be added though not by way of answer to the possible exceptions and objections of disputers because the doing of that I find would lead into some more nice and lesse profitable speculations and contribute little to the direction of practice the onely aime of this paper and therefore what was thus prepared shall not here be inserted yet by way of necessary satisfaction to a practicall question And the question is this In case I be a minister call'd to give comfort to such an one viz. an habituall customary sinner which were thus surprized by the hand of God any mortall disease or wound and were thus cast downe with extreame horrour of mind and from thence professeth himselfe resolved that if God shall spare him he will certainly lead a new life whether I would not give that man comfort in that case but suffer him to be swallowed up with desperation To this I answer 1. by setting before our eyes an example of God himselfe in a case not very distant from this proposed which may be matter of direction to any who shall be called to for comfort in this kind Judg. 10. 6. The children of Israel did evill again in the sight of the Lord and served Baalim and Ashtaroth c. and forsooke the Lord and served not him v. 6. upon this Gods anger was hot against Israel and he brought a double distresse upon them v. 7 8 9. and Israel was sore distressed And then v. 10. the children of Israel cryed unto the Lord saying Wee have sinned against thee both because wee have forsaken God and also worship't Baalim Here is that confession and sense of the provocations which our case supposes and that in time of the sore distresse and so in that parallel also And then God's returne to them is remarkeable 1. An expostulation continued for three verses to aggravate their crime and ingratitude and the close an absolute refusall a denying present pardon to these confitents Wherefore I will deliver you no more And then farther yet a bitter reproach and sarcasme v. 14. Goe and cry unto the Gods which yee have chosen let them deliver you in the time of your Tribulation And then the story proceeds to tell us the good use and effects that this severity wrought upon them And the children of Israel said unto the Lord We have sinned do thou unto us whatsoever seemeth good unto thee deliver us only we pray thee this day v. 15. And they put away the strange Gods from among them and served the Lord v. 16. their penitence is approved to God by their patience and submission and importunity by present reformation and contrary acts of piety and then it follows his soule was grieved for the misery of Israel i. e. God ceased to afflict them and on the other side prospered them to victory in the next Chapter And then this dealing of Gods being examplary to us as farre as the cases shall appear parallel may passe for a generall or first answer But then 2 ly and more distinctly to the question I answer that in this case the course I would prescribe to others or observe my selfe is this according to this copy premised not presently to make haste to apply comfort to that man meaning by comfort words of pardon or promise or assurance that his sinnes in this state shall certainly be forgiven but to dispense my comfort discreetly and so that I may lay a foundation on which he may more safely build and I more in fallibly ascertaine comfort to him I mean by preparing him to a right capacity of it by encreasing yet farther in his heart and rooting as deepe as I can the mourning which if sincere hath the promise of comfort Mat. 5. the sorrow for sinne the humiliation and indignation at himselfe the vehement desire the zeale the revenge the all manner of effects of Godly sorrow and indeed by doing my utmost in perfecting this so necessary worke in him which if by the helpe of God it be done and those graces deepely rooted through a consideration not onely of the instant danger but detestable uglynesse of sinne the provocation offered to a most gratious Father most mercifull Redeemer and sanctifying Spirit together with al the other humbling matter from the particular sinnes and aggravating circumstances of them it will then be that Godly sorrow which the Apostle speakes of and that will if God afford space bring forth that repentance which consists in a sincere change and reformation called by the same Apostle 2 Cor. 7. 10. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or as some manuscripts read 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. as I conceive a repentance a change or amendment which will not be retracted againe a lasting or durable reformation and then there is no doubt but to him which is in this estate mercy infallibly belongs And to him I shall then hasten to ascertaine it And yet of this mercy if I through some errour or neglect of mine should not give him nor he himselfe through the greatnesse of his sorrow the floud of teares in his eyes otherwise finde any comfortable assurance yet is he by God's immoveable promise sure certitudine objecti though not subjecti to be partaker and all that he loses by not being assured of it here by me or by his owne spirit is the present comfort and joy of some few minutes which will soone be repaired and made up to him at death by God's wiping off all teares from his eyes the gracious revelation of his Saviour-judge unto him with a Come thou blessed of my Father thou hast cordially mourned and converted and thou shalt be comforted Whereas if I should goe about too hastily and preposterously to grant him any such comfortable assurance that he were already accepted I meane not now that he should be accepted if his change be sincere or his sorrow such as would bring forth that change for that conditionall comfort I have all this while allowed him but positive assurance for the present upon a view of such his sorrow I might then possibly raise him up too soone before the worke were done the plant rooted deepe enough and that were utterly to ruine him by giving him his good things his comfort here to deprive him of it eternally or at the best refresh him a little here before-hand but not at all advantage him toward another life which losse being so unmercifully great and acquisition so unconsiderably small it were great uncharitablenesse to runne that hazard and so still the best way must be by proposall of conditionall but not of absolute comfort to humble him unto the dust if so be there may be hope to set him this only taske of working out his salvation with fear trembling laying hold on God's mercy in Christ his generall but conditionall mercy for all penitent purifying sinners for confessours and forsakers and none else and so labouring for that sorrow that purity that confession contrition
