Country and live a great way off from the Heavenly City have as yet no Domicilium in Vrbe no actual Possession of any of its blessed Mansions are notwithstanding Free Denizens of it and have by Covenant a Right to all those blessed Priveledges which its Inhabitants do actually enjoy From whence it is evident that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in that Text referrs to their being Citizens of Heaven and as such it earnestly exhorts them to behave themselves to live as those who being now in a remote Country are yet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Apostle expresses it Ephes. ii 19 i. e. Fellow-Citizens with the Saints above that are connaturalized with them into that Heavenly Commonwealth And being thus understood the Apostles Advice will comprehend in it both those kind of Means which I have before described For to live as Cittizens of Heaven is First to live like those who are the Inhabitants of Heaven to imitate their blessed Manners and Behaviour in doing the Will of God upon Earth as it is done by them in Heaven and this takes in the Practice of all those Heavenly Virtues of which the Religion of the End consists Secondly To live like those that have a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Citizenship in Heaven that are entitled by Covenant to the Priviledges and Immunities of it but are as yet to win its Possession by a continual Warfare and Contention with those manifold Difficulties and Oppositions which lie in our way to it and this takes in the Practice of all those Duties in which the Religion of the Means consists So that to live like Christians or as becomes the Gospel is to live in the continual Use of both kinds of the Means of Happiness So that the Christian Conversation consisting of these Two is the only full and adequate Means by which Heaven can be obtained BUT that I may make this more fully appear I shall consider these two parts of it distinctly and indeavour to shew how effectually each of them doth contribute in its kind to our obtaining the Happiness of Heaven And First I shall begin with the Proximate Means viz. The Practice of all those Heavenly Virtues which are implied in the Religion of the End and do make the Heavenly Part of the CHRISTIAN LIFE CHAP. III. Concerning the Heavenly Part of the Christian Life which is the Proximate Means of obtaining Heaven shewing what Virtues it consists of and how much every Virtue contributes to the Happiness of Heaven VIRTUE in the general consists in a suitable Behaviour to the State and Capacities in which we are placed Now Man who is the Subject of that Virtue we are here discoursing of is to be considered under a threefold Capacity The First is of a Rational Animal the Second of a Rational Animal related to God the Third of a Rational Animal related to all other Creatures And these are the only capacities of Virtue that are in Humane Nature So that all the Virtues we are obliged to and capable of consist in behaving our selves suitably to the State and Condition of Rational Animals that are related to God and their Fellow Creatures BY which three Capacities of our Nature the Virtue or Suitableness of Behaviour which we stand obliged to is distinguished into three kinds viz. The Humane The Divine and The Social Humane Virtue consists in behaving our selves suitably to the State and Capacity of mere Rational Animals Divine Virtue consists in behaving our selves suitably to the Condition of Rational Animals related to God Social Virtue consists in behaving our selves suitably to the Capacity of Rational Animals related to their Fellow Creatures but especially to Rational Creatures that are of the same Class and Society with us THAT I may therefore proceed more distinctly in this Argument I shall endeavour to shew what those Vertues of the Christian Life are which are proper to a man in each of these Capacities and how much each of those Virtues contributes to the Happines of Heaven SECT I. Concerning those Humane Virtues which belong to a Man as he is a Reasonable Animal shewing that they are all included in the Heavenly Part of the Christian Life and that the Practice of them effectually conduces to our future Happiness FIRST we will consider Man in the Capacity of a meer Rational Animal that is compounded of contrary Principles viz. Spirit and Matter or a Rational Soul and Humane Body by which Composition He is as it were the Buckle of both Worlds in whom the Spiritual and Material World are clasped and united together and partaking as he does of both Extreams of Spirit and Matter Angel and Brute there arise within him from those contrary Natures contrary Propensions viz. Rational and Sensual or Angelical and Brutish And in the due Subordination of these his Sensual to his Rational Propensions consists all Humane Virtue For his Reason being the noblest Principle of his Nature must be supposed to be implanted in him by God to rule and govern him to be an Eye to his blind and bruitish Affections to correct the Errours of his Imagination to bound the Extravagancies of his Appetites and regulate the whole Course of his Actions so as that he may do nothing that is destructive or injurious to this excellent Frame and Structure of his Nature But now in this compounded Nature of a Man there are his Concupiscible and Irascible Affections with the first of which he desires and pursues his Pleasures and with the second he shuns and avoids his Dangers and there are also Bodily Appetites such as Hunger Thirst and Carnal Concupiscence and together with these a Self-Esteem and Valuation all which are the natural Subjects of his Reason and indeed the only Subjects upon which it is to exercise its Dominion So that in the well and ill Government of these consists all Humane Virtue and Vice To the perfect well governing therefore of a mans self there are Five things indispensably necessary 1. That He should impartially consult his Reason what is absolutely best for him and by what means it is best attainable and and then constantly pursue what it proposes and directs him to For so far as he is wanting in this he casts off the Government of his Reason 2. That he should proportion his Concupiscible Affections to the just value which his Reason sets upon those things which he affects For every Degree of Affection which exceeds the merit of Things is irrational and consequently injurious to our Rational Nature 3. That he should not suffer his Irascible Affections to exceed those Evils and Dangers which he would avoid For if he doth they will prove greater Evils to him than those Evils or Dangers are which raise and provoke them 4. That he should not indulge his Bodily Appetites to the Hurt and Prejudice of his Rational Nature For if he does he will violate the nobler for the sake of the viler Part of Himself And 5. That upon the
Affection corresponding with the most perfect Draughts and Models of its own Reason it must needs highly approve of and be perfectly satisfied with it self and while it surveys its own Motions and Actions it must necessarily have a most delicious Gust and Rellish of them they being all such as its best and purest Reason approves of with a full and ungainsaying Judgment And thus the Soul being cured of all irregular Affection and removed from all corporeal Passion will live in perfect Health and Vigor and for ever enjoy within it self a Heaven of Content and Peace IV. ANOTHER Virtue which appertains to a man considered meerly as a Rational Animal is TEMPERANCE which consists in not indulging our Bodily Appetites to the Hurt and Prejudice of our Rational Nature Or in refraining from all those Excesses of Bodily Pleasure of Eating Drinking and Venery which do either disorder our Reason or indispose us to enjoy the pure and spiritual Pleasures of the Mind For besides that all Excesses of Bodily Pleasures are naturally prejudicial to our Reason as they indispose those Bodily Organs by which it operates For so Drunkenness dilutes the Brain which is the Mint of the Understanding and drowns those Images it stamps upon it in a Floud of unwholesome Rheums and Moistures and Gluttony cloggs the Animal Spirits which are as it were the Wings of the Mind and indisposes them for the Highest and Noblest Flights of Reason so Wantonness chafes the Bloud into Feverish Heats and by causing it to boil up too fast into the Brain disorders the motions of the Spirits there and so