not be desired simply and ultimately for it self As you must pray but for your daily bread and be content with food and rayment so you must see that these be but for better things even in order to the doing of the Will of God the promoting of his Kingdom and the Hallowing of his Name which must be first and most desired The order of your duty is to seek first the Kingdom of God and his Righteousness and then other things are promised with it Matth. 6. 33. and therefore for it must be desired and sought And if your very food and life must be desired but for this everlasting End then it is still but one thing that is necessary and finally to be desired For the Means is willed but with an imperfect willing because not for it self and that only hath our full and perfect Love which is Loved for it self Even in the act of Love unto the Means it is more properly the End that is Loved then the Means and the Means is chosen for that End So that you see that for all the necessity of creatures and of diligence in our Callings the truth is still clear that it is only One thing that is truly Necessary Use THE understandidg is the subservient faculty to let in that light which may by direction and excitation guide the will Having shewed you the Truth I am next to shew you how you may improve it and so to apply it as may best help you to apply it to your selves And if I should here fall upon things impertinent or make it my work to claw your ears or exalt my self in your esteem by an unseasonable ostentation of learning or eloquence or carry on any such corrupt design while I should faithfully do the work of God my Text it self would openly condemn me If One thing be needful it is that One that I must do my self while I am exhorting you to do it And woe be to me if I should lay by that to do any other unnecessary work even to fish for the applause of Carnal wits while my very subject is the Reproofs of Christ against a much more tolerable error And as to the manner of my admonition if One thing be needful I hope you will allow me to be as plain and serious as I can about this One And my first address to you shall be for tryall And I shall make it now my earnest request to you that you â—ill bethink you how much you are concerned to compare your â—arts and lives with this passage and judge your selves by the Word of God that is now before you And for your own sakes â—â— it seriously and faithfully as passengers that are hasting to the â—â—eat Assize What say your Consciences Sirs to this Question Have you indeed lived in the world as men that believe that One thing is necessary Hath this One had your chiefest care and labour and have you chosen rather to neglect all other things then â—is Look behind you and judge of the course that you have taken by the light of this one text I do not ask you Whether you have heard that One thing is Necessary nor whether you have talked of it and confessed it to be true nor whether you have been called Christians by your selves and others and have come to Church and forborn those sins that would have most â—â—emished your honour in the world This is nothing to the question Thus many thousands do that were never acquainted with the One thing Necessary Nor do I ask you Whether you have used to allow God half an hours lip-service or formal â—rowsie prayer at night when you have served the world and â—â—esh all day Nor whether you have been Religious on the by and given God some lean devotion which cost you little and which your flesh can spare without any great diminution or deâ—iment in its ease and honour and profit and sensual delights Nor whether you run to some kinde of duties of Religion to make all whole when you come from wilful reigning sin and so make Religion a fortress to your lusts to quiet your Consciences while you serve the flesh I confess such a kind of Religioussess as this the world is acquained with But this is unanswerable to the Rule before us But the question is Whether this One thing hath been the Treasure and Jewel of your estimation the darling of your affections the prize of your most diligent endeavours and the only felicity of your souls Sirs as lightly as you hear this question now you will One day find that your lives yea your salvation lyeth upon your answer to it Can you say truly as before the searcher of hearts that it is he that hath had your hearts That this One thing hath been more esteemed by you than all the world besides That other things have all stooped unto this One and served under it And that this hath had the stream of your heartiest affections and the drift of your endeavours and hath been the matter that you have had first to do and the thing for which you have lived in the world If this be not so never talk of your Christianity for shame Your Religion is vain if this be not your Religion Alas I know that we have all of us yet too much of the flesh and are too cold in our affections and too slow and uneven in our endeavours for our end But yet for all that I must still tell you as I have often done because it is necessary that here lyeth the difference between the truly sanctified soul and all the hypocrites and half-Christians in the world Every true Christian is devoted unto God and hath made an hearty and absolute resignation of himself and all that he hath unto him and therefore loveth him with his superlative most appretiative love and serveth him with the best he hath and thinks nothing too good or too dear for God and for the attainment of his everlasting Rest Christ hath the chiefest room in his heart and the bent and drift of his life is for him He studyeth how he may best serve and please him with his time his interest and all that he hath and if he fall as it is contrary to the habitual resolution of his soul and contrary to the scope and current of his heart and life so he riseth again by repentance with sorrow for his sin and loathing of himself and sincerely endeavours to amend and goeth on resolvedly in his holy course This is the state of every one that is in a state of life But for all hypocrites and half-Christians their case is otherwise The world and flesh is dearest to them and highest in their practical estimation though not in their speculative and it hath their highest affections of Love and Delight and the very bent and stream of heart and life while God is served heartlesly on the by for fear lest they be damned when they can enjoy
soul may well be fullest of Delight that is most Happy And that soul is nearest and likest unto God whose Will is most conformed to his Will The trouble of the Heart is its unsettledness when it is not bottomed on the Will of God When we feel that Gods Will doth Rule and satisfie us and that we would fain be what he would have us be and rest in his Disposing Will as well as obey his Commanding Will this gives abundant Pleasure and quietness to the soul 2. The holy workings of Charity in the soul are exceeding Pleasant All the acts of Love to God and man are very sweet This is the holy work that is its own wages 1. The â—â—â—â— of God is so sweet an exercise that verily my soul had rather be employed in it with sense and vigour then to be Lord of all the earth O could I but be taken up with the Love of God how easily could I spare the Pleasure of the flesh Might I but see the Loveliness of my dear Creator with a clearer view and see his glory in his noble works Might I but see and feel that saving Love which he hath manifested in the Redeemer till my soul were ravished and filled with his Love how little should I care who had the Pleasures of this deceitful world Had I more of that blessed spirit of Adoption and more of those filial affections to my heavenly Father which his unutterable Love bespeaks and were I more sensible of his abundant mercy and did my soul but breath and long after him more earnestly I would pitty the miserable Tyrants of the world that are worse then Beggars while they domineer and tast not of that Kingdom of Love and Pleasure that dwelleth in my breast All the Pleasures of the world are the laughing of a mad man or the sports of a child or the dreams of a sick man in comparison of the Pleasures of the Love of God 2. And the Love of Holiness the Image of God hath its degree of Pleasure And so hath the Love of the Holy servants of the Lord. There is a sweetness in the soul in its goings out after any Holy object in spiritual Love Yea more our very common Love of men and our Love of Enemies hath its proportion of pleasure far better then the sensual Pleasure of the ungodly To feel so much of the operations of grace and to answer our holy pattern in Loving them that hate us doth give much ease and pleasure to the mind The exercises of Love to God and man and that for his sake are the exceeding Pleasure of a gracious soul And here by the way you may take notice of one reason why Hypocrites and ungodly men find no such sweetness in the exercises of Religion Because they let alone the inward Pleasant work of Love which is the soul and life of Outward duty This inward work is the Pleasant work while they are strangers unto this their outward duties will be but a toll 〈…〉 seem a drudgery or a wearysome employment There is a Pleasure even in Holy Desires When a Christian feeleth his heart enlarged in longing after the wellfare of the Church and the good of others Though the absence of the thing desired be aâ—…e yet the exercise of holy desire which is an act of Love is pleasant to us If the Lustfu have a pleasure in their vile Desires and the Ambitious and the Covetous have a pleasure in their vain and delusory desires the wise well-guided desires of a true believer must needs be pleasant 4. Especially when Desire is accompanied with Hope All the Pleasures of this world are far short of affording that Rest and quiet to the soul as the Hope of Glory doth to the believer O happy soul that is acquainted by experience with the lively Hopes of the everlasting Happiness It is not the Hope of corruptible Riches nor of a fading inheritance but of the Crown that sadeth not and of the precious certain durable treasure It is not a Hope in the promise of a deceitful man but in the word of the everliving God! The soul that hath this Anchor needs not be tossed with those fears and cares and anxieties of mind that worldly men are subject to This Hope will never make them ashamed If a man were in a consumption or sentenced to Death would not the Hopes of Life upon certain Grounds be pleasanter to him then sport or mirth or lustful objects or any such present sensitive delights Much more if with the hopes of Life he had the hopes of all the felicities of Life and of the perpetuity of all these O may I but be enabled by faith to lift up the eye of my soul to God and view the everlasting mansions and by hope to take possession of them and say All this is mine in Title even upon the Promise of the faithful God! what greater Pleasure can my soul possess till it enter on the full Possession of those eternal Pleasures O poor deluded worldly men What is the Pleasure of your wealth to this O brutish sinners what is the Pleasure of your mirth and jollity your meat and drink your pride and bravery your lust and filthiness in comparison of this O poor Ambitious dreaming men that make such a stir for the Honour and Greatness of this world What is the Pleasure of your Idol-honour and short vainglory in comparison of this while you have it you have no Hope of Keeping it you are troubled with the thought of leaving it Had we no higher Hopes then yours how miserable should we be 5. The Trust and repose of the soul on God which is another part of the life of grace is exceeding Pleasant and quieting to the soul To find that we stand upon a Rock and that under us are the everlasting arms and that we have so full security for our salvation as the promise and Oath of the immutable God what a stay what a Pleasure is this to the Believer The troubles of the godly are most from the remnants of their unbelief The more they believe the more they are comforted and established The life of faith is a Pleasant life Faith could not conquer so many enemies and carry us through so much suffering and distress as you find in that cloud of testimonies Heb. 11. if it were not a very comfortable work Even we that see not the salvation ready to be revealed may yet greatly rejoyce for all the manifold temptations that for a season make us subject to some heavyness 1 Pet. 1. 5 6. And we that see not Jesus Christ yet Believing can love him and rejoyce with joy unspeakable and full of glory v. 8. The God of Hope doth sometimes fill his servants with all Joy and peace in believing and makes them even abound in Hope through the Power of the Holy Ghost Rom. 15. 13. 6. Yea Joy is it self a part of the Holy qualification of the Saints and of
though many undo their souls for fleshly pleasures and delights yet he is a strange man indeed that will offend God even for self-tormenting grief and trouble O therefore dear Christians as you have let go all your sensual pleasures for the pleasing of your Lord do not let go the pleasures of his love for which you have let go all The Lord taketh pleasure in his people even in them that fear him in those that hope in his mercy and the meek he will beautifie with salvation Psalm 147. 11. It is meet therefore that his people take pleasure in the Lord that the Saints be joyful in glory that they sing aloud upon their beds and that the high praises of God be in their mouthes Psalm 149. 4 5 6. O let not the Spirit of God be thought to be like the evil spirit that vexed Saul that filled his mind with melancholy anguish and confusion It is the evil spirit that renteth and tormenteth those that it possesseth though the spirit of God doth humble and by ordinate sorrow prepare for joy But its proper work is to sanctifie and to comfort and to establish the Believer with Peace that passeth understanding As it is a greater sign of the operation of the Spirit of Christ to restore the lapsed by a spirit of meekness and to bear one anothers burdens and exercise tenderness compassion and charity then to censure and envy and call for fire from heaven So even at home though there we are allowed to be more rigid and censorious it is a more sure and satisfactory discovery of the Spirit of Grace within us if we are raised to a sweet delight in God and quieted in his Love and carryed out in chearful obedience thankfully acknowledging the grace that we have received and waiting in the use of means for more then if we are only turmoiled and troubled in our minds and tossed up and down with unprofitable griefs and fears that abate our Love to God and our holy joyes It is the still voice that doth most fully acquaint us that it is Christ the Prince of Peace that speaketh to us Though at first when he findeth a sinner in a state of enmity and rebellion he often useth to thunder and lighten and call to him as to Saul Why persecutest thou me Wilt thou kick against the pricks Wilt thou fight against heaven Or canst thou bear the wrath of God Almighty Yet to the humbled penitent soul there is none in all the world so tender as Jesus Christ the Lamb of God the Churches husband that cherisheth them as his own flesh O that you did but know the greatness and tenderness of his love to you while you lie trembling under the unjust apprehensions of his wrath It would then so transport you with ravishing delights that the world would see that the Saints of the most High have higher Pleasures then the world affordeth BUt I know you will say Alas what need you exhort us to spiritual pleasures and consolations Do you think there is any man in love with sorrows or unwilling to live a joyful life O that you could tell us how we might attain it and you should quickly see that we are willing Answ And if you are so willing to attain it as to be also willing to use the means you shall quicklyer see that I shall certainly inform you how you may attain it and how you may come to find a life of Holiness to be the most sweet and pleasant life I therefore desire and require you to practise these Directions following Direct 1. Make it your first and principal business to attain the fullest fixed knowledge of God in his Attributes and Covenant-Relations to you 1. Study him in his Attributes If infinite Goodness take not up the soul with Love and with Delight it is because it is not known Where there is all things that the soul of man desires to its highest felicity and content and yet contentment and delight is wanting it must needs be ignorance and distance that is the cause If the Sun seem not light to you it is because you have not eye-sight or look not on the light If you find no pleasure in the most pleasant food it is because your appetites are diseased or you do not taste it If your most suitable and most affectionate friend seem not amiable to you it is because you know not his suitableness and love So if the eternal God that is infinitely powerful wise and good most perfect and most suitable to your highest affections do not possess you with abundant Pleasures and Delights of Love it is because you are unacquainted with him Study then his infinite perfections and be much with him in secret prayer and meditation where the retired soul having fewest avocations is fittest for the most near familiar converse And still remember that it is Love it self that you have to do with For God is Love It is the fountain of all delights and pleasures that you draw near to It is a cold heart indeed that fire it self cannot warm and a dead heart indeed that life it self cannot revive Conceive of God as God and you will delight in him Abhort all unworthy diminutive thoughts of him Set up his Love and Goodness in your estimation as infinitely above all the creatures Believe it the Love of your dearest friends is an inconsiderable drop to the Ocean of his Love Think not of him as cruel or an enemy if you would love him or delight in him Love and Delight are never forced by bare commands and threatnings but drawn forth magnetically by attractive Goodness Were not God most amiable and friendly and desirable to us it is not saying Love me or I will damn thee that would ever have caused man to love him but rather to fear and hate and fly from him Think but of Gods Love and Goodness and Fidelity as you do of his Power and then you will find that there are rivers of pleasure in his presence and fulness of joy at his right hand the fore-tastes whereof are the only delights that can quiet the troubled thirsty soul 2. And if you say What is all this to me any more then to the ungodly world on whom the wrath of God abideth I answer Thou art in Covenant with him and he is thine in the Covenant Relations even thy Reconciled Father thy Saviour and thy Sanctifier No husband is so inviolably bound to a wife nor will so faithfully answer his Relation as the blessed Creator Redeemer and Sanctifier unto thee Didst thou well know and consider what it is to have God himself to be thine in Covenant to all these uses and to all the ends that thou canst reasonably desire it would fill up thy soul with satisfying delights There is nothing that thou wantest but what belongs to God to give thee in one of these three great relations And sooner shall the day be turned into night and the frame of
little longer in such impudent calumniations against me and other Ministers of Christ But know that thy day is coming and that for all these things thou shalt come to judgement and if thou justifie the ungodly yet remember that It is not good to have respect of persons in judgement and he that saith to the wicked Thou art Righteous the people shall curse him Nations shall abhorr him Prov. 24. 23 24. He that justifieth the wicked and he that condemneth the just even they both are abomination to the Lord. Prov. 17. 15. Wo unto them that call Evil Good and Good Evil that put darkness for light and light for darkness that put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter which justifie the wicked for reward and take away the righteousness of the righteous from him therefore as the fire devoureth the stubble and the flame consumeth the chaff so their root shall be rottenness and their blossom shall go up as the dust because they have cast away the Law of the Lord of Hosts and despised the word of the holy one of Israel Isa 5. 20 23 24. Let the malicious serpent accuse Job before God in the end it shall turn to his own confusion And if any of the Princes of the earth will by Doegs be provoked to destroy the Priests or by jealousie kindled by malicious whisperers be incited to do by the servants of Christ as they did by the Waldenses Bohemians Protestants in many places c. we will remember the memorable words of David 1 Sam. 26. 18 19. and let the sufferers imitate him in the submissive part Wherefore doth my Lord pursue after his servant for what have I done or what evil is in my hand Now therefore I pray thee let my Lord the King hear the words of his servant If the Lord have stirred thee up against me let him accept an offering but if it be the children of men cursed be they before the Lord for they have driven me out this day from abiding in the inheritance of the Lord saying Go serve other Gods By going where they are served HAving fully shewed you What Godliness is I now beseech thee Reader to enquire Whether this described case be thine Art thou Devoted to God without reserve as being not thine own but his And hast thou devoted all thou hast to him with thy self to be used according to his Will Art thou mere subjected to his Authority and observant of his Laws and Government then of mans and can his word do more with thee tâ—en the word of any mortal man or then the violence of thy lusts and passions Art thou heartily engaged to him as thy felicity and dost thou give up thy self to him in filial Love dependance and observance as to thy dearest friend and Father Dost thou highlyest esteem him and resolvedly choose him and sincerely seek him preferring nothing in thy Estimation Choice Resolution or Endeavour before him Try by these and the other particulars in the Description whether you are Godly or ungodly and do it faithfully for the day is at hand when the ungodly shall not stand in judgement nor sinners in the Assembly of the just Psal 1. 5. And besides the marks expressed in the description let me offer you some from the plain words of the Textâ— that you may see what God accounteth Godliness and consequently â—…w to judge your selves 1. In John 3. 3 5 6. it is written Verily except a â—…an be born again he cannot enter into the Kingdom of â—…od That which is born of the flesh is flesh and â—…at which is born of the Spirit is Spirit 2 Cor. 5. 17. 〈…〉 any man be in Christ he is a new creature old things â—…e passed away behold all things are become new â—…om 8. 9. If any man have not the spirit of Christ the â—…me is none of his From these Texts you see that a heart and life made new â—…y the Spirit of Jesus Christ is absolutely necessary to true Godliness 2. Psalm 119. 5. O that my wayes were directed to keep thy Statutes Rom. 7. 18. To will is present with â—…e Psalm 73. 25. Whom have I in heaven but thee â—nd there is none on earth c. Isa 26. 8. The desire of our soul is to thy name and to the remembrance of â—…hee From these and such like texts it is evident that The principal desires of a godly man and the choice of his will is to be what God would have him be 3. Psalm 1. 2. His delight is in the Law of the Lord and therein doth he meditate day and night 1 Pet. 2. 2. As new born babes desire the sincere milk of the Word that ye may grow thereby Luke 10. 42. From these and such like Texts it is manifest That all the Godly do Love the Word of God as the food of their souls and the director of their lives 4. Matth. 6. 20 21 33. Lay up for your selves a treasure in heaven c. For where your treasure is there will your hearts be also Seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness Matth. 7. 13. Luke 24. Enter in at the strait gate strive to enter in for many shall seek and shall not be able 2 Pet. 1. 10. Give diligence to make your calling and election sure Rom. 12. 11. From these and such texts you may discern that Godliness consisteth in such diligence for salvation as to seek it before any earthly thing and not to think the labour of a holy life too much for it 5. Rom. 8. 1 5 6 7 8 13. Gal. 5. 18 19. Read them and you will see that Godliness consisteth in living after the spirit and not after the flesh and in mortifying the deeds of the body by the spirit living not by sensuality but by Faith 6. John 3. 19 20. And this is the condemnation that light is come into the world and men loved darkness rather then light because their deeds were evil For every one that doth evil hateth the light neither cometh to the light lest his deeds should be reproved but he that doth truth cometh to the light c. 1 King 21. 7 8 And the King of Israel said to Jehoshaphat there is yet one man Micaiah by whom we may enquire of the Lord but I hate him for he doth not prophesie good concerning me but evil And Jehoshaphat said Let not the King say so From these and such like Texts you see that The Godly love the discovering light and the most searching faithful preacher but the ungodly cannot endure the light which sheweth them their sins nor love the Preachers that tell them of their sin and misery 7. 1 Cor. 13. John 13. 35. By this shall all men know that ye are my Disciples if you love one another 1 John 3. 14. We know that we have passed from death to life because we love the Brethren Psal 15. 4. In whose eyes a vile person is contemned but he honoureth them that
Erroneous Sectaries are blinded in some particular points by the seducing words of men And ungodly sensualists are blinded in the main and damnably err from the necessary practical doctrines of salvation being deceived by the inclination of their own concupiscence Errors are multifarious and abound even in many that inveigh most fiercely against the erroneous But Truth is simple We have One Teacher to instruct us One Spirit to enlighten us One Word of God to be our Rule One Light to guide us through all the darkness and mazes of the world and recover our deluded darkened minds Thousands are ready to draw us away from God Temptations lye thick on every hand Within us and without us before us and on each side Which way can you look or go but you will meet with baits and snares And if Eve be once deceived Adam is the easilier overcome When the appetite and senses are ensnared by their objects and the imagination corrupted the understanding is in danger of deceit You may go into an Hospital and see variety of diseases but Health is one and the same One hath the pestilence and another hath the leprosie and another a palsie and another is distracted but among a thousand people in Health you see no such difference Health only is formally the cure of all What abundance of miserable sinners be in the world that are almost at Hell already But only one sort of men even the regenerate are rescued by grace and shall be saved from it Many inventions have men found out for their destruction but there is no way but by Christ through faith and holiness to their salvation Set as light by Christ and Holiness as you will and deride it as foolishly and perversly as you please you will find at last that this way or none must bring you to Heaven Either ignorance or pride or covetousness or malice or gluttony or drunkenness or voluptuousness or lust or any one sin of an hundred may be your ruine But there is only One salve to heal these sores and only one cordiall or antidote that can expell these several sorts of poison from your hearts Godliness is profitable to all things 1 Tim. 4. 8. Drudge for the world as long as you will and gape after honour and applause from men and try a thousand wayes for your content but when you have all done you must return by sound Repentance into the way of holiness or you are lost for ever When you have slighted grace you must give up your selves to the power of that grace When you have set light by a life of holy Love to God and the fruition of him in Glory you must make it your treasure and delight and your hearts must be upon it or you are undone Matth. 6. 21. When you have made a jeast of a Holy life you must come about and take your selves that course that you jeasted at though you be as much jeasted at by others yea and make it the principal business of your lives or perish in hell under the vengeance of the Almighty whose justice you provoked and whose mercy you neglected Choose you whether but one of them will be your part Even as Saul that was exceeding mad against Believers and persecuted them even to strange Cities Acts 26. 10 11. was glad to become one of them himself though he suffered as much as he had caused them to suffer and accounted it the greatest mercy of his life that God vouchafed him such a change what ever it cost him IV. Quest But is nothing necessary but this One Are not other things also Needfull in their places Answ I told you that other things are not other so far as they stand in due subordination to this one or are the parts of it He that saith to a sick man You would do well if you had such a skilfull man for your Physicion doth not by these words intend to exclude his Apothecary or his medicines or the taking of them or the instruments and means by which they are applyed but rather includeth and implyeth all these in the One thing mentioned to which they do subserve So all Gods graces and all the means of grace and Christian duties are contained or implyed in the One thing Necessary or supposed to it Because it is One thing that is necessary as the End therefore many means are necessary to the obtaining of it Though there be also a kind of unity as hath been shewed among those means Quest But are not outward things also necessary Must we not have food and rayment and must we not labour and provide it and take care for our families and follow our callings Must we not by lawfull means avoid reproach and poverty in the world Answ In the way of Duty it is as necessary that we labour in our callings and provide things honest and subserve Gods providence for the maintenance of our selves and others And the things of this life and Needful so far as Life is needful that we may have Time and strength to do our works and be supported while we seek the One thing needful But that which is not Necessary for it self but for another thing is not simply or principally Necessary So far as Heaven may be obtained and the work of Christianity done without the accommodations of the flesh so far these worldly things are needless There is no Necessity that you be Rich or Honourable or that you live in Health or Wealth or that you escape the hatred and reproach and trouble of a malicious world There is no Necessity that you should save your lives when Christ requireth them For he that so saveth his life shall lose it Matth. 16. 25. And that Usefulness which you may in a lower sense call Necessity that any of these things are of is but in their respect to the One thing Necessary as they are sanctified means to the service of God and our salvation If your daily bread be to be called Necessary it is not for it self or for your flâ—shly pleasure nor ultimately for your life it self but to sustain your life while you are seeking after life eternal and serving him that is the Lord of life Your Credit or Honour or Pleasure in the world are no further Necessary or Usefull to you then they promote this great End for your selves or others Nothing but God is simply Necessary for himself and Nothing else is any way truly Necessary but for him And therefore as by Necessity of precept you must labour in your Callings and seek provision for your selves and families you must most carefully watch your Hearts that your desires and labours be not carnal as tending only to carnal ends â—ut that you sincerely subject the things desired to the One thing necessary for which you must desire them and therefore that you desire but such measures and proportions as are most suitable to that End which is only for it self desireable Even life it self must
