Mystical Bedlam

1. The Owners or Possessors, Sons of men.

Adam was called the son of God, Luk. 3. Enos was the son of Seth, Seth the son of Adam, Adam the son of God: But all his posterity the sons of men: we receiving from him both flesh, and the corruption of flesh, yea, and of soul too; though the substance thereof be inspired of God, not traduced from man: for the purest soul becomes stained and corrupt, when it once toucheth the body.

The sons of men. This is a deriuatiue and diminutiue speech; whereby man's conceit of himself is lessened, and himself lessoned to humility. Man, as God's creation left him, was a goodly creature, an abridgement of heaven and earth, an Epitome of God and the world: resembling God, who is a Spirit, in his Soul, and the World, which is a Body, in the composition of his. Deus maximus inuisibilium, mundus maximus visibilium: God the greatest of invisible natures, the World the greatest of visible creatures: both brought into the little compass of Man.

Now Man is grown less; and as his body in size, his soul in vigor, so himself in all virtue is abated: so that the son of man is a phrase of diminution, a bar in the Arms of his ancient glory, an exception of his derogate and degenerate worth.

Two instructions may the sons of men learn in being called so. 1. Their spiritual corruption. 2. Their natural corruptiblenes.

1. That corruption and original pravity, which we have derived from our Parents. Psal. 51. Behold, saith David, I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me. The original word is, warm me: as if the first heat derived to him, were not without contamination. I was borne a sinner, saith a Saint.

It is said, Gen. 5. that Adam begat a son in his own likeness, after his image, and called his name Seth. This image and likeness cannot be understood of the Soul: for this Adam begat not. Nor properly and merely of the Bodies shape; so was Cain as like to Adam, as Seth, of whom it is spoken. Nor did that image consist in the piety and purity of Seth: Adam could not propagate that to his son, which he had not in himself: virtues are not given by birth, nor doth grace follow generation, but regeneration. Neither is Seth said to be begotten in the Image of Adam, because mankind was continued and preserved in him. But it intends that corruption, which descended to Adams posterity by natural propagation. The Pelagian error was, Peccatum primae transgressionis in alios homines, non propagatione, sed imitatione transisse: that the guilt of the first sin was derived to other men, not by propagation, but by imitation: but then could not Adam be said, to beget a son in his own image: neither could Death have seized on Infants, who had not then sinned. But all have sinned, Rom. 5. As by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin: so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.

This title then, the sons of men, puts us in mind of our original contamination, whereby we stand guilty before God, & liable to present and eternal judgments. Dura, tremenda refers: You will say with the Disciples, John. 6. This is an hard saying, who can hear it, bear it? nay, be ready to conclude with a sadder inference, as the same Disciples, after a particular instance, Math. 19. Who then can be saved?

I answer, We derive from the first Adam, sin and death: but from the second Adam, Grace and Life. As we are the sons of men, our state is wretched, as made the sons of God, blessed. It is a peremptory speech, 1. Cor. 15. 50. Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, neither doth corruption inherit incorruption. It is a reviving comfort in the 6. Chapter of the same Epistle: Such we were, but we are washed, but we are sanctified, but we are justified, in the name of the Lord Jesus, & by the spirit of our God. The conclusion or inference hereon is most happy. Now therefore there is no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit. We may live in the flesh, but if after the flesh, we shall die. Si voluntati & voluptati carnis satissacere conemur: If our endeavours be wholly armed and aimed to content the Flesh: but if we be led by the spirit, cum dilection, cum delectation, with love, with delight, we are of the sons of men, made the sons of God.

It is our happiness, not to be borne, but to be new borne. The first birth kills, the second gives life. It is not the seed of man in the womb of our mother; but the seed of Grace in the womb of the Church, that makes us blessed. Generation lost us; it must be regeneration, that recovers us. As the tree falls, so it lies: and lightly it falls to that side, which is most loden with fruits and branches. If we abound most with the fruits of obedience, we shall fall to the right hand, life: if with wicked actions, affections, to the left side, death.

It is not then, worth the ascription of glory to, what we derive naturally from man. David accepts it as a great dignity, to be son in law to a King. To descend from Potentates, and to fetch our pedigree from princes, is held mirabile, et memorabile decus, a dignity not to be slighted or forgotten. But to be a Monarch;

Oh, this is Celsissima gloria mundi, the supremest honor of this world, yet Princes are but men, saith the Psalmist. Put not your trust in Princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help. His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth. They may be high by their calling, Princes; yet they are but low by their nature, sons of men. And merely to be the son of man, is to be corrupt and polluted. They are sinful, the sons of men: weak, there is no help in them: corruptible, their breath goeth forth: dying, they return to their earth.

It is registered as an evident praise of Moses his faith, that for the rebuke of Christ, he refused to be called the son of Pharaohs daughter. There is no ambitiō good in the sons of men, but to be adopted the sons of God: under which degree there is no happiness, above which no cause of aspiring.

2. Our Corruptiblenesse is here also demonstrated. A mortal Father cannot beget an immortal son. If they that brought us into the world, have gone out of the world themselves, we may infallibly conclude our own following. He that may say, I have a man to my Father, a woman to my mother in his life; may in death, with Job say to Corruption, Thou art my Father: to the worm, Thou art my mother, and my sister.

It hath been excepted against the justice of God, that the sin of one man is devolved to his posterity; and that for the fathers eating sour grapes, the children's teeth are set on edge, according to the Jewish Proverb, Ier. 31. 29. As if we might say to every son of man, as Horace sung to his friend: Delicta maiorum immeritus lues: Thou being innocent, doest suffer for thy nocent superiors. This a Philosopher objected against the gods; strangely conferring it, as if for the fathers disease, physic should be ministered to the son.

I answer, Adam is considered as the root of mankind: that corrupt mass, whence can be deduced no pure thing. Can we be borne Morians without their black skins? It is possible to have an Amorite to our father, and an Hittite to our mother, without participation of their corrupted natures? If a man slip a syense from a hawth orne, he will not look to gather from it grapes. There is not then a son of man in the cluster of mankind, but ( eodem modo & nodo, vinctus & victus ) it is liable to that common and equal law of death.

It is no new thing to die, since life itself is nothing else, but a journey to death. Quicquid ad summum peruenit, adexitum properat: He that hath climbed to his highest, is descending to his lowest. All the sons of men die not one death, for time and manner: for the matter and end, one death is infallible to all the sons of men. The corn is sometimes bitten in the spring, often trode down in the blade, never fails to be cut up in the ear, when ripe: Quisquis queritur hominem mortuum esse, queritur hominem fuisse: Who laments, that a man is dead, laments that he was a man.

When Anaxagoras heard that his son was dead, he answered without astonishment, Scio me genuisse mortalem: I know that I begat a mortal man. It was a good speech, that fell from that shame of Philosophy, Epictetus: Non sum aeternitas, sed homo: particula vniuersi, vt hora diei: venire igitur oportet vt horam, praeterire vt horam: I am not eternity, but a man: a little part of the whole, as an hour is of the day: like an hour I came, and I must depart like an hour.

