shew it self in distracting cares and fears about events which will rack the mind with various and endless tortures 2. Caution Beware of dejection and despondency of mind in evil times take heed of a poor low spirit that will presently sink and give up its hopes upon every appearance and face of trouble it is a promise made unto the righteous Psal. 112. 7. He shall not be afraid of evil tidings his heart is fixes trusting in the Lord. The trusting of God fixes the heart and the fixing of the heart fortifies it against Fear but I know what many poor Christians will say in this case their timorousness and despondency arises not so much from the greatness of outward evils as from the darkness and doubtfulness of their Spiritual and inward condition which doubtless in the very truth of the case which brings me to the last use of this point Vse the Third Search and examine your hearts Christians whether those graces and qualifications to which God hath promised protection in evil times may not be found upon an impartial search in your hearts amongst which I will single out three principal ones as the proper matters of your self examination viz. 1. Uprightness of Heart and Way 2. Humiliation for your own and others sins 3. Righteousness in doing and meekness in suffering the Will of God 1. Uprightness and Integrity of heart and way To this qualification belong many sweet promises of protection such is that Prov. 2. 7. He is a buckler to them that walk uprightly Psal. 7. 10. My defence is of God which saveth the upright in heart If your hearts be true to God these promises shall be truly performed to you but beware you deceive not your selves in so great a point as this is thy heart cannot be an upright heart except 1. it be a renewed heart the Natural heart is always a false heart 't is only regeneration that gives the heart a right temper and frame all the duties and labours in the world can never keep that heart right in its course which is not first set right for God by a principle of renovation 2. We cannot judge our selves upright except uprightness be the setled frame and standing bent of our hearts Psal. 119. 112 117. It is not our integrity in one or two single actions but in the general course and complex frame of our lives and ways that will prove our integrity to God 3. Then may we reckon our selves upright when the dread and awe of God's all-seeing eye keeps our hearts and steps from turning aside to iniquity Gen. 39. 9. 2 Cor. 2. 17. That 's a sincere and upright heart indeed that finds it self at all times and in all places overawed from sin by the eye of God upon him 4. That man's heart also is upright with God who purely aims at and designs the glory of God as the scope and end of his life and actions who lives not to himself neither acts ultimately and principally for himself but lives to God as a person dedicated and devoted to him Rom. 14. 7. 5. That heart also is upright with God which governs it self and its ways by the directions and rules of the Word Psal. 119. 11 24 133. Happy is that soul that finds such evidences of integrity in it self when it is brought to the trial of it at the Bar of the Word Heb. 4. 12. At the bar of conscience 2 Cor. 1. 12. at the bar of afflictions Psal. 119. 87. and at the bar of strong temptations Gen. 39. 9. The eyes of the Lord shall run to and fro through the whole earth to shew himself strong in the behalf of such whose hearts are thus perfect towards him 2. Another gracious qualification intitling the soul to God's special protection in the worst and most dangerous times is the true humiliation for our own and other mens sins Go set a mark saith God upon the foreheads of the men that sigh and cry for all the abominations that be done in the midst thereof Ezek. 9. 4. These that thus mourn when others laugh shall laugh when others mourn Lot was the only mourner in Sodom and he was the only person exempted from destruction in the ruine and overthrow thereof 2 Pet. 2. 7. That 's a sweet and blessed priviledge mentioned in Isa. 66. 10. Rejoyce ye with Jerusalem and be glad with her all ye that love her rejoyce for joy with her all ye that mourn for her that ye may suck and be satisfied with the â—reasts of her consolations that ye may milk out and be delighted with the abundance of her glory Be contented Christians to bear your part in Sions groans and sorrows you may live to bear your part in her triumphs and songs of deliverance it is an argument of the true publickness and tenderness of your spirits for present and as sweet a sign as can appear upon your souls That you are reserved for better days 3. Righteousness in doing and meekness in suffering the will of God is another mark or note distinguishing and describing those persons whom God will preserve in the evil day You have both these together in Zeph. 2. 3. Seek ye the Lord all ye the meek of the earth which have wrought his judgments seek righteousness seek meekness it may be ye shall be hid in the day of the Lords anger The eyes of the Lord are over the righteous and his ears are open unto their Prayers 1 Pet. 3. 12. If righteousness bring you into danger the righteous God will take care of you in that danger and bring you out of it O 't is a singular comfort when a man can say it was not my sin but my duty that brought me into trouble this affliction met me in the path and way of my duty 't is for thy sake O Lord that I am in trouble as the Martyr that held up the Bible at the stake saying This hath brought me hither To conclude Manage all your Sufferings for Christ with Christian meekness as righteousness must bring you into them so meekness must carry you through them if you avenge your selves you take the cause out of God's hand into your own but the meek Christian leaves it to the Lord and shall never have cause to repent of his so doing If thou have an upright heart with God a tender and mournful heart for sin and thou suffer with meekness for righteousness sake thou art one of these souls to whom that sweet Voice is directed in my Text Come my People enter thou into thy Chambers and shut thy doors about thee hide thy self as it were for a little moment until the indignation be over-past FINIS Mr. Flavell's Two Treatises 1. A Teatise of Fear 2. The Righteous Man's Refuge Psal. 46. Hos. 5. 13. Asyli loco Praestabit vos inaccessos inviolabiles ab his regibus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fugio perfect med 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 inde 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 timor