confounds the Phantasms that the Mind can have no clear or distinct Perception of them by which means our Intellectual Faculties are very often interrupted and forced to sit still for want of proper Tools to work with and so by often loitering grow by degrees listless and unactive and at the last are utterly indisposed to any Rational Operations Besides this I say which must needs be a mighty prejudice to our Rational Nature by too much familiarizing our selves to bodily Pleasures we shall break off all our acquaintance with spiritual ones and grow by degrees such utter strangers to them that we shall never be able to rellish and enjoy them and our Soul will contract such an Vxorious Fondness of the Body that being the Shop of all the Pleasure it was ever acquainted with that 't will never be able to live happily without it For though in its separate state it cannot be supposed that the Soul will retain the Appetites of the Body yet if while it is in the Body it wholly abandons it self to Corporeal Pleasures it may and doubtless will retain a vehement hankering after it and longing to be re-united to it which I conceive is the only sensuality that a separated Soul is capable of For when such a Soul arrives into the Spiritual World her having wholly accustomed her self to bodily Pleasure and never experienced any other will necessarily render her incapable of enjoying the Pleasures of pure and blessed Spirits So that being left utterly destitute of all her dear Delights and Satisfactions which are such as she knows she can never enjoy but in conjunction with the Body all her Appetite and Longing must necessarily be an outragious Desire of being Embodied again that so she may be capable of repeating her old sensual Pleasures and acting over the brutish Scene anew AND this as some think is the Reason why such gross and sensual Souls have appeared so often after their separation in the Churchyards or Charnel-Houses where their Bodies were laid because they cannot please themselves without them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The soul that is infected with a great Lust to the Body continues so for a great while after Death and suffering great Reluctancies hovers about this visible place and is hardly drawn from thence by force by the Demon that hath the Guard and Care of it Where by the visible Place he means 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is About their Monuments and Sepulchres where the shadowy Phantasms of such Souls have sometimes appeared For being utterly unacquainted with the Pleasures of Spirits they have nothing in all the spiritual world to feed their hungry Desire which makes them when they are permitted to wander to hover about and linger after their Bodies the Impossibility of being re-united to them not being able to cure them of their impotent Desire of it but still they would fain be alive again and reassume their old Instruments of Pleasure Iterumque ad tarda reverti Corpora Quae lucis miseris tam dira Cupido And hence among other Reasons it was that the Primitive Christians did so severely abstain from Bodily Pleasures that by this means they might gently wean the Soul from the Body and teach it before hand to live upon the Delights of separated Spirits that so upon its separation it might drop into Eternity like ripe Fruit from the Tree with Ease and Willingness and that by accustoming it before to spiritual Pleasures and Delights it might acquire such a savoury Sense and Relish of them as to be able when it came into the spiritual world to live wholly upon them and to be so intirely satisfied with them as not to be endlesly vext with a tormenting Desire of returning to the Body again For so Clemens Alexandrinus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 We that are hunting after the Heavenly Food must take heed that we keep our Earthly Belly in subjection and to keep a strict Government over those things that are pleasant to it For saith he a little before 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Neither saith he is Food our Work nor Pleasure our Aim but we use them only as necessaries to our present Abode in which our Reason is instituting and training us up to a Life incorruptible i. e. They did so use them as that as much as in them lay they might wean their Souls from the pleasures of them that so they might have the better Appetite to that Spiritual Food upon which they were to live for ever AND therefore thus to temperate and restrain our selves in the Use of bodily Pleasures is one of the necessary Virtues of the Christian Life For hitherto tend all those Precepts concerning abstaining from fleshly lusts which war against our Souls I Pet. ii 11 and mortifying the deeds of the Body Rom. viii 13 and keeping under the Body 1 Cor. ix 27 and putting off the body of the sins of the Flesh Coloss. ii 11 And we are strictly enjoined to be temperate in all things to watch and be sober and walk honestly as in the day not in rioting and drunkenness not in chambering and wantonness not in excess of wine revellings and banquettings The sense of all which is That we should not indulge our bodily Appetites to the vitiating and depraving of our spiritual that we should not plunge our selves so far in
or Authority sufficiently warrants him so to do And being thus rightfully enthroned by the infinite Preeminence of his own Power and Majesty all other Beings so far as they are capable stand immutably obliged to submit and resign themselves up to his Government BUT besides that we are obliged to him as he is God we are also bound to him as he is our Creatour For there is always a Power acquired by Benefits where there is none antecedently especially where the Benefit confer'd is no less than that of our Being which is the case between us and God And this is such a Benefit as is sufficient to entitle him to us by an absolute and unalienable Propriety though he had no antecedent right of Dominion over us by virtue of his own infinite Greatness So that though before he created us or any other Being he had free Power to act any thing that lay within the compass of just and lawful which just and lawful was undefineable by any other Law but that of his own Nature and though since his Creation his Power is no more than so so that he hath not acquired to himself any new Power by creating us but only made new Subjects whereon to exercise that ancient Power and Dominion which was eternally inherent in him yet doubtless by giving us our Beings he hath laid new Obligations upon us to obey him For now deriving our selves as we do from him we are bound by all the ties of Equity and Justice to render back our selves to him and to submit those powers to his Dominion which are the effects and off-spring of his Bounty For what can be more just and equal than that that Will which is the Cause of our Beings should be the Law and Rule of our Actions then that we should serve him with those Powers we derived from him and render him back the fruits of his own Plantation For now we are not our own but Gods and He alone hath power to dispose of us and whensoever we dispose of our selves contrary to his Will and Pleasure we do not only invade his Property but employ the spoils of it against him And whilst we continue thus doing it is impossible we should ever be happy For besides that while we continue in Rebellion against him we are in an actual Confederacy with Hell for so when we are told that Rebellion is as the sin of Witchcraft that is Rebellion against God the meaning is that like Witches we are in League with the Devil and are listed Volunteers under those infernal Powers who for blowing the Trumpet of Rebellion in Heaven were banished thence six thousand years ago and have ever since been raising Forces in this lower World against God so that whilst we continue with them in Defiance to God we are in the Devils Muster-Roll who is Captain General of all the revolted Legions and so are of the quite opposite Party to the Loyal people of Heaven and consequently can never hope while we continue such to be admitted to their Society and Happiness besides all this I say Rebellion against God doth naturally draw a Hell of Miseries after it For it cannot be supposed that the wise Sovereign of the World should be so unconcerned for his own Authority as to suffer his Creatures to spurn at and affront it without ever manifesting his Displeasure