for sin 2. The Fatherly Love and Benefits of God do call for our best returns of Love The Benefits of Creation oblige all to Love him with all their Heart and Soul and Might Much more the Benefits of Redemption and especially as applyed by sanctifying Grace to them that shall be heirs of life it obligeth them by multiplied strongest obligations The Worst are obliged to as much Love of God as the Best for none can be obliged to more than to Love him with all their Heart c. but they are not as much obliged to that Love We have new and special obligations and therefore must return a Hearty Love or we are doubly guilty Mercies are Loves Messengers sent from Heaven to win up our Hearts to Love again and entice us thither All mercies therefore should be used to this end That mercy that doth not encrease or excite and help our Love is abused and lost as seed that is buried when it 's sowed and never more appeareth Earthly Mercies point to Heaven and tell us whence they come and for what Like the Flowers of the Spring they tell us of the reviving approaches of the Sun But like foolish children because they are near us we Love the Flowers better than the Sun forgetting that the Winter is drawing on But Spiritual Mercies are as the Sun-shine that more immediately dependeth on and floweth from the Sun it self And he that will not see and value the Sun by its Light will never see it These beams come down to invite our Minds and Hearts to God and if we shut the windows or play till night and they return without us we shall be left to utter darkness The Mercies of God must imprint upon our minds the fullest and deepest conceptions of him as the most perfect suitable Lovely Objects to the soul of man when all our Good is Originally in him and all flows from him that hath the Goodness of a Means and finally himself is all not to Love God then is not to Love Goodness it self and there is nothing but Good that 's suited to our Love Night and day therefore should the Believer be drawing and deriving from God by the views and tasts of his precious Mercies a sweetness of nature and increase of holy Love to God as the Bee sucks Honey from the flowers We should not now and then for a recreation light upon a flower and meditate on some Mercy of the Lord but make this our work from day to day and keep continually upon our souls the lively tasts and deep impressions of the Infinite Goodness and Amiableness of God When we Love God most we are at the best most pleasing to God and our lives are sweetest to our selves And when we steep our minds in the believing thoughts of the abundant Fatherly Mercies of the Lord we shall most abundantly Love him Every Mercy is a Suiter to us from God! The contents of them all is this My Son Give mee thy Heart Love him that thus loveth thee Love him or you reject him O wonderful Love that God will regard the Love of man that he will enter into a Covenant of Love that he will be Related to us in a Relation of Love and that he will deal with us on terms of Love that he will give us leave to Love him that are so base and have so Loved Earth and Sin yea and that he will be so earnest a suiter for our Love as if he needed it when it is only we that need But the paths of Love are mysterious and incomprehensible 3. As God is in special a Benefactor and Father to us we must be the readiest and most diligent in obedience to him Childlike duty is the most willing and unwearied kind of duty Where Love is the principle we shall not be eye-servants but delight to do the Will of God and wish O that I could please him more It is a singular delight to a Gracious soul to be upon any acceptable duty and the more he can do good and please the Lord the more he is pleased As Fatherly Love and Benefits are the fullest and the surest so will filial duty be The Heart is no fit soil for Mercies if they grow not up to holy fruits The more you love the more chearfully will you obey 4. From hence we must well learn both How God is mans End and what are the chief Means that lead us to him 1. God is not the End of Reason nakedly considered but he is Finis Amantis the End which Love inclineth us to and which by Love is attained and by love enjoyed The understanding of which would resolve many great perplexing difficulties that à natura finis do step into our way in Theological studies I will name no more now but only that it teacheth us How both God and our own Felicity in the fruition of him may be said to be our Ultimate End without any contradiction yet so that it be Eminently and Chiefly God For it is a Union such as our Natures are capable of that is desired in which the soul doth long to be swallowed up in God Understand but what a filial or friendly Love is and you may understand what a regular Intention is and how God must be the Christians End 2. And withall it shews us that the most direct and excellent means of our felicity and to our End are those that are most suited to the work of Love Others are means more Remotely and necessary in their places but these directly And therefore the Promises and Narratives of the Love and Mercy of the Lord are the most direct and powerful part of the Gospel conducing to our End and the Threatnings the remoter means And therefore as Grace was advanced in the world the Promissory part of Gods Covenant or Law grew more illustrious and the Gospel consisted so much of Promises that it is called Glad tydings of great joy And therefore the most full demonstration of Gods Goodness and Loveliness to our hearers is the most excellent part of all our Preaching though it is not all And therefore the meditation of Redemption is more powerful than the bare meditation of Creation because it is Redemption that most eminently revealeth Love And therefore Christ is the Principal Means of Life because he is the Principal Messenger and Demonstration of the Fathers Love and by the wonders of Love which he revealeth and exhibiteth in his wondrous Grace he wins the soul to the Love of God For God will have external objective means and internal effective means concur because he will work on man agreeably to the nature of man Though there was never given out such prevalent invincible measures of the Spirit as Christ hath given for the Renewing of those that he will save yet shall not that Spirit do it without as excellent objective means And though Christ and the Riches of his Grace revealed in the Gospel be the most wonderful
heaven with the blessed God then may we with the holy Apostle be in the spirit on the Lords day Rev. 1. 10. and if we turn away our foot from the Sabbath from doing our pleasure on that holy day and call the Sabbath a delight the holy of the Lord honourable and shall honour him not doing our own wayes nor finding our own pleasure nor speaking our own words then shall we delight our selves in the Lord Isa. 58. 13 14. and understand how great a priviledge it is to have the liberty of those holy dayes and duties for our sweet and heavenly converse with God 4. Our walking with God must be a matter of industry and diligence It is not an occasional idle converse but a life of observance obedience and imployment that this phrase importeth The sluggish idle wishes of the hypocrite whose hands refuse to labour are not this walking with God nor the sacrifice of fools who are hasty to utter the overflowings of their fantasie before the Lord while they keep not their foot nor hearken to the Law nor consider that they do evil Eccles. 5. 1 2 3. He that cometh to God and will walk with him must believe that he is and that he is the rewarder of them that diligently seek him God is with you while you are with him but if you forsake him he will forsake you 2 Chron. 15. 2. Up and be doing and the Lord will be with you 1 Chron. 22. 16. If you would meet with God in the way of Mercy take diligent heed to do the Commandment and Law to love the Lord your God and to walk in all his Wayes and to cleave unto him and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul Josh. 22. 5. 5. Our walking with God is a matter of some Constancy It signifieth our course and trade of life and not some accidental action on the by A man may walk with a stranger for a Visit or in Complement or upon some unusual occasion But this walk with God is the act of those that dwell with him in his Family and do his work It is not only to step and speak with him or cry to him for mercy in some great extremity or to go to Church for company or custome or think or talk of him sometime heartlesly on the by as a man will talk of news or matters that are done in a forein Land or of persons that we think we have little to do with But it is to be alwaies with him Luk. 15. 31. To seek first his Kingdom and Righteousness Matth. 6. 33. Not to labour comparatively for the food that perisheth but for that which endureth to everlasting life Joh. 6. 27. To delight in the Law of the Lord and meditate in it day and night Psal. 1. 2. That his words be in our hearts and that we teach them diligently to our Children and talk of them sitting in the house and walking by the way lying down and rising up c. Deut. 6. 6 7 8. That we pray continually 1 Thes. 5. 17. And in all things give thanks But will the hypocrite delight himself in the Almighty or will he alwaies call upon God Job 27. 10. His goodness is as the morning Cloud and as the early Dew it goeth away Hos. 6. 4. So much of the description of this walking with God CHAP. II. Use. WE are next to consider how far this doctrine doth concern our selves and what use we have to make of it upon our hearts and lives And first it acquainteth us with the abundance of Atheism that is in the world even among those that profess the knowledge of God It is Atheism not only to say There is no God but to say so in the heart Psal. 14. 1. While the heart is no more affected towards him observant of him or consident in him or submissive to him than if indeed there were no God When there is nothing of God upon the Heart no Love no Fear no Trust no Subjection then is Heart-Atheism When men that have some kind of knowledge of God yet glorifie him not as God nor are thankful to him but become vain in their imaginations and their foolish hearts are darkened these men are Heart-Atheists and professing themselves wise they become fools and are given up to vile affections And as they do not like to retain God in their knowledge however they may discourse of him so God oft giveth them over to a reprobate mind to do those things that are not convenient being filled with all unrighteousness fornication wickedness covetousness maliciousness envy murther debate deceit malignity c. Rom. 1. 21 22 26 28 29 30. Swarms of such Atheists go up and down under the self-deceiving name of Christians being indeed unbelieving and defiled so void of Purity that they deride it and nothing is Pure to them but even their mind and conscience is defiled They profess that they know God but they deny him in their works being abominable and disobedient and to every good work reprobate Tit. 1. 15 16. What is he but an Atheist when God is not in all his thoughts Psal. 10. 4. unless it be in their impious or blaspheming thoughts or in their sleight contemptuous thoughts To take God for God indeed and for our God essentially includeth the taking him to be the most powerful wist and good the most just and holy the Creator Preserver and Governour of the world whom we and all men are obliged absolutely to obey and fear to love and desire whose Will is our Beginning Rule and End He that taketh not God for such as here described taketh him not for God and therefore is indeed an Atheist What name soever he assumeth to himself this is the name that God will call him by even a fool that hath said in his heart there is no God while they are corrupt and do abominably they understand not and seek not after God they are all gone aside and are altogether become filthy there is none of them that doth good they are workers of iniquity that have no knowledge and eat up the people of God as bread and call not upon the Lord Psal. 14. 1 2 3 4. Ungodliness is but the English for Atheism The Atheist or Ungodly in Opinion is he that thinks that there is no God or that he is One that we need not Love and Serve and that is but the same viz. to be no God The Atheist or Ungodly in Heart or Will is he that consenteth not that God shall be his God to be loved feared and obeyed before all The Atheist in Life or outward practice is he that liveth as without God in the world that seeketh him not as his chiefest good and obeyeth him not as his highest absolute Lord so that indeed Atheism is the summe of all iniquity as Godliness is the summe of all Religion and moral good If you see by the description which I have given you
it follow that he sees none If cunning Serpents are too subtle for us do we think that they can overwit the Lord what had become of us long ago if God had not known what ever is plotted at Rome or Spain or Hell against us If he knoweth not of all the consultations of the conclave and of all the contrivances of Jesuits and Fryers and of all the juglings of the masked Emissaries If God had not known of Vaux and his Powder mine it might have blown up all our hopes But while we know that God is in their Councils and heareth every word they say and knoweth every secret of their hearts and every mischief which they enterprise let us do our duty and rest in the wisdom of our great Protector who will prove all his adversaries to have plaid the fools For as sure as his Omnipstency shall be glorified by overtopping all opposing powers so sure shall his Infinite wisdom be glorified by conquering and befooling the wisdom that is against him 7. Lstly if God be Infinite in Knowledge it must resolve us all to live accordingly O Remember what ever thou Thinkest that God is acquainted with all thy Thoughts And wilt thou feed on lustful or covetous or malicious or unbelieving Thoughts in the eye of God Remember in thy prayers and every duty that he knows the very frame of all thy affections and the manner as well as the matter of thy services And wilt thou be cold and careless in the sight of God O Remember in thy secretst sins and thy works of darkness that nothing is unknown to God and that before him thou art in the open light And fearest thou not the face of the Almighty Wilt thou do that when he knoweth it that thou wouldst not do if man did know He knows whether thou deceive thy neighbour or deal uprightly Defraud not therefore for the Lord is the avenger 1 Thes. 4. 6. Do nothing that thou wouldst not have God to know For certainly he knoweth all things Shall he not see that made and illuminateth the eye and shall he not hear that made both tongue and ears and shall he not know that giveth us understanding and by whom we know Psal. 94. 8 9 10. And let this be thy comfort in thy secret duties He that knoweth thy Heart will not overlook the desires of thy Heart though thou hadst not words as thou desirest to express them And he that knoweth thy uprightness will justifie thee if all the world condemn thee He that seeth thee in thy secret Alms or Prayers or Tears will openly reward thee Mat. 6. 4 6. Let this also comfort thee under all the slanders of malicious or misinformed men He that must be thy Judge and theirs is acquainted with the truth who will certainly bring forth thy righteousness as the light and thy judgement as the noone day Psal. 37. 6. O how many souls are justified with the Omniscient God that are condemned by the malignant world And how many blots will be wiped off before the world at the day of Judgement that here did lie upon the names of faithful upright men O how many Hypocrites shall be then disclosed And what a cutting thought should it be to the dissembler that his secret falshood is known to God! And when he hath the Reputation that he sought with men he hath his reward Mat. 6. 2. For its a sadder reward that God will give him CHAP. IX 8. THE next of Gods Attributes that must make its Impress on the soul is Hit Infinite Goodness The Denomination of Goodness as all other his Attributes is fetcht from and suited to the capacity or affections of the soul of man That which is truly Amiable is called Good Not as if there were no Goodness but what is a means to mans felicity as some most sottishly have affirmed For our End and Felicity it self and God as he is Perfect and Excellent in himself is more amiable then all means In three respects therefore it is that God is called Good or Amiable to man 1. In that he is Infinitely Excellent and perfect in Himself For the Love of Friendship is a higher Love then that of Desire And the most perfect sort of Love is that which wholly carrieth the Lover from himself to the perfect object of his Love The soul Delighteth to contemplate excellency when the excellency it self and not the delight is the ultimate end of that desire and contemplation 2. God is called Good as he is the Pattern and Fountain of all Moral Good As he maketh us Righteous Holy Laws commanding Moral Good and forbidding and condemning evil And thus his Goodness is his Holiness and Righteousness his Faithfulness and Truth 3. God is called Good as he is the Fountain of all the Creatures happiness and as he is bountiful and gracious and ready to do good and as he is the felicitating end and object of the soul. And this Infinite goodness must have these effects upon us 1. It must possess us with a superlative Love to God This blessed Attribute is it that makes us Saints indeed and maketh that Impression on us which is as the Heart of the New Creature It is Goodness that produceth Love And Love is that Grace that closeth with God as our Happiness and End and is the felicitating enjoying Grace Without it we are but as sounding brass or tinkling Cymbals whatever our gifts and parts may be 1 Cor. 13. Love is the very excellency of the soul as it closeth with the infinite excellency of God It is the very felicity of the soul as it enjoyeth him that is our felicity Most certainly the prevailing Love of God is the surest evidence of true sanctification He that hath most Love hath most Grace and is the best and strongest Christian and he that hath least Love is the worst or weakest Knowledge and faith are but to work our hearts to Love and when Love is perfect they have done their work 1 Cor. 12. 31. and 13. 8 9 10 13. Teaching and distant Revelations will not be for ever and therefore such Knowledge and Faith as we have now will not be for ever But God will be for ever Amiable to us and therefore Love will endure for ever The goodness of God is called Love and as God is Love so he that dwelleth in Love doth dwell in God and God in him 1 Joh. 4. 16. The knowledge of Divine goodness makes us good because it maketh us Love him that is good It is Love that acteth most purely for God Fear is selfish and hath somewhat of aversation Though there be no evil in God for us to fear yet is there such good in him that will bring the evil of punishment upon the evil and this they fear But Love doth resign the soul to God and that in the most congruous acceptable manner Make it therefore your daily work to possess your souls with the Love of God Love him once and
all that he saith and doth will be more acceptable to you and all that you say or do in Love will be more acceptable unto him Love him and you will be loth to offend him you will be desirous to please him you will be satisfied in his Love Love him and you may be sure that he Loveth you Love is the fulfilling of his Law Rom. 13. 10. And that you may Love him this must be your work to Believe and Contemplate his goodness Consider daily of the Infinite goodness or Amiableness of his Nature and of his excellency appearing in his works and of the perfect Holiness of his Laws But especially see him in the face of Christ and behold his Love in the design of our Redemption in the person of the Redeemer and in the promises of Grace and in all the benefits of Redemption Yea look by Faith to Heaven it self and think how you must for ever live in the perfect blessed Love of infinite enjoyed goodness As it is the knowledge and sight of gold or beauty or any other earthly vanity that kindleth the Love of them in the minds of men so is it the knowledge and serious contemplation of the goodness of God that must make us Love him if ever we will Love him 2. The goodness of God must also encourage the soul to trust him For Infinite good will not deceive us Nor can we fear any hurt from him but what we wilfully bring upon our selves If I knew but which were the best and most Loving man in the world I could trust him above all men and I should not fear any injury from him How many friends have I that I dare trust with my estate and life because I know that they have Love and goodness in their low degree And shall I not trust the Blessed God that is Love it self and Infinitely good what ever he will be in Justice to the ungodly I am sure he delighteth not in the death of sinners but rather that they turn and live and that he will not cast off the soul that Loveth him and would fain be fully conformed to his will It cannot be that he should spurn at them that are humbled at his feet and long and pray and seek and mourn after nothing more then his grace and love Think not of God as if he were scanter of love and goodness then the Creature is If you have high and confident thoughts of the goodness and fidelity of any man on earth and dare quietly trust him with your life and all see that you have much higher thoughts of God and trust him with greater confidence left you set him below the silly creature in the Attributes of his goodness which his Glory and your Happiness require you to know 3. The Infinite goodness of God must call off our hearts from the inordinate Love of all created good whatever Who would stoop so low as earth that may converse with God And who would feed on such poor delights that hath tasted the graciousness of the Lord Nothing more sure then that the Love of God doth not reign in that soul where the Love of the world or of fleshly lust or pleasure reigneth 1 John 2. 15. Had worldlings or sensual or ambitious men but truly known the goodness of the Lord they could never have so fallen in Love with those deceitful vanities If we could but open their eyes to see the Loveliness of their Redeemer they would soon be weaned from other Loves Would you conquer the Love of Riches or Honour or any thing else that corrupteth your affections O try this sure and powerful way Draw nigh to God and take the fullest view thou canst in thy most serious Meditation of his Infinite goodness and all things else will be vile in thy esteem and thy heart will soon contemn them and forget them and thou wilt never dote upon them more 4. The Infinite goodness of God should increase Repentance and win the soul to a more resolute chearful service of the Lord. O what a heart is that which can offend and wilfully offend so good a God! This is the odiousness of sin that it is an abuse of an Infinite good This is the most hainous damning aggravation of it that Infinite goodness could not prevail with wretched souls against the empty flattering world but that they suffered a dream and shadow to weigh down Infinite goodness in their esteem And is it possible for worse then this to be found in man He that had rather the sun were out of the firmament then a hair were taken off his head were unworthy to see the light of the Sun And surely he that will turn away from God himself to enjoy the pleasures of his flesh is unworthy to enjoy the Lord. It s bad enough that Augustine in one of his Epistles saith of sottish worldly men that they had rather there were two stars fewer in the firmament then one Cow fewer in their Pastures or one tree fewer in their woods or grounds But it is ten thousand times a greater evil that every wicked man is guilty of that will rather forsake the Living God and lose his part in Infinite goodness then he will let go his filthy and unprofitable sins O Sinners as you love your souls despise not the riches of the goodness and forbearance and long suffering of the Lord but know that his goodness should lead you to Repentance Rom. 2. 4. Would you spit at the Sun Would you revile the stars Would you curse the holy Angels If not O do not ten thousand fold worse by your wilful sinning against the Infinite Goodness it self But for you Christians that have seen the Amiableness of the Lord and tasted of his perfect Goodness let this be enough to melt your hearts that ever you have wilfully sin'd against him O what a Good did you contemn in the dayes of your unregeneracy and in the hour of your sin Be not so ingrateful and disingenuous as to do so again Remember when ever a Temptation comes that it would entice you from the Infinite Good Ask the tempter man or Devil Whether he hath more then an Infinite Good to offer you and whether he can outbid the Lord for your affection And now for the time that is before you how cheerfully should you address your selves unto his service and how delightfully should you follow it on from day to day What manner of persons should the servants of this God be that are called to nothing but what is Good How Good a Master how good a work and how good company encouragements and helps and how good an End All is good because it is the Infinite Good that we serve and seek And shall we be loitering unprofitable servants 5. Moreover this Infinite Goodness should be the matter of our daily Praises He that cannot cheerfully magnifie this Attribute of God so suitable to the nature of the Will is surely a stranger to the
