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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
fire_n	hell_n	punishment_n	sin_n	2,671	5	5.1432	4	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A39675	Pneumatologia, a treatise of the soul of man wherein the divine original, excellent and immortal nature of the soul are opened, its love and inclination to the body, with the necessity of its separation from it, considered and improved, the existence, operations, and states of separated souls, both in Heaven and Hell, immediately after death, asserted, discussed, and variously applyed, divers knotty and difficult questions about departed souls, both philosophical, and theological, stated and determined, the invaluable preciousness of humane souls, and the various artifices of Satan (their professed enemy) to destroy them, discovered, and the great duty and interest of all men, seasonable and heartily to comply with the most great and gracious design of the Father, Son, and Spirit, for the salvation of their souls, argued and pressed / by John Flavel ...	Flavel, John, 1630?-1691.	1685 (1685)	Wing F1176; ESTC R5953	379,180	504

and help on the ruine of others That is a startling Text Matth. 12.36 But I say unto you that every idle word that men shall speak they shall give an account thereof in the day of Iudgment To give an account is here by a Metalepsis of the Antecedent for the Consequent put for punishment in Hell fire without an intervening change of heart and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus And there is more evil in this abuse of our breath than we can easily discern especially upon two accounts 1 Because it is a sin most frequently committed and seldom repented of The intercourse betwixt the heart and tongue is quick and the sense of the evil as easily and quickly passeth away 2 Because the poisonous and malignant influence thereof abides and continues long after Our words may mischief others not only a long time after they are spoken but a long time after the tongue that spake them is turned to dust How many years may a foolish or filthy word a prophane scoff an Atheistical expression stick in the minds of them that heard them after the Speakers death A word spoken is Physically transient and past away with the breath that delivered it but it 's Morally permanent for as to its moral efficacy no more is required but its objective existence in the minds and thoughts of them that once heard it And upon that very ground Suarez argues for a general Judgment after men have past at death their particular Judgment because saith he long after that abundance of good and evil will be done in this World by the Dead in the persons of others that ove●live them For look as it was said of Abel that being dead he yet speaketh so it may be said of Iulian Porphyry and multitudes of scoffing Atheists that being dead they yet speak O therefore get a sanctified heart to season your breath that it may minister grace to the hearers Inference VI. LEt your breath promote the spiritual life of others as well as maintain the natural life in your selves ' Though the maintaining of your natural life be one end why God gave you breath yet it is not the only or principal end of it Your breath must be food to others as well as life to you Prov. 10.21 The lips of the righteous feed many It will be comfortable to resign that breath to God at death which hath been instrumental to his glory in this life It was no low encomium Christ gave of the Church when he said Cant. 4.11 Thy lips O my Spouse drop as the Honeycomb Honey and Milk are under thy Tongue Sweet wholesome and pleasant words dropt from her lips They drop saith Christ as the Honeycomb Some drops ever and anon fall actually and others hang at the same time prepared and ready to fall Such a prepared and habitual Disposition should every Christian continually have Your Words may stick upon mens hearts to their Edification and Salvation when you are in your Graves Your Tongues may now sow that precious seed which may spring-up to the praise of God though you may not live to reap the comfort of it in this World Iohn 4.36 37. 't is a rich expence of your breath to bring but one Soul to God and yet God hath used the breath of one as his instrument to save edifie and comfort the Souls of thousands Proverbs 11.30 The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life and he that winneth Souls is wise The good Lord make all his people wise in this Surely whether we consider the invaluable worth and preciousness of Souls the benefits you have had from the breath of others your selves the innate property of grace whereever it is to diffuse and communicate it self how short a time you have to breath and how comfortable it will be when you breath your last to remember how it hath been imployed for God All this should open your lips to counsel reprove and comfort others as often as opportunity is ministred Did Christ spend his Blood for our Souls and shall not we spend our Breath for them O let our lips dispense knowledge If you will not spend your Breath for God How will you spend your Blood for him If you will not Speak for him I doubt you will not Die for him Away with a sullen reservedness away with unprofitable Chat all Subjects of Discourse are not fit for a Christians lips 'T is a grave Admonition God once gave his people by the Pen of a faithful * Mr. West Minister You may rue saith he the opportunities you have lost Here lay a poor Wretch with one foot in Hell would he not have started back if he had had light to discover his danger Well you are now together something you must say the same breath would serve for a Compassionate Admonition as for a Complacent Impertinency which will redound to neither of your advantages You part the man dies and in the midst of Hell cries out against you One word of yours might have saved me You had me in your reach you might have told me my danger you forbare I hardned The Lord reward your negligence Inference VII IF breath be the tye betwixt Soul and Body How are we concerned to improve and draw forth the precious breath of Ministers and Christians whilst it is yet in their Nostrills The breath of many Ministers is judicially stopt already their breath serves to little other use than to preserve their own lives it will be stopt ere long by death and then those excellent treasures of Gifts and Graces wherewith they are richly furnished will be gone out of your reach never to be further useful to your Souls You should do by them therefore as one aptly speaks as Scholars do by some choice Book they have borrowed and must return in a few days to its Owner They diligently read it Night and Day and carefully transcribe the most useful and excellent Notes they can find in it that they may make them their own when the Book is called for out of their hands But alas we rather divert than draw forth these Excellencies that are in them You may yet converse with them and greatly benefit your selves by these Converses but as one speaks by the stream of your impertinent talk that season is neglected afterwards you see your lack of knowledge but then the instrument is removed How must it gall an awakened Iew to think what Discourse he had with Jesus Christ Is it lawful to give Tribute to Caesar Why do not thy Disciples fast O had I nothing else to enquire of the Lord Jesus Would it not have been more pertinent to have asked What shall I do to be saved But he is gone and I dead in my sins How many persons have we sent away that had a word of Wisdom in their hearts Having only learnt from them what a Clock it is what Weather or what News Forgetting to ask our own hearts What is all

