ravishing sight Besides we shall be fitted for the Conversation of pure Intelligences that is of Holy Angels and for enjoying the familiarity of all the Blessed Saints We shall be with Saints and Angels taken up in the admiration love and praises of God and Christ We shall then know too what the Holy Ghost is and be full thereof We shall understand plainly what we at present see only 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 through a perspective Glass and in a Riddle how those three that bear record in Heaven the Father the Word and the Holy Ghost are one All the desires both of the Mind and of the Will that is all our desires after truth good and any agreeables shall be at once infinitely satisfied and yet with satisfaction Eternally flowing forth to that incomprehensible Fountain of all Truth and Good the Eternal Infinite God No Memory or Sense of any thing past or of any thing here below remaining with us any otherwise than as such reflections may heighten our present transport or ravishment And all this happiness is to be Everlasting without End without Intermission without Allay This is for the main such an account as here may suffice to be given of the Heavenly Happiness But we must remember it is infinitely short of the full real Truth For 1 Cor. 11. 9. Eye hath not seen nor Ear heard neither have entred into the heart of Man the things which God hath prepared for them that love him â—3 Now Secondly as vast and infinite as this Happiness is that it is no presumption in a faithful Soul and such certainly are all who have so as directed made their peace with God I say that it is no presumption in such a Soul to desire pray for aim at and pursue this Happiness is evident because God has offered it in the Gospel The proposal of this and of its means together with the opening our way to it was the Great Errand and business on which Christ Jesus came into the World God sent his Son into the World not to condemn the World to keep them under that Sentence of Condemnation and Death which by Sin had taken place upon them but that the World through him might be saved For God John 3. 16. so loved the World that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life And accordingly our Saviour Jesus Christ hath abolished Death 2 Tim. 1. 10. and brought Life and Immortality to light through the Gospel The Gospel publishes the conditions ways or means by which it is to be had which we have seen in part and shall further see as we proceed and requires us thus to seek it under pain of everlasting misery if we do not And that Men of all sorts and tempers might be invited thereunto and prevailed with our Lord Jesus has taken care it should be proposed under such various Notions and Characters as may comply with all Mens tempers To draw in Ambitious Men it is proposed as Honour and Glory as a Crown a Throne a Kingdom c. To gain Men of pleasure it is represented as a Banquet a Supper a Marriage Feast fullness of Joy and Pleasures for evermore c. To allure Men that love Wealth it is called a Treasure a Treasure which neither Moth nor Rust can corrupt nor Thieves break through and steal the true Riches an Inheritance incorruptible c. And to be brief to take with some others it is perhaps called by other names But in a word to take with all forasmuch as all Men love Life and most people Long Life it is called what it is most truly Everlasting Life Upon the whole God is so desirous that none should neglect it that it is propounded to all I say in a way to suit each Mans Temper Humour and Inclination The commands to pursue it are so many that it is neither needful nor indeed easie to reckon them all up The Encouragements so great that it is not possible to add to them witness that one Command and Superlative Encouragement Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things shall be added unto you Matth. 6. 33. What can be added to all things Yet the Kingdom of God and all things that is all things good for them shall they receive who seek first the Kingdom of God and his Righteousness Thus then we see in some measure both what this Happiness is and that it is in Strictness our Duty to seek after it or endeavour to secure it § 4. It is now high time to enquire thirdly how or by what means we may secure it How shall we convey Treasure thither Or how is it possible there to lay up our Treasure In answer hereto the Directions shall be few and easy of which the first is Whoever would have a Happiness in Heaven must By Resolution and Prayer chuse God for his Happiness for it is the Enjoyment of him that makes both Heaven and Happiness without Him is neither possible And the Almighty God all that he is Infinite as he is is content to be the Happiness of such poor Worms as are we mortal Men. He of old said unto Abraham and in him the Father of the Faithful to every even the meanest faithful Soul Fear not I am thy shield and thy exceeding great reward Gen. 15. 