And this sense doth well agree with what went before and with what follows The Apostle hath a great mind to depart for whilst he is in the body he is absent from his perfect happiness For this is the consummation of a Christians happiness to be with the Lord to be admitted to a beholding of his infinite glory as appears by our Saviours earnest prayer for this Joh. 17. 24. Father I will that they also whom thou hast given me be with me where I am that they may behold my glory Besides if we shall see him as he is we must also needs be made lâ—ke unto him 1 Joh. 3. 2. else how can we be fit to live for ever in his presence Now we are kept from this seeing and beholding of the Lord in glory by this animal life It stands between us and the Crown between us and our Masters Joy between us and the perfect enjoyment of God To be with the Lord is a state of perfect freedom from sin No unclean thing shall or can enter into Heaven Rev. 21. 27. A perfect freedom from all manner of afflâ—ctions Rev. 21. 4. There shall be no more sorrow nor crying nor pain and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all tears shall be wiped away from their eyes A state of freedom from all temptations to sin For a tempting Devil and all tempting lusts shall be cast out for ever A state of perfect peace without the least disturbance from within or from without of perfect joy that shall neither have end nor abatement and of perfect holiness when the whole soul shall be enlarged and raised to know and love and enjoy the blessed God as much as created nature is capable This is the happy state of seeing God of being with the Loâ—d And it is thy corruptible body this animal life that interposes between us and it so that the Apostle is confident and rather willing to depart and be with the Lord than stay here and be without him 2. Whilst we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord without any reference to the world to come and so it may be fitly translated distant from the Lord estranged from God This agrees well with the context and scope of the Apostle also And thus the words are also a good ground of the Apostles resolution and willingness to dye q. d. I am willing to be absent from this body for whilst I am in it I find my self to be at a great distance from God And indeed the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies properly to be at a distance or to be estranged So I find it interpreted by a learned Critick without any mystery as he speaks of the distance that even Believers themselves stand at from God in this life And in thâ—s sense I shall chuse to prosecute the words In which sense the Apostle blames this body and animal life because it keeps us at a distance from God is a clog a snare a fetter a pinion to the soul And so the words do agree in sense with those of our Saviour Mat. 26. 41. The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak where by the flesh must needs be understood the body if we consider the contexâ— viz. the occasion upon which the words were spoken the sleepiness of the Apostles or if we consider the propriety of speech according to the style of the New Testament True indeed the corruption of nature is sometimes called Flesh but according to that way of speaking our Saviour would rather have said That the spirit was willing but the flesh was strong as he saith elsewhere That the strong man armed kept the house Now to explain this Doctrine a little That even the godly themselves whilst they are in this body are at a distance from the Lord It must be granted that the godly soul is nigh unto God even whilst it so journs in this mortal body and tottering flesh All souls are involved in the Apostasie of Adam and are fallen down from God have alike stâ—agled from their God and are sunk into self and the creature God opened a way for their return by the blood of Jesus for we owe it unto Christs death not only that God is reconciled to us pardoning our sins but that any of our natures become reconciled to God by accepting of him as our God and loving him as the chiefest good Now there is a double being brought nigh to God by Christ The first is more general external and as I may say relational Thus the partition-wall being broken down the Gentiles that were converted from their Idolatry to a profession of God and Christ and admâ—tted to a communion with the Visible Church are upon that account said to be Brethren to the rest of Gods Children 1 Cor. 5. 11. and as to the Church they are said to be within it vers 12. though at the same timâ— they were Fornicators Covetous Drunkards And as to God they are said to be made nigh Ephes 2. 13. A prosessing of God is said to be a being nigh to him and even an external performance is said to be a drawing nigh to him and so Nadab and Abihu even in the offering of strange fire are said to have drawn nigh to God Levit. 10. 3. And this though it be a priviledge yet it is not that honourable priviledge of the truly godly souls who are by Christ Jesus raised up to God in their hearts and reconciled to him in their natures and united to him in their affections and so are made nigh unto him in a more especial and spiritual manner Thus all sinful and wicked souls notwithstanding all their profession and performances are far from God estranged from the life of God Enmity and dissimilitude are the most real distance from God And truly God-like souls only are nigh unto him they dwell in him and he dwelleth in them as in his most proper Temple As to any kind of Apposition no man can draw nigh to God nor by any local accession for so all men are alike nigh to him who is everywhere and the worst as well as the best of men do live and move in him But they are really nigh unto God who do enjoy him and they only enjoy him whose natures are conformable to him in a way of love goodness and God-like perfections We do not enjoy God by any gross and external conjunction with him but we enjoy him and are nigh unto him by an internal union when a Dâ—vine Spirit informeth and acteth our souls and derives a Divine Life into them and thorow them And so a godly soul only is really and happily nigh unto God Thus the Apostle Paul I believe was as nigh unto God as any man in the world who did not only live and move in God as all men do though few understand it but God did even live and as it were breathe in him the very life that he 〈◊〉 was by faith in the Son of
the eyes run over the lips quaver the shoulders pull back the hands tremble the knees knock together and the whole fabrick is ready to tumble down for fear of falling Either to this as some inter pret or to that duty of Prayer as others doth that of our Saviour refer Mark 14. 38. The spirit indeed is willing but the flesh is weak It seems the spirit of the weakest Christian is strong though the body as we have seen of the strongest Saint is weak Though indeed it is not properly the weakness that is in the body that I am to speak to but the influence that the body hath upon the soul to weaken that for whilst the soul sympathizes with the body attends to it spares it pities it self becomes almost ill affected to the service of God I am not so much blaming the body because it had need by reason of its slothfulness to be drawn on to dutie but because by its influences it draws off the soul also from them for so we find it by woful experience that if the body do sleep the soul cannot wake it cannot hear without the ear nor see without the eyes so that the bodyes weariness at leng hends in the souls unwillingness and the weakness of the one grows to be the sin of the other 3. Whilst we are in the body we are at a distance from God as to communion with him we are estranged from fellowship with him and this is indeed to be absent from the Lord. Oh how many weary and uncomfortable dayes do poor Saints live at a great distance from their God their Life their Happiness whilst they are in their worldly Pilgrimage in their Cage of flesh Oh how many dayes do they forget God and are apt to think that God hath forgotten them too How do they live sometimes as it were without God in the world their souls being surfeited with carnal pleasures benummed with fears frozen with self-love choaked with cares stifled with griefs and seem to have no more feeling of God their life than a body in the dust hath of the soul its life Oh what a heavy yoke doth the poor soul draw under when it plows and harrows to the flesh and cannot lift up its head to Heaven Oh how is our intercouse with God obstructed our beholding of him obscured our entertaining of him prevented our enjoyment of him disturbed and violâ—ted our love to him to him deadned and his love to us damped ours rendred iâ—firm and his rendred insensible and all by this make bare mortal flesh Alas what uncertainties and vicissitudes what changing and tossings turnings and windings are our poor pilgrim souls here exercised with What breakin gs and piecings reconciliations and fallings out closing and parting rising and falling what ups and downs what forwards and backwards doth the poor distressed soul experience in this animal state The flourishing soul withers the lofty soul languishes the vigorous soul fainteth the nimble soul flaggeth the devout soul swooneth the lively soul sickeneth and is ready to give up the Ghost and she that was a while ago resting and glorying in the arms of her Lord anon lyes embracing a dunghil and hath almost forgotten that ever she was happy Her peace is violated her rest is disturbed her converse with Heaven interrupted her incomes from God are few and insensible her outgoings to him are few and lazy and the rivers of her divine pleasures are almost dryed up And all this whilst she is in this body and indeed a great part of it by reason of this body in which she is The animal body keeps us distant from the Lord that we cannot converse with him mind him enjoy him live upon him and unto him The body being fitted only for this animal staâ—e is ever drawing down the soul when it would raise up it self in contemplation of and communion with the blessed God And so 1. The Necessities of the body do hinder the souls communion with the Lord. Not that the necessities of the body are simply in themselves to be blamed but the caring for these doth so exercise the soul in this state that it cannot attend upon God without distraction Oh how much doth the necessary caring for meat and drink food and physick yea the ordering of temporal affairs estrange from communion and converse with God! so that the soul like poor Martha is cumbred with many cares and busied with much serving in this house and cannot attend so devoutly and entirely as it ought upon the Lord. If the body be pinched with pain the soul cannot be at rest but must needs look out for relief If the body be pinched with hunger and thirst the soul can take no rest till it have found out a supply for it If the one be sick the other is sad if the one be hungry or thirsty the other seems to languish like Hippocrates his Twins that laught and cryed lived and dyed together It is a wonderful mystery and a rare secret how the soul comes to sympathize with the body and to have not only a knowledge but as it were a feeling of its necessities how these come to be conveyed to the soul and how it comes to be thus affected with them But we find it so And indeed to speak truth it seems necessary for the maintaining of this animal state that it should be so that the soul should be as it were hungry weary sick and sleep too together with the body for if our soul should not know what it is to be hungry thirsty cold or sick or weary but by a bare ratiocination or a dry syllogistical inference without any more especial feeling of these necessities it would soon suffer the body to languish and decay and commit it wholly to all changes and casualties neither would our own body be any more to us than the body of a plant or of a starr which we do many times view with as much clearness and contemplate with as much contentment as we do our own But in the mean time the soul is diverted from its main employment turned aside from its communion with God not so much by providing somewhat for our bodyes to eat and drink and put on which is lawful and needful as our Saviour implyes Mat. 6. 32. as by sinking it self into the body being passionately and inordinately affected with its wants and so being sinfully thoughtful as our Saviour intimateth in the same chapter vers 31. 2. The Passions of the body do hinder the souls communion with the Lord. So powerful is the interest and influence that this body hath in and over the soul that it fills it with desires pleasures griefs joys fears angers and sundry passions The body calls out the soul to attend upon its several passions which I dare not say are sinful in themselves as they first affect our souls no more than it is our sin that we are men our blessed Saviour seems not to have been free
convey it thither make him cry out not with Jacob Gen. 45. 28. It is enough Joseph my Son is yet alive I will go and see him before I dye But oh this is not enough this report is not enough it is not enough that I taste some of the good things of the Land it is not enough that I see these carriages sent out for me it is not enough that my soul hath an happy and honourable life prepared for it I see it indeed before I dye but I will also dye that I may see it better and enjoy it more But I doubt there is some earthly tye even upon the heavenly soul that chains it to this present animal body But sure I am that whatsoever it is it is but a weak one Is there any worldly accommodation any creature-toy that should in reason step between a soul and its God Is this life sweet because there are creature comforts to be enjoyed And will it not be a better life when creature comforts shall not be needed And are the pleasures of this body the comforts of this life the flattering smiles or fawning embraces of the creature such a mighty contentment to a soul to a soul acquainted with the highest good Hast thou O my soul any such full and satisfying entertainment in thy Pilgrimage as to make thee loath to go home Wilt thou hide thy self with Saul among the stuff among the lumber of the world when thou art sought for to be crowned Are the empty sounds of popular applause the breaking bubbles of secular greatness the shallow streams of sensual pleasures the smiling dalliance and lisping eloquence of wives and children the flying shadows of creature-refreshments the momentany flourishes of worldly beauty and bravery Are these meat for a soul Are these the proper object or the main happiness of such a divine thing as an immortal soul Why are we not rather weary of this body that makes us so weary of heavenly employment Why do we not rather long to part with that life that parts us from our life And instead of the young Apostles It is good to be here cry out with the sweet singer Oh that one would give me the wings of a Dove that I might fly away and be at rest And now methinks by this time I might be somewhat bold and form my remaining discourse into an Exhortation But it may be you will not bear it all at once therefore I will first begin with a Dehortation to disswade from two evils concerning your body viz. Fear and Fondness 1. Take heed of Fear for the body I speak not so much of those first impressions which our fancyes and animal spirits do make upon our minds though it were to be wished that the mind not so much as once sensate or entertain these but oâ— those acts of the will whereby it doth receive allow cherish these impressions until the Cockatrice egge be hatcht into a Viper I speak not against care and circumspection no nor against that kind of suspicion whereby wise and prudent persons are jealous of circumstances and events and so do watch to prevent remove or manage bodily evils which is called Fear though even in these there may be an extreme a fear where no fear is Psal 53. 5 which is there ascribed to the wicked anâ— elsewhere threatned as a judgement Levit. 26 36. The sound of a shaken leaâ— shall chase them Deut. 28. 65. The Lord shall give thee a trembling heart There is a prudent man who foreseeth the evil and hideth himself Prov. 22. 3. But there are also many fools that hide themselves though they see no evil But I am not speaking of these There is a vast diffeâ—â—â—ce between Care and Fear By Fear I mean that trembling fluctuating tormenting passion that doth not suffer the heart to be at rest but doth as it were unhinge it and loosen the joynts of the soul whether it break out into â—xpressions or no It clouds the understanding unsettles the will disordereth the affections confounds the memory and is like an Earthquake in the soul taking it off from iâ—s own basis destroying the consistency of it and hurling all the faculties into confusion This whether it break out into any unseemly acts or â—o which commonly it doth is it self an unseemly temper for a wise man much more for a godly I might speak as a Philosopher and shew how unbecoming a man and how destructive to him this passion is so much that whilst it doth predominate it almost robs him of that which is his greatest glory even reason it self But to say no worse of it is very opposite if not contrary to that noble grace of Faith whereby the steady soul resteth and lodgeth in the arms of God as in its center But to speak to the thing in hand what an unseemly passion is this we would have the world to believe that we have layd up our happiness in God and that we are troubled that we are so far from him and yet we are afraid lest that should be taken out of the way that keeps us at a distance from him We flatter our selves that we are in haste for Heaven and yet we are dreadfully afraid lest our rubs should be taken out of the way How do these things hang together Are we perswaded that if this earthly house of our tabernacle were taken down we have a building not made with hands eternal in the Heavens If not Why do we yet call our selves Christians But I think I may take it for granted we are all so perswaded And if so Why are we so afraid it should be taken down I am loath to speak what I think yet methinks the entire and ardent love which we either do bear or ought to bear to the Blessed God and union and communion with him should cast out this fear This is suitable to Scripture 1 Joh. 4. 18. I will not dispute how far sinful fear for the body may carry a godly soul the further the worse I am sure But if any will needs be so indulgent to his own passions and so much an enemy to his own peace as to encourage himself to fear which is a strange thing from the example of Abraham denying his wife or Peter denying his Lord let him compare the issue and then let me see whether he dare go and do likewise But if that will not fright you from fear chew upon these two Considerations 1. I pray you seriously dispute the matter with your selves how far fear of sickness and death may consist with that ardent thirst after union and perfect communion with the Blessed God with which we ought to be possest 2. Dispute seriously how far it can stand with the sincerity of a Christian God hath not left us in the dark as to this matter I will turn you to a Text or two which methinks should strike cold to all slavish trembling Professors Prov. 28. 1. Job 15. 20 21. The
â—â—te upon a Child than upon a Kingdom But Christian Divinity doth abundantly demonstrate all creaturefondness unreasonable and intolerable The next thing that I will record shall be the dâ—fficult taâ—k that I found to maintain a right humble and a right cheerful frame at the same time oh how oft and how long did I labour under this difficulty That sense of sin which was called in to promote tenderness of heart being overmuch indulged was ready at length â—o destroy that largeness and cheerfulness of soul which was so much my duty and interest to maintâ—in and on the other hand the sense of Divine Wisdom Grace and Love in Christ Jesus being called in to keep up the soul from sinking was ready to bear it up so high as that it almost forgot that it was in thâ— waters Beware Christians and watch diligently that Godly sorrow do not settle into an ungodly despondency and inconsolable heaviness the soul not being able to bear up under its own burden and that a holy chearfulness and serenâ—ty do not evaporate into an unholy frotâ—â—ness and fargetfulness of your infiâ—mities the soul not being able to manage its own metal and motions I know you would willingly understand something of the frame of my heart at that day respective to my departure out of this world you will best read my heart in the ensuâ—ng discourse upon 2 Cor. 5. 6. which I think was fetcht from thence I shall therefore say no more as to this matter only acquaint you with one eminent Experience relating hereunto My mind or fancy or appetite I know not wâ—ll what to call it was somâ—times enâ—ting in me some desires to live yet longer I â—ntred the lists with this temptation and when I had fairly and calmly debated the ground and reason of such inclination after many shifts and pretences it came to this I would fain perswade my self I was not yet holy enough this I did immediately consent to knewing it to be â— certain truth But that therefore I should desire to prolong my dayes upon earth this was a fallacious Inferencâ— Me thought I pleased my self a while whilst I could say I desired only to live to be better But after a time I apprehended a fallacy in this pretence for the way to be perfected in holiness is not living but indeed dying Christians if indeed your souls be sincerely and powerfully affected towards perfect holiness then sing not so much with David Spare me that I may recover Psa 39. 13. c. as with good old Simeon who having seen God in the flesh desired to go out of the flesh that he might see him more fully and beatifically Now Luk. 2. 29. leâ—test thou thy servant depart c. I cannot inlarge upon this Observation I suppose I have hinted enough to shew those pretences of many men viz. that they would fain live to be more fit to dye to be for the most part but a kind of mockery and self decâ—it Lastly that I be not over-tedious I do solemnly and sincerely profess before God and Angels and Men that I was never so much as inclined to think hardly of God or his good and holy wayes because of this dispensation but did then constantly and freely proclaim to all that came to visit me that sin particularly self will and sensual loves are the worst of plagues and holiness the only happiness of man yea â—ffâ—â—cted holiness infinitely to be preferred before prosperous wiâ—kedness 3. Suffer me as a conclusion of this Preface and as a result from all that I have seen and suffered to commend unto you a few excellent and necessary duties I have much adâ—â— to forbear being large here but I have already transgrest therefore I will wave those common Themes of remembring your Creator bâ—times of hear kening to the voice of his Word before his Rod speak of living in continual preparation for death of repenting and renewing repeâ—tance c. and only commend two or three things which seem to me of most excellent and necessary imporâ—ance petimuâ—que daâ—uâ—que vicâ—ssim 1. Love and eâ—joy all things in God Admire Divine Goodneâ—s in every created excellency and taste a Divine Sweetness in every created comfort O how is the noble soul of man debased pinâ—hed confined by low and sensual loves whilst many men love the creature in opposition to the Creator most men in competition with him and almost all men in a way of separation from him Oh base and degenerate affâ—ctions Let God be All things in your eye so that you shall see nor know nor love nor taste nothing but him in the world Dâ—liver your selves oh immortal souls to whom I write from all those and straitning and stâ—rving creature-loves and long and labour to be filled with pure and holy and spiritual delights such as the â—ngelâ— of God have such as the Son of God had whâ—n he made it his meat and drink to do the Joh. 4. 34. will of his Father But this you will find more largely prosecuted and prest in the last of these following Discourses Therefore 2. Live purely at the pleasure of God and maintain an universal and hearty compliance with his holy and perfect will Believe it you will never enjoy a firm and steady peace till you have committed all your wâ—lls and wayes to him and wrapt up all your interests and ends in him till your hearts be conformed to the heart of God and your wills molded into his will It is a difference of wills and ends and a distinction of interests that beget all those ragings and stormings in the hearts of men against God Mine and Thine do not only divide the world amongst men but divide men against God Earth against Heaven Take this for a certain and undoubted Aphorism that the grand interâ—st of a soul is to comply with and be one with God Communion of hearts and wills and interests and ends is that glorious fellowship which a creature hath with its Creator it is indeed the interest and bonour the duty and dignity yea the Heaven and hâ—p iness of the reasonable creature But something to this purpose you will find in the first Discourse 3. I beseech you Christians be not content to say you have chosen God for your chiefest good but puriue after him as luch without grudging and without ceasing longing to be as much one with hâ—m in a participation of divine perfections as our created natures are capable Maintain a holy and secret striving of soul towards this blessed object continually as a thing moves towards its center as a soul ought to endeavour to accomplish its own perfections stand not gazing upon a Heaven to come but labour to draw dâ—wn all that peace joy love purity which Heaven is into your own souls by growing up into the life of God daily Râ—â—kon that you are never in a right temper except you be in Davids temper when he waited for God more than they
