Christians much more than to the highest rank of them 1 Cor. 7.32 35. before the pleasures of Marriage to avoid the great Carefulness and Distractions that necessarily attend that State Even to those also that after enjoyment have left their Wives i. e. by mutual consent upon the same Spiritual account And when our Saviour saith There be some who have made themselves Eunuchs by embracing a Single Life for the Kingdom of Heavens sake i. e. For the better serving God in any way He who is able to receive it let him receive it what is it but a Recommendation to his followers particularly to his Disciples and Guides of his Church of that happier Condition And as to that popular pretence of multiplying the World and continuing a Succession of Generations that is not the care of Man but of God and Individual Persons as many as are so resolved in their minds may safely chuse the better State in order to their own greater happiness without fearing the ruine of the World to ensue And indeed our Saviour the fountain of all Purity by that Expression of making themselves Eunuchs seems to grant as St. Crysostome observes the power of living a Vertuous Single Life a life of Eunuchism to all sincere endeavourers And St. Paul also when he reckons up to his Corinthians his own good Actions and Labours 2 Cor. 6.6 inserts amongst them Pureness or Chastity which he would not have done if he had thought it the mere Gift of God without any concurrence or acquisition of his own Watchings and Fastings and Prayers If then those Married Persons are commended and promised a Reward who keep themselves within the bounds of Marriage chast from Adultery Uncleanness and all unlawful Carnal Pleasures and those also a higher Reward who Renounce the pleasures of Marriage and leave their Wives consenting thereunto for the Kingdom of Heavens sake that they may love God the more entirely with all their Heart all their Soul and all their Strength which is the great Commandment of all what shall be done with those Virgins that have with much pains and difficulty abstained not only from unlawful carnal Pleasures Fornication c. but also from the lawful those of Marriage It is certainly more Heroical as a Holy Man observes with Virgins wholly to repell the importunities of the Flesh than with the Married only lawfully to satisfie them A greater vertue to subdue than only to moderate the most Violent of our Passions Their reward therefore in Heaven must be proportionably greater answerable to the several greater Degrees of Purity to which they have here attained Of them it is said in the Revelations at least of those of the highest degree of Virginal Purity These are they who were not defiled with Women Rev. 14.4 for they are Virgins And they are there also called The first Fruits unto God and unto the Lamb And their Transcendent reward is They follow the Lamb whethersoever he goeth And of whom else is it said but of the most pure Virgin-Mother of our Lord That all Generations shall call her Blessed Luke 1.48 If it should here be objected That in this Discourse there is little or nothing said concerning the sins of the Flesh being also contrary to the Purity of the Soul as well as of the Body it is answered That such sins are more directly opposite to the purity of the Body as being committed in it and cannot be committed without it and are thence called the sins of the Flesh Care therefore being taken of the Purity of the Body the Purity of the Soul is included as to these sins Not but there are other sins called Spiritual more proper to the Soul and more directly opposite to its purity and more dangerous also because not so easily discernable by us as are the sins of the Flesh such as Pride Hypocrisy Ambition Envy Wrath Contentions of Argument Disobedience to Superiours Rebellion Witchcraft Curiosity of Science Schism Heresy and the like which together with their chief Remedies Humility Lowliness of Mind Submission of Judgment Contentedness c. would be sufficient matter for so many different Discourses And I might here insert how far an obstinate Blindness Ignorance or Errour in the Understanding and a Peevish Perversness in the Will may be said to be the chief if not the only Causes of these subtiler and more Spiritual wickednesses of the Soul But at present it shall suffice to have given some short account of the abominable sins of the Flesh and the sad Consequences thereof Superadding only which I could not omit what is so particularly markt out to us by St. Jude concerning Rebellion Jud. v. 8. The Heads and Contrivers of which he calls Filthy Dreamers that defile the Flesh despise Dominion and speak evil of Dignities This Character is so plain that I need not point out the Persons concerned in it For who are these Filthy Dreamers but those who pretend Revelations and Illuminations from God to serve their own Lusts who forsaking the Guides and Governours God hath set over them and setting up for their own Passions either of Revenge or Covetousness or Ambition and the like and finding no encouragement either in God's Word or from good Men for what they do perhaps do perswade themselves at least pretend to others that they have new Advices new Instructions new Lights from Heaven And vainly puffed up in their Fleshly mind do think to shelter themselves and their wickedness under a pretext under the Fige leaves of Godliness and Spirituality till like Corah and his Company Dreaming themselves holy Num. 16.31 and offering to God false Fire they are suddenly swallowed up even before they can awake out of their filthy Dream I proceed next to the Cure and Prevention of the Sins of the Flesh by observing to the serious Reader some few useful Rules out of those many Prescribed by Pious and Learned Men for the direction of themselves and others CHAP. V. The first Rule Of our Affections Memory and Imagination FIrst we must endeavour to know our own Passions and Inclinations which if not rightly Governed do in a manner biass the Soul to what they please and are for that reason narrowly to be watcht especially the Passion of Love as being the very Source of all the rest For if our Love and Affection be once fixed and chained to any one object it grows then unruly All other Passions and Reason it self must give way to it Its Bands are strong Cant. 8.6 strong as death saith the Spouse in the Canticles Death that swallows all All our Faculties and Powers become Vassals to this Passion even our fears often proceed from our too great love it hurries them on and when not rightly placed it never stops but in our ruine Forcing us many times against our minds video meliora proboque deteriora c. to transgress our duty to God and our selves to lay aside our Liberty and Manhood
