design and thought What way shall I most advance the glory of my God how shall I that am engaged more than they all set in with the Heavens and the earth and the other creatures to declare his excellency his greatness and his goodness In the day of Visitation The beholding of your good works may work this in them that they may be gained to acknowledg and embrace that Religion and that God which for the present they reject but that it may be thus they must be visited with that same light and grace from above which hath sanctified you This I conceive is the sense of this word though it may be and is taken divers other ways by Interpreters Possibly in this day of visitation is implied the clearer preaching of the Gospel amongst those Gentiles where the dispersed Jews dwell and that when they should compare the light of that doctrine with the light of their lives and find the agreement betwixt them that might be helpfull to their effectual calling and so they might glorify God But to the end that they might do thus indeed as with the word of God and the good works of his People there must be a particular visiting of their Souls by the Spirit of God Your good conversation may be one good mean of their conversion therefore this may be a motive to that But to make it an effectual mean this day of gracious visitation must dawn upon them The day spring from on high must visit them as it is Luke 1.78 Verse 13 14. Submit your selves unto every Ordinance of man for the Lords sake whether it be to the King as Supreme Or unto governours as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evil-doers and for the praise of them that do well IT is one of the falsest and yet one of the commonest prejudices that the world hath always entertain'd against true Religion that it is an enemy to civil power and government The Adversaries of the Jews charged this fault upon their City the then Seat of the true worship of God Ezra 4.15 The Jews charged it upon the preachers of Christian Religion Act. 17.7 As they pretended the same quarrel against Christ himself And generally the enemies of the Christians in the primitive times loaded them with the slander of Rebelion and contempt of authority Therefore our Apostle descending to partacular rules of Christian life by which it may be blameless and to silence calumny begins with this not only as a thing of prime importance in it self but as particulary fit for those he wrote to being both Jews and Christians for the clearing of themselves and their Religion Submit your selves c. There are in the words divers particulars to be considered all concurring to press this main duty of obedience to Magistrates not only as well consistent with true Religion but as indeed inseparable from it not to parcell out the words into many pieces they may I conceive be all not unfitly compris'd under these two 1. The extent of this duty 2. The ground of it First The extent 1. To all Civil power of what kind soever for the time receiv'd and Autoris'd There being no need of questioning what was the rise and original of civil power either in the nature of it or in the persons of those that are in possession of it for if you will trace them quite through in the succâ—ssion of ages and narrowly eye their whole circle there be few crowns in the world in which there will not to be found some crack or other more or less If you look on those great Monarchies in Daniel's Vision you see one of them built up upon the ruines of another and all of them represented by terrible devouring beasts of monstrous shape And whether the Romane Empire be the fourth there as many take it or no yet in the things spoken of that fourh and the rest it is inferiour to none of them enlarging it self by conquests in all parts of the world and under it were the Provinces to which this Epistle is address'd yet the Apostle enjoyn's his brethren subjection and obedience to its Authority Nor is it a Question so to be mov'd as to suspend or at all abate our obedience to that which possesses in present where we live What forme of government is most just and commodious God hath indeed been more express in the officers and government of his own house his Church But Civil Societies he hath left at liberty in the chusing and modelling of Civil government though alwayes indeed overruling their choyce and changes in that by the secret hand of his wise and powerful providence yet he hath set them no particular rule touching the frame of it only the common rule of equity and justice were to be regarded both in the contriving and managing of Government And yet though it be some way defective in both they that be subject to it are in all things lawful to submit to its Authority whether suprem or subordinate as we have it here expressely whether to the King as Supreme Namely To the Emperour or to the Governours sent by him which though a Judicious Interpreter refert's to God and will not admitt of any other sense yet it seem's most sutable both to the words and to the nature of the Government of those Provinces to take that word To him as relating to the King for the them that are sent Answers to the other The King as Supreme and so is a very clear designment of the inferiour