an universal hatred of known sin and an actual conquering of it so far as to live out of gross sin which some call mortal and to be weary of infirmities and to be truly desirous to be rid of all and to be willing to use Gods means against it Thus it is with the sincerely Religious but not with these hypocrites that deceive themselves Joh. 3. 19 20. Rom. 7. 24. Luk. 13. 3 5. Rom. 8. 1. to the 14. Gal. 6. 7 8. The hypocrite hath not only some particular sin which all his Religion makes him not willing to see to be a sin or to forsake but his very state is sinful in the main by the predominancy of a selfish carnal interest and principle And he is not willing of close plain dealing much less of the diligent use of means himself to overcome that sin because he loveth it 9. This Vain Religion is not accompanied with an unseigned Love to a life of holiness which every true believer hath delighting to meditate in the Law of God with a practical intention to obey it and delighting in the inward exercise of grace and outward ordinances as advantages hereunto desiring still more of the grace which he hath tasted and grieving that he knoweth and trusteth and loveth and feareth and obeyeth God so little and longing to reach higher to know and love and fear him more Psal 1. 2. and â—19 1 2 3 4 5 9 10 c. Heb. 12. 14. 2 Pet. 3. 11. Matth. 7. 13 14. But the self-deceiver either hath a secret dislike of this serious diligence for salvation and loving God with all the soul and might because he is conscious that he reacheth it not himself or at least he will not be brought to entertain any more then will stand with his carnal ends 10. A Vain Religion doth not so far reveal the excellency of Christs image in his servants as to cause an entire Love to them as such and to delight in them above the most splendid and accomplisht persons that are strangers to the life of grace and so far to love them as when Christ requireth it to part with our substance and hazard our selves for their relief Thus do the truly Religious Psal 16. 2. and 15. 4. 1 Joh. 3. 14. Matth. 10. 40. 11. 42. and 25. 34 35 40 42 45 46. But the hypocrice either secrâ—tly hateth a heavenly holy life and consequently the people that are such because they seem to condemn him by overgoing him and differing from him or at least he only superficially approveth of them but will forsake both Christ and them in tryal rather then forsake his earthen God I have now shewed you what the self-deceiver wants in which you may see sufficient reason why his Religion is but Vain II. WE are next to shew you How these Hypocrites do deceive themselves and wherein their self-deceit consisteth It may seem strange that a man of reason should do such a thing as this when we consider that truth is naturally the object of the understanding and that all men necessarily love themselves and therefore love what they know to be simply good for them How then can any man that hath the use of reason be willing to be deceived yea and be his own deceiver and that in matters of unspeakable consequence But it is not as falshood nor as deceit that they desire it but as it appeareth necessary to the carnal ease and pleasure which they desire The way by which they deceive their own hearts consisteth in these following degrees 1. The hypocrite resisteth the Spirit of grace and rejecteth the mercies offered in the Gospel and so by his refusal is deprived of a part in Christ and of the life of grace and the hopes of glory which were tendered to him 2. But withal he is willing of so much of this mercy as consisteth with his sinful disposition and carnal interest He is willing enough to be happy in general and to be saved from hell fire and to be pardoned and to have such a heaven as he hath framed a pleasing imagination of 3. And therefore he maketh him up a Religion of so much of Christianity as will stand with his Pleasures profits and reputation in the world that so he may not be left in despair of being saved when he must leave the world that he must loved The cheap and the easie parts of Christianity and those that are most in credit in the world and that flesh and blood have least against these he will cull out from among the rest and make him a Religion of passing by the dearer and more difficult and spiritual parts 4. Having gone thus far he perswadeth his own heart that this kind of Religion which he hath patcht up and framed to himself 〈…〉 Religion the Faith the Hope the Charity the Repentance the Obedience to which Salvation is promised And that he is a true Christian notwithstanding his defects and that his spots are but such as are consistent with grace and that his sins are but pardoned infirmities and that he hath part in Christ and the promises of life and shall be saved though he be not of the preciser strain When he committeth any sin he confidently imagineth that his confession and his wishing it were undone again when he hath had all the pâ—easure that sin can give him is true repentance and that as a penitent he shall be forgiven And thus while he thinketh himself something when he is nothing he deceiveth himself Gal. 6. 3. He hath a counterfeit of every grace of God A counterfeit Faith and Hope and Love and Repentance and Zeal and Humility and Patience and Perseverance and these he will needs take to be the very life and image of Christ and the graces themselves that accompany salvation 5. Having got this Carkass of Religion without the soul he makes use of all those things to confirm him in his deceit which are appointed to confirm true Christians in their Faith and Hope When he reads or thinks of the infinite Goodness Love and Mercy of God he thinks God could not be so good and merciful if he should refuse to save all such as he When he readeth of the undertaking and sacrifice of Christ and how he is a propitiation for the sins of the whole world he confidently hence concludeth that a Saviour so gracious that hath done and suffered so much for sinners cannot condemn all such as he When he readeth of the extent and freeness of Grace in the promises of the Gospel he concludeth that these promises belong to him and that Grace could not be so free and so extensive if it did shut out all such as he When he observeth the Mercies of God upon his body in his friends and health and credit and prosperity he concludeth that surely God loveth him as a child in that he dealeth so Fatherly with him If he suffer adversity he thinks that it is the Fatherly chastisement of
