night This black-Prince-ruled world but where in thine Thy Word Saints Spirit thou art pleas'd to shine My soul is dark my brightest light but dim This yet 's my joy all I have I have from Him VVith Wanes and Changes now I oft decline But in the Full shall shortly ever shine Freed from this Leasehold earth this shady night Fully possesse possessed by the Light VVhose beaming favours from his Darkelesse face Condign'd his Choice Coheires of Glorious Grace I See no light and yet so much I see As darkes all other lights I feele no love And yet so much I feele as makes me flee All other loves when other joyes can't move My heart that sad perplexities annoyes I joy this griefe and grieve all other joyes Lord art thou gone What shalt thou so be lost Thy glorious eye into this heart hath sent The spark hath took the whole an Holocaust It restlesse mounts unto its Element Fire of the Spirit it is 't will make no stay Till to the Spirit of fire't hath burnt its way Shew me the Father and it shall suffice Whom ne'r man saw and liv'd yet seen of men If death wu'd doe it 't were well for wicked eyes Nor dead nor living yet seen of men how then Dead and alive in thee and by thy Light I feed on that full satisfying sight 'T is not the predisposed Organ here That needs the Medium of a Mediator Quicks deadned eyes th'obscured Object cleares To th'lightlesse Creature the great Light Creator Here see I all I 'd have the world is want The Bed's too short the Coverings are too scant BLack thoughts as black as hell and yet more black Their paines extort their lies Not Good What lack Hast thou of all content but only this I cannot see not say Good Good He is Mad thoughts As mad as Hell and what 's more mad Then to confesse He is and yet is bad More reason 's in m'unreasonablenesse VVhen say there is no God then not confesse Him Good Him only Good O could I thinke My heart so gone in love so brought to 'th brinke Of those Celestiall Rivers thence shu'd shrink And steale me to th' infernall Lake I think VVho did so deeply of his goodnesse drink That this was in my heart my heart in Heaven Ne'r will I trust what hath me so deceiven No no nor what I say for if I doe 'T will cheat me in That Resolution too Ah Lord what wo'nt I do whom even now Thou feasted'st with the sweets of God yet how How soon my mouth was full of gaulie taste That thou shu'dst throw away the world as waste And Fire-fit refuse yet so sure combine Me in that Jesu bundle of Life with Thine Elect who'st room enough in Him for all Or might'st have kept them from their former fall Blest God! 't is therefore that I love thee so That thou these wise-hid-depths to Babes wu'dst show VVhen Fools proud wisdome scorns to stoop so low Thou nothing do'st because 't is Good 't is Good Because Thou do'st it Thy good pleasure wu'd That this be so even so be it who will Doe what They will may thank themselves for th' ill Ensu's but what Thou wu't Thy grace VVho'rt plac'd to dwell in Satans Place O love The God of glory Come Good God! in th'unclean Spirits room VVhat am I Lord And what thy whole Creation That Thou shu'dst condole VVer 't but a Man but Millions so condole As t'beare the Shame Blame Death the whole Evils of thy Sainted Rebels whom Justice judg'd meriting one doome Love Goodnesse shu'd I praise extend Unto its due I shu'd ne'r end Nor wu'd nor will but make my dayes Expire in Panegyrick laycs TEach me Thy Foolish wisdome Lord and let The blindfold world choose wiser Follies set My heart in frame to Learn-Love-Doe Thy will To feare to Think Speak Act the smallest ill Here wisdome takes beginning only Here Where feare shall teach me wisdome wisdome feare Thou art Only-Wise-Immortall God and He That 's taught of Thee but only taught is he VVhose humble feare dives in those depths too deep For haughty Ignorance Sleep fondlings sleep And hug your dreames of wit but when you wake You 'le dearely rue your obstinate mistake HOw pleasantly I weare away my dayes I' th' sence o'renewed strength My strength decaies And rises by his ruines I melt away How sweetly melt still drop proud flesh defray Your marrow to maintain these flames still burne Ble'st spirit burne me all to fire turne Thoughts will prey on my spirits life will away Then live my sprightfull thoughts on your decay Life Life of Lives 'T is only Then I Live VVhen ready stand prepar'd with Joy to give Up my Accompt and speed me to that day That gives me Life Indeed because for Aye O When shall I put off these fleshly Clothes And in my Earthy Bed take sweet repose Untill that Morning come that Holy day In holy Pleasures I shall ever Play On well tun'd Heart that Heart inamouring ditty That is the Consort of that Heavenly Citie Even so Lord Jesus Come when breakes the day Show's us Thy face the shadow 's flowne away Even so Lord Jesus Come when breakes the day Amen Amen the Bride and Spirit say I Come I Come so come that we may come Riding o' th' Cloudes unto our Fathers Home MElt in thy Fire my Earth blest Spirit blow M'into a Glasse through whose transparent pores My radiant streames of holy luster flow Into my light-enliv'ned soule now poares On those dim glimmerings thorough this darksom dust Yet more ob scured by th'False-lights of Lusts More then more strong be those thy glorious rayes To lift my heart up to thy heavenly wayes Till thou shalt spiritualize my very flesh And make my glorious body see no lesse I Cannot hold so full so full of Thee Sweet Father help the more 's the Revelation Of Truth the more th'more strong the test'mony Of love the more th'more strong is the temptation My Love burnes still and from that fire comes light Restores the day unto my darkest Night For still I say I know I 'm ignorant And very bad but Thou art Wise and Good I can't but love Thee Thy Love-Letter I can't But I must reade thus Truth is understood Receiv'd with love without delusion so By knowing I learn to Love by loving Know. A holy Life 's the clearest Commentary I finde o' th' sacred Text the Spirit 's actuall Interpretation 'T unites what seemes contrary Parts One in Two show's how 't is it doth call Griefe joyfull faithfull feare lofty humblenesse Destinguisheth of Prayer Faith show's who confesse Who makes the Word a Lanthorn to his feet God to his pathes to mak 't a Light think 's meet HOw giddy I am with viewing the Sea I 'd know Why Thou't so ebb to some to some so flow Why this man 's left the other Love doth take But woe t' him dares debate with h's Maker make O
Thy Wise-knowing depth's unsounded be Since I cannot take Thee take take Thou mee Into Thy mercies Ocean be I receiven I know 't will beare me to my Haven Heaven That shall declare Thy righteousnesse that shall Thy Judgements manifest God's Judge of All Great Wonderfull Thy Workes Just true Thy Waies Shall be the ditty of Thy worthy Praise MY Head 's lost in my Heart sure I 'm in love Forget all yea m'own thoughts while thus above And now what 's this steales slily in my head My spirits thus in my heart concentered Don't I believe My heart my life wo'nt say it And for my thoughts what need I so much weigh it Thoughts oft confound themselves I love I live The God the Life that none but Christ can give Am crucified dead buried risen ascended Begin the Life that never shall he ended MY Head doth ake and yet my Head Doth feel no pain My Head is well and yet my Head Doth still complain Well I 'le goe lay it on my Husbands knee Where stroake it with His gentle hand shall Hee His Palm's a medecine Soveraign If He but touch The Feaver leaves if He refrain Yet I 'le not grutch Ther 's somewhat in 't He 's Wise Good ake's't still well 'Ts Thy mercy Lord 't shall never ake in Hell Ne'r ake in Hell then ever in Heaven Triumph o're griefe And sha'nt this all thy Sowers unleav'n With sweet reliefe But weigh them well they 'le overpoise them quite What 's Earth to Heaven Finite to Infinite And now my Faith what do'st where art What Yeeld to Sence Or hast forgot thy Heavenly Art How to dispence Joyes suiting every sorrow I wonder too Wer't in the Martyrs flames how Then thou 'dst doe Lord give me strength and Thou shalt take the praise Lord take my strength and That shall give Me praise NOw mouldring Earth why hang'st the head Hast not a Soul why why so dead Or shal't be more enslaved by Thy pains whose pleasures conquered lie No no 't is more ingenuous bred With courage as well as wisdome sped My spirit not mine 's egregious I 'M among the Exc'llent who so high That I not Aemulate And can I'ndure to see a Publican Thus match me He can blesse i' th' warme Sun but I 'd blesse i' th' sharpest storme I 'd pray I 'd praise my paines away And lull my griefe asleep a way Of sweet successe I 'd drown my swine This touchy grunting grumbling repine In my own waving passions Swage By reg'lar passions passions rage By this my heavenly indignation Appease this earth-fum'd perturbation Attempts to Shipwrack peace in vain That still 's afloat o' th' calmed Plaine Thy breath the windes did blow away Thy Word the boistrous billows stay Thou said'st I shu'd do greater things For Faith in 'ts power all things brings thou 'dst be commanded by 't I shu'd B' as sure of what so e're is good As if thou wert at their Commands Who humbly-bold wait watch thy hands But I wu'd doe what thou hast done I 'd make dim eyes play with the Sun Dead spirits from their graves wu'd bring And make deaf eares to heare them sing This dumb-grown tongue thy wonders tel I wu'd doe all things wondrous well I 'd th'lowest dullest flatnesse raise To th' highest tones of clearest praise I 'd fighting humours reconcile But if they 'le fight I 'd feast the while I 'd tune distempers to thy praise Turn cloudy nights to Sun-shine dayes Teach fainting hands to ring applaud And parched bones to spring with laud Smooth wrinkling gripings with a smile But if they wo'nt I 'd sing the while How ere it be yet Thou art good And better ditty I ne're wu'd Hold up declining Armes hold up Poure praises from an empty Cup For Grace is no more void then Nature Where th' creature wants ther 's the Creator Where that goes out there He comes in As well as where there goes out sin When then there 's place that 's empty o' thee Then not till then I 'le empty be Thy presence then when Thou sha't cease Then not till then I 'le cease to blesse Then never sha't Thou be unblest By him wh'hath thee a constant Guest Though in the dark a while we be Yet cause I see the Dark I see The world or want All 's one to me The while in either I ha'thee M'thinkes I can't but often pray That thou wu'dst take this world away For while 't is seen it bars my sight And I finde faith the sweet'st delight But all thy counsels have their beauty And all my comfort 's in my duty For thou hast taught my faith the way Through all to passe t' m'eternall stay Thee Thee O wu'dst thou take me now Thy childe that to thine armes doth bow Its straining soule loth to be held By th' world in'ts pleasing'st usage yeelds But paines O Thou that all things made And can'st revive them when they fade Thou that the Chaos fram'dst so faire And from foure discords match't so rare A set of healthy harmony Can'st when thou please make all agree And what 's my Musick but thy pleasure And but thy selfe what is my treasure Then let it goe and goe my health So will 's my musick so my wealth Be packing packing get thee gone No more dear friend He 's all or none Be packing packing get thee gone No more deare health Hee 's all or none Be packing packing get thee gone No more deare self He 's all or none Be packing packing get thee gone No more deare Nothing He 's all or none 'T is very well then I am ill If this be ill be I so still Till thou sha't see it fit to tell M'its very well that I am well 'T is very well friend I thee misse The misse o' th' world 's a world of Blisse Leave out thou sai'st this paltry Crotchet 'T will sound but ill and shall I botch it Into the Song sound it as 't will And so say I ha'th'better skill How too it grates my curious eares My tender Bowels wracks and teares M'observant head sets m'teeth on edge Against my self essay'd t' abridge My joy my stretching it besides Thy Will where all my joy resides And when all 's done so must I play The sweet the while lost by delay Strike off the sin strike as thou please Blot out th' offence I seek not ease And yet my ease because it is Thy pleasure t'keep me still in Blisse My ease my pleasure therefore is Or strike or not I 'm still in Blisse Nay this my ease my pleasure is Strike or forbeare the hand is His. Thankes thankes Think'st th'Angels now are still The just mens perfect spirits sill Not Heaven with their chanting voice Thou' rt o' the Choire my soul rejoyce Thou maist thou must praise with the gods The God makes musique with his rods He 's one Entire Pure Perfect Happinesse No shaddo ' o' change in him thou art e're Blest
to the proportion of our holinesse as they are to his simplicitie there being nothing to bound or alter that that is unmixed free absolute hath nothing to hinder it in its perfection And for that suiting our selves to others our sympathising teares and smiles I thinke it so farre from being inconsistent with this that it cannot well consist without it for how else shall I accommodate my selfe to my friends in their present contrary extremities how weepe with them that mourne and rejoyce with then that rejoyce at the same time Nor can we finde a greater helpe and furtherance to our promoving and progresse in our Christian course then this unmooveablenesse in respect of digression But if this station of soule bee vergent to either hand better to sadnesse I meane not of harshnesse discontent or any kind of malignitie but a more solemnesse retirednesse of spirit then to jollitie slightnesse flashinesse pragmaticalnesse idlebusibodiednes c. nothing that I know arguing a man of a more emptie and worthlesse spirit By the sadnesse of the countenance the heart is made better more pondering more wary more capable of councell diligent in action againe love is more taking with ingenious then terrour with base and servile spirits Gods mercy in Christ will sooner fetch them up then all his threatnings cast these downe And indeed a Christian so farre as understanding himselfe the ground and use of his owne affections cannot but pleasure in his sorrow delight in his mourning in his brokennesse in his contrition of heart because delights in doing the will of God because he sees the hand of God working it feeles it kneading as it were subduing fashioning it to his owne mind because his affections are answerable to God's he delights in that which God delights and further knowes neither it nor ought else of worth further then subservient conducible advantagious to his love his joy his confidence in his magnifying of Christ c. so his joy must needs have a touch a tincture of greefe because he lookes on it as on all his affections as matter of dutie and obedience else wu'd they not differ from bruit beasts because bid rejoyce in the Lord alwayes againe bid to rejoyce but now he cannot so looke on it but with a sweet gratious regret to see it no more because no more pure that hath so infinit so holy a God for its object for its only object either immediatly or at least mediatly And so indeed this very griefe cannot but intend confirme consolidate his joy in an humbly-thankfull the onely comfortable and truly joyfull posture of soule to see in what a sweet and gratious temper the divine goodnesse maintaines it whose rich and abundant mercy it is that it finds any the least smatch of true and reall peace And I am perswaded that even in heaven it selfe these hints and relishes of our owne unworthinesse made worthy in Christ of such an enmitie reconciled in such a unity will much further intend and extend these inimaginable joyes Sure I am they are a heaven upon earth And this this onely is the griefe becomming a Christian that lead'st it to the purest-and-sublimed'st joyes Those feares those tremblings that keepe the soule in the humblest selfe-debasing and therefore at the highest exaltation Let no man part what God hath put together Hence all our woes what he hath jony'd we sever From one another our affections goe And all from Him and hence is all our woe VV Here now my soule Dost heare him bid theetouch the world thou may'st But with thy Head thy Hand thy Heart 's displac'd Is out of joynt if 't be a jot from Him That tries thee how thou canst be out while in The world thou seem'st I am continually with thee With him sweet Psalmist may I may I too be I 'de too refuse these miserable joyes And waite for them are mixt with no annoyes 'T is basenesse to be cozen'd I 'de better know I want then want most when I least thinke so Give me the right or none no painted grapes My stomacke 's wiser than to feed on shapes Though th' Divell play the Zeuxis and wu'd cheat Me with a neat drawne colour I have meat Of such experienc't and approved worth Attends the craving soule I 'le ne're go forth To tamper with his hooked flies his pitfall chaffe His net-alluring glasse his braine-sicke laugh Hence jiggish joyes give me the solemne sound Whose Treble's zeale humilitie the ground God makes the meane compleats the Harmony For never two but three in one agree And hence vain man thou and thy joyes so jarre Because the God of unitie's so farre From triviall pleasures Long enough may'st lay The world to thine hearts eare thinke now to play Some pretty toy but nere can'st bring 't in tune Or if thou bring'st it in 't is out as soone The thing 's now absent to the mind the mind Now to the thing when met are straite disjoyn'd Let 's outside joy be other where obtruded That at th' best but circum praecordia ludit But playes about the heart the while 't is sad I' th' mid'st of'ts joviall'st mirth give me th' joy glads I' th' mid'st of its saddest sorrowes let my Spirit Rejoyce rejoyce In Spirit I this demerits The name of mirth indeed when th' heart doth enter Into 't and it into the heart its center Secur'd from th' reach o' th' worlds disturbance while 'T is inside outside guarded from its guile It s thickest terriblest assailings if The treacherous flesh betray 't not when a whiffe O' th' ruder winds blowes the th' other cleane away This weightie watchfull inward joy shall stay Delight 's the life of nature 't cannot live But 't must have somewhat may contentment give But I 'le take none o' th' false and so of force My soule unto the true will take its course My soule unto the true hath tane its course That onely that can make me false divorse Then may it be for ever strongly bent On thee in thee may dwell I thus intent Come worlds come divels they may have never an eare May have no part in me while I am here Still busied working me out of my selfe Int ' him whom while I see I see all 's pelfe And happy sure here 's happy worke enough Still to bespeake me from this paltry stuffe Here Here 's the ground and Piller of thy blisse Thy Christ thy God thy God thy Christ ne're misse With whom while thou shalt be Hee 'le be with thee With whom it is eternall life to be T 'S the halest ablest-bodied man and at The high'st embonpoint of Athletique state Workes long'st and hardest with the least supply Of fresh repasts as he whose symmetrie Of nature-consentaneous juyces i' th' Th' abundance of their strength 's not troubled with Those oft sharpe gnawings of Hetrogeneous humors Nor over-evacuation following tumors That that 's the halest strongest Christian Best longest worke with least o'
th' creature can For he hath most of God and who hath so He little cares which way the world will goe 'T shall never touch his heart nor taske his braine To lay about to fetch it backe againe As he whose lines are fallen in a faire Large pleasant place is made for th' worse to care If 't 'll come by faire meanes well and good hee 'le use It when and as he thinks convenient loose 'T he will ere hee 'le imploy the smallest foule Imploy't he doth that lets it pinch his soule T 's the soundest body that feeds o' th' simplest fare The soundest soule that makes his God his fare A happy man the spirit ' f a healthie mind Can in a health-injoying body finde A happie man the spirit ' f a healthy minde Can in a health-deprived body finde LIft up prevailing hands in praysing action ' Gainst Edom and the Edomitish faction There are they fallen proud Prilistims withall Their Ashdod brats so let them let them fall And never rise while on our Harpes we sing The song of Moses and the Lambe our King Victorious meekenesse gird thy all-conquering sword Unto thy potent thigh give give the word Unto thy Heavenly Host they 'l straight conjoyne With earths celestiall Armies then combine Rome Spaine France Hell take the devill and all The Mitred Captaines of the high Priests Hall Come on brave Borgias with your pransing horse Yee Popes deare Nephewes or which sounds the worse Though th' same his Base Sons whom he hath begot On an unwedded Church Change Cannon shot Into the shot of Cannon Tout d'an coup Devoure th' Presicians they 're a slender soup T' a Pulpit full of Sack a slippery yolke In lustie Muskadine they 'l never choake So well wash't downe with blood but if you thinke You'z finde as hard worke as ye had to get a drinke O' th' wary Scot close noddles constult together Hoord up i' th' deep'st Abbisse ' f y'r holy Father Jesuitick plots say a confederacie But 't shall not stand till truth it selfe can lie Come gather then together and be ye broke T'irrecomposible peeces He hath spoke Still will he thinke ye ride upon an Asse No no his white steed 's mounted Hee 'l surpasse Your forciblest finenesses Jerusalem Leape leape for joy Thy King comes and doth hem Thee round with mightie mountaines and his Hoste Is all prepar'd thine enemies to accoast For His are thine for thou art His then boast The in thee Lord thy God when thou art in th emost Inextricable dangers Here I here 's A Saint-like patience thus to chant the blisse Of bleeding wounds while their Te Deums charmes Fond soules with Swan-like songs our harmelesse harmes Shall sweetly breathe in sighes triumphant layes Of conquering Iös while our blood shall praise That name above the proudest wrath and raise A generation that shall Babell raze Stones shall be Churches and dead bones shall live E're God his glory unto Rome shall give Ther 's breath enough in heaven and dust on earth To build more men to ruine all her mirth How heaven derides these Gotham sages wu'd Drowne Eeles i' th' water drowne the Church in blood What 's the Parisian massacre forgot How crown'd with many a thousand Huganot Or th' Marian flames how oft th' Prelatique hands Were crowded with increasing Puritans Or those Ten Prim'tive persecutions what But more Christs-honourers hath their crueltio got But still the devill 's the divill although he know He workes the Saints more weale himselfe more woe So mad is envie 't had rather loose both eyes Then 'ts neighbour's one shud see 'ts deformities Courage my hearts we nor our cause can die Nay we may live to see proud Aegipt lie Dead on the shore What feare we Th' Wonderfull In Skill Power Peace Love 's ours what shall they pull The Palme from Him or shall they rend a Limbe Fro' th' Father of Spirits hurt the eye of Him Whose voyce is thunder and his eves are fire Who hands their breath then have they their desire And ne'r till then Thus in my Fort my Peace My Castle-Christ my flaming Wall ne'r cease There are they fallen yea though I thinke I fall And all my fellow souldiers for thus call We death because we thinke it so when 't is The onely rise unto our perfect blisse Th' irrevocable word 's past decree 's sign'd All things are present to a faithfull minde For hee sees all in God but he sees all At once and thus while he beholds hee 'le call Things past and future present things that are As they were not that are not as they were Let kingdomes clash and their foundations shake Haughtie hearts shrinke to their heele let fury take The loftiest Hills and hurle them in the Maine Let th' lively Sun his sprightly raies refraine And wraps 's in sable might let heaven and earth Meet in confusion while hell yawnes our mirth Shall that be swallowed up by this our joy That none can take away no foe n' annoy Rouse up brave spirits glorifie the name Of that great God that ever is the same And we in Him life death principalities Powers things present things to come shall these Disjoyne us from our God if once in Him One as He is One What is it that can dim Our glorious inutterable joy That sparkles purer luster from th' alloy That streames more radiant luster from th' alloy Of foyling griefe A joy whose native heate Growes stronger by the winter winds that beate Upon 'ts concentred spirits A joy that rises Higher yet higher by the fresh surprises Of 'ts Arke-secured braveries from all The Ocean-inundations can befall Nay leade me captive griefe yet one I know Shall captive thy captivitie and show Thy open spoyles as Trophes while I sing How sweet's the memory of sower to bring To minde those tempests past while hous'd in heaven I feast on Leelesse Wines rich marrow and leaven Untouched bread So great ill turn'd to well 'T is makes his glory-and-my good excell Ther 's nothing nothing ill but all is well Is alway well to those whose wayes excell Thus is th' upright as farre from 's neighbour as hell From heaven here well is ill there ill is well Nullius addictus jurare in verba Magistri NO give me A Philosophick Ingenuitie A Bacon Luther truth-exploring braine Can cull the Wheate from th' Chaffe and bring a graine To th' graynarie of knowledge no lazie pate Will nothing else but reade heare transcribe translate And take what 's brought it at adventure an idle drone Will suffer any thing ere 't will worke but one Whose naturalls can't indure t' be Aristotl'd With ipse dixits nor his spiritualls throtl'd W'th a Spirituall Lord's irrefragable propositions But h's free-borne spirit mak's exquisite inquisitions I' th' depths of grace and nature scornes to have His judgement strangled like a Turkish slave B' usurping tiranny a noble soule Whose understanding w'll suffer no controule But from
