A Christian Directory

Direction 8. IF thou art willing indeed to be converted, do thy best to discover that yet thou art unconverted, and in a lost and miserable state.

§. 1. Who will endeavor to cure a Disease which he thinks he hath not? Or to Vomit up the poison which he thinks he never took? or taketh to be no poison? Or to come out of the ditch, that thinks he is not in it? Or who will turn back again, that will not believe but he is in the right way? Who will labor to be converted, that thinks he is converted already? Or who will come to Christ as the Physician of his soul, that thinks he is not sick, or is cured already. The common cause that men live and die without the grace of Repentance, Sanctification and Justification which should save them, is because they will not believe but that they have it, when they have it not, and that they are penitent, and justified and sanctified already. It is not my desire to make any of you think worse of your condition than it is: But if you will not know what it is, you will not be fit for recovering grace, nor use the means for your own recovery: you think it is so sad a conclusion, to find yourselves in a state of condemnation, that you are exceeding unwilling to know it or confess it.

§. 2. But I beseech you consider but these two things: First, Either it is true that you are in so miserable a state, or it is not true: If it be not true, the closest trial will but comfort you, by discovering that you are sanctified already: But if it be true, then do you think it will save you to be ignorant of your danger? Will it cure your disease, to believe that you have it not? Will thinking well of yourselves falsely, prove that you are well indeed? Is it the way to grace, to think you have it, when you have it not? Will it bring you to Heaven, to think that you are going thither, when you are in the way to Hell? Nay, do you not know, that it is the principal temptation of the Devil, to keep men from a state of Repentance and Salvation, to deceive them thus, and persuade them that they are in such a state already? Judge soberly of the case: Do you think if all the impenitent unconverted sinners in the world were certain that they are indeed in a graceless state, in which if they died, they were past all hope, that they would not quickly look about them, and better understand the offers of a Savior, and live in continual solicitude and fear, till they found themselves in a safer state? If you were sure yourselves, that you must yet be made new creatures, or be damned, would it not set you on work to seek more diligently after grace than ever you have done? The Devil knoweth this well enough; that he could scarce keep you quiet this night in his snares, but you would be ready to repent and beg for mercy, and resolve on a new life, before tomorrow, if you were but sure that you are yet in a state of condemnation. And therefore he doth all that he can to hide your sin and danger from your eyes, and to quiet you with the conceit, that though you are sinners, yet you are penitent, pardoned and safe.

§. 3. Well Sirs, there can be no harm in knowing the truth. And therefore will you but try yourselves, Whether you are unsanctified or not? You were baptized into the name of the Holy Ghost as your Sanctifier: and if now you neglect or mock at sanctification, what do you but deride your Baptism, or neglect that which is its sense and end? It doth not so much concern you to know that you live the life of nature, as to know whether sanctification have made you spiritually alive to God.

§. 4. And let me tell you this to your encouragement, that we do not call you to know that you are unconverted, and unpardoned, and miserable, as men that have no remedy, but must sit down in despair, and be tormented with the fore-knowledge of your endless pains before the time. No; it is but that you may speedily and thankfully accept of Christ, the full remedy, and turn to God, and quickly get out of your sin and terror, and enter into a life of safety and of peace. We desire not your continuance in that life which tendeth to despair and horror: we would have you out of it, if it were in our power before tomorrow: and therefore it is that we would have you understand what danger you are in, that you may go no further, but speedily turn back, and seek for help. And I hope there is no hurt (though there be some present trouble) in such a discovery of your danger as this is.

Well, if you are but willing to know, I shall help you a little to know what you are.

§. 5. 1. IF you are persecutors, or haters, or deriders of men, for being serious and diligent in the service of God, and fearful of sinning, and because they go not with the multitude to do evil, it is a certain sign that you are in a state of death: Yea, if you love not such men, and desire not rather to be such yourselves, than to be the greatest of the ungodly. See Gal. 4. 29. Acts 26. 11. 1 Tim. 1. 13. 1 Pet. 4. 2, 3, 4, 5. Psal. 15. 4. 1 John 3. 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15. John 13. 35. Psal. 84. 10.

§. 6. 2. If you love the world best, and set your affections most on things below, and mind most earthly things; nay, if you seek not first God's Kingdom, and the righteousness thereof, and if your hearts be not in Heaven, and your affections set on the things that are above, and you prefer not your hopes of life eternal before all the pleasures and prosperity of this world, it is a certain sign that you are but worldly and ungodly men. See this in Matth. 6. 19, 20, 21, 33. Phil. 3. 18, 19, 20. Col. 3. 1, 2, 3, 4. Psal. 73. 25. 1 John 2 15, 16, 17. James 1. 27. Luke 12. 20, 21. & 16. 25.

§. 7. 3. If your estimation, belief and hopes of everlasting life through Christ, be not such as will prevail with you, to deny yourselves, and forsake Father and Mother, and the nearest friends, and house, and land, and life, and all that you have for Christ, and for these hopes of a happiness hereafter, you are no true Christians, nor in a state of saving grace. See Luke 14. 26, 33. Matth. 10. 37, 38, 39. Matth. 13. 21, 22.

§. 8. 4. If you have not been converted, regenerated and sanctified by the Spirit of Jesus Christ, making you spiritual, and causing you to mind the things of the Spirit above the things of the flesh. If this Spirit be not in you, and you walk not after it, but after the flesh, making provision for the flesh, to satisfy its desires, and preferring the pleasing of the flesh, before the pleasing of God, it is certain that you are in a state of death. See Matth. 18. 3. John 3. 3, 5, 6. Heb. 12. 14. Rom. 8. 1. 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13. & 13. 13, 14. Luke 16. 19, 25. & 12. 20, 21. Heb. 11. 25, 26. 2 Cor. 4. 16, 17, 18. & 5. 7. Rom. 8. 17, 18.

§. 9. 5. If you have any known sin which you do not hate, and had not rather leave it, than keep it, and do not pray, and strive, and watch against it, as far as you know and observe it, but rather excuse it, plead for it, desire it, and are loath to part with it, so that your will is habitually more for it than against it, it is a sign of an impenitent unrenewed heart. 1 John 3. 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 24. Gal. 5. 16, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25. Rom. 7. 22, 24. & 8. 13. Luke 13. 3, 5. Matth. 5. 19, 20. 2 Tim. 2. 19, Psal. 5. 5. Luke 13. 27.

§. 10. 6. If you Love not the Word as it is a light discovering your sin and duty, but only as it is a general truth, or as it reproveth others: If you love not the most searching preaching, and would not know how bad you are, and come not to the light, that your deeds may be manifest, it is a sign that you are not children of the light, but of the darkness, John 3. 19, 20, 21.

§. 11. 7. If the Laws of your Creator and Redeemer be not of greatest power and authority with you, and the will and word of God cannot do more with you, than the word or will of any man, and the threatenings and promises of God be not more prevalent with you, than the threats or promises of any men, it is a sign that you take not God for your God, but in heart are Atheists and ungodly men. Luke 19. 27. Matth. 7. 21, 22, 23, 26. Dan. 3. 16, 17, 18. & 6. 5, 10. Ier. 17. 5, 6. Luke 12. 4. Acts 5. 29. Psal. 14. 1, &c.

§. 12. 8. If you have not in a deliberate Covenant or resolution devoted and given up yourselves to God as your Father and felicity, to Jesus Christ as your only Savior, and your Lord and King, and to the Holy Ghost as your Sanctifier, to be made holy by him, desiring that your heart and life should be perfectly conformed to the will of God, and that you might know him, and love him, and enjoy him more, you are void of Godliness and true Christianity: For this is the very Covenant which you make in Baptism, which you call your Christening: Matth. 28. 19, 20. 2 Cor. 8. 5. 1 Cor. 6. 17. John 1. 10, 11, 12. Gal. 4. 6. Rom. 8. 14, 15.

§. 13. I Have now plainly shown you, and fully proved, from the Word of God, by what infallible signs an ungodly man may know that he is Ungodly if he will: May you not know whether it be thus with you if you are willing to know? May you not know if you will, whether your desire and design of life, be more for this world, or that to come? and whether Heaven or Earth be preferred and sought first? and whether your fleshly prosperity and pleasure, or your souls be principally cared for and regarded? May you not know if you will, whether you love or loath the serious worshippers of God? and whether you had rather be delivered from your sins, or keep them? and whether your wills be more against them, or for them? and whether you love a holy life or not? and whether you had rather be perfect in Holiness and Obedience to God, or be excused from it, and please the flesh? and whether you had rather be such a one as Paul, or as Caesar? a persecuted Saint in poverty and contempt, or a persecuting Conqueror or King? May you not know if you will, whether you love a searching Ministry, that telleth you of the worst, and would not deceive you? May you not know, whether you are resolvedly devoted and given up to God, the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, as your Father and felicity, your Savior and your Sanctifier, and whether the scope, design and business of your lives is more for God, or for the flesh, for Heaven or Earth; and which it is that bears the sway, and which it is that comes behind, and hath but the leavings of the other, or only so much as it can spare? Certainly these are things so near you, and so remarkable in your hearts, that you may come to the knowledge of them if you will. But if you will not, who can help it?

§. 14. What a so •• ish cavil is it then of those ignorant men, that ask us, when we tell them of these things, whether ever we were in Heaven? or ever saw the Book of Life? and how we can tell who shall be saved, and who shall be damned? If it were about a May-game this jesting were more seasonable; but to talk thus distractedly about the matters of salvation and damnation, and to make such a jest of the damning of souls, is a kind of foolery that hath no excuse. What though we never were in Heaven? and never saw the Book of Life? Dost thou think I never saw the Scriptures? Why wretched sinner? dost thou not know, that Christ came down from Heaven, to tell us who they be that shall come thither, and who they be that shall be shut out? And did he not know what he said? Is God the Governor of the world, and hath he not a Law by which he governeth them? And can I not tell by the Law, who they be that the Judge will condemn or save? What else is the Law made for, but to be the Rule of Life, and the Rule of Judgment? Read Psal. 1. & 15. & Matth. 5. & 7. & 25. and all the Texts which I even now cited, and see in them whether God hath not told you who they be that shall be saved, and who they be that shall be condemned? Nay, see whether this be not the very business of the Word of God? And do you think that he hath written it in vain? But some men have loved ignorance and ungodliness so long, till the Spirit of grace hath cast them off, and left them to the sottishness of their carnal minds, so that they have eyes and see not, and ears and hear not, and hearts and understand not. But those that are Willing and Diligent to know their sin and duty in order to their recovery, God will not let them search in vain, nor hide the remedy from their eyes.

