heat would scorch Therefore when God promised to Israel the beauty of the Lilly the stability of the Cedâ—r the fruitfulness of the Olive to effect all this he saith he will be as the dew And what ground can but bring forth when he who is the Father of the Rain and begetteth the drops of the dew shall himself descend upon it in bounty and goodness Who can but love him with a love of duty whom he shall thus tender with a love of mercy Who can but love him with a love of Concupiscence as being more desirous of new Influences than satisfied with former Receipts whom he so freely loves with a love of Beneficence O Lord my Soul thirsteth for thee as the gaping and chapped earth doth for the moysture of the Heavens I am nothing I can do nothing without thee my fruitfulness my growth my life depend wholly upon the droppings of thy grace when they dew lieth all night upon my Branch my glory is fresh in me and my whole man is as the smell of a field which the Lord hath blessed Be not therefore unto me O my God as a Cloud without Rain left I be as a Tree without fruit But let thy grace alwaies distill upon me as the dew and as the small rain upon the tender herb and then shall I be as the ground which drinketh in the showers that come oft upon it and bringeth forth fruit meet for him by whom it is dressed and receive also new blessing from God Meditation XIV Vpon a Pearl in the Eye VVHat specious names have Physicians put upon diseases who call a Plague Sore a Carbuncle and the white film which taketh away the delightful sight a Pearl in the Eye Do they gild over Diseases as they do their Pills or a Bolus that so their Patients may less fear and feel the evil of the one as they less taste the bitterness of the other And are any by such slender Artifices brought into an opinion that a Carbuncle is less mortal or loathsome than any other swelling that hath not so gay a name Or that blindness which is caused by a Pearl in the Eye is more comfortable than the loss of sight that comes by other accidents Methinks Reason should not run at so low an ebb in any as to please themselves in such fancies may not a Poyson have a name that sounds better to the ear a colour more pleasing to the eye and a taste that is more grateful to the Pallate than the Antidote which expels it May not Alchimy glister when Gold looks pale And yet alas in spiritual maladies in which the danger is so much the greater by how much the soul is of more value than the body with what strange delusions are many transported who when their minds are poysoned with Errour and Blasphemy do then put upon their corrupt Opinions and Tenents the glorious names of Revelations Visions Raptures refined notions and what not that may confirm themselves in their own dotages and win others into an admiration of their persons Thus Montanus gave out himself to be the Comforter that Christ had promised to send forth into the World Arius proudly boasted that God had revealed something to him which he hid from his Apostles And Eunomius fondly imagined that he was taken up to Heaven as Elias was and had seen Gods face as had Moses and was wrapt up to the third heaven as was Paul But what other thing are these Follies or rather Phrensys than as if an Israel te infected with the botch of Egypt and overspread with it from the sole of the foot to the crown of the head should boast that he had robbed the Egyptians of their most precious Jewels and had decked himself with them Would not men pitty his distemper rather than believe his confidence Would not they offer medicines to heal him rather than suffer him to perish under his miserable delusion of possessing great riches How is it then that in matters of faith in which there is both clear evidence and certainty Hereticks that are no other than ulcerous persons fitter for Dogs to lick than Christians to love should throughout all Ages so easily gain to themselves such a great multitude of Proselytes only by putting fair Names upon foul Errours It is because men for their lusts sake will not see but willingly corrupt themselves in those things which they know or is it because God hath smitten them with a spirit of blindness that they shall not see for their not receiving of the truth in the love of it Surely whatever the cause be such is the infatuation as that I had need both to tremble and to pray To tremble at the sad woe which is denounced by God himself against those that call evil good and good evill That put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter And to pray as David did Teach me thy way O Lord I will walk in thy truth unite my heart to fear thy name Meditation XV. Vpon Spiritual and bodily sickness THe soul hath its maladies as well as the body and such that for their likeness to them do often borrow their names from them Pride is a Timpany Avarice a Dropsie Security a Lithargy Lust a Calenture Apostacy an Epilepsie And yet though these names of bodily diseases do happily serve to point and shadow out the nature of spiritual how wide is the difference between the Patients of the one and of the other in regard of those qualities which may dispose them for a cure and recovery out of them In the diseases of the body it matters not whether the Patient know the name of his disease or understand the vertue of the medicines which are prescribed or be able to judge of the increase height and declination of his distempers by the beatings of his pulse the whole business is managed by the care and wisdom of the Physician who oft times conceals the danger on purpose least fear and fancy should work more than his Physick and hinder the benefit of what he applies But in the maladies of the soul it is far otherwise the first step unto spiritual health is a distinct and clear insight of sin such which makes men to understand the Plague of their own hearts Christ heals by light as well as by Influence he first Convinceth them of sin and then gives the pardon he discovers the disease to them and then administers the medicine Ignorance is a bar to the welfare of the soul though not of the body and makes the divine remedies to have as little effect upon it as Purges or Cordials have upon the Glasses into which they are put It is Solomons peremptory Conclusion that a soul without knowledge is not good nor indeed can be because it wants a principle which is as necessary to goodness as a visive power to the eye to enable it to discern its object How can he ever value holiness who understands not what sin is Or
desire a Saviour who hath no sence of his need O therefore blessed Lord do thou dayly more open my eyes that I may see my self to be among the sinzers and not among the righteous among the sick and not among the whole that so I may be healed by thee who camest not to call the righteous but sinners to repentance nor to save the whole but the sick Be thou my Physician and let me be thy Patient untill thou makest me to say I am not sick because thou hast forgiven me all mine iniquities Meditation XVI Vpon a Lamp and a Star SUch is the disparity between a Lamp and a Star as that happily it may not a little be wondred at why I should make a joynt Meditation of them which are so greatly distant in respect of place and far more in respect of quality the one being an earthly and the other an heavenly body What is a Lamp to a Star in regard of influence duration or beauty Hath it any quickning raies flowing from it Or is its light immortal so as not to become despised by expiring Can it dazle the beholder with its serene lustre and leave such impressions of it self upon the eye as may render it for a time blind to any other objects Alas these are too high and noble effects for such a feeble and uncertain light to produce and proper only to those glorious bodies that shine in the Firmament But yet this great inequallity between the one and the other serves to make them both more meet Emblems of the differing estate of Believers in this and the other life who in Scripture while they are on this side Heaven are compared to wise Virgins with Lamps burning and when they come to Heaven to Stars shining which endure for ever and ever Grace in the best of Saints is not perfect but must like a Lamp be fed with new supplies that it go not our and be often trimmed that it be not dim Ordinances are as necessary to Christians in this life as Manna to the Israelites in the wilderness though in Canaan it ceased And therefore God hath appointed his Word and Sacraments to drop continually upon the hearts of his Children as the two Olive trees upon the golden Candlestick What mean then those fond conceits of perfectists who dream of living above all subsidiary helps and judge Ordinances as useless to them as oyl for a Star or a snuffing of the Sun to make it shine more bright It is true when we come to heaven such things will be of no more use to our souls than meat or drink will be to our bodies but yet while we are on the Earth the body cannot live without the one nor the soul without the other Do thou therefore holy God perserve in me a due sense of my impotency and wants whose light is fading as well as borrowed that so I may dayly suck supplies from thee and acknowledge that I live not only by grace received but by grace renewed and while I am in this life have light only as a Lamp in the Temple which must be fed and trimmed and not as a Star in Heaven Meditation XVII Vpon a Chancery Biâ—l ONe cause and original can have but one orderly and genuine birth else what