which Christ hath made for our pardon is in it self sufficient yea and effectual as to that end which he would have it attain before our believing But our actual pardon is no such end Nor can sin be forgiven before it be committed because it is no sin Christ never intended to justifie or sanctifie us perfectly at the first whatsoever many say to the contrary because they understand not what they say but to carry on both proportionably and by degrees that we may have daily use for his daily mediation and may daily pray Forgive us our trespasses There is no guilt on them that are in Christ so far as they walk not after the flesh but after the spirit nor no proper condemnation by sentence or execution at all because their pardon is renewed by Christ as they renew their sins of infirmity but not because he preventeth their need of any further pardon Therefore as God made advantage of the sins of the world for the honouring of his grace in Christ that grace might abound where sin abounded Rom. 5.12 16 17. So do you make advantage of your renewed sins for a renewed use of faith in Christ and let it drive you to him with renewed desires and expectations of pardon by his intercession That Satan may be a loser and Christ may have more honour by every sin that we commit Not that we should sin that grace may abound but that we may make use of abounding grace when we have sinned It is the true nature and use of Faith and Repentance to draw good out of sin it self or to make the remembrance of it to be a means of our hatred and mortification of it and of our love and gratitude to our Redeemer Not that sin it self doth formally or efficiently ever do any good But sin objectively is turned into good For so sin is no sin because to remember sin is not sin When David saith Psal 51.3 that his sin was ever before him he meaneth not only involuntarily to his grief but voluntarily as a meditation useful to his future duty and to stir him up to all that which afterward he promiseth Direct 13. In all the weaknesses and languishings of the new creature let Faith look up to Christ for strength For God hath put our life into his hand and he is our root and hath promised that we shall live because he liveth John 14.19 Do not think only of using Christ as you do a friend when you have need of him or as I do my pen to write and lay it down when I have done But as the branches use the Vine and as the members use the Head which they live by and from which when they are separated they die and wither John 15.1 2 3 c. Ephes 1.22 5.27 30. 4.4 5 12 15 16. Christ must even dwell in our hearts by Faith Ephes 3.17 that is 1. Faith must be the means of Christs dwelling in us by his Spirit and 2. Faith must so habituate the heart to a dependance upon Christ and to an improvement of him that objectively he must dwell in our hearts as our friend doth whom we most dearly love as that which we cannot chuse but alwaies think on Remember therefore that we live in Christ and that the life which we now live is by the faith of the Son of God who hath loved us and given himself for us Gal. 2.20 And his grace is sufficient for us and his strength most manifested in our weakness 2 Cor. 12.9 And that when Satan desireth to sift us he prayeth for us that our faith may not fail Luke 22.32 And that our life is hid with Christ in God even with Christ who is our life Col. 3.3 4. That he is the Head in whom all the members live by the communication of his appointed ligaments and joynts Ephes 4.14 15 16. Therefore when any grace is weak go to your Head for life and strength If faith be weak pray Lord increase our faith Luke 17.5 If you are ignorant pray him to open your understandings Luk. 24.45 If your hearts grow cold go to him by faith till he shed abroad the love of God upon your hearts Rom. 5.3 4. For oâ— his fulness it is that we must receive grace for grace Jâ—hn 1.16 Direct 14. Let the â—hief and most diligent work of your faith in Christ be to inflame your hearts with love to God as his Goodness and Love is revealed to us in Christ Faith kindling Love and working by it is the whole summ of Christianity of which before Direct 15. Let Faith keep the example of Christ continually before your eyes especially in those parts of it which he intended for the contradicting and healing of our greatest sins Above all others these things seem purposely and specially chosen in the life of Christ for the condemning and curing of our sins and therefore are principally to be observed by faith 1. His wonderful Love to God to his Elect and to his enemies expressed in so strange an undertaking and in his sufferings and in his abundant grace which must teach us what fervours of love to God and man to friends and enemies must dwell and have dominion in us 1 John 4.10 Rev. 1.5 Rom. 5.8 10. John 13.34 35. 15.13 1 John 3.14.23.17 4.7 8 20 21. 2. His full obedience to his Fathers will upon the dearest rates or terms To teach us that no labour or cost should seem too great to us in our obeying the will of God nor any thing seem to us of so much value as to be a price great enough to hire us to commit any wilful sin Rom. 5.19 Heb. 5 8. Phil. 2 8. 1 Sam. 15.22 2 Cor. 10.5 6. Heb. 5 9. John 14.15 15.10 1 John 2.3 3.22 5.2 3. Rev. 22.14 3. His wonderful contempt of all the Riches and Greatness of the world and all the pleasures of the flesh and all the honour which is of man which he shewed in his taking the form of a servant and making himself of no reputation and living a mean inferiour life He came not to be served or ministred to but to serve Not to live in state with abundance of attendants with provisions for every turn and use which pride curiosity or carnal imagination taketh for a conveniency or a decency no nor a necessity But he came to be as a servant unto others not as despising his liberty but as exercising his voluntary humility and love He that was Lord of all for our sakes became poor to make us rich He lived in lowliness and meekness He submitted to the greatest scorn of sinners and even to the false accusations and imputations of most odious sin in it self Phil. 2.6 7 8 9. Heb. 12.1 2 3. Matth. 26.55 60 61 63 66. 27 28 29 30 31. Matth. 11.29 30. 20.28 2 Cor. 8.9 which was to teach us to see the vanity of the wealth and honours of the world and
the Attributes of God are the seal which must make his Image on us so the apprehension of his presence setteth them on and keepeth our faculties awake Direct 13. Be sure that Faith make Gods acceptance your full reward and set you above the opinion of man Not in self-conceitedness and pride of your self-sufficiency to set light by the judgment of other men That is a heinous sin of it self and doubled when it is done upon pretence of living upon God alone But that really you live so much to God alone as that all men seem as nothing to you and their opinion of you as a blast of wind in regard of any felicity of your own which might be placed in their love or praise Though as a means to Gods service and their own good you must please all men to their edification and become all things to all men to win them to God Gal. 1.10 11. Rom. 15.1 2. Prov. 11.30 1 Cor. 9.22 10.33 yea and study to please your Governours as your duty Titus 2.9 But as man-pleasing is the Hypocrites work and wages so must the pleasing of God be ours though all the world should be displeased Matth. 6.1 2 3 5 6 c. 2 Tim. 2.4 1 Cor. 7.32 1 Thes 4.1 2 Cor. 5.8 9. 