penitently and resoluedly to bee reformed if Hee recover and yet His sorrow of minde but such onely as the terrours of an awaked guilty conscience produce and His resolution to cast away His sinnes onely such as a man hath in a storme to cast away His goods not because hee doth not love them but because hee feareth to loose his life if hee part not with them Or a meere civill Man or formall Professour may upon His Bed of death bee very confident and seeme to bee full of comfort and yet that confidence no other then the strong imaginary ioyfull conceit of a covetous man grasping a great deale of gold in his dreame but when Hee awaketh behold his hands are empty For a more full and cleare apprehension of my meaning and iudgement in the Point let us take a survay of the different and severall kinds of death which ordinarily befall the Godly and the wicked The death of Gods Children are divers 1. Some of their holy and zealous lives doe determine and expire sweetly fairely and gloriously even like a cleare Sunne in a Summers evening without any storme or cloud of temptation and discomfort The darkesome and painefull passages and pangs of death are illightened and sweetned with the shining beames of Gods glorious presence and fast embracement of Iesus Christ in the armes of their Faith So that to them the very ioyes of Heaven and exultations of everlasting rest mingle themselues with those last agonies and expirations of death Their heads are as it were crowned with immortality and endlesse peace upon their beds of death Luther that blessed Man of God died sweetly and triumphantly over Hell the Pope and the Divell My heavenly Father said Hee at his death eternall and mercifull God thou hast manifested unto me thy deare Son our Lord Iesus Christ. I have taught him I have knowne him I love him as my life my health and my redemption whom the wicked have persecâ—â—ed maligned and with iniury afflicted Draw my Soule to Thee After this Hee said as insued thrice I commend my spirit into thine hands thou hast redeemed mee O God of truth God so loved the world that hee gave his onely Sonne that all that beleeve in Him should have life everlasting Ioh. 3. Heare how another blessed Saint of God ended his dayes Having the day before hee died continued his meditation and exposition vpon Rom. 8. for the space of two houres or more on the sudden Hee said O stay your reading What brightnesse is this I see Have you light up any candles To which I answered No It is the Sun-shine for it was about five a clocke in a cleare Summers evening Sun-shine saith Hee nay my Saviour-shine Now farewell world welcome heaven The Day-starre from on high hath visited my heart O speake it when I am gone and preach it at my Funerall God dealeth familiarly with man I feele his mercy I see his Maiesty whether in the body or out of the body I cannot tell God hee knoweth but I see things that are un-utterable So ravished in spirit Hee roamed toward heaven with a chearefull looke and soft sweete voyce but what Hee said wee could not conceive With the Sunne in the morning following raising himselfe as Iacob did upon his staffe hee shut up his blessed life with these blessed words O what an happy change shall I make From night to day From darkenesse to light From death to life From sorrow to solace From a factious world to an heavenly beeing O my deare brethren sisters and friends It pittieth mee to leave you behind yet remember my death when I am gone and what I now feele I hope you shall finde ere you die that God doth and will deale familiarly with men And now thou fiery Chariot that came downe to feth up Eliah carry mee to my happy Hold And all yee blessed Angels who attended the Soule of Lazarus to bring it up to heaven beare mee O beare mee into the bosome of my Best beloved Amen Amen come Lord Iesus come quickly And so hee fell asleepe That this is true the reporter and By-stander that ancient learned reverend Minister of God Master Leygh addeth I say the truth my Brethren I lie not my conscience bearing mee witnesse in the holy Ghost c. 2. Others may end their dayes very uncomfortably in ravings impatiencies and other strange behaviours Nay the fiery distempers of their hot diseases may sometimes even in the Saints of God produce furlous carriages fearefull distractions and some despairefull speeches But these being the naturall effects and issues of melancholike excesses Phrensies and burning Fevers are sins of infirmity in sanctified men For which if they come againe to themselves they actually repent if not they are all undoubtedly by a generall habituall repentance and Gods gratious acceptation thereof pardoned by the Passion of Christ and buried for ever in his bloody death That last and unreversable doome at the dreadfull Tribunall of the ever-living God must passe upon us not according to the violent and unvoluntary distempers at our last houre but according to the former Passages of our life the sinfull or sanctified expense of the daies of health Heare that other great Artist in the Mysterie of dealing with trouble consciences The common opinion is that if a man die quietly and goe away like a Lambe which in some diseases as consumptions and such like any Man may doe then hee goes straight to heaven but if the violence of the disease stirre up impatience and cause franticke behaviours then men use to say there is a judgement of God serving either to discover an Hypocrite or to plague a wicked man But the truth is otherwise For indeede a man may die like a lambe and yet goe to Hell and one dying in exceeding torments and strange behauiours of the body may goe to heaven 3. The death of some others is mixt to wit of fearefull tempestuous stormes and almost if not altogether despairefull agonies in the beginning of their last sicknesse and a faire refreshing glorious calme and ioyfull triumphs over temptations and feare towards the conclusion of their life For some secret end and holy purpose seeming good to his heavenly wisedome God suffers sometimes even his dearest servants to taste as it were of the fire of Hell and for a while to feele in their consciences those damned flames as a preparative to drinke more sweetly of the Well of life and Rivers of endlesse pleasures So himselfe is most honoured by helping when all hope is past The heart of his Child more ravisht with the first sight of those un-utterable joyes beeing suddenly rais'd to the height of happinesse from the depth of horrour The enemies to the narrow way dasht and confounded by observing his deliverance whom out of prophane blindnesse they deemed an Hypocrite Godly Christians gratiously reviv'd when they see That tho the Lord hide His face from his Childe for a moment yet
in that sweetest well-spring of life and immortality then enjoy the riches pleasures and glory of the whole World everlastingly For a bitter-sweet taste of which for an ynch of time Hee villanously trampleth under-foote as it were that blessed blood by wilfully cleaving to His owne wayes and furious following the swinge of His owne sensuall heart even against the check and contradiction of His grumbling conscience 3. Of the most blissefull presence freedome and communication of the Holy Ghost and all those divine illuminations spirituall feastings sudden and secret glimpses and glances of heavenly light sweeter then sweetnesse it selfe wherewith that good Spirit is woont to visit and refresh the humbled hearts of holy men 4. Of the fatherly providence and protection of the blessed Trinity the glorious guard of Angels the comfortable communion with the people of God and all the happy consequents of safety deliverance and delight that floweth thence 5. Of the unknowne pleasures of an appeased conscience a Iewell of dearest price to which all humane glory is but dust in the balance Not the most exquisite extraction of all manner of Musicke Sets or Consorts vocall or Instrumentall can possibly conveigh so delicious a touch and taste to the outward eare of a Man as the sound and sense of a Certificate brought from the Throne of mercy by the blessed Spirit seal'd with Christs blood to the eare of the Soule even amidst the most desperate confusions in the evill Day when Comfort will bee worth a World and a good Conscience ten thousand earthly Crownes 6. Of all true contentment in this life of all Christian right and religious interest to any of the Creatures For never was any sound ioy or sanctified enjoyment of any thing in the world found in that Mans heart which gives allowance to any lust or lyes delightfully in any sinne 7. Of an immortall Crowne the un-speakeable ioyes of Heaven that immeasurable and endlesse comfort which there shall be fully and for ever enioyed with all the children of God Patriarkes Prophets Apostles Martyrs Christian friends yea with the Lord Himselfe and all His Angels with Christ our Saviour that Lambe slaine for us the Prince of glory the glory of Heaven and Earth the brightnesse of the everlasting Light c. In a word of all those inexplicable nay unconceiveable excellencies pleasures perfections felicities sweetnesses beauties glories eternities above 2. It doth every houre expose Him to all those evils which a Man destitute of grace divine may commit and unprotected from above endure It brings all plagues 1. Internall Blindnesse of minde Hardnesse of heart deadnesse of affection searednesse of conscience a reprobate sense strong delusions the spirit of slumber slavery to lust estrangednesse from God bondage under the Divell desperate thoughts horrour of heart confusion of spirit c. And spirituall mischiefes in this kind moe and more dreadfull then either Tongue can tell or heart can thinke Least of which is farre worse then all the plagues of Egypt 2. Externall See Deut. 28.15 c. 3. Eternall See my Sermon of the foure last things 3. By it 's pestilent damning Property and poyson it turnes Heaven into Hell Angels into Divels Life into death Light into darknesse sight into blindnesse Faith into distrust hope into despaire Loue into hate humility into pride mercy into cruelty security into feare liberty into bondage health into sicknesse plenty into scarcenesse a Garden of Eden into a desolate Wildernesse a fruitfull Land into barrennesse Peace into war quietnesse into contention Obedience into rebellion Order into confusion vertues into vices blessings into curses c. In a word all kind of temporall and eternall felicities and blisse into all kinds of miseries and woe 7. What heart except it bee all Adamant and turn'd into a Rocke of flint but possessing it selfe with feeling thoughts and a sensible apprehension of the incomprehensible greatnesse excellency and dreadfulnesse of the mighty Lord of Heaven and Earth would not tremble and bee strangely confounded to transgresse and breake any one branch of His blessed Lawes especially purposely and with pleasure or to sinne against Him willingly but in the least ungodly thought For alas Who art thou that liftest up thy proud heart or whettest thy prophane tongue or bendest thy rebellious course against such a Majesty Thou art the vilest wretch that ever God made next unto the Divell and His damned Angels A base and an unworthy Worme of the Earth not worthy to licke the dust that lyeth under His feete A most weake and fraile creature Earth ashes or any thing that is naught the dreame of a shadow the very Picture of change worse then vanity lesse then nothing Who when thy breath is gone which may fall out many times in a moment thou turnest into dust nay rottennesse and filth much more loathsome then the Dung of the Earth and all thy thoughts perish But now on the other side if thou cast thine eyes seriously and with intention upon that thrice glorious and highest Majesty the eyes of whose glory thou so provokest with thy filth and folly thou mayest most justly upon the commission of every sinne cry out with the Prophet O Heavens bee astonished at this bee afraid and utterly confounded Nay thou mightest marvaile and it is Gods unspeakeable mercy that the whole frame of Heauen and Earth is not for one sinne fearefully finally dissolued and brought to nought For He against whom thou sinnest inhabiteth eternity and unapprochable light The Heauen is His Throne and the earth his footstoole Hee is the euerlasting God mighty and terrible the Creatour of the ends of the earth â—c The infinite splendour of his glory and maiesty so dazles the eyes of the most glorious Seraphims that they are glad to adore Him with couered faces The Diuell and all the damned spirits those stubborne Feinds tremble at the terrour of His countenance All the Nations before Him are but as the drop of a bucket but as the small dust of the balance nay they are nothing to Him saith the Prophet yea lesse then nothing Hee fitteth upon the circle of the earth and the inhabitants thereof are as grashoppers The Iudges and Princes when Hee blowes upon them are but as stubble before the Whirle-winde And Hee taketh vp the Iles as a very litle thing At His rebuke the Pillars of Heauen doe shake the Earth trembleth and the foundations of the hills are mooued His presence melts the mountaines His voice teares the Rocks in pieces The blast of the breath of His nostrils discouers the chanells of waters and foundations of the world when Hee is angry His Arrowes drinke bloud His sword deuoures flesh and the fire of his wrath burnes unto the lowest Hell The Heauen is but His span The Sea His handfull The wings of the wind His walke His garments are light His Pauilion darknes His way in the whirlewind and in the storme and