Direction 9. WHen you have found yourselves in a state of sin and death, Understand and Consider what a state that is.

§. 1. It may be you will think it a tolerable condition, and linger in it, as if you were safe, or delay your Repentance, as if it were a matter of no great haste; unless you open your eyes, and look round about you, and see in how slippery a place you stand. Let me name some instances of the misery of an unregenerate graceless state, and then judge of it as the Word of God directs you.

1. As long as you are unconverted you must needs be loathsome and abominable to God. His holy nature is irreconcilable to sin, and would be irreconcilable to sinners, if it were not that he can cleanse and purify them. Did you know what sin is, and know God's holiness, you would understand this much better. Your own averseness to God, and your dislike of the holiness of his Laws and servants, might tell you what thoughts he hath of you. He hateth all the workers of iniquity, Psal. 5. 5. Indeed he taketh you for his enemies, and as such he will handle you, if you be not converted. I know many persons that are most deeply guilty, especially men of honor and esteem in the world, would scorn to have this title given to themselves: But verlly God is not fearful of offending them, nor so tender of their de •• led honor, as they are of their own, or as they expect the Preacher should be. If those be the Kings enemies that refuse his Government and set up another, then those are the enemies of God and of the Redeemer and of the Holy Ghost, that set up the base concupiscence of their flesh, and the honor and prosperity of this world, and the will of man, and refuse the Government of God their Creator and Redeemer, and refuse the sanctifying teachings and operations of the Holy Ghost. Read Luke 19. 27.

Some think it strange that any men should be called Haters of God; And I believe you will find it hard to meet with that man that will confess it by himself, till converting Grace or Hell constrain him▪ And indeed if God himself had not charged men with that sin, and called them by that name, we should scarce have found belief or patience when we had endeavored to convince the world of it. Intreat but the worst of men to repent of Hating God, and try how they will take it. Yet they may read that name in Scripture, Rom. 1. 30. Psal. 81. 15. Luke 19. 14. Did not the Jews hate Christ think you, when they murdered him? and when they hated all his followers for his sake? Matth. 10. 22. Mar. 13. 13. And doth not Christ say, that they shall be hated for his sake, not only of the Jews, but also of all Nations, and all men, Matth. 24. 9. & 10. 22. Even by the world, John 17. 14. & 15, 17, 18, 19, &c. And this was a hating both Christ and his Father, John 15. 23, 24. But you will say, It is not possible that any man can hate God? I answer, How then come the Devils to hate him? Yea, every ungodly man hateth God: Indeed no man hateth him as Good, or as Merciful to them: But they hate him as Holy and Just, as one that will not let them have the pleasure of sin, without damning them: as one engaged in justice to cast them into Hell, if they die without conversion: and as one that hath made so pure and precise a Law to govern them, and convinceth them of sin, and calls them to that repentance and Holiness which they hate. Why did the world hate Christ himself? He tells you, John 7. 7. The world cannot hate you, but me it hateth, because I testify against it, that the works thereof are evil. John 3. 19. This is the condemnation that Light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. Nay, it is a wonder of blindness, that this God-hating world and age, should not perceive that they are God-haters, while they hate his servants to the death, and implacably rage against them, and hate his holy ways and Kingdom, and bend all their power and interest in most of the Kingdoms of the world, against his interest and his people upon earth: While the Devil fighteth his battles against Christ through the world, by their hands, they will yet confess the Devils malice against God, but deny their own; as if he used their hands without their hearts. Well poor wretched worms! instead of denying your enmity to him, lament it, and know that he also taketh you for his enemies, and will prove too hard for you when you have done your worst. Read Psal. 2. and tremble and submit. This is especially the case of persecutors and open enemies; but in their measure also of all that would not have him to reign over them. And therefore Christ came to Reconcile us unto God, and God to us; and it is only the sanctified that are Reconciled to him. See Col. 1. 21. Phil. 3. 18. 1 Cor. 15. 25. Rom. 5. 10. The carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the Law of God; nor indeed can be, Rom. 8. 7. Mark that Text well.

§. 2. 2. As long as you are unsanctified, you are unjustified and unpardoned: you are under the guilt of all the sins that ever you committed: Every sinful thought, word and deed, of which the least deserveth Hell, is on your score, to be answered for by yourself: And what this signifieth, the threatenings of the Law will tell you. See Acts 26. 18. Mar. 4. 12. Col. 1. 14. There is no sin forgiven to an impenitent unconverted sinner.

§. 3. 3. And no wonder, when the unconverted have no special▪ interest in Christ. The pardon and life that is given by God, is given in and with the Son: God hath given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son: He that hath the Son, hath life; and he that hath not the Son, hath not life, 1 John 5. 10, 11, 12. Till we are members of Christ, we have no part in the pardon and salvation purchased by him: And ungodly sinners are not his members. So that Jesus Christ who is the hope and life of all his own, doth leave thee as he found thee; and that is not the worst: for,

§. 4. 4. It will be far worse with the impenitent rejecters of the grace of Christ, than if they had never heard of a Redeemer. For it cannot be, that God having provided so precious a Remedy for sinful miserable souls, should suffer it to be despised and rejected, without increased punishment. Was it not enough that you had disobeyed your Great Creator, but you must also set light by a most Gracious Redeemer, that offered you pardon, purchased by his blood, if you would but have come to God by him? Yea, the Savior that you despised shall be himself your judge, and the Grace and Mercy which you set so light by, shall be the heaviest aggravation of your sin and misery. For how shall you escape if you neglect so great salvation? Heb. 2. 3. And of how much sorer punishment (then the despisers of Moses Law) shall they be thought worthy, who have trodden underfoot the Son of God, &c. Heb. 10. 29.

§. 5. 5. The very prayers and sacrifice of the wicked are abominable to God: (except such as contain their returning from their wickedness.) So that terror ariseth to you from that which you expect should be your help. See Prov. 15. 8. & 21. 27. Isa. 1. 13.

§. 6. 6. Your common Mercies do but increase your sin and misery (till you return to God)▪ Your carnal hearts turn all to sin, Tit. 1. 15. Unto the pure all things are pure: but unto them that are defiled and unbelieving, is nothing pure: but even their mind and conscience is defiled.

§. 7. 7. While you are unsanctified, you are impotent and dead to any holy acceptable work: when you should redeem your time, and prepare for eternity, and try your states, or pray, or meditate, or do good to others, you have no heart to any such spiritual works: your minds are biased against them. Rom. 8. 7. And it is not the excusable impotency of such, as would do good, but cannot: but it is the malicious impotency of the wicked, (the same with that of Devils) that cannot do good, because they will not; and will not because they have blind malicious and ungodly hearts, which makes their sin so much the greater. Tit. 1. 16.

§. 8. 8. While you have unsanctified hearts, you have at all times the seed and disposition unto every sin: And if you commit not the worst, it is because some providence restraining the Tempter hindereth you: No thanks to you that you do not daily commit Idolatry, Blasphemy, Theft, Murder, Adultery, &c. It is in your hearts to do it, when you have but temptation and opportunity: and will be till you are renewed by sanctifying Grace.

§. 9. 9. Till you are sanctified you are heirs of death and Hell, even under the curse, and condemned already in point of Law, though judgment have not past the final sentence. See John 3. 18, 19, 36. And nothing is more certain, than that you had been damned and undone forever, if you had died before you had been renewed by the Holy Ghost; and that yet this will be your miserable portion, if you should die unsanctified. Think then what a life you have lived until now? And think what it is to live any longer in such a case, in which if you die, you are certain to be damned. Conversion may save you, but unbelief and self-flattery will not save you from this endless misery, Heb. 12. 14. Heb. 2. 3. Matth. 25. ult.

§. 10. 10. As long as you are unsanctified, you are hasting to this misery: Sin is like to get more rooting; and your hearts to be more hardened, and at enmity with grace; and God more provoked; and the Spirit more grieved; and you are every day nearer to your final doom, when all these things will be more sensibly considered, and better understood, 2 Tim. 3. 13. 2 Pet. 2. 3.

Thus I have given you a brief account of the case of unrenewed souls, and but a brief one, because I have done it before more largely. ( Treat. of Convers. )

Direction 10. WHen you have found out how sad a condition you are in, consider what there is in sin to make you amends or repair your loss, that should be any hindrance to your Conversion.

§. 1. Certainly you will not continue for nothing (if you know it to be nothing ) in so dangerous and doleful a case as this. And yet you do it for that which is much worse than nothing, not considering what you do. Sit down sometimes and well bethink you, what recompense the world or sin will make you, for your God, your souls, your hopes, and all, when they are lost and past recovery? Think what it will then avail or comfort you, that once you were honored, and had a great estate; that once you fared of the best, and had your delicious cups, and merry hours, and sumptuous attire, and all such pleasures. Think whether this will abate the horrors of death, or put by the wrath of God, or the sentence of your condemnation, or whether it will ease a tormented soul in Hell? If not; think how small, and short, and silly a commodity and pleasure it is, that you buy so dear: And what a wise man can see in it, that should make it seem worth the Joyes of Heaven, and worth your enduring everlasting torments. What is it that is supposed worth all this? Is it the snare of preferment? Is it vexing riches? Is it befooling honors? Is it distracting cares? Is it swinish luxury or lust? Is it beastly pleasures? Or what is it else that you will buy at so wonderful dear a rate? O lamentable folly of ungodly men! O foolish sinners! Unworthy to see God! and worthy to be miserable! O strangely corrupted heart of man, that can fell his Maker, his Redeemer, and his salvation, at so base a price.

Direction 11. ANd when you are casting up your account, as you put all that sin and the world will do for you in the one end of the scales, so put into the other the Comforts both of this life, and of that to come, which you must part with for your sins.

