have Heaven with all the Glory and royalties thereof continually in our Eye before us Can any Man having fixed his Eyes upon and expecting an Eternal reward of Glory in Heaven indulge himself in the dead and powerless performance of holy duties not â—â—bouring to be carried on in the Work of the Lord with a mighty violence and holy activity of Spirit That Man is certainly unworthy the Glory of Heaven who thinks it not well worth his utmost diligence and labour of Love on Earth (a) Non enim dormientibus provenit regnum coelorum sed in Dei mandatis laborantibus Leo Serm. 2. de Epiphan pag. 25. The Kingdom of Heaven is prepared not for loyterers but for labourers Not for those that stand idle all the Day in Gods Vineyard but for those that make hast to run the Way of his Commandments * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clem. Alex. This Kingdom though not meritable by the endeavours of any mortal but the free gift of God yet is never to be taken but by an holy Storm Nor must any Man ever think to come there that is not willing to gain it in the sweat of his brows How then should this fill our Hearts with great thoughts and our Hands with all opportunities sending us forth to meet all advantages and engaging us to use all possible diligence in Heavens way And can you be content to lose Heaven rather than Labour for it To be shut our of the Paradise of God for ever rather than force your selves into it by an holy violence through the strait Gate Can you do too much for a Crown of Glory or expend more strength in the service of God than what the recompence of reward will make amends for Oh believe it Christians you can never put your time your strength your diligence to better usury than by laying forth all in the service of God! There is not a prayer not a sigh not a tear not the least struggle of the Spirit against the Flesh herein that shall ever be lost (b) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ignat. Epist ad Polyc. But as your diligence for Christ doth abound in the work of the Lord so the reward of Eternal Life by Christ shall much more abound unto you Your weak â—â—â—eavours shall be crowned with strong consolationâ— For your temporal obedience on earth you shall receive the recompence of Eternal Glory in Heaven And for your labour of love here you shall rest for ever hereafter in the sweet and delicious embraces of your best beloved the dear Lord Jesus whom to see without end will be endless happiness Oh then what diligence in the service of God what labour in the work of the Lord what exactness in all our Duties can be sufficient for that God who hath prepared such transcendently glorious and Soul-raping felicity for those that faithfully serve him Hast thou Christian such a Crown and yet run no faster Hast thou such an eternal Triumph and yet fight the Battels of the Lord with no more courage and activity Hast thou such a blessed and transcendently glorious Reward and yet no more diligent zealous and abounding in the Work of the Lord Oh take a prospect by the Eye of Faith of the Land of Promise view the Glory observe the royalties take notice of the many choyce immunities of that Heavenly Canaan let the recompence of Eternal Life be always in your Eye and then forbear to be fervent in spirit when serving the Lord if you can Their labour their Zeal their diligence for God should never be small to whom he vouchsafes a prospect of so transcendently great and glorious a Reward The endeavours of a Christian for God should always bear some proportion with what encouragements he receives from God Having therefore so clear a sight of what God hath layd up for us with himself in Heaven we should never think we can do enough for God on earth So long as God holds out a Crown of Glory we should never withhold our labour our pains our diligence in a way of duty Thou art unworthy Christian the least glympse of Heavens happiness if such a sight do not presently transform thee into 〈◊〉 incarnate Seraphim making thee burn with Heavenly Zeal in the service of God like Coles of Juniper as willing to undergo the greatest labour for so glorious a recompence Let us therefore with all intention of mind with all vigour of Soul with all due preparation of Heart run the way of God's Commandments remembring it is all for the life of our own Souls and that the recompence of Eternal Glory is still before us as the reward of all our Christian endeavours 7 WALK Heavenly-mindedly not loving the World nor the things of the World but wholy setting your Hearts upon things above In this case if any where your Eye should affect your Hearts so that the sight which God affords you of an eternal Reward in Heaven may attract and draw up your affections thither wholly divorcing them from the Love of all Creature-enjoyments The Lapwing is made an Emblem of infelicity by some because having a little Coronet upon her head she yet feeds upon the worst of excrements Well you that have a Crown of Glory though not already upon your head yet in your Eye take heed that you be not such Enemies to your own Happiness as to feed with delight upon the sordid enjoyments of this present World Themistocles that gallant Athenian Captain bid his Friend take up those Bracelets which he espied on the ground for saith he thou art not †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Plut. Themist Themistocles implying that it was below a Person of his Place and Renown to be affected with such Vanities So Christians let the Worlds Friends stoop down and embrace her Profits Honours and outward Accomodations it 's below you that have Heaven in your Eye to be taken with them 'T is a thing unbecoming all you whose Reward is laid up in the highest Heavens to stoop so far below your selves as to lay out your affections upon Earth and earthly enjoyments If Alexander would not exercise at the Olympicks as thinking such Pedantick recreations too far below him (i) Nos contemnere malumus quà m continere opes innocentiam magis cupimus magis patientiam flagitamus malumus nos bonos esse quà m prodigos Min. Foel Oct. 118. how much more should a Christian scorn having Heaven and Glory in his Eye to be found like one of the base Fellows eagerly pursuing the lying Vanities of a dunghil World 'T is storiâ—â—â—â—â—one Tigranes that coming to redeem his Father and Friends with his Wife who were all taken Prisoners by Cyrus he was asked in particular what ransom he would give for his Wife To which he readily answered that he would purchase her Liberty with his own Life But prevailing upon easier terms as they returned every one commended Cyrus for a goodly Person and Tigranes would needs know
'T is fictioned by the Poets in their Mythology of Prometheus that he did work and fashion the Bodies of Men out of Clay but he was fain to steal Fire from Heaven for the informing and quickning of them with living Souls (a) Psal 139.1 When the Body is curiously formed and admirably organized in the lower Parts of the Earth yet still it would remain a lifeless and unspirited piece of Clay did not God animate and quicken it with a living Soul with a celestial Spark lighted by his own Breath from Heaven THE Body of Man is but a Flower springing out of the Earth that will quickly wither and return to its Dust but his Soul hath Immortality written upon it it s a Bud of Eternity that can never be blasted nor wither away into nothing The Body indeed is nothing but a Compound of Death and Mortality it will quickly crumble away into dust and rottenness but the Soul having no Principles of Death and Corruption bound up in it will run a Line parallel to aâ—l Eternity it can never be confined by time but will for ever be launching forth in the boundless Ocean of an endless Duration †Matth. 10.28 The Body is obnoxious to the stroke of Death and by the Hand of Violence may before its time be matriculated amongst those that sleep in the Dust but the Soul being an immaterial Substance is above that fatal blow and hath from the spirituality of its own Nature everlasting impregnable security against every Hand of Violence written upon it so that Death itself is not able to touch the Life of the Soul THE Soul therefore being thus Divine in its Original and Eternal in its Being and Duration there is no Man unless he will renounce his own Understanding and apostatize from his own essence but must acknowledge it a point of the most important and masculine reason in all the World to consult the Salvation of our Immortal Souls providing above all things for their Eternal Welfare Should we prefer the Casket before the Jewel a frail Mansion of Mortality before an heavenly Inhabitant or the dark Lanthorn of the Body before the Soul that Divine Lamp which if fed by the Oyl of Grace would always shine forth with most radiant dazling beams of Brightness The excellency of our Souls is so transcendently Great and Glorious that it justly lays claim to our principal care and because they will never be raked up with our Bodies in the cold Embers of Death why therefore hath the Lord made it the great end of our Lives to work out Salvation for them giving diligence to make them meet through Grace for everlasting Mansions of Glory in the Kingdom of Heaven But how can we thus take care of them or design their Eternal Happiness as the great end of our Lives in case we may not have respect to the recompence of the reward seeking Life and Eternal Glory by patient continuance in well-doing to Crown them withal Can the Salvation of our Souls be the object of our principal care next to Gods own Glory when out of a pretended Zeal for that we would seem altogether careless and unsolicitous about the saving of our own Souls How can we say we make salvation the great end of our lives endeavouring that our Souls may be happy when we hold it unlawful to bend and level all our desires for the hitting of that fair mark Believe it Christians they that would perswade you 't is unlawful to have respect in our obedience to Heaven and Glory do in effect go about to argue your Souls into the careless neglect of their own everlasting welfare But can you be regardless of your own Salvation Can you sleight the great end of your lives and turn your back upon your own happiness Can you indeed neglect your immortal Souls that must either be happy or miserable either imparadised Souls in Heaven or damned Spirits in Hell to all eternity Do you know what Salvation is how everlastingly blessed those Souls will be that may approach the presence of their God that may see his Face that may rest in his eternal embraces that may enter into the joy of their Lord and drink freely of those Rivers of pleasure which are at his right hand for evermore Oh then make not light of so great Salvation but give all diligence to get an interest therein for your immortal Souls To make sure of eternal happiness was the great errand upon which God sent us into the World oh therefore take heed that you do not leave it upon uncertainties seeking after the Kingdom of God and the righteousness thereof as if you were loth to find it 10 WE may lawfully have respect in our obedience to the recompence of the reward because the very nature and proper genius of true Grace is to make a blessed divorce betwixt the world and the heart wherein it is resident and so to carry out the heart in strong desires and unsatisfiable breathings after Heaven and Glory True Grace is an Heaven-born Spark and therefore it doth naturally ascend upward aspiring after Heaven and Glory as its proper region As all the Lines meet in the Center and as all the Rivers do run into the Sea uniting themselves in the vast Ocean so all the desires of a gracious Soul they meet in Heaven uniting all their forces in one continued and insatiate anhâ—lation after fulness of Communion with God in Glory The Sun though seen in the Water yet hath his Tabernacle fixed in Heaven (a) Phil. 3.20 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Macar Hom. 17. so though a Christian hath his commoration upon Earth yet his Conversation his Trade his Commerce is daily in Heaven the place of his Eternal Abode The Men of this World are ever inveloping themselves in thick Clay they are not soaring Eagles but crawling Muck-worms but now all those that are truly gracious they are Men of another Spirit they live in the highest Region and are compared to Eagles in regard of their Heavenly-mindedness (b) Isa 40.31 Life enables Men to lift up their Body from the Earth and to tread upon it with their Feet (c) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Macar Homil. 16. Thus whoever have the Life of Grace begun in them they tread upon all earthly Enjoyments and are carried upon the Wing of desire quite above all sublunary Comforts into Heaven itself The heart that is seasoned with saving Grace is restless till it come to be fixed in a sure State of Glory and Happiness just like the Needle that is touched with a Load-stone upon which there is nothing but unquiet agitations and tremblings till it be firmly fixed and settle immovably in the North Point We read of Noah's Dove that she found no place whereupon to rest the sole of her Foot but only in the Ark so the People of God they find no place but in Heaven whereupon to rest themselves and therefore all their breathings
enough we have Heaven in our eye and a Crown of Life lies before us What though you have but little in hand yet so long as you have Heaven in hope and a clear prospect of Eternal Glory in your eye why should you not be content and sit down satisfied Whatever Christians your conditions be in this present Life yet you may say with holy David considering that glorious recompence of Reward which God allows you to have an eye to in Heaven's way the lines are fallen to me in pleasant places yea I have a goodly Inheritance If as Solomon saith it be such a pleasant thing for the eyes to behold the Sun and that which would give them content if with any thing they could be satisfied how much more should you count it pleasant to behold by the Eye of Faith the Sun of Righteousness to behold an eternal Reward of Glory giving diligence to sit down satisfied with so blessed a sight The poor weather beaten Sea-man how well satisfied is he though yet tossed with Storms and impetuous Tempests when once he discovers Land and comes within â—en of the Harbour And will not you Christians labour to be content when whatever Troubles abide you whatever pelting Storms you are tossed with upon the boysterous Sea of this ungrateful World yet still you may discover the Land of Promise and are always within ken of Heaven that wished Harbour of eternally blessed and glorious Rest That which learned St. Paul the great mystery of contentation enabling him to sit down as well satisfied in every condition was his stedfast fixed beholding of eternal Glory Paul though sadly troubled and perplexed and always delivered unto Death for Jesus sake yet he murmures not but is well content with all this as having fixed the Eye of his Faith not upon Earth but Heaven * 2 Cor. 4.17 not upon things that are seen but upon an eternal weight of unseen Glory And why is it that we having the same Reward set before us and the same Crown of eternal Glory to fix our eyes upon cannot learn of that blessed Man in every condition therewith to be content Oh take heed Christians that you murmure no longer against Heaven but strive that having stedfastly fixed your eye upon heavenly Glory you may well be satisfied in every condition not only when God gives but also when he taketh not only when we receive good from the Hand of the Lord but also when we receive evil not only when you abound with Blessings but with Crosses too not only when you enjoy all things but when you are stript of all Oh Christians how welcome should every thing be where nothing is deserved If we look at our own deserts we may wonder rather at what we have than repine against God for what we want If we want something 't is a Mercy that we want not all If we lie in a Prison 't is a favour that we are not shut up in Hell amongst damned Spirits If we have not so much in hand as many yet here is a miracle of Mercy to satisfie us that we have as much in hope as heart can wish This consideration then Christians like Hagar's Well may make us refrain our weeping and sit down content when our Bottles are empty Though here we should be stript naked yet hereafter we shall be cloathed with the Garments of Salvation Though here we should wander up and down in hunger seeking our Bread from desolate Places yet hereafter we shall feed with delight upon the Tree of Life in the Paradise of God Though here we sit in Darkness and have no Light yet this should make us content in every such disconsolate condition that hereafter we shall partake of the Inheritance of Saints in Light where we shall have a bright Sun-shine of eternal Glory 4 Walk humbly acknowledging your own unworthiness that ever God should give you the encouragement of so glorious a reward When the Lord for your better encouragement to all holy Self-denying and upright walking before himself allows you to look up to Heaven you have then cause if ever to walk humbly and be abased as low as Earth Where the guilt is great and the receiver as in this case altogether unworthy the most sutable return that can be is Humility and self-abasement God's People should never lie lower in Humility than when he raiseth them highest in their Hopes and full assurance of Eternal Glory (a) 2 Sam. 7.18 Thus holy David when God had spoken of establishing his Throne and Kingdom for ever he now as admiring the wonderful condescention of God in his preferment confesseth his own unworthiness saying who am I oh Lord God and what is my House that thou hast brought me hitherto Well! The Lord hath spoken to us of an everlasting Kingdom assuring us of that in the end as the reward of all our labours and shall not this teach us all humility causing every one to acknowledg his own unworthiness of so great Mercy (b) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Plut. Praecept Coning The Moon doth never shine less than in her nearest approaches to the Sun from whom she borrows her light Thus Christians we should never think our selves to shine less than when God causeth us to approach nearest to himself in the tenders of Heaven and Glory which his Goodness affords us They that know not these Treasures of Love and Sweetness may admire themselves and have big-swelling thoughts of their own Worthiness But let those amongst you that are come to have a prospect of Heavenly Glory fixing their Eye upon an object of the first magnitude be vile in their own apprehensions losing themselves in the fulness of God's free Grace and remunerative Goodness There is nothing that should more humble us than to think how highly the great God is about to exalt us Nor any thing that should more debase us than to consider how Glorious the Lord promises at length to make us We should see our own Poverty in the Riches of God's Bounty to us And be ashamed of our own drop when he makes us thus lanch forth in the fathomless Ocean of his own remunerative Goodness The Stars vanish when the Sun appears and so the small Candle of our own worth should presently disappear and be put out under an everlasting extinguisher when once the Glory of Heaven ariseth in our thoughts (c) 1 King 19.13 Elijah wrapt his face in a Mantle when the Glory of the Lord passed before him Thus when God gives us a prospect of Heaven causing all his Glory for our better encouragement in a way of Duty to pass before us 't is time that we should now wrap our selves in the Mantle of true Humility The greatness of God's Mercy in giving us a sight of Heavenly Glory should make us if any thing can to be little in our own Eyes 'T is then most easy to see our own pollution and vileness when God takes us up
the Prodigal be feeding upon Husks when there is Bread enough to spare in your Fathers House Will you still be building Tabernacles for your selves on Earth when the Lord shews you such Mansions of Glory prepared in Heaven Foolish Children When such an eternally glorious Reward is held out to you by the Hand of your heavenly Father how can you with any patience behold the World or think it worthy that you should spend so much as one thought upon it You should live Christians in the highest Region of an heavenly Conversation leaving those to scramble for the World that have nothing else to live upon (g) Sua sibi habeant regna reges suas divitias divites suam verò prudentiam prudentes relinquant nobis stultitiam nostram Lact. de Just lib. 5. cap. 12. pag. 493. That of Lactantius was a brave heroick Spirit which if throughly imbibed would make you all say with him let the Kings of the Earth have their Kindoms let â—â—e Rich Men have their Riches and the Prudent of this World let them have their Prudence to themselves so that they will only leave us the folly of seeking by patient continuance in well-doing Glory and Honour and Immortality and Eternal Life Get your Hearts fixed upon your Treasure in Heaven and I dare say it will never grudge you to see the Lord filling the Bellies of the Wicked with his hidden Treasure on Earth It matters not much what they have in hand so long as God allows you to have always an immarcessible Crown of Glory in you to Eye Oh this is the Happiness of Gods People even in this present World that having gotten their Hearts once weaned from earthly Comforts they live in the suburbs of the heavenly Jerusalem When once they leave off to feed with delight upon the Garlick and Onions of Aegypt they shall then sit down under the shadow of Gods dearest Love in Canaan and there find his Fruit sweet to their tast When once they turn away their Eyes from beholding worldly Vanities they may behold with delight the promised reward and have their Eyes continually feasted with the bright entrancing beams of Heavenly Glory (h) Quis non illius vitae desiderio praesentem vitum despierat Quis non illius abundantiae delectamento divitias temporis labentis exhorreat Quis non illius regni dilectione omnia terrena Regna contemnat Fulgent ad Theodor. epist 6. pag. 551. Who then for the desire of such a Life would not despise this present World Who for the delight of that abundance would not even fear the Riches of gliding time Who for the Love of that glorious Kingdom would not contemn as things of no value all earthly Kingdoms Oh believe it Christians you will have Meat to eat which the World knows not of living Heavenly-minded The World can never feast her greatest Favourites with those redundancies of Joy and Comfort which you may expect getting weaned affections to things below and living above Let therefore the Price of earthly Commodities fall and the price of heavenly Commodities rise in your thoughts And tho you be absent from your Treasure in Body yet see that you be always present therewith in Spirit In vain doth God afford you a prospect of Glory on Earth if it prove not a spiritual Load-stone to attract and draw up your Hearts as high as Heaven 8 WALK patiently as well satisfied to suffer and bear the worst of Afflictions that at length you may come to Heaven the best of Rewards Their Hearts may well be established with divine Patience in every condition whose Eyes God allows to be fixed in every Duty upon heavenly Glory And truly the condition of God's People in this present World doth evince the great necessity of Divine Patience to all that will live Godly in Christ Jesus Luther makes it the very definition of a Christian to be a Crucian who denying himself must take up his Cross and follow Christ The Lord Jesus hath two Crowns the one of Thorns the other of Glory They that would enjoy the latter and be crowned with Glory they must first undergo the former and be crowned with Thorns What the Holy Ghost said of Christ that it behoved him to suffer and so to enter into his Glory the very same holds true of all his People (i) Acts. 14.22 who through many afflictions must enter into the Kingdom of God The stones in Solomon's Temple were first hewen and polished and then set up into a stately Building So God's People first they must be hewen and carved by sufferings before they can be fit to build the Temple of God in the heavenly Jerusalem To all the People of God this World is a Wilderness not a Canaan an Egypt not a Paradise a troublesome Sea not an Harbour of Rest The day that is without clouds the light that is without Darkness the Joy that hath no sorrow is reserved for Heaven So then the misery of our present condition may well let us see the necessity of Christian Patience to suffer and wait upon God in it Without Patience every burden will seem too heavy every Cup that our heavenly Father puts into our Hand too bitter and every affliction too long But get Patience and that will lighten every burden have Patience and that will sweeten the bitterest potion lengthen Patience and that will make the time of all your afflictions seem short There is â— passive obedience required of all Christians that they may quietly suffer and 't is patience must help them If we bring evil upon our selves then we should afflict our Souls with Godly Sorrow but if the Lord bring evil upon us then we must exercise Patience both quietly hoping (k) Lam 3.26 and waiting for his salvation Christian Patience is not only a comely Grace making misery it self by a pious deportment under it seem amiable but 't is also a necessary Grace making the very worst of Miseries seem tolerable by framing a Mans mind to his present condition when his condition is not to his mind There are many Men professing the Christian Faith who if deliverance come not at their own Time they presently grow impatient of waiting God's time resolving to trade for it in their own way But were their Hearts established with divine Patience they would never thus precipitate their Mercies nor think that deliverance worth the having which only springs up out of the ruines of Faith and a good Conscience 'T is the nature of Christian Patience to make a Man tenacious of his integrity working in him a strong resolution not to purchase the greatest good with the commission of any the least evil This makes a Man the same in Prison as at Liberty the same in Poverty as when abounding with Riches the same when under reproach persecution and sorest calamities in the World as when the Sun of outward prosperity shone bright upon him Let what Storms will bluster abroad in the
and Undefiled in the way thither With what Face Christian canst thou look upon the Recompence of eternal Life and yet study to gratify thy own brutish Appetite defiling thy self every day with the Pollutions superstitious Observances ungodly Practices and sinful Compliances of a wicked World Believe it Sirs the very Mire in the Streets shall sooner be transubstantiated into massy Gold than a Man thus weltring in the Filth and Mire and Vomit of his Sins shall ever be suffered to enter into the Kingdom of God Sin blocks up the way to Heaven nor must any Man ever think he shall come to Glory there if he enter not in through the Suburbs of Grace (f) Psal 24.4 The Prophet David hath resolved the Case long ago telling us that he who is of clean Hands (g) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cor mundum scelerisque purum politum omnique immunditiâ vacuum prorsus defaecatum haec denotat phrascologia and of a choice pure polisht Heart as the original imports shall ascend into the Hill of the Lord and shall stand in his holy Place Without Holiness we cannot serve the Lord in a way of Duty ¶ Jos 24 19 Heb. 12.14 much less are we fit without Holiness to enjoy the Lord in a State of Glory A Man living in fleshly Lusts hath the very Plague-sores of Hell running upon him And shall such an one ever think to stand before an holy God in Heavenly Places To be sure the inheritance of Saints in light it was never prepared for those that have any fellowship with Works of Darkness And do you love your Lusts better than your lives or will those Pleasures of Sin which are but for a season countervail the loss of Heaven and Eternal Glory Oh foolish and unwise Sinners who for a draught of Wine for a brutish lust for a moment of carnal Pleasure will let go whatever Joy whatever Happiness the Lord hath provided in Heaven for those that fear him (a) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cyril Hieros Cateches 2. pag. 5. Why is it that you see not the danger of Sin how sadly it provokes the Lord against you how it emasculates and disinews your Souls how it blocks up your way to Heaven how it robs you of your present Comfort how it forfeits your future Crown and Happiness exposing you in the World to come to Eternal unpreventable misery And will you still be defiling your selves with this mortal pollution And that when Heaven and Glory lie before you as a bait to all Purity Uprightness and holy walking before God will you thus provoke the Lord with Manna in your Mouths Shall not the ripe Fruits of Canaan make you nauseat these wild Grapes and for ever to dâ—srelish these clusters of Sodom When the Glory of Heaven is in your Eye will you have upon your Hands the pitch and in your Hearts the very plague of Hell itself Oh why is it that you will thus render your selves uncapable of Heavens Glory by your own sinful Soul-defiling and unrighteous conversation Is not the recompence of Eternal Life which God sets before you attractive enough to draw you out of the mire of all your fleshly Lusts and ungodly Practices You have stronger engagements to purity of Life and holiness of conversation than others upon you You may daily see the Beauties antedate the Pleasures behold the Glory of the Heavenly Jerusalem and yet will you strive to be no more holy no more pure no more undefiled than others 'T is your duty to be every whit as good as others are bad every whit as holy as others are profane every whit as pure as others are polluted and whilst others are running into all excess of riot you must labour the more to cleanse your selves from all filthiness of Flesh and Spirit (b) 2 Cor. 7.1 endeavouring to perfect Holiness in the fear of God What if others profane the Sabbath (c) Jer. 17.22 You must sanctify it What if others drink till they be drunk (d) Ephes 5.18 You must study to be sober What if others defile themselves with the pollutions that are in the World through lust You must labour to keep your selves unspotted of the World What if others cast in their lot and strike hands with the workers of iniquity (e) Ephes 5.11 You must have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of Darkness ¶ 2 Tim. 21. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cyril Hieros Praefat. 'T is only the Self-purifying Soul that is capable of Heaven such an one and none else is a vessel of Honour fit as for the Masters use here so to be filled with the new Wine of Eternal Consolation hereafter Oh therefore do not go to exclude your selves out of Heaven by your sinful compliances nor to make your selves unfit for the Kingdom of God by your self-pollutions What in all the World will encourage to Purity and Holiness if not to live daily upon the mount of Transfiguration thence taking a prospect of Heaven and Eternal Glory God allows you to have a respect to the recompence of the Reward setting Heaven continually before you and let that make you to walk before him in all holy conversation and Godliness You never deserve to see the least glimpse of Heavenly Glory any more if having such a pure undefiled reward in your Eye you keep not your Hearts pure and your lives undefiled in the World 12 AND lastly walk perseveringly never growing weary of well-doing but labouring to be faithful to the death that then you may receive that Crown of Life that transcendently glorious reward which God now sets before you (f) Non quaeruntur in Christianis initia sed finis Paulus male caepit sed bene finivit Judae laudantur exordia sed finis proditione damnatur Hier. epist 16. ad Furiam Christians must not think it is enough to set out for God at the first but they must know 't is their Duty also to hold on in their obedience with God to the last They that have begun to do the Work of God in the Morning of their youth they must continue working in God's Vineyard till the evening of Death would they ever receive their penny of Eternal Glory Be thâ—u faithful unto death (g) Rev. 2.10 and I will give thee sai h Christ speaking to those of the Church in Smyrna a Crown of Life The Lord Jesus will never yield that those shall be crowned after Death who have not been faithful and constant in obedience to him all their Life We must continue stedfast in well-doing to the end would we ever be blessed of God with Eternal Salvation in the end (h) Mat. 24.13 Amongst all those that are hired to work in Gods Vineyard not he that begins first but he that holds on to the last and he alone shall receive the Reward of Eternal Life (i) Rom. 9.22 As God condemneth no Man before through final impenitency persisting
chiefest Good for our Portion we must needs have the chiefest Happiness the chiefest Delight true Liberty perfect Charity eternal Security and secure Eternity excluding all possibility of future Misery Here Christians here is the true Gladness the fullest measure of divine Knowledg the most peerless Beauty the perfect Enjoyment of all Blessedness So that you shall see God even to the Satisfaction of your utmost Curiosity have him for your Pleasure and enjoy him for your greatest Delight flourishing in his Eternity shining with the bright Reflexions of his Truth upon you and rejoycing in his Goodness with Joy unspeakable and full of Glory Moses's Face shined with the brightness of God's back-parts Paul was sensless of all other Joys when rapt up into the third Heavens Peter was thrown into an Extasie of Admiration when he only saw a glimpse of Christ's Glory in the Mount Oh then what Joy Christian will this be to thy Soul what Beauty to thine Eyes what Musick to thy Ears what Hony to thy Mouth what Perfumes to thy Nostrils what fulness of Delight to thy Heart when enjoying Communion with God in Heaven thou shalt behold nor his back-parts as Moses did but shalt (c) Omnes lectantur in laetitia exulatione omnes delectantur de Deo cujus aspectus pulcher facies decora eloquium dulce Delectabilis est ad videndum suavis ad habendum dulcis ad perfruendum Ipse per se placet et per se sufficit ad meritum sufficit ad praemium nec extra illum quicquam quaeritur quia totum in illo intenitur quicquid defideratur Semper libet eum aspicere semper habere semper in illo delectari in illo perfrui Bern. ubi supra see him Face to Face Here it is that all God's People shall rejoyce and be exceeding glad they shall delight themselves greatly in the Lord Jehovah whose Countenance is most aimable whose Face is Comely whose Voice is sweeter than the Hony and the Hony-comb Oh this Christians is a beatifical Object indeed most delightful to behold most pleasant to have and most sweet to enjoy Such is the fulness of all Good in God that of himself he can please the Soul of himself he sufficeth to merit and to be our eternal Reward Nor can the Soul desire ought out of him as finding the whole of all Happiness in him whatever it be that she can desire Here Christians if any where it contenteth to see him ever to have him ever to enjoy him for ever In God is the Understanding clarified to know and the Affections purified to love (d) In illo clarificatur intellectus et purificatur affectus ad cognoscendam diligendam veritatem Et hoc est torum bonum hominis nosse scilicet amare creatorem suum Idem ibid him as the first Truth as the chiefest Good And this surely is the whole Happiness of Man to know and love the great God his Maker in a way of divine beatifical Vision in a way of full Enjoyment and sweetest Fruition 15 THE Reward whereunto God allows his People a Respect in all their Obedience it 's a very near and proxim Reward and such as you shall speedily be put in possession of The time when the Lord will reward you with all heavenly Glory is of no long date though the time for your enjoyment of that glorious Reward will bear date to all Eternity 'T is but a little while and having finished your Course God himself will be your Portion and your exceeding great Reward The whole time of Man's Life here is so short that it goes but for one day in the Kalender of Heaven And yet as short as it is no sooner shall it close up in the peaceful Evening of a blessed Death but the Peny of eternal Life shall be given you We are usually long before we seriously set our selves to work in God's Vineyard But when once the Lord sees us working in good earnest he delays nor but comes quickly to reward us (e) Rev. 22.12 Behold saith he I come quickly and my Reward is with me to give every Man according as his Work shall be The Lord doth not say he will come to reward us which had implied some delay But as one ready to set the Crown upon our Heads behold saith he speaking in the present Tense I come quickly and my Reward is with me Or if any where the Lord speaks of his People's Reward as a thing to come you may find him qualifying the Speech with such comfortable Diminutives as are enough almost to remove the Futurity of this glorious Reward and to give it a present Subsistence (f) Heb. 10.37 Take that one Instance where the Apostle shewing the Hebrews what need they (g) Quod vero ait 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quod valet parum quantum quantum valde parum significat Theoph. in loc had of Patience that having done the Will of God they might receive the promised Reward he tells them that yet a little while and he that shall come will come and will not tarry Great is the Emphasis of the words in the Original and such as our English cannot with any handsomness of Expression render to the life For the Apostle not willing that these Believers should think the time long he speaks the whole of it by the help of three Diminutives into one short moment telling them that yet a little while yea a very very little while and their Lord who already was coming would no longer adjourn their Happiness but reward them speedily Your Seed-time of Grace how needful soever yet because it 's a dropping time the Lord will not suffer it to last always but hath provided before-hand that shortly it shall end in a rich Harvest of heavenly Glory where all Tears shall be wiped from your Eyes Truth is we have but a few days in this World and therefore many days there cannot be till God will Crown us with fulness of Reward in the World to come Be it so Christian that now thy own unbelieving dead Heart is thy trouble within and that the World and Satan trouble thee from without Yet remember after a few weary days the Lord will give thee a Writ of Ease he will give thee a Sabbath of Rest and will presently notwithstanding all contrary Winds land the Ship of thy precious Soul at the wished shoar of blessed Immortality What Athanasius said of the Arian Perfection calling it nubeculam citò-transituram will hold true of all the Afflictions Tryals and Persecutions of God's People in this Life which are but as a little Cloud that will soon be blown oâ—er So that though now you bear the burden and heat of the day yet Night comes on a pace as a time of (h) Acts 3.19 refreshing from the Lord and then you shall most sweetly repose your selves in the downy Bed of God's eternal Love Be your Sorrow never so grievous over