This should teach us, to arm our selves with patience and expectation, to encounter Death: Saepe debemus mori, nec volumus: morimur, nec volumus: Often we ought to prepare for death, we will not: at last, we die indeed, and we would not. Adam knew all the beasts, and called them by their names: but his own name he forgot, Adam, of earth. What bad memories have we, that forget our own names and selves, that we are the sons of men, corruptible, mortal? Incertum est, quo loco te mors expectat: itaque tu illam omni loco expecta. Thou knowest, in what place Death looketh for thee: therefore do thou look for him in every place. Watch therefore; for you know not what hour your Lord doth come. Thus for the Owners.

2. The vessel it self is the Heart.

The Heart is Mans principal vessel. We desire to have all the implements in our house good: but the vessel of chiefest honor, principally good. Quanm male de te ipse meruisti, &c. saith Saint August. How mad is that man that would have all his vessels good, but his own heart! We would have a strong nerve, a clear vein, a moderate pulse, a good arm, a good face, a good stomach, only we care not how evil the heart is, the principal of all the rest.

For, howsoever the Head be called the Tower of the mind, the Throne of Reason, the house of wisdom, the Treasure of memory, the Capitol of judgment, the shoppe of affections: yet is the Heart the receptacle of life, And Spiritus, which (they say) is Copula animae & corporis, a virtue uniting the soul and the body: if it be in the Liver natural, in the Head animal, yet is in the Heart vital. It is the member, that hath first life in mā, and is the last that dies in man; and to all the other members gives vivification.

As man is Microcosmus, an abridgement of the world, he hath heaven resembling his soul: earth his heart, placed in the midst as a center: the Liver is like the sea, whence flow the lively springs of blood: the Brain, like the sun, gives the light of understanding: and the senses are set round about, like the stars. The Heart in man is like the root in a tree: the organ or lung-pipe, that comes of the left cel of the heart, is like the stock of the tree, which divides it self into two parts, and thence spreades abroad (as it were) sprayes and boughs into all the body, even to the arteries of the head.

The Egyptians have a conceit, that man's growing or declining follows his Heart. The Heart of man, say they, increaseth still, till he come to fifty years old, every year two drachmes in weight, and then decreaseth every year as much, till he come to an hundred: and then for want of Heart, he can live no longer. By which consequence, none could live about an 100. years: which conceyted demonstration hath often proved false. But it is a vessel, a living vessel, a vessel of life.

It is a vessel properly, because hollow: hollow to keep heat, and for the more facile closing & opening. It is a spiritual vessel, made to contain the holy dew of grace, which make glad the City of God. It is ever full, either with that precious juice, or with the pernicious liquor of sin. As our Savior saith, Math. 15. Out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies. Know you not, saith his Apostle, that you are the Temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? If our Corpus be Templum Domini, sure our Cor is Sanctum sanctorum. It was the answer of the Oracle, to him that would be instructed, what was the best Sacrifice.

Which three Characters make Cor the heart. The good heart is a receptacle for the whole Trinity: and therefore it hath three Angels, as if the three Persons of that one Deity would inhabit there. The Father made it, the Son bought, the Holy Ghost sanctifies it: therefore they all three claim a right in the Heart. It hath three cels for the three persons, and is but one Heart for one God. The world cannot satisfy it: a Globe cannot fill a Triangle. Only God can sufficiently content the Heart.

God is, saith a Father, non corticis, sed cordis Deus: not regarding the rind of the lips, but the root of the Heart. Hence Satan directs his malicious strength against the Heart. The fox doth gripe the neck, the mastiff flies at the throat, and the Ferret nippes the Liver: but the Devil aims at the Heart, inficere, interficere. The Heart he desires, because he knows, God desires it: and his ambition still inclines, intends his purposes and plots, to rob God of his delight. The Heart is the chief Tower of life to the body, and the spiritual Citadel to the whole man: always besieged by a domestical enemy, the Flesh: by a civil, the world: by a professed, the Devil. Every perpetrated sin doth some hurt to the walls; but if the Heart be taken, the whole Corporation is lost.

How should Christ enter thy house, and sup with thee, when the Chamber is taken up, wherein he would rest, the Heart? All the faculties of Man follow the Heart, as servants the Mistress, wheels the poise, or links the first end of the chain. When the Sun riseth, all rise; beasts from their dens, birds from their nests, men from their beds. So the Heart leads, directs, moves the parts of the body, and powers of the soul: that the mouth speaketh, hand worketh, eye looketh, ear listneth, foot walketh; all producing good or evil, from the good or evil treasure of the heart. Therefore the penitent Publican beat his Heart, as if he would cal up that, to call up the rest.

It is conspicuous then, that the heart is the best vessel, whereof any son of man can boast himself possessor: and yet ( prohdolor! ) even this is corrupted. To declare this pollution, the next circumstance doth justly challenge: only one caveat to our hearts, of our Hearts, ere we leave them. Since the Heart is the most precious vessel, man hath in all his corporal household, let him have good regard to it. Omni custodia custodi cor tuum: Keep thy heart with all diligence, saith Solomon. GOD hath done much for the Heart, naturally, spiritually.

For the former; He hath placed it in the midst of the body, as a General in the midst of his Army: bulwarked it about with breast, ribs, back. Lest it should be too cold, the liver lies not far off, to give it kindly heat: lest too hot, the lungs lie by it, to blow cool wind upon it. It is the chief, and therefore should wisely temper all other members: by the spleen we are moved to laugh; by the gall to be angry: by the brain we feel, by the liver we love, but by the heart we be wise.

Spiritually, he hath done more for the heart, giving the blood of his Son to cleanse it, soften it, sanctify it, when it was full, both of hardness and turpitude. By his omnipotent grace he vnroosted the Devil from it, who had made it a stable of uncleanness: and now requires it (being created new ) for his own chamber, for his own bed. The purified heart is God's Sacrary, his Sanctuary, his House, his Heaven. As Saint August. glosseth the first words of the Pater noster. Our Father which art in heaven, that is, in a heart of an heavenly disposition. Quàmpropitia dignatio ista, that the King of Heaven will vouchsafe to dwell in an earthly Tabernacle!

The Heart then being so accepted a vessel, keep it at home: having but one so precious supellectile or movable, part not with it upon any terms. There are four busy requirers of the Heart, besides he that justly oweth it. Beggars, Buyers, Borrowers, Thieves.

1 He that begs thy Hart, is the Pope: and this he doth not by word of mouth, but byletters of commondations, condemnations rather, his Seminary factors. He begs thy Heart, and offers thee nothing for it, but crucifixes, images, &c. mere images or shadows of reward: or his blessing at Rome; which, because it is so far distant, as if it lost all the virtue by the way, doth as much good, as a candle in Sunshine.

2▪ He that would buy this vessel of us, is the Devil; as one that distrusts to have it for nothing: and therefore set what price thou wilt upon it, he will either pay it, or promise it. Satan would fain have his Jewel-house full of these vessels, and thinks them richer ornaments, then the Babylonian Ambassadors thought the treasures of Hezekiah. Haman shall have grace with the King, Absalom honor, Jezebel revenge, Ammon his lusts satisfied, Judas money, Demas the world, if they will sell him their Hearts,. If any man, like Ahab, sell his heart to such a purchaser, let him know, that qui emit, interimit: he doth buy it, to butcher it.