§. 1. Search the Scriptures, and consider how happy the Saints of God are there described: Think what it is, to have a purified cleansed soul, to be free from the slavery of the flesh and it's concupiscence, to have the sensitive appetite in subjection unto Reason, and Reason illuminated and rectified by faith; to be alive to God, and disposed and enabled to love and serve him; to have access to him in prayer, with boldness and assurance to be heard; to have a fealed pardon of all our sins, and an interest in Christ, who will answer for them all and justify us; to be the children of God, and the heirs of Heaven; to have peace of Conscience, and the joyful hopes of endless joys; to have communion with the Father, through the Son, by the Spirit, and to have that Spirit dwelling in us, and working to our further holiness and joy; to have communion with the Saints; and the help and comfort of all God's Ordinances, and to be under his many precious promises, and under his protection and provision in his family, and to cast all our care upon him; to delight ourselves daily in the remembrance and renewed experiences of his love, and in our (too little) knowledge of him, and love to him, and in the knowledge of his Son, and of the Mysteries of the Gospel; to have all things work together for our good, and to be able with joy to welcome Death, and to live as in Heaven in the foresight of our everlasting happiness. I would have orderly here given you a particular account of the privileges of renewed souls, but that I have done so much in that already in my Treatise of Conversion, and Saints Rest. This taste may help you to see what you lose, while you abide in an unconverted state.

Direction 12. WHen you have thus considered of the condition you are in, consider also whether it be a condition to be rested in one day.

§ 1. If you die unconverted, you are past all hope; for out of Hell there is no redemption: And certain you are to die ere long; and uncertain whether it will be this night, Luke 12. 20. You never lay down with assurance that you should rise again: You never went out of doors with assurance to return: You never heard a Sermon with assurance that you should hear another: You never drew one breath with assurance that you should draw another: A thousand accidents and diseases are ready to stop your breath, and end your time, when God will have it so: And if you die this night in an unregenerate state, there is no more time, or help, or hope. And is this a case then for a wise man to continue in a day, that can do anything towards his own recovery? Should you delay another day or hour, before you fall down at the feet of Christ, and cry for mercy, and return to God, and resolve upon a better course? May I not well say to thee as the Angels unto Lot, Gen. 19. 15, 17, 22. Arise, lest thou be consumed—Escape for thy life: look not behind thee —

Direction 13. WHen thou art Resolved, past thy waverings and delays, give up thyself entirely and unreservedly to God the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, as thy Happiness, thy Savior and thy Sanctifier, in an hearty Consent to the Covenant of Grace.

§. 1. This is thy Christianity; thy espousals with Christ: It is Sacramentally done in Baptism: But till it be personally owned and heartily renewed by men at age, they have no reason to be numbered with adult believers, nor to dream of a part in the blessings of the Covenant. It's pity it is not made a more serious solemn work, for men thus to renew their Covenant with God. (For which I have written in a Treatise of Confirmation, but hitherto in vain.) However do it seriously thyself: It is the greatest and weightiest action of thy life.

§. 2. To this end peruse well the Covenant of Grace which is offered thee in the Gospel: Understand it well: In it God offereth, notwithstanding thy sins, to be thy Reconciled God and Father in Christ, and to accept thee as a Son, and an heir of Heaven: The Son offereth to be thy Savior, to justify thee by his blood and grace, and teach thee, and govern thee as thy Head, in order to thy everlasting happiness. The Holy Spirit offereth to be thy Sanctifier, Comforter and Guide, to overcome all the enmity of the Devil, the World and the Flesh, in order to the full accomplishment of thy salvation; Nothing is expected of thee, in order to thy Title to the benefits of this Covenant, but deliberately, unfeignedly, entirely to Consent to it, and to continue that consent, and perform what thou consentest to perform, and that by▪ the help of the grace which will be given thee. See therefore that thou well deliberate of the matter (but without delays): And count what thou shalt gain or lose by it: And if thou find that thou art like to be a loser in the end, and knowest of any better way, even take it, and boast of it, when thou hast tried the end: But if thou art past doubt, that there is no way but this, despatch it resolutely and seriously.

§. 3. And take heed of one thing; lest thou say, Why, this is no more than everybody knoweth, and then I have done a hundred times, to give up myself in Covenant to God the Father, Son and Holy Ghost. Dost thou know it, and yet hast thou not done it? Or hast thou done it with thy lips, and not unfeignedly with thy heart? Lament it as one of thy greatest sins, that thou hast thus provokingly dallied with God: and admire his mercy, that he will yet vouchsafe to enter into Covenant with one, that hath hypocritically profaned his Covenant. If thou hadst ever seriously thus Covenanted and given up thyself to God, thou wouldst not have neglected him by an ungodly life, nor lived after to the Devil, the world and the flesh, which were renounced. I tell you the making of this Christian Vow and Covenant with God in Christ, is the act of greatest consequence of any in all thy life, and to be done with the greatest judgment, and reverence, and sincerity, and foresight, and firm resolution, of anything that ever thou dost: And if it were done sincerely by all that do it ignorantly, for fashion, only with the lips, then all professed Christians would be saved: whereas now the abusers of that holy Name and Covenant will have the deepest place in Hell. Write it out on thy heart, and put thy heart and hand to it resolvedly, and stand to thy Consent, and all is thine own: Conversion is wrought when this is done.

Direction 14. IN present performance of thy Covenant with God, away with thy former sinful life; and see that thou sin willfully no more; but as far as thou art able, avoid the temptations which have deceived thee.

§. 1. God will never be reconciled to thy sins: If he be reconciled to thy person, it is as thou art justified by Christ, and sanctified by the Spirit: He entertaineth thee, as one that turneth with repentance from sin to him: If thou willfully or negligently go on in thy former course of sin, thou showest that thou wast not sincerely resolved in thy Covenant with God.

§. 2. I know infirmities and imperfections will not be so easily cast off, but will cleave to thee in thy best obedience, till the day of thy perfection come. But I speak of gross and willful sin: such as thou canst forbear, if thou be but sincerely (though imperfectly) willing.

Hast thou been a profane Swearer or Curser, or used to take God's name in vain, or used to backbiting, slandering, lying, or to ribald filthy talk: It is in thy power to forbear these sins, if thou be but willing: Say not, I fall into them through custom before I am aware: For that is a sign that thou art not sincerely willing to forsake them. If thou were truly penitent, and thy will sincerely opposite to these sins, thou wouldst be more tender and fearful to offend, and resolved against them, and make a greater matter of them, and abhor them, and not commit them, and say I did it before I was aware: No more than thou would • t spit in the face of thy Father, or curse thy Mother, or slander thy dearest friend, or speak Treason against the King, and say, I did it through custom before I was aware. Sin will not be so played with by those that have been soundly humbled for it, and resolved against it.

§. 3. Hast thou been a Drunkard, or Tipler, spending thy precious hours in an Alehouse, prating over a Pot, in the company of foolish tempting sinners: It is in thy power if thou be truly willing to do so no more. If thou love and choose such company, and places, and actions, and discourse, how canst thou say thou art willing to forsake them, or that thy heart is changed? If thou do not love and choose them, how canst thou commit them, when none compels thee? No one carrieth thee to the place: No one forceth thee to sin: If thou do it, it is because thou wilt do it, and lovest it. If thou be in good earnest with God, and wilt be saved indeed, and art not content to part with Heaven for thy cups and company, away with them presently without delay.

§. 4. Hast thou lived in wantonness, fornication, uncleanness, gluttony, gaming, pastimes, sensuality, to the pleasing of thy flesh, while thou hast displeased God. O bless the Patience and Mercy of the Lord, that thou wast not cut off all this while, and damned for thy sin before thou didst repent! And, as thou lovest thy soul, delay no longer; but make a stand, and go no further, not one step further, in the way which thou knowest leads to Hell. If thou knowest that this is the way to thy damnation, and yet wilt go on, what pity dost thou deserve from God or man?

§. 5. If thou have been a Covetous Wordling, or an Ambitious seeker of honor or preferment in the world, so that thy gain, or rising, or reputation, hath been the game which thou hast followed, and hath taken thee up instead of God and life eternal; away now with these known deceits, and hunt not after Vanity and Vexation: Thou knowest before hand what it will prove when thou hast overtaken it, and hast enjoyed all that it can yield thee; and how useless it will be as to thy comfort or happiness at last.

§. 6. Surely if men were willing, they are able to forbear such sins, and to make a stand, and look before them, to prevent their misery: Therefore God thus pleadeth with them, Isa. 1. 16, 17, 18. Wash you, make you clean, put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; cease to do evil, learn to do well, &c. Isa. 55 2, 3. Wherefore do ye spend money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which satisfieth not? Hearken diligently unto me, and eat ye that which is good, and let your soul delight itself in fatness: Incline your ear, and come unto me, hear and your soul shall live, and I will make an everlasting Covenant with you. V. 6, 7. Seek ye the Lord while he may be found: Call ye upon him while he is near: Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and let him return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon: Christ supposeth that the foresight of judgment may restrain men from sin, when he saith, Sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee, John 5. 14. & 8. 11. Can the presence of men restrain a Fornicator; and the presence of the Judge restrain a Thief, yea, or the foresight of the Assizes? And shall not the presence of God, with the foresight of judgment and damnation restrain thee? Remember that impenitent sin and damnation are conjoined. If you will cause one, God will cause the other. Choose one, and you shall not choose whether you will have the other. If you will have the Serpent, you shall have the sting.

Direction 15. IF thou have sincerely given up thyself to God, and consented to his Covenant, show it by turning the face of thy endeavors and conversation quite another way, and by seeking Heaven more fervently and diligently, than ever thou soughtest the world, or fleshly pleasures.

