sentence of death thus to employ his Pen when he cannot his Tongue for the good of thy Soul Every particular Chapter will if God add his blessing prove a compleat Soul-saving Treatise I shall add no more to perswade thee to Come and see but this that nothing but unwillingness to see what is here to be seen and unperswadableness to make such improvement of such Sights can make thy Case desperate Be sure only Before In and After thy serious perusal of these Chapters of so much worth that thou beg earnestly of God that he would be pleased with some of his Sons Eye-salve to open thine eyes that thou mayest see and by his Spirit move so upon thy spirit that thine eye may suitably affect thine heart with what so much tends to the promoting of thine eternal welfare The Sins of Professours CHAP. I. Their regardlesseness of Souls 1. HOw Careless are we of our own Souls 1. Ignorance of their preciousness O how few do believe they are men having bodies that must dye but Souls that will never dye How few do believe that their bodies were given them to be serviceable to their Souls Their heads their hearts their eyes their ears their hands their feet c. were all to attend upon their souls and to help them to Heaven But this is not believed by many As they are ignorant of the blessed God who made them and of Jesus Christ who came to redeem them and know not whether there be an Holy-Ghost or no So they are ignorant of the preciousness of their Souls Christ hath not given them eyes to read and understand that a man is not cannot be profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own Soul Christ's questions what will it profit a man c. What shall a man give in exchange for his Soul Matth. 16.26 Put it out of all question Alas many who carry the name of Christians deserve not the name of men When you begin to value your Souls you begin to be men Oh that men would value that which once they shall they must value The damned Spirits know now the worth of their Souls How many will not 2. Inconsiderateness How few consider the worth and preciousness of their Souls When do such thoughts as these possesse you Here in this earthly tabernacle in this house of booths dwells a thing that I never said that is worth a world though here I crawl up and down like a worm of two or three Cubits long and am in danger to be thrown into an hole every day yet I carry with me a Jewell the loss whereof the whole world cannot repair How seldome do nominal Professours consider sadly and seriously what will become of their souls when their excellency Job 4 21. which is in them shall go or journey away as Eliphaz speaks Examine your thoughts all the day long from morning to Evening and few are laid out for the Soul 3. Caring â—â—â—e for the body â—han the 〈◊〉 Are not all the thoughts and cares laid out upon the body though the body be but clay and the soul is a spirit the body must dye but the soul shall never dye How frequently do we think of our â—odies what their wants burthens necessities are but not so of our souls How much of every day is spent in providing for thy body but how little for thy souâ— The body should be but the soul's servant yet men feed the slave and starve the child The body must be fed every day clad every day yea adorned every day and â—hysick'd if distempered but the soul needs food rayment phyâ—ck continually yet lyeth unregarâ—ed is left miserable naked starved c. A servant hath two talents to keep the child and the child's cloaths will the Master thank the servant if he plead I have kept the cloaths but I have neglected the life of the child Thy body is but thy souls outward garment How often have your Ministers told you that the soul was better than the body and that your souls needed dayly care more than your bodies and yet you look after the one with the neglect of the other A day is coming when thou wilt wish thou hadst been bred in the Field among the beasts and worms for that thou regardest thy soul no more than if thou hadst but the life of a beast thou wilt wish thou hadst been made a toad a serpent a worm a dog a swine c. for then thou shouldst not have suffered to eternity as now thou wilt unless the eyes of thy understanding be opened to see consider and make provision for thy precious but perishing soul Thy body is perishing every day and thy soul is upon the borders of eternity it must live for ever and yet all thy care is for the body which likely will not live threescore years and ten but the soul is neglected that must live threescore millions of years in hell without repentance and then when that date is over thou art as far from the end of thy misery as thou wast the first day thou wast thrown among the damned 4. Strangeness towards our souls How many will not speak with their souls They are greater strangers to them than the Londoners are to their next Neighbours Didst thou ever ask thy soul such questions O my soul how is it how will it be with thee O my soul in what state art thou O my soul what will become of thee O! what will become of thee in the next world 5. Niggardlyness towards our souls At what cost were we any time for our jeoparded souls The Physitian is consulted with if there be an ache upon the body we will with the woman part with all beggar our selves to recover health of body When did you know a man starve himself if he could have bread and water what ever it cost We will be at any expence of time labour and charges to keep our bodies from starving but how are the Ordinances of God the Word and Sacraments the spiritual food of the soul neglected The flesh must be satisfied as for the soul there is little regard to its well-being 1 Pet. 2 2. We cannot endure to see a Cat a Dog a Beast want meat but how easily do many digest the want of that milk whereby they should be maintained and grow God saith one gives to these their requests he gives them quailes but sends leanness into their souls 6. How fearless are many of soul-losses Fearlessness of souls losses how common is it for people to draw back from the service of Christ O! what is the matter I shall lose my estate liberty pay such a fine c. They little consider what their souls will lose if they do not persevere if they live not up their light Professours pardon me that I miscall you though you are blind and mad and see not the worth of your souls yet know that
your souls are the most considerable Jewels you stand possessed of All the world will not weigh with one soul Thy money may ransome thy body nothing save Christs blood thy soul Pause a while Reader and reflect on all thy sinfull neglects of thy immortal Soul lest on thy death-bed thou shriek and cry O my soul whether art thou going 2. Carelessness of others souls How little are the souls of others valued and cared for how many masters are there that care no more for their servants souls than for the dogs nay not so much Perhaps some of you are carefull that the bodies of your families be cloathed be fed c. but the souls lie unprovided for Soul-poysoners not censured as they ought to be Make nothing to lay poyson for souls more care is taken for the pigs than for the souls 1. How do we justly censure them as worthy of Capital punishments that murther the bodies of men but not so others who poyson and destroy thousands of souls How do you hate to have an hand in murthering the bodies of any to lay poyson for the destruction of any and yet how commonly do men lay the poyson of ill councell and ill example before others to cause them to fall into the pit of hell and are not affected with this great evil 2. Not troubled at soul-murtherers How troubled are we at any that kill bodies or that murther others but not so at the millions that destroy their own and others souls that have an hand in ruining in damning themselves and others 3. If any neglect means that might have continued the life of their husbands children c. how are they dejected how do the wring their hands and beat their breasts whereas if by carelessness if by the neglect of their duties if by evil example they have destroyed their souls they are not troubled about these matters 4. Low esteems of those that prize their souls How do you account meanly of all that take pains for their souls that wait at the pools of Bethesda that consult Ministers and books and attend on the Ordinances for their souls whilst you account it your wisdome to lay out the most if not all of your time for your bodies Hast thou the name of a Christian I pray God to let one word to sink into thine heart thou hast not Christ thou hast not the Spirit of Christ in thee he knows how to value souls and therefore shed blood for them and sends his Spirit in the Gospel to be importunate for their salvation CHAP. II. Their want of saving Conviction and Compunction HOw many Professours like Paul Alive without the Law Rom 7.9 Rev. 3.1 are alive without the Law How many like Sardis have a name to live imagine they are alive when they are dead How many are alive in their own conceit and perhaps in the conceit of others and yet are void of the true super-natural life How many are contented with their being baptized They see no need of Christ they were born of Christian Parents Luke 3.3 they are of the stock of Abraham We have Abraham to our Father They do not consider how many baptized persons are deadly enemies to Christ and to their souls and averse to the wayes of holiness they will not consider that Swearers Drunkards and Adulterers have as good claimes to Christ and heaven as these have How many also please themselves with the Religion of Education God hath not moulded their hearts though Parents their lives their Parents have taught them some Principles of Religion but they are strangers to the wonderful operations and teachings of the Holy Ghost they have not the Unction from above they know not what it is that teacheth all things and yet such as these are alive i. e. merry jocund jovial confident if any goe to heaven they shall be of the number But to speak more particularly First Few convinced of original sin imputed How many are there that were never convinced of original sin imputed or imparted 1. How few are convinced that Adam was a common person and that we sinned in his loynes that if he had stood we had stood and that it is just with God that he ship wracking himself we should be counted sinners in him We did eat of the forbidden fruit in Adam we in Adam believed the Devil rather thaâ— God we in Adam broke with God for toyes and trifles we were ungrateful disobedient in him we apostâ—tized in him and broke covenant with God in him hence by one mans offence sin entred into the world Rom. 5.12 and death by sin for that as Levi paid tithes in Abraham so we becâ—me rebells against the Majesty of Heaven in our first Parents when did you shed a tear for Adam's sin for your and his grand provocation 2. Few convinced of original sin inherent Psal 5.9 How few see Adam 's sinful nature imparted to them They see not their inward part is very wickedness nothing but wickedness Few see what a sad Apostacy from the perfection of mans nature Sin hath brought into the world and how black an Image of Sathan it hath drawn upon the soul they never saw what filthy dirty loathsome things they are in the eyes of God they never saw their noysomeness and venome the garbage and malignity of their hearts How few see a general defect of all righteousness and holiness wherein at first they were created How few are convinced of an antipathy to all that is good That they are haters of God by nature Eph. 2.1 that they are dead in trespasses and sins a more dreadful estate than if they were rotting in their graves that they have an Ocean of corruption within them that will never be dried up in this life that they have a worse Leprosie than that among the Jewes which got into the walls and would never out till the house was demolished who almost thinks so sadly of themselves They bless God their hearts are good though they be the worst of men pray not slight Ordinances closet duties and family worship lies neglected yet the Devil perswades them all is well their hearts are good though the heart of man by nature be like hell it self whose fire of lust is unquenchable though it be like Peter's great sheet which he saw in the Vision full of all unclean things Acts 11.6 though it be a receptacle of all impiety yet how few turn their eyes inward to see their natural deformities Alass All the venome the Snake sends forth is nothing to the poyson that lies in its nature And all those monstrous impieties which the lives of men are taunted with are not to be compared with the venome that lurks in the heart of every man by nature Men would not glory in their blood and descent did they but believe how sin descended and was conveyed Men could not content themselves to walk heavily under some actual
the world comes in But how little pleas'd with the galleries wherein the beloved may be held How are men pleased with the earth but find no more rellish in Christ and his ways than in the white of an egge What great journeys have you taken even compassed Sea and Land to gain riches and hardly can go a mile or two to meet with God How is every opportunity laid hold of to get more to the heap But do not you remain contented with the least measures of grace yea with somewhat below grace How oft have you left your meat to serve a Customer but when so to serve the Lord Jesus Christ How few design for riches as a means to carry them to a further end They should be but as the rounds of a Ladder not to stand upon but thereby to ascend higher even to glory and to the new Hierusalem But alas few desire the world in subordination to God and as a means to glorifie God but the more they love the World the less God is loved and the more their desires are carried out after riches the less after God How few pursue earthly things in obedience to Gods call How many out of a desire of filthy lucre How few seek the World with an holy indifferency How few reserve their zeal and hottest endeavours for heavenly things Is not the general cry Psa 4.6 Who will shew us any good We need no proof of this there are instances every where How for the getting of a penny Note will some debarr themselves of Ordinances Is it not a sufficient excuse with some for not attending on the Worship of God that they met with a Customer that kept them from the Ordinance Doth not the Clock strike too fast whilst thou art selling to advantage Doth not time run away too fast Dost thou not wish thou couldst with Joshuah cause the Sun to stand still on a Market-day or on a Fair-day when trading is quick But O! The Sexton is blamed for suffering the Clock to stand still on a Sabbath day and when thou art in the Worship of God O! When will the Sabbath be gone Amos 8.5 When will the Duty be over that we may fell How many Hypocritical out-cries are there against the World O! It eats up my time O! It eats up my spirits It robs me of communion with God We say it is an Enemy and yet we can bosome this Snake lodge this Enemy Col. 3.5 that God would have us to kill Mortifie Covetousness How oft hath God charged thee against Covetousness Take heed and beware of it Considerations to withdraw the heare from Covetousness Luke 12.15 Two words to the same purpose all little enough to take thee off from earthly pursuits How apparently hath God with-drawn from thee ever since thou wast taken with this Dalilah How hardly art thou pull'd out of the deep pit and miry clay to Duty much more to God And wilt thou be rich Art thou resolved to run into the bryars Then farewell to thee not only in time but to eternity Mat. 13.23 How many convictions and impressions of the blessed Spirit have your worldly cares choaked How have your inordinate desires of riches puzled your Souls and diverted them from minding and improving the counsells of God and Conscience But O! How unreasonable are earthly prosecutions in this day of Gods wrath When God is plucking up by the roots now to be seeking great things for our selves to have Baruck's sore running on us Jer. 45. ult this makes us the more inexcusable sinners This is altogether unseasonable this is no time for it this is ignoble yea base O that we were ashamed of it We say The last dayes are perillous dayes we pretend to expect the Cross and is this good preparation for the Cross of Christ to load our selves with thick clay to crack our Consciences and thereby to incurr Gods farther displeasure How unlike art thou to the primitive Converts Paul when converted Phil. 3.8 counts all things but dung in comparison of Christ And Zacheus no sooner had a work of grace begun upon him but down went the World faster than ever it went up He parts from riches with more freedome than he sought them The half of my goods I give to the poor Luke 19.8 and if I have wronged any man I will restore four-fold John the beloved Disciple affirms That there is an inconsistency between loving the Father 1 John 2.15 1 John 5.4 and the World and that Whosoever is born of God evercometh the World But alas Our hearts are as Cities without walls the World hath a thorow-fare in them and may come and goe without any Pass from Heaven How hath God put a remark of his sore displeasure upon our worldly endeavours We have to dwell in our seiled houses neglected Gods house Hag. 1.2 4 6. and said The time is not come for the building the waste places for the restoring the Worship of God for the building of the house of God and how hath God caused many of us to vomit up our sweet morsels which we rolled under our tongues O! Consider your wayes Ye have sowen much and bring in little ye eat but have not enough ye drink but ye are not silled with drink and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it into a bagg with holes How hath this Sin deadned you to all the Worship of God How by the interposition of this dark body of the Earth hath the light of Heaven yea the light of Gods countenance been darkned and how hath thy Soul been benighted and clouded They say If a Knife be put into the Earth it will lose its edge I am sure of this experiment That Christians who were once lively and active for God yet by engaging their hearts to the World they have lost their zeal their keenness and their lustre which once they had When thou hast gained time from thy business to think of God and to discharge duty hast hot thou miss'd thine heart hast not thou left and lost it in the croud How dost thou debase thy self hereby The curse of Cham is upon thee a servant of servants thou art a slave to that which thou shouldst rule over God did not give thee a reasonable Soul that thou shouldst choose the Serpents curse to crawl and live upon the Earth O! What sordid practises have some stoop'd unto for the getting this Worlds riches Ahab to gain a few handfulls of earth dares walk to it through Naboth's bowells Judas to pocket thirty Pieces will venture to betray his Lord and the Lord of Heaven and Earth O! tremble to think what sad effects your Covetousness may have upon you before you dye Demas left Christ lost his Soul shipwrack'd his faith and all to embrace this present evil world Prov. 28.20 And if thou make hast to be rich shalt thou be innocent Whether thou place thy confidence and hope
