depraved heart lies upon me as a lump of Lead I get nothing by talking with it as Solomon saith of the Fool Answer not a fool according to his folly lest thou be like him Prov. 26. 4. for this talking with Guilt and Weakness draweth my Soul which is made free indeed by the Son of God to the likeness of that Guilt and Weakness and my justified Conscience begins again to lick up the old Vomit of Fear and Bondage but my work is then to cast my self by naked Reliance on Jesus Christ who justifieth the Ungodly Rom. 4. 5. as being compassed about with the Guard of God's free everlasting Justification in the Person of Jesus Christ and having the shelter of this Guard then I may return and plead with Guilt and hear the complaints of my heart and the accusations of my Conscience and give them Answers from the fulness of Christ's Atonement and thus again the Fool if such a term may be used in this comparison is answered lest he should be wise in his own conceit Prov. 26. 5. I mean that the Spirit of Bondage which by the advantage of my own sin pleads rationally against my Peace till Faith comes with the Tongue of the Learned and pleads the Mystery of Free Grace against the Plea of Reason and the Righteousness of Christ and his Holiness against Sin and Guilt Nothing prevailed against Sampson till he betrayed the Vow of God that was upon him so nothing can prevail against the Peace of Justification till Guilt divide between the Soul and naked Reliance upon the personal Perfection of Christs Sacrifice and Mediatorship The Soul that lays his Foundation thus will not boast in himself Rom. 3. 27. nor wrong the Visits of God's favourable Countenance by Pride and Wantonness nor yet despair when Storms arise because his foundation is upon a Rock and his safety is not at all any of his own Handy-work As far as he beholds this All-sufficiency of Christ's Mediatorship the eye affects the heart to security and strength and crumbles all Self-sufficiency to powder and blows away the Egyptian Locusts of Guilt and Fears into the Red Sea and restores Pacification and Quiet to the Conscience and from this glorious Sanctuary the Soul comes forth to do the Actions of a new Life by the vertue of another Spirit the Spirit of Love and a sound Mind and worketh the Works of God in the World and takes pleasure in obeying the Truth and if it were possible it would actually keep the whole Law in as much as being now eternally knit to Christ's Person by Faith the Law by the Spirit of Christ is written in the heart This naked Reliance on Christ's Person was the great endeavour and left to us as the experience of the Apostles A Faith of which nature was exercised eminently by the holy Men of old Abraham Rom. 4. 20. David Psal 71. 16. Paul 1 Cor. 2. 2. and Phil. 3. 8 9. There were two foundational Reasons mentioned why the Soul is wholly to cast it self on the naked personal Merit of Jesus Christ viz. because he began our Righteousness and he only perfected the same for ever and those reasons well weighed have great strength and motive-vertue in them to beget Faith and besides 't is commanded as the absolute Condition of Salvation Act. 16. 31. Believe and thou shalt be saved in opposition to which Unbelief is made in the dispensation of the Gospel the reason of dying under the guilt of sin Joh. 8. 24. For the Gospel doth so perfectly hold out Jesus Christ to be the Propitiation for all the sins of the World through the value of his Death and open freeness of the Tender thereof that the very Hinge of Salvation and Damnation is turned upon the Faith of the heart therein or Unbelief thereof as being the most necessary and suitable Requisites for the stating of the Soul into an actual condition of Life or Death eternally Yea Christ pronounceth forgiveness of sins to the Palsie-man Luk. 5. 20. upon the meer Account of Believing And the Apostle Paul declares the Righteousness of God to be upon all that believe without making any difference upon any other respect Rom. 3. 22. This one thing saved the Thief upon the Cross when he had not opportunity to make Satisfaction for all the Wrongs and Robberies he had done This makes the Apostle Paul so laborious to preserve this Mystery from the least mixture of Legal Righteousness Gal. 5. 2. Because a Believer's State and Life is wholly by Grace 1 Cor. 15. 10. which entirely treats with the Faith of a Believer and not with his Works of Righteousness or Sin the one cannot help nor the other hinder because they are as the Elements of another World as they are called Gal. 4. 3. and can neither mend nor hurt that Justification by Jesus Christ revealed from Heaven to a Believer no more than Earthly Food can feed a Spirit or a material Sword wound an Angel And reason is because the Person of Christ is the Ark where Righteousness and Pardon is kept and conveyed singly by the Spirit of Grace to Faith which is the Acceptance of the same and so it is sure from any personal qualifications on Man's part to hinder it where 't is by the Spirit of Believing accepted Rom. 4. 16. This Justification of a sinner by Faith in the Personal Satisfaction and Righteousness of Jesus Christ is that which lays a firm ground for Assurance of Perseverance because the guilt of sin is done away and pardoned at the first believing on Jesus Christ and if they be then done away their guilt cannot really return for the pardon of sins and remembring them no more are joyned together Heb. 8. 12. Neither can sins committed after the Souls Conversion to God by Faith in Jesus Christ hazard the final state of such an one because his person was made accepted at the first closing with Christ by Faith and Pardon of sins is but the Consequent of the Acceptation of his Person Ephes 1. 6. Rev. 1. 5. So that Christ having espoused a sinner to himself by Faith doth wash him from his filth and presents him to himself at length without Spot Ephes 5. 25 26 27. and the person being recieved upon the account of meer Grace sin has no equal Plea against such an one because the strength of his Plea must be by the Law and Grace having supplanted the Accusation of the Law Joh. 1. 17. the Trial depends in another Court where sin is cast out Rom. 6. 17. And if sin could not at first hinder the Acceptation of the person much less can it procure a Dis-acceptation afterwards Rom. 5. 10. And besides the person of every Convert is considered in his true Interest through Grace in the Person of Jesus Christ in whom all Accusations are fully answered Faith having got this Foundation Encouragment and Rightful Interest in the Remission of Sins Righteousness Life and Peace sets it self by
puts them in a Bottle of Remembrance he createth Jewels for himself Jer. 31. 18. out of the Dunghill and rakes them together into his Cabinet When thou faintest he fainteth not Lie down upon him view the Travel that he has made in the Person of Christ and in the Word of his Grace throughout the Scriptures and say How unsearchable is his Understanding and Condescention How wonderfully and fearfully am I made How undeservedly how almightily how compleatly freely and throughly am I called by his Grace and led along this present Wilderness by the Right Hand of infinite care power and condescending compassionate faithfulness Oh the depth of the Wisdom and Knowledge of God in the Riches thereof How unsearchable are his judgments and his ways past finding out For of him and through him and to him are all things to whom be glory for ever Rom. 11. 33 and 36. Albeit God has laid the Foundation of Faith never so sure in the God in Jesus Christ the only life and breath of his people and the advantages thereof Person of Christ and so in himself as it stands revealed in the Scriptures and albeit the Principle of believing be planted in the heart at the first converting Work and Covenant-closure with Jesus Christ yet every acting of Faith is still kept in the power of his own Will and lies lock'd up from any exercise till he open his hand and fills the Soul with good things And this God doth for singular ends viz. 1. That God might be truly all in all and all in every part that his people might both be rich and yet not able to say My Goods are increased that he may appear to be not only the Author of their life but of the Breathing of their breath also and that the whole life of the new Creature might not be at the least distance from the heart of Christ as the Flame of the Candle cannot live without the Wick so is it impossible that the Faith or refreshment of heart can live one moment without supply of radical Moisture descending from the Head Jesus Christ Which doth not at all shew the uncertainty of a Believer's state but rather tends to assure the same by a frequent sending the Soul to God in Christ by whom it is established 2. It gives check to all allowed sin and turning the Grace of God into wantonness because he will not suffer the refreshment of his Grace to be any where but where he is himself 3. And as breathings are tokens of life so do renewed influences witness the reality of life arising from the Union of the Soul with Christ 4. It also tends to make the Soul watchful against distance from Christ lest the Breath of Life withdraw and the Soul faint insensibly and fall into the Myre of a defiled Mind and so into sinful Actions and a wounded Conscience 5. It leaves no room for sloth or sleepiness of heart lest the Locks of Communion with God's influential Presence should be cut and Strength be gone for no comfort or strength lives any longer than by faith it derives vigour from the heart and mind of Christ 6. It represents Mercy purely in that it sheweth that the standing of a Believer is meerly at the good pleasure of God and doth necessitate the Soul to be a resigned Attendant upon the meer Will of God and so allures the Soul by a necessary Conquest of Love not to live to it self but to the pure Will of him who died and rose again and quickens all things By which Resignment unto Mercy it rests on the heart of Christ and all the Fulness of God that is there 7. It gives ground of hope in sad hours for as the Clouds come so they go There is hope of a tree saith Job Job 14. 7. though it be cut down that it will spring again through the reviving moisture at the root And why art thou troubled saith David to his Soul I shall yet praise him Psal 43. 5. And besides 8. This coming and going of the Spirits influence is as a Fan which blows and brings forth the lustre of all Graces Hereby Patience Waiting and Hope are exercised Faith and Love are exercised and every Grace gets as it were a frequent new Birth in the Soul and the spiritual fondness of the Love is revived and not suffered to die Every new Breath of the Spirit is a new Application of the Soul's Ingrafture into Christ and Demonstration of his Power and is arrayed afresh as in the day of its first Espousals 9. And lastly It gives assurance of the Resurrection of the Body of which every Resurrection by Faith and Hope freely visiting the heart and bringing it again to God is the fore-runner Whiles my Meditations are musing and expatiating after the invisible God and would fain comprehend his way methinks I receive a check from Zophar Job 11. 7. Canst thou by searching find out God canst thou by searching find out the Almighty to perfection It is high as heaven What canst thou do Deeper than hell What canst thou know Keep within the revealed Word and in the patience and comfort of the Scriptures live by hope No flesh can see God and live Poor Man would be wise and see the upshot of all things but the Vessel of his Understanding cannot hold it Salvation by Christ has one kind of Rayment here another kind hereafter here it is a Kingdom of Patience and Hope but there a Kingdom of Glorious Enjoyment here is the Earnest there is the Fulness When I would look over and see some glimpses of Canaan a Jordan of difficulty stands in the way What an Adventure is it to go down into the depth of Death and the last concluding Change This is the last and great tryal of Faith to venture all my hope in Eternity at one Cast to expect to find the same God and Christ beyond the great Gulph who appears on this side by the Spirit of his Grace to enjoy the same God to Perfection whose Name I now call upon by Prayer O that victorious Faith which claspeth about that Love from which neither Life nor Death things present nor to come could divide Rom. 8. 38 39. I may not presumptuously go up into the Mount but be content a while with Wilderness-work there remaineth a Rest Return again O my Soul to thy labouring waiting state be upon thy Watch the Morning cometh by and by be not afraid to have thy Night changed into Day and all thy Weakness into Perfection only labour out thy Task and work out thy Salvation with fear and trembling in this day of Faith and Hope Am I called to work and travel How shall I undergo this Task Contemplation only is not the work of my twelve hours and Oh for freedom of heart and understanding that I may accomplish my work my Hirelings day Alas dear Christ I am willing to work thy works but would never be out of thy sight May I
not talk with thee and look upon thy face and yet work too The presence of my Christ makes any toil to be perfect freedom Methinks I can easier find in some measure my work throughout the whole Scriptures though that requires also the teachings of the Spirit necessarily than I can know how to compose my heart to keep the Faith of Union and Communion with God fresh and so to work and labour in the strength of that Fellowship whatever I do in the World When I am earnest in Contemplation I fear I fail in the matter of Action when I am acting I fear losing the Marrow of my Communion with my God Here lies Divine Skill to put both these together as being of the same nature and tending to the same end each of them helping and not hindring one another And to this end I desire help from on high to find out my way and method that I may so run that I may at length finish my course with joy The Spring of all Christian Conversation How to hold Communion with God in worldly business is Justifying Faith which cleanseth the Soul and quickens it at the same time by Union with Jesus Christ and as in the order of Nature Life is first infused before any Action of Life can appear so Faith being the accepting and digesting vertue which receives in a way of spiritual digesture Jesus Christ as the Bread of Life doth cleanse and save the Soul which new Life puts forth Actions of its own nature which Actions do add a Perfection of Growth and Manifestation but not of Essence to that new Life of Justification Regeneration and Reconcilement All good works of a holy Conversation are the improving of that Life but neither the cause nor matter of it the cause of it is the meer Grace and Favour of God Ephes 1. 4 5 6. the matter of this Life is the Spirit of Jesus Christ quickning the Soul through Union with it and from thence grows Action as the delightful Exercise of the Life of the new Man So that my more or less improvement must not question the Essence of this Life the least Action notes Life as well as the greatest though the vigour thereof be in a different measure and if I doubt of Life I cannot produce it by Action Leaves will not put life into the Tree but I am in that case by Soul-resigning and Self-renouncing Recumbency of heart to lie down upon Christ to receive Life from him All Life lies in the Root and comes thence by naked believing whereby God through Christ vents his own Life by meer Grace in my Soul that all Actions of Holiness may be no other than the Life of God working in me Now that the Soul may both enjoy its Communion with God and also act with vigour the works of Righteousness in an active Conversation there must be Order and Uniformity in every Action suitable to the Spirit of Communion with God without Order there can be no Peace but Confusion 1 Cor. 14. 23. and without Uniformity also arising from the Root of Union that is between the Action and the Spirit of the Actor there can be no Peace for Unity breeds Peace Ephes 4. 3. by making things different or distinguishable to agree in one by some common and uniting likeness or other And because this Uniformity seems naturally to offer it self to Consideration in the first place I would let a few thoughts pass upon it In all Christan and morally good Actions forbearing to speak of ungodly Actions which are plainly opposite to the Spirit of Holiness no Action though it be in it self materially good ought to be left to its own swinge but always ought to move in the hand of the Spirit as it gives direction by and suitable to the Word The natural motion of a Wheel is to run downwards yet we read Ezek. 1. 19 20 21. that the Spirit of the living Creature being in the Wheels it guided the Wheels from their natural motion to the pleasure and Will of the Spirit that was in the Wheels up or down hither or thither as the Spirit moved them the Spirit and the Wheels were made one in motion by reason of their Union And even so in all good Actions spiritually performed there is a Union betwixt the Principle of Holiness in the new Man and the outward Action that is done which forms the Action into a homogeneous suitableness to that inward Principle and prevents discord betwixt the Action and the Principle Thus it was with Job when he said My heart shall not reproach me Job 27. 6. And hence comes a peaceable Execution of any Actions when the Principle of Holiness does spirit the Action and the Action outwardly manifest a justifying Concurrence with the Principle in and by which it acts the Action and the Principle having the same united Tendency to the Will of God And as Union and Symphony betwixt a gracious efficient Principle and a gracious Action renders it a comfortable Service whatever the work be which is done so the Order betwixt these two do add a further supply to carry on a heavenly Conversation here on Earth The goodness of every Action as to Comfort in the Execution thereof ariseth from Communion with God for whom and to whom that Action and Service is performed Although both be the Exercise of the New Man yet each of them act in their own order the heart is first under true warmth within and then the suitable discoveries do follow Psal 39. 3. While I was musing saith David the fire burned and then spake I with my tongue A good Action loseth its inward beauty when it keeps not its inside order it is numbred amongst dead works and moves but in a ghastly manner when the Spirit within moves not first much like to the irrational Actions of a Man who walks up and down and talks by some strength of fancy when he is in a dead sleep all the while But when the Root of Communion with God bears the Soul forth unto fruitfulness in any Service that Service is comely because it springs naturally from a Spirit of Faith in the New Man and carries along the nature of the New Man in whatsoever is done These two being observed would so carry on the course of Christianity that in the various affairs of this life inward Peace would not be broken there would be readiness at all times to pray praise and rejoyce Thus Abraham and Enoch walked with God and this is the glorious Promise They shall walk up and down in the name of the Lord Zach. 10. 12. All good Actions being thus rooted and ordered have the Glory of God in their eye and run forth in way of duty and carry with them the encouragement of Acceptation with God And although the Actions of such a man may visibly be successless yet his heart is never wrung with disappointment because his secret Communion with and Subjection to
Society and sometimes Retirement puts me behind-hand All my Composedness is soon discomposed Let thy eye be upon me O my God according to thy word and water me every moment Isa 27. 3. lest any thing assault and hurt my Soul which thou hast redeemed and quicken my faith and hope in thy Word for this Many a wretched stop do I meet with pardon me O my Lord and my God and renew a Spirit of truth tenderness sincerity and rightly seasoned heart for the work I am now upon My scope and meaning in giving my hand and closing with this Covenant of my God is further this viz. that through his help I will ascribe truth to all the words of his Promises by believing them and receiving them as that which shall be accomplished that I will labour to keep the Majesty of the Promiser in my eye and to preserve the faith and hope of his fulfilling his Word upon the account of his unsearchable Wisdom and Faithfulness and not by my uncertain taste that no Guilt of Sin shall keep me from the Fountain wherein Sinners are to be cleansed that I will through the Guidance of his Spirit aspire after a more practical and accustomed Exercise in living the life that I live by the faith of the Son of God and resting from my own works reach after that self-denying Activity which issues from my Union with Christ as my Head O my Lord mould my heart into this life this is the very Pearl that I would willingly sell all to get What a lovely Comportment would it settle between the Actions of my outward and inward Man How would it teach my Soul to rule my Body How willingly would my Soul and Body then be contradicted and take pleasure to be thwarted by the Spirit of Christ when the Crown is settled on the Head of the new Creature and the Scepter of Government in its hand acting as in the Throne of Christ in the vertue of his pure Life and glorious Arm and every imagination of the heart bowing down before it Oh when shall my inward Man be thus cloathed with Glory and Power looking forth through all my Sences as the Morning fair as the Moon and terrible as an Army with Banners This Gate of Heaven I would aspire towards through that means of Victory which overcometh the World the Devil and an earthly Mind even through the faith of the Son of God This is that which I have in my eye although it be as a Land that is afar off I faint with desire stay me and strengthen me with the Flagons of Hope O thou who hast suffered me to touch the Skirt of thy Garment and brought me within the Covenant of his Grace When I consider the Soveraignty of God that he doth whatsoever he will in Heaven and Earth that sometimes he has deserted his people as to the powerful Communications of Grace as it was with David Peter and others in the time of their sinful Back-sliding when I consider these things I begin to stagger about the constant Immutability of God's Purpose and uninterrupted Good Will which he declares in the Covenant Heb. 13. 8. Jer. 32. 40. who saith I will not turn away from them to do them good and I will put my fear into their hearts that they shall not depart from me And therefore to obviate this heart-fainting mistake I resolve to nourish the faith of his constant Love and Good Will in his Covenant upon the ground of his unchangeable Nature that he is not as a man that he should lie nor as the son of man that he should repent that nothing can come to pass but what is the effect of his Purpose that his Covenant is everlasting and his Purpose of Love therein the same for ever Jer. 31. 35. and 32. 40 41. that his Purpose to them whom he calls up to take hold of his Covenant is wholly a Purpose of Love and Grace 2 Tim. 1. 9. that he complains when a doubting heart makes question of it Isa 40. 27. that it is confirmed by the death of the Testator that the cause of Alienation is removed viz. the Guilt of my Sin by the one compleat and compleating Offering of the Body of Christ that Christ ever lives to intercede and is always heard because the Will of the Father and Son is the same Will breathing it self forth to the Objects of Grace by the everlasting Spirit And therefore when I seem to be forsaken I resolve to believe that that desertion is only Physick And to enquire what it is that God teacheth me thereby that so I may see ground as satisfyingly to thank him for the gracious frowns of his unchangeable Love as for his gracious Smiles and to take the advantage of that season to crave his Aid more importunately to loath my sinful self and to revive afresh more purely self-denying Exercises of believing and resigning to him fearing his righteous Judgments patiently waiting when the Spirit that I have grieved will return again with the Manifestation of his gracious Presence to my Soul In all these Considerations Resolutions and Desires in my Covenanting with God my meaning further is that I accept of Jesus Christ as he is the Gift of God to be the whole Covenant to me to work Faith and give the things believed to work desires and give the things desired to act for me and in me that the Covenant may never fail from me because of my sins and miscarriages in regard he has satisfied Justice in my stead and brought me into his everlasting Righteousness nor I fail from the Covenant through Unbelief and a languishing view of my own Infirmity because he is my Strength to labour Author and Finisher of my Faith who gave himself to sanctifie me by the Spirit of Regeneration in the Application of his Word to me for quickning that so Christ may be all in all to fulfil the Engagement of God to me and my Engagement in his Name to God And seeing that Breaches are like to fall out often on my part that he would still stand in the Gap that those Breaches may not obstruct the Good Will and Mercy of God from me nor harden my heart from him that so the Grace of the Covenant on God's part in Christ towards me and on Christ's part for me towards God may remain in the eye of my Faith inviolable when the Peace of the Covenant through my sinful diversions and darkness is interrupted and bruised And that he would still recover me again into a renewed personal Covenanting with God that in his Person I may behold eternal and sure Mercies as the Sun in the Firmament as the days of Eternity Psal 89. 29. And that by his Mediation and Suretyship applied to me by the effectual working of his Spirit I may in my own person be drawn under his shadow to recover my Hold-fast and have my face set towards the Covenant And that he would still lead me
married Estate and therein to favour me with the Society of one whom I account and believe to be precious in his sight and thereby called me to some further Exercise of Faith and a nearer Approach to himself for all Supply and Succour under the Wing of his Counsel Goodness Care and Faithfulness for Soul and Body and for his blessed Presence Good Will and Favour to my self and mine And withal in regard a very dark Cloud appears hovering over the Church of Christ I thought it my duty to betake my self to the surest Hold and to retire afresh into the Arms of God himself And therefore being under much sence of the loose earthly frame of my own heart I resolved to renew upon my Soul the Obligations of the fore-mentioned Covenant which through the favour of God I have this day done lying down at the Feet of a Gracious God I have again though with feeble hands been taking hold of Jehovah ' s Covenant humbly taking him to be my God and giving my self and mine to him I do I say with much struggling yet with some sincerity in my desire take God to be my Portion and exceeding great Reward and do render my self and all that concerns me to him and to his Will this present 23d of May 1666. and for ever And do subscribe the same with my own Hand Henry Dorney Moreover in a former Sickness and under Bodily Ailments being asked whether there were any thing burthensome upon his Spirit he replied I have no distrust in him whom I have believed I feel no sting at all There is no oppressing thing upon me no quelling thing in my Spirit Nothing troubles me from within nor without His Desires after Glory were His Desires after Glory in a peculiar manner exerted in his last and Dying Speeches and Prayers and at other times before in many and various Instances and chiefly upon this Ground that he should then be perfectly freed from Sin and serve God without distraction And it may be useful here to mention this following Passage that a dear Friend once making his moan to him about vain impertinent Thoughts wherewith he was greatly haunted and troubled in Attendance on God in Duty He said to him no more than this That that very thing should make us willing to be gone hence to be with Christ He had an entire Respect to His universal Obedience all God's Commands avoiding all Appearance of Evil and laying hold of all Opportunities for receiving and doing good and his very Soul was in it and it seemed as natural to him as for a person to eat when he is hungry Yea he was as a Creature out of his Element most uneasie and restless whilst he was not actually so exercised And his Submission to the Will of God's Providence as always so it was remarkably instanced in his last Sickness and also in a former Sickness when he was heard to say Lord if it may please thee make my Passage easie If thou wilt have me go meaning his departure by Death I am willing If thou wilt have me to stay a little longer I am willing but Oh! for Sufficiency of Divine Aid Likewise it was observed in these Petitions he offered up to God in Prayer That the Lord would manage every one of our Thoughts and spiritualize them for his whole Will and that his Spirit may have the Sovereignty in our hearts And seeing it is the property of his People so far as they are spiritualized to love and delight in all his Statutes and to love his commanding Will and Word as well as his promising Word That he would lead us into the Light and Life of Jesus Christ and cause us to yield up our selves universally to his Rule and Government and greedily take in all that Grace and Kindness he hath offered to us and get up into the Region of Christ's Teaching and Leading That we might be formed to his liking and as a People whom he delighteth to own and love and be fitted for the whole Will of God that he would have us to submit unto His Mortification was clearly His Mortification evinced by his Behaviour towards that which should be always the Objective Matter for that Grace to be exercised upon and by these directions he proposed as Means and Persuasives to it That we should always seek an occasion against the Flesh as 't is said of the King of Syria He seeketh a Quarrel against me and when we cannot pray it down or meditate it down then apply our selves to good Company and holy Conference with others and be ever engaged one way or other with one Weapon or other against the Flesh as Sampson against the Philistines who sought an occasion against them And that the way to receive any Temporal Mercy is to be dead to it And that as they that will be rich fall into Temptation and a Snare the like it may be said of those that will not be poor And he further added that we must be mortified as well to Saints as Sinners if we will have true Peace And that if all things were in a right frame the Soul would be dead to all carnal and earthly things and be ever under full Sail for Heaven and how then would the Breath of Grace appear in all the Actions of our Lives And for the promoting of this necessary Work he was observed earnestly to pray That mortifying renewing Grace might always appear active in us and that there might be a secret delight in us to take Vengeance of all that carnal Frame and corrupt Inclination that is within us and an eager desire to have this Body of Death crucified and taken away That a Sentence of Death might pass upon this Body of Sin and Death in us which Christ died to remove That this Body of Death might be battered down and wasted day by day And that he would cause us always to have a War against the Law of Sin within us And that we might long to have it subdued and the Soveraignty of God's Grace advanced in our Souls And that our Affections and Desires might decay more and more towards all things that are of a fading perishing Nature And that he would crucifie and destroy in us all the Attempts of the Body of Sin wherewith we are continually haunted And that he would help us to quit our selves as those that are engaged to God and favoured by him and know what it is to have our Natures changed and the natural Enmity slain And that we might be transplanted into Jesus Christ and made one with him That the things above might be the great things in our eye and have more Room in our hearts and the things here below accounted little and be of low Esteem with us The constant seriousness of his His constant Seriousness Spirit was seen not only in his Carriage but in his Cautions to others about it saying that there are many thousand Professors