the world and sin no longer and is put off with the leavings of the flesh and hath no more of their hearts their tongues their time their wealth then it can spare They ask their flesh how far they shall be Religious and will go no further then will stand with their prosperity in the world With the first and best they serve the flesh and with the cheapest and the refuse they serve the Lord When they go highest in their out-side carnal Religiousness they go not beyond this hypocritical reserved state and usually as Cain they hate Abel for offering a more acceptable sacrifice God must take up with this from them or â—â— without They alway serve him with this reserve though it 〈…〉 not alwayes explicite and discerned by them Provided that â—â— may go well with me in the world and I may have some competent proportion of honour profit or pleasure and Religion may not â—â—ose me to be undone If God will not take them on these 〈…〉 as most certainly he never will he must go look him â—â—â—er servants and so he will and make them know at last 〈…〉 their sorrow that he needed not their service but it was 〈…〉 that needed him and the benefits of his service I thought meet though I have done it oft before to give â—â—â— this difference between the Hypocrite and the sincere And â—â—w it is my earnest request unto you all that you will presently â—â— your souls to an account and know which of these two â—â—rses you have taken and which of these two is your own â—â—ondition If nature had made you such strangers to your selves as that 〈…〉 were unable to answer such a question I would never trouble 〈…〉 with it but I suppose by faithful enquiry you may know 〈…〉 much of your selves if you are but willing You know where it is that you have dwelt and what it is that you have been â—â—â—ng in the world and you can review the actions of your lives though they have been of smaller consequence Why then may 〈…〉 not quickly know if you will so great a thing as What hath â—â— the very End and Business for which you have lived in the â—â—rld till now Have you been running so long and know not â—â— what is the prize that you have run for Have you forgot the â—â— and that you have been so long going on Have you been â—â—sie all your daies till now and know not about what or why â—ertainly this is a thing that may be known if you are willing and â—igent to know it It is for one of these two that you have â—â—ed for the world or for God To please your flesh or to â—ease God and be saved Either to make provision for Earth or â—raven Which of these is it Deal plainly with your selves â—or your salvation is deeply concerned in the account Perhaps you will say that It was for both for as you have a soul and a body so you must look to both Yea but so as one â—â—at knoweth that One thing is Needful As your body is but â—â—e prison the case the servant of your souls so it must be proâ—â—ded for and used but as a servant and maintained only in a fitâ—ess for its work But the question is Which of them hath had the preheminence Which hath had the life of your affections and endeavours Which of them was your end and about which hath been the chief business that you have most carefully and diligently carryed on This is the great question You cannot have two masters though you may have many instruments and fellow-servants You cannot acceptably serve God if you serve Mammon Every wicked man may do somthing in Religion and every good man may do something that is contrary to Religion A carnal man may do something for God and for his soul and a spiritual man ought to do something subordinately for his body and too often alas doth something for it inordinately But which bears the sway and which is first sought and which comes behind and hath but the leavings of the other Be not deceived God is not mocked Whatsoever a man soweth that shall he reap If you sow to the flesh of the flesh you shall reap corruption but if you sow to the spirit of the spirit you shall reap everlasting life Gal. 6. 7 8. Love not the world nor the things that are in the world for themselves for if any man love the world with his chiefest Love the Love of the Father is not in him 1 John 2. 15. Is it not a wonder that any reasonable man can be such a stranger to himself as not to know what he lives for and what hath had his heart and what hath been the principal business of his life Some by-matters you may easily forget or over-look but can you do so by your end which hath been your chiefest care and business If indeed you no more know your own minds nor what you have all this while been doing in the world ask those that you have conversed with and judge by the effects and signs Others can tell what you have most seriously talked of They may conjecture by their observation what you have most carefully sought and resolutely adhered to Whether it be God or the flesh this world or Heaven The One thing Needful or the many troubling trifles in your way It is like that wise and godly observers can help you to discern it though sensualists will but deceive you A mans Love at least his chiefest Love cannot be hid but will appear in his behaviour If you Love God above the world you will seek him and his Glory before the world and if you do so it may partly be discerned if you have conversed with discerning men Heaven and earth are not so like nor the way to each of them so like but it may partly be discerned which way men are going and what they drive at in their daily course But I will urge you no further to the tryal I will take it for granted that your Consciences are telling many of you that you have been troubled about many things while the One thing Needful hath been neglected And if indeed this be your case suffer me to tell the guilty plainly what it is that they have done 1. Whatever you have been doing in the world you have lost your Time if you have not been seeking the One thing necessary If you have been gathering riches or growing up in honour as the rush groweth in the mire Job 8. 11. or filling your purses or your barnes or pleasing your fantasies and flesh you have but fooled away your time and done just nothing and much worse Nothing is done if the One thing Necessary be undone Believe it Time is a precious thing and ought not to have been thus cast away When you come to the end of it the worst and proudest of you shall confess it is precious Then O for one year more
sons though you have lived as his enemies Though you have lived like Swine and Serpents he will put you into his bosom if you will but be washed and changed by his grace Though you have set more by your worldly riches then by his glory and have set more by the favour of mortal man then by his favour and though you have set more by your bellies and your brutish pleasures and little toyes then you have done by everlasting life he will yet be merciful to you and put up all these indignities at your hands and take you into his dearest love if you will but Now become new creatures and give your hearts to him that made them and seek that first that is worth the finding and lose not the rest of your lives and labour upon unprofitable things What can you say against this offer Is it not unconceivable and unspeakable mercy O what would the damned give for such an offer O what would you your selves give another day for such an offer if you now neglect it What say you then will you accept of this offer of mercy while it may be had and close with Grace while Grace would save you or will you not As ever you look for mercy in the hour of your distress when nothing but mercy can stand your souls in any stead take mercy now while it may be had Refuse it not when it is offered you as you would not be refused by it when Hell and Desparation would devour you If you slight it because it is free you slight it because it is great and therefore greatly to be valued Think not hereafter to have it at your beck if you neglect it now when it seeks for your acceptance Do not say I will a little longer keep my sins and a little longer enjoy my pleasures for I can have Christs offer at any time before I die O little dost thou know what a stab such a trifling purpose may give to the very heart of all thy hopes and happiness and how terribly God may make thee know how ill he taketh thy unthankfulness and contempt and how dear one other week of sinful pleasure may cost thy soul In the name of God I warn you do not so despise everlasting happiness Do not so trample on the blood of Christ if you would be saved by it Do not abuse the Spirit of Grace if you would be sanctified by it Play not any longer with the consuming fire the wrath of a jealous and Almighty God Jest not with damnation Though Grace be now offered you it will not be at your command Despise this motion and you may be out of hearing before the next What can you expect if you will slight such mercy but either that Death should shortly bring you to your reckoning or that God should leave you to your selves and give you up to the hardness of your hearts And if you will needs choose the world and fleshly pleasure and God and Glory shall be thus contemptuously past by you may take your choice and see what you will get by it But remember what an offer you had this day and that heaven was once within your reach and that it might have been yours for ever if you would But because I am loth to leave you so I will try by some such Arguments as the Reason of man must needs approve Whether yet you may not be brought to your selves and yield to grace that you may be saved And they shall be the Arguments that lie before you here in the Text. 1. REmember it is Necessity that is pleaded with you in my Text. One thing is Necessary Necessity and your own Necessity is such an Argument as one would think of it self should turn the scales and fully resolve you and put you past any further deliberation or delay If Necessity your own Necessity and so great Necessity to so great an End will not prevail with you What will Necessity is that ingens telum that natural reason taketh to be unresistible Men think they may do almost any thing if they can say Necessity commandeth it Omnem legem frangit magnum illud humanae imbecillitatis patroeinium saith Seneca What is it that Necessity seemeth not sufficient to justifie with the most And we will grant the Argument to be undenyable if it be from absolute Necessity indeed and if men will not dream that it is more Necessary to be Rich or Honourable or to Live then to be Holy and to be Blessed with God and to please him that created them Ubi necessitas incumbit non ultra disputandum est sed celerrimè fortiter agendum Words signifie nothing against Necessity Reason is but hindering troublesom folly when it pleadeth against Necessity Omni arte omne ratione officacior necessitas Curt. In worldly matters how quick-sighted how resolute how active is Necessity What conquerable difficulties will it not overcome What labour will it not endure if it have but the encouragement of hope And yet this Necessity is indeed no true Necessity at all For that which is Necessary but to my credit or estate or health or life can be no more Necessary then is my credit and estate and health and life it self When men do but fancy a Necessity where there is none yet that will carry them through thick and thin But O Sirs you have a real undenyable Necessity to be Holy and to set your selves to the work of your salvation such a Necessity as is founded in your Nature and laid on you by your Maker and as all the true Reason in the world will confess to be indispensable Necessity Faxis ut libeat quod est necesse Make no more words then but Resolve and stirre when it is a matter that must be done It is pitty and shame that the Amiableness of God and Holiness will not prevail with you of themselves But if you cannot yet perceive them to be Delectable acknowledge them to be Necessary Be ashamed that pretended Necessity for the Body should be more powerful with others then real Necessity for salvation is with you Look upon almost all the travel and labour that is under the Sun and all the diligence that is used here in the world and consider Whether it be not a thousand fold smaller Necessity then I am now pleading with you that setteth almost all on work The Rich will not toil and labour but will take their ease because they think they are under no Necessity but the poor will labour because they must Though the command of God to Rich and poor should make them equally diligent in their several callings in obedience to their Creator yet many thousands that labour all the year in obedience to their own Necessities would soon give it over and take their ease if they could but be well maintained without it notwithsanding the commands of God And the poor that reproach the rich for idlendss would be idle themselves
clear in it self and much more clear how few do we prevail with Is not the Question Whether God or the Creature Holiness or Sin Earth or Heaven Short or Everlasting pleasures should be preferred as plain to a wise man as any of those that I mentioned before Is it not as plain a case to a man of judgement Whether Holiness with Everlasting joys be better then fleshly pleasures with damnation as whether a Kingdom be better then a Jayle or Gold then dirt or health then sickness Yet do your salvations lie upon this Question this easie Question I must again repeat it All your salvations lie upon the practical resolution of this easie Question Be but Resolved once that God is Best for you and Heaven is Best for you and accordingly make your Resolute Choice and faithfully Prosecute it and God will be Yours Heaven will be yours as sure as the Promise of God is true But if you will not Choose God and Glory as your Best but will Choose the world and simple pleasures as Better for you you shall have no better then you chose and shall suffer a double condemnation for neglecting and refusing so great salvation You hear now by mens talk and you see by their lives that the world is divided upon this Question What it is that is Best for a man and which is his Best and Wisest course One part and the greater think in their hearts that present prosperity is best because they think that the promised happiness of the life to come is a thing uncertain or iâ— there be such a thing they may have it after the pleasures of sin These are the Infidels Another part have a superficial dead Opinion that Heaven and Holiness are Best but the Love of the flesh and the world lyeth deeper at their hearts and beareth the greater sway in their lives and these are the Hypocrites that is Christians in Opinion and Profession and so much of their Practice as will stand with their fleshly interest but Infidels in their Practical estimation and at the Heart and in the reserves and secret bent of their lives Another part being illuminated and sanctified from above Believe the Certainty and Excellency of Glory and see the vanity and vexation of this life and taste the sweetness of the Love of God and perceive the Necessity and sweetness of that Holiness which others so abhor and hereupon give up themselves to God and set themselves to seek for the Immortal treasure and make it the principal care of their hearts and business of their lives to escape damnation and live with Christ in endless Glory All the world consisteth of these three sorts of men Infidels Hypocrites and true Believers Now the Question is Which of these three are in the right Both the other do condemn the Hypocrite that halteth between two opinions and One thinks that Baal is God that the World is Best and therefore he gives up himself to it and the other thinks that The Lord is God and Heaven is best and therefore he gives up himself to it And if it would do any thing with those that doubt towards the turning of the scales to tell you which side Christ is on it s told you here in my Text as plain as the tongue of man can speak One thing is Needful Mary hath chosen that Good part which shall not be taken away from her THe Doctrine which I am now to handle to you from the plain words of the Text is this Doct. That those that prefer the Learning of the word of Christ to guide them by Holiness to Everlasting Happiness before all the lower matters of this world are they that choose the Better part even that which shall never be taken from them If now the word of Christ alone would serve your turn I had done my work I needed not to go any further You would be now resolved that Heaven and Holiness is best and would set your hearts and lives to seek it and so it would be your own for ever But this Text hath long stood in the Gospel and men have heard and read it often and yet the most are not perswaded and therefore I must try to open it a little farther to you and plead it with you and work the Reason of it upon your minds Reader our business is but to enquire What it is that is Best for Man to set his heart on and seek after in his Life and Enjoy for ever I say it is the Everlasting Enjoyment of God in Heaven For Christ saith so If thou think otherwise let us debate the case If thou believe as I do Live as thou professest to believe If men did but deeply and soundly know what it is that is best for them it would set right their hearts and lives and make them happy But not knowing this is it that keepeth them from God and Holiness and everlastingly undoes them Though I have often opened this heretofore on other occasions yet my present subject now requireth 1. That I tell you What that is that here is called The Good part 2. What it is that is set against it and by fleshly minds preferred before it And having briefly opened these two things I shall come to the Comparison and shew you which is the better part 1. That which Christ calls here that good part is 1. Principally the end of man or our everlasting Happiness with God in Heaven 2. Subordinately the Means by which it is attained 3. That Happiness which is the end comprehendeth in it these particulars which if you distinctly apprehend you will much the better understand the nature and excellency of it 1. The true Believer hath the small beginnings and earnests and foretastes of the Everlasting Blessedness in this Life in his approaches to God and living upon him by Faith and Love and â—â— his believing apprehensions of the Favour of God the Grace â—â— Christ and the Happiness which in Heaven he shall enjoy for ever 2. At death the souls of true Believers do go to Christ and enter upon a state of Happiness 3. At the last day the body shall be raised and united to the soul and the Lord Jesus Christ will come in glory to judge the world where he will openly absolve and justifie the Righteous when he condemneth the ungodly and will be glorified in his Saints and admired in all them that do believe and the Saints shall also judge the world and be themselves adjudged to everlasting Glory 4. Their everlasting habitation shall be in the Heavens even near unto God and in the presence of his Glory 5. Their company will be only Blessed Spirits even the holy Angels and glorified Saints with whom we shall be One Body and constitute the New Jerusalem and be perfectly one in God for ever 6. Their Bodies shall be perfected and made immortal spiritual incorruptible and glorious bodies shining as the Stars in the Celestial Firmament No more subject
and Honesty 1 Tim. 2. 2 3. Indeed the Greek word here is that which signifieth gravity and seemliness of behaviour but that which is frequently translated good is it which signisieth the truly Honest And you know none of the ungodly are ever called Good in Scripture but clean contrary Prov. 11. 6. The righteousness of the upright shall deliver them but transgressâ—rs shall be taken in their own naughtiness So vers 18. 19 20. The wicked worketh a deceitful work but to him that soweth righteousness shall be a sure reward As righteousness tendeth to life so he that pursueth evil doth it to his own death They that are of a froward heart are an abomination to the Lord but such as are upright in their way are his delight Everywhere you see how God abhorreth the ungodly and extolleth those that love and fear him Christ calleth the ungodly Evil men that â—â—t of the evil treasure of their hearts do bring forth evil things Matth. 12. 35. All is evil the life evil the heart evil and the man evil Prov. 12. 26. The Righteous is more excellent then his neighbour but the way of the wicked seduceth them And Psalm 16. David calleth the godly The excellent in whom is all his delight It is an excellent spirit that is in them Dan. 3. 12. 14 and 63. and an excellent way in which they go 1 Cor. 12. 31. and an excellent knowledge which the spirits illumination causeth them to attain Phil. 3. 18. Ephes 3. 18 19. You have Gods judgement of the case if that will satisfie you who it is that is the Best and Honestest man the Holy or the unholy 2. Do you think that man is an Honest man that will deny you your due and rob you of all that is your own Or rather is not the Just man the Honest man that will give every man his own I know you will give your voices for the latter O then take heed lest you condemn your selves If you be not Holy your own testimony doth condemn you For it is only the Godly that give God his own when the ungodly rob him of it Hast thou not thy Life and Time and Maintenance from God Hast thou not thy Reason and thy Affections and all thy faculties from him And should not all thou hast be employed for him Thou art a dishonest man that grudgest yea denyest him one day in seven when thou owest him all Thou art a dishonest man that givest away thy Makers due unto his vilest enemies That wastest thy means or strength on sin that spendest thy precious time on vanity that abusest his creatures to the satisfying of thy lusts and that livest to thy flesh when thou shouldst live to God Thou robbest him of all which thou givest to his enemies and of all which thou dost not use for his service It is less dishonesty to rob thy Master that trusteth thee with his goods then to rob the Lord that trusteth thee with thy time and parts and all things O blind unworthy sinners What makes you think him an honest man that robbeth his Maker or denyeth him his own when you call him a dishonest man that robbeth but such silly worms as you that in respect of God have nothing of your own Art thou better then God that it should be called dishonesty to wrong thee and no dishonesty to wrong him or deny him that which is his own God hath an absolute Title to you and that on more accounts then one You are his own as you are his creatures All souls are mine saith the Lord Ezek. 18. 4. And he hath Title to thee by Redemption as well as by Creation For to this end Christ dyed and rose and revived that he might be Lord of the deâ—d and of the living Rom. 14. 9. We are not our own we are bought with a price and therefore should glorifie God in our bodies and our spirits which are his 1 Cor. 6. 19 20. For if one dyed for all then were all dead that they which live should not henceforth live to themselves but to him that dyed for them and rose again 2 Cor. 5. 14 15. And as you your selves are Gods own as he is your Creator and Redeemer so all that you have is his own as the bestower or as your Master that trusteth it in your hands Exod. 19. 5. Now therefore if ye will obey my voice indeed and keep my Covenant then ye shall be a peculiar treasure to me above all people for all the earth is mine And saith God to Job Job 41. 11. What soever is under the whole heaven is mine Psalm 50. 10 11 12. Every beast of the Forrest is mine the wild beasts of the field are mine the world is mine and the fulness thereof 1 Cor. 4. 7. What hast thou which thou didst not receive Thou hast not a minute of time which thou owest not to God nor a thought nor a word nor a farthing of thy estate And is it not the basest injustice and dishonesty to give these to thy flesh and deny them to him and think his service an unnecessary thing If thou wilt give the world and thy lusts any thing let it be that which thou canst truly call thine own As God saith to the Idolators Ezek. 16. 18 19. Thou hast set mine oyl and mine incense before them my meat also which I gave thee c. so may he say â—o thee It is his Time which thou hast consumed in idleness and in sinful delights and his Provision by which thou hast â—ed thy lusts But the sanctified man is devoted to God His study is to give him his own All the business of his life which you account his over-much strictness and preciseness is nothing but his Honesty to God in giving him his own You look your horse should travail for you and your Oxe should labour for you and your servant work for you because they are your own And shall not we give up all that we have to God that are much more his own Will you hang them that take your Own from you and count them Honest that deal worse with God Say not If Christ were here we would give it him For he hath told you how you should use all his talents in his Laws and if you deny them to the poor or any holy use that he requireth them you deny them unto him Read Mat. 25. 10. 40 41 42. 3. Do you think that an unnatural man is an Honest man One that will abuse his Father or Mother and scorn the bowels from which he sprung All the world is agreed on it that such are dishonest Honour thy Father and Mother is called the first Commandment with promise Exod. 21 17. He that curseth his Father or Mother shall surely be put to death See Prov. 20. 20. 30. 17. The eye that mocketh at his Father and despiseth to obey his Mother the Ravens of the valley shall pick it out and the young