's but a drop A dust to Him that makes the mountaines hop And skip like Lambekins with his Earthquak hand But thou 't goe faire and soft though he command Thee flie for so doth love He who graspes the winds I' th' hollow of his hand the swelling Ocean binds Up with a word here just here stay thy waves But lawlesse man how proudly he behaves Himselfe he stinted he a strickt precise Foole no for he that is is onely wise Call'st him thy Master while thou canst expect To have thy servant shew thee more respect Thou't bid him come and goe and stay and so He must bid's God thou answerest Him thou 't goe Thou't come thou 't stay when where he will provided His will fall in with thine but if divided Th' art not so silly a Puritan to displease Thy selfe for him but He must serve thy ease Or if thou part'st with 't 't is but with lesse for more T' avoid what 's endlesse tak'st what 's quickly o're So still thy selfe 's thy end thy God O what 'S the worme a doing that assaults its God! Whose every word is pure All linck't together And woe t' him dares the least he all doth sever Every word of God is pure and woe t' him dare Make them their jeere that make it all their care The pure-in-heart see Him-their Puritie Th' impure their place who them-Him vilifie O what 's the worme a doing how every bone 'S an Aspen leafe to see it climbe the Throne VVhose footestoole's all the kingdomes of the world By whom such station-quitting spirits were hurl'd To that unbottom'd pit prepared is For all such enviers Whose vexation's this They ne're shall see what they are vext to see Men truly Holy only Happy be Poore childish fooles wu'd have they know not what Heaven they wu'd have but Heaven they wu'd not Cry out braule fight with all that wo'nt confesse It theirs yet when they see 't love nothing lesse Through th' morrall-vertue-swept yard through the porch Bedect with formall duties may approach To th' very doore but they 're too good to knock To waite and if th' least glimpse slip through the locke These light-abhorring Owles winke wish their losse If heaven be puritie they 'd rather their drosse E're-scorching ne're-consuming flames inherit Then passe the fire o' th' purifying spirit Indeed what wud'st thou there Heaven'd be but thy Hell What wud'st thou see who here dost shut thine eye Against the God-revealing light and ope Thy mouth or 's this thy purifying hope Accursed curre that barkest at the Moone That but reflects how wu't against the Sunne Or what wud'st heare a crew of simple Saints With just such puritanicke Angells chants They 'le never ha' done n're linne their singing Psalmes Unto their God for their victorious palmes None 's still or thinke'st while thou wind'st up thy dull Thy jarring heart thou 't make to waite so full A set of fore-well-tuned instruments Jumps all in one compleater of concents Contents God while blesse that dreadfull-joyfull name That brought their blessed mindes in heavenly frame I tell thee man Thou art a Pagan or a Puritan Thou may'st a Jesus but did'st Jesus know These Hell-devis'd revilings dar'st thou throw Upon nay thou wud'st be his Image did Thy faith once see him whom thy God hath hid From blinded eyes while with an ayrie name He lulls thee dead asleepe to wake in flame But Christ is life and so he is to all Whom he shall with h's talitha cumi call A virtuall power-exhibiting command Reares thee a virgin on new resolves to stand To walke the way of his Commandement To keepe thee true loyall chaste pure innocent From selfe-world-devill pollutions all for Him And so thou wud'st did'st thou beleeve in Him Some fancied I doll of thy wanton braine That will thee in thy minnion-lusts maintaine Will winke at smaller faults no great adoe Will make shud'st harbour some few grosser too Will let thee vaunt it in thy pride and gad About thy eye's and flesh's lust be glad O' th' dregs of spirit-exhausted loves the leavings O' th' marrow-sucking world the sad bequeathings O' th' banckrupt-soule now hurried out of doores To pay the debts of ' â—s ne'r-acquittable scores I here 's thy Jesus presumptuous-desperate wretch Dar'st from that soveraigne name such venom fetch To kill thy soule but for that spotlesse Lambe Who so his owne to metamorphize came To teach them by a secret sympathy To follow what by occult qualitie He makes them know his from a stranger's voice To make them runne unto the brest so choice And with their bleating rethoricke bespeake Th' simple milke that makes them strong of weake To teach them keepe his undefiled steps Not dare to tread awry for each-hand deaths At 's first smallest stillest whistle straite to come To stand before their Coate-bereavers dumbe To watch the Wolves come cloathed in their skinne The light-like Angell selfe-deceiving sinne To graze no pasture but His wholesome word To fetch no salve but what his side afford's To become silly that he might make them wise T' abase themselves he might them highly prize Not live t' themselves but Him an'th'common good And when he calls to meekely shed their blood I here 's my Christ of whom thou art afraid To have too much lest so thou shudst be made To be too wise pure just too farre from hell For feare of Heaven fear'st to doe too well Nor car'st indeed for this nor that Earth earth Is thy deare home of sinne-rejoycing mirth But if must needs away thou' rt more content To be where Angels sing then divels torment And yet wert there thou 'dst be tormented with Their singing Lo whither brought by thy beliefe Cud'st thus believe didst thou believe him just And faithfull in his sayings away thou 'dst thrust Thy heavenly joy-prevaricating lust There is a faith that doth not love to trust Nor Christ to trust that faith who sees the heart Him never saw with all for him l'not part Canst thou pursue thy honour pleasure gaine And not believe all this beliefe 's in vaine thou d'st hate loathe friends selfe All did'st ever know But what it meant to have a God to wooe thou d'st doe suffer come runne flie did'st ever prove The powerfull sweet of all-commanding love thou d'st live die by for love did'st ever spie The feasting beauties of that lively eye Poore soule for ever past my pittie if on Thou hold'st thy course I know you not be gone Thou wicked worker thou never livd'st above For what acquaintance Thou my love my dove My undefiled loving dove what thou Sit billing moaning with me flyed'st thou To th' purest houses of my spirits resort Thou m' friend my Spouse wee walke and talke wee sport Our selves in hidden loves Thou carefull how To keepe me as thy life And absent how To take the speediest wayes to finde me Thou In a sweet trembling at a sillable Thou Unlade thy bosome secrets in
lies drown'd as it were in a Sea of loves and sweetnesses in a blessed astonishment and stupefaction it is elevated in the highest advancement of life and spirits in the Lord of life and glory that descended and ascended to draw up with him all that adheres to him O were the soule wound up to this pitch and watched at it and wound up againe if never so little slipt downe how might we live O still still let us be in this blessed vision of God with more continued intentivenesse contracting thence or rather dilating those Coexistant inherent essentiall which we call attributed species Then others beholding the stedfastnesse of our faith could not but there see more of that radiant image in its deputed Majestie the ball of the sensuall eye not more naturally expressing the Idea of the directly opposite and neighbouring visage then this of the spirituall of faith doth that of God And certainly no sence doth furnish us with more and more cleare conceptions of God then the sight being for its ready commence with the soule for its extention and intention the properest most conducible and advantagious of all being the most spatious farthest reaching pure simple active and therefore most apprehensive and next to that the hearing being the lesse grosse and earthly of all the rest But to keepe to that As the Sunne conveyeth heate and activitie inseperably with and proportionably to its light so is the truth loved and done so farre and onely so farre as it is seene The actions are spurious and illigitimate that are not conceived in the heart and begotten by the eye it will be our wisedome then so truly to informe the latter at we desire the well and right forming and performing of the other Let us looke on him then by no other Organ then faith thorough no other medium then Christ at no other distance then the mearest approaches even to such an unitie that wee see our selves in him and him in us When with the wicked wee put God farre from us and see the world draw nigh us then seemes he little and this great but when we draw neere to him what a pointile what an atome what a nothing it seemes nay it is And as the medium is ever the fame so is the Organ then best when most refined abstracted metaphysicall subtilized sublimed and sence-rarified cause then most proportionable and sutable to the simplicitie and puritie of the object it intends and therefore consequently to the extensivenesse and infinitie of it God being simply infinite and infinitely simple And therefore as wisedome consists in the clearenesse and quicknesse so in the inlargednesse of the understanding but since that knowledge that light in every thing wee draw from him is the onely true wisedome wee are then wisest when our understandings are most clarified by him most acted on him And surely this clarifying of our faith is according to the intimatenesse of our humbly bold accesse unto him the nature of this Sunne being to give light to the blind and that more or lesse according as we are more off or apply our selves nearer to Him And surely while we thus see God in the holiest of holies all the kingdomes of the earth in their freshest and heart-stealingest lovelinesse and that set forth in the most rich and glorious accoutrements will lie at our feete as a dead and rotten carkasle so farre shall we be from committing folly with it so farre that though then too our spirits be at the liveliest as they cannot but be yet because wee nay therefore because we be as crucified as dead to it as it is to us Such power hath this sight to fill the heart with love this love to hold the soule close to God from any thing that would part it from him and to carry it forth in all readinesse of obedience with him When contrarily while we are looking on the world without God we are but looking on so many lying vanities that dead the heart to reall and full contentments withholding it from God and setting the hand on worke in the wayes of sinne which still estrange the soule from Him and keep Him at a distance from the soule that more deading the heart that c. so the soule running on in a round of wickednesse if God not gratiously breake in and hinder its course Which when he doth his presence makes grace to grow by the interchangeable officiousnesse of all its undivided parts The sight of God inflaming the affections they inciting to actions these againe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 stirring up the fire in more fervent flames they giving in greater light that discovering more beautie that kindling more fire that animating to more action this againe c. so truely infinitely infinitely infinitely sweet is the comfort of the God-conversing soule The soule that hath received the truth in the love thereof and he that loves mee keepes my Commandements he that doth my will shall know my will he that hath my Commandements as his possession riches c. and keepes them as his greatest joy comfort life he it is that loves me and to him will I manifest my selfe Now this manifestation againe fills the heart with more operative and effectuall love this againe c. Thus Faith worketh by love the fulfilling of the Law the end of the Commandement out of a pure heart and of a good conscience and of faith unfained the sinceritie whereof must needs be according to the sight it hath of God according to the lovelinesse worth chooseablenesse that it seeth in him Faith then I take to be by what of light in this night of blindnesse and darkenesse I can see such a light as shining on the intentively beholding soule through the face of Christ hath that influence and attractive power with it to draw it up and make it cleave and adhaere with all its might and strength to God to lift up the heart to and make it goe along with him in all his wayes While like the Helitrophion it turnes and winds shuts and opens with the motion of the Sunne of righteousnesse And this light thus influenced thus working how ever clouded and obscured to a Christians selfe to be wisedome unto salvation that effectuall knowledge of God his Christ comming into and received of the soule that is life eternall already taken hold of and ere long fully prossessed or thus Faith is a promise-lighted seeking light Burnes with pure fervent love whose active might In every radiant precept shining bright Reflects its glory to the Father-Light Thus these three-one obedience-faith-and love Unite my soule to those Thee-One Above John 11.5.7 A seeking Isaiah 11.10 with Romans 15.13 Satisfying John 5.44 with John 14.1 Faith John 1.4.19 a sincere Phil. 1.10 Matth. 6.22 Eph. 6.24 Fervent Cant. 8.6.7 love John 14.15 an universall Psal 119.6 Jam. 2.10 Ephe. 4.23 Matth. 5.10 Constant Cor. 1.15.58 Obedience So that grace is faith understanding faith affecting faith acting
hither that holy holy holy I am a man c. Hither that behaviour of the foure and twenty Elders that on the contemplation of the excellencies of God threw downe their crownes their excellencies at his feete as being nothing but what they had of Him in Him for Him But life would faile mee in referring zeale and constancie c. and all other graces hither in what dependancie relation they stood to one another Sinne being like so much muck and dung on the fire of zeale the more unmixt the more intent c. The feare of the Lord being a cleant feare and abiding for ever make me sound in thy statutes and steadfast in thy Covenant The inheritance undefiled that fadeth not away 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 how that the purer the thing is the more free from corruption heterogeneousnesse the more stable firme durable it is so the body so the soule But now we know this puritie this sinceritie is by this discovery therefore this constancy this zeale c. And hither that the things that are seene are temporall but the things that are not seene are eternall The things that are not seene being rare pure holy simple c. and therefore free from corruption and therefore from alteration from decay But into what a blessed maze and gladly involving labarinth hast thou wound thy selfe O my soule And sha't thou be so unhappy ever to finde the way out againe Is it not good for us ever to wander here in these paths of pleasure and walkes of delight Can there be any thing that can steale away the heart so surrounded with such glories such loves But art thou not to thy selfe but to thy God and doth he call thee to workes of an inferiour nature Still worke and wonder worke and love worke and blesse still keepe thy ground thy God who is the God of the vallies as well as of the mountaines And still while thou art walking with him thorough a diverse path loose thy selfe in him who shall shortly with all them that in truth have knowne his name be ever lost in the blessed contemplation of the wonderfull contrivances of the eternall wisedome When there shall be no more eating and drinking no more sleeping and rest no more spending of spirits no more avocations from the immediate and uninterrupted continually active contemplation in that full vision of the onely blessed God and in him of all his wonderfull works When there shall be no successivenesse of plenary intuition and perfect action but still the heart that knowes-loves-obeyes him continually overpowred with the blessed vision and over-flowing in loves and sweetnesses shall be incessantly running over in heart ravishing praisings and intranced in perpetuall extasies Who is it that even now is able to conceive the heaven that is in his owne heart what then when we there see and love-and-sing-and-sing-and-love-and see eternally when we shall not onely have the spirit in us but be in be wholy in the spirit Perfused baptized overwhelmed with it Not onely see and have light joy love spirit but be In nay be spirit light joy love And now O Lord what are wee that it should be thus with us O thou life of life and being of beings thou incomprehensible God! What is it to thee that wee know thee that we love thee what pleasure hast thou in our righteousnesse or what profit it is to thee that we make our wayes perfect surely O Lord thou hast thou hast none who art so infinitely above all happie and holy none but what thou acceptest as such in him in whom thou onely art in whom we onely are well pleased In whom thou wilt welcome us with a Well done good and faithfull servant when thou shalt finde us so doing who have done nothing What are our understandingst thoughts of thee but as so many mishapen confused conceits What our appositest speeches but as so much jabbering and gibberish What our accuratest performances but as so many trifling toyes All childish childish all What are they further then they are exercises of then they are testimonies of our love the end the summe of all the Commandements Yet what too are our strongest our heart-possessingest loves but as so many fond and fleeting passions And yet thou looking on us and we on thee thorough the face of thy Christ that perspective of mutuall lustre and glory from in and for whom are all our thoughts words affections actions and ought that ought is art pleased to accept them as the thoughts as the language as the love as the life of Angells Whom thou hast made ministring spirits to thy chosen thy faithfull that wee with them and they with us preferring each other in honour might all joyntly promote the honour of our onely-honour-worthy God O the freenesse of thy grace the unfathomednesse of thy wisedome the incomprehensiblenesse of thy glory O where is the learning that hath learnt thee that would not willingly debase it selfe throw downe it selfe as the footstoole before thy Throne and the Throne of thy Christ as being nothing but what it is in raysing up the soule to a dutie-learning to an humble walking with thee that would not willingly as it were unlearne all and learne it over againe in thy Christ where are those fond and selfe-conceited Opiniasters that would not lay downe all at his feete at least meekely and selfe-suspectingly mannage their Scripture-unevidenced tenets O did we know in what a blacke cloud of ignorance wee were all involved in what a night of palpable darkenesse an epithite not unknowne to a Christian heart that cannot but be feelingly sensible of it Had our memories oftener recourse to that Originall pride that confounded the language of our minds as well as that of our tongues or thought that multiplicitie and incertainty of opinions may since purposely be permitted by the divine wisedome and gratious justice to lay us low in our owne eyes to make us out of love with our selves c. how could we then be so proud and not so so contentious Why may not all that hold the same head have the same heart why may not there be dissention without contention But every one seeke their owne and none of Christ Which true foundation or foundation of truth laine in the heart if any shall as who doth not among our gold and silver unwittingly build straw and stubble why should not we labour to purge one anothers drosse with a tender love and carefull salvation as I may say of one anothers respects content peace whom the God of love and peace hath promised to save eternally Or had we observed that it is with Christians as with the tenent and mortesse in building the condyles and concavities in the bones of the body he is that eminent at one end as it were may be defective at the other that is excellent in this may be wanting in that that so wee may fall in with joyne closer to one another in one the