Governours of those times and places And whatsoever was their end that sent them and their carriage that were sent that which the Apostle addes expresses the end for which they should be sent to govern and at which they should aime in governing as the true end of all government And though they were not fully true to that end in their deportment but possibly did many things unjustly yet as God hath ordain'd authority for this end there is alwayes so much justice in the most depraved government as is a publick good and therefore puts upon inferiours an obligation to obedience and this leads us to consider the Second thing The ground of this duty 2 The main ground of submitting to humane authority is the interest that divine authority hath in it having both apponited Civil government as a common good amongst Men and particularly commanded his people obedience to it as a particular good to them and a thing very sutable with their profession it is for the Lords sake This word carries the whole weight of the duty and is a counter balance to the former which seem's to be therefore on purpose so expressi'd that this may answer it Although Civil Authority in regard of particular formes of Government and the choyce of particular persons to govern is but a humane ordinance or mans creature as the word is yet both the good of government and the duty of subjection to it
a Natural Man so little understands that is the cause of all that Spiritual Light of Grace that a Believer does enjoy No right knowledge of God to Man once fallen from it but in his Son no comfort in beholding God but through him Nothing but just anger and wrath to be seen in Gods lookes but through him in whom he is well pleased The Gospel shews us the Light of the knowledge of God 2 Cor. 4.6 but 't is in the face of Iesus Christ therefore the Kingdom of light oppos'd to that of Darkness Col. 1. is called the Kingdom of his dear Son or the Son of his Love There is a Spirit of Light and Knowledge flowes from Jesus Christ into the Souls of Believers that acquaints them with the Mysteries of the Kingdom of God which cannot otherwise be known And this Spirit of Knowledge is withal a Spirit of Holiness for Purity and Holiness is likewise signified by this Light he remov'd that huge dark body of sin that was betwixt us and the Father and eclips'd him from us the light of his countenance sanctifieth by truth 't is a light that hath heat with it and hath influence upon the affections warmes them towards God and divine things this darkness here is indeed the shadow of death and so they that are without Christ till he visit them are said to sit in darkness and in the shadow of death So this Light is Life Ioh. 1.4 Doth enlighten and enliven begâ—ts new actions and motions in the Soul the right notion that he hath of things as they are work upon him and stir him accordingly discovers a man to himself and lets him see his own Natural filthiness and makes him loath himself and fly from himself run out of himself And the excellency he sees in God and his Son Jesus Christ by this new Light enflames his heart with their Love takes him up with estimation of the Lord Jesus and makes the World and all things in it that he esteemed before base and mean in his eyes Then from this Light arises Spiritual Joy and Comfort so Light signifies frequently as in that of the Psalmist the latter clause expounds the former Light is sowen for the Righteous and joy for the upright in heart As this Kingdom of Gods dear Son that is this Kingdom of Light hath righteousness in it so it hath Peace and Ioy in the Holy Ghost Rom. 14. 'T is a false prejudice the World hath taken up against Religion that 't is a sowr Melancholly thing There is no truly Lightsome and Comfortable life but it All others have what they will they live in darkness and is not that truly sad and comforâ—less Would you think it a pleasant life though you had fine Cloathes and good Dieâ— but never see the Sun and were still kept in a Dungeon with them thus are they that live in Worldly Honour and Plenty but still without God they are in continual darkness with all their injoyments It is true the light of Believers is not here perfect and therefore their joy is not perfect neither sometimes over clouded but the comfort is this that it is an everlasting light it shall never go out in darkness as is said in Iob of the light of the Wicked â—nd it shall within a while be perfected There is a bright morning without a Cloud that shall arise The Saints have not only Light to lead them in their journey but much purer Light at home an Inheritance in Light Colos. 