1 Pet. 1. 15 16. And how high a command and strait a Rule is that given us by Christ Matth 5. 48. Be ye therefore perfect even as your Father which is in Heaven is perfect Well may it be called an exceeding Righteousness surpassing the Scribes and Pharisees which all have that enter into the Heavenly Kingdom Matth. 5. 20. There is nothing under Heaven that is known to man so like to God as a Holy soul Remember this the next time you reproach such All you that are the Serpents â—eed remember when you spit your venome against Holiness that it is the Image of God that your enmity is exercised against O what a strange conjunction of malignity and hypocrisie appeareth in the enemies of God among us A picture of Christ that is drawn by a Painter or a forbidden Image of God that is carved by an Image-maker in stone that hath nothing but the name of an Image of God these they will reverence and honour though God hath forbidden them to make such Images of him The Papists will 〈◊〉 before them and the prophane among us are zealous for them when in the mean time they hate the noblest Images of God on earth Forbidden Images of God have been defended by seeking the blood of his truest Images Do you indeed Love and Honour the Image of God Why then do you hate them and seek to destroy them And why do you make them the scorn of your continual malice Can you blow hot and cold Can you both Love and Hate both Honour and Scorn the Image of God Search the Scripture and see whether it be not the sanctified heavenly diligent servants of the Lord that are the Honourable Image which he owneth and magnifieth and gloryeth in before the world If this be not true then go on in your hatred of them and spare not These are not Images of stone but of Spirit not Images made by a Carver or a Painter but by the Holy-Ghost himself Not hanged upon a wall for men to look on but living Images actuated from Heaven by spiritual influence from Christ their head and shining forth in exemplary lives to the honour of their Father whom they resemble Matth. 5. 16. It is not in an outward shape but in spiritual wisdom and Love and Holiness of heart and life that they resemble their Creatour Whether you will believe it now or not be sure of it you malignant enemies of Holiness that God would shortly make you know it that you chose out the most excellent Image of your maker under Heaven to pour out your hatred and contempt against And in as much as you did it to his noblest Image you did it unto him 7. If all this be not enough to shew you the Honourable Nature of Holiness I will speak the highest word that can be spoken of any created nature under heaven and yet no more then God hath spoken even in 2 Pet. 1. 4. where it is expresly said that the Godly are partakers of the Divine Nature I know that it is not the Essence of God that is here called the Divine Nature that we partake of we abhor the thoughts of such blasphemous arrogancy as if that grace did make men Gods But it s called the Divine nature in that it is caused by the Spirit of God and floweth from him as the Light or sunshine floweth from the sun You use to say the sun is in the house when it shineth in the house though the sun it self be in the firmament so the Scripture saith that God dwelleth in us and Christ and the spirit dwelleth in us when the Heavenly Light and Love and Life which streameth from him dwelleth in us and this is called the Divine Nature Think of this and tell me whether higher and more Honourable things can easily be spoken of the sons of men 1 Joh. 4. 16. God is Love and he that dwelleth in Love dwelleth in God and God in him O wonderful advancement high expressions of a creatures dignity Blessed be that Eternal Love that is thus communicative and hath so enobled our unworthy souls with what alacrity and delight should we exalt his name by daily praises that thus exalteth us by his unspeakable mercie Psal 75. 10. 89. 16 17. Blessed is the people that know the joyful sound they shall walk O Lord in the light of thy countenance In thy name shall they rejoyce all the day and in thy righteousness shall they be exalted For thou art the glory of our strength and in thy favour our horn shall be exalted For the Lord is our defence and the holy one of Israel is our King Psal 148. 13 14. Let them praise the name of the Lord for his Name alone is excellent his Glory is above the Earth and Heavens He also exalteth the horn of his people the Praise of all his Saints He hath first exalted our blessed Head even highly exalted him by his own right hand and given him a name above every name Act. 2. 33. 5. 31. Phil. 2. 9. and with him he hath wonderfully exalted all his sanctified ones Heb. 2. 10. 11. For it became him for whom are all things and by whom are all things in bringing many sons to Glory to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings For both he that sanctifieth and they that are sanctified are all of One for which cause he is not ashamed to call them Brethren 1 Cor. 12. 12. For as the Body is One and hath many members and all the members of that one body being many are one body so also is Christ What greater honour can man on earth be advanced to And the Honour of the just is communicative to the societies of which they are members The Churches are called Holy for their sakes Prov. 11. 11. By the blessing of the upright the City is exalted but it is overthrown by the mouth of the wicked Prov. 14. 34. Righteousness exalteth a nation but sin is a reproach to any people Let therefore both the persons and Congregations of the Saints continually exalt the name of God O Bless the Lord for ever and ever and blessed be his glorious name which is exalted above all blessing and praise Neh. 9. 5. The Lord liveth and blessed be our Rock and exalted be the God of our Rock of our salvation 2 Sam. 22. 47. Psal 30. 1. I will extoll thee O Lord for thou hast lifted me up Psal 27. 6. And now shall my head be lifted up above mine enemies round about me therefore will I offer in his tabernacle sacrifices of joy I will sing yea I will sing praises unto the Lrrd. Psal 28. 8 9. The Lord is their strength the saving strength of his annointed He will save his people and bless his inheritance and feed them also and lift them up for ever Psal 147. 6. The Lord lifteth up the meek and casteth the wicked down to the ground Thus shall it be done to
language from their mouths even the joyful praises of their Redeemer and the thankful acknowledgements of his abundant love How sweet unto their souls is the remembrance of kindness and how delightful a work is it from day to day to magnifie his name 5. You must also distinguish between those weak mistaken Christians that understand not the extent of the Covenant of grace and those that do understand it If a believer by mistake should think that the grace of the Gospel extendeth not to such as he because he is unworthy and his sins are great no wonder if he be troubled As you would be if you should conceive that your lease were not made to you but to another or as a malefactor would be if he thought his pardon belonged not to him but to another man But hence you should rather observe the riches and excellencies of the Gospel and the happiness of the heirs of promise then dream that its better be strangers to the holy Covenant still They are better that have a promise of life and understand it not then they that have none But those that know the freeness and fulness of the promise and study with all Saints to comprehend what is the bredth and length and depth and heighth and to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge Eph. 3. 18 19. do use to walk more comfortably according to the riches of that grace wich they do possess 6. Consider also that most of these complaining Christians are glad that they are in any measure got out of their former state and therefore apprehend their cause to be better then it was before Or else they would turn back to the state that they were in which they would not do for all the world And therefore they take a godly life to be far more pleasant to them that do attain it 7. Moreover the sorrow of believers is such as may consist with Joy At the same time while they are grieved that they are no better they are gladder of that measure of grace which they have received then they would be to be made the rulers of the world While they are mourning for the remnant of their sins they are glad that it is but a remnant that they have to mourn for Yea while they are troubled because they doubt of their sincerity and salvation they are more sustained and comforted with that little discerning which they have of their evidences and with their hopes of the everlasting love of God then they could by all your sinful pleasures Try the most dejected mournful Christian whether he would change states and comforts with the best and greatest of the ungodly The soul of man is so active and comprehensive that it can at once both rejoyce and mourn While they mourn for sin and feel affliction believers can have some rejoycing taste of Everlasting Life 8. Yea the godly sorrow of a believer is the matter of his joy He is gladder when his heart will melt for sin then he would be to be your partner in your carnal pleasures He would not change the comfort that he findeth in his penitent tears for all your laughter 9. The Joy of a believer is intimate and solid as I said before according to the object of it and not like the fleering of a fool or the laughter of a child or the sensual mirth that Solomon called Madness And therefore it is not so discernable to others as carnal mirth is And therefore you think that the servants of Christ are void of pleasure when they have much more then you It is little ridiculous accidents and toys that make men laugh but great things give us an inward sweet content and joy which scorns to shew it self by laughter And what can be a fitter object of such great content then to be a member of Christ and an heir of heaven 10. Moreover this sorrow of the Godly is but medicinal and a preparative to their after-Joys It doth but work out the poison of sin which would marr their comforts and drive them to Christ and fit them to value him and tast the sweetness of his love and grace 11. And as it is not the state and life of a Christian but his fasting days or time of Physick so the comforts of the godly ordinarily do far exceed their sorrows at least in weight if not in passionate sense They have their hours of sweet access to God and of heavenly meditation and delightful remembrance of the experiences of his love and perusal of his promises and communion with his people and of the exercise of faith and hope and love And with those Christians that have attained stability and strength these comforting graces are predominant and their life is more in Love and Praise then in vexatious fears and sorrows And it should be so with all believers Love is the Heart of the new creature It is a life of Love and Joy and praise that Christ calls all his people to and forbids them all unnecessary doubts and sorrows and keepeth them up so strictly from sin that he may prevent their sorrows And if you will judge whether Holiness be a pleasant course you must goe to the prescript and consider the nature and use of Holiness and look at those that live according to the mercies of the Gospel and not look at the dejections and sorrows of those that grieve themselves by swerving from the way of Holiness as if you would judge that Health is unpleasant because you hear a sick man groan And yet even these weak and mournful Christians usually have more joy then you The very preservation of their souls from that despair which sin would cast them into if they had not a Christ to fly to and the little tasts of mercy which they have felt and the revivings that they find between their sorrows and the hopes they have of better days are enough to weigh down all your pleasures and all their own sorrows 12. Lastly consider that this is not the life of perfect Joy and therefore some sorrows will be intermixt Comfort will not be perfect till Holiness be perfect and till we arrive at the place of perfect joy What 's wanting now while we live in a troublesome malignant world shall shortly be made up in the Heavenly Jerusalem when we have admittance into our Masters joy And then all the world shall be easily convinced whether sin or duty a fleshly or or Holy life hath the greater Pleasures and contents Object But it is not only the weakness of professors but the very way that is prescribed them that must bear the blame For they are commanded to fast and weep and mourn Answ 1. That is but with a medicinal necessary sorrrw for preventing of a greater sorrow as bitter medicines and blood-letting and strict diet are for the prevention of death God first commandeth them to take heed of sin the cause of sorrow But if they will fall and break
is the highest and best condition on earth He is the best and happyest man that is likest to the glorified Saints and Angels And judge your selves whether a dejected or a rejoycing Christian be liker to these inhabitants of Heaven Object But you will say by that rule we should not mourn at all for they do not Whereas God delighteth in the contrite soul Christ blesseth mourners and weepers Answ 1. Your resemblance of the Saints in Heaven must be propertionable in all the parts You must labour first to be as like them as you can in Holiness and then in Joy If you could be as far from sin as they you need not mourn at all But because you cannot you must have moderate regular sorrows and humiliation while you have sin But yet withall you must endeavour to imitate the heavenly Joyes according to the measure of your Grace received 2. And it is such a regular contrition consisting in humble thoughts of our selves and tending to restore us from our falls and sorrows unto our integrity and joy which God delighteth in And it is such mourners as these and such as suffer for righteousness sake from men that Christ pronounceth blessed But the inordinate troubles of the soul that exclude a holy delight in God though he pardon yet he never doth encourage 6. Consider also that a great part of your Religion yea and the most high and excellent part doth consist in the causes form and effects of this holy joy and chearfulness 1. As to the causes of it they are such as in themselves are requisite to the very being of the new creature Faith and Love which are the Head and Heart of sanctifying grace are the causes of our spiritual joy An unwilling heavy forced obedience may proceed from meeâ— Fears and this will not prove an upright heart But when once we Believe Everlasting Glory and Love Christ as our Saviour and the Father as our Father and felicity and Love a holy frame of heart and life as the image of God and that which pleaseth him then our obedience will be chearful and delightful unless accidentally we trouble our selves by our own mistakes If you can truly make God and his will and service your Delight you may be sure you Love him and are beloved by him as being past the state of slavish fear 2. And I have shewed you that Joy in the Holy-Ghost is it self one part of that grace in which Gods Kingdom doth consist Though not such a part as a Christian cannot possibly be without yet such as is exceeding suitable to his state and necessary to his more happy being 3. And without this holy Delight and Joy you will deny God a principal part of his service How can you be thankful for the great mercies of your Justification Sanctification Adoption and all the special graces you have received or for your hopes of Heaven it self as long as you are still doubting whether any of these mercies are yours or not and almost ready to say that you never received them Nay you will be less thankful for your health and life and food and wealth and all common mercies as doubting leâ—t they will prove but aggravations of your sin and misery And for the great and excellent work of Praise which should be your daily sacrifice but specially the work of each Lords day how unfit is a doubting drooping distressed soul for the performance of it You stiffle holy Love within you and stop your mouthes when they should be speaking and singing the praises of the Lord and disable your selves from the most high and sweet and acceptable part of all Gods service by your unwarrantable doubts and self-vexations And when all these are laid aside how poor and lean a service is it that is left you to perform to him Even a few tears and complaints and prayers which I know God will mercifully accept because even in your desires after him there is Love but yet it is far short of the service which you might perform Nay your Heavenly-mindedness will be much supprest as long as you are sadly questioning whether ever you shall come thither and it will be yours or not 7. Are you not ashamed to see the servants of the Devil and the world so jocund and your selves so sad that serve the Lord Will you go mourning so inordinately to Heaven when others go so merrily to Hell Will you credit Satan and Sin so much as to perswade men by your practice that sin affordeth more pleasure and content then Holiness 8. You could live merrily your selves before your Conversion while you served sin And will you walk so dejectedly now you have repented of it As if you had changed for the worse or would make men think so I know you would not for all the world be what you were before your change Why then do you live as if you were more miserable then before 9. You would be loth so long to resist the sanctifying work of the Spirit And why should you not be loth to resist its comforting work It is the same Holy Ghost that you resist in both Nay you dare not so open your mouthes for wickedness and plead against Sanctification it self as you open them on the behalf of your sinful doubtings and plead for your immoderate dejections If you should how vile would you appear 10. Lastly consider that God will lay sufferings enow upon you for your sins and suffer wicked men to lay enow on you for well doing and you need not lay more upon your selves You have need to use all means for strength to bear the burdens that you must undergo and it is the joy of the Lord and the hopes of Glory that are your strength And will you cast away the only supports of your soul and sink when the day of suffering comes How will you bear poverty or reproach or injuries how will you meet approaching death if you feed your doubts of your salvation and of the Love of God in Christ which must corroborate you O weaken not your souls that are too weak already Weaken not your souls that have so much to do and suffer and that of so great necessity and importance While you complain of your weakness encrease it not by unbelieving uncomfortable complaints Gratifie not the Devil and wicked malicious men so far as to inflict on your selves a greater calamity then all their malice and power could inflict It is a madness in them that will please the Devil to the displeasing of God though the pleasing of their own flesh be it that moveth them to it But for a man to please the Devil and displease God even when he displeaseth his own flesh by it also and bringeth nothing but sorrow to himself by it this is in some respects more unreasonable then madness it self Many cast away their souls for Riches and Honours and carnal accommodations but who would do it for poverty sickness or disgrace So
fancie that it is an excellent thing to be Rich and Renowned and to rule over others or to have plenty of all accommodations for your flesh and then because God satisfieth not these carnal fancies you think he neglecteth you oâ— deals hardly with you As if every person in the Town should murmur because they are not Bâ—yliffs or Justices when if they had the wit to know it they are but kept from a double encumberance and from a burden which perhaps would break their backs When the people are thus befooled by the flesh into brutish conceits of the nature of felicity and into an over-valuing of these worldly things they are then always eitheir tickled by deluding pleasures or troubled for the crossing of their carnal wills so that they grow out of relish and liking with the true and durable delights Take heed therefore of this carnality Dir. 4. Study the greatness of the mercy which you have received You abound with mercies and yet undervalue them and over look them and sweeten not your souls with the serious observation and remembrance of them you study principally your afflictions and your wants And thus when you live in a land that floweth with milke and honey you will not feed on the prepared feast but keep still the gall and wormwood in your mouths and how then should you be acquainted with the pleasures of a holy life Yea you must use to look more to the spiritual part of all your mercies and see the love of God that appeareth in them and taste the blood of Christ in them and lose not the kernel and take not up with the common carnal part which every wicked man can value and enjoy Consider in all your mercies what there is in them for the benefit of your souls much rather then how they accommodate your flesh Could you do thus you would find the benefit of afflictions and that the denyal of what you have accounted your necessary mercies is not the smallest of your mercies And thus judging truly by the spirit and not by the flesh there is no condition except that of sin in which you might not find cause of joy Dir. 5. Take heed of sinning Keep still upon your watch against temptation sin is the cause of all your sufferings when it promiseth you delight it is preparing for your sorrow when it flattereth you into presumption it is preparing for despair when it promiseth you secresie and security it prepareth for your shame and be sure your sin will find you out Numb 32. 23. If therefore you have offended delay not your Repentance and spare not the flesh in your return but unless the honour of God forbid it take shame to your selves by free confession and make the fullest reparation of the injury that you can to God and man If you would thus get out the thorn that vexeth you the ways of God would be more pleasant Dir. 6. Daily live in the exercise of faith upon the everlasting pleasures Dwell as at the gates of Heaven as men that are waiting every hour when they are called in and when death will draw aside the vaile and shew them the blessed face of God And take heed that the enmity of interposing Death prevail not against the Joys of faith But look to Christ that hath conquered it and will conquer it for you And if thus you could live as strangers here and as the Citizens of Heaven that are ready to step into the immortal pleasures you would then taste the Pleasures of a holy life in the first fruits and foretasts thereof It is your Treasure that must Delight you As your Heart must be there so your pleasure must be derived thence Strangers to Heaven will be strangers to the Believers Joys As the pleasure of the Carnal world consisteth in the sense of what they have in hand so the pleasure of Believers consisteth in the fore-apprehensions of what they shall enjoy with God for ever If therefore you exercise not those apprehensions if you look not frequently seriously and believingly into the world that you must live in for ever how can the comforts of that world illustrate and refresh you in this present world The Light and Heat which is the Beauty and Life of this lower world proceedeth not from any thing in this world but from the Sun which is so far above us and sends down hither its quickning influence and rays They are not the genuine comforts of Christianity which are not fetcht from the world above Dir. 7. If you would have the experience of the Pleasures of a life of Faith and Holiness neither desire nor cherish any fears or sorrows but such as as are subservient to Faith and Hope and Love and preparatory to Thankfulness and Joy Think not Religion consisteth in any other kind of sorrows Nay if any other should assault you be so far from taking them for your duty or religion as to resist them and lament them as your sin That is true and saving Humiliation 1. which makes you vile in your own eyes and loath your selves for sin 2. And maketh you more desirous to be delivered and cleansed from your sin than to live in it how sweet or gainful soever it may seem and 3. which maketh you set more by a Saviour to deliver you than by all the pleasures riches and honours of the world What ever want of Grief or tears you find if you have these signs your Repentance and humiliation is sincere Do not therefore refuse your Peace because you have not greater sorrows nor disturb your souls by strugling for excessive sorrow Take not part with them but do your best to cast them out if they are such as would destroy your Love and Joy and drive you from Christ and hinder your Thansgivings Know that the Life of your Religion consisteth in the Holy Love of God and of his Image and servants and holy ways Love is your duty and your felicity and reward Therefore let all tend to the exercise of Love and value most those means which most promote it and think your selves best when you abound most in Love and not when you are overwhelmed with those Fears and Griefs which hinder Love Study therefore above all the Love of God revealed in Christ which is the best attractive of your Love to him and hate all suggestions which would represent God unlovely and undesirable to you Dir. 8. Use cheerful company Not carnal but holy not such as waste their time in unprofitable frothy speeches or filthy or prophane or scornful jeastings But such as have most of the sense of Love and mercy on their hearts and are best acquainted with a Life of Faith and whose speeches and cheerful conversations do most lively manifest their sense of the Love of God and of the Grace of Christ and the eternal happiness of the Saints There is a delightful and encouraging virtue in the converse of joyful thankful heavenly believers Use
A SAINT OR A BRUTE The Certain Necessity and Excellency of Holiness c. So plainly proved and urgently applyed as by the blessing of God may convince and save the miserable impenitent ungodly Sensualists if they will not let the Devil hinder them from a sober and serious reading and considering To be Communicated by the Charitable that desire the Conversion and Salvation of souls while the Patience of God and the day of Grace and Hope continue By Richard Baxter The First Part Shewing the Necessity of Holiness LONDON Printed by R. W. for Francis Tyton at the three daggers in Fleet-street and Nevil Simmons Bookseller at Kederminster Anno Dom. 1662. To my dearly beloved Friends the Inhabitants of Kederminster in Worcestershire and my late Auditors in the City of London Confirming Grace with Patience Love and Peace be multiplyed Dear Friends ONce more through the great mercy of God I have liberty to send you a Preacher for your private families which may speak to you truly and plainly though not elegantly when I cannot and when I lie silent in the dust I take it for no small mercy that I have been so much employed about the Great and Necessary things in despight of all the malice of Satan who would have entangled me and taken up my time in personal vindications and barren controversies As I never knew that I had one enemy in the world that ever was acquainted with me so those that know me disswading me from Apologies against the accusations of those that know me not have spared my time for better work Though there is about fifty writings in whole or part against me published by Infidels Seekers Familists Enthusiasts Quakers Papists Antinomians Levellers Covenant-breakers State-subverters Church-dividers besides impatient dissenting Brethren and Dependants that took it for the rising way I yet find no cause as to the present age and those that know me to be at any great care or pains for a defence while malicious lyes do but make men wonder that wrinkled Envy should be so mad as to come so naked on the Stage and shew her ugly deformities to the world and could not stay at least till Wit had helpt her to a Cloak I was also when I first intended Writing under another temptation being of their mind that thought that nothing should be made publike but what a man had first laid out his choicest art upon I thought to have acquainted the world with nothing but what was the work of Time and Diligence But my conscience soon told me that there was too much of Pride and Selfishness in this and that Humility and Self-denyal required me to lay by the affectation of that stile and spare that industrie which tended but to advance my name with men when it hindred the main work and crost my end And Providence drawing forth some popular unpolished Discourses and giving them success beyond my expectation did thereby rebuke my selfish thoughts and satisfie me that the Truths of God do perform their work more by their Divine Authority and proper Evidence and material Excellency than by any ornaments of fleshly wisdom and as Seneca saith though I will not despise an elegant Physicion yet will I not think my self much the happyer for his adding eloquence to his healing art Being encouraged then by Reason and Experience I venture these popular Sermons into the world and especially for the use of you my late Auditors that heard them I bless God that when more worthy Labourers are fain to weep over their obstinate unprofitable unthankful people and some are driven away by their injuries and put to shake off the dust of their feet against them I am rather forced to weep over my own unthankful heart that did not sufficiently value the mercy of a faithful flock who parted with me rather as the Ephesians with Paul Acts 20. and who have lived according to this Plain and Necessary doctrine which they have received Among whom Papists that perswade men that our doctrine tendeth to divisions can find no divisions or sects Who have constantly disowned both the Ambitious usurpations which have shaken the Kingdom and the Factions Censoriousness and cruel violence in the Church which Pride hath generated and nourished in this trying Age. Among whom I have enjoyed so very large a proportion of mercy in the liberty of so long an exercise of my Ministry with so unusual advantage and success that I must be disingenuously unthankfull if I should murmure and repine at the present restraining hand of God But I must say with David 2 Sam. 15. 25. If I shall find favour in the eyes of the Lord he will bring me again and shew me the Ark and habitation There or elswhere use me in his service But if he say I have no delight in thee behold here I am let him do to me as it seemeth good unto him And now with this Treatise let me leave you these few seasonable requests 1. Be faithful to your faithful Pastors Think not that you can live in order and safety without their Ministry When you can attend their publike Ministry Refuse not their more private help Read well my two sheets for the Ministry Where the lawful Pastor is there the Church is Be not either impiously indifferent in your worshipping of God or peevishly quarrelsom with what is commanded or practised by others nor disobedient to Authority in lawful things 2. Maintain still your antient Love and Unity and Peace among yourselves and improve your company and converse to the advantage of your souls Be daily interlocutory preachers to one another Speak as the Oracles of God and Preach by a holy patient harmless charitable and heavenly life This kind of Preaching none can silence but your own corruptions 3. Improve the profitable books which are among you 1. Read them frequently and reverently and seriously to your families when you have called them together and prayed for Gods blessing 2. Carry them abroad with you and when you fall into company where you cannot better spend your time read to them some seasonable passages of such writings 3. Give or Lend them to those that need and want either Purses or Hearts to provide them and get them to promise you to read them and enquire after the success By such improvement Books may become such Seconds or Substiâ—utes to publike preaching as that they may not be the least support of Religion and means to mens edification and salvation 4. Make special and diligent provision to satisfie your selves and others against Popery which is like to be none of the least of your temptations To this end I pray you read well the single sheet against Popery which I published and give of them abroad to others where there is need Read also my other books against it My Safe Religion and Key for Catholicks and Dispute with Mr. Johnson and Dr. Challoners Credo Sanctam Ecclesiam Catholicam And when their sophistry puzzleth you 1.
