And what shall we think of the words of our Lord Luke 6.21 Blessed are you that Weep and you that Mourn and woe to you that Laugh Now it is not to be supposed that so Good and so Merciful and so Gracious a Saviour as our Lord Jesus Christ is should envy to man any thing that could be to the Good and Welfare of his Nature But he knew how much the Carnal Joy and Mirth that is so common and so much valued among Men lavishes out those Thoughts and Spirits and that Time that should be laid out upon so serious and great things as Reconciliation to God Pardon of Sin Newness of Heart and Life and that Sorrow and Mourning and Weeping are prepared by God as fitted in their Nature to make us more Grave and Pondering of Things and that being Sanctified and in the Hand of his Grace are made use of to bring us home to himself For when men are under sadness finding the prints of the Wrath Justice and Displeasure of God upon them they enquire after the Reason Their sins as to Joseph's Brethren come to their Remembrance They are provoked to move to God by Humiliation Confession of Sin Prayer for Pardon Desire of his Grace and Spirit to enable them to Reform they enquire into his word how they may cleanse their way order their Conversation aright to please him they are moved to consider by these drops and Touches of Sorrow what that state of sorrow without Banks or Bounds or Bottom is where there is weeping and wailing and gnashing of Teeth They are taken off from that Pride and Self-Conceit they find so little in all things here below and in this present State that they enquire for those better and greater Things that are Above and in Eternity When sorrow that disposes to strong and serious enquiries becomes sorrow after and according to God Oh! how excellently does it work How do men search Lam. 3.40 and try their ways that they may turn to God Now because of the Order that God hath plac'd sorrow in to all these great Effects therefore our Lord pronounc'd a Blessing upon Weeping and Mourning For else he loves our Joy when it is Spiritual he commands to Rejoyce in the Lord all way and again he says Rejoyce He spoke many great things John 15.11 that our Joy might be full that he might fill our Mouths with Laughter and our Tongues with Singing But our carnal our sensual Joys he knows are our Death and Destruction he knows we are in no better case in our prophane foolish sinful Laughter than they who are stung with the Tarantula and Dye Laughing Thus we have greatest reason in the midst of such Laughter to be Sorrowful and the end of that Mirth will be heaviness Thus it will be bitterness in the latter end therefore he warns us of it before and in greatest Love to us declares a Woe on such Laughter But now to conclude this particular The sorrow of the World How different a thing is it For tho it causes Thoughts and Enquiries yet it is only how to be rid of the Worldly Causes of Sorrow and it turns only to Worldly Remedies And it is very often in a rage at the causes it finds and when either the Remedies are not to be found or fail in their Success it is in a Rage and flies out too often against God and Providence and so it works Death It begins that Hatred of God that Blasphemy and Rage that is in Hell or if it does not thus it is a sullen despondent unactive state of Mind that shuts and seals up all Activity like the Night wherein no Man can Work John 9.4 and so goes down into utter Darkness It either sayâ— This evil is of the Lord 1 Kings 6.33 why should I wait any longer Or like Cain My Iniquities are greater than can be Forgiven and so hastens out from the Presence of God or it recoyls upon it self as Saul Achilophel Judas or the Heart under the Power of it Dies as a stone within it self as Nabals Heart died within him 1 Sam. 25.27 Thus it every way works Death because it hath nothing to do with him who is the Fountain of Life For the Being of God is infinitely happy and blessed and all light and lustre and in him is no Darkness at all of sorrow as not of Sin he therefore when sorrow is after him springs a Light into it that whereas the Dark and Black part arises from sin and the sinful Creature yet because it is after him it shall never set in the darkness of Death and Hâ—ll It receives from him as a Tincture of Holiness so a Tincture of Life a Ray and Beam of it It works Repentance unto Life and to Salvation and so it springs up aftâ—r into Joâ— in his Favour in the Light of his Countenance in the assurance of his Love But the Sorrow of the World is like a Night that no kind of Light at all Enlightens Like the Night Job Cursed it does not turn