§. 1. Holiness consisteth not in a mere forbearance of a sensual life, but principally in living unto God. The principle or heart of Holiness is within, and consisteth in the Love of God, and of his Word and Ways, and Servants, and Honor, and Interest in the world, and in the souls delight in God, and the Word and Ways of God, and in its inclination towards him, and desire after him, and care to please him, and loathness to offend him. The expression of it in our lives, consisteth in the constant diligent exercise of this internal life, according to the directions of the Word of God. If thou be a believer and hast subjected thyself to God, as thy absolute Sovereign King and Judge, it will then be thy work to obey and please him, as a Child his Father, or a Servant his Master, Mal. 1. 6. Do you think that God will have Servants, and have nothing for them to do? Will one of you commend or reward your servant for doing nothing, and take it at the years end for a satisfactory answer or account, if he say, I have done no harm? God calleth you not only to do no harm, but to love and serve him with all your heart, and soul, and might: If you have a better Master than you had before, you should do more work than you did before. Will you not serve God more zealoussy than you served the Devil? Will you not labor harder to save your souls, than you did to damn them? Will you not be more zealous in good, than you were in evil? What fruit had you then in those things whereof you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death. Rom. 6. 21, 22. But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, you have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life. If you are true Beh • verse, you have now laid up your hopes in Heaven, and therefore will set yourselves to seek it, as worldlings set themselves to seek the world. And a sluggish wish, with heartless, lazy, dull endeavors, is no fit seeking of eternal joys. A creeping pace beseemeth not a man that is in the way to Heaven; especially who went faster in the way to Hell. This is not running as for our lives. You may well be diligent and make haste, where you have so great encouragement and help, and where you may expect so good an end, and where you are sure you shall never in life or death, have cause to repent of any of your just endeavors, and where every step of your way is pure, and clean, and delectable, and paved with mercies, and fortified and secured by Divine protection, and where Christ is your Conductor, and so many have sped so well before you, and the wisest and best in the world are your companions. Live then as men that have changed their Master, their end, their hopes, their way and work. Religion layeth not men to sleep, though it be the only way to Rest. It awakeneth the sleepy soul, to higher thoughts, and hopes, and labors, than ever it was well acquainted with before. He that is in Christ, is a new creature; old things are past away, behold all things are become new, 2 Cor. 5. 17. You never sought that which would pay for all your cost and diligence till now: You never were in a way that you might make haste in, without repenting of your haste, till now. How glad should you be, that Mercy hath brought you into the right way, after the wanderings of such a sinful life? And your gladness and thankfulness should now be shown, by your cheerful diligence and zeal. As Christ did not raise up Lazarus from the dead, to do nothing, or live to little purpose (though the Scripture giveth us not the history of his life); So did he not raise you from the death of sin, to live idly, or to be unprofitable in the world. He that giveth you his Spirit, to be a principle of heavenly life within you, expecteth that you stir up the gift that he hath given you, and live according to that heavenly principle.

Direction 16. ENgage thyself in the cheerful constant use, of the means and helps appointed by God, for thy confirmation and salvation.

§. 1. He can never expect to attain the end, that will not be persuaded to use the means. Of yourselves you can do nothing. God giveth his help by the means which he hath appointed and fitted to your help. Of the use of these, I shall treat more fully afterwards: I am now only to name them to thee, that thou mayest know what it is that thou hast to do.

1. That you must hear, or read the Word of God, and other good Books which expound it and apply it, I shown you before. The new born Christian doth incline to this, as the new born child doth to the breast, 1 Pet. 2. 1, 2. Laying aside all malice, and guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, and all evil speakings, as new born babes that desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby. Psal. 1. 2, 3. The blessed man's delight is in the Law of the Lord, and therein doth he meditate day and night.

§. 2. 2. Another means is the public worshipping of God in communion with his Church and people: Besides the benefit of the word there preached, the prayers of the Church are effectual for the members: and it raiseth the soul to holy joys, to join with well ordered Assemblies of the Saints, in the Praises of the Almighty. The Assemblies of holy worshippers of God, are the places of his delight, and must be the places of our delight. They are most like to the Celestial Society, that sound forth the praises of the glorious Iebovah, with purest minds and cheerful voice. In his Temple doth everyone speak of his glory, Psal. 29. 9. In such a Chore, what soul will not be wrapped up with delight, and desire to join in the consort and harmony? In such a flame of united desires and praises, what soul so cold and dull that will not be enflamed, and with more than ordinary facility and alacrity fly up to God?

§. 3. 3. Another means is private prayer unto God. When God would tell Ananias that Paul was converted, he saith of him, Behold he prayeth, Acts 9. 11. Prayer is the breath of the new creature. The Spirit of Adoption given to every child of God, is a Spirit of prayer, and teacheth them to cry Abba Father, and helpeth their infirmities, when they know not what to pray as they ought, and when words are wanting, it (as it were) intercedeth for them with groans, which they cannot express in words, Gal. 4. 6. Rom. 8. 15, 26, 27. And God knoweth the meaning of the Spirit in those groans. The first workings of grace are in Desires after grace, provoking the soul to servant prayer, by which more grace is speedily obtained. Ask then, and ye shall have, seek and ye shall find, knock and it shall be opened to you, Luke 11. 9.

§. 4. 4. Another means to be used is Confession of sin, not only to God (for so every wicked man may do, because he knoweth that God is already acquainted with it all, and this is no addition to his shame: He so little regardeth the eye of God, that he is more ashamed when it is known to men ) But in three Cases Confession must be made also to Man. 1. In case you have wronged man, and are thus bound to make him satisfaction: As if you have robbed him, defrauded him, slandered him or born false witness against him. 2. In case you are Children or Servants, that are under the government of Parents or Masters, and are called by them to give an account of your actions: You are bound then to give a true account. 3. In case you have need of the Counsel or Prayers of others for the settling of your consciences in peace: In this case you must so far open your case to them, as is necessary to their effectual help for your recovery. For if they know not the disease, they will be unfit to apply the remedy. In these cases it is true, that He that covereth his sins shall not prosper: but he that confesseth and forsaketh them, shall have mercy, Prov. 28. 13.

§. 5. 5. Another Means to be used, is the familiar company, and holy converse with humble, sincere, experienced Christians: The Spirit that is in them, and breatheth, and acteth by them, will kindle the like holy flames in you: Away with the company of idle, prating, sensual men, that can talk of nothing but their worldly wealth, or business, or their reputations, or their appetites and lusts; Associate yourselves with them that go the way to Heaven, if you resolve yourselves to go it. O what a deal of difference will you find between these two sorts of companions? The one sort, if you have any thoughts of Repentance, would stifle them, and laugh you out of the use of your reason, into their own distracted mirth and dotage: And if you have any serious thoughts of your salvation, or any inclinations to repent and be wise, they will do much to divert them, and hold you in the power and snares of Satan, till it be too late: If you have any zeal or heavenly mindedness, they will do much to quench it, and fetch down your minds to earth again. The other sort will speak of things of so great we •••• t and moment, and that with seriousness and reverence, as will tend to raise and quicken your sou • and possess you with a taste of the heavenly things which they discourse of: They will encourage you by their own experiences, and direct you by that truth which hath directed them, and zealously communicate what they have received: They will pray for you, and teach you how to pray: They will give the example of holy, humble, obedient lives; and lovingly admonish you of your duties, and reprove your sins. In a word, as the carnal mind doth savor the things of the flesh, and is enmity against God, the company of such will be a powerful means to infect you with their plague, and make you such, if you were escaped from them; much more to keep you such, if you are not escaped: And as they that are spiritual, do mind the things of the Spirit, so their converse tendeth to make you spiritually minded as they are. Rom. 8. 7, 8. Though there are some useful qualities and gifts in some that are ungodly, and some lamentable faults in many that are spiritual, yet experience will show you so great a difference between them in the main, in heart and life, as will make you the more easily to believe the difference that will be between them in the life to come.

§. 6. 6. Another means is serious Meditation on the life to come, and the way thereto: Which though all cannot manage so methodically as some, yet all should in some measure and season be acquainted with it.

§. 7. 7. The last Means is, to choose some prudent faithful Guide and Counselor for your soul, to open those cases to which are not fit for all to know; and to resolve and advise you in cases that are too hard for you: Not to lead you blindfold after the interest of any seduced or ambitious men, nor to engage you to his singular conceits, against the Scripture or the Church of God; but to be to your soul, as a Physician to your body, or a Lawyer to your estates, to help you where they are wiser than you, and where you need their helps.

Resolve now that instead of your idle company and pastime, your excessive cares and sinful pleasures, you will wait on God in the seasonable use of these his own appointed means; and you will find, that he appointed them not in vain, and that you shall not lose your labor.

Direction 17. THat in all this you may be sincere, and not deceived by an hypocritical change, be sure that God • e all your Confidence, and all your hopes be placed in Heaven, and that there be no secret reserve in your hearts, for the world and flesh; and that you divide not your hearts between God and the things below, nor take not up with the Religion of an hypocrite, which giveth God what the flesh can spare.

§. 1. When the Devil cannot keep you from a change and reformation, he will seek to deceive you with a superficial change, and half reformation, which goeth not to the root, nor doth not recover the heart to God, nor deliver it entirely to him. If he can by a partial deceitful change, persuade you that you are truly renewed and sanctified, and fix you there that you go no further, you are as surely his, as if you had continued in your grosser sins. And of all other this is the most common and dangerous cheat of souls, when they think to halve it between God and the world, and to secure their fleshly interest of pleasure and prosperity, and their salvation too: and so they will needs serve God and Mammon.

§. 2. This is the true Character of a self-deceiving hypocrite. He is neither so fully persuaded of the certain truth of the Scripture and the life to come, nor yet so mortified to the flesh and world, as to take the joys of Heaven for his whole portion, and to subject all his worldly prosperity and hopes thereunto, and to part with all things in this world, when it is necessary to the securing of his salvation: And therefore he will not lose his hold of present things, nor forsake his worldly interest for Christ, as long as he can keep it. Nor will he be any further religious, than may stand with his bodily welfare; resolving never to be undone by his godliness, but in the first place to save himself, and his prosperity in the world, as long as he can: And therefore he is truly a carnal worldly minded man; being denominated from what is predominant in him: And yet because he knoweth that he must die, and for ought he knows, he may then find against his will, that there is another life which he must enter upon, le • t the Gospel should prove true, he must have some Religion: And therefore he will take up as much as will stand with his temporal welfare, hoping that he may have both tha • and Heaven hereafter: and he will be as Religious as the predominant interest of the flesh will give him leave. He is resolved rather to venture his soul, than to be here undone: and that's his first principle. But he is resolved to be as godly as will stand with a worldly fleshly life: that's his second principle. And he will hope for Heaven as the end of such a way as this: that's his third. Therefore he will place most of his Religion in those things which are most consistent with worldliness and carnality, and will not cost his flesh too dear; as in being as this or that opinion, Church, or party, (whether Papist, Prot 〈…〉 t, or some smaller party) in adhering to that party, and being zealous for them, in acquiring and usi • g such parts and gifts, as may make him highly esteemed by others; and in doing such good works as cost him not too dear, and in forbearing such sins as would procure his disgrace and shame, and cost his flesh dearer to commit them, than forbear them; and such other as his flesh can spare: This is his fourth principle: And he is resolved, when trial calleth him to part with God and his conscience, or with the world, that he will rather let go God and Conscience, and venture upon the pains hereafter which he thinks to be uncertain, than to run upon a certain calamity or undoing here: At least, he hath no Resolution to the contrary, which will carry him out in a day of trial. This is his fifth principle: And his sixth principle is, That yet he will not torment himself, or blot his name, with confessing himself a temporizing worldling, resolved to turn any way to save himself. And therefore he will be sure to believe nothing to be Truth and duty that is dangerous; but will furnish himself with Arguments to prove that it is not the will of God; and that sin is no sin: Yea perhaps conscience and duty shall be pleaded for his sin: It shall be out of tenderness, and piety, and charity to others, that he will sin; and will charge them to be the sinners that comply not and do not wickedly as well as he. He will be one that shall first make a Controversy of every sin which his flesh calls necessary, and of every Duty which his flesh counts intollerably dear: And then when it is a Controversy, and many reputed Wise, and some reputed Good are on his side, he thinks he is on equal terms with the most honest and sincere: He hath got a burrow for his Conscience and his Credit: He will not believe himself to be an Hypocrite, and no one else must think him one, lest they be uncharitable: For then the censure must fall on the whole party, and then it is sufficient to defend his reputation of piety to say, Though we differ in opinion, we must not differ in affection, and must not condemn each other for such differences (A very great Truth where rightly applied). But what is it O Hypocrite, that makes thee differ in cases where thy flesh is interested rather than in any other? And why wast thou never of that mind till now that thy worldly interest requireth it? And how cometh it to pass, that thou art • always on the self-saving opinion? And whence is it that thou consultest with those only that are of the opinion which thou desirest should be true, and either not at all, or partially and slightly, with those that are against it? Wast thou ever conscious to thyself, that thou hast accounted what it might cost thee to be saved, and reckoned on the worst, and resolved, in the strength of grace, to go through all? Didst thou ever meddle with much of the self-denying part of Religion, or any duties that would cost thee dear? May not thy Conscience tell thee, that thou never didst believe that thou shouldst suffer much for thy Religion; that is, thou hadst a secret purpose to avoid it?

