it is repletive in the whole house at once as in one room and that a stately Palace which would be much disgraced and lose of its splendor by being cut into offices and accordingly this royal Grace is an entire absolute Prince of a whole Nation not as a Tetrarch of Galilee a sharer of a Saxon Heptarchy and described to us as one single act though of great command and defined to be an assent and adherence to the goodness of the object which object is the whole word of God and specially the promises of the Gospel So then to believe is not to acknowledge the truth of Scripture and Articles of the Creed as vulgarly we use knowledg but to be affected with the goodness and Excellency of them as the most precious objects which the whole world could present to our choice to embrace them as the only desireable thing upon the earth and to be resolutely and uniformly inclined to express this affection of ours in our practice whensoever there shall be any competition betwixt them and our dearest delights For the object of our Faith is not meerly speculative somewhat to be understood only and assented to as true but chiefly moral a truth to be prosecuted with my desires through my whole Conversation to be valued above my life and set up in my heart as the only Shrines I worship So that he that is never so resolutely sworn to the Scriptures believes all the Commands Prohibitions and Promises never so firmly if he doth not adhere to them in his practice and by particular application of them as a rule to guide him in all his actions express that he sets a true value on them if he do not this he is yet an Infidel all his Religion is but like the Beads-mans who whines over his Creed and Commandments over a threshold so many times a Week only as his task to deserve his Quarterage or to keep correspondence with his Patron Unless I see his belief exprest by uniform obedience I shall never imagine that he minded what he said The sincerity of his faith is always proportionable to the integrity of his life and so far is he to be accounted a Christian as he performs the obligation of it the promise of his Baptism Will any man say that Eve believed God's inhibition when she ate the forbidden fruit If she did she was of a strange intrepid resolution to run into the jaws of Hell and never boggle 'T is plain by the story that she heard God but believed the Serpent as may appear by her obedience the only evidence and measure of her Faith Yet can it not be thought that she that was so lately a Work of God's Omnipotence should now so soon distrust it and believe that he could not make good his threatnings The truth is this she saw clearly enough in her brain but had not sunk it down into her heart or perhaps she assented to it in the general but not as appliable to her present case This assent was like a Bird fluttering in the Chamber not yet confined to a Cage ready to escape at the first opening of the door or window As soon as she opens either ears or eyes to hearken to the Serpent or behold the Apple her former assent to God is vanish'd all her faith bestowed upon the Devil It will not be Pelagianism to proceed and observe how the condition of every sin since this time hath been an imitation of that The same method in sin hath ever since been taken first to revolt from God and then to disobey first to become Infidels and then Sinners Every murmuring of the Israelites was a defection from the Faith of Israel and turning back to Egypt in their hearts Infidelity as it is the fountain from whence all Rebellion springs Faith being an adherence and every departure from the living God arising from an evil heart of unbelief Heb. iii. 12. so it is also the channel where it runs Not any beginning or progress in sin without a concomitant degree of either weakness or want of Faith So that Heathens or Hereticks are not the main enemies of Christ as the question de oppositis fidei is stated by the Romanists but the Hypocrite and Libertine he is the Heathen in grain an Heretick of Lucifer's own sect one that the Devil is better pleased with than all the Catalogue in Epiphanius or the Romish Calendar For this is it that Satan drives at an engine by which he hath framed us most like himself not when we doubt of the Doctrine of Christ for himself believes it fully no man can be more firmly resolved of it but when we heed it not in our lives when we cleave not to it in our hearts when instead of living by Faith Heb. 10. 38. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we draw back and cowardly subduce our selves and forsake our Colours refusing to be martialled in his ranks or fight under his Banner Arian the Stoick Philosopher hath an excellent discourse concerning the double Infidelity of the brain and heart very appliable 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. There are two sorts of this senselessness and stupidity whereby Men are hardned into stones the first of the Understanding part the second of the Practical He that will not assent to things manifest his brain is frozen into a stone or mineral there is no more reasoning with him than with a pillar The Academicks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 never to believe or comprehend any thing was a stupid Philosophy like to have no Disciples but Posts or Statues and therefore long ago laught out of the Schools as an art of being Brutes or Metamorphosis not to instruct but transform them he could not remain a Man that was thus incredulous But the second Stupidity that of the Practical Not to abstain from things that are hurtful to embrace that which would be their death the vice though not doctrine of the Epicures though this were an argument both in his and Scripture-phrase of a stony heart yet was it such an one as the lustiest sprightfullest men in the World carried about with them Nay 't was an evidence saith he of their strength and valour of a heart of metal and proof to have all modesty and fear of ill cold as a stone frozen and dead within it And thus holds it in Christianity as it did then in reason Not to believe the truth of Scripture to deny that the Lord liveth would argue a brain as impenetrable as Marble and eyes as Crystal We sooner suspect that he is not a man that he is out of his senses then such an Infidel Some affected Atheists I have heard of that hope to be admired for eminent wits by it But I doubt whether any ever thought of it in earnest and if I may so say conscientiously denied a Deity But to deny him in our lives to have a heart of Marble or Adamant 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Arrian A
dead stupified Soul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it is so frequent amongst us that it is not worth observing He is but a puny in the Devils camp that hath not a privy coat within him to secure his heart from any stroke that God or Scripture can threaten him with Thus you see wherein this Christian infidelity consists in the not rooting faith in the heart in indulgence to those practises which directly contradict his doctrine So that though every commission of sin be not incompetible with the habit of faith so far as to denominate him an infidel yet is it from the not exercising of faith actually that I ever sin and every man in the same degree that he is a sinner so far is he an unbeliever So that this conversible retrogradous Sorites may shut up all He that truly believes assents in his heart to the goodness as well as the truth of Scripture He that assents so in his heart approves it according to its real excellency above all rivals in the World He that thus approves when occasion comes makes an actual choice of God's Word before all other most precious delights He that actually makes the choice performs uniform obedience without any respect of sins or persons He that performs this obedience never indulges himself in sin And then è converso backward thus He that indulges himself in sin doth not uniformly obey the Word He that doth not so obey doth not actually make choice of it before all competitors He that makes not this choice approves it not according to its real excellency above all things in the world He that doth not so approve assents not to the absolute goodness of it in his heart He that so assents not doth not truly believe therefore every indulgent sinner is an infidel And then look about you and within you Whosoever say The Lord liveth and yet remain in your ways of sin be you never so stout or proud-hearted my Prophet gives you the lie If you are incensed and swear that you are in the truth and stand upon your reputation his answer is mannerly but tart Surely you swear falsly every indulgent sinner is an infidel 1 Joh. iii. 6. Whosoever sins hath not seen Christ neither known him But amongst Professors of the Gospel there be a multitude of habitual sinners go of infidels 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The thing which in the first place we undertook to demonstrate We now come to the next thing proposed The root or fountain of this hypocritical faith where we are to enquire how it comes about That they which are so forward to profess are so far from true belief And higher in our search we cannot go than Adam's fall for the spring head of all this infidelity as for God's absolute decree in rejecting mens persons and then suffering and leading them to an acknowledgment of the truth of the Gospel only that they may be unexcusable I will not be so vain or unseasonable to examine Adam had once the Tree of Life to have eaten and have been immortal to have confirmed him and his posterity into an irreversible estate of happiness But since his disobedient heart preferred the Tree of Knowledge before that of Life the Tree of Life hath never thrived currantly with his progeny All our care and traffick and merchandise hath been for Knowledge never prizing or cheapning so poor a commodity as life 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. All sin is from the Tree of Knowledge and that hath rooted it so deep and given it so fair a growth within us As for the Tree of Life seeing then we would not feed on it we were never since suffered to come within reach The Cherubins and a flaming Sword have fenced it round about Gen. iii. 34. and that makes men grow so unproportionably into such monstrous shapes vast strong swoln heads and weak thin crazy bodies like Pharaoh's lean kine lank and very ill-favored Men for the most part having Brains to understand and Eyes to see and Tongues to profess but neither Hearts to apply nor Hands to practise nor Feet to walk the ways of God's Commandments As one far spent in a Consumption who hath his senses perfectly enough when he is not able to go It is only the Effectual Grace of God of which that other Tree was but an embleme which must give us life and strength to practise what we know And this amongst us is so little cared for finds such disesteem and slight observance when it appears meets with such resolute hardned stubborn hearts that it is a miracle if it ever be brought to submit it self to such course entertainment And this is the first and main ground of this Hypocritical faith our corrupt immoderate desires of knowledge and neglect of Grace The second ground more evidently discernable in us is The secret consent and agreement betwixt our carnal desires and divine knowledg and the antipathy and incompatibleness of the same with true Faith The first pair dwell many times very friendly and peaceably together do not quarrel in an age or pass an affront or cross word Knowledge doth seldom justle or offer violences to the desires of the flesh a man may be very knowing and very lewd of a towring Brain and a groveling Soul rich in speculation and poor in practise But for the other pair they are like opposite signs in the Heaven have but a vicissitude of presence or light in our Hemisphere never appear or shine together Faith lusteth and struggleth against the flesh and the flesh against Faith The carnal part is as afraid of Faith as the Devil was of Christ For Faith being seated in the concurrence of the dictate of judgment and on the other side the sway of the affections The one must either couch or be banished at the others entrance and then it cries out in the voice of the Devil Mark i. 24. What have I to do with thee or as the words will bear 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 What communion can there be betwixt me and thee thou precious Grace of God Art thou come to torment and dispossess me before my time O what a stir there is in the flesh when faith comes to take its throne in the heart as at the news of Christ's Incarnation corporal so at his spiritual Herod the King is troubled and all Jerusalem with him Matt. ii 3. All the reigning Herod sins and all the Jerusalem of habitual ruling lusts and affections are in great disorder as knowing that this new King abodes their instant destruction It was Aristotles observation That the Mathematicks being an abstract knowledg had nothing in them contrary to Passions and therefore young men and dissolute might study and prove great proficients in them if they had but a good apprehension there was no more required And that perhaps is the reason that such studies as these History and Geometry and the like go down pleasantest with those which
discerning good from evil 6. An expectation of a reward for any thing well done Lastly some gripes and twinges of the Conscience to all add a tender disposition a good Christian education common custom of the countrey where one lives where some vices are out of fashion nay at last the word of God daily preached not a love but servile fear of it These I say and the like may outwardly restrain unregenerate men from riots may curb and keep them in and consequently preserve the soul from that weight of the multitude of sins which press down other men to a desparation of mercy Thus is one unregenerate man less engaged in sin than another and consequently his soul less polluted and so in all likelihood more capable of the ordinary means of salvation than the more stubborn habituate sinner when every aversion every commission of every sin doth more harden against grace more alien and set at a greater distance from Heaven and this briefly we call a moral preparation of the soul and a purging of it though not absolutely from sin yet from some measure of reigning sin and disposing of it to a spiritual estate and this is no more than I learn from Bradwardine in his 16. de causa Dei ch 37. A servile fear a sight of some inconvenience and moral habit of vertue and the like Multum retrahunt à peccato inclinant ad opera bona sic ad charitatem gratiam opera verè grata praeparant disponunt And so I come to my last part to shew of what use this preparation of the soul is in order to Christs birth in us the ways of the Lord. I take no great joy in presenting controversies to your ears out of this place yet seeing I am already fallen upon a piece of one I must now go through it and to quit it as soon as I can present the whole business unto you in some few propositions of which some I shall only recite as conceiving them evident enough by their own light the rest I shall a little insist on and then apply and drive home the profit of all to your affections And in this pardon me for certainly I should never have medled with it had not I resolved it a Theory that most nearly concerned your practice and a speculation that would instruct your wills as well as your understandings The propositions which contain the sum of the business are these 1. No preparation in the world can deserve or challenge Gods sanctifying grace the Spirit bloweth where it listeth and cannot by any thing in us be predetermin'd to its object or its work 2. The Spirit is of power to work the conversiâ—n of any the greatest sinner at one minute to strike the most obdurate heart and soften it and out of the unnatural womb of stones infinitely more unfruitful than barrenness and age had made the womb of Sarah to raise up children unto Abraham According to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Aristotle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 diseases are sometimes cur'd when the patient is at the extremity or height of danger in an ecstasie and almost quite gone 3. 