the Earth and Sea giving up their Dead and a particular Examination of them according to God's unerring Books which will then be opened Consider 4. The Difference that will then be between the Good and Bad. The Good having Co-operated with God's Grace shall be Cloathed with Glorious Bodies and placed on Christ's Right Hand The Bad not Co-operating with God's Spirit Cloathed with Corruption and placed on Christ's Left Hand And the Consciences and Thoughts of all hearts will be then laid open Reflect What shame confusion will it then be to the Impenitent when out of their own Mouths and Consciences they will be both Accused and Condemned Consider 5. How astonishing it will be to the Wicked to hear the Sentence of the Judge Go ye Cursed into everlasting Fire And how joyful to the Righteous to hear Come ye blessed possess the Kingdom prepared for you c. Reflect Make firm Purposes to live well and in vertuous Circumstances and intreat the Judge to be propitious to you and that you may always bear in mind this terrible Judgment and Sentence to escape it which is said to have occasioned the Institution of the severest Order of Christians in the World Saturday Of Hell Consider 1. What a Punishment it would be to be bound Hand and Foot and cast into a hot fiery Furnace there to remain burning and unconsumed tho but for a short time And as every Member of the Body so every Power and Faculty of the Soul receive its peculiar Torment Consider 2. How hard and unsupportable it must needs be to be Slaves to the Devils and Companions of the damned amidst the most exquisit Tortures and incessant Blasphemies and Cursings of Allmighty God Consider 3. How long these Torments will last If after some Thousands of Years there were to be an end it would somewhat lessen them But after an Hundred thousand Years succeeds an Eternity that cannot be measured Reflect How foolish is it to chuse such endless Torments for a transitory Pleasure Endure any Punishments here to avoid them Here cut here burn but save me in the World to come was St. Austin's Prayer Entreat Almighty God that you may be so awed by them whilst living that you may not deserve to experience them when dead Sunday Of the Joys of Heaven Consider 1. The Place and the Company How great Joy it must needs be to inhabit in the City of God the heavenly Jerusalem and converse with the holy Angels and all the Saints which have been from the beginning of the World Who having the same Charity one for another being all filled with the same holy Spirit rejoyce in every ones Good as if it were their own Consider 2. The greatness of the Reward The Body it self will be spiritualized and all its Senses and Powers exalted and adorned with most admirable Gifts And the Soul enabled to see and know God as he is and to love and enjoy him to all Eternity which is the only true Blessedness And though there be far different degrees of Glory yet no Envy but on the contrary Rejoycing See the preceeding Discourse Reflect Give God thanks who hath given you to hope for and made you capable of this Glory and humbly implore him mercifully to preserve you though ungrateful in true Vertue and holy Living that you may at length come to that glorious Place and there praise and magnify him to all Eternity CHAP. III. Heads of Meditation for the Second Third and Fourth Weeks Second Week MOnday Of the Incarnation of our Saviour His leaving the Bosom of his Father and taking upon him Humane Nature Voluntarily and yet by consent of the whole Trinity A Mercy denied to the fallen Angels And a Mystery which the good Angels desired to look into Tuesday Of the Visitation of the ever-Blessed Virgin and the Salutation of the Angel Hail c. Wednesday Of the Nativity of our Lord in a Stable yet honoured with Miracles Thursday Of the Shepherd's Vision the Angels Hymn the coming of the Three Kings by the Guidance of a Star or Angel Friday Of the Offering up of our Saviour in the Temple The Humility of the Mother of our Lord being not obliged to any such Oblation Old Simeon's Prayer Lord now lettest c. He could not die till he had seen the Lords Christ Saturday Our Saviour's Baptism and the Testimony the Father and the Holy Spirit then gave of his Divinity Sunday Of our Lord's Transfiguration and the Consolation the Three Disciples also took therein It is good for us to be here c. The Third Week MOnday Of the Eight Beatitudes the Sum of Christian Perfection placing happiness in things seemingly most contrary to it such as Poverty Persecution c. But yet the true and only way to Blessedness declared to be so by him who is Wisdom it self and who himself also became our Example in sufferings Tuesday Of the Lord's Prayer containing all the good things we are to pray for and all the evils we are to pray against Wednesday Of the Rich Glutton and the ten Virgins The difference between Dives and Lazarus both in this World and the other And between the ten Virgins in the other World notwithstanding their seeming equality in this Thursday Of the Conversion of Mary Magdalene and the Woman of Samaria Both of them great Sinners The former possessed with seven Devils and the latter lived in Fornication But their Repentance was as remarkable as their Sins And their after life as Vertuous as their former had been Vicious Friday Of the Paralytick at the Pool of Bethesda and of the Man born blind Both cured by our Saviour And both afterwards openly Confessed him To leave our sins and follow Christ takes away the Cause of Sin For there is a Lameness and Blindness also in the Soul Saturday Of the Prodigal Son and the Man that fell among Thieves The Prodigal was received by his Father upon his returning and repenting The poor Man fell among Thieves by his leaving his right way Jerusalem for Jericho God for his pleasure the Church for the Company of Thieves and Robbers Reflect Conversion to God's Church and Repentance the only Remedy Sunday Of our Saviour's raising from the Dead Lazarus the Son of the Woman of Naim the Daughter of Jairus One of them was newly dead the second carried out the third three days buried The newly dead immediately upon our Saviour's speaking rose and walked was perfectly cured the rest not so soon Reflect So it fairs with Sinners More difficulty for habituated Sinners to rise to a Life of Grace The Fourth Week MOnday Of the Institution of the Blessed Eucharist He that Eats worthily of this Bread shall live for ever shall overcome his Lusts be filled with Celestial Joys c. But he that Eats unworthily eats his own Damnation if he dies in that condition not discerning the Lord's Body Tuesday Of our Saviour's Passion in General Who it was that suffered The Son of
