these things and to expound all these Solemnities Laws and Ceremonies to them so that the frame of Church and State and Families was a preservative hereof 5. But to pass by all the rest in the Old Testament the Incarnation of Christ was such a work of Omnipotent Love as caâ—not by us be comprehended That God should be united to humanity in person that humanity should thus be advanced into union with the Deity and Man be set above the Angels that a Virgin should conceive that men from the East should be led thither to worship an Infant by the conduct of a Star which Caesarius thinketh was one of those Angels or Spirits which are called a flame of fire Psal 104.4 That Angels from Heaven should declare his nativity to the Shepherds and celebrate it with their praises that John Baptist should be so called to be his forerunner and Elizabeth Zachary Simeon and Anna should so prophesie of him That the Spirit should be seen descending on him at his Baptism and the voice be heard from Heaven which owned him that he should fast forty daies and nights and that he should be transfigured before his three Disciples on the Mount and Moses and Elias seen with him in that glory and the voice from Heaven again bear witness to him These and many such like were the attestations of Divine Omnipotency to the truth of Christ 6. To these may be next joyned the whole course of miracles performed by Christ in healing the sick and raising the dead and in many other miraculous acts which are most of the substance of the Gospel-history and which I have recited together in my Reasons of the Christian Religion see Heb. 2.2 3 4. 7. And to these may be added the Power which was given over all the creatures to Christ our Mediatour All power in Heaven and Earth was given him Joh. 17.2 13.3 Mat. 28.19 Rom. 14.9 Ephes 1.22 23. He was made Head over all things to the Church and all principalities and powers were put under him And this was not barely asserted by him but demonstrated He shewed his power over the Devils in casting them out and his power over Angels by their attendance and his power of life and death by raising the dead and his power over all diseases by healing them and his power over the winds and waters by appeasing them and his power over our food and natures by turning water into wine and by feeding many thousands miraculously yea and his power over them into whose hands he was resolved to yield himself by restraining them till his hour was come and by making them all fall to the ground at his name and his power over Sun and Heaven and Earth by the darkening of the Sun and the trembling of the Earth and the rending of the Rocks and of the Vail of the Temple Mat. 27.45 51. And his power over the dead by the rising of the bodies of many Mat. 27.52 And his power over the Saints in Heaven by the attendance of Moses and Elias and his power to forgive sins by taking away the penal maladies and his power to change hearts and save souls by causing his Disciples to leave all and follow him at a word and Zacheus to receive him and believe and the thief on the cross to be converted and to enter that day into Paradise 8. And his own Resurrection is an undoubted attestation of Divine Omnipotency If God gave him such a victory over death and raised him to life when men had killed him and rolled a stone upon his Sepulchre and sealed and guarded it there needeth no further evidence of the Power of God impressing and attesting the Christian Religion than that which ascertaineth to us the truth of Christs Resurrection For he was declared to be the Son of God by POWER by resurrection from the dead Rom. 1.4 9. And his bodily appearance to his congregated Disciples when the doors were shut his miracle at their fishing his walking on the Sea his vanishing out of their sight Luke 24. when he had discoursed with the two Disciples his opening their hearts to understand his Word c. do all shew this part of Gods Image on our Religion even his Power 10. And so doth his bodily ascending into Heaven before the face of his Disciples Acts 1. 11. But especially the sending down the Holy Ghost upon his Disciples according as he promised To cause them that were before so low in knowledge to be suddenly inspired with languages and with the full understanding of his own will and with unanimity and concord herein this made his Disciples the living monuments and effects of his own Omnipotency Acts 2. 12. And accordingly all the miracles which they did by this power recorded partly in the Acts of the Apostles or rather the Acts of Paul by Luke who was his companion which you may there read and no doubt but other Apostles in their measures did the like as Paul though they are not recorded for they had all the same Promise and Spirit This is another impression of POWER 13. Whereto must be added the great and wonderful gifts of communicating the same Spirit or doing that upon which God would give it to those converted Believers on whom they laid their hands which Simon Magus would fain have bought with money Acts 8. To enable them to speak with tongues to heal diseases to prophesie c. as they themselves had done which is a great attestation of Omnipotency 14. And the lamentable destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans foretold by Christ was an attestation of Gods POWER in the revenge or punishment of their unbelief and putting Christ to death 15. And so was the great fortitude and constancy of Believers who underwent all persecutions so joyfully as they did for the sake of Christ which was the effect of the corroborating Power of the Almighty 16. And so was the Power which the Apostles had to execute present judgements upon the enemies of the Gospel as Elimas and Simon Magus and on the abusers of Religion as Ananias and Saphyra and on many whom they excommunicated and delivered up to Satan 17. The same evidence is found in Christs Legislation as an universal Soveraign making Laws for heart and life for all the world Taking down the Laws of the Jewish Polity and Ceremonies which God by Moses had for a time set up Commanding his Ministers to proclaim his Laws to all the world and Princes and people to obey them And by these Laws conferring on Believers no less than forgiveness and salvation and binding over the impenitent to everlasting punishment 18. But the great and continued impress of Gods Power is that which together with his Wisdom and Love is made and shewed in the conveâ—sion of mens souls to God by Christ You may here first consider the numbers which were suddenly converted by the preaching of the Apostles at the first And in how little time there were Churches planted
11. Exod. 12.29 Deut. 26.22 Josh 4.6 21 22. 22 24 27. Therefore the writing of Church-history is the duty of all ages because Gods Works are to be known as well as his Word And as it is your forefathers duty to write it it is the childrens duty to learn it or else the writing it would be vain He that knoweth not what state the Church and world is in and hath been in in former ages and what God hath been doing in the world and how errour and sin have been resisting him and with what success doth want much to the compleating of his knowledge 5. And he must have prudence to discern particular cases and to consider of all circumstances and to compare things with things that he may discern his duty and the seasons and manner of it and may know among inconsistent seeming duties which is to be preferred and when and what circumstances or accidents do make any thing a duty which else would be no duty or a sin and what accidents make that a sin which without them would be a duty This is the knowledge which must make a Christian entire or compleat 2. And in his Will there must be 1. A full resignation and submission to the Will of God his Owner and a full subjection and obedience to the Will of God his Governour yielding readily and constantly and resolutâ—ly to the commands of God as the Scholar obeyeth his Master and as the second wheel in the clock is moved by the first And a close adhering to God as his chief Good by a Thankful Reception of his Benefits and a desirous seeking to enjoy and glorifie him and please his Will In a word loving him as God and taking our chiefest complacency in pleasing him in loving him and being loved of him 2. And in the same will there must be a well regulated Love to all Gods works according as he is manifested or glorified in them To the humanity of our Redeemer to the glory of Heaven as it is a created thing to the blessed Angels and perfected spirits of the just to the Scripture to the Church on earth to the Saints the Pastors the Rulers the holy Ordinances to all mankind even to our enemies to our selves our souls our bodies our relations our estates and mercies of every rank 3. And herewithall must be a hatred of every sin in our selves and others Of former sin and present corruption with a penitential displicence and grief and of possible sin with a vigilancy and resistance to avoid it 3. And in the Affections there must be a vivacity and sober fervency answering to all these motions of the Will in Love Delight Desire Hope Hatred Sorrow Aversation and Anger the complexion of all which is godly Zeal 4. In the vital and executive Power of the soul there must be a holy activity promptitude and fortitude to be up and doing and to set the sluggish faculties on work and to bring all knowledge and volitions into practice and to assault and conquer enemies and difficulties There must be the Spirit of Power though I know that word did chiefly then denote the Spirit of Miracles yet not only and of Love and of a sound mind 5. In the outward members there must be by use a habit of ready obedient execution of the souls commands As in the tongue a readiness to pray and praise God and declare his Word and edifie others and so in the rest 6. In the senses and appetite there must by use be a habit of yielding obedience to Reason that the senses do not rebel and rage and bear down the commands of the mind and will 7. Lastly In the Imagination there must be a clearness or purity from filthiness malice covetousness pride and vanity and there must be the impressions of things that are good and useful and a ready obedience to the superiour faculties that it may be the instrument of holiness and not the shop of temptations and sin nor a wild unruly disordered thing And the harmony of all these must be as well observed as the matter As 1. There must be a just Order among them every duty must keep its proper place and season 2. There must be a just proportion and degree some graces must not wither whilst others alone are cherished nor some duties take up all our heart and time whilst others are almost laid by 3. There must be a just activity and exercise of every grace 4. And a just conjunction and respect to one another that every one be used so as to be a help to all the rest I. The Order 1. Of Intellectual graces and duties must be this 1. In order of Time the things which are sensible are known before the things which are beyond our sight and other senses 2. Beyond these the first thing known both for certainly and for excellency is that there is a God 3. This God is to be known as one Being in his three Essential Principles Vital Power Intellect and Will 4. And these as in their Essential Perfections Omnipotency Wisdom and Goodness or Love 5. And also in his perfections called Modal and Negative c. as Immensity Eternity Independancy Immutability c. 6. God must be next known in his Three Personalities as the Father the Word or Son and the Spirit 7. And these in their three Causalities efficient dirigent and final 8. And in their three great works Creation Redemption Sanctification or Perfection producing Nature Grace and Glory or our Persons Medicine and Health 9. And God who created the world is thereupon to be known in his Relations to it as our Creator in Unity and as our Owner Ruler and Chief Good efficient dirigent and final in a Trinity of Relations You must know how the Infinite Vital Power of the Father created all things by the Infinite Wisdom of the Word or Son and by the Infinite Goodness and Love of the holy Spirit As the Son redeemed us as the eternal Wisdom and Word Incarnate sent by the eternal Vital-Power of the Father to reveal and communicate the eternal Love in the Holy Ghost And as the Holy Ghost doth sanctifie and perfect us as proceeding and sent from the Power of the Father and the Wisdom of the Son to shed abroad the Love of God upon our hearts c. 10. Next to the knowledge of God as Creator is to be considered the World which he created and especially the Intectellual Creatures Angels or heavenly Spirits and Men. Man is to be known in his person or constitution first and afterward in his appointed course and in his end and perfection 11. In his constitution is to be considered 1. His Being or essential parts 2. His Rectitude or Qualities 3. His Relations 1. To his Creatour And 2. To his fellow-creatures 12. His essential parts are his soul and body His soul is to be known in the Vnity of its Essence and Trinity of essential faculties which is its natural
to joyn in consort with all these in those seraphick praises which are harmoniously sounded forth continually through all the intellectual world in the greatest fervours of perfect Love and the constant raptures of perfect Joy in the fullest intuition of the glory of the Eternal God and the glorified humanity of your Redeemer and the glory of the celestial world and society and under the streams of Infinite Life and Light and Love poured forth upon you to feed all this to all Eternity And all this in so near and sweet an union with the glorified ones who are the body and Spouse of Christ that it shall be all as one Praise one Love one Joy in all O for a more lively and quick-sighted faith to foresee this day in some measure as affectingly as we shall then see it Alas my Lord is this dark prospect all that I must here hope for Is this dull and dreaming and amazing apprehension all that I shall reach to here Is this sensless heart this despondent mind these drowsie desires the best that I must here employ in the contemplation of so high a glory Must I come in such a sleepy state to God and go as in a dream to the beatifical vision I am ashamed and confounded to find my soul alas so dark so dead so low so unsuitable to such a day and state even whilest I am daily looking towards it and whilest I am daily talking of it and perswading others to higher apprehensions than I can reach my self and even whilest I am writing of it and attempting to draw a Map of Heaven for the consolation of my self and fellow-believers Thou hast convinced my Reason of the truth of thy predictions and of the certain futurity of that glorious day And yet how little do my affections stir and how unanswerable are my joyes and my desires to those convictions when the light of my understanding should cure the deadness of my heart alas this deadness rather extinguisheth that light and cherisheth temptations to unbelief and my faith and reason and knowledge are as it were asleep and useless for want of that Life which should awaken them unto exercise and use Awakened Reason serveth Faith and is alwaies on thy side But sleepy Reason in the gleams of prosperity is ready to give place to flesh and fancy and hath a thousand distracted incoherent dreams O now reveal thy Power thy Truth thy Love and Goodness effectually to my soul and then I shall wait with love and longing for the revelation of thy Glory Thy inward heavenly powerful Light is kin to the glorious brightness of thy coming and will shew me that which books and talk only without thy Spirit cannot shew Thy Kingdom in me and my daily faithful subjection to thy Government there must prepare me for the glorious endless Kingdom If now thou wouldest pour out thy Love upon my soul it would flame up towards thee and long to meet thee and think with daily pleasure on that day And my perfect Love would cast out that fear which maketh the thoughts of thy coming to be a torment O meet me now when my soul doth seek thee and secretly cry after thee that I may know thou wilt meet me with love and pitty at the last O turn not now thine ears from my requests For if thou receive me not now as thy humble supplicant how shall I hope that thou wilt receive me then And if thou wilt not hear me in the day of grace and visitation and in this time when thou mayest be found how can I hope that thou wilt hear me then when the door is shut and the seeking and finding time is past If thou cast me out of thy presence now and turn away thy face from my soul and my supplication as a loathed thing how can I then expect thy smiles or the vital embracements of thy glorifying Love or to be owned by thee before all the world with that cordial and consolatory Justification which may keep my conscience from becoming my Hell If thou permit my flesh and sense to conquer my faith and to turn away my love and desire from thee how shall I then expect that Joy that Heaven which consisteth in thy Love And if thou suffer this unstedfast heart to depart from thee now will it not be the forerunner of that dreadful doom Depart from me ye workers of iniquity I know you not And if for the love of transitory vanity I now deny thee what can I then expect but to be finally denyed by thee Come Lord and dwell by thy Spirit in my soul that I may have something in me to take my part and may know that I shall dwell with thee for ever If now thou wilt make me thy temple and habitatâ—on and wilt dwell by faith and love within me I shall know thee by more than the hearing of the ear and thy last appearing will be less terrible to my thoughts Thou wilt be health to my soul when my body lyeth languishing in pain And when flesh and heart fail my failing heart will find reviving strength in thee And when the portion of worldlings is spent and at an end I shall find thee a never-ending portion Why wouldest thou come down from Heaven to Earth in the daies of thy voluntary humiliation but to bring down grace to dwell where God himself hath dwelt If the Eternal Word will dwell in flesh the Eternal Spirit will not disdain it whose dwelling is not by so close an union but by sweet unexpressible inoperations This world hath had the pledge of thy bodily presence when thou broughtest life and immortality to light O let my dark and fearful soul have the pledge of thy illuminating quickening comforting Spirit that life and immortality may be begun within me Thy word of promise is certain in it self but knowing our weakness thou wilt give us more Thy seal thy pledge thy earnest will not only confirm my faith as settling my doubting mind but it will also draw up my love and desire as suited to my intellectual appetite and will be a true foretaste of Heaven How oft have I gazed in the glass and yet overlookt or not been taken with the beauty of thy face But one drop of thy Love if it fall into my soul will fill it with the most fragrant and delectable odour and will be its life and joy and vigour I shall never know effectually what Heaven is till I know what it is to love thee and to be beloved by thee For what but Love will tell me what a life of Love is If I could love thee more ardently more absolutely more operatively I should quickly know and feel thy Love And O when I shall know that prosperous life and live in in the delicious entertainments of thy love and in the sweet and vigorous exercise of mine then I shall know the nature of Heaven the wisdom of believers and the happiness of enjoyers And then
