that as to whatever befalls the Christian either in this life or that to come If in this life God give prosperity this care of the Soul will make thee use all outward blessings soberly and temperatly This will make thee ready to honour God with them by works of piety and charity Prov. 3. 9. This will make thee endeavour to enjoy God in all such enjoyments and to tast in their sweetness the sweetness of his love in Christ Jesus And thus thy earthly comforts will prove doubly comfortable and thy gaining in the world become the greatest gain to the Soul Or if God send adversity this will make all thy troubles and calamities to work together for thy good He that lost all by shipwrack and then was more careful for his Soul and eternity sayd well I had been undone if I had not been undone The world by its hard using of Gods servants gets nothing nor do their Souls lose any thing If it turn our breath into sighs and groans we shall with the Apostle 2 Cor. 5. 2. groan more earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven And after death the holy Soul cannot but be well Christ who hath redeemed it and prepared heaven for it and it for heaven will thither receive it unto himself where joyntly with the glorified body it shall be most happy for evermore Thus my beloved neighbours you have seen the Souls worth and danger and what care we should have of its eternal salvation to which end you have nothing urged but such solid and weighty truths and duties as are generally owned and manifestly tend to make us holy and happy And now though I be separated from all troublesome affairs that I may thus wholly attend the welfare and service of your Souls and though my eternal life lies out as indeed yours too I can do no more then what I have been endeavouring and am further according to this printed gift ready to do for you The things herein contained still abide to be read and considered by you as often as you please but if any be unwilling thereunto slighting and refusing whatever may thus profit them who can help it How many of those who saw the miracles and heard the sermons of our Blessed Saviour himself and his holy Apostles continued unconverted with what unwearied patience and diligence did the great Evangelical Prophet Isaiah preach above sixty years together to a rebellious and a gainsaying people Isa 65. 2. Rom. 10. 21. Their profitings for a long time did not answer his labours among them but he might comfort himself with a remarkable passage in his own prophecy Isa 49. 4 5. Then I said the words are meant chiefly of Christ sent to the Jews and complaining of them I have laboured in vain I have spent my strength for nought and in vain yet surely my judgment is with the Lord and my work or my reward with my God And now saith the Lord that formed me from the womb to be his servant to bring Jacob again to him Though Israel be not gathered yet shall I be glorious in the eyes of the Lord and my God shall be my strength God will reward his faithful servants both according to what they have done and moreover according to what they truly desired and endeavoured to do If a few if but any one be really advantaged by what I am endeavouring I shall count my labour well bestowed as 't is said of the reverend and learned D r Hammond a passionate Lover of Souls that he used often to break out in these words with an extraordinary vehemence O what a glorious thing how rich a prize for the expence of a mans whole life were it to be the instrument of rescuing any one Soul But which I often and humbly pray if God shall bow the hearts of more making us all a willing people in the day of his power making us seriously mind our Souls salvation in the fore-mentioned ways of true Christian piety oh how greatly should we rejoyce in his goodness and in one anothers happiness O how blessed a thing would it be when the Lord our maker should thus have the Souls which he hath created and be glorified by them when Christ our Saviour should thus have the immortal spirits which he hath redeemed and be magnified in them when further his unworthy servant should come thus to have the fruit of his ministerial labours and you your selves to have the comfort and everlasting gain FINIS
custody would you not be the more sollicitous especially if you saw they were in continual danger and if further you knew that if any of them should be lost by your default you should certainly lose your life for it But now which is much more we are entrusted with many very many precious Souls each of them more worth then a world and they are we see in great and apparent danger to be ruined for ever by manifold errour and wickedness and by innumerable temptations of the flesh the devil and the world and we know moreover that if any of them perish through our neglect our own Souls may come to perish with them and for them as was said to him who had one to keep 1 Kings 20. 