1 Thes 2.4 1 John 3.22 Direct 14. Let the constant work of Faith be to take you off the life of sense by mortifying all the concupiscence of the flesh and over-powering all the objects of sense The neerness of things sensible and the violence and unreasonableness of the senses and appetite do necessitate Faith to be a conflicting grace It s use is to illuminate elevate and corroborate Reason and help it to maintain its authority and government The life of a Believer is but a conquering warfare between Faith and Sense and between things unseen and the things that are seen Therefore it is said that they thâ—â— are in the flesh cannot please God because the flesh bâ—ing the predominant principle in them they most savour and mind the things of the flesh and therefore they can do more with them than the things of the Spirit can do when both are set before them Rom. 8.5 6 7 8. Direct 15. Let Faith set the example first of Christ and next of his holiest servants still before you He that purposely lived among men in flâ—sh a life of holiness and patience and contempt of the world to be a pattern or example to us doth expect that it be the daily work of Faith to imitate him and therefore that we have this Copy still before our eyes It will help us when we are sluggish and sit down in low and common things to see more noble things before us It will help us when we are in doubt of the way of our duty and when we are apt to favour our corruptions It will guide our minds and quicken our desires with a holy ambition and covetousness to be more holy It will serve us to answer all that the world or flesh can say from the contrary examples of sinning men If any tell us what great men or learned men think or say or do against Religion and for a sinful life it is enough if Faith do but tell us presently what Christ and his Apostles and Saints and Martyrs have thought and said and done to the contrary Mat. 11.28 29. 1 Pet. 2.21 John 13.15 Phil. 3.17 2 Thes 3.9 1 Tim. 4.12 Ephes 5.1 Heb. 6.12 1 Thes 1.6 2.14 Direct 16. Let your Faith set all graces on work in their proper order and proportion and carry on the work of holiness and obedience in harmony and not set one part against another nor look at one while you forget or neglect another Every grace and duty is to be a help to all the rest And the want or neglect of any one is a hinderance to all As the want of one wheel or smaller particle in a clock or watch will make all stand still or go out of order The new creature consisteth of all due parts as the body doth of all its members The soul is as a musical instrument which must neither want one string nor have one out of tune nor neglected without spoiling all the melody A fragment of the most excellent work or one member of the comliest body cut off is not beautiful The beauty of a holy soul and life is not only in the quality of each grace and duty but much in the proportion feature and harmony of all Therefore every part hath its proper armour Ephes 6.11 12 13 14. And the whole armour of God must be put on Because all fulness dwelleth in Christ we are compleat in him as being sufficient to communicate every grace Epaphras laboured alwaies fervently in prayers for the Colossians that they might stand perfect and compleat in all the Will of God Col. 4.12 James 1.4 Let patience have her perfect work that ye may be perfect and entire wanting nothing We oft comfort our selves that though we want the perfection of degrees yet we have the perfection of parts or of integrity But many are fain to prove this only by inferring that he that hath one grace hath all but as to the discerning and orderly use of all they are yet to seek CHAP. XI Of the Order of Graces and Duties BEcause I find not this insisted on in any Writers for the peoples instruction as it ought I will not pass over so needful a point without some further advertisement about it I will therefore shew you 1. What is the compleatness and the harmony to be desired 2. What are our contrary defects and distempers 3. What are the causes of them and what must be the cure 4. Some useful Inferences hence arising I. He that will be compleat and entire must have all these Graces and Duties following 1. A solid and clear understanding of all the great the needful and practical matters of the sacred Scriptures 2 Tim. 3.16 And if he have the understanding of the Scripture languages and the customs of those times and other such helps his understanding of the Scripture will be the more compleat Acts 26.3 If he have not he must make use of other mens 2. A settled well grounded Belief of all Gods supernatural Revelations as well as the knowledge of natural verities 3. Experience to make this knowledge and belief to be satisfactory powerful and firm Especially the experience of the Spirits effectual operations in our selves by the means of this word Rom. 5.4 8.9 Gal. 4.6 4. The historical knowledge of the Scripture matters of fact and how God in all ages since Scripture times hath fulfilled his Word both promises and threatnings and what Christ and Satan Grace and Sin have been doing in the world Therefore the Scripture is written so much by way of history and therefore the Jews were so often charged to tell the history of Gods works to their children 1 Cor. 10.1 2 6 7
and capacities by prayer and such distant means if they can do no more And the Religion which giveth every man so great an interest in the good of all others and engageth all men to do good to one another is evidently good it self 1 Cor. 12. Ephes 4.15 16. 29. And all this good is not destroyed but advantaged and aggravated accidentally by our sin So that where sin abounded there grace did superabound Rom. 5.15 16 17 18 19. Grace hath taken occasion by sin to be Grace indeed and to be the greater manifestation of the goodness of God and the greater obligation for gratitude to the sinner 30. Lastly All this Goodness is beautified by harmony it is all placed in a perfect order One mercy doth not keep us from another nor one grace oppose another nor one duty exclude another As it is the great declaration of Mercy and Justice wonderfully conspiring in God Mercy so used as to magnifie Justice Justice so used as to magnifie Mercy and not only so as to consist so also it worketh answerably on us It setteth not Love against filial fear not joy against necessary sorrow nor faith against repentance nor praise and thanksgiving against penitent confession of sin nor true repentance against the profitable use of the creatures nor the care of our souls against the peace and quiet of our minds nor care for our families against contentedness and trusting God nor our labour against our necessary rest nor self-denyal against the due care of our own welfare nor patience against due sensibility and lawful passion nor mercy to men against true justice nor publick and private good against each nor doth it set the duty of the Soveraign and the Subject the Master and the Servant the Pastor and the Flock nor yet their interest in any contrariety but all parts of Religion know their place and every duty even those which seem most opposite are helpful to each other and all interests are co-ordinate and all doth contribute to the good of the whole and of every part Ephes 4.2 3 15 16. And now peruse all this together but let it have more of your thoughts by far than it hath had of my words and then determine indifferently whether the Christian Religion bear not the lively Image and superscription of GOD the prime essential GOOD But all this will be more manifest when we have considered how POWER hath in the execution brought all this into effect CHAP. VI. The Image of Gods Power III. THE third part of Gods Image and superscription on the Christian Religion is his POWER And as mans own corruption lyeth more in the want of Wisdom and Goodness than of Power therefore he is less capable of discerning God in the impressions of his Wisdom and Goodness than of his Power seeing therefore he is here most capable of conviction and acknowledging the hand of God I shall open this also in the several parts in some degree 1. In the history of the Creation the Omnipotency of God is abundantly set forth which is proved true both by the agreeableness of the history to the effects and by much subsequent evidence of the Writers Veracity 2. The same may be said of Gods drowning the old world and the preserving of Noah and his family in the Ark. 3. And of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah with fire from Heaven 4. The many miracles done by Moses upon Pharaoh and