neglected to talk of what you have heard Have not some Not talking of it as soon as dismiss'd from the Sermon fallen into impertinent discourses about news and trifles or into worldly business Mat. 13.7 22. and so the thornes choak'd all the convictions which they received under the Ministry They consider not that the Word they have heard hath been the savour of life or of death 2 Cor. 2.16 and that every one that goes from a Sermon goes off either with God or the Devil in his company Have not you been hearers of the Word only Not practising it Jam. 1.22 and not doers of it Have not you so deceived your own selves Your Ministers have prest you to secret Prayer and to constancy in it but have not you gone away and continued in the neglect of that wherein the power of godliness and heart-sincerity mainly consists Blessed are they that hear the Word of God Luke 11.28 and keep it i. e. that are good Practitioners that have a conscionable care to regulate heart and life according to what they hear and know They are rather blest than the Mother of Christ was for bringing him into the World Christ puts a rather upon the good Practitioner than upon the Virgin Mary But alas Let it be for a Lamentation that so many Professours have been for hearing but for doing only what they listed Amos 8.5 6 7 8 9. Saying When will the new Moon be gone that we may sell Corn and the Sabbath that we may set forth Wheat Making the Ephah small and the Shekel great and falsifying the Ballances by deceit That we may buy the poor for silver and the needy for a pair of shooes yea and sell the refuse of the Wheat The Lord hath sworn by the excellency of Jacob Surely I will never forget any of their works Shall not the Land tremble for this c The Kingdome of God shall be taken from you Mat. 21.43 Luke 12.43 and given to a Nation bringing forth the fruits thereof But Blessed is that Servant whom his Lord when he cometh shall find so doing When did you find the Glasses to discover and amend your Spots Have you been cast into the Form of the Doctrine which ye have received Have you obeyed from the heart the Form of Doctrine delivered to you Hath your profiting appear'd answerable to the many months and years you have sate under the Dews of Heaven What do you know more than you did before What do you believe love and hope for more than you did Have your hearts and lusts stooped more and more to this Scepter of Christ Believe it Sirs If Sin be not more odious and Christ more sweet and precious after you have been in the Shepheards Tents you have lost your hearing hours yea contracted more guilt to your Souls That you have not been chang'd from glory to glory is a great stain to the Ministry and a great ground of sadness to the poor Ministers who fear they have laboured in vain And yet have not you been such unprofitable hearers that Seekers Ranters and Quakers have took occasion to cry down the Office of the Ministry as a Cheat as an old Almanack out of date because they have seen how unsuccessful the labours of Christs Ministers have been upon your Souls If you had come down from these Mounts with your faces shining if you had received more of God upon your hearts and lives you had more credited the Ministry and put to silence these foolish men What shall I say A worse Famine is coming on Professours than what happened to Egypt and if you have laid up no store what will ye do in the years of lean Kine 7. Have not you greatly miscarried Their miscarriages as to consulting with their Ministers Mat. 16.19 as to consulting with them Though one great work of your Ministers was to deal personally with your Souls and God intrusted them with the power of binding and loosing doctrinally at least and hath promised to loose in Heaven what they loosed on Earth and to confirm the Word of his Servants Isa 44.26 and perform the Counsel of his Messengers yet how little weight have you laid upon their judgements Have not you more credited the Physicians opinion of your Bodies Laying little weight on their Judgements Not consulting with them at all and the Lawyers about your Estates than you have your Ministers concerning your Souls How seldome are Ministers consulted with about the business of the Soul and Eternity Will not they in the Acts rise up to condemn this Generation They repaired to Christs Ministers with Men and Brethren What shall we do to be saved Acts 2.37 But alas How many have sate 30 40 50. Years under a Minister and never advised with him what to do They have been no more moved Through hard Heartedness Bride than the Rocks were that Bede preached to Or else through the Pride of their hearts they have thought to heal themselves They have been so puff'd up with their own knowledge that they have not cared to hear what their Ministers could declare unto them If they be to take a Journey they will ask the Way of every one they meet but so unreasonably consident are they of their knowing the Way to Glory though there be many Wayes Prov. 14.12 that do indeed lead down to Hell yet seem the right Way to Heaven that they will not so much as ask the Way thither-ward of any Guide Prov. 26.16 The Fool is wiser in his own conceit than seven men thas can render a reason Or else they have thought as well of their Souls as some doe of their flesh Thinking the wound will heal of it self that the wound will heal of it self And hath it not so done no body knows how Can you tell how the troubles and impressions made by the Ministry in your own Souls have worn away have not Ministers sound after the House hath been swept and garnished that seven worse Spirits have entred into the Souls of many convinced and terrified Professors and their latter end was worse than their beginning Many saith famous Hooker in a stupid kind of sottish senselessness wear out the blow and so wast away to nothing as many out of sorrow have become like senseless blocks How oft hath Satan like a Cut-purse drawn thee into solitudes disswaded thee from going near thy Minister that he may rob thee of thy Convictions and the better to effect this hath he not perswaded thee to look on the Minister as proud high scorning to condescend to hear thy Soul grievances and complaints whereas he hath many and many a time with the greatest importunity beg'd this trouble of dressing thy sores If you have consulted with your Ministers Not consulting with them soon enough Acts 24.25 have not you delayed going to these Soul-Physicians When the wound was newly given and bleeding you should have
house that is falling we would endeavour to save our selves from this untoward generation The Apostle would not so have adjured them so charg'd so intreated them had he not known the danger of wicked company Psa 7.11 God is angry with the wicked every day his bow is bent his arrows are on the strings the instruments for their ruine are all prepared And is it safe to be there where the Arrows of God are ready to fly about our ears How was the Apostle afraid to be in the Bath with Cerinthus Numb 16.26 Depart saith God by Moses from the tents of Korah Dathan and Abiram lest you be consumed in all their sins How have the baskets of good figs suffered with the bad Is it not prejudicial to the gold to lye with the dross Lot had been ruined by his Neighbourhood to the Sodomites if God had not wrought wonderfully for his deliverance Will you put God to work miracles to save you from your ungodly company It is dangerous being in the road with thieves whilst Gods hue and cry of Vengeance is at their backs Prov. 13.20 A Companion of fools shall be destroyed The very beasts may instruct you to consult better for your security the very Deer are afraid of a wounded chased Deer and therefore for their preservation thrust him out of their company How few believe their own experiences From not believing that they have suffered from them what they have suffered by the company of the Ungodly It had been better we had gone to the Pest-house and eat and drank with persons infected with the Plague even whilst the soar and botch was running on them than to accompany with wicked men our bodies would have been endangered only by the one but our Souls are by the other Is not the poyson of Asps under their tongues Doth not the Devil act them Eph. 2.2 Doth he not work effectually in the Children of disobedience Doth he not inform them Is there any breath that is not infections coming from their lips How soon could Joseph rap out an Oath by living with Pharaohs Courtiers It was not long time that Peter was â—nnecessarily without a Call in the High-Priests Hall and how quickly do we hear him Curse and Swear and deny his Lord and Master We are insensibly insnared and defiled by wicked men as we are black'd and discoloured by lying long under the hot and scortching Sun-beams Do not we yet know and feel how a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump and that one sinner destroys much good and that those that were mingled among the Heathen learned their wayes Have not you found after such company-keeping how your hearts have been dead dull straitned loth and unwilling to come into Gods presence It is difficult saith a late ingenious Writer even to a miracle to keep Gods Commandements and evil company too How suddenly after your Soul-refreshments in your Closet Communion have you lost all your heats and spiritual fervencies which you had in secret and have instantly cooled by going forth into cold and corrupt air When a Saint hath been in private ravished with the love of God and the joys of Heavenâ— and afterwards meets with company which neither doth nor can speak one word of such matters what a damp is it to him What a quenching as it were of the Spirit of God in him Nay is not that true which one saith that the people of God do generally lose more by worldly men that are of a blameless conversation before men than they lose by wicked and profane men O! how oft hath communion with carnal men been at least an occasion of blotting your evidences and of your suspecting the truth of your own graces whilst you have omitted the duties of admonition and reproof when there was a call thereto O! how oft have you said If I cannot suffer such a mans frowns and displeasure and therefore have omitted my duty to their Souls and durst not appear for God against their sins how shall I deny my self in greater matters How shall I suffer at a stake for Christ How shall I resist to blood fighting against sin You hold the Wolfe by the Ear whilst among them If you reprove them you get a blot if not you fear you are too cowardly to be inrolled among the Saints I will acquaint you with an Observation of mine When I have seen a Christian fall into an intimacy with vain and erroneous company I have counted it a mark of a back-sliding heart and have found it so too too oft And no wonder for we our selves count it a disgrace to us to accompany with them who associate with people suspected for uncleanness and dishonesty and so doth the Spirit of God who will not partake in the scandal of such Association Verily He will not be a Partner with you when you are not choice of your Fellowship How few consider From not considering how hereby they harden them in their wickedness how they harden wicked men by an intimacy with them Whereas withdrawment from them might be a means to make them ashamed Whilst we are merry and jovial with them we make them believe their condition is not deplorable their danger is not great whereas if we shunned them as we would a Bowed-Wall whilst they remain enemies to the Lord this might do them good for the startling of them and rouzing of them out of their unhappy security and strong delusions wherein they are held Not discharging Duty in their company Secondly May not neglect of discharging the Duties owed to wicked men whilst in their company be also justly charged upon Church-Members Professours carelessness of the perishing condition of the Souls even of the vilest is a sin much to be lamented It is an Iron Age we live in and mens hearts are strangely hardned as to any pitty they shew to the multitudes who are in a natural and damnable condition Me-thinks you should reflect on the misery of an unconverted state whilst you your selves were so lately in it Are not you convinced Several weighty Considerations to perswade Professors to be treating with Souls about their eternal Estate what-ever company they are in that those with whom you converse daily have reasonable immortal Souls capable of eternal life or misery Have not they the same common Nature with you Are there not at least many civil bonds wherein you stand related to them Doth not their misery call aloud for your compassions Are they not in the gall of bitterness and bonds of iniquity Have they yet any part or fellowship in the pardon of their Sins The endeavouring to heal the back-slidings of Christians though a very necessary work is not so necessary for they will surely be pardoned and healed they are not in such hazard of damnation as to endeavour to open the eyes of these poor blind wretches and to turn them from the power of Satan unto God Would you not
of your provocations humbled in the very dust be sure to keep Conscience tender Let not your convictions dye strike again and again smite on the thigh again and again whilst the Iron is hot This fire may be kept alive by bringing new fuel to it Labour exquisitely to afflict your Souls that you should be so foolish so vile as under Christs Livery to commit so great and so hideous abominations Take words and say O the Light that I have abused O the means of Grace that I have slighted O the little service that I have done to Christ O the many dis-services Let these things cut and grave and afflict and humble thy Soul exceedingly from morning to evening and from evening to morning till God be pacified towards thee beware lest the motions of a lazy heart cause thee to desist sooner A patient that hath had a long disease must continue in the use of the prescriptions till the ill humour be purged away 4. Indignation Let your sorrow be accompanied with detestation See all your sins and loath them and your selves too This is promised they shall loath their ways and doings which are not good O! how much sin have we confessed which yet we have secretly hug'd in our hearts Labour to have your hearts rise against your pride hypocrifie c. Hate sin not only for Hell but as Hell yea hate your selves for your sins yea hate your selves that you can hate your sins no more O that my hatred of my Lusts might be greater than ever my love was unto them I wish from my Soul Professors were more apprehensive of Gods Judgements that are upon them and the Nation for their sins I wish many of us were come up to the frames of the hard-hearted Jews and expressed so much tenderness as they did when Gods hand was heavy upon them their sins also were an heavy burden Hos 7.14 In their affliction they sought God early they mourned and humbled themselves very much though with the removal of their trouble their sorrows wore away However be not satisfied with this sorrow but labour for such sorrow as David had when he was wounded in his heart for sin though Nathan told him his sin was forgiven yet he continued his sorrows for his great transgressions Labour I beseech you for tears of hatred and indignation be greatly displeased with your selves because you have so foolishly and wretchedly dishonoured God and ventured your eternal undoing and if yet thine eyes be not like the Fish-ponds of Heshbon for thy sins take words and sament before God thine hardness of heart that thou shouldst so grievously offend and provoke God so good so gracious a God and that notwithstanding thine heart should remain unbroken 5. Supplication Let there be added hearty cries to God for pardon of all these and all other abominations Who forgives him that scorns to sue for Remission Here is your work in this day the Devil and a false heart will put you upon other work but this is your present work Cant. 1.6 They made me the keeper of the Vineyards but mine own Vineyard I have not kept But O! do not leave the work that God sets you about I know it is your duty to provide for the bodies of your Children but consider the danger of thy Soul what guilt thou art under and give the Lord no rest till he hath blotted out all thy sin and art assured that he will remember it no more Relieve not thy self with the general bounty of God or with the free grace and rich mercy of God whilst thou neglectest to cry to God for grace and mercy He will be sought unto by the house of Israel Prize thy condition that thou art alive to pray thou mightst have been in Hell there to howl for ever and ever Seek the Lord whilst he may be found Seek in time before it be too late And if thou doubtest whether thou hast an interest in Christ and the promises because of thy hideous transgressions yet remember the gracious words that tell once from the mouth of Christ to the Samaritan John 4.10 If thou didst know the gift of God thou wouldst have asked and he would have given thee living water Though thou art unworthy of Childrens bread and hast deserved to be cast forth among the dogs yet thou hast to do with a bountifull and mercifull Lord and therefore be not cast down so as to be discouraged from waiting on the Lord. It was ill said of him why should I wait on the Lord any longer There is no hope I would have thee take better words into thy mouth and say Lord I am unworthy to be the object of thy mercy unworthy to live worthy to be denyed because thou didst call and I did not hear therefore if I call thou mayst justly turn me off in thy fury thou mightest answer me by terrible things in righteousness But deal not with me according to my deservings O! make me the great instance of the power of thy grace let thy mercy in pardoning be great exceeding great O God! Do not delay the suing out thy pardon Without delay away quickly to the Throne of Grace Remember Faelix put off his work till some other time There is danger in delays lest your sense of sin and sorrow for it vanish and decay blow up the first sparks of grace lest they go out and dye again take the first advantages of the grace of God Hast thou an inclination to humble thy self to pray to seek Gods face improve it quickly lest the wrath of God who is nighly provoked already against thee break form upon thee and there be no remedy Do not you know that you have lost the sense of the love of God But have you also lost all sense of Gods wrath Do not you wonder you escape that you are yet alive that you are not free among the dead incorporated with the Hypocrites and damned crew Will you dare you go on in your hardness of heart Will you treasure up wrath against the day of wrath O! God forbid Lay by the world thy false friend thy treacherous Joab that hath smitten to the earth with its kisses and its smiles Here is a business on which thy life the life of thy precious Soul depends Prepare to meet thy God wrath is gone out from the Lord howl weep cry it may be you shall be hid is the day of the Lords wrath it may be your sins shall be forgiven Though the law be a looking-glass to shew you your spots the Baver under the law was made of looking-glosses yet it cannot cleanse you it is the Gospel alone that pardons Away ye wandring Sheep to the great Shepheard of your Souls Hebr. 13.20 great he is in affection and love to his flock he hath laid down his life for you he hath purchased you with his own bloud Nathans parable of the Ewe-Lamb is most true of Christ and