'T is an ill Consequence that because God can and sometimes doth call unprepared sinners therefore 't is probable he will deal so with thee in particular or with unprepared men in general God doth not work in conversion as a physical agent to the extent of his power but according to the sweet disposition and counsel of his Will 4. In unprepared hearts there be many profest enemies to grace ill dispositions ambition atheism pride of spirit and in chief an habit in a voluptuous settled course of sinning an indefatigable resolute walking after their own lusts And therefore there is very little hope that Christ will ever vouchsafe to be born in such polluted hardned souls For 't is Basil's observation that that speech of the fools heart There is no God was the cause that the Gentiles were given over to a reprobate sense and fell headlong 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 into all manner of abominations Hence it is that Jobius in Photius observes that in Scripture some are called dogs Mat. xv 26. some unworthy to receive the mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven Mat. xiii 11. that some hated the light and came not to it Joh. iii. 20. as if all those had taken a course to make themselves uncapable of mercy and by a perfect hostility frighted Christ out of their coasts In the liberal dispensation of miracles in the Gospel you would wonder to see Christ a niggard in his own countrey yet so in respect of other places he was and did not many miracles there because of their unbelief Mat. xiii 58. not that their incredulity had manacled him had shortned his hand or straitned his power but that miracles which when they met with a passive willingness a contentedness in the patient to receive and believe them were then the ordinary instruments of faith and conversion would have been but cast away upon obdurate hearts so that for Christ to have numbred miracles among his unbelieving Countrey-men no way prepared to receive them had been an injurious liberality and added only to their unexcusableness which contradicts not the Axiom of St Paul 1 Cor. xiii 22. That some signs are only for unbelievers for even those unbelievers must have within them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a proneness or readiness to receive them with belief 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. in Jobius to open to the spirit knocking by those miracles and improve them to their best profit 5. Though God needs not yet he requires moral preparation of us as an ordinary means to make us more capable of grace for although according to Saint Austin Ne ipsâ quidem justitiâ nostrâ indiget Deus yet according to Salvian's limitation Fget juxta praeceptionem suam licet non juxta potentiam eget secundum legem suam non eget secundum Majestatem We are to think that God hath use of any thing which he commands and therefore must perform whatever he requires and not dare to be confident of the end without the observation of the means prescribed 'T is too much boldness if not presumption to leave all to his omnipotent working when he hath prescribed us means to do somewhat our selves 6. Integrity and Honesty of Heart a sober moral life and chiefly humility and tenderness of spirit in summ whatever degree of Innocence either study or fear or love or natural disposition can work in us some or all of which may in some measure be found in some men not yet regenerate are good preparations for Christs birth in us so saith Clement of Philosophy that it doth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. make ready and prepare the way against Christs coming 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 cooperate with other helps that God hath given us all with this caution that it doth only prepare not perfect
bestowed on Gods part Faith required on ours Christ the matter Faith the condition of the Covenant Now to bring or present this Faith before you as an object for your understandings to gaze at or to go farther to dissect and with the diligence of Anatomy instruct in every limb or joynt or excellency of it were but to recal you to your Catechism and to take pains to inform you in that which you are presum'd to know The greater danger of us is that we are behind in our practice that we know what faith is but do not labour for it and therefore the seasonablest work will be on our affections to produce if it were possible this precious vertue in our souls and to sink and press down that floating knowledge which is in most of our brains into a solid weighty effectual Faith that it may begin to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a work of faith which was formerly but a phansie dream and apparition To this purpose to work on your wills no Rhetorick so likely as that which is most sharp and terrible no such Physick for dead affections as Corrosives the consideration of the dismal hideous desperate estate of infidels here in my Text and that both in respect of the guilt of the sin and degree of the punishment proportioned to it and that above all other sinners in the World It shall be more c. Where you may briefly observe 1. the sin of infidelity set down by its subject that City which would not receive Christ being preach't unto it v. 14. 2 the greatness of this sin exprest by the punishment attending it and that either positively it shall go very sore with it and therefore it is to be esteemed a very great sin implyed in the whole Text or else comparatively being weighed with Sodom and Gomorrah in judgment it shall be more tolerable for them then it and therefore 't is not only a great sin but the greatest the most damning sin in the world And of these in order plainly and to your hearts rather then your brains presuming that you are now come with solemn serious thoughts to be edified not instructed much less pleased or humor'd And first of the first The sin of infidelity noted in the last words that City To pass by those which we cannot choose but meet with 1. a multitude of ignorant Infidels Pagans and Heathens 2. of knowing but not acknowledging Infidels as Turks and Jews We shall meet with another order of as great a latitude which will more nearly concern us a world of believing Infidels which know and acknowledge Christ the Gospel and the promises are as fairly mounted in the understanding part as you would wish but yet refuse and deny him in their hearts apply not a Command to themselves submit not to him nor desire to make themselves capable of those mercies which they see offered by Christ in the World and these are distinctly set down in the verse next before my Text Whosoever shall not receive you i. e. entertain the acceptable truth of Christ and the Gospel preached by you as 't is interpreted by the 40. verse He that receiveth you receiveth me i. e. believes on me as the word is most plainly used Mat. xi 14. If you will receive it i. e. if you will believe it this is Elias which was for to come And Joh. i. 12. To as many as received him even to them that believe in his name For you are to know that Faith truly justifying is nothing in the World but the receiving of Christ Christ and his sufferings and full satisfaction was once on the Cross render'd and is ever since by the Gospel and its Ministers offered to the world and nothing required of us but an hand and an heart to apprehend and receive and to as many as received him he gives power to become the sons of God Joh. i. 12. So that Faith and infidelity are not acts properly determined to the understanding but indeed to the whole soul and most distinctly to the Will whose part it is to receive or repel to entertain or resist Christ and his promises the Author and finisher of our salvation Now this receiving of Christ is the taking or accepting of the righteousness of Christ and so making it our own as Rom. i. 17. being rightly weighed will enforce Read and mark 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in it or by it the Gospel mention'd in the former verse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the righteousness of God by Faith as Rom. iii. 22. i. e. the not legal but Evangelical righteousness which only God accepts directly set down Phil. iii. 9. That righteousness which is through Faith of Christ the righteousness which is of God by Faith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is revealed to Faith is declared that we might believe that finding no life or righteousness in our selves we may go out of our selves and lay hold on that which is offered us by Christ and this you will find to be the clearest meaning of these words though somewhat obscured in our English reading of them Now the accepting of this righteousness is an act of ours following a proposal or offer of Christ's and consummating the match or bargain between Christ and us Christ is offered to us as an Husband in the Gospel we enquire of him observe our own needs and his Excellencies and riches to supply them our sins and his righteousness and if upon advice we will take him the match is struck we are our beloved's and our beloved is ours we are man and wife we have taken him for our husband and with him are entituled to all his riches we have right to all his righteousness and enjoy by his Patent all the priviledges all the promises all the mercies of the Gospel But if the offer being thus made by God to give us his Son freely we stand upon terms we are too rich too learned too worldly minded too much in love with the praise of men Joh. xii 43. i. e. fixt upon any worldly vanity and resolve never to forego all these to disclaim our worldly liberty our own righteousness and to accept of so poor an offer as a Christ then are we the Infidels here spoken of We will not come to him that we might have life Joh. v. 40. When he is held out to us we will not lay hold on him we have some conceit of our selves and therefore will not step a foot abroad to fetch his righteousness home to us And indeed if any worldly thing please you if you can set a value upon any thing else if you can entertain a paramour a rival a Competitour in your hearts if you can receive the praise of men how can you believe Joh. v. 44. So that in brief Infidelity consists in the not receiving of Christ with a reciprocal giving up of our selves to him in the not answering affirmatively to Christs
finding themselves not yet taken up quite from a licentious life suspect and would be in danger to despair of themselves as Atheists 'T is a blessed tenderness to feel every sin in our selves at the greatest advantage to aggravate and represent it to our conscience in the horridst shape but there is a care also to be had that we give not our selves over as desperate Cain ly'd when he said his sin was greater then could be either born or forgiven When the Physicians have given one over 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nature hath its spring and plunge and sometimes quits and overcomes the disease If thou art in this dangerous walk and strivest and heavest and canst not get out of it yet sorrow not as one without hope this very regret and reluctancy this striving and plunging is a good symptome If thou wilt continue with a good courage and set thy self to it to the purpose be confident thou shalt overcome the difficulty If this sin be a walking then every stop is a cessation every check a degree to integrity every godly thought or desire a pawn from God that he will give thee strength to victory and if thou do but nourish and cherish every such reluctancy every such gracious motion in thy self thou maist with courage expect a gracious calm deliverance out of these storms and tempests And let us all labour and endeavour and pray that we may be loosed from these toyls and gins and engagements of our own lusts and being entred into a more religious severe Course here then the Atheism of our ways would counsel us to we may obtain the end and rest and consummation and reward of our Course hereafter Now to him which hath elected us c. The XVIII Serm. 1 Tim. I. 15. Of whom I am the chief THE chief business of our Apostle St. Paul in all his Epistles is what the main of every Preacher ought to be Exhortation There is not one doctrinal point but contains a precept to our Understanding to believe it nor moral discourse but effectually implies an admonishment to our Wills to practise it Now these Exhortations are proposed either vulgarly in the downright garb of precept as These things command and teach c. or in a more artificial obscure enforcing way of Rhetorick as God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of Christ whereby the world is crucified to me and I unto the world which though in words it seems a protestation of St. Pauls own resolution yet in effect is a most powerful exhortatory to every succeeding Christian to glory only in the cross of Christ and on it to crucifie both the world and himself This method of reducing St. Paul to Exhortation I observe to you for the clearing of my Text. For this whole verse at the first view seems only a meer Thesis or point of belief that Christ came into the world to save sinners illustrated and applied by the speaker as one and the chief of the number of those sinners to be saved But it contains a most Rhetorical powerful Exhortation to both Understanding and Will to believe this faithful saying That Christ came c. and to accept lay hold of and with all our might to embrace and apply to each of our selves this great mercy toward this great salvation bestowed on sinners who can with humility confess their sins and with faith lay hold on the promise And this is the business of the Verse and the plain matter of this obscure double Exhortation to every mans Understanding that he believe that Christ c. to every mans affections that he humble himself and teach his heart and that his tongue to confess Of all sinners c. This Text shall not be divided into parts which were to disorder and distract the significancy of a Proposition but into several considerations for so it is to be conceived either absolutely as a profession of St. Paul of himself and there we will enquire whether and how Paul was the chief of all sinners Secondly respectively to us for whom this form of confessing the state and applying the salvation of sinners to our selves is set down And first whether and how Paul was the chief of all sinners where we are to read him in a double estate converted and unconverted exprest to us by his double name Paul and Saul Paul an Apostle of Jesus Christ Saul a Persecutor mad against the Christians and that both these estates may be contained in the Text although penn'd by Paul regenerated may appear in that the Pronoun 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I signifying the whole compleat person of Paul restrains not the speech to his present being only but considers also what he had been more especially set down at the 13. verse Who was before a blasphemer c. So then Paul in his Saul-ship being ablasphemer a persecuter and injurious and in sum a most violent perverse malicious unbeliever was a chief sinner rankt in the front of the Devils army and this needs no further proof or illustration Yet seeing that that age of the world had brought forth many other of the same strain of violent unbelief nothing inferiour to Saul as may appear by those many that were guilty of Christs death as Saul in person was not and those that so madly stoned St. Stephen whilst Saul only kept the witnesses clothes and as the Text speaks was consenting unto his death seeing I say that others of that age equalled if not exceeded Sauls guilt how can he be said above all other sinners to be the chief I think we shall not wrest or enlarge the Text beside or beyond the meaning of the Holy Ghost or Apostle if in answer unto this we say that here is intended not so much the greatness of his sins above all sinners in the world but the greatness of the miracle in converting so great a sinner into so great a Saint and Apostle So that the words shall run Of all sinners that Christ came into the world to save and then prefer to such an eminence I am the chief or as the word primarily signifies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I am the first i. e. Paul was the chief of all converts and Paul was the first that from so great a persecuter of Christ was changed into so great so glorious an Apostle For so it follows in the verses next after my Text For this cause I obtained mercy that in me first Christ Jesus might shew forth all long suffering c. The issue of all is this that Saul unconverted was a very great sinner yet not the greatest of sinners absolutely but for ought we read in the New Testament the greatest and first that was called from such a degree of infidelity a blasphemer a persecuter to so high a pitch of salvation a Saint an Apostle yea and greater then an Apostle whence the observation is that though Saul were yet every blasphemous sinner cannot