can lay out your love and care and labour on nothing else that will answer your expectations nor make any other bargain whatsoever but what you are sure to be utterly undone by Psal 73.25 4.6 7. Mat. 6.20 21. 13.45 46. Luke 18.33 3. A sound belief of things invisible will be so far an effectual spring of a holy life as that you will seek first the Kingdom of God and its Righteousness Mat. 6.33 and not in your Resolutions only but in your Practices the bent of your lives will be for God and your invisible felicity It is not possible that you should see by faith the wonders of the world to come and yet prefer this world before it A dead opinionative belief may stand with a worldly fleshly life but a working faith will make you stir and make the things of God your business and the labour and industry of your lives will shew whether you soundly believe the things unseen 4. If you savingly believe the invisible things you will purchase them at any rate and hold them faster than your worldly accommodations and will suffer the loss of all things visible rather than you will cast away your hopes of the glory which you never saw A humane faith and bare opinion will not hold fast when trial comes For such men take Heaven but for a reserve because they must leave earth against their wills and are loth to go to Hell but they are resolved to hold the world as long as they can because their faith apprehendeth no such satisfying certainty of the things unseen as will encourage them to let go all that they see and have in sensible possession But the weakest faith that 's true and saving doth habitually dispose the soul to let go all the hopes and happiness of this world when they are inconsistent with our spiritual hopes and happiness Luke 14.33 And now I have gone before you with the light and shewed you what a Believer is will you presently consider how 〈◊〉 your hearts and lives agree to this description To know Whether you live by faith or not is consequentially to know whether God or the world be your portion and felicity and so whether you are the heirs of Heaven or Hell And is not this a question that you are most nearly concerned in O therefore for your souls sakes and as ever you love your everlasting peace Examine your selves whether you are in the faith or not Know you not that Christ is in you by faith except you be reprobates 2 Cor. 13.5 will you hearken now as long to your consciences as you have done to me As you have heard me telling you what is the nature of a living saving faith will you hearken to your consciences while they impartially tell you whether you have this life of faith or not It may be known if you are willing and diligent and impartial Iâ— you search on purpose as men that would know whether they are alive or dead and whether they shall live or die for ever and not as men that would be flattered and deceived and are resolved to think well of their state be it true or false Let conscience tell you What eyes do you see by for the conduct of the chief imployment of your lives Is it by the eye of sense or faith I take it for granted that it 's by the eye of Reason But is it by Reason corrupted and byâ—ssed by sense or is it by Reason elevated by faith What Countrey is it that your hearts converse in Is it in Heaven or Earth What company is it that you solace your selves with Is it with Angels and Saints Do you walk with them in the Spirit and joyn your eccho's to their triumphant praises and say Amen when by faith you hear them ascribing honour and praise and glory to the ancient of daies the Omnipotent Jehovah that is and that was and is to come Do you fetch your Joyes from Heaven or Earth from things unseen or seen things future or present things hoped for or things possessed What Garden yieldeth you your sweetest flowers Whence is the food that your hopes and comforts live upon Whence are the spirits and cordials that revive you when a frowning world doth cast you into a fainting fit or swoun Where is it that you repose your souls for Rest when sin or sufferings have made you weary Deal truly Is it in Heaven or Earth Which world do you take for your pilgrimage and which for your home I do not ask you where you are but where you dwell not where are your persons but where are your hearts In a word Are you in good earnest when you say you believe a Heaven and Hell And do you think and speak and pray and live as those that do indeed believe it Do you spend your time and chuse your condition of life and dispose of your affairs and answer temptations to worldly things as those that are serious in their belief Speak out do you live the life of faith upon things unseen or the life of sense on things that you behold Deal truly for your endless â—oy or sorrow doth much depend on it The life of faith is the certain passage to the life of glory The fleshly life on things here seen is the certain way to endless misery If you live after the flesh ye shall die but if ye by the spirit do mortifie the deeds of the body ye shall live Rom. 8.13 Be not dâ—ceived God is not mocked â— for whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption but he that soweth to the spirit shall of the spirit reap everlasting life Gal. 6.7 8. If you would know where you must live for ever know how and for what and upon what it is that you live here Vse 4. Having enquired whether you are Believers I am next to ask you what you will be for the time to come will you live upon things seen or unseen While you arrogate the name and honour of being Christians will you bethink you what Christianity is and will you be indeed what you say you are and would be thought to be Oh that you would give credit to the Word of God that the God of Heaven might be but heartily believed by you And that you would but take his Word to be as sure as sense and what he hath told you is or will be to be as certain as if you saw it with your eyes Oh what manner of persons would you then be how carefully and fruitfully would you speak and live How impossible were it then that you should be careless and prophane And here that I may by seriousness bring you to be serious in so serious a business I shall first put a few suppositions to you about the invisible objects of faith and then I shall put some applicatory questions to you concerning your own resolutions and
and sellers from Christs Temple their merchandize is exposed without shame and their signs set forth and the trade of getting preferments openly professed and it is enough to wipe off all the shame to put some venerable titles upon this Den of thieves But the Lord whom we wait for will once more come and cleanse his Temple But who may abide the day of his coming for he is like a refiners fire and like fullers sâ—pe and will throughly purge the Sons of Levi Mal. 3.1 2 3 4. If talking against worldliness would prove that the world is overcome and that God is dearest to the soul then Preachers will be the happiest men on earth But it 's easier to commend God than to love him above all and easier to cry out against the world than to have a heart that is truly weaned from it and set upon a better world Object 10. But all this belongeth only to them that are in prosperity but I am poor and therefore it is nothing to me Answ Many a one loveth prosperity that hath it not And such are doubly sinful that will love a world which loveth not them Even a world of poverty misery and distress Something you would have done if you had had a full estate and honour and fleshly delights to love Nay many poor men think better of riches and honour than those that have them because they never tryed how vain and vexatious they are and if they had tryed them perhaps would love them less The world is but a painted Strumpet admired afar off but the neerer you come to it and the more it 's known the worse you will like it Is it by your own desire that you are poor or is it against your wills Had you not rather be as great and rich as others Had you not rather live at ease and fulness And do you think God will love you ever the better for that which is against your wills Will he count that man to be no worldling that would fain have more of the world and cannot and that loveth God and Heaven no better than the rich Nay that will sin for a shilling when great ones do it for greater summs who can be more unfit for Heaven than he that loveth a life of labour and want and misery better Alas it is but little that the greatest worldlings have for their salvation But poor worldlings sell it for less than they and therefore do despise it more Direct 4. Let the true nature and aggravations of the sin of worldliness be still in your eye to make it odious to you As for instance 1. It is true and odious Idolatry Ephes 5.5 Col. 3.5 To have God for our God indeed is to love him as our God and to delight in him and be ruled by him Who then is an Idolater if he be not one who loveth the world and delighteth in it more than in God or esteemeth it fitter to be the matter of his delight and is ruled by it and seeketh it more Isa 55.1 2 3. 2. It is a blasphemous contempt of God and Heaven to prefer a dung hill world before him To set more by the provisions and pleasures of the flesh than by all the blessedness of Heaven It is called prophaneness in Esau to sell his birth-right for one morsel Heb. 12.16 What prophaneness is it then to say as worldlings hearts and lives do The satisfying of my flesh and fansie for a time is better than God and the Joyes of Heaven to all eternity 3. It is a sin of Interest and not only of Passion and therefore it possesseth the very Heart and Love which is the principal faculty of the soul and that which God most reserveth for himself No actual sin which is but little loved is so heinous and morâ—al as that which is most loved Because these do must exclude the Love of God Some other sins may do more hurt to others but this is worst to the sinner himself We justly pitty poor Heathenish Idolaters and pray for their conversion and I would we did it more But do not you not think that our hypocrite-worldlings do love their riches and their honours and pleasures better than the poor Heathens love their Idols They bow the knee to a creature and you entertain it in your heart 4. It is a sin of deliberation and contrivance which is much worse than a surprize by a sudden temptation You plot how you may compass your voluptuous covetous and ambitious ends Therefore it is a sin that standeth at the furthest distance from Repentance and is both voluntary and a settled habit 5. It is a continued sin Men be not alwaies lying though they be never so great lyars nor alwaies stealing if they be the most notorious thieves nor alwaies swearing if they be the profanest swearers But a worldly mind is alwaies worldly He is alwaies committing his Idolatry with the world and alwaies denying his Love to God 6. It is not only a sin about the means to a right end as mischosen waies of Religion may be but it is a sin against the End it self and a mischusing of a false pernicious End And so it is the perverting not only of one particular action but even of the bent and course of mens lives And consequently a mis-spending all their time 7. It is a perverting of Gods creatures to a use clean contrary to that which they are given us for and an unthankful turning of all his gifts against himself He gave us his creatures to lead us to him and by their loveliness to shew his greater loveliness and to taste in their sweetness the greater sweetness of his love And will you use them to turn your affections from him 8. It it a great debasing of the soul it self to fill that noble Spirit with nothing but dirt and smoak which was made to know and love its God 9. It is an irrational vice and signifieth not only much unbelief of the unseen things which should take up the soul but also a sottish inconsiderateness of the vanity and brevity of the things below It is an unmanning our selves and hiring out our reason to be a servant to our fleshly lusts 10. Lastly It is a pregnant multiplying sin which bringeth forth abundance more The love of money is the root of all evil 1 Tim. 6.9 10. Therefore Direct 5. Let the mischievous effects of this sin be still befâ—re your eyes As for instance 1. It keepeth the heart strange to God and Heaven The Love of God and of the world are contrary 1 John 2.15 3.17 James 4.4 So is an earthly and a heavenly conversation Phil. 3.18 19 20. And the laying up a treasure in Heaven and upon Earth Matth. 6.19 20 21. And the living after the flesh and after the Spirit Rom. 8.1 5 6 13. Ye cannot possibly serve God and Mammon nor travel two contrary waies at once nor have two contrary felicities till you have two hearts
by a Redeemer as we must do They had their too great selfishness Phil. 2.21 They had their pusillanimity and fears of men as Peter and the Apostles They had their sinful controversies as Paul and Barnabas and sinful separations in complyance with the censorious as Peter and Barnabas had Gal. 2.16 17. They had their carnal sidings factions and divisions in the Church 1 Cor. 1. 3. Many a time have they been put to groan O wretched man who shall deliver me from this body of death Rom. 7 c. 11. They had as difficult duties to go through as any of us They were put upon as many tears and troubles watchings and travels fastings and self-denyal as the most laborious and suffering Christians now 12. They had as long delayes of the accomplishment of their desires as any of us 13. And lastly they past through death it self as we must do They lay gasping on their beds of languâ—shing and death broke in upon every part and they underwent that separation of soul and body as we must do Their flesh was turned to rottenness and dust and laid out of the sight of man in darkness and remaineth to this day as common earth All this the Saints in Heaven have undergone This was their case a while ago who are now in glory And this was not only the case of some few but of thousands and millions and that in the most of these particulars even of all that are gone before us unto blessedness It is not we that are tempted first that are persecuted or afflicted first that have sinned first that must die first but all this host hath broke the Ice and are safely past through this Red Sea and are now triumphing in felicity with their Saviour Direct 3. Let Faith next look back and see by what way these Saints have come to this felicity I mean by what means they did overcome and win the Crown And briefly you will find 1. That they all came to Heaven by the Mediation the Sacrifice the meritorious Righteousness of a Redeemer Jesus Christ either as promised or as incarnate none of them were justified by the works of the Law or the Covenant of Innocency 2. That their common way was by Faith Repentance Love and Obedience Not by works of Righteousness which we have done but according to his mercy he saved us by the washing of Regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Ghost which he shed oâ— us abundently through Christ Titus 3.5 Even by the triple Image of the Divine perfections Power Love and Wisdom 2 Tim. 1.7 They lived soberly righteously and godly in the world and were zealous of good works looking for the blessed hope which they have attained Titus 2.14 15. Knowing that Repentance towards God and Faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ are the summ of saving doctrine and duty Acts 20.21 And that to fear God and keep his Commandments is the whole duty of man Eccles 12.13 And that the end of the Commandment is Charity out of a pure heart and a good conscience and of faith unfeigned 1 Tim. 1.5 and that Love is the fulfilling of the Law 3. They studied the Word of God or such means of knowing him as God afforded them in order to the attaining and maintaining of these graces Psal 1.2 and sought the Lord with all their hearts while he might be found and called upon him while he was near Isa 55.6 10. And did not presumptuously neglect Gods helps and despise his Word while they trusted for his mercy 4. They lived in a continual conflict against the temptations of the Devil the world and the flesh and in the main did conquer as well as strive They made it their work to mortifie those fleshly lusts which others make it their interest and work to please Gal. 5.17.21 22. 