Happiness to the Godly and Misery to the Ungodly With fifteen Queries for the conviction of Infidels that the Gospel is the infallible Word of God p. 130 Those that have not read the second Part of my Saints Rest and Treatise against Infidelity and doubt of the Truth of the Scripture or the life to come may read this third Chapter first and so proceed to the rest of the Book Clem. Writer's Objections answered p. 157 Chap. 4. Holiness is Best for all Societies p. 159 1. It uniteth all in One head and Center p. 160 2. It hath the most uniting excellent powerful end of duty p. 161 3. It takes away the Ball of the worlds contention that breaketh Societies ibid. 4. It destroyeth selfishness which is the destroying principle p. 162 5. It hath the most righteous Laws ibid. 6. It is contrary to all disturbing evil ibid. 7. It effectually disposeth the mind to duty p. 163 8. It cleanseth the very heart and killeth secret sin 9. It cementeth Societies with unfeigned Love ibid. 10. It maketh Princes and Rulers a double blessing Manifested in five particulars p. 164 11. It maketh the most Loyal and obedient subjects For 1. it makes them know themselves p. 166. 2. And to see God in their Rulers 3. And to obey and submit for conscience sake p. 167. 4. And destroyeth self-seeking 5. And consisteth in Charity 6. Procâ—reth Divine blessings 7. And makes men meck and patient and forbearing 8. Disposeth to concord 9. Assureth of the greatest rewards of obedience 10 And confirmeth against all temptations to disobodience p. 168 Object Have not the greatest rebellions been caused by your godly men as the Waldenses Bohemians French and others nearer us Answered p. 169 170. specially to Papists p. 173 174 12. Godliness makes men true to their Covenants ibid. 13. It teacheth the true method of obeying p. 175 14. It maketh men of publike spirits 15. It maketh it their business to do good 16. It makes men love enemies and forgive wrongs 17. It interesseth Societies in the favour and protection of God p. 176 18 It is the surest way to all supplies 19. It is the Honour of Societies 20. It must be best that is so heavenly p. 177 Chap. 5. Times of Holiness are the Best Times p. 178. Those that say It never was a good world since there was so much Godliness and so much preaching are fully confuted by twenty Arguments And their cavils answered p. 181 c. Chap. 6. Holiness is the only way of safety p. 196 Chap. 7. Holiness is the only Honest way The dishonesty of the ungodly proved p. 205 Chap. 8. Holiness is the most Gainful way proved p. 219 Chap. 9. Holiness is the most Honourable way p. 232. A reproof of the reproach of Holiness in England And full proof of the Honour of a Godly life ibid. Obj. It tends to make the godly proud to tell them of their Honour Answ Many Reasons for full confutation of this Objection p. 258 The baseness of the ungodly p. 265 Chap. 10. Holiness is the most Pleasant life p. 269 Proved I. From the Nature of the thing and 1. From the Revelations of God and the Knowledge of Believers p. 270 2. From the Will and Affections the nature and operations of Grace therein p. 277 3. From the quality of External holy duties p. 282 4. From the Objects of holy Acts p. 302 303 Objections answered p. 307 308 II. From the Helps and Concomitants p. 310 From the Effects p. 312 The Aggravations of the Delights of Holiness compared with the Delights of sin p. 314 Obj. Of the sad lives of Believers Answered p. 323 Obj. Doth not God command men to fast and mourn p. 339 Use Reproof to those that can find no matter of pleasure in a holy life p. 341 The greatness of their sin and misery p. 342 Directions Shewing such graceless persons what to do that they may come to Delight in God and Godliness p. 348 Use 2 Reproof to those self troubling Christians who live as sadly as if there were little pleasure to be found in God p. 353 Considerations fit to cure this sad disease p. 354 Qu. Whether it be not Hypocritical affectation to seem conformable for fear of discouraging men from Religion Fully answered p. 359 Obj. I could rejoyce if I knew my title to the promises p. 362 Obj. I have cause of sorrow p. 363 The considerations prosecuted p. 364 Twelve Directions to sad self-troubling Christians how they may live a Joyful life and find Delight in God and Godliness p. 374. Errata PAg. 277. lin ult for Law read Love p. 35â— l. 5. for that once r. but once l. 7. r. fermentations l. ult r. sweeter p. 358. l. 30. for unanswerable r. answerable p. 367. l. 23. r. Physicion l. 38. after of r. in p. 374. l 17. for is r. are p. 375. l. 37. blot out when p. 381. l. 37. r. terrours Smaller literall errours and mispointings being not many I omit THE INTRODUCTION To all such as neglect dislike or quarrell at a life of true and serious Godliness IT hath been the matter of my frequent admiration How it can be consistent with the Natural self love and Reasonableness of man-kind and the special ingenuity of some above others for men to believe that they must die and after live in endless Joy or misery according to their preparations in this life and yet to make no greater a matter of it nor set themselves with all their might to enquire what they must be and do if they will be saved but to make as great a business and bussle to have their Wills and Pleasure for a little while in the small impertinent matters of this world as if they had neither hopes or fears of any greater things hereafter That as some melancholy persons are caetera sani as rational as other 〈…〉 all matters saving some one in which yet their deâ—… maketh them the pitty or derision of observers so many that have wit enough to avoid fire and water and to go out of the way from a wild beast or a mad man yet have not the wit to avoid damnation nor to preferre eternal life before a merry passage unto hell Yea that some that account themselves ingenuous and men of a deeper reach then the unlearned can see no further through the promises or threatnings of God then through a Prospective or a Tube and have no wit that looketh beyond a grave yea are ready to smile at the simplicity of those that care whether they live in Heaven or Hell and use but as much diligence for their salvation as they use themselves for that which Paul accounted dung Many a time I have wondered how the Devil can thus abuse a man of reason and such as think themselves no fools and how such unexpressible dotage can stand with either learning ingenuity or common understanding and what shift the Devil and these men make to keep them from
here too blame in preferring a lesser duty before a greater and doing that unseasonably which in due time was to be done and in neglecting an opportunity for the hearing of Christs word which Mary took It was not only blameless but a duty in it self to make provision for Christ and his attendants but â—he should have been hearing first while he was preaching and taken that opportunity for the benefit of her soul It was no ordinary Preacher that was come under her roof His stay was not like to be long his doctrine concerned her salvation She knew not whether ever she should have the like opportunity again And therefore she should have rather stayed for his own direction when to go make provision for their bodies then to have omitted the hearing of his word But you 'l ask perhaps When a Sermon and other worldly business fall out at once are we alwayes bound to hear the Sermon I answer No not alwayes For else in great Cities that have frequent preaching you should do nothing â—lse but hear We have a Body as well as a Soul and must have meet imployment for both and must make due provision for both and must be serviceable to the bodily welfare of others and to the common good Our bodily labour and temporal employment must be conscionably followed as well as our spiritual For God hath determined that in the sweat of our faces we shall eat our bread Gen. 3. 19. and even in innocency Adam was put into the garden to dress or till and keep it Gen. 2. 15. with quietness we must labour and eat our own bread and if any will not work neither should he eat 2 Thess 3. 12. 10. See Pauls example v. 8. Neither did we eat any mans bread for nought but wrought with labour and travail night and day that we might not be chargeable to any of you We must labour working with our hands that we may have to give to him that needeth Eph. 4. 28. And if our bodies have not competent employment they will grow such rusty unfit instruments for the soul to work by that when Melancholy or other diseases have disabled them the soul it self will have the loss and he that will do nothing but hear and pray and meditate is likely shortly to be scarce able to pray and meditate at all unless it be one of a very strong and healthfull constitution No one therefore from this determination of Christ to Martha is to be driven from their lawfull Calling into a contrary extream But this was not the case between Mary and Martha It was a special opportunity which then was to be taken We must first seek Gods kingdom and its righteousness and prudently take such opportunities for our souls as we can without omitting greater duties and as our case requireth not taking as much food as we can ingest but as much as we can digest It is possible to eat too much but not to digest too well A Christian must have prudence when two duties come together to know which at that present time is the greatest and to be preferred which dependeth much on the necessity and the ends the good that will follow the doing of them and the hurt that will follow the omission And without this prudential discerning of time and duty we shall never order our conversations aright but shall live in a continual sin when we are doing that which in its own nature and season is our duty A poor man may not Read and Hear so frequently as a Rich ordinarily nor a Servant as the Master because there would greater evils follow the omission of their common labour at that time Thus much being said for the Explication of the Text there is no more necessary but what will fall in most conveniently with the Matter The sense is as if Christ should have said 〈…〉 Martha Martha I know thou dost all this in love to me and â—…anest well in it and it is no more then what 's thy duty in its â—…per season But O what is the food that perisheth in compariâ—… of that which endureth to everlasting life It is my meat â—…d drink to do the will of him that sent me in feeding and in â—…ing souls Thou hadst now an opportunity to hear my word 〈…〉 word of the Son of God thy Saviour and thereby to have â—…moted thy Everlasting happiness as Mary doth and this should have been preferred even before this provision for our bodies and 〈…〉 for this thou hadst now omitted thy care and labour about eat and drink I would not at all have been offended with thee thou hadst thy choice and Mary had her choice Thou hast chosen â—…e and trouble about many things and made thy self a great â—…al ado but Mary hath chosen that one thing that was necessary which is the better part and therefore it shall not be taken from â—…er but she shall possess the benefit of her choice Where note for the fuller understanding of it the true oppoâ—ition between the case of Mary and Martha 1. As to the Matter Martha had many things in hand multifarious care and trouble but Mary had but One. 2. As to the Manner and effects of their employments Martha was full of care and troubles distracted or disturbed by the â—…mberance of her businesses but Mary was quietly hearing and learning how to be free from care and trouble and how to â—…ttain Everlasting rest 3. As to the quality of their business Martha's was of less necessity or concernment though good and honest in its place but Mary's was about the thing of absolute necessity Also Martha's was Good in its season but a lesser good but Mary's was that Good part which containeth all other good or referreth to it and therefore was to be preferred 4. And therefore as to the continuance Mary's being a more eligible imployment and about an everlasting treasure shall not be taken from her when the fruit of Martha's imployment will quickly have an end Yet in these different cases each one had her choice Had Martha chosen better she had had better And the choice much proceeded from the judgement and disposition Had she judged better and been inclined better Martha would have chosâ—â— better Before we come to the principal Doctrines we may profitably note these Observations by the way 1. Note here that the neerest Natural Relations as Brothers and Sisters yea Parents and Children are not alwayes of one mind or way in the matters of their salvation Greater difference may be between them then this between Martha and Mary in the Text. They may rise up against each other and seek each others lives as Christ foretold Mark 13. 12. And therefore Father Mother Brother Sister and all are to be denyed for Christ that I say not hated as Christ saith Luke 14. 26. when they stand in opposition to him The same parentage and education made not Esau and Jacob of a disposition or of one mind or
or by Policy they would rob you of your Portion they cannot do it For which way should they do it They cannot turn the heart of God against you nor make him break his Covenant with you nor repent him of his Gift and Calling which he hath extended to you For he is unchangeable and loveth you with an everlasting love Mal. 3. 6. Jer. 31. 3. Isa â—â—â— 8. Jer. 33. 20 21 23. 50. 5. Rom. 11. 29. They cannot undermine the rock that you are built upon nor batter the fortress of your souls nor overcome your great Preserver and Defence nor take you out of the hands of Christ Psal 73. 26. 31. 2 3. 62. 2. 59. 9 16. Joh. 10. 28. Cast not away the salvation that is offered you and then never fear least it be taken from you See that you chuse the better part and resolvedly chuse it and it will be certainly your own for ever For man cannot take it from you nor Devils cannot take it from you and God will not take it from you Rust and moths will not corrupt this Treasure nor can thieves break through and steal it from you Mat. 6. 19 20. But you cannot say so of worldly riches If you chuse to be Lords and Princes on the earth you cannot have your choice but if you could you cannot keep it If you chuse the wealth and credit of the world and were sure to get it you were as sure to leave it For naked you came into the world and naked you must go out Job 1. 21. If you chuse your ease and mirth and pleasure these will be taken from you If you chuse the satisfying of your fleshly desires and all the delight and prosperity that the world can afford you yet all must be taken from you Yea quickly and easily taken from you Alas one stroak of an Apoplexy or a few fits of a Fever or the breaking of a small vein or many hundred of the like effectual means are ready at the beck of God to take you from all that you have gathered for your flesh And then whose shall all these things be None of yours I am sure nor will they redeem your souls from death or hell Luke 12. 20. Psalm 49. 7. If you be in honour you abide not in it but are as to your body as the beasts that perish If you think to perpetuate your houses and your names this your way is but your â—olly though your posterity go on to approve your sayings and succeed you in your sins Psalm 49. 11 12 13. The worldly wise man doth perish with the fool as sheep they 〈◊〉 laid in the grave Death shall feed on them and the upright shall have Dominion over them in the morning ver 10 14. They shall soon be cut down like the grass and whether as the green herb Psal 37. 2. I have seen the wicked in great prosperity and spreading himself like a green bay-tree yet he passed away and loe he was not yea I sought him but he could not be found v. 35 36. You think it a fine thing to have the fulness of the creature to be esteemed with the highest and fed and cloathed with the best and fare deliciously every day as the rich man Luke 16. but hath he not paid dear think you for his riches and pleasure by this time His feeding and fulness was quickly at an end but his torment is not yet ended nor ever will be You think it a brave thing to clamber up to riches and that which you call greatness and honour in the world but how quickly how terribly must you come down Go into the Sanctuary of God and understand your end Surely God hath set them in slippery places and casteth them down into destruction How are they brought to desolation as in a moment They are utterly consumed with terrours As a dream when one awakeneth so at the awakening shall their Image or shadow of honour be despised Psalm 73. 17 18 19 20. How short is the pleasure and how long is the pain How short is the honour and how long is the shame What is it under the Sun that is everlasting You have friends but will they dwell with you here for ever You have houses but how long will you stay in them It is but as yesterday since your houses had other Inhabitants and your Towns and Countries other Inhabitants and where are they all now You have health but how soon will you consume in sickness You have life but how soon will it end in death You have the pleasure of sin you say unto your selves Eat drink and be merry but how soon will all the mirth be mar'd and turned into sadness everlasting sadness When you hear Thou fool this night shall they require thy soul and then whose shall these things be Luke 12. 20. Oh miserable wretch If thou hadst chosen God instead of thy sin and the everlasting Kingdom instead of this world thou wouldst not have been thus cast off in thy extremity God would have stuck better to thee Heaven would have proved a more durable Inheritance For it is a Kingdom that cannot be moved Heb. 12. 28. The day is near when thy despairing soul must take up this lamentation My dearest friends are now forsaking me I must part with all that I laboured for and delighted in I have drunk up all my part of pleasure and there is no more left My merry company and honours and recreations are past and gone I shall eat and drink and sport no more but God would not have used me thus if I had set my heart upon him and his Kingdom Oh that I had chosen him and made him my portion and spent these thoughts and cares and labours for the obtaining of his love and promised Glory which I spent for the pleasing and providing for my flesh Then I should have had a happiness that death could not deprive me of and a Crown that fadeth not away Neither life nor death nor any creature could have separated me from his love I need not then have gone out of the world as a prisoner out of the Gaol to the â—â—rr and to the place of execution My departing soul should not then need to have been afraid of falling into the hands of an unreconciled God and so into the hands of the Devils as his executioners nor of passing out of the flesh to hell Oh poor sinners for how short a pleasure do you sell your hopes of everlasting Blessedness and run your selves into endless pains O what comparison is there between the time of your pleasure and the everlastingness of your Punishment How short a while is the cup at your mouthes or the drink in your bellies or the harlot in your embracements or the wealth of the world in your Possession And how long a time must you pay for this in hell How quickly are your merry hours past but your torments will never be past
When your corpses are laid in the grave men can say Now he hath done his satisfying the flesh and following the world but never man can truly say Now he hath done suffering for it Your life of sin is passing as a dream and your honours as a shadow and all your business as a talc that is told but the life of Glory which you rejected for this would have endured for evermore Suppose as many thousand years as there are sands on the Sea or piles of grass on the whole earth or hairs on the heads of all men in the world yet when these many are past the Joy of Saints and the Torments of the wicked are as far from an end as ever they were The eternal God doth give them a duration and make them eternal When our joyes are at the sweetest this thought must needs be part of that sweetness that their sweetness shall never have an end If our short fore-taste be Joy unspeakable and full of glory what shall we call that Joy which flows from the most perfect fruition and perpetuation 1 Pet. 1. 7 8. We have Joy here but alas how seldom Alas how small in comparison of what we may there expect Some Joy we have but how oft do Melancholy or crosses or losses in the world or temptations or sins or desertions interrupt it Our sun is here most commonly under a cloud and too often in an Ecclipse and we have the night as often as the day Yea our state is usually a Winter Our dayes are cold and short and our nights are long But when the flourishing state of glory comes we shall have no Interscissioâ—s nor Ecclipses Tâ—â— path of the just is as the shining light that shineth more and more unto the perfect day Prov. 4. 18. And the perfect day is a perpetual day that knows no interruption by the darkness of the night For there shall be no night there nor need of candle or Sun for the Lord God giveth them light and they shall reign for ever and ever Rev. 22. 5. This is the life that fears no death and this is the feast that fears no want or future famine the pleasure that knows nor fears no pain the health that knows nor fears no sickness this is the treasure that fears no moth or rust or thief the building that fears no storm nor decay the Kingdom that fears no changes by Rebellion the friendship that fears no falling out the Love that fears no hatred or frustration the Glory that fears no envious eye the possessed Inheritance that fears no ejection by fraud or force or any failings the Joy that feels or fears no sorrow while God who is Life it self is our life and while God who is Love is the fountain and object of our Love we can never want either Life or Love And whiles he feeds our Love our Joyful praises will never be run dry nor ever go out for want of fewel This is the true perpetual motion the câ—rculation of the holy blood and spirit from God to man and from man to God Being prepared and brought near him we have the blessed Vision of his face by seeing him and by the blessed emanation of his love we are drawn out perpetually and unweariedly to Love him and Rejoyce in him and from hence uncessantly to praise and honour him In all which as his blessed Image and the shining reflections of his revealed glory he taketh complacency which is the highest end of God and man and the very term of all his works and wayes I Thought here to have ended this First Part of my Discourse but yet compassion calls me back I fear lest with the most I have not yet prevailed and lest I shall leave them behind me in the bonds of their iniquity I daily hear the voice of men possessed by a spirit of uncleanness speaking against this Necessity of a holy life which Christ himself so peremptorly asserteth I hear that voice which foretelleth a more dreadful voice if in time they be not prevailed with to prevent it One saith What need all this ado This strictness is more ado then needs Another saith You would make men mad by poring so much on matters that are above them Another saith Cannot you keep your Religion to your selfe and be Godly with moderation as your neighbours be Another saith I hope God is more merciful then to damn 〈…〉 that â—â— not so precise Another saith I shall never endure so strict a life and therefore I will venture as well as others The summe of allis They are so far in love with the world and sin and so much against a holy life that they will not be perswaded to it and therefore to quiet their consciences in their misery they make themselves believe that they may be saved without it and that it is a thing of no Necessity but their coming to Church and living like good neighbours may serve the turn without it for their salvation And thus doth the malicious Serpent in the hearts of those that he possesseth rise up against the words of Christ Christ saith that this is The One thing needful And the Serpent saith It is more ado then needs and What needs all this ado Though I have fully answered this ungodly objection already in my Treatise of Conversion sect 36. pag. 284. c. and more fully in my Treatise of Rest Part 3. Chap. 6. yet I shall once more fall upon it For death is coming while poor deluded souls are loytering and if Satan by such sensless reasonings as these can keep them unready in their sin till the â—atal stroak hath cut them down and cast them into endless easeless fire alas how great will be their fall and how unspeakably dreadful will be their misery Whoever thou be whether hâ—gh or low learned or unlearned that hast disliked opposed or reproached serious godly Christians as Puritanes and too precise and that thinkest the most diligent labour for salvation to be but more ado then needs and hast not thy self yet resolvedly set upon a holy life I require at thy hands so much impartiality and faithfulness to thy own immortal soul as seriously to peruse these following Questions and to go no further in thy careless negligent ungodly course till thou art able to give such a rational answer to them as thou darest stand to now at the Barr of thine own Conscience and hereafter at the Barr of Christ Quest 1. Canst thou possibly give God more then is his due Or love him more then he deserveth Or serve him more faithfully then thâ—â— art bound and he is worthy of Art thou not his creature made of nothing and hast thou not all that thou art and hast from him and if thou give him all dost thou give him any more then what is his own If thou give him all the affections of thy soul and all the most serious thoughts of thy heart and every hour of thy time and