the Egyptians and in the opening of the Red Sea and in the feeding of the Israelites in the wilderness and keeping their cloths from wearing for forty years and the pillar which went before them as a fire by night and a cloud by day for so long time and the darkness and thunder and trembling of the Mount at the giving of the Law with the rest of the Miracles then done not in a corner or before a few but before all the people who were perswaded to receive and obey the Law by the reason of these motives which their eyes had seen And if all this had been false if no plagues had been shewed on Egypt if no Red Sea had opened if no Pillar had gone before them if no such terrible sights and sounds at Mount Sinai had prepared them for the Law such reasons would have been so unfit to have perswaded them to obedience that they would rather with any reasonable creatures have procured scorn And to shew posterity that the history of all this was not forged or to be suspected 1. They had the Law it self then delivered in two Tables of stone to be still seen 2. They had a pot of Manna still preserved 3. They had the miracle-working Rod of Moses and Aaron kept likewise as a monument 4. They had an Ark of purpose to keep these in and that in the most inviolable place of worship 5. They had the brazâ—n Serpent till Hezekiah broke it still to be seen 6. They had the song of their deliverance at the Red Sea for their continued use 7. They had set feasts to keep the chief of all these things in remembrance They had the feast of unleavened bread which all Israel was to observe for seven daies to keep the remembrance of their passing out of Egypt in so great haste that they could not stay to knead up and make their bread but took it as in meal or unready dough They had the feast of the Passeover when every family was to eat of the Paschal Lamb and the door posts to be sprinkled with the blood to keep in remembrance the night when the Egyptians first born were destroyed and the Israelites all preserved And if these had been instituted at that time upon a pretended occasion which they knew to be untrue they would rather have derided than observed them If they had been afterwards instituted in another generation which knew not the story the beginning would have been known and the fiction of the name and institution of Moses would have been apparent to all and the institution would not have been found in the same Law which was given by Moses And it could not have been so expresly said that the Israelites did all observe these feasts and solemnities from the very time of their deliverance but in those times when the forgery began all would have known it to be false 8. And they had many other words and ceremonies among them and even in Gods Publick Worship which were all used to keep up the memory of these things 9. And they had an office of Priesthood constantly among them which saw to the execution and preservation of all these 10. And they had a form of civil Policy then established and and the Rulers were to preserve the memory of these things and the practice of this Law and to learn it themselves and govern by it so that the very form of the Common-wealth and the order of it was a commemoration hereof And the Parents were to teach and tell their children all
though we must not with Fanatical persons put first our own interpretation upon Gods works and then expound his Word by them but use his works as the fulfilling of his Word and expound his Providences by his Precepts and his Promises and Threats Direct 7. Mark well Gods inward works of Government upon the soul and you shall find it very agreeable to the Gospel There is a very great evidence of a certain Kingdom of God within us And as he is himself a Spirit so it is with the Spirit that he doth most apparently converse in the work of his moral Government in the world 1. There you shall find a Law of duty or an inward conviction of much of that obedience which you owe to God 2. There you shall find an inward mover striving with you to draw you to perform this duty 3. There you shall find the inward suggestions of an enemy labouring to draw you away from this duty and to make a godly life seem grievous to you and also to draw you to all the sins which Christ forbiddeth 4. There you shall find an inward conviction that God is your Judge and that he will call you to account for your wilful violations of the Laws of Christ 5. There you shall find an inward sentence past upon you according as you do good or evil 6. And there you may find the sorest Judgements of God inflicted which any short of Hell endure You may there find how God for sin doth first afflict the soul that is not quite forsaken with troubles and affrightments and some of the feeling of his displeasure And where that is long despised and men sin on still he useth to with hold his gracious motions and leave the sinner dull and senseless so that he can sin with sinful remorse having no heart or life to any thing that is spiritually good And if yet the sinner think not of his condition to repent he is usually so far forsaken as to be given up to the power of his most bruitish lust and to glory impudently in his shame and to hate and persecute the servants of Christ who would recover him till he hath filled up the measure of his sin and wrath be come upon him to the uttermost Ephes 4.18 19. 1 Thes 2.15 16. being abominable and disobedient and to every good work reprobate Titus 1.15 16. Besides the lesser penal withdrawings of the Spirit which Gods own servants find in themselves after some sins or neglects of grace 7. And there also you may find the Rewards of Love and faithful duty by many tastes of Gods acceptance and many comforts of his Spirit and by his owning the soul and giving out larger assistance of his Spirit and peace of conscience and entertainment in prayer and all approaches of the soul to God and sweeter forecasts of life eternal In a word if we did but note Gods dreadful Judgements on the souls of the ungodly in this age as well as we have noted our plagues and flames and if Gods servants kept as exact observations of their inward rewards and punishments and that in particulars as suited to their particular sins and duties you will see that Christ is King indeed and that there is a real Government according to his Gospel kept up in the consciences or souls of men though not so observable as the rewards and punishments at the last day Direct 8. Dwell not too much on sensual objects and let them not come too near your hearts Three things I here perswade you carefully to avoid 1. That you keep your hearts at a meet distance from all things in this world that they grow not too sweet to you nor too great in your esteem 2. That you gratifie not sense it self too much and live not in the pleasing of your taste or lust 3. That you suffer not your imaginations to run out greedily after things sensitive nor make them the too frequent objects of your thoughts You may ask perhaps what is all this to our faith why the life of faith is exercised upon things that are not seen And if you live upon the things that are seen and imprison your soul in the fetters of your concupiscence and fill your fancies with things of another nature how can you be acquainted with the life of faith Can a bird flye that hath a stone tyed to her foot Can you have a mind full of lust and of God at once Or can that mind that is used to these inordinate sensualities be fit to rellish the things that are spiritual And can it be a lover of earth and fleshly pleasures and also a Believer and lover of Heaven Direct 9. Vse your selves much to think and speak of Heaven and the invisible things of Faith Speaking of Heaven is needful both to express your thoughts and to actuate and preserve them And the often thoughts of Heaven will make the mind familiar there And familiarity will assist and encourage faith For it will much acquaint us with those reasons and inducements of faith which a few strange and