freedom from worldly business as some other things are but is equally incumbent upon Prince and Peasant upon him that sits in his closet and upon him that ploughs in the field yea they that go down unto the Sea in ships ought to go up unto heaven in their hearts and not only to converse with the clouds which they often do but above them too A hand full of earth and a heart full of heaven may well stand together For as this duty justles out no honest business so neither should it self be justled out by any And as this high excellent duty agrees to all ages and times and persons so it agrees to all conditions too poor men do think that rich men may well do it and rich men think that poor men had need to do it prosperity thinks it hath better things to mind than a God and adversity knows it hath worse things but it must mind them plenty is too full to entertain him and poverty hath enough to do to bear up under its own burden learning knows how but will not ignorance sayes it would but knows not how but notwithstanding all this shuffling the obligation to this duty ceases not None so high as to be above it none so mean as to be below it For rich and poor high and low learned and unlearned Prince and peasant though they are divided amongst themselves by punctilioes and lesser differences yet they are united in one universal Being meet in one and the same center agree in the common capacity of reasonable creatures As religion hath an interest and a concernment in the whole of the conversation according to that of the Apostle Phi. 3. 20. our conversation is in heaven so also hath it a room in the conversation of every man in every capacity No Relation Condition Action Change is exempted from the powerful influence thereof so the Apostle describes himself by his living in all good conscience before God all along Act. 23. 1. and by his exercising himself in this thing to have alwayes a conscience void of offence towards God and towards men Act. 24. 16. Now the fifth step in order would be that It is more especially the duty of Gods people to study to converse with him aright in the way of his judgements which is the Doctrine it self which I must not come to confirm till I have shewed according to my promise in the second place what it is for the soul to converse with God and how it comes to converse with him Not to name those too low and improper notions that men ordinarily have of this high and spiritual matter conversing with God to speak properly of it is a compiex Act of the soul whereby it entertains God into it self and renders it self back again to him receives impressions from him and gives up it self again to him is first filled with him and then empties it self into him You may conceive of it after the similitude of a Plant that is influenc't by the benign beams of the Sun and in those beams spreads it self and in the virtue and power of them grows up towards Heaven or after the similitude of a River that is continually filled with the Ocean and is continually emptying it self into the same 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This seems to be our Saviours elegant allusion Job 4. 14. where he compares a divine and godly principle in the soul to a well of water springing out from God and continually boyling and bubling up towards him springing up into eternal life Or you may conceive of it after the similitude of a Glass which receives the image of him that looks into it and reflects the self same image that it receives For indeed the brightness and beanty of holiness wherewith a godly soul doth shine as a light in the world is nothing but a reflection of that light and brightness wherewith the Father of lights shineth into it And so the best of men have nothing of their own to glory in for they behold God but it is in his own light they love him with a love which he hath shed abroad in their hearts they are therefore like him because he hath stampt his own image upon them And so they must needs acknowledge concerning all their acts of love and communion and delight as David did in another case Of thine own we offer unto thee This is indeed the true and noble converse and communion with God wherein the life of a godly man is infinitely advanced above the life of all other men and indeed doth nearly resemble the life of Angels Their life is described in the Holy Scriptures by a seeing of God a beholding of him face to face which we must not understand of a naked idle speculation but of a real assimilation arising from the divine impressions made upon them a beholding of him so as to be changed into his image And such is a godly mans life spiritual life his life of converse with God consisting in a participation of God and of his Grace and a holy recipâ—ocation or reflection of affections to him which are indeed two distinct acts though originally springing from the same fountain for the love wherewith the soul loves God is it self an efflux from him For by loving us he inspires a love into us and by influences from God we become God-like But this converse with God is not only by the impressions of goodness from God and the reflections of love and delight towards him but is also seen in the various acts of the soul according to the various impressions which God maketh upon the soul and suitable to the various occasions of life so we converse with God by acts of fear reverence joy confidence self-resignation and the like Now because we are in the body and so cannot converse with God so purely spiritually and immediately as the Angels in Heaven do therefore it hath pleased God to appoint unto man wayes and means of conversing with him wherein he haâ—h promised to communicate himself to the soul and so to draw forth reciprocal acts of communion acts of love fear reverence confidence resignation dependance and delight out of the same soul towards himself Now these wayes or means may be reduced to three heads Duties Ordinances and Providences though indeed the two first might be contracted into one First I will speak a word or two of Ordinances such as the Word and Sacraments for I shall name no more but those two The Preaching of the Word is a way in which God doth usually meet the soul to communicate Life 1 Pet. 1. 23. Light Psal 19. 8. Warmth Luke 23. 32. Growth 1 Pet. 2. 2. And the soul doth answer these impressions as in the water face answereth face by the acts of the acts of Faith Love Joy Meekness and holy Resolution So also the administration of the Sacraments is a way wherein God meetech the soul and communicateth his Love Sweetness Fulnâ—ss Goodness
God Gal. 2. 20. For though he walked in the flesh yet he did not walk after the flesh 2 Cor. 10. 3. And yet this gracious soul even as all other believers was at a distance from God and that not so much by reason of his creatureship for of that he doth no speak so the very Angels of God are at aâ— infinite distance from God but by reason of this mortal body and animal life which hindered him from being so nigh to God as his soul was capable to be Whilst wâ— are in the body we are absent from the Lord i. e. at a great distance from God 1. We are distant from God as to that Knowledge which we shall have of him Philosophical Divines speak of a threefold Knowledge 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an essential Knowledge of God This is that unspeakable light whereby the Divine Nature comprehends its own essence wherein God seeth himself 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by Science This man is capable of in this life But this kind of knowing of God by way of Science is but a low and dry thing common to good and bad men and Devils and is indeed the perfection of the learned more than of the godly And this kind of Knowledge of God the glorified soul will reckon but like a Fable or a Parable when it shall be once swallowed up in God feasting upon truth it self and seeing God in the pure rayes of his own divinity 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or by Intuition this man cannot attain to in this life in its perfection because it arises from a blissful union with God himself which is in this animal state imperfect This in the Platonick phrase is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a contact of God and in Scripture language a beholding of God face to face which we are not capable of in this animal concrete state So may the answer of God to Moses be understood when he besought God to shew him his glory Exod. 33. 18. i. e. to imprint a distinct Idea of his Divine Essence upon his mind Vers 20. No man can see me and live i. e. no man in this corruptible state and animal life is capable of seeing me as I am to apprehend my Divine Essence to see my face The Vision of God is not in this life but in the other so that a man must dye before he can thus know God This is the exposition of Jewish Doctors and our learned Country-men do approve it also This blessed Knowledge of God we are at a distance from whilst we are in this body so the Apostle plainly 1 Cor. 13. 12. Now we see darkly as thorow a glass but the time will come when we shall see as we are seen and know as we are known Now our body principally hinders the operation of our minds when they do exercise themselves about the nature of God whilst it presents its fancies gross imaginations to the soul so it becomes as it were a vail upon the face of the soul draws a cloud and casts a mist over its eyes that it cannot discern distinctly nor judge properly and spiritually And with allusion to this that passage of the Apostle is proper and significant we see as thorow a glass which glaâ—s is indeed continually sullied and darkened whilst we look into it by the breathing of our animal fancies and imaginations upon it Not only those stinking foggs of pride and self love and other sinful corruptions that do arise out of the soul it self do hinder our right perceptions of God as the earth sends out vapors out of it self which arise and interpose between it self and the Sun but even the animal fancy casts in its phantasms and imaginations as a mist before the eye of the soul which through Divine Grace hath been somewhat enlightened and cleared from its inbred sinful humours Though corruption in the mind be as a rheume in its eye so that it cannot well see yet that doth not hinder but that the fancy by presenting its unspiritual imaginations doth also cast a mist before it that it cannot see well nor judge rightly and so it is either held in gross ignorance or lapses into errour But in the Regeneration this sense either shall not be or shall be pure and spiritual 2. Whilst we are in the body we are distant from God as to that service which we ought to perform to him in the world And herein it were endless to run thorow all those outward duties which we owe unto God in the body and to shew how the body becomes a hinderance either to them or in them Though the soul be made willing and forward by a divine principle implanted in it yet the body remains a body a weak and sluggish instrument and so it will be whilst it is animal it will go down into the dust a weak body 1 Cor. 15. 43. What man ever had a more willing and chearful heart than Moses the friend of God Yet his hands were heavy and ready to hang down Exod. 17. 12. Shall I instance in the excellent duty of Preaching and Hearing wherein the spirits of the most spiritual Preacher are soon exhausted the tongne of the learned is ready to cleave to the roof of his mouth the head is seized with dizziness the heart with pantings the organs of speech with weariness and the knees with trembling and the ears of the most devour hearers with heaviness the eyes with sleepiness and the whole body in a short time with weakness Shall I instance in the noble duty of Prayer wherein the pious soul goes out to God but can scarce get its body to accompany it and there the fancy distracts the senses divert and indeed all the members are ready to play the Truants if not the Traitors too especially the brain where the soul sits enthroned is suddenly environed with a rude rout of sluggish vapours arising from the stomach and being no longer able to defend it self against them falls down dead in the midst of them Insomuch that the poor soul is ready to wish sometimes with the sorrowful Prophet Oh that I had in the wilderness a lodging place that I might leave my members and go from them for they are all an assembly of treacherous servants or wish that it were like its Saviour who could leave his raw Disciples asleep and go and pray apart and come again unto them Shall I instance in that high duty of sustaining Martydom bearing persecutions for God Come on my body cryes the holy soul come on to the stake come my head lay down thy self upon this block come my body compose thy self in thâ—s dark dungeon come my feet fit your selves into these stocks come my hands draw on these fetters these Iron bracelets come come drink the cup that my Father gives thee But oh how it sollows to the stâ—ke what shaking shivering trembling and reluctancy may you see in the whole structure of it The head hangs down
a dead Lion Eccles 9. 4. But I may say to these even as our Saviour said to that woman in Joh. 4. 18. concerning her Husband The life that we live here is not our life The union of the sensitive soul with the body is indeed truly and properly the life of a beast and its greatest happiness for it is capable of no higher perfection But the union of the rational soul with God is the noblest perfection of man and his highest life so that the life of a believing soul is not destroyed at death but perfected Neither was the Apostle weary of his life because of the adversities of it The Apostle was of a braver spirit sure than any Stoick he durst live though he rather desired to dye All the conflicts he endured with the world never wrung such a sigh from him as the conflict that he had with his own corruptions did Rom. 7. 24. O wretched man c. All the perfecutions in the world never made him groan so much as the burden of his flesh doth here and his great distance from the Lord. A godly soul can converse with persecuting men and a tempting Devil can handle briars and thorns can grapple with any kind of oppressions and adversities in the flesh without despondency so long as it finds it self in the bosome of God and in the arms of Omnipotence But when it begins to consider where it is how far it is from its God its life and the happy state that God hath prepared it for then it cannot but groan within it self and be ready with Peter to cast it self out of the ship to get to its God to land it self in eternity Neither indeed to speak truly is it only the sense of sin against God which seâ—s the godly soul a going For though it must be confest that this is a heavy burden upon the soul yet the Apostle makes no complaint of this here but only of his distance from God that necessary distance from God that the body kept him it at 2. See here the excellent spirit of true Religion Godly souls do groan after an unbodyed estate not only because of their sins in the body but even because of the necessary distance at which the body keeps them from God We may suppose a godly soul at some time to have no manner of affliction in the world to grieve him no sin unpardoned unrepented of to trouble him yet for all this he is not at perfect rest he is burdened and groans within himself because he is at such a distance from that absolute good whom he longs to know more familiarly and enjoy more â—ully than he doth yet or than is allowed to mortal men And though nothing else ayl him yet the consideration of this distance makes him cry out Oh when shall I come and appear before God! be wholly swallowed up in him see him as he is and converse with him face to face Bare innocency or freedom from sin cannot satisfie that noble and large spirit that is in a truly and God-like soul but that spirit of true goodness being nothing else but an efflux from God himself carryes the soul out after a more intimate union with that Being from whence it came God dwelling in the soul doth by a secret mighty power draw the soul more and more to himself In a word a godly soul that is really toucht with the sense of divine sweetness and â—ulness and imprest with divine goodness and holiness as the wax is with the stamp of the seal could not be content to dwell for ever in this kind of animal body nor take up an eternal rest in this imperfect mixed state though it could converse with the world without a sinful sullying of it self but must needs endeavour still a closer conjunction with God and leaving the chase of all other objects pant and breath not only after God alone but after more and more of him and not only when it is under the sense of sin but most of all when it is under the most powerful influences of divine grace and love cry out with Paul Oh who will deliver me out of this body 3. Suffer me from hence to expostulate a little to expostulate with Christian souls about their unseemly temper Doth this animal life and mortal body keep us at such a distance from our God our happiness Why are we then so fond of this life and mixed state Why do we so pamper this body Why so anxiously studious to keep it up so dreadfully afraid of the ruines of it If we take the Apostles words in the first sense that I named then I may ask with him in the first verse Know we not that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved we had a building of God a house not made with hands eternal in the Heavens or vers 8. Why are we not willing rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord If we take them in the latter sense as this animal body is an hinderance to the souls knowledge of and communion with God then I ask concerning this as the Apostle doth concerning rich men James 2. 6. Why do ye pamper prize honour dote upon this body Doth not this body oppress you distract you burden you clog you hinder you Doth not this body interpose between the Sun of Righteousness between the Father of Lights and your souls that should shine with a light and glory borrowed from him even as the dark body of the earth interposes between the Sun and Moon to ecclipse its light Why are we not rather weary that we are in the body Surely there are some objections some impediments to the souls longing after its happy state which I shall come to anon But I doubt also that there is something that chains the soul to this animal life some cords in this earthly tabernacle that tye up the soul in it but I cannot well imagine what they should be Say not There is something of God to be enjoyed in this life which makes it pleasant For although this be true yet I am sure God gives nothing of himself to a soul thereby to clog it or cloy it Did Moses send for some Clusters of the Land of Canaan into the wilderness think ye that the people might see and taste the fruits and sit still and be satisfied and say Oh it is enough we see that there are pleasant things in that Land we will never come at it or did he not do it rather that they might make the more haste to possess themselves of it Will any man say Away I will have no more land no more mony I have some already Can a godly soul say God hath given me an earnest I desire no more No no but the report that a Christian hears of a rest remaining a happy life remaining for it and the chariots of divine graces that he sees God hath sent out into his soul to