been so long frozen in sin and petrified even into Adamant Beloved as a man may come to such an estate of grace here that he may be most sure he shall not fall as St. Paul in likelihood was when he resolved that nothing could separate him So may a man be engaged so far in sin that there is no rescuing from the Devil There is an irreversible estate in evil as well as good and perhaps I may have arrived to that before my hour of death for I believe Pharaoh was come to it Exod. ix 34. after the seventh Plague hardning his heart and then I say it is possible that thou that hitherto hast gone on in habituate stupid customary rebellions mayest be now at this minute arrived to this pitch That if thou run on one pace farther thou art engaged for ever past recovery And therefore at this minute in the strength of your age and lusts this speech may be as seasonable as if death were seizing on you Why will you die At what time soever thou repentest God will have mercy but this may be the last instant wherein thou canst repent the next sin may benumb or fear thy heart that even the pangs of death shall come on thee insensibly that the rest of thy life shall be a sleep or lethargy and thou lie stupid in it till thou findest thy self awake in flames Oh if thou shouldst pass away in such a sleep Again I cannot tell you whether a death-bed repentance shall save you or no. The Spouse sought Christ on her bed but found him not Cant. iii. 1. The last of Ecclesiastes would make a man suspect that remembring God when our feeble impotent age comes on us would stand us in little stead Read it for it is a most learned powerful Chapter This I am sure of God hath chosen to himself a people Zealous of good works Tit. ii 14. And they that find not some of this holy fire alive within them till their Souls are going out have little cause to think themselves of God's election So that perhaps there is something in it that Matth. iii. 8. the Exhortation bring forth fruits worthy of repentance is exprest by a tense that ordinarily signifies time past 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 have brought forth fruits It will not be enough upon an exigence when there is no way but one with me to be inclinable to any good works to resolve to live well when I expect to die I must have done this and more too in my life if I expect any true comfort at my death There is not any point we err more familiarly in and easily than our spiritual condition what is likely to become of us after death Any slight phansie that Christ died for us in particular we take for a Faith that will be sure to save us Now there is no way to preserve our selves from this Error but to measure our Faith and Hopes by our Obedience that if we sincerely obey God then are we true believers And this cannot well be done by any that begins not till he is on his death-bed be his inclinations to good then never so strong his faith in Christ never so lusty yet how knows he whether it is only fear of death and a conviction that in spight of his teeth he must now sin no longer that hath wrought these inclinations produced this faith in him Many a sick man resolves strongly to take the Physicians dose in hope that it will cure him yet when he comes to taste its bitterness will rather die than take it If he that on his death-bed hath made his solemnest severest Vows should but recover to a possibility of enjoying those delights which now have given him over I much fear his fiercest resolutions would be soon out-dated Such inclinations that either hover in the Brain only or float on the Surface of the Heart are but like those wavering temporary thoughts Jam. i. 6. Like a wave of the Sea driven by the wind and tost they have no firmness or stable consistence in the Soul it will be hard to build Heaven on so slight a foundation All this I have said not to discourage any tender languishing Soul but by representing the horrors of death to you now in health to instruct you in the doctrine of Mortality betimes so to speed and hasten your Repentance Now as if to morrow would be too late as if there were but a small Isthmus or inch of ground between your present mirth and jollity and your everlasting earnest To gather up all on the Clue Christ is now offered to you as a Jesus The times and sins of your Heathenism and unbelief God winketh at Acts xvii 30. The Spirit proclaims all this by the Word to your hearts and now God knows if ever again commands all men every where to repent Oh that there were such a Spirit in our hearts such a zeal to our eternal bliss and indignation at Hell that we would give one heave and spring before we die that we would but answer those invitations of mercy those desires of God that we should live with an inclination with a breath with a sigh toward Heaven Briefly if there be any strong violent boisterous Devil within us that keeps possession of our hearts against God if the lower sensual part of our Soul if an habit of sin i. e. a combination or legion of Devils will not be over-topped by reason or grace in our hearts if a major part of our carnal faculties be still canvasing for Hell if for all our endeavors and pains it may appear to us that this kind of evil spirit will not be cast out save only by Fasting and Prayer Then have we yet that remedy left First To fast and pine and keep him weak within by denying him all foreign fresh Provision all new occasions of sin and the like and so to block and in time starve him up And then secondly To pray that God will second and fortifie our endeavours that he will force and rend and ravish this carnal Devil out of us that he will subdue our wills to his will that he will prepare and make ready life for us and us for life that he will prevent us by his grace here and accomplish us with his glory hereafter Now to him c. The VII Sermon JER v. 2. Though they say the Lord liveth surely they swear falsly NOt to waste any time or breath or which men in this delicate and effeminate Age are wont to be most sparing and thrifty of any part of your precious patience unprofitably but briefly to give you a guess whither our discourse is like to lead you We will severally lay down and sort to your view every word of the Text single and so we may gather them up again and apply them to their natural proper purposes First then the particle Though in the front and surely in the body of the Text are but bands
and junctures to keep all together into one proposition Secondly the Pronoun They in each place is in the letter the Jews in application present Christians and being indefinite might seem to be of the same extent in both places did not the matter alter it and make it universal in the former and particular in the latter For Artists say that an indefinite sign where the matter is necessary is equivalent to an Universal where but contingent to a particular Now to say the Lord liveth was and is necessary though not by any Logical yet by a Political necessity the Government and humane Laws under which then the Jews and now we Christians live require this profession necessarily at our hands But to swear falsly not to perform what before they profest is materia contingens a matter of no necessity but free will and choice that no humane Law can see into and therefore we must not interpret by the rules of Art or Charity that all were perjur'd but some only though 't is probable a major part and as we may guess by the first verse of this Chapter well nigh all of them Thirdly to say is openly to make profession and that very resolutely and boldly that none may dare to distrust it nay with an Oath to confirm it to jealous opinions as appears by the latter words They swear falsly while they do but say and Jer. 14. 2. Thou shalt swear The Lord liveth c. Fourthly the Lord i. e. both in Christianity and Orthodox Judaism the whole Trinity Fifthly Liveth i. e. by way of Excellency hath a life of his own independent and eternal and in respect of us is the Fountain of all Life and Being that we have and not only of Life but Motion and Perfection and Happiness and Salvation and all that belongs to it In brief to say The Lord liveth is to acknowledg him in his Essence and all his Attributes conteined together under that one Principle on that of life to believe whatever Moses and the Prophets then or now our Christian Faith hath made known to us of him Sixthly to falsifie and swerve from Truth becomes a farther aggravation especially in the present instance though they make mention of that God who is Yea and Amen and loves a plain veracious speech yet they swear though by loud and dreadful imprecations they bespeak him a Witness and a Judge unto the Criminal pray as devoutly for destruction for their Sin as the most sober Penitent can do for its Pardon yet are they perjur'd they swear falsly More than all this they openly renounce the Deity when they call upon him their hearts go not along with their words and professions though it be the surest truth in the World that they swear when they assert that the Lord liveth yet they are perjur'd in speaking of it though they make a fair shew of believing in the brain and from the teeth outward they never lay the truth that they are so violent for at all to their hearts or as the Original hath it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in vanum to no purpose 't is that they swear no man that sees how they live will give any heed to their words will imagine that they believe any such matter So now having paced over and as it were spell'd every word single there will be no difficulty for the rawest understanding to put it together and read it currently enough in this proposition Amongst the multitude of Professors of Christianity there is very little real piety very little true belief In the verse next before my Text there is an O Yes made a Proclamation nay a Hew and Cry and a hurrying about the streets if it were possible to find out but a man that were a sincere Believer and here in my Text is brought in a Non est inventus Though they say the Lord liveth a multitude of Professors indeed every where yet surely they swear falsly there is no credit to be given to their words infidelity and hypocrisie is in their hearts for all their fair believing professions they had an unfaithful rebellious heart V. 23. and the event manifested it they are departed and gone arrant Apostates in their lives by which they were to be tryed Neither say they in their hearts Let us fear the Lord V. 24. whatsoever they flourished with their tongues Now for a more distinct survey of this horrible wretched Truth this Heathenism of Christians and Infidelity of Believers the true ground of all false swearing and indeed of every other sin we will first examine wherein it consists secondly whence it springs The first will give you a view of its nature the second its root and growth that you may prevent it The first will serve for an ocular or Mathematical demonstration called by Artists 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that it is so the second a rational or Physical 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 how it comes about The first to convince of the truth of it the second to instruct you in its causes And first of the first wherein this Infidelity and to speak more plainly Perjury of formal Believers consists Though they say c. Since that rather phancy than Divinity of the Romanists Schoolmen and Casuists generally defining Faith to be a bare assent to the truth of God Word seated only in the understanding was by the Protestant Divines banished out of the Schools as a faith for a Chamaelion to be nourished with which can feed on air as a direct piece of Sorcery and Conjuring which will help you to remove Mountains only by thinking you are able briefly as a Chimaera or phantastical nothing fit to be sent to Limbo for a present Since I say this Magical Divinity which still possesses the Romanist and also a sort of men who would be thought most distant from them hath been exercised and silenced and cast out of our Schools would I could say out of our hearts by the Reformation the nature of Faith hath been most admirably explained yet the seat or subject of it never clearly set down some confining it to the Understanding others to the Will till at last it pitched upon the whole Soul the intellective nature For the Soul of Man should it be partitioned into faculties as the grounds of our ordinary Philosophy would perswade us it would not be stately enough for so royal a guest either room would be too pent and narrow to entertain at once so many graces as attend it Faith therefore that it may be received in state that it may have more freedom to exercise its Soveraignty hath required all partitions to be taken down that sitting in the whole Soul it may command and order the whole Man is not in the brain sometimes as its gallery to recreate and contemplate at another in the heart as its parlour to feed or a closet to dispatch business but if it be truly that royal Personage which we take it for