A CHECK TO Debauchery AND OTHER CRYING SINS Of these TIMES WITH Several useful Rules for the attaining the contrary Virtues To which are annexed some Directions and Heads for Meditation and Prayer taken out of Holy Scripture Except the Lord had left unto us a very small Remnant we should have been as Sodom and we should have been like unto Gomorrah Is 1.9 Oct. 26. 92. Imprimatur Edm. Bohun LONDON Printed for Richard Butt in Princes-street near Covent-Garden and are to be sould by Randal Taylor near Stacioners-Hall 1692. A LETTER TO A FRIEND SIR I make you this small Present as knowing a Gentleman ought to be as zealous for Virtue as he is for Honour and to shew his Courage chiefly in conquering himself Your Example influences very far being so well known and so well beloved And I need not tell you how many out of meer Emulation are apt enough to become your Creatures and Followers The Conversation of some Gentlemen is not so innocent as becomes their Quality and as it ought to be But it is commonly either Drollery or hard drinking In the former they neither spare Friend nor Foe have no regard to Modesty or good Manners and many times not to sacred Things themselves And in the latter they are obnoxious to all other even the greatest Sins It is Solomon's Observation concerning Drunkenness that it leads to Whoredom and all Lewd things and renders Men more insensible than Beasts and yet so great is the sottishness of its followers they will seek it still and not refrain Prov. 23.33 c. Those false Maxims so much in Vogue with some God will deal with me as a Gentleman a Souldier a Courtier and the like so often urged in Excuse of a Vicious Life were invented by the Common Enemy of Mankind to justle out the Laws of God and to render all good Instructions of Pious Men ineffectual Whereas the H. Scripture assures us That God is no respecter of Persons but in every Nation he that feareth God and worketh Righteousness i. e. becomes and does the duty of a Christian is accepted of him and none others Acts 10.34 35. John 3.18 And if we profess to know God and deny him in our Works we are no better than Infidels and if we say we do know him and not keep his Commandments we are Lyars let our Quality or Station be what it will Tit. 1.16 Many Saints now in Heaven were indeed not always so upon Earth but then resolutely reforming themselves and retracting their past Course of Life the Divine Grace and assistance being never wanting to such they afterwards by incessant vertue became great Instruments of God's Glory in the Salvation of innumerable Souls This is more or less applicable to every Man whilst he lives in this World who hath always some fault or other if not ill habit to retract which by God's assistance he may do when he pleases and it is his greatest wisdom not to delay his Endeavours as the contrary his greatest folly I hope therefore you will not think me your Enemy because I tell you the truth Who am on the contrary Sir Your Faithful Friend in this highest point of Friendship and most ready to serve you in any thing conducing to your eternal happiness at least my poor Prayers shall not be wanting SIR Your most Sincere Humble Servant L. D. THE EPISTLE TO THE READER Courteous Reader THese Collections were designed chiefly for the good of my self and some particular Freinds but may perhaps be of service towards the awakening and exciting others to endeavour the pulling down those abominable sins which walk our Streets at Noon day with a Whores forehead unmasked and inhabit with us in our very Gates even in the most Eminent and most frequented places of our Cities without any notice taken of them unless it be to Caress and Encourage them The wiser Heathen would have thought such gross sins a reproach to Reason and a Disgrace to Humane Nature and therefore for Christians to spend their whole lives here in them and expect Heaven at the last which is the reward only of Vertue and Holiness would be the greatest folly and madness in the World The way to Salvation is now by Grace not by weak Nature by what is revealed to â—â— to be the will of God not what we can think or can know any other way by Faith the evidence of things not seen by the Light of Nature yet most certain to us not by sight or blind Reason by denying not pleasing our selves Paradise is not to be gained the same way it was lost but the contrary Not by eating but by forbearing to eat the forbidden Fruit. Not that ceasing to do evil is sufficient to make us happy unless we also learn to do well we must besides bridling our Appetites perform such dayly duty to God as he requires of us Go on from Grace to Grace from Vertue to Vertue from one degree of Holiness to another till we come to the measure of the Stature of the fulness of Christ The first and principal step however to Vertue is the ceasing to be Vicious and this cannot be done without renouncing all sensuality and subduing our Lusts In order to which we are to pray for the assistance of God's Grace to consult good Men and good Books and resolve to follow their Example and Directions And if this short Treatise should conduce any thing towards the reclaiming of but one single Sinner from a lewd sensual debauched Course of Life to become a sober chast sincere Christian it would be thought more then a sufficient recompence to Courteous Reader Your Faithful Freind for the Good of your Soul L. D. The Contents CHAP. I. OF Gross Carnal Sins in General Pag. 1 Marriage a lawful Remedy Pag. 3 And so also our Lord's Counsel of a Single Life Ibid. The practice of the present Age too contrary to both ibid. CHAP. II. Of the impurity and filthiness of such sins Pag. 6 They proceed wholly from our selves Pag. 7 Natural Infirmities no sins Pag. 6 Opposite to God's own Holiness ibid. A particular mark set upon them in Scripture Pag. 8 Opposite to the cleanness and sanctity which ought to be in the Body as well as in the Soul of every Christian Pag. 9 Diseases Sores c. are not the uncleanness her meant ibid The Body the Temple of the Holy Ghost a Member of Christ his Spouse purchased with his precious Blood therefore to be kept holy Pag. 10 11. Fornication c. Dishonourable and Disgraceful to the committors thereof Offers the greatest indignity to Christ's Incarnation Pag. 12 Filthy Discourse tending thereunto to be avoided ibid. A Natural shame accompanies such sins Pag. 14 The Habit thereof changes Men into Beasts Pag. 15 These were the sins the Heathen sell into when abandoned by God for their Idolatry Pag. 15 16 CHAP. III. Of the punishments of such sins Pag. 17 God a revenges of such sins himself Pag.