perfect in weakenesse concording discord And if it be the glory of God to bring light out of darkenesse good out of evill how can we but rejoyce that by being subjects of the one we come to bethe instruments of the other 2 Cor. 12. 1 Cor. 2.5 And if good be the object of the concupiscible facultie why shu'd we make our affections the object of our irascible The Lord strengthen us with joy in the inner man and then goe it how it will with the outer So may we gladly keepe the word of his patience in the saddest and patience-assaultingst times so shall hee keepe us from or at least in and therefore from the houre of temptation that shall come upon all the world to try them Now is it a time for the patience of the Saints for them that keepe the Commandements of God and the faith of Jesus Now is it a time for those that have held fast this inviolable knot in the bond of love to hold up their heads in rejoycing as then knowing the greater redemption drawes nigh when the greater calamitie approaches Thus what ever of these things we may know already feelingly in the heart if not notionally perspicuously in the head let us not faile to put one another alwayes in remembrance Alwayes striving together in our Prayers and that with no small conflict of heart that we may be comforted being knit together in love and unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding to the acknowledgement of the mistery of God and the Father and of Christ Had we more godly and brotherly love wee should have more comfort and that would hunger after more knowledge and that fill with more assurance and that furnish with more grace and all acknowledge the mistery of the puritie of the wisedome of the love of the Godhead So much spirit so much faith so much faith so much Christ so much Christ so much love so much love so much knowledge so much knowledge so much fulnesse of God Eph. 3.16 c. Come then what may come befall what may befall to the flesh The Lord be with the Lord will be with will be our Spirits Ruat Mundus Restat Deus PLay on about the Candle wanton flie Play sindge thy wings consume thy soule and die Make jests of Scripture-jeere the God of heaven Laugh at the Light-mock them who hath receiven It in their hearts-and shine it in their lives Invent unheard of opprobries contrive New fashion'd obloquies scum hell for scurrulous wit Or dive th'lowest depths of the unfathom'd pit 'T will furnish thee with just sufficient store To make thy selfe a foole and nothing more Enough and but enough to over-reach And cheate thy selfe th' infernall cheater'l teach Else shud'st be wiser then thy master shud Thy wit have wit enough to make thee good On madnesse belch thy deadly Antipathie To heaven in thy horrid blasphemy Cast up thy workes and reare thy mounts on high Heape fetch on fetch to overtop the skie Shield thee with distinctions say it is not him Thou shoot'st at but his word Saint Image Limbe Not God but God in them While merrily along To the correcting stocks the foole holds on His heedlesse way tickled with the high desert Of h's flattering wit into his endlesse smart PUritan the invention of Hell the Character of a Christian the language of prophanenesse the blasphemy of God the evomition of a heart desperately wicked a glorious defamation an undermining of an open thrust at the very heart life and power of Religon an evident preferring of Pharisaicall formes and Laodecean neutralitie a Match-divillian device to kindle sire in Church and State a slie practise of the old Serpents old maxime Divide and Raigne a word that is as it is made enterteined And what indeed is this Puritan but a Protestant drawing naturall conclusions from his owne praemises beleeving and living according to his owne profession at the highest pitch of his owne principles Nor know I indeed how one differs otherwise from the other then a Papist from an Arminian A perfect birth from an Embrio a Bird from an Egge Time and due heate Cateris non obstantibus will give them both their full maturity And as I have had it from good hands confessed by a Papists that Protestanisme not kept down wu'd naturally grow up to Puritanisme And surely that which doth not is but a dry and dead stumpe without branches or at farthest leaves without fruite Is that tree which cumbers the ground is that ground which is nigh unto cursing to the executed sentence of its amendment-unaverted judgement Let then this or whatsoever other synonymous Nickname any divill-brooded braine hath latelier hatched be sent forth drest in the gavest feathers of proud and selfe-conceited and therefore desperately foolish wit yet shall they prove but finer colour'd excrements but ensignes of their vanitie and therefore not seasonably prevented of their eternall vexation of spirit But what then those more blacke and darke aspersions of impudently-forheaded calumniators with the very thoughts where of I abhorre to defile my memory Whose empty whose witlesse wit is so taking with because so easily apprehensible by so aptly sutable to corrupt nature While the substantiall wisedome of heaven is only justified by her children Who have learnt of her how ever these scoffers deceive themselves God whom in his word Saints c. they mock will not be mocked Jude 15. Act. 4.9 Matth. 25.42 c. Try all things hold fast that which is good REject the Branne reteine the flower All things abide their sifting houre Perfection onely in Heaven is 'T is knowledge here to know we misse But they who studdy not to advance Are ignorant of their ignorance But we that follow on to know In floods of lights and loves shall flow Baptiz'd in glory till wee see Th' unseene in all his Puritie But what O what then shall we be Who so much of him here can see Chant in a fire of humble zeale Soule-loosing hymns of restlesse weale Ravish't and ravish't while we rest Hugg'd in his aye-fomenting brest Surrounded in a Maze of blisse Distracted with felicities While firmely resident in one In whom All knowables are knowne The things that neither eye eare heart Can see heare thinke the milliont'h part Who see nor love simplicitie Inf'nit Invisibilitie O what what then who this now know Yet know not ought as w' ought to know T Is calme within and so I sang before 'T is calme without so sing what sang before My head-my heart-my hand shall sing My God my Prophet Priest and King These three below with those above Shall make six parts unite in love And so I sang in the extreamest storme And what else can I'n the serenest calme O Teach thy servant to be humble for the humble thou wilt teach Let him see thee and he dies and he lives for ever Send forth thy Light and thy Truth and let them lead him in thy presence Cause thy face to shine upon him and it will teach him they statutes Thy loving kindnesse is better then life O let it never depart from him O Comfort him with thy Aples and refesh him with thy Cordialls For his soule is sicke is sicke with love O thou Discerner of hearts Why are thy Chariot wheeles so slow How long shall he looke out of the window How how long shall those beauties be masked and the God of glory vailed When shall this night of ignorance turne day and these thicke clouds be dispersed Why hast thou showne thee and but shown thee O fully abidingly Thou hast wounded his heart with thy glories and it bleedeth inwardly It sinkes it falls it dies for want of more wounding 'T is sweetly imbittered with thy inconceavable thy insupportable Loves What bounds can hold it what thing detaine it what expressions describe it How long shall it languish in thy strength and expire in thy breathings O never never shall these gratious visitations forsake it THus all my life 's a course of seeking Thee Who liv'd who lost Thy life in seeking me Such is my faith such shall my finding be Whose love hath found the way to waite on Thee With righteous works which can't extended be To Thee but thou wu't meete so doing me So running from my selfe to be Ingulph't in ever-blessed Thee So twining streames in sweete confusion Till know my Love without allusion Clos'd in a Close without Conclusion I have gasped after thy Salvation O Lord Even so come Lord Jesus come quickly
who hath made these latter ordinances in their time as well as those former And that the God of nature who made nothing in vaine hath given forth such a diversitie of commands not with most wise ends To shew what concord he can make in such a seeming discrepancie betweene worke and worke men and men betweene heaven and earth in such a multiplicitie of imployments in due time and place while they are all According to his will And make an inconceiveable melody in the answering of a good conscience to him To shew thorough what a varietie of occurrents he can carry the faithfull soule while he still keepes it with Him And that hee might keepe them in an humble dependencie on him to learne how to bring forth their fruits in due season To set forth the glory of Christianitie in the sutable composure of such a change of Ornaments The excellencie of it in over-comming so many difficulties in passing so many turnings and windings conducted by the thus-more-commended manifold wisedome power goodnesse of God That takest it for so much superstition so much idolizing of the best duties and therefore for so much no duties while they are set up against the will of God Thou whom prosperitie keepes praying adversitie praysing That art exalted by thy humiliation incouraged by thy feare rejoyced by thy sorrow that gettest thy life by throwing it away that findest thy selfe by losing it that art watchfull in every thing carefull in nothing That art encountred with often doubts scruples irresolutions self-disputes and yet livest at the highest rate of assurance of the divine favour That yea by feeding thy selfe with feare thy watchings prayings fastings art carryed forth in the liveliest vigorousnesse and luxuriancy of spirits 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mic. 4. Thou that art now at the top of the third Heavens in the highest exaltations of thy spirit and now againe at the bottome of the lowest Hell while thou still lyest as fast in the hugging imbraces of the omnipresent as ever Thou whose modest sober pure peaceable guilelesse discreet unblamable zealous lively active deportment of thy selfe speakes the one that hath been brought up at thee feet of Jesus Thou whose generous magnanimous God-resembling Spirit stoopes to humilty and overtops Pride That while thou lyest below the lowest dejection of the meanest Sainted Pesant bearest thee above the most disastrous dismallest aspects of the arrogantest Prelatickst highest-aspiring Kingdome-dooming Comet as far as the third Heaven is above the Meteory Region Thou that canst gladly stoope with that meeke Lamb to wash the feete of the meanest Minister of the Gospell Lay downe thy life for the God-loved and therefore world hated brethren while Lyon-like thy righteous soule rouseth up it selfe against the Hypocriticall Pharisee with the most contemptuous and undervaluing disdaine Thou that with a heartie willingnesse canst gladly abase thy selfe to unloose the latchet of the meanest Saint while thou knowest not how to give a Pontificall Peacocke the dissembling Complement of thy hast though he swell though he burnish though he bustle though he crow it never so domineeringly till he be furtivis nudatus coloribus Thou that like thy Heavenly Father knowest how to bee afflicted in all the afflictions of his holy ones his humble ones while wherein soever the Presumptuous deale proudly Thou wilt in Him be above them and make their proudest wrath to praise Him Thou that seest far more beauty on the very feet of the poorest Embassadour of the Gospel then on the honour-pleasure-profit-Triple-crowned head of those enemies to the Crown because to the vertue because friends to the signe of the Crosse of Christ In making the earth their study their belly their God their glorious Titles their shame themselves destruction and their Country distraction Thou that knowest how to turn the other cheeke to him that smites thee and to let goe thy cloake too to him that wud take away thy coate and yet knowest thy time too when to sell it for a sword and thy life by it as deare as thou canst While yet thou seekest not so much the destruction of the enemy no nor the preservation of thy selfe as the obedience too as the glory of God by it Thou that hast learnt how to render blessing for cursing and pray for them that despitefully use thee while still thou remembrest that the same Michael that brought no railing accusation against the devill called the Pharisees a generation of Vipers the evill-working Jewes the children of the devil Thou whose well tempered soule knowest the meaning of a zealous meeknesse a milde indignation a faceat gravity a sollid pleasantnesse c. Thou who while thy cautelous heart is still agitated with the most quick resentments readiest apprehensions of dangers art most firmly setled in a most unshaken peace of a providentiall security Thou whose giving heart is streaming it selfe forth in the most inlarged and selfe-loosing compassions the most liberall supplyes and contributions to the suffering Saints and hast thy awakened feare continually exercised with the alarmes of war and death while thou standest with an undaunted magnanimity in a close fast fixed Communion with thy God like Mount Sion that cannot be shaken triumphing over Hell and Death That while thou bleedest in their wounds art bound in their bonds dyest in their death blessest for thy wounds art freed with thy bonds livest in thy death That walking in the shadow of death in the presence of thine enemies hast a set banquet of heavenly delicacies thy head annointed with the oyle of joy and gladnesse by the over-shadowing hand of the Almighty Redeemer while thy soule is like a brim-full Cup over-running with joy and praises with joy and praises Thou that amandest the wicked from thee that thou maist keep the Commandements of thy God whom thou findest so so inapprehensibly good Thou that abhorrest none more then pragmaticall busie-body censorious men as the most slight-spirited idle self-ignorant worthlesse men that are and yet seekest not thine own things but the things of others and canst not so hate thy brother in thy heart as not to rebuke him and therefore as not to rebuke him in love Thou in whose eyes a vile person is contemned whose God-acquainted spirit can not sit with vaine empty triviall-spirited persons Sons of Belial whose foolish hearts are not lift up in-to the wayes of God that are above to the wise Triflers away of precious houres in frothie frivolous fruitlesse communications that have no and therefore can administer no grace to the hearer Men not of Heaven-ascending discourse spirit life Thou that hast found the two edged sword of the word dividing between the soule and the spirit and raising this as far above that as that is above the body That thou mayest serve him in the spirit of thy minde in the more extracted as it were and more sublimed quintessence the morefree noble 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of life love zeal Thou that like that Purites
nimble eye could not prevent His noble heart turnes to incouragement And counts small undertakings too too small For that Great minde that nothing great can call But God On on brave hearts What what temptation Dismaies the man whose danger 's recreation Not feares the hard'st injeopardingst and yet feares The light'st secur'st Imployment since he heares More Alsufficiencie in th' Aeternall's Word For th' difficult'st exploits and findes't confer'd On 's Heaven-raised soule then'n Himselfe sees To th' least good thought vast insufficiencies Thus by this feeblenesse made more apprehensive O' th' gratious supervenient strength'i's defensive Offensive succours He finds so sweet a greet In 's R'covering Heart where strength and weakenesse meet God and himselfe Here'd faine b'unchamber'd by 'th ' Free quickning Aire growne stronger ' d conflict with The ruder windes and yet his strength increast Stirres up the heartned Champion to request The King his Master to designe him to Some singular service which he passing through With perill-edging puissance might prove The Sovereigne vigor of his Soveregne's love Arm'd w'th ' All-powrefull Arme that rends in pieces The hugest hosts of foes as th' slender Fleeces O' th' slightest rottenest Woole What what temptation Dismaies the man whose Danger 's Recreation â—â—st not thy exercise I' st not to trie Thy strength that Thou mayest know 't and magnifie â—â—is Giver I' st not use legges and have them use travell And use shall teach thee nimbly trippe the gravill * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Epict. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And how thou' rt here mista'n 't is not th' affliction Whereby thou suffer'st but thine owne affection No man can hurt thee unlesse thou wilt what may An Heathen teach thee magnanimitie O pray Pray for more faithfull courage let men see Ethicks are yet to learne o'Theology What fear'st but sinne lookes 't after what but grace Since there 's so much in these then these imbrace Count them thy Pleasure Glory and thy Gaines For what gets more of Christ's well worth thy paines From the eater meate cruell sweet darke light ill good A Ridle in heaven's fully understood Here were our hearts s ' Inheaven'd in Holinesse As there they 'll be even here they 'd see no lesse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 SImplicitie-Immutabilitie Art thou O'Lord and am I as thou art One Spirit with Thee this contrarietie Whence is it then whence this inconstant heart Wer 't but that to thy sacred Image I 'M renew'd I 'd looke for more Analogie One spirit yet many loves yet many changes O be there now no mixtures no estranges O here 's my woe incorrespondency My deeds unlike themselves and all to Thee O trie refine rack supernaturalize Extract subtile sublime spiritualize O spirit spirit what shall I doe for spirit This body o' Sin this rotten Carkasse bury it How ' nweldy ' t is how over-grown with flesh How faintly it workes More spirits to refresh I can't indure these lame sick presents t' give Or make me lively or not let me live O cou'd I keep my Orb and constant shine I 'd draw up worlds with influence divine And mount their spirits but so dim low coole They 'le feare 't is but some Meteor to befoole Them not so wise to deem the different doome Between a setting Sun and falling Fume Much light 't is shewes the Sun much fruit the Roote The Roote the Sun Thou art then may my fruit My Light be much that men may wonder much What 's th'lightfull Roote whose fruitfull Light is such I am thine Image don't men judge of Thee By me Ah Lord let me no longer bee Or be more like Thee What no more holy yet More perfect yet Nay my heart intreats Thee let Me branded be for a damn'd hypocrite Or my-thy Light let it increase its might The soul Thou sai'st that 's clean-and sound promoves In strength the righteous man his Light improves Unto the perfect day but better I For ever perish then Thou once shu'dst lie They 'r foolish men and if I once doe ill From P'rticulars to Generals argue will From Man to God but how ever I be Yet Thou art good when wu't Thou come to me O that I could but wish to wish to bee For ever in Hell then be a jot from Thee This th' only Hell then may I there ne'r be O cou'd I keep my earth-freed wish to be For ever in Heaven then be a jot from Thee Thee Thee But ' die for feare for love of Thee Great Good what not but I sin shame Glory Grace Grace nay Then I le live Thy Name With loudest praises I le promulgate Then My heart my life shall say Amen Amen ORub me rub me He is passed by Pass't by my breath my life my I. O what but My hanging hands and feeble knees agree To joyne their suit for speedy remedy My yearning lookes and rowling bowels make A sad relation of Thy sad forsake My yearning lookes and rowling bowels make A glad petition for Thy glading sake For Thy forsake I faint I sinke I die But for Thy sake I live I rise I flie And over all I hie I post I speed I cannot stay For Faith is nimble in its way I post I speed I cannot stay For love and love know no delay I post I speed I cannot stay For Faith and Love are all my stay I post I speed I cannot stay For Love in Sence must end my way HEalth Wealth Name Liberty The World at will enough Take thy ease and minde thee The World what 's that to me Not elbow-roome enough To turn and winde mee Not peeping hole to see My Love not breath enough For m' Lungs to winde me Great great deficiencie Not lightsome roome enough To loose n'er finde me Wu'd not I die did not I eye Thee far before my self Wu'd not I pray my selfe away From all this paltry pelfe Wu'd I demurre when gone so far In love to thy Great Selfe Wu'd I descend and not there spend M' into Thy Endlesse Selfe No sure I de goe I de never hold my head And keepe my flushed spirits from their flight To roule their chantings i' the Darkelesse Light And sing inlargement from the living dead But that I heare me thinkes a voyce behind Sing Evangelick Anthems through thy life Thy Heavenly concords woo'the I ambe a wife Wives and more winne the spirit of their minde Corrivalls here increase their mutuall flame by 'th ' mutuall praysings of th' all pleasing Name O make me then thy Instrument So holding to thy hearts content So true unto the Touch each string Each straine so suite each Note so bring A grace unto the rest that they May fall in love that heare thee play May heare thee play that they may fall In love that raises above all To dwell with dwell in him that is Because the God of love of blisse VVHere wut thou goe this morning wandring soule With whom wut sport or where wut make
