to do through the hatred we use to have of any Error which we oppose the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as St. Basil calls it I therefore say I must acknowledge and I do it without Regret that what an old Author has said of Phidias may be truly enough apply'd to every wise and good man in a Moral sense If Phidias wanted Ivory out of which to make a Statue he could make one of Brass If Marble were wanting he could make one of Wood. If the best Wood were wanting he could make one of the worst And still how course soever his Materials happen'd to be the Statue should be as good as the Stuff would bear Just so a wise and good man will make the best use he can of any Condition he can be in All his wants will be with Comfort All his Advancements with Humility All his Injoyments with Moderation He will equally stand affected to Death and Honour neither of which is to be courted thô they are Both to be indured when laid upon him unsought without impatience But yet as Phidias could work the better the fitter Materials were allow'd him and some were fitter for his purpose than others were so a wise and good man is able to make a better use of one Condition than of another and therefore ought to choose That which he can manage with the most ease to the best Advantage Now what Condition That is hath been sufficiently imply'd in the four Reasons going before of God's severe Prohibition Seek them not and may yet more expresly be made out to us in That which follows For § 9. If all Secular Greatness is less conducible to a man's Happiness or his Contentment here on Earth and carries with it more Impediments in the Narrow way to Heaven which our Lord and his Apostles affirm expresly than That other State of life which is low and little It cannot but follow on the contrary for Contrariorum contraria est ratio that the inferiour State of life is much the Best and the most Retired the most desirable Condition Indeed 't is pity that Superfluities should enlarge a man's Appetite yet so they do Pity 't is that a man's Avarice should ever be widened by his Possessions yet so it is And therefore the Scythians did very fitly thus expostulate with the Great Emperour who conquer'd all he ever fought with except Himself Quid tibi divitiis opus est quae Te cogunt esurire What hast Thou to do with Meat which does but serve to increase thy hunger or what need hast Thou of Riches which make thee still the more needy for they observ'd the more he had the more he wanted what he had not And the degrees of a man's Want do by very sound Ethicks define his Poverty We know 't is customary for Parents to make and leave if they can a great Provision for their Children or for their Nephews if they have none And still the greater Estate they leave them the better they think they have done their Duty because they take it for a thing granted that men are as Happy as they are Rich. But when we reflect upon the Character and the Choice of those men who either were sick of great Plenty and therefore left it as a Disease or were afraid of its Infection and therefore refused the Offers of it 't is plain Experience and Practice and the Best mens Examples as well as Reason yes and abundance of Scripture too will make us quite of another mind For though Contentment cannot arise from any Proportion of Estate be it great or little because it grows to us from within and not from any thing without us yet I conceive a mean Estate does most contribute to its Attainment and with the men who have but Little the Greatest Contentments are seen to dwell The reason of which is very evident For 't is easy to have a little and to be below Envy whilst 't is absolutely impossible to be above it And therefore That of Claudian has apparent Truth in it Est ubi despectus nimius juvat There is a Time when a man prospers by being slighted When a man's Poverty is his Protection when too much contempt secures his liberty and his life 'T is ever best because safest because least troublesom least perillous least invidious Not to be Great Again Ad manum est quod satis est As 't is easy to have a little so a little is sufficient for Food and Rayment and St. Paul infers strongly that Food and Rayment are enough the upshot of all we can want or pray for and 't is enough that breeds Happiness because Contentment meeting with a Mind that is fitted for it And a man's Mind is sooner fitted to find enough in a Little than to meet with it in great Abundance For Sudatur ad Supervacua says the Roman Philosopher what is more than just enough begins to have somewhat of Excess and All excess is superfluous which for that very reason will cost us sweat if not the Sweat of the Brow yet the Anxiety of the Brain not only in the Solicitude how to get or to improve but in that easier Concernment How to manage and to praeserve it In each of which Cases Sudatur ad Supervacua The meaner man even in This is so much happier than the greater by how much 't is better not to have than to lose Abundance which sooner or later the Great man must and the Mean man cannot Still the Greater any one is the more he is obnoxious to Chance and Fortune by which 't is better not to be favour'd than forsaken at last And therefore the Baleares of whom we read in Diodorus did so reflect upon the Misery which Geryon's great Treasures betray'd him to for he had never else been visited and kill'd by Hercules that they durst not have Plenty for fear of Thieves for fear of providing for their Enemies as Geryon did Which comparing with That of David He heapeth up Riches and cannot tell who shall gather them and with the Counsel of Christ himself Take no thought for the Morrow and lay not up Treasure upon Earth Matth. 