are none that walk so chearfully in Heaven's Way as those who have thus seen and tasted that the Lord is Gracious (e) Psal 110.3 In the Day of God's Power the Soul must needs be willing devoting herself to him as a Free-will offering And doubtless greater power did God never shew than when opening the Eyes of a poor lost Sinner and giving him a clear prospect of heavenly Glory Oh now the Soul can mount up with Wings as an Eagle now she can run and not be weary now she can walk on with delight in Heaven's Way and never grow faint when thus beholding as with open Face the Glory that is set before her Holy Duties to a Man eying by Faith the Reward of them are accompanied with such Manna and spiritual Nectar with such fulness of delight and heavenly contentment that now he can willingly spend and be spent in them With a carnal heart who neither sees nor hopes for this glorious Reward all holy exercises are but as Songs to a sorrowful Heart or as good food to a dead Man or as the Red-sea to Pharoah's Chariots wherein he drives on heavily finds no Pleasure can take no delight But it 's far otherwise with those who like Moses have respect to this Eternal Recompence their Meat and Drink is to do God's Will this is that heavenly Manna whereupon they would always be feeding this is that Mount of Transfiguration upon which they could always delight to dwell Oh! there is never such chearful obedience such diligence and vigour of Spirit in holy Duties as when the Soul from the highest Pisgah of Faith can behold the Glory prepared for it that heavenly Canaan towards which every Duty every Sigh every Groan every penitential Tear is an happy Step. The Fire doth not more easily dissolve Ice nor the Sun in its Noon-day brightness expel Darkness than a glimpse of heavenly Glory doth expel Sloth and make a Man delight in the Beauties of Holiness Who would not be quickned by such a Glory shining upon him What Heart would not be warmed and freed from its natural coldness in the Ways of God before such a Flame What Vigour and Liveliness what holy Activity for God in every Duty may the sight of this Eternal Reward put into us You complain Christians of your Dead-heartedness your Formality your indisposition and great aversness to Duty but would you steep your Hearts in the serious Thoughts of this Eternal Reward that would cure you of all your Distempers that would warm your cold Hearts that would quicken your dull Spirits that would make you to serve the Lord with a willing Mind counting every Duty as an heavenly Gale sent on purpose to wast you over to the wished shore of blessed Immortality Oh then if whilst others count Duty their Burden you would count it your Delight your Priviledge if whilst others stand idle in God's Vineyard counting it a weariness to serve the Lord you would willingly have Hearts lively and chearful Hearts prepared for every good word and work be sure that you look within the Veil endeavouring to perswade your Hearts of the Glory that is set before you This Eternal Weight of Glory if well considered will be sure to make the Yoke of obedience seem light and easy You shall not long need to cry out of your own drowsiness negligence and unwillingness in Duty will you but carefully fix your Eye before you go about the work of Duty upon that eternally glorious Reward that follows after Oh what will be able to revive you to fill you with Spirits of delight activity and chearfulness in the work of the Lord if not a clear prospect of that heavenly Canaan towards which you are going Whenever Christian thy Spirit begins to grow flat and thy Heart to fall in Duty Oh then look up by Faith to this glorious Reward not doubting but like Aqua vitae it will revive thee enabling thee to serve the Lord with a willing Mind 6 A due respect had to this glorious Reward will much ease you of all worldly Thoughts and Heart-dividing Cares He cannot be much distracted about earthly goods whose Heart is holy united to meditate Heaven which is best of all When the Eye is once fixed upon things above it begets in the Soul an holy carelesness about all things here below let them go how they will her Treasure is laid up in Heaven and with this she can sit down satisfied Oh little would you think what a Writ of ease what a Sabbath of Rest from all carking cares and distracting Thoughts it would give you had you but a due respect with Mosâ—s to this recompence of Reward The grand reason why most Men look so much after Earth and spend their Thoughts so much about the Meat that perisheth is indeed because they look so little after Heaven and spend their Thoughts so seldom about the Meat which will endure to Eternal Life (f) Mat. 6.33 Hence our blessed Lord observing the Hearts and Minds the Cares and Thoughts of most Men to be carried out with much anxiousness after the things of this World he endeavours to cure them of this dangerous Distemper by diverting the stream of them another way advising them to seek the Kingdom of God and the Righteousness thereof as the most sure expedient to supersede their Heart-rending Cares and to ease them of all their worldly distractions And doubtless would God's People when almost distracted with Cares about what they shall eat and drink and wherewith in necessitous Times they shall be cloathed turn their Thoughts Heaven-ward taking care to make sure of that to prepare for a Crown of Glory to be made meet for the inheritance of Saints in Light this would prove a very Sovereign Remedy against all their distractions What need he much take Thought for the Meat that perisheth who sees the Table spread in his Father's House where sitting down he shall feed upon the Meat that will endure to life everlasting What need he much trouble himself for Drink who sees a River of purest Pleasures running by the right Hand of God for evermore whereof he shall drink deep to all Eternity What need he distract himself for Cloaths who sees the Ward-robe of Heaven all hung with the Garments of Salvation to make him at last more beautiful than Solomon in all his Glory What need he in a word be much careful about earthly Possessions who knows himself provided before-hand of an Inheritance incorruptible undefiled and that fadeth not away reserved in Heaven for him Oh Sirs the Dagon of worldly Thoughts and distracting Cares could never stand had you but such an Ark as a prospect of Heavens Glory to set up against it If then Christians you would get from off the Rack of carking Cares and be able to trust God with your Bodies give diligence to get your Hearts to meditate on Heaven endeavoring to provide for your Souls everlasting Mansions of Glory If
Fruit. Do you not see multitudes every where forfeiting by Sin their Right to this blessed Reward Mortgaging Paradise for an Apple selling Christ together with all the Riches of this Kingdom and Glory for thirty pieces of Silver Oh 't is a Miracle of discriminating Grace to you that ever you saw so much of Heaven as to make you prize it at an higher rate Well if still you would keep at a distance from all appearance of Evil daily purifying your selves from all filthiness of Flesh and Spirit let the hope of this eternal Reward be abiding in you Oh let your Eye be always upon this Crown and remember if you would not Sin that the least Sin is enough to rob you of it Look within the Veil observe this heavenly Kingdom and the Glory of it and remember that the least Sin is enough to shut you our of it for ever For saith Christ (b) Matth. 5.19 whoever shall break the least of these Commandments and shall teach Men so he shall be called least in the Kingdom of God He that thinks to rhetoricate Sin into current Coyn amongst the Citizens of the new Jerusalem may well please a carnal Heart that loves to bow in the House of Rimmon cum privilegio but will doubtless prove himself if our blessed Lord may be judge such reprobate Silver as without the Philosopher's Stone of true Grace to change him by a spiritual Transmetallation into pure Gold shall never be Treasured up in the Exchequer of Heaven To talk of small Sins that a Man for his own safety may venture upon and not prejudice his Salvation some little Zoar that a Man may live in and his Soul not die is the most damnable Solecism in Christianity that can be There is that Treason against the God of Heaven in the least Sin which none but a Child of Hell and Wrath dare be found in 'T is no less treasonable and Death-worthy to Coyn Pence than to Coyn twenty Shilling-pieces because the Royal (c) Quia Deo nos totos omnia nostra debemus certè in infinitam ejus majestatem injurii sunt aeternam mortem merentur qui vel in mimina re sanctissimam ejus voluntatem transgrediuntur Authority is as much violated by the one as by the other Thus how little soever your Sins be though but as Pence and Farthings yet because committed against the great God they are damnable and such as may for ever deprive you of this glorious Reward It was but one Wedge of Gold that destroyed Achan cleaving him from amongst God's People So if thou suffer thy self to be drawn away by any one Sin it may undo thee to Eternity The Sin which in its own Nature is little may yet be made great by thy Allowance The Money for which Judas sold the Lord of Glory was not much but yet being the Wages of Unrighteousness it quickly kindled in his Conscience the Fire of Hell throwing him down headlong into that place of Torments O then be not found fingering any of Satan's Coyn whether little or great whether more or less For be your Sins never so small in themselves yet when lived in with allowance they are nothing but the earnest of Hell whereby you make sale of all your Interest in Heaven and Glory And who but a Mad-man would sell this one Pearl of great Price for such reprobate Silver Do not think Sirs by falling the Rate and Valuation of your Sins that you shall ever the more escape an Arrest◠from divine Justice which will certainly Commence a Suit against you for the least allowed Iniquity and cast you Prisoners into Hell (d) Mat. 5.26 out of which you shall never come till you have paid the last Farthing Oh then what a dreadful thing were it for any Man to forfeit Heaven and drop into Hell irrecoverably through indulgence to himself in any the least Iniquity Should a Prince sell his Crown and Dignity for a draught of cold Water as Lysimachus did it were a most happy Bargain in comparison of what they make who let go their Right to this glorious Reward for a little sensual Pleasure What for Sin to throw thee out of Heaven to keep thee for ever entring into the Joy of thy Lord to take away thy Crown hiding from thee the Light of God's Countenance that thou shalt never see it more nor be comforted any more with it for ever oh think of this my Soul and think often what a woful bargain is made where thy God thy Portion thy Life thy dearest Lord thy heavenly Treasure are all made away for a Lust that ere-long will be turned into the Fire of Hell Oh would you Christians but observe what a glorious Kingdom what fulness of Joy what Rivers of Pleasure Sin comes to rob you of this would sour all the Pleasures of Sin this would break in pieces the Dagon of every Lust this would make you as fearful to meddle with any Temptation as to burn and lie scorching in Hell for ever The allurements of Hell can never ensnare us where our Hearts are fixed upon Heaven's Glory When therefore you feel Christians Corruption stirring in your Hearts be sure to get Glory in your Eye such motions can never hurt us when struggling against the Temptation we keep our Mind fixed upon the Crown that will follow after (a) Ad portam voluntatis in qua solent manere carnalia desideria statuatur Ostarius qui vocatur recordatio calestis patriae hic enim potest pravum desiderium quasi cuneus cuneum pellere Bernard Let the mindful Sense of our heavenly Country stand as Door-keeper at the Door of the Will wherein carnal Desires are wont to dwell and as one wedge drives out another so this will drive out all carnal and brutish desires If ever we desire to thrust evil Desires out of our Hearts we must plant spiritual ones in their stead (b) Si carnales concupiscentias è cordibus nostris desideramus extrudere spirituales earum locis plantemus voluntates ut his noster animus semper in nixus habeat quibus illecebras carnalium respuat gaudiorum Cassian that our minds being fixed upon them may always dwell upon them and so refuse the Snares of present and sensual delights Keep Heaven Christians still in your Eye steep your Hearts at all Times in the sweet contemplations of heavenly Bliss and then if Temptations come if the Pleasures of Sin be offered as a bait to ensnare you you will certainly shun them with the like abhorrency and godly trembling as you would shun Hell Those allurements of Sin come too late and will never be able to fasten upon the Soul which never assault her till got upon the Mount of Transfiguration and looking by Faith into the heavenly Canaan A sight of God in Heaven makes it impossible for the Saints to sin and a sight of Heaven on Earth this makes it impossible for the Saints to
buried in Oblivion And thus having laid him in his Grave let us read his Epitaph made by the same Hand Epitaphium Jos Cooper qui obiit Anno Aetatis 41. 16â—â— Here lye's a Saint call'd hence to company With chanting Quires and winged Hierarchy Cooper's Name Ambassadour Divine Nature's great Torch and Learning's Magazine The EPISTLE To the CANDID READER THOUGH all Men by an Innate Appetite do desire Blessedness and have that before them as their * Vivere Omnes beate volunt sed ad Perridendum quid sit quod Beatam Vitam efficiam Caligant Sen. de vit Beat cap 1. pag. 627. Ultimate End in some kind of general undistinct and confus'd Intention Yet iâ—possible it is for any Man ever to enjoy Blessedness and to have it in full Fruition if not Guided thereunto by a Light from Heaven True Happiness is not to be discerned by Nature's Dim Eye Though it be a Tree of Life yet the Fruit thereof grows so High that Nature's Hand can never Reach it As the Sun that glorious Eye of the World is not to be Seen but by it's own proper Light Ten Thousand Torches though Lighted up and uniting All their Beams in One Flame cannot shew us the Sun So it is not all the Natural Reason in the World though Clarified and Improved to the utmost Reach of all Humane Understanding that can bring us to any Saving Acquaintance with God as our Happiness and Reward without some bright shining Beam of Divine Revelation from Himself Nature may shew Men some Dark and Cloudy Discoveries of Happiness at a distance just as that Blind Person who when his Sight began to return saw Men walking like Trees But to give Men a Clear Prospect of this Fruitful Land and to Direct them sufficiently in their Way thither This Nature can no more do than a Star of the least Magnitude can make Day in the World Happiness is indeed the Harbour for which We are all bound but we shall certainly Lose ourselves and Miserably make Ship-wreck by the way if ever we put to Sea without ¶ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clem. Alexan. Admonit ad Gent. p. 19. our Card and Compass of Wisdom from above to help us in Steering a right Course towards this wished Shore There is nothing that can ever lead us to God as our End but that which comes from God as the Beginning of our Strength in the Saving Knowledge of our chiefest Good In every Man there are Two Prime Faculties aâ— Understanding capable of more Truth and a Will desirous of more Good than what the universal Confluence of all Created Beings can possibly afford God therefore who is the First Truth and the Chiefest Good must first Enlighten the Understanding with the Saving Knowledge of Himself before ever the Will can tell how to Move Regularly towards Him as her Center or Enjoy Him for her full Satisfaction He must Guide the Soul by his Counsel on Earth or else she can never come to Heavenly Glory Psal 73.24 We are sure to lye down in Darkness and to Dye in the Wilderness of our own Folly if the Lord direct us not as by a Pillar of Fire through the Night and Thick Darkness of all our Ignorance into the Heavenly Canaan of true Happiness There is no Proportion betwixt a Natural Eye and a Supernatural Happiness and so no possibility that such an Object should be seen by such an Organ The great God hath Ordained Man to a far more Noble End than what his Natural Faculties can either Merit for him or Discover to him That Glorious and Ultimate End in the Acquisition whereof and not otherwise the Heart of Man can rest Satisfied it 's as far above the Reach of our most Soaring and Sublimated Thoughts as it is for Worth and Excellency beyond all our Deserts Since the Infernal Raven pick'd out the Eyes of our Understanding with a Splinter of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil we have all like the Sodomites been Groping in the Dark for the Tree of Life Deut. 32.32 But should never have been able to Distinguish It from the Vine of Sodom all whose Grapes are Grapes of Gall and Clusters Bitter had not God himself given us a Taste thereof from Heaven by the Hand of Christ The Patrons of Universal Grace I confess would turn the whole World into an Eden and have the Tree of Life to be found in every Garden as well as in the Paradise of God But the Vanity of that Opinion is Written in Legible Characters upon that confused Chaos that heap and crowd of Contradictions about the Summum Bonum in the Ruines whereof the most improved Reasons of the Heathen Philosophers and the most raised Wisdom of the World 's Learned Sages lyes Buried to this Day 'T was the common Aim of all the Philosophers as ‖ Omnium Philosophorum commune studium erat quaeâ—endo studendo disputando vivendo Beatitudinem apprehendere Aug. Tom. 6. Tract de Epicur et Stoic Cap. 4. Austin hath Observed of all the Heathen Sages by Seeking Studying Disputing and Living to find out and lay hold upon Happiness But yet so Dreadful were their Misapprehensions about it and the Means conducing thereto that if Varro may be Credited or * Aug. de Civit. Dei Lib. 19. Cap. 1. Austin after him they Disputed themselves into no less than Two Hundred Eighty and Eight Sects some placing Happiness in this thing and some in that according to their several Inclinations Humours and Conditions together with the different Projects they had to drive on in the World So that there is no Possibility of finding out the way to True Happiness at Athens amongst the Philosophers who sought it only by Human Reason but in Jerusalem amongst the Prophets and Apostles Men inspired with Divine Wisdom from Heaven they will tell us the Truth That our Happiness stands not in the Quint-Essence of Any nor in the general Collection of All Created Good Things but in the having of the Lord JEHOVAH for our Portion and our exceeding great Reward MEN may Fancy much Happiness where Garners are Full affording all manner of Store where their Flocks are Fruitful and their Oxen are Strong to Labor where there is no Breaking in nor Complaining in their Streets But David a Man after God's own Heart by an holy Epanonthesis Contradicts that gross Mistake Psal 144.15 and stands like a Beacon upon an Hill to give Aim at the Mark of True Blessedness pronouncing that People alone to be Happy whose God is the Lord. Let Men dive into the bottom of Nature's Sea yet they will be able to bring up from thence nothing but Hands full of Sand and Gravel this One Pearl of Great Price is no where Engendred in the Bowels of the Earth When the Enquiry was Where shall Wisdom be found and Where is the place of Vnderstanding The Depth said It is not in me and the Sea said It is not with me
Fourth Whether he had not Observed the Ecclipses He answered the King No I have so much to do upon Earth that I have no leisure to look up to Heaven Thus the Generality of Men have so much to do upon Earth and are so deeply engaged in their Secular Affairs that they have no leisure to spend their Thoughts upon Heaven and it's Glory Lactantius * Hinc utique Graeci 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 appellarunt quod sursum spectet Ipsi ergo sibi renunciant seque Hominum Nomine abdicant qui non Sursum aspiciunt sed deorsum Lact. lib. 2. Instit Cap. 1. p. 140. will have those guilty of Degrading themselves into the Shapes of Brutes and unworthy the Names of Men who lye Grovelling here below never fixing their Thoughts on Eternal Concernments nor setting their Affections on Things above And yet how are Multitudes every where Grovelling in the Dust of Earthly Vanities never sending up a Look a Desire a Thought no nor so much as one Hearty Groan after Heaven Natural Bodies they follow the tendency of that Element which is Predominant in them a Stone moves down-ward it would be at the Center Thus those in whom the Love of the World is Predominant they cannot but move Downward the Earth is their Center and that they will make towards let come of Heaven and Glory what will come Possibly whilst Religion is in Credit and the way to Heaven lyes through the Fortunate Islands the Arabia Foelix or through the Golden Streams of the Lydian Pactolus these Men may have their Faces that way and seem to Steer their Course Heaven-ward But if once Religion be under Hatches in the World if once a Life of serious Scripture Holiness be counted Faction and all things are at such a pass that there is no getting to Canaan but through a Barren Wilderness no coming at the fair Havens of True Happiness but through the Straits of Poverty Reproach and Affliction they have Wit enough such as it is to set Sails for another Wind and will think Heaven it self for a Golden-Mine a very easy Morgage Many there be who whilst Religion walks in Stately Equipage will be Reteiners to her But if at any time the Watch-men Wound her and the Keepers of the Walls take away her Veil you may presently see them very Shy of if not Ashamed to wear so much as her Livery What * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clemens saith of a certain Friend That he was not his but his Riches Kinsman This is true of many Professors who if Religion had not Riches in her Left-hand would never pretend neither Kindness or Kin to her Such Men who thus design their own Profit Honour and Promotion in the World by that pitiful Religion which they have they are just like the Lapis Chelidonius which say Naturalists will retain it's Virtue no longer than whilst you keep it inclos'd in Gold The Upper Springs of Grace and Glory which God always gives in Dowry with his Daughter Achsah True Godliness cannot make a Worldly Heart fall in Love with Her unless God will give him the Nether Springs also such as Riches Honours and earthly Possessions he will never be brought to Match with her nor is the Match ever made so sure upon this Account but if at any time God dry up these Nether Springs now the Stream of this Muck Worm's Affections will wholly fail such a Nabal will God's own Daughter Religion I mean find him that he will be sure to turn her upon her Father not forbearing so much as one Night to thrust her out of Doors When the Ark came into the House of Obed-Edom and they saw that it brought a Blessing upon him and his whole House then every one no doubt could think it worth their Entertainment But when Judgments attended the Ark of God almost every Man thought it a Burden and by all means would turn it off so that in such a time the Ark of God finds no Rest they send it from Gath to Ekron from Ekron to Askalon 1 Sam. 5. counting him the Happy Man that could well rid his hands of it Thus every Man will own Religion Prospering a Blessing Ark But where is he that will own Religion under Worldly Disadvantages that will entertain the Ark of God when Persecuted when Banished when Dangerous and Un-doing to those that meddle with it However the Love of the World do thus eat out the Heart of Religion with those who have their Portion in this World yet certainly it becomes not you Christians whose Treasure is in Heaven thus to have the Wayes of God in Admiration for Advantage sake Thus to Morgage your eternal Inheritance to keep the poor Cottage of an earthly Estate wherein you are but Tenants at Will Their Condition of all Mens is most Miserable who go from Heaven to Hell From the Heaven I mean of Wordly Prosperity to the Hell of Endless Destruction in the World to come The very Life of every Worldling is wrapt up in the Bundle of his outward Enjoyments And therefore not having made sure of Heaven they must needs as it was once said to a great Lord be great Losers when they Dye AND shall such miserable Caitives as these Christians be the Men to Tread out the Way for your Feet to Walk in when every Step alas that they take sinks as low as Hell Have you no other Copy to Write after but that which is Written in Blood Will no other Path serve the turn but that of Men Selling the Riches of Heaven and Glory for a little thick Clay which inevitably leads to Destruction Such an Errour ¶ Versatque nos praecipitat Traditus per manus Error alienisque perimus exemplis Sen. de vit Beat. Cap. 1 pag. mihi 628. though Received by Tradition is enough to throw you head-long into Tophet nor can you chuse but Perish Eternally if you will make the Examples of such Misers the Rule of your Living Why cannot you as †{inverted †}†Sinite sapientes hujus saeculi alia sapientes et terram lingentes sapienter descendere in Infernum Bernard de vit solit Bernard hath it suffer the Wise Men of this World who like the Serpent lick the Dust of the Earth to go Wisely down to Hell Is it not better as a Divine of ours wittily that we choose to Arrive at Heaven with Tatter'd Sails than to Ruffle towards Hell with Cleopatra's Silken Tacklings Let others Admire the Gaudy Tulip which closeth with every approaching Night and cold Blast that comes yet Christians they should be like the Herb Semper-vivum retaining their Verdure and Greeness in the hardest Winter What thô others will not have the Golden Apples of Glory if not placed in the Silver Pictures of Worldly Contentments will you therefore Throw away those Apples of Gold because the Silver Pictures of your Secular Enjoyments may get a Crack and are Broken in pieces Heaven it self is a
Eternal Reward that God sets before us Heart Purity with a Life of practical Godliness that 's the Regia Via the King of Heaven's High-way which leads to Glory So that whoever hath a due respect to heavenly Glory desiring that as the Reward of all his Labours can no more make liâ—ht Performances than a Man who desires Life can sâ—t Light by Food and Raiment with such like Comforts that are as Oyl to feed that Lamp ¶ Scientia id praestat ut quomodo et quo perveniendum sit noverimus virtus ut perveniamus Alterum sine altero nihil valet ex scientia enim virtus ex virtuâ—e Summum Bonum nascitur Lact. Instit lib. 3. câ—p 12. p. 271. As there is no possibility of arriving at Heaven without Knowledge of the way So neither is it possible that we should ever come to Heaven the way being known without walking therein 'T is not the Jacob's Staff of Speculation but the Jacob's Ladder of a Godly Conversation by which we must Climb the Tree of Life The School-men have large Disputes pro and con about the Nature of Divinity Whether it consist more in Speculation or in Practise Aquinas makes Theologiam Speculativam and Scotus will have it Practicam but indeed 't is the Complication of both these that makes a good Christian whose Gospel Light must be Animated with a Gospel Life and all whose Knowledge must Expatiate into Obedience These things if you know saith the Lord of Life happy are ye if you do them John 13.17 Knowledge may be our Pilot to guide us in our course but Practise is the Ship in which we must Sail to the Shore of eternal Soul-satisfying Happiness Hence the Apostle James 1.25 pronounces the Practical Hearer Blessed though not for his Deed yet in his Deed clearly making Practise the Evidence thô not the Ground of our Happiness the Way that leads to a Crown of Life though not the Price whereby we should think to purchase it As God is a plentiful Rewarder of those that diligently seek him so he will be sought before ever the reward of eternal Glory can be had Having therefore our Eyes upon the Star of True Happiness let us keep our Hands to the Helm of Practical Holiness [†] Qui vult sapiens ac beatus esse audiat Dei vocem discat justitiam humana contemnat divina suscipiat ut Summum illud Bonum ad quod natus est possit adipisci Lact. He that would be Blessed desiring to be Wise to Salvation let him hear the Voice of God let him work Righteousness let him despise humane Vanities let him enterprize divine Offices that he may come at length to the full Enjoyment of that Chiefest Good for which he came into the World We must quit ourselves like Men on Earth or never look to be made glorious like the Angels in Heaven True Happiness is a rich Jewel Lockt up in the Cabinet of Heaven in the Kingdom of God Holiness must turn the Key or the Door of Blessedness the Gates of the Heavenly Jerusalem will never open to us Keep we therefore our Eyes upon Heaven's Glory and then forbear we to do the Work of God upon Earth if we can It 's hope of Gain that makes the diligent Tradesman be up so early and so patient to endure hardship How much more should the Hope of gaining not Earth but Heaven not those Riches which perish in the using but the Riches of eternal Glory make us labour to be Holy Oh let Carking for this World be expelled with our Care for Heaven Let this eat up our Hearts with desire to have the Injoyment of that glorious Inheritance 'T is Fabled of Leobis and Biton that their Father having been imploring the greatest Blessing from the Gods upon these his Two Sons the next morning they were found both Dead in their Beds The greatest Blessing that can befall a Child of God is to dye in the Lord bidding Adieu to this vale of Tears and so entring upon his Master's Joy The Happiness of God's People doth indeed dawn in this Life in the Beauties of Holiness from the womb of the Morning but the Noon-tide of their Happiness the Meridian Light of Glory doth never shine forth upon them till they come to Heaven Most of a Christian's Drink in this Life is Oxymel Heaven alone puts that pure Cup of Consolation into his hand wherein there is no sour Ingredients True Blessedness grows indeed upon the Tree of Godliness which hath indeed some Bloomings and Buds of Comfort here but it comes not to it 's full growth till another Life This World is too Cold a Climate to bring it to Ripeness it must first be transplanted into the heavenly Canaan and have the Sun of Righteousness shining upon it in full strength before the blessed Fruit of this Tree will ever be brought to it's full Maturity So that a Christian doth not Wither when plucked up of Death as it were by the Roots but he changes the place of his growth leaving the Wilderness to be Planted in Canaan where the Fruit of Holiness is now Crowned with Life everlasting COME ¶ Veniant qui esuriunt ut coelesti cibo saturati sempiternam famem ponant Veniant qui sitiunt ut aquam salutarem de perenni Coelestique Fonte plenissimis faucibus trahant Hoc cibatu atque potu Dei et coeci videbunt et surdi audient muti Loquentur claudi ambulabunt stulti sapient aegroti valebunt mortui revivescent Lact. de vit Beat cap. 27. pag. 732. Edit Gal. then come all ye that Hunger that being satisfy'd with this heavenly Food ye may lay aside your Hunger for ever This Meat and Drink which God hath provided in Heaven is of that Sovereign Virtue that it both makes the Blind to See and the Deaf to Hear and the Lame to Leap for Joy and the Foolish to know Understanding and the Sick it restores to Health and the Dead it makes to Live a life of endless Glory Tully would have a Prince fed with Honour and drawn to Heroick Atchievements by the desire of Glory and Renown And I â—â—kewise would have God's People to live upon the Glory to come as that which will draw them to walk worthy of God who hath called them out of Darkness into the Kingdom of his dear Son Can any Man that sees Heaven and knows what it is to be with the Lord for ever go on in a course of sensual brutish living not regarding to prepare himself for the Glory to be revealed in him So sweet is the Pleasure of that eternal Light that if we should enjoy the same no more than one short hour yet for this one hour's Happiness we ought and that deservedly to despise all the Delights and Pleasures that the universal confluence of Worldly enjoyments could afford us TELL me then if God's People be not well advised to study Holiness Tell me
't was not any Momentary Pleasure lasting only for a Season but it was Fulness of Joy in God's presence it was perfect freedom from Sin it was Grace glorified it was the Beatifical Vision of God in Heaven together with those Soul-satisfying Pleasures that are at his right hand for evermore to which in all his obedience we find Moses so stedfastly looking SO then from the practise of Moses the Man of God thus fixing his eye in all his obedience upon the recompence of Reward and encouraging himself therewith chearfully to bear the Cross of Christ to Mortification Self-denyal and the like wholsome severities of Religion you may observe with me this point of DOCTRINE That God's People for their better encouragement to all holy self-denying and obediential walking before him they may lawfully have Respect to the Recompence of the Reward WHILST we are denying our selves running the way of God's Commandments and doing the work which he hath given us to finish here on Earth 't is no Soloecism at all in Christianity for us to have our eye stedfastly fixed upon that eternally glorious Reward which the Lord hath laid up with himself for us in the Kingdom of Heaven We may lawfully walking with God all our life be encouraged against whatever Difficulties and Persecutions we meet with in Heaven's way to think how incorruptible the Crown is how glorious the Kingdom how unspeakable the Joy how secure the Rest how endless the Pleasures how undefiled the Inheritance how full uninterruptible and everlastingly satisfying the Communion with God over all blessed for ever is whereof we shall take Possession in the hour of death HOLY Daniel when praying in the Land of his Captivity he opened his Window and set his face towards Jerusalem Thus when Praying when Repenting when Suffering and Dying for Christ we may lawfully open the Eye of Faith and set our faces towards the heavenly Jerusalem towards the promised Canaan towards the Temple of God in Zion the place of our eternally blessed and glorious Rest 'T IS a bold attempt for Men to make restrictions where God himself hath made none for Men to say we must not when God himself saith we may in all our obedience have an eye to the recompense of Reward to the full enjoyment of him in Glory THE example of Moses in this place doth evince beyond all exception that some respect may lawfully be had to the recompence of the Reward at least by way of motive and encouragement to stir us up and to quicken us both in doing and suffering for the God of Heaven For this you see is given in as one special reason Why he refused to be called the Son of Pharaoh's Daughter Why he chose rather to suffer affliction with the People of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season And why he esteemed the Reproach of Christ greater Riches than the Treasures of Aegypt even because he had a respect to the Recompence of the Reward esteeming of all the Riches Honours Pleasures and Enjoyments of this World as not worthy to be compared with the Glory that was to be revealed in him AND if Moses might thus incourage himself to indure hardship as a good Souldier of Jesus Christ by having an eye fixed upon the recompence of Reward upon Glory Honour and Immortality why should it not be lawful for Christians to do the same How can that be unlawful in Christians which the Holy Ghost hath left upon eternal record as a matter of high commendation in him Let us not think that the Lord will condemn us for looking at that in our Obedience for which he hath so highly commended his Servant Moses That which was imputed to him for a Virtue will never be imputed to us for a Crime But we also as well as he may for our better encouragement in all the ways of obedience have respect to the recompence of reward to that far more exceeding and eternal weight of Glory The Husbandman can cheerfully undergo the Labour and Charges of Seed-time though many times very great when his eye is fixed upon the Harvest Thus to make us chearful in sowing to the Spirit we may lawfully have an eye to the great Harvest when every one that now soweth Righteousness shall be sure to Reap a full Crop of Eternal Glory Gal. 6.8.9 CHAP. II. The Method laid down with two introductory Propositions for the better understanding of the Doctrin IN the prosecution of this Heavenly Truth having first premised something by way of Introduction I purpose annuente Deo to observe this Method I. I shall shew you What it is to have respect to the Recompence of the Reward II. I shall endeavour to let you understand How you are to have Respect to the Recompence of Reward III. I shall give you Some Scripture Reasons proving that you may have respect to the recompence of reward IV. AND lastly I shall help you to improve this Truth by way of Use and Application that so it may not be Unprofitable but every way Advantageous to your Souls BEFORE I come to these things you must give me leave to premise something as was hinted by way of introduction which I shall wholly comprize in these two particulars 1. THAT we are bound to serve the Lord and to walk in all dutiful obedience before him though there were no Heaven no Glory nor reward of Eternal Life to be expected from him The obligation of our obedience to the Lord Jehovah ariseth not so much from the promise of Eternal Life annexed to the Commandment as from the authority of God's Commanding INDEED when-ever God sweetens his Precepts with Promises crowning our Temporal Obedience with an Eternally Glorious Recompence this lays us under a stronger engagement But yet if you separate betwixt the Precept and the Promise if you take away the Reward of Eternal Life yet all this will not dissolve nor nullify that obligation of Obedience to God that lies upon us For impossible it is and utterly repugnant to the quality of Rational Creatures as we are not to be subject to the will of our Creator and indebted in all possible Obedience to him that made us SUCH is the transcendent Excellency of God that in himself he is infinitely worthy of all our Services and such is the Sovereignty of God over us that though we should serve him ten thousand years together in the most holy seraphick and heavenly manner that ever Saint or Angel did yet after all this he might annihilate us and yet do us no wrong WHATSOEVER we are whatsoever we have whatsoever we are able to do in this world the Lord hath more interest in it than we have our selves and therefore we owe our selves we owe our enjoyments and services to him so that he may justly require them at our hands upon any terms and we are bound to surrender them though he should never vouchsafe us the least recompence of Reward for so doing