means our Saviours question Do men gather grapes of thorns or figs of thistles Or that of Sâ— James Doth a fountain at the same place send forth water sweet and bitter May it not then justly be the opinion and mind of many that the least fruit of any holy Meditation can never grow from such a bramble of Contention as a Chancery Bill And that from such a spring of Marah a sweet and delightful stream can never issue Yea who will not be ready to take up Nathanaels question Can any good thing come out of Nazareth And then what better answer can I return to such than Philips Come and see And now let me say what I have often thought That between such a Bill and most mens Confessions of sin in prayer in which they implead themselves to God there is too great a likeness in this respect that the complaints in both have more of course and form than truth and reality In the one it is Mos curiae the usage and custome of the Court for the Plaintiffe to pretend Fraud Rapines Combinations Concealments done and made to the prejudice of his right which yet he never intends to prove against the Defendant but only to make use of as a ground of inquiry And is it not thus also in the other Are there not in Prayer large Catalogues and Enumerations of sin which many charge themselves with before God as if it were their great work to justifie God in their self condemnation Pride Wantonness Hypocricy Contumacy are the black shall I say or Scarlet sins that are among others instanced in And yet what other thing is intended by them than to make up the outside of a Prayer These sins are only placed in it as dark shadows in a Picture to set it off with more advantage and to commend it rather to men than to God In the doing of the duty they think not in the least the worse of themselves for what they say against themselves nor would have others so to do else how comes it to pass that in charging themselves so deeply at Gods Tribunal there is as little appearance of shame or sorrow in their face as there was of a Cloud in the Heavens when Elijahs Servant returned this Answer that there was nothing Now though it be no part either of my work or purpose to justifie or condemn the practises of humane Judicatories which admit loose suggestions that are Arrows shot at random because that now and then they serve for a discovery Yet I cannot but condemn and abhor that the confession of sin in prayer should be as slight and overly as the complaints of a Chancery Bill and that particular sins specified in it and aggravated with hainous Circumstances should be no other than things of course done rather to lengthen out the duty then affect the heart to discover quickness of Parts rather then truth of grace What is this but to make Prayer iâ— self which should be as sweet Incense burning upon the Golden Altar to be as an Offering of Sulpher or Assafaetida What is this but to mock God the great searcher of the heart with vain words and to publish to the World how little they fear his anger or vallue his pardon for if the Confession of Sin be formal how can the seeking of forgiveness be real O holy Lord preserve me from such hypocrisie and remember not what in this kind I have been guilty of my desire is to judg my self not in word but in truth and unfeignedly to beg that I who am in the court of thy justice wholly inexcusable may in the Chancery of thy Mercy become altogether inaccusable Meditation XVIII Vpon the philosophers stone
excellent demeanour of himself at the Bar well-nigh overcomes Agrippa upon the Bench to be a Christian O how careful then should every man be who in what condition soever he stands is a part of the body of humane society to abhor evil and to cleave to that which is good When the effects both of the one and other are not terminated in our selves but do more or less benefit or hurt others as well as our selves Meditation XXIII Vpon a Multiplying Glass WHat a vain and fictitious happiness would that be if a poor man who had only a small piece of money should by the looking upon it through a multiplying Glass please himself in believing that he is now secure from the fears of pressing wants his single piece being suddenly minted into many pounds with which he can readily furnish himself with fuell to warm him cloaths to cover him and food to satisfie him But alas when he puts forth his hand to take a supply from what he beholds he can feel nothing of what he sees and when the Glass is gone that presented him with so much Treasure he can then see nothing but his first pittance which also becomes the less desirable because of the disappointment of his hopes Upon what better foundation doth the felicity of the greatest part of men stand which is not fixed upon any true and spiritual good as its proper Basis but upon the specious semblances of a corrupt and mutable fancy What is it that rich men do not promise themselves who conceive riches to be a strong Tower They think they can laugh at Famine and when others like the poor Egyptians whose Substance is exhausted sell themselves and their children for food they can buy their bread at any rate If Enemies rise up against them they question not but they can purchase a peace or a victory If Sickness come oh how can they please themselves in thinking that their Purse can command the Physicians skill and the Drugsters shops Elixars Cordials Magisterial powders they conceive beforehand will be prescribed both as their dyet and Physick And every avenue of the body at which the disease or death may threaten to enter shall be so fortified as that both of them shall receive an easie and quick repulse Now what are all these representations but the impostures of the glass of fancy which like the colours in the Rainbow have more of shew thaâ— of Entity Doth not Solomon counsel men not to labour â—o be rich And expostulate with them Wilt thou set thine eyes upon that which is not Doth not our Saviour call them deceitful Riches And Paul uncertain Riches What then can they contribute to the real happiness of any man Surely the transient sparks that with much difficulty are forced from the flint may as soon add light to the body of the Sun as Riches can yield any solid comfort to the soul or keep it from lying down in the bed of darkness and sorrow Away then from me ye flattering vanities and gilded nothings of the world get you to the Bats and to the Moles and try what beauteous rayes you can dart into their eyes I will hence no more behold you in the Glass of Fancy but in the Glass of the Word which discovers that ye are alwaies vanity and vexation no objects of trust in the times of strait or price of deliverance in the day of wrath It is methinks observable that four times in Scripture this saying is repeated That Riches and Treasures profit nothing in the day of wrath twice in the Book of Proverbs and then again by two Prophets Ezekiel and Zephaniah Doubtless these holy men knew what an universal proness there is in the minds of most to exalt Riches above Righteousness and to think that by them Heaven might be purchased and the flames of Hell bribed How else could such words ever drop from the mouths of any that they had made a Covenant with Death and were at an agreement with Hell to pass from them But Lord keep me from imagining to save my soul by Merchandize or of entituling my self any other way to the Inheritance of Heaven than by the Bloud of Christ who is my Life my Riches my Rejoycing and sure Confidence Meditation XXIV Vpon Gravity and Levity THe Stoick Philosophy was famous for Paradoxes strange Opinions improbable and besides common conceit for which it was much admired by some and as greatly controuled and taxed by others Howbeit not Stoicisme only but every Art and course of life and learning hath some Paradoxes or other but Christianity hath many more which seem like nothing less than truth and yet are as true as strange What can be more contrary to the Principles and Maxims of Philosophers than to hold that there is a regress from a total privation to an habit It was that which the Epicureans and Stoicks derided in Paul when he preached the Resurrection from the dead and yet Christians build all their happiness and confidence upon it What can seem to carry more of a contradiction in it than that saying of our Saviour He that will lose his life shall find it And yet it is a truth of that importance that whosoever follows not Christs counsell will certainly miss of life What will happily appear more novel and strange than that which I shall now adde by inverting the common Axiom and affirming this as a truth Levia tendunt deorsum gravia sursum Light things fall downwards and heavy ascend upwards The lighter they are the lower they sink and the heavier they are the higher they rise and yet this Riddle hath a truth in it In Scripture the wicked that must fall as low as hell are resembled to things of the greatest Levity as well as vileness Dust Chaff Smoke Fume Scum and the Saints that must ascend as high as Heaven are likened to things of weight as well as worth To Wheat the heaviest of which is the best to Gold which is of Metals the weightiest as well as the richest to Gems and precious Stones that are valued by the number of the Carrats which they weigh as well as by their lustre with which they sparkle Yea God hath his Ballance to weigh men and their actions as well as his Touchstone to try them He is a God of knowledge by whom actions are weighed saith Hannah in her Song And if he find great men a lye and vanity upon the Ballance he will not spare them What a severe Judgment did God execute upon Belshazzar who being weighed and found wanting was in the same night cast out both from his Kingdom and from the Land of the living And what a dreadful Sentence hath Christ foretold shall come from his mouth in the great day against those who have made a vain and empty profession of his Name who are bid to depart from him and go accursed into everlasting fire not for doing evil against his but for not doing of good