I long for the Effusion of the Spirit remarkably promised in thy Word and for the Resurrection of the Body which now is sown in Weakness but then 't will be raised in Power and cry out to be cloathed upon with Power from on high And he further said That the want of this Conviction of our own Weakness makes us lose the Juice of Religion And that we can no more live by Grace already received than a Man can live upon his Food the day after he hath eaten it That therefore we must have the Mouth of our Souls never divided from the Fountain even God himself for we live our Life our spiritual Life upon the Flower of Free Grace only And that the Spirit of God would have us to see what we are even without Strength that God's Mercy might appear the more abundant and the Gospel be glorified in its Power that so a poor Christian may be necessitated to believe in and on Jesus Christ forced into this glorious Sanctuary made to cling on the Horns of this Altar and fly to this City of Refuge as his Zoar of Safety And he likewise said That could we live in the Faith of this that God orders every particular thing and rules all the Affairs of his People that he hath a secret Care of them and for them under all That his Providence is never off the Wheel What Relief would it be We might then pass through thick and thin and it would raise the Soul strangely on the Wing For Faith which is the sence and feeling of the Soul lies in looking unto God's Power Wisdom and Faithfulness in the Promise We have heard much of the Doctrine of Faith and now God is teaching us the Life of Faith This was spoken when under a very pressing Affliction And he further added That Faith hath no dependence upon the Creature Cast thy burthen upon the Lord and he shall sustain thee Psal 55. 22. Faith is an adventurous Cast Cast not away thy self nor thy burthen any where else Oh that we knew what it were to live in God to be brought out of our selves and to dwell there no more And that we have as great need to lock up our selves as it were in God when we go to Bed as to lock up our Doors if we would be kept from Assaults for we have as much cause to fear lest Satan and our depraved Nature should make a Prey of our Souls as of Thieves and Robbers lest they should make a Spoil of our Goods Let us therefore give away our selves to God Morning and Evening and from Evening to Morning and be always in the Spirit of Faith and Holiness Likewise he was observed to say that a holy and free Contentment in all God's Dealings is that we should most labour after for that the happiness of the Soul consists not in the bare Enjoyment of any Mercy but in the God of the Mercy That if it hath his Presence though in the Shadow of Death it hath content for outward Good or Misery is but a fancy seeing we are never the more truly happy if we have much or miserable if we have but little of this World But 't is the Enjoyment of God in any Condition must be our All in all And that we should make God and the things of God the natural Centre of the Soul and all other things we go about as if we were constrained to it We make full Experience that we have Justifying Faith when we can trust God as well for outward things as for Pardon of Sin and Salvation 'T is a woful Religion we profess when we cannot live upon God in the want of all things else Wherefore let us not rest till we get some feeding Fruitfulness in such Meditations and to have the Lord alone exalted in our Souls His Expressions in Prayer did also declare his great Dependence on God which were to this purpose That all our Concerns might be upon his heart and we owned and refreshed in him That our Souls might evermore be acted and possessed by his Spirit And that he would continue in us a hankering after him and satisfaction in him giving us in a Cast in a way of spiritual Quickning and Reviving to our Souls And that we might be under his Care and kept in his Arms and walk in his Fear causing our Acquaintance with him to grow and increase daily c. He conversed more with Heaven than Earth while he remained His Heavenly-mindedness on it And this was discerned in his Conversation and by the Sayings of his Lips which dropped as an Honey-Comb on all occasions and particularly in such words as these Things visible are the Product of things invisible and purely spiritual and therefore invisible things are the more excellent for the things which are seen were not made of things that do appear The Glory of the unseen Trade of a Christian is not so discernable now but the time will come when all seen things shall be dissolved and then it will stand forth Outward things of Sence are comfortable to the World but things unseen to the People of God are of a Soul-raising Power mounting the Soul above that which causeth Fainting for those spiritual things they look on believingly as having a real Interest in them else they would not give any Relief And whilst a Christian hath a sight of unseen things by Faith when great Gusts of Trouble come there is no room for Fear Therefore there should be a daily Converse with unseen things and we should not rest till we can see them with some Evidence and Clearness And the Soul should range up and down in this Garden of Delights not suffering that Converse to cool And that the entertaining but a little distance from God dulls the sight of him And when the Soul is looking with overmuch Intention on Worldly things it dazles the Eye as to invisible Glories And when it suffers any outward Trouble inordinately to bear in it makes the Eye goggle from that which should fix it But a good Muse on things unseen would allay calm and supple the Soul and make it steady in its Course Therefore Oh give me things unseen should we say There let my Share be It was further observed that the things of God and Religion became as it were natural to him and as it hath been said by some that spiritual things flowed from him as Water from a Fountain And what he spake thereof proceeded from an inward Sence and not so much from Head and Memory as from his Heart and Experience whence an Authority and Lustre was derived to it His Humility was visible to His Humility all for he was cloathed with it there being not the least Appearance of Pride or Vain-Glory that was discernable in him He had a very mean esteem of his own Gifts Parts and Graces And as he had a low respect towards himself so according to Scripture-Precept he esteemed others
of my own Righteousness Rom. 6. 14. Tit. 3. 5. but I am under the Law of my own Lord which is to receive him and own his Righteousness as my own for he is the Lord my Righteousness When I believe then I obey for I am commanded to believe in the Name of the only begotten Son of God when I cast my self on him that fulfilled the whole Law then I fulfil the whole Law when I cast my self on his Righteousness I am in God's sight as white as Snow my sins in this new state are rather accounted my diseases than my faults for if I am not my own my sins are not my own but accounted his who loved me and washed me in his Blood This Obedience of Faith has the sight of Christ's Fulness and the Promises of the new Covenant to lean upon and so it takes its Journy from Flesh to Spirit from Weakness to Strength in the Name of the Lord. And from this Obedience in believing which is the highest and mysterious Obedience proceeds all manner of holiness as the fruits thereof which receive their Sap from this Root this Root makes them to be living Obedience as Branches from the same Root Children of the same Parent The first Subjection is to the Righteousness of Christ's Person to submit all Fear and Guilt to the fulness of Pardon and Life that is in him as the Store-house and there to enjoy it in the enjoying of him and then by the Spirit of Life which is in Christ the Soul with freedom acts forth answerably in some measure to such a renewed state from whence all Actions of Holiness are called the Fruits of Faith and Fruits of Righteousness Phil. 1. 11. 2 Cor. 9. 10. Col. 1. 6. 2 Pet. 1. 4 5 6 7 8. After my Return from One of Faiths dark days and yet delivered I found sore Breaches made upon my Soul my inward Man had suffered loss while I travelled up and down my Soul was violently shaken the Bands of the wicked one conspired with my wicked heart and carried away my treacherous Soul so that my Glory was captivated into the Enemies hand A Wind from the Wilderness laid me in confusion the Tempest prevailed and I suffered Shipwreck all my own feeble Endeavours and former Meditations gave way and the raging Sea of filthy and foolish thoughts did beat sore upon me My Ship of former Resolutions of heart and my poor discovery of the Salvation of God was bulged and ready to sink yet my heart yerned after the Lord my Rock I cried secretly though confusedly to my God and he yet reserved a Plank for my almost drowned Soul to swim to the Shoar He has not utterly removed Mercy from me he has been yet preaching his own Free Grace to my Soul through a Voice of Thunder and Lightning Let me yet hear thy Voice O thou Preserver of Men let me yet gather up advantage through my loss help me yet to receive recovering and establishing vertue from my strong Hold. While my thoughts were thus working I endeavoured to get once more into the Sanctuary of God and there I found that although I carry about a Hell within me yet that Hell cannot devour the infinite Covenant of Peace which God made My Unbelief and Disobedience cannot make the Faith of God to be of no effect I would have lived upon Grace and Strength recieved and I trembled to see those selfish Confidences shaken to the Earth but now methinks Christ calls me again from my Father's House and promiseth me a better Name than that of Sons and Daughters of my own a Name in himself an Off-spring in himself Psal 45. 16. Isa 56. 5. which shall not be cut off I have had a Sentence of Death in my self that I might not trust any more in my self but in God who raised the Dead I am a dry Tree but he who was raised from the Dead is a green Tree and in him is my Fruit found O the Mystery and Power of this Salvation wherewith I am saved O that I might pass as it were through the Eye of a Needle into Christ's Power and there rest from the days of adversity And this Rest is glorious because 't is uncompounded it receives no Ingredients from abroad 't is singly made up of Christ and in him alone Venture O my Soul upon this naked Arm for 't is an Arm of Faithfulness and Mercy This Strength alone is a Fountain of Strength this is the River whose Streams make glad the City of God Wilt thou not be undone O my Soul that thou mayest be saved How long wilt thou set up thy Post by the Pillars of that Salvation which is wrought in God for thee and wrought in thee by single Union with God in Jesus Christ Is not his Arm stronger than thine Be thou translated by Faith into Divine Strength Let not thy Wine be mixed with Water Thy Confidences are rejected make a Voyage to the everlasting Hills enter into the Mount of God Thou hast broken both the Tables of the Covenant and yet the Prince of the same Covenant lives Wait for the Spirit to draw it over again and again by the indelible Character of his own Finger who lives to enliven thee for ever How hard is it to depart from Self from righteous Self and sinful Self I am wounded by sinful Self that I might flee from righteous Self and sinful Self also and cast Anchor only within the Vale. I am weary of the instability of the Streams Oh let me go to the Fountain When I am saying I shall die in my Nest my Nest is soon fired about my ears and turned to ashes Certainly there is a better Rest than this and it lieth in trusting Christ and trusting in him only I both trust Christ and trust in Christ when I believe that he is the Standard of all saving Righteousness communicable to Man and all my Righteousness and Holiness is but the Reflection of his I trust in Christ when I live resignedly at his Feet to be made holy And whatsoever composure of heart I do at any time receive I do not nor cannot hold it but 't is held by him while it remains and when it withdraws it lives in the Root for me I am ready to think if I had all Graces in my own dispose I would manage them to the Glory of God but how can God be glorified more than in a holy Content to live at his Allowance All his design is to allure me and so to force me out of my self to live in him as well as to live by him he bestows his Grace within doors I must not take his Graces to my self to put it to Usury for Increase but must fetch the Increase as well as the Principal from him by Union with him through Jesus Christ and my work is to rest on his Faithfulness Wisdom Willingness and Readiness to supply me as if every Grace of the Spirit were fully in
the Will of God being the grand purpose of his heart in all he doth delivers him into a holy Rest and maintains an inclination to work still without repining because he is assured his work is not in vain in the Lord. So far as the Will of God appears he is quiet with joy because the pleasure of his work lies in doing God's Will and not his own Communion with God makes up every Breach with an All-sufficiency Disappointments do lock him up within the Sanctuary of God and keeps the Soul at home in the pure tastes of that Communion with God in which it lives Psal 73. 17 25. in a readiness to every good work His good Actions though small as a Cup of cold Water or successless as Isaiah's preaching seemed to him to be Isa 49. 4. yet those works cannot be lost because Communion with God cannot be lost in the vertue of which those works were done through Jesus Christ But while I am thus travelling The Soul sensible of a cold Fit through the Consideration of several P 〈…〉 s redounding to a Believer 〈…〉 way of fruitfulness therein I feel methinks many cold fits to seize upon me as it was in the day that Abraham was troubled with the Fowls which fell upon the Carcases which God commanded him to divide for confirmation of his Promise which Abraham drove away till the Sun went down and when a deep sleep and horrour of great darkness fell upon him then even then did a fresh assurance of the Covenant break forth upon him as Gen. 15. 13. So while I am pursuing after this Salvation of God I find the Clouds gather about me I find not the same sensible Entertainment of the Salvation of God in my heart as sometimes I have done my Soul is filled with guilt and weakness and therefore am forced to retire back from the pursuing the necessary and practical Meditations about the Conversation of Godliness for a season lest I leave an Enemy at my back that is ready to invade me which Enemy if it please the Lord to scatter by his Spirit I shall be more able to attempt the Meditations of the works of Holiness and have fresh Activity to put on the Garments of Fruitfulness in the Service which I owe to Jesus Christ my Lord than methinks for present I am Inward Rejoycing and Peace has been much bruised for certain days by weakness guilt and distraction that has seized on my heart there it lies like a Mountain of Lead when my thoughts would turn inwards I hear nothing but Outcries of Accusation and Guilt possessing my heart I can find no shelter at home I am forced to fly abroad for a Lodging for Company and Food I am now invited to renew my self a Nest above my own heart my heart is grown hard dark and weak it prevails against my former sense of Divine Presence and while it is thus filled with the clamours of Death and Confusion methinks I hear the Spirit and Bridegroom say Come arise this is not your Rest lanch forth through the Ocean of Free Grace and let not thy expectation hanker towards thy self though thy flesh fail and thy heart fail yet God is the strength of thy heart and thy portion for ever My work is to go forth and Oh that I could make a fair Escape to him who stands upon the Shoar to receive me it is not a few Meditations that will do it it needs a Redeemer's hand to fetch me out and pull me up The delight of the New Man is The Soul flies out of all manner of selfish help to Jesus Christ only to be under the Government of the Spirit only and all the Issues of the Spirit flow from the heart of Christ only by which the heart of a Believer is made new in him This Newness lies especially in the Spirit of a Believer which complies with the Spirit of God in the Witness of Adoption even whiles the contradiction of defiled Nature warreth against it And upon the single Interest of this Consideration and Union betwixt Christ and the Soul yielding it self to the renewing of his Spirit doth Faith go forth and claim Forrein Aid viz. the Aid of Jesus Christ to whom it is united in Conveyance of which Aid Christ first takes the Soul more closely into the vertue of that Union that every crumb of his help may truly savour of that Relation which is betwixt him and the Soul through the New Covenant and gives out no saving and effectual Aid otherwise than as the Product and Off-spring of that Union that so Christ may be all in all as the Treasury and efficient Cause of all Relief and that the Soul through spiritual Union only might derive that Relief to it self by Faith and as the Foundation of the Union lies on free Grace so the Application thereof and the abundant help arising thence is carried on through the method of free Grace only for Faith can converse with nothing in order to the Life of the New Man but Free Grace only in the Promse The very nature of free Promises do present to the Soul the consideration of all Relief to lie originally in God and that the Soul is invited thither only to fetch it and cannot possibly return empty for the dispensation of which Grace to the Sons of Men God manifests himself in the Person of the Son who dwells in Humane Nature displaying the Evidence of this Grace in the Gospel and by his Spirit persuades the believing Soul to accept and improve it And the Soul being thus persuaded that his life lies in Christ upon a free Covenant grounded in God's Decree established on free Promises may not stay to ask leave of his guilty heart whether he be fit to lay hold upon this Deliverance but must rather consider the freeness of Grace Pardon and Righteousness which is in this new and living way which God hath made and not Man If Elijah had poured only on the parched Earth that was under his feet he could have had no Argument of Moysture to arise from thence but having by faith prayed to him who governed the Clouds down came Rain and the Drought vanished Guilt of Sin is like a Hedge or a Wall that can easily keep the heart in Impenitency and Unbelief but when Faith working by Repentance seizeth on Jesus Christ it gives Wings to the Soul of a Believer to fly up above all those hindrances of natural Guilt and Weakness and though Sin and Death remain in his Flesh yet he is got beyond the Captivity of the Law of Sin which can no more keep him from the Freedom wherewith Christ hath made him free than a Hedge can keep an Eagle from soaring up in the Air. The Sap which feeds Guilt is Unbelief now when the Sap is withdrawn the Tree dies away by degrees although it remains in its place for a season so is it with the Old Man it combers the heart a while but
Christ at his death gave it such a Wound that will never be cured till it has by the Faith and Prayer of every Believer bled it self to death When Guilt seems to live most and so sends a Believer afresh to Christ then does Guilt die apace and remains only to keep a Believer's faith in continual exercise and render Christ precious to the Soul as cold Weather makes a Fire the more comfortable and pleasant so that while my Soul holds close to this that Christ is upon his own terms Righteousness Pardon and Life to me by making me his and he being mine my own guilt becomes no longer my own because I am no longer my own but his who bought me with his blood and as guilt is removed so the fear of falling away is removed and relief against daily infirmities provided for If being an Enemy I was reconciled by his Death much more being reconciled shall I be daily saved by his Life Rom. 5. 10. But whence ariseth this that I Faith only a relief against daily infirmity find it harder to relie on him for power against daily infirmities than against the power of condemning Guilt Daily Infirmities are the lesser Enemies but yet they are present Enemies and seeming smaller in stature than the great bulk of universal Humane Guilt the Soul of a Christian is apt to step forth against them in his own strength and resolution and so returns many times with shame whereas the same Covenant which takes away the stony heart and state of Guilt is that only which gives a heart of flesh and cleanseth the Soul from all unrighteousness I cannot therefore mortifie one foolish filthy or distracted thought without the application of the whole power of the same Christ who has removed my great and condemning guilt and cast it into the Sea I am apt foolishly to think that my great guilt being removed I may in some sort take my ease which degenerates more and more into spiritual sloth and unthankfulness but my daily infirmities are like a pricking Bryar which continually afflicts me and lets me know that this is not my Rest neither will my own hands put away these Bryars but only the consuming fire of Christ's Spirit setting his Death and Resurrection in Battel Array against them So that I see if ever I expect a good hour in this World or to all Eternity it must be only and all over in Jesus Christ O cursed Nature O cursed Sloth that is ever dividing that which a blessed Covenant of Grace has joyned together Jesus Christ and my Soul All his drift towards me is that he might be all in all to me Oh that he would vent himself and spare not he that bids me fear not only believe is only able to make me believe I often draw near methinks to some Resignation to him with some universal scope but am quickly gravelled again yet so much delight remains in the very hope of my Soul towards him that makes me chuse rather to have my eyes towards him though with a long look than to say within my heart My Beloved will never come surely he will yet come and his Reward is with him This Resignation to God is so glorious in the Nature Ground Properties Resignation and encouraging Privileges of it that the very glimpse thereof makes my heart light and even faint for desire to be wholly swallowed up and translated in Spirit Soul and Body into the pure Rest and Crystal Life of God but the nature of it I can no more express than a Man's Pensil can draw the Portraicture of a Man's Life or represent the nature of a Taste albeit it may draw the Figure of a Humane Body or represent the visible Food in which lies that hidden quality of Life and Taste But if words may be used about it I would thus express it 'T is an allaying delightful willing The nature of Resignation open-hearted dissolving of all my desires cares and enjoyments of things present and to come relating to Soul and Body into the heart and unlimited disposure of God in Jesus Christ my Lord with an endless victorious Security of Confidence Consolation and Peace of heart and Conscience The ground of which glorious active and Soul-quickning Rest is The Ground of it Jesus Christ the Mediator who has received his Redeemed to the Glory of God Rom. 15. 7. He is called their Peace Mich. 5. 5. their Rest Isa 28. 12. their Sufficiency 2 Cor. 3. 5. Comfort 2 Cor. 1. 3. Joy Psal 43. 4. and All in all Col. 3. 11. In all these respects Jesus Christ becomes the ground and attractive cause of Resignation as he is God and Man bringing the Soul through Union with his Humanity to God with whom he is personally united 1 Pet. 3. 18. into which Union every Believer is received through the Mystery of his free Grace Joh. 17. 21. and the Application of this Union to the Soul by Faith breeds this blessed Resignation for Christ being thus qualified in his own Person and thus uniting the Soul to himself by his Spirit begets in the heart through believing an answerable Counterpane of Conformity and Quiet in the Inward Man which cannot be capable of loss because the unchangeable God is the Author and unalterable Cause thereof nor be obstructed while Faith holds up its exercise therein but runs out into an infiniteness of Satisfaction in all cases because it is got with the help and expiating boundless Interest of him who is infinite It enters in by the Door of his Manhood to the partaking of whatever he is Heir to and is made Heir with him of his Conquest Fulness Security Peace and Joy so that albeit the Flesh may fail God being the portion of a Believer faileth not but always unchangeably continueth in the Mystery of this Union to be the Foundation and effecting Cause of a Believer's Resignation to him as into the hands of a faithful Creator 1 Pet. 4. 19. Jesus Christ himself is the glorious Model of Resignation for God in Christ resigned up himself to the Nature of Man Heb. 2. 14. and being the Eternal Son resigned up himself to the Will of his Father to be made a Servant and he who is the Law-giver resigns himself subject to the Law God over all blessed for ever resigns himself to the Curse of the Law he resigns up the freedom of his own Will to a voluntary Covenant he undertakes as it were the encumbrance of a Family and accounts the cries of many Infants about him no disturbance but a delight he resigned up his Body to death and became of no Reputation that out of his Dust he might bring many Sons to Glory he resigned up his heart to bear their sins and sorrows he hath resigned up whatever he is to be theirs that they might be his and be saved both living and dying from all wants and fears through his Resignation of himself to stand or fall with