§. 3. O Sirs, take warning from the mouth of Christ, who hath so oft and plainly warned you of this sin and danger? and told you how necessary self-denial and a suffering disposition is to all that are his Disciples; and that the worldly fleshly principle predominant in the Hypocrite, is manifest by his selfsaving course: He must take up his Cross, and follow him in a Conformity to his sufferings that will indeed be his Disciple. We must suffer with him if we will reign with him, Rom. 8. 17, 18. Mat. 13. 20, 21, 22. He that received the seed in stony places, the same is he that heareth the word, and anon with joy receiveth it, yet hath he not root in himself, but dureth for a while; for when tribulation or persecution ariseth because of the word, by and by he is offended. He also that received seed among the thorns, is he that heareth the word, and the care of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becometh unfruitful. If thou have not taken Heaven for thy part, and art not resolved to let go all that would keep thee from it, I must say to thy Conscience, as Christ to one of thy Predecessors, Luke 18. 22. Yet l • ckest thou one thing, and such a One, as thou wilt find of flat necessity to thy salvation. And it's likely some trying time even in this life, will detect thine Hypocrisy, and make thee, Go away sorrowful, for thy riches sake: as he ver. 23. If godliness with contentment seem not sufficient gain to thee, thou wilt make thy Gain go instead of Godliness, that is, thy Gain shall be next thy heart, and have the precedency which Godliness should have, and thy gain shall choose thee thy Religion, and over-rule thy Conscience, and sway thy life.

O Sirs, take warning by the Apostates, and temporizing hypocrites, that have looked behind them, and with Demas, for the world forsaken their duty, and are set up by Justice as Pillars of Salt, for your warning and remembrance. And as ever you would make sure work in turning to God, and escape the too late repentance of the hypocrite, see that you go to the root, and resign the world to the will of God, and reckon what it may cost you to be followers of Christ, and look not after any portion, but the favor of God and life eternal, and see that there be no secret reserve in your hearts for your worldly interest or prosperity, and think not of halfing it between God and the world, nor making your Religion complyant with the desires and interest of the flesh. Take God as enough for you, yea, as All, or else you take him not as your God.

Direction 18. IF you would prove true Converts, come over to God as your Father and felicity, with desire and delight, and close with Christ, as your only Savior with thankfulness and joy, and set upon the way of Godliness with pleasure and alacrity, as your exceeding privilege, and the only way of profit, honor and content: and do it not as against your wills, as those that had rather do otherwise if they durst, and account the service of God an unsuitable and unpleasant thing.

§. 1. You are never truly changed, till your Hearts be changed: And the Heart is not changed till the Will or Love be changed. Fear is not the man: but usually is mixed with unwillingness and dislike, and so is contrary to that which is indeed the Man. Though fear may do much for you, it will not do enough: It is oft more sensible than Love even in the best, as being more passionate and violent: but yet there is no more Acceptableness in all, than there is Will or Love. God sent not Soldiers, or Inquisitors or Persecutors to convert the world by working upon their Fear, and driving them upon that which they take to be a mischief to them: But he sent poor Preachers that had no matter of worldly fears or hopes to move their auditors with▪ but had authority from Christ to offer them eternal life; and who were to convert the world by proposing to them the best and most desirable condition, and showing them where is the true felicity, and proving the certainty and excellency of it to them, and working upon their Love, Desire and Hope: God will not be your God against your wills, while you esteem him as the Devil, that is only terrible and hurtful to you, and take his service for a slavery, and had rather be from him, and serve the world and the flesh, if it were not for fear of being damned. He will be feared as Great, and Holy, and Just: but he will also be Loved as Good, and Holy, and Merciful, and every way suited to be the felicity and Rest of souls. If you take not God to be better than the Creature, (and better to you ) and Heaven to be better for you than earth, and Holiness than Sin, you are not converted: But if you do, then show it by your willingness, alacrity and delight. Serve him with gladness and cheerfulness of heart, as one that hath found the way of life, and never had cause of gladness until now. If you see your servant do all his work with groans, and tears, and lamentations, you will not think he is well pleased with his Master and his work. Come to God willingly with your hearts, or you come not to him indeed at all. You must either make him and his service your delight, or at least your Desire; as apprehending him most fit to be your delight, so far as you enjoy him.

Direction 19. REmember still that Conversion, is the turning from your carnal selves to God, and therefore that it engageth you in a perpetual opposition to your own corrupt Conceits and Wills, to mortify and annihilate them, and captivate them wholly to the holy Word and Will of God.

§. 1. Think not that your Conversion dispatcheth all that is to be done in order to your salvation. No, it is but the beginning of your work (that is, of your delight and happiness): You are but engaged by it, to that which must be performed throughout all your lives: It entereth you into the right way; not to sit down there, but to go on till you come to the desired end. It entereth you into Christ's Army, that afterwards you may there win the Crown of life: And the great Enemy that you engage against, is yourselves. There will still be a Law in your members, rebelling against the Law that the Holy Ghost hath put into your minds: Your Own Conceits and your Own Wills are the great Rebels against Christ, and enemies of your sanctification. Therefore it must be your resolved daily work to mortify them, and bring them clean over to the Mind and Will of God which is their Rule and End. If you feel any conceits arising in you that are contrary to the Scripture, and quarrel with the Word of God, suppress them as rebellious, and give them not liberty to cavil with your Maker, and malepertly dispute with your Governor and Judge; but silence it, and force it reverently to submit: If you feel any Will in you contrary to your Creator's Will, and that there is something which you would have or do, which God is against, and hath forbid you, remember now how great a part of your work it is, to fly for help to the Spirit of Grace, and to destroy all such rebellious desires: Think it not enough, that you can bear the denial of those desires; but presently destroy the desires themselves. For if you let alone the desires, they may at last lay hold upon their prey, before you are aware: Or if you should be guilty of nothing but the Desires themselves, it is no small iniquity; being the corruption of the Heart, and the Rebellion and Adultery of the principal faculty, which should be kept loyal and chaste to God. The crossness of thy Will to the Will of God, is the sum of all the impiety and evil of the soul: And the subjection and conformity of thy Will to his, is the Heart of the New Creature, and of thy Rectitude and Sanctification. Favor not therefore any self-conceitedness or self-willedness, nor any rebelliousness against the Mind and Will of God, anymore than you would bear with the dis-jointing of your bones, which will be little for your ease or use, till they are reduced to their proper place.

Direction 20. LAstly, Be sure that you renounce all conceit of self-sufficiency or merit in anything you do, and wholly rely on the Lord Jesus Christ, as your Head, and Life, and Savior, and Intercessor with the Father.

§. 1. Remember that without him you can do nothing, John 15. 5. Nor can anything you do be acceptable to God, any other way than in him, the beloved Son, in whom he is well pleased. As your persons had never been accepted but in him, no more can any of your services: All your repentings, if you had wept out your eyes for sin, would not have satisfied the Justice of God, nor procured you pardon and justification without the satisfaction and merit of Christ. If he had not first taken away the sins of the world, and reconciled them so far to God, as to procure and tender them the pardon and salvation contained in his Covenant, there had been no place for your Repentance, nor faith, nor prayers, nor endeavors, as to any hope of your salvation. Your Believing would not have saved you, nor indeed had any justifying object, if he had not purchased you the promise and gift of pardon and salvation to all Believers.

§. 2. Objection. But perhaps you will say, That if we had Loved God, without a Savior, we should have been saved: for God cannot hate and damn those that Love him: To which I answer, You could not have Loved God as God, without a Savior: To have Loved him as the giver of your worldly prosperity, with a Love subordinate to the Love of sin and your carnal selves, and to Love him as one that you imagine so unholy and unjust, as to give you leave to sin against him, and prefer every Vanity before him, this is not to Love God, but to Love an Image of your own fantasie; nor will it at all procure your salvation. But to Love him as your God and Happiness, with a superlative Love, you could never have done without a Savior. For 1. Objectively; God being not your Reconciled Father, but your enemy, engaged in Justice to damn you forever, you could not Love him as thus related to you, because he could not seem amiable to you: and therefore the damned hate him as their destroyer, as the Thief or Murderer hates the Judge. 2. And as to the Efficiency; your blinded minds, and depraved wills could never have been restored so far to their rectitude, as to have Loved God as God, without the teaching of Christ, and the renewing sanctifying work of his Spirit. And without a Savior you could never have expected this gift of the Holy Ghost. So that your supposition itself is groundless.