6.14 5. They suffered afflictions and persecutions patiently and being reviled they did not revile They loved their enemies and blest those that curse them and prayed for those that despitefully used and persecuted them Matth. 5.44 45. 1 Cor. 4.11 12 13. 2 Cor. 1.6 7. Heb. 11. They would not accept of deliverance from imprisonment torments and death upon sinning terms 6. They endured to the end and did not fall off and forsake the Covenant of their God Rev. 2. 3. 7. Lastly They did all this by the motive of their hopes of Heaven and by a confidence in the promises of it and in a heavenly mind and conversation as knowing that they did not labour or suffer in vain 1 Cor. 15.58 2 Cor. 4.17 1 Tim. 4.10 Rom. 8.18 Matth. 5.11 2 Thes 1.6 7. Heb. 12.2 This was the way by which the Saints have gone to Heaven the only true successful way Direct 4. Consider next what helps and means God gave them for this work and compare our own with them and see whether ours be not as great 1. We have the same natural capacity as they we are intellectual free agents made for another world and capable of all that they attained There is no difference in our natural faculties 2. We have the same God to shew us mercy 1 Cor. 12.5 There are divers operations but the same God Ephes 4.4 5. There is one God one Lord c. even the Lord over all good to all that call upon him Rom. 10.12 The same mercy which called them and waited on them calleth us even a God who hath no respect of persons but in every Nation he that feareth him and worketh righteousness is accepted of him Acts 10.37 Though he be a free benefactor he is a righteous Judge and he is good to all and the Father of every member of his Son 3. They had the same Saviour as we have the same sacrifice for their sins the same Teacher and the same example the same intercessor with the Father For though there be divers administrations there is the same Lord 1 Cor. 12.5 Ephes 4.4 For other foundation can no man lay than him who is the chief corner stone 1 Cor. 3.11 They all did eat of the same spiritual meat and drank of the same rock as we do which is Christ 1 Cor. 10.3 4. It was the reproach of Christ which Moses in Egypt esteemed better than their treasures Heb. 11.26 The same Physician of souls who hath us in cure did cure all them The same Captain who is conducting us to salvation is he that saved them The same Prince of the Covenant and Lord of life who conquered death and all their enemies hath conquered them for us and is preparing us for life with them They had no greater or better High Priest and Mediator with God than we have 4. They had the same Rule to walk by and the same way to go as all we have Gal. 1.7 8. 6.16 Phil. 3.14 15. The same Gospel and Word of God in the main though under various promulgations and administrations Those before the flood were under the Covenant of the promised seed
Nos quoque floruimus sed flos fuit ille caducus Flammaque de stipula nostra brevisque fuit Ov. VERA EFFIGIES RICHARDI BAXTERI MIN IES CH IN OP ET PATA FIDEI SPEI ET CHARITATIS An. 1670. AETAT SUAE 55º Farewell vaine World as thou hast been to me Dust and a Shadow those I leave with thee The vnseen Vitall Substance I committ The Leaves Fruit are dropt for soyle and Seed Heaven's heirs to generate to heale and feed Them also thou wilt flatter and molest But shalt not keep from Everlasting Rest THE LIFE OF FAITH THE Life of Faith In Three PARTS The First is a Sermon on Heb. 11.1 formerly preached before His Majesty and published by his Command with another added for the fuller Application The Second is Instructions for confirming Believers in the Christian Faith The Third is Directions how to live by Faith or how to exercise it upon all occasions By RICHARD BAXTER 2 Cor. 5.7 For we walk by faith not by sight 2 Cor. 4.16 17 18. For which cause we faint not but though our outward man parish yet the inward man is renewed day by day For our light affliction which is but for a moment worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory While we look not at the things which are seen but at the things which are not seen For the things which are seen are temporal but the things which are not seen are eternal Heb. 12.27 By faith he forsook Egypt not fearing the wrath of the King for he endured as seeing him that is invisible LONDON Printed by R. W. for Nevill Simmons at the three Crowns over against Holbern Conduit 1670. To the Worshipfull my much honoured Friend Richard Hampden of Hampden Esquire and the Lady Laetitia his Wife Grace and Peace be multiplied SIR YOur Names stand here in the front of this Treatise on a double account First that the custom of Writers having given me such an advantage I may tell the present and future Ages how much I love and honour your Piety Sobriety Integrity and Moderation in an Age when such Vertues grow into contempt or into lifeless Images and Names And how much I am my self your debter for the manifold expressions of your love and that in an Age when 〈…〉 the superioâ—â—â—â—culties is ouâ— of fâ—shion and towards such as I is grown â— crime Sincerity and 〈◊〉 are things that shall be honourable when Hypocrisie and Malice have done their worst But they are most conspicuous and refulgent in times of â—â—rity and when the shame of their contraries seâ— them off Secondly To signifie my Love and Gratitude by the best 〈◊〉 which I can make which is by tendering to you and to your family the surest Directions for the most noble manly life on earth in order to a blessed life in Heaven Though you have proceeded well you 〈…〉 need of help so great a 〈…〉 for skilfull counsel and 〈…〉 and industrious and unweaâ—â—◠〈…〉 And your hopeful children may 〈…〉 to learn this excellenâ— Life from these Directions for the love of your prefixed Names And how happy will they bâ— if they converse with God 〈…〉 are wallowing in the 〈◊〉 of 〈…〉 When the dead heaâ—ted sinner thinketh not of 〈…〉 be dragg'd out of 〈◊〉 paâ—pered corruptible flesh to divinie 〈◊〉 and â—â—â—with the beginnings of endless 〈◊〉 to the world where they might have found everlasting rest what joy will then be the portion of mortified and patient Believers whosâ— Treasâ—â—â—s and Hearts and Conversatiâ—â— in Heâ—ven are now the foretaste of their possession as the Spirit of Christ which causeth this iâ— the seâ—â— of God and the pledge and earnest of their inheritance If a 〈◊〉 pleasing life in a dark distracted 〈◊〉 world were better than a life with God and Angels methinks yet they that know they cannot have what they 〈◊〉 should make sue of what they may haâ—â— And they that cannot keep what they 〈◊〉 should learn to 〈◊〉 what 〈◊〉 may keep Wonderfull stupidity â—hâ—t they 〈…〉 dead bodies 〈…〉 grave is as common a work 〈…〉 children into the world and that this life is but the road to another and that all men are posting on to their 〈…〉 should think no more considerately whither so many thousand souls do go that daily shoot the gulf of death and return no more to the world which one they called their home That men will have no house or home but the ship which carryeth them so swiftly to eternity and spend their time in furnishing a dwelling on such a tempestuous Sea where winds and tide are hasting them to the shore and even to the end are contriving to live where they are daily dying and care for no â—â—bitation but on horse-back That almost all men die much wiser than they lived and yet the certain foreknowledge of death will not serve to make them more seasonably and more safely wiâ—e Wonderful that it should be possible for a man awake to believe that he must shortly be gone from earth and enter into an unchangeable endless life and yet not bend the thoughts of his soul and the labours of his life to secure his true and 〈…〉 Adam hath given sin the 〈…〉 grace and madness the priority to wisdom and our wisdom health and safety must now come after by the way of recovery and cure The first born of lapsed man was a malignant persecuting Cain The first born of believing Abraham was a persecutor of him that was born after the Spirit 1 John 3.12 Gal. 4.29 And the first born of this Isaac himself was a profane Esau that for one morsel sold his birth-right Heb. 12.16 And naturally we are all the off-spring of this profaneness and have not acquaintance enough with God and with healthful holiness and with the everlasting heavenly Glory to make us cordially preferr it before a forbidden cup or morsel or a game at foolery or a filthy lust or before the wind of a gilded fools acclamation and applause or the cap and counterfeit subjection of the multitude But the fortunae non tua turba ut Ov. quos sportula fecit amici ut Juv. who will serve mens lusts and be their servants and humble attendants to damnation are regarded more than the God the Saviour the Sanctifier to whom these perfidious rebels were once devoted That you and yours may live that more wise and delightful life which consisteth in the daily sight of Heaven by a Living Faith which worketh by Love in constant Obedience is the principal end of this publick appellation That what is here written for the use of all may be first and specially useful to you and yours whom I am so much bound to love and honour even to your safe and comfortable life and death and to your future joy and glory which is the great desire of Your obliged Servant RICH. BAXTER Feb. 4. 1669. THE PREFACE Reader 1. IF it offend thee that the Parts of
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Assent p. 540. l. 21. put out and p. 582. l. 11. r. friends THE Life of Faith HEBREWS 11.1 Now faith is the substance of things hoped for the evidence of things not seen THough the wicked are distinguished into Hypocrites and Vnbelievers yet Hypocrites themselves are Vnbelievers too They have no faith which they can justifie by its prevailing efficacy and works and therefore have no faith by which they can be justified Because their discovery is needful to their recovery and all our salvation depends on the sincerity of our faith I have chosen this text which is a description of faith that the opening of it may help us for the opening of our hearts and resolving the great question on which our endless life depends To be a Christian and to be a Believer in Christ are words in Scripture of the same signification If you have not faith you are not Christians This faith hath various offices and objects By it we are justified sanctified and saved We are justified not by believing that we are justified but by believing that we may be justified Not by receiving justification immediately but by receiving Christ for our justification not by meer accepting the pardon in it self but by first receiving him that procureth and bestoweth it on his terms Not by meer accepting health but by receiving the Physician and his remedies for health Faith is the practical Believing in God as promising and Christ as procuring justification and salvation Or the practical belief and acceptance of life as procured by Christ and promised by God in the Gospel The everlasting fruition of God in Heaven is the ultimate object No man believeth in Christ as Christ that believeth not in him for eternal life As faith looks at Christ as the necessary means and at the divine benignity as the fountain and at his veracity as the foundation or formal object and at the promise as the true signification of his will so doth it ultimately look at our salvation begun on earth and perfected in Heaven as the end for which it looketh at the rest No wonder therefore if the holy Ghost here speaking of the Dignity and Power of faith do principally insist on that part of its description which is taken from this final object As Christ himself in his Humiliation was rejected by the Gentiles and a stumbling stone to the Jews despised and not esteemed Isa 53.2 3. having made himself of no reputation Phil. 2 7. So faith in Christ as incarnate and crucified is despised and counted foolishness by the world But as Christ in his glory and the glory of believers shall force them to an aweful admiration so faith it self as exercised on that glory is more glorious in the eyes of all Believers are never so reverenced by the world as when they converse in Heaven and the Spirit of Glory resteth on them 1 Pet. 4.14 How faith by beholding this glorious end doth move all the faculties of the soul and subdue the inclinations and interests of the flesh and make the greatest sufferings tollerable is the work of the holy Ghost in this Chapter to demonstrate which beginning with the description proceeds to the proof by a cloud of witnesses There are two sorts of persons and imployments in the world for whom there are two contrary ends hereafter One sort subject their reason to their sensual or carnal interest The other subject their senses to their reason cleared conducted and elevated by faith Things present or possessed are the riches of the sensual and the byas of their hearts and lives Things absent but hoped for are the riches of Believers which actuate their chief endeavours This is the sense of the text which I have read to you which setting things hoped for in opposition to things present and things unseen to those that sense doth apprehend assureth us that faith which fixeth on the first doth give to its object a subsistence presence and evidence that is it seeth that which supplieth the want of presence and visibility The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is that which quoad effectum is equal to a present subsistence And the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the evidence is somewhat which quoad effectum is equal to visibility As if he had said Though the glory promised to Believers and expected by them be yet to come and only hoped for and be yet unseen and only believed yet is the sound believer as truly affected with it and acted by its attractive force as if it were present and before his eyes as a man is by an inheritance or estate in reversion or out of sight if well secured and not only by that which is present to his view The Syriack Interpreter instead of a Translation gives us a true exposition of the words viz. Faith is a certainty of those things that are in hope as if they did already actually exist and the revelation of
soul He cuts out the heart with a Hae sedes livoris erant jam pascua vermis you next tread on his interred corps that 's honoured but with a Hic jacet Here lyeth the body of such a one And if he have the honour to be magnified by fame or history it 's a fool-trap to ensnare the living but easeth not the soul in Hell And shall we envy men such a happiness as this what if they be able to command mens lives and to hurt those that they hate for a little while Is this a matter of honour or of delight A Pestilence is more honourable if destroying be an honour The Devil is more powerful if God permit him to do men hurt than the greatest Tyrant in the world And yet I hope you envy not his happiness nor are ambitious to partake of it If Witches were not kin to Devils they would never sell their souls for a power to do hurt And how little do tyrannical worldlings consider that under a mask of Government and Honour they do the same Let the world then rejoyce while we lament and weep Our sorrow shall be speedily turned into joy and our joy shall no man â—hen take from us Joh. 16.20 22. Envy not a dying man â—he happiness of a feather-bed or a merry dream You think â—t hard in them to deny you the liberties and comforts of this â—â—fe though you look for Heaven And will you be more cruel than the ungodly Will you envy the trifling commodities or delights of earth to those that are like to have no more but to lye in Hell when the sport is ended It is unreasonable impatience that cannot endure to see them in silks and gallantry a few daies that must be so extreamly miserable for ever Your crums and leavings and overplus is their All. And will you grudge them this much In this you are unlike your heavenly Father that doth good to the just and unjust would you change cases with them would you change the fruit of your adversity for the fruit of their prosperity Affliction maketh you somewhat more calm and wise and sober and cautelous and considerate and preventeth as well as cureth sin Prosperity makes them through their abuse inconsiderate rash insensible foolish proud unperswadable And the turning away of the simple slayeth them and the prosperity of fools destroyeth them Prov. 1.32 It 's long since Lazarus's sores were healed and his wants relieved and long since Dives feast was ended O let me rather be afflicted than rejected and be a door-keeper in the house of God than dwell in the tents of wickedness and rather be under the rod than turned out of doors Look with a serious Faith upon Eternity and then make a great matter of enjoyments or sufferings here if you can Great joyes and sorrows forbid men to complain of the biting of a Flea Thunder-claps drown a whispering voice O what unbelief our impatiency and disquietness in sufferings do discover Is this living by faith and conversing in another world and taking God for All and the world for Nothing What! make such a do of pâ—verty imprisonment injuries disgrace with Heaven and Hell before our eyes The Lord vouchsafe me that condition in which I shall be nearest to himself and have most communion with Heaven be it what it will be for the things of earth These are the desires to which I 'le stand To thank God for the fruit of past afflictions as the most necessary mercies of our lives as some of us have daily cause and at the same time to be impatient under present afflictions or inordinately afraid of those to come is an irrational as well