himself on this wise What-ever my case is now sure I was made in the image of God placed under the eye of his Providence as it were of his Family and Table Heaven and Earth ministred to me I was Lord of the lower and Favourite of the upper World as if the one was made on purpose to exercise and divert me and the other to receive and reward me I have a nature capable of immortality and had eternal life designed for me as the inheritance of a Son and my task of obedience was as easie and honourable as my hopes were glorious For I had no hard burthen laid upon me nothing required of me but what was proportionable to my powers and agreeable to the reason of my mind no restraint was laid upon my passions but such as was evidently both necessary for the World and good for my self that it could not be drawn into an argument of harshness and severity in God nor make apology for my transgression All my faculties were whole and intire I was neither tempted by necessity nor oppressed by any fate I was therefore happy enough and why am I not so still It is true that humane nature hath miscarried since it came out of the hands of God and I carry the Skar of that common Wound yet is the dammage of the first Adam so repaired by the second that mankind is left inexcusable in all its actual transgressions but especially in a dissolute and impenitent course of rebellion Besides I see others whose circumstances were in all points the same with mine and their difficulties and temptations no less to live holily and comfortably having either escaped the too common pollutions of the world by an early compliance with the grace of God or at least quickly recovered themselves by repentance I find therefore that I might have lived in the light of God's countenance in serenity of mind quiet of conscience sense of my own integrity and comfortable hopes of unspeakable glory in contemplation of which I might have defied death and lived in Heaven upon Earth but I have been meerly fooled by my own incogitancy and undone by my own choice For proceeds he 2. I have forfeited all this by sinning against God and been so sottish as to prefer the satisfaction of my own humour before all the aforesaid felicities I have been ingratefull towards my great benefactour broken the law of my Creation confronted the wisedom of the most High been insolent towards a mighty Majesty violated just and righteous commandments sinned against light knowledge and conscience added presumption to folly wilfullness to weakness despised counsels exhortations promises assistances my sins are many in number horrible in their aggravations deadly in their continuance and my perseverance in them By this means I have not onely wrought disorder in the world but disordered my own Soul spoiled my own powers suffered passion to get head of my reason clouded my understanding and so by former sins rendered it in a manner necessary that I sin still For when I would doe good evil is present with me I find a law in my members rebelling against the law of my mind and carrying me into captivity to the law of sin O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from this body of death I have driven away the good Spirit of God and put my self under the power of Satan become his slave and drudge I know nothing now of the comforts of innocence of the joy of a good Conscience mine is a continual torture to me I have lost the light of God's countenance and the very thoughts of him are dreadfull to me by all which together life is a burden and yet the thoughts of death are intolerable Such reflections and considerations as these break the very heart of a sinner and resolve him into sighs and tears 3. BUT this is not the worst of the case for in the third place he considers what is like to be the issue of this This miserable life saith the sinner cannot last always death will arrest me shortly and present me before a just Tribunal the grave will e're ong cover me but not be able to conceal me for I must come to Judgment Methinks I hear already the sound of the last Trump Let the dead arise let them come to judgment I see the Angels as Apparitors gathering all the world together and presenting them before that dreadfull Tribunal How shall I be able with my guilty Conscience to appear upon that huge Theatre before God Angels and Men Methinks I see the Devil standing at my right hand to aggravate those faults which he prompted me to the commission of I behold the Books opened and all the debaucheries extravagancies and follies of my whole life laid open Christ the Judge of all the World coming in flaming fire to take vengeance upon them that have not known him nor obeyed his Gospel How shall I endure his presence how shall I escape his eye I cannot elude his judgment nor evade his sentence come then ye Rocks and fall upon me and ye Mountains cover me from the face of the Lamb and from him that sitteth upon the Throne But the Rocks rend in sunder the Sea and the Earth disclose their dead the Earth dissolves the Heavens vanish as a Scroll and I hear the dreadfull Sentence Depart ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels Methinks I hear Christ Jesus thus upbraiding me You have listened to the Devil and not to me I would have saved you but you would not be ruled by me you have chosen the way of death now therefore you shall be filled with your own ways I forewarned you what would be the issue of your courses but you would have your full swing of pleasure for the present whatever came of it hereafter you laughed at judgment and it is come in earnest you have had your time of jollity and sensual transports and now your portion is weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth O therefore saith the sinner that I had never been born cursed be the day that brought me forth and the Sun that shone upon me would the womb had been my grave and I had never seen the light Thus my guilty Conscience anticipates its own punishment and I am tormented before my time 4. BUT is there no hope left must I lie down thus in sorrow and despair These things I may justly expect but they are not yet incumbent upon me I am yet alive and they say there is hopes in the land of the living the door is not yet shut against me Hell hath not yet closed her mouth upon me I have heard God is a mercifull God and thereupon I presumed hitherto and abused his goodness but sure his mercies are above the measure of a man if they be infinite like himself he hath more goodness then I have ingratitude Possibly there may be some hope left in the bottom of this
set his heart on those things that will be sure to desert him in his need and in fine which serve onely to make him do that unwillingly which must be done in spight of him that is instead of securing him from death or preparing him for it or fortifying him under it they do in every respect the quite contrary his riches perish and he perishes with them and it may be by them LASTLY for that gawd of fame and worldly glory it is of so thin a contexture that it is disputable whether it have any substance at all or no or any being otherwise then in phancy and conceit But to be sure it is far too slight to last long and too airy to give any satisfaction to a languishing Spirit or a dying man When a man's mind comes to be serious to retreat into it self to feel remorse for former follies what will it avail him that he hath a name amongst men that he hath carried it fairly and raised a reputation with those that see not into the inside of things that he hath appeared bravely upon the Stage but is stripped of all behind the Curtain is taunted and condemned by his own Conscience and by God who is greater then his Conscience and knows all things It is not all the plumes of Fame together with popular breath can lift a man up when his own weight sinks him and his guilt casts him down Especially when death approaches how ridiculous will it be to goe about to comfort a man's self with report when he is going into the land of forgetfullness A good name indeed for brave and vertuous actions embalms a man's memory to all ages but the name of the wicked shall rot in despight of all the spicery of flatterers and Parasites What is there in being talked of when I shall be no more