their blood but to love them so as to be willing to let out his blood for their good if it might be The maxim that some have labored to infuse into Princes I had rather be feared than be loved it is a maxim only beseeming Tyranny and no way sutable to an ingenuous spirit but to a base and sordid spirit Certainly that man be he what he will that is acted by that principle is a man of a sordid and low spirit a man of a generous spirit and of an ingenuous spirit would rather be beloved than be feared Let every man seek to gain another by love If you strive otherwise to gain any but by love First You are not likely to prevail Secondly If you do prevail there will be so much trouble before you do prevail that it will not be worth the having when you do prevail Thirdly When you have your will upon them they do the thing that you would have them they dare not do otherwise I but they hate you though What good is this for a man to have his will upon another if in the mean time he hates him Then Fourthly If you do not prevail by love They will do no more than just needs must and this is the reason indeed why Hypocrites do so little for God God hath never gained their hearts by Love but only by fear and therefore they will do no more for God than they must of necessity whereas as I said before love never propounds bounds And then Fiftly If you do not get them by Love they watch for all opportunities to fling off Now what a poor gain is this to gain one with a deal of trouble and for him to do what I would have him and yet to hate me and to do no more than needs must and then to wath for all opportunities to appear against me Where fore my Brethren for the close of this Note let us follow after Love and provoke one another to Love you will find sweetness in your own Love and sweetness that you get by Love in the very exercise of Love you will find sweetness and then the Love that you get by others you will find that sweet and you will find it so much the sweeter because you get it by Love And then further another Note is this Seeing Love hath such bonds in it Let us make use of the Love of God to bind our hearts to him You have heard that Love hath bonds And then you have heard that we should do as God doth And then Thirdly Is this Gods way Oh! let us make use of all the Love that ever God hath shewen unto us for to gain our hearts unto himself And this would be a large Theam to speak of if we should lanch into it if I should come to open unto you what the Love of God hath been to you how much Love God hath shewn to the Nation and to our selves for the gaining of our hearts Oh the many twists of this Cord 't is a strong Cord indeed to bind us to God In Deut. 11. 13. If thou shalt diligently love the Lord thy God there 's that that he requires of them after what he hath done for them If thou wilt but diligently love the Lord thy God That 's that that God seeks by al his love to work our hearts to Love Not to speak now of the Love of God to you as you are Creatures nor as you are Men But a little to speak of the Love of God to you as you are Saints I shall shew you very briefly what strong Cords of Love God hath cast upon you to gain your hearts to himself to love him As first Gods Love to you if you be Saints it is eternal Love before ever you were born the bowels of God yerned towards you as I may so speak with holy reverence God was twisting these bonds of love from all eternity that he might gain your hearts God was thinking that in such a time there shall be such and such men and women that shall live upon the earth I 'le make preparation by such bonds now as shall unite and fasten them close to my self when ever it comes to be revealed to them It was love from eternity Oh! the Transactions that were between the Father and the Son from all eternity for to manifest love to your souls the great Counsels I say that were transacted between the Father and the Son before the world was were about these Bonds of Love to you Secondly It 's choise Love when he left many thousands he set his heart upon you Mal. 1. 2. Was not Esau Jacob's brother saith God Yet I loved Jacob. So wert not thou of such a Familie and yet thou seest how God hath cast off a great part of that Familie and yet hath he loved thee Wert not thou such a ones brother such a ones sister that remained wicked and ungodly and it may be died so and yet God hath loved thee he hath past by so many great ones in the world and so many of thy kindred and rather pitcht his Love upon thee It 's choise Love and therefore this might gain thee to himself Thirdly It is free Love the Love of God is free so you have it in Hos 14. 4. I will love them freely and in Deut. 7. 7. The Lord did not set his love upon you nor chuse you because you were more in number than any people for you were the fewest of all people God there would manifest his love to his people to gain their hearts to him saith he The Lord did not set his love upon you because you were more Why then did God set his love upon us in the 8. verse but because he loved thee It 's a strange arguing The Lord did not set his love upon you because you were more but the Lord did set his love upon you because he loved you he could go no higher There can be no other reason why the Lord should love you but because he did love you We use to say it 's a womans reason to say I will do such a thing because I wil do it Now if any of you would have a reason why God loved you why thus He loved me because he loved me The Lord did not set his love upon you for this reason but he did set his love upon you because he loved you So it is a free love Oh! let the freeness of it be another Ingredient so as to bind your hearts unto him Fourthly God hath so loved you as he gave his Son for you So God loved us Sometimes it hath been in the thoughts of men whether there might not he more worlds than this world Certainly God in his infinit power he might make a thousand worlds more glorious than this such worlds as the meanest Creature in those worlds might be as high in excellencie above the
is called The first begotten of all creatures and the blessing upon the first born was a type of the blessing that we have by Christ Now though this in an orderly way belonged to Esau as being the first-born yet Jacob's taking of him by the heel was a certain token from God that Jacob should supplant him and that he should get the birthright from him and so the blessing from him and in that Jacob should thus get the blessing though he were the yonger and this sign was given of it when he was in the womb this did shew the free election of God that it was through Gods meer free Grace that Jacob had the blessing rather than Esau and so that the posterity of Jacob were in a better condition than the posterity of Esau It was only the free Grace of God not from any excellency in Jacob any worthines in him more than in Esau for God shewed a sign of it that he intended good when they were in the womb before Jacob could do any thing that was good Though Esau was the Elder stronger hairy active stout man and Jacob a plain man yet Jacob is chosen Esau is rejected and God shews the sign of this by his taking his brother by the heel Now this concern'd the people very much they understanding this to be the scope of it As if he should say What you are the posterity of Jacob and not of Esau and you glory in this Wel how comes it to pass there is so great a priviledge to the posterity of Iacob rather than to the posterity of Esau how comes this Is it not from the free Grace of God in chusing one rather than the other that in the very womb as in Mal. 1. 2. I have loved you saith the Lord yet ye say Wherein hast thou loved us Was not Esau Jacob's brother saith the Lord yet I loved Jacob and hated Esau In this I manifested my free love even unto this people that though Esau was Iacob's brother and eldest brother yet I loved Iacob and hated Esau So in Rom. 9. 11. The children being not yet born neither having done good or evil that the purpose of God according to election might stand not of works but of him that calleth It was said The elder shall serve the yonger as it is written Jacob have I loved but Esau have I hated Now this was to shew Gods free grace that it was in the womb If any should say But God foresaw that Jacob would be a better man than Esau I answer If it were of foreseen works there were no Argument in this to prove Gods free election but the Apostle makes it to be an Argument to prove Gods free election of Iacob rather than Esau because he chose them in the womb Luther upon the 25. Chap. of Genesis hath an excellent discourse upon this subject concerning Gods rejecting the pride pomp and vanity of the world and chusing the things that are mean and contemptible in the eyes of the world and it was an emblem of it in that God would rather chuse Iacob the plain man than Esau the hunter and the hairy man I say it was an emblem of this That the Lord intends to reject the brave things in the world the galantry glory and pomp of the world and wil rather chuse the mean and contemptible things of the world Who can perswade saith Luther upon the place the Pope and Charls the fifth the French King and the like that they being great in the world yet are contemptible in the eyes of God and God hath rather chosen despised and contemptible things than them And that was the scope of the Prophet to humble this people that they should consider of the free grace of God towards Jacob. And we should make use of this We are to consider the free Grace of God how it hath wrought in chusing our for fathers and what good we do enjoy by such a choice we are to acknowledg it to be a fruit of free Grace too Others were before God as well as our forefathers as now when God brought the Gospel first to England other Nations were before God as well as them It was meer free Grace that pitcht upon them rather than others and we enjoy the blessing of it to this day let us not sin against this free Grace of God shewed to our Ancestors And more particularly You that now enjoy great blessings from Gods mercies to your Ancestors either outward or inward you must consider the free Grace of God as now such of you as are rich great in the world whence is it that your Ancestors were richer than others and were not beggers as well as others Was it not free Grace free Grace in in the kind of it it was the free goodness of God Others that had their Ancestors to be beggers they were before God in the same lump with your Ancestors and that God should rather pitch upon your Ancestors to be honorable in the earth and rich and you enjoy the benefit of it in this world look to the free goodness of God that hath made such a difference between your Ancestors and others it may be some of you though you be honorable and rich yet your elder Brother might be rejected and sometimes Families rises from the yonger Brother rather than the elder It was so here Iacob that was the yonger he afterwards came to have the blessing and Esau rejected And it may be that the posterity of the elder Brother proves wicked it was so here Religion in the Family of Jacob and not in Esau look back to this and see what cause you have to bless God and how you are engaged to the free Grace of God towards you in regard of your Ancestors as here the Prophet would have this people look back to the free Grace of God to their Father Jacob and that 's the first thing the Prophet aim'd at But in the Second place Jacob took his Brother by the heel That is as if he should say your Father Iacob he was greedy of the blessing greedy of the birth-right there was a secret in stinct of God upon the spirit of Iacob when he was in the very womb to be greedy of the blessing of the birthright and therefore he would do what he could to get it from his Brother as if the Prophet should say Oh! but you that are his posterity you are carnal you do not regard the priviledg of the birthright you do not regard the blessing that comes by it being carnal you care not which way that goes so be it you may but live and have your ease and contentment to the flesh Oh! you are not like your Father Iacob that was so greedy to have this blessing We are to make use of this for our instruction thus some of you that have had your parents very forward in their youth betimes some of your
when God loved him you may find in Ezek. 16. 4 5. c. And as for thy Nativity in the day that thou wast born thy navel was not cut neither wast thou washed in water to supple thee thou wast not salted at all nor swadled at all and then in the 5. verse None eye piâ—ed thee to do any of these unto thee to bave compassion upon thee but thou wast cast out in the open field to the loathing of thy person in the day that thou wast born then in the 6. verse And when I passed by tree and saw thee polluted in thine own blood I said unto thee when thou wast in thy blood Livâ— yet I said unto thee when thou wast in thy blood Live Again and again and then in the 8. verse Now when I passed by thee and looked upon thee behold thy time was the time of love and I spread my skirt over thee and covered thy nakedness yea I sware unto thee and entred into a Covenant with thee saith the Lord God and thou becamest mine Well but wherein did God manifest that he did love Israel when he was a Child Mark the 8. verse When I passed by thee and looked upon thee behold thy time was the time of love and I spread my skirt over thee and covered thy nakedness yea I sware unto thee and entred into a Covenant with thee saith the Lord and thou becamest mine The Love of God to Israel i exprest in these three particulars First That God made a Covenant with him Oh 't is a great mercy of God and a fruit of great love that such an infinite God would be pleased to make a Covenant with his people to bring them into Covenant with him all man-kind was in Covenant with God at first but falling from that first Covenant there was but only a peculier people that God took into Covenant with himself and made it as a fruit of his great love to take a certain people into Covenant with himself more than others And secondly Thou becamest mine that is I had separated thee for my self and took thee for a peculier one to me and intended special mercy and goodness to thee Thou becamest mine so as that I should have a special propriety in thee and thou shouldest have a special propriety in me And then thirdly I confirmed all this by an Oath I sware this unto thee Was not here love for God to Covenant to take in to such propriety and to swear that we should be his Thus when Israel was a child I loved him that 's the meaning of this Scripture Now the Note of Observation is this First That it is the priviledg of the Church and of the Saints for God to love them God loves his people this is their priviledge he loves them with a special love In the 12. of Jer. 7. they are called the dearly beloved of Gods soul see how God loves his people God he delights in his Saints and there is nothing in the world that should sanctifie a gracious heart more than this That God loves him And as Gods love is extraordinary to them more than to other People so their love again should be reflected upon God in a more than ordinary way There 's nothing can be a recompence to Love but Love that 's certain Love is never satisfied but with Love And therefore seeing God professes love to his people he doth expect love from them therefore he will not be satisfied with any duties you perform whatsoever you do but it must be out of Love Love must have Love and know that you cannot prize Gods love more than God prizes yours there is nothing in Heaven and Earth that God prizes more than the love of his Saints and therefore if ever Gods love or Gods prizing of your love may gain love Oh you Saints love the Lord. That 's the first But Secondly It 's a great aggravation unto sin to sin against love For to that end God here shews that he loved them that he might aggravate their sin so much the more and cleer himself Many times you make in the daies of your humiliation and at other times many aggravations of your sin that your sin it is against knowledge this is great That your sin it is of an hainous nature that it doth a great deal of hurt that it brings you under dreadful threatnings that it provokes the wrath of an infinite God against you these are great things for the humbling of your hearts for sin But above all aggrevations for sin this is the great aggravation That your sin is against Love that though God hath shown much love to you yet you sin against a loving God and a gracious God God begins with this aggravation being his scope here to cleer himself and to charge his people of ungratefulness yet God loved them Oh! sins against love are great sins indeed But Thirdly I loved him when he was a child 〈◊〉 very 〈…〉 to mind Gods old love That 's the Third Note The love of God unto us when we were children yea the love of God unto our fore-fathers the love of God unto a people when they were at the first beginning the ancient love of God to a people 't is of very g 〈…〉 use it is of great use for al to consider of the love of God in former times to them nay brethren it would be of very great use for us to consider of ancient love of God to England And I will give you one remarkable Note of Gods antient love to this Nation that 's this That it was the first Nation that ever God set his heart upon for the chusing of the Gospel the first Nation in the world that by publick Authority did submit to the Gospel and certainly God remembers that love of England For we find it recorded it 's true we cannot expect Scripture for this because it was â—â—nce the time of any Scripture but so far as we may give any credit to Stories we find it of all Nations upon the face of the Earth the first that received the Gospel with the Countenance of Publick Authority And this is not a little matter Certainly the Lord remembers the kindness of our youth and the old love of England and the first love of England in receiving the Gospel Indeed God caused the Gospel to be preached to other places before it was to England I but there was no placâ— that by the countenance of Publick Authority 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it so soon as England did and therefore England may be said to be the very first fruits of the Gospel in that respect Oh! 't is good for us to consider of that and many good uses we may make of Gods old ancient love when we see any further expressions of Gods love it may encourage us upon the thoughts of his former love there was an old love and this God continues his old