contentment in this vale of teares and a piece as it were of everlasting pleasures 5. In times of triall Thou seest sometimes a Father setting downe his little One upon it's feet to trie it's strength and whether it bee yet able to stand by it selfe or no But withall hee holds his armes on both sides to uphold it if he see it incline either way and to preserve it from hurt Assure thy selfe thy heavenly Father takes care of thee with infinitely more tendernesse in all thy trials either by outward Afflictions or inward temptations The thou shouldest fall yet shalt thou not bee utterly cast downe for the Lord upholdeth thee with his hand Psal. 37.24 Never did Gold-smith attend so curiously and punctually upon those pretious mettalls hee casts into the fire to observe the very first season and bee sure that they tarry no longer in the furnace then the drosse bâ—â— wasted they thorowly purified and fitted for some excellent use as our gratious God lovingly waits to take thee out of trouble and temptation when the rust 〈◊〉 removed from thy spirituall armour thy graces shiâ—â— out and thou heartily humbled and happily fitted to doe him more glorious service for the time to come I meane when hee hath attained the end which hee mercifully intended in love and for thy good 6. In conceits of our unworthinesse David commanded Ioab and the other Captaines to entreat the young man Absolom gently for his sake 2. Sam. 18.5 A rebellious traiterous Sonne up in armes against his owne Father gracelesly and unnaturally thirsting out of a furious ambitious humour to wâ—ing the Regall Scepter out of his hand and to set the Imperiall Crowne upon his owne head How dearely and tenderly then will the Father of mercies deale with a poore humbled soule that sighes and seekes for his favour infinitely more then any earthly treasure or the glory of a thousand worlds 7. I will suppose thou hast broke some speciall vow which were a grievous thing made before the Sacrament upon some day of humiliation or such other occasion and so forfeited thy selfe as it were and thy soule into the hands of Gods justice to bee disposed of to the dungeon of utter darkenesse if thou weâ—t served as thy sinne hath deserved And thereupon thou art much afflicted and sore troubled in minde to have suffered thy selfe to be so sottishly ensnared againe in such a dis-avowed sin against so strong a purpose But here consider whether thou being a Father would'st take the forfeiture of a bond and advantage of breaking day especially full sore against his will from thy dearest Childe intreating thee to intreat him kindely Much nay infinitely lesse will thy heavenly Father deale hardly with thee in such a Case if thou complaine at the Throne of Grace with a grieved spirit renew thy covenant and tell him truly that thou wilt by the help of the holy Ghost guard thy heart with a narrower watch and stronger resolution for the time to come If wee confesse our sinnes hee is faithfull and iust to forgive us our sinnes 1. Iohn 1.9 And in such a Case wee have ever a blessed Advocate with the Father Iesus Christ the righteous Cap. 2.1 8. A Father sometimes holds his Child over a Pond River or Well to fright him from it lest at some time or other he fall into it But the Child especially if of riper conceit and wiser thoughts laughes perhaps in the Fathers face dreads no danger dreames not of drowning And what 's the reason thinke yee Only because hee knowes hee that holds him is his Father So thy heavenly Father holdes thee as it were over Hell in some strong temptation upon purpose to terrifie thee from tampering so much with the Divels baites so that thou sees nothing about thee for the present but darknesse and discomforts the very horrors of eternall death ready to take hold on thee yet for all this upon the ground of this loving gracious resemblance thou maist be comforted and cry confidently with Iob Tho he slay me yet will I trust in him With David Tho I walke through the valley of the shadow of death I will feare no evill Who is among you saith the Prophet that feareth the Lord that obeyeth the voice of his servant that walketh in darkenesse and hath no light Let him trust in the Name of the Lord and stay upon his God 9. A Son by the seducement of some dissolute and drunken Belials is drawne into lewd and licentious company and so plunges presently over head and eares into pestilent courses Falls unhappily to swaggering drinking gaming the mirth and madnesse of wine and pleasures And at length to expresse to the life an exact conformity to that compleat character of the professours of Good-fellowship as they call it and Epicurisme both for pursuite of sensuall delights and persecution of true professours Wisd. 2.6 c. 12 c. Whereby he wasts his Patrimony cuts the heart of his Parents wounds his conscience c. His Father mournes and grieves consults and casts about with all love and longing for his recovery and returne At length out of sense and conscience of his base and debosht behaviour vile company dishonouring God banishing good motions c. Hee comes to himselfe intreats his father upon his knees with many teares that hee would bee pleased to pardon what is past receive him into favour againe and hee will faithfully endeavour to displease him no more but redeeme the losse of the former with the improovement of the time to come How willingly and welcomely thinke you would such a Father receive such a son into the bosome of his fatherly affection and armes of dearest embracement And yet so and infinitely more is our heavenly Father mercifull and melting towards any of his relapsed children returning unto his gracious Throne with true remorse and hearty griefe for so going astray Which is an incomparable comfort in case of backe-sliding which yet God forbid 10. A Father indeede will lay heavier burdens upon his son now growne into yeares and strength and puts him to sorer labour and harder taskes But while hee is very young hee is woont to forbeare him with much tendernesse and compassion because he knowes hee is scarce able to carry himselfe out of the mire Even so but with infinite more affectionatenesse and care watchfullnesse and love doth our heavenly Father beare in his armes and forbeare a Babe in Christ. See Isai. 40.11 This may bee a very sweet and pretious cordiall to weake consciences ar their first conversion Who when they cast their eie upon the hainousnesse and number of their sinnes the fiery and furious darts of the Divell the frownes and angry foreheads of their carnall friends the worlds lowring and enmity the rebelliousnesse and untowardnesse of their own hearts pressing upon them all at once and so considering that refraining from evill they make themselves a prey are ready to sinke and faint and feare
fullnesse and constant fruition is reserved for the next life Here wee are trained as it were in a spirituall warfare against the World the Flesh and the Divell wee are exercised unto New-obedience by manifold crosses troubles and temptations Satan is sometimes set upon us to afflict us with His owne immediate Hellish suggestions Sometimes our owne sinnes grievously affright us with renewed representations of horrour Sometimes our owne God frownes upon us Himselfe with His displeased and angry countenance and in love leaves us a while to the terrours of a spirituall desertion Hee sometimes laies His visiting 〈◊〉 upon our Bodies and casteth us downe 〈…〉 of sicknesse Sometimes Hee sends heavy crosses upon our outward States and breakes the Staffe of our prosperity Continually almost Hee suffers many malicious Currs to barke at us with slanders lies disgracefull imputations and all the enemies of grace to pursue us bitterly with much malice and disdaine Thus are wee trained and entertained in this world Our Crowning comes in the World to come Ninthly To cause thee to have recourse with more reverence thirst and thankfull acknowledgement to the Well-head of refreshings if God once withdraw the light of His countenance and comfortable quickning of His Spirit wee shall find no comfort at all in any Creature no life in the Ordinances no feeling of our spirituall life and therefore wee must needs to the ever-springing Fountaine of All-sufficiency c. Which blessed ends and effects when the good hand of our God hath wrought Hee will as certainly returne as ever the Sunne did after the darkest Mid-night and that with abundance of glory and sweetnesse proportionable to the former dejection and darknesse of our spirits The lowest ebbe of a spirituall desertion brings the highest tide of spirituall exultation As wee may see before in Mistris Brettergh and Master Peacocke pag. 84. 2. What is the reason thou art so sad and sore afflicted for the absence of thy Beloved and with want of the woonted gracious and comfortable workings of the Spirit It is because Thou hast formerly grasped the Lord Iesus sweetly and savingly in the armes of thy Soule been sensibly refreshed with the savour of His good ointments ravished extraordinarily with the beauty of His Person dearenesse of His blood riches of His purchase and glory of his kingdome And hast heretofore holden Him as the very life of thy Soule and chiefest and onely treasure ejaculating with David unfainedly from the heart-roote Whom have I in Heaven but Thee And there is none upon Earth that I desire besides Thee Earth is an Hell and Heaven no Heaven without Iesus Christ I say the present griefe that thy well-beloved is now gone argues evidently this former enjoyment of His gracious presence And then build upon 't as upon the surest Rocke Once Christs and His for ever The gifts and calling of God are without repentance Whom Hee loveth once Hee loveth unto the end Hee is no changeling in his love I am the Lord faith Hee I change not therefore yee sonnes of Iacob are not consumed Once elected ever beloved Once New-borne and borne to eternity If once the sanctifying Spirit hath seizd upon Thee for Iesus Christ thou art made sure and lockt fast for ever in the armes of his love with everlasting barres of mercy and might from any mortall hurt and adversary power Thou maist then cast downe the gauntlet of defiance against the Devill and the whole world and take up with Paul that victorious chalenge unto all created things I am perswaded that neither death nor life nor Angels nor Principalities nor powers nor things present nor things to come nor height nor depth nor any other Creature shall bee able to separate mee from the love of God which is in Christ Iesus our Lord Hee may hide His face from Thee for a while but thou hast His owne sure and inviolable Word from His owne mouth That Hee will returne and with everlasting kindnesse have mercy on thee Hee may frowne upon Thee I confesse for a season and so fright thee with his terrours as tho in thy present apprehension thou wert a lost Man But Hee never will Hee cannot possibly forsake thee finally I have sworne once by my holinesse that I will not faile David Psal. 89.35 And in the meane time thy former feelings of the motions of the Spirit and grace doe give cleare evidence and assurance that spirituall life is still resident in thy Soule tho runne as it were into the roote and tho it 's more lively operations and effects bee suspended for a time The Woman that hath once felt the Child stir in Her wombe is most assured that shee is with-Child that an immortall Soule and naturall life is infused into it by the omnipotent hand of God though at other times shee perceive no motion at all It is so in the present Point And thy grieving also groaning and panting after Christ is an unanswerable argument that thou art alive spiritually Lay the waight of the whole world upon a man that is starke dead and Hee can neither stirre cry or complaine 3. Consider that some graces are more substantiall in themselves more profitable to us and of greater necessitie for salvation as Faith repentance love New-obedience active and passive Selfe-deniall vilenesse in our owne eyes humble walking with God c. Others are not so or absolutely necessary but accompany a saving state as separable accidents as ioy and peace in believing sensible comfort in the holy Ghost comfortable feelings of Gods favour rejoycing in hope a lively freedome in prayer assurance of evidence c. And from hence mayest thou take comfort in two respects First Desertion deprives thee only of these comfortable accessarâ—es but thou art still possest of the Principall and substantialls of salvation Of which not the utmost concurrence of all hellish and earthly rage can possibly rob thee And therefore thou art well enough in the meane time and as safe as safety it selfe can make thee 2. Secondly Losse of these lesse principall graces which by accident is a singular advantage and gaine drives thee nearer unto Iesus Christ at least by many unutterable groanes every one whereof is a strong cry in the eares of God and causeth thee better to prise and plie to exercise and improove more fruitfully those other more necessary graces without which thou canst not bee saved It is a wise and honest passage in Mistris Iuxons Monument pag 60. Shee continued faithfull to the ende in the most substantiall graces For howsoever shee mourned for the want of that degree of ioy which shee had felt in former times yet she continued in repentance in the practise of holinesse and righteousnesse in a tender love of God and to his Word and Children in holy zeale and fruitfulnesse even to the last period of her daies And indeede her want of full ioy was so
with the wrath of God and left to the horrour of some hideous temptation 4. Heare Master Hooker a man of great learning and very sound in this point I varie some words but keepe the sense entire Happier a great deale is that mans Case whose soule by inward desolation is humbled then hee whose heart is through abundance of spirituall delight lifted up and exalted above measure Better is it sometimes to goe downe into the pit with him who beholding darknes and bewailing the losse of inward ioy and consolation crieth from the bottome of the lowest hell My God My God why hast thou forsaken mee Then continually to walke arme in arme with Angels to sit as it were in Abrahams bosome and to have no thought or cogitation but of peace and blessing himselfe in the singularity of assurance above other men to say I desire no other blisse but only duration of my present comfortable feelings and fruition of God I want nothing but even thrusting into heaven and the like For in the height of spirituall ravishments thou art in great hazard of being exalted above measure and so may bee justly exposed to a Thorne in the flesh the Messenger of Satan to buffet thee which is a very heavie case But now on the other side the lowest degree of humiliation under Gods mighty hand is the nearest step to rising and extraordinary exultation of spirit The extremest darknesse of a spirituall desertion is wont to go immediately before the glorious Sun-rise of heavenly light and un-utterable lightsomnes in the soule David securely pleasing and applauding himselfe in his present stability and strong conceit of the continuance of his peace brake out thus I shal never be moved Lord by thy favour thou hast made my mountaine to stand strong But hee was quickly throwne downe from the top of his supposed unmoveable hill taken off from the height of his confidence and lay trembling in the dust Thou didst hide thy face and I was troubled But now that sweetest rapture of incredible joy for so he spake The ioy which I feele in my conscience is incredible did arise in Master Peacocks heart when hee was newly come as it were out of the mouth of Hell Mistris Bretterghs wonderfull reioycing followed immediately upon her returne out of a roaring wildernesse as she called it What large effusions of the Spirit and overflowing rivers of heavenly peace were plentifully showred downe upon Robert Glovers troubled spirit after the heaviest night in all likelyhood that ever he had in this world by reason of a greivous Desertion 5. Nay heare the Spirit of all truth and comfort Himselfe immediately Who is among you that feareth the Lord that obeyeth the voyce of his servant that walketh in darkenesse and hath no light Let him trust in the Name of the Lord and stay upon his God Whence wee