to the Light because it is not turn'd to God and so is a shade of Hell â—efore Hell it self a valley of the shaddow of Death and the horrors of it are the beginnings of the horrors of Hell As therefore Carnal Joys are sparks of our own kindling Esay 50. notwithstanding which we shall lye down in sorrow even so is sorrow not after God as a black shade of our own 4. The service of sorrow after God to Repentance unto Salvation is that it breaks and forces asunder that sinful Frame in our Hearts of sin and contrariety to God and to Holyness The very Natural Affection of sorrow loosens and Divides the Heart from that which is the Cause and occasion of such sorrow Because that great self-Self-love the force of that Law of Self-preservation is so strong upon us that seeing sorrow is an Affection that stands in an enmity to our Peace Comfort and Enjoyment and to our Life it self if it be extreme or too long continuing we therefore come off from what is the occasion or that gives reason to our sorrow though we had exceedingly lov'd it before This we find in all Cases and through the whole Nature of Things when therefore sin and loss of the favour of God because of it is made by the grace of God the just Reason and most sensible and prevailing reason of our sorrow It dissolves the Frame of sin in our Heart that had been before compact as the Adamant and as the neither Mill-stone Now this sorrow dividing and separating between sin and the Soul it brings forth that broken and contrite Heart that God will not despise Again This sorrow is a spiritual melting softning and dissolving Thing It separates the Soul every particle as it were from other so that it is supple soft and ready to tâ—ke any figure thaâ— God would have it take It brings the Soul to quick and lively sense which
even by one Affection because all are joyn'd and united with it For where Sorrow goes Love goes because sorrow is for the want of some good the Souls desires If then sorrow be after God and for Holiness It assures the Soul hath a springing Love for God and Holiness and in the distance it apprehends it self from these it laments Where sorrow goes there hatred also goes For sorrow arises from some evil that the Soul hates and abhors that presses in upon it In sorrow after God sin and the wrath and displeasure of God is what the Soul hates and it finding these near and closing upon it it sorrows and laments that they may be cast out and removed And how do these the Love of God and hatred of sin work to Repentance And thus also it might be shewn How Fear Hope Joy Delight move as sorrow moves The Apostle knowing with what a strength and force and presence the Affections move writes to the Colossians c. 2. To set their Affections on things above For if the Affections are so set the Spirit and Soul will be so set and therefore the whole man will be so set Oâ— the contrary the sorrow of the World carries the strength of the Soul the Affections on the World which not able to sustain and bear up an Immortal Spirit it often destroys the Body by Violence and leaves the Soul to sink also the Spirit to fall down from God which is the Death of it 2. The Affection of sorrow is the Affection that is most properly conversant about sin and the consequences of it the wrath and displeasure of God the curse and evil Now then as sin is a departure from God the fountain of Life and happiness the supreme good and so ushers in and introduces all unhappiness so sorrow that is after God begins in the apprehension of God and of his Law and so descends on all the evil consequential or following on the loss of God But the sorrow of the World not beginning with God fetters it self with the Evils which press upon it with relation to the present World which can never be well removed without removing the principal cause sin and the displeasure of God for it But to this the sorrow of this World hath no regard and so is never cured but becomes of a peice with the sorrows of the second Death For so all sorrow here not Healed by the repentance to Salvation not to be repented of which Heals the sorrow after God becomes one with the sorrows of Hell and everlasting wailing By godly sorrow therefore sorrow is made to be its own Death and Plagues For working repentance to Salvation never to be repented of When it is sorrow after God it is the Destruction of all sorrow For it can be no longer but as Scripture speaks forrow and sighing shall flee away and there shall be no more sorrow As it came in by sin so by sin Repented of and Pardoned it for ever ceases and vanishes away So sorrow is conversant about its