few are converted to Christ in their old age It was recorded for a wonder in the primitive times that Marcus Cajus Victorius became a Christian in his old age time and usage fixes the roots of sin deep in the Soul old trees will not bow as tender pliable plants do Hence it is that all essays and attempts to draw men from the course in which they have walked from their youth are frustraneous and succesless The Drunkard the Adulterer yea the self-righteous Moralist are by long continued usage so fixed in their course and all this while Conscience so stupefied by often repeated acts of sin that it is naturally as impossible to remove a mountain as the will of a sinner thus confirmed in his wickedness However let tryal be made and the success left to him to whom no length of the time or difficulty must be objected or opposed The fourth way to Hell shut up by two Considerations 1. First Let it be considered the longer any man hath been engaged in and accustomed to the way of sin the more reason and need that man hath speedily and without delay to repent and reform his course there is yet a possibility of mercy a season of Salvation left how far soever a Soul be gone on towards Hell none can say it is yet too late When Mr. Bilney the Martyr heard a Minister preaching thus O thou old Sinner that hast gone on in a course of sin these fifty or sixty years dost thou think that Christ will accept thee now or take the Devils leavings Good God! said he what preaching of Christ is here Had such Doctrine been preached to me in the day of my troubles it had been enough utterly to have discouraged me from Repentance and Faith No no Sinner it is not yet too late if at last thy heart be touched with a real sense of thy sin and danger the word is plain Isa. 55.7 Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts and let him return unto the Lord and he will have mercy upon him and to our God for he will abundantly pardon An abundant pardon thou needest thy sins by long continued custom and frequent repetitions have been abundantly aggravated and an abundant pardon is with God for poor sinners he will abundantly pardon but then thou must come up to his terms thou must not expect pardon or mercy when thy sins have forsaken thee but upon thy forsaking them yea such a forsaking as includes a resolution or decree in thy will to return to them no more Hos. 14.8 there must be a change of thy way and that not from profaneness to civility only which is but to change one false way to Heaven for another or the dirty road to hell for a cleanlier path on the other side the hedge but a total and final forsaking of every way of sin as to the love and habitual practice of it yea and thy thoughts too as well as thy ways there must be an internal as well as an external change upon thee yea a positive as well as a negative change a turning to the Lord as well as a turning from sin and then how long soever thou hast walked in the road towards Hell there will be time enough and mercy enough to secure thy returning Soul safe to Heaven 2. Secondly Canst thou not forbear thy customary si● upon lesser motives than the salvation of thy Soul and if thou canst wilt thou not much more do it for the saving of thy precious immortal Soul Suppose there were but a pecuniary mulct of an hundred pounds to be certainly levied upon thy Estate for every Oath thou swearest or every time thou art drunk wouldst thou not rather chuse reformation than beggery And is not the loss of thy Soul a penalty infinitely heavier than a little money But as the wise Heathen observed Senec. Ep. 42. Gratuita nobis videntur quae chariss●mè constant quae emere nollemus si domus nobis nostra pro illis esset danda c. Ea sola emi putamus pro quibus pecuniam solvimus ●a gratuita vocamus pro quibus nos ipsos impendimus We reckon those things only to be bought which we part with money for and that we have those things gratis for which we pay our selves Is nothing cheap in our eyes but our selves our Souls Do we call that gratis that will cost us so dear Darius threw away his Massie Crown when he ●red before Alexander that it might not hinder him in his flight Sure your Souls are more worth than your money and all the enjoyments you have in this world It had been an ancient custom among the Citizens of Antioch to wash themselves in the Baths but the King forbidding it they all presently forbare for fear of his displeasure whereupon Chrysostome convinced them of the vanity of that plea for customary sinning You see 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. 〈◊〉 14. saith he how soon fear can break off an old custom and shall not the fear of God be as powerful to over-master it in us as the fear of man O friends believe it it is better for you to cut off a right hand or pluck out a right eye than having two hands or eyes to be cast into Hell where their worm dieth not and their fire is not quenched The fifth way of losing the Soul opened V. The fifth way by which an innumerable multitude of Souls are eternally lost is by the bait● of sensual sinful pleasures Some customary sins have little or no pleasure in them as swearing malice c. but others a●sure and entice the Soul by the sensual delight that is in them This is the bait with which multitudes are enticed ensnared and ruined to all Eternity Voluptatum blanditiis deliniti ad ea garenda omnia qua prava sunt impellimur Arist l. 2. Eth. c. 3. It is a true and grave observation 〈◊〉 Philosopher That we are impelled as it were to that which is evil by the alluring blandishments of pleasure This was the first bait by which Satan caught the Souls of our first Parents in Innocency Gen. 3.6 The tree was pleasant to the eye Pleasure quickens the principles of sin in us and inflames the desires of the heart after it Every pleasant sin hath a world of Customers and cost what it will they resolve to have it I have read of a certain Fruit which the Spaniards found in the Indies which was exceeding pleasant to the taste but Nature had so fenced it and double-guarded it with sharp and dangerous thorns that it was very difficult to come at it They tore their cloaths yea their flesh to get it and therefore called the Fruit Comfits in Hell Such are all the pleasures of sin Comfits in Hell Damnation is the price of them and yet the sensitive appetite is so outragious and mad after them that at the price of their Souls they will have them Thus

everlasting Destruction from the presence of the Lord and the Glory of his Power And speaking of the Torments of the Damned Christ thus expresseth the misery of such wretched Souls in Hell Mark 9.44 Where their Worm dyeth not and the fire is not quenched But how shall the Wicked be punished with everlasting Destruction if their Souls have not an everlasting Duration Or how can it be said That their Worm viz. the remorse and anguish of their Consciences dieth not if their Souls dye Punishment can endure no longer than its subject endureth If the being of the Soul cease its pains and punishments must have an end You see then there are everlasting Promises and Threatnings to be fulfilled both upon the Godly and Ungodly He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life and he that believeth not the Son shall not see Life but the wrath of God abideth on him Iohn 3.36 The Believer shall never see spiritual Death viz. the separation of his Soul from God and the Unbeliever shall never see life viz. the blessed fruition of God but the Wrath of God shall abide on him If Wrath must abide on him he must abide also as the wretched subject thereof which is another Argument of the Immortality of Souls Argument III. THE Immortality of the Soul is a Truth asserted and attested by the universal consent of all Nations and Ages of the World Multum dare solemus praesumptioni omnium hominium c●m de Animae Aeternitate disserimus non leve momentum apud nos habit consensus hominum aut timentium inseros aut colentium Soneca Ep. 17. We give much saith Seneca to the presumption of all men and that justly for it would be hard to think that an Error should obtain the general consent of Mankind or that God would suffer all the World in all Ages of it to bow down under an universal Deception This Doctrine sticks close to the nature of Man it springs up easily and without force from his Conscience It hath been allowed as an unquestionable thing not only among Christians who have the Oracles of God to teach and confirm this Doctrine but among Heathens also who had no other Light but that of Nature to guide them into the knowledge and belief of it In omni re co●se●sio o●●ium gentiam Lex Naturae putanda est esque instar mille demonst●ationum tal●● consensio apud bonos esse deb●t Zanch. de im●ort Animarum p. 644. Learned Zanchius cites out of Cicero an excellent passage to this purpose In every thing saith