for such a particular occasion Our Saviour himself in the History of his Family by the Evangelists has left a pattern of this last sort which may justly be regarded as a direction in this case both by Ministers and People His Disciples desired him to teach them to pray he complyed with their Desire and did so by composing a Form for them It is without doubt part of the Duty of his Ministers in the Church after this example of the great Pastour to teach the faithful People to pray and this they may do in the same way as he did and the People shall certainly do well if they use the Prayers which such have composed for them Thus they shall be edified and profited by the Gifts which God has communicated to his Ministers Whatever Gift or Spirit of Prayer can reasonably be pretended to be afforded the Church in these days it may be exercised in the composing and writing down our Prayers before we offer them to God and there is no man but must needs exercise his Gift more suitably to the great God he worships and more to his own or other Peoples edification and to a better degree of performance truly in this way than in depending upon sudden and unpremeditated Thoughts and Expressions So that without doubt both Ministers and People ought to use composed Forms of Prayer ordinarily to perform this duty in the fittest manner I shall only add to this matter thus much that if any Master of a Family uses these Prayers in his Family it is but as if he should desire a Minister to pray with them as People are commonly wont to do when such a Person happens to stay a Night at their House And I have said so much to this matter because I have observed the unjust and erroneous disparaging of Prayer by a Form which has been amongst us has had a great influence towards the too frequent omission of Family Worship Now to conclude this Preface I shall only suggest these advices concerning the use of this Book That it is as I think ordinarily most fitting that this Exercise be performed by the Master of the Family himself But if any Circumstances hinder that it may be done by a Child or Servant but should always be done in his presence if possible that his Authority may give it the more respect with the inferiour parts of the Family When the introductory Prayer is said all should be standing to make themselves sensible of the Presence of God and to dispose them to a reverent and serious frame of Mind and so to make the more solemn and fit enterance upon what they are going about The latter Prayer should be used by all the Company kneeling and joining in it with heart and devout Affection If any young Persons who are devoutly inclined have it their lot to live under such Governours of their Families as are negligent of their duty in this matter I advise them if they may be permitted it to spend an hour in their Chamber alone on the Lord's Day in these Meditations and Prayers This they may very profitably do and perhaps their good Example in such a practice may shame the Master of the Family out of his neglect Now I commit this Endeavour to the Providence of God humbly dedicating it to his service And I do most willingly say Not unto us O Lord not unto us but unto thy Name give the Glory for thy loving Mercy and thy Truths sake And that it may be accepted with him through the Mediation of Jesus Christ and accompanied with his powerful Blessing so as it may also be well accepted in the Church and succesful to the promoting of true and pure Religion in many Souls to their Comfort and Salvation and his Glory thereby I heartily pray THE EXCELLENCY OF THE SOUL Let us Pray PRevent us O Lord in all our doings with thy most gracious favour and further us with thy continual help that in all our works begun continued and ended in thee we may glorify thy Holy Name and finally by thy Mercy obtain Everlasting Life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen Zach. 12. Last Part of the First Verse And formeth the Spirit of Man within him THE Words that I have now read from the Holy Scripture are part of a very Majestick Preface or Introduction to a favourable Prophecy concerning Judah and Jerusalem which is understood to foretell the Times of the Maccabees the distresses of those times and the mighty Deliverances which God would give the Jews by the Conduct and Courage and Resolution of those Men. In so great and lofty Expressions the Prophet was directed to introduce it that he might encourage the Faith and raise the Expectations of that People who were now in a very weak and low Condition For they were but newly returned from their Captivity and were envied and hated and opposed in their present Interests by wicked and powerful Neighbours He reminds them herein of the great Works of that God in whom he would have them now put their trust The whole Verse and Preface contains thus much The Burden of the Word of the Lord for Israel saith the Lord Who stretcheth forth the Heavens and layeth the Foundations of the Earth and formeth the Spirit of Man within him That which we may observe in this Text is That the Prophet places this work of God His forming the Spirit of Man within him together with his stretching out the wide and spacious Heaven and his laying the Foundations of the ponderous Earth and that when he design'd to represent the Greatness of God his ability and fitness to do what he had promised by shewing them the works he had already done This then we may reckon is here intimated to be a workparallel with those that are mentioned with it and fit to be mention'd with them to the same purpose This is a great and mighty Work as well as the other two All God's Works of Creation do declare their Authors Greatness and as the Psalmist speaks Praise him But some do this more than others as they are more excellent and greater than others Elsewhere also the Scripture mentions the making of Man as one of the more excellent and wonderful Works of God and sets it together with his making the Earth and stretching out the Heavens As in Isa 45. 12. where God to magnify himself in the Esteem of that People and to assure them that he could raise up one that should deliver them from Captivity says by his Prophet I have made the Earth and created man upon it I even my Hands have stretched forth the Heavens Now when the making of Man is here spoken of as one of the greatest Works of God this must needs be understood with relation to the Soul of Man For certainly a thing so small and weak so gross and heavy and so dark and so decaying as is the Humane Body cannot justly be reckoned worthy of this great comparison
