Spirit but with worldly businesse or company when I do grieve for my sins carnal grief bears a share in it and carnal joy abolisheth it Meditat. VIII To confesse my sinnes without any sense of them without any hatred of them to pray for grace and not to be sensible of the necessity or excellency of it to come to thine Ordinances without reaping any good from them to think and meditate of thee and neither admire nor love thee nor long and delight to be in thy company to what purpose are these things thou desirest of us our hearts and not our works words or thoughts without that Ah my Lord and my God shall all be in vain and wilt thou cast me off for ever Dost thou hate my soul and am I an abomination unto thee Must I be shut out for ever and never enjoy the sweetnesse of thy presence Thou wilt not O my God thou wilt not thou canst not O my God thou canst not for thou hast made a Covenant with me and I claim that Covenant for I have not any thing in the world besides thy Covenant in the Lord Jesus Christ that I can so much as have the least hope that will do me any good If the Lord Jesus Christ did not sit at thy right hand to make Intercession for me my sins continually daily hourly clamoring against me and accusing of me must needs prevail against me Alas my heart is far from that spiritual frame that thou requirest for the miseries that sinne brings are more troublesome and heavy to me then the filthiness that is in sinne Thy blessings are more lovely in our eyes then thy self Every duty hardens me in my formality Lord thou art the Father of mercies oh have mercy upon me for my case is not the common case of thy people but few few of many may be found whose soul is like my poor soul for where is there any that can say so and yet be so little affected as I am Meditat. IX Mine hopes are false and my fears are true the deadliest poysons do not make me sick nor the excellentest cordials do not comfort me I am not sick of sinne nor doth the Sacrament of the body and bloud of Christ fill me with joy nay rather doth it not fill me with griefs and fears If my sears and griefs were not carnall would they were more but my carnall joys eat out my spirituall grief and my joys also I am as it were like Absalom I hang between heaven and earth I would fain have heaven and yet would not part with earth Oh my Lord Jesus Christ art thou of no more excellency in mine eyes Doth thy love to me raise up no more love in me then to stand deliberating what to do when thou standest with stretched out arms to receive me to thy bosome Canst thou love one that loves thee so little as I do Thou didst love me when I loved thee not at all Why sittest thou so sad O my soul Go cast thy self into the armes and bosome of the Lord Jesus Christ there lie and hear the beatings of his heart toward thee and it may be thou maist be warmed with the heat of his love Christ pours out the boyling streams of his heart-bloud upon thy poor soul for his heart boyled in love towards thee and can thine heart still be frozen Oh Infidelity thou art the poyson of my soul thou with thy cold blasts hast frozen mine heart and keepst it so Lord give me faith or else all thy mercies are in vain Thy love is and hath been too great for me to beleeve Lord thou that lovest me so much as to give me Christ oh love me so much as to give me faith to beleeve it There remains in mine heart no more then the first spark of thy love and the first principle of grace that thou didst put into my soul when thou didst regenerate me All the flames are gone out that were once kindled in me All the fruit and leaves and boughs are stript from me there are all things to do beside bare regeneration I am as an arm cut off so that it hangs only by a little skin a slender thread Lord this is my hope that my corruptions and Satan that have quenched these flames that I have had shall never be able to quench this spark But alas that is a poor comfort that this is all my comfort that I shall not lose heaven though it be a thousand times too great a comfort for such a wretched sinner as I am to have Is it nothing to lose all my comforts all my duties all my sweet communion with thee or at least only so much of these remains as to keep me from being utterly cast off For one that had fared deliciously every day to come to have no more bread then to keep life and soul together though he dies not yet he hath a miserable life Thus thus and far worse it is with me Meditat. X. If I stood clear before thee O my God of those many sins of sencelesnesse under judgements fruitlesnesse under Ordinances mispending of time want of watchfulnesse of mien own waies and for the appearing of the Lord Jesus Christ Only my sinnes of unkindenesse to the Lord Jesus Christ were enough to cause thee to take away thy mercies from me I have heard and read the great mystery of my Redemption of his being scourged and crowned and nailed of his bleeding and dying for me of his great love and such things that if a Friend of this world had done or suffered the thousandth part so much his memory would have been precious Meditat. XI Ah my dear God thou hast been my God and therefore thou art my God how little can my soul know by any thing that I now either do or feel I am fain to fetch evidences and signs from actions done many years since My Praiers and other holy duties were matter of more joy when I did them then now they have terrour in them Now I think I do them not as heretofore I have been assisted by thy grace oh my lost joys and my lost duties where I shall finde you I know not the joys I had formerly and the great zeal of mine heart made me pray but now not out of feeling and zeal but for zeal and joy and I go from praier with a sad heart and an hard heart My praiers come neither from my heart nor reach to my heart Oh my Lord Jesus Christ where are thy motions and the joys of thy Spirit to work thine own work in me why do I walk in this valley of tears not only without comfort but without grace I do even stand astonisht at my self to see the vast difference between my self now and when I was thine When the Candle of the Almighty shone upon my soul and the Spirit of my God dwelt in me then sorrow and weeping flew away Alas I now have scarce any thing left me but
thy hand to smell unto all the day 2. Set down this that thou hast resolved to spend no more time in such a recreation then thou shalt spend in praier and Meditation 3. Go unwillingly from this duty and do not rush into worldly businesses but look to thy heart which is a slippery deceitful thing MEDITAT II. Of the Mercies of God 1. BE convinced of and affected with the presence of God 2. Pray beg of God that he would put such considerations and thoughts into thy heart that thou maist be so convinced of and affected with his goodnesse that thou maist love praise and serve him Considerations 1. Consider how much thou art engaged to God for bodily mercies he hath given thee thy senses sight hearing and other parts of thy body If thou didst want thy sight what wouldst thou give for it if thou wast Emperour of the world How many thousand pounds wouldst thou give A Diamond is not therefore worth no more then 6d because a poor man can give no more if thou shouldst reckon up what thy hands feet health liberty were worth to what a vast Surn would they arise Thou hast all these things from God thou hast not them from thy Parents they knew not before thou wert born whether thou shouldst be male or female thou maist say to God as David did In thy Book were all my members written 2. Consider what faculties of soul God hath given thee What a miserable condition are mad men in those that are born naturall fools thou art well and thousands are sick thou hast plenty when thousands beg their bread 3. Consider what spirituall mercies God hath given thee how many thousand poor ignorant Heathens are there which never heard of God and of Christ who were born and bred where the Gospel is not preached but worship the devil but thou dwellest in the Sunshine and under the droppings of the Gospel and are not these great mercies and unvaluable If thou dost not value them it argues so much the greater goodnesse in God to bestow them upon thee nay hath not God made thee to know him he hath not only given thee the light of the Gospel but eyes to behold it 4. Consider the greatnesse of God Why should he look after thee nay why doth he not destroy thee Thou art but a worm nay a viper why doth he let thee hang upon his hand of providence and not shake thee off into hell fire As we walk we do not step out of our way to avoid crushing a worm to death if we see an adder or such a venomous creature we go out of our way to destroy it God hath not dealt so with thee but when thou hast run from God he hath called after thee and would not suffer thee to perish though thou wouldest and when thou hast come against him with thy sinnes and thy rebellions he hath stood with stretched out armes to embrace thee Are not these miracles of mercy O my Soul how many mercies dost thou receive from God even at that very time when thou sinnest against him 5. Consider the innumerable multitude the infinite greatnesse of his mercies and the wonderful love wherewithall he bestows them How precious are thy thoughts toward me O God saith David I am sure thou hast just cause to say so also O my soul The mercies that God hath bestowed are wonderful but those that he hath promised are farre greater What manner of love hath the Father bestowed upon us that we should be calledth Sons of God! Now we are the Sons of God and it doth not appear what we shall be That he should make us his Sons is very much but that he should not spare his own Sonne that he might spare us is beyond all admiration Affections Admire the goodnesse of God Lord what is man what is sinful man that thou shouldst so regard him What am I that am the worst of men why art thou so good to me that have been and am so bad When I was in my bloud to the loathing of my person thou saidst unto me in my bloud Live nay not only when I was weltring in my own bloud but in the bloud of Christ thou saidst unto me Live What did I ever do to deserve those mercies or what have I or can I do to requite them As thy glorious Name so thy mercies are extolled above all praises 2. Admire thine own ingratitude Have I so requited my God O my Soul as to return rebellions for mercies Hath God heaped upon me so many glowing coals of love and mercy and is my heart still frozen Must God only be a looser by his blessings If man who is bound to do me good when it lies in power bestows a small courtesie on me how doe I thank him whensoever I meet him but though God who is no way engaged of his free grace bestows thousands of thousands of blessings how do I live in the midst of them without ever regarding of them Nay my ingratitude is such that I make God a looser by his mercies If thou Lord hadst made me to beg my bread I should have been more thankful for one daies food then I am now for a years Are his mercies lesse because they are continued Alas O my Soul how foolish are we We do even daily provoke God to take away his blessings because we will not prize them while we have them and then there is another thing wherein we do wonderfully ill if God doth but lay any affliction upon us and take away but one mercy in stead of being thankful that we have enjoyed it so long and that he hath not taken away all we murmure and repine and rob him of all the praise that is due for the rest of the mercies we enjoy Alas what doth God require of us for all his mercies but this that we should love him with all our heart soul and strength 3. Stir up thy heart to praise and thanks-giving Blesse the Lord O my Soul and all that is within me blesse his holy Name Forget not all his Benefits who forgiveth all thine iniquities who healeth all thy diseases Who redeemeth thy life from destruction who crowneth thee with loving-kindenesse and tender mercies Not love God not praise God O my Soul why what could God require lesse at thy hands then these I have heard of one that being delivered out of a great and long desertion had much ado to stay within doors and not run into the streets and stay every one she met that she might tell them what God had done for her soul How do the Angels love and praise God to all Eternity and why should the Angels love and praise God more then I He never forgave them one sinne he hath forgiven me thousands 't is true they are in glory so shall I be too if I be not unthankful for the mercies I have received Resolutions I am resolved for the time to come to sing Psalmes