I remember the kindness of thy youth saith God For yong people to love God Oh! God loves that God loves the love of yong ones the love of children how sweet will old age be to thee if thou canst say thus Lord through thy mercy I have loved thee from a child and that 's an evidence that thou didest love me when I was a child How many are there now that are old whom God loved when they were yong that would give ten thousand worlds if they had them that they had known and loved God sooner than they have done Though it 's true I lived in wickedness almost all my daies and yet at length God manifested himself to me and by that I know God hath loved me from eternity but Oh! that I had loved God from a child I say those whose eyes God enlightens and hearts God converts to himself would give ten thousand thousand worlds that they could but say this Oh that I had but loved God from a child You who are children and yong ones do you begin betimes to love God that if you live to be old you may say that God loved you from a child It was an excellent speech of Austin when God pleased to work upon his heart Lord I loved thee too late And so it will be with any that do begin to love God they will say that they loved God too late and it will be the great burden to their souls that they loved God so late as they did And called my Son out of Egypt I call'd him that is by Moses and Aaron I sent them to call them out of Egypt and bring them from thence and this seems to have reference to that Scripture in Exod. 4. 22. where the Lord saith Israel is my Son even my first born Moses comes to Pharaoh in the Name of God to have Israel out of Egypt and he coms to Pharaoh after this manner and Tell him that God saith Israel is my son even my first born so in Jer. 31. 9. I am a Father to Israel and Ephraim is my first born My son The Seventy have it in the plural My sons his sons out of Egypt but in the Hebrew it is in the singular I called my son out of Egypt and although the holy-Ghost speaks of al the people in general yet he puts them in the singular number and in their very community they are cal'd the son of God The Church that 's the Note from hence is related to God as a son to the father yea the very first-born what God speaks of the people of Israel is especially intended towards his Saints which are the true Israel of God they have the priviledg to be sons unto God to be children Is it a light matter saith David to be the son in Law to to a King but then what do you think it is to be the son to the King of Heaven and Earth and the Heir of Heaven and Earth Is Ephraim my dear son Jer. 31. 20. Ephraim my dear son This is the priviledg therfore of the Saints that God deals with them as sons I 'le spare them as a Father spareth his own son that serveth him in the third Chapter of Malachy the 17. verse And the special priviledg that they have from this is that they are not under that Law that slaves are under in reference to God those that are in the state of slaverie they are under this Law Do or Die if thou doest offend but in the least thou shalt perish for ever the curse of the Law is upon thee But the Sons of God are brought into another condition not to be under that Law they indeed if they do offend may be corrected and chastized but they are never under the Law of the sentence of eternal death for their offence there 's a great deal of difference between the administration of God towards Slaves and towards Sons This is the great priviledg of Son-ship That thou art not under the Law thou art brought under another Law under the Law of Jesus Christ that though thy sin indeed of its own nature if God should deal with thee in Justice would be enough to put thee under an eternal Curse yet being a Son God puts thee under another Law and doth not deal with thee by that Law that pronounces a Curse against every sin They are Sons Secondly Let wicked men who have to deal with Gods people when any of the Saints of God are under their power let them take heed how they use them For they are Sons they are not Slaves they are the Sons of the eternal God in Jer. 2. 14. Is Israel a Servant is he a home-born Slave why is he spoiled How comes it to pass that Israel is dealt withall so as he is What is not Israel a Son When as any of the people of God are under the power of any men God looks upon them as Sons and if they deal hardly with them God will enquire and will say thus Is such a one a slave had he been a slave I would not so much have car'd for your dealings thus with him but he is a Son You find in the Acts that they were afraid when they heard that Paul was a Roman When thou knowest thou hast to deal with a Son of God know that thou hast not so much liberty to misuse him as thou hast to misuse another man though no liberty to misuse any Thirdly The Saints are not only Sons in their particular relation but in their Community they are sons too Take them joyn'd together as the members of the Church and so the whole Community of the Church now is but as one Son I called my Son out of Egypt He speaks of the whole Body of Israel Now the Lord looks upon the Community of his Church as one Son in the singular number There are many priviledges that do belong to the Church of God in their Community as well as in their particular relation And they should labor to unite themselves much together seeing God puts them altogether in the singular number Oh! the Lord loves unity in his Church Though a Son yet in Egipt That 's the Note further from thence That Gods Sons are not free from sore and grievous evils in this world though they be Sons yet they may go into Egipt In Jer. 12. 7. I have for saken mine house I have left mine heritage I have given the dearly beloved of my Soul into the hands of her enemies Though the dearly beloved of Gods Soul yet given into the hands of enemies Though Gods Son yet goes into Egypt So the Church under Antichrist for above twelve hundred years God gave up his Sons into that spiritual Egypt We must not think therefore as soon as we come under greivous afflictions that God hath cast us off from being Sons though they were in
through Love that you come to be like minded and do not think to force men into the same mind to use bitter language and expressions to men if they differ in judgment from your selves But if there be any Love be of the same mind labor to get into one anothers hearts if you would do good to one another As a Minister if he would do good to his People he must labor to get into their hearts that the people may love him therefore it hath been observed that your wrangling Ministers and bitter men that if they be but crost in any thing they presently went their own bitterness they never do any good at all But those that can be willing to deny themselves and willing to suffer for the Case of the Gospel they prevail most And so if you would do good for any of your kindred do what you ca 〈…〉 get into their hearts that they may love you and so 〈◊〉 may be a means to draw them to the waies of God 〈…〉 y Love you may come to have any liberty in their hearts that you would you may say what you will if once they be perswaded that you love them then you may ask more liberty to reprove any thing that is evil in them and to perswade them to any thing that is good then they take nothing ill from you and therefore 't is a great disadvantage that men of sowr and bitter spirits have in obtaining their own designs if they once speak any thing though never so good yet it is rejected because that people think it is not out of Love But on the other side it is a mighty advantage that a sweet and loving disposition hath let such an one speak never so though the thing be never so harsh yet the party will take it wel because he knows he loves him Oh! these bonds of love my brethren they are mighty strong When you meet together in any Society if you would have any thing do not seek to get your wil by wrangling and frowardness but by bonds of Love I confess there are some men that are of such perverse spirits that the neerer one comes to them the further they go from one that they have even lost all ingenuity but if you have to deal with men that you think to be gracious and to be ingenious then do not think to gain any thing from them but by Love These bonds of Love that here we have in the Text the Devil seeks to break the great design of the Devil it is to make men to have hard thoughts of God his waies and to make them beleeve that God hates them and that though they have some good things from God for the present yet that the heart of God is not towards them and so labors to make a separation between the soul and God And so the great design of the Devil is to break the bonds of Love between Christian and Chistian It was a fearful judgment that we reade of in Zach. 11. 14. when the staff that was called Bonds was broken even the Brotherhood between Judah and Israel he threatens it as a Judgment I 'le break the bonds of brotherhood And then you find that the staff of Beauty was broken when the staff of bonds was broken My brethren never was the bonds of Love more broken among Christians than they are now We reade of bands of Love but what 's become of them They are broken They were in former times so twisted as I told you the word in the Hebrew signifies love so twisted into so many Wreaths as one would have thought they could never have been broken but whatsoever the matter is we find they snap asunder Oh! how justly might God bind us with Iron bonds seeing that the bonds of Love will not bind us God hath cut the Cords of divers of our yokes asunder and hath broken the bonds of the oppressor and now behold we break the bonds of Love Oh! unworthy wretches that we are every one of us looks with a jealous eye one upon another every one shifting for himself there are no bonds of love in our hearts the wicked in Scripture are said to die without bonds that 's Gods patience that they shall die without bonds but wo to us we live without bonds and that 's our sin and the wrath of God upon us in Eccles 3. 8. There is a time to love when is the time Certainly if ever there were a time to love then this is a time to love And there is a time to hate Oh Divine Love whither art thou gone hast thou left the earth as unworthy of thy beauty and glory Oh! that thou wouldest come again unto the hearts of the Saints and bind them together The want of the bonds of Love every one complains of Oh! those soul-refreshing and soul-ravishing meetings that we were wont to have But especially more publickly we find the bonds of Love quite gone and quite broken reade but over the 1 Cor. 13. and see the effects of Love there and by that you will find the bonds of Love quite to be gone Love the Scripture tells us it thinks no evil it maks the best interpretation of things that can be Now surely there 's a great deal of want of love amongst us that when men in the uprightness and sincerity of their hearts shall desire to find out the mind of God and the will of God and meerly out of conscience because they dare not go any further than they see the mind of God to go before them therefore they shall be judged to be a stiff-necked people and to be the great hinderers of Reformation Is this the best interpretation that possibly can be made of things Is it not possible why there should be some other grounds why they differ from their brethren but meerly stiff-neckedness how if it should be owned by Jesus Christ at the great day That it was out of sincerity because they did desire to know the mind of Jesus Christ fully and yet they could not see what their brethren say they did We should make the best interpretation of things that possibly we can Love it cures all things and it bears all things now for such publick striking against any such forbearance and crying out that we would have a Tolleration of all things u◠Religion this is the great argument when they know in their consciences that their brethren do joyn with them in the Doctrinal part of Religion and in the main things and those things wherein they differ are things of no such great moment but may be forborn with peace enough if mens hearts were peaceable and still now to in fuse that into the peoples heads that if they were but in any thing forborn there must be a tolleration of all things surely this is not any fruit of Love this is not that which the holy Ghost
Sun as the Sun is high above a piece of earth But now this we may know let there be never such excellent Creatures made they cannot have a greater fruit of love than mankind hath from God Oh! this is the love of God to mankind this cals aloud to the children of men to love God here 's a fruit of love beyond that which is to Angels for the Lord took not upon him the Nature of Angels but the Nature of man Fifthly God so loved his people as he hath given himself too as well as his Son Not only given the Second Person in Trinity but Himself He doth not think enough to give Heaven and Earth to thee to be thy Portion but he will make Himself to be thy portion he will be thy God You would think it a great matter if God should say Well all this world I will give to be thy portion yea that I might give a testimony that I love thee I will make another world for thy sake and make thee the Emperor of it all but in that God hath given thee his Son and given thee Himself this is a greater degree of Love and the soul of man were it enlarged indeed so as it might be yea so as grace doth enlarge the hearts of the Saints such a soul would say Lord what will thou give me if thou givest me not thy Son if thou givest me not thy Self though I be less than the least of thy mercies yet except I have thy self to be my protion this is not sufficient for me Well saith God That thou maiest know that my heart is set upon thee for good I 'le give thee my Son I 'le give thee my self and my Spirit Oh! what love is this to the children of men that ever we should live to have our ears filled with this sound from Heaven that God should do such things as these are for the children of men Sixthly God doth so love his people as in comparison of his Saints he cares not what becomes of all the world in Isa 43. 4. I loved thee therefore will I give men for thee and people for thy life If thy case be so that it shall not be well with thee without great evils that shall come upon the children of men the generality of men and many people and Nations I do not so much care for them saith God my heart is upon you so as in comparison of you I care not what becomes of all the world Oh the Love of God unto his Saints Yea further God hath loved thee so as he hath pardoned all thy sins here 's another twist of Gods Love in Rev. 1. 5. Vnto him that hath loved us and washed us from our sins by his own blood For his giving himself for us that is in Gal. 2. 20. He hath loved us and washed us from our sins by his own blood here 's a fruit of Love You do not hear it said that Christ hath loved us and hath purchased great Kingdoms for us hath made you Lords and Earls and Countesses and so hath loved you no But he hath loved us and washed us from our sins by his blood Now it 's a good argument that the Love of God is upon you if you account this to be a great fruit of Love to wash you from your sins by the blood of Jesus Christ Surely if he will do so much for you as shall cost him so dear as his own blood he loves you the Love Jesus Christ broke through these difficulties for when there were such transactions between the Father and Son about redeeming the Soul saith God If thou wilt take upon thee to deliver them from their sin thou must come thy self and be made a Curse for their sins What will you undertake such a thing as that to deliver them from their sin it will cost you thus much Saith Jesus Christ Lord thy will be done in it yet let me deliver them from their sin though I lose my life though it cost me my blood though I be made a Curse whatsoever it cost me yet let their sins be washed from them He hath washed us from our sins though it cost him his blood Oh! the Love of Christ to his Saints what Bonds of Love have we here I have seen some that they may twist and bind their cords the more fast they will wet them that so they may close and bind the more Oh the Cords of the Love of Jesus Christ are wet with his own blood Again Loved thee surely his Love hath been great he hath put loveliness upon thee he hath put upon thee his own Nature If one can say any thing greater than hath been said this one would think should be very high and great tor God so love us as to put his own Nature into us to make us partaker of the Divine Nature so to love us as to put his own Life into us to enable us to live the very same life that himself doth live so to love us as to put his own Image upon us Oh! this is the Love of God to his Saints Again He loves thee with the very same Love wherewith he loves Jesus Christ himself In John 17. about the latter end That thou maiest love them with the same Love wherewith thou hast loved me saith Christ to the Father Oh! to have the same Love that the Father loves Christ withal Is not this a strong Bond to bind thy heart to God If God had loved thee only so as to give thee an estate and honors here in this world this is no other love but that the Reprobate may have and will this Love satisfie thee Oh! the difference between the Love of God to his Saints and the Love of God to other men he loves the great ones of the world that are wicked with no other love but with the love that he loves a Reprobate but he loves the Saints with the same Love wherewith he loves his Son and this Love will bring thee one day to be one with the Father and the Son and is not here a strong Bond of Love to gain thy heaâ—t to Himself And further from this it must needs be that the Lord must delight in Communion with his Saints and indeed God doth all this for his Saints puts the Divine Nature into them and the Life of God and sets so much Love upon them why that he might have a people to enjoy everlasting Communion with him saith God I would fain have some Creatures that might live with me to enjoy communion with me that might live to see my face and see all the Glory that I intend to manifest to all eternity Oh blessed God! hast not thou the Angels that are with thee to enjoy thy Glory to have communion with thee no saith God but I would have these poor creatures that are so low and mean in the