bestowed by God upon Judea the Country which is renouned for Christs Birth is also only celebrated for this Balm all other Nations wholly wanted it or at least had none like it Moses tells us that it was anciently one of the Isâ—maelites Commodities which they carried from Gilead to Egypt And Ezekiel saith it was Israels and Judahs Merchandise to Tyrus Doth it not then genuinely poynt out unto us that the whole world must be beholding to Christ for Salvation and healing Doth it not as a spiritual Hierogliphick assert that weighty Doctrine of Peters That there is no name under heaven given amongst men whereby we must be saved but by the name of Christ Why then do men lay out their money for that which is not Balm Why do they take hold sometimes on one Creature and sometimes one another saying Be thou our healer let this ruin be under thy hand Is it not one of those glorious Appellations which God in Scripture is pleased to take unto himself Ego Jehovah curator tuus I am the Lord that healeth thee Take heed then O Christian when thou art under any distress or under any malady to cheat thy self with false remedies to use Fig leaves instead of Figs themselves Adam took the one which did only hide his nakedness but not cure it but to restore Hezekiah God took the other Use what God hath appointed not what thou fanciest Secondly This Balsâ—me tree drops and weeps forth its Balm to heal their wounds that cut and mangle it and did not our blessed Saviour do thus What a strange requital did this great innocent and holy person make unto those from whom he suffered They mock and revile him hanging upon the Cross and he prayes and begs forgiveness for them They shed his bloud and he makes it a precious Medicine to heal their putred sores They smite and pierce him to the heart with a Spear and he erects in his heart a fountain to wash them from their sin and uncleanness Was it ever heard that a Physician would sweat and bleed for his surfeited Patient Or that an offended Prince would expiate the foul Treasons of his Subjects with his own life Surely well might the Apostle say that God commended his love towards us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us Be astonished O ye Angels of Heaven who delight to pry into Gospel mysteries at this Abyss of divine love from which Seraphims themselves cannot but detract if they should in the least conceive that they could either fathom with their knowledge or express in their praises And be ye melted O rocky hearts of sinners with the ardency and strength of such love which is stronger than death it self It was his love which held him upon the Cross to finish your salvation when death could not hold him in the grave Let this love of Christ constrain you henceforth not to live unto your selves but unto him that died for you Thirdly This Balm which distills from this wounded tree is of such vertue and efficacy as that it is Medicina omni morbia Physick to cure all diseases being applied inwardly or outwardly It allayeth the Head-ach it restoreth thy eye-sight helpeth the Astmah purgeth Ulcers cureth the poysonful Sting of Serpents healeth all kind of wounds Is not then this Balm in the Letter an apt Emblem of the Balm in the mystery of the bloud of Christ Which is of an unlimited power and excellency What is the evil that can befall any for which this is not a certain Cure Oh when taken inwardly as in the Sacrament of the Lords Supper it is both Food and Physick it enlightens the dark mind it heals the broken in heart it fills the hungry with good things When sprinkled outwardly as in Baptisme it is effectual to stop the Leprosie of Sin to cure the venome and rage of Lusts to mollifie the stony heart and to make fruitful the Barren Be then of good chear O ye drooping and afflicted souls let me say to you as Paul to those in the tempest The lives of none of you shall be lost If you complain No sins like yours let me adde There is no Salvation like Christs If you say you are a Systeme a fardle of sins and lusts hear what the Apostle saith The bloâ—d of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin No man ever miscarried for being a great sinner but only for being an impenitent sinner Be not in love with your sins as Beggars are with their sores that will not part with them and then doubt not of your Physicians skill or care It is his peculiar glory that never any Patient miscarried under his hand though such was their condition that they were all utterly incurable by any other Meditation XXX Vpon the palpitation of the heart THe Pearl which in the Oyster is a disease in the Cabinet is a Jewel of rich value and in the Ear an Ornament of an orient beauty and such a thing is this trembling or palpitation of the heart in the body it is a sad malady in the soul it is an heavenly grace They who are afflicted with the one seek earnestly to the Physician for a Cure And they who want the other importune God to obtain it from him as a blessing when once they know the excellency and worth of it Who is the Favourite of heaven with whom the high and lofty one that inhabiteth Eternity will dwell And to whom he will look with an eye of protection with an eye of care and delight Is it not to him that is of a contrite heart and that trembleth at his word Who is the best Saint on Earth Is it not he who useth most diligence to work out his salvation with fear and trembling All duties are best done when accompanied with this holy trembling Prayer and Confession of sins are never better made than when we imitaâ—e those Penitents in Ezra who sate trembling in the street of the House of God The Word is never more awfully received as the Will and Command of a Great King than when received as the Elders of Bethlehem did Samuel who trembled at his coming O methinks I cannot without wonder read how Paul lived among the Corinthians in fear and much trembling as sensible of the weight of his Ministry and how they again received Titus Pauls Messenger with the like affection not entertaining him with costly banquets with Court-like Salutations but with fear and trembling which is the highest respect that can be showen to the Doctrine of Christ Yea the Supper of the Lord it self though it be a Feast of Love in which Christ qui est totus amor est caput coenae who is all love is the chief and onely dish that a Soul hath to feed upon is best Celebrated with a Divine trembling which may correct our joy and keep it from degenerating into a carnal mirth The sparkling raies of light which are reflected from the polished Diamond are
accipiet nummum fractum vel fictum A wise Exchanger that will not take Money that is broken or false though we cannot mock him as one Man mocketh another how many do take a liberty to mint Doctrines and Tenents that have onely the Semblance but not the Purity and substance of Divine Truth and upon these they set the Name of God that they may the more easily deceive the incautious As Pompey built a Theater Cum Titulo Templi with the Title of a Temple and Apollinar is the Heretick a School Cum Titulo Orthodoxi with the Title of Orthodox What prevalency such Arts in this kinde have had I would the defections of many Particular Persons yea of Churches did not abundantly witness Was not the whole Church of Galatia soon removed from him that had called them into the Grace of Christ unto another Gospel by their false Teachers blending the necessity of Circumcision with the Gospel and of Workes with Faith And did not the Corinthians comply more readily with the false Apostles then with Paul Ye suffer if a Man bring you into bondage if a Man devour you if a Man take of you if a Man exalt himself if a Man do smite you on the face It is the temper and disposition of most to be far more circumspect and jealous in the concernments of their Estates then of their Faith and to use both the scale and the test to finde out false and light Coynes when in matters of Faith the question is seldom made whose Image and Superscription do they bear It is enough if they please Fancy or else have the allowance of such whom they have in admiration Can I then do less then bemoan the slightness and indifferency of Christians about Truth which is the onely deposite that God hath Concredited to the Saints and awaken both my self and others to buy the Truth at any Rate but â—o sell it or debase it at no Rate Rob but God once of his Truth and what Riches of Glory do you leave him Is not he the God of Truth and are not ye witnesses Chosen by himself to give Testimony unto it And can you dishonour him more then to make him like the Father of Lies while you either spread the infection of Errouâ— to others or receive it from others into your own Bosome Bethink therefore your selves you who Deliver the Oracles of God that you be not as the Lying Vanities of the Heathen which deceived those that repaired unto them What comfort can you ever have in departing from the Form of sound Words and in Speaking Affected and Swelling