And therefore you may hence learn in what sort you must seek after it 1. You must not place the chief part of your Religion in it as if it were a life of meer sorrow that we are called to by the Gospel But you must make it a servant to your Faith and Love and Joy in the Holy Ghost and other Graces As the use of the needle is but to make way for the thred and then it is the thred and not the needle that makes the seam So much of our sorrow is but to prepare for Faith and Love and these are they that close the Soul with Christ. It is therefore a sore mistake of some that are very apprehensive of their want of sorrow but little of their want of Faith or Love and that pray and strive to break their hearts or weep for sinne but not much for those higher Graces which it tendeth to One must be done and not the other left undone 2. As tears are the Expressions of the heart so those are the most kindly and sincere which voluntarlly flow from the inward feeling of the evill that we lament If you could weep never so much meerly because you think that tears are in themselves necessary and had not within the hatred of sinne and sense of its vile and killing nature this were not true Humiliation at all And if the Heart be humbled before the Lord it is not the want of tears that will cause him to despise it Some are so backward to weep by Nature that they cannot weep for any outward thing no not for the loss of the dearest friend when yet they would have done ten times more to redeem his life then some that have tears at will Groans are as sure Expressions of sorrow as tears with such as these And the hearty rejecting and detestation of sinne is yet a better Evidence then either But where men have naturally a weeping disposition which they can manifest about Crosses in the world and yet cannot shed a tear for sinne there the Case is the most suspicious 3. The principal Cause why you must strive for deeper sorrow is that you may obtaine the Ends of that sorrow that sinne may be more odious to you and more effectually mortified that self may be taken down and Christ may be valued and desired and exalted and that you may be fitted for a Holy Communion with God for the time to come and saved from Pride and kept in watchfullness 6. From this that was last said you have a Rule by which you may certainly discern what measure of Humiliation it is that must be had It mst go so deep as to undermine our Pride and so far the heart must needs be broken as is necessary to break the heart of sinne and carnal self If this be not done ther 's nothing done though you weep out your eyes You must be brought so low that the blood of Christ and the favour of God may be more precious in your eyes then all the world and in your very hearts prefered before it And then you may be sure that your Humiliation is sincere whether you have teares or none 7. From hence also you may see that you must take heed of ascribing to your own Humiliation any part of the office and honour of Christ Think not that you can satisfie the Justice of the Law or merit any thing of God by the worth of your sorrows though you should weep even tears of blood It is not true Humiliation if it consist not in the sense and acknowledgment of your unworthyness and desert of condemnation and if it do not lead you to look out for pardon and life from Christ as being lost and wholly insufficient for your selves And therefore it would be a plain contradiction if true Humiliation should be taken as Satisfaction or Merit or trusted on instead of Christ. IV. Having thus far opened the Nature and Reasons of true Humiliation I conclude with that advice which I principally here intended Refuse not to be throughly and deeply humbled Be not weary of the humbling workings of the Spirit Grief is an unwelcome guest to Nature but Grace can see Reason to bid it welcome Grace is ingenious and cannot look back on so great unkindness with unwillingness to mourne over it Zech. 12. 10. There is somewhat of God in godly sorrow and therefore the Soul consenteth to it and seeketh for it and calls it in Yea and is grieved that it can grieve no more Not that sorrow as sorrow is desireable but as a necessary Consequent of our grievous sinning and a necessary Antecedent of our further recovery As we may submit to Death it self with a cheerful willingness because it is sanctified to be the passage into Glory how dreadfull soever it be to Nature in it self so much more may we submit to Humiliation and brokenness of heart with a holy willingness because it is sanctified to be the entrance into the state of Grace Consider for your satisfaction of these following things 1. The main brunt of your sorrows will be but in the beginning and when once you are setled in a holy course you will finde more Peace and comfort then ever you could have had in any other way I know if you will be medling with sinne again it will in its measure breed sorrow again But a godly life is a life of Uprightness Conversion is a departing from sinne and consequently a departing from the Cause of sorrows And can you not bear such a sorrow for a little while 2. Consider but whence you are coming Is it not out of a state of wrath And where you have been all this while Was it not in the power of Satan And and what you have been doing all your lives Hath it not been the drudgery of sinne and the offending of your Lord and the destroying of your selves And is it meet is it reasonable is it ingenious for you to come out of such a Case without lamentation that you staid in it so long 3. Consider also that it is Necessary to your own recovery and Salvation Do you think to take so dangerous a surfeit and then to be cured without a Vomit You will endure for the health of your bodies the bitterest pills and loathsomest potions the shortest dyet and the letting out of your blood for you know that your life lieth on it and there is no remedy And should you not endure for the saving of your Souls the bitterest sorrows the keenest rebuks the freest Confessions and the most plentifull tears Sinne will not down at easier rates Self will not be conquered else The heart of it will not be broken till your hearts be broken We know your sorrows Merit nothing and make not God amends for your sinnes nor is it for want of sufficiency in the blood of Christ that we require them But it is part of the fruit of his Blood upon your Souls If his Blood do not
how long his patience will yet endure you or what hour he will call away your Souls And if death come alas what a case will it find you in how lamentably unready are you to meet him how unready to appear before the dreadfull God whom you have offended and what a terrible appearance do you think that will be to you most certainly if you die before you are converted you will not be from among the Devils and damned souls an hour The Law hath cursed you already and the execution will be answerable if you die in your sins And thus you may see the gain of sin and what it is that you have been doing all this while for your own Souls and what a case it is that you have brought you selvs into and what need you have speedily to look about you 5. The next step of your Consideration should be this Bethink your selves what a blessed Condition you might be in if by Conversion you were but recovered from this misery and brought home to God This moved the heart of the Prodigall son to return Luke 15. 16 17. When he came to himself he said How many hired servants of my fathers have bread enough and to spare and I perish with hunger He that had not husks to feed on with the swine considered the plenty that he had for saken at home The poorest member of the houshold of Christ is in a better condition then the greatest King on earth that is unconverted You might have lived another kinde of life then you have done for safety and benefit and true content if you would have turned your minds and life to God Were you but Converted you would be the living members of Christ and his precious benefits would be yours His blood would clense you from all your sins and they would be all freely forgiven you God would be Reconciled to to you and become your friend yea your Father and your God and will take you for his houshold servants and adopted children The Holy Ghost would dwell in you and guide your understandings and shew you that which flesh and blood connot reveal and bring you into acquaintance with the mysteries of God He will be a Spirit of Light and Life within you and work your hearts yet more to God and give you yet stronger inclinations and affections to the things above He will help you when you are weak and quicken you where you are dull and be your remembrancer when you are forgetfull of necessary things He will help you in prayer both for matter and for manner and help you in Meditation and conference and other duties He will warn you of your danger and strengthen you against temptations and cause you to overcome and if you fall he will cause you to rise again he will be an in-dwelling comforter to you and so effectually speak peace to you in the midst of your disquietness that by speaking it he will create it in you And in the multitude of your thoughts within you his comforts will delight your Souls O what a life might you live if Christ by his Spirit did once live in you you may easily conjecture how tender Christ would be of his own members how dearly he would love them how constantly he would watch over them how plentifully he would provide for them and how safely he would preserve them And if you should come into a rougher way he would lead you out Afflictions should never be laid on you but for your good and continue no longer then your need continueth them and be taken off at last to your satisfaction and contentment Indeed your life would be a life of mercies and that which is but a common Mercy to common men would be a speciall Mercy to you as coming from your Fathers love and furthering you salvation and hinting out to you your everlasting Mercies You could not open your eyes but you would see that which may encourage and comfort you all the works of God which you behold would shew you his Majesty his love and power and lead you to himself You could not open your Bible but you would find in it the blessed lines of Love O what good it would do you to read there the blessed Attributes of your God! to look upon his Name to peruse the description of his most perfect nature what good would it do you to read of the nature and incarnation and life and death and resurrection and assension and intercession and return of your blessed Redeemer what good would it do you to find those holy Rules which your new nature is agreeable to and to read over the Law that is written in your hearts and read the curse from which you are delivered what life and joy would your Souls receive from the many and full and free promises of grace were you once but truly sanctified and made new your condition would be often comfortable but alwaies safe and when you were in the greatest fears and perplexities you would still be fast in the armes of Christ And what a life would that be to have daily access to God in prayer to have leave in all your wants and dangers to seek to him with a promise of hearing and success that you may be sure of much more from him then a child can from the tenderest father or a wife from the most loving husband upon earth What a life would it be when you may alwaies think on God as your felicity and fetch your higehest delights from him from whom the ungodly have their greatest terrours And it is no contemptible part of your benefits that you may live among his people and in their speciall love and have a speciall Communion with them and interest in their prayers may possess among them the priviledges of the Saints and the Ordinances of God That in stead of idle talk and the unprofitable fellowship of the children and works of darkness you may joyne with the Church of God in his Praises and feed with them at his table on the body and blood of Christ and then have conveyances of renewed grace and a renewed pardon sealed to your Souls But how long should I stay if I should tell you but one half the blessings of a Sanctified and spirituall state In a word God would be yours Christ would be yours the Holy Ghost would be yours all things would be yours the whole world would have some relation to your wellfare Devils would be subdued to you and cast out of your Soules sinne would be both pardoned and overcome Angels would be ministring spirits unto you for your good The promises of Scripture would be yours and everlasting Glory would at last be yours and while you staid on earth you might comfort your selves as oft as you would with the believing foresight of that unconceiveable unspeakable endless felicity O sirs what a treasure have I here expressed in a few words what hearts would you have if they
in good sadness how to make sure of a life of endless Joy and Glory and how to scape the flames of Hell This is not an equall distribution of thy Thoughts As thou wilt confess at last in the horror of thy Soul 8. It is the end of your present Time and warnings that you may Consider and prepare for your Everlasting state What have you to do on Earth but to Consider how to get well to Heaven O that you did but know what a Mercy it is before you enter upon an Endless Life to have but Time to bethink you of it and to make your Election sure If you were to be called away suddenly this night and the Angel of the Lord should say to any of you Prepare for within this hour thou must die and appear before the living God Then would you not cry-out O not so suddenly Lord Let me have a little more time to Consider of my Condition Let me have one month longer to bethink me of the case of my Soul and to make sure that I am Justified from the guilt of my sins Let me have one day more at least to prepare for my Everlasting state for alas I am yet unready Would not these be your cries if God should call you presently away And yet now you have time you will not Consider of these matters and prepare 9. Moreover is it not time for you to Consider your waies when God doth Consider them If he would forget them or did not regard them you might regard them the less your selves But be sure of it he doth observe them whether you do or not and he Remembreth them though you forget them Dost thou not know that all the sins of thy life are still on record before the Lord saith Job 14. 16 17. Thou numbrest my steps dost thou not watch over my sinne My transgression is sealed up in a bag and thou sowest up mine iniquity Do you think that God forgets your sins as you forget them saith the Lord by the Prophet Hosea 7. 2. They Consider not in their hearts that I remember all their wickedness Now their doings have beset them about they are before my face But you 'l say what if God do Consider our waies why surely then it is not for nothing but evil is near if nor prevented As the Lord saith in Deut. 32. 34 35. Is not this laid up in store with me and sealed up among my Treasures To me belongeth vengeance and recompence their foot shall slide in due time For the day of their calamity is at hand and the things that shall come upon them make hast If God be registring up thy sins thou hast cause to tremble to think what that pretends For in this hardness and impenitency of thy heart thou art treasuring up wrath against the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous Judgments of God Rom. 2. 5. As Grace is the seed of Glory so sinne is the seed of shame and trouble and everlasting Torment and though it may seeme long before the Harvest you will tast the bitter fruit at last and whatsoever you have sowed that shall you reap 10. Moreover if any thing ail'd you you look that God should presently Consider you Or if you want any thing you think he should Consider your wants And yet will you not Consider of him and of your own wants When you are in trouble you 'l cry to God Have Mercy upon me O Lord Consider my Trouble Psal. 9 33. Consider and heare me O God Psal. 13. 3. When you lie in pain and sickness you 'l then cry to God Consider mine affliction and deliver me Psal. 119. 153. If you be oppressed or abused you 'l groan as the Israelites under their Task-masters and perhaps cry to God as the captived people Lam. 1. 11. See O Lord and Consider for I am become vile Remember O Lord what is come upon us Consider and behold our reproach ch 5. 1. 2. 20. And must God Consider of you that will not Consider of him or your own Souls Or may you not rather expect that dreadfull answer which he gives to such regardless sinners Prov. 1. 24 25 26 27 28 29 30. And heare your cries as you heare his Counsell and think of you as you thought of him Nay more then so even while you forget him the Lord doth daily Consider you and supply your wants and save you from dangers and should you then cast him out of your Thought If he did not think on you you would quickly feel it to your cost and sorrow 11. Moreover the Nature of the Matter is such as one would think should forâ—e a Reasonable creature to consider of it and often and earnestly to consider When all these things concurre in the matter he must be a block or a mad man that will not Consider 1. When they are the most excellent or the greatest things in all the world 2. When they are our own matters or neerly concerne us 3. When they are the most necessary and profitable and delightfull things And 4. When there is much difficulty in getting them and danger of losing them And all these go together in the matter of your Salvation 1. If you will not think of God and your Souls of Heaven and Hell what then will you think of All other things in the world are but toyes and jesting matters to these Crowns and Kingdoms Lands and Lordships are but chaff and bawbles dirt and dung to these Everlasting things The acts of renowned Kings and Conquerors are but as Popet-plaies in Comparison of the working out of your Salvation And yet will you not be drawn to the Consideration of such astonishing things as these One would think that the exceeding Greatness of the matter should force you to Consider it whether you will or no when smaller Objects affect not the Sences yet Greater will even force their way He that hath so hard a skin that he cannot feel a feather methinks should feel the weight of a mil-stone And if he feel not the prick of a pin methinks he should feel a dagger He that cannot hear one whisper methinks should hear a Cannon or a clap of Thunder if he have any such thing as hearing left him He hath bad eyes that cannot see the Sun One would think that so Glorious an Object as God should so entice the eyes of men that they should not look off him One would think that such matters as Heaven and Hell should follow thy thoughts which way ever thou goest so that thou shouldest not be able to look besides them or to think almost of any thing else unless with great neglect and disesteem O what a thing is a stony heart that can forget not only the God that he liveth by but also the place where he must live for ever Yea that will not be perswaded to the Sober Consideration of it for one hour 2. And as these are the Greatest
us and the cause of all our sinne and misery And this is the Revenge that is warrantable in the Penitent and some think is meant 2 Cor. 7. 11. 5o. As the Humbled Soul hath base thoughts of himself so he is willing that others should esteem and think of him accordingly even as a vile unworthy sinner so far as his disgrace may be no wrong to the Gospel or to others or dishonour to God His Pride is so far taken down that he can endure to be vilified with some Consent not approving of the sinne of any man that doth it maliciously but consenting to the Judgment and Rebukes of those that do it truly and to the Judgment of God even by them that do it maliciously The Humbled Soul doth not stand defending and unjustly extenuating his sinne and excusing himself and swelling against the Reprover Whatever he may do in a temptation if this temper were predominant his Pride and not Humility must be predominant But he judgeth himself as much as others can justly judg him and humbly confesseth to be Base in mens eyes till God shall think it meet to raise him and recover his esteem And the Root of all this in the will is 1o. A Love to God whom we have offended 2o. A hatred of sinne that hath offended him and that hath made us vile and 3o. A believing sense of the Love and Sufferings of Christ that in his flesh hath condemned sinne Rom. 8. 2 3. And thus you see what Humiliation is in the Will which is the very Life and Soul of true Humiliation 3o. Humiliation also consisteth in the Affections In an unfeigned sorrow for the sinne which we have committed and the corruption that is in us and a shame for these sinnes and a holy feare of God whom we have offended and of his Judgments which we have deserved and a hatred of our sinnes by which we have deserved them But as I must further shew you anon it is not the Measure but the sincerity of these Passions by which you must make a Judgment of your state And that will be hardly discerned by the Passions themselves but only by so much of the Will as is in them and therefore the Will is the safest to Judg by 4o. Humiliation also consisteth expressively in the outward actions when opportunity is offered And it is not true in the Heart if it refuse to appeare without when God requireth it in your ordinary course The outward acts of Humiliation are these 1o. A voluntary Confession of sinne to God and to men when God requireth it and that is when it is necessary to his Honour to the healing of them that we have endangered and satisfying the offended At least in the hearing of men in such cases as these to Confess them openly to God An unhumbled Soul will refuse this for the shame but the Humble will freely take shame to themselves and warne their brethren and justifie God and give him the Glory 1. Joh. 1. 9. If we confess our sinnes he is faithfull and just to forgive us Read Mark 3. 6. Levit. 5. 5. 16. 21 26. 40. Num. 5. 6 7. Jam 5. 16. Confess your faults one to another and pray one for another that yee may be healed Prov. 28. 13. He that hideth his sinnes shall not prosper but who so confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy Not that any man is to confess his secret sinnes to others except in case that he cannot otherwise find relief Nor that a man is to publish those offences of his owne by which he may further dishonour God and hinder the Gospel But when the sinne is open already and specially when the offence of others the hardening of the wicked the satisfaction of the Church concerning our Repentance do require our Confession and open Lamentation the Humble Soul both must and will submit to it But the rotten hearted unhumbled Hypocrite will Confess but in these cases 1o. When the secrecy of the Confession or the smalness of the fault or the Customariness of such Confessing doth make it to be a matter of no great disgrace 2o. Or when it is so open that it is in vain to attempt to hide it and his Confession will do nothing to increase the disgrace 3o. Or when Conscience is awakened or they see they must die or are forced by some terrible Judgment of God In all these cases the wicked may Confess And so Judas will Confess I have sinned in bâ—traying the innocent blood And Pharaoh will Confess I and my people have sinned And a Thief on the Gallows will Confess and the vilest wretches on their death bed will Confess But we have more death-bed Confessions then voluntary Confessions before the Church Nay so far hath Pride and Hypocrisie prevailed and the ancient discipline of the Church been neglected that I think in most Countries in England there are many more that make Confessions on the Gallows then personally in the Congregation 2o. Humiliation must be also expressed by all those external means and signes which God by Scripture or Nature calleth us to As by tears and groans so far as we can seasonably procure them And by Fasting and laying by our worldly pomp and bravery and using meane though decent attire and by condescending to men of the lower sort and stooping to the meanest By humble Language and Carriage and by forgiving others on this account that we are sensible of the greatness of our Debts to God And thus I have briefly shewed you the true Nature of Humiliation that you may know what it is that I am perswading you to and which you must submit your hearts unto II. When I have told you the Use and Ends of Humiliation you will see more of the Reason of it's Necessity to your selves And first it is one Use of Humiliation to help on the Mortification of the flesh or Carnal self and to annihilate it as it is the Idol of the Soul The nature of mans sinfull and miserable estate is that he is fallen from God to Himself and liveth now to Himself studying and loving and pleasing Himself his Natural self above God And a sinner will let go many outward sinnes and be driven from the out-works before he will let go Carnal self and be driven from the Castle and strength of sinne There is no part of Mortification so Necessary and so Hard as Self-denial Indeed this doth virtually comprehend all the rest and if this be done all 's done If it were but his Friend his Superfluities his House his Lands perhaps a Carnal heart might part with it But to part with his life his All his Self this is a hard saying to him and enough to make him go away sorrowfull as Luke 18. 22 23 24. And therefore here appeareth the Necessity of Humiliation This layeth all the Load on Self and breaketh the heart of the old man and maketh a man loath himself that formerly doted on himself