have no design upon Books but only to rid them of some hours which would otherwise lie on their hands The most studious of our Gentry ordinarily deal in them as inoffensive tame peaceable studies which will never check them for any the most inordinate affections But of Morality saith he and practical knowledge a young man or intemperate is uncapable You may make him con the precepts without Book or say them by roat 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He cannot be said to believe a word of them his heart is so possest with green fresh boisterous lusts that he cannot admit any sober precepts any farther than his memory If you are in earnest with him to apply and practise what he reads you exact of him beyond his years he is not solemn enough for so sad severe employment and therefore it is concluded that he is fit for any intellectual vertue rather than prudence This consists in a peaceable temper of the mind an Artist he may prove and never live the better suppose him one of youthful luxuriant desires and never think he will be taught to live by rule All the learning and study in Books will never give him Aristotles Moral prudence much less our spiritual which is by interpretation Faith And this is the second ground of Infidelity amongst Christians the competibility of knowledg and incompatibility of true Faith with carnal desires The third is The easiness of giving assent to generalities and difficulty of particular Application A common truth delivered in general terms is received without any opposition Should it be proposed whether nothing be to be done but that which is just whether drunkenness were not a vice whether only an out-side of Religion would ever save a man No man would ever quarrel about it When thus Nathan and David discoursed they were both of one mind the one could talk no more against unconscionable dealing than the other would assent to If you propose no other Problems than these the debauchedst man under Heaven would not dispute against you But all quarrelling saith the Stoick is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 About the Application of general granted Rules to personal private cases The Jews and Assyrians and Egyptians and Romans are all agreed that holiness is to be preferred above all things but whether it be not impious to eat swines flesh and the like which of them observes the rules of holiness most exactly there the strife begins Common general declamations against sin are seldom ever offensive and therefore the Master of Rhetoricks finds fault with them as dull liveless unprofitable Eloquence that no man is affected with The cowardliest Bird in the Air is not afraid of the Faulcon as long as she sees him soaring and never stoop But when the Ax that was carried about the Wood threatning all indifferently shall be laid to the Root of the Tree When Nathan shall rejoynder with a Thou art the man and S. Paul come home to his Corinthians after his declamation against Fornicators and Idolaters with And such were some of you 1 Cor. vi 11. then their hearts come to the touchstone This is a tryal of their belief If they will forsake their sins which before their judgment condemned at a distance If they will practise the holiness and integrity which they were content to hear commended That famous War of the Trojans and Iliads of Misery following it in Homer were all from this ground The two great Captains at the Treaty agree very friendly that just dealing was very strictly to be observed by all men and yet neither would one of them restore the Pawn committed to his trust nor the other divide the spoils Each as resolute not to practise as both before unanimous to approve There is not a thing more difficult in the World than to perswade a carnal man that that which concerns all men should have any thing to do with him that those promises of Christ which are confest to be the most precious under Heaven should be fitter for his turn than this amiable lovely sin that now sollicites him That Scripture is inspired by God and therefore in all its dictates to be believed obeyed is a thing fully consented on amongst Christians We are so resolved on it that it is counted but a dull barren question in the Schools a man can invent nothing to say against by way of argument if a Preacher in a Sermon should make it his business to prove it to you you would think he either suspected you for Turks or had little else to say But when a particular truth of Scripture comes in ballance with a pleasing sin when the general prohibition strikes at my private lust all my former assent to Scripture is vanished I am hurried into the embraces of my beloved delight Thus when Paul reasoned of temperance righteousness and judgment to come Felix trembled Acts xxiv 25. His trembling shews that he assented to Paul's discourse and as in the Devils Jam. ii 29. it was an effect of a general belief But this subject of temperance and judgment to come agreed not with Felix his course of life His wife Drusida was held by usurpation he had tolled her away from her husband the King of the Emiseni saith Josephus and therefore he could hear no more of it He shifts and complements it off till another time and never means to come in such danger again to be converted for fear of a divorce from his two treasures his Heathenism and his Whore Thus was Agrippa converted from the shoulders upward which he calls Almost a Christian or as the phrase may be rendred 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a little way Acts xxvi 28. convinced to the general truths in his brain but the lower half his heart and affections remained as Heathenish as ever And this is the third ground of practical unbelief that generalities can be cheaply believed without parting from any thing we prize The Doctrine of the Trinity can be received and thwart never a carnal affection as being an inoffensive truth Christs sufferings and satisfaction for sin by the natural man may be heard with joy but particular application is very difficult That our obedience to every command of that Trinity must be sincere that we must forgo all and hate our own flesh to adhere to so merciful a Saviour and express our love to the most contemptible Soul under Heaven as he hath loved us that we must at last expect him in majesty as a Judge whom we are content to hug and embrace in his humility as a Saviour This is a bloody word as Moses his wife counted the Circumcision too harsh and rough to be received into such pampered tender fleshy hearts The fourth ground is a general humour that is gotten in the World To take care of nothing but our reputations Nor God nor life nor soul nor any thing can weigh with it in the ballance Now it is a scandalous
thing a foul blot to ones name to be counted an Atheist an arrant Infidel where all are Christians and therefore for fashions sake we will believe and yet sometime the Devil hath turned this humor quite the contrary way and made some men as ambitious of being counted Atheists as others of being Christians It will shortly grow into a gentile garb and part of courtship to disclaim all Religion in shew as well as deeds Thus are a world of men in the World either profest Atheists or Atheistical Professors upon the same grounds of vain-glory the one to get the other to save their reputation in the World Thus do many men stand up at the Creed upon the same terms as Gallants go into the field that have but small maw to be killed only to keep their honor that they might not be branded and mocked for cowards And yet certainly in the truth these are the veriest daftards under Heaven no worldly man so fearful of death or pious man of hell as these are of disgrace The last ground I shall mention and indeed the main of all is The subtlety and wiliness of the Devil He hath tried all his stratagems in the World and hath found none like this for the undermining and ruining of Souls to suffer them to advance a pretty way in Religion to get their heads full of knowledg that so they may think they have faith enough and walk to hell securely The Devil 's first policies were by Heresies to corrupt the Brain to invade surprize Christianity by force but he soon saw this would not hold out long he was fain to come from batteries to mines and supplant those Forts that he could not vanquish The Fathers and amongst them chiefly Leo in all his writing within the first Five hundred years after Christ observe him at this ward Ut quos vincere ferro flammisque non poterat cupiditatibus irretiret sub falsâ Christiani nominis professione corrumperet He hoped to get more by lusts than heresies and to plunge men deepest in an high conceit of their holy Faith He had learned by experience from himself that all the bare knowledg in the World would never sanctifie it would perhaps give men content and make them confident and bold of their estate and by presuming on such grounds and prescribing merit to Heaven by their Lord Lord even seal them up to the day of damnation and therefore it is ordinary with Satan to give men the teather a great way left they should grumble at his tyranny and prove Apostates from him upon hard usage Knowledg is pleasant and books are very good Company and therefore if the Devil should bind men to ignorance our Speculators and Brain-Epicures would never be his Disciples they would go away sadly as the young man from Christ who was well affected with his service but could not part with his riches Mat. xix 22. So then you shall have his leave to know and believe in God as much as you please so you will not obey him and be as great Scholars as Satan himself so you will be as prophane The heart of Man is the Devils Palace where he keeps his state and as long as he can strengthen himself there by a guard and band of lusts he can be content to afford the out-works to God divine speculation and never be disturbed or affrighted by any enemy at such a distance Thus have you the grounds also whereupon true Faith which is best defined a spiritual prudence an application of spiritual knowledg to holy practice should be so often wanting in men which are very knowing and the fairest Professors of Christianity Now lest this discourse also should reach no further than your ears lest that which hath been said should be only assented to in the general as true not applied home to your particular practises and so do you no more good than these general professions did here to the Jews only to prove you perjur'd Hypocrites swearing falsly whilst you say the Lord liveth we will endeavour to leave some impression upon your hearts by closing all with Application And that shall be in brief meekly to desire you and if that will not serve the turn by all the mercies of Heaven and horrours of Hell to adjure you to examine your selves on these two interrogatories which my Text will suggest to you First Whether you are as good as the Jews here Secondly Whether you are not the best of you altogether as bad For the first the Jews here said the Lord liveth were very forward to profess 't were some though but a low measure of commendation for us to be no worse than Jews Let there go a severe inquisition out from the Royal Majesty over the whole Court or at least from every particular man upon himself and bring in an impartial verdict whether there be not some amongst you that are not come thus far as to say The Lord liveth Some are so engaged in a trade of mishapen horrid monstrous Vices have so framed and fashioned the whole fabrick of their lives without any blush or lineament of God in them that they are afraid ever to mention him in earnest for fear of putting them out of their course they dare not believe too much of God lest it should be their undoing a little sense of him would take off many of their tricks of sinning and consequently spoil their thriving in the world like Diana's Silver smith Act. xix 24. for by this craft they have their wealth The least glimpse of God in these mens hearts nay one solemn mention of him in their mouths were enough to bring them into some compass to upbraid their ways reprove their thoughts Were these men taken to task according to the Canon Laws of our Kingdom and not suffered to live any longer amongst Christians till they understood clearly the promise of their Baptism till they durst come and make the same Vow in their own persons before all the Congregation which in their infancy their Sureties made for them were our Canon of Confirmation duly put in execution and every one as soon as he were capable either perswaded or forced to fit himself for the receiving of it as it is severely required by our Rubrick though much neglected in the practice I doubt not but there would be fewer sins amongst us much more knowledg of God and mentioning of his Name without the help of Oaths Blasphemies to which God now is in a kind beholding that ever he comes into our mouths But now men having a great way to go in sin and nothing in the world to stop them begin their journey as soon as they are able to go and make such haste like the Sun or Gyant in the Psalmist to run their course are so intent upon the task the Devil hath set them that they can never stay to see or hear of God in their lives which yet is legible and
bestir your selves like Christians I shall never envy your learning the Pharisees were great scholars well seen in the Prophets and 't is much to be suspected could not choose but find Christ there and acknowledge him by his Miracles they saw him plain enough and yet not a man would believe on him My second part The greatest scholars are not always the best Christians 'T is observable in the temper of men that the cowardly are most inquisitive their fears and jealousies make them very careful to foresee any danger and yet for the most part they have not spirit enough to encounter and they are so stupid and sluggish that they will not get out of its way when they have foreseen it the same baseness and timerousness makes them a sort of men most diligent to at a distance avoid and near hand most negligent to prevent Thus in iiii Dan. 5. Nebuchadnezzar dreams and is affrighted and a proclamation is made for all the Wisdom of the World to come in and consult and sit upon it and give their verdict for the interpretation of the dream and when he had at last got the knowledge of it by Daniel that his fears were not in vain that the greatest judgement that ever was heard of was within a twelve moneth to fall on him then as though he had been a beast before his time without all understanding he goes and crowns himself for his slaughter Just when according to the Prophecy he was to suffer then was he walking in his pride whilest he was ignorant he was sensible of his danger and now he sees it before his eyes he is most prodigiously blind At the end of twelve moneths when his ruine was at hand ver 29. he walked in the Palace of the Kingdom of Babylon and the King spake and said Is not this great Babylon that I have built c. In brief he that was most earnest to understand the dream is most negligent of the event of it and makes no other use of his knowledge of God's Will but only more knowingly and wilfully to contemn it And this generally is the state of corrupt nature to keep a distance and a bay betwixt our knowlege and our wills and when a truth hath fully conquer'd and got possession of our understanding then to begin to fortifie most strongly that the other castle of the soul the affections may yet remain impregnable Thus will the Devil be content to have the outworks and the watch-tower taken so he may be sure to keep his treasure within from danger and will give us leave to be as great scholars as himself so we will continue as prophane And so we are like enough to do for all our knowledge for wisdom saith Aristotle is terminated in it self 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it neither looks after nor produces any practical good saith Andronicus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nay there is no dependence betwixt knowing and doing as he that hath read and studied the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may perhaps be never the better wrastler nor the skilfullest Physician the more healthy experience and tryal must perfect the one and a good temperature constitute the other A young man may be a good Naturalist a good Geometer nay a wise man because he may understand 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 wonders depths nay Divine matters but hee 'l never be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 prudent or actually vertuous i. e. a good Moralist 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 moral precepts they cannot be said to believe they have not entred so far they float only in their memories they have them by heart