may draw a double comfort in time of Desertion first Because in thy present apprehension thou finds and feeles thy selfe in darkenesse and to have no light thou art ready therupon to conceive and conclude un-necessarily against thy owne soule that Gods favour Iesus Christ grace salvation and all are gone for ever And this is the most cutting sting sorest pang which grievously afflicts and rents the heart in pieces with restlesse angvish in such Cases Out of what depth of horrour doe you thinke did these heavie groanes and almost if not altogether for the time despairing speeches spring in those blessed Saints mentioned before Will the Lord cast off for ever And will hee be favourable no more Is his mercy cleane gone for ever Doth his promise faile for evermore While I suffer thy terrours I am distracted I am amazed confounded and almost mad with feare least my soule should bee swallowed up with the horrours of eternall death I am afraid lest the Lord hath utterly withdrawne his wonted favour from me Woe woe woe c. A weake a wofull a wretched a forsaken woman I have no more sense of grace then these curtaines Oh! how wofull and miserable is my estate that must thus converse with hell-hounds It is against the course of Gods proceedings to save mee c. But now herein the deserted in the sense I have said are much deceived and extremely wrong their owne soules in such extremities not considering that their walking in darkenesse and having no light may most certainely consist with a saving estate and a Beeing in Gods favour tho for the present not perceived Which appeares plainely by the quoted place Wherein Hee that walketh in darkenesse and hath no light is such an one as feareth the Lord and obeyeth the voice of his servant Now the feare of God and obedience to the Ministery are evident markes of a gracious man Hence it is that when the servants of God are something come againe unto themselves they see and censure their owne unadvisednesse in that respect disavow and disclaime all termes tending that way which they let hastily fall from them in heate of temptation And I said faith David this is my infirmity but I will remember the yeeres of the right hand of the most High Truly said Master Peacocke my heart and soule have been far led and deepely troubled with temptations and stings of conscience but I thanke God they are eased in good measure Wherefore I desire that I bee not branded with the note of a forlorne reprobate Such questions Oppositions and all tending thereto I renounce Here then is a great deale of comfort in the greatest darkenesse of a spirituall desertion for wee may assure our selves that God by his blessed Spirit hath a secret influence and saving worke upon the soule of his Child when there is no light or feeling of his favour at all The Sun we know tho hee leaves his light upon the face of the earth yet notwithstanding descends by a reall effectual influence into the bosome and darkest bowels thereof and there exerciseth a most excellent work in begetting mettals Gold Silver and other pretious things It is proportionably so in the present Point A poore soule may lie groveling in the dust afflicted tossed with tempest and in present apprehension have no comfort and yet blessedly partake still of the sweet influence of Gods everlasting love of a secret saving worke of grace and almighty support of the sanctifying Spirit Let us looke upon the Lord Iesus himselfe His holy soule though hee was Lord of Heaven and Earth upon the Crosse was even as a scorched heath-ground without so much as any drop of deaw of comfort either from Heaven or Earth and yet at the same time hee was gloriously sustained by an omnipotent influence And God was never nearer unto Him than then neither Hee ever so obedient unto God And I make no doubt but that the judicious eye of the well-experienced Physition may many times easily observe it in those troubled tempted and deserted soules which they
coelo errare constat qui putant omnes eos servatos esse qui moribundi Deum invocant Ex hoc enim loco satis liquet multos quibus in ore est Domine miserere nostri ad inferos descendere Ergo dicet aliquis quo modo constat promissionis illius veritas salvum fore qui Dei nomen invocaverit Ioel 2. Resp. Illud de ijs intelligitur qui Deum verè synecrè invocant 1. Fide quod isti nequeunt qui fidem non habent sapiusculè quid sit nesciunt 2. Cum affectu Deum glorificandi Isti verò in clamoribus suis propriam solummodò respiciunt salutem 3. Diâ—cedendo ab iniquitate 2. Tim. 2.19 Quod isti non faciunt Cartw. in Locum * Non est â—ecâ—atum quarere Deum in calamitatibus ab eo opeus auxilium petere imò mandatuÌ„ divinuÌ„ est ut in aerumnis periculis ad DeuÌ„ consugâ—amus sicut dicitur Invoca me in die tribulationis Psal 50. Sed tantum petere ut sensus mali tollatur ut nos molestijs periculis eximamur atque intereà perseverare in peccandi proposito id verò est irridere Deum atque iram ipsius provocare Moller in Locum f O quà m multi saith a reverend Father cum hac spe ad aeternos labores bella descendunt g Greeneham in His grave Counsell and godly Observation Pag. 9. Non potest male mori qui benè vixerit Prorsùs consirmo audeo dicere credidi propter quod loquutus sum Non potest male mori qui bene vixerit August lib. de Disciplina Christ. cap. 2. h Decimo septimo Februarij die Lutherus coepit aegrotare gravitis ex pectore quanquam erat imbecillior prandit tamen cum filijs familiaribus suâ—â— atque coenavit Inter coenandum argumentis assèruit sore ut in alterâ vitâ illâ beatâ alter alierum recognoscat Post caenam sumpto unicornu ex vino pro medicamento ad quietem se componens salutatis amicis qui aderant Orate inquit Deum ut Evangelij doctrinam nobis conservet Pontisex enim Concilium Tridentinum dira moliuntur Haec ubi dixit facto silentio dormit aliquamdiu sed urgente vi morbi post mediam noctem excitatus queritur de pectoris angustiâ praesenticus iam instare sinem his verbis Deum ardenter invocat Pater mi coelestis Deus Pater Domini Iesu Christi Deus omnis consolationis ago tibi gratias quòd filium tuum Iesum Christum mihi revelâsti cui credidi quem sum professus quem amavi quem celebravi quem Pontifex Romanus reliqua impiorum turba persequitur afficit contumeliâ Rogo te mi Domine Iesu Christe suscipe animulam meam Mi Pater coelestis etiamsi divellor ex hac vit á licèt corpus hoc mihi sit iam deponendum certò tamen scio me tecum esse permansurum in sempiternum neque possè me tuis ex manibus à quoquam avelli Non multò post eam precationem ubi spiritum suum in manus Dei semel iterùm commendâsset tanquam dormiturus paulatimâ— vitâ decedit nullo cum corporis qui quidem animad verti posset cruciatu Osiand Hist. Eccles. Cent. 16. Lib. 1. cap. 56. i Acts and Monum vol. 2. pag. 994. I no more weigh Cochlaeus his cursed lyes to the contrary or of any his fellow stigmaticall Knights of the Post as Bolsec c. then I would doe the barking of a Dog the braying of an Asse or bellowing of a Divell k Master Iohn Holland a faithfull Minister of Gods Word l In His Sermon intituled The Soules Solace against sorrow pag 17. c. o Perkins in his Salve for a sicke Man m Of one Reprobate that dyes in this despaire and torment of conscience there bee millions that dye in presumption of mercy without sense of sinne or punishment The reason whereof is because Satan who knowes Hee hath time little enough in this life to draw men to sinne and long enough after this life to torment them for it doth therefore ordinarily reserue the tormenting of sinners to the Day of iudgement and till they be in Hell left if Hee shuld deale so roughly with all sinners in this world they might being so pincht with terrours seeke after the meanes of salvation as did the Iayloâ—r and the â—ewes Act. 16.30 and 2.37 c. Chibald Triall of Faith lib. 1. cap. 5. p. 70. n Wee should never bee in such a forlorne condition wherein there should bee ground of despaire considering our sinnes bee the sinnes of Man His mercy the mercy of an infinite God Doctor Sibbes Brused Reede Preface to the Reader o Out of the cursed Nurcery of such sorts of sinners as these God doth now and then single out some and hang them up as it were in chaines as wofull Spectacles of despaiâ—e for warning to others Rom. 2.5 o In what sense despaire is the greatest sinne for it is not simply so Ever the more excellent the vertue is the more pestilent is the opposite vice Hatred of God in it selfe is a greater sinne then desperation because the Love of God is a more excellent grace then Hope See 2â— q. 2. art 3. Though Aquâ—nâ—â— His Summes bee a vast dunghill of much rotten superstitâ—oÌ„ and false Divinity yet about vertues vices lawes and other Philosophicall Points He lets â—all some Truths Desperatâ—o mâ—tor est 〈…〉 â—eâ—p ratio peior est omni peccato Bern. Perpetrare stagitium aliquod 〈…〉 est Seâ— disperara est â—escendere in infernum Isid. Iudas mag â—ex hoc offendit Dominum qâ—a se suâ—pendâ—t â—uduâ— quòd Dominum prodidit Hieron in â—sal 108. Iudam traditoâ—em 〈…〉 misit quà m indulgentiae desperatio fecit penitùs interire August deâ—â—lit Pâ—nit Quid aliud est desperare quà m Deum sibi comparare Qui 〈…〉 comparat â—inem â—mponit divine virtuli dans sinem ixfiâ—uto 〈…〉 ause â—nsâ—â—o cui nihil deest quodetiam cogitar i non potest Idem de 〈…〉 cap. 5. But doe not mistake the good Father or upon His word presume but heare what Hee addes Sunt alij inimici desperationis qui adâ—ò pâ—aesemâ—â—â— â—â— Deo confidâ—â—â— quòd quandam sibi licentiam acquirunt peccandi sine poeâ—temiâ—â—xpâ—llant ventam qui credunt quoniam Christiani sunt non posse damnari adulantes siâ—â— eà quòd scriptum est omnis quicunque invoâ—averit nomen Domini salvus eâ—it â—utanâ—enâ—â— noâ—â—cu Dominita vocare quoâ—aâ—possunt Christum credere Sacramem a Ecclesiae samere non verentes multos esse vocasos sed paucos electos Ibid. cap. 6. q Indeed sometimes and most commonly conscience in many is secure at the time of death God in his justice plaguing an affected security in this life with an inflicted security at death And the Lord seemes to say as once to the Prophet Goe
of voluptuousnesse shalt most certainely very shortly lie upon thy Bed of death like a wilde bull in a net full of the fury of the Lord either sealing thee up finally in the desperate senselessenesse of thine owne dead heart with the spirit of slumber for everlasting vengeance even at the doore or else exemplarily enraging thy guilty conscience upon that thy last bed with hellish horrour even before hand For ordinarily the more notorious servants of Satan and Slaves of lust depart this life either like Nabal or Iudas Tho more by many thousands die like hard-hearted sots in security then in despaire of conscience If it bee so with thee then that thine heart when thou shalt have received the sentence of death against thy selfe die within thee as Naballs And most commonly saith a worthy Devine Conscience in many is secure at the time of death God in his iustice so plaguing an affected security in life with an inflicted security at death I say then thou wilt become as a stone most prodigiously blockish as tho there were no immortalitie of the Soule no losse of eternall blisse no Tribunall in Heaven no account to bee made after this life no burning in Hell for ever Which will make the never-dying fire more scorching and the ever-living worme more stinging by how much thou wast more senselesse and fearelesse of that fiery lake into which thou wast ready to fall Death it selfe saith the same Man cannot awaken some consciences but no sooner come they into hell but conscience is awakened to the full never to sleepe more and then she teareth with implacable fury and teacheth forlorne wretches to know that forbearance was no payment But if it please God to take the other course with thee and to let loose the cord of thy conscience upon thy dying Bed thou wilt be strangled even with Hellish horrour upon earth and damned above ground That Worme of Hell which is a continuall remorse and furious reflexion of the Soule upon its owne willfull folly whereby it hath lost everlasting ioyes and must now lie in endlesse easelesse and remedilesse torments is set on worke whilest thou art yet alive and with desperate rage and unspeakeable anguish will feede upon thy Soule and flesh The least twitch whereof not all the pleasures of ten thousand Worlds would ever bee able to countervaile For as the peace of a good so the pangs of a guilty conscience are unspeakable So that at that time thou maist iustly take unto thy selfe Pashur's terrible name Magor-Missabib Feare round about Thou wilt be a terrour to thy selfe and to all thy friends And that which in this wofull case will sting extremely No friends nor Physicke no gould nor silver no height of place nor favour of Prince not the glory and pleasures of the whole World not the crownes and command of all earthly kingdomes c. can possibly give any comfort deliverance or ease For when that time and terrour hath overtaken thee which is threatned Prou. 1.24 Et seq Because I have called and yee refused I have stretched out my hand and no man regarded But yee have set aâ— naught all my counsell and would none of my reproofe I also will laugh at your calamity and will mocke when your feare commeth When your feare commeth as desolation and your destruction commeth as a Whirlewinde when distresse and anguish commeth upon you Then shall they call upon Me but I will not answere they shall seeke mee earely but they shall not finde mee for that they hated knowledge and did not chuse the feare of the Lord. They would none of my counsell they despised all my reproofe Therefore shall they eate the fruitâ— of their owne way and be filled with their owne devises I say when this terrible time is come upon thee then will the mighty Lord of Heaven and earth come against thee as a Beare that is bereaved of her whelpes and will rent the caule of thy heart and will devoure thee like a Lion He will come with fire and with His charets like a Whirle-winde to render His anger with fury and His rebuke with flames of fire All his terrours at that houre will fight against Thee and that unâ—quenchable anger that burnes to the very bottome of Hell and sets on fire the foundations of the mountaines The empoysoned arrowes of His fiercest indignation shall be drunke with the bloud of thy Soule and sticke fast in it for ever In a word the fearefull armies of all the plagues and curses sorrowes and un-sufferable paines denounc'd in Gods Booke against finall Impenitents shall with un-resistable violence take hold upon thee at once and pursue thee with that fury which thou shalt never bee able either to avoide or abide And who is able to stand before this holy Lord God who can abide in His sight when He is angry who can deliver out of His hand what man or Angell what arme of flesh or force of Armes what creature or created power what Cherub or which of the Seraphins is able to free a guilty conscience from the ever-knawing Worme and an impenitent wretch from eternal flames Oh Me thinkes a sensible fore-thought of these horrible things even at hand should make the hardest heart of the most abominable Behall to tremble at the roote and fall asunder in His brest like drops of water To haue his end in his eye and seriously to remember the tribulation and anguish that shall shortly come upon His Soule the affliction the Worme wood and the gall should fright and fire Him out of all His filthy gracelesse good-fellow courses 3. Thirdly Let them consider what horrour it will bee in evill times I meane not onely at death and the last Day which are the most terrible of all but also In times of disgrace and contempt of common feare and confusions of the state of sickenesse crosses restraint banishment temptations or any other dayes of sorrow I say at such times to finde in stead of peace fiery scorpions in their consciences innumerable sins graven there with an iron pen un-repented of Heare how excellently Austin foretels forewarnes them into what a forlorne and fearefull state they shall most certainely fall when after a short gleame of worldly glory they fall into tempestuous and troublesome times Of all afflictions incident to the Soule of man there is none more grievous and transcendent then to have the Conscience enraged with the guilt of sinne If there bee no wound there if all bee safe and sound within if that bird of the bosome sing sweetely in a Mâ—â—s brest it is no matter what miseries be abroad in the World what stormes or 〈◊〉 be raised against Him What arme of flesh or rage of foes beset Him rouâ—d For Hee in this are hath presently recourse unto His conscience the safest Sanctuary and Paradise of sweetest repose and finding that sprinkled with the bloud of the Lambe filled with abundance of peace