and therefore he will take as much of them as he can and dare But Religion is but his Physick and therefore he will take it as little and seldom as he dare Had he but seen the face of God by faith and had he but the heart of a true believer that is suited by holyness to the holy works that God commandeth as the heart of a true friend is suited to the will of him whom he loveth he would then be no longer Religious against his will and consequently in Vain but he would think the most pure and heavenly mind and life and the highest degree of love and holiness to be the best and most desirable state for his soul as every true believer doth Had this Hypocrite any true love to God as he deceitfully pretends to have he would love his Image and Word and wayes and then he would love best that kernel and marrow of Religion that life and soul of worship and obedience which now he savoureth not but shiftethâ—off as a needless or tedious or unattainable thing The nature and use of these Hypocrites Religion is to save them from Religion They carry an empty guilded scabberd accusing the sword of a dangerous keenness as a thing more perillous then necessary to their use When they seem most zealous they are but serving God that they may be excused from serving him and they worship him of purpose to shift off his worship They offer him the lips that the heart may be excused and complement him with cap and knee that they may excuse themselves from real holiness They offer him the empty purse for payment and tender him a sacrifice of husks and shells and lifeless carkasses They will abound in the shadow and ceremony that they may be excused from the spiritual life and substance Alas that dead hearted hypocrite that sits there and heareth all this is so great a stranger to the opening of the heart and the deep entertainment of saving truth and to the savoury relish of the searching healing quickening passages of holy doctrine and to the thankfull wellcoming of an offered Christ and to the lookings and longings of the soul after God and to the serious desires and hopes and labours of a gracious soul for life eternal that he is idle asleep and dead as to all this spiritual work and if he had not some customary service to perform and some ceremonies or external task to do and some bodily worship to be employed in he would find little or nothing to do in the Assemblies but might sit here as a bruit or as one of a strange language that comes but to see and to be seen And therefore if there be not somewhat more suitable to him then power and spirituality it seemeth as no worship to the formal hypocrite It is the pretty jingles and knacks of wit and the merry jears at the preciser sort or some scraps of Greek and Latin Authors or shreds of Fathers or Philosophy or at best an accurate well set speech that makes the Sermon good and acceptable to this hypocrites ears It is not spirit and life within him that brought him hither nor is it spirit and life that he savoureth and that he came for And therefore it is that this sort of hypocrites are usually most impatient of a misplaced word or of a worship performed in the primitive simplicity If a man deliver the Lords Supper but as Christ did and receive it but as the Apostles did or serve God but as the Churches in their dayes he will seem unreverent and slovenly and sordid to these self-deceiving Formalists They are set upon excess of ceremonies because they are defective in the vital parts and should have no Religion if they had not this All sober Christians are friends to outward decency and order But it s the empty self-deceiver that is most for the unwarrantable inventions of men and sticketh in the bark of Gods own Ordinances that taketh the garments for the man and useth the worship of God but as a Masque or Poppet play where there 's great doings with little life and to little purpose The chastest woman will wash her face but it s the harlot or wanton or deformed that will paint it The soberest and the comelyest will avoid a nasty or ridiculous habit which may make them seem uncomely when they are not But a curious dress and excessive care doth signifie a crooked or deformed body or a filthy skin or which is worse an empty soul that hath need of such a covering Consciousness of such greater want doth cause them to seek these poor supplies The gawdiness of mens Religion is not the best sign that it is sincere Simplicity is the ordinary attendant of sincerity It hath long been a proverb The more ceremony the less substance and the more complement the more craft And yet if it were only for want of inward true Religion that the hypocrite setteth up his shews it were bad enough but not so bad as with most of them or all it is For it is an enmity to Religion that accompanyeth their Religion As in lapsed man the body that was before the souls obedient attendant is become its Master and the enemy of its perfection and felicity so in the carnal Religion of the Hypocrite the outside which should be the ornament and attendant of the inward spiritual part hath got the Mastery and is used in an enmity against the more noble part which it should serve and much more are his humane inventions and mixtures thus destructively imployed His bellows do but blow out the candle under pretence of kindling the fire He sets the body against the soul and sometime the cloathing against both He useth forms to the destruction of knowledge and quenching of all seriousness and fervour of affection By Preaching he destroyeth Preaching and prayeth till prayer is become no prayer but the image or carkass of prayer at the best And useth his words to the destruction of the due Principle sense and ends Having still his carnal self for his end he preacheth and prayeth and serveth God in a manner that seems most suitable to his end so that it is not Gods means that he useth when he useth them but his own Nor doth he indeed worship God while he seems to worship him nor is indeed Religious but seems Religious It is materially perhaps Gods work that he doth and his means that he useth but Formally they are his own and not Gods at all when we meet with abundance of our people that are most nimble in their accustomed forms that know not what Religion or Christianity is nor who Christ is nor almost any of the substance of the Gospel it assures us that its easie to be Infidels with Christian expressions in their mouths and that its easier to teach a Parret to speak then to be a man As their bodies are but the prisons or dungeons of their souls so their formal words and