distant thoughts will never reach to As he that converseth much with a learned wise or godly man will easilier believe that he is learned wise or godly than he that is a stranger to him and only now and then seeth him afar off So he that thinketh so frequently of God and Heaven till his mind hath contracted a humble acquaintance and familiarity must needs believe the truth of all that excellency which before he doubted of For doubting is the effect of ignorance And he that knoweth most here believeth best Falshood and evil cannot bear the light but the more you think of them and know them the more they are detected and ashamed But truth and goodness love the light and the better you are acquainted with them the more will your belief and love be increased Direct 10. Live not in the guilt of wilful sin For that will many waies hinder your belief 1. It will breed fear and horrour in your minds and make you wish that it were not true that there is a day of Judgement and a Hell for the ungodly and such a God such a Christ and such a life to come as the Gospel doth describe And when you take it for your interest to be an unbeliever you will hearken with desire to all that the Devil and Infidels can say And you will the more easily make your selves believe that the Gospel is not true by how much the more you desire that it should not be true 2. And you will forfeit the grace which should help you to believe both by your wilfull sin and by your unwillingness to believe For who can expect that Christ should give his grace to them who wilfully despise him and abuse it Or that he should make men believe who had rather not believe Indeed he may possibly do both these but these are not the way nor is it a thing which we can expect
a God is it whom I am bound to serve and who hath taken me into his Covenant as his child How happy are they who have such a God engaged to be their God and Happiness And how miserable are they who make such a God their revenging Judge and enemy Shall I ever again wilfully or carelesly sin against a God of so great Majesty If the Sun were an intellectual Deity and still looked on me should I presumptuously offend him Shall I ever distrust the power of him that made such a world Shall I fear a worm a mortal man above this great and terrible Creator Shall I ever again resist or disobey the word and wisdom of him who made and ruleth such a world Doth he govern the whole world and should not I be governed by him Hath he Goodness enough to communicate as he hath done to Sun and Stars to Heaven and Earth to Angels and Men and every wight and hath he not Goodness enough to draw and engage and continually delight this dull and narrow heart of mine Doth the return of his Sun turn the darksome night into the lightsome day and bring forth the creatures to their food and labour doth its approach revive the torpid earth and turn the congealed winter into the pleasant spring and cover the earth with her fragrant many-coloured Robes and renew the life and joy of the terrestrial inhabitants and shall I find nothing in the God who made and still continueth the world to be the life and strength and pleasure of my soul Psal 66.1 c. Make a joyful noise unto God all ye Lands sing forth the honour of his Name make his praise glorious say unto God How terrible art thou in thy works Come and see the works of God He is terrible in his doing towards the children of men He ruleth by his power for ever his eyes behold the Nations let not the rebellious exalt themselves O bless our God ye people and make the voice of his praise to be heard who holdeth our soul in life and suffereth not our feet to be moved Psal 86.8 9 10. Among the gods there is none like unto thee O Lord neither are there any works like unto thy works All Nations whom thou hast made shall come and worship before thee O Lord and shall glorifie thy Name For thou art great and dost wonderous things thou art God alone Psal 92.5 6. O Lord how great are thy works thy thoughts are very deep a bruitish man knoweth not neither doth a fool understand this Faith doth not separate it self from natural knowledge nor neglect Gods Works while it studyeth his Word but saith Psal 143.5 I meditate on all thy Works I muse on the work of thy hands Psal 104.24 O Lord how manifold are thy works in wisdom hast thou made them all the earth is full of thy riches so is the great and wide Sea c. Nay it is greatly to be noted that as Redemption is to repair the Creation and the Redeemer came to recover the soul of man to his Creator and Christ is the way to the Father so on the Lords day our commemoration of Redemption includeth and is subservient to our commemoration of the Creation and the work of the ancient Sabbath is not shut out but taken in with the proper work of the Lords day and as Faith in Christ is a mediate grace to cause in us the Love of God so the Word of the Redeemer doth not call off our thoughts from the Works of the great Creator but call them back to that employment and fit us for it by reconciling us to God Therefore it is as suitable to the Gospel Church at least as it was to the Jewish to make Gods works the matter of our Sabbath praises and to say as Psal 145.4 5 10. One generation shall praise thy works to another and shall declare thy mighty acts I will speak of the glorious honour of thy Majesty and of thy wonderous works And men shall speak of the might of thy terrible acts and I will declare thy greatness All thy works shall praise thee O Lord and thy Saints shall bless thee Psal 26.6 7. I will wash my hands in innocency and so will I compass thine Altar O Lord that I may publish with the voice of thanksgiving and tell of all thy wonderous works Psal 9.12 I will praise thee O Lord with my whole heart I will shew forth all thy marvelous works Direct 14. Let Faith also observe God in his daily Providences and equally honour him for the ordinary and the extraordinary passages thereof The upholding of the world is a continual causing of it and differeth from creation as the continued shining of a Candle doth from the first lighting of it If therefore the Creation do wonderfully declare the Power and Wisdom and Goodness of God so also doth the conservation And note that Gods ordinary works are as great demonstrations of him in all his perfections as his extraordinary Is it not as great a declaration of the Power of God that he cause the Sun to shine and to keep its wonderous course from age to age as if he did such a thing but for a day or hour and as if he caused it to stand still a day And is it not as great a demonstration of his knowledge also and of his goodness Surely we should take it for as great an act of Love to have plenty and health and joy continued to us as long as we desired it as for an hour Let not then that duration and ordinariness of Gods manifestations to us which is their aggravation be lookt upon as if it were their extenuation But let us admire God in the Sun and Stars in Sea and Land as if this were the first time that ever we had seen them And yet let the extraordinarniess of his works have its effects also Their use is to stir up the drowsie mind of man to see God in that which is unusual who is grown customary and lifeless in observing him in things usual Pharaoh and his Magicians will acknowledge God in those unusual works which they are no way able to imitate themselves and say This is the finger of God Exod. 8.19 And therefore miracles are never to be made light of but the finger of God to be acknowledged in them whoever be the instrument or occasion Luke 11.20 There are frequently also some notable though not miraculous Providences in the changes of the world and in the disposal of all events and particularly of our selves in which a Believer should still see God yea see him as the total cause and take the instruments to be next to nothing and not gaze all at men as unbelievers do but say This is the Lords doing and it is marvelous in our eyes Psal 118.23 Sing unto the Lord a new song for he hath done marvelous things Psal 98.1 Marvelous are thy works and that my soul knoweth right well