they say them over by rote as children do their Catechism or Plato's scholars saith Plutarch his depths of Philosophy they now recite them only and shall then understand them when they come of age when they are stayed enough to look into the meaning of them and make use of them in their practice The Mathematicks saith Aristotle have nothing to do with the end or chief good that men look after never any man brought good or bad better or worse into a demonstration there 's no consultation or election there only plain downright diagrams necessary convictions of the understanding And therefore for these meer speculations which hover only in the brain the youngest wit is nimblest for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sharpness of apprehension is a sprightfulness of the mind and is there liveliest where there be most spirits but prudence and active vertue requires an habituate temper of passions a stayedness of the mind and long tryal and experience of its own strength a constancy to continue in vertue in spight of all forreign allurements or inward distempers And the ground of all this is that those things that most incumber the Will and keep us from practice do nothing clog or stop the understanding sensuality or pleasure hinders us not from knowing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. that a Triangle hath three angles equal to two right ones and the like Nay the most insolent tyrannizing passions which domineer over us which keep us in awe and never suffer us to stir or move or walk or do any thing that is good will yet give us leave to understand as much as we would wish they have only fettered our hands and feet have not blinded our eyes as one shut up in the Tower from the conversation of men may be yet the greatest proficient in speculation The affections being more gross and corporeous from thence called the heels of the soul and so easily chained and fettered but the understanding most pure and spiritual and therefore uncapable of shackles nay is many times most free and active when the will is most dead and sluggish And this may be the natural reason that even Aristotle may teach us why the greatest scholars are not alwayes the best Christians the Pharisees well read in the Prophets yet backwardest to believe because faith which constitutes a Christian is a spiritual prudence as 't is best defined and therefore is not appropriate to the understanding but if they be several faculties is rather seated in the Will the objects of Faith being not meerly speculative but always apprehended and assented to sub ratione boni as being the most unvaluable blessings which ever we desired of the Lord or can require The speculative part of divine wisdom may make us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 intelligent spirits nay possibly do it in the worst notion render us devils Real practical knowledge only prudence will make Angels ministring spirits unto God teach us to live and be better then we did So then in the first place learning doth neither make nor suppose men Christians Nay 2 ly it doth per accidens many times hinder put a rub in our way and keep us from being Christians Philoponus and Synesius Miracles of learning were therefore hardest to be converted they were so possest and engaged in Peripatetical Philosophy that however
important documents of the Text our righteousness and faith may exceed that of the Pharisees Mat. v. 20. our preaching and walking may be like that of Christs in power and as having authority and not as the Scribes Mat. vii 29. and we not content with a floating knowledge in the brain do press and sink it down into our inferiour faculties our senses and affections till it arise in a full harvest of fruitful diligently working faith It was Zenophanes his phansie 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that God was all eyes and all ears but breathed not there was no use of that in him and so is it with us who are always exercising our knowledge powers to see and hear what e're is possible but for any breath of life in us any motion of the spirit we have no use of it it is not worth valuing or taking notice of nothing so vulgar and contemptible in them that have it nothing of which we examine our selves so slightly of which we are so easily mistaken so willingly deceived and nothing that we will be content to have so small a measure of A little of it soon tires us out 't is too thin aery diet for us to live upon we cannot hold out long on it like the Israelites soon satiated with their bread from Heaven nothing comparable to their old food that Nilus yielded them Numb xi 5. We remember the fish that we did eat in Egypt but now our soul is dryed away there is nothing but this Manna before our eyes as if that were not worth the gathering Pythagoras could say that if any one were to be chosen to pray for the people to be made a Priest he must be a vertuous man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Iamblicus because the Gods would take more heed to his words and again that many things might be permitted the people which should be interdicted Preachers It was the confirmation of his precepts by his life and practice 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that made Italy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all the Country his School and all that ever heard him his Disciples Nothing will give such authority to our doctrine or set such a value on our calling as a religious conversation He that takes such a journey as that into Holy Orders must go on 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to his 15. Symbolum must not return to his former sins as well as trade saith lamblicus the falling into one of our youthful vices is truly a disordering of our selves and a kind of plucking our hands from the plow A Physician saith Hippocrates must have colour and be in flesh 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of a good promising healthy complexion and then men will guess him a man of skill otherwise the patient will bid the Physician heal himself and having by his ill look a prejudice against his Physick his phansie will much hinder its working You need no application He again will tell you that the profession suffers not so much by any thing as by rash censures and unworthy professors In brief our very knowledge will be set at nought and our gifts scoffed at if our lives do not demonstrate that we are Christians as well as Scholars No man will be much more godly for hearing Seneca talk of providence nor be affected with bare words unless he see them armed and backt with power of him that utters them Consider but this one thing and withal that my doctrine is become a proverb and he is a proud man that can first draw it upon a Scholar his learning and his clergy make him never the more religious O let our whole care and carriage and the dearest of our endeavours strive and prevail to cross the proverb and stop the mouth of the rashest declamer That Comedy of Aristophanes took best which was all spent in laughing at Socrates and in him involved and abused the whole condition of learning though through Alcibiades his faction it miscarried and mist its applause once or twice yet when men were left to their humour 't was admired and cried up extremely Learning hath still some honourable favourers which keep others in awe with their countenance but otherwise nothing more agreeable to the people then Comedies or Satyrs or Sarcasms dealt out against the Universities let us be sure that we act no parts in them our selves nor perform them before they are acted Let us endeavour that theirs may be only pronunciations a story of our faults as presented in a scene but never truly grounded in any of our actions One wo we are secure and safe from Wo be to you when all men shall speak well of you we have many good friends that will not â—et this curse light on us O let us deliver our selves from that catalogue of woes which were all denounced against the Pharisees for many vices all contained in this accomplisht piece Ye say but do not Mat. xxiii 4. And seeing all our intellectual excellencies cannot allure or bribe or wooe Gods spirit to overshadow us and conceive Christ and bring forth true and saving faith in us let all the rest of our studies be ordered in a new course let us change both our method and our Tutor and having hitherto learnt God from our selves let us be better advised and learn our selves from God Let us all study all learning from the spring or fountain and make him our instructer who is the only Author worth our understanding and admit of no interpreter on him but himself The knowledge of God shall be our vision in heaven O let it be our speculation on earth Let it fill every conceit or phansie that we at any time adventure on It is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the last work in which all the promises all our possible designs are accomplished O let us in part anticipate that final revelation of him lest so sudden and so full a brightness of glory be too excellent for the eyes of a Saint and labour to comprehend here where the whole comfort of our life is what we shall then possess And if all the stretches and cracking and torturing of our souls will prevail the dissolving of all our spirits nay the sighing out of our last breath will do any thing let us joyn all this even that God hath given us in this last real service to our selves and expire whilst we are about it in praying and beseeching and importuning and offering violence to that blessed spirit that he will fully enlighten and enflame us here with zeal as well as knowledge that he will fill us with his grace here and accomplish us with his glory hereafter Now to him that hath elected us hath created us and redeemed us c. The XI Sermon Matth. X. 15. It shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment then for that City THE whole new Covenant consists of these two words Christ and Faith Christ
want and necessity put them upon and now they have got their ends all those are soon out-dated they have faith and so are justified and sure of their estate and so now they may sin securely there is no condemnation to them they are in Christ and all the sins nay all the devils in the world shall never separate them And this is a sanctified religious piece of infidelity in men which think they have made sure of the main and so never think of the Consectaries they have faith and so T' is no matter for good works the lease is sealed the wedding solemniz'd and then never dream or care for Covenants And these mens fate is like to be the same spiritually which we read of Samson's bodily strength he vowed the vow of a Nazarite and as long as he kept unshaven no opposition could prevail against him but as soon as he broke his vow when he had let his Mistress cut his locks his strength departed from him All the promises and priviledges of our being in Christ are upon condition of our obedience and our vow being broken the Devil and the Philistins within us will soon deprive us of our eyes and life Whatsoever livelihood we presume we have in Christ we are deceived we are still dead in trespasses and sins Thus do you see the three degrees of infidelity frequent amongst Christians 1. a not taking him at all 2. a mistaking of his person 3. a breaking off the Covenants now that you may abhor and fly from and get out of each of them by a lively faith my next particular shall warn you the greatness of this sin and that first positively in its self it shall be very tolerable for that City Faith may be conceived in a threefold relation either to men the subjects of it and those sinners or 2. to Christ and his suffering the objects of it with all the effects remission of sins and salvation attending it or 3. to God the Father the Author and Commander of it as the only condition annext to all his promises And consequently infidelity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shall be aggravated by these three depths or degrees each adding to its exceeding sinfulness As Faith respects its subject and that a sinful miserable one engaged and fixt in an unremediable necessity of sinning and suffering for ever so is it the only means upon earth nay in the very counsel of God able to do us any help all the arts and spiritual engins even in Heaven besides this are unprofitable Nay the second Covenant now being seal'd and God for ever having establisht the rule and method of it I say things thus standing God himself cannot be presum'd to have mercy upon any one but who is thus qualified it being the only foundation on which our heaven is built the only ground we have to hope for any thing as is manifest by that place Heb. xi 1. being rightly weighed Now faith is the substance of things hoped for where the Greek phrase 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies the ground or foundation of every of those things which can be the object of a Christians hope So that where no ground-work no building if no faith no hope no possibility of Heaven If the Devil could have but stoln this jewel out of the world he had shut up Heaven gates eternally and had left it as empty of Saints as it is full of glory not capable of any flesh but what Christ's hypostatical union brought thither And this is no more then I conceive the learned mean by necessitas medii that faith is necessary as a means i. e. there is no means besides of power either absolutely or ex hypothesi of it self or on supposition of Gods Covenant to bring us to Heaven Nothing is of force besides in reason to prepare or morally accommodate and God hath not promised to accept in mercy of any thing else For whereas the promises are sometimes made to repentance sometimes to obedience as whosoever repenteth shall be saved and the like you are to know that it is on this ground of the necessary union of these graces that where one of them is truly and sincerely there the rest are always in some degree there being no example of penitence or obedience in any subject which had not faith also For he that comes to God must believe that he is c. Heb. xi 6. And he that heartily believes he is and is a rewarder of them that seek him will not fail to search pursue and follow after him So that though the promises are made promiscuously to any one which hath either of these graces yet 't is upon supposal of the rest if it be made of faith 't is in confidence that faith works by love Gal. v. 6. and as St. James enforces it is made perfect by works James ii 22. So that in the first place infidelity is sufficiently aggravated in respect of the subject it being a Catholick destroyer an intervenient that despoils him of all means all hope all possibility of salvation finding him in the state of damnation it sets him going suffers him not to lay hold on any thing that may stay him in his precipice and in the midst of his shipwrack when there be planks and refuges enough about him hath numm'd his hands depriv'd him of any power of taking hold of them In the second place in respect of Christ and his sufferings the objects of our Faith so Faith is in a manner the Soul of them giving them life and efficacy making things which are excellent in themselves prove so in effect to others Thus the whole splendor and beauty of the world the most accurate proportions and images of nature are beholding to the Eye though not for their absolute excellency yet for both the account and use that is made of them for if all men were blind the proudest workmanship of nature would not be worth the valuing Thus is a learned piece cast away upon the ignorant and the understanding of the auditor is the best commendation of a speech or Sermon In like manner those infinite unvaluable sufferings of Christ if they be not believed in are but as Aristotle saith of divine knowledge a most honourable thing but of no manner of use if they be not apprehended they are lost Christ ' s blood if not caught up in our hearts by Faith but suffered to be poured out upon the earth will prove no better then that of Abel's Gen. iv 10. crying for judgment from the ground that which is spilt is clamorous and its voice is toward Heaven for vengeance only that which is gathered up as it falls from his side by faith will prove a medicine to heal the Nations So that infidelity makes the death of Christ no more then the death of an ordinary man in which there is no remedy Wisd ii 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 there is no cure no physick in