Marriage supper and even compelleth them to come in but he expecteth that they bring a wedding garment and come not in a garbe that shall dishonour his house Though his Grace be free yet he will not expose it to contempt but will have the fullness and freeness of it glorified Though he came not to Redeem himself but us yet he came to be glorified in the work of our Redemption He hath no Grace so free as to save them that will not esteem it and give him thanks for it And therefore though Faith is enough to accept the gift yet must it be a thankfull faith that will magnifie the giver and a humble faith that will feele the work of it and an obediential faith that will answer the ends of it And therefore that faith which is the Condition of our Justification is fitted as well to the honour of the Giver as the commodity of the receiver And as Reason telleth us that it should be so so Christian ingenuity consenteth that it be so The Soul that is truly united to Christ and partaketh of his nature doth think it's own Receiving greatest where the honour of Christ is greatest And it cannot take pleasure in the thoughts of such a kind of Grace as should dishonour the Lord of Grace himself As Christ is solicitous for the saving of the Soul so that he makes the Soul solicitous of the right entertainment of him that saveth it And therefore though his Blood and not his Teaching or his Government was the Ranson of our Souls yet he is resolved to Justifie none by his Blood but on the Condition of that Faith which is a hearty Consent to his Teaching and Dominion It is not in the Application or bestowing of Christ's benefits as it was in the purchasing of them When he came to Ransom us he consented to be a sufferer and gave his cheeks to the smiter and submitted to reproach he endured the Cross despising the shame and being reviled he reviled not but prayed for his persecutors But when he comes by his saving Grace into the Soul he will not there be entertained with contempt For in the flesh he came on purpose to be humbled but in the Spirit he comes to be exalted In the flesh he came to condemn the sinne that reigned in our flesh Rom. 8. 3. and so was made sinne for us that is a Sacrifice for sinne 2 Cor. 5. 21. But in the Spirit he comes to conquer our flesh and by the Law of his quickning Spirit to free us from the Law of sinne and death both that the Righteousness of the Law might be fullfilled in us and also that there might be no Condemnation to us who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit Rom. 8. 1 2 4. The Kingdom of Christ was not worldly for if it had been worldly he would have sought to establish it by strength of armes and fighting which are worldly means Joh. 18. 36. But his Kingdom is within us It is a Spiritual Kingdom and therefore though in the world he was used with contempt as a fool and as a Sinner and a man of sorrows yet within us he will be used with honour and reverence as a King and absolute Lord. It was the houre of the executioner and the power of darkness when he was in his suffering but it is the houre of his triumph and marriage and the prevailing Power of the Heavenly Light when he cometh by Saving Grace into the Soul On the Cross he was as a sinner and stood in our place and bore what was our due and not his owne But in the Soul he is the Conquerour of sinne and cometh to take possession of his own and doth the work that belongeth to him in his dignity and therefore he will there be acknowledged and honoured On the Cross he was pulling down the Kingdom of Satan and setting up his own but in the preparatory purchase But in the Soul he doth both by immediate execution On the Cross sinne and Satan had their full blow at him But when he entred the Soul he hath his blow at them and ceaseth not till he have destroyed them In purchasing he expended his own But in Converting he takes possession of that which he purchased In a word he came into the world in flesh for his undertaken Humiliation but he comes into the Soul by his Spirit for his deserved exaltation And therefore though he endured to be spit upon in the flâ—sh he will not endure to be sleighted in the Soul And as in the world he was scorned with the Title of a King and crowned with thorns and clothed in such Kingly robes as might make him the fitter object for their reproach So when his Spirit entereth into the Soul he will be there inthroned in our most reverent subjective and deepest esteeme and crowned with our highest Love and Thankfullnes and bowed to with the tenders of Obedience and our praise The Cross shall there be the portion of his enemies and the Crown and Scepter shall be his and as all were preferred before him on Earth even Barrabas himself so all things shall be put under him in the Sanctified Soul and he shall be preferred before all This is the end of Humiliation to make ready the heart for a fuller entertainment of the Lord that bought it and to prepare the way before him and fit the Soul to be the Temple of his Spirit A humbled Soul would never have put him off with excuses from Oxen and Farms and Wives As Luke 14. and Matth. 22. But the unhumbled will make light of him And 2. As Christ himself will be honourably recieved or not at all so must the Mercies and Graces which he offereth He will not apply his blood and righteousness to them that care not for it He will not pardon such a masse of iniquity and remove such mountaines as lie upon the Soul for them that feel not the Necessity of such a Mercy He will not take men from the power of the Devil and the drudgery of sinne and the suburbs of Hell and make them his Members and the Sonnes of God and the Heirs of Heaven that have not learn't the value of these benefits but set more by their very sinne and misery and the trifles of the world Christ doth not despise his Blood his Spirit his Covenant his Pardon nor his Heavenly Inheritance and therefore he will give them to none that do despise them till he teacheth them better to know their worth Do you think it would stand with the Wisdom of Christ to give such unspeakable blessings as these to men that have not hearts to value them Why it is more to give a man Justification and Adoption then to give him all this visible world the Sunne the Moone the Firmament and the Earth And should these be given to one that cares not for them Why by this meanes God should miss of his ends He should not
Saints you have far more to do then other men You have a multitude of head-strong passions to subdue and abundance of deadly sinnes to kill and rooted vices to root upâ—â— You have many a false opinion of God and his waies to be plucked up and the customes of many years standing to be broken You have blind minds that must be enlightned with heavenly kowledg and abundance of Spiritual Truths that are above the reach of flesh and blood that you must needs learn and understand You have much to know that is hard to be known You have a dead Soul to be made alive and a hard heart to be melted and a scared Conscience to be softned and made tender and the guilt of many thousand sinnes to be pardoned You have a new heart to get and a new End to ayme at and seek after and a new life to live abundance of Enemies you have to sight with and overcome abundance of temptations to resist and conquer Many Graces to get and preserve and exercise and increase and abundance of holy works to do for the Service of God and the good of your selves and others O what a deal of work doth every one of these words conteine and yet what abundance more might I name And have you all this to do and yet will you delay And they are not indifferent matters that are before you It is no less then the saving of your Souls and the obtaining the blessed Glory of the Saints Necessity is upon you These are things that Must be done or else wo to you that ever you were born And yet have you another day to lose Why Sirs if you had a hundred mile to go in a day or two upon paine of death would you delay O think of the work that you have to do and then judg whether it be not time to stirre 20. And me thinks it should exceedingly terrifie you to consider what abundance by such Delayes do perish and how few that wilfully delay are ever converted and saved Many a Soul that once had purposes hereafter to repent is now in the misery where there is no Repentance that will do them any good For my part though I have known some very few Converted when they were old yet I must needs say both that they were very few indeed and that I had reason to believe that they were such that had sinned before in ignorance and did not wilfully put off Repentance when they were convinced that they must turn Though I doubt not but God may convert even these if he please yet I cannot say that I have ever known many if any such to be converted Sure I am that Gods usual time is in Child-hood or youth before they have long abused grace and wilfully delaid to turn when they were convinced Some considerable time I confess many have before their first convictions and purposes be brought to any great ripeness of performance but O how dangerous is it to delay 21. Consider also Either Conversion is Good or Bad for you Either it is needfull or unnecessary If it be bad and a needless thing then let it alone for altogether But if you are convinced that it is Good and necessary is it not better now then to stay any longer Is it not the sooner the better Are you afraid of being safe or happy too soon If you are sick you care not how soon you are well If you have a bone out you care not how soon it is set If you fall into the water you care not how soon you get out If your house be on fire you care not how soon it be quenched If you are but in fears by any doubts or ill tidings you care not how soon your fears be over And yet are you afraid of being to soon out of the power of the Devil and the danger of Hell and of being too soon the Sons of God and the holy justified heirs of Heaven 22. Consider also Either you can turn now or not If you can and yet will not you are utterly without excuse If you cannot to day how much less will you be able hereafter when strength is less and difficulties greater and burdens more Is it not time therefore to make out to Christ for strength and should not the very sense of your disability disswade you from delay 23. Consider how long you have staid already and put Gods Patience to it by your folly Hath not the Devil the world and the flesh had many years time of your life already Have you not long enough been swallowing the poison of sinne and long enough been abusing the Lord that made you and the blood of the Sonne of God that was shed for you and the Spirit of Grace that hath moved and perswaded with you Are you not yet gone far enough from God and have you not yet done enough to the damning of your selves and casting away Everlasting Life O wretched sinners it is rather time for you to fall down on your faces before the Lord and with tears and groans to lament it day and night that ever you have gone so far in sinne and delayed so long to turn to him as you have done Sure if after so many years rebellion you are yet so far from lamenting it that you had rather have more of it and had rather hold on a little longer no wonder if God forsake you and let you alone 24. Have you any hopes of Gods acceptance and your Salvation or not If you have such hopes that when you turn God will pardon all your sinnes and give you Everlasting Life is it think you an ingenious thing to desire to offend him yet a little longer from whom you expect such exceeding Mercy and Glory as you do Have you the faces to speak out what is in your hearts and practice and to go to God with such words as these Lord I know I cannot have the pardon of one sinne without the Blood of Christ and the riches of thy Mercy Nor can I be saved from Hell without it But yet I hope for all this from thy Grace I beseech thee let me live a little longer in my sinnes a little longer let me trample on the Blood of Christ and despise thy commands and abuse thy Mercies a little longer let me spit in the face of thy Goodness and prefer the flesh and the world before thee and then pardon me all that ever I did and take me into Glory Could you for shame put up such a request to God as this If you could you are past shame If not then do not practise and desire that which you cannot for shame speak out and request 25. Moreover it is an exceeding advantage to you to come in to God betimes and an exceeding loss that you will suffer by delay if you were sure to be converted at the last If you speedily come in you may have time to learn and get more understanding in the matters of
hasting away me thinks if you have your wits and sense about you you should presently turn and make sure of Heaven without any more delay 31. Consider also whether it be equal that you should delay your Conversion when you can seasonably dispatch your worldly business and when your flesh would be provided for you can hearken to it without Delay You have wit enough to sow your seed in season and will not delay it till the time of harvest You will reap your corn when it is ripe and gather your fruit when it is ripe without delay You observe the seasons in the course of your labours day by day and year by year You will not lie in bed when you should be at your work nor delay all night to go to your rest nor suffer your servants to delay your business You will know your dinner time and supper time day by day If you be sick you will seek help without delay lest your disease should grow to be uncurable And yet will you delay your Conversion and the making sure of Heaven Why Sirs shall these trifles be done without delay and shall your Salvation be put off In the Name of God Sirs what do you think of Do you imagine that you can better suffer Hell-fâ—re then hunger or nakedness Or that you can better bear the loss of Everlasting Joyes then the loss of your commodities and provisions in the world Sure if you believe the life to come you cannot think so And can you have while for every thing except that one thing which all the rest are meerly to promote and in comparison of which they are all but dreams Can you have while to work to plow and sow and reap and cannot you have while to prepare for Eternal Life Why Sirs if you cannot find time yet to search your hearts and turn to God and prepare for death give over eating and drinking and sleeping and say you cannot have time for these You may as wisely say so for these smaller matters as the greater 32. Moreover if men offer you courtesies and commodities for your bodies you will not stand Delaying and need so many perswasions to accept them If your Landlord would for nothing renew your lease if any man would give you houses or lands would you delay so long before you would accept them A beggar at your doore will not only thankfully take your almes without your intreaty and importunity but will beg for it and be importunate with you to give it And yet will you Delay to accept the blessed offers of Grace which is a greater thing 33. Ye Consider that it is God that is the Giver and you that are the miserable beggars and receivers And therefore it is fitter that you should wait on God and call on him for his Grace when he seemeth to delay and not that he should waite on you He can live without your receiving but you cannot live without his giving The beggar must be glad of an alms at any time and the condemned person of a pardon at any time but the giver may well expect that his gift be received without delay or else he may let them go without it 34. And me thinks you should not deal worse with God when he comes to you as a Physician to save your own Souls then you would do with a neighbour or a friend when it is not for your own good but for theirs If your neighbour lay a dying you would go and visit him without delay If he fell down in a swoon you would catch him up without delay If he fell into the fire or water you would pluck him out without delay Yea you would do thus much by a very beast And yet will you delay when it is not another but your selves that are sinking and drowning and within a step of death and desparation If a woman be but in travaile her neighbours will come to her without delay And yet when their own Souls are in bondage to sinne and Satan and a state of death they will let them lie there year after year and when we desire them to be Converted here 's nothing but delaies 35. If yet you perceive not how unreasonably you deale with God and your Souls I beseech you consider whether you do not deal worse with him then you do with the Devil himself If Satan or his servants perswade you to sinne you delay not so long but you are presently at it You are ready to follow every tipling companion or gamester that puts up the finger You are as ready to go as they to invite you The very sight of the cup doth presently prevaile with the drunkard and the sight of his filthy mate prevaileth with the fornicatour and sinne can be presently entertained without delay But when God comes when Christ calls when the Spirit moveth when the minister perswadeth when Conscience is convinced we can have nothing after all but wishes and purposes and promises with Delaies O what a stomack hath that man or what a brain that will snatch at poyson and swallow dung and dirt with greediness without any chewing and when you offer him meat stands sighing and looking on it and hardly will be perswaded to put it in his mouth and if he do he is chewing it so long that at last he even spits it out againe and cannot get it down Thus deal ungodly wretches between their poisonous sins and the saving means and Grace of Christ. Nay more then this so eager are they on their sinne that we are not able to intreat them to delay it When the passionate man is but provoked we cannot perswade him to delay his rayling language so long as to consider first of the issue We cannot intreat the drunkard to put off his drunkenness but for one twelve-month while he tryeth another course All the ministers in the Country cannot perswade the worldling to forbear his worldliness and the proud persons their pride and the ungodly person his ungodliness for the space of one moneth or week or day And yet when God hath a command and a request to them to Turn to him and be saved here they can Delay without our intreaty 36. Consider also that it is not possible for you to turn too soon nor will you ever have cause to repent of your speediness Delay may undoe you but speedy turning can do you no harm I wonder what hurt you think it can do you to be quickly reconciled to God And why then should there be any Delay where it is not possible to be too hasty Do you think that there is ever a Saint in Heaven yea or on Earth either that is sorry that he stayed not longer unconverted No you shall never hear of such a repentance from the mouth of any that is indeed converted 37. But I must tell you on the contrary side that if ever you be so hapy as to be Converted you will Repent it and an hundred
