whereby we have communion with Christ and an assured testimony of and from him For he that believeth in the Son of God hath the witness in himself And what witness is that This is the record that God hath given us eternal life and this life is in his Son He that hath the Son hath life O happie and sure connexion Eternal life first This life eternal is in and by Christ Jesus This Jesus is ours by faith This faith witnesseth to our souls our assurance of life eternal Chariâ—y is the last which comprehends our love both to God and man for from the reflection of Gods love to us there ariseth a love from us to God again The beloved Disciple can say We love him because he loved us first and from both these resulteth our love to our brethren Behold so full an evidence that the Apostle tells us expresly That we know we are passed from death to life because we love the brethren For the love of the Father is inseparable from the love of the Son He that loveth him that begets loves him that is begotten of him Now then my son deal unpartially with thine own heart ask of it seriously as in the presence of the searcher of all hearts Whether thou dost not finde in thy self these unfailing evidences of thine election Art thou not effectually though not perfectly called out of the world and corrupt nature Dost thou not inwardly abhor thy former sinfull ways Dost thou not think oâ— what thou wert with detestation Dost thou not heartily desire and endeavour to be in all things approved to God and conformed to thy Saviour Dost thou not gladly cast thy self upon the Lord Jesus and depend upon his free all-sufficiency for pardon and salvation Dost thou not love that infinite goodâ—ness who hath been so rich in mercies to thee Dost thou not love and bless those gleams of goodness which he hath cast upon his Saints on earth In plain terms Dost thou noâ— love a good man because he is good Comfort thy self in the Lord my son let no fainting qualms of fear and distrust possess thy soul Faithful is he that hath called thee who will also preserve thy whole spirit and soul and body blameless unto the coming of oer Lord Jesus Christ. Comfort against Temptations § 1. Christ himself assaulted our trial is for our good THou art haunted with Temptations that which the Enemy sees he cannot do by force or fraud he seeks to effect by importunity Can this seem strange to thee when thou seest the Son of God in the Wilderness fourty days and fourty nights under the hand of the Tempter He that durst thus set upon the Captain of our salvation God blessed for ever how shall he spare frail flesh and blood Why should that Saviour of thine thinkst thou suffer himself to be tempted if not to bear thee out in all thy temptations The keys of the bottomless pit are in his hands he could have shut up that presumptuous spirit under chains of darkness so as he could have come no nearer to him then hell but he would let him loose and permit him to do his worst purposely that we might not think much to be tempted and that he might foyl that great enemy for us Canst thou think that he who now sits at the right hand of Majestie commanding all the powers of heaven earth hell could not easily keep off that malignant spirit from assailing thee Canst thou think him lesse merciful then mighty Would he die to save thee and will he turn that bandog of hell loose upon thee to worry thee Dost thou not pray daily to thy Father in heaven that hee would not lead thee into temptation If thou knowest thou hast to doe with a God that heareth prayers oh thou of little faith why fearest thou Loe he that was led by his own divine Spirit into the Wildernesse to bee tempted of that evill Spirit bids thee pray to the Father that he would not lead thee into temptation as implying that thou couldst not goe into temptation unlesse he led thee and whiles he that is thy Father leads thee how canst thou miscarry Let no man when he is tempted say I am tempted of God for God cannot be tempted with evill neither tempteth hee any man God tempteth thee not my sonne yet know that being his thou couldst not be tempted without him both permitting and ordering that temptation to his owne glory and thy good That grace which thy God hath given thee he will have thus exercised thus manifested So wee have known some indulgent Father who being assured of the skill and valour of his deare son puts him upon Tiltings and Barriers and publique Duels and lookes on with contentment as well knowing that hee will come off with honour How had wee known the admirable continency of good Joseph if hee had not been strongly solicited by a wanton Mistresse How had wee known Davids valour if the Philistims had not had a Giantly Challenger to encounter him How had wee knowne the invincible piety of the three Children if there had not beene a Furnace to try them or of Daniel if there had been no Lions to accompany him Be confident thy glory shall be according to the proportion of thy triall neither couldst thou ever bee so happy if thou hadst not been beholden to temptations §. 2. The powerfull assistance of Gods Spirit and the example of S. Paul How often thou saist have I beaten off these wicked suggestions yet still they turn upon me again as if denials invited them as if they meant to tire me with their continuall solicitations as if I must yeeld be over-laid though not with their force yet with their frequence Know my sonne that thou hast to doe with spirituall wickednesses whose nature is therefore as unweariable as their malice unsatisfiable Thou hast a spirit of thine owne and besides God hath given thee of his so as hee lookes thou shouldst through the power of his gracious assistance match the importunity of that evill spirit with an indefatigable resistance Be strong therefore in the Lord and in the power of his might and put in the whole armour of God that thou maist be able to withstand â—n the evill day and having done all to stand Look upon a stronger Champion then thy selfe the blessed Apostle thou shalt finde him in thine owne condition see the missenger of Satan sent to buffet him and he did it to purpose how soundly was that chosen vessell buffeted on both sides and how often Thrice hee besought the Lord that it might depart from him but even yet it would not be the temptation holds onely a comfort shall countervaile it My grace is sufficient for thee for my strength is made perfect in weaknesse It is not so much to be considered how hard thou art laid at as how strongly thou art upheld How many with the