told the prudent should hold their peace in an evil day though I know 't is an unthankful office to admonish and reprove c. Yet I have laid by all Impediments and Objections that Self was obtruding and wish I had such gifts and such affections and such a discerning of the hearts and lives of Professours as might render me some way useful to put you upon self-reflection upon self-tryal in order to a full Repentance I pray God I may so farr at least succeed as to obstruct that cursed exclaiming against the sins of Governours and the sins of divided Parties as at length to make you cry out What have I done O! how have I provoked God Out of pity to your souls have I undertaken this subject Our pangs like those of a travailling Woman are hastening the Clouds are swelling I am loth they should fall on you in a secure and impenitent condition I am not ashamed to tell you that I foresee foul weather and I would you should be in readiness for boisterous Seas I know nothing save guilt will then sink your hearts the load of affliction will be so heavy and hard upon you that I would have nothing else not the load of millions of unrepented sins at the same time to press you down Sins unrepented of will soon as poyson drink up your spirits If sin be confessed and repented of if God hath forgiven no matter what loads lye upon the back seeing no guilt lyes upon the Conscience Having given you an accompt of my Design and the reason of it I shall only add That it may not be expected I should give you a full Catalogue of all your sins which are provocations in the eyes of the Lord this day Who can understand his errours Cleanse thou me and the Land from all our secret Psal 19.12 as well as known faults God forbid I should be so censorious as to judge all Professours guilty of these sins in all the Particularities or in all the Aggravations of them Some are to be charged one way some another few can wash their hands in innocency that they are no ways Principals or Accessories Farr be it from me to be partial in my Charge to advance any Faction of men upon the ruines of their Brethren I desire you would take this Catalogue into your Closets with you and as you read set a special mark of observation on those sins which are chiefly yours in order to repentance and amendment and then give the Lord no rest till he hath took his Pen and dipt it in the blood of his Son and blotted them out of his Diary and remembrance And Lastly Let me beseech the Reader to be very importunate with the Lord for an humble tender spirit that prejudice unbelief and hardness of heart may not accompany him in the perusal of the following lines and thereby both his and my own endeavours become abortive A Brief ACCOUNT OF What may be expected in the following TREATISE By a Friend to the Authour and Reader PRofessour In this necessary and seasonable Gospel-Glass there are many sad but useful Sights for thee First Wouldst thou know what may be seen I 'le tell thee Herein the Miscarriâ—ges of Professours and therefore of thine own self are enumerated and aggravated The Sins enumerated are either against the Law and Gospel joyntly or against the Gospel and Law severally Professours Sins against the Law and Gospel joyntly are hinted in the first Chapter which shews their Regardlessness of their own and others Souls Their Sins against the Gospel more peculiarly are spoken to in the seven next Chapters The 2d shews their Want of saving Conviction and Compunction the 3d. their Want of Despair in Self the 4th their Miscarriages about Soul-troubles the four following Chapters their Miscarriages about believing in Christ the 5th their Ignorance of Christ serving their turns of Christ making base Capitulations with him the 6th their Delayes to close with Christ the 7th their Taking Christ partially without conjugal Affections and without considering the Cost they may be at the 8th their Shuffling together false Signes of closing with Christ. Their Sins against the Law more peculiarly are either against the First or Second Table Their Sins against the First Table under the Head of Vngodliness are discovered in the Eleven following Chapters The 9th shews their Ignorance and Errours the 10th their Want of Love to God the 11th their Evil Surmises of God the 12th their Vnthankfulness the 13th their Neglect of Prayer especially of Secret both Ejaculatory and Closet-Prayer the 14th their Miscarriages about their Prayers the 15th their Slighting the written Word of God especially in not reading and meditating on it as they ought the 16th their Miscarriages about the Promises the 17th their Abuse of Providence the 18th their Hypocrisy the 19th their Sabbath-Sins Their Sins against the Second Table are either Personal or Relative Their Personal Sins are evinced in the four next Chapters The 20th shews their Miscarriages about Self-tryal the 21st their Pride the 22d their Gluttony the 23d their Idleness Their Relative Sins are spoken to in the Fourteen following Chapters The 24th shews their Vnmercifulness the 25th their Vnrighteousness or Vnfaithfulness in Trading the 26th their Covetousness the 27th their Envy the 28th their Sins as Superiours the 29th as Husbands or Wives the 30th as Parents or Children the 31st as Masters or Servants the 32d their Miscarriages towards Ministers before their silencing the 33d Since their silencing the 34th their Miscarriages towards Sinners The Aggravations of their Miscarriages that are here enumerated thou hast in the two next Chapters The 37th shews their Dis-ingenuity and Scandalousness the 38th their Sinning against Knowledge and impenitently notwithstanding all means to bring them unto Repentance Secondly Wouldst thou know and that experimentally How useful such Sights may be unto thy Soul Read diligently the two last Chapters The 39th shews What Vse thou shouldst make of this Glass and the 40th What Reason there is thou shouldst make such Vse thereof And now Consciencious Reader so I stile thee because I hope thou resolvest so to be having given thee this brief Account of what thou mayest expect in the following excellent Treatise I cannot but assure thee that if thou bringest hither with thee a serious and teachable Spirit desirous to have thy Soul searched to the quick and the sores thereof launced and throughly cured thou wilt not lose thy cost and pains The closeness and pythiness of the Compilement will not only please but the Materials so full of Spiritual vigour and Scriptural-experience will wonderfully advantage thy Soul and give thee cause all the dayes of thy life yea to eternity to bless God for putting it into the heart of the Reverend Authour after he hath sacrificed his spirits and strength in a publick way of service to God and his Church with more than ordinary activity and self-denial under many bodily weaknesses yea under a
Conscience as soon as the guilt of sin is removed as they hope their mourning ceaseth though the strength of sin be as greatas ever 5. Few seek comfort aright Among the multitudes professing Religion how many seek for grace in order to their comfort Joy Peace Comfort being their great end but how few seek for comfort in order to grace 6. Few mourn for unbelief How few mourn for their slightings of Christ It is more natural and so more easie to mourn for sins against the Law than those again Christ and his Gospel Therefore if there be many tears shed for neglect of Prayer for Theft Perjury c. yet how few are found mourning for undervaluing and rejecting Christ and his Tenders whose Soul cries out O! how unkind have I been to Christ O! that he should come out of his Fathers Bosome for me come under the Law yea Dye for me and yet I should keep him out of dores that the Son of God that the brightness of the Fathers glory and the express Image of his person the upholder of all things by the word of his power Heb. 1.3 when he had by himself purged our sins and sate down on the right hand of the Majesty on high should stoop so low Rev. 3.20 as to stand at the door and knock and yet that I should not let him in break heart break into small dust be trembling all over for thy unkindnesses to so great so rich so good a Friend O wretch that I have been What! more kindness to my Dog my Cat. c If my Dog be whining at the door he hath admittance and yet thou shut out O. I abhorr my self in dust before thee I meet with few of these mourners CHAP. V. Their ignorance of Christ their serving their turns of Christ their making base capitulations with Christ 1. HOw many are ignorant of Christ Too too many Ignorant of Christ and of what use he is to perishing Souls They know no more the Gift of God than the Samaritan Woman did they know not what an excellent gift Christ is John 4.10 that he is the Fountain of living Water and therefore ask nothing of him It is one thing to hear of a Christ and another thing to know Christ How few know Christ to be their only Life If you did believe that he that hath the Son hath life 1 Jo. 5.12 and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life And that who so findeth me Christ findeth life and shall obtain favour of the Lord Prov. 8.35 36. But he that sinneth against me Christ wrongeth his own Soul all they that hate me Christ love death Upon such a Conviction what would you not give for Life Esau will part with his Birth-right to preserve his Life The Woman will part with all her Estate to recover health and to secure her self from the grave Of all blessings we value Life mostly but few have such esteems of Christ Few can say as Paul What things were gain to me those I counted loss for Christ Phil. 3.7 8 9. yea doubtless and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and do count them but dung that I may win Christ and be found in him not having mine own righteousness which is of the Law but that which is through the faith of Christ 1 Cor. 2.2 the righteousness which is of God by faith I determined not to know any thing save Jesus Christ and him crucified Psal 73.25 Or with David Whom have I in Heaven but thee and there is none upon Earth that I desire besides thee Few look on Christ as the Original of their Life that they must live move and have their being in Christ and from Christ alone that they are dead without him and hence their desires are not after him If you knew that you want Christ more than Bread and Water then would you cry out Lord give me Christ None but Christ None but Christ in him is my help in him is my salvation He is the Authour of all our good affections and of all our gracious abilities but alass blind man sees him not in his usefulness Cant. 5.9 What is thy Beloved more than another Beloved He hath no form nor comeliness Isa 53.2 3. and when we shall see him there is no beauty that we should desire him He is despised and rejected of men Men must dye and be damned without a Christ but they know it not they know no good that Christ is and no good that Christ brings Secondly Many serve their turns of Christ How many serve their turns of Christ close with Christ for their own ends When men have served their turnes one of another away they goe so these troubles they have and ease they would have they have stayed off from Christ as long as they could they have tryed worldly Comforts they will not do they have tryed Duties they will give no rest and therefore in the terrours of their Spirits they must have Christ so much of him as may give them quiet and rest Men are weary of the bands and setters wherein they are held under the Law they would fain be delivered from Sathan that torments them and from the sins that now stare them in the face they groan under the weight of the wrath of God but not under the body of sin Sathan as a Tormentour is un-welcome but as a Tempter is still liked well enough O! I am afraid I shall to Hell O! if there be no other way to escape but through Christ O! then for a Christ then Sermons and Ministers are welcome in hopes of bringing in not so much a Christ as peace and comfort to the troubled Spirit So that men use Christ as sick men take meat not for love of it or liking to it for their Stomachs rise against it but for fear of death which makes them force themselves to eat Though many come to Christ it is by constraint not willingly not with delight not as an healthy man comes to a full table to feed with pleasure Many to avoid a greater mischief to avoid damnation to avoid eternal torments will to Christ in their sore extremities they will then make large confessions take up great resolutions against their sins pray to God and with vehemency and constancy so as they never prayed before but upon ease to the impostumed matter upon recoveries out of their troubles they become if not profane yet worldly and negligent of Christ his Person his Laws his Concernments They have of Christ what they came for They come to Christ as some come to Shops not to have all in the Shop but what they immediately want They want comfort and therefore they venture as the Leapers to the Camp of the Syrians they had no love to them they counted them
some secret lust more precious than Christ he is not the chief Corner-Stone whereas to them that believe he is precious exceeding precious Few like Paul determine to know nothing else save Christ and him Crucified One Christ was enough to take up Pauls thoughts to eternity Si Christum noscis c. he did not care what he was ignorant of so he knew Christ Though he was brought up at Gamaliels feet he laid down all his knowledge at Christs feet 1. Are your hearts so drawn to Christ From esteeming Christ the most necessary good as to count him the most necessary good in all the World And all other things to be but adjuncts so that you are able to live without them but not without Christ Liberty is sweet to a believer but he can live in a Prison yea and live merrily too he can sing there if Christ be within the grate Bread is sweet but he can live in a Wilderness a desolate houling desart and sing there too as Moses did if Christ be there yea and preferr it before Canaan If thy Presence go not with us carry us not hence A Wilderness with Christ is more precious than a Canaan without him If ye were through Believers the World would not be accounted among the Necessaries One thing is necessary One not many Other things may divert or may a little refresh but Christ is the Necessary 2. yea the only good Is he in a sense the only good to your Souls Is nothing else good separated from Christ give a Believer what you will without Christ it weighs nothing he droops as the Marygold when the Sun withdraws What is all this whilst I am Christless There is none good but Christ Riches are miscall'd goods they are not good sure in their reference as they relate to Christ as they come from Christ from that bosome of love and as they advance Christ and bring Christ and the Soul to nearer Communion If the World in its glory splendour and fulness hinder communion with Christ by deadning flatning and distracting the heart it becomes a burthen He is burthened with friends relations enjoyments of all sorts that rob him of Christ that ecclipse the face of the Sun of Righteousness through their unhappy interposals Phil. 3.7 What was gain is counted loss As he enjoyeth much or little of Christ thereafter he laughs or weeps he riseth or falleth In Christ are Riches honours and friends yea Prayers Sermons Sacraments c. The Lord is the Temple He is all in all Col. 3.11 He is all things and in all things not only by way of merit whatever they have or expect is on Christs account nor only by way of conveyance through him we have all good communicated nor only by way of causality as he worketh all in all but he is all virtually he is instead of all things to them he makes up the defect of all things If no Estate no Friends no Liberty no Health no Comfort c. yet the Believer wanteth nothing As having nothing 2 Cor. 6.10 and yet possessing all things Thus the Woman told the Persecutour when he threatned her to deprive her of her Husband Christ is my Husband Professours look to your hearts Isa 24.16.56.3 to your affections and then you will have cause to cry My leanness my leanness woe unto me I am a dry tree Seventhly How few Christians have Few consider the Cost beforehand in their closing with Christ considered the Cost they may be at They were told of the Cross but the Cross was at a great distance and things when remote seem little How many little studied the import of that word Cross What a shameful painful tedious death it imports Something of trouble they would undergoe for Christ but really they never thought of dying for Christ of spilling their hearts blood for Christ So that they did not close with Christ understandingly either they were ignorant of Christs person or of the consequents of closing with him that they should be hated of all men for his Names sake Mat 10.22 Acts 14.22 that they must through much tribulation enter into his Kingdom that they shall be put out of the Synagogues and that the time cometh Jo. 16.2 that whosoever killeth them will think that he doth God service Hence when unexpectedly the rain descends Mat. 7.27 the floods come and the winds blow and beat upon their houses the stately spiritual buildings which they have been erecting they do not only totter but fall and great is their fall Even Cedars are taken up by the roots How many in such times put away a good Conscience and concerning Faith have made ship-wrack 1 Tim. 1.19 Jude v. 12. How many are Trees whose fruit withereth without fruit twice dead plucked up by the roots They see not the riches of Christ will make them amends for all these losses and perills they cannot ballance the troubles of the Flesh with the comforts of the Spirit the present evil things with the future inheritance in Heaven the Temptations they meet with are unexpected They are like some Ladies that put forth to Sea for pleasure they launch forth towards Christ but as the King of Navarre who said he would not venture farther than he could quickly retreat in case of danger The Storm makes them return to their Harbour yea with the Dogg to the vomit 2 Pet. 2.22 and the Sow to the mire These poor Souls O that my heart could bleed for them were willing to come up to some of Christs terms Gal. 3.4 to lose a little nay to suffer many things but they cannot endure to lose Life O my Soul weep in secret for them when thou considerest that the Children of the Kingdom Church-Members shall be cast out into outer daarkness Mat. 8.12 there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth Matth. 5.18 Luke 9.23 Luke 14.26 God will not abate a punctum of what he requires he expects that we take up the Cross daily that we hate Life it self as well as whatsoever else is near and dear unto us The Conditions imposed on his fallen Creatures are irreversible he will never stoop lower O! this makes many a man to goe away sorrowful I beseech the Reader to goe over with the work of Conversion again now that the Cross is in sight now that Tribulation ariseth Now let him see whether Christ is better than Name Liberty Friends Relations Lively-hood and Life it self and whether he can believe Luke 9.24 that he that will save his life shall lose it and he that will lose his life for Christs sake shall find it and that with advantage CHAP. VIII Their shuffling together false Signes of closing with Christ 8ly HOw do many Professours shuffle together a company of false Signes of closing with Christ Many rest in false Signes of closing with Christ How do they count them true and infallible which are