as unbelieving incongruity Are we derided slandered abused by the ungodly If we repine that we have enemies and must fight we repine that we are Christs souldires and that is that we are Christians Quomodo potest imperator militum suorum virtutem probare nisi habuerit hostem saith Lactantius Enemies of God do not use to fight professedly against himself but against his souldiers Non qui contra ipsum Deum pugnent sed contra milites ejus inquit idem If the remnants of goodness had not been a derision among the Heathens themselves in the more sober sort a Heathen would not have said Nondum faelix es si non te turba deriferit si beatus vis esse cogita hoc primum contemnere ab aliis contemni Sen. Thou art not yet happy if the rabble deride thee not If thou wilt be blessed learn first to contemn this and to be contemned of others No body will deride or persecute us in Heaven 5. Improve your talents and opportunities in your callings as Believers especially you that are Governours God is the original and end of Government The highest are but his ministers Rom. 13.6 This world is but the way unto another Things seen are for things unseen And Government is to order them to that end Especially by terrifying evil doers and by promoting holiness in the earth The Moral as well as the Natural motion of inferiour agents must proceed from the influence of the superiour The spring and the end of every action truly good are out of fight Where these are not discerned or are ignorantly or maliciously opposed the action is vitiated and tendeth to confusion and ruine God is the end of all holy actions and carnal self is the end of sin If God and self are infinitely distinct you may easily see that the actions materialâ—y the same that are intended to such distant ends must needs be very distant Nothing but saving Faith and Holiness can conquer selfishness in the lowest of the people But where the flesh hath more plentiful provision and self is accommodated with the fullest contents of honour and pleasure that the world affords how difficult a work then is self-denyal And the reign of the flesh is contrary to the reign of Christ Where the flesh and visible things bear sway the enemy of Christ bears sway The carnal mind is enmity against God for it is not subject to his Law nor can be Rom. 8.7 And how Christs enemies will receive his Laws and use his Messengers and regard his waies and servants the most of the world have experience to their cost The interest of the flesh being contrary to Christs interest the competition maintaineth a continual conflict The Word of God doth seem to be against them The faithful Ministers that would save them from their sins do seem to wrong them and deal too boldly with them Were it an Elijah he would be called The troubler of Israel and met with an Hast thou found me O mine enemy No measure of prudence knowledge piety innocency meekness or self-denyal will serve to appease the wrath and displeasure of this carnal enmity If it would the Apostles had escaped it or at least it would not have fallen so furiously upon Christ hâ—mself Nay these are the oyl that
work on earth And that some should do the extraordinary work in laying the foundation and leaving a certain Rule and Order to the rest and that the rest should proceed to build hereupon and that the wisest and the best of men should be the Teachers and Guides of the rest unto the end 24. And how necessary was it that our Sun in glory should continually send down his beams and influence on the earth even the Spirit of the Father to be his constant Agent here below and to plead his cause and do his work on the hearts of men and that the Apostles who were to found the Church should have that Spirit in so conspicuous a degree and for such various works of Wonder and Power as might suffice to confirm their testimony to the world And that all others as well as they to the end should have the Spirit for those works of Love and Renovation which are necessary to their own obedience and salvation 25. How wisely it is ordered that he who is our King is Lord of all and able to defend his Church and to repress his proudest enemies 26. And also that he should be our final Judge who was our Saviour and Law-giver and made and sealed that Covenant of Grace by which we must be judged That Judgement may not be over dreadful but rather desirable to his faithful servants who shall openly be justified by him before all 27. How wisely hath God ordered it that when death is naturally so terrible to man we should have a Saviour that went that way before us and was once dead but now liveth and is where we must be and hath the keyes of death and Heaven that we may boldly go forth as to his presence and to the innumerable perfected spirits of the just and may commend our souls to the hands of our Redeemer and our Head 28. As also that this should be plainly revealed and that the Scriptures are written in a method and manner fit for all even for the meanest and that Ministers be commanded to open it and apply it by translation exposition and earnest exhortation that the remedy may be suited to the nature and extent of the disease And yet that there be some depths to keep presumptuous daring wits at a distance and to humble them and to exercise our diligence 29. As also that the life of faith and holiness should have much opposition in the world that its glory and excellency might the more appear partly by the presence of its contraries and partly by its exercise and victories in its tryals and that the godly may have use for patience and fortitude and every grace and may be kept the easilier from loving the world and taught the more to desire the presence of their Lord. 30. Lastly And how wisely is it ordered that God in Heaven from whom all cometh should be the end of all his graces and our duties and that himself alone should be our home and happiness and that as we are made by him and for him so we should live with him to his praise and in his love for ever And that there as we shall have both glorified souls and bodies so both might have a suitable glory and that our glorified Redeemer might there be in part the Mediatour of our fruition as here he was the Mediatour of acquisition I have recited hastily a few of the parts of this wondrous frame to shew you that if you saw them all and that in theâ—r true order and method you might not think strange that Now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places is made known by the Church the manifold wisdom of God Ephes 2.11 which was the first part of Gods Image upon the Christian Religion which I was to shew you But besides all this the WISDOM of God is expressed in the holy Scriptures thesâ— several waies 1. In the Revelation of things past which could not be known by any mortal man As the Creation of the world and what was therein done before man himself was made Which experience it self doth help us to believe because we see exceeding great probabilities that the world was not eternal nor of any longer duration than the Scriptures mention in that no place on earth hath any true monument of ancienter original and in that humane Sciences and Arts are yet so imperfect and such important additions are made but of late 2. In the Revelation of things distant out of the reach of mans discovery So Scripture History and Prophecy do frequently speak of preparations and actions of Princes and people afar of 3. In the Revelation of the secrets of mens hearts As Elisha told Gebeâ—i what he did at a distance Christ told Nathaniel what he said and where So frequently Christ told the Jews and his Disciples what they thought and shewed that he knew the heart of man To which we may add the searching power of the Word of God which doth so notably rip up the secrets of mens corruptions and may shew all mens hearts unto themselves 4. In the Revelation of contingent things to come which is most frequent in the Prophecies and Promises of the Scripture not only in the Old Testament as Daniel c. but also in the Gospel When Christ foretelleth his death and resurrection and the usage and successes of his Apostles and promiseth them the miraculous gifts of the Spirit and foretold Peters thrice denying him and foretold the grievous destrâ—ction of Jerusalem with other such like clear predictions 5. But nothing of all these predictions doth shine so clearly to our selves as those great Promises of Christ which are fulfilled to our selves in all generations Even the Promises and Prophetical descriptions of the great work of Conversion Regeneration or Sanctification upon mens souls which is wrought in all Ages just according to the delineations of it in the world All the humblings the repentings the desires the faith the joyes the prayers and the answers of them which were foretold and was found in the first Believers are performed and given to all true Christians to this day To which may be added all the Prophecies of the extent of the Church of the conversion of the Kingdoms of the world to Christ and of the oppositions of the ungodly fort thereto and of the persecutions of the followers of Christ which are all fulfilled 6. The WISDOM of God also is clearly manifested in the concatenation or harmony of all these Revelations Not only that there is no real contradiction between them but that they all conjunctly compose one entire frame As the age of man goeth on from infancy to maturity and nature fitteth her endowments and provisions accordingly to each degree so hath the Church proceeded from its infancy and so have the Revelations of God been suited to its several times Christ who was promised to Adam and the Fathers before Moses for the first two thousand years and signified by their Sacrifices was
agreed whether its acts should be called physical properly or not Nay they cannot tell what doth individuate an act of sense whether when my eye doth at once see many words and letters of my Book every word or letter doth make as many individual acts by being so many objects And if so whether the parts of every letter also do not constitute an individual act and where we shall here stop And must all these trifles be considered in our Faith Assenting to the truths is not one Faith unless when separated from the rest and consenting to the good another act Nor is it one Faith to believe the promise and another to believe the pardon of sin and another to believe salvation and another to believe in God and another to believe in Jesus Christ nor one to believe in Christ as our Ransom and another as our Intercessor and another as our Teacher and another as our King and another to believe in the Holy Ghost c. I deny not but some one of these may be separated from the rest and being so separated may be called Faith but not the Christian Faith but only a material parcel of it which is like the limb of a man or of a tree which cut off from the rest is dead and ceaseth when separated to be a part any otherwise than Logical a part of the description The Faith which hath the promise of salvation and which you must live by hath 1. God for the Principal Revealer and his Veracity for its formal object 2. It hath Christ and Angels and Prophets and Apostles for the sub-revealers 3. It hath the Holy Ghost by the divine attesting operations before described to be the seal and the confirmer 4. It hath the same Holy Ghost for the internal exciter of it 5. It hath all truths of known divine revelation and all good of known divine donation by his Covenant to be the material general object 6. It hath the Covenant of Grace and the holy Scriptures and formerly the voice of Christ and his Apostles or any such sign of the mind of God for the instrumental efficient cause of the object in esse cognito And also the instrumental efficient of the act 7. It hath the pure Deity God himself as he is to be known and loved inceptively here and perfectly in Heaven for the final and most necessary material object 8. It hath the Lord Jesus Christ entirely in all essential to him as God and Man and as our Redeemer or Saviour as our Ransome Intercessor Teacher and Ruler for the most necessary mediate material object 9. It hath the gifts of Pardon Justification the Spirit of Sanctification or Love and all the necessary gifts of the Covenant for the material never-final objects And all this is essential to the Christian Faith even to that Fath which hath the promise of pardon and salvation And no one of these must be totally left out in the definition of it if you would not be deceived It is Heresie and not the Christian Faith if it exclude any one essential part And if it include it not it is Infidelity And indeed there is such a connexion of the objects that there is no part in truth where there is not the whole And it is impiety if any one part of the offered good that is necessary be refused It is no true Faith if it be not a true composition of all these Direct 8. There is no nearer way to know what true Faith is than truly to understand what your Baptismal Covenanting did contain In Scripture phrase to be a Disciple a Believer and a Christian is all one Acts 11.26 Acts 5.14 1 Tim. 4.12 Matth. 10.42 27.57 Luke 14.26 27 33. Acts 21.16 Joh. 9.28 And to be a Believer and to have Belief or Faith is all one and therefore to be a Christian and to have Faith is all one Christianity signifieth either our first entrance into the Christian State or our progress in it As Marriage signifieth either Matrimony or the Conjugal State continued in In the latter sense Christianity signifieth more than Faith for more than Faith is necessary to a Christian But in the former sense as Christianity signifieth but our becoming Christians by our covenanting with God so to have Faith or to be a Believer and internally to become a Christian in Scripture sense is all one and the outward covenanting is but the profession of Faith or Christianity Not that the word Faith is never taken in a narrower sense or that Christianity as it is our heart-covenant or consent containeth nothing but Faith as Faith is so taken in the narrowest sense But when Faith is taken as ordinarily in Scripture for that which is made the condition of Justification and Salvation and opposed to Heathenism Infidelity Judaism or the works of the Law it is commonly taken in this larger sense Faith is well enough described to them that understand what is implyed by the usual shorter description as that it is a believing acceptance of Christ and relying on him as our Saviour or for salvation Or a belief of pardon and the heavenly Glory as procured by the Redemption wrought by Christ and given by God in the Covenant of Grace But the reason is because all the rest is connoted and so to be understood by us as if it were exprest in words But the true and full definition of it is this The Christian Faith which is required at Baptism and then professed and hath the promise of Justification and Glorification is a true Belief of the Gospel and an acceptance of and consent unto the Covenant of Grace Particularly a believing that God is our Creatour our Owner our Ruler and our Chief Good and that Jesus Christ is God and man our Saviour our Ransoms our Teacher and our King and that the Holy Ghost is the Sanctifier of the Church of Christ And it is an understanding serious consent that this God the Father Son and Holy Ghost be my God and reconciled Father in Christ my Saviour and my Sanctifier to justifie me sanctifie me and glorifie me in the perfect knowledge of God and mutual complacence in Heaven which belief and consent wrought in me by the Word and Spirit of Christ is grounded upon the Veracity of God as the chief Revealer and upon his Love and Mercy as the Donor and upon Christ and his Apostles as the Messengers of God and upon the Gospel and specially the Covenant of Grace as the instrumental Revelation and Donation it self And upon the many signal operations of the Holy Ghost as the divine infallible attestation of their truth Learn this definition and understand it throughly and it may prove a more solid useful knowledge to have the true nature of Faith or Christianity thus methodically printed on your minds than to read over a thousand volumes in a rambling and confused way of knowledge If any quarrel at this definition because the foundation is not first