he the consent of all Nations is to be accounted the Law of Nature And therefore with all good Men it should be instead of a thousand Demonstrations and to resist it as he there adds what is it but to resist the voice of God and how much more when with this consent the Word of God doth also consent As for the consent of Nations in this point the learned Author last mentioned hath industriously gathered many great and famous Testimonies from the antient Chaldeans Graecians Pythagoreans Stoicks Platonists c. which evidently shew they made no doubt of the Immortality of their Souls How plain is that of Phocylides 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Speaking of the Soul in opposition to the Body which must be resolved into dust he saith But for the Soul that is immortal and never grows old but lives for ever 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And Trismegistus the famous and celebrated Philosopher gives this account of Man That he consists of two parts being mortal in respect of his Body but immortal in respect of his Soul which is his best and principal part Pluto not only asserts the immortality of the Souls of Men but disputes for it and among other Arguments urges this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Si erim Mors dissolutio esset utriusque corporis sc. animae Iu●in● foret malis cu● mori●●tur Plato in epist. That if it were not so wicked Men would certainly have the advantage of righteous and good Men who after they have committed all manner of evils should suffer none But what speak I of Philosophers the most barbarous Nations in the World constantly believe it * Quid de Tu●●cis Tartaris Moschis Indis Persis aliisqu● omnibus ●u●c temporis barba●●● nationibus dicam Nemo tam barbarus aut impius est quin sentiat post montem sup 〈…〉 〈◊〉 in quibus anime aut pro Malefactis punlantur aut co●ountur celiciisq p●s●uantur p●o 〈◊〉 factis Zanch. ubi supra The Turks acknowledge it in their Alchoran and though they grosly mistake the nature of Heaven in fansying it to be a Paradise of sensual Pleasures as well as the way thither by their Impostor Mahomet yet 't is plain they believe the Souls immortality and that it lives in pain or pleasure after this life The very salvage and illiterate Indians are so fully persuaded of the Souls Immortality that Wives cast themselves chearfully into the Flames to attend the Souls of their Husbands and Subjects to attend the Souls of their Kings into the other World Two things are objected against this Argument Object 1. I. That some particular persons have denied this Doctrine as Epicurus c. and by Argument maintained the contrary Sol. To which I answer That though they have done so yet 1. this no way shakes the Argument from the consent of Nations because some few persons have denied it we truly say the Earth is Spherical though there be many Hills and Risings in it If Democritus put out his own eyes must we therefore say all the World is blind 2 It is worth thinking on whether they that have questioned the Immortality of the Soul have not rather made it the matter of their option and desire than of their Faith and Persuasion We distinguish Atheists into three Classes such as are so in Practice in Desire or in Iudgment but of the former sorts there may be found multitudes to one that is so in his setled judgment 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hieroc If you think it strange that any Man should wish his Soul to be mortal Hierocles gives us the true reason of it A wicked man saith he is afraid of his Iudge and therefore wishes his Soul and Body may perish together by Death rather than it should come to Gods Tribunal Object 2. II. Nor can the strength of the Argument be eluded by saying All this may be but an universal Tradition one Nation receiving it from another Sol. For as this is neither true in it self nor possible to be made good so if it were it would not invalidate the Argument for if it were not a truth agreeable to the light of nature and so easily received by all Men upon the Proposal of it it were impossible that all Nations in the World should embrace it so readily and hold it so tenaciously as they do Argument IV. THE Immortality of the

oppose those things which God hath subordinated bring this home to your natural or civil actions eating drinking Plowing or Sowing and see how the consequence will look Object 3. Say not 't is a mercenary Doctrine and disparages free Grace for are not all the enjoyments and comforts of this life confessedly from free Grace though God hath dispensed them to you in the way of your diligence and industry Object 4. To conclude say not the difficulties of Salvation are insuperable 't is so hard to watch every motion of the heart to deny every lust to resist a suitable temptation to suffer the loss of all for Christ that there is no hope for overcoming them For 1 God can and doth make difficult things easie to his people who work in the strength of Christ Philip. 4.13 2 These same difficulties are before all others that are before you yet it discourageth not them Philip. 3.11 Others strive to the uttermost There are extreams found in this matter some work for Salvation as an hireling for his wages so the Papists these disparage Grace and cry up works Others cry down obedience as legal as the Antinomians and cry up grace to the disparagement of duties avoid both these and see that you strive but 1 think not Heaven to be the price of your striving Rom. 4.3 2 strive but not for a spurt let this care and diligence run throughout your lives whilst you are living be you still striving your Souls are worth it and infinitely more than all this amounts to Inference VI. DOth the Soul overlive the Body and abide for ever Then 't is a great evil and folly to be excessively careful for the mortal Body and neglective of the immortal Inhabitant In a too much indulged Body there ever dwells a too much neglected Soul The Body is but a vile thing Philip. 3.21 the Soul more valuable than the whole World Matt. 16.26 to spend time care and pains for a vile Body whilst little or no regard is had to the precious Immortal Soul is an unwarrantable folly and madness To have a clean and washed Body and a Soul all filth as one speaks a Body neatly cloathed and dressed Carzv p. 148.149 with a Soul all naked and unready a Body fed and a Soul starved a Body full of the Creature and a Soul empty of Christ these are poor Souls indeed We smile at little children who in a kind of laborious idleness take a great deal of pains to make and trim their Babies or build their little houses of Sticks and straws And what are they but children of a bigger size that keep such ado about the Body a house of Clay a weak pile that must perish in a few days 'T is admirible and very convictive of most Christians what we read in an Heathen I confess saith Seneca there is a love to the Body implanted in us all 〈◊〉 insit●m esse nobis corpo●is nostri charitatem Fate● nos hujus gere●e tutelam nec nego indulgendum illi ser●iendum nego Multus enim serviet qui corpori servit qui pro illo nimium timet qui ad illud omnia refert hujus nos nimi●● amor timoribus inquietat solicitudinibus onerat contumeli●s objicit bones●um ei vile est c●i corpus nimis charum est agatur ejus diligentissimè cura ita tamen ut cum exiget ratio cum dignitas cum fides mittendum in ignem sit Seneca Ep. 14. p. 545. we have the Tutilage and charge of it we may be kind and indulgent to it but must not serve it but he that serves it is a servant to many cares fears and passions Let us have a diligent care of it yet so as when Reason requires when our Dignity or faith requires it we commit it to the fire 'T is true the Body is beloved of the Soul and God requires that it moderately care for the necessities and conveniences of it but to be fond indulgent and constantly sollicitous about it is both the sin and snare of the Soul One of the Fathers being invited to dine with a Lady and waiting some hours till she was drest and fit to come down when he saw her he fell a weeping and being demanded why he wept O saith he I am troubled that you should spend so many hours this morning in pinning and trimming your Body when I have not spent half the time in Praying Repenting and caring for