1. The Land where their Inheritance lyeth is full of Light and their Inheritance it self is light For the Vision of God for ever is that Inheritance that City hath no need of the Sun nor of the Moon to shine in it for the glory of the Lord doth lighten it and the Lamb is the light thereof As we said that increated Light is the happiness of the Soul the beginnings of it are our begun happiness they are beams of it sent from above to lead us to the Fountain and fulness of it With thee sayes David is the Fountain of Life and in thy Light shall we see light There are two things spoken of this Light to commend it His Marvellous Light that it is after a peculiar manner Gods and then that is is Marvellous All light is from him the light of sense and that of reason therefore he is called the Father of Lights but this Light of Grace is after a peculiar manner his being a light above the reach of Nature infus'd into the Soul in a supernatural way The light of the Elect World where God specially and graciously recides Natural Men may know very much in natural things and it may be in supernatural things after a natural manner They may be full of School-Divinity and able to discourse of God and his Son Christ and the Mystery of Redemption c. and yet want this peculiar light by which Christ is known to Believers they may speak of him but 't is in the dark they see him not and therefore they love him not the light they have is as the light of some things that shine only in the night a cold Glow-worm-light that hath no heat with it at all Whereas a Soul that hath some of His Light Gods peculiar Light communicated to it sees Jesus Christ and loves and delights in Him and walks with Him A little of this light is worth a great deal yea more worth than all that other common speculative and discoursing knowledge that the greatest Doctors can attain unto 't is of a more excellent kind and original 't is from Heaven and ye know that one beam of the Sun is more worth than the light of ten thousand Torches together 't is a pure undecaying Heavenly light whereas the other is gross and earthly be it never so great and lasts but a while Let us not therefore think it Incredible that a poor unletter'd Christian may know more of God in the best kind of knowledge than any the wisest and Learnedest natural Man can do for the one knowes God only by Mans Light the other knowes him by his own light and that 's the only right knowledge as the Sun cannot be seen but by its own light so neither can God be savingly known but by his own revealing Now this Light being so peculiarly Gods no marvel if it be Marvellous the common light of the world is so though because of its commoness we think not so The Lord is Marvellous is Wisdom in Power in all his works of Creation and Providence But above all in the workings of his Grace This Light is unknown to the World and so Marvellous in the rareness of beholding it that there be but a few that partake of it And to them that see it is Marvellous because in it they see so many excellent things that they knew not before As if a Man were born and brought up till he came to years of understanding in a Dungeon where
are reprov'd for it they say and possibly think so too I will take heed to my self I will be guilty of this no more and because they go no deeper they are many of them ensnared in the same kind again But however if they do never commit that same sin they do but change it for some other as a current of waters if you stop their passage one way they rest not till they find another The conversation can never be uniformly and entirely good till the fram of the heart the affections and desires that lodge in it be changed It is naturally an evil treasure of impure lusts and must in some kind vent and spend what it hath within 'T is to begin with the wrong end of your work to rectify the outside first to smooth the conversation and not first of all purge the heart Evil affections are the source of evil speeches and actions Whence are strifes and fightings sayes St. Iames are they not from your lusts which war in your members Unquiet unruly lusts within are the cause of the unquietnesses and contentions abroad in the world One Man will have his corrupt will and another his and thus they chock and justle one another and by the cross encounters of their purposes as flints meeting they strike out these Sparkes that set all on fire So then according to the order of the Apostles Exhortation the only true principle of all good and Christian conversation in the world is the mortifing of all earthly and sinfull lusts in the heart while they have possession of the heart they do clog it and straiten it towards God and his wayes it cannot walk constantly in them but when the heart is freed from them 't is enlarg'd and so as David speaks fits a Man not only to walk but to run the way of Gods commandements And without this freeing of the heart a Man will be at the best very uneven and incongruous in his ways one step like a Christian and another like a worldling which is an unpleasant and an unprofitable way not according to that word Psa. 18. Thou hast set my feet as hindes feet set them even as the word is not only swift but straight and even and that is the thing here requir'd the whole course and revolution of a Christian's life to be like himself and that it may be so the whole body of sin and all the memberâ— of it all the deceitful lusts must be crucified In the words there are 3. Things 1. One point of a Christians ordinary entertainment in the world is to be evil spokne of 2. Their good use of that evil to do the better for 't 3. The good end and certain effect of their so doing The glory of God 1. Whereas they speak against you as evil doers This is in the general the disease of Mans corrupt nature and argues much the