DIRECTIONS AND PERSWASIONS TO A Sound CONVERSION For Prevention of that Deceit and Damnation of Souls and of those Scandals Heresies and desperate Apostasies that are the Consequents of a Counterfeit or Superficial Change By Richard Baxter LONDON Printed by A. M. for Nevil Simmons Book-seller in Kederminster and are to be sold by him there and by N. Ekins at the Gun in Pauls Church-yard 1658. The Preface IT is weight so unconceivable that dependeth on the soundness of our Conversion and Sanctification that our care and diligence cannot be too great to make it sure As the professed Atheist Heathens and Infidels without so the self-deceiving Hypocrites within the Church do wilfully cast away themselves for ever by neglecting such a business of everlasting consequence when they have time and warnings and assistance to dispatch it Multitudes live like bruits or Atheists forgetting that they are born in sinne and misery and setled in it by wilfull custom and must be Converted or Condemned These know not many of them what need they have of a Conversion nor what Conversion or Sanctification is And some that have been Preachers of the Gospel have been so lamentably ignorant in so great a matter that they have perswaded the poor deluded people that it is only the gross and haynous sinners that need Conversion branding them with the name of Puritans that will not take a dead Profession joyned with Civility for true Sanctification and promise Salvation to those that Christ hath with many asseverations professed shall not enter into the Kingdom of God Others that confess that a through Sanctification is a necessary thing do delude their souls with something that is like it Hence is the misery and dishonour of the Church Holiness it self is disgraced by the sins of them that are unholy because they pretend to that which they have not Hence it is that we have thousands that call themselves Christians that live a worldly fleshly life and some of them hating the way of Godliness and yet think they are Converted because they are sorry when they have sinned and wish when it is past that they had not done it and cry God mercy for it and confess that they are sinners and this they take for true Repentance When sinne was never mortified in their souls nor their hearts ever brought to hate it and forsake it But when they have had the profit and pleasure of sinne they are sorry for the danger but never regenerate and made New Creatures by the Spirit of Christ. Hence also it is that we have such abundance of meer Opinionists that take themselves for Religious people Because they have changed their Opinions and their parties and can prate contentiously against those that are not of their mind and joyn themselves with those that seem to be the strictest they take themselves to be truly Sanctified And this makes such gadding from one opinion to another and such censuring reviling and divisions upon that account because their Religion is most in their Opinions and hath not mortified their carnal selfish inclinations and Passions nor brought them to a holy heavenly mind Hence also it is that we have so many sensual scandalous Professours that seem to be Religious but bridle not their tongues their appetites or their lusts but are railers or backbiters or tipplers or gluttons or filthy and lascivious or some way scandalous to their holy Profession because they are strangers to a through-Conversion but take up with the counterfeit of a superficial change Hence also we have so many worldlings that think themselves Religious men that make Christ but a servant to their worldly interest and seek Heaven but for a reserve when Earth forsakes them and have something in this world that is so dear to them that they cannot forsake it for the hopes of Glory but give up themselves to Christ with secret exceptions and reserves for their prosperity in the world And all because they never knew a sound Conversion which should have rooted out of their Hearts this worldly interest and delivered them up entirely and absolutely to Christ. Hence also it is that we have so few Professours that can lay by their Pride and bear disesteem or injury and love their enemies and bless them that curse them yea or love their godly friends that cross them or dishonour them And so few that can deny themselves in their honour or any considerable thing for the sake of Christ and in obedience and conformity to his will And all because they never had that saving change that takes down Self and sets up Christ as Soveraigne in the soul. And hence also it is that we have in this age so many dreadful instances of Apostasie So many reproaching the Scripture that once they thought had Converted them and the way of Holiness that once they did profess and denying the Lord himself that bought them and all because they formerly took up with a superficial counterfeit Conversion O how commonly and how lamentably doth this misery appear among Professours in their unsavoury discourse their strife and envy on Religious pretenses their dead formality their passionate divisions or their selfish Proud and earthly minds A through Conversion would have cured all this at least as to the dominion of it Having therefore in my call to the unconverted endeavoured to awaken careless souls and perswade the obstinate to Turn and Live I have here spoken to them that seem to be about the work and given them some Directions and Perswasions to prevent their perishing in the birth and so to prevent that Hypocrisie which else they are like to be formed into and the deceit of their hearts the Errour of their Lives and the Misery at their Death which is like to follow That they live not as those that flatter God with their mouth and lie unto him with their tongues because their heart is not right with him neither are they stedfast in his Covenant Psal. 78. 36 37 Lest denying deep entertainment and rooting to the seed of Life or choaking it by the radicated predominant Love and cares of the world they wither when the heat of persecution shall break forth Matth. 13. 20 21 22. And lest building on the sands they fall when the winds and storms arise and their fall be great Matth. 7. 26 27. And so they go out from us that they may be made manifest that they were not of us For if they had been of us they would no doubt have continued with us 1 Joh. 2. 19. Look therefore to this great important business and give all diligence to make your calling and election sure 2 Pet. 1. 10. And trust not your hearts too easily or too confidently But turn to the Lord with all your hearts Joel 2. 12. Cleave to him Resolvedly or with Purpose of heart Acts 11. 23. And see that you sell all and buy the Pearl Matth. 13. 46. And stick not at the price but absolutely resign
him What say you now will you yet obey So will God do by you if he love you and mean to save you When he hath taken away your wealth your friends your children will you then hearken to him or will you not When you lie groaning on your couch and all your parts are overwhelmed with paines and death begins to lay hands upon you and bids you now come and answer for your rebellions and delayes before the living God What will you do then Will you turn or not O the lamentable folly of sinners that put themselves to so much sorrow and create calamity for themselves When sickness comes and death draws near you beg and cry and groan and promise When you feele the rod what Christians will you then be And why not without so much adoe You then think God deales somewhat hardly with you And why will you not turn then by gentler means You might spare your selves much of this misery if you would and you will not Is it a seemly thing for a man to be driven to Heaven by scourges Is God so bad a Master and Heaven so bad a place that you will not turn to them and mind them and seek them till there be no remedy and you are as it were driven to it against your wills Is the world such an Inheritance and sinne so good a thing and the flesh or devil so good a Master that you will not leave them till you are whipt away What a shamefull unreasonable course is this Well sirs the case is plain before you Turn you must at one time or other or be the firebrands of Hell And seeing it is a thing that must be done were it not best for you to take the easiest and the surest way to do it Why this is the easiest and the surest way even to strike while the iron is hot before it coole again and to go through with it when God doth move you and perswade you If you love your flesh it self do not put him to take up the rod and fetch you home by stripes and terrours But that 's not the worst For it will sorely hazard the work it self and consequently your salvation if you do not go through with it at the first attempt I know there is many a one that hath been converted and saved after many purposes and promises and half-conversions But yet I must tell you that this is a very dangerous course For you do not know when you grieve the Spirit of grace and set so light by mercy when it is offered you whether that Spirit may not utterly forsake you and leave you to your own ungodly wills and let you take your lusts and pleasures and say Let this wretch be filthy still let him keep his drunkenness his companions his worldliness and the curse of God with them till he have tried what it is that they will do for him Let him follow his own conceits and the pride and obstinacy of his own heart till he find whether they will bring him Let him serve the flesh and the world till he understand whether God or they be the better master Seeing he will not be wise on earth let him learn in hell and let torments teach him seeing mercy might not teach him O poor soul what a case art thou in if this should once be the resolution of God Moreover you may easily know that the longer you stay the more leasure you give the devil to assault you and to try one way when he cannot prevail by another and to strengthen his temptations Like a foolish Souldier that will stand still to be shot at rather then assault the enemy And the longer you delay the more your sin gets strength and rooting If you cannot bend a twig how wil you be able to bend it when it is a Tree If you cannot pluck up a tender plant are you likely to pluck up a sturdy Oak Custom gives strength and root to vices A Blackmoor may as well change his skin or a Leopard his spots as those that are accustomed to do evil can learn to do well Jer. 13. 23. If you stick at Conversion as a difficult matter to day it will be more difficult to morrow or the next moneth and the next year then it is now Yea the very resistance of the Spirit doth harden the heart and the delayes and triflings of the soul do bring it to an insensibility and boldness in sinne and drive away the fear of God from the heart Now it may be you are somewhat awakened and begin to see that you must turn or die but if you trifle and delay this light may be gone and leave you in greater darkness then before and the voice that now awakeneth you may be silent and leave you to fall asleep again Moreover you know that you are uncertain of the continuance of the Gospel You know not whether you shall have such lively serious Preachers as you have now Nor you know not whether you shall have such godly neighbours and company to encourage you and help you in the work God will remove them one after another to himself and then you will have fewer Prayers for you and fewer warnings and good examples and perhaps be left wholly to the company of deceived ungodly fools that will do nothing but hinder and discourage you from Conversion And you are not sure that Religion will continue in that reputation as now it is in The Times may turn before you turn and godliness may become a scorn again and it may be a matter of suffering and may cost you your lives to live as the servants of Christ must do And therefore if you stop at it now as a difficult thing when you have all the helps and encouragements that you can expect and the way to Heaven is made so fair and when Magistrates and Ministers and Neighbours are ready to encourage and help you what will you do in times of persecutions and discouragement If you cannot turn when you have all these helps and means what will you do when they are taken from you If you cannot row with the stream how will you row against it If you dare not set to Sea when you have wind and tide and sunshine what will you do in stormes and tempests when all is against you O what would some of your forefathers have given to have seen the daies that you see How glad would many a thousand in other Countries of the world be to have but the helps to Heaven that you have Never look to have the way fairer and easier while you live If you think Heaven is offered you at too deer a rate now you may even let it go and try whether Hell be better for the next offer is like to be upon harder termes rather then easier If you cannot now find in your hearts to turn and live a holy life What would you have done in the daies of the Apostles or antient
yea and the current of your prayers and all the rest of your religious performances When in confession you should acknowledge and laâ—ent an unregenerate carnall state you will only confess that you have the infirmities of the Saints and that you have this or that sinne which yet you think is mortified When you should importunately beg for Renewing grace you will beg only for strengthning grace or assurance When you should be labouring to break your hearts you will be studying to heal them and will be hearkning after present comforts when you have more need of godly sorrow It will fill your mouthes in prayer with Pharisaicall thanksgivings for the mercies of Regeneration Justification Adoption Sanctification which you never received Little doth many a soul know what sanctification and the feverall graces of the Spirit are that use to give God thanks for them There 's many and many a one that must for ever be in hell that were used in their prayers to give God thanks for their hopes of glory And the common cause of all this deceit and misery is that men do run from under the hands of their Physician before he ever went to the bottom of their sore and go away with a half-conversion and so spend all the rest of their lives in a meer delusion as verily thinking they are converted when they are not How confidently will such receive the Lords Supper and thrust themselves into the communion of the Saints as if they had as good right as any to be there till the Lord of the Feast shall take them to task and say Friend how comest thou in hither not having on a wedding garment and then they will be speechless Mat. 22. 12. How many false deceiving comforts and perhaps even seeming raptures and assurance may these have in themselves as verily thinking their case is good when alas they never yet laid the foundation Yea and it is to be observed that Satan is a friend to the comforts of this kind of men and therefore will do all that he can to promote them For he would willingly keep his Garrison in peace Luk. 11. 21. And therefore he may possibly be a comforting spirit to them himself and imitate the Holy Ghost the Comforter of the Saints And it may be give them such raptures as seem higher then those which the Spirit of holiness doth give He envieth the Saints their peace and comfort because he foresees how durable they will prove But he can be content that deluded hypocrites may have joy because their comforts do not weaken but strengthen his Kingdom within them and he knows they are like to endure but for a while And thus you may perceive how hard it is to convert one of these half-converted men that have strangled the New Creature as it were in the birth and that are fortified against all the means of grace by a false conceit that they are sanctified already See therefore that you make sure work and take not up in the middle and with halves but take your present time and give up your souls to a totall change 4. Consider If you take up short of a through Conversion you lose all your labour and sufferings and hopes as to the matter of your salvation And what pitty is it that so much should be lost Alas to see many of our hearers toucht at a Sermon and come to a Minister and bewail their sinne and seem to be humbled and promise to be new men and yet all this to be lost How sad a case is this to think of To see them leave their company and former course of life and come among the professors of holiness and all men take them for reall Converts and yet all this to be lost and their souls lost after all How sad a case is this If you grow up to the greatest parts for outward duty and be able to discourse or pray or preach even to the admiration of the heaâ—ers yet if you do not ground this on a through Conversion all is but lost as to your own salvation If you keep up the highest strain of profession and get the highest esteem in the Church so that others depend upon you as Oracles yea if the Pope with all his infallibility should cannonize you for Saints it were all but loss If you should keep up the most confident perswasions of your salvation and hope to go to Heaven to the last hour of your lives it were all but lost if you build not all on a through Conversion Yea if you should be taken by persecutors for one of the party to which you joyn and should suffer for the cause of Religion among them all were but lost without a sound Conversion 1 Cor. 13 1 2 3. It is a pittifull case to see some poor unsanctified souls how they wander and change from one opinion to another and from party to party to find out that which they want within They turn to this party first and that party next and then to another and then think they are sure in the way to Heaven when they never throughly turned to God by Jesus Christ and therefore are certainly out of the way whatever party it be that they joyn with Some go to the giddy Sects that make the highest pretences to strictness And some go to Rome because they think that there they shall have more company and hear the deluding sound of Vnity Vniversality Antiquity Succession Miracles and such like And then they think they have hit the way Alas poor souls If God were but nearest and dearest to your hearts and Christ and his Righteousnes exalted within you and your soules unfeignedly turned from your sinnes you would be in the certain way to Heaven in what Countrey or company or Church soever you were supposing that you believe and do nothing there which is inconsistent with this life of Grace Though yet every Christian should choose that particular Society if he can where he may not only be saved but most certainly saved and find the greatest helpes and least hinderances or else where he may do God the greatest service But choose what company you will in all the world the strictest the most reformed the most splendid in outward pompe and glory or of whatever excellency else you can imagine you will never be saved in it your selves as long as your hearts are unconverted I know the Papists have found out many devices by Sacraments and Ceremonies and the Merits of the Saints to patch up the defect of a through Conversion but all are meer delusions that pretend to such a thing O then think of this poor sinner Hast thou gone so farre and done so much and shall all be lost because thou wilt not follow it to the end Hast thou groaned and wept and confessed and bemoaned thine own condition Hast thou prayed and read and heard and fasted and changed thy company and much of thy course of life and shall all
in the dark and therefore we call you to the Law and to the Testimony and desire you to take our words into the light and see whether they be according to the Word of the Lord. Nothing troubleth us more then that we cannot perswade our hearers to this tryal Some of them are so hardened in their sinne and misery that they will not be at so much labour as to open their Bibles and try whether we say true or not Some of them will not trouble their minds with the thoughts of it Psal. 10 4. God is not in all their thoughts And some are already too wise to learn they will not so long abate their confidence of their former opinions though poor soules their ignorance doth threaten their damnation And some are so engaged in a sinfull party that their companions will not give them leave to make so much question of the way that they are in And some will scarce take the Scripture for the Rule by which they must try and be tryed but look more to custom and the will of those in power over them And most are unwilling to try because they are unwilling to know the truth and cannot endure to find themselves miserable nor see the sinne which they would not leave nor see the duty which they love not to practice And thus we cannot get them to try whether the things that we teach them be so For want of this it is that men deceive themselves and think their case to be safe when it is miserable because they will not try it by the Word This makes them rage and be confident in their folly Prov. 14. 16. and laugh and sing at the brink of Hell and swimme as merrily down the stream to the devouring gulf as if no evil were near them This makes them in the depth of misery to have no pitty on themselves and to do so little to escape it Though they have time and means and helps at hand yet there are not hearts in them to make use of them yea they runne themselves daily further on the score and all because we cannot get them to search the Scripture and try whether sinne be so small a matter and whether this will not be bitterness in the end Hence it is that they are so easily drawn by a temptation and that they dislike a holy life and have base thoughts of them that are most diligent for salvation and are most precious in the eyes of God and that they can even deride the way that they should walk in Prov. 1 22. Psal. 1. 2. because they will not search the Scripture to see what it saith to these matters The Word is a Light and would do much to open their eyes and winne them over to God if they would but come to it with a desire to know the truth You think that the ungodly that are rich and great are in a better condition then a godly man that is poor and despised And why is this but because you will not go into the Sanctuary and see in what a slippery place they stand and what will be the end of these men Psal. 73. 16 17 22. In a word this is the undoing of millions of souls They are all their life time out of the way to Heaven and yet will not be perswaded to ask the way but they runne on and wink and put it to the venture Many a thousand are gone out of the world before they ever spent the quantity of one day in trying by the Scripture whether their state were good and their way were right Nay let their Teachers tell them that they must be sanctified and take another course they will differ from their Teachers though they be never so wise or Learned and they will contradict them and not believe or regard them And yet we cannot get them to come to us and put the case to the tryal and let the Scripture be the jndge Would they but do this they could never sure have such hard thoughts of their Teachers and be offended at their plainest closest dealing You would then say I see now the Minister saies not this of himself he speaks but that which God commandeth him And if he would not deliver the Message of the Lord he were unworthy and unfit to be his Embassadour He were cruel to me if he would not pull me out of the fire by the plainest closest meanes Jud. 23. He hated me if he would not rebuke me but suffer sinne upon me Lev. 19. 17. If he would please men he should not be the servant of Christ Gal. 1. 10. I know it is no pleasure to him to trouble me or to provoke me but it would be his own destruction if he tell me not of my danger Ezek. 3. 18. And I have no reason to wish him to damn his own soul and suffer me to do the like by mine and all for fear of displeasing me in my sinne These would be your thoughts if you would but try our words by the Scripture and see whether we speak not the mind of God And sure it would go somewhat deeper in your hearts and it would stick by you and be more before your eyes when you once understood that it is the Word of God This then is my request to you sirs that the work of your Conversion may not miscarry that you would carry all that you hear to the Scripture and search there and see whether it be so or not that so you may be put out of doubt and may be at a certainty and not stand wavering and that your Faith may be resolved into the Authority of God and so the work may be Divine and consequently powerfull and prevailing when the Ground and Motive is Divine If you be not satisfied in the Doctrine which the Minister delivereth to you first search the Scripture your selves and if that will not do go to him and desire him to shew you his grounds for it in the Word of God and joyn with you in Prayer for a right understanding of it Do you question whether there be so severe a judgment and a Heaven and a Hell as Ministers tell you Search the Scripture in Mat. 25. 2 Thes. 1. 8 9 10. Joh. 5. 29 Matth. 13. Do you question whether a man may not be saved without conversion regeneration and holyness Open your Bibles and see what God saith John 3. 3 6. Mal. 18. 3. 2 Cor. 5. 17. Rom. 8. 9. Heb. 12. 14. Do you think a man may be saved without Knowledge Let Scripture judge 2 Cor. 4 3 4. Joh. 17. 3. Hos. 4. 6. Do you think a man may be saved that doth as the most do and goeth in the common way of the world Search the Scripture and see Mat. 7. 13. and 20. 16. and 22. 14. Luke 12. 32. Do you think an unhumbled Soul may be saved that never was contrite and broken hearted for sin Try by Isa. 57. 15. and 66. 2.
