of men in this World are manifold it is impossible to run thorough them all paticularly They may be reduced according to the old division unto three kinds animi corporis and fortunae The enjoyments of the mind are such as these peace comfort experiences of Divine assistance conquest of temptations and victory over spiritual enemies besides the gifts and graces of the mind which are rather endowments than enjoyments and will fall more directly under the next Head Those of the body are such as relate to the maintaining adorning feeding cloathing refreshing of the body Of the Third sort are riches honours peace victory flourishing Families gainful trading and more of the like nature All which the unregenerate mind loves and enjoyes in a gross and unspiritual manner viz. either in a way meerly sensual and brutish or else selfish and Idolatrous These Swine feed upon husks rest upon the lowest round of the Ladder and dwell upon the dark side of every creature They know not the love of God taste not his sweetness admire not his perfection and image shining forth and manifesting it self in all created good But the godly man tastes another kind of sweetness even the Divine goodness in every thing that he enjoyes It is the stamp and impression of God viz. of his love and image which indeed gives the value to and puts the price upon every creature Have you not known some men put a high esteem upon a small piece of Silver that bears the image of their Prince or testifies the love of their friend Why even so it is here It is a derivative sweetness goodness and amiableness which commends the creature to a judicious palate There is almost as much difference between man and man in the way of enjoying of things as between men eating of the Fruit and Swine devouring the husks men picking out the marrow and Dogs gnawing of the bones All godly souls are not indeed alike refined as we may shew hereafter Isaac loves his son Esau too much for his Venison Gen. 25. 28. though his father Abraham loved him for the Promise and Covenant sake And yet all such souls are so far exalted and restored by grace to an understanding of their own dignity and happiness that they cannot possibly live and feed upon any thing below God himself 6. God is All to the godly man in his Endowments the All of what he is as well as of what he hath I have in part shewed already how prophanely the wicked man magnifieth himself in his wisdom courage strength and all other endowments of body and mind To which I might add that he is also very gross in admiring the endowments of other men and the several excellencies that are in other creatures The barbarous people of the Island Melita seemed to be more devout in this respect than the incrassated Jews they when they saw how miraculously Paul was endowed concluded it was something Divine in him only they put it into an ill phrase for they said that he was a God Act. 28. 6. But these stand staring at Peter as if they thought that he by his own power or holiness had wrought such wonders Act 3. Oh how are the understandings and apprehensions of natural men captivated confined and terminated in poor particularities But the godly and renewed soul eyes and loves the excellencie of God shining forth in all accomplishments and endowments whether his own or any other creatures In all these he sees another kind of beauty than the wicked man takes notice of As he owns God in all that he doth performeth possesseth so he entitles him to all that he is He himself is not wise just humble holy in mind nor strong beautiful or excellent in body but God is All this in him The flattering Ruler looks upon Christ but as a meer man and yet ascribes goodness to him Good Master c. But our Saviour leads up his thoughts to the Fountain None is good but God The Jews wonder how Christ came by all that learning but he presently resolves them Joh. 7. 16. My Doctrine is not mine but his that sent me In a word God is the All of a good man's life In whom he enjoies it in whom alone it is sweet for whom he spends it and for whose sake alone he is content to prolong it reckoning with his Lord and Saviour that he came not into the World to serve himself or to seek his own glory but the glory of him that sent him Joh. 7. 18. God is so All to him as the soul is to the body Tota in toto tota in qualibet parte wholly in his soul and in all the faculties of it wholly in his life and in all the passages thereof God is so All to him that he is not satisfied with him neither except he may enjoy more of him except he may enjoy all of him that is to be enjoyed by a creature of such a capacity He aspires after this perfection to know nor love nor enjoy nothing but God in the World He labours to attain to the very Resurrection of the dead whilst he is yet alive Phil. 3. 11. that is to such a pure perfect and Divine Life as the Children of the Resurrection shall be advanced to And now understand all that I have said with these Cautions 1. This is principally to be understood of Good men grown up to some perfection of Stature You see already and may further see that it is exactly true of Christ Jesus and and that it is also true of David and Paul and other eminent servants of God But we know that there are also babes in Christ spiritual men that are yet in a great measure carnal 1 Cor. 3. 1. That mighty Spirit of Jesus that sits as a Refiner of Silver in the souls of men refines them by degrees and yet is content that those should be called pure in whom yet much dross remains 2. It only holds of good men when they are themselves when they are in their right spiritual wits of good men when they act upon deliberation when they are free from temptations dejections passions disturbances For there is a season wherein even the wise Virgins do slumber Matth. 25. 5. wherein even the Spouse of Christ who was all fair and spotless is secure and careless Cant. 5. There was a season when good Josiah fought his own battel and not the Lords when good Hezekiah magnified himself and gloried in his own Treasures more than in the magnificence of God when holy David himself resolved to sacrifice the lives of innocents to his own lusts and to avenge a quarrel of his own 1 Sam. 15. Therefore 3. This is only to be understood of regenerate persons so far as they are regenerate In Paul himself there remained something that was unregenerate perverse and rebellious Rom. 7. though he will not acknowledge that it was he himself vers 20. Every regenerate and true Christian soul so
right gracious soul The great thing which he hopes for in the world to come is to be perfected in the image of God and live everlastingly in communion with him And therefore when the Apostle Paul speaks of his departure out of this world he gives us to understand what was mostly in his eye and upon his heart and that was to be with Christ Phil. 1. 23. And the Apostle John when he speaks of the glory and blessedness of a future state describes it by the resemblance that the soul shall bear to God at that time 1 Joh. 3. 2. When he shall appear we shall be like unto him Heaven is but a name and notion without God God himself is not the happiness of a soul except he be enjoyed and he can no other way be enjoyed but by a spiritual union with him and assimilation to him The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Text signifies either who or what Now then there are many that are for ease many for peace and liberty many for pomp and preeminence in Heaven But our Psalmist hath nothing desireable no not there but God alone Whom have I or what have I in Heaven but thee CHAP. V. God is All to the godly man in his delight and pleasure The pleasures of wicked men are sensual There are degrees of sensuality amongst carnal men The delight that an unregenerate man takes in spiritual things is carnal The godly soul feeds upon God in every thing He loves and admires his own soul in God Grace does not overthrow the judgement of sense but it regulates the senses as to their actings and enables the soul to delight in things sensual in a super sensual manner 2. GOD is All to the godly man in his Delight and Pleasure As the appetites of the unregenerate soul are sensual so are his sentiments and resentments This must needs follow as indeed it doth follow in the fourth Psalm their desire is Who will shew us any good vers 6. their delight is in Corn and Wine and in the encrease of them vers 7. They know no higher good than peace plenty liberty and length of daies know not how to entertain themselves any better than by sitting down to eat and drink and rising up to play Thus you find the desport and jovialty of the wicked described Job 21. 10 11 12 13. Am. 6. 4 5 6. Luk. 12. 19. and many other places But you will say these are a grosser sort of sensualists all wicked men sure are not so brutish so swinish as to wallow in such kind of mire as this is I confess they do not all welter in the same mire there are almost as many kind of Idolaters as there are kinds of creatures to be idolized There seems to be a greater and lesser brutishness amongst the brutes themselves a Sheep will not wallow in the mire like a Swine nor a Pidgeon feed upon such stinking Carrion as a Crow and yet they are brutes as well as they All wicked souls do not feed upon the same husks but all feed upon husks that have forsaken the bread of their Father's house There are several sorts of Dishes whereupon the earthly life feeds Lust is oft-times fed by things materially good as well as by those that are materily evil A man may be as unchast and adulterous with his own gifts and parts as with his neighbours Wife and a woman may fall into as unclean dalliances with her own beauty as with a man that is not her Husband The Logical life when men adore their own souls and feed upon their own perfections is as truly unholy and unclean though not altogether so gross as that which is meer sensual And thus I doubt not but that many of the Stoical Philosophers with their Autaesthesie and self-enjoyment were as unclean and idolatrous as the Epicurean Atheists with all their meats and drinks and strange flesh Yea though the unregenerate mind should be much delighted with the outward dress and dispensation of Religion as they were in Ezek. 33. 31 32. yea though it should be mightily pleased and tickled with the notions of God's Free-grace Justification by the blood of Jesus an everlasting inheritance in the Paradise of God and such spiritual things as these as I do easily conceive it may yet were his delight that he takes in these very things unclean and earthly For still it is resolved into this it is self and not God which he ultimately takes pleasure in But God is All in the delights and complacencies of the truly godly soul He delights not in himself or any other creature abstractly considered and in separation from God It is said of one I think it is of Austin that after his conversion he could take no pleasure in Cicero's Orations because he could not find the name of Christ there but surely in a good sense the name of Christ may be said to be inscribed and something of his image drawn upon every creature for by him all things were made and he hath copyed out something of his own perfections upon them all And this is that which the holy and wise soul gathers up and feeds upon with delight I know indeed that Grace doth not destroy natural affections in men no nor overthrow the judgement of sense but it doth certainly confer upon men a far more excellent and spiritual faculty of discerning and delighting What I said before concerning the spirituality of a godly man's desires of Heaven and heavenly things may be applied to his delights also But I conceive that the greatest doubt doth not lie there Therefore as to the pleasurable objects of this World whereof the chiefest seems to be a man 's own soul The godly man loves and admires and reverences his own soul no less but much more purely than any other man He admires the infinite and uncreated wisdom understanding love life liberty displaying and discovering it self in the constitution of his own mind Free-will and Affections and the excellent capacities and functions of these faculties and so by giving God the glory of his wonderful making Psal 139. 14. he escapes the brand of a self-admirer There are many other objects of delight in this World all which it is the proper work of Divine Grace to spiritualize to the soul such as food and raiment Houses and Lands Friends and Relations and many the like It cannot be denied but that the godly man loves his friends his Wife and Children and Parents with a natural love but he loves them also and all that is lovely in them with a spiritual love which is predominant that by which they are any of them pleasant and amiable he understands to be a communication of God unto them and under that notion labours to relish them most of all Whilst we are in this bodily mixt state we cannot be freed from a delight that is meerly sensual Meat and drink no doubt affected our Saviours sense and afforded the same