39 42. If thou let this man go or be missing thy life shall go for his life Have we not then need to be watchful to the uttermost of our power and to be carefull all the ways we can for their safety and preservation Consider well Acts 20. 17 18 19 20 21 26 27. Ye know after what manner I have been with you at all seasons serving the Lord with all humility of mind and with many tears and temptations which befell me And how I kept back nothing that was profitable unto you but have shewed you and have taught you publickly and from house to house Testifying both to the Jews and also to the Greeks repentance towards God and faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ Wherefore I take you to record this day that I am pure from the blood of all men For I have not shunned to declare unto you all the counsell of God and Ezek. 3. 17 18 19 20. 21. as also Ezek. 33. 2 to 9. O son of man I have set thee a watchman unto the house of Israel therefore thou shalt hear the word at my mouth and warn them from me When I say unto the wicked O wicked man thou shalt surely dye If thou dost not speak to warn the wicked from his way that wicked man shall die in his iniquity but his blood will I require at thine hand Nevertheless if thou warn the wicked of his way to turn from it if he do not turn from his way he shall die in his iniquity but thou hast delivered thy Soul If we be faithful as every honest man should be in his trust we may you see deliver our own Souls but if we be negligent watchmen there are these things among many others which will sadly aggravate our condemnation 1. When admitted to places of imployment we take upon us the cure of Souls for their edification and salvation 2. That we may attend this care the better we receive a benefit piously given to free us from all other cares 3. In order to this I mean the care of Souls for their edification and Salvation our Masters and Tutors instructed us and our parents devoted us to the service of Christ 4. To this too we devoted and gave up our selves professing or hoping that we were thereunto inwardly called and moved by the Holy Ghost 5. For this end we have also been outwardly called or set apart by the Church for the work of the Ministry 6. Moreover when ordained we did solemnly promise and engage this way to bend our studies and to use both publick and private monitions and exhortations as well to the sick as to the whole within our cures as need should require and occasion be given 7. And which we may adde in the last place we were then by the Bishop ordaning most gravely charged and exhorted in these words Brethren we exhort you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ that you have in remembrance in how high a dignity and to how weighty an office and charge ye are called That is to say to be messengers watchmen and stewards of the Lord to teach and to premonish to feed and to provide for the Lords family to seek for Christs sheep that are dispresed abroad and for his Children who are in the midst of this naughty world that they may be saved through Christ for ever Have alwaies therefore printed in your remembrance how great a treasure is committed to your charge For they are the sheep of Christ which he bought with his death and for whom he shed his blood The Church and Congregation whom you must serve is his Spouse and his Body And if it shall happen the same Church or any member thereof to take any hurt or hindrance by reason of your negligence ye know the greatness of the fault and also the horrible punishment that will ensue Wherefore consider with your selves the end of your Ministry towards the Children of God towards the spouse and body of Christ and see that you never cease your labour your care and diligence untill you have done all that lieth in you according to your bounden dutie to bring all such as are or shall be committed to your charge unto that agreement in the faith and knowledge of God and to that ripeness and perfectness of age in Christ that there be no place left among you either for errour in religion or viciousness of Life Now after all this If we do our utmost for the Souls health of them committed to our charge if we leave no good means thereof unattempted If we should labour for this night and day with tears as the Apostle says he did If we should never so often and earnestly beseech you to practice the fore going printed Directions put into your hands and what ever Christian duties our Saviour requires of us If we should follow you from the Church-house to your own houses if no better could be with the most passionate intreaties as for the life of our own Souls and yours who could justly think us too importunate who could reasonably count us too earnest or too busie who could justly blame us for making more a do then needs for all this would be but enough as to some and as to others it would be too little 2. Parents and Family-governours how carefully should they look to it lest any under them should perish by their negligence or wickedness Be assured Christ will erelong say to the as Eliab to David with whom hast thou left those few sheep in the wilderness what are become of those precious Souls of thy Children or Servants which I intrusted thee with Nor will it be enough for thee only to answer For my children I brought them up without the charge of the Parish I put them out to trades or I left them competent estates or portions And as for my servants I paid them their wages and gave them meat and drink according to my agreement with them For all this chiefly respects but the body and thy heart would be filled with horrour if the blood of their Souls should be required of thee Oh the cry of a lost Soul is a dreadful thing Suppose any of thy Servants should now be in hell