against them in some dire and sensible Effects And therefore though in this Life which is the time of our Tryal and Probation he mercifully forbears us to lead us to Repentance yet if we leave this Life with our Wills unsubdued and unresigned to him we must not expect to be thus gently dealt with in the other For it is as easie for him who is the Father of our Spirits to correct our Spirits as 't is for the Parents of our Flesh to correct our Flesh. And though our Souls are no more impressible with material stripes than Sun-beams are with the blows of a hammer yet are they liable to have horrid and dismal thoughts impress'd upon them and to be as much aggrieved by them as sensible Bodies are with the most exquisite Torments So that if God be displeased with us there is no doubt but he can imprint his Wrath upon our Minds in black and ghastly thoughts and cause it perpetually to drop like burning sulphur on our Souls And it being in his Power thus to lash our Spirits to be sure when once he is implacably incensed against us as he will be in the other World if we go Rebels thither he will more or less let loose his Power upon us and make us feel his wrathful Resentments by infusing supernatural Horrours into our Souls and scourging our guilty and defenceless Spirits with inspirations of dire and frightful Thoughts Now though this be not a natural and necessary Effect of our Rebellion against God because it depends upon his Will who is a free Agent yet considering that he is a wise Agent and that as such it is necessary he should one way or other manifest his Displeasure against such as are unreclaimable Rebels to his authority it is next to a natural one and at least the fearful Expectation of it in such rebellious spirits which is a misery next to the enduring it is necessary and unavoidable For God hath imprinted a dread of his own Power and Majesty so deeply on our Natures that we are not able with all our arts of Self-deceit wholly to obliterate and deface it and though in this life we may sometimes suppress and stupifie our Sense of God yet even here in despight of our selves 't will ever and anon return upon us And if when we have done what we know is offensive to that invisible Majesty we stand in aw of we do but suffer our selves seriously to reflect upon it there presently arises in our minds a swarm of horrid Thoughts and dismal Expectations and if in this present State in which we have so many Salvo's for our wounded spirits so many Pleasures and Self-delusions to charm our natural dread of God our overcharged Consciences do notwithstanding so often recoil upon us and alarm us with such dismal abodings what will they do hereafter when all those Pleasures are removed and all those Self-delusions baffled with which we were wont to sooth and divert them Then doubtless we shall be continually stung with sharp and dire Reflections and our Consciences like tragick Scenes be all hung round with the Ensigns of Horrour then shall the dread of God perpetually haunt us like a grim Fury and the terrour of his offended Majesty strike us into an everlasting Trembling and Agony For so S. James tells us that the Devils themselves do believe and tremble James ii 19 they believe that there is an Almighty Being above them and are conscious that they are in actual Rebellion against him which makes them horribly afraid of his vengeance and yet such is the inveterate devilishness of their
the most indisposed to render to one another For as Aristotle de Repub. lib. 1. pag. 298. hath observed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 As man in his perfect state is the best of all Animals so separated from Law and Right he is the worst For out of Society we see his Nature presently degenerates and instead of being inclined to assist grows always most salvage and barbarous to his own kind Since therefore we have so much need of each others help Society is absolutely necessary to cherish and preserve in us our natural Benevolence towards one another without which instead of being mutually helpful we should be mutually mischievous For as the same Philosopher hath observed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Id. ibid. He that cannot contract Society with others or through his own Self-sufficiency doth not need it belongs not to any Commonwealth but is either a wild Beast or a God We being therefore so framed for Society and under such necessities of entring into it it hence necessarily follows that being associated together we are all obliged in our several Ranks and Stations so to behave our selves towards one another as is most for the Common Good of All and that since the Happiness of each particular Member of our Society redounds from the Welfare of the Whole and is involved in it we ought to esteem nothing good for our selves that is a Nuisance to the Publick Because whatsoever this suffers I and every man suffer and unless I could be happy alone that can never be for my Interest in particular that is against my Interest in common Now in such a mutual Behaviour as most conduces to our common Benefit and Happiness as we are in Society with one another consists all Social Virtue the proper Use and Design of which is to preserve our Society with one another and to render it a common Blessing to us all And hereunto five things are necessary viz. 1. That we be charitably disposed towards one another 2. That we be just and righteous in all our Intercourses with each other 3. That we behave our selves peaceably in our respective States and Relations 4. That we be very modest towards those that are Superiour to us in our Society whether it be in Desert or Dignity 5. That we be very treatable and condescending to all that are Inferiour to us Under these Particulars are comprehended all those Social Virtues upon which the Welfare and Happiness of Humane Society depends Now that the Practice of all these is included in the Christian Life and doth effectually conduce to our everlasting Happiness I shall endeavour particularly to prove And I. AS rational Creatures associated and so related to one another we are obliged to be kindly and charitably disposed towards each other For the end of our Society being mutually to aid and assist one another it is necessary in order hereunto that we should every one be kind and benevolent to every one that so we may be continually inclined mutually to aid and do good Offices to one another And so far as we fall short of this we fall short of the End of our Society For to be sure the less we love one another the less prone we shall be to promote and further each others Welfare and consequently the less Advantage we shall reap from our mutual Society But if instead of loving we malign and hate each other our Society will be so far from contributing to our Happiness that it will be only a means of rendring us more miserable For it will only furnish us with fairer Opportunities of doing Mischief to one another and that mutual Intercourse we shall have by being united together in Society will supply us with greater Means and Occasions to wreak our spight upon each other For Society puts us within each others reach and by that means if we are enemies renders us more dangerous to one another like two adverse Armies which when they are at a Distance can do but little hurt but when they are joined and mingled never want opportunities to destroy and butcher one another So that Hatred and Malice you see renders our Society a Plague and we were much better live apart poorly and solitarily and withdraw from one another as Beasts of Prey do into their separate Dens than continue in one anothers reach and be always liable as we must be while we are in Society to be baited and worried by one another AND as Hatred and Malice spoils all our Society in this Life and renders it worse than the most dismal Solitude so it will also in the other For whensoever the Souls of men do leave their Bodies they doubtless flock to the Birds of their own Feather and consort themselves with such separate Spirits as are of their own Genius and Temper For besides that good and bad Spirits are by the eternal Laws of the other World distributed into two separate Nations and there live apart from one another having no other Communication or Intercourse but what is between two Hostile Countries that are continually designing and attempting one against another so that when wicked Souls