my own Soul Two things a Master commits to his Servants care saith one the Child and the Childs cloaths it will be but a poor excuse for the Servant to say at his Masters return Sir here are all the Childs cloaths neat and clean but the child is lost Much so will be the account that many will give to God of their Souls and Bodies at the great day Lord here is my Body I was very careful for it I neglected nothing that belonged to its content and well-fare but for my Soul that is lost and cast away for ever I took little care or thought about it 'T is remarkable what the Apostle saith Rom. 8.12 We owe nothing to the flesh we are not in its debt we have given it all more than all that belongs to it but we owe many an hour many a care many a deep thought to our Souls which we have defrauded it of for the vile Bodies sake You have robb'd your Souls to pay your flesh This is madness Inference VII HOW great a blessing is the Gospel which brings life and immortality to light the most desirable mercies to immortal Souls This is the great benefit we receive by it as the Apostle speaks 2 Tim. 1.10 Christ hath abolished death and brought life and immortality to light by the Gospel Life and immortality by a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is put for immortal life the thing which all immortal Souls desire and long for These desires are found in Souls that enjoy not the Gospel-light for as I said before they naturally spring out of the very nature of all immortal Souls But how and where it is to be obtained that is a secret for which we are entirely beholding to the Gospel-discovery It lay hid in the Womb of Gods purpose till by the light of Gospel Revelation it was made manifest But now all men may see what are the gracious thoughts and purposes of God concerning men and what that ●s he hath designed for their Immortal Souls even an Immortal life and this life is to be obtained by Christ than which no tidings can be more welcome sweet or acceptable to us O therefore study the Gospel This is life eternal to know thee the only true God and Iesus Christ whom thou hast sent John 17.3 And see that you prise the Gospel above all earthly Treasures 'T is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation you have two inestimable benefits and blessings by it 1 It manifests and reveals eternal life to you

that their lives were cheap and low priz'd things for his enjoyment And here indeed is the glory and triumph of a Christians Faith and love to Christ For 1 it enables him to part chearfully with what he sees and feels for what his eyes yet never saw 1 Pet. 1.8 Whom having not seen ye love 2 To part with what is dearest on earth and lies nearest the heart of all he enjoys for Christ's sake 3 To reconcile his heart to what is most abhorrent and formidable to nature 4 To endure the greatest of pains and torments to be with him 5 To cast himself into the vast Ocean of Eternity the most amazing change to be with Christ. O the glorious Conquests of Love Inference II. THen the Apostasie of unregenerate Professours in times of eminent danger is not to be wondered at They will and must warp from Christ when their lives are in hazard for him The love of the Body will certainly prevail over their love to Christ and Religion Amor meus pondus meum Self-love will now draw Love is the weight of the Soul which inclines and determines it in the competition of Interests and the predominant Interest always carries it Every Unregenerate Professor loves his own life more than Christ prefers his body before his Soul such a one may upon divers accounts as Education Example slight Convictions of Conscience or Ostentation of gifts fall into a Profession of Religion and continue a long time in that Profession before he visibly recede from Christ hope of the Resurrection of the Interest of Religion in the World Shame of retracting his Profession Applause of his Zeal and Constancy in higher Tryals The Peace of his own Conscience and many such Motives may prevail with a Carnal Professor to endure a while but when dangers of life come to an height they are gone Matth. 24.8 9 10. And therefore our Lord tells us that they who hate not their lives cannot be his Disciples Luke 12.26 Now will they lose their lives by saving them Matt. 16.25 And the Reasons are plain and forcible For 1. Now is the proper season for the predominant love to be discovered it can be hid no longer And the love of life is the predominant love in all such persons For do but compare it with their love to Christ and it will easily be found so They love their lives truly and really they love Christ but feignedly and pretendedly and the real will and must prevail over the feigned love They love their lives fervently and intensely they love Christ but coldly and remissly And the fervent love will prevail over the the remiss love Their love to their Bodies hath a root in themselves their love to Christ hath no root in themselves Matth. 13.21 and that which hath a root must needs outlast and outlive that which hath none 2. Because when life is in hazard Conscience will work in them by way of Discouragement 't will hint the danger of their eternal state to them and tell them they may cast away their Souls for ever in a Bravado for though the cause they are called to suffer for be good yet their Condition is bad and if the Condition be not good as well as the Cause a Man is lost for ever though he suffer for it 1 Cor. 13.3 Conscience which encourages and supports the upright will daunt and appall the Hypocrite and tell him he is not on the same terms in Sufferings that other men are 3. Because then all the Springs by which their profession was fed and maintained fail and dry up Now the wind that was in their backs is come about and blows a storm in their faces There are no Preferment nor Honours now to be had from Religion These mens Sufferings are a perfect Surprize to them for they never counted the cost Luke 14.28 Now they must stand alone and resist unto bloud and sacrifice all visibles for invisibles and this they can never do O therefore Professors look to your hearts try their predominant love compare your love to Christ with that to your lives Now the like question will be put to you that once was put to Peter John 21.15 Lovest thou me more than these What say you to this You think now you do but alas your love is not yet brought to the fire to be tryed You think you hate sin but will you be able to strive unto blood against sin Hebr. 12.4 Will you chuse suffering rather than sin Iob 36.21 O try your love to Christ before God bring it to the tryal Sure I am the love of life will make you warp in the hour of Temptation except 1. You sate down and counted the cost of Religion before-hand if you set out in Profession only for a Walk not for a Iourney if you go to Sea for Recreation not for a Voyage if you be mounted among other Professors only to take the air and not to engage an enemy in sharp and bloudy Encounters you are gone 2. Except you live by Faith and not by Sense 2 Cor. 4.18 Whilst we look not at the things that are seen You must ballance present Sufferings with future glory You must go by that account and reckoning Rom. 8.18 or you are gone Now the just shall live by faith and if Faith don't support your fears will certainly sink you 3. Except you be sincere and plain-hearted in Religion driving no Design in it but to save your Souls else see your lot in that Example 2 Tim. 4.10 Demas hath forsaken me O take heed of a cunning subdolous double heart in Religion be plain be open care not if your ends lay open to the eyes of all the World 4. Except you experience the power of Religion in your own Souls as well as wear the name of it O my Brethren 't is not a name to live that will do you service now Many Ships are gone down to the bottom for all the brave Names of the Success the Prosperous the Haypy return and so will you There is a knowing in our selves by taste and real experience Hebr. 10.34 which doth a Soul more service in a Suffering hour than all the splendid Names and Titles in the World 5. Except you make it your daily work to crucify the Flesh deny self for Christ in all the Forms and Interests of it He that can't deny himself will deny Jesus Christ Matth. 26.24 let him deny himself take up his Cross and follow me else he can't be my Disciple Ponder these things in your hearts whilst yet God delays the Tryal Inference III. IF the Souls of men be naturally so strongly inclin'd and affected towards the Body then hence you may plainly see the Wisdom of God in all the Afflictions and Burdens he lays upon his people in this World and find that all is but enough to wean off their Souls from their Bodies and make them willing to part with them The life of the Saints in this World