Son through the Spirit with nothing but a state of grace and salvation and the fruition of God All that worth which silver and gold and such worldly things have is not so much in their own nature as from our esteem or from some outward humane appointment but we can never thus make them equally excellent with our selves 'T is true by a wilful slavery to sin we may as the Prophet speaks Jerem. 6. 30. turn our selves into brasse and iron and reprobate silver we may unman and unchristian our selves we may undervalue and debase our Souls blotting out the image of God and writing upon them the superscription of earth and the world Thus indeed the Epicure may greatly delight in sensual pleasures and the ambitious mind in flattering titles and the frothy wit in abusive lightness Thus 't is true carnal and worldly things to carnal and worldly hearts may become but too sutable dear and precious But the desires of a gracious heart are after higher and better things For every faithful Christian considers that God hath made even our bodies upright and our faces lifted from the earth that we might conceive how far from it our heaven-born Spirits should be elevated towards himself and Christ and heavenly Glory which are therefore most excellent because most proportionable and sutable to our Souls in their utmost capacities 5. And lastly the worthlesness of the world appears by its unprofitableness As Samuel said to the people 1 Sam. 12. 20 21. Turn ye not aside from serving and following the Lord for then should ye go after vain things which cannot profit because they are vain Too many indeed are ready to think the profits of the world worth their gaining even by the loss of their consciences of heaven and God himself And as for those who make conscience of their waies and endevour to walk circumspectly closely and humbly with God who scrupulously forbear prophane rash oaths and idle discourse who are sensible of the least secret sin who avoid what they can all occasions and appearances of evil who withstand the corruptions of the times and places they live in though they gain less in the world these are often accounted such as know not what is best for themselves But S t Paul assures us that such Godliness with contentment is the truest gain whereas the world when you have spent all your thoughts and the labour of your lives upon it though it may further you in some lesser respects yet it cannot profit you in the main thing necessary It cannot procure us the favour of God who regardeth not the rich man more then the poor for they are all alike the work of his hands He accounts of all not according to their meanness or greatness but according to their real piety and goodness Prov. 19. 1. Better is the poor that walketh in his integrity then he that is perverse in his lips and is a fool Prov. 28. 6. Better is the poor that walketh in his uprightness then he that is perverse in his ways though he be rich Observe They are the poor that walk in their integrity that know love and serve God not that kind of poor who are grossely ignorant and neglectful of God and who lead sensual sloathful and heathenish lives though they above others might be most easily convinced of the emptiness and unprofitableness of the world and so have greater care of their Souls salvation seeking out after God in Christ to supply their Spiritual necessities that it may be better with them in the life to come Again the world cannot ease the pain of an afflicted conscience nor can it give us the grace we want Ordinarily 't is so abused that it makes people not more thankful but more forgetful of God nor doth it as it ought draw their hearts nearer to God but sets them at a further distance from him nor doth it make them more humble but more haughty nor more constant and sincere in duties but more unfit for any good word or work Nor can the world profit us in the day of wrath When the sinful pleasures of youth are ended by sickness age or death what can be left but the worm of conscience bred out of them to torment the Soul for ever Have you not sometimes considered with your self how soon the world and its pleasures will turn you off How can you but now and then take notice of your own frailties which tell you how certainly and shortly you must lie down in the dust Do you not sometimes go to the house of mourning or stand by dying