world I would have them to be raised up to enjoy communion with my self this is the end of Gods bestowing any Grace upon his Saints it is that he might raise them to enjoy communion with him and to delight in him and he to delight in them that he might have creatures to communicate the treasures of his goodness too and that thou mightest communicate what thou art able to him Surely Christ doth not account himself to be full without his Saints and therefore you find in Ephes 1. 23. that the Church is called the Fulness of Jesus Christ and therefore he praies Father let them be where I am I shall not account my self so full except they be with me and see my Glory Oh the Love of Jesus Christ to his Saints And then further This Love it sweetens and sanctifies all for good thou maiest see Love in every thing now though thou hast less of the creature than others have yet thou hast it out of Love when thou comest home it may be thou hast not so much as others have perhaps but a piece of bread and smal drink yea but I have it out of Love look upon all thy mercies and thou mayest see the eternal Love of God to thee in them They are all sanctified to me for the furtherance of eternal good the Lord from all eternity did see that such a kind of life was the best for me to further the eternal good he intended for me and therefore he hath disposed of me to this condition rather than another condition Oh! how sweet may the life of a man or woman be when as they can reason after this manner Well this condition that now I am in the Lord from eternity saw the fittest condition to work my heart to himself and therefore it is that I am in this estate rather than another And then Love thou findest daily by experience how hath the Lord helped thee in thy straights and heard thee in thy prayers and answered thy desires This I told you in the opening of the text was a fruit of Love to the people of Israel and so it hath been with thee And this love is very strange too for though the Lord did forsee all thy weakness and all thy unbeseeming carriages thy unworthines c. yea the Lord did not only foresee what thou wouldest be before he did manifest love but he did forsee how thou wouldst walk unworthy of his love after it was manifested to thee and though he forsaw all this yet still his love was not quenched towards thee but saith the Lord My love shal break thorow all this Many times you set your love upon some and they prove untoward and unworthy and you think with your selves Could I have but foreseen this untowardness they should never have had my love but now the Lord did foresee al thy il requitals and yet it did not hinder the love of God towards thee And then further In the love of God there is the love of all relations As now The love of a father towards a child the Lord takes upon him the relation of a father and the love of a husband the Lord takes upon him the relation of a husband and the love of a friend too that 's sweet And then that that crowns all it is this That it is an abiding love an everlasting love a love that shall never be quenched He that the Lord loves he loves unto the end he will rest in his love Zeph. 3. 17. Jer. 31. 3. 2 Thess 2. 16. If thou knowest that he hath loved thee in his Son thou hast hereby an everlasting consolation let Heaven and Earth meet together let there be what changes and alterations there will yet there is everlasting consolation for thee if thou knewest but this love of God Now my brethren all this I have done to that end that your hearts may be gained unto God And what wilt thou do now Wilt not thou now love the Lord thy God shal not al this love of God to thee in Christ constrain thee The love of Christ constrains me saith the Apostle Oh! love the Lord all ye Saints if the Lord hath thus loved you love ye the Lord all you his Saints Then God is Love himself he is the Element of Love And whither should love go but up to the Element Air it desires to be in its proper place and Earth will descend to its proper place the proper place of Love is God God is as it were the Element of Love for so the Scripture saith God is Love And he that dwels in God dwels in love Oh labor to be rooted and stablished in love in Ephes 3. 17. Being rooted and stablished in love you may be able to comprehend with all Saints what is the length and breadth and depth and heighth and to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledg Being rooted in love thereby ye come to comprehend with all Saints the breadth and length and depth and heigth and to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge It is not the strength of natural parts Learning doth not so much teach us what the length and heighth and depth of the love of Christ is as Love get but your hearts rooted in Love and you wil come to understand the glorious things of the Gospel in another manner than ever you did And mark what follows That you might be filled with all the fulness of God Had we not such an expression in Scripture we should not dare to make use of it What for a poor creature to be filled with God to be filled with the fulness of God to be filled with all the sulness of God! This is the reason why Christians are so scant in their obedience and empty in their spirits because they are not acquainted with this breadth and length and depth and heighth of the love of Christ Oh know that God prizes thy love and he is satisfied with nothing but thy love in Cant. 7. 12. There will I give thee my loves saith the Spouse When thou comest to the Ordinances to hear the Word receive Sacraments or Prayer yet if thou comest not to give the Lord Christ thy loves it is nothing There will I give thee my loves Oh! Christ prizes love at an high rate and that love that will serve for other things certainly will not serve Christ He loves thee too little saith Augustan that loves any thing besides thee who loves not that thing for thee You may love Wife and Children and Friends yea but you must love them all for God when you see any thing lovely in Husband or Wife or children or Friends yea but think this is but a beam of the loveliness of God And thus I have endeavored now to raise your hearts to God by Love the Lord hath cast Bonds of Love upon your souls On that by the Ministry of his
Word this day these Bonds may be somewhat strengthened that you may feel some strength in these Bonds that you may go away with your hearts more strongly united to the Love of God than ever I drew them with the Cords of a man With Bonds of Love and I was to them as they that take off the yoke on their Jaws and I laid meat unto them Part of the last Sermon it was spent in opening unto you these Bonds of Love And shewing First What were the Bonds of Gods Love towards the people of Israel the several expressions of Gods Love to them in several particulars And shewed you how that all those that had to deal with men to draw them to God should do as God doth labor to draw them with Bonds of Love I have especially directed my self unto the Saints of God and shewed to them what bonds of of Love God hath laid upon their hearts to draw them to himself I have not applied this point generally yet for indeed one principal Bond of the Love of God towards the Nation will follow in the words after But certainly the Lord hath sought to draw this Nation to himself with Bonds of Love We may say concerning God he hath loved this Nation Loved it It was the first Nation that ever received Jesus Christ by the countenance of publick Authority of the Supream Authority in the Nation And when Antichrist had darkned the light of the Gospel here the bowels of Gods Compassions yerned towards it and God wrought wonderfully to deliver this Nation from Antichristian Tyrannie Moreover The Lord hath not sent the light and power of the Gospel to any Nation under Heaven more fully nay without prejudice to any other we may say not so fully as to this Nation though there are many of the Saints of God else where yet in no place under Heaven hath God more yea so many Saints I might almost say put all the Nations of the earth together so many that know him so fully and have that power of godliness in the worshiping of him as here in this Nation Oh! the Bonds of Love that are upon us Yea If we look upon our outward mercies those liberties that we enjoy there 's scarce any Nation that hath the Commonalty of the people that live like men in comparison of ours for the most part of all the Nations in the world the generality of people are like slaves rather than any Free-men their Governors rule over them with Tyranny but here the Common people have Liberties and God works mightily for them for the vindicating of the Liberties that they have both for their bodies and outward estates and their souls likewise and Oh! the Love that God hath shewn unto us of late in working so miraculously for us as he hath done But there is one point more observable in these Bonds of Love that God draws people unto himself by The scope of the Prophet here in mentioning these Bonds of Love it is to aggravate their sin from whence there is this That there 's nothing more aggravates sin than that it is against Love God hath Three Bonds to bind us to Obedience There 's the Bond of his Law And the Bonds of Afflictions And the Bonds of Love But now to break all these Bonds The Bonds of the Commandements and the Bonds of Afflictions and Bonds of Love too this aggravates sin very much Oh charge thy sin with this aggravation Oh thou sinner What against such a God such Love Oh what a vile heart have I Saith Augustin Oh 't is too hard a spirit that though it will not bestow Love yet it will not requite Love O! let not there be such a hardness in the Spirits of the Saints Thou didest not begin with God to love thou didest not begin to bestow Love be not so hard towards God as not to requite Love Do not we see how base Love can gain upon mens hearts adulterous love what strong bonds that love is the giving of gifts and bribes what bonds they are to tie mens harts their hands and tongues and shall not the Love of God and the fruits of that be a stronger Bond to tie thy heart unto him Nothing goes more to the heart of Man of God than the abuse of Love A man can better bear the abuse of his mony the abuse of any thing he doth or hath than the abuse of his Love Gods Spirit is grieved with his Saints we do not reade that the Spirit of God is grieved with the Wicked God may be angry with the wicked every day but not grieved but when the Saints sin against him the Spirit of God is grieved because their sins are against Love when thou sinnest against God the Lord looks upon thee as Caesar once upon Brutus What thou my Son What thou whom I have so loved What break all those bonds When we reade in the second Psal of the Kings and Princes of the Earth that said Let us break their Bonds asunder and cast away their Cords from us We think that 's great Rebellion but for thou that professest thy self to be Gods it 's a greater evil to break these bonds of Love Oh! thou my Son my Child thou whom I have bestowed so much Love upon yet thou to sin against me when thou art committing of any evil conceive with thy self as if God were looking upon thee and pleading with thee by all those fruits of his love that ever thou hast received from him and wilt thou yet sin against him for all this We reade in Mark 14. 72. when Peter had sinned Christ did but look upon him and he wept bitterly Oh! Peter saw love in the looks of Jesus Christ and therefore we know after when Christ came to him he pleaded with him with this argument of love Doest thou love me and doest thou love me Oh! when he saw the eyes of Christ so sparkling of love and then considered that he had sinned against that Christ that had so loved him broke all those bonds of love then he went out and wept bitterly the word is in Mark 14. 72. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He did break out in weeping For so it may signifie that force that there is in doing any thing to lay a force upon ones self to do a thing He did break out break out in weeping he was not able to bear it his heart burst even in sunder when he considered how he had burst asunder the bonds of Love Oh that after such manifestations of Mercy and goodness such warmings of heart in Communion with Jesus Christ what thou Oh my soul what canst thou find in any waies like Gods waies canst thou find the like love and the like sweetness in any as thou hast done in God yet for all this unkind unloving dealings God follows thee with Love his heart is yet open unto thee
AN EXPOSITION WITH Practical Observations CONTINUED Upon the Eleventh Twelfth Thirteenth Chapters of the PROPHESY OF HOSEA Being First delivered in several LECTURES at Michaels Cornhil LONDON By Jeremiah Burroughs Being the Seventh Book published by Thomas Goodwin William Greenhil Sydrach Simpson William Bridge John Yates Will. Adderly LONDON â—â—inted by Peter Cole at the sign of the Printing-Press in Cornhil near the Royal Exchange 1651. To the READER GOD who alone is perfect in Himself hath reteined this Prerogative to Himself That His Work should be perfect as Moses speaks And as another Holy One hath it doth al his pleasure Paul though in what-ever he was to commit to writing in matters sacred had infalibility of assistance yet perfected not all be intended These things we will do if God permit said he to the Hebrews But we no where find extant any evidence that he accomplished what he there intended Namely A full Methodical Discourse upon those first Principles and Foundations of Religion which that speech had reference unto It is no wonder then that if such a kind of Imperfection accompanied the Works of so great a Master-builder if it attend those who build on this Foundation and are not priviledged as yet he was from building Hay and stubble This sort of Incompleatness hath befallen the Works of this worthy Author in respect to the finishing of this Prophesie which he intended and had performed wherein yet to the Church of God there shal be no loss there being no thoughts nor Notions suggested to any man which though for the present they die with him But the same Spirit that is the inspirer of all doth bring to light in some one or other servant of God in his own time What a Treasury of Thoughts seemed to be lost and to die with the Savior of the World which he had not could not then utter which yet the Spirit that fil'd him without measure distributed amongst the Apostles that came after him according to the measure of the gift of Christ in each There is no beam of Divine Light hath shone into any mans heart that shal finaly and for ever be put under a Bushel but in the end shall be set up to give light to the whol House The purpose of this Preface is To consign the Pasport thorough the World of these last Notes of the Author upon this Prophesie Namely The Eleventh Twelfth and Thirteenth Chapters and to assure the Reader That they are the best and most genuine that can be expected being collected out of those under his hand al along and the best Copies of those that took them from his mouth And to subjoyn this hearty prayr for a blessing from Heaven on these the rest of these our Brothers Labors that are published that his Works may follow him and he receive at latter day a full reward even according to the fruit of his doings Thomas Goodwyn William Greenhil Sydrach Simpson William Bridge John Yates Will. Adderly THE CONTENTS CHAP. XI VERS I. COhaerence Page 2 Observation 1 God stands much upon the cleering of himself to be a God of Love and Mercy Ibid. Obs 2 It is the Priviledg of the Saints to be beloved of God 4 Obs 3. It is a great aggravation of sin to sin against Love 5 Obs 4 It 's very useful to call to mind Gods old Love 6 Obs 5 All Gods old mercies remain engagements to duty and aggrations of sin 7 Obs 6 Let not our hearts sink though we are able to do but little for God 8 Obs 7 If God love us so soon our love to God ought not to be deferred 9 Obs 8 The Church is in the same relation to God as a Son is to a Father 11 Obs 9. Let wicked men take heed how they use the Saints for they are Gods Sons 12 Obs 10 The Saints are not only Sons in relation but in community ib. Obs 11. Gods Sons are not free from sore and grievous evils in this world 13 Obs 12 It 's a great mercie to be called out of Egypt 14 Obs 13. God hath an eye to Christ in all he doth 19 VER II. Exposition 22 Obs 1 It 's a mercie of God to have Gods Ministers calling us to obedience 23 Obs 2 When God hath called us out of affliction it 's a great addition of mercie to call us out of son unto duty ib. Obs 3 It 's a great aggravation of mens sins if they be called to duty after God hath called them out of misery and they do not obey it ib. Obs 4 For men not only to disobey Gods call but to turn away themselves from it and from those that speak to them in his name is very micked and a high degree of sinfulness 24 Obs 5 It is yet a higher wickedness to have our corruptions irritated by the Word and provoked ib. Obs 6 That Gods free grace is very great and very strong 25 Use Comfort against a stubborn heart 26 VER III. Exposition 27 Obs 1 When God calls his people out of afflictions yet they know no more how to guide themselves in their way than a little child doth 28 Vse for England 29 Obs 2 The way that God leades people in many times may be a way of much difficultie ib. Use We have cause to bless God that we are in his way 30 Obs 3 Though we meet with difficultys in our way yet God loves to teach his people how to go in their way and the more difficult their way is the more care hath God of them to teach them how to go ib. Use Be not discouraged at your difficulties but look up to God for guidance ib. Obs 4 Seeing God makes it a fruit of his love to teach them how to go when you see others slip and stumble in the way of profession of Religion Bless God then for his mercie towards you that he helps and teaches you in your way 33 Obs 5 Take heed you that have need of teaching that you be not wayward foolish wanton and unruly and that you do not wilfully run into rugged and slippery waies 34 Obs 6 Gods Ministers and all others should labor to follow God in this way of his that is To have a tender care of others ib. Obs 7 Gods Ministers must not be discouraged though they meet with those that are very froward 35 Obs 8 It is a great aggravation of sin when children requite not their parents for their education 36 Obs 9 God will not cast off his children though they get hurt 37 Use Be not discouraged when you have gone out of Gods way because the Lord will heal his people 38 Obs 10. God doth us much good we knew not of 39 Use Not to abuse our strength in the waies of sin and so manifest that you know not that God hath healed you 41 VER IV. Exposition 42 Obs 1 That the waies of God are very rational so that they may draw any man of understanding to love