sufferings are prepared for the fearful and unbelieving in the World to come Rev. 21.8 How many sad examples do the Church-Histories of ancient and latter times afford us of men who consulting with flesh and bloud in time of danger have in pity to the Body ruined their Souls There be but few like minded with Paul who set a low price upon his liberty or life for Christ Act. 20.24 or with those worthy Iews Dan. 3.28 who yielded their Bodies to preserve their consciences Few of Chrysostoms mind who told the Empress Nil nisi peccatum timeo I fear nothing but sin Or of Basils who told the Emperor God threatned Hell whereas he threatned but a prison That is a remarkable Rule that Christ gives us Mat. 10.28 The sum of it is to set God against man the Soul against the Body and Hell against temporal sufferings and so surmounting these low fleshly considerations to cleave to our duty in the face of dangers You read Gal. 11 16. how in pursuit of Duty though surrounded with danger Paul would not conferr or consult with flesh and bloud i. e. ask its opinion which were best or stay for its consent till it were willing to suffer he understood not that the flesh had any voice at the Council-table in his Soul but willing or unwilling if duty call for it he was resolved to hazard it for God We have a great many little Politicians among us who think to husband their lives and liberties a great deal better than other plain-hearted and too forward Christians do but these Politiques will be their perdition and their craft will betray them to ruine They will lose their lives by saving them when others will save them by losing them Matth. 10.39 For the interest of the Body depends on and follows the safety of the Soul as the Cabin doth the ship O my Friends let me beg you not to love your Bodies into Hell and your Souls too for their sakes be not so scar'd at the sufferings of the Body as with poor Spira to dash them both against the wrath of the great and terrible God Most of those Souls that are now in Hell are there upon the account of their indulgence to the flesh they could not deny the flesh and now are denyed by God They could not suffer from men and now must suffer the vengeance of eternal fire 4. In a word it appears we love them fondly and irregularly in that we cannot with any patience think of death and separation from them How do some men fright at the very name of death and no Arguments can perswade them seriously to think of an unbodied and separated estate 'T is as death to them to bring their thoughts close to that ungrateful Subject A Christian that loves his Body regularly and moderately can look into his own grave with a composed mind and speak familiarly of it as Iob 17.14 And Peter speaks of the putting off of his Body by death as a man would of the putting off of his cloaths at night 2 Pet. 1.13 14. And certainly such men have a great Advantage above all others both as to the tranquillity of their life and death You know a parting time must come and the more fond you are of them the more bitter and doleful that time will be Nothing except the guilt and terrible charges of conscience put men into terrours at death more than our fondness of the Body I do confess Christless persons have a great deal of reason to be shie of death their dying day is their undoing day but for Christians to startle and fright at it is strange considering how great a friend death will be to them that are in Christ. What are you afraid of What to go to Christ to be freed of sin and affliction too soon Certainly it hath not been so comfortable an habitation to you that you should be loth to exchange it for an Heavenly one USE III. Of Exhortation TO conclude seeing there is so strict a friendship and tender affection betwixt Soul and Body let me perswade every Soul of you to express your love to the Body by labouring to get union with Jesus Christ and thereby to prevent the utter ruine of both to all Eternity Souls if you love your selves or the Bodies you dwell in shew it by your preventing care in season lest they be cast away for ever How can you say you love them when you daily expose them to the everlasting wrath of God by imploying them as weapons of unrighteousness to fight against him that formed them You feed and pamper them on earth you give them all the delights and pleasures you can procure for them in this World but you take no care what shall become of them nor your Souls neither after death hath separated them O cruel Souls cruel not to others but to your selves and to your own flesh which you pretend so much love to Is this your love to your Bodies what to imploy them in Satans service on Earth and then to be cast as a prey to him for ever in Hell You think the rigor and mortification of the Saints their abstemiousness and self-denial their cares fears and diligence to be too great severity to their Bodies but they know these are the most real evidences of their true love to them they love them too well to cast them away as you do Alas Your love to the Body doth not consist ●n feeding and cloathing and pleasing it but in getting it united to Christ and made the Temple of the Holy Ghost in using it for God and dedicating it to God I beseech you brethren by the mercies of God to present your Bodies living Sacrifices to God which is your reasonable service● Rom. 12.1 The Soul should look upon the Body as a wise Parent upon a rebellious or wanton child that would if left to it self quickly bring it self to the Gallows The Father looks on him with compassion and melting bowels and saith with the rod in his hand and tears in his eyes my child my naughty disobedient headstrong child I resolve to chastise thee severely I love thee too well to suffer thee to be ruin'd if my care or corrections may prevent it So should our Souls evidence their love to and care over their own rebellious flesh 'T is cruelty not love or pity to indulge them to their own destruction Except you have gracious Souls you shall never have glorified Bodies except you Souls be united with Christ the happiness of your Bodies as well as Souls is lost to all eternity Know you not that the everlasting condition of your Bodies follows and depends on the Interest your Souls now get in Christ O that this one sad truth might sink deep into all our considerations this day that if your Bodies be snares to your Souls and your Souls be now regardless of the future estate of themselves and them assuredly they will have a bitter parting at

implanted in a weak and imperfect Soul go with it to glory where they exert themselves in a more high and perfect way of acting than ever they did here below The languishing spark of love is there a vehement flame the saint remiss and infrequent delight in God is there at a constant ravishing and transporting height 4 To conclude As all implanted habits of grace ascend with the sanctified Soul to Heaven for the Soul ascends not thither as a natural but as a new Creature so all the effects results and sweet improvements of those Graces which we gathered as the pleasant fruits of them on earth these accompany and follow the Soul into the other World also Their Works follow them Rev. 14.13 They go not before in the notion of merits to make way for them but they follow or accompany them as Evidences and comfortable Experiences I doubt not but the very remembrance of what past betwixt God and the Soul here betwixt the day of its Espousals to Christ and its Divorce from the Body will be one sweet ingredient into their blessedness and joy when they shall be singing in the upper Region the Song of Moses and of the Lamb. They were never given to be lost or left behind us And thus you see with what a rich Cargo the Soul sails to the other World though