seen what to be mentioned in History unless my name be written in the Book of Life Tully somewhere disputes with himself Longam an latam famam mallet Whether was most desirable a spreading or a lasting name whether to be talked of in many Countries or to be remembred to many Ages But the matter is not great which of the two nor will both of them joyned together be of any moment if a man either cease to be or be in such a condition that it had been good for him never to have been For Notus nimium omnibus qui ignotus moritur sibi He that hath not made it his care so to know himself as to secure himself of a blessed immortality it will be little comfort or antidote against death that he shall be talked of far and near when he is gone So that upon the whole matter in these things consisting all the maintenance and incouragement the Devil can give his Servants and these being so mean and slight in themselves and failing men too at last they have a most uncomfortable bondage that give up themselves to his service CHAP. V. The Habitual Sinner's case stated or a reflection upon what hath been said in the foregoing Chapter THE CONTENTS § I. The import of the phrase when he came to himself shews that the Prodigal was all this while hitherto not well in his wits and that the habitual sinner is in a like condition § II. The truth of which appears by considering either the most usual causes or effects of distraction § III. Objections against this inference answered § IV. The application and conclusion of this First Part of the Parable Vers 17. And when he came to himself he said c. WE have in the foregoing Chapter traced the Prodigal from the freedome and felicities of his Father's house to the extremity of misery and servitude which his extravagant humour cast him into and in him and the issues of his way we have seen the beginnings the progress and the result of a sinfull course lively represented Now summing up all together and reflecting upon what hath been said it is evident that the person here described especially if he resolve to continue in this condition cannot be in his right wits The truth of which all men that seriously consider the premises cannot but bear witness to And besides it is plainly suggested by our Saviour himself in these words vers 17. when he came to himself c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which phrase either signifies a man dead or in a swound at least and coming to life again or a man drunk dispelling at last the cloud of his fumes and recovering the use of his limbs and senses or a man distracted and returning to his wits and understanding again AND indeed all these are applicable enough to an habitual sinner he is morally or spiritually dead Eph. 2. 1. You hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins The disease of willfull sin doth so deprave men's natures and disable their powers that there appears no hope of recovery to a sense of God and goodness no more then of a man naturally dead unless God be pleased to breathe into him the breath of life He is drunk the steams of lust have clouded and besotted his understanding and oppressed all his vital powers that for the present he is not able to guide nor fit to govern himself he hath rather the shape then the sense of a man no man takes his judgment nor regards what he saith or doth but every man looks upon him as a beast and were it not that there is hope of his recovery would think him fit with Nebuchadnezar to be turned out to grass But because this disturbance is usually short it doth not therefore come so home to the condition of the sinner for sin is a lasting phrenzy or distraction and agrees thereto both in the causes and in the symptomes THE true account of the cause of Distraction as I take it is this when the Animal Spirits by some accident or other are so over-heated that they become unserviceable to cool and sedate reasoning And then reason being thus laid aside phansy gets the ascendent and Phaeton like drives on furiously and inconsistently This combustion of the spirits happens sometimes by over great intention of the mind in long and constant study sometimes by a feaver which inflaming the bloud that communicates the incendium to the spirits which take their original from it But most usually by the rage and violence of some of the passions whether irascible or concupiscible as they are wont to be distinguished a man setting his heart vehemently upon some object or other the spirits are set on fire by the violence of their own motion and in that rage are not to be governed by reason This we have sad examples of in Love in Grief in Jealousie in Wrath and Vexation and indeed Bethlehem is filled with the instances And this account fits but too well the case we have in hand namely of the willfull and habitual sinner He having passionately addicted himself to some one or other of
their thinking it had taken effect Then they unworthily contrive to abuse the affections of their good old Father with feigned probabilities that his beloved Son was devoured by wild Beasts And now they thought all was well they had reaked their malice and concealed their guilt they kept their countenances fed upon the sweets of revenge and all this while their Conscience felt no regret Till at last as God would have it they themselves fall into the hands of him they thought they had made away their necessities compell them to goe down to Aegypt and there the man the Governour of the Land lookt sternly upon them pretends to take them for Spies and threatens to deal severely with them Then courage fails them and Conscience recovers We are verily guilty say they of the bloud of our Brother when we saw the anguish of his Soul c. What is the matter now what alters the case how comes Joseph to their minds now who had been so long forgotten Now they find they stand in need of mercy and therefore sadly remember how merciless they had been before now they pity poor Joseph for whom before they had no compassion now they have bowels when their own case was sad and their punishment leads them to a remembrance of their guilt THUS we see affliction if it doth not make men good yet at least it will not suffer them to be at ease in their sin and so disposes them towards repentance But contrariwise prosperity raises the passions and depresses Conscience it hath made many from hopefull and tolerable become bad and intolerable but scarcely ever improved any from bad to good It is a well known story of Zeno who was as intent as any other man upon the amassing of wealth and as much taken with the gaiety of the world so long as his Merchandize succeeded but when he shipwrackt his Fortunes he recovered his reason and applied himself to the study of Philosophy and the inriching of his mind Naufragio tutus foelix infortunio his undoeing was his making and his misfortune proved his recovery And this the Holy Psalmist observes to be a common case for Psal 55. 19. he gives this account of mens obstinate impiety because saith he they have no changes therefore they fear not God And Saint Peter also 2 Pet. 3. 