The Last Battle of the Soul

MY Body is sick, my Soul is wounded: God's wrath is fearful; it burneth to the bottom of Hell▪ The heat thereof already maketh my Soul to sweat: I can find no Skrine or Sconce to set between me and this fire: Oh, in all appearance I shall shortly •… ee dissolved, for to be brought before that great Tribunal: Alas, what terrors are these, Sin, Sickness, Death, the Grave, and an unprepared Soul? I tremble all like Belshazzar: Mine heart is entangled with fears: my knees shiuer, and smite one against another: Mine heart is pricked, while I remember mine evil spent life: While I had time to do good, I was of the frozen Generation: Now God's glowmes like Boanarges, Sons of Thunder, armed with fiery fury, make heart and Soul to melt, and to fall down in drops within my bowles: Oh, for a drop of water for to cool the boiling heat o •… mine heart: Is there no man here that can afford me a word of comfort, for to uphold mine heart into this heavy hour?

Sir, I think it expedient that ye send for your Pastor, the man of God, that beareth the keys of •… he Kingdom of heaven: It may be that the good God shall put some words of comfort into his mouth whereby your wearied Soul shall be refreshed* while the chosen Servants of God speak his words to the faint heart, the Lord putteth forth a power to enable them to do all that wherefor they are spoken: So soon as S. Peter had spoken to the lamed man, his feet and ancle bones received strength: Though miracles cease now, yet this shall be true, so long as the world standeth▪ The effectual fervent prayer of a rightcous man availeth much: Will it please you Sir that I go for to fetch him?

He shall be welcome unto me: But alas, while I might I frequented him too little: I haunted rather the company of these that delighted me with sportes and jests, whereof now I have no comfort: Because I thought I could repent hereafter, I did that whereof I may now repent, and whereof indeed, as I fear, I shall repent but too late •… This now puts my Soul into the dumps: now all my foolish laughters are turned into mourning, for I fear exceedinglie to die, I tremble and toss within this bed, GOD alone knoweth what shall be the end of this lingering trial: Go Sir, I pray you, and desire the man of God to come and visit a bruised reed, and a smoking flax.

I go for him presently: I hope before he leave you, ye shall find this tempest of temptations to growcalme: In the mean-time till he come, I pray you to remember that all your pains are but a cross sent before to crucify the love of the world: In your greatest distress, strive to be a Disciple of Jesus, the Author and finisher of our Faith, who for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross: Be not discouraged in your greatest smarts▪ For reproofs of instruction are the way of life: In your greatest fear remember the joy that is set before you.

Sir, having known of your disease by your godly friend I am come to see you, and to impart unto you some spiritual comforts▪ While the Soul is sore troubled, there is danger in delay: A bruised Spiritis like a bone out of joint, the longer it be let alone, the hardlier it is set. If I had known of your sickness sooner, I would have visited you ere now.

I rejoice Sir to see you, my Soul ever loved you: But alas, not as I should have done: If God should but at this time spare my life, with the help of my God ye should see me at once a far changed man.

Come Death▪ come Life, God maketh all things to work to the best of these that love him.

God's corrections are good directions: With one cross he can work two cures, first a correction for by-past corruption, and after a direction for times to come: If God should not scourge us betimes the reigning of the flesh should prove the ruin of the Spirit: This was the utter overthrow of the Sons of Eli, God would not correct them, because the Lord would stay thē.

As for that which ye speak concerning the changing & amending of your life, your resolution is good: But seeing the hour of death is uncertain, it is good that ye be presently prepared: Death cometh upon mā with stealing steps: Let no man put far off the day of his death There is great danger, that any man sooth himself with the vain hope of this mortal life: No man can tell how soon he shall be arraigned to compear before God's Barre: None said a Pagan is assured to live until the morrow.

It is good therefore daily and hourelie to be upon our Watch-Tower, preparing our selves for death, which shall either be the end of all our misery, or the beginning of our everlasting woe, delay to prepare for death, is a strong thread in the Devils net. A man will not die the sooner that he prepare himself to die: If a man be prepared to die, and yet die not, hoc sibi ponat in lucro, that preparation is great advantage unto him: But if he die, he hath done that which he should have done: What a dangerous venture is this to a man to delay to prepare himself to die, because it may be that yet he may live? But may it not also be that he die? It is a dangerous thing to perrell our Salvation upon a may be, which may as well no be: It is fearful to be hanged over Hell with the evil twined thread of a life that must end, none can tell, how, where, nor when. No man is exeemed from this necessity.

The post Pale Horse whereupon Death is mounted, caries his Rider thorough all Nations, Cities, and Houses; pulling out of their beds Princes, Prelates, and private men without any respect of persons: thus are their hopes cropped in their fairest flower: It is good therefore that we ever be upon our gard: God offereth grace today: To day if ye hear his voice: But who promiseth tomorrow? well is him that feareth always.

O the terrors of Death and of the Grave! mine heart quaketh while I remember of these last strugglings that are in death: It was not without reason that the Pagans called it terribilium terribilissimū, of all fearful things, the most fearful.

If men knew what Christ hath made of Death, the living would not be so afraid with the fear thereof, Isaiah saith, that he hath put it into his Stomacke, he hath swallowed it up in victory: A wife man will not swallow over that which he is not able to digest: Christ hath swallowed Death and hath digested it perfectly: Now Death after Christ's digestion, hath lost all its poison, and is turned into a sleep: The name thereof is changed, for to tell us of the change of its nature: Dead Lazarus in Christ's language is called sleeping Lazarus, Lazarus Our Friend sleepeth, said Christ, speaking of his death: He that liveth and believeth in me, said Christ, shall never die: Death is not death to the Friends of Christ, but a sleep to their body, & a translation of their Soul from a prison to a Palace: As by the grace of God, it is made an Exodus of misery, so is it a Genesis of a better life, the corruption of one thing being the generation of another: What is this, that men should so fear Death, which is the end of the foul & cōbersome way of our Pilgrimage? Hath not God made death like a Chariote to a wearied man, for to carry him to his everlasting rest? This was seen in a visible figure, when Elijah in a fiery Chariot went up by a whirl wind unto heaven.

All that is true Sir: But ye know that death is fearful to all flesh: So soon as it cometh, it maketh a Soul liable to yield an acoūt for all the actions of the by-past life: The body and the Soul are of old acquaintance, and have not will to part one frō the other: I cannot express what a worsling I find within me; there is such a working fear about mine heart, that I tremble to think upon it: This maketh my words to wade in tears, mine heart is cut with sobs of sorrow: O death, the enemy of Life, is there no comfort against thee? Is there no Balm in Gilead? Of force then must I die?

The woman of Tekoah said very well, We must all needs die, and are as water spilled on the ground, which cannot be gathered: Death is an unavoidable passage, there is none entry unto Heaven, but by it. I will strive to let you see before that ye enter in at the doors of Death, that your Soul hath no such cause to be afraid: Indeed I confess, that death to these that know not Christ, is indeed a most fearful thing▪ according to this Satan said, Skin for skin, and all that a man hath he will give it for his life: See how a Natural man would be content that his skin were pulled off him, if it could be a ransone for to save his life: Such is the fear of death, that for to be free of it, a man would give his skin: Agag called it a bitter thing: Surelie, said he, The bitterness of death is past: The wild Gourdes shred into the Prophets pottage, for bitterness, were called Death: So soon as they had tasted them, all cried, Death is into the pot: The bitter torments of Hell are called, so great a Death: David speaking of the pangs of death, calleth them waves: The waves of death compassed me: See how death is compared to a raging Sea, with rolling waves: To this David subjoins, The snares of death prevented me: Death indeed is fearful, armed with waves & snares: We in our weakness make it also fearful, painting it with bare bones, with a skul, girning with its teeth, and with its sting, like a flooked Dart, for to pierce thorough the heart of man.

It is true that death is bitter in it self, but he that made sweetness to come out of the strong, and meat to come out of the eater, can bring both meat and sweetness out of death for the Christian Soul, though nothing be stronger than death, the greatest eater of the world. One saith well, that there is in death but one bitter morsel to swallow.

The chief course that we have to take for to win to an happy death, is that above all things, we strive to make our acquaintance with Christ, the Lord of life: Till a man know Christ, who hath disarmed Death by taking away its sting and its dart, he will tremble at its buzz: A Be that wāteth the sting, will afray a Child with its buzz, but the man of understanding is not afraid for a sound. I am assured that the excessive fear of Death in a wicked man, is a most powerful means for to make him die before his day, that is sooner than by course of Nature he should have died: Though a man's day be set, yet God useth means, Death is a distress unto the wicked.

Let him thē that would die in peace make his peace with his God: No man cā be willing to die, before his Conscience be at quiet, till God and his Soul have shaken hands, & been friended: A man that is at feed with his God, will say to death God's messenger, as Ahab said to God's Prophet, Hast thou found me mine enemy. But as for the godly mā whose Soul is prepared to meet with his God, he will say to Death, welcome Friend, take my Soul by the hand, and draw it out of this prison, Oh, but it is wearied. O, but it longeth to be free from these bonds of mortality, cumbersome clogges of claye. He that is assured to go to Christ, cannot die unwillingly, what careth he to die an hour, for to live forever? I will never fear Death, said a Father, which can do no more than restore me to him that made me To change a life that is mortal, for an that is eternal, is an unspeakable profit.

But alas: By what way may I come unto that Life?

I am the way, said Christ, None cometh to the Father but by me: This way is thorough the valey of death: In this valey ye need not to fear, if Christ be with you. In the valey of the shadow of death, said David, I will fear none evil: his reason was this, that God was with him: For thou art with me.

I find myself Sir exceeding weak, and that I draw near the doors of Death: I take great delight to hear you: I requeast you to continue your comforts: I entreat you to call to remembrance these special comforts ye have had, either by your own experience, or by reading, or by Meditation: I am assured that ye have some laid up in store for yourself, against the hour of temptation: Let me hear I pray you, what ye think best to be said to a man in his greatest fears.

First of all, that ye may be capable of comforts, strive to be patient in your trouble: Acknowledge in this sickness the great mercy of your God: In this affliction he hath given to you, the wish and choice of David's chastisement: You are not fallen into the hands of men, whose compassions are cruel, but in the hands of God, your Father, whose bowels are full of merciful remembrance: Though a Mother should forget her Child, we are printed upon his Palms: It is true, that no afflictiō for the present seems joyous: Yet afterward the bitter seed of sorrow, bringeth forth the sweet & quiet fruit of righteousness.

If ye would be armed against the fear of Death, my counsel is, that above all things in the tempest of your temptations, ye have recourse unto the bloody wounds of Christ, wherein as in the holes of the Rock, your Soul like a Dove may find a place of refuge: His wounds well may I call, The secret of the most High: He who lodgeth there, is under the shadow of the Almighty: An afflicted Soul is like a Be in a tempest, tossed to and fro: Frae once the Be hath win to its Hyue-hole, it entereth into rest: The poor Soul of a man for a space will be wonderfullie tossed with tempests, and long will it wrestle: But so soon as it can once win in at the holes of Christ's wounds, then it enters into Rest: Out of these wounds, as out of its Castle and fortress, it will boast the Devil, Death, the Flesh, and the World: In these wounds is the Souls strongest Tower, the secret place of the most High, where none enemy of man's Salvation shall be able to reach unto it for to hurt it: Let your chiefest care be to creep in into these wounds.

Again, after that ye have shaken hands with Christ, and made him your friend, consider well what he hath made of Death: Christ hath made it a friend of a foe: Is not Death now a sleep? Christ's friends sleep: Sleep as ye know is our great friend: He must be a great friend without whose friendship we cannot live: As we cannot live without Sleep, neither can we live without Death: Except that we die on Earth we cannot live in Heaven: Thou fool▪ said S. Paul, That which thou sowest is not quickened, except it die: The whole course of a Christian is contained within the compass of these words, I live to die, that I may die to live: If man will not resolve to live for to die, he shall not die to live: The course of a Christian is from a good life to an happy death, and from thence to life yea, to life eternal: Well is the man that runneth not without this compass.

But alas, O my God, take me not away in the midst of my days: Alas, Sir, must I die so soon?

The Apostle saith, That we die daily. Tunc quoque cum crescimus vita decrescit. It is certain, that so soon as we begin to live, we also begin to die: What are all the days of our life, but a progress unto Death, which is the putting off of our Tabernacle? What is this body, but a mire of mortality? Hominiquid vita? cylindrus: What is man's life, but a rolling thing.

But will the Lord take me away in the midst of my days? Hath not God promised to the godly man that his days shall be long in the land? Long life is a thing whereof God hath made promise unto these whō he loveth.

I answer, that such a promise is under two conditions: First of God's glory, secondly of man's well: If God love a man dearlie, he will whiles take him away in his youth, that he may have him near to him self: Moreover God seeth that which no man can fore-see, viz. the evil to come. The righteous saith Isaiah is taken away from the evil to come: God hath indeed promised many days to the righteous man: But if God shorten them, and take him away sooner, what wrong hath he done unto him? If a Lord should give to one of his servants some cottage house of clay, with some little piece of ground for Colewort or Cabbage for to live upon, saying, This will I give thee for thy lifetime: But if afterward this Lord should say, Fetch me my good feruant out of his clattie Cottage, and bring him to my Palace, that he may eat at mine own Table forever: Tell me, if by the change that servant hath lost: Would that servant think ye, say, No Lord, I will not come to thy Table, for thou hast promised me this Cottage-house for my lifetime? What Lord in the Land was ever troubled with such an answer?

And yet indeed it is so, that God doeth with his faithful servants, when they die into the midst of their days: When men are departed from this life, it is the Lord that hath sent his messenger Death for to fetch their Souls from their bodies, which Scripture calleth Tabernacles of clay, unto his heavenly Mansions, there for to banquet eternally at his Table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

Now tell me, O man, what have ye lost, for to go from the Earth to the Heavens? Is there anything in this world of such worth, that should make you desire to live, for to stay from your God but an hour?

That which ye say Sir, is very true: But how few are these who in this world can gladly condescend to depart out of this life? The life is sweet.

I confess indeed that everyone hath not attained unto this high degree of grace, as to say with S. Paul, I desire to be dissolved, &c. Yet all the godly will subscribe to this that all the faithful are happy who are dissolved: Though every man can not wish to die yet every man of God will say, That Death is better than life, Death is a salve which healeth us of all our sores: Is not Death God's messenger, sent for to pull the troubled Soul out of this sinful world, as God's Angel pulled Lot out of S •… dom? Is not our life here a warfare? Are we not here as Daniel was in the Dungeon among Lions? Are not we here with Jeremiah sticking fast into the miry clay? Are not we here with Israel, into the House of bondage overburdened with sin as they were with brick? Are we not here with S. Paul, under the body of Death? And with Joseph in the stocks, not of tree, but of sin?

If it were well told a man what is here, and what he may look for in the life to come, if he had but a grain of grace, as great as of Mustard seed, he should easily discern whereof to make choice: Is not our life here a wind, and a vapor of vanity? But which is most of all to be considered: Is there not here a necessity of sinning laid upon all the living? Who should not be glad to be fredde and rid of these sinful bonds? Is not this life continually sick of the filthy flooxe of sin, a most loathsome disease? When we seek our daily bread, we must immediately subjoin, forgive us our sins: First, as we see here, we must beg our bread, and then pardon. What then are we here, but daily beggars for the belly? The King must beg his bread from God: In the Heavens there shall be no begging, but thanking of God for his benefits: Who should for all that he can beg on Earth, desire for to live out of Heaven but one hour? Are we not all here under a corruptible burden, a burden of corruption, under which the Soul is pressed as a Cart full of sheaves? So long as we are here, our Souls are laden with sins: A Soul burdened with such baggage runs on wheels, as it were down an hill all post haste, except that God stay it, it shall never cease, till it arrive in Hell, where God shall break it in sunder by the tempest of his wrath.

But Death is the wages of sin, who shall not fear?

Indeed Death is such of the own nature: But God in great mercy hath made death to the godly like the Rain-bow, which being naturally a sign of present rain, by God's Covenant becometh a perpetual sign of fair weather to come after that rain: As through Death Christ wrought our Life, so must we be killed for to be made alive: The glorious Resurrection must be through dust and corruption: Our pains must go before our pleasures, and lashes before our laughters: After that, in come pleasures for evermore.

If we had the faith of God, we should not much fear the smart of death which by Christ is made transitus ad vitam, a passage unto Life: Let us once pass thorough this Jordan, and behold, we are in an instant in Canaan.

All that is true Sir: No man can control you: yet naturally all love Life: The Life is sweet.

How sweet is it? I pray you: Is not our whole Life trouble and weariness? What is our sleeping, our resting, our eating, our drinking, but a servitude to the flesh? Who should not desire to be rid from such servile necessities? who for to be free of such bondage, should not renounce his dear self, and all the love of this irk some life? To be with Christ, is it not our best? Yea, is it not our rest? what shame is it for Christians to dote so after this present life, who should have learned to long after the life to come?

Christ came down, that we might go up: If we desire not to go up, we know not wherefore he came down: He came down to be a Servant, we go up to be Lord's: He came down to be hungry, we go up to a perpetual Feast: He came down to be banished, where he had not whereupon to lay his head, we go up to dwell in Palaces of pleasures, into everlasting Tabernacles: In a word, he came down to distress, to sorrow, to pain, to misery, to fight against our enemies, Devils, Death, and temptations, yea, he descended unto Hell we go up to Joy, to Honor, to Light, to Life, to Liberty, to our Father, to our Friends, to our Savior and Comforter. What shall I say more? Even to unspeakable Glory in Paradise with God & his Angels: What a folie is this, that a man should desire to be deprived of such Comforts for a puff of breath? Be glad Sir, to quite the rank Onions of Egypt, for that heavenly Manna Sweet like Wafers made with honey.

If a man could be fully persuaded of that which ye say, I think that hardly could he with-hold himself from putting hands into himself, that so he might change for the better: If all that be, why should any desire to stay from God but an hour? If I may desire to be dissolved, why may I not dissolve myself. The working out of a lawful desire cannot be unlawful.

No man living Sir, may absolutely desire to be dissolved, but under condition, that it be for the glory of God, and the Salvation of his own Soul: For two respects a man may desire to be dissolved: First, for to be delivered from the bondage of sin, which the Apostle calleth, A body of death: Secondly, for an earnest desire to be with his God, a man may desire to be dissolved. But for no reason must a man dissolve himself, that were self murder: If we may not kill our Neighbor whō we should love as our selves, neither must we kill our selves, who are the rule and square of neighbourlie love: Man in this world is as a set Watch, he must not remove, till it please him by whom he was set, to command him to come: Though lawfully we may desire death, that we may be delivered from the body of death, which is sin; for to be with Christ, which is meekle better for us, yet we must not cry for death for some triflles of wordly troubles, as Jonah did for the lossing of his leafes: Our desire of Death should be chiefly grounded upon a desire to be with Christ, and to be fredde from the spiritual bondage of our sins: well is him that can sincerely say from his heart, Miserable man that I am, who shall deliver me from this body of death? That Soul is happy, whose desire is upon that which is meakle better for it: To be with Christ, in Scripture style is called meakle better: What say ye now Sir, doeth not your heart groan under this burden of sinful death? Doeth not your Soul long to be out of this body, for to be with him, where it shall be meakle better for you?

I take up the matter better than I did: I see by your reasons, that there is no reason wherefore a man should desire to die, but for to be with his Christ, and to be delivered from the body of bondage, which is a death: But alas.

I see you yet Sir, into a plunge, I heard that word, Alas: Wherefore say ye Alas? Ye look yet as one who desireth to live: My words are not gifted with persuasion; ye seem to be afraid at that word, dissolved: What aileth you? There be doubtless something within that troubleth you.

I am sorry to go out of this world, whereunto I am chained by diverse respects: In the cutting off of my days, I will mourn with sick Hezekiah in the words of his doole: I am deprived of the residue of my years, &c.

I see Sir, that ye are taking up the Lamentations of Hezekiah: I will strive to make answer to every sentence apart: Ye are deprived, say ye, of the residue of your years: He is not deprived that hath changed for the better: The residue of your few years shall be turned into eternity: He who seeth many years, seeth many miseries, and which is worse, contracteth many sins, the cause of all our woe: Moreover, what is a residue of life? Death is not far, when it is farthest.

But if I die, I shall not see the Lord even the Lord in the land of the living.

This is your ignorance: What can man see of the Lord, in the land of the living? What can a sinner see of that great JEHOVAH here? What is to be seen on Earth, but the Back-parts of JEHOVAH? Into the Heavens whereunto ye now approach ye shall see that great and glorious JEHOVAH, face to face. What are all men on Earth, but a number of worms crawling and creeping upon a clat or clod of clay?

But again what is this that ye call the land of the living? What is all the Land ye see, but a dead lump of earth, where the most part of men are dead in their sins? Do not the best part die daily, unto Sin, which death is our best life, and yet laden with a body of death? Can ye now call this earth the Land of the living? Call me not Nahomi pleasant, said Nahomi, but call me Marah that is bitter, for the Almighty hath dealt very bitterlie with me: So may the Earth say, Call me not the Land of the living: No, rather call me a dungeon of death, a place for the burying of the dead a place where all must needs die, and be as water spilled upon the ground, which cannot be gathered up again.

But alas, if I die, I shall behold men no more with the inhabitants of the world.

This here is your grief, that death will strik you with a blindness, so that ye shall not be able to see anymore the faces of these whom ye love best into this world, as of Wife, Children, and of Friends of your old acquaintance: This is your d •… lour thē, that ye shall see them no more: Let such thoughts Sir, move these to mourn, who know not Death better than that Pagan, who speaking of a slain man said,

That is, Death closeth man's eyes for evermore: This is most false▪ A true Christian knoweth, that though both his eyes should sink •… own into his head, or drop out like blobbes or drops of water, yet that with these same eyes run into water, he and none other for him shall see his Redeemer: Though after my skin, said Job worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God, whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold; and not another. Lay this comfort to your heart: Though your eyes were eaten out with the worms, if you die in the faith of Jesus, ye shall see God and none other for you, and that with these same eyes ye now look unto me •… If ye be persuaded that ye shall see your God, in the Heavens, in whose face is fullness of Ioye, ye have little cause of doole that ye shall no more behold man with the inhabitants of the world: What are all the creatures of thi •… World, but things that dwell in d •… st? The Saints and Angels that dwell into these upper Chambers whose feet are above ou •… head are so fa •… in glory, above all the glory of the world, as the Heavens are above the Earth: As Zebah and Zalmunah said of Gideon's brethren, so may we say of all these that dwell there, everyone of them is like the Son of a King: What are all the Creatures below, but beggerlie things?

But alas, if I die, mine age is departed and removed from me as a Shepherds tent.

What is your doole? It is all then, that ye must quite your shepherds tent. Now poor man, What have ye lost? Ye shall change a poor shepherds tent for the most pleasant Palace of your God, a life mortal, for a life that is eternal: A man brought from age of years unto eternity, is like David, a shepherd brought from the Ewes, for to be made a King: What regret should a man have, for to change a little Lodge for a London? What is this life. but a daily dyeing?

But alas, I have cut off like a weauer my life: He will cut me off with pinning sickness, from day even to night he will make an end of me.

Take heed Sir what ye say: Your meaning is, that by your sins ye have abridged and cut short your days, or that ye have prouocked God by your sins, to take away your Life from you: If it be so, that like a weauer ye have cut your days by your sins; break off now these sins by repentance: If by your sins ye have cut like a weauer the threads of this mortal life, begin now by repentance to spin the web of a new life, some threads of life eternal: Let now the rotten thrummes of the vices of your life fall down to the ground:

While ye have time, weave into your life graces thorough graces, as warp and woft: Weaue on still, till from grace ye work in into the eternity of glory.

But alas, He will cut me off with pynning sickness: I fear greatly that the pains of Death put me out of all patience.

Take courage Sir: The pain shall not be so great as ye fear: God will lay no more on you, than ye shall be able to bear: He shall weigh all your pains in his merciful Ballance, before that he lay them upon you: He knoweth that your strength is not like the strength of a Whale, he breaketh not the bruised •… eede God is so bent unto mercy, that while he scourgeth sinners for their faults, he is said to bring to pass, his strange work and his strange act.

But I fear his cutting: God's cuts are very sensible: I fear to be •… cut off with pyning sickness.

Fear not▪ God is cunning in his cutting He will not cut into the quick like an ignorant Surgeon▪ The merciful God taketh no pleasure to cut you off with pyning sickness but he will cut off your corruptions with such pains: In such pains should be pleasure; The bluenesse of the wound purgeth away evil Pleasant should be that pain which is God's Raser for cutting off man's •… ptions▪ Away with the pleas •… es of this •… otten flesh Such in the beginning though lawful, •… re burning and bloody pleasures: unlawful end into hellish torments, fear not pyning sickness.

But alas, from day even to night he will make an end of me.

I know Sir, that the night is wearisome, and that sickness some what light in the day, waxeth heavy in the night: From day to night, the sickness increaseth: The remeede is this, be strong in God, whose strength is made perfect in weakness: If dolours increase in the night, here is a comfort, The night time is a most fit time for prayer: The time of silence is most convenient for speaking unto God: The night time is a special time whereof God hath made choice, for in it to speak secretly unto men: It was in the night that Eliphaz saw the vision and heard the voice of instruction: In thoughts, said he, From the visions of the night, wh •… deep sleep falleth on men, fear came upon me and trembling, which made all my bones to shake: Then a Spirit passed before my face, the hair of my flesh stood up it stood still, but I could not discern the form thereof: An Image was before mine eyes, there was silence, and I heard a voice, &c.

See how in •… e visions of the night, while there was silence, Eliphaz heard the voice of God: Let no sick man be afraid for the night, it is the time of silence, the chief time of conference with God: Whē Creatures are most silent, then is a time for man to speak to God, and for God to speak to man: The din of the day marreth our meditations.

But alas, from day to night he will make an end of me.

It is better that he make an end of you, than that any other should do it: If he make an end of you, pray earnestly for a good end: If the end be well, all is well: Your complaint is that, from day to night he will make an end of you: Be thankful to God for his mercy toward you, in that he hath given you so long a time to repent as from day to night: He might have made you sink down thorough the Earth unto hell in a moment with Dathan and Abiram: He might have burnt you with fire from Heaven in a thunder clappe with Corah: He might have drowned you into the Sea with Pharaoh: He might have slain you under a Tower, with these eighteen at Siloam: He might have sent a wind for to smite the four corners of your house, while ye had been at a banket with Job's Children: What if the goodness of God had deserted you, and taken his free Spirit frō you? What if he should do so to the best of us? Certainelie we •… should either make away our selu •… with Saul by the sword, or with Judas and Ahithophel by the cord, o •… with Zi •… rie by the fire. Many others have in an instant been snatched away in the very swea •… e of their sins.

First then, I say, That is a grea •… mercy of God unto man, that God himself maketh an end of him, and not suffereth him to fall into the hands of his mercielesse creatures.

Secondly, in that, from day to night he delayeth, it is a merciful patience: Take heed Sir, what I say: Count this a great mercy of your God, though ye should die this night, thank God for his patience, that it was from day to night, before that he would make an end of you: It is a great benefit of God, to get but so much time wherein we may once cry, Lord, have mercy upon me▪ No man can sufficiently esteem the high price of a days laiser unto night: Here is the patience and the long suffering of God.

Now Sir consider, and weigh well what hath been said: Is it not now your desire, that ye be dissolved? Are ye not as yet resolved? It would seem, that there be something that yet troubleth you: As for the words of Hezekiah's chattering, which hath been the words of your mourning, I hope that in some measure ye have been cleared with some contentment.

I confess Sir, that ye have pertinentlie made answer to all these difficulties: But, alas, what shall I say?

What aileth you? Be plain with me, I pray you Sir, think no shame to tell me what is into your mind: If the Patient cover his sore from the Surgeon, the greater will his danger be: It is an hard matter when the Patient playeth false with the Physician: Lay open your wounds, if ye would have salve fit for your sores.

I think shame Sir to tell you what aileth me, yet seeing I have need both of instruction & of comfort, I will be no stranger unto you, whom I know to be a man of God, that is not curious for to ripe up secret sores for your own curiosity, but rather for to cure them: I will not conceal the matter from you: It is this: I have filled my Barns, and I desire to enjoye the fruits thereof: There is no man, but he would desire after great pains, •… o r •… ape some fruits of his labors: I wish that Death would excuse me for some years: This is my grief, for I must be plain with you, mine heart cannot well accord to forsake such comforts.