live without Care or any sort of Seriousness keep what the World calls the best Company have their choice of Women and Wine and deny themselves nothing of Sensuality And all this as the World now goes without running any great Hazard of losing their Reputation but not of losing their immortal Souls which sure ought most to be regarded by them To these supine Christians and Slaves to their own Lusts who know better but yet as it were in their own Defence take the Liberty not only of living Counter to but also of drolling upon all that is serious or sacred even the Holy Scriptures and our blessed Saviour himself rather than be stopp'd or check'd in their Career or in the leastwise hindred the following the full Swinge of their own unbridled Appetites and ungovernable Wits I can only propose First The Impurity and Filthiness of such Sins and Secondly The severe Punishments that inseparably attend them CHAP. II. Of the Impurity and Filthiness of such Sins PAssions Frailties and Infirmities are the common Plea and Pretence of Sinners Whereas the defect and proneness of our Nature to sin is in it self no Sin so long as not compli'd withall and besides is abundantly repaired and supernatural Assistance recovered by the Incarnation of our Saviour and the Means he hath afforded us to a holy Life if we are not wanting in the Application The loss of our Innocency hath not deprived us of any of our Faculties Our Understanding and Will are still the same and we have the same freedom to chuse the Good and reject the Evil nor is the divine Assistance God be thanked denied to any that seek it So that the Commission of Sin is entirely from our selves Perditio tua ex te Thy Destruction is from thy self Hos 13.9 says the Prophet and the preventing of it wholly in our own power And one would think we should not readily fall in love with so great deformity My present Subject however is those grosser Sins the Sins of the Flesh as being most rise amongst us and such as destroy all seriousness the foulness and filthiness whereof appears 1st From the great offence they give to God's own Holiness and Purity To which every evil even in Thought is opposite Sanctity being his great and most proper Attribute than which the Seraphims could find none greater when they sung Holy Holy Holy Lord God of Sabbaoth Besides the Divine Nature being absolute Purity without any Mixture or Composition whatsoever and being also absolute Perfection so that no defect or want of any good thing is in him it must needs be that what is contrary to those as is all imperfection and evilness must also be opposite to him Which speaking according to the manner of men is to be displeasing to be grievous to be loathsome and odious to him but most of all these grosser sins And this we know also from God's putting all along in Scripture a particular mark of his displeasure upon them setting them in the front as the Captains and Ring-leaders of the rest These are the members we are to mortify upon Earth Col. 3.5 Fornication Vncleanness inordinate Affection evil Concupiscence c. So again 1 Cor. 6.9 be not deceived neither Fornicators c. nor Adulterers Rom. 1 24 c. Thess 4.5 Eph. 4.1 nor Effeminate Persons nor Abusers of themselves with Mankind c. shall inherit the Kingdom of God These are the sins with which the Gentiles when they offended God most of all before the light of the Gospel shone amongst them stand every where in Scripture principally charged Nay so great an offence are these sins to the Holiness of Almighty God that he seems to equal them to the greatest sin of all 1 Cor. 6.9 Rev. 22.15 Col. 3.5 And therefore in Holy Write we find them ordinarily linked together with the sin of Idolatry And sometimes also with Covetousness taken in its largest sence for Coveting either Persons or Riches which last is said also to be Idolatry And the former may be called so too for the same reason because it is hard to say which of the two Harlots or Money is most powerful and most idolized in this lower World The Impurity and filthiness of Fornication and other grosser sins of the Flesh appears yet farther from their oppositeness to that Holiness and Cleanness which ought to be in the Body as well as in the Soul of all those who profess themselves Members of Christ Not that this filthiness of the Flesh is any External Deformity in the Body or any Diseases Ulcers or Sores For we find Job Lazarus and many other great Saints who had been well pleasing in God's sight were before men very loathsom Persons But it is a real defilement of the Body as the Body is the honourable Instrument and Associate of the Soul and ought by it to be employed to a more noble end even together with the Soul to be employed to the Glorifying God and one day also to be presented with it before him in his Heavenly Tabernacle 1 Thess 4.4 This is the will of God saith St. Paul even your Sanctification that you should abstain from Fornication that every one of you should know how to possess his Vessel i. e. his body in Sanctification and Honour Vers 7. not in Lust of Concupiscence for God hath called us not to uncleanness but unto holiness And the same Apostle in his first Epistle to the Corinthians 1 Cor. 6.20 addresses himself to the Men of this Age as well as those of all others after a most prevailing manner Know you not that your body is the Temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you and not your own or at your own disposing for ye are bought with a price the precious Blood of our Lord to be also his Spouse and his Members therefore ought to glorifie God both in Body and Soul which are God's And is there not good reason that after being purchased even our body as well as soul at so dear a rate as the Inestimable Blood of our Lord we should at least in gratitude sanctifie and devote our selves wholly to his honour and service But to compell us to it unless we will deny our selves to be Men and rational Creatures the Apostle's Argument here and in his other Epistles runs thus The Church is the Spouse of Christ Eph. 5.29 30 c. 1 Cor. 6.17.6 13. whom he bought and purchased to himself with his own Blood and Life whom he Cherisheth also with the like care as the same Flesh and Bone and the same Spirit with himself And for the same reason is now our Body as wel as our Soul for the Lord and the Lord for the Body If therefore the Wife have not power over her own Body but the Husband no more hath Christ's Spouse the Church or we her Members 1 Cor. 7.34 power over our selves but Christ And tho' it be said only of