oftner I have not enough delighted in that duty 'T is strange that that which is the happinesse of heaven I should finde so little delight in well for this next Moneth I will spend one hour a week in meditating upon the mercies and love of God His mercies are enough and great enough surely to take up so much time for in heaven Eternity is little enough to admire them Conclusion 1. Pray desire God that he would by his Spirit blow these coals of mercies that he may enflame thy heart with love and joy and praise of him alas otherwise the judgements of God will not affect us nor the mercies of God enflame us 't is the Spirit that quickeneth else mercies will not profit 2. Praise God Call upon thy soul again and again awaken thy heart let it not be so drowsie at a work of so great importance 3. Acknowledge that were thy heart ought thy mouth and thy heart would be filled with the praises of God acknowledge that is no want of matter and motives of praise in the truths which thou hast considered but thy heart is so dead that nothing almost will work upon it After the Meditation is ended think with thy self what truths did most affect thee c. 2. Write down thy resolution c. 3. Go unwillingly from this duty MEDITAT III. Of Sin 1. BE convinced of and affected with the presence of God 2. Desire God to assist thee in this Meditation Considerations 1. Consider seriously how much God abhors sinne and how odious it is to him this you may see both by what God hath said and what God hath done to shew the abhorrence of it 2. Sinners it is said that God loatheth them and they lothe God Zec. 11.8 and God by his Prophet crieth out saying O do not this abominable thing which I hate How often doth God professe his hatred of sinne if one should spit in a mans face or lay toads or Serpents in his bosome or whatsoever you could imagine it could not be so abominable to him as sinne is to God he hates it more then we hate hell how can we know any ones hatred of any thing but by his expressions and his actions suppose you should see one take some curious costly or rare dish of meat which he loved above any meat in the world and because there was some small crum of another meat which he had an antipathy against he should fling all with violence and detestation away were not this enough to satisfie you that he abhorred that meat a crum whereof made him abhor that which he so much loved Suppose you should see one take a Watch whose wheels and all the rest were cut out of intire Diamonds and spying some little small and almost indiscernable spider in it should fling it to the ground with so much violence that he should break it all to peeces it would evidently argue how much he detested a spider What excellent Creatures are Angels and yet because a sinne though but of thought was found in them how doth it cast them like lightning into hell Suppose further thou shouldst see the meekest wisest man and lovingst Father in the world taking his Son and scourging of him with rod after rod until that he wereall of gore bloud from head to foot and though he cried out and begged of his Father to spare yet he would not spare him but scourged him to death Would you not say that the Sonne had done somewhat that the Father did wonderfully abhor Hath not God dealt thus with Christ Did he not chastise him until he shed bloud from the Crown of the head to the sole of the feet Did not Christ die under his correcting hand Did not Christ cry out again and again Father if it be possible let this cup passe from me And did he not love Christ more then any Father loved his Sonne and all this because Christ was guilty of sinne though but as a Surety these things are not inventions of wit or rhetorick but reall truths If the destroying of Sodom Gomorrha Jerusalem Angels and the most part of Adams posterity and the whole world save eight persons If the Sufferings of Christ be not enough to satisfie thee of Gods hatred of sinne then thou maist go on to thy own destruction but know this that it will be bitternesse at the last 2. Consider what thou dost when thou sinnest every sinner doth virtually put heaven and Christ and God and his favour and loving kindenesse and all his promises in one scale and that pleasure profit or honour which sinne promiseth with a wounded conscience the torments of hell the wrath of God in the other scale and doubtlesse virtually a sinner choosech sinne with all these mischiefs before the service of God with all his mercies It is as if a sinner should say Rather then I will not satisfie my base lust I will part with God with Christ with heaven and all I will suffer his wrath let God do his worst I will have my will Every obstinate sinner doth in his heart say thus and though now thou little imaginest it yet at the day of judgement this will be made as manifest to thee as if it were writ with a beam of the Sunne Things that now seem lesse consequent shall then be made evident A wicked wretch that sees one of Gods people hungry naked imprisoned and doth not relieve him he little thinks that is all one as if he had seen Christ so and not reliev'd him but at the day of judgement Christ will make it manifest unto him 3. Consider how often thou hast sinned against God Every unconverted man doth nothing else his plowing is an abomination all his imaginations are only evil and that continually Nay though thou art one of Gods people yet David cries out that his sinnes are more in number then the hairs of his head and dost thou think thy sinnes are fewer then Davids How many years hast thou lived how many daies hours minutes thy sinnes are more The Hour-glasse that runs hath not so many sands in it as the sinnes that thou committest in that hour If thou dost not beleeve this consider that there is not one of thy thoughts words actions but is polluted with abundance of sins If thou saist Our Father since thou dost not speak it with that reverence attention fervency faith love joy confidence admiration of his goodness and many other which we are engaged to have when we call God by the Name of Father thou becomest guilty of all the contrary sins and many more that are not named in speaking that one word in thy prayer not as thou oughtst Fear not making thy sinnes seem greater or more than they are 4. Consider further for what trifling vanity nay for what base things that thou wilt be ashamed to own before men thou hast lost God lost thine own soul if thou returnest not and hast brought on thy self more miseries than
not give so much grace as to make me through the abundance of it almost whether I will or no to serve thee yet to whom thou dost give so much grace as to desire more grace O let not this desire which is of thy own infusing be in vain if there be any thing in the whole world that I desire more then thy grace then let me want grace to desire it any more Lord if the reason why thou deniest my praier be because I do not desire as I ought I humbly beseech thee to grant that I may ask aright alas my afflictions lie heavier on me then ever they did and I am more wicked or at least lesse holy then ever since my conversion I was how little am I affected with any thing that belongs to thy service nor yet doth it affect me that I am not affected Lord if there were any in heaven or in earth that could help me besides thee then considering my manifold sinnes I should I but Lord I would not thy mercies are so great go to any other Now Lord now is the time to have mercy upon me I am like the man that went from Jerusalem to Jericho wounded naked and half dead I cannot call for help O let my wounds move thee to compassion If I cold bewail my sinful misery with tears of repentance I know thou wouldest deliver me but I cannot weep nay hardly mourn Oh faint faint is my grief and cold is my love What wilt thou do Lord with one that scarcely from his heart desires to serve thee alas what canst thou do for me more or lesse then to make me desire to serve thee Accept I must or for ever be lost What a low degree of goodnesse am I come unto a Soul full of sadnesse and empty of goodnesse To morrow Lord I am to receive thee into my soul thee my blessed Saviour Lord thou knowest I did not use to have a heart so empty of goodnesse when I expected thee to come next day Meditat. XXVI Lord now I do resolve to serve thee and in this particular especially I will not speak evil of any man what injury soever he both me Now I will so watch over my words that I will not offend with my tongue and that by degrees I may attain some perfection herein I here vow every week between this and the next communion to keep one day so strictly that I will not during that day speak so much as one idle word that day if I do I will give to the poor Lord how excellent is thy service so pure so sweet O that there were such a heart in me that I might for ever serve thee Meditat. XXVII When I reade the story of the Martyrs I do wish that I had lived in those daies that I might also die as they did or methinks I could now willingly lay down my life rather then yeeld to the abominable Idolatry and superstitions of the Sea of Rome but when I search and try my heart I much fear that the reason of this my desire is because I think it easier to lay down my life for Christs sake then for his sake to overcome my corruptions for it being but one act though it hath more pain yet being but of small continuance it is lesse trouble then all my life long to fight against sin and thus I do ill even in my best wishes in divers respects for I chose Martyrdome not because thereby I might more honour God but that I might the sooner and easier come to heaven And again that I think I might content my self though I did not so much hate corruption If I died a Martyr all would be well whereas Though I give my body to be burnt and have not charity it would profit me nothing and to love God it is impossible for him that doth not hate sinne and fight against his corruptions Alas O my soul how weary are we of our spiritual fight and we would fain finde some other way to heaven then by the continuance of it O that I were dead to the world and lived to God how vain is the world yet while we know something better we shall not think so We talk much of the vanity of the world but who beleeves that the world is vanity and vexation of spirit Or who is sensible of this truth Or if he were sensible of it and sometimes affected with it yet it soon vanisheth and we do not live accordingly How much easier is it to speak like an Angel then live like a Saint Meditat. XXVIII Lord that thou wouldst do it for me take my soul and my body what shall I do with them any longer I govern them so ill and indeed am so unable to govern them that they govern me Lord if thou shalt condemn me at the last day I do now justifie thee and testifie to all the world that thou art just though then if such a time shall come I shall blaspheme thee My dear God I have yet a spark of thy love I will not leave that small hold of thee for ten thousand worlds I know Lord there is no dallying with thee What if I spoke with the tongue and writ with the pen of men and Angels it is nothing Lord take a poor soul at his word Lord I am thine and do now give my self and ten thousand worlds if I had them to thee yet when thou dost take from me some poor part of my estate I murmure Alas I have a poor weak heart Meditat. XXIX Lord my knowledge of thee is but small and that which is is but little spirituall or experimentall To know thee by what others write and say of thee is sweet to them that can set their seal to it from their own experience Lord what is it that hath kept me so long from thee or kept thee so long from me I know I have been wanting to thee and to my self Lord take my heart I have too much love for any besides thee though I have too little for thee Oh how sweet are the thoughts of thee and would be sweeter if I thought oftner and longer and more attentively of thee Alas I am almost grown out of acquaintance with thee I do not perceive my corruptions in any thing more then in this that though to think of thee be a thing so easie and so profitable yet I think so seldome My dear God deliver me from the businesse of the world Suits of Law and such things they undoe me they take up my thoughts that I cannot be rid of them I feel upon me the curse which thou threatnest upon the people of Israel If they would not serve thee with joy they should serve strangers with a great deal of hardship I was well while I was with thee then I had my Songs in the night now my daies are turned into the shadow of death Lord draw me draw me make the cords of thy love stronger or rather then