them and from every part of his Resignation sends forth his Spirit to work Resignation also in them according to the measure of his own Gift in every part of his mystical Body by virtue of that Union to which he hath called them with himself and herein lies the ground and foundation of a Believer's holy Resignation to God As for the Properties of this holy Properties of Resignation Resignation there is a notion of weakness and subjection in the Resigned and of Power and Dominion in the Person to whom Resignation is made There is also an Alienation of some proper and private Interest and a change thereof into the Interest of another And so it is in the Resignation of the Soul to God The Soul being sensible of its own inability bequeaths it self to the Almighty Redeemer and doth subject it self to the Rules of his Dominion as the Clay to the hand of the Potter and so every Nerve of the Soul is loosed and lies down at the Will and Disposure of the Lord to do as it seemeth good unto him and so the Soul ceaseth from its own private Interest and submits it self to the Merit Mercy and Laws of the Mediator to be dieted cloathed and employed by him only and lives no longer by the Life of his own hand Isa 57. 10. Hos 14. 3. Now he stretcheth forth his hands and another girds him and leads him whither his fleshly Reason would not he knows never a step of his way but as the Word and Spirit guides him Isa 42. 16. he dares not say his Sins are his own nor his Righteousness his own but as Christ in the Gospel directs and suffers him to think and speak he can neither accuse nor excuse himself neither judge nor acquit himself any otherwise than as he who bought him will allow and give his consent Numb 30. 7 8. because he is now uuder the Dominion and Interest of another and is no longer his own but married to him who was raised from the dead Resignation is a free Act and is managed in the Will aiming to prevent a greater Evil or obtain a greater Good and therefore carries some content and delight with it and which is so much the more increased as the Power Authority and Faithfulness of the Person resigned to is great and sure so is it with a Believer's Resignation to God in Jesus Christ every glimpse of his infinite Power Truth and Mercy redounds to the increase of a Believer's refreshment because he hath a Right therein by Resignation thereunto in the Person of Jesus Christ and it eyes his Person in all the Worth Perfection and Excellency thereof in such a way of propriety therein that it affecteth the heart and makes way for the influence of that worth to enter upon the Mind and Affections and so renders it active according to the Mind of Christ and Spirit of the Gospel to obey believe and live upon that Mind of Christ represented to the Understanding improving his Worth by a sanctified Application to every part of the New Man as a holy Oyl sinking into every Faculty of the Soul and naturally inclining it to every Exercise of that new State to which it is begotten and brought forth by a spiritual Resignation The blessed Privileges which arise from hence are innumerable as God Privileges of Resignation to whom the Resignment is made is unmeasurable and infinite The Soul of a resigning Believer enters into Purity Establishment Protection Peace Love Liberty Boldness Satisfaction and Joy in the Holy Spirit and gains an entrance abundantly into the Kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ As a Stick of Wood cast into the fire is changed into the property of Purity that fire so the casting of the Soul into the Blood of the immaculate Lamb abides no longer filthy but spotless through the price and preciousness of that Blood the Spirit of which Blood removes the Conscience and private owning of Guilt and transfers it into the Laver of Christ's Satisfaction and comes forth cloathed with Pardon Righteousness and Acceptation in the sight of God the righteous Judge who has constituted a Satisfaction to himself by such a method that his Mercy to a Sinner might be an Act of Righteousness to Jesus Christ the Mediator and that by Resignation to Christ a Believer might enjoy it in enjoying Christ whose nature is also shed abroad in the heart by the washing of the new Birth through the Word of his Grace to mortifie and cleanse the heart as a Seal of Implantation into the perfect Righteousness and Acceptation of his Person who bought it with his Blood Gal. 2. 20. 1 Joh. 1. 9. Which Resignation gives Establishment by engaging him who Establishment bears up the Pillars of the Earth to bear a poor sinner's weight and keep it from reeling Resignation doth incorporate a Believer into the very Rock of Ages it conveyeth a Sinner through the Word of Free Grace and Power clean from his own sin and gives it an Arrival in the very Breast of Christ where it abides without sin or change 1 Joh. 3. 6. Though sin remain in the natural Man and dwells with Humane Flesh through the whole Circuit of the first Adam's state yet Faith rejoyns the Soul into the second Adam who is wholly pure as the first Adam is wholly sinful So that a sinner in coming to him resigns himself up from perfect sin to perfect purity The Body of Christ as it is mystically below remains for a season under the washing of the Word but as it is mystically married to Christ risen from the Dead and sitting at the Right Hand of God with him 't is pure as the Sun in its brightness and established for ever above all shaking storms of the lower Region whether it be Guilt Change or Danger Resignation doth naturally claim Protection as appears in the case of Protection the Gibeonites Josh 10. 4 5 6. Charity and Pity would induce a noble Mind to help the distressed though there were no propriety of the distressed to move such a noble Mind It were cruelty to suffer a Neighbour's Ox to lie in the Ditch without some real willingness to help it out but Resignation gives a propriety in the Resigned to the person to whom the Resignment is made and therefore Christ owns the cherishing and protection of a resigning Soul upon the account of Conjugal Propriety Ephes 5. 29. No man ever yet hated his own flesh and not only protecteth but nourisheth it viz. as Christ the Church This Propriety makes every Branch of the Wants Griefs Burdens or Dangers that every resigning Believer has to be Christ's Concernment as truly and as much for the nature of them as the Salvation of all the Elect for which he came into the World and died His Salvation reacheth into every Crevice of their need He saveth to the utmost Heb. 7. 25. which saving Protection stands fitted to a resigned Soul as
working and beholds it as it were the audible Voice of God and the very Mind of Christ It cannot be satisfied in the weakness of the Letter but passeth through the Letter immediately to the Person of Jesus Christ and converseth with God in him The whole Scriptures in the eye of Faith is as a pair of Spectacles through which Faith gets the sight and closeth with the Promise It magnifies the Scriptures Ordinances and Sabbaths as they are the Portal through which to enter into Communion and Converse with God himself It believes the Scriptures that makes Report of the Will and Pleasure of God and so passeth through them to the Will Mind and Name of God himself Faith visits as a faithful Guide in its Journey and useth it no farther than a means tending to bring the Soul and God together The Word reports that Christ is there his Life his Strength his Grace is there and requires the Soul to enter in and take it Faith enters in finds and receives it Faith having found its Object and espying the way how to come at it is quickned by the Spirit in pure Obedience to God's Command to attempt some holy Adventures upon the Word and passeth by all Considerations of Flesh and Blood as deaf and blind to all things but what the Word speaketh 't is resolved to take as it were a senceless Journey to Christ even upon the Sea for 't is contented to feel no Ground but the Promise It stays not to enquire whether it hath strength enough to walk or no but looks on the Word of Truth and considers its need and so ventures and by venturing engageth all the Attributes of Jehovah Father Son and Spirit for its relief If I perish I perish The faithful and true Witness hath said Fear not only believe Faith so far as it works doth Faith doth both possess the Vnderstanding Judgment and Will and puts them to exercise persuade the heart of the Truth Power Wisdom and Goodness of God that speaketh and of the true performance of the thing spoken and is singly of it self through the overshadowing of the holy Spirit a principle of appropriating to the heart the Truths spoken from the Mouth of an infinitely true holy and wise God in his Word and so fixeth a blessed Satisfaction in the heart through the real Existence of the things spoken and apprehended by the renewed Understanding so far at least as they are by an actual Exercise of Faith apprehended Luk. 1. 45. Blessed is she who believed for there shall be a performance of the things told her from the Lord. The Understanding being renewed The Vnderstanding exercised views over the Covenant as it was made with Christ before all time Tit. 1. 2. and considers what method God has used to manifest it in the World He created the habitable World and made Man at first righteous and then permitted him to fall into the Breach of the first Covenant viz. of Works whereby he gave entrance and footing to the second Covenant viz. of Grace Gen. 3. 15. and carried it along in a holy Line through the corrupt Race of Mankind before the Flood he then sweeps away the ungodly World and preserves the Covenant-line in Noah and from him carries it on to Abraham and kept it on in its course amidst much Prophaneness and Idolatry that was in the World He then renewed it more distinctly with Abraham and gave it a more visible Being than ever before that time and by reason thereof called Abraham the Father of the Faithful He confirmed it also to Isaac and Jacob who are oftentimes mentioned in the Scriptures as the three grand Witnesses of this Covenant-favour From thence it descended to the twelve Tribes representing the elect visible Church After which it was brought forth in a Typical Demonstration of Christ and his managing of all things needful to make that Covenant applicable which is carried on under the shadows of the Ceremonial Law The Prophets succeed asserting this Covenant of Grace and expounding it At last Christ comes in Flesh and seals it with his Blood and the Apostles are sent sorth to discover and preach this eternal Purpose of Grace to the wide World for calling in the Elect. So that the Covenant of Grace which was made of God in Christ before the Creation of the World appears as the main scope of the Scriptures and issues forth its vertue through all the Promises Fatherly Commands Reproofs Consolations and the Deliverances which are recorded in Scripture as the various Streams Operations Experiences and Effects of the Covenant of Grace in and towards the Heirs of Life It bears the Name of the Old Covenant during the time while the Passover was in use and after the Lord's Supper was instituted it was called the New Covenant both Old and New are one Covenant of Grace differing from the Covenant of Works as far as Grace and Works do differ The Understanding having perused The exercised Judgment the Scriptures and so made its view and deliberated the matter digesting it by Meditation and Prayer the Judgment resolves to make Covenant-refuge its Sanctuary and thereupon forbids the heart to admit the Contradiction of Flesh and Blood and the reasoning of Carnal Wisdom and Observation resolves to determine nothing according to the Flesh endeavours to shut up all passages by which Unbelief carnal Mis-construction and fear were wont to enter and labours to keep open every Port that may admit the naked recourse of the Spirit in the Word and opens the Windows of the Soul to take in the Testimony and Evidence of a faithful and merciful God only And when this mighty Discovery and Conquest is made the foundations of Bondage Terror and Tyranny which before tormented the Conscience and enslaved the heart doth now begin to totter The Understanding and Judgment The Will assents having gone thus far in the Conduct of the Spirit do attempt effectually the persuading of the Will to accept a new Lord viz. the Messenger and Prince of the Covenant him in whom all the Promises are Yea and Amen Sanctified Conviction begins to sway the Will as Nathaniel was moved by Philip to come and see him of whom Moses and the Prophets did write and assuies the Conscience that God is ever mindful of his Covenant has sealed it with the Blood of his own Son and has sworn that it shall stand sure as the Ordinances of Heaven and that no particle of it shall ever fail to which the Will assents But alas how doth my Pen as it were gash my own Soul in writing what I cannot heartily and at full liberty put in practice Oh that my Understanding and Judgment had thus far in a powerful Gale of the Spirit led my Soul forth to the Gates of Freedom and thus far brought me within the Bond of the Covenant How soon would the same mighty Power conquer over my Will to a holy Security and Rest in believing I
therefore I go to everlasting Strength The more I make infinite Power my Lord and Master the more is that Divine Power engaged to hold me up Rom. 14. 4. Let my own Power languish into nothing so long as I can claim on the account of Free Grace undoubted Right to the Arm of God my own strength never did me good but deceived me Dost thou not know O mis-giving heart that I am shortly to leave the whole weight of my Soul in lanching from Mortality upon the same word of Promise which doth now offer strength to wade through difficulties of my present Warfare And what do I more than step forth to behold the Lord sealing his Covenant and Promise that he will be my God and will guide me by his Grace and afterwards bring me to Glory To which Covenant in faith though with fear and trembling I desire to give my consent which I trust in some measure of sincerity I have done Neither do thou O Satan vaunt and say to me as Eliab said to David 1 Sam. 17. 28. I know the pride of thy heart I shall yet bring thee down Know O thou false Accuser I go to him who is both able to hold me up and make me humble too that I may be more and more abased and die away from the workings and lustings of Flesh and Blood into the Power Grace Wisdom and Truth of God to whose Covenant for that end by his own Appointment I declare my consent and do desire with a broken and bleeding heart to bless him that ever he allowed me to come so near him in this manner Though I fall I shall not fall utterly I shall be raised up again because my Redeemer is risen and he is strong who pleads my Cause What is the Volumne of the Scriptures but a divine Oeconomy containing the Laws of Relation betwixt a God of all Grace and his chosen Institutions and Commands of Grace Threatnings and Reproofs of Grace Promises and Betrothings of Grace and meer Grace Has not the same God who said I will betroth thee to me for ever in Righteousness and Judgment in Loving-kindness and tender Mercies and in Faithfulness Hos 2. 19 20. said also to me Thou shalt know the Lord Has he not said to me Thy Maker Father Son and Spirit is thy Husband Isa 54. 5. even while I am grieved in Spirit and tossed about with the Tempest of my own Confusions And has he not said that I shall say The Lord is my God Hos 2. 19 20. And he will say I am one of his people and will not be ashamed to be called my God Heb. 11. 16. Yea hath he not said that I shall say I am the Lords and that I shall bear his Name and Sir-name with his Jacob and his Israel and that I shall even subscribe it with my hand never to be reversed Isa 44. 5. O Fountain of Life and living Waters reveal thy self that I may not go about to marry Flesh and Spirit together but that I may be spirited as a chaste Virgin espoused to Christ and so enter into this glorious spiritual Flesh-mortifying and mystical Wedlock Let it not be meerly speculative but real and influenced with light life and power from thy heart to mine Oh how doth this unwilling heart of mine pull back What canst thou close with besides God in Christ but it will perish and while it is in thy hand will be a broken Reed that will make thee fall in leaning upon it Is not the Covenant of Grace somewhat which God himself hath devised for his own Glory and thy Establishment Has he required thee to bind thy self to fear and love him and hath not he engaged to circumcise thy heart that thou maist love and fear him Deut. 30. 6. Jer. 32. 38 39 40 41. Oh that I could put faith to this Word till the warmth thereof grew up into a Flame which many Waters might never quench and Oh let my faithful God who has expresly promised by Covenant to give me one heart and one way with the rest of them who are Confederates of Grace that I may fear him for ever for my Good remember it and fulfil it as he hath said with all his heart and all his soul Oh pardon my unbelief that I do stand so far aloof from putting to my Seal that God who cannot lie will accomplish his word to a tittle MY Soul longs to be at some The Soul longs for clear work more distinct and express Closure with such a God and would fain reckon before-hand what it will cost me When I consider that word 1 Cor. 6. 19 20. Know you not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you and that you are not your own for you are bought with a price And therefore glorifie God in your body and in your spirit which is God's I even faint under the Majesty of such a Covenant of unutterable Grace which calls me up to such dignity and duty at once Body and Spirit which are God's what a word is this You are not your own how far doth this reach The whole Concernments of my Soul and Body which are my own are to be given up to God by Faith and new Obedience that they may be his and at my own dispose no longer Oh a thousand Worlds for a Surrender suitable to this Estate and Calling of God in Christ Jesus Oh let the Creator of Israel my King fashion the value of this Pearl in every Affection of my Soul that I may in his own meaning sell all to purchase it Christ Jesus was in earnest when he gave his Body to the Cross and his very Soul an Offering for my sake O that I could be in a like seriousness in giving away my Body and Soul to him again Strengthen O Lord my weak hands and confirm my feeble knees Methinks I hear the voice of my The Soul is invited by Christ beloved Jesus calling out Fear not O anxious Soul behold it is I be not asraid I who am thy Redeemer am strong I am mighty to save and therefore Hearken O Daughter and consider incline thine ear forget also thy father's house and thine own people Let me be the Object of all thy Affections rest in my pleasure only and always so will I thy King and Husband greatly desire thy Beauty and be always trimming thee for my own Society for I am thy Lord and thou must worship and fully rest in and be devoted to me alone and to no other I consent dear Christ and here And doth consent and engage I offer my Body and Soul to the Agreement I give it up dear and precious Redeemer I give it up unto thee for ever in obedience to thy Commands and relying upon thy Strength I write it with my own hand that I will be thine and for thee and not for any other My Beloved is mine and I am his Though I am
one of his People in Jesus Christ and my heart assenting to and being somewhat refreshed in those Truths of God about the nature and advantagious effects of this misterious Union and considering how greatly the Faith and Improvement of this astonishing Privilege would conduce to carry on the ends of my Covenant with God and his for so he persuaded my heart to believe with me I thought it necessary to employ a present providential Retirement this 29th of January 1663. and so from time to time as God shall permit and assist me to improve this Gospel-truth of a Believer's Union with God in Christ for my Soul 's further Nourishment Strength and Establishment as the principal In-let both of new Life and all spiritual Chear Vigour and Activity My Enquiry now then is how to set up this Myrror so before the eyes of my Mind that I may by Application thereof be throughly transformed into the same Image and to clear the Pipes that the Life and Spirit of this Union with Christ and the Father in him may enter into my Soul and make me effectually a partaker thereof live thereby and act therein Breath O Almighty Spirit upon my thoughts fetch in my heart and prostrate it at the feet of thy infinite Grace and Power for Purging Help and Healing for Light Life and Blessing in this most necessary Travel of my Soul How long shall I view Mysteries of Life without a suitable living Transformation When shall the Light of Life appear When shall Christ be so formed in me that the Man-child of Power and Glory may be brought forth ruling and new-forming my poor Soul Say Oh say to my Soul I am come yea I am come not only to make thee to understand but understandingly to receive the Mystery of this Union and to be efficaciously united and actually live in the Motions and Exercise of this Union-life So be it O my God who art the Spirit of all Grace So be it 1. The Son of God emptied himself This Vnion is pure in its nature in descending to assume and be united to the Nature of Man and therein to the likeness of sinful Flesh and so works up every adopted Child through emptying it from all the Wisdom and Strength of the first Adam and from all the Guilt and Pollution derived thence to the Participation of Union with him in the Spirit No unclean thing can enter in thither there can be no Union but under Consideration of perfect Purity essected by the Law of the Spirit of Life which is in Christ He took on him our Nature and was personally united thereto By which means the sin of our Nature was imputed to his Person but could never be united to his Person for he was still sinless while he bare the likeness of sinful Flesh Heb. 4. 15. And therefore the real spiritual Union which Believers have with him is in the nature of it pure and sinless and their persons as they stand in that Union without spot Col. 1 22. for in that respect they are wholly brought over from the Stock of the first Adam into the Second adn return back no more although the polluted Nature of the first Adam sticks in their flesh till its dissolution and compleat change And from thence it follows that the Spirit of Christ in applying this mystical Union with him to the Soul by faith draws the Soul of a Believer having sprinkled it from the Conscience of Guilt into a most quick and lively distaste of all Pollution and so divides between that which is born of the Flesh and that which is born of the Spirit throwing aside the Pollutions of the Flesh that the Union may be purely made in the Spirit through faith Gal. 2. 20. for He that is joyned to the Lord is one spirit Hence it is that while Guilt and sinful Pollution invades the Soul even of a Believer the Application of this Union lies suspended and during that season a Believer abides dark and weak and though he be in a state of Union yet he cannot have the comfort of it but is as a strong Man that cannot find his hands And now O my Soul consider thy own state consider the Centre of thy happiness the Call of the Gospel the privilege and necessity of being transplanted into the pure Stock of the second Adam and what thou art to do in the strength of Free Grace for entring into and of being made partaker of this wonderful Privilege and most secure Rest 2. This whole Work is wrought It is inconsistent with Vnmortifiedness by the Lord both in what his eternal Purpose of Grace did decree and was carried on in the Person of Christ for thee and also in that which he worketh in thee by his Spirit to make thee actually interested established and daily growing up in the Light Life and Vertue of this Union-state with God in Christ Thy Nature is dead in sins thou art wholly polluted and without strength but the least serious Conviction of this doth import some step of Free Grace towards thee nourish it and so rowl all thy Guilt upon the Lamb of God be laborious diligent and frequent in this weighty Exercise There is no seeking this Union with any Idol in the heart Ezek. 14. 3. for that provoketh to Jealousie even an impure thought may not lodge in this Bed a dry earthly sapless frame of heart cannot be refreshed there because this Bed is green Cant. 1. 16. but such is the Bounty of Free Grace that through the Sense and Conviction of this Indisposition of heart it leads the Soul to Jesus Christ and sprinkles it with his Blood Oh this efficacious Remedy and doth wash it again in pure Water removes away the filthy Garments gives it Access into the King's Presence The pure in heart shall see God But thy innumerable Impurities O my Soul and the continual Recursion of Guilt and Darkness Hypocrisies loathsome Uncleannesses Unmindfulness of God Back-sliding and impenitent stupifying Fits are so many and so often and many times so captivating this Sincerity and Strength and spiritual Taste that no Balm can be found nor any thing to help but the free Bounty and Atonement of him who is Michael thy Prince And even this is my Case at present Oh how little doth my heart relish and digest these things while I am musing and writing them I am estranged from inward Converse with God this day and yet cannot soakingly relent I mention the Blood of Sprinkling without prizing it at its due value Oh let the watchful Eye and tender Heart of him whose Compassions fail not consider and visit me But however O my Soul this is thy Work Let not Evil lodge within thee be separate touch no unclean thing declare thy Chastity by crying out and then the Promise lies fair and free before thee I will receive you 2 Cor. 6. 17. yea cry out and thou shalt be rescued for thy Redeemer is strong Here
him Cant. 8. 5. This is true Gospel-venture Hence comes quickning in God's sweet season of God's making How easie think you it were for you to come to Christ if you were without spot But are you not ashamed to let Christ wash you from all your sins You are loath to trouble him so far and yet you can never please him better The greater the work of his Redemption the greater is his Glory This rather wins his heart to you than render you unpleasing or unwelcome to him 'T is his own bewailing Language Ye will not come to me c. If you will look up to the brazen Serpent you will quickly know Freedom There is no condition you can be in but you are well enough if Christ be with you That 's the reason that neither Water nor Fire c. can destroy he is willing be you so too Trust him and see if any condition whatsoever comes short of Remedy where Christ is all in all all for Pardon all for Purging all for Advice Rest and Satisfaction In a few days yours and my Vail will be gone and we shall see and hear who is gone before what now we desire to believe I leave you and my little Child to the teaching and blessing of the Lord c. 1653. To S. D. H. N o 11. I should be glad to receive a Letter written from your heart that Jesus Christ was indeed not only your Portion but your Joy and your Companion he is willing to be so if you be willing that is Gospel-Language and Truth A dear Friend such an one as he doth not love Complements and unwarrantable Modesty See how he takes up Peter Joh. 13. 8. you may you ought to be as free and familiar towards him as he is towards you although with a holy fear and humility It is a vain device of Satan to think that Holiness Strength or Peace can come any other way I am persuaded you do think if some friends you have in the World could do you any good they would The same persuasion may much more truly be applied to him that is both able and willing too only the difficulty is through pride and darkness we are to our own wrong loath to venture Let us now and then lift up our hearts for each other to him who will a few days hence lift up our heads c. 1653. To D. H. N o 12. GOd has hitherto spun out my worldly Being and continued Life My main labour as fast as I can turn other business and thoughts out of doors is to seek the Lord by spiritual Enquiry one hour of close Communion with him is better than a thousand A little I taste by Glimpses and Glances of that Taste but I bless his Name I thirst for more Sometimes my Condition is nothing but almost a very Darkness but my God doth then rouse up a poor dead heart and enlighten it again by and by Oh the Riches of that Goodness that doth so often gird us when we know not he is so near Such a Saviour who is a living Pillar of Atonement and his Nature through Sufferings the very Seat of Compassion for all that come to God by him our Lord our Lord Christ whose Sufferings were not for his own sake and from whom a longing Soul was never repulsed But Oh methinks sometimes the Wonder is too great to be the Lot of such a poor Wretch but a better thought again tells me that this is the very differencing mark of Gospel-faith not to come with a full hand of Righteousness and fleshcontented Preparedness but with a hand and heart fully guilty through the Flesh of all manner of Enmity and Contradiction against the Spirit and Grace of Christ and lay such a heart and hand before him and beg his help to cure that Enmity and stop the mouth of that Contradiction and cause the poor Soul by believing to triumph singly in his Conquest which doth then most singly appear to the eye of Faith when a sick Soul lays the whole weight of his Diseases upon Christ and not touch the bearing of the Guilt of one of them nor endeavour to ease the Shoulder of Christ by one of his fingers Christ neither needs nor desires such help at a Sinner's hand His work is to tread the Wine-press alone thine and mine dear Sister is only to believe and see his Salvation Let us not rashly or impatiently put our hand to the Ark as Uzza did but leave him the whole honour of his own Cross only wait humbly and believingly in the use of Prayer and pondering the Scriptures for there the Spirit appears to form the Soul into a safe and Gospel-rest and create the Image of Christ and will renew by degrees according to the measure of his Grace such a Soul 1653. To S. D. H. N o 13. YOur long large and savoury Letter I received I discern your thirst in those Lines you are not alone in that Agony You know that Thirst is a restless want of refreshing Liquor and you know the Promise calls them blessed although as yet Satisfaction be not given If a restless desire be a Blessing why should not God have the honour of that Dispensation Although the refreshing presence of Christ our Bridegroom have not yet entred the Chambers of your sensible Enjoyment yet Blessed are they that thirst for c. Your whole Letter doth argue Thirst and therefore you are truly blessed and therefore you shall be satisfied I could write many complaining Lines yea I can never complain too much of my vile sinful Body and Mind but in doing that I must not blemish the free Grace of God in Christ yea I am sorry I have done it too much wrong hitherto Devils are against it Flesh and Blood are against it and shall I do so too Let me embrace it rather never mourning from God but mourning towards him in hope above hope Study that word Yield not to weariness nor faintness in mind at no hand through faith and patience you shall inherit it as well as the rest of Abraham's Daughters before you Was not Christ in an Agony Did not he thirst Was not even he straitned And must not you be conformable I say again Rejoyce in it and hold the Hem of his Garment and you will find by and by the vertue come forth he is not deaf he cannot deny himself he does hear and the Vision will speak You do well to pump the Wells of Salvation the Scriptures The Night will not long last the Day is coming the Prince of this World is judged and thy God reigneth I shall one day I doubt not with thee sing the Song of the Lamb beyond sin fear and sorrow I leave thee to his care and love which is far beyond mine I must end but I leave you to him whose words are Life indeed Farewel in the Bowels of Christ to whom I commit you c. 1653. To D. H. N o 14. THe Conveniency