§. 3. Indeed Conversion is your implanting into Christ, and your uniting to him, and marriage with him, that he may be your life, and help, and hope. He is the way, the truth and the life: and no man cometh to the Father, but by him. John 14. 6. God hath given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son: He that hath the Son, hath life; and he that hath not the Son, hath not life. 1 John 5. 11, 12. He is the Vine, and we are the branches: As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the Vine, so neither can we, except we abide in him: He that abideth not in Christ, is cast forth as a branch and withered, to be burned: John 15. 4, 5, 6. All your life and help is in him, and from him: Without Christ you cannot Believe in the Father, as in one that will show you any saving Mercy, but only as the Devils that believe him Just, and tremble at his Justice; without Christ you cannot Love God, nor have any lively apprehensions of his Love. Without Christ you can have no Hope of Heaven, and therefore no endeavors for it. Without him you cannot come near to God in prayer, as having no confidence, because no admittance, acceptance or hope. Without him how terrible are the thoughts of death, which in him we may see as a conquered thing: and when we remember that he was dead and is now alive, and the Lord of life, and hath the Keys of Death and Hell, with what boldness may we lay down this flesh, and suffer death to undress our souls? It is only in Christ that we can comfortably think of the world to come; when we remember that he must be our Judge, and that in our Nature glorified he is now in the Highest, Lord of all; and that he is preparing a place for us, and will come again to take us to himself, that where he is, there we may be also, John 14. 3. Alas, without Christ, we know not how to live an hour; nor can have hope or peace in anything we have or do; nor look with comfort either upward or downward, to God or the Creature, nor think without terrors of our sins, of God, or of the life to come. Resolve therefore that as true Converts, you are wholly to Live upon Jesus Christ, and to do all that you do by his Spirit and strength; and to expect all your acceptance with God upon his account: when other men are reputed Philosophers or Wise, for some unsatisfactory knowledge of these transitory things, do you desire to know nothing but a crucified and glorified Christ: study him, and take him (objectively) for your Wisdom: When other men have confidence in the flesh, and in their show of Wisdom in Will-worship and Humility, after the Commandments and Doctrines of men, (Col. 2. 20, 21, 22, 23.) and would establish their own righteousness, do you rejoice in Christ your Righteousness: And set continually before your eyes, his Doctrine and Example as your Rule: Look still to Jesus the Author and finisher of you faith, who contemned all the Glory of the world, and trampled upon its Vanity, and subjected himself to a life of suffering, and made himself of no reputation, but for the joy that was set before him, endured the Cross, despising the shame, and underwent the contradiction of sinners against himself. Live so, that you may truly say as Paul, Gal. 2. 20. I am crucified with Christ: Nevertheless I live: yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.

§. 4. HAving given you these Directions, I most earnestly beseech you to peruse and practice them, that my labor may not rise up as a witness against you, which I intend for your Conversion and Salvation: Think on it, Whether this be an Unreasonable course, or an unpleasant life, or a thing unnecessary? and what is Reasonable, necessary and pleasant, if this be not?

And if you meet with any of those distracted sinners that would deride you from Christ and your salvation, and say, this is the way to make men mad, or, this is more ado than needs; I will not stand here to manifest their bruitishness and wickedness, having largely done it already, in my Book called, A Saint or a Bruite, and Now or Never, and in the third Part of the Saints Rest: But only I desire thee as a full defensative against all the pratings of the Enemies of a holy Heavenly life, to take good notice but of these three things.

§. 5. 1. Mark well the language of the holy Scriptures, and see whether it speak not contrary to these men: And bethink thee, whether God or they be wiser, and whether God or they must be thy Judge?

§. 6. 2. Mark whether these men do not change their minds, and turn their tongues when they come to die? Or think whether they will not change their minds, when death hath sent them into that world where there is none of these deceits? And think whether thou shouldst be moved with that man's words, that will shortly change his mind himself, and wish he had never spoke such words?

§. 7. 3. Observe well whether their own Profession do not condemn them: and whether the very thing that they hate the godly for, be not that they are serious in Practising that which these malignants themselves profess as their Religion? And are they not then notorious Hypocrites? To profess to believe in God, and yet scorn at those that diligently seek him (Heb. 11. 6.) To profess faith in Christ, and hate those that obey him: To profess to believe in the Holy Ghost as the Sanctifier, and yet hate and scorn his sanctifying work. To profess to believe the day of Judgment and everlasting torment of the ungodly, and yet to deride those that endeavor to escape it: To profess to believe that Heaven is prepared for the Godly, and yet scorn at those that make it the chief business of their lives to attain it: To profess to take the holy Scriptures for God's Word and Law, and yet to scorn those that obey it: To pray after each of the Ten Commandments [ Lord have mercy upon us, and incline our hearts to keep this Law ] and yet to hate all those that desire and endeavor to keep them: What impudent hypocrisy is joined with this malignity? Mark whether the greatest diligence of the most godly be not justified by the formal profession of those very men that hate and scorn them? The difference between them is, that the Godly Profess Christianity in good earnest, and when they say what they believe, they believe as they say: But the ungodly customarily and for company take on them to be Christians when they are not, and by their own mouths condemn themselves, and hate and oppose the serious Practice of that which they say they do themselves believe.

PART. II. The Temptations whereby the Devil hindereth men's Conversion: with the proper Remedies against them.

§. 1. THE Most Holy and Righteous Governor of the world, hath so restrained Satan and all our enemies, and so far given us Free-will, that no man can be forced to sin against his will: It is not sin if it be not ( positively or privatively ) voluntary. All our enemies in Hell or Earth cannot make us miserable without ourselves; nor keep a sinner from true Conversion, and Salvation, if he do it not himself; no nor compel him to one sinful thought, or word, or deed, or omission, but by tempting and enticing him to be willing: All that are Graceless, are willfully Graceless. None go to Hell, but those that chose the way to Hell, and would not be persuaded out of it: None miss of Heaven, but those that did set so light by it, as to prefer the world and sin before it, and refused the holy way that leadeth to it. And surely man that naturally loveth himself, would never take so mad a course, if his reason were not laid asleep, and his understanding were not woefully deluded: And this is the business of the Tempter, who doth not drag men to sin by violence, but draw and entice them by Temptations: I shall therefore take it for the next part of my work, to open these Temptations, and tell you the Remedies.

§. 2. Tempt. 1. The first endeavor of the Tempter, is in General to keep the sinner asleep in sin: so that • e shall be as a dead man, that hath no use of any of his faculties: that hath eyes and seeth not, and ears but heareth not, and a heart that understandeth not, nor feeleth anything that concerneth his peace: The light that shineth upon a man asleep, is of no use to him: His work lieth undone: His friends, and wealth, and greatest concernments are all forgotten by him, as if there were no such things or persons in the world: You may say what you will against him, or do what you will against him, and he can do nothing in his own defense. This is the case that the Devil most laboreth to keep the world in; even in so dead a sleep, that their Reason, and their Wills, their fear, and hope, and all their powers shall be of no use to them: That when they hear a Preacher, or read the Scripture or good Books, or see the holy examples of the godly, yea, when they see the Grave, and know where they must shortly lie, and know that their souls must stay here but a little while, yet they shall hear, and see, and know all this, as men asleep, that mind it not, as if it concerned not them at all; never once soberly Considering and laying it to heart.

§. 3. Direct. 1. For the Remedy against this deadly sin, 1. Take heed of sleepy opinions, or Doctrines and conceits which tend to the Lethargy of Security: 2. Sit not still, but be up and doing: Stirring tends to shake off drowziness. 3. Come into the light: Live under an awakening Minister and in wakening company, that will not sleep with you; nor easily let you sleep: Agree with them to deal faithfully with you, and promise them to take it thankfully. 4. And meditate oft on wakening considerations. Think whether a sleepy soul beseem one in thy dangerous condition. Canst thou sleep with such a load of sin upon thy soul? Canst thou sleep under the thundering threatenings of God? and the Curse of his Law? with so many wounds in thy Conscience, and Ulcers in thy soul? If thy body were sick, or in the case of Job, yea, if thou hadst but an aking Tooth, it would not let thee sleep: And is not the guilt of sin, a thing more grievous? If Thorns, or Toads and Adders were in thy Bed, they would keep the waking? And how much more odious and dangerous a thing is sin? If thy body want but meat, or drink, or covering, it will break thy sleep: And is it nothing for thy soul to be destitute of Christ and Grace? A condemned man will be easily kept awake: And if thou be unregenerate, thou art already condemned, John 3. 18. 3. 5. Thou sleepest in Irons: in the captivity of the Devil: among the walking judgments of God: in a life that is still expecting an end: in a Boat that is swiftly carried to eternity: just at the entrance of another world; and that world will be Hell, if Grace awake thee not: Thou art going to see the face of God: to see the world of Angels or Devils, and to be a companion with one of them forever: And is this a place or case to sleep in? Is thy Bed so soft? thy dwelling so safe? God standeth over thee man; and dost thou sleep! Christ is coming, and death is coming, and judgment coming, and dost thou sleep? Didst thou never read of the foolish Virgins, that slept out their time, and knocked and cried in vain when it was too late? Matth. 25. 5. Thou mightest wiselyer sleep on the Pinnacle of a Steeple in a Storm, than have a soul asleep in so dangerous a case as thou art in. The Devil is awake, and is rocking thy Cradle! How busy is he to keep off Ministers, or Conscience, or any that would awake thee? None of thy enemies are asleep; and yet wilt thou sleep, in the thickest of thy foes? Is the battle a sleeping time, or thy race a sleeping time, when Heaven or Hell must be the End? While he can keep thee asleep, the Devil can do almost what he li • t with thee. He knows that thou hast now no use of thy eyes, or understanding, or power to resist him: The Learnedst Doctor in his sleep is as unlearned actually as an Ideot, and will dispute no better than an unlearned man: This makes many learned men to be ungodly: they are asleep in sin. The Devil could never have made such a drudge of thee, to do his work against Christ and thy soul, if thou hadst been awake. Thou wouldst never have followed his whistle to the Ale-house, the Play-house, the Gaming-house, and to other sins, if thou hadst been in thy wits and well awake. Read Prov. 7. 23. 24. I cannot believe that thou longest to be damned, or so hatest thyself, as to have done as thou hast done, to have a lived Godless, a Graceless, a Prayerless, and yet a merry careless life, if thy eyes had been opened, and thou hadst known and feelingly known, that this was the way to Hell. Nature itself will hardly go to Hell awake. But it's easy to abuse a man that is asleep: Thou hast Reason; but didst thou ever awake it to one hours serious Consideration, of thy endless state and present case? O dreadful judgment to be given over to the Spirit of slumber! Rom. 11. 8. Is it not high time now to awake out of sleep? Rom. 13. 11. When the light is arisen and shines about thee! When others that care for their souls, are busily at work! When thou hast slept out so much precious time already! Many a mercy, and perhaps some Ministers, have been as Candles burnt out to light thee while thou hast slept! How o • t hast thou been called already, How long wilt thou sleep, O sluggard? Prov. 6. 9. 10. Yet thou hast thundering calls and allarums to awake thee. God calls, and Ministers call! Mercies call, and judgments call! and yet wilt thou not awake? The voice of the Lord is powerful: full of Majesty; breaketh the Cedars; shaketh the Wilderness: and yet cannot it awake thee? Thou wilt not sleep about far smaller matters! at meat, or drink, or in common talk, or Market: But O how much greater business hast thou to keep thee awake? Thou hast yet an unholy soul to be renewed; an ungodly life to be reformed! an offended God to be reconciled to; and many thousand sins to be forgiven! Thou hast death and judgment to prepare for: thou hast Heaven to win, and Hell to scape! Thou hast many a needful Truth to learn, and many a holy duty to perform; and yet dost thou think it time to sleep? Paul that had less need than thou, did watch, and pray, and labor day and night, Acts 20. 31. 1 Thess. 3. 10. O that thou knewest how much better it is to be awake. While thou sleepest, thou losest the benefit of the Light, and all the mercies that attend thee: The Sun is but as a clod to a man asleep: The world is as no world to him: The beauty of Heaven and Earth are nothing to him: Princes, friends and all things are forgotten by him! So doth thy sleep in sin make nothing of health, and patience, time and help, Ministers, Books and daily warnings: O what a day hast thou for everlasting, if thou hadst but a heart to use it! What a price hast thou in thine hand? Prov. 10. 5. Sleep not out thy day, thy harvest time, thy tide time: They that sleep, sleep in the night, 1 Thess. 5. 7. Awake and Christ will give thee light, Rom. 13. 12. Ephes. 5. 14. Awake to righteousness, and sin not, 1 Cor. 15. 34. O when thou seest the Light of Christ, what a wonder will it possess thee with, at the things which thou now forgettest? What joy will it fill thee with? and with what pity to the sleepy world?—But if thou wilt needs sleep on, be it known to thee, sinner, it shall not be long. If thou wilt wake no sooner, death and vengeance will awake thee: Thou wilt wake when thou seest the other world, and seest the things which thou wouldst not believe, and comest before thy dreadful Judge! Thy damnation slumbereth not, 2 Pet. 2. 3. There are no sleepy souls in Heaven or Hell, all are awake there: and the day that hath awakened so many, shall waken thee: Watch then if thou love thy soul, lest thy Lord come suddenly and find thee sleeping, Mark 13. 34, 35, 36, 37. What I say to one, I say to all, Watch.