no if grace do not now set open your hearts and procure him better entertainment But perhaps you will think that you walk with God because you think of him sometimes ineffectually and as on the by But is he esteemed as your God if he have not the Command and if he have not the precedency of his creatures Can you dream that indeed you walk with God when your hearts were never grieved for offending him nor never much solicitous how to be reconciled to him nor much inquisitive whether your state or way be pleasing or displeasing to him when all the business of an unspeakable importance which you have to do with God before you pass to judgement is forgotten and undone as if you knew not of any such work that you had to do when you make no serious preparation for death when you call not upon God in secret or in your families unless with a little heartless lip labour and when you love not the spirituality of his worship but only delude your souls with the mockage of hypocritical outside complement Do you walk with God while you are plotting for preferment and gaping after worldly greatness while you are gratifying all the desires of your flesh and making provision for the future satisfying of its lusts Rom. 13. 13. Are you walking with God when you are hating him in his Holiness his Justice his Word and Waies and hating all that seriously love and seek him when you are doing your worst to dispatch the work of your damnation and put your salvation past all hope and draw as many to Hell with you as you can If this be a walking with God you may take further comfort that you shall also dwell with God according to the sense of such a walk you shall dwell with him as a devouring fire and as just whom you thus walked with in the contempt oâ— his mercies and the provocation of his Justice I tell you if you walkt with God indeed his authority would rule you his Greatness would much take up your minds and leave less room for little things You would trust his promises and fear his threatnings and be awed by his presence and the Idols of your hearts would fall before him He would over power your lusts and call you off from your ambitious and covetous designs and obscure all the creatures Glory Believing serious effectual thoughts of God are very much different from the common doubtful dreaming uneffectual cogitations of the ungodly world Object But perhaps some will say This seemeth to be the work of Preachers and not of every Christian to be alwaies meditating of God Poor people must think of other matters They have their business to do and their families to provide for And ignorant people are weak-headed and are not able either to manage or endure a contemplative life so much thinking of God will make them melancholy and mad as experience tells us it hath done by many and therefore this is no exercise for them To this I answer 1. Every Christian hath a God to serve and a Soul to save and a Christ to believe in and obey and an endless happiness to secure and enjoy as well as Preachers Pastors must study to instruct their flock and to save themselves and those that hear them The people must study to understand and receive the mercy offered them and to make their own calling and election sure It is not said of Pastors only but of every blessed man that His delight is in the Law of the Lord and therein doth he meditate day and night Psal. 1. 2. 2. And the due meditation of the soul upon God is so far from taking you off from your necessary business in the world that it is the only way to your orderly and successful management of it 3. And it is not a distracting thoughtfulness that I perswade you to or which is included in a Christians walk with God but it is a directing quickening exalting comforting course of meditation Many a hundred have grown melancholy and mad with careful discontentful thoughts of the world it doth not follow therefore that no man must think of the world at all for fear of being mad or melancholy but only that they should think of it more regularly and correct the errour of their thoughts and passions so is it about God and heavenly things Our thoughts are to be well ordered and the errour of them cured and not the use of them forborn Atheism and Impiety and forgetting God are unhappy means to prevent melancholy There are wiser means for avoiding madness than by renouncing all our Reason and living by sense like the beasts that perish and forgetting that we have an everlasting life to live But yet because I am sensible that some do here mistake on the other hand and I would not lead you into any extream I shall fully remove the scruple contained in this Objection by shewing you in those following Propositions in what sense and how far your thoughts must be taken up with God supposing what was said in the beginning where I described to you the duty of Walking with God Prop. 1. When we tell you that your Thoughts must be on God it is not a course of idle musing or meer thinking that we call you to but it is a necessary practical thinking of that which you have to do and of him that you must love obey and enjoy You will not forget your Parents or Husband or Wife or Friend and yet you will not spend your time in sitting still and thinking of them with a musing unprofitable thoughtfulness But you will have such thoughts of them and so many as are necessary to the Ends even to the Love and Service which you owe them and to the Delight that your hearts should have in the fruition of them You cannot love or obey or take pleasure in those that you will not think of You will follow your trades or your Masters service but unhappily if you will not think on them Thinking is not the work that we must take up with It is but a subservient instrumental duty to promote some greater higher duty Therefore we must Think of God that we may Love him and do his Service and Trust him and Fear him and Hope in him and make him our Delight And all this is it that we call you to when we are perswading you to Think on God 2. An hypocrite or a wicked enemy of God may Think of him speculatively and perhaps be more frequent in such thoughts than many practical believers A Learned man may study about God as he doth about other matters and names and notions and propositions and decisions concerning God may be a principal part of his Learning A Preacher may study about God and the matters of God as a Physician or a Lawyer do about the matters of their own profession either for the pleasure which knowledge as knowledge brings to humane nature or for
so hardly perswaded that it would be forgiven you and now do you make so small a matter of it Did you then so much wonder at your folly that could so long let out your thoughts and affections upon the creature while you neglected God and Heaven and do you begin to look that way again Do you now grow familiar with a life so like to that whirh was once your state of death and bear that easily that once was the breaking of your heart O Christians turn not away from that God again who once fetcht you home with so much smart and so much grace with such a twist of Love and Fatherly severity Methinks when you remember how you were once awakened you should not easily fall asleep again And when you remember the thoughts which then were in your hearts and the tears that were in your eyes and the earnest prayers which you then put up that God would receive you and take you for his own you should not now forget him and live as if you could live without him Remember that so far as you withdraw your hearts from God and let them follow inferiour things so far you contradict his works upon your hearts so far you violate your Covenant with him or sin against it so far you are revolters and go against the principal part of your profest Religion Yea so far you are ungodly as you thus withdraw your hearts from God Cleave to him and prosecute your Covenant if you will have the saving benefits of his Love and Covenant 3. MOreover the servants of God are doubly obliged to walk with him because they have had that experience of the goodness the safety and the sweetness of it which strangers have not Do you not remember how glad you were when you first believed that he pardoned and accepted you And how much you rejoyced in his Love and entertainment And how much better you found your Fathers house than ever you had found your sinful state And how much sweeter his service was than you did before believe It 's like you can remember something like that which is described in Luk. 15. 20 22 23 24. And he arose and came to his Father But when he was yet a great way off his Father saw him and had compassion and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him And the Son said unto him Father I have sinned against Heaven and in thy sight and am no more worthy to be called thy Son But the Father said to his servants Bring forth the best Robe and put it on him and put a Ring on his hand and Shooes on his feet and bring hither the fatted Calf and kill it and let us eat and be merry for this my Son was dead and is alive again he was lost and is found What would you have thought or said of this Prodigal if after all this he should have been weary of his Fathers house and company and have taken more pleasure in his former company Would you not have said he was a forgetful and unthankful wretch and worthy never more to be received I do not speak to you now as to Apostates that are turned ungodly and have quite forsaken God and Holiness But I beseech you consider what it is after such experiences and obligations as these so much as to abate your love and grow remiss and mindless and indifferent as if you were aweary of God and were inclined to neglect him and look again to the world for your hope and satisfaction and delight As you love your souls and as you would avoid the sorrows which are greater than any that ever you felt take heed of fleighting the Love that hath done such wonders for you and of dealing so unthankfully with the everliving God and of turning thus away from him that hath received you Remember whilst you live the Love of your espousals Was God so good to you at the first and holiness so desirable and is it not so still And I am sure that your own experience will bear witness that since that time in all your lives it never was so well with you as when you walked most faithfully with God If you have received any falls and hurts it hath been when you have stragled from him If ever you had safety peace or joy it hath been when you have been nearest to him your wounds and grief and death hath been the fruit of your own waies and of your forsaking him Your recovery and health and life have been the fruit of his waies and of your adhering to him Many and many a time you have confessed this and have said It is good for me to draw near to God He hath helped you when none else could help you and comforted you when none else could comfort you How far are you above the worldlings happiness when you are nigh to God One lively thought of his Greatness and Excellency and of his Love to you in Jesus Christ will make the name of wealth and honour and favour and preferment and sensual pleasures to seem to you as words of no signification How indifferent will you be as to your prosperity in the world when you feel what it is to walk with God If you are lively experimental Christians you have found this to be true Have you not found that it is the very Health and Ease and proper employment of your souls to walk with God and keep close to him And that all goes well with you while you can do thus however the world doth esteem or use you And that when you grow strange or disobedient to God and mindless of his Goodness his presence and his authority you are like the stomach that is sick and like a bone that is out of joynt that can have no ease till it be healed and restored to its proper place No meats or drinks no company nor recreation no wealth or greatness will serve to make a sick man well or ease the dislocated bones Nothing will serve a faithful holy soul but God This is the cause of the dolour of his heart and of the secret groans and complainings of his life because in this life of distance and imperfection he finds himself so far from God and when he hath done all that he can he is still so dark and strange and cold in his affections when persecution driveth him from the Ordinances and publick Worship or when sin hath set him at a greater distance from his God he bemoaneth his soul as David in his banishment from the Tabernacle Psal. 42. 1 2 c. As the Hart panteth after the water-brooks so panteth my soul after thee O God My soul thirsteth for God for the living God When shall I come and appear before God My tears have been my meat day and night while they continually say unto me Where is thy God And it is no wonder if with his greatest joy he be yet clouded with these sorrows because he yet
unresistibly procureth our Love to them And when we Love them it is wonderful to observe how easily we are brought to think well of almost all they do and highly to value their judgements graces parts and works when greater excellencies in another perhaps are scarce observed or regarded but as a common thing And therefrre the destruction or want of Love is apparent in the vilifying thoughts and speeches that most men have of one another and in the low esteem of the judgements and performances and lives of other men much more in their contempt reproaches and cruel persecutions Now though God will have us encrease in our Love of Christ in his members and in our pure Love of Christians as such and in our common charity to all yea and in our just fidelity to our friend yet would he have us suspect and moderate our selfish and excessive Love and inordinate partial esteem of one above another when it is but for our selves and on our own account And therefore as he will make us know that we our selves are no such excellent persons as that it should make another so laudable or advance his worth because he Loveth us so he will make us know that our friends whom we overvalue are but like other men If we exalt them too highly in our esteem it is a sign that God must cast them down And as their Love to us was it that made us so exalt them so their unkindness or unfaithfulness to us is the fittest means to bring them lower in our estimation and affection God is very jealous of our hearts as to our overvaluing and overloving any of his Creatures what we give inordinately and excessively to them is some way or other taken from him and given them to his injury and therefore to his offence Though I know that to be void of natural friendly or social affections is an odious extream on the other side yet God will rebuke us if we are guilty of excess And it 's the greater and more inexcusable fault to over-love the Creature because our Love to God is so cold and hardly kindled and kept alive He cannot take it well to see us dote upon dust and frailty like our selves at the same time when all his wondrous kindness and attractive goodness do cause but such a faint and languid Love to him which we our selves can scarcely feel If therefore he cure us by permitting our friends to shew us truly what they are and how little they deserve such excessive Love when God hath so little it is no more wonder than it is that he is tender of his glory and merciful to his servants souls 5. By the failing and unfaithfulness of our friends the wonderful Patience of God will be observed and honoured as it is shewed both to them and us When they forsake us in our distress especially when we suffer for the cause of Christ it is God that they injure more than us And therefore if he bear with them and forgive their weakness upon repentance why should not we do so that are much less injured The worlds persidiousness should make us think How great and wonderful is the patience of God that beareth with and beareth up so vile ungrateful treacherous men that abuse him to whom they are infinitely obliged And it should make us consider when men deal treacherously with us How great is that mercy that hath born with and pardoned greater wrongs which I my self have done to God than these can be which men have done to me It was the remembranâ—e of David's sin that had provoked God to raise up his own Son against him of whom he had been too fond which made him so easily bear the curses and reproach of Shimei It will make us bear abuse from others to remember how ill we have dealt with God and how ill we have deserved at his hands our selves 6. And I have observed another of the Reasons of Gods permitting the failing of our friends in the season and success It is that the Love of our friends may not hinder us when we are called to suffer or dye When we over-love them it teareth our very hearts to leave them And therefore it is a strong temptation to draw us from our duty and to be unfaithful to the cause of Christ lest we should be taken from our too-dear friends or lest our suffering cause their too-much grief It is so hard a thing to dye with willingness and peace that it must needs be a mercy to be saved from the impediments which make us backward And the excessive Love of friends and relations is not the least of these impediments O how loth is many a one to dye when they think of parting with wife or husband or children or dear and faithful friends Now I have oft observed that a little before their death or sickness it is ordinary with God to permit some unkindness between such too-dear friends to arise by which he moderated and abated their affections and made them a great deal the willinger to dye Then we are ready to say It is time for me to leave the world when not only the rest of the world but my dearest friends have first forsaken me This helpeth us to remember our dearest everlasting friend and to be grieved at the heart that we have been no truer our selves to him who would not have forsaken us in our extremity And sometime it maketh us even aweary of the world and to say as Elias Lord take away my life c. 1 King 19. 4 10 14. when we must say I thought I had one friend left and behold even he forsaketh me in my distress As the Love of friends intangleth our affections to this world so to be weaned by their unkindnesses from our friends is a great help to loosen us from the world and proveth oft a very great mercy to a soul that is ready to depart And as the friends that Love us most and have most interest in our esteem and Love may do more than others in tempting us to be unfaithful to our Lord to entertain any errour to commit any sin or to flinch in suffering so when God hath permitted them to forsake us and to lose their too great interest in us we are fortified against all such temptations from them I have known where a former intimate friend hath grown strange and broken former friendship and quickly after turned to such dangerous wayes and errours as convinced the other of the mercifulness of God in weakning his temptation by his friends desertion who might else have drawn him along with him into sin And I have often observed that when the husbands have turned from Religion to Infidelity Familism or some dangerous heresie that God hath permitted them to hate and abuse their wives so inhumanely as that it preserved the poor women from the temptation of following them in their Apostasie or sin When as some other women with
his Love He hath readify forgiven the sins which I thought would have made my soul the fuel of Hell He hath entertained me with joy with musick and a feast when I better deserved to have been among the Dogs without his doors He hath embraced me in his sustaining consolatory arms when he might have spurned my guilty soul to Hell and said Depart from me thou worker of iniquity I know thee not O little did I think that he could ever have forgotten the vanity and villany of my youth yea so easily have forgotten my most aggravated sins When I had sinned against light when I had resisted conscience when I had frequently and wilfully injured Love I thought he would never have forgotten it But the greatness of his Love and Mercy and the blood and intercession of his Son hath cancelled all O how many mercies have I tasted since I thought I had sinned away all mercies How patiently hath he born with me since I thought he would never have put up more And yet besides my sins and the withdrawings of my own heart there hath been nothing to interrupt our converse Though he be God and I a worm yet that would not have kept me out Though he be in Heaven yet he is near to succour me on Earth in all that I call upon him for Though he have the Praise of Angels he disdaineth not my tears and groans Though he have the perfect Love of perfect soulâ— he knoweth the little spark in my breast and despiseth not my weak and languid Love Though I injure and dishonour him by Loving him no more though I oft forget him and have been out of the way when he he hath come or called me though I have disobediently turned away mine ears and unkindly refused the entertainments of his Love and unfaithfully plaid with those whose company he forbad me he hath not divorced me nor turned me out of doors O wonderful that Heaven will be familiar with Earth and God with man the Highest with a worm and the most Holy with an unconstant sinner Man refuseth me when God will entertaine me Man that is no wiser or better than my self Those that I never wronged or deserved ill of reject me with reproach And God whom I have unspeakably injured doth invite me and intreat me and condescendeth to me as if he were beholden to me to be saved Men that I have deserved well of do abhorre me And God that I have deserved Hell of doth accept me The best of them are bryars and as a thorny hedge and he is Love and Rest and Joy And yet I can be more welcome to him though I have offended him than I can to them whom I have obliged I have freer leave to cast my self into my Fathers arms than to tumble in those bryars or wallow in the dirt I upbraid my self with my sins but he doth not upbraid me with them I condemn my self for them but he condemns me not He forgiveth me sooner than I can forgive my self I have peace with him before I can have peace of conscience O therefore my soul draw near to him that is so willing of thy company That frowneth thee not away unless it be when thou hast fallen into the dirt that thou mayest wash thee from thy filthiness and be fitter for his converse Draw near to him that will not wrong thee by believing misreports of enemies or laying to thy charge the things thou knewest not but will forgive the wrongs thou hast done to him and justifie thee from the sins that conscience layeth to thy charge Come to him that by his Word and Spirit his Ministers and Mercies calleth thee to come and hath promised that those that come to him he will in no wise shut out O walk with him that will bear thee up and lead thee as by the right hand Psal. 73. 23. and carry his Infants when they cannot go O speak to him that teacheth thee to speak and understandeth and accepts thy stammering and helpeth thine infirmities when thou knowest not what to pray for as thou oughtest and giveth thee groans when thou hast not words and knoweth the meaning of his spirit in thy groans that cannot be contained in the Heaven of Heavens and yet hath respect to the contrite soul that trembleth at his word and feareth his displeasure that pittieth the tears and despiseth not the sighing of a broken heart nor the desires of the sorrowful O walk with him that is never weary of the converse of an upright soul that is never angry with thee but for flying from him or for drawing back or being too strange and refusing the kindness and felicity of his presence The day is coming when the proudest of the sons of men would be glad of a good look from him that thou hast leave to walk with Even they that would not look on thee and they that injured and abused thee and they that inferiours could have no access to O how glad would they be then of a smile or a word of hope and mercy from thy Father Draw near then to him on whom the whole Creation doth depend whose favour at last the proudest and the worst would purchase with the loudest cryes when all their pomp and pleasure is gone and can purchase nothing O walk with him that is Love it self and think him not unwilling or unlovely and let not the deceiver by hideous misrepresentations drive thee from him when thou hast felt a while the storms abroad methinks thou shouldest say How goâ—d how safe how sweet is it to draw near to God! 1. With whom should I so desirously converse as with him whom I must Live with for ever If I take pleasure in my house or land or country my walks my books or friends themselves as clothed with flesh I must possess this pleasure but a little while Henceforth know we no man after the flesh Had we known Christ himself after the flesh we must know him so no more for ever Though his Glorified spiritual Body we shall know Do you converse with Father or Mother with Wives or Children with Pastors and Teachers Though you may converse with these as Glorified Saints when you come to Christ yet in these Relations that they stand in to you now you shall converse with them but a little while For the Time is short It remaineth that both they that have wives be as though they had none and they that weep as though they wept not and they that rejoyce as though they rejoyced not and they that buy as though they possessed not and they that use this world as not abusing it or as though they used it not for the fashion of this world doth pass away 1 Cor. 7. 29 30 31. Why then should I so much regard a converse of so short continuance why should I be so familiar in my Inne and so in love wiâ—h that familiarity as to grieve when I must but think of
worldly trash which are made and new-made to be the dwelling place of God Desire not the company which would diminish your heavenly acquaintance and correspondency Be not unfriendly nor conceited of a self-sufficiency but yet beware lest under the honest ingenuous title of a friend a special faithful prudent faithful friend you should entertain an Idol or an enemy to your Love of God or a corrival and competitor with your highest friend For if you do it is not the specious title of a friend that will save you from the thorns and bryars of disquietment and from greater troubles than ever you found from open enemies O blessed be that High and everlasting friend who is every way suited to the upright souls To their Minds their Memories their Delight their Love c. by surest Truth by fullest Goodness by clearest Light by dearest Love by firmest Constancy c. O why hath my drowsie and dark-sighted soul been so seldome with him why hath it so often so strangely and so unthankfully passed by and not observed him nor hearkened to his kindest calls O what is all this trash and trouble that hath filled my memory and employed my mind and cheated and corrupted my affections while my dearest Lord hath been daies and nights so unworthily forgotten so contemptuously neglected and disregarded and loved as if I loved him not O that these drowsie and those waking nights those loitered lost and empty hours had been spent in the humblest converse with him which have been dreamed and doted away upon now I know not what O my God how much wiser and happier had I been had I rather chosen to mourn with thee than to rejoyce and sport with any other O that I had rather wept with thee than laughed with the creature For the time to come let that be my friend that most befriendeth my dark and dull and backward soul in its undertaken progress and heavenly conversation Or if there be none such upon earth let me here take no one for my friend O blot out every Name from my corrupted heart which hindereth the deeper engraving of thy Name Ah Lord what a stone what a blind ungrateful thing is a Heart not touched with celestial Love yet shall I not run to thee when I have none else that will know me shall I not draw near thee when all fly from me When daily experience cryeth out so loud NONE BUT CHRIST GOD OR NOTHING Ah foolish Heart that hast thought of it Where is that place that Cave or Desert where I might soonest find thee and fullest enjoy thee is it in the wilderness that thou walkest or in the croud in the Closet or in the Church where is it that I might soonest meet with God But alas I now perceive that I have a Heart to find before I am like to find my Lord O Loveless Lifeless stony heart that 's dead to him that gave it Life and to none but him Could I not Love or Think or Feel at all methinks I were less dead than now Less dead if dead than now I am alive I had almost said Lord let me never Love more till I can Love thee Nor think more on any thing till I can more willingly think of thee But I must suppress that wish for Life will act And the mercies and motions of Nature are necessary to those of Grace And therefore in the life of Nature and in the glimmerings of thy Light I will wait for more of the Celestial life My God thou hast my consent It is here attested under my hand Separate me from what and whom thou wilt so I may but be nearer thee Let me Love thee more and feel more of thy Love and then let me Love or be beloved of the world as little as thou wilt I thought self-love had been a more predominant thing But now I find that Repentance hath its Anger its Hatred and its Revenge I am truly Angry with that Heart that hath so oft and foolishly offended thee Methinks I hate that Heart that is so cold and backward in thy love and almost grudge it a dwelling in my breast Alas when Love should be the life of Prayer the life of holy meditation the life of Sermons and of holy conference and my soul in these should long to meet thee and delight to mention thee I straggle Lord I know not whither or I sit still and wish but do not rise and run and follow thee yea I do not what I seem to do All 's dead all 's dead for want of Love I often cry O where is that place where the quickening beams of Heaven are warmest that my frozen soul might seek it out But whither ever I go to City or to Solitude alas I find it is not Place that makes the difference I know that Christ is perfectly replenished with Life and Light and Love Divine And I hear him as our Head and Treasure proclaimed and offered to us in the Gospel This is thy Record that he that hath the Son hath Life O why then is my barren soul so empty I thought I had long ago consented to thy offer and then according to thy Covenant both He and Life in him are mine And yet must I still be dark and dead Ah dearest Lord I say not that I have too long waited but if I continue thus to wait wilt thou never find the time of Love and come and own thy gasping worm wilt thou never dissipate these clouds and shine upon this dead and darkened soul Hath my Night no Day Thrust me not from thee O my God! For that 's a Hell to be thrust from God But sure the cause is all at home could I find it out or rather could I cure it It is sure my face that 's turned from God when I say His face is turned from me But if my Life must here be out of sight and hidden in the Root with Christ in God and if all the rest be reserved for that better world and I must here have but these small beginnings O make me more to Love and long for the blessed day of thine appearing and not to fear the time of my deliverance nor unbelievingly to linger in this Sodom as one that had rather stay with sin then come to thee Though sin hath made me backward to the fight let it not make me backward to receive the Crown Though it hath made me a loiterer in thy work let it not make me backward to receive that wages which thy Love will give to our pardoned poor accepted services Though I have too oft drawn back when I should have come unto thee and walked with thee in thy waies of Grace yet heal that unbelief and disaffection which would make me to draw back when thou callest me to possess thy Glory Though the sickness and lameness of my soul have hindered me in my journey yet let their painfulness help me to desire to be delivered from them and to be at home where without the interposing nights of thy displeasure I shall fully feel thy fullest Love and walk with thy Glorified ones in the Light of thy Glory triumphing in thy Praise for evermore Amen BUT now I have given you these few Directions for the improvement of your solitude for converse with God lest I should occasion the hurt of those that are unfit for the Lesson I have given I must conclude with this Caution which I have formerly also published That it is not melancholly or weak-headed persons who are not able to bear such exercises for whom I have written these Directions Those that are not able to be much in serious solitary thoughtfulness without confusions and distracting suggestions and hurrying vexatious thoughts must set themselves for the most part to those duties which are to be done in company by the help of others and must be very little in solitary duties For to them whose natural faculties are so diseased or weak it is no duty as being no means to do them the desired good but while they strive to do that which they are naturally unable to endure they will but confound and distract themselves and make themselves unable for those other duties which yet they are not utterly unfit for To such persons therefore instead of ordered well-digested Meditations and much time spent in secret thoughtfulness it must suffice that they be brief in secret Prayer and take up with such occasional abrupter Meditations as they are capable of and that they be the more in reading hearing conference and praying and praising God with others untill their melancholly distempers are so far overcome as that by the direction of their Spiritual Guides they may judge themselves fit for this improvement of their Solitude FINIS * Charles Earl of Balcarres who dyed of a stone in his heart of a very strange magnitude