TWO TREATISES THE FIRST Of FEAR FROM Isa. 8. v. 12 13 and part of the 14. THE SECOND The Righteous Man's Refuge IN THE Evil Day From Isaiah 26. verse 20. By Iohn Flavell Minister of the Gospel LONDON Printed by H. H. for Robert Boulter at the Turks head in Cornhill 1682. A PRACTICAL TREATISE OF FEAR Wherein the various Kinds Vses Causes Effects and Remedies thereof are distinctly opened and prescribed for the Relief and Encouragement of all those that fear God in these Doubtful and Distracting Times By Iohn Flavell Minister of the Gospel Say unto them that are of a fearful heart Be strong Fear not behold your God will come with a vengeance even God with a recompence he will come and save you Isa. 35. v. 4. Intellige in te esse etiam fortitudinem spiritus quomodo infirmitatem carnis ac jam hinc scias quid unde facias quid cui subjicias infirmum scilicet forti Tertul. Adv. Gentes LONDON Printed by H. H. for Robert Boulteraâ—t the Turks head in Cornhill 1682. To the Right Worshipful Sir IOHN HARTOP Knight and Baronet Sir AMong all the Creatures God hath made Devils only excepted Man is the most apt and able to be his own tormentor and of all the Scourges with which he lasheth and afflicteth both his Mind and Body none is found so cruel and intolerable as his own fears The worse the times are like to be the more need the mind hath of succour and encouragement to confirm and fortifie it for hard encounters but from the worst prospect Fear inflicts the deepest and most dangerous wounds upon the mind of man cutting the very nerves of its passive fortitude and bearing ability The grief we suâ—â—er from Evil felt would be light and easie were it not incensed by Fear Reason would do much and Religion more to demulce and lenifie our sorrows did not Fear betray the succours of both And it is from things to come that this prospecting Creature raiseth up to himself vast Hopes and Fears If he have a fair and encouraging Prospect of Serene and prosperous day from the Scheme and Position of second causes Hope immediately fills his heart with cheariness and displaies the signals of it in his very face answerable to that fair benign Aspect of things but if the face of things to come be threatning and inauspicious Fear gains the Ascendant over the mind aâ— unmanly and unchristian faintness pervades it and among the many other mischiefs it inflicts this is not the least that it brings the evil of to morrow upon to day and so makes the duties of to day wholly unserviceable to the evils of to morrow which is much as if a man having an intricate and difficult business cut out for the next day which requires the utmost intention both of his Mind and Body and haply might be prosperously managed if both were duly prepared should lie all the night restless and disquieted about the event torturing and spending himself with his own presaging Fears so that when the day is come and the business calls for him his strength is no way equal to the burden of it but he faints and fails under it There is indeed an excellent use that God makes of our Fears to stimulate our slothful hearts to greater vigilance and preparation for evils and there is a mischievous use Satan makes of our Fears to cast us under Despondency and vnbecoming Pusillanimity and I reckon it one of the great difficulties of Religion to cut by a thred here and so to manage our selves under threatning or doubtful Providences as to be touched with so much sense of those approaching evils as may prepare us to bear them and yet to enjoy that constancy and firmness of mind in the worst times that may answer the excellent principles we are professedly governed by These last times are certainly the most perillous times great things are yet to be acted upon the Stage of this World before it be taken down and the Scena antepenultima latter end I say not the last will be a Tragedy There is an Ultima clades adhuc metuenda a dismal slaughter of the Witnesses of Christ yet to be expected the last bite of the cruel Beast will be deadly and if we flatter not our selves all things seem to be disposing themselves in the Course of Providence towords it But Sir if our Vnion with Christ be sure in it self and sure to us also if Faith give us the daily visions and Praelibations of the World to come what well composed Spectators shall we be of these Tragedies Let things be tossed Susque deque and the Mountains cast into the midst of the Sea yet then the assured Christian may sing his Song upon Alamoth A Song composed for God's hidden ones This so poiseth and steddies the mind that we may enjoy the comfort and tranquillity of a resigned will when others are at their wits end With design to promote this blessed frame in my own and others hearts in these frightful times I meditated and now publish this small Tract to which a dear friend from whom I have often had the