together and become Dogs Swine absolute Slaves to our Lusts and so wholly defacing the glorious Image of God engraven in us transforms us into Vessels of Dishonour fitted and prepared by our own folly for Eternal Destruction The Young Man that is deceived and enticed by a Whore who invites him in with a Stolen Waters are sweet Bread eaten in a corner is pleasant or some such little Inveigling Devices of the Devil follows her says the Wiseman As an Ox goeth to the Slaughter i. e. with Greediness as thinking he is going to a fresh Pasture and as a Fool to the Correction of the Stocks without any foresight at all Prov 5.5.9.18 not knowing that he is in any danger till a Dart strike thro his Liver Where as her house is the ready way to the Grave going down to the Chambers of Death and her steps layhold on Hell Behold the dreadful end of a sinful dishonourable Love Which well considered is certainly the best Remedy to stop the Foolish beginnings thereof And to cause Virgins to fly to their Veil to secure their Beauty from occasioning their ruine and to take Adulteries out of their bosom and beware of the Curiosity which is always Criminal But then on the contrary if this powerful Passion of Love be rightly managed so as to be once fixed upon its true object Almighty God and to hate for love of him all sin and with St. Paul Phil. 3.8 count all things loss and dung to gain Christ it then surmounts all difficulties and casts out all fears and renders the whole duty of a Christian easie and Sufferings and Persecutions for Christs sake desirable that he may thereby more please God and become more conformable to our Lord of which more afterwards Secondly Our Memory and Imagination are to be mortified We must not suffer our selves to ruminate and feed our Fancies upon past sensual Pleasures our own or other Mens for that is next to our Acting them over again Thus the Israelites when they were delivered by God himself from the midst of a sinful Nation and miraculously fed in the Wilderness with Manna from Heaven Num. 11.5 6. longed and lusted after the Flesh-pots of Egypt and so displeased Almighty God more by wishing for them again than when they actually enjoyed them So St. Peter Compares a Christians returning to the Filthiness from which he hath once escaped 2 Pet. 2.22 to a Dogs returning to his vomit and a Swine that is clean to her wallowing in the mire And our Saviour himself hath particularly forewarned us Luk. 9.62 That whosoever hath put his hand to the Plough i. e. professed himself a Christian looking back with any delight to his former sinful course of life is not fit for the Kingdom of Heaven We are therefore most carefully to mind these two Faculties especially considering they are the very Store-house of the Soul See St. Austin in his Confessions lib. 10.8 concerning the boundless Capaciousness of the Memory for the comprehending the Images of all things that can any way fall under Mans Consideration Which therefore if filled with filthy Idea's obscene Representations and the like most of all disturb and distract us and are the greatest hinderance to Piety imaginable and indeed the main Engine by which the Devil works according to the power now left him his malicious designs upon us Whereas on the contrary if they be filled with good Objects devout Representations they do unavoidably cause great Piety and Devotion in us and our hearts cannot but be set upon such Rich Heavenly Treasure Because our Imagination alone hath so great influence upon us either to good or bad that such as our Fancy is such is our Love and such is the whole Man Every one is drawn trahit sua quemque c. by some forcible Fancy something that pleases and according as that is thereafter are our thoughts It is well therefore if that something be either Truth or Justice or Beatitude and Eternal Life the only true End and Scope of a Christian Now in our watchfulness over these two faculties we are to have a particular Eye 1st to Our outward Senses Not suffering them to approach at least not dwell upon sinful Objects but removing them presently from us or us from them For not Arguing with but rather running away from them is the surest Remedy against the Temptations of all sensual Objects it being much easier to keep our selves from any knowledge or experience of them than after experiencing them so great is the Pravity of our Nature from longing after them especially those which are Incitements to Lust A Whorish Woman saith Solomon will hunt for the precious Life of a Man Prov. 6.26 27. and you may as safely take fire into your bosome or walk upon hot burning Coals as Converse with her or even look upon her without having first made a Covenant with your Eyes When therefore our Circumstances are such that we cannot well avoid the presence of a Tempting Object our best Expedient is 2ly To retire immediately into our selves to Discourse with God who stands always knocking ready to be admitted and to enter with us into our Soul and particularly to pray and beseech him either to remove the present Temptation or preserve us from it Rev. 3.20 Or the sooner to put it out of our mind we may recite any Affectionatly pious Devotions or Psalms we have ready stored up in our Memory which will make our Intention not capable of long minding two things at once unawares quit its former sinful object Or we may consider with our selves the bitterness and sting sin whatsoever committed leaves behind it by reason of the uncertainty of our true Repentance and Sincere Reformation of Life Or we may meditate on the Dolorous Passion of our Saviour which rent the very Rocks Heb. 6.6 or any part of his sufferings in the Garden at the Pillar upon the Cross and that Voluntarily to sin is as much as in us lies to Crucify him afresh Or on some one of the Four last things On Death which puts an end to all Earthly pleasures in a moment and separates a wicked Soul not only from the Body but from God forever On the last Judgment when the dreadful Sentence on Drolling Debauchees and all Impenitents will be Go ye Cursed Mat. 25.41 On Hell That everlasting Fire whither the Cursed are to go Or lastly On the Vnspeakable Joys of Heaven which may be so advantageously represented to the Soul as to drive out the thoughts of all other pleasures For there the Blessed have their Knowledge perfected Ps 63.5 their Afflictions rewarded more than they were in the least worthy Rom. 8.18 Rev. 22.4.4.8 They possess all Riches all Honour enjoy all Pleasures are ravished with the Beauty and Holiness of our Lord Eph. 4.10 Joh. 17.21 23. filled with the fulnes of God made one with Christ and with God Which
