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A40098
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A sermon preach'd at the Church of St. Mary le Bow to the Societies for Reformation of Manners, June 26, 1699 by Edward Lord Bishop of Gloucester.
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Fowler, Edward, 1632-1714.
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1699
(1699)
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Wing F1725; ESTC R27371
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15,614
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58
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Great Creators Service in being serviceable to us makes them to be employed Honourably and like themselves III. Nothing but this hearty Regard to God in our Services will secure our Constancy in well-doing The discouragements we shall therein find upon the failing of our expectations will sooner or later quire dishearten us when we chiefly propose to our selves the poor low ends of Gain or Credit but especially upon our meeting with a quite contrary Reward to what we hoped for We shall be ready then to say with those profane Jews It is vain to Serve God and what profit is it that we have kept His Ordinances IV. This will be consequently a great Support to our Spirits when we find our good Services not accepted by Men or not to have their desired success When we do good Offices either to the Bodies or Souls of Men and find our selves unworthily requited it goes to our Hearts But we are soon easy again when we can thus Reflect I did these Services as to the Lord more than to Men and God is not Unrighteous to forget my Work and Labour of Love which I have shewed to His Name which is the Encouragement Given by the Apostle Heb. 6. 10. and was that which enabled him to express himself so bravely as he did 2 Cor. 12. 15. I will very gladly spend and be spent for you tho' the more abundantly I love you the less I be loved V. Nothing will secure to us the Divine Assistance in difficult Services but being governed by this Divine Principle Nor can we reasonably have the least suspicion of Gods readiness to go along with us in those Services to which we are induced by the love of Himself and a generous desire of doing good VI. This is that only which can give us a well grounded hope of Success in any good undertaking I know no Argument that Man can urge to encline God Almighty to give a Blessing to his Endeavours who is chiefly acted by little private selfish ends VII The successes those have who Chiefly design themselves or the gratifying of their Animal Appetites will prove more unhappy to them than their greatest disappointments They will help to make them so much the more miserable both here and hereafter Hereafter as they will aggravate their Punishment by aggravating their Sins and here as they will more and more Encourage them in those gratifications The Self-designer who obtaineth that Credit that Profit or Sensual Pleasure he hunteth after becomes by this means more uneasy than he was before For the more any Lust is pampered the stronger it grows and there is nothing a Man's Observation Experience and Feeling do more fully prove to him than that all Lusts are very troublesome things and therefore no wonder that Perturbationes was the common Philosophical Name for them There may also be given not a few Instances of Outward Mischiefs that attend on Mens prosperous Successes in Selfish Designs But I proceed to our last Consideration viz. VIII By principally designing the Glory of God in all our Services we infinitely best consult our own Interest This was touched upon in the Doctrinal part By our own interest we are to understand the interest of our Souls Our Souls being our selves our Bodies ours not our selves as some of the Philosophers both Greek and Latine have observed And therefore the interest of our Bodies is no otherwise Our interest than as it is subservient to that of our Souls The Glory of God and our Happiness are so inseparably conjoyned that in promoting the one we promote the other also So that he loves himself best who loves God most and he who chiefly designeth His Glory in the best and truest sence is the most Selfish Man And thus are we come to the Motive in the Text knowing that whatsoever good thing any Man doth viz. as to the Lord and not unto Men the same shall he receive of the Lord Or as we have it in the parallel place Knowing that of the Lord you shall receive the Reward of the Inheritance And this Reward of the Inheritance we find in our Text shall be proportioned to the Services we do To our Services not to our Successes Endeavour only being our Work This the Prophet Isaiah did â—â—mfort himself withall Chap. 49. â—â— 5. Then said I I have laboured in vain I have spent my Strength for nought and in vain Yet surely my Judgment is with the Lord and my Work or Reward is with my God And now saith the Lord who formed me from the Womb to be his Servant to bring Jacob again unto Him tho' Israel be not gathered yet shall I be Glorious in the Eyes of the Lord and my God shall be my Srength Oh how Admirable how Astonishing are the Expressions by which this Reward of the Inheritance is set forth to us It is called an Inheritance incorruptible and undefiled reserved in Heaven for us A Building of God and an House not made with hands Eternal in the Heavens A Crown of Life of Righteousness and of Glory A Kingdom prepared from the Beginning of the World A being with Christ and beholding the Glory which