fair Idea and Character of your excellent Spirit hath occasioned the prefixing of your worthy Name I beg pardon for such an unusual presumption as also your charity in censuring the faults that will appear in it when it shall come under so exact and judicious an eye it may be useful though it be not elegant its seasonableness is its best commendation and its aim better than its performance As for you Sir I hope Faith hath really placed your Soul in that Serene and happy station where Seneca fancied Moral Virtue to have placed a good man Fatendum est cacumine Olympi constitutus supra ventos procellas omnes res humanas Above the Storms and Tempests of this unquiet and distracting World but there are many gracious persons at this day labouring under their own Fears and whose hearts are ready to fail with looking for those things that are coming to try them that dwell upon the Earth and possibly somewhat of relief may be administred to many such by this discourse Some bivious and staggering Souls may be established some discouraged and fainting Spirits may be revived some doubts may be dissolved that have long perplexed gracious 〈◊〉 Whatever use it may be of to any I humbly call in the aid of your Prayers to my own for a special blessing upon it and remains Sir Yours to Honour Love and Serve you John Flavell A Catalogue of some Books Printed for and to be Sold by Ro. Boulter at the Turk's head in Cornhil 1682. Folio BIshop Reynolds Works Calderwoods History of the Reformamation of the Church of Scotland from 1560 to 1625. Rushworth's Collections First Volume His Second Volume Pharmacopoea Londinensis Baily's Chronology Twiss De Scientia Media Sturmy's Magazine Curia Politiae Quarto Durham on the Revelatioâ— Baxter's Saints Rest. Owen
with a great and terrible God and is scared with apprehensions of his infinite and eternal wrath Than which no evil is or can be greater You see at what height Christs conflict with it wrought when it made him sweat as it were great clots of bloud Of all temporal evils death is the greatest and therefore Iob calls it the King of terrours Iob 18. 14. or the most terrible of terribles Thuanus relates two strange instances of the fear of death One of a certain Captain who was so terrified with the fear of death that he poured out a kind of bloudy sweat from all parts of his body Another is of a Young man condemned for a small matter by Sixtus Quintus who was so vehemently terrified with the fears of death that he shed a kind of bloudy tears These are strange and terrible effects of fear but vastly short of what Christ felt and suffered who grapled with a far greater evil than the Terrors of death even the wrath of an incensed God poured out to the full and that immediately upon him But yet evil as evil is rather the object of hatred than of fear it must be an imminent or near approaching evil which we see not how to escape or put by that provokes fear and rouzes this Lion And therefore the Saints in glory are perfectly freed from fear because they are out of the reach of all danger Nor do we that are here in the midst of evils fear them till we see them approching us and we see not how to avoid them To hear of Fire Plague or the Sword in the Indies doth not affright us because the evil is so remote from us It 's far enough off we are in no danger of it but when it is in the Town much more when within our own dwellings we tremble Evil hurts us not by a simple apprehension of its nature but of its union and all propinquity is a degree of union as a learned Divine speaks And its worth Observation that all carnal security is maintained by putting evils at a great distance from us As it is noted of those secure Sensualists Amos 6. 3. they put far from them the evil day the meaning is not that they did or could put the evil one minute farther from them in reality but only by imagination and fancy they shut their own eyes and would not see it lest it should give an unpleasing interruption to their mirth and this is the reason why death puts the living into no more fear because it is apprehended as remote and at an undetermined distance whereas if the precise time of death were known especially if that time were near it would greatly scare and terrifie This is the nature of natural Fear the infelicity of nature which we all groan under the effects of It is in all the creatures in some degree but among them all none suffer more by it than man for hereby he becomes his own tormentor nor is any torment greater than this when it prevails in an high degree upon us Indeed all constitutions and tempers admit not the same degrees of fear some are naturally couragious and stout like the Lyon for magnanimity and fortitude others exceeding timorous and faint-hearted like the Hare or Hart one little dog will make an hundred of them fear and flee before him Luther was a man of great courage and presence of mind in dangers Melancthon very timorous and subject to despondency thus the difference betwixt them is expressed in one of Luther's Letters to him I am well nigh a secure spectator of things and esteem not any thing these fierce and threatning Papists I much dislike those anxious cares which as thou writest do almost consume thee There might be as great a stock of grace in one as in the other but Melancthon's grace had not the advantage of so stout and couragious a temper of body and mind as Luther's had Thus briefly of natural Fear SECT II. THere is a Fear which is formally and intrinsically sinful not only our infelicity but our fault not our simple affliction and burden but our great evil and provocation and such is the fear here dissuaded called Their Fear i. e. the fear wherewith carnal and unbelieving men do fear when dangers threaten them and the sinfulness of it lies in five things 1. In the spring and cause of it which is unbelief and an unworthy distrust of God when we dare not rely upon the security of a divine promise nor trust to Gods protection in the way of ouâ— duty This was the very case of that people Isai. 30. 