4. represents it as the common argument upon which such men incourage themselves in the contempt of all Religion where say they is the promise of his coming for since the Fathers fell asleep all things continue as they were c. as if he had said whilest there were visible interpositions of the Divine Providence in the world and that God was wont presently by some remarkable judgment or other to revenge himself upon those that violated his Laws and affronted his Majesty so long the world was kept in some awe and Religion reverenced but from such time as there hath been a constant calme and no interruption of the course of common causes men have called in question whether there be any Providence at all in this World and if once they can perswade themselves God hath left off to mind the affairs of the present world they will confidently and with some colour of reason infer that then he will not call things to account hereafter Wherefore it is the usuall method of the Divine Wisdome to make way for the reasons and motives of Religion by affliction first softning the obdurate heart by some sharp cross taking down the pride confuting the Atheism curing the wantonness and delicacy of men's tempers and so bringing them to a cool and thoughtfull condition and to reason with themselves as the Prodigal in the Text. FROM all which we learn both the hardness of a vicious heart in that nothing can pierce it but affliction and also the blindness and folly of men who so passionately desire prosperity together with the great usefullness of affliction and from all these that it proceeds not from harshness and severity in God that he sends calamities upon the sons of men but there is an illustrious instance of his wisedom and of his goodness in those providential dispensations since this is the only way of recovering and making men good and happy § IV. LET us now see in the last place somewhat particularly what are the considerations the Prodigal entertains his thoughts upon in this his afflicted condition And consulting the Text and carrying along with us a just notion of the nature of the case we shall find those reducible to these four points I. HE considers what the condition was he is faln from and how happy he might have been had it not been for his own folly How many hired Servants c. q. d. I that am pinched with want now felt none in my Father's house I was liberally maintained honourably treated wanted nothing but the wisedom to understand my own felicity and in this condition I might have continued for neither did my Father's estate complain of the burden of my accommodations nor was he strait handed or abated any thing of his Fatherly affections towards me it was nothing but my own folly ruined me And then 2. HE proceeds to deplore the sad estate he is fallen into When I set out from my Father's house in quest of liberty did I ever dream of becoming a Slave when I despised the liberal provisions of his Family did I or cou'd I have thought I should come to want bread to feed upon husks How sad is the change how severe is my fate which I know no more how to bear then how to avoid But that 's not the worst yet For 3. HE forethinks what is like to be the issue of this It is not only feeding upon husks but I perish for hunger I have a prospect of nothing but death before me in the case I am in I am lost undone undone in the most dreadfull circumstances for I perish and it is with hunger death makes its sure approaches and that in the most ghastly shape vivens vidénsque pereo I see and feel my self dying 4. But yet in the last place he looks about him to see if there be not some escape I am dying saith he but not quite dead Whilest there is life there is hope Who will not catch hold of any thing rather then perish And it agrees not with my condition to stick at any thing that can minister the least probability of safety Am not I a Son though I am here a Slave have I not a Father and hath not he pity why then do I stand still and die and not rather make the utmost experiment AFTER this manner we may feel the pulse of the Prodigal Son to beat and the thoughts of a sinner whom God hath awakened by affliction move much after the same rate For first as soon as his eyes are opened he cannot choose but call to mind the blessedness of a state of innocency and reason with
he to give both thanks and reward to him that cures our bodily infirmities though he do it not without some pain and trouble to us and why should we not rather love God's methods as the Physician of Souls there is no passion nor much less revenge in his proceedings with us he neither cuts and lances us cruelly nor uses any other sharpness then the case necessarily requires he doth nothing with intention to hurt or grieve us but proceeds with art and care designing our greatest good and in a word is in all his actions agreeable to the goodness and benignity of his own nature The summe of all which and of what we intend further to say is that of the Apostle God is good and the goodness of God leadeth to repentance Rom. 2. 5. For the consideration of that is the spring of hope and of all motion by way of return THERE are indeed some men who having entertained very crude notions of the Divine Majesty do sometimes assert on the one hand that vindictive justice is essential and natural to God so that he is bound up to require strict satisfaction and without it cannot properly pardon any transgression And others on the other hand talk at the same wild rate of his mercy and goodness as if all the instances he makes thereof were also natural and necessary and that he could not insist upon his own right but must make all the expressions of kindness that are possible towards his Creatures But both these notions are equally false and mischievous the former of them representing God a rigid Majesty and tending to desperation the other an easy and soft Deity and tempting men to presume upon him the one making him an object of horrour and the other of contempt for who can love him that cannot pity and who can reverence him who hath it not in his power to do otherwise The truth is therefore that all particular instances both of the one kind and of the other are subject to his wisedom that he can exercise either mercy or severity as he sees occasion for after this manner the Scripture speaks of him that sometime he hath mercy because he will have mercy and that when he will he hardeneth sinners for destruction AND to think otherwise of God especially in the case of mercy and pardon as if he could not dispense it as he pleases is to bring in a rigid fatality with the Stoicks instead of a God and is so far from aggrandizing the Divine Majesty that it is the greatest diminution of his power and glory and renders him less then a man for we can recedere à nostro jure remit of our own rights and give mercy a triumph over strict justice And although the sinner when he offends against God forfeits himself into the divine hand and gives God just cause to punish him if he will yet certainly he cannot by any act of his put a Law upon God or oblige him to punish or if he think fit to shew mercy AND then for the interest of God's Rectourship and government of the world it is not a necessity of punishment that conserves that but the power or freedom of punishing or remitting accordingly as it shall seem good to his own wisedom Whereby when men are both provoked to amendment by the hopes of pardon and restrained from disobedience by the fear of punishment For the liberty of dispensing either of these at pleasure is that which produces a reverence towards the Divine Majesty that is a complication of love and fear wherein the very notion of Religion consists It is not an impertinent passage to this purpose which we have in the Historian when the young Gentlemen in the new Roman Common-wealth had a design to restore the Kingly Government in the Family of the Tarquins they had Speeches made amongst them to this effect To be bound up by the rigour of Laws which had no compassion nor made allowance for contingency was very harsh and unsafe considering humane infirmity But under Kingly Government there was power of dispensation possibility of indulgence liberty of interpretation room for mercy and pardon a man that fell did not necessarily there miscarry For there was place for intercession repentance might relieve him and the prerogative of the Prince was the security of the Subject NOW that repentance is available with God we have all the assurance that can be desired for besides what we have said already from the consideration of the perfections of the Divine Nature and the interest of his Government Repentance is the great and principal Doctrine of the Gospel which the Son of God himself came to proclaim by his Preaching to confirm by his Miracles to make way for and to procure acceptance to by his Death and Sacrifice and to render throughly effectual and successfull by his Intercession at God's right hand in Heaven Wherefore as Manoah's wife reasoned when her Husband had dreadfull apprehensions of the Majesty of God who had appeared to them and concluded they should die Because they had seen God No saith she if God intended to destroy us he would not have appeared to us or much less have accepted a Sacrifice at our hands So assuredly if God had not great compassion to mankind and did not design to accept them upon repentance he