this There is a dark Mist upon Eternity to all Unbelievers they are led by carnal Reason and will therefore believe no more than what Sense discovers but now Faith that gives a present Subsistence to future Glory and is the convincing Evidence of things hoped for of Heaven and eternal Felicity though as yet unseen Heb. 11.1 SENSE cannot out-see time nor look beyond the Grave but Faith gives the Soul a clearer Prospect of Eternity and shews it under all Afflictions a far more exceeding and eternal weight of Glory 2 Cor. 4.17 So then when by Faith we can look into another World believing that verily there is a Reward for the Righteous when by Faith we can assure our hearts of the Glory to come believing that he who Sows to the Spirit shall of the Spirit Reap Life everlasting then we have Respect to the Recompence of the Reward 2. FIDVCIALLY to apply it to our selves as that which we believe shall be the Recompence wherewith the Lord will eternally Crown us Thus Moses whilst he refused to be called the Son of Pharoah's Daughter esteeming the Reproach of Christ greater Riches than the Treasures in Egypt doubtless he looked upon the Lord Jehovah as his Portion upon the Kingdom of Heaven as his own Inheritance upon Life Happiness and Eternal Glory as things prepared for himself and so he had Respect unto the Recompence of the Reward To come unto the Lord in ways of Obedience believing him to be a plentiful Rewarder of all that diligently seek him is something but when we appropriate God for a Portion to our selves saying with Thomas My Lord and my God and believe him to have prepared for us in particular such Eternally Glorious Things as eye never saw nor ear heard nor could the Heart of Man ever yet conceive of then we have Respect indeed to the Recompence of the Reward THE Church of Rome I confess hath Anathematized all those who urge it upon Believers as their duty to appropriate God and Christ and eternal Glory in Heaven to their own Souls and they call us by way of Reproach Specialists for maintaining that the Object of saving Faith is the special Mercy of God Remission of Sins for me and Justification through the Blood of Christ for me and a Crown of Life laid up for me and a Kingdom of Eternal Glory to be expected by me in Particular this they declaim against as the first-born of all Absurdities But believe it Christians without this particular Appropriation of God and Christ and Eternal Glory to our selves our Faith will bring us no more Peace no more Comfort no more Joy in the Holy Ghost than for Lazarus to hear there was Food enough in Dives's House when he might not so much as taste of the Crumbs that fell from that Rich Man's Table Hagar had a Well of Water hard by her but for all that she sits weeping so long as she saw it not Thus Christian though God and Christ and the Kingdom of Heaven with all the Glory thereof lye before thee yet so long as thou lookest not upon God as thy Portion upon Christ as thy Saviour and upon the Kingdom of Heaven as thy Eternal Inheritance no wonder though thou weep and go mourning from day to day For 't is only respect to God and Christ to Heaven and Eternal Glory as things wherein we our selves have an Interest that can effectually comfort our Souls and make us rejoyce with Joy unspeakable and full of Glory STRIVE we then to look upon Heaven and Eternal Glory as prepared for us in Particular to look upon a Crown of Righteousness as laid up for us and then we have respect indeed to the Recompence of the Reward Though Christian thou canst not say Riches are thine yet see that thou canst say Grace and Glory are thine and that is much better When once the Soul can say though now I Sow in Tears yet anon I shall Reap in Joy though now I walk in Sackcloth yet I shall shortly be cloathed upon with the White Robes of eternal Glory though be now Poor in this World yet for all that I am Rich in Faith and Heir-apparent to the most glorious Kingdom that ever eye beheld though I now lie amongst the Pots mourning like the Doves of the Valley yet looking towards Heaven can say above yonder Heavens must I dwell for ever above yonder Heavens hath the Lord prepared for me a Crown of Righteousness a Mansion of eternal Glory all fulness of Joy in his Presence and unperishing Pleasures at his own Right Hand for evermore When thus I say the Soul can Appropriate the Happiness the Glory and the Royalties of the World to come to it self then it hath a due respect to the Recompence of the Reward 3. SERIOVSLY to consider of Heaven and Glory and often to be meditating upon them 'T is not a sudden motion nor now and then a transient thought about eternal Life and Happiness in another World that will prove a Man to have due respect to the Recompence of the Reward But there must be serious Thoughts and fixed Meditations upon them so that the Mind may be delightfully busied about and wholly taken up in the sweet Contemplation of them Zacheus being a Man of low Stature could not see Christ but by climbing up into the Sycamore-Tree (f) Necesse est igitur in animo frequenter versare coelestia nemo enim quaerit illud de quo non rogitat Davenant in Colos c. 3. v. 1. Pag. 244. Thus Christians unless you climb up into the high Sycamore of Heavenly Meditation seriously fixing your Thoughts in all your Obedience upon that Crown that Kingdom that eternal weight of Glory which God hath prepared for those that love him you can never have any due respect to the Recompence of the Reward WHEN God would have Abraham take a view of Canaan he called him up into the Mountain of Nebo to the top of Pisgah So would we ever take a Prospect of the Holy Land the Promised Canaan the Heavenly Jerusalem as that which must be the Reward of all our Labours the way is to go up unto the Mountain of Nebo even to the highest Pisgah of Heavenly Meditations Such is the Power of Holy Meditation that it sets a Man upon the Shoar of Eternity it carries him with Paul up into the Third Heaven and brings him notwithstanding any flaming Sword of Worldly opposition to keep him out into the Paradise of God so that now he can see the Beauties taste the Pleasures and clearly take a view of the Glories of the World to come Whilst Stephen was stedfastly looking towards Heaven he saw the Glory of God and Christ standing at his Right Hand Thus Christians we never get so full a Prospect of God and Christ and Eternal Glory as when we seriously meditate Heaven stedfastly fixing our thoughts on the World to come We Read of Elijah that he was carried up to Heaven in
a fiery Chariot Thus Holy Meditation it would carry us above the Clouds it would give us Possession of Heaven before we come there and set us in the midst of all the Glory and Royalties of Eternal Life as if they were already present Heavenly thoughts are as so many steps towards our Eternal Rest When by these therefore we Travel every day to the City of God and delightfully walk therein when every day we take as it were a turn or two in Paradise seriously Meditating Heaven together with the glory that shall shortly be revealed in us then we have Respect indeed to the Recompence of the Reward 4. EARNESTLY to desire and long for it When we see so much of the Excellency Worth and Glory of the World to come that we groan within ourselves desiring with all our hearts to get out of these Houses of Clay and to be cloathed upon with our House which is from Heaven then we have respect to the Recompence of the Reward 2. Cor. 5.2 When Paul had once been wrapt up into the Third Heaven and seen the Paradise of God his Note was ever after I desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ Thus the Soul that hath a respect to the Recompence of the Reward he hath been in the Heavenly Paradise he hath tasted some Clusters of Canaan and therefore he cannot but long for more he can never be soon enough with Christ he can never soon enough get above the World and Sin and Temptations he can never be soon enough with God in Glory Oh! when shall it be They that have the first Fruits of the Spirit cannot chuse but have their eyes always fixed upon the Recompence of the Reward earnestly desiring the time of Harvest when they shall Reap a full Crop of Eternal Happiness and Glory in the Heavenly Canaan AS Noah's Dove was restless finding no place whereupon to set the sole of her foot till she came into the Ark so Christians if your eyes are rightly fixed upon the Recompence of the Reward you will find your selves carried out after Heaven and Glory in a restless manner and will never sit down satisfyed till you come to rest in the Bosome of God's Eternal Love Never Christians did Rachel more long for Children nor David for the Waters of Bethlehem nor Absalom to see the King's Face than your Souls will long for the glorious Liberty of the Children of God to be drinking the Waters of Life in the Heavenly Paradise and to come to the Beatifical Vision of God in Glory where you shall see him Face to Face in case you have an eye rightly fixed upon the Recompence of the Reward THE Language of every Soul whose eye is rightly fixed upon Heaven and Glory it is like unto that of Job speaking forth his desires after God Oh that I knew where to find him that I might come even to his seat Job 23.3 Such a Soul is impregnated with holy desires and longings after God in Glory and with these the Soul travels all the day long crying out with the Church in the Revelations as in pain to be delivered from under the bondage of Sin and Corruption into Heavenly Glory GIVE the Soul Riches give it Honours give it all the Pleasures that can be thought of to ravish the heart of a Carnal Man yet having an eye rightly fixed upon the Recompence of Reward in vain shall you seek by these to bribe it out of its holy desires and longings after God in Glory For scorning and trampling upon them all as unworthy to come in competition with God it even breaketh through desire after him and can truly say of God with holy David Whom have I in Heaven but thee and there is none upon Earth that I desire besides thee Psal 73.25 'T IS just with the Soul as with some Women in the time of their Impregnature who if they see any thing when they are with Child that they have a mind to they must have it or else they will long and dye for it Thus the Soul that by Faith hath got a sight of Heavenly Enjoyments now the heart of such a Soul it is set upon Heaven and he must have Heaven upon a Crown of Life and he must have a Crown of Life upon God and Christ and Eternal Glory and he must have them all together or else give him what you can he will long and die unsatisfied THERE is so much of the Beauty Loveliness and Glory of Christ revealed to the Soul in looking upon the Recompence of Reward that now it grows impatient of living any longer without him crying out as she did in another case Why are his Chariots so long in coming and Why tarry the wheels of his Chariots When will my beloved make haste and be like a young Roe upon the Mountains of Spices When will the day break and the shadows fly away that I may see my beloved in his Glory When will he come to put an end to these days of Sin and Sorrow that I may rest for ever in the Bosome of his Eternal Love When will he take me by the hand and lead me out of the Wilderness of this World into the Heavenly Canaan When will he rebuke the Winds and the Seas that will give me no rest in this Troublesome World and set me safe on the Shoar of Eternal Happiness When will he deliver me from this Body of Death and gather my Soul to the Spirits of Just Men made perfect When will he take from me these Rags of Mortality and cause me to be cloathed upon with an House not made with hands Eternal in the Heavens When will he make me return and come to Sion with Songs and everlasting Joy upon my head When will he cause me to obtain fulness of Joy and Gladness with him in Eternal Mansions of Glory that Sorrow and Sin and Sighing being done away I may be with the Lord for ever Oh when shall I once see that blessed day NOW What is it I beseech you after which your hearts do thus strongly breathe thus insatiably thirst thus impatiently long If Riches will not satisfy but you must have a Treasure in Heaven if Worldly Honour will not satisfy but you must have a Crown of Righteousness from Christ himself if Carnal Pleasures will not satisfy but you must have that fulness of Joy which is in God's Presence and those Pleasures which are at his Right Hand for evermore if in a word the Life that now is will not satisfy but you must though you dye for it go live for ever with Christ in Glory why then there is no doubt Christians but with Moses you have an eye to the Recompence of Reward For then our eye is rightly fixed upon the Recompence of Reward when our Souls are carried out in strong desires after God and Christ and Eternal Glory as our only Happiness 5. TO be by the consideration of it exceedingly encouraged to diligence and
length you may attain to the full injoyment of God in Glory Here also I confess the Truth meets with some Adversaries who do tell us That to make Heaven the end of our Duties seeking in all our Obedience our own Happiness our own Glory our own Salvation is Mercenary and utterly inconsistent with the free Spirit of a Christian But the truth is if we consult holy Scripture we shall find this Practice so far from being Mercenary and inconsistent with the free Spirit of a Christian that he is unworthy the Name of a Christian who in all his Obedience and Performances is not found so doing For if Christ himself hath Commanded us That we should seek the Kingdom of God and the Righteousness thereof in the first place That we should lay up for our selves a Treasure in Heaven not labouring for the Meats that Perish but for the Meat which shall endure to eternal Life How can we then count that Man a Christian who despising the Authority of Christ cares for none of these things but carelesly goes on in a way of Duty as if Heaven and Glory were not worth the looking after YOU may Believe it Sirs the main Errand upon which God sent you into the World was to work out not only his Glory but your own Salvation with fear and trembling And let me tell you so inseparably is the Glory of God and your own Salvation joined together that you never Dishonour God more than when Salvation-work is neglected by you and you begin to be unmindful of your own Happiness GOD's Glory I must confess must be the Ultimate and Highest End of all our Obedience as will farther be shewed you But yet this hinders not but that in all our Obedience we may design our own Happiness making the eternal Salvation of our immortal Souls the great End next unto God's Glory of our Lives For Subordinata non Pugnant is a sure Maxim We do never Oppose God's Glory when we only make Heaven our End and seek the Salvation of our own Souls with a due Respect had unto his Glory THERE is indeed a Two-fold End Fine Operis Finis Operantis the End of the Work and the End of him that Worketh And though in some cases they are diverse if not contrary to one another yet in the Case now spoken of they are co incident and both of them materially the same thing (l) Nam quis alius noster est finis nisi pervenire ad regnum cujus nullus est finis August de Civit. Dei lib. 22. cap. 70. For not only doth the Scripture make Salvation the end of Faith and Obedience but also of Christians themselves Believing and Obeying the Lord when it teaches them to work out their own Salvation with fear and trembling 1. Pet. 1.9 Phil. 2.12 BE not therefore such enemies to your own Souls as to neglect that Happiness which God in all your Obedience would have you to look after but now see that you make Heaven and eternal Glory the great end of your Life Whilst others are designing to make themselves Rich and Great and Honourable in the World Oh! let it be the grand design of your Souls to surprize Heaven and to take by an Holy Violence the Kingdom of God Mat. 11.12 IF Christians you would make again of Godliness be sure then that by all holy and godly Conversation you gain for yourselves in Heaven a Crown of Life Rest not satisfied with the low and beggarly injoyments of this World but now see that you set your Affections on things above endeavouring to lay hold on eternal Life Your present life is a flitting shadow a vanishing bubble a day which though never so pleasant must yet have the dark Curtains of death drawn over it and cannot be long but the life which is to come is a leaf never fading a light ever shining and such a day as shall know no evening Tell me then which is most rational to seek after that life and those Pleasures which are lost almost as soon as found or after that Life and those unfadable Pleasures which being once found can never be lost nor taken away from us Luke 10.42 (k) Praeferantur vera falsis aeterna brevibus utilia jucundis Lactant. de vero Cult c. 21. p. 123. LEARN now to prefer true Happiness before deceitful Riches eternal Comforts before short injoyments and those things that will prove everlastingly advantageous to your Souls before the Pleasures of Sin which are but for a Season God doth not grudge that you would seek your selves in his Service only he would have you to seek after your selves not in the Meat that perisheth but in the Meat which shall endure to eternal Life John 6.27 There is a kind of holy Ambition which our Blessed Lord hath not only allowed but also exhorted us to and that is that we should aim at and seek after a Kingdom Not an earthly Kingdom from which we may soon fall but an Heavenly Kingdom which connot be shaken wherein we shall reign with Christ for ever and ever Revel 22.5 Here then is a whet-stone to diligence and matter for our ambitious thoughts with warrant to be working upon Earthly Princes if under pretence of serving them you seek to possess your selves of their Crowns and Kingdoms will deal with you as Traytors but the King of eternal Glory he is never better pleased with you than when in serving him you aim at a Crown of Life indeavouring to get Possession of the Kingdom of Heaven For then you have respect indeed to the Recompence of the Reward when by patient continuance in well-doing you seek for Glory Honour and Immortality and therefore you need not to doubt but God will shortly render unto you eternal Life Rom. 2. (l) Nullus labor durus nullum tempus longum quo aeternitatis gloria comparatur THINK we therefore no Labour too much no time too long for the gaining of eternal Glory in the Kingdom of Heaven If upon uncertain hopes of a fading Kingdom whose foundation is in the dust Men will take such pains laying all at stake and hazarding not only Liberty but Life it self What should we do then but contemn the World run the hazard of greatest Sufferings and move chearfully forward in all the ways of Obedience towards the Crown of eternal Life towards a Kingdom that cannot be moved towards a City that hath foundations whose builder and maker is God For (m) Quisquis corruptelas terrae virtute calcaverit arbiter iâ—â—o summus et verax ad lucem vitam quae perpetuam suscitabet Lact. de vit Beat. ad finem who ever contemning the corruptible Enjoyments of this Life shall aspire in the ways of Obedience after Heavenly Glory why God the Righteous Judge of all the World will make such an one meet to be a partaker of the Inheritance of Saints in light and will honour him at length with a Crown of Eternal
yet we must neither serve nor love him so much for the Reward that he will Crown us with as for his own sake 'T is Storied of (l) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Vide Plutarch in Vit. Alex. Alexander that he was wont to say of his two Friends Ephestion and Craterus Ephestion loves me because I am Alexander but Craterus loves me because I am King Alexander implying that the one loved his Person and the other nothing else but his Princely Gifts Many there are in the World who Craterus-like have a good mind to God's gifts and benefits that he bestoweth on them and for these they would seem to love him But (m) Cum Deus sit ipsa essentia bonitatis per se et ultimus finis omnium propter seipsum quoque diligendus est Aquinas 2ª 2 ae Q. 27. a. 11. Christians should be so many Spiritual Ephestions obeying the God of Heaven and loving him for himself and all other things in the World Heaven and Glory it self not excepted for his sâ—ke If there be any subordination betwixt God and Heaven surely then we should rather love and by patient continuance in well doing seek after the Reward of Eternal Happiness in Heaven for God's sake than love and seek after God for Heaven's sake 'T is hard I confess to distinguish betwixt God and the Recompence of the Reward (n) Nec deum debemus amare propter praemia sed praemia propter deum Pet. Mart. in Sam. But if any such distinction may be made we must rather love and obey God for his own sake than for the sake of that Eternal Reward how glorious soever For as Austin well saith (o) Deus gratis se vult coli gratis se vult diligi hoc est castè amari Non pterea se amari vult quia dat aliquid praeter se sed quia dat se Aust in Ps 52. God will not be loved and served because he gives us any Reward besides himself but because he gives us himself as our exceeding great Reward Gen. 15.1 The Wife that intirely loves her Husband she looks for no other Reward of her Love and Obedience to him but only to enjoy him as her Husband So we must not be acted in our Obedience by a Mercenary Spirit looking more at our own Reward than at God himself but must think it a sufficient Reward of all our Love and Obedience to God that we shall at length enjoy him as our God in Christ Jesus When we are acted more in ways of Obedience by the Fear of Hell and by the desire of Heaven than by Love to God this argues a servile mercenary frame of Spirit clearly evincing that our respect to the Recompence of the Reward is not such as it ought to be For though we may lawfully have respect to them both looking upon the Torments of the one to deter us from Sinning against God and upon the Comforts of the other to encourage us to all holy walking before him yet that which ought to be the main Spring of all our Obedience setting all on work for God that which should be the very Soul of all our Religious undertakings especially deriving Life and the purest quint-essence of Holiness into them why 't is the Love of God shed abroad in our hearts Oh therefore see to it that in all your Obedience to God you be acted not by the Spirit of Bondage but by the Spirit of Adoption not by Fear but by Love not by servile and mercenary but by filial and ingenuous Principles You may set the Joys of Heaven on the Right Hand and the Torments of Hell on the Left having an eye to them both as strong incentives to quicken you in your motion But the Love of God in Christ this must be the spring and main ground of your moving in Heaven's way (p) Deum non colimus nisi propter deum ut deus quem colimus ipse sit merces Nam qui deum ideo colit ut aliquid aliud promereatur quam ipsum non quem colit diligit quia non ipsum sed aliud concupiscit Prosper in Psal 119. For we never Worship the Lord in a right way we never serve God as we should till we can serve him for himself Nor do we consult God's Glory at all but our own security when 't is only the fear of Hellish Torments and not the love that we should bear to the Lord that makes us walk in Obedience before him An heart rightly affected in the Services of God is so ingenuous and so throughly steeped in the Christal Stream of Divine Love that though there were no Heaven no Hell no Reward nor Punishment yet it would constrain a Man to do his Duty making him to shun Sin and to walk in all upright Obedience before the Lord. (q) Ipse Christianus vere est qui proficiendo perveniet ad talem animum ut plus amet dominum quam timeat Gehennam ut etiamsi dicat illi deus utere delicijs carnalibus sempiternis et quantum potes pecca nec morieris nec in Gehennam mitteris sed mecum tantum modo non eris Exhorrescat et omnino non peccet non jam ut in illud quod timebat non incidat sed ne illum quem sic amat offendat in quo uno est requies quam oculus non vidit nec auris audivit nec in cor hominis ascendit August de Catechiezâ—nd Rudik cap. 17. Let God say to such an one Crown yourselves with all Earthly Delights and take your fill of all Mundane Pleasures Cloathe yourselves in Purple and fare Deliciously every day Sin as much as you will and deny yourselves in nothing that a Carnal heart can desire yet you shall never die for it nor be cast into Hell only this shall be your Punishment that you shall never see my Face nor enjoy my Favour Why such is the strength of the Love which he bears to the God of Heaven that he would tremble at such an offer and not much be tempted with it to sin against the Lord not so much because he is afraid of falling into Hell as because he is unwilling to offend that God whom his Soul loveth and whose Favour he looks upon as better than Life it self A true Christian though he may fear Hell and eschew it with a fear of flight and aversation yet this is not the Spring of his Motion but as the Primum Mobile sets all the other Spheres a going and as the Soul informing the Body gives Life and Motion to the whole Man so the Love of God shed abroad in the heart this is the Spring of a Christian's Obedience setting all the Faculties of his Soul as so many Heavenly Orbs a going for God and putting Life into all it's Performances The Sparks do not more Naturally fly upward than the Love of God doth actuate draw forth and carry a Christian in ways of Obedience to God
bear the holy Presence of God to see him face to face and to look fully upon the Brightness of his Glory in the heavenly Paradice where they shall not have the least Fig-leaf to hide the shame of their nakedness Believe it Sinners unless your sore-eyes be healed and your Natures Sanctified you may find as much comfort in Hell as you could in beholding the Face of God in Heaven That Heaven which is a Paradice of all delights to a gracious Soul you that are not Sanctified and made New Creatures you would find it a very Tophet a place of all hellish and intollerable Torments should you enter into it In Ireland they say is a Fountain whose Waters kill all those Beasts that drink of them but is pleasant to the People not hurting them though they usually drink of it Thus though that pure River of Water in the New Jerusalem proceeding out of the Throne of God and of the Lamb Rev. 22.1 be more pleasant than life it self to all God's People yet should any brutish Sinner be suffered to drink of those Waters he would find them more bitter than the stroke of death For the Soul must first be made a prepared subject for Heaven and the Joys thereof or Heaven it self would be an Hell to it and the Joys of Heaven they would fill it with the greatest and most exquisite Torments And truly would Ungodly Sinners but set Reason a-work they might easily satisfy themselves of their own unfitness for Heaven and what an hell it would be to them should they come there They that count it a weariness to serve the Lord a few hours together on Earth how can they think themselves fit for Heaven where they must serve him day and night without ceasing to all Eternity If they find it so tedious to be restrained from Vanity by the presence of a faithful Minister or a serious Christian for a little scantling of time How can they think themselves able to bear the presence of an infinitely holy God restraining them from all their Sins and pleasurable Vanities for ever When they cannot endure to spend a short Sabbath with seriousness in the worship of God but are presently tired out longing that the Sabbath were over What fitness have they to spend an Everlasting Sabbath in worshiping the God of Heaven which will never be over Grace dawning in God's People is now their burden their sore eyes cannot look upon the brightness of it Oh then How unable will they be to bear it when all it's imperfections being done away it shall break forth into a bright Sun-shine of eternal dazling glory Oh be convinced that you must first be made holy or you can never be made happy you must first be sanctified or you can never be saved you must first be cleansed from all unrighteousness and made New Creatures or you will never be fit to inhabit the New Jerusalem Esther might not come into the Kings Presence till first she was washed and purified So till first we be throughly washed in the Laver of Regeneration and purified thereby from all Filthiness of Flesh and Spirit we can never enjoy God's Presence in a state of Glory Holiness is that which becomes God's House and therefore except you follow after Holiness and pursue it you must never look to come to Heaven the place of God's holy habitation 'T is fabled of Hercules in the Flames of Oeta that he left the Garment sent him by Deianira which could not be got off without tearing his Flesh and so became Immortal If you have not already prevented me in the accommodation the Moral of the Apologue is this You must put off the Rags of your own Filthiness laying aside every weight Heb. 12.1 and the Sin which doth tenaciously cleave to you would you ever enter upon a state of blessed and glorious Immortality As the rising Sun must needs go before the perfect day So sanctifying Grace must needs go before and is that alone which can fit us for eternal Salvation God hath told you in his holy Word that nothing which defileth shall ever enter into the New Jerusalem And whomsoever the voice of God speaking in the Scriptures shuts out of Heaven in this Life they shall undoubtedly be shut out of Heaven in the Life to come So that in vain shall you look for happiness in the World to come if here you give not diligence to be holy walking in all dutiful Obedience before the God of Heaven Pharnaces being up in Arms against Caesar sent him a Crown thinking by such a Present to appease his Wrath but Caesar sending it back again returned him this answer Faceret imperata prius let him first lay down his Arms and return to his Obedience and then his Crown should be accepted of by way of Recognizance Thus as Caesar would not accept of a Crown so to be sure God will never give a Crown of Glory to those by way of Recompence whom he sees to be up in Rebellion against him not labouring to become holy and to walk in Obedience before him The Kingdom of Heaven is a place prepared for Children and not for Strangers for Friends and not for Enemies for such as are pure and undefiled in their way and not for the wicked and unrighteous 1 Cor. 6.9 who must never continuing such inherit the Kingdom of God The Ark of Noah was a Receptacle for Beasts that were unclean as well as for those that were clean But into Heaven there shall in no wise enter as was said any thing that defileth and is unclean Let then I beseech you the consideration of all this make you careful to seek after Heaven and Glory in a way of Grace and Holiness (x) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Justin Martyr Holiness is the Perspective through which we must see God 'T is as possible to see the Sun without Eyes as to see God and be saved without Holiness For without Holiness no Man can see the Lord Heb. 12.14 There is an (y) Negat quenquam posse deum videre sine Sanctimonia quoniam non aâ—ijs oculis videbimus deum quam qui reformati sunt ad ejus imaginem Calvin Inheritance laid up for Saints in light but in case you walk in darkness not labouring to make yourselves meet for it you must never look to enâ—oy it Colos 1.12 Oh that you would therefore be daily Mortifying your (z) Mutari nos oporet et novas creaturas effici priusquam participes esse possumus coelestium beneficiorum Nam in nobis nihil est aliud quam summa ineptitudo ad bonum spirituale sive intelligendum sive faciendum sive denique capiendum Davenant in Locum Corruptions breaking off your Sins by Repentance perfecting Holiness in the fear of God and so preparing your selves for Heaven that you may be counted meet to be partakers of that glorious Inheritance He that Soweth not his Field hath no hope to Reap it he that
runneth not the Race hath no hope of the Garland he that Fighteth not the Battel hath no hope to obtain the Crown Why thus my Friends if you sit down satisfied without Grace not labouring to become pure and holy and unblameable before God in love you can never have any good hope to enjoy the Harvest the Garland the Crown of Eternal Life Ephes 2.12 PROMISE yourselves what happiness you please and be as confident of your own good condition as you will Yet believe it Sirs unless now with the Wise Virgins you get Oyl in your Lamps and Grace in your Souls you must never sit down with Christ in the Kingdom of God to the Marriage-Supper For to presume of Life and Happiness without (a) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cyril Grace and Holiness is the next way to lose them both and to plunge yourselves deeper in Eternal Misery Presumption being still the Preface to Damnation And are you grown so secure indeed that you can sit down satisfied without that which alone can make you meet for Heaven and Eternal Glory Oh methinks that unmarcescible Crown of Life that far more exceeding and eternal weight of Glory whereof you must everlastingly fall short if you keep it not in the way of serious Practical Holiness should make you give all diligence to get Grace into your hearts and to become holy Is it nothing do you think to miss of Eternal Glory to be eternally shut out of God's heavenly Kingdom and for ever to lose that Crown of Righteousness that fulness of Joy and those Pleasures which are at God's Right Hand for evermore Oh what everlasting hellish horrour will fill your Souls at Death and Judgment should you spend your lives in Vanity not striving to perfect holiness in the fear of God! Oh that you would look upon a graceless condition and negligence in the ways of God now as you will look upon it when for want of grace and diligence in Heaven's way the Lord shall throw you down for ever into hellish Torments the Lord shall punish you with everlasting destruction from his own blessed Presence and bid you depart accursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels Oh the unspeakable horrour Oh the everlasting dreadful confusion that will then fall upon you Oh what Worlds would you not give to be saved when for want of sanctifying grace you must of necessity be damned for ever Oh what would you not now do to come to Heaven when for want of Holiness you are sure to be thrown down into hellish Torments and there shut up amongst damned Spirits in everlasting Chains under darkness In the fear of God Sirs and out of tender compassion to your own Immortal Souls do not rest a moment longer in a graceless condition but as ever you desire to be saved now labour to be throughly sanctified and as ever you would see the face of God in Glory now labour to walk before him in all holy Conversation and Godliness Never think to be Mercenarij if you will not be Operarij You can never receive the Reward of Eternal Glory when you dye if you work not hard in God's Vineyard so long as you live The Lord will give you both the upper and the nether Springs both Grace and Glory But on this condition that you espouse Achsah his Daughter that you devote yourselves to the practice of Piety endeavouring to perfect holiness in the fear of God Heb. 12.28 There is a Kingdom that cannot be moved there is a (b) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Crown of Life more glorious than the (c) 1 Cor. 9.25 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sun in it's Noon day Brightness there is fulness of Joy in God's Presence together with Soul-satisfying (d) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Words signify such Pleasures as shall never end but will run Parallel with Eternity it self Pleasures at his Right Hand for evermore and all this you may have for your Portion and to make you everlastingly happy but then you must seek it in God's own way by patient continuance in (e) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cyrill Hier. Cateches 1. Pag. 2. Well-doing and by a life of Serious Practical Holiness He that would have a good Harvest must diligently Till and Sow his Ground So you must break up the fallow Ground of your Hearts endeavouring to Sow to the Spirit would you ever obtain a blessed Harvest in which you may reap a full Crop of Eternal Joy God hath tyed Grace and Glory Holiness and Happiness together So that no Grace no Glory no Holiness here no Happiness hereafter Whosoever leads a lewd unsanctified life on Earth shall never lead a blessed and glorified life in Heaven As no Man might be in the Wedding-house not having on a Wedding-garment Mat. 22.11 12. So whoever is not found cloathed with the garments of Righteousness he shall never enter into a Mansion of glory into an house not made with hands eternal in the Heavens 2 Thes 2.13 The Image of God must first be renewed upon you in the Beauties of Holiness before ever you can be capable of seeing the face of God in Sion or be counted meet to be Inhabitants of the New Jerusalem Look at Heaven and Glory as much as you will and let your eye be still fixed upon the Recompence of the Reward Yet if you seek it not by patient continuance in well doing endeavouring to cleanse yourselves from all filthiness of Flesh and Spirit you are never like to be Crowned with it In vain do we look at Heaven and Eternal Glory so long as we live in Sin never striving to be holy which is nothing but to walk in the way that leads to Hell and everlasting Misery For then only have we due respect to the Recompence of the Reward when we seek it in a way of Obedience endeavouring to be changed into the likeness purity and holiness of that God who hath promised that so doing he will Crown us with it CHAP. V. The Doctrin Proved evincing the lawfulness of having a Respect to the Recompence of the Reward in Twelve Particulars III. HAVING thus shewed you What it is to have Respect to the Recompence of the Reward and how you may do so we are in the next place to evince it for your better satisfaction by some Scriptural Demonstrations That you are allowed of God to have respect to the Recompence of the Reward and may lawfully do so in all your Obedience 1. WE may lawfully have Respect in our Obedience to the Recompence of the Reward because God himself hath commanded us that we should do so Had not the Lord by his own Authority enjoyning us by Patient continuance in Well-doing to seek after Heaven and Glory made it our duty to do so we might well have questioned the Legality of such a practise But now there is not the least ground of Hesitancy nor any colour of Reason why we should question Whether