words which are one of Satans Lures to seduce into Errors Who can ever understand Behmens greeming of the inward Root or the Canting of the Familists of being Godded with God and Christed with Christ And be you wise O Christians in the differencing of such impure Gibberish from the Holy Dialect of the Spirit Let not such Arts which serve onely as the light of the Fowler in the night first to amaze the Birds and then to bring them into the Net ensnare and captivate you Keep untainted from Errours the doctrines of Faith that you profess which will be your glory and the Duties that you performe to God from hypocrisie which will be your Comfort Let not your intercourse with Heaven be in such Services that are guilded onely with words of Piety which make them specious to Men and wholly destituâ—e of sincerity which can alone commend them to God Would it not be a piece of inexcusable folly for any to heap up a Mass of Counterfeit Coyn and then to value himself to be worth thousands And is it not far greater for Men to think that they have laid up much Treasure in Heaven and are rich towards God by the Prayers that they have made and other Services that they have done which will all be sound at the last day dross and not gold and will produce no other return then the increase of a sore Condeâ—nation O the thoughts of it are dreadfull to think how many will be found poor miserable and naked Laodiceans who confidently presume that they are rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing I cannot theresore but Pray Lord help me to buy of thee Gold tried in the fire and to get such truth of Grace into my heart that I may never be amongst the number of those who are justly hated by Men for hypocrites in this World and condemned by God for hypocrites in the other World Meditation LIV. Vpon health of body peace of conscience IT was an high and Eminent testimony given by Sâ— John to the Elder Gaius in the Prayer that he made for him with an earnest wish that he might prosper and be in health even as his Soul prospereth It is a Crown that I could heartily desire might be deservedly set upon the head of every one that is called by that honourable Name of Christian and then I doubt not but those reproaches which are dayly cast upon them would fall as far short of them as stones that are thrown at the Sun and those Scandals at which those who are without do stumble would be removed and they also won by their Conversation to the obedience of the Faith But alass â— I must invert the Apostles wish and if I will wish true Prospeâ—ity to the Saints themselves Pray that their Soules may prosper and be in health as their Bodies prosper So unequal is the welfare for the most part that is between the one and the other Where may I find the Man or who can tell me what is his Name whose care and observance hath so far prevailed as to make his Soul in an equal Plight with his Body and to keep the one as free from Lusts as the other from Diseases Who ever thought it necessary that Pensions should be given to Oratours to disswade Men from runing into Infected Houses or to be out of love with Mortal Poysons Is not the least jealousie and suspition of such things Argument enough to secure themselves against dangers that may fall out But is there not need to admonish and warn the best and holiest of Men that they abstain from Fleshly Lusts which war against the Soul Is it not requisite to bid the most watchful to take heed of a Lethargie when the Wise Virgins are fallen asleep Did not Christ himself Caution his Disciples against having their hearts at any time over-charged with surfeting and drunkenness and the Cares of this life And yet the meanest of their Condition might seem to exempt them from such Snares From whence then is it that the welfare and health of the Body should be more studiously endeavoured by all then the well-being of the Soul in its Peace and Serenity is almost by any Is it not from the strength of fleshly Principles which abide in the best and darken oft times the eye of the understanding that it cannot rightly apprehend
themselves a continuance for many yeares In what a differing frame and figure doth it appear to the one and to the other The one behold it as a Bridg lying under their feet to pass them over the Jordan of this life into the Canaan of eternall Blessedness and the other as a Torrent roaring and frighting them with its hasty downfall Gladly therefore would I counsell Christians who enter into the Church Militant by a mysticall death being buried with Christ by Baptisme and cannot pass into the Triumphant but by a Natural death to bear dayly in their Mindes the Cogitations of their inevitable end as the best meanes to allay the fear of death in what dress soever it comes and to make it an inlet into happiness whensoever it comes As Joseph of Arimathea made his Sepulcre in his Garden that in the midst of his delights he might think of death So let us in our Chambers make such Schemes and Representations of Death to our selves as may make it familiar to us in the Emblemes of it and then it will be less gastly when we behold its true visage When we strip our selves of our Garments think That shortly as St. Peter saith we must put off this our Tabernacle I and think again what a likeness there is between our Night-Clothes and our Grave-Clothes between the Bed and the Tombe What a little distance there is between life and death the one being as an Eye open and the other as an Eye shut in the twinkling of an eye we may be living and dead Men. O what ardors of lusâ—s would such thoughts chill and damp what sorrowes for sins past what diligence for time to come to watch against the first stirrings of sin would such thoughts beget It being the property of sin to divert us rather from looking upon our end then embolden us to defie it Lord then make me to know my end and the measure of my dayes that I may in my own Generation serve the will of God and then fall asleep as David did and not as others who fall asleep before they have done their work and put off their Bodies before they have put off their sins Meditation LX. Vpon the Natural Heat and the Radical Moisture THere is a Regiment of Health in the Soul as well as in the Body in the inward Man as well as in the outward Man they being both subjects incident to distempers and that from a defect or excess in those qualities which when duely regulated are the Principle and Basis of life and strength What preserves and maintaines the Natural life but the just temperament of the Radicall Moisture and the innate heat and what again endangers and destroyes it but the heat devouring the moisture or the moisture impairing the heat When either of these prevail against each other diseases do suddenly follow And is it not thus in the Soul and Inward Man In it those two signal Graces of Faith and Repentance do keep up and cherish the Spiritual life of a Christian Faith being like Calor innatus the Natural heat and Repentance like Humidum Radicale the Radical moisture If then any by believing should exercise Repentance less or in Repenting should lessen their Believing they would soon fall into one of those most dangerous extreams either to be swallowed up of Sorrow and despair or else to be puffed up with security and presumption Is it not then matter of Complaint that these two Evangelicall Duties as some Divines have called them which in the practise of Christians should never be separated should be lookt upon by many to oppose rather then to promote each other in their operations Some out of weakness cannot apprehend what consistency there can be between Faith and Repentance whose effects seem to be contrary the one working Peace and Joy the other trouble and sorrow the one Confidence the other fear the one Shame the other boldness Now such as these when touched with the sense of their sin judge it their duty rather to mourn then to believe and to feel the bitterness of sin then to taste the sweetness of a Promise and put away comfort from them least it should check and abate the over-flowings of their sorrow Others again whether out of heedlessness or wilfullness I will not determine when they behold the fullness of Grace in the blotting out of sin the freeness of Grace in the healing of Backslidings they see so little necessity of Repentance as they think it below as they so speak a Gospel Spirit to be troubled for that which Christ hath satisfied for It is not Repentance that they should now exercise but Faith Sorrow seems interpretatively to be a jealousie of the truth of Gods Promise in forgiving and of the sufficiency of Christs Discharge who was the surety who hath not left one single Mite of the Debt for believers to Pay Sorrow therefore seems to them as unseasonable as it would be for a Prisoner to mourn when the Prison door is opened and himself set free from debt and bondage Thus this pair of Graces and duties concerning which I may say as God did of Adam it is not good that either of them should be alone are yet divided often times in the practise though indissolubly linked together in the Precept Fain would I therefore evidence to the weak the concord of these two graces in respect of Comfort and to the wilfull the necessity of them both in order unto Pardon Unto the weak therefore I say That the Agreement between Faith and Repentance doth not lie in the immediate impressions which they make upon the Soul which are in some respects opposite to each other but in the Principle