think you will not If you are such as you profess you are all Saints and shall be saved If any of your be not such they can be nothing else but Hypocrites Seeing therefore that you are all either Saints or Hypocrites come now to the bar and refuse not a tryal that may prevent the errors of another kind of tryal that you cannot refuse And here let me set before you your Profession and then try your selves Whether you are such as you profess your selves to be or not And I think I may take it for granted that the Articles of the Creed and the Bâ—ptismal Covenant is the least that every one of you do profess and that the desires implyed in the Petitions of the Lords Prayer you all profess to be your own desires and that you take the 〈◊〉 Commandâ—ments for part of the rule of your obedience Let us peruse them briefly in the several parts 1. Do you not all say that you Believe in God the Father Almighty Maker of Heaven and earth and that you will have no other gods but him and are you not accordingly engaged in Covenant with him you will not deny it And what is the meaning of this much of your profession It is no less then to take God for the only infinite good to be loved with the chiefest love and to take him for your absolute Lord and Governour the Owner of you and all you have to whom you owe universal absolute obedience and that you are truly willing to love him above all and fear him and trust him and obey him accordingly though your flesh and all the world should be against it He that meaneth not all this doth dissemble or lye when he saith he taketh God to be his God For to be God is to be this much to us And really is it thus with you as you profess speak but as men that dare not lye before the Lord that knows your hearts Do you indeed Love God as God with your superlative love Are your hearts set upon him Do you make it your principal care to please him Is it your delight to do his will Is it sweeter to you to think and speak of him then of the world Doth it grieve you most to offend him In a word you are not such strangers to Nature but you know what love is And you are not such strangers to your own hearts but you know what it is to love your pleasure your profit your honour and your friend can conscience say before the Lord that you love him better then all these if not more passionately yet more deeply effectually and resolvedly with a love that will cause you to deny and part with all for him If you thus truly love him as God and above all how comes it to pass that you seek the world more carefully and eagerly then him and that you are more pleased with worldly thoughts and speeches and employments then with divine were not the Hypocrite justly blinded and a willfull stranger to himself he could not but know that he loveth not God as God and above all And to love him in subordination to your flesh and its contents is not at all to love him as God As it is no degree of conjugal love to love a wife but as a servant nor no degree of the love due to your Soveraign to love him as an equal or as a slave And if really you take God for your absolute Lord and Governour why is it then that you take no pleasure in his Laws but count them too strict and had rather be at your own dispose why is it that you obey your fleshly desires before and against the God whom you acknowledge why will you not be perswaded to that holiness justice and charity which you know his Law commandeth you why do you willfully continue in those sins which conscience tells you God forbids will you live in willfull disobedience and love your sins and loath your duty and obstinately continue thus and yet profess that you take God for your God and consequently for your Lord and Governour and yet will you not confess that you are dissembling Hypocrites 2. Do you not all profess that you believe in Jesus Christ and have you not in Covenant taken him for your Saviour and Lord And do you so indeed or do you not play the Hypocrites If you believe in Christ and take him for your Saviour you then take your sins for the disease and misery of your souls and you are so grieved for them and weary of them and humbled in the apprehension of your lost estate that you fly to Christ as your only refuge from the wrath and curse of the offended Majesty and value his justifying and healing grace before all the riches of the world and you are willing to take his bitterest medicines and use the means appointed by him for the destruction of your sin and the perfecting of his graces And is it thus with you that have unhumbled hearts that never felt the need of Christ as condemned miserable men must do and that love the sin that he would cure and are unwilling to be mortified and sanctified by his grace Unless a carkass be a man such Hypocrites as these are no true Christians and have but a seeing self-deceiving faith 3. Do you not all profess to believe in the Holy Ghost and are you not engaged to him in Covenant as your Sanctifier And do you not grosly play the Hypocrites here If not how comes it to pass that you stick in your natural state as if you had no need of sanctification and live as quietly without any acquaintance with true Regeneration and the Spirit to dwell and rule within you as it you needed no such change Or else that you take up with a Formal an affected or a forced kind of Religion in stead of Sanctification and spiritual devotion And how comes it to pass that you distaste the highest degrees of holiness and that you will not be brought to the mortification self-denyal and unreserved obedience which are the essence of sanctification As for the more deboist prophane sort of Hypocrites that make a common mock of godliness and scorn at the very name of Holiness and Sanctification and deride at all that pretend to have the Spirit I had rather tremble at the thought of their misery then now stand to reprove that notorious hypocrisie which professeth to believe in the Holy Spirit which they deride and Covenanteth with the Sanctifier while they hate and mock or at least do obstinately refuse sanctification When God himself tells us Rom. 8. 9. That if any man have not the Spirit of Christ the same is none of his And therefore to deride a man for professing that he hath the Spirit is to deride him for professing to be a Christian 4. Do you not all profess to Believe the Holy Catholick Church that is that Christ hath a people dispersed through the