our souls as an harbinger to prepare a place within us for the worm in Hell where it may lye and bite and gnaw at ease eternally 'T is an Examination that will deserve the most precious minute of our lives the solemnest work of our souls the carefullest muster of our faculties to shrift and winnow and even set our hearts upon the rack to see whether any fruit or seed of infidelity lurk in it and in a matter of this danger to prevent Gods inquest by our own to display every thing to our selves just as it shall be laid open before God in judgment 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Heb. iv 13. naked and discernible as the entrals of a Creature cut down the back where the very method of nature in its secrecies is betrayed to the eye I say to cut our selves up and to search into every crany of our souls every winding of either our understanding or affections and observe whether any infidel thought any infidel lust be lodged there and when we have found this execrable thing which hath brought all our plagues on us then must we purge and cleanse and lustrate the whole City for its sake and with more Ceremony then ever the heathen used even with a superstition of daily hourly prayers and sacrificing our selves to God strive and struggle and offer violence to remove this unclean thing out of our Coasts use these unbelieving hearts of ours as Josiah did the Altars of Ahaz 2 King xxiii 12. break them down beat them to powder and cast the dust of them into the brook Kidron that Cedron which Christ passed over when he went to suffer Joh. xviii 1. even that brook which Christ drank of by the way Psal cx 7. And there indeed is there a remedy for infidelity if the Infidel will throw it in If he will put it off be it never so dyed in the contempt of Christs blood that very blood shall cleanse it and therefore In the next place let us labour for Faith let not his hands be stretched out any longer upon the cross to a faithless and stubborn generation 'T were a piece of ignorance that a Scholar would abhor to be guilty of not to be able to understand that inscription written by Pilate in either of three languages Jesus of Nazareth King Joh. xix 19. Nay for all the Gospels and Comments written on it both by his Disciples and his works still to be non-proficients this would prove an accusation written in Marble nay an Exprobration above a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In a word Christ is still offered and the proclamation not yet outdated his sufferings in the Scripture proposed to every one of you to lay hold on and his Ministers sent as Embassadors beseeching you to be reconciled 2 Cor. v. 20. and more then that in the Sacrament of the Eucharist his body and blood set before our eyes to be felt and gazed on and then even a Didymus would believe nay to be divided amongst us and put in our mouths and then who would be so sluggish as to refuse to feed on him in his heart For your Election from the beginning to this gift of Faith let that never raise any doubt or scruple in you and forslow that coming to him this is a jealousie that hath undone many in a resolvedness that if they are not elected all their faith shall prove unprofitable Christ that bids thee repent believe and come unto him is not so frivolous to command impossibilities nor so cruel to mock our impotence Thou mayest believe because he bids Believe and then thou mayest be sure thou wert predestinated to believe and then all the decrees in the World cannot deny thee Christ if thou art thus resolved to have him If thou wilt not believe thou hast reprobated thy self and who is to be accused that thou art not saved But if thou wilt come in there is sure entertainment for thee He that begins in Gods Councels and never thinks fit to go about any Evangelical duty till he can see his name writ in the book of life must not begin to believe till he be in Heaven for there only is that to be read radio recto The surer course is to follow the Scripture to hope comfortably every one of our selves to use the means apprehend the mercies and then to be confident of the benefits of Christs suffering and this is the way to make our Election sure to read it in our selves radio reflexo by knowing that we believe to resolve that we are elected thereby we know that we are past from death to life if we love the brethren 1 Joh. iii. 14. And so is it also of faith for these are inseparable graces So Psal xxv 14. Prov. iii. 32. Gods secret and his Covenant being taken for his decree is said to be with them that fear him and to be shewed to them i. e. their very fearing of God is an evidence to them that they are his elect with whom he hath entred Covenant Our faith is the best argument or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by which to make a judgment of Gods decree concerning us I say if we will believe God hath elected us 't is impossible any true faith should be refused upon pretence the person was predestined to destruction and if it were possible yet would I hope that Gods decrees were they as absolute as some would have them should sooner be softned into mercy then that mercy purchased by his Son should ever fail to any that believes The bargain was made the Covenant struck and the immutability of the Persian laws are nothing to it that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life Joh. iii. 15. Wherefore in brief let us attend the means and let what will or can come of the End Christ is offered to every soul here present to be a Jesus only do thou accept of him and thou art past from death to life there is no more required of thee but only to take him if thou art truly possessor of him he will justifie he will humble he will sanctifie thee he will work all reformation in thee and in time seal thee up to the day of redemption Only be careful that thou mistakest not his Person thou must receive him as well as his promises thou must take him as a Lord and King as well as a Saviour and be content to be a subject as well as a Saint He is now proclaimed in your ears and you must not foreslow the audience or procrastinate To day if you will hear his Voice harden not your hearts He holds himself out on purpose to you and by the Minister wooes you to embrace him and then it nearly concerns you not to provoke so true so hearty nay even so passionate a friend if he be not kissed he will be very angry Lastly if in this business of believing so vulgarly exposed there yet
it self without any care to direct our studies to the advancement either of Gods glory in other or graces kingdom in our selves For this is the thing no doubt here aimed at and the performance of it as strictly required of us Christians and that not some only of us but as many as the commandment is here given to every man every where So I come to my last particular the extent and latitude of the persons with whom this covenant is made and from whom this condition is exacted All men every where Now the universality of the persons reflects either to the preceding words Commands or to the subsequent the matter of these commands Repentance From the first the point is that Gods Commands were made known by the preaching of the Gospel to all men every where From the 2. that the Repentance here meant is necessary to every man that will be saved For the first it hath been already proved out of Scripture that the vocal articulation of Gods commands the sound and preaching of the Gospel hath gone out into all the World and that not Universis but singulis directed and promulged at least to every creature Mar. XVI 15. Mar. xvi 15. the whole Gentile world has title to it Now for the spiritual efficacy of this voice 1 Cor. 11. 4. the demonstration of the spirit and of power hath not this also waited on the voice and in some kind or other evidenced it self in the like extensive latitude Yes no doubt for there being two effects of the preaching of the Word either converting or hardening either dissolving the wax or stiffening the clay you shall in every man be sure to meet with one of them For the conversion what a multitude came in at the first noise of it primo manè as soon as ever the Sun of righteousness began to dawn In the ancient Sea-fights they had their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 little light ships 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Zenophon 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 say Thucydides and Polybius which they sent out as spyes in the night or at day break to bring word how the Seas were cleared that so they might dare to make use of the first opportunity to go out with their whole Navy Thus was Job and some few other Gentiles before the Gospel and Cornelius at the dawning of it sent before in a manner ut lembi ante classem to spy and bring word whether the Gentiles might enter and be received and these returning to them like Noahs Dove in Gen. viii 11. Gen. VIII 11. with an olive leaf in her mouth as a token of peace and safety to all that would venture then did the whole Navy and Troop follow then did the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the many the root the common people of the world out of all Nations and conditions some hasten and run and croud for a part in this salvation and the Glory of the Lord was revealed and all flesh saw it together as it is in the phrase of the Prophecy Isa xl 5. or in the words of the Story Isa XL. 5. There were daily added to the Church such as should be saved Look but on the Doctor of the Gentiles as he sits in his chair in Tyrannus his School Acts XIX 10. Acts xix 10. and you shall find that at that one Lecture which indeed was two years long all the lesser Asia heard the Word of the Lord Jesus both Jews and Greeks The 3000 souls which were added to the Church at St. Peters Sermon Acts ii 4. was a sufficient hours work Acts 11. 4. and a thing so admired by the wise men of the Gentiles that they imputed it magicis Petriartibus veneficis carminibus De Civ l. 18. c. 53. saith Austin to some incantations and magical tricks which Peter used And they got the dying oracle to confirm it with some supposâ—â—itious verses to the purpose forged by them that the Christian Religion was raised by Peters witchcraft and by it should last 365 years and then be betrayed and vanish But had these same Gentiles in this humour of malice and prejudice seen a third part of the Roman world all the Proconsular Asia converted by one Pauls disputations they would certainly have resolved that all the sorcery of Hell or Chaldaea could never have yielded such miraculous enchantments And this the Sons of Sceva had experience of Acts xix 14. Acts XIX 14. who with all their exorcisms and the name of Jesus added to them could not yet imitate the Apostles in any one miracle but the devil was too hard for them wounded overcame prevail'd against them Briefly 't was more then the magick either of men or devils which so convinced the artificers of hell that they brought out their Books and burnt them openly Act. XIX 19. which beside the price of their most profitable skill were rated at 50000 pieces of silver which is computed to be about 6250 l. So mightily grew the word of God and prevailed and the first effect of it conversion was miraculously manifest though not on all yet on many of all people every where Now for the other effect of it the hardning of obdurate Atheists Act. XIX 9. look on xix Acts. 9. where it is plain that for all Pauls Logick and Rhetorick disputing and perswading for the space of three moneths many were hardned and believed not They had within them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Theodoret calls it a heart that would reverberate either precept or instruction and make it rebound against the hand that sent it Philip. l. 1. de Anima 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Philoponus phrases it in his 1. l. de animâ their spirits fatned and incrassated within them stal'd up and fed to such a brawniness that neither the understanding nor the affections were capable of any impression and so their condition proved like that of the Anvil which by many strokes is somewhat smoothed but no whit softned all they got by one days preaching was to enable them the better to resist the second Every Sermon of a Paul or Peter was but an alarum to set them on their guard of defence to warn them to cast up some more trenches and bulwarks to fortifie themselves stronger against any possible invasion of Gods spirit according to that of the Aegyptian Hermes P. 5. speaking 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is in a Christian phrase the power of the Scripture they have saith he this property in them that when they meet with evil men 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they do more sharpen and egg them on to evil Thus was the preaching of the word to all men every where attended with some effects or other according to the materials it met with never returned unprofitably but either was the power of God to salvation unto all that believed or the witness of God to condemnation to those which were hardned Now if this