with the Divels painting and false luster carries away captive all carnall men and detaines in a Fooles-Paradise indeed an hellish prison a world of deluded Ones Yet those few illightened Soules whose eyes have been happily opened by spirituâ—ll Eye-salve to turne from darkenesse to light and from the power of Satan unto God behold a double deformity and ouglines in so foule a monster deceitfully dressâ—d in the Divels counterfeite colours and guilded over garishly in His personated Angelical glory 3. It is most filthy Farre filthier then the most stinking confluence of all the most filthy fulsome nasty loathsome things in the world And it must needs bee so For whatsoever a Man can conceive to bee most contrary distant and opposite to the infinite clearenes purity sweetnesse beauty and goodnesse of God all that and much more is sinne in the highest degree Hence it is that in the Scriptures it is compared to the filthiest myre in which a Sow will lie downe to coole and cover her selfe To the loathsome vomite not of a man but of a Dog To the unsavoury poysonfull dampe which rotten Carkases exhale out of opened graves To menstruous filth To the dirt under the nailes or the stinking sweat of the Body or the putrified matter of some pestilent ulcer To the very excrements which Nature having severed froÌ„ the purer part of the meate thrusts out of the stomack casts into the draught To the filthinesse pollutions and impurities of the world so called by a singularity for sin is the transcendent filth of the world To all the uncleannesses for which the Purifications cleansings washings and sprinklings were appointed in the Leviticall Law To abomination it selfe c. Nay and yet further which makes for the further detestation of sinne Whereas all outward filth defiles onely the Body this of sinne by the strength and contagion of it's insinuating poyson soakes thorow the flesh and the bone and enters and eates into the very minde and conscience Tit. 1.15 defiles the pure and immortall Soule of Man How long might wee cast dirt into the Aire before wee were able to infect the bright shining beames of the Sunne Yet so filthy is sinne that at once with a touch it infects the Soule a clearer and purer essence then it and that with such a crimsin and double-â—â—ed staine that the Flood of Noah when all the World was water could not wash it off Neither at that last and dreadfull Day when this great Vniversall shall bee turned into a Ball of fire for the purifying and renewing of the Heaven and the Earth yet shall it have no power to purge or cleanse the least sinne out of the impenitent Soule Nay the fire of Hell which burnes night and day even thorow all eternity shall never bee able to raze it out 4 It is most infectious Spits venome on all sides farre and wide corrupts every thing it comes neare By reason whereof it is fitly resembled to Leaven to a Gangreene to the Leprosie which filthy disease quickly over spreads the whole Body Numb 12.10 Infects the clothes the very Walles of the House Levit. 14.37 c. Posterity 2 King 5.27 The first sinne that eveâ— the Sunne saw was so pregnant with Soule-killing poyson that it hath already damnably polluted all the Sonnes and Daughters of Adam that were ever since and will still by the un-resistable strength of the same contagion empoysâ—n all their natures to the Worlds end Nay at the very first breaking out it suddenly blasted as it were both Heaven and Earth And so stained the beauty of the one the brightnesse of the other and the originall orient newly burnisht glory of the whole Creation that from that houre it hath groaned under the burden of that vanity and deformity to which this first sinne hath made it subject and will travaile in paine under the bondage of the same corruption untill it bee purged by fire in the great Day of the Lord. It but one sinne bee doted upon delightfully and impenitently like a lumpe of Leaven it soures all the Soule defiles the whole Man and every thing that proceeds from Him His thoughts desires affections words actions and that of all sorts naturall civill recreative religious It doth not onely unhallow his meate drinke carriage His buying selling giving lending and all His other dealings in the world even His plowing The plowing of the wicked is sinne Prov. 21.4 But also turnes all his spirituall services and divinest duties His prayer hearing reading receiving the Sacrament c. into abomination If but one raging corruption in a Minister Magistrate Master of a Family as lying swearing filthy-talking scoffing at Religion opposition to godlinesse Sabbath-breaking an humour of Good-fellowship or the like represent it selfe to the eye of the World in His ordinary carriage and hang out as a rotten fruite in the sight of the Sunne it is woont fearefully to infect or offend by a contagious insinuation and ill example all about Him to diffuse it's venome to His Family amongst His Sonnes and Servants over the Parish where Hee lives all companies where hee comes the whole Country round about especially if Hee bee a Man of eminency and Place 5. It is extremely ill A farre greater ill then the eternall damnation of a Man For when Hee hath Ilen many millions of yeeres in the Lake of fire and under the dominion of the second death He is never the nearer to satisfaction for sinne Not all those Hellish â—lames thorow all eternitie can possibly expiate the staine or extingvish the sting of the least sinne Nay the very destruction of all the creatures in the world of Men and Angels Heaven and Earth is a great deale lesse ill then to offend God with the least transgression of His lawes For all the creatures of ten thousand worlds were they all extant come infinitely short in excellency of worth of the Hearts-blood of Iesus Christ. And yet without the effusion of it no sinne could ever have been pardoned nor any Soule saved A man would thinke it a lesser ill to tell a lie then to lie in Hell But heare Chrysostome Altho many thinke Hell to bee the supreame and sorest of all evils yet I thinke thus and thus wil I daily preach That it is farre bitterer and more grievous to offend Christ then to bee tormented with the paines of Hell 6. It is full of most fearefull effects 1. It deprives every Impenitent 1. Of the fauour and love of God the onely Fountaine of all comfort peace and happinesse which is incomparably the most invalue-able losse that can be imagined 2. Of his portion in Christs blood of which tho the drops waight and quantity bee numbred finite and measurable yet the Person that shed it hath stampt upon it such height of price excellency of merit un-value-ablenes of worth that hee had infinitely better have his portion
is the care of those Ministers which divide Gods Word aright say our great Divines of Great Britaine first fitly and wisely to wound the Consciences of their hearers with the terrours of the Law and after to raise them by the Promises of the Gospell c. The Spirit first terrifies those who are to bee justified with the Law breaking and humbling them with threats scourges and lashes of Conscience that thereby despairing of themselves they may flie unto Christ. Wee cannot learne out of the Gospell saith Chemmitius that wee are to bee blessed in Christ except by an anthithesis as Luther speakes we also acknowledge that wee are accursed by the Law The Doctrine of the Law saith Davenant is to be propounded to the impious and impenitent to strike terrour into their hearts and to demonstrate their just damnation except they repent and she to Iesus Christ. Perkins that great Light of our Church both for soundnesse of learnâ—ng sincerâ—ty of iudgement and insight into the Mystery of Christ teâ—ching How Repentance is wrought telâ— vs That first of all a Man must have knowledge oâ— foure things Of the Law of God Of sinne against the Law Of the guilt of sinne and of the Iudgement of God against sinne which is His eternall wrath In the second Place must follow an application of the former knowledge to a Mans selfe by the worke of the conscience assisted by the holy Ghost which for that cause is called the spirit of bondage in this manner The breaker of the Law is guilty of eternall wrath saith the Minde But I am a breaker of the Law of God saith the Conscience as a Witnesse and an Accuser Therefore I am guilty of eternall death saith the same Conscience as a Iudge Every Law shall have His part in the Lake which burneth with fire and brimstone Reuel 21.8 But I am a Liar Therefore I shall have my part in that everlasting fiery Lake And so of other sinnes Covetousnesse Cruelty Drunkennesse Whoredome Swearing Defrauding Temporizing Vsury Filthinesse Self-uncleannesse Foolish talking â—esting Ephes. 5.4 Revellings Galat. 5.21 Prophaning the Lords Day strange apparell Zeph. 1.8 And innumerable sinnes moe which beeing all severally prest upon the heart by a discourse of the guilty conscience as I have said must needs full sorely crush it with many cutting conclusions from which set on by the spirit of bondage is woont to arise much trouble of minde which saith Hee is commonly called the sting of the conscience or penitence and the compunction of heart And then succeedes seasonably and comfortably the worke of the Gospell The Soule beeing thus sensible of and groaning under the burden of all sinne is happily fitted for all the glorious revelations of the abundant riches of Gods dearest mercies for all the comforts graces and favours which shine from the face of Christ for all the expiations refreshings and exultations which spring out of that blessed Fountaine opened for sinne and for uncleannesse Never any of Gods Children saith Greeneham were comforted thorowly but they were first humbled for their Sinnes The course warranted unto us by the Scriptures saith Hieron is this First to endeavour the softning of our Hearers hearts by bringing them to the sight and sense of their owne wretchednes before we adventure to apply the riches of Gods mercy in Christ Iesus The preaching of the Gospell is coÌ„pared by our Saviour Himself unto the Sowing of seedes as therefore the ground is first torne up with the plâ—â—gh before the seede be committed unto it so the fâ—llow ground of our hearts must first bee broken up with the sharpenesse of the Law and the very terrour of the Lord before wee can bee fit to entertaine the sweete seed of the Gospell I would have a Preacher to preach peace and to aime at nothing more then the comfort of the Soules of Gods people yet I would have Him withall frame his course to the manner of Gods appearing to Elijah The Text saith that first a mighty strong winde rent the Mountaines and brake the rockes then after that came an earthquake and after the earthquake came fire and after all these then came a still and a soft voyce After the same manner I would not have the still and milde voyâ—e of the Gospell come till the strong tempest of the Law hath rent the stoâ—y hearts of men and have made theâ—â— beliâ—es to tremble and rottennesse to enter into their bones Or at least because our Auditories are mixt consisting of men of divers humours it shall bee good for Him to deliver His doctrine with that caution that neither the humbled soules may be affrighted with the severity of Gods judgements nor the prophane and unrepentant grow presumptuous by the abundance of Gods mercy The person that is full despiseth the hony-combe saith Salomon And what doth a proud Pharisie or a churlish Nabal or a Politicke Gallio or a scoffing Ishmael care to heare of the breadth and length and depth and height of the love of God in his Sonne Iesus Except it bee to settle them faster upon their lees The Doctrine of that nature is as unfitting such uncircumcised eares as the snow the Summer and the raine the Harvest Vnto the Horse belongs a whip to the Asse a bridle and a rod to the Fooles backe c. Hee that intendeth to doe any good in this frozen generation had need rather to bee Boanerges one of the sons of thunder then Bar-Ionah the Sonne of a Dove The Word of God saith Forbes hath three degrees of operation in the hearts of men For first it falleth to mens eares as the sound of many waters a mighty great and confused sound and which commonly bringeth neither terrour nor ioy but yet a wondering and acknowledgement of a strange force more then humane power This is that effect which many felt hearing Christ when they were astonished at His Doctrine as teaching with authority What manner doctrine is this Never man spake like this man This effect falleth even to the reprobate which wonder and vanish Haâ—ak 15. Act. 13.41 The next effect is the voice of thundâ—r Which bringeth not onely wonder but feare also not onely filleth the eares with sound and the heart with astonishment but moreover shaketh and terifyeth the conscience And this second effect may also befall a reprobate As Felix Act. 24. The third effect is proper to the elect the sound of harping while the word not onely ravishâ—th with admiration and striketh the Conscience with terrour but also lastly filleth it with sweete peace and ioy c. Now albeit the first two degrees may bee without the last yet none feele the last who have not in some degree felt both the first two God healeth none saith Gouge but such as are first wounded The whole need not a Physitian but they that are sicke Christ