deum ordinata est For God himself is the Centre of all Good and Holiness from which the Lines of all Moral Rectitudes and Divine Virtues are drawn according to which they are regulated in which they are conserved and into which returning they must ultimately resolve themselves SINCE Holiness then is nothing else but an harmonious Conformity with and a Transcript of his righteous Will concerning us Why should we count our having a Respect to eternal Glory any Forfeiture of our Holiness ¶ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cyril Catech. Mystag 5. pag. 244. or go about to censure that Practice as Unlawful for which we have God's own Fiat Were not this to make more Sins than God ever made and to go about by a kind of Interpretative Blasphemy to impeach the infinitely Holy God of giving not only his Imprimator but his Fiat also to unholy Practises commanding Men to seek after Heaven and Glory from the beholding whereof they should according to what some †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cyril Hier. Cat. 6. p. 55. â— Dogmatize turn away their eyes as the greatest Vanity But dare we say That Mens walking in the Light of the Sun is Darkness to them Or That Conformity with God's Righteous Will is the cause of any unrighteous Practise Sirs to question the Legality and Holiness of Duties commanded is to question his Holiness and the Lawfulness of his Authority who commanded them How dare we then say that is Bitter in the Fruit which we know to be Sweet in the Root How can we count that Impure in the Streams which we dare not but confess to be Pure in the Fountain How dare we traduce that as Sinful in the Practise which we know to be Holy and Just and Good in the Precept How dare we to be short look upon Christians as Disingenuous and Transgressing in that which they purely Act in Obedience to God's Commands If God Christian bid thee by patient continuance in well-doing seâ—k for Heaven and Glory do not doubt but his Command will sufficiently secure thee from the Censure of a Legalist or Mercenary in so doing before Men and Angels For Who shall lay any thing to the Charge of God's Elect in those Precepts which are justified by the Holy Precepts and Commandments of God himself injoyning them Rom. 8.33 2. WE may lawfully have Respect in our Obedience to the Recompence of the Reward because the most Eminent of God's faithful Servants have done so before us We have not only Precept but President to warrant our Practise in this case there being none of the People of God but by striving to enter in at the strait Gate by laying up for themselves a Treasure in Heaven by Suffering with Christ that they might be Glorified together with him have clearly Commented and Paraphrased upon those and the like Portions of Holy Scripture that we knowing thus the mind of God therein may go and do likewise Thus David a Man after God's own Heart Psalm 119.112 and therefore surely no Mercenary he inclin'd his Heart to perform God's holy Statutes alway as expecting in the end the Reward of eternal Glory In the Original it is even to the end 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Fructus praemium eò quod fructus postremum et finis laboris est and so our own Translation renders it But yet the same Word doth also signify a Reward which is not usually given before the end of our Works clearly implying That David having an Eye to the Recompence of the Reward did more Cheerfully run the way of God's Commandments David was willing to take pains in God's Vineyard spontaneously inclining his Heart to perform God's holy Statutes all his dayes as expecting at the evening of his Death to receive the Penny of eternal Life and Glory in God's heavenly Kingdom This also we find to be the Practice of holy Paul a man so Ambitiously desirous to promote God's Glory that through an holy Transport of Love thereto he once wished himself suspended and put apart from the Comforts of Christ in the Jews stead that God might but be glorified thereby Rom. 9.3 And yet he hath an Eye in all his Obedience to the Recompence of the Reward putting forth himself with the greatest Intenseness of Zeal and Diligence imaginable for the Price of his High-calling 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Graece quod magnam habet Emphasim significat enim manus totumque Corpus protendere ad scopum ut eum apprehendas ante quam pedibus eum attigeris A lapide in locum He did not grudge to Spend and be Spent in the Service of but stretching forward and extending himself usque ad extremum virium he pursues 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the Aim which he had taken the Reward set before him so the Original Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifieth as impatiently desiring to be seized of God's Kingdom and Glory to which he was called And though he was a man daily exposed to Reproach Persecutions and greatest Dificulties in Heaven's way for the cause of Christ 2 Cor. 4.18 yet whilst he looked at the things which are not seen making Heaven and Glory the scope and end of his Life as the Original may well import he was incouraged thereby with cheerfulness and alacrity of Spirit to encounter them all not thinking his Life dear if by any means he might win the Crown and be landed safe at the Haven of eternal Rest So that the Respect which this holy Apostle had to the Recompence of Reward it was instead of a Cordial to comfort him amidst all his Afflictions it was a strong Incentive with him to Obedience putting Life and Vigour into all his Endeavours and from this he took Incouragement most gladly to Spend and be Spent in the Service of God Heb. 10.32 The like we may say of those Primitive Christians mentioned in the Epistle to the Hebrews who though they were encountred with a whole Army of Afflictions though they were spoiled in their Goods by wicked men as so many Harpies preying upon them at their pleasure though they were Theatriz'd and brought forth upon the Stage not only as Spectacles of Scorn and Reproach but also as Objects of Persecution for wicked men to exercise their Malice and Cruelty upon from whom they received not only bitter Words but also hard Blows Yet they joyfully underwent it all enduring the Cross and despising the Shame as Christ their Redeemer had done before them and all this because they had an Eye to the Recompence of Reward believing themseves to have in Heaven an induring Substance a far more exceeding and eternal weight of Glory that would abundantly make amends for all their Sufferings So that the grand Reason inducing these Primitive Christians to indure Afflictions and take joyfully the spoyling of their Goods on Earth was their Hope of a better and more induring Substance when they came to Heaven Besides these many pregnant Instances might be given
nourishing a groundless Presumption We do no less in a word Tempt the Lord in making the way more difficult and narrow than we do in making the way more facile and wider which leads to the Kingdom of Heaven than God himself hath made it Be afraid then Christian of Tempting God for want of taking Incouragement from the Promises of Life and Glory to run the way of his Commandments But never be afraid of displeasing him or Forfeiting thy Ingenuity by having Respect in thy Obedience to the Recompence of the Reward For certainly it can never Argue a Disingenuous and Mercenary Spirit to make use of that as an Incouragement whereby to provoke us to all holy self denying and upright walking before him If God himself take us up in Mount Nebo shewing us the Land of Promise the Coelestial Canaan the Heavenly Jerusalem for our better Incouragement in Heaven's Way we are not sure to turn away our eyes from the beholding of it Look whatever God himself doth set before us as a motive to Diligence in Heaven's way we may lawfully be acted by it and have our eye fixed upon it Since therefore the Lord of Mercy hath set before us the Recompence of Reward propounding therein Heaven and Glory as Incentives to Obedience we may lawfully Eye them and in all our Obedience have Respect unto them 5. WE may lawfully have an eye to the Recompence of Reward in our Obeâ—ience because this Reward is nothing else but what every Christian stands obliged to look after and above all things in the world to desire The grand Reason inducing some to deny the Lawfulness of having Respect to the Recompence of the Reward is their gross Mistake concerning the Nature of it They look upon Heaven and Glory through the false Glass of their own distemper'd Fancies whereby the Complexion of Heaven and Glory hath been so strangely metamorphosed transfigured and misrepresented to them that though in it self it be of such an unsullied magnetick graceful attractive and châ—ste Beauty that the very Eyes of the glorious Seraphims are Captivated to the most insatiate beholding of it yet they can see no such Form such Beauty such Comeliness in it that a gracious Soul should desire it HOWEVER if we set aside this muâ—dy Preâ—â—dice abstracting from Heaven and Glory what a Carnal Heart would conceive to be there we shall find that there is nothing in Heaven and Glory that a gracious Soul can tell how to spare there is nothing in the Recompence of Reward in eternal Life and Happiness but what every Christian is bound to look after The Blessedness which abides us in Heaven it 's either Objective or formal and Subjective Blessedness Objective is nothing but God himself that immense and boundless Ocean of â—ll Goodness in whom are treasured up such Altitudes such Hyperbole's such over-flowing Pleonasmes of all Excellencies and divine Perfections that whosoever is admitted to the participation of them like a Stone in the Center he can go no further he can possibly desire no more but is perfectly satisfied taking up his everlasting repose in the words of holy David that spiritual Orpheus Return to thy rest O my Soul for loe the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee Blessedness Formal and Subjective why it 's nothing but the Clarifying of the Soul Crowning it with a bright Constellation of all heavenly Graces and raising it up in Holiness to the Fulness of the measure of the Stature of Christ whereby being accurately prepared for immediate Communion with God himself it now launcheth forth into that fathomless Ocean of all Goodness bathing it self in the Vastness of a Deity warming it self in the uninterrupted Irradiations of an eternal Sun-shine swimming in the Chrystalline Rivers of purest Pleasures and everlastingly closing with the Lord Jehovah that fixed Centre of Rest and Happiness in a way of pure Extatical Speculation in a way of sweetest Love and Soul-intrancing Fruition And if such be the Recompence of the Reward that is set before us if such be the Heaven the Glory the Happiness that abideth us in another World how dare we assert it unlawful when the Scripture hath made it our Duty by patient continuance in well-doing to seek after these things pursuing them as the great End of our Life May we not in our Obedience have respect to the perfecting of all our Graces and to the fulness of Communion with God in Glory Is it our Duty now to perfect Holiness in the fear of God 2 Cor. 7.1 seeking his Face and Favour with all our Heart and may we not much more have our Hearts carried out in Desire after that blessed Estate of Happiness where all our Graces being perfected into Glory we shall immediately enjoy the Light of God's joyful Countenance solacing ourselves with eternal Smiles and drinking in of that Fulness of Joy and delicious Pleasures which are at his right Hand for evermore May we here serve God and make use of every Ordinance with respect to the getting of a little more Grace a little more Faith more Sincerity more Love more Holiness and may we not serve him with respect to full Perfection when Grace that is now Militant shall then be Triumphant that is now in the Bud shall be ripened into a fragrant Flower that is now in its Infancy shall attain to its full Age that is now in a word but Dawning like the Morning Light shall then break forth into an uncloudable glorious Sun-shine May we here serve God run the way of his Commandments wait upon him in the Beauties of Holiness and be frequent in evâ—ry Duty with respect to the getting of a little Acquaintance a little Fellowship a little Communion with him in Christ so that we can be satisfied with no Duty wherein we have not some fresh ministrations of his holy Spirit some heavenly Influences gliding down into our Souls some Signals of his presence with us some propitious Glance from his Eyes some Dawnings of his Glory upon us and yet may we not ascend by an holy Gradation and have respect to Fulness of Communion with God when we shall not see him through a Glass darkly as now we do but having the Dust of Sin and Mortality wiped out of our eyes shall see him Face to Face when we shall not be put off with a transient Smile as now we are but shall have the Light of his Countenance sâ—ining upon us with most clarified Beams and pure Irradiations to all Eternity When in a word we shall not only see the Back-parts of Jehovah as now we do but the Lord shall cause all his Goodness and Glory to pass before us to flow in upon us and to abide with us for ever Doubtless in this bundle of Life in t e Recompence of the Reward there is not any one Flower bound up but what hath such a spiritual Fragrancy and such a Tincture os divine Beauty that every Christian is obliged to seek after them
peculiar Offices and Labours before ever God did set his seal thereunto For what is the Respect to the Recompence of Reward of which we are now speaking but a Sovereign Cordial made up of those choice Ingredients Faith and Hope to comfort the Spirits and make glad the Hearts of God's People whilst walking in all upright self-denying and holy Obedience before him 'T is doubtless the First-born of Impossibilities for the Soul to believe the Promise of Eternal Life and wait for it as it ought to do without having respect in all its Obedience to the Recompence of the Reward which is nothing but these two Graces conversant about their Virgin-objects uniting their strength and mingling their most sprightful and generous Wine for the comfort of God's People in Heavens way So that whoever asserts it unlawful to have any respect in our Obedience to Heaven and Glory he doth what in him lies to make the motions of Faith and Hope Irregular or else to put out the Eye of Faith as the Philistians dealt with Sampson and to break the Anchor of Hope leaving the Poor Souls to the courtesy of an enraged Wave to the clemency of an inhospitable Rock to the mercy of an inexorable Wreckful Storm Indeed though most other Graces have Eternity written upon them living that life which shall never be swallowed up of Death Yet Faith and Hope are Graces of a shorter date they are both of them Children of the Promise but not like to be long lived their operation is such as doth infallibly imply an imperfection in the subject receptive of them and therefore they must die in the Mount not thinking to enter into the Land of Canaan where Faith shall be perfected into Vision Beatifical and Hope into the full and immediate fruition of God Himself Irenaeus I confess would have Faith and Hope to abide in the Life to come and also Durandus seems to incline that way But though a Faith of Dependance will be in Heaven giving all the Inhabitants of that New Jerusalem a full Plerophory and everlasting Assurance of their Happiness yet to believe the Promise of Eternal Life and Hope for it as now we do is altogether incompossible with a state of Glory For we can walk no longer by Faith when once we see God face to face Nor hope any longer for Heaven and Glory when once we are put in full Possession of them-As therefore Hope which is seen is no Hope so Faith which is seen is no Faith For what a Man already sees and fully enjoys why doth he yet believe or hope for it Faith may now lay hold upon God's Word of Promise for everlasting Salvation and Hope may now expect this Salvation waiting with Patience for it But when God shall fulfill his Promise putting us in full Possession of Heaven and Crowning us with eternal Salvation then Faith shall be quite at an end and Hope shall have its full Period Faith and Hope may now bear up the hands of the Soul while it fights the Lord's Battels as Aaron and Hur did bear up the Hands of Moses But when all the Spiritual Amalekites are utterly destroyed and we come to the heavenly Canaan whose Cities are Walled about with everlasting Salvation and all her Streets Paved with undisturbed Peace Isa 26.1 then Faith and Hope will be no longer useful but their Office shall quite expire However those men deal unequally with Faith and Hope obtruding upon them an unjust Supersedeas and ingratefully cutting them off the midst of their days who will not allow a Christian in his Obedience to steal by the eye of Faith so much as one comfortable look from Heaven nor patiently to wait by Hope for the Promise of eternal Life Shall Faith and Hope give way hereafter the one to open Vision and the other to the full Fruition of God in Glory and shall we deny them their Canaan here not suffering them to draw water with Comfort out of the Wells of Salvation nor to Solace themselves in the sweet Embraces of Heaven and Glory their Virgin Objects Certainly Christians your Graces of Faith and Hope can never be conversant about their proper Objects so long as Heaven and Glory are not in your eye You do intercept the expectation of Hope and draw a thick Veil of Darkness before the eye of Faith when you have not respect in all your Obedience to the Recompence of the Reward seeking by patient continuance in well-doing for a Crown of Life Since then our Graces will be obstructed in their genuine Operations and not suffered to be conversant about their proper Objects if we have not a due Respect in our Obedience to the Recompence of the Reward we may well conclude the practise to he holy and just and good For surely the Lord will have all our Graces drawn forth after and regularly exercised upon their proper Objects 8. WE may lawfully have respect in our Obedience to the Recompence of the Reward because this is nothing but what that innate desire of Happiness which the God of Nature hath immoveably fixed in the Central Point of every Rational Beeing especially doth prompt and oblige us to If we diligently consult the whole Context of that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Law of Nature which God himself hath unblottably written upon the Table of every Man's Heart with his own unerring Finger we shall find many Radical Principles and unraseable Impressions of Virtue Justice and Goodness upon it And yet amongst them all there is no Principle more undelible no Impression stamped deeper nor any Precept more Triumphant unquestionable and authentical than this that every man ought to provide for his own welfare consulting the perpetual conservation the blessed Advancement and the everlasting Happiness of his own Beeing As God hath by a natural Instinct set all other Creatures a longing after their own Preservation and Welfare So he hath more Emphatically stamped every rational Nature with an innate desire of its own Happiness whereby it cannot but long after it Though since our first Apostacy from God we be miserably degenerated from the excellency of our own Natures and have our Wills so corrupted and wholly perverted about the ultimate end that we have not those Breathings those Pantings those unsatisfied Desires after God himself as we should we are not drawn by the attractive and magnetical virtue of a Deity desiring to fix ourselves in the Quietative Center of his Love and Favour and the Light of his Countenance we make him not our supream and ultimate end aspiring after fulness of Communion with the Lord Jehovah as the Alpha and Omega the Beginning and the End of all our Happiness Yet an innate desire of Happiness is so incorporated with our very Beeings and so indelibly written upon our Essences that the Fall it self hath not blotted it out but even in a state of Corruption this sacred Relique of God's Image abideth with us so long as we continue to be
which I shall now in the practical improvement of it endeavour so to shake that unloading all its precious Fruits into your own bosoms it may feed and enrich your Souls to eternal life The Lord having planted a Garden Eastward in Eden for our first Parents he caused a River to go out of Eden to water †Gen. 2.10 the Garden from whence it parted itself and became into four heads Holding resemblance herewith if your Souls be the Garden of God my Doctrine is a River of life proceeding from the Eden of the Text from whence also to Water your Souls and make them fruitful as the Garden of God it divideth it self into four Heads in the use of it yeilding us matter of Information Reprehension Exhortation and Consolation 1 THEN by way of Information since that it is thus lawful for us to have respect in all our obedience to the recompence of the reward this may well satisfy us concerning the truth of these ensuing Corollaries As 1 THIS may give us to understand that it s no argument of insincerity nor any just forfeiture of a Christians uprightness and ingenuity for him to have an eye in his obedience to the recompence of the reward A Christian in seeking after Heaven and Glory in all his obedience he doth nothing but what is holy and just and good which doubtless can never make him unholy nor be any just forfeiture of his uprightness and integrity in the sight of God You may as well extract dross out of the purest Gold and dregs out the most refined Spirits as a Christian may become disingenuous and contract upon himself the guilt of hypocrisy by having an eye in his obedience to the recompence of the reward Indeed I Read of many in holy Writ * 2 Tim. 4.10 censured as mercenaries and stigmatized for gross hypocrites because they were wholly acted in God's service by sinister ends and worldly considerations serving the Lord not for love but for loaves for esteem of Men secular Advantages Honours Preferments earthly Emoluments together with the like external accommodations But that a Man should be impeached of insincerity and branded for a Mercenary a Legalist an Hypocrite because acted in the ways of God by a desire after the full enjoyment of God in Glory seeking Heaven and Happiness seeking Life Immortality and eternal salvation by patient continuance in welldoing this never could I find recorded in God's sacred Oracles Live not then Christian any longer upon self-created Racks let not thy Countenance be sad from day to day suffer not any groundless sorrow to have Dominion over thee as if thou delightest in nothing but to make thy Soul a map of misery neither let thy Heart any longer be filled with fears and jealousies and perplexing thoughts about thy own sincerity censuring thy self for that wherein God did never yet condemn but always justifie thee To be labouring in all our obedience not (b) Joh. 6.27 Mat. 6.20 Luke 12.33 Psal 4.6 2 Cor. 4.18 for the Meat that perisheth but for the Meat which will endure to Eternal Life not for Earth but Heaven not for the favour of Men but for the smiles of God in the Face of Jesus Christ not for things Temporal which are seen but for things Eternal which are not seen not for a Portion in this World (c) Luke 10.42 but for that better part which shall never be taken from us not for the Honour which comes from Men (d) Joh. 5.44 but for the Glory the Felicity and that Eternal Soul-raping Happiness which comes of God only this argues not Hypocrisie and Mercenariness but an Heart that is truly Upright and Sincere in the Sight of God! There is a certain Fish with one Eye called Uranoscopus which they (a) Zach. 7.5 Joh. 6.26 Joh. 5.44 say is always gaâ—ing upwards towards Heaven Thus every true Christian hath his Eye still fixed upon Heaven he looks within the Veil and would always by his good will be on the top of Mount Nebo thence taking for his better encouragement to all holy self-denying and upright walking before the Lord a prospect of the Celestial Canaan Make not that then Christian any sign of Hypocrisie which doth clearly argue thee to be a true Nathaniel (a) Joh. 1.47 an Israelite indeed in whom there is no guile Had the Lord by prohibition or otherwise made it unlawful for us to have respect in our obedience to the recompence of the reward and yet still thou wouldst allow thy self in that practise this indeed might have forfeited thy Integrity but since the Lord himself doth approve of it both commanding and commending it as praise-worthy in Holy Writ let not Christian thy Heart reproach thee and smite thee for an Hypocrite whilst by patient continuance in well-doing thou seekest after Glory and Honour and Immortality in the Life to come 'T is of dangerous consequence for a Christian as to make those things evidences of Sincerity so to make those things signs of Hypocrisie which God never intended to be such If the Lord have any where made it the distinctive Character of an Hypocrite to have an Eye in his obedience to Heaven and Glory then indeed you might well make sad inferences against and pass hard censures upon your selves But if otherwise you find the Lord commanding you to do so and have the practice of the most eminently Holy and Upright of all God's People plainly paraphrasing upon that Commandment for your better satisfaction oh then take heed that you be not rash to conclude hard things against your selves because you cannot but have an Eye in all your obedience to the recompence of Eternal Life lest you be found reflecting dishonour thereby upon God himself and blaspheming against the Generation of his Children What shall a Christian bring in an action of disingenuity against himself and conclude himself an Hypocrite for that which all along hath been the laudable practice of Gods true Nathaniels who have received Letters testimonial subscribed by the Hand of Heaven itself that they were Israelites indeed in whom there was no guile What think you Christians of Moses of David and of Paul the Apostle Were â—hey not all of them Men according to God's own Heart Men upright in their lives and conversations and far enough from being mercenaries in the service of God And yet all this notwithstanding they lived upon the Mount of transfiguration their Faces were still Sion-ward they had always an eye to the recompence of the reward seeking always for themselves by patient continuance in well-doing no less than eternity of Life and Glory in God's Heavenly Kingdom If then Christians upon this account you dare not censure them take heed that upon the same account you do not censure your selves as persons that are altogether disingenuous hypocritical and mercenary in the service of God! There is nothing unlawful but what is holy and good in obeying the Lord with respect to
us with his Love arrest us by the gentler hand of his Mercy inveagle us by the sweet insinuations of his own Spirit subdue us to the obedience of his Righteous will by an irresistible over-powering Work of free Grace and after aâ—l this allure us to be Happy leading us on in wayes of holiness by the Divine Suada by the powerful Rhetorique by the unsullied captivating glances by the magnetique prospect of Heaven and Eternal Glory God might have measured us out a full Cup of Divine Fury without any ingredients of Love he might have writ the Sins we stand Guilty of and his wrath against us for them in our own Blood he might have raised up a Monument of Glory to himself out of our Eternal Ruins he might have made every one of us even in this present Life a Magor-missabib filling us with the trembling of Cain the madness of Achitophel the despair of Judas and the dreadful astonishment of Belshazzer thro' the heart-rending proccupations of Hell and Eternal Damnation When therefore in stead of all this Terrour we find the Lord willing to glorifie the Riches of his Mercy in our Happiness and Salvation not only wooing us to receive Mercy beseeching us to be Happy and entreating us to accept of Heaven and Glory but also setting open the Wells of Salvation feasting us with Heavenly Manna giving us many sweet prelibations and fore-tasts of Eternal Glory taking us up every Day to the top of Mount Pisgah and thence raising us for our encouragement in well-doing to see the Beauties and to antedate the Pleasures of the Celestial Canaan of the Heavenly Jerusalem how can we choose but stand adoring as Men filled with Extasies and Trances of Admiration the Lords wonderful Condescention and matchless Goodness towards us Was it ever known amongst the Kings Potentares and Monarchs of the World that they could ever do any thing worthy to make so much as an Emblem of Gods remunerative Goodness when in their chiefest Goodness they set their Wits a-work how to gratify their greatest Favourites and what to do for the Man whom they delighted to honour They have cloathed their Favourites in Purple and Royal Apparel they have incircled their Heads with a princely Diadem they have intrusted them with universal negotiations of State they have mounted them upon their own Steeds with Proclamations before them of their special Favour But yet all this superadding thereto all that Splendour which attracts the desires of the most noble Heroes all that Glory which feeds the Admiration of the most ambitious Princes all that Beauty which captivates the Hearts of the most passionate Lovers all those Thrones Empires and Triumphs which the World so much adores I say all this will be no more than the small drop of a Bucket to the whole Ocean than the light of a Star to the glorious Sun if compared with that Crown that Kingdom that eternal Reward which through a Miracle of condescending Love and matchless Goodness the Lord promises and makes proposal of for the encouragement of his own People For what is finite compared with that which is infinite What is Earth compared with Heaven What is a temporal Reward if compared with the recompense of Eternal Life What in a word is the confluence of all secular enjoyments if compared with the vast and boundless Ocean of Gods (a) Psal 17.15 fulness wherewith his People have a sure promise to be satisfied for evermore Oh that all you who do yet continue the Vassals of Satan and are still Slaves to your own usurping Lusts would now consider your folly your madness in refusing to walk in obedience before so bountiful a Master and in entertaining unreasonable prejudices against the ways of God as if there were no profit nor advantage to be found in them Consider it poor foolish Sinners can the World the Flesh and the Devil do that for your Souls that the God of Heaven both can and hath promised to do will you but submit to the Scepter of his Kingdom endeavouring to walk in all dutifull obedience before him God offers you a Crown of Life together with many exceeding precious promises which as so many Death-bed Cordials will antidote your Hearts against the Terrors of the Grave and can the World the Flesh and the Devil make you any such Tenders and make them good when they have done that hearkning unto them you should ungratefully turn your backs upon the God of Heaven making light of the Tenders of his Love and Grace But must the Lord have such a stir to make you Happy Must he follow you with daily Importunities alluring you by Rewards to provide for your own everlasting Welfare and will you yet go on in the careless neglect of him and his wages as if Heaven and Eternal Glory were not worth the looking after Is the Lord such a plentiful rewarder of those that diligently seek allowing them for their encouragement in all Holy and Upright walking before himself the full prospect of such an Heavenly Kingdom such an unfadable Crown of Life such an incorruptible undefiled and glorious inheritance and will you still go on to undervalue his Love and Goodness refusing the right ways of obedience as unprofitable and fruitless which do all of them center in Eternal Blessedness Then blame not the God of Heaven the Riches of whose (b) Rom. 2.4 Grace and Goodness you have thus despised if for bringing up an evil report of him and his wayes he cause you with those unbelieving Jews to die in the Wilderness and for ever exclude you out of the Celestial Canaan You must not always think to live upon the Expences of free Grace But if still you go on to turn it into wantonness being thus abused it will shortly turn to fury The Divine remunerative Goodness of God so richly expressed in the frequent tenders of Heaven it should have dropt Oyl into the Wheels of your Souls making them more like the Chariots of Aminadab (c) Cant. 6.12 Si 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 notationem spectes populum voluntarium beneficum animo liberali praeditum sonat Rom. 2.5 like a bounteous sweet-hearted and willing People as that Word may import in all the Ways of Obedience with a Noble Spontaneity But if still you shall retain your unreasonable prejudices against and wonted averseness to the right way of God's Commandments esteeming of the Lord as an hard Task-master and looking upon his Service as a cruel Bondage assure your selves that the very Goodness of God will accumulate Wrath against you and plunge you a Thousand Times deeper in remediless unpreventable misery than if you had never sitten under the tenders the solicitations the gracious Importunities of it (d) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clem. Alex. Admon ad Gent. p. 40. Oh inconsiderate ungrateful Sinners of what a crimson tincture is your giving the repulse to Gods merciful condescentions when waiting upon you with tenders of Grace and Glory
neutrality indifferency and insipid formality in the ways of God censuring all those that will not be formal outsided and negligent like themselves as persons of furious Spirits perverse Zealots and humoursome Fanaticks as if they were afraid of too much Holiness Believe it Sirs these and the like Scripture Injunctions do concludingly evince that Christianity is no idle speculation but a business of greatest activity requiring the quintessence and vigour of the Spirit the very strength and sinews of the Soul together with the greatest intensness of all the affections There is such an attractive magnetique virtue in that eternally glorious reward which Religion proposeth to all them that do cordially embrace it that their Hearts are so inflamed with desire after it that it turns all difficulties into fuel for their Zeal to feed upon Impossible it is for such as are truly gracious to be remiss and negligent in Heavens way as being transformed by a prospect of Heavenly Glory into so many incarnate Seraphims whose proper nature it is to have their affections boyled up to the highest consistency of uncurbed Zeal for Gods Glory (c) Rom. 12.11 making them fervent in Spirit serving the Lord. Would you therefore approve your selves to be true Nathaniels Israelites indeed in whom there is no guile Then see that ye willingly spend and be spent in the service of God contending with an holy Violence that you may enter through the strait Gate into the Kingdom of Heaven 'T is no heartless wish nor languishing endeavour no still-born Prayer nor abortive resolution which will argue your Souls to be sound and of the right Complexion Many there are amongst us who taking up the form and denying the Power of Godliness are all for a moderation in Goodness So that with them lukewarmness though it speak the Soul in the saddest temper shall be graced with the name of Discretion and Christian Prudence The truth is as that holy Man now with God whom before I quoted saith all unregenerate Men in a manner do usually cast unto themselves in the mould of their own worldly Wisdom a religious Mediocrity and they pitch with resolution and security upon a degree of Zeal compatible with their own secular concernments and this must be a competent sufficiency of Holiness for Heaven and serve their turn for Salvation This glorious formality if God's People out of a consciousness of their duty and from the strength of desire which they have to the recompence of Eternal Life transgress why now the Wicked to prevent the estuations of a troubled Conscience and the dreadful pre-occupations of Eternal Flames which would otherwise seize upon them they are forced to censure God's People as guilty of too much preciseness circumspection and affected singularity For should they not fancy an easier way to Heaven than that of striving and running contending and wrestling wherein God's People walk they must needs cast away the confidence I say not of their Hope but of their groundless presumption and sit down in despair as Persons for whom it is impossible that they should come to Heaven or ever escape the damnation of Hell But believe it Christians whatever short Cut carnal Gospellers fancy to Heaven you must resolve to serve the Lord with fervency of Spirit excellency of Zeal and enflamed affections together with a supernatural singularity above all ordinary and moral perfections would you ever come there Fair and softly saith the Proverb goes fair But as one wittily observes it never goes so far as Heaven (a) Non dormientibus provenit regnum coelorum nec otio desidia torpentibus beatitudo aeternitatis ingeritur Prosp Omnis qui ad Paradisum redire desiderat oportet transire per ignem Aust God prepared a Wife for Adam in Paradise sleeping But there are no preparations of Happiness Life and Eternal Glory made for sleepers in the Paradise of God Our first Parents sinning were cast out of Paradise and therefore we can never return thither to feed upon the Tree of Life unless we return with undaunted resolution upon the Cherubims flaming Sword We must not only take up the form but also embrace the power of Godliness we must not be almost (b) Acts 26.28 but altogether Christians would we ever receive the Crown of Eternal Glory For to be sure they that have only an appearance of Holiness shall go to a real Hell and they that are but almost Christians shall but almost be saved which indeed will be the emphasis of Damnation to have been within a step of Heaven and Eternal Glory Let then Christians the blind World entertain you with what malicious invectives and approbrious Sarcasms it will censuring you for Phanticks perverse Zealots and dissembling Hypocrites Yet see that you abate not one scruple of your former Zeal either taking up with a slothful oscitancy in the ways of God or leaving your selves at a profane liberty to comply in any sinful practices but having always an Eye to the recompence of the reward give diligence to be still as precise circumspect and accurate in all your walkings as ever Remember when ever the Men of the World ask you what need you be so strict and accurate so precise and circumspect not contenting your selves to do as others do Why it is in plain language and to paraphrase a little upon those profane Queries as if they should ask you what need you make matter of Heaven and Glory what need you so much to regard Life and Eternal Salvation in the Kingdom of God not contenting your selves to go to Hell and be damned for ever as the Wicked must And can you indeed make light of Heaven and Eternal Glory can you Christians be willing to fall short of Gods beatifical presence in Heaven and for ever to lie under his frowns in Hell that such ungodly questionings as these should make you ashamed to own Christianity in the Life eminency and power of it As they Christians have little reason to censure you for your Diligence Zeal and circumspection in Heavens way So little reason have you to be ashamed thereof being come within ken of your Rest already and may with Moses from Mount Nebo take a clear Prospect of the Holy Land of the Celestial Canaan CHAP. VII The Doctrine improved by way of Reprehension reproving all such as do inordinately love and pursue the World and discovering the vanity of all Secular Enjoyments in Six Particulars 1 BY way of reprehension this Doctrine affords just matter of Reproof against and may smite as with a mighty Scourge two sors of Persons 1 Since God allows us to seek Glory Honour and Immortality for our selves by patient continuance in well-doing (b) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost in Mat. 22. how justly are all those reproved who making light of these eternal concernments do wholly spend their time and exhaust their strength in pursuit of the profits Emoluments and comforts of this present World The Lord makes