people confessing the world to be nothing worth and complaining of the losse of their time and strength spent upon it And do you not see how little it doth for them in their greatest need Oh therefore let this prevail with us to prize our Souls above the world let this with what hath been considered in the foregoing particulars make us set as light by it as it doth or will do by us Let us henceforth make Christ our treasure and count it our happiness to honour and worship him as we ought to do Let us make God our portion and sit down content with him alone and let them who can get no better take the world and the pleasures of it Having now seen what it is to gain the world and the worthlesness thereof though gained we are in the next place to consider what it is to lose the Soul and the preciousness of that if lost As to the losing of the Soul the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here rendred to lose signifies to have a mulct or punishment inflicted and so may import not only the fatal final losse or damnation of the Soul but also any losse or damage that belongs to it here or hereafter 1. Therefore to lose the Soul is to lose ones self A mans Soul is the principal part of himself and so it is in S t Luke ch 9. 25. What is a man advantaged if he gain the whole world and lose himself Soul and body too and be cast away 2. To lose the Soul implies a being deprived of all further opportunities and seasons of grace of all virtuous and gracious endowments which are as the life of the Soul When Christ calls by death or Judgement they that like the foolish virgins have not oyl in their lamps and their lamps trimmed that have not their Souls adorned with the saving graces of his Spirit they shall not enter with him Having waited so long already and all in vain he will now stay no longer till they go and buy for themselves but will shut the door of mercy against them for ever 3. The losing of the Soul implyes the losse of all such earthly enjoyments as sensual hearts love and prize above their Souls and for which they undoe themselves for ever Oh who can express the wretchedness of such people when they shall stand before the Judgment seat of God to
receive their just doom in the most forlorn and desolate condition stript and forsaken of all carnal comforts friends possessions and outward accommodations whatsoever which to the hazard of their Souls they have grasped at and used in a sinful way and therefore must now lose both the Soul and them too eternally 4. The losing of the Soul implyes the losing of Christ and Heaven and the blessed Vision of God for ever And this indeed is the loss of losses such as there was never the like before nor ever can be again after it The fore-mentioned might be born but hardly but this is intollerable This worst effect of sin Depart from me or go away from me is as terrible a word as everlasting fire For alass Whither shall they go that go from God when he alone hath the power of eternal life Ten thousand words cannot speak a Soul more unhappy then those two words without God Eph. 2. 12. Thou mayst be without riches without friends without health without liberty nay without all outward blessings and yet be blessed but if without God thou art cursed with a curse The hypocrites hell which is the hottest of all other is set out by this Job 13. 16. The hypocrite shall not come before God When God would most powerfully perswade to dutie this is his motive Jerem. 7. 27. Obey my voice and I will be your God When he would most effectually disswade from sin this is his argument Jerem. 6. 8. Be instructed O Jerusalem least my Soul depart from you And again Hos 9. 12. Wo unto them when I depart from them How sad a saying is that of Sauls 1 Sam. 18. 15. I am sore distressed for the Philistins are upon me and God is departed from me How mournfully doth Micah bemoan the loss even of his helpless idols Judges 18. 24. Ye have taken away my Gods and what have I more and what is this ye say unto me what aileth thee How sadly is holy David and our Blessed Saviour afflicted at Gods absence in part and for a while My God my God why hast thou forsaken me says the one Lord says the other Psal 88. 14 15. why castest thou off my Soul Why hidest thou thy face from me I am afflicted and ready to dye while I suffer thy terrours I am distracted Do these so complain of Gods absence in part and for a while how bitterly then will the lost Soul complain when forsaken of God utterly and eternally Some are ready to say to God as Job 21. 