lay the blame on God because he doth not give it you and say We cannot convert our selves But would you have the Spirit come in while you hold the dore against him He knocks and desireth you to open and let him in and you wish him to come in but you bolt the dore and no intreaty will procure you to open it It is Consideration of the saving doctrine of the Gospell that openeth the heart and giveth it entertainment Set you selves therefore on purpose to this work open the doores of your heart which are now shut and let the King of Glory come in Who will believe that you love the Light when you shut the windows and draw the curtains If you will set your selves to consider of the Truth the windows of your Soul will be set open and then the light will certainly come in Now you read over whole Chapters and hear Sermon after Sermon and either they never stir you or at least it 's but a little for a fit like a man that hath a little warmd him at the fire in the winter and when he goes from it is colder then before But if you would but set your selves to consider of what you hear or read one line of a Chapter or one sentence of a Sermon would say you in tears or make you groane or at least do more then now is done Satan hath garrisond the heart of every carnall man And consideration is the principall means to cast him out If by considering of the terrible threatnings of the word you would discharge these Canons of God against them what a battery would it make in the corruptions of your Souls Our God is a consuming fire and the fire of hell is threatned in his Law as the wages of sin By serious Consideration you may as it were fetch fire from God and from his word and set to the very gates of Satans garrison and fire him out of many of his holds But because this is so needfull a point I shall be so large upon it as 1º to tell you some of those things that you should consider of 2o. to tell you in what manner you should do it and 3o. to give you some Motives to put you on I. The first thing that I would have you oft to think on is The Nature of that God with whom you have to do Consider that if he be the most wise it is all the reason in the world that he should rule you If he be Good and infinitely Good there is all the reason in the world that you should Love him and there is no shew of reason that you should love the world or sin before him If he be faithfull and true his threatnings must be feared and his promises must not be distrusted and there is no reason that you should make any question of his Word If he be Holy then Holiness must needs be most excellent and those that are the Holiest must needs be the best because they are most like to God And then he must be an enemy to sin and to all that are unholy because they are contrary to his nature Consider that he is Almighty and there is no resisting him or standing out against him In the twink of an eye can he snatch thy guilty Soul from thy body and cast it where sin is better known A word of his Mouth can set all the world against thee and set thine own conscience against thee too A frown of his face can turn thee into Hell And if he be thine enemy it is no matter who is thy friend For all the world cannot save thee if he do but condemne thee They are blessed whom he blesseth and they are cursed indeed whom he curseth He was from Eternity and thou art but as it were of yesterday Thy being is from him thy life is alwaies in his hands Thou canst not live an hour without him thou canst not fetch a breath without him nor think a thought nor speak a word nor stir a foot or hand without him Thou mayst better live without bread or drink or fire or aire or earth or water then without him All the world is before him but as the drop of a bucket or a little sand of dust that should be laid in ballance with all the earth Hadst thou but compassed about this lower world and seen all the Nations of it and its wonderfull furniture and seen the great deeps of of the mighty Ocean and the abundance of Creatures that be in all O what thoughts then wouldst thou have of God! But if thou hadst been above the Starres and seen the Sun in all its glory and seen the frame and course of those higher Orbes and seen the blessed glorious Angels and all the inhabitants of the higher world O then what thoughts of God wouldst thou entertaine O but if it were possible that thou hadst seen his Glory or seen but his back-parts as Moses did or seen him in Christ the now glofied Redeemer what apprehensions wouldst thou have of him then Then how wouldst thou abhor the name of sin and how weary wouldst thou be of the pleasantest life that sensuality could afford thee Then thou wouldst quickly know that no Love can be great enough and no praises can be high enough and no service can be holy and good enough for such a God Then you wouldst soon know that this is not a God to be neglected or dallyed with nor a God to be resisted nor provoked by the wilfull breaking of his Laws It is Eternal Life to know this God Joh. 17. 3. and for want of knowing him it is that sin aboundeth in the world This maketh Holyness so scarce and leane Men worship they care not how because they worship they know not whom O therefore dwell on the Meditations of the Almighty So far as he doth possess thy mind there will be no place for sin and vanity One would think if I should set you no further task and tell you of no other matter for your Meditation this one should be enough For this one is in a manner all What will not the due knowledge of God do upon the Soul That 's the best Christian and the most happy man that knoweth most of him And that 's the most vile and miserable wretch that is furthest from him and strangest to him It is the Character of the foole of fooles to have a heart whose disposition and practice saith There is no God Psal 14. 1. That is To be so affected and employed in their hearts as if there were no God and when God is not in all his thoughts Psal. 10. 4. It was better with man when he had less knowledge for himself and fewer thoughts for himself and more of God And there is no way to restore us to sound understanding and to perfect our knowledge but to turn our eye upon God again For in knowing him we know all that 's worth the knowing Take
were but possessed lively sensible of all that is contained in this leafe or two you would not envy the greatest Prince on earth his glory nor change states with any man that were a stranger to these things Did you but use to consider of the state of the Saints how could you keep off and stay with sinne and make so many delaies in turning unto God! Sure this consideration might turne the scales 6o. The next part of your Meditation should be Of the gracious and wonderfull work of our Redemption and the means and remedies which are provided for your Souls and the terms on which Salvation may be obtained For all the sins that you have committed you are not given over to despaire the Lord hath not left you without a reremedie Your Conversion and Salvation is not a thing impossible Nay so much is done by Christ already that it is brought upon reasonable terms even to your hands A new and living way is consecrated for us by Christ through the veile of his flesh and by his blood we may have boldness to enter into the Holiest Heb. 10. 19 20. He hath borne your burden and offereâ—h you in stead of it his burden which is light Matth. 11. 28. He hath removed the Impossibility and nailed to his Cross the hand writing that was against you Col 2. 14 15. And in stead of it offereth you his easie yoak He hath spoiled the Principalities and Powers that had captivated you and openly triumphed over them on the Cross. You are not left under the care of making satisfaction to God for your own sinnes but only of accepting the Redeemer that hath satisfied This much I dare confidently say to you all without extending his benefits too farre It will be for want of faith in you and not for want of satisfaction by the Redeemer if any of you perish And how free are his offers How full are his promises you are conditionally all pardoned and justified already as is legible under the hand of God And the Condition which is imposed on you is not some meritorious or mercenary work but the Accepting of the benefit freely given according to its nature use and ends This is the Faith by which you must be justified These are the terms on which you may be saved And which is more the Lord hath provided means even excellent and plentifull and powerfull means for the furthering of your Souls in the performance of this Condition and helping you to Believe and Repent that you may live And if the Spirit make not these Means effectuall adjoyn not his speciall grace after this you remaine unconverted it will not be long of him but of your selvs So that you may perceive how hopefull acase you are yet in by the blood of your Redeemer if you destroy not your own hopes and make not your case desperate by wilfull Impenitency and refusall of free grace How faire are you yet for Heaven and what happy advantages have you for Salvation It 's brought even to your doors It 's thrust as it were into your hands The Redeemer hath done so much for you all as to bring your Salvation to the choice of you own wills and if you be his chosen ones he will also make you willing You have precepts to Believe you are threatned if you will not Believe you have promise upon promise and Christ himself offered you pardon and life and Salvation with him if you are but truly and heartily willing You have God himself condescending to beseech you to accept them and Embassadours intreating you in his name and stead 2 Cor. 5. 19 20. You have Ordinances fitted to your necessities both Reading and Preaching and Sacraments and Prayer You have store of plaine and powerfull Books you have the Godly about you most desirous to assist you that would be glad to see or heare of your Conversion You have the sight of the wicked that are wallowing in their own dung and the dirt of the world to make you hate such beastly waies You have Reason and Conscience within you to consider of these matters and set them home and apply them to your selves You have time and strength to do all this if you will not abuse it and provoak God to take it from you for your negligence You have Mercies of many sorts outward and inward to win upon you and encourage you in the work And sometime Afflictions to remember you and awaken you and spur you on The Devil and all your Enemies are so far disabled that they cannot destroy you against your wills nor keep you from Christ but by your own Consents The Angels of Heaven are ready to helpe you and would even rejoice at your Conversion This is your case and these are your helps and encouragements You are not shut up under desperation God never told you It is in vaine to think of Conversion It is too late If any have told you so it was the Devil and not God And one would think that such Considerations as these should drive the nayle to the head and be effectuall to move you to Resolve and Turne 7o. The last thing that I would set before you to be Considered is What 's like to be the end of it if after all this you should die unconverted O sirs your hearts are not able now to conceive of it nor the tongue of any mortal man to utter it But so much of it we can certainly utter as one would think should make your hearts to tremble You have seen it may be a dying man in what pangs and agonies he parteth with his Soul and you have seen it's like the corps that was left there behind and seen it laid in the common Earth But you see not what became of the Soul nor what an appearance it made in another world nor what companiâ— did attend it nor what a place or state it past into O sirs when the hour is at hand that this must be your own case it will awaken you to other kind of affections then you have or can have at the reading of these words It 's wonderfull that a little distance should make us so insensible of that change which we are all certaine will come to pass And yet through the folly and deadness of our hearts it is so But they are other kind of thoughts of these weighty matters which we shall have the next hour after death then the liveliest affections beforehand can afford us The misery was great that the Redeemer did find you in and which you deserved by your sinne against the Law of the Creator But if you be found unconverted at last your punishment will be much sorer and your case far worss then it was before The Redeemers Law or Gospel hath it's peculiar Threatning which differeth from the Law of the meere Creator in severall respects Even 1o. in the nature of the punishment which will be torments of Conscience for
matters so they are your Own matters and therefore one would think you should not need so much ado to bring you to Consider them If it were only other mens matters I should not wonder at it But self-love should make you regard your Own In outward matters all seek their Own things Phil. 2. 21. And have they not more Reason to seek their Own Salvation It is your Own Souls your Own danger your Own sin your Own duty that I perswade you to Consider of It is that God that Christ that would be your Own it is that Heaven that blessedness that may be your Own if you lose it not by neglect It is that Hell and torment that will certainly be your Own if you prevent it not And shouâ—d not these be thought on You will think of your Own goods or lands or riches of your Own families your Own business your Own lives and why not also of your Own Salvation 3. Especially when it is not only your Own but it is the One thing needfull Luke 10. 42. It is that which your life or death your Everlasting Joy or Torment lieth on and therefore must be Considered of or you are utterly undone for ever Necessity lyeth upon you and wo be to you if you Consider not of these things It is not so necessary that you eat or drink or sleep or live as it is Necessary that you make sure your Everlasting life And the Profit also doth answer the necessity Buy but this one Pearle and you will be infinite gainers though you sell all that you have in the world to buy it Matth. 13. 44 45 46. Get God and get all make sure of Heaven and then fear no loss nor want nor sorrow If you count not all the world as dung for the winning of Christ that you may be found in him possessed of his righteousness it is because you know neither the world nor Christ Phil. 3. 7 8 9. Yea the Delight also will answer the Commodity For in the presence of God is fulness of Joy and at his right hand are pleasures for evermore Psal 16. 11. And the fore-thoughts of them may well make glad our hearts and cause our Glory to rejoyce Psal. 16. 8 9. For Goodness and Mercy shall follow us all the daies of our lives and we shall dwell in the House of the Lord for ever Psal. 23. 6. He shall guide us with his Counsell and afterward receive us into Glory Psal. 73. 24. And lest yet you should suspect any lack of Comfort he tells you you shall enter into the Joy of your Lord Matth. 25. 23. And that you shall be with him where he is to behold his Glory Joh. 17. 24. 4. And yet if all this might be had with a wet finger If Heaven were the portion of worldlings and sluggards that trouble not their Thoughts much about it then you might have some excuse for your Inconsiderateness But it is not so there are difficulties in your way and they are many and great what a dark understanding have you to informe what a dull and backward nature to spurre on What an unreasonable appetite What rageing passions What violent rebellious senses to contend with to Master and to rule Abundance of adversaries on every hand A subtil Devil and as malicious as subtil and as furious and able to do you a mischief if God restrain him not A world of wicked men about you each one more stiff in Errour then you in the Truth and more fast to the Devil then you are to God if his grace do not hold you faster then you will hold your selves and therefore they are abler to deceive you then you are to undeceive them Many of them are crafty and can puzzle such ignorant beginners as you and can put a face of reverence and truth upon damnable Errors and pernicious waies And those that have not wit have foolish violence and scorn and passion and can drive you towards Hell if they cannot draw you All these Enemies you must Conquer or you are lost And is it not time for a man in so much danger to Consider of them that he may know how to escape And for one that is compassed about with such difficulties to Consider how he may well get through them What abundance of things have you to Consider of of all your life past of the Relations you have born and how you have performed the duties of those relations Of the time you have had and how you have spent it Of the means you have had and what you have received by them Of the present state of your Souls your sins your miseries your hopes and the duties that are incumbent on you in order to your recovery Of the temptations to be encountred with and the graces that are daily to be exercised and confirmed should not a man bethink himself with all possible care and Consider and an hundred times Consider that hath all this to do or be undone for ever You have much to Know that will not easily be known and yet must be known and much to do receive and suffer that hath difficulty joyned with Necessity Were it Necessary and not hard the facility might draw you to make light of it And were it hard and not Necessary the difficulty might more discourage you then the matter would excite you But when it Must be done or you must be shut out of Heaven and lie in Hell for it world without end and yet there are so many difficulties in the way I think it's time to look about you and seriously Consider 12. To conclude Consideration would prevent a world of misery which else will make you Consider when it is too late It must be a principall means of your Salvation if ever you be saved If God have so much Mercy for you he will make you Consider and set your sins in order before you Psal. 50. 21. And set Hell fire before your face and hold your Thoughts on it that you cannot look off He will set before you a Crucified Christ and tell you that this your sins have done and make you think of the Reason of his sufferings what there is in sinne that could require it and what it is to rebell against the Lord and runne your selves into the Consuming fire Now your Thoughts are gadding abroad the world and stragling after every trifle and going away from God But if ever God will save you he will overtake your hearts and fetch them home and shew them that they have somewhat else to think on If Commands will not serve he will send out his threatnings and terrours shall come upon you and pursue your Soul as the wind Job 30. 15. He 'l fetch you out of the Ale-house and the Gaming-house and take you off the merry pin and lay that upon your heart that you shall not easily shake off If you are taken up with the Cares of the world he 'l shew you that
you have somewhat else to care for and drown those Cares in greater Cares If you have such giddy unsetled vagrant minds that you cannot call in your Thoughts to God nor hold them with him he will lay those clogs and bolts upon them at first that shall restraine them from their idle vagaries and then he will set upon them such a byass as shall better order them and fix them for the time to come Men do not use to go to Heaven and never think of it And to scape Hell fire and the plague of sinne and the curse of the Law and the Wrath of God and the rage of Satan and never think on it Nor do they use to mind other matters and find themselves in Heaven before they ever dreamd of it or before their hearts were set upon it No Sirs if ever God will save you he will make you Consider and again Consider and perhaps with many a sigh and groan and bring these things so neere your hearts that you shall not only Think on them but feel them According to that Command Deut. 6. 6 7. 11. 18 19 20. They shall be as written before your eies You shall think of them when you lie down and when your rise up as if they were written upon the testure of your beds you shall think of them when you sit at home when you go abroad as carrying them still with you which way soever you go As before God was not in all your Thoughts so now he will be the sum and end of them all And if by your Resistance you scape these Considerations believe it God will bring you to Consideration by a severer and more dreadfull way If he do but give your Conscience a Commission it will follow you and bring you to such a Consideration as Judas was brought to If he lay you under his Judgments and speak to you by his Rod and give you a lash with every word and ask you whether yet you will Consider of it It may bring such things to your Thoughts as you were little troubled with before If he say but the word how soon will your Soul be required of you and when you lie in Hell and feel the smart you will then Consider of it Now we cannot beg of you to bestow one hour in sober Consideration but then you shall do it without intreaty Then you will be as a man that hath the Stone or Gout or Tooth-ake that cannot forget it if he would never so faine Forget your folly your obstinacy and unthankfullness then if you can Forget Gods wrath and the torment which you feel then if you can Now you were so busie that you could not have while to think of the matters of the world to come but then God will give you leasure you shall have little else to do You shall have time enough When you have thought of these things ten thousand years you shall still have time enough before you to think of them againe You will not Consider now but when God hath performed the intents of his heart in the latter daies you shall perfectly Consider it Jer 23. 20. 30. 24. O that you were wise that you understood this that you would Consider your latter end Deut. 32. 29. What brings so many thousand Souls to Hell but because they would not Consider in time If you could speak with any of those hopeless Souls and ask them How came you to this place of torment they would tell you because we did not Consider of our case in time we little thought of this day though we were told of it We had a load of sinne upon us and did not Consider how we might be relieved We had Christ and Mercy set before us but we did not Consider the worth of them nor how to be made partakers of them We had time but we Considered not how to make the best of it We had the work of our Salvation lay upon our hands but we did not Consider how we might accomplish it O had we but Considered what now we feel we might have escaped all this and have liv'd with God! These would be the answers of those miserable Souls if you could but ask them the cause of their misery Ther 's scarce a Thief or Murderer hang'd at the Gallows but will cry out O if I had but had the wit and grace to have Considered this in time I need not to have come to this Ther 's scarce an unthrift that falls into beggery no nor a man that comes to any mischance but will say If I had Considered it before hand I might have prevented it Most of the Calamities of the world might have been prevented by timely and sober Consideration God himself doth place mens wickedness much in their Inconsiderateness and laies the cause of their destruction upon it Whence is it that Israel was rebellious to astonishment Isa. 1. 3. Why Israel doth not know my people doth not Consider Job 34 25 26 27. He shall break in pieces mighty men without number and set others in their stead therefore he knoweth their works and he overturneth them in the night so that they are destroyed He striketh them as wicked men in the open sight of others because they turned back from him and would not Consider any of his waies Why do men live so wilfully in sinne but because They Consider not that they do evill Ecel 5. 1. How many such hath the world that God pronounceth a Wo to Isa 5. 11 12. that drink and play and give themselves to their merriments but they regard not the work of the Lord neither Consider the Operation of his hands They Consider not in their heart the folly of their waies Isa. 44. 18 19 20. When they see Gods Judgments they Consider not the meaning of them and therefore lay them not to heart Isa. 57. 1. 2. And when God calleth men to Conversion or Reformation he useth to call them to Consideration as the way to it Hag. 1. 5. Thus saith the Lord of Hosts Consider your waies The Sonne that shall escape the misery of his Fathers is he that Considereth and turneth away from his transgressions and Considereth and doth not his Forefathers works Ezek. 18. 14 20. And when he sendeth the Prophet to them Ezek. 12. 3. It is but with this encouragement Though they are a rebellious house it may be they will Consider And David professeth that Consideration was the beginning of his Conversion Psal. 119. 59. I thought on my waies and turned my feet unto thy Testimonies I made hast and delayed not to keep thy Statutes I know that it is the Lord that must renew and revive a sinfull Soul But yet under God Consideration must do much O could we but perswade our people to Consider it is not sure possible that they could be as they are or do as they do Would so many thousands live in ease and quietness under the guilt of so