greatest misery It is because they would not Choose that Good and refuse the way and cause of Misery But how cometh it to pass that men will make no wiser a choice Is the case so doubtful that they cannot be resolved in it every man would have that which he thinks is Best for him Why do men follow after wealth or pleasure or credit in the world but because they take it to be Best for them Why do they set so light by Holiness and Christ and Heaven bâ—… cause they apprehend them not to be Best for them Wâ—… men refuse and obstinately against all perswasions refuse a Holy life if they took it practically to be Best for them what will they contrive their own destruction do they long to do themselves a Mischief and the greatest Mischief in the world No that 's not the case But the matter is this Their senses draw them another way Their eye their ear their taste their feeling every sense hath a Pleasure of its Own and this sense or flesh is violent and unreasonable and would fain be satisfied and Reason that was given us to Rule it is bribed and blinded and perverted by it and so is ready as a servant to obey it and to take its part and the fleshly mind discerneth not the things of God for they are spiritually discerned the Will also and the Affections are by the byas of a fleshly inclination corrupted and habitually lean to the fleshly part And that which men Love they will easily think well of and are glad of any thing like Reason to defend it and that which is against the Inclination of the Will will hardly be thought well of and any thing like Reason will serve against it This depravation of the mind and will of man enslaved and ruled by the Flesh or sensuality is the very cause that most men will not choose the Better part and so the cause of their perpetual misery And till the Holy Ghost send in a heavenly light of Wisdom into the mind to shew them the true difference between the Good and the Evil and a new Inclination into the Will that shall turn their hearts from the Evil to the Good they will still go on and the matters of God will seem foolishness to them and they will take those men for the veryest fools that follow the Wisdom of the Lord and provide most carefully for eternal life and they will take those for the wisest men that are most contrary to the God of Wisdom and that dare leap most fearlesly into Hell Or if this be not their Opinion but conviction force them to a wiser kind of language yet will it be their Practical estimation and their Hearts as their Choice and Lives will easily declare For that which is born of the flesh is flesh and that which is born of the spirit is spirit Joh. 3. 6. The fleshly man will have a fleshly mind and will and openly or secretly will Live after the flesh and such are the heirs of death Rom. 8. 5 7 13. Fleshly generation cannot make a spiritual mind or heart in any but it must be by spiritual Regeneration and therefore except a man be born again of the spirit as well as of water he cannot enter into the Kingdom of Heaven Joh. 3. 3 5. This inward difference of Inclinations is the true cause of the difference of the judgements and the courses of men about the matters of God and their salvation This is it that makes so many to think none wise but those that are more dangerously mad then men in Bedlam and that makes so many others stand in doubt as men unresolved what to choose and what course to follow As if it were really a difficult point for a man to be resolved in Whether it be best and wisest to follow the teachings of God or of the flesh and to seek first the Kingdom and Righteousness of God or to make a pudder for nothing in the world and to claw this itching flesh a while though they must smart for it for ever or to master the flesh and live to God! In a word the world are half unresolved whether it be better to be Holy with Gods promise of Eternal Glory or to take the Pleasures of sin for a season and neglect this Holiness though this course be threatned by the Living God with Everlasting torments This is the true state of the Question which I say one part of the world doth seem to be unresolved in and another part are resolved on the worser side against their souls and a Holy life and only those that the illuminating sanctifying spirit hath resolved do choose the needful better part The reason of this distracted judgement of the most is within themselves It is not because that there is any such difficulty in the case as should put a wise man to a stand Nor it is not because they have not sufficient evidence in the word or that God denyed them Teachers Books or any Necessary Means for their information The Light is among them but they Love it not because their hearts and deeds are evil and their darkness doth not comprehend it and this is their delusion and their condemnation Joh. 1. 6 7 8. 3. 19. When I am preaching to a congregation of many hundred or thousand souls if the salvation of all that people did lie upon any other question no harder then this that we have in hand so it were such as fleshly interest and corrupted minds and wills had no quarrel against how easily how surely should I save the souls of all that heard me Reader let me have thy judgement If the Question were Whether Light or Darkness be the Better Whether a dead corps be better then a Living man Whether a cottage for a day or a Rich habitation for term of life be better Whether as much drink as will make thee drunk or a nights lodging with a whâ—re be better then Lands and Lordships for thy life time or for a thousand years Whether one sweet cup with shame and beggery all thy life after or one bitter draught with perpetual prosperity should be rather chosen Whether a sick man were better take an unpleasing medicine that would cure him or a pleasant poyson that would kill him Whether he were better pay a little to the Physicion or dye to save his money Whether that Prince be wise that will sell his Kingdom for a cup of wine or for childrens rackets Or whether that child â—e vertuous that cannot abide his Fathers sight or house or commands but loveth better to do that which he knows displeaseth him or to tumble in the dirt with swine I say if any of these were the Question to be Resolved and the salvation of all that heard me lay upon the true Resolution I leave it to your own judgements Whether I were not like to save the souls of all that heard me And yet in a case as
judgement more regardable then a hundred yea many hundred 2. Nay it is no One at all Those that you say turn off arâ— only such as tryed an Opinionative Religiousness and some of the Outward duties of Christianity but they never tryed the power of a living rooted faith nor the predominant Love of God in the soul nor a Living Hope of the Heavenly Glory nor the sweetness of a Heavenly life nor the mortification of the fleshly inteâ—â—â—â— and true self-denyal These are the vital parts of Christianâ—â—â— which these few Apostates never tryed though some of them have had some acquired counterfeits of them and some good gifts of common grace and think that none had more then they had Sinner I beseech thee for the Lords sake deal faithfully with thy poor soul when all lies at the stake Wilt thou take the judgement of a swaggering Gallant or a scoffing worldly or ungodly Sot that none of them ever truly tried a state of Holiness And wilt thou refuse the judgement of God and of all his servants that have tryed it Go to any Godly man and ask him which of these wayes he hath found by experience to be best and hear what he will say to thee He will be ashamed to hear thee make a Question of it He will tell thee Alas friend I was once deceived by sin and deceived with the pleasures of my flesh and the glittering glory and riches of this world as you are now I once was a stranger to the life of faith and the Hopes of Heaven and the Holiness of the Saints But it was by the meer delusion of the Devil and it was the fruit of the blindness and deadness of my heart I knew not what I did nor where I stood nor what I chose nor what I set light by I never well considered of the matter but carelesly followed the sway of my fleshly inclination and desires But now I seee I was the Devils slave and my Pleasures were my fetters and my own corrupt affections were my bondage and I now find that I did but delude my soul I got nothing by all that the world did for me but provision for my after-sorrows I had been now in Torments if I had but dyed in that condition I would not be again in the case that I was in for all this world or a thousand such worlds That life that once I thought the best hath cost me dear even the breaking of my heart and a thousand thousand fold dearer would have cost me if the dearest blood and recovering Grace of my dearest Lord had had not prevented it O had I not been unspeakably beholden to the Mercy of the Lord even to that Mercy which I then made light of I had been undone for ever I had been laid under Everlasting desperation before this Now I find that there is no life so sweet as that which I then was so loth to choose Now it is my only grief that I was holy no sooner and can be no more Holy then I am O that I had more of that quickning comforting saving Grace O that I were further from my former sinful fleshly state O that I could get nearer God though I parted with all the prosperity of this world I now find what I lost by my continuing in sin so long but then I knew it not O friend as you love your soul take warning by me and make use of my experience and give up your self to God betimes This or to this purpose would the answer of an experienced person be if you should ask him Which is the better way But if you say that thus we would be our selves the Judges and bring the matter into our own hands I answer you 1. It is true we would be our selves your Helpers and do the best we could for your salvation And if you will neither help your selves nor give us leave to help you take what you get by it we have done our part But 2. I will not yet so part with you I will further make you this reasonable offer I demand of thee whoever thou art that Readest these words Whether thou know of any man on earth that thou thinkest to be a wiser man then thy self If not thou art so like the Devil in Pride that no wonder if thou be near him in malignity and misery If thou do know of any wiser then thy self go with me or with some faithful Minister to that man and ask him Whether a diligent holy life be not much Better then any other life on earth and if he do not say as I say here and as Christ saith in my Text that the godly choose the better part or else if I prove him not a very sot before thy face I will give thee leave to brand my understanding in thy esteem with the notes of inâ—amy and contempt Yea more then so I will allow thee to go to one that differeth from me in the way of his Religion Ask an Anabaptist if thou think him more impartial whether A Holy and Heavenly heart and life be not the best and try whether he will not say as I do Ask those that you call Episcopal or Presbyterian or Independents or Separatists Ask an Arminian or one of the contrary mind Yea ask a Papist and see whether he will not say as I do It is true they are every one of them of minds somewhat different about some points in the order and manner of their seeking God But all of them that are but sober men will confess as with One mouth that God should be loved above all and sought and served above all and that all should live a Holy Diligent Heavenly life 2. But yet if all this will not satisfie you I will come yet lower Who is it that you would have to be Judge or Witness in thâ—… case Is it thy malignant or worldly or drunken and ungodly friend I am contented that the case be referred even to him and to as many of them as thou wilt upon condition that he will but first Try the way that he is to judge of Let him but make an unfeigned tryal of a life of Holy Faith and Love and Obedience and Self-denyal as long as I have done and we will receive his Testimony Nay more let him thus try a life of Holiness inwardly and outwardly but one year yea or but one moneth or day or hour and we will take his Testimony But to be judged by a man in a matter of salvation that speaks of what he never knew nor tryed one hour but speaks against he knows not what this is a motion too bad to be made to a very Bedlam 6. If yet you are not resolved which is the Better part and way to whom do you desire to referr it Shall Heathens Jews and Infidels be Judges Why if they be they will give the cause against you Jews and most of the Heathen world do profess to believe a
world grew to no more experience and Arts and Sciences were ripened no more when now they have ripened in a shorter time How is it that Printing and Writing were not found out and that all Sciences and Arts are of so late invention and as it were but in their youth Certainly Knowledge is the daughter of Experience and Experience the daughter of Time and therefore if the world had been from eternity it must needs have been many a hundred thousand years ago at â— far higher state of Knowledge then is yet attained in the world For every age receiveth the experiences and writings of the former and hath opportunity still to make improvement of them At least the world could not have been ignorant so long of Printing Writing and a hundred things that are certainly of late invention It is therefore an incredible thing that an Eternal world should lose all the memorials and monuments of its Antiquity before the Scripture-time of the Creation And therefore doubtless it began but then Qu. 2. And if God were not the Author of the Scripture how come so many clear and notable Prophesies of it to be fulfilled How punctually doth David and Isaiah 53 describe the sufferings of Christ and Daniel foretell the very year and so of many others Qu. 3. And how comes it all to contain but one entire frame conspiring to reveal the same doctrine of grace and life at first more darkly and in types and promises and afterwards more clearly in performance when the writers lived at hundreds and thousands years distance from each other Qu. 4. And if thou hadst not a blinded prejudiced mind thou wouldst perceive an unimitable Majesty and spirituality in the Scripture and wouldst savour the spirit of God in it as its author and wouldst know by the image and superscription that it is the Word of God It beareth unimitably the Image of his Power and Wisdom and Goodness so that the blessed Author may to a faithful soul be known by the work Qu. 5. If the Scripture came not from the Spirit it could not give or cause the spirit and if it bore not Gods Image it self how could it print his Image upon the souls of so many thousands as it doth The Image of God is first engraven on the seal of his holy Doctrine and thereby imprinted on the heart There is no part of that holy change on man but what that holy Doctrine wrought If therefore the change be of God the Doctrine that wrought it is of God For both of them are the same Image answering each other as that on the seal and on the wax But it is most certain that the Holy change on the soul is of God The nature of it sheweth this For it consisteth in the destruction of our sin and the denyal of our selves and the raising the heart above this world and the total Devoting of our selves and all that we have to God and conforming our selves to his will and resting in it and seeking and serving him with all our power against all temptations and living in the fervent Love of God and of our Brethren and desires after everlasting life and a taking Christ for our Lord and Saviour to reconcile us to God and do all this in us by his Spirit And surely such a work as this must needs be of God If it be Good it must needs be Originally from him that is most Good this is undenyable And he that will say this is Evil is so much of the Devils nature and mind that it is no wonder if he follow him and be Brutified And you cannot say that the Work is good and the Doctrine bad For the Work is nothing but the Impress of the Doctrine And God doth not use to appoint or use a frame of falshoods and deceits as his ordinary means to renew mens souls and work them to his Will Perhaps you will say that you see no such change made by the Word nor any such spirit given by it unto men but only the effects of their own Imaginations But 1. The Question is Whether they are True or false Imaginations Gods truth causeth that Impress on the mind of man which you call his Imaginations For where should Truth be received but in the mind and how should it work but by cogitation They are cogitations above and contrary to those of flesh and blood that are wrought by this holy Doctrine It is nevertheless os the spirit because it moveth man by consideration 2. And if you see not a work on the hearts of the regenerate appearing in their lives which raiseth them to a far better state then others it can be no better then strangeness or malice that can so far blind you 3. But if it be so with you give leave yet to the persons that know this holy change in themselves to believe the more confidently the Word that wrought it We know that we are renewed and passed from our former spiritual death to life and therefore that it was the Truth of God that did the Work of God upon us Nothing but Truth can sanctifie But the Word doth sanctifie therefore the Word is Truth Indeed the Holy Church of Christ throughout all ages of the world hath been his living Image and so a living Witness of his Word as shewing by their lives the transcript of it in their hearts It is easie for any that know them except the maliciously blind to perceive that the true servants of Christ are a more purified refined honest conscionable holy heavenly people then the rest of the world For my part I am fully convinced of it I see it there is no comparison for all their imperfections which they and I lament I am fully satisfied that there is much more of God on them then on others And therefore there is much more of God in the Doctrine that renewed them then in any other The Church is the living Scripture the pillar and ground of the truth 1 Tim. 3. 15. the Law is written in their hearts Heb. 8. 10. better then it was in the Tables of stone 2 Cor. 3. 3. And by their holy Love and Works the world may know that Jesus Christ was sent of the Father and may be brought to believe in him by their Unity John 17. 21 22 23. Matth. 5. 16. God would not concurr so apparently and powerfully with a false doctrine to make so great a change in man nor so far own it as to use it for the doing of the most excellent work in all this world even the gathering him such a Church and sanctifying to himself a peculiar people zealous of good works Tit. 2. 14. If you say that some of the Heathens have been as good I answer 1. The Goodness found in them is but in temperance fidelity and such like and not a holy spirituality or heavenliness no nor a through-conscienciousness in what they knew 2. That good was rare in comparison of that
but what is to be found in this way I lay not only all the reputation of my understanding but all the hopes and happiness of my soul upon the proof of this point If I prove it not I will confess my self a fool and undone for ever But if I prove it let the ungodly make this sad Confession and choose the Better part while they may have it 1. And first That Godliness is the Best for all societies that are just I prove thus 1. Godliness doth Unite or Center all Societies in the Only Head and Center of Unity that is the Blessed God himself A Common-wealth will never have Peace in a state of Rebellion against their Soveraign unless he be one that they can overcome Nor Souldiers in a state of Mutiny against their General nor Schollars in shutting out their Master God is the only Soveraign of the whole world The godly all unite in him Ungodliness is Rebellion against him The Rebels are alwayes in his Power There is no Peace nor safety therefore nor any Unity but an Agreement in Rebellion for a while to any that are not by Holiness united in him and Loyal subjects to him Isa 48. 22. There is no Peace saith the Lord unto the wicked Object But do we not see that the main Divisions of the world are about Religion Answ 1. It s true but not by the truly Religious The great quarrel of the world is against Religion in the life and practice of it 2. It is unholy men that cannot abide to be accounted unholy that are the chief dividers 3. Among the truly Godly there is no division in the main but only diffetences about the smaller Branches of Religion which are Numerous and less discernable and less necessary then the common Truths They are all Agreed of Truth enough to bring them to Heaven and therefore enough to unite them in dear Affection upon earth Nay there is not one of them that hath not a special love to all that he discerneth to be the servants of the Lord. If any be without this he is ungodly And we are not to answer for the miscarriages of every Infidel or ungodly man that will put on the Name of Christianity and Godliness If there should be fallings out among the godly they cannot rest till they are healed and set in joynt again But you must not then be so unjust as to conclude that we can have no Unity till we are in all things of a mind May not men of various complexions be of one Society Are not the multitudes of Veins and Arteries in your Bodies united in the trunks and roots It not the Tree one that hath many branches Object But God whom you will needs unite in is far from us and his mind unknown and so is not the mind of Princes and therefore we cannot unite in God Answ In things Necessary to our future Happiness and present unity in special Love the mind of God is more plainly and fully opened to us then the mind of any Prince unto his subjects What precepts can be plainer then to Love God above all and our Neighbour as our selves and first to seek the Kingdom of God and to Repent and Believe in Christ How plain are the Articles of our Faith and the ten Commandments Divisions have been about niceties I hope God will call back his Churches to the Antient simplicity and Practical Godliness and then the Christian world will be agreed except the wicked 2. Godliness propoundeth and prosecuteth the most Uniting Excellent Powerful End for all that duty that should advance Societies and therefore must needs be Best for all Societies God and Heaven is the common End of all the Godly They are Agreed every man of them in One End and so are not others Their End hath that Power in its attractive Excellency by which it can do the greatest things that are to be done with the will of man The Ends of the ungodly are small and childish toye◠Our End also is as the Sun sufficient for all and therefore 〈…〉 matter of contention All may have God as well as One without diminishing the happiness of any 3. Godliness takes away the Ball of the worlds contention that sets men everywhere together by the ears It teacheth men to slight the Honour and Vain-glory that the Gallants will fight and die for And to contemn that wealth that Towns and Countries and Kingdoms are divided and destroyed by It teacheth men to slight that Money the Love of which is the root of all evil 1 Tim. 6. 10. It sheweth men a better Treasure and not only Verbally but Effectually teacheth them to trample upon that which the tumultuous world doth so much scramble for and seek by such rapine oppression deceit and blood If all the Ambitious climers and State-troublers were truly godly they would quietly seek for higher Honours If all the covetous Noblemen Souldiers Landlords and Rich men were truly Godly they would never set both City and Countrey into combustions and poor oppressed families into complaints for the Love of Money If thieves turned godly you might travail safely and spare your locks and keep your purses If Tradesmen were all truly Godly deceit would not so break their peace What is there for Societies to strive about when the bone of contention is taken away and Godliness hath cast down the Idol of the world that did disturb them 4. Godliness takes down the great disturbing and dividing Principle in mans soul and that is Selfishness And it both commandeth and worketh self-denyal Every ungodly man hath a private End and a private Spirit and Interest that is dearer to him then any other So many ungodly men as there are so many Ends and Interests And how then can there be a Possibility of Unity The wisest Law-givers could never yet contrive an effectual course for the uniting of all these If Selfishness were down I scarce know what should trouble the peace of Kingdoms Cities Families or any other Societies Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy self Or Thou shalt not covet is the summe and conclusion of all the Law of God concerning our carriage one to another And it is Godliness and nothing else that perfectly teacheth and truly though imperfectly here effecteth this Self-denyal But of this elsewhere 5. Godliness hath the most perfect Righteous Laws and therefore is 〈…〉 all Societies If God can make better Laws then man then this is past all question His Laws require nothing but what is for mens good They prescribe nothing that is dishonest or unjust They promise the greatest Rewards to the obedient They drive on the backward by the threatning of the greatest punishments Their Authority is highest and most unquestionable They all proceed from one absolute Soveraign and are the same to all the people of the world They change not but are to endure to the worlds end Whereas all the Laws of men are limited to their own Dominions and endure
Eagles shall eat it To be without natural affections is the brand of highest wickedness Rom. 1. 31. and 2 Tim. 3. 3. And do you not know that it is worse to be without holy affections to the God that made you and the Christ that bought you and to despise forsake or abuse the Lord Thou hadst thy Being more from him then from thy Parents They knew not how thy parts were formed It was he that gave thee thy immortal soul It is by him that thou hast lived until now much more then on the food thou eatest or the air thou breathest in And art thou so unnatural as to be ungodly and deny him thy love and care and service that hath made thee and to call a holy heavenly life a needless toyl Deut. 32. 6. Do you thus requite the Lord O foolish people and unwise Is he not thy Father that hath bought thee hath he not made thee and established thee If an unholy man be an honest man that is so unnatural as to cross the end of his Creation and deny his service to the Lord that made him then he is honest that spits in his Fathers face and despiseth his Mother that brought him forth 4. Do you think that he is an honest man that is unthankful It is agreed on by all the world that unthankfulness is a principal point of dishonesty He is no honest man that will abuse or despise those by whom he liveth or that have engaged him by kindness If you were so used your selves by one whose lives or estates you had preserved would you not say What an unworthy wretch is this have I deserved this usage at his hand Why all the unthankfulness against men in the world is not to be compared to thy unthankfulness against God What are the Benefits which man hath given thee in comparison of his Did ever man do any thing for thee that is comparable to thy Creation and Redemption and offering thee salvation from everlasting misery and a room with Angels in everlasting glory besides every hourâ— mercy that ever thou hadst here in this world And is that an honest man that will requite this God with prophaneness and ungodliness and return him sin for all his mercies and refuse to live a holy life Doth thy flesh deserve all thy care and labour and is this God unworthy of it and dost thou call his service a needless work If ingratitude can make a man dishonest thou art then a dishonest man But it is the business of the godly to give up themselves to him that made them and to exercise their thankfulness in their capacities for these greatest mercies 5. Do you think that a cruel unmerciful man or a loving and merciful man is the more honest Surely I shall here have all your voices He that hateth those that hurt him not and would kill them and set their houses on fire and carryeth malice in his face and speeches will be called an honest man but by few And he that is Loving and studyeth to do Good to all about him will be counted Honest Why try the ungodly and the Saints by this No more malicious men in the world then the ungodly They have an enmity even to the God that made them Col. 1. 21. and to the Christ that bought them Luke 19. 27. and to the Word of God that offereth them salvation and would lead them to eternal life and hate the Knowledge of the way of life Prov. 1. 22. They are enemies to the servants of the Lord and hate the upright that desire their salvation and would but draw them from their sins Prov. 29. 10. 9. 8. They curse those that bless them and persecute those that pray for them Matth. 5. 44. The first wicked man that was born into the world did kill his brother because his own works were evil and his brothers righteous 1 John 3. 12. But this is not their greatest cruelty They are enemies to their own salvation They will run into Hell in despight of Christ and all the Preachers in the world For there is but one way thither the way of ungodliness and that way they will go Yea that is not all but bloody wretches they would have all the Countrey do as they do and be damned with them They are angry with a man if he will not live an ungodly life and tipple and swear and do as they They revile him if he will not give over his diligent serving of the Lord which is all one as to fall out with men because they will not forseit heaven and run from God and damn their souls and all for nothing When they might more mercifully scorn us because we will not give over eating or that we will not cut our own throats And are these cruel persons honest men Is that merciless wretch an honest man that is not content to cast away his own everlasting happiness for nothing upon his fond conceits but must needs have others do so too That is not content to wrong the Lord but would have others wrong him also The Devil is Honest if these be Honest But for the Godly it is their desire their care their work to save themselves and further the salvation of all others O how they long to hear of the Conversion of Towns and Countries and how glad are they when they hear it Not for any worldly commodity to themselves but because they rejoyce at the good of others And what would they not do to promote it which they could do 6. Do you think that a perfidious unfaithful man or a faithful man that will not be hired to break his word is the honester man Sure this is no hard question neither A Knight of the Post that will say and unsay swear and forswear and will betray his dearest friend for a groat is taken by few for an honest man in comparison of him that will rather die then lye or be unfaithful Why nothing is more plain then that all you that are ungodly are treacherous to the Lord himself You are perfidious Covenant-breakers You owe him your selves wholly on the grounds that I before expressed and yet you are unfaithful to him You have all from him and you serve his enemy with it You call him your God and will not Love nor honour nor serve him as your God Mal. 1. 6. You bound your selves to him in your Baptism and many a time since by a solemn Vow or Covenant but you live in the treacherous breach of it continually You Covenanted to take the Lord for your God and yet you will not seek him nor be Ruled by him You Covenanted to take Jesus for your saviour and yet will not be saved by him from your sins Matth. 1. 21. You Covenanted to take the Holy-Ghost for your Sanctifier to purifie your hearts and lives and yet you resist his holy motions and hate his sanctifying word and work and some of you will mock at Sanctification