we must say that in this Blessed Deity in the Unity of Essence there is a Trinity of Essential properties and Attributes that is Power Wisdom and Goodness Life Light and Love The measure of which is to have no measure but to be Infinite And therefore this Being is Eternal and not measured by Time being without Beginning or end He is Immense as being not measured by Place but containeth all places and is contained in none He is Perfect as not Measured by Parts or by Degrees but quite above Degrees and Parts This Infiniteness of his Being doth communicate it self or also consist in the Infiniteness of his Essential properties His Power is Omipotency that is Infinite Power His Knowledge or wisdom is Omniscience that is Infinite Wisdom His Goodness is Felicity it self or Infinite Goodness The first seal to our Cognisance on which he engraved this his Image was the Creation that is 1. The whole world in General 2. The Intellectual Nature or Man in special In the Being of the Creation and every particular Creature his Infinite Being is revealed so wretched a Fool is the Atheist that by denying God he denyeth all things Could he prove that there is no God I would quickly prove that there is no world no man no creature If he know that he is himself or that the world or any Creature is he may know that God is For God is the Original Being And all Being that is not Eternal must have some Original And that which hath no Original is God being Eternal Infinite and without cause The Power of God is revealed in the Being and Powers of the Creation His Wisdom is revealed in their Nature Order Offices Effects c. His Goodness is revealed in the Creatures Goodness its beauty usefulness and accomplishments But though all his Image thus appear upon the Creation yet is it his Omnipotency that principally there appears The beholding and consideration of the wonderful greatness activity and excellency of the Sun the Moon the Stars the fire and other creatures doth first and chiefly possess us with apprehensions of the Infinite Greatness or Power of the Creator In the Holy Word or Laws of God which is the second glass or seal more clear and legible to us than the former there appeareth also all his Image His power in the narratives predictions c. His Wisdom in the prophesies precepts and in all His Goodness in the promises and institutions in a special manner But yet it is his second property his Wisdom that most eminently appeareth on this second seal and is seen in the glass of the holy Law The discovery of such mysteries the revelation of so many Truths the suitableness of all the instituted means and the admirable fitness of all the holy contrivances of God and all his precepts promises and threatnings for the Government of Mankind and carrying him on for the attainment of his end in a way agreeable to his nature these shew that wisdom that is most Eminently here revealed though Power and Goodness be revealed with it so in the face of Jesus Christ who is the third and most perfect seal and glass there is the Image of the Power and Wisdom and Goodness of the Godhead But yet it is the Love or Goodness of the Father that is most Eminently revealed in the son His Power appeared in the incarnation the conquests over Satan and the world the Miracles the Resurrection and the Ascension of Christ. His wisdom appeareth in the admirable mysterie of Redemption and in all the parts of the office works and laws of Christ and in the means appointed in subordination to him But Love and Goodness shineth most clearly and amiably through the whole it being the very end of Christ in this blessed work to reveal God to man in the Richoâ— of his Love as giving us the greatest mercies by the most precious means in the meetest season and manner for our good Reconciling us to himself and treating us as Children with Fatherly compassions and bringing us nearer him and opening to us the everlasting treasure having brought life and immortality to light in the Gospel God being thus revealed to man from without in the three Glasses or Seals of the Creation Law and Son himself he is also revealed to us in our selves man being as it were a little world In the Nature of man is revealed as in a Seal or Glass the nature of the blessed God in some measure In Unity of Essence we have a Trinity of Faculties of soul even the Vegetative Sensitive and Rational as our bodies have both parts and spirits Natural Vital and Animal the Rational Power in Unity hath also its Trinity of faculties even Power for Execution Understanding for Direction and Will for Command The measure of Power is Naturally sufficient to its use and end the understanding is a faculty to reason discern and discourse The will hath that Freedom which beseemeth an undetermined self-determining creature here in the way Besides this Physical Image of God that is inseparable from our Nature we have also his Law written in our hearts and are our selves objectively part of the Law of nature that is the signifiers of the will of God Had we not by sin obliterated somewhat of this Image it would have shewed it self more clearly and we should have been more capable of understanding it And then when we are Regenerate and Renewed by the Grace and Spirit of Christ and planted into him as living members of his body we have then the third impression upon our souls and are made like our Head in Wisdom Holiness and in effectual strength Considered as Creatures endued with Power understanding and will we have the Impress of all the foresaid Attributes of God But Eminently of his Power Considered as we were at first possessed with the light and law of works or Nature of which we yet retain some part so we have the Impress of all these Attributes of God But most Eminently of his Wisdom Considered as Regenerate by the Spirit and planted into Christ so we have the impress of all his said Attributes But most eminently of his Love and Goodness shining in the Moral accomplishments or graces of the soul. Man being thus made at first the Natural and Sapiential image of God with much of the Image of his Love the Lord did presently by necessary Resultancy and voluntary consent stand Related to us in such variety of Relations as answer the foresaid Properties and Attributes And these Relations of God to us are next to be known as flowing from his Attributes and Works As we have our derived Being from God who is the Primitive Eternal Being so from our Being given by Creation God is Related to us as our Maker From this Relation of a Creator in Unity there ariseth a Trinity of Relations This Trintty is in that Unity and that Unity in this Trinty First God having made us of nothing is necessarily
and dead to morrow They are our delight to day and our sorrow or horrour to morrow But our God is Immortal Our houses may be burned Our goods may be consumed or stolne our cloaths will be worn out our treasure here may be corrupted But our God is unchangeable the same for ever Our Laws and Customes may be changed our Governours and Priviledges changed our company and employments and habitation changed but our God is never changed Our estates may change from Riches to poverty and our names that were honoured may incur disgrace Our health may quickly turn to sickness and our ease to pain But still our God is unchangeable for ever Our friends are unconstant and may turn our enemies Our Peace may be changed into war and our liberty into slavery but our God doth never change Time will change customes families and all things here but it changeth not our God The Creatures are all but earthen mettal and quickly dasht in peices our comforts are changeable our selves are changeable and mortal but so is not our God 3. And it should teach us to draw as near to God as we are capable by unchangeable fixed Resolutions and constancy of endeavours and to be still the same as we are at the best 4. It should move us also to be more desirous of passing into the state of immortality and to long for our unchangeable habitation and our immortal incorruptible Bodies and to possess the Kingdom that cannot be moved Heb. 12. 28. And let not the mutability of things below much trouble us while our Rock our Portion is unmoveable God waxeth not old Heaven doth not decay by duration the Glory of the blessed shall not wither nor their sun set upon them nor their day have any night nor any mutations or commotions disturb their quiet possessions O Love and Long for Immortality and Incorruption CHAP. VII 6. HAving spoken of the effects of the Attributes of Gods Essence as such we must next speak of the Effects of his three great Attributes which some call Subsistential that is his Omnipotency Understanding and Will or his Infinite Power Wisdom and Goodness By which it hath been the way of the Schoolmen and other Divines to denominate the three Persons not without some countenance from Scripture Phrase The Father they call the Infinite Power of the God head and the Son the Wisdom and Word of God and of the Father and the Holy Ghost the Love and Goodness of God of the Father and Son But that these Attributes of Power Understanding and Will or Power Wisdome and Goodness are of the same importance with the termes of Personality Father Son and Holy Ghost we presume not to affirm It sufficeth us 1. That God hath assumed these Attributes to himself in Scripture 2. And that man who beareth the Natural Image of God hath Power Understanding and Will and as he beareth the Holy Moral Image of God he hath a Power to execute that which is Good and Wisdome to direct and Goodness of Will to determine for the execution And so while God is seen of us in this Glass of Man we must conceive of him after the Image that in man appeareth to us and speak of him in the language of man as he doth of himself And first The Almightiness of God must make these impressions on our souls 1. It must possess the soul with very awful Reverent thoughts of God and fill us continually with his holy Fear Infinite Greatness and Power must have no common careless thoughts lest we Blaspheme him in our Minds and be guilty of Contempt The Dread of the Heavenly Majesty should be still upon us and we must be in his fear all the day long Prov. 23. 17. Not under that slavish Fear that is void of Love as men fear an Enemy or hurtful Creature or that which is Evil For we have not such a spirit from the Lord nor stand in a Relation of enmity and bondage to him But Reverence is necessary and from thence a Fear of sinning and displeasing so Great a God The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdome Prov. 1. 7. and 9. 10. Psal. 111. 10. By it men depart from evil Prov. 16. 6. Sin is for want of the Fear of God Luk. 23. 40. Pro. 3. 7. Jer. 5. 24. I. ev 25. 36. The Fear of God is often put for the whole new man or all the work of Grace within us even the Principle of new life Jer. 2. 19. and 32. 40. And it is often put for the whole work of Religion or Service of God Psal. 34. 11. Prov. 1. 29. Psal. 130. 4. and 34. 9. And therefore the Godly are usually denominated such as Fear God Psal. 15. 4. and 22. 23. and 115. 11 13. and 135. 20. and 34. 7 9. c. The godly are devoted to the Fear of God Psal. 119. 38. It is our Sanctifying the Lord in our hearts that he be our fear and dread Isa. 8. 13. If we Fear him not we take him not for our Master Mal. 1. 6. Evangelical Grace excludeth not this Fear Luk. 12. 5. Though we receive a Kingdom that cannot be moved yet must our acceptable service of God be with Reverence and godly fear Heb. 12. 28. With fear and trembling we must work out our salvation Phil. 2. 12. In fear we must pass the time of â—â—journing here 1 Pet. 1. 17. In it we must converse together Eph. 5. 4. Yea Holiness is to be perfected in the fear of God 2 Cor. 7. 1. and that because we have the Promises The most prosperous Churches walk in this fear Acts 9. 31. It s a necessary means of preventing destruction Heb. 11. 7. and of attaining salvation when we have the promises Heb. 4. 1. God puts this fear in the hearts of those that shall not depart from him Jer. 32. 40. See therefore that the Greatness of the Almighty God possess thy soul continually with his Fear 2. Gods Almightiness should also possess us with holy Admiration of him and cause us in heart and voice to Magnifie him Oh what a Power is that which made the world of nothing which upholdeth the earth without any foundation but his Will which placed and maintaineth all things in their Order in Heaven and Earth which causeth so great and glorious a creature as the Sun that is so much bigger then all the earth to move so many thousand miles in a few moments and constantly to keep its time and course that giveth its instinct to every brute and causeth every part of nature to do its office By his Power it is that every motion of the Creature is performed and that order is kept in the Kingdoms of the world Jer. 32. 17 18 19. He made the Heaven and the Earth by his Great Power and stretched out arm and nothing is too hard for him The Great the Mighty God the Lord of Hosts is his Name great in counsel and mighty in works Neh. 9.
for the Head yet we are more for Christ as a means to his glory then he for us I mean he is the more excellent principal end For to this end Christ both dyed rose and revived that he might be Lord both of the dead and living Rom. 14. 9. who being in the form of God thought it not robbery to be equal with God but made himself of no reputation and took upon him the form of a servant and was made in the likeness of men and being found in fashion as a man he humbled himself and became obedient unto death even the death of the Cross Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him and given him a name which is above every name that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow both of things in heaven and things in earth and under the earth and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father Phil. 2. 6. to 12. Rev. 5. 8 9 10 11 12. And I beheld and I heard the voice of many Angels round about the Throne and the beasts and the elders and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand and thousands of thousands saying with a loud voice Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom and strength and honour and glory and blessing And every creature which is in Heaven and on Earth and under the Earth and such as are in the sea and all that are in them heard I saying Blessing honour glory and power be unto him that sitteth on the Throne and unto the Lamb for ever and ever So Rev. 15. 3 4. 20. 6. Rev. 21. 23. The City had no need of the Sun neither of the Moon to shine in it for the glory of God doth lighten it and the Lamb is the light thereof Rev. 22. 3 4. The Throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it and his servants shall serve him And they shall see his face and his name shall be in their foreheads These and many other Scriptures shew us that God will be for ever Glorified in the person of the Redeemer more then in either men or Angels and consequently that it was the principal part of his Intention in the design of mans Redemption 2. I will be briefer in the rest In the way of Redemption man will be saved with greater humiliation and self-denyal then he should have been in the way of Creation If we had been saved in a way of Innocency we should have had more to ascribe to our selves And it is meet that all Creatures be humbled and abased and nothing in themselves before the Lord. 3. By the way of Redemption sin will be more dishonoured and Holiness more advanced then if sin had never been known in the world Contraries illustrate one another Health would not be so much valued if there were no sickness nor Life if there were no Death nor Day if there were no Night nor Knowledge if there were no Ignorance nor Good if man had not known Evil. The Holiness of God would never have appeared in execution of vindictive Justice against sin if there had never been any sin and therefore he hath permitted it and will recover us from it when he could have prevented our falling into it 4. By this way also Holiness and Recovering Grace shall be more triumphant against the Devil and all its enemies By the many conquests that Christ will make over Satan the World and the Flesh and Death there will very much of God be seen to us that innocency would not thus have manifested 5. Redemption brings God nearer unto man The mysterie of Incarnation giveth us wonderful advantages to have more familiar thoughts of God and to see him in a clearer glass then ever we should else have seen him in on earth and to have access with boldness to the throne of grace The pure Deity is at so vast a distance from us while we are here in flesh that if it had not appeared in the flesh unto us we should have been at a greater loss But now without controversie great is the mysterie of godliness God was manifested in the flesh justified in the spirit seen of Angels preached to the Gentiles believed on in the world and received up into glory 1 Tim. 3. 16. 6. In the way of Redemption man is brought to more earnest and frequent addresses unto God and dependance on him Necessity driveth him And he hath use for more of God or for God in more of the wayes of his mercy then else he would have had 7. Principally in this way of saving miserable man by a Redeemer there is opportunity for the more abundant exercise of Gods mercy and consequently for the more glorious discovery of his Love and Goodness to the sons of men then if they had fallen into no such Necessities Misery prepareth men for the sense of mercy In the Redeemer there is so wonderful a discovery of Love and Mercy as is the astonishment of men and Angels 1 Joh. 3. 1. Behold what manner of Love the Father hath bestowed upon us that we should be called the sons of God! Eph. 2. 4 5. God who is rich in Mercy for his great Love wherewith he loved us even when we were dead in sins hath quickened us together with Christ by grace yee are saved and hath raised us up together and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus that in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness towards us by Christ Jesus for by grace yee are saved through faith and that not of your selves it is the gift of God Not of works lest any man should boast Tit. 3 3 4. For we our selves were sometimes foolish disobedient deceived serving divers lusts and pleasures c. But after that the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man appeared not by works of righteousness which we have done but according to his Mercy he saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost Never was there such a discovery of God as he is Love in a way of Mercy to man on earth as in the Redeemer and his benefits 8. In the way of Redemption the soul of man is formed to the most sweet and excellent temper and his obedience cast into the happiest mold The glorious demonstration of Love doth animate us with Love to God and the shedding abroad of his Love in our hearts by the spirit of the Redeemer doth draw out our hearts in Love to him again And the sense of his wonderful Love and Mercy filleth us with Thankfulness so that Love is hereby made the nature of the new man and Thankfulness is the life of all our obedience For all floweth from these principles and expresseth them so that Love is the compendium of all Holiness in one word and Thankfulness of all Evangelical obedience And
it is a more sweet and excellent state of life to be the Spouse of Christ and his members and serve God as friends and children with Love and Thankfulness then to serve him meerly as the most loyal subjects or with an obedience that hath less of Love 9. In the way of Redemption Holiness is more admirably exemplified in Christ then it was or would have been in Adam Adam would never have declared it in that eminency of Charity to others submission to God contempt of the world self-denyal and conquest of Satan as Christ hath done 10. And in the way of Redemption there is a double obligation laid upon man for every duty To the obligations of Creation all the obligations of Redemption and the new Creation are superadded And this threefold cord should not so easily be broken Here are moral means more powerfully to hold the soul to God 11. And in this way there is a clearer discovery of the everlasting state of man and life and immortality are more fully brought to light by the Gospel 2 Tim. 1. 10 then for ought we find in Scripture they were to innocent man himself No man hath seen God at any time the only begotten Son that is in the bosome of the Father he hath declared him Joh. 1. 18. For no man hath ascended up into heaven but he that came down from heaven even the son of man which is in heaven Joh 3. 13. 12. Man will be advanced to the judging of the ungodly and of the conquered Angels even by the good will of the Father and a participation in the honour of Christ our head and by a participation in his Victories and by our own Victories in his strength by the right of Conquest we shall judge with Christ both Devils and men that were enemies to him and our salvation as you may see 1 Cor. 6. 2 3. And there is more in that promise then we yet well understand Rev. 2. 26 27. He that overcometh and keepeth my words unto the end to him will I give power over the Nations and he shall rule them with a rod of Iron as the vessels of a Potter shall they be broken to shivers even as I received of my Father 13. And that which Augustine so much insisteth on I think is also plain in Scripture that the Salvation of the Elect is better secured in the hands of Christ then his own or any of his posterities was in the hands of Adam We know that Adam lost that which was committed to him But we know whom we have believed and are perswaded that he is able to keep that which we commit to him against that day 1 Tim. 1. 12. Force not these Scriptures against our own Consolation and the glory of our Redeemer and then judge Joh. 7. 2. As thou hast given him power over all flesh that he should give eternal Life to as many as thou hast given him Joh. 6. 3. All that the Father giveth me shall come to me and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out Ver. 39. And this is the Fathers will which hath sent me that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing but should raise it up again at the last day Joh. 10. 26 27 28 29. But yee believe not because yee are not of my sheep as I said unto you My sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me and I give unto them eternal life and they shall never perish and none shall take them out of my hands My Father which gave them me is greater then all and no man is able to pluck them out of my Fathers hands Eph. 1. 3 4. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ according as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and without blame before him in Love Having predestinated us to the adoption of his children by Jesus Christ to himself according to the good pleasure of his will to the praise of the glory of his grace wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved Being predestinated according to the purpose of him that worketh all things after the counsel of his own will Ver. 11. And if Faith and Repentance and the right disposition of the will it self be his resolved gift to his Elect and not things left meerly to our uncertain wills then the case is past all question 2 Tim. 2. 25 26. In meekness instructing those that oppose themselves if God peradventure will give them Repentance to the acknowledging of the truth and that they may recover themselves our of the snare of the Devil Eph. 2. 8. By grace yee are saved through faith and that not of your selves it is the gift of God Gal. 5. 22. The fruit of the spirit is Love Faith Phil. 1. 29. To you it is given on the behalf of Christ not only to believe on him Act. 13. 48. As many as were ordained to eternal life believed Jer. 24. 7. And I will give them an heart to know me that I am the Lord and they shall be my people and I will be their God for they shall return unto me with their whole heart Ezek. 11. 19 20. And I will give them one heart and I will put a new spirit within you and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh and will give them an heart of flesh that they may walk in my statutes and keep my ordinances and do them and they shall be my people and I will be their God Ezek. 36. 26 27. A new heart also will I give you and a new spirit will I put within you and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh and give you an heart of flesh and I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes See also Heb. 8. 6 7 8 9 10. where this is called the new and better Covenant I will put my Laws in their minds and write them in their hearts Jer. 31. 33. And Jer. 32. 39 40. And I will give them one heart and one way that they may fear me for ever And I will make an everlasting Covenant with them and I will not turn away from them to do them good but I will put my fear in their hearts that they shall not depart from me 1 Cor. 4. 7. Who makes thee to differ and what hast thou that thou didst not receive Much more may be produced from which it is evident that Christ is the Author and finisher of our Faith and that the certainty of the salvation of his Elect doth lie more on his undertaking and resolution infallibly to accomplish their salvation then upon our wisdom or the stability of our mutable free-wills and that thus we are better in the hands of the second Adam then we were in the hands of the first