but O! how is the world mistaken in many of them Thou hast not called upon me Isa 41.21 23. O Jacob Though Jacob was a People sever'd into a Church-State with an aim at Gods praise yet Jacob pray'd not This was grievous unto God Do not many Professours clearly evidence that they are prayerless Souls by their disobedience to the Preceptive their impatience under the Providential Will of God By their distrust of the All-sufficiency and Faithfulness of God Zeph. 3.2 She obeyed not the voice she received not correction she trusted not in the Lord she drew not near to her God By their entring into so many Temptations Matth. 26.41 Jer. 10.21 Watch and Pray lest you enter into Temptation By their being deceived and labouring to deceive others in the things of God The Pastours are become bruitish and have not sought the Lord. By their Back-slidings Zeph. 1.6 Considerations against this sin Psa 10.4 Joh. 21.15 and Apostasies And them that are turned back from the Lord and those that have not sought the Lord. Doth not this sin speak out high contempt of God That God is not entertained so much as in a thought He will not seek God God is not in all his thoughts That the thoughts of God are blasphemous What profit should we have if we pray unto him Yea Doth not this sin speak out the hearts denial of God What saith the Psalmist Psa 53.1 4. The Fool hath said in his heart there is no God he calls not upon God To live without Prayer is to be dead while alive for it is to live without God Jer. 10.25 The Families that know not God and that call not on his Name are the same What Will ye not do so much as Pray unto God What can you do less for God than by this homage to own him for your Maker Or less for your own Souls than to beg their lives of him whose hand of Justice is lift up against them Their Souls and theirs only shall live Psa 69.32 that seek the Lord. No Malefactours dye more unlamented than those that when cast will not beg for their lives How many also are there Restraining Prayer that have cast off Prayer How many have restrained Prayer And that both when they have thought they have prayed themselves out of affliction they have had no more to say to God Job 15.4 till under affliction again and when they have for some time prayed for deliverance to no purpose This evil is of the Lord why should I wait any longer This is worse than not to pray at all Not to pray at all notes only the neglect of duty but to cast off Prayer a distaste of duty But I shall be more particular Though Prayer be the only Key Neglecting Eâ—aculatary Prayer to unlock the Store-houses and Treasuries of all Blessings yet how little hath this Key been used I shall wave publick and private and only instance in secret Prayer and that both sudden and composed and solemn How few Professours have made conscience of Ejaculatory Prayer How seldome have we darted up our Souls to Heaven upon sudden emergent occasions in some short desires As when we are hearing Lord set home this Word upon my heart When in Prayer our hearts are melting c. Lord suffer not my heart any more to be hardened from thy fear When we are about our worldly employments Lord keep my heart with thy self c. Are not some of us wholly unacquainted with this kind of Praying Not such a Dart saith one to be found in all their Quiver They know not how in the midst of their worldly businesses and company yea in the midst of their solemn religious duties in hearing reading conferring praying c. to send their thoughts to give God a visit though a short one in a desire or two to speak at least one or two heart-words unto him Have not most Professours too much contented themselves with their solemn Visits of God but between their solemn Duties have scarce ever conversed with God What account shall we be able to give of our thoughts the first-born of our Souls from morning to evening Is not this the highest improvement of them to send them in embasies unto Heaven and by them to converse with God Do not the best of us find strangeness apt to grow between God and our Souls between our set Duties And may we not impute that strangeness to our omission of these more â—â—ansient and occasional talkings with God How many precious things in Christian conference in Sermons in our solemn joynt Prayers are lost for want of present liâ—ting up our hearts to God for his presence therein and blessing thereupon How many blessed motions or the Holy Spirit suggested to us in our particular Callings are quench'd for want of these short sallyes of our Souls to Heaven for more grace that these sparks may be kept alive yea blown into a flame Neglect of this kind of Prayer is no small provocation it grieves God there is much unkindness in it that God should be so gracious as to let his door stand wide open at all times and that he should assure us of welcome when ever we come to him and yet that we should not be so kind as to step in to visit him with a desire hour after hour and that though we may thus visit him and not neglect but rather further any business we have in hand and without being uncivil to any company in which we are He cannot but take this udkindly How few Professours have made conscience of closet-Prayer Neglecting closet Prayer Though Christ takes it for granted that his Disciples will thus pray and hath annexed a sweet promise to the due performance of this duty When thou prayest enter into thy Closet Mat. 6.6 and when thou hast shut thy door pray to thy Father which is in secret and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly Retire thy self get thee a place set thy self a time wherein thou mayest vacare Deo be at leisure to make it thy business to pray to God c. Yet how is this duty wholly omitted by some and too too seldom performed by others Satan prevails with some otherwise honest Souls to put off this duty from time to time by telling them either that they will but play the hypocrites therein or that the time is not convenient by reason either of some bodily or of some soul distempers or that this and the other worldly business must of necessity be dispatch'd at such a time c. O how little do such love the Lord that are afraid to talk too secretly or too often in secret with him But alas how many omit closet-Prayer altogether Some content themselves with praying with others either in the Church or in the Family How can such look upon themselves as Saints whatever Profession they make What a Saint and yet
and victory Have we made conscience to meditate upon our Wants what Graces we mostly need of their Wants what we are most defective in From this neglect we pray as if we did not pray without zeal earnestness and importunity Whereas had we viewed our Wants of God of his Grace Spirit Protection Mercy and Presence we should pray as for Life and those stragling vain thoughts would hereby have been suppressed When the Malefactour is begging his Life at the Barr his Soul is not running adrift after every Feather but he minds his business 't is Life and his Life that is endangered and therefore he gathers up all possible arguments that may induce the Judge to abate of the rigour of Justice towards him But how oft have we been on our knees and have been ignorant of what ailes us so that we might truly say we knew not what to ask When you goe to your Markets you consider what you and yours want but do we so when we goe to our Spiritual Markets Have not we neglected to meditate of the Mercies of God of Mercies received which we have received Hence we come either customarily before God or not with that holy boldness as we should One Mercy opens a door to another The Valley of Achor was given as a door of hope to Israel Hos 2. Forgetting the returns of Prayer makes our hearts ake and knees faint We should book the passages of Gods grace how he remembred us in our low condition how he hath visited us day by day when we have come in as the parched ground we have found God a dew to us and springs of water have appeared in the wilderness When we have come in before God with our Shackles on our Feet with Irons that have entred our Souls God hath made it a Jubilee he hath proclaimed the acceptable year he hath let us out of the Prison-house and hath set our feet in a large place When we have come in before God with guilt on our Souls and with fearful expectations how hath God given us the white stone and sent us away with his blessing and with gladness of heart The neglect of our Diaries of the Providences and Mercies of God the want of reflecting on all the Rings that God hath sent us makes us more like Slaves than Children Do we with David cry out Psa 40.5 Many O Lord my God are thy wonderful works which thou hast done and thy thoughts which are to us-ward they cannot be reckoned up in order unto thee if I would declare and speak of them they are more than can be numbred Have not we neglected to meditate on the great and wonderful things of the prevalency of Prayer that have been done upon the Prayers of Gods People We should have in everlasting remembrance what a powerful Engine Prayer is Gen. 32.28 Exod. 32.32 Jam. 5.17 18. It hath held the hands of the Almighty Jacob and Moses prevailed over God It hath been a Key to open and shut the Heavens Elias was a man subject to like passions as we are and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain and it rained not on the earth by the space of three years and six months And he prayed again and the Heaven gave rain and the Earth brought forth her fruit And O what wonderful things hath God promised to a Praying People Jer. 33.3 Mat. 21.22 Call unto me and I will answer thee and shew thee great and mighty things which thou knowest not Whatsoever ye ask in my Name c. Here is more than Herod offered that was but half the Kingdome here is a Whatsoever Did we appear before God with these instances of grace and promises fresh in our thoughts we should not say What a weariness is it Or that there is no profit in serving God and gallop through our duties as we are wont 2. Not stirring up Grace received Another neglect before Prayer is The not stirring up our Graces before we set upon the Duty We too much rest on habitual preparation whereas actual is necessary He that leaps immediately from the Shop to the Throne of Grace and labours not to quicken his dull Soul and to leave worldly businesses behind him as Abraham his Servants when he goeth to sacrifice no wonder if he lose the Duty and provoke the Lord rather than be accepted with him The Well is seldome so full but that you may nay you must throw in a little to fetch up the more It is thought by the redoubling of David's charge that he found not his heart in a good frame for the exalting of God and therefore cries out so vehemently Psa 103.1 2. Bless the Lord O my Soul and all that is within me praise his holy Name Bless the Lord O my Soul and forget not all his benefits 2ly When Praying How have we failed when we have entred upon the Duty And that in Invocation in Confession in Petition and in Thanksgiving 1. In our Invocations In Invocation We call God Father and yet how unlike are we unto him we resemble not him we call Father we reverence not him we call Father we trust not to him with that confidence we would to receive of our Fathers of the Flesh we fear when we ask Bread he will give us a Stone we have lower thoughts of Gods bowels than of our own we think our selves more pitiful better natur'd than God himself If I were a Mother and my Child in distress I should deny him nothing 2. In our Confession of Sin Confession Psa 119 26. We are not full and free and ingenious we sit with Rachel upon some Idols we do not declare our wayes unto him but rather cover our transgressions as Adam Few can clear themselves as Job did You will perhaps confess Job 31. We have erred and strayed from thy wayes like lost sheep We have left undone c. Dolus in generalibus Psa 32.3 but still in generals David was in this gravelled When I kept silence my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long But you descend not to particulars or if to particulars yet the Benjamin is reserved loth to let Benjamin goe loth to confess envy pride breach of vowes want of love to Saints loving the rich only neglecting the poor You will confess what every man knows you are guilty of or what every man is addicted to but you shame not your selves by instancing in the particular neglects and commissions by which you chiefly provoke the Lord the Agags are not brought to execution the best of the Cattel are kept back one Wedge is hid in the Tent. Or if you confess most particularly yet it is without hatred of the sins confess'd You confess sin yet hugg it bosome it plead for it within one quarter of an hour You confess sin but without self-abhorrence 1 Kings 8.38 Job 42.6 you loath it not as the Plague
heart What good didst thou do or receive in that company wa st thou eyes to the blind feet to the lame didst thou labour to bring thy Friends nearer to Jesus Christ or hast thou more estranged and prejudiced them from and against the way of truth O my heart Didst thou take heed to thy wayes that thou didst not sin with thy tongue Didst thou keep thy mouth as with a bridle When going into the Shop or Field yet with Isaack thou art to meditate there and conferr with God and thy heart thus O my heart for whom dost thou labour for Self or for God whose Servant wilt thou be to day the Worlds or Christs O my heart How many snares are there in the World what a dirty place â—is the World and how great is thy danger if God prevent not by special grace O my Soul What need hast thou of Almighty power to keep thee that thou mayest retain thy sweetness in salt waters But alas How seldome do we reflect on our words or silence on our speaking or hearing on our behaviour abroad or at home When do we consider what our affections were most set upon in such and such a place in such an hour and what our demeanour God-ward and toward our Neighbour was We do not believe Bernard who tells us If we would examine our selves as oft as we need Bern. in Cant. we must do it alwayes And Chrysostomes paraphrase and counsel on Psalm 4. is of as little credit with us Let this account be kept every day have a little Book in thy Conscience and write therein thy daily transgressions and when thou layest thee down on thy Bed bring forth thy Book and take an account of thy sinnes 6. Crowing weary of the work before they have brought things to an issue Do not we grow weary of this work before it be brought to any considerable Issue We flagg before we come to the up-shot Still some were learning and never came to the knowledge of the truth And so some pretend at least to be alwayes trying but they hold not fast They try their hearts as some did truths till they be wholly sceptical as ignorant whether converted or no as ever They know not more this year than they did seven years since but hang betwixt Heaven and Hell in a dubious state for want of skill or pains to decide this matter We are not resolute and peremptory enough to have an account of our Souls yea such an one as that we may have boldness in the presence of Christ When David thought on God and was troubled Psa 77.3 6. he never gives over his heart till he ended this controversie He communed with his heart and made a diligent search We should commune till we know whether we be natural or spiritual and accordingly be humbled greatly or greatly rejoyce in God our Saviour But alas This Age is strangely dull and sluggish those Duties that will cost expence of spirits and call for the labour of the mind we wholly omit or do them very negligently Reader Could I but prevail with thee to set in good earnest upon Occasional Meditation and Heart-Examination and Solemn Meditation and Self-Tryal I should bless the Lord as long as I breath for this enterprise of mine The searcher of hearts knoweth that I took Pen in hand on this design to labour with thee in order to inside Duties that thou might'st not be contented with a Form of Godliness and rest in the external part of Religion that more work might be done within doors in Closets and Hearts O that you would reform Not pass on to another Chapter till you have engaged your slippery incconstant hearts to attend on this necessary Duty Take a few Considerations to impell you 1. Motives to this great duty Heathens else will rise up in judgment against us The very Heathen will rise up in judgement to condemn you if you neglect this duty A Roman Philosopher every night before he slept would examine himself thus Quod malum hodie sanesti c. What sin hast thou opposed wherein art thou bettered Cato also would daily at evening call to mind what ever he had seen read or done that day I use saith Senica every evening to plead my cause with my self when the candle is gone and all silent I review all that I have said or done in the day I hide nothing from mine own scrutiny I pass by nothing Pithagoras gave also this severe rule to his Scholars that they should no night suffer sleep to seize their senses till they had three times recalled the accidents and passages of the day what evil have I committed what good have I omitted Except your Righteousness exceed the Righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees saith Christ may not I say of the Heathen how can you hope for Salvation O! how hath thine heart cheated thee with vain confidences How hast thou cryed the Temple of the Lord I have Abraham to my Father whilst moral Heathens have been better acquainted with their hearts than thou art Yea Sensitive creatures will else shame us 2. The very sensitive creatures may shame thee into the practise of this duty Go thou sluggard to all the souls of Heaven Do they not sit in the Sun and view themselves look inward to themselves turn every feather to set it at rights Do they not look over their feathers and pick out and throw away that which is bad and set others in their places when misplaced Nay 3. We shall else be self-condemned You your selves will be judges of your selves You take the glass and what is amiss in the hair in the face in the body you rectifie by it and what no observation to be made of the faces of your Souls O! take the word of God and make use of this glass which now is in thine hand doth it discover no spots no neglects no failings O! view thy self and humble thy self reflect on thy self and conserr with thy self till thou art ashamed till thou abhorrest and loathest thy self before the Lord. 4. You have a sure sign of hypocrisie on you The neglect of this duty a sign of hypocrisie whilst this duty lies neglected for all the upright have been very carefull to commune with their hearts to search their hearts to make diligent search lest any lust should be covered as Rachel covered her Idols or as Saul was hid in the stuff Nothing is more desired by a sincere Soul than to be throughly searched examine me O Lord Psa 26.2 as Artificers do whether their gold be weight or no and prove me as Artificers do their silver in the fire try my reins and my heart the most inward motions of my Soul search me more deeply and throughly than the world can do Unfound hearts have one Dalilah they have one house of Rimmon that they cannot endure to be examined and found out they are loath to search too