I should perish make the cords of thine afflictions stronger and if I murmure scourge me while I leave murmuring How true do I finde that saying He that injures forgives not My wickednesse I have committed against thee makes me not able to beleeve almost that thou art or canst be reconciled unto me When I should do more for thee and lesse against thee I shall easilier beleeve thy loves or rather when thy spirit shall shed abroad thy love in my heart I shall know thou lovest me I sigh and mourn and weep over my poor soul but cannot help it Dear Lord Let my tears prevail with thee Pity Pity have Pity upon a poor languishing soul that is even gasping out its last breath It grieves me to see what a sad condition I am in I am not yet in hell and by thy mercy I may never come thither but I am running headlong thither Wo is me that I am constrained to live in Mesech and to have my habitation in the Tents of Kedar Meditat. XXX Lord I pray for mercies and when I have them to see the unsuitablenesse of my spirit to them and mine unthankfulnesse for them brings more sadnesse upon me then to want them All the things I begged of thee for temporall mercies both in carrying me forth and bringing me home and concerning my businesse I went about not finding things in such a sad condition at home yet my heart is the same still as hard and as stony not willing to yeeld it self and all up to thee as if I were more able to order matters then thou Now my heart is subject to murmure that it is so hard when it should mourn Lord thou hast done enough to justifie thy love and thy tender compassions to me if thou shouldest never do more and not only thy justice could not be blamed but not thy mercy My dear God let me not die in thine arms of love except I must die and then let me die in thine arms Meditat. XXXI Accept of my poor praiers and when at the last day when the secrets of all hearts shall be known the hypocrisie and coldness of my desires shall be known and thy goodnesse shall be admired in hearing such praiers as mine are For the light of thy countenance to shine upon and the breathings of thy Spirit to blow upon a garden of Spices is not so much for the advancement of thy free-grace as for thee to shine upon and thy Spirit to breathe upon such a dunghill as I am that sends forth such noisome savours as I do Lord if thou wilt be my God I have a body and a soul I will give thee them 'T is true they are thine already but alas if I had any thing to give that were not thine I would but I have not Meditat. XXXII Lord I wait to see the day of my salvation and the hour when thou wilt shew me thy loves and when I shall lie in thy bosome and arms and hear the beatings of thy heart in love and the soundings of thy bowels towards me and know thine everlasting thoughts of love to me when thou shalt seal the pardon of my sinnes to me and make me reade the counterpain of the Covenant of love between thee and me which thou reservest in heaven and is fair and not blotted as mine is and when shall the day of the love and joys of my espousals return and my thoughts be swallowed up in love Lord why shouldst thou withhold thy love the manifestations of thy love Can thy love love to be concealed from thy Beloved I will wait for the discoveries of thy love I am loth to do any thing before thou comest whom my soul loveth for fear thou shouldest come when I am not looking for thee and thou escapest me I look every praier to see thee come leaping on the mountains and skipping upon the hils as a Row or an Hinde But I see thee not why dost thou put a spark of love into my heart If thou wilt leave me why didst thou cast thy mantle upon me and when I follow after thee say what hast thou done thy loves are better then wine sweeter then honey even more to be desired then life it self Lord if the small sparks and relishes of thy love be so sweet to me what will the feeding on this heavenly manna be If a drop of thy love be so sweet what will the overflowings be If thy smiles bring so much joy what will thy embraces do Lord I long till I am undone with thy love All my carnall and worldly joys undone Lord it is not my unworthinesse that should hinder me nor will hinder thee from bestowing Lord help my unbelief Well Lord if I must walk in darknesse and see no light yet give me thy grace that I may stay my self upon thee my God my life is but short and when the hour of my departure shall come then I shall enjoy him whom my soul loveth and know as I am known then I shall forget the sorrows pains and throws of my travell for the joy that shall be revealed My Bride saith come and the Spirit saith Come Come Lord Jesus Come quickly Meditat. XXXIII I wait for the appearing of the Lord Jesus Christ if thy love be as fire in straw or such like matter lie smoaking and makes ones eyes weep while one strives to finde the fire At last it being able to hold no longer breaks forth into a great flame and the longer it is before it discovers it self the greater is the flame and light when they do break forth Lord whilest I am looking for thy love thou makest me weary let the length of thy stay be made up by the fulnesse of thy presence and greatnesse of thy manifestations when thou comest I seek thee in my praiers and I say O where art thou whom my soul loveth and yet thou sendest me away weeping and mourning I seek on my bed when I awake in the night but I finde thee not I speak with those which have found thee and they tell me nay I know it by thy Word that thou art near to every soul that seeks thee and when a poor soul cries thou wilt answer it then I multiply my praiers and call lowder and yet my praiers are as the winde that passeth away and returns no more O my Lord and my God thy love was strong enough to make thee suffer and thou didst die that thou mightest make known and commend thy love unto the Sonnes of men and now thou hast done all this to manifest thy love and wilt thou hide it from me Creature-love hath wrought strange things in me I have never been weary of their discourses and humane learning how hath it made me ravisht with some learned saying and if thou wouldest discover thy love and shed that abroad in my heart certainly it would work wonders For the Creatures flames of love are but as a blaze that straw makes but is
methods fright the ignorant 1. This is the very method of those Meditations by which every one that is brought home to God is converted For the first thing in conversion is our being convinced of some Truths which conviction raiseth affections for if the truths of God end in conviction and go no further nay if they end in affections only and never come to resolutions of shunning evil and doing good conversion can never be perfected as for example One is convinced that he is a miserable undone wretch by reason of originall and actuall abomination Upon this conviction fear and sorrow are raised yet if these do not work in us a firm resolution of leaving those sinnes we are yet in our sinnes and unconverted 3. There are severall things for the concluding of Meditation as shall appear CHAP. V. Directions for the working of our hearts to be convinced of and affectedwith the presence of God 1. FOR being convinced of and affected with the presence of God it may thus be wrought 1. We are to consider that God is present every where as truly really and essentially as he is in heaven For God did not create heaven to confine him but to manifest his presence for the Heaven of Heavens are not able to contain him for God is neither included by nor excluded from any place and though Jacob saith Surely the Lord was in this place and I knew it not Gen. 28.16 yet we must not imagine that Jacob was ignorant of that truth but did not actually consider it but David in the 139. Psalm is clear in explaining and clearing up the omnipresence of God 2. We must consider that God doth more peculiarly observe his people while they are performing of heavenly duties whether it be while they are speaking unto him or he speaking unto them he doth then more especially observe the motion and frame of their hearts as when we are in any company we do more especially look upon and observe those to whom we speak or who speak to us yet this is to be understood not as if God did observe us more at one time then another in respect of Gods knowledge it self but thus that God is much more offended with us if our carriage and frame of heart be more irreverent and unholy in the time of prayer and Meditation then at such times as we are in the works of our particular calling 3. We may consider with our selves that Christ doth actually behold us especially in these duties of holinesse for it is not the distance of place that doth hin-Christs knowledge and exact observing of us Little did Nathanael think that Christ saw him under the Fig-tree Nathanael did not see Christ nor was he corporally present then yet Christ behold Nathanael when he praied so Christ beheld Steven before the heavens were opened and the opening of the heavens was not that thereby Christ might be enabled the better to behold Steven but that Steven might thereby be the better enabled to see that Christ looked on him without all controversie God knows and observes with what reverence faith love c. we pray for else our praiers would be in vain and our faith also vain for how could he give us according to our faith if he knew not how much our faith were If the inward frame of our hearts were not observed by him then an hypocrite that hath better expressions should get more by his prayers then a true Nathanael that hath a better heart 4. Suppose that thou hadst lived in Christs time or suppose that Christ were now in England consider with what joy reverence and confidence thou wouldest go to him for the pardon of thy sins or for any other mercy thou stoodst in need of Thou maist go so to him now his distance from thee in respect of corporall presence doth not make him lesse able to know thy wants or hear thy praiers nor his being now glorified makes him lesse willing to grant them then if he were bodily present in the room with thee in the form of a Servant as he was once at Jerusalem the glory of Christ doth not hinder his love and goodnesse for Chtist is the expresse image of his Father and God Attributes do not hinder one another The Majesty of God doth not set bounds unto his goodnesse and make that finite nor doth his goodnesse make his Majesty lesse glorious his goodnesse makes his Majesty more amiable and his Majesty makes his goodnesse more wonderfull So neither doth the exaltation of Christ cause him to abate any thing of his goodnesse unto his people but if any way his love be altered it is by being made more then it was and when Christ was upon earth you must have come to him by faith or you could obtain no mercy from him and by faith though he be in heaven you may obtain any mercy now You may consider any one or two or more of these considerations until your heart be so convinced of and affected with the presence of God that you may thereby be the better fitted for the carrying on the duty of Meditation more effectually CHAP. VI. Concerning the Preparatory Praier that is to be used before Meditation THE next Preparatory consideration is Praier and it is to be performed in these words or to like purpose Lord my designe in this duty of Meditation is not to be an hour sequestred from worldly employments for that were to be idle an hour and to encrease my sinnes not my graces but my businesse at this time is to be so convinced and affected with those spirituall Truths revealed in thy Word that I may fully resolve by thy strength and power to reform my life because I can neither understand the things that belong to my peace nor understanding them be convinced of the certainty and truth of them Nay Lord though my understanding be enlightened yet without thee mine affections cannot be enflamed I can neither know resolve nor perrform what is good without thee for from thee comes both the will and the deed of thy good pleasure I beseech thee Lord that thou wouldest give me thy grace to make conscience of performing this duty with my whole strength and not carelesly and perfunctorily And Lord do thou enlighten me with and convince me of thy Truths and so affect my heart with the love of holinesse and hatred of sinne c. that I may thereby be enabled fully firmly notwithstanding all the opposition that the flesh world or devil can make to run the waies of thy Commandements with joy and with speed and when thou hast wrought in me the will so to do give me also the deed and that I may not trust to the strength of my resolutions but to the continuall gracious assistance of thy Spirit for the performance of those things that through thee I shall resolve to do Holy and blessed God Christ hath sent me wishing me to come to thee in his Name for any mercies