15. Thus saith the Lord the holy one of Israel in returning and rest shall ye be saved in quietness and in confidence shall be your strength and ye would not but ye said no for we will flee upon horses therefore shall ye flee and we will ride upon the swift therefore shall they that pursue you be swift one thousand shall flee at the rebuke of one c. Thus stood the case Sennacherib with a mighty Host was ready to invade them this puts them into a fright in this distress God assures them by the mouth of the Prophet That in returning and rest they should be saved in quietness and confidence should be their strength The meaning is never perplex your selves with various councels and projects to secure your selves under the wings of Egypt or any other Protector but with a composed quiet and calm temper of mind rest upon my power by faith take my promises for your security this shall be your salvation and your strength more effectual to your preservation than Armies Garisons or any creature defence in the World one act of faith shall do you better service than Pharaoh and all his forces can do But ye said no q. d. we dare not trust to that a good horse will do us more service at such a time than a good promise Egypt is a better security in their eye than Heaven This is the fruit of gross infidelity And as wicked men do thus forsake God and cleave to the creature in time of trouble so there is found a spice of this distrustfulness of God producing fear and trouble in the best men It was in the Disciples themselves Matth. 8. 26. Why are ye fearful O ye of little faith A Storm had befallen them at Sea danger began to threaten them and presently you find a storm within their fears were more boisterous than the winds and had more need of calming than the sea and it was all from their unbelief as Christ tells them the less their faith the greater their fear If a man can but rely upon God in a promise so far as he is enabled to believe so far he will reckon himself well secured Illyricus in his Catalogue of the witnesses relates this remarkable passage of one Andreas Proles a godly aged Divine who lived somewhat before Luther and taught many
disorders tumults rapines theft murders and all manner of uncleanness and unrighteousness nec hospes ab hospite tutus men would become like the fishes of the sea as the Prophet complains Habak 1. 14. where the greater swallow up a multitude of the smaller fry alive at one gulp propriety could not be maintained in the world no mans person could be safe or inviolate power and opportunity to do mischief would measure out to men their Lot and inheritance and consequently all Societies must disband and break up We say and the observation is sure he that fears not his own may easily be master of another mans life 'T is law and fear of punishment that keeps the World in order men are afraid to do evil because they are afraid to suffer it they see the Law hath inseparably linked penal and moral evils together if they will presume upon the one they must necessarily pull the other upon them too and this keeps them in some order and decorum there would be no order or security without Law but if Laws had no annexed penalties to inforce them and give them their Sanction as good there were no Laws they would have no more power to restrain the corruptions of mens hearts than the new cords or green wit hs had to bind Samson And yet if the severest penalties in the world were annexed to or appointed by the Law they could signifie nothing to the ends of Government without Fear This is that tender sensible power or passion on which threatnings work and so brings men under moral government and restraint Rom. 13. 3 4. Magistrates are a terror to evil works wilt thou not then be afraid of the power but if thou do that which is evil be afraid for he beareth not the sword in vain And by this means a world of evil is restrained and prevented in the world It was the custom and policy of the Persians I cannot say laudable at the death of their Kings to give every man liberty for the space of five days to do what he would and such mischiefs were done every where by the unbridled lusts of men in those days that it made the people long and pray for the instalment of their next King it exceedingly endeared Government to them Blessed be God for Law and Government for curbing by this means the raging lusts of the hearts of men and procuring rest and comfort for us in the world this way 2. The Use of Sinful Fear This is formally evil and sinful in its own nature as well as the fruit of sin and offspring of sinful nature yet the Lord knows how to over-rule it in his providential Government of the world to his own wise and holy purposes and he doth so First by making it his scourge to punish his enemies If men will not fear God they shall fear men yea they shall be made a terrour to themselves And indeed it is a dreadful punishment for God to deliver a man up into the hands of his own fears I think there is scarce a greater torment to be found in the world than for a man to be his own Tormenter and his mind made a Rack an Engine of torture to his Body we read in 2 Kings 17. 25. that God sent Lyons among the people but certainly that is not so bad as for God to let loose our own Fears upon us No Lion is so cruel as this passion and therefore David esteemed it so great a deliverance to be delivered from all his fears Psal. 34. 