3 The Flesh is the Borrower, and he would have this vessel to use, with promise of restoring. Let him have it a while, and thou shalt have it again; but as from an ill neighbor, so broken, lacerated, deformed, defaced; that though it went forth rich, like the Prodigal, it returns home tattered and torn, and worn, no more like a heart, then Michols image on the pillow was like David. This Sutour borrows it of the Citizen, till usury hath made him an Alderman: of the Courtier, til ambition hath made him noble: of the Officer, till bribery hath made him master: of the Gallant, till riot hath made him a beggar: of the Luxurious, till lust hath filled him with diseases: of the Country Churl, till covetise hath swelled his barns: of the Epicure, till he be fatted for death: and then sends home the heart, like a Iade, tired with unreasonable travel. This is that wicked borrower, in the Psalm, which payeth not again. Thou wouldest not lend thy beast, nor the worst vessel in thy house to such a neighbor: and wilt thou trust him with thy heart? Either not lend it, or look not for it again.

4. The World is the Thief, which (like Absalom) steals away the heart. This cunningly insinuates into thy breast, beguiling the Watch or Guard, which are thy senses, and corrupting the servants, which are thy affections. The world hath two properties of a Thief: first, It comes in the night time, when the lights of reason and understanding are darkened, and security hath gotten the heart into a slumber. This dead sleep, if it doth not find, it brings.

2 It makes no noise in coming, lest the family of our revived thoughts wake, and our sober knowledge discern his approach. This thief takes us, as it took Demas, napping: terrifies us not with noise of tumultuous troubles, and alarm of persecutions; but pleasingly gives us the music of gain, and lappes us warm in the couch of lusts. This is the most perilous oppugner of our hearts: neither beggar, buyer, nor borrower could do much without this thief. It is some respect to the world, that makes men either give or sell, or lend the vessel of their heart. Astus pollentior armis: Fraud is more dangerous then force. Let us beware this thief.

First, turn the beggar from thy door, he is too saucy, in asking thy best movable, whereas beggars should not choose their alms. That Pope was yet a little more reasonable, that shown himself content with a King of Spain's remuneration; The present you sent me was such, as became a King to give, and S. Peter to receive: But da pauperibus: the Pope is rich enough.

Then reject the buyer: set him no price of thy heart, for he will take it of any reckoning. He is near driven, that sels his heart. I have heard of a Jew that would for security of his lent money, have only assured to him a pound of his Christian debtors living flesh: a strange forfeit, for default of paying a little money. But the Devil, in all his covenants, indents for the heart. In other bargains, caveat emptor, saith the Proverb: Let the buyer take heed: in this, let the seller look to it. Make no marte nor market with Satan.

Non been pro multo libertas venditur auro.

The heart is ill sold, what ever the price be.

Thirdly, for the borrower: Lend not thy heart in hope of interest, lest thou lose the principal. Lend him not any implement in thy house, any affection in thy heart: but to spare the best vessel to such an abuser, is no less then mad charity.

Lastly, ware the thief: and let his subtlety excite thy more provident prevention. Many a man keeps his goods safe enough from beggars, buyers, borrowers, yet is met withal by thieves.

Therefore lock up this vessel with the Key of faith, bar it with resolution against sin, guard it with supervisiting diligence, and repose it in the bosom of thy Savior. There it is safe from all obsidious, or insidious oppugnations: from the reach of fraud or violence. Let it not stray from this home, lest like Dinah it be deflowered. If we keep this vessel our selves, we endanger the loss. Jacob bought Esau's birth-right, & Satha stole Adams Paradise, whiles the tenure was in their own hands. An Apple beguiled the one, a mess of pottage the other. Trust not thy heart in thine own custody; but lay it up in heaven with thy treasure. Commit it to Him, that is the maker and preserver of men: who will lap it up with peace, and lay it in a bed of joy, where no adversary power cā invade it, nor thief break through to steal it.

3. The Liquor this vessel holds, is evil.

Evil is double, either of Sin, or of Punishment: the deserving and retribution: the one of man's own affecting, the other of God's just inflicting. The former is simpliciter malum, simply evil of it own nature: the latter but secundum quid, in respect of the sufferer, being good in regard of God's glory, as an act of his Justice. For the Evils of our sufferings, as not intended here, I pretermit. Only, when they come, we learn hence how to entertain them; in our opinion, as our due rewards: in our patience, as men, as Saints: that tribulation may as well produce patience, as sin hath procured tribulation. Non sentire mala sua non est hominis, & non ferre non est viri: He that feels not his miseries sensibly, is not a man: and he that bears them not courageously, is not a Christian.

The juice in the heart of the sons of men is evil, all have corrupted their ways. Solomon speaks not here in indiuiduo, this or that son of man: but generally, with an universal extent, the sons of men. And leaving the plural with the Possessors, by a significant salaecisme, he names the vessel in the singular; the heart, not hearts: as if all mankind had cor vnum in vnitate malitiae: one heart in the unity of sin: the matter of the vessel being of one polluted lump; that every man, that hath an heart, hath naturally an evil heart. Adam had no sooner by his one sin slain his posterity, but he begot a son, that slew his brother. Adam was planted by God a good Vine, but his Apostasy made all his children sour grapes. Our nature was sown good, behold, we are come up evil. Through whose default ariseth this badness?

God created this vessel good; man poison'd it in the seasoning. And being thus distayned in the tender newness, seruat odorem testa diu: it smells of the old infection, till a new juice be put into it, or rather it self made new. As David prays: Create in me, oh Lord, a clean heart, and renew a right spirit within me. GOD made us good, we have marred ourseluesa,nd behold: we call on him, to make us good again. Yea, even the vessel thus recreated, is not without a tang of the former corruption. Paul confesseth in himself a body of Death, as well as David a native uncleanness. The best grain sends forth that chaff, whereof before the sowing, it was purged by the fan. Our contracted evil had been the less intolerable, if we had not been made so perfectly good. He that made heaven and earth, air and fire, Sun and Moon, all elements, all creatures good, surely, would not make him evil, for whom these good things were made. How comes he thus bad? Deus hominem fecit, homo se interfecit. In the words of our Royal Preacher, Eccles. 7. Loe, this only I have found, that God hath made man upright: but they have sought out many inventions. Man was created happy, but he found out tricks, to make himself miserable. And his misery had been less, if he had never been so blessed: the better we were, we are the worse. Like the posterity of some profuse or tainted Progenitour, we may tell of the Lands, Lordship’s, honors, titles, that were once ours; and then sigh out the song, fuimus Troes, we have been blessed.

If the heart were thus good by creation, or is thus good by redemption, how can it be the continent of such evil liquor? when by the word of His mouth that never erred, A good tree cannot bring forth bad fruits. I answer, that saying must be construed in sensu composito: a good tree continuing good, cannot produce evil fruits. The heart borne of God (in quanto renatum est, not peccat) doth not commit sin, so far as it is borne of GOD. Yet even in this vessel, whiles it walks on earth, are some drops of the first poison. And so,

But Solomon speaks here of the heart, as it is generate, or degenerate, not as regenerate: what it is by nature, not by grace: as it is from the first Adam, not from the second. It is thus a vessel of evil. Sin was brewed in it, & hath brewed it into sin. It is strangely, I know not how truly, reported of a vessel, that changeth some kind of liquor put into it, into it self: as fire transforms the fuel into fire. But here the content doth change the continent; as some mineral veins do the earth, that holds them. This evil juice turns the whole heart into evil; as water poured upon snow, turns it to water. The wickedness of man was so great in the earth, that it made every imagination of the thoughts of his heart only evil continually.