there must bee a third thing To take them to our selves to beleeve they are ours and there needes a worke of the Spirit for this For tho the promises bee never so cleare yet having nothing but the promises you shall never bee able to apply them to your selves But when the holy Ghost shall say Christ is thine All these things belong to Thee and God is thy Father when that shall witnesse to our spirit by a worke of His owne Then shall wee beleeve c This is the order observed in our iustification 1. First There is a sight of our misery to which wee are brought by the Law 2. Secondly There is by the Gospell an holding forth of Christ as our redemption from sin and death 3. Thirdly there is a working of Faith in the heart to rest on Christ as the ransome from sinne and death Now when a man is come hither Hee is truly and really iust Wee teach that in trve conversion a man must bee wounded in his conscience by the sense of his sinnes His contrition must bee compungent and vehement bruising breaking renting the heart and feeling shee throwes as a woman labouring of Childe before the new-Creature bee brought forth or Christ truly formed in Him It is not done without bitternesse of the Soule without care indignation revenge 2. Cor. 7.11 But as some Infants are borne with lesse paine to the mother and some with more so may the new-man be regenerated in some with more in some with lesse anxiety of travell But surely grace is not infused into the heart of any sinner except there bee at least so great affliction of Spirit for sinne foregoing that He cannot but â—eele it c. This bruising is required before conversion 1. That so the Spirit may make way for it selfe into the heart by levelling all proud high thoughts c 2. To make vs set an high price upon Christs death This is the cause of relapses and Apostasies because men never smarted for sin at the first They were not long enough under the lash of the Law Hence this inferiour worke of the Spirit in bringing downe high thoughts is necessary before conversion By this time it doth most clearly and plentifully appeare what a foule and fearefull fault it is for men either in the managing of their Publike ministery or more private Passages of conference visitations of the sicke consultations about a good estate to Godward and other occasions of like nature to apply Iesus Christ and the promises to promise life and safety in the evill Day to Soules as yet not soundly illightned and afflicted with sight of sinne and sense of Gods wrath to consciences never truly wounded and awaked I insisted the longer upon this Point because I know it full well to bee a most universall and prevailing Policy of the Devill whereby hee keepes many thousands in His cursed slavery and from salvation To confirme as many Pastours as Hee can possibly willing enough to drive their Flocks before them to damnation in an ignorant or affected Preiudice and forbearance of that saving method of bringing Soules out of Hell mentioned before and made good with much variety of evidence And to nourish also in the hearts of naturall men a strong and sturdy disconceite opposition raging against downe-right dealing and those men of God able as they say but falsely and furiously against their owne Soules by their terrible teaching to drive their hearers to distraction Selfe-destruction or despaire who take the only right course to convert them and to bring them to Iesus Christ as Hee Himselfe invites them to wit labouring and heauy laden with their sinnes Matth. 11.28 Dawbers then who serue Satans craft in this kinde and all those who dispence their ministery without all spirituall discretion and good conscience of whom there are too many as great strangers to the right way of working grace in others as to the worke of grace in themselves I say they are a generation of dangerous men Old excellent as they say in an accursed Art of conducting poore blinded Soules merrily towards everlasting miserie and setting them downe in the very midst of Hell before they bee sensible of any danger or discovery of their damnable state Great men they are with the men of this world with al those wise fooles and sensuall great ones who are not willing to bee tormented before their time or rather who desire impossibly to live the life of pleasures in the meane time and yet at last to die the death of the righteous They have still ready at hand hand over head mercy and pardon Heaven and salvation for all commers and all they come neere without so much as a desire to put any difference or divide the pretious from the vile Which is a prodigâ—â—usly-arrogant folly pernicious in the highest degree both to their own soules and those they delude Heâ—â—e 〈◊〉 they are branded in the Booke of God calling them 〈◊〉 Sâ—wers under mens elboes Ezek. 1â— 1â— That 〈◊〉 laid soft and lockt fast in the Cradle of security thâ—â— may sinke suddenly into the Pit of destruction before they be aware Criers of peace peace when no peace is towards Ier. 6.14 but horrible stirs tumbling of garments in bloud burning and devouring of fire A â—â—n-pleasers â—alat 1.10 who chuse rather to tickle the itching eares of their carnall hearers with some fâ—othy Frier-like conceits out of Dung-hill 〈◊〉 And so smooth Great Ones in their humours by their cowardly flatteries especially if they any waies depend upon them for countenance rising and preferment rather then conscionably to discharge that trust 〈◊〉 upon them by their great Lord and Master in Heaven upon answerablenes for the bloud of those Soules which shal perish by their temporizing silence and flattering vnfaithfulnesse Healers of the hurt of their Hearers with 〈◊〉 words Ier. 6.14 while their Soules are 〈◊〉 by the wounds of sinne unto eternall death Preachers of smooth things Isa. 30.10 which kinde of Men the greatest part and all worldlings wonderfully affect and applaud tho to their owne everlasting vndoing They swell under such Teachers with a Pharisaicall conceite that they are as safe for salvation as the precisest of them all but alas their hope is but like a hollow wall which beeing put to any stresse when the tempest of Gods searching wrath begins to shake it in the time of a finall triall of it's truth and soundnesse it shatters into pieces and comes to naught Heare the Prophet Now go write it before them in a table and note it in a booke that it may bee for the time to come for ever and ever That this is a rebellious people lying children children that wil not heare the Law of the Lord which say to the Seers see not and to the Prophets prophesie not unto us right things speake unto us smooth things prophesie deceits Get you out of the way turne aside out
of the path cause the Holy One of Israel to cease from before us Wherefore thus saith the Holy One of Israel Because ye despise this word and trust in oppression and perversenesse and stay thereon Therefore this iniquity shal bee to you as a breach ready to fall swelling out in a high wall whose breaking commeth suddenly at an instant And Hee shall breake it as the breaking of the potters vessell that is broken in pieces hee shall not spare so that there shal not be found in the bursting of it a sheard to take fire from the harth or to take water with all out of the Pit Dawbers with untempered morter Ezech. 13.11 Who erect in the conceits of those who are willing to bee deluded by them Pharises at the best a rotten Building of false hope like a mudde-wall without straw or morter made onely of sand without lime to binde it which in faire weather makes a faire shew for a while but when abundance of raine falls and winter comes it moulders away and turnes to myre in the streetes Their vaine confidence in prosperous times before it come to the Touchstone of the fiery triall by Gods searching Truth may seeme currant But in the tempest of Gods wrath when the stormy winters night of death approacheth or at furthest at the iudgement Seate of the iust and Highest God it prooves to bee counterfeite when at last they shall cry Lord Lord like the foolish Virgins And those Mat. 7. in steade of imaginary comfort they shal bee crusht with horrible and everlasting confusion Heare the Prophet Say unto them which daube it with untempered morter that it shall fall there shall bee an overflowing showre and yee O great haile stones shall fall and a stormy winde shall rent it Loe when the wall is fallen shall it not bee said unto you where is the daubing wherewith yee have daubed it Therfore thus saith the Lord God I will rent it with a stormy winde in my fury and there shall be an overflowing showre in mine anger and great hailestones in my fury to consume it So wil I breake downe the wall that yee have daubed with untempered morter and bring it downe to the ground so that the foundation thereof shal bee discovered and it shall fall and yee shall bee consumed in the midst thereof and yee shall know that I am the Lord. Thus will I accomplish my wrath upon the wall and upon them that have it dawbed with untempered morter and will say unto you The wall is no more neither they that daubed it To wit the Prophets of Israel which prophesie concerning Ierusalem and which see visions of peace for Her and there is no peace saith the Lord God Such as with lies make the heart of the righteous sad whom God hath not made sad and strengthen the hands of the wicked that Hee should not returne from His wicked way by promising Him life Ezech. 13.22 These fellowes hold and beare meere civill men in hand that their estate is sound enough to Godward whatsoever the purer and preciser Brethren prate to the contrary and yet the holy Ghost tells us that without holinesse no man shall see the Lord. Hebr. 12.14 That formall Professours are very forward men whereas Iesus Christ professeth that Hee will spew the luke-warme out of His mouth Nay and if there bee talke even of a good fellow especially of some more commendable naturall parts and plausible carriage if Hee be so but moderately that I may so speake and not iust every day drunke well well will they say wee have all our faults and that is His. But as concerning the faithfull servant of God they are woont to entertaine the same conceite of Him which Ahab did of Elijah to wit that Hee was a troubler of Israel Which one of the captaines had of the Prophet sent to annoint Iehu that Hee was a mad fellow which the false Prophets had of Micaiah that Hee was a fellow of a singular and od humour by Himselfe and guided by a private spirit of His owne which Tertullus had of Paul that he was a pestilent fellow which the Pharises had of Christs Followers that they were a contemptible and cursed generation a company of base rude illiterate underlings Nay sometimes when the bedlam fit is upon them they will not sticke to charge Gods people in some proportion most wickedly and falsely as the ancient Heathens did the primitive Christians with conventicles and meetings of hatefull impurities faction disaffection to Caesar and many other horrible things whereas poore Soules they were most innocent and infinitely abhorred all such villanies And they met in the morning even before Day not to doe God knowes any such ill but for the service of God even their more ingenuous adversaries being witnesses to sing prayses to Christ. God to confirme their discipline forbidding all manner of sinne c. with all the miscarriages miseries and calamities that fell vpon the State as tho they were the causes Whereas those few neglected Ones which truly serve God are the onely men in all Places where they live to make up the hedge and to stand in the gappe against the threatned inundations of Gods dreadfull wrath and all the Opposites to their holy Profession are the true Cut-throats of Kingdomes able by their dissolutenesse and disgracing godlinesse to dissolve the sinewes of the strongest state upon Earth Looke upon Amos 4.1.2 And there you shall finde who they are which cause God to enter a controversie with the Inhabitants of a Land Heare how Austin describes some of these Selfe-seeking and Soule-murthering Dawbers in His Daies Farre be it from us saith Hee that we should say unto you live as you list doe not trouble your selves God will cast away none onely hold the Christian Faith Hee will not destroy that which He hath redeemed He will not destroy those for whom He hath shed His blood And if you please to recreate your selves at Plaies you may go what hurt is there in it And you may go to those Feasts which are kept in all Townes by joviall companions making themselues merry as they suppose at these publike meetings comessations but indeed rather making themselves most miserable I say you may go and be jovial Gods mercy is great and may pardon all Crowne your selves with Roses before they wither You may fill your selves with good cheere and wine amongst your good-fellow companions For the creature is giuen unto us for that purpose that wee may enjoy it If wee say these things peradventure wee shall hâ—ve greater multitudes applaude and adhere unto our Doctrine And if there bee some which thinke that speaking these things wee are not well advisde wee offend but a few and those precise Ones But wee winnâ— thereby a world of people But if wee shall thus doe speaking not the words of God not the words of Christ but