fall into such dangerous snares and yet because after all this 't is possible that though 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the good sense signifie actuall giving yet it may not in the ill actuall punishing because to thinke worthy and to reward still goe together in God in retribution of good but not so in evill his pardoning mercy oft interceding and againe because those words may well passe not for any law set to God but onely as a meanes to keep us from so falling when we stand by setting such a direfull character upon it shewing us how promiselesse and dangerous such our state is it will therefore be no temptation to anywho is in this sad estate to be hopelesse or give over labouring to get out again but rather a Summons or Proclamation of terrour straight to awaken him out of that estate to humiliation and prayers to God lest it be too late And in this the example of David will be encouragement to him who after a years sleepe or lethargy in those sins of adultery and murther c. which were such falls of a regenerate man and by God's ordinary meanes never retracted all that while was yet by God's grace and mission of a Prophet extraordinary recalled and reduced again though it cost him afterwards many flouds of teares penitentiall expressions to wash out those spots which he had thus contracted though even still he lies under the reproach of that sinne when he doth not of any other because that only was indulged in so long 1 King 15. 5. And the same may be said of Solomon also who after such heavie falls which beyond all the children of God are sadly recorded of him in Scripture was by God brought back to repentance God's mercy being beyond all promise I shall adde beyond all other example to him in this behalfe And therefore the close must be that if we have followed them in their sinnes we must be sure to imitate them also not only in the repentance and sincerity of that but in all the degrees and demonstrations of their repentance if we hope for the mercy which they met with To which I shall adde no more save onely this that the product of that which from these places hath beene concluded seemes to be very agreeable with that famous case set by Saint Augustine l. de persever of two men supposed to be converted together to live the life of converts in the same manner to fall together and so to continue some time and then one of them before death to recover and rise againe and the other to dye in his state of relapse where he makes this an argument and example of God's making a discrimination betwixt men supposing this last act of recovery in the one to be an act of spirituall extraordinary grace to him which was not given nor by any obligation due unto the other which is the most that from these two places thus paraphrased hath beene collected He that thinketh he standeth let him take heed lest he fall 1 Cor. 10. 12. If any man be overtaken in a fault you that are spirituall restore such a man considering thy selfe lest thou also be tempted Gal. 6. 1. Then saith the Devill I will returne to my house from whence I came out and comming he findeth it empty swept and garnished then goeth he and taketh with him seven other spirits worse then himselfe and they goe in and dwell there and the end of that man is worse then the beginning So shall it be to this evill generation Mat. 12. 42. Behold thou art made cleane goe sinne no more lest a worse thing happen unto thee Joh. 5. 14. OF A LATE OR A DEATH-BED REPENTANCE Brutus in Epist ad Pergamen 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 By HENRY HAMMOND D. D. LONDON Printed in the yeere 1646. OF A LATE OR A Death-bed Repentance CONCERNING a late or Death-bed repentance which I conceive much fitter for a sad secret consideration in the presence onely of God and the Scripture ones own soul then for a dispute or debate wherein either each party may be unwilling to yeeld or willing to retaine their owne prepossessions or else that person that hath long depended on the benefit of a late repentance may thinke it great rashnesse to resigne up that hold upon slight grounds and such will any seeme to be at a suddaine transient representation It must first be acknowledged that one of those two things is ordinarily understood by it either the perfecting our accounts with God at that time reinforcing all our former good resolutions and shutting up that busines of our soules which in time of health had beene sincerely begun but not perfected or else the Beginning of that worke of Repentance at that time For the first of these it is acknowledged that the Close of our lives whether it be old age or sicke bed is very proper and usefull to that purpose For the person that hath before that sincerely converted to God with unfained sorrow and confession of all former sinnes and firme resolution of amendment which is the least that true repentance can consist of may then when he sees himselfe drawing toward a period of a life mixt with infirmities and sinnes lay his full load on his owne shoulders and so with true sorrow and compunction come heavy laden to his Saviour lay downe that burthen before God by particular confession and beseech his pardon through the sufferings and satisfaction of Christ for every of these which pardon the true sincere penitent hath on those termes promise to receive from Heaven Nay he that had before made many good resolutions and yet through custome of the place through strength of naturall constitution and such like temptations hath hitherto not beene so faithfull to his resolutions as he ought may now at last upon God's visitation and by helpe of this discipline of Heaven radicate and settle such resolutions so deepe that they would be constant and persevering if he should againe recover and so this discipline may in that case be thought to have beene designed by God to this wholsome end and the working of such an effect will no doubt be acceptable in his sight But for the second the beginning I say the beginning the worke of repentance at that time I desire these particulars may seriously be laid to heart 1. In a generall view of it whether it be not reprochfull and contumelious thus to offer God the refuse and vilest of our age and parts like that offering to Ceres Phygaliensis in Pausanias none of the hony of their bees but only the wax or juicelesse part of their labour and of their wooll those fleeces which were not fit for use but full of the daglockes the coursest and foulest part of it That kinde of wooll if a late Critickes bold conjecture might be heeded was it in which the spunge of vinegar was put when 't was given Christ on the