thew 49 Obs 2 The way to prevail with men is to deal with them in a rational way 50 Obs 3 It 's a great aggravation of sin not to be drawn dy these cords of men 52 Use 1 Saints should be eminent in courtesie 54 Use 2 We should draw our relations with gentleness ib. Use 3 Gentle means rejected aggravate sin 55 Obs 4 We must preserve the honor of our inferiors though their faults be great ib. Obs 5 It will aggravate the shame and confusion of men which disregarded Gods using them in an honorable way 56 Obs 6 Not to be drawn to our duty but by violence and strength it is beastial 57 Obs 7 As God deals with us according to our nature so we ought to deal with God as far as we are able sutable to his nature ib. Obs 8 That the Lord doth not alwaies stand upon number though the greatest 59 Obs 9 That Love it hath strong bonds 63 Obs 10 We should labor to cast the bonds of love upon those we have to deal with 66 Obs 11 Seeing Love hath such bonds in it we should make use of the Love of God to bind our hearts to him 78 Obs 12 There 's nothing more aggravats sin than that it is against Love 88 Obs 13 That deliverance from oppression is a great mercie 92 Obs 14 To abuse our ease when God is pleased to deliver us from yokes is very sinful 93 Obs 15 To oppress one another after we are delivered from oppression is likewise a great evil 97 Obs 16 Mercies prepared and provided for laid before us are to be prized 101 Obs 17 In receiving of our food we must look up to Heaven 102 Obs 18 The Service of Gods people is easie and their provision is bountiful ib. Use How great is the mercy of God to us who hath eased our yokes and laid meat before us 〈◊〉 103 VER V. Obs 1 That which bardens men hearts against threats in their sin is some shifts that they have in their thoughts 104 Obs 2 A stout heart cares not whether it goes rather than it will return to God 105 Obs 3 Stubborn hearts if any thing crosses them will foolishly and desperately wish their return to their former condition of misery ib. Obs 4 God knows how to cross wicked men of their wills to spoil them of their plots 106 Obs 5 If we will not do Gods Will God will cross us of our own 107 Obs 6 God is not so much displeased at our sins as at our not returning 108 Obs 7 To refuse to return notwithstanding means used and mercies tendered is a fearful thing ibid. Obs 8 Scornful spirits when they are called upon to return from their evil waies do not only deny returning but also scorn and slight what is said to them 110 VER VI. Obs 1 It 's time for a people to return when God doth whet or draw out his Sword 111 Obs 2 That the abiding of the Sword is a sore judgment ib. Use Against protractors of the War Obs 3 The sword shall abide as long as God will have it ibid Obs 4 That though it be sad for the sword to be in the Field yet for the sword to be in the City is sadder 113 VER VII Exposition 118 Application 1 Publick to England ibid 2 Private to particular persons 119 Why men start back Reasons 1 Gods waies are unsutable to them ibid 2 They have a greater mind to other things ibid 3 They are weary of the waies of God ibid. 4 They have watched advantages to get off from what they have formerly made profession of ibid 5 They are sorrie they engaged themselves so much as they did ibid 6 They greedily embrace any Objections against such waies ibid 7 They are very greedie to take any offence ib. 8 They watch for offences 120 9 They are willing to embrace any opinion that will give them liberty 121 Obs 1 That it is a great evil for men to strive against their conscienoes 122 Obs 2. Mens hearts sink down to low and mean things naturally 126 Obs 3. It is the end of the Ministry of the Word to call men to the Most High God who have their hearts groveling after low and base things ib. Obs 4 It is a great and sore evil to stop our ears against the calls of the Word 127 Obs 5 That the calling to the most high God is a special means to cause those that are in a suspence to come in to a full resolution ibid Obs 6 The true Worship of God is an elevating thing 129 An Exhortation 131 1 To great men ibid 2 To Saints ibid How God hath exalted the Saints 1 He hath raised them from the depth of miserie 131 2 He hath made them one with his Son ib. 3 Hath loved them with the same love wherewith he loved his Son ib. 4 Hath made them Co-heirs with his Son ib. 5 Hath given his Angels to be ministring spirits to them ibid 6 God intends to honor himself in their eternal good ib. 7 He hath prepared for them a Crown of Glory ib. Obs 7 God hath little honor in the world 132 VER VIII Exposition general 134 Exposition particular 135 Obs 1 The greatness of mans sin hinders not the work of Gods mercie 141 Use 1 If the bowels of Gods mercie work towards us let ours work towards our brethren 142 Use 2 Why should great afflictions for God hinder our hearts working to him when our great sins against God hinder not Gods heart from working towards us ibid. Obs 2 Sinners are at the very mouth of misery when they do not think of it ibid. Obs 3 Gods free mercie is that which keeps us from being destroyed ibid. Obs 4 Sinputs God to a stand ib. Obs 5 The salvation of a sinner breaks through manie reasonings and workings in Gods heart 143 Obs 6 According to the relation a sinful people have to God so difficult a thing is it for God to execute his wrath upon them 144 Why God is not readie at any time to execute Judgment upon a sinner 1 The prayers of the Saints stand against Justice 145 2 The Lord look upon the place with an eye of pitie ib. 3 God considers that he hath but little worship in the world 146 4 He looks upon the Service hath been formerly given him in that place ib. 5 There may be a remnant of Saints there ib. 6 He eyes the miseries they will endure ib. 7 The Lord sees how the adversaries will insult 147 8 He looks upon the Elect ones not yet born ib. 9 If my wrath must be satisfied let it run out upon others ib. 10. The affliction of the Saints is Gods own affliction 148 11 God will fetch good out of their evil ib. 12 Gods Justice is glorified by his patience ib. 13 Gods mercie may convert ib. Obs 7 A chollerick disposition is none of Gods Image 150 Use 1 Take heed of being passionate ib. Use 2 Let
love unto his people and surely God intends yet further love unto us And then for our selves in particular It 's very good for us to look back unto his ancient love That is Now God hath loved some of you from your child-hood how the providence of God did work towards you then Some of you I suppose in this place may say that God loved you when you were children when I was a child I had such and such expressions of Gods love towards me It was love that I was born of Christian Parents and that I was brought up in Christian education That I was delivered from such and such dangers yea it may be God began to reveal himself to me betimes And if you would call to mind all the loving passages of Gods providence since you were children you might have matter of meditation sufficient There 's many of you that complain you cannot find matter for meditation I 'le give you a rule to help you in meditation at any time it 's this When you cannot meditate of other things but you are presently be wildered and know not whither to go then turn your selves to this meditation To think of all the gracious passages of Gods providence towards you ever since you were children and this the weakest may be able to go along in And that 's the third Note of Observation Fourthly All Gods old mercies remain engagements unto duty and aggravations to our sin I loved him when he was a child 't is brought to that end to aggravate their sin and further to engage them unto duty Remember that the love and mercies of God unto you when you were children are engagements to duty when you are old And they are aggravations of your sin The sins of those men and women that are against old mercies they are the greatest sins Oh! that you should sin against that love of God unto you when you were children God began with you then and hath continued his love and mercy to you ever since then Oh! make this an aggravation of your sin in the day of your humiliation charge it upon your own souls these and these sins have I committed though God loved me though Gods mercy and goodness was towards me when I was a child and hath gone along to me yet I have walked unworthy of all that love and mercy know that if you do forget the old love of God yet the Lord remembers it he remembers his old mercies and he remembers your old sins But then fiftly Let not our hearts sink in despairing thoughts though we see that we are able to do but little for God and though we are unworthy of love Though there be much vanity and folly in our hearts and in our lives yea though there hath been much stubbornness yet still let not our hearts sink in despairing thoughts I loved them when they were a child They could do little for me and they knew little of me and they were vain and foolish and stubborn and yet I loved them Certainly the waies of God towards Israel are as a type of his waies towards his Saints as the afflictions of Israel are Typical to the Church and we gather an argument to be patient in afflictions when we reade how God dealt with the people of Israel in the wilderness so we may gather an argument to help our faith when as we reade how God dealt with them though they were unworthy and were poor and weak yet God loved them Therefore you poor people that find your selves weak in understanding alas you know little and can remember little of that which is good and alas you can do little for God â—ea I find perhaps saith one much frowardness and stubborness in my heart against God but do you bewail it if so let not your hearts be discouraged do not think that these are things that will hinder the love of God Gods heart may be towards you notwithstanding this when God comes to love he doth not find the object to be lovely before he loves but his love makes the object to be lovely therefore God can love though thou knowest little and can do but little But you will say He can love I but Will He love If I did but know that this would satisfie my heart To that I answer First how ever when you hear that God did love Israel when he was such a child that none eye pitied him this is enough to help you against any concluding thoughts against Gods love for God did love his people when they were as unworthy as you are And then secondly But would you know whether God would love you the readiest way for you to know whether God will love you yea or no It is first To raise up your faith if you are able upon such grounds as these are Upon the consideration of his love to his people when they were unworthy And then secondly In quietness and meekness of spirit to lay thy self before the Lord as an object of his pity If thou doest not think thy self worthy to be an object of love yet lay thy heart before God as an object of pity and there resolve to wait til the time of love shall come till God shall make known that his heart is towards thee for good 't is not the way for thee to be froward and vexing because of thy unworthiness meanness poverty and baseness and so to determine that he will not love thee therefore but I say the way for thee to have the sence of Gods love is this When thou seest there is no worthiness in thee why he should love thee yet there is enough in thee to make thy self an object of his pity And sixtly Doth the love of God to his people begin so soon I loved Israel when he was a child Oh! let not thy love then to him be deferred too long Gods love begins betimes to his people let not his people love be deferred too long God is before hand with you in love and when ever we begin to love him it is upon this ground Because he loved us first You who are yong youths do you love God betimes for if you be such as ever shall be saved God did not only love you when you were a child but he loved you before you were born before the foundations of the world was laid Oh! it is pity that the first springing of your love should not be bestowed upon God Certainly old love is the best love as old love in God is sweet so old love in the Saints it 's a sweet thing to think that God loved me from a child but then if I can say this too I loved God from a child this will make it sweeter put but these two together Oh! when these two can be added what is wa 〈…〉 g to the comfort of ones life God loves that love that is from a child Jer. 2. 2.
Covenants to God and then sin again and God comes upon them again and they fall a crying out of their sin again Well they are raised and the hearing of the Word that never prevails with them but in their afflictions then they will repent and cry out Oh! cry out of their companie Oh! that we had spent our time in praying and in lamenting for our sin that we spent in such and such company Yea this is when Gods hand is upon you But what do you do upon the hearing of Gods Word that 's to be like a man to be drawn by the Word and not to be mov'd only by blows Oh! thou hast a beastial heart and brutish heart and charge your selves with that brutish heart I fear some of you have cause to say That in all the course or my life my heart hath never yeelded to God but just when blows hath been upon me I beseech you brethren deal with God like men God deals with you like men And that might have been another Note in windâ—â—g up all I drew them with the Cords of a man and with the bonds of Love The Lord deals with us sutable to our Nature Oh let us deal with God as far as we are able sutable to his nature Why doth God regard us as men let us regard him as God then let us glorifie God as a God when the Lord hath to deal with us he considers we are men when we have to deal with God let us consider he is God and as the Lord is pleased to condescend to us as men Oh! let us labor to ascend up to him as God With Bonds of Love The word here translated Bonds it is Thick Cords not only with Cords as you have it before but with Thick Cords so the word that is translated Bonds signifies for it comes of a word that signifies to Wreath and to thicken with wrea hing that as you see those that make Cords and Lines they take their Hemp and wreath one Wreath and then they take another and wreath that and so another and wind many Wreaths together and so make a strong Cord that 's the propriety of this word With the Bonds of Love That is with such Bonds as have many Wreaths in them have many things joyned together to make it to be a strong Cord a Cord as strong as a Cart rope for so I find the same word is used in Isa 5. 18. where it is said They draw iniquity with the Cords of vanity and sin as it were with a Cart rope The word that is trranslated there Cords it is the same that is in the former part of our verse The Cords of a man But now the other And sin as it were with a Cart rope that 's the same word that here you have in the text translated The Bonds of Love With a thick Rope of a Cart with a Rope that hath many Wreaths in it so that though the former word in your English CORDS seems to have as much as the latter BONDS yet according to the Hebrew this latter hath more in it and signifies such Cords as have many twisted and wreathed together As indeed we shall find when we come now to open the Bonds of Love that God did draw this people withal we shall find many Cords wreathed and twisted together to bind this people fast to God you have a sutable expression somewhat paralel to this in Jer. 31. 3. With loving kindness have I drawn thee saith God I have drawn them with the Bonds of Love that is thus I have used them in a loving way If love would have gained them if love would have overcome them if love would have bound them to me they have wanted no love saith God whereas they had deserved the bonus of iron to be upon them instead of those iron bonds that their sins deserved they have had the bonds of love If you ask me what were those Bonds of Love that God drew this people of Israel unto Himself by The first was this God did wonderfully separate this people from all the Nations in the world unto Himself to be a people unto himself and that out of love and this was a great fruit of love and a strong Wreath this was had there been nothing else That God should set his heart upon this people above all other people in the earth to be his people in Exod. 33. 16. Wherein saith Moses shall it be known that I and thy people have found grace in thy sight if thou goest not with us for thereby saith he shall ne be separated from all Nations of the Earth it is in your books only shall be separated but the Hebrew word signifies wonderfully separated we shall wonderfully be separated from all the Nations of the earth Indeed the Lord he did wonderfully separate the people from all the Nations of the earth and this was only out of love it was not from any excellencie he saw in this people In Deut. 7 6. The Lord did not chuse thee c. but in the 7. verse He did not set his love upon you nor chuse you because you were more in number than other people for you were the least of all people Observe my brethren by the way That the Lord doth not alwaies stand upon number upon the greatest this indeed is our argument that so many go in such a way and so few in another way and so surely God is most like to approve of that that the most go on in No God doth not alwaies stand upon number saith he I did not chuse you because you were most in number for I knew that you were the least therefore it was only love that made the Lord chuse this people at first and separate them from other Nations And then the second Bond of Love is I chose you and your seed also And this was a great mercie If I had but only set my heart upon your selves it had been somwhat but it was upon you and your seed so as to bring you and your seed into Covenant with me There 's two twists as I may so say in this Bond of Love that he should chuse them and their seed and bring them both into Covenant for thus you have it in Deut. 4. 37. Because he loved thy fathers therfore he chose their seed after them and in Ezek. 16. 8. there the text saith It was a time of love and I took you and entered into Covenant with you It was a time of Love and that made the Lord to enter into Covenant with this people God shewed it was a time of love indeed that he would take such a people as this was and enter into Covenant with them And then the third Twist I set my heart upon them to delight in them too I made them my portion my inheritance my Treasure the Deerly
beloved of my soul my Glory a Royal Diadem to my self I could shew you Scripture for every one of these expressions that this people were taken by God to be his chief Treasure his peculier Treasure and his Delight Deut. 7. 6. The Lord thy God hath chosen thee to be a special people to himself a special and he gives them all those Epethites Surely these are Bonds of Love And then in the fourth place If so be at any time they were in any afflictions I pitied them and looked upon them with the eye of mercie and releeved them redeemed them out of their afflictions in Isa 63. 9. In his love and in his pity he redeemed them And then fifthly I set on work all my Wisdom and my Power and my Mercy to do them good above all Nations working great wonders for them Now this we shall not need to mention any particular Scripture for the whol story of God carrying of them from Egypt along in the Wilderness to Canaan and there providing for them is a testimony for this so in Isa 63. we named before Gods redeeming of them he ads this too And carried them all the daies of old The Lord never was so glorious in his power towards any people as towards them the right hand of his Power and Excellencie was stretched out for them in Exod. 15. And then sixthly By the Bonds of Love I had a continual watchful eye over them and their Land mine eye was upon their Land where they dwelt for good above all other Lands that were upon the earth in Deut. 11. 12. A Land saith the text which the Lord thy God eareth for the eyes of the Lord thy God are alwaies upon it from the beginning of the yeer even to the end of the yeer Canaan was a Land that God cared as little for as any place of the earth before his people came into it a Land wherein God was as much dishonored as in any place of the Earth but now when his people came into it now it is a Land that mine eye is upon that the Lord takes care of from the beginning of the yeer to the end of the yeer this respect did God shew to his people Seventhly I gave them my Oracles the Revelation of my Will. This was another notable fruit of the love of God to this people In Judah was God known his Name was great in Israel in Psal 147. 19 20. He shewed his Word unto Jacob his Statutes and his Judgments unto Israel I dealt not so with any Nation And as for my Judgments they have not known them saith God This was a notable Priviledg that Israel had above all other people In Rom. 3. What advantage hath the Jew saith the Scripture or what profit is there of Circumcision Yes every way the Jew hath much advantage every way above al other people of the earth Why wherein for unto them were committed the Oracles of God Other men had the book of Nature they could see Gods Name as it were written in the Characters of the book of Nature yea but the special things of God the Counsels of God concerning the Eternal Estate of the Children of Men were not then revealed but saith he I gave to this people my Oracles they had those Counsels of mine concerning mans eternal estate revealed I opened to them my whol heart and soul all that I would have known to the children of men for that time I opened to them Oh this is a bond of love indeed to have the Oracle of God committed to a people And then the Eighth Twist as I may so say in this bond of love to make it a great Cable as it were to bind them unto God was this I set my heart so upon as to have the Messias to come from them in whom all the Nations of the earth should be blessed I rather chose this people than another to have my Son to be born of them to be of their stock And then Ninthly I gave them a Law the sum of which was nothing but love as I opened the last day That the Law of God had strength of Reason in it and so God drew them with the cords of a man his Law was rational So I drew them with bonds of love I gave them a Law the sum of which was nothing but love as thus What 's the sum of the first and second Table of the Law The sum of the first Table it is Thou shalt LOVE the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul And the sum of the second Table is Thou shalt LOVE thy Neighbor as thy self so that Love is the sum of the whol Law And then Tenthly I have out-bid all temptations whatsoever good pleasure delights honor they could expect in following any thing else I shewed them that they might have it and much more in my self there was nothing they could have in following after any of their false worship 〈◊〉 creature they would have any good in I made it appear that they might have as much in my Self I out bid all temptations for the encouraging of them in my waies that is in the full course of Scripture we find the Lord propounding himself to his people as a lovely object on purpose to draw their hearts away from all other things that might seem to be lovely that he might have the whol soul to himself Yea and in the Eleventh place Whensoever they were in any want if they did but cry to me I heard them What people is there so great as this people that the Lord is so nigh unto in all that they call upon him for saith Moses Yea and lastly I have done so much for them that it cannot be conceived that I should have done more What should I have done more for my Vinyard than I have done Isa 5. 4 Let any one speak what love they could conceive could be more from a God to his people than I have shewen So that put all these together and you see how God did draw this people with bands of love Now this for the Explication Now from hence our First Note is That Love it hath strong bonds Strong as strong as death Cant. 8. 6. None are so strongly bound together as friends that are bound in Love The bonds of Nature are not so strong as the bonds of Love A friend is nearer than a brother saith the Scripture The bonds of Love are the strongest bonds they are a twisted bond For First Love it is in its self a lovely thing to behold there 's an amiableness in Love to draw the eye and the heart to it In Cant. 7. 6. How fair and how pleasant art thou O Love for delights How fair and how pleasant is Love Take Love for the affection of love it is fair and pleasant for delight and when the beloved