14. To conclude Vindictive Justice will be doubly honoured upon them that are final rejecters of this grace Though conscience would have had matter enough to work upon for the torment of the sinner and the justifying of God upon the meer violation of the Law of nature or works yet nothing to what it now will have on them that are the despisers of this great salvation For of how much sorer punishment suppose yee shall he be thought worthy that hath trodden under foot the Son of God when it is willful impenitency against most excellent means and mercies that is to be charged upon sinners and when they perish because they would not be saved Justice will be most fully glorified before all and in the conscience of the sinner himself All this considered you may see that besides what reasons of the counsel of God are unknown to us there is abundant reason open to our sight from the great advantages of this way why God would rather save us by a Redeemer then in a way of Innocency as our meer Creator But for the answering of all objections against this I must desire you to observe these two things following 1. That we here suppose man a terrestrial inhabitant cloathed with flesh otherwise it is confessed that if he were perfect in heaven where he had the Beatifical Vision to confirm him many of these forementioned advantages to him would be none 2. And it is supposed that God will work on man by Moral means and where he never so infallibly produceth the good of man he doth it in a way agreeable to his nature and present state and that his work of Grace is Sapiential magnifying the contrivance and conduct of his Wisdom as well as his Power otherwise indeed God might have done all without these or any other means 3. The knowledge of God in Christ as our Redeemer must imprint upon the soul those Holy Affections which the design and nature of our Redemption do bespeak and which answer these forementioned ends As 1. It must keep the soul in a sense of the odiousness of sin that must have such a remedy to pardon and destroy it 2. It must raise us to most high and honourable thoughts of our Redeemer the Captain of our Salvation that bringeth back lâ—st sinners unto God and we must study to advance the Glory of our Lord whom the Father hath advanced and set over all 3. It must drive us out of our selves and bring us to be nothing in our own eyes and cause us to have humble penitent self condemning thoughts as men that have been our own undoers and deserved so ill of God and man 4. It must drive us to a full and constant dependance on Christ our Redeemer and on the Father by him As our life is now in the Son as its root and fountain so in him must be our faith and confidence and to him we must daily have recourse and seek to him and to the Father in his Name for all that we need for daily pardon strength protection provision and consolation 5. It must cause us the more to admire the Holiness of God which is so admirably declared in our Redemption and still be sensible how he hateth sin and loveth Purity 6. It must invite and encourage us to draw near to God who hath condescended to come so near to us and as sons we must cry Abba Father and though with reverence yet with holy confidence must set our selves continually before him 7. It must cause us to make it our daily imployment to study the Riches of the Love of God and his abundant mercy manifested in Christ so that above all books in the world we should most diligently and delightfully peruse the Son of God incarnate and in him behold the Power and Wisdom and Goodness of the Father And with Paul we should desire to know nothing but Christ crucified and all things should be counted but loss and dung for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus our Lord Phil. 3. 8. That we may be able to comprehend with all Saints what is the bredth and length and depth and heighth and to know the Love of Christ which passeth knowledge that we may be filled with all the fulness of God 8. Above all if we know God as our Redeemer we must Live in the Power of holy Love and Gratitude His Manifested Love must prevail with us so far that unfeigned Love to him may be the predominant affection of our souls And being free from the spirit of bondage and slavish fear we must make Love and Thankfulness the sum of our Religion and think not any thing will prove us Christians without prevailing Love to Christ nor that any duty is accepted that proceedeth not from it 9. Redemption must teach us to apply our selves to the holy Laws and Example of our Redeemer for the forming and ordering of our hearts and lives 10. And it must quicken us to Love the Lord with a redoubled vigour and to obey with double resolution and diligence because we are under a double obligation What should a people so Redeemed esteem too much or too dear for God 11. Redemption must make us a more Heavenly people as being Redeemed to the incorruptible inheritance in Heaven The blessed God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead to an inheritance incorruptible undefiled and that fadeth not away reserved in Heaven for us who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation 1 Pet. 1. 3. 12. Lastly Redemption must cause us to walk the more carefully and with a greater care to avoid all sin and to avoid the threatned wrath of God because sin against such unspeakable Mercy is unspeakably great and condemnation by a Redeemer for despising his grace will be a double condemnation Joh. 3. 19. 36. CHAP. XII 11. THE third Relation in which God is to be Known by us is as he is our Sanctifier and Comforter which is specially ascribed to the Holy Ghost And doubtless as the Dispensation of the Holy Ghost is the Perfecting dispensation without which Creation and Redemption would not attain their ends and as the sin against the Holy Ghost is the great and dangerous sin so our Belief in the Holy Ghost and Knowledge of God as our Sanctifier by the Spirit is not the least or lowest act of our faith or Knowledge And it implieth or containeth these things following 1. We must hence take notice of the certainty of our common original sin The necessity of sanctification proveth the corruption as the necessity of a Redeemer proveth the guilt It is not one but all that are Baptized that must be Baptized into the Name of the Son and Holy Ghost as well as of the Father which is an entering into Covenant with the Son as our Redeemer and with the
objective means yet shall not these do it without the internal effectual means But when Love doth shine to us so resplendently without us in the face of the Glorious Sun of Love and is also â—et into us by the Spirits Illumination that sheds abroad this Love in our hearts then will the holy fire burn which comes from Heaven and leads to Heaven and will never rest till it have reacht its center and brought us to the face and arms of God 5. And from the Fatherly Relation and Love of God we must learn to Trust him and Rest our souls in his securing Love Shall we distrust a Father an Omnipotent Father Therefore is this Relation prefixed to the Petitions of the Lords Prayer and we begin with Our Father which art in Heaven that when we remember his Love and our Interest in him and his Alsufficiency we may be encouraged to Trust him and make our addresses to him If a Father and such a Father smite mee I will submit and kiss the Rod for I know it is the healing fruit of Love If a Father and such a Father afflict mee wound mee deal strangely wiâ—h mee and grieve my flesh let mee not murmure or distrust him for he well understandeth what he doth and nothing that shall hurt mee finally can come from Omnipotent Paternal Love If a Father and such a Father kill mee yet let mee Trust in him and let not my soul repine at his proceedings nor tremble at the separating stroak of death A Beast knows not when we strive with him what we intend whether to Cure or to Kill him but a Child need not fear a killing blow nor a Loving soul a damning death from such a Father If he be a Father where is his Love and Trust 6. If God be our Father and so wonderful a Benefactor to us then Thanks and Praise must be our most constant work and must be studied above all the rest of Duty and most diligently performed If the tongue of man which is called his Glory be made for any thing and good for any thing it is to give the Lord his Glory in the Thankful acknowledgement of his Love and Mercies and the daily chearful Praises of his Name Let this then be the Christians work 7. The Children of such a Father should live a contented chearful life Diligence becometh them but not contrivances for worldly greatness nor carking cares for that which their Father hath promised them to care for Humility and Reverence beseemeth them but not dejection and despondency of mind and a still complaining fearful troubled disconsolate soul. If the Children of such a Father shall not be bold and confident and chearful let joy and confidence then be banished from the earth and be renounced by all the Sons of men CHAP. XVI 15. THere are yet divers subordinate Attributes of God that being comprized in the forementioned may be passed over with the briefer touch And the next that I shall speak of is his Freedome And God is Free in more senses than one but for brevity I shall speak of all together 1. And first God hath a Natural Freedome of Will being Determined to Will by nothing without him nor liable to any Necessity but what is consistent with perfect Blessedness and Liberty His own Being and Blessedness and Perfections are not the objects of his Election and therefore not of that which we call Free Will But all his works without as Creation Providence Redemption c. are the effects of his Free Will Not but that his Will concerning all these hath a Necessity of existence For God did from Eternity Will the Creation and all that is done in time and therefore from Eternity that will existing had a Necessity of existence But yet it was Free because it proceedeth not Necessarily from the very Nature of God God was God before he made the world or Redeemed it or did the things that are daily done And therefore one part of the Schoolmen maintain not only that there is Contingency from God but that there could be no Contingency in the Creature if it had not its Original in God the Liberty of God being the fountain of Contingency 2. There is also an Eminency both of Dominion and Soveraignty in God according to which he may be called Free His Absoluteness of Propriety freeth him from the restraint of any Obligation but what floweth from his own Free Will from Disposing of his own as he pleases And his Absolute Soveraignty freeth him from the Obligation of his own Laws as Laws though he will still be true to his Promises and Predictions Let man therefore take heed how he questioneth his Maker or censureth his Laws or Works or Waies CHAP. XVII 16. ANother Attribute of God is his Justice With submission I conceive that this is not to be said to be from 〈◊〉 any otherwise than all Gods Relations are as Creator 〈◊〉 c. because here is no time with God For though 〈◊〉 Blessed Nature denominated Just is from Eternity yet not 〈◊〉 â—â—râ—ality or Denomination of Justice For Justice is an Attribute of God as he is Governour only And he was not Governour till he had Creatures to Govern And he could not be a Just Governour when he was no Governour The Denomination â—â—â— not arise till the Creation had laid the Foundation Many Questions may be resolved hence which I will not trouble you to reâ—â—â—e Justice in God is the Perfection of his Nature as it giveth every his his due oâ— Governeth the world in the most perfect Orders â—or the Ends of Government Because he is Just he will Reward the Righteous and difference between the Godly and the Wicked For that Governor that useth all alike is not Just. The Crown of Righteousness is given by him as a Righteous Judge 2 Tâ—m 4. 8. 1. The Justice of God is substantially in men we call it an Inclination â—â—â— Nature and so it is Eternal 2. It is 〈◊〉 formally in his Relation of Governour 3. It is expressively first in his Laws For as a Just Governour he made them suited to the Subjects Objects and Ends. 4 It is expressively secondarily in his Judgments and Executions which is when they are according to his Law oâ— in the Cares of Penalty where he may dispense at least according to the state of the subject and sitted to the Ends of Government 1. The Justice of God is the Consolation of the Just He will Justifie them whom his Gospel Justifieth because he is Just. The Justice of God in many places of Scripture is taken for his Fidelity in vindicating his people and his Judging for them and procuring them the happy fruits of his Government and so is taken in a Consolatory sense Psal. 89. 14. Justice and Judgement are the habitations of thy Throne Mercy and Truth shall go before thy face 2 Thes. 1. 5 6. It is a Righteous thing with God to recompence tribulation to them that trouble
prevent the sinner with his Judgement but with his Grace he often doth He never punisheth before we are sinners nor never Decreed so to do as all will grant He punisheth none where his foregoing commands and warnings have had their due effect for the prevention And therefore because the Precept is the first part of his Law and the Threatning is but subservient to that and the first intent of a Governour is to procure Obedience and Punishing is but upon supposition that he misseth of the first therefore is God said not to afflict willingly because he doth it not ex voluntate antecedente but ex voluntate consequente that is for so the distinction is sound not as a Law-giver and Ruler by those Laws considered before the violation but only as a Judge of the Law-breakers But yet Gods Mercy is no security to the abusers of his Mercy Bot rather will sink them into deeper misery as the aggravation of their sin As God Afflicts not willingly and yet we feel that he afflicteth so if he do not condemn you willingly you shall finde iâ— you are impenitent that yet he will condemn you If you say God can be forced to do nothing against his will I answer you that it is not simply against his will for then it should never come to pass But it is against the Principal act of his will which floweth from him as a Law-giver or Ruler by Laws in which respect it may be said that he had rather that the wicked turn and live but yet if they will not turn they shall not live A merciful Judge had rather the Thief had saved his life by forbearing to steal but yet he had not rather that Thieves go unpunished than he should condemn them But you 'l say If God had rather men did not sin why doth he not hinder it I answer 1. He had not absolutely and simply rather that is so far as to do all that he can to prevent it nor all that without which he foreknoweth it will not be prevented But he doth much against sin as a Law-giver and nothing for it he causeth us not but perswades us from it and therefore as a Ruler he may be said to have rather that men did not sin or rather that they would turn and live 1. The Mercy of God therefore should lead sinners to Repentance and shame them from their sin and lead them up to God in Love 2. Mercy should encourage sinners to Repent as well as engage them to it For we have to do with a Merciful God that hath not shut up any among us in despair nor forbid them to come in but continueth to invite when we have oft refused and will undoubtedly pardon and welcome all that do return 3. Mercy being specially the portion of the Saints must keep them in Thankfulness Love and Comfort and all Mercies must be improved for their proper ends When a Merciful God is pleased to fill up his servants lives with such Great and Various Mercies as he doth it should breed a continual sweetness upon their hearts and cause them to study the most grateful retribution He should breath forth nothing but Thankfulness Obedience and Praise who breaths nothing but Mercies from God As the food that men live upon will be seen in their temperature 〈…〉 and strength so they that live continually upon Mâ—rcâ—â—s â—â—ould be wholly turned into Love and Thankfulness 〈…〉 ould become as it were their nature temperature 〈…〉 O how unspeakable is the Love of God that 〈…〉 eet a life for his servants even in their warfare 〈…〉 ge in this world that Mercy must be as it were 〈…〉 Air that they breath in the food which they must live upon and the remembrance improvement and thankful mention of it must be the business and imployment of their lives O with what sweet affections meditations and expressions should we live if we lived but according to the rate of those Mercies upon which we live Love and Joy and Thanks and Praise would be our very lives What sweet thoughts would Mercy breed and feed in our minds when we are alone what sweet apprehensions of the Love of God and Life Eternal should we have in Prayer Reading Saoraments and other holy ordinances Sickness and Health Poverty and Wealth Death as well as Life would be comfortable to us for all is full of Mercy to the Vessels of Mercy O Christians what a shame is it that God is so much wronged and our selves so much defrauded of our peace and joy by passing over such abundance of great unvaluable mercies without tasting their sweetness or well considering what we do receive Had we Davids heart what songs of Praise would Mercy teach us to indite How affectionately should we recount the mercies of our youth and riper age of every place and state that we have lived in to the honour of our Gracious Lord and the encouragement of those that know not how Good and Merciful he is But withall see that you contemn not or abuse not Mercy Use it well for it is Mercy that you must trust to in the hour of your distresses O do not trample upon Mercy now lest you be confounded when you should cry for Mercy in your extremity 4. The Mercifulness of God must cause his servants to imitate him in a Love of mercy Be merciful for your heavenly Father is merciful Blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy Matth. 5. 7. Be merciful in your Censures Be merciful in your retributions You are none of Gods Children if you Love not your Enemies and pray not for them that curse you and do not good to them that hate and persecute you according to your power Matth. 5. 44 45. If you forgive not men their trespasses but take your Brother by the throat neither will your heavenly Father forgive you your Trespasses Matth. 6. 14 15. Mark that even while he is called your heavenly Father yet he will not forgive if you forgive not Unmerciful men are too unlike to God to claim any interest in his saving mercy in the hour of their extremest misery Men of cruelty blood and violence he abhorreth And usually they do not live out half their daies But they that bite and devour one another are devoured one of another Gal. 5. 15. The last judgement will pass much according to mens works of mercy to the members of Christ Matth. 25. He shall have judgement without mercy that hath shewed no mercy and mercy rejoyceth against judgement James 2. 13. Pure Religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this to visit the Fatherless and Widdows in their affliction and to keep himself unspotted in the world James 1. 27. He that having this worlds goods seeth his Brother in need and shutteth up the bowels of his compassion from him how dwelleth the Love of God in him But above all cruelty there is none more devilish than cruelty to souls And
it should all be done to the Glory of God 1 Cor. 10. 31. He that regardeth a day or regardeth it not he that eateth or that eateth not must do it to the Lord And though a Good Intention will not sanctifie a forbidden action yet sins of Ignorance and meer Frailty are forborn and pardoned of God when it is his Glory and Service that is sincerely intended though there be a mistake in the choice of means None of us liveth to himself and no man dyeth to himself For whether we live we live unto the Lord and whether we dye we dye unto the Lord Whether we live therefore or dye we are the Lords For to this end Christ â—â—th dyed rose and revived that he might be Lord both of the dead and living Rom. 14. 6 7 8 9. Our walking with God is a serious Labouring that whether present or absent we may be accepted of him 2 Cor. 5. 9 To this the Love of our Redeemer must constrain us For he dyed for all that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves but unto him thâ—t dyed for them and rose again Vers. 14 15. Religion therefore is called the seeking of God because the soul doth press after him and labour tu enjoy him as the Runner seeks to reach the prize or as a Suiter seeketh the Love and fruition of the person beloved And all the particular acts of Religion are oft denominated from this intention of the End and following after it and are all called a seeking the Lord. Conversion is called a seeking the Lord Isa. 55. 6. Seek ye the Lord while he may be found Hos. 3. 5. The Children of Israel shall return and seek the Lord their God Hos. 7. 10. They do not return to the Lord their God nor seek him Men that are called to Conversion are called to seek God Hos. 10. 12. Break up your fallow ground for it is time to seek the Lord till he come and rain Righteousness upon you The converted Children of Israel and Judah shall go weeping together to seek the Lord their God Jer. 50. 4. The wicked are described to be men that do not seek the Lord Isa. 9. 13. 31. 1. The holy Covenant 2 Chron. 15. 12 13. was to seek the Lord If therefore you would Walk with God let him be the mark the prize the treasure the happiness the Heaven it self which you aim at and sincerely seek 1 Chron. 22. 19. Now set your heart and your soul to seek the Lord your God Psal. 105. 3 4 Glory ye in his Holy Name Let the heart of them rejoyce that seek the Lord Seek the Lord and his strength seek his face for evermore As the life of a Covetous man is a seeking of Riches and the life of an ambitious man is a seeking of worldly honour and applause so the life of a man that liveth to God is a seeking Him to please him honour him and enjoy him And so much of this as he attaineth so much dotb he attain of satisfaction and content If you live to God and seek him as your End and All the want of any thing will be tolerable to you which is but consistent with the fruition of his Love If he be pleased mans displeasure may be borne The loss of all things if Christ be won will not undo us Mans condemnation of us signifieth but little if God the absolute Judge do justifie us He walketh not with God that Liveth not to him as his only Happiness and End 4. Moreover our Walking with God includeth our subjection to his Authority and our taking His Wisdom and Will to be our Guide and his Laws in Nature and Scripture for our Rule you must not walk with him as his Equals but as his Subjects nor give him the honour of an ordinary superior but of the universal King In our doubts he must resolve us and in our straits we must ask counsel of the Lord Lord what wouldst thou have me to do is one of the first words of a penitent soul Act. 9. 6. When sensual worldlings do first ask the flesh or those that can do it hurt or good what they would have them be or do None of Christs true Subjects do call any man Father or Master on earth but in subordination to their highest Lord Matth. 23. The Authority of God doth aw them and govern them more than the fear of the greatest upon earth Indeed they know no power but Gods and that which he committeth unto man And therefore they can obey no man against God what ever it cost them but under God they are most readily and faithfully subject to their Governours not meerly as to men that have power to hurt them if they disobey but as to the officers of the Lord whose Authority they discern and reverence in them But when they have to do with the enemies of Christ who usurp a power which he never gave them against his Kingdom and the souls of men they think it easie to resolve the question whether it be better to obey God or men As the commands of a rebellious Constable or other fellow-subject are of no authority against the Kings Commands so the commands of all the men on earth are of so small authority with them against the Laws of God that they fully approve of the ready and resolute answer of those Witnesses Dan. 3. 16 17 18. We are not careful to answer thee in this matter If it be so our God whom we serve is able to deliver us c. But if not be it known unto thee O King that we will not serve thy gods nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up Worldlings are ruled by their fleshly interest and wisdom and self-will and by the will of man so far as it doth comporte with these By these you may handle them and lead them up and down the world By these doth Satan hold them in captivity But believers feel themselves in subjection to a higher Lord and better Law which they faithfully though imperfectly observe Therefore our walking with God is called A walking in his Law Exod. 16. 4. A walking in his statutes and keeping and doing his commands Lev. 26. 3. A walking in his paths Mic. 4. 2. It is our following the Lamb which way soever he goeth To be given up to our own hearts lusts and to walk in our counsels is contrary to this holy walk with God Psal. 81. 12. and is the course of those that are departed from him And they that are far from him shall perish he destroyeth those that go a whoring from him But it is good for us to draw near to God Psal. 73. 27 28. 5. Our walking with God doth imply that as we are ruled by his Will so we fear no punishment like his threatned displeasure and that the threats of death from mortal men will not prevail with us so much as his threats of Hell Luk. 12. 4. If God