That Sir is but a wordly temptation: What are Barns of corn on Earth in comparison of God's most pleasant Palace in Heaven, wherein are pleasures for evermore? Fye upon Barns, a nest for Myce and Rattons: Would ye desire to live for to enjoye the leauinges of vnbeastes? They begin, and as it were sit at the first mess: Thus after that the Fowls of the Air have gotten their share, and the Rattons have gotten their fill, poor man as it were cometh after all, and sitteth down at the latter meat. But what are all these things, though man should enjoye them all his alone? What can he get of them all but a belly full of meat? What is the Bellie to that spiritual Birth-right and blessing that is laid up into the Heavens? What is the Bellie, but a thing ordained for destruction with all that is in it? Meats for the Bellie, and the Bellie for the meats, But God shall destroy both it and them. Cast out of your heart the care of your Bellie: The Bellie in the Heart maketh a man a monster: Let this be your chief, care, that shortly your Soul may sit down at God's Table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in God's Kingdom: What grieveth you now S •…

God hath blessed me, my Moneyes are increased; and now my life is but coming to the best.

The richest life is not ever the best life; abundance of Moneyes is no sure token of God's mercies: If it had been otherwise, Christ had never cast the Bagge unto Judas.

That churlish Carle in the Gospel, that would not let Lazarus dyne with his dogs, how soon was his Purple pulled from him, and he made a beggar into Hell, seeking a drop of water from him, whose scabs his dogs had licked on Earth? Nabel like a fool is feasting today, and tomorrow he shall become sick, and die with an heart like a stone within him: What fatter then shall he be of his Feast? Beware Sir, to marry your mind with your Money, lest ye be thereby divorced from Christ: S. Augustine said wisely,

A marriage between our Mind and our Money, is a divorcement between the Soul and Christ its Spouse.

It is good for us, lest that we should love this world too well, that like a cursed Step-mother it misuse us, and rather strike us, than stroke us, as it doeth with these wordly brats, who neither live, nor love a Life but this. What think ye now Sir of this world?

I desire yet that God would grant me some space to live, that I might make some better provision for my little Children: I wish that I might live till they were better provided, within a few days if God would spare me, I hope that I should make a conquest.

Fye upon that conquest that maketh a man to desire to tarie from God but one hour: Solomon after all his conquests said, that he hated all his labor: I said he, hated all my labor, which I had taken under the Sun: The reason is subjoined by himself, Because I should leave it unto the man that should be after me: And who knoweth whether he shall be a wise man or a fool? Yea, he proved a fool indeed, by forsaking the counsel of the old wise, for to follow the folie of his young fools: What folie is this I play you, for a man to desire to live, for to conquise sparinglie for one that will spend it all lauishlie, crying among the drunkards, Fill the pynt again? Many children will at one cast of the dyce, cast more from them into a night, than their fathers were able to win into a year: What is great riches to the most part of Heirs, but fuel to their folly? Is it not commonly seen, that after the Father hath pined himself with scraiping together this thick clay and pelfie dung, in cometh a forlorn deboched Heir with his drunk̄ music, singing Veri vades, We have spent more than our fathers have win. A little with GOD'S blessing is much worth: Hardlie can men conquise much with a good Conscience: From thence is the prophan proverb, Well is the Heir whose fathers soul is in Hell: The gloss is this, hardly can the father enrich his children, but by lossing his own Soul: What a woeful bargain is this? Neither doeth it ever come to pass, that the evil conquist come to the hands of them for whom it was appointed: After that the Worldling by hook & by crook hath taken with the angle, and hath catched with the net, & gathered in his drag, all that is about him: At last it cometh to pass, that after he hath well ladned his Boat, and is come near the haven, there cometh a blast of judgment which over-turneth all into a moment: Thus in the highest of his hopes in sight of the Shore, ladned and fraughted with the fruit of all his labors of his lies, his guile, and deceit, he goeth down to the bottom of the depths, so that none is able to rescue him: Thus after that, first he hath made shipwreck of his conscience, he also maketh shipwarcke of all his goods, and so is he deprived of his imagined profit: What though his ship should come in? What though all should prosper for a while? Let Micah steal his mothers silver and turn it into gods, and get a Priest, & bless himself, when he hath done, thinking that all shall prosper now: But ere it belong▪ some of the race of the Adder by the way, shall come and take away his gods: And if he run out to follow for his own, they shall either scorn him with what aileth thee? or shall boast him to keep silence, saying, Let not thy voice be heard among us, lest angry fellows run upon thee, and thou loss thy life with the lives of thine house-hold.

Let no man bless himself with Micah because he hath gods at home: Though men by many means may become rich, and think that they shall leave great wealth unto their children, God can by as many means disapoint them, as by blood, by shipwreck, by fire, by water, by war, by banqueroupts, by plea, and by piracie, &c. He who today was swaggering in his Silks and swimming in his wealth speaking of nothing but of thousands, within a little space behold him again, and loe, all is changed: The poor man he goeth and no man regardeth him, he is hungry, nacked and cold, but not so cold as the charity of these that may help him: These who were wont to eat at his table, desire no more to see him: The thoughts of old obligations are to them lik letters of Caption for to enforce thē to give some what to their old distressed friend: But cold are such comforts: Here, behold Sir, as in a glass, what vanity into these transitory things, which men think to make permanent to their posterity: But let a man be rich till he die; After that he hath spoiled others to make himself wealthy, shall his children be his Heirs? No, not: The wealth of the sinner is laid up for the Just: See how God maketh a Worlding to be as it were a drudge or a pack horse for to gather with the sweat of his brows, that wherewith the righteous man may be sustained: As he made the Ravens to flee and fetch flesh for the nourishing of his Servant Elijah: Some tims also it will befall otherwise, that thewe alth of the sinner shall be laid up for one worse than himself, that all the world may see, and behold, what vanity there is in such carking care: O, will some say, if he that is dead saw such a man in his house, Master of all his labors, What would he now think? Thus God in a manner making deboched bare men like lean Kine prey upon the wicked, who while they lived, would not with the Olive leave their fatness for to be Kings in Heauē, letteth the world see what folie it is to put their trust in such transitory trashes.

What say ye now Sir? Are ye now free of such earthly temptations?

I am miserably vexed with this world: Worldlie things, do what I can, run ever into my mind, and trouble me with carking cares.

So long as a man's heart is clogged with this clay, he hath no power to stir hand or foot to heavenward: There is both gall and guile in earthly mindedness: Well is him, whose Soul can sore far above this Region of corruption, for to mind above all things the things that are above.

My mind alas, is like Martha, busied about many things, or rather buried in many things.

But Christ said, One thing is necessary: He that said it, is that which he said; even that, One necessary thing. We may pass to life eternal without any other thing: But there is such a necessity in Christ, that without him we can do nothing: Without me, said he, ye can do nothing: Christ is that Best part, Mary's choice: Well is that Soul, that maketh him its part: He is only that which shall never be taken from us▪ But what wordly thing is that, that as yet troubleth you?

Mine heart Sir, is over-burdened with the weight of many cares concerning this Life.

Our Savior hath set down a particular Precept concerning that, Take heed, said he, to yourselves, least at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting and drunkenness, and cares of this life: Such cares may snow down white hairs upon our hairy scalp: But it is only the godly care, the care of the Life to come, that worketh Repentance never to be repented of: But come to the pārticulars.

I have latelie bought some heritage, my servants are plowing it, before I die I would wish once to reap the fruits thereof.

To be wordly minded is death:

The command is gone forth', none can plead ignorance: Love not the world, nor the things of the world: Well is him that so liveth here, that he may be counted worthy to enjoy that world: It is no time now Sir to think of ploughes, ye must now leave all, for to follow Christ, like Elisha, who left his plowing for to follow his new vocation: Take now a kiss of your dearest friends, and follow this great Elijah, the Lord Jesus, the Chariot of all his chosen, and the Horse-men of his Israel.

My Lands are labored, the Harvest draweth near, there is a plentiful crop upon the ground, Cornes and wheat, and all abound.

There is no solid comfort in Wheat or in Corn, but only in God's countenance: I compare all wordly things to the Tallow of a Candle, and spiritual things to the flamme thereof: If the Candle be right set, that the flamme be vpmost, the Candle will shin clearly, and give light: But if ye turn the Candle, and hold the flamme down, it shall at once drown in its own tallow: Even so if the Soul of man be well set, that spiritual thoughts be vpmost, and wordly considerations sanctified, which have been melted & strained from their dross be under, that Soul will shine in holy life before men: But if the flamme of the Spirit be turned down, it will drown under the drops of such earthly tallowe: By this at last, all our light dieth out like a Candle, so that our hearts that were once enlightened, become lik a dampish dungeon.

I confess, so long as we are here the fire of the Spirit within the best of us, is like ignis in materia, fire in an earthly matter, from whence cometh ever some filthy reeke: But when once we shall be above all places, whereunto no reeke can reach, this spiritual flamme abstracted from all earthly matter, shall shine most clearly into the presence of God forever. Are ye not yet Sir resolved? Is not your desire now to be dissolved?

The world is yet still in my mind: I have takē much pains into it, & am now but beginning for to get some ease: I have built an house, gladly would I dwell some space into it: Mine heart is sore, yea, it bleeds for to leave this Lodging, and never to come to it again: I had trimmed it for my pleasure, and now behold, shall I be disappointed?

There is no great matter of grief Sir, when a man changeth for the better: What are all the ceiled Palaces of Princes on earth, but like the house of a Spider? How soon are they all sweept away with the besom of vengeance, when God is angry? What are all our dwellinges on earth, but Dungeons in a dunghill? Let not your heart Sir be on your house: It is now time to mind the things that are above: Eye upon clay and stones: What are all the royal Palaces of the world to these statelie houses above, whereof the floor or pavement glisters with thousands of Stars, as with as many golden nails, o •… twinkling Dya •… onds: There the Sun & y ^e Moon the two great Jewels of Heaven, shall be under your feet, which are now above our head. What is within, no mortal tongue can tell: S. Paul saw there some-thing, but he never revealed it, neither was it lawful for him to declare what he had seen: This one thing we may know, seeing the outside of Heaven is so beautiful, how pleasant must it be within? Heaven is like the Kings Daughter, whose whole beauty is within: There is profit, pleasure, health, wealth, honor, happiness, beauty & bless: In a word, there be things that eye never saw, neither ear heard, yea, which never could enter into the heart of man.

But alas, must I then forsake all my wealth, and so leave all my treasures behind me▪

Such treasures are but traitors, though they be counted gods: God said to Magistrates, I have called you gods: But he never called gold god: To call gold god, is Ashdodien language: God's of gold must be forsaken, for to go to the God of Glory: What are all these wordly things whereon natural men so do gaze? What are they, but idols lying vanities? To overcome the love of such liars, is the triumph of Truth: If God's Ark be within our heart, such Dagons will fall down: Turn therefore your eyes from such clay, and mind the things that are above: Manie gather riches as he that earneth wages to put it into a bottomless bag: The first lesson of Christianity is self denial.

How is it then Sir, that a man must go through this world for to come to Heaven?

Even as the Israelites desired to go through the Land, of Sihon the King of the Amorites, for to come to Canaan the figure of Heaven▪ Let me go through thy Land, said Israel, We will not turn aside into the fields, nor into the vineyards, neither drink of the waters of the wells we will go by the Kings high way, until we be past thy Country. It is so▪ that we must pass through this world, for to come to that heavenly Canaan, we must not turn asid into the fair fields of pleasure, nor drink our selves drunk in its vineyards: But we must follow directly the rule of God's Law the King of Heavens high way, that so we may enter into Canaan. What say ye Sir? Is it not time to be resolved?

Mine heart is pined within me: It is like to break for sorrow, when I look to my little Children, Who shortly shall be fatherless: Alas hard shall their estate be, when I shall be away, who will take care of them?

That which Christ said to Peter, may be said to you, O man of little Faith, why hast thou doubted? Hath not God promised to show mercy unto thousands of these that love him? If the King of this Land should now come himself to your bed-stock and say James, or John, here I give to you mine hand before God and good witness, that I shall be a Father to your Children after you, and shall so provide for them, that they shall want nothing that may do them good: If ye heard such a man make such promises, I think that ye should not be in pain for the estate of your childrē: And yet what is a King but a man? But so it is, that all men are lyares, or may lie: But God who cannot lie, hath given his Hand and his truth to the faithful man, yea, hath oblished himself by an oath, and hath taken Heaven and Earth to be witness, that he shall never forsake the godly man nor his seed, his promise is to thousands: If ye believe God to be true, rely upon his promise: Let not the care of Children trouble you anymore, prepare yourself for God, and let Death be welcome: Put your house to an order in time: Discharge yourself of all wordly burdens: denude your hands and your heart of all temporal affairs, that your Soul have nothing to do, but to wait upon your God: It is not time to be combered with the world, while the whole heart should be taken up with heavenly meditations: It is now high time to think earnestly upon that life, whereunto ye are going by Death: It would seem Sir that ye are not contentas yet for to remove: What can this be that troubleth you▪ should not your heart rejoice to go unto your God?

I find contrary draughts within me: Your words indeed Sir begin to work upon mine heart, and to draw up my Soul toward the pleasures that are above: But again I find the desires of this life like weighty paisses drawing me down to the ground again: This is my regret: Alas, must I then leave this world, and the light thereof, and never see it again anymore? Shall I behold man no more with the inhabitants of the world? Shall I never see after this into the Land of the living any of all these whom I have loved so well?

Sir, it shall be your far best to suffer the love of Christ swallow up the love and all other considerations of wordly things, as Moses his serpent swallowed up the serpents of the Magicians: What ever seemeth pleasant into this world unto the natural eye, it is but by juggling of the senses: If we have the grace of God, this grace shall be indeed like as a four nooked Clauer, is in the opinion of some, viz a most powerful means against the juggling of the sight: If we could seek this grace, it would let us see the vanity of such things which beguile the natural senses: The eye of a man's Soul is betimes like the eye of a man come out of a bilious fever, all things seem to him to be yellow, because of the bile which have perverted his sight: Satan can forge temptations like glass, of whatsoever color he pleaseth, wherethorow all things seem to be of the color of his temptations: Thorow one glass a man's own spouse will seem to be filthy: Thorow another a bordel-whore will seem to be pleasant: Thorow one the world will seem to be glorious, thorough another the brightest heavens will seem to be but clouds: Thorow one, fables will seem to be Scripture, thorough another, Scriptures will seem to be but fables▪ Thorow one if a man feast as Christ did, he will seem to be a glutt •… n, thorough another if he feast with the Baptist, he will seem to be a devil: The chief gripe of your temptation is in this, that if ye were once dead, ye shall behold man no more with the inhabitants of the world: Ye are far beguiled into the sight of the woe •… ld, wherewith ye are so ravished: Change your Spectacles, and all that is below shall seem to be of another color: If your Soul could once sore up towards Heaven, the love of the Earth and earthly things would fall from you, as did the Mantle of Elias, when he was wrapped and ravished up unto glory.

But ye know Sir, that it is very hard not to be sore grieved to go out of this world, Non amplius visur us neque videndus, neither for to see anymore, nor yet to be seen: Who without tears can say his adewes to all his joys, pleasures, and contentments that are here? Whē I once shall be carried out of my house, ye shall see me no more: Hencefoorth ye and I will speak no more together: I departing from you, must go to the place of silence, among stink & worms: Who canwithout displeasure say to all wordly joys, farewell?

It is best that ye turn your back unto such naughty things, as Hezekiah turned his back to the stock, and his face to the wall, that he might confer with his God: It is great folie to be so fond upon such transitory trashes: What is so pleasant in this world that should allure us to it? Are not all things inconstant here below? There is nothing that standeth at a stay, but either it is coming in or going out like the Tide: There is no creature but while it beginneth to wax it also beginneth to wane: A child of the age of a day hath less time to live at Eauen, than he had in the morning: Since he came out of the belly, from the morning unto eauen he hath made a days journey in the way to his grave: In ipso ortu vergimus ad occasum: Our arising up is but a course to our fall: The degrees of a man's life, are as as many step unto his death: All that we see below is in a continual whirling from a beginning to an end: The course of all the Creatures below is in a trance of transitory trashes: I can but teach you with words▪ as John baptized with water: It is only the Lord who can persuade.

I take delight to hear you, I pray God to persuade me: Continue I pray you into that discourse concerning the vanity and inconstancy of woe •… ldly things, ripe them up, and open them wider, that I may see them within the bowels.

The wisest among men preached, Vanity of vanities, and all is vanity: All things are vain, and all things cry unto us that we are vain, So vain a thing is man: The Trees, the Herbs, the Flowrishes, the Fruits, the Fishes, the Beasts, the Spring, the Summer, the Harvest, the Winter, the Air, the Water, the Earth, the Heavens, are all appointed teachers by God, to tell man of his changing: Their line is gone out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world: All that have eyes & ears may hear, & read their doctrine, that here is nothing permanent: One creature calleth to another, Let us leave this World: See we not how we melt away by drops, for to be dried into dust: Moses saith, that we spend our years as a tale that is told; a strange speech for to declare the vanity of long life so much desired: while a tale is in telling, it seemeth to be something, but when a tale is once told, these that have heard it will in end say, That it is but a tale: So long as man's life is lasting, it is like a tale that is in telling: But so soon as Death the end of all cometh, it is but like a tale that is told: Thus as ye see all man's life in Scripture language, is called but a tale: All the times of our life past, present, and to come, are turned at last into a fuimus, we have been: We that live now, let us remember our case, Ecce tempus nunc futurum quo dicen •… nos fuisse, The time shall be shortly that man shall say of us that we have been: And thereafter a time shall come that none shall know that ever we had a being: Our life is like a sparkle fleeing out of the fire, which dieth out into the flight, it failleth before it falleth.

These be words of great power, I find now some working thereof within mine heart: I pray you continue.

We have none abiding here, We all both young & old post swiftlie away to the grave, the last bed wherein every man must sleep, we are long of coming to: But how soon are we pulled down? Our strength saith Moses, is soon cut off, and we flee away: We are like the Ye which thaweth sooner than it froze: This is the Law of all flesh, Prince, People, Poor and Rich, all must go to Golgotha: The Preacher saith plainly, There is no discharge in that war.

Though a man in the morning be proud like a Peacock, with lifted up feathers, if Death come before the night come, he must lay down his head among dead men's Skuls: What a thing is this, that within an hundredth years not one of us all that are here shall be left alive, no not in this great City, wherein we live? Are we not all as water spilled upon the ground, which cannot be gathered up again▪ What memory is now of these tha •… are past? And what shall be said o •… us, when we are gone? It is o •… far best then to follow our God▪ and to turn our back upon all suc •… lying vanities.

I requeast you Sir, not to be wearied: Proceede I pray you into tha •… purpose, that I may learn what vanity is into this life, which is so▪ much desired.

Mans life into this world is but a Pilgrimage and a race not of great length; for man that is borne of a w •… man, hath but a short time to live: Jacob's answer to King Pharaohs question concerning his age, was few and evil have my days been? What is man saith one but Vermis crasti •… moriturus? a worm that will die to▪ morrow: David putteth the length of his days between his little finger & his thumb: My life said he, is like a span long: some get but an inch, consider well I pray you Sir, seeing it is so, what is it then of your life, which is but of the length of a span what though it were an ell of length? Is not Methusalah with his many hundredth years as well in dust, as as he that lived but a day: Other have given place to us, and we must also give place to others: To me today, to thee tomorrow: There is no lodging for immortality upon the Earth▪

My Soul rejoiceth to hear you Sir, proceed I pray you.

We have no great cause to desire to sojourn on earth: What are we here on earth but like poor beggars shute down to the lowest chambers of the world? This low contrie may well be called Cabul, as Hiram, by disdain called the dirty cities of Solomon: Be glad no •… Sir for to leave this earth, a dirti •… dwelling: Step up the Staire eve •… the Ladder of Jacob, that ye may mount up to your God, for to see what he is doing above: Well is you who shall hear shortly the music of Angels into that Palace whose pavement is the roof of all •… mortal dwellings: O if ye kne •… what is there! Fye on our ignorance The Childrē of God in this worl •… are like Lord's children, sent out to be fostered into little Cottages o •… clay, when they are sent for by sickness and death; their Fathers messengers they weep to come home to their Fathers Palace, because they know not these many pleasant Mansions that be in their Fathers house▪ But after that they have once try •… what it is to be in Heaven with their God, they shall wonder 〈◊〉 their childishness: Be not Sir l •… these fort of men that cannot abid •… to hear speak of Death, but even sicken at the name thereof, or wax wroth at the speaker, as Ahab, fumed at the Prophet, because he spake not good things unto him.

Hezekiah spake more wisely, while he was threatened by the Prophet, Good, said he, is the word of the Lord: I pray you to continue your purpose concerning death: It is good that we remember our latter end.

Indeed Sir the thoughts of Death are helpful and healthful to the Souls of men, to be corrections for their corruptions: Such thoughts keep ever God in our sight: They are like a strainer, wherthrough the thoughts, words and works of men are purified: Hardlie can a man think of a sho •… t life, and think evil, as hardly can he d •… eame of a long life, & think well: All the sins of God's Church in Icrem •… es days were imputed unto this, that she remembered not her end: We for the most part deceive our selves with the opinion of long life, and so did they who are dead already: O how gracious would one day be to these now, who while they lived, did scorn at these words, Redeem the Time! But their ma •… ket time is now past: God's Faire was ended before they could understand what it was to buy without money: Well is the man who, while he hath time, so liveth to die, that he may die to live: If our life be good, our death cannot be evil: To the godly man death is a comfort, as being a medicine for all his diseases; a cure for all his cares, a rest •… from his labors: But in this is his greatest joy that by it the filthy flooxe of sin is dried up into an instant: * By it also the prison door is opened that the Soul like a Dove may fly up to its God: The consideration of such things made Solomon to preach, The day of death is better, than the day that one is borne: He spake the truth, for the one is the beginning, the other is the ending of all our woe and misery.

Now Sir, before that I proceed any further, I pray you to tell me what ye think now of this world. In this as I remember was your last temptation grounded, that going out of this world, ye should no more see nor be seen: I have let you see as in a glass, what vanity is in it, yea, that all is but vanity of vanities, the very abstract of an abstract, or for to speak so, vanity fined and quintessenced out of vanity, which I may call the spirit or quintessence of vanity. Now Sir tell me what ye think of this world, wherein gods must die like men? No wordly thing below in the day of need will be able to keep touch unto us.

Fye, fie on my faults, and my folie: I foolishly once thought that I should feather a nest into this world, that should never be pulled down: Mine heart hath been so bent toward this vanity that I have neither moved foot nor finger toward eternal Life.

It is true that I have been nourished and brought up into this world like a Child into a rural cottage I like a Child thought that there was no better: Jonah was angry for to quite his Gourd: The greatest pleasures that are here being well weighed, are but like the shadow of that Gourd, euanishing and worm-eaten pleasures: All such comforts are but slender, they fail man in his greatest need.

Though wordly pleasures be sweet for a space to these whose portion is into this Life, yet as Abner said of the devouring Sword to Joab, It will be bitterness in the latter end: In all the gourdes of wordly pleasures are worms of pain, which shall make them to wither.

That is most certain: well is him that hath turned his back to all such lying vanities: So long as a man is in nature, not reformed by grace, he is but a stranger from heaven: The love of the world in his heart like a moth, cats out all liking of Heaven. I have been too long alas, sucking the breasts of this Nourse, whereout of I have drawn nothing but the swill of wickedness: Blessed be my God, who hath sent this affliction for to wane my Soul from the love of all things below: I begin now to incline for to return to my Fathers house in Heaven, where, as I hear, it shall be much better for me. Oh, forlorn Son that I am▪ who have wandered so far from my Father!

I thank God, Sir, for these good motions, flesh and blood cannot teach such lessons: But one word I have observed into your speech, ye have said, that ye begin to incline to go home to your Father: Are ye not as yet fully resolved? Desire ye not indeed presently to be dissolved? Is it not your greatest desire to flitte f •… om this body which is but a Booth, a Shoppe, or Tabernacle of clay? Is not your Soul wearied to sojourn into such a reekie Lodge? Is not your heart panting after God, l •… ke an Hart, panting after the water brooks? He are ye not your Soul crying within you, O when shall I come and appear before God? A small feeble inclination to go to God is not sufficient, ye must now come to a steadfast resolution: He who is not resolved, is not ready for to be dissolved: Ta •… courage, be not dashed into this danger, declare your mind freely, be not nice, there be none here but friends.

I am so pyned with sickness, that hardly can I make answer: Oh▪ but I am pressed with an heaui •… hand: I fear much my last hour: My Soul is sore troubled.

Learn of Christ in his trouble: Now, said he, is my Soul troubled, and what shall I say? Father, deliue •… me from this hour: But for this cause came I into this hour: Father glorify thy Name: As he did, so do ye: He fearing the hour was earnest with God in prayer for to be delivered from it; and yet most humbly submitted himself unto his Fathers will: So do ye: If ye fear greatly that hour, pray fervently, that God deliver you from it and yet notwithstanding, let God have all his will of you: His will shall eu •… r be your well.

But alas, my pains are grea •… : my breach is like the sea: God's rod upon me is torn with stripes, and worn to the stomps: In my torments I both fear and feel his wrath: If he loved me, would he scourge me with such scorpions?

Whom God loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every Son whom he receiveth: By this ye see plainly▪ that he will receive none to himself, but those whom he is minded to scourge: This scourging whereof ye complain, is God's love-token, telling you that he is minded for to receive you: Woe •… o the Child whom the Father will not correct: God commandeth loving Fathers to chastise their children till they cry: His command is also, that they be not hindered for their cries: Chasten thy Son, said God, while there is hope, and let not thy Soul spare for his crying: So long as there is life, there is hope: While God chasteneth you, it is a token that there is hope: Woe to that man, whom GOD disdaineth to strike: It is a sore word when a Father or a Master saith to a Child I despair of him, there is none hope, I give him over, & will strik him no more: It was a fearful word that God said to the rebellious Israelites, I will not visit your Daughters when they are harlotes, nor your Spouses when they are whores: That is, I will correct them no more, but let them run head-long to their own destruction: Woe to him whom God will not correct: Certe tunc magis irascitur Deus cum non irascitur, God is most angry, when he seemeth least to be angry: The wicked are most fearefullie plagued, when God spareth them most: Let not therefore your sore pains discourage you, but rather comfort you, as being a special token that God will receive your Soul What recks what this Carion suffer, if so be that God receive the Soul? Shall I not drink of my Fathers Cup? said Christ: * To drink of a Kings cup it would be thought an honor. See then what honor is in the affliction of the godly, thereby they drink of the King of Heavens cup: This is also a token of our friendship with Christ, when we drink with him of one cup: Men will not drink of one cup with their enemies. Rejoice then Sir, to drink with Christ in your Fathers cup Though this cup be bitter at the brim, the bottom will have a pleasant farewell.

Think well upon this Sir, and possess your soul in patience despare never of God's mercy, though he seem to be angry, depend upon him, trust into him, though he should slay you: In confidence of h •… s Love rest and sleep in his bosom, hang on him, save his honor by trusting in him: If this ye do, I assure you, that ye shall die sweetlie, resting into his arms.

I find Sir my pains greatly to increase.

Be of good comfort: If your pains increase, God will increase your patience with your pains, he is merciful, and will surly strengthen you in the weakest hour: God's strength is made perfect in weakness: In the mean time, be fighting out the good fight manfullie: Hold up your hands with Moses against Amaleke: Pray fervently to your God, that he would cast into your memory all the good things that ever ye heard or read, wherewith your Soul as with a rempart may be guarded against the hour of temptations: Pray oft-ten with Christ, Father deliver me from this hour: What say ye Sir? It appeareth that there be something into your mind yet that vexeth you.

This Soul of mine is very loath to depart from this body: They be of old acquaintance, haplie long shall it be before they meet again, Friends cannot be but sorry while they shed.

That is natural to all: But grace in the Godly must rule Nature: We must gladly leave all for to go live with Christ, we must deny our selves for to confess him: we must desire to be dissolved, for to be with him; he who loveth anything better than him, shall not be found worthy of him: Your Soul, say ye, is sorry to go from the body: What are our bodies for the present, but prisons of clay? Let them go to clay, till the day of the Resurrection come, when those painful prisons shall be turned into pleasant Palaces: What recks of an inch of time here on Earth▪ in respect of eternity in Heaven? Should a man's heart so itch after an inch of Earth, that he would desire to tarry from Heaven but an hour?

The Soul must turn its back upon the body, for to turn its face unto the God of Glory: This is but a childish temptation: It is for women & children to weep, at the taking of adewes, chiefly while these that depart are going to a better condition of life.

Because the day draweth towards Euening, it is now time for me to remove: I hope God willing to come again the Morrow, and to visit you, that I may minister unto you some Spiritual comforts: In the mean time, seeing your mind hath been so perplexed with carnal temptations, concerning Life, Lāds, Children, and Riches: Cause read unto you this night in mine absence the Book of Ecclesiastes, from the beginning unto the end, where ye shall see as in a glass, the vanity of all these things, wherewith your Soul now is most enamored. If ye have time, cause also read unto you Job 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

Before I go Sir it shall be best that I recommend you unto God by prayer.

G OD save you Sir: How have ye rested this Night? Have ye found any working of God's Spirit within you, since our last conference? Is your mind so at quiet now, that ye may boldly say, with Simeon, Now let thy servant depart in peace?