mistakes about it that you must avoid and 4o. I shall press on the Substance of the Direction and shew you the necessity of it I. There is a Preparatory Humiliation that goes before a saving change which yet is not to be despised because it is a drawing somewhat neerer unto God though it be not a faithfull closure with him This Preparatory Humiliation which many have that perish doth chiefly consist in these things following 1º It lieth most in the Fear of being damned As it is most in the Passions so most in this of Feare 2o. It consisteth also in some apprehension of the greatness of our sinnes and the wrath of God that hangs over our heads and the danger that we are in of being damned for ever 3o. It consisteth also in some apprehensions of the folly that we are guilty of in sinning and of some Repentings that ever we did it and some remorse of Conscience for it 4o. Hereto may be joyned some Passions of Sorrow and this expressed by groans and tears 5o. And all this may be accompanyed with Confessions of sinne to God and man and Lamentations for our misery and in some it preceedeth to desperation it self 6o. And lastly it may proceed to an indignation against our selves and to the taking of a severe revenge on our selves yea more then God would have men take as Judas did by self-destroying This desparation and self-execution are no parts of the Preparatory Humiliation but the excess and error of it and the entrance upon Hell 2. But there is also a Humiliation that is proper to the Converted and which accompanieth Salvation and this conâ—eineth in it all that is in the former and much more Even as the Rational Soul conteineth the sensitive and vegetative and much more And this Saving Humilation consisteth in these following particulars 1. It beginneth in the Understanding 2º It is rooted in the Will 3º It worketh in the Affections and 4o. When there is opportunity it sheweth it self in outward expressions and actions 1. Humiliation in the Understanding consisteth in a low esteem of our selves and in a self-abasing self-condemning Judgment on our selves And that in these Particulars 1o. It consisteth in a deep and solid apprehension of the odiousness of our own sinnes habitual and actual and of our selves for our sinnes and that because they are contrary to the blessed Nature and Law of God and so contrary to our own perfection and chief Good 2o. It consisteth also in a solid and fixed apprehension of our own ill-deserving because of these sinnes So that our Judgments do subscribe to the equity of the condemning sentence of the Law and we Judge our selves unworthy of the smalest mercy â— and worthy of Hell fire 3o. It consisteth in an apprehension of our undone and miserable Condition in our selves not only as we are the Heirs of Torment but as we are void of the Image and Spirit of God and have lost his favour and are under his displeasure and enmity by our sinne and have forfeited our part in Everlasting Glory and how unable we are to help our selves And 1o. This is in such a measure that we truly judge our sinne and our selves for sinne to be more odious then any thing else could have made us and our misery by sinne in the foresaid particulars to be greater then any outward Calamity in the flesh and then any worldly loss could have procured us And this we apprehend by a Practical Judgment and not only by a bare uneffectual speculation 2o. And the spring of this is some Knowledge of God himself whose Majesty is so Glorious and whose Wisdom is so Infinite who is so Good in himself and unto us and whose Holy Nature is contrary to sinne and who hath an absolute Propriety in us and Soveraignty over us 3o. And also it proceedeth from a Knowledge of the true state of mans felicity which by sin he hath cast away that it consisteth in the Pleasing and Glorifying and Enjoying of God in Loving and Delighting in him and Praising him for ever and having a Nature Perfectedly Holy and sitted hereunto To see that sinne is contrary to this felicity and hath deprived us of it is one of the springs of true Humiliation And 4º It proceedeth also from a believing Knowledg of Christ Crucified whom our sinnes did put to death who hath declared in the most lively manner to the world by his Cross and sufferings what sinne is and what it had done and what a case we had brought our selves into Thus much of saving Humiliation consisteth in the Understanding 2o. The Principal seat of this Humiliation is in the Will and there it consisteth in these following Acts. 1o. As we think basely of our selves so the Will hath a fixed Displacency against our selves for our sinnes and a kind of Loathing of our selves for all our abominations as you may read Ezek. 36. 31. 20. 43. 6. 9. A humble sinner is allen out with himself and as he is Evill his heart is against himself 2o. There is also in the will a deepe Repenting that ever we sinned and wronged God and abused Graceâ— and have brought our selves to this as we have done so that the humbled Soul could wish that he had spent his daies in prison in beggery or in bodily misery so that he had not spent them in sinne and if it were to do againe he would rather choose such a life of shame and calamity in the world then a life of sinne and would be glad of the exchange 3o. A humbled Soul is truly willing to grieve for the sinnes which he hath committed and to be as deeply sensible of them and afflicted for them as God would have him Even when he cannot shed a tear yet his will is to shed them When he cannot feel any deep afflicting of his Soul for sinne his hearty Desire is that he might feel it He doth an hundred times weep in Desire when he doth it not in Act. 4o. A humbled Soul is truly willing to Humble the flesh it self by the use of those appointed means by which God would have him bring it in subjection As by fasting or abstinence or mean attire hard labour and denying it unnecessary delights It 's a Doubt worth the Considering whether any such Humbling act must be used purposely in Revenge on our selves for sinne To which I answer that we may do nothing in such Revenge that God doth not allow or that makes our body less fit for his service for that were to be Revenged of God and our Souls But those Humbling means which are needfull to Tame the body may well be used with this double intention First and Chiefly as a Means for our safety and duty for the time to come that the flesh may not prevail and then Collaterally we should be the more content that the flesh is put to so much suffering because it hath been and still is so great an Enemy to God and
It layeth this Tower of Babel in the dust and maketh us abhorre our selves in dust and ashes It setteth the house on fire about our eares which we both Trusted and Delighted in And makes us not only see but feel that it's time for us to be gone Pride is the Master Vice in the unsanctified and it 's the part of Humiliation to cast it down Self-seeking is the busines of their Lives till Humiliation help to turn the streame And then if you did but see their thoughts you should see them think most vilely of themselves And if you do but over-heare their Prayers or Complaints you shall hear them still cry out upon themselves and beg help against themselves as their greatest Enemies 2. The next Use of Humiliation and implyed in this is to Mortifie those sinnes which Carnal self doth live upon and is maintained by and to stop all the avenues or passages of it's provision Sinne is sweet and dear to all that are unsanctified But Humiliation makes it bitter and base As the Indians cured the Spanish Captaine of his Thirst after Gold by pouring melted God down his throat or as Children are perswaded from playing with a Bee-hive when they are once or twice stung by them or from playing with snappish dogs when they are bitten by them So God will teach his Children to know what it is to play with sinne when they have smarted by it They will know a nettle from a harmless herbe when they feel the sting we are so apt to live by sense that God seeth it needfull that our Faith have something of sense to helpe it When the Conscience doth accuse and the heart is smarting and groaning in pain and we feel that no shifting or striving will deliver us then we begin to be wiser then before and to know what sinne is and what it will do for us When that which was our delight is become our burden and a burden too heavy for us to bear it cureth our delighting in it When David was watering his couch with his tears and made them his drink his sinne was not the same thing to him as it was in the committing Humiliation washeth away the painting of this harlot and sheweth her in her deformity It unmasketh sinne which had got the vizard of Virtue or of a small matter or harmless thing It unmasketh Satan who was transformed into a Friend or an Angel of light and sheweth him as we say with his cloven feet and horns How hard is it to cure a worldling of the love of money But when God hath laid such a load of it on his Conscience that makes him groan and cry for help he hath then enough of it When he feels those words in Jam. 5. 1 2 3 4. And he begins to weep and howl for the Miseries that are comming on him and he feels the stink of his corrupted Riches and the Canker of his Gold and Silver do begin to eat his flesh as fire and his Idol is but a witness against him then he is better able to judge of it then he was before The wanton thinks he hath a happy life when the harlots lips do drop as the honey-combe But when he perceiveth her end is bitter as wormwood and sharp as a two-edged sword and that her feet go down to death and her steps take hold on Hell and he lyeth in sorrow complaining of his folly Prov 5. 3 4 5 11 12. he is then of a more rectified judgment then he was Manasseh humbled in irons is not the same as he was upon the Throne Though Grace did more to it then his fetters yet were they some way serviceable to that end Humiliation openeth the doore of the heart and telleth you what sinne is to the quick and letteth in the words of life which passed no further then the care or braine It is a tireing work to talk to dead men that have lost their feeling especially when it is an affective and practicall doctrine which we must deliver to them which is lost if it be not felt and practised Till Humiliation comes we speak to dead men or at least to men that are fast asleep How many Sermons have I heard that one would think should have turned mens hearts within them and made them cry out against their sinnes with sorrow and shame in the face of the Congregation and never meddle with them more When yet the hearers have scarce been moved by them but gone away as they came as if they knew not what the Preacher said because their hearts were all the while asleep within them But a Humbled Soul is an awakened Soul It will regard what is said to it especially when they perceive that it cometh from the Lord and concerneth their Salvation It is a great encouragment to us to speak to a man that hath eares and life and feeling that will meet the word with an appetite and take it with some relish and let down the food that is put into their mouths The will is the chiefest fort of sinne If we can there get in upon it we may do something But if it keep the heart and we can get no neerer it then the eare or braine there will no good be done Now Humiliation openeth us a passage to the heart that we may assault sâ—nne in it's strength When I tell you of the abominable nature of sinne that caused the death of Christ and causeth Hell and tell you that it is better to runne into the fire then to commit the least sinne wilfully though it be such as the world makes nothing of another man may hear all this and superficially believe it and say it is true but it is the humbled Soul that feeleth what I say What a stir have we with a drunkard or worldling or any other sensuall sinner in perswading him to cast away his sinnes with detestation and all to little purpose sometime he will and sometime he must needs be tasting them again and thus he stands dallying because the word hath not mastered his heart But when God comes in upon the Soul as with a â—empest and throweth open the doores and as it were thundereth and lighteneth in the Conscience and layeth hold upon the sinner and shaketh him all in pieces by his terrours and asketh him Is sinning good for thee Is a fleshly careless life so good Thou wretched worm Thou foolish piece of clay Darest thou thus abuse me to my face Dost thou not know that I look on Is this the work that I made thee for and that I feed and preserve thee and continue thee alive for Away with thy sinne without any more adoe or I 'le have thy Soul away and deliver thee to the tormentors This wakeneth him out of his dalliance and delaies and makes him see that God is in good earnest with him and therefore he must be so with God If a Physician have a patient that is addicted to his appetite who hath
the Gout or Sâ—one or other disease and he forbid him wine or strong drink or such meats as he desireth as long as he feeles himself at ease he will be venturing on them and will not be curbed by the words of the Physion But when the fit is on him and he feels the torment then he will be ruled Pain will teach him more effectually then words could do When he feeleth what is hurtfull to him and feeleth that it alway makes him sick it will restraine him more then hearing of it could do So when Humiliation doth break your hearts and make you feel that you are sick of sinne and filleth your Soul with smart and sorrow then you will be the more willing that God should destroy it in you When it lyeth so heavy on you that you are unable to look up and makes you go to God with groanes and teares and cry O Lord be mercifull to me a sinner When you are faine to go to Ministers for ease to your Consciences and fill their eares with accusations of your selves and open even your odious shamefull sinnes then you will be content to let them go Now there is no talking to you of Mortification and the resolute rejecting of your sinnes The Precepts of the Gospel are too strict for you to submit to But a broken heart would change your mindes The healthfull Plow-man saith Give me that which I love these Physicians would bring us all to their Rules that they may get money by us I never mean to follow their directions But when sickness is upon him and he hath tryed all his own skil in vaine and paine giveth him no rest then send for the Physician and then he will do any thing and take any thing whatever he will give him so that he may but he eased and recovered So when your hearts are whole and unhumbled these Preachers and Scriptures are too strict for you You must have that which you love self-conceited precise Ministers must have leave to talk but you will never believe that God is of their mind or will damn men for taking that which they have a mind of O but when these sinnes are as swords in your hearts and you begin to feele what Ministers told you of then you will be of another mind Away then with this sinne There 's nothing so odious so hurtfull so intollerable O that you could be rid of it what ever it cost you Then he will be your best Friend that can tell you how to kill it and be free from it and he that would draw you to it would be as Satan himself to you Matth. 16. 22 23. Gal. 1. 8 9. Humiliation diggeth so deep that it undermineth sinne and the fortress of the Devil and when the foundation is rooted up it will soone be over throwne When the Murderers of Christ were pricked to the heart they 'l then cry out for counsell to the Apostles Acts 2. 37. When a murderer of the Saints is stricken blindfold to the earth and the Spirit withall doth humble his Soul he will then cry out Lord what would'st thou have me to do Acts 9. 6. When a cruel Jaylour that scourged the Servants of Christ is by an Earth-quake brought to a heart-quake he will then cry out What shall I do to be saved Acts 16. 30. And here comes in the usefulness of Afflictions even because they are so great advantages to Humiliation Men will be brought to some Reason by extreamities When they lie a dying a man may talk to them and they will not so proudly fly in his face nor make a scorne of the word of the Lord as in their prosperity they did God will be more regarded when he pleadeth with them with the rod in his hand stripes are the best Logick and Rhetorick for a fool When sinne hath captivated their Reason to their flesh the Arguments to convince them must be such as the flesh is capable of perceiving We may long tell a beast of dangers and discommodities before we can perswade him from that which he loves Sensuality doth brutifie men in too great a measure And so far as they are brutish it is not the clearest Reasons that will prevaile And if God did not maintaine in corrupted man some remnants of free Reason we migh preach to beasts as hopefully as to men But Afflictions tend to weaken the Enemy that doth captivate them as prosperity by accident tends to strengthen him The flesh understandeth the language of the rod better then the language of Reason or of the Word of God And as the sensible part of our Humiliation promoteth Mortification so the rational and voluntary Humiliation which is proper to the Sanctified is a principal part of Mortification it self And thus you may see that it 's necessary that we be throughly humbled that sin may be throughly killed in us 3. Another use of Humiliation is to fit the Soul for a meet entertainment of further Grace and that both for the honour of Christ and Grace and for our own welfare 1. In respect of Christ it is equal that he should dwell in such Souls only as are fit to entertaine him Neither his person nor his business are such as can suit with the unhumbled heart Till Humiliation make a sinner feel his sinne and misery it is not possible that Christ as Christ should be heartily welcome to him or received in that sort as his honour doth expect Who cares for the Physician that feels no sickness and feares not death He may pass by the doores of such a man and he will not call him in But when paine and feares of death are on him â—e will send and seek and bid him welcome Will any man fly to Christ for succour that feeleth not his wants and danger Will they lay hold on him as the only refuge of their Souls and cleave to him as their only hope that feele no great need of him Will they lie at his feet and beg for mercy that feel themselves well enough without him When men do but hear of sinne and misery and superficially believe it they may coldly look after Christ and Grace and feel the worth of the later in such a manner as they feel the weight of the former But never is Christ valued and sought after as Christ till sorrow have taught us how to value him Nor is he entertained in the necessary honour of a Redeemer till Humiliation throw open all the doores No man can seek him with his whole heart that seeks him not with a broken heart And it 's certain that Christ will come on no lower terms into the Soul Though he come to do us good yet he will have the honour of doing it Though he come to heâ—l us and not for any need he hath of us yet he will have the welcome that 's due to a Physician He comes to save us but he will be honoured in our Salvation He inviteth all to the