from which they arise which is the same the Grace of Christ and in the end which is the same the salvation of Man and in habitude and subordination that they have one to another for Repentance is never more kindly then when it disposeth us to the exercise and actings of Faith whose comforts of joy Peace and Serenity of heart are as Gold which is best laid upon sad and dark colours or as the Polished Diamond that receiveth an addition of lustre from the watering of it Gods Promise is that the Believing Jewes who look upon Christ by an eye of Faith shall be also great Mourners They shall mourn for him as one mourneth for his onely son and shall be in bitterness for him as one that is in bitterness for his first borne Unto the careless or wilfull I also say That God never forgiveth sin but where also he giveth a Penitent and Relenting Heart So that though Faith hath a peculiar nature in the receiving of pardon applying it by way of Instrument which no other grace doth yet Repentance is the express formal qualification that fits for pardon not by way of causality or merit but by way of means as well as of command which ariseth from a Condecency both to God himself who is an holy God and to the nature of the Mercy which is the taking and removing of Sin away Never dream then of such free grace or Gospel mercy as doth supercede a broken and a contrite heart or take off the necessity of sorrowing for sin For Christ did never undertake to satisfie Gods wrath in an absolute and illimited manner but in a well ordered and meet way viz. the way of Faith and Repentance How else should we ever come to taste the bitterness of sin or the sweetness of grace How to prize and esteem the Physician if not sensible of our disease How to adore the love of Christ who redeemed us from the Curse of the Law by being made a Curse for us if not burdened with the weight of our Iniquities Yea how should we ever give God the glory of his Justice in acknowledging our selves worthy of death if we do not in a way of repentance judge our selves as the Apostle bids us Was not this that David did in that solemn Confession of his In which he cries out Against thee thee only have I sinned and done this evil in thy sight that thou mightst be justified when thou speakest and clear when thou judgest Can I therefore wish a better wish to such who are unsensible of their sins than Bernard did to him whom he thought not heedful enough about the judgments of God who writing to him instead of the common Salutation wishing him Salutem plurimam much health said Timorem plurimum much fear that so their confidence may have an allay of trembling Sure I am that it is a mercy that I had need to pray for on my own behalf and I do Lord make it my request that my faith for the pardon of sin may be accompanied with my sorrow for sin and that I may have a weeping eye as well as a believing heart that I may mourn for the evils that I have done against my Saviour as well as rejoyce in the fulness of mercy that he hath shewed to me in a glorious Salvation FINIS
none of which he wanted but in condescending to those of low degree if he might but be serviceable to them Which was apparent in that freedom of access and converse with those between him and whom there was otherwise a great disparity especially in that humbleness of mind he shewed after any large receits or performances wherein he shewed himself like Moses though his face shone he knew it not Secondly His Charity both in giving and forgiving the latter of which as it is most noble so it is the most difficult and that which is peculiar to Christ Disciples As for the former though the World might expect more visible and pompous demonstrations of it yet that charity is best which like the waters of Shiloh run softly and the more private in this case the better Our Saviour would have our good works shine and not blaze Now that he was not deficient in this may appear in that he was no hoarder nor left he any Sums behind him by which it appears plainly that he lived to the utmost if not beyond the extent of his In-come which also in vulgar estimation was double to the reality Thirdly To this may be added his Meekness and Patience the natural result of Humility in which graces he was eminent being seldom or never transported by passion or if at any time those passions which do repugn that grace did arise they soon had a counterbuff from the divine principle was in him He alwaies had an innocent and grateful chearfulness in his Converse that rendred it very acceptable being very free from that morosity of spirit which many times is like a cloud in a Diamond and like a Curtain before a Picture And yet as the sweetest Rose hath its prickles and the industrious Bee that makes the healing and mollifying Honey and Wax her sting So he had a sting of holy Zeal which wisdom had the conduct of that it was not put forth upon every trivial provocation he knew when and where and how far to shew it and in Gods Cause his Zeal was better tempered than like a brittle blade to fly in shivers and wound by-standers but it was true mettal and would cut deep so as to leave impressions behind it Fourthly Add to this his peaceable disposition a great ornament to Christianity It was his principle and practice not to have that by contention he might have by peace and for peace sake though he durst not sell the truth yet he did often Câ—dere de jure depart from his right and that Ne Evangelium detrimenti aliquid capiat for the Gospels sake that it might not suffer by him He loved those of a peaceable spirit and was grieved at the contrary spirit and practice in any though his friends He did heartily bewail our divisions and how desirous he was to obey those commands of the Psalmist and the Apostles Pursue peace ensue peace noting both the vehemency and swiâ—tness of the prosecution If some did know they would not it may be be satisfied and if others did know they would it may be be offended and therefore it is best to leave that to him whose judgement is according to truth But I remember I am to write a Preface not a Narrative of his life He was a lover of goodmen Loving and faithful in his Relations a good Child a good Father a good Husband a good Brother a good Master a good Neighbour a good Friend a good Governour a good Subject a good Minister and all because he was a good Christian He was full of heavenly Ejaculations contented and patient under the loss of his desired Relations And as they say the Swan sings sweetly before his death So was his heart drawing near his change full of thankfulness being like a Vessel that wanted vent For being graciously preserved in the Visitation and restored to his friends he expressed in all his Converses with them a deep sence of Gods mercy and a fear least we should soon forget it and grow cold in our returns of praise and obedience and therefore did advise that we would become Monitors to one another and call upon one another not to forget that God who had so eminently preserved us Thus was the blessed Spirit of God tuning him for eternal praises and winding his heart up to that sweet and heavenly work it pleased God by a short and sweet passage to take him unto His death was not so much sudden as speedy Sudden death is evil when death finds a man unprepared but speedy death is a great mercy The Prodromi and Harbingers of death being many times more terrible than death which made a good man say I bless God I fear not death yet I dare not say but I fear dying Meaning that the best Christians have something of nature in them The Jews among the several waies of dying they reckon up say that of Moses is the best who died at the mouth of the Lord God took away his soul with a kiss Yet Censorious Worldlings are ready to make strange glosses and comments upon such passages of providence which it would become them rather with a holy silence to adore than with a bold curiosity to pry into Let them remember that known saying Qualis vita finis it a He cannot have an ill death that leads a good life I would therefore exhort thee and all others so to live that we may have that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Augustus the Emperour prayed for and that many Saints have if it were the will of God desired in both acceptations of the Word in the preparation of soul and the easiness of dissolution That the knot of life may rather be untied than cut and that our Souls may go like Ships richly fraught with full Sails upon a calm Sea under a gentle Gale into the Haven of Happiness So praies he Qui A longè sequitur vestigia semper adorans The Contents of the Meditations Med. 1. UPon a Mote in the Eye Page 1 Med. 2. Upon a piece of battered Plate 2 Med. 3. Upon the Galaxia or milky way 3 Med. 4. Upon a Picture and a Statue 5 Med. 5. Upon a Graff 6 Med. 6. On a Glass without a foot 7 Med. 7. Upon the sight of a Lilly and a Violet 9 Med. 8. On a Crum going the wrong way 11 Med. 9. On two Lights in a Room 12 Med. 10. On building after fires 13 Med. 11. On the Torrid Zone 15 Med. 12. On strength and length in Prayer 17 Med. 13. On the Morning Dew 18 Med. 14. On a Pearl in the eye 21 Med. 15. On spiritual and bodily sickness 23 Med. 16. On a Lamp and a Star 24 Med. 17. On a Chancery Bill 26 Med. 18. On the Philosophers Stone 28 Med. 19. On a Greek Accent 30 Med. 20. On a debauched Minister 33 Med. 21. On the golden Câ—lf and brazâ—â—Serpenâ— 36 Med. 22. On the Circulation of the bloâ—d 39 Med. 23. On a multiplying Glass 41 Med. 24.