distinguish between the motions of Grace and those of Nature what are Temptations and what not and here the Judgment of some wise conscientious man more skilful than our selves is to be taken in least we should place our greatest Consolation as the Soul always does in something in any thing that is not God We are to think our selves below all and that there are none more frail than our selves to empty our selves of all affections to Earthly things and to have no propriety or desire that shall in the least wise hinder our love to God from being pure To leave our Lusts and that forever which tho' with St. Austin we may find difficult yet with him also we shall thereby find our selves freed from a Chain To be so indifferent lastly to joy or sorrow Temptation or quietness Life or Death and all things in this World as to expect no Consolation here but what flows from the Cross This is dying to our selves and all Creatures that we may be united to God which the Holy Scriptures call partaking of the Divine Nature 2 Pet. 1.4 turning our heart to God conformity to his Holy Will walking in the Truth serving him with a pure mind i. e. without anxiety or Expectation of reward rejoicing in him acquiescing in him 2 Pet. 3.1 going out of our selves into him by a perfect Abnegation of our selves Mark 8.34 referring all things to his Glory and making him all in all to us 1 Cor. 25.28 Eph. 1.6 which is the perfection of Religion as may be seen more at large in Thomas a Kempis and other Spiritual Books But then in our endeavouring after this perfection we must beware of the highest cunning and must subtile Device of the Devil which the Scripture calls his transforming himself into an Angel of Light And that is either 1st By his stirring up in us a secret self-conceit of our good Actions as if they could not possibly be mended Or 2ly His throwing in some little specious Reasonings and Fallacies to make us abate or alter them as he always pretends for the better and for God's greater Glory For example in the exercise of our Charity towards our Neighbour to corrupt that Divine Love he usually suggests something from Reason to induce us to change Divine into Rational then something from Nature to change Natural into Carnal then something from our Flesh alone to change Rational into Natural till by degrees he renders that love in us which was at first Divine and Pure altogether impure and unchast and most opposite and most displeasing to Almighty God But yet for the most part he takes care not to deface all Vertue in his Servants that neither themselves nor others may easily discern the wickedness he intermixes and so be frightned into Repentance Such are the Wiles of the Roaring Lyon who continually goes about seeking how to devour and make a prey of us 1 Pet v. 9. Whom we are commanded to resist stedfast in the Faith with all sobriety and watchfulness But do thou O Lord have mercy on us and strengthen us to overcome him Secondly The means now of obtaining farther Assistances of the Holy Spirit besides what we receive in Baptism are chiefly 1st Prayer our own and other mens Phil. 1.19 2ly Frequently Communicating If we would for Example obtain in opposition to our Lusts those false Loves that most excellent Gift of loving God above all things which is the only true love and doing every thing to please him we must First Pray for it And this we cannot do with that earnestness and integrity we ought before we sincerely repent of our False Loves our Darling Lusts For God hears not unrepenting Sinners and admits of no Rivals in our Affections he will have our whole heart or none Then after our deep sorrowing for those Heinous Sins and what sins are not heinous Even so sorrowing as not to be content without the Absolution of the Church See Bishop Andrews's Sermon on John 20.23 Whose sins ye remit Joh. 20.23 c. to be ready to submit to her severest Discipline for the good of our Souls See the Preface to the Commination in the Common-Prayer Book in great Humility and Lowliness of Mind and Self-abjection and with a stedfast Lively Faith also that God both Can and Will answer our Request if it be for our Good we may again and again discover to him our particular Follies which he already knows but yet expects to be as it were anew Informed of them by us bemoaning our vileness and opening to him our present wants with all the Motives which we can think will cause true Contrition in us and incline Him also to Grant our instant Petition We desire for the purpose what he commands us the loving Him above all things Let us lay before Him besides our own weaknesses and Infirmities his Perfections Beauty Wisdom Love and Mercy towards us which one would think were enough to excite our love to him without his commanding us to love him who are most unworthy of his love So many Blessings so many Deliverances both Temporal and Spiritual will they not move us Hath he not Redeemed us from all our Enemies the World the Flesh and the Devil taught us what to do and what to refrain given us tender Consciences the greatest Blessing upon Earth to admonish us Enabled us by his Holy Spirit to perform what he requires And yet when we continue vitious is he not still patient and long-suffering for our Repentance Preventing our Conversion with his Grace renewing his Image in us and making us again capable of Immortality and Glory For all which Benefits and Ten Thousand more can we do less than pray we may hate our Selves our Lusts and all things else and become Dead to sensuality and the World for love of him who first loved us even to Death Some there are and always have been who by Assiduous Praying having attained to the love of God think Prayer the greatest pleasure of their whole Life and themselves never well but when they are thus conversing with Almighty God whom they reverentially apprehend to be always with them either before or within them And are continually offering to him his own most precious Gifts which he therefore vouchsafes them that they may have something valuable and worthy to offer And so by their Devotions they also prepare their Souls for the receiving those particular Graces for which they pray and of which they stand in need The Power and Prevalency of Prayer whether Vocal or Mental with Almighty God and the great benefits to ourselves and others from the several parts thereof Self-Examination Confession Thanksgiving Petition Praise Resolution Intercession Oblation and every kind of Devotion wherein we either speak to God or God to us together with proper Forms and Directions for every occasion the Reader may amply learn from the publick Liturgies Manuals Catechisms Lives and Devotions of holy Men c