both to the Father and to us and so of our NEARNESS to God in and by him Our distance is the lamentable fruit of our Apostacy which inferreth our fears and estrangedness and backwardness to draw near to God It causeth our ignorance of him and our false conceits of his will and works it greatly hindereth both love and confidence whereas the apprehension of our nearness to God will do much to cure all these evils As it is the misery of the proud that God looketh on them as afar off that is with strangeness and abhorrence and disdain Psal 138.6 And accordingly they shall be far off from the blessed ones hereafter Luke 16.23 So it is the happiness of Believers to be nigh to God in Jesus Christ who condescended to be nigh to us which is our preparation to be yet nearer to him for ever Psal 148.14 34.18 145.18 Ephes 2.13 It giveth the soul more familiar thoughts of God who seemed before to be at an inaccessible distance which is part of the boldness of access and confidence mentioned Ephes 3.12 2.18 Rom. 5.2 Heb. 10.19 We may come boldly to the Throne of grace Heb. 4.16 And it greatly helpeth us in the work of Love to think how near God is come to us in Christ and how near he hath taken the humane nature unto him When a sinner looketh at God only as in himself and as he is estranged from the guilty he is amazed and confounded as if God were quite out of the reach of our love but when he thinketh how he hath voluntarily come down into our flesh that he might be man and be familiar with man and what a wonderful marriage the Divine Nature hath made with the humane this wonderfully reconcileth the heart to God and maketh the thoughts of him more sweet and acceptable If the life of faith be a dwelling in God and God in us and a walking with God 1 Joh. 3.24 4.12 15 16. Ephes 3.17 Gen. 17.1 24.40 5.22 6.9 Heb. 11.5 Then must we perceive our nearness to God The just apprehension of this nearness in Christs Incarnation and Relation to us is the chief means to bring us to the nearness of love and heavenly conversation Col. 3.1 3 4. Direct 8. Make Christ therefore the Mediation for all your practical thoughts of God The thoughts of God will be strange to us through our distance and terrible through our guilt if we look not upon him through the prospective of Christs humanity and cross God out of Christ is a consuming fire to guilty souls As our acceptance must be through the Beloved in whom he is well pleased so our thoughts must be encouraged with the sense of that acceptance and every thought must be led up to God and emboldened by the Mediatour Mat. 3.17 17.5 12.18 Ephes 1.6 Heb. 2.9 10 12 13 17. Direct 9. Never come to God in prayer or any other act of worship but by the Mediation of the Son and put all your prayers as into his hand that he may present them to the Father There is no hoping for any thing from God to sinners but by Christ and therefore there is no speaking to God but by him not only in his Name but also by his Mediation And this is the exercise of his Priesthood for us by his heavenly intercession so much spoken of by the Holy Ghost in the Epistle to the Hebrews Seeing we have a great High Priest that is passed into the Heavens Jesus the Son of God let us hold fast our profession Let us therefore come boldly to the Throne of grace that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need Heb. 4.14 16. Direct 10. Hear every word of Scripture Precept and Ministerial Exhortation consonant to the Scripture as sent to us by Christ and from the Father by him as the appointed Teacher of the Church Hear Christ in his Gospel and his Ministers and hear God the Father in the Son Take heed of giving only a slight and verbal acknowledgement of the voice of Christ whilest you really are more taken with the Preachers voice as if he had a greater share in the Sermon than Christ hath The voice in the holy Mount which Peter witnesseth that he heard 2 Pet. 1.17 was This is my Beloved Son in whom I am well pleased hear ye him Mat. 17.5 And it shall come to pass that every soul which will not hear that Prophet shall be destroyed from among the people Acts 3.23 When ye received the Word of God which ye heard of us ye received it not as the Word of men but as it is in truth the Word of God which worketh effectually in you that believe 1 Thes 2.13 The Sheep will follow him for they know his voice a stranger they will not follow John 10.4 5. Direct 11. Take every mercy from God as from the hand of Christ both as procured by his Cross and as delivered by his Mediatory Administration It is still supposed that the giving of the Son himself by the Father to this office is excepted as presupposed But all subsequent particular mercies are both procured for us and given to us by the Mediator Yet is it nevertheless from God the Father nor doth it evertheless but the more fully signifie his love But the state of sinners alloweth them no other way of communication from God for their benefit and happiness but by one who is more near and capable to God who from him may convey all blessings unto them Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in things heavenly in Christ Ephes 1.3 He that spared not his own Son but gave him up for us all how shall he not with him also freely give us all things Rom. 8.32 Through the knowledge of him the Divine Power giveth us all things that pertain to life and godliness 2 Pet. 1.3 God hath given us eternal life and this life is in his Son 1 John 5.10 11. All things are delivered into his hand Joh. 13.3 17.2 Therefore receive every particular mercy for soul and body as from the blood and from the present mediation of Christ that you may rightly understand it and have it as sanctified and sweetned by Christ Direct 12. Let Faith take occasion by every sin to renew your sense of the want of Christ and to bring you to him to meditate and grant you a renewed pardon Therefore entertain not their mistake who tell men that all sin past present and to come is fully pardoned at once whether it be before you were born in Gods decree or Christs satisfaction or at the time of your conversion nor theirs who teach that Christ pardoneth only sins before conversion but as for all that are committed afterward he doth prevent the need of pardon by preventing all guilt and obligation to punishment except meer temporal chastisement The preparation
it being his work to make us thus both Believers and Saints and his perfective work of our real Sanctification being as necessary to us as our Redemption or Creation Matth. 28.19 2â— Heb. 6.1 2 4 5 6. Direct 18. Therefore as every Christian must look upon himself as being in special Covenant with the Holy Ghost so be must understand distinctly what are the benefits and what are the conditions and what are the duties of that part of his Covenant The special Benefits are the Life Light and Love before mentioned by the quickening illumination and sanctification of the Spirit not as in the first Act or Seed for so they are presupposed in that Faith and Repentance which is the Condition But as in the following acts and habits and increase of both unto perfection Acts 2.38 Repent and be baptized every one of you in the Name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost for the promise is to you and to your children and to all that are afar off and to as many as the Lord our God shall call See Acts 26.18 Ephes 1.18 19. Titus 3.5 6 7. The special condition on our parts is our consent to the whole Covenant of Grace viz. To give up our selves to God as our Reconciled God and Father in Christ and to Jesus Christ as our Saviour and to the holy Spirit as to his Agent and our Sanctifier There needeth no other proof of this than actual Baptism as celebrated in the Church from Christs daies till now And the institution of it Mat. 28.19 with 1 John 5.7 8 9. 