happiness When you begin therefore at any time fondly to admire any of these bodily excellencies then think with your selves Oh but all these do not make my soul happy Nay this beautiful outside must stink and be deformed these fair and flourishing members must wither in the dust this active strong and graceful body must be buryed in disgrace and weakness before I can attain to entire and perfect happiness This consideration will advance us to live above the body 3. Be content to be unbodyed for a time Is it true that we can no otherwise be happy no otherwise be present with God know him familiarly enjoy him perfectly and entirely cannot we get to him except we go thorow the dust Be it so then be content to be unbodyed for a time Occidat modo imperet could the Heathen say concerning her Son much rather may a Christian say concerning his Father Let him slay me so my soul may but reign with him which is by his reigning in it Let him kill me so he will but fill me Let him draw me thorow the dust of the earth so he will but draw me out of this dust of the world so he will but draw me nigh unto himself and bring me into a full and inseparable conjunction with my Lord Methinks I need not use many arguments to perswade a soul that is feelingly overpowered mastered ravished with the infinite beauty goodness glory and fulness of his God to be willing to quit a dusty tabernacle for a time wherein it is almost swallowed up to depart and to be entirely swallowed up in him Nay suppose a Christian in the lowest form who hath but chosen God for his highest good and only happiness as every sincere Christian hath methinks he should have learnt this lesson to comply with that infinite perfect will that governs both him and the whole world I cannot conceive a godly soul without the subduing of self-will nor suppose a sincere Saint void at least of the habit of self-resignation Therefore I will add no more concerning this but rise a step higher 4. Long after an unbodyed state desire to depart and to be with the Lord groan within your selves to have morality swallowed up of life in which temper you find the holy Apostle To be content to dye is a good temper a temper scarce to be found I think in any wicked man not from a right principle I am sure But methinks it s no very great thing in comparison of what we should labour to attain to Think on 't a little what a strange kind of cold uncouth phrase it is Such a man is content to be happy Men are not said to be content to be rich but covetous not willing to be honoured but ambitious And why should it only be content to be with God I am perswaded there is no shew nor semblance of satisfactory bliss and happiness for a soul a noble immortal nature but only in the supreme essential perfect absolute good the blessed and eternal good And should not this noble active Being be carryed out with vehement longings after its proper and full happiness as well as this earthly sluggish body is carryed with restless appetite after health and safety and liberty Why should a soul alone be content to be happy when all other things in the world do so ardently court and vehemently pursue their respective ends and several perfections Certainly if the blessed and glorious God should display himself in all his beauty and open all his infinite treasures of goodness and sweetness and fulness within the view of a soul it could not but be ravished with the object earnestly press into his presence ruere in amplexus and with a holy impatience throw it self into his arms There would be need of setting bounds to the Mount to keep it from breaking thorow unto the Lord what is said of the Queen of the South when she had heard the wisdom and seen the glory of Solomon 2 Chron. 9. 4. would be more true of a Christian there would be no more spirit left in him Some have therefore observed the wisdom of God in engaging the soul in so dear a union with the body that it might care for it and not quit it Yea the Heathen observed the wisdom of God in concealing the happy state of a separated soul that so men might be content to live out their time victurosque Dii celant ut vivere durent Foelix esse mori But alas we see but darkly as thorow a glass and our affections towards God are proportionable to our apprehensions of him these are dark and therefore those are dull And oh would to God they were but indeed proportionable for then we should love him only if not earnestly and desire him entirely if not sufficiently Consider what I have hinted concerning the happiness of the soul in the enjoyment of God and what I have more fully demonstrated concerning the bodyes hindering of it and keeping it at a distance and then argue Is happiness the main end of every Being Must not this soul then being a noble and immortal nature needs look out for some high and noble happiness suitable to its excellent self Can that be any where but in the enjoyment of the highest and uncreated good And can this never be attained whilst we are in this animal state in this mortal body that keeps at such a distance Oh why then do we not look out after so much enjoyment of this blessed God as we are now capable of and long after a departure hence that we may enjoy him freely and fully and be eternally happy in him oh be not only content but even covetous But what shall the soul break the cage that she may take her flight God forbid How can he pretend to be a lover of God who is not formed into his will subject to his ordination content to abide in the station that he hath allotted him But if we may not break it to escape yet methinks it may be safe enough with submission to wish it were broken If we may not with Saul dissolve our selves yet with Paul we may desire to be dissolved The perfection that the most Christians attain to is but to desire to live and be content to dye Oh consider what I have said in this matter and invert the order of those words in your hearts Be content to live desire to dye But what would you have us pray for death Answer I speak not of a formal praying either for one or other What the Apostle speaks of the greatest of sins 1 Joh. 5. 16. I am ready to say of this state of freedom from all sin I do not say that ye should pray for it You will tell me that David and Hezâ—kiah prayed for life And I could tell you that Elijah prayed for death 1 King 19 4. he was indeed a man subject to passions James 5. 17. but I believe this was none of them
more refined corruption is harder to be discovered and men are loath to be convinced of the evil of it Now this particular distinct loving of life not as in God but in it self as a creature-good is clearly condemned in that first and great Commandment Matth. 22. vers 37. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul and with all thy mind q. d. God the Supreme Infinite Perfect Original Essential Self-sufficient Good is to be loved in the highest and purest and strongest manner that the heart of man is capable to love and all other things only in him and under him and as being of him and for his sake Let it be allowed that life is good yet it must be added that it is but a created-good let it be allowed that life is comfortable yet it must be acknowledged that mans chiefest comfort and happiness doth not stand in this animal life So then life it self is to be loved in God who is the fountain and spring of life it is to be loved in the quality of a created good and no otherwise Now created goods are to be loved only in the Creator as coming from him as partaking of him as leading to him Argue the case a little thus The soul of man is allowed to love its body with which the great God hath matcht it and to love union with this body which union we call life But this body being a creature and a creature much inferiour to it self and much more ignoble than it self cannot in reason be judged to be the fit and adequate object of its strongest and best affections That must needs be something more excellent than it self and that cannot be any thing in this world for this world hath nothing so noble so excellent in it as the soul of man it must indeed be the Creator himself Well seeing God is the supreme self-sufficient perfect Good he is to be loved with all the streâ—gth and powers of the soul singly and entirely And the will of God being God himself is not only to be submitted to or rested in but to be chosen and loved above all created things yea even above life it self the best of creatures So then if it be the will of God to call for our lives we ought readily to give them up because we ought to love the will of God much more than our lives I pray you drink in that notion viz. that the will of God being pure holy perfect should not only be submitted to or rested in but even loved and chosen above all creatures Now the will of God is not that only whereby he teacheth men and prescribes Laws to them but that whereby he rules and governs the world and disposes of men in any condition of life or takes away their lives from them The eternal fountain of goodness can send forth nothing but what is perfectly good and that which is perfectly good ought to be loved with an universal pure and as far as possible perfect love This you will say perhaps is a high and a hard saying But let it not seem impossible for a man to love his own life only in God and in subordination to him for this God requires and he requires not things â—mpossible Luke 14 26. If any man come after me and hate not his own life he cannot be my Disciple i. e. not simply hate â—t but in comparison of me and my will It is not then impossible nay you see it is a necessary duty without which we cannot be Christs Disciples The Saints of old found it possible Holy Paul gives this answer readily Act. 21. 13. I am ready to dye at Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus and Act. 20. 24. I count not my life dear unto me so that I might finish my course with joy It is witnessed of the whole Army of the Saints in Rev. 12. 11. That they loved not their lives unto the death i. e. they did not value them in respect of God and his truth Neither let any one flatter himself and say Yea if I were called to dye for God I would rather do it than deny him For the will of God is as much to be eyed in his sending for us by a natural death as by martyrdom and a not giving up our lives to him at any time is as truly to deny him and his will as not to give them up at the stake when we are called to it Besides how shall we imagine that he that is unwilling to dye in his bed should be willing to dye at a stake Now this duty of being mortified to the love of this animal life being so difficult yet so necessary and so noble how doth it become every Saint to study to attain to this perfection which that we may let us press upon our selves this Consideration this Doctrine That the glorified Saints shall live as the Angels of God in Heaven We know that if this body were broken down this low life cut off we should live like Angels not being beholden any more to poor creatures for help or comfort but should be filled with the fulness of God filled with his Image and Glory and live upon him entirely for evermore Yea I may add that this very living above our own lives meerly at the will of God is a participation of the Angelical Life even in this world Therefore labour to be mortified to that love of this life which is here upon earth yea be weary of it yea almost ashamed of it 4. Shall we thus live the lives of the Angels subsisting in God feasting upon him filled with him to all eternity This may moderate our sorrow which we conceive for the loss of any created good houses lands husband wife children c. yet a little while and we shall not miss them shall not need them shall not desire them any more The blessed Angels live a glorious life and they have none of these but are perfectly satisfied in the enjoyment of God alone They have no wives nor children yet they want none And yet a little while and we shall have none neither neither shall we want them having all things in the God of all things They neither marry nor are given in marriage but are in conjunction with the Father with love and goodness and truth it self and so they have no want of any thing If you have no Candles left in the house yet it is towards day-break and the Sun will rise upon you and you shall need none and yet have light enough too In a word learn to live beside them whilst you have them and you will be the better able to live without them when they are removed 5. I come now to the fifth and last Use that I shall make of this Doctrine and oh that you and I may make this happy use of it Shall the Saints be as the Angels of God in their way of living in living
a particular pinching love Oh take heed of this creature-love of valuing any created thing any otherwise than in God any otherwise than as being from God partaking of him and leading to him 3. Live not upon Ordinances These are Gods institutions love them cleave to them attend upon them let no temptation cause you to leave them but live not upon them place not your Religion place not your hope your happiness in them but love them only in God attend upon them yet not so much upon them as upon God in them lie by the Pool but wait for the Angel love not no not a divine ordinance for its own sake Why who doth so Alas who almost doth not 1. Thus did they in Ezek. 33. 32. who delighted in the Prophets eloquence and in the Rhetorick of his Sermons as much as in a well tuned voice and harmonious musick and so do thousands in England who read the Bible for the style or the stories sake and love to sit under learned and elegant discourses more for accomplishment than for conversion And swarms of Priests who preach themselves more than Christ Jesus even in his own ordinances as a proud Boy rides a horse into the Market to set forth himself more than his Masters goods 2. But there are many not so gross as these who do yet use ordinances in a way very gross and unspiritual placing their devotion in them and sinking their Religion into a settled course of hearing or praying who will wait upon God as they call it at some set and solemn times New Moons and Sabbaths it may be evening and morning but Religion must not be too busie with them nor intermeddle in their ordinary affairs or worldly employments it hath no place there they do not count it a garment for every dayes wear 3. And not only these but even almost all men are too apt to seek rest in duties and ordinances or at least to be pretty well satisfied with the work done whether they have conversed with God there or no Oh if you love your souls seek you happiness higher conversing with divine ordinances I confess is honourable and amiable but it is too low a life for an immortal soul Affirmatively Let nothing satisfie you but God himself take up with no pleasure no treasure no portion no paradise nay no Heaven no happiness below the infinite supreme and self-sufficient good Let your eye be upon him and his all-filling sulness let your desire be unto him and to the remembrance of his name follow hard after to know the Lord and to enjoy the Father through his Son Jesus Christ let your fellowship be with the Father and with the Son by the spirit 1 Joh. 1. 3. O love the Lord all ye his Saints Psal 31. 23. yea love him with all your soul and all your strength Mat. 22. 37. yea and keep your selves alwayes in the love of God Jude 21. persevere and increase in the love of God Keep your selves in the love of God Oh sweet duty Oh amiable pleasant task Oh sweet and gratesul command Away ye crowd of creatures I must keep my heart for my God Away ye gawdy suitors away ye glittering toyes there is no room for you My whole soul if its capacity were ten thousand times larger than it is were too scant to entertain the supreme good to let in infinite goodhess and fulness Oh charge it upon your selves with the greatest vehemence love the Lord O my soul keep thy self in the love of God let the love of God constrain you and keep your selves under the most powerful constraints of it In a word live upon God as upon uncreated life it self drink at the fountain seed upon infinite fulness depend upon Almighty Power refer your selves to unsearchable wisdom and unbounded love see nothing but God in the creature taste nothing but God in the world delight your selves in him long for communion with him and communications from him to receive of his fulness grace for grace Then do we live most like Angels when we live most purely in God and find all the powers of our souls spending themselves upon him and our selves our life and all the comforts of it flowing from him and again swallowed up in him But because we are yet in the body I shall explain it in these following particulars 1. Converse with God in all your Selfexcellencies I bade you before not converse with these now I say converse with God in these Thus do the Angels they know nothing that they have of their own they enjoy nothing distinct from God They are excellent creaturs excellent in knowledge power holiness c. yet they enjoy all their excellencies in God and ascribe them all to him Rev. 7. 12. And so let us labour to do 1. View your selves not in your own particular Beings but in the Essence of God look upon your selves as being and subsisting in the midst of an Infinite Essence in which the whole Creation is as it were wrapt up and doth subsist 2. And what ever excellency you find in your souls or bodyes look not upon it as your own maintain not a Meum and Tuum a distinction of interests beâ—ween God and your selves but look upon all as Gods and enjoy it in him 3. When you find your selves tempted to cast a fond and unchaste look upon the beauty strength activity or temper of your own bodyes upon the ingenuity wisdom constancy courage composedness of your own souls take heed of settling into a selfish admiration of any of them but enjoy them in God and say This O my body this O my soul is no other than the portraicture of the Blessed God these created excellencies are broken beams of the infinite unspotted uncreated perfections Jer. 9. 23 24. Having once attained to this we shall no longer covet to be admired desire to be commended fret at being undervalued I mean not in a selfish manner but rather break out in a spiritual passion with the psalmist Oh that men would praise the Lord for his goodness and for his wonderful works in the children of men Psal 107. 8. 3. Nay let me add when you find your selves ready to put your own stamp upon Gods best coin to look upon supernatural gifts and graces with a sinful selfish admiration remember that you have them only in Christ Jesus and enjoy them in your head labour to enjoy grace it self only in Christ as the Apostle Gal. 2. 20. I yet not I but Christ in me I laboured yet not I but the grace of God 1 Cor. 15. 10. So ought we to glory I believe I love I am patient penitent humble yet not I but the grace of God that is with me Christ Jesus that dwelleth in me And indeed a godly man who thus lives at the very height of his own Being yea and above it too knows best how to reverence himself yea and to love himself too and yet without any self-love For he
THE Voice of one Crying IN A WILDERNESS OR The business of a Christian both Antecedaneous to Concomitant of and Consequent upon a sore and heavy Visitation Represented in several Sermons First Preacht to his own Family lying under such Visitation And now made Publike as a Thank-offering to the Lord his healer By S. S. A Servant of God in the Gospel of his Son All the Paths of the Lord are mercy and truth unto such as keep his covenant and his testimonies Psal 25. 10. Mala poenalia non sunt veré mala quia fluunt à summo Bono nimirum Deo ducunt ad summum Bonum nimirum fruitionem Dei erant in summo bono nimirum Christo Biel. The evils of Punishment are not truly evils for they flow from the chiefest good even God they lead to the chiefest good the enjoyment of God and are found in the chiefest good even Christ Jesus LONDON Printed Anno Dom. 1666. TO THE READER Christian Readers IT is now more than seaven months since it pleased the holy and wise God together with some dear and Christian friends from London to visit my house with the Plague whereby he gently toucht and gave warning to my self and whole family consisting then of eight souls but called away bâ—nce only three members of it viz. two tâ—nder babes and one servant besides my beloved sister and a child of my precious friend that man of God Mr. G. C. since also translated who were of those Citizens that visited me You will easily believe that I can have no pleasure to rake into the ashes of the dead nor to revive the tast of that wormwood and gall which was then given me to drink and yet I see no reason but that I ought to take pleasure in the pure and holy will of God which alwayes proceeds by the eternal rules of Almighty love and goodness though the same be executed upon my dearest creature-comforts and grate never so much upon my sweetest earthly-interest yea and I see all reason in the world Why I should give God the glory of his Attributes and works before all the world and endeavour that some instruction may accompany that astonishment which from me and my house hath gone out and spread it self far and near I will not undertake to make any Physical observations upon this unaccountable disease nor to vindicate my self either from that great guilt that is charged upon me as if I were a sinner above all that dwell in this countrey or from those many false and senseless aspersions that have been cast upon my behaviour during this visitation much like that we read of Mat. 28. 13. but do freely commit my self to him that judgeth righteously and pray with the Psalmist Psal 69. â— Let not them that wait on thee O Lord God of Hosts be ashamed for my sake let not those that seek thee be confounded for my sake O God of Israel Neither do I purposely undertake in this Preface to reconcile the providences of the most wise God to his promises or to salve that seeming difference between the words of his mouth and the language of his hands between which I have only suspected some kind of jarr but have experienc't an excellent harmony In very faithfulness hast thou afflicted me Whence arise all those uncharitable censures with which the afflicted soul is apt to charge both himself and his God too Spring they not certainly from these two grand causes viz. A misapprehension of the nature of God and of the nature of Good and Evil let the studious and pious Reader search and judge If ever therefore you would be establisht in your minds in a day of affliction 1. Labour to be rightly informed concerning the nature of God Away with those low and gross apprehensions of God whereby your carnal fancies do ascribe unto God such a kind of indulgence towards his children as you bear towards yours which indeed no way agrees to his nature His good will towards his children is a solia wise and holy disposition infinitely unlike to our humane affections Soli Deo competit Amare Sapere â— Labour to be rightly informed concerning the nature of good and evil Judge not the goodness or evilness of things by their agreeableness or disagretableness to your flesh palate or carnal interest but by the relation that they have to the supream good The greatest prosperity in the world is no further good than as it tends to make us partakers of God and the greatest affliction may thus be really good also But that by the By. My design is to justifie and glorifie Infinite Wisdom Righteousness Goodness and Holiness before all men Oh blessed God! who maketh a seeming Dungeon to be indeed a Wine-celler who bringeth his poor people into a Wilderness on set purpose there to speak comfortably to them â—s 2. 14. Be of good cheer O my soul He hath taken away nothing but what he gave and in â—b 1 21. lieu of it hath given thee that which shall never be taken away the first fruits of liâ—e â—k 10. â—2 instead of those whom the first born of death hath devoured But why do I say devoured Doth not that truly live at this day which was truly lovely in those darlings Didst thou O my fond heart love Beauty Sweetness Ingenuity incarnate And canst thou not love it still in the fountain and enjoy it in a more immediate and compendious way Thy body indeed cannot taste sweetness in the abstract nor see beauty except it be subjected in matter but canst not thou O my soul taste the Vncreated goodness and sweetness except it be embodyed and have some material thing to commend it to thy palat Be shâ—med that thou being a spirit as to thy constitution art no more spiritual in thy affections and operations Dost thou with sadness reflect upon those sweet Smiles and that broken Rhetorick with which those Babes were went to entertain thee 1 Consider duly what of real contentment thou hast lost in losing those For what were those things to thy real happiness Thou hast lost nothing but what it was no solid pleasure nor true felicity to enjoy nothing but what the most sensual and brutish souls do enjoy as much as thou 2. Be ashamed rather that thou didst enjoy them in such a gross and unspiritual manner Art thou troubled because any earthly interest is violated Rather be ashamed that thou hadst and cherishedst any such interest But pardon me Courteous Readers this digressive Soliloquy and now suffer me patiently whilest I speak something by way of Admiration something by way of Observation and something by way of Exhortation 1. Let me call upon Men and Angels to help me in celebrating the Infinite and almighty grace and goodness of the Eternal and blessed God Who enabled me to abide the day of â—l 3. 2. his coming to stand when he appeared and made me willing to suffer him to sit as a