proper object and cause and it hath the great effect of removing it self and of it self loosing it self in that Joy that follows upon the Salvation of that Repentance it self hath wrought which must needs make an end of Sorrow or Perfects it into it self never to be Repented of 3. The serviceableness of godly sorrow to Repentance is that this Affection of all the Affections or Passions of the human Soul is that which makes it wise and considerative seeing Repentance then that is to Salvation is a most Wise and prudent grace This Affection of sorrow is most preparatory and contributary to it The sorrow after God is no Ignorant or unreasonable Passion or Affection call'd Attrition no superstitious Pennance or ceremony of Sorrow not a mere softness and dissolving into Tears not any desultory Passion that falls into some morning Dew or as it were heat Drops but a deep inward trouble that we have offended God and sinn'd against him and endangered our selves to Eternity by our sins And however there may be at first some sudden stroke or Impression and a Passion upon it that may go off yet it is indeed a spring that dis-embogues it self through the whole course of a Christians Life There is a sorrow and a relenting of Soul that is a soft Dew or Distillation from the Soul upon it self that makes it very tender humble and Apprehensive of the Evil of Sin of the Ingratitude and unthankfulness of having sinned against God and given Offence to the Eyes of his Holiness and of his Glory And as this arises from understanding so it begets understanding and close Consideration It is observ'd in Nature that sorrow and sadness encline to Wisdom and attentness of Mind Vexation gives understanding is a saying And hereunto the wise King Solomon agrees Eccles 7.3 c. sorrow is better than laughter It is better to go to the house of Mourning than to the house of Feasting for the Living will lay it to Heart And by the sadness of the Countenance the Heart is made better In the day of Adversity consider that is the proper season of it Generally our Mirth and Rejoycing is too lighr and flashy it scatters and sets the Spirits in wandring I said of Laughter it is Mad and of Mirth what does it As the cracking of Thorns under a Pot so the Laughter of Fools is Vanity Sorrow is like a shade that congregates and gathers up the Spirits to think and weigh and poize things Sorrow loves solitude and so the Repenting Person is described he sitteth alone and keepeth silence because he hath born it upon him Lam. 3.28 Vanity and folly the pleasures of sin that are but for a season cannot endure the tediousness and melancholly of an Hour alone And this is the unhappiness of mankind they cannot endure to be alone and to speak with themselves I hearken'd and heard but no man spake aright Jerem. 8.6 or said What have I done We are so naturally for Diversion They that are not so mad as to to be for the roar and madness of Company yet they cannot be content without what we call Divertisement and Merryment and cannot endure sorrow and sadness Let us now but ask our selves whether we think Solomon was a Wise Man or not and whether he was not in circumstances of greatest advantages to rejoyce in all the Pleasure Mirth and Enjoyment of this World which he calls Laying hold on folly Eccles 2.1 c. while yet he acquainted his Heart with Wisdom to understand what was the utmost amount or to be had from all the Entertainments of that kind And when he assures us as he does that Mirth is but Madness and the Laughter of this World so unreasonable that no Man can tell what it serves for or to what purpose it is and that he so much commends sorrow to us let us then take Counsel with our selves whether he spake wisely or not
the full purpose of the Heart before was to cleave to sin and the world now the heart cleaves to God with its full purpose This humble broken Spirit is the Sacrifice of God the Sacrifice he will not despise because it is ready to yeild up it self in all obedience to him Psal 51.17 But the sorrow of the World not eying God nor having regard to him never changes the Heart nor Life into obedience to him and so leaves a man in the same lost undone state and so becomes desperate Sorrow and Anguish as the Scripture calls it Esay 8.22 and may be most fitly described by Jer. c. 4.28 They are all greivous Revolters they are Brass and Iron they are all Corrupters the Bellows are burnt the Lead is consumed of the Fire the Founder melteth in vain for the Evil of the Heart is not pulled away reprobate silver shall men call them because the Lord hath rejected them When God therefore as the