do leave this Terrestrial Abode and pass into Eternity they are presently incorporated by the Laws of that invisible State into the Nation of wicked Spirits and confined for ever to their most wretched Society and Converse besides this I say Likeness doth naturally congregate Beings and incline them to associate with those of their own Kind Now Rancour and Malice is the proper Character of the Devil and the natural Genius of Hell and consequently 't is by a malicious Temper of Mind that we are naturalized before-hand Subjects of the Kingdom of Darkness and qualified for the Conversation of Furies So that when we go from hence into Eternity this our malignant Genius will render us utterly averse to the friendly Society of Heaven and naturally press and incline us to consort with that wretched Nation of spightful and rancorous Spirits with whom we are already joined by a Likeness and Communion of Natures But O! much better were it for us to be shut up all alone for ever in some dark Hole of the World where we might converse only with our own melancholy Thoughts and never hear of any other being but our selves than to be continually plagued with such vexatious Company For though we who are spectators only of Corporeal Action cannot discern the manner how one Spirit acts upon another yet there is no doubt but Spiritual Agents can strike as immediately upon Spirits as bodily Agents can upon Bodies and supposing that these can mututually act upon one another there is no more doubt but they can mutually make each other feel each others Pleasures and Displeasures and that according as they are more or less powerful they can more or less aggrieve and afflict one another And if so what can be expected from a company of spightful and malicious Spirits joined in Society together but that their
Terrors and Allurements we should thereby disarm them of their main Strength and render them much less able to seduce us for the future And this methinks we might easily do if we would but fairly represent to our selves the present State and Posture of our Affairs For we are a sort of Beings that are every Moment travailing from hence to an eternal World where an unexpressible Happiness or Misery attends us and all that we enjoy or suffer in this Life is only the Convenience or Inconvenience of a short Journey to a long Home but can have no other Influence upon our everlasting Condition than as it is the Occasion either of our Virtue or Vice which are the only Goods and Evils that will accompany us to Eternity and make us happy or miserable there for ever But as for Poverty or Riches Pain or Pleasure Disgrace or Reputation they are things which probably within these ten or twenty Years will be as perfectly indifferent to us as our last Nights Dream was when we awoke in the Morning And this methinks duly considered were enough to render us very unconcerned at any Good or Evil that can happen to us here For what a mighty Matter is it whether I fare well or ill for twenty or thirty Years who when that is expired must be happy or miserable for Millions of Millions of Ages and what will these little Goods or Evils signifie to me when my Body is in the Grave and my Soul in Eternity When I am stript into a naked Spirit and set ashore upon the invisible World then all these things will be as if they never were and in the twinkling of an Eye I shall lose Sight of them for ever and of all that I enjoyed or suffered in this Life I shall have nothing remaining but my Virtue or Vice whose Issues will prove my eternal Happiness or Misery Doubtless would we but accustom our Minds to such Reflections as these they would effectually restrain us from the immoderate Love or Fear of the things of this World and reduce us to a constant and efficacious Persuasion that there is no Good in this World comparable to that of doing our Duty nor any Evil incident to us in this Life that is not infinitely less formidable than Sin And when once our Affection to this World and our Opinion of the Goods and Evils of it are thus moderated and rectified the Temptations to Sin will quite lose their hold of us and be no more able to fasten upon our Resolution So that now we may pass safely through them whilst they are sparkling about us there being no Tinder in our Breasts for them to catch fire and kindle upon Now they will be no longer capable to allure or affright us those bosom Orators being silenced that were wont to contend for them and to magnifie their Charms and Terrors and when we neither immoderately love nor fear them 't will be no hard matter to defend our Virtue and Innocence against all their Assaults and Importunities IV. TO our final Perseverance it is necessary that we should more curiously search into the smaller Defects and Indecencies of our Nature in order to our reforming and correcting them Hence we are commanded to hate even the garments spotted by the flesh Jude 23. i. e. to take care of the Beginnings of Sin of any thing that hath the least Spot or Infection of it and accordingly we are obliged not only to take care to rub out the greater Stains of our Nature but to be diligent that we may be found of our Lord in peace without spot and blameless 2 Pet. iii. 14 i. e. to indeavour to reform those smaller and more indiscernable Defects of our Nature which though they do not totally stain yet very much spot and blemish it that so at the coming of our Lord we may be found not only sincere and upright but as near as may be innocent and blameless For so Phil. ii 15 we are bid to be blameless harmless and without rebuke in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation i. e. to endeavour so to demean our selves in this World as that we may appear not only honest for the main but so near as is possible spotless and unreproveable And indeed there is nothing doth more frequently occasion mens final Miscarriage in Religion than their not being careful and diligent in this matter When they first enter into the Christian Warfare they very industriously set themselves against that Course of wilful Sin in which they formerly lived and this were wondrous well if they did not stop here and go no farther but alas in the mean time while they are thus industriously busied in subduing their old Sins there are a great many lesser Flaws and Defects in their Nature which by a timely Care and Inspection they might easily correct but these they take no Notice of but quietly permit them to grow and increase till at last they become as hurtful dangerous to them as their old Sins were against which they have all this while so zealously contended As for Instance when they first entered upon a Resolution of Amendment they were profane it may be or sensual or vehemently adicted to Fraud and Oppression and against these they opposed themselves with great Zeal and Animosity and so far they did well but in the mean time perhaps there was Pride and Ostentation Envy and Peevishness Self-will and Censoriousness secretly budding and sprouting up in their Natures all which they might have easily cured by timely Applications but alas in the Heat of their Contest against their other Sins they never so much as minded or regarded these but e'en left them alone till they grew up into obstinate and inveterate Habits and became every whit as fatal and destructive to their Souls as those were which they have been all this while subduing and mortifying So that after all they have only changed their Sins and have been conjuring up one Devil while they have been laying another and whilst the Tide of their Wickedness hath been ebbing on this Shore it hath been flowing on the contrary and as it hath sunk in Sensuality it hath swelled into Devilishness Perhaps whilst you are zealously carrying on your Warfare against your old Sins you may find your selves too apt to be tickled with Applause and puff'd with vain Ostentation have a Care now that while you are starving one Vice you do not pamper another For if you do not correct this little Irregularity of your Nature betimes 't will soon be as dangerous and mischievous to you as ever any of those Vices were against which you are contending 't will by degrees so insinuate into your good Intentions and so sophisticate the Purity of them that at last you will intend nothing else but Applause and so your whole Religion will be converted into dead Shew and empty Pageantry and your spiritual Warfare will prove only a passage out of Profaneness