in subtilty of argument but you could say that against the necessary means of your own salvation that none can answer when you die by your wisdom and have disputed your selves out of the reach of mercy will you not bewail it then as folly Is he wiser that being hungry eats his meat or he that gives such reasons for his refusing it and pleadeth so learnedly against eating and drinking that none can answer him Is the condemned man wiser that makes friends for a pardon or he that with unanswerable subtilty reasoneth against it till the ladder be turned such is your vain and seeming wisdom You are not wise enough to be cured but to give reasons why you should continue sick In the issue it will prove that you were not wise enough to be saved but notably wise to resist salvation and plead your selves into hell 2. You pretend that you have a saving faith when your hearts refuse that salvation from sin and that rule of Christ which is the object of faith and when you will not believe the doctrines precepts or threatnings that cross your own conceits and when your belief of heaven will not carry your hearts from earth nor work you to a holy heavenly life 3. You pretend to Repentance as I said before while you hold fast the sin and give not up your selves to God when as if your neighbour or Master or Husband should but beat one of you and tell you when he hath done that he repenteth and do this as oft as you commit your willful sins and say you repent I am confident you would not take it for true repentance You repent but will not confess when it is to your disgrace as long as you can hide your sin You repent but will not make restitution or reparation of injuries to your power You repent but your heart riseth against him that reproveth you You repent but you had rather keep your sins then leave them What 's this but to deceive your own hearts and to mock your selves with a seeming vain and mock-repentance 4. You pretend to love God above all as was before said when you love not his Image waies or communion but love that which he hateth and still prefer the world before him 5. You pretend that you have true desires to be godly and what God would have you be But they are such desires as the sluggard hath to rise and as the slothful hath to work that is if it could be done with ease and without labour you lie still and use not the means with diligence for all your desires When you can fit and have your work done with wishes and your families maintained and your necessities all supplied with wishes you may think to come to heaven with wishes The good desires that the poor may be warmed and cloathed that James speaks of Jam. 2. 15. did neither relieve the poor nor save the wisher The desire of the slothful killeth him because his hands refuse to labour Prov. 21. 15. Up and be doing according to thy desires or else confess that thy wishes are hypocritical and that thou deceivest thy own heart by Vain desires 6. You also pretend to be sincere worshippers of God You pray and you read the Scripture and good books and you hear the Word and receive the Lords Supper But I have before shewed you your hypocrisie in these you pray against the sin that you love and would not leave you pray for holiness when you hate it or desire it not in any degree to cross your flesh you serve God with meer words whether of your own conceiving or of others prescribing with some forced acknowledgement of that God that hath not your hearts or lives Let Christ pass the sentence on you and not I Matth. 15. 7 8 9. Ye hypocrites well did Esaias Prophesie of you saying This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth and honoureth me with their lips but their heart is far from me But in vain they do worship me teaching for doctrines the commandements of men You like that teaching that sooths you in your own opinions and galleth not your consciences in the guilty place A Ministry you would have that should stand like an adorned Idol that hurts no body and toucheth not your sores or that is but instead of a pair of Organs or a tinckling Cymbal to tickle your fancy and make Church-worship to be as a kind of religious stage-play to you But a true Minister of Christ to open to you the doctrine of the Kingdom and roundly to awake you from security in sin and to call you up to the most serious holy heavenly life and follow you and let you take no rest till you yeild and practise it and to call you to open confession of your open scandalous sins that you may make such reparation to the wronged honour of God and souls of men as you are capable of and accordingly to absolve you or to bind you over to answer it at the bar of God and charge the Church to avoid communion with you if you are impenitent and incorrigible such a Ministry as this which is the Ministry of Christs appointment you abhor at least when they come to touch your sores Then you are too proud to be taught and ruled by such as these though you hypocritically profess to be ruled by Christ who ruleth his Church by his Spirit Word and Ministers conjunct Then you say who gave you authority to do thus and thus by me As if you knew not that Christ in Scripture hath described confirmed and limited the Ministerial office Like condemned Traytors that should say to him that â—â—â—ngeth them a pardon Who 〈◊〉 you authority to make so 〈…〉 me or like a man that hath the plague or leprosie that asketh the Physician Who gave you authority to tell me that I am sick and put me on such medicines as these or as the Israelite to Moses Exod. 2. 14. Who made thee a Prince and a Judge over us not understanding that God by his hand would deliver them saith Stephen Act. 7. 25. Or as the Jews to Christ when he was teaching men the way to heaven Matth. 21. 23. By what authority dost thou these things and who gave thee this authority so because you hate the way of your recovery you will not be saved without authority nor be satisfied of their authority that would save you but are like a beggar that should proudly refuse a piece of gold and ask By what authority do you give it me A Ministry that agreeth with Gods dâ—scription you cannot abide Act. 20. 〈…〉 36. Heb. 13. 7 17. 1 Cor. 4. 〈◊〉 1 Thes 5. 12 13. 1 Tim. 5â— 17. 20. and 2 Tim. 4. 1. So that indeed it is but a mock-minister a mock-sacrament a mock-prayer and so a seeming vain Religion which you desire 7. Lastly you pretend also to sincere obedience If we ask you whether you are willing to obey God you will