not by Faith chosen and used by us under the notion of a Mâ—diatour or Means to our first act of love and consent but is a Means to that of the Fathers chusing only but is in that first consent chosen by us for the standing means of our Justification and Glory and of all our following exercise and increase of love to God and our sanctification so that it is only the assenting act of faith and not the electing act which is the efficient cause of oâ— very first act of Love to God and of our first degree of sanctification and thus it is that Faith is called the seed and mother grace But it is not that saving Faith which is our Christianity and the condition of Justification and of Glory till it come up to a covenant-consent of heart and take in the foresaid acts of Repentance and Love to God as our God and ultimate end The observation of many written mistakes about the order of the work of grace and the ill and contentious consequents that have followed them hath made me think that this true and accurate decision of this case is not unuseful or unnecessary Direct 12. The Holy Ghost so far concurred with the eternal Word in our Redemption that he was the perfecting Operator in the Conception the Holiness the Miracles the Resurrection of Jesus Christ Of his Conception it is said Mat. 1.20 For that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost And vers 18. She was found with child of the Holy Ghost And of his holy perfection as it is said Luke 2.52 that he increased in wisdom and stature and favour with God and men meaning those positive perfections of his humane nature which were to grow up with nature it self and not the supply of any culpable or privative defects so when he was baptized the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape like a Dove upon him Luke 3.22 And Luke 4.1 it is said Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost c. Isa 11.2 And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him the Spirit of wisdom and understanding the Spirit of counsel and might the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord and shall make him quick of understanding in the fear of the Lord c. Joh. 3.34 For God giveth not the Spirit by measure to him Acts 1.2 After that he through the Holy Ghost had given commandments to the Apostles whom he had chosen Rom. 1.4 And was declared to be the Son of God with power according to the Spirit of Holiness that is the Holy Spirit by the resurrection from the dead Mat. 12.28 If I cast out Devils by the Spirit of God c. Luke 4.18 The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he hath anointed me to preach the Gospel to the poor he hath sent me to heal c. Isa 61.1 In all this you see how great the work of the Holy Spirit was upon Christ himself to fit his humane nature for the work of our redemption and actuate him in it though it was the Word only which was made flesh and dwelt among us John 1.3 Direct 13. Christ was thus filled with the Spirit to be the Head or quickening Spirit to his body and accordingly to fit each member for its peculiar office And therefore the Spirit now given is called the Spirit of Christ as communicated by him Rom. 8.9 If any man have not the Spirit of Christ the same is none of hiâ— Joh. 7.37 This spake he of the Spirit which they that believe should receive viz. it is the water of life which Christ will give them 1 Cor. 15.45 The last Adam was made a quickening Spirit Gal. 4.6 God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into our hearts whereby we cry Abba Father Phil. 1.19 Through the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ See also Ephes 1.22 23. 3.17 18 19. 2.18 22. 4.3 12 16. 1 Cor. 12 c. Direct 14. The greatest extraordinary measure of the Spirit was given by him to his Apostles and the Primitive Christians to be the seal of his own truth and power and to fit them to found the first Churches and to convince unbelievers and to deliver his will on record in the Scriptures infallibly to the Church for future times It would be tedious to cite the proofs of this they are so numerous take but a few Matth. 28.20 Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you that 's the commission Mark 16.17 And these signs shall follow them that believe c. Joh. 20.22 Receive ye the Holy Ghost c. 14.26 But the Comforter the Holy Ghost whom the Father will send in my name he will teach you all things and bring all things to your remembrance whatsoever I have said unto you Joh. 16.13 When the Spirit of Truth is come he will guide you into all Truth c. Heb. 2.4 God also bearing them witness both with signs and wâ—nders and with divers miracles and gifts of the Holy Ghost according to his own will Direct 15. And as such gifts of the Spirit was given to the Apostles as their â—ffice required so thâ—se sanctifying graces or that spiritual Life Light and Love are given by it to all true Christians which their calling and salvation doth require John 3.5 6. Except a man be born of Water and of the Spirit he cannot enter into the Kingdom of Heaven That which is born of the flâ—sh is flesh and that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit Heb. 12.14 Without holiness none shall see God Rom. 8.8 9 10 14. They that are in the flesh cannot please God But ye are not in the flesh but in the Spirit if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his See also v. 1 3 4 5 6 7 c. Titus 3.5 6 7. He saved us by the washing of Regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Ghost which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour that being justified by his grace we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life But the testimonies of thâ—s truth are more numerous than I may recite Direct 16. By all this it appeareth that the Holy Ghost is both Christs great witness objectively in the world by which it is that he is owned of God and proved to be true and also his Advocate or great Agent in the Church both to indite the Scriptures and to sanctifie souls So that no man can be a Christian indeed without these three 1. The objective witness of the Spirit to the truth of Christ 2. The Gospel taught by the Spirit in the Apostles 3. And the quickening illuminating and sanctifying work of the Spirit upon their souls Direct 17. It is therefore in these respects that we are baptizâ—d into the Name of the Holy Ghost as well as of the Father and the Son
Jesus Acts 21.13 3. In so strong a fortitude of soul as to venture and give up our selves our lives and all our comforts and hopes into the hand of Christ without any trouble or sinful fears and to pass through all difficulties and tryals in the way without any distrust or anxiety of mind These be the characters of a strong and great degree of faith And you may note how Heb. 11. describeth Faith commonly by this venturing and forsaking all upon the belief of God As in Noah's case verse 7. And in Abraham's leaving his Countrey v. 8. And in his sacrificing Isaac v. 17. And in Moses forsaking Pharaoh's Court and chusing the reproach of Christ rather than the pleasures of sin for a season v. 24 25 26. And in the Israelites venturing into the Red Sea v. 29. And in Rebab's hiding the spies which must needs be her danger in her own Countrey And in all those who by faith subdued Kingdoms wrought Righteousness obtained Promises stopped the mouths of Lions quenched the violence of fire escaped the edge of the sword out of weakness were made strong O hers were tortured not accepting deliverance that they might obtain a better resurrection and others had tryal of cruel mockings and scourgings yea moreover of bonds and imprisonments they were stoned they were sawn asunder were tempted were slain with the sword they wandered about in Sheep skins and Goat skins being destitute afflicted tormented of whom the world was not worthy They wandered in Desarts and Mountains and in Deus and Caves of the earth And in Heb. 10.32 33 c. They endured a great fight of affliction partly whilst they were made a gazing flock both by reproaches and afflictions and partly whilst they became companions of them that were so used And took joyfully the spoiling of their goods knowing in themselves that they had in Heaven a better and an enduring substance And thus the just do live by faith but if any man draw back my soul shall have no pleasure in him saith the Lord. See also Rom. 8.33 36 37 c. These are the Spirits descriptions of faith but if you will rather take a whimsical ignorant mans description who can only toss in his mouth the name of FREE GRACE and knoweth not of what he speaketh or what he affirmeth or what that name signifieth which he cheateth his own soul with instead of true Free Grace it self you must suffer the bitter fruits of your own delusion For my part I shall say thus much more to tell you why I say so much to help you to a right understanding of the nature of true Christian Faith 1. If you understand not truly what Faith is you understand not what Religion it is that you profess And so you call your selves Christians and know not what it is It seems those that said Lord we have eaten and drunken in thy presence and prophesied in thy Name did think they had been true Believers Matth. 7.21 22. 2. To erre about the nature of true Faith will engage you in abundance of other errours which will necessarily arise from that as it did them against whom James disputeth James 2.14 15 c. about Justification by Faith and by Works 3. It will damnably delude your souls about your own state and draw you to think that you have saving Faith because you have that fancy which you thought was it One comes boldly to Christ Mat. 8.19 Master I will follow thee whithersoever thou goest But when he heard The Foxes have holes and the Birds have nests but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head we hear no more of him And another came with a Good Master what shall I do to inherit eternal life Luke 18.18 as if he would have been one of Christs Disciples and have done any thing for Heaven And it 's like that he would have been a Christian if Free Grace had been as large and as little grace as some now imagine But when he heard Yet lackest thou one thing sell all that thou hast and distribute to the poor and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven Come follow me he was then very sorrowful for he was very rich Luke 18.21 22 23. Thousands cheat their souls with a conceit that they are Believers because they believe that they shall be saved by Free Grace without the faith and grace which Christ hath made necessary to salvation 4. And this will take off all those needful thoughts and means which should help you to the faith which yet you have not 5. And it will engage you in perverse disputes against that true faith which you understand not And you will think that you are contending for Free Grace and for the Faith when you are proud knowing nothing but sick or doting about questions which engender no better birth than strifes railings evil surmisings perverse disputings c. 1 Tim. 6.4 5. 6. Lastly You can scarce more dishonour the Christian Religion nor injure God and our Mediatour or harden men in Infidelity than by fathering your ill-shapen fictions on Christ and calling them the Christian or Justifying Faith Direct 29. Take not all doubts and fears of your salvation to be the proper effects and signs of unbelief Seeing that in many they arise from the misunderstanding of the meaning of Gods Promise and in more from the doubtfulness of their own qualifications rather than from any unbelief of the Promise or distrust of Christ It is ordinary with ignorant Christians to say that they cannot believe because they doubt of their own sincerity and salvation as thinking that it is the nature of true faith to believe that they themselves are justified and shall be saved and that to doubt of this is to doubt of the Promises because they doubtingly apply it Such distresses have false principles bought many to But there are two other things besides the weakness of faith which are usually the causes of all this 1. Many mistake the meaning of Christs Covenant and think that it hath no universality in it and that he died only for the Elect and promiseth pardon to none but the Elect no not on the condition of believing And therefore thinking that they can have no assurance that they are Elect they doubt of the conclusion And many of them think that the Promise extendeth not to such as they because of some sin or great unworthiness which they are guilty of And others think that they have not that Faith and Repentance which are the condition of the promise of pardon and salvation And in some of these the thing it self may be so obscure as to be indeed the matter of rational doubtfulness And in others of them the cause may be either a mistake about the true nature and signs of Faith and Repentance or else a timerous melancholy causeless suspition of themselves But which of all these soever be the cause it is something different from proper unbelief or distrust of God
saved 24. Promises to believers in sickness and at death 1 Cor. 11.32 But when we are judged we are chastened of the Lord that we should not be condemned with the world Heb. 12.6 7 8 11. For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth and scourgeth every Son whom he receiveth If ye endure chastening God dealeth with you as with Sons Shall we not be in subjection to the Father of spirits and live But he for our profit that we might be partakers of his holiness No chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous but grievous nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness to them which are exercised thereby James 5.14 Is any sick let them send for the Elders of the Church The prayer of faith shall save the sick and the Lord shall raise him up and if he have committed sins they shall be forgiven him John 11.3 He whom thou lovest is sick Psal 41.1 2 3. Blessed is the man that considereth the poor the Lord shall deliver him in time of trouble The Lord shall preserve him and keep him alive The Lord will strengthen him upon the bâ—d of languishing Thou wilt make all his bed in his sickness 2 Cor. 5.1 c. For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved we have a building of God an house not made with hands eternal in the Heavens For in this we groan earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from Heaven For we that are in us tabernacle do groan being burdened not for that we would be unclothed but clothed upon that mortality may be swallowed up of life Now he that hath wrought this for the self same thing is God who also hath given to us the earnest of the Spirit Therefore we are alwaies confident knowing that whilst we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord. For we walk by faith not by sight we are confident I say and willing rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord. Phil. 1.20 21 23 Now also Christ shall be magnified in my body whether it be by life or by death For to me to live is Christ and to die is gain I am in a strait betwixt two having a desire to depart and to be with Christ which is far better Luke 23.43 To day shalt thou be with me in Paradise Rev. 14.13 I heard a voice from Heaven saying to me write Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth yea saith the Spirit that they may rest from their labours and their works do follow them Heb. 2.14 Forasmuch as the children are partakers of flesh and blood he also himself likewise took part of the same that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death that is the Devil and deliver them who through fear of death were all their life time subject to bondage Psal 68.20 He that is our God is the God of salvation and to God the Lord belong the issues from death 2 Tim. 1.10 Who hath abolished death and hath brought life and immortality to light by the Gospel 1 Cor. 15.54 O death where is thy sting O grave where is thy victory The sting of death is sin and the strength of sin is the Law but thanks be to God which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ 25. Promises to persevering Believers of the Resurrection unto life and of Justification in Judgement and of Glorification 1 Cor. 15. throughout John 5.22 24 28 29. He that heareth my Word and believeth on him that sent me hath everlasting life and shall not come into condemnation but is passed from death to life The hour is coming in the which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice and shall come forth they that have done good to the resurrection of life and they that have done evil to the resurrection of damnation John 14.19 Because I live ye shall live also Col. 3.1 3 4. If ye be risen with Christ seek those things which are above where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God Set your affections on things above not on things on the earth For ye are dead and your life is hid with Christ in God When Christ who is our life shall appear then shall ye also appear with him in glory 2 Thes 1.10 He shall come to be glorified in his Saints and admired in all them that believe Matth. 25 34 46. Come ye blessed c. The righteous into life eternal John 12.26 If any man serve me let him follow me and where I am there shall also my servant be If my man serve me him will my Father honour John 14.1 2 3. Let not your heart be troubled In my Fathers house are many mansions I go to prepare a place for you And if I go and prepare a place for you I will come again and receive you to my self that where I am there ye may be also John· 17.24 Father I will that they also whom thou hast given me be with me where I am that they may behold the glory which thou hast given me John 2.17 GO TO MY BRETHREN and SAY VNTO THEM I ASCEND TO MY FATHER and YOVR FATHER TO MY GOD and TO YOVR GOD. 1 Cor. 6.2 3. Know ye not that the Saints shall judge the world Know ye not that we shall judge Angels Acts 3.19 Repent and be converted that your sins may be blotted out when the time of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord and he shall send Jesus Christ Luke 14.14 Thou shalt be recompensed at the resurrection of the just Let the Reader here take notice of that most important observation of Dr. Hammond that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Resurrection doth often signifie in general our living in the next world or our next state of life in the Scriptures and not the last Resurrection only unless it be called The Resurrection of the flesh or of the body for distinction or the context have before explained it otherwise By which 1 Cor. 15. and Christs answer to the Sadducees may be the better understood 26. Promises to the godly for their children supposing them to be faithful in dedicating them to God and educating them in his holy waies Exod. 20. Commandment 2d Shewing mercy to thousands in them that love me and keep my Commandments Acts 2.39 For the promise is made to you and to your children and to all that are afar off c. Psal 37.26 His seed is blessed 1 Cor. 7.14 Else were your children unclean but now are they holy Matth. 23.37 O Jerusalem Jerusalem how oft would I have gathered thy children together even as a Hen gathereth hee chickens under her wings and ye would not Rom. 11.11 Through their fall salvation is come to the Gentiles 16 17 18 c. shew that they were broken off by unbelief and we are graffed in and are holy as they were Matth.
