comply vvith the prophane whom he should have curbed and now the Lord passes by them and seems to take less notice of their open wickedness then of his secret complyance with it thus it is with many who wil not be or dare not be Swearers or Drunkards but they wil keep a hand for the drunkard or the scoffer they will be the friends and familiarâ— with such in secret they have not gotten so much zeal for God and for his ways as to despise a vile person Psalm 15.4 but such as these God complains of by the Prophet Hos 7.8 Israel was a cake not turned if you look upon their outside they were Christians but if you could see the inside they were idolaters Such God wil spue out of his mouth with the greatest loathing possible he does most commonly cast them out of their profession here and out of their Church-priviledges if they be under any 1 Cor. 11.19 or if not here when he comes to judgement he will surely remember these they shal be cast out before men and Angels Mat. 24.51 they shall have their portion with hypocrites there shal be weeping and gnashing of teeth these shal have a place in hel by themselves the prophanest sort of men wil hiss them out of their company the devils will stand off from them because they seemed to be distinct from them in the world and as for the godly they shal be separated from them because they were not of them Thus these hypocrites shal have a place by themselves and if any worse then other it â—â—al be theirs As of all sorts of sinners these are the worst because hypocrites so of all kinde of hypocrites these are worst It is a great mistake amongst the common people who think none are hypocrites but they which make some extraordinary profession of Religion they judge them to be hypocrites and them onely who make a greater profession then the common standard by which the multitude measure their Religion will allow of so that none are reckoned for hypocrites but those who are noted for professors This I say is a great mistake for there is not a wicked man or woman in this place how prophane soever but is an hypocrite for every one here does profess himself a Christian and if it be not so he is an hypocrite there is not one here that wil renounce all interest in Christ or that will openly in words refuse obedience to him yea there is not one here but does at some times in some wayes professe a subjection to him and shall therefore at the last not onely be condemned with the prophane for saying Christ shall not reign over them but they shall be judged with the Hypocrite for saying that they go when they go not as the evil son Matthew 21.30 who added a lie to his disobedience But although amongst them that call themselves Christians there be many kindes of hypocrites and all that take the name of Christian upon them are either Saints or hypocrites yet these which are almost Christians are the worst of hypocrites he that is almost a Christian is of the highest form of hypocrites the higher a man rises in profession if it be not in truth the higher he arises in hypocrisie for he that does not follow God fully when he is at the height he is but almost a Christian and that is but a raised piece of hypocrisie and when a man is in this condition this is his misery that all his profession does but increase his sin he is so much the more an elaborate hypocrite Of all persons Christ cries out against these in the Scripture how often does he cry out Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees Hypocrites for all the people of the Jews by virtue of their profession were such who did not obey the truth But these did excel in profession they went beyond others in many degrees and yet did not love the truth vvith all their hearts therefore he cries out more against the Scribes and Pharisees hypoâ—crites then against the Publicans and harlots Hypocrites Mat. 22.13 14 15 23 25 Christ did not cry out against these for Hypocrites for doing more then others but for not doing vvhat they ought to do Hypocrisie lies not in making more profession then vve ought but in doing less then vve do profess Therefore although he condemned their hypocrisie yet he commended their profession and set people to imitate and exceed them Mat. 5.20 Except your righteousnesse exceed the righteousnesse of the Scribes and Pharisees ye cannot enter into the kingdom of Heaven Cons 10. These are the greatest despisers of God of Heaven and holiness of any people these bring the greatest contempt upon the kingdom of Heaven of any because they come in sight of it and then go back which is a manifest contempt God was more angry with the people of Israel for talking of returning back to Egypt when they were in the widerness then for all their unwillingness to come out of Egypt Nay he was more offended at their unwillingness to go into Canaan when they came upon the borders of it then for all their murmuring at the red sea especially when they had seen the fruit of it this was a manifest contempt of the good land for if they should have gone back after they came so near unto Canaan it would have broughtmore discredit upon that land then if they had never stirr'd out of Egypt for if they had refused to go out of Egypt all men would have imputed it to their idleness but if they had returned the fault would have been laid upon the land If a man passes by your shops and inquires not for any commodity you take little notice of him but if he see your goods and cheapen them and leave them he either condemns the commodity or the seller either it is not good or it is too dear So men that look not after Heaven do but neglect it but those who come to buy and yet will not come up to the terms these discredit it When men come so neer it as the young man did who was offered it and yet left it when there was but one thing lacking these do bring the greatest dislike upon the things of God of any men alive for these men do in effect say it is not so much worth they say that God offers it at too dear a rate and what greater reproach can there be cast upon the kingdom of heaven then to say it is too dear The prophane sort of men do but neglect it they never ask after it they cheapen not but the half Christian he sees and asks and cheapens but will not buy this is a villifying of it This is your case you that are almost christians you wil bee found the greatest contemners of the ways of God for other men fall short out of ignorance as having not seen or known God but you come oftentimes so neer that you see the kingdom of