Were there nothing in the Constitution of Man but that he could not be worthy to be compared with the vast bigness of the Earth and Heavens with the constant Motion the brightness and durableness of the Heavenly Bodies But the Soul of Man is in a Sense vaster and larger than these as it is capable to comprehend them It is of more unwearied motion than they it moves its self it is brighter far and far more durable than any of them It is then upon the account of the Spirit in Man that the making of him is thus set together with those great operations of the Creating Power Upon these grounds we may conclude that the Prophet Zachary does in our Text intimate the great excellency and dignity of the Soul of Man It shall be the business of this Discourse to insist upon some Proof and Application of this Truth And let us now perswade our selves for a little while to turn our Thoughts inward to view and consider our selves to know what a sort of Being God has given us Of all knowledge this may be reckon'd some of the most useful and important Hereby we shall come to understand what it becomes us to do what our true Interest is what great things we are capable of and should therefore pursue them To demonstrate the Excellency of the Soul of Man I shall insist only upon these two Heads of Discourse as containing what is sufficient for the present purpose They are the Nature of the Soul and the Capacities of it which do arise from and are the Consequents of such a Nature In the first place Let us consider the Nature of the Soul of Man And this I shall represent to you briefly under two Particulars 1. It is a Spirit 2. It is Immortal 1. The Soul of Man is a Spirit and therein it is an Excellent Being It is Invisible A thing that cannot be seen by the Eyes of the Body through the Excellency of it It is said of God in Praise of him that he cannot be seen The Apostle Paul calls him by way of Eminency the Invisible God 1 Tim. 1. 17. This then is an Excellency and does greatly recommend the Soul It is too pure and sublime a thing to fall under the gross apprehension of Bodily Senses It is a Pure Uncompounded and Unmix'd thing It is all the same is not made up of worse and better Parts It is in a sort all Light and has no Darkness is a bright celestial Ray sprung from the Great Father of Lights and Spirits Or at least it was very full of light and brightness in its Original State and before it was sullied with sinful Pollution in the Fall of our first Parents It has not diversity of Parts designed for divers Actions so as that what one Part can do another cannot which is the usual disparagement of Bodies But all the Soul can do whatever the Soul can do It can all of it understand and will apprehend or remember it can all chuse or refuse It has not some parts heavy and some active some to move and others to be moved but is all full of Action and is always working and busie It knows no weariness it needs no rest or refreshment It knows its own Actions and chuses what it does and acts freely and from its own Motion These are the Properties and Advantages that belong to it as it is a Spirit That the Soul of Man is a Spirit the Holy Scripture does abundantly declare When a man dies it says of his Body The Dust shall return to the Earth as it was and of his Soul The Spirit shall return to God that gave it Eccles 12. 7. This is a thing distinct from the Body it was not raised from the Dust as that was but came from God immediately nor does it return to the Dust but returns to God at our Death The Apostle says What man knoweth the things of a man that is the purposes wishes designs save the spirit of man which is in him speaking of the Soul of Man 1 Cor. 2. 11. And in the Fifth Chapter of that Epistle at the 5th Verse he directs the Corinthians to excommunicate an Eminent Person among them who had been Incestuous for the destruction of the Flesh that the Spirit might be saved in the Day of the Lord meaning his Soul I shall add no more to this particular but proceed 2. To what was next mentioned as declaring the Excellent Nature of our Souls which was that they are Immortal These Beings have a beginning indeed as every thing else has but One who is the first Cause and Author of all others But the Souls of men shall never come to an End When a man dies there is only a separation made for a while of his Soul from his Body with a dissolution indeed of the Body but the Soul remains the same that it was That lives still though not here and continues to be though it has changed its Habitation Do not imagine said the dying Cyrus to his Children That when I depart from you I shall be no where nor any longer For whilst I was with you ye could not see my Soul only ye knew by the Actions ye observed that it was in my Body Be assured then that it is still the same tho ye do never see it Thus the Learned Heathen could speak of the Soul And it is in the Nature of this to be Immortal as it is a Spirit It has nothing in its self to put an end to its being as it is an uncompounded thing It cannot be destroyed by any thing else but only by God that made it The Soul of man knows no decay it admits of no encrease of its Substance It remains always the same and is herein a Noble Image of the Unchangeable God It shall out-last the strongest works of Humane Art It shall endure longer than the Heavens and the Earth It shall weary time and then run on with Eternity This is a very great and important Excellency of it That it shall never cease to be and certainly if we are in any respect Immortal this deserves our very serious consideration And this also the Holy Scripture that source of all Saving-Knowledge and Wisdom does sufficiently teach us When it speaks of our Being after this Life and even before the Resurrection of our Bodies As when Christ said to the penitent Thief when he was dying This day shalt thou be with me in Paradise He was to Be therefore his Soul was not to be dissolved with his Body and he was to be in Paradise in a happy State When the Scripture calls Death a Departure out of this World it seems to intimate this The Apostle Paul who was to leave his Body in this World as all other dying Persons do yet speaks of his Death as a Departure 1 Tim. 1. 6. And in Phil. 1. 23. He speaks of his Death as what he desired in these words I desire to