Nature but still it hangs upon me and sinks and weighs down my Soul as oft as 't is aspiring towards thee O my God have pity upon me deliver me from this Body of Sin ease my weary and heavy laden Soul of this grievous Burthen under which it labours and groans and suffer not this spark of divine Life which thou hast kindled in me to be opprest and extinguisht by it but so cherish it I beseech thee with the continual Influences of thy Grace as that it may at length it may break through all this Rubbish that suppresses it and finally rise into a glorious Flame Then shall I always approach thee with Joy and breath up my Soul to thee in every Prayer then shall my Heart be firmly united to thee in a devout and chearful Affection and my Prayers shall come up as incense before thee and breathe a sweet-smelling savour into thy Nostrils Hear me therefore O my God I beseech thee and strengthen me with all might in the inward man that for the future I may contend more vigorously and successfully against these vile Inclinations of my Nature which do so miserably hamper and depress my soul that so at last I may be a conqueror and more than a conquerer through Jesus Christ our Lord Amen If through any bodily Infirmity such as Melancholy Weariness Drousiness or Sickness you find your self indisposed to divine Offices indeavour to quicken your sluggish Mind with the Consideration of some one of the most moving Arguments of your Religion such as the Love of God and of your Saviour the Majesty of Gods Presence in which you are or the blessed Immortality you hope for and then address your self to God in this following Prayer O Blessed God thou art a most pure and active Spirit who doest always move with an uncontrolable Freedom and art never hindred or wearied in thy Operations have pity upon me I beseech thee thy poor infirm Creature who am cumbred with this Body of death and so deprest by its manifold Frailties that I cannot lift up my Heart unto thee Thou knowest O Lord my spirit is willing though my flesh is weak my labouring Soul aspires towards thee it stretches forth the Wings of its Desires toward thee and would fain mount up above all earthly things and unite it self with thee in eternal Love but alas its Fervours are dampt and its Endeavours tired by this clog of Flesh that hangs upon it and perpetually sinks and weighs it down again O my God draw near unto me and touch my Mind with such a powerful sense of thee as in despight of these my bodily Indispositions may attract and draw up my Soul unto thee And if it be thy blessed will release me from these fleshly Incumbrances and fit my Body to my Mind that I may serve thee as I desire to do with a fervent and a chearful Spirit But if it shall seem good in thine Eyes to leave me strugling under these bodily Oppressions Lord give me Patience and Submission to thy heavenly Will that so when I cannot approach thee with that Pleasure and Satisfaction I desire I may be heartily content to serve thee upon any Terms and that what I want of Vigour and Chearfulness in my Religion I may make up in Truth and in Reality And O let the Sense of these my present Indispositions cause me more vehemently to long after that free and blessed State wherein with fixt and steady Thoughts with flagrant Love and an entire Devotion of Soul I shall for ever worship praise and glorifie thy name Amen If through present Worldly-mindedness or Vanity of Spirit you find your self cold and apt to be distracted in your Religious Offices indeavour to stir up your Affections by representing to your self the Greatness and Urgency of your spiritual Wants the Vanity of all outward things and the Reality and Fulness of heavenly Enjoyments And do what you can to recollect your wandring Thoughts by setting your self in the Presence of the great God to whose All-seeing Eye every Thought and Motion of your Soul is open and naked And when by thus doing you have composed your Mind into a more serious Frame present this following Prayer O Thou ever blessed Majesty who fillest Heaven and Earth with thy Presence and art always listening to the Supplications of a world of Creatures that hang upon thee open I beseech thee thine Ears of Mercy to me who am unfit and unworthy to approach thee who by setting my Affections upon things below and plunging my self into the Cares and Pleasures of this Life have estrang'd and alienated my Mind from thee and lost that delightful Relish of thee with which I was wont to draw near unto thee And now that I am retired from the World to converse with thee and spread my wants and my desires before thee those worldly Cares and Delights with which I have been too too conversant are importunately thrusting themselves upon me to divert my Thoughts distract my Intentions and carry away my Affections from thee by reason whereof my Mind wanders my Hope droops and my Desires are frozen and whilst I am drawing near thee with my lips my heart is running away from thee O my God have pity upon me pluck my Soul out of this deep mire quicken raise and spiritualize these my groveling Affections Possess this Heart which opens it self to thy gracious Influences with such a strong and vigorous Love to thee as may lift me up above all earthly things and continually carry forth my Soul in vehement Desires after thee that so I may always approach thee with a joyful Heart being glad to leave the company of all other things to go to thee my God my exceeding Joy Give me a sober diligent and collected spirit that is neither choaked with Cares nor scattered with Levity nor discomposed with Passion nor estranged from thee with sinful Prejudice or Inadvertency but fix it fast to thy self with the Indissoluble Bands of an active Love and pregnant Devotion that so when-ever I prostrate my self before thee I may presently be born away far above all these sensible Goods in a high Admiration of thee and a passionate Longing after thee And now O Lord while I am addressing to thee gather in I beseech thee my wandering Thoughts and fix and stay them upon thy self And O do thou touch my cold and earthy Desires with an out-stretched Ray from thy self and cause them to rise and flame up to thee in Fervours answerable to my pressing Wants that I may so ask as that I may receive so seek as that I may find so knock as that it may be opened unto me through Jesus Christ my blessed Lord and Redeemer Amen If after this you find your Heart is very much enlarged and your Mind and Affections vigorously disposed towards God and heavenly things fix your Mind a little while upon the Beauty and Excellency of his Nature or upon some of the most
it And there is nothing will be capable of pleasing the One but what does gratifie the unbounded Liquorishness of the Other NOW to such a Soul the spiritual World must needs be a barren wilderness where no Good grows that it can live upon none but what is nauseous and distastful to its coarse and vitiated Palate where there are noble Entertainments indeed for Minds that are contempered to them that have already tasted and experienced them but not one Drop of Water to cool the Tip of a Sensual Tongue or gratifie the Thirst of a Carnal Desire So that were we admitted to that Heavenly Place where the Blessed dwell yet unless we had acquired their Heavenly Disposition and Temper we could never participate with them in their Pleasures For so great would be the Antipathy of our sensual Affections to them that we should doubtless flie away from them and rather chuse to be for ever Insensible than be condemned to an everlasting Perception of what is so ungrateful to our Natures So that till we have in some measure moderated our Concupiscible Affections and weaned them from their excessive Dotages upon sensual Good it is impossible we should enjoy the Happiness of Heaven For such perfect Opposites are a Spiritual Heaven and a Carnal Mind that unless This be spiritualized or That be carnalized it is impossible they should ever meet and agree III. ANOTHER Virtue that belongs to a Man considered meerly as a Rational Animal is FORTITUDE which in the largest sense consists in not permitting our Irascible Affections to exceed those Evils or Dangers which we seek to repel or avoid in keeping our Fear and Anger our Malice Envy and Revenge in such due subjection as not to let them exceed those Bounds which Reason and the Nature of Things prescribe them For I