Alas, Sir, Satan's temptations are like that Serpent of Lerne called Hydra, which had fifty heads, whereof one being cut off, two sprang up in the place thereof: I take that serpent to have been but a fable: But that which I say may be written for an History: Many heads of temptations have ye cut off with the sword of God's word: But now I think that for every head cut off, two are sprung up in the place thereof: All my temptatons hitherto have been but upon the skin like the scratch of a pin, wrinkles but not wounds: All my troubles hitherto hath been but matters of trifles, viz. Fear for my Life, fear for my Children, fear for the Grave of this our muddy mortality, and for other such trifles and trashes, unworthy for to trouble a courageous Spirit: The Spirit of a courageous man, said Solomon, will bear his infirmity: But the wounded spirit who can bear it? well is the child of God in his •… orest sickness for while his body is sick, his Soul is sound: His God in great love will make all his bed in his sickness, and strengthen him into the bed of languishing: He whom God loveth is armed with Faith and patience, all his troubles are but outward scrappings upon the skin: The temptations wherewith I am lashed are spiritual woundings for my sins, which never troubled me before: I heard oft-ten of such troubles, but I never knew before this time what such things did mean: Think ye Sir that the Spirit of a godly man can be thus wise troubled? I hear David crying in his mourning, There is no soundness in my flesh, neither is there any rest in my bones: But what recks of flesh and bones, if the Spirit were free?

The most godly that ever lived, have suffered spiritual wounds: Christ the Captain of our Salvation, said, That his Soul was sad even unto the death: Job cried, that h •… s Spirit was drunken up with the poison of God's arrows, The arrows of the Almighty, said he, are within me, the poison whereof drinketh up my Spirit: See how that holy man of God complaineth that his Spirit was like a drink drunken up by the poison of God's arrows. By this ye see that spiritual wounds are alloted to the dearest of God's Elect, so that they are not exeemed from inward blows: Trouble of Conscience is the disease of the innocentest Soul.

That satisfieth me not: As for Christ, the blows which he suffered in his Soul, were blows of satisfaction for the sins of others: As for Job these blows were blows of probation & of trial, for to let the world see that he was not an hypocrite that served GOD for rewards, as Satan did allege: But it is not so with me, who am a bond slave of corruption: I suffer for my sins, which are ever before me: The fainer I would forget them, they flow the faster into my remembrance: The voice of my Conscience followeth me with hue & with cry. Though God hath spared thee long, thou hast not been bettered, look now for vengeance after so long delays: I can make no answer, I cannot deny, but God hath spared me long: In this is my greatest fear: The higher a stroke be fetched, the longer it is in coming: But the higher it be lifted, the heavier it will fall.

I answer to that which ye said first, viz. that Christ's sufferings are no comfort to you, because they are blows of satisfaction: The afflictions of Christ were of diverse uses first of all, for to make payment to God's Justice for our sins: Secondly, he suffered, that by his own experience of sense he being expert what it is to suffer, might assure us that he is both a merciful and a faithful high Priest, For in that he himself hath suffered being tempted, he is able to succor thē that are tempted: Thus the Apostle declareth plainly afterward, We have not, said he, an high Priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities: But was in all pointes tempted like as we are, yet without sin: This experience which he had of our misery, is called his learning, Though he were a Son, yet learned he obedience, by the things which he suffered: He also suffered, for to be an example unto us.

I understand not well these words that Christ learned obedience by his sufferings.

The words indeed seem obscure: The most Learned think that Christ is said to have learned obedience by his sufferings, because while he suffered he felt indeed how difficile a thing it is talem obedientiam Deo praestare, to yield such obedience unto God: others say, that by his sufferings he joined to his divine knowledge y ^e practice of his passions: that which he had before only in contemplatiō is now also known unto him by suffering that which he knew: Others say. That he learned obedience by his sufferings, that is, Re ipsa expertus est quid sit patrem habere cut p •… rendum sit, He knew by Experience what it was, to have a Father to whom obedience was due: Thus Christ while he learned obedience by his sufferings, hath teached all the faithful to suffer patiently.

As for that which ye said concerning Job, that his afflictions were only blows of probation & of trial; ye deceive yourself, they were also for his sins: Whenfore is the living man sorrowful? said Jeremiah, The answer is peremptory, man suffereth for his sins.

That seemeth not ever to be true: While Christ's Disciples saw a man that was blind from his birth, they asked Christ saying, Master, who did sin, this man or his parents, that he was borne blind? Jesus answered, Neither hath this man sinned, nor his Parents, but that the works of God should be made manifest in him: Oh, that I were that borne blind, that I were not afflicted for my sins, but that the works of God's mercy might be manifested in me!

These words of Christ are not to be taken so strictlie as though God would lay any affliction upon a man in whom is no sin: This could not stand with the Justice of God: If Adam & his Children had never sinned, not one of them could have been stricken either with blindness, or deafness: This blind man then was not afflicted for his sins only, or especially, or as if he had been a greater sinner thā others, but chiefly this disease came unto him, that the works of God's power and mercy might be made manifest by his cure: So David was sore afflicted for his adultery and murder, but chiefly for to stop the mouths of these enemies of God, whom he by his scandle made to blaspheme: God as ye see may afflict you for your sins, and yet not chiefly for them; but for to take a trial of your patience, or for to make others fear to sin when they shall perceive by you, how great pains a godly Soul will suffer before that it can be well reconciled unto God again.

I confess Sir that ye speak with the tongue of the Learned: But for all that I find such temptations tumbling within me, that I may compare them to the swelling of Jordan: My sins, alas, huge in greatness, stand up like mountains between me and my God: They are so high that they hide Heaven from my Soul: What shall I do Sir? If ever ye helped me, help me now with your comforts.

Though these mountains be high, yet ye must clime the mount with Moses, if ye would see Canaan: So long as Moses was in the valey, he could not see the typ of Heaven: We must all clime up the Hill: We cannot see Christ before we be lifted from the Earth: We are all but men of little stature like Zacchaeus: We must therefore up the tree with him, and up the mount with Moses, before we can see either Christ o •… Canaan that place of promise: Ye are sorry for your sins: But sanat confessio morbi: A sin well confessed is healed: But what sins be these Sir whose tops reach so high that they hide the Sun from you?

Alas, for the sins of my Youth; my Riot and my Drunkenness, my Chambering & my wantonness, my strif and envy: Fye on my Fornications, and Adulteries, my lying and deceiving Hypocrisy: So I had a lamp of profession, I cared not for oil in it, my chief care hath ever been for the outward shell of my duty, but never for the Kernell: God's graces in me have been like a pure liquor in a fustie vessel.

I am glad to hear of these buffets of your Conscience, such grief is from grace: I know what shall be the event, even Repentance never to be repented of: But say on

This is my greatest grief▪ that I sinned into the light with Absalom▪ even in the clear Sun shine of the Gospel: Now may I well be ranked with these who counted it pleasure to riot in the day time: It were more easy for me to number the sand than my sins.

There is no sin either of omission or commission, in the light or in darkness, that can hinder God to be merciful to a sinner, if the sinner can repent: God who is infinite in mercy can forgive the riots of the day, sins of knowledge as well as night sins; which are sins of ignorance: There is one sin of ignorance which shall never be forgiven, even to despair of God's mercy: What ignorance is this, that any Creature should think it self more sinful, than God can be merciful? To make our sins to ouerreach his compassions, were to make the Center to contain the Circumference: If your sins be in number like the sand, God's mercies are without number: The greatest number that man's brain can invent either by telling, or by ciphering in comparison of that which is infinite, is not so much as a drop of a Bucket compared to the great Ocean.

I have alas, been an impudent sinner, who with my sins have buffeted my God on every side: It were now righteous with God that he should buffet me with his judgments: I slept in sin, and could not be wakened: While Christ's Cock crowed, my Soul lay fast asl •… epe: Yea, while he crowed again, I had past the third deny all: And though I was forewarned, I had none hoe in evil doing: While God was in my mouth, he was far from mine heart: O that bloody scarlet scroll of so many iniquities.

As ye reason with yourself, and with me, so let it please you to reason but a little with your God: Come now, said the Lord▪ & let us reason together: Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool: There is no sin so red though it were double died, but the virtue of Christ's Blood can cause it cast its color.

I have no Faith to apply any salve to my sore: I hear your explication of God's mercies: But there is none application within me: What better will a man be that ye set much meat down before him on the Table, if he cannot eat it?

Manie have sit down at Table having their appetit so bound up at the first, that they abhorred to see meat, & yet little & little have been brought on first to taste, & thereafter to eat a little, last of all, one piece bringeth on another, till they recover their appetit: This is but a disease in your Soul, which maketh it abhor all comforts, as it is said of these that are bodily sick in the Psalm, Their soul abhorreth all manner of meat, and they draw near the doors of death: What was their remeedie? Earnest prayer to God: Then they cried unto the Lord in their trouble, and he delivered them from their distresses: Mans extremity is God's opportunity. Be of good comfort Sir, have the Faith of God within you: Be earnest in prayer, and God shall deliver you from all your fears.

Oh, that I had Faith: Oh, that I could pray! I find my griefs to grow: I spake never in earnest till now: All other temptations before were but for carnal things: They were all but sport, in comparison of this of my sins where with my Soul is pressed and borne down: I take this to be the forebrunt of endless plagues and pains prepared for the damned: I abhor myself, fie on me: What am I, but a dead Sardian, or which is worse, a lukewarm Laodicean neither cold nor hot, a fit provocation of vomit to my God: It is a wonder if by this death he vomit me not out of his Church, for to cast me into Hell: Now what pleasure can I have of all my sins, where of I am ashamed? All the joys of my bygone life being joined together, countervail not the least part of my present pain.

Alas, Sir, how can I gladly draw near the doors of death, while there be such impedimentes between me and the doors of Heaven.

I love these lamentations: It is good that a Soul be sensible of sin: Woe to that Soul that is past all feeling: Blessed be God, that hath wakened you out of the slumber of your sins: God's wrath ever followeth drowsy consciences, for to give them up to the spirit of slumber, or to sporting spirits, that make men to sport themselves with their own deceiuings: It is good that in our afflictions, we consider well the cause; for Affliction cometh not out of the dust, neither doth trouble spring out of the ground: leremie in this is plain, Man suffereth for his sins: It is your part to make a careful search for the capital sin, which as ye think may chiefly be the cause of so great a wrath: Till Achan was found Israel could not stand before their enemies: But say on Sir, let me hear you to Amen.

God hath set all my sins in order before me: I see nothing but a burning wrath, which Scripture calleth, a consuming fire: Mine evil thoughts which I ever thought to be free, stand now up in battle array against me •… O Lord, why hast thou made us to err from thy ways, and hardened our heart from thy fear? I have no comfort within my Soul: I hear a clamour within my conscience crying unto me, What part or interest can thou look for in the Kingdom of him whom thou hast so highly dishonored? How can thou be of that number that belongeth to the election of grace? I find my conscience raging within me lik a swelling sea, except some calm of mercy come, my Soul shall be swallowed up with some fearful surge: Alas, Sir, what is your counsel: All that is within me is into an uproar, despare is working within the bowels of my belly.

These secret throwings in the belly are but God's secret reproves, tokens of his Love: Such secret checks are like the rebukes of a Father, taking his Child apart to some quiet chamber for to admonish him: This is God's customable doing with his own Children, if by their open and scandalous sins, they have not moved y ^e enemies of God to blaspheme, he will take them to the secret chamber of their heart, & there apart as it were, after that he hath barred the door, and put all out, he will tell them what they have done: Joseph would not tell before the Egyptians how his Brethren had sold him: But while he revealed himself to his Brethren, he commanded all others to go forth: Cause every man, said he, to go out from me, and there stood no man with him, while he made himself known to his Brethren: God would not reprove Job before Elihu & El •… phaz his uncharitable friends, but a part out of the while wind: After that he had rebuked and scooled his Servant Job in the secret whirl of the wind, and hade made him to acknowledge his faults, he came to his friends and told them that his wrath was kindled against them: After that Peter had thri •… e most shamefullie denied his Master Christ, who heard him so perjuredlie lie, would not reprove him openly before the wicked, but only turned his eye with a look towards him: With that secret look which no man perceived but Peter himself, he gave him such a secret check and nippe of reproof, that incontinent he went out, and weeped bitterlie: * Ye shall find at last Sir, all these temptations that trouble you within, are but God, taking you apart, and telling you with Joseph, what ye have done: God is now in the whirl wind working secretly with you as with Job, till ye be humble in dust and ashes: All this bitterness which ye find within, is but from a Love-look of Christ, that ye may be saved by weeping bitterlie for your sins: Be of good comfort Sir, all these troubles within are but God out of love whispering some reproofs into your ear for some bygone faults.

I wish that it were so: But O, what a stir is this within my Soul? I think those words of God in Ierimie to be directly said unto me, Thine own wickedness shall correct thee, and thy backslidinges shall reprove thee, know therefore, and see that it is an evil thing and bitter, that thou hast forsaken the Lord thy God, and that my fear is not in thee.

While the dregge and mud of a melancholious mind is stirred up from the bottom with grievous temptations, the sinner must spare to judge, till the Soul be settled: Let that muddy mind of yours first be settled, and ye shall shortly see that matters are not as they seem to be: When Christ said to Peter, Get thee behind me Satan, it was a speech of glouminesse: But O the sweet gloumes of Jesus more sweet than the worlds smiles: Let that righteous reprove me, and it shall be as oil which shall not break mine head: God may seem to be angry at his Darlings, but yet in great love he hath locked up their Salvation, and made it sure in his unchangeable decree.

Mine heart is pricked with pains and grieved with grief: This is the mischief, I see none out-gate, my Soul is environed with temptations.

The words of S. Peter are comfortable, The Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptations: If your temptations be great, here is matter of joy, ye have a God who knoweth how to deliver you. There is no temptatiō so deadly but God knoweth how to cure it: A touch of the garment of Christ's righteousness will anon dry up that flooxe of blood.

I am so tossed, that I am not able to touch it: I am like a ship in a tempest, seeking its Haven, but cannot come by it; whiles I am bl •… wen to this side and whiles to that side: Thus being driven hither & thither as with contrary Tydes, mine heart quaketh, and my conscience is in a qualme.

Christ, who in the days of his flesh rebuked the winds, will calm such qualms, that your conscience may be at rest: * Though the rolling sea rage, so that it make the Mariners to reel to and froe, & stagger like drunken men, yet when they cry unto the Lord, He maketh the storms a calm so that the waves thereof are still: He who can still the waves of waters, can calm the most stirring surgesse of temptations: It is written of the Mariners, that while in the temptest all their cunning is gone, their last refuge is to their prayers, Then they cried unto the Lord in their trouble, and he delivereth them from their distresses: If your distress Sir, be like the tempest which cannot be with stood by care or cunning, run to your God by prayer, confess fully and freely your sins: Suffer no starting holes or hollowness in your heart: But work it to sincerity, use all means for to be friends with your God: Seek earnestly from God, for the sake of his Christ, the peace of Conscience.

So I do: But alas, while I seek peace, I hear from God as it were that voice of Jehu to Iohoram▪ horse-man saying to my Soul, What hast thou to do with peace? get thee behind m •… e: What wonder that God be angry with me, who was never careful to please him? My Soul like a Night-Owl hath hated Light, and loved darkness: Such is the weight of my transgression that I am like to finke thorough the sward of God's wrath: This checketh me sore, that while I sinned, I strove to ouermaster my conscience arraigning me for my wickedness: When I think of this, •… think shame to face the Sun and the Moon.

The more ye be ashamed of your sins, the less ye need to fear everlasting shame: The Pharisee thought no shame of him self, but bragged of his worth, the Publican could not face the Heavens for shame: Your part shall be with the Publican, who returned justified unto his house: He who condemneth himself, shall go home to Heaven with the justice of his God. Cry unto the Lord in your trouble.

I am not able to speak, the force of temptations is like to shiuer me in pieces: All that is within me is in a fearful uproar: O how fear •… full is the rack and gibbet of an evil conscience: The black scroll of my sins which of before seemed to be enroled, is now unfolded & laid open, wherein every letter seemeth huge, great like a mountain: Every day is a death unto me, all my counts are out of order, there is not a string in mine heart in a right tune: What are sinners, but stubble? God's sentence is, Burn them: Alas, that while I sinned, I weighed not the following woe: I have brewed my grief, and now I must drink in sorrow.

One thing I perceive Sir, that your grief must have vent, till ye have disburdened yourself with tears and complaints, ye cannot admit any comfort.

There is no doloure lik to my doloure: The arrows of the Lord's wrath are within me, whereof my Spirit drinketh the poison.

These arrows are not arrows of wrath, but of warning, like the arrows of Jonathan, shot for to drive David frō the fury of Saul: Hear the Spirit crying with Jonathan, Are they not beyond thee? God's arrows are flown over you, are they not beyond you? There is no danger.

My sins which once seemed little like mots, begin now to swell, and to become thicker than mountains: I have no peace within: In my Soul is kindled an unquenchable fire, in it is the fuel of everlasting burnings: Often have I posted off my sins in the lump with a slubbert general confession: Now resteth nothing within me but fear distrust & qualm •… s of Conscience.

Be strong in God Sir: Hope in his mercy, believe in him, though he should stay you: If ye will not believe, saith Isaiah, surly ye shall not be established: While the woman of Canaan was making request to Christ for her Daughter, she found Christ at the first to be very harsh and sour, in calling her a Dog: But that little blast being once blown out for the humbling of her Soul, she heard incontinent these words of comfort, O woman, great is thy Faith: Be it unto thee even as thou wilt: God's face may seem grimne for a space, but there is but a moment in his wrath: though he should slay you, yet must ye trust in him: In your hurt ye must hope for his help.

My strongest hope is but a stinging fear: My greatest confidence is but trembling of conscience: It seemeth to me, that there is one knocking at the door of mine heart and crying in a voice, Is Faith here? Is love within? Is one called the fear of God into this place? Is the Spouse of Christ in this heart? Alas, what can I say, having such an ouglie Soul within me? Can Christ the Spouse of the Church love such a Soul as mine, which is like a blear or squint eyed Leah? can the dark night beguile him, that he should take such a loathsome Leah for a beautiful Rachel?

If Death now overtake me, I look for fire and faggot, the fuel of everlasting burnings: Oh, my Faith fainteth, and mine hope houereth: What say ye Sir? Doeth not your heart pity to see me in such a plunge? Yet for all this I must justify God: All this is righteouslie come upon me, though his wrath should so settle upon me, that thereby my bones should be crushed like these eighteen who were slain under the tower of Siloam, to God should belong righteousness, but to me open shame and confusion of face.

Shame of face for sin is the beginning of grace in a sinner; wait upon the Lord a little, and he shall make his mercy to appear like a morning light, at the break of day all the night shadows of temptations shall flee away, and Christ the Sun of Righteousness, shall arise and shine upon your Soul with his blessed beams: This shall make your Soul like a Bird on a bush wellcomming the morning with a song for joy that the night is past.

Satan alas, hath so hood-winked my Soul with my sins, that I cannot get a sight of mercy, the sense of my sins giveth mine heart many a cold pull: I fear to die in despair: What say ye Sir? Doeth not your heart pity me?

The Lord pity you, & give me an heart to pray for you: The Lord put the words into my mouth, that may comfort your comfortless Soul in this Iingring trial: Have patience in your pain, sin is like a rotten tooth, the deeper root it hath in the jaws, the more painful it is in the drawing. Continue Sir to discover your sore; if the boil of such corruption be ripe, I shall launce it, that such filthy matter may be cleansed away: I pray God so to direct me, that I may prove a Surgeon cunning in this cure; if there be anything as yet that troubleth you, conceal it not, if ye think that my comforts may be helpful unto you: Many are more ashamed to confess a fault, than to commit a sin. What is this that grieveth you now Sir?

The wrath of God affrayeth me; His anger is like a Lyon, which cannot be tamed: My sin is past, but punishment is to come: Terrors cry out of the fire, Thy pleasures now are ended, now thou must suffer pains: From the top of the pinnacle of all thy preferments, come down to the dungeon of darkness, because thou hast fallen down before the god of this world, go down, go down to him, whom thou on earth hast worshipped: These be the terrors of God, standing in battle array against me, which make me to fling all comforts from me: My Soul is possessed with a slavish fear.

Indeed I must confess, that I am much beholden unto God, for so large a time of repentance: But alas. I have neglected it, yea, and obstinatlie have kicked against my Maker: So now I find by doolefull sense, that I remain into the guilt; my Soul is so sick with this that I cannot tell: All comforts are unto it like a dead potion into the stomach which hath no virtue to work: God thinketh me not worthy of comfort: For while I was in prosperity, I was so covered over with the spirit of slumber, that I would not be warned nor wakened by the voice of God's Trumpeters, sounding judgments, as sons of thunder, Because I misregarded Boanarges the Sons of Thunder, God will not daine me with a Barnabas, a Son of consolation. Now behold Sir, what grieveth me, what say ye for my comfort?

I rejoice from mine heart not in your grief, but in that ye are so grieved for your sins: God in mercy by such sorrow doeth whet up your desires after him: The Child by a knock & a fall knoweth his own weakness, and perceiveth the need of his Nourse: I rejoice to see you humbled with the sense of your sins under the hand of God, I am comforted to see you humbled, let this humility be a comfort to yourself: It is good to be of a humble and contrit Spirit: To whom will I look? said the Lord, even to him that is of a contrit Spirit, and trembleth at my word: The more a man be humbled he is nearer to be justified: The Publicā a little before he was justified, was knocking upon his breast, and crying to God for mercy to him a miserable man: The more humble a man be, he is the farther from the dint and danger of God's judgments.

By your discourse Sir, it would seem that a cast down Soul with its own unworthiness, is in less danger of judgment, than these who are high lifted up in their own conceit.

It is most certain: The humble & y ^e proud are like these seeds that were sown in Egypt, when the plague of hail came, the Flaxe and the Barley were smitten, saith the Scripture, for the Barley was in the ear, and the Flaxe was bolled: But the Wheat and the Rye were not smitten, for they were not grown up: The wicked in time of wrath are lik Flaxe & Barley, because they are lifted up, they are smitten, they are in the ear, yea, and bolled in their pride, and therefore cannot escape: But as for the humbled heart of the godly man, it is lik the Wheat and Rye, the best corn: It is not smitten because it is not grown up, but lieth humble before the Lord: Corpora magnanimo satis est prostrasse Leoni: Humiliation maketh the Lyon to spare his adversary: God is pleased and pacified so soon as he seeth a man humbled in heart: Ahah had killed & after also had taken possession Yet so soon as he humbled himself in Sacke, though all his humility was but outward, the Lord looked upon him, and would have Elijah to see it also, Seest thou, said the Lord to his Prophet, how Ahah hath humbled himself before me: Because he humbleth himself before me, I will not bring this evil in his days.

Bless God Sir, for your humbled heart, yet rely never upon any grace that is within yourself, let God's mere mercy alone be your strength and your stay: The least opinion of our own worth is a frost which nippeth Repentance in the blossom.

Think ye Sir, that before a man win to Heaven, that he must be racked and riuen as I am with fearful temptations?

Before the most part of the Elect can enjoy these joys that are above, they are not only racked with pain, but also as it were racked thorough hell: There must first be an hell in the conscience with the sense of our sins, we must have a sight of wrath, before we enter into God's Rest: Heaven is not win with a wish: Christ saith, that it suffereth violence, and that the violent take it by force: Thorow many tribulations and afflictions we must enter into it: The Crown is after a course of crosses.

I am hailed away with the strong stream of temptations: I cannot think, that if God loved me, he would suffer me to be thus way tread under foot like dust, with such fearful temptations: O how fearful is the cross upon the Conscience!

These whom GOD loveth best, he chasteneth: The loving Mother will run upon her dearest Daughter with her feet, if she perceive her to be given to folie: God treadeth not upon his own, but for profit: The Godly are like Saffron or Camomile, which grow the better the more they be trodden down: Grace must gripe Nature till it gasp.

Mine heart is strained and squised with grief: O the heavy weight of my sins, which hang so fast on! I am like a tired horse that fain would be rid of his burden.

To be tired of sin, is a token that ye shall be shortly delivered: He who is tired with sin, is tired, not to be a drudge of sin: Sin is not heavy to the Wicked, because it is in them as water in its own element, though it be of weight, yet it weigheth not: Well is the wearied Soul, it hath Christ's promise of ease: But woe to them who with Laodicea, have need of nothing: For the most part, men are drowned in drowsiness: Security is far more dangerous than despair: As was sung of Saul and of David, so may be here, Despair hath slain her thousand, but Security her ten thousand: Manie are not wakened till they be so wakened, that their judgment and senses are lost.

It is a fearful curse for a man to bless himself, while he should mourn for his sins: Such as bless themselves, while the Lord pronounceth the words of the curse, The Lord will not be merciful to that man: Security hath shaken hands with Hell and Death: But well is him who feareth always: He is greatest in God's sight, who is least in his own eyes.

But alas, Sir, my conscience speaketh home, that I have been a stranger from my God: O but I am wearied, how shall I be delivered from this burden of bondage?

These who are ladened and wearied, may hear Christ in his Gospel crying unto them, Come unto me Go to him who crieth so lovingly, Come: Strive above all things, to get a sight of your Savior, by the eye of Faith: Urge upon your heart a deep meditation of his mercy, his merits are able to cure our maladies.

There is such a mist between me and the Messias, that it is not possible for me to see him. Oh, that my eyes were cleared with God's Eyesalue, that I might clearly be hold him!

The great desire ye have to see him is a sort of sight: All men see not Christ alike: All go not up to the mount with Peter, James, and John: All see not God face to face with Moses: All men lay not their head in Christ's bosom, with his best beloved Disciple; Be not discouraged: though ye cannot win so near to Christ, as ye would: If ye cannot win to him for to embrace him, as Simeon did strive to touch the border of his garment behind with y ^e finger of faith and it shall stay the bloody flux of your Sins: Ye sigh for a sight of Christ * A sigh for a sight of him, is a sight of him indeed: He who would be found of these that sought him not will be much more found of these that seek him, and sigh for him: Be of good heart: Though for a space your spiritual day be misty, yet at last your drumly sky shall be cleared: Christ is not ever absent, while he is not seen: The Sun as we see will be covered with a cloud, & the Moon will be under wake, but incontinent thereafter, the clouds being over-blown, we enjoye their brightness and their beams: What shall be able to separate a Christian from the Love of his Christ? What then shall be able to mak a Christian soul despair? Shall Damnation? No, For Christ God's▪ Saluatiō is ours: Shall Hell? No, For our Christ hath the keys both of Heaven & of Hell: Shall the World? No, For Christ hath overcome the World: Shall the Law? No, For our Christ hath fulfilled the Law. Shall Death? No, For our Christ is the Way and the Life: Shall the Fathers wrath? No, For He hath trodden the wine-press of his wrath for you, and for all repenting sinners: All Scripture pointeth at him, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it: Run Sir to him, & he shall deliver you from all your sins, and from all your fears: Strive to curb your own corruptions which are so broodie within you.

I cannot alas, be quite of my sins: I strive to run away from them, but the faster they follow me, like cur Dogs that are so accustomed to follow their Master they will not be boasted home again: Where ever I go with my thoughts above or below, my sins follow hard after me: Though I threaten them, though I boast them, yea, betimes entreat them to depart, their answer is, We are thy works, we will go with thee. This putteth my Soul out of peace and order, and thrusteth me away from the Lord; my God: I have been long seeking and sighing for comforts: But as yet I can espy none appearance.

Comforts sought sought, and sighed for, are not aye seen at the first: Elijah's servant went up the hill Carmell eight several times to espy some appearance of rain: The first seven times he could see nothing, & at the eight he saw but a little cloud of comfort: Behold said he, there ariseth a little cloud out of the sea, like a man's hand: A little after that, the heavens were blake with clouds and wind, and there was a great rain.

Hold your face Sir a little space with Elijah between your knees, and cast yourself down upon the Earth, as he did, that is, fall down in all humility of Soul before your God in prayer: That done, send up your prayer the spiritual spy unto the top of the hill: Send it again and again, ever till it espy some little cloud of comfort: If your Soul take pains in prayer till ye perceive but an hand breadth of mercy, at last God's comforts shall rain down in great abundance upon your wearied Spirit: What shall I say, if ye will not be informed ye cannot be reformed.

Indeed that is a pleasant and fit comparison, worthy to be printed with a Note on the margent: It hath been well adapted by you▪ Oh, that it could be as well applied by me: Oh, that the Lord, whose love expelleth fear, would strengthen my weak Faith with an handbreath, of his mercy: O for such a little cloud of comfort, it would lif •… up mine hands which hang down, and strengthen my weak knees: But in steed of such a comfortable cloud, I see nothing but clouds of w •… ath, ready to fall and become a deludge of vengeance: from my birth, I must not dissemble, I have dallied with my God, and have despised the gracious day of his visitations: And now all my comforts resemble to the Eagle, that taketh her to her wings, and flieth aloft high into the Skye, from my sinful reach: O fear! O horror! O the multitude of my transgressions! how shall I be quiet?