that watch for the morning Psa 130. 6 Ps 119. 20. when his soul broke for the longing that it had unto him at all times I say not that you should prepare for death that seems too low both word and thing look and live beyond death and the grave be lifting up your heads to discover the dawnings of the day of your Redemption be laying hold upon immortality and eternal life Something to this purpose you will find in the second Discourse withâ—r I refer you And now accept I pray you these poor labours which for the glory of my God I makâ— publick that since with Hezekâ—â—h I may not go up â—o the House of the 2 King 20. 8. Lord to declare the goodness of the Lord â—et I may leave some monument of it in wâ—iâ—â—ng as he did when he had been sick Isa 3â— 9. and was recovered of his sickness I will add no more but entreat all serious and devout Readors to magnifie the holy name of God on my behalf adding thereunto their earnest prayers to God for me viz. that the same fire that burnt up the standing Corn of my creature-comforts may also happily consume all the stubble of my creature delights and loves that my God would give me a name better than of Sons and of Daughters the blessed Isa 56 5. fruits of his Spirit instead of the Beloved fruits of the womb that I may for ever live under the most powerful influences of this dispensation and that the glory of the Lord may never depart out of the Temple of my soul as it departed out of the Temple made with hands Now to the God of all grace and peace be all praise and glory To him I commit you all and rest Your friend and servant in Christ Jesus S. S. Feb. 27. 1665. Quod sani quaesivimus hoc invenimus aegri Quae nequiit vallis visûs tulit haec lachrymarum Courteous Reader THere being through some ill circumstances such a mistake happened in the Printing of these Papers which caused a confusion not to be afterward helpt by the placing of them thou art desired to take notice that after those words Curse God and Die page 31. should have followed the second Reason which is now to be found in the midst of pag. 43. and so the sense is continued to pag. 102. after which comes in the Application pag. 31. to pag. 43. where the first Discourse is concluded with those words Whosoever sinneth hath not seen him nor known him I shall suppose thy candour such as to excuse this trouble thou art unhappily put to which I have done what I could to lessen by this Notice and Direction and should but increase it by any farther Apology for a fault which now admits not of a remedy Other slighter Errata's correct thus â— Page 13 line 19 for the read a l. 20 for a r. the p 15 l. 4. for so r to p. 46 l. 8. put in hold of and l. 9. blot out here p. 68. l. 7. for had r. hath p. 81. l. 2 for act read art and l. ult for promises r. premises p. 85. l. 4. for on r. up p. 125. l. 4 for more r. meer p. 136. l. 9. blot our it p 157. l. 22. for it r. Christ p. 193. l. 15. for the r. your p. 214. l. 12. for them r. him Place this after the Epistle to the Reader A VVelcome TO THE PLAGUE AMOS 4. 12. Prepare to meet thy God O Israel IN this Sermon of the Prophet the Lord reckons up the many fearful Plagues wherewith from time to time he had assayed to reclaim this perverse people the ten Tribes of Israel beginning at the 6th verse But still concludes the relation with a doleful Epiphonema yet have ye not returned unto me It is not my business to enquire into the several Plagues either the clear meaning of them or the particular time when they took place or ended nor into the impenitence and stubborness of the people though many useful things might be observed from hence But in the conclusion because none of these judgments had prevailed upon them God resolves to trouble himself with them no longer but to destroy them utterly All that he had done to them in the Land had not prevailed therefore now he will cast them and carry them out of the Land by the over-flowing scourge of an Assyrian captivity This threatning he denounces in the second and third verses I will take you away with hooks and your posterity with fish-hooks c. And after he had reckoned up the many calamities whereby he had sought to bring them to repentance but they repented not and so had demonstrated the equitableness of this final judgment he reassumes the same threatning and persists in his former resolution vers 12. Therefore thus will I do unto thee And then adds Because I will do thus unto thee therefore prepare to meet thy God O Israel Which words may either be understood Ironically by way of derision of all their vain confidences and refuges and then the Doctrine is That there is no standing before nor striving against nor flying from God when he comes to execute vengeance Which is an excellent truth and of great use Or else the words may be understood seriously by way of exhortation The doubt seems to arise from the ambiguous meaning of the word Meet The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies both to meet in a hostile manner to assault invade or grapple with as a man meets his enemy so it is used concerning David addressing himself to fight with Goliah 1 Sam. 17. 48. He ran to meet the Phillstin And also to meet in a friendly amicable manner by way of communication collocution salutation or converse So it is used concerning Isaac going to meet Rebekah Gen. 24. 65. and concerning Gods meeting of Balaam to speak with him and impart his mind to him Numb 23. 4. If we take the word in the first sense then it is spoken by way of Irony or derision and so the meaning of the words is contained in the Proposition that I have laid down If we take the words in the latter sense then it is spoken seriously by way of exhortation and so the meaning of them may be wrapt up into this Doct. That it is the duty of Gods people to study a right behaviour towards him and to converse with him aright in the way of his judgments in the time of their afflictions And in this sense I shall take them and prosecute them Besides that general unalterable godly frame and behaviour which Gods people owe to him as a standing duty and indispensable homage there are some more especial behaviours and tempers which they owe to him in special cases and are duties pro hic nunc as the season requireth Particularly there are some special behaviours required at our hands in the time of our affliction And these both 1. Towards ourselves as self-examination
strange knowledge of many secrets which they never learnt by Books no nor gathered gradually by Observations And as for mans communications of his notions by words and phrases I doubt not to affirm that there is something like to be found in Beasts and Birds yea that very beauty and flower of sound even Musick which some men magnifie so much is more fairly and sweetly uttered by the filly Bird that sits solitary upon a bough than by the Quiristers of the Popes Cathedral What solid Prerogative worth naming remains to man above his fellow-creatures but his conversing with God which we call Religion and is indeed Reason rectified sanctified exalted and boyled up into its pure and primitive perfection In so mnch that I have sometimes thought that I never heard a more reproachful word spoken concerning degenerate man neither do I think that any thing can be spoken of him more shameful and dishonourable than what the Apostle saith of the Heathen Ephes 2. 12. Without God in the world By conversing with God in the world is man truly raised above the beasts and the godly man above all other men Nay hereby is the godly soul advanced to the dignity and glory of the Holy Angels or at least to a parity of happiness For it is this that is their perfection and glory as we find it described in Mat. 18. 10. They alwayes behold the face of God And therefore our blessed Saviour doth affirm that the Saints in the Resurrection who shall be raised above all creature-communion to live upon God singly and entirely shall be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 equal to the Angels of God Luk. 20. 36. In a word this is the most real Heaven setting aside all circumstances of place c. the perfect and proper happiness of a soul to see God Mar. 5. 8. to be like unto him 1 John 3. 2. to converse with the Father by the Son as our Saviour bath told us who â—est knew it John 17. 3. This is life eternal to know thee the only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent By this it is that God dwells in the soul and the soul in God as we shall see hereafter and the Kingdome of Heaven doth really enter into every Believer 3. The natural man is utterly unwilling and unable to converse with God An earthly Mountain may as soon rise up to Heaven by its own power and good will as an earthly mind And such minds are all natural and unregenerate Sin as I hinted before is a falling from God a sinking of the soul into self whether sensual self or spiritual self and a shrivâ—lling of it up into the creature and the sinful soul is alwayes like a shadow moving upon the surface of the Earth and higher it cannot get Rom. 8. 5. Would you know what is the principal object of a natural mans admiraration inclination and ambition The Psalmist will tell you It is some created good Psal 4. 6 7. Will you know what is the disposition of the natural man towards the supreme and uncreated good The Apostle will tell you It is Ignorance and Enmity 1 Cor. 2. 14. Rom. 8. 7. The carnal mind is enmity against God This high duty of conversing with God in a right manner is besides the temper of the wicked man never any such man did perform it It is a contradiction A wicked man conversing with God is as if one should say An ungodly man that is godly But that 's not all This duty is not only out of the hands of a wicked man but out of his reach too Neither can he know him saith the Apostle to the Corinthians and again to the Romans Neither can he be subject to him Can two walk together except they be agreed saith the Prophet Can man walk with God converse with God except he be reconciled to him And what agreement but by a Mediator What Mediator between God and man but Christ Jesus who 〈◊〉 a Mediator as the Logicians call a medium participationis who is God man In the word some converse with one thing in a world and some with another as I noted before but all converse principally and mainly with the creature that are not regenerated by Grace reconciled by Christ 4. It is the duty of man in all ages of life at all times and in all places and conditions to converse with God It is a necessary natural certain constant duty springing up out of the very nature and natural will of God and out of the very nature and relation and capacity of the reasonable soul binding semper and ad semper as the Schoolmen speak and admitting of no dispensation nor diminution There is no time wherein it is not a duty or wherein it is less a duty than at another time however we are apt to give to our selves many relaxations from it The first fruits nay the very early buds of the tender soul and of the springing faculties these are due to God and ought to be dedicated to him Eccles 12. 1. Remember now thy Creator in the dayes of thy youth Manhood is not allowed so to attend unto cares and exploits nor old age to pains and griefs as to neglect converse with God But whether young men build or plant fight or study or work or marry or manage the affairs of the house or of the field all should be undertaken and carryed on in away of converse and fellowship with God or whether old men sit and muse and meditate or lye under the pains and grievances of decrepit age still it ought to be in the Lord. Neither doth this duty admit of interruption no more than of cessation There is no dispensation given us from this duty as in no age so in no hour of our life As we cannot live a moment out of God so neither ought we to live a moment without God in the world We ought continually so endeavour to walk in subservience to and converse with God yea and as far as may be in a feeling converse with him too Holy David witnesseth of himself that the fear of God was continually before his eyes and that he did continually converse with God for so those words may be understood Psal 73. 23. I am continually with thee The like is recorded of many other Saints both in the Old and New Testaments concerning whom one may well say as the Queen of Sheba concerning the servants of Solomon and with much better reason 1 King 10. 8. Happy are these thy servants O Lord which stand continually before thee Neither is it the duty of some few men that have the greatest knowledge or the most leasure For it springs up out of the relation of a creature and out of the very nature of the rational soul so that no soul of man is exempted from it however many ignorant and profane persons live rather in a professed independance upon God Neither is it a duty only upon supposition of leasure and
in discontents complaints and many dismal passions Oh then alas I am undone What shall I do for the hundred talents I am the only man that hath seen affliction no sorrow like unto my sorrow I shall go softly all my dayes for the joy of my heart is perished the delight of my eyes is cut off Thus Rachel weeâ—â— for her children and will not be comforted Rizpah attends the carkasses of her Sons and will not be parted from them 2 Sam. 21. It is a strange thing that a soul should live upon its losses And yet how many do so Their very soul cleaveth to the dust where their creature-comforts are interred whose souls are so much bound up in the creature that they will needs live and dye together with them If God smite the Gourd and make it to wither Jonah droops and will needs dye too Jonah 4. 8 9. If Joseph be missing a while Jacob will not be comforted no he will go down into the grave unto his Son mourning Gen. 37. 35. Who would have thought to have heard such words from such wise men as a Prophet and a Patriach Oh the strange and unbounded power which this unseemly creature love hath obtained over the best of men which makes me call him a happy man almost more than a man a compeer of Angels who hath learnt to converse with God alone Well converse not with creature-losses let not your soul take up its lodging by the carkasses of your created-comforts with Rizâ—ah dwell not upon the lowest round of the ladder but climb up by it to the meaning of God and to some higher good and more excellent attainment They live to their loss who live upon their losses who dwell upon the dark side of the dispensation For every dark Providence hath one bright side wherein a godly soul may take comfort if he be not wanting to himself 5. Converse not with flesh and blood By flesh and blood I suppose the Apostle means no more than men Gal. 1. 16. And indeed if we confer with men only for counsel and repair to men only for comfort in a time of affliction we shoot short of the mark But by flesh and blood the Scripture elsewhere often means man in this his animal state as he is in his corruptible mortal body as 1 Cor. 15. 50. and many other places And in this sense I speak when I say Converse not with flesh and blood Judge not according to your senses let not your own sensual appetite determine what is good or evil sweet or bitter Consult with rectified Reason and not with brutish appetite confer with Faith and not with Fancy Rectified Reason will judge that to be really good which our sensual appetite distasts An enlightened mind will judge that to make for the interest of the soul and its eternal happy state which sense judges hurtful to the interest of the body and its animal state It is not possible there should be any order nor consequently any peace or rest in that soul where the inferiour faculties domineer over the superior and sensitive powers Lord it over the intellectual and where raging appetite and extravagant fancy must clamber up into the throne to determine cases and right Reason must stoop and bow before it Be admonished to fly converse with all these if you would converse rightly purely properly comfortably with God which is the highest office and attainment of created nature Consider what I have said concerning this excellent and high employment and awaken your souls and all the powers of them to mâ—et the Lord God and converse with him aright in the way of his judgments Converse with God with God in Christ with God in his promises with God in his attributes and labour to do it not speculatively notionally but really practically according as I have directed in the foregoing discourse Religion is not an empty airy notional thing it is not a matter of thinking nor of talking but it hath a real existence in the soul and doth as really distinguish though not specifically one man from another as Rea on distinguishes all men from beasts Converse with God is set out in Scripture by living and walking and the like Let me inculcate this thing therefore again and press it upon you and I shall finish all As the way of glorifying God in the world is not by a meer thinking of him or entertaining some notion of his glory into our heads but consists in a real participation of his image in a God-like disposition and holy conversation according to that of our Saviour Joh. 15. 8. Herein is my Father glorified c. So the way of conversing with God in his several attributes is not a thinking often with our selves and telling one another that God is just wise merciful c. though this be good But it is a drinking in the virtue and value of these divine perfections a working of them into the soul and on the other hand the souls rendring of it self up to God in those acts of Grace which do suit with such attributes as in water face answereth face I do not call bare performance of duties a conversing with God Prayer and Meditation c. are excellent means in and by which our soul converses with God but communion with God is properly somewhat more spiritual real powerful and divine according as I described it just now As for example The soul receives the impressions of divine Soveraignty into it and gives up it self unto God in the Grace of Self-denyal and humble subjection The soul receives the communications of divine Fulness and Perfection and entertains the same with Delight and Complacency and as it were grows full in it Even as the communications of the virtues of the Sun are answered with life and warmth and growth in the plants of the earth So a souls conversing with the attributes of God is not an empty notion of them or a dry discourse concerning them but a Reception of Impressions from them and a Reciprocation to them The effluxes of these from God are such as do beget reflections in man towards God This is to know Christ to grow up in him into all things according to that in 1 John 3. 6. Whosoever sinneth hath not seen him neither known him The second Reason why we ought especially to study to converse with God in the time of afflictions is because that is a time wherein we are most apt to think our selves excused from this duty as if it were allowed us in our extremity to forget God and mind our selves only And that not only in respect of those bodily straits and distresses which I named under the last head but in respect of our own passions When the afflicting hand of God is upon us pressing and grieving of us and taking our beloved comforts from us we are apt to indulge our own private and selfish passions care fear sorrow complainings c. Yea to think we are in some
wound our own peace we shake the settledness of our own hearts we put our selves into briars In a word we both lessen our creature comforts and multiply our griefs and aggravate our sorrows by calling things our own If we had not taken them to be our own it would not have troubled us to part with them Be sure therefore to eye and own the absolute and unlimited Soveraignty of God But â—hat's not all it is not enough to believe it we must converse with it otherwise than by thinking of it or assenting to it Then do we converse with the Soveraignty of God 1. When the powerful sense of it doth silence quarrelling yea murmurings yea even disputings in the soul We may indeed modestly contend with men concerning their dealings with us the Potsheard may strive with the Potsheard of the earth but it must not say to the Potter Why hast thou made me thus A pacate and quiet frame of heart is a real conversing with the Soveraignty of God So did Aaron when he held his peace Levit. 10. 3. and Job when he attributed nothing unseemly to God Job 1. ult 2. When the sense of it doth suppress self-will This is an unruly lust in the soul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Giant-like spirit warring against Heaven and breeding bate continually This is that which maintains a Meum and Tuum even with God himself that â—ets up interests as the Jews set up Princes Hosea 8. 4. but not by God yea indeed in opposition to him This is the seditious party in the soul that is alwayes crying out We will not have this man to rule over us And when that darling interest which this proud rival hath set up is touched of God and smitten and blasted from Heaven it is ready to fret and storm yea and to think it hath reason to be angry If this Son of the bondwoman were cast out Abraham's Family would be all of a peece all in order and at rest If this undisciplin'd and perverse spirit were quite banished Oh what a calm day would it be in the soul what fair and sweet correspondence would there be between God and his creature for certainly this is the Jonah that raises the storm and makes the great deeps of the soul that they cannot rest but do perpetually roll and toss yea and cast out mire and dirt continually But alas I doubt this spirit is not quite layd no not in the most spiritual man the best of men are ready to nourish and hatch up some darling some private interest or other of their own dinstinct from God and the grand interest of their souls which God himself must not touch some Gourd or other that the cold wind must not blow upon He is a blessed man indeed who doth so understand that he lives and moves in God alone and is so overpowered with the sense of the infinite goodness and holiness of God and the absolute perfection of his divine will as that he reckons it his greatest perfection to be nothing in himself nor have nothing of his own distinct from God but only studyes to be great in God to be filled with God to live to him and for him to enjoy all things as in and under him who counts it his only interest to quit all self interest and particular ends and to be freely at the disposal of the highest mind conformable to the highest good chearfully compliant with the uncreated will Potiphar had so committed all to Joseph in the sense of his great faithfulness that he knew not ought he had save the bread that he did eat Gen. 39. 6. But this similitude is too low A godly soul should commit all its interest its life and livelihood and all to God in the sense of his Soveraignty and not know ought that he hath no not his own life but despise it in comparison of uncreated life as Job speaks Job 9. 21. Methinks the Soveraignty of God speaks such language to the soul and in it as Eli to Samuel My Son hide nothing from me keep nothing back of all that thou hast and the pious soul should not with foolish Rachel conceal any selfish interest so as not to be willing to part with it when its Soveraign Lord and Father comes to search the tent but with allusion to Amos 6. 10. when God comes to ferret out all self-interests and shall ask Is there any such yet with thee should be able to answer boldly No there is none Blessed is the man that is in such a case blessed is the man whose only interest it is to serve the will of the Lord Well improve the infinite Soveraignty of God to this end and work it upon and into your own hearts that all self-will may stoop to it and let the main interest of your souls be so planted and established in your souls that no other interest may be able to grow by it Charm your own self-will with such severe reproofs as this is Either deny thy self O my soul or deny thy self to be a creature either be wholly at Gods command or call him not thy Soveraign 3. When the sense of it doth beget Revevence in the soul towards God We ought not only to be subject to the Rod of God but even to reverence him when he correcteth with it and so not only to accept of the Rod but to kiss it too And surely iâ— the Fathers of our flesh correct us and we give them Reverence Heb. 12. 9. much more ought we to reverence the Soveraign Father both of flesh and spirit This is a devout act of the soul whereby it looks up and adores the Infinite and Soveraign Majesty and thinks equitable and honourable thoughts of him even when he is in the way of his Judgments And these are the proper acts of a soul conversing with Gods Soveraignty in the time of afflictions When we are silent before him subject unto him and reverencing of him then do we really and truly converse with him as our Almighty and absolute Soveraign But Gods Authority and Prerogative though it may silence will scarce satisfie such a corrupt and rebellious pass are our natures grown to Therefore 2. Converse with the perfect and infinite Righteousness of God in the time of afflictions that divine perfection whereby he renders to every man what is just and due and no more This we are to eye and own and sincerely to acknowledge even in the time of our greatest extremity after the example of Daniel chap. 9. 14. The Lordour God is righteous in all his works and of the godly Levites Neh. 9. 33. Thou art just in all that is brought upon us thou hast done right Argue with Abraham Gen. 18. 25. Shall not the Judge of all the Earth do right Can Righteousness it self erre in Judgment Shall the Timber say unto the Rule Why hast thou measured mee thu or to the Line thou art crooked Are not my wayes equul saith the Lord Ezek.