this they have learnt of God and therefore they are no deceivers 9. Moreover do you think that he is an Honest man that is an enemy to the publike Good or rather he that is a common benefactor The best of the Heathens thought it one of the highest parts of virtue to be serviceable to many and devote our selves to the common good But wicked men are the very plagues of a land For their sakes it is that judgements come upon us It is they that would let in the plague of sin which would undoe us He that sets fire to the thatch doth do no worse against your towns then wicked men that would kindle the fire of the wrath of God by their crying sins Read the Scriptures and see who it was that caused Israel to perish in the wilderness but unbelieving sinners Who troubled Israel and made them fly before their enemies but one Achan Josh 7. And what but sin was the cause of their captivity and present desolation was it Lot or the Sodomites that brought down from heaven the fire of vengeance Was it Noah or the world of the ungodly that brought down the flood Are these Honest men that provoke God to forsake the Land and are the vermine and destroyers of our peace and happiness But you know that God hath promised his blessing to the Godly and to the places where they live ofttimes for their sakes as Josephs case and others tell us 10. That man can be no Honest man that wanteth the very principle of Honesty and that intendeth not the End that 's necessary to make any action truly Honest But such are all ungodly men 1. The Principle of true Honesty is the high esteem of God and everlasting life in our undestandings and the belief of Gods revelations necessary to the attaining of that life and the prevailing Love of God in the heart and the Love of man for his sake Without these Principles of Honesty no man can be Honest How can he be an Honest man that Believeth not his maker He that taketh God for a lyer hath no reason to be taken for any better himself For would he be thought better then he takes God himself to be nor can he in reason be expected to believe any man else For none can be better then God And is that an honest man that professeth himself a Lyer and taketh all men to be so too And how can that be an Honest man that Loveth not Goâ—… well as his fleshly lusts and pleasures And this is the case of all the wicked If they did not Love their Riches and honour and sensual pleasures more then God they would not keep them against his command nor lose his favour rather then lose them nor seek them more carefully then they seek him and his Kingdom and think of them and speak of them with more delight And certainly he that Loveth his Riches or Honours or filthy sins better then God and Heaven it self must needs be thought to preferr them before his neerest Friends or the common good And is that an Honest man that would rather cast off Father or Mother then cast off his filthy sins and that would rather forsake his chiefest friend then forsake his vices and would sell his friend or the Commonwealth for a little gain or pleasure even for a whore or for drunkenness or such like things I think you would none of you say that this were an Honest man that would not leave so small a matter for the life of his friend or for the preservation of the Common wealth And can you expect that he should prefer any friend before God and his Salvation If he will sin against God and sell his salvation for his sin can you think he should more regard any man how dear soever There is no true Honesty in that man where the Love of God doth not command 2. Moreover if the Honouring and Pleasing of our Lord and the saving of our souls be not the End and principal motive of our actions there can be no true Honesty It is essential to Honesty that God be our End If you would know what a man is first know what he Intendeth and maketh the End and marke of his life And so you must do if you would judge of his actions The End is the principal ingredient that makes them Good or Bad. If a Thief Love God because he prospereth him in stealing or because he giveth him strength and opportunity this is a wicked Love of God If a drunkard Love God for giving him his drink and a Whoremonger Love God for strenthening him in his lust will you call this Honesty Every wicked man doth make his sensual present pleasure his principal End through all his life If he love his neighbour it is but carnally as a dog loveth him that seedeth and stroaketh him If he seem to be a good Commonwealths man it is but for vain-glory or carnal accommodatiâ—… and he fighteth for his King or Countrey but as a dog doth â—â—â— his bone If he give to the poor it is but that which he can spare from his Belly and it is either in a common pitty or for vain applause or he thinks by it to stop the mouth of Justice that God may let him alone in his sins or save him after all his wickedness This is no more an Honest man then he that makes a trade of stealing and will pay Tythes of all that he steals or give some part to the Church or Poor that God may pardon him and save him when he hath done All the Religion and all the charity of wicked men is but for themselves and that which hath no higher End then Carnal self is truly no Religiâ—… Charity It is only the sanctified man that is Honest for it 〈…〉 he that is devoted to God and doth the works of his life to 〈…〉 and glorifie his maker There is more Honesty in the very 〈…〉 ing and drinking of the sanctified then in the prayer and sacrifices and alms deed of the ungodly Or else God would never have said as he hath done that Unto the Pure all things are pure but to them that are defiled and unbelieving is nothing pure but even their mind and Conscience is defiled Tit. 1. 15. And that every creature is sanctified by the word of God and by Prayer 1 Tim. 4. 4 5. And that the prayer and the sacrifice of the wicked is abomination to the Lord and he abhoreth and loatheth them when the prayer of the upright is his delight Prov. 15. 8. 21. 27. Isa 1. 13. Prov. 28. 9. 8. 7. 11. 20. For the sanctified in their very eating and drinking do make it their end to Glorifie God and to be fitted for his service 1 Cor. 10. 31. But the ungodly do all even in their duties that seem most Holy but for a selfish carnal End So that it is plain that he that wanteth the necessary Principles and
Judgements of the Lord God hath begun to take away the reproach of Holiness and through his great mercy to us it is more Honourable in England then formerly it hath been Is it Honoured by you Or are you hardened to perdition Fearfull is the case of him whoever he be that after all the gentle and terrible warnings of the Lord dare think or speak reproachfully of a Holy life Yet hear the calls of the Eternal Wisdom Prov. 1. 20 21 22 c. How long ye simple ones will ye love simplicity and the scorners delight in scorning and fools hate knowledge Turn you at my reproof But mercies and judgements are lost on the hard-hearted Isa 26. 10 11. Let favour be shewn to the wicked yet will he not learn righteousness in the land of uprightness will he deal unjustly and will not behold the Majesty of the Lord. When the hand of the Lord is lifted up they will not see but they shall see and be ashamed for their envy at his people and the enemies own fire shall devour them And then as they set at nought his counsell and would none of his reproof but mocked them that feared God so will he also laugh at their calamity and mock when their fear cometh For that they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord Prov. 1. 25 26 27 29. I will add but this one word of terror To scorn at Holiness is to scorn at the Holy Ghost whose office or work it is to sanctifie us As the Father hath commanded us to be Holy as he is Holy 1 Pet. 1. 16. and made it his Image on us and as the Son hath come to destroy unholiness 1 John 3. 8. and give us an example of perfect holiness and sanctifie to himself a peculiar people Titus 2. 14. so is it the undertaken work of the Holy Ghost as sent therefore from the Father and the Son to make Holy all that God will save And though I say not that it is the unpardonable Blasphemy against the Holy Ghost to scorn his very work and office yet I say it is a Blasphemy against the Holy Ghost so near that which is unpardonable that the thoughts of it should humble all that have been guilty and make men fear so horrible a sin But Bessed is he that walketh not in the Counsel of the Ungodly â—or standeth in the way of sinners nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful but his delight is in the Law of the Lord and in his Law doth he meditate day and night The curse of the Lord is in the house of the wicked but he blesseth the habitation of the just Surely he scorneth the scorners but he giveth grace unto the lowly Prov. 3. 33 34. These are the true sayings of the Lord. I thought not meet to pass by this necessary reproof of the contempt of Holiness which this Land hath been so guilty of and which hath undone so many souls and made such desolations in the Land And now you shall see that I am able to make good the grounds of this reproof and that Holiness is no Dishonourable thing 1. The Holy servants of the Lord have the most Honourable Master in all the world This only is sufficient to weigh down all the Honours of the world if it were ten thousand worlds When the builders of the Temple were asked their names by the Officers of King Darius Ezra 5. 10 11. their answer was We are the servants of the God of Heaven and Earth No King on Earth no Angel in Heaven hath a more honourable Master To be the highest Officer of the greatest Prince is a Title as much more base then this as man is baser then the Infinite God If God can not put sufficient Honour on those that are Related to him tell us who can When Moses went to Pharaoh for the Israelites deliverance he was to speak in the name of the Lord and when Pharaoh spake contemptuously of the Lord as one that he knew not and would not obey how wonderously doth God vindicate his honour his people Let other men be called Knights and Lords and Kings and Emperours may I but be truly called the servant of the God of Heaven I shall not envy them their honours Our relation to so glorious a Majesty doth put an unexpressible Honour upon the poorest person and the lowest works A servant of the Lord is more Honourable in ragâ— in a smoaky cottage or the meanest state then the Emperour of Constantinople or Tartary is in all their Wealth and Worldly Glory And if you think not so your selves why do you so much honour them when they are dead What was Peter and Paul and the rest of the Apostles but poor despised men in the world that travailed about to preach the Gospel and what was their honour but to be the Holy Servants of the Lords Yet now they are dead you are desirous to keep Holy dayes in an honourable memorial of them and Kings and Princes reverence their names What were the Martyrs whose memories are now so Honourable with us but a company of hated persecuted men that were used by others as Butchers do their beasts and worse But because they were the servants of the Lord and suffered for his truth and cause their names are honourable and the names of their greatest persecutors do even stink It s said of Constantine the Great who himself was Greater by his Holiness then his Victories that he was wont to reverence the Bishops that had been sufferers for Christ and kissed the place where the eye abode that one of them had lost for the Gospels sake The Christian Princes that ruled the world were wont to Honour the poorest mortified retired servants of Christ that had cast off the world as perceiving that he is more Honourable that contemneth it then he that enjoyeth it The nearest to God undoubtedly are the most Honourable 2. Consider that as it is God that the Saints are thus Related to so their Relation is so near and their Titles so exceeding high which God himself hath put upon them that it advanceth them to the greatest height of Honour that men on earth can reasonably expect Yea with holy admiration we must say it so wonderful is the Honour which the Glorious God hath put upon his poor unworthy servants thar they durst not have owned it nor thought such Titles meet for men if God himself had not been the Author of them Nor could they have believed that God would so advance them if he had not both revealed it and given them faith to believe his revelation As if it were not enough for us to be his servants he calleth us his friends Joh. 15. 13 14 15. Greater Love hath no man then this that a man lay down his life for his friends Ye are my friends if ye do whatsoever I command you Henceforth I call you not servants For the servant knoweth not what his Lord
Righteousness are not a more Honourable employment then the sordid drudgery of the world must say also that the life of a worldling is more Honourable then the life of the holy Angels and the heavenly host They are obeying and praising God and living in the sense of his dearest love while you are sinning and scraping in this Earth And can you believe that your life is more Honourable then theirs If not you must confess that the Godly that come nearest the work of Angels do live a more Honourable life then you When Christ called Peter to leave his fishing and follow him and be his servant he tells him that he will make him a fisher of men as intimating that it was a more honourable work to catch souls by the Gospel and win them to God and to salvaâ—ion then to catch fishes To please God and save our souls and further others in obeying him to their salvation is the Highest work that the sons of men are capable of while they live in flesh As the Priests were sanctified to draw nearer unto God then the common people and to be employed in his most Holy service so are the godly separated by grace from the ungodly world and brought nearer God and used by him in the noblest works In a great house there are not only vessels of Gold and of Silver but also of wood and of earth and some to honour and some to dishonour 1 Tim. 2. 20. If a man therefore purge himself from sin he shall be a vessel unto honour sanctified and meet for the masters use and prepared unto every good work Ver. 21. The Vessel that Swine are fed in is not so Honourable as that which is used at a Princes table If you would know what use the Godly are employed in read 1 Pet. 2. 5 9. As lively stones they are built up a spiritual house they are a holy Priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices unto God which shall be acceptable by Jesus Christ They are a chosen generation a royal Priesthood an holy Nation a peculiar people that they should shew forth the praises of him who hath called them out of darkness into his marvellous light The holy Scriptures tell you the work of Saints Compare them with the work of the drunkard the glutton the gamester the fornicator or the covetous or ambitious worldling and let your reason tell you which is the more Honourable Psalm 34. 9. O fear the Lord ye his Saints for there is no want to them that fear him Psal 31. 23. O Love the Lord all ye his Saints for the Lord preserveth the faithful Psal 89. 5 7. The heavens shall praise thy wonders O Lord thy faithfulness also in the Congregation of the Saints God is greatly to be feared in the Assembly of the Saints and to he had in reverence of all them that are about him These are the employments of the Saints 6. Moreover the Godly have the most Honourable entertainment by the God of all the world They are bid welcome when others are rejected The door is opened to them that is shut against the wicked They are familiar with Jesus Christ as the children of the family when others are strangers whom he will not know Cant. 5. 1. Matth. 25. 10. Matth. 7. 23. I will profess unto them I never knew you depart from me ye workers of iniquity Psalm 1. 6. For the Lord knoweth the way of the Righteous but the way of the ungodly shall perish The faithful are feasted by him when the rest are examined with a Friend how comest thou in hither not having on a wedding garment bind him hand and foot and cast him into outer darkness Matth. 22. 12 13. They are called the children that have the bread and the rest are called the dogs of which some are without and those within do feed but on the crums that fall from the childrens table Matth. 15. 26 27. Revel 22. 15. Hear the Lords invitation and his promise Isa 55. 2 3. Hearken diligently unto me and eat ye that which is good and let your soul delight it self in fatness Encline your ear and come unto me hear and your soul shall live and I will make an everlasting Covenant with you Who is it that is admitted into the Tabernacle of the Lord and who shall dwell in his holy hill He that walketh uprightly and worketh righteousness and speaketh the truth in his heart In whose eyes a vile person is contemned but he honoureth them that fear the Lord Psalm 15. 1 2 4. The upright shall dwell in the presence of the Lord. Psalm 140. 13. God will save Sion and the seed of his servants shall inherit it and they that love his name shall dwell therein Psal 69. 35 36. And Blessed is the man whom thou choosest O Lord and causest to approach unto thee that he may dwell in thy Courts he shall be satisfied with the goodness of thy House even of thy holy Temple Psal 65. 4. Saith David Mine eyes shall be upon the faithful of the Land that they may dwell with me he that walketh in a perfect way he shall serve me Yea Christ entertaineth faithful souls with a spiritual feast of his own flesh and blood His flesh to them is meat indeed and his blood is drink indeed John 6. 55. and he that eateth and drinketh these shall live for ever Verse 54 56. The returning Prodigal is met with joy and quickly embraced in his Fathers arms the fatted Calf is killed for him a ring and new apparell is provided him and musick must express the Joy for his recovery Luke 15. O how welcome are converted sinners to the God of mercy And as they are welcome at their first return so are they in all their attendance on him and addresses to him and service of him while they continue in his family They have boldness now to enter into the Heliest by the new and living way that is consecrated and are invited to draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith Heb. 10. 19 22. In Christ we have boldness and access with confidence by the faith of him Ephes 3. 12. And God hath made us accepted in the beloved to the praise of the glory of his grace Ephes 1. 6. We are living sacrifices acceptable unto God Rom. 12. 1. And our services though weak are sacrifices acceptable and well-pleasing to him Phil. 4. 18. 2 Tim. 2. 3. 5. 4. when the prayers of the wicked are abhorred of the Lord his people serve him acceptably in reverence and godly fear Heb. 12. 28. He answereth their prayers and often speaketh peace unto them and signifieth his acceptance of them If they could bring him a house full of Gold and Silver they would not be so welcome to him as they are in bringing him their hearts their humbled hearts their broken tender melted hearts that burn in Love to him and flame up towards him in desires and in holy praise To
no relief 3. Another duty that Holiness consisteth in is Thanksgiving and Praise to the God of our salvation He that knows not that this work is Pleasant is unacquainted with it If there be any thing Pleasant in this world it is the praises of God that flow from a believing loving soul that is full of the sense of the mercies and goodness and excellencies of the Lord Especially the â—â—animous conjunction of such souls in the high praises of God in the holy Assemblies Is it not pleasant even to Name the Lord to mention his Attributes to remember his great and wonderous works to magnifie him that rideth on the Heavens that dwelleth in the light that cannot be approached that is cloathed with Majesty and Glory that infinitely surpasseth the Sun in its â—rightness that hath his Throne in the Heavens and the Heaven of Heavens cannot contain him and yet he delighteth in the humble soul and hath respect to the contrite yea dwells with them that tremble at his Word Is any thing so pleasant as the Praises of the Lord How sweet is it to see and praise him as the Creator in the various wonderful creatures which he hath made How pleasant to observe his works of providence to them that read them by the light of the Sanctuary and in Faith and Patience learn the interpretation from him that only can interpret them But O how unspeakably Pleasant is it to see the Father in the Son and the God-head in the man-hood of our Lord and the Riches of Grace in the glass of the holy Gospel and the manifold wisdom of God in the Church where the Angels themselves disdain not to behold it Ephes 3. 10 11. The praising of God for the incarnation of his Son was a work that a chore of Angels were employed in as the instructors of the Church Luke 2. 13 14. There is not a promise in the book of God nor one passage of the Life and Miracles of Christ and the rest of the History of the Gospel nor one of the holy works of the spirit upon the soul nor one of those thousand mercies to the Church or to our selves or friends that infinite Goodness doth bestow but contain such matter of Praise to God as might fill believing hearts with Pleasure and find them most delightful work Much more when all these are at once before us what a feast is there for a gracious Soul O you befooled fleshly minds that find no pleasure in the things of God but had rather be drinking or gaming or scraping in the world awaken your souls and see what you are doing With what eyes do you see with what hearts do you think of the Works and Word and Wayes of God and of the Holy employments that you are so much against For my own part I freely and truly here profess to you that I would not exchange the Pleasure that my soul enjoyeth in this one piece of the holy Work of God for all your mirth and sport and gain and whatever the world and sin affords you I would not change the delights which I enjoy in one of these holy dayes and duties in the mentioning of the eternal God and celebrating his praise and magnifying his Name and thinking and speaking of the riches of his Love and the glory of his Kingdom no not for all the pleasure of your lives O that your souls were cured of those dangerous diseases that make you loath the sweetest things You would then know what it is that you have set light by and would marvail at your selves that you could taste no sweetness in the sweetest things Can you think that your work or your play your profits or your sports are comparable for pleasure to the Praises of the Lord If Grace had made you competent Judges I am sure you would say There is no comparison Hear but the testimony of a holy soul yea of the Spirit of God by him Psal. 147. 1. Praise ye the Lord for it is good to sing Praises to our God for it is pleasant and praise is comely Psalm 149. 1 2. Praise ye the Lord sing unto the Lord a new song and his Praise in the Congregation of Saints Let Israel rejoyce in him that made him let the children of Zion be joyful in their King For the Lord taketh pleasure in his people he will beautifie the meek with salvation Let the Saints be joyful in Glory let them sing aloud upon their beds Let the high Praises of God be in their mouth c. Psal 95. 1 2 3. O come let us sing unto the Lord let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving and make a joyful noise to him with Psalms For the Lord is a great God and a great King above all Gods Psalm 96. 1 2 3 4. O sing unto the Lord a new song Sing unto the Lord all the earth Sing unto the Lord bless his Name shew forth his salvation from day to day Declare his glory among the Heathen his wonders among all people For the Lord is great and greatly to be praised Honour and Majesty are before him strength and beauty are in his Sanctuary Did not this holy Prophet find it a Pleasant work to Praise the Lord Yea all that Love the Name of God should be Joyful in him Psalm 5. 11. Every one of his upright ones may say with the Prophet Isa 61. 10. I will greatly rejoyce in the Lord My soul shall be joyful in my God For he hath cloathed me with the garments of salvation he hath covered me with the robes of righteousness as a Bridegroom decketh himself with ornaments and as a Bride adorneth her self with her Jewels For as the earth springs forth her bud and as the Garden causeth the things sown in it to spring forth so the Lord will cause Righteousness and Praise to spring forth before all the Nations It is a promise of Joy that is made in Isa 56. 6 7 8. To the sons of the stranger that joyn themselves to the Lord to serve him and to love the Name of the Lord to be his servants every one that keepeth the Sabbath from polluting it and taketh hold of my Covenant Even them will I bring to my holy mountain and make them joyful in my House of Prayer What a joyful thing is it to a gracious soul when he may see the reconciled face of God and feel his Fatherly reviving Love and among his Saints may speak his Praise and proclaim his great and blessed name even in his Temple where every man speaketh of his Glory Psalm 29. 9. If the Proud are delighted in their own praise how much more will the humble holy soul be delighted in the Praise of God! When the Love of God is shed abroad in the heart and Faith doth set us as before his Throne or at least doth somewhat withdraw the veil and shew us him that lives