1. And he says the same at present to every disposed person who reads or hears this Take God then at his Word And first resolve with thy self and say inwardly in Spirit God shall be the portion of my Soul Let others please themselves in other Goods in the Encrease of Corn and Wine and Oyl in joyning House to House and Field to Field in loading themselves with thick Clay or laying up Treasure upon Earth for many years for my part I will take up with none of these the Almighty God shall be my portion Our Lord Jesus himself for of him prophetically is that Psalm to be interpreted did while in the Flesh so resolve Psal 16. 5. The Lord is the portion of mine inheritance and of my Cup thou maintainest my lot Fear not then thou for whom Christ died to the end thou mightest come to the Father by a new and living Way through his bloud Fear not I say neither forbear thus to come thus to resolve And having thus inwardly resolved with thy self Take with thee words and apply thy self faithfully and humbly by Prayer to God telling him that thou art resolved to make the same Choice as thy Saviour not only by his Doctrine but by his Practice and Example taught thee Tell him whatever Portion of things below he has given thee or shall give thee thou art resolv'd not to be put off with any with all these nothing below himself shall satisfy thee for indeed nothing below him can And to insure the Choice that he may give himself to thee tell him thou givest thy self to him but be
upon us and even laden us with How early were we acquainted with his Will and made sensible of our Duty and Obligations to him What Aids have we received by Education What Warnings by Ministers by Parents by Friends Having even been hewed by the words of his Messengers or Agents of all sorts What quickning by his Spirit Has not his Word to allude to holy Jeremy's expression been in our heart as a burning fire shut up in our Bones Yet have we suppress'd or smothered all this warmth and quenched the holy Spirit Nor Conscience nor Grace has prevailed to restrain us from Sin we have trampled on both We have heard again and again of the Blood of Jesus shed for us and been press'd with our duty thereto yet in effect have we accounted it an unholy thing at least made it to us hitherto very ineffectual for Baseness or Trifles denying the Lord that bought us And all this how often how long Are not in a manner all our Sins become habitual to us A second Nature by our own very Act So that being accustomed Learn'd as the Original Word signifies namely by our own wicked practice to do evil we can now no more do good than the Aethiopian change his Skin or the Leopard his Spots Look look poor Soul that canst not mourn for Sin look upon thy sins what an infinite number or heap is there of them reaching up to Heaven And all of them Crimson sins too crying to God in heaven for vengeance upon thee Look I say as near as thou canst on their Number and Nature and look till thine Eyes affect thine Heart and thine Heart dissolve in Tears This is the readiest way to produce Contrition or Godly Sorrow the Endeavour of which is a second step to Repentance § 9. A third will be Confession of Sin and indeed without this especially to God Contrition will be very faint Our affections are not ordinarily moved without attent and continued thought and thought will not well be kept attent without words When therefore we say a sight and sense of Sin together with Contrition for it and Confession of it are a first second and third step to repent this is not to be so taken as if they were disjoyned separate and practised perfectly apart from one another or any of them without the other they who would be true penitents must seriously casting themselves before God in secret Examine Mourn and Confess as new matter offers it self and then Examine again for more matter and Confess and Mourn again All these run into one another and lead one to the other as I may say backward and forward And a Soul by honest endeavours of them before God in secret will even by its own experience and the duct or course of its own affections find the due method order and savory practice of them better than words can express or any Casuist advise Now by Confession of Sin we must not conceive to be meant a meer reciting of our Sins or rehearsing before God our several Acts of Sin which yet God knows to do perfectly is impossible for the best of us no nor giving account even of all the several kinds of our Sins though both these are to be done as far as we are able but a hearty affectionate charging and accusing our selves before God according to what we know to the very full heighth of our guilt acknowledging together that our Confessions and Self-accusations come far short of the just account or summ of our Sins whereof a vast multitude are unknown to us owning our selves therefore to have deserved eternally the Divine wrath and curse and at present to