Here, if we consider the dignity of the vessel, & the filthiness of the evil it holds, or is rather holden of; (for non tam tenet, quam tenetur ) the comparison is sufficient to astonish us.

Quàm male convenient vas aureum, atrum{que} venenum! Oh! ingrate, in considerate man! to whom God hath given so good a vessel, and he fills it with so evil sap. In a great house there be vessels of honor, and vessels of dishonor; some for better, some for baser uses. The heart is a vessel of honor, sealed, consecrated for a receptacle, for an habitacle of the graces of GOD. Shall we take the member of Christ, and make it an harlots; the vessel of God, & make it Satan's? did God infuse into us so noble a part, & shall we infuse into it such ignoble stuff? was fraud, falsehood, malice, mischief, adultery, idolatry, variance, variableness ordained for the heart, or the heart for them? when the seat of holiness is become the seat of hollowness: the house of innocence, the house of impudence: the place of love, the place of lust: the vessel of piety, the vessel of pravity: the throne of God, the court of Satan; the heart is become rather a Ielly, then an heart. Wherein there is a tumultuous, promiscuous, turbulent throng, heaped and amazed together, like a wine-drawers stomach; full of Dutch, French, Spanish, Greek, and many country wines; envy, lust, treason, ambition, avarice, fraud, hypocrisy obsessing it, and by long tenure pleading prescription: that custom, being a second nature, the heart hath lost the name of heart, and is become the nature of that it holds, a lump of evil.

It is detestable ingratitude in a Subject, on whom his Sovereign hath conferred a golden cup, to employ it to base uses; to make that a wash-potte, which should receive the best wine he drinketh. Behold, the King of heaven and earth hath given thee a rich vessel, thy heart; wherein, though it be a piece of flesh or clay of it self, he hath placed the chief faculties of thy spirit and his: how adverse to thankfulness and his intent is thy practice, when thou shalt pour into this Cup lees, dregs, muddy pollutions, tetricall poisons, the waters of hell, wines which the infernal spirits drink to men: taking the heart from him that created it, from him that bought it, from him that keeps it; and bequeathing it in the death of thy soul, to him that infects, afflicts, tempts, and torments it: making him thy Executour, which shall be thy executioner; that hath no more right to it, then Herod had to the bed of his sister? What injury, what indignity is offered to God, when Satan is gratified with his goods: when his best movable on earth is taken from him, & given to his enemy?

The heart is flos solis, and should open & shut with the sun of righteousness. To him, as the Landlord, duplici iure, it should stand opē, not suffering him to knock for entrance, till his locks be wet with the dew of heaven. Alas! how comes it about, that he which is the owner can have no admission? That we open not the doors of our hearts, that the King of glory might enter; who will then one day open the doors of heaven, that a man of earth may enter? Did God erect it as a lodging for his own Majesty; leaving no window in it, for the eye of man (so much as) to look into it, as if he would keep it under lock & key to himself, as a sacred Challice, whereout he would drink the wine of faith, fear, grace and obedience, wine which himself had sent before for his own supper: and must he be turned forth by his own Steward, and have his Chamber let out for an Ordinary, where sins and lusts may securely revel? Will not He that made it, one day break it with a rod of iron, and dash it in pieces like a Potters vessel?

Shall the great Belshazzar, that Tyrant of Hel, sit drinking his wines of abomination and wickedness, in the sacred boules of the Temple, the vessels of God, the hearts of men, without ruin to those that delightfully suffer him? was it a thing detestable in the eyes of God, to profane the vessels of the Sanctuary; and will he brook with impunity the hearts of men to be abused to his dishonor? Sure, his justice will punish it, if our injustice do it. The very vessels under the Law, that had (but) touched an unclean thing, must be rinced or broken. What shall become of the vessels under the Gospel, ordained to hold the faith of Christ, if they be (more then touched) polluted with uncleanness? They must either be rinced with repentance, or broken with vengeance.

I am willingly led to prolixity in this point. Yet in vain the Preacher amplifies, except the hearer applies. Shall none of us, in this visitation of hearts, ask his own heart, how it doth? Perhaps, Security will counterfeit the voice of the heart, as Jacob did Esau's hands, to supplant it of this blessing; saying, I am well: and stop the mouth of diligent scrutiny with a presentment of Omnia been. Take heed; the heart of man is deceitful above measure. Audebit dissimulare, qui audet malefacere: He will not stick to dissemble, that dares to do evil. Thou needest not rip up thy breast, to see what blood thy heart holds, though thou hast been unkind enough to it in thine iniquities: behold, the beams of the Sun on earth witness his shining in heaven; and the fruits of the Tree declare the goodness or badness. Non ex folijs, non ex floribus, sed ex fructibus dignoscitur arbor.

What is lust in thy heart, thou adulterer; malice in thine, thou envious: usury in thine, thou covetous; hypocrisy in yours, ye sons of Gibeon; pride in yours, ye daughters of Jezebel; falsehood in yours, ye brothers of Joab; and treachery in yours, ye friends of Judas? Is this wine fit for the Lord's boule, or dregs for the Devil to carouse of? Perhaps the sons of Belial will be filthy; let them be filthy still. Who can help them, that will not be saved? let them perish.

Let me turn to you, that seem Christians, (for you are in the Temple of Christ, and I hope, come hither to worship him,) with confidence of better success. What should uncleanness do in the holy City, evil in a heart sanctified to grace, sealed to glory? The vessel of every heart is by nature temperde of the same mould; nor is there any, (let the proud not triumph) Quorum praecordia Titan de meliore luto sinxit. But though nature knew none grace hath made difference of hearts; and the sanctified heart is of a purer metal, then the polluted. A little living stone in God's building is worth a whole quarry in the world. One poor man's honest heart is better then many rich evil ones. These are dead; that's alive: and a living dog is better then a dead Lion. Solomon's heart was better then Absalom's, Jude’s then Judas, Simon Peters then Simon Magus his: all of one matter, clay from the earth, but in regard of qualities, and God's acceptance, the richest mine and coarsest mould have not such difference. There is with nature grace, with flesh faith; with humanity Christianity in these hearts.

How it becomes it such a heart, to have hypocrisy, injustice, fraud, covetousness leen in it? Let these bitter waters live in heathen cesterns. To the master of maledictiō, & his ungodly imps we leave those vices: our harts are not vessels for such liquor. If we should entertain thē, we give a kind of warrant to others imitatiō. Whiles Polygamie was restrained within Lamechs doors, it did but moderate harm: but when it once insinuated into Isaac's family, it got strength, & prevailed with great prejudice. The habits of vices, whiles they dwell in the harts of Belials children, are merely sins: but when they have room givē thē in the harts of the sons of God, they are sins and examples: not simply evil deeds, but warrants to evil deeds. Especially with such despisers and despiters of goodness; who, though they love, embrace and resolve to practice evil, yet are glad, they may do it by Patronage, and go to hell by example.