like somehead-strong horse in the midst of his career to stop on the sudden and to leave us at once ere wee could think of it both safe and healthfull This was the Lords doing and it was marvellous in our eyes Behold the Lords hand is not shortned that it cannot save neither his ear heavy that it cannot hear The same mercy is everlasting the same remedy certain Be wee but penitent and wee cannot be miserable Comforts against losse of Friends § 1. The true value of a friend and the fault of over-prizing him THou hast lost thy friend Thy sorrow is just the earth hath nothing more precious then that which thou hast parted with For what is a friend but a mans selfe in another skin a soul divided into two bodies both which are animated by the same spirit It is somewhat worse with thee therefore then with a palsied man whose one halfe is stricken with a dead kinde of numnesse he hath lost but the use of one side of his body thou the one halfe of thy soul. Or may I not with better warrant say that a true friend hath as it were two soules in one body his own and his friends Sure I am so it was with Jonathan and David The soule of Jonathan was knit with the soule of David and Ionathan loved him as his owne soul Still the more goodnesse the stronger union Meer nature can never be so fast a cement of soules as grace for here the union is wrought by a better spirit then our owne even that blessed spirit who styles himselfe by the name of Love By how much greater thine affection was so much heavie◠is thy losse But let mee tell thee I feare thou art too much accessary to thine owne affliction Didst thou look for this losse Did thy heart say What if we should part Didst thou not over-enjoy this blessing whilest thou hadst it Surely these are no small disadvantages As every other evill so this especially is aggravated by our unexpectation neither hadst thou been so oppressed with this sorrow if thou hadst fore-seene it and met it on the way It is our weak inconsideration if we do so welcome these earthly comforts not as guests but as in-mates and as some that are importuntely hospitable so entertain our friends that we cannot abide to give them leave to depart Whereas we ought according to the wise advice of our Seneca not much abluding from the counsel of that blessed Apostle with whom he is said to have interchanged Letters so to possess them as those that make account to forgo them and so forgo them as if we possessed them still § 2. The tru◠ground of a◠undefeisible enjoying of our friends Thou art grieved for the loss of a dear friend Take heed lest thy love had too much of the man and too little of God All blessings as they come down from the Father of mercies so should be enjoyed in him and if we enjoy them as in themselves our love begins to degenerate into carnal It is a sure rule that all love that depends upon a thing affected when that thing ceaseth then the love ceaseth as he that loves a face onely for beauty when that beauty is defaced by deformity presently cools in his affection he that respects a man for his bounty onely disregards him when he sees him impoverished Didst thou value thy friend onely for his wit for his ready compliances for his kinde offices all these are now lost and thy love with them but if thou didst affect him for eminence of grace for the sake of that God that dwelt in him now thy love is not cannot be lost because thou still enjoyest that God in whom thou lovedst him Comfort thy self therefore in that God in whom he was thine and yeeld him chearfully into those hands that lent him thee §. 3. The rarity and trial of true friends Thou hast lost a true friend That Jewel was worthy to be so much more precious by how much more rare it is The world affords friends enow such as they are Friends of the purple as Tertullian calls them friends of the basket as the Poet such as love thy loaves and fishes and thee for them Wealth makes many friends saith the Wise man but where is the man that loves thee for thy self that loves thy Vertue and thee for it devested of all by-respects Whiles there is honey in thy gally-pot the wasps and flyes will be buzzing about it but which of them cares to light upon an empty vessel Was he so much thine that he would not be set off by thine adversity Did he honour thee when thou wert despised of the world Did he follow thee with applause whiles thou wert hooted at by the multitude Would he have owned thee if he had found thee stripped and wounded in the Wilderness Such a friend is worthy of thy tears But take heed thy love prove not envious If thy God hath thought him fitter for the society of Saints and Angels dost thou repine at his happiness Thou hast lost his presence he is advanced to the beatifical presence of the King of glory Whether is thy loss or his gain the greater § 4. It is but parting not a 〈◊〉 Thou hast lost thy friend say rather thou hast parted with him That is properly lost which is past all recovery which we are out of hope to see any more It is not so with this friend thou mournest for He is but gone home a little before thee thou art following him you two shall meet in your Fathers house and enjoy each other more happily then you could have done here belowe How just is that charge of the blessed Apostle that We should not mourn as men without hope for those that do but sleep in Jesus Did we think their souls vanisht into air as that Heathen Poet profanely expresseth it and their bodies resolved into dust without all possibility of reparation we might well cry out our eyes for the utter extinction of those we loved but if they do but sleep they shall do well Why are we impatient for their silent reposal in the bed of their grave when we are assured of their awaking to glory §. 