§. 4. Tempt. 2. If Satan cannot keep the soul in a sleepy, careless, inconsiderate forgetfulness, he would make the unregenerate soul believe that there is no such thing as Regenerating Grace; but that it is a fancied thing, which no man hath experience of, and he saith as Nicodemus, How can these things be? He thinks that natural conscience is enough.

§. 5. Direct. 2. But this may be easily refuted by observing, that Holiness is but the very Health and rectitude of the soul; and is no otherwise supernatural, than as Health to him that is born a Leper. It is the rectitude of Nature, or its disposition to the use and end that it was made for. Though Grace be called supernatural, 1. Because it is not born with us; and 2. Corrupted Nature is against it; 3. And the End of it is the God of Nature, who is above Nature: 4. And the Revelation and other means are supernatural (as Christ's incarnation, resurrection, &c. ) Yet both Nature, and Scripture and experience tell you, that man is made for another life, and for such works which he is utterly unfit for, till Grace have changed and renewed him, as it doth by many before your eyes.

§. 6. Tempt. 3. But, saith the Tempter, if supernatural grace be necessary, yet it may be born in you: Infants have no sin; Christ saith, Of such is the Kingdom of God: Abraham is your Father, yea, God; John 8. 39. 41. You are born of Christian Parents.

§. 7. Direct. 3. See the full proof of Original Sin in all Infants, in my Treatise of the Divine Life, Part. 1. Chap. 11. & 12. Grace may indeed be put betimes into Nature, but comes not by nature. Except you be born again, you cannot enter into the Kingdom of God, John 3. 3. 5. If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are past away: behold all things are become new, 2 Cor. 5. 17. But how vain is it for him to boast that he was born holy, who finds himself at the present unholy. Shew that you have a holy heavenly heart and life, and then you are happy when ever it was wrought.

§. 8. Tempt. 4. But, saith the Tempter, Baptism is the laver of Regeneration: You are Baptized, and therefore you are Regenerated. The Ancients taught that all sins were washed away in Baptism, and Grace conferred.

§. 9. Direct. 4. Answ. The Ancients by Baptism meant the Internal and External acts conjunct: the souls delivering up itself to God in the Covenant, and sealing it by Baptism: And so it includeth Conversion, and true Repentance, and faith: And all that are thus baptized are pardoned, justified and holy: But they that have only Sacramental Regeneration, or the external Ordinance, are not for that in a state of life: For Christ expressly saith, that except you are born of the Spirit as well as Water, you cannot enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, John 3. 5, 6. And Peter told Simon Magus after he was baptized, that he was yet in the gall of bitterness and bond of iniquity, Acts 8. 13. It is not the putting away the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience, 1 Pet. 3. 21. Christ cleanseth his Church by the washing of water by the word, Eph. 5. 26. But if you had been cleansed in Baptism, if at present you are unclean, and unholy, can you be saved so?

§▪ 10. Temp. 5. When this faileth, the Tempter would persuade them, that Godliness is nothing but a matter of mere Opinion or belief: to believe all the Articles of the faith, and to be no Papist nor Heretic, but of the true Religion, and to be confident of God's mercy through Christ: For he that believeth shall be saved. Mar. 16. 16.

§. 11. Direct. 5. To this you must answer, that it will not save a man that his Religion is true, unless •• be true to it! Read James 2. against such a dead faith. Saving faith is the hearty entertainment of Christ as our Lord and Savior, and the delivering up the soul to him to be sanctified and ruled, as well as pardoned. Knowledge puffeth up, but charity edifieth. He that knoweth his Masters will and d • th it not, shall be beaten with many stripes, Luke 12. 47. It's sad that men should think to be saved • y that which will condemn them! by being of a right opinion, and a wrong conversation; by believing their duty, instead of d • ing it; and then presuming that Christ forgiveth them, and that their state i • good: Opinion and presumption are not faith.

§. 12. Tempt. 6. But, saith the Tempter, Holiness is the excellency of holy persons: but vulgar unlearned people may be saved, without such high matters which are above them.

§. 13. Direct. 6. But God telleth you, that without Holiness none shall see him, Heb. 12. 14. The unlearned may be saved, but the ungodly cannot, Psal. 1. 6. Holiness is to the soul, as life to the body: He that hath it not, is dead; though all have not the same degree of health: Sin is sin, and hated of God in learned and unlearned: All men have souls that need regenerating at first: And as all bodies that live, must live on the earth, by the Air, and Food, &c. • o all souls that live, do live upon the s 〈…〉 God, and Christ, and Heaven, by the same Word and Spirit; and all this may be had by the unlearned.

§. 14. Tempt. 7. But, saith the Tempter, God is not so unmerciful as to damn all that are not holy: This is but talk to keep men in awe; and not to be believed.

§. 15. Direct. 7. But if God's threatenings be necessary to keep men in awe, then are they necessary to be executed. For God needs not awe men by a lie. He best knows to whom he will be merciful, and how far! Did you never read, Isa. 27. 11. It is a people of no understanding: therefore he that was made them will not have mercy on them, and he that formed them, will show them no favor. And Psal. 59. 5. Be not merciful to any wicked transgressor. Is he not just, as well as merciful? Exod. 34. 6, 7. Do you not see that men are sick, and pained, and die for all that God is merciful? And do not Merciful Judges condemn Malefactors? Are not Angels made Devils by sin, for all that God is merciful? The Devil knoweth this to his sorrow. And if God spared not the Angels that sinned, but cast them down to Hell —2 Pet. 2. 4. will he be unjust for you?

§. 16. Tempt. 8. But Christ died for all: and God will not punish him and you both, for the same fault.

§. 17. Direct. 8. Christ died so far for all that have the Gospel, as to procure and seal them a free and general pardon of all their sins, if they will repent and take him for their Savior, and so to bring salvation to their choice. But will this save the ungodly obstinate refusers? Christ died to sanctify, as well as to forgive, Eph. 5. 27. and to purify to himself a peculiar people zealous of good works. Tit. 2. 14. and to destroy the works of the Devil, 1 John 3. 8. and to bring all men under his Dominion and Government, Rom. 14. 9. Luke 19. 27. If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, the same is none of his, Rom. 8 9.

§. 18. Tempt. 9. No man can be certain of his salvation: but all must hope well: and to raise d • ubts in men's hearts, whether they shall be saved or no, will not help them, but puzzle them and cast them into despair.

§. 19. Direct. 9. But is there so little difference between a child of God and of the Devil, and between the way to Heaven and the way to Hell, that they cannot be known asunder? Hath not Christ taught us plainly how to know them? Psal. 1. & 15. 1 John. 3. and bid us give diligence to make our calling and election sure? 2 Pet. 1. 10. If all men must hope that they shall be saved, then most must hope for that, which they shall never have: But it is no hope of God's making, which deceiveth men. Should so great a matter as our everlasting joy or misery, be cast out of our Care, and ventured so regardlesly in the dark? When it is it that we have life, and time, and all for, to make it sure? And what hurt can it do you, to find out the truth of your own condition? If you are indeed unregenerate and unholy, discover it now in time, and you have time to be recovered: You must despair of being saved without conversion: But that preventeth absolute final despair. Whereas if you find not out your case till time is past, then hope is past, and the Devil hath you in endless desperation, where he would.

§. 20. Tempt. 10. If this prevail not, the Devil will seek to carry it by noise instead of reason, and will seek to keep you in jovial, merry, voluptuous company, that shall plead by Pots, and Plays, and pleasures, and shall daily make a jest of Godliness, and speak of the godly with scorn, as a company of Fanatick Hypocrites.

§. 21. Direct. 10. But consider, that this is but the rage of fools; that speak of what they never understood? Did they ever try the way they speak against. Are they to be believed before God himself? Will they not • at their words at last themselves? Will their merry lives last always? Do they die as merrily as they live? and bring off themselves as well as they promised to bring off you? He that will be cheated of his salvation, and forsake his God, for the ranting scorns of a distracted sinner, is worthy to be damned.