a Mind towards the Brazen Serpent a flying to the Horns of the Altar and that does the work Oh the Justification through the means of believing and only plain-hearted believing is a strange thing yet not at all difficult where the Anoynting teaches and the Soul be made free by the Spirit from Carnal Quiddities and Complements as the poor believing Woman was who prest to touch the Hem of Christ's Garment without IFS and AND 's The Lord direct all your Paths and make you fruitful in Holiness through believing and fear no evil Fare you well in the Lord for ever 1654. To S. D. H. N o 17. MY Remembrance of you in my heart does not neither ought to bear proportion to my writing I have reason to esteem you an Heir of Blessing and I would gladly when I hear you own believingly and thrivingly the God of your Mercies and rejoyce in your joy as a Member of the same Body of Christ with you Be eyeing what the Redeemer has done what the vertue of his Sacrifice is not what difficult design he attempted unless it be to honour him the more who has overcome all that we can suppose to have most difficulty in it I think it is a matchless Mercy to let our sins of all sorts and aggravations be cast on his Cross with a humble Resignment to him waiting for Salvation and Strength as a penitent Sinner's Portion through Faith The Lord be with you in whom I rest c. 1654. To J. F. N o 18. MY dear Friend I understand by what I hear that you are like to stay some time in England whilst I am detained here and in regard I know your main desire is to serve Jesus Christ in the simplicity of the Gospel I desire the place of your abode and the people you labour amongst may be adapted to such a savoury design I do somewhat doubt that if you are persuaded to some populous City you will be troubled with itching Ears and find some Temptations more vigorous than in a more private Auditory Yet I will not disswade you from what the Call of God doth most apparently incline you to but do desire you may so lanch forth that the Room of those famous Worthies who are swept away may be supplied and the Word of Reconciliation held forth till the Mystery of God be finished And therefore act with all your might whilst the day lasts and remember the distracted Condition of your warfaring Friends Beware of discouragements your work is excellent your labour short your infirmities undertaken by Christ and your Temptations and the Tempter also judged Yours is a Warfare as well as mine blessed be the Captain of our Salvation through whose Blood alone is hope of Conquest And thus commending you to the Lord c. 1655. To S. D. H. N o 19. I Trust you find the Word of God faithful and creating faithfulness also in the Seed thereof in your heart I think this is a true Maxim One deliberate unfeigned desire of perfect Righteousness in Christ is the very fruit of the perfect Righteousness of Christ For who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean but he alone by his creating Power and Love Nourish Faith tenderly and humbly try the Lord's Will and your own heart prize that Faith which puts forward all Grace which takes away discouragement from Mortification and makes it as the Gate of Heaven and Hope of Glory for the Apostle found it so and pleads it just so to us Rom. 6. 5 6 7 8 c. You have a good Guide give him the honour solely to order your heart and way his voice is heard in the Scripture Believe not your own heart or reason against the naked word of Truth In Cases of Scruple or discouragement of any sort give your self the same Counsel as by the Scriptures you would give to another person in the same Case The work of Faith is not to make sin no sin but because of sin to bring the Soul to the Redeemer that the more sin it sees it may the more abhor it and triumph the more in that Grace doth super-abound through a Mediator And here lies the Mystery of Faith the Lord himself has it and you and I shall say we have enough 1655. To D. H. N o 20. SInce God made your heart pant after that World in which dwells Immortality and Righteousness did you ever upon good Grounds judge any earthly Friend a certain Comfort If so then has God by removing your Sister and now by removing your Father witnessed the contrary If you apprehended them as uncertain then why are they not sufficiently repayed in the fatherly respect of an unchangeable God Is it good to be angry with the Lord Do not study to be more sour and melancholy but how to be more holy self-denying and chearful on the account of a freely tendered Covenant rejoycing that shortly you shall take your Journey and go visit your Father your Sister c. and all the Saints since the beginning Never study how to dishonour the nature of the Gospel by a sullen carnal pleading of Self-unworthiness The truth is Self is not worthy to plead but Christ is worthy to be loved and believed and that 's enough If he will love me heal me purge me save me convince me accept me freely why should I be offended at it and say he cannot mean as the Gospel speaks My sullen heart is never broke till Almighty Convincement from God break my heart to powder till that time I play with Melancholy under a kind of vexing delight I trust God will teach you some good Lesson by this Visitation that the knowledge of God in Christ and the knowledge of your heart may be wisely taken in I earnestly desire this that all your thoughts be brought over to a subjection to the good pleasure of God with delight viz. in that good pleasure of his and be thankful for that yet you have an opportunity to honour him by saying and thinking all his ways are Mercy and Truth Though he take to himself your nearest Friends you do them so much right as to rejoyce that they reign though you mourn after your Beloved and long to leave your self that you may love him the better I leave you to him who can and will do more in his love and pity than I or any Friend can do Rejoyce in hope lift up your head the days of your Lamentation is almost ended I remain yours in the fellow-feeling of the same burthen c. 1655. To A. C. N o 21. I Enjoy my health through the goodness of God as yet My Soul has many dry and sapless Seasons many drowsie and fainty Qualms through the deceipt of heart that lies rooted within but yet the Lord cries ever and anon in my ear I am God and I change not therefore thou art not consumed I find it desperately dangerous to set my Reason and Sense in dispute with that which
Faith only should take up viz. Reconcilement upon free Terms If there be any Sinfulness or any Aggravation of Sin which seems to except it self from the Remedy of Christ's Atonement then certainly the Eye of Faith takes not up its Mark as it should do If there be any Weakness and Darkness and the Soul think to get over it without a humble Resignation of the Case to Christ for help it will find the Cure come badly on A heart which would not have a liberty for sinning can never engage in a free-hearted Adventure on Christ too far for Pardon and Strength Christ never refused any one Sinner that came to him on Earth unless it were the mocking treacherous and spightful Pharisees and therefore I am bound to believe he hears and accepts every unfeigned Request though hardness and darkness do afflict So that I am with my lamenting after him to rejoyce also that he is himself the Corner-stone of that work in my heart that yearns after him in a dry Land I recommend you to the Lord and rest c. 1655. To A. C. N o 22. I Thought good to send you a few Lines which while I am writing serves instead of a Conference there only wants your Answer to every Sentence and the mutual refreshing of your Voice I can at a distance guess at your thoughts I can also take Refreshment in this that the Arm of the Lord seen by you or unseen yet it holds you teacheth you and is always near you We may not think the unchangeable God doth change as oft as we use to change Not every Cloud nor all the Clouds of the Sky are able to hinder the Course of the Sun because the Sun is above them and so is the Covenant of our Peace above our Darkness and Weakness A small matter if Seasons of Weakness and Dulness may be called so is enough when Unbelief is cherished to make as much mischief in the Soul as a Woolf among a Flock of Sheep Indeed every Sin is hateful in the sight of God and a sluggish heart that is rather prone continually to all that is evil inwardly and outwardly than inclined to good is grievous to the Spirit of God But this is perpetually the Refuge that God accounts the Sinfulness of his People their Sickness not their State and to purge and cure them he useth sometimes one Means and sometimes another witness Psal 89. 31 32 33 34. and Isa 27. 8 9. But still the Covenant being wholly of his Contrivement stands fixed in Heaven and Jesus Christ who has both your Nature as much as if your self were there and God's Nature too in one Person to preserve that Covenant in your stead for your good There is no creature-goodness of any sort soever that prefers any person to have an Interest in that Covenant because he sheweth Mercy to whom he will And there is nothing essentially needful to give any one a Right to apply this Covenant but a sense of necessity and a willingness to accept it and be saved by it only As wicked people fancy the way to Heaven so as that they think they can obtain it and yet desire still to keep their sins in their Bosoms and cannot hear of parting with them so many gracious people though beloved of God cannot imagine that Eternal Life being a Blessing of that greatness can be got so easie as by believing only Or if they grant it is to be had only by Believing yet they do so much look upon personal Qualifications by which to try their Faith that unless it be to such and such a degree they think they have not Faith And when they have got the degree they desire they are as much to seek as before And all is because God has left no such Qualifications as things that shall give rest to the Soul for they are but the Garments of Faith That Soul that is willing Christ should both save him and purge him shall be saved and purged and God cannot but account him clean from condemning Guilt I hope you live in the Study and Consolation of these glad Tidings of Gospel-Peace I trust also that God has and doth sanctifie all his Dispensations to your heart that you may be chearful in believing and fruitful in Holiness as one who is taught of the Lord and thus commending you to the Lord your Rock I rest yours in Truth and Love c. 1655. To B. D. N o 23. I Hear that the same hand of a good God that carried you forth hath brought you home to visit the Habitations of some Friends and view the Monuments of others deceased amongst which our Parents and Sister and Grandmother of refreshful Memory How God has dealt with you in that Wilderness of Pits and Snares from whence you came I know not but I hope the Prayers of those deceased in the hand of a living Christ are at this Hour pleading for you The God of all Power preach Freedom of Resignment unto him into your heart I wish there may be more of pure Communion with God in your heart than my feeble Soul can reach unto 'T is rich Bounty from God if I have never so little truth of desire towards him But I may mourn out all my moisture that my hard heart cannot come fully away to him Oh for a broken believing heart the Merchandize thereof is better than the Merchandize of Silver c. Such as have listed themselves into that spiritual Warfare there is no fear of miscarrying while they keep to their Colours and are given up to the Lamb's Conduct 1655. To C. A. D. N o 24. YOurs of the 25th of September last I received and do thank you for your Christian Love and Tenderness therein exprest and for the Heads of that searching refreshing Sermon for indeed nothing can be refreshing but what is searching and convincing The Vertue and the Excellency of Gospel-Remedies can never be welcome nor do their work till they be permitted to search and overcome that Truth may break forth to Victory and there may be healing without Putrefaction at the bottom And when a poor Soul cannot order his own Distempers yet then to consent to and approve of the Soveraignty of the Medicine and Skill of the Physician Could I come up to that Truth Faith and Resignment I should then more magnifie that Grace and be more fruitfully refreshed in the Salvation of God There is a pure Releif in the Gospel conveyable only by the Arm the Spirit of the Lord but it is oftentimes in a great measure spoiled and defiled in a carnal way of Endeavour to receive it To entertain spiritual Truths in the Spirit and to be subjected to their Law and formed over into their Mould Complexion and Constitution this I think were Religion indeed For my own part I view these things at such a distance that sometimes I even doubt whether there be any more than Notion left or if more what it is that
depart from God but far more bitter to stay away from God when we have departed from him And to this effect he expressed himself in Prayer That by Nature we are averse to the Convictions of God's Spirit in his Word and Satan is ever blowing up his Spawn and Seed within us whereby to spoil our Taste and Relish of things pure and spiritual and interrupt our Peace and Communion with God And therefore that God would cause us more clearly to discern the Corruption and Malignity of that Evil that is in our Natures and make us to know all our Abominations and whatever is repugnant to his holy Nature and Will both in our Hearts and Lives and make us freely sensible of throughly ashamed broken and humbled for the same That he would raise us up to a greater Antipathy against all that that is displeasing to him and hurtful to our Souls And that no Interest might hinder or squeeze out the working of his Grace within us as not to have Freedom to act And that all that might be conquered that would interrupt the Intercourse of his Spirit with our hearts And that he would not suffer us to spare and indulge any Corruption or leave any corner of our hearts wherein Sin may be at Peace That no Agag be permitted to live in us That his Fear might Garrison our hearts against all the Invasions and prevailing power of our own Corruptions And that Satan by his Wiles might not sweeten us into any Bonds of Guilt And seeing that we are apt to grow hard continually and it is God's Power alone that can soften help and heal that he would cause us to experience the transforming Power of his Grace in our Souls making all new and refining us every moment That we might get into Jesus Christ and make him now our Advocate who will be our Judge And because we need Converting and new Creating evermore that Regeneration-work might pass upon us continually and we made all over new and be prepared for all his Concerns That he would baptize us into the Grace of the Gospel and cause us to live answerable to so high a Calling as that is That we might be baptized evermore into the Father Son and Spirit and so receive Life and Quickening from Jesus Christ who is our Head And when our Guilt is upon us That the Lord would keep our hearts tender to feel the smart of Sin and so hasten to our Physician to be bound up and healed And not suffer our Wounds to wrankle and fester for want of coming to him for Pardon and Cleansing That he would make us go out to him and never neglect or keep aloof from his Recovering Grace else we shall provoke him more and more by undervaluing the Riches of his Grace and refusing the Remedy he hath provided for Sinners That he would make up every Breach and cause us to be all over plunged in the Fountain opened for Sin and Vncleanness What the Scripture reveals His Proficiency in Grace and promises That the Root of the Righteous yieldeth Fruit And whose Hope the Lord is shall not cease from yielding Fruit. That the Godly Man shall bring forth Fruit in his Season and in Old Age shall be fat and flourishing And he that abideth in Christ and Christ in him the same bringeth forth much Fruit was in an extraordinary measure fulfilled in him And all those Heavenly Doctrines and Practicable Truths which he understood believed and professed he lived over His Practice agreed and held pace with his Principles That what his head apprehended his heart affected his Will embraced his Life manifestly declared and published And when bodily Strength decayed yet his spiritual Vigour still remained And his Bow abode in Strength and the Arms of his Hands were made strong by the Hands of the mighty God of Jacob. And such was his Fruitfulness in well doing that those who at any time discoursed him about Soul-Concerns it was their own Fault and Omission if they parted from him without some real benefit His frequency in Meditation was very remarkable Whence His frequency in Meditation he was noted often to say that That Soul could not thrive much in Grace and Holiness that was not much in Meditation His Freedom from Envy and distracting Cares was obvious to His Freedom from Envy and distracting Cares those who knew him best in the general Course of his Conversation Whence also he was observed to say I bless God I have no Temptation at all to envy others Prosperity and 't is a great favour from the Lord that I have much freedom from Anxious Thoughts touching what God will do with me as to my outward Condition and being in this World His inward Tranquility Peace and Joy was patent to all so far as His inward Tranquility Peace and Joy it could be outwardly discerned not letting fall in the observation of any that were most conversant with him the least word of repining at any time And 't is also ratified by these Suggestions which he recommended to others from his own experience with the way how to attain it saying The Lord never made Flesh and Blood to be a Weapon to conquer Despondency The Soul must escape from all Creature-Refuges if ever it will have true quiet That if a Man will have solid Peace and Content he must first have God to be his God for true Peace and Quiet is in him alone That a Man cloathed with Rags may have as much inward Content and Satisfaction and far more than the richest and greatest man in the World for our Happiness lies in the right Composure of the Mind and not in the greatness of any outward Condition And that whatever befalls us in this World is ordinarily so far sweet or bitter to us as we fancy it to be That as outward Profit makes the trouble of any Vndertaking sweet to the Man that prospers in the World so if we could live in the faith of this that all things shall work for good we should be as much satisfied under Afflictions as in the greatest Worldly Prosperity And he would often say when he returned home from amongst the Persons and Affairs of this World That he had no quiet till he had poured out his Soul to God in Prayer And if there he did not meet with him instantly yet still he had no Peace till he had regained the Presence of God again And that walking with God was the joy and delight of his Soul His Self-denial shewed it self His Self-denial in his Humility Dependence on God Mortification Resignation and Heavenly mindedness which hath been before declared And to this purpose he advised That we should cease from our selves and so think speak and do in the name of Christ That all our Thoughts Speeches and Actions should be managed by us as the Thoughts Words and Actions of Jesus Christ for by going out of our selves we are made his and he is
spirit and sence of this short word Saved Isa 49. 6. reacheth The meaning of Salvation far even to the ends of the Earth It importeth a state of security from the evil of sin Mat. 1. 21. of Enemies Luk. 1. 71. of Satan 2 Tim. 2. 26. of Hell Wrath Condemnation 1 Thes 1. 10. from the evil of all distress in this life c. Gen. 48. 16. and hereafter 1 Thes 1. 10. It importeth an investiture and possession of all real good in this life and in that to come viz. Conversion Calling Acts 11. 14. 2 Tim. 1. 9. Justification Sanctification Adoption Strength Acceptation with God Blessing Manifestation of God Knowledge of the Truth and every good thing that may tend to enable the heirs of life to dispatch their work quit themselves victorious and lead them at last to their Fathers house Act. 4. 12. 1 Joh. 1. 9. Jer. 31. 9. Jer. 15. 20. 2 Cor. 6. 2. Psal 28. 9. Isa 35. 4. Act. 11. 14. Deut. 33. 29. the walls whereof are God's part thereby for discharging of which he is made a high Priest and so he procures it and maintains it in the power of a King and reveals it as a Prophet all which Offices he was anointed to and qualified for in his own Person And by reason of that Essential Union with the Godhead in which he stood the Father delights in and owns him as Son of Man and doth every way suit with him as the Father of such a Son who is both God and Man The Spirit also which proceedeth from the Father and the Son doth through the same Union of the Divine Essence also suit with him and operate by and through him as the Spirit of him who is both God and Man in one Person Hence ariseth the Perfection and absolute Compleatness of the Mediatorship I am not alone saith Christ but I and the Father that sent me Joh. 8. 16. And the comforting Spirit shall receive of mine and shall shew it unto you Joh. 16. 14. For the fulness of the Godhead dwelleth in him bodily Col. 2. 9. and joyntly and carries on the work of Mediatorship which was personally untertook by the Eternal Son who is made Emanuel And this answers the Question which Philip made Shew us the Father Hast thou not seen me saith Christ He that hath seen me viz. by the eye of Faith as I really am and ought to be looked upon hath seen the Father Joh. 14. 7. Every Action and Revelation of himself is the Revelation of the Father Son and Spirit in the distinguishable working of each Person and yet united in the same God who worketh all in all Christ suffered as the Son of such a Father and the Father in this design of Mediatorship was cloathed with a true Fatherly Relation to the incarnate suffering Son and the Eternal Spirit which proceedeth from the Father and the Son did put forth his Almighty Essential Vertue in the offering up of the Body of Christ upon the Cross Which Union of Father Son and Spirit in God our Saviour Tit. 2. 13. appears in Joh. 17. and Heb. 9. 14. So that all the Persons in the saving of Man doth as it were concenter and work together in the Person of the Mediator The Will of the Father Joh. 4. 34. The Mercy of the Son Heb. 4. 13 14. And the Power of the Spirit Heb. 9. 14. and Rom. 1. 4. All which being one in the Divine Essence of God meet together in the Person of the Son who is according to the Eternal Decree God and Man through his Union with and in the Godhead God thus manifested in the Flesh and as Father Son and Spirit laying the foundation of Mediatorship in Jesus Christ the Eternal Son God and Man doth also in and with him carry it on as a Father to and Spirit of him who is God-man And for this cause the Gospel is called the Word of Truth in respect not only of the Matter of it but the legal Testimony that it receives from these three Witnesses as the Declaration of the Counsel of their own Essential Will and Purpose And in regard the Son of God in the Name and Co-working of Father Son and Spirit undertook the Mediatorship by taking Man's Nature every mortal person that has the nature of Man stands alike near to him in the Dispensation of the Gospel-Call It puts aside other Mediators The Angels are Spirits and have not Humane Nature in which to mediate for Man Christ himself is nearer to us than they are he is Man The Spirits of Just Men made perfect cannot mediate for us for though they are Humane yet they want living Bodies but Christ has his Humane Body with him and therefore is nearer to Men who are cloathed with Flesh Neither can one mortal Man mediate as a Mediator 'twixt God and Man because though he have the Humane Nature in him yet it is in him personally and not representing the whole Race of Man as the pure Nature of Christ the second Adam doth And besides Mortal Man is but Man but Christ is both God and Man that he might lay his hand on both parties God and Man to reconcile them together as they are reconciled in the Person of the Mediator Col. 1. 19 20 21 22. Promises cannot mediate for Man has no right to them but through Christ first Duties cannot mediate because they are loathsome without a foregoing Interest in Christ Graces cannot mediate because they are Fruits of Reconciliation through the Mediator the Fruit cannot be the cause of the Root from whence they come So that as Jesus Christ in being Mediator took our Nature viz. that Humane Nature that is in every person of Mankind into immediate Union with the Godhead dwelling in his Person so this Jesus Christ God and Man in the Relation he bears to the Father and Spirit and they to him in their mutual concurrence in this great work of his Mediation with him having sealed and anointed him thereto that he might compleatly effect it he is the true immediate Object of a Believer's eye and he who renouncing all other names and helps flies thither shall be saved by him Act. 4. 12. He that seeth the Son and believeth on him shall have everlasting life His appearing in the Promises doth make them a Convoy to bring the Soul to him which would otherwise be no better Guides than the Light to a blind Man His presence in Duties makes them the way and door of approach which would otherwise be no better Guides by single gazing on and using of them than a Lanthorn in a Man's hand can be a Guide by gazing on it and leading himself round about in a Circle by the light thereof not minding the way or the door to find which that light was appointed and intended The Graces of his Spirit are the Beams of that Excellency that is in his Person and the Streams which flow from the Fountain which are subject to
Intermission and stoppage without the constant supply which they receive from the Sun and the Fountain And therefore a Biliever's eye and aim must be tending to an immediate pitching on and closing with himself as the proper course and sure way and only orderly means to find rest and safety to the Soul The next thing to be considered is to enquire how the Eye of Faith The Aim of Faiths Eye desirous to attain its Mark. is to be levelled at and exercised upon this perfect and glorious Object so as to change the Soul from bearing the burthen of its own guilt and to get power against the defiling nature and power of sin and so to carry on the change from Glory to Glory after the Image of Jesus Christ by the vertue of his Spirit 2 Cor. 3. 18. The Dispensation of the Gospel is the Glass the Glory of the Lord there appearing is that which Faith fixeth and feedeth upon it passeth through the Glass and seizeth upon Jesus Christ represented therein and there stays till it hath enamoured the Soul into the same likeness The Glory of Christ begets an Image of Glory in the heart of a Believer of the same nature with its self Indeed there is a transient closing with the Promises as with a Neighbour who can tell where the Souls Friend dwelleth and so do the Ordinances and so far the Spirit of the Father lodgeth in them for the help of the diligent seeker to draw him to Christ The first motion also of that diligent seeking proceedeth from the Father who worketh with the Son by the Spirit to draw the Soul in true method to the Person of the Son as Mediator in whom the Father Son and Spirit gives the Soul a satisfactory Meeting Joh. 5. 17. c. 6. 44 45. and c. 14. 23. But the Knot of Union by which the Soul partakes of the Life and Glory of God is not perfectly knit till the Soul actually enters into the Fellowship of Christ the Mediator 1 Cor. 1. 9. and for this very end serves the preaching of the Gospel in the Dispensation of it Col. 1. 28. The Soul being thus ushered in treats with and fixeth on Christ absolutely and immediately and lays hold on his Personal Worth only as the Foundation of its hope and help The Soul has gained a great deal of Beauty in Christ's Eye when once 't is brought by his Spirit to leave its own Idols and forsake its own Country and to trust singly under the shadow of his Wings there Blessedness begins as Boaz said to Ruth Ruth 2. 12. And here the Soul closeth with the All-sufficiency of the Mediator pondering the large extent thereof And whereas the Soul is usually more troubled with the Aggravations of sin and the Circumstances thereof than about the sin it self and about its insincerity and want of feeling remorse and sufficient detestation against sin in its repentance and much molested with the stain that Guilt leaves on the Conscience and finding that neither remove of Guilt nor power of Cleansing nor freedom from its just Accusation can be got from the Consultations of a â—ounded Spirit it falls nakedly on the All-sufficiency of the Mediator and there it beholds him as one able to take away all sins in their whole extent His Body was given him for that end and although his own Body was pure yet it was in the likeness of the flesh of sin or sinful flesh and depravation of Nature received from Adam that as far as any motions of sin or capacity of sinning is found in Mankind he did bear the likeness of that State And so is called the second Adam not only as one representing the Elect Seed of Grace but also as being the Superadequate Antidote to conquer and remove all Poyson that entred upon Mankind by the sin of the first Adam The Nature of the second Adam is made as perfectly holy as the first was defiled by sin and became perfectly sinful as appears in Rom. 5. And in regard the strength and slaying power of sin lies in the Law his Humane Nature was made under the Law subjected to the whole Law as far as it had to do with sinful Man for this end that he might redeem them who were under the Law from being under any condemning or accusing Sentence or sting of punishment from thence which he bringeth about by obeying it satisfying for the breach thereof made by sinful Man Sin is therefore sin because 't is against the Law he therefore is made under the Law and that to fulfil its Commands and bear its doom Though sin be finite in the Transgressor yet 't is infinite in respect of the Object the infinite God But the Obedience and Suffering of Christ was of an infinite extent in respect of the Person because 't was the Act of God-man and in the Vertue also because 't was a contrived Remedy in the Council of God's Love to outstretch the injury that was done to the infinite Divine Majesty by finite Man Hence it is that this Remedy carries with it the Terms of Abounding Grace Rom. 5. 17 20. and unsearchable Riches Ephes 3. 8. The All-sufficiency lies also in this that 't is a free Gift considering that the Gifts of God's Love are infinite as his Nature is the thoughts of which do by Faith bring in a Foundation for infinite Justification and Righteousness and makes way to the rest of the purchased Possession that lies in the Person of the same Redeemer the infiniteness of his Goodness and Drift in this design which could never suffer disappointment the infiniteness of his Wisdom that could never mistake the infiniteness of his Love that can never cease nor Power fail And since the Nature of the Salvation of God is infinite it is brought down into the Person of God-man and from him into the Ordinances and so by the Spirit into the heart of Man retaining still its infinite Nature In Jesus Christ the infinite God is made Flesh in the Ordinances he speaks by Man's Voice in the faith of the heart he dwelleth carrying the Soul by the Operation of his Spirit to look upon him and hear his Voice in the steps of his Condescention to the true enjoyment of himself 'T is comfortable to have the Testimony Faith taking a right Method of a good Conscience Prov. 15. 15. and power over Corruption and Soul-disquiet thereby but I must not begin there God begins my Righteousness and Freedom in himself and brings it forth in the Person of Jesus Christ I must begin it there also and as it is perfected in him I must perfectly suck it thence continuing perpetually at that Breast Heb. 10. 14. never expecting to have it mended by any thing I could do though it were the obeying of the whole Law Gal. 2. 16. for my Obedience is but the Obedience of a stained Nature that has already broken that righteous Law When Guilt Defilement and Weakness of a foolish