5. The loss of a vertuous wife mitigated Thou hast lost a dear wife the wife of thy youth the desire of thine eyes Did ye not take one another upon the terms of redelivery when ye should be called for Were you not in your very knitting put in minde of your dissolution Till death us depart Was she vertuous knowest thou not that there was a Pre-contract betwixt thy Saviour and her soul ere thou couldst lay any claim to her body And canst thou now grudge his just challenge of his own Wilt thou not allow him to call for a consummation of that happie match Didst thou so over-love her outside that thou wouldst not have her soul glorious If thou lovedst her
bodies to those regions of blessednesse that they may thence fetch comfort to alleviate the sorrows of their heavie partners Thus doe thou my sonne imploy thy better part no paines of the worse can make thee miserable That spirituall part of thine shall ere long be in blisse whiles this earthen peece shall lye rotting in the grave Why shouldst thou not even now before thy separation improve all the powers of it to thy present advantage Let that still behold the face of thy God in glory whiles thy bodily eyes look upon those friends at thy bed side which may pity but cannot help thee § 3. 2 Comfort from the author of sicknesse and the benefit of it Thou art pained with sicknesse Consider seriously whence it is that thou thus smartest Affliction commeth not out of the dust couldst thou but heare the voyce of thy disease as well as thou feelest the stroke of it it saith loud enough Am I come up hither without the Lord to torment thee The Lord hath said to me Goe up against this man and afflict him Couldst thou see the hand that smites thee thou couldst not but kisse it Why man it is thy good God the Father of all mercies that layes these stripes upon thee Hee that made thee he that bought thee at so deare a rate as his owne blood it is he that chastiseth thee and canst thou think he would whip thee but for thy good Thou art a Father of children and art acquainted with thine owne bowels Didst thou ever take the â—od into thy hand out of a pleasure that thou tookest in smiting that flesh which is derived from thine owne loines Was it any ease to thee to make thy child smart and bleed Didst thou not suffer more then thou inflictedst Couldst thou not rather have been content to have redeemed those his stripes with thine own Yet thou sawest good reason to lay on and not to spare for his loud crying and many teares and canst say thou hadst not loved him if thou hadst not been so kindly severe And if we that are evill know how to give loving and beneficiall correction unto our children how much more shall our Father which is in heaven know how to beat us to our advantage so as wee may sing under the rod with the blessed Psalmist I know O Lord that thy judgements are right and that of very faith fulnesse thou hast afflicted me Might the child be made arbiter of his own chastisement do we think he would award himself so much as one lash yet the wiser parent knowes he shall wrong him if he doe not inflict more as having learned of wise Solomon Thou shalt beat him with the rod and shalt deliver his soul from hell Love hath his stroaks saith Ambrose which are so much the sweeter by how much they are the harder set on Dost thou not remember the message that the two sisters sent to our Saviour Lord behold hee whom thou lovest is sick Were it so that pain or sicknesse or any other the executioners of Divine justice should be let loose upon thee to tyrannize over thee at pleasure on purpose to render thee perfectly miserable there were just reason for thy utter disheartening now they are stinted and goe under commission neither can they bee allowed to have any other limits then thy own advantage Tell me whether hadst thou rather be good or be healthfull I know thou wouldst bee both and thinkst thou mayst well be so Who is so little in his owne favour as to imagine hee can be the worse for faring well But he that made thee lookes farther into thee then thine owne eyes can doe he sees thy vigour is turning wanton and that if thy body be not sick thy soul will if he therefore finde it sit to take downe thy worse part a little for the preventing of a mortall danger to the better what cause hast thou to complain yea rather not to be thankfull When thou hast felt thy body in a distemper of fulnesse thou hast gone to sea on purpose to make thy self sick yet thou knewest that turning of thy head and stomach would bee more painful to thee then thy former indisposition why should not thine alâ—wise Creator take liberty to cure thee with an afflictious remedy § 4 3 Comfort from the vicissitudes of health Thou art now sick Wert thou not before a long time healthfull Canst thou not be content to take thy turns If thou hadst had more daies of health then houres of sicknesse