applause without any higher principle may prepare and prompt men to endure Persecution And it need no more be wondred at that the meer animal and selfish life should expose it self to much smart and many severities than that a generous Cock should fight to crow and expose himself to death it self to get the victory over his Antagonist It is well known how much the superstitious Papists will deny and debase and degrade and torment themselves what Penances and Pilgrimages and poverty they will undergo and all this out of a slavish fear of God and a design to keep their lusts alive They will half kill their own bodies rather than crucifie their lusts or mortifie the body of sin These things they do not for the mortification of lusts but indeed these things they do rather than they will mortifie them for these things with them supply the place of Mortification But I fear we have many Self-sufferers in the World that will not own themselves to be of that Society I believe it is a malicious reproach that is by some cast upon the generality of Protestant sufferers at this day in the World viz. that they suffer for humour and self-conceit out of obstinacy and a spirit of contradiction for applause and a greater corroboration of their party But yet it may reasonably be feared that there are too many that do so It seems not at all strange to me that a man should study Self-advancement by a pretended Self-denial that he should seem to lose his life on purpose that he may find it I mean that he should pretend to crucifie the meer animal and selfish life on purpose to enjoy it the more securely and hug it the more dearly that a man should take joyfully the spoiling of his Goods rather than violate his fleshly interest or expose his lusts to spoil Men do sometimes most of all maintain and pamper this dying life of theirs when they seem to starve it and drive on the same design with Judas even when their Persecutions seem to be the same with Pauls Men may as verily feel themselves and as passionately please themselves in the seeming constancy courage and patience of their sufferings as in the pretended zeal and devotion of their actions and as truly seek and set up themselves and a Self-supremacy in their own souls by the one as by the other But God is All to the truly godly soul in his Persecutions This I might explain as to the Cause of them the End of them and the Manner of sustaining them As to the efficient cause of them he does not fret and storm and rage at men whether open Enemies or false Friends whether Informers Accusers Law-givers Executioners but he looks higher and sees and owns the hand of God in all things that befal him by the ministry of men David knew that Shimei could not have cursed him if God had not opened his mouth 2 Sam. 16. 10. And our Saviour presently replies unto Pilate when he bragged of his power Joh. 19. 11. Thou couldst have no power at all against me except it were given thee from above As to the material cause or matter of his Persecutions God is all in that too For he suffers for righteousness sake Mat. 5. 10. and for well doing 1 Pet. 3. 17. not for toyes and trifles petty perswasions and private opinions or matters of meer indifferency His soul is employed about more substantial and important matters he will not so much as go to Law about such things much less expose himself to the rigour of a penal Law for them he will not so much as be in a heat about them much less will he burn for them And therefore it is not out of pride humour or sullenness as the Persecutors do slanderously report but out of conscience towards God that he endures grief 1 Pet. 2. 19. He knows no interest but that of his soul which consists in his most exact conformity to truth and holiness and it is to this interest and the propagation of it that he is well content to sacrifice whatever else may be reckoned dear or grateful to him As to the End of his sufferings God is All unto the godly soul here too There are many base and low and selfish ends which a man may propound to himself in suffering for a good cause which it were too long to insist upon All which the truly Divine soul abhors He is not so prodigal of his blood as to shed one drop of it to purchase a name written in Red Letters he will not expose his Goods to spoil in order to a more ample restitution he will not fall on purpose to rebound the higher nor have his person confined that so his name may spread and his credit be enlarged But he is well content to be reproached that so God may be honoured and to be starved that truth may be maintained he is content to wither in his estate that so he may flourish in gâ—ace to perish in the outward man that he may be renewed in the inward to die for the people if so he may preserve them from perishing The glory of God and the Salvation of souls or if you will in plainer terms the exercise of grace the defence of truth the advancement of the Kingdom of Christ in his own soul and the propagation of it in the souls of others are the grand designs of the godly soul when he takes up any cross Lastly God is All to the godly soul in the manner of his suffering Persecutions His way of sustaining them is with a pure peaceable humble self-denying patient constant chearful and charitable mind a mind prepared to wish good and do good to his very enemies and Persecutors Mat. 5. 44. In which excellent temper he feels not he pleases not he enjoies not himself or any self-excellency but glorifies God who gives such power unto men and admires Divine grace in that Heroical and most Christ-like passive frame which he finds derived into his soul I shall wave the farther prosecution of this particular because I foresee it will fall fitly also under another Head CHAP. IX God is all to the godly man in his Enjoyments What are the Enjoyments of Mind of Body of Estate The unregenerate mind enjoyes all these in a sensual or selfish manner But the godly man tastes a Divine sweetness in every thing that he enjoies though there be different degrees of refinement in Souls that are refined God is All to the godly Soul in his Endowments The unregenerate mind gross in admiring his own and other mens excellencies The godly soul entitles God to all that is good in himself or others God is the All of a good man's life and yet he is not satisfied with what he enjoies of him here but perpetually thirsts for more The Doctrine to be understood with three cautions that are briefly laid down 5. GOD is All to the godly man in his Enjoyments The enjoyments
unlimited it is doth alwaies proceed according to the Eternal Rules of goodness and righteousness And this will heal your spirits of all fretfulness and reconcile your minds not only to those Laws and Institutions of his which seem to be most Arbitrary but also to those Providences which seem to be most severe or unequal By a like mistake we are apt to ascribe Passion to God and to represent him to our selves as if he were all in a rage and very angry when he afflicts us Which Notion destroies all that chearful acquiescence under his hand and that quiet and friendly conversing with his Providence which we ought to maintain and so an imaginary wrath in God begets a real rage in our peevish and inpotent minds When as indeed the nature of God is as free from Anger Hatred Revenge and all the passions of our minds as it is from Hands or Eyes or Feet or any of the Members of our Bodies God is good and doth good saies our Psalmist Psal 119. 68. God is Love saies the beloved Apostle again and again 1 Joh. 4. 8 16. And there is nothing more certain than that God would never afflict his Creature if some greater good were not in view He envies not his People any of their Ease Peace Health Liberty or other Enjoyments but he loves them with a strong and Holy and Wise Affection and therefore will Afflict them in these things whether they will or no that he may bestow upon them some more substantial good Labour to converse with God in all his Providences as with Wisdom Goodness Righteousness and Love it self and then you will not be weary of his Discipline or peevishly affected towards any of his Dispensations We are apt to cry out Oh if we were but sure of the Love of God towards us in all our Afflictions we could be then content and patient Why go you and possess your souls in patience and get your Wills reconciled to the Providences of God Love him and delight in him and believe in him though he Afflict you never so sore and then be assured that God loves you for the Love and good Will of God is not his giving the Creature but it is the communication of himself and his Divine Perfections to your Souls CHAP. III. A Second Cause assigned viz. A misunderstanding of our true interest This Explained Where the true interest of Souls is Stated and the Cure prescribed in reference to this Cause of the Distemper A third Cause assigned viz. The want of a right discerning of Good and Evil. Where the nature of Good and Evil is Explained and Direction given how to discern them by way of Cure 2. ANother Cause of this distemper is A misunderstanding of our true interest Alas how are we sunk into this body How studious are we and fond of the accommodations and conveniencies of this animal life What fears and jealousies cares and contrivances what watchings and prayings and strivings and all for the peace and welfare of the flesh Certainly we judge our main interest to lie in the preserving pleasuring accommodating of the body and not of the soul which wicked apprehension as it destroies all true Religion so particularly it breeds the distemper that I am speaking of We are strangely fond of this Life as miserable as it is and of this body as unsuitable as it is and therefore are we so much offended with all things that are grievous and hurtful to the same yea we are apt to fret against God himself if he do not please and pamper them as much as we It is a woful degeneracy that hath befallen the soul of man which makes him mis-judge and mistake his main interest the like mistake is not to be found in the whole World sure I will not say with the Prophet Pass ye over the Isles of Chittim and send unto Kedar and see if there be such a thing but indeed pass ye through the whole Creation and visit all the particular beings that are therein and you shall not find such a thing such a degeneracy as this is you shall not find any Creature that thus forgets it self or thus mistakes its main intetest although the same be no interest in comparison of the concernment of an immortal soul Be astonished O ye Heavens at this monstrous absurdity The Fig-tree in Jonathan's Parable would not leave its sweetness to go to be promoted over the Trees but this noble plant of the Lord 's planting the rational soul hath forsaken its interest and forgotten its proper sweetness and renounced its own pleasure and felicity to go serve its own servant and study the interest of flesh and blood To the service whereof it is so entirely devoted that God himself must be quarrelled with if he use not this Dalilah kindly if he offer to put it to any pain Be advised I beseech you therefore to get a right understanding of your grand interest and where it lies in order to the healing of this distemper Value your selves by your souls and not by your bodies by your spiritual and not by your corporal state Is that man happy whose body and bodily concernments are all in a peaceful and flourishing state when in the mean time his soul is defiled depraved deformed impoverished and become more vile than the Dung upon the earth and more wretched than the Beasts that perish How then can that man be judged miserable whose nobler part is beautiful healthful rich and prosperous although his corporal and temporal estate be squalid sordid contemptible and much afflicted Our Saviour hath fully resolved this Question in the persons of Dives and Lazarus Luk. 16. Live like souls as much as may be abstracted from the body provide take care for view and visit your souls value your selves happy or unhappy according as it fares with your souls and then you will find it more natural and easie for you to bear up patiently and chearfully under all the Storms that light upon your outward man 3. The want of a right discerning of Good and Evil. This is somewhat akin to the former Our souls are so sadly sunk into matter and so fondly inamoured of our bodies that we are ready to judge of all things to be good or bad according as they accommodate or incommodate them and so we come many times to put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter Isa 5. 20. This is certainly a proper and immediate cause of our flying from groaning under and hastening out of Afflictions and Persecutions because we judge them hurtful and evil to us And why evil Forsooth because they gall our backs offend our senses pinch and oppress our flesh And is this indeed a right rule whereby to judge of the goodness or evilness of things Nay but if you would indeed possess your souls in patience in the midst of bodily pressures then exercise your spiritual senses to discern aright between Good and Evil as the Apostle's phrase is Heb.