18. 25. Are not the Lords wayes equal let your souls say too Be ye sirmly perswaded of the infinite and incorruptible Righteousness and Equity of God but that 's not all we do not then converse with the Righteousness of God when we do believe it or acknowledge it a very Pharaoh may be brought to make such a confession Exod. 9. 27. The Lord is righteous and I and my people are wicked But then do we converse with the Righteousness of God in general when the sense of it doth give a rational satisfaction to the soul And indeed whereas the Soveraignty of God is enough to silence yet his Righteonsness had need to be called in to administer satisfaction The former is sufficient to stop the mouth but there is need of the latter to settle the heart And indeed methinks it is a heart-settling consideration For how can the interest of the creature be better secured than in the hands of a righteous God Where can we venture all we have better than in such a cettain and steady bottom How can we better trust our selves than on such firm and even ground We will trust our selves far with an upright and righteous man and if we hear of the miscarriage of any interest of ours at any time it doth mightily calm and satisfie our hearts if we are assured that it was in the hands of a just and upright person Much more rational and steady satisfaction may the Infinite Righteousness of God administer even in the time of the greatest affliction if it be duly wrought into the heart But more particularly 1. The powerful sense of the Reghteousness of God should make us sensible and serious It becomes us seriously to ponder duly to weigh and in good earnest to lay to heart all that is done to us by a righteous God We use slightly to pass by and slightly to esteem the words or actions of vain man But it is not for nothing that the righteous God afflicts any man in any measure at any time The voice of God though it be not alwayes articulate yet is alwayes significant Will a Lion roar for nothing Surely every action of the righteous God hath a meaning in it A hair falls not from our head nor a Sparrow to the ground without him Much less sure do greater changes befall us withcut him And in all things he is infinitely righteous Oh how doth this call us to sensibleness and seriousness How ought all the powers of the soul to be awakened to attention when the righteous God utters his dreadful voice and the whole frame of the heart and life to be composed under his heavy hand Now if ever one would say of Laughter It is mad one would reckon trifling to be a kind of prophaneness and judge that foolish jestings do almost border upon blasphemy formerly not convenient now not lawful For indeed a vain frothy light trifling spirit in the day of affliction is in a sense a blaspheming of the Righteousness of God As a consequent of this 2. It should put us upon self examination Nature it self had taught the Heathenish Mariners to enquire where the fault was in a storm Jonah 1. 7. Much more may the knowledge of Gods Infinite Righteousness teach us so may the holy Word too that word in Lam. 3. 40. Let us search and try our wayes c. and many others Now do the faculties of the godly soul being awakened begin to cast lots upon themselves to find out the guilty party And certainly God hath a great hand in ordering these lots he doth ordinarily shew unto man his sin even by the verdict of his own heart Conscience I mean is Gods Vicegerent in the soul and though its true this Judge is oft-times corrupâ—ed and bribed or at least over-ruled in prosperity yet God instructeth it to speak good sense and to speak out and speak the truth in the time of affliction I believe they hit the nayl upon the head who cryed out one to another Verily we are guilty concerning our Brother Gen. 42. 21. Another cryes Verily I am guilty concerning my Minister concerning my People guilty concerning my Wife concerning my Children concerning my Estate my Time my Talents and it may be all true I believe the Heathen was in the right who lookt upon his hands and feet and cryed out Judg. 1. 7. As I have done so God hath requited me and the Babylonish Monarch harpt upon a right string after he was come to his right wits again Dan. 4. ult Those that walk in pride he is able to abase God hath not given to our faculties any infallibility indeed but he inables them to make good guesses and I am verify perswaded doth many times lay the hand upon the right sore and order this secret Lottery from Heaven So that that faculty or that frame or that action which stands convicted in the Court of Conscience is seldom held guiltless in the Court of Heaven 3. It should work us to Humiliation and Reformation an heart broken and a conversation healed of its breaches By Humiliation I mean a heart broken purely properly and spiritually for sin I do not mean by it an heart broken for losses and afflictions and bowing down it self heavily under the burden of its distresses no nor a heart broken for sin as viewing it only in the calamitous effects and bitter fruits of it which I doubt is the Humiliation of most Many may say concerning their Humiliation to use the Prophets words in a different sense Zach. 13. 6. These are the wounds with which I was wounded in the house of my friends by the loss of my friends the loss of my health the loss of my goods these tears that you see these groans that you hear are nothing but the scarr which the soar hath left behind it and the wales which the Rod hath made I doubt our very sorrow for sin in a time of affliction admits of a mixture of carnal self and passion and so of sin too But I mean a pure spiritual proper sorow and hatred of sin which I know may be broached by sharp afflictions and have vent given to it by piercing the vessel but that is not the proper cause and ground of it Moses in his joy had an eye to the recompence of reward Heb. 11. 26. And so a Christian in his sorrow may have respect to the recompence of his sin I mean his afflictions but it is not primarily and principally caused by these For though these dreadful showers from Heaven should cease yet the stream of his eyes or at least the fountain of his heart would not cease issuing forth bitter waters Though the Righteousness of God do serve to give vent to godly sorrow yet it is the goodness and holiness of God that gives it Do we sorrow for sin because it spoiled us of our comforts stript us of our ornaments Then sure we think there is something in the world worse than sin
God seems not to be a duty of this season I confess this is a high and hard duty Every smatterer in Religion will cry out in his affliction Thou art just and righteous O Lord But Thou art good and mercisul Blessed be the name of the Lord is the voice of a Job only Job 1. 21. But it is a duty though a hard one and affording much pleasure and contentment to them that are exercised therein That the kindness and benignity of God doth not fail that his Love is not broken off from his people no nor suspended neither when he afflicts them most is most certain For though he worketh changes in and upon us yet himself is eternally and unchangeably the same Jer. 1. 17. And though some of his dealings towards his people seem to be rough and severe yet if we judge rightly of them they are all Mercy and Truth towards them that keep his Covenant Psal 25. 10. And that the people of God ought to converse with this Divine Love and Mercy even in their greatest afflictions is as clear To this purpose I might alledge the forequoted example of holy Job and might enforce this Doctrine from the Apostles words Phil. 4. 4. and Jam. 1. 2. Count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations and from many good Reasons too if it were needful I know indeed that it is a hard thing to keep up a right frame towards and converse rightly with the Righteousness and Goodness of God at the same time the one frame is ready to justle out the other Sorrow is apt to contract the heart and destroy the large and chearful temper of it And joy doth dilate and enlarge it and is ready to make it forget its grief But though it be hard yet it is possible These two may well consist in the same soul according to that in Psal 2. 11. Rejoyce with trembling But how must we converse with the Love and Mercy of God in the time of afflâ—ctâ—ons I have partly prevented my self in this already but I shall speak a little more distinctly of it We do not then converse with the Goodness and Mercy of God when we barely think of it or acknowledge it But 1. When we believe and apply it and take to our selves the comforts of it When we look through the clouds that are round about us and quite cover us and by the eye of faith behold the Fountain and Father of Light when we can look beyond the frowns that are â—n his face and the Rod that is in hâ—s hand and see the good will that dwells in the heart of God towards us More especiaâ—ly 2. When we do not only see and belâ—eve it but also draw vircue and influences down from it into our souâ—s to establish settle and saâ—isfie them Not so much when we see it as when we taste it when we feel tâ—e Sun of Righteousness warm us though it do not dazle us and though we cannot perceive it to shine upon us yet we find it to shine in us We do then converse with the Love and Mercy of God in an afflicted state when the same doth bear us up not only from utter sicking but even from inordinate sorrowing when we draw a virtue from it inâ—o our souls to sustain them yea and to cherish them too Thus Job comforts himself in his living Redeemer Job 19. 25 and the Psalmist in the Mercy of God even when he was ready to slip Psal 94. 18. 19. In the multitude of my thoughts within me thy comforts delight my soul In a word we converse with Dâ—vine Goodness when we are really warmed with it and with Almighty Love when we rejoyce in it and can with holy venturousness and humble confidence throw our selves into the very bosome of it when we receive impressions of it from the Spirit of God and are thereby molded into a temper fuitable to it and becoming it For then indeed do we most happily converse with the Love and Goodness of God when we for our part do live upon it when we being assured of an interest in a loving and good God do render up our selves also unto him in the most beautiful and becoming affections of Love Joy Confidence and holy Delight This is an excellent frame and sure I am it is much for our interest thus to converse with God in the time of our afflictions It is a high way of glorifying God and bringing much credit to Religion And indeed he that keeps up this frame can be afflicted but in part he scapes the greater half of the evil For though it be never so stormy a time without him a storm upon his house upon his goods upon his relations yea upon his own body yet it is a calm day within in the soul there is peace and tranquillity Lastly and indeed everlastingly too we are to converse with the Infinite self-sufficient Fulness of God in a day of the greatest extremity that is as if I should say not with any one single Attribute but with the very godhead of God the immense perfection of God the Allness of the Deity Oh how seasonably doth this blessed object present its self to the soul in a time of afflictions losses mortalities persecutions when we are most emptied of creature-enjoyments and the emptiness of them doth most appear for upon these two doth our conversing with God much depend I need not tell you how apt we are to live beside God when we have our fill of creature-delights whilst we can entertain our hearts with a created sweetness we soolishly forget and neglect the supreme good And so fond and unreasonable is this affection that no warnings no precepts will serve the turn God is forced to break that off from us from which we would not be broken Sure I am the blessed and bountiful God envyes not his servants any of their creature-comforts or delights but he loves them as I said before with a strong and powerful love and will not suffer them to live so much to their losses as they do when they spend noble affections upon transitory things in the everlasting enjoyment of which they could never be happy Now afflictions are a negative if we speak properly even as sin is and whenever we are afflâ—cted in any kind we are empâ—ied os some created good as poverty is nothing but the absence of riches sickness the want of ease of order of health in the constiâ—uâ—ion restraint is the loss of liberty c. So then it appears that in a time of affliction God is emptying of câ—eature enjoyment for indeed afflâ—ction it self is little or nothing else but such an emptying or deprivation And that then the emptiness of the creature doth most appear I suppose all will grant The sick person looks upon his decayed strength and withering members and is feelingly convinc't of the truth of the Scripture All flâ—sh is grass Another casts about hâ—s eyes with Sampson and sees heaps
upon heaps and cryes out like one that feels the weight of his own words Childhood and youth are vanity or alas how soon is the desire of ones eyes taken away with a stroke Another sees his goods carryed away before his face and his house on fire before his eyes and then cryes out that he hath a real proof of the yanity of those things which Solomon had long ago observed Prov. 23. 5. Riches take themselves wings and fly away as an Eagle towards Heaven Whilst we see the creatures stand we will not believe but they are stable whilst we see them fair and flourishing we cannot rightly lay to heart the withering nature of them but when we see them cut down we do then conclude they were but flowers when we see them flitting we conclude they are shadows when God pours them our upon the ground we are then convinced that they were unstable as waters To shew us what the best of our creature enjoyments are God is forced to take them quite away that they be no more Now then in such a case at such a time converse with the Infinite self-sufficient Fulness of God Oh now it is seasonable now it is your duty nay now it will be your greatest policy If that chanel that creature-chanel be stopt in which your affections were wont to run too freely turn the stream of them into their proper chanel in which they may run freely and neither ever meet with obstruction nor ever overflow Let your soul grow up into acquaintance and union with God by creature-breaches and disappointments More particularly converse with the self-sufficient Fulness of God 1. By the act of Creature-denyal The eying of an infinite absolute uncreated Fulness in a right manner takes off the soul from all created objects earthly things even as the beholding of the Sun in its glory dazles the eye to all things below God becomes so great in the eye of the soul that it cannot see the poor motes of worldly comforts Give a soul a feeling taste of the infinite sweetness and fulness of the fountain and its thirst after the poor puddles of the world is presently abated if not perfectly quenched according to that of our Saviour Joh. 4. 14. Whosoever shall drink of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst that is not after any other thing Like unto which is that Gospel promise Isa 49. 10. they shall not thirst who do enjoy these springs of water When this fountain is opened in the eye of the soul and the soul begins to taste of it it longs to drink deeper of that indeed but as for all other waters waters of the Cistern the soul looks upon them as not being or at least as being bitter waters of Marah in comparison we do then truly converse with the infinite self-sufficient Fulness of God when we look upon all created good with a noble disdain are content to part with it or if we do still enjoy it are resolved to enjoy it only in God and so look upon it and love it only as a beam from the Fâ—â—her of Lights as a drop of the infinite Fountain of all Perfections Tell me Is it not a poor and low thing that many Professors do who acknowledge and magnifie the uncreated Goodness the Fulness of God and yet at the same time do covet and court the creature with all eagerness and their worldliness is apparently too hard for their Religion Methinks I hear God speaking to such seeming friends as Dalilah to Sampson Judg. 16. 15. How can ye say you love me when your heart is not with me To these mens hearts methinks our Saviours Doctrine should strike cold Mat. 6. 21. Where your treasure is there will your heart be also And those words of his beloved Apostle 1 Joh. 2. 15. If any man love the world the love of the Father is not in him Let a man pretend and profess what he will and in words magnifie the Fulness and Sufficiency of God as much as he will if in the mean time his soul be bound up in the creature such a mans Religion is vain nay indeed his profession of God becomes a real reproaching of him and a blasphemy against Reason it self Let your low estem of all created good in comparison of the supreme good your readiness to quit your title to every creature comfort and in the mean time your care to live beside it witness the true and honourable esteem the true and feeling sense that you have in your hearts of the infinite and self-sufficient Fulness of God For however men may make a shift to cheat themselves God is not truly great in the soul till all other things become as nothing neither doth the soul rightly converse with his Infinite Fulness so long as any thing stands in opposition to it or competition with it 2. Converse with the self-sufficient Fulness of God by the grace of Faith I mean by that act of it whereby we do interest our selves and as it were wrap up our own souls in this Fulness and make it our own And herein there is no danger of a humble souls being too bold or venturous For the Proclamation is full and the Invitation free Isa 55. 1. Joh. 7. 37. Rev. 22. 17. Whosoever will let him take the water of life freely What Seneca sayes of the soul in regard of the divine original of it may sure be better said of a godly soul in respect of the Divine Nature and qualities of it illum divina delectant nec ut alienis interest sed ut suis it doth not converse with things divine as with an others but as its own And indeed we cannot truly and comfortably converse with the Infinite Perfection and Fulness of God if we have no title to it but then we converse with God when we converse with our own God not anothers when the soul is able to say All this Fulness of Power Wisdom Goodness is all mine in my head Christ Jesus for in him all this Fulness dwels Col. 2. 9. and he dwelleth in me in him are hid all these treasures Col. 2. 3. and my life also is hid with Christ in God as theirs was in Col. 3. 3. You see then that a soul cannot converse with the Infinite Fulness and Self-sufficiency of God but by Christ for it is in and by him that we receive of Divine Fulness Joh. 1. 16. Hence was that of the devout Father Tolle meum tolle Deum to which I may add Tolle Jesum tollis meum The fulness of a fountain is nothing to me except it be mine There is bread enough in my Fathers house sayes the poor Prodigal but for all that I perish with hunger so is there living waters evermore in this uncreated life this infinite Spring of all Perfection yet many souls are choakt with thirst because the fountain is not theirs it is a fountain sealed as Solomon speaks in another case
from them as grief Isa 53. 3. fear Heb. 5 7. who yet was free from all sin 1 Pet. 2. 22. Nay it seems necessary as I said before considering the nature of this animal life that the soul should have the corporeal passions and impressions feelingly and powerfully conveyed to it without which it could not express a due benevolence to the body that belongs to it and indeed were it not so we could not properly be said in the Apostles phrase here to be at home in the body the soul would rather dwell in domo alienâ quà m suâ But the soul being called out to attend upon these passions is easily ensnared by them for it can hardly exercise it self about them but it stâ—ps insensibly into a sinful inordinacy As for example The animal spirits nimbly playing in the brain and swiftly flying from thence thorow the nerves up and down the whole body do raise the fancy with mirth and chearfulness which we must not presently mistake for the power of grace nor condemn for the working of corruption So also when the Gall empties its bitter juice into the liver and that mingles it self with the blood there it begets fiery spirits which presently fly up into the brain and cause impressions of anger Now though I dare not say that the souls first sensating and entertaining of these passions is sinful yet it is sadly evident that our souls being once moved by these undisciplin'd animal spirits are very apt to fit upon and cherish those passions of grief fear mirth anger and as it were to work them into it self in an inordinate manner and contrary to the dictates of reason and so the will presently makes those sinful which before were but meerly humane or as one calls them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the more blossomings or shooâ—ings forth of animal life within us We see then in these particulars that not only the depraved dispositions of the soul do keep us at a distance from God but even this body also is a great hinderance to that knowledge of God which we shall attain to that service of God which we might perform and that sweet communion with him which we shall enjoy It is a clog to the soul that would run a mist to the soul that would see clearly a manacle to the soul that would work a snare to the soul that would be free a fetter to chain it to earthly and material things and as it were a pinion to the wings of contemplation More particularly it is a hinderance to it as to those three things which I have â—â—amed As to the souls knowledge of God the body is an occasion of ignorance and errour As to its serving of God an occasion of distract on and weariness lightness and triflingness and as to its communion with God an occasion of earthliness and sensuality Now this distance which this body keeps the soul at from God might more particularly appear in another way of explication by observing the especial grievances that do arise to the soul from those three great animal faculties if I may so speak The Senses the Appetite the Fancy 1. The Senses I mean the external senses of the body seeing hearing c. These convey passions to the soul upon which it insists and feeds with a sinful fondness and eagerness Set open the eye and it will set hard to convey some species to the soul of earthly objects that shall justle the Ideas of God out of it Set open the ear and it will fill the soul with such a noise and earthly tumult that the secret whispers of the divine spirit cannot be heard The like I may say of the rest Oh how easily do these discompose the fixed soul distract the devout soul cast a mist before the contemplative soul and hale down the raised soul from communion with Heaven to converse with earthly objects Vt vidi ut perii is the complaint of many a Christian as well as it was of the Heathen The souls of most men are quite sunk into their senses and do nothing but as it were lacky to them all their lives and so the servants are on horseback and Princes go on foot Though the eye will never be satisfied with seeing nor the ear with hearing yet forsooth these importunate suiters must be gratified the eye must see what it will see and the ear must hear what it will hear nothing must be with held from them that these childish senses do whine after These mens souls are indeed incarnate swallowed up in their eyes ears and mouths But not only these but even godly souls are often charmed and ensnared by their senses even they converse not only in the body but too much with it also and it becomes as a Dalilah to lull them asleep and bind them too Good Job found his senses so treacherous that he was fain to make a covenant with them Job 31. 1. And well if he could scape so too The words are a Metaphor for indeed the worst of it is that these senses are not capable of any discipline one cannot bring them into any covenant-terms so that whilst we have senses they will be treacherous whilst our eyes are in our heads they will be wandring after forbidden objects 2. The Appetite the sensitive appetite which is a faculty of the sensitive soul whereby this animal man is stirred up to desire and lust after the things which his senses have dictated to him This bodily lust following upon the neck of the former becomes a greater snare to the soul This restless suitor comes whining ever and anon to the soul for every trâ—fle that the eye hath seen or the ear heard or the mouth hath tasted and by it continual coming and importunate crying wearies her into an observance of it As the fond child comes crying to the Mother for every knack and gaw that it hath seen upon the stalls and she though she cannot in judgment approve of the request yet either in fond indulgence or for peace sake will condescend to purchase it This is the Daughter of the Horsleech that cryes continually Give Give Why what would it have even any thing that it hath seen or heard or touched or tasted any thing that it sees a fellow-creature to be possest of And so indeed the Appetite doth not only ensnare the soul unto drunkenness and glutâ—ony but voluptuousness lascivousness and all manner of sensuality The evil of the sensual appetite appears in wantonness and lasciviousness whether real verbal or mental in immoderate and inordinate trading ingrossing sporting building attiring sleeping visiting as well as in eating and drinking I will determine nothing concerning the first motions of the appetite whereby it sollicits the will to fulfil it only this that if it sollicite to any thing simply and morally evil it is sinful in that first act and that at all times it ought carefully to be watcht lest it seduce to intemperance in things lawful