written and allowed of by the Ancient Fathers and the whole Church of God in all Ages And then as to the necessity of Prayer if we consider our many wants Temporal and Spiritual to be relieved many sins wherein we still offend God to be pardoned many Temptations and Dangers from which to be preserved many Benefits and Assistances received and all these with a respect also to our Fellow Christians we cannot but acknowledge every moment of our Lives had we no other necessary Duties too little to be spent in this one Great Duty of Continual Prayer 1 Thess 5.17 Our good Lord assist us by his Holy Spirit in the diligent and sincere performance thereof The other Chief Means of our obtaining Divine Assistances against our Lusts is 2ly Frequen Communicating as many good Christians now do and the Primitive Christians did almost every day I do not intend here to treat largely of this Holy Sacrament there being many good Books Written designedly on that Subject but only recommend to the Reader without medling with God's power therein which transcends all Humane Conception and Comprehension the Immense Benefit of this Holy Mystery to each worthy Communicant in reference to his particular Necessities For obtaining Remission of this or that Sin a Remedy of this or that Infirmity a Deliverance from this or that Affliction for receiving a Benefit or giving thanks for a Benefit received for helping our Neighbour for encreasing the Holy Spirit and Love of God in us Because as by one Spirit in Baptism We are made one Mystical Body of Christ 1 Cor. 12.13 so likewise in the Eucharist are we made to drink into the partaking of one Spirit The Blessed Eucharist being as necessary for the continuing and encreasing as Baptism for the first receiving the Holy Spirit Because also this is that particular Nourishment instituted by Christ for the preserving our Body and Soul to Everlasting Life that particular Pledge and Assurance of our Resurrection that true Bread from Heaven which mystically also Incorporates us into Christ and makes us continue and grow up into perfect Members of his Body that so thus partaking of the Nature and Spirit of the Second Adam the Heir of all things we may become with him Sons of God Heirs of Eternal Life as we were by the First Adam of Eternal Death That true Heavenly Bread lastly so Exalting and Assimulating our Nature into Christ when worthily Communicating as to make us one with him as he and the Father are one According to our Saviour's Prayer when he was Instituting this Blessed Sacrament I pray thee Father John 17. that they may be one as we are one O Blessed Union between poor Man and his Maker O happy those Souls who here worthily feed on this Heavenly Bread the only true Nourishment of the Life of Grace enabling them in the Strength thereof to walk even to the Mount of God the Life of Glory The Conclusion THE Summ of this Discourse is The Sins of the Flesh are most dangerous because most natural to us And by reason of their filthiness most loathsome to Almighty God and most severely punished by him For not only those of the greater magnitude Fornication Adultery Incest Sodomy Beastiality are followed with God's most Tremendous Judgments but also we find in Scripture Vncleanness and Laciviousness Gal. 5.19 Eph. 5.3 destinct from the foregoing and of a less denomination every where joyned with such Sins as exclude the Practisers thereof from the Kingdom of Heaven The way to prevent such Sins and to avoid the punishment of them is To mortify our Passions our Memory and Imagination to beware of impure Suggestions cheirsh Holy Inspirations and avoid all the occasions of such Sins to Improve lastly the Grace of God in us by Assiduous Prayer daily Examination of our selves perfect Repentance frequent Communicating and all other holy means pressing still farther to higher and higher Gifts particularly to the attaining that most excellent Gift of Charity which makes us love God above all things and our Neighbour as our selves hate even our own Lives for love of Him who first loved us undergoing the the greatest sufferings with Thankfulness and Complacency performing all our Actions on purpose to please him referring them to his Honour offering them up to his Praise and Glory To whom Father Son and Holy Ghost be all Honour Praise and Glory to all Eternity Amen God is a Spirit and they that worship him must worship him in Spirit and in Truth Joh. 4.24 Grace and Truth i. e. means of Salvation came by Jesus Christ Joh. 1.17 God sent forth the Spirit of his Son into our hearts that they that live should not henceforth live unto themselves but to him who dyed for them Gal. 4.6 2 Cor. 5.15 Wretched is that man who is all for the good things of this Life a good House good Apparel good Provision c. and is content to have a bad Soul Int. Christ Some Short Directions and Heads of Meditation for the Persons Concerned in the Preceeding Discourse CHAP. I. Of Meditation it's Requisites and how it differs from Contemplation MEditation is called the first Essential part of Prayer leading to Contemplation Thanksgiving Petition c. in which all the Principal Faculties of the Soul the Memory Vnderstanding Will and Affections are severally employed The Memory recollects the matter to be Meditated upon and also placeth the Soul in the Divine Presence The Vnderstanding judgeth of the Subject and its Vertues and accordingly proposeth it to the Will The Will excites in us divers Acts and Affections either of Love Affiance Gratitude c. towards God Or of Hatred Compunction desire of doing better c. towards our selves which is indeed the main Scope and end of Meditation Then follows our Praying and representing to Almighty God our Miseries Necessities Temptations which we most earnestly beg him to redress for his own Love and Compassion's sake and the Merits of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ But when the Faculties of the Soul are unactive or slow in their Operations as it often happens they are to be excited by the help of good Books which ought always to be at hand when we Meditate and in all such holy exercise we are to approach the Divine Presence with our greatest Reverence and Humiliation And it is also necessary before every Meditation to make a strict Examen of Conscience 1. What Benefits we have received that day from Almighty God for which we are to return Thanks 2. What Sins we have that day committed running through every hour in thought word and deed for which we are to beg pardon 3. We are to resolve upon an amendment in every particular by the Grace of God After such strict Examination of all our Thoughts Desires Words and Works judging our selves that we be not judged of the Lord and Confessing our Sins in the bitterness of our Soul as the Church requires and taking also