But how can this evil juice in our hearts be perceived? what beams of the Sun ever pierced into that abstruse and secret pauilion? The anatomizing of the heart remains for the work of that last and great day. Rom, 2. 16. As no eye can look into it, so let no reason judge it. But our Savior answers, Out of the heart proceed actual sins: the water may be close in the fountain, but will be discerned issuing out. The heart cannot so contain the unruly affections, but like headstrong rebels they will burst out into actions; and works are infallible notes of the heart. I say not, that works determine a man to damnation or bliss: the decree of God orders that: but works distinguish of a good or bad man. The Saints have sinned, but the greatest part of their converted life hath been holy.

Indeed we are all subject to passions, because men: but let us order our passions well, because Christiā men. And as the skillful Apothecary makes wholesome potions of noisome poisons, by a wise melling and allaying them: so let us meet with the intended hurt of our corruptions, and turn it to our good. It is not a sufficient commendation of a prince to govern peaceable and loyal subjects: but to subdue or subvert rebels. It is the praise of a Christian to order refractary and wild affections, more then to manage yielding and pliable ones. As therefore it is a provident policy in Princes, when they have some in too likely suspicion, for some plotted faction, to keep them down, and to hold them bare: that though they retain the same minds, they shall not have the same means to execute their mischiefs: so the rebellious spirits impotency gives most security to his Sovereign: whiles He sees afar off what he would do, but knows (near at hand, that's certainly) he cannot. So let thy heart keep a straight & awful hand over thy passions and affections: Vt si moueant, non remoueant: that if they move thee, they may not remove thee from thy rest. A man then sleeps surely, securely; when he knows (not that he will not, but) that his enemy cannot hurt him. Violent is the force and fury of passions, ouerbearing a man to those courses, which in his sober and collected sense he would abhor. They have this power, to make him a fool, that otherwise is not; and him, that is a fool, to appear so. If in strength thou canst not keep out passion, yet in wisdom temper it: that if, notwithstanding the former, it comes to whisper in thine ears thine own weakness; yet it may be hindered by the latter from diuulging it to thy shame.

Thou seest how excellent and principal a work it is to manage the heart, which indeed manageth all the rest: and is powerful to the carrying away with it self, the attendance of all the senses: who be as ready at call, and as speedy to execution, as any servant the Centurion had: waiting only for a come, go, do, from their leader the Heart. The ear will not hear, where the heart minds not, nor the hand relieve, where the heart pities not: nor the tongue praise, where the heart loves not. All look, listen, attend, stay upon the heart, as a Captain to give the onset. The Philosopher saith; It is not the eye that seeth, but the heart: so it is not the ears that hear, but the heart.

Indeed: it sometimes falleth out, that a man hears not a great sound or noise, though it be nigh him. The reason is, his heart is fixed, and busily taken up in some object, serious in his imagination, though perhaps in it self vain: & the ears like faithful servants attending their master the heart, lose the act of that auditive Organ, by some suspension, till the heart hath done with them, and given them leave. Curious and rare sights, able to ravish some with admiration, affect not others, whiles they stand as open to their view: because their eyes are following the heart, and doing him service about another matter. Hence our feet stumble in a plain path, because our eyes, which should be their guides, are sent some other way on the hearts errand. Be then all clean, if thou canst: but if that happiness be denied on earth, yet let thy heart be clean; there is then the more hope of the rest.

4. The measure of this vessels infection. Full.

It hath not aspersion, nor imbution, but impletion. It is not a moderate contamination, which admitted into comparison with other turpitudes, might be exceeded, but a transcendent, egregious, superlative matter, to which there can be no accession: the vessel is full; and more then full, what can be? One vessel may hold more then another, but when all are filled, the least is as full as the greatest. Now Solomon, that was no flatterer, because a King himself; without awe of any mortal Superior, because Servant to the King of Kings, & put in trust with the registering of his Oracles; tells man plainly, that 1. his heart, not some less principal part, 2. is evil, not good, or inclining to goodness. 3. nay, full of evil, to the utmost dram it contains.

This describes Man in a degree further, then nature left him, if I may so speak: for we were borne evil, but have made our selves full of evil. There is time required to this perfecting of sin, and making up the reprobates damnation. Judgment stays for the Amorites, till their wickedness becomes full: and the Jews are forborne, till they have fulfilled the measure of their fathers. Sin loved, delighted, accustomed, habituated, voluntarily, violently perpetrated, brings this impletion. Indeed, man quickly fills this vessel of his own accord: let him alone, and he needs no help to bring himself to hell. Whiles God's preventing grace doth not fore-stall, nor his calling grace convert, man runs on to destruction, as the fool laughing to the stocks. He sees evil, he likes it, he dares it, he does it, he lives in it; and his heart, like an hydropicke stomach, is not quiet till it be full.

Whiles the heart like a Cistern, stands perpetually open, and the devil like a Tankerd-bearer, never rests fetching water from the conduit of hell to fill it; and there is no vent of repentance to empty it; how can it choose, but be full of evil? The heart is but a little thing, one would therefore think it might be soon full: but the heart holds much, therefore one would think, it could not be soon full. It is a little morsel, not able to give a Kite her breakfast; yet it contains as much in desires, as the world doth in her integral parts. Neither if the whole world were given to the Pellaean Monarch, would he yet say, My heart is full, my mind is satisfied.

There must then concur some co-working accidents to this repletion. Satan suggests: concupiscence harkens, flatters the heart with some persuasion of profit, pleasure, content: the heart assents; and sends forth the eye, hand, foot, as instruments of practice: lastly, sin comes; and that not alone: one is entertained, many press in. Mala sunt contigua & continua inter se. Then the more men act, the more they affect; & the exit of one sin, is another's hinte of entrance: that the stage of his heart is never empty, till the tragedy of his soul be done.

This fullness argues a great height of impiety. Paul amply delivered the wickedness of Elimas, Act. 13. O full of all subtlety and all mischief, thou child of the Devil, thou enemy of all righteousness, &c. a wretched impletion. So is the reprobate estate of the Heathen described. Rom. 1. to be filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, covetousness, &c. The same Apostle in the same Epistle speaking of the wicked in the words of the Psalm, saith, Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness. Here, the heart is full of evil. The commander being so filled with iniquity, every member as a Soldier in his place, fills it self with the desired corruption. The eye is full of adultery and lust, saith the Apostle. The hand full of blood, saith the Prophet. The foot full of averseness, the tongue full of curses, oaths, dissimulations. Every vessel will be full, as well as the heart; full to the brim, nay, running over, as the vessels at the marriage in Cana, though with a contrary liquor. And when all are replenished, the heart is ready to call, as the widow in the 2. of Kings, the 4. Bring me yet another vessel, that it may be filled.

This is the precipitation of sin, if God doth not prevent, as Satan doth provoke: it rests not, till it be full. Sinful man is evermore carrying a stick to his pyle, a talent to his burden, more foul water to his cestern, more torments to be laid up in his hell: he ceaseth not, without a supernatural interruption, & gracious revocation, till his measure be full.

Thus I have run through these 4. circumstances of the Comma, or first Point of man: observing, 1. from the Owners, their corruptible fragility. 2. from the vessel, the Hearts excellency. 3. from the liquor contained in it, the pollution of our natures. 4. and lastly, from the plenitude, the strength and height of Sin. The sum is, 1. the heart. 2. of man. 3. is full. 4. of evil.