1 Pet. 3.21 with John 3.5 The special Duties afterward to be performed have their rewards as aforesaid and the neglect of them their penalties and therefore have the nature of a Condition as of those particular rewards or benefits Direct 19. The Duties which our Covenant with the Holy Ghost doth bind us to are 1. Faithfully to endeavour by the power and help which he giveth us to continue our consent to all the foresaid Covenant And 2. To obey his further motions for the work of Obedience and Love 3. And to use Christs appointed means with which his Spirit worketh And 4. To forbear those wilful sins which grieve the Spirit John 15.4 Abide in me and I in you v. 7. If ye abide in me and my words abide in you ye shall ask what ye will and it shall be done unto you v. 9. Continue in my love Col. 1.23 If ye continue in the Faith c. Jude 21. Keep your selves in the Love of God Heb. 10.25 26. Not forsaking the assembling of your selves together c. For if we sin wilfully c. of how much sorer punishment shall he be thought worthy who hath done despight to the Spiâ—it of grace v. 29. Heb. 6.4 5 6. Ephes 4 3â— Grieve not the holy Spirit of God 1 Thes 5.19 Quench not the Spirit Direct 20. By this it is plain that the Spirit worketh not on man as a dead thing which hath no principle of activity in it self nor as on a naturally necessitated Agent which hath no self-determining faculty of will but as on a living free self-determining Agent which hath duty of its own to perform for the attaining of the end desired Those therefore that upon the pretence of the Spirits doing all and our doing nothing without him will lye idle and not do their parts with him and say that they wait for the motions of the Spirit and that our endeavours will not further the end do abuse the Spirit and contradict themselves seeing the Spirits work is to stir us up to endeavour which when we refuse to do we disobey and strive against the Spirit Direct 21. Though sometimes the Spirit work so efficaciously as certainly to cause the volition or other effect which it moveth to yet sometimes it so moveth as procureth not the effect when yet it gave man all the power and help which was necessary to the effect because that man failed of that endeavour of his own which should have concurred to the effect and which he was able without more help to have performed That there is such effectual grace Acts 9. and many Scriptures with our great experience tell us That there is such meer necessary uneffectual grace possible and sometime in being which some call sufficient grace is undeniable in the case of Adam who sinned not for want of necessary grace without which he could not do otherwise And to deny this blotteth out all Christianity and Religion at one dash By all which it appeareth that the work of the Spirit is such on mans will as that sometimes the effect is suspended on our concurrence so that though the Spirit be the total cause of its own proper effect and of the act of man in its own place and kind of action yet not simply a total cause of mans act or volition but mans concurrence may be further required to it and may fail Direct 22. Satan transformeth himself oft into an Angel of Light to deceive men by pretending to be the Spirit of God Therefore the spirits must be tryed and not every spirit trusted 2 Cor. 11.14 15. Mat. 24.4 5 11 24. 1 John 3.7 Ephes 4.14 Revel 10.3 8. 2 Thes 3.2 1 John 4.1 3 6. Direct 23. The way of trying the spirits is to try all their uncertain suggestions by the Rule of the certain Truths already revealed in Nature and in the holy Scriptures And to try them by the Scriptures is but to try the spirits by the Spirit the doubtfull spirit by the undoubted Spirit which indited and sealed the Scriptures more fully than can be expected in any after revelation 1 Thes 1.21 Isa 8.16 20. 2 Pet. 1.19 John 5.39 Acts 17.11 The Spirit of God is never contrary to it self Therefore nothing can be from that Spirit which is contrary to the Scriptures which the Spirit indited Direct 24. When you would have an increase of the Spirit go to Christ for it by renewed acts of that same Faith by which at first you obtained the Spirit Gal. 3.3 4. Gal. 4.6 Faith in Christ doth two waies help us to the Spirit 1. As it is that Condition upon which he hath promised it to whom it belongeth to give us the Spirit 2. As it is that act of the soul which is fitted in the nature of it to the work of the Spirit That is as it is the serious contemplation of the infinite Goodness and Love of God most brightly shining to us in the face of the Redeemer and as it is a serious contemplation of that heavenly glory procured by Christ which is the fullest expression of the Love of God and so is fittest to kindle that Love to God in the soul which is the work of the Spirit These are joyned Rom. 5.1 2 5 6. Being justified by Faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ By whom also we
have access by Faith into this grace wherein we stand and rejoyce in hope of the Glory of God The Love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given to us For when we were without strength in due time Christ died for the ungodly God commended his Love to us that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us So Ephes 3.17 18 19. Let Christ dwell in your hearts by Faith and it would help you to be rooted and grounded in Love and to comprehend with all Saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height and to know the Love of Christ which passeth knowledge and so to be filled with the fulness of God If Faith be the way to see Gods Love and Faith be the way thereby to raise our Love to God then Faith in Christ must needs be the continual instrument of the Spirit or that means which we must still use for the increase of the Spirit Direct 25. The works of the Spirit next to the excitation of Life Light and Love do consist in the subduing of the lusts of the flesh and of the power of all the objects of sense which serve it Therefore be sure that you faithfully serve the Spirit in this mortifying work and that you take not part with the flesh against it A grat part of our duty towards the Holy Ghost doth consist in this joyning with him and obeying him in his strivings against the flesh And therefore it is that so many and earnest exhortations are used with us to live after the Spirit and not after the flesh and to mortifie the lusts of the flesh and the deeds of it by the Spirit especially in Rom. 8.1 to the 16. and in Gal. 5. throughout Rom. 6. 7. Col. 3. Ephes 5. Direct 26. Take not every striving for a victory nâ—r every desire of grace to be true grace it self unless grace be desired as it is the lovely Image of God and pleasing to him and be desired before all earthly things and unless you not only strive against but conquer the predominant love of every sin There are many uneffectual desires and strivings which consist with the dominion of sin Many a fornicator and glutton and drunkard hath earnest wishes that he could leave his sin when he thinketh of the shame and punishment and hath a great deal of striving against it before he yieldeth But yet he liveth in it still because his love to it is the predominant part in him Rom. 6.2 How shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein Know ye not that so many of us as were baptized into Christ were baptized into his death We are buryed with him by Baptism Knowing this that our old man is crucified with him that the body of sin might be destroyed that henceforth we should not serve sin For he that is dead is freed from sin V. 12. Let not sin reign therefore in your mortal bodies that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof V. 13. Neither yield your members servants of unrighteousness unto sin For sin shall not have dominion over you Know ye not that to whom you yield your selves servants to obey his servants ye are to whom ye obey whether of sin unto death or of obedience unto righteousness Rom. 8.13 If ye live after the flesh ye shall die but if ye through the Spirit do mortifie the deeds of the body