24. Depart from us for we desire not the knowledge of thy ways They think him sometimes too near them in a Sermon in a private instruction in a motion of his Spirit or in a conviction of conscience and could wish him with his holy Laws farther off that they might sin more securely but let such beware least he take them at their word and give them their wish to their woe in banishing them everlastingly from his comfortable presence Oh with what tormenting grief will they then behold those Soul-ravishing delights which the righteous have in the presence of God the fountain of all good whilst they are sentenced to an eternal separation from him How sad and deformed a spectacle is the body from which the Soul is parted oh how sad then shall the condition of that Soul be from which God is parted for ever This though very grievous yet is not all for 5. and lastly the losing of the Soul implies further it s being brought to the highest degree of sin and consequently to such a fulness of sorrow and such a weight of Gods burning eternal wrath as no heart can conceive or tongue express They that would choose sin to save themselves from a little trouble or affliction will find that now what they feared and ten thousand times more is come upon them The wicked could now wish their Souls were so lost as to cease to be that they might cease to be tormented but God by his infinite power will both uphold them in their being and make them more sensible of pain then ever that they may be the subjects of greater punishment And now the Conscience of a lost Soul gnaws to think so many nights I went to bed prayerless so many times I swallowed down unlawful gain so many hours I spent in revelling foolish sporting or idle unprofitable talking so many opportunities of receiving good at the Lords-supper and other ordinances I have lost because I would not prepare for them nor so much as defile my foot or endure a little cold or trouble to be present at them Oh that I had been more diligent in the practice of religion and holiness oh that I had kept the Lords-day better and been more innocent in my walking all the week after though a less gainer in the world Oh that I had never known such or such a sin which I loved lived in plotted and contrived and by which I have now wrought my own eternal ruine Oh that I had spent but half my mis-spent time in praying and studying Gods Word in doing good and watching over my ways then had I been yonder in Heaven but now I must be for ever tormented in these flames Thou mayst now so under value thy Soul as to spend much more time upon thy beasts then upon it though Truth it self tells us in the Text that it is more worth then a world But that which is now despised in hell will be esteemed and the damned shall fully know the price of this Pearl whether they will or no. But it is far better to know and believe it now that we may be more careful of its preservation Consider therefore I beseech you in the next place the preciousness of the Soul in these several respects 1. As to God our maker for did not he at first make it in innocency after his own glorious image in knowledge righteousness and holiness Gen. 1. 26. Eph. 4. 14. Col. 3. 10. And ever since how is it the body of the Child only the frailer and viler part which is from the substance of the Parents as it was at first formed of the dust of the ground Gen. 2. 7. whereas the precious Soul which is of a Spiritual nature and shall never die hath its immediate being and original from God the Father of Spirits Heb. 12. 9. Infundendo creatur creando infunditur How is it God only from whom it is who can effectually command the Soul to subjection while the Magistrate can but force the outward man And God only who can punish it while man can but kill the body S t Mat. 10. 28. Still even under the state of corruption how is it the Candle of the Lord and the master-piece of his creation shewing the dignity of its nature by its various and noble operations He that by these knows not what the Soul is knows not what a man is For what is it but the Soul which thus distinguisheth us
their everlasting peace 6. That which I would chiefly and in the last place intreat for thy Souls safety is this Expose not thy self to the temptations of Seducers The Soul is more precious then to be hazzarded upon the mistaken sense of the Apostles words 1 Thess 5. 21. To trie all things thou needst not be of all religions how false or dangerous soever Among several poysons thou wouldst not trie any of them whether it would kill thee or no. Therefore the meaning of this place must be that we are to examine the Doctrines that are delivered unto us by the Scripture whether they are built thereon or no. Like the Bareans commended Acts 17. 11. who searched the Scriptures whether those things were so that were delivered to them for the truths of God And let that place Rom. 14. 1. be considered by all such as are not throughly grounded in the Principles of Christianity Him that is weak in the faith receive but not to doubtful disputations Every private Christian is not fit to cope with hereticks and such as are skilful to destroy the faith of others You would not allow a man to come and undermine the foundation of your house This do they and worse that go about to undermine your Faith and labour to shake and unsettle you in the grand truths of the Gospel Therefore I say again Expose thy Soul as little as may be to the temptations of seducers 'T is in vain for any to pray to God to keep them from the infection of errour if they wilfully against the express word of God and without any just warrant and call run into the company of Seducers and read their Books Observe well how God in the Scripture bids us To beware of them S t Mat. 7. 