how canst thou think thou hadst cause to repine Had the divine Wisedome thought sit to mitigate thy many daies pain with the ease of one hour it had been well worthy of thy thanks but now that it hath before-hand requited thy few painfull houres with yeares of perfect health how unthankfully dost thou grudge at the condition It was a foule mistake if thou didst not from all earthly things expect a vicissitude they cannot have their being without a change As well may day be without a succession of night and life without death as a mortall body without sits of distemper and how much better are these momentany changes then that last change of a misery unchangeable It was a wofull word that Father Abraham said to the damned glutron Son remember that thou in thy life time receivedst thy good things and Lazarus evill things but now he is comforted and thou art tormented Oh happy stripes wherewith we are here chastened of the Lord that we may not bee condemned with the world Oh welcome feavers that may quit my soule from everlasting burnings § 5 4 Comfort Sicknesse better then sinfull health Thou complainest of sicknesse I have known those that have bestowed teares upon their too much health sadly bemoaning the feare and danger of Gods disfavour for that they ayled nothing and our Bromiard tels us of a devout man in his time that bewailed his continued welfare as no small affliction whom soon after God fitted with pain enough The poore man joyed in the change and held his sicknesse a mercy neither indeed was it otherwise intended by him that sent it Why are we too much dejected with that which others complain to want why should we finde that so tedious to us which others have wished There have been Medicinal Agues which the wise Physitian hath cast his Patient into for the cure of a worse distemper A secure and lawless health how ever Nature takes it is the most dangerous indisposition of the soul if that may be healed by some few bodily pangs the advantage is unspeakable Look upon some vigorous Gallant that in the height of his spirit and the heat of his blood eagerly pursues his carnal delights as thinking of no heaven but the free delectation of his sense and compare thy present estate with his Here thou liest groaning and sighing and panting and shifting thy weary sides complaining of the heavie pace
judgements of God denounced against sinners and laid home to the conscience hast thou not found thy heart pierced with them hast thou not shrunk inward and secretly thought How shall I decline this dreadful damnation When thou hast heard the sweet mercies of God laid forth to penitent sinners hath not thy heart silently said Oh that I had my share in them When thou hast heard the Name of Christ blasphemed hast thou not felt a secret horrour in thy bosom All these argue a true spiritual life within thee Motion is the most perfect discoverer of life He that can stir his limbs is surely not dead The feet of the soul are the Affections Hast thou not found in thy self an hate and detestation of that sin whereinto thou hast been miscarried Hast thou not found in thy self a true grief of heart for thy wretched indisposition to all good things Hast thou not found a secret love to and complacency in those whom thou hast thought truly godly and conscionable Without a true life of grace these things could never have been Are not thine eyes and hands many times lifted up in an imploration of mercy Canst thou deny that thou hast a true though but weak appetite to the means and further degrees of grace What can this be but that hunger and thirst after righteousnesse to which our Saviour hath pronounced blessednesse Discomfort not thy selfe too much son with the present disappearance of grace during the hour of thy temptation it is no otherwise with thee then with a â—ree in winter-season whose sap is run down to the root wherein there is no more shew of the life of vegetation by any buds or blossomes that it might put forth then if it were stark dead yet when the Sun returnes and sends forth his comfortable beames in the spring it burgens out afresh and bewraies that vitall juyce which lay long hidden in the earth No otherwise then with the hearth of some good huswife which is towards night swept up and hideth the fire under the heap of her ashes a stranger would think it were quite out here is no appearance of light or heat or smoak but by that time she hath stirred it up a little the bright gleeds shew themselves and are soon raised to a flame Stay but till the spring when the Sun of righteousnesse shall call up thy moisture into thy branches stay but till the morning when the fire of grace which was raked up in the ashes shall bee drawne forth and quickned and thou shalt find cause to say of thy heart as Iacob said of his hard lodging Surely the Lord is in this place and I knew it not Onely doe thou not neglecting the meanes wait patiently upon Gods leasure stay quietly upon the bank of this Bethesda till the Angel descend and move the water §. 