I should now conclude, leaving my discourse, and you to meditation of it; but that you would then say, I had failed in one special part of a Physician; that having described the malady, I prescribe no remedy. Since it is not only expedient, to be made experient of our own estate, but to be taught to help it: Give me leave therefore briefly to tell you, that some principal intentions, to the repair of your Hearts ruins are these. 1. Seeing this vessel is full, to empty it. 2. Seeing it is foul, to wash it. 3. Since it hath caught an ill tang, to sweeten it. 4. And when it is well, so to preserve it. with these four uses, go in peace.

1. There is first a necessity, that the heart which is full of evil by nature, must be emptied by conversion, and replenished with grace, or not saved with glory. what scuppet have we then to free the heart of this muddy pollution? Loe, how happily we fall upon Repentance; God grant Repentance fall upon us. The proper engine ordained & blessed of God to this purpose, is Repentāce: a grace, without which man can never extricate himself from the bondage of Satan: a grace whereat (whē it lights on a sinful soul) the devils murmur and vex themselves in hell, and the good Angels rejoice in heaven. This is that blessed engine, that lightens the hearts of such a burden, that Rocks and Mountains, and the vast body of the earth laid on a distressed & desperate sinner, are corkes and feathers to it.

This is that, which makes the eternal wisdom content to admit a forgetfulness, and to remember our iniquities no more then if they had never been. This speaks to Mercy, to separate our sins from the face of God, to bind them up in heaps and bundels, and drown them in the sea of oblivion. This makes Mary Magdalene of a sinner, a Saint: Zacchaeus of an extortioner, charitable, and of a persecuting Saul, a professing Paul. This is that mourning master, that is never without good attendants; tears of contrition, prayers for remission, purpose of amended life. Behold the office of Repentance: she stands at the door, and offers her loving service: entertain me and I will vnlode, vnlade thy heart of that evil poison, and were it full to the brim, return it thee empty. If you welcome Repentance, knocking at your door from God, it shall knock at God's door of mercy for you. It asks of you amendment, of God, forgiveness. Receive it.

2. The heart thus emptied of that inveterate corruption, should fitly be washed, before it be replenished. The old poison sticks so fast in the grayne of it, that there is only one thing of validity to make it clean, the blood of Jesus Christ. It is this, that hath bathed all hearts, that ever were, or shall be received into God's house of glory. This blood cleanseth us from all sin. Paul seems to infer so much, in joining to the spirits of just men made perfect, Jesus the Mediator of the new Covenant, and the blood of sprinkling, that speaks better things then the blood of Abel. As if he would prove, that it was this blood, which made them just and perfect. In vain were all repentance without this: no tears can wash the heart clean, but those bloody ones, which the side of Christ, & other parts wept, when the spear and nails gave them eyes: whiles the Son of eternal joy became a Mourner for his brethren. Could we mourn like doves, bowle like Dragons, & lament beyond the waylings in the valley of Hadradimmon, quid prosunt lacrimae, what boots it to weep, where there is no mercy, and how can there be mercy without the blood of Christ?

This is that ever-running fountain, that sacred Poole of Bethesda, which without the mediation of Angels, stands perpetually vnforbidden to all faithful visitants. Were our Leprosy worse then Naaman's, here's the true water of Jordan, or Poole of Siloam, Wash and be clean; Bring your hearts to this Bath, ye corrupted Sons of men; hath God given you so precious a Lauer, and will you be unclean still? Pray, entreat, beseech, send up to heaven the cries of your tongues and hearts for this blood: call upon the preserver of men, not only to distill some drops, but to wash, bathe, soake your harts in this blood. Behold, the Son of God himself, that shed this blood, doth entreat God for you: the whole Choir of all the Angels & Saints in heaven are not wanting. Let the meditation of Christ's mediation for you, give you encouragement and comfort. Happy Son of man, for whom the Son of God supplicates, and intercedes. What can He request without speed?

He doth not only pray for you, but even to you, ye sons of men. Behold him with the eyes of a Christian, faith and hope; standing on the battlements of heaven, having that for his pavement, which is our seeling, offering his blood to wash your hearts, which he willingly lost for your hearts: denying it to none, but Wolves, Bears, and Goats, and such reprobate, excommunicate, apostate spirits, that tread it under their profane and luxurious feet, esteeming that an unholy thing, wherewith they might have been sanctified. Come we then, come we, though sinners, if believers, and have our hearts washed.

3. All is not done with this vessel, when washed. Shall we empty it, cleanse it, and so leave it? Did not Satan reenter to the house swept and garnished, with seven worse spirits, whiles it was empty? Behold then, when it is emptied, and washed, and sweetened, it must be filled again: a vacuity is not allowable. It must be replenished with somewhat, either evil or good. If God be not present, Satan will not be absent. When it is euacuated of the works of the flesh, it must be supplied with the fruits of the Spirit. Humility must take up the room, which pride had in the heart. Charitablenesse must step into the seat of avarice. Love extrude malice, mildness anger, patience murmuring. Sobriety must dry up the floods of drunkenness. Continence cool the inflammations of Lust. Peace must quite the head from dissensions. Honesty pull off Hypocrisies visor; and Religion put profaneness to an irrevocable exile.

Faith is the hand, that must take these Jewels out of God's treasury, to furnish the heart: the pipe to convey the waters of life into these vessels. This infusion of goodness must follow the effusion of evil. God must be let in, when Satan is locked out. If our former courses and customs, like turned-away abjects, proffer us their old service, let us not know them, not own them, not give them entertainment, not allow their acquaintance. But in a holy pride, as now made Courtiers to the King of heaven, let us disdain the company of our old play-fellows, opera tenebrarum, the works of darkness. Let us now only frequent the door of mercy, and the fountain of grace; and let faith, & a good conscience be never out of our society. Here's the supply.

4. We have now done, if when our hearts be thus emptied, cleansed, supplied, we so keep them. Non minor est virtus, &c. Nay, let me say, non minor est gratia. For it was God's preventing grace, that cleansed our hearts, and it is his subsequent grace that so preserves them: That we may truly sing;

Return not to your former abominations, lest your latter end be worse then your beginning. Hath God done so much to make your hearts good, and will you frustrate his labors, annihilate his favors, vilipend his mercies, and reel back to your former turpitudes? God forbid it, and the serious deprecation of your own souls forbid it.

Yea, oh Lord, since thou hast dealt so graciously with these frail vessels of flesh, emptied them, washed them, seasoned them, supplied them; seal them up with thy Spirit to the day of redemption, and preserve them, that the evil one touch them not. Grant this, Oh Father almighty, for thy Christ, and our Jesus his sake.

1. The Tenant. Madness.

There is a double madness, corporal and spiritual, The object of the former is Reason: of the latter, Religion. That obsesseth the brain, this the Heart. That expects the help of the natural Physician, this of the Mystical. The difference is; this spiritual madness may insanire cum ration, cum Religion numquam. The morally- frantic may be mad with reason, never with Religion.