is called by the Name Love it shews that Love is very amiable and very beautiful Secondly Love it hath much sweetness in it much power to insinuate its self into the heart As we know base love adultrous love it hath a great deal of power to insinuate into the heart in Eccles 7. 26. the hands of the whorish woman are called bonds If whorish love hath such power so to insinuate and to be bonds much more then hath True Love Cracious Love Thirdly Love it is generative Love hath a great generative power to beged Love Augustin saith There is no greater provocation to Love than to begin to love Love can draw iron hearts Love it is the Loadstone of Love it will draw Love and beget Love where ever it is Fourthly Where Love is got into the soul it cōmands all it commands all the Faculties and Understanding where Love is got Look what a man loves so accordingly his understanding will work It a man loves his sin his understanding will be working for his sin Oh what subtil Arguments will men have for their sin when they love it any way that a mans heart is engaged in Love he will be very subtil to argue for it So on the contrary when once the Lord hath taken the heart with Love this Love commands the understanding and then all reasonings are for God and the soul it hearkens after no reasonings that are against God or against his waies when once the heart is taken with Love If a mans heart be taken with love to a Woman he will hear nothing against her but if his love be taken off from her then every report that he hears against her he will aggravate to the uttermost he can and will soon beleeve it So it is when a mans heart is taken with the things of God and of Religion it will hear nothing against them but if a mans heart be off and do not love the waies of God then they are glad if they can hear any thing that makes against them Love commands all the Faculties of the Soul the Understanding and the Thoughts it commands the Will and Affections it commands the Body it commands the Estate it commands the Liberties it commands all that a man hath or is or can do Love hath the absolute commanding power of all Oh! Love hath strong Bonds And again Love it makes every thing that is done for the beloved to be delightful It doth not only command to do a thing but it makes it delightful I will rest in my love and rejoyce over them with singing saith God When the heart is once taken with love I say it doth not only do that which is good for that which it doth love but doth it with delight And then Love knows not any bounds it never sets its self any bounds at all but would do and do and do and do even infinitly for that it doth love so far as love prevails no bounds are set Yea and when it doth much it will not be wearie neither So far as the Soul is acted with Love it will never be wearie with what it doth Men that love their pastime all night they will sit up at it and never be tired so those that love the waies of God though the flesh may be weak yet not the spirit And then Love it is strong so as it stands out against all oppositions nothing that doth oppose can prevail against love in Cant. 8. 6 7. Love is as strong as death and many waters cannot quench the fire of love And then in the next place Love it rejoyces in suffering not only delights in doing but delights in suffering If one that loves another shall suffer for him that he doth love he will rejoyce in those sufferings And lastly Love it suffers not its self to be its self as it were to be at his own dispose Love doth wholly give its self into the possession of him that it doth love it is not his own no longer The heart that is once taken with love is no more its own but gives its self into the possession of that that it doth love so that put all these together and you may see that love it hath strong Bonds I drew them with the Bonds of Love And then a Second Note of Observation is this Let us do as God doth then that is Labor to cast the Bonds of Love upon those we have to deal with it 's Gods way to his people to bind them to himself to throw upon them Bonds of Love And then saith God I have enough I have them strong enough if I get them with the bonds of Love Oh let us do as God doth labor to draw people with bonds of Love If you would draw any to you let it be by Love do you desire to draw any to you you that are Ministers especially you are appointed to draw others to God it 's your work what should you do open the Love of God to them present the Grace of the Gospel to souls labor to work upon their hearts by all the mercies of God By the mercy of God tendered to them by the mercy of God received by them bestowed upon them There 's no such way to draw souls to God as this Repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand that 's the preaching of the Gospel The first preaching of all Christs Sermons and of his Disciples was Repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand As if he should say Oh! Sirs look about you Consider your waies there 's a glorious Kingdom now at hand a Kingdom of righteousness and mercy wherein the glory of the Grace of God comes to be revealed to the children of men in another way than ever formerly This is the way to bring men to repentance It 's true it 's good to use all means to shew the greatness and the justness and the holiness of God and the like But the prevailing argument above all to bring men to repentance it is That the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand and indeed we would do so if we did consider that repentance it is a Gospel Grace it is not that that comes by the Law the Law takes no notice of repentance but the Gospel and therefore to present the Love of God as it is in the Gospel so there God manifests his love to the children of men and that 's the way to draw to repentance there 's a notable story that we have in the book of Martyrs not far from the beginning as also in the Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius speaking of John the Apostle that did commit a yong man which was very hopeful unto a Bishop to take care of him but afterwards proved to be very wicked and got among a company of theeves and so came to be the Captain of a company of theeves and robbers
and was wholly bent to slaughter and murder and extream cruelty and lived in the mountains Afterwards John comes to this Bishop to whom he had committed the yong man and bid him restore unto him the charge which he and Christ had committed into his Custody then the elder looking down with a heavy countenance sobbing and sighing said He is dead John enquiring how and what kind of death he answered he is dead to God for he is become the Captain of a company of theeves in such a place The Apostle then rending his garments in great sorrow said Prepare me a Horse and let me have a guide and so rode in post being come unto the place he is taken by the theevish watch he neither flieth nor resisteth but saith for this purpose came I hither bring me unto your Captain who being armed beheld him coming but when he knew that it was John he was strucken with shame and fled away The old man forgetful of his yeers pursueth him flying and crieth My son why fliest thou from me thy father unarmed and old O son tender my case be not afraid as yet there remaineth hope of salvation I will undertake for thee with Christ And thus he runs after him crying that yet there was hope of mercie and pardon and that he would die for him He hearing this first stood still turning his countenance to the ground next shoke off his Armor then trembled for fear and wept bitterly so that this broke his heart and he returns back and falls a weeping upon the neck of John and became an eminent Christian afterwards Whatsoever is to be thought of this story yet certainly there 's no such bonds as the bonds of Love to draw the hearts of people unto God Have you to deal with stony hearts the way it is to lay them upon the soft pillow of the Gospel and so you may break them lay a stone upon a stone and so it goes from you and doth not break but if you lay it upon a pillow you may presently break it with a hammer The Word is compared to a hammer yea but we must labor to lay the hearts of people upon the pillow as it were of Love upon the Grace of God in the Gospel and that 's the way to break their hearts there are none so bound to God as those that are bound to him by Love those that are bound to God by fear that hath not Love mixt withal their bonds will not hold they will seek quickly to break the bonds of fear there 's no men I say that are held to God by the bonds of fear but they will seek after any occasions to break those bonds and if they can but get any opportunity to get themselves out of those bonds they will and commonly at last they do break them and get themselves out of the bonds of fear but now those that are held by bonds of Love they are held for ever unto God I beseech you observe this Note When men cast off the sweet of their sin by the sweet of the Love of God then they will never return to their sin again Oh! but if it be only the bitterness of the Law of punishment that makes them cast off sin they will be ready to turn to their sin again as a dog will return to the vomit as a dog casts out the vomit meerly in regard of the pain he doth feel but when it is cast out by the sweet of Love when one sweet enters for another such hold on their way Austin hath a notable expression for that in the 9. Book of his Confessions about the beginning speaking of a sweeâ— of sin Thou Lord saith he didest cast out those sweetnesses and thou didest enter in thy self instead of them who art more sweet than any pleasure whatsoever And it was from hence that he held on so in his way because God casting out the sweet of sin instead of that sweet he had by sin before did himself I say enter into the soul that was more sweet to Austin's soul than all other sweetnesses whatsoever Oh! saith he afterwards The sweet it is to want those sweetnesses when he had the Love of God come in instead of whatsoever sweetness he had before No mervail though Grace be so persevering and we reade so much of perseverance especially in the times of the Gospel because that there 's none truly converted unto God but they have that sweet come into their souls through Love that is more delightful to them than all the sweet they had by sin before Never be afraid you that God is beginning to turn to himself never be loth to part with any sweetness you had in the waies of sin for by turning to God you shall find that sweetness in God and his waies that will be a thousand times more Oh they are things that they love and they are loth to part with them Yea but when you are turned to God God will be as lovely to you as ever any thing in the world was If the Ice be but broken over night by the Husbandman he comes the next day and it is frozen up again but let the Sun come with his warm beams and then it runs down with flakes then it breaks throughout many Countries together it breaks all at once by the beams of the Sun And so the beaking of the heart by the terrors of the Law it is but liâ— the breaking of the Ice with a pole by the Husbandmâ—â— to give the Cattel drink but when the Love of God co 〈…〉 to the heart then the corruptions of the heart dissolve even as the Ice dissolves when the warm Sun comes upon 〈◊〉 Th 〈…〉 ay therefore to gain the hearts of men it is by love And we should the rather do it because it is the great design of God in the Gospel To manifest his love to the Children of men he hath opened his heart and the treasures of love in the Gospel What is the Gospel but the treasures of the love of God opened those eternal loving kindnesse of God towards mankind they are opened in the Gospel and no Minister can be a faithful Minister of the Gospel but those that shall endeavor to open the heart love of God to the children of men in Jesus Christ and go to gain souls unto himself Oh! 't is a pleasant work to be a Minister of the Gospel in this respect to be alwaies searching into the treasures of Love and to make them known to souls for the gaining of them unto God And then likewise If you have to deal with men you must labor to draw them with the bonds of love in Phil. 2. 1. If there be therefore any consolation in Christ if any comfort of Love if any fellowship of the Spirit if any bowels and mercies fulfil ye my Joy that ye be like minded saith the Apostle Oh! let it be
saith That Love bears all things I am loth to mention any further lest there should be any occasion of stirring up any spirits and so hindering the fruit of Love Let me say on the other side there may be too eager censure the other way that is to censure such as are of a different way and judgment that they do it altogether out of their self-ends and self-aims I verily beleeve that on the other side those brethren that do differ they may be consciencious in their way and do it out of zeal to God and to what they apprehend to be truth We should apprehend one another so if we see there be nothing else wherein they do manifest corruption of heart but meerly in their waies of difference in their judgments and opinions Now if both could but thus judg each of other that they both are upright in what they do pursue One side imagins that our part is Gods mind and the other side judges that that party is Gods mind let us judg now that they do it in uprightness except it apperrs some other way then we should quickly come to close and joyn hearts together if we had such upright opinions one of another therefore the more it is the design of the Devil to break those Bonds of Brotherhood and of Love the more should we labor to unight together And you who are Superiors labor you to gain your Inferiors by love Oh let those tie together do not say of your inferiors they are of untoward dispositions and how can my heart be towards them to love them Oh! none of your inferiors are more untoward unto you than you are unto Christ and Christ if he should not love you because of your untowardness what would become of you Now consider of this when your servants and children are untoward Why should that hinder love when as my untowardness doth not hinder the love of Christ to me I remember I have read of Monica Austins Mother her husband being an Heathen and that some of her neighbors that had Christian husbands wondred how they came to live so lovingly together saith other Christian women that were neighbors Our husbands are Christians and yours an Heathen and yet you live more lovingly with him than we do with our husbands She answered them It may be when your husbands do any thing that provokes you you are presently froward with them but I labor to overcome my husband by love so to gain his heart to me and upon that we live so lovingly together Christianity teaches me to perform the duties of a wife to my husband though my husband be an Heathen I verily beleeve there are many godly men and women that sometimes when the one is godly and the other is wicked You will say How can that be Yes though there be godliness yet there may be such frowardness and passion as may cause wonderful disturbance but on the other side where there is godliness and love there is such an overcoming with Love that though the man be wicked and never so harsh yet he hath the nature of a man in him and so long as he hath the nature of a man in him he will be overcome by Love and therefore that 's the way to bind men and women together Would you be united more than ever yet you have been labor to cast the Bonds of Love one upon another let the husband study how to overcome his wife with love and so the wife the husband and then there will be a sweet union indeed and so for Masters and servants there should be Love there to unite one to another though the master be above the servant yet the master should account it a happiness to him in that his servant doth love him there is not such a distance between you and your servants as there is between God and you Oh! it 's a sweet thing when a man can say in his family I bless God all my familie loves me And whatsoever they do they do it out of love to me It may be you are harsh towards your servants and you will make them do what you command them to do and they dare not do otherwise yea but what 's that but do your servants love you do they do all for you out of Love you might have as much obedience from your servants as you have and have it a great deal better than you have if you have it out of love and so likewise in a family when one servant loves another as it was said of David in 1 Sam. 18. 22. All his servants love thee all Sauls servants did love David so those that are servants should labor to live so in families as all the other servants should love them But you will say They are so wicked that how can I hope to have love from them Yes Though they cannot love thee as thou art godly yet godliness hath something in it that is common to the excellency of mans nature Yea and those that are in place of power in the Magestracie they should labor to gain those that are under them by love as the greatest in a family if he be a Lord or an Earl should not think it too much to gain a servant by Love so those that have the greatest power in Government they should not think it too much to gain their meanest Subjects in a way of Love we see it was thus with David 1 Chron. 28. 2. Then David the King stood up and said Hear me my Brethren and my People See what a sweet expression is here of a great Prince Then David the King stood up and he said Hear me my Brethren and my People he did not sit down Majesterially and say My People and you that are my Subjects and that are under me I command you to do thus and thus but he stands up unto them and saith Hear me my Brethren my People This was a way to gain the hearts of people unto him You know Absolom he sought in a false way to steal away the hearts of people by a gentle carriage I remember I have read of John the Second a King of Portugal he chose his Emblem to be a Pelican that he might express his love to his Subjects upon this ground for the Pelican when her yong ones have been bitten with Serpents she feeds her yong ones with her own blood and thereby cures them now upon this this King of Portugal chuses the Pelican to be his Emblem thereby he would testifie his readiness to let out his blood for the good of his Subjects for the healing of his Subjects He would not feed upon his Subjects blood but he would rather let out his own blood for their good This is the commendations of a Prince not to seek to feed upon Subjects blood and to raise up his Honor and Prerogative by his sheding of