inconsiderable things which have a power to extinguish Life but none to preserve it How necessary then is it to get Grace into the Heart when the Life that we have hangs thus continually in suspence before us and how circumspect should we be of small sins which create as great dangers to the Soul as the other things can to the Body They that live in the Pale of the Church perish more by silent and Whispering Sins then by Crying and Loud Sins in which though there be less Infamie there is ofttimes the greaâ—er danger in regard they are most eâ—sily fâ—llen into and most hardly repented of like knots in fine Silk which are sooner made then in a Cord or Cable but with far more difficulty are unloosed again Let us therefore who often say that ' a Mâ—n may live of a little think also of how much less a Man may Die and miscarry not in his Body only but in his Soul also Meditation IX Vpon two Lights in a Room WHat an Amicable as well as Amiable thing is Light for these two Tapers which enlighten the same Room do not shine with a Divided or with a Confounded but with an Vnited Light as the Opticks do clearly demonstrate by the distinct shadowes which they cast and yet the Eye which is benefitted by both of them to a more full and perfect discerning of its objects cannot difference the raies and strictures that flow from them or assigne which is the Light that comes from the one or from the other Such I have sometimes thought is the Harmony between the Natural Light of Gifts and the Supernatural of Grace meeting in the same Person though they be both differing in the Original yet in the Subject in which they are seated they shine not with a Divided or a Confounded but with an United Light and in their Efflux and Emanation so conspire as that they greatly better him in whom they are conjoyned and cast a mutual lustre also upon each other One being as the Gold which adornes the Temple and the other as the Temple which sanctifies the Gold Let no Man therefore despise the Light of Gifts as needless to the Perfection of a Christian nor yet so magnifie it as to be injurious to the Light of Grace no more then he would put out one of his Eyes as useless because when he winks with the one he can see as well with the other there may be a reason sometimes to shut one Eye but there can be none at any time for to extinguish it Meditation X. Vpon Building after Fires IT is the saying of Florus the Historian concerning that fatal Fire of Corinth in which all its Edifices were consumed into Ashes and its Statues of Brass Silver and Gold melted into one common Masse Aeris notam pretiosiorem fecit ipsa opuleâ—tissimae urbis Injuria That the Vastation of that wealthy City was an occasion to make the Mettal of it to be highly esteemed in after Ages The like may be said concerning many Buildings that the Flames which have turned them into desolate ruines have occasioned a following beauty and stateliness in the second Fabricks far above what the first ever had How oft have we seen by such accidents the dimensions of Buildings inlarged the Formes and Models of them much bettered the whole with much more Art and Cost Enriched so as to fill the beholders with delight and wonder Can man thus improve disadvantages and make Burnings and indigested heapes to serve as a Foile to his Art and Skill can he effect a kind of Resurrection and New-Birth to what was once destroyed what then can God do whose power is perfected in weâ—kness and like the Sun shines brightest when invironed with the blackest Clouds of difficulties Surely he can yea and undoubtedly will give a being to the Bodies of his Mâ—rtyrs which the Fire hath consumed into Ashes and the Wind hath scattered into distances He will awake his Saints who have made for Age their Beds in the Grave and have filled their Mouthes with the Gravel and Slime of the Pit He will call for his redeemed ones fâ—om out of the deep Seâ— and from the Mawes of Fishes that have devoured them and give to every one of them not only the same Specifical but the same Numerical Body changed in its Properties but not in its Essence Chrified with Angelical Perfections but noâ— Trâ—nsubstantiated from a Corporeal to a Spiritual substance Is not all this done already in Christ our Nature in his Body is Spiritualized to tell us that for possibility it may be and for certainty it shall be so in us He is our Brother therefore we may be like him and he is our Head therefore we must be like him in a Conformity to his Glorious Body Why therefore should I fear the greatest Enemies of Life the Fire the Grave or the Sea Is there any thing too hard for God is not his Power and his Promise ingaged to do that for me which he hath done for my Saviour hath he not said that those that sleep in Jesus he will bring with him Lord help me to make it my onely care to have my Life Holy that my Resurrection may be happy to live to Christ that I may live with Christ and from a Netherlander in the dust below may be made a Citizen of the New Jerusalem which is above and rejoyce in the joy of thy People and glory with thine Inheritance Meditation XI Vpon the Torrid Zone VVHen I think or read what strange Descriptions the Ancients have made of the Middle or Burning Zone which in regard of its excessive Ardours they judged altogether inhabitable and how much experience hath evinced their ignorance in asserting the healthful temperate and pleasant Dwellings that are to be found there I cannot but Parallel them with the Misreports that Carnal Men through blindness of Mind or Pravity of Heart have taken up and spread abroad of the wayes of Religion and Holiness rendering them to the World less tolerable then the Scorchings of the most Torrid Zone and more dreadful then a Howling Desart Such which require Austerity and admit no Latitude such which by continual Conflicts make Watery Cheekes and bleeding Hearts and what not which may serve as a Flaming Sword to deter any from entering upon the Confines of an Holy Life But is it not matter of Wonder that Experience which puts an end to all Contradictions that can rise up against it and stops the Mouthes of Gainsayers should not silence those unjust Calumnies that have been long cast upon Religion by such Men who speak evil of those things which they know not Can there be any thing more unreasonably charged upon it then that which is contrary to the experience of Believers Honey may as well cease to be Sweet because the Sick Man saith it is Bitter as the Pathes of Holiness to be Pleasant because Carnal Men affirm them to be irksome and difficult and the
greatly differing from what others find and feel whose lines are not fallen in so fair a place But still I say when shall I dwell in that blessed Country where sorrows dye and joys cannot Into which Enemy never entred and from which a Friend never parted When shall I possess that Inheritance which is a Kingdom for its greatness and a City for its beauty where there is Society without Envy and rich Communications of good without the least diminution Meditation XLIII Vpon Time and Eternity THe two Estates of this and the other World are measured by Time and by Eternity as their just and proper measures there being nothing in this World which is not as transient as Time nor in the other which is not as fixed and lasting as Eternity How inexpressibly then must the good and evil the happiness and the misery of those two Estates differ from eacâ— other What is the duration of all earthly greatness in respect of the stability of heavenly glory but as a flash of lightning to a standing Sun in the Firmament or as a spark ascending from a furnace to a never setting Star What are the most fiery trials of this life either for intension or length unto the everlasting burnings and scorchings of hell but as the soft and gentle heat of a blushing face unto the constant flames and torments of the bowels What are Racks Stone Collick Strangury Convulsions heaped together into an extream horrour but as the simple grudgings of an Ague to the desperate rage and anguish which the least bite of that worm that dies not creates in the lowest faculty of the soul There are additions to things which are limited and diminuent terms of that to which they are annexed and contain in them as Logicians speak oppositum in opposito one opposite in another He that saith a dead man or a painted Lion by saying more saith less than if he had said but a man or a Lion only without any such additions it is all one in effect as if he had said no man no Lion For a dead man is not a man neither is a painted Lion a Lion Such are the additions