15. not to go after them S t Luke 21. 8. To avoid them Rom. 16. 17. To turn away from them 2 Tim. 3. 5. If they come to us not to receive them or bid them God speed or encourage them 2 Ep. Joh. 10. Though they come with seeming zeal Gal. 4. 17. They zealously affect you but not well Yea they would exclude us that you might affect them Though they come with pretences of Gods Spirit this they may easily do who are led by their own spirit or a worse 2. Cor. 11. 3. But I fear lest by any means as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity which is in Christ v. 4. For if he that cometh preacheth another Jesus whom we have not preached or if ye receive another spirit which ye have not received or another Gospel which ye have not accepted ye might well bear with him v. 13. For such are false Prophets deceitful workers transforming themselves into the Apostles of Christ v. 14. And no marvel for Satan himself is transformed into an Angel of light v. 15. Therefore it is no great thing if his Ministers also be transformed as the Ministers of righteousness whose end shall be according to their works And to this we may adde but two Scriptures more and so finish this use The one 2 Pet. 3. 17 18. Ye therefore beloved seeing ye know these things before beware lest ye also being led away with the errour of the wicked fall from your own stedfastness But grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ The other Jude v. 24 25. Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling and to present you faultless before the presence of his Glory with exceeding joy To the only wise God our Saviour be Glory and Majesty Dominion and Power now and ever Amen Use 4. Is the losse of the precious Soul so exceeding great and dreadful How very careful then so far as concern'd should we be of the welfare and salvation of the Souls of others And how fearful should we be to have any hand in their utter undoing If thy friend after thou hast warned him will take such ways as but to ruine his estate dost thou not think it well when thou canst say praised be God in that I am not guilty of it Much more if any of thy relations neighbours or acquaintance after thou hast endeavoured thy duty towards them will follow such courses as to ruine their Precious Souls is it not a great mercy when thou canst say blessed be the Lord in that I have had no hand in it In a Country a Parish a neighbour-hood a family by setting a good example and so furthering the work of Christ in the hands of his Ministers thou mayst not only benefit thy self but be always doing good to others as long as thou livest and the Souls of those whom time after time thou hast encouraged in the ways of holiness may come to bless God for thee and with thee for ever Whereas by shewing a bad exampl thou hinderest the messengers of Christ in his work and service and art continually doing mischief to thy self and others about thee all thy life long And the perishing Souls which thou hast any way drawn to sin and ruine may curse thee eternally as a wretched miscreant doing more hurt then if thou hadst ruined a whole Kingdome as to the outward estate of it Oh therefore if thou hast inticed any to sin and they be yet a live seek to do their Souls as much good as thou hast been a cause of evil But if they be dead and swallowed up in the torments of Hell think what a case thou art in and how justly thou mayst fear to follow them if a great repentanee prevent it not But this chiefly concerns those who in a more special manner are entrusted with the Souls of others whether Ministers or Parents and Family governours 1. As for every faithful Minister of Christ how exceeding careful should they be for the Souls committed to their charge How exceeding careful should they be to save themselves and those that hear them And to keep themselves as S t Paul says he did pure from the blood of all men 'T is true God hath made our Calling excellent and honourable but people would see little cause to envy us that double honour of respect and maintenance which the Apostle would have given 1 Tim. 5. 17. did they rightly consider how weighty our charge is how dangerous our condition how many and difficult our duties and how troublesome our fears and cares touching the estate of their Souls I know some may think we take more care then needs wishing we would meddle less with them in their ignorant careless and secure ways which we could wish too if it would consist with Gods honour the credit of religion and their and our own safely But I besech you consider if any of you was intrusted with a Jewel of five or ten thousand pound price would you not see it needful to watch all ways and by all means to keep it safe and secure and if you had many such in your