The best way to be quite of sin, y ^t it reign not in us, is to bend up our hearts to Christ, who is Emmanuel, God with us: Thogh all be worthy to be damned, yet there is no condamnation to these that are in Christ: He is that heave-offering, which we must ever hold and heave up like a buckler between God's wrath and our sinful Souls: In what case find ye your Conscience to be for the present?

One deep calleth to another deep at the noise of God's water Spouts▪ My sorrow is like the Sea, it ebbeth and it floweth: As I have swimmed thorough one deep temptation, I fall into another that is deeper: My brain is turned with a whirling giddiness.

There is no such deepness either in our sins or in our troubles, but the mercy of God in Christ shall be able to over-reach it by innumerable fathomes: S. Paul said, that he was assured, that neither high nor depth shall be able to separate us from the love of God.

Though affliction rain down upon us like water falling from spouts, they may well wash us, but shall not be able to drown us: A godly man should not be afraid for a spo •… full of bitter waters: Though th •… waters of the sea roar & be troubled▪ Though the Mountains shake with the swelling thereof, yea, though the surges thereof should boast the clouds, here is the faithful man's comfort, There is a river the streams whereof shall make glad the City of God: Thogh the Mediterranean Sea, yea, the great Ocean with its surges, should boast God's Jerusalem, a little river or brook, a Kidron of God's grace sending out streams of comforts like the waters of Siloam shall make glad the City of God.

But how shall I pass thórow to Canaan, behold, before me what floodes of iniquities overflowing their banks as in the swelling of Jordan: Such fearful floodes ru •… between me and Heaven 〈◊〉 place▪ appointed for my 〈◊〉

〈◊〉 •… oak with the garment 〈◊〉 Christ's righteousness will divide the floodes of Belial, as Elisha divided the Jordan by striking it with the mantle of Elijah, that he might safelie pass thorough: Christ's merits are like the Ark, which made the Jordan to go back, for to make a way for Israel unto Canaan: Our hearts like the Priests, must stand hard by the side of this Ark, till all our affections the Lord's Armies be come thorough the swelling Jordan of grievous afflictions.

While I behold myself, I abhor myself: The eye of my God seeth me, and what am I, but like a bemired Dog trodde by Satan into the puddle of perdition? Alas, when good motions came into •… e heart, I crosed them with my lusts▪ Now cursed be my lusts.

I am so filth •… ▪ •… hat I abhor myself, my sins are so 〈◊〉 , that nothing is able to make them 〈◊〉

Know ye Sir what God said of old in Isaiah? Come now, and let us reason together, though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow, though they be red l •… k crimson, they shall be as woole: If ye could but reason a little with God, ye should find this to be true: There is no sin, which Christ's blood is not able to purge: What ever your sin be, if ye can repent, he can forgive: Christ can do anything butthis▪ he cannot save him that will not repent: Seeing ye know him to be infinite in mercy▪ have all your recourse to him; Take once a proof of his mercy: Humble yourself at his feet, and see whether or not there be mercy with him that he may be feared.

The servants of Benhadad knowing that the Kings of Israel were merciful Kings: Put sack-clot •… upon their loins, & ropes upon their heads, for to seek man's mercy, which also they found: Shall man find mer •… into the narrow bowels of a man, and 〈◊〉 he bound the holy One of Israel? Christ who is not only true, but Truth it self hath said, Whatsoever ye shall ask in my Name, that will I do: He who is true may lie, but Truth cannot lie.

That is truth: While I consider your comforts for the distressed Soul, I think that all your purpose pointeth chiefly at Christ, as though he alone were the ground of Grace: Let me hear I pray you more at large, what Christ is unto us.

He is Emmanuell, God with us, God with man, God in Man, God-Man: In Him God and Man, are but one Person: Our life is hid with Christ in God: Because we did eat of the forbidden Fruit, He was hanged upon a cursed tree: He hath borne us such a love as is unspeakable: What tongue 〈◊〉 form words sufficie •… •… or to express the least part of the same?

By the conduite pype of his Humanity Grace for Grace hath been conueighed to our graceless Souls, who can express his Love, he loveth us to the end, and of his Love there is none end.

This I will say, That he hath borne to man such a love, that hath made all mankind like a Banquerupt, so far unable to pay the principle, that though man should love his Savior withal his might and his mind, yet should he not pay so much as the interest of so great a love: No, though he should give his body to be brunt for the honor of his Name: No, though he should for his sak have his name if it were possible, scraiped out of the Book of Life: Though all our Souls should suffer for his honor the everlasting pains of the damned, all these pains were not to be counted the interest of his pains for us: It is more that a Prince get a deadly hurt in a Battle, thā that a thousand common Soldiers were slain: It is more that the Prince of Heaven suffered upon the cross but an hour, than that a thousand worlds had been cast into a thousand hells, for to be tormented forever There is no proportion in suffering between the creature & him who was both God and Man into one person.

O then, what can be the interest of that principal love, that moved God to die for man? Let this be like a Bell ringing for to waken your drowsy Soul: Let your Soul like John lean upon the blessed bosom of Jesus: Have ever your eye upon this Mercy-seat.

Is it only then in Christ, Sir, that Salvation is to be found? All Scripture would ye say, doeth leauell at him.

The Scripture is plain: There is none other Name given under heaven among men, whereby we must be saved▪ He is full of the bowels of love; He is that only Savior, pointed out by both the Testaments: Like as the two Cherubims, though severed one from another, yet looked one towards another, and both upon the Mercy seat: Even so the Olde and New Testament look one towards another, & yet point at one & the same Christ, the marrow and kernel of man's Salvation▪ All Religion is in this, that we know Christ: This is man's Salvation, to know Christ and him crucified: By his Blood the Bill and Bond of the Law, is crossed and cancelled: He is that Carkasse whereunto all faithful Souls like Eagles must resort: He is our refuge against the dint of God's wrath: The Spouse could not come up from the wilderness, but by leaning upon her beloved, Christ.

As the Propitiatorie covered the Tables of the Law, that were in the Ark, so Christ covered our sins against these Tables: As the cloud covered the Israelites from the fight of Pharaoh hotelie following after them, so Christ's righteousness like a cloud covered us from the judgments of God his fiery wrath pursuing us.

Let men cover themselves never so carefully, still some part of them shall peep bare, until Christ come with the covering of his righteousness.

If by the temptations of Satan your Soul hath been ruffled or galled upon the sore: The best balm that ever dropped from the pen of God's Spirit upon the leaves of his Sacred Book, is the History of Christ's Bloodie passion: There we may see the dearest mercies that ever moved the relenting bowels of God's tenderest compassions.

Behold the Sacred Blood of that unspotted Lamb, which saved the Souls of those that spilled it.

If ye be pined with Corrasius of terror, in him are Cordials of compassions, the only salve for the sores of the Soul Though ye were covered with scarlet abominations, here is virtue whereby ye shall be made whiter than the snow: Did he not pray for them, yea, did he not save them, who by bitter railing, discharged upon him the utmost of their gall?

Such men at last were pricked in their hearts they truly repented: Their sighs and sobs were supported & sinewed with the strength of Grace: Such men became godly indeed: But I did never pass the pitch of formal piety: I ever desired more to seem godly, than so to be: I have been betimes sore shaken with awful terrors: But I never yet could say, that the softening blood of Jesus did melt my marble heart.

What ever had I, but some light of reason & glimmerings of general grace, which cannot soar so high, as to conuoy the soul to the doors of Heaven? The word of saving grace implanteth it self into the heart of the godly man: He only is furnished with a resolute & unswayed uprightness.

Alas, alas, alas, mine heart is thrown with a sore wringing: There is a large harvest for Hell, many called but few chosen.

What shall I say? Mans thoughts are framed into a sinful mould The silly sons of Adam are wonderfullie tossed with the contrary Tyd •… of Satan's temptations: Some he benumeth with the sweetness of Sec •… ritie, others he troubleth with the tartennesse of terrors: O but Satan's Balow is sweet to the Soul in the craddle of Security! But O how dreadful shall he be when he appearing grieslie and fierce unto the Soul, shall waken it with a cry and a glowre saying, Damned soul come out to fire, & faggot, come out to vnqueancheable brimstone beams, come out to weeping and gnashing of teeth.

A man after this manner wakened in conscience, is like a man wakened out of his sleep on a sudden: At the first he is in such a maze, that till he be better wakened he cannot well understand what is said to him: All his thoughts are into an hurlie burlie: Then his outward rebellions, and his inward repynings, with all his abominations seem to fall down upon him like clouds of blood: There be no comforts that can settle his fears, till the Spirit of grace appear unto him in the calm.

Look up with your eye Sir, and seek a blinke of the face of Jesus: He only is the Prince and Pryce of our Peace, our joy, and our liberty: If the Son make us free, we shall be free indeed: Wrestle with him, use violence in an holy boldness: vis Deo grata.

In him are the lasting treasures of mercy and immortality: He it is only who can make this biting Conscience to be toothless, he only can command this raging sea: I know Sir, that your sorrows are sore, and my Soul pitieth you, for I see you in the very pangs and terrors of the new birth: I perceive your Soul gasping for grace, as the dry and thirsty ground for drops of rain.

O the boisterous blasts of temptations, able to make the tallest and deepest rooted Cedars to stagger, yea, the Sirion to skippe like an Unicorn: What shall I do?

Seeing Christ alone is our protection and perfection, let all your courage be in him: In him ye must be valiant, for none but the valiant can by violence enter into the Kingdom of God: If a man know Christ well, he shall not be discouraged though he were cast into a raging sea of temptations: Though a mā were cast into a gulf of twenty fathom deep, if he can keep his head aloft, he cannot be drowned: So as long as Christ our Head is above, we his members may well be dowked, but we cannot be drowned: All Christian comforts run upon him like the title of a Book, wherein is contained the substance of the whole.

If Christ Sir be yours, ye cannot perish: He who is rooted in him, can never be rooted out.

But how can Christ be mine, seeing I am but a bag of corruption & a body of Death? What hath mine heart been, but like a vipers belly, filled with a deadly brood? Miserable man that I am, will Christ ever daine to look upon such a vile wretch as I am, who hath turned my Christian liberty in a fleshly license.

These who are least into their own eyes, are in greatest account with him: When ye hear of the wandering sheep brought home, and of the lost groat found, and of the forlorn Son returned to his Father: Ye should cast your figure & say, Of whom is this written but of me? for whom is it written but for me?

If ye stick fast by him, no perrell shall make an hair of your head to perish: Be of good comfort, for your life is hid with Christ in God.

I am so vile, that hardly dare I presume to think that Christ would die for such a filthy rotten creature as I am, who from the sole of the foot to the crown of the head, is filled with botches, boils, and putrifying sores: When I behold myself into the glass of God's Law, I abhor the monstrous face of my Soul: I am one of those in whom Satan hath parbreaked, and spewed the spawn of all sorts of sin: Of all sinners, I am the first: For I have not sinned of ignorance, but of knowledge, against the light of my mind, against the voice of my God, against the workings of his Spirit, & against the cries of mine own Conscience: This is my greatest fear, that I have done despite unto the Spirit of Grace. This striketh widest wounds into my Soul, and maketh all the bowels of my belly to wamble. O fie, fie, what a filthiness is within this heart of▪ 〈1 page duplicate〉 〈1 page duplicate〉 mine: The small moats move not thicker in the Sun, than sins of all sortes have reeled to and froe in this wicked heart of mine, which is nothing, but a nest of Spiders, and a cage of corruptions.

O what a shameful discovery should this be, if mine heart were as well seen as my face! If all the monsters of my meditations were set in open view, if the eyes of men could spy out what thoughts have been within my breast since I was borne: If all the men of Afric a place most fertile of Monsters, were taken to be witness, they would plainly declare that the Earth cannot bring forth such Monsters as are bred into the heart of man.

O the great mercy of God, who to the ende that man may live with man, hath hid the heart of man from men! O my God, though thou hast ceiled the eyes of man, that he cannot see within my breast, thine eyes, which see our thoughts a far off, perceive most clearly all my bygone abominations. To Thee alone belongeth the discovery of a closed heart: Would I be dashed if the eye of a sinner took me at an evil turn, and shall I not be ashamed when I remember how the eye of my God hath followed me in all mine evil ways?

Alas, my dear Pastor, ye speak much to me of Christ and of his death, but what portion can such a vile stinking creature as I, have with Christ? I have delayed all to the after-noon, and now my Sun is ready for to set: The black night of darkness is posting upon my soul.

My Soul refuseth all sortes of comforts: I think that it shall die in the very grippes of such bloody temptations: Behold, and consider if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow.

I know Sir, that no sort of men are sooner or sorer touched for their sins, than are the best children of God: Satan is most busy to blow at the coal of their corruptions.

And again, there be no sort of men more ready to appropriate to themselves the comforts of God, than they to whom they least belong.

But yet Sir, seeing ye are sick in Soul, ye must not refuse spiritual Physic: Christ is the only comfort against the guilt of sin: His blood is the only trayacle against the poison of this pest: But can any comfort avail to him that will not receive it? As meat set upon the Table cannot nourish, except that it be put into the mouth, and from thence be sent down to the stomach: So, neither can the words of comfort feed the heart, Nitraijciantur in viscera nostrae animae & transeant in affections nostras, except that they enter into the bowels of our Soul, and pass thorough unto our affections: Your Spirit is so knappish and way-ward, that it will not admit the most solid comforts: The mark of Christ's Lambes is an ear-mark: My sheep hear my voice.

But think ye Sir, that I can be one of God's, who have been so great a sinner? My Soul is sick to the death with surfeits of sin: Can God's Spirit abide where there is so great corruption? Can two Guestes of so contrary nature, dwell together in one man?

They may indeed, though they cannot agree: Grace and corruptions may be into the heart of a mā, as Israel was with the Jebusites, Hiuites, and Perezites, into Canaan: But as Israel wasted these Nations by little & little, so the Spirit of God with grace by little and little rooteth out, wasteth, and foileth these nations of sin that are within us: But not all at once. Lest we should grow idle, and roust for want of such spiritual exercise.

The heart of a godly man is like the house of Abraham, where Isaac and Ishmael lodge together: Though for a space they tarie together, at death the old scorning Ishmael shall be cast out: He shall not inherit the promise with Isaac the laughing man.

If Sir ye find a wresling within your heart, some new working, which once ye did not perceive, it is a token that grace is conceived in your soul: After that a womā hath conceived, she will find sometimes a working about the heart, provoking to vomit: It is so with y ^e heart of a regenerate mā, so soon as grace is conceived into it, it will overcast til it cast and vomit out many filthy corruptions: Though Jacob be little and weak & at the first seem not to be a peregall unto the rugh man, who is full of strength, yet at last he shall catch him by the heel, and overturn him in a moment: Waite but a little, and ye shall be utterly out of the reach of all the powers of Hell.

I tremble all with fear, that the Lord cast me off and banish out of the Land of the living this filthy festered Soul.

God is more merciful, than man can conceive him to be: Can a mother forget her Child? that she have no compassion? saith the Lord: A loving Father will be loath to cast his Child out of doors in a deadly disease: If these who are evil can give good things unto their Children, how much more will that Father who is goodness it self, give the holy Spirit with all other good things to these who will seek then? cry to God in prayer.

Alas, the sorrow of mine heart lameth the liberty of my tongue, my words cannot express the groans of my grief.

Though ye be not able to utter words, sigh with your heart unto God: God heard Moses his sighs, like cries: Why criest thou to me? said God to the sighing man: A sigh out of a soft melting heart, is a powerful prayer before God.

I am both sinful and senseless: Though I have sinned most hainouslie, yet I find no melting in mine heart: All the tears of my repentance within me are become like a frozen moisture: I cannot so much as wring out one drop thereof: Oh, that they were so melted, that they might rush out at the floodgates of mine eyes, that thereof I might with the sinful woman make a bath for the feet of my Lord! Oh that mine heart were formed into another mould! Oh that I could in his presence drench my Soul in a shower of tears! O how precious is the sense of a revealed and a reconcealed God! I find myself so ycie and cold, yea, so benumbed and blockish, as though I were void of all sense of grace: What can this be?

He who findeth himself benumbed is not altogether senseless: In such a man there must be some stirring of the pulse of a spiritual life: A dead man knoweth not that he is dead, no more doeth a dead soul: A seared conscience feeleth not defertions: That man hath the beginning of grace, who can say from his heart, I have no grace in myself, but only to find that I have no grace.

This we must all know, that the best of God's Saints will be troubled with temporal desertions, as Jonah was, while he was wrapped with waves and with weeds in the bottom of the sea: Out of this belly of hell they will cry to God, Why hast thou made us to err from thy ways? and hardened our heart from thy fear? Most godly Souls may swarfe in sin, but they cannot die in their sins: A spiritual man may be do •… ked in a sea of sin or sorrow, but can never be drowned: At last God shall make him sing with Jonah, Yet hast thou brought up my life from corruptions, O Lord, my God: The spiritual life and light which God hath once put into the Soul of man, can never be totallie extinguished: God's graces and his gifts are without repentance: Judas from horror may rin to the halter, but Peter cannot perish.

Think ye then Sir, that a man cannot fall from the grace of God, if once he hath been received in Grace? may not Grace like some plants for a space take root, and thereafter wither? May not God begin a good work into a man, and after leave it imperfect?

God's working in the godly is not like the doing of him that beginneth to build an house before he count his cost, but is not able to finish it: I am confident of this very thing, said S. Paul, that he which hath begun a good work in you, will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ: God's spiritual gifts and graces which are without repentance, come never within the compass of God's Reuocation. * God will make Saul a King, and again repent that ever he was crowned, and thereafter will put him frō his kingdom: He will lend out a Talent and after take it back again: He will give to man a tongue, and thereafter make him dumb: He will give Health, Wealth, Riches, and after take all back again: The Lord hath given and the Lord hath taken, may be said of all things except of his spiritual and special graces: These he giveth once, but never taketh them back again: Sin indeed will waken and diminish the sense and feeling of their operation, but can never take them quite away. Grace in a godly Soul will be betimes like flax smoking without a flamme, or like embers under an heap of ashes: Though all seem to be dead out, yet there is some little secret spunke within which shall never be quenched: New sins I confess are very dangerous, they will wonderfullie impair the sense of mercy into faithful Souls, yea, so that to their judgment the Spirit of God will seem altogether to have forsaken them, But yet into their most desperate-like-cry there is a My of Faith in their prayer, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?

Grace in a godly Soul will be like sap into an Oak or Elm in the frostie days of December, hid close within the bark: While Christ the Sun of righteousness removeth his hot beams from the faithful Soul, the Soul drouppeth like an Herb into a winter day.

Grace like sap runneth in to the heart and there lurketh for a spake: But again, so soon as this Sun beginneth to return with the heat & health of his countenance in a new Spring-time, then will appear again first bude, then blossoms, then flourishes, and after fruits: That which was hid of before, is incontinent perceived: As seed now cast into the ground seemeth to be a dead thing, and yet hath life in it, so is God's grace alive and quickening when it seemeth far otherwise: In a sown a man liveth, though he seem to be dead.

The life of God in a man can never altogether be choked with sin: Our misery is not able to over-reach his mercy.

A sparkle of fire should be more able to burn up the sea, than man's sins for to dry up the blood of his mercy: Where grace is begun a man may fall, but he can never fall away.

If Sir, ye have found once the life of God within your Soul, ye have received a sure pledge & pawn of immortality, say to your Soul, And now my Soul return unto thy rest.

There is no rest within me: I am alas, as a man upon a raging Sea, tumbled and tossed with such fearful temptations, which make all the bowels of my belly to wamble.

Sea sickness Sir, is sore while it lasteth: But many seek this sickness for to cure them of a worse: Take courage; God hath imbarked you into this temptation, for to cause you caste out some corruptions which lie & lurk about your heart. Be content to tarie a little space upon the Firth, till the filth of you stomach be clean purged away: Assure yourself that all this sore sickness shall work your health in the latter end, which shall cause your to sing, For his mercy endureth forever. In the shadow of God's wings mak your refuge, until these calamities pass over.

I am ever in great doubt of myself.

Though ye doubt of yourself, ye must not doubt of God's kindness and compassions: If •… e doubt that God can be merciful to your sins, ye deny your Creed wherein ye see forgiuennesse of sin to be an express Article of Faith.

Though for some space ye be troubled with doubts, at last ye shall know by his Spirit within that Christ was no more willing to suffer for sinners, than he shall prove both willing and able to save you: God's custom is to choose the hardest way for the best end, partly for to prove his power, partly for to try our trust.

I wish it be so: But for the present I find a fear within me which maketh my Soul to tremble: I ever think that hardly can it be that the Spirit of God would dwell into mine heart, which is a very cage of corruption: If the men of God, when they see bordels, abhor them, and go by them, shall not the Spirit of God much more pass by me, yea, & abhor me, who of mine heart have made a most filthy stew: Moreover, Satan is busy with his Bellows blowing at the juniper coals of God's wrath, that against me may be kindled a consuming fire.

The frown of a Prince may be the favor of God: But when God frowneth, who shall show favor? O what a cry is in the dumb choppe of the conscience!

As I perceive ye are in the storm of temptations: As the ship in a tempest goeth with a low sails, So is it good and most sure in the tempest of temptations to take down the top sails of our own worth.

But yet Sir, in your humility beware to disprise and set at naught the graces of God that are within you: Virtue standeth in the midst: As the Publican would not brage vainlie with the Pharisee, that he was not like other men, so neither would he desperatlie say with Cain, Mine iniquity is greater, than that it may be forgiven.

Alas, Sir ye know not what weight hangeth upon mine heart: ye are not privy unto my secret sins which I think shame to utter: O these gnawings of my wormish Conscience: hardly can ye imagine what filthy thoughts have been into my heart, since I came into this world: Hitherto they have all been hid from mine eyes: But now I think that I see all my sins set in order before me: My Soul is poisoned with the stink of such corruptions▪ I abhor myself, and what wonder that God abhor me?

The more a man abhorreth himself, God who is mild & merciful, loveth him the better: It is good for a man to stink in his own nose: A wicked man may be well compared to the Latin Cimex French Punaise Tree, Lice that stink most vilelie, and yet feel not the stink of their own breath: Laodicea thought her self happy, and yet God said, that he would spew her out of his mouth.

God's thoughts are not man's thoughts: Ye complain Sir, of the filthiness of your bygone thoughts, it is well done: But here is your comfort, Now is that fountain of God in Zachrie opened to the house of David for sin and for uncleanness: Though through sin ye were lepper in soul as Na •… man was in body, the Jordan of Christ's Blood is able to mak you clean: The precept is not of hard practice, Wash and be clean, believe and be saved.

If ye would have the Spirit of God to take a Chamber into your heart, keep your heart clean: God's house must be a clean house, it must often be sweept: If the dust or dirt of sin defile the pavement thereof, it must first be watered with the tears of repentance: The stoure & dust must be laid with holy water, & then we must sweep out all filthiness with the besom of godly revenge. This doing Sir, God shall delight to dwell in you.

If Satan blow at the juniper coals of your sins kindled with sparkles of fiery wrath, run with the Bucket of Faith to the Blood of Jesus which is only able for to quench that flamme.

My cheeks are watered with tears trickling down both day and night: * my moist eyes are soked in this salt brimie water: O but they are comfortless tears.

God at last shall make them comfortable like the bowle full of dew, which Gideon wrāg out of his Fleece, God's sign of Israel's Salvation: Have patience a little Sir, and your watery eyes shall receive the other drȳ sign of the fleece, all your tears shall be dried and wiped away, so that ye shall never weep anymore: The hour is fast coming, that God shall wipe away your tears, the waters of your weeping after that there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, nor pain.

Seek the Lord while he may be found, and call upon him while he is nigh: To him alone in Jesus must ye have all your recourse, on him alone must ye rely.

I wote not where to go: I can neither sit, stand, nor lie: Mine heart alas, is hardened, yea, hard like the heart of the Leviathan, which is hard like a piece of the nether millstone: I think that such hardness is from the deceitfulness of sin.

It is a sort of softness when we feel our own hardness: He who hath begun such softening will bring his own work to perfectiō in his appointed hour: The seeds of grace are like Corn, they are not ripe the first day they are sown, but ripen by degrees: From this is that saying, Grace requireth space, or in space cometh Grace.

A reprobate sense is not so near at any time, as when it is least suspected and most neglected: Say in all patience with the Prophet Micah, I will bear the indignation of the Lord, because I have sinned against him: He will turn again, he will have compassion upon you: He will subdue your iniquities, & cast them in the depths of the sea.

Hold up your heart toward the Father of Lights, the giver of every good gift: Let your foul flee up to the Throne of his Grace.

My Soul is not fit for fleeing to the Heavens: It is lik a pulled foul that wanteth the feathers: It may well nod with its head, and make a mint with the stumpts of its wings, but can by no means hoise it self from the Earth. All my comforts are clipped from me: Sins heavy like millstones, are hung about my neck: Oh, that I were cast into the sea with my sins, there to be buried forever far, if it were possible, from the presence of my God: Since ye came to me mine heart was not in such a plounge of misery as it is now: There is nothing within me but wrath and woe, warring against my Salvation: God's heavy hand hath distressed mine heart wonderfullie.

My Soul is so besieged with temptations that it may well be called, Magor missabib, fear round about: This I fear that my name be crossed out of the Book of Life.

I remember of a wise counsel which a learned Divine gave to a man sore assaulted upon his death-bed with the temptations of the devil: When thou art tempted of Satā, said he, & seest no way to escape, evē thē plainly close up thine eyes, and answer nothing to his temptations: But commend thy cause to God: This said he, is a principal point of wisdom, that we must follow in the hour of death: That is, That we daine not to give Satan an answer but say with Michael, The Lord rebuke thee Satan. If thy flesh tremble and fear to enter into another life, and if it doubt of salvation, if thou yield to these things, thou hurtest thyself, therefore close thine eyes as before and say with S. Stephen, Lord Jesus receive my Spirit, and then certainly Christ will come unto thee with all his Angels and be the guider of thy way.

At the entry of the red Sea, when Israel environed on both sides with mountains, having the sea before and the Egyptians behind, could see no means of escape: Then Moses said to Israel, The Lord shall fight for you and ye shall hold your peace: That is, ye shall seal up your thoughts in silence, and let God be doing So do ye, be silent for a space, daine not Satan's temptations with an answer, fear not, stand still, and see the Salvation of the LORD: As Moses said of the Egyptians, so will I say of all your temptations within a short space, The Egyptians whom ye have seen today, ye shall see them again no more forever.

Oh, that with Job I could lay mine hand upon my mouth, and with Jacob wait for God's salvation: But alas, I am laden with iniquity: Satan besiegeth me so that I cannot keep silence: Satan hath laid down a bloody libel before me whereunto he urgeth me to make answer.

If ye must needs make answer, learn that notable speech of Bernard on his death bed: * About an hour before his death, he being as he thought, presented before the great Tribunal of his Judge, where he found himself seuirelie charged with the accusation of Satan, forsook himself for to rely upon Christ alone: I freely confess said he that as thou affirmest, I am most unworthy, and that by no worthiness of mine can I merit eternal life; yet I am assured that my Lord Christ hath a double right to heavens glory, one by heritage, and another by conquest: The first is sufficient for himself, the other is for me, ex cujus donojure illud mihi vendicans, non confundor, which by right of gift I claim and challenge and shall not be confounded: Upon this Rock ye must cast the anchor of your soul: The Lord is able to do unto us above all that we can ask or think.

Take courage Sir: Let Satan make out his process; your dear and loving Brother is both your Judge and your Aduocat.

Oh that I could take that counsel and keep silence, waiting till the Captain of Salvation bring me thorough this red sea of bloody temptations: Oh that I could lay hold upon that right of heaven, which Christ hath conquered: But alas, I can find no ground or warrant in mine heart that such a conquest can belong to me, for I know that in me dwelleth no good things.

The greatest foe the faith of the godly hath and the chiefest cause of their trembling & troubled heart, is that often they seek in themselves grounds & warrāts of God's favor, as though the Lord could not love them unless there be in them such virtues as in every point should be: Because they want perfectiō, they think they have nothing: By this means Satan shaketh silly Souls to and fro like Reedes with the winds of distrust: Make the right use of such temptations, let them draw you from yourself, for to rely only upon the mercy of your Lord: Be earnest to find God's mark in your Soul, even Sanctification the Salvation mark whereof the marrow is Christ's satisfaction: From this mark, press toward the mark, for the price of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.

Faine would I have grace so to do: But out upon me, I have taken such surfeit of sins, that I find myself void of all grace: O death, death, death, doolefull is that separation of a Soul dead in sin from the body dead for sin.