11. Complaint of the insensibleness of the time and meanes of conversion I could gladly thou saist attend with patience upon God in this great and happy work of the excitation of grace were I but sure I had it could I be but perswaded of the truth of my conversion but it is my great misery that here I am at a sad and uncomfortable losse for I have been taught that every true convert can designe the time the place the meanes the manner of his conversion and can shew how neare hee was brought to the gates of death how close to the very verge of hell when God by a mighty and out-stretched arme snacht him away in his own sensible apprehension from the pit and suddenly rescued him from that damnation and put him into a new state of spirituall life and undefaisible salvation All which I cannot do not finding in my selfe any such sudden and vehement concussion and heart-breaking any such forcible and irresistible operation of Gods Spirit within me not being able to design the Sermon that converted me or those particular approaches that my soule made towards an hardly-recovered desperation My son it is not safe for any man to take upon him to set limits to the wayes of the Almighty or to prescribe certain rules to the proceedings of that infinite Wisedome That most free and all-wise agent will not be tyed to walk alwaies in one path but varies his courses according to the pleasure of his own will One man hee cals suddenly another by leasure one by a kinde of holy violence as hee did S. Paul another by sweet solicitations as Philip Nathaniel Andrew Peter Matthew and the rest of the Apostles One man he drawes to heaven with gracious invitations another he drives thither by a strong hand we have known those who having mispent their yonger times in notoriously lewd and debauched courses living as without God yea against him have been suddenly heart-stricken with some powerfull denunciation of judgement which hath so wrought upon them that it hath brought them within sight of hell who after long and deep humiliation have been raised up through Gods mercy to a comfortable sense of the divine favour and have proceeded to a very high degree of regeneration and lived and died Saints But this is not every mans case Those who having from their infancy been brought up in the nurture and feare of the Lord and from their youth have been trained up under a godly and conscionable Ministery where they have been continually plyed with the essectuall means of grace Precept upon precept line upon line here a little and there a little and have by an insensible conveyance received the gracious inoperations of the Spirit of God though not without many inward strifes with temptations and sad fits of humiliation for their particular failings framing them to all holy obedience these cannot expect to finde so sensible alterations in themselves As well may the child know when he was naturally born as these may know the instant of their spirituall regeneration and as well may they see the grasse to grow as they can perceive their insensible increase of grace It is enough that the child attaining to the use of reason now knowes that he was born and that when wee see the grasse higher then we left it we know that it is growne Let it then suffice thee my son to know that the thing is done though thou canst not define the time and manner of doing it Be not curious in matter of particular perceptions whiles thou mayst be assured of the reality truth of the grace wrought in thee Thou seest the skilfull Chirurgion when hee will make a fontinell in the body of his patient he can do it either by a sudden incision or by a leasurely corrasive both sort to one end and equally tend towards health trust God with thy self and let him alone with his own work what is it to thee which way he thinks best to bring about thy salvation § 12. Complaint of irresolution and uncertainâ—y in matter of our election answered All were safe thou saist if onely
blessed Martyr Theodorus have upon racks and gibbets found their consolations stronger then their pains Whiles therefore the goodnesse of thy God sustaines and supplies thee with abundance of spirituall vigour and refreshment answerable to the worst of thine assaults what cause hast thou to complain of suffering The advice is high and heroicall which the Apostle James gives to his Compatriots My brethren count it all joy when ye fâ—ll into divers temptations Let those temptations be rather trials by afflictions then suggestions of sin yet even those overcome yeeld no small cause of triumph for by them is our faith no lesse tried and the trying of our saith worketh patience and the perfect work of patience is a blessed entirenesse of grace The number of enemies addes to the praise of the victory To overcome single temptations is commendable but to subdue Troopes of temptations is glorious § 3. The restraint of our spirituall enemies and their over-matching by the power of God Alas thou saist I am overlaid not with multitudes onely but with power In all challenges of Duels there is wont to be respect had to the equality both of the Combatants and weapons But woe is me how am I overmatched For me I am a weak wretch and we wrestle not against flesh and blood but against Principalities and powers against the rulers of the darknesse of this world against spirituall wickednesse in heavenly places Behold the Amorite whose height is like the height of the Cedars and their strength as the strength of oaks What are we but poor pismires in the valley to these men of measures Who can stand before these sonnes of Anak I did not advise thee my son to be strong in thy self alas we are all made up of weaknesse One of those powers of darknesse were able to subdue a whole world of men but to bee strong in the Lord whose lowest Angel is able to vanquish a whole hell of Devils and in the power of his might who commandeth the most furious of those infernal spirits to their chains Wo were us if we were left in our own hands there were no way with us but foiling and death But our help is in the Name of the Lord who hath made heaven and earth The Lord is our strength and our shield he is our rock and our salvation he is our defence so as we shall not be moved It is he that hath girded us with strength unto battel and that subdueth those that rise up against us Take courage therefore to thy self man there cannot be so much difference