in its balbutient age Instruct the Father or what more can ingage Me to content then 't is my Fathers pleasure In whose contentment 's lain up all my treasure Of joy and blisse But th'want o'th'laying th'foundation Well and well building on 't makes all th'mutation So oft befall us else might we steady stand Upright unshaken mov'd on neither hand God is my Diapason rise or fall Above all thorough all the ground of all And so he is to All his workes but they Can heare no concords that will disobey But wee that put our selves into his hand Obedient instr'ments of his just command Who with his crosse-division running art Gives such mysterious pleasure to the heart Of 's understanding ones a stranger can't Conceive whose judgement 's too too rude too scant To compasse such an odde variety Into a sweeter-sounding unity Nor sees th'decorum now with smarter strokes Of 'ts valour excitating tones provokes Our rouzed spirits unto Martiall feates To quiet combates with the enemies threats Now w'th soft retreatings recollects them by it 'S remisser touches to a watchfull quiet Strike hard or gently stroke this know we still We 're th' better musick of his gracefull skill Prosperity's a Triall too and he that uses 'T not in that notion exceedingly abuses Himselfe and it and never sooner looses His every-way ensnared soul then when he chooses It not as pleasing God but him refuses Adversity not because his minde induces Him t'think it 's not thought good of God but hee Wu'd ever prosperous never afflicted be And wu'd'st thou so know every state 's a triall And all prosperity lies in self-deniall While thou surrounded with the confluence Of all the earths indearements that presents Thee with its goodliest heart-alluring'st offers Tak'st them as not ta'ne of them daily proffer'st A glad resignment having learn'd the art To have thy Food-indeed ev'r hungring heart More fil'd with Heaven then thy hands with Earth Count'st Myriades of Worlds a starving dearth Till Him thou seest in All gets Him through All Above all livest with Him 's in through 'bove all O such a man this man of Millions he 'S well bottom'd beares so well so high degree Be rooted grounded stablisht in the Faith So maist thou reare that superstructure hath A winde-and-storme-out-facing firmitude Whos 's Capstone shu'd be constant gratitude Whose corner stone is Christ whom while we see How can we unchearefull how unthankfull be In every thing give thankes ' cause every thing Brings good to us ' cause glory to him brings This is the will of God Sweet will The will Of God concerning me What me What still More sweetnesse What am I that I should be To be the subject of such Majesty That thou shud'st once bestow a thought on me But such a such a thought concerning me In Christ In Him even now translate into The Kingdome of thy dearest Son might view My Crosse triumph't o're by a patient and Long suffering joy while strengthned strengthned stand With might all might according to his power His glorious power doth all things over-power O' th' joy the joy the over-flowing joy Tides on the Heaven-ward soule wherein the Law Of comforts God's a hidden spring delights The inward man whose chiefe whose sole delight 's To be the subject of Gods will a joy Whose boundlesse inundations can destroy And beare before it like a wispe of Straw The hugest oppositions sad'st annoy That Earth and Hell can raise a joy redoubles T 's augmented forces by'ts increasing troubles The while he makes the more retir'd repaires Unto h's entowring Name views th' Legions there Attend him how heavens souldiers flock about Him with their profer'd service and his doubts Fly far away the while hee 's more intent To th' secrets of his heart more represent Him purity integrity simplicity Sincerity truth th' face of God vvhereby H's's inlargedly spirited with joyfull love 'T dares wrastle a fall with death and longs to prove The mastery and like some mighty Gyant fil'd With generous Wines speeds sprightly to the field Of high exploits that th' world and he might see Th'o'repowring arme of Al-sufficiency What wonders 't acts in feeble flesh a joy That can the most blood-sucking sorrow cloy With superabundant sweetnesses a joy Sings nothing sweeter then it's wisht envoy Unto the world a joy whose skill is showne ' N extracting marrow from the dryest bone A joy of that extended pure delight ' I's impossible the heart b' in such a plight Shut up in selfish ridgid austere constriction No't can be hard while such a blest affection Dissolves it all in pitty drawes powres it out In streames of meek compassions run about On every side with heedy tendernesse To see what wayes of succouring redresse 'T may finde while still it makes this gentlenesse prove More flaming oyle to its Seraphicke Love Thus thus annoint with this Celestiall joy Diffuses weighty spirits and imployes M' in such a sadnesse t' which all th' rest is madnesse A grave confulting serious sober sadnesse Consist's with is the Basis of true gladnesse 'T which all other's is but a merry madnesse A joy 's no light slight frothy vapouring bubble That disappeares at th'softliest-blasting trouble But a perspicuous solidity Transplendent firmnesse agile stability Thus kindly may the influented Art Of that bright morning Star that rules this heart Temper thee to it selfe and warm thy soule VVith spirits may raise th' above the worlds controule 'T is not thy Musicke Stories Company Thy forc'd ungenuin mirth can remedie Thy wound no i'ts but a palliated cure 'T will fester more and thou wilt lesse indure T 's returning smart but leave this Mountebanke trick And search toth ' coare better once be throughly sicke Then never truly well Out with this odde This peevish humour that oppugnes thy God His sacred will for then and not till then Thou't say to all his workes a glad Amen 'T is onely this our inconformitie 'S the cause of all our sinne and miserie And wu'dst thou not conforme did'st firmely beleeve Him all good thou all bad but hence we grieve Fond soules the griefes must be griev'd over again Cause our weake faith this maxime can't maintaine How can we be in our repining mood But in our heart we say he is not good No no it 's not it 's not so easie a thing To b'leeve him good for whether wud 't not bring Us duely truly creedited keepe then to this Say God is good for that is all our blisse Our blisse is all in Christ by whom alone The selfe denying soule God good hath knowne Worke waite pray praise This part 's thine God's the rest 'T is daring sacriledge to be unblest Gods glorie 's rob'd ere thine owne good but pray Thy Will be done let thankefull patience pray Blest man how ever There 's nothing comes amisse Toth ' man harh ta'ne the will of God for his Is now no more himselfe is ruled by Another soule his sole
thy Spirits thankes The very Ethnicks don't they doe the same I nothing singular that beare thy Name Who sit'st i' th heavens farre above all feares When all the world 's together by the eares Thou' rt still thy self Happy Happinesse When all the world blasphemes as when they blesse Oh cou'd I keepe my proper place with thee How farre above the daring'st Ill 's I 'de be I 'de play with flames exsult at th' thoughts of death And make my troubles keep m' i' th' better breath I 'de dance upon a dunghill sing in fire I 'de make a bed of Roses on a briar I 'de teach my teares to smile my sighes to laugh My paines to sport I 'de make thy rod my staffe Wut teach me this deare Lord teach teach m'excell To be in heaven while I am in hell For so was Christ and he and we are Christ Be then my dust below I 'le be at th' high'st What ayl's the livelesse corps whose soule 's in heaven My soule 's soule 's thou is thou my soule in heaven Heav'n is thy armes thy everlasting armes Be they still under wher 's the hell me harmes Let blustering windes and ratling tempests beat About m'assaulted eares with threats on threats O' th' terriblest stormes while I inhoused lie Imbedded in his Alisufficiencie And gather up my soule the closer in To his inwrapping comforts while I sing And they me rock i' th' faster sweeter sleep Of praising rest i' th' armes alone shall keep M' in safety maugre all the enemies I' th' maddest forciblest fury while th' world lies I' th' armes o' th' airy Prince who hath the skill To make faire weather where he meanes to kill ANd have I Lord so often wisht to die And yet I cannot live Have I so lost My soule for thee yet finde it cannot I Well still thou' rt good how ever I be crost Still will I wish and wish it with mine heart Subvert me Lord or make me more convert What shall I die alive shall I survive My selfe Shall I endure this life of pleasure Not I pray day and night How doe I thrive Where are the precious sheaves the hidden treasure Where is my livelyhood my livelynesse Well yet I have them ' cause I so confesse A word soon said but truly but of those Whose bleeding-carefull-zealous heart it knowes VVOrk on my love spare not thy pains 't is good T 's a kindly heat and sweat what art a drie Hungry with exercise take for thy food My Flesh my Blood thy thirst shall satisfie Work on these putrid humours still transpire Fresh pure sound by these Alteratives acquire I hunger Lord thirst for thy Righteousnesse My zeale doth so consume me I must have More food or faint much lesse can work afresh Hast no vvine t' spare no Milk no Hony I crave For strength not lust not for my selfe but thee That by much strength much honor'd thou mai'st be Be they but crums yet be th' o' th' childrens bread Be they but drops yet be th'o ' Salvations Well Even those can make a dog a dog that 's dead A living man these greater wonders tell O had I but the bucket 't get a sup How soon unto th'spring head 't wu'd mount me up Here will I draw ingage here all my strength Tug pull again and yet again and yet I 'le not give over 't will come I know at length It 's very aire my hope that will not let Me faint but when 't comes and I get a drinke You that have felt those joyes what th' are may thinke Lightned inlivn'd inlarg'd extold transport Beyond my selfe unto my selfe resort I see I see O when shall I once account My selfe fram'd to this patterne i' the mount Vnto my Lord deare Lord make me So like that who sees me may see Him drawne to th' very life each feature Each lineament thus a new creature I Am the fountaine and I purpose through These neighbouring intermixed Channells to Convey my selfe to each he who 'l not part His interposing earth let out his heart Reciprocate the freshning streames I send May stand stink dry not borrow who 'l not lend They 're Idiots indeed who h've private spirits 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But who is not himselfe he onely merits Not to be counted mad and so sought he Us not himselfe in whom made wise we be We 're not our owne we 're purchas'd with a prise To live no more t' our selves but now to rise To higher things to live beyond our selves In By To Him who bought's brought 's off the shelves ' ' F so great a death to bring us of our selves Our greatest death when selfe-besotted Elfes Were we dissolved in the open Maine What spatious libertie were gotten to refraine Th' land bordering Rockes O wu'd the righteous Sun Looke on our frozen hearts how fast they 'd runne Their hardned selfe contracted clods so oft Dash one against another into soft To giving inlarged streames wu'd friendly close Themselves wu'd quickly in each other loose And all with sweet concurrence nimbly flow To their imbracing Ocean O wu'd we soe Change each to other till we each were none With what advantage shu'd we be our owne For one have all thus happily unite Are growne too strong for th' world for hells despight We 're all disjoyned by our fall but set In one againe the greater strength we get What I lay out in prayers purse study paines For them with how farre multiplyed gaines Of quick returnes I finde them all in theirs Shu'd I as I shu'd not be overwhelm'd with teares Feares griefes grow weak and feeble or as I shu'd Be alwayes poore and needy in spirit how good How good it is to know that he who is In all my thoughts hath me in his Who is more beneficiall by one thought then all The world can be by all their deeds I fall No sooner now but straite one helpes me rise So farr 's two better in one how rais'd how high's My drooping soule though absent in the body Present i' th' spirit with all the spirituall body How heartily I joy in sweetly injoy Their better ordered more establish'd joy M' affections are not mine nor theirs are theirs But each in th' other's mirth and sorrowes shares How steddy stand in ballance't griefes and joys While others still supply fresh counter poyses I live not in my self but them-and-thee Live thou and they and that 's enough for mee I live not in my self but them-and-thee Live thou and they I needs must living be And if all comforts God-and-h's Saints comprises All comfort then from one another rises Conspire we then in one in one expire That makes his melting Saints a mounting fire 'T is good being here and hither rise might all Wh'have skill have will in t ' one and other t'fall But he that will be of himselfe May glut not glad himself with pelfe Yea let him laugh his belly full Yet doth the shark himself
And teach my grievingst griefe delight Heavens harpers did Romes Epicedium play Hundreds of yeares before her fatall day Then come sweet Lute with gentle Aires Come kindly touch me with the Cares Of Christs-Crosse-bearing soules whose share Of common woe and weale I beare With Voltos then come raise my spirits Unto the Triumphs they inherit Whose wo's their weale whose wound 's their cure whose Heaven 'S their sweet whose want's their wealth whose hel's their Heaven VVHere am I How this turne hath giddied mee Decemb. 1640. Can hardly credit what I plainly see So farre fro'th doore so backward on the stage Still to protract this wearie pilgrimage Blest Lord so turnd'st our feare-led captive thoughts As those that dreampt we saw devouring Vaultes Heapt by the foaming Beast with Virgin Slaine Indign'd his I doll-lust We dreampt againe Christs-warre-preventing Throne became the Theame Of speedy praise but fear'd this was a dreame But we awake in Paradise And that no fooles be we but wise To keepe our hold'our God so close Nor becks nor blowes shall make us loase Then prove the former dreame yet true Change but the time the latter's too AS he whose braines are weak and businesse much Walks here there now this now that will touch Takes up layes down wu'd somewhat knows not what Even so my Good my God I had forgot Craz'd by my fall Still were my braines imploy'd With swarmes of busie follies still annoy'd With great paines taking in great trifles void Of all successe and got as soone was cloy'd Thus hither thither flew but ne'r cu'd finde An object sutable unto my minde Beauty honour riches seem'd an empty shade Before I saw the substance ere I 'd made Discovery of the Truth they seem'd a lie But that being seen they seem'd a lying lie A shade of shades Natures dim glimmering light Burnt clearer in my heart and shew'd me a sight Far worthyer choyce A soule a beautious soule Inrich'd with rarer honour a prudent soule A meek-sweet lovefull heart whose noble spirit Scornes a few-thousand-miled world shu'd bury it ' N a petty speck of dirt but pleasures in Its larger glories by the eye unseen Then after this while carefull search I made Straite shun a light shew'd this too but a shade A Heaven-sent light was darted in my heart And made me this perverting course divert The world in 'ts richest ornaments is but A show a show th'compleat'st nature but Thon only good and therefore only true Give m' in a recapitulated view Those Scripture-scattered Glories O cu'd I those Thy analysized Graces well compose Into their lovely face How deep I de fall In love and say thy beauty darkens all The creatures beautie's but a skin-deep lawne That by some slight distemper soon undrawne Reveales the lurking messengers of death That lie in waite to snatch away the breath And so possesse their Master of the face That seem'd but now above a creatures grace But take the purest in 'ts admired'st hew If modest else 't is none it dares but shew Its hands and face but He but alwayes Hee Is altogether Lovelinesses Hee Is Lovelinesses altogether every one Is in Him and but in Him there is none The creatures Vertue 's but a fairer foule Lodg'd in too straite a roome t' content my soule That only recreated splendors loves Whereon simplicity and infin'ty moves And where may I enjoy it better then Admitted to its near'st approaches when No intervenient object bars my sight In its impure and narrow Channell Light Pure perfect boundlesse inaccessible light VVhen shall I live in thy delighting sight I live but I wu'd live another life VVhere light and darknesse know no longer strife I live but I wu'd live another life That might informe me what a death 's this life How how m'abhorring spirit starts me back When by thy faire I see their ugly black VVhen by thy wisdome I their folly see And by their folly may the wiser be With what a mightier force my soule returnes To thee in thee with mightier fervour burnes O Light of Lights when shall I see Thee as I 'm seen VVhen shall I bee Thou Love of Loves with Thee i' th' high'st VVho long to learn yet what 's my Christ May Thoughts Men Bookes may all I see But answers to this question be May Thoughts Men Bookes may all I see Be Thoughts Men Bookes be All of Thee May every Sermon that I heare But breake the Clouds this Sun may cleare May every thing I heare or see Be all but Testaments of Thee And when th 'ave told me all they can I still must aske as I began VVell satisfied in seeking till My search with satisfaction fill VVHat 's white compar'd to blacke to browne to gray What mar'le 't excels but take the lightest gray Nay th'purest white the strongest sight e're saw Sublime thy apprehension yet and draw A purer unto which this bright'st's as black As th' face of Hell and yet beleeve there lacks As much resemblance in this draught to th' Life As Earth of Heaven of Heaven for all our strife 'S but pourtrai'd with a coale revealed God In h's holyest glories by a dirty Clod O' th' work-besoiling Clay and yet beleeve Thou' rt altogether unable to beleeve The difference till thou seest it Thou't see a light Is able to discerne an Hypocrite A man s'inlightned he hath skill enough To cheate himselfe and all the world this snuffe This dying snuffe shall burne as black as Hell When with its Christ sincerity shall dwell But what 's that all-surpassing splendor O Where 's he Where 's he will lead me to that show And teach my thoughts my rude and artlesse lines To draw the features of that face divine Divine That every foolish fondling w'll blurt On a neat piece of finer-formed durt O beauty Cu'd I speak but I have lost Expressions in impressions I 'de rather lie Admiring Adoring More sweetnesses suck I So but fire will out must speak of him Rightly if I can however speak of him The best of things so earnestly I covet Th'Unspeakable Gift yet can I say I love it And love will praise its object so must I And yet now I begin to praise I die O may my life so porutrait forth my Love To win Corrivals mount their spirits above With sacred flames while I stand peering there Where all Terrestriall beauties shad dowes are O see prie gaze b'inamour'd here is fare For Myriads of Love-sick worlds and spare O see prie gaze b'inamour'd here is fare Whose Rivals bring each other greater share For many eyes hearts see love more then one Fresh Graces spie to feed fresh hungers on O here 's a banquet where the guests finde ever The more the merrier for the cheare failes never Discovered such a goodly plenty show's Whose there can grieve but that his friends it loose Whose there can grieve but that his griefe 's his sauce To make him rellish more his wiser choice
Of food of friends Whose modest sharp-set eye Each corner of this feasting face doth prie And every Gospel-verset in his reach As some Grace-whelming dish doth ope and teach His neighbours eyes the shape and mouth the sweet Happy happy soules that at this banquet meet T 's a doubtfull feast indeed not only ' cause We 've all that Heaven and Earth can give but ' cause VVhen we remember whence we came poore wretches Rak'd up from dunghills drawn from under hedges Blinde lame sick naked wandring here and there Th'beaten road to death and now see where we are Translate from death to life from that dark sad Disconsolate State or which is worse those mad And desperately deluding joyes to such Incircleing reallity of blisse as much Glory as our capacity can beare Angels attend us God himselfe our cheare Our Cloathing-Light we are not able t'beare 'T but doubt we 're in a dreame and fondly feare VVe've nothing ' cause so much but th'night's far spent Th'last watch th'last houre 's nigh th'day w'll prevent's Gird up your loynes trim up your Lamps along Hast tune your hearts to th'Epithalanian song Now now we see the day no more through night Our earthy houses now so swept so cleane There 's not a dust a speck a moate to dark a beame VVhile solemnize th'Espousals of the darklesse Light VVHen wu't thou come deare Lord and shew the face Shall blemish all these splendors O the fire Burnes in this breast for an allay of Grace Of Grace that feeds not damps such blest desire Some drops of love still to increase the flame And make it beare me thither whence it came VVas'e n't a reflection from the righteous Sun VVas glanced in my heart Or was it one From that light-likened Angell Then undone I am unlesse quite out the fire be blowne By th' holy Spirit But can the devill come So drest He hath a cloven foot say some Sure this he hath he cannot humble be But he can counterfeit But hee 's so bad Hee le not seeme good for nothing now what shu d'make thee Masque thy selfe in humility who had N'advantage hence Sure 't was the native hew I 'm in a Labyrinth but where 's the clew Lord if it be of thee then let it stand If not downe downe let it for ever fall T is thee I seeke in it dost thou command Mine Isaak here t is and my selfe and all O how I joy I 've such a sacrifice Whereby my God my Love unto him tries Sure many choiser splendors have I seene Yet few so choise was it my sensuall eye I sought to please fit objects they had beene But a new eye new glories did espie Through that bright Christall a farre brighter jewell That yet into this fire cast's in fewell How how I 'm wrack't love hate desire averse Sorry rejoyce feare hope angry well pleas'd Carefull not care cannot rehearse Hope t'ought not be feare 't ought there am I eas'd Diseased here well I 'le stint the strife Nere loose my Love that lost for me his Life Lord how I love thee that thou did'st not leave Me in the creatures hand alone 't is thee Thee 't is alone to whom I wish to cleave My other wish serves this if thou do'st see It cement fit to make me closer cling To thee to me deare Lord that cement bring I dare not fetch it least that I should bring For morter slime I 'le set me downe and blesse Thy name first to thy willing of the thing Then to thy time meanes manner I 'le adresse Me my way rowle on thee delight in thee Thou't doe's I my-thy hearts desire shall see How full I am what shall I doe for vent I muse th' fire 's tin'd when will the word 's burst out They doe so crowde throng presse stop they are so pent Come loaden with such matter that I doubt I must be faine to let them all alone And in ward speake what in word can't be showne Thy mercies Lord I speake it with my heart Flow in so fast I am not able t'beare The memory of them how much lesse convert My thoughts to words yet will I have a care Both I and others both in my word and deed The thankfull memory of Thy Loves may read BLest blest be thee m' inligtning sunne For now I see I 'm but a shade Blest blest I feele my life begun For now I feele my soule Thou' rt made I am not Lord but I wu'd bee I 'de not be I but I 'de be thee Not be my owne be at thy call Wu'd nothing be wu'd ha' thee all I 'd be but feet and thou shud'st walke I 'd be but tongue and thou shu'dst talke I 'd be but eye I 'd be but eare And thou shu'dst see and thou shu'dst heare What see I heare I in this field Thou thee through me do'st heare and see VVhere goe I With whom is this talk held 'T is thou through me speak'st com'st to thee Trees birds home selfe These What 's all th' world to mee Thy Spirit through them all conveighs me Thee So I All th' world is but thy instrument In which thou sit'st a playing thy-my content Most blessed God that brought'st my minde in frame Not left'st me a set-off-discord to thy name O rub me rub me I begin to fall My What love Convulsions pull and hall M'adheringly-pursuing soule 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I 'M left behinde O for wings for strength to flie One drop One little No Cordiall left Hee No Balsome t' keep my heart uncleft E'ne gone I was but that a lightsome thought Whose season-bearing seed was deeply wrought I' th' secrets of my heart sprang up and brought Me an Idea o' th' Inlivening Tree Who stretcht it selfe beyond the farth'st degree O' th' spatious Heavens tendring me'ts healing leaves And ay-preserving fruit when my heart perceives I'ts feare-shrunck selfe with hopefull joyes inlarg'd Whereon m'officious spirits are discharg'd Unto their severall functions while the peace Past understanding thence doth re-increase My watchfull guard in heedy confidence To hold my peace in holding Peace's Prince HAppie's the man that knowes the cause of thing 's Unhappy then 's the man whom God not brings Acquainted with himselfe only happy hee Hath him his friend in whom he all doth see HOw good it is to waite on Thee Deare Good How good it is To bee Possest with that that I desire That 's not the thing that I require But to desire with what possest thou 'dst have me be that 's my request The world hath not the thing I would Till I can heare Thee say I should But still in aequilibrio stand Expecting thy scale-turning hand Not any thing till nothing will So false are th'weights of good and ill But thine are true Blest Truth O tell My heart what 's ill and what is well Till then I 'll leane th' contrary way Wish not to have 't ' cause wish I may So happily