by his own iniquities crying out Unclean and loathing himself for all his abominations weary of his sin and heavy-laden as all must be that are fit for Christ Read Isa 57. 15. 66. 2. Psal 51. 17. 34. 18. Lev. 13. 44 45. Ezek. 36. 31. 20. 43. 6. 9. Matth. 11. 28. Rom. 7. 24. 4. This mans Religion must needs be Vain for he wanteth the life of faith it self and heartily believeth not in Christ He hath but an opinion of the truth of Christianity through the advantage of his education and company and thereupon doth call himself a Christian and heartlesly talk of the mysterie of Redemption as a common thing But he doth not with an humbled broken heart betake himself to Christ as his only refuge from the wrath of God and everlasting misery as he would lay hold on the hand of his friend if he were drowning The sense of the odiousness of sin and of the damnation threatned by the righteous God hath not yet taught him to value Christ as he must be valued by such as will be saved by him These hypocrites do but talk of Christ and turn his name as they do their prayers into the matter of a dry and customary form They flie not to him as the only Physician of their souls in the feeling of their festring wounds they cry not to him as the Disciples in the tempest Save Master we perish They value him not practically though notionally they do as the pearl for which they must sell all Matth. 13. 44 45 46. Christ doth not dwell in his heart by faith nor doth he long with all the Saints to comprehend what is the breadth and length and depth and height and to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge Eph. 3. 17 18 19. He counteth not all things loss for Christ and the excellency of his knowledge nor doth he count them as dung that he may win Christ and be found in him not having his own righteousness but that which is through the faith of Christ Phil. 3. 8 9 10. nor can he truly say that he desireth to know nothing but a crucified Christ 1 Cor. 2. 2. and that the life that he now liveth in the flesh he liveth by the faith of the Son of God that loved him and gave himself for him Gal. 2. 20. He is not taken up with that admiration of the love of God in Christ as beseems a soul that is saved by him from the flames of hell and that is reconciled to God and made an heir of life everlasting He hath not understandingly deliberately seriously and unreservedly given up himself and all that he hath to Christ and thankfully accepted Christ and life as given on the Gospel terms to him This living effectual faith is wanting to the Hypocrite whose Religion is Vain 5. This Vain Religion doth never practically shew the soul the amiableness and attractive goodness of God so far as to win the heart to a practical estimation of him and adhering to him above all nor so far as to advance him above all the creatures in the practical judgement will and conversation nor doth it cause the soul to take him for its portion and prefer his savour before all the world and devote it self and all unto his interest and will and give him the superlative and soveraign honour both in heart and life Psal 63. 3. and 30. 5. and 4. 6 7. and 16. 5. and 17. 14. Mat. 10. 37. 6. This Vain Religion is alwayes without that serious belief of the life to come which causeth the soul to take it for its happiness and treasure and there to set its desires and its hopes and to make it his principal care and business to attain it and to make all the pleasures and profits and honours of the world to stoop to it as preferring it before them all Matth. 6. 20 21. and ver 33. Luk. 18. 22 23. and 14 33. Col. 3. 1 2 3 4 5. Phil. 3. 18 19 20. The Hypocrite taketh heaven but for a reserve and as a lesser evil then hell and seeks it but in the second place while his fleshly pleasures and interest have the preheminence and God hath no more but the leavings of the world and he serveth him but with so much as his flesh can spare 7. This Vain Religion consisteth principally in external observances If he be a Formalist that hath it his Religion lyeth in his beads and prayer books in going so oft to Church and keeping holy dayes and fasting dayes and saying over such and such words and using such and such gestures and ceremonies and submitting to Church orders and crying down Sectaries and preciseness and jearing at the simplicity of plain hearted Christians that never learnt the art of dissimulation Their Religion is but a pack of Complements a flattering of God as if they would mock him with cap an knee who will not be mocked Gal. 6. 7. while they draw near him with their lips their hearts are far from him Mat. 15. 7 8 9. They wash the outside and pay tithe of all and give some almes and forbear disgraceful sins which would make them be esteemed ungodly among men Mat. 15. 2 3. Mar. 7. 4 8. Matth. 23. 25 26 c. Mat. 6. 1 4 6. c Isa 1. 11 12 13 14. Isa 58. 1 2. But these self-deceivers are strangers to the inward spiritual work of holiness Their hearts are not busie in the worship of God by fervent desire and exercise of other graces while their tongues are put into an artificial pace and they are acting the part of men that seem to be Religious If they be cast into the Sectarian mold they place their Religion in the strictness of their Principles and Parties and in contending for them and in their affected fervour and ability to speak and pray ex tempore But the humble holy inward workings of the soul toward God and its breathings after him and the watch that it sets over the heart this hypocrite is much a stranger to If he be brought up among the Orthodox in well ordered Churches he placeth his Religion in the holding of the truth and taking the right side and submitting to right order and using Gods ordinances but the most of an upright mans employment is at home within him to order his soul and exercise grace and keep down sin and keep out the world and keep under the flesh and carnal self and do the inward part of duty And he is as truly solicitous about this as about the outward works and contenteth not himself to have said his prayers unless indeed his heart have prayed nor to have heard unless he have profited or heard with obediential attention And he makes conscience of secret duties as well as of those that are done in the sight of men But this the hypocrite comes not up to to trade in the internal spiritual part 8. The Religion that is Vain is without