betwixt thee and those hellish powers as there is betwixt them and the Almighty their force is finite and limited by his omnipotence How fain dost thou think Jannes and Jambres the great Magicians of Egypt by the conjoyned powers of hell would have made but a Louse in an affront to Moses yet they could not How earnestly was that legion of Devils fain to beg but for leave to prevail over a few Gaderene-swine How strong therefore soever they 〈◊〉 to thee yet to him they are so meer weakness that they cannot so much as move without him Who can fear a Bear or a Lion when he sees them chained to their stake Even children can behold them baited when they see their restraint Look not upon thy self therefore look not upon them but look up to that over-ruling hand of the Almighty who ordinates all their motions to his own holy purposes and even out of their malice raises glory to himself and advantage to his servants §. 4. The advantage that is made to 〈◊〉 by our temptations and foils It is a woful advantage thou sayst that I have made of temptations for alas I have been shamefully foiled by them and what by their subtilty and what by their violence have been miscarried into a grievous sin against my God and lie down in a just confusion of face to have been so miserably vanquished Hadst thou wanted tears my son for thine offence I should willingly have lent thee some It is indeed a heavie case that thou hast given thy deadly enemy this cause to triumph over thee and hast thus provoked thy God Be thou thorowly humbled under the consciâ—ence of thy sin and be not too sudden in snatching a pardon out of the hand which thou hast offended be humbled but after thou hast made thy peace with God by a serious repentance be not disheartned with thy faâ—lings neither do I fear to tell thee of an advantage to be made not of thy temptations onely but even of thy sin What art thou other then a gainer if having been beaten down to thy knees thou hast in an holy indignation risen up and fought so much the more valiantly A wound received doth but whet the edge of true fortitude Many a one had never been victorious if he had not seen himself bleed first Look where thou wilt upon all the Saints of God mark if thou canst see any one of them without his scars Oh the fearful gashes that we have seen in the noblest of Gods Champions upon earth whose courage had never been raised so high if it had not been out of the sense of some former discomfitures As some well-spirited wrestler therefore be not so much troubled with thy fall as zealous to repay it with a more successful grapling We know saith the blessed Apostle that all things work together for good to them that love God All things yea even those that are worse then nothing their very sins The Corinthians offended in their silent connivence at the incestuous person the Apostles reproof produceth their sorrow what was the issue For behold this self-same thing that ye sorrowed after a godly sort what carefulness it wrought in you yea what clearing of your selves yea what indignation yea what fear yea what vehement desire yea what zeal yea what revenge Lo what a marvellous advantage is here made of one offence What hath Satan now gotten by this match One poor Corinthian is mis-led to an incestuous copulation The evil spirit rejoyceth to have got such a prey but how long shall he enjoy it Soon after the offending soul upon the Apostles holy censure is reclaimed he is delivered over to Satan that Satan should never possess him The Corinthians are raised to a greater height of godly zeal then ever Corinth had never been so rich in grace if it had not been defiled with so foul a crime Say now whether this be not in effect thy case Shouldst thou ever have so much hated thy sin if thou hadst not been drawn in to commit it Shouldst thou have found in thy self so fervent love to thy God if it had not been out of the sense of his great mercy in remitting it Wouldst thou have been so wary of thy steps as now thou art if thou hadst never slipped Give glory to God my son whiles thou givest shame to thy self and bless him
of the Lord Jesus for every just Cause is his neither is he less a Martyr that suffers for his conscience in any of Gods Commandments then he who suffers for matter of Faith and Religion Remember that cordial word of thy Saviour Blessed are they that are persecuted for righteousness sake for theirs is the kingdom of heaven In such a prison thou shalt be sure to finde good company there thou shalt finde Joseph Micaiah Jeremiah John Baptist Peter Paul and Silas and what should I think of the poll all the holy Martyrs and Confessors of Jesus Christ from the first plantation of the Gospel to this present day repent thee if thou canst to be thus matched and choose rather to violate a good conscience and bee free then to keep it under a momentary restraint §. 