ye shall live See Gal. 5.16 18 19 20 21 22 23. They that are Christs have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts V. 24. and 2 Tim. 2.19 The foundation of God standeth sure having this seal The Lord knoweth who are his And let every one that nameth the Name of Christ depart from iniquity Object But it is said Gal. 5.17 The flesh lusteth against the Spirit so that ye cannot do the things which ye would Answ That is every true Christian would fain be perfect in Holiness and Obedience but cannot because of the lustings of the flesh But it doth not say or mean that any true Christian would live without wilful gross or reigning sin and cannot that he would live without murder adultery theft or any sin which is more loved than hated but cannot We cannot do all that we would but it doth not follow that we can do nothing which we would or cannot sincerely obey the Gospel Object Paul saith Rom. 7.15 18. To will is present with me but how to perform that which is good I find not and what I would that I do not Answ The same answer will serve To will perfect Obedience to all Gods Laws was present with Paul but not to do it He would be free from every infirmity but could not And therefore could not be justified by the Law of Works But he never saith that he would obey sincerely and could not or that he would live without heinous sin and could not Indeed in his flesh he saith there dwelleth no good thing but that denyeth not his spiritual power who so often proposeth himself as an example to be imitated by those that he wrote to Thousands are deceived about their state by taking every unâ—ffectual desire and wish and every striving before they sin to be a mark of saving grace misunderstanding Mr. Perkins and some others with him who make a desire of grace to be the grace it self and a combatâ— against the flesh to be a sign of the renovation by the Spirit whereas they mean only such a desire of grace as grace for the Love of God as is more powerful than any contrary desires and such a combating as conquereth gross or mortal sin and striveth against infirmities And of this this saying is very true Direct 27. Strive with your hearts when the Spirit is striveing with you and take the season of its spâ—cial help and make one gale of grace advantageous to another This is a great point of Christian wisdom The help of the Spirit is not at our command take it while you have it Use wind and tide before they cease God will not be a servant to our slothfulness and negligence As he that will not come to the Church at the hour when the Minister of Christ is there but say I will come another time will have none of his teaching there so he that will not take the Spirits time but say I am not now at leisure may be left without its help and taught by sad experience to know that it is fitter for man to wait on God than for God to wait on man More may be done and got at one hour than at another when we have no such help and motions Direct 28. Be much in the contemplation of the heavenly Glory for there are the highest objects and the greatest demonstrations of Gods Love and Goodness and therefore in such thoughts we are most likely to meet with the Spirit with whose nature and design they are so agreeable We fall
in their Ordination which is a Consecration and their self-dedication to God And it is high sacriledge in themselves or any other that shall alienate them unjustly from their sacred calling and work Or of things to holy uses as places and utensils may be sanctified Or it may be a dedication of persons to a holy state relation and use as is that of every Christian in his Baptism and this is either an external dedication and so all the baptized are sanctified and holy or an internal Dedication which if it be sincere it is both actual and habitual when we both give up our selves to God in Covenant and are also disposed and inclined to him and our hearts are set upon him yea and the life also consisteth of the exercise of this disposition and performance of this covenant This is the Sanctification which here I speak of And so much for the name The doctrinal Propositions necessary to be understood about it are these more largely and plainly laid down in my Confession Chap. 3. Prop. 1. So much of the appearance or Image of God as there is upon any creature so much it is good and amiable to God and man Object God loveth us from eternity and when we were his enemies not because we were good but to make us better than we were Answ Gods Love and all Love consisteth formally in complacency God hath no complacency in any thing but in good or according to the measure of its goodness From eternity God foreseeing the good which would be in us loved us as good in esse cognito and not as actually good when we were not When we were his enemies he had a double love to us or complacency the one was for that natural good which remained in us as we were men and repairable and capable of being made Saints The other was for that foreseen goodes in esse cognito which he purposed in time to come to put upon us This complacency exceeded not at all the good which was the object of it But with it was joyned a will and purpose to give us grace and glory hereafter and thence it is called A Love of Benevolence Not but that complacency is the true action of Love and Benevolence or a purpose to give benefits is but the fruit of it But if any will needs call the Benevolence alone by the name of Love we deny not in that sense that God loveth Saul a persecutor as well as Paul an Apostle in that his purpose to do him good is the same Object God loveth us in Christ and for his righteousness and not only for our own inherent holiness Answ 1. The Benevolence of God is exercised towards us in and by Christ and the fruits of his Love are Christ himself and the mercies given us with Christ and by Christ And our Pardon and Justification and Adoption and Acceptance is by his meritorious righteousness And it is by him that we are possessed with Gods Spirit and renewed according to his Image in Wisdom and Righteousness and Holiness And all this relative and inherent mercy we have as in Christ related to him without whom we have nothing And thus it is that we are accepted and beloved in him and for his righteousness But Christ did not die or merit to change Gods Nature and make him more indifferent in his Love to the holy and the unholy or equally to the more holy and to the less holy But his complacency is still in no man further than he is made truly amiable in his real holiness and his relation to Christ and to the Father The Doctrine of Imputation is opened before John 16.27 The Father himself loveth you because ye have loved me and believed c. And 14.21 He that loveth me shall be loved of my Father As God loved us with the love of benevolence and so much complacence as is before described before we loved him 1 John 4.10 Ephes 2.4 so he now loveth us complacentially for his Image upon us and so much of his grace as is found in us and also for our relation to his Son and to himself which we stand in by this grace But as he loveth not Saul a persecutor under the notion of a fulfiller of his Law in Christ so neither doth he love David in his sin under the notion of one that is without sin and perfect as having fulfilled the Law in Christ But so loveth him in Christ as to pardon his sin and make him more lovely in himself by creating a clean heart and renewing a right spirit within him for the sake of the satisfaction and merits of Christ Prop. 2. Holiness is Gods Image upon us and that which was our primitive amiableness Col. 3.10 Prop. 3. The loss of Holiness was the loss of our amiableness and our state of enmity to God Prop. 4. Holiness consisteth in 1. Our resignation of our selves to God as our Owner and submission to his Providence 2. And our subjection to God as our Ruler and obedience to his Teaching and his Laws 3. And in Thankfulness and Love to God as our Chief Good efficiently and finally Prop. 5. Love is that final perfective act which implyeth and comprehendeth all the rest and so is the fulfilling of the Law and the true state of sanctification Rom. 13.10 Matth. 