great Founder Casting men as into the Furnace of sorrow they are not purged fâ—om Evil the Melting is in vain and they are therefore Rejected by God as Reprobate Silver When Sorrow and Affliction which are as the Chirurgery or Blood-Letting of the gracious Hand of God Effects nothing of Good it is as the Corruption of the whole Mass of Blood and is certainly to Death 6. When sorrow is placed upon offence against a Person and upon unthankful and disingenuous Treaty of him there arises a Love and Compassion to that Person a shame to offend further a resolution to make him all the reparations we are able and the greater the Bitterness the greater the Effect And though these cannot be properly placed as issuing from the Creature towards the Creator yet Scripture representing God as hath been said Grieved Peirced press'd with Sin it represents the grieved sorrowing relenting sinner so Affected as if there were an Ingenuous even Compassion and Love towards God the Creator and unwillingness so to grieve and provoke any further It represents therefore the highest degrees of Bitterness and a sorrow as for a First Born Zech. 12.10 and for an only begotten Child or Son or like that most compassionate Lamentation for the excellent Prince Josiah 2 Chron. 25.25 slain at Megiddo that was so continued a sorrow as to be spoken of in Lamentation to that day as Scripture uses to speak now seeing Repentance it self as hath been shewn in the general Nature of it hath so much of this The sorrow that is Affected like it is most fitted and prepard to work it and it is so blessed by God to work it whereas the sorrow of the World is like Clouds without this Rain of Heaven and Wells without this Water of Salvation and therefore settles as into the Lake of the second Death and smells of its Brimstone And thus far I have proceeded to make out the serviceableness of godly sorrow or sorrow after God that works Repentance to Salvation never to be Repented of General 3d. I come now to the third General concerning sorrow for Sin viz. To shew the Wisdom of God and the Reasonableness of his making use of sorrow and fitting it as after himself or according to himself to so great an end and purpose and that according to the very Reason and Nature of Things it could not be otherwise but that godly sorrow must be so made use of above and before any other Affection and that it becomes him by whom are all things and for whom are all things so to make use of it 1. There can be according to what the Apostle says no other object of Rational Intellectual Sorrow but only the loss of the Favour of God or his displeasure for sin or subordinated to it which makes it sorrow after God For if on one side the sorrow so plac'd and fix'd hath so blessed Effects that he that so sorrows receives no iniury by it but so great good as Repentance to Salvation never to be Repented of that it is not so much Lost as chang'd into Fulness of Joy and so perfected and on the other side that sorrow laid out on any other object which is sorrow after the World works Death Then it must needs become the wise and gracious God of whom by whom are all things in bringing many Sons to Glory to bring them to Perfection by such a sorrow as this For if God was pleas'd to make such a Rational Intellectual Nature as man that might though made Holy fall into sin It must needs be that it must have a fitness to turn it self with sorrow upon such an evil and reason of sorrow as God offended and displeas'd for sin supposing a man by that sin had not lost either the use of his Understanding or not lost the sense of God Holiness and Goodness seeing if it did not lye Dead and Benummed or strongly diverted and turned off from its Object or that God does not appear an Irreconcileable Judg and Revenger and give up man to the wickedness and rage of Death It must so turn Whenever therefore God by his grace in Christ and by his Spirit turns any sinner to himself and stirs up those Powers of understanding and Conscience after himself The very order of the Creation of God Requires that the understanding and Natural Conscience and Affection of Man should be turn'd upon him displeas'd by Sin by this humble sorrow of Love even as upon his wrath and Vengeance with a sorrow of Pain Fear and Terror so that both the Bondage of Fear of Death Heb. 2.15 and the Reverence of godly Fear and Love move to this sorrow and the wise order of Things settled by God cannot allow it otherwise On the other side if the turn of the Rational Nature and Affection be drawn out upon the sense of any evil with trouble and dislike and reflection on its