7. The good 〈◊〉 of retirednesse and the partnership of the souls imprisonment Thou art a Prisoner make the best of thy condition close aire is warmer then open and how ordinarily doe wee heare Birds sing sweeter notes in their cages then they could doe in the wood It shall bee thine owne fault if thou bee not bettered by thy retirednesse Thou art a Prisoner so is thy soule in thy body there not restrained onely but fettered yet complaines not of the straitnesse of these clay walls or the weight of these bonds but patiently waites for an happy Gaole-delivery so doe thou attend with all long-suffering the good houre of the pleasure of thy God thy period is set not without a regard to thy good yea to thy best hee in whose hand are all times shall finde and hath determined a fit time to free both thy body from these outward prison-walls and thy soule from this prison of thy body and to restore both body and soule from the bondage of corruption to the glorious liberty of the sonnes of God Comforts against Banishment § 1. Comfort from the universality of a wise mans Country THOU art banished from thy Countrey Beware lest in thy complaining thou censure thy selfe A wise mans Countrey is every where what such relation hath the place wherein thou wert born to thy present being What more then the time wherein thou wert born what reason hast thou to bee more addicted to the Region wherein thou fell'st then to the day of the week or houre of the day in which thou salutedst the light What are times and places of our birth but unconcerning circumstances Wherever thou farest well thou maist either finde or make thy Countrey But thou sayest there is a certain secret property in our native soyle that drawes our affection to it and tyes our hearts to it not without a pleasing kinde of delight whereof no reason can bee yeelded so as we affect the place not because it is better then others but because it is our owne Vlysses doth no lesse value the rockie soyle of his hard and barren Ithaca then Agamemnon doth the noble walls of his rich and pleasant Mycenae I grant this relation hath so powerfull an influence upon our hearts naturally as is pretended yet such a one as is easily checked with a small unkindnesse How many have wee knowne who upon an actuall affront not of the greatest have diverted their respects from their native Country and out of a strong alienation of minde have turned their love into hostility We shall not need to seek farre for Histories our times and memories will furnish us too well Doe we not see those who have sucked the brests of our common Mother upon a little dislike to have spit in her face Can we not name our late home-bred compatriots who upon the disrelish of some displeasing Laws have flown off from their Country and suborned Treasons and incited forrain Princes to our invasion So as thou seest this naturall affection is not so ardent in many but that it may be quenched with a mean discontentment If therefore there were no other ground of thine affliction thy sorrow is not so deep-rooted but that it may be easily pulled up § 2. Comfort from the benefit of self-conversation It is not the aire or earth that thou standest upon it is the company thou saist from which it is a kinde of death to part I shall leave all acquaintance and conversation and be cast upon strange faces and languages that I understand not my best entertainment will be solitude my ordinary inhospitality What dost thou affright thy self my sonne with these bugges of needlesse terrour He is not worthy of the name of a Philosopher much lesse of a Christian Divine that hath not attained to bee absolute in himselfe and which way soever hee is cast to stand upon his owne bottome and that if there were no other men left in the world could not tell how to enjoy himselfe It is that within us whereby wee must live and be happy some additions of complacency may come from without sociable natures such is mans seek and finde pleasure in conversation but if that bee denyed sanctified spirits know how to converse comfortably with their God and themselves § 3. Examples of those holy ones that have abandoned society How many holy ones of old have purposely withdrawne themselves from the company of men that they might bee blessed with an invisible society that have exchanged Cities for Deserts houses for caves the sight of men for beasts that their spirituall eyes might be fixed upon those better objects which the frequence of the world held from them Necessity doth but put thee into that estate which their piety affected Oh! but to bee driven to forsake Parents kinsfolke friends how sad a case must it needs bee What is this other then a perfect distraction What are wee but pieces of our Parents and what are friends but parts of us what is all the world to us without these comforts When thou hast said all my son what is befalne thee other then it pleased God to enjoyn the Father of the faithfull Get thee out of thy Country and from thy kindred and from thy Fathers house into a Land that I will shew thee Loe the same God by the command of authority calls thee to this secession If thou wilt shew thy self worthy to be the sonne of such a Father doe that in an humble obedience to God which thou art urged to doe by the compulsion of men But what so grievous a thing is this Dost thou think to find God where thou goest Dost thou make full account of his company both all along the way and in the end of thy journey Hath not he said who cannot sail I will not leave thee nor forsake thee Certainly he is not worthy to lay any claim to a God that cannot finde parents kindred friends in him alone Besides he that of very stones could raise up children unto Abraham how easily can he of inhospital men raise up friends to the sons of Abraham Onely labour thou to inherit that faith wherein he walked that