the Father hath given Him A Sitting with Him upon his Throne even as he Sits on his Father's Throne A transcendently transcendent as the Words may be rendred and everlasting weight of Glory By these and more such Amazing Words is this Reward expressed by our Blessed Saviour Himself and His holy Apostles But by our interest I understand likewise the interest of our Souls with respect to the Bodies with which they shall be Cloathed Since the happiness of the other Life is set forth by St. Paul by having our vile Body so changed by Christ as to be fashioned like unto his Glorious Body And our Saviour might have a special reference to the Glorified Bodies of the Righteous in saying that They shall Shine forth like the Sun in the Kingdom of the Father And by the Exceeding great and precious promises of the Gospel as St Peter calls them viz. The Promises of so unspeakable a Happiness as is therein described What may we not be Encouraged to do for the Glorifying of our most Blessed Creator Redeemer and Sanctifier And What may we not be Encouraged to Suffer too for the same end The Sufferings of this present Life being not Worthy to be Compared with the Glory that shall be revealed in us as saith St. Paul And therefore my beloved Brethren to conclude with the Exhortation of that great Apostle be ye stedfast immoveable alwaies abounding in the Work of the Lord for as much as you know that your Labour is not in vain in the Lord Our Labour will be so far from being in vain that we have now heard our Reward will infinitely exceed the greatest Services we can ever be capable of performing Through the Merits of our Dear Lord and Saviour Christ Jesus to whom with the Father and the Holy Ghost be Ascribed by Us and the whole World all Honour and Glory now and for ever Amen FINIS Published at the Request of the Societies Which should have been plac'd in the Title ERRATA PAge 13. line 14. read sight Page 35. line 13. read gloryed Some BOOKS Printed for B. Aylmer at the Three Pigeons in Cornhill AN Account of the Societies for Reformation of Manners in London and Westminster and other parts of the Kingdom with a Perswasive to Persons of all Ranks to be zealous and diligent in promoting the Execution of the Laws against Prophaneness and Debauchery for the effecting a National Reformation Published with the Approbation of these Lords with many more Lords Temporal Lords Spiritual Judges Pembroke P. T. Carliol Ed. Ward Lonsdale H. Bangor Ed. Nevill Leeds N. Cestriens Nic. Lechmere Bedford S. Eliens Tho. Rokeby Lindsey J. Oxon. John Turton Kent E. Gloucestr John Blencowe Bridgwater R. Bath Wells Hen Hatsell Thanet J. Bristol Guilford c. J. Cicestriens A Discourse of the Great Disingenuity and Unreasonableness of Repining at afflicting Providences and of the Influence which they ought to have upon us Job 2. 10. Published upon Occasion of the Death of our gracious Sovereign Queen Mary of Blessed Memory with a Preface containing some Observations touching her excellent Endowments and exemplary Life Certain Propositions by which the Doctrine of the Holy Trinity is so explain'd according to the ancient Fathers as to speak it not Contradictory to Natural Reason together with a defence of them in Answer to the Objections of a Socinian Writer in his newly printed Considerations on the Explications of the Doctrine of the Trinity occasioned by these Propositions among other Discourses 4to A second Defence of the Propositions by which the Doctrine of the Holy Trinity is so explained according to the Ancient Fathers as to speak it not Contradictory to Natural Reason in Answer to a Socinian Manuscript in a Letter to a Friend Together with a third defence of those Propositions in Answer to the newly published Reflections contained in a Pamphlet Entituled A Letter to the Reverend Clergy of Both Universities in 4to All three by the Right Reverend Father in God Edward Lord Bishop of Gloucester A Sermon Preach'd at St. Mary le Bow to the Societies for Reformation of Manners by Lilly Butler Minister of St. Mary Aldermanbury A Sermon Preach'd at St Mary le Bow to the Societies for Reformation of Manners by Samuel Bradford Rector of the said Parish A Sermon Preach'd at St. Mary le Bow to the Societies for Reformation of Manners by John Hancock D. D. and Chaplain to his Grace the Duke of Bedford FINIS
Creators Laws with Laws of their own Enacting with the Sanction of Corporal and Pecuniary Penalties and the due inflicting of them on those who are too much hardned in their wicked Practices to be reformed by the Menaces of Punishment in another Life and by Spiritual Methods And it being the Business of the foresaid Societies to do their utmost to Awaken the good Laws of our Land against Prophaneness and Immorality which have for the most part a long time lain a sleep and served to little better purpose than the reproaching of those too generally speaking who have been intrusted with the Execution of them What more worthy Enterprize or of greater or so great Importance could enter into the hearts os you my Worthy Brethren who have entered into these Societies to undertake And the method you have pitched upon for the carrying on of this Blessed Work is so excellently well contrived that it hath succeeded by the Blessing of God to Admiration in and about this City This hath been a great Age for Projects but this of Yours tho' I undervalue it in so calling it doth infinitely excell them all as very beneficial as some of them are found to be It must be Acknowledged that no Man is the more Religious