confluence of choicest provisions such is God's free entertainment of his Servants and Favourites Mine Oxen and Fallings are killed and all things in a readiness come unto the Marriage Mat. 22 4. And Come yee blessed of my Father receive the Kingdome prepared for you Mat. 25 34. But when men are to prosecute their deadliest Enemies they will do it with the uttermost rigour that their possibility can reach unto Such and infinitely greater is Gods anger against his Adversaries he takes pleasure at their overthrow and laughs at their destruction Ah I will ease me of mine enemies and be avenged on mine Adversaries Isay 1.24 And as if his mercy were utterly at an end and he had forgotten to be gracious he will denounce that everlasting excommunication as the triumph of his glorious justice Go ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Divel and his Angels Mat. 25.41 5 Reason Because it hath a great and a long reach 1. It reacheth to the Soul 2. And it reacheth to eternity 1 It reacheth unto the Soul other sentences reach but to the body name estate family relations liberty life as was before hinted but this reacheth the Soul Fear not them which kill the body and when they have done that have no more that they can do but fear him who when he hath killed is able to cast into Hell yea I say unto you fear him Luke 12 4. How do malefactors that are arraigned for some capitall offences tremble before an earthly Judge when he is pronouncing sentence of death upon them but how will corrupt Judges themselves tremble as Faelix did when he heard Paul reasoning of judgement to come yea a more than either he or Belshazzar did when the hand was writing him a divorce from his Kingdome when this sentence of Damnation is going out how will blackness cover all faces when a World of selfe condemned sinners shall stand before the dreadfull Tribunall of the Lord Jesus which in the last Assize he is sitting upon life and death when nothing is left them but a certaine fearfull looking for of judgement and fiery indignation which shall devour the Adversaries Hebr. 10.27 'T was a sad hearing to the rich glutton Thou foole this night shall thy Soul be taken from thee Luke 12.20 The Soul is more worth than the World in his esteem that laid down his life to save Soules Mat. 16.26 And in this damnation this jewell is lost and this darling of ours must be delivered to the roring Lion The Saints do lay all at stake to save their souls Profsâ—s Pleasures Honours Friends Liberty Life it self and think all to be an easie exchange which will more than conclude the loss of the soul to be the loss of all losses 2. And that which makes this so great a loss and that we are treating of so great Damnation is because it is for ever and ever It reacheth to Eternity The sinner under convictions thinks he shall dy no other death looks upon himself as in a very hell upon earth David after deliverance out of such a deep saith O Lord thou hast delivered my Soul from the nethermost hell and Saint Augustine having in his confessions taken shame unto himself for a multitude sins in the depth of his humiliation calls out of the deep of misery to the deep of mercy Lord pitty my Soul in the lowest hell such in Scripture-sense are called lost Christ came to seeke save the lost but this loss shall- be their gain and I may say in this case as the Word in another he that loseth his life shall find it and the Apostle Paul desired to be lost in himself that he might be found in Christ this is but a seeming loss nor will it last long heaviness may indure for a night but joy cometh in the morning for a moment have I hid my face in mine anger saith the Lord but with everlasting mercy will I return and have compassion but the lose we are speaking of is reall and irreparable The soul under desertion thinks it self in a wofull case and hath much ado to distinguish betwixt it self and a cast-away as appears in Davids case Psal 77.7 8 9. Will the Lord absent himself for ever and will he be favourable no more c. and Job complained in the bitterness of his soul that God had set him up as his marke to shoot at and the venome of his arrows drank up his Spirit and Hezekiah did mourn like a Dove and chatter like a Crane and complained that from morning to night God did make an end of him But though it were now winter with them and the sap was gone down into the root yet the Suns return brought their spring again and the light of Gods countenance made all whole but in that desertion which Damnation causes the deserted soul is deserted for ever When the body loses the soul at the death naturall it s a sad loss but the Resurrection will bring them together again but where the soul and God are parted in the spirituall death and the naturall death finds them in this case eternall death presently seizes that soul and that separation wil be everlasting that soul and happiness will never meet 6. Reason The last reason to prove this Damnation to be exceeding great is Because it consists in