not step out 'T is unbeleeving pride proud faithlesnesse 'S the bitter roote of all unhappinesse Looke on the humble-and-beleeving man He will be happy doe you what you can Below he lies the while he flies above Th' great'st evills and sweets the bitterest in love Still may I Act my God-adoring faith Not heare what sinne or sinfull sorrow saith Up up above I am out of the reach Of what in pact in peace will make a breach The cause once known the Cure's halfe done th' disease Exactly tane away the Symptomes cease Being as co-transient as co-incident Faith knowes no sinne nor humblenesse male-content Perverse and faithlesse faithlesse and perplext 'S the combination of the holy Text. A generation of perversenesses In whom's no faith no men of blessednesses Were they implanted in my pleasant rivers And suckt th' sweets m' All-abounding Name delivers Liberall to thirsty soules cu'd they the while Thus feeding runne to th' dry and barren soile Cry out for any want but want of care To keepe them fatting on Angely fare To stretch their wider branches to receive More of my fulnesse in more fruitfull leaves Happy happy soules indeed big with delight Knowne of and knowing the Lord what lust m' excite Him sit nay stand nay walke i' th' wayes of folly What blacke event becloud with melancholy Pure candid limpid quicke pellucid spirits Streame from the lively fountaine well demerits The honour o' th' parent grace Why 's living man Whose life is joy so sorrowfull what can What reas'n deject him man suffers for his sinne Which faith not suffering let 's no suff'rings in For while it comes to God it turnes from evill That found this left why troubled at words of divels But wary indigning simpathizing hearts Are Agents in their sweetly-played parts I le boldly say 't if truth say true So farre untoward so farre a Jew Untoward froward faith I can as well While melt in love gainst love rebell Untoward froward faith I can as well While blesse in heaven banne in hell Heare then the summe of Christian art Keepe faith in all things Acting's part Faith's onely where it lives and where it lives 'Ts the spirit the paire of nerves that motion gives To every action the man the worke is dead Is sinne where this is not the heart the head FOnd man in those first loynes himselfe unblest Fled from his nest cou'd never since find rest Now soares above now headlong fall's below That place-uncircumcised Being O That faith wou'd hold me still above my feare And feare below my pride Durst I presume To blesse my selfe my selfe unblessed doome Wer 't thou my feare great God how soone I 'd start Abhorre runne farre from this div'l swolen heart Aspires thy Throne in envious discontent To doe it's homage to thy regiment My wanton head wu'd it more Babells plot To reach forbidden fruite my froward heart not Rejoyce in all thy wills my stubborne hand Not quickly act thy soveraigne commands This head heart hand this all that first wu'd Thee Their Maker governe e're they 'd humble be Wert thou my trust shud I still sow the wind And reape the whirlewind tangle teare my mind With thorny cares such tireing circuits fetch To rake the Mammon makes me more a wretch Contrive a wisedome that thou never taughtst Create Chimaeras flocks of monstrous thoughts Headlesse conceipts that hold not of thy Christ The head the whole where all our worth 's compris'd Resolve upon an happinesse of mine owne Though by 't my happinesse be quite o're throwne Pitch such an height of learning unto which I will attaine what e're come on it itch After vaine applause be eminent or none Have what I will or else let all alone Silly-proud-childish-obstinate-God-denying else How madly lost when fondly sought my selfe How faithlesse pride the brainessets on the wracks While fretting grief the heart-strings gnawes and cracks Were God thy ayme thy stay this ne're wu'd neede H' accepts the doing will for th' willing deede How hard and yet how easie now I worke To please my Saviour sav'd me from the Turke My tireing Tyrant selfe expects the tale Of toylosome Brickes though time straw strength shu'd faile I will be rich will honors pleasures have Saith selfe or else I le venter on the grave But who pursues these riches honors pleasures He knownes not Christ his Alsufficient Treasures How easie is thy yoake thy burthen light When with selfe world divell mandates I them tight The faith that once of God hath got a taste Loves not the world so well to fall for hast But takes his time meanes measure manner kinde As willinger to be without were so his minde Whose manifold wisedome shewes its mighty power To keepe the soule whom neither th' golden showre O' th' glittering'st goods the cheating world can tender Nor th' bitting'st siege fiercest shots can make surrender And wherein faith most bravely hath acquitted 'T selfe 's not told so easily as pertinently omitted Since then the evill heart is to depart From thee and to depart from Thee 's the heart Of unbeleefe put in this faithfull feare Then shu'd I still be good because still here All blisse is in Thy presence th' evill heart 'S in evill case cause 't will from Thee depart Evill departs fares ill and all because This fearelesse unbeliefe not tends Thy lawes Stampt on the heart in golden Carracters Of ne're defaced loves and thence transfers Its thoughts to trash puts forth its hand to folly Th' luscious fare's resolv'd in t ' adust melancholly Fond fearelesse faithlesse man n'er findes his rest Runnes from his mercy least he shu'd be blest Then let thy feare fall and incompasse me From this false world while faith makes upward flie Thus both made one in love this faithfull feare Translates my soule to its celestiall Spheare To rest from th' labour I to 'th utmost doe And sing 't along ' cause thou wu't bring me through So gives he his beloved rest sweet sleepe Amidst the sprightly est activitie dost keep My spirits in reposed freshnesse while Th' world breakes their sleepe head heart with vaine turmoile Worke out salvation with a trembling feare Give love its perfect worke 't will cast out feare Th' excrementitious humours thus expeld Th' implanted spirit of faith's communion's held The better with the gracious love that sweetly feedes O' th' purer Pabulum of humble deeds 1 Joh. 3.9 CUd'st thou induce th' proposall t' vouchsafe a touch Unto the stateliest to yes the fairest moile The richest dâ—â—â—â—gerie what brave indignation'd boyle In that Heroick breast while thou sha't see The imminent Crowne of such an eminencie Surround thee in a glorious compasse hath no end Of time nor place but shud'st thou not intend Thy heedie faith but th' glancingst squint-eye lend From him to painted lies how soone thou d'st mend O how thy bowell's'd turne within thee with A sweete regret to think thy father seeth Cou'dst thou now sinne while such a
same building frame and growing body so farre should we be from making them as arguments to keepe us at the greater distance And what indeed is the end of Gods various dispensation of himselfe in such diversitie of gifts parts abilities if not that hee might shew the more of his wisedome in drawing them all so compleatly into one gracefull knot the bond of peace love that in such if not by such a variety can preserve the unitie if not further the harmony of the spirit of the Lord Jesus Ephes 4. perlege Or to what purpose is our knowledge but for love for charitie the fulfilling of the Law the end of the Commandement out of a pure conscience and of faith unfained This is the sincere the true faith and knowledge that thus workes What puritie of conscience what life of assection I see in the conversation caeteris paribus by that shall I judge of the truth of the measure of the faith the knowledge as the roote by the fruit and by that I look to be judged by the judge of all things by him whose call is for whose residence is in whose shining is into the heart where he shewes himselfe where he is where he ha's savingly Not by what is found in my braine my head but in my brest my heart that which sitteth here making musicke to the Lord with a gratious answering to all his wills a glorious admiration of his love his wisedome c. his mercifull acceptance in the Lord Christ and not that which it jarring with others there That which sounds forth God in its life and not that which founds forth it selfe in its tongue The Divill I beleeve hath as much knowledge and can dictate as excellent discourse as all the men of the world Knowledge so farre as it is not cordiall and living so farre as it is not sappy savory and fruitfull but dry and barren or bringing forth wild thistles so farre I shall never thinke it to have the Lord Christ for its roote So farre as it is not sapida sertilis it will proove but insipida futilis foolish and vaine I would have knowledge then bee my food and my food my strength and my strength my exercise I wu'd feede with delight but not for delight but for the better disgesting of my knowledge into an assimulated practice And be our opinions notions what they will if they convey no more of God along with them certainly they never came of his sending who alwayes comes along with the true understanding of his will of himselfe the onely truth And by more of his presence induceth more glorious light-more humble love-more faithfull action And to what purpose have our hearts tugged so hard at heaven for the pulling downe of those spirituall wickednesses and exalted vilenesses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Psal 12. but as they have held up the heads and strengthned the hands of the ungodly but as they are those of whom we have no warrant that they had their commission from him and therefore no promise that hee would dispence himselfe through them but as they are intruders betweene God and us and obtruders of their ceremoniall and traditionall obstructions in our immediater approaches to him and they taken away wee might have more of him and that that wee might doe more for him But now to have the obstacles removed and the end never the nearer attained to what purpose is it To have those who under the pretence of being the Conduit pipes were the dirt and filth that stopped them of being the Contrefenestres the shutting windowes to keepe out the theevery of innovations schismes seperations c. out of the Church keepe out the light and truth and were the greatest schismaticks renters of the Church themselves to have these I say removed as sure enough they shall at what ever rate and wee draw never the more light and life into our hearts into our lives but still hugge our owne fond imaginations still seeke about in such extravagancies after our owne inventions lying vanities that promise faire and performe worse then nothing what other will it be interpreted by him then the dispising the turning of his goodnesse his glory into shame while we know God more but know him not and therefore worship him not as God the commander of the whole man But those O Lord that know what it is to know thee can they but be thankfull in an active and 〈◊〉 action-denying thankefulnes O then that thou wouldest accomplish the work that thou hast so gratiously so powerfully undertaken How long shall thy servants nauseate at the fulsomenesse of their pride Though they make the hearts of kingdomes still ake with it let them be vomited be vomited forth thoroughly Rather let us be pained with our cure that not prevent our death We yea thou art sicke of their Lukewarmenesse O when wutâ—â— thou spue them out of thy mouth So will we flocke up to mountaines of thy house and poure forth our soules in thy praises So in the humilitie of our spirits will we sit at the feet of thy Jesus and learne at the mouths of thy holy servants So shall our hearts bow before thee and out hands be dilgent in thy service So shall holinesse bee written on our pathes and our lives be the memorialls of thy mercies So shall the review of thy favours be as the fringe for remembrance of thy precepts So shall the wonderfulnesse of our deliverancies be read in the wonderfulnesse of our obedience So will we commune with our owne hearts and be still and say what have wee returned thee What sinne have we more crucified what dutie have we more have we better done So will we offer unto thee the sacrifice of righteousnesse of a broken and contrite heart While wee bind all the faculties of our soule and members of our bodies to thy Alcar With the cords of our affections to thy Christ and thou sha't accept them gratiously O Lord our hearts thy Sion DElayes are neither constant grounds of suspect nor dispaire neither of suspect of the promisers present good will nor of dispaire of the promise it 's future performance In my last I promised you another which till now you received not yet hath this delay neither proved an utter silence nor proceeded from an unfriendlike disrespect God hath promised you deliverance which yet you have not yet received yet can this protraction neither argue a change of his fatherly affection nor unchangeablenesse of your child like afflictions Neither is it a ground for your doubt of his great prudence or gracious goodnesse in correcting nor of your comfortable support in or seasonable freedome from the correction He that beleeveth maketh not hast Faith is confident of the issue patience attendant on the time Two sweet and never-parting companions An unbeleeving patience or an impatient beleese how dissonant are they in the eares of a Christian How can I with a truly submissive and not presuming
the world makes to their pride the consideration of their owne parts gifts indowments abilities eminencies whatsoever As then most truly and throughly humbled when thou risest to thy highest station and takest the fullest view of all thy excellencies As seeing nothing but what thou hast of him in him and for him the onely ground of humilitie because of glory To see thy selfe thus and thus richly qualified and yet to see thy selfe to be miserable poore blinde and naked to have so much and yet to have nothing argueth that the Candle of God hath shined over thy head in its brighter beames and his secrets have dwelt more intimately more abidingly in thy Tabernacle While seeing thy selfe of the noblest stocke of the choysest of nations as touching learning with the learned'st concerning zeale with the most active touching the righteousnesse in the Law blamelesse c. and yet to treade and trample all these things under thy feete with the utmost indignation and detestation as the most despicable drosse and dunge in comparison of one thought of revealed Christ that hast knowne or rather art knowne of Him that is the onely excellency I such a light shining in upon the soule and out-shining the most glorious Sunne even at mid day is that which will cast the greatest Apostle upon his face and make him cry out that he is lesse then the least of Saints And certainly there may be a due and selfe-denying acknowledgement of parts indowments performances c. while there may be an impudently modest and selfe-seeking selfe-denyall of all the most desperate the most detestable hypocrisie Besides for a man to carry himselfe lowly dejectedly discontentedly upon the meere convincements of his defects and faults may be meere basenesse and pusilanimitie that will soone upon the least conceit of its owne worth turne into and indeed narrowly looke into proceeds from and carries along with it pride and selfe-love Neither is that to bee thought true humilitie that is not a furtherance to thankefulnesse And the only course to keep from boasting being to learn how to know all of grace how to glory boast in the Lord. We being onely so farre humbled as outed of our selves so far outed of our selves as filled with God so far as he is pleased gloriously to condescend to humble himselfe unto us and graciously to take us up to advance us into himselfe There being nothing that layes the soule lower in its owne eyes then its highest exaltation in Gods Nothing that makes it better know better keepe its distance in an humble lovefull trembling joyfull every-way-duly-affectionate active obedient walking before him then the knowledge then the assurance of its communion of its union with him I know the wisedome of God is foolishnesse to the world it is ignorant it is wulfully ignorant of it But I speake to them whose hearts have the minde of Christ and can sensibly interpret the meaning of his spirit And certainly he that speaks not nonsence to nature speakes but little supernaturall sence Besides nature may have a kinde of Ahab-like Judas-like humilitie on the apprehensions of evills morrall or naturall But to be humbled at the thoughts of our selfe-sufficiency in him who is our onely sufficiency our new selfe this of grace While our hearts understand that sweet harmony of that seeming contradiction I and yet not I but the Spirit of Christ that dwelleth in me that humble meeke gentle spirit Thou whose maine whose principall study is to know all the excellencies of the World in the face of Christ to know it by them and them by it that through it thou maist know him who hath ordained it as the conveying Medium of the light of the knowledge of his Glory Thou whose world-and selfe-contemning behaviour speakes thee one of those finding seekers and seeking finders that with asweet sharpenesse and unsatisfied satisfaction followest on to the knowledge of him in whom are hid all the treasures of wisedome and knowledge Thou sweetly passionated heart that knowest what are those flutterings of the soule to flie those holy efforts those lanchings forth into the great depths what it is to be given up to to lye under the power of the Divine Spirit while on thy water-like diffused soule it hatcheth new formes of the Divine nature Thou tender humbled shivered and shivering spirits that worke out thy salvation with feare and trembling while thou biddest defiance to the gates of Hell and laughest death and destruction in the face Thou who though often assaulted with Thornes in the flesh with buffetings in thy spirit art kept in such a compleate peace in the sense of the Al-sufficient Grace and canst glory canst pleasure in count gaines of thy infirmities thy distresses necessities persecutions c. as the advancers of the overcomming strength of thy Christ thy only joy glory gaine Thou poore weake feeble wretch that canst doe nothing and yet canst doe all things through him that strengthens thee Thou whose inward and heart-disolving sighes are the daily harbingers for thy speedy admission to that great and eternall Supper of thy solemniz'd espousalls Thou whose love-sicke Christ-inamoured soule bursts for the longings that it hath that it alwayes hath after the full and never-interrupted imbraces of thy deare thy onely deare beloved Thou that countest every minute an age till thou art with Him and yet countest seaven and seaven yeares ages and ages spent in the greatest hardship he shall appoint thee but as a minut in thy sweete waitings on him Thou whose Heaven-visited soule cannot but break forth in exalting exclamations O the beauties the harmonies the sweetnesses the riches the glories the Crownes the inexpressiblenesses the inconceivablenesses of the knowledge of the love of God in Christ Jesus by his holy Spirit Thou who art Heaven inside and outside Who art cloathed with the Sunne and treadest the Moone under thy feete while thou hast that within thee that could it be seene would dazle the eyes of the world into an envious astonishment In whom is the Kingdome of Heaven the righteousnes the peace the joy in the Holy-ghost unspeakable glorious Thou that countest the doing of his Will on Earth as it is done in Heaven the turning of Heaven into Earth and men into Angels And therefore seest infinite more beautie in the poorest Priest-deridest Mecanicke conscionably and sincerely busied in his calling though but in the shoveling up of dirt and sweeping of Chimnies then thou dost in all the guildings and paintings the Copes and Surplusses c. all the sumptuous gallant trickings of the Beast in the wilfull sensuall hypocriticall worship of God Yea then in the hearing the reading of Sermons meditating praying conferring c. or whatever more immediate services more world-withdrawing exercises so as excluding the seasonable discharge of thy severall relations the performance of thy dutie to God in and through that to men As knowing the worth of every thing to be as it is to the will of God