that this is not necessary to them that have been brought up civilly or religiously from their youth But it is as possible to be saved without Faith as without Repentance and that special Humiliation which I described to you before It 's part of your Sanctification 2. Another mistake to be carefully avoided is The placeing of your Humiliation either only or principally in the Passionate part or in the outward expression of those Passions I mean either in pinching grief and sorrow of heart or else in tears But you must remember that the Life of it is as was said before in the Judgment and the Will It is not the measure of Passionate sorrow and anguish that will best shew the measure of your sincere Humiliation much less is it your teares or outward expressions But it is your low esteem of your selves and contentedness to be vile in the eyes of others And your displacency with your selves and willingness to mourn and weep for sinne as much as God would have you with the rest of the acts of the Judgment and Will before described Two great dangers are here before you to be avoided First some there be that have terrible pangs of sorrow and are ready to teare their own haire yea or make away themselves as Judas in the horror of their Consciences and these may seem to have true Humiliation and yet have none And some can weep abundantly at a Sermon or in Prayer or in mentioning their sinne to others and therefore think that they are truly humbled and yet it may be nothing so For if at the same time their hearts are in love with sinne or had rather keep it then let it go or have not an habitual hatred to it and a predominant superlative Love to God their Humiliation is no saving work That which is in the Passions and teares may be even forced against your wills And it signifieth scarce so much as a common Grace where you are not willing of it Many a one can weep through a passionate womanish tender nature and yet not only remain unhumbled but be Proud in a very high degree How many such do we ordinarily see especially women that can weep more at a duty or conference then some that are truly broken hearted could do in all their lives and yet be so far from being vile in their own eyes and willing to be so in the eyes of others that they will hate and reproach and raile at thoâ—e that charge them with the faults which they seemed to lament or at least that charge them with disgracefull sinnes and they will excuse and mince their sinnes and make a small matter of them and love none so well as those that have the highest thoughts of them So that Pride doth ordinarily reign in their hearts and break out in their words and lives and make them hate the faithfullest reproachers and live in contention with any that dishonour them for all the tears that come from their eyes Judge not therefore by passions or tears alone but by the Judgment and the Will as is aforesaid 2. Another sort there are much better and happier than the former that yet to their great trouble are mistaken in this point And that is they that think they have no true Humiliation because they find not such pangs of sorrow and freedom of tears as others have when as their hearts are contrite even when they cannot weep a tear Tell me but this Are you vile in your own eyes because you are guilty of sinne and that against the Lord whom you chiefly love Do you loath your sinnes because of your abominations and could you heartily wish that you had been suffering when you were sinning and if it were to do again would you chuse to suffer rather then to sinne Have you a desire to grieve when you cannot passionately grieve and a desire to weep when you cannot weep Can you quietly beare it when you are vilified by others because you know your selves to be so vile And are you thankfull to a plain Reprover though he tell you of the most disgracefull sinne Do you think meanly of your own sayings and doings and think better of others where there is any ground then of your selves Do you justifie Gods afflictions and mens true rebukes and think your selves unworthy of the Communion of the Saints or to see their faces and unworthy to live on the face of the Earth Yea would you justifie God if he should condemn you This is the state of a humbled Soul Find but this and you need not doubt of Gods acceptance though you were unable to shed a tear There 's more Humiliation in a base esteem of our selves then in a thousand tears And more in a will or desire to weep for sinne then in tears that come through force of terror or moisture of the brain or passionate tenderness of Nature If the Will be right you need not fear It is he that most hateth sinne and is hardliest drawn to it that is trulyest humbled for it He that will lament it to day and commit it to morrow is far less humbled and penitent then he that would not be drawn to it with the hopes of all the pleasures of the world nor commit it if it were to save his life 3. To avoid this some runne into the contrary mistake and think that sorrow and teares are unnecessary and that they may Repent as well without them as with them and they lay all in some dull uneffectual wishes and so they think the Heart is changed But certainly God made not the Affections in vain It cannot be that any man can have a Sanctified Will but his Affections will hold some correspondence with it and be commanded by it Though we cannot mourn in that Measure as we desire yet some sorrow there will be wherever the Heart is truly changed And appretiativè this sorrow will be the greatest No man can heartily believe that sinne is the greatest evil to his Soul and not be grieved for it And indeed our Liveliest Affections should be exercised about these weightiest things It 's a shame to see a man mourn for a friend and whine under a Cross that toucheth but the flesh and yet be so insensible of the plague of sinne and the anger of the Lord and to laugh and â—est with such mountains on his Soul Though grief and tears be not the heart or principal part of our Humiliation yet are they to be lookt after as our duty yea sorrow in some measure is of absolute necessity and the want of tears is no good signe in them that have tears for other things Indeed the sense of our folly and unkindness should be so great that it should even turn our hearts into sorrow and melt them in our brests and draw forth streams of tears from our eyes and if we cannot bring our selves to this we must yet lament the hardness of our hearts and not excuse it
him to them gave he Power to become the Sonnes of God even to them that believe in his Name Joh. 1. 12. This is the wonderfull Love that the Father hath bestowed on those that were his Enemies that they should not only be reconciled to him by the death of his Sonne but also be called the Sonnes of God Rom 5. 10. 1 Joh. 3. 1. For he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world that we should be Holy and without blame before him in love having predestiuated us to the Adoption of Children by Jesus Christ to himself according to the good pleasure of his Will to the praise of the Glory of his Grace wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved Ephes. 1. 4 5. 6. O what an unspeakable Mercy is it to have the blessed God whom we had so oft offended to become our Reconciled Father in Christ. For it is not an empty title that he assumeth but he hath more abundant love to us and tenderness of our welfare then any title can make us understand 5. And hereupon it doth immediatly follow that we have a right to the blessed Inheritance of his Sonnes and are certain Heirs of his Heavenly Kingdom Col. 1. 12. For if Sonnes then Heirs Heirs of God and Joint Heirs with Christ Rom. 8. 17. Being saved by the washing of Regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost and justified by Grace through Christ we are made Heirs according to the hope of Eternal Life Tit. 3. 5 6 7. Being begotten againe to a lively hope by the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead to an Inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that fadeth not away reserved in Heaven for us 1 Pet. 1. 3 4. 6. With all the Holy Ghost is given to us not only to close us at first with Christ but to take up his abode in us as his temples and to be the Agent and Life of Christ within us and to do his work and maintain his Interest and clense us of all filthiness of flesh and Spirit and Sanctifie us throughout and to strive against and conquer the flesh and to keep us by Divine Power through Faith unto Salvation 1 Cor. 6. 19. Gal. 5. 17 22. 2 Cor. 6. 1. 1 Pet. 1. 5. For because we are Sonnes God seudeth forth the Spirit of his Sonne into our hearts whereby we cry Abba Father Gal. 4. 6. This Spirit of Adopton which we receive doth bear witness with our spirits that we are the Sonnes of God Rom. 8. 15 16. For if any man have not the spirit of Christ the same is none of his Rom. 8. 9. By this Spirit is the spirit of the world cast out of us the spirit of pride and of blindness and of delusion and hard-heartedness and of sensuality and malice and hypocrisie are cast out By this is Gods Image imprinted on our Souls we are conformed to his blessed Will we are made partakers of the Divine Nature being Holy as God is Holy Col. 3. 10. 2 Pet. 1. 4. 1 Pet. 1. 16. Hereby we are delivered from the thraldom of sinne and the slavery of the Devil and the seduction of the world and our treacherous Flesh. Hereby also we are fitted for the Service of God to which before we were undisposed and unfit O what an ease is it to the Soul to be free from so much of the burden of sinne What an honour is it to have the Spirit of God within us and to have a Nature so truly Heavenly and Divine How can it go ill with him that hath God dwelling in him and that dwells in God 1 Joh. 4. 15. 7. Another of our precious benefits by Christ is that we shall be actually imployed in the special and neerest Service of God that on Earth is to be performed Let diseased Souls desire idlenes and swinish sinners take pleasure in the mire and feed like ravenous beasts on carrion or as dogs on dung but the Saints will ever rejoice in God and take it for the most blessed life on Earth when they can but do him the greatest Service Let his Enemies that hate his Service be weary of it as if it were a toile or drudgery but his Children will desire no sweeter work They never think themselves so well as when they are most serviceable to their blessed Lord though at the greatest cost and labour to the flesh So sweet is Gods Service that the more of it we can do the more is our pleasure and honour and content Other work spendeth strength but this increaseth it Other work must have râ—creation intermixt but this is it self the most delightfull recreation Other service is undertaken for the love of the wages but this is undertaken for the Love of the Master and the work and is wages it self to them that go through with it For other service is but a means and that to some inferior end but this is a means to the Everlasting perfection and blessedness of the Soul and such a means as containeth or Presently procureth somewhat of the end All the Saints are even here a chosen Generation a royal Priesthood an holy Nation a peculiar People that they should shew forth the praises of him that hath called them out of darkness into his marvelous light They are an holy Priesthood to offer up a Spiritual Sacrifice acceptable to God by Jesus Christ 1 Pet. 2. 5 9. Their very bodies are a living Sacrifice holy and acceptable to God in their reasonable service What a sweet work is it to live in the daily Love of God in his Praises in the hopes and sweet fore-thoughts of Everlasting Joyes The world affordeth not such a Master nor such a work 8. Another of the precious benefits by Christ is The liberty of accesse in all our wants to God by Prayer with a promise to be heard The flaming sword did keep the way to the tree of life till Christ had taken it down and consecrated for us a new and living way through the Vaile which is his flesh and now we have boldness to enter into the Holiest by the blood of Jesus and therefore may draw neer with a true heart in full assurance of Faith Heb. 10. 19 20 22. When worldlings may cry to their Baal in vaine the Righteous cry and the Lord heareth them and delivereth them out of all their hurtfull troubles O what a Mercy is it in our falls in our distresses in our dangers in our wants to have a God a faithfull mercifull Father to go to and make our moane to for relief What a Mercy is it when our flesh and our hearts do faile us when friends and worldly things all fail us to have God for the Rock of our hearts and our Portion Psal. 73. 26. When sickness begins to break these bodies and earthly delights do all forsake us and death calls us to come to our endless state then to have a Reconciled Father to go to and crave his ayd upon
12. Luke 16. 15. 5. The Sound Convert is so acquainted with the defects and sinnes and necessities of his own Soul that he is much taken up at home in his studies and cares and censures and his daily worke The acting and strengthening of Grace the subduing of corruption and his daily walk with God are much of his employment Above all keeping he keeps his Heart as knowing that thence are the issues of life He cannot have while to spy out the faults of others and meddle with their affaires where duty binds him not as others can do because he hath so much to do at home Gal. 6. 3 4. Prov 4. 23. But the Opinionist is most employed abroad and about meer notions and Opinions but he is little employed in such heart-searching or heart-observing work His light doth not pierce so deep as to shew him his heart and the work that is there to be necessarily done As the change is little upon his Heart so his employment is little there He is little in bewailing his secret defects and corruptions and little in keeping his Souls accounts and little in secret striving with his heart to work it into communion with God and into a Spiritual lively fruitfull frame He is forward to aggravate the sinnes of others and oft-times severe enough in censuring them But he is a very gentle censurer of himself and a patient man with his own corruptions and puts the best construction upon all that is his own He hath much labour perhaps in shaping his Opinions but little for the humbling and Sanctifying his heart by the power of the Truth 6. And as the difference lyeth thus constantly in the Heart so it is usually manifested by the tongue Matth. 12. 34. The Sound Convert is most desirous to discourse of those great and saving truths which his very heart hath taken in and which he hath found to be the seed of God for his Regeneration and the Instruments of that Holy and happy change that is made upon him He feeleth most savour and life in these great and most Necessary points which formed the Image of God upon him and upon these he daily feeds and lives Read Joh. 17. 3. 1 Cor. 15. 1 2 3 4 5 6. 1 Cor. 2. 2. Phil. 3. 8 9 10 11. 1 Tim. 3. 16. Acts 26. 22 23. In these Scriptures you may find what points they were that the greatest Saints did study and live upon But the Opinionist is most forward to discourse of meer Opinions and to feed upon the aire of notions and controversies of lesser moment For one hours Holy Heavenly experimental heart-searching discourse that you shall have from him you shall have many and many hours discourse of his Opinions I mean it indifferently of all his Opinions whether true or false For though falshoods cannot be fit food for the Soul yet Truths themselves also may be made of little service to them A man may be a meer Opinionist that hath true Opinions as well as he that hath false Almost all the free and zealous discourse of these men on matters of Religion is about their several sides and parties and Opinions If they be set upon a point especially wherein they seem to themselves to be wiser then others they have a fire of zeale for it in their brests that makes them desirous to be propagating it to others About the Orders and Ceremonies of the Church about the formes of Prayer and the accidents of worship about Infant Baptism or other such controversies in Religion is the freest of their discourse Yea you may perceive much of the difference even in the very manner of their conference A Serious Christian even when he is necessitated to speak of lower controverted points yet doth it in a Spiritual manner as one that more savoureth higher Truths and makes a Holy and Heavenly life his end even in these lower matters and deals about such controversies in a practical manner and in order to the growth of Holiness But the Opinionists even when they speak of the most weighty Truths do speak of them but as Opinions and when they discourse of God of Christ of Grace of Heaven it is but as they discourse of a point in Philosophy or little better They go not through the shell to the kernel they look after the Truth but they have but little relish of the Goodness The like may be said of their reading and hearing of Sermons The sound Convert feeleth life spirits in that which is little savory to the Opinionist It is one thing in a Sermon or Text that is pleasant to a true Christian and another thing usually that is most pleasant to the Opinionist The true Christian delighteth in and feedeth on the inward life of Spiritual Doctrine and the Good which they offer him that is indeed it is upon God and Christ himself that he is feasting his Soul in reading and hearing For this is the Soul of all without which letters and words are but a carcass But the superficial Opinionist is much more taken up either with the History or the Elegancy of Speech or with the rational light of the discourse still sticking in the bark and savouring not Christ and the Father in all As a man that reads the deeds or lease of his own Lands delights in one thing and a cleark that reads the same or the like in a book of Presidents for his learning delights in another thing So is it in this case 7. And hence is follows that they are several sorts of duties and exercises usually that these several sorts of persons are most addicted to The sound Convert is most addicted to those Spiritual means that tend most to the strengthning of his Faith and warming his heart with the Love of God and promoting Holiness and destroying sinne But the Opinionist delighteth most in those means that tend to â—â—rnish him with speculative Knowledg and discourse and to satisfie his fansie or curious mind The sound Convert is much addicted to Prayer even in secret and to Heavenly Meditations and gracious disourse But the Opinionist is much more addicted to reading Histories or Controversies or dogmatical Divinity or Civil and Political matters The sound Convert savoureth best those Preachers and Books that speak the most weighty Spiritual Truths in the most weighty Spiritual manner in Power and Demonstration of the Spirit But the Opinionist relisheth those Preachers and Books most that either speak curiously to please the eare or exactly and learnedly to please the natural intellect or that speak for the Opinions or partly that he is addicted to But others he hath less mind of 8. Moreover the sound Christian layeth out most of his Zeal Affections and Endeavours about the great Essentials of Religion and that as I said in a practical manner But the Opinionist layeth out his Zeale upon Opinions Right or wrong it is but as Opinions Of these he makes his Religioâ— For these he contendeth He loveth
to him as that he had and may make him more happy Look to it therefore that you have right and beliving thoughts of Heaven and that unfeignedly you take it for your Home and Happiness and look not for any other Portion Till you see so much of the certainty and excellency of Everlasting Glory as shall prevail with you to lay out your faithfull labour for it and to be at a point with all this world as having laid up your Treasure and Hopes in the world to come you have no ground to conclude that you are true Christian Converts Seeing therefore that it's Heaven that is the very Reason the End the Life of all your Religion it follows that you must necessarily understand somewhat of its excellency and believe its certainty and accordingly set your hearts upon it and make the attainment of it your daily work and business in the world This is to be a Convert indeed Remember therefore first what I told you before wherein the nature of this Blessedness doth consist I will only name the Essentials of it that your apprehensions may be right and forbear to say much as being done already 1. The first thing considerable in our Everlasting Blessedness will be our personal Perfection of the whole man This is in order to the Perfection of our Everlasting Operations and Enjoyments Our bodies shall be no more flesh and blood nor corruptible or mortall or subject to hunger or pain or weariness nor to passions that rebell against the reasonable soul but they shall be spiritul bodies and Immortall and Incorruptible and Undefiled Our Souls will be perfected in their Natural Perfections and in their Moral They shall be of more advanced Understanding and comprehensive Wisdom then now Our wills shall attain to perfect rectitude in a perfect conformity to the Will of God and every affection shall be brought to its perfect order and elevation All sinne shall be done away whether it were in the understanding will affections or the actions The executive power will be answerable to the rest of the Perfections and to the blessed work which it hath to do And thus we shall be like the Angels of God 2. The next thing considerable in our Blessedness is our approximation or approach to God We shall be admitted into the holiest and brought as neer him as our natures are capable of and we are fit for 3. Moreover we shall be Members of the new Jerusalem and receive our Glory in Communion with that blessed Society and so as Members contribute to her Glory 4. And we shall behold the glorified Person of our Redeemer and he will be glorified on us as the fruits of his Victory 5. And we shall behold the face of the blessed God and see his wisdom and power and glory and know as we are known Though we cannot now fully know the manner yet in that sense as our Angels are said to behold the face of God Mat. 18. 10. we also shall behold it 6. We shall also enjoy him in the neerest relation and by the most raised vigorous affections of our souls We shall be filled with his Love as full as we can hold and we shall abound with perfect Love to him again And the Joy that is in his presence which this Intuition and Everlasting Love will afford us is such as no heart is here able to conceive 7. Being thus furnished we shall be employed in his perfect Praises in singing and rejoycing to him with the heavenly Host and Magnifying his great and holy Name 8. And in all this will the Glory of God shine forth and he will be admired in his Saints 2 Thes. 1. 10. 11. In us it shall appear how abundant he is in power and wisdom and goodness in holiness faithfulness and righteousness 9. And God himself will be well pleased with us and with the new Jerusalem and his glorified Sonne and will take complacenâ—y in this manifestation and communication of his Glory and of Himself unto his creatures And this is his Ultimate End and should be the highest point of ours The Revolution hath now brought all to that Center which is both the Alpha and Omega the begining and the end His Will is the Fountain or Efficient of all and it is the Ultimate End and Perfection of all There is no more to add as to the matter but that as to the Duration first we may take it as that which leaves no room for any addition that all this will be Everlasting leaving not any doubts or fears of a cessation Abundance of glorious adjuncts of this felicity might be mentioned but I pass them all by and do but name these few which are the Essentiall Constitutive parts of our Happiness because I have touched them before and fullyer spoken of them in the Saints Rest. Thus much I thought meet to mention here that you may have somewhat of that in your eye that I am perswading you to intend and seek and the rather because I perceive that many of the godly have not such distinct Apprehensions of the constitutive parts of this Felicity as they should have but much wrong their souls and God Himself and the Glory of their Profession by looking but at some of the Parts Believe God sirs that this is the life that you shall live if you will take it for your Portion and set your hearts upon it and follow the Conduct of Christ for the obtaining it Can you be content with Heaven alone Is it enough for you though you be despised and persecuted in the world Do you account this for Certainty and Excellency to be worth all Yea that all is dross and dung to this Thus must you do if you will be true Converts For all such are heavenly in their minds and hearts and in the drift of all their lives and Conversations DIRECT X. My next Advice that you may prove sound Converts is this Rest not and count not your selves truly Converted till God and his holy Waies have your very Love and Desire and Delight and take not that for a saving Change when you had rather live a worldly ungodly life if it were not for the fear of punishment I shall speak but little of this because I toucht upon it before when I told you that Christ must have your hearts and because it is but a consectary of the last or contained in it But yet I think it best to present it here distinctly to your Consideration because a slavish kind of religiousness doth deceive so many and because the life of Grace is here exprest I deny not but holy Fear is eâ—ceeding usefull to us even a Fear of the Threatnings and Judgments of God But yet I must tell you that in Fear there is much more that is common to the unsanctified then there is in Love Desire and Delight Though the Fear of God be the beginning of wisdom it is Love that is the Perfection and that Fear is not