to pity them Drones are to be beaten out of the Hive and starved in Winter It is the Workman that is worthy of meat in Christs account Mat. 10.10 Idleness hath brought much evil upon you and bred many in you it begets many diseases in the body but many more in the Soul Psal 91.11 it exempts a man from the protection of Angels and it exposeth to Gods wrath it brought ruine upon Sodom and the Cities round about Jude v. 7. and they are set forth for an example suffering the vengeance of eternal fire 2. In their general callings How are we guilty of abundance of Idleness in our general callings And above all Idleness Spiritual sloth is most dangerous I find some with unwearied diligence labouring to enlarge their Possessions and to raise their Posterity they rise early and sit up late and eat the bread of carefulness but all is for the Body they do little or nothing for their precious Souls and for Eternity Christ and Heaven stand by and few regard them Few work out their Salvation with fear and trembling Some will not be at so much pains for their Souls as to perform the common outward Duties of Religion They will goe to the Market or to be merry with Friends many a mile but if a Lecture he but a few paces from their thresholds they count it intollerable to wet their â—â—et to expose themselves to the air Well Well God hath eased you of this labour But if men are for some easie parts of Religion yet how few are for the difficult parts thereof They cannot endure to watch their hearts to sanctifie the Lords day so strictly as not to think their own thoughts nor speak their own words nor do their own deeds How many Professours have so long given way to their lazy distempers have lain so long upon the Bed of sloth that when we press them to any painful and laborious Duties they think it excuse enough to say We have put off our Coat and loth we are to put it on We have given way to sloth so long that we hate to take pains for Christ and for Eternity Hence Self-examination Meditation Watchfulness against the first risings of sin Mortification of inward heart-sins c. these works are totally laid by and the longer we neglect them the more ado there is to perswade us to take them up We are like truant-Boyes who hate their Book after a long vacation All we have to uphold our selves with is this that the Spirit is willing when God knows the contrary We are willing to be rich and therefore take pains So we would in Spiritual things too if we were so desirous of them If we were willing to enjoy Christ in our Closets would we be even asleep there upon our knees If we were willing to know the way to Glory would we not take so much pains as to goe to the Shepheards tents and ask for the good old way O! O! It will cut you to the heart when you come to Hell-gate that you mist of Heaven for not enquiring the way thither and that you took more pains to be rich and to damn your Souls than to save them Had that time been spent in Prayer holy Conference and in Self-arraignments which was wasted in the Bed Shop Fields unnecessarily you might have had an eternal rest whereas Hell will be as intollerable to all so especially to them who have stood idle all the day long CHAP. XXIV Their Unmercifulness THE Fourth Sin of Sodom was this Professors unmercifulness Ezek. 16.49 Neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy That is they were unmerciful and inhumane And are not some Professours even in England very hard-hearted and cruel I have oft thought and said That Our late Civil Wars have had too great influence upon us to make us cruel If there be among you a poor man of one of thy Brethren within any of thy Gates Deut. 15.7 8. in thy Land which the Lord thy God giveth thee thou shalt not harden thy heart nor shut thine hand from thy poor Brother but thou shalt open thine hand wide unto him and shalt surely lend him sufficient for his need Luke 14.13 in that which he wanteth O! The poor we have alwayes with us But When we make a Feast do we call the poor Who invites the Guests that Christ hath bid for our Tables When I consider how rare Bowells of mercy and kindness are Col. 3.11 it makes me fear and I have Scripture-grounds for my fear that few are the Elect of God O hard-hearted Professours Hear ye the Word of the Lord Jam. 2.13 He shall have judgement without mercy that hath shewed no mercy He shall have all judgement pure judgement without any mixtures of mercy unmixed wrath shall be his portion Christ is so resolved to punish the Unmerciful that he will over-look any sinner rather than him yea for the greater honour of the Justice of God Mat. 25.41 42 c. Mat. 9.36 The Lord seems to begin and end the great Assizes with the Arraignment and Sentencing of the Unmerciful man How few compassionate Professours are there The proper vital act of Mercy is Compassion How few resent the miseries of others as if they were their own Luke 10.33 How few set themselves to do good to those who are miserable Such what-ever they pretend are indeed unmerciful for Mercy is an active and a communicative thing How few are merciful to others Souls How few pity and set themselves to help sinning Souls but more of this under another Head How few are merciful to the Bodies of others How many are there that will not spare of their superfluities to cloth Christs naked shoulders or to fill his hungry belly Men lay out more to adorn a Cup-board or the walls of their houses than ever they gave to Jesus Christ and his Servants all their dayes Men can feed their Birds their Catts their Doggs their Swine but the Sucklings and Lambs of Jesus Christ perish for want Christ tells you what kindness you shew to his Spouse Matth. 25.40 his Friends his Children he counts as done unto himself and believe it all the scornes and neglects you have cast on either his Ambassadors or poor Saints he will remember another day Go to thy Closet and carry this with thee who so stoppeth his ear at the cry of the poor he also shall cry himself Prov. 21.13 but shall not be heard If you give to whom is it Is it not only to the poor of your own party But hath not the Lord charged you to give to every man that asketh Luke 6.30 Gal. 6.10 Hath he excepted any but idlers Are not you to doe good to all though especially to the Houshold of faith And among them should not your greatest charity have been set forth on them who are become poor not by vile courses but by Gods
attended these whereby they have sallen in that esteem which once they had above you There is no Envy in God Disliking their own enjoyments and his holy Angels they rejoyce at our advancement and at the glory of the humane Nature that it is so exalted above theirs but unhappy we that cannot see any excellency in another but we dislike our own enjoyments and are more vexed at the welfare of our Neighbours than we would be at our own calamities The Beasts do not envy one another Considerations to withdraw the heart from Envy Gal. 5.20 but Men do yea the Devils envy not one another some Professours are herein worse than Devils No wonder if there have been hatred variance emulations wrath strife seditions and heresies whilst envyings have abounded amongst us You know the miserable effect of Envy in the first man that was born of a woman through Envy Cain hated Prov. 27.4 and then kill'd his Brother Abel Wrath is cruel and Anger outragious but who is able to stand before Envy This is so filthy so shameful a sin that few will own it Observe the confessions of men in Prayer and Conference and you will hardly find a Professour acknowledge Envy The malignity of this sin appears in that it strikes directly at the Providence of God who disposeth of the inequality of mens conditions according to his soveraignty and wisdome It hath a tacit accusation of God for raising up some so high and laying others so low It is deeply unsatisfied with Gods bounty to the Children of men that he gives so liberally to some whereas he is not bound to any Whilst others complain against God for making the World no better the envious man is troubled that he hath done so well for some of his Creatures Gal. 5.19 20 21. No wonder the Apostle reckoneth Envy among the gross sins of Murder Uncleanness Idolatry Witchcraft c. and concludes Heaven is no place for such They which do such things shall not inherit the Kingdome of God This is a sin so damnable and so ugly making you so much like the Devil that it is high time you watch against it mourn for it and seek its ruine O! When shall we hear the Exhortation Let us not be desirous of vain-glory provoking one another envying one another When shall we in honour preferr one another When shall we like Barnabas Acts 11.23 When we see the grace of God rejoyce When shall Ministers reprove the Joshuahs that are envying for their sakes in Moses words I would to God all the people of the Lord did prophesie When shall we like John the Baptist be contented to decrease so that Christ may increase and to be laid by if others more able may be substituted to do Gods work When shall we rejoyce if God useth others to convert by them more than by us and with famous Mr. Dod I would to God saith he that I were the worst Minister in England his meaning was that all should excel him in gifts and graces We pretend to evidences of our conversion from our love to the Saints but let us hear what the effects of true love are 1 Cor. 13.4 5. Love seeketh not her own love envieth not love is not puffed up As love is the fulfilling of the Law so envy is the dissolution of it O! when shall we instead of envying our Brother bless God for him If he hath more than we have more strength parts riches honours graces c. the account he must pass with God is the greater let us pity him rather than envy him Believe it God is wiser than we are and if his distributions are various we have as many talents as we can well improve Let us look to our own duty in the places wherein God hath set us and pray for them that have ten tallents more than we have that they may serve the Lord ten times more than we can O that thine eye might affect thine heart that thine eye should be evil because Gods is good CHAP. XXVIII The sins of Family-Governours Professours miscarriages in their Families As Governours Not commanding their houshold to serve God Gen. 18.19 1. HOw guilty are such of you as have families to govern of not commanding your houshold to serve God Of how few can God say as he did of Abraham by way of approbation I know him that he will command his children and his houshold after him and they shall keep the way of the Lord to justice and judgement that the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which he hath spoken of him By your Authority you should command them to subject their hearts wills and consciences to the will and pleasure of Jehovah but alas how many of you have been careless in this your Children and Servants yea Wives must know your Authority upon worldly accounts you command them imperiously enough to fullfill your will and pleasure to serve you but how Gallio-like are you little caring whether they obey the Lord 2. Being Zealous against disobedience to themselves not to God How much passion have you discovered when Children and Servants yea and Wives too submit not to your will and pleasure But when do they see so much Zeal against their neglects of Gods work as they find in you when they neglect your secular commands These passions are of a scandalous nature and may make your inferiours to believe that you value more your Authority than Gods the having your own will to be obeyed than that Gods requiries should be observed 3. Not caring for the Souls of their Families How many Professing-Governours are there that shew great care for the bodies of their Families but not for their Souls Meat and drink and clothes or money to buy them they shall have but none or little instruction How little do you Chatechise your Families Not Chatechising them Heb. 6.1 Prov. 22.6 How seldome do you ask them any questions concerning the first Principles of the Doctrine of Christ If you do Chatechise your Children as you ought in obedience to those Divine commands Train up a Child in the way wherein he should go Bring up your Children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. Ephes 6.4 Yet how few of you do Chatechise the rest of your houshold your Servants and Wives Heb. 6.1 though they be but Babes in Religion Children in Understanding and this Milk is appointed for Children in Understanding as well as Age Neither doth the work of Chatechising them belong only unto Ministers to them indeed it doth belong as such as watch for their Souls but unto you Heb. 13.17 for it belongs to all that have the charge of Souls and you are charged not only with your Children's but with your Servant's and with your Wives Souls Whatever any of you may fancy there never comes a Wife a Child or Servant into any of your Families but with this warrant from the great
Lord of Heaven and Earth keep the Soul of this Wife this Child this Servant for if it be missing amongst the number of my sheep at the great day through thy neglect in instructing c. thy Soul shall go for it Hence not only should your Children be taught by you but your Wives and Servants The Wife is commanded to learn of her Husband at home and the Husband to walk with her as a man of knowledge and your Servants should be trained by you in Religion Gen. 14.14 as Abrahams Servants were by Abraham thus some of the Hebrew Rabbins think that Abraham's trained Servants are therefore so called Not conversing personally with them abâ—ut their Souls How seldome do you converse personally with every one in your Families concerning the practical part of Religion How seldome do you ask them any questions how it is with their Souls and what they think will become of them to all Eternity Are you not as great strangers to the inwards of their Souls as you are to the Souls of the Indians If their bodies be in danger meat physick attendance are procured but their Souls may perish in formality and carelessness for any help you will afford them Some Professing-Governours never treat with their housholds about their Spiritual Estate from one year to another Hence comes the great Apostasy of our times The Lord humble us and deliver us from bloud-guiltiness Many an Husband may cry out O my Wife's Soul is like to perish through my default many a Parent may shriek O! I am verily guilty of the bloud of my Child and many a Master may impute to his own account all the disorders of his Servants for that they have no personal conference with them about Original Corruption Regeneration Justification Sanctification Glorification c. Perhaps thou prayest in thy Family every day but not knowing the inward lusts and workings of their hearts towards God or Sin thou knowst not how to pray as thou oughtest thou knowst not what to confess and what to pray for nor what to bless God for 4. Not walking with gravity Have you walk'd with that gravity before your Wives Children and Servants as ye ought Have you not made your selves vile by lightness frothiness and unseemly carriages Governours of Families are the Viceroy's of God they are in the place of God and therefore should keep up their Authority and not sinfully run into such vanity and familiarity with their inferiours as to breed in them contempt of the Ordinance of God 5. Not giving them time to serve God in You have given your Children and Servants time to work for your selves but have you afforded them time to serve their God in Too too many use their Inferiours just as they use their Beasts they work and feed their Beasts but never instruct no more do they instruct their Inferiours When do you call your Wives Children Servants into your Closet and not only press them to look after their Souls and in order thereunto to spend some time in Prayer Reading Meditation c. but tell them how God wrought on you how he awakened you what corruptions prevail'd with you and how God help'd you to crucisie them How do you know but the same motives might melt reduce and turn their hearts too 6. Have not you miscarried as to the time Taking undue time for Family-Duties In the Morning too early for the management of your religious work in your houses Some Governours Pray in the Morning too early so early with a small part of their Family whilst others are in Bed or in the service of the World so that they worship not God together as they ought and this is past over with silence but if they miss of their Servant in the Shop or Field O! how doth the fire of Hell break forth at their lips How angry is the Governour he cries out O! I shall be undone by the unfaithfullness of my Wife Children Servants but sees not a greater danger a more probable ruine falling on him for not having his Family to worship God with him Others deferr Morning Prayer till it be almost Noon Too late They will adventure into all worldly imployments as we say without fear or wit they see no need of God to protect them from outward or inward dangers no need of Gods blessing till they are ready to fill their panch and then some Collects must be said some short Prayers it is the Custome of their fore Fathers it is the Religion of their Ancestours or Conscience will trouble at the total neglect of the Morning Sacrifice and therefore the Prayer shall be run over with more hast than the boy that saith his lesson that they may rise up to eat drink and play And as some are unseasonable in their duties in the Morning At Evening too late so at Evening Whilst their strength lasts to serve the world they attend it some 'till even midnight and then come let us go to Prayer when the poor Wife Children and Servants had rather be in bed than on their knees The Governour Prays dully enough 1 Sam. 2.17 Putting off family Prayer with a long grace and that while the poor family sleep or nauseate the duty and so like Elies Sons these Sons of Belial cause their people to abhorre the offering of the Lord. Are there not also some Professing-Governours unworthy of the name of Christian who think to please God and the family with a long grace before meat which shall be in lieu of all the service of the day 7. Not reading Scripture and good books How few are there that read the Scriptures and good books in their houses O! this will take up too much time as if God had given men all their time to neglect him in and to indulge to the services of the Flesh World and Devils CHAP. XXIX The sins of Husbands and Wives HUsband 's and Wives are call'd to reflexion on their miscarriages joyntly Husbands and Wives sins severally Joyntly for their not being so carefull of their choice as they should have been not seeking God enough in a matter of so great consequence which was for tearm of life and wherein the Souls of each other were so highly concerned 1 Cor. 7.39 The Wife is bound by the Law as long as her Husband liveth but if her Husband he dead she is at liberty to be married to whom she will only in the Lord. 2 Cor. 6.14 Be ye not unequally yoaked together with unbelievers for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness and what communion hath light with darkness That they came together upon low earthly and lustfull motives for profit pleasure beauty rather than to further the Kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ The Sons of God saw the Daughters of Men that they were fair Gen. 6.2 and they took them Wives of all which they chose That they did not by Prayer and Fasting