do not take Fortitude here in the narrow sense of the Moralists as it is a Medium between Irrational Fear and Fool-Hardiness but as it is the Rule by which all those Irascible Passions in us which arise from the sense of any Evil or Danger ought to be guided and directed That by which we are to guard and defend our selves against all those troublesome and disquieting Impressions which outward Evils and Dangers are apt to make upon our Minds And in this Latitude Fortitude comprehends not only Courage as it is opposed to Fear but also Gentleness as it is opposed to Fierceness Sufferance as it is opposed to Impatience Contentedness as it is opposed to Envy and Meekness as it is opposed to Malice and Revenge All which are the Passions of weak and pusillanimous Minds that are not able to withstand an Evil nor endure the least Touch of it without being startled and disordered that are so softned with Baseness and Cowardise that they cannot resist the most gentle Impressions of Injury For as sick Persons are offended with the light of the Sun and the freshness of the Air which are highly pleasant and delightful to such as are well and in health Even so Persons of weak and feeble minds are easily offended their Spirits are so tender and effeminate that they cannot endure the least Air of Evil should blow upon them and what would be only a Diversion to a Couragious Soul troubles and incommodes Them And whatsoever Courage such persons may pretend to it 's meerly a Heat and Ferment of their Bloud and Spirits A Courage wherein Game-Cocks and Mastives out-vy the greatest Heroes of them all But as to that which is truly Rational and Manly which consists in a firm Composedness of Mind in the midst of Evil or Dangerous Accidents they are the most wretched Cowards in Nature For the true Fortitude of the Mind consists in being hardened against Evil upon Rational Principles in being so fenced and guarded with Reason and Consideration as that no dolorous Accident from without is able to invade it or raise any violent Commotions in it In a word in having such a constant Power over its Irascible Affections as not to be overprone either to be timorous in Danger or envious in Want or impatient in Suffering or angry at Contempt or malicious and revengeful under Injuries and Provocations And till we have in some measure acquired this Virtue we can never be happy either here or hereafter FOR whilst we are in this world we must expect to be encompassed with continual Crouds of Evil Accidents some or other of which will be always pressing upon and justling against us So that if our minds are sore and uneasie and over-apt to be affected with Evil we shall be continually pained and disquieted For whereas were our Minds but calm and easie all the Evil Accidents that befall us would be but like a Shower of Hail upon the Tiles of a Musick-House which with all its Clatter and Noise disturbs not the Harmony that is within our being too apt to be moved into Passion by them uncovers our mind to them and lays it open to the Tempest And commonly the greatest Hurt which these outward Evils do us is their disturbing our Minds into violent Passions and this they will never cease doing till we have throughly fortified our Reason against them For if our Reason commands not our Passions to be sure outward Accidents will and while they do so we are Tenants at will to them for all our Peace and Happiness and according as they happen to be Good or Bad so must we be sure still to be Happy or Miserable And in this Condition like a Ship without a Pilot in the midst of a Tempestuous Sea we are the sport of every wind and wave and know not till the Event hath determined it how the next Billow will dispose of us whether it will dash us against a Rock or drive us into a quiet Harbour SO miserable is our Condition here while we are utterly destitute of this Virtue of Fortitude But much more miserable will the want of it necessarily render us hereafter For all those Affections which fall under the Inspection and Government of Fortitude are in their Excesses naturally vexatious to the Mind and do always disturb and raise Tumults in it For so Wrath and Impatience distracts and alienates it from it self and confounds its Thoughts and shuffles them together into a heap of wild and disorderly Fancies so Malice Envy and Revenge do fill it with anxious biting Thoughts that like young Vipers gnaw the Womb that bears them and fret and gall the wretched Mind that forms and gives them Entertainment And though in this world we are not so sensible of the mischief which these black and rancorous Passions do us partly because our sense of them is abated with the Intermixture of our Bodily Pleasures and partly because while we operate as we do by these unwieldy Organs of Flesh our Reflexions cannot be comparably so quick nor our Passions so violent nor our Perceptions so brisk and exquisite as they will doubtless be when we are stript
into naked Spirits yet if we go away into the other World with these Affections unmortified in us they will not only be far more violent and outragious than now and we shall not only have a far quicker Sense of them than now but this our sharp sense of them shall be pure and simple without any intermixture of Pleasure to soften and allay it And if so Good Lord what exquisite Devils and Tormentors will they prove when an extreme Rage and Hate Envy and Revenge shall be all together like so many hungry Vultures preying on our Hearts and our Mind shall be continually baited and worried with all the furious Thoughts which these outragious Passions can suggest to us When with the meagre Eyes of Envy we shall look up towards the Regions of Happiness and incessantly pine and grieve at the Felicities of those that inhabit them when through a sense of our own Follies and of the miserable Effects of them our Rage and Impatience shall be heightned and boiled up into a Diabolical Fury and when at the same time an Inveterate Malice against all that we converse with and a fierce desire of Revenging our selves upon those who have contributed to our Ruine shall like a Wolf in our Breasts be continually gnawing and feeding upon our Souls what an insupportable Hell shall we be to our selves Doubtless that Outward Hell to which bad Spirits are condemned is very terrible but I cannot imagine but that the worst of their Hell is within themselves and that their own Devillish Passions are severer Furies to them than all those Devils that are without them For Wrath and Envy Malice and Revenge are both the Nature and the Plague of Devils and though as Angels they are the Creatures of God yet as Devils they are the Creatures of these their Devillish Affections they were these that transformed them from Blessed Angels into Cursed Fiends and could they but once cease to be envious and malicious they would cease to be Devils and turn Blessed Angels again If then these rancorous Affections have such a malignant Influence as to blacken Angels into Devils and make them the most miserable who were once the most happy Creatures how can we ever expect to be happy so long as we indulge and harbour them WHEREFORE to remove this great Impediment of our Happiness Christianity strictly enjoins us to practise this necessary Virtue of Fortitude which consists in the due Regulation of all these our Irascible Affections in moderating our Anger and Impatience suppressing our Envy and extinguishing all our unreasonable Hatred and Desire of Revenge For hitherto tend all those Evangelical Precepts which require us to put away all bitterness and wrath all clamor and evil speaking and malice Ephes. iv 31 to lay aside all malice and to be children in malice 1 Pet. ii 1 1 Cor. xiv 20 to be strengthned with all might unto all patience and long suffering Coloss. i. 11 And accordingly all the Virtues which are comprehended in this of Fortitude are reckoned among the Fruits of that Blessed Spirit by which we are to be guided and directed Gal. v. 