Spiritual Exercise to put the Soul into sure and quiet Possession thereof in a through and direct levelling its eye at the Object the Person of Jesus Christ and to that end it gets the Soul up above the Reasonings of the Old Man Flesh and Blood into the Mount of Gospel-reason and from thence through the Promises and demonstration of the Word of Truth by the Spirit as through a Prospective-Glass gathers into its eye the lovely view of a compleat Redeemer and gazeth upon him till a Dart strike through the Liver and the Soul be made like the Chariots of Aminadab and is both willingly and safely carried into a holy confidence of the truth of what it seeth and the truth of its own being comprehended within the free and liberal reach of the design of God's Free Mercy in a way of particular Application thereof and cryeth out My Lord and my God And O that my Soul were a little upon the wings of the Spirit to ascend by Faith into this Mount of God my Saviour Why abide I among the Folds of corrupt Nature to hear the bleating of my own Confusions and Lusts seeing the Sword of the Lord and his Gideon is drawn for my deliverance Awake O my Heart awake O my Conscience shake thee from thy Dust let the Testimony of Faith and Spirit of Adoption and Freedom lead my Captivity Captive for ever In this glorious Work Faith seizeth on the Soul as the Angel did seize upon Lot and as it were tear him out of Sodom with this blessed advantage that it makes the Soul willing in the day of God's Power to be pulled with violence out of Sodom out of all its fleshly filth and fleshly state it rejoyceth to see the Blood of former Lusts to be sprinkled on all its Raiment 'T is wrathful against the Inchantments of Self-Pride Man's Applause Carnal Reason Earthly Compliances Fleshly Fears and Distrust It roars against its Sensual Mind and Carnal Consultations as a Lyon over its Prey It unhingeth the Gates of its Captivity and carrieth them up to the top of the Mount never to return again Mighty is this Sampson-Faith when its Locks of sanctified Convictions and Manifestation of Grace are grown up to some happy maturity it looks further and further after Christ in every Scripture it rejoyceth exceedingly to find the free Gift of Christ in such Language as this I will give thee for a covenant of the people that thou mayest say to the prisoners Go forth Isa 49. 8 9. Not by works of righteousness which we had done but according to his mercy he saved us Tit. 3. 5. I am he that blotteth out thy sins for my own sake Isa 43. 25. and will not remember them any more But the poor Soul looks down upon the scars of its own vile heart and daily weaknesses and cries out Oh! but what are these Wounds in my heart and hands these thorns in my sides these pricks in my eyes The Understanding triumphing through Faith replies These are the Memorials of the Wounds with which Christ was wounded in the House of his Friends when he came to his own and they received him not and when the Sword of Indignation awoke against the Shepherd one who accounted it no Robbery to be equal with God he then saved the Sheep and after a sore Conflict slew the Wolf and gathered again the Poor of the Flock who were appointed by the Law of Moses to the Slaughter Arise therefore and be not dismayed at the Witnesses of Christ's Agony which dwells for a season in thy mortal Flesh The Battel was his not thine he mortally wounded the Dragon and the God of Peace will shortly tread down Satan and every Spawn of his under your feet These Enemies are left to prove your Faith Integrity and Patience that you might learn Spiritual War and be renowned by Victory through the mighty Spirit of the Captain of your Salvation Then Faith fixeth its eye again upon Jesus Christ through the Word and beholds him as a Lamb that was slain and yet risen and there sees the Grave where the guilt of Conscience was buried and argueth it self into Freedom Guilt is destroyed and none can raise the Dead but God only but God will not raise it up because he destroyed it himself that he might marry the Justified Soul to himself out of that Destruction of Guilt and Bondage in the Person of his own Son that he might thereby bring forth Life and Immortality to sinners 2 Tim. 1. 10. Rom. 5. 6. by Faith and therefore here Faith strives to keep its eye while hands and feet are working and by this Compass it steers its Course towards the Haven of Safety But the abundant Grace and vastness of this Salvation in and through the Person of Jesus Christ is so great that my eye is dazled I am not able to measure the Heavens I bring my Bucket to hold the Sea and 't is drowned in the great Waters And yet here Faith has a Refuge against Confusion of Mind viz. when it espies a passive sence in all the Justification and Acceptation of the Gospel and in all the Fruits thereof working me up to and making me to be content with a Conformity according to the Measure given me by Jesus Christ Hence are the words discovering it rendred in a passive sense Justified Redeemed and Saved and the Action of this is ascribed only to Christ or God in Christ who justifieth redeemeth and saveth And hence also Faith giveth the Soul Relief against Confusion of Mind about defect of knowledge by the thought of this that though I know little yet I am known perfectly of God Gal. 4. 9. and though I apprehend little of the great Mystery of this Salvation yet I am apprehended fully by Jesus Christ Phil. 3. 12. while I receive him by Faith and am willing to be comprehended and moulded by his Spirit It was but a small thing on Mans part to touch the Hem of Christ's Garment yet that being an Act of Reliance on Christ and subjecting the Soul to him presently there came in Health of Body and Pardon of Sins from that comprehending Relation in which Christ stood to such a Soul The Souls work in Faith or rather that to which the Soul is wrought is a contentedness to receive the Person of Christ by Faith as the Sum and Title of its Interest in more than it can be ever able to receive within its own capacity The Soul that receives the Person of Christ by one true closing hint through Faith receives a rightful Propriety to every Excellency and Perfection that is in God laid up in Christ for that end though the length of that Perfection and Blessing be never fully known As a Man who buyes a Field if no Exception in the Laws of that Nation be made he buyes all the Advantages of that piece of Earth downwards to the very Centre of the Earth and all between that and the Stars albeit
he really minds no more it may be than the Grassie Superficies of his Land till he discovers some other Excellency Then he minds that also and owns it whether it be Mines of Gold or Silver or whatever is in the nature of the Earth which was not known when he bought it because he bought a Right to it without Restriction to any particular quality in it So is it with a Soul that by Faith lays hold on and receives Christ's Person it may be his eye is chiefly on freedom from the guilt of sin but in taking the Person of Christ he recieves not only Pardon but a true Right to whatsoever is in Christ relating to this Life and that which is to come the Heaven of Heavens is not able to contain the utmost of that Inheritance which belongs to a Believer because it cannot contain God This Faith discovers and cries out My lines are fallen in a fruitful place I have a goodly heritage Faith being thus mounted it has The Influence of Faith into new Obedience many advantages for 't is skilful and therefore victorious It has the advantage of discovery for offence or defence It has Champion Ground and a clear Air to breath in and so is every way furnished for Victory and Success And as Faith is thus fitted by means of its station and capacity for discovery so it lies under the Bond of Obedience engaged and commanded to accept and drink in the Happiness that lies in Christ Faith is eminently both Privilege and Duty A Privilege in that it enters on the Possession of the whole Covenant of Grace and Eternal Life here upon the Earth and 't is bound thereto in point of Duty The Nature of Duty and Obedience is the better discerned if we consider the nature of Commandment Commandment may be thus understood either Primitive or Superadded Primitive Commandments are such as constitute the Pale between Good and Evil and are the Demonstrations of Righteousness the contrary to which is Sin and Unrighteousness which was originally given to the nature of Man in Paradise and after the Fall renewed in Tables of Stone to which that relates which the Apostle John speaketh Where there is no law there is no transgression for sin is the transgression of the law 1 Joh. 3. 4. This Law was revived by Moses for discovery and conviction of Sin and Transgression Gal. 3. 19. Rom. 7. 7. The Superadded Commandments are all Exhortations and enforcing Precepts in the Scripture which require Obedience to the primitive Rules of God's holy Will which are as it were the Emblem of his righteous Nature manifested to Man And these two have a different manner of Obligement The primitive Commandments do oblige from the very Nature of God and discovery of his Will in opposition to the defilement of Man by his Apostacy And these do shew what is the duty which Man oweth to his Creator The superadded Precepts by way of Exhortation or by way of Commanding Charge do seem rather to oblige from the apparent Equity of the Will of God manifested to shew his most holy and righteous Nature by and serveth to apply the heart thereto The breach of the former is Transgression the breach of the latter is actual though impotent Wilfulness and methinks is properly that which is called disobedience Albeit all sin is truly termed disobedience yet this seems to have a foul tincture of a repugnant Will in disobeying and so oft as the Command is renewed this disobedience is the more aggravated and increased The same Draft and Model serves to discover what is Obedience or Disobedience in the new Creation In this new World as it were of Salvation by Jesus Christ the manifestation of Free Grace in the Doctrine of Christ's Birth Life Death Resurrection and Ascension c. doth make the Treaty between the spotless Purity and Sufficiency of Christ's most holy Nature and the natural Guilt and lump of Wretchedness that has over-spread the Nature and Life of sinful Man which Manifestation of Christ presents it self in a way of Cure to defiled Man and doth in a primitive way viz. in the very nature of it require defiled Man to be Healed There is vertually in the very manifestation of the Gospel a Command gone forth to lost Man to return and accept the Salvation that is thus provided and held forth Besides which there comes in the next place a positive Command to believe 1 Joh. 3. 23. with many invitations persuasions and directions about it The not receiving the former is blindness the not receiving the latter is more eminently wilful blindness and both of them wretched impotency because the Letter of the Gospel it self cannot quicken The Spirit of this Gospel doth therefore go further in behalf of the Elect who were peculiarly given to Christ and presents it self as a quickning power in all the parts of it and as the real necessary and most effectual Remedy against all manner of Guilt which also is in the next place followed with a Law in the hand of the Spirit to receive it by Faith and this is that quickning vertue in all invitations and persuasions to receive and apply that glorious Remedy And this is that twofold Law which every Convert lies under viz. the Manifestation it self and a spiritual requiring Word commanding the Conscience to receive it and live thereby through an actually exercised Faith For as God pursued Man's Apostacy and disobedience through Adam to death and destruction so he pursueth Man's Remedy through the Death and Sufficiency of the second Adam to Justification of Life and Salvation In the former God said Man must die in the latter he saith Man must and shall live He himself is the Commander and the life and strength of his own Commands in that the second Adam is not only a living Soul as the first was but a quickning Spirit 1 Cor. 15. 45. This Command from God in the Gospel to believe receive and enjoy Pardon and Righteousness in Jesus Christ Act. 13. 38 39. c. 16. 31. 1 Joh. 3. 23. even that Righteousness and Salvation which is laid up in the Person of the Mediator 2 Cor. 3. 9 10. for every one who comes for it Heb. 7. 25. and would enjoy the same Rev. 22. 17. This Command I say necessarily requires Obedience thereto Rom. 16. 26. This Obedience is exercised in a pure and free receiving Jesus Christ as my only Redeemer as being bought by him and being made his I am not my own I must not measure my self by my self but by what he is for me and to me When the temptations of Fear through my personal Guilt do command me to Despair I must not obey them but must obey the Law of Christ the Law of Faith as 't is called Rom. 3. 22. when Pride of heart or Self-ability doth command me to boast I must not obey it 1 Cor. 1. 13. but must reply I am not under the Law of my own Sin nor
the way who is a Guide also and therefore great is the loss of that man who walks alone and compasseth himself about with his own sparks if he fall as Solomon speaks he has none to raise him up again Eccles 4. 10. and thus Christ is held forth as a comfortable Leader and Companion Isa 57. 18. Jer. 3. 14. And the Church improves this Privilege by leaning on her Beloved as she comes forth out of the Wilderness This blessed Companion makes way for his peoples safety in the Fire and in the Water of Affliction Dan. 3. 25. Isa 43. 2. 8. And by this means also Faith has got a true and faithful Witness on the Believers side to clear off Accusations and from hence are those expressions used in the Psalms Plead my cause Be surety for me c. and the often Appeals made to God who trieth the Heart and Reins and who standeth up on the side of his people and on their behalf These and infinitely more Privileges do arise to every Believer from the Interest that he hath in Christ's entire and incommunicable Person by the Union of Free Govenant and Mystical Ingrafture and the Communion of Vertue derived from the Person of this Mediator in which Mystery of Grace he enjoys Christ as the Hand enjoys the Head yet both of them are distinctly considered in the Body or as the Eye enjoys the influence and vertue of that very light and heat which is in the very body of the Sun although the body of the Sun be many thousand Miles distant from that Eye which doth actually enjoy that Sun in the light and heat of its influence and doth as truly enjoy it as if it lay in the material Body of the Sun and in a way of greater advantage fitted for its capacity and use So is the Person of Christ enjoyed really and truly with all Privileges relating to Believers whiles he retains his Personality uncommunicated and undivided to any other as the very Water of the Fountain is enjoyed in the Streams and the Sap of the Root enjoyed in the Branches and yet the Stream is not the Fountain nor yet the Branches any part of the Root The way of the Souls enjoyment Christ's Entrance upon the heart works Renewing there of Christ in all the Privileges of his Person and Offices of his Mediatorship and in all the Influences of Spiritual Unction and Transformation of the heart into the power and likeness of Jesus Christ is wrought by the Spirit of Regeneration through Faith which causeth the Soul to pass over from its self from all its strength from all its own carnal hope fear and selfish care into the Death Life Righteousness and Perfection of the Person of Jesus Christ and so is enabled to say in truth I am not mine own I live yet no longer I but Christ liveth in me and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God viz. by the very Life and in the very Life of Christ apprehended received enjoyed and working effectually in me by Faith in him who loved me and washed me from my sins in his own blood Gal. 2. 20. Rev. 1. 5. This is that translating renewing changing and quickning work which the Scripture doth so often mention as the design of the Gospel And 't is with reference unto this that Christ is called a Stone of Stumbling and Rock of Offence sinful and selfish Nature strives to preserve its life against the killing vertue of the Spirit of Christ in the Gospel preached to the World This is the reason of so much Carnal Profession and Barrenness in Christianity when the hearts of Men turn the nature of the Gospel which is a Law of Grace and obeyed only by Faith into the similitude of the Law of Moses and make it a matter of Man's working and subject it to the poor and lame endeavours of unrenewed Man not remembring or at least not understanding that the Tree must first be made good before the Fruits can be good This was meant by the Apostle when he bewails the Jews who though they followed after Righteousness attained it not because they sought it not by faith but as it were by the works of the law Rom. 9. 31 32. Ever since the Fall of Man Righteousness forsook the created Nature of Man which is largely shewed Rom. 3. 10. and is only now in Christ revealed from Heaven in receiving of whom by being baptised spiritually into his Death and Life his Righteousness is enjoyed Every Command of the Gospel doth first require Faith which is the great Commandment and in the vertue and power thereof requires and works Holiness in all the Fruits of a new Life by the vertue of Jesus Christ working in every Precept and Command of God in the whole Scriptures being Gospellized by his Spirit And here my heart begins again to groan while I find so little of this killing renewing power accomplishing its work upon me How far am I from this renewed State I am weary of the lifeless Notion of the thing I faint in my sighing and find no rest I long for the breath of the Lord and lament out my Complaint before him When will the Lord come into his Temple My flesh trembleth 'twixt hope fear and desire I am as a Bottle dried in the Smoak my heart is pained and in Travel O preserver of Men make no tarrying lest I be like them who go down to the pit Oh let Death feed upon me till the Foundation of Life Power and Peace be laid in my Soul and Deliverance come from another place Droopings are deadly O my Soul do not say thy Wound is incurable the Creator of the ends of the Earth doth undertake for thee he will yet reveal abundance of Truth and Peace Come then O Fountain of Help and do thine own Will upon me How easie is it to say the word Renewing in comparison of the thing really executed and done All that can be spoken about it is but words the Change it self is the thing I long for my eyes fail with hoping for the very Salvation of God in this work Oh that the Heavens might drop down their Dew Why are the Influences of the Clouds with-held Oh for the sounding of his Bowels who is gone into a far Country and has promised to return My musing heart cannot fetch him but my groaning is before him and the tears and cries of my Soul is in his sight O Earth cover thou not my blood let the cry of my distress be heard Anguish is upon my heart and Oh let the Season of my Redemption come According to the measure of the power of Christ given to me I would yet struggle against this Gyant unmortified self I would rather take a Sling and a Stone in the power of Christ than all the Weapons of a Carnal Arm and Understanding Christ well knew the length of that Petition Thy Will be done
when he taught his Disciples that Prayer Could I but pray this Prayer in the Latitude of it I should think my foot within the threshold of Heaven The main Gospel-killing work lies The blessedness of a mortified Vnderstanding and mortified Will. in mortifying the Understanding and the Will into the Wisdom and Dominion of the Spirit and in regard my present Controversie is against my own Carnal Will I would deal with that first did not my unmortified Understanding stand in the way My unmortified Understanding can easily dally with all the Notions about the Trinity Law and Gospel Promises and Covenant Faith and every Grace of the Spirit and every Duty of Godliness and yet but trifle all the while The renewed Understanding sucks in the lively Evidence of the Mind of God in all those things and is called the Demonstration of Spirit and Power 1 Cor. 2. 4. and the very Mind of Christ 1 Cor. 2. 16. This Mind of Jesus Christ represents to Faith the infinite God wrapped up in every Particle of his Word and is the Spirit of every revealed Truth Hence comes that Expression You have not so learned Christ Ephes 4. 20. A renewed Understanding is not taught by Words and Sentences be they what they will and though never so good but by the Mind of God and Christ in them Ephes 4. 21. The whole Volumne of the Scriptures is but as it were a small hint of the unmeasurable Will of God And this is the reason why the Scriptures though the words are the same and not altered yet do they by the Spirit speak variety of Instructions in the Unity of the same Truth as the Spirit pleaseth to reveal it self therein which doth not at all argue defect in the Scriptures but infiniteness in the Mind of Christ therein contained This Fulness of the Mind of Christ in the Word is that which makes it divide between the Soul and the Spirit the Joynts and the Marrow and is a Discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart Heb. 4. 12. A renewed Understanding makes use of the Word and all the Expressions therein but as the Door by which to enter into the whole Vision of God in Jesus Christ and the Revelation of his Will and so takes up the Truth truly in the method in which the infinite God is pleased to condescend A renewed Understanding sees the Mystery of Truth to be Substance and Life through that report of it which words do speak It converseth with Life through the Conduit of Words Phrases and Terms It gives way to the Truth as it is in Jesus by believing and not mangle it with carnal Reason and so makes way for the renewed Will to give Obedience by believing doing and suffering the Pleasure and Will of God The renewed Will is one with God's Will in a way of Submission thereto It lies down broken heartedly in the pleasure of God 'T is zealous in Obedience secure in believing quiet in suffering because the Will of God reigneth and cannot be disappointed It makes the Soul in all things give thanks and rejoyce evermore It grieves where the Holy Spirit is grieved and it delights where God delights If God say to Abraham Offer up Isaac he doth it with joy Reluctancy is gone because the Will of God dwells in the renewed Will and the Consultations of Flesh and Blood are mortified It grieves for Sin because it crosseth the revealed Will of God and yet rejoyceth in Hope because all things shall work together for good to them that love him The renewed Will is always renewing it self by Faith in Christ and looking into the Law of Liberty It thanks God heartily for Life Death Health Sickness Success or Disappointment in High Degree or Low Degree because 't is baptized into his Will And that the nature of this new Creation in the Will may provoke my heart to withdraw from the Servitude of my corrupt Will I would ponder the nature of it a little further The first Parent of the Grace of Adoption by Jesus Christ was the good pleasure of the Will of God in his Decree Ephes 1. 5. and actual Conversion by the Word is the Operation also of the Will of God Jam. 1. 18. which bringeth forth a Birth in the new Man of the same likeness Psal 110. 3. Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power and by this the truth of all Obedience is measured Isa 1. 19. It is also the first thing the Spirit of God hath in its eye and which doth in a way of Acceptation fill up the defect of all other Service 2 Cor. 8. 12. The State of Death in Sin is Captivity to the Will of Satan and the Flesh and Subjection to the Will of God is the First-born from the Dead it first appears and so goes on as the living Token of true Christianity and never ceaseth till 't is filled with the Fulness of God who brought it forth and so it is the undoing Principle to Flesh and Blood and captivates Fear Care and Bondage into the Liberty of Jesus Christ the Eternal Son of God and makes Christ and a Believer no longer twain but one in the Union and Operation of the Spirit whereby the Dominion and sure Protection of God secures the Soul as the Waters cover the Sea Here I stick and here I groan Alas alas for this day of the Lord Oh for this day spring from on high to reveal this light and breath in the Life of this renewed Understanding and Will from the rolling bowels of his own Grace and Spirit I am sick yea I am sick my Pen shakes my heart quivers with desire after this renewing Work Give way O Carnal Mind of Unbelief Darkness Sin and Vanity that my heart may faint away into the bosom of this changing Power of the Spirit of Christ who has redeemed it This glorius Work of renewing The use of the Scriptures the Mind is carried on by the eternal Word of God by which he made the World All Creating Work is effected through the eternal Word the Son of God by the eternal Spirit from the everlasting Father in which God is all in all This eternal Word hath declared himself by a word of Faith Reconciliation and Comfort contained and expressed in a way suitable to the Capacity of Humane Sense Reason and Understanding in the Scriptures that so the incomprehensible Will of God might look into the heart of Man through the inlets of natural Sense and the faculties of a natural Mind making them subservient in this renewing Change Therefore is it made visible to the eye and receivable by the ear retainable by the memory and meditable by the heart in the use of the Scriptures and so doth in a rational way by Reproofs Instructions Convincements and Comforts bring forth the new Creature and hold it in a Spiritual Union and Fellowship with the Father Son and Spirit through a daily Increase tending to the
