and he that peâ—ceiveth the operations of a strong effectual Lovâ— hath an acquaintance with God and Heaven whiâ—â— is above that of believing Faith seeth the Feaâ—â— but Love is the tasting of it And therefore it that the Holiest souls sticks closest unto God because though their reâ—soning faculty may be dâ—fective they know him by the highest and mâ— Tenacious kind of knowledge which this Worâ—â—ffâ—rdeth as I have lately shewed elsewhere â— Here you have described to you the true witness the spirit Not that of supposed Internal Voiceâ— which they are usually most taken up with whâ— have the smallest knowledge and Faith and Love and the greatest self esteem or spiritual pride with the strongest phantasies and pâ—ssiâ—ns But the objective and the sealing Testimony the Divinâ— Nature the renewed Image of God whose Children are known by being like to their Heavenly Father even by being Holy as he is Holy This is the Spirit of Adoption by which we are inclined by Holy Love to God and confidence in him to cry Abba Father and to flie unto him The Spirit of Sanctification is thereby in us the Spirit of Adoption For both signifie but the giving us that Love to God which is the filial nature and our â—athers Image And this Treatise doth happily direct thee to â—â—at faithful beholding God in Righteousness which â—ust here begin this blessed Assimilation which full â—tuition will for ever perfect It is a happy sign that God is about to repair our â—ins and divisions when he stirreth up his serâ—ants to speak so much of Heaven and to call â— the minds of impatient complainers and conâ—tious censurers and ignorant self conceited diâ—ders and of worldly unskilful and unmerciful â—stors to look to that state where all the godly shall one and to turn those thoughts to the furtherance Holiness to provoke one another to Love and to â—od works which two many lay out upon their hay â—â—d stubble And to call men from judging and â—spising each other and worse then both those out their Meats and Drinks and Dayes to study â—â—ghteousness and Peace and Joy in the Holy Ghost â—r he that in these things serveth Christ in which â— Kingdom doth consist is acceptable to God and proved of men that are wise and good Let us â—â—erefore follow after the things which make for â—ace and things wherewith one may edifie anoâ—â—er whilest the contentious for meat will destroy â—e work of God Rom. 14. 17 18 19 20. The â—ion between Peace and Holiness is so strict that he â—o truly promoteth one promoteth both Heb. 12. â—4 Jam. 3. 17. The true way of our Union is exâ—lently described Eph. 4. 11 12 13 14 15 â—6 If any plain unlearned Readers shall blame the â—curateness of the stile they must remember that those persons have not the least need to hear of Heâ—ven and to be drawn up from the vanities of earâ—â— who cannot digest a looser stile As God hath endued the worthy Authour with more thâ—n ordinary measure of judiciousness 〈◊〉 soundness and accurateness of understanding 〈◊〉 seriousness spirituality and a heavenly mind we have for our common benefit the effects of these happy qualifications in this judicious heâ—venly discourse And if my recommendations mâ— in any measure further your acceptance in provement and practising of so edifying a Treatâ—â— it will answer the ends of him who waiteth with 〈◊〉 in hope for the same Salvation Rich. Baxter Acton May 30. 1668 THE BLESSEDNESSE OF THE RIGHTEOUS A Proemial Discourse to the intended Subject THe continual mixture of Good and Evil in this present state of things with its uncertain fluctuations and subjection to perpetual changes do naturally prompt a considering mind to the belief and hope of another that may be both more perfect and more permanent For certainly it could never be a design adequate or any way agreeable to the Divine Wisdom and goodness that the blessed God should raise such a thing as this lower Creation out of nothing Only to give himself the temporary pleasure of beholding the alternate Joys and Sorrows of the best part thereof his reasonable creature seated in it Nor a delight at all proportionable to an eternal happy being when he hath connaturalliz'd such a creature to this sensible world onely to take notice how variously the passions he hath planted in him may be mov'd and stir'd by this variety of occasions which he shal thence be presented with And what suddain and contrary impressions may be made upon his easie passive senses by the interchanged strokes and touches of contrary objects How quickly he can raise him into a transport of high contentment and pleasure and then how soon he can again reduce him to a very Paroxism of anguish and despair It would discover us to have very vile and low thoughts of God if we did not judge it altogether unanswerable to his perfections to design no further thing in creating this world and placing such a creature as man in it then onely to please himself for a while with such a spectacle and then at last clear the Stage and shut up all again in an eternal Silent darkness If we could suppose a man furnished with such power he would surely adde little to the reputation of his being wise or good beyond other men by a design so to use it Much less can we think it worthy of God to perpetuate such a state of things as this and continue a succession of such persons and actions as we now behold in the world through eternal generations onely to perpetuate to himself the same pleasure in the exercise of his immense power upon created natures over which he hath so infinite advantage And indeed nothing can be more unconceivable then that the great Creatour and Authour of all things should frame a Creature of so vast comprehension as the Spirit of man put into it a capacity of knowing and conversing with himself give it some prospect of his own glory and blessedness raise thereby in many boundless unsatisfied desires after him and an unexpressible pleasure in the preconceived hope of being received into the communion of that glory and blessedness and yet defeat and blast so great an expectation by the unsuspected reducement of the very subject of it again to nothing Yea and that he should deal herein as in that case he must the most hardly with the best And that such souls whose meer love and devotedness to him had made them abandon the pleasures of this life and run thorough whatsoever difficulties for his sake should fare worse then the very worst were beyond all the rest most utterly unimaginable and a thought which Pagan-reason hath not known how to digest or entertain If saith one and he speaks the sense of many another as well as his own with the dissolution of our bodies the essence of the Souls whatsoever that be should be dissolved too and for ever cease to be any thing I know not how
turn my thoughts to glorious objects but I cannot The blessed soul feels it self free from all confinement nothing resists its will as its will doth never resist the will of God It knows no limits no restraints is not tyed up to this or that particular good but expatiates freely in the immense universal all comprehending goodness of God himself And this liberty is the perfect Image and likeness of the liberty of God especially in its consummate state In its progress towards it it increases as the Soul draws nearer to God which nearer approach is not in respect of place or local nearness but likeness and conformity to him in respect whereof as God is most sublime and excellent in himself so is it in him It s consummate liberty is when it is so fully transformed into the likeness of God as that he is all to it as to himself So that as he is an infinite satisfaction to himself his likeness in this respect is the very satisfaction it self of the blessed soul. 6. Tranquility This also is an eminent part of that assimilation to God wherein the blessedness of the holy Soul must be understood to lye a perfect composure a perpetual and everlasting calm an eternal vacancy from all unquietness or perturbation Nothing can be supposed more inseparably agreeing to the nature of God than this Whom Scripture witnesses to be without variablness or shadow of change There can be no commotion without mutation nor can the least mutation have place in a perfectly simple and uncompounded nature Whence even Pagan reason hath been wont to attribute the most undisturbed and unalterable tranquility to the nature of God Balaam knew it was incompatible to him to lye or repent And supposing him to speak this from a present inspiration it is their common Doctrine concerning God Any the least troubles and tempests saith one are far exiled from the tranquility of God for all the inhabitants of heaven do ever injoy the same stable tenour even an eternal quality of mind And a little after speaking of God saith he 't is neither pâ—ssible he should be moved by the force of another for nothing is stronger than God nor of his own accord for nothing is perfecter than God And whereas there is somewhat that is mutable and subject to change somewhat that is stable and fixt in which of those natures saith another shall we please God must we not in that which is more stable and fixt and free from this fluidness and mutability for what is there amâ—ng all beings that can be stable or consist if God do not by his own touch stay and sustain the nature of it Hence is it made a piece of deformity of likeness to God by another who tells his friend It is an high and great thing which thou desirest and even bordering upon a Deity not to be moved Yea so hath this Doctine been insisted on by them that while other Divine perfections have been less understood it hath occasioned the Stoical â—ssertion of fatality to be introduced on the one hand and the â—picurian nâ—gâ—tion of providence on the other least any thing should be admitted that might seem repâ—gnant to the tranquility of their Numâ—â—â— But we know that our God doth whatsoever pleaseth him both in heaven and earth and that he doth all according to the wise counsel of his holy will freely not fatally upon the eternal prevision and foresight of all circumstances and events so that nothing can occur that is new to him nothing that he knows not how to improve to good or that can therefore infer any alteration of his counsels or occasion to him the least perturbation or disquiet in reference to them Holy souls begin herein to imitate him as soon as they first give themselves up to his wise and gracious conduct 'T is enough that he is wise for himself and them Their hearts safely trust in him They commit themselves with unsollicitous confidence to his guidance knowing he cannot himself be mis-led and that he will not mis-lead them As Abraham folled him not knowing whether he went and thus by faith they enter into his rest They do now in their present state only enter into it or hover about the borders Their future assimilation to God in this gives them a stated settlement of Spirit in this rest They before did owe their tranquillity to their faith now to their actual fruition Their former acquiescency and sedate temper was hence that they believed God would deal well with them at last their present for that he hath done so Those words have now their fullest sense both as to the rest it self which they mention and the season of it Return to thy rest O my soul for the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee The occasions of trouble and a passive temper of Spirit are ceased together There is now no fear without nor terror within The rage of the world is now allay'd it storms no longer Reproach and persecution have found a period There is no more dragging before Tribunals nor haling into Prisons no more running into dens and deserts or wandring to and fro in Sheep-skins and Goat-skins And with the cessation of the external occasions of trouble the inward dispositions thereto are also ceased All infirmities of Spirit tumultuating passions unmortified corruptions doubts or imperfect knowledge of the love of God are altogether vanished and done away for ever And indeed that perfect cure wrought within is the souls great security from all future disquiet A well tempered Spirit hath been wont strangely to preserve its own peace in this unquiet world Philosophy hath boasted much in this kind and Christianity performed more The Philosophical 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or calmness of mind is not without its excellency and praise That stable settlement and fixedness of Spirit that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the moralist tells us it was wont to be termed among the Grecians and which he calls Tranquillity when the mind is alwayes equal and goes a smooth even course is propitious to it self and beholds the things that concern it with pleasure and interrupts not this joy but remains in a placid state never at any time exalting or depressing it self But how far doth the Christian peace surpass it that peace which passeth all understanding that amidst surrounding dangers enables the holy soul to say without a proud boast none of all these things move me The peace that immediately results from that faith which unites the soul with God and fixes it upon him as its firm basis when 't is kept in perfect peace by being stay'd upon him because it trusts in him When the heart is fixed trusting in the Lord filled full of joy and peace or of joyous peace by an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in believing And if Philosophy and which far transcends it Christianity Reason and Faith have that statique power can so