would never have given his own Son to be a Sacrifice for sin Can any man suspect that God is indifferent whether men be saved or no when he hath sent his Son to save them Can any man imagine him implacable towards those whose nature he sent his Son to assume and thereby to make an union betwixt the divine and humane Natures Will any man think him inexorable to sinners who pitied them healed them conversed with them and died for them Let Devils despair who have not only no promise and no Saviour but nothing pitiable in their case having had no tempter to abuse them no flesh or body to clog them no infirmity to extenuate their presumption they are without hope and therefore incapable of repentance and so go on eternally to hate and blaspheme the God that will not pardon them But there is no cause man should do so who as he hath all the arguments of pity in his case so hath all the assurances of pardon from God upon his repentance TO say no more the very constant experience of all Ages and the common sense of all mankind leaves us without all doubt that this method of repentance pacifies the Almighty insomuch that when he hath most exprest his angry resentments and seems to have been most peremptory and decretal in his threatnings yet all but mad and desperate persons have incouraged themselves to hope for impunity upon repentance even then when there hath not been the least intimation of any such condition in his denunciations for thus when the Prophet Jonas had from the mouth of God proclaimed expresly Yet forty days and
he observe the most weak and imperfect essays of the new birth or as the Apostle expresses it when Christ is beginning to be formed in men I saw thee saith our Saviour to Nathanael S. Joh. 1. 48. when thou wast under the fig-tree when thou wast reasoning about me whether I was the Messias or not I was privy to that conflict of thy thoughts between the report of the miracles wrought by me and the prejudicate opinion concerning the supposed place of my nativity I was not so much offended with thy objections as pleased with thy sincerity in that thou didst diligently inquire honestly debate and proceed to resolution upon rational satisfaction Most apposite to this purpose is that passage of the Prophet Jeremiah Chap. 31. vers 18 19 20. I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning himself thus Thou hast chastised me and I was chastised as a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke Turn thou me and I shall be turned for thou art the Lord my God Surely after that I was turned I repented and after that I was instructed I smote upon my thigh I was ashamed yea even confounded because I did bear the reproach of my youth And after he had thus passionately described the first kindlings of repentance in the hearts of the people of Israel he then introduces God taking notice and expressing his compassions in the next words Is Ephraim my dear Son is he a pleasant child for since I spake against him I do earnestly remember him still therefore my bowels are troubled for him I will surely have mercy upon him saith the Lord. By all which we see that God despiseth not the day of small things NOW the consideration of this affords mighty incouragement to sinners to begin their motion to God-ward who would not put himself upon the way when the first attempt of returning shall be taken notice of If a man do but consider if he doe but pray if but breathe and pant after God there is a gracious eye upon him it is not altogether lost labour Nay saith our Saviour A cup of cold water given to a disciple in the name of a disciple shall not lose its reward And if such mean performances pass not unrewarded much less doth any thing of good escape God's notice and observation And upon the same consideration there is great reason of caution and that men take heed of discouraging any though never so small hopes of good and buddings of reformation in others for seeing God takes notice of beginnings he must needs be offended with those that obstruct them and will be sure severely to resent it Let therefore those that scoff at prayer and devotion as preciseness at seriousness and self-reflection as melancholy degeneracy of spirit that either press men forward into the same excess of riot with themselves and labour to divert or stifle all workings of Conscience by the means of sensual entertainments or treat those with contumely who boggle at their extravagancies and begin to take up and reform let all such I say consider well what they doe when God's eye is upon such beginings of good lest they be found fighters against God And let all that have any sense of goodness themselves or but so much as a reverence of God's all-seeing eye think it becomes them to incourage such beginnings to indeavour to kindle such sparks and blow them up into a flame of love to God and goodness to which purpose I take liberty to apply a passage of the Prophet Isaiah Chap. 65. vers 8. Thus saith the Lord as the new wine is found in the cluster and one saith Destroy it not for there is a blessing in it q. d. The wise Master of the Vineyard especially in an unfruitfull time takes special notice of those few Grapes in a cluster that have good juice in them and will neither permit them to be carelesly crushed with the hand nor cast away amongst refuse So will the God of Israel do by his Vineyard the House of Israel he will take notice of the few that are good in the midst of a bad generation and not destroy all together And in like manner he will not despise the first essays of emergency from former vice and wickedness But thus I am led to the second parallel § III. 2. The Father as soon as he saw his Son had compassion so hath God to mankind especially when he sees them on their way homeward He had always good will towards them as they were his Creatures made in his own image designed for his service and for the enjoyment of himself and upon all these accounts hath a propension to do them good But so long as any man continues in a course of rebellion against him all the issues and expressions of this good will are obstructed which nevertheless as soon as ever he begins to relent and come to himself break out again and discover themselves For as the Psalmist tells us Like as a Father pitieth his Children so the Lord pitieth them that fear him Psal 103. 13. NOT that we are to imagine the Divine Majesty to be subject to the weakness of humane passion in a strict and proper sense so as to feel any pain or trouble upon the account of his concern for mankind for that the spirituality of his nature the perfection of his understanding and his self-sufficiency will by no means admit of But he is pleased in Holy Scripture to represent himself after that manner to the intent that we may be incouraged to hope and to indeavour since we are assured that he is not a meer spectator of the conflicts and agonies of a Penitent but hath a real inclination to do him good and would by no means have him perish To this purpose Ezek. 33. 11. he swears As I live saith the Lord God I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked but that the wicked turn from his way and live Turn ye turn ye from your evil ways for why will ye die O house of Israel What greater passion can any Father express towards his beloved Son then God here condescends to and what greater assurance can God give of his earnestness and reality then that of an Oath by himself WHILEST men are at the worst the divine goodness finds out some arguments of pity for he considers he made them fallible Creatures that he gave them not the bright and piercing intellects of Angels he joyned matter and spirit together in their composition by means whereof there is a continual contest between sense and reason a constant dispute betwixt bonum utile and jucundum that their transgression is not like that of Devils who sinned proprio motu without a tempter he knows the power of example the prejudices of education the long follies of Child-hood and therefore as I have shewed before is not implacable towards mankind whilest the state of life and this world lasts But when he takes notice that any man begins to