4. It is a dreadful threatning which is recorded in Deut. 28. 65 66 67. against the disobedient and rebellious Thou shalt find no ease neither shall the sole of thy foot have rest but the Lord shall give thee there a trembling heart and failing of eyes and sorrow of mind and thy life shall hang in doubt before thee and thou shalt fear day and night and shalt have no assurance of thy life in the morning thou shalt say would God it were Even and at Even thou shalt say would God it were morning for the fear of thine heart wherewith thou shalt fear and for the sight of thine eyes which thou shalt see When fear hath once seized the heart you may see deaths colours displayed in the face What a dismal life do they live who have neither any peace by day nor rest by night but wearisom days and nights are appointed to them The days of such men are tiresome days they wish for the night hoping it may give them a little rest but their fears go to bed with them their hearts pant and meditate terrour and then O that it were day again 2 By Fear God punisheth his enemies in hell It is that flagellum Dei terrible scourge of God by which a great part of the torment of the damned is inflicted on them Divines use to make this triparâ—ite distinction of hell torments and tells us God punishes the wicked there partly by remembrance what is past viz. the mercies and means they once had but are there irrecoverably lost partly by the sense of things present even the wrath of God overlaying soul and body and partly by the fear of what is to come and sure this is not the least part of the misery of those wretched cast-aways O that fearful expectation of fiery indignation more and more of Gods wrath still coming on as the waves of the Sea thrusting forward one another Yea this is that which makes the Devils tremble Iames 2. 19. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the word signifies such a noise as the rote of the sea or the roaring of the waves when they break themselves against the rocks and this is occasioned by the fears which are continually held as a whip over them 3 Providence makes use of the slavish fears and terrors of wicked men to dissipate and scatter them when they are combined and confederated against the people of God by these have they been routed and put to flight when there hath been no other visible power to do it It 's said Psal. 78. 55. God cast out the Heathen before his people Israel and by what means were those mighty nations subdued not by the strength or multitudes of the Israelites but by their own fears for it s said Ioshuah 24. 11 12. The Lord sent the hornet before them which drave them out These Hornets were the fears and terrors of their own guilty and presaging minds which buzzed and smarmed in their own breasts and stung them to the heart worse than the swords of the Israelites could do Theodoret relates a memorable story of Sapores King of Persiâ— who had besieged many Christians in the City â— Nisibis and put them to great straits so that little hopes of safety were left them but in the depth of their distress God sent an Army of Hornets and Gnats among their enemies which got into the trunks of their Elephants and ears and nostrils of
grievously wounded my own Conscience To this wounded and trembling conscience is opposed the spirit of a sound mind mentioned 2 Tim. 1. 7. God hath not given us the spirit of fear but of power of love and of a sound mind A sound mind is in this place the same thing with a pure and peaceable Conscience a mind or Conscience not infirmed or wounded with guilt as we say a sound or heal body which hath no disease to infirm it such a mind is opposed to the spirit of fear it will make a man bold as a Lion Nil conscire tibi nullâ Pallescere culpâ hic muâ—â—â— aheneus esto An evil and guilty Conscience foments fears and terrours three ways 1. by aggravating small matters and blowing them up to the height of the most fatal and destructive evils so it was with Cain Gen. 4. 14. Every one that meets me will slay me Now every child was a Giant in his eye and any body he met his over-match A guilty Conscience gives a man no sight of his enemy but through a magnifying or a multiplying glass 2 It begets Fears by interpreting all doubtful cases in the worst sense that can befastened upon them Pessimus in dubiis Augur timor If the Swallows do but chatter in the chimney Bessus interprets it to be a discovery of his crime that they are telling take of him and saying Bessus killed a man Nay 3 If a guilty Conscience have nothing to aggravate and magnifie nor any doubtful matter to interpret in a frightful sense it can and often doth create fears and terrors out of nothing at all the rules of Fear 〈◊〉 not like the rules in Arithmetick where many nothings make nothing but fear can make something out of nothing yea many thingâ— and great things out of nothing at all Psal. 53 5. there werâ— they in great feaâ— where no fear was here was a great fear raiseâ— or created out of nothing at allâ— had their fear been examined anâ— hunted home to its original it would have beeâ— found a pure creature of fancy a Chimaera haveâ—â—â— no fundamentum in re no other foundation but 〈◊〉 troubled fancy and a guilty Conscience thus it 〈◊〉 with Pashur he was a very wicked man and a bitâ—â— enemy to the Prophet Ieremy and if there be none 〈◊〉 fright and terrifie from abroad rather than he 〈◊〉 want it he shall be a terror to himself Ier. 20. 