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is peace long-suffering gentleness goodness and meekness all which are nothing but this great Virtue of Fortitude severally exerting it self upon those several Irascible Affections that are in us and guiding and regulating them according to those Laws and Directions which right Reason severally prescribes them and setting such Bounds and Limits to each of them as are necessary to the Peace and Happiness of our Rational Natures That so when Outward Dangers or Evils do excite them they may not start out into such wild Excesses as to become Plagues and Diseases to our Minds NOW how much the Practice of this Virtue conduces to our Heavenly Happiness is evident from hence That all the Diseases and Distemperatures which our Mind is capable of are nothing else but the Excesses of its Concupiscible and Irascible Affections but it s being affected with Good and Evil beyond those Limits and Measures which Right Reason prescribes Did we but love outward Goods according to the value at which true Reason rates them we should neither be vexed with an Impatient Desire of them while we want nor disappointed of our Expectation while we enjoy them And when our Desires towards these outward Goods are reduced to that Coolness and Moderation as neither to be impatient in the Pursuit nor dissatisfied in the Enjoyment of them it is impossible they should give any Disturbance to our Minds And so on the other hand did we but take care to regulate our Resentments of Outward Evils and Dangers as Right Reason advises they would never be able to hurt or discompose our Minds For Right Reason advises that we should not so resent them as to increase and aggravate them that we should not add the Disquietude of an anxious Fear to the Dangers that threaten us nor the Torment of an Outragious Anger to the Indignities that are offered us nor the Smart of a Peevish Impatience to the sufferings that befall us In a word that we should not aggravate our Want through an invidious Pining at anothers Fulness nor sharpen the Injuries that are offered us by a malicious and revengeful Resentment of them And he that follows these Advices of Reason and conducts his Irascible Affections by them has a Mind that is elevated above the Reach of Injury that sits above the Clouds in a calm and quiet Aether and with a brave Indifferency hears the rowling Thunders grumble and burst under its Feet And whilst Outward Evils fall upon timorous and peevish and malicious Spirits like Sparks of Fire upon a heap of Gunpowder and do presently blow them up and put them all in Combustion when they happen to a dispassionate Mind they fall like Stones on a Bed of Down where they sit easily and quietly and are received with a calm and soft Complyance When therefore by the continual Practice of Moderation and Fortitude we have tamed and civilized our Concupiscible and Irascible Affections and reduced them under the Government of Reason our Minds will be free from all Disease and Disturbance and we shall be liable to no other Evil but that of Bodily Sense and Passion So that when we leave our Bodies and go into the World of Spirits we shall presently feel our selves in perfect Health and Ease For the Health of a Reasonable Soul consists in being perfectly Reasonable in having all its Affections perfectly subdued to a well-informed Mind and clothed in the Livery of its Reason And while it is thus it cannot be diseased in that Spiritual State wherein it will be wholly separated from all bodily Sense and Passion because it has no Affection in it that can any way disturb or ruffle its calm and gentle Thoughts And then feeling all within it self to be well and as it should be every String tuned into a perfect Harmony every Motion and
Shame and Fear and when we endeavour the former our Appetite bridles us with Dislike and Aversation In this extremity therefore what is to be done that we may be free Why the case is plain we must resolve to conquer either our Reason or our Lusts if we conquer our Reason which we shall find by far the harder Task of the two we shall acquire the Freedom of Devils and Brutes the Freedom to do Mischief and wallow in the mire without Shame or Remorse but if we conquer our Lusts we acquire the Freedom of Men yea of Saints and of Angels the freedom to act reasonably without Reluctance or Aversation and this being much more easily to be acquired than the former I dare appeal to any mans Reason which of the two is in it self most eligible If therefore we would vindicate our rational Freedom we must resolve to shake off those slavish Fetters our brutish and our devilish Appetites that do so perpetually turmoil and incumber us in all our virtuous Attempts and rational Operations we must tie up our selves from executing their Commands and serving their wicked Wills and Pleasures and heartily resolve to act as it becomes us in the Capacity of rational Creatures related to God and one another And then though at first we must expect to find our selves confined and straitned by our vicious Aversations we shall be immediately released from all that Shame and Fear which did so continually curb us in the carreer of our Wickedness and even our vicious Aversation if we couragiously persist in our good Resolution will grow weaker and weaker and be every day less and less combersome to us till it is totally extinguished And then we shall feel our selves intirely restored into our own Power and be able without Check or Controle to dispose of our selves and all our Motions according as it shall seem to us most fit and reasonable then we shall act with the greatest Vigour and Freedom having no counter-striving Principles to restrain or retard us no vicious Aversations on the one side or guilty Shame or Fear on the other to counterpoize us in our rational Motions then we shall move without Check or Confinement in a large and noble Sphere for we shall be pleased with what is fit and wise and good without any Reserve or Exception and we shall do what we please without any Let or Hindrance So that by ingaging our selves in the heavenly Life we enter into a state of glorious Liberty and if we constantly persist in it and do still prevalently list to live as becomes us we shall be more and more free to live as we list till at last we are arrived into a perfect Liberty wherein we shall live without Restraint or Controul without check of Conscience or reluctance of Inclination which are the two main Bars that confine and straiten men in their Operations If therefore we would ever be free let us immediately come off from our vicious Courses to the Practice of this divine and heavenly Life wherein by degrees if we couragiously hold on we shall wear off those Shackles that do so miserably hamper and intangle us and then we shall be intirely free to do whatsoever our reason dictates to us then we shall run the ways of Gods commandments and like our blessed Brethren above be all Life and Spirit and Wing in the discharge of our Duty to him IV. CONSIDER the Pleasure of this heavenly Life 'T is true there is a sort of Pleasure that results from all the Acts of a sensual and earthly Conversation but we find by Experience that though in the pursuit it strangely allures and inchants us yet in the Fruition it always disappoints our Expectation and scarce performs in the Enjoyment one half of what it promised to our Hope and at the best 't is but a present and transient Satisfaction of our brutish Sense a Satisfaction that dims the Light sullies the Beauty impairs the Vigour and restrains the Activity of the Mind diverting it from better Operations and indisposing it to the fruition of purer Delights leaving no comfortable Rellish or gladsome Memory behind it but oftentimes going out in a stink and determining in Bitterness Regret and Disgrace But in each act of this divine and celestial Life there is something of the Pleasure of Heaven something of those divine Refreshments and Consolations upon which the good People of Heaven do live For the greatest part of their Heaven springs from within their own Bosoms even from the Conformity of their Souls to the heavenly State and the sprightful out-goings of their Minds and Affections towards the heavenly Objects from their contemplating and loving their praising and adoring the most high God from their Imitation of his Perfections their Subjection to his Will and Dependance on his Veracity all which Acts as I have already shewed have the most ravishing Pleasures appendant to them and are so necessary to the Felicity of rational Creatures that the Wit of Man cannot fancy a rational Heaven without them For the heaven of a rational Creature consisting in the most intense and vigorous Exercise of its rational Faculties about the most suitable and convenient Objects what Object can be more convenient to such