baseness and depravedness of it this propension to evil speaking one of another either blotting the best actions with misconstructions or taking doubtful things by the left ear not chusing the most favourable but on the contrary the very harshest sense that can be put upon them Some Men take more pleasure in the narrow Eying of the true and real faults of Men and then speak of them with a kind of delight All these kind of evil speakings are such fruits as spring from that bitter root of pride and self-love which is naturaly deep fastened in every Mans heart But besides this general bent to evil speaking there is a particular malice in the world against those that are born of God which must have vent in calumnies and reproaches If this evil speaking be the hissing that is natural to the Serpents seed sure by reason of their natural antipathy it must be breath'd forth most against the seed of the Woman those that are one with Jesus Christ If the tongues of the ungodly be sharp swords even to one another they will whet them sharper than ordinary when they are to use them against the righteous to wound their name The evil tongue must be alwayes burning that is set on fire of hell as St. Iames speaks but against the Godly it will be sure to be heated seven times hotter than 't is for others Reasons of this are 1. Being naturaly haters of God and yet unable to reach him what wonder if their malice act it self against His Image in His Children and labour to blot and stain that all they can with the foulest calumnies 2. Because they are neither able nor willing themselves to attain unto the Spotless holy life of Christians they bemire them and would make them like themselves by false aspersions they cannot rise to the Estate of the Godly and therefore they endeavour to draw them down to theirs by detraction 3. The Reproaches they cast upon the Professors of Pure Religion they mean mainly against Religion it self and intend them to reflect upon it These evil speakings of the World against pious Men professing Religion are partly gross falshoods invented without the least ground or appearance of truth for the World being ever credulous of evil especially upon so deep a prejudice as it hath against the Godly the falsest and absurdest calumnies will alwayes find so much belief as to make them odious or very suspected at least to such as know them not this is the Worlds Maxime Lye confidently and it will alwayes do something As a Stone taken out of the Mire and thrown against a white Wall tho it stick not there but rebound presently back again yet it leaves a spot behind it And with those kind of evil speakings were the Primitive Christians surcharg'd even with gross and horrible falshoods as all know that know any thing of the History of those times even such things were reported of them as the worst of wicked Men would scarce be guilty of The Devil for as witty as he is makes use again and again of his old inventions and makes them serve in several ages for so were the Waldenses accused of inhumane banquetings and beastly promiscuous uncleanness and divers things not once to be named amongst Christians much less to be practised by them so that it is no new thing to meet with the Impurest vilest slanders as the Worlds reward of Holiness and the practice of pure Religion Then again Consider How much more will the wicked insult upon the least real blemishes that they can espy amongst the Professors of Godliness And in this there is a threefold injury very ordinary 1. Strictly to pry into and maliciously to object against Christians the smallest imperfections and frailties of their Lives as if they pretended and promis'd absolute perfection They do indeed exercise themselves such as are Christians indeed with St. Paul to keep a good Conscience in all things towards God and Men they have a regard unto all Gods Commandments as David speaks they have a sincere love to God which makes them study
wrong'd us who ever it is but especially being one of our Brethren in this Spiritual sense Many are the Duties of this peculiar fraternal love that mutual Converse and admonition and reproof and comforting and other Duties which are in neglect not only amongst formal but even amongst real Christians Let us intreat more of his Spirit who is Love and that will mend this Fear God All the Rules of equity and Charity amongst Men flow from a higher Principle and depend upon it and there is no right observing of them without due regard to that therefore this word that expresses that Principle of Obedience is fitly inserted amongst these The first obligemenâ— of Man being to the Soveraign Majesty of God that made him and all their mutual Duties one to another deriv'd from that A Man may indeed from Moral Principles be of a mild inoffensive Carriage and do Civil right to all Men But this answers not the Divine Rule even in these same things after the way that it requires them The Spiritual and Religious observance of these Duties towards Men springs from a respect to God and terminates there too begins and ends in him and generally all obedience to his Commands both such as regulate our behaviour towards himselfe immediately and such as relate to Men doth arise from a