I am so defiled and deformed that while I remember judgment, it maketh me all to shake and to shiuer: Fye on me a graceless creature wallowing in a mire of misery: Oh, but for a dram of God's grace! Oh, for the greatness of the pickle of mustarde seed thereof!

He that desireth grace is not altother graceless: It is God's goodness that hath given you this small and weak desire of grace, in this God's good hand is upon you: He who giveth grace to desire grace, shall give also grace for grace: God often giveth to a man above his hopes, I sought but life, said David, yet the Lord gave him to be a King: God who in sickness giveth you the desire of grace, shall before ye die give you grace for grace, a grace which at last shall make you to sing: I sought but grace, yet God hath given me glory: If ye feel and fear his wrath, seek the more earnestly for his mercy: This was that good counsel which Zephaniah gave to Israel before the decree of wrath come out Seek righteousness, seek meekness, it may be ye shall be hid in the day of the Lord's anger: Christ's cry is, Seek, Ask, Knocke.

Seeing God desireth to be asked he longeth to give; seeing he desireth us to seek him, he desireth to be found; seeing he desireth us to knock, his desire is to open: God is more rich and liberal, than we are poor, His hand is wider for to give gifts, than our heart can be for to receive: He who will not believe that God can be merciful to him, is twice in the wrong to God After that he hath broken the law of his Justice by offending, he is not content except that he wrong his mercy by distrust: God's delight is to be with the Children of men on earth, as also to have them with himself in heaven.

Now Sir, being assured of th •… love, embrace this Lord with all 〈◊〉 arms of your affections: Seek earnestly the Spirit of Grace, for he is poured on thirsty grounds: I will pour water, said the Lord, upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the dry ground.

Oh, but for one drop of that water: Oh, that my Soul were watered with the dropping bowels of his mercy: In the mean time my bones with sorrow are dried up like an hearth: The terrors of the Almighty stick within mine heart, and my Spirit sucketh out the vennome thereof: I think that I am in the very gorge pipe of hell: If this wrath continue▪ doubtless it shall be my bane.

God's wrath is fearful I confess, but God will not be long wroth with his Children▪ I will not, said the Lord, contend forever, neither will I be always wroth: For the Spirit should fail before me, and the Souls which I have made: So soon as man beginneth to be wearied of his sins, God beginneth to be wearied of his wrath, yea which is strange, In all our afflictions he is afflicted. There is but a moment in his wrath, but his mercy endureth forever.

There is such a mercy in God, that in comparison thereof all the mercies of men are but scrofe and scum, a myte of his mercy, shall remove the mountains of your misery, in Christ is a mine of mercy.

I know that it is so: But I as yet have no sense of such a mercy While I seek and cry for help, God either answereth not at all, or when he maketh answer, it is like that which Elisha said to Joram, seeking comfort upon extremity, What have I to do with thee, get thee to t •… Prophets of thy father and mother, a •… desire them to help thee, get thee 〈◊〉 thy pleasures and profits, and preferments, which in forsaking me, thou didst so eagerlie pursue: This maketh all the wounds of my remorse to blead afresh.

As Samuel took the voice of God to be the voice of Eli, so many take the voice of a temptation to be the voice of God: We must try the Spirits: Satan is crafty: He can wind himself wonderfullie into the heart of men, sometimes by sleepy security, some time by fearful despair: While he entiseth unto sin, he maketh God to speak nothing but mercy to a sinner.

Thou may sin, will he say, and repent again: But while he accuseth for sin, he maketh all God's words to be words of wrath, that the sinner may be swallowed up with despair. *Tak heed Sir, who it is that answereth to your cry: Though God should draw you thorough Hell, be ye still assured of Heaven: His wrath is but for a moment, but his mercy endureth forever.

Settle your heart in the secret of God, lest it be carried away with every light wind and gale of temptation: Seek out of yourself in Christ the grounds and warrands of your Salvation.

I fear greatly to be over-blown, and that I make shipwreck of the faith upon most fearful banks and dangers, such a boisterous gale did •… never feel.

While temptations are most terrible to our feeling, they are often least dangerous: Shallow feas are full of broken waters, while deeper though more terrible are of a softer swelling, carrying the burden more safelie above. Tak courage the most godly heart must encounter with many thorters: The Lord humbleth the hearts of his Saints, lest that in a vain conceit of their own worth they should over-ween themselves: Think well upon that which I say, a red-war in the Soul is better than a sleepy laish Security: Away with Laban's mirth, his songs and his Tabrets.

Flat opposition is not so dangerous as a covered agreement: Take to heart this my counsel, Though the Lord should s •… ay you, yet put your trust into him: God is not ever gotten at the first: verily, said Isaiah, thou art a God that hiddest thyself, O God, of Israel, the Savior.

I understand not what such hidding meaneth: O the fearful Tribunal of God, whose eyes of fire see all the ways of man: In his Ballance he pondereth all his goinges: God's mercy I know is a good staff to stay upon, but it is far from mine heart and hand. I am not like these sinners which but trip and stumble, and rise again after a snapper, my fall i •… with my full weight; the milstons o •… his wrath are hung about my neck▪ which bear my Soul down to the bottom of Hell, I find now the truth of that saying of the wise▪ His own iniquities shall take the wicked himself, and he shall be holden with the cords of his sins.

What shall I say? as truly said the wise, By sorrow of the heart th •… spirit is broken: Seeing ye are acquaint with the speeches of the wise remember that counsel of the wise▪ Trust in the Lord with all thine heart▪ and lean not to thine own understanding. I pray you to be plain with me, What is this that maketh you li •… a reed shaken with the wind, wherein lieth the strength of your temptations?

I will not conceal the matter from you: This is it, mine own heart absolveth me not: while I put mine hand into mine own bosom, Oh, how liprous pull I it out again? My Conscience giveth me a terrible twetch: * Incessantlie it crieth out guilty against me: What shall I say then, to that of the Apostle, If our heart condemn us, God is greater than our heart? Is not this the true sense of these words, If our own heart condemn us, much more will God condemn us, who is more mighty than our heart? In this I find myself amidst the thickest throng of fearful temptations, wrapped in the wrath of God: This temptation is like a fresh post-horse▪ for to carry me to damnation, it is of Satan's saddling.

* Indeed Sir, the judgment of a man's conscience is a lively image of the judgment of God: It is certain, that whom the conscience condemneth into this world, him shall God condemn in the world to come: And again, whom the conscience shall absolve into this world, him shall God absolve into the world to come. The Conscience is God's Judge within: But this ye must know y ^t it is not time for a Judge to give out sentence while his wits are troubled, or while he is in a mood or passion▪ A wise Judge will not be sudden, but will take time to consider well the cause before he pronounce.

A Conscience that is troubled should not sit down in judgment As one appealed from drunk •… King Philip to sober King Philip, so must a sinner appeal from his Conscience in a qualme, to his Conscience in a calm.

Moreover, every voice that is within a man, is not the voice of his Conscience, but of some temptation shrouded under the coat of the Conscience, like Jacob clothed with Es •… us garment: While Jonah was but in the belly of a fish, his heart cried, that he was in the belly of hell: Satan hath a deceiving Prospect or dioptre for sin: At the one end sin and judgment appear to be far off, little like Midges: But while the instrument is turned, these midges appear like mountains: Sin in the doing is like Zoar a little one, but in repenting it is like Nineveh huge and great: It seemeth before the door of mercy like a Camel at a needels eye.

But think ye Sir, that the Conscience of a man which God hath set within him as an Judge, as a Watch, and a Witness, yea, as a thousand witnesses, can fail at any time.

It is certain, that while the Consciences of men are well wakened, and not troubled with terrors of temptations, they are into y ^e breasts of men, verily God's voice declaring to the Soul what God hath concerning it, ratified into the Heaven: But ye know that many a man's Conscience will be mightily troubled: Sometimes it will be darkened with Ignorance, so that as Samuel took Eliab for David, it will also take him to be appointed to be a King whom the Lord hath rejected: Some times it will not know what ailleth the Soul, no more than Elisha knew what ailed the Shunamite, while she fell down at his feet: Some times it will be fast asleep like Jonah, while he snorted in the hatches.

I compare the Consciences of the godly and of the wicked to men in a dream: One man that is lain down in his bed, hungry without his supper, will dream that he is at a feast making good cheare: But while he awaketh, his Soul is empty, his dishes flee away with his dream: It is so that it fareth with a wicked man, whose Conscience is in a dream: He will imagine that assuredly there is nothing but Heaven for him: He will think with the hungry dreamer that he is ready presently to sit down at table, even at that Table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the Kingdom of God: Now while he is even at the sitting down, which is at the hour of his death, his Conscience wakeneth, and he is found empty: Thus all his dishes fl •… eth away with his dream.

Again, another man shall dream of fearful things, viz. that he is in the midst of his enemies ready to be slain: If any be waking in the bed with him, he will hear him into his sleep sighing and sobbing with a sore mone: But so soon as he is wakened, he findeth himself in surety lying upon a bed of down: It is even so that it will often fare with a godly man, whose Conscience is in a dream: His heart will be burdened with grief as with a night mare: He will imagine that God is become his enemy, and that assuredly he will cast him into hell: Now while he thinketh that he is even at the fall, and while for fear thereof in his sleep he is making his mone: God in mercy wakeneth him softlie, and loe, he is lying into the arms of his God: At last it fareth with the godly & the wicked as it fareth with Pharaohs Butler and his Baker after their dreams, the one was restored to his office, but the other was hanged.

I wish at God that my Conscience were in such a Dream, and that all my troubles were but some spiritual night Mare, a disease that is cured by wakening the Soul that sleepeth: I know that the spiritual senses of the Soul may be sometimes covered with a veil of gross dullness: But I cannot suspect or surmise that this can be a dream: Behold, I speak, I hear, I see, I savor: Howe then can this be a dream.

He who dreameth, will think all that: He will think that he speaketh, that he heareth, seeth, and walketh, and runneth & leapeth over brinks or ditches, while indeed he is snorting upon his bed: Yea, in his dream he will think that his dream cannot be a dream, but that surely he is broad awake: This cannot be a dream, he will think even while as he dreameth.

I know Sir, that your body is surly awake, and not dreaming: But in all appearance your Soul is in a slumber: The Lord waken you softlie in his mercy.

If I dream, the Lord waken me soon out of this dreadful dream: I am filled with a world of woes, every thought is as it were a thorn thrust into mine heart: My fears are like the fevers, they go by fits: A little since I thought that my blood was calmed, and that I had some respite: Of my sins I had but a shallow sense, but now behold, a new fit of greater force, which maketh all the powers of my Soul to shiuer: All my sins are in God's quarrel, up in arms against me: God's wrath followeth me with a full fail, and chargeth me a fresh with bloody blows. * While I was but breeding this fever, I was but chained with wordly enchantments: All my trouble was but for Bairnes, Lands, Children, Houses, and other perishing pleasures, trifling troubles, which I could not for a long space resolve to forsake.

But now is pain instead of pleasure, a sour and bitter sauce, prepared for Adams sweet Apple, fear, shame, and remorse: What recks to want pleasure, if so be there were no pain: I would not give a flee for the world, and all the pleasures or profit that therein is, if I could once be reconciled to my God: Mine heart is like an Anvil whereupon the Lord striketh most fiercelie with the hammer of his wrath: There is not a power of my Soul, which is not loaden with blows: All my distresses hitherto have been but light skirmishes, now I am come to the main Battle: My Soul is hunted to and fro like a Partridge on the mountains: Who is on my side? Who?

The Lord is with you, though ye perceive him not: This is incident to the faithful, not ever to know when God is with them: Gideon was a man renowned for his Faith▪ he was one of the Catologue of the faithful, & yet while the Angel said unto him, The Lord is with thee thou mighty mā of valor, he answered, Oh, my Lord if the Lord be with us, why then is all this befallen us?

See how the man of God knew not that God was with him.

Take courage Sir, seeing the skirmishes are past, and that ye are come to the main Battle, God shall be your main help: Come out against all your enemies, as David came out against Goliath, in the Name of the God of Battels, and Lord of Armies: There is no Corslet of proof against a stone cast out of a sling in the Name of the great JEHOVAH: Resist the Devil and he shall flee from you.

God's wrath hath heat the fiery Fornace on seven times more thā it was of before: I am so dashed with y ^e sense of my sins, & so pierced with stinging fears, y ^t thereby all the powers of my Soul are shaken: Hithereto I have been crossed with care, for my life, and for my Children: What care I now for my dearest Children? Would to God that I might give my first borne for my transgression, and the fruit of my womb for the sins of my Soul.

Behold, here a poor distressed and distracted sinner, who knoweth not to what hand to turn him: All the enemies of my Salvation pursue me with hue and with cry: The great God of Justice hath set up a Gibbet into my Soul. All the terrors of the Lord muster against me: I am galled and gored with sinful fears, as Egypt was plagued with Flies & Frogs: Mine heart is filled with dismayedness, my belly trembleth, & rottenness is entered into my bones: While I had time to repent I willingly wallowed into the mire of sin, wherein now I necessarily stick: Fear driveth, Hope draweth, I am tossed like a Tenice ball: O the straitness of that account, which I am shortly to be called unto! O that terrible Tribunal! O these chains of darkness, in which sinners shall be reserved unto God's last Sessions: Who can stand in such a tempest, where the creature hath a combat with God and with his wrath, hand to hand? I am stricken with such amazedness, that I know not where to find any true refreshment▪ This maketh death to me as a King of fear: All the sins that ever I did commit, seem to me malicious blows which I have set upon the face of my GOD▪ Hardlie can I think that such a Cain or cursed Cham as I, cā ever enter into Canaan▪ Think ye not this to be true? I find this to be truth: There is no peace saith my God to the wicked.

These be but temptations of Satan, who is seeking for to fifth you as wheat: Pray Christ that he would pray for you, that your faith fail not There is full power in Christ for to lock up the jaws of that roaring Lyon: He at last shall discover unto you those Gun-powder plots.

I know that there is sufficient power in Christ for to save me, but I doubt of his will: If Christ were minded to save me, would he not give me an assurance to be saved? This temptation passeth through the bark to the bone.

Our assurance is not perfect into this life: We are all here like a Ship tossed with contrary Tydes into a raging Sea.

As the weather beaten Bark is driven with many contrary courses before she can win her Haven▪ so hath the Soul, many toes and froes, before it pierce to the Skes for to enter into Heaven: God giveth to no man here all good things at once, but some we receive in hand, and some in hope: This hope is the Christian Souls plight anchor in the swelling Seas of temptations: While all that is present is full of trouble, Hope fetcheth comforts from the times to come: While it is foul, we hope it shall be fair: While we are sick, we hope for health: While we prouid for our Children, we hope they shall do well: While men write Books, they hope they shall do good: While the Mariner saileth thorough the raging waves, he hopeth to come home again, he hopeth for vantage: While the Sower, casteth his seed from him, he weepeth, but Hope comforteth him, that he shall receive again a plentiful increase. The hope of y ^e pleasant Spring is a comfort in the cold Winter The hope of the Day is the long Nights comfort: Deaths special comfort, is in hope that we shall all meet again: Well then, Sir, seeing it is so, the comforts which we have not received as yet in hand, receive them in Hope, wait upon God, and wait upon him still: While all your senses are silent, Hope shall come with Help, assuring you that at last ye shall prevail: Let the devil do his worst to dismay you, stick ye fast by this Hope which shall never fail you: yea, though God himself should seem to be your enemy, yet say to him with Job, Though thou should slay me, yet will I trust in thee.

That Sir, is of very hard practice: For if the Lord of Life put out the life, who shall put it in again? mine Hope is small, if it be not lost: I fear to feel shortly that which shall be without either end or ease: All sorts of temptations come hail shot upon me: I am laid open to all the blows of God's wrath: I am lik a wind-waued tree loose at the roots: Mine heart quaketh, my Soul panteth; my conscience is in a qualme: What can such torments be but very Postes and fore-runners of everlasting pains? What can they be but the very smoke of God's wrath coming before a fire that shall burn to the bottom of Hell? The fear of this clogeth so my Conscience that I cannot think but such terrors be the very earnest of eternal woe: This maketh my liver to rolle in my body: O that mercy might be Bartered for Money.

Indeed Sir, such terrors are such of their own nature, even the smoke of a kindled wrath, never to be quenched. But unto the godly, their nature is changed by grace: Such tremblings, and shakings, such thunders, and earth quakes, fears and fires, are but the preparations of the Soul for to meet with its God into the still and calm voice.

After this manner as ye know▪ the Lord came unto his Servant Elijah: Before he came to him, he prepared his way by three fearful Messengers, First, by a wind which rent the mountains and brake in pieces the Rocks; Secondly, by an Earthquake, which made all to shake under him; Thirdly by a fire: All these came before for to terrify the man of God, that by that means he might be the better prepared to meet with his God in the calm. Before Christ would show himself to the world, he sent two austere Messengers before him, First, Moses with a fiery Law, and last the Baptist like a Carpenter with a sharpened Axe in his hand▪ for to hewe down every fruitless tree that marred the ground: After them came the meekness of the Lamb of God, crying, Come unto me all ye that are wearied and laden, and I will ease you. God will not be merciful to proud self-sufficient men.

Take Sir these blasts of temptations to be but the Lord's wind of preparation: These heart-quackes are but earth quakes: All your other fiery temptations are but fire from Heaven, Posts from GOD in haste for to give you warning of his coming: By such warnings the Lord will waken you, lest with the wicked in the slumber of security, ye should sleep still in your sins, or with scorners should smooth them over, and jest them away, as though the sins of men should never be sentenced, nor their life examined: Be of good comfort Sir, your sharpest temptations which Satan hath whet upon the whet-stone of his malice, by God's grace shall be to you like the Baptists Axe for to hewe down all superfluities of wickedness within you: It is good that God snedde the unfruitful and rotten branches of our life, that in our hearts a way may be prepared for the King of glory.

Ye must also know Sir, that such troubles and tempests, are but a preface of God's presence, as, Hearken and take head Israel, was set before the Law: Suffer therefore patiently the Lord's rebukes: Let the righteous smite me, said David, and it shall be a kindness, and let him reprove me, and it shall be an excellent oil, which shall not break mine head: These fears Sir, that trouble you, are nothing but God's reproofs: * Take them as a kindness, yea, & as an excellent oil, which shall neither break head nor heart for your hurt: The nature of oil is not to break▪ but rather to heal that which is already broken: God by such trubles intendeth to refine you: Have patience but a little in your griefs: Yet a little while, and they shall be no more: The night is darkest while the dawning is nearest: while the fever it at the hight, the cooling sweat is at the door of the poares: While the Mountains are on both hands, and Pharaoh behind, and the Sea before, then let Israel stand still, and see the Salvation of the Lord: These Egyptiā temptations, are but for to chasse you to Canaan with hard bondage, from a Land where it is counted an abomination to offer Sacrifice unto God: So soon as the rod of God shall strike upon that Sea, it shall make way, and ye shall safelie pass thorough: The Lord shall fight for you, and ye shall hold your peace: And what then? The Egyptians whom ye have seen today, ye shall see them again no more forever: God will afflict his own, but not destroy them: Bread Corn is bruised, but God will not break it, with the wheels of his cart.

I have looked for such comforts, but alas, they are long in coming: In the mean while, my Soul is all agast, I taste nothing but gall and worm-wood, mine heart is filled with sorrow: My breach is lik y ^e sea, all my wordly sweetness is turned into worms of Conscience: My tears trickle down both day and night, and yet God delayeth to send me comfort: My God shake off the sins which hang so fast on.

Have patience Sir, but a little, and comfort shall come: Before ye reap your fruits ye must first till and sow the ground: The seed time is a sorrowful time: Man soweth his seed in tears: But again while he remembereth that except he sow, he shall not reap, & that as he soweth, so shall he reap, he casteth from him his seed liberallie down upon the ground, smilling with his watered cheeks of sorrow in hope of a plentiful increase.

Think it not strange Sir, that in this seed-time of grace ye sow in tears: Comfort yourself in this▪ that joy shall arise out of your sorrow: While ye sow in tears, think not your labor lost: Out of your greatest sorrow shall spring your truest joy: As at the rising of Christ our Lord was a Earth quake, so at our regeneration which is the first resurrection, there is an heart-quake: Be not discouraged, though the hand of God be heavy upon you, his stripes will work to your well: As an Horse or a Mule being once well lashed with a whip doth ever after fear, if he hear but y ^e Bell which is tied to the whip: So men, if he hath been once well scoured & scourged with God's rod, he will so tremble at the sound thereof, that he will fear to anger the Lord again: It is good that God mingle the tartness and terrors of the Law with the sweetness of the Gospel.

I am so confounded with shame that I cannot face the Heavens: Fye upon my filthiness, my course is backward from my God.

It is an evil token when for sin there is no shame in the sinner: This Scripture calleth a Whoores forehead: In this Lot his elder Daughter bewrayed her self, and show that she was not touched for her sin of Incest: For after she had committed vilanie with her father, she as it were shameleslie bragged of it, by calling her son Moab, that is, Of my father, that his name might cry to the world, The father of this child begat him upon his own daughter: Shame ever followeth sin, if men be not ashamed of sin, which is Repentance, God shall shame them for sin, which is Vengeance: As for your backward course, a few steps backward, will mak you advance further in your leaping.

I fear exceedinglie: I fear to loss both Soul and Salvation.

Let Faith moderate your fear: When Jacob thought that he had lossed Joseph, and was in great fear, for Benjamin, even then found he both Joseph & Benjamin: Look often unto God and ye shall find him with David to be the light of your countenance.

God hath opened the flood-gates of his wrath against my Soul: O the deepness of my troubles!

The Soul in deepest troubles is like Noah's Ark on the waters, the higher it was tossed, the nearer it approached to the heavens: Little Boats of little burden are but for shallow waters: But great ships of greater lod are sent unto the depths: The deepness of your temptations, Sir, declare that God hath loden you with many graces: Brauest Captains are put to the Front and forebrunt of the choke: Best Christians are battered with most bitter temptations: God who suffereth them to be tempted, knoweth what they can do, and therefore to encourage others by their example, he putteth them to a proof, for to let the world see, what his grace can work in weakness, at last ye shall say, We went thorough fire and water, but thou hast brought us to a wealthy place: What say ye Sir? Beginneth not your heart to rejoice? Be glad, Sir. & say to God with the Psalmist, All my springs shall be of thee.

I have little mind of springs, the Apostle said wisely, Is any man mirrie? let him sing: Mine Harp and Heart both are out of tune: The Harp of my joy is hung upon the villowes: My fingers can guide no more this wirbling instrument: All the joy of my light, and the light of my joy is quenched with unspeakable grief, as with a damp.

Mine heart is like a moth eaten cloth, all rent with temptations and eaten out with the worm of Conscience, like that worm which did eat away the pleasures of Jonah: By its byte all my joy is fallen down like that Gourd: All the good that ever was within me is boulted out, Satan hath sifted me: I think presently that I am at the very mouth of Hell, ready to fall down to the bottom thereof.

The way to Heaven is near by the gates of hell: The way to pleasures for evermore, is paved with pains: David first cried to God, de profundis, out of the depths, said he, have I called to thee: But afterward he praised him in excelsis, with the highest Organs of laude, even with loud Cymbals, yea, high sounding Cymbals.

It was well said by one, Quo acerbior miseria eo acceptior misericordia, the sowrer the misery, the sweeter the mercy: Let the hope of that sweet mercy which is to come, sweeten the tartenesse of your present terrors: He who can bring light out of darkness, and who brought water out of the fiery flint, can mak the sweetness of his grace spring out of the gall of bitterness: Woe to him whom God will not correct: This was a sore word Ephraim is joined to idols, let him alone: Pray God that he never let you so alone: Bless God for this chastisement: Though for a space ye be in the fearful depths of temptations▪ Let nothing mak you to despair, Christ the most solid Rock of your Salvation shall turn all such surges into froth.

While Jonah was in the belly of hell, and all the billows of God's wrath passing over him, yet would he not despair into that hell, but being tumbled up & down there, he trembled in his believing, and believed in his trembling: Then I said, I am cast out of thy sight: There was his trembling: Yet I will look again toward thine holy Temple: There was his believing: And the Lord spake to the Fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land; these were the fruits of his Faith.

Learn Sir of Jonah, not to despair, were it in the belly of hell: Though for a space ye as it were go down with that Prophet to the bottoms of the mountains, the time shall come that ye shall sing to God, yet hast▪ thou brought up my life from corruption, O Lord my God: God for a space for the sins of his chosen, for his glory, for his praise, for proof▪ for example, and many other reasons may be eclipsed from shining to the silly sinful Souls of his Turtles: But there is none obscurity that shall be able forever to restrain from them y ^e Celestial influence of his blessed beams of comfort: In a little wrath I hid my face from thee for a moment, but with everlasting kindness will I have mercy on thee, saith the Lord thy Redeemer.

But alas, mine heart is all •… eadie wounded with incurable wounds.

In Christ is your remeede If ye be wounded, there is health in his wings for the healing of your wounds: Though for a space such wounds be sore in your feeling, yet fret not: Ye would gladly suffer all that and more, if ye knew how many stripes Heaven were worth: Though Christ tarie, yet he will not tarie. He is more sensible to our sores than we can imagine: Believe him while he speaketh: These be his words of sense, He that toucheth you, toucheth the Apple of mine eye.

Be of good heart Sir, Christ shall be the Judge of our sins, who was judged for our sins: He to whom all judgment is delivered, was delivered for us unto death: Ye say, that your heart is wounded, let this be a salve for your sore, a broken heart is the very heart of repentance never to be repented of: The heart which was never wounded for sin, is deadly wounded with sin: The heart which was never wounded for sin, hath never known the virtue of Christ's wounds, the only remeede of sin: Be of good courage in this good fight, like the Church▪ who for her valor in spiritual warfare, is compared to the troops of horses in the Chariots of Pharaoh.

Now seeing the day groweth to an end, after that in my prayer I have recommended you to God's protection and direction, I will leave you until morrow. Let us pray.

THE Lord bless you Sir, according to your •… d sire I am come again to visit you in your bed of languishing.

I was looking for you, for since ye left me yesternight I may say with Jacob Sleep departed from mine eyes: My conscience all this night hath been like a boiling pot: O but weak man is borne to many sorrows! his days are few and evil: The best of them is builabour and sorrow: But let us now begin where we left.

Our last conference, as ye may remember, was concerning Christ, in whose wings, I said, was health for healing of your wounds: I declared unto you, that he is so tenderlie touched with the feeling of our sores, that he hath declared that these that touch us, touch the apple of his eye: Hath this been the matter of your nights meditation?

That which ye have said of Christ, Sir is true; There is indeed health in his wings, and help in his hands: But alas, Christ will not be helpful but to these that are of a strong Faith: My Faith is both faint and fectlesse, nothing but a smoke of Faith.

Christ hath said plainly, that he will not quench the smoking flax▪ S. Peter was not a man of strong Faith, when in his voyage to Christ upon the sea, he began to sink: Said not Christ unto him, Thou man of little Faith, why hast thou doubted?

The Lord reproved him for the weakness of his Faith, but never coost him off for the littleness thereof.

That was another matter, Christ was with his Apostle There was virtue into that hand, wherewith he gripped the sinking man, as was virtue in his garment, while the hem thereof was but touched: Such a weak Faith as mine, cannot reach up so far as to touch him into the Heavens.

Though your faith be weak, & that Christ also be bodily absent, yet be not for that disquieted, his Godhead is present: He himself hath said, concerning his bodily presence, that it was expedient for us that he should go away: As for the weakness of your Fa •… th, pray God to strengthen it: Faith though it be little yet it is of great force, a grain of it will cast a mountain into y ^e sea▪

Let me see I pray you Sir, any particular example of a weak Faith saving any man.

Of this in Scripture we have a cloud of witnesses: I shall let you see two, one in substance y ^e other in type or figure: That of Peter in the New-Testament is substantial: Christ called him a man of little Faith, and yet by that Faith, though little, he was saved: The other is in the Old Testament, in the type and figure: When the Israelites were bitten with the fiery Serpents, their only refuge and remeede was to look up to the brazen Serpent: This was the very type of a Soul stung with sin, beholding Christ with the eye of Faith: Of these who beheld that Serpent of brass, some were bleared, and other some had weak eyes: But the weakness of their sight could not hinder the cure: Nay, the old man with his dimmed eyes beholding as through a mist that type of Christ, was as soundly cured, as he whose eyes were in their greatest vigor: The meat taken with a paralitique and trembling hand, will not refuse nourishment to the body, no more than if it were taken with a stable hand: Observe Sir, what I say, Faith is the eye of y ^e soul whereof the Israelites eyes were but a figure, Christ is the truth of the brazen Serpent: Though this eye be dimmer in some, yet if it see, the Soul shall be saved: Faith is the hand of the Soul, Christ is the food: Though this Faith tremble, Christ trembleth not: The palsy is not into the food: Be of good courage Sir, fear not this trembling fear, the work of Salvation cannot be wrought out, but with fear and trembling: When the work shall be ended, all trembling shall cease, and Faith shall be stable, then the Soul shall be made free from all palsy pain.