great and dreadfull punishments We shall make use of this old and common distinction of 1. Poena Damni The punishment of loss 2. Poena Sensus The punishment of sense All evil is distinguished into 1. Malum culpae The evil of sin 2. Malum poenae The sin of punishment All evill of sin may be distinguished into 1. Inherent our own sins 2. Adherent our other mens sins All evil of punishment as afore into 1. Poenam Damni the punishment of loss 2. Poenam Sensus the punishment of sense Man is a compound creature consisting of a soul and body a Coelestiall and Terrestriall part as God is Lord both by Creation Preservation and Purchase so he requires to be honoured with both with all of both all the parts of our bodys and all the powers of our souls If the Apostles inference hold concerning one viz Gods right of purchase ye are bought with a price and therefore ought to glorifie God c. It will conclude much more strongly if we take in all ye are created with his power preserved by his providence as well as bought with a price therefore ye ought to glorifie God both with your bodies and souls which are Gods Here is the very quâ—nâ—essence of reason that God should have his own that which is so much his own by a manifold right Give unto Caesar that which is Caesars and give unto God that wich is Gods Now for such as give up themselves wholly to God in a way of grace and duty taking him to be their â—â—rtion and his Son to be their Lord preferring their interests before all others serving them in the
beautie of holiness and power of Godliness giving up themselves bodys souls and spirits unto God upon the account of the Covenant desiring nothing more than that their hearts may be whole with God and they could be stedfast in his Covenant making God and Jesus Christ the joy of their hearts and breath of their lives and resolve to continue so doing to the death God hath provided for them suitable joyes and pleasures in the life to come Rationall delights for their reasonable souls and sensible delights for their glorified bodys Mistake not far be it from me to say or you to imagine that the glorified Saints shall enjoy such carnall delights in heaven which sensuall and flesh pleasing men do make their heaven upon earth that were a conceite better beseeming a Turk than a Christian the Proselytes of Mahomet have dreamed of such an earthly or rather hellish heaven by fancying such an Utopian Paradise into which the unclean may enter and the pleasures of sin shall meet them The sensible pleasures to be enjoyed there are such as sort and suite with the sublimated senses of glorified bodies and no other And as God hath prepared such suitable joyes and pleasures for such as love and serve him in sincerity even joyes for Soules and pleasures for bodâ—es for those that glorify him with Soules 〈…〉 so on the contrary those that will 〈…〉 â—ting call nor close with his 〈…〉 in accepting his dear Son 〈…〉 great Salvation offered with him but remaine sworne vassalls to the Divell World and Flesh giving up the parts and powers of their Soules and Bodies to serve sin in the lust of it These shall receive wages according to their work as they polluted themselves with filthiness of the flesh and spirit and dishonoured God with their Soules and Bodies so God will punish them accordingly their Soules with rationall punishments tribulation and anguish shall be upon the Soul of every one that doth evill and their bodies with sensible which the word shaddows out by fire and brimstone These two sorts of Torments are breifly contained in those Scriptures Isay 66.24 Mark 9.44 In the worme that dyeth not and the fire that never goeth out In which expressions expositors conceive the holy Ghost alludeth unto two Kinds of burialls of dead corpses some were interred in the earth and out of those wormes would breed which would eat them up and never leave devouring till all were consumed an Ancient gives this account of the degrees of that annihilation which resolves the body into its principle of nullity Caro in putredinem putredo in vermes vermis in pulvere pulvis in nihilum redigitur The flesh is turn'd into rottenness that rottenness into wormes those wormes into dust and that dust is reduced to nothing Other bodies were not buryed in the earth but were burned with fire and reduced to ashes and those ashes were reserved in urnes Only here is the difference this worme is not like that that devours bodies for when the body is consumed that worme dies nor is this fire like that that burnes carcasses for when the carcases are burnt that fire goes out but this is ignis inextinguibilis unquenchable fire By this never dying worme we are to understand the worme of an accusing and tormenting conscience that is ever gnawing and hereby we may understand all rationall torments of which the buffetings of conscience are the cheifest And by this fire that never goes out we are to understand the torments of sense set off by burning because that was the most torturing death that