true Suppose that the Law do pardon a fellon if he can read as a Clerk and one that is a fellon be in doubt whether his reading will serve or not this is not to deny belief to the pardoning act of the Law Suppose one promise a yearly stipend to all that are of full one and twenty years of age in the Town or Country To doubt of my age is not to doubt of the truth of the promise Object But do not Protestant Divines conclude against the Papists that saving Faith must be a particular application of Christ and the Promise to ourselves and not only a general assent Answ It is very true and the closer that application is the better But the application which all sound Divines in this point require as necessary in saving Faith is neither an assurance nor perswasion that your own sins are already pardoned or that they ever will be But it is 1. A belief that the Promise of pardon to all believers is so universal as that it includeth you as well as others and promiseth and offereth you pardon and life if you will believe in Christ 2. And it is a consent or willingness of heart that Christ be yours and you be his to the ends proposed in the Gospel 3. And it is a practical Trust in his sufficiency as chusing him for the only Mediatour resolving to venture your souls and all your hopes upon him Though yet through your ignorance of your selves you may think that you do not this thing in sincerity which indeed you do yea and much fear through melancholy or temptation that you never shall do it and consequently never shall be saved He that doubteth of his own salvation not because he doubteth of the truth of the Gospel but because he doubteth of the sincerity of his own heart may be mistaken in himself but is not therefore an unbeliever as is said before If you would know whether you believe the Promises truly answer me these particular questions 1. Do you believe that God hath promised that all true Believers shall be saved 2. Do you believe that if you are or shall be a true Believer you shall be saved 3. Do you chuse or desire God as your only happiness and end to be enjoyed in Heaven and Christ as the only Mediatour to procure it and his holy Spirit as his Agent in your souls to sanctifie you fully to the Image of God Are you truly willing that thus it should be And if God be willing will not you refuse it 4. Do you turn away from all other waies of felicity and chuse this alone to venture all your hopes upon and resolve to seek for none but this and to venture all on God and Christ though yet you are uncertain of your sincerity and salvation why this makes up true saving faith 5. And I would further ask you Do you fear damnation and Gods wrath or not If not what troubleth you and why complain you If you do tell me then whether you do believe Gods threatning that he that believeth not shall be damned or not If you do not what maketh you fear damnation Do you fear it and not believe that there is any such thing If you do believe it how can you chuse but believe also that every true Believer shall be saved Is God true in his Threatnings and not in his Promises This must force you plainly to confess that you do believe Gods Promises but only doubt of your own sincerity and consequently of your salvation which is more a weakness in your hope than in your faith or rather chiefly in your acquaintance with your self Direct 8. Yet still dwell most upon Gods Promises in the exercise of love desire and thankfulness and use all your fear about the threatnings but in a second place to further and not to hinder the work of love Direct 9. Let faith interpret all Gods Judgements meerly by the light of the threatnings of his Word and do not gather any conclusions from them which the Word affordeth not or alloweth not Gods Judgements may be dangerously misunderstood CHAP. VII How to exercise Faith about Pardon of sin and Justification THE practice of Faith about our Justification is hindered by so many unhappy controversies and heresies that what to do with them here in our way is not very easie to determine Should I omit the mention of them I leave most that I write for either under that disease it self or the danger of it which may frustrate all the rest which I must say For the errours hereabout are swarming in most quarters of the Land and are like to come to the caâ—s of most that are studious of these matters so that an antidote to most and a vomit to the rest is become a matter of necessity to the success of all our practical Directions And yet many cannot endure to be troubled with difficulties who are slothful and must have nothing set before them that will cost them much study and many peaceable Christians love not any thing that soundeth like controversie or strife As others that are Sons of contention relish nothing else But averseness must give place to necessity If the Leprosie arise the Priest must search it and the Physician must do his best to cure it notwithstanding their natural averseness to it Though I may be as averse to write against errours as the Reader is to read what I write we must both blame that which causeth the necessity but not therefore deny our necessary duty But yet I will so far gratifie them that need no more as to put the more practical Directions first that they may pass by the heap of errours â—â—ter if their own judgements prevail not against their unwillingness Direct 1. Vnderstand well what need you have of pardon of sin and Justification by reason of your guilt and of Gods Law and Justice and the everlasting punishment which is legally your due 1. It must be a sensible awakening practical knowledge of our own great necessity which must teach us to value Christ as a Saviour and to come to him in that empty sick and weary plight as is necessary in those who will make use of him for their supply and cure Matth. 9.12 11.28 29. A superficial speculative knowledge of our sin and misery will prepare us but for a superficial opinionative faith in Christ as the remedy But a true sense of both will teach us to think of him as a Saviour indeed 2. Original sin and actual the wickedness both of the heart and life even all our particular sins of omission and commission and all their circumstances and aggravations are the first reason of our great necessity of pardon And therefore it cannot but be a duty to lay them to heart as particularly as we can to make that necessity and Christs redemption the better understood Acts 2.37 Acts 2â— 8 9 c. 3. The wrath of God and the miseries of this life
find it so after giving to the poor or visiting the sick or providing for your family What then must you do You must lament the carnality of your minds and beg of God for such grace as may fit you for your duties And not cast off your duty because you are so bad but labour to be better and to do it better And 2. You must not judge of the benefit only by present feeling But if God hath promised a blessing to you believe it and you shall certainly meet with it at the last Many a one thinks that to forsake all bodily labour and to do nothing but the duties of Religion doth benefit them more at the present when perhaps in a little time the sickness of their bodies or the melancholy destraction of their minds doth lose them more than they had gotten and make them unfit for almost any duty at all And many a one that think their spiritual benefit is interrupted by their callings do find all Gods Promises fulfilled at last to their satisfaction Quest 7. But is it not lawful to set ones self only to Religion as John Baptist Anna c. did Answ It is a duty to be as religious as you can But it is also a duty to labour in your calling and do all the good you can to others The aged and impotent that cannot labour in a calling are excused from it And they that give up themselves to the Magistracy Ministry Physick c. must meddle with no lower things which would hinder them in the higher But no man can be excused from doing all the good he can to others by any pretences of looking to his soul For he can no way more surely further his salvation nor cahe hinder it more than by sinful negligence and sloth Quest 8. But was not labour and toil a curse upon Adam after his sin and any man that can may labour to escape a curse Answ 1. Adam in innocency was set to dress and keep the Garden 2. The curse was in the toil and the frustration of his labour 3. And even that is such a curse as God will not take off or remit Quest 9. Doth not Paul say to servants If ye can be free use it rather Answ True But he saith not If you can be idle use it rather A free man may work as hard as a bondman Quest 10. May not a man that hath several callings before him chuse the easiest Answ Not meerly or chiefly because it is easie but he must chuse the most profitable to the common good be it easie or hard if it be such as he can undergo Yet he may avoid such a calling as by trying his body indisposeth him to spiritual things or by taking up all his time will deprive him of convenient leisure for things spiritual But he that only to ease his flesh doth put by more profitable employments because they will cost him labour doth serve his flesh and cast off his duty to his God II. The signs of wealthy-idleness are these 1. When men think it unnecessary for them to labour constantly and diligently because they are rich and can live without it or because they are great and it is below them The confutation of which errour I gave you before and shall give you more of it anon The poor in spirit think not a laborious life below them 2. When men have time to spare This is a most evident mark of Idleness For God hath given us no time in vain but hath given us full work for all our time They that have time to play away needlesly to sleep away needlesly to prate away needlesly do tell the world that Sodom's Idleness is their sin Especially poor souls who are yet unsanctified and are strangers to a renewed heart and life and are utterly unfit to die O what abundance of important work have these to do And can they be idle while all this lyeth undone Indeed if they are in despair of being saved it is no wonder And one would think by their lives that they did despair For surely a man so neer another world that must be in Heaven or Hell for ever would never live idly if he had any good hope that his endeavours should not be all in vain The poor in spirit have no time to spare Labour is their life Eternity is still before their eyes Necessity is upon them and they know the wo that followeth Idleness Repentance for sin and negligence past is a constant spur to future diligence And their work is sweet and incomparably more pleasant to them than Idleness If the Devil be so diligent because he knoweth that his time is short Rev. 12.12 it is a shame to them that are not so who call themselves the servants of the Lord. 3. When mens labour hath but the time that 's due to Recreation and Recreation and Idleness hath the great part of time that 's due to labour The labour of the idle Sodomite is like the Religion of the reserved Hypocrite It is but the leavings of the flesh or somewhat that cometh in upon the by But God is not unconstant in his mercies unto us He is still preserving us and maintaining us The Angels are still guarding us The faithful Ministers of Christ are constant in teaching us and loth that Satan should hinder them and save their labour Faithful Magistrates also watch continually to be a terrour to evil doers and a praise to them that do well as the Ministers of God for our good And can a short and idle kind of labouring then excuse us Christ said It was his meat to do his Fathers will when he was endeavouring mans salvation John 4 34. And that he must do the work of him that sent him while it was day John 9.4 And shall Idleness be excused in us even in us who must be judged according to our works Rev. 22.12 Mark 13.34 by him that hath commanded every man his work Yea when we are redeemed and purified to be zealous of good works Titus 2.14 and are his workmanship created to good works in Christ which God hath ordained that we should walk in them Ephes 2.10 4. When men make a great matter of all their labour and of that which to a diligent man is small The sluggard hath his thorn hedge and a Lion in the way Prov. 22.13 26.13 15 16. But the diligent say when they have done their best We are unprofitable servants Nothing is so weary to them as unprofitable idleness except hurtful wickedness They think still O how short is time and how much work is yet undone And as every faithful Minister in his calling is never so well pleased as when he doth most for the good of souls so is it with every faithful Christian in his place A Candle if it be not burnt is lost and good for nothing 5. The idle Sodomite hath a mind which followeth the affections of his body And as soon as
3. We beseech you brethren by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ that ye be not soon shaken in mind or troubled neither by Spirit nor by word nor by letter as from us as that the day of Christ is at hand Let no man deceive you You see here that Spirit Word and Scripture may be pretended for an untruth Matth. 4. Satan often saith It is written 2 Cor. 11.12 13 14 15. False Apostles and deceitful workers may transform themselves into the Apostles of Christ and Ministers of Righteousness and no marvel for Satan himself is transformed into an Angel of light 1 John 4.1 Beloved believe not every Spirit but try the Spirits whether they be of God Gal. 1.7 8. If we or an Angel from Heaven preach any other Gospel to you let him be accursed Quest But how then shall I know when it is the Spirit which putteth any thing into my mind Answ 1. The matter it self must be tryed whether it agree with the sacred Scripture and must be proved true by the Word of God 2. The end to which that truth is brought must be proved to be just and good For Satan pleadeth truthâ— to sinful ends 3. The application of them to your own case must be such as will hold tryal and it must be proved by sound argument that indeed they do thus and thus belong to you For Gods Spirit will not belye you nor make you better or worse than you are no more than he will belye the Scriptures Object But is it not the same Spirit which spake to the Apostles which speaketh to us If they were to believe him immediately so must we and seeing the Spirit is above the Scripture we must try the Scriptures by the Spirit and not the Spirit by the Scriptures Answ Alas how pittifully ignorance beweildreth men 1. It is the same Spirit which was in the Apostles and is in the weakest Christian But he worketh not in the same degree He inspired them to infallibility being promised to lead them into all truth and to bring all things which Christ had spoken to their remembrance and he enabled them to prove this by manifold miracles Doth he do all this by you or had you the same promises 2. The same Spirit in them was given to one end and to you for another To them it was given to cause them by his inspiration to deliver all that Christ had taught them and to leave it on record to all generations as his infallible Word and Law to be the Rule of doctrine and practice to the end of the world But to you the same Spirit is given to cause you to understand and love and obey this Law which is already written and not to write or know another 3. The Spirit indited the Scriptures before you were born and we are sure that that is the Word of God and we are sure that Gods Spirit contradicteth not it self Therefore your after-pretended revelations must be tryed by the certain ancient Rule which had the seal of miracles which yours hath not Obj. But how shall I know what application to make of Scripture to my self but by the teaching of the Spirit of God Answ But you must not take every thought and suggestion or remembrance to be the Spirits application Gods Spirit teacheth men by the light of sound evidence which may be proved and wil hold good in tryal He teacheth you by exciteing you to rational studies and argumentation and by blessing you in such sober use of Gods means But he doth not teach you to know your state by the bare remembring of a text Direct 9. Take heed also of misunderstanding what is the witness of the Spirit that we are Gods children Many think it is like some voice or suggestion or inspiration within them saying Thou art the Child of God And so many Christians languish in terrours that feel no such perswading Spirit in them And many Hypocrites are deluded by the perswasions of their own imaginations But in Scripture the word witness is oft taken for evidence or an objective testimony And the Spirits being a witness and being a seal an earnest a pledge a white stone a new name c. are all of the like signification And the meaning is By this we know that we are the children of God or that he abideth in us by the Spirit which he hath given us 1 John 3.10.24 4.13 And if any one have not the Spirit of Christ the same is none of his Rom. 8.9 As if he should say have you the Spirit of Christ or have you not if you have that is a seal an earnest a pledge of Gods Love and of your heavenly inheritance and a certain evidence or witness that you are his children Gal. 4.6 He that loveth God as his Father in Christ and is sanctified to God hath the Spirit Shew this Love and this Sanctification and you produce the true witness that you are the heirs of life Holiness and Heavenliness and Love is the witness seal and earnest and not chiefly an inward perswasion that we are Gods children 2. Yet this much more the Spirit doth when it hath sanctified us and given us the witness or evidence in our selves 1 John 5.10 11. He also helpeth us to see and know that grace which he giveth and actuateth in us 3. And also to conclude from that evidence that we are Gods children And also to feel the inward comfort of that conclusion But all this he doth by these means in a discursive or rational way and by blessing such reasoning to our comfort 4. Also he comforteth the soul in another way distinct from the way of concluding from evidence and that is by exciting the Love of God and his praises in us which are of themselves delighting acts But of this anon Direct 10. Take heed of Heretical Seducers who use to fish in troubled waters and to fall in with such perplexed consciences to perswade them that all the cause of their trouble is their opinions and unsound Religion and not in them and that the only way to comfort is to change their Religion and to come over unto them No person fitter for a Quaker a Papist or any Sectary to work upon than a troubled mind For such are like the ignorant Country people in their sickness who will hearken to any one who putteth them in hope and promiseth them ease and most confidently tells them that he can cure them and saith I was just in your case and such or such a thing cured me so will the Formalist and the Fanatick the Papist and the Quaker say I was just in your condition I was troubled and could get no peace of conscience no joy in the Holy Ghost but was alwaies held in fears and doubting till I changed my Religion and ever since that I have been well and O what joyes I have to boast of And if it be an unsound Hypocrite that is thus tempted perhaps God may