5. ult But how shall we thus discern by what rule shall we judge them Good is the rule whereby to judge of Evil Rectum est Index obliqui and then for created good the nature of God the supreme good is the rule whereby to judge of that Perfectum in suo genere est mensur a reliquorum So then judge of all things by their relation that they bear to the nature of God and the tendency that they have to make us partakers of it And if we thus judge sincerely we shall not be so much offended at those Providences that are forming us into a resemblance of Christ Jesus nor be so hasty to run out of that Furnace that is refining us to be Vessels of Honour fit for our Masters use If David had at this time judged as discreetly and discerned as clearly as afterwards he did he would rather have wisht for the strength of an Ox to endure than the wings of a Dove to escape these pressures for in the up shot of all when he had viewed and compared all together and well recollected himself he professed openly that he accounted it good for him that he met with such usage in the World Psal 119. 67 71 75. God is the supreme good that is good for us that brings us nigh and makes us like unto him and that is not only Prosperity though indeed that ought to do it and I hope often doth it but even Adversity also Heb. 12. 10. He chasteneth us for our profit that we might be made partakers of his holiness CHAP. IV. The Fourth and last Cause assigned viz. Selfishness Self-love briefly touch'd upon Self-will more largely described with an earnest advice to bend all our powers against this rebellious Giant THese Causes of this Distemper are to be found in the understanding The Fourth and last Cause that I shall name is in the Will and it is Selfishness By this I mean two things Self-love and Self-will By Self-love in this place I mean sensuality or a judging of things by sense which I have touched upon already and an over high valuation of this meer earthly life and the conveniencies thereof Why are we so weary of Sickness and so impatient under Persecution Will it not come to this at length because we are so afraid to die There can be no farther end of the greatest Afflictions in this World than the parting of soul and body Is not this the worst that can come It seems then that it is an immoderate love of this wretched life that is the root of all these bitter fears and passions Labour therefore to be Crucified to the love of this natural life There are many inconveniencies and miseries that do arise from this root which I cannot now name certainly this distemper which I am speaking of is a very great one For however you find David here labouring under it yet elsewhere we find him earnestly labouring to be rid of it Why art thou cast down O my soul and why art thou disquieted within me c. Psal 42. 5 12. 43. 5. He is troubled at his being troubled and cannot with patience think how impatient he had been Strike therefore at the root of this Distemper labour to get your over-fond love and over-high valuation of this earthly life mortified He will be able not only to endure but even to contemn all Adversity who hath once well learnt to contemn his own life He cannot be in the power of any who hath death in his own power saies Seneca which admits of a good sense and agreeable to our Christian Divinity though he did not mean it so The other branch of selfishness is Self-will And this also is a pestilent disturber of the mind and engages the soul in many quarrels against God The understanding indeed may be mistaken and the flesh may smart and the Devil may tempt but I think the proud petulant perverse Self-will is the Achan the grand troubler of the soul This is the Sea from whence arise all those Clouds and Storms that trouble the Earth and infest Heaven it self If this were thoroughly mortified I dare say all the skill of earth all the Magick of Hell all the passions and pangs of the body could not make a clamorous soul This was the cause of Jonah's heat and rage and desire of death viz. because he might not have his own will Yea and it seems that Job's will was not molded into the Will of God and that that was the cause of his impatience for his complaint is called a contending with the Almighty and that by Job himself Job 40. 2. I do earnestly advise you therefore to bend all your strength against this rebellious Giant and be daily begging more strength than yet you have If you can overcome your own Wills you need not fear being overcome by any Adversity He that can deny himself can do any thing The Will of God is holy pure and perfect and indeed it is not only the duty but the glory of man to comply with it freely and chearfully What can be more Divine than a will according to God's Will an Heart according to God's Heart It was the commendation of David you know yea it is the perfection of Angels I have often observed with great delight the excellent patience and composure of David's spirit in the time of his flight from Absalom which you will find recorded in 2 Sam. 15 and 16 Chap. and you may see that he possest his soul in so much patience by this means by eying the absolute goodness of the Will of God and resigning himself thereunto Chap. 15. 26. and Chap. 16. 10. The patience of our Lord and Saviour was much more admirable than his and he was a person whose will was swallowed up in the Will of God Luk. 22. 42. Not my will but thy Will be done The time and matter and manner and measure of all your afflictions are all ordered by a Will and Wisdom which is above that is infinitely pure and perfect O therefore labour to get your wills reconciled to this Divine Will and your hearts at all times overpowered and mastered with the sense of the infinite goodness and holiness thereof and so shall you find all wrath and doubtings all discontents and jealousies to die and wither away and you will possess your souls in peace and gladness in patience and serenity in the midst of all your Afflictions I know several other causes might be brought of this distemper but I conceive they are either such as are inferiour and less principal or such as may be reduced to some of these that I have assigned Therefore I pass on to the Improvement CHAP. V. The Improvement by way of Concession that there is an averseness in the humane nature from Afflictions which is purely natural How it becomes sinful Secondly It is a greater distemper when unlawful means are used for deliverance out of Adversity Thirdly An Exhortation to beware
of this Disease and to labour after a contrary temper Which temper recommended in three things First Patience under the troubles of this life This pressed with two or three weighty considerations Secondly Weariness of the Imperfections of life Thirdly Eager desires of Eternal rest How to turn David's Rhetorick into Divinity AND here I will grant that there is an averseness in the humane nature from Afflictions and a desire of release from them which is purely natural which is not properly sinful as I conceive no more than eating or drinking or sleeping is But it easily becomes sinful many waies when it is not rightly ordered directed and bounded by our wills or when our wills do concur with the disorderliness and excess of it And so it is when the averseness of the nature becomes impatience in the will and desires in the appetite become turbulent passions in the higher powers of the Soul 2. If impatience of troubles and eager desires of rest from Adversity be a Distemper then much worse is it when unlawful and indirect means and courses are added thereunto David indeed was eager over eager of deliverance yet we do not find that he used unlawful waies to decline the rage of Saul and to save his life but he consulted with God and pray'd unto him and so stood upon his own defence The wings of a Dove are swift indeed but they are honest and innocent But what shall we say to them that take to themselves wings to escape and that the wings of a Hawk or a Vulture that deliver themselves by Injustice Rapine Murder and Deceit that break the Snare by breaking Vows and Oaths and Promises that care not if they swim through a Sea of Blood so they may but get safe to Land that to redeem their bodies will not stick to sacrifice their souls David's indeed was a great distemper but this is a desperate and Devilish madness But that which I do principally infer and most of all press from the consideration of David's distemper is that you would diligently endeavour to beware of the like The infirmities of Saints are not recorded for our imitation no nor to afford us a way of excusing our selves but indeed for our caution and they will render us the more inexcusable if we beware not that whereof we are so warned Now that you may be safe and sound from this distemper labour to get a contrary temper Three things therefore I exhort you to in opposition to this distemper to wit Patience under troubles of this life Impatience of the imperfections of this life and eager desires of eternal rest 1. Labour to be patient and during of the troubles of this life and moderate your desires of deliverance and rest from Adversities Think not much nor think not long concerning any tryal as if some strange thing or some unequal thing befell you Labour to be mortified as much as may be to the sense of all bodily Afflictions and moderated in the expectations of temporal deliverance in as much as the former is not properly your misery nor can the latter of it self be your happiness What an unseemly thing is it to hear Christians venting all their passions spending all their complaints upon their outward state Oppressions Injuries Persecutions and spending all their Prayers upon their fleshly interest as if it were by that that they must live and be happy Oh that the voice of this weeping might be heard no more amongst us Was it not a childish thing in the Israelites to weep and whine after a little flesh Do but read the story in Numb 11. 4 5 6. and you will take it rather to be the puling of Children than the complaint of men and especially the men of Israel Wherein was the cry of the men of Israel after Corn and other sensual accommodations better than the howling of Dogs to which it seems to be compared Hos 7. 14. Concerning this impatience of trouble and eagerness after relief and ease and rest I need not say as our Saviour saies Matth. 5. Do not even the Publicans the same but do not even the Beasts the same do not they groan under their burden do not they long to be delivered from their pains and pressures and restraints And shall the longing of souls be no higher nor purer than those of a meer animal appetite Shall the Prayers of the Sons of God be of no higher a strain than the Children of the Raven which are said to cry unto God for meat Job 38. ult Set aside the elegancy of them and all your groanings under Affliction and lusting after deliverance are common to the beasts that perish as well as you And this may well be the first Motive to the duty which I exhort you to 2. Consider that if you be thus weary of Affliction and eager after rest you do secretly find fault with a chief piece of God's dispensations in the World and frustrate the ends which God hath in bringing tribulation upon the righteous The exercise of Graces such as Patience Self-denial Faithfulness Courage Constancy is the great end of God in all his afflictive Providences upon his people and if we be so soon weary of them and so importunately bent upon deliverance from them how can this great design of Heaven be fulfilled For can the Plaister work a Cure except it may be suffered to lie on 3. Consider that there is really more valour and true greatness of mind in enduring hardships patiently and constantly than in all these fightings and contendings for God which pass with many men for such a noble zeal To dare to live in an unpleasant and bitter time is much more magnanimous than to wish to die and to endure the anguishes of life with an humble patience and submissive spirit is more Divine than to endeavour to escape them This passive valour was the mighty courage of the Son of God whereby he overcame all that was against him How easie was it for him to have revenged himself upon all his enemies by Legions of Angels or Fire from Heaven How easily could he have frown'd them all into their first nothing But he gave his back to the smiter and his cheeks to them that pull'd off the hair he was dumb as a Sheep before the Shearers whereby he