fire as soone as ever it begins a little to be kindled for green wood for such are we in spirituall matters will suddenly go out unlesse it be very well kindled CHAP. VIII Concerning Affections KNowledge is for Consideration and Consideration is to raise Affections and the end of Affections are Resolutions as the end of Resolution is Action and the reforming of our lives Our Affections are various according to the Subject we meditate of Sometimes we admire Gods goodnesse his Majesty his Wisedom Sometimes we admire and wonder at our own folly and madnesse that we should live so contrary to our own principles that those Truths that God revealed unto us on purpose that we might improve them to our eternall welfare we should lay by as things forgotten and uselesse as if one that had a receit to cure the stone and were convinced of the excellency and efficacy of it yet should make no other use of it but to reade it over and lay it by Sometimes the affection is despising the world and abhorring our selves in dust and ashes sometimes forrow sometimes joy love fear c. which you may finde abundantly in the Psalmes of David which were but Davids Meditations though not in this Method Now as soon as our affections are much stirred and raised it is time to pass over to resolutions CHAP. IX Concerning Resolutions Rule I. LEt your Resolutions be firm and strong not slieghty let not them be velleities or wishes but resolved pur poses or determinations Do not say with thy selfe Well I see very well that the wrath of God comes upon the Children of disobedience and I must to hell or leave my taking of the Name of God in vain I do not do well to swear and I could wish I could leave it but say thus with thy self I am resolved by the blessing of God whatsoever comes of it to leave my swearing There is no dallying with God nor giving a faint deniall to sin I have heard of one who hearing the sin of Swearing spoke much against by some in whose company he was observed their discourse and said Well by the blessing of God I will never swear more and though he was a common Swearer before he was never since heard to swear one Oath to this day 2. Let thy resolutions be for the time present not for the future Do not say Well I do intend to leave my drinking but for the present I am engaged in such a meeting and for that time I will do as I have done but after that I will think of it and take some order for mending of it this is but one of Satans wiles whereby he coseneth thee of thy whole life by daies which he could not do by years If Satan should say unto thee Thou shalt never repent never leave thy drunkennesse it may be it would startle thee and he would be in danger of getting nothing of thee by asking so much but he tempting thee only to let it alone this Week and afterwards for a week longer c. he obtains the same thing at severall times which he could not obtain at once 3. The third Rule Let thy resolutions be not only against thy sin but against the means occasions and temptations to it for it is better to discern Satan if it may be then to put a Sword in his hand and say thou canst well enough defend thy self against him This is Solomons advice He doth not say to him that would fly Adultery You may talk with a harlot but Be not inticed by her words to uncleannesse he will not give thee leave to go into her house or so much as by her door Pro. 5.8 So when he disswadeth the drunkard from drunkennesse he wisheth him not so much as to look upon the Wine For as the beauty of a harlot so the colour of wine will enflame our desires after it Prov. 23.31 after this manner did Job resolve I have made a Covenant with mine eyes that I will not look on a woman and he resolved not only against the sin it self but against the beginnings and temptations to the sin Job 31.1 and God forbidding the Nazarites wine forbad them to eat grapes lest by that they should be enticed to drink wine Now that I may presse this Rule I shall answer an Objection which generally wicked men are subject to make as thus When we perswade a Drunkard that he would leave his drunkennesse that he would for two or three Moneths resolve not to go into Tavern or Ale-house he cries out of preciseness and saith What do you count it a sinne to drink in a Tavern or Ale-house I answer therefore 1. That when our hearts are affected with the sinfulness of sin and wrought up to a hatred of it we do as when we exceedingly hate any man we avoid all those places where we are likely to meet him I may bid such an one ask God why he forbids the adulterer to walk by the doors of the harlot May he not say Why she lives in such a street and as honest and godly men walk that way as in any other place in the City 2. Consider that Licitis perimus omnes is a good saying we generally perish by lawfull things for in things that are unlawfull we are generally more watchfull 3. Those things that may be lawful to others may not be so to thee Meats that are most nourishing to men in health are poison to one in a Feaver 4. Know this that though to be tempted be not a sinne yet when we have found by experience that going to a Tavern c. hath been a snare and temptation that hath generally prevailed over us then to be tempted with such a temptation is a sin though one yeelds not because by going into temptation which we need not we sinne for if one shall say I resolve that though I do speak with the harlot I will not consent though thou dost so and resistest all her enticements thou sinnest notwithstanding for thou plainly breakest the Command Pro. 5.8 5. But suppose that it were lawfull for thee to drink wine in a Tavern that hast been so often ensnared by it yet one effect of true repentance is an holy revenge by debarring our selves those things which are lawfull taking Gods part against our selves 2 Cor. 7 11. 6. Consider that if thy hatred of sinne and love of God be not strong enough to stop thee from the beginnings and keep thee from the occasions of sinne how canst thou expect that it should keep thee from committing the sinne it self when it hath got some advantage over thee He that cannot stop himself at first will much lesse when he hath rolled down a steep hill half way be able to stop himself for then he fals with more violence and the same strength to hold will not serve then which would at first therefore I shall still continue the advice to resolve not only against the sinne but against the
for one that is very poor to give The next Rule is Let this penalty be alwaies of something that is materially good as giving to the poor spending some time in reading of Scripture for as for Popish penances as whipping Pilgrimages and such like they are unprofitable and ridiculous The next Rule is Let this penalty be alwaies some holy duty that is most contrary to thy Master sin as if thy Master sin be Covetousnesse let it be almes if it be voluptuousnesse let it be fasting with praier or abstaining wholly for a time from that wherein thou most delightest c. The next Rule is Let your Vows be rather against the outward then the inward acts of sin rather against speaking angrily then being angry for though inward acts of sinne are worse yet they are not so much in our power The next Rule is If your Vows are concerning doing holy duties it is better to vow to spend so much time in reading holy Scripture or such like then to vow to reade so many Chapters for thou wilt be tempted to reade them over too fast that thou maist have ended whereas if it be so much time that thou hast resolved to spend thou wilt not be so subject to this temptation CHAP. XI Rules for the concluding of Meditation 1. THou art earnestly to beg of God strength to perform whatever thou hast resolved to do in his service This must be done fervently though briefly and humbly proceeding from an earnest desire to do what thou hast promised and resolved and also from an humble sense of thine inability to perform it 2. The second duty is thanksgiving if thou shalt perceive any heavenly warmth of love or spiritual hatred of sin or any other spiritual effect wrought in thy heart thou art to give God the glory and not to rejoyce in thy self but in the Lord but thou art to rejoyce with trembling knowing that if thou art puft up though thou hast the will to do good wrought in thee yet if thou provokest him he can stop it that thou shalt never be able to do what thou resolvest to do The first is an humble acknowledgement of our failings in the performing of this duty For if we were not geeen wood that love which is now but a spark would have been a flame God is not wanting unto us but we are wanting to our selves and him After these are performed there remaineth three duties more 1. We are to remember what Vows and promises we have made and it is very useful to write down all thy Vows as thou makest them in a Book because that we shall else be subject to forget the Vow or the time or conditions upon which we made it And it is good to have a Book to keep a Register of things in it besides a Diary which I have spoken of and given Rules for in a Manuall entituled A Directory to Christian Perfection 1. Let one head be for which you are to leave some leaves for Vows under which you must write all your Vows or Resolutions as you make them or spiritual promises for Christians and such like The second must be for the mercies of God eminent deliverances and also answers of Praiers These are to be set down with all pertinent circumstances that may any way encrease the mercy The third head should be for grosser failings which were good to be writ down not in letters at length that every one may reade them but in characters known only to our selves There are other things which because I do not now speak purposely of that businesse I omit The second thing after Meditation is ended is to remember what passages in our Meditation did most affect us and as it were to lay them up in our thoughts that frequently we may in the rest of the day think of them As when we walk in a garden we content not our selves with enjoying the fragrancy of the flowers while we are there but if we may have leave we often gather a Nosegay to smell of the rest of the day In this businesse of Meditation do thou likewise The third duty after Meditation is by degrees warily and unwillingly to go out of the presence of God to worldly emploiments Do not go from the presence of God as a bird out of the snare with joy and with speed And thou must go also watchfully and warily from such emploiments as one that carries some precious liquor in a shallow broad brittle dish he looks to his way to the dish and liquor that is in it lest by holding of it awry by fals or stumblings he should spill the one or break the other So must thou be watchfull over thy waies else the grace that God hath powred into thy heart in this duty will be spilt To rush into holy duties or out of them argues too great undervaluing of the things of God Instances OF Solemn Occasionall MEDITATION Meditation 1 ALas my God I am in a sad condition mine afflictions grow daily upon me and that which is mine unsupportable misery my corruptions grow faster upon me then my affliction What before made me weep will not now make me sigh The heavy burthen of a great abomination doth not lie upon me so much as before I was oppressed with a vain thought in my praiers Alas Lord alas I am undone alas my corruptions have almost made me love them and make me weary of duties and carelesse of graces My joys are gone and my sorrows are gone that were sutable to thy Word and now my joys are but the laughter of fools and my sorrows are carnall sensuall and more of hell in them then of heaven and as now I can scarce tell my sorrows so have I scarce any sorrow to tell I have sate down and wept to consider the great decays of holinesse in me but now I can see my God going from me and whenas now he is even out of sight mine eyes are as dry as my heart is hard Alas Lord if thou wilt not return thou wilt lose a poor soul that hath loved thee and is somewhat troubled Now poor sad soul that it is so wicked as it is Meditat. II. Lord thou seest the strange distempered temper of mine heart and spirit ah blessed God I should take more comfort if I should see my heart-bloud running forth before mine eye then to see mine eyes so dry and my heart so hard I have worn out almost all motives to holinesse they now take no impression in me which before were too strong for me to bear they ravisht me which now do not move me I scarce ever go to prayer but I have enough and too many spirituall complaints to employ it to express If every day I had not just cause to bewail a continued decay of grace I might have some respit of my griefs But what shall I now do When every day shall bear witnesse against me and every night my sin shall go to bed with