to imbrace as the true Religion But such I find the Christian Religion to be to me Therefore c. The Proposition here is manifestly false for it contains grounds common to all Religioâ—s publiquely owned and profest throughout the world and sure all cannot be true And hence the conclusion though materially considered it be true yet formâ—lly considered as a conclusion issuing from such premises must needs be false and what then is become of thy Orthodoxie when as to the formal object of thy Faith thou believest but as M hometanâ— and Pâ—gans do when thou art of this Faith by Fate or Chance only not Choice or rational Inducement Next as to the effects of thy Faith Let them be inquired into also and they will certainly bear proportion to the grounds of it The Gospel is the power of God to salvation to every one thâ—t 〈◊〉 to them that believe it noâ— it â—â—gnifies nothing The Word of God received with a Divine Faith as the Word of God 〈◊〉 works â—â—â—ttually upon all that so receive 〈◊〉 i. e. all that believe what such efficacioâ—s workings of it hast thou felt upon thy soul Certainly it s most connaturural effect is that very change of heart and inclinations God-ward of which we have been speaking What is so sutable to the Gospel Revelation as a good temper of heart Godward and how absurd it is to introduce the cause on purpose to exclude its genuine inseparable effect But evident it is though true Faith cannot that superficial irrational â—ssent in which alone many glory may too well consist with a disaffected heart towards God and can it then signifie any thing towards thy blessedness sure to be so a solifidian is to be a nullâ—fidian Faith not working by love is not Faith at least profits nothing For thy outward conformity in the solemnities of worship 't is imputable to so corrupâ—â— motâ—ves and principles that the thing it self abâ—â—actively considered can never be thought characteristical and distinguishing of the heirs of blessedness The worst of men 〈◊〉 perform the best of outward duties Thy most glorious loasted vertues if they grow not from the proper root love to 〈◊〉 they are but splendid sins as above appears and hath been truly said of old Thy repentance is either true or false if true it is that very change of mind and heart I speak of and is therefore eminently signaliz'd by that note 't is repentance towards God If false God will not be mocked For thy Regeneration in 〈◊〉 what can it avail thee as to this blessedness if the present All worldly evils are willingly endured and all such good things quitted and forsaken for Christs sake and his Elects And if the question be ask't as it was once of Alexander when so frankly distributing his treasures among his followers what do you reserve for your self The resolved Christian makes with him that short and brave reply HOPE He lives upon things future and unseen The objects any one converses with most and in which his life is as it were bound up are suitable to the ruling principle of life in him They that are after the flesh do savour the things of the flesh they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit The Principle of the fleshly life is Sense The principle of the Spiritual life is Faith Sense is a mean low narrow incomprehensive principle limited to a point This Center of Earth and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this now of time It can reach no higher then terrene things nor further then present things So bruitish is the life of him that is led by it wholly confined to matter and time But the righteous live by Faith Their Faith governs and maintains the life They stear not their course according to what they see but according to what they believe And their daily sustenance is by the same kind of things Their Faith influences not their actions only but their comforts and enjoyments They subsist by the things they believe even invisible and eternal things But it is by the intervening exercise of hope whose object is the same The Apostle having told us from the Prophet that the just shall live by Faith presently subjoyns a description ' of that Faith they live by viz. that it is the sustance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen it substantiates and reallizes evidences and demonstrates those glorious objects so far above the reach and Sphere of sense It is constantly sent out to forage in the invisible Regions for the maintenance of this life And thence fetches in the provisions upon which hope feeds to the strengthening of the heart the renewing of life and spirits Our inward man saith the Apostle is renewed day by day while we look or take aime which is next in the series of the discourse for the intervening verse is manifestly parenthetical not at the things that are seen but at the things that are not seen for the things that are seen are temporal but the things that are not seen are eternal And the word here rendred look doth plainly signifie the act of hope as well as that of faith for it doth not import a meer intuition or beholding a taking notice or assenting onely that there is such things but a designing or scoping at them which is the very word with an appropriative eye as things that notwithstanding their distance or whatsoever imaginable difficultie are hoped to be attained to and enjoyed And here are evidenly the distinct parts of Faith and Hope in this business Faith upon the Authority and credit of the Divine Word and Promise perswades the heart that there is such a glorious state of Nor is that aversation the lesse culpable for that it is so hardly overcome but the more 'T is an aversation of will and who sees not that every man is more wicked ac-according as his will is more wickedly bent Hence his impotencie or inability to turn to God is not such as that he cannot turn if he would but it consists in this that he is not willing He affects a distance from God Which shews therefore the necessity still of this change For the possibility of it and the incouragement according to the Methods wherein God is wont to dispense his Grace the Sinner hath to hope and indeavour it will more â—itly fall into consideration else where CHAP. XIII Fourth Inference That the Soul in which such a change is wrought restlesly pursues it till it be attain'd Fifth Inference That the knowing of God and conformity to him are satisfying things and do now in a degree satisfie according to the measure wherein they are attained Sixth Inference That the love of God towards his people is great that hath designed for them so great and even a satisfying good 4. 'T Is further to be inferr'd that a soul wherein such a change is wrought pursues this blessedness with restless
best seen what a mans belief is by his practice For when any profess to believe this or that practical truth relating to their salvation if they believe is not practically i. e. with such a belief as will command their suitable practice it matters not what belief they are of or whether they were of that judgment or no. Yea it will prove in the issue better for them they had been of another when their own professed belief shall be urged against them But let us cosider a little how in practical matters of less concernment we would estimate a mans belief You meet a Traveller upon the way who tells you the Bridge over such an unpassâ—ble River is broken down and that if you venture you perish if you believe him you return if you hold on he reasonably concludes you believe him not and will therefore be apt to say to you if you will not believe me you may make trial Your Physician tells you a disease is growing upon you that in a short time will prove incurable and mortal but if you presently use means he shall prescribe ' tâ—s capable of an easie remedie How would you your self have your belief of your Phisitian judged of in this case would you expect to be believed if you should say you do not at all distrust your Phisitians integrity and judgment but yet you resolve not to follow his directions unless you would have us believe too that you are weary of your life and would fain be rid of it There is no Riddle or Mystery in this How ridiculous would men make themselves if in matters of common concernment they should daily practice directly contrary to their professed belief how few would believe them serious or in their wits But however call this believing or what you will we contend not about the name the belief of such a thing can no further do you good you can be nothing the better for it further then as it ingages you to take a course suitable and consequent to such a belief To believe that there is a Hell and run into it that unrighteousness persisted in will damn you and yet live in it To what purpose is it to make your boasts of this Faith But since you are willing to call this believing all the foregoing reasoning is to ingage you to consider what you believe Do you believe that unrighteousness will be the death of your soul will eternally separate you from God and the presâ—nce of his glory and when you have reason'd the matter with your self you find it to be certainly so should not such a thing be more deeply pondered The bare proposal of an evident truth commands present assent but if I further bend my mind to reason out the same thing to my self I am occasioned to take notice of the grounds dependencies the habitudes of it what it rests upon whither it tends and thence more discern its importance and of what moment it is then I should have done if upon first view I had assented only and dismist it my thoughts And yet is it possible you should think this to be true and not think it a most important truth Is it a small matter in your account whither you shall be blessed or miserable for ever whether you be sav'd or perish eternally Or is it considered by you according as the weight of the matter requires that as you are found righteous or unrighteous so will it everlastingly fare with you You may possibly say you already conclude your self righteous therefore no further imploy your thoughts about it But methinks you should hardly be able how ever to put such a thing out of your thoughts while as yet the final determination is not given in the case If a man have a question yet depending concerning his life or estate though his business be never so clear he will hardly forget it the trial not being yet past And though in this matter you have no reason to suspect errour or corruption in your Judge through which many honest causes may miscarry in an humane Judicature yet have you no reason to suspect your self If the holy Spirit hath assured you it hath not stupified you but as you have then the less of fear you have the more of love and joy Therefore you will not thence mind such a concernment the less but with the more delight and therefore also most probably with the more frequency and intention What a pleasure will it be to review evidences and say â—o here are the Mediums by which I make out my title to the Eternal Inheritance Such and such characters give me the confidence to number my self among Gods righteous ones And do you lead that heavenly raised life do you live in those sweet and ravishing comforts of the Holy Ghost that may bespeak you one whom he hath sealed up to the day of redemption If you pretend not to any such certainty but rely upon your own judgment of your case are you sure you are neither mistaken in the notion of the righteousnesse required nor in the application of it to your own souls Possibly you may think your self because in your ordinary dealings you wrong no man your self being judge a very righteous person But evident it is when the Scripture uses this tearm as discriptive of Gods own people and to distinguish betweeen them that shall be saved and perish it takes it in that comprehensive sense before explained And however it requires at least much more of thee under other expressions as thou canst hardly be so ignorant but to know And do but use thy reason here a little and demand of thy self Is he to be accounted a righteous person that thinks it fit to avoid wronging a man but makes no conscience at all of wronging God More particularly Is it righteous to live all thy dayes in a willing ignorance of the Author of thy being never once to enquire where is God my Maker Is it righteous to forget him dayes without number not to have him from day to day in all thy thoughts Is it righteous to estrange thy self from him and live as without him in the world while thou liv'st mov'st and hast thy being in him not to glorifie him in whose hands thy breath is to be a lover of pleasure more then God a worshipper in thy very soul of the creature more then of the Creatour Is it righteous to harden thy heart against his fear and love to live under his power and never reverence it his goodness and never acknowledge it to affront his Authority to belie his Truth abuse his Mercy impose upon his Patience desie his Justice to exalt thy own interest against his the trifling petite interest of a silly worm against the great all comprehending interest of the common Lord of all the world to cross his will to do thy own to please thy self to the displeasing of him whence hadst thou thy measures of