not Child-hood and Youth the time wherein Solomon adviseth the Children of men should be trained up in the way wherein they should goe O Parents Prov. 22.6 If God be worth your own acquaintance is he not worth the acquaintance of such as are so near and dear unto you Can you without trembling think that as soon as Death breaks up your house you may to Heaven and your Children must to Hell and thither through your default But if you should dye in this neglect of instructing your Children you will be miserable as well as they And O! What a greeting will there be hereafter between ungodly Parents and Children What an hearing will it be to your tormented Souls to hear your Children cry out against you All this that we suffer was long of you you should have taught us better and did not What an addition will such out-cries be to your misery 4. Suffering Children to fall out with one another By not redressing the disorderly carriages of your Children towards one another How few Reboccah's are there She was carefull to remove jars and mischiefs that might arise between her two Sons 5. Not praying for â—hem By not praying for your Childrens Souls and against those very particulars which their natural constitution leads them mostly to 6. Not correcting aright By not correcting them aright as to time not early enough He that loveth him correcteth him betimes not whilst the fault is fresh in his thoughts with all the aggravating circumstances thereof Not with compassion enough You have reason saith Mr Dod to be angry with your selves rather than to be bitter to your Children for you correct your own sin in your Children If the Child be curst and froward hath he not seen his Parent brawling and contentious c not ushering correction with Prayer that God would bless word and rod. Commonly Parents correct in an high passion whereby Prayer is hindered and the Medicine becomes invalid 7. Being over-angry By being angry without a cause or above the desert Anger must be let out according to the nature of the offence If Parents be always chiding or correcting they make their Children resolute like Hagar and Ismaei to take up their heels and into the Wilderness will they any where to be delivered from such hard usages Provoke not your Children to wrath Eph. 6.4 Some Parents want natural affections are too severe Correction like Physick if too frequent will work no more with Children than our meat with us 8. By loving your Children more than God Loving inordinately loving them as they are yours not as they are Gods as they bare your Image not Gods for their beauty and parts rather than for their graces loving a beautifull Child that is voyd of grace more than a deformed Child though eminent in grace loving one excessively as Jacob Joseph hence Joseph is envyed by the rest prodigal favours to some especially if without reason are offensive to others who are less respected Loving so as loth to let them go when God calls for them you cannot say as Eli it is the Lord 1 Sam. 3.18 let him do as seems him good God pulls and you pull and you quarrel with God about the goard and you think you do well to be angry Job blessed God when God took all away at once by one blow 9. Not providing callings for them or not the best By not devoting them to some honest calling but letting them live in idleneness and so they grow up monuments of your neglect Some Gentlemen train up their Children to hold an Hawk to follow a Dog and commonly they dye in an Alehouse or shorten their lives thereby But if you do provide a calling for your Children is it not what is most gainfull rather than what will be most usefull to the good of the Soul Had you not rather have them rich Factours among Idolaters where they learn the manners of the Heathens then to have a meaner calling at home where the Gospel is preached in power and purity 10. Not matching them aright By not matching them to godly persons but rather to the rich Hereby ye shew that the silver shrines are in higher repute than grace and Godliness 11. Giving away all to them By giving all to your Children though the Church of God hath more need of it Hereby you evidence that you prefer not Zion before your chiefest joy that you love the outward grandeur of your Children more than the prosperity of the Church It is a wonder saith Mr. Baxter how so many seemingly holy can quiet their Consciences in such a sin as this is If one of you have two or three hundred pounds per annum it is a wonder if you leave an hundred pounds a year of it to pious or charitable uses Nay do not Parents leave all to their Children when they have apparent proofs that they will spend it in the service of Hell O! Let Parents tremble What wilt thou inable and strengthen thy Children to rebell against God put fuell to the fire put swords into their hands to sight against the most high Parents I beseech you look diligently to your duties be humbled for these and such like miscarriages O! look about you and you will see a sad Apostasy in Children Parents civil the Children debauched Parents godly the Children formall or loose Parents eminent for grace Children notorious for lewdness Let your bowels turn within you to see so great a degeneracy Double your diligence that there may be an holy seed Knock off the chains of Hell from your Children what you may lay not out all your time how they may be rich It is no time to seek great things for your selves seek them not Pitty the Souls of your Children that are slaves to the Devil How can ye mind your trades fields bodies whilst the Souls of your Children are in danger of perishing How can ye see the Devil driving your Children to Sin and Hell and ye stand still with a Gallio-Spirit Go to your Closets and ask your hearts whether the Soul be not the principal part of the Child and whether that needs not your care more than the body Do not throw away the Blade to preserve the Scabbard God hath set you to watch their Souls to train up their Souls to provide for their Souls if you do not what is your love more than a Pagans a Turks towards your Children You think you should be unnatural if you should not lay up for your Children though many Professours upon pretence that God will provide indulge to the flesh pamper their bodies and starve their Children but here is the best laying up to lay up a stock of Prayers for them and a stock of Counsell and Instruction in them O Parents Once more I beseech you put on bowels of pitty and compassion Pitty the perishing Souls of your own Children Command your Children to keep the way of
affect your hearts as it ought Some there were but very few would say Brown Bread and the Gospel is a Feast Few like the Christians at Constantinople cryed out Better the Sun not shine than Chrysostome be silenced You could bless God for Health Estate c. but not for these great Luminaries of Glory who were appointed to conduct and guide you unto the Heavenly Jerusalem 4. Not praying for 〈◊〉 How little did you Pray for them How little have you prayed for gifts and abilities to goe through their whole work for preservation for them and for a sanctified use of all Gods dispensations toward them How little did you deprecate the stopping of their mouths and supplicate that their mouths might be kept open Eph. 6.19 and that utterance might be given unto them that they might open their mouths boldly to make known the Mystery of the Gospel Have not they oft begg'd your Prayers in the words of Paul I beseech you Rom. 15.30 31. Brethren for the Lord Jesus Christs sake and for the love of the Spirit that ye strive together with me in your Prayers to God for me that I may be delivered from them that do not believe in Judea in England and yet have not you neglected to call upon God for their deliverance How can you tell but their mouths had still been opened had not you neglected Prayer Mat. 7.7 8. Hath not Christ promised Knock and it shall be opened unto you To him that knocketh it shall be opened 5. Making Excuses for not hearing them Have not you made sorry Excuses for not hearing them How little have you believed that Word He that heareth you heareth me And by consequence that not-hearing of them was not-hearing of Christ himself What slight excuses have been deemed sufficient to keep you from the Shepheards Tents The Apostle would have us Swift to hear James 1.19 Swiftness notes diligence in taking the first occasion but how have you to complement with a Friend to indulge to the flesh for fear of a little rain for fear of wetting your feet for fear of losing a six-penny yea a penny-Customer declined several opportunities of attending the Embassadours God sent you For these things the wrath of God is breaking out upon you the day is come or coming Amos 8.12 Cant. 5.3 6. Their miscarriages before in and after hearing Before Hearing without antecedent meditation when ye shall wander from Mountain to Hill from Sea to Sea and seâ—k bread and find none This very excuse the fear of defiling her feet would not serve the Spouse 6. How did you miscarry both before and in and after hearing How slender was your preparation to attend upon these Deputies of Christ How little did you meditate on the Word you were to receive at their lips Did you thus consider The Gospel that I am about to hear wil be the savour of life unto life or of death unto death I shall be nearer Heaven or Hell by this Sermon I am going to If the Gospel be alwayes hid I am a lost Soul and shall perish is my Soul hungry This is the bread of Heaven Is my Soul thirsty this is the water of life this is the milk whereby I must grow up unto eternal life this messenger of Heaven will be for the fall as well as the rising of many in Israel If he be not instrumental for my Salvation he will be for my Damnation Isa 55.10 11. As the rain cometh and watereth the Earth and returneth not thither c. So shall Gods Word that goeth forth out of this Ministers mouth not return unto him voyd How little did you consider the excellency and necessity of the Word that you were to partake of What â—reasure was afforded you in an earthen vessel That the Truths and Doctrines that your Ministers taught you were of as much worth as your Souls as Heaven as Salvation How little did you pour out your Souls in Prayer unto God before you went to hear your Prayer Ministersâ— Eâ—â—her 〈◊〉 your Ministers that God would open their mouths to speak the word truly sincerely powerfully and seasonably and suitabty to your condition or for your own Souls that God would open your hearts to enteâ—tain the word so as to profit by it that you might not have open ears and shut hearts that you might not have ears Prov. 20.12 and yet hear not as knowing that the hearing ear and seeing eye the Lord hath made even both of them How careless were you to purge your Souls before you came to hear the word Putting off the shooe Moses before he was to hear God speaking put off his shooe to intimate that you should put off your carnal and earthly affections before you come to hear Gods word But have not you rush'd out of your worldly employments to many a Sermon How careless were you to lay apart all filthiness Jam. 1.21 and superfluity of naughtiness that you might receive with neekness the engrafted word Eccles 5.1 which is able to save your Souls If you have not come without habitual have you not neglected actual preparation When you have been actually under the Ministry Have not you heard irreverently In hearing irreverently without awfull apprehensions of Gods Majesty and presence Have you said of the place where any Minister of Christ hath preached unto you as Jacob of Bethel how dreadfull is this place Have you in your hearing Sermons set your selves in the presence of God Acts 10.33 as Cornelius did when Peter was preaching unto him The King of Moab will rise up in judgement to condemn the irreverence of many of our Professours when Ehud told him Judg. 3.20 I have a message to the from God the King arose from his Throne and bowed himself Have not you evidenced your irreverence in hearing carelesly Carlesly dully drowsily sleepily c. Have not you lent a more attentive ear to a Tale to a Fable to a Romance to a Ballad to a Stage-Play of several hours length than to a Sermon of an kour Have not you come to Church as to an Apothecaries Shop for a recipe to sleep Hath not the Gospel come unto you in word only and not in power When the Minister threatened you from the Lord could you say My slesh trembleth for fear of thee and I am afraid of thy righteous judgements How many months and years did Gods Servants threaten you with a Famine of hearing the Word of the Lord but did this Judgement fright you and humble you whilst it lay in the cloud of the threaâ—ning as the least appearances of an outward Famine have awakened you When your Ministers came with the tydings of Peace to you were their feet beautiful May not your Ministers complain of you as Christ of the Jewes John 8. â—â— My Word takes no place in you So careless have you been of any thing that hath been spoken
sword in the house of their Sanctuary and had no compassion upon young man or maiden old man or him that stooped for age he gave them all into his hand Have not you cause to fear lest you shall also be so given into the hands of worse Babylonians You can judge what is a Ministers competency but when have ye a competency You can add field to field house to house hundreds to hundreds and yet the Horse-leach cries Give Give Yet do not you judge a small stipend that will hardly keep body and soul together a competency for a Minister What is that great service you do for God above the Minister that you should think it reasonable to leave hundreds yea thousands to your Children and that the Minister should be kept so short that he cannot leave them a groat What shall I say to you Let me borrow the words of God by the Prophet Will a man rob God Mal. 3.8 9 10. Yet ye have robbed me But ye say Wherein have we robbed thee In Tythes and Offerings Ye are cursed with a curse for ye have robbed me even this whole Nation Bring ye all the Tythes into the Store-house that there may be meet in mine house and prove me now herewith saith the Lord of Hosts if I will not open you the windows of Heaven and pour you out a blessing that there shall not be room enough to receive it O! Restitution to be made by such as have not given what was due from them to their Ministers Do not any longer detain what is due to your former Ministers make restitution of unjust gain as ever you hope to be saved It is not enough to say Lord forgive me I thought it not my duty but thou must reckon how many years thou hast reaped Spirituals and pay what thou owest or Judas will condemn thee for he thought it unsafe to keep what was unjustly got Remember Zacheus he thought it not enough to give over his oppression but when converted he made conscience of making restitution Let the Elders that rule well 1 Tim. 5.17 18. be counted worthy of double honour especially they who labour in the Word and Doctrine For the Scripture saith thou shalt not muzzle the Oxe that treadeth out the Corn and the Labourer is worthy of his reward Here you see double honour honour of reverence and honour of maintenance was due unto your Ministers Here is an allusion to the right of the first-born who were to have a double portion Their maintenace was due from you neither should their maintenance have been ordinary mercenary wages but such as is given by way of honour as well as by way of reward Have not you lived in the contempt of an Ordinance of God 1 Cor. 9.14 The Lord hath ordained c. as before Do not any longer delude your Consciences by crying against Tythes as Antichristian as Jewish Did not Abraham before the Jewish Laws pay Tythes to Melchisedech And are there not from thence arguments drawn that you cannot answer Why do ye not fear lest through the prevalency of Self you should be too base covetous and partial in your own matters O! Give to God what is Gods Deny not your Ministers their dues You owe vaste summs to them which if you detain in this day of their wants God will call you to a speedy account for the grinding of the faces of these poor yea he will make you vomit up such sweet morsels with all the rest of your substance Jam. 5.4 if not with your blood Behold the hire of the Labourers which have reaped down your Fields which is of you kept back by fraud crreth and the cryes of them which have reaped are entred into the eares of the Lord of Sabbath Lydia even enforced the Apostles to accept of her gift The Macedonians beseech'd Paul with much entreaty to accept of their bounty If thou wert converted by one of them thou didst owe to him no less than thy self What thou art and hast should not have been counted too dear for him who was Gods Instrument to pull thee as a brand out of the fire even when thou wast half burnt Say at length with David I will not serve my God with that which cost me nothing I shall conclude this head with the saying of a Reverend man It is a plain argument of a base esteem of God of Grace of the Kingdome of Heaven that a Servant a Factour should have twenty times the alloance of Heavens Factour for your Souls You are not come up to the honesty of the Pharisee Mat. 23.23 He gave Tythes of all that he possessed even of the smallest things of Mint and Annis and Cummin Luke 11.42 And doth not Christ say These things ye ought to have done What were your Ministers more unworthy than the Priests of that Age Their regardlessness of the Widdons and Children of their dead Ministers 13. If you have not been niggardly toward your Ministers whilst alive with you have not you been niggardly towards their Wives and Children after their deaths Verily not minding the Widows and Children of deceased Ministers is a sin that God will remember in the day of accounts David enquired after the seed of Jonathan he evidenced his true love to the Father in remembring the posterity O! when shall love be without dissimulation 14. Their grieving their Ministers Have not you been a very great trouble to their Souls Your Ministers were so affectionately desirous of you that they were willing to have imparted to you not the Gospel only but also their own Souls because ye were dear unto them And is this your kindness to your Friends to break even their hearts who were glad to spend and be spent for you How proudly have you carried it toward them God threatned the Israelites that the Cananites should be pricks in their eyes and thorns in their sides Surely it better became Cananites to be thorns to the Israelites than for you to be thorns to your Ministers How oft have you grieved them to see your stoutness and rebellion against all their Counsels May not your Ministers say as David Psal 119.158 I beheld the Transgressours and was grieved because they kept not thy Word May they not say We have seen your lukewarmness your sloth your earthliness c. and our Souls were troubled You should have been like the Thessalonians 1 Thes 5.19 the crown of our rejoycing but you have been crowns of thorns which have pierced not our heads but hearts You should have refreshed our Bowels been as Cordials and sweet refrectives after all our wearisome labours but have not you dealt unkindly with us and the more we have loved you have not we had the less love from you Have not you beâ—â— more merciful to your Horses and Dogs than to your Ministers You have baited and been kind to those creatures but God knows how after all our toyle