was inflicted by the Jewes but to open these a little more fully we will take them as they lie before us and speak of them apart 1 Rationall torments provided for damned Soules are a part and the greatest part of the torments of Hell for which this deserves to be called Great Damnation Now as the Soul is distributed into the understanding will and affections so we may assigne unto these soveral faculties their peculiar torments I only intend to touch upon them to give you a tast and not to enter upon any topicall and methodicall discourse concerning them 1 They shall be plagued in their understandings by seing and knowing and feeling themselves to be irrecoverably lost and intolerably miserable Here the messengers of the Lord knowing the terrors of the Lord did cry alowd to give warning of their sin and danger and duty they did throw Hell-fire in their faces and so gaster them with the thunder and lightning of Hell and damnation that they could never be at quiet but were even tormented before their time and when they had done their uttermost when they had studyed and preacht and prayed and waited and wept themselves into consumptions in seeking to them and to God for them that they might be saved they could make no better a report of their embassy to him that sent them but to this effect Lord who hath believed our report or to whom hath the arme of the Lord been revealed In which seat doth that Souâ— siâ— in what town is his habitation or in what family dwells he that was dead and is alive that was lost and is found Some of us thy unworthy servants Lord have through undeserved mercy been preachers ten some twenty some thirty some forty yeares and more to such and such congregations we have preacht some hundreds some of us thousands of Sermons and through grace we have indeavoured to do it faithfully in our measure we have taught publikly and from house to house we have spoken with authority and dealt personally and familiarly with the soules of refusers and all was but lost labour upon them though not a labour in vaine to our selves Will not this be a sad hearing for thousands when those that have been watchmen for their souls must come to give up this account with griefe But what will the Lord say to this Will he say to those that would not be taught be ignorant still and to those that would not be reformed be disobedient still no surely it may well be doubted whether the Lord had not formerly seared them up in their ignorance and prophaneness with such an hardning of their hardness by inflecting senslesness for their affecting senslesness But now it shall be otherwise the ignorant shall be no longer ignorant the drunkard swearer who monger sabboth-breaker shall be so no longer they shall see with their eyes and hear with their eares and understand with their hearts though they shall never be converted nor be healed Lord thy hand is lifted up said the Prophet Isay and they will not see thy wrath was in the threatning they saw a black clowd rising and a driving storme coming and would not beware but now they shall see volentes nolentes willing or nilling they shall hear and understand and be ashamed and confounded Then shall the damned know good and evill as the Angels that kept not their first estate know it and as the
impardonable and their torments unsuffereable Christs merit cannot then satisfie for their sins neither can Gods mercy pardon them God and Christ can as soone cease to be what they are as to do it The case of the damned for ever shall be much like that of the wicked that shall be alive immediately before Christ's coming to judgement Luk. 21.25 26. There shal be signs in the Sun and in the Moon and in the Stars that is if we consult Mat. 24.29 The Sun shal be darkned and the Moon shall not give her light and the Stars shall fall from heaven and the powers of the Heavens shal be shaken c. When upon the world God shall rain Stars and the ungodly may ever expect when he shall rain snares fire and brimston storm and tempest to be the portion of the wicked to drink When these are but the beginning of sorrows more pangs are coming upon them as upon a woman in travel as the Evangelist Luke goes on upon the earth there shal be distress of Nations and perplexity the Sea and Waves roaring Mens hearts failing them for fear and for looking after those things which are coming for all the judgements that are come they shall still be eaten up with fear of further wrath and indignation that is still a coming 2. Sensible torments provided for the bodies of the damned are also a part of those punishments which do denominate this to be GREAT DAMNATION As the former were comprehended under the Worm that dyeth not so these under the fire that never goeth out As the torments of conscience were put for all rational torments belonging to the Soul so the torments of the sense of feeling here signified by fire is put for all sensible torments belonging to the body I shall first discover unto you why the torments of hell are