gave us an Example of the most admirable longanimity and magnanimity too and by enduring the Cross did perfectly vanquish all that Crucified him We do mightily admire the valiant Acts of David's Worthies when we read how one slew eight hundred at one time another resisted the whole Army of the Philistines and slew many of them another defended a piece of Ground from a whole Troop of Philistines and slew them another slew a Lion and two Lion-like men another went down to an Egyptian Champion only with a Staff and first spoil'd the Egyptian of his Spear and then slew him with it I will not disparage this valour of theirs but I will affirm that David in his flight from Absalom manifested a more excellent courage than when he slew the great Philistine and that the valour of these his Worthies in it self considered is no more to be compared to the admirable Patience Self-denial and submission of the Redeemer of the World or to that of Moses who was but one of his servants than the passions of a Beast aâ—e to be compared unto the ingenuous resolution of a rational soul For such a kind of animal courage fierceness and killing faculty many of the Beasts of the Earth have as much Adino Eleazar Shanimah or Benaiah the son of Jehojadah so much commended in the 2 Sam. 23. True valour consists not in the greatness of bones but in the greatness of mind not in strength of sinews but in strength of Grace not in the fierceness and sightingness but in the meekness and patience of disposition That 's not the true generousness of spirit which cannot brook injuries but indeed that which can That 's not the true valiant mind which is resolved what ever comes of it to have its own will but that which most freely resigns it self to the Will of God Quo minus quid sibi arrogat homo eò evadit nobilior divinior 2. Instead of being weary of the Persecutions of life be ye weary of the imperfections of life Let the body of death rather than the troubles of God be the cause of your weariness and complaint O wretched man c. It is valour to endure patiently the Afflictions of the body but to mourn under the infirm and imperfect condition of the soul whilst it is embodied is also devout and pious yea to be content to spend an Eternity in such an imperfect state and such an unsuitable body as this were an argument of a mind over sluggish and forgetful of its own bliss And yet I cannot say but that there is something of Religion in the souls patient induring of its imperfect condition in the body because the Will of God is so 3. Convert the animal appetites into Divine longings instead of eagerness of rest from Adversity be as eager as may be of Eternal Rest of a state of perfection and glory Let not the Beast be above the Man the sensual appetite be stronger than the spiritual let not David's thirsting after the waters of Bethlehem 2 Sam. 23. nor the Bond-servant panting after the shadow Job 7. 2. condemn your lazy souls that have a more desirable object set before them It is good to be a Horse-Leech here suck in what you can of Eternal Life and after all yet cry Give give In a word then to turn David's Rhetorick into Divinity Instead of Oh that I had wings like a Dove cry ye Oh that I had the Heart of Dove chastly adhering to God innocently behaving it self towards men and patiently enduring injuries Instead of Oh that he would give me wings like a Dove that I might flye away pray ye Oh that one would give me the wings of Faith and Hope that I might soar aloft in a disdain of Worldly Evils The wings of the Ostrich that lifteth up her self on high and scorneth the Horse and his Rider Instead of the wings of a Dove to flye away and be at rest wish rather Oh that one would give me the wings of an Eagle that I might flye away towards Heaven FINIS
THE Great Commandment A DISCOURSE Upon Psal 73. 25. SHEWING That God is All things to a Religious Soul BEING A further Explication of a short Discourse called The Angelical Life formerly Written by the same Author S. S. I laboured more abundantly than they all yet not I but the Grace of God which was with me 1 Cor. 15. 10. I live yet not I but Christ liveth in me Gal. 2. 20. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy Heart and with all thy Soul and with all thy Mind This is the first and Great Commandment Mat. 22. 37 38. LONDON Printed by R. W. for H. Mortlock at the White-Hart in Westminster-Hall and at the Phoenix in St. Paul's Church-yard 1678. Imprimatur Hic Liber cui titulus The Great Commandment c. Geo. Thorp R mo in Christo P. D. Domino Gulielmo Archiep. Cant. à Sacris Domesticis May 17. 1678. To the Right Honourable and most Accomplish'd Lady the Lady Mary Daughter to the Right Honourable the Countess Dowager of Huntingdon and Consort to Mr. William Jolliff of London Madam AMongst the many Excellencies wherewith it hath pleased the Father of Lights to adorn and illustrate you this is not the least of your Vertues that you do not love to be told of them And for my part such is the Reverend regard that I bear to your sweet modesty that I fear to write what I suspect your Honour would blush to read In my judgement I do esteem your Honour to be a Person fit to be addrest to for your Patronage of a Discourse of this nature and that I in so doing am not far from the same circumstances wherein the great Doctor of the Gentiles stood toward King Agrippa when he accounted himself happy that he had to do with so competent a Judge And in ingenuous gratitude I account my self tantum non bound publickly to beg your perusal and owning of this latter Discourse whose acceptance of the former when it was only offer'd you as a private Present I found so kind and affectionate I know your Honour is not asham'd of Religion neither name nor thing and I hope you will neither be asham'd of nor offended at him who out of a sincere desire to promote the happiness of mens Souls hath adventur'd to explain and recommend it to the World though he be but Madam The meanest of your Honours Servants S. S. TO THE READER Christian Reader REligion is deservedly esteemed the highest accomplishment of the rational nature both humane and Angelical as being the converse which the highest created powers and faculties maintain with the supreme and uncreated good And it is worth observation that even amongst the Heathens who yet had no distinct knowledge of the true God acquaintance with their gods and a relation to them was accounted their greatest glory which made all Prophetical and Priestly persons of what capacity yea or sex soever who pretended to be Secretaries or menial servants to the gods to be had in so great veneration Yea the very Princes and Heroes amongst them though they were otherwise very powerful wise and valiant and made no great Conscience of being proud of it neither were still most ambitious which of them should be accounted nearest of Kin to the gods and those that pretended nearest Kindred gloried in that more than in all their other accomplishments Thus the great and noble and valiant Hector is brought in by Homer as being in nothing short of Minerva and Apollo and failing of divine honour save only that his extraction was not immediately divine And there you will find that the same Hector when he could wish for no greater thing cries out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Iliad v. I would I were as sure the son of Jupiter and that Juno had born me as I will plague the Grecians this day Virgil brings in his Aeneas glorying indeed of his Piety Counsel and Prowess but of nothing so much nor so often as of his relation to Venus Nate Deâ is the salutation that he is most pleased with Ovid brings in the blustering Ajax not over modest indeed in telling of his Valour and Feats of Arms but his greatest brag of all is his A Jove tertius Ajax And yet for the further commendation of Religion it is as much if not more observable that every where it put such a grace upon all the persons who professed it that they were had in greatest estimation who were the truest to it and justified the profession of it by the severest conformity What ever Religion hath been at any time publickly owned amongst any Nations so far as I can understand hath been accounted so sacred and venerable that if any man whatsoever should venture to prophane it or in his Works to deny it he was accounted the most profligate of all men and not fit to live It was ever esteemed an honourable Character of the greatest Princes and Heroes to be devout and pious according to the professed Religion If we will believe Homer Agamemnon Achilles and Nestor and all the fam'd Grecian Heroes were pious Princes who would seldom either fight or treate or con-consult or undertake any matter of moment without the preface of a Prayer or Sacrifice or both The despisers of the gods and Religion were had in common detestation and nothing could be said worse of any man than that he was contemptor superûm or as Horace calls it in his penitential Ode Cultor Deorum infrequens God does by his Prophet in a wondering way make an enquiry whether it was ever known that a people forsook their gâ—ds who yet were no gods Jer 2. 11. which I may well allude to and with astonishment enquire whether ever any people reproached and vilified their own Religion which yet was no Religion or accounted it their honor to be thought irreligious And yet alas it is too too obvious that in a Christian Nation in this Protestant Nation many men do really hate that Religion which yet they do profess and account it a piece of Fanaticisme and madness to be and act according to the Gospel which they own that is in short to be honest men and true to their Words These are a generation of men whom one may well call prophane Hypocrites and indeed they do not so much dishonour Religion as themselves who like dishonest men do openly oppose and hate what yet they openly profess But there are besides these another sort of men who knavishly and malignantly but ignorantly and superstitiously reproach Religion These men would very honestly have all men to live up to their Religion but then they make Religion to be nothing else but some Systematical or mechanical thing without them by which they measure themselves or unto which they make their outward man to conform And thus whilst they maintain such or such Opinions or are of this or that Perswasion or Party or are careful to observe such and such Modes and Forms
perfections of the Creator He looks upon the whole World as not subsisting of it self nor for it self but in and for God who is above all through all and in all Ephes 4. 6. in whom the whole Creation standeth and we all live move and have our beings Acts 17. 28. To him the whole World is as the Temple of God all mankind and all their several excellencies an Image and Portraicture of God yea to him Monstrat quaelibet herba Deum the Grass of the Field reads a Divinity Lecture In a word Huic Deus est quodcunque videt quodcunque movetur He apprehends the Power Wisdome Perfection and Will of God in all that he sees does receives or sustains Though Religion do not consist in Notions yet true proper and spiritual Notions of things especially of God and of the relation wherein the whole World stands to him are mightily conducing to it if not a substantial part of it So thought the Apostle Paul sure when he corrected the superstitions and false conceits of the Athenians concerning a Deity Acts 17. And so thought our Blessed Saviour when he would not suffer the Jewish Ruler to ascribe goodness to him whom he believed to be no more than a meer man Luk. 18. 19. Why callest thou me good none is good save One that is God CHAP. IV. God is all things to the godly man in his Affections The Desires of Unregenerate men run out only after Creature good The Objection of wicked men having good desires answered Wherein is shewed that all desires of good are not good desires and an account given of it Men may be carnal in their desiring of spiritual good James 4. 