been all this while a sleep we saw the light that shone upon us we heard the voice that called to us wherewith shall we then excuse our selves that our desires were not mov'd that our Souls were not presently in a flame was it then that we thought all a meer fixion that we durst not give credit to his word when it brought us the report of the everlasting Glory will we avow this Is this that we will stand by or what else have we left to say have we a more plausible reason to alledge that the discovery of such a glory mov'd us not to desire it then that we believed it not sure this is the truth of our case We should feel this heavenly fire alwayes burning in our breasts If our Infidelity did not quench the coal If we did believe we could not but desire But doth not the thoughts of this shake our very souls and fill us with horrour and trembling We that should be turn'd into indignation and ready to burn our selves with our own flame and all about us if one should give us the lie that we should dare to put the lye upon the Eternal Truth upon him whose Word gave stability and being to the world who made and sustains all things by it That awful Word That Word that shivers Rocks and melts down Mountains that make the inanimate Creation tremble that cna in a moment blast all things and dissolve the frame of Heaven and Earth which in the mean time it upholds is that become with us fabulous lying breath Those God-breath'd Oracles those Heavenly Records which discover and describe this blessed state are they false and foolish Legends must that be pretended at last if men durst that is so totally void of all pretence what should be the gain or advantage accrewing to that Eternal All-sufficient being What accession should be made to that infinite self-fulness by deluding a Worm Were it consistent with his Nature what could be his design to put a cheat upon poor mortal dust If thou dare not impute it to him such a deception had a beginning but what Author canst thou imagine of it or what end did it proceed from a good mind or a bad could a good and honest mind form so horribly wicked a design to impose an universal delusion and lye upon the world in the name of the true and holy God or could a wicked mind frame a design so directly level'd against wickedness or is there any thing so aptly and naturally tending to form the World to sobriety holiness purity of conversation as the discovery of this future state of glory and since the belief of future felicity is known to obtain universally among men who could be the Author of so common a deception If thou had'st the mind to impose a lie upon all the world what course would'st thou take how would'st thou lay the design or why dost thou in this case imagine what thou knowest not how to imagine And dost thou not without scruple believe many things of which thou never had'st so unquestionable evidence or must that Faith which is the foundation of thy Religion and eternal hopes be the most suspected shaking thing with thee and have of all other the least stability and rootedness in thy soul If thou can'st not excuse thy infidelity be ashamed of thy so cold and sluggish desires of this glorious state And doth it not argue a low sordid Spirit not to desire and aim at the perfection thou art capable of not to desire that blessedness which alone is suitable and satisfying to a reasonable and spiritual being Bethink thy self a little how low art thou sunk into the dirt of the earth how art thou plunged into the mity Ditch that even thine own clothes might adhor thee Is the Father of Spirits thy Father Is the world of Spirits thy Country Hast thou any relation to that Heavenly Progeny Art thou ally'd to that blessed Family and yet undesirous of the same blessedness Can'st thou savour nothing but what smells of the Earth Is nothing grateful to thy Soul but what is corrupted by so vicious and impure a tincture are all thy delights centred in a Dunghill and the polluted pleasures of a filthy world better to thee then the eternal visions and enjoyments of Heaven what art thou all made of Earth Is thy soul stupifi'd into a Clod hast thou no sense with thee of any thing better and more excellent can'st thou look upon no glorious thing with a pleased eye Are things onely desirable and lovely to thee as they are deformed O consider the corrupted distempered state of thy Spirit and how vile a disposition it hath contracted to it self Thine looks too like the Mundan◠Spirit The Spirit of the World The Apostle speaks of it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by way of distinction we have not received the Spirit of the world but the Spirit that is from God that we might know or see and no doubt 't is desire that animates that eye 't is not bare speculative intuition and no more the things freely given us of God Surely he whose desire doth not guide his eye to the beholding of those things hath received the Spirit of the world onely A Spirit that conforms him to this world makes him think onely thoughts of this world and drive the designs of this world and speak the language of this world A Spirit that connaturalizes him to the world makes him of a temper suitable to it He breathes onely worldly breath carries a worldly aspect is of a worldly conversation O poor low spirit that such a world should with-hold thee from the desire and pursuit of such glory Art thou not ashamed to think what thy desires are wont to pitch upon while they decline and wave this blessedness Methinks thy very shame should compel thee to quit the name of a Saint or a Man To forbear numbring thy self with any that pretend to immortality and go seek Pasture among the Beasts of the Field with them that live that low animal life that thou dost and expect no other And while thou so fallest in with the world how highly dost thou gratifie the pretending and usurping God of it The great fomentor of the sensual worldy genius The Spirit it self that works in the children of disobedienence and makes them follow the course of the world hold them fast bound in worldly lusts and leaves them captive at his will causes them after his own Serpentine manner to creep and crawl in the dust of the Earth He is most intimate to this apostate world informs it as it were and actuates it in every part i◠even one great soul to it The whole world lies in that wicked one as the body by best Philosophers is said to be in the Soul The world is said to be convicted when he is judged He having fall'n from a state of blessedness in God hath involv'd the world with himself
and deportments towards God and man Christ formed in the soul or put on the new creature in its being and operations the truth learned as it is in Jesus to the putting off the old man and the putting on the new More distinctly we may yet see wherein it lyes upon a premised view of some few things necessary to be foreknown in order thereunto As That this righteousness is a renewing righteousness or the righteousness of one formerly a sinner a lapsed perishing wretch who is by it restored into such a state towards God as he was in before that lapse in respect of certain great essentials though as yet his state be not so perfectly good while he is in his tendency and motion And shall by certain additionals be unspeakably better when he hath attained the end and rest he is tending to That a reasonable creature yet untainted with sin could not but have a temper of mind â—uteable to such apprehensions as these Viz. That as it was not the Author of being to it self so it ought not principally to study the pleasing and serving of it self but him who gave it being that it can no more continue and perfect it self unto blessedness than it could create it self and can therefore have no expectation hereof but from the same Author of its being And hence that it must respect and eye the great God its Creator and Maker as The Soveraign Authority whom it was to fear and obey Soveraign Good whom it was to love and enjoy But because it can perform no duty to him without knowing what he will have it do nor have any particular expectation of savours from him without knowing what he will please to bestow and is therefore obliged to attend to the revelations of his Will concerning both these It is therefore necessary that he eye him under a notion introductive and subservient to all the operations that are to be exerted towards him under the two former notions i. e. as the Eternal never failing Truth safely to be depended on as intending nothing of deceit in any the revelations whether of his righteous Will concerning matter of duty to be done or of his good Will concerning matter of benefit to be expected and enjoyed That Man did apostatize and revolt from God as considered under these severall notions And returns to him when an holy rectitude is recovered and he again becomes righteous considered under the same That it was not agreeable to Gods wisedom truth and legal justice to treat with Man a Sinner in order to his recovery but through a Mediator and that therefore he was pleased in wonderfull mercy to constitute and appoint his own Son Jesus Christ God-man unto that Office and Undertaking that through him man might return and be reconciled to himself whom he causlessely forsook designing that man shall now become so affected towards himself through the Mediator and firstly therefore towards the Mediators own person as he was before and ought to have been towards himself immediately Therefore whereas God was considerable in relation to Man both in his innocency and Apostacy under that forementioned two fold notion of the supream Authority Goodness He hath also set up and exalted our Lord Jesus Christ and represented him to Sinners under an answerable two fold notion of a Prince Saviour i. e. a mediating Prince and Saviour to give repentance first to bow and stoop the hearts of sinners and reduce them to a subject posture again and then remission of sins to restore them to favour and save them from the wrath to come Him hath the Father cloth'd with his own authority and fill'd with his grace requiring sinners to submit themselves to his ruling power and commit themselves to his saving mercy now both lodg'd in this his Son to pay him immediately all homage and obedience and through him ultimately to himself from him immediately to expect Salvation and blessedness and through him ultimately from himself That whereas the Spirits of men are not to be wrought to this temper but by the intervention of a discovery and revelation of the divine Will to this purpose Our Lord Jesus Christ is further appointed by the Father to reveal all this his counsel to Sinners And is eminently spoken of in Scripture upon this account under the notion of the Truth in which capacity he more effectually recommends to Sinners both his authority and his grace So that his three fold so much celebrated Office of King Priest Prophet the distinct parts of his general Office as Mediator which he manages in order to the reducement of lost Sinners exactly correspond if you consider the more eminent acts and properties of each Office to that threefold notion under which the Spirit of Man must alwayes have eyed and been acted towards God had he never fallen and hence this righteousness which consists in conformity to the Gospel is the former righteousness which was lâ—st with such an accession as is necessary upon consideration that it was lost and was only to be recovered by a Mediator Therefore you may now take this short and as compendious an account as I can give of it in what follows It includes so firm and understanding an assent to the truth of the whole Gospel Revelation as that the soul is thereby brought through the power of the Holy Ghost sensibly to apprehend its former disobedience to God and distance from him the reasonableness of subjection to him and desirableness of blessedness in him the necessity of a Redeemer to reconcile and recover it to God the accomplishments and designation of the Lord Jesus Christ to that purpose And hence a penitent and complacential return to God as the supream Authority and soveraign Good an humble and joyful acceptance of our Lord Jesus Christ as its Prince and Saviour with submission to his Authorâ—y and reliance on his grace the exercise of both which are founded in his blood looking and pitching upon him as the only medium through which he and his duties can please God or God and his mercies approach him and through which he hath the confidence to venture upon a Covenant-acceptance of God and surrender himself to him afterward pursued to his uttermost by a continued course of living in his fear and love in obedience to him and communion with him through the Mediator alwayes while he is passing the time of his pilgrimage in this world groaning under remaining sin and pressing after perfect holiness with an earnest expectation animating him to a persevering patience through all difficulties of a blessed eternity in the other world That such a conformity to the Gospel should be expressed by the name of righteousness cannot seem strange to such as acquaint themselves with the language of the Scripture That graoious frame which the Gospel made essential impresses upon the soul is the Kingdom of God in the passive notion of it his Kingdom received and now actually come with power upon our Spirits