Physicians have put a difference betwixt Frenzy, and Madness: imagining madness to be only an infection and perturbation of the foremost Cell of the head; whereby Imagination is hurt: but the Frenzy to extend further, even to offend the reason and memory; and is never without a fever. Galen calls it an inflammation of the brains, or films thereof, mixed with a sharp fever. My purpose needs me not to be curious of this distinction.

To understand the force of madness, we must conceive in the brain three ventricles; as houses assigned by Physicians for three dwellers, Imagination, Reason, and Memory. According to these three internal senses or faculties, there be three kinds of Phrensies or Madnesses.

1. There are some mad, that can rightly judge of the things they see, as touching imagination & fantasy: but for cogitation and reason, they swerve from natural judgment.

2. Some being mad, are not deceiu'd so much in common cogitation and reason; but they err in Fantasy and Imagination.

3 There are some, that be hurt in both imagination and reason, and they necessarily therewithal do lose their memories. That whereas in perfect, sober, and well composed men, Imagination first conceives the forms of things, and presents them to the reason to judge; and reason discerning them, commits them to Memory to retain: in mad-men nothing is conceived aright, therefore nothing deriu'd, nothing retayn'd.

For spiritual relation, we may conceive in the soul; understanding, reason, will. 1. The understanding apprehendeth things according to their right natures. 2. The Reason discusseth them, arguing their fitness or inconvenience, validity or vanity: and examines their desert of probation or disallowance, their worthiness either to be received or rejected. 3. The Will hath her particular working, and embraceth, or refuseth the objects, which the understanding hath propounded, & the reason discoursed.

Spiritual madness is a depravation, or almost deprivation of all these faculties, quoad coelestia; so far as they extend to heavenly things. 1. For understanding, the Apostle saith. The natural man perceyues not spiritual things, because they are spiritually discerned. And the very minds of unbelievers are blinded by the god of this world. 2. For Reason: it judgeth vanities more worthy, of prosecution when they are absent, of embracing when they salute us. It is in vain to serve the Lord: and what profit is it, that we have kept his ordinance, or walked mournefully before him? This is the voice of distracted cogitation, and of reason out of the wits. We call the proud happy; and the workers of wickedness are set up: yea they that tempt God are delivered. 3. For Will; it hath lost the propenseness to good, and freedom of disposing it self to well doing: neither hath it any power of it own, to stop and retarde the precipitation to evil.

Now whereas they distinguish Soul. 1. in vegetabilem, that giveth life. 2. in sensibilem, that giveth feeling. 3. in rationalem, that giveth reason: the first desiring esse, to be; the second, been, to be well; the third optime esse, to be best; so not resting till it be with God: behold, this spiritual madness enervates this last action of the soul, as corporal endeavors to extinguish the two former.

They attribute to the Soul 5. powers. 1. Feeling, whereby the Soul is moved to desire convenient things, and to eschew hurtful. 2. Wit, whereby she knoweth sensible and present things. 3. Imagination, whereby she beholdeth the likeness of bodily things, though absent. And these three virtues, say Philosophers, be common to men with beasts. 4. is Ratio, whereby she judgeth between good and evil, truth and falsehood. 5. Intellectus, whereby she comprehends things (not only visible, but) intelligible, as God, Angels, &c. And these two last are peculiar to man, abiding with the soul, living in the flesh, and after death. It beholdeth still the higher things per intellectum, and the lower per rationem.

As corporal madness draws a thick obfuscation over these lights, so spiritual corrupts and peruerts them: that as they are strangers to heaven, quoad intellectum, so at last, they become fools in natural things, quoad rationem. As the Apostle plainly. Even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, so God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things that are not convenient. They that forget God, shall forget nature. Hence ensue both these frenzies, and with them a dissimilitude to men, to Christian men. It is reckoned up among the curses, that wait on the heels of disobedience. Deut. 28. The Lord shall smite thee with madness, blindness, and astonishment of heart. But it is a fearful accumulation of God's judgments and our miseries, when spiritual Frensy shall possess the soul, and scatter the powers of the inner man: euacuating not only imagination; but knowledge; not reason, but faith; not sense, but conscience. When the opinion of the world shall repute men sober and wise, and the scrutiny of God shall find them mad-men.

To draw yet nearer to the point of our compass, & to discover this spiritual madness; let us conceive in man's heart, (for therein this frenzy consists) in answerable reference to those three faculties in the brain, and powers of the soul before manifested, these three virtues, Knowledge, Faith, Affections. The defect of grace, and destitution of integrity, to the corrupting of these three, cause madness. We will not inquire further into the causes of corporal frenzy: the madness which I would minister to, is thus caused: a defective knowledge, a faith not well informed, affections not well reformed. Ignorance, unfaithfulness, and refractary desires make a man mad.

2. The Tenement, the heart.

The Heart is a mansion for God, not for madness. God made it, and meant to reserve it to himself: he never placed such a Tenant in it, as the Frenzy of sin. Christ is said to have a fourfold house, Anagogical, Allegorical, Corporal, Moral.

1. The first is the Church triumphant, that glorious, and everlasting habitation of his Deity.

2. The second, is the Church militant, wherein he dwells sacramentally, by his holy Ministry.

3. The third is Corporal, that consecrated womb of the Virgin, wherein he dwellit 9. months.

4. The last is Mans Heart, wherein he hath a mystical and spiritual abode. Christ doth dwell in our hearts by faith, and by love. As he loves the gates of Zion, more then all the dwellings of Jacob: so he delighteth in the heart of man, more then in all Palaces and Pauilions of Princes. When an adversary Tyrant hath taken the chief Forte in a Country, and driven out their just and merciful Governor; fear, sorrow, and expectation of ruin possesseth the inhabitants. It can go no better with the like Nation of Man, when Jesus Christ is expelled his habitation, the heart; and so savage a Tyrant is admitted to Tenure, as madness: a strong man, that will fortify the Castle, and scorns to lose it, except strength it self, the irresistible grace of Christ lays battery to it. But this Theme is scarce cold, since I last handled it. I must be forced to leave the Tenement awhile, in the unmerciful hands of madness; and inquire, (if perhaps with any comfort) how long this Tenure lasteth.

3. The Tenure whiles they live.

Alas! what gain we by searching further into this evidence? the more we look into it, the worse we like it. Whiles they live. The 1. Tenure of Madness. 2. in the Heart. 3. is for term of life. Too long a time for so bad a Tenant. But you will say unto me, as the Disciples to Christ: Who then can be saved? Nunquid daturus est Deus regnum coelorum stul • is? Will God give the Kingdom of heaven to madmen? Fear not, all are not mad-men that have madness a Tenant in their hearts; but they that have it for their Landlord. It is not my distinction, but Saint Paul's, Rom. 7. Sin may dwell, nay, Sin will dwell in your hearts; let it not reign there, saith the Apostle. It must be a household servant, it must not be a King. Aliud est habere insaniam, aliud haberi ab insania. It is one thing to have madness, another thing for madness to have thee. Since it will dwell in thee, whiles thou dwelest in the flesh, make it a servant, a slave, a drudge. Set the Gibeonites to draw water; let it make thine eyes laue thy body with repentant tears: and to cleave wood, let it rend thy heart with sorrow. Keep that subtle deceiver, with whom thou ignorantly struckst the hand of covenant, under bit and bridle: velle, reuelle, turn, restrain, command, control it at thy pleasure. Let it never be thy Captain, thy Lādlord, thy King.