carnal tears and one great cause of my grief and part of my misery is that I can weep no more sometimes indeed tears stand in mine eyes when I consider these things Lord give me faith O give me faith I feel a deal of Atheism in mine heart Mine heart is so full of corruption of all kinde and all degrees that I can feel no bottome of this stinking ditch Mine Imaginations is divers times a through-fare for Satans blasphemous thoughts which my soul abhors I may even sit down and spend the remainder of my wicked life in weeping and wailing and wringing of my hands and tearing off the hairs of my head My sad soul may say to my God Art thou quite gone from me have all my hopes of thee been as dreams and empty shadows unto me and hast thou shown me so much of heaven and wilt thou make hell more terrible and bitter to me Shall thy sweet mercies be turned into the gall of Aspes to me not only to be bitter but deadly I have cause I have cause Lord to mingle my drink with my tears to water my couch with weeping Thou art too great a God to be dallied withall and what do I else As our dearest Friends though we never so much delighted in their company while they were living yet we are afraid to be alone with them they are a terronr to us after the souls have left their earthly Tabernacles So my praiers while they were living praiers were a great comfort to my poor soul but now my praiers are without life and my supplications are dead they are a terrour to me they look gashly upon me and I upon them Meditat. XII My dear God thouart not moved with words if we had the tongue of Men and Angels if we could speak as never man spake if our hearts meant no more then they do what would our vain words do I am ever weary of my life because of my corruptions I can go no where nor do any thing but my corruptions follow me and tire me even out of my patience O that I could weep over my soul and weep over my praiers to see how dead they are which way to turn I know not I have praied a thousand times for another heart and yet mine heart is as hard as a stone and so full of hypocrisie that there is a world of hypocrisie in my confessions of hypocrisie Lord shall I cast away my confidence and lay down my weapons and put off mine armour because my corruptions are so strong and impetuous and deaden my very soul But alas what am I weary of not of my sinnes but of the accusations of my conscience that will not let me alone Blessed be thy Name that I am troubled that I do not live holily and yet I will strive to live holily Lord mine heart is ertangled in the snares of the world Blessed Saviour thou which hast overcome the world deliver me from the cares and love of the world Alas what good do my tears do me Dost thou bottle up such tears such puddle water in thy bottles Let the bowels of thy compassion yern within the towards my poor soul It is full of sin but my sinne is my sorrow though my sorrow it self is sinful if thou standest as a stranger to me I must give over my self for lost then I may say farewell praiers better to say farewell then to adde to my former sins a greater guilt by defiling my praiers that are as the Chariots to carry out my soul into the bosome of God What am I to stand against corruption or temptations I am no more able to overcome nay to resist them then to remove Mountains I have sinned away my comforts and sinned away my joys and sinned away mine hopes and even my God if thy mercies be not greater and what remains for my poor soul to do but to sit down in sorrow and even to mourn until my soul be heavy unto death It had been better for me that I had not been one to shew the way to others Nay but oh my God that is best for me that thou hast done for me Blessed God do but make me thine Meditat. XIII Alas Oh my soul may not I justly spend the remainder of my daies in sighing to perceive my good God from whose sweet presence I have in former times had so much grace and comfort to be such a stranger now to men and what is worse mine heart so senselesse of his absence The time hath been when myheart hath almost bled within me to think what a miserable condition I should be in if ever it should come to passe that it should be thus Lord why dost thou absent thy self from my poor soul if I were in a desertion of comforts I were in a farre better condition but to be in a desertion of graces and not to be troubled is a sad condition Me thinks I see my stock of grace grow weaker and weaker and more and more to languish as one that is dying the pulse grows weaker and weaker until at last it be no moee O Lord what to say I do not know alas I cannot but call and cry and pray Lord if ever thou wilt take pity upon a poor miserable speechlesse sinner Lord If thou wilt that I may overcome Lord I cannot get mine heart to be content to be damned and indeed since then I must eternally be separated from thee I do not desire to get mine heart to be content but to struggle against it as long as I am able Meditat. XIV To have Satan and corruption come and beset me as soon as I awake and to follow me all the day long and to go to bed with me and to keep me waking to have no respite is a sad condition When I should awake with my God my good God who kept me and watched over me whilst I slept to have Satan stand ready and hold his temptations before mine eyes which way soever I look and to prevail so far with me as at last to make me scarce to hate the sin he tempts me to I feel in my spiritual part an utter abhorring of the sinne I would give ten thousand worlds rather then commit the sinne and yet I have much ado to refrain alas can my secure soul live Meditat. XV. I am in such a wretched temper as to be willing to offend my God and when I go about to grieve sorrow is far from me nay the grief which sometimes I feel is not strong enough to conquer the temptation when tears stand in mine eyes to consider the miserable condition of my soul in being so prone to sin the temptation encreaseth To hear one of thy servants groaning under thy hand and then to stand parlying with temptation and not rather be afraid that the same affliction c. Lord I am in thy hand for affliction lay what thou wilt upon me I must bear it and I would bear it patiently
soon out it hath not substance enough to nourish and maintain what it begets For Creature-Excellencies are not strong enough to keep up the delight we take in them but thou Lord art love and thou art such a treasure of excellencies that the poor soul makes new discoveries of those treasures every day To all Eternity thou art enough to keep alive and in full strength all the love and joys and praises of Saints and Angels Lord thou art enough to answer thine own love but what am I that I should speak of thee thou art so glorious that I am afraid to speak of thee Meditat. XXXIV Lord I call and thou dost not answer I am even tired out if thou dost not support I sink under the burthen I long and look to see thy beauty but I cannot behold nor perceive one glimpse that thou art excellent I see by the eye of faith but thine excellencies do not affect me All my praiers are turned into this Lord shew me Christ and shew me him whom my soul loveth for I have heard of him and the fame of his excellencies have come unto me yet mine eyes have not seen him I think with my self Surely Christ manifesting himself and to be filled with all the fulnesse of God and to have a conversation in heaven must needs signifie more then ever I have experienced in my self For such poor things as I have found wrought in my soul cannot fill up those expressions Then I hear of those whose lives are spiritual and Christ-like not glorious in outward mortifications Thou art blamelesse that way speaking of such things which God hath wrought for them and in them which I have not found but are the very same things which are in my view and I follow after to attain but cannot Then from their relation of the Lords dealings with them I perceive that God did humble them more before he did discover himself unto them then ever he hath as yet humbled me so that I finde no rest day nor night in my spirit and yet though I am thus restlesse in seeking after something which I cannot know what it is I seek for I cannot discern any true sincere constant love to Christ He neither lets me know that he loves me nor that I love him so that I stand amazed and know not what to do and still by the help of God I will not cease to cry and call upon him for whom my soul I doubt not but would love if he discover his beauties and love unto me and work them on my heart I seek for one who I cannot tell who he is before I finde him then I shall know and shall tell to all who he is and set forth his excellencies though they shal as little understand me as I do them who declare the things that God hath wrought for them Meditat. XXXV There is not such an one in the world as I am that I know Publicans and harlots I justifie them I in the midst of means of Ordinances and mercies in the midst of the flames of love nay when thou laiedst on me that affliction that is now fresh bleeding in mine eyes or rather despised and forgotten I should have learnt obedience by things I suffered and I have done as if I were to learn to sinne by them Thou hast chastised me with rods and I have put the sting of sinne into them and have made them scorpions Thou sendest them for Antidotes and I have turned them into poyson Lord teach me what it is wherein thou art so offended to leave me thus Lord I beleeve thou hast pardoned me but small is my comfort when thou pardonest sinne but subduest it not Meditat. XXXVI Lord I do so evidently finde my self unable to judge of truths or to resist temptations that I almost nay altogether lie at the mercy of every temptation and to be carried about with the winde of every vain doctrine if thou dost not stand by me what should I tell thee the secret puddle of my heart I am weary of the stench and filthinesse of it there is not a prayer but they meet me at it and lie as a talent of lead upon me If mine heart were all on fire with thy love these things could not be I sometimes have thoughts rising in my heart that are wicked proud and foolish thoughts I begin to be offended that I begging for the manifestations of thy love yet have them not but those thoughts no sooner begin to arise but I consider What am I that thou shouldest give me thy loves and how can I expect the manifestations of thy love when I will not give thee my loves but let them run waste upon the creature How many times do I choose to do any thing rather then spend my time in Meditation and Prayer nay to do nothing and be idle For although thou lovest us first yet thou dost not usually discover thy thoughts of love to a soul before she hath made over her love and her felf unto thee then I think thou canst by the power of thy Spirit bring in my heart my soul and my love and that usually ere thou dost ravish the soul with the discoveries of thy love this I know and let all the world know it that whatsoever wicked thoughts arise in my weak heart which I cannot answer I know that all thy waies are holy just and good Lord what shall I give for the sheddings abroad of love in my heart that which should be given for it were it at the utmost parts of the world I could fetch it thence But Lord the price of it is already paid 't is near unto thee even at thy right hand O thou most High he hath paid for this mercy by his bloud long ago and my praiers thou requirest not as a price Lord fill me with these spiritual supplications that I may give thee no rest nor take any rest my self until I have found him whom my soul loveth Come Lord Jesus come quickly Meditat. XXXVII O Lord beat me and drive me with storms and tempests I am come unto thee like the Prodigall Son for all but that which most of all I should have a spiritual sorrow ragged and tatter'd and undone My sins and misery are like his not my sorrow For me to see my self languishing my graces daily grow weaker my love colder and even almost to be speechlesse in praier Alas the sorrow that I have is rather bewailing my misery then my sinne I know not what it is Lord but thou dost Sure I am my condition is sad and I am sad and my sadnesse is all the poor remains of comfort that I have and yet I no sooner begin to take any comfort in my grief but I perceive so much hypocrisie in my grief that the poor spark of comfort that I have is put out Alas tears of bloud were fitter for me then dry eyes O Lord must every trifle steal away my heart from thee