be alwaies actually upon God but he that doth manage his calling in Holiness doth all in obedience to Gods commands and sees that his work be the work of God and he intendeth all to the glory of God or the pleasing of his blessed will and he oft reneweth these actual intentions and oft interposeth thoughts of the presence or power or love or interest of him whom he is serving He often lifteth up his soul in some holy desire or ejaculatory request to God He oft taketh occasion from what he seeth or heareth or is doing for some more spiritual meditation or discourse so that still it is God that his mind is principally employed on or for even in his ordinary work while he liveth as a Christian And it is not enough to think of God but we must think of him as God with such respect and reverence and love and trust and submission in our measure as is due from the Creature to his Creator For as some kind of speaking of him is but a taking his Name in vain so some kind of thinking of him is but a dishonouring of him by contemptuous or false unworthy thoughts Most of our walking with God consisteth in such affectionate apprehensions of him as are suitable to his blessed Attributes and Relations All the day long our thoughts should be working either on God or for God either upon some work of obedience which he hath imposed on us and in which we desire to please and honour him or else directly upon himself Our hearts must be taken up in contemplating and admiring him in magnifying his Name his Word and Works and in pleasant contentful thoughts of his benignity and of his Glory and the Glory which he conferreth on his Saints He that is unskilful or unable to manage his own thoughts with some activity seriousness and order will be a stranger to much of the holy converse which believers have with God They that have given up the Government of their thoughts and turned them loose to go which way phantasie pleaseth and present sensitive objects do invite them and to run up and down the world as masterless unruly vagrants can hardly expect to keep them in any constant attendance upon God or readiness for any sacred work And the sudden thoughts which they have of God will be rude and stupid savouring more of prophane contempt than of holiness when they should be reverent serious affectionate and practical and such as conduce to a holy composure of their hearts and lives And as we must walk with God 1. In our communion with his servants 2. And in our affectionate Meditations so also 3 In all the ordinances which he hath appointed for our Edification and his Worship 1. The Reading of the Word of God and the explication and application of it in good Books is a means to possess the mind with sound and orderly and working apprehensions of God and of his holy Truths So that in such Reading our understandings are oft illustrated with a heavenly Light and our hearts are touched with a special delightful rellish of that truth and they are secretly attracted and engaged unto God and all the powers of our souls are excited and animated to a holy obedient life 2. The same Word preached with a lively voice with clearness and affection hath a greater advantage for the same illumination and excitation of the soul. When a Minister of Christ that is truly a Divine being filled with the Knowledge and Love of God shall copiously and affectionately open to his hearers the excellencies which he hath seen and the happiness which he hath foreseen and tasted of himself it frequently through the co-operation of the Spirit of Christ doth wrap up the hearers hearts to God and bring them into a more lively knowledge of him actuating their graces and enflaming their hearts with a heavenly Love and such desires as God hath promised to satisfie Christ doth not only send his Ministers furnished with Authority from him but also furnished with his Spirit to speak of spiritual things in a spiritual manner so that in both respects he might say He that heareth you heareth mee and also by the same Spirit doth open and excite the hearts of the hearers so that it is God himself that a serious Christian is principally employed with in the hearing of his heavenly transforming Word And therefore he is affected with reverence and holy fear with some taste of heavenly delight with obediential subjection and resignation of himself to God The Word of God is powerful not only in pulling down all high exalting thoughts that rise up against God but also in lifting up depressed souls that are unable to rise unto heavenly knowledge or communion with God If some Christians could but alwaies finde as much of God upon their hearts at other times as they finde sometimes under a spiritual powerful Ministry they would not so complain that they seem forsaken and strangers to all communion with God as many of them do While God by his Messengers and Spirit is speaking and man is hearing him while God is treating with man about his reconciliation and everlasting happiness and man is seriously attending to the treaty and motions of his Lord surely this is a very considerable part of our walking and converse with God 3. Also in the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Christ we are called to a familiar converse with God He there appeareth to us by a wonderful condescension in the representing communicating signs of the flesh and blood of his Son in which he hath most conspicuously revealed his Love and Goodness to Believers There Christ himself with his Covenant-gifts are all delivered to us by these Investing signs of his own institution even as Knighthood is given by a sword and as a House is delivered by a Key or Land by a Twig and Turf Nowhere is God so near to man as in Jesus Christ and nowhere is Christ so familiarly represented to us as in this holy Sacrament Here we are called to sit with him at his Table as his invited welcome guests to commemorate his sacrifice to feed upon his very flesh and blood that is with our mouths upon his Representative flesh and blood and with our applying Faith upon his real flesh and blood by such a feeding as belongs to Faith The Marriage-Covenant betwixt God â—ncarnate and his espoused ones is there publickly sealed celebrated and solemnized There we are entertained by God as friends and not as servants only and that at the most precious costly feast If ever a believer may on earth expect his kindest entertainment and near access and a humble intimacy with his Lord it is in the participation of this sacrifice-feast which is called The Communion because it is appointed as well for our special Communion with Christ as with one another It is here that we have the fullest intimation expression and communication of the wondrous Love of God
Will and not as the motion of the brutish appetite And that God is their felicity and the only help and comfort of their souls and so the principal Good to be desired by them is become to them a truth so certain and beyond all doubt that their understandings are convinced that Velle Bonum Velle Deum to Love Good and to Love God are words that have almost the same signification and therefore here is no room for deliberation and choice where there is omnimoda ratio boni nothing but unquestionable good A Christian so far as he is such cannot chuse but desire the favour and fruition of God in immortality even as he cannot chuse because he is a man but desire his own felicity in general And as he cannot as a man but be unwilling of destruction and cannot but fear apparent misery and that which bringeth it so as a Christian he cannot chuse but be unwilling of damnation and of the wrath of God and of sin as sin and fear the apparent dangers of his soul so that his New Nature will presently cast his Fear and Repentance and Desires into their proper course and order and set them on work on their several objects about the main unquestionable things however they may erre or need more deliberation about things doubtful The New Creature is not as a lifeless Engine as a Clock or Watch or Ship where every part must be set in order by the art and hand of man and so kept and used But it is liker to the frame of our own nature even like man who is a living Engine when every part is set in its place and order by the Creatour and hath in it self a living and harmonical principle which disposeth it to action and to regular action and is so to be kept in order and daily exercise by our selves as yet to be principally ordered and actuated by the Spirit which is the principal cause By all which you may understand how the Holy Ghost is in us a spirit of Supplication and helpeth of our infirmities and teacheth us to pray and intercedeth in us and also that Prayer is to the New Man so natural a motion of the soul towards God that much of our walking with God is exercised in this holy duty And that it is to the New Life as breathing to our Natural Life and therefore no wonder that we are commanded to pray continually 1 These 5. 17. as we must breath continually or as nature which needeth a daily supply of food for nourishment hath a daily appetite to the food which it needeth so hath the Spiritual Nature to its necessary food and nothing but sickness doth take it off And thus I have shewed you how our walking with God containeth a holy use of his appointed means II. To walk with God includeth our Dependence on him for our Receivings and taking our Mercies as from his hand To live as upon his Love and Bounty as Children with their Father that can look for nothing but from him As the eye of a Servant yea of a craving Dog is upon his Masters face and hand so must our eye be on the Lord for the gracious supply of all our wants If men give us any thing we take them but as the Messengers of God by whom he sendeth it us We will not be unthankful unto men but we thank them but for bringing us our Fathers gifts Indeed man is so much more than a meer Messenger as that his own Charity also is exercised in the gift A meer Messenger is to do no more but obedientlly to deliver what is sent us and he need not exercise any Charity of his own and we owe him thanks only for his fidelity and labour but only to his Master for the gift But God will so far honour man as that he shall be called also to use his Charity and distribute his Masters gifts with some self-denial and we owe him thanks as under God he partaketh in the Charity of the Gift and as one childe oweth thanks to another who both in obedience to the Father and Love to his Brother doth give some part of that which his Father had given him before But still it is from our Fathers Bounty as the principal cause that all proceeds Thus Jacob speaketh of God Gen. 48. 15. God before whom my Fathers Abraham and Isaac did walk the God which fed mee all my life long unto this day the Angel which redeemed mee from all evil bless the Lads c. When he had mentioned his Father Abraham and Isaac's walking with God he describeth his own by his dependence upon God and receiving from him acknowledging him the God that had fed him and delivered him all his life Carnal men that live by sense do depend upon inferiour sensible causes and though they are taught to pray to God and thank him with their tongues it is indeed their own contrivances and industry or their visible benefactors which their hearts depend upon and thank It were a shame to them to be so plain as Pharaoh and to say Who is the Lord or to speak as openly as Nebuchadnezzar and say Is not this great Babylon that I have built by the might of my power c. Dâ—n 4 30. Yet the same Atheism and Self-idolizing is in their hearts though it be more modestly and cunningly exprest Hence it is that they that walk with God have all their Receivings sanctified to them and have in all a Divine and spiritual sweetness which those that take them but as from Creatures do never feel or understand 12. Lastly it is contained in our Walking with God that the greatest business of our lives be with Him and for him It is not a walk for complement or recreation only that is here meant but it is a life of nearness converse and employment as a servant or child that dwelleth with his Master or Father in the house God should be alwayes so regarded that Man should stand by as Nothing and be scarce observed in comparison of Him We should begin the day with God and entertain Him in the first and sweetest of our thoughts we should walk abroad and do our work as in his sight we must resolve to do no work but His no not in our trades and ordinary callings we must be able to say It is the work which my Master set me to do and I do it to obey and please his Will At night we must take an account of our selves and spread open that account before him desiring his acceptance of what was well and his pardon for what we did amiss that we may thus be ready for our last account In a word though Men be our fellow-labourers and companions yet the principal business of our Care and Diligence must be our Masters service in the world And therefore we must look about us and discern the opportunities of serving him and of the best improvement of his
what it is to be Godly and to walk with God and what it is to be an Atheist or Ungodly you may easily see that Godliness is more rare and Atheism more common than many that themselves are Atheists will believe It is not that which a man calls his God that is taken by him for his God indeed It is not the Tongue but the Heart that is the man Pilate called Christ the King of the Jews when he crucified him The Jews called God their Father when Christ telleth them they were of their father the Devil and proveth it because what ever they said they would do his lusts Joh. 8. 44. The same Jews pretended to honour the name of the Messiah and expect him while they killed him The question is not what men call themselves but what they are Not whether you say you take God for your God but whether you do so indeed Not whether you profess your selves to be Atheists but whether you are Atheists indeed or not If you are not look over what I have here said and tell your consciences Do you walk with God who is it that you submit your selves willingly to be disposed of by To whom are you most subject and whose commands have the most effectual authority with you who is the Chief Governour of your hearts and lives whom is it that you principally desire to please whom do you most fear and whose displeasure do you principally avoid from whom is it that you expect your greaetest reward and in whom and with whom do you place and expect your happiness whose work is it that you do as the greatest business of your lives Is it the goodness of God in himself and unto you that draweth up your hearts to him in Love Is he the ultimate End of the main intentions design and industry of your lives Do you trust upon his Word as your security for your everlasting hopes and happiness Do you study and observe him in his works Do you really live as in his presence Do you delight in his Word and meditate on it Do you love the Communion of Saints and to be most frequent and familiar with them that are most frequent and familiar with Christ Do you favour more the particular affectionate discourse about his Nature Will and Kingdom than the frothy talk of empty wits or the common discourse of carnal worldlings Do you love to be employed in thanking him for his Mercies and in praising him and declaring the glory of his attributes and works Is your dependence on him as your great benefactor and do you receive your mercies as his gifts If thus your principal observation be of God and your chief desire after God and your chiefest confidence in God and your chiefest business in the world be with God and for God and your chifest joy be in the favour of God when you can apprehend it and in the prosperity of his Church and your hopes of glory and your chiefest grief and trouble be your sinful distance from him and your backwardness and disability in his love and service and the fear of his displeasure and the injuries done to his Gospel and honour in the world then I must needs say you are savingly delivered from your Atheism and Ungodliness you do not only talk of God but walk with God you are then acquainted with that spiritual life and work which the sensual world is unacquainted with and with those invisible everlasting excellencies which if worldlings knew they would change their minds and choice and pleasures You are then acquainted with that rational manly saintly life which ungodly men are strangers to and you are in the way of that well grounded Hope and Peace to which all the Pleasures and Crowns on earth if compared are but cheats and misery But if you were never yet brought to walk with God do not think that you have a sound belief in God nor that you acknowledge him sincerely nor that you are saved from heart atheism Nor is it Piety in the Opinion and the Tongue that will save him that is an Atheist or ungodly in heart and life Divinity is an affective-practical science Knowing is not the ultimate or perfective act of man but a means to holy Love and Joy and service Nor is it clear and solid knowledge if it do not somewhat affect the heart and engage and actuate the life according to the nature and use of the thing known The soundness of Knowledge and Belief is not best discerned in the intellectual acts themselves but in their powerful free and pleasant efficacy upon our choice and practice By these therefore you must judge whether you are Godly or Atheistical The question is not what your Tongues say of God nor what complemental ceremonious observances you allow him but what your Hearts and your endeavours say of him and whether you glorifie him as God when you say you know him Otherwise you will find that the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who held the truth in unrighteousness Rom. 1. 18 21. And now alas what matter of lamentation is here before us To see how seriously men converse with one another and how God is overlookt or neglected by the most How men live together as if there were more that is considerable and regardable in these particles of animated dust then in the Lord Almighty and in all his graces service and rewards To see how God is cast aside and his interest made to give place to the interest of the flesh and his services must stay till men have done their service to their lusts or to worldly men that can do them hurt or shew them favour And his will must not be done when it crosseth the will of sinful man How little do all the commands and promises and threatnings of God signifie with these Atheistical men in comparison of their lusts or the laws of men or any thing that concerneth their temporal prosperity O how is the world revolted from their Maker How have they lost the knowledge of themselves and forgotten their natures capacities and obligations and what it is to be indeed a man O hearken sinners to the call of your Redeemer Return O seduced wandering souls and know at last your resting place why is not God in all your thoughts or why is he thought on with so much remisness unwillingness and contempt and with so little pleasure seriousness or regard Do you understand your selves in this Do you deal worthily with God Or wisely for your selves Do you take more pleasure with the Prodigal to feed swine and to feed with swine then to dwell at home with your heavenly Father and to walk before him and serve him in the world Did you but know how dangerous a way you have been in and how unreasonably you have dealt to forsake God in your hearts and follow that which cannot profit you what haste would you make
remembrancers Can we stop our ears against the voice of Heaven and Earth Can we be ignorant of him when the whole Creation is our Teacher Can we overlook that holy glorious Name which is written so legibly upon all things that ever our eyes beheld that nothing but blindness sleepiness or distraction could possibly keep us from discerning it I have many a time wondred that as the eye is dazzled so with the beholding of the greatest Light that it can scarce perceive the shining of a lesser so the Glorious transcendent Majesty of the Lord doth not even overwhelm our understandings and so transport and take us up as that we can scarce observe or remember any thing else For naturally the greatest objects of our sense are apt to make us at that time insensible of the smaller And our exceeding great business is apt to make us utterly neglect and forget those that are exceeding small And O what Nothings are the Best and Greatest of the Creatures in comparison of God! And what toyes and trifles are all our other businesses in the world in comparison of the business which we have with Him But I have been stopped in these admirations by considering that the wise Creator hath fitted and ordered all his Creatures according to the use which he designeth them to And therefore as the eye must be receptive only of so much light as is proportioned to its use and pleasure and must be so distant from the Sun that its Light may rather guide than blind us and its Heat may rather quicken than consume us so God hath made our understandings capable of no other knowledge of Him here than what is suited to the work of holiness And while we have Flesh and fleshly works to do and lawful necessary business in the world in which Gods own commands employ us our souls in this Lanthorn of the body must see him through so thick a glass as shall so far allay our apprehension as not to distract us and take us off the works which he enjoyneth us And God and our souls shall be at such a distance as that the proportionable Light of his countenance may conduct us and not overwhelm us and his Love may be so revealed as to quicken our desires and draw us on to a better state but not so as to make us utterly impatient of this world and utterly weary of our lives or to swallow us up or possess us of our most desired happiness before we arrive at the state of happiness While the soul is in the body it maketh so much use of the body the brain and spirits in all is operations that our wise and merciful Creator and Governour doth respect the body as well as the soul in his ordering disposing and representing of the objects of those operations so that when I consider that certainly all men would be distracted if their apprehensions of God were anywhit answerable to the Greatness of his Majesty and Glory the Brain being not able to bear such high operations of the soul nor the greatness of the passions which would necessarily follow it much reconcileth my wondring mind to the wise and gracious providence of God even in setting innocent nature it self at such a distance from his Glory allowing us the presence of such Grace as is necessary to bring us up to Glory Though it reconcile me not to that doleful distance which is introduced by sin and which is furthered by Satan the world and the flesh and which our Redeemer by his Spirit and Intercession must heal And it further reconcileth me to this disposure and will of the blessed God and this necessary natural distance and darkness of our minds when I consider that if God and Heaven and Hell were as near and open to our apprehensions as the things are which we see and feel this life would not be what God intended it to be a life of Tryal and preparation to another a work a race a pilgrimage a warfare what Tryal would there be of any mans Faith or Love or Obedience or Constancy or Self-denial If we saw God stand by or apprehended him as if we saw him in degree it would be no more praise-worthy or rewardable for a man to abhor all temptations to worldliness ambition gluttony drunkenness lust cruelty c. than it is for a man to be kept from sleeping that is pierced with thorns or for a man to forbear to drink a cup of melted Gold which he knoweth will burn out his bowels or to forbear to burn his flesh in the fire It were no great commendation to his Chastity that would forbear his filthiness if he saw or had the fullest apprehensions of God when he will forbear it in the presence of a mortal man It were no great commendations to the intemperate and voluptuous to have no mind of sensual delights if they had but such a knowledge of God as were equal to sight It were no thanks to the persecutor to forbear his cruelty against the servants of the Lord if he saw Christ coming with his glorious Angels to take vengeance on them that know not God and obey not the Gospel and to be admired in his Saints and glorified in them that now believe 2 Thes. 1. 7 8 9 10. I deny not but this happily necessitated Holiness is best in it self and therefore will be our state in Heaven but what is there of Tryal in it or how can it be suitable to the state of man that must have Good and Evil set before him and Life and Death left to his choice and that must conquer if he will be crowned and approve his fidelity to his Creator against competitors and must live a rewardable life before he have the reward But though in this life we may neither hope for nor desire such overwhelming sensible apprehensions of God as the rest of our faculties cannot answer nor our bodies bear yet that our apprehensions of him should be so base and small and dull and unconstant as to by born down by the noise of worldly business or by the presence of any creature or by the tempting baits of sensuality this is the more odious by how much God is more Great and Glorious than the creature and even because the use of the creature it self is but to reveal the Glory of the Lord. To have such sleight and stupid thoughts of him as will not carry us on in uprightness of obedience nor keep us in his fear nor draw out our hearts in sincere desires to please him and enjoy him and as will not raise us to a contempt of the pleasures and profits and honours of this world this is to be despisers of the Lord and to live as in a sleep and to be dead to God and alive only to the world and flesh It is no unjust dishonour or injury to â—e Creature to be accounted as Nothing in comparison of God that it may be able to do Nothing