Faculties than that Almighty Sovereign of Beings whose Power is the Spring of all Truth and whose Nature is the Pattern of all Goodness So that without a perfect Union of our Minds and Wills and Affections with God there can be no possible Idea of a perfect Heaven of rational Pleasures but in this blessed Union lies the very Soul and Quintessence of Heaven Since therefore in every Act of every Virtue of the divine Life there is at least an imperfect Union of the Soul with God it necessarily follows that there must be some degree of the Pleasure of Heaven in every one So that if we do not experience much greater Joy and Delight in the Acts of this divine Life than ever we did in the highest Epicurisms and Sensualities 't is not because there are not much greater in them but because we never exerted them with that Sprightliness and Vigour as we do our sensual Appetites and Perceptions because we are clogg'd in the Exercise of them either by false Principles or bodily Indispositions or sinful Aversations But if we would take the pains to inure and accustom our selves to these heavenly Acts we should find by degrees they would grow natural and easie to us and our Souls would be so habituated contempered and disposed to them that we should upon all Occasions exert them with great Fredom and Inlargement And then we should begin to feel and relish the Pleasure of them then we should perceive a Heaven of Delights springing up from within us and unfolding it self in each beatifical Act of our heavenly Conversation then we should find our selves under the central force of Heaven most sweetly drawn along and attracted thither by the powerful Magnetism of its Joys
Thoughts and Reflections But so long as we keep within the Bounds of Sobriety and do not sally out into malicious or scurrilous or prophane Jesting our Religion doth not only connive at our Mirth but commend and approve it and so remote is it from cramping those Strings and Sinews of the Mind Chearfulness and Action that it recollects their scatterd Vigour and winds up their Slackness to a true Harmony FOR it requires that our speech should be alway with grace Col. iv 6 i. e. as some Expositors understand the Phrase that it should not be whining and melancholy but sprightly and chearful it bids us rejoice evermore 1 Thes. v. 16 and rejoice in the Lord alway and again rejoice Phil. iv 4 that is to indeaver to be chearful in all Conditions and to bear all Events with a serene and lightsome mind And therefore the Apostle reckons this among the blessed Fruits and Effects of that Divine Spirit which accompanies and animates Christianity viz. Joy or Chearfulness Gal v. 22 and this is one of the Particulars in which the same Apostle makes the Christian Laws to consist as they stand opposed to the Ritual Laws of the Jews the Kingdom of Heaven i. e. the Laws of the Christian Church is not meat and drink i. e. consist not of Injunctions or Prohibitions of things that are of a Ritual or indifferent Nature but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost Rom. xiv 17 which three Particulars being opposed to things that are unnecessary must by the Law of Oppositions denote things that are necessary and therefore as by Righteousness and Peace must be meant Justice and Peaceableness so by Joy in the Holy Ghost must be meant Chearfulness and Alacrity in doing the will of God because Joy can be in no other Sense Matter of Necessary Duty By all which its evident that Chearfulness of Temper is so far from being discountenanced by our Religion that 't is required and injoined by it so far as 't is in our Power and Choice And indeed it highly becomes us who serve so good a Master to be free and chearful and thereby to express a grateful sense of his Goodness and of those glorious Rewards which we expect from his inexhaustible Bounty but as for a gloomy Look and dejected Countenance it better beseems a Gally-slave than a Servant of God And as Chearfulness is a Duty that very well becomes our State so it is highly necessary to support and carry us on in our Christian Warfare FOR Chearfulness is Natures best Friend it removes its Oppressions enlivens its Faculties and keeps its Spirits in a brisk and regular Motion and hereby renders it easie to it self and useful and serviceable to God and Man It dispels Clouds from the Mind and Fears from the Heart and kindles and Cherishes in us brave and generous Affections and composes our Natures into such a regular temper as is of all others the most fit to receive religious Impressions and the breathings of the Spirit of God For what the Jews do observe of the Spirit of Prophesie is as true of the Spirit of Holiness that it dwells not with Sadness but with Chearfulness that being it self of a calm and gentle Nature it loves not to reside with black and melancholy Passions but requires a composed and serene Temper to act upon And hence Tertul. in his de Spectac Deus praecepit Spiritum sanctum utpote pro Naturae suae bono tenerum delicatum Tranquillitate Lenitate Quiete Pace tractare non Furore non Bile non Ira non Dolore inquietare i. e. God hath commanded that the holy Spirit who is of a tender and delicate Nature should be entertained by us with Tranquility and Mildness with Quietness and Peace and that we should take care not to disturb him with Fury and Choler or with Anger and Grief And indeed Melancholy naturally infests the holy Spirit and disturbs him in all his operations it overwhelms the Fancy with black Reeks and Vapours and thereby clouds and darkens the Understanding and intercepts the holy Spirits Illuminations and like red coloured Glass before the eye causes the most lovely and attractive Objects to look bloody and terrible It distracts the Thoughts and renders them wild roving and incoherent and thereby utterly indisposes them to Prayer and Consideration and renders them deaf and unattentive to all good Motions and Inspirations It freezes up the Heart with dispairing Fears and Despondencies and represents easie things as difficult to us and difficult as impossible and thereby discourages us from all those vertuous Attempts to which the blessed Spirit doth so importunately excite and provoke us In a word it naturally benums and stupifies the Soul obstructs its Motions and makes it listless and unactive and so by indisposing it to co-operate with the holy Spirit renders it an incapable Subject of his divine Grace and Influence Thus melancholy you see by its sullen and malevolent Aspects doth obstinately resist and counter-influence the holy Spirit without whose Aid and Assistance we can never hope to prosper in our spiritual Warfare WHEREFORE if we mean to succeed in this great Affair it concerns us to use all honest and innocent Means to dispel this black and mischievous Humour and to beget and maintain in our Minds a constant Serenity and Chearfulness of Temper and when ever our Spirits begin to droop and languish to betake our selves to such natural Remedies such harmless Diversions Refreshments and Recreations as are fit and proper to raise them up again and not to suffer them to sink into a Bog of Melancholly Humours whilst 't is in our Power by any honest Art or Invention to support them Which if we can but effect will be of vast Advantage to us in the whole Course of our Religion For in an even Chearfulness of Temper our Spirits will be always lively strong and active and fit for the best and noblest Operations they will give Light to our Understandings Courage to our Hearts and Wings to our Affections so that we shall be able more clearly to discern divine and heavenly things more resolutely to practise and more vehemently to aspire after them and our Considerations will be more fixt our Devotions more intent and all our spiritual Endeavours more active and vivacious For a chearful Temper will represent every thing chearfully to us 't will represent God so lovely Religion so attractive the Rewards of it so immense and the Difficulties of it so inconsiderable and thereby inspire us with so much Life and Courage as that none of all those spiritual Enemies we war and contend against will be able to withstand our Resolution X. TO our Course and Progress in this our spiritual Warfare it is also necessary that we maintain in our Minds a constant Sense and Expectation of Heaven that since the things of the other World are future and invisible and consequently less apt to touch and affect us