Though Sin, the Devils mad dog hath bitten thee, and thou at first beginnest to run frantic: yet apply the plaster of the blood of Christ to thy sores. This shall draw out the venom, and grace shall get the mastery of madness. Be of good comfort, thou shalt not die frantic. Encourage thyself with a holy violence against thy fleshly lusts: intend, contend to infeeble, and at length to extinguish the force of thy depraved nature. Kill madness, lest madness kill thee. Be sensible of the bane, that lies in this spiritual frenzy, and do not laughing die. Madness is at first, inimicus blandus, a fleering enemy: in the midst, dulce venenum, sweet poison: at last, the Epithets of blandum and dulce being lost, it is Scorpio pungens, a stinging Serpent. Well, yet let it sting thee here, that it may not sting thee hereafter. Happy is he, that learns to be sober by his own madness; and concludes from I have sinned, I will not sin. Madness may be in his heart, like a Tenant; it shall never be like a Tyrant. Innocent Adam was naked, and knew it not: sinful Adam was naked, and knew it. Then comes God, hearing his excuse of concealing himself deduced from his nakedness: Who told thee that thou wast naked? Sure, his guilt told him. We have been mad, and are now come to our selves, to know our own madness. If it be asked, who told us, that we were mad? I answer, Even the same grace of God's Spirit, that reclaimed us from madness. For the wicked, since they love madness, be it unto them: and when they will never be recollected, let them be mad still. But blessed be that God, that helped us; praised be his holy Name, that hath recalled us. He hath in this life freede us from madness, as a Tyrant, and shall hereafter free us from it as a Tenant.

Thus have you the Mystery of this spiritual Bedlam detected, and a crew of Mad-men let out to your view: whose house is the world, whose bonds are iniquities, whose delight is darkness, whose master is the Devil: for those whom he keeps in this metaphorical Bedlam, without reclayming by the power of the Gospel; he hath ready provided another material, local, infernal Bedlam, a dungeon, not shallower then Hell, wherein there is no light of Sun or Star, no food but speckled Serpents, no liberty to straggle; but the Patients are bound with everlasting chains; and himself (with his same-suffering spirits) do eternally whip them with rods of burning steel and iron. One hour in this Bedlam will tame the most savage mad-men, that were ever nursed among wolves, or sucked the breasts of inhumanity.

I hear them talk of some irrefragable Rorers, creatures, (not men) whom no limits of reason can teddar up: let them take heed, lest they become at that day, Rorers indeed, and roar for the very anguish of their hearts: howling like Dragons, that have lived like Tigers. Think of this Bedlam, ye mad-men, Eccl. 11. Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth, &c. Rejoice, nay (it were somewhat well, if no more then joy ) be mad; in thy youth, tempus insaniendi, a time of illimited desire; Let thy heart cheare thee, and do thou cheare thy heart; that, thee with lusts; thou, that with wine and junkets: and walk frantikely, inordinately; in thy ways, by-ways, & wrywayes, for the way of truth thou wilt not know; and in the sight of thine eyes, such tempting, and lust-provoking objects, as those two Sentinels of the body can light upon: or if thou canst not yet be madder, extend thy desires to find out experimental madness: but know thou, that for all these things, God will bring thee into judgment: remember, that there is an infernal Bedlam, whereunto they that live and die spiritually-mad-men, must be eternally confined.

He that should now tell the Covetous, the Ambitious, the Voluptuous, &c. they are mad-men, should appear to them mad, in saying so. They rather think us mad; as Festus, though mad himself, without learning, could tell Paul, that Much learning had made him mad. But we may answer for our selves, as Augustine of David's madness: Insanire videbatur, sed regi Achish insanire videbatur: David seemed mad, but to King Achish: We are judged mad-men, of none but mad-men, because we run not with them to the same excess of riot, because we cut short our affections of their vain delights, and drown not our selves in the whirlpool of their luxuries; but girde repentance to our loins with resolution; they imagine us frantic. They think us mad-men, we know them so. And they shall at last despairingly confess in this lower Bedlam: We fools accounted the godly man's life madness, and his end to be without honor: Now is he numbered among the children of God, and his lotte is among the Saints. Be wise then in time, ye sons of men; trust not spiritual madness, lest it bring you to eternal Bedlam. From whose jaws when you are once entered, be you never so tame, you cannot be delivered.

3. The Period.

We have ended Mans Comma, and his Colon, but not his Sentence: the Period continues and concludes it. We 1. found his heart full of evil. 2. We left it full of madness. 3. Let us observe at the shutting up, what will become of it. After that, they go to the dead. Heres the end of man's progress: now he betakes himself to his Standing-house, his Grave. The Period is delivered

• Consequently. After that
• Discessiuely. they go
• Discensiuely. down to the dead.

If a man looks into what life it self is, he cannot but find, both by experience of the past, and proof of the present age, that he must die. As soon as we are born, we begin to draw to our end. Life it self is nothing, but a journey to death. There is no day, but hath his night: no sentence, but hath his period: no life on earth, but hath the death. Examine the scope of thy desires, and thou shalt perceive, how they hasten to the grave: as if death were the jail, prize or principal end, which the vanity of human endeavours runs at. Be a man in honor, in wealth, in government: he still ambitiously blind, languisheth for the time to come; the one, in hope to enlarge his greatness; the other, his riches; the last, his dominions. Thus they covet the running on of time and age, and rest not till they have concluded their sentence, and attained their Period, gone to the dead.

All men, yea all inferior things must be freed by an end: and as the Philosopher answered to the news of his sons death: Scio me gen •• sse mortalem: so God the Father of all, may say of every man living, Scio me creasse mortalem: I have made a man that hath made himself mortal. Man is a little world, the world a great man: if the great man must die, how shall the little one scape? He is made of more brittle and fragile matter, then the Sun and Stars: of a less substance then the earth, water, &c. Let him make what show he can with his glorious adornations; let rich apparel disguise him living; sear-cloths, spices, balms enwrappe him, lead and stone immure him dead: his original mother will at last own him again for her natural child; and triumph over him with this insultation, he is in my bowels, Psal. 146. He returneth to his earth. His body returneth not immediately to heaven, but to earth, nor to earth, as a stranger to him, or an unknown place, but to his earth; as one of his most familiar friends, and of oldest acquaintance. To conclude:

If we be sinful, we must die; if we be full of evil, and cherish madness in our hearts, we must to the dead. We have sins enough, to bring us all to the grave: God grant they be not so violent, and full of ominous precipitation, that they portend our more sudden ruin. Yea, they do portend it; but Oh nullum sit in omne pondus.

But I have been so prolixe in the former parts of the Sentence, that I must not dwell upon the Period. He needs not be tedious, that reads a Lecture of mortality. How many in the world, since this Sermon begun, have undergone experimental demonstration of this truth? This Sentence is but the moral of those spectacles, and those spectacles, the justifying examples of this Sentence. They are come to their Period before my speech: my speech, myself, and all that hear me, all that breathe this air, must follow them. It hath been said, We live to die: let me a little invert it: Let us live to live: Live the Life of grace, that we may live the life of glory. Then though we must go to the dead, we shall rise from the dead; and live with our God out of the reach of death forever.