formerly a great sinner himself and hath known by sad experience the deplorableness of that condition and found mercy at God's hands methinks such a person should with warm affections and tender bowels awaken that man into an apprehension of his danger who is in the condition he himself hath escaped and incourage him to try those mercies of God which he himself hath experimented For if either a righteous man that never needed repentance i. e. such a change of his whole state as we have been speaking of should be less sensible of such a man's case or especially if a proud self-applauding Pharisee despise him yet it will by no means become a Convert to be without compassion For besides all other arguments to this purpose it may be such a man may have just cause to consider whether his own example when he did goe on in the way of sin had not that pernicious contagion as to infect or confirm this man in his wickedness which he sees him now lie under and then it will not be only charity but justice which will oblige him to this duty IT was the opinion if I remember rightly of St. Basil that in Hell the torments of the damned are daily increased in proportion as the evil seed of their corrupt doctrine or the evil example which they sowed whilst they were alive fructifies upon earth but whether that be so or no it is certain men's sins are aggravated by the mischief they do to others as well as by other circumstances and therefore every such Penitent as we speak of must think it his duty and concern to indeavour to hinder the propagation of sin and to stop the infection in others as well as to destroy the malignity of it in himself § II. NOW there are many ways which an honest heart will find out of doing this we are recommending without taking upon him to be a Preacher Solomon tells us A wicked man speaketh with his feet and teacheth with his fingers that is though he say nothing with his lips all his life and actions do teach and instruct the world in wickedness and there is no question but that holy men may most effectually recommend vertue to others by their own practice and example Example insinuates gently works insensibly but powerfully as almost all great Engines do it relieves men's modesty and yet shames their sloth it kindles emulation presses upon ingenuity recommends the excellency convinces the necessity demonstrates the possibility of vertue Besides that there are a great many of the most curious lines thereof that are not to be described by the pencil or that can be expressed by words but are to be observed in the life and conversation of good men For this reason amongst others it pleased God to send our Saviour not only to preach the divine life to the world but to live and converse with men that by his example he might more plainly convince them of it and for this cause also we solemnly thank God for the examples of all holy men that have gone before us AND besides example there are many opportunities and advantages which good men have of propagating a sense of piety and Religion such as the authority of Parents influence of benefactours interest of relations convenience of travelling together society of commerce and all other bonds of conversation Every of which a mind inflamed with the love of God and compassion to the Souls of men will find usefull to this purpose And this was the course Moses advised Israel for the keeping up a sense of God and his Laws in their minds and the propagation of it to posterity Deut. 6. 6 7. These words which I command thee this day shall be in thine heart and thou shalt teach them diligently to thy Children and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house and when thou walkest by the way and when thou liest down and when thou risest up c. And for the incouragement of all good men in this business besides the great honour it is to be subservient to God in so important an affair and besides the unspeakable comfort to our own Consciences If by converting a sinner from the evil of his way we save a Soul from death and cover a multitude of sins Jam. 5. 20. and that by such an act of zeal we have also the happiness to efface our own former miscarriages Besides all this I say in present we shall also advance our own glory and crown hereafter for in the words of the Prophet Daniel They that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the Firmament and they that turn many to righteousness as the Stars for ever and ever Daniel 12. 3. IT were very easy to inlarge on this subject but that which is most pertinent and the peculiar consideration of this place is to shew the particular aptness of those that have themselves been converted from a wicked life to be instrumental of recovering others which I will briefly give account of in the following particulars and so dismiss this point And in order to this § III. IN the first place it is considerable that those that are of sickly constitutions are generally observed to be more pitifull and compassionate to the infirm then those robust and healthy persons that scarce ever knew what sickness meant and those that have long languished under any painfull infirmity and at last have recovered are both the best able and most willing to give advice to others under the same distemper Upon which account it hath been the custom of some Nations who had no professed Physicians to bring their sick out into the Market-place where all persons that came were obliged by Law to take notice of them that by this means the experience of one that had escaped a disease might afford a relief to him that now laboured under it And so it is reasonable to think that those who have been sick in sin and of sin heretofore must needs by their own experience know the baits that allure men the charms that bewitch them the fallacies of Sathan that impose upon them the folly and perverseness that defixes men in that unhappy estate the workings of passion the regret of Conscience the thoughts and reasonings the objections the prejudices and the very inside of other men in that condition And therefore as God commands Israel Exod. 23. 9. Thou shalt not oppress a stranger for ye know the heart of a stranger seeing ye were strangers in the land of Aegypt i. e. they knew what injuries oppressions insolencies and affronts a stranger was exposed to and what fears anxieties and jealousies he must needs be always under and therefore it having been their own case they ought to think it reasonable to pity such so in the present case the Convert is furnished both with more observations to render him serviceable to the conversion of Souls and more compassion to apply and make use of his experience to
yet when we say and that truely of him that he made all things for himself and his own glory the meaning is that he takes delight in the reflection of his own image and feels his own perfections reverberated upon him from his Creatures BUT there is no necessity we should goe so far since all I am concerned in at present is sufficiently manifest namely that the happiness of men in the Kingdom of Heaven could not be compleat and full without the advantage of that blessed society which there they shall enjoy and that added to the forementioned ingredients raises it to the highest pitch of felicity that we can apprehend or imagine FOR in the first place there we shall enjoy the glorious presence of the Divine Majesty without consternation or affrightment whilst men are in this world it is not only impossible for weak eyes to behold so bright a glory but every approach of him strikes them with terrour When God had appeared to Jacob in a vision only it filled him with great apprehensions of so august a Majesty and he breaks out Gen. 28. 17. How dreadfull is this place c. And the Prophet I saiah when he saw a stately scene of the Divine Glory cries out Woe is me I am undone for mine eyes have seen the King the Lord of Hosts Isa 6. 