distinctly we may apprehend how satisfying this likeness or image imprest will be if a little further deferring the view of the particulars of this likeness which we have defigned to instance in we consider these general properties of it 1. 'T is a vital image not the image only of him that lives the living God but it is his living and soul quickning image 'T is the likeness of him in that very respect an imitation and participation of the life of God by which once revived the soul lives that was dead before 'T is not a dead picture a dumb shew an unmoving Statue but a living speaking walking image that wherewith the Child is like the Father the very life of the subject where it is and by which it lives as God speaks and acts comformably to him An image not such a one as is drawn with a Pencil that expresses only colour and figure but such a one as is seen in a Glass that represents life and motion as was noted from a worthy Author before 'T is even in its first and more imperfect draught an analogical participation as we must understand it of the divine nature before which first tincture those preludious touches of it upon the Spirit of man his former state is spoken of as an alienation from the life of God as having no interest no communion therein The putting on of the new man which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness is presently mentioned in direct opposition to that dismal state implying that to be a participation of the divine life And certainly so far as it is so 't is a participation of the divine blessedness too 2. 'T is an image most intimate therefore to its subject Glory it is but not a superficial skin-deep glory such as shone in Mâ—sâ—s his face which he covered with a Vail 'T is througâ—y transformative changes the soul throughout not in external appearance but in its very nature All outward imbellishments would add little felicity to a putrid corrupt soul. That would be but painting a Sepulchre Thiâ— adds â—rnament unto life and both especially to the inward man 'T is not pâ—int in the 〈◊〉 while dâ—â—th is at the heart but 't is 〈…〉 of such a principle within as will soon form and attemper the man universally to it self 'T is glory blessedness participated brought home and lodged in a mans own soul in his own bosom he cannot then but be satisfied A man may have a rich stock of outward comforts and while he hath no heart to enjoy them be never the happier But 't is impossible that happiness should be thus lodged in his Soul made so intimate and one with him and yet that he should not be satisfied not be happy 3. An image connatural to the Spirit of man Not a thing alien and forraign to his nature put into him purposely as is were to torment and vex him but an ancient well-known inhabitant that had place in him from the beginning Sin is the injurious intruder which therefore puts the soul into a commotion and permits it not to rest while it hath any being there This Image calms it restores it works a peaceful orderly composure within returns it to it self to its pristine blessed state being reseated there as in its proper primitive subject For though this image in respect of corrupted nature be supernatural in respect of institute and undefiled nature it was in a true sense nâ—tural as hath been demonstrated by divers of ours against the Papists and upon the matter yielded by some of the more modeâ—â—â—e among themselves At least it was 〈…〉 with humane nature consentaneâ—us to it and perâ—ective of it We are speaking it must be remembred of that part of the divine Image that consists in moral excellencies there being another part of it as hath been said that is even in the strictest sense natural There is nothing in the whole moral Law of God in conformity where unto this Image did ab origine consist nothing of what he requires from man that is at all distructive of his being prejudicial to his comforts repugnant to his most innate principles nothing that clashes with his reason or is contrary to his interest or that is not most directly conservative of his being and comfors agreeable to his most rational principles subservient to his best and truest interest For what doth God the Lord require but fear and love service and holy walking from an intire and undivided Soul What but what is good not only in it self but for us and in respect whereof his Law is said to be holy just and good And what he requireth he impresseth This Law written in the heart is this likeness How grateful then will it be when after a long extermination and exile it returns and repossesses the Soul is recognâ—zed by it becomes to it a new nature yea even a divine a vitâ—l living Law The Law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus What grievance or burden is it to do the dictates of nature actions that easily and freely slow from their own principles and when blessedness it self is infolded in those very acts and inclinations How infinitely satisfying and delightful will it be when the soul shall find it self connaturallized to every thing of its duty and shall have no other duty incumbent on it than to be happy when it shall need no arguments and exhortations to love God nor need be urged and prest as heretofore to mind him to fear before him When love and reverence and adoration and praise when delight and joy shall be all natural acts Can you separate this in your own thoughts from the highest satisfaction 4. This Image will be now perfect Every way fully perfect First In all its parts as it is in the first instant of the souls entrance into the state of regeneration the womb of Grace knows no defective maimed births And yet here is no little advantage as to this kind of perfection For now those lively lineaments of the new creature all appear which were much obscured before every line of glory is conspicuous every character legible the whole entire frame of this Image is in its exact Symmetrie and apt proportions visible at once And 't is an unspeakable addition to the pleasure of so excellent a temper of Spirit that accrews from the discernable intireness of it Heretofore some gracious dispositions have been to seek through the present prevalence of some corruption or temptation when there was most 〈…〉 occasion for their being reduced 〈…〉 Hâ—nce the reward and pleasure of 〈…〉 and improvement of the principle were lost together Now the Soul will be equally disposed to every holy exercise that shall be suitable to its state It s temper shall be even and Symmetral Its notions uniform and agreeable nothing done out of season Nothing seasonable omitted for want of a present disposition of Spirit thereto
be his perpetual triumph over all the imaginary Deities the phansied Numina wherewith he was heretofore provoked to jealousie And he shall now have no rival left but be acknowledged and known to be all in all How pleasant will it then be as it were to loose themselves in him and to be swallowed up in the overcoming sense of his boundless alsufficient every where flowing fulness And then add to this they do by this dependence actually make this fulness of God their own They are now met in one common principle of life and blessedness that is sufficient for them all They no longer live a life of care are perpetually exempt from solicitous thoughts which here they could not perfectly attain to in their earthly state They have nothing to do but to depend to live upon a present self-fufficient good which alone is enough to replenish all desires else it were not self-sufficient How can we divide in our most abstractive thoughts the highest pleasure the fullest satisfaction from this dependence 'T is to live at the rate of a God a God-like life A living upon immense fulness as he lives 2. Subjection which I place next to dependence as being of the same allay The product of imprest Soveraignty as the other of all-sufficient fulness Both impressions upon the creature corresponding to somewhat in God most incommunicably appropriate to him This is the souls real and practical acknowledgement of the Supream Majesty Its homage to its Maker Its self-dedication Than which nothing more suits the state of a creature or the Spirit of a Saint And as it is suit-table 't is pleasant 'T is that by which the blessed Soul becomes in its own sense a consecrated thing a devoted thing sacred to God It s very life and whole being refer'd and made over to him With what delightful relishes what sweet gusts of pleasure is this done while the soul tasts its own act approves it with a full ungainsaying judgment apprehends the condignity and fitness of it assents to its self herein and hath the ready suffrage the harmonious concurrence of all his powers When the words are no sooner spoken Worthy art thou O Lord to receive glory honour and power for thou hast created all things and for thy pleasure they are and were created but they are resounded from the penetralia the inmost bowels the most intimate receptacles and secret chambers of the Soul O Lord thou art worthy worthy that I and all things should be to thee worthy to be the Omega as thou art the Alpha the last as thou art the first the end as thou art the beginning of all things the Ocean into which all being shall slow as the Fountain from which it sprang My whole self and all my powers the excellencies now implanted in my being the priviledges of my now glorified state are all worth nothing to me but for thee please me only as they make me fitter for thee O the pleasure of these Sentiments the joy of such raptures when the soul shall have no other notion of it self than of an everlasting sacrifice always ascending to God in its own flames For this devotedness and subjection speak not barely an act but a state A Being to the praise of grace A Living to God And t is no mean pleasure that the sincere soul finds in the imperfect beginnings the first Essayes of this life the enitial breathings of such a Spirit its entrance into this blessed state when it makes the first tender and present of it self to God as the Apostle expresses it when it first begins to esteem it self an hallowed thing separate and set apart for God Its first act of unfeigned self-resignation when it tells God from the very heart I now give up my self to thee to be thine Never was marriage covenant made with such pleasure with so complacential consent This quitting claim to our selves parting with our selves upon such terms to be the Lords for ever O the peace the rest the acquiescence of Spirit that attends it When the poor soul that was weary of it self knew not what to do with it self hath now on the sudden found this way of disposing it self to such an advantage there is pleasure in this Treaty Even the previous breakings and relentings of the soul towards God are pleasant But O the pleasure of consent of yielding our selves to God as the Apostles expression is when the Soul is overcome and cryes out Lord now I resign I yield possess now thy own right I give up my self to thee That yielding is subjection self-devoting in order to future service and obedience To whom ye yield your selves servants to obey c. And never did any man enrol himself as a servant to the greatest Prince on earth with such joy What pleasure is there in the often iterated recognition of these transactious in multiplying such bonds upon a mans own soul though done faintly while the fear of breaking checks its joy in taking them on When in the uttering of these words I am thy servant O Lord thy servant the son of thine handmaid i. e. thy born servant allâ—ding to that custom and Law among the Jews Thy servant devoted to thy fear a man finds they fit his spirit and are aptly expressive of the true sense of his soul is it not a grateful thing And how pleasant is a state of life consequent and agreeable to such transactions and Covenants with God! when 't is meat and drink to do his will When his zeal eats a man up and one shall find himself secretly consuming for God! and the vigour of his soul exhaled in his service Is it not a pleasant thing so to spend and be spent when one can in a measure find that his will is one with Gods transformed into the divine will that there is but one common will and interest and end between him and us and so that in serving God we raign with him in spending our selves for him we are perfected in him Is not this a pleasant life Some Heathens have spoken at such a rate of this kind of life as might make us wonder and blush One speaking of a vertuous person saith he is as a good Souldier that bears wounds and numbers skars and at last smitten through with darts dying will love the Emperour for whom he falls he will saith he keep in mind that ancient precept follow God But they that complain cry out and groan and are compelled by force to do his commands and hurried into them against their will and what a madness is it saith he to be drawn rather than follow And presently after subjoyns we are born in a Kingdom to obey God is liberty The same person writes in a Letter to a friend If thou believe me when I most freely discover to thee the most secret fixed being of my soul in all things my mind is thus formed I obey not God so properly as
in the name of the same person and particularly of the winged stati of the good soul when apart from the body carried in its triumphant flying Chariot of which he gives a large description somewhat resembling Solomons rapturous Metaphor Before I was aware my soul made me as the Chariots of Aminnadib But being in the body 't is with it as with a Bird that hath lost its wings it falls a sluggish weight to the earth Which indeed is the state even of the best in a degree within this Tabernacle A sleepy torpose stops their flight They can fall but not ascend the remaines of such a drowsiness do still hang even about Saints themselves The Apostle therefore calls upon such to awake out of sleep from that consideration as we know men are not wont to sleep so intensely towards morning that now their salvation was nearer then when they believed i. e. as some judicious Interpreters understand that place for that they were nearer death and eternity than when they first became Christians though this passage be also otherwise and not improbably interpreted However 2. The holy souls release and dismission from its earthly body which is that we propounded next to be considered will excusse and shake off this drowsie sleep Now is the happy Season of its awaking into the heavenly vital light of God The blessed morning of that long desired day is now dawned upon it the cumbersome night-vail is laid aside and the garments of salvation and immortal glory are now put on It hath past through the trouble darkness of a wearisome night and now is joy arrived with the morning as we may be permitted to allude to those words of the Psalmist though that be not supposed to be the peculiar sense I conceive my self here not concern'd operously to insist in proving that the souls of Saints sleep not in the interval between death and the general resurrection but enjoy present blessedness It being besides the design of a practical discourse which rather intends the propounding and improvement of things acknowledg'd and agree'd for the advantage and benefit of them with whom they are so then the discussing of things dubious and controversible And what I here propound in order to a consequent improvement and application should methinks pass for an acknowledg'd truth among them that professedly believe and seriously read and consider the Bible For meer Philosophers that do not come into this account 't were impertinent to discourse with them from a Text of Scripture and where my design only obliges me to intend the handling of that and to deliver it from what may fitly be supposed to have its ground there unless their allegations did carry with them the Species of demonstrating the simple impossibility of what is asserted thence to the power of that God whose word we take it to be which I have not