last and perfect Fulness Col. 2. 19. Ephes 1. 23. And that Jesus Christ may make this express Word of his effectual to accomplish the design of his love to the Souls of his Redeemed he guides them by his Spirit to the most advantagious improvement thereof that not one Jot of his Word may be lost The whole Scriptures are the Inspiration of the Spirit of God the Father and the Son Jesus Christ Heb. 1. 1. Col. 3. 16. 2 Tim. 3. 16. given to reveal the way of Salvation which is carried on by a way of History and Doctrine in both which the State of Mankind is discovered in reference to its Innocency Fall and Recovery The State of Innocency and the Fall comprehended all Mankind in the Persons of Adam and Eve the State of Recovery respects only a part of Mankind saved out of that universal Loss by Christ according to the Election of Grace and therefore he is called the second Adam Rom. 5. 14. 1 Cor. 15. 45. who infuseth the Gift and Operation of Righteousness to his Seed as the first Adam had infused the Guilt and enthralling corrupting Power of Sin into his Seed As the Fall was a perfect Fall so the Recovery to the Remnant recovered is a perfect Recovery compleated fully in God's Decree before the World was Ephes 1. 4. and actually solemnized at Christ's Suffering Col. 2. 15. which becomes applicable to every individual person of that number by the Spirit of Faith and Holiness and whereby they are fully and really freed from the matter of Guilt through Union with Christ albeit the afflicting sense and fear of Guilt appears many times through the weakness of Faith in that Union and through the incumbring defilement of Sin in them who are redeemed holds on a Conflict in the Flesh till the last Enemy viz. Death be destroyed and so Mankind stands divided the Persons of them who only bear the Image of the first Adam corrupted by the Serpent's Poyson and they who bear the Image of the second Adam and in the latter every redeemed person carries also a Sub-Division in his own heart for a time viz. the grand Principle of his renewed State and the afflicting Stain and Enmity of the first Adam's Nature remaining in the Flesh And in reference to these two Contraries viz. the Good and Bad Persons of Mankind and the different Principles of Good and Evil the Scripture doth display all the Threatnings and Comforts Reproofs and Encouragements Judgments and Promises Instructions and Rebukes that are found in that blessed Volume with manifestations of God's power and goodness to the one and his power and wrath against the other So that whatsoever is spoken of any one person is spoken of all persons in the same State and whatsoever is spoken of any Action or Qualification in any person is spoken of alike Actions and Qualifications in every person who is in the same state to the end of the World even as long as Mankind remains and as far as the Line of each State whether it be good or bad reacheth so far doth every person continuing in that State bear his proportionable share through the Grave to Eternity When the Spirit of God speaketh any thing in the Word it first looks through the State in which any person is and so deals with that particular person according to the state in which he is whether it be a state of Sin or Grace and so acts towards him according to the rules and method of such a state Hence 't is that comforts or afflictions or teachings that are one and the same in their own nature are exceeding different in the end and use which the Spirit makes of them through the different state of Light or Darkness Life or Death in which all men lie So that by this means the same Word is a savour of Life to one which is a savour of Death to another The general threatnings against Ungodliness concerns every particular ungodly Man The particular punishment inflicted upon any one ungodly Man shews what is equally due to the rest of ungodly Men. And although one evil Man may not commit the same wicked Action as another doth yet he has the Nature and the same evil State which is the Root of that Action and as it brings forth Actions equivolently evil it is by the Spirit of God equally sentenced to Punishment And as in all visible Actions the state of the person in the Scriptures is first considered so in all Actions the nature and spirit of that Action as it holds relation to the state of the person acting is regarded by the Spirit of God in the Word before the Action it self and involves every one within the Guilt of that Action if it be wicked or within the Blessing of that Action if it be good in whom the nature and spirit of such an Action worketh From this ground Christ calls wicked Anger Murther and unchast Lustings Adultery Matth. 5. 21 28. And from this ground a gracious desire and intention has the blessing of a gracious Action 2 Cor. 8. 12. And when the Action is one and the same and yet the Spirit and inward Mind of them who execute that Action different the Action is not accounted the same but different as in the case of Cain's killing Abel and Phineas's killing Zimri it was Murther in the one and Righteousness in the other So that Actions may agree and yet the spirit of that Action in the Actors not agree and the spirit of one Action may agree with the spirit of another Action or the spirit of one that acts may agree in some particular Action with the spirit of another who acts the same thing and yet the difference of their grand state disagree as appears in the case of David's Uncleanness through Lust and the Sin of his Son Ammon for the Repentance of the one is recorded but not of the other So that in the use of the Scriptures we are to consider how far Actions agree and how far the spirit or immediate inward working which produceth Actions agrees and how the grand state of persons do agree that we may know how to make use of the Reproofs and Punishments Promises and Rewards that we find given to others in Scripture As concerning the state of Godliness there is no Godly Man has any peculiar privilege which is not common to all who are in the same state because the Covenant is made to them all alike in Jesus Christ in whom God is become their God upon the equal terms of Free Grace and Christ is as well the Head of one Member as of another and all the privileges which can flow from such a common relation run down rightfully to every person within that relation viz. Justification Adoption Reconciliation Sanctification Preservation Instruction and such like Operations of the Spirit that issue from that relation and which tend to a living enjoyment thereof and the advancing of that state to perfection
All Commands also and Duties bear with them an equal Engagement to every person alike related within the state of Covenant-Interest because those Commands and Duties relate to the same Interest in which all the people of God are one Joh. 17. 20. Matth. 28. 20. So that this Interest in God which is helpful in one case is applicable to all alike cases wherein the Saints who enjoy that Interest are concerned which makes every Promise to have a kind of Infiniteness as God is infinite From this Ground the same Promise that armed Joshua against fear through the presence and faithfulness of God Josh 1. 5. I will never leave thee nor forsake thee is used likewise to every Saint to arm him against Covetousness and fear of Want Heb. 13. 5. And thus the Experience of one Saint becomes advantagious to another through their mutual Interest in the same Root of Spiritual Life in Christ by which they are one with him and Co-partners each with other of the same Grace From this Ground there is no Member of Christ that can say he has not need of anothers help because the Spirit of God by which they are united into one Body conveys its operation through one to another as it pleaseth him 1 Cor. 12. 11. which Spirit of God is the new Life of the Weak as well as of the Strong as he pleaseth to manifest his Power and Vertue in the one or the other more or less by which they are strong or weak that so they might love pity and sympathize each with other being all interested in the same Life and whereby they are all one Body and Members one of another Rom. 12. 5. Hence it is that all things spoken in the Scriptures are of true and proper use to every Child of God as far as their condition agrees with or stands in need of that Help Comfort Counsel or Reproof mentioned there which is the scope of the Spirit of God in all those Promises Instructions or Reproofs recorded in the Scriptures as if they and their particular Cases had been first or only in the eye of God when that word was spoken or that instance given be it what it will What I say to you saith Christ Matth. 13. 37. I say to all watch for whatsoever things were written afore time to others were written for our learning as the Apostle tells the Church of the Romans Rom. 15. 4 5. That we through patience and comfort of the same scriptures might have the same enjoyment and ground of hope as they had being equally interested in the same God who by his Spirit breaths Grounds and Influence of the same Grace of Patience and Consolation as it did to them to whom the Spirit through the Scripture had formerly spoken And thus the same Word being the Inspiration of the Spirit bloweth where it listeth and the sound thereof is gone forth into all the World and the spirit drift scope and use of the words of Life to the end of the Earth as far as the Spirit which breathed it begets any Soul into the Life of Union with God in Jesus Christ who is the Eternal Word and Mind of the Eternal Father from whom all the Children of Adoption receive their Being and Birth through the Gospel of that only begotten Son of God spiritually shed abroad into their hearts So that every one who is Christ's may say the History of the Scriptures is for me the Prophets are mine the Apostles are mine and all their Prophesies and Preachings all Promises Reproofs and Comforts Counsels Warnings and Examples the Gospel under Moses his Vail and as it shines in the Teachings and Miracles of Christ and his Apostles all things all persons Paul Apollos Cephas Life and Death are the Inventory of my Happiness things past present and to come are mine and for my use and advantage because the Spirit which worketh in and by all these is mine and Christ to whom I come and whom I serve is mine and Christ is God's and his God and Father is mine because I am his Heir and Co-heir with him Let such a privilege cause the Soul to cry out Breath O Spirit open your selves O blessed Scriptures and water me with all manner of Teaching Let mysterious Grace possess my Understanding powerful Wisdom from God in the Scriptures make me wise to Salvation Let Strength and Vertue from on high renew both Spirit Soul and Body to all power of a spiritual mind that I may comprehend with all Saints what is the heighth length depth and breadth of the love of God in Christ and be built amongst them upon the Foundation of the Apostles and Prophets Christ himself being my Corner-stone and his Power enlivening me to every good word and work through that common Salvation wrought by him for every Member of his Body among whom I also am allowed to claim my share in the Inheritance of Light through the faith and patience of the Scriptures and Testimony of Jesus my Lord. Abraham's Faith was exercised upon the Covenant which God made with him saying I will be thy God and the God of thy seed which Faith was further confirmed by the Sign of Circumcision that was added to that Covenant and tried yet further by offering up his Son in all which he had the faithfulness of God and his free Grace and Power in his eye and saw Christ's day a far off therein although 't is like he saw not distinctly the very manner of Christ's coming in the Flesh and the manner of his Death and Resurrection yet his faith in the substance of the Covenant of God's free Grace and in his wisdom and power to accomplish the same in his own way and time led him to embrace that Covenant so dispensed and to that measure discovered deriving Interest in God to his Soul and the Righteousness of Justification thereby which the Spirit doth record in the Scriptures to be the same justifying Exercise of Faith which in the fulness of time should and so did more distinctly put forth its self upon Christ dead and risen and upon the power and truth of God therein to confirm and actually execute in the Person of Christ the Branches and Method of that Covenant relating to the taking away Sin applying Righteousness and uniting Man to God in the Mystery of Grace and Salvation and therefore 't is said the same Righteousness is now imputed to Believers as was to him because the nature of their Faith and the substance of the Object of that Faith is one and the same In the exercise of which they walk in his steps Rom. 4. 12. and so are justified with believing Abraham and inherit his Blessing Gal. 3. 9. And thus the Scriptures in the spiritual use thereof do run through all visibly different Dispensations Administrations Instances and Cases of the Saints with one and the same invisible scope and secret tendency agreeable to the state of Godliness and relating to all persons within
a curious Key to the Wards of a Lock and intermits not the least moment from suitable and needful help Isa 27. 3. only he manageth it in his own method which a resigned Soul owns he is satisfied and delighted in Hence comes Peace when the Soul Peace of a Believer by Resignment having viewed the Compass of plentiful Redemption the strength of the Rock that is under him and the Helmet of Salvation that is over him saith Return O my soul to thy rest for God hath dealt bountifully with thee God hath delivered my life from going down to the pit and my eyes from tears and my feet from falling Psal 116. 7 8. I will now lay me down and sleep for no less than God himself makes me to dwell in safety Psal 4. 8. The Peace of Resignation is Christ's Peace which none can divide from a Believer it is his Garison and fortified Security Col. 3. 15. Joh. 14. 27. And from hence flows Love to God the Father Son and Spirit The Love Love of the Father in the Son and by the Spirit in all the unspeakable discoveries of it warms the heart into this Resignation unto him 1 Joh. 4. 19. Christ appearing so amply furnished to conciliate Love and presenting the Bracelets of his kindness and declaring his Wealth Power and Glory of his Kingdom Psal 145. 11. as once Abraham's Servant did to Rebeccah in behalf of Isaac he gains the heart of a Believer to forsake former Contents and resign up the utmost Affections to him The more the Soul resigns the more doth it love and the more it loves the more it doth resign to him The Love of God shed abroad into the heart by the Spirit from the heart of Christ breeds Resignation and that Resignation still feeds Love each moving other with a perpetual motion and so from an endless Principle of Union with Christ runs forth to all Eternity From whence ariseth also a sense Freedom of perfect Freedom the Pales of distance are broken down free Access to God in Christ is gained Mis-apprehensions removed and Open-heartedness interweaves betwixt Christ and the Soul The Heir is no longer Servant but a Son Esther is brought from the Custody of Hegai to the King's Palace The boundless Deity in all its Purity Power and Protection is the Range of a resigning Believer The Law is removed the Prince of this World is judged and cast out the former state of Enmity and Bondage is over and gone and now the Soul dilates it self with full spread into that Freedom wherewith Christ hath made it free Joh. 8. 36. Gal. 5. 1. Which Freedom brings in Boldness along with it the Soul being Boldness once resigned up to Christ is no longer a Stranger but of his Houshold yea betrothed to his Person in Righteousness and Tender Mercy and is always in his eye Resignation betwixt Christ and the Soul being mutually past Darkness is swallowed up of Light there is no shelter for the Beasts of Prey no Weapon that is formed against a Believer can prosper who has resigned himself to the Former of all things he may now dwell safely in the Wilderness and sleep in the Woods a Lyon-like Courage grows in the Soul from the Lyon of the Tribe of Judah to whom by Resignation it is united What now may hinder Satisfaction Why may not the Soul say I Satisfaction have enough my Inheritance is lawfully gotten neither have I got it with my Sword and Bow as Jacob got a Portion from the hand of the Amorite but I have given my self for it I have resigned my whole self to Christ and he has resigned his whole self to me I own and accept his Resignation and he accepts mine What further remains than that I bid farewel to mine own Poverty and Wretchedness and put on Change of Raiment Why may not I dwell amidst the Flagons Cant. 2. 5. of his satisfying Presence I am filled and my Cup runs over And now also who may hinder a satisfied Soul from Joy Will not Joy all the Foundation-work and Walls of this Building bear a Superstructure of Joy in the Holy Spirit Is not the upshot of this Resignation betwixt Christ and a Believer mutual Joy He joys over his beloved with singing Zeph. 3. 17. and her soul rejoyceth in God her Saviour Luk. 1. 47. As far as any degrees of this Resignation tastes these high Privileges so doth a relish of Joy grow in the Soul Resignation brings the Soul into the heart of Christ who hath triumphed gloriously in rescuing his Spouse and now rejoyceth over her as a Bridegroom rejoyceth over the Bride Isa 62. 4. and in the day of the gladness of his heart calls her Hephzibah My delight is in her Which Joy begets an Eccho of its own likeness from her again My delight is in him And thus the Crown of Joy is placed on the Head of Spiritual Resignment The Soul cannot resign to God without Joy in him nor rejoyce in him without Resignment They live in one another because the Seed and Nature of all spiritual Privileges lies in every Privilege and the Nature of this Privilege being endless because God is everlasting the Crown of Joy can therefore never wither And the more this Resignation to God in Christ gets Ground in An Entrance to the purchased Possession the Soul the more is an Entrance made into the everlasting Kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ not as it is a Work done by us but wrought in us in which the heart is made to give way and is made voluntary therein by the Spirit of Grace Which Work is here carried on through much Contradiction in the Flesh which strives against it while the Inward Man in every Believer pants after it and finds no Rest but as the Power of this holy Resignation to God in all things prevails till at last it steps over Mortality and leaves every Obstruction behind perfectly and for ever and then God is all in all Christ enjoying his Spouse without any Reluctancy or Unsuitableness in her and she enjoying her Husband without any Vail upon his Face she hears his pure Language and returns pure Language again Love has its full vent on both sides the mutual Yerning of Bowels will then be satisfied the Voice of COME which sounds from Christ above and the Believer below will period it self in one eternal unseparable Meeting Resignation will then enjoy an uninterrupted Delight How astonishing is the thought of this When the thought of it is strained through the weakness of my Faith conflicting with so much Darkness and present Treachery of heart and Self-unworthiness the Glympses thereof makes me both fear and rejoyce at once and yet am not able to rejoyce perfectly for fear nor fear perfectly for hope O infinite Redeemer be over and above all my fear and faintness act like thy self almightily and freely that my heart may shout for Joy in the hope of the
spiritual Warmth do attest those things are really true The more spiritually any thing is preached or spoken it gives the more relishable taste to their inward Man and though they are of divers Nations yet they accord in the same main Principles of the new Creature and the same substantial inward exercise of heart 3. Observe also with what Radical Uniformity the Opposers of Grace do resist the Convictions of his Spirit And besides 4. Doth not thy truest Rest lie in thy nearest Approaches to God in Christ as thy Centre towards which thou art restlesly rowling as the true and real bottom of all thy hope and comfort But wouldst thou indeed know that the matters contained in the Word of Christ are real things Then never read or hear for meer knowledge sake Look for some Beams of Christ's Glory and Power in every Verse Account nothing Knowledge but as it is seasoned with some Revelation of the glorious Presence of Christ and his quickning Spirit Use no Conference about spiritual Truths for Conference sake but still mind the promoting of something for real Edification Use not Duties for Custom and meer Service sake but for Approach and nearer Communion with God Make no person thy Pattern more nor less than as some warmth of the Presence of Christ appears in his Words Walk and Conversation Let thy Recreation be Prayer suffer not Guilt to wranckle wash often in the Blood of Christ do not slightly grieve the Spirit but pray for the fulfilling of the Promise that the Spirit shall teach you all things Let nothing bar up your way from craving pardon of sin and hope of relief And if you thus trade in spiritual things as real they will appear more and more to be real according to the Promise Joh. 7. 17. If any man do his will he shall know c. But alas while I would thus muse my heart into some spiritual Freedom and Activity I am again dismally invaded my filthy and vile heart rebels the Prince of Darkness hath violently broke in upon me my Conscience is defiled and my Peace wounded my Prayers are heartless I have turned my self round into a Giddiness I have lost my Station and am bleating up and down like a Lamb in a large place I got a glimpse of Relief but cannot fix my eye upon it But what gain I by solitary Complaint I have sinned in the sight of God Angels and Men in the sight of my Redeemer in the sight of my own Conscience and Oh that I could pour out my Soul as Water before the Lord It would be a rich Mercy to me to be admitted to tumble at the feet of my Judge and get so near as Mary did to wash his feet with Tears and wipe them with the Hairs of perpetual Resignation to himself and to his disposal of me to purge me in what method soever so I may be clean and the seven Abominations of my heart cast out I would fain say in faith I will yet look to thy holy Temple Blessed be the name of him who is strong merciful gracious and abundant in Pardon Blessed be that God that Redeemer the Lord although unworthy sinful Wretch that I am yet my Righteousness O that God would yet spirit me to enquire into and taste the Bread which came down from Heaven I am searching after the real Existence of Christ and the benefit which flows from Union with him And I perceive that my peculiar Happiness lies not in this that these things have real Existence in themselves but that I know them to exist and my self to exist in them and they in me The things themselves are spiritual I cannot know them naturally but by the Spirit of Faith for Flesh cannot see Spirit In the Mount will the Lord be seen As far as God shines upon my heart and Ordinances so far I behold a real worth and glorious power in them In his light only I see light Psal 36. 9. As far as Grace gets life in my Soul so far I see the real Excellency of it As the Life of God opens it self to my heart so far I live and know the ravishing comfort of spiritual Life for with him is the Fountain of Life when he withdraws his Breath I do as it were return to the Dust for in him I live and move I know no worth in any Christian but as I partake with him in the same Spirit and Life Divine Commands Reproofs and Comforts do so far affect my heart powerfully as my Soul doth live in him who speaketh them The demonstration of spiritual things doth so far appear convincing as my heart is really transformed by them into the Image of Jesus Christ my Lord and my Head Though I have a renewed Principle of Light and Sight yet I cannot exercise the Sense of spiritual Sight till the Son of Righteousness sends forth a Beam to me by which I may behold in the Reflection of his own Light And this binds over my Soul to a necessity of a mortified believing Resignation to the Author of all Light Sight and Strength who is an unchangeable Rock and his work is perfect although I am full of Changes yet this Covenant keeps me from utter falling my strength and sight is ever decaying but he renews his Loving-kindness every Morning O let the day hasten in which I may know as I am known and the shadows of darkness and infirmity slee away I might come to a more real view of Jesus Christ and appropriate him and his benefits nearer to my heart if I had practically learnt the Exercise of Faith God has allowed a venturing boldness to Believing that it may step forth and stand in the breach when all seems to be lost When Lot is taken and Ziglag burnt and all carried away Captive then can Faith turn the day and recover the Spoil Faith is a distinct Grace wrought Faith only brings the heart to Christ freely by the holy Spirit quickning the heart to assent to and rest upon the Word of God upon the account of the Truth of God who spoke it 'T is distinct as Seeing and Hearing is distinct from other Senses 'T is wrought freely by the Spirit and so no acquired Notion it quickens through conveying Life from Christ to the heart by Divine Appointment It assents to and rests upon the Word against the Contradiction of Flesh and Blood It eyes the Truth of God as the Fountain of its Satisfaction and Success And so it first unites the heart to Christ and gives actual Propriety in him and in the Covenant which God made with him before the World was and consequently to all the Blessings contained in the Covenant 2 Tim. 1. 9. Ephes 1. 3 4. As the Gospel offers Christ Pardon and Life so Faith takes it freely not measuring the Ground of accepting it from below but from above It sees the Word to be the breathing of God in Jesus Christ in which all his Attributes are
not return ashamed but be kept in the more wakeful pursuits after him and while I follow him I am with him in my desire and if I desire him he desires me and there we meet Cant. 7. 10. in the Communion of desires till the shadows flee away A Sluggard indeed desireth and hath not because his hands refuse to labour Prov. 21 25. but a laborious desire after Christ enjoys him in the eye of Faith and Scripture-evidence Rev. 21. 6. and 22. 17. Joh. 7. 38. and therefore in the patience and faith of the Scriptures I have hope And what though some outward disadvantage has been occasioned which yet I know not of by this Retirement to seek him who knows my Soul loveth him will not he some way or other repay that loss and heal that breach O Lord pardon pity and care for him who in love to thy self and thy holy Will desires to seek the Kingdom of God first c. A DISCOURSE of UNION with CHRIST Joh. 17. 23. I in them and thou in me that they may be made perfect in one WHen I consider this true Loves Knot uttered by Christ himself and the wondrous Union in these three words I Thou and They declared by Christ at his passage from Earth to Heaven as the contrived Counsel of the eternal God Father Son and Spirit and when I find up and down in the Scriptures that the Elect when once they are quickned by the Spirit into the state of Regeneration are said to have their Life in God Col. 3. 3. and that God lives in them dwells in them and they in him 2 Cor. 6. 16. 1 Joh. 4. 13. that their works are wrought in God Joh. 3. 21. that God worketh in them 1 Cor. 12. 6. that God walks in them 2 Cor. 6. 16. that they walk with God and in his Name Gen. 5. 24. Mic. 4. 5. that Christ speaks in them and they in him 2 Cor. 13. 3. and 12. 19. I say when I consider such like expressions plentifully scattered by the holy Spirit in the Scriptures I conclude there is some admirable Union betwixt the Father of Glory and every one of his elect Seed in Christ which is a Mystery so spiritual a sacred Palace so secret that the most exquisite parts of Nature can never enter in to view it as it is 't is new Jerusalem under a Vail into which Flesh and Blood cannot enter But seeing Christ has said To you it is given to know the Mystery of the Kingdom of God Mark 4. 11. I would humbly wait for the power of the Spirit to transform and fit me and the manifestation of the Spirit to teach me that so enquiring I may enter and entring may possess this purchased Possession at least in the First Fruits and Earnest thereof and although methinks I shrivle up before the mysterious heat and lustre of this Gospel yet being commanded to seek the Lord and being under a Promise of help Jer. 31. 9. I wait on God for Strength and Wisdom to attempt this Enquiry methinks these steps do offer themselves The infinitely wise God decreed to make Mankind and the visible World to be his Habitation and the Creatures to serve him Man is made in a state of Righteousness and so stands upon his own legs and as it were in a moment he begins to totter and falls from that state into a state of sin and misery God so permitting it that his Justice and Mercy might the more be exalted a Remnant of undone Mankind are decreed to Salvation in a way of Mercy And that the Justice of God against Sin and Sinners may be preserved and yet the Elect Remnant saved God himself in the Person of the eternal Son assumes the Nature of Mankind into the Union of his Person and in that Nature pays to his own Justice all the Debt which this elect Remnant among the rest of fallen Mankind had involved themselves into in performing whereof he unites himself so near to them and they so near to himself that what he did for them was reckoned by Justice it self accountable to the Behoof and Concernment of each elected person as much as if every one of them had compleatly satisfied Justice in their own persons and the Union is so near betwixt him and them that whereas he is the express Image of the Father and having all power committed to him he stamps upon them the Image of God anew viz. Righteousness and true Holiness which becomes theirs only through Union with him and do only exist in their existing in him which existence is wrought by the holy Spirit forming him spiritually in their hearts as it formed him bodily in the Virgin 's Womb which Formation of Christ in their hearts becomes a mystical spiritual and true Union betwixt him and them which same Spirit works Faith in them that they may be made living Subjects and suitably capacitated for this mutual Union betwixt them also and him And thus the Lord of Life having enlivened to himself a living Spouse they enjoy each other by an unutterable nearness of spiritual In-dwelling in each other so near that the Spirit of God who manageth the Match sticks not to say that the Church and so every particular person thereof is a Member of his Body of his Flesh and of his Bones and not only that but he that is joyned to the Lord is one Spirit Ephes 5. 30. 1 Cor. 6. 15 17. Hence it comes to pass that from the very moment that the Soul hath accepted of Jesus Christ being seized upon to that purpose by the Spirit of Regeneration proceeding from the Father through the Son and received by believing that believing person so effectually visited by the Call of the Gospel doth now and never before become a new Man and though Sins and Temptations never so many do batter and bruise yet his House cannot fall nor his State be altered because God himself has laid his Foundation on a Rock and has drawn the Soul's Consent by believing to lay it there too and this Rock is Christ in whom the Almighty God receives this believing and renewed person into that Union and true real nearness which lies shadowed forth in the Scriptures of Truth under the terms of Father and Child 2 Cor. 6. 17 18. Husband and Wife Ephes 5. 25. c. Vine and Branches yea as one Body consisting of Head and Members and many such like similitudes in the Scriptures to set forth this wonderful Nearness and Union from whence it followeth that no Action State or Condition of such a renewed Person whether it be inward or outward is so entirely his own and of private Concernment to himself alone as it was before his sins were more entirely his own damage before now they wound his Relation and grieve Christ Ephes 4. 30. he sinned before against the Law of God he now sins in all his miscarriages against Christ also 1 Cor. 8. 12. and against the Law of his