anguish as tho many fiery Scorpions stings stuck fast in them Either lead us to the sight of that blessed Anti-type of the Brazen Serpent to coole and allay the boyling rage of our guilty wounds or we are vtterly undone Either bring us to the Blood of that just and holy One which with execrable villany wee have spilt as water upon the ground that it may bind up our broken hearts or they will presently burst with despaire and bleed to eternall death Give us to drinke of that soueraigne Fountaine opened by the hand of mercy for all thirsty Soules or else wee dye There is nothing you can prescribe and appoint but wee will most willingly doe Wee will with all our hearts pluckâ— out our right eyes cut off our right hands We meane part with our beloved lusts and dearest sinfull pleasures abominate and abandon them all for ever from the heart root to the Pit of Hell If wee can bee rid of the Devills setteâ—â— welcome shall bee Christs sweete and easy yoke In a word wee will sell all even all our Sinnes to the last â—ilthy ragge of our heretofore doted vpon minion delight So that wee may injoy our blessed Iesus whom you have told us and wee now beleeve God hath made both Lord and Christ c. Now when wee shall see and find in some measure the hearts of our Hearers and spirituall Patients thus prepared both by legall dejections and terrours from the spirit of bondage and also possessed with such melting and eager affections wrought by the light of the Gospell and Offer of Christ When their Soules once begin to feele all sins even their best beloved One heauy and burdensome to prize Iesus Christ far before all the world to thirst for Him infinitely more then for riches pleasures honours or any earthly thing to resolue to take him as their husband and to obey Him as their Lord for ever and all this in truth I say then and in this case wee may haue comfort to minister comfort Then upon good ground wee may goe about our Masters command Isa. 40.1 which man-pleasers many times pittifully abuse Comfort yee Comfort yee my people I meane in respect of spirituall bondage Speake yee comfortably to Ierusalem and cry unto Her that Her warre is accomplished that Her iniquity is pardoned Wee may tell them with what a compassionate Pang and deare compellation God Himselfe labours to refresh them Isa. 54.11 Oh thou afflicted and tossed with tempest that hast no comfort behold I will lay thy stones with faire colours and lay thy foundations with Saphirs c. Wee may assure them in the word of life and Truth that Iesus Christ is theirs and they are His And compell them as it were by an holy violence not without a great deale of just indignation against their lothnesse to beleeue and holding off in this case to take his Person His merit His blood all His Spirituall riches priviledges excellencies And with Him possession of all things even of the most glorious Deity it selfe blessed for ever See 1. Cor. 3.21.22.23 Ioh. 17.21 But now in the meane time untill sense of Spirituall misery and poverty raise an hunger and thirst after Iesus Christ before such like preparations and precedent affections as have been spoke of be wrought in the hearts of men by pressing the Law and proclaiming the Gospell and that in Sincerity for the degree and measure wee leave it to God as a most free Agent in some they may bee stronger in some weaker the preaching or promising of mercy as already belonging unto them is farre more unseasonable and unseemely then Snow in Summer raine in harvest or honour for a foole It is upon the matter the very Sealing them up with the Spirit of delusion that they may never so much as thinke of taking the right course to bee converted What sottish and sacrilegious audaciousnesse then is it in any Dawber to thrust his prophane hand into the treasury of Gods mercy and there hand over head without any allowance from his highest Lord to scatter His dearest and most orient pearles amongst Swine To warrant salvaon to any unhumbled Sinner To strengthen the hands of the wicked who never yet tooke sinne to heart to any purpose and thirst farre more such true Gadarens are they after gold satisfying their owne lusts and perking above their brethren then for the blood of Christ by promising them life To assure meere civill men and Pharises who are so farre from the sense of any spirituall poverty that they are already swolne as full as the skin will hold with a selfe-conceit of their owne rotten righteousnesse that they shall bee saved as well as the most puling precisian Especially sith there is such a cloud of witnesses to the contrary as you have heard before Besides all which upon this occasion take two or three moe Heare a most faithfull and fruitfull workman in the Lords harvest of great skill experience and successe in the most glorious Art of converting Soules which makes mee more willing to vrge his authority and esteeme His judgement in Points of this nature None saith hee can prove or shew president that faith was wrought in an instant at first without any preparation going before Nor can it bee conceived how a man should beleeve in Christ for salvation that felt not himselfe before in a miserable estate and wearied with it and desired to get out of it into a better As the needle goes before to pierce the cloth and makes way for the threed to sew it So is it in this case Afterward Hee tells us how and in what manner order these predispositions and preparative Acts required for the plantation of faith and so securing us of the right season and a comfortable calling to assure men of Spirituall safety are wrought in such as God is drawing unto Iesus Christ. Hee requires from the law First Illumination Secondly Conviction Thirdly Legall terrour From the Gospell by the helpe of the Spirit First Revealing the remedy Secondly Beliefe of it in generall Thirdly Support in the meane time from sinking under the burthen and falling into despaire Fourthly Contrition Which is attended with some kind of First Desire Secondly request Thirdly Care Fourthly Hope Fiftly Ioy. Sixthly Hungring and thirsting after mercy and after Christ. Seventhly Resolution to sell all to wit all sins not to leave an hoofe behind c. And thus saith hee God brings along the man that Hee purposeth to make His. And when he is at this passe God seales it up to him inables him to beleeue And saith Sith thou wilt haue no Nay Bee it unto thee according to thy desire And God seales him up by the Spirit of promise as surely as any writing is made sure by sealing of it Then he beleeves the word of God and rests and casts himselfe vpon it And thus hee finds himselfe discharged of
the manner of His death I except the Thieves upon the Crosse My meaning is that there may bee some I know nor how few but I am sure there is none except Hee have in Him the perfection of the madnesse of all the Bedlams that ever breath'd would run that hazard who formerly out of the way and unreformed may now at last being very extraordinarily and mightily humbled under Gods mighty hand cleaving to the Lord Iesus with truly broken hearts indeede follow by a miracle as it were the Thiefe upon the Crosse to an everlasting Crowne And here now I require the care conscience heavenly wisedome experimentall skill and all His ministeriall dexterity in the Physition of the Soule to discerne aright betweene these and seeming Penitents and then to apply Himselfe proportionably with all holy discretion and seasonablenesse to their severall different estates But to fright and fire every One for ever from that extremest folly of hoping to follow that miraculously penitent Thiefe and from going on in sinne and deferring Repentance upon such a deceiving and desperate ground let us consider 1. First what an holy and learned Man of God saith to this Point In great wisedome that men at the last gaspe should not utterly despaire the Lord hath left us but one example of exceeding and extraordinary mercy by saving the Thiefe on the Crosse. Yet the perversenesse of all our nature may bee seene by this in that this one serveth us to loosenesse of life in hope of the like whereas wee might better reason That it is but one and that extraordinary and that besides this One there is not one moe in all the Bible and that for this One that sped a thousand thousands have missed And what folly is it to put our selues in a way where so many have miscarried To put our selves into the hand of that Physition that hath murthered so many going cleane against our sense and reason whereas in other wee alwaies leane to that which is most ordinary and conclude not the Spring of one Swallow It is as if a Man should spurre His Asse till Hee speake because Baalams Asse did once speake so grossely hath the Divell bewitched us 2. Secondly the singularities about the good Thiefe first His heart was broken with one short Sermon as it were but thou hast or mightest have heard many and art yet hard-hearted Secondly the other Thiefe saw also that soveraigne Soule-healing blood gush freshly and abundantly out of His blessed side and yet was not strucke or stird at all Thirdly His example is onely for true Penitents but Thou upon this presumption despising in the meane time the riches of Gods goodnesse and forbearance and long-suffering leading Thee to repentance hardenest thy heart that thou canst not repent Fourthly His case was singular and such that the like is not to bee found in the whole Scripture A King sometimes pardons a Malefactour at the Place of execution wilt thou therefore runne desperately into some horrible villany deserving death hoping to bee that One amongst many thousands Fifthly It was a miracle saith an excellent Divine with the glory whereof our Saviour would honour the ignominy of the Crosse we may almost as well expect a second crucifying of Christ as such a second Thiefe Christ then triumphing on the Crosse did as Princes doe in the triumph of entring into their Kingdomes they pardon grosse offences before committed such as they pardon not afterwards 6. Having an eye upon this Thiefe that thou mayest more fully and freely follow thy pleasures Thou makest a covenant with death and an agreement with Hell and puts the evill Day farre from Thee But the Lord hath professed That thy covenant with death shall bee dis-annulled and thy agreement with Hell shall not stand when the overflowing scourge shall passe thorow then shalt thou bee trodden downe by it 3. Thirdly the ordinary impossibilities of following the blessed Thiefe in His miraculous Repentance First thou art cryed unto continually by Gods Messengers to come in now while it is called to Day yet thou standest out still out of this conceite onely or rather deceite to take thy fill of pleasure in the meane time and to seeke God sufficiently upon thy Bed of death by repenting with the Thiefe at last But know for thy terrour and timely turning that the longer thou puts off and deferres the more unfit thou shalt be to repent Thy custome in sinning will exercise more Tyranny over Thee The curse of God for thy going on still in thy trespasses will bee more heavy upon Thee The corruptions that lurke in thine owne bosome will be more strengthened against thee And this threefold cord is hardly broken These three Giants will be maistered with very much adoe The further thou walkest in the wayes of death the more unwilling and more unable wilt thou bee to returne and bee reformed Thine understanding will be more darkened with Hellish mists thy judgement more perverted thy will more stubborne thy memory more stuft with sensuall notions thine affections will become more rebellious thy thoughts more earthly thine heart more hardened thy conscience more feared thy selfe more sold to sinne and every day that comes over thine head in this state of darkenesse much more the Child of the Divell then thou wast before To refuse Christ upon this Point so freely and fairely offered is to receive Gods curse under Seale and to make sure thy covenant with Hell and League with death untill thou bee slaine by the one and swallowed up of the other without all mercy or recovery For in this time of delay God growes more angry Satan more strong thy selfe more unable to repent sinne more unconquerable thy conversion more hard thy salvation more impossible A ruinous house the longer thou lettest it run the more labor charge will it require in repairing If thou drive a naile with an hammer the more blowes thou givest to it the more hard will it bee to plucke it out againe It is just so in the Case of continuing in â—inne and every new sin is a new stroke with an hammer that drives the naile in further Secondly with what possibility art thou like to passe thorow the great work of saving repentance or with what heart canst thou addresse thy selfe unto it when upon thy sicke Bed thou art set upon at once if thy conscience bee waking with the ugly sight of all thy sinnes charging upon thee with insupportable horrour with the pangs of death with Satans utmost malice and His very Powder-Plot and with the terrour of that approaching strickt Tribunall Which dreadfull encounter is able to put to it the spirituall strength of many yeeres gathering Thirdly Resolution to deferre Repentance when grace is offered doth justly merit to bee deprived for ever after of all oportunity and ability to repent Fourthly it is just with God that that man who doth purposely put off repentance and provision
with that pretious blood of His c. 6. It is growing from appetite to endeavour from endeavour to action from action to habite from habite to some comfortable perfection and tallnesse in Christ. If it bee quite quencht and extingvished when the spirituall angvish and agony is over or stand at a stay never transcending the nature of a naked wish it is to bee reputed rootelesse heartlesse gracelesse There are Christians that lie as yet as it were strugling in the wombe of the Church who for a time at the least live spiritually onely by grievings and groanes by hearty desires eager longings affectionate stirrings of spirit c. There are also Babes in Christ young men in Christ strong men in Christ old Christians A perpetuall infancy argues a nullity of sound and saving Christianity The Childe that never passeth the stature and state of an Infant will proove a Monster Hee that growes not by the syncere milke of the Word is a true Changeling not truly changed Hee that rests with contentment upon a desire onely of good things never desired them savingly But here lest any tender conscience bee unnecessarily troubled I must confesse It is not so growing as I have said or not so sensibly at certaine times as while the pangs of the New-birth are upon us in times of desertion temptation c. Tho even then it growes in an holy impatiency restlesnesse longing c. Which is well-pleasing unto the Father of mercies in the meane time and which Hee accepts graciously untill Hee give more strength The Point thus cleared is very sweet and soveraigne but so that no carnall Man must come neere it no stranger meddle with it much lesse Swine trample upon it It is a Iewell for the true-hearted Nathanaels wearing alone Nay the Christian himselfe in the time of his Soules health height of feeling and flourishing of His Faith must hold off His hand Onely let Him keepe it fresh and orient in the Cabinet of His memory as a very rich Pearle against the Day of spirituall distresse As pretious and cordiall waters are to bee given onely in swounings faintings and defection of the spirits so this delicious Manna is to bee ministred specially and to bee made use of in the straits and extremities of the Soule At such times and in such Cases as these In 1. The strugglings of the New-birth 2. Spirituall Desertions 3. Strong temptations 4. Extraordinary troubles upon our last Bed 1. For the first When thou art once come so farre as I intimated before To wit that after a thorow conviction of sinne and sound humiliation under Gods mighty hand upon a timely and seasonable revelation of the glorious Mystery of Christ His excellencies invitations His truth tender-heartednesse c. For the desire I speake of is an effect and affection wrought ever immediately by the Gospell alone I say when in this Case thine heart is filled with vehement longings after the Lord of life If thou bee able to say with David My soule thirsteth after thee as a thirstie Land If thou feele in thy selfe an