volens nos amorem non habere nisi vitae aeternae in istis velut innocentibus delectationibus miscet amaritudines ut in his patiamur tribulationes Docetur amare meliora per amaritudinem inferiorum ne viator tendens ad putriam stabulum amet pro domo suâ Aust in Psal 40. 45. For doubtlesâ— Sirs as Manna in the Wilderness when the people distrusting God's daily provision would needs hoard it up bred Worms and stank So when Men inordinately loving the World will needs accumulate Riches they do but store up Worms to gnaw upon their Consciences that will daily vex and disquiet them If therefore you would not multiply your own â—orrows be not too much in love with your worldly enjoyments striving beyond measure to multiply them Therefore hath the Lord rubbed gall and wormwood upon the breasts of all our Creature-comforts thâ—â— we may learn to get weaned affections to them Evâ—â—y Rose hath its Thorn in this present life that we may not to much be delighted with its sweetness 3 Consider all Creature-enjoyments they are uncertain and changable The Riches Honours and enjoyments of this present Life they are called Bona Fortunae the Goods of Fortune Not so much because they are the Largess of that fictitious Goddess as because they are like her inconstant and always obnoxious to variety of changes a As the fashions in the World alter and change every day so doth the fashion of the World with all its enjoyments What we usually call substance is indeed but a glining shadow that hath nothing but mutability written upon it Men may fancy what assurance they will in their earthly enjoyments But indeed they are always like the Moon in her last quarter ever upon the change (b) Ostenduntur istae res non possidentur dum placent transcunt Sen. Our Creature-comforts they are not so properly possessions as Pageants * 1 Cor. 7.31 which whilst they please us in a moment they pass away from us (c) 1 Tim. 6.17 Divitiae hujus seculi incertae sunt quia transitoriae sunt quoniam plerumque amittet illus homo ante mortem ex toto autem in ipsâ morte Haymo in loc Hence Riches have the epithet of uncertain given them by divine Inspiration as most proper for them Because we know not how soon God may sequester us from them or them from us and so leave us to survive our own Happiness The World usually deals with its greatest Favourites those that serve it with most devotion as 〈◊〉 dealt with Jacob his near Kinsman who changed his Wages ten times Day unto day makes report and every Man 's own experieâ—ce may read him a sufficient lectâ—â—â— concerning the manifold sâ—d changes aâ—d various â—â—â—â—â—tions to which we are every Day liâ—ble in our Creatâ—â—â—â—njoymentâ— How many of the Worlds greatest Favourites have we seen honourable and dishonoured in one and the same Day (d) Subito enim laetitia à tristitia absorbetur gaudium in dolorem vertitur sanitas infirmitate laeditur prosperitas adversitate prosternitur juventus ad senectutem vita currit ad mortem Haymo Homil. in Dom. 5. post Pascha pag. mihi 134. In fullnâ—ss of Creature-comforts and yet emptied of them all in a moment Abounding with Riches and yet soon reduced to wants and with Job becoming poor even to a Proverb Compassed about with Friends and Relations in the Morning and yet deserted of them all before the Evening as persons left alone to outlive the choicest of comforts You then that have heard and seen the Providence of God thus ringing the changes of Creature-enjoyments all the World over why will you still proceed in your Love to them and commit Idolatry with them Do you not consider that your Beauty your Riches your Honours your Pleasures and all your Creature-comforts are no better than inconstant fading Vanities that are daily obnoxious to variety of changes What is all your pleasure but as a bitter Pill wrapt up in Sugar which however it be hony in the mouth yet is gall in the stomack What is all your Beauty but as a fading flower which at the first breaking forth of the Sun of Afflictions may be scorched and wither away into the ghastliness of a dead Carcass What are all your Honours but as a blast of idle wind which can neither be kept by all your care nor reduced by all your policy when once gon past you What in a word are all your Riches but as a golden ray from Heaven's Sun-shine which in a moment may be intercepted by every discontented cloud that comes lined with nothing but want and poverty For shame then let the great uncertainty of your Creature-enjoyments and that mutability which you see to be written upon them make you labour no longer for them but rather strive for those better comforts which are above uncertainty and can never change Worldly Prudence when speaking in its proper dialect will bid us hold fast that which is certain (e) Tene certum dimitte incertum and let go that which is uncertain Behold then I set before you Earth and Heaven And which of these two will you now make your choice Will you choose an uncertain Earth before a certain Heaven Will you choose those Earthly enjoyments that are daily subject to variety of changes before those Heavenly Mansions of Glory that are above mutability and can never change Or that the manifold changes to which all our Wordly comforts are daily obnoxious may cause us to change our thoughts of them and no longer to pursue them with a doting observance In all the changes to which our Creature-enjoyments are daily liable (f) 1 John this is the great end which God aims at that we may not love the World nor the things of the World When therefore you find your health changed into sickness your Riches changed into Poverty your Honours changed into Reproaches and all your Creature-enjoyments into so many pregnant instances of the Worlds uncertainty oh see that hereby you be instructed what little reason you have to let out your affections upon them or to fall in love with them Are things of such a changeable nature so much to be prized Shall an uncertain perishing World be preferred before Heaven and Glory which are not obnoxious to any uncertainty but have security against all changes written upon them Here Sirs you can enjoy none of your Creature-comforts with security but whether you have Riches or Honours or Pleasures or any other worldly accomodations you hold all upon the greatest uncertainty and are sure of nothing But now making choice of Heaven and Glory for your portion you will find them to be beyond the reach of change and indeed like the Laws of the Medes and Persians that knew no alteration Why then will you rather choose to be Tenants at will in your Worldly enjoyments than to purchase the Fee-simple of Heaven and unchangable glorious
Contemne vivens quae post mortem habere non potes Difficile est imò impossibile ut praesentibus quis frumur bonis futuris at hic ventrem illic mentem impleat ut de deliciâ—â— ad delicias transent ut in Terra in Coelo gloriosus appareat Bern. de interiori Domo Cap. 45. And is not then the everlasting unseen Glory of Heaven to be sought before all those Earthly enjoyments that your Eyes behold Much talk there is of Riches and Honours and Pleasures and for these and the like momentany enjoyments we may daily see Men exhausting their strength and wearying out their Lives though they know they must shortly leave them And shall not we be much more willing to lay forth our selves for those Pleasures which will never fail us for those Honours which shall never be blasted and for those which Riches can never be taken from us The enjoyments of this Life are like a Lâ—â—p which while it burneth doth consume it self But now the Riches of Heaven and Glory are Eternal and can neve be wasted All Worldly comforts they are still upon the wing and when ever Death finds us we shall lose them for ever But now the recompence of reward that hath Eternity written upon it it s a Kingdom that can never be moved it s an Eternal weight of Glory it s that â—etter part thaâ— Soul-entrancing Joy which no Man can take from us Dwell then I beseech you in your thoughts a little seriously upon this particular and forasmuch as all your Creature-comforts will shortly leave you oh labour for those comforts for those Graces and for that Glory which will never fail you but abideth for ever You profess your selves to be Christians to believe the Resurrection and after that an Eternal condition for immortal Souls why then will you fix your Hearts and ground your Hopes upon those inconsistent and rotten materials which will shortly crumble into dust and leave your Souls to sink under the stroak of God's heavy Displeasure in Eternal Misery If Sirs you would not be Eternally miserable in the World to come then take heed that you do not too eagerly pursue the temporal enjoyments of this present World (c) Qui maluerit bene vivere ad tempus malè vivet in aeternum Damnnabitur enim sententiâ Dei ad Eternâ—m poenam quia coelestibus bonis terrena praeposuit Lactant. lib. de vita beata pag. 665. For whoever will have his Heaven of Worldly prosperity in this Life must expect no other portion but an Hell of Wrath and endless Misery in the Life to come He that will live in pleasure for a time shall for ever be tormented it being a Righteous thing with God to sentence all those to Eternal punishment in Hell who have preferred their Earthly enjoyments before the Happiness and Glory of Heaven it self (d) Luke 16.25 Attendamus divitem purpuratum pauperem Lazarum illum post epulas flammis perennibus traditum istum post aerumnas in aeterna sinûs Abrahae quiete securum Fulgent ad Venant epist 7. pag. mihi 574. Thus Dives who in his Life time received his good things whilst Lazarus received his evil things while he was tormented in Hellish flames when that poor Man was comforted in Abraham's Bosom Only thus far let me caution you that every one who prospers in this Life cannot properly be said to receive his good things (e) Non omnes autem qui bona praesentis vitae habent bona praesentis vitae recipiunt nec omnes qui mala hujus vitae patiuntur mala hujus vitae recipiunt Sed illi recipiunt bona in vita sua qui in gaudio et deliciis vitae praesentis exultant in eo se beatos credunt quod se nullâ concuti adversitate conspiciunt illi autem mala recipiunt in vita sua qui pressuras tribulationes praesentis vitae cum timore Dei tolerant in corde contrito humiliato non temporalia gaudia sed aeterna suspirant nec tranfitura bona sed permansura desiderant Idem ibid. Nor can every one who is here afflicted be said to have received his evil things But they receive their good things in their Life time who place the Whole of their Happiness in the Pleasures and Delights of this present World counting themselves to be blessed because they are not in trouble as other Men and they receive their evil things in their Life time who sincerely fearing the Lord do patiently endure all the tribulations of this present World breathing continually with an humble and contrite Heart not after Temporal but Eâ—ernal Joys not after transitory enjoyments but after that better part which shall never be taken from them together with those Pleasures which are at Gods right Hand for evermore Look to 〈◊〉 then that though you use the World yet you set not your Hearts upon it And though you meet with tribulation in the World yet see that you cast not away the confidence of your Hope but laboâ—â— to make a sanctified improvement of it (f) Qui gaudiis temporalibus oblectantur jussa divina contemnunt illi aeternis ignibus sunt concremandi illi verò qui mala temporalia cum timore Dei patienter tolerant aeternâ quiete potituri sunt Fulgent Epist ad Venant pag. 573. For remember those who violating the Commandments of God do place their whole delight in â—â—eir secular accomodations must with Dives be Eternally tormented in Hellish Flames Whilsâ—â—hey who feariâ—â— the Lord do patiently undergo all present Afflictions shall rest with Lazarus for ever in the sweet entrancing Bosom of Father Abraham CHAP. VIII The Doctrine further improv'd by way of Reprehension reproving all ungodly Persons who prefer the Pleasures of Sin before the Recompence of Reward and shewing the Folly of that Practice in Six Particulars II. SInâ—â— God allows us to seek Life and Eternity of Heavenly Glory for our selves by patient continuance in well-doing how justly may this speak reproof to all those who have pleasure in unrighteousness making daily Provision for the Flesh to fulfill the Lusts thereof God would have them to seek after Spiritual Delights but they seek after nothing save their carnal Pleasures preferring the Wages of unrighteousness before that eternal recompence of Reward which the Lord hath prepared for those that love him They are not so much desirous of the pure and unmixed Joys of Heaven as of those feculent and sordid Delights which they find in a course of Sin whilst indulging their own bruitish and sensual Appetites Such are all those who prefer a Tavern before the Sanctuary a Strumpets arms before their Saviours embraces the Bowls of Bacchus before the Cup of Salvation and carousing Healths amongst their ungodly Associates before those Rivers of unperishable Pleasures which water the Garden of God in Paradise for evermore Oh but how is it that for the putrid and noysome
which indeed is the Life of thy Soul Did the Body of thy dearest Relation lie dead upon the floor what a woful Spectacle would it be and how bitterly wouldst thou weep over it But O Sinner thy Immortal Soul which should be more preciously dâ—ar in thy sight than all thy Relations in the World that lies dead in Sin it 's estranged from God the Fountain of Life it hath no interest in Christ the Prince of Life it hath no Portion in the Holy Ghost the Spirit of Life it hath neither Part nor Lot in Eternal Glory the Crown of Life and is not this a far more sad and woful Spectacle such as may well turn thy Head into Water and thy Eyes into a Fountain of Tears Oh what should fill thy Heart with Groans thy Eyes with Tears and thy Mouth with doleful Complaints if not this to see thy Soul without Life without God and Christ and without all hope of Eternal Glory in the World Canst thou weep bitterly for a dead Relation and yet canst thou not weep for thy self hast thou no Tears to shed over a dead Soul For a Man to be killed by Sin and yet to live to Sin taking pleasure therein what a woful condition is this If yet Sinner thou hast pleasure in unrighteousness to be sure the Tokens of Death are upon thee thou hast neither Life nor yet any hope of Eternal Life abiding in thee A Soul taking delight in the pleasures of Sin it 's a dead Soul * John 3.36 and a Dead Soul it shall never see Life but the Wrath of God abides upon it 2 CONSIDER so long as you take delight in the pleasures of sin you remain uncapable of and can never enjoy communion with God If conformity be that which capacitates for a mutual communion then doubtless an unholy sinner that hath pleasure in unrighteousness is altogether unfit for communion with an holy God †Heb. 1.13 whose Eyes are so infinitely pure that he cannot behold the least iniquity (a) Fit nostra societas cum Deo per similitudinem Ferrar. There can be no fellowship where first there is not some similitude What fellowship can there then be betwixt the great God who is all light and profane ungodly sinners delighting themselves in the unfruitful works of darkness You may say there is fellowship betwixt you and the God of Heaven (b) 1 John 1.6 But then if you walk in darkness making sin your delight you lie saith the Apostle and do not the truth 'T is an exempt priviledge and that which is peculiar to the pure in Heart that they shall see God and have communion with him (c) 2 Cor. 6.14 15. Hence St. Paul puts the question intending thereby a more vehement negation what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness and what communion hath light with darkness and what concord hath Christ with Belial We see by experience the darkness cometh not till the light be gone and when the light cometh the darkness vanisheth they cannot dwell together it being the nature of things contrary mutually to take away each other Thus the infinitely holy God and a voluptuous sordid Sinner who hath pleasure in unrighteousness they are of such contrary natures that they can no more have fellowship together than the clearest Light and the thickest darkness Amongst all the creature there are none that can have communion with any that live not the same life with themselves as a Plant whose life is only vegetative can have no communion with a beast whose life is sensitive neither can a beast have communion with Men because they live a rational (d) Ephes 4.18 life Thus all sensual wicked Men they are estranged from the life of God they live a life of sensuality delighting in sin as their proper Element and therefore can have no communion at all with God whose life is a life of unchangably blessed and spotless Holiness Oh then how miserable is the condition of all voluptuous sensualists who render themselves uncapable through their brutish lusts of communion with an holy God! Michael and the Dragon could not agree in one Heaven nor the Ark and Dagon in one House no more can a wicked Man and an holy God agree to have communion together Your carnal pleasures they shut out from communion with God as the Plague of leprosy shut out of the Camp debarring a Man from all society with such as were clean (e) In his rebus quae inter se pugnant ita ut neutra ferat alterius consortium quotiens hanc amplectimur illam abdicavimus quotiens unam rejioimus alteram agnoscimus Cyprian de dupl Martyr pag. 600. And had you rather with the Prodigal be feeding upon Husks amongst Swine than to feed with delight upon this bread of life in your fathers House Will you still go on to preferr these Onyons and Garlick of Egypt your carnal delights and pleasurable vanities before all the delicious Clusters of Canaan before the hidden Manna of Sweet communion and fellowship of an holy God Poor brutish sinners did you but know by experience what it is to walk in the light of God's countenance what it is to enjoy his favour what it is to be under his smiles in the face of Christ to receive daily the fresh communications of his love and for ever to have the sweet influences of these heavenly Pleiades falling down like a Golden showr into your own bosoms oh how quickly would you nauseate all carnal delights how quickly would you come off with shame and self-abhorrency from your pleasurable vanities making choice of Communion with God as the only Paradise of true delight and Soul-satisfying pleasures in all the World (f) Psal 34.8 Oh therefore do but tast and see how good the Lord is and what fulness of joy you may have in communion with him You have long been sucking the Breast of carnal delights and tasting how good the pleasures of sin are though but for a season Come now in like manner and draw the sincere milk of comfort from the breasts of Divine promises lay your mouths to the Hony-Comb of Heavenly communion sit you down a little under the shadow of the most High ascend with God into the Mount of transfiguration take a turn or two with him in the Galleries of love and if you find not a day thus spent to be better more laden with Fruits of Paradise to refresh and make glad your Souls than a thousand else where then turn aside again to your carnal pleasures renounce this Heavenly Canaan as a barren Wilderness and go back to the flesh-pots of your sensual delights in Egypt and spare not But oh the fulness of joy and divine satisfaction of a Man walking close in communion with God! You may as well perswade the most pompous Monarch faring deliciously every day to lay aside his princely Robes to desert his Throne and go feed upon husks with the Prodigal as
own madness when though now you sare deliciously yet anon you cannot get a drop of Water though now you are Cloathed in Scarlet yet anon you must be covered with shame though now you walk with delight amongst your ungodly associates yet anon you must be shut up in everlasting Chains under darkness though now you take your fill of carnal pleasures yet anon you must depart accursed into everlasting Fire Oh Believe it sinners the time is at Hand when as Jonathan did in another case you will cry out of all your carnal pleasures I have tasted a little Hony and now I must die I have had a little taste of the hony of sin and taken some sensual delight therein but now I must die eternally and perish for ever of all my carnal pleasures there is nothing now but Eternal Torments remains unto me If then Sirs you have any spiritual discerning consider this and learn now to counter balance your temptations to sin with those Eternal easless torments that will follow after The Lord fenced Eden with a flaming Sword Thus the Eden of sinful Pleasures is fenced with the flaming Sword of God's Wrath which doth always cut those asunder that must needs enter in Oh that now therefore you would look upon the Pleasures of Sin as you will then look upon them when instead thereof you must have nothing but Eternal Pains Oh the change that every sensual Sinner will then meet with now rejoycing but then mourning now laughing but then weeping and gnashing of Teeth for evermore Oh what Worlds would he now give to be saved when for a little wanton Dalliance for a little sensual Delight and carnal Contentment he must now go to Hell and be Damned for ever Where then is thy Reason oh Man that for a superfluous Cup thou shouldst adventure to drink a Cup of Wrath unmixed and for the Pleasures of Sin here shouldst willingly run the hazard of eternal Burnings in Hell Canst thou be content to purchase thy carnal Delights with the Blood of thy own Soul with eternal bitter Howlings and Lamentations in Hellish Torments Oh little can you now imagine how dreadful will be the end of all your ungodly Practices when as your †Revel 18.7 Pleasures in Sin have abounded so your eternal Pangs and Torments in Hell shall much more abound Be no longer enchanted then if you love your Immortal Souls with any sensual Contentments but think often with your selves what fiery Wrath and Indignation they will shortly expose you to Look beyond your carnal Pleasures to that eternal Crown of Life whereof they will deprive you to that everlasting unpreventable Misery wherein they will involve you and then delight in them still if you can * Propter discretionem poenarum haec ipsa impia civitas tantum recipit quantum deliquit sed tamen nihil poenarum illi decrit quae temporaliter peccavit aeternis cruciabitur tormentis Haymo in Loc. Satiùs est hic ad modicum tempus esse miserum quam in aeternum esse miserum satiùs est modicâ miseriâ emere aeternam foelicitatem quam modicâ faelicitate voluptate praesenti emere aeternam miseriam A Lapide How much better is that Sorrow that will end in Joy than that Joy which will end in eternal Sorrow And what Man that is well in his wits doth not count it a wiser part to go weeping to Heaven than laughing to Hell the Torments whereof are endless and past all imagination CHAP. IX The Doctrine improved by way of Exhortation to God's own People exciting them to walk in the whole course of their Life as becomes a People that have Heaven and Glory set before them as the sure reward of all their Labours wherein the Exhortation is branched out into Twelve Particulars of grand import to every gracious Soul III. BY way of Exhortation this Doctrine may be useful both to Saints and to Sinners both to such as have and to such as have not an Interest in that Recompence of Reward which God sets before us 1 BY way of exhortation to you that are blessed with an interest in this glorious reward give ye diligence so to act and walk in the whole course of your life as becomes a People that have Heaven and Glory at all times in their Eye The great care of every Christian in this present World should be to walk worthy of him that hath called us to his Kingdom and Glory endeavouring that his Christian deportment may be something answerable to his high encouragement Though the Lord should never sweeten his holy precepts with any on promise to encourage to the present work of Duty by theâ—â—roposal of an Eternal reward yet we were bound to obâ—â—rve every precept with the most religious devotion to walk in all dutiful obedience before him how much more when God holds forth a Crown of Life an Heavenly Kingdom an Eternal weight of Glory to provoke us thereunto If a prospect of Heavenly Glory will not make us walk circumspect and cause the face of our conversation to shine it argues we are Men of a sordid and ignoble Spirit What shall God promise us a Crown of Life shall he take us up into the Mount of transfiguration shall he shew us all the Beauties of Heaven and afford us a full prospect of Eternal Glory for our encouragement to all holy self-denying and upright walking before himself and yet shall we be remiss and negligent in a way of duty not endeavouring to walk as becomes the Gospel of Christ Believe it Christians that respect which God allows in all your obedience to Heaven and Eternal Glory is a strong engagement upon you obliging you in all things to have respect to that which you know to be acceptable and well-pleasing before him Oh then take heed that you spot not your selves as the Men of the World do but see that you live as those that are Burgesses and Citizens of the new Jerusalem striving always to shâ—w forth the Virtues of him that has called us out of Darkness into his marvellous light You have heard what manner of Priviledge the Lord endulgeth you with what fulness of Joy what an immarcescible Crown of Life what an Eternal recompence of reward the Lord sets before us what manner of Persons should we then strive to be in all Holy Conversation and Godliness TO manifest therefore that you have a due sense of God's wonderful condescending Love see carefully to the ordering of your conversation aright according to the purport of these Twelve ensuing particulars 1 WALK thankfully adoring the Riches of God's Grace who allows you so great encouragement in Heavens Way When God allows you in all your obedience the liberty of having a respect to the recompence of the reward what less can you do than with all thankfulness acknowledge his wonderful condescention and stand admiring it Can you see the Heavens open and a Crown of Life prepared for you and yet
the Tree of your Christian profession never so stately and flourishing yet vain-glory is a Worm that will smite it and so quickly make it wither away that you must never expect to gather any clusters of Canaan any ripe fruits of Paradise any gleanings of true Happiness from it The Pharisees they fasted and prayed and gave Alms but because they did it all to be seen of Men this took the Crown from off their Heads and robb'd them of all future Happiness (d) Matth. 6.2 Verily I say unto you saith Christ reproving their Hypocrisy they have received their reward They sought in all their religious performances the praise of Man not the Glory of God and therefore their Sin it becomes their punishment The praise of Man they shall have but the Glory which comes from God only they shall never have And yet tho vain-glory be thus like the Curse of Christ to the barren Fig-tree causing all our Plants so to wither that the ripe fruit of Eternal Glory will never grow upon them Yet how apt are the very best to let all their performances be sowred with this Leaven and to suffer this Worm to corrupt their Choicest Fruits and Flowers Oh how rare a thing is it to see Men acted not by any carnal respect or vain-glorious motive in what they do but by spiritual motives and Heavenly considerations such as are the Love of God a desire of Communion with him and the hope of an Eternal reward from him (a) Molendinum non circumagitur nec facit farinam nisi excitetur vento sic multi non facerent farinam bonorum operum â—â—si fâ—â—te vento vanitatis Stella de Cont. Mundi vanit lâ—b 1. cap. 11. Esteem of Men popular Applause and worldly Glory these make many Persons take some little tincture of Religions who otherwise would never have had so much as a shew of it Many thousand there are who count godliness not gain unless they can make a gain of godliness nor will they at all lay forth themselves in the service of Christ unless thereby they can raise up to their own name a Monument of worldly Glory But oh how unworthy and sordid is the practice of such self-designers in religion who do thus subordinate the Glory of God the credit of Religion and the joys of Heaven to their own carnal ends and make them all subservient to the lust of their own hypocritical vain-glorious and ambitious Hearts Is there not beauty enough in God to attract our love and Glory enough in Heaven to recompence all our labours unless we may have and ambitiously design for ourselves the praise of Men To follow God in religious performances to be seen of Men to make a profession of Christianity meerly that our names may be famous and admired in the World what is this but to be a Judas selling Christ for Mony or Esau selling our Birthright for a Mess of Pottage Beware then that you never enter into this temptation which that you may not do pray hard for an upright frame of Spirit and consider often as a motive to all holy duties the Glory Happiness and Eternal joy which God hath set before you As Aaron's Rod devoured the Rods of the Magicians So that Crown of Life and Eternal Glory which shall shortly be put upon us should utterly devour consume and eat up all desires after vain-glory If stately and sumptuous Buildings allure you think often what Cottages these are in comparison of those Heavenly Mansions which Christ is preparing for us If gorgeous and fantastical Apparel bewitch you think seriously what wages these are in comparison of those white Robes wherewith all the people of God shall be cloathed in the Kingdom of their Father If any worldly splendour and Glory have an influence upon you oh think what a Bubble it is in comparison of that far more exceeding and eternal weight of Glory which lies before us in all the ways of obedience Let a Man but often revolve in his thoughts and always keep in his Eye the Reward of Eternal life and he will not need to look abroad in the World for any motives to all upright self-denying and holy walking before the Lord. Oh how little should a Christian be affected with all Earthly Glory and how upright should it make him when God allows him in all the ways of obedience a Tree of Life to feed upon causing him by faith to see the Glory and to anticipate the pleasures of the Heavenly Jerusalem What is it not enough that there is Heaven at the end unless you may have the praise of Men in the way of obedience Will not the Glory which comes from God alone satisfy you unless vain Men like yourselves admire you Is it nothing to be walking on towards a Crown of life unless others see and count every step that you take in Heavens way Can you think you have cleansed your Hearts in vain and count all your labour lost in the service of God who will shortly reward you with an Eternal reward if you have not the praise of Men given you into the bargain Oh dreadful hypocrisy and never to be bewailed but with tears of Blood If thus you be acted by vain-glory and sinister ends in the service of God in vain shall you expect a Mansion of Eternal Glory in God's Heavenly Kingdom Our first Patents by eating of the Tree of Knowledge they lost their right to the Tree of life Thus if you will seek the praise of Man and live upon the Wind of popular applause in the service of God you cannot but forfeit your right to Eternal Glory (b) Non virtue sed causa virtutis apud Deum mercedem habet August de Temp. Serm. 59. For as Austin well observes 't is not the greatest doers but the sincerest Livers not Men of a glorious profession and many performances but Men of holy motives and pure intentions whom God will reward with Eternal life So much better it is not to seem and be than not to be and yet seem a true Christian Beware therefore lest being wholly acted by Vain-glory and other sinister ends in the service of God there be found under the name of a Christian nothing else but the Heart of an Infidel 3 Walk contentedly not murmuring against Heaven but sitting down as well satisfied with your present condition be it what it will 'T was hard enough with old Jacob when there was a Famine in the Land of Canaan but having received the glad tidings of his Sons welfare he is now at ease and as one fully satisfied he cries out it is enough Joseph is yet alive So whatever hardships attend you and whatever Troubles you stand involved in yet Christians methinks the glad Tidings of Eternal Life prepared for you and of that everlastingly glorious Reward which God sets before you should make you sit down well satisfied and cry out as in an extasy of admiration it is
into the Mount of Transfiguration and causeth the light of the Glory of Heaven to shine round about us The Sun indeed having dazled our Eyes we see nothing well But yet we discern our selves and see our own unworthiness best of all when our Eyes are most dazl'd with the brightness of that Glory which God sets before us As therefore with one Eye we behold the good that is done by us so to keep us humble let us stedfastly look with the other upon the good that is laid up in Heaven for us What is all our Work to so glorious a reward What is the Wilderness of our barren obedience to that fruitful Canaan a Land that flows with Milk and Hony What in a word are all our weary Weeks of Labour and Travail to that Eternal Sabbath of Rest that will follow after Do but consider Christians the transcendent worth and excellency of that reward which God sets before us and then be proud if you can of your own worth and religious performances how excellent soever (d) 2 Cor. 4.17 That far more exceeding and Eternal Weight of Glory may well keep you humble and cause whatever you can do or suffer for it to seem lighter than vanity it self We that did not deserve the least glimpse of heavenly Glory what doth the Lord afford us a full Sun-shine We that could not expect the smallest tast of his Goodness what doth he give us a whole Cluster of Canaan We that have deserved nothing but to be filled with the fear of Wrath the foretasts of Hell the dreadful preoccupations of Eternal Burnings doth the Lord allow us for our encouragement the hope of Glory the first fruits of Heaven and the joyful prelibations of an Eternal recompence of reward there Oh then let us all fall down and adore his matchless Goodness endeavouring to be as low in Humility as the Lord hath made us to be high in our priviledges We that have risen thus in God's thoughts should fall in our own striving most to humble our selves when most assured of a Blessed Exaltation to Life and Eternal Glory (e) Non potes intrare per portam aliquam angustam nisi te humilies nisi te humiliaveris non intrabis in regnum Dei Stella de contemnendis Mundi vanitatibus lib. 2. Remember Sirs you must stoop low in Humility would you ever enter in thro' the strait Gate into the Kingdom of God Man by Nature is full with the emptiness of Self-admiration and till this be removed out of the Way he can never be filled as a vessel of Honour with the new Wine of eternal Consolation We lay up the richest Wine in the lowest Cellars So doth God the Riches of heavenly Glory in the humble and lowly Hearts (f) Prov. 18.12 Whom ever God intends to exalt he first humbles them Giving none the blessing of Eternal Life till first he have brought them upon their knees (g) Ama esse parvus humilis ut mereà ris à Deo exaltari in alto throno gloria Stella de Cont. Mundi vanitat ubi suprà Be little therefore in your own Eyes that you may be great in God's heavenly Kingdom And if ever you would sit high in Glory be sure to live low in self-abasement Men that neither desire Glory nor consider the worth of it may well be proud standing much upon their own worth But you that would come to Glory at last as having seen the excellency of it must count it your greatest worth to be sensible of your own unworthiness resolving to creep to Heaven upon the bended knees of true humility And truly there is nothing that will lay Men so low in themselves as to think seriously how high for their encouragement God raiseth them in promising and how much higher God will raise them in bestowing Eternal Life upon them If any thing can empty us of Self-admiring thoughts and can keep us humble 't is duly to consider how richly God will fill us erelong with Eternal Soul-ravishing Comforts Then if ever will the Soul lie at the feet of God when her Eye is stedfastly fixed upon those entrancing Pleasures which are at God's right Hand for evermore He that thinks to rise in Glory cannot choose but be humble lying down in his own shame 5 Walk resolvedly going on in the way of your Duty with what difficulties soever it may be attended Most Men are apt to measure duty by their own safety are unwilling to engage in the wayes of Christ till all difficulties are removed by a secular arm and if once the Times frown upon any religious exercise their faces are no longer towards that Duty as formerly nor can you possibly prevail with them to lanch forth any further for Christ than if at any time a storm should arise they may get safe to the Shore again But judge in your selves is it seemly for those to make shy of Duty because of seeming dangers attending it to whom God allows the hope of an Eternal reward for their encouragement the way of Duty Shall they leave themselves at a loose indifferency performing or omitting Duty at their own choice to evade the Cross who shall erelong have their Heads incircled with an immarcessible Crown of Glory Did Noah thus Did Abraham thus Did the three Jewish Worthies thus though threatned with the scorchings of an hot fiery Furnace Did Daniel thus who notwithstanding the Royal Edict to the contrary upon pain of being made a Prey to the ravine of furious Lyons was yet frequent in the invocation of holy Prayer calling upon God and giving thanks to him as he did afore-time (h) Dan. 6.10 Oh methinks Christians it should shame us to decline Duty not persevering in the faithful and constant performance thereof how dangerous and difficult soever having allowed us for our encouragement a prospect of Heaven as a bright glimpse of future Glory and in all our religious undertakings a respect unto the recompence of reward Do you not observe Christians how the Merchant-venturer puts to Sea running many a desperate hazzard amidst Storms and Tempests in hope of a gainful return And with what undaunted courage doth the valiant Souldier take his Life in his hand encountring the fiercest adversary upon the hope of an uncertain victory Why then should we decline our Duty for fear of any Storm who are always within ken of the Harbour where once being landed we are sure to enjoy an everlasting calm * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost hom 16. ad pop Antioch Rom. 8.37 Why should not we valiantly fight the Lord's Battels who fight not as uncetain but are sure of the Day before we enter the Field and may sound a triumph before the Victory as knowing that through Christ we shall be more than Conquerors Oh why should we be afraid to grapple with any Goliah-afflictions to encounter a whole host of crosses or to suffer any fiery tryal in a way of