say God forbid that any should deny it But when it comes to the particulars and you find that he commandeth you that which flesh and blood is against and would cost you the loss of worldly prosperity then you will be excused and yet that you may cheat your souls you will not professedly disobey but you will perswade your selves that it is no duty and that God would not have you do that which you will not do Like a Countrymans servant that promiseth to do all that his Master bids him but when he cometh to particulars threshing is too hard a work and mowing and reaping are beyond his strength and plowing is too toylsome and in the conclusion it is only an idle life with some easie charres that he will be brought to This is the Hypocrites obedience He will obey God in all things as far as he is able in the general But when it comes to particulars To deny himself and forsake his worldly prosperity for Christ and to contemn the world and live by faith and converse in heaven and walk with God and worship him in Spirit and truth to love an enemy to forgive all wrongs to humble our selves to the meanest persons and to the lowest works to confess our faults with shame and sorrow and ask forgiveness of those they have injured these and other such works as these they will not believe to be parts of obedience or at least will not be brought to do them Poor souls I have stood here a great while to hold you the glass in which 〈◊〉 you were willing you might see your selves 〈…〉 you will yet wink and hate the light if you perish in your self-deceiving who can help it Briefly and plainly be it known to thee again whoever thou art that hearest this that if thou have not these five characters following thy Religion is all but vain and self-deceiving 1. If Gods authority as he speaketh by his Spirit Word and Ministers be not highest with thy soul and cannot do more with thee then Kings and Parliaments and then the world and flesh Mat. 23. 8 9 10. 2. If the 〈…〉 â—â—â—ing glory be not practically more esteemed by thee and chosen and sought then any thing or all things in the world Mat 6. 21. Col. 3. 4. Joh. 6. 27. 2 Tim. 4. 8 9. Matth. 22. 5. Luke 18. 22 23. Phil. 3. 20. 3. If thou see not such a loveliness in holiness as being the image of God as that thou unfeignedly desirest the highest degree of it Matth. 5. 20. Psal 119. 1 2 3 c. Phil. 3. 12 13 14. 4. If any sin be so sweet and dear to you or seem so necessary that you consent not and desire not to let it go Mat. 19. 22. Phil. 3. 8. Psal 66. 18. 5. If any known duty seem so costly dangerous troublesome and unpleasant that ordinarily you will not do it Mat. 16. 24 25 26. Psal 119. 6. In a word God must be loved and obeyed as God Christ must be entertained as Christ Heaven must be valued and sought as Heaven and Holiness loved and practised as Holiness Though not to the height of their proper Worth which none on earth is able to reach yet so as that nothing be preferred before them BUt yet there is one more discovery which if I pass by you will think I bawk a chief part of my text An unbridled tongue in a Professour of Religion is enough to prove his Religion vain By an unbridled tongue is not meant all the sins of our speech If any man offend not in word the same is a perfect man and able also to bridle the whole body But in many things we offend all Iam. 3. 2. Every unwarrantable jeast or angry word or hasty rash expression is not enough to prove a mans Religion to be in vain Though Christ say that we shall answer for every idle word he doth not say we shall be condemned for every idle word But when the tongue is unbridled and is not kept under a holy Law but suffered to be the ordinary instrument of wilfull known sin or of gross sin which men might know and will not this proves the person void of holiness and consequently his Religion vain It s true every Hypocrite hath not an unbridled tongue some of them have the bridle of moral precepts and some of Religious education and some of the presence and awe of persons whom they esteem common knowledge with natural mansuetude and moderation doth bridle the tongues of many an Hypocrite But as every wicked man is not a drunkard or fornicator and yet every drunkard or fornicator that liveth in it is a wicked man so every Hypocrite hath not an unbridled tongue his vice may lie some other way but every man that hath an unbridled tongue is an Hypocrite if withall he profess himself a Christian The sins of the tongue are of three sorts 1. Such as are against piety 2. Such as are against Justice 3. Such as are against Charity 1. Against Piety that is directly against God are Blasphemy Perjury rash swearing swearing by creatures light and unreverent using of Gods Name and attributes and Word and works pleading for false doctrine or false worship disputing aâ—ainst truth and duty scorning at godlinesâ—â— or reasoning against it These and such impieties of the tongue 〈◊〉 the evidences of prophaneness in the speakers heart though some of them much more then others and if the tongue be not then bridled all is in vain 2. Sinfull speeches against Justice and charity are these reproaching Parents or Governours or neighbours railing and reviling cursing provoking others to do mischief or commit any sin disputing against and disswading men from truth and duty and hindering them by your speeches from a holy life and the means of their salvation calling good evil and evil good lying slandering false witness-bearing back-biting extenuating mens vertues and aggravating their faults beyond the certain apparent truth receiving and reciting and carrying on evil reports which you know not to be true endeavouring to cool mens love to others by making them seem bad when we cannot prove it mentioning mens faults and failings without a call and just occasion unchast immodest ribald speeches cheating and deceitful words to wrong others in their estates with other such like But undoubtedly that sin of the tongue which the Apostle here had particular respect to was the reproaching of fellow-Christians especially upon the occasion of some differences of judgement and practice in the smaller matters of Religion The Judaizing Christians gave liberty to their tongues to reproach those that refused the use of those ceremonies which they used themselves and placed much of their Religion in The quarrel was the same that was decided by the Apostles Act. 15. and by Paul Rom. 14. and 15. and throughout the Epistle to the Galathians And this is the Religion that James calls vain here which was much placed in ceremonies with a pretense of