lie at God's mercy Thus at once not only accusing but condemning and as it were passing Sentence on our selves and giving thereby glory to God whatever becomes of us This kind of reflections will certainly by God's grace bring us to deep remorse and humiliation of Soul abhorrence of our selves and admiring the goodness of God who has born with us so long and has never all this time taken advantage against us while going on in the affronting his Justice abusing his Grace and by all ways provoking him to cut us off in the midst of our Days as well as midst of our Sins And from hence our Confessions will lead us insensibly into deprecating that wrath which we have owned our selves to have deserved to the begging mercy and pardon as earnestly as ever poor Malefactor when about to receive Sentence acknowledged what he had before endeavoured to hide and cast himself upon mercy Such affectionate work as this I say is that Confession of Sin before God which leads to and together ever accompanies Repentance § 10. Some indeed make Confession as it is a part of what they call Penance and in the name of Penance they would be content we should think they include all Repentance or rather mean thereby the whole Method of reconciling Men to God some I say would make Confession to be little if any thing else but an unbosoming our selves to a Priest discovering to him all our most secret sins which either are or we suspect to be mortal as they speak with their several Circumstances But this Usurpation upon Mens Consciences and Oppression of Souls without any Command in Scripture introduced only into the Church declined in Purity and serving meerly to maintain an extravagant power in every Father Confessor that is generally in every Priest our Church has most deservedly abrogated and though there be some particular Cases in which with the Holy Scriptures and Ancient Church we teach the confessing our Sins to Man to be expedient if not necessary also to our Peace with God yet out of these Cases is not confessing to man either requir'd or even always fit The Cases wherein it is necessary are but Three as far as I am able to comprehend The First That of Publick Scandal given to the Church by gross and open sin whereby any person has forfeited his Christianity or his Right and Title as well to Heaven or the Church above as to his Membership of the Church on Earth It is very necessary such person take publick shame to himself and openly declare his Sin to the end he may as openly declare and give proof of his Repentance and Christian People may be satisfied in communicating with him again And this if some will call a kind of satisfaction for sin they may have their pleasure provided they neither imagine nor bear the World in hand it avails to make atonement for the guilt of Sin before God in which behalf nothing was or ever will be meritorious but the Sacrifice of Jesus Christ upon the Cross 2. In case of having wronged any particular person by Word or Deed it is requisite the Person who has done wrong go to or send for meet or otherwise apply to the party wronged and confess the wrong he has done if able making also satisfaction if not
After this how can I think of neglecting him through any tenderness of face Especially when I am at present in so far better that is easier and more tolerable Circumstances than he was I perhaps am laugh'd at by some Fools or Mad-men for obeying him but I am otherwise at ease and to have Heaven for the reward of overcoming this petty private affront Shall then such inconsiderable Trifles make me wave or forgo my Duty Far be it from me In any other Case whatsoever by like Consultations or Considerations as in these Cases now set down shall we through God's Grace and Blessing upon our honest endeavour find out particular means and by such thought work our hearts to particular resolution for breaking our selves of any other or whatsoever Sins we have found more peculiarly prevalent in us And thus as to the second Step of this Head of Practice The Third will be A particular Resolution or as occasion serves Vow touching the use of those Means which we have found most proper to amend us and touching such instances of our Manners which upon enquiry we have found most to need Reformation All general Resolutions we know must be performed in particular instances of Life and Action and therefore a particular Resolution touching those Means which by consideration we have found proper to each Case will be no less necessary than the general Resolution first proposed as to the main Body of the Work As for example Suppose avoiding ill Company be one Means I have found out to keep me from Intemperance and Excess or from loss of Time c. I 'll immediately resolve not only against loose but against vain Companions I 'll keep home more abandon certain Familiars estrange my self from such and such I 'll set my self certain employment so much for such a time c. Suppose again contenting my self with sufficient Provisions and abandoning a too peremptory Resolution I had taken up to be rich to such a degree be the Means I have discovered proper for the remedying my unjust oppressive dealing I 'll resolve on that and immediately order my Affairs accordingly But in such Cases as these perhaps single resolution will not suffice to hold our unstable Souls sometimes therefore but with much caution and deliberation we may do well to add Vow David or whatever holy Man was the Author of that Psalm did so Psal 119. 