3. explained wherein is shewed how many waies men seek their own lusts instead of God and the carnality which may be found in Prayers that seem spiritual God is All to the godly man in his desires of things temporal and in his hopes of Heaven 2. GOD is All things to the godly man in his Affections The wicked man as he views himself in himself and the several creatures in themselves so he loves and delights in himself and the creatures as something distinct from God But the godly soul endeavours by all means to keep all his affections pure and chast for God alone Now in as much as the affections of the soul are many it will be necessary to explain the matter in some particulars 1. God is All to the godly man in his desires and cravings in his lookings and waitings in his hopes and expectations I put all these together under one Head because they seem to be much what the same or at least of great affinity one to another The desires and appetites of the unregenerate soul do run out only after creature good self accommodations and things that do gratifie the meer animal life Thus the Psalmist describes their temper Psal 4. 6. Many say Who will shew us any good which our English Meter interprets very truly The greater sort crave worldly goods That is a short but yet a very true and full description that the Apostle Paul makes of these men Phil. 3. 19. They mind Earthly things It were easie to be large here in demonstrating in a general way that there is nothing in the worldly nature but the lust of the flesh the lust of the eye and the pride of life according to the distribution which the Apostle makes 1 Joh. 2. 16. But I shall not further insist upon that general It seems as if wicked men sometimes had good desires and good wishes and indeed it cannot be denied but that some of their desires are materially good who can say but that of Balaam was a good wish as to the matter of it Numb 23. 10. Let me die the death of the righteous and let my last end be like his It was materially a good wish though a bad bargain of Simon Magus that by the imposition of his hands men might receive the holy Ghost Acts 8. 19. It is not to be doubted but that many wicked men yea perhaps the most of them at one time or other do heartily desire that their sins may be pardoned and their souls saved and they go to Heaven according to that of our Saviour Luk. 13. 28. Many will seek to enter in and shall not be able But however these may seem to be good desires yet they are not really so All desires of good are not good desires If men should desire the presence of Christ in glory and the Kingdom of Heaven in subordination to self and subserviency to a fleshly interest it would be so far from being indeed a good that it would scarce be a lawful it may be a blasphemous wish And it is very clear that all the seeming good wishes and prayers and desires of unsanctified minds are ultimately resolved into a fleshly interest and self gratification It is not God but themselves that they really seek even then when they desire him to be at peace with them and that they might be with him in his Kingdom It is only true of all unregenerate men which the Apostle affirms of all men Phil. 2. 21. All men seek their own things and not the things which are Jesus Christs and this holds good of them not only when they are with Saul seeking their Asses or with Absolom seeking an earthly Kingdom but even then when they are seeking to enter into the Kingdom of God But God is All in the desires and prayers and hopes of the godly soul The whole World is too short a bed for such a soul to stretch it self upon The appetites and cravings of such a soul being excited and awakened by the sense of its own large and excellent capacity the inadequateness and insufficiency of the creature the infinite self-sufficiency and sweetness and suitableness of God the supreme good cannot possibly fix or rest or terminate themselves in any thing below him and the enjoyment of him Thus the desires of the godly are described by the Psalmist in opposition to the lustings of the wicked Psal 4. 6. Lord lift thou up the light of thy countenance upon us And so in the words of the Text if they be understood by way of prayer Who will give me to be in Heaven with thee The prayers of the wicked although they may be for things good and lawful yet are ultimately resolved into self-gratification They may be as fluent in words as loud in their cries as hearty and fervent in their requests as other men If it be for Corn and Wine and Oyl they can roar and howl as loud as the best and yet this is not interpreted as seeking of God but of themselves Hos 7. 17. They have not cryed unto me with their heart when they howled upon their beds They assemble themselves for Corn and for Wine c. That is a very memorable expression of the Apostle James Jam. 4. 3. Ye ask amiss that ye may consume it
upon your lusts Which indeed is the design of unregenerate souls even when they seem to pray for things in their own nature spiritual Wicked men are carnal even in praying for spiritual things But godly men are not so they are so far from that that on the contrary they are spiritual in praying for carnal and earthly things They wrap up a Prayer in a Prayer they have a farther reach than the meer enjoyment of the creature when they pray for creature good a higher end than the pleasing and serving of themselves when they pray for themselves or their own private and personal concernments Certainly it is not only an absurd but a monstrous and blasphemous thing for any man to pray to God to fulfil his lusts the interest of God being so perfectly contrary to the interest of carnal self And yet I fear there are very many that do thus interpretatively blaspheme God even in their Prayers when they pretend to honour him and these sometimes perhaps not of the very worst of men neither What would it have been else but a prayer of lust if the two Disciples had been suffered to have prayed for fire from Heaven upon the heads of the poor Samaritans to revenge their Master's quarrel as they would have done Luk. 9. 24 What was it else but a prayer of lust when the same two Disciples petitioned their Lord for the chiefest place and preeminence in his Kingdom Mark 10. 37 Only our gracious Saviour was pleased somewhat to excuse them by reason of their ignorance Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of and again Ye know not what ye ask I will not dispute how far a devout and well meaning soul may pray upon a mistake nor how far such a soul may possibly mistake the interest of his lusts for the interest of Religion and the Kingdom of Christ But methinks such mistakes are very dangerous and much more dangerous and inexcusable now than they were in the daies of the Son of Man And yet as dangerous as they are I fear they are too too common even in these daies Charity covereth a multitude of sins indeed but yet it is the endowment of a rational soul and so the Charity that is stark blind is no Charity Yea I may add that it is the part of Charity to discover a multitude of sins before the eyes of those that commit them as well as to cover them before ones own It is too evident if we compare the constant talk and temper of men with their devotions and if with their prayers you compare their practices which they use in pursuit of them that passion revenge and self-interest do indite the prayers of many that seem to be zealous for the Lord every thing is Anti-christian that is contrary to their opinion ease or interest and then is the Kingdom of Christ exalted when they themselves are advanced into a peaceful honourable and ruling state What if it should come to pass that some even of them that seem to be most forward to sit at the right and left hand of Christ in his Kingdom should be found to stand on his left hand with the impure Goats in the day of the decision of all things And what can we say of those animose and furious strivings and groanings of men in prayer against all that dissent from themselves but that their prayers are rather the bublings and boylings up of interest than the language of the pure peaceable and gentle spirit of God I fear these mens prayers are not put up without wrath as the Apostle exhorts 1 Tim. 2. 8. and I wish their hands be found so holy as they should be if ever they have opportunity to use them Nay what if many of our most fervent and affectionate groanings after deliverance liberty and redemption from afflictions and oppressions as innocent as they seem to be should be found to be nothing else but the raging of our own animal passions and such prayers as an oppressed Beast might put up as well as we if he could express them so affectionately I know it is very lawful and warrantable to put up prayers unto God for relief in our troubles and release from our pressures but yet it is no more than what is natural unto men no more than what Jonah's heathenish Mariners did as well as he Man seeks for deliverance from troubles properly as an animal not as a Christian And if this be All we aim at in our prayers they will be interpreted if not as a begging for our lusts yet as meer breathings of the Animal life and out-cries of our own sensual affections no better fruit than may be found upon Publicans For do not even the Publicans the same But this is not all that the Godly soul aims at in his prayers and hopes but God is All in his hopes whether of things in this World or in another It is not the meer naked abstract enjoyment of prosperity liberty or life it self in this World that the godly soul so vehemently looks longs prays and hopes for but it is some real communication from God or something that may capacitate him for God in all these Every man that is wronged and oppressed would gladly be righted and delivered But the godly man sets not his heart so much upon his own ease as upon the honour of God and the interest of Truth and righteousness which he desires may take place in the World Every man would be great but the good man alone accepts of worldly power meerly for this end that by his authority he may the better serve the honour of his great God which seems to have been purely David's design Psal 75. 2. When I shall receive the Congregation I will judge uprightly Victory is sweet and acceptable to all but that truth should be mighty and prevail that equity and justice should triumph in the World this is dear and desirable only to the godly soul the soul that is purified from earthly and selfish loves The meer worldly life desires worldly liberty but that higher principle which is seated in the godly soul covets a more spiritual and excellent freedom even the glorious liberty of the Sons of God Life is sweet to all but to the godly Soul to be without God would not be to live For his loving kindness is better than life Psal 63. 3. In a word it is the interest of God and communion with him which spirits and impregnates all the hopes and expectations of the renewed soul which he conceives concerning earthly things And if this be so it need not be doubted but that God is All to him in his hopes concerning the World to come the All of Heaven I fear there are many Christians that are high in their own hopes of Heaven and of their going thither who little think of God there and are little acquainted with the spiritual nature of right happiness But God is All of Heaven it self to a