hearty hunger and thirst after the favour of God that Fountaine opened for sinne and for uncleannesse and fellow-ship with Christ Assuredly then the Well of life is already opened unto thee by the hand of thy faithfull Redeemer and in due time thou shalt drink thy fill He that is Alpha and Omega the Beginning and the End the eternall and unchangeable God hath promised it And amid the sorrowes of thy trembling heart and longings of thy thirsty soule thou mayst even challenge it at His hands with an humble sober and zealous confidence As did that Scottish Penitent a little before his Execution Hee freely confessed his fault to the shame as Hee said of Himselfe and to the shame of the Divell but to the glory of God Hee acknowledged it to bee so hainous and horrible that had hee a thousand lives and could he die ten thousand deaths Hee could not make satisfaction Notwithstanding said hee Lord thou hast left mee this comfort in thy Word that thou hast said Come unto mee all ye that are weary and laden and I will refresh you Lord I am weary Lord I am heavily laden with my sinnes which are innumerable I am ready to sinke Lord even to Hell without thou in thy mercy put to thine hand and deliver mee Lord thou hast promised by thine owne word out of thine owne mouth that thou wilt refresh the weary soule And with that Hee thrusts out one of his hands and reaching as high as Hee could with a louder voyce and a strained cryed I challenge thee Lord by that Word and by that Promise which thou hast made that thou performe and make it good unto mee that call for ease and mercy at thine hands c. Proportionably when heavy-heartednesse for sinne hath so dryed up thy bones and the angry countenance of God so parched thine heart that thy poore soule begins to gaspe for grace as the thirsty Land for drops of raine thou mayst tho dust and ashes with an holy humility thus speake unto thy gracious God O mercifull Lord God thou art Alpha and Omega the beginning and the end Thou sayest It is done of things that are yet to come so faithfull and true are thy decrees and promises And thou hast promised by thine owne word out of thine owne mouth that unto Him that is athirst thou wilt give of the Fountaine of the water of life freely O Lord I thirst I faint I langvish I long for one drop of mercy As the Hart panteth for the water brookes so panteth my soule after thee O God and after the yerning bowels of thy woonted compassions Had I now in possession the glory the wealth and the pleasures of the whole World Nay had I ten thousand lives ioyfully would I lay them all downe and part with them to have this poore trembling soule of mine received into the bleeding armes of my blessed Redeemer O Lord and thou onely knowest it my spirit within me is melted into teares of blood my heart is shivered into peeces Out of the very place of Dragons and shaddow of death doe I lift up my thoughts heavy and sad before Thee the remembrance of my former vanities and pollutions is a very vomite to my soule and it is full sorely wounded with the grievous representation thereof The very flames of Hell Lord the fury of thy just wrath the scorchings of mine owne conscience have so wasted and parched mine heart that my thirst is insatiable My bowels are hot within mee my desire after Iesus Christ pardon and grace is greedy as the grave the coles thereof are coles of fire which hath a most vehement flame And Lord in thy blessed Booke thou calls and cries Ho every One that thirsteth come yee to the waters c. In that great day of the Feast Thou stood'st and cryed'st with thine owne mouth saying
and upon good ground invite thee as it were to repose upon it as upon a sure Word of God with everlasting rest and safty But thou giving too much way to the Divels lies and the dictates of thine owne distrustfull heart keepes off and retires as tho they were too weak to support thy now troubled and trembling Soule especially loaden with so many and hainous sinnes Whereby consider how great indignity thou offers to such pretious promises and Places as these Isa. 1.18 Ezek. 36.25 Isa. 55.7.8.9 And 57.15 Especially beeing so strongly backt by Gods blessed Oath God willing more abundantly to shew unto the heires of promise the immutability of His counsell confirmed it by an Oath That by two immutable things in which it was impossible for God to lie wee might have a strong consolation who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us Heb. 6.17.18 What a mighty strength may that most glorious speech of our all-mercifull God infuse into our Faith Ezek. 36.11 As I live c. As if Hee should have said As sure as I am the True Eternall Living and Omnipotent God c. so certainely I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked But I have pleasure that Hee should come in take my Sonne and bee my servant Vnderstand the same proportionably of every promise As sure as I have an eternall Essence and Beeing of a God-head c. So certainely will I give freely to every One that is truly weary of all His sins and thirsts unfainedly for mercy and grace eternal rest and refreshing in the ever-springing Fountaine of all spirituall and heavenly pleasures And so of the rest In a word what an unworthy thing is this That all the pretious promises in the Booke of God confirmed with his owne Oath and sealed with His Sonnes blood should suffer dishonour and disparagement as it were by thy distrust As tho so many mighty Rocks of mercy and truth were not able to susteine a poore bruised Reede 5. By disabling and dis-honouring 1. Gods free love See Hos. 14.4 Ier. 31.3 Ezech. 16. Deut. 7.7.8 Ioh. 3.16 Eph. 1.5 If God would not give us Christ without some matter and motives in us without something done by our selves first it were something to stand out in such a case But he gives him most freely without any respect or expectation at all of any precedent worke or worth on our part Onely there is required a predisposition in the Partie to take Christ legall dejection sight sense and burden of sinne we must bee truly wounded sensible of the Divels yoke feele our owne misery wee must prize Him above and thirst for Him more then the whole world c. A man will not seriously seeke after a Physition before Hee feele Himselfe to be sicke for ease before Hee bee prest with the waight of His burden for a plaister before Hee bee wounded for heavenly riches before Hee bee sensible of His spirituall beggery for enlargement and pardon before Hee finde himselfe in prison for mercy before Hee smart with sense of His misery Such dispositions then as these serve onely to drive us unto Christ and to let us see and feele a necessity of Him But they are infinitely with more then an utter impossibility disabled by any worthinesse to draw on Christ. Hee is a Gift Rom. 5.16 Ioh. 3.16 And what is freer then Gift Nothing is required at our hands for receiving Him but emptie-handednesse and sensiblenesse of our owne nothingnesse Our Heavenly Father never did or ever will fell His Sonne unto any Iustitiarie or any that will needes bee something in Himselfe Hee ever did and ever will give Him to every poore Soule thas is vile in His owne eyes nothing in himselfe labours and is heavy laden and willing to take Him as a Saviour and a Lord. A full hand can hold nothing Either it must bee empty or wee cannot receive Christ. First thirst and then buy without money and without price Isa. 55.1 Mee thinkes Chrysostome doth somewhere set out sweetly the admirable and adored frankenesse of this divine bounty b If thou wilt be adorned with my comlinesse or bee armed with my weapons or put on my garments or bee fed with my dainties or finish my iourney or come into that City whose Builder and Maker I am or build an House in my Countrey Thou maist so doe all these things that I will not onely not exact of thee any price or paiment for any of these things but I my selfe would bee a Debtour unto thee of a great Reward so that thou wouldest not disdaine to use my things my strength gifts graces What can be ever found equall to this bounty If God then bee so infinitely good as to offer His Sonne so freely And thou so fitted to receive Him by sensiblenesse of thy spirituall miserie thirsting for his blood resolving upon His service for the time to come c. How unad-visedly cruell art thou to thine owne conscience and unmannerlily proud that wilt needs stand off still from taking the Lord Iesus and suffer still thy poore trembling Soule to lie unnecessarily upon the Racke of terrour Sith thou gets and gaines nothing thereby but first Gods dishonour secondly Thine owne willfull torture thirdly Gratification of Satans malicious cruelty Obiect 1. But were it not fitter for mee maist thou say first to amend my life to doe some good workes to have experience of the Change of my conversation to grieve legally longer c. Before I bee so bold as to lay hold upon Christ and apply the Promises Answ. Thou must first bee alive before thou canst worke Thou must have spirituall ability inspired before thou canst walke in the good way Thou must be justified before thou bee sanctified Now spirituall life is onely then and never before or by any other meanes infused but when wee reach out an empty hand and take Iesus Christ into our humbled Soules When a 〈…〉 wearie of all sinne according to His Call Commandement and counsell roles itself as it were and â—â—anes upon the Lord Iesus then is spirituall life first breaâ—hed into it The vitall operations of grace in â—ll holy duties good deeds amendment of life holy walking universall obedience c. must appeare afterward Zacheus received Iesus Christ first into His heart and house before Hee was able to restore and distribute Casting ouâ— selves upon that Lord of life with truth of heart as our onely Iewell and Ioy we have in heaven or in earth 〈◊〉 whom we are resolved to live and die drawes frâ—m Him into our soules that heavenly vertue and vigour whereby we are afterward inabled to exercise all the functions of spirituall life and to die to the world and all wordly pleasures for ever Herein is thy fault and failing thou conceives not a right of Gods free grace but thinkes thou shalt not bee welcome except thou
make their consciences asleepe at their death as they have made it asleepe all their life lest conscience should see and speake and they heare and bee saved Therefore they die tho not desperate as Saul and Ahitophel yet sottishly without comfort and feeling of Gods love as Naâ—al Dyke of Conscience cap. 12. p Whom Satan seeth 〈◊〉 of Gods favour whom Hâ—e knoweth 〈…〉 and 〈◊〉 to bee cast into Hâ—ll fire those doth Hee â—alsely perswade that they are out of all danger and never suffer them so much as to perceive their lamentable estate But whom â—ee seeth God doth favour whom Hee knoweth to bee Christs brethren and fellow-heires of the Kingdome of heaven those will Hee tempt very often to seate to doubt yea sometimes even to despaire of their salvation Touchstone for a Christian. pag. 81. q Ex hoc lâ—co satis liquet multos quibus in ore est Domine miserere nostri ad inferos descendere Cartw. in cap. 1. Proverb Sunt quicredunt quoniâ—m Christiani sunt non posse damnari adulantes sibi eò quòd scriptum est Omnis quiâ—â—nque â—nvocaâ—â—rit nomen Domini salvus erit Putant enim se nomen Domini invocare quoniam possunt Christum credere sacramenta Ecclesiae sumere non verentes multos esse vocaâ—ot sed paucoâ— electos August De verâ falsâ Poenit. cap. 6. O quà ◠multi cum hac spe ad aeternos labores bella descenduntâ— How many goe to Hell with this hope * Doctor Featly Audi dominum Mors peccatoris pessima Quae tibi videtur hona pessima est si intùs videaâ— Vides forâ—s â—aceâ—em in let to nunquid vides intùs â—aptum ad gebeâ—nam August in Ps. 33. r Ostenditur nobis per haec verba quòd illo in tempore inter angustias diversorum terrorum videntes se peccatores anxiabuntur current huc illuc ad sacerdotes doctrinam poenitentiam sibi quaerentes Alij autem interrogantes quid eos oporteat facere sed festinante judicio necessitatibus alijs super alias venientibus cum non sit docendi licentia nec tempâ—â—s faciendae justitiae aut agendae poenitentiae festinatio eorum vacua erit Hoc enim in quotidiano usu videmus fieri Quotidie enim sacerdotes clamant in Ecclesiâ Qui peccavit poenitentiam agat Neque seducant vos honores devitiae temporales quia tempus vestrum prope est Et si consummatio vestra tardaverit mors vestra non tardat nemo credit nemo obâ—â—â—dit cum autem venerit super illos mors festinant anxiantur vocant sacerdotes poenitentiam volunt agere quando jam poenitentiae locus non est Itaque dum expoâ—unt peccata sua capitur anima eorum vadunt vacui magis autem ligaci justo jâ—dicio Dei quta non propter odium peccatorum displicentes sibi volâ—ham poenitentiam agere sed propter mortis timorem Adhuc enim si vivere poâ—uissent non sibi displicuissent Ineâ—â—â—tus author Hom. 52. in cap. Mat. 25. Vlulant quidem in cubilibus id verò doloris impatientiâ faciunt queÌ„ expoenis concipiunt non quòd peccata sua deplorent Gualt in cap. 7 Hos. Fuiâ—â—â—eâ— est is seâ—sus ea conscientia peccati miseriae praesertim verò conscientia tanti contemplus oblâ—tae lâ—cis idque ex judicijs quibus exercebuntur ut tum quidem seriò crucâ—andi sint deâ—ideâ— in Christi Non quidem quòd id desiderium sit â—uturum Christi propter ipsum Christum aut propter odium Peccati sed propter sensum miseriae quem ferre non poterunt Rolloc in cap. 8. Iohan. s And to seeke Him then is not to seeke Him Non quaerebant Eum. No they seeke Him not they dissemble with Him saith Asaph in the next verse For when God to trie them reprived them never so little time they fell to their old byas and when as Hee ceased killing their seeking was at an end So are all forced seekings like to a Bow-string brought to his full bent but remit you never so little it starteth backe againe Nay it is not quaerebant no kindly seeking but a base ignoble creeping to without all ingenuity when wee must either die or doe it Winchesters Sermons pag. 181. t 2. Maccab. 9. u Doctor Vsher in His Answer to a Iesuites Challenge pag. 152. x Dyke of Repentance cap. 16. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mat. 13 52. Poenitentia nunquam sera si seria Sed sera rarò vera Agens poenitentiam reconciliatus cum sanus est posteà benè vivens securus hinc exit Agenâ— poenitentiam ad ultimum reconciliatus si securus hinc exit Ego non sum securus August Hom. 41. ex 50. Ambros. Exhort ad poenitent Quomodo agit poenitentiam in extremis vitae fiâ—â—bus constitutus Poenitentia quae ab inâ—irâ—o petitur â—nsirma est Poenitentia quae à moriente tantùm petitur timeo ne ipsa moriatur August de temp Serm. 57. Câ—m venerit super illos mors â—estinant anxiantur vocant sacerdotes Poenitentiam volunt agere quando iam Poenitentiae locus non est Quâ—a non propter odium peccatorum displicentes sibi volebant poenitentiam agere sed propter mortis timorem Incert Author in Mat. Hom. 52. y And thus many deare servants of God are oftentimes grievously perplexed troubled in spirit gauled in mind long seeking and labouring for release and finding none condemning themselves that they are the very firebrands of Hell and cannot bee saved Nay many times they doe even die with speeches in their mouthes which much savour of despaire Hieron in His Caveat and Comfort for Beleevers pag. 41. z Sed ne fortès charissimi aliquem nimis securum saciat aut remissum tam nova felicitas credulitatis Ne sortè dicat aliquis in corde suo Non me usque adeò conturbet cruciet rea conscientia Non me usque adeò contristet culpabilis vita video sub momento video sub exiguo spacio latroni crimina sua donata Deterreant quaeso nos ab hâc persuasione innumerabiles populi sub tali securitate nudi vacui bonis malis pleni ex hac luce praeâ—epti Immittit Diabolus securitatem ut inferaâ— perditionem neque dinumerari possiâ—â— quantos haec inanis spei umbra deceperit Deinde stulâ—isâ—â—mum est ut causa quae de necessâ—â—atibus agitur aeternis inutilitatibus vitae deficientis committatur extremis O dibile est apud Deum quando homo sub siduciâ poenitentiae in senectatem reservatae liberius peccat August De Temp. Serm. 120. a Greenham pag. 2. cap. 32. Edit 3. b Legi inquit Augustinus perlâ—gi Scripturam neminem inveni in duobus millibus annorum salâ—atum in sine nisi Lâ—tron mincruce Nicolaus Laurentius adversus desperationem pag 371. c That that may bee said is this and it is nothing True