must thou much desire and endeavour for those things which no way further thee in this great businesse of knowing serving and following God but they are to be accounted superfluous and frivolous 2. Consider the folly and madnesse of those who live no otherwise then as if they had been created for no other end then to drink and eat and sleep and dance and game or to get riches and such like fooleries Certainly if these people were asked whether they did in their consciences think that God created them that they might spend their lives in dancing c. they could not say yes None can imagine that hath any understanding that at the day of judgement God will ask them why they did not dance more and game more and gain more riches 3. Consider seriously with thy self whether thou livest sutable to the end of thy Creation think with thy self that when that time which thou spendest in eating drinking sleeping recreation visits vanities is taken from thy life what a small pittance is left for God and for the works of thy particular calling nay thy sleeping eating drinking recreation should all be done some way or other to enable and fit thee the better for the service of God But alas how seldome is it that thou hast thought of fitting thy self for Gods service by eating drinking c. Nay how many times hast thou made thy self unfit for Gods service by such things Now before thou goest any further be fully convinced of these truths and if any scruple should remain which cannot though a man be but truly rationall argue and pray them away for though it may be some Objections may be too hard for thy arguments which notwithstanding seldome comes to passe since thy consideration must be of truths so plain evident and obvious which all grant yet no scruples will be too hard for thy praiers Affectione 1. Be ashamed and confounded within thy self that thou hast lived so contrary to thine own principles and that thou hast minded that little or nothing in doing of it as a thing by the bye which now thou dost but seriously think of it thou plainly seest to be the main businesse of thy life saying thus Alas O my God what did I think of when I thought not of thee What was I mindeful of when I forgot thee Alas O my Soul how comes it to passe that we thought of these things no sooner 'T is a strange thing that our hearts and the world should so far deceive us that we should prefer eveny trifling thing before that which concerns us more then ten thousand worlds We have served the world which was not made but to serve us 2. Abhor thy life past Well I am resolved to leave you ye vain and sinful pleasures I will no longer dote upon you you have but too long bewitcht my soul I might have had a thousand holy thoughts and praiers and treasures of almes laid up for Eternity which I am sure I should not have repented of when I come to die and you vanities have took up my time and stole away my heart and thoughts from these things Well I have enough of you I have done with you for the rest of my strength and daies I will give unto my God 3. Turn thy self to God and say Blessed God wilt thou accept of the service of a poor wretch that hath spent so much of his time and strength upon base lusts and vanities Nay surely Lord If thou wilt accept of such a wretch as I am such a heart such love such service as I have I will give to thee and for the time to come thou shalt be the very joy of my soul and the deliciousnesse of my thoughts and dost thou indeed entreat and importune me to be reconciled how wonderfull is thy mercy that notwithstanding I provok't thee hitherto daily to thy face yet that thou shouldest follow after me to embrace me whereas what could be expected but that thou shouldest pursue me to destroy me Resolutions Well by the blessing of God I am resolved that though heretofore I have spent whole daies in such and such like recreations which at best are but vanities for this moneth I will either not use such and such recreations at all or at least spend no more time any day in them then I do in praier and meditation and I hope one day the Lord will work in me such a heavenly frame of spirit that praier and meditation shall be in stead of a thousand recreations David was of that temper for he saith that he will go to God his exceeding joy and that the Law of God was dearer to him then thousands of gold or silver and that his heart was ready to break for the very desires and longings that he had after God O my Soul that will be a rare time when it shall be thus with us Why should David love God more then we He forgave David much but he hath forgiven us more well O my soul if thou wilt pray hard and follow hard after God thou little knowest what he will do for thee and the joys that he hath laid up for them that love him even in this world are unspeakable and glorious Conclusion 1. Pray Lord thou knowest the decitfulnesse of my heart the strength of my corruptions and the multitude of snares and temptations which encompasse me on every side especally when I am in worldly employments in company thou knowest how subject holy flames are to go out therefore be thou pleased by the holy breathings of thy Spirit to keep these holy fervours of love from being quencht 't is not the strength of my resolutions that can enable me to resist temptations if I am not kept by the mighty power of thee my God I am lost 2. Praise God blessed be thou O God for any heavenly motion or desire that hath been wrought in me thou might'st have suffered me as thou dost thousands I have provoked thee as much as they never to be convinced of or affected with these truths t is thy wonderful mercy that thou didst make me for such a blessed end as the enjoyment of thy self and much greater mercy that thou hast let me know so much but most of all that thou hast given me a heart to desire and endeavour after it Blesse the Lord O my Soul 3. Acknowledge thy failings alas Lord whatsoever is wrought in me that 's good had been farre greater but that I am green wood to the sparks of thy love Lord pardon the iniquity of my holy services My highest and most inflamed thoughts of thee are unworthy of thee it is well that I have thee to love whom I need not fear loving too much After the Meditation is ended 1. Think with thy self which of these truths or what passage of this Meditation did most warm thy heart and affect thee and fix it and treasure it up in thy thoughts keeping it as it were a nosegay in
the tongue of man can express or the heart of man conceive there is nothing that thou seest with thy eyes or hearest with thy ears or feelest with thy hand is more certainly true than this But alas because thou hast heard it so often and God of his infinite goodness and patience hath not made thee yet to feel the stroak of his justice and the misery due to sinne thou wilt not believe him though his threatnings be never so clearly set down and with much earnestness 5. Consider against what precious mercies what sweet love what blessed experience holy inspirations what abundance of means strong resolutions precious promises clear light c. thou hast sinn'd Affections 1. Pray to God to help to a further sence of the sinfullness of sinne Blessed God must all these considerations pass as a Serpent on a stone without making any impression upon my soul Lord give me an affecting knowledge of the sinfullness of sinne and not have such slight thoughts of sinne as I have had but grant that I may esteem of sinne as thou esteemest it 2. Talk with thine own soul about this matter O my soul are these considerations true or false if thou thinkest them false bring thy objection shew wherein the error lies which thou canst never do but if they be true as certainly they are how comes it to pass that we have made nothing of sinne 't is in vain for us to put off the sense of our sinnes untill it be too late 3. Be confounded and ashamed in the presence of God Alas O Lord my God as a thief is ashamed when he is taken or as a woman is ashamed when her adulteries are found out by her loving husband so and a thousand times more I desire to be confounded and ashamed in thy presence when I consider how abominable my life hath been and how that I have committed my abominations even in thy sight and provokt thee to thy face and had not thy patience and mercy been infinite thou couldst never have stood out against so many provocations I had been in hell roaring and blaspheming long before this day and then I had been past prayers and past mercies and past pardon What shall Isay unto thee O thou preserver of men to excuse my sinnes I cannot I have nothing but the multitude of thy tender compassions and thy free grace in Jesus Christ to flie unto Lord lay my sinnes home to me to humble me and to break my stony heart but lay them not to my charge to condemn me If thou hadst not in thy word promised forgiveness to sinners through Jesus Christ I could no more hope to obtain pardon than even the devils themselves Resolutions It is enough O my soul and too too much that we have been undoing our selves and provoking God thus long that we have as it were with all our power pull'd down the vengeance of God upon us and as it were kindling his wrath against us but he hath not suffered his whole displeasure to arise nor suffered us to perish though we would blessed be his Name that we have not committed the sinne against the holy Ghost which we certainly had done had he given us up to the strength of our own corruptions and to the power and malice of Satan to improve them to our destruction Is it true indeed that God saith Yet return and I will save thee doth he stand with stretcht out arms doth he indeed stand with stretcht out arms to imbrace us is it possible he should be so gracious to forgive such and so many sinnes and of such long continuance Well blessed be God we will go unto him and never offend him more We will hereafter whensoever we are tempted unto sinne say What sinne against such love such mercy such experiences offend that God that hath pardoned us that hath done such things for us and is not content with that but hath promised to do more I will not hereafter stand parlying with temptations but I will cry out unto God and say Lord help me for I suffer violence and in particular I am in some measure sensible that I pray not with that fervency and reverence as I ought to do for the time to come I shall by the blessing of God mend that I am too passionate well since God hath been so gracious as to forgive so many so great so grievous sinnes that mine own heart is not able to understand their vileness or number I