himself to hope that God will save him without so much adoe which by the help of the Devil he may easily be brought to hope away then goes the duty If you could not shew him that there is a Necessity of Family Prayer and a Necessity of sanctifying the Lords Day and a Necessity of forsaking his tipling and voluptuousness and a Necessity of living a heavenly life he would quickly resolve of another course For he had rather do otherwise if he durst He never was Religious from a true Predominant Love to God and a holy life but for fear of Hell and for other inferiour respects Remember this when you have precious opportunities before you of doing or receiving good and when you see that you have leave to take these opportunities and yet you draw back and are questioning How we can prove it to be your duty or that you cannot be saved without it Do not these Questions plainly shew that you Love not the work and Delight not in a holy life and that you had rather let it alone Are you not blind if you see not this is in your selves Yea it 's plain that you have such an aversness or hatred to God and a holy course of life that if you did but know what shift to make to scape damnation you would fly away from God and Holiness and have as little to do with them as you can Your Questions and Cavils do plainly declare this wicked emnity and backwardness of your hearts and consequently shew how farre you are from true Conversion Not that I am of their mind that think there is any Good which the Law of Christ Obligeth us not to accept and which we can refuse without sinne and danger to our selves For God doth both draw us and drive us at once But when the Threatning and Punishment only can prevail with men and men Love not God and Godliness for themselves but had rather have liberty to live as the ungodly I shall never take one of these for a sanctified man nor have any hope of the saving of such a soul how farre soever his fears may carry him from his outward sinnes or to outward duties Till God shall give him a better Conversion then this I say I have not the smallest hope of this mans salvation Then you are Gods Children when the Honour the Work the Family the Name of your Father are lovely and delightfull to you And when you grieve that there is any remnants of sin in your souls and when your sinnes are to you as lameness to the lame that pain them every step they go and as sickness to the sick that makes them groan and groan again and long to be rid of it And when you think those the happiest men on earth that are the most holy and wish from your hearts that you were such as they though you had not a house to put your head in When you look towards God with longing thoughts and are grieved that your understandings can reach no nearer him and know no more of him and that your hearts cannot embrace him with a more burning Love When you admire the beauty of a meek a patient a mortified spirituall heavenly mind and long to have more of this your self yea to be perfect in all Holiness and Obedâ—ence When your hearts are thus brought over to God that you had rather have him then any other and rather live in his Family then any where and rather walk in his waies then in any then are you indeed Converted and never till then whatever other dispositions you may have And now if that were my business what abundance of reason might I shew you to make you willing to come over unto God with Love and with Delight Whom else can you Love if he that is Love it self seem not lovely to you All loveliness is in him and from him The creature hath none of it self nor for it self To Love a life of sinne is to Love the Image and Service of the Devil and to Love that which feeds the flames of Hell What is it then to Love this sinne so well as for the Love of it to fly from God and Godliness Methinks men at the worst should Love that which will do them good and not preferre that before it which will hurt them Do sinners indeed believe that God and Holiness will do them hurt and that sinne will do them greater good Is there ever a man so mad that he dare speak this and stand to it If indeed you think it best to live in sinne and therefore had rather keep it then leave it your understandings are befooled I had almost used Paul's Phrase and said bewitched Gal. 3. 1. Will it do you any hurt to leave your beastly sensual lives and to live soberly righteously and godly in the world denying ungodliness and worldly lusts and looking for the blessed hope and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ This is the Doctrine of Saving Grace Tit. 2. 11 12 13. Would it do you any harm to be assured of Salvation and ready to die and to know that the Angels shall Conduct your departing souls to Christ and that you shall live in Joy with him for ever Or to be employed in those holy works that must prepare you for this day and help you to this assurance If God be naught for you if Holiness and Righteousness and Temperance be naught for you then you may as well say Heaven is naught for you and therefore you must resolve for sinne and Hell and see whether that be good for you I shall say no more of this Point because I have written of it already in the Conclusion of the Saints Rest which I desire you to peruse DIRECT XI The next part of my Advice is If you would not have this Saving Work misearry Turn then this present day and hour without any more Delay Somewhat I have spoke of this already and therefore shall say the less But yet I shall back this Direction with such Reasons as will certainly convince you if you be not unreasonable of the folly of Delay and shew you that it concerneth you presently to Return And though my Reasons will be numerous it is not the Number but the Strength of them that I shall urge you principally to Consider and because of the Number I will go over them with the greater brevity 1. Consider to whom it is that you are commanded to Turn and then tell me whether there can be any Reason for delay It is not to an empty deceitfull creature but to the faithfull All-sufficient God To him that is the cause of all things the Strength of the Creation the Joy of Angels the Felicity of the Saints the Sun and Shield of all the Righteous and Refuge of the Distressed and the Glory of the whole World Of such Power that his Word can take down the Sun from the Firmament and turn the
tell the Parents with the Anabaptists It is too soon to be dedicated to God and entred into his Covenant when they come to their childhood and youthfull state he will then perswade them that it is yet too soon and when he can no longer perswade them that it is yet too soon he will then perswade them that it is too late O what a happy thing it is to come unto God betimes and with the first What advantage hath youth They have the vigour of wit and of body They be not rooted and hardned in sinne nor filled with prejudice and obstinacy against Godliness as others be Besides the capacity of serving God of which anon 12. You have such times of advantage and encouragement as few ages of the world have ever seen and few Nations on Earth do enjoy at this day What plain and plentifull teaching have you What abundance of good examples and the society of the godly private and publique helpes are common Godliness is under as little suffering as ever you can expect to see it yea it is grown into repuâ—ation among us so that it is an honour to serve God and a dishonour to neglect it as well it may Our Rulers countenance the Practises of Godliness they proclaim themselves the forward Professors and Patrons of it and take this as their Glory And this is not ordinary in the world Seldome hath the Church seen such daies on Earth And yet is not the way to Heaven fair enough for you Yet are you not ready to turn to God When should men make Hay but when the Sun shines Will you delay till this Harvest time be over and the Winter of persecution come again Can you better turn to God when a godly life is the common scorn of the Countrey as it was a while agoe and when every one will be deriding and railing at you Or when it may possibly cost you your lives Have you Sun and winde and tide to serve you and will you stay to set out in stormes and darkness 13 Moreover Your delâ—y doth cast your Conversion and Salvation upon hazard yea upon many and grievous hazzards And is your Everlasting happiness a matter to be wilâ—ully hazarded by causeless and unreasonable delays 1. If you delay to day you are utterly uncertain of living till to morrow If you put by this one motion you know not whether ever you shall have another Alas that ever the heart of man should be so sensless as to delay when they know not but it may prove their damnation and when Heaven or Hell must certainly follow that they dare put off a day or hour when they know not whether ever they shall see another 2. And as your life is uncertain so are the means uncertain by which God useth to do the work He may remove your Teachers and other helps and then you will be further off then before 3. And if both should continue yet Grace it self is uncertain You know not whether ever the Spirit of God will put another thought of turning into your hearts Or at least whether he will give you hearts to turn 14. Moreover The delay of Conversion continueth your sinne and so you will daily increase the number and increase your guilt and make your souls more abundantly miserable Are you not deep enough in debt to God already and have you not yet sinnes enough to answer for upon your Souls Would you fain have one years sinnes more or one daies sinnes more to be charged upon you O if you did but know what sinne is it would amaze you to think what a mountain lyeth already upon your Consciences One sinne unpardonned will sink the stoutest sinner into Hell And you have many a thousand upon your Souls already and would you yet have more Me thinks you should rather look about you and bethink you how you may get a pardon for all that 's past 15. And as sinne increaseth daily by delay so consequently the Wrath of God increaseth you will run further into his displeasure and possibly you may cut down the bough that you stand upon and hasten even bodily destruction to your selves When you live daily upon God and are kept out of Hell by a miracle of his mercy me thinks you should not desire yet longer to provoke him least he withdraw his Mercy and let you fall into misery 16. And do but consider what will become of you if you be found in these delaies You are then lost body and Soul for ever Now if you had but hearts to know what is good for you the worst of you might be converted and saved for God doth freely offer you his Grace But if you die in your delaies in the twink of an eye you will find your selves utterly undone for ever Now there is hope of a change but when delays have brought you to Hell there is no more change nor no more hope 17. Consider that your very time which you lose by these delaies is an unconceivable loss When time is gone what would you then give for one of those years or daies or hours which now you foolishly trifle away O wretched sinners are their so many thousand Sous in Hell that would give a world if they had it for one of your daies and yet can you afford to throw them away in worldliness and sensuality and loitering delaies I tell you Time is better worth then all the wealth and honours of the world The day is coming when you will set by time When it is gone you will know what a blessing you made light of But then all the world cannot call back one day or hour of this precious time which you can sacrifice now to the service of your flesh and cast away on unprofitable sinning 18. Consider also that God hath given you no time to spare He hath not lent you one day or hour more then is needfull for the work that you have to do and therefore you have no reason to lose any by your delaies Do you imagine that God would give a man an hours time for nothing much less for to abuse him and serve his enimy No let me tell you that if you make your best of every hour if you should never lose a minute of your lives you would find all little enough for the work you have to do I know not how others think of time but for my part I am forced daily to say How swift how short is time and how great is our work and when we have done our best how slowly goeth it on O precious time â— what hearts have they what lives do those men lead that think time long that have time to spare and pass in idleness 19. To convince you more consider I beseech you the exceeding greatness of the work you have to do and tell me then whether it be time for you to delay Especially you that are yet unconverted and strangers to the heavenly nature of the
too much already It 's a wonder of patience that hath borne with us so long we will abuse the patience of God no longer but begin to be absolutely his this day If this may be the effect of these exhortations you shall have the everlasting blessing But if still you Delay I hope I am free from the guilt of your blood DIRECT XII The last Direction that I shall give you for preventing your miscarriage in the work of Conversion is this Stop not in weak and wavering Purposes and faint attempts but see that you be groundedly unreservedly and habitually or firmly Resolved There are many good thoughts and meanings in the Soul before Resolution but you are not truly Converted till you are Resolved and thus Resolved as is here exprest Here I shall shew you 1. What this Resolution is 2. Why it is so necessary and 3. I shall urge you to resolve and 4. I shall Direct you in it 1. Resolution is the firm or prevalent Determination of the Will upon Deliberation In opening this Definition I shall first shew you how we are led up to Resolution by Deliberation and 2. What is this Determination of the will There are several steps by which the will doth rise up to Resolution which I shall set before you And first it is presupposed that in the state of corrupted Nature the Soul is unresolved for God if not in many that are exceeding wicked Resolved against him At first the sinner doth either Resolve to be as he is or else he hath no Resolution to Return But God breaks many a wicked Resolution or else woe to the ungodly for there were no hope Many wicked wretches have not only neglected their Souls but also Resolved that they would never lead a Holy life nor never joyn themselves to the Communion of Saints nor never leave their drunken company or be so precise and make so great a matter of sinne as the Godly do When we urge them with the plainest Words of God and the most unquestionable Reasons so that they have not a word of sense to speak against it When we have told them of the Command of God and told them of the certain danger of their Souls they will plainly tell us that they are Resolved never to be so precise When they have nothing else to say but nonsence they will put us off with this that they are Resolved to venture their Souls without so much adoe But as Resolute as they are God will break and chang their Resolution and make them as much Resolved of the clean contrary if ever he will save them For woe to them that ever they were born if he should take them at their word and Resolve as they Resolve Now in this case there are many degrees that men go through before they come to be Resolved for God 1. The first thing usually that befalleth such a Soul is some further Light which shews him that which before he understood not 2. This Light causeth him to begin to Doubt whether all be so well with him as he thought it had been and whether he were so wise in his former Resolutions as he thought himself 3. When Light hath bred these Doubtings in his mind these Doubtings breed some Fears within him and he begins to be a little awakened Lest evil be neerer him then he was aware of and lest the threatenings of God and his Ministers should prove true 4. These Fears do drive him to Consider of the matter and to Deliberate what he is best to do To consider whether these things be so or not and what course he must take if they should prove true 5. Though sometimes God may bless the very first Considerations to be the present means of true conversion yet that is no usual thing but ordinarily the first Considerations do help the mind to some slight convictions so that the man begins to see a great deal more then he did before and so much as puts him now past doubt that he was before mistaken and out of the way 6. Finding himself in this case his fears increase and his grief comes on for his former folly and he finds himself in a miserable case and at a loss for a Remedy 7. By this much he is quickened to a purpose or resolution to hearken to those that can instruct him and enquire of them that he thinks are in the right and to use such means as he is acquainted with to find out what he must do to be saved And accordingly he goes among good company and begins to hear more diligently and sensibly and to mark and regard what he hears and reads and also to cry to God in Prayer for mercy and relief But all this is but from the Natural Fears of misery awakened in him by Common preparing Grace 8. In the use of these Means of Grace he begins better to understand and relish the Doctrine of Redemption by Jesus Christ and the nature and necessity of true Sanctification by the Holy Ghost And though sometime these Evangelical Illuminations may be special saving works at the very first yet it 's more usual especially with us that are bred up under the Gospel to have a more superficial common Illumination before the saving Light come in And by this common Light men have at first but a general glimmering and confused Knowledg of a Saviour and of Redemption and of Mercy to be had by him And sometime they have a distinct Knowledg of some parts only of the Christian Faith and sometime a distinct Knowledg and belief of every Article but only superficial and not savingly effectual 9. By this general or superficial Knowledg of Christ and Mercy a kind of Hope ariseth in the heart that yet there is a possibility of escape and a kind of comfort answerable to this Hope 10. These Hopes are accompanied with some Desires to understand yet more of the Mistery of the Gospel and to be made partakers of the saving Mercy of which he hath had a confused light 11. And hereupon there is further kindled in the will a Purpose or Resolution to go further on in learning and enquiring into the Will of God and using his means And 12. This purpose is performed and means are further used And thus far the Soul is but in Preparation and under the common workes of Grace and possibly may fall off and perish The first degree may be so stifled that it shall not reach unto the second or the second so stifled that it shall not reach unto the third But the most common stop is at the third degree when men are a little frightened they will not follow it on to Consideration And they that follow Consideration diligently do usually speed well and get through all the rest But when the Soul is brought thus farre if God will save it he next procâ—eds to this much more 1. He giveth a clearer Light into the Soul which giveth a more distinct or