of Time which put to good or evil expresse less than if nothing had been added He that saith happiness for a season or sorrow for a time saith less than if he had said happiness or sorrow only For perfect happiness or sorrow cannot be circumscribed in the narrow limits of Time no more than Immensity in the points of a place What is happiness that will expire but misery at a distance Or what is sorrow that endures only for a time but an evil supported by hope But adde Eternity to good or evil and it makes the good to be insinitely better and the evil to be infinitely worse Can I then do less than wonder that men who carry eternal souls in their bosoms such as are of kin to Seraphims yea advanced to the participation of the Divine Nature that are the immediate Subjects of Endless woe or bliss should yet so live Aâ— si fabula esset omnis eternitatas as if Eternity were a fable as if they had neither God to serve or souls to save May I not say be astonished O heavens at this and be horribly afraid be ye very desolate as the Lord himself did at Israels folly What greater stupidity can there be than this which most are guilty of to busie themselves like Martha about perishing trifles and to neglect the one thing which is necessary To be thoughtfull of things below and seldom think of heaven till death summon them to leave Earth To make Salvation the by-work of their lives and the fulfilling the apperites of the flesh their chiefest task and care Were it not a strange thing if a man who is to be judged on the morrow and to receive the sentence either of a cruel death or of a rich and honourable estate could not keep in mind the concernments of the next approaching day without tying some Scarlet thread upon his finger as a significant Ceremony to remember him Or the writing of some Caveats upon the posts of the Prison which might hint unto him what danger his life is in Is it not much more strange that the weighty matters of eternal life or eternal death should not by their own greatness press the heart of man unto a constant remembrance of them especially when he knoweth not what a day may bring forth Can the miscarriage of such a person be other than dreadful when their follies as well as their pains shall make them to gnash their teeth and to curse themselves for the neglect of that great Salvation which hath been often tendred them in the Gospel When they shall feel everlastingly what they could never be perswaded for to fear When they shall be convinced that at a far cheaper rate they might have been Saints in Heaven than Salamanders in Hell O that I could therefore awaken and excite all those whom the present enjoyments of the world serve as Opium to cast them into a deep sleep and will happily be angry with those that seek to raise them out of it though they keep them from perishing in it And how can I better do it than in St. Chrysostomes expressions to this purpose Suppose a man saith he much desirous of sleep and in his perfect mind had an offer made of one nights sweet rest upon condition to be punished an hundred years for it would he except of his sleep upon such terms Now do not they who would be loath to be reputed fools do far worse that for the short fruition of a few transient delights hazard a double Eternity the loss of an Eternity of blessedness and the sustaining of an Eternity of miseries for what other proportion can all earthly things bear to heavenly in respect of their duration than a few beatings of the pulse or twinklings of the eye unto Myriads of Ages Be then timely wise ye worldlings in a frequent consideration of your eternal being that you may not pass your life away in a dream of happiness and awake in the horrour of a begun Eternity in misery Say unto your selves are we not in the world as the Child conceived is in the womb not to abide there but to come out in a due time to a more full and free life Why then do we fondly think of building Tabernacles here Why do we so please our selves in our present condition as to be wholly regardless of our future Is not death such a combate as we never enter into but once and therein are either saved or shin eternally Why do we then make little or no provision against what we know will and must certainly follow Do we think that our glory shall descend after us and screen us from Gods siery indignation Will our riches purcâ—ase heaven or bribe hell Will the first-born of our body be accepted for the sin of our soul What is it
of any necessity of death As God made us living Creatures so his power was able to sustain us immortal creatures we had bodily life by our soul in our body and spiritual life by Gods Image in both but sin brought on us death of all sorts Death spiritual in the loss of Gods Image death bodily in the begun corruption of our body and death eternal in the endless ruine of both And whom would not this single thought afflict with dread and sorrow to see what a change sin hath made in the condition of man If Adam would have lived without sin he might have lived without end But now by his credulous receiving the Serpents Poyson Death is glued to our nature necessity of evil to the freedom of our will and all misery to our selves Another dark and posing thought did arise from the progress of death which keeps no order or method It thrusts its sickle not only into the ripe corn but the green blade it nips the blossom as well as gathers the fruit it dissolves the knot that was but new made between the soul and the body as well as that which age and years had conâ—â—rmed There were I observed skulls of all Sizes There were some who had never seen the Sun to pass from one Tropick to the other Others there were whose life could not be reckoned by daies or hours but by minutes they dropt only from the Womb to the Grave And is not this amongst the secrets of God that thousands should thus pass through the world and be determined to different Estates for Eternity What can I say But that the waies of God are unsearchable and his Judgements past finding out As it now shews his Soveraignty thus to deal with his Creatures as it pleaseth him so the Great Day will manifest the Wisdom and Justice of God that is wrapt up in these mysterious providences He that is the Judge of all will be found to be righteous towards all A third sad thought The consuming power of the grave did stir up within me so that I was ready to say Can these dry bones live Can these mingled dusts be distinguished Can the dusts that are scattered into distances be ever united Doth not the Noble and the Base the Saint and the Sinner lye equally under the power of corruption Who then would not dread to descend into the Grave and make Hemans question Will God shew wonders to the dead shall the dead arise and praise him But when I consider that Believers in their ascending into heaven do only let fall their bodies to the earth as Elijah dropt his Mantle when he was taken up and that their Spirits return to God that gave them That Death striketh not on the New man but on the Tabernacle which is a common Lodging both to Flesh and Spirit my fears are greatly Alleviated for who is much solicitous for the Cabinet when the Jewel is safe Yea when I think that death which separates our persons from the world our soul from the body and every part of our body from another cannot dissolve our Union with Christ but that then we sleep in him and shall be raised by him and conformed to him as the pattern of our glory O how do these most radiant thoughts dispell both the black fears of death and the lightsome comforts of the world as the rising Sun makes the bright stars of heaven to vanish as well as the dark shades of the night How little then doth the love of this life or the difficulties of death abate the desires of a Believer to be dissolved and to be with Christ which is far better Who can wonder at old Simeons importunity to depart in peace when his eyes had seen the Salvation of God and his arms embraced it Who would not be of the same mind that hath once tasted of the Clusters of the heavenly Canaan to long after the full Vintage How pathetical is that of Austin upon Gods answer to Moses Thou canst not see my face for no man can see me and live Who replies with great confidence Lord is that all that I cannot see thy face and live Eja Domine moriar ut te videam videam ut hic moriar nolo vivere volo mori dissolvi cupic essecum Christo I pray thee Lord then let me dye that I may see thy face Or let me see thee that I may dye in this place I would not live I would dye I desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ Thus