if it had no other it would never drop Anchor there PROP. VII The Souls of the just when separated from their Bodies do not wander up and down this World nor hover about the Sepulchres where their Bodies lie nor are they detain'd in any Purgatory in order to their more perfect Purification nor do they fall asleep in a benummed stupid State But do forthwith pass into glory and are immediately with the Lord. WHen once the mind of man leaves the Scripture-guidance and direction which is to it what the Compass or Pole-star is to a Ship in the wide Ocean Whither will it not wander In what uncertainties will it not fluctuate And upon what Rocks and Quick-sands must it inevitably be cast Many have been the foolish and groundless Conceits and Fancies of men about the Receptacles of departed Souls 1. Some have assigned them a restless wandering life now here now there without any certain dwelling place any where The only ground for this fancy is the frequent Apparitions of the Ghosts or Spirits of the dead whereof many instances are given and who is there that is a stranger to such Stories Now if departed Souls were fixed any where this World would be quiet and free from such disturbances I make no doubt but very many of these Stories have been the industrious Fictions and Devices of wicked and superstitious Votaries to gain reputation to their way speaking lies in Hypocrisie to draw Disciples after them And many others have been the Tricks and Impostures of Satan himself to shake the credit of the Saints Rest in Heaven and the imprisonment of ungodly Souls in Hell as will more fully appear when I come to speak to that Question more particularly 2. Others think when they are loosed from the Body at death they hover about the Graves and solitary places where their Bodies lie as willing seeing they can dwell no longer in them to abide as near them as they can just as the surviving Turtle keeps near the place where his Mate died and may be heard mourning for a long time about that part of the Wood. This opinion seeks countenance and protection from that law Deut. 18.10 11. which prohibits men to consult with the dead of which restraint there had been no need nor use if it had not been practised and such practices had never been continued if departed Souls had not frequented those places and given answers to their Questions But what I said before of Satans Impostures is enough for present to return to this also Bell. lib. 2. de Purg. cap. 6. 3. The Papists send them immediately to Purgatory in order to their more thorough Purification This Purgatory Bellarmin thus describes It is a certain place wherein as in a Prison Souls are purged after this life that were not fully purged here to the intent they may enter pure into Heaven and though the Church saith he hath not defined the place yet the School-men say it is in the Bowels of the Earth and upon the borders of Hell And to countenance this profitable Fable divers Scriptures are by them abused and misapplied as 1 Cor. 3.15 Matth. 5.25 26. 1 Pet. 3.19 all which have been fully rescued out of their hands and abundantly vindicated by our Divines who have proved God never kindled that fire to purifie Souls but the Pope to warm his own Kitchin 4. Another sort there are who affirm they neither wander about this World nor go into Purgatory but are cast by death into a Swoon or sleep remaining in a kind of benummed condition till the Resurrection of the Body This was the Errour of Beryllus and Irenaeus seems to border too near upon it when he saith The Souls of Disciples shall go to an invisible place appointed for them of God Discipulorum Animae abibunt in invisibilem locum definitam ●is à Deo ibi usq●e ad Resurrectionem commorabuntar sustinentes Resurrectionem Post recipientes corpora perfectè resurgentes i. e. corporaliter quemadmodum dominus resurrexit sic venlent ad conspectum Dei Iren. lib. 5. and shall there tarry till the Resurrection waiting for that time and the receiving their Bodies and perfectly i.e. corporally rising again as Christ did they shall come to the sight of God All these mistakes will fall together by one stroak for if it evidently appear as I hope it will that the Spirits of the just are immediately taken to God and do converse with and enjoy him in Heaven Then all these Fancies vanish without any more labour about them particularly Now there are four Considerations which to me put the immediate glorification of the departed Souls of Believers beyond all rational doubt 1 Heaven is as ready and fit to receive them as ever it shall be 2 They are as ready and fit for Heaven as ever they shall be 3 The Scripture is plainly for it And 4 There is nothing in reason against it 1 Heaven is as ready and fit to receive them when they die as ever it shall be Heaven is prepared for Believers 1 By the purpose and Decree of God and so far it was prepar'd from the Foundation of the World Matth. 25.34 2 By the death of Christ whose blood made the purchace of it for Believers and so meritoriously opened the Gates thereof which our sins had barred up against us Heb. 10.19 20. 3 By the Ascension of Christ into that holy place as our Representative and Forerunner Iohn 14.2 This is all that is necessary to be done for the preparation of Heaven and all this is done as much as ever God design'd should be

In this Scripture we have the contrary glass representing the unspeakable misery of those Souls or Spirits which are separated by death from their Bodies for a time and by sin from God for ever Arrested by the Law and secured in the prison of Hell unto the judgment of the great day A Sermon of Hell may keep some Souls out of Hell and a Sermon of Heaven be the means to help others to Heaven The desire of my heart is that the conversations of all those who shall read these discourses of Heaven and Hell might look more like a diligent flight from the one and pursuit of the other The scope of the context is a perswasive to patience upon a prospect of manifold tribulations coming upon the Christian Churches strongly enforced by Christs example who both in his own person ver 18. and by his spirit in his Servants ver 19. exercised wonderful patience and long suffering as a pattern to his people This 19. ver gives us an account of his long-suffering towards that disobedient and immorigerous generation of sinners on whom he waited 120 years in the Ministry of Noah There are difficulties in the Text. Estius reckons no less than ten expositions of it Locus ●i●c omnium penè interpretum judicio difficillimus Estius and saith it is a very difficult Scripture in the judgment of almost all Interpreters But yet I must say those difficulties are rather brought to it than found in it It is a Text which hath been rackt and tortured by Popish Expositors to make it speak Christs local descent into Hell and to confess their Doctrine of Purgatory things which it knew not But if we will take its genuine sense it only relates the sin and misery of those contumacious persons on whom the spirit of God waited so long in the Ministry of Noah giving an account Of 1. Their sin on Earth Of 2. Their punishment in Hell 1. Their sin on Earth which is both specified and aggravated 1 Specified Namely their disobedience They were sometimes disobedient or unperswadeable neither precepts nor examples could bring them to repentance 2 This their disobedience is aggravated by the expence of God's patience upon them for the space of an hundred and twenty years not only forbearing them so long but striving with them as Moses expresseth it or waiting on them as the Apostle here but all to no purpose they were obstinate stubborn and unperswadeable to the very last 2. Behold therefore in the next place the dreadful but most just and equal punishment of these sinners in Hell they are called Spirits in prison i e. Souls now in Hell At that time when Peter wrote of them they were not intire men Psal. 31.6 Eccles. 