had there it 's impossible but flesh and blood would suggest many thoughts to Abraham to keep his heart in suspence But what took Abrahams heart off from suspence to resolve fully what to do in such a case the text saith The God of Glory appeared to him it was not only God but the God of Glory My Brethren when God is calling you off from all Creature comforts from all things that may quiet your hearts in the world and you have strong temptations to keep you in the waies of sin let but the God of Glory appear to you and this will take up your hearts this will bring your hearts to a full resolution Oh! blessed blessed are those souls though they have continued long in suspence yet at length the God of Glory appears to them in the midst of their doubts and temptations and hangings off And if there be such a force in this then learn to present before thy soul that is in such a suspence the Glorie of the great God look up to this great God 't is the infinite high God that I am called to Oh! thou suspending thou wavering soul look up to this most high and answer this call of God unto himself answer it thus Oh Lord Thou art an Infinite Blessed Glorious Being the Supream Being of all I am a poor vile worm that lie under thy feet it 's mercie that thou wilt vouchsafe to look towards me thou mightest have let me gone on in base waies and perished to all eternity without giving me any call to thy self but now that thou shouldest give me a call to thy self the high and glorious blessed Lord this is mercy Lord I come and with fear and trembling fall down before thee saying Lord what wilt thou have me to do Those who have been wavering and afterwards setled they have found that this hath been the thing that hath setled them some dreadful authoritie of the high God that hath come to their hearts in some truth beyond what formerly he hath done and this hath fully taken off their souls to him And then Fifthly The true Worship of God is an elevating thing Then are they called to the most high when they are called to the true Worship of God for it raises the soul to the most high Mens inventions are low things are base and unworthy things Oh consider whether thou findest this in the Worship of God doest thou find thy soul raised up to the most high in his Worship thou doest never worship God aright except thou findest in some measure thy soul raised up to the most high in his Worship let no man look upon the Worship of God as a low mean thing know when thou art to come to worship God thou hast now to deal with the high God whom Angels worship and adore 't is that God who is far above all Creatures in Heaven and Earth thus thou art to look upon the Worship of God Oh! how far are most men from this when they are worshiping of God! very few there are that lift up their hearts to the most high even in the duties of Worship And so it follows in the words None at all would exalt him Why If God be the most high God how can he be exalted I answer He is so high as he cannot be more high than Himself God cannot be more excellent than he is in Himself God cannot make Himself better than He is nor more glorious in Himself than He is Therefore no creature can make him more than he is all that all the Creatures in Heaven and Earth can do for God can ad nothing to him In Nehem. 9. 5. He is exalted saith the text above all blessing and praise Yet then God accounts Himself to be exalted First When he is known and acknowledged for the High Supream First being of all things when we fear Him as a God when we humble our selves before him as before a God when we are sensible of the infinite distance there is between him and us when we are willing to lay down what we are or have or can do for the furtherance of his praise when his Will is made the Rule of all our waies and especially of his Worship when we make him the last end of all when 't is the great care of our souls and work of our lives to do what possibly we can that he might be magnified lifted up in the world and when we account the least sin a greater evil than can be recompenced by all the good that Heaven and Earth can afford unto us and now God accounts Himself exalted by us And this is the Work that all of us have to do to give up our selves to the exalting of the Name of this blessed God He is worthy so worthy of honor from us creatures that though ten thousand millions of Men and Angels should perish eternally for the furtherance of the least degree of his honor he is worthy of it all so high is this God and therefore know it to be our work to endeavor in our places to exalt him and blessed is that man or woman that when they are to die are able to say Oh Lord thou hast been high in my heart thy Wisdom I have adored and submitted mine unto it thy Will I have honored and yeelded mine likewise to it and it hath been the great care of my soul that I might do somthing in my place to lift up thy Name according as I have been able I say thou maiest go out of the world in peace as having done in some measure that thou camest into the world for Oh! you whom God hath exalted let it be your care to exalt this God and especially the Saints of the Lord know God hath exalted you on high and expects that you should lift up his Name he hath lifted up you out of the depth of miserie from the nethermost Hell he hath joyned you to his Son he hath made you one with his Son He hath loved you with the same love wherewith he loveth his Son he hath made you Heirs Co-heirs with his own Son he hath given his Angels to be ministring Spirits to you he hath made it his great design to honor himself in your eternal good the greatest work that God hath to do in the world it is the honoring himself in your Glory he hath prepared a Crown of glory for you Oh then do you joyn together to exalt the Name of this God who hath lifted up you who were such poor vile worms let the high praises of this God be in your hearts and mouths for ever in Psal 108. 4. Thy mercy is great above the Heavens and thy truth reacheth unto the Clouds mark what follows in the 5. verse Be thou exalted O God above the Heavens and thy Glory above all the Earth Oh Lord we see thy mercy is exalted above the Heavens and thy truth
among men Judgment That is Righteous Judgment among men thou canst not turn to God from thy Unrighteousness and to a Righteous God and yet still not be Righteous towards men Certainly if thou beest turn'd to God from thy Unrighteousness towards a Righteous God then thou will be turn'd likewise from thy unrighteousnes towards men and will be righteous towards them Many texts of Scripture I might have shewn you that commend this Grace of Righteousness and it 's made the great Promise to the Glorious Church when that shall be That Righteousness shall prevail there that the People shall be a Righteous People And Judgment Not only Judgment in doing no man any wrong and being righteous in dealing But thus Judgment Execute Justice against Sin manifest thy hatred against Sin by the Execution of Judgment This is the Note from thence That those who turn to God will manifest their hatred against sin by the Execution of Judgment if they be in place of Power Though in thine own cause thou maiest forbear yea thou shouldest be merciful but when Publick Manifestation of hatred against Sin requires Justice then there 's no place for Sparing when God calls thee in any Publick Place to manifest hatred against Sin then I say thou maiest not think of Sparing But you will say Oh! I must pity and shew Mercy Well If you would be merciful be merciful in your own cause Many men that will pleade for Indulgence to Malefactors yet in their own business they have no Indulgence to those that offend them It beseems a Judg to be very pitiful when he is wronged himself but it beseems him to be very righteous and just when the Publick calls him Keep MERCY and JVDGMENT Mercy is first and Judgment afterwards The Scripture makes a difference between our respect to Mercy Judgment that place in Micah The Lord hath shewen thee O man what he would have thee to do LOVE MERCY and DO JVSTICE There should be a Preheminency in Mercy Mercy must not only be shown but loved and Justice must be done And then Keep MERCY and JVDGMENT The mixture of Mercy and Judgment is very comely The Scripture doth mix them very often Psal 101. 1. I will sing of Mercy and Iudgment and Prov. 21. 21. He that followeth after Righteousness and Mercy findeth Life Righteousness and Honor. Psal 112. 4. The upright man he is full of Compassion and Righteousness Jer. 9. 24. The Lord there doth seem to glory in this in his Righteousness aswel as Mercy saith the Lord Let no man glory in the flesh but let him glory in this That he knoweth Me that I am the LORD which exercise loving kindness Iudgment and Righteousness in the Earth Let him glory in this That he knows that I am such a God this is my glory That I am both Righteous and Merciful Now for the several Rules when Mercy should be Shown and when Judgment should be Executed that would be the Use here How men should be directed to mix both these together Mercy when men offend by Infirmity when I see it 's but a weakness it is not through wilfulness Mercy then should be shown Oh that we would consider of this our brethren that sometime differ from us in Judgment in practice consider Do they appear in any of their carriages any waies to be wilful in their way can you take it upon your consciences that it is through obstinacy and through any wicked principles that they have that they go against conscience doth it not appear in all their other waies that they walk humbly and conscionably that if they be in the wrong yet it is through meer weakness that they cannot see the Truth that thou thinkest thou doest see Now thou shouldest be merciful towards them and carry not thy self in a ridged severe bitter and harsh way towards them but in a Merciful way Mercy when the offence is by infirmity And then when the offender is already sensible of his offence then Mercy Or when there may be as much good done in a fair gentle merciful carriage as in a harsh ridged carriage And then especially at that time when any man or woman begins to feel passion arise in their hearts and a spirit of revenge to stir in them above all times then is the time for mercy examin thine heart thou hast to deal with thy brother now see whether there doth not begin to arise passion and revenge in thy spirit towards him now is the time for Mercy it 's not the fit time for Judgment it 's not a fit time to give Judgment nor for thee to execute Judgment but now is the time for Mercy And then there 's the time for judgment When thou art call'd to manifest hatred against sin when the publick good requires it when you cannot be merciful to one but you must be cruel to another As in many things wherein men would be merciful the truth is the Mercy they shew to some is cruelty to others and when thou hast the least interest in a business then there 's the most like to be the time for Judgment Well Keep Mercy and Judgment Keep it not only do some acts of Mercy and Judgment but keep it Many men in some good moods observe it Oh how pitiful are they how merciful are they but come to them at another time and Oh! how ridged are they then Oh! how sowr are they how bitter how cruel how harsh are they We have found it so by experience you can say such a man Oh! what sweet converse had we together and what a sweet temper'd man he was how loving how meek how gentle how pitiful But come to him now how harsh and how rugged in his expressions and extream bitter mightily turned as if he were not the man keep Mercy keep it Doth God at any time melt thy heart and make thee apprehensive of thy need of mercy doth thy heart begin to bleed towards thy Brethen Oh! keep it keep this temper the Lord keep this in the thoughts and purposes of thy heart for ever Oh take heed of change of heart It should be the care of Christians not only to do that that is good but to keep their hearts in such a constant frame Oh that some of you would but call to mind the dales of old Was there not a time that your hearts did melt towards your brethren and had sweet converse and communion with them what 's become of those spirits now Oh! turn to that gracious sweet temper again and if ever God bring you to that temper again keep it Consider what is it that hath changed my heart what hath brought me to it now if God doth discover how thou hast lost that sweetness of thy heart Oh! labor to repent and turn to God and resolve if ever God bring me to that temper again as sometimes
you afterwards Yea but now did not you behaue your selves proudly and stubbornly and so make your service so much the more hard by provoking your Governors Oh! look back to these things and consider how far you are from being of the disposition of Iacob that you proâ—â—ss to be your father Many Apprentises in their hard services have don that that they have cause to repent of afterwards He served for a Wife First the Note is That Love will carry through long service Love is ashamed to complain of difficulties Oh! so it wouid be if we loved God do not complain of the service of God to be difficult The Second is this That a good Wife is a great blessing of God though she hath no portion though a man serve for her yet it is a great blessing of God there is a more special mercy of God there than there is in giving men an Estate he served long and long even for a Wife Luther upon the place speaks much about the blessing in Marriage and of a good Wife Saith he Certainly Iacob did not serve so long that he might have a Companion of his life with whom there should be nothing but railing scolding and wrangling no but he look'd upon an estate of Marriage at the School of all Vertue for so should a married estate indeed be And then further another Note that is very observable He served these two seven years This may be one ground why Iacob served so long for a Wife and a special ground why Because that he had a charge from his father Isaac to take a Wife in La 〈…〉 's family and therefore he would rather serve seven years and seven years after that to have a Wife from him than to go to seek a Wife any other where in obedience to the charge of his Father Luther in his Comment upon this very Scripture he doth much urge that very Note That Children should be obedient to their Parents in their matches and take heed of matching against their Parents consent If you profess your selves to be of the seed of Jacob for so the godly are set out in Scripture be like unto your Father Jacob in this In being obedient to your parents in your matches there is no greater disobedience in the world than the disobedience of a Child in the case of marriage in the flinging off of the yoke of subjection to your Parents in this kind Luther urges this exceeding much from hence Civil Laws require the consent of Parents in all Lawful marriages and so the Authority of sacred Scripture declares to us that those marriages have been ever happy that have been with the consent of their Parents And again saith he experience doth testifie that those marriages have been for the most part unhappy that have been without consent of Parents certainly the blessing of God is not upon them you may to satisfie your lusts think to please your selves for a week or two but it 's just with God that you should live miserably all your daies that make no more conscience of disobedience to your Parents in your matches And any of you that are here present if you be guilty this way know that the Lord rebukes you this day and you are taught to go alone and humble your selves and to bewail that sin of yours which is certainly a very great sin and you had need both Husband and Wife together both fast and pray to get away the guilt of that sin that so you may have a blessing upon your married estate and upon your posterity without which you cannot expect it therefore did Jacob serve thus that he might be obedient to his Father Isaac which did charge him to go and take a Wife in that place And thus much for that Twelfth Verse It follows VER 13. And by a Prophet the Lord brought Israel out of Egypt and by a Prophet was he preserved STILL the Prophet goes on in shewing their meanness in their Ancestors your Father Jacob was thus mean a poor exile he was fain to serve thus for his Wife It 's true Joseph was a while in prosperity but when Joseph was dead all your Ancestors then they were in Egypt as miserable bondslaves they were there as bondslaves and how should they get out there was no way in the world Pharaoh a mighty King they had no friends abroad nor no Armies to help themselves only a Prophet God sent them a Prophet Moses and what was this Prophet one that had been a poor Shepheard for forty yeers together in the Wilderness and when this Prophet was to go into Egypt to be a deliverer of them was it ever like that he should be the man in Exod. 4. 20. the text saith He took his Wife and his Sons and set them upon an Ass we reade but of one Beast that he had and so he went into Egypt in a mean and low condition and when he came there he was not owned and we never read that Moses did declare who he was and the children of Israel would not own him and Pharaoh begun to buslâ— and would not let Israel go how should this one Moses deliver them nay their bondage did encrease when Moses came unto them Yet by a Prophet the text saith the Lord brought Israel out of Egypt and by a Prophet was he preserved This was a mighty work of God to bring Israel out of Egypt by a Prophet and to preserve them in the Wilderness and be the way there is on useful Note you reade in Exod. 38. 26. There was six hundred thousand and three thousand five hundred and fifty males from twenty yeers old and upwards And in Numb 1. 46. that was the second yeer after they went out from Egypt and there you shall find that there was just so many besides Levi after God had taken Levi for himself to be his portion thereby God would shew that none should lose any thing that they did for him How often when men have been willing to give any thing to God God hath made it up in one yeer but that by the way This that I bring this for it is To shew the great work of God that by a Prophet he brings such a number out of Egypt and he preserves them in the Wilderness uses no means for their preservation for the guiding of them which way they should go but a mean Prophet for the providing water for them for the providing meat for them for the providing of cloathes for them for the defending of them against their Enemies that they should not come and destroy them when they were in any danger to help them when they were stung by the Serpents to shew them what they should do to heal them and to keep them all in peace that they should not mutiny one against another To compose all their differences this Prophet had the great stroke in all these