as God T' know good and evill I 'le then plod Upon this narrow Scrutiny With all submissive industry I 'le then resigne mine eyes to thee Thou Only Wise to see for mee I 'le be a foole the only way To passe for Wise another Day CHristian O how I tremble at the Name That holds the God that holds the world in frame O what an Earthquake-Palsey shakes my limbs What Spirit-intercluding feare bedims Mine eye What quivering Agues hurry through My panting veines surpris'd with chilling dewes I tremble how I tremble at the Name Christian Shall I say so I must my Joy constraines My Joy that serves it selfe by lighter paines With weightier comforts I professe Ah Lord Make thou my Life unto my Tongue accord Christian A piece of undivided Christ Watch soule for if thy selfe thou God beliest Off Sacrilegious hands th'ungodlike man Ungodly is is not a Christian For God is Christ and Christ is Man CReep sneaking Earthworm to thy bags of Gold And glutt thy greedy Panch with hungry Clay Climbe lofty Spider to thy Heights take hold Of Princes Palaces toile night and day Spin out thy braines into a curious plot Kings Kingdomes are but silly flies soon caught And thou whose Life sayes Time was made for leisure Thou for an Ocean-sporting Behemoth To tosse to rowle thy self in Seas of pleasure Yet know the Foot the Broome the Sluce whose Breakes through th' condensed'st Earth the Aire most wrath high Reaches and draws the abounding'st Waters dry Poore Base Wretcht man Are these things to compare That are so short that Are not while they are With Him that is our Substance With the Rare Th' only Honor t' be his Son his Wisdome Th'faire Sole-pleasing Love whose pure Essentiall Light Breaths flames in all with mutuall Delight God! Christ Blest Spirit Yee-Thou-Are-art mine For ever art One With thy Self-and-Thine MAT. 12. 43 44. GOe sweep thy House and weare out all the brooms Of Ethicks to the stumps collect the sweets Of Scripture flowers garnish perfume thy roomes Thou' rt yet the Rendevous where Legion meets And revell rout's more safe till Christ ha'indwelt Thee'nd kept Possession Which had he then th'hadst felt Thy sin-purg'd-thirsty soule draw wholy up Thy daily draughts of his reviving Cup. This sin-drean'd-Christ-replenisht soule 's no rest For th'unclean Spirit but the self-full brest OH where 's a quiet Lambe a gaulelesse Dove An humble soule an all-enduring Love A Glorious-and-offence-by-passing man That sweetly smiles at All the creature can A a Psa 131. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 smoothly plained silenc't soule abides No b Isa 40.4 cum Psal 31.20 rugged rough excrescencies of Pride A fitted soule to fall in close conjunction With God t' apply it selfe to every function A patient Job meek Moses gentle Paul Upright Gods Friend Heavens Seer well may y'him call The lively Image of his Christ VVho was the lowliest-and-the High'st Blest man Hath found the Philosophique Stone That with a touch turnes Dunghils into Thrones And of a Thorny makes a Golden Crowne Admir'd Believer While he'humbly laies him downe Below th'least mercy i' the nethmost Pit Walkes as a man not worthy o' the Name He forfeited unto Eternall shame Not worthy t'look to th'God he sold for nought On any creature who all in bondage brought Below the lash o th' Diabolicqu'st tongue Satanicqu'st hand in doing doth no wrong Sits still in Heaven with Him in Heaven did sit While in the Grave far far above the reach O' th' highest reaching sins can make no breach Upon his praising Obncords far above The barking or the fawning World but prove Th'increasers of his mirth by what he felt From their attempts while here below he dwelt DEny my selfe Take Up My! Crosse Each Day And follow Thee Selfe Friends gain ease name may Not one of these parts of my self not all Serve But my self and all my self must call Thee Lord What no propriety at home An Inmate to my self And yet must come And beare Must bring my shoulders to this Crosse Nay stoope for 't too and that for My My Crosse How lights anothers though heavier far And say 'T were once ones Life a Yeare a Moneth but every day And that including subdivided times As oft as he shall please recall our crimes Unto our memory And yet thus loaden travell Nay after perfectnesse her 's that would ravell The fin'st spun with into a sad confusion To draw these premisses into a glad conclusion But wisdom 's from above and 't is not nature That sees the height bredth length depth o' th' Creator H's incomprehensible love in Christ How light 's The burthen How unconceiv'd th'delights Thus made more capable of vaster Blisse By these impos'd impossibilities To flesh and blood how much th' more room for grace For God to make our soules the happier Place Of his such wonder-working residence That makes our Faith so far exceed our Sence His Spirit his powre our own that we might be Th'more glorious Proofe of his Omnip'tencie Omnia mea mecum porto TIll thou canst make the Cross of Christ uncrown'd And snatch the Scepter from his hand confounds Kingdomes like Potsheards till thou canst controule Him that shall rowle the Heavens like a scroule And make them melt with fervent heat to give Me passage to my high prerogative It s full enjoyment till thou canst untie Or cut in two the Gordian knot where I 'M inseperably interwoaven with himselfe Till thou canst rob the everlasting wealth And dry the inexhausted Spring Or stop The invisible Influxes that doe drop That poure out * Cant. 5.16 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sweetnesses come streaming through Their pure and undiscover'd Channell to M'inlivened soule th'ebbing world shall still redound VVith flouds of overflowing comforts ground My soule above the reach of worldly cares To feast upon the sweets of heavenly fare LUKE 1.53 O May I daily empty me of me Could'st thou but fill me daily more with Thee Can'st thou deny thy selfe Or can there be Ought good but Thee Or be Vacuity In Grace more then in Nature O'make make me More humble so I rise more fill'd with Thee Ah Lord Now where am I sure this is right I here is that is worth the name Delight Here her 's a Joy that swallows all my joyes In'ts shorelesse blisse and over all m'annoyes Triumphs in glorious peace the while't imployes It 's provident security and swerves On neither hand but to an haire observes Its narrow ways untill it come t'innest I' th' omnipresent Center of his brest O may I daily sill with more of Thee T 's this filling only humbles-raises me HUmilitie and grace are commensurable take the depth of the one and you have the height have all the dimentions of the other Ex pede Herculem So much Humilitie-so much Grace-so much God or rather so much God-so much Grace-so much Humility All our disposings of our selves to him being post-not predisposings so farre as I
the ground This Palace Thou perkt up to Heaven adorn'st Thee'n specious self-admired Parts and scorn'st Thy neighbouring Underling whose humble heart Shall raise his praise as choosing th' Better part Who deeply founded on his Rock outstands The proudest structure on the crumbling sands That over-charg'd with its owne pondeur shall With lower-shooting violences fall Intomb'd in its owne ruines ' ith'Abysse 'T wixt which and Heaven the vastest Chasma is BEE proud who can Dost constant use to bow Thy serious minde by an intentive view Of God How Great How Good Vile Sinfull thou Mercies how excellnnt and those not few God! Man Mercie Such from Such to such a man These and their Suches Weighed So Where 's the man NO All. And now what letts what 's now between Why not now joyne claspe in a mutuall close And twine in full embraces Why not lose My Name my Life in Thee so ever bee With Thee with Thee the only Heaven I 'd see No No All All be gone For I have lost have lost my selfe in One. For ever ever Lord that I may feare No more to be my self but still be here And if thy wisdome see my foolish heart Wu'd surfet on thy kisses and convert This Grace to wantonnesse shu'dst still impart Unsowred sweets yet though our lips must part But shall they part never never shall our hands Though then in Hell I be yet what withstands But I may Vault my self to Heaven on This hold Whose touch is strength whose strength is uncontrol'd I Wonder how I live I 'm but a Shade A Ghost Doe dead men eat then I 'le eat too My life is hid with Christ in God I 'm made To men a stranger to my self nor doe I know ought aft'r th'flesh live in the Spirit Survey the Glories that I Now inherit How black 's this Sun how grim a night this cleare This flearing day O what an Aegypt's here While in my Heaven-illumin'd Goshen stand I viewing the palpablely-obscured land Which did they feel it as they think they see 't How to our Dwellings wu'd they speed their feet But still the world 's the world When shall I see The Sun the Day that make these thus to mee I see else knew I not these thus wu'd see More yet more that more knowing I might be I see but oft a cloud intrudes between And make's me say 't is darknesse to have seen I see one beam through th'Cranie blear's mine eye When all are pointed there O where am I My Light shall strength my sight nay I shall be All light for as He is I shall Him see No Dark of Folly-Sin-Sorrow shall there bee VVhen I Allight Allight shall Alwaies see ACTS 10.10 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 'T Is good 't is good being Here. Shall I go downe Shall I goe eat whose stomack kindly swels VVith for by Food-indeed Shall I goe drowne My Faith in Sence Or may my spirits as well Be lost as dull'd so too the work not hast Then goe flesh goe but dip but sip but Tast Goe not unenvyed of those precious houres VVherein thou laiest me out for dead and yet Extortest more for Life where funerall flowers Are welcome sweetes But what a sad regret Comes over if not overcomes my spirit To heare them talk of straws that Thrones inherit Nay t' heare them talk like two wh'ave but one soul bound for the same Heaven-Voyage They fall foule Keep up my Faith and there the while thee feed VVhere when I am no more I food shall need Keep up my Faith and talke thee there the while Where when I am this feare shall be my Spoile Keep up my Faith and then I may goe downe And through my Crosse the better view my Crowne HOw is my soule distracted with content How full of Joyes and yet how fill'd with Griefe How well compos'd my heart and yet how rent How often straights and yet as oft reliefe Impatient of delaies I patient stay Oh come away deare Lord I 'le not away The more I have the more I still desire The more I still desire the more I have Thrice happy thirst whereby I so acquire The drinke who drinkes he never more shall crave I aske no more but this but more of this No more this th' only blisse more still there 's misse Oh could I ever dwell where I have been Or once could be where I shall ever dwell In Kedars Tents I mourne when I have seen Th' Invisible how soon my heaven to hell Is turn'd The only hell that I can see To see the face reflects no God on me Cast me into those Roomes of this great Inne Where I may heare them talke that talke of Home And when these worldlings which thee ne'r have seen Chance in my-thy appointed way to come Oh iet me be so prepossest with thee Hearing I may not heare nor seeing see When highest I arise I lowest fall And when I lowest fall I highest rise The higher my sin and shame me more appall The lower the greater's mercy in mine eyes I fall rise rise fall move but nev'r remove So stedfast am I founded on his love Mount up my spirit what not Higher yet Yet Higher Higher yet this is too low Till quite above my selfe advanc'd I get Where my New self shall me His Glory show In this third Region shall my Eagles eye Th'unclouded splendour of his face descrie Before I heard but Now I Now behold Those holy beauties that first struck me dead Those holy beauties that first did unfold The riches of my life thus thus is bred Death out of Life Life out of Death by his Light More black 's mydark mydark his Light more bright Oh how I love to love such * Desirablenesses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Can. 5.16 Lovelinesses As Thou art Altogether how I hate My selfe I cannot love oh th'expedite distresses That my self-jealous soule doe intricate Cares Cleerings Feares Desires Zeale Indignation Revenge one smile caus'd cur'd blest perturbation By'agreeing discord how delight 's augmented By these harsh touches how well grac't the close VVith a full harmony never be repented Shall this Repentance VVhen thou dost Lord compose A heart thus broken 't is then an instrument And ne'r till then can give thine ears content For never thou pleas'd with thy self alone Break'st one in two but bring'st two hearts in one So am I whole again ' cause one with Thee So love my self ' cause Loving Lov'd of Thee O VVhat a Consort is thy Word VVhen Place falls into Place O what a Beauty is thy VVord VVhen Grace is matcht to Grace But what a What then is That Word That shews all Face to Face HOw faire a Casket is thy VVord VVhat broken sparkes it doth afford From every corner to invite My eyes to frequenter delight My eyes my wondering eyes to see Such radiant Christianity Cu'd I but sett these sparks in one VVhat floods of lustre thence were flow'n One's worth a world Heaven
e're Blesse 2 KINGS 4. ONce was I dead Authority then brought Applyed thy Word but nought till Thou cam'st wrought And now I languish i' this fainting fit The meanes begun my life best strengthens it Come lay then eyes to eyes mouth hands that I May see sing doe more wonders till I die To see to sing to doe thy Will above As here to have it seen sung done I love VVHen I lov'd death and ran away from life My wanton Circuits for some fresher sin Mercy pursued o'retooke and with its strife Inclin'd my will to know God Good againe Good God! and now I feare to step awry Thy hand 's as neare as thy ne'r slumbering eye I stumble but not fall fall off not fall That shoots me the more forward upward this Obliquely I ascend why why at all Dear'st God O love O feare the Lord that is So wondrous good O feare th'least temporall misse Of such a friend secures Eternall blisse Ne're leave me such company such for ever Infinite simplicity of joyes I sever My self a moment for a momentary Shadow of blisse These thoughts first must I vary Eternity is little enough t' imploy In him and shall I bate a moments joy Avant false loves I 'le lose you All for Ever E're I will misse a minute of this pleasure To lie infolded in my Saviours armes To feast upon his kisses while he warmes He melts my soule into his melting armes Presumptuous Rivals still your Syren charmes My soul is at her heighths and cannot stoop To lend an eare to your inchanting Cup. No no I 've Nectar I have Flagons here One drop's enough ten thousand Worlds to reare As far above themselves as now they are Below Him who is only worth compare Feed Sensualist on dreames of aiery Thrones Of golden Mountaines and of pleasure Own 's No parallel but give me leave to tell The ' hadst been in Heaven thou d'st say thou art in Hell VVho ere was thus imbedded in Thy breast Deare Lord and could finde other where his rest His Rest that moves in such an endlesse sweet VVhere all the Spirits of the Godhead meet VVith my diffused soul entwines it self In fresh rencounters with'ts imbettering Self I 'M in a straite prest hard on either hand I both wayes hast and yet am at a stand I here is Christ but there is more of Christ Here in my mouth and heart but there is nigh'st VVhat i st but love can keep me from the sight The perfect sight of my select delight But love's obedient if thou 't bid me goe And travell on this Pilgrimage below Doe suffer seaven and seaven yeares so to show How grounded's my affection that 't is no Fond fancy that the giddy world deceives I goe I run I flie yet give me leave To beare thy Picture next my heart to looke Upon th'adored Beauties of thy Book That they may be the covering of mine eyes So to preoccupy them from these lies O glories Can I hold Can I refraine But still thou sai'st and therefore I Remain Love 's not its own lives in'ts Belov'd thinkes good Not what the Subject but the Object wu'd COntent to live but covetous to die Glad here to doe more good but more to flie Above these sad temptations to doe ill Yet covetous again of life to fill Heaven with more saved soules and yet againe Death not t'occasion more Hell filling sin Thus while I waver in this blessed doubt This blest propensity thus helps me out Lord while thou wu't I 'd live and when thou wu't I 'd die my humble soul learn'd at the foot Of my deare Jesu no true rule 's t' be had To judge of right and wrong of good and bad But by thy Will and Nill Thus living die I still And dying live thus m'will he gives In both because I die and live Beset with Heaven on every hand Prepar'd for Heaven thy Command HIgh and happy is that pitch of Christianity that can so well reconcile the greatest of enemies Life and Death as that they both friendly take up their lodgings in the same Breast and see themselves entertained with the same respect at the same time without the least grudging or repining at each other The heart not vexed with any partiall peremptory desires of either But they quietly residing in it and officiously waiting on it with a dexterous serviceablenesse to discharge either of their duties according to the good pleasure of God signified to the God-well-pleased soule Then is a Christian like Himselfe when he hath that power over himselfe as to walke with his life in his hand as ready at the least sound of the word given either to lay it down or put it up againe in his heart When he weares it loose about him like an outer garment ready to slip on and off as occasion serves This is the onely man that is fit to Live who is fit to Die and fit to Die who is fit to Live He that knowes how to Live hereafter is well prepared how to Live here and hee is not prepared to depart hence that knowes not how to Live hereafter He that knowes no difference betwixt earth and heaven but more and lesse of God as he can not but be continually making more after heaven because after more of God so can he not but be as willing to stay on the earth while it is more agreeable to the will of God which is Himself the Heaven of a Christian Blessed blessed soule thus sented in his God! To whom the sound of the feete of death are delightfull and the drawing out of his dayes is pleasant When the withering'st age detaines not too long in life nor the flourishing'st youth hastens too soone to death As he that crowned with all the pomps and pleasures that the fragrant'st the fertilest Garden of the world can afford see 's nothing in the whole but meere vanity meere nothingnesse lesse than nothing And on the other hand cast forth into the driest and barrend'st Wildernesse the vast and howling Desart still digges up Fountaines of everliving and never exhausted waters and makes his Bacha his Baracha his vale of teares a mountaine of praises as * Psal 84. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 drinking Him for his Spring who is the Lord of Life and Glory SEest how this string untoucht doth quickly stir At th'sound of that they not who 're not so far Where are the soundings of thy Bowels Lord Our Bowels sound and shall not thine accord They touch Thee not but thine eyes-apple they touch And wu't not stir when their presumption 's such And though we cannot move our neighbours heart Yet in our griefe wu't not thou beare thy part Thou art our Father Oh let there never be Even in Inanimates more Simpathy Forget her Childe a mother may yet not Thou thine for if they are thy selfe 's forgot Draw out our Soules and make us follow thee For where thou art there only there are
bayes are these thy brags They have no Grandeur to amuse My free-borne spirits scorne to choose What so inadequate will prove Unto the Heavenly vastnesse of my Love Nor when I see thee crosse my way Arm'd in thy terrors to essay Me with fell browes and felling blowes Canst make me stoope to thy dispose there 's no such amiablenesse appeares T' attract the sweetnesse of my feares So canst not play the Cheater nor The Thiefe I thus provided for Nor have I time nor strength t' attend Thy gaudy trifles nor to lend An eare unto thy trifling threats Whilst such a fearefull-Love compleats It selfe by growing more One in One My busied thoughts o're-whelm'd alone In my exceeding Great Reward My Buckler and my shielding Guard Whos 's Sunne-amasing bright aspects Majestique Grace Inf'nt protects Omnipotent Benignities Eternall favours my soule n're sees But wonder-struck it panting lies For life to live before those eyes Whose every glance conveies such sparkes As all created beauties darkes And wholly makes my loving feare Injoy th'inliv'ning dyings there Breaking through every object to Th'great Love with whom I have to doe That fires out mixtures while he warmes Pure hearts in 's purifying armes Trampling on worlds with all their force And fraud that strive to stop my course There lie thou sprawling feare and there Disheartned love so proudly'd dare T' usurp the name belongs to One Doth both as you yourselves oppone Let vulgar men have vulgar mindes Let false feare kill while fond love blindes Let vulgar men have vulgar mindes Move crosse and stumbling lie behinde Unenterfairing even pac't Affections smoothl'each other hast And me on them as the same feet O' th' same Heaven-journying soul to meet The same desire one blessed God Who ne'r made passions be at ods BUt Sin and Satan fear'st not them No no nor them they can't condemne Me that must be the Higher powre Whose feare their feare doth over-powre Why shu'd I so disgrace my Birth A piece of Heaven-inspired Earth Shall I degenerate from my Birth And to base feares resign my Mirth No 't is not them I feare but Him Whose love will never lose a limbe I conflict with a conquer'd foe Wh'hath only strength enough to show The stronger over ruling hand Subjecting All things to'ts command I 'le wary cautions active be And so my feare from feare shall free Give me no feare but that which meets In hearty joyes and honved sweets A well compos'd Ingredient To make the more compleat content A pure a cleane a cleansing sound Strong strengthning healthy feare whose ground Is Love is Faith a hopefull feare A feare of great delight 's my feare Sweet feare How oft I 'd name thee ere I 'd let thee goe who art so neare So deare unto my heart Sweet feare That mak'st such Musick in mine eare That feast'st me with such royall cheare Such heavenly fare the while I heare Thee say the King my Father 's here The King my Husband 's come to beare Me company to solace me W'th all manner o' pleasants hid for me Unworthy me to sup and dine To banquet with me with the wine The generous wine repleats my soule With raised spirits above th'controule Of men and divles while humbly waite On th' gratious Councels that impart So glad a course of watchfull worke T' avoid the sad temptations lurke About m'in every corner and Hath promis't me hee 'l ever stand Close by me wi'h's ne'r slumbring eye Ne'r shortned Arm that can espie That can prevent thought he so good Evill's at th'great'st distance but he wu'd Have them approach assault to try How much of that great God may lie In such a little piece of flesh What mighty powre he can expresse B' a broken contrite heart what high What unconceiv'd delights defie The highest-aspiring griefe and scorn T' be over-reached overborn By'ts cruell Talons but still soare Their Heaven-securing flights as more Advanced b' its pursuits while still Resolve t' be uppermost will-nill All th' ravenous griefes and Harpy feares Though th'hugest terriblest flock appeares Sweet feare still sweet And have I met Thy name again Though counterfeit That wu'd betray me while I let The feigned sound have entrance yet As error proved makes the truth More lovely so its falshood doth Thy faithfull friendship while I finde They 're purposely of him design'd These hid as well as open foes That may th' sagacity disclose That with the courage lies inclos'd In this my faithfull feare repos'd In that All-powerfull breast Sweet feare Wise Valiant feare still may I feare Yet never feare to lose thee feare Thy misse but not thy losse may heare May see as well as know thou art A constant lodger in my heart While still thou art in exercise Of some sage puissant enterprize Still watchest prayest workest wait'st Still fight'st still beat'st thy way through straights Sweet feare how oft I 'd name thee er'e I 'd let thee goe who art so neare So deare unto my soul sweet feare That mak'st such Musick in mine eare Well make it still within my heart VVe'r still together though we part Il faut avoir Courage iusques apres la mort THe shrill mouth'd Trumpet and the ratling Drum The clattering armour and the quivering Speare Swords glittering Canons roaring these become The Spirit that 's steel'd with Faith not bar'd with feare The smell of sulphure and the sight of blood The sence of wounds of death the heart yet good Thus muster up thy forces day by day Thus fight before thou fight'st this is the way To carry it sure put on thy Panoplie Arm'd Capapea thy proudest foe defie What need'st thou Christian feare maintain the field God is thy Shield Tower Captain never yeeld Or fear'st thou more the fiery darts of men Then divles these quench't shall those affright thee and when Thou shu'dst be bold because thou art afraid In weaknesse God his power is perfect made HAst seen the Hunter hurry down like thunder Headlong descents beare up the steepest Crag Leap hedge and ditch cut gates and bars asunder Break through the thickets plunder through the Quags Scowre o're the Hillocks flie it o're the Plaines Out-face the windes laugh at the storming raines Forget his hunger envy not the Bryars His clothes his flesh wi'h's Steed undaunted prance Through lonely Heaths perplexed Woods never tyres But on still on he rides and if he chance To get a fall leaps nimbly up again And makes the ground to feel's more swift disdain Thus fired with courage nought but feare refraines Thus sports in 's perils pleasures in his paines Up Heaven-bred heart up This 't is doth demerit The exercise of thine Heroique spirit Shall that brave breast recoile what what temptation Dismaies the man whose danger 's recreation How his resisted soule will reinforce It selfe and take new valour to its course Through all he breakes downe all he beares o're all He flies his saith is further'd by his fall For what his