Oh, that I were but sick of such a palsy pain! Oh, that I were assured to have any grain of true Faith! Alas, I am undone: This wretched heart of mine is so wrung with wrath, that there remaineth not within it so much as a drop of grace: All my spiritual moisture is spent, all the faculties of my Soul are so racked, that my tongue cannot utter my grief and smart: Is there no Balm in Gilead for a sorrow▪ beaten sinner? Oh, through excessive pain my Liver is rolled within me: If I find no remeede, my Soul shall shortly bleade to death, my pains exceed, my sorrow is extreme, thorough the tortours thereof my Soul is compelled to roar: Oh, Lord, turn thy wrath in mercy, and thy Justice seat in a Throne of grace, and pardon the sins which more and more ripen thy wrath against me: Mine heart is rent and harrowed with grief, what salve can I find fit for such sinful sores? The more I thrust grief out, the more it throngeth in.

The sovereign salve for such sores, is to get a sight of Christ, who bare all our sins upon his battered back, which was torn with merciless strippes: Christ in that plight is the most fit object for the eye of a troubled Soul: There is no salve for the sore of sin, but y ^e sight of him who is the truth of that brazen Serpent, the object of the faithful eye: This remeede among all others is like the master Be, the best of all the hyue: * Though ye be like Zacchaeus a man of little stature, so that ye cannot see Christ over the multitude of your sins, yet run before, climb the tree of the Cross, and behold him: No, rather behold him now upon the Cross fixed upon a mount high above, that all may see him, even upon mount Caluarie: Behold him there treading death under his feet: * Though there be a mount of dead men's scules; there is no dead scule so high, but Christ may be seen above it: Christ is ever nearest in the hotest skirmish: He is the sea & the seat of mercy: If ye can seek, ye shall find no scant of mercy into him, ye shall wonder at his love when ye shall relish his kindness.

To Christ then, yea, to Christ alone must ye run and forsake all, as the Mariner, while all his cunning is gone, runneth to God in the tempest: In him is Balm for all wounded spirits, there is no gash so deep, but his blood can cure it: As all rivers lead to the sea, so should all comforts guide us unto Christ: While he was in the days of his flesh there was no misery that could with-hold sinners from him, neither lameness, nor blindness, nor deafness, nor devils, could stay any from him, nor stay him to do them good, he healed them all: Never a man came back from him, saying▪ I have sought to this God in vain, I came to him, but he could not help me: Or as the father of the lunatic, said, I brought him to thy Disciples, and they could not cure him: To him may all heart broken sinners say with the Prophet, My flesh and mine heart faileth, but thou art the strength of mine heart and my portion: Flesh and friends, health and wealth, and all will fail us, but Jesus will never fail us: Mans extremity is his opportunity▪ By him alone the Soul of man hath light, liberty, and life: All other helps and hopes are but vain: As no water could wash & cleanse the leprosy but one lie Jordan, so nothing can wash away the leprosy of sin but the Blood of Christ, the Lamb of God, which is a spiritual Jordan for washing of leper Souls: In a word in all our stormy troubles Christ Jesus is a firm Rock of refuge which repelleth and turneth into froth, all the waves of most tēpesttuous temptations: By his Blood alone our Souls are both healed & hallowed, upon the right of your redemption, suit the remission of your sins: Be not abashed, he who hath Christ, needeth not to fear.

If I were one of Christ's, would he leave me thus wise comfortless▪ He is the Sun of Righteousness, in whose beams as in a spring time I was wont to rejoice: But now he is gone down: My Soul is benighted, and I am affrighted with grudginges of despair. Oh, that mine eyes of flint were melted into tears! O smite my flinty heart with the rod of thy mercy, that it may make tears the water of repentance to gush out at the Conduite pypes of my mourning eyes: O what a palpable darkness!

Comfort yourself with hope, waiting till that Sun arise again upon your Soul: Suppose a man created upon the earth as Adam was at the first, if he should see the Sun set, he would be afraid at that first darkness, thinking that the Sun were gone down, never for to return: But knowing by experience y ^t he is ordained by God, a Ruler for to rule the day by intercourse of the night, while he seeth him set, he is content, because he looketh for his rising again: If the year were ever Winter which maketh all things to die and wither, we would all die for sorrow * But now in the deepest snowes and most hoary frosts, we have some sparkle of joy kindled by the hope of the approaching Spring.

As is in these natural things, so it is in spiritual: Christ the Sun of Righteousness will seem to the Soul to set under the night cloud of some fearful temptation: In such a case the sinner will think that he shall never see God again: But for all that, after some hours of darkness, appeareth Roseis aurora quadrigis, Christ that Day▪ spring from on high, which the Soul like a Bird on a bush welcometh with a morning spring: After deepest discomforts come dearest comforts

Have patience Sir a little, till the night of your temptation be past▪ After a little open the window, & ye shall s •… e the Sky of day, then again▪ behold that Sun, which seemed to be lost▪ arising with his blessed beams, with a loving and life giving countenance: Be not discouraged, though Christ absent himself, it shall be but for a space, until the day break, and the shadows flee away, All his absence from the godly, is but like that which he said to his Disciples, Yet a little while, and ye shall not see me, and again, a little whi •… e and ye shall see me: It is of his help, as of Habbakkuks vision, Though it tarie wait for it, because it will surly come, it will not tarie: Be stout and courageous, the bitterest of your temptations are but the sweet gloumes of a Father.

I am pricked with the poisonous rarowes of Satan's spyte: I doubt if God would be so rough to one of his own Children as he is to me: Fathers strike with the rod, but I am scourged with Scorpions, wherewith y ^e Lord is now avenging the quarrel of his covenant: Oh, that ever I came to this wretched pass.

Ye are impatient: * There is nothing in all your affliction, but the smiting of the righteous, which ye should account a kindness: Such smiting is but smiling, in effect a love token, Whom I love I chasten, God's corrections are balm which shall not break your head.

I am both bruised & broken, my pains surpass my power, Satan with his snares and fetters hath confined me to a wretched slavery, my soul is out of temper: Trembling of heart and sorrow of mind: And terrors from the Chamber assault me on all sides: O but the passage to glory is rough and boisterous. Behold how I sweat for pain, as one roasted with a fearful flamme.

In that heat is a comfort: The style of the godly is to be called▪ Brands plucked out of the fire: Is 〈◊〉 this a brand taken out of the fire? said the LORD, in Zechariah: This manifesteth that a godly man for a space may be scorched upon kindled coals, but God incontinent rescueth him, as a man will catch quickly at that which he would not have burnt: God will never leave his own to the full rage of a stinging Conscience: Let all men have patience while God worketh: If for sins he punisheth his deadliest enemies, why should he not also for sin correct his dearest Children? If man uncontrolled may sing of mercy & of judgment for to keep his house in order, shall not God have his will to sing what song he pleaseth unto his own creature Let the cracking Law-music of Sinai be ended and then God shall rejoice your heart with the sweet melody of the Gospel: If while God in this your trouble in a manner is mourning unto you, ye lament for your sins, he shall in the end make you to dance at the piping of his Gospel: From Sinai he shall bring you unto Zion, where all your pains shall be turned into pleasures.

All pleasures are far from me for the present: A world of pleasures are dear bought with one pang of Conscience: God's wrath hath seized upon me for to drag my Soul down to the bottom of hell: It runneth ever into my mind that I am guilty of the sin against the holy Ghost: This I take to be the mark, that such as once a •… e guilty of that sin, cannot be renewed again by repentance, this mark seemeth to be in me, for as yet for all the holy words I have heard out of your mouth, I find no renovation, though God's goodness by you hath led me to repentance, I have not been moved: But after mine hardness and impenitent heart I have treasured 〈◊〉 unto myself wrath against the day of wrath: This spoileth me of outward peace and inward joy: What can this be but y ^e sin against the holy Ghost, which shall neither be forgiven in this world nor in the world to come? I pray you Sir, to let me know what a fearful sin that is which Scripture saith, Shall never be forgiven: Let me hear of its name and nature.

This sin Sir, of all sins is the most fearful, as being a sin of highest natu •… e: In Scripture it is called Blasphemy against the holy Ghost: Because there is no pardon for it, it is called, A sin unto death: Christ himself declared this plainly▪ verily said he, I say unto you, all sins shall be forgiven to the sons of men, and blasphemies, wherewith soever they shall blaspheme, but he that shall blaspheme against the holy Ghost hath never forgiveness.

These words seem strange that all sins shall be forgiven to the sins of men and also blasphemies wherewith soever they shall blaspheme, whether against y ^e Father or the Son, but that there is no forgiveness for blasphemy against the holy Ghost: By that speech it would seem that there be blasphemies against God, which are not against the holy Ghost: By that also it would seem that the holy Ghost is greater than the Father or the Son, for what ever blasphemy is uttered against them it may be forgiven, but as for that where with the holy Ghost is wronged, it is an inexpiable stain of it, there can be had no remission: Before ye proceed, clear me of this difficulty.

The like of these words are also in S. Matthews Gospel, All manner of sins and of blasphemy said Christ, shall be forgiven unto men, but the blasphemy against the holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men: To this is subjoined in the verse following, Whosoever speaketh a word again the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him, but whosoever speaketh against the holy Ghost, it shall never be forgiven him.

By this at the first blinke it would seem indeed that it were not so dangerous to offend the Father, or the Son, as the holy Ghost.

Wherefore, ye must consider that this sin which is called, the sin against the holy Ghost, is no less against the Father, and against the Son than it is against the holy Ghost.

But it is called the sin against the holy Ghost, because it is a most high rebellion, and stiff standing out against the peculiar work of the Spirit, which is to enlighten the mind, and bow the will and affections, that man by repentance may be brought home again unto his God.

As the Creation is ascribed to the Father, and Redemption unto the Son, so is illumination and conversion of Souls 〈◊〉 to the holy Ghost, though all these e •… ternall actions of Creation, Redemption, and Sanctification be common to all the three Persons of the Trinity.

Understand then, that the reason wherefore this sin is called, the sin against the holy Ghost; it is because it is against that energy & efficatio •… s working of conversion, common to all the three Persons, but particularly ascribed to the holy Ghost, as our Creation is to the Father, and our Redemption to the Son.

When man stiflie and stubburnlie sinneth against the remeede of sin, how can that sin be remeeded? It must of necessity be a sin reremeedilesse. A sin past all remeede is a desperate disease.

Let me I pray you hear more clearly what this sin is.

It is an universal apostasy from a known Truth with an eager, •… nest & malicious persecuting of the same, by both secret and open hostility.

I know that many of the learned call that sin an universal apostasy from the Truth, but I never could well understand that.

The Pharisees are esteemed to have been guilty of that sin, yet I cannot read that they had made an universal apostasy from the truth of doctrine: Christ said, that they sat in Moses chair, which did signify that they had kept something of Moses his Doctrine, though miserably mixed with the leaven of their traditions.

Thus as ye see their apostasy was not universal: * Saul did not altother renounce the religion of Israel though after he had been among the Prophets, he killed the Priests.

Indeed Sir, that doubt is not without great difficulty:: Mine opinion concerning that, is that who out of malice and despite renounceth and persecuteth any fundamental point of religion, which he hath before known and approuen, is by consequence guilty of that universal Apostasy: My reason is founded upon the Apostles rule, Whosoever shall keep the whole Law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all: That is, whoever he be that maketh no conscience of one sin, maketh conscience of no sin: If for the fear of God you dare not murder, how dare thou then, if thou fear God, committee adultery? or how dare thou steal or lie.

Even so he out of malice & despite, renounceth any main ground of the Truth, which he hath once known and professed, and after that contemptiouslie with a lifted up hand persecuteth the same, he in my judgment hath drawn upon himself the guiltiness of an universal Apostasy.

If by this universal Apostasy were only understood an actual, public & total renouncing of God & of all Religion, with railing and raging, such sinners should not be (as indeed they are) most difficile to be known.

I perceive by the definition of that sin, that it is not common to all the Reprobates.

No not: But only to these who have been enlightened with some knowledge of the doctrine of truth, & after begin maliciouslie to persecute the same.

But think ye that any man would be so beastly as to persecute a known Truth: I cannot think that the Pharisees who are said to have been guilty of that sin, did ever know Christ to be come from God, for had they known him, they had not crucified the Lord, the Lord of glory.

Indeed these words are true of many, but not of those doctors which made Christ to pronounce so many woes against them: They and their complices knew what he was, and wherefrae he came: Ye both know me, said Christ to them, and ye know whence I am.

Merciful God, how could they then pursue him with such spite & bitterness? I think that by that knowledge as by a bit their most head-strong corruption should have been snaffled and curbed.

Man doeth not despite to the Spirit of grace at y ^e first, but by little and little like clay before the Sun: his heart is ha •… dened by the deceitfulness of sin.

First, a man will know the Truth, and will love it with some sort of fervor for a space, after a little this love beginneth to lessen and grow cold, while at last it is turned into hatred: man being fallen in love with lies, which fill his bowels with a boiling hatred of the Truth: From thence cometh a persecution and a final desertion, a just recompense of reward due to all these that will not receive and keep the love of the Truth, that they might be saved

If the poor Pagan for abusing his natural •… ite, by changing the truth of God into a lie by God's just judgment, was given over to a reprobate mind; what wonder if they who having once been enlightened fall away, be never possibly reneued again unto reap̄tance, seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame? Such men go about presumptuouslie to grind the face of all godliness.

I see then that in the sin against the holy Ghost, there must first be a knowledge of God's Truth, and then a willful rebellion against it with a lifted up banner.

The Apostle is plain: If we, saith he, sin willfully after that we have received the knowledge of the Truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful looking for of judgment, & fiery indignation.

The poison of that sin is in y ^e word, willfully after a preceeding knowledge: While Peter denied his Master it was not willfully, but for fear of his lif: Soul persecuted most bitterlie, beyond measure, said he, I persecuted the Church of God, and wasted it, but God had mercy on him, for it was in his ignorance.

These two great men rode so near unto that unpardonable sin, that between Peter and it was nothing but willfully, and between Paul and it was nothing but ignorantly.

Knew ye ever in Scripture or out of Scripture any that fell into that sin.

In the Old Testament Saul fell into it, and therefore the Lord discharged Samuel to mourn for him: * In the New Testament Judas was guilty thereof, and therefore Christ would not pray for him: While he prayed his holy Father to keep through his own Name the other Apostles, he would not speak a word for the lost son of perdition: In that he practiced his precept, There is a sin unto death, I do not say, that he shall pray for it.

Is this sin so great that God's mercy cannot be able to overcome it.

Some think that it is called, irremissible, because that it is forgiven with exceeding great difficulty: But certainly there is no remission for it: The cause is this, God will not be mocked with men, neither will he suffer his Justice to perish for the salvation of any, for seeing he that despised Moses Law, died without mercy under two or three witnesses: Of how much sore punishment suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the Blood of the Covenant wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done despite unto the spirit of grace?

I desire to know how men fall into such a desperati niquitie.

Such men having received some general graces of God in a reasonable great measure, first vnconscionablie begin to neglect them, suffering these sparkles of goodness to die out, after that they have shaken out of their mouth, the Bridle of restraining grace while it is cast loose, lying upon their main, they plod on from one sin to another, till shame be past the shed of their hair, so y ^t they be passed all feeling.

The Spirit being often grieved and the heart made hard with a custom of sin, whereby as with a canker the noble buds of the Spirit are fretted and blasted at last the Lord in his justice rolleth up y ^e sinner, & wrappeth him into a reprobate sense.

Thus men by neglecting the inward secret checks of the Spirit, and by harbouring privy inward r •… pinings, boiling lusts, murmurings, grudgings, and unthankfulness, the crafty empoysoners of grace, as at last come to this point, that all the good things they seemed to have are most licentiouslie dissolved into a publ •… ck prophanitie, whereby they upbraid the Spirit of grace to his face, and that with base and scarrell jests, yea, and often with most filthy belghes of blasphemy.

That once done, all their grace clearly melteth away like snailes, lik the fat of Lambes, or lik the winter ice which once being thawed floweth away, and is seen no more: All such things be fore-runners posting before the prince of sins, even the sin against the holy Ghost, which is among all sins like Beclzebub among the devils.

Observe again, I pray you, how the unquenchable fire of this unpardonable sin is kindled: While man suffereth diverse sins to lie dispersed in his heart at their natural liberty, without controlment, Satan most craftily by some cunning slight as by an hollow burning glass, so concentrats and unites them together like fiery beams that they set on, fire the whole body of man's corruption, whereby as by a powder plot the Soul is blown up in blaspheming, even up unto the very bosom of the prince of the air. Well is the man who from his youth is sensible of all appearance of evil.

Let us then take heed, and consider how this sin again the Spirit of grace creepeth in sensibly upon the heart of man, ordinarily this sin followeth a long custom in sinning, as the head incurable Scirrhus in the leuer, affected with the dropsy, cummeth after many surfites. Thus according to that old saying, though a created testimony.

O happy they who curb their corruption in time before they get edge and vigor.

While a man is in this life may it not be known if he be guilty of this sin.

Very hardly: for as Agrippa was almost persuaded to be a Christian, and yet never came from almost unto altogether, so will a man almost fall into this sin, and yet be rescued, as a man will be for a space in the hight of a fever, that ye will neither know whether he be dead or quick: Many have been revived at the putting on of their winding-sheet: Even so it will be in the sickness drawing unto this sin, which is a sin unto death: Some will seem to be dead in it as a man into an Apoplexy, & yet it will be seen that they will arise and repent: Of this assertion I take Manasseh for a warrand, for after that he had known the truth & had persecuted the known Truth, making the streets of Jerusalem to run blood, yet saith the Scripture, while he was taken among the thorns, and bound with fetters, and carried to Babylon, In his affliction he besought the Lord his God, and humbled himself greatly before the God of his fathers.

A man's flesh whether on his cheek or hand cutted to atacke being taken in time while the flesh and blood are yet warm, will again stick to and receive the life almost lost: If such be the force of Nature, how much more powerful are the workings of grace, except thē that a man after knowledge be as Paul was in his ignorance exceedinglie mad in the persecuting Truth, I dare not define his sin to be past remeede.

Indeed Sir, these be very clear similitudes which illustrate our purpose wonderfullie.

But seeing as ye think, no man can certainly know the particular man, that is now guilty of this sin, how is it y ^t we are forbidden to pray for such a man: If any man, saith S. John, see his brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall pray for him, but there is a sin unto death: I do not say, that he pray for it, so soon as such a mā dieth, without remeed he must in all post haste gallop from the land of the living unto the abhorred region of everlasting death. To what end serveth this inhabitation, if no man can know assuredly who is guilty of this sin?

The opinion of the most learned, is that in the time of S. John, the gift of discretion was given unto the Church, whereby both sooner and surer they might discover the damnable sin: As for us we can hardly well perceive it, but by final impenitence and most fearful despair, whereby such miserable Apostates who have revolted from the Truth, declare at last with Julian, that the God of Galilee hath fully and fearfully overcome them: Till that appear, let us beware to judge rashlie, seeing Peter speaking to Simon Magus, seemeth to set before him a certain possibility to be saved; a perhaps, that the thought of his heart might be forgiven him.

Now it appeareth by all your discourse, that the sin against the holy Ghost is a revolting from the Truth, with a most willful persecuting: I thank God, my Soul is free of that.

But tell me I pray you, may not a man be free of that most heinous sin, and yet be damned? It would appear that many Reprobates are free of that sin.

It is most certain, for it is only the sin of these who have known the Truth of God's word, and hath made a fearful revolt from it with a persecuting hatred against the same: Many who have lived in a true profession, have denied God in their life: There be but too many whose hollow hearts are covered with outwardnesse like a potteshard over laid with silver dross.

Alas, that putteth my Soul in terrible fear, for this is my conscience in a qualme, I have professed with great show, and that without substance: I have been one of Satan's reuellers, having a smilling countenance but a bleeding Conscience: God's judgementes have stayed till my sins was rype: When the fire is kindled, woe to the stubble: There is no place now for to escape: In Heaven, in Earth, and in the Sea, God's hand will find me out: Fye now on all my greatest pleasures, the Darlings of account: Though I have not sinned that sin against the holy Ghost, which God cannot forgive, I am guilty of sins which God will never forgive: O these eyes of fire, ten thousand times brighter than the Sun, what sin is able to escape them? what glistering golden shows of outwardnesse, shall mak you to dazzle, & ye everlasting eyes?

Man had great need to be ware that his tongue walk not without a bit: There is no sin, but God can forgive it, if the sinner could repent, the Sea of his mercy is bottomless: As for that that God will or will not it is too great presumption for mā to define: Ye continually flit from one temptation to another, whereon ye feed like a Flee happing from scab to scab: Ye often seem desirous to shift the comforts of the Spirit for to go seek a knot in a rush, a difficulty where none is. Be earnest in prayer, sigh to God, for the assistance of his Spirit, that ye may be capable of comforts which y ^e Tempter most enuyeth unto you: When the silly Soul would fainest hear the words of spiritual peace, then crieth he red-war, stirring up temptations like the fowls that cumbered Abraham when he should offer sacrifice: Take heed to yourself Sir: The Serpent now is more crafty than when he pointed Adam to another tree, for to deprive him of the Tree of life: Resigne up yourself in all holy obedience to the will of your God: I can never persuade you to take heed to that which I say: Between a good tongue, and a bored holy ear, is an happy harmony, such music is melodious, but a deaf ear maketh a dumb tongue: Beware of the Spirit of giddiness, which maketh the Soul to run round as it were in a Circle of needless doubts.

I entreat you Sir, for patience, for I am one of a sorrowful spirit, as Hannah said to Eli, a fiery wrath lurketh in my breast, which maketh mine heart to groan: Pity me Sir, I pray you, for now I am come to the arraignment, and am called to the bar like a Crane or a Swallow, so do I chatter: The voice of the Preacher did often glide by my faults: But now God's Spirit speaketh home, and setteth all my sins in order before me: Now must I end my years in the bitterness of my Soul: Well may I say with that godly Matron, Call me not Nahomi, that is pleasant: But call me Marah, that is bitter, for the Almighty hath dealt very bitter lie with me.

That which is most bitter is often most wholesome: God's course with the godly is from the bitter to the Sweet: When Israel in their progress had removed from Mara, they came to Elim, from a place of bitterness they came to refreshing fountains of waters, and to pleasant palm trees: All this world is but a Mara, a place of bitterness: Let us have patience but for a space, till we ariue in Elim up into the Heavens, where we shall dwell among most pleasant palms, and drink of the wholesome springes of the well of Life, even pleasures for evermore: The Amen, the faithful and true witness hath promised.

My troubles are far from such pleasures: I fear that such troubles be but the fore-runners of a greater tempest: This maketh all the bowels of my belly to wamble.

Nay, by the contrary take them as I have already said to be messengers posting before the calm: It is good as ye know to see every season like it self: The Christian life in this world must be like the Winter season, subject to frosts and to snowes for killing of weeds and of worms: If the earth and men's bodies be not nipped with cold, great are the evil which ensue: The earth becometh barren, and man's body become sickelie and subject to many diseases: It is even so with the Soul, if it remain not here in a wintrous estate, laid open to the tempests & nipping colds of temptations profitable for to mellowe and to rot the fellow ground of the heart, there is no great appearance of any good spiritual harvest: But if the winter tempests of afflictions come whereby the weeds and worms of the conscience are killed, then may we look for a pleantifull harvest of the quiet fruit of righteousness: God in mercy shall step with his merciful feet thorough the fields of our heart, and his steps shall drop fainesse: Let such hopes comfort you in this wearisome winter of your afflictions: All God's gloumes are but like winter clouds, or like the louring of the Skye, fair weather will be next, let such tempests fall but in there own season: Happy is he whose heart with such boisterous blasts is not swaide awry.

O what a longsome winter is this, wherein I cannot once see the Sun of righteousness, neither feel the heat of his beams, the comforter that should relieve my Soul is far from me.

Let not that discourage you Sir, hear what Christ himself the bottomeless fountain of all comforts, saith, I go away for a while, and ye shall be sorrowful, but I will come again, and your joy shall none be able to take away: If ye find Christ to be absent, comfort yourself with the hope of his return: His absence is but for a little: While the day is at the shortest, and the Sun farthest from us in the dead of winter, we are comforted with this that the day at once will grow longer, and that the Sun will return to us by the degrees, by which he went away: Your day now, Sir, is at the shortest, tarry but a little & ye shall shortly perceive a Spring Ianuar of joy, after this dead December of distresses: The more wintrous the Season of the life hath been, look for the fairer Summer of pleasures for evermore. Have patience a little: The Euening of your sorrows is almost past, the day is at the breaking, your reward is a bright morning star of joy: At the dawning of these joys your night cloudy and darkest dolors shall decease: God with some ray or beam of his reconcealed face, shall lighten you the way to heavens glory.

This sinful life of man is like a surgefull sea, tossed with many blasts and billows. Whiles the floodes and waves of wrath, so catch a man till all the bowels of his belly begin to wamble, all that is within him will be in a strange stir while he is as it were with Jonah, down in the belly of hell, at the roots of the mountains, having for his best garland the weeds wrapped about his head, in such a pitiful plight, he will be tempted to say to God with Jonah, I am cast out of thy sight, so darkened will the eye of his Conscience be.

But if so be that in the jaws of his anguish with Jonah, he can say to his God in his deepest plunge, yet I will look again toward thine holy Temple (which I may call the godly man's Pole, the directer of the Christian course) he shall be saved: If while his Soul fainteth within him, he can with the weak eye of Faith behold that Pole of peace, and with the Mariners in the Psalm, cry unto the Lordin his trouble, the Lord shall deliver him out of his distresses: He who by speaking unto the Fish, made it to vomit out the prisoner, by a word of his mercy shall hale him out of such seas of sorrows, & shall softlie & swiftly bring him thorough the swelling surges to the haven of peace, rest and quietness, even of pleasures for evermore: Waite on a little, and your God shall store you with spiritual comforts.

But Oh, for the present, I am in the extremity of anguish, which any created nature can possibly endure.

My silly Soul is lashed with a severe whip of double cords knottie at the end: God's custom is to handle his own nicelie and softlie like glasses for fear of crackes: But I am crushed under the millstones of his wrath, which are ready every hour to settle down upon my Soul, for to sink it from the brim to the bot tome of hell.

O the length and breadth of that flying roll and volume of wrath, that is coming upon me for to curse me with the Thief and the swearer.

There is such a freting canker into sin, that in my judgment, if it could reach unto the very stars, it should mak them to roust by staining their brightness and polish color: I think that if sin could attain thereunto it should rotte these fair celestial bodies.

In my judgment it should strike the Sun and Moon the two eyes of the world with a catarict suffusion or with a sort of gutta serena, so that the world should go blind. All this woe is most justly befallen me, because while God's long suffering invited me to repentance, by delaying the day of my death, I turned his grace into wantonness, while I was threatened by his Justice, I strained & racked his mercy beyond his truth and promise: I wonder not now that God's judgments make me to reel to and fro, and stager like a drunken man: But here is my grief, and most piercing pain: I cannot think that GOD would suffer any of his own Children to be chaissed with such bloody bickerings and not incontinent run to his help: Can a mother forget her Child? though she should, God cannot forget these that are his: God's wrath continueth still against me, my sins are mounted up to his ears with a noise, and he hath taken notice: Behold, and consider, if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow.

These be the pains of new birth: In such spiritual travailing the Soul will be in a wonderful distress, like Rachel of whom it is written that in travailing, She was in hard labor: The hardest labor of the first birth is soft being compared to the labors of the second: No sorrow in the flesh is able fully to express it: I see a shadow of such sorrows in that mourning of Hadadrimmom in the valley of Megiddon.

This is a mourning joined with fasting, making man and wife for a space to shed beds, that the man may mourn in one place and the wife in another. The family of the house of David apart, and their wives apart: The family of the house of Nathan apart, and their wives apart: The family of the house of Levi apart, and their wives apart: The family of Shimei apart, and their wives apart: All the families that remainc, every family apart, and their wives apart.

All this mourning is wrought in man's heart by a Spirit which Zechariah calleth, the Spirit of grace: Behold, & see Sir, what it is of this your great grief: It is a sure token that the Spirit of Grace hath been poured upon your Soul: Too too many vndera smilling countenance have a smarting Conscience, while the wieked laugh their heart is sorrowful-Rejoice in such a tribulation, after this short seed-time of sorrow, if ye can have patience, ye shall reap the quiet fruit of righteousness, after the dark cloudy night of sorrow, the day will dawn: At the breaking of the Skye a star of comfort shall arise which shall never set under a night cloud of watery tears.

Man naturally is so impatient, that he cannot wait in a stayed temper, till the Lord hath ended his work.

I understand not such working: I ever heard preached that God was merciful to his own, and that he did proportion even at an hairs breadth, their trials and troubles to their spiritual temper, never surcharging any above their force, in their greatest darkness his custom is to lighten them the way to relieve with some ray or beam of a fatherly favor: But mine heart is altogether soacked and sacked with sorrow: Mine heart is nothing but a gulf of grief.