compared to fire The Jews before their Jurisdiction was taken away by Herod who was sur-named the great primus ex alienigenis Rex Judeorum the first of forraigners that was King of the Jews had three Courts of Judicature one was ruled by three men wherein were tryed money matters and lesser causes The 2 did consist of 23 Judges who heard decided weighty affairs and matters of life and death And these two were called the lesser Shanedrim The highest of all which was called the great Shanedrim had 71 Judges who had the hearing of most weighty affairs as the matter of a whole Tribe or an high Priest or a false Prophet Now the punishments that their Judicatories did infl ct were of four Sorts 1. Hanging 2. Beheading 3. Stoning 4. Burning And because burning was the most dreadful therefore doth our Saviour â—llude unto that in compâ—ring of hell-torments to fire Neither is it every kind of fire but the fire of Gehenna now that Gehenna was the Vally of Hinnom a place in the suburbs of Jerusalem where Idolaters offered their children halfe burnt to Idols Which place was also called Tophet from a word in the Hebrew tongue which signifies a Drum because they did beat drums to deaden the cries of the Infants while they were a burning Indeed those half burnings do best shadow out unto us those of hell where the dâ—mned shall be fuel for everlasting fire ever burning and never consumed ever dying and never dead It s also called fire and brimstone as if fire it self were not hot enough to shadow out the terrour of it I might here enlarge upon all the senses as we did before upon the faculties but the very torments of the Soul are the very Soul of torments and do as far surpass bodily torment as the Soul doth the body And I have enlarged so much upon that that its time to think of contracting here Yet for all the hast know that as Heaven is likened to a Kingdom where there is a confluence of Pleasures so Hell is compared to a Prison where there is an inundation of Miserys It s called in the Gospel 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 utter darkness being furthest from God the Fountain of life and glory say some Because compared to a prison say others and prisons were usually without the gates of Cities and they were dark places especially the dungeons where malefactours were as it were buryed alive Without are doggs saith John of the new Jermsalem Revel 22.15 Within are children but without doggs And the Apostle calleth Infidels such as are without Col. 4.5 without indeed if you read all those withouts Eph. 2.12 Without Christ without the Commonwealth of Israel without the Covenant of promise without hope and without God in the world and surely those that are in hell are and everlastingly shal be without in all these respects Now as in a Prison all the senses have their punishments The Eyes are punished with darkness the Ears with complaints of fellow prisoners the Smell with loathsome stinks the Palate with the hunger or coursest provisions the Touch with the hard earth and cold and nakedness So in the prison of hell ther 's 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the blackness of darkness for the sight besides that cursed crue of the Devils and damned the displeased countenance of the Almighty and the sight of him whoâ— their sins have pierced Their ears shalâ—â— filled with roarings and howlings and gnashing of teeth besides the curses and blasphemies of the damned Their smell shall be suffocated with fire and brimston their tast glutted with Gall and Worm-wood and the dreggs of the Cup of the Lords Fury And their touch with fire with fire unquenchable Observe lastly that our Enquiries concerning Hell are here answered by fire to note out unto us the extremity of hell-torments Fire is as great a torment as our capacities can reach unto but if they can reach higher the terrours of those infernal torments are still out of our reach As a fire painted on a wall in the story of Dives and Lazarus is nothing in comparison of our Culinary fire so that fire that burns upon our hearths is but like a painted fire for heat to the flames of hell Suppose a woman should lye in the extreamest pangs of child-birth for 100 years or a man should lye languishing under the continual pains of stone and goute and collick for 1000. Suppose a Traytour should be upon the Rack as many years as there are drops in the Sea or a Malefactour should be a burning as many years as there are Sands on the Sea-shore Suppose Captives should be detained in the Turkish Gâ—llies or in that hell upon earth the Devils Slaughter-house the Spanish Inquisition for as many years as there are Stars in the Firmament These if they were real would be amazing and confounding considerations able to shake to pieces the stoutest heart of the most daring Nimrod but these that we have been speakâ—ng of are so infinitly beyond them ut nihil supra that nothing can be more transcendedently inconceivable and unspeakable AETERNITY is of such a length that when we