6. I do the less think it strange thô strange enough that Maximus Tyrius and other Antients admir'd the Wisdom of Diogenes in that he made it his choice to be as unfurnished as an Angel as free from all Earthly Goods as the Spirits of Heaven For they consider'd within Themselves that to have Riches and Honours as well as Children is to give Hostages to Fortune And that 't is here as in an Army the greater the Bulk the more it is expos'd to Wounds and Slaughter § 10. But thô the Saying of Epicurus is most evidently true Honesta res est Paupertas laeta that he who does not only bear but injoy his Poverty is not only an happy but an honourable man and in this respect a rich one that what he has not
we are glued in our Affections to the things here below we think the World to be a Great and a Glorious thing so the higher we fly above it the more contemptibly Little 't is natural for it to appear And therefore § 17. Secondly let us consider That as the way whereby to escape the glorious Dangers of which I speak is to sequester our Affections from the Things of this World and to take wing towards a Better so that our Flight may be the higher we are to take some ready Course whereby to make our selves light For however it is natural for Birds to fly yet the most they can do is but to flutter if they are laden with thick Clay a Phrase by which the Prophet Habakkuk describeth Mony and denounceth a Woe to them that load themselves with it The reason of which is very obvious For notwithstanding it is natural for the spirit of man to fly upwards yet what in one Case is natural may be impossible in an other A man may fly just as soon with a weight of Lead at his Feet as with a Burden of Silver upon his Back The lightest Birds commonly do fly the highest And considering 't is a Duty for a man so to buy as if he were never to possess To deny his dear self and to take up Christ's Cross and to follow Him it seems to follow thereupon that He who hath least of this World and the least to do in it is probably the fittest for That great Duty Though 't was not meerly for being poor that Lazarus was carried to Abraham's Bosom yet 't was That that his Poverty dispos'd him for And St. Peter said fitly touching Himself and his Condisciples Lo we have left All and followed Thee Because they could not follow Christ and carry all they had with them For every Follower of Christ has a very narrow way wherein to walk and a very strait Gate whereat to enter So that the Body of a Christian is Load enough unto the Soul and therefore many more Impediments may well be spar'd Our Bodies saith St. Paul are but Earthen Vessels but Dust and Ashes saith Abraham Gen. 20. 27. And sure the way to keep our selves unspotted from the World is not to bury our selves alive even by adding Earth to Earth Ashes to Ashes Dust to Dust. That being the way of our being buried not in sure and certain Hope but in sure and certain Fear of a Resurrection For when the Minions of this World who are dead whilst they live shall by the just Judgment of God live again when they are dead too and shall be summon'd out of their Graves as Malefactors out of a Dungeon they will say to the Mountains fall on us and to the Hills cover us that is they will desire to be once more buried Now to prevent so sad a Rising we are to Rise whilst we are here from the Death I mean of Sin and from the Grave of Carnality And that we may rise the more nimbly we must be Levis Armaturae must not lay upon our selves too great a load of thick Clay which commonly brings with it another load whether it be of worldly Cares or of Carnal Pleasures Whatsoever most Christians may think of This 't was sadly consider'd by many Heathens of which I shall but instance in four or five Diogenes was a poor but yet a very great Man because his Poverty was his choice and he was one who did not want but contemn the Gayeties of the World How did he fly above the Vices and Follies of it by stripping himself of its Impediments and by imping the wings of his brave Ambition 'T was his Ambition to be at Liberty not to give Hostages to Fortune to live a life disingaged from things below him He found that one Tub was enough to lye in and one wooden Dish enough to drink in and was resolved that his Housholdstuff should hold proportion with his House Yea even That he thought too much for its being somewhat more than was strictly needful And therefore he brake his wooden Dish upon his first consideration That the Hollow of his Hand had made it needless Now I the rather choose to instance in this remarkable