and yelling They shall never more bee heard tho with much violence they throw their serikings into the Aire and cry with sighes and groanes as piercing as a sword Not but that the Gates of Heaven and armes of mercy may stand wide open untill their last breath But alas They have already so hardened their hearts that they cannot repent After thine hardnesse saith Paul and heart that cannot repent They now but howle upon their Beds they doe not cry unto God with their heart as the Prophet speakes Hos. 7.14 Their earnest and early crying in this last extremity is onely because Their feare is come upon them as desolution and their destruction as a whirlewinde When they cast out their considerations for comfort It is not the whole Creation can possibly help them for they must stand or fall to the Tribunall of the everlasting God mighty and terrible the Creator of the ends of the Earth If they looke up to God the Father that Prov. 1.24.26 comes presently into their heads with much horrour and quite kills their hearts Because Hee hath called all our life long and all that goodly time wee refused Hee will laugh now at our calamity and mocke when our feare is come Iesus Christ as they strongly conceive and un-mooveably conclude against themselves hath now to them for ever closed up His wounds as it were and will not afford them one drop of His blood because they have so often by comming unworthily spilt it in the Sacrament persecuted Him in His members and despised Him in the Ministry The blessed Spirit because in the Day of visitation they repelled all his inward warnings and holy motions preferring Satans impure suggestions before His sacred inspirations doth now in their own acknowledgement by the equity of a just proportion in this Day of vexation leave them to eat the fruit of their former wilfulnesse and reape the reward of their owne wayes Thus these forlorne wretches are disclaimed forsaken and abandoned of Heaven and Earth God and Man of all the comforts in this life and blessings of the World to come And so by finall despairing of Gods mercy the greatest of sinnes they most unhappily and cursedly follow Iudas the worst of men into the darkest and most damned nooke in Hell 2. Others die senselesly and blockishly They demeane themselues upon their dying Beds as tho there were no immortality of the Soule no Tribunall aboue no strict account to bee given up there for all things done in the flesh no everlasting estate in the world to come wherein every one must either lie in unspeakeable paines or live in un-utterable pleasures In their life time they were never woont to tremble at Gods judgments or rejoyce in his promises or much trouble themselves with the ministry of the Word or about the state of their soules All was one to them what Minister they had whether a Man taught to the kingdome of Christ or a generall Teacher or an ignorant Mangler of the word or a dissolute fellow or a Dawber with untempered morter or a dumbe Dog If they were neither Whores nor Thieves but well accounted of amongst their neighbours thriued in the world prospered in their outward state prouided for posterity slept in a whole skinne were not vexed on the Lords day with any of these precise Trouble-townes They were well enough and had all they looked for either in this world or in the world to come Wherefore at their death by reason of their former disacquaintance with spirituall things and God not opening their eies they are neither afflicted with any feare of Hell or affected with any hope of Heaven they are both un-apprehensive of their present danger and fearelesse of the fiery lake into which they are ready to fall In these regards they are utterly untouched die most quietly and without any trouble at all And it is their ordinary Answere when they are questioned about their spirituall state and How it stands with them betweene God and their owne Consciences I thanke God nothing troubles me Which tho they thinke it makes much for their owne credit yet alas It is small comfort to judicious By-standers and such as wish well to their Soules But rather a fearefull confirmation that they are finally giuen ouer to the spirit of slumber and sealed up by divine justice in the sottishnesse and security of their owne senselesse hearts for most deserved condemnation Thus these men as One speakes live like stocks and die like blocks And yet the ignorant people saith Greeneham will still commend such fearefull deaths saying He departed as meekely as a Lambe Hee went away as a bird in a shell when they might as well say but for their featherbed and their pillow hee dyed like a beast and perished like an Oxe in a ditch 3. Others die formally I meane they make very goodly shewes and representations of much confidence and comfort Having formerly beene formall Professours and so furnished with many formes of godly speeches and outward Christian behaviours And the spirit of delusion and spirituall Selfe-cousenage wich in their life time detained them in constancy of security and selfe-conceitednesse about the spirituall safty of their soules without any such doubts troubles feares temptations which are woont to haunt those who are true of heart for ordinarily such is the peace of unsound Professors continuing their imaginary groundlesse persvasion and presumption in the height and strength unto the end for their very last breath may bee spent in saying Lord Lord open unto us as wee see in the foolish Virgines and those Mat. 7. I say such men as these thus wofully deluded and fearefully deceiving others may cast out upon their last beds many glorious speeches intimating much seeming confidence of a good estate to God-ward contempt of the world willingnesse to die readinesse to forgiue all the world hope to bee saved desire to bee dissolved and goe to Heaven c. They may cry aloud with a great deale of formall confidence Lord Lord Mercy Mercy in the name of Christ Lord Iesus receive our spirits c. And yet all these goodly hopes and earnest eiaculations growing onely from a forme not from the power of godlines are but as I said somewhere before as so many catchings and scrablings of a Man over-head in water He strugles and strives for hold to save Himself but he graspes nothing but water it is still water which He catches and therefore sinkes and drownes They are all but as a spiders web Iob. 8. 14.15 Vpon which One falling from the top of an house laies hold by the way for stay and support Hee shall leaâ—e upon his house but it shall not stand Hâ—e shall hold it fast but it shall not endure O how many descend faitlâ— an ancient Father with this hope to eternall trauailes and torment How many saith an other worthy Doctour goe to Hell with a vaine hope of Heaven whose chiefest
cause of damnation is their false persuasion and groundlesse presumption of salvation Of all the foure kindes of death which ordinarily befall such as are not saved this is the fairest in shew but yet of greatest imposture to those about them and of most pestilent consequence to harden especially all of the same humour that heare of it 4. Some die Penitently But I meane seemingly so not savingly Many having served their appetites all their lives and lived in pleasure now when the Sun of their sensuall delights begins to set and the darke midnight of misery and horrour to seize upon them would very gladly bee saved And I blame them not If they might first live the life of the wicked and then die the death of the righteous If they might have the earthly Heaven of the worlds Favourites here and the Heauen of Christs Martyrs in the world to come These Men are woont in this last extremity to take on extremely But it is but like their Howling upon their Beds Hos. 7.14 Because they are pinched with some sense of present horror and expectation of dreadful things They cry out mightily for mercy But it is no other then their early seeking Prov. 1.28 Because distresse and anguish is come upon them They enquire eagerly after God and would now bee gladly acquainted with Him But just like them Psal. 78. When Hee slew them then they sought Him and they returned and enquired early after God And they remembred that God was their Rocke and the high God their Redeemer Neverthelesse they did flatter Him with their mouth And they lyed unto Him with their Tongs For their heart was not right with Him They promise very faire and protest gloriously what mended men they will bee if the Lord restore them But all these goodly promises are but as a morning cloud and as the early dew They are like those of a Thiefe or murtherer at the Barre which beeing now cast and seeing there is now no way but one O what a reformed man would Hee bee if Hee might bee reprieved Antiochus as the Apocryphall Booke of the Maccabees reports when the hand of God was upon Him horribly vowed excellent things O what Hee would doe so and so extraordinarily for the people of God! yea and that He Himselfe also would become a Iew and goe through all the world that was inhabited and declare the power of God But what was it thinke you that made this raging Tyrant to relent and thus seemingly repent A paine of the bowells that was remedilesse came upon Him and sore torments of the inner parts So that no man could endure to carry him for His intolerable stinke And He himselfe could not abide His owne smell Many may thus behaue themselves upon their Beds of death with very strong shewes and many boisterous representations of true turning unto God whereas in truth and triall they are as yet rotten at heart roote And as yet no more comfort upon good ground belongs unto them then to those in the fore-cited Places And if any spirituall Physition in such a case doe presse it hand over head or such a Patient presume to apply it it is utterly misgrounded mis-applied Heare what One of the worthiest Divines in Christendome saith Now put case One commeth to His ghostly Father with such sorrow of minde as the terrours of a guilty conscience usually doe produce and with such a resolution to cast away His sinnes as a Man hath in a storme to cast away his goods not because Hee doth not love them but because Hee feareth to lose His life if Hee part not with them doth not hee betray this mans soule who putteeh into His head that such an extorted repentance as this which hath not one graine of love to season it withall will qualifie Him sufficiently for the receiving of an absolution c. And another excellently instructed unto the Kingdome of Heaven Repentance at death is seldome sound For it may seeme rather to arise from feare of iudgement and an horrour of Hell then for any griefe for sinne And many seeming to repent affectionately in dangerous sicknesse when they have recovered have been rather worse then before It is true that true Repentance is never too late but late Repentance is seldome true For here our sinnes rather leave us then wee them as Ambrose sayes And as Hee addes Woe bee unto them whose sinne and life end together This received Principle among the ancient Fathers That late Repentance is rarely true implyes that it is often false and unsound and so by consequent confirmes the present Point Too manifold experience also makes it good Amongst many for my part I have taken speciall notice of two The one beeing laboured-with in prison was seemingly so extraordinarily humbled that a reverend Man of God was mooved thereby to bee a meanes for his reprive whereupon a Pardon was procured And yet this so extraordinary a Penitent while death was in his eye having the terror removed returned to His vomit and some two yeeres after to the same Place againe as notorious a Belial as Hee was before Another having upon His Bed of sicknesse received in His owne conceite the sentence of death against Himselfe and beeing pressed to humiliation and broken-heartednesse for Hee had formerly been a stranger and enemy to purity and the power of godlinesse answered thus My heart is broken and so broke out into an earnest confession of particular sinnes Hee named uncleannesse stubbornnesse obstinacy vaine-glory hypocrisie dissimulation uncharitablenesse covetousnesse luke-warmenesse c. He compared himselfe to the Thiefe upon the Crosse. And if God saith Hee restore mee to health againe the world shall see what an altered man I will bee When hee was prest to syncerity and true-heartednesse in what hee said Hee protested that hee repented with all his heart and Soule and minde and Bowels c. And desired a Minister that stood by to bee a witnesse of these things betweene the world and Him And yet this Man upon His recovery became the very same if not worse then Hee was before Now sith upon this Perusall of the different deaths incident to the godly and the wicked it appeares that some men never soundly converted may in respect of all outward representations die as confidently and comfortably in the conceite of the most as Gods dearest Children and that Christs best servant sometimes may depart this life uncomfortably to the eye and in the opinion of the greatest part And wee heard before that our last and everlasting Doome must passe upon us according to the syncerity or sensuality the zealous forwardnes or formality of our former courses and not according to the seeming of our last carriage upon Bed of death and enforced behaviour in that time of extremity I say these things beeing so I hold my conclusion still and resolution not much to alter my censure and conceit of a mans spirituall state for