Believer knows that as his life and soul so his worldly riches are nowhere sure but in the hand of God And therefore if they can procure his security and get him to receive it and return it them in Heaven with the promised advantage they have then secured it indeed All is lost that God hath not in one way or other and all is secured that he hath and for which we have his promise This is laying it up in heaven Matth. 6. 21. While we keep it we cannot secure it from thieves When we have disposed of it according to the Will of God upon the warrant of his promise it is then in his Custody and then it is safe Neither rust or moath can then corrupt it nor the strongest thieves break through and steal To be Good and do Good is to be likest unto God and therefore must needs be the sweetest life 2. Works of Justice also have their pleasure For they demonstrate the Justice of God himself from whom they do proceed That which is most Pleasant to God should be most Pleasant unto us And as he hath bid us not forget to do good and to communicate because with such sacrifice he is well pleased Heb. 13. 16. so he hath told us that he delighteth in the exercise of loving-kindness judgement and righteousness in the earth Jer. 9. 24. He hath shewed us what is good and what doth he require of us but to do justly and love mercy and walk humbly with our God Mich. 6. 8. And therefore he commandeth Israel Hos 12. 6. Turn thou to thy God Keep Mercy and Judgement and wait on thy God continually Private justice between man and man and family-justice between parents and children masters and servants and Political justice between the Magistrates and the people do all maintain the order of the world and procure both publike and private peace It is selfishness and injustice tyrannie oppression disobedience and rebellion that procure the miseries of the world But Righteousness is safe and sweet 2. You have heard of the Pleasure of Holy Actions both Internal and External The truth is evident also from the Objects of these Acts and the matter from which a believer may derive his Pleasures And O what an Ocean of delight is here before us Were our powers capacities and acts but answerable to the Objects we should presently have the Joyes of heaven 1. A Believer hath the ever blessed God himself to derive his comforts from He hath his Nature and Attributes to be his comfort He hath his near Relations to afford him comfort and this is more then to have all the world It is a God of Infinite Power and Wosdom and Goodness that we believe in that we Love and Worship and Obey It is also a Father Reconciled to us that hath taken us in Covenant to him as his people through Jesus Christ And where shall we find comfort if not in God It is in vain to look for that from any creature that is not to be found in him Poor worldlings you have nothing that is worth the having but the crumms that fall from the childrens table God is our Portion and the world is yours and yet you have less even in this world then we You have the shadow and we have the substance You have the shell and we the kernell You have the straw and chaff and true believers have the corn Your comforts are shaken with every storm and tost up and down by the Justice of God or the Pride of man But God that is our Portion is unchangeable Yesterday to day and the same for ever We have a Kingdom that cannot be moved Heb. 12. 28. Persecutors cannot take our God from us nor can any thing separate us from his Love Rom. 8. 36. They may separate us from our houses from our Countries from our friends from our riches our liberties our lives from our Books our company and Ordinances but not from God who is our great Delight In poverty in persecution in sickness and at death we have still our interest in God A Christian is never in so low a state but he hath a God to whom he may go for comfort who is more to him then your sweetest pleasures Is it not a pleasure to have such a God as can cure all diseases supply all wants overcome all enemies deliver in all dangers and hath promised that he will do it so far as is for our good If he want water that hath the Sea or he want land that hath all the earth or he want light that hath the Sun yet doth he not need to want delight that hath the Lord to be his God if â—e do but keep in the pathes of grace And are you yet unresolved whether Godliness be the most Pleasant Life Take all your pleasures and make your best of them may I but have the Lord to be my God and I hope I shall never desire to change with you 2. A Holy life is therefore Pleasant because we have a full sufficient Saviour from whom we may daily fetch delight The Eâ—ernal Son of God is become the Healer of our wounds our Peace-maker with the Father the Conquerour of our enemies the Ransom for our sins the Captain of our salvation the Head of his Church and the Treasure of all our Hopes and Joyes Sin and misery are the works of Satan which Christ came into the world to destroy If Hypocrites can steal a little Peace to their Consciences from a false conceit that they have a part in Christ what comfort may it be to the true Believer that hath a sure and real interest in him That is the sad and miserable life when you are out of Christ and strangers to his Covenant and cannot say his benefits are yours but you are yet in your sins without his righteousness But when we have a special interest in him the foundation of our everlasting joy is laid and the heart of sin and misery is broken What fear or sorrow can you name that I may not fetch a sufficient remedy against from Christ What can the Prince of darkness say to our discomfort which we may not answer by Arguments from Christ By this judge of the Comfort of a Holy life If the Godly over-look the Grounds of Joy that are laid in Christ and live in a mistaken sorrow that is not for want of Reasons and warrant to rejoyce but for want of a right discerning of those Reasons But what have you that are ungodly to answer against all the terrours of the Law or to answer against all the accusations of your consciences or to comfort you against the remembrance of your approaching misery While you have no part in Christ you have no right to comfort One thought of Christ to a believing soul may afford more Delight then ever you will find in a sinful life 3. Moreover we have the Holy spirit of Christ that is purposely given us to be
our Comforter And if that be not a pleasant life that is managed by such a Guide and that be not likest to be a joyful soul that is possest by the Spirit of joy it self there is no joy then on earth to be expected Hath God promised his Spirit to comfort you that are wicked in your sin No it is the malicious deceiving spirit that is your Comforter that by his comforts he might keep you from solid spiritual everlasting comforts But the Repenting Believing soul that is united unto Christ and hath already had the spirit for his conversion it is he that hath the promise of the spirit for his consolation And if that be not the most comfortable life where the God of Heaven becomes the comforter we cannot then know the effect by the cause If Life it self will quicken if light it self will illuminate the comforting spirit will certainly comfort in the degree and season as God seeth meet and the soul is fitted to receive it 4. Moreover we have the whole treasurie of the Gospel to go to for our Delight And little doth the sensual unbelieving soul know what sweetness what supporting pleasures may be from thence derived I had rather have the holy word of God to go to for contents then the treasures of the rich or the pleasures of the sensual or the flatteries and vain glory of the ambitious man All that the world doth make such a pudder about which they ride and run for which they so much glory in will never afford them so much Content as one Scripture promise will do to a truly faithful soul I must profess before Angels and men that I had rather have one Promise of the Love of God and the life to come which is contained in the holy Scriptures then to have all the riches pleasures and honours of this world My God this was my Covenant with thee and to this I stand O blessed be the Lord that hath provided us such a Magazine of Delight as is this heavenly sacred Book The Precepts appoint us a pleasant work The strictest prohibitions do but restrain us from our own calamities and keep out of our hands the knife by which we would cut our fingers The severest threatnings do but deterre us from running into the consuming fire and hedge about the devouring gulf lest we should foolishly cast our selves therein And these are the bitterest parts of that holy word But when we read the promises of a Saviour and the wonderful history of his Incarnation and of his holy self-denying life his conquests miracles death resurrection ascension intercession and his promise to return when we read of the foundation which he hath laid and the building which he intends to finish of his rich abundant promises to his chosen what provision do we find for our abundant joys No strait can be so great no pressure so grievous no enemies so strong but we have full consolation offered us in the promises against them all We have promises of the pardon of all our sins and promises of heaven it self and what can we have more we have promises suited to every state both prosperity and adversity What do we need which we have not a promise of And the word of God is no deceit What but a promise can comfort them that are short of the possession May I not have more joy in sickness with a promise then the ungodly without a promise in their health A promise in prison sets a man as at liberty A promise in Poverty is more then riches A promise at death is better then life What I have a promise of I may be sure of but what you possess without a promise you may lose and your souls and hopes with it this night There is no condition on earth so hard to a man that hath interest in the promises in which he may not have plentiful relief We live by faith and not by sense And we reckon more on that as ours which we hope for then which we do possess We are sure that there is no true felicity on earth It then we have a promise of Heaven when Infidels lie down in the dust with desperation have we not a more comfortable life then they 5. Moreover we have Heaven it self to fetch our comfort from Not Heaven in sight or in Possession but Heaven in Promise and seen by faith And if Heaven will not afford us pleasure whence shall we expect it Even sensual men can rejoyce as well in what they see not if they are assured it is theirs as in what they see And why then may not Believers do so much more A worldling when he seeth not his money in his chest or at use or his lands and cattel that are far from him can yet rejoyce in them as if he saw them And should not we rejoyce in the certain Hopes of Heaven though yet we see it not when I am pained in sickness and role in restless weariness of my flesh if then I can say I shall be in Heaven may it not be the inward rejoycing of my soul You know where you are but you know not where you shall be The Believer knoweth where he shall be as truly as he knoweth where he is unless it be one that by his frailty hath not reacht unto assurance who yet hath reached unto Hope What great matter is it if I lay in greatest pain if I can say I shall have everlasting ease in Heaven Or if I lay in prison or in sordid poverty and can say I shall shortly be with Christ Or if I had lost the love of all men and could say that I shall everlastingly enjoy the Love of God Most of your comforts do come in by the way of your thoughts And what Thoughts should so rejoyce the soul as the thoughts of our abode with Christ for ever If a day in the Courts of God be so delightful what is ten thousand millions of ages in the Court of Glory and all then as fresh as at the first day There it is that our sin will be put off Our carnal enmity laid by our temptations will be over our enemies will all have done our fears and sorrows will be at an end Our desires will be accomplished Our differences be reconciled Our charity perfected and our expectations fully satisfied and Hope turned into full fruition O may I but be able with stronger faith and fuller confidence to say that Heaven is mine and when this tabernacle is dissolved I shall be with Christ my life and my death will be delightful and I need not complain for want of pleasure Let who will take the pleasures of the flesh may I but have this In prayer in meditation in holy conference in every duty it is the expectation of approaching blessedness that drops in sweetness into all No wonder if it can sweeten a course of duty when it can make light the greatest sufferings and turn pain into pleasure
give 3. Holiness removeth fears and troubles and therefore must needs be a Pleasant state It removeth the fears of the wrath of God and of damnation and the fears of all destructive evils It tends to heal the wounded soul and pacific the clamorous conscience and abate all worldly and groundless sorrows for which the wicked have no true cure 4. Holiness is the destruction of sin and sin is the cause of all calamities and therefore Holiness must needs be Pleasant 5. Holiness doth consist in rejoycing Graces that are exceeding pleasant in the exercise as Faith Hope Love Patience c. yea it consisteth in Joy it self Rom. 14. 17. 6. It fits the soul for Communion with God who is the fountain of Delights and it brings us near him and acquaints us with him as a God of Love and therefore must needs be a Pleasant state 7. You see by experience that when once men have tryed a Holy life they think they can never have enough of it The more Holy they are the more Holy they would be He that hath most would fain have more And the weakest desireth no less then to be perfect And do you think men that have tryed it would so long after more and more if it were not pleasant Judge also by the labour and diligence of the godly who seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness and make it the principal business of their lives Would they make all this ado for nothing Or for that which is a matter of no delight Judge also by the delights which they voluntarily forsake when they let go all their sinful pleasures and renounce all the glory of the world would they make this exchange if they had not found a more pleasant course and that which tends to everlasting pleasure 8. You see also that the truly Godly when once they have tryed a holy life will never go back again to their former pleasures but loath the very remembrance of them It is not all the honours and riches and pleasures in the world that can hire them to forsake a holy life Sure therefore they find it the most pleasant course if not in sensible delights yet at least in easing their consciences and securing their minds from the terrours that sinful pleasures would produce If they found that Godliness answered not their expectation they have leisure enough and temptations too many to turn back into the state from whence they came But how would they abhorr such a motion as this 9. If Holiness were not a Pleasant thing it could not help us to bear up under all afflictions nor make us rejoyce in tribulation as it doth That which can sweeten gall and wormwood must needs be very sweet it self That which can make reproach and scorn and poverty and imprisonment either sweet or tolerable is sure it self a pleasant thing 10. Lastly if Holiness were not pleasant it could not make Death it self so easie nor take off its terrours nor cause the Martyrs to suffer so joyfully for Christ Death is the King of terrours and so bitter a cup that it must needs be a pleasant thing indeed that can sweeten it BEsides all this that hath been said let me briefly have some general aggravations of the Delights of Holiness And compare it as we go with the Delights of the ungodly 1. The Delights of Holiness are the most Great and Glorious and Sublime delights They are fetcht from the most Great and Glorious things It is God and his Grace and everlasting glory that feed our pleasures Whereas the Delights of sensual men are fed with trifles What do they rejoyce in but the fooleries of sin and the filthyness of their own transgressions What is it that contenteth them but a dream of honour or the good will and word of mortal men or a brutish sportfulnesse or the pleasing of the itch of lust or the provision that they have laid up for the flesh The treasures of a Kingdom excell not the treasure of a childs pin-box the thousandth part so much as Heaven excells the treasure of the ungodly Judge therefore by the matter that feeds their pleasure which of the two is the more pleasant life to sport in their own shame and laugh at the brink of misery with the ungodly or to delight our selves in the Love of God and rejoyce in the assured hope of Glory with the true believer 2. The Delights of Holiness are the most rational well-grounded sure delights They are not delusory nor grounded on mistakes or fancies They are warranted by the truth and All-sufficiency of God and the certainty of his promise and the immutability of his counsels and the sure Reward prepared for his Saints None but a lying malicious Devil or his instruments that participate of his nature or a blind corrupted partial flesh will ever go about to question the foundations of our faith and comforts The hopes and comforts that are built upon this Rock will never fall nor make us ashamed But the ungodly rejoyce in their own delusions It is ignorance and errour that they are beholden to for their mirth They laugh in their sleep or as mad men in their distraction Did they know that Satan rejoyceth in their joyes and that an offended God is alwayes present and how poor a matter it is that they rejoyce in it would marr their mirth If they saw the Hell that they are near or well-considered where they stand and what a case their souls are in they would have little list to play or laugh If they knew aright the shortness of their pleasures and the length of their sorrows and in what a doleful case their wealth and fleshly delights will leave them it would turn their laughter into mourning and lamentation So that they rejoyce but as a sick man in a phrensie or as a fool upon some good news to him that is false upon meer mistake 3. The Delights of Holiness are the most pure Delights and most entire and compleat There is no Evil in it mixed with the Good and therfore nothing to interrupt the joy Our joyes indeed are too much interrupted but that is not from any hurt that is in a holy life but by the contrary sin which Holiness must work out If men take poyson let them not blame nature that strives against it if they are sick but let them blame themselves and the poyson that puts nature to expell it In Holiness it self there is nothing but Good and therefore nothing that should grieve us But it is far otherwise with sensual delights As they are sinful they are wholly evil As they are natural feeding upon the creature alone they are as it is a mixture of Vanity and Vexation Every creature hath its unsuitableness and imperfection by which it disturbeth even where it pleaseth and troubleth where it comforteth and frustrateth and disappointeth more then it satisfieth The more we Love it usually the more we suffer by it That
mend his rellish and cure his ingratitude And will you do so your selves by Christ and Holiness and say as those Mal. 1. 13. What a weariness is it Take heed lest you provoke the Lord to cast you into a state in which you shall have more cause to be aweary If you are weary of reading and praying and hearing and other holy exercises and weary of heart-searching penitent meditations will you not be wearyer of Hell-fire and of the dolorous reviews of this your folly and of the endless easeless remediless sense of the wrath of God and gripes of your own self-tormenting consciences How just is it with God to give those men somewhat that they have cause to be aweary of that will be thus aweary of his sweetest service and reject the greatest mercies he can offer them as if they were some burdensom worthless things 3. Will you have any pleasure at all or will you have none If any in what then will you place it and whence will you expect it if not from God in a holy life If God be thy trouble what then is fit to be thy delight Darest thou say in thy heart or with thy tongue that sin and sensuality is better Darest thou say that a good bargain or other worldly gain or cards or dice or other sports or ease or good chear or an Ale-house or a Whore are pleasanter things then walking with thy God in faith and holiness and expectation of the everlasting joyes Heaven and earth shall bear witness against thee and common Reason shall bear witness against thee for this inhumane impious folly and ingratitude if ever thou appear at the barr of God with the guilt of such unreasonable sin What! is God no better in thine eyes then a filthy brutish sinful pleasure and is the Love of God no sweeter a work then the Love of sensual delights Saith blessed Augustine He that will sell or exchange his soul for transitory commodities doth censure Christ to be a foolish Merchant that knew no better what he aâ—â— when he gave his Life for those souls that you will not lose a sin for So I may say here Hath Christ bought for you Holy and Everlasting pleasures at the price of his own most bitter pains and precious blood and do you now think them no better then your fleshly beastial delights Is it Christ or you think you that is mistaken in the value of them Did he shed his blood to purchase you that which is not worth the parting with a cup of drink for or the parting with your pleasure or unjust commodity for Sure he that judgeth thus of Christ is far from believing in him with any true Christian saving Faith 4. If you can find no pleasure in God and in a holy life you may be sure that he will have no pleasure in you Wonder not if you find in your greatest need that you are abhorred and loathed by the Lord when you loathed the very thoughts and mention of him in the day of your visitation Marvail not if the most Holy God do take no pleasure in a leathsem sinner when the sinner is so ungodly that he takes more pleasure in the most sordid fading trifles then in God You may offer the sacrifice of your heartless hypocritical prayers and praises unto God and he will count them abomination and cast them back as dung into your faces and tell you that he hath no pleasure in the sacrifice of such fools Read it in his own words Prov 15. 8. 21. 27. Isa 1. 13. Eccles. 5. 4. As you are weary of serving him so he is â—â—â—ary of your services and it is a trouble to him 〈…〉 them and when you spread forth your hands he will hide his eyes from you yea when you make many prayers he will not hear Isa 1. 14 15. When the Jews offered their lame deceitful sacrifices and said Behold what a weariness is it God sends them word that he hath â—o pleasure in them nor would regard their persons nor accept a sacrifice at their hands Mal. 1. 8 9 10. and their solemn feasts he counteth dung And dung would be no acceptable present or seast to your selves if it were offered you instead of meat Mal. 2. 3. My soul saith the Lord loathed them and their soul abhorred me Zech 11. 8. As he that despiseth him shall be lightly esteemed by him 1 Sam. 2. 30. So he that loatheth him shall be loathed by him If any man draw back saith the Lord my soul shall have no pleasure in him Heb. 10. 38. For he is not a God that hath pleasure in wickedness neither shall evil dwell with him the foolish shall not stand in his sight he hateth all the workers of iniquity Psalm 5. 4 5. And little do you now imagine what a horrour it will be to you in the day of your extremity for God to tell you that he hath no pleasure in you When you look before you into an eternity of woe which you have no hope to escape but by the mercy of the Lord and he shall dash that hope by telling you that he hath no pleasure in you it will give your souls the deadly wound that never shall be healed In vain then shall you wish that you had chosen in time the durable delights and not the pleasures of filthy sin for so short a season and to your torment you shall know whether God or the world was more worthy of your sweetest affections and delights and how deservedly they are all damned that obeyed not the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness 2 Thes 2. 12. Who knowing the judgement of God that they which commit such things are worthy of death not only do the same but have pleasure in them that do them Rom. 1. 32. If you will count it your pleasure to ryot in the day-time rather then to walk and work by the light you must look to receive the due reward of such unrighteousness 2 Pet. 2. 13. If it be your sport to sin and to do mischief Prov. 10. 23. you shall have small sport in suffering the punishment of your willful folly 5. If God and Holiness seem not pleasant to you then Heaven it self cannot seem pleasant to you if you consider it truly as it is For the Heavenly felicity consisteth in the perfection of our Holiness and the perfect fruition of God himself by Sight and Love and Joy for ever If the little Holiness be unpleasant and irksom to you which appeareth in the imperfect Saints on earth what pleasure could you take in that supereminent Holiness which is the state and work of the celestial inhabitants If the thoughts and mention of God be unpleasant to you and his holy praises do seem to you as matters of no delight What then would you do in heaven where this must be your everlasting work And if Heaven seem a place of toyle and trouble to you how just will it be that