But concerning the gratifying of the appetite seeing there must be in us a sensitive appetite whilst we are in this animal state it is to be endeavoured as far as may be that we gratifie the appetite not as it is a sensitive appetite but under this notion as the thing that it desires makes for our real good and tends to the enjoyment of the supreme good to eat and drink not because we are hungry or thirsty because the appetite desires it but with reference to the main end with respect to the highest good that the body may be enabled strengthened and quickened to wait upon the soul chearfully in the actions of a holy life But this man in his animal state cannot perfectly attain to which shews that the appetite doth keep us at a distance from God 3. The Fancy this also keeps a man at a distance from God and hinders us in the knowledge and service of God and interrupts the souls communion with God This is a busie and petulant faculty or inward sense and the soul doth readily sensate the passions of it so that it doth frequently hinder its mental operations and becomes a great snare A working fancy how much soever it is magnified by the wisdom of this world is a mighty snare to the soul except it work in a fellowship with right reason and a sanctified heart I am perswaded there is no greater burden in the world to a serious soul especially in hot and dry constitutions where it is commonly most pregnant and most impatient of discipline And I confess I have often wondred at the souls readiness to be so speedily affected with the fantasms and imaginations of it and fondness to hug them so dearly This indeed if it be so far refined as to present sober and solid imaginations to the mind and to act in subservience to sanctified reason is an excellent handmaid to the soul in many of her functions But otherwise is a snare as we have partly observed already and may observe more if we study the secrets of our own souls and the mighty mysteries that are within us And this doth not only ordinarily disturb distract and hinder in ordinary duties but even when the soul is at the highest pitch of communion and contemplation it assayes to pull it down to attend to its vain fantasms and indeed gives it many a grievous fall I doubt not to affirm that this is the most pernicious enemy of the three that I named to the souls happiness as might appear in many respects I will only name one It hath an advantage against us which neither of the other two hath It infests us and annoyes us sleeping as well as waking In sleep the senses are lockt up and the appetite is for the most part silent from its begging but then the fancy is as busie and tumultuous as ever forming and gathering imaginations and those are commonly wild and senseless if not worse The mind in way of kindness and benevolence to the body suspends its own actings whilst the body takes its rest in the night and then the rude fancy takes its opportunity to wander at liberty as being without its keeper and acts to the disturbance of the body but that 's not the worst for it becomes so tumultuous and impetuous sometimes as that it awakens the mind to attend upon its imaginations and this the soul doth condescend to in an inordinate manner and sets the stamp of sinfulness upon them to its own wounding And now that I am speaking of sleep as a Mantissa to this discourse I cannot but observe how this very thing also keeps us at a distance from God in this animal state How is our communion with God interrupted by this For herein we cease not only from the actions of an animal life but commonly from the actions of a spiritual life too What a great breach what a sad intercision is there made in our converse with God by this means Such a poor happiness it is that we have in this world that it is cut off and seems as it were not to be one fourth part of our time For indeed a happiness that is not felt deserves not the name of happiness Some learned and active men have been ashamed that they have slept away so much of their time which was all too little for their studyes and exploits Ah poor Christian that as it were sleeps away so much of his God being as much estranged from him in the night as though he had never conversed with him in the day and in the morning when he awakes cannot alwayes find himself with him neither which is enough to make a poor Saint wish either that he might have no need of sleep or that with the amorous Spouse Cant. 5. 2. Though he sleep his heart might wake perpetually We have seen in what sense this mortal body keeps Believers absent from the Lord and in what respects it keeps them at a distance from God even in this life from the Knowledge of God the Service of God and Communion with him Here then by way of Application 1. We may see that it was for good reason that the blessed Apostle is confident and willing to depart nay groans within himself desiring that mortality might be swallowed up of life as he speaks v. 4. I told you before that these words did contain the reason or ground thereof and by this time I hopw you see that the reason is good and the ground is sufficient What will the men of this world say Will you perswade us out of our life Should any thing in the world make a man weary of his life Proestat miserum esse quam non esse The Apostle was sure besides himself or he would never have fallen out with hâ—s own life or else he was in a passion and knew not what he said or else his life was bitter to him by reason of the poor afflicted persecuted condition that he lived in and so he was become desperate and cared not what became of him No none of these The Apostle was in his right wits and in a sober mind too It was not a passion or a fit of melancholly but his judgement and choice upon good deliberation and therefore you find him in the same mind elsewhere Phil. 1. 23. I desire to depart and to be with Christ which is far better Besides he gives a reason for what he desires now we know that passion is unruly and unreasonable Neither was the Apostle besides himself for he gives a good solid and wise reason Whilst we are at home in the body c. He will part with his life rather than not be perfectly happy For whereas worldlings put such a high price upon life and think that nothing should perswade men out of their lives It s true indeed if we speak properly life is the perfection of the creature The happiness of every thing is its life A living Dog is better than
wicked travelleth with pain all his dayes a dreadful sound is in his ears They are the words of Eliphaz indeed but they do agree with the words of God himself Isa 33. 14. The sinners in Sion are afraid fearfulness hath surprized the hypocrites When I read over these Texts I cannot but pray and cry O my soul come not you into the number of the wicked and be not united into the assembly of Hypocrites 2. Take heed of fondness of the body of a double act of it priding pampering 1. Take heed you pride not your selves in any excellencies of the body Doth this mortal body keep us at a distance from our God Do we well then to love that which keeps us from that which is most lovely Why do we stand fondly gazing upon that which keeps us from the blessed sight of God If you ask me Did ever any man hate his own flesh I will ask you again Did ever any wise man love his own flesh above him that made it Did ever any godly soul love his body in opposition to his God Oh but it is a comely body And what is a beautiful body but a fair prison A silver twist or a clog of gold do as really hinder the flight of a Bird and forestall her liberty as a stone tyed at her heels Nay those very excellencies which you so much admire are so much the greater hinderances If we had learned that excellent lesson indeed of enjoying all things only in God then the several beauties and braveries of the body would be a help to our devotion they would carry us up to an admiration and contemplation of that glorious and most excellent Being from whom they were communicated so we might in some sense look into a glass and behold the beauty of God But alas these commonly prove the greater snares Many had been more beautiful within had they been less beautiful without more chaste if less comely many had been more peacèable and more at peace too if they had been less able to have quarrelled and fought It was said of Galba who was an ingenious man but deformed that his soul dwelt ill but sure I am it might better have been so said of beautiful Absolom or Jezabel whose bodies became a snare to their souls On the other hand they that want a beauty in their bodyes will perhaps labour to find an excellency in their minds far beyond it as the Philosopher advised to look often into a glass ut si deformis sis corrigas formositate morum c. 2. Take heed of pampering the body of treating it too gently and delicately Deny it nothing that may fit it for the service of God and your souls and allow it no more than may do that Thy pampering is 1. Vnseemly What make a darling of that which keeps us from our Lord carry it gently and delicately and tenderly towards that which whilst we carry about with us we cannot be happy 2. Injurious If you bring up this servant delicately from a child you shall have him become your Son at length yea your Master If you do by your bodyes as the fond King did by his Son Adonijah 1 King 1. 6. never displease it never reprove it never deny it it will do with you in time as he did raise seditions in your soul Go on and please and pamper and cocker your bodyes and it will come to this at length that you must deny them nothing you must give whatsoever a whining appetite will crave go whither your gadding senses will carry you and speak whatsoever wanton fancy will suggest Doth not the body it self set us at a sufficient distance from God but we must estrange our selves more from him by pleasuring it spend the time that should be for God in decking trimming adorning it When you cram this you feed a Bird that will pick out your eyes you nourish a Traitor when you gratifie this Adonijah In a word Is it not enough that we do all carry fire in our bosomes but we must also blow it up into a flame Nay my Brethren do not so foolishly And now methinks by this time I may venture upon an Exhortation by degrees at least 1. Watch against the Body You have heard how the senses appetite and fancy become a snare to the souls â—â—ing unto and conversing with God Now then if you seriously design communion with Heaven if you placed your happiness in the knowledge and enjoyment of that supreme and eternal good it becomes you to watch against all things that may distract or divert you from it or make you fall short of the glory of God Men that live upon earthly designs whose great ambition it is to be great in the world do not only use the most effectual means and take the most direct courses to accomplish those designs and attain those ends but do continually suspect and diligently watch against all the moths that would corrupt the rust that would consume the thieves that would plunder their treasures and in a word against all possible hinderances defraudations and disappointments So will we suspect and watch sure against all enemies and traitors to our souls if we live here upon eternal designs if our ambition be to be great in God alone And the more eminent the danger is the more will we watch Have you not found by experience which of these three have been most prejudicial to your communion with God If not you have not been so studious to know the state nor pursue the happiness of your own souls as you might If so then watch against that most of all which you have found to be most injurious For it ordinarily comes to pass either by the difference of constitutions or difference of temptations or different wayes of living or some other thing that Gods children are more ensnared by some one of these than other Well be sure to watch and pray and strive more especially against the more especial enemies of your souls 2. Live above the body above bodily enjoyments ornaments excellencies Though these bodily enjoyments be never so sweet these bodily ornaments never so glorious yet is not your happiness in these Certainly they live to their loss who live upon the excellencies of their own souls whether natural or supernatural they deprive themselves of the infinite glory fulness and sufficiency that is in the Blessed God who take up their happiness in these Much more do they pinch and impoverish their own souls who live upon bodily ornaments or excellencies wherein many inferiour creatures do excel them the Rose in beauty the Sun in brightness the Lion in strength the Stagg in swiftness c. If a woman were as lovely as the morning fair as the Moon clear as the Sun if a man were full of personal grace and majesty terrible as an Army with banners yet were not their happiness in these accomplishments Nay which is worse these ornaments stand between us and our
But I will not enveigle my self in any controversie Methinks the sad consideration layd before your eyes whilst we are in the body we are absent distant from the Lord should wring out an O wretched man that I am c. or an I desire to be dssiolved or if not words yet at least a groan after immortality with our Apostle here We groan within our selves that mortality may be swallowed up of life But can a soul possibly long for the destruction of the body Philosophy indeed tells us that it cannot Be it so yet I 'm sure Divinity teaches that a soul may long after the redemption of the body the redemption of it from this kind of aâ—iâ—al corruptible ensnaring condition that it is now in Rom. 8. 23. We groan within our selves waiting for the redemption of our body If we cannot wish to be unclothed yet we may long to be clothed upon vers 4. of this chapter At least methinks the Heathen should not out-do us who could say Morinolo sed me mortuum esse nihil curo But will all cry Oh if we were sure of interest in it of pardon of sin of truth of grace of eternal life then we could freely leave all Answ 1. That is you would live to be more holy before you dye you are not yet holy enough No nor never shall be till you dye If you long after holiness long to be with God then for that is a state of perfect holiness To desire to live upon pretence of being more holy is a meer fallacy a contradiction But it may be this is not the meaning of the Objection Theresore 2. A not having of what we would have is not an excuse for not doing what we should do It is our duty to rejoyce in the Lord Phil. 4. 4. which our not having of assurance doth not exempt us from though if we have assurance we might indeed rejoyce the more But to take off this plea at once 3. Our earnest longings after a full and perfect enjoyment of God and so our breathings after an immortal state doth not depend upon our assurance but indeed assurance rather depends upon that I doubt we are commonly mistaken in the nature of assurance and it may be are in a wrong manner curious about the signs of Christs appearing in our souls For certainly a well grounded assurance of the love of God doth most discover and unfold it self in the growth of true godliness in the soul Now the love of God and an earnest desire to be like unto him and to be with him is the better half of all religion Mat. 22. 37 38. so that it rather seems that assurance springs up from this frame of soul than that this arises out of assurance If assurance be the thing that you desire get your souls joyned to God in a union of affections will and ends and then labour and long to be closer to him liker to him perfectly holy and happy in him and be ye assured that Christ is in you of a truth For these mighty works which he hath wrought these divine breathings these holy pantings after him do bear witness of him 4. Whether ever you come to that feeling knowledge that powerful sense of your state or no which you call assurance yet know that it is your duty to long after immortality We are wont to call assurance the priviledge of some few but the Scripture makes this temper that I am speaking of the duty of all Believers which I do the rather name because I find few Professors of this temper and indeed but few that are willing to believe that they ought to be Our Saviour calls all Believers to as much in effect as I do Luk. 21. 28. Look up and lift up your heads for the day of your redemption draweth nigh whereby is not meant a bare posture and speculation but joy and longing are required by that phrase say the Dutch Annotat. See also Rev. 22. 17. Consider further which methinks should strike cold to the hearts of cold-hearted Professors that this very temper is made one of the greatest characters of true and sincere Saints I do not know of any one oftner named See Rom. 8. 23. We groan within our selves waiting for the redemption of our body 2 Tim. 4. 8. The Lord shall give the Crown to them that love his appearing Tit. 2. 13. We should live godly in this present world looking for that blessed hope and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ 2 Pet. 3. 12. What manner of persons ought we to be in all holy conversation and godliness looking for and hastening to the coming of the day of God! Jude 21. Keep your selves in the love of God looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life Do all these plain and pathetical Scriptures stand for cyphers in your eye Methinks they should not But not to stand upon the proof of it to be a duty it matters not whether there be an express command for it or no This that I am speaking of is not so much the duty of godly persons as the very nature genius and spirit indeed of godliness iâ— self Methinks a godly soul that is truly toucht with divine goodness influenc't by it and imprest with it as the Needle is with the Loadstone must needs strive powerfully within it self to be in conjunction with it A holy soul that after all its wearisome defeats and shameful disappointments in the creature finds its self perfectly matcht with this infinite full and perfect object must certainly and necessarily be carryed without any other argument with fervent longings after union to it and communion with it The Spouse might say concerning Christ as he concerning her Cant. 6. 12. Or ever I was aware my soul made me like the chariots of Aminadab And every godly soul may in some degree say with that Spouse Cant. 5. 4 5. My Beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door and my bowels were moved for him I rose up c. Tell me friends How can Divine Grace that Well of living water in the soul chuse but spring up into eternal life John 4 14. I doubt not to affirm that that which is of God in the soul must needs carry the soul after God as it belongs to Heaven so it will belonging towards Heaven That which is of a divine original must needs have a divine tendency that which is of divine extraction will have in it a divine attraction and persue a divine perfection Col. 3. 1. That divine life and spirit that runs thorow godly souls doth awaken and exalt in some measure all the powers of them into an active and chearful sympathy with that absolute good that renders them compleatly blessed Holiness and purity of heart will be attracting God more and more to it self and the more pure our souls are and the more separate from earthly things the more earnestly will they