and wonderful thing for them to have rain then But though it be Harvest-time yet it shall rain and thunder and all to the end that you may be convinced of yourgreat wickedness in asking you a King They had not only had their desires granted before this time but as they thought had some confirmation of their desires for Saul had prospered after he had been a King but yet for all that saith he I will give you an evident demonstration that it is not in love that you have him but it was your great wickedness in seeking you a King And Samuel called upon the Lord saith the text and the Lord sent thunder and rain that day And then in vers 19. All the people said to Samuel Pray for thy servants unto the Lord thy God that we die not for we have added unto all our sins this evil To ask us a King Now we do acknowledg it to be a very great and sore evil indeed though our King hath prospered a while yet God shews us now that it is an evil And by this you may see that it is hard for men to be convinced when they have according to their hearts desires that it is in Anger rather than in Love But to give you some Notes whereby you may be helped to come to see whether what you have granted by God according to your desires be in anger or love As First When you desire a gift rather than God in it when your desires are for the Gift rather than the Giver you can have no comfort that there 's love in it There 's no man that hath to deal with another if he knows that what he doth desire from him it is not out of love to him but meerly from the love of the gift certainly though he may give him for some other ends yet he doth not give it out of love Those desires that are not out of love are not satisfied from love Love satisfies no desires that are not raised by love love it acts alwaies upon love Now God knows what the ground of our desires are if we desire the Gift rather than the Giver rather than God in it I say we can have no comfort that it is from love what we do enjoy A gracious heart whatsoever it would have from God yet this is the main thing in its desires Oh! let me have God in it such is my condition here in this world that God appoints that I shall not enjoy him immediately altogether but I shall enjoy him through such and such mercies Oh then that I might have these mercies that I might enjoy him in them Certainly any thing that thou hast in way of satisfaction to these desires is out of love but when thou lookest no further than the Creature thou wouldest have the thing but lookest not at God in it thou canst not expect the love of God to be conveyed by it That 's the first thing Secondly When our desires are imoderate and violent then we have cause to suspect if God satisfies them that they are not out of love when we are in a hurry in our desires This was just the case of this People here Nay but let us have a King say they we must needs have him whatsoever comes of it we will have him When God doth use to satisfie the desires of his People in his love he doth first quiet their hearts he brings their hearts into a sweet and blessed moderation but when mens hearts are violent that the thing they desire they must have God doth manie times say You shall have it then take it but then he speaks not in love that 's verie remarkable The desires of the People in the 11. of Numbers for Quails it 's a notable Scripture to confirm our Point here That God doth not alwaies satisfie in love Reade Psal 78. 30. and so on there you have the same story recorded of their desiring of Quails they were mightily violent in their desires But that 's the thing I would observe there That the Lord after he had shewed that he did not answer their desires in love but in wrath then in vers 34. after the judgments of God had come upon them in the satisfying of their desires that many of them were slain by God then saith the Text he called the name of that place Kibroth-Hattaavah because there they buried the people that lusted that is The Sepuleres of the lusts of the desires that they had God sets a Brand upon that place saith he Here are the Graves of the desirers Oh! the desirers they must needs have flesh and they stood upon their desires their desires must be satisfied And here 's the Graves of the desirers saith God Oh remember you that lust after evil things remember when your desires are immoderate and violent it 's just with God to set a brand by som remarkable hand of his against you and say Here 's the mark of these desires that were so immoderate and so violent That 's the Second Note Thirdly When God grants unto men their desires but it is before the due time They have what they would have Oh! but they have it not in Gods time Children they long and desire after green Fruit but if they could stay but a few weeks or months one Apple then would be worth an hundred when they are green but they cannot stay they must have the Fruit when it is green They have it but it breeds Worms in their bellies and doth them no good So when we have our desires satisfied before the due time it 's not in love then Certainly a Mother intends little good to her Child though her Child should cry for green Apples from off the tree to fill the belly of her Child with those green Apples No it 's not the due time God had promised that Israel should have a King in due time that there should come KIngs from the loins of Abraham And in Deut. 17. 14. There 's a prophesie of a King that they should have yea but they would not stay Gods time and therefore it was not out of love in Psal 106. 13. it is said there That those that did so lust God gave them their lusts in his wrath They did not wait for his Counsel That 's that which is noted there Oh! we should be willing to wait for Gods Counsel We would have the thing presently done yea but Gods Counsel works one thing after another and one thing depends upon another and we should be willing to wait for his Counsel If we will not mind Gods Counsel but must have our desires satisfied and that now we cannot expect love in them but it 's rather wrath He gives unto them in his Anger and that 's the Third Note Fourthly When God grants us what we would have but there comes no blessing at all with what we enjoy he doth grant the thing but takes away the
that let us have a King let become of Samuel what wil come and of his house what care they And so when men are greedy in their desires Let us have such and such a thing but care not what becomes of others That 's another N 〈…〉 of desires not granted in love Twelfthly When God satisfying of our desires makes way for some judgment Now indeed the thing is comfortable that we have but stay a while and you shall see there is some judgment making way by that very thing that you have and when the judgment is come afterwards you will see how it made way for it there are very great judgments many times upon men that are made way for by the satisfying of their own desires God hath many waies to prepare a path for his anger by giving you your desires many times there 's nothing more ordinary in experience than this and therefore we need not stand upon it If you wil but examin the course of your lives sometimes you may see that if God had satisfied your desires in such and such things it would have made way for the greatest misery that ever you had in al your lives and when God denies sometimes to his People they can confess O Lord I see that had I had my mind in such a thing which I would have had I had been undone And on the other side You wil find that those things which you accompt the greatest mercies to you do make way for the greatest evils surely they were not given in love then Thirteenthly When men are greedy of things and never consider the inconvenients when they would have their desires satisfied in a foolish way never minding what inconveniences may follow in this thing more than in the other thing meerly looking upon that which is for the present sutable to them but never think what inconveniences may follow Thus it was here they would have a King but Samuel came and told them all the inconveniences that would follow upon it how that they should have this affliction and the other You that are so desirous of him if he comes among you he will bring you into slavetie your Estates and your Children shall be under his power you wil be in slaverie to everie Courtier Nay but we will have a King for al this they would needs change the way of Government O that we might have a king And they would be brought more under Law than before for indeed in the time of the Judges if you reade that storie you shal find that the People of Israel were in a great deal of Libertie then and they obeyed the Judges in a great measure in a voluntary way if you raade the storie you shal find but Two Tribes that followed Barach and Deborah and so of Jepihthah and Sampson those that were willing freely to offer themselves they followed them and those of Ephraim they did chide with the other and ask'd them Why did you not call us to it as noting that there was a great deal of freedom in the time of the Judges Yea but we will have a King and we wil all then be tied to the same thing and be under the same power and so there will be a great deal of union that way when this man shall not be in this way and the other shal not be in another way and men to have their freedom thus thus but al shal come in and joyn under the same Law and so we shall go on in one Certainly this was their reasoning in their desire of having a King Now this kind of union no question was verie good among the People but to have it in this way That whereas the People were governed in such a way before as stood with a great deal of Libertie It 's true they shall have a kind of union but they do not consider what inconveniences there will be in their being thus chain'd together Prisoners that are chained at a Post they are altogether all the day long But would you have such a kind of union to be united with such chains Consider that with the union there may come a slavery upon you But they did not consider of any such things no matter say they Come let us be all joyn'd in one and let the same Law be upon every one But now how this would bring them under bondage and slavery in those things they would be loth to be brought under in in that they considered not at all Fourteenthly When men seek to have their desires sarisfied meerly because they love change We cannot have any comfort that God doth it out of love when it is out of a foolish spirit that loves novelty They though they had bin long enough under that kind of Government and in a meer kind of novelty not knowing what might come of such a change but a change they would have And so people though there be never so much good in a way yet out of a novelty they would fain have a change And if God grant them a change when they have no other ground but that for it it is a sign that there is wrath in it and not love Further When it is through impatiency and want of heart to submit to God in a former condition It 's ill when it is through a meer novelty but when it 's through impatiency then it 's like to be in wrath and not in mercy if your condition be changed God hath put you in a lower and mean condition it 's true it 's lawful for you to desire a change yea but if you desire it because you cannot submit to Gods hand then it 's a sign that it is in wrath but when you have brought your hearts to this Lord here I am dispose of me as thou pleasest I am content to lie under thy hand but Lord I look up to thee for mercy Consider I am a poor weak Creature and it is fit that thou shouldest have thy will and not I mine then if God make a change you may have comfort that it is in mercy but if you have it through impatiencie you can have no comfort at all in it It was just so here they could not bear the hand of God that was upon them any present trouble that they had upon them and so thought to help themselves by having a King and God gave them one but it was in his anger Further When our desires of further mercies makes us forget the former mercies and makes us unthankful for former mercies they would have a King that might go before them and fight for them Fight for them Did not God fight for them before Oh wonderful and glorious Battels they had when they were under their Judges when they had Samuel to direct them they never had more glorious Victories afterwards than then Nay you shall find in the whol Story of the Judges that they did alwaies prevail and
their Judges generally were good and guided them in Gods waies but the Kings did not so For the Kings of Israel were none of them good from the beginning of them to the end Oh unthankful wretches that they are so eager to have another condition never minding nor blessing God for what they had forgetful of all the good that ever they had Samuel could appeal to them Whose Ox or Ass have I taken he judged righteously in his judgment But they forget all Gods goodness and mercy towards them and must now be in another condition Oh! consider of this you that desire new conditions be not you unthankful for what you have had if you be so eager to have more so as to forget what you have had if God should send you more your case is like to be worse than now it is If one should go and take meat to eat befor he hath digested what he eat before he hath fill'd his stomach but there comes new dishes to the Table that pleases his pallate and he falls upon that and eats more and more but that doth not nourish him but turns to evil humors and so doth him hurt but if he would stay till he hath digested what he hath eaten before then he might eat and have good nourishment And you that would fain have more and more have you digested what you have had are you thankful for what you have had hath God had the glory of what you have had before then if God gives you any thing you may have comfort to your souls that it comes out of love Further When men desire new things out of distrust of God and make such conclusions of unbeleef Surely if God should not grant such and such things unto them then they are lost and undone and there 's no way in the world to help them and their desires are put on by distrust Whereas my Brethren Gracious desires are put on by faith it 's the prayer of Faith that doth â—ood it is Faith that doth inflame gracious desires that are sent up to God they are sent up by the strength of Faith and not the strength of Vnbeleef It is the strength of Vnbeleef that makes the desires of people so strong as they are as thus These people desir'd a King Why because they could not trust God to have but only Judges as they had before Samuel was an old man his sons were naught and they see themselves in a hard condition yea but now seeing God had nor spoken to them about a new Government they should have had it from God if they had it at all God should chuse them one but they thought that they must have one to go before them in their Battels or else their Battels would miscarry and they saw the Princes of the earth they went before their Subjects in their Battels and therefore they would be like unto them and durst not trust God in that way that they were in before and therefore it was in wrath that God gave them their desires Yet further If when God changes our condition we bring the sins of our old condition into our new we can have no comfort then that it is out of love our care should be when our condition is changed Oh but what were the fins of my former condition what were the sins of my afflicted my low condition let me take heed that I do not bring those corruptions into my new condition And then lastly If we seek to attain our desires by unlawful means certainly that is curs'd If God doth let us prosper in waies that are unlawful in themselves we cannot beleeve that what we enjoy comes out of love but out of wrath I was the willinger to enlarge this Point because of the great usefulness of it Now then by way of Corallary by all that hath been said First Learn we then from hence To take-heed that we quiet our selves in our desires be not too earnest in your desires remember that Scripture 1 Cor. 10. 6. Now these things were our ensamples to the intent we should not lust after evil things as they also lusted It hath reference even to their lusting for their Quails it was call'd lusting after evil things though the things themselves were good yet because of the way of their lusting it made them evil to them these are for our ensample because we should not lust so as they lusted Oh! when you reade but that 11. of Numb and the 78. Psal and there find how they lusted after evil things and how the wrath of God came upon them when they had their desires satisfied let these be ensamples for us that we take heed of lusting so And so when we reade of their desires so after a King and what they met withal when they had him I say it should teach us so far to moderate our desires as to labor to regulate them by the Word of God and not be headie in them but to order them according to the mind of God And then the Second is this Let us by all that hath been said learn to prepare our hearts for what we have and to seek proportionable grace for any thing that we do desire Treasure up this lesson when thou wouldest have a mercie from God Oh seek proportionable grace and prepare for the mercie Thirdly learn this Lesson Be not too much exalted when thou hast thy desires satisfied Me thinks this Point might be as a prick to prick the bladders of the pride of mens hearts Oh! take heed though you have prospered according to your desires Saul prospered a great while and yet it was in wrath Certainly there 's no great matter to be expected from such things as we may have in Gods wrath and therefore no cause to be exalted Fourthly Learn from hence Never to draw any arguments of Gods love by satisfying your desires in outward things It is a vain conceit of people to think thus God loves me why because I have desired such and such things and God hath given them to me If a man were to go and chuse a Wife if he knew her face were painted would he conclude Surely here 's one of an excellent complexion No he would rather suspect it truly the argument is as good That this womans complexion and the constitution of her body is whole and good as that argument that my condition is good because God satisfies me in my desires Fifthly draw this consequence likewise Learn never to envie at any men that have their lusts satisfied there 's little cause that you should envie them If you should see a man that loves Wine and you knew it were poisoned And a man that hath a Sattin Sute and you know it hath the Plague in it there were no cause of envying such a man a Leather Sute were a great deal better God satisfies men many times but it is in