relish to his palate whilst he had an animal body as they afforded to other mens although he was so infinitely pure and spiritual as that it was his meat and drink to be doing the Will of God The power of Grace doth not enable any man not to taste a sweetness or bitterness in things that are really sweet or bitter It does not fall under the power of my reason or will whether or no I will relish or sensate the sweetness of my morsel I cannot help that although I can keep my self from eating it so then it cannot fall under the power of grace But although Grace do not destroy the sensation of the senses yet it regulates and moderates all the senses as to their actings Hence Job is said to have made a Covenant with his eyes Job 31. 1. and David to have kept his mouth as with a bridle Psal 39. 1. And as it governs the senses as to their actings so it also bestowes a more excellent ability upon the soul to delight it self in things sensual in a supersensual way and manner Besides the pleasure of the senses which is animal and common to all men yea indeed and beasts also the gracious soul doth relish something Divine something of God his Love his communications in all delectable objects which confers upon them a transcendent substantial sweetness And thus he may be said to taste God in every morsel to smell the Divinity in every Flower and to converse with him by a kind of secret feeling in all that he touches tastes or handles in the World CHAP. VI. God is All to the godly man in his Trust and Confidence The creature-confidence of carnal men is Blasphemy Good men are afraid of distrust How great reckoning they have alwaies made of their Faith The only fear of carnal men is the violation of self interest God is All in the fears of good men They fear him only though they are not afraid of him God is All to the godly man in his grief and sorrow explained 3. GOD is All to the godly man in his Trust and Confidence The degenerate and unregenerate soul as it is sunk into the creature so it sticks there it sticks by love and delight and sticks fast by confidence It were endless to give you but the Scripture instances of Self-confidence and Creature-dependance In Creature-confidence there is much Atheism or rather indeed blasphemy For to ascribe that firmness faithfulness sufficiency which God alone is to any thing besides him must needs be blasphemous and idolatrous And thus do wicked men blaspheme whilst they lay the stress of their souls upon the Arm of flesh upon Chariots and Horse men upon friends and Allies upon carnal interests or worldly riches And thus we know they do Psal 20. 7. Some trust in Chariots and some in Horses Prov. 18. 11. The rich man's wealth is his strong City and as a high Wall in his own conceit But godly men have God alone for their refuge and confidence according to that of the wise King Prov. 18. 10. The Name of the Lord is a strong Tower the righteous run into it and are safe I know they may be and often are surprized with fears and doubts but yet even then they will not let go their hold of God Psal 56. 3. What time I am afraid I will trust in thee It is as much the part of a godly soul to relye and rest upon God as to love him and pray unto him he is afraid of distrust unbelief and casting away his confidence as well as of Drunkenness or Debauchery I cannot but take notice what great reckoning the Saints have made of their Faith as if the very life of their souls had been bound up in it How expresly and pathetically does the Apostle charge us concerning this Ephes 6. 16. Above all taking the Shield of Faith and again Heb. 10. 23. Let us hold fast the profession of our Faith without wavering and again Vers 35. Cast not away your confidence which hath great recompence of reward Job when he had lost all yet resolves not to part with his Faith whatever became of him Job 13. 15. Though he slay me yet I will trust in him And doubtless an ingenuous and steady reliance upon the grace and strength and help of God alone is an excellent argument of a sound and gracious soul Good men know how to make use of second causes and they see commonly as far into all creature-probabilities as any other men but it is the vertue and strength of God that they rest upon in all means and instruments 4. God is All to the godly soul in his fears The ungodly are full of worldly fears slavish fears scarce ever free from fears about one thing or other yea though there be nothing visible to make them afraid But as their interest is bound up in self and this present World so their great and only fear is concerning the violation of this self-interest He that hath plac'd his happiness in the enjoyment of any created good hath made a miserable choice for he is in danger of being utterly ruin'd every hour all created good being subject to so many spoilers that a man can never be secure in his possession And therefore no wonder that his heart is haunted one while with the fears of death another while with the fears of losses loss of Friends or Children loss of Goods or Reputation fears of wants fears of disgrace and many things more which his slavish heart is aw'd with continually But God is All in the fears of good men He is their fear and their dread as the phrase is Isa 8. 13. Not that they are properly afraid of God for they discover nothing in him but what is most amiable and grateful to them and therefore converse with him as with love it self serve him as accounting it their happiness and interest to do so and obey his Commands as those which are most equitable and suitable and most perfective of their natures with all gladness and chearfulness but they are afraid of sin so as wicked men are afraid of sickness and death viz. as that which is hurtful to them and destructive of their happiness Sin is all their fear by reason of the opposition it bears to the pure nature of God and so it may be said that God is All in their fear Thus Moses seems to have been more solicitous for the honour of God than for the preservation of the whole Congregation and more afraid of the sin of the Egyptians than of the death of the Israelites Numb 14. 13 14 15 16. whereunto many more Instances might be added Lastly To name no more of the Affections God is All things to the godly soul in his grief Concerning the sorrow of the wicked one I may say partly the same as I said even now concerning their fears it is a worldly sorrow derived from and terminated in the Creature But the sorrow of
Christ in my own soul or in the World or to some end higher than the pleasing of my flesh and the gratification of my animal passions I may be said to do that for God although I do not directly meditate upon the Being of God at that time And so the Religious Christian even in his recreations which of all civil actions may seem to be most alien from a Religious design may truly eye and serve God If we were so abstracted from sense and purified from flesh-pleasing as were to be desired we might consult the health of our bodies and the exoneration of our minds by recreations and serve God as truly by them as by taking either food or Physick yea though we did receive a satisfaction from those things which are purely sensual a thing which we cannot hinder yet might we be said to be supersensual and Religious in those very acts For it is not the having of animal senses no nor the pleasing of them as such that is our fault but our sacrificing to and being sunk into the animal life this is our sin and shame and misery He that doth work or play Marry or give in marriage sincerely respecting the true good of his soul cannot be said to be sensual in such actions although his senses may and indeed will have their part in the delights thereof All things cannot be said to be done for flesh-pleasing in which it falls out that the flesh is pleased For some of those very actions that are principally designed and calculated for the glory of God and the interest of the soul may yet indifferently serve for the gratification of the senses and the entertainment of this animal body as may eating and drinking though it be directly to the glory of God and Marrying though it be never so much in the Lord. In his sacred Actions there the godly soul is yet more spiritual and refined Here is indeed no great danger of sensuality properly so called and yet here the wicked man can make a shift to be carnally-minded and selfish as you have already heard But in these kind of actions God is All to the godly soul He feels not himself in these he seeks not himself by them O how common a thing is it for men to carry an image of themselves before their eyes even in the things that they pretend to do for God! I suppose Jehu was no little fond of himself and his own valourousness and thought God was not a little endebted to him for it when he calls for witnesses and spectatours of it Come see my zeal for the Lord. And truly the Sacrilegious selfishness of other men is as great though not altogether so gross who although they do not so loudly proclaim themselves nor set up such visible Trophees of their own prayers yet do magnifie themselves in their own eyes and secretly applaud themselves in an unhallowed sense of their own Atchievements and attainments But the truly Religion soul though he cannot but know his own worth and excellencies yet knows it not no delights not in it as his own but as a communication of the Almighty goodness and infinite perfection of God unto him When he shines most gloriously in the exercises of gifts and the actings of grace he does not presently fall in love with his own picture dote upon his own perfections nor wantonly dally with his own gifts but looks upon his lustre only as a poor reflection of the divine light and glory which hath spread it self upon him As a rendring nothing to God but what is indeed his own Of thine own have we given thee and all this store cometh of thine hand and is all thine own 1 Chron. 29. 14 16. Have ye not read how sharply the Apostle Peter takes up the wondring Jews that seemed not to acknowledge God in the miraculous cure wrought upon the Crepple Acts 3. 12. Ye men of Israel why look ye so earnestly on us as if by our own power and holiness we had made this man to walk The godly man feels not himself in his Religious performances neither does he seek himself by them He makes not Religion a piece of pâ—licy nor serves himself of God when he pretends to serve him as that hypocritical Generation did of whom our Saviour speaks Matth. 23. 14. who made long prayers in subserviency to oppression and after him his Apostle James Jam. 4. 3. who prayed on purpose that they might have to spend upon their lusts This hath been a very reigning superstition in the world Did Saul think ye properly seek God or himself and his own safety in those forced burnt-offerings of his which he speaks of in 1 Sam. 13. 12. Therefore I said the Philistines will come down now upon me to Gilgal and I have not made supplication unto the Lord I forced my self therefore and offered a burnt-offering Did Judas think ye properly seek the honour of God or himself and his own enriching when he made a motion for giving three hundred pence to the poor Let the Spirit of God be Judge of this whose determination you will find in Joh. 12. 6. Some serve their own covetousness some seek their own safety some study to advance their own name and reputation by their Fastings Prayers and Alms But a godly soul is a stranger to all these low and sorry ends It is not wealth nor fame nor peace nor victory over his enemies nor deliverance from distresses no nor any other external glory or only reward in another World which he pursues in his Religious course But he draws nigh to God that God may draw nigh to him he waits upon him in Duties and Ordinances waiting for communications from him he knows nothing better than God himself for which he should serve him he accounts his end happiness and honour to resemble him and grow up in him In a word he does not only perform the duties of Religion as being God's Work which he hath set him about and promised a reward unto but indeed as his own work his own business he reckons it the true interest of his own soul to be good and do good and therefore will spend himself in these endeavours though no body will pay him no nor thank him for it Mark the different temper that was in Christ and some of his followers they served God for meat and drink Joh. 6. 26. but he accounted it his meat and drink to serve him Joh. 4. 34. CHAP. VIII God is all to the godly man in his Sufferings An account of Self-sufferers Papists and others God is All to the godly man in the Efficient the Material and Final cause of his sufferings explained God is all to the godly man in his manner of fearing Afflictions and Persecutions 4. GOD is All to the godly man in his Sufferings I know that unsound and hypocritical spirits are much more forward to do than suffer and yet no doubt the power of self-love and affectation of