12.7 Acts. 7.50 but Spirits in the proper sense i.e. separated Souls bodiless and lonely Souls whilst in the Body it is properly a Soul but when separated a Spirit according to Scripture-language and the strict notion of such a Being These Spirits or Souls in the state of separation are said to be in a Prison that is in Hell as the word elsewhere notes Rev. 20.7 and Iude v. 6. comp Heaven and Hell are the only receptacles of departed or separated Souls Thus you have in a few words the natural and genuine sense of the place and it is but a wast of time to repeat and refel the many false and forced interpretations of this Text which corrupt minds and mercenary Pens have perplext and darkned it withal That which I level at is comprized in this plain Proposition DOCT. That the Souls or Spirits of all men who dye in a state of unbelief and disobedience are immediately committed to the Prison of Hell there to sufferr the wrath of God due to their sins Hell is shadowed forth to us in Scripture by diverse Metaphors for we cannot conceive spiritual things unless they be so cloathed and shadowed out unto us Spiritualia capere non possumus nisi adumbrata Augustine gives this reason for the frequent use of Metaphors and Allegories in Scripture because they are so much proportioned to our senses with which our senses have contracted an intimacy and familiarity and therefore God to accommodate his truth to our capacity doth as it were this way embody it in earthly expressions according to that celebrated observation of the Cabalists lumen supremum nunquam descendit sine indumento The pure and supream light never descends to us without a garment or covering In the old Testament the place and state of damned Souls is set forth by Metaphors taken from the most remarkable places and exemplary acts of vengeance upon sinners in this World as the overthrow of the Giants by the flood those prodigious sinners that fought against Heaven and were swept by the flood into the place of Torments Hell called the place of Giants and why to this Solomon is conceived to allude in Prov. 21.16 The man that wanders out of the way of understanding shall remain in the congregation of the dead in the Heb. it is they shall remain with the Rephaims or Giants These Giants were the men that more especially provoked God to bring the flood upon the World they are also noted as the first inhabitants of Hell therefore from them the place of Torments takes its name and the damned are said to remain in the place of Giants Hell called Tophet and why Sometimes Hell is called Trophet Isa. 30.33 This Tophet was in the valley of Hinnom and was famous for divers things There the children of Israel caused their children to pass through the fire to Moloch or sacrificed them to the Devil drowning their horrible shrieks and ejulations with the noise of Drums In this valley also was the memorable slaughter of eighteen hundred thousand of the Assyrian Camp by an Angel in one night There also the Babylonians murthered the people of Ierusalem at the taking of the City Ier. 7.31 32. So that Tophet was a meer Shambles the publick chopping block on which the limbs both of young and old were quartered out by thousands it was filled with dead Bodies till there was no place for burial By all which it appears that no spot of ground in the World was so famous for the fires kindled in it to destroy men for the doleful cries that echo'd from it or the innumerable multitudes that perished in it for which reasons it is made the embleme of Hell Sometimes it is called a lake of fire burning with brimstone Hell a lake of fire Rev. 19.20 denoting the most exquisite torment by an intense and durable flame And in the Text it 's called a prison A prison where the Spirits of ungodly men are both detained and punished This notion of a Prison gives us a lively representation of the miserable state of damned Souls and that especially in the following particulars First Prisoners are arrested and seized by authority of Law 't is the Law which sends them

there are of the rude and ignorant multitude who are bred themselves much like the Beasts they daily converse withal and so they are fitly described Iob 30.6 7. Go into their houses and you may sooner find in the window or upon the shelf a Pack of Cards than a Bible or Catechise their Beds and Tables differ little or not at all from the Stalls and Cribs where beasts lye down and feed in respect of any worship of God among them or if for fashion sake a few words be hudled over in the evening when their bodies are tired the man saith something he scarce knows what the wife is asleep in one corner the children in another and the servants in a third This is the Education multitudes of Parents give their Children all the week and when the Sabbath comes the most they learn to know at Church is where their own seat stands and that it is necessary to speak with such a Neighbour after Prayers about such or such a bargain or business for the next week And others there are who breed their Children as prophanely as these do sottishly teaching them by their Examples the newest Oaths that were last minted in Hell and to revile and scoff all serious Godliness and the sincere Professors of it smiling to hear with what an Emphasis they can talk in the Dialect of Devils and how wittily they can droll upon godly Ministers and Christians Such Families are Nurseries for Hell and though God by an extraordinary hand of Providence now and then snatch a Soul by conversion from among them as a brand out of the fire yet generally they die as they live going to the generation of their Fathers where they shall never see light Psal. 49.19 I know Education and Regeneration are two things but I also know one is frequently made the instrument of working the other Quo semel est imbuta recens c. and that the savour of what first seasons our youth generally abides to old age Prov. 22.6 We may observe all the World over how tenacious men are of that which is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 delivered to them by their Parents O what a cut must it be to the heart of that Father whose Sons life shall tell his Conscience what a profane Sons lips once told his Father to his face Si malè seci à te didici If I have done evil I have learnt it of you Had they felt more of your prudent correction it might have prevented their destruction Prov. 23.14 Thou shalt beat him with the rod and shalt deliver his soul from hell That this is a common beaten path to Hell is beyond all question but how to bar it up and stop the multitudes that are engaged in it to their own ruine this is the labour this the work I cannot be large but I will offer a few weighty Considerations The first way to Hell barr'd 1. Let all Parents consider what a fearful thing it is to be the instruments of ruining for ever those that received their Beings instrumentally from them and to seek whose good they stand obliged by all the Laws of God and Nature In vain are all your cares and studies for their bodies whilst their Souls perish for want of knowledge You rejoyced at their birth but they will have cause to curse the day they were born of you and say Let the day perish wherein I was born and the night in which I was conceived You were solicitous for their bodies but careless of their Souls earnest to see them rich but indifferent whether they were gracious You neglected to teach them the way of Salvation but the Devil did not neglect to teach them the way of sin You will one day wish you had never been Parents when the dol●ful cries of your damned Children shall ring such Notes as these in your Ears O cursed Father O cruel merciless Mother whose examples have drawn me after you into all this misery You had time enough and motives enough to have warned me of this place and misery whilst my heart was tender and my affections pliable Had it not been as easie to have put a Bible as a Play-book before me To have chastised me when I provoked God by sin as when I provoked you about a trifle One word spoken in season might have saved my Soul one reproof wisely given and set on by your example might have preserved me Had it not been the same pains to have asked me Child what wilt thou do to be saved as what wilt thou do to live in the world Or had I but observed any serious Religion in you had I but found or heard my Father or Mother upon their knees in prayer it might have awakened me to a consideration of my condition in my youth I was shame fac'd fearful credulous and apt to imitate had you had but wisdom as other Parents have to have taken hold of any