nor could Mary Magdalen refrain her weeping by Christ's (b) John 20.14 15. Sepulchre because though Christ was present with her yet she did not know him So though the Well of Life Everlasting be before us and Christ having the Reward of eternal Glory in his Hand be present with us to Crown us yet if we know not all this we may well be filled with Sorrow and go weeping as Men without Hope from day to day For it is not so much Heaven as the Assurance of Heaven nor so much an Interest in eternal Life as the Knowledg of our Interest in that glorious reward that can wipe away all Tears from our Eyes and make our Hearts rejoyce with Joy unspeakable and full of Glory The Safety of your Souls depends indeed upon your Interest in the Recompence of eternal Glory that gives them the strongest Security against an everlasting Shipwrack so that let what Storms and Tempests will be abroad in the World yet having an Interest in heavenly Glory they shall never miscarry but be landed safe upon the wished Shoar of eternal Rest But yet the Comfort of your Souls and Hearts and Lives doth mainly depend upon the Knowledg and Assurance of that blessed Interest You may be safe with a bare Interest in Heaven but you can never be Comfortable nor free from Heart-perplexing Thoughts all the day long without knowing your Interest without some Assurance of Heaven as your eternal Inheritance The Sun when hid in a Cloud doth not yield those comfortable Irradiations and guilded Beams of Brightness to refresh us as at other times when shining forth in its Noon-day Splendour So neither must you expect the like Comfort from Heaven and eternal Glory to solace your Hearts your Interest therein being hid from your Eyes as otherwise they would afford did you but know Heaven to be your home and eternal Glory to be entailed upon you as your Portion in another World You then that would live Comfortable and die Triumphing give diligence to know what Right you have to the Recompence of Reward 'T will afford you little Comfort to have Heaven in your Eye so long as you want the Assurance of Heaven in your Hearts not knowing but you may eternally fall short of it A prospect of eternal Glory without a known Interest in eternal Glory will prove but a dull Cordial Be thy Right to eternal Life never so good yet thou losest the Comfort thereof so long as thy Evidences for eternal Life are not cleared up And had you rather dwell in the Tents of Kedar invelop'd in thick Darkness than to live and die assured of the heavenly Jerusalem as your own Inheritance Had you rather walk under the Fears of Death and be filled every day with the dreadful Apprehensions of eternal Burnings than to know that your Names are written in the Book of Life Had you rather be wandring in the Wilderness not knowing whether ever you shall come to Canaan than to be upon sure ground for that holy Land Had you rather be shut up in a black Cloud than solace your Souls in the bright Sun-shine of God's Love and Favour Had you ratheâ— be under continual Tossings at Sea and live at the Mercy of every enraged Wave than to come with full Sails into the peaceful Harbour of a divine Plerophory Had you rather be upon Uncertainties for an heavenly Mansion than to know that if your earthly House of this Tabernacle were dissolved you have a Building of God an House not made with Hands eternal in the Heavens In one word had you rather barely look upon heavenly Glory than to behold it with an Eye of Faith as that which shall infallibly be the Reward of all your Obedience to Crown you with What alas are all the Royalties of Heaven and Glory to me if I may not know them to be mine Were all the Beams of heavenly Glory collected and gathered together in one Sun yet what were all this to me if still I be left to sit in Darkness not seeing any ground of Claim to one beam of that Glory Let all the Clusters of Canaan let all the Grapes of that Holy Land be pressed and strained into one Cup yet what Comfort can my Soul have thence when seeing them I know not but I may want them for ever God allows us in all our Obedience to look at Heaven and Glory and eternal Happiness but wherewith shall I clear up my Heart and make glad my Soul if I cannot look upon Heaven as my Heaven upon Glory as my Glory upon eternal Happiness as my own Happiness and exceeding great Reward What sweetness can a Christian draw from the Promise of eternal Life if he know not himself to have an Interest in it and be not sure to live eternally by it Lose not therefore the Comfort of your Souls in an heap of Uncertainties do not cast away through your Unbelief those Cordials which God hath provided for you oh sit not down satisfied any longer without the assurance of Heaven if you would not live and die without the Joys of Heaven Many there are I confess that cry down Assurance under the reproachful Nick-names of carnal Confidence Presumption and Security as if this heavenly Manna like that in the Wilderness were subject to Corruption and would breed Worms making Men turn Libertines grow careless and cease to work out their own Salvation with Fear and Trembling But the truth is there are none that ever walk so chearful so upright so circumspect in Heavens way as those that know they shall infallibly come there Amongst all Men in the World those are always most stedfast most immoveable most abounding in the Work of the Lord that know their Labour shall never be in vain but be Crowned at length with eternal Rest Whoever expects to receive much from God and hath the Hope of eternal Life abiding in him such an one will most willingly spend and be spent in the Service of God giving diligence above all others to purify himself as (c) 1 John 3.3 he is pure As well you may say that the Fire will make a Man freeze with cold as that the Assurance of eternal Life will make God's People grow secure sloathful and negligent in their Christian Course taking boldness to live as they list What doth the Assurance of future Glory dispose those that have it to turn the Grace of God into Wantonness Shall a known Interest in the Reward of eternal Life be thought to make Men love the Wages of Unrighteousness Must the knowing that we have an Inheritance amongst the Saints in Light incline us to have the more Fellowship with the unfruitful Works of Darkness Can you think that the Souls Evidences for Heaven should encourage it to walk the way which leads to Hell Men that are yet unacquainted with the Spirit of Adoption not knowing what it is to have the hope of eternal Life abiding in them may tell you so
way as thou dreamest of or if there be why yet in that very Lyon thou mayst find Hony The way to Heaven is not so dark and gloomy as most imagine though indeed it be strait and tedious to Flesh and Blood yet there stands a bright Crown of eternal Glory at the end which makes it comfortable Be ashamed then having such encouragement to walk disconsolate in Heavens way There are not so many Thorns to prick you as Roses to refresh you Nor half so much cause of Sorrow â—s there is of Comfort and rejoycing of Spirit Christians walking in Heaven's Way they may meet I confess with a fiery Tryal but then there is some Light for their Comfort as well as Heat to Torment them And let me tell you the more your Hearts are melted and softned in such a Flame the deeper will be the Impression of divine Love Consolation and Sweetness upon them A sight of Glory from Heaven is then most Cordial when we can see nothing but Bonds and Imprisonments and forest Afflictions to abide us on Earth (a) Acts 7.55 How sweetly did Stephen that blessed Proto-martyr fall asleep under a Shower of Stones as if he had gone to Heaven in a Bed of Down The Reason of all was this he saw Heaven open and Jesus standing at the right Hand of God ready to turn every Stone that was thrown at him into an orient Pearl and to Crown him so soon as ever he had passed the Straits of Death with eternal Life Thiâ— made him forget his Sorrow and walk on with Comfort through the Valley of Death that at length he might come to that Glory in Heaven which he found such a Cordial to his Soul when ready to leave her earthly Tabernacle And why is it that we having the same Recompence of Reward set before us cannot endure the like Hardships with the same Comfort Must there be so much ado to make us live upon those Cordials which Heaven it self hath provided for us Are the Consolations of God grown small with us that we resolve thus to walk with sorrowful Hearts whilst he shews us Heaven as in a Glass and sets Glory in our Eye Shall every light Affliction eat â—ut the Heart of our Comfort when we see there lies before us a far more exceeding and eternal Weight of Glory Either Christian let thy Heart feel more or thy Eye see less of Heaven And do not go to bring up an ill Report upon the celestial Canaan by walking disconsolate in the way thither For you that have Heaven before you to come weeping after for you that have Glory in your Eye to be filled with Sorrow for you that may hope to live with God for ever in the Mount to go mourning from day to day like Doves of the Valley how unseemly were this If the World be bitter yet sweet is Paradise If the Earth cast you out yet Heaven will receive you If here you be tossed with Storms like a Ship at Sea yet arriving at the wished Shoar of Eternity you will find rest If in this (b) Mat. World Men Revile you and Persecute you saying all manner of Evil of you falsly for Christ's sake yet still you should walk rejoycing and be exceeding glad because great is your Reward in Heaven And what so great Matters are all our Afflictions on Earth that they should be able to imbitter Heaven Pray you (c) 2 Cor. 4.16 what is Affliction to Glory What is light Affliction to a weight of Glory What is a short momentary Affliction that like a little Cloud will soon be blown over to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a far more exceeding and eternal Weight of Glory beyond all possible Hyperbole that will never be over That Man sure never looked by Faith so far as Heaven whom any Affliction on earth can make to go weeping â—ike Rachel refusing to be Comforted 11 WALK purely endeavouring to cleanse your selves from all filthiness of Flesh and Spirit and to mortifie every Lust â—hat would spoyl you of your Reward It becomes not those that have the Recompence of eternal Life before them to love the Wages of Unrighteousness Nor those that have Glory in their Eye to make themselves by the Polâ—utions that are in the World through Lust like one of the base Fellows The Inheritance of the Saints in Light â—ts a pure and an undefiled Inheritance And therefore beholding it we must labour to be changed into the â—ame undefiled Purity and Holiness with it would we ever come to the full Enjoyment of it The Lord alows us a sight of Heaven in all our Obedience that beholding from day to day we might at length receive a Tincture of Purity and unspotted Holiness from it He gives us a prospect of our future Happiness that be (d) 2 Cor. 3.18 holding with open face the Glory of the Lord we might be changed into the same Image from Glory to Glory The difference betwixt Grace and Glory is not as some observe from these words specifical but gradual They differ not in Kind but only in Degree Grace is Glory inchoate and Glory is Grace consummate Grace is Glory Militant and Glory is Grace Triumphant Grace is Glory dawning and Glory is Grace shining forth in its noon-dayâ— brightness And I know no better way to ripen Grace into Glory than for Grace to behold and continually sun it self in the warm Beams of eternal Glory The Hope of future Happiness is the strongest Inducement to present Holiness Every Man (e) 1 John 3.3 that hath this Hope in him purifieth himself as he is pure Hope to be like Christ hereafter Glorious as he is Glorious and Blessed as he is Blessed will work in us a desire to be as like him as we can here Pure as he is Pure and Holy as he is Holy He that hath most hope of being saved will give most diligence of all others to be sanctified We never cleanse our Hands so much as when we have Glory in Hope Nor do we ever Purify our Hearts so throughly as when we have Heaven in our Eye When Moses had been with God upon the Mount he came down with his Face shining Thus if at any time God calls us up into the Mount with himself giving us a sight of that Glory which shall shortly be revealed in us we should be sure to come down having not only our Faces but our Hearts likewise shining with unspotted Purity It were the most unbecoming thing in the World for those to Dâ—file themselves with any Unrighteousness who have their Eye continually fixed upon an undefiled Inheritance expecting as the full Reward of all their Labours a Crown of Righteousness What shall not Heaven's Brightness expel the Darkness of Hell Shall not the Hope of eternal Happiness promote in our Hearts and Lives the Work of Holiness Is there a Crown of Glory at the end of our Christian Course and shall not that make us walk Pure
Bags and Coffers are stored with Gold Because the World dandles you upon her Lap 't is no sure sign that you shall rest for ever in Abraham's bosom You may not think to be Heirs of Heaven because you are the Possessours of the Earth For not getting an Interest in the Recompence of the Reward now you are sure to go without it to all Eternity The good things of this present World you may love but the good things of Heaven and Glory you shall never have You may have a large Portion of earthly Enjoyments But shall never enjoy the Inheritance of Saints in Light †Psal 17.14 'T is no new thing for God to fill their Bellies with his hidden Treasures with the choicest of all earthly Comforts who never take any care to lay up for themselves a Treasure in Heaven But what alas will it profit you to have Earth in Hand if you have not Heaven in hope What though Riches and Honour are the Lot of your Inheritance amongst those whose Lot is Happiness and eternal Glory What relish think you hath Dives now left him of all his Delicacies or Esau of his dear-bought Pottage What pleasure hath the Rich Fool of his full Barns or that young Man of his large Possessions What delight hath Jezabel in her Paint or Ahab in Naboth's Vineyard What comfort can a Man have in the choicest Quintessence of any or in the greatest Confluence of all earthly Enjoyments who must receive them as his Portion and can never expect any other Happiness any other Portion or Reward in God's heavenly Kingdom It may be for the present thy Mony is thy Idol and thou art held in Thraldom under thy own Possessions but what will remain of thy Silver and Gold to carry thy Soul through the Storm of Death save only the (b) Jam. 5.3 rust thereof to joyn in Judgment against thee and torment thee eating thy Flesh like Fire for ever It may be thou art acted now by vain Glory and Desires of popular Applause but what will it then avail thee to be admired by thy fellow Prisoners and condemned by thy Judge It may be thou servest thy own Lust and another's Beauty but what Pleasure will there be in all this when the Fire of Lust shall be turned into the Fire of Hell It may be thy worldly Comforts and Accommodations are now looked upon by thee as thy greatest Happiness but what miserable Comforters will these be when peeping out of thy Grave thou shalt see Heaven and Earth all on a fire and Christ coming in the Flames thereof to take Vengeance upon thee There is a blessed God that could comfort in such an hour but thou must never see him There is a Crown of Glory that fadeth not away there is a Kingdom that cannot be moved there is all fulness of Joy and Soul-satisfying Pleasure but having thy Portion in this present World thou shalt never have these to comfort thee in the World to come Make the best of your Portion here of your Riches Honours and Pleasures on Earth for you must never receive any Portion hereafter you must never look to be Crowned with Life and Eternity of Glory in Heaven Oh then how unhappy are all those who neglect to get an Interest in the Recompence of the Reward have no Heaven but Earth no Glory but what will end in everlasting Shame and perpetual Contempt no Pleasures but what must shortly be changed into Hellish Intolerable and remediless Torments If you love your immortal Souls come away from all worldly Vanities and be sure to get an Interest in this glorious Reward that your Lives and your Happiness your Rejoycing and all your Comfort may not end together The greatest Portion in this Life will afford you but small Comfort of upon good Grounds you cannot look for a better Portion after Death 2 CONSIDER the Recompence of the Reward which God sets before us it 's a thing feasable and that which you may obtain if you will but seek it The Riches Kingdom and Glory of this World may be sought and yet never found But whoever by patient continuance in well-doing shall seek for Glory and Honour * Rom. 2.7 and blessed Immortality God will certainly Crown them with Life everlasting The Lord is willing to bestow Heaven the best of Rewards upon the worst of Sinners will they but embrace it This eternal Recompence of Reward 't is a thing indeed difficult to be obtained that none may despise it But yet it 's possible to be obtained that so none may sit down discouraged as despairing of it This Exhortation would be out of season to the Damned in Hell betwixt whom and eternal Glory there is a great Gulf fixed so that they are now no longer within the Possibilities of Life and Salvation But for you there is still Balm in Gilead to heal all your Wounds there is an all-sufficiency of Merit in Christ to expiate your Sins and there is still a most merciful Propensity of Will in God to Crown all those that diligently seek him with a glorious Reward And why then since Life is before you will you die the Death Why will you choose to be miserable under Tenders of Glory and eternal Happiness Why will you expose your selves to hellish Torments when the Lord himself doth so earnestly invite you to accept of Heaven Shall God be willing to give and yet you so unwilling to receive the Reward of eternal Life Oh why will you be such Enemies to your own Happiness making light of that great Salvation which though difficult is yet possible to be obtained Can you be content to fall short of eternal Glory and for ever to (c) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clem. Alexand. Admonit ad Gentes pag. mihi 6. a. be shut out of Heaven where is fulness of Joy Shall God hold out the Golden Scepter of his Grace and will you not so much as touch it to save your own Lives Must he follow you with daily Importunities of Love intreating you to accept of this glorious Reward to make you happy and will you still with Disdain turn your backs upon him as if the Favour of God in Christ as if Heaven and eternal Glory were not worth the having (d) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cyril Hier. Praef Cateches pag. 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Idem Cateches 1. pag. 3. The Lord is Bountiful and willing to give But yet he expects that you should be so dutiful as to receive with all thankfulness what he gives The bestowance of this glorious Reward doth indeed belong to God as his part But then the seeking and acceptance thereof doth belong to every one of you as your necessary indispensable Duty Give diligence then since God so freely offers with all thankfulness to embrace the Reward of eternal Life Were the Matter of this Exhortation an Impossibility exciting you to seek for what you could never find and to labour for what
wherein to seek after Heaven and Glory is never extended beyond it (i) Exod. 16.26 Qui promisit poenitenti veniam non promisit poenitendi horam qui poenitenti misericordiam premisit peccanti crastinum non promisit Aug. de verb. Dom. Serm. 59. as the Israelites might gather Manna on any of the six days in the Week but not on the seventh Do you not know but if you neglect the present opportunity refusing now to seek after the reward of Eternal Life God may seal you up in your impenitency for ever denying you all further advantages for your Souls as not having promised a Day of Repentance to any though he have promised to all that are truly penitent a Crown of Glory (k) Cor. 6.2 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Epic. Stob. cap. 16. Oh then to Day if you will hear his Voice harden not your Hearts neglecting the reward of Eternal Life till tomorrow when the present time is the only Day of Salvation If the Day of Salvation be neglected your hope of Salvation will for ever be frustrated If now you let slip the Day of Grace you cannot chuse but fall short hereafter of the Crown of Glory Time and opportunity in this case do vastly differ Time is the continuation of Hours Days and Years successively coming after each other But opportunity is the universal concurrence of all other helps and advantages to give birth by their auspicious Midwifery to your wished ends So that you may have time and yet lose your opportunity You may have in the Glass of your time many sands when there is not a sand left in the Glass of your opportunity You may have the Moon-light of time when the Sun of opportunity is gon down in an everlasting Night of Darkness upon you And to be sure Sirs if you lose the Sun-light of opportunity you will never be able by the Moon-light of time to find out and walk in that narrow Way which leads to Glory (l) Matth. 25.10 11 12. The five foolish Virgins came too late and for that cause were everlastingly shut out from the marriage Supper (m) Luke 19.42 Si eo ipso die resipuisset quo Christus urbem ingressus est haec sententia lata non fuisset quod quia neglexit in posterum nullus misericordiae locus ex quo liquet quantum interest resipiscentiam non dico in annum sed in diem differre Cart. in loc Heb. Jerusalem had the things belonging to her peace hid from her Eyes because in the Day of her visitation she would not know them And Esau having lost through delays his Fathers Blessing he found no place of Repentance nor opportunity to recover it though he sought it with Tears So that you see the least of opportunity to get Heaven once fallen never springeth again The Market-day of Grace once over we must never expect a second wherein to purchase for our selves that one Pearl of great price The swift tide of God's mercy in the strivings of his Spirit once returned we must never look to see it high water again nor think by the reflowings thereof to have our Souls landed safe upon the wished shore of Eternal Rest And this dear Friends I tell you not to plunge you in despair but to beget in you desires after the lively hope of Eternal Life not to shut you up under a sentence of wrath and unpreventable Misery in Hell but to hasten you in your pursuit of Heaven and Eternal Glory Though you have formerly made light of Salvation yet if now you will prize it though you have heretofore turned your backs upon Heaven yet will you but now seek after it though hitherto you have undervalued all those inestimable tenders of Life and Eternal Glory which God hath made you yet if now you will close with them seeking diligently by patient continuance in well-doing for Glory Honour and Immortality you need not doubt but Salvation shall be your Crown Heaven shall be your home and the full enjoyment of God in Glory that shall be your portion and your exceeding great reward Yet the Golden Scepter of God's Grace is stretched out now therefore be sure to lay hold upon it Yet there is a door of Mercy stands open be sure now to enter in thereat Yet you are not sealed up under an irreversible Sentence of Wrath in Hell give diligence therefore this day this hour this present moment to lay up for your selves a Treasure in Heaven Now oh now my beloved is your Term-time wherein to plead with God for the lives of your Immortal Souls shortly comes an everlasting Vacation of Happiness or Misery where you cannot be heard pleading for your selves though with Tears of Blood ¶ In morte cheu nec vel semel quidem peccare licet nam hoc tale peccatum est irrevocabile Semel mortuus es semper mortuus es semel male mortuus es semper damnatus es Hanc mortem corrigere hanc damnationem excutere per omnem aeternitatem non poteris As in War so in this case we are not permitted to err twice now Heaven and Eternal Glory lie before you either speedily get an interest in them or together with your present opportunity you will lose them for ever When Death begins to make his arrest upon thee it s not then a time to sow but to reap the fruit of our doings not to labour for Eternal Rest but to rest from our labours not by works of Righteousness to seek a Crown but to receive a Crown of Righteousness not to lay up for our selves a Treasure in Heaven but to go to Heaven where our Comfort our Treasure our Happiness are all laid up That Seed of Grace must be sown in season from which we would ever reap a crop of Eternal Glory Now therefore while the Lord waits to be gracious while his Spirit strives and calls you to break off your Sins by Repentance be sure to work out your own Salvation with fear and trembling providing for your selves everlasting Heavenly Mansions against the Time that your Earthly Tabernacles will be dissolved Oh remember if while God affords you the auspicious gales of his own Spirit you shall not now hoyst up your Sails setting forward in your Voyage for the holy land you must never expect to arrive safe at the shore of blessed Eternity CHAP. XI A Sixth Consideration added to move Sinners to seek an Interest in Heaven and Glory taken from that everlasting Misery that will otherwise befall them where also the Horror of that Hellish Misery is set out in Six Particulars 6 AND lastly consider if you get not an interest in Heavenly Glory the reward of Eternal Misery must be your portion It hath by some been fiction'd that what every Man affected in this Life with that he should be solaced in the Elisian fields The Moral carrieth in it a certain truth that look what Men set their Hearts most upon here such shall
plunge the Soul in remediless intolerable Misery 2 Be sure that you quit your own Righteousness giving diligence to see the Insufficiency of it to Life and Salvation Such is the Corruption of our Nature that though the Covenant of Works be violated and the Condition thereof unperformable to Man lapsed Yet still we would Trade for Heaven in a way of working building our Hope for eternaâ— Life upon the sandy Foundation of a Self-opiniative Righteousness If at any time Men are startled by the powerful Impressions of a Soul-searching Ministry and begin to feel the Sting of Sin in their Consciences you may presently see them have recourse not to Christ but to Moses not to the Righteousness which is of God by Faith but to the Righteousness which is of the Law placing their whole Affiance in the supposed Worth and Merit of their own good Works as if these could save them But know you must that those who put Confidence in their own Righteousness will as surely fall short of Heaven and Glory as those who make no Conscience of Righteousness at all Good Works when rested in and made the Matter of our justification before God are as infallibly Damning as evil Works when never Repented of (p) Gal. 3.10 For as many as be of the Works of the Law trusting in and expecting Salvation by them are under the Curse The Law at first was an easie way to Righteousness and from thence to Salvation But now every step thereof sinks as low as Hell It 's written within and without with Curses which way soever a Man stirs he finds nothing but Death before him One Man's way by the Civility of his Education the Ingenuity of his Disposition the Engagement of other ends or Relations may seem more smooth and plausible than anothers but by Nature they all run into Hell as all Rivers though never so different in other Circumstances run into the Sea And the Reason of all this the Apostle hath subjoyned in the following words taken from that everlasting Inability that we lie under to fulfil all Righteousness which the Law in its utmost rigour and latitude doth require at our Hands as pronouncing all those Accursed that continue not in all things which are written in the Book of the Law (q) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 M. Eremita to do them So then though Sin and Death go together as Work and Wageâ— yet eternal Life must never be expected as the Purchase of our own good Works but as the free Gift of God in Christ Jesus The Ways of Sin (r) Rom. 6.23 is Death saith the Apostle But the Gift of God saith he purposely changing the manner of his Speech is eternal Life Say therefore the Papists what they will of their Merit of Condignity proportionate in worth and excellency to eternal Glory Yet would you not for ever be shut out of Heaven and fall short of Glory you must Renounce all Opinion of your own Merit laying hold on eternal Life as the free Gift of God For can we rationally think that our imperfect Obedience should justly deserve with God the Reward of eternal Glory Do we fail coming short in every Duty and shall we yet look for Heaven and not of Debt and not of Mercy If the (s) Rom. 8.18 Sufferings of this present Life are not worthy to be compared with the (a) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Oecum in loc Glory that shall be revealed in us what little reason can we have to think by any inferior act of Obedience to merit such a far more exceeding and eternal weight of Glory (b) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost in Philip. Homil. 11. The Reward of eternal Life is the gift of God and therefore not to be sought by Works of Righteousness as infinitely exceeding in Worth and Dignity all our performances how glorious soever Misinterpret me not as if I were declaiming against the necessity of inherent Righteousness when indeed the meritoriousness and condignity thereof proportionate to eternal Life is all that we here deny We do not cry down Obedience and good Works as they stand in subordination to â—â—ace and are the genuine Fruits of Sanctification as they of the Romish Faction have maliciously traduced the Reformation But only as they stand in opposition to the free Grace of God in our Justification and are made by Pharisaical self-justitiaries the Foundation whereupon to bottom their hopes for eternal Life We of the Church of England do maintain the necessity of good Works pressing earnestly to the practise of them as antecedaneous to Life Eternal without which no Man can be saved But that wherein we dissent from the Church of Rome is about the causality of good Words with whom we dare not affirm (a) Si propriè appellentur ea quae decimus nostra merita Spei quidem Seminaria sunt charitatis Incentiva occultae praedestinationis Judicia futurae foelicitatis Praesagia Via regni non causa regnandi Bern. lib. de Grat. liber Arbitr but deny them to be meritorious of Eternal Life as if a Man should be saved for them We do allow them with Bernard to be the preservatives of Hope the Incentives of Charity the marks of hidden Predestination the Presages of future Happiness the Way that leads to the Kingdom of Heaven but not the meritorious causes of our reigning with Christ there Take heed then that you think not of your own Righteousness above what you ought to think 'T is your duty to fulfil all Righteousness but will certainly be your undoing if you trust in any Beware therefore oh Man of this sugared Poyson within thee let there be no depending upon thy good Heart thy good Life thy good Performances But remember the proud Pharisee who stands upon his own bottom as well as ungodâ—â— Sinners whose lives are notoriously infamous for all manner of abominable impieties will fall short of Heaven Whoever thinks to find Life in his own Righteousness and Glory in his own Graces will be sunk through such carnal Confidence to lose Life and Eternal Glory for ever Oh then let not any Man be found cloathed in his own Righteousness that would ever be cloathed upon with the Garments of Salvation For Men to despair in themselves counting all their Righteousness but loss for the excellency of Heaven This is the best way to obtain the reward of Eternal Glory in the Kingdom of Heaven He that here cries out as a Man lost and undone in himself will hereafter be found in Christ to the saving of his Soul Never did any Man yet get to Heaven by trusting in his own Righteousness Nor shall any Man fall short of Heaven who renouncing his own Righteousness trusteth wholly to the Mercy of God in Christ Jesus 3 GET renewed Natures making sure of a principle of Grace within (b) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Macar Hom. 30. A Wicked Man in his unregeneracy is no more capable of an
interest in this Glorious Reward than a dead Man is capable of being made the Monarch of the whole Universe The Tree must first take root and be filled with sap before any precious Fruit can grow upon it So you must first have the Root of the matter within you and be filled with the Sap of Sanctifying Grace before ever you can be Trees of Righteousness bearing Fruit to Eternal Life A Man must first be born into the World before he can have any Dignities Honour on Preferment conferred upon him in the World Thus a Man also must first be born again from Heaven by the Holy Ghost before ever he can be preferred to the full enjoyment of Life and Eternal Glory in the Kingdom of God (c) John 3.3 For except a Man be born again from above saith Christ he cannot see the Kingdom of God d A Man must first be a Member of the Church militant on Earth by Sanctification before he can possibly be made a Member of the Church triumphant in Heaven by eternal glorification (e) Rom. 5.21 The Grace of God in Christ Jesus is that alone which must Crown us with Glory if ever we have it And yet know you must that the Grace of God itself will never reign but through Righteousness unto Eternal Life The grand Reward of a Christian is the beatifical Vision of God in Glory But because he is an infinitely pure and holy God (f) Heb. 12.14 why therefore without Holiness you must never look to see him as your Happiness and Reward What should they do with an Holy God who are not themselves sanctified Or how can they behold with Comfort the Holy one of Israel who have not a pure Eye but are all over polluted and stained with Sin Never think to be a Vessel of Glory if first thou be not seasoned throughout in Body Soul and Spirit with renewing Grace But oh how long shall these things be Paradoxes and hidden Mysteries amongst you Where is the Man in our Congregations that knows by his (c) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clem. Alex. own experience what it is to be made a new Creature to be born of the Spirit from above to have his Heart washed in the Laver of Regeneration from all uncleaness and in a Word to be â—aised by the Almighty irresistable power of God from the Death of Sin to the Life of Grace Are not most Men pleasing themselves with external performances making their Prayers their Alms their good Works a fufficient Qualification for Heaven whilst they never think of getting sanctified Hearts and renewed Natures (g) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Macar Hom. 30. Oh that all such amongst you would now consider how impossible it is for any Man to obtain the Reward of Eternal Glory not being first born again from above and made a new Creature Poor self destroying Sinners if here you become not Men of a pure Heart you must never see the Face of God in the Kingdom of Heaven but the Furnace of Hell is heating for you and a Night of Eternal Darkness abides you in the World to come And is it nothing do you think to be shut out of Heaven and to fall into Hell irrecoverably Is it nothing to miss of Eternal Life and for ever to lose the Reward of Eternal Glory that you can live and die so well satisfied in a carnal unregenerate Condition True it is while we are in this World living by sense little do we conceive what it is to be saved to sit down with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the Prophets in the Kingdom of God what it is to have full and Everlasting Communion with God in Glory nor can we so prize these things now as we ought to do Oh but we shall come to breath out our Souls into Eternity and must stand trembling at God's Tribunal to receive our everlasting doom then to be sure Life Happiness and Eternal Glory will be in request Oh then that in such a Day when all the World cannot comfort you Life may be yours and Salvation yours and the full enjoyment â—f God in Heaven yours give diligence now to have the Truth and Life of Grace in your inward Parts endeavouring to find a through sanctifying Change wrought upon you Remember if you die in a carnal Condition you are undone for ever damned for ever But if sanctified through the Spirit and made new Creatures the Reward of Eternal Glory shall be your Portion 4 Lay hold upon Jesus Christ by a lively Faith above all things labouring to get an interest in him Christ hath purchased by his own Death the reward of Eternal Life But it s not for all promiscuously whether good or bad but only for those that by Faith receive him making him their Saviour Though Christ were as universal a cause of Salvation as the Arminians dogmatize Yet till by Faith you embrace him as willing to receive him in all his Offices as a Prophet to instruct and teach you as a Priest to intercede and die for you as a King to command sanctifie and govern you to be sure he will never profit you to Life and Salvation * John 5.12 He that hath the Son hath Life but he that hath not the Son hath no Life Both the Life of Grace and the Life of Glory come in by Christ he alone is the Tree from whence you may gather this Fruit of Paradise And therefore of necessity you must close with Christ would you either have the Life of Grace to make you holy or the Life of eternal Glory to make you happy Salvation for lost Sinners could no otherwise be purchased but by the precious Blood of the Lord Jesus And though now the purchase be thus made yet the Blood of Christ cannot save you unless you receive him to dwell in your Hearts by Faith Communion is never to be found but where first some kind of union went before to usher it in So that though Christ came into the World to repair our lost condition to cleanse us from all unrighteousness to deliver our Souls from the Wrath to come and to make us meet by â—his Spirit working in us for the full enjoyment of God in Glory Yet if first we be not united to Christ we can never have the Happiness of Communion with him in these and the like glorious Priviledges but notwithstanding the Blood the Death the Sufferings of Christ must for ever fall short of Eternal Glory How dreadful then is the condition of every Christless Sinner There is an All-sufficiency of Merit in Christ but it shall never procure their Pardon There is a redundancy of Grace in Christ But it shall never sanctify nor make them holy There is a Soveraignity in the Blood of Christ but it shall never cleanse their Souls from Sin a There is an indeficient Fountain of Life in Christ But refusing him they must inevitably die the Death and suffer the
Vengeance of Eternal Fire You then that would not for ever thus dreadfully miscarry and come short of God's Kingdom and Glory oh see that you now give diligence to close with Christ making him your Wisdom to direct you your Righteousness to justify your Persons your Sanctification to prepare you for Glory and your Redemption to free your Souls from the Wrath to come b His Merit is beyond all your Misery his Pardons are more than all your Debts his Power to succour is infinite and therefore it can never (i) Et verè malorum profunditas necat si quos desperatio indulgentiae detestanda cordis obduratione praejudiciat Fulgent epist ad Venant pag. 560. 1 Cor. (k) Deus etenim noster sic est misericors bonus sicut infinitus invictus proinde bonitas invicti non vincitur infiniti misericordia non finitur Idem Qualecunque sit ergo peccatum à Deo quidem potest remitti converso sed ille sibi remitti non sinit qui desperando contra se indulgentiae ostium clauserit Fulgent pag. 562. be non-plust by any thing but an Evil Heart of unbelief Have Faith in Christ and though the universal Guilt of all Mens Sins in the World lay upon you yet they could never damn you But want Faith refusing to accept of Christ upon Gospel Terms and Heaven itself cannot save you Every Sin hath such infinite evil and malignity bound up in it that of itself it deserves Damnation But yet no Sin doth actually expose the Soul thereto without Infidelity Were there but one Soveraign medicine against some mortal Disease in all the World surely his case must needs be desperate who laboring under this Mortal Distemper should refuse that Soveraign Remedy Such is the case of every unbeliever who refusing the Redemption purchased by Christ and making light of so great Salvation can never escape the Damnation of Hell nor the Wrath of God nor the Vengeance of Eternal Fire (l) Act. 4.12 For there is no other Name under Heaven given amongst Men by which we must be saved Out of a tender care therefore of your own Souls make sure of Christ and do not dare to live a Moment longer without an interest in him Christ alone is the Way which leads to Life and therefore not believing in him not embâ—acing of him not accepting of him as your Saviour You walk every moment on the frontiers of Hell not knowing how soon you may drop irrecoverably into that Place of Torments Why then will you not come to Christ applying his Righteousness to your selves by Faith that you may have Life obtain Mercy and be crowned with an Eternity of heavenly Glory Oh little do you know the Happiness of a Soul believing in Christ for remission of Sins and for Life everlasting His Faith gives him an interest in that Christ who hath Life Heaven and Eternal Glory following after him so that Faith alone doth more for him than all other Graces besides for tho Faith in the Substance of it considered as an inherent Quality hath no singular excellency above other Graces Yet as it is receptive of Christ and an Instrument appointed of God for the applying of his Righteousness to our Souls whereof no other Grace is any more capable than the Eye of receiving food to nourish the Body so 't is the most precious and useful of all others What the Eye was to an Israelite when stung in the Wilderness that Faith alone is to us when mortally wounded with the sting of Sin It was not a quick Ear nor a strong Arm nor an active Hand nor an eloquent Tongue that could heal him but only an Eye looking up to the brazen Serpent Thus 't is not Knowledge though Angelical nor Sorrow for Sin how afflicting soever nor any Religious Performances how many and glorious soever that can help us but only Faith in the Lord Jesus (e) John 3.15 through whom we shall never perish but have Eternal Life Oh then what encouragement may this afford to all such as lie bleeding and groaning under the Sense of their own Sinfulness Whatever your wounds be the Blood of Christ applied by Faith can heal them Whatever your Sorrows be the Spirit of Christ can abundantly comfort you What ever your Fears of Wrath and Hell be the Redemption purchased by Christ can remove them all Whatever your unworthiness be yet being cloathed upon through Faith with the Garment of Christs Righteousness you are sure to obtain the Blessing of Life Glory and unconceivable Happiness in the Kingdom of God! If then you desire when your Souls shall be dislodged from these Tabernacles of Clay to have them received into everlasting Habitations do not oh do not any longer refuse but now see that you close by Faith with a precious Christ There is not a Soul of you I am sure that is willing to go to Hell and be damned for ever (f) Acts. 16.31 Believe therefore in the Lord Jesus Christ and so escaping the Wrath the Flames the Damnation of Hell you are sure to be saved with an Everlasting Salvation Remember Jesus Christ in that blessed Zoar unto whom retiring by Faith unfeigned thy Soul shall live and be crowned with fulness of Joy when Fire and Brimstone Storm and Tempest Wrath and Hell shall be rained from Heaven upon the whole World of the Ungodly 5 BE sure that you make an universal Resignation of your selves to the Lord Jesus devoting yourselves wholly both Soul and Body and all that you are to the service of Christ That Faith which is saving hath two Hands the one to receive Christ and the other to give up the Soul to the obedience of Christ 'T will not suffice for us barely to rely upon Christ that he may save us But if our Faith be of the right Stamp a Living and not a Dead Faith (g) Acts. 11.23 it will make us cleave unto Christ with full purpose of Heart (h) Luke 1.74 75. that we may serve him in Holiness and Righteousness all our Days We must here live to Christ by sincere obedience would we ever live with Christ in Glory as our Eternal Recompence Give Diligence then that as Christ is yours you also may be Christs You must look as well at Christ commanding Duty as promising the Reward thereof Would you ever have Christ looking after you to Crown you with Eternal Glory In vain shall you expect the Dignities and Priviledges that come by Christ so long as you refuse to perform the Homage and Services that are due to Christ Oh therefore beware lest there be any amongst you that fall short of Eternal Life by building their Hopes for it upon a partial accepting of Christ If you take not Christ for your Soveraign to obey and serve him he will never be your Saviour to redeem and crown your Souls with eternal Glory (q) Jam. 2.17 20 26. Your Faith is dead and will never save