found any thing they say to amount to That we have reason to presume it an acknowledged thing among them that will be concluded by Scripture That the Soul doth not sleep when it ceases to animate its earthly body many plain Texts do evince which are amassed together by the reverend Mr. Baxter some of the principal whereof I would invite any that waver in this matter seriously to consider As the words of our Saviour to the Thief on the Cross. This day shalt thou be with me in Paradise That of the Apostle We are willing rather to be absent from the body and present with the Lord. And that I am in a straight having a desire to depart and to be with Christ. That passage The Spirits of just men made perfect c. Which are expressions so clear that it is hard for an industrious Caviller to find what to except to them and indeed the very exceptions that are put in are so frivolous that they carry a plain confession there is nothing colourable to be said Yea and most evident it is from those Texts not only that holy souls sleep not in that state of separation but that they are awaked by it as out of a former sleep into a much more lively and vigorous activity than they enjoyed before And translated into a state as much better then their former as the tortures of a Cross are more ungrateful then the pleasures of a Paradise these joyes fuller of vitalitie then those sickly dying faintings As the immediate presence and close imbraces of the Lord of life are more delectable then a mournful disconsolate absence from him which the Apostle therefore tells us he desired as far better and with an Emphasis which our English too faintly expresses for he uses a double comparative 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by much more better and as a perfected i. e a crowned triumphant Spirit that hath attained the end of its race as the words import in the agonistical notion is now in a more vivid joyous state then when lately toyling in a tiresome way it languished under many imperfections And it is observable that in the three former Scriptures that phrase of being with Christ or being present with him is the same which is used by the Apostle 1 Thes. 4. 17. to express the state of blessedness after the resurrection intimating plainly the sameness of the blessedness before and after And though this phrase be also used to signiâ—ie the present injoyment saints have of Gods gracious presence in this life which is also in nature and kind the same yet it is plainly used in these Scriptures the two latter more especially to set out to us such a degree of that blessedness that in comparison thereof our present being with Christ is a not being with him our presence with him now an absence from him While we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord and I am in a strait betwixt two desiring to depart or having a desire unto desolution and to be with Christ c. How strangely mistaken and disappointed had the blessed Apostle been had his absence from the body his dissolution his release set him further off from Christ or made him less capable of converse with him then before he was And how absurd would it be to say the spirits of the just are perfected by being cast into a stupifying sleep yea or being put into any state not better then they were in before But their state is evidently far better The body of death is now laid aside and the wights of sin that did so easily beset are shaken off flesh and sin are laid down together the soul is rid of its burdensome bands and shackles hath quitted its filthy darksome prison the usual place of lasiness and sloth is come forth of it's drowsie dormitory and the glory of God is risen upon it 'T is now come into the world of realities where things appear as they are no longer as in a drean or vision of the night
Worship Some possibly can say they are sober just Charitable Peaceable and others that can boast lesse of their Vertues yet say they are sorry for their sins and pray God to forgive them And if we urge them concerning their Translation from the state of Nature to that of Grace their becoming new creatures their implantation into Christ. They say they have been Baptized and therein regenerate and what would we have more But to how little purpose is it to equivocate with God to go about to put a fallacy upon the Judge of Spirits or escape the animadversion of his fiery flaming eye or elude his determinations and pervert the true intent and meaning of his most established Constitutions and Laws Darest thou venture thy soul upon it that this is all God means by having a new heart created a right Spirit renewed in us by being made Gods workmanship created in Christ Jesus unto good works by becoming new creatures old things being done away all things made new by so learning the truth as it is in Jesus to the putting off the old man and putting on the new which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness by being begotten of Gods own will by the word of truth to be the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the chief excellency the prime glory as certainly his new creature is his best creature the first fruits or the devoted part of all his creatures by having Christ formed in us by partaking the divine nature the incorruptible seed the seed of God by being born of God Spirit of Spirit as of earthly parents we are born flesh of flesh When my eternal blessedness lies upon it had I not need to be sure that I hit the true meaning of these Scriptures especially that at least I fall not below it and rest not in any thing short of what Scripture makes indispensably necessary to my entring into the Kingdom of God I professedly wave controversies and 't is pity so practical a business as this I am now upon and upon which Salvation so much depends should ever have been incumbred with any controversie And therefore though I shall not degress so far as to undertake a particular and distinct handling here of this work of God upon the soul yet I shall propound something in general touching the change necessarily previous to this blessedness wherein that necessity is evidenceable from the nature of this blessedness which is the business I have in hand that I hope will pass among Christians for acknowledged truth not liable to dispute though the Lord knows it be little considered My design being rather to awaken souls to the consideration of known and agreed things than to perplex them about unknown Consider therefore First that the holy Scriptures in the forementioned and other like passages do plainly hold forth the necessity of a real change to be made in the inward temper and dispositions of the soul and not a relative only respecting its state This cannot be doubted by any that acknowledge a real inherent depravation propagated in the nature of man No nor denyed by them that grant such a corruption to be general and continued among men whether by imitation only or what way soever And willing I am to meet men upon their own principles and concessions however erroneous or short of the truth they may be while they are yet improvable to their own advantage Admit that regeneration or the new birth includes a change of our relation and state God-ward doth it therefore exclude an intrinsique subjective change of the inclinations and tendencies of the Soul And if it did yet other termes are more peculiarly appropriate to and most expressly point out this very change alone As that of conversion or of turning to God of being renewed in the spirit of the mind of putting off the old man that is corrupt by c. and putting on the new man which is created in righteousness and true holiness c. of partaking the Divine nature It matters not if this or that expression be understood by some more principally in another sense the thing it self of which we speak is as clearly expressed and as urgently pressed as there was cause as any other matter whatsoever throughout the whole Book of God But men are slower of belief as to the great Article of the Christian Doctrine then to most I might say any other This Truth more directly assaults the strong holds of the Devil in the hearts of men and is of more immediate tendency to subvert his Kingdom Therefore they are most unwilling to have it true and most hardly believe it Here they are so madly bold as to give the lie to all Divine Revelations and though they are never so plainly told without holiness none shall see God they will yet maintain the contrary belief and hope till go ye cursed vindicate the Truth of God and the flames of Hell be their Eternal confutation Lord that so plain a thing will not enter into the hearts of men that so urgent inculcations will not yet make them apprehend that their Souls must be renewed or perish That they will still go dreaming on with that mad conceit that whatever the Word of God says to the contrary they may yet with unsanctified hearts get to Heaven How deplorable is the case that when men have no other hope left them but that the God of truth will prove false belie his word yea and overturn the nature of things to save them in their sins Thou that livest under the Gospel hast thou any pretence for thy seeming ignorance in this matter couldst thou ever look one quarter of an hour into the Bible and not meet with some intimation of this truth What was the ground of thy mistake What hath beguiled thee into so mischievous a delusion How could such an imagination have place in thy soul that a Child of wrath by nature could become a Child of God without receiving a new nature That so vast a change could be made in thy state without any at all in the temper of thy Spirit Secondly consider That this change is in its own nature and the design of God who works it dispositive of the soul for blessedness 'T is sufficiently evident from the consideration of the state it self of the unrenewed soul that a change is necessary for this end such a soul in which it is not wrought when once its drowsie stupifying slumber is shaken off its reflecting power awakened must needs be a perpetuall torment to it self So far it is remov'd from blessedness it is its own Hell and can flie from misery death no faster then from it self Blessedness composes the soul reduces it to a consistancie it infers or rather is a self-satisfaction a well-pleasedness and contentment with one self self in rich't and fill'd with the divinefulness Hence 't is at rest not as being pent in but contentedly
that we have said to them false and fabulous We are to the most as men that mock in our most serious warnings and counsels and the word of the Lord is a reproach We sometimes fill our mouthes with Arguments and our hearts with Hope and think sure they will now yield but they esteem our strongest reasonings as Leviathan doth Iron and Brass but as Straw and rotten Wood and laugh at Divine threatnings as he doth at the shaking of the Spear Yea and when we have convinc't them yet we have done nothing though we have got their Judgements and Consciences on our side and their own their Lusts onely reluctate and carry all They will now have their way though they perish We see them perishing under our very eye and we cry to them in thy name O Lord to turn and live but they regard us not For these things sometimes we weep in secret and our eyes trickle down with tears yea we cry to thee O Lord and thou hearest us not thy hand seems shortened that it cannot save it puts not on strength as in the days of old It hath snatcht souls by thousands as firebrands out of the fire but now thou hidest and drawest it back Who hath believed our report to whom is the Arm of the Lord revealed Mean while even the Divels instruments prosper more than we And he that makes it his business to tempt and intice down souls to hell succeeds more then we that would allure them to heaven But we must speak whether men will hear or forbear though it concerns us to do it with fear and trembling Oh how solemn a business is it to treat with souls and how much to be dreaded least they miscarry through our imprudence or neglect I write with sollicitude what shall become of these lines with what effect they will be read if they fall into such hands by them whom they most concern Yea and with some doubt whether it were best to write on or forbear Sometimes one would incline to think it a merciful omissionâ— lest we adde to the account and torment of many at last but sense of duety towards all and hope of doing good to some must oversway Considering therefore the state of such souls I am now dealing with I apprehend there may be obstructions to the entertainment of the counsell here recommended of two sorts partly in their minds partly in their hearts something of appearing reason but more of reâ—â— perverse will That which I shall do in persuance of it will fall under two answerable heads 1. A reply to certain doubts and objections wherein to meet with the former 2. The proposal of some considerations wherein to contend against the latter As to the first It appears men are grown ingeniously wicked and have learned how to dispute themselves into hell and to neglect what concerns their eternal blessednesse with some colour and pretence of reason It will therefore be worth the while to discusse a little their more specious pretences and consider their more obvious supposeable scruples which will be found to concern either the possibility lawfulness advantage or necessity of the endeavours we perswade to Is it a possible undertaking you put us upon or is there any thing we can do in order to the change of our own hearts We find our selves altogether undesirous of those things wherein you state blessedness and they are without savour to us If therefore the notion you give us of blessedness be right all the work necessary to quallifie us for it is yet to be done we yet remain wholly destitute of any principle of life that may dispose us to such relishes and injoyments If the new Creature as you say consist in a suitable temper of Spirit unto such a state as this 't is