3 4. he was his own bug bear afraid of his own shadow and truly this is a great plague and misery he that is a terror to himself can no more flee from terrors than he can flee from himself O the efficâ—cy of Conscience how doth it arrest the stoutest sinners and make them tremble when there is no visible external cause of fear Nemo sejudice nocens absolvitur 1. Object But may not a good man whose sins are pardoned be affrighted with his own fancies and scared with his own imaginations Sol. No doubt he may for there is a twofold fountain of fears one in the body another in the soul one in the constitution another in the conscience it is the affliction and infelicity of many pardoned and gracious souls to be united and married to such distempered and ill habited bodies as shall afflict them without any real cause from within and wound them by their own diseases and distempers and these wounds can no more be prevented or cured by their reason or Religion than any other bodily disease suppose an Ague or a Feaver can be so cured Thus Physicians tell us when adust choler and melancholy overflows and abounds in the body as in the Hypochondriacal distemper c. what sad effects it hath upon the mind as well as upon the body there is not only a sad and fearful aspect or countenance without but sorrow fear and afflicting thoughts within this is a sore affliction to many good men whose Consciences are sprinkled with the bloud of Christ from guilt but yet God sees good to clog them with such afflictions as this for their humiliation and for the prevention of worse evils 2. Object But many bold and daring sinners are found who notwithstanding all the guilt with which their consciences are loaded can look dangers in the face without trembling yea they can look death it self the King of terrors in the face with less fear than better men Sol. True but the reason of that is from a spiritual judgment of God upon their hearts and consciences whereby they are hardened and seared as with an hot iron 2. Tim. 4. 2. and so Conscience is disabled for the present to do its office it cannot put forth its efficacy and activity now when it might be useful to their salvation but it will do it to purpose hereafter when their case shall be remediless 3. Cause 3. We see what a forge of Fears a guilty Conscience is and no less is the sin of Unbelief the real and proper cause of most distracting and afflictive fears so much as our Souls are empty of faith they are in times of trouble filled with fear We read of some that have died by no other hand but their own fears but we never read of any that died by fear who were once brought to live by faith If men would but dig to the root of their fears they should certainly find unbelief there Matth. 8. 26. Why are ye fearful Oye of little faith The less faith still the more fear Fear is generated by unbelief and unbelief strengthened by fear as in nature there is an observable 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 circular generation vapours beget showers and showers new vapours so it is in things moral and therefore all the skill in the world can never cure us of the disease of fear till God first cure us of our unbelief Christ therefore took the right method to rid the disciples of their fear by rebuking their unbelief The remains of this sin in Gods own people is the cause and fountain of their fears and more particularly to shew how fear is generated by unbelief let a few particulars be heedfully adverted 1. Unbelief weakens and stumbles the assenting act of Faith and thereby cuts off from the soul in a great measure its principal relief against dangers and troubles It is the use and office of Faith to reallize to the Soul the invisible things of the world to come and thereby encourage it against the fears and dangers of the present world Thus Moses forsook Egypt not fearing the wrath of the King for he endured as seeing him that is invisible Heb. 11. 27. If this assentting act of Faith be weakned or staggered in the soul if once invisibles seem uncertainties and visibles the only realities no wonder we are so scared and frighted when these visible and sensible comforts are exposed and endangered as they often are and will be in this mutable world That man must needs be afraid to stand his ground that
God for our relief in the days of darkness and trouble promises of support under the heaviest burdens and pressures Isai. 41. 10. Fear not for I am with thee be not dismayed for I am thy God I will strengthen thee yea I will help thee yea I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness A promise able to make the most timorous and trembling soul to shout with the joy of men in harvest or as they that divide the spoil There are found the encouraging promises of defence and protection Isa. 27. 2 3. and Isa. 33. 2. promises that lead us into the Almighty power of God and put us under the wings of his care in time of danger Promises of moderation and mitigation in the day of sharp affliction that we may be able to bear it Isai. 27. 8. 1 Cor. 10. 13. Promises of deliverance out of troubles if the malice of man bring us into trouble the mercy of God will assuredly bring us out Psal. 91. 14 15. and Ps. 125. 3. And which is most comfortable of all the rest promises to Sanctifie and bless our troubles to our good so that they shall not only cease to be hurtful but by vertue of the promise become exceeding beneficial to us Isa. 27. 9. Rom. 8. 28. All these promises are provided by our tender Father for us against a day of straits and fears and because he knew our weakness and how apt our fears would be to make us suspect our security by them he hath for the performance of them engaged his wisdom power care faithfulness and unchangeableness 2 Pet. 2. 9. Isai. 27. 2 3. 2 Chron. 16. 9. 1 Cor. 10. 13. Isai. 43. 1 2. In the midst of such promises so sealed how chearful and magnanimous should we be in the worst times And say as David Psal. 49. 