hadst some time since beene cut off utterly but that I intended to shew or make known or make to be seene for so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 literally signifies my power in thee as in cutting up or anatomizing a man alive which is condemned to death saith Chrysostome that others may be instructed and benefited by that dissection In this matter 't is true Saint Paul reades 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for this very thing I raised thee up say we but that must be understood and interpreted by what we have already found to be the meaning of the story and not on the other side this rendring of the passage in the story which the context inforceth and P. Fagius and out of him Ainsworth acknowledge to be the importance of the Hebrew brought to the sound of our English phrase in Saint Paul for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 must not needs referre to the time of Pharaoh's birth or to any absolute destination of his person it would be hard to bring any example of such a sense of it in Scripture or other Author but may belong to some particular passage or part of his life and so directly to this point of time when God saies he might have slaine him with plague or murrain and so be rendred raising as that signifies a raising one out of a danger or sickenesse a rescuing or recovering him and so keeping alive as 't is ordinarily used in Scripture of raising from sickenesse or death The sense certainly is that God continued him alive when he had filled up his measure of obduration and so in ordinary course was to be cut off by death in the same manner as the author of the booke of Wisdome saith of God's dealing with the Canaanites c. 12. 20. Those who are due to death thou punishedst with so much long animity and so it 's intimated by that which follows Rom. 9 22. God willing to shew his wrath c. endured with much long suffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction And then when Pharaoh's heart was thus hardned by God in this extraordinary manner God expostulates with him v. 17. in triumph as it were over this sinner that now is the illustrious object of his judgements of obduration plague of heart a kind of hell on earth for which he was reserv'd beyond the ordinary period of life kept alive for this remarkeable judgement as yet exaltest thou thy selfe c. and in referrence peculiarly to that expostulation is that objection to be understood Rom. 9. 19. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 why doth he yet find fault i. e. God might indeed saith the objector with good reason finde fault all the while of the former six judgements when Pharaoh hardned his owne heart but now when God hath hardned him and by a totall deprivation of grace without which he cannot choose but sinne ingulfed him in an irreversible state as much as if he were in hell 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 why yet or still doth he find fault or expostulate for who hath resisted his will then God might be said to will his obduration which he had inflicted by way of punishment though before 't is confest he could not and what possible resisting of his will is there that he should still find fault The answer to this objection first by way of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not for any exact determining or stating any point of controversie or question particularly of that immediately precedent who hath resisted his will but for the puzling and silencing of the objecter v. 20. 21. and then by speaking directly to the matter in hand about Pharaoh v. 22. might out of Saint Chrysostome be fully cleared if this were not already too large an overgrowne 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and this part of it impertinent wholly to the matter in hand The result of all that I have laboured to lay downe concerning Pharaoh is this that although his state were a long time but reversibly ill as long as he hardned his owne heart yet when his owne obdurations were come to the fulnesse of measure and he ripe and dropping into hell as after the sixth judgement he was then God exchanged the first part of that due punishment of his in another world that was instantly to have commenced for a temporary cooler hell here hardned his heart and obstructed all possibility of repentance from him and so concluded him in this life in an irreversible estate Having gone thus farre I shall now demand whether an impenitent Christian that in the midst of many meanes of grace many cals of Christ for many yeares together afforded doth repeate and reiterate his resistances and hardens so oft his owne heart against God be not as great a provoker as Pharaoh was I am sure that that which Josephus makes the character of Pharaoh 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Folly with wickednesse and malignity is the just inscription of such for the most part And if it be objected that such an one is not allowed those signes and prodigies that he was I answer 1. that t is but the greater mercy to him that he is not those being all destructive miracles and if he complaine for want of them he may within a while if he have not already meet with some rouzing judgement some sharpe disease of the stone or strangury or feaver a thunder and lightning about his eares which will be able to supply that place and aggravate his guilt perfectly as high as Pharaoh's if he be not reformed 2. Father Abraham's answer to Dives may be conviction to him that he that hath the Moses and Prophets in the Christian sense the many methods of the Holy Ghost the many cals of Christ in the Church and is not wrought on by them neither would that man repent though al Pharaoh's miracles were shewed before him some magician-inchanting-deceit flattery of his owne corrupt heart or comfortable hope which the removall of a punishment would be apt to infuse into him would be as sure divertisements to avoid the force of the most powerfull worke of Gods upon him as the like were then unto Pharaoh 'T is true there may be some disparity in regard of some circumstances betwixt that Pharaoh and the Christian impenitent and therefore there will be no certainty deducible from Pharaoh's example that any man now a dayes doth come in this life to that irreversible estate This I am most willing to graunt and from thence to conclude that 't will be a great madnesse for any melancholy hypocondriack from this discourse to take occasion to pahnsy himselfe actually in that estate and from thence to give over all hope and labour to get out againe 1. Because the doing so is the sure way to ingulfe him in it for the future though he be not yet in it which is one peece of fury thus to run into that which I feare when the feare ought in any reason to drive me from it 2. Because