Assembly a man with a gold ring and there cometh also a poor man in vile rayment and you have respect to him that weareth the gay clothing c. are not you partial in your selves Have not you made a difference a groundless difference a difference grounded on carnal respects and not upon solid reason Are not ye become judges of evil thoughts Have not you made your judgement of such persons according to the dictate of your own evil thoughts and not according to the rule of the Word O! how seldome do Professours value and respect as God doth Let rich Professours be sick or under any other stroke of Gods hand what a doe is there what running to him what sending after him what endeavours to comfort him But O! how are the poor of the Church despised Little sending to them though they want necessaries for their Bodies in the time of their Visitation and their Souls are ready to sink for want of a word in season Your frequent visiting of some when under Gods hand and seldome resorting to others when in the same extremity Jam. 2.6 Hebr. 2.11 John 20.17 evidenceth that you despise the poor Yea are not you ashamed to be in the company of a mean Christian or to call a poor Christian Brother to own any such near relation to him And yet the Lord is not ashamed to call such Brethren Goe to my Brethren c. But woe and alas the same mind is not in us which was in Christ Jesus Matth. 11.29 Learn of me for I am lowly But we are proud and haughty and we learn of the high and mighty of the Earth to despise others of a lower condition than our selves The proud rich man can be content to claim kindred of Abraham he calls him Luk. 16. Father Abraham but you read not that ever he said Brother Lazarus It will not serve us nor save us saith a late Bishop of England to be able to say Abraham is our Father except we will charitably acknowledge the poorest Christian even Lazarus for our Brother Besides how soon is a rich Formalist admitted to Fellowship How hardly the Godly if poor 7. Slighting weak as well as poor Christians How do they who count themselves Christians of the highest form who have had great acquaintance with Christ and his wayes who have had a long experience of Christs sweetness and Satans deceits keep by themselves with the neglect of the lambs of them who are but of yesterday and know little of the mind of God How do we slight them Christ did not so who have but a mite or two for to cast into the treasury I mean who can contribute but little to their gifts or graces They that are poor in spirit as well as poor in the world have but very little respect now adayes whereas we should treasure and respect the smallest dust of Gold and Pearl we should resemble the Lord Jesus Christ his greatest care seems to be of the Lambs Feed my Lambs The Children in the Cradle and when they begin to take then feet should then be most dandled should then mostly be help up they then should be never out of hand If ye are Fathers ye are unnatural ones if you throw off the care of all the Children that need your care and take care of them who need it not As grace so growth in grace is given to edesie the body of Christ the eye is not for its self but for the blind members to lead them in paths of Righteousness Your care should be like Gods his care is for the least sly as well as for the greatest of the creatures Christ did not will the Salvation of one believer more than another he dyed equally for all all believers stand alike justified through the blood of Christ Christ knocks at the poor mans door as well as the rich if Christ makes any difference it is in this the poor weak Christian hath more expressions of his love and affection than the strong have he shews most pitty to the greatest objects of pitty to those that are in greatest want yea the young Saint at his first Conversion when he lately dropt from the Womb of the Gospel when he is but a Babe in Christ a sucking-Infant he hath more kisses and embraces more joy and comfort than perhaps he meets with till he be a grown man and old man in Christ till he be not only a gracious but a glorified Saint The very Philosopher observes that by Nature Parents are still carried with their greatest affections to the Child that is youngest because that is commonly most indigent that is most hug'd in the bosome dandled on the knee kiss'd and smiled upon I wish there were more of this Nature even among supra-natural Christians It is lamentable to see how little honour is bestowed upon the weaker Vessels and how few there are to be found that carry the lambs in their bosomes next their hearts and gently lead those that are with young 8. Not compassionating fall'n Brethren How little compassion is shew'd to fall'n Brethren to such as are overtaken with a fault yea with many When their hearts like the sluggards fields are overgrown with weeds we do not lend them our Spade and Mattock and Knife we do not labour to pull the brands that are half burnt out of the fire to save our selves this labour we deem them Caâ—â—-awayes as if there were no hope of their Restitution and Salvation we never more look after them to be sure we do not as the blessed Apostle John did who as Eusebius relates in his Ecclesiastical History ran after the back-slidden Professour who was turned an High way-man to take him by holy guile and to recover him out of the snares of Hell We carry it as if we held that sins committed after Conversion were unpardonable Art thou a stranger to thy own heart If not thou knowest God pittyeth thee though thou fallest seven times a day and it ill becomes thee who hast been so oft holpen out of the deep ditch to deny help to thy Brother that lyes there and perhaps will perish if none be more merciful than thy self Are there no solemn engagements upon thy Soul towards thy Neighbour Will not God take thee by the throat for thy unmercifulness Mat. 18.32 33 34. O thou wicked Servant I forgave thee all thy debt because thou desiredst me shouldst not thou have had compassion upon thy fellow-Servant even as I had pitty on thee Verily the Lord is wroth with you and if this be not amended he will deliver you to the Tormentours till you shall pay all that is due unto him O! Repent of your defectiveness in this thing Multitudes are hastening to the Valley of Decision multitudes are departed from their former Profession some of them are become scandalous their sins will lye at your doors and their blood too if you through unfaithfulness or through negligence or through
you cannot so exhort as Ministers c. But have you not been told that God can work by small means as well as by great and that by things that are not God can confound the wisdome of the flesh and bring to naught the things that are Is not this like the pretence of not being eloquent Do you not know have you not heard that the issue and event depends on the blessng of the Lord rather than on the work it self Is it not all one to the Lord to wound by a short as by a long sword Cannot God bless a few words in thy mouth as he did in Christs and the Apostles Can'st not thou say follow Christ and may not presently a Matthew a Publican leave his sinfull courses and embrace the Christian faith Can'st thou not say Repent and Believe that your sins may be blotted out and may not God concur with thee as he did of old times Is the Lords hand shortned that it cannot help If Israel be not gathered yet thy reward is with the Lord if thine heart were upright and could testifie that night and day thou hast not ceased to warn to rebuke and counsel Certainly your memories are not so bad but you must remember the weight of sin and of the wrath of God you have seen the wonders of the Lord in the deeps you that have escaped to shoar can tell of the Rocks and Shelves and Storms which you have been delivered from and will you set other Shipwrack their Souls rather than hold out your light unto them 〈…〉 may avoyd their ruines What shall I say to humble you There is more 〈◊〉 in Hell than you can afford Blush blush and be ashamed to have less zeal love and pitty to perishing Souls than Dives in Hell had he would have his Brethren saved from the Valley of Hinnom Your silence will make others think that Hell is a tollerable place that sin is not so evil and bitter a thing that to lye under Gods wrath is not so great a misery whilst you are so slow and backward to warn your Friends and Acquaintance that they slee from these and take Sanctuary in the true City of Refuge the Lord Jesus Christ O! If you know the worth of a Soul pitty the multitude with whom the day is not broke whose forlorn Souls are under a continual Massacre from the bloudy Butcher of Hell Besmear your Souls no longer with the guilt of their bloud Let them not starve for want of bread whilst you have to give them I shall bless God for ever and ever if this your negligence of the Souls of those whom you may account without may be cordially bewailed and you for the future double your diligence for their conversion Ministers cannot convert without the Concourse of Omnipotency neither can you Though Satan and thy own lazy heart hath told thee thou art unfit to set upon this work yet better do it meanly than wholy omit it God like Parents on earth loves to see his Children lift at those duties which are too hard for them and then he steps in and is a Co-worker with them What God did by illiterate Fishermen by Priscilla he can do by thee The Lord pardon thy former unmercifulness to the Souls of men But if thou continue careless and cruel if thou wilt not by Prayers for them and counsels to them seek their reducement as sure as thou art reading the voyce of thy Brothers blood is crying against thee from the earth By your example before if not since Profession you have been the cause of the destruction of Souls of how many who can tell And as Jeroboam made Israel to sin many years after he was rotten in his grave so your sin your wicked examples may propagate the trade of sin from generation to generation until Christ shall come to Judgement Tremble tremble at the thoughts of it if thou hast not the heart of a Beast in thee O! how many Souls are crying in Hell against thee cursing the day they knew thee or their Ancestours knew thee for that by thee they learned to sin the more and were strengthned in their wickedness by thy tongue and by thy life And now are not you bound to do your utmost to make restitution to labour to save them that be alive Is it not reasonable that you should labour to win Souls to Gods as you have to the Devils service and to have many blessing God in the Heavens for you that ever they were in the company of such an active zealous Christian who by word and life was instrumental to bring them to the knowledge of themselves and of their God And is it not a glorious work to hold forth such Light to the World that they seeing your good works may glorifie God and you may be Propagators of Zeal and Holiness from Generation to Generation till Christ shall appear to judge the World and to reward you for all the services you have done to his Name O! how welcome shall that man be to Heaven and Christ who hath fed the Souls and clothed the Souls and visited the Souls which he hath purchased with his own precious blood Christ will own thee for his Benefactour CHAP. XXXVII The Dis-ingenuity and Scandalousness of their Miscarriages WHen God had given the Prophet Ezekiel a large Catalogue of Judah's Abominations The wickedness of the former miscarriages Ezek. 8.9 V. 6 13 15. he then shew'd him the Wickedness of their Abominations He said unto me Goe in and Behold the wicked Abominations they do here He commanded him once and again and again to turn him yet again and he should see greater Abominations I cannot indeed promise thee that thou shalt now see greater Abominations than those already mentioned All that I shall now do shall be to represent the former Miscarriages in their crimson dye and scarlet colour And The First Thing I shall mention Commitred against so good and kind a God Eph. 4.30 as making your Sins Professours out of measure sinful is your Dis-ingenuity in so sinning against God O! You have sinned against a gracious God You have grieved the good Spirit of God whereby some amongst you have been sealed to the day of Redemption I am bold to say that one godly man's sinning against light and mercy doth more break the heart of God than the bruitish Sins of a Pagan Kingdom Ezek. 6.9 I am broken saith God with your whorish heart which hath departed from me c. And ye shall loath your selves for your evils which ye have committed in your abominations Amos 2.13 God hath been press'd down with your sins as the Cart with sheaves till he hath even Creak'd under the weight God expected more from the Treet planted in Zion than from the wild ones in the Wilderness Luke 13.9 Grief and Burthen springs much from unexpected Unkindnesses I looked for Fruit and there was none How were David's and Saul's Sins aggravated from
institutions though all the sins for which God cast out the Heathen and cast off his Israel oe found amongst us and these highly aggravated and innumerable circumstances yet how little are we concerned therein How seldom do we express our inward sorrows by Tears and Fasts David beheld the Transgressours aâ—â— was grieved because they kept not Gods word Horrour seized on him because they made void Gods Law Yea Rivers of water ran down his eyes because men kept not Gods Law Psal 119.158 v. 53 136. 1 Pet. 2.7 But where is the sorrowing after a Godly sort Where are the weeping Jeremiah's Naltons Midhopes or whose Soul like Lots is vexed pierced with the unclean conversation of the wicked If ever God did call us to weeping and to mourning this is the day but behold joy and gladness slaying Oxen killing sheep eating flesh and drinking wine Let us eat and drink for to morrow we shall die And it was revealed in mine ears saith the Lord of Hosts Surely this iniquity shall not be purged from you till you die Isa 22.12 13 14. saith the Lord God of Hosts When Elijah saw how iniquity abounded how the worship of God was crushed how things went among the great ones of those wicked times how Idolaters were countenanced the faithfull prophets durst not shew their faces he is so burthened at what became of this that he knows not how to live 1 Kings 19.4 It is enough take away my life He is weary of the world weary of his own Land though the best under the cope of Heaven yea he thinks it a good time to remove that his eyes may see no more of these detestable things and that his Soul may be no longer prick'd with these scratching Briars But the searcher of Hearts knows how little we have been affected with all the shipwrackt faith and conscience that our eyes have seen how seldome our heads have been fountains of teart how seldome we have made our houses Bochims how insensible we have been of all the ungodliness and unrighteousness which we and our people are guilty of Wo is us we have not been wounded through Gods sides we have not sympathised with a Christ Crucified every day But like Gallio we have not laid these things to heart And yet we have still impudently enough laid claim to Christ and the priviledges of the New Testament purchased by his bloud Though we never followed Christ to the Cross weeping though we have hardly shed one tear for all the contempt and abuse of him which is Epidemical which abounds from Dan to Beersheba from one part of the Nation to another We pretend we have great sorrows though they are not expressed by tears in a sensitive manner we think to relieve our selves with the dryness of our constitution and yet we have tears more than a good many to express our sorrows by if a Relation drops into the Earth we can follow the Herse wringing our hands and beating our breasts if an Estate which we have got by carking cares by neglect of duties heart-duties and family-duties be in one day consumed and dissolved by a flame into ashes we then can express our sorrows by weeping and lamentation witness some of your howlings your cries at the late Desolation by Fire But commune with your own hearts whether you were ever made so sensible ever so affecâ—â—â—and â—unk with the consideration of the honour that God hath lost by you and by thousands like your selves Was God ever more affronted by a professing people than by us Was ever Christ so set at naught as of late times Was he ever more despised in his Person Offices and Institutions by the Rhabsheka's of the Earth than he hath been lately by them who have had a form of godliness Zech. 7.12 and yet our hearts are bard as an Adamant O! what grounds have you to question all your mourning for your own sins whilst you mourn not for the sins of others Did you mourn for sin as it is against God You would mourn for other mens sins for they are against the Lord also Ezra 9.3 You would be like Ezra he rent his garments pull'd off the hair of his beard sate down astonished for the sinfull marriages of the people But we are insensible though God be much more dishonoured by the Adulterers and Adulteresses by the Blasphemers and Atheists by the Worldlings and Apostates who swarm in the midst of us How can we perswade our selves that the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts whilst he is so much reflected on and yet we no way suitably affected therewith If a Child if a Father if an Husband if a Friend be injured thou art much affected with the injury but not so with all the affronts that the Sons of Belial put upon the blessed God every day How can we imagine in the least that we have any true love to the Souls of our Neighbours whâ—â—â—â— we behold them lifting up the heel against their Maker wounding and destroying their Souls by their sins and yet we not sign if not weep in secret for the desperate nazards they are running Nay how can you imagine you love your selves your estates liberties lives c. whilst God is provoked to ruine you and them for their great provocations Josh 7. You know one Achan brought a Plague upon the whole body of Israel and yet his sin was secret But we have Street-Drunkards Street-Swearers Street-Adulterers and Adulteresses Street-Scoffers at Piety and the Worship of God And are ye not in danger to partake of the Plagues that these sins are crying for And what yet are your hearts as insensible as Rocks The Lord be mercifull to you and take out the heart of stone How can you be free from being guilty of all the known sins of the land whilst you do not mourn for them before the Lord Nay yea of the â—okens of Gâ—ds dispâ—â—asure against Sin Isa 22.45 Joel 2.2 to shew yet the greatness of your stubbornness you are insensible not only of your own and other mens sins but of the tokens of Gods displeasure against those sinnes God hath emptied us from Vessel to Vessel followed us with the Sword and Pestilence and wonderfully so lately by dreadfull flames God hath spoyled us of our glory and humbled us as low as dust and ashes it is a time of treading down and therefore we should weep bitterly it is a day of darkness and of gloominess a day of clouds and of thick darkness We have had such a Plague as never the like such a Fire hath been kindled as never the like amongst us the Protestant Nations are very low and the Antichristian very bold and consident yet we can hardly hang out harps upon the Willows Eph. 4.19 but as if our hearts were past feeling we are insensible both of sin and wrath O! I hear some cry out of hard times but there is much more reason to cry out