it is partly malice and partly the recriminations of a guilty galled conscience that fain would steal a little peace by thinking others to be as bad as you I shall dismiss this unhappy sort of men with these two requests 1. You are the men that of all others have the most notable advantage for your conviction of the misery of your present state and therefore I beseech you take that advantage One would think it should be the easiest matter in the world for such as you to know that you are ungodly that hate godliness and oppose it you have no plausible pretence for self-flattery or self-deceit And therefore confess your misery and look out to Christ for help and pardon while there is hope and time 2. For the time to come will you but try a serious holy life before you speak against it any more For shame speak not evil of the things you know not as those bruits described Jud. 10. And holiness was never well known but by experience O that you would be intreated but to yeild to this most equal motion Away with your worldly fleshly lives and live in faith and holiness a just a spiritual and heavenly life but one year or one quarter or one moneth and then if by experience you find just cause for it reproach a holy life and spare not II. TO the second sort that speak evil of men upon differences of opinion especially while they profess the same Religion in all the essential necessary parts I shall propose these aggravations of their sin for their humiliation 1. Consider can you think it agreeable to the Law of Christ to reproach men behind their backs and unheard for that which you never soberly and Christianly told them of to their faces Did you lovingly first admonish them and impartially hear what they can say for themselves what is your end in speaking against your brother Is it to do him hurt or good If hurt be sure you do him Justice and backbiting is not the way of Justice If good you cross your own intention For what good can it do him that another hears him evil spoken of 2. If you are Christs Disciples it must be known to all men by your special love to one another Joh. 13. 35. And is reproach and evil-speaking the fruit or evidence of such love can you talk so of the friends that are most dear to you or that you love indeed how do our hearts rise against that man that speaks reproachfully of our dearest friends Love would scarce suffer you to endure such abuse of Christians in another without a serious reprehension much less to be the abuser of them your selves 3. Your evil speaking of your brethren destroyeth love in others as it proves the want of it in your selves And to destroy their love is to destroy their souls You do your worst to quench the love both of him that you speak evil of and of them to whom you speak it Good is the object of love and therefore to speak of men and manifest them to be lovely is the only way to make them loved Evil is the object of hatred and therefore to speak evil of them is to make them seem hateful and draw men to the guilt of hating them To praise a man will do more to make him loved then if you only intreat another to love him And to dispraise a man will do more to make him hated then if you directly perswade another to hate him And what service you do the Devil and what disservice unto Christ by destroying love and sowing hatred among his servants were you impartial you might easily discern 4. Is it not shame and pitty that the followers of Christ should imitate the Devil and ungodly men as by detraction and reviling words they do you aggravate your brethrens faults and find faults where there are none and so do Satan and ungodly men You have a secret desire to make them seem contemptible and vile and so have Satan and ungodly men And hereby you seem to justifie the wicked and encourage them in their reproaching They think they may boldly speak such language of you all as they hear you speak of one another O what pitty is it to hear the professed children of the Lord to use the hell-bred language of his enemies as if they had gone to school to Satan 5. Are there not tongues enough sharpened against us in the world but we must wound each other with our own Is it not enough if we are the seed of Christ that every where the serpents seed do hate us and that all manner of evil is falsly spoken of us and that we are made as the scorn and the off-scouring of all things but we must also hate and reproach each other Have you not load enough from the world Have you not enemies enough to do the work of enemies but friends must do it And hath not Satan instruments and tongues enough of his own but he must use those that are Christs against himself 6. If thou hate thy brother yet sure thou dost not hate thy self Why then dost thou hurt and shame thy self His hurt is but to be defamed which is little if any thing at all for it is much in himself whether it shall hurt him But thy hurt that dost it is to provoke God against thee and incur his wrath and wound thy soul by the guilt of sin And if another hurt thee in the heel wilt thou therefore stab thy self to the heart If another be bad wilt thou become so by unjust defaming him And how dost thou cross thine own intentions The stone that thou castest at him flyes back in thy face Thou proclaimest thy own transgressions and shame when thou art uncharitably proclaiming his Is not a backbiter a reviler if not a malicious calumniator a worse name which thou tak'st to thy self then that which thou canst fasten on him whom thou dost reproach 7. Thy uncharitable speeches are a dangerous sign of an unhumbled and unpardoned soul If thou canst not forgive thou art not forgiven Did you know your selves it would teach you to deal more compassionately with others You would have the act of Oblivion as extensive as you could if you knew what danger you are in your selves Do you not know as much by your selves as you have to reproach your brother with Do you not then invite both God and man to take you at the worst and use you as you use your brother methinks you should rather be desirous of a more tender and indulgent way as knowing what need your selves have of it If you say O but he hath done thus and thus against me Let conscience say what you have done your selves against God others If you say He is a Schismatick an Hypocrite or this or that remember that malice is blind never wants matter of accusation or reproach innocency is no defence against it else Christ and his