them as to all others or as to the most Direct 9. Love is our spiritual health and Selfishness is our sickness sin and death When we fell from the Love of God to our selves we fell also from the Love of others to our selves The individuate creature was contracted in himself and all together set upon Propriety and forgot his relations to God and man And when grace destroyeth this selfish privateness of spirit it setteth us again in love with God and man together and the better any man is the more publick spirit he is of and the less dâ—fference he maketh between his neighbours interest and his own when God and his interest make not a difference And this is to Love our neighbour as our selves that is without the vice of partial selfishness not setting up our own interest against his but equally measuring both by Gods and referring them thereunto Levit. 19.18 34. Matth. 19.19 Gal. 15.4 Direct 10. Remember that loving others as our selves is our own interest and benefit as well as our duty And a notable instance it is how much our duty is our own interest and good and how merciful God is in his strictest Laws As the Love of God is Heaven it self and sinners that love him not do damn themselves and put themselves from Heaven and happiness and to pardon them is to sanctifie them even so it is an unspeakable loss and misery which sinners draw upon themselves by not loving their neighbours as themselves but only in a subordination to themselves and for their proper private ends I pray you mark but these few particular instances 1. If I love my neighbour as my self my very love is my delight and ease The form of Love consisteth in complacency or pleasedness and therefore it must needs be pleasant to every one that useth it However bad Love hath bitter fruits And whenever wrath or envy or hatred comes instead of Love it is my sickness I feel my self diseased by it 2. If I love others others will love me They are scarce free to do otherwise You may almost constrain any man to love you if you love him heartily and shew it plainly and were within his view to make him see it All men love a loving nature but especially if they be loved by such themselves 3. If I love my neighbour as my self to do good to him will be as easie and pleasant as to my self I can ride and run and labour contentedly for my self I can sloop to the most sordid employment for my self And so I should as easily do for others Whereas want of Love doth make all tedious that I do and maketh my duty a continual burden and too often tempts me to omit it Love made both Christ and his Apostles to do so much for souls with ease and pleasure which else they could not have undergone John 15.13.9 2 Cor. 12.15 Ephes 3.17 5.2 Col. 2.2 4. If I love my neighbour as my self I can as easily suffer any thing from him as from my self I can easily bear that in my self as to sight or smell the loathsomest sores or ulcers which others cannot bear I am easily brought to forgive my self and to forbear self-hurting and self-revenge and so should I do to others if I thus loved them And then how easie would my life be among all the injuries of the world 5. If I loved my neighbour as my self if my flesh did want my mind which is my self could never be in want Because all that my neighbours have is mine as to my comfort and content My house is homely but my neighbours is comely and convenient and to my mind that is as comfortable as if it were my own My Land is small but my neighbours is large my grounds are barren but my neighbours fruitful my corn is bad but his proves good my cattel die or prosper not but his do well I am low and despicable and no man careth for me but others are Lords and Princes and honourable and if I love them as my self their corn their cattel their houses and lands their Kingdoms and honours are as much my comfort as if they were my own I know these are Paradoxes to dapraved selfish nature but thus it would be if Love were perfect and thus it is in that measure that we love And should that duty be taken for a burden which as to my comfort maketh all the wealth and honour and Kingdoms of others to be my own Obj. If you love your neighbours as your selves you must mourn with them that mourn and all the calamities and sorrows of the world must be yours which will overcome your joyes Ans 1. I am not to sorrow as much as they do sorrow but as much as they rationally ought to do And men are not to think that a loving correction which worketh for their good and salvation is worse than the snares of prosperity The brother of high degree must rejoyce when he is made low as well as the brother of low degree must rejoyce when he is exalted Jam 19.10 And why should that be my sorrow which is his benefit and should be his joy If Paul and Silas sing in the stocks why should not I sing with them Patience and rejoycing are the duty of all Believers in affliction 2. The mercies and happiness of every one that feareth God is far more than his misery Therefore his joy and gratitude should be more than his sorrows and complaints If a mans tooth do ach and all the rest of his body be well should not he and I be more thankful for the health of all the rest than troubled for a tooth A Believer hath alwaies the Spirit of God and a part in Christ and the pardon of sin and a right to Heaven And then how much greater should his joy be than his sorrows and mine also on his behalf 3. The Goodness and Love of God is manifested to the world more abundantly than his justice and severity We know of no afflicted Saints but on this spot of earth And we know of no damned ones but Devils and wicked men But we know that the worlds above us are incomparably more vast than this and that the glory of the celestial Spirits is far greater than our sufferings and sorrows here Therefore our joy which Love procureth should be a thousand-fold greater than our sorrows 4. And as for the wicked as the consequent Will of God layeth by compassion so consequently considering them as the obstinate final refusers of grace they are not those neighbours whom we are bound to love as our selves For they are enemies to God and deprived of his Image and therefore our obligations to mourn for them are abated as Samuels for Saul when he knew that God had rejected him 1 Sam. 15.35 16.1 And we are obliged to rejoyce in the declarations of the Justice and Holiness of God and the universal benefit which redoundeth from his Judgments Rev. 18.20
sufferers it will cause us to possess our souls in patience and to let it have its perfect work 8. It will much overcome the fears of death It is no small abatement of them that Cicero and such honest Heathens had to think of the thousands of their worthiest Ancestors and that they were to go the common way of all mankind But how much more may it encourage a Believer to think that he is not only to go the way of all the world through the gate of mortality but the way also which all Gods Saints have gone save Henoch and Elias who are now in Heaven Thus died all the Prophets and the holy men of God yea Jesus Christ himself before us that death might be conquered when it seemed to have conquered Heb. 2.14 9. It will do much to raise us from hypocritical reserves and temporizings and from lukewarmness and resting in low degrees When our conversation is with the holy ones above we shall have upon our minds an ambition to attain to their degrees and to do Gods will on Earth as it is done in Heaven It will much encline us to the highest and noblest sort of duty which the spirits of the just made perfect do perform He that converseth only with his own sad tempted sinful heart and with tempted faulty mourning Christians may learn to confess and mourn and weep and pray But he that also converseth with glorified spirits will be so rapt up with their heavenly melody that he will learn and long to love God more fervently to praise him more chearfully and to give him thanks more abundantly for his mercies Heaven-work is learnt by a heavenly mind in the use of a heavenly conversation 10. And to look much at our Brethren that are now in glory will also fill our lives with pleasures and make our Religion our continual joy and will help us to a foretaste of Heaven on Earth For we shall as it were take our selves to be almost with then and their melodies will be our delight and love to them will make their joyes to be our own And though it is the sight of God and our Mediatour by faith which must be our chiefest hope and joy yet while we are here men in flesh yea more when we have laid by flesh and blood the presence of all the blessed spirits and heavenly host will be a great though subordinate part of our heavenly felicity and delight Direct 6. When you have gone thus far consider what obligations lie upon you to converse by Faith with your Brethren in Heaven and to look up frequently to their state and work 1. Your necessary Love to God requireth it For as your Love to him must be shewed by your loving his Image in your Brethren so it requireth you to love them most that are likest God or else you love them not for his likeness And it requireth you to love them most whom God loveth most and that is those that are likest him and nearest him And he that loveth God in his creatures and loveth any one truly for God must love the Angels and perfected Spirits best because they love him best and are nearest him and likest to him and are also most beloved by him 2. The common nature of Love and Humanity requireth it For it requireth us to love that best which is best as is said But the blessed ones in Heaven are better than any here on Earth and therefore should be better loved 3. The nature of our Love to the Saints requireth it For if we love them as Saints and Godly we shall love those most that are most holy and that is the blessed ones above And if we love them most we shall certainly mind them and converse with them by Faith and not be voluntary strangers to them 4. It is part of that heavenly conversation which is commended to us Phil. 3.20 21. When it is said that our conversation is in Heaven it signifieth that our Burgeship is there and our interest and great concerns are there and our dwelling is there and our trading and thriving business is there and for it and our friends and fellow-citizens and those that we daily trade and converse with in love and familiarity are there even as our God and our Head and our Inheritance is there He never knew a heavenly conversation that pretending there to know God alone hath no converse with his holy ones that attend him and doth not live as a member of their society in the City of God that doth not with some delight behold their holiness unity and order c. 5. The honouring of God and our Redeemer doth require it that we daily converse with the Saints in Heaven Because it is in them that God is seen in the greatest glory of his Love and it is in them that the Power and Efficacy and Love of our dear Redeemer most appeareth You judge now of the Father by his Children and of the Physician by his Patients and of the Builder by the House and of the Captain by his Victories And if you see no better children of God than such childish crying feeble froward diseased burdensome ones as we are you will rob him of the chief of this his honour And if you look at none of the Patients of our Saviour but such lame and languid pained groaning diseased half-cured ones as we you will rob him of the glory of his skill and cures And if you look but to such an imperfect broken fabrick as the Church on Earth you will dishonour the Builder And if you look to no other Victories of Christ and his Spirit but what is made in this confused dark and bedlam world you will be tempted to dishonour his conduct and his conquests But if you will look to his Children in Heaven who are perfected in his Love and Likeness and to Christs Patients which are there perfectly cured and to his Building in the heavenly unity and glory and to all his Victories as there compleat then you will give him the glory which is his due Rev. 21. 22. 2 Thes 1.10 11 12. 6. So also you will dishonour Religion and the Church if you converse not with the Saints above For the reasons last given For you will judge of the Church and of Religion by such imperfect things as here you see where men turn Religion to the service of their worldly interests and ends and fight for ambition faction tyranny usurpation and worldly lusts under the sacred names of Religion and the Church and for the pretended Love of Christ and one another do tear the Church into shreds and worry and hunt and devour one another You will be tempted to be Infidels if you do not here converse with the sincere humble holy charitable Christians and look up to Heaven to perfect souls And then you will see a Church that is truly amiable holy unanimous and glorious in perfect Love 7. If you look not up to