revenge of our selves according to the Example of St. Paul's Penitent amongst the Corinthians we shall by such fifting our Consciences be the better able to sever the Wheat from the Chaff and know also what is fittest to offer to Almighty God what to pray for and what also to meditate upon In which particular Examen of our Consciences wherein we are to endeavour to produce Acts of Contrition Self-confusion Humility Resolutions of amendment Resignation c. we must observe to what Vice we are most inclined and be sure to bend all our Forces against it for that Captain-Imperfection being Conquered the rest will easily submit And in the next Examen we must Impartially enquire whether our relapses in that kind are as frequent as formerly and so continue on the Fight with new Fervour Vigour and Constancy till it shall please God to give us the Victory Now the difference between Meditation and Contemplation is said by holy Men to be as follows 1. We Meditate when by the help of the Vnderstanding we seek and cast about and at length fix our thoughts upon such Truths and Reasons as are in our present Circumstances most apt to move and affectionate the Will to the embracing the Love of God Christian Vertues Works of Piety c. but sometimes the Inclinations of the Will the Holy Spirit operating more principally in that by Love than in the Vnderstanding by Illumination preceed the Acts of the Vnderstanding tho' most commonly it is the other way the Will and Passions not easily moving without the Reasoning of the Vnderstanding to excite them 2. We Contemplate when we steadfastly and unmovably behold God by Faith believing that he is really with us and within us as he truly is and so leaving all other Objects Idea's and Discourses we Internally look on him as present love him in silence and feed on his All-satiating Sweetness And this Contemplation is either by the help of Sensible Idea's or Intelligible or surmounts them both which is the highest sort of Prayer But this is not my business at present I intending only some short Meditations such as the Reader may easily carry about with him even in his Memory CHAP. II. Of the Subject of Meditation with Heads for the first Week THE Matter and Subject of Meditation may be any thing whatsoever Divinely revealed or that any way conduceth to our Salvation But most commonly it is adapted to the Three Degrees of Christians the lower the middle and the highest Some Learned Men recommend the method of the Church in her Liturgies beginning with Advent Nativity of our Saviour and so on to his Preaching Passion Resurrection Ascension sending the Holy Spirit taking in the Epistles and Gospels of all the Dominica's and Holy-Days This Rule is Chiefly observed by the Clergy Others advise the Selecting some certain number of pious Subjects for every day in the Week and keeping to them only and this seems also a very useful way of Meditation Heads of Meditation for the first Week Monday Of the Chief end of Man Consider 1. Why he was Created namely to praise and glorifie God 2 How far this is observed or transgressed by us and how far the ample means offorded thereunto abused Reflexion 1. Give God Thanks 2. Ask Pardon 3. Promise Amendment in every particular as need requires Tuesday Of God's Benefits Consider our Being from God Preservation Redemption Sanctification Spiritual Gifts and Graces the Holy Sacraments Eternal Life c. All that God gives is freely out of his own Goodness not for his own but our profit Reflex 1. Give great Thanks with all possible Humility 2. Offer up your self all your Thoughts Words Actions and Affections to God to be sincerely directed to his Glory only Wednesday Of your Sins Consider 1. Who it is you have offended viz. God most Munificent who hath done so many and so great things for you and promised more and greater 2. God Omniscient who sees all things most clearly 3. God Omnipotent who can destroy you in a moment and none is able to resist him 4. God most Pure who abhors all sin and for that Reason threw the fallen Angels out of Heaven for one single Sin Adam out of Paradise and condemned him to above 900 Years Pennance for one single disobedience Reflect What then will become of Impenitent Sinners And how great Reason to Fear and Tremble at so great Power and Justice of God! Consider 2. Who thou art that offend'st and resistest so great a God A most vile inconsiderable Worm The whole World in God's sight is but as a drop of the morning dew Sapient 11. What is man then so minute a Particle of that Drop Who is indeed nothing of himself and compared to Infinity bears no Proportion Reflect How great the Clemency of God in bearing so long with so great Sinners and your self the Chief and very greatest of all Consider 3. For what Cause you offended God For some very vile thing some vain Honour some beastly pleasure and that knowingly and wilfully not out of Ignorance or Infirmity Reflect Detest thy Foolishness before God Acknowledge thy Fault Beg mercy Thursday Of Death Consider 1. The certainty of it and the uncertainty of the time Recollect all the suddain Deaths you have ever seen heard or read of and conclude it the greatest madness and folly in the World to live on in such a State in which you would not die Reflect You can die but once and if not well your loss is irreparable Consider 2. Of what things Death deprives you Of all External things Riches Pleasures Honours Friends for which and whose sake you have so often offended God And that nothing will accompany you to the other World but your works whether good or bad Reflect Imagine what a wicked man restored to Life from Hell-fire would do and that do you Consider 3. The State of your Body and Soul Your Body for which you have been so Sollicitous will be carryed out to be meat for the Worms your Soul immediately hurri'd to Judgment by the Angels and from thence by an unknown way to an eternal State either of bless or misery according to the Actions done in the Flesh Reflect Use now all possible means by your self and others to make Christ who is to be your Judge become propitious to you And pray to God for Grace that you may now both know and do what upon your Death-bed and at the Judgment Seat you will wish you had done Friday Of the last Judgment Consider 1. The particular Judgment that passeth upon every man at his Death and remains unalterable 2. The dreadfulness of the last general day when the Heavens will be rouled together as a Scrol the Sun it self darkened the Moon not give her light the Stars fall from their Orbs the Earth quake the Mountains and Islands remove out of their places and Mens hearts fail them for fear 3. An Universal appearance of all the Sons of Adam