of God! If Sirs you think â—an Honour to appear Good (b) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ignat epist ad Magnes pag. 52. Omnino enim nihil prodest nomen sanctum habere sine moribus quia vita à professione discordans abrogat illustris tituli honorem per indignorum actuum vilitatem Salvian de Gubern Dei lib. 3. pag. mihi 94. is it not much morâ—â—n Honour to be so indeed What alas is the Name of Christian worth if you will goâ— put on the Nature of a Christian To think I was well reputed of amongst God's People I was called a good and had the Name of a Christian can this be a Cordial when you come to die Or will it comfort your Hearts when appearing before the Judgment-seat of (c) Quid est in quo nobis de Christiano nomine blandiamur cum utique hoc ipso magis per nomen sacratissimum rei simus qui à sancto nomine discrepamus Nam ideo plus sub religionis titulo Deum ludimus quia positi in religione peccamus Idem paulo post the great God where all your Paint and Varnish being washed off you must now be punished as Hypocrites with everlasting Destruction from the Presence of God and from the Glory of his Power To be counted Rich and yet turn Bankrupt to be judged healthful and yet sick unto Death would but aggravate in such cases a Man's Misery So to be counted Holy and yet Profane to have a Name to live and yet after all be found dead in Trespasses and Sins oh this will most dreadfully aggravate the Hypocrites Misery another day this will sink them deeper in Hell than the notoriously ungodly this will prepare flaming Ingredients for the Cup of Wrath and put new Stiâ—gs into those fiery Scorpions that will vex and torment them for ever If then you love your Souls give diligence now to have the best side inward doing every thing from the Heart sâ—â—cerely as unto God! Strive you must to make clean the inside as well as the outside of the Platter and to have pure Hearts as well aâ—â—lean Hands would you ever (d) 2 Tim. 2.21 be Vessels of Honour 〈◊〉 for the Master's use The foolish Virgins they had Lamps in their Hands a Profession of Godliness (e) Mat. 25.3 adorned with many glorious Performances But these were not animated with an upright Heart they wanted the Oyl of Grace within and therefore depart from me saith Christ I never knew you Christ will know those well he will know them to be Men of pure Minds and upright Hearts whom he receives to dwell with himself in eternal Mansions of Glory Otherwise if a Work of Grace be wanting within if the Heart be unsound and not inwardly Holy they must look to depart accursed into everlasting burnings where the painted fire of all their pretended zeal shall most surely be punished with the true fire of God's heavy wrath and sore displeasure Thus you may possibly appear Holy before Men and have your Christian Profession adorned with many seemingly glorious Performances But in case your Hearts be not upright before God now he throws you down for ever into Hellish-torments now he punisheth your Souls with everlasting Destruction from his own Presence now he commands you to depart accursed into everlasting Fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels and you must obey him Oh then what a woful thing is a rotten Heart and how much doth it concern us all to be that indeed which we are in shew He that is seemingly good but really bad though die he may with seeming hopes for Heaven and Glory yet fall he must into a real Hell of Misery and eternal endless Torments 7 SEE that you mortify through the Spirit the Deeds of the Body That which thou sowest saith the Apostle (f) 1 Cor. 15.36 is not quickned except it die so except first you die to Sin you can never be quickned nor raised to enjoy the Reward of eternal Life The way to die hereafter is to live here And the way to live hereafter is to die here They that now live in Sin must hereafter expect Death and eternal Misery as the just Reward and Punishment of their Sins But they that now die to Sin crucifying the Flesh with the Affections and Lusts shall hereafter live with God in eternal Mansions of Glory For saith the Apostle if ye live after the (h) Rom. 8.13 Flesh ye shall die But if ye through the Spirit mortify the Deeds of the Body ye shall live Here you see are described two ways the one leading to Death the other to Life the one to Hell the other to Heaven the one to endless Torments the other to all fulness of Joy in God's own presence So then he that will save the Life of his Sins shall lose his Soul But he that will mortifie himself his beloved Lusts and Sins and dearest Corruptions he shall live for ever Though then you cannot totally kill (g) Gal. 5.24 your Corruptions in this Life yet see that you be daily mortifying them Though you cannot wholly cast them out from remaining yet be sure to keep them under from reigning in your mortal Bodies that you should obey them All Sins are meritoriously Mortal but none save those which are left unmortified do eventually prove so (i) Rom. 6. Though it be true that every Sin deserveth Death even the Motus primò primi concerning which the Schoolmen write the very first risings and ebullitions of Lust in the Soul which do prevent all use of Reason though standing in her highest Watch-tower of Vigilancy to descry and with all curiosity to make observation of every approaching Enemy Yet there is no Sin though aggravated by supervening Circumstances to an equality of Guilt and heinousness with the most prodigious and horrid â—mpieties that were ever yet perpetrated by any Offender that doth actually infer Death exposing a Man to the Vengeance of eternal Fire unless suffered to go unmortified The least Sin when allowed of is enough for thy Damnation and the greatest when mortified can by no means hinder thy eternal Salvation The Life of Sin and the Life of a Sinner are like two Buckets at a Well if the one go up the other must go down Thus if your Pride your Hypocrisie your Covetousness your Carnality your vile Affections live in you you must die eternally but if through the Spirit you mortify them you shall live for ever Behold then I now set before you Life and Death Mount Ebal and Mount Gerrizzim Blessings and Cursings the Pleasures of Heaven and the Torments of Hell and oh that you would choose not Death but Life not Ebal but Gerizzim not Cursings but Blessings not hellish intolerable Torments but heavenly Glory There are but two Estates of Men in this present Life and but two proportionate to them in the Life to come Some here live after the Flesh and they must die
as he had it what then will be the end of every wicked Servant who hath embezelled his Lords Talent spending it riotously upon Harlots This Man must certainly expect more dreadful aggravations of Punishment than the other That slothful Servant shall have a milder Cup of Wrath when this wicked Servant shall drink up the dregs of Divine Fury If the unprofitable Servant be avenged seven-fold surely then the rebellious Servant must be avenged seventy times Seven-fold (a) Quòd si sterilitas in ignem mittitur rapacitas quid meretur Aut quid recipiet qui alienum tucerit si semper ardebit qui de suo non dederit Et si judicium sine misericordia erit illi qui non facit misericordiam quale judicium erit illi qui fecerit rapinam Fulgent Serm. de dispens Dom. p. 615. If Divine Justice whip the one with Rods 't will certainly whip the other with Scorpions If sterility be cast into the Fire who can tell the Wrath the fiery Flames of Tophet into which rapacity shall be thrown If he that relieved not others with what was his own must burn for ever what Vengeance of Eternal Fire may those look for who have extorted from others what was not their own What will be the end of the cruel who grind the Faces of the Poor if he shall have judgment without mercy who shewed no mercy If not doing the thing which is good will shut out of heavenly Glory doubtless then working that which is evil and abominable in the sight of God will for ever sink Men in unsufferabl hellish Torments 10 AND lastly be much upon your knees at the throne of Grace imploring with all earnestness and holy Importunity the help of Heaven whereby you may be duly qualified and fitted for it Our endeavours after Life and Glory they must ever be succeeded with the Grace of God effectually working in us or else we must lose our Reward Nothing of ours will ever bring us to God as the end and quietative Centre of our Souls except we first receive it from God as the Author of every good and perfect Gift (a) Jam. 1.17 If ever we come to Canaan 't is the God of Israel that must lead us by the Hand and by the Arm of his Omnipotency put us in full possession of it (b) Col. 1.12 There is an Inheritance of Saints in Light but unless God the Father of Lights by a sufficiency of discriminating Grace do first qualify and meeten us for it we are like to abide in everlasting Darkness The Stone hath no power to mount upward but what it wholly receives from the strength and impress of the Arm throwing it Nor have we whose Hearts by Nature are as Stones any Power to move Heaven-ward but what we do wholly receive from the irresistible Strength and Divine Energy of God's holy Spirit carrying us that Way Free will to what is spiritually good is a plain Soloecism in the School of free Grace So that whoever by the good use hereof thinks to get the Reward to be sure he shall never enjoy any fellowship in Christ's Colledge nor have the least degree of preferment in the University of Heaven Our Estate by (c) Rom. 5.6 Nature is without any strength So that we are no more able to do the Works of a Spiritual than a dead Man to do the Works of a natural Life (d) Ephes 2.1 By Nature we are blind and cannot therefore see the things of the Spirit of God unless he first gives us a (z) 1 Cor. 2.14 spiritual Eye We are alienated from the Life of Christ and must never look to have any saving acquaintance with him if the Father draw us not The Lord 's drawing is not by destroying the Will but by Sanctifying of it and inclining it to what is good He puts forth the Arm of his Grace to apprehend us and that creates in us an Arm of Faith to apprehend him They do but flatter and miserably comply with sinful corrupt Nature against Grace who assert any such Power in Man whereby he may prepare himself for special Grace So prodigeous is our Impotency by Nature that we have not the power of a good Thought of a Sigh of one hearty Groan after God and Christ and eternal Glory in our own hands To talk of an universal Grace that is only determined and made effectual by the good improvement of our own free will antecedently consenting thereto before any effectual change wrought upon us by the Spirit of Regeneration is indeed to deny God's discriminating Love and instead of that to set up an Idol of our own If so be that the same Grace be granted to all then 't is not God but every Man (a) 1 Cor. 4.7 that improves this Grace who makes himself to differ from another contrary to the true intent of the Apostle's Question For that which is common to all Men doth never make a difference betwixt any You must know then that we do not difference our selves from others by improving the same Talent better than others did But 't is God alone who doth difference us from others from the vilest of Sinners from the damned in Hell by giving us that Talent of Grace to Trade with and a Will to improve it which he never gave to them He is (b) Heb. 12.2 no less the Author than the Finisher of our Faith And he alone must work (c) Sicut sancti viri se post primi parentis lapsum de corruptibili stirpe editos non virtute propriâ sed praeveniente gratiâ supernâ ad meliora se vota vel opera commutatos Greg. lib. Mor. 22. c. 10. Grace in us to make us Holy as well as bestow Glory upon us to make us happy We do not prevent God loving him first but he prevents us first Circumcising our Heart that we may love him Were the Grace of God merely suasory and by moral Arguments making Tenders of Life and Glory to us but giving us no (d) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ignat. epist ad Rom. pag. mihi 84. power to accept of them nor renewed Hearts to close with them well we might hear the glad Tidings of eternal Life but most certainly for all that we must die in our Sins and be damned for ever For as a learned Divine of our own hath it there is so much Perverseness and devilish Antipathy in our Hearts by Nature that neither the Promises of Heaven can allure us nor the Blood and Passions of Christ perswade nor all the flames of Hell affright us out of our Sins till the Lord by the sweet and glorious Power of his holy Spirit subdue and conquer the Will to himself The Apostle therefore speaking to this purpose contents not himself to say it is God that commands you that exhorts and persuades you both to will and to do But saith he 't is God that works in you both to will
then by his Grace excite it that the Sinner may actually believe and repent to the saving of his Soul No Man did ever yet believe repent or come to God for Mercy but in the strength of God Nor did any ever yet obtain the Reward of Eternal Life but through the Grace of God effectually enabling to work in the Lord's Vineyard and making him faithful unto the Death Go then to God in Prayer you that love your Immortal Souls for Grace for Purity for Holiness but be sure that you pray fervently remembring you can never arrive at the Haven of true Happiness without the gentle gales of God's own Spirit to speed you thither By nature you are dead in Trespasses and Sins and if therefore God quicken you not you are lost for ever By nature you are mortally wounded and this your wound is uncurable you must die of it if God heal it not for you By nature you are a Reprobate to every good Word and Work unless therefore God work in you both to will and to do of his own good pleasure you can never work out your own Salvation By nature you are dreadfully polluted all over unclean as a Vessel in which there is no pleasure so that if you beg not the Spirit of God to cleanse you from all filthiness both of Flesh and Spirit you can never be Vessels of Honour sit for the Masters use Holy Jacob being in danger of his Brother Esau's Fury he wrestled with God all Night resolving not to let him go without a Blessing and his two Arms he used in this holy Wrestle (a) Hos 12.4 they were Prayers and Tears Thus Sirs you are in danger not of Man's Fury but of indignation of Wrath and Hell from the great God and will you not wrestle for a Blessing closing in with God by the Arms of Prayer and Tears Oh seek the Lord while he may be found and see that you call upon him whilst yet he is near Do not oh do not trifle away that Time about the Meat that perisheth which should be spent in labouring for the Meat which will endure to eternal Life What is it to gain Earth and lose Heaven to gain the World and lose your Souls What alass to fare deliciously every Day and at Death to be found despairing to be found dropping into Wrath into Tophet into Hell irrecoverably Oh how much better is it that now you should pray and mourn and weep bitterly before the Lord every Day to get prepared for Heaven for Glory for a Crown of Righteousness for the recompence of eternal Life than that you should then weep and howl without Hope for the Misery the Wrath the unsufferable Hellish Flames that must now seize upon you and burn you for ever torment you for ever Well that you may never forget seeking the Lord nor cease praying before him remember where your Strength where your Hope where all your Comfort lies 'T is the Lord alone that hath the Word of Eternal Life and therefore go to him resolving that you will pray and never give over praying that you will wrestle and never give over wrestling that you will weep and sigh and groan and never give over till you have the Blessing The same God who gives us the Crown when we have overcome he must give us strength whereby to overcome He that will cloath us upon with the Garments of Salvation when we come to Heaven he alone it is that must now give us Grace cloathing us first with the Garments of Righteousness that we may be fit for that glorious Inheritance CHAP. XIII The Doctrin improved by way of strong Consolation to God's People exhorting them to live upon a due respect to this eternal Reward as upon hidden Manna IV AND lastly though we have for a little while been leading you as through the Wilderness yet now we begin to draw nigh to the heavenly Canaan My Text is a Tree of Life and I would not willingly come from it till I have shaken some apples of Love some of its sweet and precious Fruit into your Bosoms 'T is the Mount of Transfiguration and I would not willingly come down till your Faces shine with the Oyl of Gladness 'T is a spiritual Eden a Garden full of all pleasant Flowers and I would not willingly come out of it till I have cropt here and there one and gathered you an heavenly Nosegay to revive and refresh with its Divine Fragancy your Spirits in a fainting Hour You have been with us a little upon the Ocean under all those Storms and rageful Tempests which will beat upon such for ever as have no right to the recompence of the Reward But supposing your claim to this Reward good your right unquestionable and evidences without flaw I shall now endeavour to lodge you in the peaceful and wished Harbour of Divine Consolation And truly here is a River the streams whereof if any thing will make glad the City of our God The Well I confess is deep but yet through the Comforters assistance you lending the Bucket of your Faith I doubt not but we may draw Water Water of Life nay the Wine of Eternal Consolation to refresh you to enliven and comfort your Hearts in every Condition What Wilderness need terrify thee having Canaan so plain before thee What Storms can disturb thy peace being come within Ken of thy Eternal Harbour Oh think with thy self dear Christian what Afflictions need discourage thee having always in thy Eye such a far more exceeding and Eternal weight of Glory This Doctrine drops Balm for the healing of wounded Souls 't is as so much spiritual Manna for God's People to feed upon in the Wilderness of this World till they are come to Canaan a Land that floweth with Milk and Hony Deny not then your selves the Comfort of that Reward which God sets before you The Lord for your better encouragement sets Heaven with all the Happiness and Glory thereof in your Eye and therefore let not your Eye upon a pretence of I know not what Modesty or Self-denial be turned away from the stedfast beholding it Oh see Christians that you dwell much in your thoughts in your serious Musings in your Divine Contemplations upon this Theam endeavouring with Moses in all that you do in all that you suffer for God to have a due respect to the recompence of the Reward Oh let the glimpses of Heavens Glory close up your Eyes when you go to Bed at Night and let the Light the bright irradiations and Heart-warming Sun-shine of the same Glory be sure to feast your Eyes when first you awake every Morning Whilst you live live in the Hope of Heaven and when you die oh strive that you may die in the full assurance of Heaven Get like Moses a prospect of Canaan before you leave this Wilderness and whether you pray whether you wrestle with Temptations whether you resist unto Blood striving against Sin or whatever you
do do all with respect to this Glorious Reward and in the strong Consolation of that Eternal Rest toward which you are moving This is not to be feeding upon any forbidden Fruit but indeed to be gathering Apples from that Tree of Life which God himself hath planted for you This is not to be Mercenaries but to be moving like so many living Stones towards God as the alone quietative Centre of all your Wishes Desires and heavenly Anhelations This is not to be carrying a Portion for your selves Christians nor to be conveighing any stoln Waters into your own Cisterns but it is to live upon your Fathers own allowance and to be drinking of that pure Fountain of Life of Divine Joy and Comfort which the God of Israel himself hath opened for you (a) Isa 55.1 and invites you to They do grosly mistake themselves and injure God's Goodness who looks upon the eying of Heaven and Glory in our obedience as a poysonous Corrosive to eat out the Heart of Sincerity For if you rightly conceive of it it 's a most precious Sovereign Cordial made up by the Hand of Heaven to revive the Heart of a Christian when desponding and to keep his Faith his Patience his Hope his Uprightness and all other Graces alive Truth is take away Heaven from a Christian and you strike him with all his Graces dead at a blow For a Christian both here and hereafter both Militant and Triumphant he lives upon Heaven Here by Faith and hereafter by sight here by Hope and hereafter by the full enjoyment of it now he lives militant in expectation of Heaven and then he lives Triumphant in the everlasting glorious Possession of Heaven (b) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clem. Alexand. Paedagog lib. 2. cap. 6. pag. 74. See then oh Christian that thou let not out the Life Blood of thy Soul of thy Faith and of all thy Graces by neglecting to have a respect in all thy obedience to the recompence of Reward Oh pour not out upon the Ground that sweet nectarious Wine that full Cup of Divine Consolation which thy heavenly Father himself hath mingled wherewith to make glad thy Heart to enliven thy Soul and refresh thy Spirit when labouring in God's Vineyard 'T is not Humility but the Pride and Vanity of a fleshly Mind 't is not Uprightness but Hypocrisy when Men will not suffer themselves to be encouraged by God's own Arguments nor to be acted by the Lord 's own Motives nor to live upon those spiritual Morsels those provisions of Heaven and Glory which the Lord himself hath made for them Fear not then poor trembling Christian thy own Sincerity because Heaven is so much in thy Eye so much upon thy Heart and so much in thy Thoughts this is nothing but that Banquet of Love that the Lord would have thee always to live upon Come then oh Believer for the Master himself calleth thee Come and drink of this Water of Life come with me and let us gather some Clusters of Canaan let us take a prospect to refresh us of that holy Land Oh where should a Christian delight to be but upon the top of this Pisgah this Nebo this Mount Abarim beholding with Gladness the Celestial Canaan What Pleasure canst thou have in an Aegypt in a Babylon in the black Tents of Kodar when God calls thee to walk with him in the Galleries of his Love to dwell with him in the Suburbs of the new Jerusalem to live daily in the warm Sun-shine in the bright Reflexions of Heaven and Glory Oh remember Christian when working in God's Vineyard for thy better encouragement that golden Penny of Glory which the Sun-set of thy Life will bring with it Remember whilst fighting the Lord's Battels against the (c) Revel 2.7 World the Flesh and the Devil how certainly having overcome thou shalt feed upon the Tree of Life which is in the midst of the Paradise of God! Oh think often with thy self whilst thy Hand is at God's Plough and thou art sowing in Tears what an eternal glorious Reward will follow after The Mariner sailing in the darksome Night under Storms and Tempests hath his Eye upon the Star Thus whilst sailing in the Ship of sincere Obedience under Storms and Tempests you must have the Eye Christians of your Faith always fixed upon the Pole-star of Glory would you ever come safe to the Harbour of your eternal Rest Like the Uranoscope your Eye must always be turned upward viewing the Beauties telling the Towers marking well the Bul-warks considering the stately Palaces and with all holy curiosity observing the Royalties of the supernatural Jerusalem So long therefore as God keeps you at work here below oh see Christians that you live with comfort upon his allowance solacing your Souls every Day with due respect to Heaven above and by serious fixed thoughts about the Reward of eternal Life which abides you there Now that your Joy may be full and your Cup overflow give me leave to shew you the Strength and Soveraignity of this Divine Cordial by acquainting you with these two ensuing particulars Viz. 1 WHAT manner of Reward it is whereunto God allows you a respect in all your obedience 2 WHAT a due respect had unto this Reward will do for you with what Marrow and Fatness of Comfort it may Fill you in every condition 1 I am to let you know what manner of Reward it is whereunto God allows you a respect in your obedience And here had I the Tongue of Men and Angels had I the whole Monopoly of finest Elegancies were the Words that I shall uter first formed for me in the Mouth of the most Seraphique Cherubim yet so transcendently Glorious is that Recompence of Reward which God sets before you that my expressions though filled up with greatest emphasis and cloathed upon with the most full and comprehensive significancy would as much come short of making an adequate discovery a full representation thereof to your understandings as the light of a little Glow-worm comes short of the Sun in all its Glory Hyperbolize to be sure I shall in speaking of this glorious Reward but it will be by Way of Miôsis and diminution rather than by way of Auxesis and aggravation For whoever will undertake to discourse of Heavens Glory whilst he dwells himself in an Earthly Tabernacle he will be no more able to express it fully and to the Life than that talkative Bird which can so neatly dissemble the Voice of a Man will be able with all her borrowed Notes to tell you what is the utmost Splendour Glory and Magnificence of all the World The Land of Canaan as one wittily observes notwithstanding all the helps we have is still for the most part a Terra incognita an unknown Land So that to give a full description of it in all its Riches of Glory it 's golden Mines it 's fruitful Trees it 's pleasant Fountains is no more possible for the stammering
Tongue of a poor Mortal than to compass the whole Heaven with a Span or to contain the vast Ocean in Cockle-shell (d) Vicit officium linguae sceleris magnitudo Lactant. lib. 6. de ver Cultu pag. mihi 626. Sed quis dicere vel cogiture sufficiat qualis sit in conspectu Domini Dei illa beatorum spirituum calestium que â—irtutum innumerabilis multitudo Quae sit in eis sine fine festivitas visionis Dei Quae laetitia sine defectu Quis amoris ardor non crucians sed delectans Quod sit in ei desiderium visionis Dei cum satietate satietas cum desiderio Aug. Medit. cap. 27. pap 61. What Lactanctus saith of a certain Vice the same may I say of this glorious Reward It 's greatness doth far exceed the largest significancy of the Tongues expression For who tho exhausting the whole Exchequer of good Language and Rhetoricating it the utmost emphasis of all daring Hyperboles can tell how incorruptible the Crown how sweet the Rest how glorious the Kingdom how full and satisfactory the Joy of Eternal Reward will be What Tongue of Man or Angel can fully express how soft the Bosom of God's eternal Love is wherein his People shall rest themselves for ever What Tongue can say how entrancing the light of God's Countenance how pleasant the embraces of a blessed Redeemer how delightful those Soul extasying Rivers of Pleasure are which run out at the Right Hand of God for evermore Truth is we can no more tell the excellency of a Christians Reward and the Powers of the World to come by those descriptions thereof that we meet with in Holy Writ than one who had never seen the Sun could give you a full account of all it's Splendour Brightness and Glory by the twinkling of a little Star in a Dark Night (e) 2 Cor. 12.4 St. Paul though he saw not all yet he saw more than what the Tongue of any Mortal Wight is able to utter And truly as Austin hath it we can better say what there is not than what there is in a Christian's Reward so unspeakably great is the Glory of it Let not therefore my dark amd muddy expressions occasion in you any low contemptible Thoughts of this Glorious Recompence But know that whatever through Grace I shall be enabled to speak of it will be but a little glimpse of light breaking in at some small crany in comparison of the Sun in it's Noon-day brightness So that what the Queen of Sheba said of Solomon's Glory the like will you when you come to Heaven say of this It was a true report that I had in the Land of the living concerning the Greatness and Glory of a Christian's Reward howbeit I believed not the words till now that my Eyes have seen it and behold the one half was not told me of what by sweet experience I do now find THIS to prevent all low and unworthy Thoughts of that Reward whereunto God allows his People a respect in all their obedience I now come to tell you as I can what manner of Reward it is which I shall do in these ensuing particulars CHAP. XIV Makes Further Improvement of the Doctrin by way of Consolation shewing what manner of Reward it is whereunto God allows his People to have a Respect in all their Obedience 1 THE Reward whereunto God allows his People a Respect in all their Obedience it 's a pure sincere and unmixed Reward Here every Rose hath its Thorn and our choicest Comforts they have something of Vexation in them But this Reward is a sweet Ambrosian Handkerchief to wipe away all Tears from your Eyes so that when once you come to enjoy it then you shall sorrow no more nor suffer any more nor have any more sad Thoughts any more heavy Hearts (a) Revel 21.4 any more afflicted Spirits to all Eternity Now God brings you to Sion with Songs and everlasting Joy upon your Heads wiping away all Tears from your Eyes Now there (b) Nulla erit ibi tristitia nulla angustia nullus dolor nullus timor nullus ibi labor nulla mors sed perpetua sanitas semper ibi perseverat Bern. Medit. cap. 14. pag. mihi 332. is no more pain for ever Heaven is situated in so wholsom an Air that whoever have the happiness to be made free Denizens of that new Jerusalem they obtain forthwith such an admirable 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Temperament both of Soul and Body that they are never troubled again with any peccant Humour to beget either Grief of Soul or Aches Pains and Distempers of Body Here every one of God's Children hath his Mouth filled with one Complaint or other this Man cries out of his Losses and that Man of his Sufferings I was full saith one but now I am empty I did lately abound saith another but am now in wants e'rewhile saith a third I was blessed with a loving Husband with a dear Wife with indulgent Parents with many sweet Babes and choicest Comforts but now Providence hath separated betwixt me and them and left me alone to out-live all my Enjoyments call not me Naomi call me no longer Pleasant but call me Marah (c) Ruth 1.20 for the Lord hath dealt bitterly with me These daily are the sad Complaints and thus we may frequently hear the best of God's People crying out in this Life Stay but a while though and the Reward of eternal Life will silence them all so that there shall be no crying out in the Streets of the new Jerusalem no Voice shall be heard there but that of Joy unspeakable of sweetest Melody of eternal Triumph Oh the infinite blessed difference betwixt our condition now and what is like to be when we come to Heaven Now weeping then rejoycing now groaning then triumphing Now filled with Gall and Wormwood then overflowing with Rivers of Pleasure Now labouring as in the Brick-kilns of Egypt under a sad Heart a diseased Body a wounded Spirit under Reproach Persecution and sorest Afflictions But then resting (d) Revel 14.13 from our Labours from all our Toyl or Tears our sad Thoughts our dying Groans our grievous fiery Tryals and so crowned with Life Immortality and unmixed purest Pleasures at God's right Hand for evermore Thou may'st possibly think it strange Christian to find so much Dross in the purest Gold so much Gall in thy Hony-comb such a mortal Sting in every Comfort so dark a Cloud upon thee when enjoying the fairest Sun-shine so much occasion of Sorrow and heart-breaking Sadness so much Vanity disappointment and vexation of Spirit in all worldly Enjoyments But remember the Rose that hath no Thorn the Honey that hath no Gall the Day that hath no Cloud the Crown that is lined with no perplexing Cares the Wine that is dash'd with no bitter Waters of Marah the Joy that hath no Grief no Sadness no Affliction to allay it is reserved for Heaven as the only
ever as much unsatisfied as ever (l) Ibi non gustabunt quam suavis sit Deus sed implebuntur saturabuntur dulcedine mirificâ nihil ets deerit nihil oberit omne desiderium eorum Christus praesens implebit Et paucis interjectis erit denique Deus omma in omnibus illius praesentia omnes animae corporis implebit appetitus Cyprian de Ascent § 9. pag. 526. But yet when once the Soul comes to Heaven seeing God as he is feeding upon the good things of his House and drinking of the River of his Pleasures now the Soul wants no more now she hath enough to fill up all her desires to supply all her needs and to answer all her longings now she is satisfied to the full now she is got to her Journeys end she is safely arrived at the Harbour of perfect rest she is come like a Stone to her proper Center and can go no further can desire no greater Happiness no better God nor Christ nor Comforter no better Heaven no greater Glory no fuller Joy than now she hath and shall have to all Eternity In this Life God's People indeed have those glimpses of heavenly Glory those divine Communications of Grace and Goodness those sweet illapses of the Spirit those foretasts of Heavens Chear those delicious sips of Canaan's Wine that are enough to imbitter all secular enjoyments to them and soundly to inflame though not fully to satisfy their spiritual thirst But in Heaven they sit down to a full Meal they bath themselves in Rivers of purest Pleasure (m) Isa 25.6 they have now a Feast of fat things a Feast of Wines on the Lees of fat things full of Marrow of Wines on the Lees well refined here Chri bids them welcome beyond expectation (n) Cant. 5.1 entertaining them in his own words to the Spouse I am come into my Garden my Sister my Spouse I have gathered my myrrhe with my Spices I have eaten my Honycomb with my Hony I have drunk my Wine with my Milk eat O Friends and drink yea drink abundantly O beloved And surely the Soul that is entertained with such a Feast of Love as this cannot choose but be fully satisfied Here is the Hony and the Hony-comb here is Wine and Milk Here is abundance o satisfy Hunger and abundance to quench the Thirst and what can any Man desire more I tell you Christians if all the Glory of Heaven can satisfy your Souls you shall have it if all the fulness of God can satisfy you◠Souls you shall have it if all the redemption purchased by the Blood of Christ can satisfy your Souls you shall have it if all the Comforts of the Holy Ghost if fulness of Joy in God's Presence and Pleasures at his right Hand for evermore can satisfy your Souls you shall have them all to content you when you come to Heaven Now when we find Peter under a dark glimpse of this Glory crying out in the Mount of Transfiguration as a Man in some Measure satisfied it is good to be here How can we reckon of any thing less than fulness of satisfaction when we come to mount Sion and unto the City of the living God to the heavenly Jerusalem and to an innumerable company of glorious Angels to the general Assembly and Church of the First-born which are written in Heaven to the Spirits of just Men made perfect and to the full enjoyment of God himself whom to see and love will be perfect Happiness Never fear Christian that thy Soul though enlarged to the utmost of all created Capacities and crying out for the present like the Horse-leeches Daughters give give will want any good thing when once crowned with this glorious Soul satisfying Reward The Soul that hath God blessed for ever to be his Reward and Portion need never complain of want any more than a Man standing at the Fountain Head or enjoying the glorious Sun need complain of Thirst or Darkness One Sun is sufficient to give light to the whole World To be sure one God in Christ when fully enjoyed is a sufficient Portion to quiet the Heart and satisfie the most enlarged Desires of every gracious Soul in the World If Jacob could say it is enough hearing that his Son Joseph was yet alive oh how much more may a Soul safely lodged in the downy Bosom of eternal Blessedness and living with God in Mansions of Glory say now it is enough I desire no more When the Sun beholdeth the Moon with a full Aspect then the Moon is at the full and no further capable of any the least Accession of Light So when God shall lift up the Light of his Countenance casting a full and propitious Aspect upon his People now shining as so many glorious Stars in the heavenly Orb why then they will be in the full of their Happiness enjoying whatever good (a) Quicquid desiderabimus totum habebimus nihil amplius desiderantes Bern. Medit. cap. 4. pag. 105. thing they can desire and uncapable of desiring any thing more than what they do enjoy Oh then what manner of Reward is this that we who with Noah's Dove have been long hovering over the troubled Waters of Creature-enjoyments and yet found no place of Repose should at length be admitted into such an Ark as will give rest from all Labou◠and Toyl and from every Storm entertaining our Souls with all fulness of Delight and Satisfaction To be happy yea and so happy as not to desire any greater Happiness to be glorious yea and so glorious as not to desire any further Glory to be full of all divine Comforts yea and so full that there is no room to pour in the least drop of Consolation more oh how transcendently blessed is such a Reward and into what Extasies into what heavenly Raptures and Trances of Admiration may it throw us whilst but a little contemplating about it And yet thus it shall certainly be done to the People of God and this shall be the Reward of all such as the King of Glory hath a delight to honour They have now that satisfaction in Communion with God which makes them count one day so spent better than a thousand elsewhere But when crowned with this glorious Reward they will then have that fulness of divine Content and Satisfaction in Communion with God which will make them count Eternity it self but as one day 7 That Reward whereunto God allows his People a respect in all their Obedience its Simultaneous and Insuccessive such a Reward as they shall enjoy altogether and at once Here in this Life (b) Heb. 1.1 the Lord Communicates of his Grace and Goodness to his People 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 at sundry times and in divers manners by peace-meal as the Apostle speaks concerning the Revelation of God's Will to the Fathers of old But in Heaven he gives them their Reward their Happiness their Glory by Wholesale pouring out the full Vials of