were the Alpha or first efficient and yet the Creature the Omega or finis ultimus and all the Goodness in God were to be estimated and denominated by its respect to the felicity of man And so the creature hath the best part of the Deity Such notions evidently shew us that lapsed man is predominantly selfish and is become his own Idol and is lost in himself while he hath lost himself by his loss of God when we see how powerful his self-interest is both with his intellect and will even men of great ingenuity till Sanctification hath restored them to God and taught them better to know Him and themselves are ready to measure all Good or Evil by their own interest when yet common reason would have told them if they had not perverted it by pride and partial studies that short of God even among the Creatures there are many things to be preferred before themselves and their own felicity He is irrationally enslaved by self love that cannot see that the happiness of the world or of his Country or of multitudes is more to be desired then his happiness alone And that he ought rather to choose to be annihilated or to be miserable if it were made a matter of his deliberation and choice then to have the Sun taken out of the firmament or the world or his Country to be annihilated or miserable And God is infinitely above the Creature Obj. But they say He needeth nothing to make him happy having no defect of happiness Answ. And what of that Must it needs therefore follow that he made not all things for himself but for the creature finally He is perfectly happy in himself and his will is himself This will was fulfilled when the world was not made for it was his will that it should not be made till it was made and it is fulfilled when it is made and fulfilled by all that comes to pass And as the absolute simple Goodness and Perfection of Gods essence is the Greatest Good the eternal immutable Good so the fulfilling of his will is the ultimate end of all obedience He hath expressed himself to take pleasure in his works and in the holiness obedience and happiness of his chosen And though Pleasure be not the same thing in God as it is in man no more then will or understanding is yet it is not nothing which God expresseth by such terms but something which we have no fitter expression for This Pleasing of the will of God being the end of all even of our felicity is better then our felicity it self They that will maintain that God who is naturally and necessarily Good hath no other Goodness but his Benignity or aptness to do good to his creatures must needs also maintain that God being for the Creature and not the Creature for God the Creature is better then God as being the ultimate end of God himself and the highest use of all his Goodness being but for the felicity of the Creature As also that God doth do all the Good that he is able For natural necessary agents work ad ultimum posse And that all men shall be saved and all Devils and every worm and toad be equal to the highest Angel or else that God is not able to do it And that he did thus make happy all his Creatures from eternity for natural necessary agents work alwayes if they be not forcibly hindered and that there never was such a thing as pain or misery in man or brute or else that God was not able to prevent it But abundance of such odious consequences must needs follow from the denying of the Highest Good which is God himself and confesting none but his efficient Goodness But some will be offended with me for being so serious in confuting such an irrational Atheistical conceit who know not how far it prevaileth with an Atheistical generation Be it known to you careless sinners that though the Sun will shine on you whether you think on it or not or love it or thank it or not and the fire will warm you whether you think on it and love it or not yet God will not justifie or save you whether you love him or think on him or not God doth not operate brutishly in your salvation but Governeth you wisely as rational Creatures are to be governed and therefore will give you Happiness as a reward and therefore will not deal alike with those that love him and that love him not that seek him and that seek him not with the labourers and the loiterers the faithful and the slothful servant Would you have us believe that you know better then God himself what pleaseth him or on what terms he will give his benefits and save mens souls or do you know his nature better then he knoweth it that you dare presume to say because he needeth not our love or duty therefore they are not pleasing to him Then what hath God to do in governing the world if he be pleased and displeased with nothing that men do or with good and evil actions equally Though you cannot hurt him you shall find that he will hurt you if you disobey him And though you cannot make him happy by your holiness you shall find that he will not make you happy without it And if he did work as necessarily as the Sun doth shine according to your similitude yet 1. Even the shining of the Sun doth not illuminate the blind nor doth it make the seeds of thorns and nettles to bring forth vines or roses nor the gendering of frogs to bring forth men but it actuateth all things according to the several natures of their powers And therefore how can you expect that an ignorant unbelieving and unholy soul should enjoy felicity in God when in that state they are uncapable of it 2. And if the Sun do necessarily illuminate any one he must necessarily be illuminated and if it necessarily warm or quicken any thing it must be necessarily warmed and quickened else you would assert contradictions So if God did necessarily save you and make you happy you would necessarily be saved and made happy And that containeth essentially your Holiness your Loving desiring and seeking after God To be saved or happy without enjoying God by Love or to Love him and not Desire him seek him or obey him are as great contradictions as to be illuminated without light or quickened without life What way soever it be that God conveyeth his sanctifying spirit I am sure that if any man have not the spirit of Christ the same is none of his Rom. 8. 9. and that without Holiness none shall see God Heb. 12. 14. and that if you will have the Kingdom of God you must seek it first preferring it before all earthly things Matth. 6. 33. Joh. 6. 27. Col. 4. 1 2 3. And then if all the question that remaineth undecided be whether God do you wrong or not in damning you or whether
God be Good because he will not save you when he can I shall leave you to him to receive satisfaction who will easily silence and consound your impudence and justifie his works and laws Prepare your accusations against him if you will needs insist upon them and try whether he or you shall prevail but remember that thou art a worm and he is God and that he will be the only judge when all is done and ignorance and impiety that prate against him to their own confusion in the day of his patience shall not then usurp the throne Object 2. But how can God be fit for mortals to converse with when they see him not and are infinitely below him Answ. I hope you will not say that you have nothing to do at home with your own souls and yet you never saw your souls And it is the souls the Reason and the will of men that you daily converse with here in the world more then their bodies and yet you never saw their souls their Reason or their wills If you have no higher light to discern by then your eyesight you are not men but beasts If you are men you have Reason and if you are Christians you have faith by which you know things that you never saw You have more dependance on the things that are unseen then on those which you see and have much more to do with them And though God be infinitely above us yet he condescendeth to communicate to us according to our capacities As the Sun is far from us and yet doth not disdain to enlighten and warm and quicken a worm or fly here below If any be yet so much an Atheist as to think that Religious converse with God is but a fancy let him well answer me these few questions Quest. 1. Doth not the continued being and well-being of the Creatures tell us that there is a God on whom for being and well-being they depend and from whom they are and have whatsoever they are and whatsoever they have And therefore that passively all the Creatures have more respect to him by far then to one another Quest. 2. Seeing God communicateth to every Creature according to their several capacities is it not meet then that he deal with man as man even as a Creature Rational capable to know and love and obey his Great Creator and to be happy in the knowledge love and fruition of him That man hath such natural faculties and capacities is not to be denyed by a man that knoweth what it is to be a man And that God hath not given him these in vain will be easily believed by any that indeed believe that he is God Quest. 3. Is there any thing else that is finally worthy of the highest actions of our souls or that is fully adequate to them and fit to be our happiness If not then we are left either to certain infelicity contrary to the tendency of our natures or else we must seek our felicity in God Quest. 4. Is there any thing more certain then that by the title of Creation our Maker hath a full and absolute right to all that he hath made and consequently to all our love and obedience our time and powers For whom should they all be used but for him from whom we have them Quest. 5. Can any thing be more sure then that God is the Righteous Governour of the world and that he Governeth man as a rational creature by Laws and Judgement And can we live under his absolute Soveraignty and under his many righteous Laws and under his Promises of salvation to the Justified and under his threatnings of damnation to the unjustified and yet not have more to do with God than with all the world If indeed you think that God doth not Love and reward the holy and obedient and punish the ungodly and disobedient then either you take him not to be the Governour of the world or which is worse you take him to be an unrighteous Governour And then you must by the same reason say that Magistrates and Parents should do so too and love and reward the obedient and disobedient alike But if any mans disobedience were exercised to your hurt by slandering or beating or robbing you I dare say you would not then commend so indifferent and unjust a Governour Quest. 6. If it be not needless for man to Labour for food and rayment and necessary provision for his body how can it be needless for him to labour for the happiness of his soul If God will not give us our daily bread while we never think of it or seek it why should we expect that he will give us Heaven though we never think on it value it or seek it Quest. 7. Is it not a contradiction to be happy in the fruition of God and yet not to mind him desire him or seek him How is it that the Soul can reach its Object but by estimation desire and seeking after it And how should it enjoy it but by Loving it and taking pleasure in it Quest. 8. While you seem but to wrangle against the Duty of believers do you not plead against the comfort and happiness of believers For surely the employment of the soul on God and for him is the health and pleasure of the soul And to call away the soul from such employment is to imprison it in the dungeon of this world and to forbid us to smell to the sweetest flowers and confine us to a sink or dunghill and to forbid us to tast of the food of Angels or of men and to offer us Vineger and Gall or turn us over to feed with Swine He that pleadeth that there is no such thing as real Holiness Communion with God doth plead in effect that there is no true felicity or delight for any of the Sons of men And how welcome should ungodly Atheists be unto mankind that would for ever exclude them all from happiuess and make them believe they are all made to be remedilesly miserable And here take notice of the madness of the unthankful world that hateth and persecuteth the Preachers of the Gospel that bring them the glad tidings of pardon and hope and life eternal of solid happiness and durable delight and yet they are not offended at these Atheists and ungodly Cavillers that would take them off from all that is truly good and pleasant and make them believe that nature hath made them capable of no higher things than beasts and hath enthralled them in remediless infelicity Quest. 9. Do you not see by experience that there are a people in the world whose hearts are upon God and the life to come and that make it their chiefest care and business to seek him and to serve him How then can you say that there is no such thing or that we are not capable of it when it is the case of so many before your eyes If you say that it is but their
right his kindness and sollicitations of you and you have so little to say for any pretence of right or merit in the creature Why are not men ashamed of the greatest dishonesty against God when all that have any humanity left them do take adultery theft and other dishonesty against creatures for a shame The time will come when God and his interest shall be better understood that this dishonesty against Him will be the matter of the most confounding shame that ever did or could befall men Prevent this by the juster exercise of your thoughts and keeping them pure and chast to God 10. If God be not in your thoughts and the chiefest in them there will be no matter in them of solid comfort or content Trouble and deceit will be all their work when they have fled about the earth and taken a tast of every flower they will come loaden home with nothing better then Vanity and Vexation Such thoughts may excite the laughter of a fool and cause that mirth that is called madness Eccles. 7. 4 6. and 2. 2. But they will never conduce to setled Peace and durable content And therefore they are alwaies repented of themselves and are troublesome to our review as being the shame of the sinner which he would fain be cleared of or disown Though you may approach the creature with passionate fondness and the most delightful promises and hopes be sure of it you will come off at last with grief and disappointment if not with the loathing of that which you chose for your delight Your thoughts are in a wilderness among thorns and bryars when God is not in them as their guide and end They are lost and torn among the creatures but rest and satisfaction they will find none It may be at the present it is pleasanter to you to think of recreation or business or worldly wealth then to think of God But the pleasure of these thoughts is as delusory and short-lived as are the things themselves on which you think How long will you think with pleasure on such fading transitory things And the pleasure cannot be great at the present which reacheth but the flesh and fantasie and which the possessed knoweth will be but short Nay you will shortly find by sad experience that of all the creatures under heaven there will none be so bitter to your thoughts as those which you now find greatest carnal sweetness in O how bitter will the thought of idolized honour and abused wealth and greatness be to a dying or a damned Dives The thoughts of that Alehouse or Playhouse where thou hadst thy greatest pleasure will trouble thee more then the thoughts of all the houses in the town besides The thoughts of that one woman with whom thou didst commit thy pleasant sin will wound and vex thee more then the thoughts of all the women in the town besides The thoughts of that beloved sport which thou couldst not be weaned from will be more troublesome to thee then the thoughts of a thousand other things in which thou hadst no inordinate delight For the end of sinful mirth is sorrow when Solomon had tryed to please himself to the full in mirth in buildings vineyards woods waters in servants and possessions silver and gold and cattel and singers and instruments of musick of all sorts in greatness and all that the eye or appetite or heart desired he findeth when he awaked from this pleasant dream that he had all this while been taken up with Vanity and Vexation in so much that he saith on the review Therefore I hated life because the work that is wrought under the sun is grievous to me for all is vanity and vexation of spirit Yea I hated all my labour which I had taken under the sun Eccles. 2. 1 2 3 c. 17. 18. You may toil out and tire your selves among these bryars in this barren wilderness but if ever you would feel any solid ground of quietness and rest it must be by coming off from vanity and seeking your felicity in God and living sincerely for Him and upon Him as the worldling doth upon the world His pardoning mercy must begin your Peace forgiving you your former thoughts and â—is healing quickening mercy must increase it by teaching you better to employ your thoughts and drawing up your hearts â—nto himself and his glorifying mercy must perfect it by giving you the full intuition and fruition of himself in heaven and employing you in his perfect Love and Praise not leaving any room for creatures nor suffering a thought to be employed on vanity for ever CHAP. IV. BY this time I hope you may see reason to call your selves to a strict account what converse you have been taken up with in the world and upon what you have exercised your thoughts surely you must needs be conscious that the thoughts which have been denyed God have brought you home but little satisfaction and have not answered the ends of your creation redemption or preservation and that they are now much fitter matter for your penitential tears then for your comfort in the review I do not think you dare own and stand to those thoughts which have been spent for fleshly pleasures or in unnecessary worldly cares or that were wasted in impertinent vagaries upon any thing or nothing when you should have been seeking God! I do not think you have now any great pleasure in the review of those thoughts which once were taken up with pleasure when your most pleasant thoughts should have been of God Dare you approve of your rejecting your Creatour and the great concernments of your soul out of your thoughts and wasting them upon things unprofitable and vain Did not God and Heaven deserve more of your serious thoughts then any thing else that ever they were employed on Have you laid them out on any thing that more concerned you or on any thing more excellent more honourable more durable or that could claim precedency upon any just account Did you not shut heaven it self out of your thoughts when you shut out God And is it not just that God and Heaven should shut out you If Heaven be not the principal matter of your thoughts its plain that you do not principally love it And if so judge you whether those that Love it not are fit to be made possessors of it O poor distracted senseless world Is not God Great enough to command and take up your chiefest cogitations Is not Heaven enough to find them work and afford them satisfaction and delight And yet is the dung and dotage of the world enough Is your honour and wealth and fleshly delights aed sports enough God will shortly make you know whether this were wise and equal dealing Is God so low so little so undeserving to be so oft and easily forgotten and so hardly and so sleightly remembred I tell you ere long he will make you think of him to your sorrow whether you will or
and erroneous disposition of our own hearts The will hath a very great power upon the understanding And therefore ungodly fleshly men will very hardly receive any truth which crosseth the carnal interest or disposition And will hardly let go any errour that feedeth them because their corrupted wills are a byas to their understandings and make them desperately partial in all their reading and hearing and hypocritical in their prayers and enquiries after truth Interest and corruption locketh up their hearts from their own observation Whereas a man that walketh with God that is jealous and holy and just and a searcher of the heart is driven from hypocrisie and forced to behave himself as in the open light and to do all as in the sight of all the world as knowing that the sight of God is of far greater concernment and regard The partiality corruption and byas of the heart is detected and shamed by the presence of God Therefore to walk with God is to walk in the light and as children of the light and not in darkness And he that doth Truth cometh to the light that his deeds might be manifest that they are wrought in God when every one that doth evil hateth the light neither cometh to the light lest his deeds should be reproved And this is their condemnation that light is come into the world and men love the darkness rather then the light because their deeds are evil Joh. 3. 19 20 21. It tendeth therefore exceedingly to make men wise to Walk with God because it is a walking in the light and in such a presence as most powerfully prevaileth against that hypocrisie deceitfulness and partiality of the heart which is the common cause of damning errour 10. Lastly they that walk with God are entitled by many promises to the guidance and direction of his spirit And blessed are those that have such a guide at once a light in the world without them and a light immediately from God within them For so far as he is received and worketh in them he will lead them into truth and save them from deceit and folly and having guided them by his counsel will afterward take them unto glory Psal. 73. 24. Whereas the ungodly are led by the flesh and often given up to their own hearts lusts to walk in their own counsels Rom. 8. 1 13. Psal. 81. 12. till at last the fools do say in their hearts there is no God Psal. 14. 1. and they become corrupt and abhominable eating up the people of the Lord as bread and call not on his Name ver 2. c. Deceiving and being deceived sensual having not the spirit Jud. 19. who shall receive the reward of their unrighteousness as accounting it pleasure to riot in the day time 2 Pet. 2. 13. IV. ANother benefit of Walking with God is that it maketh men good as well as wise It is the most excellent means for the advancement of mans soul to the highest degree of holiness attainable in this life If conversing with Good men doth powerfully tend to make men good conversing with God must needs be more effectual which may appear in these particulars 1. The apprehensions of the presence and attributes of God do most effectually check the stirrings of corruption and rebuke all the vicious inclinations and motions of the soul even the most secret sin of the heart is rebuked by his presence as well as the most open transgression of the life For the thoughts of the heart are open to his view All what is done before God is done as in the open light nothing of it can be hid no sin can have the encouragement of secresie to embolden it It is all committed in the presence of the Universal King and Lawgiver of the world who hath forbidden it It is done before him that most abhorreth it and will never be reconciled to it It is done before him that is the Judge of the world and will shortly pass the sentence on us according to what we have done in the body It standeth up in his presence who is of infinite Majesty and perfection and therefore most to be reverenced and honoured And therefore if the presence of a wise and grave and venerable person will restrain men from sin the presence of God apprehended seriously will do it much more It is committed before him that is our dearest friend and tender Father and chiefest benefactor And therefore ingenuity gratitude and love will all rise up against it in those that walk with God There is that in God before the eyes of those that walk with him which is most contrary to sin and most powerful against it of any thing in the world Every one will confess that if mens eyes were opened to see the Lord in Glory standing over them it would be the most powerful means to restrain them from transgressing The drunkard would not then venture upon his cups the fornicator would have a cooling for his lusts the swearer would be afraid to take his Makers name in vain the prophane would scarce presume to scorn or persecute a holy life And he that walketh with God though he see him not corporeally yet seeth him by faith and liveth as in his presence and therefore must needs be restrained from sin as having the means which is next to the sight of God If pride should begin to stir in one that walks with God O what a powerful remedy is at hand How effectually would the presence of the Great and Holy God rebuke it and constrain us to say as Job 42. 5 6. I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear but now mine eye seeth thee wherefore I abhor my self and repent in dust and ashes If worldly love or carnal lust should stir â—n such a one how powerfully would the terrours of the Lord repress it and his Majesty rebuke it and his Love and Goodness overcome it If worldly cares or murmuring discontents begin to trouble such a one how effectually will the Goodness the All sufficiency and the faithfulness of God allay them and quiet and satisfie the soul and cause it to be offended at its own offence and to chide it self for its repinings and distrust If Passion arise and begin to discompose us how powerfully will the presence of God rebuke it and the reverence of his Majesty and the sense of his Authority and pardoning grace will asswage it and shame us into silent quietness who dare let out his passions upon man in the presence of his Maker that apprehendeth his presence The same I might say of all other sins 2. The presence and attributes of God apprehended by those that walk with him is the potent remedy against Temptations Who will once turn an eye to the gold and glory of the world that is offered him to allure him to sin if he see God stand by who would be tempted to lust or any sinful pleasure if he observe the presence of the Lord
Hell How chearfully may we go out of this troublesome world and leave the greatest prosperity behind us when we are sure to live in Heaven for ever Even an Infidel will say that he could suffer or dye if he could but be certain to be Glorified in Heaven when he is dead 3. Walking with God doth mortifie the flesh and allay the affections and lusts thereof The soul that is taken up with higher matters and daily seeth things more excellent becometh as dead to the things below And thus it weaneth us from all that is in the world which seemeth most desirable to carnal men And when the flesh is mortified and the world is nothing to us or but as a dead and loathsome carkass what is there left to be very troublesome in any suffering from the world or to make us loth by death to leave it It is men that know not God that overvalue the profits and honours of the world and men that never felt the comforts of Communion with God that set too much by the pleasures of the flesh And it is men that set too much by these that make so great a matter of suffering It is he that basely overvalueth wealth that whineth and repineth when he comes to poverty It is he that set too much by his honour and being befooled by his pride doth greatly esteem the thoughts or applauding words of men that swelleth against those that disesteem him and breaketh his heart when he falleth into disgrace He that is cheated out of his wits by the pomps and splendour of a high and prosperous estate doth think he is undone when he is brought low But it is not so with him that walks with God For being taken up with far higher things he knoweth the vanity of these As he seeth not in them any thing that is worthy of his strong desires so neither any thing that is worthy of much lamentation when they are gone He never thought that a shadow or feather or a blast of wind could make him happy And he cannot think that the loss of these can make him miserable He that is taken up with God hath a higher interest and business and findeth not himself so much concerned in the storms or calms that are here below as others are who know no better and never minded higher things 4. Walking with God doth much overcome the fear of man The fear of him that can destroy both soul and body in Hell fire will extinguish the fear of them that can but kill the body Luke 12. 4. The threats or frowns of a worm are inconsiderable to him that daily walketh with the great and dreadful God and hath his power and word for his security As Moses esteemed the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Egypt because he had respect to the recompence of reward so he feared not the wrath of the King for he endured as seeing him that is invisible Heb. 11. 27. 5. Walking with God doth much prepare for sufferings and death in that it breedeth quietness in the conscience so that when all is at peace within it will be easie to suffer any thing from without Though there is no proper merit in our works to comfort us yet it is an unspeakable consolation to a slandered persecuted man to be able to say These evil sayings are spoken falsly of me for the sake of Christ and I suffer not as an evil doer but as a Christian And it is matter of very great peace to a man that is hasting unto death to be able to say as Hezekiah 2 King 20. 3. Remember now O Lord how I have walked before thee in truth and with a perfect heart and have done that which is good in thy sight And as Paul 2 Tim. 4. 7 8. I have fought a good fight I have finished my course I have kept the Faith henceforth there is laid up for me a Crown of Righteousness c. And as 2 Cor. 1. 12. For our rejoycing is this the testimony of our conscience that in simplicity and godly sincerity not with fleshly wisdome but by the grace of God we have had our conversation in the world such a testimony of conscience is a precious cordial to a suffering or a dying man The time that we have spent in a holy and heavenly conversation will be exceeding sweet in the last review when time spent in sinful vanity and idleness and in worldly and fleshly designs will be grievous and tormenting The day is coming and is even at hand when those that are now the most hardened Infidels or obstinate presumptuous sinners or scornful malicious enemies of holiness would wish and wish a thousand times that they had spent that life in a serious obedient walking with God which they spent in seeking worldly wealth and saying up a treasure on earth and feeding the inordinate desires of their flesh I tell you it is walking with God that is the only way to have a sound and quiet conscience And he thâ— is healing and setling his conscience upon the Love of God and the Grace of Christ in the time of his prosperity is making the wisest preparation for adversity And the preparation thus made so â—ong before perhaps twenty or forty or threescore years or more is as truly useful and comfortable at a dying hour as that part which is made immediately before I know that besides this general preparation there should be also a particular special properation for sufferings and death But yet this general part is the chiefest and most necessary part A man that hath walked in his life time with God shall certainly be saved though death surprize him unexpectedly without any more particular preparation But a particular preparation without either such a life or such a heart as would cause it if he had recovered is no sufficient preparation at all and will not serve to any mans salvation Alas what a pittiful provisioâ— doth that man make for death and for salvation who neglecteth his soul despiseth the commands of God and disregardeth the promises of eternal life till he is ready to dye and then cryeth out I repent I am sorry for my sin I would I had lived better and this only from the constraint of fear without any such love to God and holiness which would make him walk with God if he should recover what if the Priest absolve this man from all his sins Doth God therefore absolve him Or shall he thus be saved No it is certain that all the Sacraments and Absolution in the world will never serve to save such a soul without that grace which must make it new and truly holy The Absolution of a Minister of Christ which is pronounced in his name is a very great comfort to the truly penitent For such God hath first pardoned by his general Act of Oblivion in the Gospel and it is God that sendeth his Messenger to them in Sacraments and Ministerial Absolution