was utterly departed and therefore this thin measure of knowledge or judgment betwixt good and evil that was left them which my awe to Gods sincere love of his creature makes me hope and trust he bestowed on them for some other end then only to increase their condemnation to stand them in some stead in their lives to restrain and keep them in from being extreamly sinful This I say they horribly rejected and stopt their ears against that charmer in their own bosoms and would not hear that soft voice which God had still placed within them to upbraid their wayes and reprove their thoughts What a provocation this was of Gods justice what an incentive of his wrath may appear by that terrible promulgation of the Ten Commandments at Mount Sinai They despised the law in their hearts where God and nature whisper'd it in calmly insensibly and softly and therefore now it shall be thunder'd in their ears in words and those boisterous ones at which the whole mount quaked greatly Exod. xix 18. And in the 16. verse it must be usher'd with variety of dismal meteors upon the Mount and the voice of a trumpet exceeding loud so that all the people that was in the Camp trembled Thus upon their contempt and peevishness was this manuscript put in print this Privy Seal turned into a Proclamation and that a dreadful one bound and subscribed with a Cursed is he that continues not in every title of it to perform it Mean while the matter is not altered but only the dispensation of it That which till then had taught men in their hearts and had been explain'd from tradition from Father to Son Adam instructing Seth and Seth Enoch in all righteousness is now put into Tables that they may have eyes to see that would not have hearts to understand that the perverse may be convinced and that he that would not before see himself bound may find and read himself accursed And after all this yet is not the old law within them either cast away or cancel'd by the promulgation of the other for all the book is printed the old copy is kept in archivis though perhaps as it alwayes was neglected soil'd and moth-eaten and he shall be censured either for ambition or curiosity that shall ever be seen to enquire or look after it Still I say throughout all their wayes and arts and methods of rebellions it twing'd and prick't within as Gods judgments attended them without and as often as sword or plague wounded them made them acknowledge the justice of God that thus rewarded their perversness Nay you shall see it sometimes break out against them when perhaps the written law spake too softly for them to be understood Thus did Davids heart smite him when he had numbred the people though there was no direct commandment against mustering or enâ—olment yet his own conscience told him that he had done it either for distrust or for ostentation and that he had sinned against God in trusting and glorying in that arm of flesh or paid not the tribute appointed by God on that occasion To conclude this discourse of the Jews every rebellion and idolatry of theirs was a double breach of a double law the one in tables the other in their heart and could they have been freed from the killing letter of the one the wounding sense of the other would still have kept them bound as may appear in that business of crucifying Christ where no humane law-giver or magistrate went about to deter them from shedding his blood or denying his miracles yet many of their own hearts apprehended and violently buffetted and scourged and tormented them At one time when they are most resolved against him the whole Senate is suddenly pricked and convinced within and express it with a Surely this man doth many miracles John xi 48. At another time at the top and complement of the business Pilate is deterr'd from condemning and though the fear of the people made him valiant yet as if he contemn'd this voice of his conscience against his will with some reluctance he washes his hands when he would have been gladder to quench the fire in his heart which still burnt and vext him Lastly when Judas had betray'd and sold him and no man made huy and cry after him his conscience was his pursuer judge and executioner persecuted him out of the world haunted him would not suffer him to live whom otherwise the law of the Country would have reprived till a natural death had called for him Lastly even we Christians are not likely to clear our selves of this bill 't is much to be feared that if our own hearts are called to witness our Judge will need no farther Indictments 'T was an Heathen speech concerning this rule of our lives and actions that to study it hard to reform and repair all obliquities and defects in it and then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to set it up strong and firm as a pillar in our hearts was the part and office of a Philosopher and then afterwards to make use of it in our whole conversation this was the part of a vertuous man complete and absolute And how then will our contempt be aggravated if Christianity which Clemens calls spiritual Philosophy and is to be reckoned above all moral perfections hath yet wrought neither of these effects in us if we have continued so far from straightning or setting up or making use of this rule that we have not so much as ever enquired or mark't whether there be any such thing left within us or no Theodoret in his second 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is very passionate in the expression of this contempt of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the light of truth shining in our understandings There be a sort of birds saith he that flie or move only in the night called from thence Night-birds and Night-ravens which are afraid of light as either an enemy to spy to assault or betray them but salute and court and make love to darkness as their only Queen and Mistress of their actions 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as a creature sent on purpose to preserve them and these saith he deserve not to be child but pitied for nature at first appointed them this condition of life 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 't is their birth-right and inheritance and therefore no body will be angry with them for living on it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. But for them who were made creatures of light and had it not been for their wilfulness had still continued light in the Lord who are altogether encompast and environed with light light of nature light of reason light of religion nay the most glorious asterism or conjunction of lights in the world the light of the Gospel to walk in for these men meerly out of perversness of wilful hearts to hate and abjure and defie this light to run out of the world almost for fear
our Wills and so to be more horrible Atheists then ever the Heathen had in their Understandings Now that we may the more distinctly discover the Christian Atheist who is very orthodox in his opinion very heretical in his practice we will observe how every part of his life every piece of his conversation doth directly contradict his doctrine and pluck down and deface the very fabrick of godliness expunge those very notions of piety which Reason and Scripture hath erected in the soul And first He is in his knowledge sufficiently Catechiz'd in the knowledge of Scripture and is confident that all its dictates are to be believ'd and commands practis'd But if you look to find this assent confirmed by his practice and exprest in his carriage you are much mistaken in the business Is he such a fool as to order his life according to the rigour of them No no doubt 't is not one mans work to believe the Scripture and obey it Suppose I should tell you that there are but a few of you that read Scripture to that purpose that observe any edict of piety or virtue only because the Scripture hath commanded it There be many restraints that keep unregenerate men from sinning a good disposition religious education common custom of the place or times where we live human laws and the like and each or all of these may curb our forwardness and keep us in some order But who is there amongst us that being tempted with a fair lovely amiable vice which he may commit without any regret of his good nature scandal to his former carriages fear or danger of punishment either future or present or any other inconvenience Who is there I say that from the meer awe and respect that he bears to Scripture retires and calls himself off from that sin which he had otherwise faln into If I should see all manner of conveniences to sin in one scale and the bare authority of the Scriptures in the other quite out-weighing all them with its heaviness I should then hope that our hearts were catechiz'd as well as our brains in the acknowledgment of this truth that Scripture is to be believed and obeyed But I much fear me if I should make an enquiry in every one of our hearts here single the greatest part of the Jury would bring in an evidence of guilt that in any our most entire obediences some other respect casts the scales and this is one piece of direct Atheism that though our Understandings affirm yet our Will and affections deny that Scripture is for its own sake to be obeyed Secondly Our brains are well enough advised in the truth of the doctrine of Gods Essence and Attributes our Understandings have a distinct conceit of awe and reverence to answer every notion we have of God and yet here also our conversation hath its postures of defiance its scoffs and arts of reviling as it were to deface and scrape out every of these notions out of our Wills and to perswade both our selves and others that that knowledge doth only float in our brains but hath no manner of weight to sink it deep into our hearts to glance at one or two of these we believe or at least pretend to we do so the immensity i. e. the ubiquity and omnipresence of God that he indeed is every where to fill to see to survey to punish and yet our lives do plainly proclaim that in earnest we mean no such matter we shut up our hearts against God and either as the Gadarens did Christ being weary of his presence fairly entreat or else directly banish him out of our coasts because he hath been or is like to be the destruction of some Swine i. e. beastial affections in us And in sum those bodies of ours which he hath markt out for his Temples we will scarce allow him for his Inn to lodge with us one night Again can we expect to be credited when we say we believe the ubiquity and omnipresence of God and yet live and sin as confidently as if we were out of his sight or reach Do we behave our selves in our out-rages in our luxury nay even in our gravest devotions as if God were within ken Without all doubt in every minute almost of our lives we demonstrate that we doubt either of his omnipresence to see or else his justice to punish us for those very things which we dare not to venture on in the sight of an earthly Magistrate that may punish us nay of a spy that may complain of us nay of an enemy that will upbraid us nay of a friend that will check and admonish us we never doubt or demur or delay to practise in private or the dark where still God is present to oversee and punish And if this be not a scoffing a deluding a meer contemning of God to do that without any fear or regret in his sight which we never offer to attempt before a man nay a friend I know not what may be counted Atheism In like manner we acknowledge God to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all-sufficient and if we should be examined in earnest we would confess that there is no ability in any creature to bestow or provide any good thing for us and yet our will here also hath its ways and arguments of contradiction Our whole life is one continued confutation of this piece of our faith our tremblings our jealousies our distrusts our carefulness our worldly providence and importunate carking our methods and stratagems of thrift and covetousness and the whole business of our lives in wooing and solliciting and importuning every power of nature every trade and art of the world to succour to assist and provide for us are most egregious evidences that we put no trust or confidence in Gods all-sufficiency but wholly depend and rely upon the arm of flesh both to raise and sustain us This very one fashion of ours in all our distresses to fly to and call upon all manner of second causes without any raising or elevating our eyes or thoughts toward God from whom cometh our help plainly shews that God still dwells abroad in tents we have seen or heard of him but have not yet brought him home into our hearts there to possess and rectifie and instruct our wills as well as our understandings Thirdly The whole mystery of Christ articulately set down in our Creed we as punctually believe and to make good our names that we are Christians in earnest we will challenge and defie the fire and fagot to perswade us out of it and these are good resolutions if our practices did not give our faith the lye and utterly renounce at the Church door whatsoever we profest in our pews This very one thing that he which is our Saviour shall be our Judge that he which was crucified dead and buried sits now at the right hand of God and from thence shall come to judge the world this main part
prepossession that it outruns all other computations of our life We carry a body of sin about us before we have one of flesh have a decrepit weak old man with all his crazy train of affections and lusts before even infancy begins Behold saith the Psalmist Psal li. 5. I was shapen in iniquity and in sin did my mother conceive me as if guilt were the plastick power that formed us and wickedness the Minera and Element of our being as if it were that little moving point which the curious enquirers into nature find to be the rudiment of animation and pants not then for life but lust and endless death So that the saying of St. James chap. i. 15. seems a description of our natural birth When lust hath conceived it bringeth forth sin and sin when it is finished bringeth forth death Nor does this hasty inmate leave us when grown up no it improves its rancour against God and goodness mixes with custom passion and example and whatever thing is apt to lead us unto mischief somenting all the wild desires of our inferior brutal part till it become at last an equal and profest enemy making open hostility setting up its sconces fortifying it self with munition and defence as meaning to try the quarrel with God and pretending right to man whom God doth but usurp Thus shall you see it encampt and settingup its banners for tokens under that proud name of another law Rom. vii 23. I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind and as if it had got the better of the day bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in the members i. e. unto its self And shall we feel such an enemy within us laying siege at God and grace in us and fiercely resolving whether by deceit or battery to captivate us unto himself and shall we not take notice of him Shall we not think it worthy our pains and expence to defeat him or secure our selves Beloved that will be the best stratagem for the taking of this enemy which is now adays most ordinary in sieges to block up all passages and hinder all access of fresh provision and so by denying this greedy devourer all nourishment from without to starve and pine him into such a tameness that he may be taken without resistance which how really you may perform by these means of mortification and repentance prescribed you in Scripture you shall better learn by your own practice then my discourse The fourth aggravation of this guilt is that is that its minera and fewel lurks even in a regenerate man wretched c. and enforceth Paul into a conflict a war against himself And is it possible for one otherwise happy as the regenerate man inwardly surely is to sleep securely and never to try a field with the Author of its so much misery or finding it to be within its self part of it self not to think it a sin worthy repentance and sorrow by which Gods Holy Spirit is so resisted so affronted and almost quelled and cast out Fifthly and lastly the guilt of it appears by the effects of it 1. inclination 2. consent to evil for even every inclination to sin without consent is an irregularity and kind of sin i. e. an aversion of some of our faculties from God all which should directly drive amain to him and goodness That servant which is commanded with all speed and earnestness to go about any thing offends against his Masters precept if he any way incline to disobedience if he perform his commands with any regret or reluctancy Now secondly consent is so natural a consequent of this evil inclination that in a man you can scarce discern much less sever them No man hath any inordinate lust but doth give some kind of consent to it the whole will being so infected with this lust that that can no sooner bring forth evil motions but this will be ready at hand with evil desires and then how evident a guilt how plain a breach of the law it is you need not mine eyes to teach you Thus have I insisted somewhat largely on the branches of Original sin which I have spread and stretcht the wider that I might furnish you with more variety of aggravations on each member of it which I think may be of important use for this or any other popular Auditory because this sin ordinarily is so little thought of even in our solemnest humiliations When you profess that you are about the business of repentance you cannot be perswaded that this common sin which Adam as you reckon only sinned hath any effect on you I am yet afraid that you still hardly believe that you are truly and in earnest to be sorry for it unless the Lord strike our hearts with an exact sense and profest feeling of this sin of our nature and corruption of our kind And suffer us not O Lord to nourish in our selves such a torpor a sluggishness and security lest it drive us headlong to all manner of hard-heartedness to commit actual sins and that even with greediness And so I come briefly to a view of each mans personal sins I am the chief where I might rank all manner of sins into some forms or seats and then urge the deformity of each of them single and naked to your view but I will for the present presume your understandings sufficiently instructed in the hainousness of each sin forbidden by the Commandments For others who will make more or less sins then the Scripture doth I come not to swatisfie them or decide their Cases of Conscience In brief I will propose to your practice only two forms of confessing your sins and humbling your selves for them which I desire you to aggravate to your selves because I have not now the leisure to beat them low or deep to your consciences Besides original sin already spoken of you are to lay hard to your own charges 1. your particular chief sins 2. all your ordinary sins in gross For the first observe but that one admirable place in Solomons Prayer at the dedication of the Temple If there be in the land famine c. Whatsoever plague whatsoever sickness what prayer or supplication soever be made by any man or by all thy people Israel which shall know every man the plague of his own heart and spread forth his hand to this house then hear thou in Heaven c. Where the condition of obtaining their requests from God is excellently set down if they shall know i. e. be sensible of be sorry for and confess to God every man the plague of his own heart that is in the bulk and heap of their sins shall pick the fairest loveliest sin in the pack the plague i. e. the pestilential reigning sweeping offence on which all the lower train of petty faults do wait and depend do minister and suppeditate matter to work If I say they shall take this