of these handles in time you had rescued my Soul from Hell Nay so cruel have you been to your own Child that you allowed me no time if I had had a disposition for any exercise of Religion yea you have quenched and stifled the sparks of convictions and better inclinations that sometimes were in my heart O happy had it been if I had never been born of you or seen your faces This must be the result and issue of your negligence except God by some other hand which is no thanks to you rescue them from their impending ruine 〈…〉 ldren whose unhappy Lot it is to be born of 〈…〉 carnal and irreligious Parents consider God hath endued them with a Reason and Conscience of their own to enable them to make a better choice than their Parents did and that there is no taking Sanctuary from the wrath of Go● in their Parents examples We read in 1 Kings 14.13 of a good Abijah in whom was found some good thing towards the Lord God of Israel in the house of Ieroboam Here was a Child that would not follow his wicked Father to Hell though he had both the authority of a Father and of a King over him Amandus genitor sed praeponendus Creator You must honour your Parents but still you must prefer your God before them God will never lay it to your account as your sin but place it to the account of your duty and comfort that you refused to follow them in paths of sin and destruction No Law of God no tye of Nature binds you to obey their commands or tread in their steps farther than they command in Gods Authority and Name and walk in his ways Your temptations indeed are strong and disadvantages great but the greater will the mercy of your deliverance be It will be no Plea for you at the Judgment-seat to say Lord my Father or Mother did so and so before me and I thought I might safely follow them or thus and thus they commanded me and I thought I

or importance of Eternity than it is for a man to turn the Tide or course of a River with his weak breath Add to this Nemo errat sibi ipsi sed dementiam spargit in proximos Sen. That as one sinner confirms and fixeth another wedging in each other as men in a crowd who must move as it moves so they make it their business to render all that differ from them odious and ridiculous So the Apostle notes their practice and Satans policy in it 1 Pet. 4.4 wherein they think it strange that ye run not with them into the same excess of riot speaking evil of you 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they gaze strangely at them as the Hen that hath hatched Partridge-eggs looks strangely after them when she seeth them take the wing and soar aloft not knowing that they are of an higher kind than her own Chickens And that is not all they not only gaze at them as a strange generation making them signs and wonders in Israel as the Prophet speaks but they defame revile and speak evil of them representing them as a pack of Hypocrites as turbulent factious seditious persons the very pests of the times and places they live in and all this not for doing any evil against them but only for not doing evil with them because they run not with them into the same excess of riot Thus the World smiles upon its own and derides those that are afraid to follow them to Hell by which it sweeps away the multitude with it in the same course The third way to Hell shut up But O if the Spirit of God would please to set on and follow home the following Considerations to your hearts you would certainly resolve to take a persecuted path to Heaven though few accompany you therein rather than to swim like dead fishes with the stream into the dead Sea of eternal misery 1. Though you go with the consent and current of the World yet you go against the express Law and prohibition of God He hath laid his command upon you not to be conformed to the world Rom. 12.2 That you live not the rest of your time to the lusts of men but to the will of God 1 Pet. 4.2 That you follow not a multitude to do evil Exod. 23.2 That you go not in the way of evil men Prov. 4.14 That you have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness All these and many more are commands flowing from the highest Soveraign Authority obliging your Consciences to obedience under the greatest penalties by them your state must be cast to all Eternity in the Day of Judgment you may make a pish of the precept but see if you can do so of the penalty 2. Other men in all Ages of the World that were as much concerned in the World as you and valued their lives liberties and estates as well as you have yet got out of the crowd disengaged themselves from the way of the multitude and taken a more solitary and suffering path out of a due regard to the safety of their Souls And why should not you love them as well and care for them as much as ever any that went before you did Noah walked with God all alone when all flesh had corrupted their ways Elijah was zealous for the Lord when he knew of none to stand by him but thought he had been left alone Iob was upright with God in the Land of Vz. Lot stood by himself a godly Non-conformist in a vile debauched Sodom David was as a wonder to many so was Ieremiah and those few with him for signs and wonders in Israel I demand of your Consciences what discouragements have you that these men had not Or what encouragements had they which you have not Why should not the Salvation of your Souls be as precious in your eyes as it was in any of theirs Shall you be impoverished and persecuted if you embrace the way of Holiness so were they Shall you be reproached scorned and reviled so were they All your discouragements were theirs and all their motives and encouragements are yours 3. Is not the way which you have chosen marked out by Christ as the way to destruction And that which you dare not chuse and embrace as the way to life See the marks he hath given you of both in that one Text Matt. 7.13 14. Enter ye in at the strait gate for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction and many there be which go in thereat Because strait is the gate and narrow is the way which leadeth unto life and few there be that find it And where now is your encouragement and hope that God will be more merciful than to damn so great a part of the World If you will do as the Many do dream not of speeding as well as that little flock separated by Sanctification from the multitude shall speed You have your choice to be damned with many or saved with few to take the broad smooth-beaten road to Hell or the difficult suffering self-denying path to Heaven O then make a seasonable necessary stand and pause a while consider your ways and turn your feet to Gods testimonies 't is a great and special part of your Salvation to save your selves from this untoward generation The fourth way of losing the Soul opened IV. Multitudes of Souls are daily lost by rooted Habits and long continued Custom in sin When men have been long setled in an evil way they are difficultly reclaimed Physicians find it hard to cure a Cachexy or ill habit of body but it 's far more difficult to cure an ill custom and habit in sin Ier. 13.23 Can the Leopard change his spoes or the Ethiopian his skin then may ye also do good that are accustomed to do evil The spots of a Leopard and hue of an Ethiopian are not by way of external accidental adhesion if so washing would fetch them off but they are innate and contemper'd belonging to the constitution and not to be alter'd so are sinful habits and customs in the minds of sinners by this means it becomes a second Nature as it were and strongly determines the mind to sin A●t●neris assuescero multum est It 's a great matter to be accustomed this way or that saith Senceca yea Caput rei est hoc vel illo modo hominem assuefieri 'T is the very head or root of the matter to be so or so accustomed saith Aristotle very much of the strength of sin rises from customary sinning a brand that hath been once in the fire easily catches the second time Every repeated act of sin lessene●h fear and strengtheneth inclination An Horse that took an ill stroke at first breaking and hath continued many years in it is very difficulty if ever to be brought to a better way What men have been accustomed to from their childhood they are tenacious of it in their old age Hence it is that so