with that pardon particularized and applied to themselves But where the heart is not truly penitent and converted that person is not pardoned by the Gospel as being not in the Covenant or a child of promise and therefore the pardon of a Minister being upon mistake or tâ— an unqualified person can reach no further than to admit him into the esteem of men and to the Communion and outward priviledges of the Church which is a poor comfort to a soul that must lye in Hell But it can never admit him into the Kingdom of Heaven God indeed may approve the act of his Ministers if they go according to his rule and deal in Church administrations with those that make A CREDIBLE PROFESSION of FAITH and HOLINESSE as if they had true faith and holiness but yet he will not therefore make such Ministerial acts effectual to the saving of unbelieving or unholy souls Nay because I have found many sensual ungodly people inclining to turn Papists because with them they can have a quick and easie pardon of their sins by the Pope or by the Absolution of the Priest let me tell such that if they understand what they do even this cheat is too thin to quiet their defiled consciences For even the Papists School-doctors do conclude that when the Priest absolveth an impenitent sinner or one that is not qualified for pardon such a one is not loosed or pardoned in Heaven Leg. Martin de Ripalda exposit Liber Magist. li. 4. dist 18. p. 654 655. p. 663 664. dist 20. Aquin. Dist. 20. q 1. a. 5. Suar. Tom. 4. in 3. p. disp 52. Greg. Valent. Tom. 4. disp 7. q. 20. p. 5. Tolet. lib. 6. cap. 27 Navar. Notab 17. 18. Cordub de indulg li. 5. q. 23. they deny not the truth of those words of Origen Hom. 14. ad cap. 24. Levit. Exit quis à fide perexit de castris Ecclesiae etiamsi Episcopi Voce non abjiciatur sicut contru interdum fit ut aliquis non recto judicio eorum qui praesunt Ecclesiae for as mittatur sed si non egit ut mereretur exire nihil laeditur interdum enim quod for as mittitur intus est qui foris est intus videtur retineri And what he saith of Excommunication is true of Absolution An erring Key doth neither lock out of Heaven nor let into Heaven A Godly Believer shall be saved though the Priest condemn him and an unbeliever or ungodly person shall be condemned by God though he be absolved by the Priest Nay if you have not walked with God in the spirit but walked after the flesh though your repentance should be sound and true at the last it will yet very hardly serve to comfort you though it may serve to your salvation because you will very hardly get any assurance that it is sincere It is dangerous lest it should prove but the effect of fear which will not save when it cometh not till death do fright you to it As Augustine saith Nullus expectet quando peccare non potest arbitrii enim libertatem quaerit Deus ut deleri possint commissa non necessitatem sed charitatem non tantum timorem quia non in solo timore vivit homo Therefore the same Augustine saith Siquis positus in ultima necessitate voluerit accipere poenitentiam accipit fateor vobis non illi negamus quod petit sed non praesumimus quod bene hinc exit si securus hinc exierit ego nescio Poenitentiam dare possumus securitatem non possumus You see then how much it is needful to the peace of conscience at the hour of death that you walk with God in the time of life 6. Moreover to walk with God is an excellent preparation for sufferings and death because it tendeth to acquaint the soul with God and to embolden it both to go to him in Prayer and to Trust on him and expect salvation from him He that walketh with God is so much used to holy Prayer that he is a man of Prayer and is skilled in it and hath tryed what prayer can do with God so that in the hour of his extremity he is not to seek either for a God to pray to or a Mediator to intercede for him or a Spirit of Adoption to enable him as a child to fly for help to his reconciled Father And having not only been frequently with God but frequently entertained and accepted by him and had his prayers heard and granted it is a great encouragement to an afflicted soul in the hour of distresse to go to such a God for help And it is a dreadful thing when a soul is ready to go out of the world to have â—â— comfortable knowledge of God or skill to pray to him or encouragement to expect acceptance with him To think that he must presently appear before a God whom he never knew nor heartily loved being never acquainted with that communion with him in the way of Grace which is the way to communion in Glory O what a terrible thought is this But how comfortable is it when the soul can say I know whom I have believed The God that afflicteth me is he that loveth me and hath manifested his love to me by his daily attractive assisting and accepting Grace I am going by death to see him intuitively whom I have often seen by the eye of Faith and to live with him in Heaven with whom I lived here on earth From whom and Through whom and To whom was my life I go not to any enemy nor an utter stranger but to that God who was the Spring the Ruler the Guide the Strength and the Comfort of my life He hath heard me so oft that I cannot think he will now reject me He hath so often comforted my soul that I will not believe he will now thrust me into Hell He hath mercifully received me so oft that I cannot believe he will now refuse me Those that come to him in the way of Grace I have found he will in no wise cast out As strangeness to God doth fill the soul with distrustful fears so walking with him doth breed that humble confidence which is a wonderful comfort in the hour of distress and a happy preparations to sufferings and death 7. Lastly to walk with God doth encrease that Love of God in the soul which is the heavenly tincture and inclineth it to loâ—k upward and being weary of a sinful flesh and world to desire to be perfected with God How happy a preparation for death is this when it is but the passage to that God with whom we desire to be and to that place where we fain would dwell for ever To love the state and place that we are going to being made connatural and suitable thereto will much overcome the fears of death But for a soul that is acquainted with nothing but this life and favoureth nothing but Earth and Flesh and hath
no connaturality with the things above for such a soul to be surprized with the tydings of death alas how dreadful must it be And thus I have shewed you the Benefits that come by walking with God which if you Love your selves with a rational love me thinks should resolve every impartial considerate Reader to give up himself without delay to so desirable a course of life or if he have begun it to follow it more chearfully and faithfully than he had done CHAP. VII I Am next to shew you that Believers have special obligations to this holy course of life and therefore are doubly faulty if they neglect it Though indeed to neglect it totally or in the main drift of their lives is a thing inconsistent with a living Faith Consider 1 If you are true Christians your Relations engage you to walk with God Is he not your Reconciled Father and you his Children in a special sense And whom should Children dwell with but with their Father You were glad when he received you into his Covenant that he would enter into so near a Relation to you as he expresseth 2 Cor. 6. 17 18. I will receive you and will be a Father to you and ye shall be my Sons and Daughters saith the Lord Almighty And do you draw back as if you repented of your Covenant and were not only weary of the Duty but of the Priviledges and Benefits of your Relation You may have access to God when others are shut out Your Prayers may be heard when the prayers of the wicked are abominable You may be welcome when the worldling and ambitious and carnal are despised He that dwelleth in the highest Heaven is willing to look to you with respect and dwell with you when he beholdeth the proud afar off Isa. 66. 1 2. 57. 15 16. And yet will you not come that may be welcome Doth he put such a difference between you and others as to feed you as his Children at his table while others are called Dogs and are without the doors and have but your crums and leavings and yet will you be so foolish and unthankful as to run out of your Fathers presence and choose to be without among the Dogs How came your Fathers presence to be so grievous to you and the priviledges of his family to seem so vile Is it not some unchild-like carriage the guilt of some disobedience or contempt that hath first caused this Or have you faln again in love with fleshly pleasures and some vanity of the world Or have you had enough of God and Godliness till you begin to grow aweary of him If so you never truly knew him However it be if you grow indifferent as to God do not wonder if shortly you find him set as light by you And believe it the day is not far off in which the Fatherly Relation of God and the priviledges of Children will be more esteemed by you when all things else forsake you in your last distress you will be loth that God should then forsake you or seem as a stranger to hide his face Then you will cry out as the afflicted Church Isa. 63. 15 16. Look down from Heaven and behold from the habitation of thy holiness and of thy glory Where is thy zeal and thy strength the sounding of thy bowels and of thy mercies towards me are they restrained Doubtless thou art our Father though Abraham be ignorant of us and Israel acknowledge us not thou O Lord art our Father our Redeemer thy name is from everlasting Nothing but God and his Fatherly Relation will then support you Attend him therefore and with reverent obedient chearfulness and delight converse with him as with your dearest Father For since the beginning of the world men have not known by sensible evidence either the ear or the eye besides God himself what he hath prepared for him that waiteth for him Isa. 64. 4. Though he be wroth with us because we have sinned yet doth he meet him that rejoyceth and worketh rightcousness that remembreth him in his waies vers 5. Say not I have played abroad so long that I dare not now go home I have sinned so greatly that I dare not speak to him or look him in the face Come yet but with a penitent returning heart and thou mayest be accepted through the Prince of Peace Prodigals find better entertainment than they did expect when once they do but resolve for home If he allow us to begin with Our Father which art in Heaven we may boldly proceed to ask forgiveness of our trespasses and whatever else is truly good for us But alas as our iniquities seduce us away from God so the guilt of them affrighteth some from returning to him and the love of them corrupteth the hearts of others and makes them too indifferent as to their communion with him so that too many of his children live as if they did not know their Father or had forgotten him We may say as Isa. 64. 6 7 8 9. But we are all as an unclean thing and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags and we all do fade as a leaf and our iniquities like the wind have taken us away and there is none that calleth upon thy name that stirreth up himself to take hold of thee for thou hast hid thy face from us and hast consumed us because of our iniquities But now O Lord thou art our Father we are the Clay and thou our Potter and we are all the work of thy hand Be not wroth very sore O Lord neither remember iniquity for ever Behold see we beseech thee we are all thy people O do not provoke your Father to disown you or to withdraw his help or hide his face or to send the Rod to call you home for if you do you will wish you had known the priviledges of his presence and had kept nearer to him Be not so unnatural so unthankful so unkind as to be weary of your Fathers presence and such a Father 's too and to take more delight in any others Moreover you are related to God in Christ as a Wife unto a Husband as to Covenant union and nearness and dearness of affection and as to his tender care of you for your good And is it seemly is it wisely or gratefully done of you to desire rather the company of others and delight in creatures more than him Isa. 54. 5 6. How affectionately doth thy Maker call himself the Husband of his people And can thy heart commit adultery and forsake him My Covenant they brake though I was an Husband to thee saith the Lord Jer. 31. 32. O put not God to exercise his jealousie It is one of his terrible attributes to be a jealous God And can he be otherwise to thee when thou lovest not his converse or company and carest not how long thou art from him in the world Woe to thee if he once say as Hos. 2. 2. She is not
wanteth more of God than he enjoyeth and his enjoying graces Love and Joy are yet imperfect But when he hath attained his nearest approach to God he will have fulness of Delight in fulness of fruition O Christians Do I need to tell you that after all the tryals you have made in the world you have never found any state of life that was worthy your desires nor that gave you any true content but only this living upon God If you have not found such comfort here as others have done yet at least you have seen it afar off within your reach As men that in the Indies in the discovery of Plantations expect Gold Mines when they find those golden sands that promise it You have found a life which is certainly desirable and leadeth to joy in the midst of sorrow And it is no small joy to have a certain promise and prospect of everlasting joy It is therefore more excusable in those that never tasted any better than the pleasures of the flesh to neglect this sweeter Heavenly life than it is in you that have been convinced by your own experience that there is no life to be compared with it 4. YOur Walking with God is the necessary prosecution of your Choice and Hopes of life eternal It is your necessary preparation to your enjoying him in Heaven And have you fixed on those Hopes with so great reason and deliberation and will you now draw back and be slack in the prosecution of them Have you gone so far in the way to Heaven and do you now begin to look behind you as if you were about to change your mind Paul setteth you a better example Phil. 3. 8 9 10 11 12 13. Yea doubtless I account all things but loss for the excellency of the Knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and do count them but dung that I may win Christ and be found in him If by any means I might attain to the resurrection of the dead Not as though I had already attained either were already perfect But I follow after if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus Brethren I count not my self to have apprehended but this one thing I do forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forth unto those things which are before I press toward the mark for the price of the high Calling of God in Christ Jesus He compareth himself to a runner in a race that till be apprehend the price or mark doth still make forward with all his might and will not so much as mind or look at any thing behind him that would turn him back or stop him in his course The world and the flesh are the things behind us We turned our backs upon them at our conversion when we turned to God It is these that would now call back our thoughts and corrupt our affections when we should run on and reach forward to the heavenly price It is God and Heaven and the remaining duties of a holy life that are the things before us And shall we now look back what we that are running and striving for a Crown of endless glory we that if we lose it do lose our souls and hopes for ever we that have loitered in the morning of our lives and lost so much precious time as we have done we that have gone so far in our way and held out through so many difficulties and assaults Shall we now grow weary of walking with God and begin to look to the things behind us Did he not tell us at the first that Father and Mother and house and land and life and all things must be forsaken for Christ if we will be his Disciples These are the things behind us which we turned our back on when we consented to the Covenant and are they now grown better or is God grown worse that we turn our hearts from him to them when we first begun our Christian race it was upon supposition that it was for that immortal Crown which all the world is not to be compared to And have we not still the same consideration before us to move us to hold on till we attain it Hold on Christians it is for Heaven Is there not enough in that word to drive back all the cares and pleasures that importune your minds to forget your God Is there not enough in that word to quicken you up in your greatest dulness and to call you home when you are wandring from God and to make you again fall out with all that would reduce you or divert you and call it Vanity and Vexation of spirit Methinks the fore-thought of that life and work which you hope to have with God for ever should make you earnestly desire to have as much of the like on earth as is here to be attained If it will he your Heaven and Happiness then it must needs be desirable now It is not beseeming a man that saith he is seeking for perfect communion with God in Heaven and that above all things as every Christian doth to live in a daily neglect or forgetfulness of God on earth Delightfully to draw near him and exercise all our faculties upon him or for him sometime in prayer and contemplation on himself and alwaies in works of obedience to him this is the life that beseemeth those that profess to seek eternal life O therefore let us make it our daily work to keep our God and Glory in our eye and to spur on our dull affections and in the diligent attendance and following the Captain of our salvation to prosecute our expected End 5. LAstly consider that God doth purposely provide you hard entertainment in the world and cause every creature to deny you the pleasure and satisfaction which you desire that so you may have none to walk with but himself with any heart-setling comfort and content If you see not enough in him to allure you to himself you shall feel enough in the world to drive you to him If his Love and Goodness will not serve alone to make him your pleasure and hold you to him in the best and most excellent way of Love at least the storms and troubles that are abroad shall shew you a Necessity of keeping close to God and the Love of your selves shall help you to do that which was not done by the attraction of his Love alone If you will put him to it to send out his command to every creature to cross and vex you and disappoint all your expectations from it that so he may force you to remember your Father and your home deny not then but it is long of your selves that you were not saved in an easier way Would you wish God to make that condition pleasant to you which he seeth you take too much pleasure in already or seek and desire it at least When as it is the pleasantness of the
according unto Godliness but doth subserve our carnal ends 6. In the next form we grow to study more the pure and wonderful Love of God in Christ and to rellish and admire that Love and to be taken up with the Goodness and tender mercies of the Lord and to be kindling the flames of holy Love to him that hath thus Loved us and to keep our souls in the exercise of that Love And withall to live in Joy and Thanks and Praise to him that hath redeemed us and Loved us And also by Faith to converse in Heaven and to live in holy contemplation beholding the Glory of the Father and the Redeemer in the Glass which is fitted to our present use till we come to see him face to face Those that are the highest in this form do so walk with God and burn in Love and are so much above inferiour vanities and are so conversant by Faith in Heaven that their hearts even dwell there and there they long to be for ever 7. And in the highest form in the School of Christ we are exercising this confirmed Faith and Love in sufferings especially for Christ In following him with our Cross and being conformed to him and glorifying God in the fullest exercise and discovery of his Graces in us and in an actual trampling upon all that standeth up against him for our hearts and in bearing the fullest witness to his Truth and Cause by constant enduring though to the death Not but that the weakest that are sincere must suffer for Christ if he call them to it Martyrdome it self is not proper to the strong Believers Whoever forsaketh not all that he hath for Christ cannot be his Disciple Luke 14. 33. But to suffer with that Faith and Love forementioned and in that manner is proper to the strong And usually God doth not try and exercise his young and weak ones with the tryals of the strong nor set his Infants on so hard a service nor put them in the front or hottest of the battel as he doth the ripe confirmed Christians The sufferings of their inward doubts and fears doth take up such It is the strong that ordinarily are called to sufferings for Christ at least in any high degree I have digrest thus far to make it plain to you that our Conformity to Christ and fellowship with him in his sufferings in any notable degree is the lot of his best confirmed servants and the highest forme in his School among his Disciples and therefore not to be inordinately feared or abhorred nor to be the matter of impatiency but of holy joy and in such infirmities we may glory And if it be so of sufferings in the general for Christ then is it so of this particular sort of suffering even to be forsaken of all our best and nearest dearest friends when we come to be most abused by the enemies For my own part I must confess that as I am much wanting in other parts of my conformity to Christ so I take my self to be yet much short of what I expect he should advance me to as long as my friends no more forsake me It is not long since I found my self in a low if not a doubting case because I had so few enemies and so little sufferings for the cause of Christ though I had much of other sorts And now that doubt is removed by the multitude of furies which God hath let loose against me But yet methinks while my friends themselves are so friendly to me I am much short of what I think I must at last attain to BUt let us look further into the Text and see what is the cause of the failing and forsaking Christ in the Disciples and what it is that they betake themselves to when they leave him Ye shall be scattered every man to his Own Self-denyal was not perfect in them selfishness therefore in this hour of temptation did prevail They had before forsaken all to follow Christ they had left their Parents their Families their Estates their Trades to be his Disciples But though they believed him to be the Christ yet they dreamt of a visible Kingdome and did all this with too carnal expectations of being great men on earth when Christ should begin his reign And therefore when they saw his apprehension and ignominious suffering and thought now they were frustrate of their hopes they seem to repent that they had followed him though not by apostasie and an habitual or plenary change of mind yet by a sudden passionate frightful apprehension which vanished when grace performed its part They now began to think that they had lives of their Own to save and families of their Own to mind and business of their Own to do They had before forsaken their private interests and affairs and gathered themselves to Jesus Christ and lived in communion with him and one another But now they return to their trades and callings and are scattered every man to his own Selfishness is the great enemy of all societies of all fidelity and friendship There is no trusting that person in whom it is predominant And the remnants of it where it doth not reign do make men walk unevenly and unsteadfastly towards God and men They will certainly deny both God and their friends in a time of tryal who are not able to deny themselves Or rather he never was a real friend to any that is predominantly selfish They have alway some interest of their own which their friend must needs contradict or is insufficient to satisfie Their houses their lands their monies their children their honour or something which they call their Own will be frequently the matter of contention and are so near them that they can for the sake of these cast off the nearest friend Contract no special friendship with a selfish man nor put no confidence in him whatever friendship he may profess He is so confined to himself that he hath no true love to spare for others If he seem to love a friend it is not as a friend but as a servant or at best as a benefactour He loveth you for himself as he loveth his money or horse or house because you may be serviceable to him Or as a horse or dog doth love his keeper for feeding him And therefore when your provender is gone his love is gone when you have done feeding him he hath done loving you When you have no more for him he hath no more for you Object But some will say it is not the falseness of my friend that I lament but the separation or the loss of one that was most faithful I have found the deceitfulness of ordinary friends and therefore the more highly prize those few that are sincere I had but one true friend among abundance of self-seekers and that one is dead or taken from me and I am left as in a wilderness having no mortal man that I can trust or take much comfort in Answ.