amoris divini in nos derivata beneficia prae omnibus hujusce saeculi deliciis longâ— sua vissima delicious than any Wine how Cordial soever And certainly most Blessed and full of Glory must the Change of every Saint in Heaven be which can render it capable to enjoy everlasting immediate Communion with so infinitely Pure and Glorious a Majesty For as the bodily Eye cannot stedfastly behold any bright and glorious Object that is never at hand if not wonderfully strengthened So were not all the Powers of the Soul wonderfully elevated and corroborated by a glorious created Strength the Saints in Heaven where God's Majesty and matchless Glory is fully manifested could no more enjoy him look upon him and delight in him as their Happiness than a Man having sore Eyes is able to look full upon the Sun in its greatest and most dazling Brightness God therefore creates in his Saints such a supernatural Disposition whereby they are prepared for the full Enjoyment of himself prepared to be filled with all the fulness of God prepared to behold for ever this glorious Sun whereas otherwise they would have been too much oppressed with the Weight of such a Glory What the Operation of the Soulâ— is which doth formally denominate the Saints Happy and whereby they do fully enjoy as God the alone beatifical Object is a thing much controverted amongst not only the School-men but the soberest Divines Some making it to be an Act of the Understanding with the Thomists whilst others would have it to be an Act of the Will loving and taking infinite Complacency in God with the Scotists (f) Essentialis beatitudo in Dei possessione constituenda est utriusque verò facultatis actu voluntatis scilicet intellectûs aequè principaliter ac immediate beati Deum possidebunt Arrows Tact. Sacr. lib. 3. cap. 4. §. 3. But I see no reason why any one should go about to promote a Schism betwixt the Graces of Knowledge and Love or give one the Preheminence above the other Since neither one nor the other can be excluded as mutually contributing to our nearest Union with and fullest Enjoyment of the divine Majesty And therefore the Scripture doth not place the whole of our Happiness in the seeing of God but also speaks of perfect (g) 1 Cor. 13.13 Charity towards God as that which goes to the Constituting of us in a State of compleat Blessedness So that there is not only a beatifical Vision of God in Heaven whereby we see him Face to Face that is to say as clearly and fully as a finite Creature can behold an infinitely glorious Essence But there is also a beatifical Love to God whereby we shall take an eternal Solace of Delight and full Aquiescency in God so that all our Affections being now called home from ranging after lying Vanities shall most sweetly meet together in an overflowing Ocean of Love to the Lord Jehovah Both these are necessary to the full Fruition of God wherein our Happiness doth (h) Psal 34.8 formally stand We must know God and love him too we must as well tast the Sweetness of God as see his Glory would we ever be made blessed by the Enjoyment of him In the Sun there is Heat as well as Light and did it not communicate its warm Influence to the World as well as the bright shining Beams of its Light there was no living thus Heat as well as Light is required in the Recompence of Reward we must not only have the Light (i) Beatitudo secundum Boethium est status omnium bonorum aggregatione perfectus ergo consistere debet in operationibus utriusque facultatis rationalis quia si deesset vel visio Dei ut primi veri vel illius fruitio per amorem ut summi boni maneret in mente inquietudo sunt autem inquietudo beatitudo 〈◊〉 compatibiles Bayhs Instit relig Christ pag. 291. of the Knowledge of the Glory of God in the Face of Jesus Christ but we must also love him withall our Soul with all our Mind with all our Heart and with all our Might would we ever live the Life of perfect Blessedness God is a Being infinitely true and good So that both the Understanding must behold him as the first Truth and the Will must sweetly embrace him by love as the chiefest good to make us compleatly blessed And certainly there are those Pleonasms of Beauty and Goodness in God that the Soul shall no sooner be call'd up to the full Enjoyment of him in Glory but she will see and love him she will love and see him she will drink in everlasting Light from God as the Fountain of Light and will bath her self for ever in the River of his Pleasures with all fulness of Joy and divine Contentment Who then can conceive what will be the Glory the Happiness the everlasting delight of a Soul keeping an eternal Sabbath of Loves in the Bosom of the ever blessed God where both our Knowledge of and Charity towards God being incorporated intâ— one glorious Fruition of him shall like a thousand Suns in Conjunction with each other make a bright Constellation of heavenly Glory If (k) 1 Kings 10.8 the Queen of Sheba observing Solomon's Glory pronounced all about him (l) Dictum est olim Solâ—moni à Regina Shebae beati viri tui beati servi tui qui stant coram te semper quâ—nto magis beati sint oportet quotquot Dei in christo in faciem praesentes perpetìm contemplantur blessed saying happy are thy Men and happy are these thy Servants which stand continually before thee and that hear thy Wisdom What shall we then think of those blessed Servants of God who shall for ever stand rejoycing in the beatifical Presence behold the Majesty tast the Goodness and experience infinitely beyond what they could ever have desired the loving Kindness of God which is better than Life it self This Christians oh this as Bernard hath it is a Reward indeed to see God and to live with God to (b) Praemium est videre Deum vivere cum Deo vivere de Deo esse cum Deo esse in Deo qui erit omnia in omnibus habere Deum qui est summum bonum Et ubi est summum bonum ibi est summa faelicitas summa jucunditas vere libertas perfecta charitas aeterna securitas secura eternitas Ibi est vera laetitia plena scientia omnis pulchritudo omnis beatitudo Et paucis interjectis videbit Sanctus Deum ad voluntatem habebit ad voluptatem fruetur ad jucunditatem In aeternitate vigebit in veritate fulgebit in bonitate gaudebit Bernard Medit. cap. 4. live of God to be with God to rest in the Bosom of God's dearest Love who shall be all in all to us to have God himself for our Reward who is the chiefest Good what Reward can compare with this Having God the
night yet there will come a day-break of Comfort and you are sure to have Joy in the beauteous (i) Psal 30.5 morning of your Souls happy Transmigration out of its tottering earthly Tabernacle into a Mansion of heavenly Glory Afflicted you may be for ten (k) Rev. 2.10 days a few short moments of time but all will end in an immarcessible Crown of Glory which ten thousand Years no nor yet Eternity it self shall be able to wear out Be it so that the Lord should hide his Face from you and seem (l) Isaiah 54.7 to forsake you yet 't is but for a moment for a little Instant of Fatherly Displeasure So that with great Mercies will he gather you and with everlasting Kindness will he have Mercy on you And albeit you now (m) 2 Cor. 4.17 have one Afflictions upon another yet they are both light and short and such as must quickly give place to a far more exceeding and eternal weight of Glory Oh then how diligent should the nearness of this Reward make us in doing the Work of God and how patient in bearing his Hand when lying most heavy upon us 'T was the complaint of a good Man upon his Death-bed that now he was going to a place where he should never do nor suffer any thing more for a gracious God (a) Non modica enim consolatiâ— est laboris cito sperare judicem remuneratorem constantiam certaminis remuneraturum Haymo AND though we have no cause to complain when God gives any one of us his Quietus est rewarding our weak endeavours with a Crown of Life Yet surely because the distance betwixt us and our eternal Reward is so small we should work the more chearfully redeem time for the Service of God more carefully and endure hardship as good Souldiers of Jesus Christ endeavouring to bring in what revenews of Glory we can into the Exchequer of Heaven Oh Christian labour to fill up that little scanting of time which lies betwixt thee and thy Eternal Reward in Heaven with all Faith Love Virtue and Patience as knowing that thy Glass being once run out now thou shalt never work more for God never any more suffer the least reproach or hardship for God but shalt have a blessed Sabbath of Rest from all thy labours Thy Days dear Child of God! how few soever and full of trouble yet they are all the working Days yea and suffering Days too that ever thou shalt have as being sure ere long to terminate in an Eternal Festival an Everlasting Holy-day of Joy unspeakable and full of Glory Will you then be prevailed with to watch with Christ one Hour and patiently to suffer for him who so quickly will come to reward you and take you to himself Having drunk a little draught of the bitter Waters of Marah the Sugar of Eternal Glory is ready Yet a little while and the Storm will be over the Day will break and all the dark shadows of Sorrow will take Wing and for ever fly away Wait but a few moments more and God will certainly lighten your Darkness discloud your Sun fill up your Comforts and come riding gloriously through the Skies in a triumphant Chariot all paved with Love to fetch you up into an eternal Mansion of Glory with himself in the highest Heavens (b) Gen. 45.27 28. 'T was no small reviving to old Jacob but indeed as Life from the Dead when Joseph his Son sent Waggons to carry him down into Egypt a Land of bondage as it proved But when Christ our dearest Saviour our precious Redeemer whom our Souls have loved and our Hearts longed after shall not send but come in Person taking us up into the Chariot with himself and carrying us away into the Palace of the great King into the glorious liberty of the Children of God oh now what sweet acclamations of Joy and Gladness will our Mouths be filled with as Streams everlastingly flowing from a full Fountain of purest Joy in our Hearts that shall never be exhausted but springing up like a Well of living Water unto Life everlasting (c) Isa 30.18 'T is a blessed thing to wait for the Lord in a way of well-doing but its Blessedness itself and that which will more than recompence all our Service to have Christ coming with millions of glorious Angels to conduct us into Heaven and set the Crown upon our Heads with his own Hands Now the Righteous forgetting that little moment of Sorrow which they had in this World they cry out admiring in this the Day of their glorious inauguration with the Church (d) Isa 25.9 Lo this is our God! we have waited for him and he will save us this is the Lord we have waited for him we will be glad and rejoice in his Salvation The Lord usually comes before expectation to a People waiting for him with a Crown of Life And that makes them look upon him with more delight and entertain him as in an extasie of heart-entrancing Joy and Admiration You cannot but greatly admire the Lord and your own everlasting Happiness when they come because 't is but a little while and he will come putting you in full possession of heavenly Glory when you thought yourselves to be at a great distance from it 16 AND lastly the Reward whereunto God allows his People a respect in all their obedience it 's an everlasting Reward This Reward is a glorious Sun which when once arisen upon you will never go down but everlastingly refresh your Souls with warmest Beams of Love and Comfort 'T is a full Hogshead of cordial Wine which can never be drawn drie but will run most pure nectareous Spirits of Joy and Gladness without any seculency to all Eternity 'T is an everlasting Spring of Joy and Happiness that shall never lose its most sweet enflowred vernancy through the approach of an injurious Winter (e) Dies septimus vespera est nec habet occasum quia sanctificasti eum ad permansionem sempiternam ut id quod tu post opera tua bona valde quamvis ea quictus feceris requievisti septimo die Hoc praeloquatur nobis vox libri tui quo et nos post opera nostra ideo bona valde quia tu nobis ea donasti Sabbatho vitae aeternâ— requiescamus in te etiam Aug. Cons l. 13. c. 36 The seventh Day as Austin observes had no Evening mentioned to typify an Eternal Sabbath of rest provided of God and fully to be enjoyed by his People when they shall have finished their course Truth is Eternity is the grand aggravation both of the Saints Happiness and of the Sinners Misery Heaven would not be so sweet nor Hell so bitter the Flames of this would not be so scorching nor the smiles of that so entrancing were it not that both the Joys of Heaven and the Torments of Hell shall endure for ever The Night of the damneds Horror and Misery would not be
not henceforth be afraid of the world's Frowns consider well that Crown of Life that heavenly Kingdom which will shortly be given you What though Men revile you and despitefully use you so long as you have this everlasting Consolation and good Hope through Christ to encourage you What though Men frown threatning nothing but Death and Destruction so long as the Smiles of Heaven abound in sweetness towards you Be it the Pleasure of unreasonable Men to trouble you to Imprison you to kill and make havock of you Yet this may encourage you against all slavish Fears that still it is the good Pleasure of your heavenly Father to give you a Kingdom Luke 12.32 8 A due Respect (f) Nullus dolor est de incursatione malorum praesentium quibus fiducia est futurorum bonorum Cyprian ad Demetrian p. 329. had to this glorious Reward 't will exceedingly ease you under all your Burdens The sight of future Glory doth wonderfully mitigate the Sense of present Misery He whose Heart is fixed upon heavenly Glory will not much regard any hurt that comes from Earth (g) Nihil interest ubi sitis in saeculo qui extra saeculum estis Tertul. ad Martyr c. 2. p. mihi 191. Nihil crus sentit in nervo cum animus in coelo est Idem Fox acts and Mon. vol. 2. pag. 301. nor will he much be solicitous about his Condition in this World who sees a Mansion of Glory prepared for himself in the next Be a Man upon the Rack yet he will feel but little Pain so long as his Mind is set upon his eternal Rest This precious Truth did holy Bainham to his own unconceivable Comfort experience when at the Stake with Arms and Legs half consumed in the Flames he cried out triumphing O ye Papists behold you look for Miracles and here you may see one for in this Fire I feel no more Pain than if I were in a Bed of Down but it is to me as a Bed of Roses A Prospect of heavenly Glory under Sufferings (h) Spes in aeternitatem animum erigit idcirco nulla mala exteriùs quae tolerat sentit Greg. 6. Moral doth so wonderfully refresh the Soul that like a spiritual Stoick she becomes then insensible of them esteeming for shadows of Affliction rather than Afflictions indeed As sorrowful saith the Apostle (i) 2 Cor. 6.10 speaking of his Sufferings yet always rejoycing His Mind was so swallowed up with the Glory set before him that he had no more sense or feeling of all the Miseries that came upon him than if they had been but a vanishing Shadow (k) Nemo mortem cogitet sed immortalitatem nec temporariam paenam sed gloriam sempiternam Cyprian epist 81. pag. 260. Here then is a way to escape the bitterness of every Cup of Affliction and to make all our Sufferings seem light let none of us think of the Cross but the Crown that will follow after let us not think of our present Pain but let us think of that eternal weight of Glory to which it leads There is no fiery Furnace so hot but an Eye to Glory will bring you through it without any smart no Cross so painful but a Respect to this blessed Reward will make it easie (l) Tormenta quanto fuerint graviora tanto majorem virtutis gloriam parient Lactant. institut lib. 5. c. 11. pag. 491. Quanto plus tormentorum accesserit tanto plus referam praemiorum Gordius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrys hom 1. Oh this if any thing will put ease into every Burden and make the sorest Affliction seem a light matter to think with our selves when under any Trouble that the sharper we find our present Conflict the more sweet the more great and glorious will be our Reward in Heaven 9 A due Respect had to this glorious Reward it will be a good Antidote against the Pleasures of Sin enabling you to overcome all Temptations thereto They that by Faith can see the Glory and tast the Pleasures of such a Paradise are not wont to run a Whoring after carnal Delights nor can they easily be ensnared with the pleasurable Baits of Sin Souls filled with the lively sense and happy Preoccupations of future Glory are armed against the Allurements of Sin and all fleshly Intrusions Let a Man bot once feel the sweetness of this Hony and you shall not afterward perswade him so much as to tast the forbidden Fruit of Sin Let him have but a glimpse of this heavenly Brightness and there is no Lust no Jezabel thought in all her Paint and meretricious Ornaments but will appear in his Eye ever after like some foul mishapen Monster to affright his Mind rather than to attract his Love Let a Man but fix his Thoughts a little upon this eternal Recompence and there is no great danger that he will never love the Wages of Unrighteousness any more Oh believe it Christians an Eye fixed upon heaven's Glory would make you afraid to be handling Hell's Merchandise This would mingle Bitterness with all sensual Delights and cause you with loathing and abhorrency to spit out every sweet Morsel of Sin Having your Hearts refreshed with a Prospect of Heaven with a due Respect to that Crown that Joy that Glory which abides you there if now Temptation comes like a Potiphar's Wife soliciting you to commit Folly you will say with the Olive shall I forsake my Fatness and with the Fig-tree shall I leave my Sweetness to enjoy the Pleasures of Sin which are but for a Season Sin never comes but like some Dalilah to cut the Hair of your Strength or like the old Serpent to shut you out of Paradise and to drive you from feeding upon this Tree of Life Judas-like it kisses us and betrays us whatever be the Pleasure of Sin the best that can come of it is a broken Heart and if that fail it will end in Hell in Wrath in everlasting Flames What a blessed thing is it then to have Heaven as a sure Antidote against this Sweet but deadly Poison To lose Heaven for a Lust to sell such a Kingdom for a draught of sensual Delight to lose Christian thy God thy blessed Saviour thy eternal Reward for a few carnal Pleasures what a dreadful loss would this be Oh thou that art a Man (a) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Basil committing Sin without Fear and living in it without Remorse how wilt thou tear and rend thy self how bitterly wilt thou lament and too late repent thy Folly thy Madness to think when tormented in hellish Flames how easily thou sufferedst thy self to be cheated out of Heaven out of Life out of all fulness of Joy for a damning brutish Lust Oh bless God Christians that you have a prospect of heaven's Glory to stand like an Angel with a flaming Sword to keep you from undoing your selves from losing your Crown your immortal Souls your eternal Reward by eating of this forbidden
a Land all whose Rivers run heavenly Nectar and all whose Trees are ever laden with the sweet delicious Grapes of Paradise (o) Si tanta nobis tribuis in careere quid dabis in patria Aug. de civit Dei If here in the Land of your Pilgrimage so much of Heavens Glory be revealed to you what Tongue of Man or Angel can tell the Happiness the Glory to be revealed in you when at home in your own Country The Crown of Life if now so bright and orient to an Eye of Faith beholding it Oh then what a far more excâ—â—ding and Eternal Weight os Glory will be found in it when a glorious Christ shall set it upon your Head with his own remunerative Hands 12 AND lastly a due respect had to this glorious Reward will bring you safe to it never leaving you till your Souls be crowned with fulness of Glory The Loadstone will draw Iron to itself when intra Spheram activitatis suae within the reach of its own attractive influence Thus the Reward of Eternal Life as an heavenly Loadstone hath that magnetick Virtue in it that if you put yourselves by a due respect had thereto under it it will draw you home to itself The wise Men keeping their Eye upon the Star which went before them were at length brought to Christ Thus keeping your Eye Christians upon this Eternal Reward as a glorious Star it will bring you at length to Christ in Glory whom fully to enjoy is our Life our Comfort our Happiness yea the Heaven of Heavens 'T is true Christians we must be uncloathed of this Body of Death before we can enter into the Joy of our Lord and be cloathed upon with the white Robes of Blessed Immortality Death must break down the Prison Walls of a Mortal Body before our Souls can ever come to the glorious Liberty of God's Children (a) 2 Cor. 5.1 Till our earthly Tabernacle be dissolved there is no having of a Building of God an House not made with Hands Eternal in the Heavens And why should we not be willing that God should pull down these Cottages of Clay who hath promised to raise us up a more glorious Temple The Loadstone cannot draw Iron as some say whilst the Diamond is in Presence Doubtless were it not for a Body of Death that is still present with us an Eye fixed upon Heaven's Glory would immediately draw us into Heaven For besides the interposition of an earthly gross Body together with those corruptions whose Foundation is in that Dust there is nothing as one well observes that hinders a Christian from the full enjoyment of God in Glory So that Death's peculiar Office is to break down this Wall of separation that the Soul may the better come to her God her beloved Redeemer her Eternal Habitation in the Kingdom of Heaven The Soul when once loosed from this dying Body then she hath the Crown of Life set upon her Head then she sees God no longer through a Glass darkly but Face to Face then she is ravished with the unconceivable sweetness of the beatifical Vision (b) Mori plane timeat sed qui ex aqua spiritu non renatus Gehennae ignibus mancipatur mori timeat qui non Christi cruce passione censetur mori timeat qui ad secundam mortem de hac morte transibit quem de seculo recedentem perennibus poenis aeterna torquebit flamma Cyp. de Mortalit pag. 344. Let those therefore tremble at the knocking and approaches of Death who know not what will become of their immortal Souls who not being born again from above are every moment liable to infernal Flames who have no interest in the Glory purchased by Christ who must pass from Death to Death from short momentany Pleasures to everlasting hellish Torments Death to the Wicked is the Trap-door that opening lets them fall down irrecoverably into the dark vault of Eternal Misery But to the Gracious Soul there is no cause of Terrour in Death no Fear in the Grave no Sting to perplex in a bodily dissolution as that which only ushers in her everlastingly Blessed and Glorious Coronation Death comes to a Man dying the recompence of Reward like Moses to the Israelites to deliver him as the Angel to Peter in Prison to set him free as God's fiery Chariot to carry him like Elias into heavenly Glory And are you Christians afraid of entring upon your own Blessedness are you afraid to be cloathed upon with your House from Heaven Get a right notion of Death which as Bernard calls it is nothing but the Gate of Life the Portal of eternal security Though Death look upon thee with a grim Countenance yet it comes upon a good errand to God's People to fetch them out of their Wilderness-condition and to bring them to an everlasting estate of Happiness By Death we go from Earth to Heaven from conversing with Sinful Men to converse with Millions of glorious Angels and what makes us so loath to remove Who would not leave a Cottage to gain a Kingdom Who would not leave an Egypt to inherit Canaan Who would not leave gladly an oppressive Babylon to be made a Citizen of Sion of the heavenly Jerusalem OUR greatest Misery lies not in Death but in Life 'T is the Veil of Flesh that keeps us from entring into the holiest of all c Death gives us a pasport from corruptible Joys to an incorruptible Crown from a Mortal Life to a Life of blessed Immortality from a troublesome condition to a State of perfect tranquillity So that the name of Death should not offend us But the Happiness and Glory to which it leads should delight us The Moon never comes to the full til after her change Thus through the change of Death a Christian comes to all fulness of Joy and hath the white Robes of Glory given him Now the Bridegroom comes to meet the Soul in Happiness now all Tears are wiped away and Heaven Gates are set wide open to give her everlasting glorious entertainment Now the Reward of life everlasting now the Joy of Eternal Salvation now the full possession of the heavenly Paradise comes Now heavenly Mansions instead of earthly Tabernacles now greatest Glory instead of small and Eternal Happiness instead of poor temporal enjoyments are bestowed upon every Child of God What Man that is well in his Wits woâ—ld not part with Life and bid Death welcome upon terms of such everlasting blessed and glorious advantage (d) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost ad pop Ant. hom 7. Death in the true notion (c) Mors haec transitus universorum est transitur à corruptione ad incorruptionem à mortalitate ad immortalitatem à perturbatione ad tranquillitatem Non igitur nomen mortis te offendat sed boni transitûs beneficia delectent Ambros lib. de Bono mort cap. 4. Proemium vitae gaudium salutis aeternae perpetua laetitia possessio Paradisi
fearing the Shame and not knowing well how to spare so much Mony as was needful in the case To all other Duties he finds mighty impulsions to close with any opportunity for them and against every Temptation to sin strong aversations and reluctances so that he feels the Law of the Spirit of Life within his own Bowels though too often alass too often he is disobedient to it 3 He measures all Persons Places Employments by their subserviency to the Divine Life in his Soul and still comes off with Shame and great Heaviness where he spends one Hour without some spritual advantage 4 He hath a real compassion for all Men making it his Heart's Desire to God that they may be saved but his delight lies in those that have most of the Image and likeness of God upon them those that are begotten by the same immortal seed formed into the same divine Nature acted and fed by the same Almighty Spirit of Life with himself these are his Beu'ah's his Hepthsibahs he thinks â—he could not live in the World without â—hem 5 This notwithstanding he still finds himself out of his Proper Center he is daily under powerful tendencies and restless desires after the full enjoyment of and the nearest conjunction with the blessed God in Christ Jesus which desires are mightily strengthned by a deep Sense of his present misery under hard bondage the impetuousness of in-dwelling Corruption and violent Temptations which make every Day of his Life a bloody Warfare so that his Soul almost chooseth Strangling and Death rather than Life he loaths it he would not live always at such distance from the blessed God in such incessant and dangerous conflicts with World Flesh and Devil for a thousand Worlds so far as he is willing under the Tears and tediousness the Conflicts and Dangers of this Mortal Life by way of pure Compliance with the Will of God he really judgeth the greatest act of Self-denial that he is capable of performing 6 To sweeten a Life so much in the Gall of Bitterness and Bonds of Iniquity he makes it his Business to be much with God through an Almighty Redeemer and much in the Fellowship of the Holy-Ghost and this not only at the stated times of publick private and secret Duties but especially of secret Duties where he sets himself no bounds but takes all opportunities which he finds his Heart fit to comply with many times in company and employment of another Nature he is weary of forbearing and his Heart restless till he find room for such retirement for he hath found that Life and Power that divine solace and sweetness in it with which all the Delights of Sense are no more worthy to be compared than a Dunghil with the Sun And oh when Heaven hath thus come down in Smiles to him and filled him with Righteousness Peace and Joy in the Holy Ghost how often hath he been afraid to make an end of the Duty How often when rising off his Knees hath he fallen down again not willing to leave his sweetness and his Fatness so and so doubled the Time of his Duty Thus was his whole Sheet of Paper filled whether there was any thing more written of this kind we cannot find The preservation of this Sheet seems to be an intimation of Divine Providence that he shou'd be shewed to the World in those colours that he had lay'd on himself He lived till the Non-conformists had a little Smile from the Court after a Decad of Severity and Frowns And now having got a little Liberty by the Licences the King granted to those of his Station he took the Gale of Opportunity to be more abundant in the work of the Lord. And that in the Age of his full Vigour and Strength Yet even now see he is at leisure to think of Death and being Poetically given composed this Dialogue betwixt a Person dying and Death Thus prefacing it Oppress'd with Pain I groan'd as one unwise Death's horrid Aspect did my Soul surprize This frightful Picture ghastly to behold Did all his Terror on my Thoughts unfold At first confounded all amaz'd I stand But gaining confidence thus I demand Moriens or Person Dying Are you that King of Terrors which they say Doth conquer Empires and great Kings dismay Death The very same Sir Death both name and thing My Looks kill some all die that feel my Sting Person Dying Poor Death your looks speak not your strength but fear You cannot live I guess self-judg'd you are Death And would it not torment the greatest Powers My Empire large as Nature Grace devours Person Dynig What that 's the reason of your hollow Eyes Of all the paleness on your Cheeks that lies You have some secret Wound if I guess right Your vital Blood is gone you look so white Death My vital Blood was Poyson and my Sting Did give me Power and create me King Person Dying Your Poyson who destroy'd Christ on the Cross Your Sting great Jesus dying caus'd this loss How came this Palsie in your trembling Hand For fear of losing Scepter and Command Scepter Poor Death it is a Spade I judge No sign of Majesty but of a Drudge Go dig my Grave I would repose in Dust Death you must help to scower off my Rust This Mortal Life will kill me Welcome Grave My hidden Life in Christ is all I have Death do your Office Heaven calls away Dissolve my Bonds my Soul shall win the Day I cannot live indeed unless I die Such is Death's Triumph such his Victory Neither did he forget to think on Heaven upon which he hath bestowed a larger Poem as also others upon Faith Hope Repentance c. which shew the way thither Which possibly the Reader may find in some other place For he delighted to fetter his Thoughts in Verse And though he hath not such high flights as some may expect yet there is in his Poems the devout Breathings of a Divine Poet he wrote not for the Stage nor a King Arthur But that which speaks his Heart most to have been in Heaven is not a Poem but what his serious Reflections and Meditations wrote in Prose in the Treatise following God is pleased to exercise many of his Servants with thoughts of Heaven as it were to prepare them for it immediately before he call them to it Thus Mr. Bolton was writing de quatuor novissimis particularly of Heaven when he dyed Thus the late Reverend Dr. Bates had finished his last Treatise of spiritual Perfection not long before he had expired the last words of which Book are Enter thou into the Joy of thy Lord. Many more might be named But our own Author must not be forgotten who had taken much pains to transcribe what he had preached and fitted for the Press his Meditations upon this Subject It may be there are few Subjects more cultivated and none on which more is to be said God and Heaven fall under no Hyperbole A late Doctor
wrote at the end of his Friend's Book upon part of the same Subject What this to know as we are known shou'd be The Author could not tell he 's gon to see We have seen him in his Life let us now see him at his Death in and under the Gripes of his last Sickness which for want â—f the Pen of a ready writer remain only in a few short and broken Sentences but they are of that Weight that if Reader thou hast any Sense of Eternity thou wilt covet to die like him Take a few of them When shall I be unburdened of this Body of Corruption Oh Happy Day and â—onged for Oh when Oh when Methinks it is very grievous to think of being turned back again and put into the Hands of the World again Again Oh lift me up meaning by Prayer to my longed for Rest Again crying May not I pray for dissolution I find no hurt in it good old Simeon cries out Let thy Servant depart in peace Another time being in Pain I could fill my Mouth with Complaints but I will be dumb because thou hast done it Again standing by him desiring him to take something frequently that he might gather strength he replies Away away I look not for it God is able to raise me up but I know my Days are at an end and my Time is accomplished I only wait for my Lord. Oh why linger I so long Come my Dear Lord Come quickly and take me up to thy self Again Oh when will the Day of Redemption come When shall I have past all these wearisome Nights and Days Again When he had been under much Faintings and Sinking he cries out with Eyes lift up to Heaven Oh where are thy wanted loving-kindnesses are thy Bowels shut up One standing by him asked him if he spake it as to his Souls concern He answered Oh no I bless God its state is settled Another time having some ease and refreshment he said This is not Heaven One standing by replies I hope you will be willing to tarry with us Oh yes if God have any more Work for me to do I shall thankfully take the Mercy There were multitudes of these sweet Passages lost by his observing one transcribe them after which he was much silent We have seen him die twice over once morally and now naturally let us accompany him to his Grave and there hear what Character a conforming Minister gave of him one that knew him well and intimately and therefore the rather to be believed His whole Life was a curious delineation of Religion and Learning so Virtuous and Spotless that Malice itself might be angry but had no cause to be so with him His Reputation as invulnerable as the Air his unexampled Goodness might justly stile him a Match for Antiquity in its greatest Purity and Severity I 'll pass by his natural Constitution his solid Judgment his Affections and the Faithful Treasury of his Memory I 'll say nothing of his Quick and Happy Fancy the fruitful Store-house of hallowed and sublime Notions Yet I can't but make mention of his Gravity which was always constant and genuine He did nâ—t deserve this Character that Suidas gave Salust the Philsopher 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Somtime acting the grave Lecturer sometimes playing the ridiculous Child He was not in the Desk or Pulpit demure and mighty devout and elsewhere Light Vain Frothy and Dissolute But always composed Serious and Reverend beyond his Age. His Presence struck a reverential Awe into the Persons he conversed with and his Deportment was so Graceful and Majestick that I well remember Time was when these words Here comes Mr. Cooper would charm a rude Society into civil order and compose lead Persons into an handsome decorum his Affability was Candid and Generous his Language Free and Eloquent his Charity open-handed and if I may not say he was liberal beyond his measure of the good things of this Life I am sure of the things of another Life he was often liberal beyond his strength his Humility had taught him to speak evil of no Man and his Loyalty to enjoin Subjects to obedience and to hush into Silence whatever did detract from or tend to the defaming of Dignity the contempt of the World was very conspicuous in this holy Man Agar's Prayer found sweet entertainment in his Soul desiring to be a Stranger on the Earth like the kingly Prophet and as a refined Saint always accounted himself to be in a State of Banishment while in a state of Mortality his Studies and Learning were unwearied and venerable and I dare challenge the World to give me the Lye while I assert him to be a general accomplisht Scholar no common Linguist a smart Disputant a judicious Philosopher and an experienced godly Divine If I say nothing his printed Sermons his Legis septimentum his noble attempts in three Works that must now be buried in the same Womb that conceived them and his constant generous designs for the publick good speak more in silence than I can utter with the highest pitch of my invention his singular Piety did disperse its Rays to all that beheld him being like sacred Fire 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 warming refreshing quickening all about it and kindling in others the like Zeal for God and Goodness he had in himself Witness this Legacy he left to me Study God says he and study your self closely and pursue Holiness more than Learning though both together make an happy Constitution And when I was a Boy be sure whatever Precepts dropt from his sacred Lips I had this for one Disce Christum aut nihil learn Christ or nothing of whom I must needs tell the World that if ever I behold the blissful Face of God in Glory next to the sacred Trinity I think I may say I owe it to his Godly Councel and Society Should I tell you his compassion to Souls his Heroick Spirit his Trust in Providence his Delight in Meditation and Thanksgiving and of all his heavenly endowments I should raise a work to trouble Fame and astonish Praise For his ministerial Labours I appeal to this People how earnest how importunate how instant in season and out of Season he hath been with them to convert them to a state of Grace and to bring them to a saving Knowledge of Jesus Christ Let your Consciences speak what great things he hath done for your Souls You alone my Friends of this place have the greatest loss your Watchman's gone your Glory 's departed How well now may you be termed Desolation Come come with me here paint the Characters of Woe Here pay your Tribute to the dead Here make return of those Sighs and Tears your holy Passion hath abundantly laid out for you Engrave his Doctrin upon your Hearts and though he 's gone be still intimate with his Godly Counsels and hearty Advice and while you have Childrens Children to perpetuate his Memory let not his Name his precious Name be