endeavour the nearest union that may be with God and so by consequence methinks they must needs in some sense desire the removal of that animal life and dark body that stands in their way for they know that that which now letteth will let such is the unchangeable nature of it till it be layd in the dust till it be taken out of the way The thirsty King did but cry for water of the Well of Bethlehem and his Champions broke thorow the Host of the Philistines and fetcht it 2 Sam. 23. 15. And will ye not allow the thirsty soul if not to break thorow to fetch it yet at least to break out into an Oh that one would give me to drink of the living water of the fountain of grace and peace and love Will ye allow hunger to break down stone-walls and will ye neither allow the hungry soul to break down these mud-walls nor to wish within it self that they were broken down In a word then give me leave earnestly to press you to an earnest pressing after perfect fruition of and eternal converse with God and to change the Apostles words Heb. 12. 1. Seeing we are compassed about with so great a divine light and glory and brightness let us be willing and desirous to lay aside this weight of flesh and this body that so easily resists us with sins and snares and run with eagerness to the object that is set before us Amen Amen Draw me we will run after thee THE Angelical Life MAT. 22. 30. Are as the Angels of God in Heaven THE Doctrine of our Lord Jesus Christ and the great things of Christian Religion as they were accounted a strange thing by all the world when they were first publisht and preacht so indeed by none less entertained or rather more opposed than by the wisest of men living in that age viz. Scribes Pharisees Sadduces who were the disputers of this world as the Apostles phrase is 1 Cor. 1. 20. A thing of wonderful observation not only to us in our day but even to our blessed Lord himself in the dayes of his flesh who fetches the cause of it from Heaven and adores the infinite Wisdom of God in it Mat. 11. 25. Amongst other set Disputations that the Saddâ—ces held with our Saviour this in this chapter is very famous where they dispute against the Resurrection of the dead by an argument fetcht ab absurdo vers 25. grounded upon an instance of a woman that had been married to seven Husbands successively Now say they if there be a Resurrection whose Wise shall she be then our Saviour answers by destroying the ground of their argument and shewing that they disputed upon a false supposition for saith he In the Resurrection there shall be no marrying but men shall be as the Angels of God In which words this Doctrine is plainly layd down for I shall not meddle with the Controversie Doct. That the glorified Saints shall be as the Angels of God in Heaven The other Evangelists do lay down the same truth as you may find Mark 12. 25. Luk. 20. 36. In the explication of which point I will shew 1. Negatively wherein the Saints shall not be like the Angels 2. Affirmatively wherein they shall be like unto them or as St. Luke hath it equal to them 1. Negatively The glorified Saints shall not be like the Angels in essence The Angelical essence and the rational soul are and shall be different Souls shall remain souls still keep their own essence The essence shall not be changed souls shall not be changed into Angelical essences 2. They shall not be wholly spirits without bodyes as the Angels The spirit of just men now made perfect are more line to the Angels in this sense than they shall be after the Resurrection For now they are spirits without bodyes but the Saints shall have bodyes not such as now so corruptible so crazy not in any thing defective not needing creature supplyes But incorruptible glorious bodyes in some sense spiritual bodyes which are described by three characters 1 Cor. 15. 42 43. Incorruptible somewhat more than immortal glorious powerful Neither doth their having bodyes any whit abate of their perfection or glory nor render them inferior to the Angels for even the glorious Redeemer of the world hath a body who is yet superior to the Angels and he shall change the vile bodyes of the Saints and make them like unto his glorious body Phil. 3. ult 3. Neither have we any ground to believe that the Saints shall be altogether equal to the Angels in dignity and glory But rather that as man was at first made a little lower than the Angels so that he shall never come to be exalted altogether so high as they for it seemeth that the natural capacity of an Angel is greater than of a 〈◊〉 and so shall continue for they are distinct kinds of creatures As a beast cannot become so wise and intelligent as a man for then he would cease to be a beast so neither can a man become so large and capable as an Angel for then he would cease to be a man 2. Affirmatively The glorified Saints shall be like the Angels of God in Heaven first In their qualities that is 1. In being pure and holy whether they shall be equal to them in positive holiness or no I know not whether they shall understand and know and love God in all degrees as much as the Angels It seems rather that they shall not because as I said before their capacity shall not be so large But if in this they be not altogether equal to the Angels yet it implyes no imperfection for they shall be positively holy as far as their nature is capable and so shall be perfect in their kind Heb. 12. 23. The spirits of Just men made perfect They shall in this be like unto the Angels if not equal to them yea like unto God himself in it Be ye holy as I am holy 1 Pet. 1. 15. Mat. 5. ult But as to negative holiness the Saints shall be even equal to the Angels of God in Heaven i. e. they shall have no more sin no more corruption than they have They shall be as perfectly freed from all iniquities imperfections and infirmities as the Angels What can be cleaner than that which hath no uncleanness at all in it Why so clean shall all the Saints be Rev. 21. 27. No unclean thing shall enter into Heaven They shall be without all kind of spot or blemish Ephes 5. 27. which is a perfect negative holiness more cannot be said of the Angels in this respect As branches of this 2. As the holy Angles do reverence the Divine Majesty Isa 6. 2 3. they cover their faces with their wings crying Holy Holy Holy Lord of Hosts so shall the glorified Saints You may see what sweet harmony they make consenting together to give all the glory of all to God Rev. 7. 9 11 12. The Saints
stood and cryed Salvation to our God who sitteth upon the Throne and to the Lamb The Angels stood round about saying Amen Amen 3. In their readiness to do the will of God and execute his commands therefore the Angels are described to have wings Isa 6. 2. with twain they did fly How God shall please to imploy Angels or Saints in the world to come is not for us to enquire But they shall be alike ready to do his will and serve his pleasure whatever it shall be Even whilst the Saints are imperfect on earth they can cry Here am I send me Isa 6. 8. How much more ready shall they be then when all their fetters are knockt off 4. They shall be as the Angels in their chearful and unwearied execution of the will of God So the Angels are and so shall the Saints be The spirit shall be then more willing and the Flesh shall be no more weak as it is now for when it is raised again it shall be in power 1 Cor. 15. 43. More things of this nature might be added but I pass lightly over them because although they be true yet they are not principally lookt at in this Text therefore I come to the second thing wherein the glorified Saints shall be like unto the Angels and that is 2. In their way of living They shall be like the Angels i. e. saith one truly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 living like the Angels How is that our Saviour tells us Neither marrying nor being given in marriage it is added presently in Luk. 20. 36. For neither can they dye any more If there be no dying there will be no need of propagation if no need of propagation then why should they marry The Angels are single and know no other conjunction but with God in a spiritual manner no more shall the Saints But what great matter is that to be like the Angels in what perfection is that Many Saints yea and sinners too upon earth are so like the Angels nay and the Devils too Therefore you must know that our Saviour under this phrase of not marrying c. doth comprehend all manner of creature-converse all kind of living upon and delighting in the creature by a Synecdoche of the part as is ordinary in Scripture I have not given upon usury saith the Prophet yet the people curse me Jer. 15. 10. i. e. I have had no dealing in the world no negotiation By one kind he understands the whole Ezek. 25. 41. where by eating their fruits and drinking their milk is understood the possessing of all that was theirs And in many other places the Spirit of God uses this Tropical way of speaking The Angels of God neither marry nor are given in marriage i. e. they live not upon any created good delight not in any created comfort but live entirely upon God converse with him are everlastingly beholding his glory and delighting themselves in him Thus shall the glorified Saints live for ever Their bodyes shall not need nor use created supplyes food physick rayment c. which things in this animal state they stand in need of Mat. 6. 32. But that 's not all for their souls shall not any longer desire nor hanker after any created thing but as the Angels shall be possest of God filled with the fulness of God all the powers and faculties of them perfectly refined and spiritualized abstracted from all created things eternally rejoycing and delighting themselves in the contemplation and participation of the supreme and infinite good For during this earthly and imperfect state not only the bodyes of good men feed upon and are sustained by the creatures in common with other men but even their souls do taste too much of worldly contentments and drink too deep of earthly pleasures and creature-comforts Even the most refined souls upon earth though they do not properly feed upon any thing below God yet do ost dip the end of their Rod in this hony that lyes upon the earth with Jonathan do cast an unchaste eye upon their earthly enjoyments and delight in them in a way too gross and unspiritual having abstracted them from God and loving them with a distinct love But in the Resurrection it shall not be so for the holy souls shall be perfectly conformed to the holy God shall feed upon him singly live upon him entirely be wrapt up in him wholly and be satisfied in him solely and everlastingly and so shall they be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 equal to the Angels The creature although it do not fill any truly sanctified soul upon earth yet it hath some room there but then it shall be perfectly cast out and the soul shall be filled with all the fulness of God the creature is now much in some godly souls and something in all of them but then it shall be nothing at all to them or in them but God shall be all in all all things in all of them as the way of the Saints living and their glorified state is described 1 Cor. 15. 28. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that God may be all in all They shall inherit all things but how is that why see the explication of it in the following words God will be their God Rev. 21. 7. He that overcometh shall inherit all things and I will be his God God shall be unto them instead of all things In that state there shall be no need of Sun or Moon Rev. 21. 23. by which excellent and useful creatures the whole Creation seems to be understood for they that shall live above the Sun and Moon shall certainly live above all things that are below these But how then why it follows The glory of God shall enlighten them and the Lamb shall be their light so Rev. 22. 5. And there shall be no night there and they need no Candle neither light of the Sun for the Lord giveth them light All happiness is derived into them from God and therefore there shall be no night no want of any creature-comfort to them neither shall they desire any thing more of the creature whether small or great whether Candle or Sun For explication of this their blessed life let me allude to that of our Saviour Luk. 12. 24. The Fowls of the Heaven neither sow nor reap yet God feedeth them so the Saints of Heaven neither want nor desire any created good for they feed upon God the supreme and infinite good And again vers 27. The Lillies neither toyl nor spin and yet Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these These blessed souls have no respect at all to things terrene created yet are they so filled and adorned with the glory of the infinite Majesty that Solomon in all his glory was a filthy and ragged thing in comparison of them In a word the state of the glorified Saints and Angels is set out by our Saviour in the same manner by one and the same description and that is
the seeing of God The life of Angels is called a continual beholding of the face of God Mat. 18. 10. and the state of the Saints glory and happiness is also a seeing of God Mat. 5. 8. Heb. 12. 14. Rev. 22. 4. They shall see his face and his name shall be in their foreheads Now this phrase the seeing of God applyed both to the Saints and Angels doth place their happiness in God alone excluding the creature and it doth import the fulness and clearness and certainty of that their bliss Thus I have shewed you in what sense though I am not able to shew you in what degree the glorified Saints shall be like the Angels of God in Heaven Their way of living viz. upon the blessed God alone shall be the same with that of the holy Angels Application From the discovery of the future state of the Saints I find my self filled with indignation 1. Reproof Against the carnal conceits that many Christians have of Heaven Christians do I call them Nay herein they seem rather Mahumetans who place Heaven in the full and lasting enjoyment of all creature-comforts nay indeed of sinful and abominable pleasures as one may read in their Alcoran It may be few Christians are altogether so sensual but sure I am the far greater sort of Christians so called are very gross and carnal at least very low in their conceits of the state of future happiness Heaven is a word as little understood as Holiness and that I am sure is the greatest mystery in the world it would be tedious to run thorow the particular various apprehensions of men in this matter and indeed impossible to know them The common sort of people understand either just nothing by Heaven but a glorious name or at best but a freeness from bodily torment As nothing of Hell affects them but that dreadful word fire so nothing of Heaven but the comfortable word Rest or safety Others it may be think there is something positive in Heaven and they dream of an honourable easic pleasant life free from such kind of toyls labours pains persecutions reproaches penuries which men are subject to in this life This is a true notion but much below the nature of that happy state others are yet more highly affected with the words of Glory and Glorious and seem to be much ravished with them but are like men in a maze or wonderment that admire something that they understand not and are altogether confounded in their own apprehensions of it As if a man should be mightily taken with such a fine name as Arabia the happy and by a blind fervor of mind should desire to go and visit it Others rise higher yet in their apprehensions of Heaven and look upon it as a holy state but that holiness is negative viz. a perfect freedom from sin and all temptations to it And indeed this is a precious consideration and that wherein many a weary soul finds much rest But yet this amounts not to the life of Angels it is a lower consideration of Heaven than what our Saviour here presents us with The state of the glorified Saints shall not only be a state of freedom from temporal pains or eternal pains or a freedom from spiritual pains and imperfections but a state of perfect positive holiness pure light ardent love spiritual liberty holy delights when all created good shall perfectly vanish all created love shall be swallowed up the soul shall become of a most God-like disposition shining forth in the glory that he shall put upon it glorying in nothing but the blessed God Father Son and Holy Ghost in his divine Image and perfections and wrapt up entirely into his infinite fulness to all eternity Which hath made me oft-times to nauseat and indeed to blame the poor low descriptions of the Kingdom of Heaven which I have found in Books and Sermons for too drye yea and gross which do describe Heaven principally as a place and give it such circumstances of beauty firmness security light and splendor pleasant society good neighbourhood as they think will most commend an earthly habitation True indeed the Holy Ghost in Scripture is pleased to condescend so far to our weak capacities as to describe that glorious state to us by such things as we do best understand and are apt to be most taken with and do most gratifie our senses in this world as a Kingdom Paradise a glorious City a Crown an Inheritance c. But yet it is not the will of God that his enlightened people should rest in such low notions of eternal life For in other places God speaks of the state of glory according to the nature and excellency of it and not according to the weakness of our understanding and describes it at another rate calling it the Life of Angels as here the beholding of God Mat. 5. 8. a coming unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ Ephes 4. 13. Gods being All things in us 1 Cor. 15. 28. It is called a Knowing of God and of his Son Jesus Christ Joh. 17. 3. In a word which is as high as can be spoke higher indeed than can be perfectly understood it is called a Being like unto God 1 Joh. 3. 21. We shall be like unto him But this Use is not so much for Reproof as it is for Information 2. Here is matter of Roproof yea and of just indignation against the gross low sensual earthly life of Professors who yet hope to be the children of the Resurrection and to be as the Angels of God in Heaven What hope to be like them then and yet altogether unlike them now I speak not in a passion but out of a just indignation that I have conceived against my self and against the generality even of Saints themselves I am not going to speak of Covetousness commonly so called there is a sin much like to it which is not indeed a single sin but an evil and unseemly temper which is earthly-mindedness or minding of earthly things or if you will because I would not be misunderstood a living upon the creature or a loving of the creature with a distinct love Oh the insensible secrecy and insuperable power of this creature-love I cannot sufficiently exclaim against it Why do we spend noble affections upon such low and empty nothings Are we called with suâ—h a high Calling think you that our conversation should be so low Is the fulness of the fountain yours and do ye yet delight to sit down by and bathe your selves in the shallow streams Is your life hid with Christ in God Why then do you converse as if your life were bound up in the creature Have you layd up your treasure in the blessed God what do your hearts then so far from it Is your happiness in Heaven why then is not your conversation there too Do ye count it your bliss to see God what then mean those fond and wanton glances that ye cast
upon created-comforts and that unchaste love which you bestow upon things below I mean not only the bleatings of the Sheep and the lowings of the Oxen I speak not of the grosser sort of earthly-mindedness sensuality or covetousness but of that more refined and hidden creature-love a loving of friends relations health liberty life and that not in God but with a love distinct from that love wherewith we love God To love all these in God and for his sake and as flowing from him and partaking of him and with the same love wherewith we love God himself is allowed us But to love them with a particular love as things distinct from God to delight in them meerly as creatures and to follow them as if some good or happiness or pleasure were to be found in them distinct from what is in God this is a branch of spiritual Adultery I had almost said Idolatry To taste a sweetness in the creature and to see a beauty and goodness in it is our duty but then it must be the sweetness of God in it and the goodness of God which we ought alone to taste and see in it As we say Vxor splendeâ— radiis mariti the wise shines with the rayes of her husband so more truly every creature shines but by a borrowed light and commends unto us the goodness and sweetness and â—ulness of the blessed Creator You have heard that the glorified souls shall live upon God alone entirely wholly eternally and should not the less glorious souls I mean gracious souls do so too in some degree yea even we who are upon earth and do yet use creatures should behold all the scattered beams of goodness sweetness perfection that are in these creatures all united and gathered up in God and so feed upon them only in God and upon God in all them It is the character of wicked and godless men that they set up and drive a trade for themselves live in a way distinct from God as though they had no dependence upon him they love the world with a predominant love they enjoy creature-comforts in a gross unspiritual manner they dwell upon the dark side of their mercies they treasure up riches not only in their chests but in their hearts they feed upon the creature not only with their bodyes but their very souls do feed upon them and thus in a word they live without God in the world All this is no wonder for that which is of the earth must needs be earthly Joh. 3. 31. is it not a monstrous thing that a heavenly soul should feed upon earthly trash I speak without any Hyperbole the famous King of Babylon forsaking the society of men and herding himself with the beasts of the earth and eating grass with the Oxen was not so absurd a thing nor half so monstrous or unseemly as the children of the Most High God forsaking the true bread of souls and feeding upon the low fare of carnal men even created sweetness worldly goods Nay a glorious starr falling from its own sphere and choaking it self in the dust would not be such an eminent piece of baseness For what is said of the true God in one sense Joh. 3. 31. is true of the truly godly in this sense He that cometh from Heaven is above all i. e. above all things that are below God himself 3. Shall this life of Angels be also the life of Saints This may then serve as a powerful consideration to mortifie in us the love of this animal life to make us weary of this low kind of living and quicken us to long after so blessed a change Well might the Apostle say indeed that to dye was gain Phil. 1. 21. For is not this gain to exchange an animal life for an Angelical life a life which is in some sense common to the very beasts with us for that which in some sense may be called the life of God For as the blessed and holy God lives upon his own infinite and self-sufficient fulness without being beholden to any thing without himself so shall the Saints live upon him and upon the self-same infinite fulness and shall not need any creature contributions The Apostle indeed saith That the last enemy to be destroyed is death 1 Cor. 15. 26. which is true of enemies without us and it is true with respect to Christ who shall make a general Resurrection from the dead for that is the proper meaning of it But it is true also that the last enemy to be overcome within us is the love of life Therefore it is said That a man will part with any thing to keep his life Job 2. 4. And we do generally excuse the matter and cry Oh! life is sweet life is precious It must be confest and it may be granted I believe that there is an inclination of the soul to the body arising from that dear and unconceivable union that God himself hath made of them which is purely natural some say altogether necessary for the maintaining of man in this complex state and not in it self sinful Possibly there may not be found a man upon earth so holy and mortified in whom this is not found certainly it is the last hinderance to be removed out of the way of our perfect happiness This although in iâ— it self natural yea necessary without blame yet in the inordinateness of it ordinarily if not constantly becomes sinful I count him the most perfect man in the world who loves not his own life with an inordinate sinful love who loves it only in God and not with a creature-love distinct from God There are two wayes whereby this natural and lawful love of life becomes sinful viz. immoderateness and inordinateness Immoderateness is when men love their lives at that rate that they are filled with unreasonable and distracting fears cares and thoughts about them when the whole business of life is almost nothing else but a studiousness to preserve the Being of life Inordinateness is when men though they do not love their lives at that excessive rate yet do love life as a creature-good not in God nor in order to him but love it for it self as something out of God Every carnal man in the world is guilty of the latter and I doubt but few Saints altogether free from the guilt of it Now that this immoderate love of life ought to be subdued in Christians all men almost will grant If any will not grant it we can easily prove it from the command of God Mat. 6. 25. Take no thought for your life 1 Joh. 2. 15. Love not the world neither the things that are in the world Both which words in the favourablest interpretation that can be given of them do in the judgment of all forbid immoderation Nâ—y a meer Philosopher would enforce this from meer moral confiderations which I cannot now stand upon But this inordinate love of life as it is a more secret sticking evil a