they might be perswaded to the Trinity they will not believe the resurrection 'T was too plain a contradiction to philosophical reason ever to enter theirs Thus in the 1 Cor. i. 21. the World by wisdom knew not God they so relyed on their reason and trusted in it for all truths that they concluded every thing impossible that would not concur with their old Principles But this resistance which reason makes is not so strong but that it may easily be supprest and therefore Synesius was made a Bishop before he explicitly believed the resurrection because they were confident that he which had forsaken all other errors would not long continue perverse in this and so good a Christian in other things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 could not choose but be illuminated in time in so necessary a point of faith and indeed so it happened in them both But there are other more dangerous engins more insidious courses which learning uses to supplant or undermine belief other stratagems to keep us out of the way to anticipate all our desires or inclinations or thoughts that way-ward and these are spiritual pride and self-content Men are so elevated in height of contemplation so well pleased so fully satisfied in the pleasures and delights of it that the first sort scorn to submit or humble themselves to the poverty and disparagement of believing in Christ the second are never at leasure to think of it For the first spiritual pride 't is set down as a reason that the natural man receives not the things of the spirit 1 Cor. ii 14. receives them not i. e. will not take them will not accept of them though they are freely given him for they are foolishness unto him i. e. so his proud brain reputes them The pride of Worldly wisdom extremely scorns the foolishness of Christ and consequently is infinitely opposite to faith which is wrought by special humility Secondly for self-content 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Heraclitus in Hesych Wise men need no friends they are able to subsist by themselves without any help they will have an happiness of their own making and scorn to be beholding to Christ for a new inheritance they are already so fully possest of all manner of contents Let any man whisper them of the joys of the new Jerusalem of the Intercessor that hath saved of the way thither and made it passable of all the priviledges and promises of our adoption they will hear them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as old wives fables they have the fortunate Islands too their exactest tranquillity and serenity of mind in a perpetual contemplation and all the golden Apples in Paradise shall not tempt or allarm them out of it 'T is strange to see when such a man is called what a doe there is to get him out of his dream to hale him out of his study to the Church how sleepy and drowsy and lethargical he is in matters of Religion how soon a little devotion hath tired him out that could have pored over a book incessantly all his life long and never thought thus to have been interdicted the delights of humane learning thus to have been pluckt and torn from the embraces of his Athenian Idol His conversion is much unlike another mans that which calls others into compass seems to let him loose thrusts him abroad into the world teaches him to look more like a man then ever he meant makes him a member of the Commonwealth that was formerly but an Anchoret and forces him to walk and run the way of Gods Commandments that had once decreed him himself to a chair for ever In brief there is as little hopes of one that indulges himself and gives himself up to the pride and contents of any kind of learning of him that terminates knowledge either in it self or else in the ostentation of it as of any other that is captiv'd to any one single worldly or fleshly kind of voluptuousness This of the brain in spight of the Philosopher is an intemperance as well as that of the throat and palate and more dangerous because less suspected and seldomer declaimed against and from this Epicurism especially of the soul good Lord deliver us Not to heap up reasons of this too manifest a truth would God it were not so undeniable take but this one more of the unsufficiency of learning never so well used to make a man a Christian Let all the knowledge in the world prophane and sacred all the force and reason that all ages ever bragg'd of let it concur in one brain and swell the head as big as his was in the Poem that travell'd of Minerva let all Scriptures and Fathers joyn their power and efficacy and they shall never by their simple activity produce a saving faith in any one all the miracles they can work are only on the understanding the will distinctly taken is above their sphear or compass or if their faculties are not distinguisht and to will is present with me Rom. vii 18. as well as to understand yet they can produce only an absolute simple general will that is an assent and approbation of the absolute goodness of the thing proposed not a resolute will to abandon all other worldly purposes to perform that which I will Knowledge and right apprehension of things may convince me first of the history that all that is spoken of or by Christ is true and then of the expedience to apply all his merits to my soul but when I see all this cannot be done without paying a price without undoing my self without pawning all that I have my learning my wealth my delights my whole worldly being without self-denial then the general assent that absolute will is grown chill and dead we are still whatever we believe but infidels all the Articles of the Creed thus assented to are not enough to make us Christians So that the issue of all is all knowledge in the world cannot make us deny our selves and therefore all knowledge in the world is not able to produce belief only the spirit must breath this power into us of breathing out our selves he must press our breasts and stifle and strangle us we must give up the natural ghost he must force out our earthly breath out of our earthly bodies or else we shall not be enlivened by his spiritual Thus have you reasons of the common divorce betwixt knowledge and faith i. e. the no manner of dependence betwixt them in nature Secondly the open resistence in some points betwixt reason and Scripture Thirdly the more secret reluctancies betwixt the pride and contents of learning and the spirit And lastly the insufficiency of all natural knowledge and transcendency of spiritual so that he cannot know them because they are spiritually discerned I should now in very charity release you but that there is one word behind of most important necessity to a Sermon and that is of Application That laying to our hearts the
appear some difficulties in the practice to be overcome before it prove a possible duty if self-denial be incompetible with flesh and blood if delights and worldly contentments if an hardned heart in sin and a world of high Imaginations refuse to submit or humble themselves to the poverty of Christ if we cannot empty our hands to lay hold or unbottom our selves to lean wholly on Christ then must we fly and pray to that spirit of power to subdue and conquer and lead us captive to it self to instruct us in the baseness the nothingness nay the dismal hideous wretchedness of our own estate that so being spiritually shaken and terrified out of our carnal pride and security we may come trembling and quaking to that Throne of Grace and with the hands of Faith though feeble ones with the eye of Faith though dimly with a hearty sincere resigning up of our selves we may see and apprehend and fasten and be united to our Saviour that we may live in Christ and Christ in us and having begun in the life of grace here we may hope and attain to be accomplished with that of Glory hereafter Now to him which hath elected us c. The XII Sermon Acts XVII 30. And the times of this ignorance God winked at but now commandeth all men every where to repent THE words in our English Translation carry somewhat in the sound which doth not fully reach the importance of the Original and therefore it must be the task of our Preface not to connect the Text but clear it not to shew its dependence on the precedent words but to restore it to the integrity of it self that so we may perfectly conceive the words before we venture to discuss them that we may 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Aristotle phrases it first represent them to you in the bulk then describe them particularly in their several lineaments Our English setting of the words seems to make two Propositions and in them a direct opposition betwixt the condition of the ancient and present Gentiles that God had winked at i.e. either approved or pitied or pardoned the ignorance of the former Heathens but now was resolved to execute justice on all that did continue in that was heretofore pardonable in them on every one every where that did not repent Now the Original runs thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. that is in a literal construction God therefore passing over the times of ignorance as if he saw them not doth now command all men every where to repent Which you may conceive thus by this kind of vulgar 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or sensible proceeding in God God always is essentially and perfectly every one of his Attributes Wisdom Justice Mercy c. but yet is said at one time to be peculiarly one Attribute at another time another i. e. to be at one time actually just at another time actually merciful according to his determination to the object As when God fixes his eyes upon a rebellious people whose sins are ripe for his justice he then executes his vengeance on them as on Sodom when he fixes his eyes upon a penitent believing people he then doth exercise his mercy as on Nineveh Now when God looks upon any part of the lapsed world on which he intends to have mercy he suffers not his eye to be fixed or terminated on the medium betwixt his eye and them on the sins of all their ancestors from the beginning of the world till that day but having another accompt to call them to doth for the present 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 look over all them as if they were not in his way and imputing not the sins of the fathers to the children fixeth on the children makes his covenant of mercy with them and commandeth them the condition of this covenant whereby they shall obtain mercy that is every one every where to repent So that in the first place 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 must not be rendred by way of opposition he winked then but now commands as if their former ignorance were justifiable and an account of knowledge should only be exacted from us And in the second place 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a word read but this once in all the New Testament must be rendred not winking at but looking over or not insisting upon as when we fix our eyes upon a hill we suffer them not to dwell on the valley on this side of it because we look earnestly on the hill Now if this be not the common Attical acception of it yet it will seem agreeable to the penning of the New Testament in which whosoever will observe may find words and phrases which perhaps the Attick purity perhaps Grammar will not approve of And yet I doubt not but Classick authorities may be brought where 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shall signifie not a winking or not taking notice of but a looking farther a not resting in this but a driving higher for so it is rendred by Stephanus Ad ulteriora oculos convertere and then the phrase shall be as proper as the sense the Greek as authentical as the doctrine that God looking over and not insisting upon the ignorance of the former Heathen at Christs coming entred a covenant with their successors the condition of which was that every man every where should repent And this is made good by the Gr. Schol. of the N. T. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. that is spoken not that the former heathen should be unpunished but that their successors to whom St. Paul preached if they would repent should not be called to an accompt of their ignorance should not fare the worse for the ignorance of their fathers and at this drives also Chrysostome out of whom the Scholiasts may seem to have borrowed it their whole 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 being but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 gleanings out of the Fathers before them I might farther prove the necessity of this interpretation if it were required of me and thus far I have stay'd you to prove it because our English is somewhat imperfect in the expression of it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Aristotle Two cubes are not a cube but another figure very different from it and indeed our English Translations by making two Proposition of this Verse have varied the native single Propositions in that regard and made it unlike it self which briefly if I can inform my self aright should run thus by way of one simple Enunciation God therefore not insisting on but looking over those times of ignorance doth now command all men every where to repent of which those three lines in Leo his fourth Sermon de Passione Domini are a just Paraphrase Nos sub veteris ignorantiae profunda nocte pereuntes in Patriarcharum societatem sortem electi gregis adoptavit So then the words being represented to you in this scheme or single diagram are the covenant of mercy made with the progeny of