disagreeableness and inconveniency and yet its pressure upon it which is sorrow grief and sadness it must either be turn'd upon God offended and displeas'd by sin or it is to no purpose of good that there is such a Passion or Affection in man For if it be plac'd on any other object it is but sorrow of this World how just so ever in regard of any evil of suffering it may seem to be It is but sorrow to Death and so of no good at all to us but evil till it be deriv'd into a higher and more excellent Channel So that it may be said of this sorrow as Solomon says of Laughter It is madness and what doth it And in place of Thorns crackling under a Pot It is as the slow Fire Eccles 7.2 c. of too near agreement with that of Brimstone of the Lake It is not of any merciful or gracious use but for the manifestation of the wrath and displeasure of God against sin 2. Let us consider seriously what Jesus Christ our Lord suffered under the sense of sin and then think whether
Wickedness and Sensuality The thirty pieces are nothing worth Mat. 27.3 and the innocent blood above all value when Men suffer in the Agonies of Conscience and Fears of the approaching Judge A House full of Silver and Gold will not buy a Man to resist God when indeed he appears to him when the terrible Majesty opens it self Numb 22.18 what is so precious that Men will not fling to the Bats and Moles Isai 2.20 When the Breath is going out of the Nostrils how precious is Repentance Faith a Pardon in Christ a happy Eternity to those who have heretofore slighted them as the off-scouring of all things But these things are always so rich Wisdom is always so precious that it disdains to borrow Esteem from a minute of Extremity and therefore it most often falls out that those who would none of its counsel but despised all its Reproof when they come to seek it early cannot find it but it laughs at their Calamity as Men laugh at the unhappiness of Fools that would not be corrected in their Folly till their Misery confute their Confidence 3. From hence it follows That this Repentance is a Choice when there is no other Choice If a Man loved his Sins or the World never so passionately he must leave them if he disliked God and his Holiness and an everlasting Abode with him to the utmost yet he is even forced upon them or dashed upon an Eternal Misery and Unhappiness which it is impossible to choose And therefore though he would not choose the holy ways of God if he might still enjoy former Vanity yet that being out of his reach and way he must take what is to be had The Sense therefore is no more than this All these things are good when a Man is just a Dying but while he lives and can have the World they are troublesom and unprofitable Death makes them good upon this account only because else there would be something worse and there can no longer be any thing better A Man is now willing to offer a Life he hath not to give but Eternal Life is not worth any part of that Life he thinks in his power to do any thing else with Let us then observe at what rate it is set for to use Tertullian's words in another Case we may thus Reason * Quale bonum hoc est quod melius est poena quod non potest videri bonum nisi pessimo comparatum ut ideo bonum sit resipiscere quia deterius est ardere Caeterum si per mali collationem cogitur bonum dici non tam bonum est quam genus mali inferioris quod altiori malo obscuratum ad nomen boni impellitur Tertul. De Monogamia Chap. 3. What a mean sort of good is this that only excels Punishment which needs the worst of States for a Foil to it self that it may be thought Good It is good to repent and be saved because who can dwell with everlasting Burnings But if it must purchase the Reputation of being Good from Evil it is not so much a Good as a lower degree of Evil which while the greater Evil Eclipses it is compelled as it were to accept the name of a good being driven upon the confines of Goodness by the Violence of greater Evil. 4. This Repentance is not the Free but inslaved Judgment and Choice of the Soul as Men cast out Goods in a Storm and receive a Power to Rule over them that they cannot endure but that it is too strong for them Men are afraid what God will do to them therefore they submit His Enemies in Heart are found Lyers to him they flatter him with their Mouth as Julian oppressed by the Almightiness of Christ is storied to have cried out Vicisti Galilaee Thou hast overcome me Galilean Thus they are overcome by Death and the apprehension of Judgment In the sight and view of the Danger Men resolve to part with their Sins Let but that remove they call for their