for abstaining from the Practice of any Vice merely for fear of temporal Penalties Yet those on whom this fear works an outward Reformation are in a much more hopeful way to a thorow Conversion from Religious Motives than the more hardy Sinners Besides by the vigorous Execution of the Laws wicked wretches are restrained from doing open dishonour to Almighty God that dishonour to his Authority which may well be called National when Connived at and as such deservedly punished And by this means they are forced to give over offending Scandalously and debauching others by their infectious Example and insnaring Practices Whereupon will necessarily follow that our Youth for the future will be nothing so liable to be corrupted and a happy stop will be put to that propagation of Vice which for so many Years hath been greatly encreasing And as nothing is more evident than that this your Undertaking is the most excellent one considered in it self so we ought not in the least to doubt but that it is likewise so with respect to the Principle by which you are acted For what Motive can you have thereto besides the Love of God and Goodness and an earnest desire to promote both the Temporal and Eternal Wellfare of your Fellow Citizens and Country-Men together with the hope of being qualified thereby for greater degrees of that Happiness which our Blessed Lord has promised to his faithful Servants and chiefly confisteth in Likeness to GOD and the Eternal Enjoyment of him Which hope must as much proceed from Love to God as to your selves Can you design any Secular Advantage by being thus employed Expense it brings upon you but can it make you a Recompence for it and for all your pains by bringing in what the World calls Profit I must be an idle Man if I seriously asked you these Questions There is a Reward from Men which you could not but expect when you entred into this Service and you have accordingly found it But I verily believe this was no Motive to you I mean the Reward of hard Censures as a Company of Busy-bodies and Medlers in Matters that don't concern you tho' if they concern not you they can concern no body But indeed nothing is more evident than that every Man without Exception is obliged to Concern himself in this great Work suitably to the Circumstances in which Providence hath placed him And none can accuse those of you who are not Magistrates as Seizing upon their Office The best of it is you cannot be Censured as Exercising your selves in things too high for you tho' you do in great Matters this your Success demonstrates Brow-beatings also from too many who ought to have given you the greatest Encouragement is a Reward which I suppose did not neither come unlookt for nor yet that of Vexatious Prosecutions nor that of running imminent dangers from Lewd Mobs Neither these nor worse things can surprize those who are bent upon doing their utmost towards the Overthrowing of the Devils Kingdom who express the greatest Emnity to the darling Lusts of his Children and to the Ungodly Trades of a great number of them And whether you Expected them or no you cannot be ignorant what Reflections upon your proceedings many Sober People have been too forward to make and some who have the Repute and very justly I doubt not of truly Religious People too thro' their rash Credulity and lending too favourable an Ear to idle Tales and from jealousies of what Consequence such Combinations may in time prove to be to our Constitution in Church and State On which Topick I never yet heard one wise word and do perswade my self I never shall And since Experience assures us of nothing more than that no great Undertaking can be managed with any considerable Advantage otherwise than by Societies and therefore in all Professions they are found to be necessary It is very wonderful to me that the least danger to either of these Constitutions can be suspected from such Societies as are formed wholly for the promoting of the grand Design of both as I need not say the Reformation and Regulation of Manners is But it will be well for those Regular Persons who are so forward to find fault with these Societies if there be nothing of Envy at the bottom arising from their Consciousness of being much out done by them in Concern for the Publick Weal in Activity in doing good and in Zeal for the Honour of Almighty God And mentioning their Zeal I cannot but observe that were it not as Prudent as Pious their Adversaries would never have been baffled in Courts of Judicature as they have been And as my Brethren you might reasonably have made account of far worse requitals for your Pains than any of you have found hitherto through the special protection of the Divine Providence and yet you would run the Venture so have I not heard that the furious Rage which some have met with for giving informations against Impious and Profligate People hath in the least discouraged any of them And by the way none but such as are either wicked or very silly can look upon this as a base Employment as infamous as the Trade of Informing was against another sort of Men we know when For since Crimes must ever go unpunished if there be no Informations and therefore no care can be taken either of the Honour of God or the Honour of the Government and the Welfare of the Publick or of the Souls of Obdurate Sinners this cannot be a more necessary than Honourable Service But to return to what I was now saying the principle of this your Zeal may not without great Uncharitableness nor apparent Injustice be called in question Since