5. For besides that the very glory of such displays of the Divinity were wont to be very wonderfull and surprizing the consideration also of what men had deserved at God's hands and the reflection upon their own miscarriages made all such appearances very formidable and suspicious to them But now in Heaven we shall see him and live he will not oppress us with his Majesty nor confound us with his Glory there shall be no guilt to affright us nor object to amaze us he will either fortify and sharpen our sight or submit himself to our capacity and shine out in all sweetness delight and complacency towards us NOW this must needs afford unspeakable felicity for in enjoying him we enjoy all things forasmuch as all that is any where good and delectable did flow from him and is to be found in him as in its source and original All that can charess our powers that can ravish our hearts all that is good all that is lovely and desirable are here in their greatest perfection and compendiously to be enjoyed So the Psalmist Psal 16. 11. In thy presence there is fullness of joy and at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore AGAIN we shall there also enjoy the society of the blessed Jesus we shall see him as he is and behold his glory and be with him for ever What a ravishment was it to the Disciples and what an ecstasy did it put them into when he appeared again to them after his Resurrection he had promised them he would do so and they had reason to believe him having seen the miracles he had wrought already and the wonderfull attestations to his divine power notwithstanding when they saw with what malice the Jews persecuted him and with what success that they stigmatized his reputation insulted over his person derided his doctrine and put him to death which he had now for some time lien under the power of their hearts mis-gave them and they began now to mistrust they should never see him again who they had hoped should have redeemed Israel However they resolve to see what is become of him and between hopes and fears they come to his Sepulchre on the third day but with more of the latter then the former as appears by the spices they brought with them to imbalm him as if they resolved his memorial should be precious with them though they never saw him more Thither being come they find the Watch dismayed and fled the Sepulchre open the Grave-cloaths laid in order all which somewhat revived them and besides they see an Angel standing at the door telling them that he was indeed risen from the dead this more incourages them but when himself appears to them as they were going pensive into Galilee and convinces them that it was indeed he by entertaining them with the same discourses he used to have with them by eating with them and by shewing to Thomas especially his Hands and his Feet and all the Characters of the same person THEN what joy were they in Lord how were they transported how do they wonder at their own stupidity and incredulity hitherto and admire their own felicity now But when at the last day after many hundred years interruption of his bodily appearance nay when those good men that have not seen but have believed that have lived to him denied themselves been persecuted have died for him shall see him in glory shall behold that image of perfect goodness and loveliness shall injoy him that died for them that purchased them by his bloud that opened Heaven to them shall hear him say Come ye blessed of my Father receive a Kingdom prepared for you c. You who have imitated me in holiness and followed me in my sufferings you who have not been discouraged by the meanness of my first appearance nor the long expectation of my second coming whose love and resolution for me was not baffled by the contempt of the world debauched by the examples of men nor abated by the pretended difficulty of my institutions you shall now see my glory be like me rejoice with me live with me and never be separated from me more It is in vain for me to goe about to express the transcendency of this joy which no tongue can utter nor any pen can describe we can think a great deal more then we can speak but we shall then feel what we cannot now conceive when every face shall shine with chearfullness every eye sparkle with joy every heart overflow with gladness and every mouth be filled with Allelujah and the whole Quire sing together the new song the song of Moses and of the Lamb. BUT this is not all yet for in Heaven holy men shall not only enjoy the presence of their Lord but the comfortable society of all his train the glorious host of Angels these as they have condescended to minister to men in this world and diligently to imploy themselves for the protection of good men and for the recovering of evil men to God and for the raising them from the dead and presenting them before God in Heaven so having now successfully finished all that ministry shall now wellcome them to glory rejoice with them and entertain them in friendly and familiar conversation those great and wise and holy Spirits shall recount to them all the wonders of divine providence past which they have been imployed in discover to them all the secrets of the other world and as Praecentors goe before and guide them in all the joys and triumphs of that blessed Kingdom AND lastly holy men shall rejoice in the happy society of one
it are inlarged where the objects to be enjoyed are unlimited and unmeasurably great and lastly where the duration is eternal no wrong is done to one man when another is happy as well as himself nor can any complaint murmur or animosity enter there 3. BUT thirdly if it appear that there was great reason why the Father should thus dispose then his apology is the more perfect and the murmurs of the elder Brother utterly absurd Now for this the Father adds It was meet that we should make merry and be glad for this thy Brother was dead and is alive again c. As if he had said Son though the prerogative of a Father ought to bear down the pretensions of a Son and I might without your leave dispose as I will of my own yet I have taken care of your interest as well as of my own authority and have shewed you that your Brothers gain shall not be your loss and now I will condescend further to you and shew you what equitable considerations there were on the part of your Brother which made it becoming my wisedom to do as I have done IN the first place when I saw in how sad and pitifull a plight your poor Brother was who was my own flesh and bloud as well as your self and thereby collected what hardships he had undergone I should have forgotten my self as well as him and not have deserved the name of Father if seeing his contrition as well as his distress I had not had compassion on him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. St. Chrysost When saith the Father I saw my Son observed his submission and heard his humble address what could I do less then I did was it in my power not to pity my own Son be thou judge that art angry at it It was not in my nature to be cruel to him that proceeded from my own loins c. And by the favours which you see I have conferred upon him I have not only melted down all the hardness of his heart and assured him to my self for the future against all relapses but also set open a door of hope to others of my family if ever such a case should happen again that they may have no invincible temptation to be obstinate and incurable And if perchance you may think that by this means I as well incourage others to rebell as to return I tell you that I for my part had rather if it must be so that many should presume upon my goodness then that one should despair of mercy since the latter would seem to perish by my default but the other only by their own folly AND again when I considered how difficult a matter it is for any that are once intangled in a course of sin to dis-engage themselves again because rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft and that to sip of the cup of meer liberty is intoxicating and stirs up an unquenchable thirst after more that there are charms in debauchery and the lips of an whorish-woman are snares and bird-lime when I say I consider that a young man who hath once cast off the awe and reverence of his Father and the reins of government is like the Raven out of the Ark who though she found not where to set her foot but saw the face of all things full of horrour and desolation yet hovered to and fro and returned not to the Ark again and I have observed the way of riot and licentiousness usually to end in death and the very mouth of Hell I was therefore not only seised with admiration and transported with