Sins again as Mariners wish for their Goods after the Storm They throw up their Lusts in their sickness but drink them in when their trouble is past as the Dog returns to his vomit 2 Pet. 2.22 In all this there is nothing of the love of God 5. In this Repentance the Soul of it is generally a pitiful mean Self-love even the meanest kind imaginable wherein a Man considers himself as a Creature in being and likely or at least possible to be for ever without any apprehension of himself as a rational Creature made for God and the Enjoyment of him in conforming with whom his Happiness consists and in the resting for ever in his love Of this part he hath no distinct apprehension only he would be happy though he knows not what it is or rather he would not be miserable yet even that he truly understands not But as the Jews said to Christ when he spake to them of the Bread of Life Lord ever more give us this bread and yet were scandalized at his Explanation of himself to be that Bread so far as to leave him John 6.34 And the Pharisees hearing of the Vineyard to be let out to other Husband-men and the Judgment upon themselves to be executed Luk. 20.16 Cried out God forbid yet run on in the Sin that brought it upon them This little point of Self-love into which all is crowded is ennobled with no sight of the Excellency of the things themselves or a due Estimation of them as the true pleasure and joy of an Immortal Spirit This is not that allowable love of a Man's self which incircles it self within the love of God as the lesser Circle is comprehended by the greater but this either leaves out that love wholly or debases it to basest self Let us now compare both sides together and see how much true Repentance differs from that which is always to be feared lest it should be the height of the Death-Bed And of that which hath been spoken this is the Sum True Repentance is the most free Election of the Soul inabled by the Grace of God upon a clear and just Dictate of the Judgment attended with sincerest Affection to give up it self to God through Jesus Christ and when it is most it self not under any irregular fear or constraint and at least would be the same in a time when it hath all the probability that can be to lay hold upon things present The other Repentance arises from a Soul all troubled and discomposed with the throws of Death the fears of Hell the Doubts what will become of it in another World the Uproars of a guilty Conscience when it supposes it self necessarily at the full stop of its former Courses by being cut off from longer Life in the midst of all which arise vehement Resolutions to turn from Sin to God and possibly with many fair Apparences but without opportunity to give proof of themselves Let
it is a foul and impure and shameful thing and as it is an Offence against the Holy and only Wife and gracious Majesty of God and as it brings Wrath and Ruine and Condemnation upon it contemplates considers and weighs those Reasons and thereby finds it self affected with sorrow and affliction as if it were after the manner of a broken Bone or bruised Flesh Thus we read of a broken and contrite Spirit and of those who are bruised in Spirit and grieved in Spirit and of a wounded and a troubled Spirit and of a sorrowful Spirit And this when it eyes God as a Father in Christ Gracious and Good and ready to be Reconcil'd and to forgive is a true godly Sorrow or a Sorrow after God For it is in the True Region of godly sorrow the Spirit and it hath the Right Sense and Affection even such an apprehension of God And such a Sorrow the Spirit communicates to the Body in which it dwells so as to make the Appearance of it Solemn Humble and Lowly It denies it those Ornaments or Refreshments that it self at other Times desires for it it bridles and curbs its own appetites and desires of pleasure and satisfaction in it it humbles it by Fasting it lays it in the Dust it keeps it waking it dissolves it into Tears and if it be very great as sometimes it dries up the Benign Juices of it and it carries all the Marks of the Spirit so affected And because these arise from a sorrow within after God God is pleased with them and accepts them as signs of such sorrow and calls for them 2. The Sicknesses or Wants or Pains or Notes of Disgrace that the Wise and Holy Providence of God sends sometimes upon the Body that make it an uneasie or a dishonourable Habitation of the Spirit These the Spirit takes Notice of with troublesome and unquiet thoughts the thoughts being in a Motion a Conflict and Agony if by the Grace of God they are guided to search the Causes of these