as yet wholly unformed in us And is there any thing to be done by a dead man in order to life Can a Child contribute any thing to its first formation or a Creature to its coming into being If you were serious in what you say methinks you should have little mind to play the Sophisters and put fallacies upon yourselves in a matter that concerns the life of your souls And what else are you now doing For sure otherwise one would think it were no such difficulty to understood the difference between the esse simpliciter the meer being of any thing and the esse tale its being such or such by the addition of somewhat afterward to that being Though nothing could contribute to it s one being simply Yet sure when it is in being it may contribute to the bettering or perfecting of it self as even the unreasonable creatures themselves do And if it be a creature naturally capable of acting with design It may act designedly in order to its becoming so or so quallified or the attaining of somewhat yet wanting to its perfection You cannot be thought so ignorant but that you know the new Creature is onely an additional to your former being And though it be true that it can do no more to its own production than the unconceived Child as nothing can act before it is doth it therefore follow that your reasonable soul in which it is to be formed cannot use Gods prescribed means in order to that blessed change You cannot act holily as a Saint but therefore can you not act rationally as a man I appeal to your reason and conscience in some particulars Is it impossible to you to attend upon the dispensation of that Gospel which is Gods power unto salvation the seal by which he impresses his image the glass through which his glory shines to the changing of soules into the same likeness are you not as able to go to Church as to the Tavern and to sit in the assembly of Saints as of Mockers Is it Impâ—ssible to you to consult the written word of God and thence learn what you must be and do in order to blessedness will not your eyes serve you to read the Bible as well as a Gazett or Play-book Is it impossible to inquire of your Minister or an understanding Christian neighbour concerning the way and terms of blessednesse Cannot your tongue pronounce these words what shall I do to be saved as well as those pray what do you to think of the weather or what news is there going Yet further Is it impossibly to apply your thoughts to what you meet with suitable to your case in your attendance upon preaching reading or discourse Have all such words a barbaroâ—s sound in your ear can you not consider what sense is carried under them What they import and signify can you not bethink yourself do the doctrines of God and Christ and the life to come signifie something or nothing or do they signifie any thing worth the considering or that t is fit for me to take notice of And yet to proceed a little further with you I pray you once more demand of yourselves and
for it for this end to be relieved 'T is the mistaking of the notion of Heaven that hath also an ingrediency into this doubt if it be really a doubt what is it a low thing to be filled with the Divine fulness to have his Glory replenishing our souls to be perfectly freed from sin in every thing conformed unto this holy nature and will That our minding our interest in this or any affairs should be the principal thing with us is not to be thought our Supreme end must be the same with his who made all things for himself of whom through whom and to whom all things are that he alone might have the glory But subordinates need not quarrel A lower end doth not exclude the higher but serves it and is as to it a means God is our end as he is to glorified and enjoyed by us our glorifying him is but the agnition of his glory which we do most in beholding and partaking it which is therefore in direct subordination thereto 3. But it may further be doubted what if it be acknowledged that these are both things possible and lawful yet to what purpose will it be to attempt any thing in this kind O! what assurance have I of success is there any word of promise for the encouragement of one in my case or is God under any obligation to reward the indeavours of nature with special grace wherefore when I have done all I can he may with-hold his influence and then I am but where I were and may perish notwithstanding And suppose thou perish notwithstanding Do but yet consult a little with thy own thoughts which is more tolerable and easie to them to perish as not attaining what thy fainter struglings could not reach or for the most direct wilful rebellion doing wickedly as thou couldest Or who shall have thinkest thou the more fearful condemnation He that shall truely say when his Master comes to judgment I never had indeed Lord an heart so fully changed and turned to thee as should denote me to be the subject of thy saving pardoning mercy but thou knowest who knowest all things I long and with some earnestness did endeavour it Thou hast been privy to my secret desires and moanes to the weak strivings of a listless distempered spirit not pleased with it self aiming at a better temper towards thee I neglected not thy prescribed means onely that grace which I could not challenge thou wast pleased not to give thou didst require what I must confess my self to have owed thee thou did'st with-hold onely what thou owedst me not therefore must I yield my self a convicted guilty wretch and have nothing to say why thy sentence should not pass Or he that shall as truely hear from the mouth of his Judge Sinner thou wast often forewarned of this approaching day and call'd upon to provide for it Thou hadst Precept upon Precept and Line upon Line The counsels of life and peace were with frequent importunity prest upon thee but thou rejectedst all with proud contempt did'st despise with the same profane scorn the offers commands and threats of him that made thee hardenest thy heart to the most obstinate rebellion against his known Laws did'st all the wickedness to which thy heart prompted thee without restraint declinedst every thing of duty which his Authority and the exigency of thy own case did oblige thee to did'st avoid as much as thou couldest to hear or know any thing of my will could'st not find one serious considering hour in â— who le life time to bethink thy self whaâ— was likely to become of thee when thy place on earth should know thee no more Thou might'st know thou wast at my mercy thy breath in my hand and that I could easily have cut thee off any moment of that large space of time my patience allow'd thee in the world Yet thou never thought'st it worthy the while to sue to me for thy life Destruction from the Lord was never a terrour to thee Thou would'st never be brought upon thy knees I had none of thy addresses never didst thou sigh out a serious request for mercy Thy soul was not worth so much in thy account Thy blood wretch be upon thy guilty head Depart accursed into everlasting flames c. Come now use thy reason a while imploy a few sober thoughts about this matter remember thou wilt have a long eternitie wherein to recognize the passages of thy life and the state of thy case in the last judgement Were it supposeable that one who had done as the former should be left finally destitute of Divine Grace and perish Yet in which of these cases would'st thou chuse to be found at last But why yet should'st thou imagine so sad an issue as that after thine utmost endeavours grace should be with-held and leave thee to perish because God hath not bound himself by promise to thee what promise have the Ravens to be heard when they cry But thou art a sinner True otherwise thou wert not without promise the promises of the first Covenant would at least belong to thee Yet experience tells the world his unpromised mercies freely flow every where The whole earth is full of his goodness yea but his special grace is convey'd by promise onely and that onely through Christ and how can it be communicated thrâ—ugh him to any but those that are in him What then is the first inbeing in Christ no special grace or is there any being in him before the first that should be the ground of that graciâ—us communication things are plain enough if we make them not intricate or intangle our selves by foolish subtilties God promises sinners indefinitely pardon and eternal life for the sake of Christ on condition that they believe on him He gives of his good pleasure that grace whereby he draws any to Christ without promise directly made to them whether absolute or conditional though he give it for the sake of Christ also His discovery of his purpose to give such grace to some indifinitely amounts not to a promise claimable by any for if it be said to be an absolute promise to particular persons who are they whose duty is it to believe it made to him If conditional what are the conditions upon which the first grace is certainly promised who can be able to assign them But poor soul thou need'st not stay to puzzle thy self about this matter God binds himself to do what he promises but hath he any where bound himself to do no more Did he promise thee thy being or that thou should'st live to this day did he promise thee the bread that sustains thee the daily comforts of thy life Yea what is nearer the present purpose did he promise thee a station under the Gospel or that thou should'st ever hear the name of Christ if ever his Spirit have in any degree mov'd upon thy heart inclin'd thee at all seriously to consider thy eternal concernments did he
which he manifest himself To behold Him in the posture wherein he saves souls clad with the garments of Salvation girt with power and apparell'd with love travelling in the greatness of his strength mighty to save To view Him addressing himself to allure and win to him the hearts of sinners when he discovers himself in Christ upon that reconciling design make grace that brings salvation appear teaching to deny ungodliness c. To behold Him entring into humane flesh pitching his Tabernacle among men hanging out his Ensignes of peace laying his trains spreading his nets the cords of a man the bands of love To see Him in his Christ-ascending the Cross lifted up to draw all men to him and consider that mighty love of justice and of souls both so eminently conspicuous in that stupendious sacrifice Here to fix our eyes looking to Jesus and behold him whom we have pierced To see His power and glory as they are wont tâ— be seen in his sanctuaries to observe him in the solemnities of his worship and the gracefulâ— postures wherein he holds communion with his Saints when he seats himself amidst them on the Throne of grace receives their addresses dispenses the tokens and pledges of his love Into what transports might these visions put us every day Let us then stir up our drowsie souls open our heavy eyes and turn them upon God inureâ— and habituate them to a constant view of his yet vailed face that we may not see him onely by casual glances but as those that seeâ— his face and make it our business to gain â— thorough knowledge of him But let us remember that all our present Visions of God must aim at a further Conformity to him they must design imitation not the satisfying of curiosity our looking must not therefore be an inquisitive busie prying into the unrevealed things of God Carefully abstain from such over-bold presumptuous looks But remember we are to eye God as our pattern Wherein he is to be so he hath plainly enough reveal'd and propos'd himself to us And consider this in the pattern both to which we ought and to which we shall be conformed if we make it our business so will sense of duty and hope of success concur to fix our eye and keep it steady Especially let us endeavour to manage and guide our eye aright in beholding him that our sight of him may most effectually subserve this design of being like him and herein nothing will be more conducible than that our looks be qualified with Reverence and Love 1. Let them be reverential looks We shall never be careful to imitate a despised pattern or that we think meanly of when this is the intimate sense of our souls Who is a God like unto thee glorious in holiness There is none holy as the lord this will set all our powers on work such sights will command and over-awe our souls into a conformity to him Subjects have sometimes affected to imitate the very imperfections and deformities of their adored Prince Let us greaten our thoughts of God Look to him with a submissive adoring eye Let every look import worship and subjection Who can stand before apprehended sovereign Majesty with such a temper of soul â— shall signifie an affront to it This will makâ— every thing in us unsutable to God yield anâ— vanish and render our souls susceptible of alâ— divine and holy impressions 2. Let them be friendly and as far as may consist with that reverence amorous lookâ— 'T is natural to affect and endeavour likeness tâ— them we love Let love alwayes sit in our eye and inspirit it this will represent God alwayâ— amiable will infinitely commend to us his nature and attributes and even ravish us into his liâ—eness The loving Spouse often glorieâ— to wear her beloved Husbands picture on her breast The love of God will much more makeâ— us affect to bear his image in our hearts His Law is a true representation of him and Love is the fulfilling of that Law an exemplification of it in our selves Love will never enter a quarrel nor admit of any disagreement with God His more terrible appearances will be commendable in the eye of Love It thinks no evil But so interprets and comments upon his severer aspects whether through his Law or Providence as judge all amiable and frame the soul to an answerable deportment 2. In this way then let us endeavour a growing conformity unto God It hath been much and not unnecessarily inculcated already that the blessedness of the righteous hereafter doth not consist meerly in beholding an external objective glory but in being also glorified They are happy by a participated glory by being made like God as well as seeing his glorious likeness whereby the constitution of their Spirits is changed and reduced to that excellent harmonious agreeable temper that holy composure and peaceful state from which blessedness is inseparable As far as we are capable of blessedness in this world it must be so with us here Glory without us will not make us happy in Heaven much less will any thing without us make us happy on earth 'T is an idle dream of sickly crazie minds that their blessedness consists in some external good that is separable and distant from them which therefore as they blindly guesse they uncertainly pursue never aiming to become good without which they can never know what it is to be blessed What â—elicity are men wont to imagine to themselves in this or that change of their outward condition were their state such or such then they were happy and should desire no more As the childs phansie suggests to it if it were on the top of such a Hill it could touch the Heavens but when with much toil it hath got thither it finds it self as far off as before We have a shorter and more compendious way to it would we allow our selves to understand it A right temper of mind involves blessedness in it self 't is this only change we need to endeavour We wear out our days in vanity and misery while we neglect this work and busie our selves to catch a fugitive shadow that hovers about us It can never be well till our own souls be an Heaven to us and blessedness be a domestique an home-dwelling inhabitant there 'Till we get a settled principle of holy quietude into our own breasts become the sonâ— of peace with whom the peace of God may find entrance and abode Till we have that treasure within us that may render us in sensible of any dependence on a forraign good or fear of a forraign evil Shall that be the boast and glory of â— Phylosopher onely I carry all my goods with â— where ever I go And that a vertuous good man iâ— liable to no hurt Seneca thinks they discoveâ— a low Spirit that say externals can adde any thing though but a very little to the felicity of an honest mind as if saith he meâ—
look for this blessed hope the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ. That which you know consummates that blessedness For when Christ who iâ— their life shall appear then shall they also appear with him in glory by the participation of the divine nature their Spirits escape and get up above this corrupt impure world That new nature is a holy flame that carries theâ—r hearts upwards towards heaven Further such desires appear hence to be of divine originall an infusion from the blessed God himself That nature is from him immediately in which they are implanted The Apostle speaking of his earnest panting desire to have mortality swallowed up of life presently add's He that wrought us to the self same thing is God They are obedient desires The souls present answere to the heavenly call by which God calls it to his kingdom and glory This glory is as hath been formerly noted the very term of that calling The God of all grace hath called us into his eternal glory by Christ Jesus The gloriâ—ied state is the marke the price of the high calling of God in Christ. T is the matter of the Apostles thanksgiving unto God on the behalf of the Thessalonians that they were called by his Gospel to the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ when the soul desires this glory it obediently answers this call This is a complyance and subjection of heart to it How Lovely and becoming a thing is this when God touches the heart with a stamp and impress of glory and it forthwith turnes it self to that very point and stands directly bent towards the state of glory if not wayward or perverse but here in yield it self to God and complyes with the divine pleasure Such desires have much in them of a child-like ingenuity To desire the sight of a Fathers face when this is this intimate sense of the soul show me the Father and it suffices To desire the fullest conformity to his nature and will to be perfect as that heavenly Father is perfect what doth better become a child They are generous desires they aim at perfection the highest that created nature is capable of not contented to have had some glances of divine glory some stroaks and lines of his image but aspiring to full-eyd visions a perfect likeness They are victorious desires they as it were ride in triumph over the world and every sublunarie thing they must be supposed to have conquered sensual inclinations to have got the mastery over terrene dispositions and affections With what holy contempt and scorn of every earthly thing doth that loftie soul quit thiâ— dirty world and ascend that is powerfully carryed by its own desire towards the blessed state The desire of such a knowledge of Christ as might transform into his Likeness and pass the soul through all degrees of conformity to him till it attain the resurrection of the dead and become like a risen glorified Jesus Such a desire I say if it make all things seem as loss and dung in comparison even a formal Spirit less religion it self will it not render this world the most despicable dunghill of all the rest Try such a soul if you can tempt it down to injoy a flattering kind world or to please it when angry and unkind When desires after this glory are once awakn'd into an active lively vigour when the fire is kindled and the flame ascends and this refined Spirit is joyfully ascending therein see if you can draw it back and make it believe this world a more regardable thing Why should not all those considerations make thee in love with this blessed frame of Spirit and restless till thou find thy self uncapable of being satisfied with any thing but divine likeness 6. That while we cannot as yet attain the mark and end of our desires we yeild not to a comfortless despondency in the way but maintain in our hearts a lively joy in the hope that hereafter we shall attain it We are not all this while perswading to the desire and pursuit of an unattainable good Spiritual desires are also rational and do therefore involve hope with them and that hope ought to infer and cherish joy Hopeless desire is full of torment and must needs banish joy from that breast which it hath not the possession of T is a disconsolate thing to desire what we must never expect to enjoy and are utterly unlikely ever to compass But these desires are part of the new creature which is not of such a composition as to have a principle of endless trouble and disquiet in it self The Father of mercies is not so little merciful to his own child to lay it under a necessity from its very natural constitution of being for ever miserable by the desire of that which it can never have It had been very unlike the workmanship of God to make a creature to which it should be necessarie to desire and empossible to enjoy the same thing Not but as he hath given holy souls as to the present case great incentives of desire so doth he afford them proportionable encouragements of hope also and that hope intervening can very well reconcile desire and joy and lodge them together in the same bosome So that as it is a thing capable of no excuse to hear of this blessedness and not desire it so it would be to desire and not expect it to expect it and not rejoyce in it even while we are under that expectation And it must be a very raised joy that shall answer to the expectation of so great things If one should give a stranger to Christianity an account of the Christian hopes and tell him what they expect to be and enjoy erelong he would sure promise himself to find so many angells dwelling in humane flesh and reckon when he came among them he should be as amidst heavenly Quire every one ful of joy and praise He would expect to find us living on earth as the inhabitants of heaven also many pieces of immortal glory lately dropt down from above and shortly again returning thither He would look to find every where in the Christian world incarnate glory sparkling through the over-shaddowing vail and wonder how this earthly sphere should be able to contain so many great souls But when he draws nearer to us and observs the course and carriage of our lives when he sees us walk as other men and considers the strange disagreement of our daily conversation to our so great avowed hopes and how little sense of joy and pleasure we discover our selves to conceive in them would he not be ready to say sure some or other willing only to amuse the world with the noise of strange things have composed a Religion for these men which they themselves understand nothing of If they do adopt and own it for theirs they understand not their own pretences they are taught to speak
glory of God Your hearts being bent thitherward and made willing to run through whatsoever difficulties of life or death to attain it Do not think that Christ came into the world and dyed to procure the pardon of your sins and so translate you to heaven while your hearts should still remain cleaving to the earth He came and returned to prepare a way for you and then call not drag you thither That by his Precepts and Promises and Example and Spirit he might form and fashion your Souls to that glorious state And make you willing to abandon all things for it And low now the God of all grace is calling you by Jesus Christ unto his eternal Glory Direct then your eyes and hearts to that marke the Prise of the High calling of God in Christ Jesus 'T is ignominious by the common suffrage of the civiliz'd world not to intend the proper business of our Callings To your Calling to forsake this world and mind the other make hast then to quit your selves of your entanglements of all earthly dispositions and affections Learn to live in this world as those that are not of it that expect every day and wish to leave it whose hearts are gone already 'T is dreadful to dye with pain and regret To be forced out of the Body To dye a violent death and go away with an unwilling refluctant heart The wicked is driven away in his wickedness Fain he would stay longer but cannot He hath not power over the Spirit to retain the Spirit nor hath he power in death He must away whether he will or no. And indeed much against his will So it cannot but be where there is not a previous knowledge and love of a better state where the Soul understands it not and is not effectually attempered and framed to it O get then the lovely Image of the future glory into your minds keep it ever before your eyes Make it familiar to your thoughts Imprint daily there these words I shall behold thy face I shall be satisfied with thy likeness And see that your souls be inrich't with that righteousness Have inwrought into them that holy rectitude that may dispose them to that blessed state Then will you dye with your own consent and go away not driven but allur'd and drawn You will go as the redeemed of the Lord with everlasting joy upon their heads As those that know whether you go even to a state infinitely worthy of your desires and choice and where 't is best for you to be You will part with your souls not by a forcible separation but a joyful surrender and resignation They will dislodge from this earthly Tabernnacle rather as putting it off then having it rent and torn away Loosen your selves from this body by degrees as we do any thing we would remove from a place where it sticks fast Gather up your spirits into themselves Teach them to look upon themselves as distinct thing Inure them to the thoughts of a dissolution Be continually as taking leave Cross and disprove the common maxime and let your hearts which they use to say are wont to dye last dye first Prevent death and be mortifi'd towards every earthly thing beforehand that death mave have nothing to kill but your body And that you may not die a double death in one hour and suffer the death of your body and of your love to it both at once Much less that this should survive to your greater and even incurable misery Shake off your Bands and Fetters the terrene affections that so closely confine you to the house of your bondage And lift up your heads in expectation of the approaching Jubilee the day of your redemption when you are to go out free and enter into the glorious liberty of the Sons of God When you shall serve and groan and complain no longer Let it be your continual song and the matter of your daily praise that the time of your happy deliverance is hastening on that ete long you shall be absent from the body and present with the Lord. That he hath not doom'd you to an everlasting imprisonment within those closs and clayie walls wherein you have been so long shut up from the beholding of his sight and glory In the thoughts of this while the outward man is sensibly perishing let the inward revive and be renewed day by day What Prisoner would be sorry to see the walls of his Prison House so an Heathen speaks mouldering down and the hopes arriving to him of being delivered out of that darkness that had buried him of recovering his liberty and injoying the free air and light What Champion inur'd to hardship would stick to throw off rotten rags rather expose a naked placid free body to naked placid free air The truly generous soul to be a little above never leaves the body against its will Rejoyce that it is the gracious pleasure of thy good God thou shalt not always inhabit a Dungeon nor lie amid'st so impure and disconsolate darkness that he will shortly exchange thy filthy Garments for those of Salvation and Praise The end approaches As you turn over these leaves so are your days turned over And as you are now arrived to the end of this Book God will shortly write Finis to the Book of your Life on Earth and shew you your names written in Heaven in the Book of that Life which shall never end FINIS Senec. * Pruritus disputandi scobies Ecclesia * Ut ulcera quaedam nocituras manus apoetunt tactu gaudent faedam corporum scabiem delectat quicquid â—xâ—sperâ—t Non alitè◠dixerim his mâ—ntibus in quas voluptates velut mala ulcera crupê unt voluptati esse laborem vexâ—tionemque Sâ—n. de tranquillitate anâ—â—â— Sen de Brev. vit * Nihil est Deo similius aut gratius quam vir animo perfectè bonus c. Apul. de Deo Soâ—â—atis * Inter bonos viros ac Deum amicitia est conciliante virtute amicitiam dico etiam necessitudâ— similitudâ— c. Sca de prov * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Plato in Minâ—e 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Dyonys Halicar Antiq. Rom. lib. 8. Rom. 2 6 7 8 9. * Rom. 16 18. Phil. 3. 19. * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sept. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The vâ—lgar Latine Eâ—oautem 〈…〉 appaâ—câ—o â—oâ—spectui 〈◊〉 satiabo◠〈◊〉 â—â—pâ—â—uâ—riâ— gloâ—ia tua Exactly following the Seventy as doth the Ethiopique the Chaldee Paraphrase disagrees little the Arabique lesse the Syâ—iâ—ck mistook it seem◠〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and so read that word saith which we read likenesse Hieronymus juxta Hebr. reads the words exactly as we do Ego in justiâ—iâ viâ—â—bo faciâ—m tuam implebor cum evigilavero similitudine tua 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Seems best to be rendered here by or through righteousness as by the condition