far as he is regenerate and acteth up to the height of Divine principles doth thus see taste enjoy and design God in all as I have shewed For the very life and essence of Religion is the dethroning of Self and advancing of God into preeminence In as much therefore as God being supreme and his interest prevailing in a soul is the very life and soul of Religion it will necessarily follow that the Doctrine holds good concerning every truly regenerate soul and that every such soul hath this temper as to the predominancy of it CHAP. X. The improvement of the Doctrine laid down by way of examination A general direction what Queries men are to put to themselves as to the finding out of this matter Certain instances of a Self-emptied and God-exalting mind The first instance When we are concerned in all the wickedness committed in the World as truly as if it were committed by our selves The second when we are more affected with the iniquity of an action than the injury that is done to our selves thereby YOU cannot but by this time be somewhat in love with this excellent and Angel-like temper and desirous to find whether you your selves be thus spirited It is doubtless a scrutiny and meditation becoming the most serious and generous minds For all Religion is reduced to this summa Totalis and Religion is the only concernment of souls Examine therefore I pray you and that not only once and generally but frequently and precisely and rifle into all the particular and if it be possible into all the individual motions and actions of your hearts and lives to find this Divine temper Examine your selves in all the forementioned particulars whether God be All to you in your Apprehensions Affections Actions Sufferings Enjoyments Endowments Enquire whether the truth of God be dearer to you than your own party or perswasion whether the interest of God lie nearer to your heart than self-interest the interest of your own credit and reputation whether the advancement of the Divine Life be more desireable to you than Self-accommodation or Self-advancement whether the love of God or the naked possession of the creature do most delight you in every enjoyment whether the Image of God or your own do most affect you in your Children whether the glory of God or your own do most spirit you in your Actions whether you be rent from Self-enjoyment and centred upon God alone whether you be emptied of Self-will and molded into the Divine Will whether you abound in your own sense and Self-feeling or be filled with the fullness of God In a Word whether all Self-love and Self-supremacy be thrown down and God alone do exercise his Soveraignty over all the powers of your souls These are very substantial enquiries For your better discovery I will therefore propound to you some certain marks or signs of such a Self-emptied and God-exalting mind as I have been commending which yet indeed are rather branches and instances of it than signs 1. When we take our selves to be concerned in all the wickedness committed in the World as truly as if it were committed by our selves or our relations I mean so far as to be grieved for it We are wont to be dejected by reason of any gross sin that we our selves fall into this I do not condemn nay judge necessary as our Duty and yet this may possibly arise from a meer superstitious principle and may be found springing up in the heart of a slave We are apt to be troubled when our Children or near friends prove ungracious or openly rebellious against God this I do not simply condemn neither and yet I must tell you that this may arise from a meer natural affection and a principle that is carnal But if the interest of God lay so close and warm to our hearts as it ought to do and as it does to the Saints and Angels in Heaven we should mourn over the sins of all men even our Enemies and Persecutors as truly as our friends we should be grieved for the Apostasie of mankind yea and of the Devils themselves The predominancy of Religion in the soul would refine natural affections into spiritual and exalt particular affections into universals You have heard of a man who vexed his soul with the ungodly conversations of strangers 2 Pet. 2. 7. and of another who when ever he lookt abroad and beheld transgressours was grieved Psal 119. 158. And I have known a man who when he lookt upon an Assembly of ignorant and hypocritical and ungodly men either in a Church or in a Market would have wept over them as if they had all been his own Family It is an argument of God's supremacy in the soul when we mourn over sin because it is a degeneracy from the pure nature of God and not because it is found in them whom we love or are related to 2. When in the wrongful persecutions committed against us we can look through our own injury and be mostly affected with the wickedness of the action I do not say it is unlawful to be sensible of or affected with the injury and violence offered to us But I say it is no more than is common to a Publican or Harlot no more than what is common to an Elephant a Lion or a Dog as well as to us and therefore though it be a lawful thing and necessary yet it is no great thing But when we can look upon the reproaches cast upon our names and have our hearts mainly concerned for the Name and Honour of God when we can forget the burden of our own fetters and as it were not feel the smart of our own stripes and wounds because of the greater load and pain which we sustain by the lusts of men that do inflict them it is certainly an excellent instance of God's supremacy in our souls But you will say Is this possible Is it possible that the soul whilst it is embodied should be more concerned for God than for its own body I must confess it is somewhat difficult and very rare Men complain of the Injuriousness of men but seldom of their Unrighteousness of the cruelty of their enemies as it is exercised upon them but not as it is a departure from the holy and loving nature of God But yet it is not impossible neither thus to neglect the smarting of our own flesh and carnal interest in comparison of the interest of truth and holiness and the glory of God For thus did our blessed Saviour who seemed to forget his own pangs upon the Cross in comparison of the sin of them that Crucified him praying Father forgive them for they know not what they do Luk. 23. 34. And that I may not seem to over-shoot you with Examples thus did Stephen a man of like infirmities with us whose last and loudest voice was Lord lay not this sin to their Charge Act. 7. ult as if his heart were more broken with the sin
than his body bruised with the Stones of them that persecuted him Thus did Moses and thus did David whose zeal and anger against his enemies was principally upon the account of their sin Psal 119. 139. My zeal hath consumed me because mine enemies have forgotten thy Words Upon which words Mollerus glosses thus David in suis aerumnis non tam afficitur malorum suorum sensu privatis injuriis quà m quòd videt nomen Dei ab hostibus contumeliâ affici CHAP. XI Three more Instances of a God exalting mind When in the afflictions that befal us we can over-look all creature comforts and delight in the Will of God When we repent of sin and hate it for its own sake and esteem nothing worse than it is When we take pleasure in the gifts and graces of God shining forth in others as well as in our selves Joshua and Jonah taxed This temper proved to be Angelical 3. WHen in the Afflictions that befal us more immediately from the hand of God we can overlook all the creature-comforts which are taken from us and kiss the hand of God that takes them There is all reason that the Will of God should be dearer to us than any created good however our fond and sensual hearts may contradict and blaspheme Is not the Will of God to be seen in all our crosses losses sicknesses in all our personal domestical and national disturbances And is not even this Will of God God himself Is it not infinitely wise holy and perfect What are our sorry scant mixt enjoyments then in this World that they should be valued against this Almighty and Sacred pleasure We magnifie the good Will and pleasure of God in our peace plenty health prosperity and it is good to do so in a right spiritual manner But possibly it may be the sweetness of the enjoyments themselves that we do so much relish and not the good Will of God in them But if in the sharpest and sorest afflictions that do befall us we find our selves so mastered and over-powered with the sense of the purity and perfection of the Will of God that we can adore and reverence it yea cleave to it and love it more than any of our creature comforts more than our lives themselves nakedly considered it is an excellent instance of that soveraignty which God hath obtained in our souls This was the temper of our blessed Saviour who seemed scarce to taste the bitterness of the Cup for the excellency of the hand that reached it to him Joh. 18. 11. The Cup which my Father hath given me shall I not drink it The affliction which the Lord sendeth shall I not bear it saies old Eli 1 Sam. 3. 18. It is the Lord let him do what seemeth him good The Book which was given to the Prophet Ezekiel to eat was as sweet as Honey to him because it was given him by the hand of God although it contained nothing in it but lamentation and mourning and woe Ezek. 2. 10. 3. 3. the Will of God was pleasant and delightful to him for though the contents thereof were grievous yet he gladly assented to the end and scope of these providences as the Dutch Annotators gloss upon the words 4. When we esteem nothing worse than sin is for which we should repent of it or hate it You may fright superstitious minds by telling them of judgements and punishments and scare hypocrites with everlasting burning but certainly there is that in the very nature of sin that is more dreadful to an ingenuous soul than fire and brimstone can fully represent Such a soul cannot sin without pain he esteems sin to be the very same to his soul which a disease is to the body and therefore he is not so properly said to be grieved for it which seems to respect the evil consequences of it as indeed to be sick of it as one is of a distemper or weary of it as one is of a painful burden It is well when men will reform their evil waies for fear of the punishments of this World or the Hell of another though I fear such reformation is rather superstition than true conversion in God's account but it were much better if men would be drawn to God and not driven to him Perhaps the fear of wrath and Hell may at length end in a more ingenuous and generous temper but for the present it seems to me to be nothing else but a spirit of bondage when Isaac is once grown up in the soul this Bond-woman and her son must pack Love when it is perfected will cast out fear 1 Joh. 4. 18. 5. When we can rejoyce and take pleasure in the gifts and graces of God shining forth in others as heartily and really as in our selves It were to be wished that we could do it as much but this is a rare attainment and for ought I know reserved for the other World However if we do it as truly and really it is an argument that God is greater than self in our souls Joshuah though a good man being transported with zeal for his Master's credit fail'd in this when he was offended at the gift of Prophecie confer'd upon Eldad and Medad and cry'd My Lord Moses forbid them Num. 11. 28. And it lies as a blemish to this day upon Jonah the Prophet that he valued his own reputation above the kindness of God shewed upon the poor Ninevites We profess to disrelish this temper in Joshuah and Jonah but alas we are apt to indulge it in our selves For where shall we find a soul so emptied of it self and so ravished with the Divine beauty and glory that can be heartily well pleased with the temporal prosperity of others when it seems to jar with our own or the beamings forth of Divine lustre upon the souls of others when we our selves come to be eclipsed thereby If God were so supreme in our souls as he ought to be we should overlook our selves look upon the excellencies of other men without disdain or envy yea and admire and delight in the communications of God to our fellow-creatures as heartily as if our own particular Beings were adorned with them Certainly there is no such thing as Meum and Tuum amongst the Inhabitants of the upper World but God is All in All unto them and we commonly say that one part of the happiness of Heaven will be that there will be no place for envy and emulation From whence I infer that those souls that are in this World most refined and universaliz'd have most of Heaven come into them and do most plentifully taste the First-fruits of Eternal Life This heavenly temper we find in Moses made manifest in his answer to Joshuah Numb 11. 29. In his Father-in-law Jethro who rejoyced for all the goodness that the Lord had done to Israel Exod. 18. 9. In the Apostles who glorified God and were right glad because that unto the Gentiles also God had granted Repentance