of the sinner Thirdly they may be perswaded of the necessity of a change this must needs arise from the two former he that sees the evil of his own wayes together with the danger of them must needs conclude that a change must passe upon him in order to happiness though no unregenerate man does know what that change is which he must suffer if he wil be saved yet many of them know thus much that they must be changed they are convinct that something is to be done for Heaven though they are ignorant of the particulars I have met with some that have confessed that they could not read or think of that passage of Christ John 3.3 Except a man be born again he cannot inherit the kingdom of God but it would perplex their thoughts thus there is I am perswaded in many men a confused general notion of Regeneration though they have not a distinct knowledge of it and they are convinc'd it is a work which they have not yet experienc'd without vvhich they cannot be saved I need not go out of the Congregation for the proof of this I am confident this is the perswasion of many of you who know you must be changed if saved the Lord grant you may not carry these convictions to hell Fourthly they may be convinc'd of the equity of the wayes of God and the reasorableness of all his commands yea and of his judgments How many are there whose affections serve the devil and their lusts who vvil notwithstanding consent in their judgements to the vvayes of God they wil grant vvhen they are urged to it that there is nothing more equitable then that the creature should be conformed to the vvil of the Creator that he that made us should expect from us a submission to his commands seeing vve depevd upon him and vve should improve and spend all that for him which we receive from him The very principles of Reason wil condemn the sinner as a monster and the most irregular person in the vvorld vvho would live without being accountable to God upon whom he depends this is to blot out the notion of a creature out of his heart for vvhat reasonable being could expect this unless he were of himself and could subsist without any help from another if you propose this to the reason of many men they wil confess it is very equitable that the Lord who made us and by vvhose patience and bounty we subsist should put the yoak upon us and that it is no injustice nor exaction in him to require the strictest obedience in us so that vvhen he conside rany or all the ways which the Lord prescribes unto us to walk towards him though hee apprehend them as hard and unpleasant thorough his weakness and corruption yet when he doth but glance upon the soveraigne power of God over his creatures and the dependance of the creatures upon him he must needs say that it is a reasonable thing and just to fear this God and to submitt to all that he commands And as they are convinc'd of the equity and justness of all his commands to us so they are from hence forced to see the justice of that sentence which shal be pronounced against all those that despise and refuse the yoke of the Lord as I hinted before from that of Rom. 1.32 For what is more deeply rooted in nature then this Principle that the work should praise the workman and that the workman should draw forth his own honour and glory from his own and if these shall refuse to serve the ends of their being that then he should subsâ—ract all comfortable influences from them and turne his hand against them for evill Now if these thinges be ingrafted in nature surely men who have many accessions of light to their naturall principles by the gospel under which they live will goe to hell with a conviction of the equitie of those â—hings which the Lord required of them and of the Iudgment which he hath past upon them V. They may be persawded of the truth of the threatnings and promises so that they may be able sometimes to looke into heaven and hell through the truth of God in the one and the other Thus Balaam saw the reality of those promises which God had made to Israel and he saw also the certainty of the fulfilling of all that God had spoken against the enemies thereof thus the eyes of wicked men are sometimes opened especially of temporary beleevers and such as are almost christians that they are cleerly convinc'd that there will be a difference betwixt those that fear the Lord and those that fear him not they know it will goe ill with the wicked but it will goe well with the godly so that when the threats denounced against such are opened they tremble as Faelix did at the preaching of judgement to come Acts 24.25 They feel something of what is threatned already in their consciences the word is as hot as an oven to them which scorches them convictions and terrors which from thence fall upon them are like streams of fire breaking out of hell it self so that if we did but some times observe and consider the impressions that are made upon such mens spirtis it would put it out of doubt whether there be a hell or not and men vvould conclude that the dreadful things threatned in the Word of God are not ciphers or things to be played vvithal or the inventions of men onely to keep others in awe as some Atheists have believed but that they are truths whereof one tittle shal not fall to the ground unperformed these things vvicked men know to be true here and shal feel them true hereafter yea these tastes of the truth of the threatnings make oftentimes great visible changes in them and they do much to escape the judgement written thus Herod did many things when he heard John Baptist and the Jews being terrified with the sharpnesse of his Ministry came to him confessing their sins Mat. 3.6 What says he to them You generation of Vipers who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come as if he had said Now that hell has flasht in your faces you come in a fit of terror and you pretend to be sorrowful for your sins but let me see such things as wil evidence this in after-fruits Beside this they are convinc'd of the truth of the promises of God made to his people And when the terrors which brake in from the threatnings has made some external change upon them mistaking themselves and taking this which is wrought for a gracious change they reckon themselves among the regenerate and reading the promises which are made to these they confidently apply them to themselves and that not without abundance of joy Thus did Herod Mark 6.20 when Johns Doctrines had some impressions upon him and these had made an alteration in his practises and ways having reformed many things that were amiss