also have other Saints been affected who have had death in desire and life in patience O what a strange change then hath Christ made in death and the grave and his grace in the heart and affections of Believers Death which sin brought into the world is now become the only means to destroy and kill sin Death which is only contrary unto life is now turned into a Port and passage into life So that when we pass out of this life we lose neither life nor being but are admitted to a more glorious life and being than ever we had Death that before was an armed Enemy is now made a reconciled and firm friend a Physician to cure all our diseases and an Harbinger to make way for glory The Grave also by Christs lying in it is become a bed of rest in which his Saints fetch a short slumber untill he awaken them to a glorious Resurrection It is the Chamber into which he invites his beloved ones to hide themselves untill his indignation be past the Arke into which he shuts his Noahs whilest he destroyes the world with an overflowing deluge of his wrath and displeasure And therefore it is that by his grace they are not afraid to meet Death which others would shun and make it as a voluntary offering unto God which others pay only as a necessary debt Yea they esteem it as one of the choicest Jewels in that exact Inventory that Paul hath made of the riches of Believers and next unto Jesus Christ bless God for it as the greatest mercy O holy Saviour do thou then who art the Lord both of the dead and of the living unto whom all ought to live and all ought to dye enable me thy servant to love thee above life which of all blessings is the sweetest and to hate sin above death which of all evils is the bitterest to nature that so I may have this testimony of the power of thy grace in the change of my heart that for the enjoyment of perfect Communion with thee I can gladly lose my life and be separated from sin can willingly undergo death which is of all evidences the Clearest Meditation XLIX Vpon a Spring in an high ground THe additional blessing which Achsah sought of Caleb her Father was Springs of water for her south or dry land who gave her the upper and the nether Springs If the distinct recording of this particular in Scripture carry any thing of
Piety gives both to the Person and to his Services a peculiar Preheminence and Dignity above all others The Naturalists observe that the Pearles that are bred of the Morning Dew are far more bright and clear than those which are bred of the Evening Dew And so are those duties of a greater worth and beauty which are the fruits of a Morning and not an Evening Godliness It is the commendation of Hezekiahs Reformation above all others of the Kings of Judah that in the first year of his Reign in the first Moneth he opened the doores of the House of the Lord. It is that which makes Josiahs Memory to be as a Box of precious Nard that while he was yet young he began to seek after the God of David his Father It is an Honourable Testimony which Paul gives to Epenetus that he was the first-fruits of Achaia unto Christ and the like is that which he gives to Andronicus and Junia that they were in Christ before him To have a Precedency in the Faith is not onely a happiness but a dignity What glory can be greater then to be a Jeremiah sanctified from the Womb or a Timothy nourished up in the words of Faith Sâ—condly The comfort of Age is a well-spent Life When a Man comes to the Grave as a Shock of Câ—rne in its seâ—son and not as a bundle of Tares to the Fire when the Bones are full not of the Sins of Youth but of the Services that were then done to God when a Man can say as dying Hezekiah Remember O Lord I beseech thee how I have walked before thee in truth and with a perfect heart and have done that which is good in thy sight O it is sad when the sins of youth become the burthen of age â— if the Grashopper then be a weight to the Body what a pressure will heapes of Mountainous sins be to the Soul Age at the best hath sufficient Griefes it is of it self a Sickness and a Neighbour to Death and needs not the bad provisions of Youthfull Follies to make it worse Let then the Counsell of Wise Solomon be acceptable unto you who are yet in the spring and flower of your age to Remember your Creator in the dayes of your youth and then if Death make you Pale before Age make you Gray you will have this comfort that you are old in houres though not in yeares and bave lived much though not long as having lost no time in sowing Seed unto the Flesh as most doe who make youth a foolish Seed-time to a Mourning Age and Old Age a bitter Harvest to a foolish Youth Or if your Almond-Tree shall flourish and that a more gracious Old Age shall succeed a gracious Youth Old Age it self shall be followed with a Crown of endless Glory Meditation LII Vpon a Rock IT is the saying of the Moralists That Accidents which befall Men have a double handle by which they may be apprehended So as that if they be rightly taken they become not onely less burthensome and unpleasant but also of use and advantage to those that sustain them like bitter Herbes that are by the skill of the Physician turned into a wholsome Medicine The like may be said of this present Subject that it hath a double aspect under which it may be represented to our Consideration each of which will suggest thoughts far differing one from another and yet both have their rise from Scripture Doth not God bid us look unto the rock from whence we are hewen and to the pit whence we are digged And then what can it hold out to our view but the misery of our natural condition our deadness deformity barrenness and untractableness to any good Is it not the complaint of the best that their hearts are Stony and Rocky and that they are apt to stand it out with God and not to yield to the Work of his Grace is there any evil that in their account is more insuperable then a flinty heart When did Moses who had faith to work many Miracles most distrust but when he was to make the Rock to yield Water though God commanded him to speak onely to it yet as deeming it insufficient he smote it twice And yet is it not the Promise of God to take away the stony heart and to give an heart of flesh And is it not that which I beg that God would mollifie both my Naturall and Acquired hardness and preserve me from Judiciall hardness That so I may not resist Pharoah like his Messages his Miracles his Judgments and his Mercies and grow worse in stead of being better I would that God might be a Rock to me but I would be as Wax unto him that so I might be apt to receive Divine Impressions from him It is my sin to be as a Rock to God unflexible and sooner Broken then Bent But it is my unspeakable comfort to think that God will be a Rock to me who stand in a continual need of his aide and power to uphold me who if I be not built upon him cannot subsist and if I be not hid in him can have no salvation I cannot therefore but give some scope and line to my thoughts that I may the better take in the honey and sweetness that drops from this Metaphoricall Name of God who is often stiled in Scripture the Rock of Israel the Rock of Ages the Rock of Salvation But here I must use the help of the Schooles who rightly informe us that when any thing of the Creature is applyed to God it must be via remotionis by way of remotion and via eminentiae by way of transcendent eminency First by way of remotion All defects and blemishes whatsoever are not in the least to be attributed unto him who is absolutely perfect as Heraulds say of Bearings the resemblance must be taken from the best of their properties and not from the worst Is a Rock deformed and of unequall parts God is the first of Beauties as well as of Beings and all his attributes are equally infinite his Justice is of as large extent as his Mercy and his Wisdom as his Power Is a Rock unsensible of the straits of those that fly unto it for succour so is not God who is both a Rock and a Father of Mercies Who can read the expressions of his tenâ—erness and not be affected How shall I give thee up Ephraim how shall I deliver thee Israel how shall I make thee as Admah how shall I set thee as Zeboim mine heart is turned within me my repentings are kindled together Is the strength of a Rock intransient and fixed in it self not communicating its verâ—ue to what lies upon it So is not the strength of Israel who is a living and not a dead Rock and gives both life and power to those that are united to him I can do all things saith holy Paul through Christ strengthning me Is a Rock Barren and can yield no food though it