unto Life Act. 11. 18. And in Mr. Calvin who is reported to have spoke thus concerning Luther Lutherus est charus Dei servus etiamsi me diabolum millies mille vocaverit It is an excellent sign of Self-debasement and the exaltation of God in the soul when propriety ceaseth CHAP. XII The sixth Instance an Universal Love The notion of the love of the Brethren examined Who is our Brother according to the Apostle James No man can be truly said to love God who does not love the Image of God The spirit of some men even in their pretences to the love of God is rather Devilish than Divine To be content that men should go to Hell implies a contentment that men should be wicked which is against the Honour of God The seventh Instance an holy unsatisfiedness with all the Attainments of this Life It is an Argument of a mercenary and penurious spirit to be only desirous to know the lowest degree of saving Grace To take up our rest in Evidences destroies the nature of those Evidences The Conclusion is an Exhortation to men to endeavour to make God All to themselves to which they are briefly moved and directed 6. AN Universal Love a Love of the whole Creation If we love all men some with a love of delight others with a love of compassion it is an excellent argument of God's supremacy yea of his Allness in our Affections For it must needs be for God's sake if our Charity be thus large Many men do mightily please themselves with this that they love the Brethren though in the mean time they can well allow themselves to hate all whom themselves are pleased to esteem otherwise But I say unto you saith Love it self Love your Enemies Mat. 5. 44. There is nothing more a-kin to the nature of God than a mind thus unbounded in its Charity and Benevolence vers 45. Men boast much of their love of God why no man hath seen God at any time saies the Apostle 1 Joh. 4. 12. only he hath copied out himself in the Creation and if we love not that it is absurd to talk of loving him as if a man should brag that he lov'd an Universal when in the mean time he hateth all the particulars through which that Universal derives it self The Apostle John speaks much of loving our Brother but would you know who is this brother he describes him in the 1 Joh. 4. 20. His Brother whom he hath seen which must not be understood as if our love were to be limited to them only whom we have actually set our eyes upon but rather it is to be extended to every man that may be seen q. d. Omne visibile est amabile All particular loves are capable of being defiled yea the love of good men may possibly be a bad that is a selfish love But when we find our hearts formed into an universal love of mankind it is a sign that God is principally concern'd in our hearts for all men are not in themselves lovely nor obliging to us I cannot but wonder that ever men should imagine that they are then most loving of God and mightily zealous for him when they most rage against his enemies curse them kill them and devote them to destruction and alledge David's Prophecies to justifie their Imprecations Shall I say concerning these men as our Saviour to his Disciples they know not what spirit they are of Truly one may much suspect it to be Devilish because it is envious bitter wrongful censerious and damning rather than Divine which is pure peaceable gentle easie to be entreated full of mercy c. However sure I am that the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God Jam. 1. 20. God forgive our hasty and rash passions But to be in cold blood well content that any man should go to Hell is a sad sign that ones self is not in the way to Heaven nor spirited according to God For God is Love and desires not the death of a sinner but wills all men to be saved and to come unto the knowledge of the truth 1 Tim. 2. 4. God's glory is indeed the communication and beaming forth of himself unto the creature he is then honoured when he is imitated sin and wickedness is only contrary to the honour of God as darkness alone is contrary to light Yea to be content that men should go to Hell implies a contentment that men should be wicked For it is wickedness alone that brings men to Hell nay indeed to be wicked is to be in Hell 7. An holy unsatisfiedness with all things here below yea with the very gracious attainments of this life and an eager panting after a state of perfection in God It is an argument of a mercenary spirit and a sign that men look upon Eternal Life rather as a Bargain than their proper happiness when they are only desirous to know the lowest degree of saving grace and would go to Heaven at the cheapest rate When men do desire to find evidences of grace in themselves on purpose that they may take up their rest in them and fix there it is a sign of a penurious shrivelled and parsimonious mind and in so doing they do ipso facto destroy the nature of these evidences The surest evidence of grace is that which springs up in the soul it self and discovers it self in the growth of true goodness and in restless motions after God He that can be content with any measure of holiness that is competible to man in this earthly mixed state content to live an eternity in this kind of body yea though he could do it without sin hath not such honourable thoughts of God as he ought to have But when the soul is unsatisfied with all its present acquisitions and attainments and springs up incessantly into God and the further and fuller resemblance of him and into a state of perfect purity as the Apostle Paul did Phil. 3. it is a certain argument and instance of an absolute supremacy that God hath obtained in such a soul And truly I cannot reckon that God is so great in my eye nor so high in my heart as he ought to be till I arrive at this temper To Conclude then Labour to make God All things to your selves according to all the fore-named instances viz. in your Apprehensions Affections Actions Sufferings Enjoyments Endowments to be abstracted as much as can be from all poor pinching particularities And now shall I need to tell you that this is the most noble and Angelical Life You your selves surely know that that which makes the life of Saints and Angels so much happier and more glorious than ours is that they are not sunk into any senses nor drowned in any matter but are perfectly centred upon God and filled with him Shall I need to tell you that thus we shall live in that other World to which we all hope to come or that this will be to us not only
to that but to the two last Only I cannot but intimate that there is a vast difference between fearing of God and being afraid of him To fear him is often made the Character of an ingenuous holy child-like spirit and is therefore made the summ of all Religion Eccles 12. 13. but to be afraid of him to worship him as a severe numen or a saevus dominus with a kind of horrour and invidiousness of mind with a secret kind of wrath and jealousie or doubting does certainly argue a superstitious and legal spirit a mind that for the present is in bondage yea if I mistake not the meaning of the Prophet he makes this the badge of an hypocritical people Isa 33. 14. Fearfulness hath surprized the Hypocrites who amongst us shall dwell with devouring fire who amongst us shall dwell with everlasting burning As soon as Adam had sinned against God he becomes afraid of him and flies from him Gen. 3. And to this day men do secretly hate him whom they fear As for the fear of the creature and fear of trouble in the flesh it is a predominant principle in carnal minds where self rules but it is incident to the best of Saints and is recorded as their infirmity for our caution as in Isaac David Peter who for fear of men denied one his Wife another his reason a third his Saviour But it is weariness of troubles and eager desires of rest from Adversity that are most plainly found in the Text and which I am therefore to speak to I think I need not speak to them singly for I think they are never found single but are inseparable Companions And here I shall endeavour to shew that good men are subject to these distempers Secondly Shew the cause of the distemper Thirdly Prescribe the cure of it And lastly improve the Doctrine in some few Inferences That the hearts of good men are sometimes surprized with impatience of troubles and eager desire of rest from Adversity will appear by the Examples of several eminent Saints I will not peremptorily determine whether the Prophet Elijah were thus distempered when he fled from the Persecution raised against him by Jezabel gat him all alone into the Wilderness and requested for himself that he might die 1 King 19. But I doubt not to affirm that holy Job was under this distemper He sticks not to confess that he is even tired out and wearied and wasted and exhausted in his spirits with the Afflictions that were upon him Wearisome nights are appointed to me Job 7. 3. My soul is weary of my life it is bitter within me Job 10. 1. Therefore you have him even cursing the day and night of his birth almost through the Third Chapter and wishing to be hid in the Grave over and over and that with a great deal of vehemency Job 6. 8 9 10. O that I might have my request and that God would grant me the thing that I long for Even that it would please God to destroy me that he would let loose his hand and cut me off And the Prophet Jeremiah was wearied with the Persecution and Oppression of his Country-men although the same was light in comparison of what he was to suffer Jer. 12. 5. he was wearied with running even with the Foot-men At another time you have him also cursing his Birth-day through impatience and the man that brought tidings of his coming into the World because he slew him not from the Womb Jer. 20. 14 15 16 17. The same Prophet could be content to live a solitary unpleasant unprofitable life like an Anchoret so he might but escape the treachery of the people Jer. 9. 2. What a discontentment and passion Jonah was in and that for a light matter all know and how he will needs be gone out of the World in a pet his History does fully relate Concerning David and his impatience disquietness weariness and perplexity of mind I have many things to say and the book of Psalms does afford many pregnant instances How long wilt thou forget me O Lord how long shall mine enemies exalt themselves over me how long shall the Adversary reproach how long shall the wicked triumph c. But I need not go far from my Text to demonstrate the greatness of David's distemper In the words of this Text and the two following Verses you will discern the greatness of his weariness and the eagerness of his desires of deliverance if we consider the following particulars 1. In general he seems to apprehend his case desperate out of which there was no escape Videntur hae voces esse hominis desperati saies Mollerus The Words of the Text seem to be rather a boyling up of passion than the putting up of a Prayer a wise or well grounded Prayer This is a sad distemper of mind very dishonorable to God and unbeseeming a godly soul and yet so diseased in his mind does David here seem to be as also at other times as when he forgot all the promises that God had made to him and cry'd out All men are Lyars and I shall perish by the hand of Saul 2. More particularly he is so weary of his Persecution and so intent upon deliverance that he puts God upon the working of Miracles for his escape and such a Miracle as we never read that he wrought for any man Oh that I had wings What must the course of nature and the order of the Creation be inverted for him It was a devout and holy zeal in David to envy the Sparrows and the Swallows because they were allowed to come nearer the Altar of God than he Psal 84. 3. But to be content to be transformed into a silly Bird meerly to have the benefit of her wings to escape a temporal danger is certainly a strange distraction in a holy man Oh how wonderful great is the power of this animal life which puts men upon such strange contrivances for its own preservation yea even such men as in whom the reigning power of it is destroyed and a higher life hath taken place Certainly the wings of David's Soul the wings of Faith and hope were sadly moulted away or he would never have invented such a strange device as a winged body He is so eager that any kind of wings will not serve his turn neither they must be wings of a Dove the swiftest that he could think of Oh that I had wings like a Dove For so I judge that he names the wings of a Dove rather than any other Bird because of the great speediness of her flight though I know some men to excuse the Prophet or rather indeed to shew their own wit have invented other reasons Naturalists speak much of the swiftness of the Dove in flying they say she can out-fly the Hawk and need not to fear him if she would but keep a direct and simple flight but when she begins to clap with her wings in a certain kind of pride and