God c. Lo the holiest man may not be exempted from the dread but from the slavish fear of the great Judge We know his infinite justice we are conscious to our selves of our manifold failings how can we lay these two together and not fear But this fear works not in us a malignant kinde of repining at the severe Tribunal of the Almighty as commonly whom we fear we hate but rather a careful endeavour so to approve our selves that we may be acquitted by him and appear blameless in his presence How justly may we tremble when we look upon our own actions our own deserts but how confidently may we appear at that Bar where we are beforehand assured of a discharge Being justified by faith â—we have peace with God through Jesus Christ our Lord. When we think of anâ— universal conflagration of the world how can we but fear but when we think of an happie restitution of all things in this day how can we but rejoyce in trembling § 4. In that great and terrible Day our Advocate is our Judge Thou quakest at the expectation of the last Judgement Surely the very Majestie of that great Assize must needs be formidable And if the very delivery of the Law on Mount Sinai were with so dreadful a pomp of Thunder and Lightning of Fire Smoke Earthquakes that the Israelites were half dead with fear in receiving it with what terrible magnificence shall God come to require an account of that Law at the hands of the whole sinful generation of mankinde Represent unto thy thoughts that which was shewed of old to the Prophet Daniel in Vision Imagine that thou sawest the Ancient of days sitting upon a Throne like the fiery flame 〈◊〉 a fiery stream issuing and coming forth from before him thousand thousands ministring unto him and ten thousand times ten thousand standing before him the judgement set and the Books opened Or as John the Daniel of the New Testament saw a great white Throne and him that sate on it from whose face the earth and the heavens fled away and the dead both small and great standing before God and the Books opened and the dead judged out of those things which were written in those Books according to their works Let the eyes of thy minde see before-hand that which these bodily eyes shall once see and tell me how thou feelest thy self affected with the sight of such a Judge such an appearance such a process And if thou findest thy self in a trembling condition cheer up thy self with this That thy Judge is thine Advocate That upon that Throne there sits not greater Majestie then Mercie It is thy Saviour that shall sentence thee How safe art thou then under such hands Canst thou fear that he will doom thee to death who died to give thee life Canst thou fear he will condemn thee for those sins which he hath given his blood to expiate Canst thou fear the rigour of that Justice which he hath so fully satisfied Canst thou misdoubt the miscarriage of that soul which he hath so dearly bought No my son all this divine state and magnificence makes for thee Let those guilty and impenitent souls who have heaped unto themselves wrath against the day of wrath quake at the glorious Majestie of the Son of God for whom nothing remains but a fearful expectation of judgement and fiery indignation which shall devour the adversaries But for thee who art not onely reconciled unto God by the mediation of the Son of his love but art also incorporated into Christ and made a true limb of his mystical Body thou art bidden together with all the faithful to look up and lift up thy head for now the day of thy reâ—emption is come And indeed how canst thou do other since by vertue of this blessed union with thy Saviour this glory is thine every member hath an interest in the honour of the Head Rejoyce therefore in the day of the Lord Jesus and when all the Tribes of the earth shall wail do thou sing and rejoyce and call to the heavens and the earth to bear thee company Let the heavens rejoyce and let the earth be glad let the sea make a noise aud all that is therein let the field be joyful and all that is in it Then shall all the trees of the wood rejoyce before the Lord for he cometh for he cometh to judge the earth and with righteousness to judge the world and the people with his truth §. 5. Frequent meditation and due prepaâ—ation the remedies of our â—ear Thou art affrighted with the thought of that Great Day Think of it oftner and thou shalt less fear it It will come both surely and suddenly let thy frequent thoughts prevent it It will come as a thief in the night without warning without noise let thy careful vigilance always expect it and thy soul shall be sure not to be surprised not to be confounded Thine Audit is both sure and uncertain sure that it will be uncertain when it will be If thou wilt approve thy self a good Steward have thine account always ready set thy reckoning still even betwixt God and thy soul Blessed is the servant whom his Master shall finde so doing Look upon these heavens and this earth as dissolving and think with Jerome that thou hearest the last Trump and the voice of the Archangel shrilling in thine ears as once thou shalt Arise ye dead and come to judgement Shortly let it be thy main care to live soberly righteously and godly in this present world looking for that blessed hope and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity Who shall change our vile body that it may be fashioned like to his glorious body according to the working whereby he is able to subdue all things to himself Comforts against the fears of our spiritual enemies § 1. The great power of evil spirits and their restraint THou art affrighted at the thought of thy spiritual enemies No marvel Neither earth nor hell hath any thing equally formidable Those three things which are wont to make enmity dreadful and dangerous Power Malice Subtilty are met in them neither is it easie to say in which of these they are most eminent Certainly were we to be matcht with them on even hand there were just cause not of Fear onely but Despair I could tremble thou sayst to think what Satan hath done what he can do what contestation he enabled the Egyptian Sorcerers to hold with Moses how they turned every man his rod into a Serpent so as they seemed to have the advantage for the time of many Serpents crawling and hissing in Phoraoh's pavement for one How they turned the waters into blood How they brought Froggs upon the Land of Egypt 〈◊〉 as if thus far the power of hell would