will not hereafter be troubled when I hear my neigbour or underling or when I hear my fellow N. use such or such taunting words against me I will not be provoked by this or that despite or contemptuous trick that he or she doth use against me but rather I will endeavour to say or do such a thing to gain his good will and to pacifie his anger conceived against me for certainly his injuries are not comparable to my sinnes and yet God forgive me them there is a difference between I. N. and me I am resolved I will go to him and be reconciled this very day or if I cannot I will pray for him and speak well of him this very day if I have occasion to speak of him at all howsoever I will pray for him now Conclusion 1. Pray desire God that he would increase thy detestation of sin and that thou mightst as well hate sinne as leave sinne and that he would not let any spark that hath been kindled by his own Spirit go out in thee Say unto him Lord I do not beg riches I can go to heaven without them please thee without them but I beg of thee grace and strength against corruptions pardon of sinnes if thou deniest me these I am undone 2. Praise God Blessed be thy Name that my heart hath been in any measure affected with the hatred of sinne that I have in any measure known and considered the things that belong to my peace thou mightst have suffered me to drop into hell and never to have thought of it before I had been there but thou hast not dealt so with me 3. Acknowledge thine own unworthiness of so great patience as God hath exercised towards thee thine inability to think any of those good thoughts that thou hast had c. as is in the first Meditation After all think what passages most affected thee 2. Write down thy resolutions c. 3. Go unwillingly from the duty MEDITAT IV. Of Death 1. BE convinced of and affected with the presence of God 2. Pray for his assistance Considerations 1. Canst thou not remember that thou wert by such an one when he died didst thou not see how his countenance failed his eye-strings broke how he grew weaker and weaker at last grew speechless how he throtl'd in the throat how his teeth grated how he sweated and strugled for life and at last gaspt and died consider that thus thou must do likewise how soon the Lord only knowes that thou
doth not ake if we have the Stone we have not the Gout or if both them yet not some other torturing disease or if the whole body be tortured yet one may possess his soul in patience but to have a tortured body and a wounded conscience who can bear it besides all this none can help none will pity those that are in hell nay what is the height of misery that way God himself shall in the midst of all their roarings and tortures laugh at their calamity when it comes as desolation and as a whirlwind upon them 4. Consider seriously what Eternity means for ever ever ever to be tormented is an an overwhelming consideration to lye under the torture of the Stone but one night how tedious is it but to be tormented to all eternity O it is the hell of hells Affections and Resolutions Be astonish'd and tremble at the wrath of the Lord Alas O my soul why dost thou not tremble as Felix did when thou considerest these things why art not thou more sensible of the power of his wrath do not the foundations of the earth tremble and the pillars of Heaven shake when he is angry and how comes it to pass that thou art so little affected with these things hast thou full assurance of the favour of God when was it sealed surely the very possibility that these things should come upon us should very much affect us 2. Pray O blessed God thou that hast the keyes of death and of hell take pity on me and though I neither understand nor am sensible in any considerable measure either of the miseries of hell or of my own danger in falling into them Lord how thou knowest both let the bowels of thy compassion earn towards me and never suffer me to fall into that devouring fire and into those everlasting burnings blessed be thy Name that I am on this side of hell if thou hadst cast me into that place of torment as I have daily provoked thee to do I had been past hopes past prayers past mercies past repentance I beseech thee O Lord that thou wilt chasten me that I may not be condemned with the world 3. Despise and abhorre the sinfull vanities and pleasures of the world O vain world there is nothing in thee but sinne and misery temptations vanity and vexation of spirit and are thy vain profits and pleasures so much to be valued as for them to dwell in devouring fire and are the pleasures of sinne that are but for a season so much worth that for them we should dwell in everlasting burnings Have we not had frequent experiences that the sorrowes we have had for committing of sinne have farre exceeded the pleasures that we have had in committing of it and surely the terrors of an awaked conscience are not to be compared with the horrours of the damned and other insupportable and endless miseries of that place of torment Come O my soul let us not deceive and flatter our selves with vain and false hopes of the mercies of God it is true God is very mercifull to them that fear him and we may be sure of this that if we do sincerely desire and endeavour to serve him that we shall finde his mercies as much above our thoughts and expectations of them as the heavens are above the earth but if we slight them and are careless of his service and turn his grace into wantonness let us not deceive our selves with vain words for because of these things comes the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience and those that live so shall surely finde that at that day the mercies of God will not serve at all to mitigate but abundantly to justifie the wrath and fury of God that he shall pour out upon the wicked then they shall pay for every mercy they have received and the riches of his despised goodness shall but increase the treasures of his wrath therefore O my soul since these things are so what are we to do why do we not fear him that can cast both body and soul into hell The Prophet Habacuc when he did but think but of some temporall judgements that God had threatned rottenness entred into his bones If indeed the love of God did constrain us so that we did from a principle of love make conscience of sinne so that we never offend God it were well but since we plainly find that it is not strong enough alone let us not fear to call in and improve the consideration of the torments of hell to deter us from sin the motive is imperfect but not sinfull our great work we have to do in the world next to the glory of God is to avoid hell and obtain heaven and to resist our now three great enemies the world the flesh and the devil who endeavour day and night to drive us headlong into perdition If any one in the world much more if the devil should appear to us and offer us such a sum of money if we would give him our souls that we might be damn'd we think we should abhorre him and his offer but alas doth not every one that useth by extortion and violence either getteth or keepeth what is not his do the same thing his damnation it as certain and as infallible though more secretly and invisibly contrived by Satan as if Satan should visibly appear to him and he make a contract with him therefore O my soul let us take heed of the wiles of Satan for he generally works by the world and the flesh to deceive us therefore let us now resolve by the blessing of God to look upon the world and the flesh to be as dangerous and implacable enemies as Satan himself let us not endeavour to please the world by vain discourses by omitting what God commands or doing what he forbids Let us not be troubled but rather rejoyce when we are revil'd and scorn'd for righteousness sake For the time to come when I am to do any religious duty I will not so much as consider what men will judge or say of me nor endeavour to make the world my Friend since God himself hath set enmity between us and as for the flesh I am sure we are no debters unto that we have paid it farre more then ever we owed it therefore for the time to come I will rather abstain from lawfull then use unlawfull pleasures and I will take heed not only of those pleasures that are unlawfull in kind but those also that are unlawfull in degree and that I may better avoid unlawfull pleasures I will sometimes abstain from those that are lawfull and having seriously considered I am convinc'd of this that I have not made conscience enough in the matter of sleep I have not redeem'd the time from that nor have enough considered the sinfulness of it but like the sluggard that Solomon speaks of have turned upon my bed as a door upon the hinges therefore henceforth I shall endeavour
and cunning adversaries came to ensnare him in his words so that they thought it were impossible for him to say I or No to their Questions without extraordinary prejudice to himself yet he answered with such admirable wisedom and innocence that they went away ashamed of their folly Nay when Satan himself came and set upon him with his subtlest temptations that he could possibly finde out yet our Saviour without deliberation and study immediatly answered him so fully that he could not so much as reply but was fain to fly to another temptation and no marvell for he was the wisedom of the Father 3. Consider the wonderful and exceeding holiness of Christ when he was in the height of all his Agonies and Sufferings he abated not any thing of his love and confidence in God For his Sufferings did not make him forget or diminish any thing no not in the least circumstance of his graces or of any thing that the Law required at his hands To be so freely willing to have that Agony continue which was unspeakable and as the torments of Hell if his Father pleased was more then if those in Hell should freely submit to endure the torments they suffer The holinesse of those in heaven is not comparably so much greater then the weakest Saint on earth As the Holinesse of Christ was greater whilest he lived on earth then that of those in heaven Nay all the Saints on earth are fil'd from his fulnesse For he is the Fountain that conveys to his Saints as they are able to receive the infinite Ocean of the holinesse of the God-head No marvell that the Angels when they saw his glory cried out Holy Holy Lord God of Sabbaths 4 Consider that notwithstanding all these infinite Excellencies in Christ he thought it no robbery to be equall to the Father yet how exceedingly did he humble himself and how gracious was he The poorest man or woman in the world nay the greatest sinner that truly repented with what love did he receive them He was the Son of Righteousnesse from whom the Angels receive their glory and yet he disdains not to shine upon such dunghils as we are It is strange O my Soul to consider how willing Christ was to please every one only provided it was in things that were not for their hurt that desired them Many times nay most times when others were with him when he in respect of himself only would have done otherwise yet he did as their desires required Rom. 15.3 The Apostle saith even Christ pleased not himself many times when he was hungry If any came to him that needed Instruction or if he were sleepy and any came to him that needed consolation he would abstain from meat and sleep that he might do them good It is not so with great men but it was so with Christ who was the great God Affections and Resolutions 1. Admire the Excellencies of Christ O blessed Saviour thou art the chiefest of ten thousand Thou art altogether lovely Thou hast a Name above all Names that at thy Name every knee should bow Thou Lord art set at the right hand of the Father in the heavenly places Farre above all principality and power and might and dominion and every Name that is named not only in this world but also in that which is to come Thou art the brightness of thy Fathers Glory and the expresse Image of his Person Consider O my Soul what can these words mean Surely if God commanded all the Angels to worship him when he brought him into the world how much more should we for whom he hath done much more admire and adore him in Spirit and in Truth Be confounded and ashamed that thou art not more affected with these things Doubtlesse O my Soul It is not for want of excellency in Christ for he is the Lord of glory but for want of a clearer Faith in thee to behold his excellencies If the Scripture had not spoke the thousandth part of Christ as it doth how could thy thoughts have been lower of him then they are how could thy heart be more sencelesse It is a shame that every vanity should steal away our hearts from Christ much more abominable is it that our very sins that murthered him should ever prevail with us in the least Pray Blessed God 't is not in man by all his wisedom and industry to know or be affected with the Excellencies of Christ if thou dost not reveal them If I had a thousand worlds they were too small a price for so great a mercy O shew me thy self and thy Sonne and it sufficeth And now O my Soul are the Excellencies of Christ nothing unto us Do we indeed admire them Surely all is but meer words and vain thoughts if we do not strive as farre as we may to imitate him in those Excellencies for which we pretend to admire him Are we patient as he was meek humble holy who when he was reviled reviled not again c. We do but deceive our own souls in giving glorious titles and speaking high things of Christ and in the mean while not endeavour to transform into his Image It is impossible we should love him for his patience and holinesse and not love patience and holinesse not yet never care to practise and get them Therefore for the time to come the life of Christ shall be the example whereby I shall endeavour to frame mine And that I may the better do so I will reade over especially the New Testament and observe in every particular what Christ did how he spoke to his Friends to his Enemies how he demeaned himself in every action whether civil or natural or Religious how in all his Relations And when I have written them down I shall often peruse them and shall endeavour in every action that I do and word that I speak to remember if I can whether there be any parallel instance in the life of Christ if there be I shall make that my patern and do likewise but if there be none that I can think of then I would do that which in my conscience I think Christ would have done in like case For the Conclusion I refer you to the Directions and Instances of former Meditations The Conclusion of the whole I Found a great deal of difficulty in writing this small Treatise of Meditation not in the doctrinal or directory part because Christian experience and study are things by which that party is managed but in the setting down of instances and examples therein I found the difficulty to lie For Meditation is an harder work then to give Directions thereunto aand I have generally found it easier to study a day then to meditate an hour but of all the kindes of Meditation whereof Instances are set down in this Book I found the greatest difficulty in those of Solemne Occasionall Meditations they consisting for the most part of praier which the devout soul when it hath ended
forgets so that if one might gain a world when the heart is overwhelmed with grief or inflamed with love or ravished with joy one could not remember the powrings out of the soul In such cases one may say of such Meditations as St Paul speaks of those glorious things which he saw when he was wrapt into the third Heavens they are neither lawful nor possible to be uttered many times the secrets in our communion with God are of that nature that it is not lawful by reason of that scardal nor possible to utter because the affections being so intensly employ'd invention memory and intellectual actings of the Soul during that time do almost quite cease and indeed whosoever goes about to invent instances of Meditation if it be only a learned man and not holy his studies may exceed his actings that way but if it be an holy experienced Christian as his inward thoughts of love joy grief and admirings of God are above all that his tongue doth or can utter so those secret expressions which he useth between God and his own soul when his thoughts are full of heaven and of God are much beyond what he can invent or by stndy expresseth Therefore since those Meditations that are fullest of devotion cannot be remembred to set down Instances of Meditations except one should take them from some Saint as he was powring out his soul before God in secret one can never set them fully down in secret I say For the soul is never so free nor may be before others as with God alone and the truth is if I had not had these Instances of Solemn Meditation by me I think I should hardly have set down any of that kinde I should only have referr'd him to the Psalms It was so that I wrote these from the mouth of one to whom though unseen I was oft times so near that I could hear his secretest devotions if uttered though but with an ordinary voice I am very confident for his part he thought that none but God and his own Soul were privy to his Praiers I have sometimes considered it as a case of Conscience whether it was lawfull by stealth to hear and afterwards to publish the private Meditations of others but considering how much advantage it may bring to others and how the party himself can suffer nothing in it his Name being concealed by me I resolve to publish them besides I very well know as I said before that the spiritual expressions between God and ones own soul in secret are forgotten almost as soon as ended It is very unlikely that any should remember them ten years after as the most of these are I thought good to give an account of this matter lest I should be thought to have that holy frame of heart which many of the expressions in these Meditations argues that he had that used them and arrogate to my self that which is farre from me If any shall be offended at the brevity and shortnesse of my Directions for this great and weighty businesse of Meditation I shall only say thus much as to that 1. That I am not willing to overcharge or affright new beginners for for such I do very much intend this Treatise with too great a number of particulars 2. I would not have this swell above the bignesse of a Manuall for I have often observed that when one hath perswaded some to buy some Book and told them it hath been but a small price it hath been almost as strong a motive the smalnesse of the price as the goodnesse of the Book and I would not be willing that both these Motives should be wanting to the Buying of this Book As for the plainnesse of the Stile or matter I shall thus excuse it if it oughto be excused I wrote this for the meanest and ignorantest sort of Christians that they might buy and understand it that they might buy it I have made it a Manuall that they might understand it I have made it plain and spoke to them in their own language and to the Learned I say if any such shall reade this Treatise Indocti repiunt coelum and though I highly prize Learning yet I know that as to praier and meditation and all other acts of devotion wherein we keep a strict Communion with God and watch over our own souls an experimental knowledge and acquaintance with and inflam'd affections towards God will more avail us then all the Learning in the world and doubtless it is not generally ignorance in those that live under Ordinances but the non-improvement of the Truths we know that will undoe us if we did but improve these plain truths viz. that God is that there will be a Day of Judgement that we must die that we ought to love God with all our heart with all our soul with all our minde with all our strength that we should do as we would be done to I say if we did but improve these into practice we should attain to more holinesse then if we knew a thousand times more and left those truths as generally men do by them as things forgotten I doe very much think that the truths of Religion have been spun into too fine a thred of late daies and some have observed that fewer have been converted of late years then formerly when fundamentals have been plainly powerfully and practically prest upon the conscience it is an errour to think that notions so they be spirituall cannot be too acute or speculative I have one thing to entreat of the Christian Reader and it was one end of publishing this Treatise that I might with it publish these my desires the thing that I am to request of you will neither be charge nor trouble It is your frequent serious fervent praiers that I desire of you I know it is us'd too much as a complement among Christians to desire prayers of their Christian friends and they are too often superficially promis'd and too seldom conscienciously perform'd nor would I have thee whosoever thou art that fearest God account this my Request as a thing of course and that it is at thy liberty to grant it or no for suppose a poor distressed man overwhelm'd and almost swallowed up with the sense of his miseries and wants should with tears and strong importunities begge relief of thee Dost thou think it were an arbitrary thing when it was in thy power to relieve him or not Mightst thou not justly expect that the the next time thou wentst to pour out thy soul before God that he should keep by him the denial that thou gavest that poor man and give it thee when thou in the distressed thoughts of thy heart madst thy praier to him and dost thou think that the Lord will hold thee guiltlesse when one whose afflictions are many corruptions strong temptations to _____ shall in the anguish and bitternesse of his spirit desire thy praiers and thou refuse or neglect Consider whether at the day of judgement thou wilt have any sufficient excuse to pleade I have sometimes thought that the Bils that have publikely been put up for the praiers of the Congregation have been too little regarded it may be they have been too customarily and formally put up it may be so but it is not good for us to be Judges of evil thoughts little do we know what terrouts and fears and anguishes of spirit overwhelm them while they are so little regarded by us O that we were sensible of others afflictions and sorrows whether spiritual or temporal as they themselves are and as we would have them to be of ours were our souls in their souls stead and if the Lord should so by his providence order it as to bring us into those straits which we saw our Brother in and would not afford him so much as our prayers may we not justly expect that the next time that we our selves are in streights our consciences should take up a Parable and taunting Proverb against us and say as Josephs Brethren did we are verily guilty concerning our Brother in that we saw the anguish of his soul when he besought us and we would not hear therefore is all this distresse come upon us And that which I would desire thee to begge of God for me is That he would give me sincerely to aim at his glory in all my actions but especially those that belong to my Ministry that I might not be as a broken vessell and that he would give me greater discoveries of and love to himself and the Lord Jesus Christ and that he would give me gifts and strength and wisedom opportunity and a heart to serve him and mercies suitable to my wants that mine afflictions may be sanctified my temptations conquered and my corruptions mortified One thing more I am to request of thee that is to do what I know too much neglected by my self and I fear by others Thou art to pray for a blessing upon thy self when thou readest this Treatise and that God would make it a blessing unto others also into whose hands it shall come I desite you that you would help me with your praiers in this particular When we do but take our ordinary daily bread we crave a blessing how much more when we do things that concern our eternall good When we take a Book to that end spiritually to benefit by it do we think that it is in our own power or in the power of any Treatise that we reade without Gods assistance to do us good Nay the Word of God it self is but a dead Letter if the holy Spirit be absent when we hear or reade it But that thou shouldest desire a Blessing upon thy self in reading of this Book is not all I request of thee but that thou wouldest also extend thy prayers further even for others that it may be also for their edification whosoever shall reade it For as we are to pray that every Sermon we hear may be for the spirituall advantage of others as well as of our selves It holds also in reading of Treatises of Devotion FINIS