Ira dâ—i est ista vita mortalis ubi homo vanitati similis factus est dies ejus velut umbra pretereunt c. Aug. de Civ Dei l. 21. c. 24. 2. Inference Not that this blessednesse can be attained by meer humane indeavours more whereof see under the next Inference but there 's an inclination a certain poâ—duâ— naturae as some School-men speak by which it propends towards it or there is the radix or â—undâ—mâ—ntum or capacitas as some others i. e. that it not only may receive it but that it may be elevated by grace actively to concurr by its natural powers as vital principles towaâ—ds the attainment of it according to that known saying of Saint Aug. Pâ—sse credero naturae est hominis c. * Voluptas bonuÌ„ 〈◊〉 est Hâ—â—c tu noâ— dico â—â—ter viâ—os sâ—d inter homines numeras cujus 〈◊〉 bonum 〈◊〉 ac 〈◊〉 ac 〈◊〉 consâ—â— excedâ—t ex hoc animaâ—â—um numero pulch crimâ— ac dus secuâ—do 〈…〉 Sen. Ep. 91. * Hic Deos aeqâ—aâ— illò tendit originis suâ memor Nemo impro è eò coâ—atur ascendere unde descâ—nderat socâ—i eis sumus membâ—a c. Sen Ep. 92. * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Plotin Ennead 4. lib. 3. * Sicut noa est à carne sed lupeâ— carnâ—m qâ—od carnem facâ—t vâ—vert sic non est 〈◊〉 sed super homiâ—â—m qâ—uâ— hominem sacit 〈◊〉 vâ—vâ—re D. Aug de Civit Dei lib 19. c. 25. * Ut in ordâ—ne causarum â—fficiâ—ntium ita in gradi us virtutâ—s peâ—fâ—ctionis non datur progâ—essâ—s â—a infiâ—iâ—um sed oportet sit aliqua pâ—â—mâ— summa perfectio P. Molin de cognitione Dei Not to insist upon what hath been much urged by learned men of former and latter yea of the present time that whosoever denies the existence of an absolute perfect being contradicts himself in the denial inasmuch as nâ—cessity of existence is included in the very subject of the negâ—tion some accounting it a Sophisme and it being unseasonable here to discuss it 3. Inference Capax est noster 〈◊〉 pâ—â—fectur illo si 〈◊〉 depâ—imaâ—t Sen. Epist 92. 1 Cor 2. 14. Râ—m 8. â— Eph. 4 23. Eph. 4 18. Chap. 2. 12. Rom 1 28. 2 Pet. 3. Job 21. 14. Psal 53. Joh. 15. Rom. 1. Psal. 36. 1 â— Psal. 50 Psal. 51. Eph. 2. 10. 2 Cor. 5. 17. Eph. 4. 23 24. Jam 1. 18. Gal. 4. 19. 2 Pet. 1 4. 1 Pet. 1. John 3. 6. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Pet. 1â— 4. Col 1. 12. 2 Cor. 5 5. Heb. 12 14. 2 Cor. 5 18 19. 1 Joh. 1. 1 2 3 4. Psal. 36. 5 6. Psal. 104 34. Psal. 139 17 18. Isa. 16. 8 9. Mark 6. 6. Joh 15. 25. Rom. 6. 11. 1 Joh. 3. 14. Chap. 5 2. * Proinde virtutes quas sibi videtur habere nisi ad Deum retulerit etiam ipsâ vitia sunt potiùs quà m virtutes Aug de Civit. Dei l. 19. c 25. Matth. 13 37. See Psal. 81. 8. to 13. Pro. 1. 20. to 24 c. Hos. 11. 4. Job 35 Rev. 16. * Tacitus speaking of the hatred of Tiberius and Augusta against Germanicus the causes whereof saith he were acriores quia iniquae Hos. 7 16. 2 Pet. 1 〈…〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈…〉 Chap. 1. 7. Joh. 17. 17. * Mr. 〈◊〉 Trial of sincere love to Christ. Rom. 1. 16. 1 Thes. 2 3. Heb 6. Rev. 9. 5. Hab. 2. 4. Heb. 10. â—7 Chap. 11. 1. 2 Cor. 4. 16 8. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Psal. 4. Psal. 27. * Aptitudinally I mean and Exhypothesi i. e. supposing the knowledge of the object Otherwise as to actual explicite desires God doth give us beyond what we can ask or think But 't is impossible the soul should rest satisfied in that which upon knowledge it is undesiâ—ous of and dâ—th or would reject Inference 1 Joh. 3. 6. 3 Joh 11. 1 Tim. 6. 6. Psal. 34. â—â— 1 Joh. 2. ult Chap. 3. 1. Hâ—b 12. 1 Cor. 6. Isa. 55. Job 35. Joh 3. 16. Heb 5. 9. 1 Joh. 2. 29. Joh. 5. 37. Pro. 10. 16. Chap. 11 14 Ver. 18. Mat. 13. 43. Chap. 25. 46. Isa. 55 2. Rom. 6. 20 21. Psal. 73. â—â— 15. Rom. 8. 24. 1 Cor. 15. 19. 1 Pet. 13. Hos. 11. Jer. 2. Ezra 10. 2 3. Psal. 78. 7 13. Jer. 3 2â— 23. Exod 23. 2â— Titus 2. 11 12. Râ— 2. 7. 1 Joh. 3. 3. Heb 1â— 34. T it 1â— 1 2. 1 Thes 5 â— Rom. 5 2. Chap. 12. 12. Psal. 27. 13 14. Tit. 1. 2. Psal. 119. 49. Joh. 14. 1 2. Inseren 10. De Civit. Dei lib. 19. Josh. 24. Prov. 22. 3. Est benè non potuit dicere dixit erit Joh. 16. 20 2â— Phil. 1. 9 1â—â—â— Epicurus Luke 10. 21. Act. 7. 22. Luke 12. Luke 6. 14. 25. Wisd. 53. c. 1 Coâ— 1. * Folly is 〈…〉 Prov 15 21. 1 Cor. 2. 9. Eph. 1. 17. Heb. 11. 3. 2 Rule 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mar. Antonin Lib. 5. Ecoelo descendit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 * Hist. Mundi The wisedom and significancy of which Dedication Plato also in Alcibiad 1. takes notice of Heb. 4. 12. 2 Cor. 13. 5. Phil. 2. 12. Rev. 2. 6 7. Phil. 3. 18 19 20. Col. 3. 1. 2 3 4. Heb. 11. 1 13. 16. Matth. 5 19 20 21. Rule 3. Doubt 1. Reply â—udio vâ—lâ—us cum ad coeâ—u◠〈…〉 nihil aliud quam Deum 〈◊〉 vâ—lgi naturalis 〈◊〉 est sâ—rmo Min. Fâ—l Octâ—â— Doubt 2. Reply * Therefore as to that form of expression that such acts of unregenerate men are sins that is a Catechrestical piece of Rhetorick which being so understood is harmless but to use it in property of speech and thence to go about to make men believe that it 's a sin to do their duty is void both of truth sense and full of danger unto the souls of men Prov. 21. 4. Doubt 3. Reply Psal. 65. 2. Job 21. 15. 4. Doubt Reply Necessitas medii 1 Pet. 1. 23. Jam. 1 18. Rom. 6. 17. Joh. 17. 17. 2 Pet. 1. Isâ— 1 Chap. 55 〈…〉 〈…〉 Isa. 65. 1. * Mr. Baxter Poena Damni Sensus Jam. 3. 6. 4. Rule Phil. 3. 14. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Pet. 5 10. Jer. 2. 5. Prov. 13 20. Prov. 4. 18. Hos. 6. 3. Isa. 57. 1â— * Psal. 25 14. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Psal. 32. 6. Job 14 35. Phil. 1. 9. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Heb. 5. â—l Heb. 6. 1 Pet. 1. 2 3. John 10. Cant. 5. 3. So we apprehend God proportionably more clearly as the Idea we have of a person is more distinct that we have of him by the sight of his picture or face through a glass beyond that which we have by hearing a reported description of him though by himself unseen This is acquaintance with God 1 King 9. 3â— Job 6. 37. Psal. 33. 18 34. 15. Cant. Psal. 16. 8 Psal.
compose the soul and reduce it to so quiet a consistency in the midst of storms and tempests how perfect and contentful a repose will the immediate vision and injoyment of God afford it in that serene and peaceful region where it shall dwell for ever free from any molestation from without or principle of dis-rest within CHAP. IX The Pleasure arising from knowing or considering our selves to be like God from considering it 1. Absolutely 2. Comparatively or respectively to the former state of the soul. To the state of lost souls To its pattern To the way of accomplishment To the souls own expectations To what it secures The Pleasure whereto it disposes of union communion A comparison of this Righteousness with this Blessedness 2. HEre is also to be considered the pleasure and satisfaction involv'd in this assimilation to God as it is known or reflâ—cted on or that arises from the cognosci of this likeness We have hitherto discoursed of the pleasure of being like God as that is apprehended by a spiritual sensation a feeling of that inward rectitude that happy pleasure of souls now perfectly restored We have yet to consider a further pleasure which acrews from the souls animadversion upon it self its contemplating its self thus happily transformed And though that very sensation be not without some animadversion as indeed no sensible perception can be performed without it yet we must conceive a consequent animadversion which is much more explicite and distinct and which therefore yields a very great addition of Satisfaction and delight As when the blessed soul shall turn its eye upon it self and designedly compose and set it self to consider its present state and frame the consideration it shall now have of it self and this likeness imprest upon it may be either Absolute or Comparative respective 1. Absolute How pleasing a spectacle will this be when the glorified soul shall now intentively behold its own glorious frame When it shall dwell in the contemplation of it self view it self round on every part turn its eye from glory to glory from beauty to beauty from one excellency to another and trace over the whole draught of this image this so exquisite piece of divine workmanship drawn out in its full perfection upon it self When the glorified eye and divinely enlightned and inspirited mind shall apply it self to criticize and make a judgment upon every several lineament every touch and stroke shall stay it self and scrupulously insist upon every part view at leisure every character of glory the blessed God hath instamp't upon it how will this likeness now satisfie And that expression of the blessed Apostle taken notice of upon some other occasion formerly The glory to be revealed in us seems to import in it a reference to such a self intuition What serves revelation for but in order to vision What is it but an exposing things to view and what is revealed in us is chiefly exposed to our own view All the time from the the Souls first conversion till now God hath been as it were at work upon it He that wrought us to c. hath been labouring it shaping it polishing it spreading his own glory upon it inlaying inameling it with glory now at last the whole work is revealed the Curtain is drawn aside the blessed Soul awakes Come now saith God behold my work see what I have done upon thee Let my work now see the light I dare expose it to the censure of the most curious eye let thine own have the pleasure of beholding it It was a work carried on in a Mystery secretly wrought as in the lower parts of the earth as we alluded before by a Spirit that came and went no man could tell how Besides that in the general only we knew we should be like him it did not yet appear what we should be now it appears There is a revelation of this glory O the ravishing pleasure of its first appearance and it will be a glory always fresh and flourishing as Job's expression is my glory was fresh in me and will afford a fresh undecaying pleasure for ever 2. The blessed soul may also be supposed to have a comparative and respective consideration of this impressed glory That is so as to compare it with and refer it to several things that may come into consideration with it and may so heighten its own delight in the contemplation thereof 1. If we consider this impression of glory in reference to its former loathsâ—me deformities that were upon it and which are now vanished and gone How unconceivable a pleasure will arise from this comparison when the soul shall consider at once what it is and what once it was and thus bethink it self I that did sometimes bear the accursed image of the Prince of darkness do now represent and partake of the holy pure nature of the Father of lights I was a meer Chaos an hideous heap of Deformity Confusion and Darkness But he that made light to shine out of darkness shined into me to give the knowledge of the light of his own glory in the face of Jesus Christ and since made my way as the shining light shining brighter and brighter unto this perfect day I was an habitation of Dragons a Cage of noisom lusts that as Serpents and Vipers were winding to and fro through all my faculties and powers and preying upon my very vitals Then was I hateful to God and an hater of him sin and vanity had all my heart The charming invitations and allurements of grace were as musick to a dead man to think a serious thought of God or breath forth an affectionate desire after him was as much against my heart as to pluck out mine own eyes or offer violence to mine own life After I began to live the Spiritual new life how slow and faint was my progress and tendency towards perfection how indisposed did I find my self to the proper actions of that life To go about any holy spiritual work was too often as to climb an Hill or strive against the stream or as an attempt to fly without wings I have sometime said to my heart Come now le ts go pray love God think of heaven but O how listless to these things how lifeless in them Impressions made how quickly lost gracious frames how soon wrought of and gone characters of glory rac'd out and overspread with earth and dirt Divine comeliness hath now at length made me perfect The glory of God doth now incloath me they are his ornaments I now wear He hath made me that lately lay among the pots as the wings of a dove covered with silver and her feathers with yellow gold he hath put another nature into me the true likeness of his own holy divine nature He hath now perfectly master'd and wrought out the enmity of my heart against him Now to be with God is my very element Loving admiring praising him are as natural as breathing once