Strokes on the Body and finds them to be an offended Justice a provoked and displeased Holiness upon the account of Sin and Iniquity and that it apprehends These are but the Beginnings of Sorrows and that they are Indications and Fore-bodes of Wrath to come and of further Judgments from Heaven even at the present upon both Body and Spirit if there be not that course taken of seeking Pardon and Reconcilement in Christ and turning from Iniquity These thoughts sanctified and conducted by God upon himself thus upon the occasion of outward affliction become that sorrow after God of which the Apostle speaks and often works that Repentance to salvation never to be Repented of Thus Scripture very often speaks of Outward Afflictions made serviceable to Conversion to returns to God Famine and Pestilence and War and Captivity in the Land of Enemies are Represented in the Prayer of Solomon as great Motives and even procuring and exciting Causes of Humiliation Bethinking our selves turning to the Lord. The Afflictions of Men are often spoken of by God and used as Arguments to such Resentments as call to Self-judging and so to reforming â—ven often not only in the Old but in the New Tectament We are Chasten'd of the Lord that we might not be condemned with the World Affliction yieldeth the peaceable Fruit of Righteousness to them who are exercised thereby 1 Cor. 11.31 Heb. 12.11 Both these Operations of godly sorrow seem to be Represented with a great Elegancy V. 14. and Holy Eloquence Job 33. the first when this Sorrow begins in the Spirit of a Man and Thoughts arising therein God speaks once and twice in a Dream in a Vision of the Night He opens the Ears of Men and sealeth their Instruction That he may withdraw Man from his purpose and hide Pride from Man He brings him to such Humiliation as keeps him from going on in his former purpose Again when sorrow begins in the Body v. 19. He a man any man upon whom the methods of God for Repentance are so laid is chasten'd with pain upon his Bed and the multitude of his Bones with strong Pain so that his Life abhorreth Bread and his Soul dainty meat his Flesh is consumed away that it cannot be seen and his bones that were not seen stick out yea his Soul draweth near unto the Grave and his Life to the Destroyers if there be a Messenger with him an Interpreter one among a thousand to shew to man his uprightness then he is gracious unto him and saith deliver him from going down to the Pit I have found a Ransom his Flesh shall be fresher than a Childs He shall pray unto God and he will be Favourable unto him and he shall see his Face with Joy he will Render unto man his Righteousness And now this sorrow thus after God sanctified thus to have Respect to God and carried out after him is Counter distinguish'd it is most different from the sorrow of the World that worketh Death The sorrow that hath no higher spring than this World works Death that is however the Mind or the Body be Affected when it does not mount up to a consideration of God offended for sin when it does not seek pardon of him and Reconciliation to him in Christ when it only pores upon the things of this World and agitates it self about them it runs down into the dead Sea of Sorrow that weeping and wailing and gnashing of Teeth that is in Hell It is an Idolatrous Sorrow arising from an Heart deeply set on this World and glewed to it and so goes down into the Vault and Pit of eternal Sorrow It tends to the Death of the Body it brings down the Head to the Grave It tends to wear and grind bodily Nature to the Dust every such sorrow not after God that hath no tincture from him on it If it be not Antidoted by sorrow after God and by Repentance to Salvation It tends to eternal Death and is the Inlet unto it For it is certain all sorrow here that comes from Heaven ascends up to Heaven as Water ascends as high as its Spring But that which is of a terrene earthly Nature sinks down to the Center which is the neathermost Hell I come now to the second Head to shew the excellent use and service sorrow after God yeilds in this wise and holy preparation of it by God to that Repentance to salvation not to be Repented of 1 In that so great and principal an Affection of the Soul is given up to God It hath an use and a service to steer the Soul to God For the Affections are as the Rudder of the Soul as the Helm of it guided by the judgment as by a Pilot And these affections are all in a Linck and in a chain If any one of the principal Affections are mov'd that mighty Vessel of the whole Soul is turn'd this way or that way by a very small thing as it may seem