his administrations so much less must we accuse God of negligence or injustice by stepping into his throne And though the Railers of these times excuse their sin with the name of Justice they must shew their Commissions for the executing of that Justice before it will pass in heaven for an excuse Is not God severe enough will not his judgement be terrible enough would you wish men to suffer more then he will inflict on the impenitent what more then hell and will it not be soon enough are you so hasty for so dreadful a revenge can you not stay when the Judge is at the door Mark both the usage and remedy of believers in Jam. 5. 5 6 7 8. To the rich and great ones of the world he saith Ye have lived in pleasure on the earth and been wanton ye have nourished your hearts as in a day of slaughter Ye have condemned and killed the just and he doth not resist you There 's your usage Be patient therefore brethren unto the coming of the Lord There 's the remedy But must we stay so long he thus repeateth his advice Be ye also patient stablish your hearts for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh Let your moderation be known to all men the Lord is at hand Phil. 4. 5. Shall not God avenge his own elect that cry day and night unto him though he bear long with them I tell you that he will avenge them speedily Luke 18. 7 8. There 's no contradiction between crying long and avenging speedily 5. Consider what compassion rather then reproach you owe to those by whom you suffer They do themselves much more hurt then they do you Are they great they have the more to answer for and their fall will be the greater Jam. 5. 1 2 3. If you are your selves believers go into the Sanctuary and ask the Scriptures what will be their end and then deny them compassion if you can Alas consider they are at the worst but such as you were formerly your selves as to the main Paul makes a sad confession of his own persecution of the Church when he was before Agrippa and doth not complain that he was himself so hardly used I verily thought saith he with my self that I ought to do many things contrary to the Name of Jesus 〈◊〉 of the Saints I shut up in prison little thinking that they were Saints I gave my voice against them I punished them oft in every Synagogue And being exceedingly mad against them I persecuted them Acts 26. 9 10 11 12. He would not tell Agrippa that he was mad but he might speak more freely of himself O sirs pitty poor men that have the temptations of worldly greatness and prosperity and must go through a Camels eye if they will come to heaven who stand so high that sun and wind have the greatest force upon them Who see so much vanity and little serious exemplary piety who hear so much flattery and falshood and so little necessary truth saith Seneca Divites cum omnia habeant unum illis deest scilicet qui verum dicat si enim in clientâ—â—am falicis hominis potentumque perveneris veneris aut veritas aut amicitia perdenda est If you were in their places you know not how far you might be prevailed against your selves If little temptations can make you miscarry in your places so oft and foully as you do what would you do if you had the strongest baits of the world and allurements of the flesh and the most dangerous temptations that Satan could assault you with Have you not seen of late before your eyes how low some have fallen from high professions and how shamefully the most promising persons have miscarried tha were lifted up and put to the tryal of such temptations of prosperity as they had never been used to before O pitty those that have such dangerous tryals to pass through and be thankful that you stand on safer ground and do not cruelty envy them their perils nor reproach them for their falls but pray and daily pray for their recovery 6. Consider this speaking evil of those by whom you suffer hath too much of selfishness and corrupted nature in it to be good If another suffered as you do and you were advanced as another is would you not speak more mildly then Or if not so yet the proneness of nature to break out into reviling words though it were for Religion and for God doth intimate to you that it hath a suspicious root Do you find it as easie to be meek and patient and forgive a wrong and love an enemy Take heed lest you serve Satan in vindicating the cause of God It s an unfit way of serving God to do it by breaking his Commands Read seriously the description of a contentious hurtful soul-tongued zeal in Jam. 3. and then tell me what thanks Christ will give you for it The two great Disciples James and John thought it would have notably honoured Christ and curbed the raging Spirit of the ungodly if he would have let them call for fire from heaven to consume a Town that refused to receive him But doth Christ encourage their destroying zeal No but he tells them Ye know not what spirit ye are of They little knew how unlike to the tender merciful healing Spirit of Christ that fiery hurting spirit was that provoked them to that desire nor how unpleasing their temper was to Christ This is the very case of many thousand Christians that are yet young and green and harsh and have not attained to that mellowness and sweetness and measure of charity that is in grown experienced Christians They think their passions and desires of some plagues on the contemners of the Gospel are acceptable to God and blame the charitable as too cold when they little know what spirit it is that raiseth that storm in them and how unlike and unacceptable it is to Christ Were you as zealous to serve all others in love and to stoop to their feet for their salvation and to become all things lawful to all men that you may win some this saving zeal would be pleasing to your Lord who comes to do the work of a Physician and not of the Souldier to save and not to destroy and therefore most approves of those that serve him most diligently in his saving work 7. Lastly consider your passions and evil speakings will but increase your suffering and make it seem just if otherwise it were unjust If you are not meek you have not the promise of inheriting the earth Matth. 5. 5 If you honour not your Parents or superiours you have not the promise that your daies shall be long in the land And your evil speaking will make men conclude that you would do evil if you could and durst As it s said to be Zoilus answer when he was askt why he spoke evil of Plato and such worthy men Quoniam malum facere cum velim non passum