thou want'st In earth and be as troubled as thou canst Be steady immoveable if thou 't approve By alway abounding workes thy trust above Hast seen the palsie hand how'ts shaking sinews Bungle at its worke it often discontinues And slowly rids away while marrs th'little part It do's So th'feare-griefe-care-disturbed heart All things cooperate thy good How dar'st Deny 't How dar'st affirm it while thou scar'st Thy self vvith thine own shadow fondly cast O' th' love shines clearest vvhen the Cloud is past The Cloudy world the cleare quick-sighted soule Transpeirces vvhen't detaines the dully foule And thus me thinkes afflictions makes us sing How good How good they are while they re-bring Our stragling hearts to more demeuring views Of him vvhom vve cause he us first did chuse And thus by them his holinesse partake When disincumbred frequenter we make Immediater approaches so to limbe Us form and feature more his own and trim 'S more accurately to him vvhile more see Him as he is the vvorld as it is Vanity Of all except vexation and thereof Full in its serled'st state and are we lo'th To be unmanicled to have our hand Strengthned to hold truth more of Christ while stand Happily ' nfetterd in these freeing Cords That make our erst enslav'd affections Lords Where closer kept in perfect libertie Imperfect onely in that t' shall closer be Hee 'l point out our misprisions and give Instructions how we may more like him live How good ' Twu'd make thee covet povertie And be ambitious of disgrace and flee Upon the wracke presented by thy God Wu'd'st thou beleeve that glorious abode O' th' spirit of spirits What is thy state If once with all our States and Lives thou weigh it I knew a man the moone hath twelve times since And onely twelve by quarterly dissents Lighted the winking world t' see how 't beclings Th' inconstancy of sublunary things This man whose Age stood i' th mid'st of all The earth's temptations while they roundly fall About his necke to steale his heart with kisses Downe to 'th infernall Chambers forearm'd withblisses Of never failing proofe where ere they cover Marches where that sweet Dove is us'd to hover Upon his God exploring head that sought Him in the Garden and imbracing caught Him in his walking voice that i' the fresh O' th' day wont there to meet him and expresse Farre fresher loves VVhen suddenly he teares A dismall cracke invade his quiet eares As when some mighty Structure craz'd with yeares And reparations negligences beares 'Ts decrepid limbs upon its friendly props Who straite deceived of the ground that drops From under 'm not o're sound no little part Themselves forc't from their tottering Charge they start Assunder from their close conjunction Now Now All 's agoing her massie bodie bowes Her longue-time-drooping now quite falling head O' th' weaker Ayre that overburthened Finds strength enough to lift her dolefull voyce Unto the lofty skies seem'd to rejoyce By their cleare cheerie countenance that they Were so farre distant from so shroud a fray But still the loud mouth'd Ayre not able beare Th' oppression fumes in a furious rage and teares Her deadly throat with envious exclamation To rend the restie eares o th' drousie Nation Whose feeble Portalls too too weake to stand So hard a stresse flie up before the grand Tumultuous noise attended with its Troupes Of hiddious feares t' whom straite their spirit stoopes With yeelding slavery while they represent Them spectacles as Potent to torment See Citties broyling in their bloody flames And choak't in sweltring smoake the mincing dames Their fashion-brooding braines dasht on the streete They thought too base a pavement for their feete The canker'd Usurer hugging o' the bagges Betray his Life the fine-mouth'd Wanton draggs Some poysonous carrion from a loathsome hole For his restorative and now there 's nothing stole That 's felony nor slaughter's murther to Those divle-inspired Pontificians who With more than Savage cruelty make death laugh 'T selfe fat with'flesh't devoures the blood it quaffes In full Carrowses from the Parricide hands Of Hell-sprung Catilines whose Rome-bred Bands Arm'd with Hierarquique powers make sculls their Cups Bouse of their Rounds to fate and wallow up To th' reaking knees in vast Acheldamas Thus and beyond Thus in a thousand wayes That grim-fac't Monster shooke his angry dart Against the fearing but God fearing heart Rose in undanted courage to that height That Nature ne're can beare advanc't by th' sight O' th' Beautie in that breach the Musicke in That Crack that vailed beautie that was seene More faire through black that Musick that Was heard more sweete through waters that begat That well composed temper in his heart So fixedly prepar'd no force might part It from t 's Elshaddai by whose blisse-full name 'T was so enlivened with transporting flames So man'd with Heaven-animated spirits So carried forth with brave resolves 't demerits Some Angells Pensill to describe the joy Intranc'd the soule who while on All it saw This Motto There 's no evill but the Lord Hath don 't full nimbly aptly sweetly accords The will o'th'Lord be done for He can doe Nothing but Good but very Good And who VVhos 's heart 's inflam'd with Thy Great Love Great Go Can say that any thing Thou dost is odd Who 's he shall teach thee wisdome Canst thou draw The Heavens out like a Curtaine give a Law To th' Earth to hang on nothing Who shall lend Him bowels that steeres our hearts Or who extend His goodnesse unto Him Shall th'fountain come To drink o' th' streames Shall I be cal'd to summe M' account to Thee Thou scan my Poesie On thy crook't fingers Ar'nt my wayes eaven Thy First framings of thy thoughts wholly perverse And that continually and thou redresse Thou make thy Maker Or was I so o're taken Like some unwary Father who hath forsaken His goods to live at 's Sons provision or Hast thou them of thy selfe and dost abhor To be beholding unto me Behold the man 'S become's own God himselfe and scornes to stand T' our pleasure but to thy dust proud dust goe drudge About thy Thorny Earth learn hence not t' grudge Me my prerogative and if thou dost Deale proudly still still I 'le be uppermost But are my doings all good whence then this mutter Ar'nt they Shew me my Master let him utter His skill Come Mushrome thou of yesterday Come teach the Ancient of dayes to sway His Scepter Or what milder sounds th' attempts That quarrel'st at his prudent Regiment Who 's not a truly-throughly-humble man Hee 's but a practicall Arminian Had'st but thou well studyed his revealed will And pray'd thee to'ts perswasion wu'd't not still Thy murmuring at the loosing of a Straw Who had'st digested that Eternall Law Of pretermission and receipt to grace Wu'd this in all thy Topicks find no place More than the proud Pelagian will see Even so my Father ' cause it pleased thee What shall the child
felicitie What 's Heaven if not a seeing face to face Sung heart to heart were here that full seene grace Sung to a perfect harmony of wills We might on Earth of Heaven take our fills Bless't God hath given us such an Heavenly Brother To tune us all to Thee and each to other O what a consort 's here but ah where finde I two or three strick Unisons in minde Yet were they thirds fifts eights yet unitie Runs sweetely through with a sweet Symphonie There 's one blest One i' th' mid'st who where he is In turning all to One turnes all to blisse One reconcil'd One Smpathy agree How full's my soule with heavenly melodie What 's sinne shame griefe what whatsoever's bad But discord from the good the God we had What else th' all-sinning sinne this Tree I will A sign of Soveraigntie I will not Hell Hell but what th' all-saving grace come doe Come suffer m'will thy will I come I doe Heaven Heaven How harsh'n answ'r t' a sweet injuction How sweet an answer to so harsh a function Thus fin-and-sorrow follow self-will'd pride And grace-and-peace the self that is denide To will thy will 's the sole humilitie Wherein thou dwel'st and that 's in Heaven to be How sweet a Heaven 's the heart still say it wu'd It is my God do he what seemes him good Here 's a belov'd sweet singing Israel Whose heart 's full set to God's consent's as well In all notes as in one and if he strike A jarre jarres with himselfe till strikes alike And that 's a jarre that playes a pleasant moane I'th'eares of Heaven and therefore in his owne VVhat to give Grace and Glory but to give According to thy sacred will to live VVhat i st to be in Hell To be at ods Men with themselves friends neighbours devils God's Cursing the cause of this their sad discent From th' just inflicter of their punishment Gnashing their teeth for envy at the thought Of that Salvation Reconcilement brought Thou only blest in being only One Make us to be One spirit with thine owne And so with one another ere may I be VVith them thee feare they feare to disagree VVhat was our blessers dying blessing His prayer VVe might be One as He and 's Father are O were I were I able to unfold The riches that one sillable doth hold There 's only One thing that is necessary Met we all there how cu'd we thus contrary One body one spirit one hope one faith one Lord Baptim God Father so many Ones afford Their help to keep all One and yet how few VVhose boysterous spirits will not bussle throw Soft peaces bounds so lewse loose unity For none but humble-candid-wise agree But proud-contentious-fooles will ne'r agree Nor vvith themselves nor others nor with Thee Their friendship 's but dissembled enmity Unto th'r owne soules Thee all since not agree In Christ they 're not at peace wi'th ' very stones O' th' field the whole Creation groanes Under this universall enmity It feeles by man his parting friends with Thee Now this Commune Vinculum is broke All flies in pieces and we doe but cloke Our differences if not seem to be Each for himselfe and then what friends we be How now afraid of injury from each other Shrink up our selves into our selves and smother At least our mutuall hatred and not discover The depths of malice that our hearts doe cover Stor'd up against th'all-good all-powrefull God while self-wills and fond desires wu'd pull The Crowne from off his head so ' gainst our selves Who love they hate who hate they love themselves But whether are we brought by this sad breach Or what was 't brought it but our selfish reach Or what can binde it up but only Hee In whom alone we reconciled bee That bundle o'life b'whom His are gathered in To One to never part their hearts again Deare Saviour Cu'd we pattern lowly Thee How willing to our Farhers will wee 'd be Blest Love that spy'st so rare a policy Th'Athistick Florentine cu'd ne'r descry Stand soule this ground while Heaven can provide Himselfe of joy thy joy must needs abide Let him have all have all though I get none My joy 's my Gods content and not my owne Thou canst not Lord displease me ' nlesse thou wu't Displease thy selfe for I will what thou wu't Take take thee all deare Lord though I get none My joy 's my Gods content and so my owne So will the wilfull'st but passive instruments they But of thy grace we actively obey My care 's to please my husband so my self He that so loves so foolish fond an else Wu'd undoe all againe to put in selfe Though taught so well in him t' injoy it selfe Th' issue I nor know nor care t 's my blisse His pleasure 's mine and my displeasure's his He beares our burthen we injoy his yoake He weares our Thornes that hath our Thrones bespoke O cu'd we ever keep us at this pitch What an untroubled life wee 'd leade how rich In all contents nor wu'd there need descents To lower arguments that can't dispence Us sollid true substantiall comfort till We 're rais'd to sing it is our God his will The great'st content is none whose grounds not this Th' great'st discontent's swallow'd up in this vast blisse That beares the soule in an unstopped streame Of mightie force to 'th pleasure o' th' Suprearme The strength of all obedience is this It is his will and not it is my blisse The man that 's not alive can he be strong 'T is Love's the life of God beares all along With speed with ease the Councell ta'ne word given No parley 's with the flesh On on 's straite driven With conquering flames and if his blood shall rise Hee 'le lose his blood e're hee 'le his God despise What chalenge wo'nt he take what frowns what blows What death 's on deaths who such a Guerdon knowes Awaites his certaine victory such a Beautie As cheares him to and cleares him through his dutie VVhos 's thence infused vigour feares nothing more Then want of dangert ' make the world adore Those Heart'ning Splendors that in every Ray Th' all conquering strength o' th' Deity convey VVith what Luxuriances the turgent soule 'S borne up beyond the world and hells controule O how it longs it longs to be imploi'd I' th greatest worke the greater love 's injoy'd How't runnes at halfe a word how 't markes the lippes And heares before they speake away it trip VVith speedy dilligence and cannot stay Though th' thrungin'st pressing'st diff'culties beats it way Snaps off the strongest cords like rotten threads Dissects the massiest barres in shivering shreds And drives before it all the joyned force O' th' mighti'st obstacles oppugne its course And if it feele the least repulse returnes VVith thrice-redoubl'd couragious onsets burnes VVith spirit-incensing indignation to Be stop't in ought that for his Christ hee 'd doe The man 's in love
thee t' unwrap thee o' thy misterious lawes And give thy unvailed beauties into me And take my love-inflamed heart to thee To live by faith by love that live by action And but thy pleasure what 's my satisfaction To you it is given to know the ministeries of the kingdome of Heaven And art not thou O Lord tui juris art not Thou at Thine owne disposall at whose disposall are all the things in the world mayst not thou give thy selfe to whom thou pleasest or what is Heaven but Thee or the knowledge of its mistery but the knowledge of Thee and the knowledge of Thee life eternall Thy free and gracious and therefore not worke-fore-seene gift Shalt Thou depend on the creature or that on Thee Thou on its will or it on Thine Can the humble soule say thou sawest man would be good or bad and therefore thou must needs order him to life and death and so not thy will but theirs must have the precedency the preheminency It is not safer to say that thou who art an absolute and free agent giver and disposer of thy selfe in the inhabitation of whom in the soule is Grace Glory Life eternall that thou in leaving and passing by a man hath left him as bad because not pertaking of thee the onely good or blasphemously to say thou seeing some goodnesse in man without thy selfe as it must needs be if not from thee from thy will thou seeing of him thus good of himselfe and therefore a God wouldst order him to salvation and then how can he be a God O into what absurdities into what everlasting confusions would not the mad pride of degenerate nature leade us and all for want of a true thorough sight of that infinite desparitie betweene the Creator and the creature thaâ— absolute soveraigntie that he hath over it that cleare and distinct understanding of his will its positivenesse privitivenesse activenesse permissivenesse c. it s alwayes justice holinesse goodnesse Can that soule but above all desire nay desire it as that one onely thing that it might ever dwell in the house in the presence of God to behold the beauties of his holinesse and to blesse him among his chosen and yet but say withall but if he hath no delight in me here I am let him doe to me as seemeth him good Os what is it can more assure the soule that it hath seene him that it shall ever see him as having chosen that good part that shall never be taken from it in whom alone it could learne to humble it selfe to the death in the willing fulfilling of a ready obedience to its Fathers will This is the heart that will not haste after its owne inventions but will waite upon his counsells that feareth the Lord and dwelleth in his secrets Marle not my soule If wisedome some reserved cases have For heavens Cabinet councell he shu'd save Thee never an Heaven shu'd he fully show The misteries of his state here here wee 'd know Him fully and that were heaven indeed But since Thy conversation shu'd be never thence I blame not this thy scrutinie but wu'd Thy grosse contempt if thy remissenesse shu'd Not prie fnr truth as life and that to see Sparkling i' th' loveliest resplendencie That lights our Hemisphere The soule in'ts grave That 's not abroad i' th' Light Thou't then behave Thee wisely when thy Scripture-guided eye It s ingenious boldnesse shall most humbly prie Unto the utmost bounds of modestie And there where reason failes let faith supply Till thou sha't see thy faith was rationall That skild thy will to trust Truth over all When thou sha't see all ends fall in together All knit all into one knot no time shall seaver No sooner now I 've gotten one but then The others gone and I 'm t' be gone agen Then sha't thou know as thou art knowne without Discourse at one compleat sight far from doubt Grow then in gracious knowledge now and so More Heaven in more Heaven-like manner know Thy Councels were not worthy o' Thee great God Were'nt they too deep Broad Long High f'r me to plod Them out to one full intuition nor My love so great so sweetly'd inforce m'abhor M'selfe cu'd this blest distraction comprehend Thee in my owne short armes till thou sha't send Th'inlarging Light and Truth shall end This controversie in thee my endlesse friend Now can't I bring two ends together then Two ends to bring together can't I ken Now can't I Mercy and Justice knit in one Then see it shall not need for they are one VVrapt up in one Decree how Thou't expresse Thy uniforme sweetnesse in a divers dresse Substantiall goodnesse in a various shade Compleat perfection with a Cloud ore-laid O come then come VVhen breakes the day That breakes these broken shades away The Clouds subjected under our feet Hang ore our head so may we meet And greete may wholy contemplate the face That glances here imparted grace SHall faith subscribe to sense Or sense to faith Poore faithlesse faith my eyes my head my eares My heart say they all what they will Thus saith Jehovah Speake Lord Now thy servant heares Can't I beleeve thon art I le not beleeve I am Art good N'r I bad But I both beleeve Thou art thou a Rewarder ar't of all That diligently seek thee I have sought Seek and will seek thee so I le nere lin't call By thought by word by deed till I am brought VVord otherwise by a messenger of Heaven And then I le trust but what I have receiven I Would not beleeve because I see feele heare c. but see heare c. because I beleeve not have my sense leade my faith but my faith my sense because I have a ground for it by revelation by the VVord and not so far beleeve as I finde ground from faith out of sense If I cannot believe Gods eyes I will never believe mine owne thinke all I see heare doe as a dream farther then faith goes along and assures me of it c. To receive apprehensions of things as meerely presented by the senses is no more then brutish by naturall reason no more than humane but what by supernaturall reason by faith is divine though indeed that reason be but unreasonablenesse farther then it is inlightned by this farther then it is acquainted with adheres to workes according to the will of God The heartie thorough active compleat knowledge of the Truth Now truth is as I may say of fundamentall necessitie to the constituting of a true and stable faith it being impossible that that which is founded on falsehood shud prove other then false and failing whether concerning persons or things our condition in generall or perticular acts Where the promise precept word is not taken aright the application of the soule to it must needs be amisse where the ground is mistaken the building muw needs miscarry Where that 's not sound this must sinke Loose and spongie soiles