51. I have said that is resolved with my self to keep thy Words and lest that should not do ver 106. I have sworn and I will perform it that I will keep thy righteous Judgments Thus as to the first Part of the Method for breaking our selves of Sin by such Acts as are to be done for the present Those which are to be continued are the prosecution of these Resolutions or Vows by a constant study of Mortification and by daily endeavours of proficiency in Holyness through the whole following part of our Life Now the treating hereof belongs not to this first Class of Advices but is to be set down in the second Part. In the mean while we are to proceed with what yet remains for our present making our peace with God § 14. And now after this Practice of Repentance Faith interposes again and that not meerly Faith towards God or a belief of the Being Nature and Providence of God as hitherto most insisted on but Faith in our Lord Jesus Christ or Faith as called by the Apostle Rom. 3. 25. Faith in his Blood For him as bleeding for us upon the Cross as sacrificed upon that Altar hath God set forth to be a propitiation and it is by the Blood of his Cross that he made peace Col. 1. 20. 'T is the Blood of Christ who through the Eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God that purges our Consciences from dead Works to serve the living God Heb. 9. 14. 'T is by that one offering he hath perfected forever them that are sanctified Heb. 10. 14. This is that Fountain set open to the House of David and to the Inhabitants of Jerusalem for Sin and for Vncleanness Zechar. 13. 1. Hither therefore after all Confessions Contrition Tears Resolutions Vows and endeavours of Reformation the faithful Soul comes Here it exerts new Acts of Faith that is Trust Affiance and Dependance And as the Holy persons Matth. 28. 9. did corporally to our Saviour after his Resurection so must true Penitents as it were catching the Crucified Jesus by the Feet hold him fast after a spiritual sort as their only hope and refuge that only name given under Heaven that Dear Jesus which redeemed us from the Wrath to come and with Christ thus not in their Arms but Heart look up to the Eternal Father for pardon and peace through the Son of his Loves This distinct trust in Christ as sacrificed for our Sins in this Order or thus in conjunction with such practice of Repentance as set down exerted or exercised I conceive of most essential and singular Force to the perfecting our Peace both with God and in our own Consciences § 15. And now I see not any thing which remains speaking as to a certain course of transient Acts ordinarily to compleat a Man's Reconciliation with God except we should say it is requisite to Cloath all these Acts with serious and suitable Prayer Prayer is that Christian Duty which as I may say alone as it were gives a body to all the Acts of Grace in the Soul or as one well observes It is indeed that single Duty wherein Dr. Owen of the Spirit of Prayer every Geace is acted every Sin opposed every good thing obtained or impetrated of God Without it Contrition and Faith and Resolution are after a sort airy and volatil This fixes them and makes them substantial mature and permanent Nay it raises and strengthens or heightens them Prayer is such an Office as not only actuates or draws out into Exercise all Christian Graces but makes the Soul more earnest and zealous in the Actings of them Having therefore proceeded as above directed towards making thy Peace with God cast thy self in secret at the Throne of Grace in earnest and humble supplication confessing and bewailing thy Sin with the Exercise of all the Contrition thou canst excite passing Sentence on thy self acknowledging what thou hast deserved but withall pleading the Sacrifice of the Death of Christ the atonement made by the Blood of his Cross and casting thy self upon God's mercy through that great and alone true Propitiation bringing indeed the heartiest Purposes and making the firmest Resolutions thou can'st endeavouring to the utmost of thy Power to perform all that concerns thee on thy part by the Covenant of Grace but after all acknowledging thy self an unprofitable servant Luke 17. 10. disclaiming therefore any righteousness of thine own and beseeching Pardon for thy very Repentance begging to be sprinkled with the Blood of Jesus and to be found in him For he is the Lord our