you are everlastingly shut out How can you for shame beg of God to glorifie you when you take the Glory that he hath promised for a misery If you think that there is a Heaven of such sensual pleasures as you desire or that any shall be saved that only choose Heaven as a less and more tolerable misery then Hell you will shortly find your expectations deceived Lay all these five considerations together and you may perceive what miserable souls those are that can find pleasure in perishing trifles of the world and none in a Holy and Heavenly life Be assured of this whosoever thou art that if God and Heaven and a Holy life be not a thousand times sweeter and more delightful to thee then any thing that this world can afford to thy contentment it is not for want of matter of superabundant delight to be found in God and in his holy ways but it is for want of reason or faith or consideration or a sutable Heart in thee which may make thee fit to know and taste the pleasures which now thou art unacquainted with And is it not pitty that such infinite delights should be set before men and they should lose them all for want of a Heart and appetite to them and should perish by choosing the lowest vanities before them I do therefore earnestly beseech thee that readest these words if thou be one of these unhappy souls that canst find no pleasure in God and Holiness that thou wouldst speedily observe and lament that blindness and wickedness of thy heart that is the cause of this infatuation and corruption of thine apprehension and rational appetite and that thou wouldst presently apply thy self to Christ for the cure of it To which end I advise thee to these following means Direct 1. IF you would taste the pleasure of a holy life bethink you better of the necessity and excellency of it and cast away your prejudice and false conceits which have deceived you and turned your minds against it A child may be deluded to take his own Father for his enemy if he see him in an enemies garb or be perswaded by false suggestions that he hateth him A man may be perswaded to hate his meat if you can but make him believe that it is poyson or to hate his cloaths if you can make him believe they are infected with the plague If you will suffer your understandings to be deluded so far as to overlook the amiable nature of holiness and to think the image of God is but a fancie or that a heavenly life is nothing but hypocrisie and that it is but pride that maketh men seek to be holyer then others and that makes them they cannot goe quietly to Hell in despight of the commands and mercies of the Lord as others do I say if the Devil the great deceiver can possess you with such frantick thoughts as these what wonder if you hate the very name of Holiness How can you find pleasure in the greatest good while you take it for an evil If you will believe all that the Devil and his foolish malicious instruments say of God and of a holy life you shall never love God nor see any loveliness or taste any sweetness in his service Dir. 2. Come neer and search into the inwards of a holy life and try it a little while your selves if you would taste the pleasure of it and do not stand looking on it at a distance where you see nothing but the out side nor judge by bare hearsay which giveth you no taste or relish of it The sweetness of honey or wine oâ— meat is not known by looking on it but by tasting it Come neer and try what it is to live in the Love of God and in the belief and hope of life eternal and in universal obedience to the laws of Christ and then tell us how these things do relish with you You will never know the sweetness of them effectually as long as you are but lookers on It was the similitude which Peter Martyr used in a Sermon which converted the Noble Neopolitane Marquess of Uicum Galeacius Caracciolus who forsook wife and children and honours and lands and countrey and all for the liberty of the Reformed Religion at Geneva saith he If you see the motion of dancers a far off and hear not the Musick you will think they are frantick but when you come near and hear the musick and observe their harmonical orderly motion you will take delight in it and desire to joyn with them So men that judge at a distance of the truth and holy ways of God by the slanderous reports of malignant men will think of the godly as Festus of Paul that they are beside themselves But if they come among them and search more impartially into the reasons of their course and specially if they joyn with them in the inwards and vital actions of religion they will then be quickly of another mind and not go back for all the pleasures or profits of the world In the works of Nature and sometimes of Art the outside is so far from shewing you the excellencies that it is but a comely vaile to hide them Though you would have a handsome cover for your watch yet doth it but hide the well ordered frame and useful motions that are within You must open it and there observe the parts and motions if you would pass a right judgement of the work You would have a comely cover for your Books but it is but to hide the well composed letters from your sight in which the sense and use and excellency doth confist You must open it if you will read it and know the worth of it A common spectator when he seeth a Rose or other flower or fruit-tree thinketh he hath seen all or the chiefest part But it is the secret unsearcheable motions and operations of the vegetative life and juice within by which the beauteous flowers and sweet fruits are produced and wonderfully differenced from each other that are the excellent part and mysteries in these natural works of God Could you but see these secret inward causes and operations it would incomparably more content you He that passeth by and looketh on a Bee-hive and seeth but the Cover and the laborious creatures going in and out doth see nothing of the admirable operations within which God hath taught them Did you there see how they make their wax and honey and compose their combs and by what laws and in what order their Common-wealth is governed and their work carryed on you would know more then the out side of the â—ive can shew you So it is about the life of Godliness If you saw the inward motions of the quickening spirit upon the soul and the order and exercise of every grace and by what laws the thoughts and affections are governed and to whom they tend you would then see more of the beauty of Religion then you can see
by the outward behaviour of our assemblies The shell is not sweet but serves to hide the sweeter part from those that will not storm those walls that they may possess it as their prize The kernel of Religion is covered with a shell so hard that flesh and blood cannot break it Hard sayings and hard providences to the Church and to particular believers are such as many cannot break through and therefore never taste the sweetness The most admired feature and beauty of any of your bodies which fools think to be the most excellent part of the body is indeed but the handsome well-adorned case that God by nature doth cover his more excellent inward works with Were you but able to see within that skin and 〈…〉 once to observe the wonderful motions of Heart and Braine and the course of the blood in the veins and arteries and the several fermentations and the causes and nature of chylifications and sanguifications and the spirits and senses and all their works and if you saw the reason of every part and vessel in this wonderous frame and the causes and nature of every disease much more if you saw the excellent nature and operations of that rational soul that is the glory of all you would then say that you had seen a more excellent sight then the smooth and beauteous skin that covers it The invisible soul is of greater excellencie then all the visible beauties in the world So also if you would know the excellencies of Religion you must not stand without the doors or judge of it by the skin and shell but you must come neer and look into the inward Reasons of it and think of the difference between the high imployments of a Saint and the poor and for did drungery of the ungodly between walking with God in desire and love and in the spiritual use of his Ordinances and creatures and conversing only with sinful men and transitory vanities between the life of faith and hope which is daily maintained by the foresight of Everlasting Glory and a life of meer nature and worldliness and sensuality and idle complement and pompe which are but the progenitors of sorrow and end in endless desperation Come neer and try the power of Gods Laws and of the workings of his spirit and think in good sadness of the place where you must live forever and the glory you shall see and the sweet enjoyment and employment you shall have in the presence of the eternal Majesty and think well of all the sweet contrivances and discoveries of his love in Christ and how freely all these are offered to you and how certainly they may be your own peruse the promises and sweet expressions of Love and Grace and exercise your souls in serious meditation prayer thanksgiving and praise and withall remember that none but these will be durable delights and then tell me whether a life of sport and pride and worldliness and flesh-pleasing or a life of faith and Holiness be the better the sweeter and more pleasant life Direct 3. If you would taste the Pleasures of a Holy life you must apply your self to Christ in the use of his appointed means for the renewing of your natures that his Spirit may give you a new understanding and a new heart to discern and rellish spiritual things For your old corrupted minds and hearts will never do it They are unsuitable to the things of God and therefore cannot Receive them nor savour them nor be subject to the holy laws 1 Cor. 2. 14 15. Rom. 8. 5 6 7 8. The appetite and rellish of every living creature is agreeable to its nature A fish hath small pleasure in the dry land nor a bird in the deeps of water grass and water is sweeter to an Ox then our most delicate meats and drinks Corruption and Custom have made you so vitious that your natures are not such as God made them at the first when he himself was mans desire and delight but they are now inclined to sensual things being captivated by the fleshly part and have contracted a strangeness and enmity to God And therefore those Hearts will never rellish the sweetnesses of a life of Faith and Holiness till Faith and Holiness be planted in them and they be born again by regenerating grace For that which is born of the flesh is flesh and but flesh and therefore doth reach no higher then a fleshly inclination can move it and that which is born of the spirit is spirit and therefore will rellish and love things Spiritual Direct 4. Lastly if you would taste the pleasures of a Holy life you must forbear those sinful fleshly pleasures which now you are so taken up with For these are they that infatuate your understandings and corrupt your appetites and make the sweetest things seem loathsom to you As the using of vain sports and filthy lust abroad doth make such persons a weary of their own relations and families and business at home so also the glutting of the mind with vanity and using your selves to sinful pleasures is it that turns your hearts from God and maketh his Word and Wayes unsavoury to you You must first with the Prodigal Luke 15. be brought into a famine of your former pleasures and be denyed the very husk and then you will remember that the meanest servant in your Fathers house is in a far better case then you having bread enough while you perish through hunger And hence it is that God doth so often promote the work of Conversion by Affliction and by the same means carryeth on the work of Grace in most that he will save Cannot you tell how to leave your sensual pleasures What will you do when sickness makes you weary of them Weary of your meat and drink and bed weary to hear talk of that which now doth seem so sweet and to say I have no pleasure in them Cannot you spare your friends your sports your bravery your wealth and other carnal accommodations What will you say of them when pain disgraceth them and convinceth you of their insufficiency to stand you in any stead These things that you are now so loth to leave may shortly become such a load to your souls as undigested meat to the stomack that is sick that you can have no ease till you have cast them off Away therefore with these luscious Vanities betime which vitiate your appetites and put them out of rellish with the things that are truly pleasant O what a shame it is to hear a man say I shall never endure so godly and spiritual and strict a life when he can endure and take pleasure in a life of sin You may wiselyer lie down in the dunghill or the ditch and say I shall never endure a cleaner place or feed on carrion and say I shall never endure a cleaner dyet or accompany only with enemies and wild beasts and say I shall never endure the company of my friends What! is God
be in and I delight in the welfare and not in the distress and misery of my friend And surely God that is Love it self and hath created Joy in man to be his Happiness and hath placed so much of misery in sorrow can never be so delighted in our distress and trouble as in our content and joy As he hath sworn that he takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked but rather that they repent and live so we may boldly conclude that he takes no pleasure in the anguish and dejectedness of his children but rather that they walk in Love and chearful Obedience before him But his Word will fully and plainly tell you what temper it is that is most pleasing to him It is a light and easie burden that Christ doth call us to bear and it is his office to ease us and give us rest that labour and are heavy laden with burdens of our own Mat. 11. 28 29. He was anointed to preach the Gospel or glad tidings of salvation to the poor and sent to heal the broken-hearted to preach deliverance to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind and to set at liberty them that are bruised and to preach the acceptable year of the Lord Luke 4. 18 19. When he was to leave the world how carefully did he provide for the comfort of his Disciples Commanding them not to let their hearts be troubled Joh. 14. 1. and promising to send the comforter to them and that he would come to them and not leave them Comfortless vers 16 18 26. Repeating it again v. 27 28. Peace I leave with you my peace I give unto you not as the world giveth give I unto you Let not your heart be troubled neither be afraid Nay he engageth them as they Love him to rejoyce even because he went unto the Father He engageth them in the decrest Love to one another that their lives might be the more comfortable He foretelleth them of his sufferings and of their own lest being surprized their sorrow should be the more He promiseth them that their sorrow shall be turned into joy Joh. 16. 20. and that in him they shall have peace when in the world they have tribulation v. 33. directing them to prayer and promising to hear them that their joy may be full v. 24. and promiseth that none shall take it from them v. 22. telling them of the mansions that he prepareth for them and that it is his will that they be with him and behold his glory that nothing might be wanting to their joy Joh. 14. 2 3. 17. 23 24. When he appeareth to them after his Resurrection his salutation is Peace be unto you Joh. 20. 19 21 26. The abounding and multiplying of this holy Peace is the desire and salutation of Paul to the Churches in all his epistles Gal. 6. 16. Ephes 6. 23. Rom. 15. 33. 1 Cor. 1. 3. Rom. 1. 7. Gal. 1. 3. Phil. 1. 2. Col. 1. 2. 2 Thes 1. 2. 1 Tim. 1. 2. Tit. 1. 4. Philem. 3. So Peter 1 Pet. 1. 2. 2. 1 2. 2 Joh. 3. 3 Joh. 14. The Gospel it self is a message of glad tidings Luk. 8. 1. Act. 13. 32. And it is the work of the ministers of Christ to preach Peace to the sinful world through him Act. 10. 36. and to beseech them to be reconciled to God 2 Cor. 5. 19 20. and to bring Peace to the houses where any of the sons of Peace abide Matth. 10. 12 13. Luk. 10. 6. Triumphing joys and proclamations of Peace were the entrance of Christs Kingdom This Angels proclaime Luk. 2. 14. Glory be to God in the highest on Earth Peace Good will towards men This the new inspired Disciples proclaim Luk. 19. 37 38. The whole multitude of the Disciples began to rejoyce and praise God with a loud voice for all the mighty works that they had seen saying Blessed be the King that cometh in the name of the Lord Peace in heaven and Glory in the Highest what abundance of commands for Rejoycing are in the Scripture Psal 31. 1. Rejoyce in the Lord O ye righteous for praise is comely for the upright Psal 97. 11 12. Light is sown for the righteous and gladness for the upright in heart Rejoyce in the Lord ye righteous and give thanks at the remembrance of his holiness 1 Thes 5. 16. Rejoyce evermore Phil. 3. 1. Finally my Brethren Rejoyce in the Lord Phil. 4. 4. Rejoyce in the Lord always and again I say rejoyce 6. Be careful for nothing but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanks giving let your requests be made known unto God And thus are the godly ordinarily described even in their deepest sufferings and distress Rom. 5. 1 2. Being justified by faith we have peace with God and rejoyce in hope of the glory of God And not only so but we glory in tribulation Phil. 3. 3. It is the description of a regenerate man to worship God in spirit to rejoyce in Christ Jesus to have no confidence in the flesh 1 Pet. 1. 6 8. It is the description of believers to Rejoyce greatly in a Christ not seen even with joy unspeakable and full of glory though for a season if need be they may be in heaviness through manifold temptations 1 Pet. 4. 12 13. 14. even in the fiery tryal we must rejoyce as being partakers of the sufferings of Christ that when his glory shall be revealed we may be glad also with exceeding joy when all manner of evil is spoken of us falsly for the sake of Christ and when we are hated of all men and reproached we must rejoyce and be exceeding glad and leap for joy as knowing that our reward in heaven is great Luk. 6. 22 23. Matth. 5. 11 12. The Apostles were as sorrowful yet alway rejoycing as having nothing and yet possessing all things 2 Cor. 6. 10. rejoycing in their suffering for believers Col. 1. 24. even when they were beaten rejoycing that they were counted worthy to suffer for the name of Christ Act. 5. 39 40. The rich must Rejoyce in that he is made low as well as the brother of low degree in that he is exalted Jam. 1. 9 10. The Eunuch when he was but newly converted went on his way rejoycing Act. 8. 39. There was great joy in Samaria when they had received the word of God Act. 8. 8. The voice of rejoycing and salvation is in the tabernacles of the righteous The statutes of God are the rojoycing of their heart Psal 119. 111. 19. 8. All those that trust in God should rejoyce and shout for joy and all that love his name should be joyful in him Psal 5. 11. 33. 21. Let the righteous be glad let them rejoyce before God yea let them exceedingly rejoyce Psal 68. 3. Let us therefore desire to see the good of his chosen and rejoyce in the gladness of his nation and glory with his inheritance Psal 106. 5.
it therefore if you can have it Dir. 9. In your addresses to God in holy worship be sure that Praise and Thansgiving have its due proportion They are the chief and most excellent and acceptable part and therefore let them not have the smallest room Though your sins and wants be as great as you imagine in your complaints it is yet your duty to Praise the Excellencies and Attributes and works of your Creator and to be Thankful for the preparations made by Christ and freely offered you so that they shall certainly be yours if you accept them But much more Thankful should you be that have but the evidence of Desire and Consent to prove your Interest in Christ and in his Covenant I would intreat poor troubled fearful souls to Resolve upon this one thing which is reasonable necessary and in their power that when they are upon their knees with God they will spend as much of their Time and words in confessing mercies and Praising God as in confessing sin and condemning themselves and lamenting their wants and weaknesses and distress Though they cannot do it cheerfully as they should let them do it as they can And at last while they keep in the right way of duty and use themselves to the commemoration of that which is sweet and grateful to the soul Religion it self will become sweet and grateful and chearfulness of heart will be promoted by our own considerations expressions The same I desire of them as to their Thoughts that they will do their best to spend as many thoughts and as much time upon Mercy as upon sin and misery and upon the Goodness and Love of God in Christ as upon his threatnings and terrous Dir. 10. If you would taste the comforts of a holy life be sure that you give up your selves to Christ without reserve and follow him fully and place all your hopes and confidence in his promised rewards Serve him with your best yea with your all and not with some cheap and heartless service Comforts are the Rewards of faithfulness They that do God the most sincere and costly service and save nothing from him which he calleth them to lose are likest to be encouraged by his sweetest comforts It is sluggish neglects and unfruitfulness doing no good in the world but thinking to be saved by a dull profession that makes so many uncomfortable professors as there be Though I know that on the other extream too many live in pining sadness by not understanding the Covenant of Grace which accepteth of sincerity and secureth the weak and infants in the family of Christ But yet the barren unprofitable Christians I mean that comparatively are such though they be sincere shall find that God will not encourage any in sloathfulness by his smiles and consolations Direct 11. If you would know the Rest and Comfort of Believers see that you Rest in the Will of God in all Conditions as the Center and only bottom for your souls His will is not to be reduced to yours strive therefore to bring yours most fully and quietly to his Gods Will is the Universal Original and End of all things and there is no Felicity or Rest for man but in the fulfilling and pleasing and disposals of his will Be not too desirous of the fulfilling of your own wills and murmure not against the disposals of the Will of God It cannot but be Good which proceedeth from that will which is the Spring of good The accomplishment of Gods Will is the perfection of all created beings being that End for which they are all created If you Rest in your own wills your Rest will be imperfect disturbed and short of duration For your wills are the wills of weak and vicious men They are frequently misguided by an ignorant mind and perverted by a corrupt and byassed heart But Gods will is never misguided nor ever determined of any thing but for the best If you Rest here you Rest in safety you may be sure you shall never be deceived by him You may Rest in constant peace and quietness for God is unchangeable and will not be off and on with us as we are with him and with our selves As you pray that his Will may be done acquiesce in the doing of his Will and whatever befall you repose and satisfie your hearts in this Direct 12. Lastly let me add that when you have all the Directions that can be given you trust not too much to your own understanding and skill for the application of them to your selves in any weighty difficult cases But as you will not think it enough for the health of your bodies to have Physick Books and Physick Lectures unless you have also a Physicion who knoweth more then you to direct you in the application so think it not enough that you have the best Books and Sermons unless you have also a faithful and judicious Pastor whose advice you may crave in particular difficulties and who may direct you in the discovery of your own diseases and applying the fittest remedies in their seasons and measures with such Rules and Cautions as are necessary to the success If God had not known that there would still be many children and weak ones in his family that would stand in need of the instruction support and encouragement of the strong he would never have settled Pastors in his Church to watch over all the flocks and to be alwayes ready at hand for the confirmation and encouragement of such as need their help There had been no Physicions if there had been no diseases Tire not your Physicions with needless consultations for easie and ordinary cases but be not without them in your greater straits and wants and doubts And blessed be God even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ the Father of Mercies and the God of all comfort who comforteth us in all our tribulation that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble by the comfort wherewith we our selves are comforted of God For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us so our consolation also aboundeth by Christ And whether we be afflicted it is for your consolation and salvation which is effectual in the enduring of the same sufferings which we also suffer or whether we be comforted it is for your consolation and salvation 2 Cor. 1. 4 5 6. While you are sick or infants the stronger must support you You cannot stand or go or suffer of your selves And God is so tender of his weak and little ones that he hath not only given strength to others for their sakes and commanded the strong to bear the burdens and infirmities of the weak Gal. 6. 1 2. Rom. 15. 1 2 3 4. but also established the Ministerial office much for this end Mal. 2. 7. For the Priests lips should keep knowledge and they should seek the Law at his mouth for he is the Messenger of the Lord of Hosts Not that we should disclose our Consciences and depend for guidance on every ignorant or ungodly man that hath the name and place of a Priest Even among the Papists men have leave to choose such Confessors as are fittest for them If the Priests depart ouâ— of the way and cause many to stumble at the Law and corrupt the Covenant of Levi the Lord will make them contemptible and base before all the people according as they have not kept his wayes but been partial in the Law Mal. 2. 8 9. But use those that are qualified and sent by the Spirit of God who in simplicity and godly sincerity not with fleshly wisdom but by the Grace of God have had their conversation in the world especially to you-wards 2 Cor. 1. 12. Such as you have acknowledged in part that they are your rejoycing as you also are theirs in the day of the Lord Jesus vers 14. Not using them as such as have dominion over your faith but as those that by office qualification and willingness and disposition are Helpers of your Joy vers 24. In the saithful practice of these Directions you will find that Holiness is the most Pleasant way and that the Godly choose the better part and that the ungodly sensualists do live as BRUTES while they unreasonably refuse to live as SAINTS FINIS I. C. Scaliger Epidorp 1. 7. p. 296. Hoc quod Valeo Non queo quod debeo Quid 〈◊〉 Mensura meaâ—es tu Domine immensa potestas Non ego tua Quodque habeâ— tu mihi dedisti Quodque do non do sed accipis hoc enim dedisti Tu solus tibi satis es tu mihi tibique Nec te laudo ubi laudo sed ipse te ipse laudas Me persiciens non tua sic laudibus ornans Queis me ad te trahis haud ego te traho super me Me praeveniens hic ades ut mihi superfis