thought rul'd in Thy princely mind thou cou'dst not cou'dst not sinne 'T is death to such a one to sinnne Nay death thou d'st runne to death to free thee from this death Live like thy selfe then Christian act act act Set keepe thy faith on worke in every fact In vain 's the power that 's not produc'd to act Where what is had 's not us'd what 's had is lack't O Leave me not my head O stint the strife Canst pull my head off Canst see me so to flutter Bustle and struggle So labour for my life Do'st pleasure in my paine or hear'st me utter ' Blasphemous word yet with the tender Fowle Or quiet lambe I de faine retaine my soule My soule Thou art 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Psal 31.24 Hold fast and now I 'm ' ready die Canst see me gripe and graspe the cloathes my heart Not strength yet Canst heare me say I die I die griev'd nothing but with Thee to part Deare friend dear'st husband and yet thou my death What shall our children doe too O give breath Breath still blest spirit and while I am alive I le have a care to see thy graces thrive VVHat sweet repasts when God and hunger meet And stay the hungry soule whose hunger's sweet How sweet the draughts when God and thirstings meet And stay not quench their thirsts whose thirst's so sweet I here 's the soule shall eate drinke once for all When want of praise no more for prayer shall Oh cu'd I praise what need I pray But I shall praise shall praise for aye That 's m' onely worke both here and there What is no praise can be no prayer I 'M dull I 'm dull with this my clod O breath these earth-rejecting veines and make Them full with praise of purer worth I 'm full I 'm full of Thee my God O breath my blessing-turgent veines and make Them run them spring Thy prayses forth Winde up my soule to those Seraphique straines Wherewith that noble Quire entertaines Their farre-above all praise-exalted Maker That joyes in this that thou art his partaker Whose joy 's his glory glory will will thine Thine his will-pleased joy his glory thine Who onely happy will not happy be Unlesse thee as himselfe hee happy see I tremble and this shaking gives a grace Unto my singing voice VVhat This my place I tremble and this shaking opes my pores And thrusts my sluggish humors out of doores I tremble and this shaking makes me catch My God more fast in h's faster foulds doth catch I tremble and this shaking cleares my wings Rouses my spirits up the speedier brings To sit among the gods t' exalt the name That deignes to Christian creatures by the same To sit among the gods to give receive Eternall blessings thus to interweave My joy inseparably with his glory Be all my pleasures hushed with this story Admire Let this still musicke still my griefe Till sence supply what 's wanting in beleefe For carnall sence is not so farre below My faith but spirituall may overflow To powre out mutuall blessings and to be Most blessed by my blessing so to see It is more blest to give then to receive Honor'd by him all honour with him leave To power out mutuall blessings whilst I lie Drown'd in the fountaine where no sooner I Cry blessed but my blessing strait redounds With millions to my brest and heaven resounds With Echoed praises of those beautious creatures Are all in love with one anothers features Spirits spiritualiz'd rarifide to such Sublim'd simplicitie there 's not so much As th' smallest specke of dust the Atom'st moate With 'ts interpos'd obscurity to floate Betwixt their light and beautie God and them Their every-way-surrounding glorious stem I tremble and this shaking gives a grace Unto my singing voyce is this my place I heare eternitie speake and say I love Thee as my selfe whom no affections move I 'le be thy crowne of everlasting glory While thou sha't banquet on the endlesse story Of all my councells and survey the depths Highth breadths lengths of my er'st-untracted steps While thou sha't heare my thwarting feet agree I' th' perfect'st set o' th' pleasant'st melodie While still perfused i' the richest savours Th' art fed with kisses e're refreshing favours Still lost in admiration of thy blisse Thou't finde so blessed ' cause s'admir'd it is Well if the master of the feast shall say Friend sit up here shall I dare disobey God knowes no compl'ments hee 's sinceritie A word 's enough where all 's realitie Mount mount my soule and keepe upon the winge Jehovah see and Hallelujah sing O How my soule 's inheaven'd in the sound That descants on so beautifull a ground See eye love heart sing glory and all accord To make my life the musicke of my Lord. Rejoyce my spirits and all my thoughts within Ride triumph with the speedie Cherubim While death and hell attend my conquering Carre Whose glory duskes the brightest glizning Starre The brightest Sun in all his Summers pride 'S a cloud of darkenesse when together ey'd Thankes thankes my soule for when my soule sings thanks Then onely then my joy 'ore flowes its bankes Praise praise my spirit for while my spirit sings praise Then onely then I weare the crowning bayes Blesse blesse my heart for when my heart sings blesse Then onely then my heart feeles blessednesse Heart soule spirit spirit heart soule zeale fire Breake breath burne blaze and in his brest expire Earth hold me not O pinnion me no more When shall I be whence I shall be no more Still hold me earth for heaven wu'd be no heaven Shu'd not my will keepe time and fall in eaven With his O could I blesse thee here here were My heaven but want both heart and art how ere Can 't hold while some want matter for their words I words f'r Immatteriatnesse yet like the tender Birds That in the silent shadow sit forlorne Bill dresse their feathers by the dawning morne Stand perking pearing in the blooming Sunne And teach their light-delighted tongues to run Their chirping welcomes to its glorious raies So doe I strive to chatter forth Thy praise Praise praise him soule I le never cease to praise And when I cry I le cry I cannot praise Why sorry but for sinne t is folly why For sinne but that unthankfull praiselesse I Praise my petitions praise him my confessions Praise deprecations praise him intercessions And if my tongue cease praise in griefes and feares I le make my tongue recant in praysing teares In every thing give thankes for 't is his will That gives me cause to sing 't is well 't is ill O praise praise praise let me no longer live Then doe my masters businesse prayses give Nay life is praise for then I truly live When joy then truly joy when praises give The life is best 's most like the life above Hence I so much Psalme-singing tempers love The man is best comes nearest to
my brest Thence Councells furnish take thee to my rest Thou jealous of mine honour did Thy thoughts Run on my beauties day and night that nought Cud please thee else thy feet i' th' pleasant wayes Of my commands did'st count them so How sayes saith Thy heart and they is this thy holy faith Cleane feare God ' ndwelling love Now now what saith Thy conscience Did thy heart er'e feele a dagger yet Survive the thorough-strucken wound and yet Thy-heart-still-killing smart survive the hope Of Cure this daggers it kills heart and hope With minute mortall stabbes of quicke dispaire Myriads of endlesse living dyings are I tell thee man Th' art not a man or art a Puritan A beast a dog a hog a what-he-will Whose Jesu-countermands thy lustes fulfill I tell thee man Thou art a Devill or a Puritan There are but two unelimentary spirits Good bad God the divill and justly he demerits T' be counted th'latter who 'l not be the first Who scoffes at th' blessed spirit to be th' accurs'd Bad in th' extreame who wu'd be i' th' meane Of absolute good who wu'd no nearer come To God then needs t' be cast i' th' farthest roome Of utmost darkenesse there to learne too late Th' remotest distance of the middle state Of wilfull neutralists a semblance make Of friends to heaven when Tophets part they take HOw now mad sparke what pride thee in thy wit When pride 's the Principle follie and what is it What is thy wit when it is at the best And worth the name but judgement neately drest The wit that 's made the judgements recreation This play the ground while that the variation That made the sauce unto a weaker braine That else wu'd of the stronger meate complaine And what is judgement but a childish thought When to the full'st maturitie 't is brought What all our parts but parts and those received And in a moment may be quite bereav'd The best are bad for else they never cu'd Be tane away but are th' parts of that good That onely good compleate then not our owne So then who hath th' great'st the best hath none But what in Him but what in Him we see We see 't we feel 't in humbling humilitie VVEll say thou saydst thou thought'st 't were somewhat well Why not confesse his gratious gifts as free As of th' ungracious retributions tell By that that humbly thankefull thou mayst be By this thankfully humble be sincere Nor shame nor praises need'st thou then so feare I Have sat downe and councell held I cannot fight I cannot build And yet I can't but fight and build The warre the building 's great Great wants do threate My strength my stocke is small Is none at all What shall I doe I le doe thy word A Toole in this that hand a sword My Christ will helpe and wealth afford My strength my stock 's not small For they are all The building warre shall thrive While hee 's alive Here then I le minutely repaire Nay hence not budge a foot my care ' Sonl ' he who ' h's life so freely'd spare Me and I not fetch 't but spare Such gainefull care Such life such strength whereby 'T is I am I Ungratefull sloath had rather fall and die Then stretch his bosom'd hand to ' th' life so nie THe world 's uncertaine and my knowledge too But I desire to be certified Of nothing but Christ and him crucisied Christ from this head all goods all grace convay And on him crucified all ills sinnes lay So see my all while see my Christ My evills on my goods in Christ So has my foote a sure place Nor will I longer wandring trace The world to finde a setling stay For I have one and that 's my way VVArre peace life death A harbour and a shelfe The death of death The Image of himselfe Th' omnipotent Prophet and the Priestly King That Learnt Obedience by his Suffering A sacrificing sacrifice Simplicitie Lodg'd in a house of clay Omnipotencie Sensible of humane frailties The Lord of life Slaine The God of glory undergoing the strife Of vilifying tongues The administrator Of heaven and earth administred to th' Creator Poore reliev'd by th' Creature Aeternall happinesse Afflicted stupendious godlinesse Great mistery and they that thinke it small As doe all worldlings they know nought of all God manifest i' th' flesh heaven dwell in earth Descend in hell O how divine's my mirth When I can in my flesh my earth my hell See Him See in my flesh my earth my hell This spirit this heaven O spiritualize me more Him more t' approve whom Angels so explore Adore A God poore heathen gospells th' God to whom The sensuall sense-refined world doth come Drawne by beleeving hearts Unbonnded glory Caught up to glory what created oratory Can reach can teach these wonders so sublime Profound Th' celestiall theame of timelesse time How humble shu'd I be cu'd I still bow My selfe to pry into this mistery How Heighthned inlarg'd cu'd I still soare aloft In this so broad so long deep-heighth t' be taught Gen. 1.31 2 Cor. 3.18 THou Lord mad'st onely good my object be 'T is onely good then I shud see But I wu'd ill and ill now onely see 'T is onely sinne then I 'de not be But I 'd be Christ when shall I onely be T is onely God then I shall see Thou Lord madst onely good my object be 'T is only good then I shu'd see But I wud ill and ill now only see 'T is onely I then I 'd not be But I 'd be thee when shall I onely be 'T is onely thee then I shall see Thou' rt only good and I wu'd see All but as spots to draughts of Thee All but as spots to draughts of Thee Who art the only good I see The world 's the Image of thy Image word The mire sin that Satan blur'd Man with the stain straite through th'Creation crept But this untouch't him selfe hath kept And h's glorious-face-resplendent glasse hath left To daily dresse me quite bereft Of sight by that foule filth His Spirits breath Upon this Mirror quicks my death Struck-eyes And now since such a foulnesse in My fairest I see I 'le never lin To eye to pry to dresse redresse me by This God-conforming Theory VVHy shu'd I envie grace insult o're sinne Are not the Saints sins mine my graces theirs All sinn's in one in one all grace we in Them both he onely well himselfe compares Whose humble thankfull watchfull soule makes true One flesh one spirit one Adam old and new THou art Thou onely art Man 's but a But An adj'ctive accident a what-Thou-wut Thou art art onely excellent to be 'T is that 't is that 's the onely excellencie Bee 't all my businesse t' get more Thee That being more Thee I may more be More be in more to be To Thee PAsse world along with all thy pompous traine Goe ruffling in thy pride thy richest
rid Of halfe my selfe stand's in'ts owne light but bid Thou dost my stay and I 'le obey Till thou sha't call who art my all VVhose will 's my heaven My owne the leaven Sowes all my sweete thine sweets my sowre Makes me unwish my still-wish't houre COme flying on thy spicie mountaines on Thy saving hills and so convey along Those opening odours kindely work upon M' obstructed soule unlocke it from among These streights and let my spirits out of prison To praise thy name among thy second risen These meditations prayers thankes confessions Thus peec'd patcht interrupt when shall they end In endlesse praise what now by darke expressions These volumes of thy word and workes commend Me leafe by leafe b' one cleare intire view May the Synopsis of thy Face me shew Now see I one in all then all in one So may I see what is not all is none SIR No longer after my long Vacation in my travells to frustrate you of your desire though of force I must of the thing desired FEare I conceive may not unfitly be distinguished into a feare of aversion and a feare of adhesion of turning from and cleaving to and this may well be stupendious astonishing overcomming in respect of the immensitie of the goodnesse of its object such a feare as may be sayd to fall upon the soule and make the soule fall under it in a sweet God-injoying submissive humilitle Such a feare as one may be sayd to be In the seare of the Lord to be plunged in swallowed up of those great and glorious apprehensions This being both the effect and the cause of uniting the heart to God And hence is it a feare of such great joy and strong confidence The soule thus brought into God by love that is stronger then death and faith that interested in the power wisedome goodnesse of God can doe all things by this so neare approach to and communion with him discovering more of his fulnesse and in that of the creatures vanitie And hence are they so inseperably linckt together men of courage-fearing God-hating covetousnesse fearing the Lord-and Delighting Greatly in his Commandements It is rashnesse and madnesse that proceeds not from this feare it is basenesse and pusillanimitie that ariseth not from this courage The joy is sadnesse that is not accompanied with this feare and griefe the more kindly it is the more it hath of this delight For that other of aversion whether respecting morall or naturall evills it is either a bare and simple or a mixt and applicative a eare a feare of contraction or of dilatation of the spirit a meere withdrawing and flight or an aggressive resistance and repulsion And either of them is convenient pro re nata as warranted by the consideration of the thing time place person c. For morrall evills it is a feare of absolute resistance because they never consist with the will of God quoad nos for naturall it is a respective resistance and flying so farre as they shall appeare to be his will or not as we are called or not called to them So that there may be a feare of these evils well consisting with a willingnesse too and desire of them as it is said of Christ hee was heard in all that hee feared and yet againe I come to doe thy will as it is written of mee a body hast thou prepared me c. The spirit may be willing when the flesh is weake There may be and that lawfully an abhorrencie from evill as evill and yet a will ingnesse to it as the will of God and therefore good Father let this cup passe from me if possible but not my will but thy will be done The prayer of him who himselfe alone in his owne person so freely drunke up that so unimaginably terrible cup of the Aeternall wrath that shu'd have beene the portion of an everliving death to so many millions of soules And certainly could all the calamities of the world that were ever are or ever shall be suffered from Adam to the youngest of his sonnes steeped like so much Gall and Wormewood in one cup till all their ill-savoured tast were extracted from them they could never make a draught so intensively bitter so large a draught of bitternesse as that which was presented to him accepted of him pray'd for by him To which he comes brings his body as a Voluntier as ready as prepared for The Service The Suffering So in deede should this feare of aversion be subordinate to fall in with and be comprehended in as part of as comming from and tending to that of adhesion I therefore turning from evills because pro sua virili of their owne nature it would turne me from God but such being the never never sufficiently admired power wisedome and goodnesse of God that he can turne even the greatest evill to the greatest good the soule stands in aequilibrio with a kind of willing unwillingnesse or willing willingnesse disposed to it So as it may be said not to feare them but God fearing them because of him and him in by and through them as it may be said to love not the creature but God they being but as foyles and set offs for the further illustrating the otherwise not so apprehensible Glory So make the soule cleave the closer to him and gather more strength from him So these feares differing not in their being and nature but in the manner of action both being the feare of God now acting ad intra now ad extra now making good its primary object now evill its secondary Christ upon whom were the chastisements of our peace whose stripes hath purchast us the spirit of a sound and healthy mind who was troubled for our ease and tranquilitie that wee in him possessed of his fathers alsufficiencie might be of an untroubled mind having thus like that unparellel'd Queene to her impoysoned husband suckt out the venome virulencie and malignitie of our feares that naturally fill us with disturbance distractions evill-creating and evill-nourishing conceits over studious and over burdening preventions Their deadly qualitie and over-mastering power thus drawne away and onely so much left as is within the strength of inherent and continually supervenient grace and may by it be kept at an under subdued and worke't out daily to the further manifesting the power of God in us and by us as well as upon us The more then we prevaile against this distempering feare the more is our convalescencie the greater our recovery of that happy harmony that was betweene our affections before they were untuned in their fall Every affection being so farre good as it holds its correspondency with the other and all as they tend to their perfection action Good is the griefe the feare that after helpes A wary circumspective deliberating confultive prudentiall providentiall feare And to this purpose was it an answer well worthy its Author that Turkish Terrour that even-incredibly valiant Scanderbeg to the precipitate
what they are like to finde he can make Musick of all things As well of the most harsh hidious terrours as the softest and sweetest sounding melodie can as well play with the most froward and wrastling so the word Psal 18. as the most pure-and peaceable disposition As being he who knowes how to be in perills often in wearinesse in painefulnesse in watchings often in hunger and thirst in fastings often in cold and nakednes besides his continuall sympathizing with the Churches knowes how to run through good report bad report how to abound and how to want and how in all to be content a most blessed concord in the spirituall eare the spirituall heart That can take joyfully the spoyling of his goods receive any word any precept of God as pure-holy-good-and-just and set about the actively passive obedience of it in much affliction with joy of the Holy Ghost Happy afflictions that helpe to such an holy joy O! where but I forbeare And if he griefe it is at the want of this cheerefull and thankefull deportment of himselfe And this is a higth that wee are carryed up to in the New Adam beyond the reach of the Old even in his innocencie Hee being altogether free from these evills and therefore nothing acquaint with these evill-conquering comforts The Almightie wisedome to the more eminently advanceing of his glorious Grace having thus wonderfully by our fall raised us up to an higher to a permanenter to an ever-highly-permanent Station Strike up then your allarum when you will you shall never carry him by force but shall but rowse up more spirits to man him repell you As hee is of a harsh rugged rough-hewne proud-cruell that is not alleviated with a sweet milde smooth temprature so is it an effeminated flaccid torpid dispirited enervated soule that is not quickned not inlivened with courage That alone being hydropicall this feaverish That too dull for action this is too quicke for councell for patience for endurance But both happily met together in one in a wise understanding actuating spirit like the naturall heate kindly fomented by the radicall moisture and duly agitated by the influent and insite spirits keepe the soule in a happy and healthy constitution because in an apt and proxime power for the well performance of its severall functions Hence may be it those Grecian Captaines were so well seene in Musicke as in feates of Armes and Philosophie as that brave-spirited Epimanondas c. it being a usuall custome after their feasts to have a Lute presented them to play on And certainly he is a man of a choice and compleate temperature that is well made up of a Scholler Souldier and Musitian A head full of discreet and sage knowledge a heart full of couragious and meeke love a hand full of indefatigable and difficultie-overcomming action Such a head such a heart such a hand That make such a Man And yet what are all these and were there a thousand more such suches but meere counterfeit spiritlesse and dead resemblances of that true and living way to compleatenesse of heart 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because to him the true and living God the Creator the compleator of the heart There being nothing good nothing of worth but what is in God in whom as in Christ we are in these and all graces Compleat In that meeke and immaculate Lambe that dreadfull and terrible Lion of Judah that brazen Serpent in whom are hid all the treasures of wisedome and knowledge Thus made conformeable unto that All-sweet All-wise All-mightie Being the Maker the Perfection of all things By whom we are made perfect through our likenesse to him our living in him And here onely here is the rise of that true magnanimitie that consists in the uncontroulable power of a sweet and humble wisedome God And now since I have so insencibly slipt thus far into the nature of this grace we know not how soon the Lord may settle our distractions of State and Church and so prevent us with his mercies and fit us by them who will never be fitted for them and it being the Carracter of an ingenious child to feare favours and not to be affrighted with frownes I will a little draw it forth into that part of it which may be most sutable to those times It being the nature of it upon the knowledge of God to know nothing else great no more goods then evills And yet either so weake is our knowledge or so seldome our acting it which makes it for so farre no knowledge to us that in those Halcyon dayes have wee most neede of the highest resolves and Princeliest circumspection not to have our spirits debased in the knowledge of things after the flesh But now to have a speciall care of exercising that mysterious that inheavening art of making all things become new knowing affecting doing all things under new notions from new principles by new rules to new ends so using the World as not using it medling with it as in transitu by the way as a viaticum a baite when needs but what needs c. See Page 27. 'T is then 's the danger when the danger 's past Th' inward foe fights wilier when the outward's cast Tacticks unheard of covert stratagems Sly in his Methods suddenly he hems Us in with tempting troops while w' thought h 'had been Distant by many miles we 're rounded in A Maze of fatall friends straite rout our thoughts To a desbausch't confounded yeelding brought Stand sentinell soule unlesse thou standst Perdu Loosest thy life thou 't not the losse escue Capua Hannibali Cannae Fuit A rich and pleasant Asia is more dangerous then a barren and hungry America lue and tepid bathes then harsh storming windes these confirming those consuming the hardiest spirits not guarded with discretion Neither indeed is it a thing so worthy a Christian to seeke for an abiding Citie when this inferior is like to be fired about his eares To make friends of the unrighteous Mammon when it is ready to be snatcht from us to estrange our selves from these things when they turne their backe upon us But when the world shail comes with its Cornucopia of riches pleasures glory c. and would poure all upon our heads and God on the other hand readie to poure downe more aboundantly of that anointing that teacheth us all things that qualifieth us with more Kingly Propheticall Priestly endowments and fills us with joy and gladnesse above our fellewes now not to leave the substance for the shade the Pearle for the Barly-corne is somewhat like him that lives by faith and hath made a true discovery of that onely excellent object Now when the world comes fleering in all her whorish attire with the most cunning and sophisticall insinuations and our spirits are in the height of their jollitie ready to throw themselves into her imbraces when the outward and inward temptations thus powerfully met in their united strength now to