holy fear of his Name Therefore this fear of God upon which followes necessarily the keeping of his Commandements is given us by Solomon as the total Sum of Mans business and Duty and so this way to solid happiness 't is totum hominis after he had made his discoveries of all things besides under the Sun gone the whole circuit and made an exact valuation and found all to amount to nothing but vanity and vexation of Spirit The account he gives of it it was all for this purpose to illustrate and establish this truth the more and to make it the more acceptable to be a repose after so much weariness and such a tedious Journey and so as he speaks there Verse 10. A word of delight as well as a word of truth that the mind might sit down and quiet it self in this from the turmoyl and pursuit of vanity that keeps it busy to no purpose in all other things but whereas there was emptiness and vanity that 's just nothing in all other things there was not only something to be found but all in this one this fear of God and that 's keeping of his Commandments which is the proper fruit of that fear All the repeated declaring of Vanity in other things both severally and altogether in that Book are but so many stroakes to drive and fasten this nail as 't is there Verse 11. This word of Wisdom which is the Summe of all and contains all the rest So Iob after a large inquest for Wisdom searching for its Vein as Men do for Mines of Silver and Gold hath the return of a Non inventium est from all the Creatures The Sea sayes it is not in me c. But in the close finds it in this The fear of the Lord that is Wisdom and to depart from evil that is understanding Under this fear is comprehended all Religion the inward and outward of it all his worship and Service and all the observance of His Commandements which is there Eccles. 12. and elsewhere expresly joyned with it and therefore is included in it when 't is not express'd so Iob. 28. to depart from evil that is understanding repeating the former words by that So Psal. 111. Verse 10. It hath in it all holiness and Obedience they grow all out of it It is the beginning and it is the top or consummation of wisdom for the word signifies both Think it not then a trivial common matter to speak or hear of this Subject but take it as our great lesson and business here on earth that the best proficients in it have yet need to learn it better and that it requires our uncessant dilligence and study all our dayes This fear hath chiefly these things 1. A reverent esteem of the Majesty of God which is a main fundamental thing in Religion and that moulds the heart most powerfully to the obedience of his will 2. A firm belief of the Purity of God and of his power and justice that he loves holiness and hates all sin and can and will punish it 3. A right apprehension of the bitterness of his wrath and the sweet of his Love that His incensed Anger is the most terrible and intollerable thing in the World absolutely the fearfullest of all evils and on the other side His Love of all good things the best the most blessed and delightful yea only blessedness Life is the Name of the sweetest good we know and yet this loving kindness is better then life sayes David 4. It supposes likewise Soveraign love to God for his own infinite Excellency and goodness 5. From all these things springs a most earnest desire to please him and in all things and unwillingness to offend Him in the least and because of our danger through the multitude and strength of tentations and our own weakness a continual selfe-suspition a holy fear least we should sin and a care and watchfulness that we sin not and deep sorrow and speedy returning and humbling before him when we have sinned There is indeed a base kind of fear that in the usual distinction they call servile fear But to account all fear of the Judgements and Wrath of God a Servile fear or not to stand upon words to account such a fear improper to the Children of God I conceive is a wide mistake Indeed to fear the punishment of sin without regard ro God and his Justice as the inflicter of them or to forbear to sin only because of those punishments so as if a Man can be secur'd from those he hath no other respect to God that would make him fear to offend this is the character of a slavish and base mind Again for a Man so to apprehend wrath in relation to himself as to be still under the horrour of it in that notion and not to apprehend Redemption and deliverance by Jesus Christ is to be under that Spirit of bondage which the Apostle speaks of Rom. 8. And such fear though a Child of God may for a time be under it yet the lively actings of faith and persuasion of Gods love and the feeling of reflexe love to him in the Soul doth cast it out according to that of the Apostle 1 Ioh. 4.18 true love casteth out fear But to apprehend the punishments the Lord threatens against sin as certain and true and to consider the greatness and fearfulness of them but especially the terrour of the Lords anger and hot displeasure above all punishments and though not only no nor chiefly for these yet in contemplation of those as very great and weighty to be affraid to offend that God who hath threatned such things as the just