Philosopher because I know him very much censur'd and think him as little understood For that which is taken by a Proverb to be the Cynicalness and sowrness was thought by diverse ancient Authors the lovely Nobleness of his Temper His choice of Poverty was the result of his very deep Knowledge and Contemplation Nature and Industry had both conspir'd to his Perfections of which it was not the least that he knew the whole World and always had it under his Feet too as having weigh'd it in a Ballance and found its lightness He had been sued to and courted by the Great Potentates of the Earth whose Prosperities stoop't down to receive the Honour of his Acceptance But what Solomon out of his Wisdom both infused and acquired acquir'd both by joious and sad experience the same Diogenes concluded I shall not dare to say how That All is vanity under the Sun Now we all know that Vanity is of extremely little weight if put in the Ballance of Diseretion and in the Ballance of the Sanctuary of none at all Nay the Psalmist concludes that Man himself is but Vanity who yet is very much the noblest of any Creature under the Sun And sure if every man is Vanity and the greater he is the greater Vanity and not only Vanity but Vexation of Spirit how could Godfrey Duke of Bulloin have done more prudently for himself than in refusing to accept a Crown of Gold where Christ Himself wore one of Thorns or why should any of Christ's Followers buy the Friendship of a Prince when Xenocrates an Heathen would not deign to sell His no not to Alexander Himself who would fain have bought it Why should a Christian affect Dominion when Atilius an Heathen made choice to leave it why should one of Christ's Disciples court and covet That Plenty which was despis'd by Fabricius an arrant Heathen Why should a Christian set his Heart upon the getting and leaving a vast Revenue to his Posterity when the Heathen man Socrates thought it a Charity to his Children to leave them none Not that he thought it a Breach of Charity to make Provision for his Family but that he durst not betray them to great Temptations As He himself had refused half the Kingdom of Samos when offer'd to him so was he willing that his Children should inherit his Temper and Frame of Mind He knew the Providence of God was the surest Patrimony And had been taught by his experience that Friends well got were the next great Treasure 'T was his Duty as a Father to leave his Children very well and by consequence in a condition not the richest but the most suitable and safest for them and therefore
Advantage as well as Duty to do in this case as he would be done by to pay as much Reverence and Submission to such as are over him in Authority as he expects from his own Servants his Wife and Children It being pity that any Subject who is a Rebel to his Prince should meet with any thing but Rebellion from All that owe Service or Duty to him For why should any man expect to have a dutiful Wife an obedient Son or a faithful Servant who is neither of the Three to his Native Soveraign but is undutiful and false to his Publick Parent not to the People's but God's Vicegerent There can be nothing more apposite than that a Boutefeux a Kindle-coal a Make-bate in the City should have his House full of Tumults that He who is hissing at publick Government should carry a Serpent in his own Bosom that as he Sows so he should Reap that his own Wickedness should correct him that he should suffer what he has done and that with the measure he metes to others who are exceedingly above him others exceedingly below him should duly measure to him again Nor should it otherwise be of pleasant but as 't is of profitable Remarque that Women did never here in England so affect Mastery over their Husbands Never were Children here in England so disaffected so disobedient so quite unnatural towards their Parents Never were Servants here in England so false and treacherous towards their Masters as since our English-mens Revolt from The God of Order since their being too proud to be under God or at least no farther willing that God himself should reign over them than upon This Condition only that he will do it Their way either without any Vicegerent or with one of Their choosing What I now have said last I should have taken for a Digression had not the Evils now mentioned been all the Fruit of the same Plant which had taken some Root in the Heart of Baruch I mean The Itch of a man's seeking Greater Things for himself than God sees fit or has been pleased to allow to such as seek them § 14. Now in order to the learning so great and good a Lesson as This which I have been hitherto describing we must attend to those Things which are the Means of and the Motives to it In order to the former we must not only addict our selves to all the usual Means of Grace such as Prayer and Giving of Alms Reading and Hearing the Word of God frequent Perceptions of the Lord's Supper private Conferences with Casuists or Ghostly Fathers and the like But we must use our best Wit and our soundest Reason and as St. Paul exhorts Timothy we must duly stir up the Gift of God which is in us