joy to see your Brother emerge out of all these difficulties but I thought it fit to set up a monument of so rare an accident and to place some marks of favour upon him that had with such resolution broke through and recovered MOREOVER saith the Father as this event was rare and extraordinary in it self so it will have a very happy influence upon the reputation of my family and government for as insuccessfull rebellions in the conclusion tend to the greatning of the Prince or State from whom the secession was made so this return of my Son will repair the honour of my discipline and management as much as his miscarriage had aspersed it And lastly I have great reason to believe that he who hath made trial of all things and knows so throughly both the miseries that attend an extravagant course and the good and comfort as well as the burdens of obedience and hath by the severity of the former been driven to return to the latter will for ever after prove most dutifull and governable Wherefore upon the whole matter I think there is just grounds for my joy at my Son's return and that you should rejoice also AND now this Apology of the Father suggests to us these four things in justification of the divine wisedom as well as his goodness in bestowing all the unspeakable favours mentioned in the former Chapters upon penitent sinners 1. The great interests and happy influence of such demonstrations of kindness 2. The extream difficulty and consequently the rarity of such recoveries make it very well worth a memorial when any such thing happens 3. It is a vast honour to Religion and demonstrates both the efficacy of its methods and the comfortableness and sureness of its incouragements when such persons are reclaimed Lastly such persons are commonly very eminent and remarkably usefull afterwards and therefore are fit objects of the divine bounty 1. FIRST such demonstrations of favour and kindness to penitent sinners is greatly the interest of God's Family and Kingdom in order both to the bringing men into it and to the assuring their station therein For God as we have said heretofore neither forcibly draws any into his service nor violently detains them in his family but leaves them to the exercise of their own liberty his people are a willing people and that obedience is not worthy of God that is not voluntary and chearfull Therefore it is necessary that he propound great and mighty motives and inducements that so he may out-bid the Devil and convince the minds of men that it is their interest as well as their duty to forsake sin to turn to God and to adhere to him THE Founder of Rome that he might quickly furnish it with Inhabitants made it an Asylum or Sanctuary to all that were in danger or distress that so men finding that security and those advantages abroad which they could not expect at home might make that their Country where they found best entertainment Not unlike to this is the meaning of our Saviour in the Parable of the King which made a Marriage Feast for his Son and having invited his Guests but they refusing he sends his Servants into the High-ways and Hedges commanding them to bring those in which they found there that his house might be furnished with guests not doubting but partly the great necessity
I lain long enough under the terrours of the Law and the spirit of bondage For God requires not sorrow for it self but for its end and it is no satisfaction to him that his Creatures lie under affrightfull apprehensions besides our own Consciences will tell us we may then dry our eyes and be comfortable when the cause is taken away and not before for then is it Godly sorrow when it bringeth forth repentance not to be repented of 2 Cor. 7. 10. AND herein lies the great uncomfortableness of a death-bed repentance for besides the horrible madness of trusting the issues of eternity upon extempore preparations if it should please God to give a man both the grace and the opportunity then at last seriously to bethink himself to feel remorse for his sins to make resolutions and to renew his baptismal Covenant yet then he can give no proof to himself of his own sincerity because he cannot repair God's honour he can make no conquest over Satan he can leave no example to the world he cannot by habit and exercise make the ways of God become easy and natural to himself he cannot be said to have lived the life of the righteous and therefore cannot comfortably conclude that he shall die the death of such AS for the penitent Thief in the Gospel that accompanied our Saviour in his sufferings upon the Cross to whom our Saviour pronounced that he should that day be with him in Paradise his case was peculiar probably he had lived in great darkness and ignorance and never had the means of grace till now but however it was not unagreeable to the divine wisedom and goodness to do something extraordinary at that great time and to signalize the efficacy of our Saviour's Mediatourship by some remarkable instance at such a time when the dignity and glory of his person was most clouded and obscured and as there never was nor will be such another occasion as this so it is great and desperate folly for any man to trust to such an experiment And whereas in the Parable Matth. 20. vers 12. those Labourers that came into the Vineyard at the eleventh hour are rewarded equally with those that had born the burden and heat of the day It is in the first place to be observed that though they came late yet not so late but that they did really work in the Vineyard and then besides here is nothing contrary to what we are pressing for we are far from intention of discouraging any to return at last or from limiting the mercies of God who is able to foresee what a late Convert would have done if he had opportunity and may accordingly extend mercy to him All therefore which I say is that this is a most uncomfortable state when a man's Conscience cannot give security for him nor is there any thing that affords him positive grounds of hope having not performed the conditions of the New Covenant only he hath a general refuge in the merits of Christ and in God's mercy WHEREFORE there is all the reason and all the wisedom in the world that a man should not trust to prefaces and praeludia beginnings and first eslays of repentance but let it have its perfect work that with the Prodigal Son he not only sit down and bewail his misery or take up resolutions of returning to his Father but that he forthwith set about it and effect it So he arose and came to his Father What entertainment he meets with from his Father upon so doing I am now to shew in the third and last Part of the Parable The father said to the servants bring forth the best robe and put it on him c. S t. LVKE 15. 22. Non patitur contriti cordis holocaustum repulsam Quotiens te in conspectu Domini video suspirantem Spiritum sanctum non dubito aspirantem cum intuâ—or flentem sentio ignoscentem Cypr serm de coena Page 240. 241. THE PARABLE OF THE Prodigal Son PART III. The Prodigal received and reconciled or God's gracious reception of a Penitent Sinner S. Luke 15. Vers 22 23 24. But the Father said to his servants Bring forth the best robe and put it on him and put a ring on his hand and shoes on his feet And bring hither the fatted Calf and kill it and let us eat and be merry For this my Son was dead and is alive again was lost and is found c. CHAP. I. Of Reconciliation or Justification THE CONTENTS § I. The passionate story of Joseph Gen. 37. parallel to this Parable before us § II. God takes notice of the first beginnings of good in men The use of that consideration § III. God's compassion and tenderness to men under agonies of mind yet without the weakness of humane passion § IV. God not only takes delight in beginnings of good but promotes them by his grace The famous story in Eusebius of St. John and a dissolute young man and several usefull observations thereupon § V. The greatness of God's pardoning mercy and the fullness and compleatness thereof upon repentance set out in several great instances full of unspeakable consolation to the Penitent and wherein God's mercies outgo those of mercifull men the greatness of the sin of our first Parents and of the Jews in crucifying our Lord which