would have been grieved for their griefs and for ought they know might have fallen into as sad a state as they themselves are now lamenting 6. Do you think it is for the Hurt or the Good of your friend that he is removed hence It cannot be for his Hurt unless he be in Hell At least it is uncertain whether to live would have been for his Good by an increase of Grace and so for greater Glory And if he be in Hell he was no fit person for you to take much pleasure in upon earth He might be indeed a fit object for your compassion but not for your complacency Sure you are not undone for want of such company as God will not endure in his sight and you must be separated from for ever But if they be in Heaven you are scarce their friends if you would wish them thence Friendship hath as great respect to the good of our friends as of our selves And do you pretend to friendship and yet lament the removal of your friend to his greatest happiness Do you set more by your own enjoying his company then by his enjoying God in perfect blessedness This sheweth a very culpable defect either in Faith or Friendship and therefore beseemeth not Christians and friends If Love teacheth us to mourn with them that mourn and to rejoyce with them that rejoyce can it be an act of rational Love to mourn for them that are possessed of the highest everlasting joyes 7. God will not honour himself by one only but by many He knoweth best when his work is done When our friends have finished all that God intended them for when he put them into the world is it not time for them to be gone and for others to take their places and finish their work also in their time God will have a succession of his servants in the world Would you not come down and give place to him that is to follow you when your part is played and his is to begin If David had not died there had been no Solomon no Jehoshaphat no Hezekiah no Josiah to succeed him and honour God in the same throne You may as wisely grudge that one day only takes not up all the week and that the clock striketh not the same hour still but proceedeth from one to two from two to three c. as to murmur that one man only conâ—inueth not to do the work of his place excluding his successors 8. You must not have all your Mercies by one messenger or hand God will not have you consine your Love to one only of his servants And therefore he will not make one only useful to you but when one hath delivered his message and done his part perhaps God will send you other mercies by another hand And it belongeth to him to choose the messenger who gives the gift And if you will childishly dote upon the first messenger and say you will have all the rest of your mercies by his hand or you will have no more your frowardness more deserveth correction than compassion and if you be kept fasting till you can thankfully take your food from any hand that your Father sends it by it is a correction very suitable to your sin 9. Do you so highly value your friends for God or for them or for your selves in the final consideration If it was for God what reason of trouble have you that God hath disposed of them according to his wisdome and unerring will should you not then be more pleased that God hath them and employeth them in his highest service than displeased that you want them But if you value them and love them for themselves they are now more lovely when they are more perfect and they are now fitter for your content and joy when they have themselves unchangeable content and joy than they could be in their sin and sorrows But if you valued and loved them but for your selves only it is just with God to take them from you to teach you to value men to righter ends and upon better considerations and both to prefer God before your selves and better to understand the nature of true friendship and better to know that your own felicity is not in the hands of any creature but of God alone 10. Did you improve your friends while you had them or did you only Love them while you made but little use of them for your souls If you used them not it was just with God for all your Love to take them from you They were given you as your candle not only to Love it but to work by the Light of it And as your garments not only to Love them but to wear them and as your meat not only to Love it but to feed upon it Did you receive their counsel and hearken to their reproofs and pray with them and conser with them upon those holy truths that tended to elevate your minds to God and to inflame your brests with sacred Love If not be it now known to you that God gave you not such helps and mercies only to talk of or look upon and Love but also to improve for the benefit of your souls 11. Do you not seem to forget both where you are your selves and where you must shortly and for ever live Where would you have your friends but where you must be your selves Do you mouâ—n that they are taken hence Why if they had staid here a thousand years how little of that time should you have had their company when you are almost leaving the world your selves would you not send your treasure before you to the place where you must abide How quickly will you pass from hence to God where you shall find your friends that you lamented as if they had been lost and there shall dwell with them for ever O foolish mourners would you not have your friends at home at their home and your home with their Father and your Father their God and your God! Shall you not there enjoy them long enough Can you so much miss them for one day that must live with them to all eternity And is not eternity long enough for you to enjoy your friends in Obj. But I do not know whether ever I shall there have any distinct knowledge of them or love to them and whether God shall not there be so far All in All as that we shall need or fetch no comfort from the creature Answ. There is no reason for either of these doubts For 1. You cannot justly think that the knowledge of the Glorified shall be more confused or imperfect then the knowledge of natural men on earth We shall know much more but not so much less Heaven exceedeth earth in knowledge as much as it doth in joy 2. The Angels in Heaven have now a distinct particular knowledge of the least believers rejoycing particularly in their conversion and being called by Christ himself Their Angels Therefore when we shall
Evil to our selves is none of the sinful or imperfect selfishness to be renounced or laid by but part of our very Natures and as inseparable from us as we are from our selves Much more were it not digressive might be said on this subject but I shall only add that as God doth draw us to every holy duty by shewing us the excellency of that duty and as perpetuity is not the smallest excellency so he hath purposely mentioned that Love endureth for ever when he had described the Love of one another as a principal motive to kindle and encrease this Love And therefore those that think they shall have no personal Knowledge of one another nor personal Love to one another for we cannot Love personally if we know not personally do take a most effectual course to destroy in their souls all holy special Love to Saints by casting away that principal or very great motive given them by the Holy Ghost I am not able to Love much where I foreknow that I shall not Love long I cannot Love a comely Inne so well as a nearer dwelling of my own because I must be gone to morrow Therefore must I love my Bible better than my Law books or Physick books c. because it leadeth to Eternity And therefore I must Love Holiness in my self and others better than meat and drink and wealth and honour and beauty and pleasure because it must be Loved for ever when the Love of these must needs be transitory as they are transitory I must profess from the very experience of my soul that it is the belief that I shall Love my friends in Heaven that principally kindleth my Love to them on Earth And if I thought I should never know them after death and consequently never love them more when this life is ended I should in reason number them with temporal things and Love them comparatively but a little even as I Love other transitory things allowing for the excellency in the nature of Grace But now I converse with some delight with my Godly friends as believing I shall converse with them for ever and take comfort in the very Dead and Absent as believing we shall shortly meet in Heaven and I Love them I hope with a Love that is of a Heavenly Nature while I Love them as the Heirs of Heaven with a Love which I expect shall there be perfected and more fully and for ever exercised 12. The last Reason that I give you to move you to bear the Loss or Absence of your friends is that it gives you the loudest call to retire from all the world and to converse with God himself and to long for Heaven where you shall be separated from your friends no more And your forsaken state will somewhat assist you to that solitary converse with God which it calls you to But this brings us up to the third part of the Text. AND yet I am not alone because the Father is with me Doct. When all forsake us and leave us as to them alone we are far from being simply alone because God is with us He is not without company that is with the King though twenty others have turned him off He is not without Light that hath the shining Sun though all his Candles be put out If God be our God he is our All and is enough for us And if he be our All we shall not much find the want of creatures while he is with us For 1. He is with us who is Everywhere and therefore is never from us and knoweth all the waies and projects of our enemies being with them in wrath as he is with us in mercy 2. He is with us who is Almighty sufficient to preserve us conquerable by none and therefore while he is with us we need not fear what man can do unto us For they can do nothing but what he will No danger no sickness no trouble or want can be so great as to make it any difficulty to God to deliver us when and how he please 3. He is with us who is Infinitely wise and therefore we need not fear the subtilty of enemies nor shall any of his undertaken works for his Church or us miscarry for want of foresight or through any oversight We shall be preserved even from our own Folly as well as from our Enemies subtilty For it is not our own wisdome that our greatest concernments do principally rest upon nor that our safety and peace are chiefly secured by but it is the Wisdome of our great Preserver He knoweth what to do with us and what paths to lead us in and what is best for us in all conditions And he hath promised to Teach us and will be our sure infallible Guide 4. He is with us who is Infinitely Good and therefore is only sit to be a continual delight and satisfaction to our souls that hath nothing in him to disaffect us or discourage us whom we may love without fear of overloving and need not set any bounds to our Love the object of it being infinite 5. He is with us who is most nearly related to us and most dearly loveth us and therefore will never be wanting to us in any thing that is fit for us to have This is he that is with us when all have left us and as to man we are alone and therefore we may well say that we are not alone Of this I shall say more anon in the application Quest. But how is he with us Answ. 1. He is with us not only in his Essential presence as he is everywhere but as by his Gracious Fatherly presence We are in his Family attending on him even as the eye of a servant is to the hand of his Master We are alwaies with him and as he phraseth it himself in the Parable Luke 15. all that he hath in ours that is all that is fit to be communicated to us and all the provisions of his bounty for his children When we awake we should be still with him When we go abroad we should be alwaies as before him Our life and works should be a Walking with God 2. He is alwaies with us efficiently to do us Good Though we have none else that careth for us yet will he never cast us out of his care but biddeth us cast our care on him as promising that he will care for us Though we have none else to provide for us he is alwiaes with us and our Father knoweth what we want and will make the best provision for us Mat. 6. 32 33. Though we have none else to defend us against the power of our enemies he is alwaies with us to be our sure defence He is the Rock to which we fly and upon which we are surely built He gathereth us to himself as the Hen gathereth her Chickens under her wings Mat. 23. 37. And sure while Love is thus protecting us we may well say that the Father himself
world his God so doth it savour of the same hainous sin to lament our loss of Creatures more than the displeasure of God If God be my enemy or I am fallen under his indignation I have then so much greater matters to lament than the loss or absence or frowns of man as should almost make me forget that there is such a thing as man to be regarded But if God be my Father and my friend in Christ I have then so much to think of with delight and to recreate and content my soul as will proclaim it most incongruous and absurd to lament inordinately the absence of a worm while I have his Love and presence who is All in All. If God cannot content me and be not enough for me how is he then my God or how shall he be my Heaven and everlasting Happiness 2. If God be with me he is with me to whom I am absolutely devoted I am wholly his and have acknowledged his interest in me and long ago disclaimed all usurpers and repented of alienations and unreservedly resigned my self to him And where should I dwell but with him that is my owner and with whom I have made the solemnest Covenant that ever I made â— never gave my self to any other but in subordination to him and with a salvo for his highest inviolable right Where should my goods be but in my own house with whom should a Servant dwell but with his Master and a Wife but with her Husband and Children but with their Father I am nearlier related to my God and to my Saviour than I am to any of my Relations in this world I owe more to him than to all the world I have renounced all the world as they stand in any competition or comparison with him And can I want their company then while I am with him How shall I hate Father and Mother and Wife and Children and Brother and Sister for his sake if I cannot spare them or be without them to enjoy him To hate them is but to use them as men do hated things that is to cast them away with contempt as they would alâ—enate me from Christ and to cleave to him and be satisfied in him alone I am now married to Christ and therefore must chearfully leave Father and Mother and my native place and all to cleave to him And with whom should I now delight to dwell but with him who hath taken me into so near relation to be as it were one flesh with him O my dear Lord hide not thou thy face from an unkind an unworthy sinner Let me but dwell with thee and see thy face and feel the gracious embracements of thy Love and then let me be cast off by all the world if thou see it meetest for me or let all other friends be where they will so that my soul may be with thee I have agreed for thy sake to forsake all even the dearest that shall stand against thee and I resolve by thy grace to stand to this agreement 3. If God be with me I am not alone for he is with me that Loveth me best The Love of all the friends on earth is nothing to his Love O how plainly hath he declared that he loveth me in the strange condescention the sufferings death and intercession of his Son What Love hath he declared in the communications of his Spirit and the operations of his Grace and the near relations into which he brought me What Love hath he declared in in the course of his providences in many and wonderful preservations and deliverances in the conduct of his wisdome and in a life of mercies What Love appeareth in his precious promises and the glorious provisions he hath made for me with himself to all eternity O my Lord I am ashamed that thy Love is so much lost that it hath no better return from an unkind unthankful heart that I am not more delighted in thee and swallowed up in the contemplation of thy Love I can contentedly let go the society and converse of all others for the converse of some one bosome friend that is dearer to me than they all as Jonathan to David And can I not much more be satisfied in thee alone and let go all if I may continue with thee My very Dog will gladly for sake all the Town and all persons in the world to follow me alone And have I not yet found so much Love and Goodness in thee my dear and blessed God as to be willing to converse alone with thee All men delight most in the company of those that Love them best They choose not to converse with the Multitude when they look for solace and content but with their dearest friends And should any be so dear to me as God O were not thy Love unworthily neglected by an unthankful heart I should never be so unsatisfied in thee but should take up or seek my comforts in thee I should then say Whom have I in Heaven but thee and there is none on earth that I desire besides thee Though not only my friends but my flesh and heart themselves should fail me it is thou that will still be the strength of my heart and my portion for ever it is good therefore for me to draw near to thee how far soever I am from man O let me there dwell where thou wilt not be strange for thy loving kindness is better than life instead of the multitude of my turmoiling thoughts let me be taken up in the believing views of thy reconciled face and in the glad attendance upon thy Grace or at least in the multitude of my thoughts within me let thy celestial comforts delight my soul. Let me dwell as in thy family and when I awake let me be still with thee Let me go no whither but where I am still following thee Let me do nothing but thy work nor serve any other but when I may truly call it a serving thee Let me hear nothing but thy voice and let me know thy voice by whatever instrument thou shalt speak Let me never see any thing but thy self and the glass that representeth thee and the books in which I may read thy name And let me never play with the outside and gaze on words and letters as insignificant and not observe thy name which is the sense Whether it be in company or in solitude let me be continually with thee and do thou vouchsafe to hold me by my right hand And guide me with thy counsel and afterwards receive me unto thy glory Psal. 73. 23 24 25 26 28. Psal. 63. 3. 4. If God be with me I am not alone for I shall be with him whose Love is of greater use and benefit to me than the Love of all my friends in the world Their Love may perhaps be some little comfort as it floweth from His But it is His Love by which and upon which I Live It is His Love that gives
had been less with the dearest of my friends How much more sweet then would my life have been How much more blameless regular and pure How much more fruitful and answerable to my obligations and professions How much more comfortable to my review How many falls and hurts and wounds and griefs and groans might I have escaped O how much more pleasing is it now to my Rememberance to think of the hours in which I have lain at the feet of God though it were in tears and groans than to think of the time which I have spent in any common converse with the greatest or the learnedest or the dearest of my acquaintance And as my Greatest business is with God so my daily business is also with him He purposely leaveth me under wants and suffers necessities daily to return and enemies to assault me and affliction to surprize me that I may be daily driven to him He loveth to hear from me He would have me be no stranger with him I have business with him every hour I need not want employment for all the faculties of my soul if I know what it is to converse in Heaven Even prayer and every holy thought of God hath an Object so great and excellent as should wholly take me up Nothing must he thought or spoken lightly about the Lord. His name must not be taken in vain Nothing that is common beseemeth his worshippers He will be sanctified of all that shall draw near him He must be Loved with all the Heart and Might His servants need not be wearied for want of employment nor through the lightness or unprofitableness of their employment If I had Cities to build or Kingdoms to govern I might better complain for want of employment for the faculties of my soul than I can when I am to converse in Heaven In other studies the delight abateth when I have reached my desire and know all that I can know But in God there is infinitely more to be known when I know the most I am never satiated with the easiness of knowing nor are my desires abated by any unusefulness or unworthiness in the Object but I am drawn to it by its highest excellencies and drawn on to desire more and more by the infiniteness of the Light which I have not yet beheld and the infiniteness of the Good which yet I have not enjoyed If I be idle or seem to want employment when I am to contemplate all the Artributes relations mercies works and revealed perfections of the Lord its sure for want of eyes to see or a Heart enclined to my business if God be not enough to employ my soul then all the persons and things on earth are not enough And when I have Infinite Goodness to delight in where my soul may freely let out it self and never need to fear excess of Love how sweet should this employment be As Knowledge so Love is never stinted here by the narrowness of the Object We can never Love him in any proportion either to his Goodness and amiableness in himself or to his Love to us What need have I then of any other company or business when I have infinite Goodness to delight in and to Love further than they subserve this greatest work Come home then O my soul to God Converse in Heaven Turn away thine eyes from beholding vanity Let not thy affections kindle upon straw or bryars that go out when they have made a flash or noise and leave thee to thy cold and darkness But come and dwell upon celestial beauties and make it thy daily and most diligent work to kindle thy affections on the infinite everlasting Good and then they will never be extinguished or decay for want of fewel but the further they go and the longer they burn the greater will be the flame Though thou find it hard while Love is but a spark to make it burn and complain that thy cold and backward heart is hardly warmed with the Love of God yet when the whole pile hath taken fire and the flame ascendeth fire will breed fire Love will cause Love and all the malice of Hell it self shall never be able to suppress or quench it unto all eternity 6. And it is a great encouragement to my converse with God that no misunderstanding no malice of enemies no former sin or present frailty no nor the infinite distance of the most Holy Glorious God can hinder my access to him or turn away his Ear or Love or interrupt my leave and liberty of converse If I converse with the poor their wants afflict me being greater than I can supply Their complaints and expectations which I cannot satisfie are my trouble If I would converse with Great ones it is not easie to get access and less easie to have their favout unless I would purchase it at too dear a rate How strangely and contemptuously do they look at their inferiours Great friends must be made for a word or smile And if you be not quickly gone they are aweary of you And if you seek any thing of them or would put them to any cost or trouble you are as welcome to them as so many vermine or noisome creatures They please them best that drive you away With how much labour and difficulty must you clime if you will see the top of one of these mountains And when you are there you are but in a place of barrenness and have nothing to satisfie you for your pains but a larger prospect and vertiginous despect of the lower grounds which are not your own it is seldome that these Great ones are to be spoken with And perhaps their speech is but a denyal of your requests if not some snappish and contemptuous rejection that makes you glad when you are got far enough from them and makes you the better like and love the accessible calm and fruitful plains But O how much greater encouragements hath my soul to converse with God! Company never hindereth him from hearkening to my suit He is infinite and Omnipotent and as sufficient for every individual soul as if he had no other to look after in the world when he is taken up with the attendance and praises of his Heavenly Host he is as free and ready to attend and answer the groans and prayers of a contrite soul as if he had no nobler creatures nor no higher service to regard I am oft unready but God is never unready I am unready to pray but he is not unready to hear I am unready to come to God to walk with him and to solace my soul with him but he is never unready to entertain me Many a time my conscience would have driven me away when he hath called me to him and rebuked my accusing fearful conscience Many a time I have called my self a prodigal a companion of Swine a miserable hard-hearted sinner unworthy to be called his Son when he hath called me Child and chid me for my questioning