Relation to him Ezek. 16. 38. he bare his own guilt before with distraction and horrour now Christ bears it from him before his very eyes and melts his heart into remorse at the sight of such a spectacle Zach. 12. 10. Ten thousand Rivers of Oyl could not expiate one Sin before but now they all pass away as a Cloud driven before the Wind and efficacy of the one Sacrifice of Christ to whom and to which by faith he is united his sins made him wander still farther and farther from God before now they are made contrary to their own nature to scourge him into the fresh Application of Jesus Christ by whom he draws near to God Psal 89. 30 31. 1 Pet. 3. 18. in all his Affliction he was alone before now Christ is his Partner Isa 63. 9. Christ is truly touched with his Calamities Zach. 1. 12. his smart is as the pricking of the Apple of Christ's Eye Zach. 2. 8. As for Losses in temporal things they were before Judgments upon him they are now gracious Trials of his faith and patience and means of purging him and drawing him into a nearer reliance on the Heir of all things So that his Losses and Crosses do not now tend to undo him but to awaken and transform him 1 Sam. 30. 6. in the midst of his fears he is not forsaken 2 Cor. 4. 9. but through this Union with Christ he is still in safe hands Psal 27. 1. Isa 43. 2. Dan. 3. 17 18 25. Temptations of Satan and his fury cannot destroy him because the Prince of Life to whom a renewed person is united has cast out the Prince of this World and tempers his poysonous Temptations into a phisical Potion curbing noxious humours in order to health Joh. 12. 31. working the Soul to more Humility Faith Prayer and patient Recumbency on God and Contentment in him 2 Cor. 12. 7 8 9 10. The meer civil Actions of such a person though the same still in themselves yet in respect of the change of the Agent they have some different Consideration otherwise than they had before He sets about them with other motives other dispositions and other ends than he had before which appears in that although the thing be done or spoken never so well to the contentment of others yet if Christ to whom this new Creature is united be not served with singleness of heart therein this renewed Soul akes as much as if the Action it self had been done never so much amiss And whence comes this smiting of heart but from this Union with God in Jesus Christ 2 Sam. 24. 10. in that the proper sway and tendency of such Convictions do bring the Soul still nearer and nearer to God through Jesus Christ which gives a spiritual Discovery of the unseen and living Breath and Pulse of this Union Ezek. 20. 37. And this seems to have relation to that expression used by the Lord to his people of old The quarrel of my Covenant Levit. 26. 25. threatning to punish them for their sins as they were contrary not only to the Law of Righteousness but also contrary to the Law of Covenant-Relation Yea all the Labours Anxieties and solicitous Exigents in the affairs and business of a renewed person do run along through the Sympathy of Christ and by reason of this near Union cannot but be Copartner therein and looks to it that one way or other the incumbrance shall usher in advantage he condescends to be as one weak with them that are weak as one troubled with them who are troubled that he may discipline the Grace and exercise the Faith of his people whereby he glides them along into some unavoidable necessity of Resignation of themselves and their Cares into the Arms of his divine Power and so ripens in them the Application of this Union betwixt him and them in their hearts And his design being to bring his People as a chast Virgin to himself he aims rather at the carrying on of that drift than at the answering the natural desires of his people about Ease or Deliverance any otherwise than as may suit with that end of his in making of them partakers of his holiness and whispers secretly into their ear the Servant is not to be above his Master I trod the dirty and toilsome way before you and am treading over again every step of it with you and in you you must be conformable to my Death and shall be conformable to my Resurrection Come along with me and your burthens shall not break you because it cannot break me your own projects may fail but in me you are Heirs of Blessing and Deliverance and shall not go without it Heb. 6. 15. I will give you rest Matth. 11. 28. He relieved not his own Body against the Treachery of Judas and the Company that came to apprehend him although he was the Omnipotent God and had all Power in his hands because it suited not with the design of Man's Redemption and as it fared with that Body of his that was in personal Union with the Godhead so doth it fare in some proportion with each Member of his mystical Body Their burthens and perplexities do not at all import that his hand is shortned or that he is really absent or had forgotten them no more than his Divine Nature could be separated from the Humane Nature when the stress of his sorrow made him cry out My God my God Why hast thou forsaken me As that Union carried him through so will this Union carry through his Members also It being now about three years since that God was pleased to cast Some Considerations in order to the fresh Application and Improvement of this Grace of Vnion with God in Christ the aforesaid Meditations into my heart and since that time having been for a season a Stranger in a strange Land beyond the Sea and there passed through a dark Vale of Privation and Distance from those Ordinances and that Society which I formerly enjoyed and having there also layen in the Shadow of Death through a long and lingring Sickness of my Body and being now some Months past returned back to my own Native Country where the good hand of God which never left me quite desolate caused me to review the Solemn Covenant which through his Grace I entred into the 30th December 1660. which Covenant being yesterday renewed and having therein solemnly given up my self again to the Lord and accepted of him in the Tenders of his Grace to be my God and Saviour and to own him in all the Relations of his condescending Grace and Love and also to submit willingly to his blessed Yoke Rule and Will expressed by his Spirit in his Word I find still much longing in my Soul to know him more inwardly that I might the more enjoy him and be the more serviceable to him and to that purpose having perused over again the foregoing Meditations concerning the Union between God and all and every
Redeemer the Fountain of Acceptation Pardon Life and Health In his hands I desire to leave you and remain c. 1658. To S. D. H. N o 33. I Thought good to send you a Line or two I am my self through the goodness of God in health and in hope of greater things to the Inner Man than I can yet attain My Life is a Warfare in all Respects O blessed be the Lord that is never weary of such a defiled Lump but holds my Soul in some life to this day with expectation that he will never leave till the Wilderness be made a fruitful Field and the Old Man be utterly destroyed for strong is he who hath promised and there shall be a performance to the patient attending on his Word God doth so order the bringing about of our eternal Rest that when he has lifted us over all the Mountains and Valleys of this present Pilgrimage he may at length be admired in them that believe and give matter of eternal Praise when we shall look back and see how we have escaped the devouring Floods and by his hand behold all the present spiritual Enemies lie dead for ever The Weary shall be refreshed the longing Soul satisfied the Captive delivered and the Scattered be yet gathered and return to Zion The Zeal of a faithful and gracious God and our Redeemer will accomplish this Be things how they will yet we are not allowed to say Our Wound is incurable but rather say Salvation is of God and he will be surpassingly wonderful to them that wait on him What though the Fig-Tree do not blossom yet God cannot alter the Word that is gone out of his Mouth Fear not for I have redeemed thee Isa 43. 1 c. Thou art mine to revive the spirit of the humble Isa 57. 15. He delights to dwell among broken Bones as his dwelling place that the Mourners may sing away their grief in God their Saviour There I leave you and commending you to the Lord I rest c. 1658. To D. H. N o 34. SUch is our bodily condition that we cannot make up these distances without the intervening of Letters or Friends but that Communion which I trust we have mutually though under much darkness with the Father and the Son by the Spirit of Grace needs no such helps I trust our Prayers meet at a shorter Cut and that we strive together in the same Faith of the Gospel It may be you find you have much to do to keep your head above water I find the same I bear about the same Body of Death and find the same Contradiction in my corrupt and confused Nature One Christian seems to out-run another till God reveal the mischievous Hell that dwells in our Flesh Then Paul himself will cry out O wretched man that I am and Isaiah that Evangelical Prophet be forced to say All our Righteousness is as filthy Rags What are our poor glimmerings to the brightness of the Sun of Righteousness Were there not an equal Relief in the Mediator for the youngest and weakest of the Flock as well as for them who have long travelled in the Profession of Godliness the Accoutrements of the most experienced Christians would shrivle up and wither away and leave nothing behind in the Soul but such an Out-cry as those Who shall dwell with everlasting Burnings but he that dwells in the burning Bush keeps it from consuming 'T was only the Likeness of the Son of Man that made the three Children in Daniel walk up and down in the Fire and yet safe from burning I will be with you saith God in the Fire and Water his Name is Emanuel God with us His Covenant is free the Purpose of Grace wonderful his good Will ariseth only from himself and will not cannot change and therefore the Sons of Jacob are not consumed We little think oft-times in our fear and discouragement how far our weak Prayers reach they are like an Arrow gone out of our sight and we many times think them lost and forgot and consider not that every dry Groan and watery Tear is put into the Bottle and winds up through the ascending vertue of the Mediation of him who is one with the Father to the Throne of Acceptation Let us comfort one another in this hope that we may labour and travel hard but not faint by the way I remain yours in the highest Bond c. 1658. To S. H. N o 35. I Am much refreshed that the Lord doth so favourably deal with your heart 'T is the best News you can write me of your particular to hear that you are toyling with a bad heart and hurried to and again by one Wave after another This may not be accounted bad News because the straitness of the way to Life consists in such a Warfare 'T is good News to hear that a poor Creature that is not able of her self to think one good thought should earnestly desire to be rid of all sin and that she might own the Holiness of God's Nature against all Pollution The Thirsty shall be filled that 's good News Matth. 5. 6. Always keep these two Supports ready viz. God is both able and willing to perfect his work in you to the end Whatever your Fight be let your Weapons be Prayer and Faith and you shall get the day I leave you to the Lord and rest c. 1658. To B. D. N o 36. I received the sad News of my deceased Sister blessed be the Name of him who was dead and is alive and will shortly cause the Dead to come forth that will be a blessed day for all the Redeemed to visit their precious Kindred And blessed be him who has in any gracious measure watered your heart let him favourably add this also viz. That upon all the Glory there be a Defence This is by my precious Friend whom God hath mightily rescued by his Grace I want nothing but more Communion with that God which you pant after more Faith more Truth and Resting upon him more Satisfaction in him that I may say and believe and sing God is my Portion Will he not rend the Heavens Will he not rend these hearts and appear That the Mountains of every fear and disquiet may skip like Lambs before the presence of our God When shall the Promises be Substance and a faithful compassionate God be an abundant Salvation Can the lowring face of an uncertain World and the things thereof make the Promise and unchangeable good Will of God of no effect doth not he whisper through every dark Cloud and say Come up hither The Lord open our ears to Instruction and let us rejoyce to take our leave of that which will not profit Every Prayer we make saith We have chosen an invisible Inheritance Oh what a glorious thing is Faith at a desperate pinch Then is his Throne high and lifted up when Christ is in profit and loss in life and death the hearts advantage above these
lower Ebbings and Flowings The Lord be with you c. 1659. To B. D. N o 37. IT were a miserable thing for a gracious heart to suffer Crosses if the Curse were in them but seeing their Nature is changed our misery doth not lie in such Dispensations but our Instructions are therein though it is hard to say and believe it and when the Clouds seem to gather thick over ones head then to claim sheltering teaching and purging Power under the Wings of God and to sing as Luther was wont Psal 46. God is a Refuge for us Selah that is a posture some way becoming an Heir of Life and Glory whose Estate is truly secured beyond Thief or Moth. I am sometimes even amazed to think how short I come of what I seem to be and of real acknowledging that God and living in that absolute blessed Covenant which I profess my self a sharer in And doth not these things require rough Dispensations inward or outward to awaken and send a poor Sinner home to that Advocate who is King Prophet and Priest to help But alas dry words my leanness my leanness yet strong is he who hath in some part already and will yet further one day totally remove all things that offend Let us bless him love him and honour all his ways The Lord help you and I to live above the Changes of this lower World There is a Magnanimity in Faith which overcometh the World if we could but attain that pitch The Lord establish our hearts and hopes upon himself he changes not and blessed be his Name I leave you with him and rest c. 1659. To D. D. N o 38. I Know no Refuge but in God and blessed be his Name his Name is a strong Tower this World is but a withering Portion a bad Prop to lean upon the Covenant of Grace will make amends for all I may not complain unless it be against my Unbelief God must have the Glory of all his works and therefore blessed again and again be his Name he hath not left his people whatever the World expect or think and therefore let us charge our hearts to resist sinful Melancholy his ways are still Mercy and Truth and the Children of Zion must shall and will rejoyce in their King a mighty King their and our Saviour The Lord is the Pilot of his Church and People the Vessel may be tost but cannot miscarry such honour and privilege have all believing Penitents The Clouds are thick below but the Lord rules above and hath said It shall be well with the Righteous And though I am unrighteous yet he who I desire to make the Object of my Faith is perfect and in his Righteousness I trust mine there I would cling and rejoyce in the hope of the Glory of God yet to be revealed c. 1659. To D. H. N o 39. SEeing our time here is a Warfare 't is a comfort to perceive the Lord's presence with any poor Soul so as to make it stand out in hope and prayer while Temptations and Corruptions like fiery Darts are flying thick on every side It never goes desperately ill with those that travel towards Zion and are acquainted with Assaults from Satan and hearttreachery from themselves till they begin secretly to whisper Rebellion against the Covenant and Law of God's Grace and say There is no help for me in God David's Excellency lay not so much that he was freer from Sin and sinful Miscarriages than others but in this that he could not endure to say or hear others say of him There is no help for him in God Psal 71. 11. c. 3. 2. and c. 42. 10. That was the Anchor that made him ride out Storms and the Rope that drew him up out of many a deep Pit Let us use the same means with reverence and yet with freedom God is a jealous God and cannot endure to be accounted changeable Jer. 33. 24 25. he keeps both ends of the Covenant and will not give the Glory of any part of that Trust out of his own hands Every Desire every Thirst and Exercise of Resolution or Hope heavenwards and every Soul and Body-deliverance to such ariseth from this viz. that God is faithful 2 Thes 3. 3. though our Labour and Prayer ought therein also to be employed viz. as the means which God has commanded on our part for a Closing with the efficatious vertue of his Spirit by believing whereby the force of Christ's Death and Resurrection becomes singly applicable to remove Guilt and confer a gracious Conformity to his Nature and the Law of Righteousness in the Soul I see you level at the right Mark and own your Relief from the right place and why may I not say You shall yet see greater things than these c. 1659. To D. H. N o 40. THe Lord be praised that you are within such a Covenant that nothing can befall us for evil while our eye is truly rolling heaven-ward yea within such a Covenant as is confirmed in the Blood of him who is able to turn the heart and eye heaven-ward That God hath dealt so favourably with your heart as to tie it to a hungry pursuit after him is much comfort to my Soul and matter of praise to his Name And I account it no small Mercy that my Child is under your care and both of you under God's gracious Wing When we acquaint one another that every day we live is a day of Battel and that the Enemy within us doth rage this is no reason of discouragement because the Battel is the Lords I am put every day to fly to the City of Refuge and I bless the Lord I never found the Gate quite shut against me yet I am forced sometimes methinks to squeeze in Which difficulty ariseth from my Unbelief and want of retaining a frame of tender Resignation not from any straitening in his Bowels but in my own but these days of distance are hastening away I perceive your eye grows dim the Lord bless the Means for Recovery however be not dismayed you shall want never an eye when your Body shall be raised incorruptibly 't is not long thither the Redeemer will be seen eye to eye and then farewel all Imperfections c. 1659. To D. H. N o 41. I Perceieve B. Cr. hath much trouble through Indisposition of Body and it is good it should be so though disquieting to the Flesh and you have a gracious share I perceive also In such Cases it will be some help to turn our thoughts from poring upon the Affliction it self and endeavour by all means to find out the Lesson which God is teaching thereby for that is properly and truly our work in that Christ hath born the Curse for us he hath taken away the wrathful Penalty and left only an awakening and instructory Nature in all the Afflictions that his People meet with Isa 27. 7 8 9. and 63. 9. Psal 89. 30 31 32 c. Oh that
in his Breath as in his Breathing so it is with spiritual Life exercising fresh and fresh Acts of Recourse to Jesus Christ And by this means the Soul comes at length to be bathed in the Comfort of his Truth and Love by an operating Faith Let my Condition be what it will inwardly or outwardly I am not to be dismayed from running to God and encouraging my self in him But my work is to listen out what God reproves or teacheth thereby holding this as an unmovable Truth That his love never fails from his People one moment and his People are they who in good earnest chuse him for their God whose very hearts fly and hanker after him such who come to God by Christ who design that as their Aim The whole Scripture doth justifie this plain difference between persons and persons viz. they who come to the light and they who hate it Joh 3. 20 21. Now I say My work is never to let my heart question his love to me If he has made me to hanker after him and if he loves continually then there is continually room for Access to him 'T is true that he hath suffered his People sometimes to fall grievously as David and others and he hid his face upon it But did we ever read that he did turn away from the Prayer of the Poor and while it is nothing else but his own Spirit interceding in them and Christ for them 'T is not imaginable though he seems not to answer sometimes yet he loves their voice continually Faith viz. an acting out of our own Life in the Life and spirit of Christ for all manner of good from God by him is and was always a conquering successful Grace In the greatest Surge it gives either Contentation or it hastens the opening of the Door for Deliverance and usually both together one way or other 'T is a sad thing that when we should be exercising Faith for getting the good of an Affliction and prying after further Discoveries of God's Truth Love and Wisdom and enquiring what the voice of our Father is and what it means I say it is a sad thing that at that time we should spend our thoughts in an unseasonable distrust of an Interest in him His Rod his Trials walk up and down among his People to shew he is their Father and his Discipline is amongst his Children and yet we are apt to take the very sign of our Reconciliation and make it an occasion of our distrust that we are not related to him This Wisdom comes not from above but is carnal sensual and unworthy of them who have heard the Word of Faith yea and accepted it also for many years 'T is bad tempting God and vexing his Spirit in that which provoketh him most But if I think I was not related to him before let me fly to him in Christ now and I shall be his though I was not actually so before for he casts away no sincere Comer But I do suppose you armed by the Lord to encounter these Assaults and am persuaded your Faith will grow by every Trial yea when 't is most assaulted you will be made to expect some good in the Rear which will make you glorifie God even in the Fires Dear Sister I commend you to the Lord Christ prays for you and therefore your faith cannot fail He will be Eyes to the Blind Feet to the Lame He will give Grace and Glory and no good thing will he with-hold c. 1661. To T. N. N o 56. IN pursuance of my Promise and also that the mutual Remembrance of each other may be kept alive I account my self engaged to present you these Lines 'T is one comfort that the Lord rules the World yea no other but that God to whom the Supplications of his People are always acceptable in Jesus Christ and that nothing can be perfectly miserable to them who are constituted Heirs of Blessing and past away from the Curse through the Curse of Christ And though the glorious Arm and Truths of God seem to be overwhelmed in the World yet when God shall appear to vindicate his Name and cloath himself with Jealousie what Obstruction shall hinder his Course or stop his hand I know you are not only strugling with difficulties without as well as I am but with Enemies within and truly that is my case also And I know nothing that keeps me from being overwhelmed but only this viz. some blinks of the free and eternal unchangeable Bounty of God who has for his own sake only pitch'd upon such an unworthy Creature and caused my Soul to hanker after him When I am tired out with my own Darkness Infirmity Pollution and Unbelief his good Spirit is pleased sometimes to sway my heart to throw my self Body and Soul and all my Sins and Cares upon him through Jesus Christ and so out of my own Shame and Confusion of face there darts in sometimes a Beam of Relief from him who quickeneth the Dead and calleth the things that are not as if they were Could we come off more smoothly to own and catch that Hold upon Jesus Christ which the Word of God's Grace doth invite us to we might lanch forth and venture securely in the Ark Jesus Christ when there is not a Foot of dry Ground here below to stand upon When we cannot pray then to remember Christ intercedes When we are all over defiled and confused to remember the Mediator is cloathed with our Nature and that on our behalf in perfect Purity and in the same Nature which each of us doth bear He did conquer over all that which we are as yet conflicting with in his Name That we are esteemed not according to our present Infirmity but according to that Perfection to which we are entitled in him who is at God's Right Hand Could we be more exercised in this view and blessed prospect it would make our dry and dead Limbs recover heat and life as it was with Jacob when he heard that Joseph was yet alive Joseph our Brother is yet alive And all Power is committed into his hands he has the Keys of Hell and Death and is himself the Door of Life also Oh how unpersuadable are our hearts for the most part and loath to credit the Word of his Grace and Truth so far as to resign up our selves our sins our burthens of all sorts to the vertue and power of his Atonement and Soveraignty who has ended all differences and brought in an everlasting Righteousness and Good Will that a righteous God and sinful Man might be reconciled together in him who has ballanced the Account exactly and being gone has left a Legacy of Blessing and Peace to every Soul that flees to him to feed upon till the days of full refreshing appears and we see him as he is When I only muse my own weakness it makes me more weak while I converse with anxious thoughts it makes my heart dark sower and
is most wise creep into him as near as you can and be assured the nearer you creep thither the better welcome and the more will your heart be composed The good hand of the Lord be with you c. 1667. To B. D. N o 86. I Do begin to long after a Line or two more from you how it stands as to your inward Man for that part is oft on my heart concerning you The Lord is favourable to me I have both the visitation of his favourable Frowns and Smiles and his Frowns are very wholsome for he never leaves me nor breaks so much as one Clause of his Covenant for his mercy endureth for ever I and my Family are in health I may say The Lord is my Shephard I shall not want any good thing Our God is a sweet Portion and Heaven a perfect Rest let us spring upwards and all will be well Your condition is often and sometimes solemnly presented by us before the Lord Who is a God hearing Prayer 'T is a comfort to me to think you are in his hands and that he will assuredly guide you by his Counsel until he has brought you to Glory I commend you to his care and kindness c. 1667. To J. A. N o 87. I Always perceive your friendly respect to me for which I return you many thanks As for the former part of your Letter there remaineth nothing on my thoughts that needeth any Apology from you for I never found your Lines any other than the meer proceed of Integrity and entire Affection towards me and therefore always very acceptable and the rather because they do not only leave Conviction upon me being privy to the burthen of mine own evil heart I groan under but are also by way of spur a good and weighty motive to stir up my Soul to pursue the harder after that Mark which I should and do daily long to attain unto Poor Worms as we are may hear and behold one another sometimes with some moral and affectionate Impressions but Oh what an influential Object is Jesus Christ who when yearningly beheld transforms the Soul into the same likeness and indeed the Graces of his Spirit in his People also improved through the Communication of the head have great force through that Communication to quicken one another All this tends to exalt that Fountain of Life and Grace in Christ that feeds all the Streams with its own vertue And blessed be for ever the God of all Grace that has called you and I into that glorious Fellowship and Communion To him we may complain and be pitied in him we may boast and can never exceed there Affection may be inflamed without danger for he infinitely surmounts all our love and all our praises into whose gracious Arms my dar Friend I commend you c. 1668. To B. D. N o 88. WE see how uncertain things below are but our Interest in the unchangeable Covenant of Grace will never fail nor deceive us that still you may say the Lord is good and every thing will work together for good if we let not go our Confidence The good and gracious God spread his Wing over you and direct and manage your Concernments for you You are much upon my heart praying that you may have the presence of God preserving and supporting your heart and ordering your Affairs I can commend you to him as one whom he is pleased through Christ to own within the rich sweet and precious Covenant of his Grace and whom he will care for and never leave till you are fully freed from every heart-oppressing care Therefore in the midst of all Cloudy Dispensations rouse up Faith and so pass through till you arrive at the Port of true Rest where the Fore-runner is entred for you There is a Rock which is not capable of Concussion A believing heart well digesting the 46th Psalm may behold Terrour without dismaying dread An unchangeable God is still the same Refuge in the midst of all other Changes To that Rock I commend you 1668. To C. E. D. N o 89. I Apprehend it a providential favour of God to me who gave me an opportunity of seeing my dear Cousin your Husband before the Lord removed him hence that I might have some fresh taste of the frame of his Soul when he stood upon the brink of Eternity ready to lanch forth I know it is an afflicting Providence to you to be deprived of the Society of so dear a Relation after you had so long enjoyed the Endearment of each others Affections and had passed through many afflicting Dispensations together in this Vale of trouble and had also I doubt not many joynt Applications to God praying together and according to the ability which God gave endeavouring to promote each others spiritual and everlasting Welfare But herein there is matter of Consolation and thankfulness to God not only that he lent you this choice Comfort through so many years of your Pilgrimage but that he caused you to see his faithfulness and goodness in carrying this your dear Husband through to the end of his spiritual Warfare and that God preserved him from staining his Profession in the eyes of the World and has rendred the remembrance of him precious amongst his People and fulfilled his Word touching him Mark the righteous Man and behold the upright c. And what though he be taken out of our sight for a little time there is no reason to repine that the Lord hath seen it good to take him into the Vision and perfect Fruition of himself among the Blessed as he hath given us ground to be fully persuaded and has now put an end to his troubles and disquiets has healed his aches cured his diseases and removed his pains of Body translated him from this World where he is yet pleased to leave you for a further exercise of your faith and patience And now what remains but that you gird up the Loyns of your Mind to run the remainder of your own Race And while you are here in time breath after the same eternal Rest rejoycing amidst all Trials and believing that our faithful and gracious God who has begun his good Work in your heart will never cease till he hath carried you through and landed you safe beyond all temptation sin and sorrow Into the hands of this gracious God I commend you c. 1668. To M. S. N o 90. I Am loath to omit the giving you a Line or two by my dear Sister who is this Morning turning over one Leaf more of her wandring Pilgrimage God is pleased so to order it that methinks I can hear little from any of my dear Friends but stories of worldly perplexity and who are they who are one way or other without their share therein This Life is like a troublesome Dream but blessed are they who when once the Dream is out and when once they come to awake shall be satisfied with realities of true