whereby to find out such Means as are perhaps the least thought of thô perhaps the most effectual to reach the End we aim at We know an Archer not to be short of the Mark before him will use his indeavour to shoot beyond it As Demosthenes of a Stammerer attain'd to an excellent Pronunciation by speaking with Pebbles in his Mouth and so He facilitated his Conquest of a Natural Impediment by adding and subduing an Artificial one Have we sincerely a Desire to be the better for being Rational to make a right use of the Light within us to free our selves from a Disease the most tormenting in all the World to be as happy as is possible in a Valley of Tears we must not only not seek Great Things for our selves but must not suffer Great Things to grow upon us in Excess We must never once indure to have as much of this World as we are able nor yet as much as is lawful for us but only as much as is expedient We must not dare to make Trials as too many are wont to do through a most sinful Curiosity what store of Riches may be attain'd to within the Compass of one Man's Life There being nothing more inhuman more unbecoming or more unworthy of a Rational Agent than for a man to be condemn'd by his own Consent to be digging all his days in the Mine or Quarry to be so much below a Bruit as not to know when he has enough Enough to make use of enough to keep enough to care for enough to lose enough to leave behind him enough to give accompt of in the day of Judgment There can be nothing more disgraceful to a man's Reason and Understanding than not to know when he has enough in these six Points I now have mentioned Not only Christ and his Apostles but Horace himself and his Oppidius and many other Heathen Writers have taught us a Lesson of human Prudence which men as men must needs confess 't is a Shame and Misery not to learn Denique sit finis quaerendi finite Laborem Incipias parto quod avebas We ought to fix on a Proportion of Worldly Goods to which our Industry and Prudence with due regard to our Quality and the Necessities of our Family may safely and innocently reach And having once attain'd That must say as resolvedly to our Appetites and by consequence to our Indeavours as God once said to the Swelling Waters of the Sea Thus far shall ye go and no farther We are at an end of our Desires We will not be troubled with any more We will not be evermore adding to the dead weight of our Possessions but only to the right use and injoyment of Them As for Surplasages of Fortune if any happen we will employ them in Christian Projects and not in Philosophical but Theological Experiments suggested to us by God himself in several parts of his holy Word as How we may draw Bills of Credit upon Him who inhabits the New Ierusalem How we may lend unto The Lord thô The Proprietary of All and be paid by Him again an hundred sold for the forbearance How we may feed and cloath our Saviour thô in his State of Glorification How redeem our very Redeemer by contributing what we can to the Redemption of Christian Captives from the Tyranny of the Turks and lay up in store a good Foundation for our selves upon a Project of attaining Eternal Life Thus to stint all our Appetites and to limit our Desires is to antedate the Happiness we hope and pray for 'T is to create unto our selves by the help of God's Grace an humble Degree of Self-sufficience on this side Heaven It was the Saying of a wise Heathen which no wise Christian will scorn to learn Nihil Nos magis ab animi fluctibus vindicaverit quà m aliquem semper figere incrementis Terminum There is nothing can more exempt us from all inquietudes of Mind from the Rack of Expectation and the Strappado of Disappointments than our putting a certain period to our Increase a certain Boundary or Butt to our Acquisitions Our best Successes being so slippery and our Appetites so strong that for Both
in Churches are no Swearers or Sabbath-Breakers they have therefore discharged their Duty towards God notwithstanding their dishonouring of Publick Parents their Killing their Cousening and their bearing False-witness Such as these must be taught by the Answer of this Master to this Inquiry that their chiefest Duty towards God is their Duty towards their Neighbour and that their Godliness is but Guile whilst they acknowledge the true God and yet disown his Vicegerent Abhor Idols and yet commit Sacrilege Scruple at vain or common Swearing but yet dissemble and lye and enter into Solemn Covenants against their many most sacred and praevious Oaths whilst they are strict Sabbatizers but disorderly walkers six days in the week ever putting on the Form but ever denying the Power of Godliness The Good Master in the Text will not thus be serv'd by us for he expects good Servants too And to our being good Servants there is nothing more needful than that we be honest and upright men In this especially saith our Saviour consists the way to Eternal Life So that the Liberty and Freedom so much spoken of in the Gospel is a Manumission from Satan and not from Christ who did not live our Example that we might not imitate him or praescribe us Praecepts that we might not obey them No the Liberty of the Gospel doth only make us the more his Servants And though his Service is perfect Freedom yet doth it not cease to be a Service For as he that is called in the Lord being a Servant is the Lord's Free-man so is He the Lord's Servant who is called being free 1 Cor. 7. 