notwithstanding were both pardoned § VI. Of the Novation Heresy and the mischiefs of it § VII Practical reflections upon Justification § I. IT is a very lively and pathetick story which Moses gives us concerning Jacob and his Sons especially his beloved Son Joseph to this effect The Brethren of Joseph envying him that great share he had in his Father's affections resolve some way or other to dispatch him out of the way but that they might not imbrue their hands in his bloud they conclude to sell him a slave to the Midianites that happened at that time to come in the way and to hide their own fault from their Father they kill a Kid and dip Joseph's Coat in the bloud and telling a demure story to the old man impose upon his belief that some wild Beast had devoured his Son Which when the good man was possest of he most tenderly resents the affliction rends his Cloaths puts Sackcloth upon his Loins and mourned many days Whereupon his Sons and Daughters and even those especially that had raised the tragedy personate so well as to take upon them to be his comforters but the wound was too deep to be easily cured for he refuses consolation No saith he I will go down to the grave to my Son mourning my grief shall only wear away with my life and only the land of oblivion shall make me forget Joseph At last after a long and sad time of lamentation there comes the surprizing news to the good man Joseph thy Son is yet alive and Ruler of all the Land of Aegypt The aged Father faints at the tidings the News was too good to
be true the apprehension of his Son's death had seized him so long that he could not believe any thing to the contrary now and by the report of his life his wounds bleed afresh and the grief for the loss of him was so renewed that the good man sinks into a Deliquium BUT when they had opportunity to report the whole business to relate the message was brought from Joseph and especially came to real proof shewing him the Wagons which his Son had sent to bring him down into Aegypt Then saith the Text the Spirit of their Father revived and he is as ready to be transported with an ecstasy of joy now as to be overwhelmed with sadness before but he recovers himself And Israel said It is enough Joseph my Son is yet alive I will goe down and see him before I die THE story besides the unquestionable authority of sacred record carries the natural marks of truth upon it all things being represented so done as they must needs be done upon supposition of the fact And for the lively strokes of passion in it I know not whether any thing in all history be able to match it grief and joy great as their several causes taking place successively vying with and setting off each other NOW although the business which we have at present before us be only a Parable yet it is not much unlike that history for here we find a beloved Son at different times under the extremities of good and evil one while as miserable as folly and misfortune can make him another while recovering himself and his station again and in all this diversity of fortune a good Father passionately concerned with him grieving and rejoycing respectively as the condition of his Son gave him occasion and all exprest with equal life as in the former history as if it were not a representation of what might be done but what was really matter of fact WE have hitherto seen the tragical part only the Son's folly and misery and the Father's grief the Son running on from one intemperance to another till his Father despaired of him and he found himself ruined but then by a great providence he comes to himself and returns but as we say by weeping cross BUT now the scene is changed the Son is recovered and the Father revived and all is joy and gladness Here the good Shepheard bringeth his lost Sheep home on his shoulders rejoycing here we see the good Samaritan pouring in wine and oyl and binding up the wounds of him that was miserably wounded and in a deplorable condition In short here we have a kind Father owning receiving and indowing his returning Son and here we have God Almighty the Father of Spirits pardoning and blessing penitent sinners § II. But to come to particulars whether we attend to the literal or the mystical sense of the Parable in this last part of it we shall easily observe these four remarkable passages 1. The passionate interview the benign aspect and kind greeting the Father affords his Son upon his first appearance in his way homewards 2. The kind and present supply of the Sons wants or he ornaments which the Father bestows upon him being t now returned 3. The splendid reception and entertainment he makes for him 4. And fourthly and lastly his apology for so doing I begin with the first viz. the passionate greeting at the first interview expressed thus vers 20 21 22. But when he was yet a great way off his Father saw him and had compassion and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him And the Son said to his Father Father I have sinned c. THE Son relents and the Father melts into compassion the Son is ashamed and the Father's bowels yern towards him the affections of a Father prevent the Son's humiliation and acknowledgments and yet the Father's kindness will not discharge or supersede the Son's duty there is a noble contention between them the one would demonstrate more love and the other strives to equal that with ingenuity It is hard to observe order in passion however in the Father's carriage we take notice of these four steps FIRST he takes knowledge of his Son at a distance whilest he was yet a great way off though probably his former vices had disfigured him and his poverty disguised him long absence might have estranged him and age had somewhat altered him yet paternal affection is quick and sagacious he discovered and distinguished him notwithstanding SECONDLY his sight affects his heart when he saw him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he had compassion his bowels yerned towards him far sooner is the heart of a Father dissolved into kindness then that of a Son into obedience a great deal of consideration and resolution at last brings the Son to recover his sense of duty but the Father takes fire presently and the flame is not to be concealed For THIRDLY the greatness of his passion prompts him beyond the gravity of his years the dignity of his relation and above the remembrance of his just offence for he ran to meet his Son And then lastly he indulges his affections or cannot command them he falls on his neck and kisses him he forgets all former undutifullness and provocation he stands not rigidly expostulating the matter nor scrupulously weighing formalities but makes the fullest expressions of joy and indearment NOW in a due proportion to all these particulars making only a just allowance for the Majesty of God is the condescension of our heavenly Father towards returning sinners as I will shew by drawing the parallel in all the aforesaid particulars something more at large FIRST as an earthly Parent that has lost a Son carries the image of him in his thoughts and never so loses the remembrance of him but that upon every the least occasion he occurrs to his mind and therefore he will be quick in apprehending the first approaches of him if he happen to return so God our heavenly Father hath so tender a love to men and such a concern for their good and happiness that he takes notice of their first motions towards himself he discerns the first reasonings the reletings the agonies of mind the first dawnings towards a resolution of returning WE see not the Corn grow only we discover when it is grown nor do we discern how our own members are fashioned in the womb but the curious eye of God observes the first lines and traces of nature the first essays and palpitations of life upon which account the Psalmist admires the divine providence Psal 139. 14 15 16. I will praise thee for I am fearfully and wonderfully made My substance was not hid from thee when I was made in secret and curiously wrought in the lower parts of the earth Thine eyes did see my substance being yet imperfect and in thy book all my member were written which in process of time were fashioned when as yet there was none of them And much more doth