be able to speak to the hearing of the ends of the whole Heavens O the Melody of that great day when Saints and Angels innumerable shall be the Pronouncers Oh never such Melody Melody that may be heard Millions of Years Millions of Miles O Lord keep me in my present work till thou callest me to future work and prepare me for the glorifying of thee for ever Help me in this instant help me leave me not now help me through this Thicket graciously Lord graciously deal with me at my Dissolution that nothing but Actings of Love and Grace may be shining upon Me. I leave me with thee I desire to do it perfectly April 19. He spake to one that had watched with him the foregoing Night You see how it is with me You are young the Lord affect your heart with a true sense of your eternal State that you may not be befooled of your immortal Soul by a tempting Devil and a tempting World Some space after he took occasion to say It makes my Soul ashamed within me sometimes that I have had the whole Book of all God's Promises and Covenant before me and do believe that there is mine Inheritance and yet to be in such a posture as I am Alas to be made the Children of the Most High and to live like Fools it should make the Soul long to have the utmost of the Grace promised I expect every night and every day and every piece of a day to be gone that when-ever any Qualm comes upon me I am ready to think this is the time and yet I find in my self a natural Reluctancy against Death that I would and I would not but where-ever my Damp my Black my Disquiet is it ariseth from some Tardiness in my Soul to my God I have a great desire to be freed from my Burthens and to be in that State I greatly long for but yet I would willingly that God should pitch my Stakes and determine the matter God's Wisdom and his Goodness goes together for God's Attributes do not cross one another I ought to have a Manly Walk with God it is not a crouching crimbling childish foolish unexpert Walk By Manly I mean to weigh things as they are in the grave Discovery of Scripture Surely I long to be in the Fountain to see it and be for ever in it To one asking him how he did he said It is a great Mercy that my Mind abides in any Conjuncture and that the Wheels of the Clock do not fall all out of order I cannot now converse but I think the Trade meaning the Heavenly Trade goes on and the Lord make it a smart Trade Lord teach me how frail I am all things are best known by Experience as Learning is obtained by Observation Rules and Precepts April 20. Finding himself exceeding faint and weak said I could now lie down and say This is my last if the Lord saw it fit having much ado to retain Life To a Christian Friend that came to visit him he said Blessed be the Lord for the Covenant of Grace and the Surety of that Covenant where our stay is All Goodness all Mercy all Peace c. The way and method God takes he himself hath cut out but what his scope is in this my present Case I do not know Afterward it being told him of the death of an aged Relation who lived to above fourscore Years he spake to this effect Is he dead with whom I never had the opportunity seriously to converse with in the things of a spiritual World Surely this is the time to do any thing for God and to be helpful to others The Lord bless the Providence to that poor Woman his Wife To another Friend taking leave and saying The Lord be with you I hope he will carry you to your Journeys end he replied I hope he will I believe he will never leave me nor forsake me To another poor Christian he gave this Counsel Cling upon Christ and he will never leave you I cannot say much but be sure of that follow hard after Christ and he will never leave you That is all my Experience all that I have been a learning of the Truth and Faithfulness of God these scores of Years Only love him only obey him entirely seek him pray to him much for that is the only likeliest way and I never heard of any that did it faithfully and was lost Then he prayed O my God be near me suffer nothing to miscarry through the All-sufficiency of thy infinitely great Grace To a dear Friend that came to visit him telling him that he was very much upon the hearts of the People of God who prayed for him he replied these words That one heart of Christ sets other hearts awork He farther said I am glad to see you upon account of former Intimacy but I chiefly rejoyce that you have found the same God in Prayer that I have done and that you are hankering after the same Fountain and Spring and cannot live without it as God hath given me also an unwearied Reach after and upon these Grounds I am glad to see you My dear Friend fare you well the Lord be with you To a Relation he spake thus Spring to Heaven though for your springing you spring out of the Body and leave it behind you Let us look to it lest you and I fall short of our Hope Multitudes of Professors standing aloof off have lost their way they have lost their work they have lost their end Our opportunity is as clear in our hand now as ever it was in the hand of David or Paul or any of the Saints of God that lived before us Oh how do I love to see Grace grow in Friends in Relations c. The Lord be with you and carry you and make your Affliction to be a sanctified Affliction that in a little while you may not have any burthen but may see your Salvation and have it April 21. To another Visitant he spake thus I may not stand wondering meaning in reference to his long Sickness but yet I may wonder indeed that ever God made me a Man that ever he made me a rational Creature that ever he brought me forth into the World where the Gospel was and that he hath told me that he will save me for ever Oh that I could wonder admire and adore it You duggle up and down and so I have done heretofore and here we walk over but a little Ground and if we obtain little or much it is but a little got in a little Ground and we have therein trouble But Oh what is it to flee over the whole Heavens and to be every where in God and in Christ In all other good things relating only to this Life all the pleasure we have in seeking them is to think how pleasurable they will be to us when obtained But the delight and pleasure of spiritual things lie much in the very seeking of them
April 22. Being the Lord's Day in the Afternoon to a Friend that came to see him he expressed himself thus The Doctor hath told me the lightsomest News to day that he hath told me a great while in acquainting me that there is but little hope of my Continuance long in the World but the Afflictions of God's People lie near my heart Oh to be filled with the Spirit three or four hours in Prayer for the Concerns of Sion He farther spake in his particular Case c. thus What if they that have seen me shall see me no more if he sees me that hath seen my Yearnings and Groanings if he sees me again he will not say he knows me not he is a God that will not forget his Promise He who hath seen my Soul in Travel who hath seen those Pangs of desire that no other hath seen he will be ready to say in the Riches of his Grace Here is poor such a one come to my Gate Come to my Knee Come to my Mercy-Seat Oh for affectionate thoughts of God and getting into him they are things that will not dry up they will not wither that will not be parched up Oh blessed be that heart that is thorow in desires Oh where is that glorious Majesty Oh what is it to come to the first Spring of Spiritual Life To come to God to the God that hath carried me into my threescore and tenth Year with a high hand And now he fore-seeing the remainder of my days would be Sorrow and Labour to the Body he calls me off And what is threescore and ten Years compared with Eternity A poor Pittance of time wherein God hath had very little Service from me Thus I parle a little about it to get some deep thoughts of that unspeakable Majestick Grace Little can I say of my Religion more than this I love the Lord in all he did I love him in all his Image I may say I may lay me down and rest for the Lord sustaineth me I have no other I desire no other Lord glorifie thy Name I have had caring thoughts about my self and others but now thou seemest to determine the matter Thou didst see I could not stand in the Shock but in thy strength I could have stood But thou wilt not cause all thy Waves and thy Billows to pass over me Thou hast had thy Champions and wilt have thy Champions Lord the Clouds arise apace the Wicked are full of Wrath they would root out thy Interest they would make Jacob low they are set upon Mischief and Spight Arise arise O God let the Lamb deliver let the Lamb overcome let thy unreasonable Enemies be turned over to Judgment Beautifie the place of thy Holiness confirm the Weak fix the Staggering Let thy People be able to meet Sufferings to put on Faith and Patience and say Aha Aha We are for God and his Ways Let thy People meet Death meet Losses meet whatever the Enemy can do and say We scorn your Cruelty Oh that thy People may stick by thee when there is nothing but Violence and Contradiction of thy Will O Lord work wonders for thy People break the Arm cut asunder the Bow of the Ungodly Oh let Shame be upon those that would take away thy Worship Glorifie thy self appear and stand an invincible Champion in Israel Let the earth know that thou dost possess the Gates of thine Enemies Let my Soul come into the Bundle of Life let my Soul come to all that that is promised by Jesus Christ I am to receive the Salvation of my Soul with exceeding Joy Am I near to the great Revelation of Christ to know more than ever Solomon did with that Perfection of Nature he had and Attainment of Grace Am I near to attain more than ever Paul could reach to by the Power of Grace and to know more of the Covenant of Grace than Abraham himself did and all the Saints while they were here in the World Oh I am confounded I am confounded and astonished I wonder I wonder at Free Grace and am amazed for want of more Faith The Filthy the Filthy duggle of a respect to my own Works which would follow me and spoil me and spoil all the Mystery of Free Grace c. Oh that now at last the Glory of Free Grace might lift me into the eternal place of it To a near Relation he spake thus Brother you are come to take your leave of me The Doctor as a sweet Messenger told me to day that I am near my Change I am now going from Shadows to Substance from things imperfect to things compleat and the thoughts of it even confound me I have been trading in the things of God for almost threescore years as to the experience of it and now after this long WOOF upon the LOOM it is to be taken off and all of it VIEWED and I know a World of Evil there is but I have always had a Sufficiency of the Grace of the Gospel declared to me that as defects came in they might be removed and by his Grace I have kept on with some desire with some delight with some Faith and Chear and now the RECKONING is to be made O my God there is a great Transaction upon me I throw my self upon Christ in the Gospel I sink if Christ sinks I have had nothing else to rest the Sole of my Foot upon now let thy Mercy be for me Thou hast given me good hope through Grace now Lord answer every good word upon which thou hast caused my Soul to hope Thou hast brought me hitherto so far to the very end of the Wilderness now O God bring me to thy Canaan I have waited for it Many other Sicknesses have not removed me now thou seemest to say This shall Now let me leave all my Filth behind me take it off There is a TRANSLATION let that Translation be effected upon me O Lord let not that Temptation come upon me that I have prayed to no purpose that I have faltered in the things wherein thou hast steered my Soul in Truth and in Spirit Lord let not a dead thought abide with any ugly savour in me now when thy Providences with the Concurrence of thy Servants meaning the Doctors say that thou callest me when they say The Master calleth thee Oh Oh was there ever such a day Had I ever such a day to be standing in the Portal to be waving up my hand to be knocking Oh for an Opening Lord say to me I will open Come in and let us sup together No less O Lord. Answer the Breathings of my Soul all along all my days Thou art faithful thou hast chosen me deny me not O thou that art Truth thou knowest that I have chosen thee Thou knowest my Life in this World hath been Death and Poyson to me without thee and now I come only expecting what thou hast promised and not what I have procured for there hath been my
thousands of years after The Lord save us from the Pollution of the Times Oh that we may not discover our Nakedness in such a day as this The Lord hath called his People Soldiers The Battel is when there is no way to escape then is the very time to enter the Shock with our spiritual Adversaries and then is the day to honour God above all things if we should be tempted to any thing sinful to any thing wherein God is displeased and the Souls Communion with him wounded O venturous Attempts purely for God are huge Increasers of Grace and to be cheary in it and not as Persons undone but there must be Faith Patience Hope Belief of the Scriptures intimate Communion with God that carries it thus out If I believe that God is infinite and is he infinite Then he can do any thing for me and will do it If I believe he is good he will do good to me for he hath said he will do it with his whole heart and with his whole Soul The Lord make you more fruitful Plants in his House bearing Fruit. Oh Oh that you and I while in this World may not think too slightly of our high Calling Oh Strength doth fail me to speak of it but surely it will be the great shame if any sensible shame can be hereafter or at least there will be something of an Equivolence to it that ever we should be called with a holy Calling to Eternal Life and yet that there should be no greater difference between us and the Uncalled of the World The difference is as much as if a Man should be sent to ransom one out of Slavery and another left in perpetual Bondage but this Slavery of Hell to be redeemed from it is unconceivable and unutterable and yet to walk so like others in any thing O O should the noblest Creatures on Earth walk up and down in the World like a Toad and the highest Rank of Men that have Parts and Abilities walk up and down like pitiful Creatures that scarce know how to walk in a posture as Men. Oh for a trim neat watchful prudent Christian Every Dram of Purity Neatness Fruitfulness springs from God and therefore when the Soul answers its High Calling it takes no less than God it takes it receives him It is not to gaze upon him in a way of Profession only but to get in him who is the Fountain of Holiness and this is the Communion of Saints Communion with God there is the bottom of all Communion and having that then we grow up in God into him in all things who is the Head There is an ugly thing ever coming in as if we may have all the Privileges of the Gospel and yet walk at a Loose as an unbended Bow and from this thing doubtless many with abundance of hopes have tipt over and never saw the Land of Jordan and so have died and perished We may guess with our selves there is something in it when the Spirit of God saith to us watch watch and that we should exhort one another and bids us often to beware which is given us as a Causionary Word and indeed whilst I am in the World let it stick with me and whilst you are in the World let it stick with you We have gone on in a formal way and there hath been a strange kind of Benummedness upon the Souls of Christians What is a Church for but for the carrying on of Ordinances more inwardly and spiritually as a Church of Christ We have had mighty Sermons of these things and have them still blessed be God but I would have my Soul while I am in the World and every other Soul also greatly to be a questioning whether or no my naked YEA AND NAY doth come up to the Holiness of Christ or no for we should be like him he doth not say a little like him but like him and the Soul should aim at that which to be without is a sign that the heart is rotten or invaded with Rottenness to a great Declension As he that is an Apprentice to a rich Man he aims to come up to his Master's Estate there is such a thing in the nature of the desire of such a one and if it were so in our Spiritual Trade Christians Converse would be more with respect to their glorious Country and that would keep Religion so warm between them that if there were any thing unbecoming in any they would not spare to speak of it to them that so the heart of a dear Friend may be delivered from the Guilt of Sin and be nourished in the way of Life April 23. He spake as followeth No Refreshment here makes me to think of what spoken in the Revelation He shall lead them to the living Springs Rev. 7. 17. He will open Rivers in the Tops of the Mountains Isa 30 25. and 41. 18. near at hand but not yet actually possessed near at hand but a little temporary Life stands in the way Oh to the Hungry every bitter thing is sweet I am this day suffering the punishment of the pleasure that Adam and Eve took in eating the forbidden Fruit. I am this day suffering under that and might have suffered it eternally in all the horrour and fury of it but that a Saviour hath appeared with an everlasting Gospel in the midst of Heaven on whom he bids me relie and on him I relie Whereupon a Minister standing by said to him The second Adam is a better Head than the first Adam was To which he replied Oh Blessed be Divine Grace there is a great difference indeed for always Christ and his Grace is rendred with a much more and it is from Heaven All that are taken into that dear Christ they are as clearly stated in Life as by the first Adam in Death these are the words of a God that cannot lie Here is ground of Faith grond of Confidence where the Soul hath fled for Refuge and made it his business to flee thither and no where else There is a Passage and it is an incumbring Passage and all must pass it and that Passage I am in there is no expectation of Life to revert back and a longing desire I have to pass through it and here I am waiting for that delivering word and to see the Glory of God I cannot deliver my self from mine own Spittle Thus I wear off and shall be seen here no more To another Visitant he said You see me at a parting view the Lord be good to you and your Husband And she answered Oh that my parting meaning out of this Life might be with the like Comfort and with the like presence of God And he again spake saying The Lord make your Religion thorow-pace and your Labours in that Family successful and enable you to overcome when Powers without and Temptations within assault you To another at his taking leave saying The Lord be with you he said I hope the
kept up a rare thirst through his goodness after him and a delight in the ways of his communications But I would not it is not for me to speak these things you should be vain in your own conceit But go on I see the Foundation laid he will never leave you be at rest And now study the great mystery of the Gospel of which you have a large notion but I would have you turn every notion into a practical work a practical acting into a practical use I would have you turn it all and labour to do it every day that what you believe may be so to you as substance and not Air and the Lord will visit you and help you Your Nature is timorous and fearful but God coming in to fill your Soul with Faith and fill Faith with powerful workings you will have a great Friend at every turn to be for you to be with you for you will be able to trust God when you see not why nor wherefore to trust to his promise c. His Speech and Charge to his only Child was as followeth MARY I and you must part I and you must part I leave you behind me in the World and my Prayer to God is to keep my child to teach my child to keep you and to make your heart to be full of love to spiritual things that you may not be befooled of your Soul that you may not be befooled of Heaven that you may not perish like a Fool. And I charge you I charge you I charge you in the name of God who is your Judge that you hearken attentively to all the Counsel of your Dear Mother and do not play it away bable and trifle it away see you do it for your everlasting good and concernment and be obedient to her and do not only be fondling but hearken seriously to her Counsel and take it in MARY come to me that I may give you one Kiss I am about to kiss you and this Kiss must be a witness of my true desire of your good I Kiss you in love and my very Kiss will be a witness against my Child if you do not tread in the steps of your PARENTS such as you have observed to be good O my dear Child be not careless therein I leave you now to the conduct of him who is my conducter To a Christian Friend who said we must be willing to part with you you have a Pisga-sight of Canaan he replied I think I am at the very end and yet I do not go out all the day long I am thirsting O blessed be my God I am perswaded he will perform all that concerneth me To another Christian Friend at his taking leave of him he said thus I expect again to see you and an innumerable company more of Saints c. He further spake with respect to his languishing Body If I could have something or other to refresh my Body if the Lord saw it fit but the whole Earth I think is insufficient for it April 25. This day being Wednesday which proved the day of his Death in the Morning he spake to a dear Friend a Minister saying The blessing of the everlasting Gospel be upon you the Lord be with you And about Eleven of the Clock he began to Change having several Agonies and between them he desired to be prayed for saying Lift up a Prayer for me and speak that I may hear you For whatsoever ye shall ask on Earth shall be granted in Heaven let then the Earth be full of Prayer And coming out of another fit said Hitherto hath the Lord helped me I am in the hand of God I am in his hand and under his promise the end of this affliction is in the hand of my God the Lord enable me to abide his Will And the 5th Fit or Agony which was ' twixt four and five of the Clock in the Afternoon he in that Breathed out his Soul into the Arms and Embraces of his dear Lord and Redeemer retaining his senses to the last for even a little before his Decease his Wife asking him how he did he answered with great composure I am almost Dead and desired to be lifted up a little higher which were the last words he spake and a few moments preceding his Departure he opened wide his Eyes and immediately closed them again and so Expired FINIS ERRATA PAge 7. line 16. read see for let p. 10. l. 26. dele and p. 29. l. 32. r. person for perso p. 35. l. 8. del word of the p. 61. l. 8. r. Vail for Vale p. 62. l. 9. r. therein for thereon p. 63. l. 15. r. very for ve p. 70. l. 3. r. converse for dally p. 100. l. 5. r. expatiating for expiating p. 104. l. 34. del he p. 124. l. 28. add him p. 143. l. 15. r. hast for has p. 160. l. 18. add he p. 188. l. 1. r. means for mens p. 203. l. 19. r. floweth for followeth p. 213. l. 14. r. clouds for glouds p. 306. l. 11. r. heart for heat p. 313. l. 5. r. omnipotent for omnipent p. 328. l. 23. r. the for lhe p. 327. l. 3. add not And for any other literal Errors or false Pointings which are very few and inconsiderable the Reader is desired to Correct
am methinks like Jonah tumbling My Soul in a Tempest in the bottom of the Sea the Bars of an earthly and dark Mind are stopping my way and am as lifeless methinks as if I had no Interest in the Fountain of Saving Health The Weeds are wrapp'd about my head I am in the Deep but cannot cry unto the Lord as Jonah did And what the Lord is teaching me by this unexpected disappointment I cannot yet tell yet notwithstanding I have hope in him that I shall yet be rescued from this Captivity and see his Face again I have been searching after all my sins through the several Ages of my Life and endeavoured to view the Depravity of my Soul in all the sinful Circumstances of every sin but I cannot wind my self out my design was to get thereby to a more sincere Closure with Christ but e're I was aware I had challenged forth more Enemies than I could well suppress I thought by aggravating my sins to have gotten more hunger after Jesus Christ but like over-much cold Water it damped my Stomach and I found Sickness seizing upon me rather than Hunger a heartless Stupidity instead of Believing I concluded I was in some kind or other out of my way or else had not prepared my Stomach to keep out the Infection that exhaled from that Body of Death which is within me as I should have done whiles I was moving the Limbs thereof The thing I aimed at was quickning Then I remembred that word Luk. 24. 5. Why seek ye the living among the dead Come not amongst the Graves without his company who died for sins and is risen from the Dead I could not be satisfied about the sincerity of my Repentance and there I stuck till at length I remembred that Christ rose again as well to give Repentance as Remission of Sins Act. 5. 31. and 11. 18. so that I can bring no Repentance to him but I must first get it from him He is exalted to be a Prince and a Saviour to give Repentance c. A Saviour to take away all the defects of my Repentance a Prince to overcome all the difficulties and to create in me a sound Mind against the Infirmites of my Repentance and my halting therein Take then O mighty Prince and Saviour this work into thy own hands and create a right Spirit within me So that now my gadding Spirit is My Soul returning to its Strong Hold. brought back again to see that Christ is the Alpha and Omega the Author and Finisher of whatever doth concern the new Creature And although he be so yet how hard is it to venture my Soul and Body my whole Hope and Care into his hands by faith in his Word I had need know such an one very well with whom I am to venture my Journey through a Warfaring Life here and shortly through Death and Judgment too and so into the Ocean of Eternity O dear Jesus who art my Lord and my God who canst renew my heart and none else can do it breath upon me and say Receive the Holy Ghost Cast thy Mantle upon me and let the Unction of thy Spirit be so shed abroad throughout my whole Soul that my heart may be entirely thine thine only that thy self only may be the Covering of my eyes instead of all other Objects And now what should hinder but The Soul first improves Baptism that at length I should solemnly in the presence of God the Father Son and Spirit and in the presence of all the elect Angels pursue the ends of that Covenant which was sealed by Christ's Appointment to me in Baptism through whose hands soever that Ordinance was appointed and permitted to pass upon me Was not that a Divine Prophesie which Balaam himself spake which passed through his Mouth Numb 24. 17. There shall come a Star out of Jacob c. and can the Ordinance of Christ be made void through whose hands soever it came and in what unworthy Robe soever it was drest Did the sacred Ark lose its vertue by being in the Philistines Custody Did he forsake it who dwelt between the Cherubims Was the Mercy-seat forsaken and become like common Metal Why then should this Ordinance be lost to me in the substance of it though it may be some humane Scurf was laid upon it And have I not more reason to hope through Covenant-Grace that the Faith and Prayers of my dear Parents then and since are in force for a Blessing upon it to me than the defects of others in the manner of Administration can have to hinder it especially seeing now I desire humbly to take hold of the Covenant and with my own consent to say I agree to the Condescension of thy Grace and Love my dear Lord I catch hold on thy free Love and into thy Name O most holy God the Father Son and Spirit I give my self up through him who confirmed the Covenant and came by Water and Blood to make it effectual I believe Lord help my Unbelief I reach out my hand through thy Grace let thy Grace and Power pull me over to thy self that in the Ark of thy unchangeable Covenant I may be carried above my self and above a miserably drowned World Be not absent O thou who in thy Mercy didst make and impose this Seal of the Covenant as the Badge of one of thy Family for me to wear who also speakest words of Truth and Life when thou saist I baptise thee in the Name of the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost fulfil thy good Word unto me thy Servant in which I desire to hope that thou mayest be mine and I may be thine wholly for ever that I may serve thee and glory in thee with all thy people who are thine own Inheritance Do not hang back O my poor Struggles with Vnbelief heart whose weakness and inconstancy have so often bruised my inward Man O Anxious Unbelief thou tellest me 't is a bargain soon made but how shall it be performed Thou urgest me with difficulties that will arise from the World from my self from the Tryals that I may undergo in my Body my Soul my Estate unwonted Tryals Thou tellest me of the great fits of Darkness and shameful declining I have had after much Refreshment and strong Resolutions to the contrary Thou tellest me that my Falls will now cost me dearer than ever they did and the Holy Spirit will be sooner vexed and grieved than before Thou tellest me I shall soon be weary of my Yoke and then my Sins will be of a deeper and more heart-hardning Die than ever But remember O Soul-destroying Unbelief I rowl my self upon the Rock of Ages I deliver my self up to the Covenant of Grace not to bring strength to it but to fetch strength from it and from that word which saith Sin shall not have Dominion over you for you are not under the law but under grace Rom. 6. 14. And because I am weak