22. We are not said with greater Truth to be infranchiz'd by the Gospel than to have made an exchange of Masters We were before Servants to Sin But now to Righteousness Before to Satan but now to Christ. We did before serve an Hard Master but now a Good one And this I come to shew at large upon My second Doctrinal Proposition That our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ is not any severe Egyptian Master But a Master full of Mercy and Loving kindness And this he is in two Respects In respect of the Work which he requires which is not foesible only but pleasant And of the Wages which he promiseth Aeternal Life He is for each of these Reasons 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Good Master § 1. That he is a good Master and a good Master in perfection we may discern by the particulars of which a perfect good Master must be compos'd For He who exacts no more Duty than we are able to discharge and yet affords a greater Recompence than we are able to deserve He who sets us such a Task as is not only always possible but most times easy nor only easy to be perform'd but also pleasant in the performance He who treateth his Servants as Friends and Brethren as if he were their Fellow-Servant or indeed his Servants Servant He who when he takes upon him the most of Mastership and Empire commands his Servants no meaner things than he Himself in his Person hath done before them He who when he is affronted is very easily reconcil'd and even sues to his Servants for Reconcilement He whose work is worth the doing because to do it is a Reward and yet rewards it when it is done above all that we are able to ask or think He is sure a good Master and a good Master in perfection even as good as we are able to wish or fancy And just such a Master is Iesus Christ. He is the Master that makes us Free Gal. 5. 1. the Master whose Service is perfect Freedom Rom. 6. 18 22. The Master that frees us from all other Masters besides Himself The Master that bids us call no man Master upon Earth For one is our Master and He in Heaven Matth. 23. 10. § 2. Indeed if Moses were our Master and none but He Our Case were then very hard For He requireth more Service than we are able to perform and pronounceth a Curse in case we do not perform it and yet affords not any strength whereby to adapt us for the performance But yet however he is an hard Master he is not a Cruel or an Unjust one because he is an hard Master in order to a just and a gracious End That is he drives us from Himself to make us look out for a better Master He gives us a Law by which we cannot be justified Gal. 2. 16. that we may seek to be justified by somewhat else He pronounceth a Curse to as many as are of the works of the Law that he may fright us into His Arms who hath redeemed us from the Curse by being made a Curse for us Gal. 3. 13. In a word he is our Schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ that being under Christ we may be no longer under a Schoolmaster Gal. 3. 24 25. And thus having ascended from Moses to Christ from the hard Master to the mild One we are no longer under the Tyranny and Exactions of the Law but under the Kingdom and State of Grace Rom. 6. 14. no longer in bondage under the Elements of the World Gal. 4. 3. but have received the Adoption of Sons v. 5. We are no longer under a Master who can only forbid Sin but we are now under a Master who can forgive it No longer under a hard Master who the longer we serve him keeps us in bondage so much the more But we are now under a Good one who turns our Service into Sonship translating us into Heirs and Coheirs with Himself v. 7. § 3. But here it cannot be deny'd That if we look upon Christ as nothing more than a Master who came not to abrogate but to fill up the Law Matth. 5. 17. our Condition is not better but rather worse than it was before For Christ is stricter in his Precepts than Moses was and seems to have set us an harder Task He commands us to forgive and to love our Enemies Not to look upon a Woman with the Adultery of the Eye to rejoyce in Persecutions and to leap for Ioy when we are Mourners He commands us to fight with all that is in the World and not to give over fighting until we conquer I therefore say with all that is in the World because as the Sublunary World was divided of old before the Times of Columbus and Americus Vesputius into these three parts Europe Asia and Africa to wit the parts of That World which was created by God alone so St. Iohn in his first Epistle hath divided the World of Sin and Wickedness the World created by Men and Devils For as he tells us in one place That the whole World lyeth in wickedness like a Net cast into the Sea so he tells us in another That All that is in the World is the lust of the flesh the lust of the eye and the pride of life And methinks This Trichotomy hath