razing down our Jerusalem to the foundation thereof rejoyce God will remember them and make them desolate and lay his vengeance on Edom And if any of the bordering Philistines shall deal by revenge V. 15 16 17. and take vengeance with a despightfull heart God knows how to stretch out his hand upon them and to destroy the remnant of the Sea coast and to execute great vengeance upon them And if any of our Neighbours round about shall with Tyrus say against Jerusalem Aha she is broken Ezek. 26.2 3 4. that was the gates of the people she is turned unto us we shall be replenished now that she is laid wast God can soon stoop these Mountains by causing many Nations to come up against them as the Sea causeth his Waves to come up and scrape their dust from them and make them like the top of a Rock Amos 3.2 God cannot bear it that the Heathen should be insulting whilst he is correcting his own and therefore God hath confirmed it by an Oath that he will deal severely with such Mockers Zeph. 2.8 9 10. I have heard of the reproach of Moab c. therefore as I live saith the Lord of Hosts the God of Israel surely Moab shall be as Sodom c. Zech. 1.15 And I am sore displeased with the Heathen that are at ease for I was but a little displeased and they helped forward the affliction Leave we these to the Righteousness of God and let us return to our selves whilst they are insulting Isa 64.4 Numb 16. Job 31.3 may we be on humbling and repenting Work God is come down and hath done terrible things that we looked not for we have been visited but not with the common visitation of all people God hath strange punishments for the workers of iniquity And no wonder when strange Oaths have been minted of later times that our Forefathers never heard of there have been strange wayes of Epicurisme and Gluttony strange wayes of uncleanness strange unknown fashions in apparel and for Fraud cheating and Tricks of Legerde main they have fresh and new and frequent every day Hath not God then a just controversie with his people If the Lord draw out Judgements that were never heard of before and make us signs and wonders to the world and an astonishment to all Nations may we not justifie his proceedings If we exceed our Forefathers Sins what wonder is it if we feel Judgements that they were never sensible of CHAP. XXXIX What use Professours should make of this Gospel-Glass ANd now Professour to all thy former Sins Quarrel not with the Glass do not add this great abomination that having had the Glass of the Word so faithfully revealing many of thy sins to thee thou shouldst go away and strait forget what manner of man thou hast been Let not Satan tempt thee to quarrel with the enterprise for that the Glass is not broad enough to shew to thee all thy stains and deformities know here are enough presented to thy view to lay thee low enough in Hell without Repentance Perhaps also by thy corrupt reason thou canst plead for one or two particulars or bring it under debate whether they are stains or not But know to the confusion of thy face here are spots unquestionable spots discovered and such as are not the spots of Gods Children But wouldst thou improve this or any other such Glass for the good of thy Soul Let Gods Honour and thy precious Souls everlasting welfare perswade thee to receive in meekness and love the following Counsels 1. Reflect on all the particulars Improve it for promoting Consideration and Meditation that thou may'st see what are thine iniquities Do not behold only and so goe away be not contented with slight apprehensions but muse that the Fire may burn Consider how oft in the Bill of Attainder thy Conscience tells thee thou art guilty O! ponder these things in thine heart chew the Cud recoyl upon thy self Let the Lord hear one the more for thee crying out what have I done How have I provoked the Lord By meditation retain the memory of thy sins with all their aggravations as much as thou canst set past sins in present view and possess the sins of thy youth as if they were just now committed now track the abominations of your lives charge this duty upon thy own Soul as that which must be done as thou wilt answer it at thy peril before God and Angels Perhaps hitherto you have forgot your corrupt lives and hearts as you have your natural faces forthwith but let it be so no more for Christs sake Consider not only how many of these sins you have been guilty of but how frequently and for how many dayes or years thou hast lived in some of these abominations having oft been guilty of the same sin though perhaps thou knew'st it to be a sin and hast prayed and resolved against it And because the particulars may seem little sins though in a sense there is no little sin because there is no little God and sins have their accents and aggravations from the person who is affronted yet because it is with sin as it is with stones you may carry this stone and that stone without trouble with much case but when many little stones are heared together they become weighty and heavy to bear therefore I advise that by serious meditation you sum them up joyntly till your backs or rather your hearts be broken and you take up the language of the Prophet My sins are passed over my head Psal 38.4 they are become too heavy for me to bear Reflect not only on thy Pride and carelessness and other particular miscarriages but put all the Items into one main Sum that it may stoop thy heart 2. Confession Away now and present thy self before the great and holy God whom thou hast provoked by these by all these great abominations and upon thy knees give glory to him by confessing to him as many of thy sins as thou canst remember with all their aggravating circumstances Josh 7.19 It is the same advice that Joskuah gave to Aâ—chan tell God what thou hast done and what thouâ—â—ast left undone Hide it not from him Confess to God all thy low unworthy thoughts of him all thy enmity against him his Laws and People c. Go and confess what envy what malice what ranckour hath lain in thine heart against thy Neighbour Confess to the Lord how oft thou hast spoke evil of dignities of the blood-royal of the favourites of Heaven of the Sons and Daughters of the most High who were more righteous than thy self Many times thou hast brag'd with the Pharisee what sins thou hast not been guilty of now confess what thou hast been guilty of I know if thou art an Hypocrite thou art loth to bring it forth thou thinkest it will be a shame to thee But let me tell thee it is a shame
his beloved Flock he hath nourished you up and he is willing to lay you in his bosome View your great Surety this day He came under an Arrest for you he hath discharged the debt of all that come by faith to him Rom. 4.25 He was delivered for our offences and was raised again for our justification He is willing the incestuous when penitent should not have his wounds lye undressed lest Satan take any advantage thereby Act. 20.21 Iâ— there â—e Repentance towards God let there be Faith towards the Lord Jesus Christ If he hath given you the fore-runner you have his pledge his pawn that he will forgive you Do not say God heareth not sinners whilst there is a Fountain opened for sin and for uncleanness All thy sins cannot shut it because it is opened to wash away sin 6. Add to Supplication Resolution Resolution How can you pardon your very Child that will not promise to do so no more Let it be in the purpose of your hearts to neglect meditation no more to keep up bitterness among Christians no more c. Enter into an holy Vow against your sins Be a through Protestant protest against the World the Flesh and the Devil It will be thus if your hearts be throughly humbled for your sins and truly inflamed against them O say what have I to do with Idols any more O that you were very resolute come Life come Death come Heaven come Hell yet I will change my course I will not through Gods grace helping me do as I have done omit as I have omitted If you are not very peremptory to resist Satan and Sin not to yeild unto Temptation you encourage the Enemy to tempt you whilst you are not resolved to deny his 〈◊〉 citations That woman is in danger of new sollicitations to uncleanness who doth not resolutely bid defiance to the first Temptation of the Ruffian Perhaps you wonder that after many prayers c. your sin still prevails But know saith one sin will be your Conquerour if you be not resolved to be its enemy Till resolution against all sin be wrought in you God will hate all your prayers for the pardon of your sins He hath an impudent forehead a forehead of Brass that dares go in before God and say O Lord I beseech thee to pardon my worldliness and earthly-mindedness for I am not yet resolved to be Heavenly minded O Lord pardon my envy and I trust thou wilt do it for yet I am unresolved to part from it Pardon my Rebellions for I am not yet resolved whether I shall cease to be a Rebel Believe it whilst you do not resolve to hate sin it is a clear sign you have nor a spiritual knowledge of its evil Did you in the light of the Spirit see sin in its nature and in its bitter effects did you see it as utterly inconsistent with all real happiness and as the infallible and unavoidable precipice of your intollerable and eternal damnation this would make you hate sin and to be irreconcilable to it But here I must give you this caution In the strength of Christ that you raise not your resolutions on your own strength for then you will soon quit them by reason of your own weakness When you bind your self by a Vow against such a sin take Christ into the Bond to be sureâ—y for you to give you help and strength to perform in the hour of temptation Augustine professed that though the thoughts of leaving his sins were once a great burthen to him yet at length being peremptorily Resolved he found it a most easie and delightfull thing to live without them Friends your sufferings may be nearer than you are aware of Your sands I am sure run fast and no stop is put to them you may not expect that the shadow will go backward ten degrees it may rather go forward you may hardly have one hours warning before you must remove hence how suddenly hath God cut down the Cedars and the thistles amongst us O! in that day it will be as scalding lead to thee that death and judgement surprized thee when thou hadst not so much as resolved to leave thy cursed Rebellions against thy God 7. See what becomes of your Resolutions Reformation Psal 119.106 how they are made good thou hast purposed not to offend yea covenanted with thy God for better obedience yea thou hast sworn to keep his righteous Judgements But hast thou dealt uprightly with thy God O! be not satisfied with purposes and resolutions but look to the performances of them Blessed are ye of God if all the sinnes you have been convinced of and have engaged against be now put away if there be no more pride covetousness contention self-seeking c. returning with seven worse Devils upon you I pray God we may see more than Resolution some real and permanent effect of all your Confessions Sorrows and Resolves O! O! O! how would it rejoyce my Soul to see an effectual alteration in the Faces and Lives and Conversations of Professours How shall I bless God for ever if by seeing your Faces in this imperfect Glass you be transformed and your hearts and Eves be put into a new frame of obedience Among all the sigâ—ts in the World none sadder than to see multitudes that had their Faces Zion-wards now facing about to the vanities of the Gentiles O! how glorious how desirable a sight will it be to see these returning with weeping and supplication Here remember your Reformation must be general and special General O! Labour to do as much for God and Grace as you have done for the World and Self As ye have yeelded your members servants to iniquity unto iniquity Rom. 6.19 So now yeeld you members Servants of Righteousness unto Holiness Redeem all former omissions by a double diligence you having idled away much of your time had need spur up your selves See that you walk circumspectly not as Fools but as Wise redeeming the time But it is not only a general Reformation that I advise you to Special Watch also and pray against those sins by which you have most dishonoured God If thou aâ—â— recovered of a dangerous disease thou wilt generalâ—y me a good diet but especially get Antidotes and Preservatives against that diseaâ—e thou wast so lately cured of O where the enemy hath made the greatest breaches there let there be double guards and double â—oâ—â—â—cations Be Tertullians true penitents Nonvult iterum Divinae misericordiae oneri c. Tert. He would not burthen the Spirit of God again to deliver him from that sin Follow a worthy Pattern When David had shed blood and had prevailed with God to pardon that sin afterwards though he longed for the waters of Bethlehem yet he abstains and checks himself because it did but hazard the blood of his Captains CHAP. XL. Motives to make sueh use thereof ANd now to hasten to a conclusion O
that it would please God to make my words as an Hammer Motives to let our hearts be broken for and from our Sins to break the Rocks O that I may be thus usefull to your Souls O that somewhat at last may be hinted that may through the blessing of Goâ— break your hearts for and from sin that may promote your Repentance for your own and your othermens sins And indeed unless your hearts be broken for sin they will never be broken from sin But the more bitterness of Spirit you are in for sin the more probability there is you will not return unto sin When men have furfetted upon a Dish and are greatly afflicted and pained by it the more unlikely they are to return again unto that Dish That is certain saith Mr. Burroughs either a mans sin will make an end of his mourning or his mouâ—ning will make an end of his sin Yea if your hearts be not broken for other mens sins they are not kindly broken for your own sins You will never put it out of all doubt that your sorrow is right and genuine unless you mourn for others as well as your own sins for it will alwayes be objected that if Sin as Sin were your Burden if Sin as dishonouring God as wounding Christ as grieving the Spirit then other mens sins being reslexions on the Authority and Will of the great God Father Son and Spirit should have some considerable weight upon your Souls The truth is others sins become thine if thou knowest them and mournest not for them O then In what a case are all the hardned jolly Professours who can make a sport of Drunkeness Uncleanness Superstition Perjury c. in others Consider therefore by the Help of this Glass others sins as well as thine own to help on thy brokeness of heart for and from sin Psal 119.158 Behold with David the transgressour and be grieved because they keep not Gods word Let your Souls with Lot be vexed there are greater sins found among Professours in England than were in Sodom Let thy Soul be as his was as in Hell as upon the Rack How can you evidence that you are translated from death to life because you love the Brethren whilst you are not troubled to see them wounding and damning their souls by their sins you are grieved to see any Friends of yours in great hazards and dangers by the Sword by Sickness by Fire but the Souls of your Friends are in the greatest danger yet you lament not the sight of these deplorable spectacles God forbid that any of you should have grounds of hope to gain Liberties and outward Privileges by others provocations whilst all their sins become yours whilst you are not humbled for them But to lay before you some Considerations that may set home by the Spirit draw water out of the Flint 1. God is greatly incensed Should not your hearts be broken for and from sin seeing sin hath so incensed God against the Land of your Nativity Can you retire from the World and seriously consider the Prints of Gods displeasure against poor England and yet remain impenitent Is it nothing to you that God hath for many years been withdrawing from his Sanctuary in England O! Your Ministers have had miscarrying Wombs and dry Breasts Though they rose early and sate up late were much in watchings and in labours for the Conversion and Edification of Souls yet how seldome have any been under the Pangs of the New Birth How seldome were any pricked at the heart How seldome have any cryed out What shall we do to be saved And for others concerning whom we hoped better things How have they shed their Leaf How have they pined and withered away as to Practical Godliness How have they lost that Seriousness that Heavenlyness that Power of Godliness which before they seemed to have had Your Ministers saw this and lamented it they acquainted you with it invited you to remember from whence you are fall'n to repent and do your first works But yet You returned not unto the Lord. Should not this pierce your very hearts Is it nothing to you that not only your selves but so many Professours in England should lose their faithful and painful Ministers Is it nothing to you for God to call home by Death and otherwise so many of his Embassadours whom you have grieved whom you have despised and affronted and who have been more burthened with your Pride Earthliness Divisions Sensuality c. than they are with their present Poverty and Dishonours under which they lye What doth it portend save War and Hostility when Embassadours are called home And may not you fear that the wrath of God is and will be against you till there be no remedy They mocked the Messengers of God 2 Chron. 36.16 and despised his Words and misused his Prophets untill the wrath of the Lord arose against his people till there was no remedy If God will treat with you no more believe it he will fight with you And O! O! O! Who will set the Bryars and Thornes against him He will goe through them he will consume them in his wrath Is it nothing to you that there is yet such a Spirit of Division in the Land O! What heats and heart-burnings what animosities and jealousies are there so that a Brother cannot trust a Brother Is it nothing to you that God hath been so long contending with the Land by the Sword and by the Pestilence and so lately by Fire Is it nothing to you that God permitted that dreadful Fire in London to break forth about Three of the Clock on a Lords Day morning Did he not thereby cause his Sabbath in a manner to cease in London Did not he make his holy Day of Rest a Day of labour and disquiet Did not he hereby as it were anticipate his Peoples conventions to expiate him and so drew them as it were off from the Remedy that his hands being loosened he might punish 2 Chron. 7.12 Deut. 9.14 Jer. 2.2 and not be prevailed with to pardon May we not say with Jeremiah even upon this account The Lord hath swallowed up all the Habitations of Jacob and hath not pittied he hath thrown down in his wrath the strong Holds of the Daughter of Judah he hath brought them down to the ground Is it nothing that at the same time God should send forth such a boysterous Wind to fann and blow up the Fire East West South and North God therein executing the Judgement threatned against Elam Jer. 49.36 of bringing the four Winds from the four Quarters of Heaven c. If the punishment of one Element saith a late Writer be dreadful as the Water was to the old World and the Air is in Pestilential Infections and the Earth was when it opened its mouth to swallow up Corah and his company how dreadful is Gods punishing a Land or Person with double and treble Judgements in one