The hand of our God is wonderfullie in his works: as for us, we cannot work upon a Creature but by the help of another: As for God, while he worketh, it often befalleth that either there is nothing or that which would seem to be contrary to his working.

In the Creation he brought something out of nothing, from nobeeing he brought a being: He would not make some-thing of something, but made all of nothing: God would not build upon another foundation: Once he destroyed the world with rain, now saith the Lord, I shall never do it again: But how shall a man know it? even by his Rain-bow, a certain sign of rain▪ Behold, how in the Heavens he setteth his rain armor for a sign of peace to the world declaring that he will no more shoot down a deludge for to drown the Children of men: Before that God would send down fire upon the sacrifice of Elias for the trial of the true God, he appointed the ditch about it, first to be filled with water: God is best known in the contrary means: So Christ would open the blind eyes by spittle and clay, which naturally are more fit▪ to put out the sight than put it in: By the heauing up of Moses weak hands, helped up by others: God made choice to overthrow Hamalek rather then by the sword of Joshua: By the bluenes of the wound he purgeth away evil: Christ by death overcame Death and purchased life: In wrath he remembereth mercy, where mercy would seem to be forgotten: He first killeth y ^t after he may make alive: His strength is made perfect in▪ weakness: Out of the seed of tears▪ he bringeth an harvest of joy, apply all this to yourself: Before that God make a new Creation in you, he will let you see first that there is nothing in yourself whereof to make it: Though God for a space hath opened the Windowes of his wrath and poured down upon you deluges of troubles and as yet seemeth to bend his Bow for a new shot: If he were of mind to shoot he would not show his Bow: Behold, and see a sign of peace, a Bow without a string: Though it were bended, as a token of war by God's merci •… , it betokeneth peace: While the ditch about the sacrifice of the he •… r is fullest of water viz when all is swimming with abundance of tears, God then shall be most ready to answer by fire.

Be of good courage Sir, let Christ's mortar lie style upon your eyes until his work be finished, that ye may recover your sight▪ Though clay blind-foldeth, his spittle enlighteneth.

I am but a lumppe of clay shut up under unbelief: I cannot practice your precepts: I have a will to do so: But I find stronger powers within me leading this Will into Captivity: What can this be? can both good and evil tarie together in one heart that is God's?

That is most certain, There is both fish and dross in God's net, both corn & chaff in his barn both Wheat & darnall in his field, both Sheep & Goats in his fold: To will is present with me, said Paul, But how to perform that which is good I find not.

While I behold such floods of temptations my brain is so troubled with dizinesse that all seem to go round: My Soul is like a Land lying frin the sea, which is beaten with billows and with waves on all sides, mine head is giddy while I behold the strict stream of such tumbling waves.

The temptations and troubles of this world may well be compared to a River that runneth with a quick stream: If while ye ride thorough ye ever look down upon the stream your head will wax dizie indeed, so that ye shall be in danger of a fall: But those who know what it is, ever behold the yonder brink fixing their eyes upon that which moveth not It is so that we should do while we pass thorough the swift running streams of temptations, we must not fixe our eyes upon the stream which runneth but upon yonder immouable shore of eternity, where we mind to land after that we have waden thorough the cumbersome foord of this life: In hope against hope rely upon God's mercy: Challenge your interest therein thorough Christ's bloody merits.

While I desire to do so the arrows of fearful temptations come vpō me with poisoned points: I hear a voice within me crying, What hast thou to do with the shore of eternity? thou who hast wearied thyself in the way of wickedness, and hast spended thy whole life into black dismal days, by making others to mourn in black, thou shalt never wear the white garments of Christ's righteousness, neither in grace nor glory: Oh, that mine heart were in a true spiritual temper! Oh, that it were seasoned and softened with the dew of Grace! Oh, where shall I hide me, until these calamities be overpast?

Your Soul Sir, within you is like a man in a ship tossed with a tempest as the Disciples on the Sea, fearing to drown, cried to Christ, Master, save us, for we perish •… ▪ So do ye; though for a space he seem to sleep, careless of your salvation, he shall show himself broad awake at your cry: Behold, he that keepeth Israel, shall neither slumber nor sleep: My counsel is that ye wrap and infold your silly Soul in his bloody merits, as in a close warm garment that shall keep you safe and sure against the wind and weather of all temptations: I like your fears better than the security of these who thinking that they sleep in a sound skin, care not whither judgments blast or mercy bless: If the Hypocrite content man, he careth not for God: All his best things are but form and outwardnesse, he hath a form of knowledge, he also hath a form of godliness: In this form he sleepeth, not troubled with any check or counter-blast of Conscience Waite ye upon Christ.

Christ hath forgotten me▪ If he had mind of me, would he suffer my Soul thus to be eaten away with the bloody gangrene of an evil Conscience? happy are the wicked, for they are not plagued like other men.

Nay, unhappy are the wicked what ever their estate be: while they study to worldly joy encompassing themselves with carnal contentments it is for nothing but that as the devils desired, they should not be tormented before the time: In such false joys they are led hoodwinkt to destruction: While God suffereth his own for a space to be afflicted, it is no token of forgetfulness, nor yet of uncomfortable strictness: Did he not suffer his own Son to suffer, till he cried, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? God in great mercy to us hath set out his own Son as a patrene of patience, for to let all the godly see, that seeing he hath torn with bloody whipes the back and shoulders of his only Son, that no man should take exception to drink in the same Cup, as also that no man should despair or take in evil part to be chastened of the Lord: But when we are judged, saith the Apostle, we are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be condemned with the world: Many will suffer legs and arms to be cut from them into a feaster, for to save the rest: What reck what the body suffer if so be the Soul be saved? what ever affliction ye suffer in body or mind, it is for the saluatiō of your silly Soul, by such pangues, your God will prevent y ^e pains of hell: In your greatest griefs, God is but practicing his own precept of saving Souls by fear, whereby they are pulled out of the fire: The Sorrowes of the godly end in joy: But as for the wicked they are like the Sea, whiles tossed, whiles tumbled, but ever inwardly disquieted.

Is this then the estate of the godly here to be betimes crossed with most fearful temptations, whereby as with an Ocean sea they will seem to be over-whelmed?

It is certain, for many are the troubles of the righteous: Christ dearest here are lik Lilies among the thorns: This life are the Winter of their affliction: They are a groaning genaration, Turtles crouding with sighs and groans which their tongues cannot express, while Abraham began to sleep, loe an horror of great darkness fell upon him.

But in such anguish of heart will they not have some bosom comforts? salt Sea water strained thorough the earth becometh sweet: At the greatest sense of wrath will they not aye have some hope of mercy though for a space they have swimmed down the current of the times shifting their sails to the turning of every wind.

They will be in great distress: Their Soul will be shaken like a sea full of surges, tossed with contrary Tydes: As for their comfort it will be lik the smoke of flax without a flamme: In their deepest temptations they will have some bosom secret graces into the heart as cmbers under an heap of ashes: Some times in all outward appearance they will be so douked that they will seem to be drowned: While they are all under the water with Jonah, as it were at the roots of the mountains they will think, and so also will others think, that they are in the belly of hell: This is their estate, while for a space they are borne down with the weight of wrath and with the burden of their sins, they are as it were many fathom deep under the water: But so soon as it pleaseth God▪ for to remove that weight, incontinent they come up to the brim of the water, because there is breath and life within them.

So long as there is life in a man, he may well at the first plunge go down to the bottom of a Poole, but incontinent he mounteth up again, because there is a Spirit and breath within him. But if he be once dead, he sinketh down like Lead unto the ground: It is even so with the wicked and the godly, the wicked are dead in the waters of affliction and therefore with Pharaoh and his army they sink down like Lead into the mighty waters: But as for the godly, though heavy weights of sin for a space hang fast on, yet because the Spirit of God, a Spirit of life and of breath is within them, they may well at one plunge or other douke down, because of the weight of their corruptions, but incontinent they come up again: By virtue of the Spirit as by Corke they are carried above, & so at last swim thorough all the waves of their troubles and temptations, till they come to the shallow, where they may set their feet upon a Rock, even the Rock Christ.

When Jonah was cast into the Sea, whoever thought that he should come out again? yet hear: how the drouked man sang at last, Yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption, my Lord my God: So little was his hope once, that he said, being in the belly of hell, The earth with her bars was about me forever

What hope of change can we have of that which we call, For ever? * See what little hope that Prophet had for a certain space, before that God would bring his life from corruption: What out-gate could the poor man see into such a dark dungeon into the belly of the Fish, down at the roots of the mountains into the bottom of y ^e deep?

That which the silly man could not see, God saw: He whom the Ship could not save, was saved in the belly of hell: He who could save Jonah, in the water, could save his servant Sadrach and his fellows in she fire: While these three poor men were bound in their coats, their hosen and their hattes, and cast into that fearful Furnace, there came in One that afraid them all, a fourth man. even the Son of God, which by an absolute soueraignetie loosed y ^e other three, so that they all four in the Kings sight walked up & down together without any hurt: All the miracles of the old Testament were but types and figures of God's mercy and spiritual blessings under the New: The passage of the Israelites from Egypt to Canaan, was a type of our walking in this world▪ unto that Canaan that is above: The Egyptians behind, the Sea before, the Mauniaines on every side were but types of our spiritual enemies: Some like Egyptians behind, are chaissing us, some like Mountains on every side hedge us in to keep us from escape: Some before like a Sea are before us, between us and Canaan: Christ is a cloudy Pillar which in the day time is darkness, & cometh between us and the rage of the Egyptians of this world, so that for mist they cannot see us: In the dark night of our tribulations he goeth before us in a pillar of fire, for to be a light unto our steps: At last, after we have passed by many mountains of miseries, and are come to the red sea of temptations, even to the last temptations on our death▪ bed, where all our sins red like scarlet stand like a red sea between us and the place of promise, God by the rod of his merciful power, giveth that sea, such a blow that all its billows make room to let his people pass thorough: Then all mourning is turned into music: Moses singeth with the men & Mi •… ian with the women: Nothing is heard there but songs & sounding Timbrels: Manie a •… ore sigh had they before they came to this Song: Many a pitiful look gave they back to Pharaoh, breathing out rage behind them, they q •… aked lik an Haire that heareth the bark of the Dog, breathing to be at it: But while at last they saw thenselves bounded with an enemy that boasted them with drowning, then God in their greatest fears sent a powerful deliverance: Behold, here as in a Cart y ^e draughts of the Christian man's journey unto Heaven: Read into it, That thorough many tribulations we must enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, even thorough burning Rivers of Brimstone.

But alas, they come thorough all their troubles & were at last delivered: But I see none appearance that God will do the like to me: I have been prodigal of the peace of my Conscience, my sins doubled do daily ripen God's wrath against me: In all liklie-hood God's decree is gone out, that I should porish: * My Faith faileth me, Hope is flown away: Oh, for that peace in believing.

As by bitter Succorie the burning blood is cooled and refreshed, so by such bitter bloody blows, the pride of life is subdued & hemmed within a compass: By such to •… turing and tormenting fears: The good Lord is working for your well that thereby he may drive you from all selfeconceate •… nesse & partial ouervaluing of your own worth: It is God's custom by such means to doublem as zeal, to blow at the smoking flax; till the weak reeking sparkle of grace be kindled into a bright burning flam. By such troubles and temptations the good Lord keepeth your Soul in watchfulness: Many in this world sleep soundly in their sins, being fully stuffed and swelled therewith, and for all that never waken, till they be wakened in y ^e •… re of Hell: Others who are troubled with some inward checks, run •… to Taverns for to drown their sorrow for sin, by pouring in of strong drink: Others think to smoke it out by the •… eeke of Tabacca: Some run to the di •… ne of the world among loud laughters.

As the Israelite •… in Tophe •… sounded their Drums, that they should not bear the squeeles of their Infants burning in the fire, so so go some about by y ^e noise of sports & wordly joys to deafen so their Souls, that they should not hear the shrighes of their troubled Conscience: But all such comforts and companiourie are like that red wine, giving color in the cup, and moving it self aright: But what is the end of all? Such things may seem to cool & refresh for a space, lik as when a burnt finger is dipped into cold water, where one quality encirculoth another: But shortly after that little an •… iperistasis is past, in come doubled dolours with all the anwels of the principal sum, at last all such drunk comforts bite like a Serpent, and sting like a Cockatrice, as doeth the drunkards best claret wine.

Well is that Soul which God in mercy exerciseth daily either with one cross or other, not suffering it to be rocked and lulled with Satan's balowes in the cradle of Security.

Rejoice then in tribulation, put all your trust in God, yea, though he should slay you, inwarpe yourself in the Mantle of his mercies: Relye upon him with whō nothing is impossible: He who can make the great Camel pass thorough the needle eye, can open the narrow gate, and let your Soul enter into his Rest.

Learn of the Father of the faithful to believe in hope against hope: God thinketh himself most glorified when men believe in him, while there is least outward appearance: His delight is to allure in the wilderness, where is least appearance: Forget never that courageous words of Job, Though he should slay me, yet will I trust in him: Not to have Faith, except we feel and see, is to be faithless with Thomas while he said, that he would not believe till he was assured by the two witnesses of his senses, viz. Sight and Feeling: Christ out of pity granted to him contentment of •… enle, but with a sore & a nipping check, Because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed, blessed are they that have not seen, and yet believed: If ye would be blessed, believe before ye either feel or see: He who brought meat out of the de •… ourer and light out of darkness, can enlighten your misty mind.

What then would ye me to do Sir, while within and without I can perceive no token of comfort, none appearance of favor? seeing he hath hid his countenance from my Soul, what think ye best that I should do?

Do as Isaiah did, I will, said he, wait upon the Lord, that hideth his face from the house of Jacob, and I will look for him: God is like a Mother that cannot forget her Child: She may hide her self a little, and let it get a knock, that it may fear and learn to beware of greater dangers: Though God gloume in outward countenance at the faults of his Children, yet in his heart are ever thoughts of peace and of mercy.

Of this David produced two witnesses, Once I heard, said he, yea, twice, that mercy belongeth to God: Once in all appearance he heard this read or preached by the Prophets, and another time by the Spirit the inward teacher of the Soul: Behold how the Spirit and the Word, once yea, twice, both outwardly and inwardly have testified that mercy is with God, yea, as a thing which most properly belongeth unto him: In your more sober mood and cold blood, ye shall confess this to be true: God for a space will seem to be uncouth: He, as Naomie bade Ruth return home with her Sister •… rpah, will bid a sinner go seek his comforts in his bypa •… t pleasures: But if with Ruth he see him steadfastly minded he will incontinent leave off such speaking.

I know that God is full of mercy; Of this the Devils did never doubt: Within the compass of his compassions is mercy for a thousand worlds, but what is that to me? How shall I come by it?

The Scripture is plain, Ask, said Christ, and ye shall receive, seek and ye shall find: Sticke to him with a truly Christiā & vnshakē resolutiō.

What ever ye shall seek from the Father in my Name, said Christ, he will give it unto you: If ye believe Christ to be true, practice his precept: Take once but a proof of his promise seek in the Name of Jesus whatsoever thing may do you good, and see whether or not God shall prove faithf •… in his promise: * Before that a man will distrust another, he will first at least be beguiled once: Upon Christ's words then with freedom of Spirit, Ask, seek, and knock, and see whether or not your Soul shall be answered with these three viz, receiving finding, and opening: There is a worthy history in the Gospel which pointeth at this that we should do what Christ Commandeth, though there be little appearance of any good success: After that Christ had teached the people out of Peters ship, the Sermon being ended, the Lord said, unto Simon, Launch out into the deep, and let down your nets for a draught, Simon answered, said unto him, Master we have toiled all the night and have token nothing, nevertheless at thy word I will let down the net: What ensued upon his obedience? they enclosed such a multitude of fishes y ^t for the weight thereof their net brake, the abundance was so great that they beckned to their partners which were into another ship, that they should come to help them: And they came and filled both the ships, so that they began to sink: Let your wearied Soul learn of Peter to obey Christ, though they had toiled all the night and had taken nothing, and had lost all hope of any taking, yet at Christ's word they let down the net.

Christ in his Miracle would not cause the fish to leap into their Ship, but he would have them to launch and labor, yea, and seek help of others: Moreover, before Christ did this, they had toiled all the night before, without any profit: Christ came not to abrogate the Law by feeding idle men, but he came to fulfill the Law, and to give a blessing to these that did eat their bread in the sweat of their face: Trust first in God, Sir, and at his word launch in the deep: Labor in the sweat of your face, seek, ask, knock, and be assured to find and receive, for yea, and Amen hath spoken it: Though your sins be great, if ye believe his word, he hath given both his word and his oath to forgive, two immutable things wherein it is impossible that God should lie. O the unlimited & boundless bowels of his mercy.

I have already rapped at the door of grace, but I have gotten none answer: God will not cast up his gates to let in such a rotten ra •… call as I am: The dinne of temptations within me is like the rumbling of a Linne, wherein waters rush with a •… oise: I by my sins have grown so heavy upon the Lord▪ that I press him as a Cart is pressed that is full of sheaves: While I pray, Christ letteth not on him that he either heareth or seeth me.

Though at y ^e first prayer ye receive not, yet cry again, & again: The poor receive not alms at your door at the first cry, and therefore they cry again, and again, till their alms come: That Canaanitish woman that came from the costs from Tire and Sidon for to seek help of Christ for her Daughter troubled with a devil, was not heard at her first prayer, she received none answer at all, at the second she received a very hard answer, viz, That he was sent unto others, than to the like of her, viz. Unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel. At the third prayer she received the hardest answer of all, viz. That she and her Daughter were but dogs, to whom the Children's bread, did not belong: What did she then? She took the buffet for the bit: We are but dogs, said she, why then, let us eat the crumbes: At that word Christ could refuse her no more, but gave her all her will, O Woman, said he, great is thy Faith, be it unto thee even as thou wilt: Though while ye cry, Christ make none answer, yet cry again: If he call you a dog, cry for a crumbe: Often his comforts are folded in his Judgments: S. Paul prayed th •… ise before God gave to him an answer: While the angel of the Devil did buffet him, he cried for help once & again, after the third time God made answer that his grace should be sufficient for him: Jacob got not his blessing at the first suit, no not, at last it came to worsling, and weeping, and wresting, he wept & made supplicatiō, and then the Lord blessed him: Did not Christ himself in his great agony pray, and after one prayer, pray again for the removing of the painful cup? If ye have prayed pray yet again, were it in the same prayer, as Christ did, of whom it is said▪ That again he went away & prayed & spak the same words: God may let his own cry, and cry aga ne, but he will not let them cry •… ill they be confounded: At last when his time is come, he will arise to their help: He cannot sit the importunate cries of wearied spirits: Because of the importunity of the seeker that neighbor in the Gospel could not get his friend refused, the one friend came to the other friends door, but for the lend of three loaves tor to set down before another friend, who was in his journey, came late unto his house: A friend of mine, said he, in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him: From within the other answered, that he should not trouble him, because the door was shute, and his Children were with him into the bed: I say unto you, said Christ, Though he will not rise, and give him▪ because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity▪ he willrise and give him as many as he needeth.

The spiritual use of this is subjoined unto the verse following, Ask and it shall be given you, seek and ye shall find, &c. Because of the earnest suit of the poor Widow, the evil Judge who neither feared God, nor respected man, was forced to do her justice: These things are written for our learning, not to take a refusell from our God in anything that may be good for our Soul, man's importunity in seeking, is God's opportunity in giving.

These things cannot be written for me: What doeth Christ care for me? have not I tread under the filthy feet of mine affections that precious Blood? Have not I counted that Blood f the Covenant as an unholy thing? My Spirit is in a fear that it hath done dispight unto the Spirit of grace: This is the chief gash and wound of my Soul, this is a gangrene, which eateth out mine heart, the temptation is come from the bark to the bone.

If ye were guilty of that sin, ye would not be so grieved for it: These who do despite unto the Spirit of grace, mourn not for that siane as it is an heinous offense against God, but as it procureth the wages of everlasting woe: In such a man the fear of judgment is greater than the hatred of sin: Judas could say, Oh, I have sinned in betraying the innocent Blood: The fear of judgment, & not the love of Christ made him bewail his treason: The sin against the holy Ghost is not so great, but God could forgive it, if the sinner could repent: The bosom of God's mercy is not so straightened that it cannot receive a sinner because of the huge greatness of his sins: There was no disease which Christ could not cure in the days of his flesh: But because of the unbelief of men, in some partes he could not do many miracles: Observe a strange word, spoken of God by God himself, He could not do? Unbelief in a manner putteth the Almighty in a sort of weakness, so that he cannot do: As there was no sickness but Christ could care it, if men could believe, so there is no sin, but God can forgive it, if man can repent: If any sin vnpar doned lie still, & bear upon the Soul of man, it is because of his unbelief: * Be earnest with God, that he would increase your Faith: Be of good courage, Sir, though many be the troubles of the righteous▪ yet here is his comfort, the end of that man is peace: Your Soul is traveling in the pains of the new birth: Let the Spirit of Christ be doing, till he end the work of your Salvation within you: There is sweet in his gloumes, and love in his look, even while he seemeth to be angry: He who with a silent look, first pricked, and then healed the heart of Peter, shall at last after your troubles wipe away your tears, and ye shall weep no more: The look of our Lord▪ is a working look: Our beholding is but by reception of spaces, but Christ's looking is by emission of graces, which like streams of heat and light come from the Sun, the worlds eye, with a most powerful influence.

Be of good courage, Sir, be not dismayed in your afflictions: Such is the courage of Christ's Spouse that she calleth all her troubles but a look of the Sun, a little black bleink wherewith the outward skin is only made duskie: Christ's will is that we suffer here such flea▪bitings, that we may know what he hath suffered for us in saving us from eternal woe. Fixe your Faith in his merits, which are the only Oil that maketh all things easy, even a most precious restorative for a languishing and sorrow beaten Soul.

Be wise and ware, by your doubting to confine the boundless mercies of your God, believe and be saved, this is the truth of the Gospel.

But the Law of God is of a great stricknesse; it bindeth all the senses and all the thoughts and imaginations of the heart to a perfect obedience under y ^e pain of Maranatha: This thought straineth hard mine heart, and wringeth it together into a narrow room with a predominant power.

Indeed Sir, the Law of God, striketh upon all that is in man, and oblisheth most strict to a perfect and sincere obedience, for not only dischargeth it actual Murder, Adultery, Theft, and such like, but also the counsels, and plots, and desires to practice such villainies: Yea, not only such plots, which are forbidden in the Commandment, which forbiddeth the evil action, but also the least desire of ill, though detasted and abhorred with speed: The tenth Command which is last, requireth such a purity into the heart of man, that it will not only have it to be clean of gross evil thoughts fed and petted with yielding and consent, but also it requireth that it be free of the least impression of any evil thought: The Soul of man is like a Cristall looking Glass: If a man but blow upon it with his breath, at once it is darkened with a duskie skumme, wherewith it is dimmed that till it be sweept, the image of a man's face will not appear into it: So it is of sin and of our Soul, the least affection or inclination to sin is like a dim skumme upon the face of the Soul, caused by the stinking breath of the devil: What is a filthy temptation? but afflatus illius impuri Spiritus, a breathing of that unclean Spirit? Thus as ye see God indeed requireth a great purity to be in his creature, for the hammering down of the pride of flesh, puffed up with vain and overweening conceits: His Law requireth that his Children be so clean that there be not so much as the breath of evil upon them for to darken or mak dim the polish of their cristall color.

But here is our comfort, there is an hand in the heaven▪ that is able to sweep away all our sins whatsoever, and make our Soul were it never so roustie, to become clear like gold new come out of the furnace: Though ye have lain among the pots yet shall ye be as the wings of a Dove covered with silver, and her feathers with yellow gold. Let not the rigor of the Law affraight you: Christ is he who hath fulfilled the Law: He hath nailed that hand writing upon his Cross, and so hath made us free of its rigor: Sin reigneth not in a godly heart, but so long as man is here, sin hath in him some poisonous and pestilent roots: If we do not what we can to employ his graces faithfully, for to render his Talents with some profit, he shall say unto us, faithful servant come & enter into thy Masters joy: Be of good heart, after that God's anger like the Moon is come to its hight, it shall begin to wane as it began to wax: After a full flood shall come a low ebb.

What then think ye best that I do while I am environed with so many troubles and temptations?

Your best is to run ever unto Christ in whom alone is virtue for to cure your filthy flux: Let nothing hinder •… ou in the way till ye be at him: By his blood he shall present you harmless and guiltless before God's Tribunal: Though swarms of temptations wherein is Beelzebub the master flee buze about you, be not astonished: Hold on your course, till ye come to him: Thogh many troubles lie into your way, gird up your loins and run with courage through this snakie field, having your feet shod with the preparatiō of the Gospel of peace: Let grief be a whet stone unto grace.

If I should now run to Christ, think ye that I would be welcome to him, after that I have sported so long, and solaced myself in security, in the soft and green way of fading pleasures: While his precious word was preached, I like the crafty Adder closed mine ears, as from the voice of a charm: But think ye that he can love me, who is one so unworthy to be loved, a lazy drowsy drooping drone, altogether carlesse in the work of my salvation.

There is a great misconceit of God in most men's hearts Some there be who with amplifying conceats, make the way to Heaven broader than the Scripture, like the Pharisees broad Philacteries or shaking ribbands: Others again, as Balaam's Ass thrusted his master to the wall in a room way, with less reason than the Ass, they thrust aside upon the walls of doubts or despair, as though God's mercies were so narrow that no possibility were for to pass thorough: By this means they fasten upon God, an impossibility to forgive: But to come to the point, your question is, if I think that God can love you, who is so unworthy to be loved

I think it verily, and I am persuaded: God, I confess, cannot love sin in man, but he may love man in sin: God inviteth not these whom he loveth not: Come unto me, saith he, all ye that are wearied: Your weariness crieth unto you, that which was said to the blind man, Be of good comfort, arise, the Master calleth thee, an humble confession in the mouth, is the speech of contrition in the heart: God hath sworn that he liketh not a sinners death. He is more glad to find us for to help us, than we can rejoice to find him for to be helped by him: Who can think but he is glad to find us, that took such pains to seek us, that not caring for the unwholesome and noisome night air, came to our door having his head full of dew, and his locks full of the drops of the night? which is more, such was his love and liking of us, that for to save our life he would die a cursed death: The last words of your complaint are that ye are one who is unworthy to be loved.

* I had rather hear a sinner calling himself wretched and unworthy with the Publican, than boasting of his worthiness with the Pharisee: The swelled hydropie words of thanksgiving that we are not lik other mē, are a sure toking of a deadly & incurable disease: Man naturally goeth about to lessen & impair his faults, yea, often̄ rather than he will cry guilty he will fasten his folly by consequent upon his Maker: Adam said, The woman which thou gavest me, gave me of the tree, & made me to eat: Many are carried down the muddy stream of overweening their own worth. Our greatest worthiness is in the sense of our own unworthiness, and in the seeking of Christ's worthiness: That man is worthy before God, who findeth himself unable to do that which is worthy, and unwilling to do that which is unworthy: The very strife and battle between grace and nature in theregenerat, is a victory in God's eyes: A broken imperfectiō, if it be sincere without guile, is put up in his merciful count book, for a perfectiō indeed, such is the mercy of God, while we mislike our selves: These were the wisest words of Agur, in God's account, when he said, I am more fool •… sh than any man: S. Paul was never more dearelie beloved of God, as when he hating himself called himself the first of sinners: Cast your eyes off yourself, and look unto God your strength & your stay: The Name of the Lord is a strong tower the righteous runneth into it, & is safe.

O that I could practice your precepts! O that my God would inspire me with such a blessed and lively vigor of his Spirit, that might quicken my Soul to everlasting life! O that it would please my God, strongly to refresh me with the comfort of his countenance! But alas, out of this most filthy puddle of my heart arise such filthy vapors which so over-cloud the Sun of righteousness, that I am not able to behold his face: while he did shine upon me, his most bright and unspotted beams were fully darkened: The more the heat of his word did beat upon me, the more my conversation became stinking and loathsome like a carrion cast out before the Sun, this I cannot deny, at the remembrance thereof I find myself charged afresh upon the Conscience with terrors and vexations: O the dead slubber of security, wherein I have sleept unto this hour! my custom ever was to post over my sins, in the lump with a general slumbert confession.

There is nothing within me but matter of fear, I feel my faith fainting, I fear my sins, I fear the wrath of God, I fear the force of Satan, the king of fear: I may be well be called that which Jeremiah called Pashur, viz. Magor-missabib, that is, Fear round about, yea, I not only fear, but I feel a fearful wrath: My stubburnesse and stony heart hath brought upon my Soul God's brazen hands: Now is he doing to me that which of old he threatened against these that were like me, If ye walk stubbornlie against me, I will walk stubbornlie with you: In my youth I was guided by the guise of times, my delight was to go with the drove, now I am lost, being cold dead frozen in the dregs of my uncleanness.