22.37 Mark 12.33 1 John 7.16 Prop. 6. Heaven it self as it is our ultimate end and perfection is but our perfect Love to God maintained by perfect vision of him with the perfect reception of his Love to us Prop. 7. Therefore it was Christs great business in the world to destroy the works of the Devil and to bring us to this perfect Love of God Prop. 8. Accordingly the greatest use of Faith in Christ is to subserve and kindle our Love to God Prop. 9. This it doth two special waies 1. By procuring the pardon of sin which forfeited the grace of the Spirit that so the Spirit may kindle the Love of God in us 2. By actual beholding the Love of God which shineth to us most gloriously in Christ by which our Love must be excited as the most suitable and effectual means John 3.1 4.10 Prop. 10. Our whole Religion therefore consisteth of two parts 1. Primitive Holiness restored and perfected 2. The restoring and perfecting means Or 1. Love to God the final and morâ— excellent part 2. Faith in Christ the mediate part Faith causing Love and Love caused by Faith 1 Cor. 12. last 13. Rom. 8.35 Ephes 6.23 1 Tim. 1.5 2 Thes 3.5 1 Cor. 2.9 8.3 Rom. 8.28 James 1.12 2.5 1 Pet. 1.8 Prop. 11. Repentance towards God is the souls return to God in Love and Regeneration by the Spirit is the Spirits begetting us to the Image and Nature of God our heavenly Father in a heavenly Love to him So that the Holy Ghost is given us to work in us a Love to God which is our sanctification Rom. 5.5 Titus 3.4 5 6
very brief I. For the first Case before sickness cometh Direct 1. Be sure that you settle your Belief of the life to come that your Faith may not fail Direct 2. Expect Death as seriously all your life as wise Believers are obliged to do That is as men that are alwaies sure to die as men that are never sure to live a moment longer as men that are sure that life will be short and death is not far off and as foreseeing what it is to die of what eternal consequence and what will then appear to be necessary to your safe and to your comfortable change Direct 3. All your daies habituate your souls to believing sweet enlarged thoughts of the infinite Goodness and Love of God to whom you go and with whom you hope to live for ever Direct 4. Dwell in the studies of a crucified and glorified Christ who is the way the truth and life who must be your hope in life and death Ephes 3.17 18 19. Direct 5. Keep clear your evidences of your right to Christ and all his Promises by keeping grace or the heavenly nature in life activity and increase 2 Pet. 1.10 2 Cor. 13.5 John 15 1 c. 1 John 3. Direct 6. Consider often of the possession which your nature in Christ hath already of Heaven and how highly it is advanced and how near his relation is and how dear his love is to his weakest members upon earth And that as souls in Heaven have an inclination and desire to communicate their own felicity to their bodies so hath Christ as to his body the Church John 17.24 Ephes 5.25 27 c. Direct 7. Look to the Heavenly Host and those who have lived before you or with you in the flesh to make the thoughts of Heaven the more familiar to you as in the former chapter Direct 8. Improve all Afflictions yea the plague of sin it self to make you weary of this world and willing to be gone to Christ Rom. 7. Direct 9. Be much with God in Prayer Meditation and other heart-raising duties that you may not by strangeness to him be dismayed Direct 10. Live not in the guilt of any wilful sin nor in any slothful neglect of duty lest guilt breed terrour and make you fly from God your Judge But especially study to redeem your time and to do all the good you can iâ— the world and to live as totally devoted to God as conscious that you live to no carnal interest but desire to serve him with all you have and your consciences testimony of this will abundantly take off the terrours of death whatever any erroneous ones may say to the contrary for fear of being guilty of conceits of merit A fruitful life is a great preparative for death 2 Tim. 4.8 2 Cor. 1.12 c. Direct 11. Fetch from Heaven the comforts which you live upon through all your life And when you have truly learned to live more upon the comforts of believed glory than upon any pictures or hopes below then you will be able to die in and for those comforts Matth. 6.20 21. Col. 3.1 4. Phil. 3.20 21. 1 Thes 4.18 Phil. 1.21 23. Direct 12. The Knowledge and Love of God in Christ is the beginning or foretaste of Heaven John 17.3 1 Cor. 13. c. and the foretastes are excellent preparations Therefore still remember that all that you do in the world for the getting and exercising the true Knowledge and Love of God in Christ so much you do for the foretastes and best preparations for Heaven 1 Cor. 8.3 If any man love God the same is known of him with approbation and love II. In the time of sickness and near to death Direct 1. Let your first work when God seemeth to call you away be to renew a diligent search of your hearts and lives and to see lest in either of them there should be any sin which is not truly hated and repented of Though this must be done through all your lives yet with an extraordinary care and diligence when you are like to come so speedily to your tryal For it is only to Repenting Believers that the Covenant of Grace doth pardon sin And the impenitent have no right to pardon Though for ordinary failings which are forgotten and for sins which you are willing to know and remember but cannot a general Repentance will be accepted as when you pray God to shew you the sins which you see not and to forgive those which you cannot remember or find out Yet those which you know must be particularly repented of And Repentance is a remembring duty and will hardly forget any great and heinous sins which are known to be sins indeed If your Repentance be then to begin alas it is high time to begin it And though if it be sound it will be saving that is If it be such as would settle you in a truly godly life if you should recover yet you will hardly have any assurance of salvation or such comfort in it as is desirable to dying man Because you will very hardly know whether it come from true conversion and contain a Love to God and Godliness or whether it be only the fruit of fear and would come to nothing if you were restored to health But he that hath truly repented heretofore and lived in uprightness towards God and man and hath nothing to do but to discern his sincerity and to exercise a special Repentance for some late or special sins or to do that again which he hath done unfeignedly before will much more easily get the assurance and comfort of his forgiveness and salvation Direct 2. Renew your sense of the Vanity of this world Which at such a time one would think should be very easie to do When you see that you are near an end of all your pleasures and have had all except a grave to rot in that ever this world willd o for you may you not easily then see whether the godly or the worldly be the wiser and the happier man And what it is that the life of man should be spent in seeeking after Matth. 6.33 Isa 55.1 2 3. Eccles 7.3 4 5 6. Direct 3. Remember what Flesh is and what it hath been to you that you may not be too loth to lay it down Of the dust it was made and to the dust it must return Corruption is your Father and the Worm is your Mother and your Sister Job 17.14 Drought and beat consume the Snow-waters so doth the grave those which have sinned The womb shall forget him the Worm shall feed sweetly on him Job 24.20 Flesh and blood shall not inherit the Kingdom of God but this mortal must put on immortality by being made a spiritual body 1 Cor. 15. And this flesh hath cost you so dear to carry it about so much care and labour to provide it food to repair that which daily vanisheth away and so many weary painful hours and so many fearful