66 Reproach Reproach see Apostacy Reprobation Reprobation see Note Dangerous sign Restitution Why no pardon without Restitution 320 Scripture for Restitution 321 Repute Repute not to be trusted 421 Reverence We are with Reverence to hear the Lord speak 416 Rich Rich see High-minded Root What 's the immediate Root of Faith 177 Rule Rule for matter of Meditation 7 The general Rule of Worship 437 S Saints Priviledg of Israel refer to the Saints 11 Saints see Law Affliction Prosperity Satan Satan's great design 71 Sanctifie Gods Love sanctifies all things 84 Scare see Ministers Scripture What the Scripture presses much 297 Scripture see Restitution Self Wherein self appears in sin 512 Self destruction see Aggravation Sensual Sensual things see Fill. Servants Servants should love one another 76 Servants see Recreation Sign Sign see Carnal heart Similitude Similitudes what and how to be used 350 Sin Sin see Imitate Sinner A sinners duty 340 Soul Soul see Guiding Spirit Gods Spirit grieved only by the Saints 89 Spirit see Church Gods Spirit bitter to some 406 Slaves Gods Sons slaves for a time 14 Slavery God hath his time to call his sons out of Slavery ibid. Spiritual Spiritual things see Little State The State of the Saints is very secure 154 Steps The steps of Apostacy 432 Stout The Character of a stout heart 107 Stratagem Stratagem see Devils Success Success no note of a good Cause 536 Superiors Superiors should win by Love 74 Superstition Superstition see Beginning Suspense Suspence a cause of great evil 123 Swearing see Kissing the Book Sword For the Sword to be in a City a sad thing 113 T Tartness see Ministers Terror see Jehovah Terrible see God Their see Arabian Thoughts Gods Thoughts from eternity concerning his Elect 79 What thoughts we should have of outward comforts 456 Time see Slavery Tools see Iron Trading Oppression in Taading a great evil 313 Tradesmen Vnder Tradesmen to oppress is wicked 314 Tradesmen see Meditation Trembling Trembling due to God 416 Trembling see Alteration Tribes see Confidences Troubles Great troubles at the raising of Christs Kingdom 184 Truths Truths not necessary to be imposed 98 V Vanity The vanity of proudmen 445 Priests may be vanity that seem to be much for God 352 Vindicate How the Saints are to vindicate Reproaches 410 Violence see Magistrates Use The use of Reason in Religion 440 W Wait How we are to wait on God 303 Why we should wait 304 Way To be guided in our way is a fruit of Love 32 The way to Vniformity 70 A way of Holy Revenge 108 Gods waies not our waies 118 Weeping Weeping not sutable to a high Spirit 247 Wilderness Wilderness see Conduct Wind Creature-hopes are but winde 202 Wives Wives or Husbands not to be forced on Children 390 Word Word see Drawn Work Work see Chief One Work of the day of Judgment 511 World World see Honor Worship Worship see Rule Corruption Wrath Proneness to wrath not Gods Image 150 Y Yong Yong see Confident Z Zeal All men should shew Zeal 〈…〉 r God FINIS Heb. The scope of the Chapter Where the Chapter ends The cohâ—eâ—ence Obs 1. Tota Scriptura hoc praecip 〈…〉 è agit ne dubitemus sed certo speremus 〈…〉 danâ—u credamus Deum esse misericordeÌ„ benegnum patientem Luth. 〈…〉 Rom 9. 11. 12. The phrase opened Excussâ—◠〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 significat eum qui crebâ—ò sugum parentis vel Heri excutit quamvis 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ternov in 〈…〉 c. What a child Israel was Ezek. 16. 1. c. applied Wherein the love of God to Israel stood Obs 1 Jer. 12. 7. Obs 2. 〈◊〉 3. Gods ancient love to England An instance of it England the first Nation in the world that God chose for the embracing Religion by publick Authority Lucius of England is said to be the first Christian King Centur. Cent. 2. Cap. 2. Tit. de Propagation Ecclesiiae 〈◊〉 J. Balai Catal. Who also by publick Authority established Christianity about the year 169. Lucius in lucem prodit de patre coello J. B. Author primus apud Britones Religiones erat Rossaei Britania God remembers the kindness of Englands youth first love Particul persons should recal Gods antient love unto them when they were children A Rule how we may never want matter of meditation Obser 4. Obs 5. Gods waies of mercy and affliction toward Israel a type of his waies toward his people in all ages Gods love doth not find but make the person lovely Object Answ How to know whether God will love us or no Obs 6. Youth What will compleat the comfort of our lives Jer. 2. 2. How we may know whether God loved us when children Nimis serò te amami Aug. Exod. 4 22. Jer. 31. 9. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 70. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Obs 1. Priviledges of Israel refer to the Saints Malach. 3. 17. Saints therefore not under the Law Psal 89. 30 31. c. Obs 2. Jer. 2. 14. Use Obs 3. The Church one in Faith Spirit Babtism c. Eph. 4. 4 5. not in outward incorporation and visible Government Obs 4. Jer. 12. 17. Deut. 32. 10. observed Gods Sons slaves to Satan oft-times and for a season And to wicked men which is the admiration of Angels God hath his time to call them out of that slavery Obs 5. Exod. 12. 42. Applicat to England The Text as cited Mat. 2. 15 further expounded Hierom Matthew's interpretation seems strange to some * See Bucer on Matth. 28. P. 197. shewing that the Apostles allegations of Scripture were not proper unless to such as the holy Ghost enlightned to see the mystical sense of them and except we shall say that those Expositions were received things in those daies as are among the Jews now the Chaldae paraphrase expounding many places of Christ which according to the Letter have another sense and this perhaps may be the saâ—er to affirm because else it may seem the Apostles could not so well have charged the Jews with Obstinacy as Act. 13. and Chap. 28. and else where Opinions about the place in Matthew Junius in loc Paralel lib. 1. Paral. 6. Isa 2. 9. Isa 9. 6. 3. preferred so Hierom on Hos 11. 1. expounds it Exod. 12. 46. and Joh. 19. 36. compared Things accidental are under providene Great things intended of God by smal 2 Sam. 7. 14. Heb. 1. 5. compared also Obs God som way or other aims at Christin all his works which to see wil be one part of the Saints glory A similitude A fruit of Gods Love and of Christ's Spirit to understand the reach of God in Scripture A comfort to the Saints in their sufferings that they have a conformity with Jesus Christ by them Those that fly with their children The danger and length of Christs flight into Egypt The inward tentations of the parents 〈◊〉 Christ in thei 〈…〉 flight Expos 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 70. 2 Cor. 5. 4. illustrated Calvin in
our servants A masters comfort 1 Sam. 18. 22 Servants should love one another Object Answ Magistrates shold govern by love 1 Chr. 28. 2. The difference betwixt the gesture language of David the Princes of these times John 2d King of Portugal The property of the Pelican A Princes pattern Timeri quà m diligi A pernitious state maxime The evils of striving otherwise than by love Why Hypocrites are hide-bound towards God The benefits of love Obs 3. Deut. 11. 13. The cords of Gods love to his people 1 Eternal Gods thoughts from eternity concerning his Elect. 2 Elective and separating Malach. 1. 2. Use 3 Free Hos 14. 4. Deut. 7. 7. discoursed 4 He gave his Son for them Which he did not for Angels 5 And Himself also This is set forth by gradation and prosopopie 6. Regards nothing else Isa 43. 4. illustrated 7 Pardoned all their sins Revel 1. 5. Gal. 2. 20. observed A representation of the love of Christ in coming to take away our sin An apt simile 8 Puts loveliness upon them 9 Loves them with the love he hath to Christ Joh. 17. 23. 10. Hence God delights in his Saints Why God does all the former things for his Saints Eph. 1. 23. illustrated by Joh. 17. 24 11 Gods love sweetens and sanctifies all A meditation for afflicted Saints 12. Gods love overcomes all our unworthiness both before after conversion which he foresaw 13 Gods love hath in it the love of all relations 14 An everlasting and unchangable love Zeph. 3. 17. Jer. 3. 13. 2 Thess 2. 16. Application 2 Cor. 5. 14. God the Element of Love 1 Joh. 4. 16. Eph. 3. 17 18 19. The rarity of the expression in Eph. 3. 19. Why Christians ar so scant in their obedience and empty in their spirits Cant. 7. 12. noted God regards nothing but love Our love should be eminent toward Christ Minus te 〈◊〉 Deus diligit qui praeter te aliquid diligit qui propter te non diliget August Confess Gods special love to Engl. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. The scope of the Text. Obs 4. Three sorts of Gods Bonds Use Niâ—â—â— durus est animus qui amore si nolebat impendere noltt rependare August Adulterous love Gifts The Spirit grieved only by the Saints 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A meditation for a Saint about to sin Mark 14. 72. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Erupisset Beza Ovelatione capitis he covered his head as Marriners use to do Theophylact. Simile Simile Expos Luther No coÌ„mand in the Gospel without a promise Simile Obs 1 Deliverance from Oppression a great mercy Levit. 26. 13. Ezek. 34. 27. Expounded A cure for Atheistical thoughts Obs 2. To grow wanton after deliverance from yokes is very sinful Englands sin The Evils of licentiousness after deliverance 1 It hardens our Adversaries Suppression of Errors by violence no argument of the truth of Church-government Omnes licentiâ deteriores sumus 2 It obscures the work of God Psal 149. 4. enlightned 3 Deprives others of just liberty Which wil be charged on the ocasioners of it 4 It â—aâ— bring the yoke on again 5 It justly provokes men against liberty Lam. 1. 14. What use we should make of our liberty Exod. 12. 25. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 illustrated Obs 3. Oppression of others after deliverance from oppression a crying sin Deut. 28. 48. Conscience oppression the most grievous What Statesmen should consider in imposing things Object Answ Such Truths as are not of necessity not to be imposed Men of latitude in judgment A meditation for such And necessary at this time Isa 58. 6. 9. We should make the lives of Beleevers comfortable In what things we should bear with our brethren And why Use To Magistrates and Governors of families Times of Recreation to be permitted to servants 1. It would drown the memory of the superstitious Holydays 2. It would forward the sanctification of the Sabbath Expos Faciam eos edere quietè Luth. Obs 1. Use To the Rich. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 descendere ferit Obs 2. Obs 3. Use to Hard Masters Use 2. The misery of other places cy mer 1. The Text paraphrased Obs 1. Use A great mercy to be thorowly taken off from carnal props 2. Obs 2. Obs 3. Use for England Englands condition must be far worse if it think of returning Obs 4. Who the Assyrian was Isa 10. 5. 7. 12. A Character of a stout heart Obs 1. Use A way of holy revenge Obs 2. Obs 3. Use to the convicted Job 9. 4. to be observed by such An obstinate sinner worse than the Devil in some respect Jer. 3. 22. should be our example An exhortation to backsliders Jer. 4. 5. expounded 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 renuit fastidinit Pâ—el Obs 4. Expos 1. Caepit vulg Hierom. of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Hiphil Obs 1. Jer. 18. 7 8. England Expos 2. Obs 2. Isa 34. 5. 6. Jer. â—6 1â— Use Against protractors of the War The War taken by the great The New-Model of the Army Anno 1645 1646. A blessing for those that hasten peace Obs 3. Use for Engl. How men were deceived at the begining of this war Jer. 47. 6 7. Obs A sad thing for the sword to be in a City Ioseph de Bello Iudaic. lib. 7 cap. 7. 1100000. slain in the siege at Jerusalem The mercy of God to London all this War The Butt the enemy aimed at Isa 37. 33. 34. 35. Ezek. 14. 17. Jer. 25. 15. Not only preserved but made the City of Refuge for the kingdom Expos Isa 14. 31. This the caus why London hath been so aimed at Every good patriot ought to labor the the good of London By prayer and all good endeavors Psal 55. 9. 17. explained Our own Counsels a cause of Englands lasting war Expos Comâ—det capita torum Vulg. Propter consilia eorum Pagn Ezek. 11. 2. When Parliament Army City and Kingdom wil give over their own Counsels Good intentions may be seduced A false religious and State principle Gods waies not our waies Expos Application 1. 〈…〉 England Why some were 〈◊〉 w 〈…〉 at the begining of this Reformation Why they started off again 2. Private particular persons Why these start back 1. 2 3 4 5 6. 7 8. 9. Admonition to such 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Suspenst sunt Calv. Parâ—us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 70. In suspence here what Applicat to England Populus meus dubitat au velit redire ad me Luth. * Populus meâ—s haesitat se convertere ad Legemmeam Chald. Paraphrase Obs The conflict of conscience corruption Suspence a caus of much evil Considerations tending to settle the unresolved about the waies of God Simile Populus meus pendebit ad reditum meum i. e. pendulus sperabit vulg Montanus Expos 2 3. 4. Obs 1. Piety raises the heart more than pride Obs 2. Obs 3. Simile Obs 4. Psa 97. 9 10. illustrated Abrahams
loc Obs 1 Obs 2. Obs 3. How we should charge our souls if we answer not Gods call to duty after deliverance Obs 4. Jer. 2. 27. Chap. 32. 33. Chap. 18. 17. illustrated Use to Ministers Jer. 18. 17. to be remembered by those that turn their backs on the Word How men come to that height Ier. 43. 2. with Chap. 44. 86. Obs 5. Simile Why men most wicked where there is great means Obs 6. The Jews a very wicked people yet notwithstanding God makes them his peculier people Gods greatest delign is to magnifie his free-grace Deut. 9. 6. illustrated Psal 78. 8. Ezek. 16. 30. Act. 7. 52. Psal 106. 7. Exod. 14. 11 12. Exod. 16. 2. 28. Chap. 17. 2. with the continual story of the Israelites confirm the doctrine A meditation for parents vexed with stuborn children Use Comfort against a stubborn heart Exod. 34. 9. Expos Psal 77. 20. The Tâ—xt referred to Deut. 1. 31. Psal 107. 7. observed Obs 1. Use for England Our path untroden Obs 2. Exod. 14. 9. Baal-zephon what Use Obs 3. Use Psa 107. 6. 7. England The changableness of those that have been our guides Jer. 31. 22. enligntned and applied Jer. 31. 9. illustrated It 's a fruit of fatherly love to guide us in our way Applied to the guidence of the soul Why the soul needs guiding Yong beginners not to be too confident An apt simile A prophesie touching the proof of much of the profession of these times Obs 4. Simile Obs 5. Obs 6. Num. 11. 12. Obs 7. 1 Thes 2. 7. Ministers pattern Tit. 1 7. An apt simâ—le A Nurses qualification Obs 8. Be ashamed undutiful children The Pisidians Expos The text one of the most remarkable in Scripture Obs 9. Isa 57. 17. 18 Use Applicat to England The New-Model of the Army 1645. Psal 5 〈…〉 Obs 10â— God stands much upon it to be acknowledged the healer of his people Lewis the 11. of France Use Psal 10. 3. Healing with forgiveness a sweet mercy Applied to visited families persons Expos 1. 2. Cords of a man what 1. How God dealt rationally with the people of Israel 1. A Law in its self rational Deut. 4. 8. explained 2. Backt with Reasons Preface to the Decalogue 3. Urg'd with Motives Deur Chap. 4 5 6. 4. Cleered from Objections 5. God desires conâ—erence with us Isa 1. 18. Simile 6. Would have us consider Deut. 32. 29. Simile 7. Pleads with them Simile 8. Appeals to their own consciences Isa 48. 8. illustrated Isa 5. Ezek. 18. 2. How God deals gently with his people 1. Sutes himself to their dispositions Simile 2. Observed when they were in a good temper Wives 3. Gave them time to consider Use 4. Hired them to obedience 5. Distinguished of weakness wilfulness 6. Afflicted in measure as their natures might bear Isa 57. 16. 7. was aflicted in al their afflictions Isa 63. 9. Simile 3. How God drew his people in an honorable way 1. Instruction more than correction 2. Preserved their ingenuity 3. Aimed at their good in all 4. Stil held forth hope of reconciliation Admonition to parents and governors 5. Kept up their honor Jer. 2. 14. Isa 27. 7. 6. Met them half way Simile Obs 1. 1 King 8. 47. observed Psal 119. Obs 2. Use Joh. 16. 8. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Cor. 2. 4. Ministers must convince not scare men The most convincing Ministry the most powerful Majestrates 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 must deal by reason rather than violence in difficult cases of consience Why Reason and not Violence is to be used to tender consciences Parents and Masters must use more Conviction than Correction Obs 3. Psal 2. Who wil nor be drawn by the Cords shal be whipt with them 2. How God deals with his people in a gentle way Use 1. Saints should be eminent in courtesie 2. Draw our relations with gentleness And why An apt simile Harsh natures should observe this 3. Gentle meaus rejected agravate sin Evidenced 3 How God deals honorably with men Obs 1 Preserve the honor of our inferiors Yea though the faults be great Dan. 12. 2. illustrated Masters that have Apprentices in the City Obs 2. Obs 3. To be drawn by the Word is to be drawn like a man to be forced by blows is to be drawn like a beast Obs 4. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in densis 〈…〉 bus a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 contorsit condensavit torquendo Expos 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Isa 5. 18. The Hebrew of the Teâ— empharical Jer. 31. 3. The Text paraphrased The bands of love to Israel 1. Separation from all other people Exod. 35. 16. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mirisicemut prae omnibus pop Munster Deut. 7. 6 7. Obs 1. 2. Election of the Parents their seed Deut. 4. 37. 3. Made them his inheritance portion treasure c. Deut. 7. 6. 4. Pitying theÌ„ in their afflictions Isa 63. 9. 5. Engaged al his Attributes for their good Isa 63. 6. A continued watchfuley over them Deut. 11. 12. 7. Gave them his Oracles Psal 147. 19 20. Rom. 3. 8. The Messiah to come of them 9. A law of Love The sum of the Law 10. Gave theÌ„ more than any else could offer 11. Heard theÌ„ in all their prayers Deut. 4. 7. 12. It could not have been conceived God should have done more Obs 1. Cant. 8. 6. The bonds of Love 1. Cant. 7. 6. illustrated 2. Eccles 7. 26. observed 3. Nulla est major ad amorem provocatio quam praerentre amando Aug. * Magnes amoris amor Love commands al the souls faculties 5. Makes all services delightful 6. Hath no bounds 7. Caution 8. Song 8. 6 7. 9. Rejoyce in sufferings 10. Seeks not its own 1 Cor. 13. Obs 2. Ministers duty to open Gods love Mark 1. 15. applied Repentauce a grace of the Gospel not of the Law Book of Martyrs lib. 1. Euseb lib. 3. cap. 20. Simile Simile Aust Confess lib. 9. cap. 1. Ejiâ—â—â—bas eas à me tu vera ac sumum suavitas ejiciâ—bas pro 〈◊〉 omni voluptate dulcior Why perseverence more frequent under the Gospel than under the Law Use to yong converts An apt simile Gods great design in the Gospel 2. Gain men with love in dealing with them Phil. 2. 1 2. The way to uniformity Spleenful Ministers Deal with kindred in Love A sowr disposition doth disadvantage much But perverse spirits are otherwise to be dealt with Satans great design Zach 11. 14. The love of Christians one to another in England formerly compared with our divisions now Eccles 3. An Apostrophe to Love Publick Love gone out of England A conviction of the consciences of some Many of both sides in mater of discipline and Churchgo â—rnment sincere Caution We should countermine Satan 3. Superiors should win by love Monica the mother of Austin Godly couples for want of love live worse than when one yoke-fellow is carnal oft-times The distance betwixt Christ and us greater than betwixt us