5. Why should I fear in the day of evil Let those that have no God to flee to no promise to rely upon let them fear in the day of evil I have no cauâ—e to do so But even from these most comfortable refuges in the promises our own Fears beat us we are so scared that we mind them not so as to draw encouragement resolution and courage from them Thus the Shields of the mighty are vilely castaway So for all the choice records of the Saints experiences in all former troubles and distresses God hath by a singular providence aiming at our relief in future distresses preserved them for us if danger threaten us we may turn to the recorded experiences his people have left us of the strange and mighty influence of his providence upon the hearts of their enemies to shew them favour Gen. 31. 29. Psal. 106. 46. Ier. 15. 11. There also are found the ancient Rolls and Records of the admirable methods of his peoples deliverance contrived by his infinite and unsearchable wisdom for them when all their own thoughts have been at a loss and their understandings posed and staggered Exod. 15. 6. 2 Chron. 20. 12 15. 2 Kings 19. 3 7. There are the recorded experiences of Gods unspotted faithfulness which never failed any soul that durst trust himself in its arms Mica 6. 4 5. Ioshuah 7. 9. There also are to be found the Records of his tender and most fatherly care for his children who have been to him as a peculiar treasure in times of danger Psal 40. 17. Deut. 32. 10 11 12. Isai. 49. 16. Iob 36. 7. 2. Chron. 16. 9. All these and many more supports and cordials are made ready to our hand and provided for a day of trouble but alas to what purpose if our own fears so transport us that we can neither apply them nor so much as calmly ponder and consider them 3. To conclude by these Fears we are deprived of those manifold advantages we might gain by the calm and composed meditations of our own death and the change it will make upon us could we sit down in peace and meditate in a familiar way upon death could we look with a composed and well setled mind into our own graves and not be scared and frighted with the thoughts of death and startle whenever we take it though but in our thoughts by the cold hand To what seriousness would those meditations frame us And what abundance of evils would they prevent in our conversations The sprinkling of dust upon new writing prevents many a blot and blur in our books or letters and could we thus sprinkle the dust of the Grave upon our minds it would prevent many a sin and miscarriage in our words and actions But there is no profit or advantage redounding to us either from promises experiences or death it self when the soul is discomposed and put into confusion by its own fears And thus you see some of those many mischievous effects of your own fears CHAP. VI. Prescribing the rules to cure our Sinful Fears and prevent these sad and woful effects of them SECT I. WE are now come to the most difficult part of the work viz. The Cure of the sinful and slavish fear of Creatures in times of danger which if it might through the blessing of God be effected we might live at hearts ease in the midst of all our enemies and troubles and like the Sun in the Heavens keep on our steady course in the darkest and gloomiest day But before I come to the particular Rules it will be necessary for the prevention of mistakes to lay down three useful cautions about this matter 1. Caution Understand that none but those that are in Christ are capable to improve the following Rules to their advantage The security of our souls is the great argument used by Christ to extinguish our fears of them that can kill the Body Matth. 10. 28. But if the Soul must unavoidably perish when the Body doth if it must drop into hell before the Body be laid in the grave If he that kills the body doth by the same stroak cut off the Soul from all the means and possibilities of mercy and happiness for ever what can be offered in such a case to relieve a man against fear and trembling 2. Caution Expect not a perfect cure of your Fears in this life whilst there are enemies and dangers there will be some fears working in the best hearts If our Faith could be perfected our Fears would be perfectly cured but whilst there is so much weakness in our Faith there will be too much strength in our Fears And for those who are naturally timorous who have more of this passion in their constitution than other men have and those in whom melancholy is a rooted and chronical disease it will be hard for them totally to rid themselves of fears and dejections though in the use of such helps and means as follow they may be greatly relieved against the tyranny of them and enabled to possess their souls in much more tranquillity and comfort 3. Caution Whosoever expects the benefit of the
Rev. 18. 7. O it were well for us if in the midst of our pleasant enjoyments we would be putting the difficultest cases to our selves and mingle a few such thoughts as these with all our earthly enjoyand comforts I am now at ease in the midst of my habitation but the time may be at hand when my habitation shall be in a Prison I see no faces at present but those of friends full of smiles and honours I may see none shortly but the faces of enemies full of frowns and terrors I have now an estate to supply my wants and provide for my family but this may shortly fall as a prey to the enemy they may sweep away all that I have gathered reap the fruits of all my labours Impius has segetes I have yet my life given me for a prey but O how soon may it fall into cruel and bloud-thirsty hands I have no better security for these things than the Martyrs had who suffered the loss of all these things for Christs sake a double advantage would result to us from such meditations as these viz. The Advantage Troubles 1. Of Acquaintance with 2. Of Preparation for 1. Hereby our thoughts would be better acquainted with these evils and the more they are acquainted the less they will start and fright at them We should not think it strange concerning the fiery trial as it is 1 Pet. 4. 