measure and clearness of these such wil be their shame and such will be their confusion to see how near they came to the kingdom of God and yet shut out God convinâ—es those of sin whom he intends to save that they may condemn themselves and justifie God here and he convinces many whom be intends not to save that they may be forced to justifie him hereafter when he shal condemn them Psalm 51.3 4. Against thee have I sinned that thou mayest be justified when thou speakest and pure when thou judgest David did not sin that God might be justified but David was convinced of his sin that God might be cleared and David condemned in himself Saints convictions make them humble themselves and the convictions restraints which are thereby made upon wicked men will make very much for the justifying of God at the last and for the taking of all excuse from them for they can never answer this plea If there were not evil in sin why did you fear or refrain from any and if there was evil in it why did you not refrain all sin and this will stop their mouths that they had knowledg of this day of the judgement of it for God wil take out a copy of the Judgement of the day out of their own consciences CHAP. VI. Shewing the reasons why men so far perswaded go no further QV How comes it to pass that men thus far perswaded go no farther As it is a wonder that men go so far as some do without grace so it is as strange a thing that being brought so far they should stop here but this is First from Satan he labours to blinde their eyes that they should not see the things that belong to their peace but if he cannot keep them in a gross darkness and in a total neglect of Heaven then he hath a hundred ways to couzen them and to bring them to composition and to perswade them to half it with God if he cannot keep them where they are yet he will make them sit down in the mid way to Heaven he knows that he that underbids shal buy the truth no more then he that never cheapens it He knows Christ hath set the price upon it and he that vvil not give all that he hath for the kingdome of Heaven shal as surely lose it as he that wil give nothing He that wil keep one sin or deny one command of Christ to submitt to it shall thereby be excluded as well as he that yeelds in nothing to Christ the devill does labour therefore to hinder awakened soules from comming up fully to Christ when he cannot hinder them from doing something he wil perswade them to keep the right hand or to spare the right eye If they will take their lamps yet he wil not suffer them to take oyl for their vessells and this way Satan cousins not a few who cannot be tempted to sitt still yet are easily kept from pressing forward to the mark Rea. 2 From their consciences Conscience having attained its end which was peace the man sits down It was nothing but trouble of conscience at first that makes such men stirr and now by doing something having obtained a little peace they say soul thou hast enough they never act in religion beyond necessitie nor goe further then the terrours and feares of conscience will drive them and these are oft times removed without grace and they sit down without Christ I shewed you in the former how the devill did hide from them the extent of their duties and the latitude of Christ commands that so they might not attempt to goe farther then hâ— might consent unto with security to his own interest in them having cozened them into a good opinion of themselves mis-represented the work of grace and the change which is wrought in them they think all is wel and conscience is in a great calme and this being once asleepe againe they settle upon their lees the dregs which are yet left are not purged out for all the motions of man which proceed from no other principle then the feares of death hel carry a man no farther then to seeke his own peace the conscience is wounded and if the man can lick that whole again hee is quiet but if the will were wrought upon he would not set down till he were perfectly changed Reas 3. may be from their own corruption Being awakned by the word they begin to stirr under the sense of the danger and being convinced of the truth they receive it with joy and like Herod do many things til it comes to some peculiar corruption and there they are stopped there is some darling lust or other that they cannot leap over they march like Jehu furiously vvith a seeming zeal for God til they come to the golden Calves of Dan and Bethel and they cannot pull these down some lust some interest some advantage hinders them from following of Christ fully and had they but grace in their wils sutable to the light in their understandings they would be Christians indeed as in the case of Jehu 2 King 10.25 29 30. The young man in the gospel goes on very chearfully and bids fair for Heaven as one that was resolved to have it upon any termes Mat. 19.20 What lack I yet He seems to be vvilling to give more for Heaven then all had yet given and to do more then yet he had done as if all that God had required in the law had been too little and too low a price for glory but when Christ makes a proposal to him which met with his darling sin which was the love of the world he goes away sorrowful This man that was so near the kingdome of Heaven in all appearance leaves it behind him for the love of one corruption this is the case of every haif-Christian one Iust or other hinders them though they seem to run wel and parts Christ and them for ever Reas 4. From the meanes they live under they may live under a fawning and flattering Ministry who vvil perswade them that the smoak is a fire and the spark is a flame that cry peace peace where there is none healing their vvounds sleightly and daubing them vvith untempered mortar Ezek. 13.10 How many are there that go to Hel in peace whom their Ministers canonize here for Saints how many are careless of themselves by reason of their Ministers considence who wil salute his people by the name of beleevers as if he knew their place in Heaven This makes them think they live high when indeed 't is he that preaches low and that all is wel because he never shewed them how ill it is Men preach the work of conversion by halves they search not their people to the quick they come not neer the consciences of their hearers neither do they labour to do it if they can cloath their matter in silken and soft language that may please the ears