Holiness with Heaven after The Lord have Mercy upon the poor distracted world and bring some more of them to their wits We have Wise men if themselves may be judges very wise in their own conceit that know many great matters in the world and yet do not practically know whether God or the Devil be the better master whether sinne or Holiness be the better work and whether Heaven or Hell be the betther wages If they say They know these things judge by their lives whether they know them Practically or not Resolve they will not for God and Holiness and Heaven nor against the flesh the world and sinne whatever they may be brought to confess to their self-condemnation Is it not a pitifull case that such points as these should seem so hard to reasonable men as to be so long in Resolving of them 4. And I pray you Consider How horribly by this you disgrace your understandings You that cannot abide to be derided as sots and fools in the world do yet abuse your selves thus grosly as iâ— there were never greater sots scarce upon the Earth We have proud men that are so high in their now eies that they can hardly endure contempt from others and love almost none that think but meanly or dishonourably of them and yet what a horrible contempt and dishonour do they cast upon themselves If one of these our wise neighbours should study seaven years to know whether the Sea be fire or water whether a mountain be heavy Whether the fire be hot or cold and could not be Resolved after so many years Consideration what would you think and say of these wise men Why Sirs it is far grosser folly I tell you again it is far grosser folly to be unresolved whether you should be Holy or unholy which is in plain English whether it be better go to Heaven or to Hell For Faith and Holiness is the way to Heaven and an unholy life is the way to Hell And if you will needs forsake the way to Heaven you may hope to come thither as long as you will but you may as well hope to touch the Moon with your finger or to runne up and down with a mountain on your backs And if you will hold on in the way to Hell that is in an unsanctified state you may say you hope for all that to escape Hell even as wisely as to leap into the Sea and say I hope to scape drowning or to throw down your selves headlong from the top of the steeple and say I hope to scape hurting me as well as you Sirs I beseech you do not abuse God and abuse Christ and the Spirit and Scripture and withall abuse your immortal Souls for I know not what for a stinking sin for a thing of nought Your Souls are noble Creatures and your understandings are noble faculties Why will you expose them to be the scorn of Satan and make them so base and sottish as you do You can see the folly of a poor drunkard that will make a beast of himself and go reeling and talking nonsence about the street for the boies to hoot at him and make himself the laughing-stock of the town And I pray you why do you not understand that till you are Resolved for a Holy Heavenly life you are all drunk while you think your selves to be sober You are as miserable as the other and more in this that yours is in your natures and theirs is but an accident yours is continued and theirs in that particular but by fits In the Name of God Sirs bethink you whether you can possibly more disgrace your wits then to be unresolved of a case as plain as the high way and which your Everlasting Salvation or damnation lieth on If one of you could not in twenty years be Resolved whether the the Sunne be light or dark or whether the day or the night be fitter for rest or whether it be better plow and sow or let all alone and hope God will give you a crop without labour would you take this for a wise man Again I tell you your folly is more gross that cannot all this while be Resolved whether you should cast away your wilfull sinnes and give up your selves to Christ and a Holy life to obtain the Glory and scape the misery that is hard at hand If you stood up to the neck in the water or stood but in a storm of raine you would not be so long in deliberating whether it were better for you to stay there longer or come out If your finger were but in the fire you need not so long a deliberation whether you should take it out Any yet these wise men are under many thousand unpardoned sinnes and under the curse of the Law of God and within a step of everlasting fire and have no way possible to escape but by Conversion Faith and Holiness and this God hath told them as plain as the tongue of man can speak and yet they are Considering of it whether it be best to come out of it and yet they cannot be Resolved Did I say They are Considâ—ring Nay the Lord be mercifull to them they are so dead-hearted and besotted that they do not so much as seriously Consider of it But even runne on without Consideration Ah poor wretches They are ready to go to another world and may look every day when the bell toles for them and when death will bring them to their endless life and yet they have not wit enough to Resolve whether they should make ready no nor with enough in their most carless worldly state to know that they are unready Death is coming and Judgment is coming and the burning Wrath of God is coming and are even at the doore and yet these wise men are unresolved of that only way that is of absolute necessity to their safety They must have more time yet to consider of the matter whether it be best for them to turn or no They stand at the very brink of Hell and yet they must further consider of it whether it be better to turn back or to go on Nay they will go on without Consideration And yet these men would take it â—aynously if one should lay hands on them and carry them to Bedlam or but tell them of the hundreth part of the sottishness that they are guilty of 5. And it is further considerable that these men that are all this while unresolved about their Conversion and Sanctification have wit enough to resolve of doubtfuller and less necessary matters without any such advising or delaies And they are men of ordinary parts and capacities for the matters of this world They can eat when they are hungry and drink when they are thirsty without a twelve-months timâ— to advise first on it They can resolve to go to bed at night and to rise in the morning without a years or a daies deliberation If they have any thing to buy or sell
your Cross and follow him You must be hated of all men for his sake and the Gospels and you must prepare for prison and fire and sword There 's no hope of being saved while you purpose to save your pleasures riches liberties or lives Matth. 16. 25. Marke 8. 35. Luke 9. 24. And will a man that is unresolved forsake his friends estate and life for the sake of Christ and the hopes of Glory He cannot do it I know that a carnal ungrounded Resolution may decive a man in the day of tryal when the self-suspecting fearfull Christian may hold out But yet without a humble self-denying Resolution joyned with an adherence to Christ for strength there 's no man will hold out If thou be a wavering minded man thou wilt be unstedfast in all thy waies Jam. 1. 8. If thou be not Resolved the words of a mans mouth will turn thee out of the way the very mocks and scorns of a drunkard or a fool that hath no understanding in the matters of Salvation will make thee shrink and hide thy profession and be ashamed of Christ in whom alone thou hast cause to Glory If thou be not a Resolved man what better can be expected but that thou turn as the weather-cock with every wind and fit thy Religion to thy worldly ends and as another Judas sell thy Lord for a little money If thou fall not away it will be but for want of a tryal to procure it and therefore in Gods account thou art gone already because thy Resolution was never with him When you turn to God there will remain within you the remnants of your corruption a body of death a rebelling flesh and this will be still tempting you and drawing you from God And O how strong do these temptations seem to the Soul that is unresolved Yea without a firm habituate Resolution it is impossible to overcome them Your whole way to Heaven is a continual warfare You have enemies that will dispute every foot of the way with you There 's no going a step forward but as the ship doth in the Sea by cutting its way through the waves and billows and as the plow doth in the earth by cutting through the resisting soil There is self which is your principal enemy and there is Satan and the world and almost all that you meet with in it will prove your hinderers And you must make your way by valour and Holy Violence through all And will an unresolved man do this You will scarce ever how your knee to God in secret prayer nor set your selves upon serious Meditations but the flesh and the Devil will be drawing you off You will never attempt a faithfull reproof a liberal work of Charity a hazardous confession of Christ or any dangerous or costly duty but the flesh and the Devil will plead against it and put you to it And in these and many such cases of your lives you will never break through nor do any good on it without Resolution Do I need to tell you how hard the way of Salvation is that fly from it on mistake because you think it harder then it is Do I need to tell you how false you will prove to Christ if you have not Resolution that know it by your ordinary miserable experience that a poor temptation will make you sinne against your knowledg How many good wishes and purposes have you had already in sickness or at a lively Sermon that are all come to nothing for want of a firm Habituate Resolution What abundance of time-servers and of chaffie professours are lately fallen off to the way of rising and riches in the world or to the pride and giddy levity of dividers that oppose the Truth of God and their Teachers and trouble the Church and all because they were never well rooted by a sound Resolution They that take Christ but upon liking do usually mislike him when he calls them to self-denial For they had never that connatural principle that should effectually dispose their Souls to like him nor had they ever the inward experiences of power and sweetness which are proper to the sincere and should increase their liking of him Either Resolve therefore or stand by and perish 10. I beseech you consider also what abundance of clear undeniable Reasons doth God give in to thee to turn the Scales and cause thee to Resolve He fetcheth Reasons from his own Dominion and Soveraignty Should not a creature obey the Lord that made him He reasoneth with you from his daily preservations Do you live upon him and should you not obey him He reasoneth with you from his Almightiness You are all at his Mercy and wholly in his hands and yet dare you disobey him He reasoneth with you from his Love and Goodness Never did evil come from him nor did he ever do any wrong Never was there man or Angel that was a loser by him it is not possible to have so good a master and yet will you not obey him He fetcheth reasons from all his Mercies Every bit of bread is from him and should be an Argument with thee to obey him Every daies health and strength and comforts and every nights rest and ease thy Mercies at home and thy Mercies abroad in private and in publike all should be so many Arguments with thee to Resolve You cannot look upon a plant or a flower under your feet upon the Sun or a Starre that 's over your heads or upon any creature but you may see so many Reasons that should move you to Resolve If all these will not serve he fetcheth yet stronger Reasons from the Incarnation example and blood of the Sonne of God Canst thou look on God incarnate for sinne combating with Satan and conquering for thee and dying and bleeding and buried for thy sinne and yet be unresolved to leave that sinne and turn to him that hath bought thee by his blood If all this will not serve he Reasoneth with thee from thy own benefit If thou care not for God dost thou care for thy self Dost thou regard thy own Soul If thou do it 's high time to Resolve He reasoneth with thee from Everlasting Glory Is a certain Kingdom an Everlasting glorious Kingdom nothing to thee Art thou content to be thrust out of that Eternal Inheritance Is the filthy pleasure of the flesh for a few hours better then the endless joys of the Saints He pleads also with thee from the danger that thou art near Poor Soul thou little seest what others see that are dead before thee Thou little knowest what they feel that died before they were Resolv'd for God He fetcheth his Reasons from the certaine everlasting flames of Hell and is there not force enough in these for to Resolve thee Good Lord what a thing is a senseless sinner Dost thou believe Heaven and Hell as thou takest on thee to do If thou do believe them is it possible for thee believingly to think of
Heaven and its Eternal Glory and yet to be unresolved whether to turn or not Or canst thou think of the endless miseries of the damned and yet be unresolved whether to turn or not Can any heart be so senseless or deluded Moreover he pleadeth with thee from the equity and sweetness of his Service It is but to Love him and to seek his Kingdom and forbear those things that hurt thy Soul His Commands are not unreasonable nor grievous Darest thou speak out and say that sinne is better and that Satan hath provided thee a better work then God hath done He reasoneth with thee also from his Wisdom and his Justice He tels thee that as Satan hath nothing to do with thee and as he is none of thy friends and meaneth thee not so well as God doth so he is not able to prescribe thee a more just and perfect law then God hath done Follow God and thou art sure thou shalt never be deceived or misled For he wanteth not Wisdom or Power or Goodness to be a meet Law-giver and Guide But if thou follow the Devil the world or the flesh thou followest a blind and a deceifull guide And yet after all these Reasons art thou not Resolved He Reasoneth with thee also from thy own experience What good hath sinne done thee And what hurt would Holiness do thee Yea he reasons with thee from the experience of all the world Who was ever the bâ—tter for sinning And who was ever the worse for Holiness How long will thy fleshly delights endure What will this do for thee in thy extremity Was ever man made Happy by it Thou knowest well enough thou must shorty leave it and that it will forsake thee in thy greatest need But so would not God if thou hadst Resolvedly given up thy self to him All men that refuse a Heavenly life do sooner or later wish that they had chosen it Abundance of such Reasonings God useth with thee in his Word and by his Ministers and dost thou think indeed that there is not weight enough in these to give thee cause immediately to Resolve How little or nothing canst thou say against them Canst thou bring any Reason that is Reason indeed against these or any of these Reasons of the Lord Darest thou say that ever a one of them is false or insufficient And what are the Reasons which you have on the contrary to hinder you from Resolving Forsooth because your sinnes are sweet you would fain have the pleasure of them a little longer yet O wretched Souls that find more pleasure in the abusing of your Maker and Redeemer then in loving honoring and pleasing him That delight more in serving the flesh and the Devil then in serving God and seeking after his Favour and your own Salvation You are a hundred times madder then a man that lieth tumbling himself in his dung and will not rise out of it to receive a Kingdom because it is so soft and so sweet that he is loth yet to leave it You are foolisher then Nebuâ—hadnezzar had been if he had been loath to return again to his Kingdom because he would fain stay longer among the beasts of the fields among whom in his distraction he had betaken himself Dan. 4. 31 32 33. And what other Reasons have you against Resolving Forsooth you shall be mockt or jested at by others By whom I pray you Not a man but a miserable fool will do it Yea but you are told you must forsake â—ll and be ready to die for Christ if he â—all you to it Very true and can you â—eep that which he calleth you to forsake How long will you keep it Silly Souls do you not know that you forsake it by not for saking it and lose all by saving any thing and that you have no way to save it but by losing and forsakeing it Suppse you were by enemies banished out of England and upon pain of death you must be gone within a twelve-month And a King that loveth you inviteth you to his Country and tells you for the poor livings that you have lost he will make you Lords and Princes so you will bring with you the little goods you have and leave nothing behind you Hereupon one man takes the next wind and ships over all his riches that he may have it when he comes there Another saith I am loath to leave my goods I have a while longer to stay here and what shall I do without them I am loath to see the habitation of my Ancestours impoverished And so when his time is expired he is fain to leave them all behind him and hath none that will receive him in the Country where he must abide Which of these think you is the wiser man Which of them was it that lost his goods and which did save them I speak to you but such another parable as Christ used to you himself Luke 16. 2 3 4 9. Where you are advised to send your riches before you and to make you friends of the mammon of unrighteousness that when you dye you may be received into the everlasting habitations I know there are other vain delusions that hinder you from Resolving I will not call them Reasons for they are unreasonable I shall only say this to you that if there be ever a man of you that heareth his words that dare be such a Blasphemer as to reproach the Laws and Image of his maker and say that he hath made you too strict a Law and laid too heavy a task upon you and a Heavenly life is troublesome and unnecessary If there be a man of you that is so devilish as that you dare plead the Devils cause and justifie his work before the Lord's and say that it is better to please the flesh let that man prepare himself to make good these words before the Lord and his Holy Angels and be sure that he shall be there put to it in another manner then he is here by me And if you have such Reasons as you will stand to before the Barre of God to prove the Devil the better Master and an unholy life to be better then a Heavenly see then that you look them up and there make your best of them and expect to live with the Master that you served and to reape as you sowed and eate the fruit of your fleshly waies which you took to be the best But if you have no such Reasons but your Consciences are convinced that God should be served and sinne should be speedily forsaken and Heaven should be provided for above all Resolve then to do it before you stirre Or else say plainly I have no Reason to be wicked but because I will be wicked I will forseke God and damn my own Soul without any Reason because I will do it And if you are at this pass you may take your course 11. Another thing that I would intreat you to consider of is this It is a most
many sinnes and the wrath of God if they did but well Consider of it Durst they live so peaceably in a state of death and in the slavery of the Devill if they did but well Consider of it Would they do no more to prepare for their speedy appearing before God and for the scaping of Hell fire if they did but Consider of it Would thâ—â— swallow down their cups so greedily and give up themselves to the world so eagerly if they did but well Consider what they do Methinks they should not The cause of sinne and the Devil is so naught that I should hope to shame it with most of the ungodly if I could but bring them to a serious Consideration of it O how the Kingdom of Satan would down if we could but tell how to make men Considerate How fast the Devil would lose his servants What abundance Christ would gaine And how many would be saved if we could but tell how to make men Considerâ—te And one would think that this should be easily done seeing man is a self-loving and reasonable creature But yet to our grief and great admiration we cannot bring them to it I should not doubt but one Sermon or one Sentence of a Sermon might do more good then a hundred do now If I were but able to perswade the hearers when they come home to follow it by serious Consideration But we cannot bring them to it If our lives lay on it we could not bring them to it Though we knew that their own lives and Salvation lieth on it yet can we nor bring them to it They think and talk of other matters almost as soon as the Sermon 's done and they turn loose their Thoughts or if they do read or hear or repeat a little yet cannot we get them to one half hours secret and sober Consideration of their case This is the Reason why it is so rare a thing to see men throughly turn to God This is much of the use of all Gods teachings and afflictions too but to bring men to sober Consideration God knows that sinne hath unmanned us and lost us the use of our Reason where we have most use for it and therefore the means and Works of God are to recover us to our Reason and to make us men againe The very graces of his Spirit are to make us to be more Reasonable And now before I dismiss this Direction I have a Question and a Request to make to thee whoever thou art that Readest these lines My Question is this Hast thou ever sâ—berly Considered of thy waies and laid thâ—se greatest matters to heart or hast thou not Dost thou ever use to retire into thy self and spend any time in this needâ—ull work If thou dost not my Request to thee is that now at last thou wouldest do it without delay Shall I beg this of thee shall the Lord that made thee that bought thee that preserveth thee Request this of thee that thou wouldest sometimes betake thy self into some secret place and set thy self purposely to this work of Consideration and follow it earnestly and close with thy heart till thou hast made something of it and brought it to a Resolution Wilt thou then spend a little time in reasoning the case with thy self and calling thy heart to a strict account and ask thy self What is it that I was made for And what business was I sent into the world about And how have I dispatcht it How have I spent my time my thoughts my words and how shall I answer for them Am I ready to die if it were this hour Am I sure of my Salvation Is my Soul Converted and truly Sanctified by the Holy Ghost If not what Reason have I to delay Why do I not set about it and speedily resolve Shall I linger till death come and find me unconverted O then what a sad appearance shall I make before the Lord. And thus follow on the discourse with your hearts What say you Sirs Will you here promise me to bestow but some few hours if it be but on the Lords Day or when you are private on the way or in your beds or in your shops in these Considerations I beseech you as ever you will do any thing at my Request deny me not this Request It is nothing that is unreasonable If I desired one of you to spend an hour in talking with me you would grant it yea or if it were to ride or go for me And will you not be intreated to spend now and then a little time in Thinking of the matters of your own Salvation Deny not this much to your selves deny it not to God if you will deny it me Should you not bethink you a few hours of the place and state that you must live in for ever Men will build strong where they think to live long But a tent or a hut will serve a Souldiour for a few nights O Sirs Everlasting is a long day In the Name of God let not Conscience have such a charge as this against you hereafter Thou art come to thy long homeâ— to thy Endless state before eveâ— thou spentest the space of an hour in deep and sad and serious Considerations of it or in trying thy title to it O what a Confounding charge would this I am confident I have the witness of your Conscienses going along with me and telling you it is but reasonable yea and needfull which I say If yet you will not do it and I cannot beg one hours sober discourse in secret between you and your hearts about these things then what remedie but even to leave you to your misery But I shall tell you in the Conclusion that I have no hope of that Soul that will not be perswaded to this duty of Consideration But if I could perswade you to this reasonable this cheap this necessary work and to follow it close I should have exceeding great hopes of the Salvation of you all I have told you the truth Consider what I say and the Lord give you understanding 2 Tim. 2. 7. Or if you put me to conclude in harsher terms they shall be still the Oracles of God Now Consider this yee that forget God lest I teare you in pieces and there be none to deliver you Psal. 50. 22. And so much for the third Direction about Consideration on which I have staid somewhat long because I apprehend it of exceeding necessity DIRECT IV. The fourth Direction which I shall give you that the work of your Conversion may not miscary is this See that the work of Humiliation be throughly done and break not away from the Spirit of Contrition before he have done with you and yet see that you mistake not the Nature and the Ends of the work and that you drive it not on further then God requireth you Here I shall first shew you the true Nature of Humiliation and 2o. the use and ends of it and 3o. the