those in Heaven you will quite misunderstand the providences of God in the prosperity of the wicked and the sufferings of the Saints and the changes that are usually made on Earth You will begin to think that sin is safe and the wicked are not so miserable as they are nor godly diligence so profitable a thing you will not know the reasons of providence unless you can see unto the end And the ultimate end is not on Earth But go into the Sanctuary and take the prospective of the promise and look to the blessed souls with Christ and all the riddle will be expounded to you and you will be reconciled to all the providences of God You are strange to truth if you are strange to the triumphing Saints in Heaven 8. The progressive nature of your faith and godliness requireth it You are travelling to Heaven where the blessed are and are nearer to them than when you first believed And the nearer you are to them the more you should mind them and by Faith and Love be familiar with them And when you are almost at home you should be even ready to embrace your friends at the meeting 9. Your Relation to the blessed Spirits doth require it and your Christian and ingenuous disposition towards them 1. Are they not such as were latety near you in the flesh some of them your dearest companions and friends and should you causlesly forget them 2. Are they not not now your friends who love you better than they could do on earth Doubtless their knowledge and memory is not grown less to forget you if once they knew you but they are like to know much more And their Goodness being increased their Love is increased and not diminished 3. And you belong to the same Society with them even to the Body or Church of Christ whose nobler part above and inferiour part on Earth do make up the whole Is it not expresly said Heb. 12.22 23. that we are come unto Mount Zion and unto the City of the Living God the heavenly Jerusalem and to an innumerable company of Angels and to the general Assembly and Church of the first born which are written in Heaven that is to those which as the first born are most noble and possessed of the heavenly inheritance and are there entered inhabitants already And to God the Judge of all and to the spirits of just men made perfect and to Jesus the Mediatour of the New Covenant c. And what is it to come to them but to come or be joyned to that Society of which they are the nobler part Will you be Fellow-Citizens with them and have no communion with them nor seriously remember them How can you remember God himself and not remember those that are his Courtiers and nearer to him than you are And how can you think of Christ and not think of his Body Or how can you think of his Body and forget the most excellent and honourable parts Or how can you remember your selves and forget your chiefest Friends and Lovers 10. The very nature of the Life of Faith requireth us to look much to the departed Saints The Life of Faith consisteth in our conversing with the things unseen as the life of sight or sense is our conversing with things seen If you love and think on none of the Saints but those that are within your sight you live so far but as by sight Though Faith live not upon Saints properly but on God and our Redeemer yet it liveth and converseth with the Saints If it work aright it will as it were set you among them and make you live on Earth as if you heard their songs of praise and saw their Thrones of Glory 11. The present necessities of your condition in this world do require you to look much to the Saints above as is before shewed in the benefits recited We live here among such persons and things as are objects of continual sorrow to us And have we not need of some more comfortable company If you had nothing at home but chiding and discontent and poverty you will be willing of so much recreation as to be invited to feast sometimes where there is plenty pleasure and content If you lived among groaning sick or melancholy persons in an Hospital you would be glad sometimes of merryer company a little to refresh your minds Alas what a deal of sin do we daily see or hear of and what a deal of sorrow is round about us What are our News-books filled with or the daily reports which come to our ears but sin and sorrow vanity and vexation what is the employment of most of the world what is it that Court and Country City and all Societies ring of but vanity and vexation sin and sorrow And is not a walk in Heaven with better company a pleasure desirable in such a case What grief must needs dwell on the minds of sober Catholick Christians to see the Church on earth so torn so worryed so reproached as it is throughout the earth so torn in pieces by its zealous ignorant self-conceited Pastors and Members so worryed by its open and secret enemies even by the usurping tyrannizing Wolves in Sheeps cloathing who spare not the flock Matth. 7.15 10.16 Acts 20.29 so reproached by the world of Infidels and Heathens who fly from it as from an infected City and say Christians are drunkards and deceivers and lyars they are all in pieces among themselves they revile and persecute one another we will therefore be no Christians How sad is it to see the one part of the world professing Christianity to make it odious by their wickedness and their divisions and the rest of the world abhorring it because these have made it seem odious to them How sad is it to hear all Christians speak of love and Concord Unity and Peace while few of them know the way of Peace or how to hold their own hands from tearing the Church into more pieces while these peaceable words are in their mouths To see the Pastors and People as if it were for Unity and Peace contriving the ruine of all that are not of their Party and Way and studying how to extirpate one another and multiplyjng snares and stumbling blocks as necessary means to heal the Church How sad is it to see so great a faction as the Roman Kingdom for it is more properly a Kingdom than a Church to lay the necessary Vnity and Communion of all the Churches upon so many forgeries of their own upon the supposed certainty of the falseness of all mens senses in the point of Transubstantiation and upon the subjection of the Church to an universal usurpes and to keep up ignorance lest knowledge by reading the translated Scriptures and such Books as do detect their frauds should mart their markets and spoil their trade To see their Prelates take their own domination wealth and greatness to be really the prosperity of the Church and
very brief I. For the first Case before sickness cometh Direct 1. Be sure that you settle your Belief of the life to come that your Faith may not fail Direct 2. Expect Death as seriously all your life as wise Believers are obliged to do That is as men that are alwaies sure to die as men that are never sure to live a moment longer as men that are sure that life will be short and death is not far off and as foreseeing what it is to die of what eternal consequence and what will then appear to be necessary to your safe and to your comfortable change Direct 3. All your daies habituate your souls to believing sweet enlarged thoughts of the infinite Goodness and Love of God to whom you go and with whom you hope to live for ever Direct 4. Dwell in the studies of a crucified and glorified Christ who is the way the truth and life who must be your hope in life and death Ephes 3.17 18 19. Direct 5. Keep clear your evidences of your right to Christ and all his Promises by keeping grace or the heavenly nature in life activity and increase 2 Pet. 1.10 2 Cor. 13.5 John 15 1 c. 1 John 3. Direct 6. Consider often of the possession which your nature in Christ hath already of Heaven and how highly it is advanced and how near his relation is and how dear his love is to his weakest members upon earth And that as souls in Heaven have an inclination and desire to communicate their own felicity to their bodies so hath Christ as to his body the Church John 17.24 Ephes 5.25 27 c. Direct 7. Look to the Heavenly Host and those who have lived before you or with you in the flesh to make the thoughts of Heaven the more familiar to you as in the former chapter Direct 8. Improve all Afflictions yea the plague of sin it self to make you weary of this world and willing to be gone to Christ Rom. 7. Direct 9. Be much with God in Prayer Meditation and other heart-raising duties that you may not by strangeness to him be dismayed Direct 10. Live not in the guilt of any wilful sin nor in any slothful neglect of duty lest guilt breed terrour and make you fly from God your Judge But especially study to redeem your time and to do all the good you can iâ— the world and to live as totally devoted to God as conscious that you live to no carnal interest but desire to serve him with all you have and your consciences testimony of this will abundantly take off the terrours of death whatever any erroneous ones may say to the contrary for fear of being guilty of conceits of merit A fruitful life is a great preparative for death 2 Tim. 4.8 2 Cor. 1.12 c. Direct 11. Fetch from Heaven the comforts which you live upon through all your life And when you have truly learned to live more upon the comforts of believed glory than upon any pictures or hopes below then you will be able to die in and for those comforts Matth. 6.20 21. Col. 3.1 4. Phil. 3.20 21. 1 Thes 4.18 Phil. 1.21 23. Direct 12. The Knowledge and Love of God in Christ is the beginning or foretaste of Heaven John 17.3 1 Cor. 13. c. and the foretastes are excellent preparations Therefore still remember that all that you do in the world for the getting and exercising the true Knowledge and Love of God in Christ so much you do for the foretastes and best preparations for Heaven 1 Cor. 8.3 If any man love God the same is known of him with approbation and love II. In the time of sickness and near to death Direct 1. Let your first work when God seemeth to call you away be to renew a diligent search of your hearts and lives and to see lest in either of them there should be any sin which is not truly hated and repented of Though this must be done through all your lives yet with an extraordinary care and diligence when you are like to come so speedily to your tryal For it is only to Repenting Believers that the Covenant of Grace doth pardon sin And the impenitent have no right to pardon Though for ordinary failings which are forgotten and for sins which you are willing to know and remember but cannot a general Repentance will be accepted as when you pray God to shew you the sins which you see not and to forgive those which you cannot remember or find out Yet those which you know must be particularly repented of And Repentance is a remembring duty and will hardly forget any great and heinous sins which are known to be sins indeed If your Repentance be then to begin alas it is high time to begin it And though if it be sound it will be saving that is If it be such as would settle you in a truly godly life if you should recover yet you will hardly have any assurance of salvation or such comfort in it as is desirable to dying man Because you will very hardly know whether it come from true conversion and contain a Love to God and Godliness or whether it be only the fruit of fear and would come to nothing if you were restored to health But he that hath truly repented heretofore and lived in uprightness towards God and man and hath nothing to do but to discern his sincerity and to exercise a special Repentance for some late or special sins or to do that again which he hath done unfeignedly before will much more easily get the assurance and comfort of his forgiveness and salvation Direct 2. Renew your sense of the Vanity of this world Which at such a time one would think should be very easie to do When you see that you are near an end of all your pleasures and have had all except a grave to rot in that ever this world willd o for you may you not easily then see whether the godly or the worldly be the wiser and the happier man And what it is that the life of man should be spent in seeeking after Matth. 6.33 Isa 55.1 2 3. Eccles 7.3 4 5 6. Direct 3. Remember what Flesh is and what it hath been to you that you may not be too loth to lay it down Of the dust it was made and to the dust it must return Corruption is your Father and the Worm is your Mother and your Sister Job 17.14 Drought and beat consume the Snow-waters so doth the grave those which have sinned The womb shall forget him the Worm shall feed sweetly on him Job 24.20 Flesh and blood shall not inherit the Kingdom of God but this mortal must put on immortality by being made a spiritual body 1 Cor. 15. And this flesh hath cost you so dear to carry it about so much care and labour to provide it food to repair that which daily vanisheth away and so many weary painful hours and so many fearful
thoughts of dying that methinks you should quietly resign it to the grave which hath been so long calling for it Especially considering what it hath done by the temptations of a vitiated appetite and sense against your souls into how many sins it hath drawn you and what grief and shame it hath procured you and what assurance and heavenly pleasures it hath hindered and how many repentings and purposes and promises it hath frustrated or undone Methinks we should conceive that we have long enough dwelt in such an habitation Direct 4. Foresee by Faith the resurrection of the body when it shall be raised a spiritual body unto Glory and shall be no more an enemy to the soul Direct 5. Renew your familiarity with the blessed ones above Remember that the great Army of God the souls of the just from Adam till now are all got safe through this Red Sea and are triumphing in Heaven already and that it is but a few straglers in the end of the world that are left behind And which part then should you desire to be with And remember how ready those Angels which rejoyced at your conversion are to be your Convoy unto Christ Luke 16.23 Direct 6. But especially think with greatest confidence and delight that Jesus your Head is entred into the Heavens before you and is making intercession for you and is preparing you a place and loveth your company and will not lose it You shall find him ready to receive your souls and present them spotless unto God as the fruit of his mediation He will have you be with him to behold his glory and none shall take you out of his hands Let his Love therefore draw up your desires and stablish your hearts in confidence and rest Direct 7. Remember that all that are living must come after you and how quickly their turn will come and would you wish to be exempt from death alone which the whole world below must needs submit to Direct 8. Think still of the Resurrection of Christ your Head that you may see that death is a conquered thing and what a pledge you have of a life to come Direct 9. Dwell still in the believing fore thoughts of the blessedness of the life to which you go as it is your personal perfection and the perfect Love and fruition of God with his perfect joyous praise Remember still what it is to see and know the Lord and all things else in him which are fit for us to know And labour to revive your Love to God and then you revive your desires and preparations Direct 10. Give up your selves wholly to the Will of God and think how much better it is for upright Souls to be in Gods hand than in your own The Will of God is the first and last the Original and End of all the creatures Besides the Will of Infinite Goodness there is no final Rest for humane souls But mans will is the Alpha and Omega the beginning or first efficient and the ultimate end of all obliquity and sin Be bold then and thankful in your approach to God remembring how much more safe and comfortable it is to be for life and death at Gods disposal than our own Bâ—sides these read the Directions against the fear of death in my Book of Self-denyal and what is said in my Saints Rest and other the Treatises before mentioned CHAP. XXVIII How by Faith to look aright to the Coming of Jesus Christ in Glory BEcause I have said so much of this also in my Saints Rest and in many other Treatises I will now pass it over with these brief Directions Direct 1. Delude not your souls nor corrupt your faith and hope by placing Christs Kingdom in things too low or that are utterly uncertain Think not so carnally of the second coming of Christ as the Jews did of the first who looked for an earthly Kingdom and despised the spiritual and heavenly And make not the unknown time or other circumstances of his coming to be to you as the certain and necessary things lest you do as many of those called Millenaries or Fifth-Monarchy men among us who have turned the doctrine of Christian hope into an outragious fury to bring Christ down before his time and to make themselves Rulers in the world that they might presently reign under the name of the Reign of Christ and have by seditious rebellious railing at Christs Ministers and hating those that are not of their mind done much to promote the Kingdom of Satan while they cryed up nothing but the Kingdom of Christ Direct 2. Do all that you can in this day of grace to promote Christs present Kingdom in the world and that will prove your best preparation for his glorious coming To that end labour with all your might to set up Life and Light and Love abhorring Hypocrisie Ignorance and Vncharitableness turn not Religion into a ceremony carkass or dead Imagery or Form Nor yet into Darkness Errour or a humane wandering distracting maze Nor into selfish proud censorious faction Build not Christs Kingdom as the Devil would do by hypocritical dead shews or by putting out his Lights or by schism division hatred and strife Read James 3. Direct 3. Yet leave not out of your faith and hope any certain part of Christs glorious Kingdom We know that we shall for ever be with the Lord and in the presence of the Father in heavenly glory and withall that we shall be in the New Jerusalem and that there shall be a new Heaven and a new Earth in which shall dwell righteousness and that we shall judge the Angels and the world And if we know not the circumstances of all these parts let not therefore any of them be denyed 1 Thes 4.11 2 Cor. 5.1 3 8. Rev. 20. 22. 2 Pet. 3.13 Direct 4. Think what a day of Glory it will be to Jesus Christ Matth. 25.31 O how different from his state of humiliation He will not come again to be despised spit on buffeted blasphemed and crucified Pilate and Herod must be arraigned at his bar it is the marriage-day of the Lamb a day appointed for his glory Rev. 21 22. Direct 5. Think what a day of honour it will be to God the Father how his Truth will be vindicated his Love and Justice gloriously demonstrated Matth. 25. 2 Thes 1.8 9. Direct 6. Think what a day it will be to all the children of God to see their Lord when he purposely cometh to be admired and glorified in them 2 Thes 1.11 12. To see him in whom they have believed whom they loved and longed for 2 Pet. 3.11 12 13. 1 Pet. 1.8 To see him who is their dearest Head and Lord who will justifie them before all the world and sentence them to life eternal To see the day in which they must receive the end of all their faith and hope their prayers labours and patience to the full 1 Pet. 1.8 9. Rev. 2 3.