and Service before the Things of the World When our Lord was dead and his Disciples were now come to Galilee according to his Appointment to meet him there while they staid there Peter returned to his Trade of Fishing and drew the rest of the Disciples who had been of that Employment to join with him After they had had a Night of fruitless Labour Jesus in in the Morning presents himself to them and as they were eating in his presence he propounds this Question to Peter in Verse 15. Now he had reason to single out Peter to this Examination because it was he that had made the motion of this return to their worldly Business and had drawn the others to it after he had separated them to be Fishers of Men. And since this was plainly the occasion of the Question we may most reasonably interpret it to intimate a Rebuke of that Apostle for this return to his Trade and what our Lord replies to Peter's Answer to his Question does sufficiently justify and even require this Interpretation of it for he says to him three times Feed my Lambs or my Sheep which was as much as to say to him Shew thy Love to me if thou hast it by betaking thy self intirely and industriously to the Office of an Apostle and leave this worldly Trade and Business from which I have called thee This then is without doubt the meaning of this Place The Question of our Lord intimates that he required of St. Peter that he should love him more than worldly Gains more than his Trade and the Business that he had called him from and should accordingly apply himself to that Service of him which he had called him to This then is a standing Law and Rule and Universally obliging That we love God more than the Things of the World And if so it is we may be sure a necessary condition to be performed for our partaking of the Things above If God requires us to prefer them we cannot but without ground expect that he will ever bestow them upon us unless we do so He has not made this Law only to dispense with it but to guide us to our Happiness thereby if we will obey it or to condemn us to misery if we will not 2. To encourage our selves thus to prefer the Things above we may consider that if we do so we shall certainly obtain them We shall not set our Hearts upon them in vain God is a rewarder of those that diligently seek them Heb. 11. 6. To them who by patient continuance in well-doing seek for Glory Honour and Immortality God will give eternal Life the Apostle assures us Rom. 2. 7. In this course we shall be sure not to run in vain nor to labour in vain It pleases God that we despise the present Allurements and good things of this World in comparison to the matchless Blessings of his Love Therefore Moses is commended for having done so when he esteemed the reproach of Christ greater Riches than the Treasures of Egypt and chose rather to suffer affliction with the People of God than to enjoy the Pleasures of Sin which are but for a Season Heb. 11. 25 26. This renders any that do it the peculiar Favourites of Heaven as is plainly intimated Heb. 11. 16. where 't is said of some They desired a better Country even an Heavenly therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God He thought fit he was pleased to own a peculiar relation to such Persons he was willing to be called their God that is to be their God and it is added in the same Verse He hath prepared for them a City Since Heaven was that they chiefly desired he intended them for Heaven 3. Lastly It may be another encouragement to what the Apostle here requires That if we do thus prefer the Things above God will provide and bestow a competent Portion of the Things of this World If we value and seek most the Things of this World we may through God's displeasure miss of them For his over-ruling Providence disposes of all things and he can frustrate all our Designs if we displease him and make us low and poor and mean notwithstanding all our Endeavours to be otherwise and displease him we certainly do if we do not esteem and seek Him and his Love before all other things But if we do this we shall become as was said before the peculiar Favourites of his Love And if for this he will be our God it may be certainly concluded that we shall not want any of his Creatures If he will give the greater he will not with-hold the less he will not let such Persons want any manner of thing that is good for them And this indeed is what our Saviour has expresly promised Mat. 6. 33. Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and his Righteousness and all these things shall be added unto you By these things he means those he had been speaking of before not the superfluous Riches of this World not the great Dignities and Honours of it which things are but an useless Burden and not at all necessary to our Happiness but Meat and Drink and Cloathing and the necessary Accommodations of this present Life These things the Care of Providence will certainly provide for us if we love God with all our Heart and live according to a high esteem and value for his Favour and Love And thus we may see that to mind and prefer the things above is the surest and the shortest way to Happiness both in this Life and the next and more than this I hope need not be said to move us to it THE PRAYER O Most blessed and glorious God the only perfect and all-sufficient Being Thou art O Lord thine own Infinite and Eternal Happiness and thou givest being and happiness to all thy Creatures thy infinite Goodness delights in our well-fare and thou hatest nothing that thou hast made We adore thee O Lord we bless thee we praise thee we magnifie thee we give thee thanks for thy great and glorious Goodness and for the bounteous Exercises of it to the Sons of Men. We thank thee that thou hast given us such a Being as we have and hast made us so capable of happiness That we have Bodies and Senses suited to this very rich and plentiful World about us and capable to take delight in the good things here and for that the Earth is full of thy Goodness But we praise thee yet more for the Spirit in Man whereby we are capable of a rational and spiritual and so a most Honourable and Angelical Delight in the Objects of our Senses that we can please our selves with their beauty order wonderful contrivance and subserviency to each other and that we are capable to see upon them the impresses and marks of thy glorious Wisdom of thy mighty Power of thy infinite Fulness of thy Majesty and Glory And we thank thee O Lord most of all for