12. It is with our thoughts as it is with young colts and so they start at every new thing they meet but we cure them of it by bringing them home to that they start at and making them smell to it better acquaintance cures this startling humour at them The newness of evil saith a late grave and Learned Divine is the cause of fear when the mind it self hath had no preceding encounter with it whereby to judge of its strength nor example of another mans prosperous issue to confirm its hopes in the like success For as I noted before out of the Philosophers experience is instead of armour and is a kind of fortitude enabling both to judge and to bear troubles for there are some things which are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 scarecrows and vizors which children fear only out of ignorance assoon as they are known they cease to be terrible I know our minds naturally reluctate and decline such harsh and unpleasant subjects 'T is hard to bring our thoughts to them in good earnest and harder to dwell so long as is necessary to this end upon them We had rather take a pleasant prospect of future felicity and prosperity in this world of multiplying our days as the sand and at last dying quietly in our Nest as Iob speaks Our thoughts run nimbly upon such pleasant fancies like oyled wheels and have need of trigging but when they come into the deep and dirty ways of suffering there they drive heavily lik Pharaohs Chariots dismounted from their wheels But that which is most pleasant is not always most useful and necessary Our Lord was well acquainted with griefs though our thoughts be such great strangers to them he often thought and spake of his sufferings and of the bloudy Baptism with which he was to be baptized Luke 12. 50. and he not only minded his own sufferings before hand but when he perceived the fond imaginations and vain fansies of some that followed and professed him deluding them with expectations of earthly prosperity and rest he gave their thoughts a turn to this less pleasing but more needful subject the things they were to suffer for his name instead of answering a foolish and groundless question of sitting on his Right and Left hand like earthly Grandees he rebukes the folly of the Questionist and asks a less pleasing question Matth. 20. 22. But Iesus answered and said Ye know not what ye ask are ye able to drink of the cup that I shall drink of And to be baptized with the baptism that I shall be baptized with q. d. You do but abuse your selves with such fond and idle dreams there is other imployment cut out for you in the purpose of God Instead of sitting upon Thrones and Tribunals it would become you to think of being brought before them as Prisoners to receive your doom and sentence to die for my sake these thoughts would do you a great deal more service 2. As such meditations would acquaint us better so they would prepare us better to encounter troubles and difficult things when they come Readiness and preparation would subdue and banish our fears we are never much scared with that for which our minds are prepared There is the same difference in this case as there is betwixt a Souldier in compleat Armour and ready at every point for his enemy and one that is allarm'd in his bed who hath laid his cloaths in one place and his Arms in another when his enemy is breaking open his chamber door upon him It was not therefore without the most weighty reason that the Apostle presses us so earnestly Eph. 6. 13 14. Take unto you the whole armour of God that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day and having done all to stand Stand therefore having your loyns girt about with truth and having on the breast-plate of Righteousness and your feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of peace We see the benefit of such previsions and provisions for sufferings in that great example of courage and constancy Acts 21. 13. I am ready saith Paul not only to be bound but to die at Jerusalem And the same courage and constancy remained in him when he was entering the very Lists and going to lay his very neck upon the block 2. Tim. 4. 6. I am ready to be offered up and the time of my departure is at hand The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 properly signifies a libation or drink-offering wherein some conceive he alluded to the very kind of his own death viz. by the Sword His heart was brought to that frame that he could with as much willingness pour out his bloud for Christ as the Priests used to pour out the drink offering to the Lord. 'T is true all the meditations and preparations in the world made by us are not sufficient in themselves to carry us through such difficult services 't is one thing to see death as our fancy limnes it out at a distance and another thing to look death it self in the face We can behold the painted Lyon without fear but the living Lyon makes us tremble but yet though our suffering-strength comes not from our own preparations or forethoughts of Death but from Gods gracious assistance yet usually that assistance of his is communicated to us in and by the conscionabl◠and humble use of these means let us therefore be found waiting upon God for strength patience and resolutions to suffer as it becomes Christians in the daily serious use of those means whereby he is pleased to