upon God and enjoying all happiness in him alone for ever Shall this certainly be ouâ—â— life in Heaven oh then labour to begin this life upon earth If you cannot perfectly transcribe yet at least imitate that Angelical kind of life Though you are here imprisoned in a body of earth and oft cumbred and clogg'd with bodily infirmities and called to attend upon bodily necessities yet as far as this animal state will permit live upon God Do not excuse nor vindicate that low kind of earthly life do not justifie your living below and besides God but stir up your selves to behold where your happiness lies and live not willingly below it Certainly a godly soul hath more than bare hope in this world God the blessed infinite and communicative good hath not lockt up himself so far out of fight but that he gives his people a comfortable beholding of him even whilst they are in their Pilgrimage and what Soloman saith of the life of the godly he means it of their present life Prov. 15. 24. The way of life is above to the wise Their living not only shall be but is now above it is a high way of living They are certainly a puny sort of Mechanical Christians that think and talk only of a Heaven to come and dream of an happiness without them and distinct from them The truly godly and God-like soul cannot so content himself but being spirited and principled from above is carryed out after the Infinite and Almighty Good as a thing is carryed towards its centre and hastens into his embraces as the Iron hastens to the Loadstone and longs to be in conjunction with it If therefore ye be from Heaven live above all above all earthly things If ye be risen with Christ seek the things that are above Col. 3. 1. If ye be born of God live upon God and suck not the breasts of a stranger Deny self live besides self i. e. live not to the lusts live not to the service of your senses to the lust of the flesh to the lust of the eye to the pride of life let not your souls be servants to your sins no nor to your senses that were for servants to ride on horseback and Princes to walk on foot Eccles 10. 7. Live above self i. e. let your souls quit all their own interest in themselves and entirely resign themselves to God as to all points of duty and service But that 's not all neither is that it which I press you to from these words but live above the creature and whatsoever is in it viz. delighting in God conversing and communing with him alone as the chiefest Good Desire not any creature any further than as it may help you forward to the Creator neithet delight in it any further than as it either represents some of the divine perfections witnesseth something of divine love or leadeth to some divine participation or communion Seeing we shall come to live upon God and delight in God alone without any creature let us now live upon feed upon love God alone in every creature Now to give you a more distinct knowledge of this high and noble life I will explain it in some particulars negatively and affirmatively First Negatively 1. Live not upon Self I speak not of living unto Self but live not upon Self Self-excellencies Self-sufficiencies any created accomplishments which was the life of the Stoicks those great Philosophers who placed happiness in the enjoyment of themselves which they called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To enjoy ones self indeed is a high duty a noble priviledge a duty of the Gospel Luk. 21. 19. Possess ye your souls But how must we enjoy our selves why only in God He enjoys himself 1. Not who in a sullen melancholy retires to a solitary and monastical life as many of the sowrer sort of Papists do 2. Nor he that in a proud mood disdains the perfections of God shining forth in other men and hiding himself from them through envy contents himself to sit and admire his own personal accomplishments as many humorists do 3. Nor he who finding nothing without him nor knowing nothing above him to give his soul her full rest settles upon a foundation of his own and admires a self-sufficiency in the temper of his own spirit a little subdued by Philosophical precepts as the Stoicks did and our Quakers do But he who enjoyes himself in God i. e. who doth not view himself in the narrow point of his own Being but taking a view of himself in the unbounded essence of God loves and enjoyes and values himself and all his personal excellencies as he is in God and partakes of his perfections To live in a way of self-converse is below the end of mans creation who was made for a higher good And hereby a man shall never obtain true happiness for it is peculiar to God alone to be happy in himself In a word a soul that confines it self to its self and lives and moves and rejoyces only within the narrow cell of its own particular Being deprives it self of that Almighty and Original Goodness and Glory that sills the world and shines thorow the whole Creation 2. Live not upon any creature without your selves Self indeed is a Creature but yet for clearness in proceeding we shall distinguish them Now this is the life of the greatest sort of men they live beside God and move only within the sphere of the creature you will easily understand that I speak not of the bodyes living upon the creature for so God hath appointed that it shall live and yet as to this too I say with our Saviour Man liveth not by bread alone c. But I speak of the soul of man living upon the creature as its highest good and feeding upon it as its best fare They rise up early and sit up late and God is not in all their thoughts They are filled with domestiek and forein comforts but behold not the Father of Lights from whom all these descend They live upon the good things of the world yet live without God in the world Now by these men 1. do not mean those Heathens that in the most Idolatrous manner do in the literal sense set up the creatures for Gods 2. Nor those Christians that in a most gross manner do makeidols of the creatures and place their happiness in them 3. No nor only those earthly Professors who follow the world too eagerly and have such a deep and rooted respect for it that they can be ordinarily content to suffer creature-employments to justle God and duties out of their hearts and houses whose worldliness is apparently too hard for their Religion Who then Shall we come any nearer yes 4. Those are guilty of creature converse who do not enjoy all creatures in God who love any thing in any creature with a distinct love that do not love it only in God who love silver gold houses lands trading friends with
Oh how sweet is the God that made it so Is there any thing lovely it is a picture of him whose name is Love Is any thing firm stable lasting it is a shadow of that glorious essence with whom there is no shadow of change Have you any thing strong it arises out of that God with whom is everlasting strength Doth any creature give rest ease refreshment it springs out of the All satisfying fulness of God In a word labour to climb up by every created excellency as by so many beams to the Father of lights let all the world be to you as Gods Temple and be ready to say of every place as Jacob How dreadful is this place surely this is no other than the house of God! that God who runs thorow all created Beings and from himselves derives several prints of beauty and excellency all the world over But especially take heed of your own created-comforts that they do not insensibly lead a way your hearts and ensnare you into a sinful particular distinct love of them which is a sin soon committed hardly discerned and most hardly reformed If any be freed from these inordinate affections sure they are but few and those few have come dearly by it as he said in another case with a great summ they have obtained this freedom they have payed for it not with the foreskins of the Philistines but with the lives of what they so loved there being no way to cure this evil distemper but cutting off the member infected with it the part that it fed upon As a branch of this head let me add labour to live upon God in the excellencies of other men value them and all their accomplishments only in God as he that did diligere Deum habitantem in Augustino Admire God and enjoy God in them Where ever you see wisdom goodness ingenuity holiness justice or any other accomplishment say Here and there is God And this is the honest way of making our selves Masters of whatever is another mans and enjoying it as truly as he himself doth yea as truly as if it were our own when we behold all these beams as coming from the same fountain of lights and do love them all in him with an universal love This is the rare Art of having nothing yet possessing all things of being rich though one have nothing and of being wise though one know nothing 3. The last way of living upon God in the creature is To taste and feed upon the love of God in them not only his common bounty but his special love in Christ The good will of God gives a sweet relish to every morsel as I hinted before Even in the midst of all your delightful pleasant sweet enjoyments let your souls be more affected with this than with them let this be as the Manna lying upon the top of all your outward comforts which your spirits may gather up and feed upon But this I toucht upon before therefore I shall add no more concerning it Thus I have shewed you how you may imitate the life of Angels in living upon God even whilst you live in the body To this I may add another particular or two 3. Converse with God and live upon him in all his Ordinances Let communion with God be your drift in every duty and the very life and soul and sweetness of every ordinance You never read of a soul more thirsty after ordinances than David as might appear abundantly yet if you look well into the expressions you will find that it was not so much after them as after God in them not after the dead letter but after the living God Psa 4. 2. 2. My soul thirsteth for God for the living God and Psal 84. 2. My heart and my flesh cryeth out for the living God Let the Word preacht or read be as a voyce from Heaven talking you let your conserence be a comment upon that Word let meditation be as a kind of bringing down God into your souls and prayer as a raising up of your souls into God nothing but faith and love put into phrases And so of all the rest 4. Converse with God in all his Providences prosperity adversity plenty penury health sickness peace and perplexity This is a large Theme But as to prosperity I have speken something a ready under that head of conversing with God in creature enjoyments As for adversity I have said much more in a large discourse to describe and commend the Art of conversing with God in affictions Briefly at this time converse not with losses wants afflictions but with God in them and that not only with the justice righteousness severity and soveraignty of God in them but with the goodness and mercy of God in them They are dark Providences we had not need to dwell all together on the dark side of them If all the wayes of the Lord towards his people be mercy and truth Psa 25. 10 then his roughest and most uncouth wayes are so 100 If God be wholly love 1 Joh. 4. 8. then his very corrections proceed not from hatred If it be his name to be good and to do good Psal 119. 68. where have we learnt then to call his afflicting Providences Evils and to divide evil which is but one even as God is one into culpae and paenae sin and affliction surely we speak as men And if God call them so he speaks after the manner of men as he often doth If the governing will of God be pure persect and infinitely good and righteous ought we not to converse with it in a free and chearful manner yea and to love it too In a word pore not upon creature-changes nor the uncertain wheels of motion that are turning up and down we know not how nor how oft but fix your souls upon that All-seeing eye that unbounded understanding that unsearchable and infinite goodness that derives it self thorow the whole universe and sits in all the wheels of motion governing all the strange motions of the creatures in a wonderful and powerful manner and carrying them all in their several Orbs to one last and blessed end Thus imitate the Angelical life even whilst you are in the body converse with God in self-excellencies in creature-excellences Ordinances Providences And yet labour to be more like them still to abstract your mind from all these and all material and sensible things and to converse with God without the help of any creature I mean in the spirit and by a secret feeling of his Almighty Goodness and the energy of grace and the communications of a divine life in your souls In a word if you would taste of Heaven whilst you are upon Earth labour above all things for a true conjunction of your hearts with God in a secret feeling of his goodness and a reciprocation of love to him and to find the holy and blessed God exercising his grace and power upon all the faculties of your souls and
rendring them like unto himself and all these powers of the soul mutually spending themselves upon him freely and entirely as upon the chiefest good which is their proper and full object Seeing the Saints in glory shall be like unto the Angels of God in their way of living in and upon God alone receive I pray this Exhortation which I have so largely prosecuted and labour to begin that life as far as you can upon Earth Is there not reason for such an Inference Doth it not now flow naturally from the Doctrine If you think it do not I will add two or three particulars to strengthen this Inference or at least to clear it 1. It is highly reasonable that we begin to be that which we expect to be for ever to learn that way of living in which we hope to live to all eternity So that I infer upon as strong ground as the Apostle 1 Joh. 3. 3. He that hath this hope purifieth himself c. 2. If this be the life of Angels then it is the highest and noblest life that any created Being is capable of As by the bread of Angels and the tongue of Angels the most excellent food and the most excellent language is understood in Scripture so must we understand this life of Angels Now it is very suitable to the reasonable soul that immortal noble Being to aim at the highest and noblest life See Mat. 16. 26. What shall a man give in exchange for his soul 3. This shall not only be our life in Heaven but it self is something of Heaven a beginning of Heaven This life is not a thing really distinct from life eternal Joh. 17. 3. this is life eternal c. 1 Joh. 5. 13. Ye have eternal life Therefore we read of eternal life abiding in men and not abiding in them 1 Joh. 3 15. So also Joh. 6. 54. Whoso eateth my flesh hath eternal life A holy soul thus deified thus living in and upon God is as truly glorified upon Earth in some degree as the world is enlightened by the morning Sun which is as truly though not so glorionsly as by the Sun in its gâ—eatest height Oh low and ignoble spirits that can be satisfied with a happiness which shall only be in the world to come Certainly it true and proper speech to say that a Participation of God is an Anticipatien of Heaven and to be like unto him is to be with him You see what reason I have to make such an Inference and to form it into such an earnest Exhortation Oh therefore I beseech you before God and his holy Angels to endeavour to be like him and live like them Object Say not How can men on Earth live like Angels Ans 1. But fall on and imitate them though it be haud passibus aequis labour to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if you cannot be altogether 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2. We are bidden to live the life of God Mat. 5. ult Be perfâ—ct c. So 1 Pet. 1. 15. Be ye holy c. If I speak high how high speak these Texts Obj. Say not But how can this animal life permit this Ans 1. For 1. Thus men have lived in the body Thus lived Enoch Gen. 5. 22. Thus lived Paul Phil. 1. 21. Thus lived David that man after Gods own heart the greatest and most divine character that can be given of a mortal man Psal 73. 25. there is none upon Earth that I desire besides thee 2. Cannot we live in the body except we live to the body You see Saints upon Earth live above other men upon Earth and yet a little more pains take the other flight and you may live above your selves too higher than you do I will only add a Motive or two to this duty of living upon God 1. The last enemy to be overcome is creature-love This is the last enemy that keeps the field by which alone the greatest sort of men do perish everlastingly beat down this and you win the day and shall wear the Crown nay the very conquest of it is a Crown as I said before 2. To live upon God in the creature is to enjoy the creature in the best sense You will lose nothing of the creature by this means but shall enjoy it more fully than ever you did For the creature is ten thousand times sweeter in God than it is in it self Yea in a word this is the way to enjoy all the world and to enjoy the accomplishments of all men and all things as much as if they were your own 3. is the way never to lose any thing He that lives upon God spends upon a stock that cannot be wasted drinks at a fountain that cannot be exhausted So much as we enjoy of God in the creature we do not lose with it and that which we do not so enjoy we deserve to lose This then is the secure and honourable life in comparison of which the life of a Prince is but a wallowing in the mire Lord give us evermore this bread and hearts to feed upon it Amen FINIS Dei Animae Consortium SIVE Periphrasis in posterius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 JOHN 4. 16. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 O Mnia mî Deus est idem Deus est meus omnis Ipse Deo totus totus ipse Dei. Omnia mihi Deus est In Deo cujusque boni creati Singulae vires penitissimè insunt In Deo solaminà que implicantur O mnia vitae Omnis Deus est meus Omne quod feoit mihi dat benignus Omne quod prae se quia nil pependi Insuper menti dedit appetenti Omne quod ipse est Ipse in Deo totus In Deo versor medio que spiro In Deo grandescere concupisco Luceo totus radiis paternâ Luce receptis Ipse totus Dei. Non mâ—â— non alterius creati Sum Deus sed quantus ego tuus sum Vita quos à te radios recepi Oro reflâ—ctat Cunctate subter Deus alme quae sunt Judico mente inferiora nostrâ Absit ut rebus studeat caducis Mens generosa Fac teipsum mi Deus ipsiorem Huic meae menti penitus seipsâ Fac meipsum mi Deus uniorem Quà m mihi tecum GOD and the SOVL OR A Periphrase upon 1 JOHN 4. 16. dwelleth in God and God in him MY God is All things unto me All God is also mine I am O Lord wholly in thee And also wholly thine God is All things unto me The powers of each created good In God are all contain'd In him my Comforts all do bud Flourish and are maintain'd All God is mine He gave me all that he had made All which did not suffice My larger Soul therefore I pray'd He gave himself likewise I am wholly in God I' th midst of God I live and breath In him I 'm only bright The rayes with which I shine beneath Are borrow'd from his light I am wholly God's O Lord I 'm not at all mine own Nor for another free Let life be a reflection Of beams receiv'd from thee All things below thee Lord I judge To be below my Soul Oh let my nobler mind even grudge It self in dust to rowl Be more my self O God to me Than I my self have been Make me O God more one with thee than with my self Amen FINIS