The force of temptation wringeth such words out of you, as though ye had none hope at all: Your Soul Sir, is like the Moon into an eclipse: There be darkness and changing of colors for a time, because your sins like an earth come between you and the beams of Christ, the Sun of righteousness: I have seen the Moon in her eclipse for a space as though she had not been at all into the heavens, but as she darkened by little and little, so after the greatest darkness was past, the light returned by degrees.

Despair not Sir, of an infinite mercy, let not your heart be wasted with weariness: Though the earth of your sins which in comparison of God's mercy is but a point, overshadow the Soul for a space, while it is in this low region, the time shall come that God shall mount your Soul above the circle of the Stars whereunto the shadow of such an earth is not able to attain: Thogh God for a space walk stubbornlie with you, he is not stubborn: Whē ye shall begin to walk humbly with your God, God shall walk no more stubbornlie with you, but shall deliver you from all your fears: Build yourself upon your holy Faith.

I may well say with Job, My stroke is heavier than my groaning: Whereon can my Faith lay hold? God is armed with wrath, and Satan is armed with despite: I see nothing for the present but blows and bloody battles, most dreadful fears tear in pieces mine heart strings, & suck out the inmost of mine heart blood.

Though there be many adversaries, yet Christ is with you: Make all your boast of him who is the Captain of your Salvation: He hath win the field, he hath tread under foot principalities and powers, and hath led Captivity captive: He whose Faith is founded upon him, shall never be confounded: His fresh bleeding wounds are cuer filled with compassions: * Though God by our sins be moved to show some wrath, here is our great comfort, There is no condemnation to these that are in Christ: Believe ye not the Scriptures? I know ye believe: If Christ be with us, who shall be against us? These who think that their sins over-reach God's mercy, make the Centre to compass about the Circumference: Though he should receive a world of sinners in the bosom of his mercy, it will not for that be the more straightened: O the unspeakable compass of God's compassions.

I doubt not of the infinite compass of his mercy, but whether or not he will show that mercy to such sinners as I am, this often troubleth my darkened and droopping Soul.

To show mercy to most mise rabble persons, is most familiar to God's Nature: * He never executeth judgment till we egg him and enforce him unto: For this cause, where he punisheth, he is said, To doc his work, his strange work, and to bring to pass his act, his strange act: He hath sworn by his life, that he taketh no delight in our death: Our God is not rigorous against these that would fain do well: No not, but lik as a father that pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him, for he knoweth our frame, he remembereth that we are but dust: Our God will not exact strictlie a perfection in the life of his Children: If we have an affection to do well, though we cannot affect it, he will accept it: A godly Father hath said well concerning this, Deus magis delectatur affectu quam effectu, that is▪ God is more pleased with the affection of a man than with the effect it self: Christ thought more of the poor woman's mites, than of rich men's millions, and that all because of her good affection: Well is the Soul in whose bosom it lodgeth.

But the good affection must ever be followed with some effect: * Mine heart hath been nothing but a filthy puddle, a false Fox hole: The more I dig into this dung hill I am the more confounded: O what a jewel is a good Conscience co •… ered up into the heart of a Christian! It is like a precious pearl in a Ring: I am ashamed to come into God's presence while I look upon my sins.

Shall the sick man be ashamed to lay out his sores to a secret and wise Surgeon: It is good to think shame of sin before we do it, for to abstain from it: It is also good to think shame of it after it is done, for to repent us of it: But we must never think shame to confess it: This is the craft of Satan, he ta keth away shame from man at the commission of sin, and restoreth it again to man at the confession of sin. That which he hath once taken away from a man by forged cavillation like Zacchaeus, he▪ though in a worse sense, refloreth him fourfold: A wicked man after that he hath sinned, hath fourfold more shame to confess his sin before a Congregation, which indeed, should be his honor; tha •… he had at the committing of sin the only cause of shame: If he had been as ashamed to commit sin privily, as he is ashamed to confess it publicklie, he had never taken pleasure into sin.

Men of widest Consciences whose hearts are s •… uft and engrossed with wickedness, will often I confess seem shame▪ f •… st before men: In the presence of a carnal •… eye, they will strain the g •… ate like •… e Maidens, which cannot eat at Table where they are seen, their throat is so narrow, that hardly can any meat pass over, quasi vero: O but in secret greatest gluttons, devouring black bread embrued with yesterdayes broth.

She that but pitissat sippes before the Sober can skip at the scols with her Comers, till she be sick with healths.

Even so it is of such sinners, most modest they are & shamefast while they are seen: The gnate of a light vain word they cannot digest if men have heard it, but in the mean time in the polluted thoughts of their profane hearts, they are filthy dreamers, & if secret occasion serve; without shame of God they will swallow Camels, making no bones: Though their sin be never so huge in greatness, even Adultery, the wrack of most famous Families, if they can strain and pass it with a close conveyance, their heart will say of it as Lot said of Bela, Is it not a little one? Well is that Soul which while it is tempted to sin, hath ever an eye upon its God, saying with Joseph, Now behold, my God seeth me, and he is a witness of this my doing: How then can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?

As for that ye say now that ye are ashamed to come before God, while ye look upon your sins: It is good sir that ye think shame to come into God's presence, because of your sin, but think not shame in God's presence to confess your sin: Sin whether secret or confessed is evil, but the confession of sin is ever good, God's word is true, If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness: Trust in God, Sir, rely upon his merciful bowels, who out of his great compassions hath said, I have received a ransom: God loveth those that are feelinglie affected, & wakened out of the slumber of Conscience.

But think ye verily that God will be merciful to me? whose Soul hath been but a soil for weeds.

I think that ye yourself should think none otherwise: A good man, saith Solomon, is merciful to his beast: It is a beastly thing for a man, to think that God will not be more merciful to his Soul, than any man can be to his beast: God was more offended at Cain for despairing of his mercy, than for killing of his brother: Judas kindled more God's wrath for the desperate hanging of himself▪ than for the betraying of his Lord that was hanged by his treason: He who offered his mouth to receive a kiss from that Treatour, had never refused him mercy, if he had sought it with a repenting heart: Because profane Ahab had but a show or outward scroofe of repentance, having Sackcloth nearest his skin, the Lord spaired him all his days, to let men see what he will do to true repentance, seeing he is so gracious unto that which is but an outward likeness thereof.

There is no sin that offendeth God more highly as distrust: Here is the great injury of doubt or despair, it maketh the sin of a little Grasshopper to over-reach the infinite mercy of the most High, as though man a little clat of clay, could be more sinful, than that infinite Majesty can be merciful: Happy is that Soul which God hath singled out in time for to make it loath its best loved pleasures: God delighteth to take up a seat in a bruissed heart, sorrow beaten for displeasing of its God.

Take a good heart, Sir, ye have to do with a God, whose Name and Nature is mercy, a God whose mercy is great above the Heavens, yea, and over all his works: That which over reacheth all God's works, may easily ouertoppe all your sins & iniquities: God will have man with his narrow bowels of mercy to forgive his brother seven times in a day, if he shall return seven times in a day, saying, It repenteth me: If God requireth such mercy of man whose bowels in y ^e widest are not of a span breadth, what shall he do, whose compassions are rolled together into bowels broader than the Sea, yea, wider than the heavens? If ye can repent Sir, God can forgive: When man ceaseth to spurn, God beginneth to spare.

I take God to witness, that I am sorry for my sins, and so ashamed▪ that with the Publican I cannot lift up mine eyes to the heavens: I would be content to kiss the ground a thousand times for to get but one kiss of the feet of him, who is the on •… lie help of the conscience, and the health of the countenance: I find myself deep to the Chine in a gulf of misery: Tell me truly Sir, I pray you: Thinkeyee that if with a mourning heart I confess my sins to God, that he will have pity of me? I am sore perplexed, the deep thoughts of mine own guiltiness strike men with such a set silence that I am not able to utter my grief: My fear is that I be of the family of hell, an hair of horror and utter woe. Be free with me, I pray you, Thinkeyee th •… t such an hord of misery as mine can ever meet with his mercy.

It is great ignorance Sir, to think that any misery of man can over reach the infinite power of his pity, and boundless compass of his compassions: It were more easy to turn the Sun from his course, than God from showing mercy to repenting sinners, both his Name and Nature is mercy: See we not out of what myres of misery God's mercy hath delivered repenting sinners: In Scripture we may read long Catologes of pardoning sins: Consider well I pray you, think deeply upon the mercies of your God: Look well what he hath done to others: Could the adultery of David, the incest of Lot, the drunkenness of Noah, the murder of Simeon & Levi, the persecutions of Paul, the perjury of Peter, or any other like sin hinder God to be merciful to the •… so soon as they repented? * Wherefore wereall these pardons printed into God; Book, but for to tell all ages that no man were he never so sinful▪ should despair of the mercy of his God: As I live, saith the Lord, take no delight into the death of sinners▪ but rather that they should repent and live: These be his own words: If words bear no weight▪ behold effects, God hath so loved the world, that he hath given his only Son, that whosoever believeth in him, should not perish, but have everlasting life: This is not a verbal love when a man giveth his best beloved for to die for another: God hath not spared his only Son, that by his satisfying sufferings, his Justice being paid, he might show mercy to man his poor unworthy creature, not only the Father hath loved the world, but also the Son out of unspeakable love was as desirous to die for man, as the Father was to send him: This out of his own mouth he declared that no love could over-reach his love, No man, said he, hath greater love than this, than when a man layeth down his life for his friend: The highest of man's love is to die for his friend: But Christ's love was greater, he died for us even when we were his enemies: In another point, behold the love, of Christ scarselie, saith the Apostle▪ for a righteous mā will one die, yet per adventure for a good man some would even dare to die: But God commendeth his love towards us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us: Who shall doubt of this love which the Lord hath registered on earth with the dearest blood of his only begotten Son? There is such a love in the Father, and such a love in the Son, and such a love in the holy Ghost toward the Salvation of man, that all the heavens are filled with love of our well, so that at the conversion of one sinner on earth, there is more joy among the Saints and Angels, than for fourscore and ninteene righteous who need not repentance.

* If Sir, ye would have the heavens to rejoice, cast yourself into the arms of your God, with these words, Lord, do with me what thou wilt, though thou should slay me, yet will I true in thee: If ye would see the picture of God's mercy, ye must draw aside the curtain of all carnal surmises.

Oh, that I might cast my Soul into his Arms! But how can I do this? The Lord hath turned his back on me, shall I cast myself into a consuming fire? At the first sight of his angry face my Soul will die for fear.

Men often are deceived: So soon as Manoah had seen the Angel, he said, to his wife, We shall surly die, because we have seen God: But his wife answered more wisely, If the Lord were pleased to kill us, he would not have received a sacrifice from us: As she said to him, so say I to you, If the Lord were pleased to kill you, he would not have given his Son in a Sacrifice for you: * I is a greater love token, that God hath given his Son in a Sacrifice for you, than that he should receive any sacrifice from you

It is the Apostles argument▪ that since God hath given unto us his own Son, he will not refuse us any other thing that may do us good, Christ alone is the sinners refuge, he is a Rock of comfort which cannot be shaken, a Rock which commandeth all seas of sorrows the pole of our peace. Be earnest in prayer with God, cry till he he •… e.

I am wearied with crying to God, my prayers may be called, The voice of my roaring: But what shall I say? I cry, but there is none that maketh answer, God hath covered himself with a cloud, that my prayers should not pass thorough, he hath stopped his ears that my prayer should not be heard▪ This is a most fearful blast and blow in his bloo die battle.

Deceiue not yourself, often our prayer framed and followed by the Spirit of grace is heard, though the fence of grant be not yet brought to us: God for causes will let a time go between, seeking and finding: After this the Angel spake unto▪ Daniel. At the beginning of thy prayer God heard thee, and now I am come to tell thee: See how a space will interceede between God's hearing of man's prayer, and man's knowledge that God hath heard him. Though ye as yet know not whither God hath heard you or not, ye must not infer that God hath not heard you at all: Waite on a little with Daniel, till God think it time to send you a Messēger for to tell you that he hath heard you, yea, that he heard you at the beginning of your prayer: till th •… s Messenger come, depend wholly upon Christ's good will: Let all your trust be in him, who is your most faithful Advocate for to plead your cause: He will be a Guide to all these that seek him: and a light to all these that see him, and life to all these that love him: Though a Mother should forget her Child, the Lord will not forget his own, whom he hath printed upon the palms of his hands: Many Mothers think it enough to bear and bring forth their Children, that done, they send them out a fostering unto others: But Christ not only is as a Mother beareth and bringeth us forth by the second birth, but also feedeth and fostereth us upon his own breasts as a loving Nurse, I have, said he, carried Ephraim as a Nurse in mine arms: Be of good comfort Sir, let the joy of Christ relish all your sorrows, he was the man of grief, that he might bring joy to the world, he was beaten with stripes, that of his stripes he might make physic for sick Souls, by his stripes we have health: In a word his flesh was pierced and bored that in these holes there might be a City of refuge for sinful Souls, pursued with the tempest of God's wrath, the avenger: Woe to him that maketh an idol of his own sufficiency, as the Thunder chiefly beateth the highest steeple heads so doeth the fire of God's wrath strike at the hight and top of proudest spirits.

By the most part of your speech Sir, I think that your chief comforts against Death and all other troubles, are grounded upon Christ's Blood and his wounds▪

That which I say Sir▪ is true: When as all things will forsake us & fall frō us, Christ will stick & stand fast by us, that I speak truly, I dare be answereable for it in the presence of my God: As ye must one day make a reckoning to God, of that which ye hear, so must I that self same day give an account of that which I teach: My Sermons must be read before him that sent me to preach, for he will know how I have fed his Lambes: * If I build upon Christ the fundamental Stone, the perles and precious Stones of Christ's passions, I shall get a reward: But if I build upon him Stubble, Hay, or Wood: Because I hold fast the foundation, he will save my Soul, when he shall try my Doctrine with the fire and light of his word: But because I built upon him the combustible light Stubble and Hay of human words, of wordlie eloquence, I shall be saved very hardly, as by the fire of great affliction: For this cause knowing the great danger, I wish that all my comforts to you and all others be only of Christ, who is both our surety and our Savior: He in love swallowed the bitter pill of death, the cure of all our diseases: After that, for our cause his face had been covered for our blasphemous, spittle & his back battered with bruises, he continued in his love, and for our cause would be hanged upon that stinking l •… ll Mount Caluarie, suffering a death which God had blasted with a curse.

I will tell you plainly, Sir, that there is no meditation so comfortable to a wearied Soul, as that which is concerning the bleeding wounds of Jesus, the vanquisher of hell: His wounds are as many windows wherethrow we may see the unspeakable abundance of our Lord's love.

Let men run from East to West, from South to North, they shall find no place of avoidance from the fie •… ie wrath, but only into these his wounds, which well may be called, The refuge or Sanctuary of a troubled Soul. Here is liberty for a Soul that is enfolded into the snares of God's judgments: Here is a hiding place against the evil day: Here is the hole of the Rock the window of the Ark where poor Souls like Doves, that can find no footing, may enter in: * Here is a City of refuge for chaissed sinners: The people that dwell therein shall be forgiven their iniquity: There be wide bounds within the compass of his compassions. Seeing Christ is such an One, run and hie you as fast as ye can unto this Rock of refuge: He who shall be founded thereon, shall never be confounded: Take up all the matter in a word, the righteousness of Christ Jesus purchased unto us by his Blood, is the only cure and cover of our sins: All other things are but like fig-leaves too short and thin a cover, like these cutted coats of David's servants, which covered not their buttockes.

How darreanie rotten stinking attainted flesh attempt to attribute any worth unto it self, in the atchieuement of that Pearl & peerless work of man's Saluatiō, whereof Christ Jesus is y ^e only Author & actor.

Manie who would seem in this world to carry away the Garland of godliness, are hanged in this snare: Away with such a pang of pride and elevation of Spirit.

I see now Sir, that Christ is only the Salue which is able to heal the sores of the Soul, the blisters and bitings of our Conscience: I see that his Blood is the only liquor of that Fountain of David for sin and uncleanness: But I am so defiled with willful wallowing in the puddle of sin, that hardly think I that ever he will daine to look upon such a bemired Dog as I am, who have followed the swing and the sway of the most filthy: Of me it is written, Let him that is filthy be filthy still.

Let not that discourage you: * Ye cannot be ignorant in what estate he found his Church: At the first before he married her, he found her in her first birth, a cast away, a bloody brood, a misshapen creature, with a long Nauell uncut, vnsalted; and not swaddled, lying in the open field to the loathing of her person in the day she was borne: Yet all that made not him to loath her: But after that by two commands of life, he had bidden her, Live live, whereby she got strength, he decked her, and sware unto her, and entered into covenant with her and she became His: Behold and wonder at the love of our Lord, the Spouse of our Souls: All our filthy and bloody deformities could not scar him from the love of our Souls: If any be defiled with sin and uncleanness, let them come to him, who will not refuse to wash them: He is the only laver of the Church: There is nothing pure, but that which he hath purged: It is he alone who hath repaired all our ruins: Listen unto his voice, crying to all sorrow beat̄ sinners, Come unto me.

Think often upon this, Sir, if ye desire comforts in your distress: The great work of man's redemption finished by the Blood & death of God, is a work worthy of continual wondering: As for the work of the Creation, it cost the Lord but his Will and his Word: But the work of man's redemption was a costlie work, it was chargeable to God, it cost him the best thing that he could give, even the lif of his Love, our Lord: O what a mercy! O what a lively Love! The meditation of this work should work in our heart a loving compulsion and a compelling love: The thought of this made S. Paul to say, The love of Christ constraineth me: What shall a Christian man fear, having Christ his Brother to be both his Aduocat and his Judge, his Surety and his Savior? Was not his blessed Body displayed abroad upon the Cross, with his arms spread, a crying gesture, a gesture crying with a voice, Come unto me all ye that are leadened and wearied? Oh, that we were sick for the love of him, who died for y ^e love of us! Oh y ^t we were wounded with love, when we remember his precious wounds, from which gushed out the streams of our Salvation: Flee Sir, to the holes of this Rock, flee to the bores of his wounds, run not with Adam unto the shrubs for to hide yourself from God, here is your hiding place in the Lord's deepest wounds: He is the fortress of your Faith, our strength and our stay, the only help and ground of all our hopes, our warrantable justice: He only is the body of all spiritual comfort▪ all other things were they never so specious, are but show and resemblance: Shroud yourself under his protection, and throw no more yourself upon temptations, whereby ye may be disabled from manfullie fighting out the good fight, followed with a Crown, filled with massines of glory.

Now well is me that ever I heard tell of Christ: Blessed be the day the Son of God was borne: But alas, where are the holes of that Rock, where my wearied Soul may enter in?

Lift up your lumpish thoughts, seek first to the nail holes in his feet begin humbly, creep in into these lowest wounds, and there for a space settle your abode, kiss his sacred Feet, wash them with the true tears of repentance, wype them with the hairs of your head, from thence look up, and come to the nail holes of his Hands: Be busy there like a Be, suck out of them the Honey of Heaven, from thence go to the Spear hole in his side: Let your Soul sit down there, and crowd like a Dove, ever till Christ let it in into the hole of the Rock, the place of its everlasting rest: If once the faithful Soul Christ's Turtle win in into the fortress of his wounds, from thence it will boast all the enemies of its Salvation: Frō thence will it cry to the flesh, crouch: There it careth not for the Serpents hissing, nor for the Cockatrices den, nor for the Graues gaping, nor for Deathes dungeon, nor for the Popes Purgatory, his pardons, his dirges, and his Trentals, which bring fat morsels to Baals Priests: Christ is mine, will he say, He is to me advantage both in death and life: As the Dove found no footing till she came to the Ark, so the Soul can find no rest, till it come to Christ: I •… ever totters, til it lean vpō his Love. Happy is y ^e Soul y ^t is secured with y ^e seal & secret impression of God's favor.

If I had faith, to believe, all would be well: I acknowledge y ^t there is sufficient help in Jesus, but such a help is only for these that are strong in faith, my faith is both faint & fecklesse.

Christ hath said plainly, that he will not quench the smoking flax: S. Peter was not a man of strong faith, whē he began to sink down into the Sea: Said not Christ unto him, Thou man of little Faith▪ why hast thou doubted? He reproved him for the weakness thereof, but cast him not off for the littlenes thereof.

That was another matter: Christ was with him, Christ took him by y ^e hand: * Ther was virtue in y ^e grip of Christ's hand, as was in the hem of his garment while it was touched: Such a weak Faith as mine cannot mount up so high as that it may reach unto Christ into the heavens.

Though your faith be weak, and Christ also be absent in body, yet be not for that disquieted: he is present in his God-head: As for the weakness of your faith, pray God to strengthen and increase your faith: Faith though little, is of great force, a grain of it is able to remove Mountains, and cast them into the Sea.

I pray your Sir, to entreat God for a fixed heart, for as I perceive, endless are the mazes of Satan's circular temptations, which vnavoidablie, if they be not barred out by grace, wind themselves into man's heart with a sly and crafty insinuation.

O man of little faith that I am, if I had Faith, I would believe that I had it, if I had Faith, I am persuaded that I should have Peace: Being justified by Faith, we have Peace towards God: That Peace I seek, and cannot find: These troubles wherewith I am tossed plainly argue that my Faith is failed.

I answer, that whoever are justified by Faith, they also have peace toward God, though such a Peace be not ever felt: That which a man feeleth not, is not ever absent: A man in a trance knoweth not that he liveth, and yet he is not altogether deprived of life: The tree seemeth to be dead in time of Snow and frost, and yet it hath life, and sap at the root: These then that are justified by Faith, have Peace, but their peace is not ever sensible, but often is disturbed with fearful temptations.

I desire to know of you what is that ye properly call the peace of Conscience.

I take the qualms of Conscience chiefly to proceed from a sense of God's wrath kindled for some sins of commission or omission: Satan also with his billows bloweth at this fire, yea, often while God is pacified, he assaulteth the silly Soul with false fears and counterfeit alarums.

Now when by the virtue of Christ's intercession the fire of God's wrath is quenched, the Conscience of man beginneth to settle and grow calm, and instead of accusing us any further, it beginneth to excuse and acquit us before the Tribunal of our God: Upon this doeth ensue a pleasant calmenes, quietness and rest, in the Soul of a sinner.

Though this Peace be sore envied and often troubled by Satan's railing and •… aging, yet the Soul having peace with God, is at last after a little space made free of all its fear •… , & is made sensible of that truce & atonement, even of that Peace which passeth all understanding.

I would earnestly learn of you how a man whose Conscience is troubled, may recover that Peace which once he had.

The best method I know, is that a man ripe first up his Conscience, and spy what mot of sin is fallen into his Conscience, which is the eye of the Soul: The eye being hurt will water & pour out tears, so must the Conscience be sore grieved for offending of God: Secondly, out of this grief it must sigh before the Lord in feruant prayer, first, for forgiveness chiefly of that sin, which lieth heaviest upon the heart: Thirdly and last of all, the Soul must suit earnestly for the restoring of that joy.

After this manner David did proceed in that penetentiall Psalm: First of all, he was exceedinglie grieved, which grief did burst out in words watered with tears, Have mercy, upon me, O God, according to thy loving kindness, &c. Thus after he had cried for to be washen, & purged with Hyssop, he cried that God would restore unto him the joys of his Salvation: Above all things let such a person be often groaning to God in prayer, for to catch some blinke of God's reconcealed face in Jesus his bloody wounds: That blood of sprinkling is the only Salue for the sores of the Soul. To all this let not these helps be neglected, viz. that such troubled Souls make use of good Books, by whose help their devotion may be roused up, for to remember the days of old: My chief counsel is that such persons fixe steadfastly the eye of their Faith upon Jesus bleeding on the Cross, whereupon he paid our ransom, and triumphed over all the enemies of our Salvation: This is the truth whereof Israel had the typ in the brazen Serpent, which healed all the be holders: My counsel also is, that such troubled persons frequent the Sermons of powerful Preachers, and seek conference with them, whom God hath stamped with a powerful gift of Teaching and integrity of life, men who have had great experience in the ways of God, and who have smarted themselves at other times by such fearful nipping checks, men who are not ignorant of the Devils devices.

It is said of Christ himself, the Orient and Day-spring, That in all things it behooved him to be made like unto his Brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high Priest in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people: For in that he himself hath suffered, being tempted, he is able to succor them that are tempted. See how it behooved Christ himself for to suffer temptation, that he might be able to succor us in our temptations.

While the troubled sinner is in doing all these duties, he must carefully watch over all his ways, that by no sin either in thought, word, or deed he grieve the Spirit of God again: For a new sin thrust upon the heart, will make all the closed wounds of the Conscience to gap and to bleed afresh: A Soul that is become relapse shall find God harder, to be entreated, than of before, not without much ado shall it get peace, that after by any known sin it hath quarrelled again the Spirit of comfort.

But indeed, he or she whose Conscience hath been once well lashed with God's whip, and battered with his blows, had rather run throw a fire, than anger the Lord again: At the first appearance of a temptation they will start for fear, and with a sigh will cry to God with a trembling voice, O my God, how should I think this wickedness, let be to do it? Who knoweth the power of thy wrath? According to thy fear so is thine anger.

Too too many in this Nation affect this sickness of Conscience, as being only the disease of the holiest: This they will utter as ye would think with bleeding groans before men; while indeed they are but scorning the world▪ sporting wantons, laughing under a painted mask of misery: Their tears are praeficarum lachrymae, tears without trouble, water sold for the wind of man's praise: They are spots in the Church, which make the ways of God to be evil spoken of, such open a wide door unto Atheism.

Fye upon hypocrisy, God will not be scorned, there is nothing so secret but at last it shall be made manifest: I am assured, that who for to ca •… ch men's applauses, fain a mourning for their sins, the Lord shall suffer them to fall either in some scandalous sin, or other fearful inconvenient, whereby they shall be forced in earnest to mourn to their shame: In my judgment there is no such bitter and comfortless mourning as is that of these for their manifested sins, who once did most fain deep groans for catching of applauses.

To such may well be applied that of the Prophet, Thine own wickedness shall correct thee, & thy backslydings shall reprove thee, know therefore and see, that it is an evil thing and bitter, that thou hast forsaken the Lord thy God, and that my fear is not in thee, saith the Lord God of Hosts.

Let no man sport in secret sins, were it in a thought, for that which hath wings will declare the matter.

I have often been seeking out the reason wherefore the wicked in the world for the most part, know not what trouble of Conscience meaneth: What think ye?

Their heaven is on earth: David seeing their peace and prosperity, did bear them at envy, yea, so that his feet were almost gone: They are not in trouble, said he▪ in trouble like other men, neither are they plagued like other men, &c. Even at their death he could perceive no bands of any vehement pains, after that the whole space of their life, they had enjoyed morethan their heart could wish:

How ever it be that they prosper in this world, yet certainly if a man will go and seek God in his Sanctuary, there he shall tell him that he hath set them in slippery places, and that when he awaketh, he shall despise their image: There is a hell for them after the heaven of this earth.

I would gladly be instructed of you, that I might discern between the true solid Peace of conscience which the godly enjoye, and that senseless benummednes of the wicked, wherein they being deceived, cry, Peace, peace, even while God is putting the fiery lunt unto the mosine of their sudden destruction. Let me hear of the peace both of the one and other. I think all men should study to mark the difference.

The Reprobates who have their portion in this life, will seem indeed to have that true Peace of Conscience, because nothing within troubleth them: Their peace indeed is nothing but a dead benum nednesse of spirit, their Conscience being Seared, is not capable of feeling.

I shall give you two special marks whereby ye shall discern a true Peace and quietness of Conscience from the dead benummednes which the wicked have.

First, a Conscience which hath God's Peace is awful of sin, wittinglie and willingly for a world it would not despite the Spirit of grace: But the wicked who is in a false peace, flitteth from sins to sin, as a Fly from scab to scab, laying all his burden securelie upon the broad shoulders of God's mercy.

Secondly, the seared dead Conscience of the wicked hath but a part of that which is called Peace: Their hearts will be senseless of all evil, they will have no war within, no sorrow is there: But as they have no spiritual sorrow for their sins committed, neither have they any spiritual joy for the sense of their sins remitted.

Here then know the true Peace of God in the Conscience: The unspeakable grief for sin is asswaged, the fearful qualms are calmed, the raging and roaring tempests are allayed, the swelling seas are fallen and ebbed, God is come in the calm, not only for to wype away the tears of sorrow frō their eyes but also for to fill their mouths with laughters of joy: So not only are they void at last of the sense of most terrible horrors, but they are sensible of a joy which will make them to dance with David before the Ark, yea, to laude the Lord at a Stake, amidst tarry poudered flames of fire. This is that continual feast which cheereth the godly Soul amidst the bloody bickerings of Satan, and burning persecutions of merciless missacrours.