§. 22. Tempt. 11. Next be telleth them, that a godly life is so hard and tedious, that if they should begin, they should never endure to hold on; and therefore it is in vain to try it.

§. 23. Direct. 11. But this pretence is compounded of wickedness and madness. What but a wicked heart can make it so hard a thing to live in the Love of God and holiness, and in the hopes and seeking of eternal life? Why should not this be a sweeter and pleasanter life, than drinking, and roaring, and gaming, and fooling away time in vain; or than the enjoying of all the delights of the flesh? There's nothing but a sick distempered heart against it, that nauseateth that which in itself is most delightful. When Grace hath changed your hearts, it will be easy. Do you not see that others can hold on in it? and would not be as they were for all the world? And why may not you? God will help you: It is the Office of Christ and the Spirit to help you: Your encouragements are innumerable. The hardness is most at first: It is the longer the easier. But what if it were hard? Is it not necessary? Is Hell easier, and to be preferred before it? And will not Heaven pay for all your cost and labor? Will you sit down in desperation, and resolve to let your salvation go, upon such silly bug-bear words as these?

§. 24. Tempt. 12. Next the Devils endeavor will be, to find them so much employment with worldly cares, or hopes, or business, that they shall find no leisure to be serious about the saving of their souls?

§. 25. Direct. 12. But this is a snare, though frequently prevalent, yet so irrational, and against so many warnings and witnesses, even of all men in the world either first or last, at conversion, or at death, that he who after all this, will neglect his God and his salvation, because he hath worldly things to mind, is worthy to be turned over to his choice, and have no better help or portion in the hour of his necessity and distress. Of this sin I have spoken afterward Chap. 4. Part. 6.

§. 26. Tempt. 13. Lest the soul should be converted, the Devil will do all that he can to keep you from the acquaintance and company of those whose holiness and instructions might convince and strengthen you; and especially from a lively convincing Minister, and to cast you under some dead hearted Minister and Society.

§. 27. Direct. 13. Therefore, if it be possible, though it be to your loss or inconvenience in the world, live under a searching heavenly Teacher, and in the company of them that are resolved for Heaven! It is a dead heart indeed that feeleth not the need of such assistance, and is not the better for it when they have it. If ever you be fair for Heaven, and like to be converted, it will be among such helps as these.

§. 28. Tempt. 14. But one of the strongest Temptations of Satan, is by making their sin exceeding pleasant to them; for the gain, or honor, or fleshly satisfaction; and so increasing the violence of their sensual appetite and lust, and making them so much in Love with their sin, that they cannot leave it: Like the thirst of a man in a burning Feavor, which makes him cry for cold drink, though it would kill him, the fury of the appetite conquering reason. So we see many drunkards, fornicators, worldlings, that are so deeply in Love with their sin, that come on it what will, they will have it, though they have Hell with it.

§. 29. Direct. 14. Against this Temptation I desire you to read what I have said after Chap. 4. Part. 7. & Chap. 3. Direct. 6. & 8. O that poor sinners knew what it is that they so much Love! Is the pleasing of the flesh so sweet a thing to you? and are you so indifferent to God and holy things? Are these less amiable? Do you foresee what both will be at last? Will your sin seem better than Christ, and Grace, and Heaven, when you are dying? O be not so in Love with damning folly, and the pleasure of a Beast? as for it to despise the heavenly wisdom and delights!

§. 30. Tempt. 15. Another great Temptation is, the prosperity of the wicked in this life; and the reproach and suffering which usually falls upon the godly: If God did strike every notorious sinner dead in the place, as soon as he had sinned, or struck him blind, or dumb, or lame, or inflicted presently some such judgment, then many would fear him, and forbear their sin: But when they see no men prosper so much as the most ungodly, and that they are the persecutors of the holy seed, and that sentence against an evil work is not speedily executed, then are their hearts set in them to do evil, Eccles. 8. 11.

§. 31. Direct. 15. But alas, how short is the prosperity of the wicked! Read Psal. 73. & 37. Delay is no forgiveness: They stay but till the Assize: And will that tempt you to do as they? How unthankfully do sinners deal with with God! If he should kill you and plague you, that would not please you: And yet if he forbear you, you are emboldened by it in your sin. Thus his patience is turned against him: But the stroke will be the heavier when it falls! Dost thou think those men will always flourish! Will they always domineer and revel! Will they always dwell in the houses where they now dwell, and possess those Lands, and be honored and served as now they are! O how quickly and how dreadfully will the case be changed with them! O could you but foresee now what faces they will have, and what heavy hearts, and with what bitter exclamations they will at last cry out against themselves, for all their folly, and wish that they had never been deceived by prosperity; but rather had the portion of a Lozarus! If you saw how they are but fatted for the slaughter, and in what a dolorous misery their wealth, and sport, and honors will leave them, you would lament their case, and think so great a destruction were soon enough, and not desire to be partners in their lot!

§. 32. Tempt. 16. Another temptation is, their own prosperity: They think God when he prospereth them, is not so angry with them as Preachers tell them: And it is a very hard thing in health and prosperity to lay to heart either sin or threatenings, and to have such serious lively thoughts of the life to come, as men that are wakened by adversity have: and specially men that are familiar with death. Prosperity is the greatest temptation to security, and delaying repentance, and putting off preparation for eternity. Overcome prosperity, and you overcome your greatest snare.

§. 33. Direct. 16. Go into the Sanctuary, yea, go into the Church-yard, and see the End: And judge by those Skulls, and Bones, and dust, if you cannot judge by the fore- •••• ings of God, what prosperity is! Judge by the experience of all the world! Doth it not leave them •••• in sorrow at last? Woe to the man that hath his portion in this life. O miserable health, and wealth, and honor, which procureth the death, and shame, and utter destruction of the soul! Was not he in as prosperous a case as you, Luke 16. that quickly cried out in vain, for a drop of water to cool his Tongue? There is none of you so senseless as not to know that you must die? And must you die? Must you certainly die? and shall that day be no better prepared for? Shall present prosperity make you forget it, and live as if you must live here forever? Do you make so great difference between that which is, and that which will be? as to make as great a matter of it as others, when it comes; and to make no more of it▪ when it is but coming? O man, what is an inch of hasty time! How quickly is it gone? Thou art going hence apace, and almost gone! Doth God give thee the mercy of a few days or years of health to make all thy preparations in for eternity, and doth this mercy turn to thy deceit, and dost thou turn it so much contrary to the ends for which it was given thee? Wilt thou surfeit on Mercy, and destroy thy soul with it? Sense feeleth and perceiveth what now is, but thou hast Reason to foresee what will be? Wilt thou play in Harvest, and forget the Winter?

§. 34. Tempt. 17. Another great Temptation to hinder Conversion, is the example and countenance of Great Ones that are ungodly▪ when Landlords and men in power are sensual, and enemies to a holy life, and speak reproachfully of it, their inferiors by the reverence which they bear to worldly wealth and greatness, are easily drawn to say as they: Also, when men reputed Learned and Wise, are of another mind; and especially when subtle enemies speak that reproach against it, which they cannot answer.

§. 35. Direct. 17. To this I spake in the end of the first Part of this Chapter. No man is so great and wise as God. See whether he say as they do in his word! The greatest that provoke him can no more save themselves from his vengeance, than the poorest beggars! What work made he with a Phara • h! and got himself a name by his hard heartedness and impenitency? He can send Worms to eat an arrogant Herod, when the people cry him up as a God! Where are now the Caesar's and Alexanders of the world: The Rulers and Pharisees believed not in Christ; John 7. 48. Wilt not thou therefore believe in him? The Governor of the Country condemned him to die; and wilt thou condemn him? The Kings of the earth set themselves, and the Rulers take counsel together against the Lord and his anointed, saying, let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us, Psal. 2. 2, 3. Wilt thou therefore join in the Conspiracy? When he that sitteth in the Heavens shall laugh, the Lord shall have them in derision—He will break them with an iron rod, and dash them in pieces like a Potters Vessel, unless they be wise, and kiss the Son, and serve the Lord with fear before his wrath be kindled and they perish, Psal. 2. 4, 9, 10, 11, 12. If thy Landlord or Great ones shall be thy God, and be honored and obeyed before God and against him, trust to them, and call on them in the hour of thy distress, and take such a salvation as they can give thee: Teach not God what choice to make, and whom to reveal his mysteries to: He chooseth not always the Learned Scribe, nor the mighty man: Christ himself saith, Matth. 11. 25. I thank thee O Father, Lord of Heaven and Earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them to babes: Even so Father; for so it seemed good in thy sight! If this reason satisfy you not, follow them, and speed as they. If they are Greater and Wiser than God, let them be your God's, 1 Cor. 1. 26. You see your calling how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called▪ but God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things that are mighty; and base things of the world, and things that are despised hath God chosen, and things that are not, to bring to naught things that are. It is another kind of Greatness, Honor and Wisdom which God bestoweth on the poorest Saints, than the world can give; Worldlings will shortly be aweary of their portion: In your Baptism you renounced the world with its pomps and vanity: and now do you defy, what you then defied?

§. 36. Temp. 18. Another Temptation is to draw on the sinner into such a custom in sin, and long neglect of the means of his Recovery, till his Heart is utterly Hardened.

§. 37. Direct. 18. Against this read after Chap. 4. Part. 2. against Hardness of Heart.

§, 38. Temp. 19. Another Temptation is, to Delay Repentance, and purpose to do it hereafter.

§. 39. Direct. 19. Of this I entreat you to read the many Reasons which I have given to shame and waken delayers, in my Book of Directions for a sound Conversion.

§. 40. Tempt. 20. The worst of all is, to tempt them to flat unbelief of Scripture and the life to come.

§. 41. Direct. 20. Against this read here Chap. 3. Dir. 1. Chap. 4. Part. 1. and my Treatise against Infidelity.

§. 42. Temp. 21. If they will needs looks after Grace, he will do all he can to deceive them with counterfeits, and make them take a seeming half conversion for a saving change.

§. 43. Direct. 21. Of this read my Directions for sound Conversion, and the Formal Hypocrite, and Saints Rest, Part. 3. c. 10.

§. 44. Temp. 22. If he cannot make them flat Infidels, he will tempt them to question and contradict the sense of all those Texts of Scripture which are used to convince them, and all▪ those doctrines which grate most upon their galled consciences; as of the Necessity of Regeneration, the fewness of them that are saved, the difficulty of salvation, the torments of Hell, the necessity of mortification, and the sinfulness of all particular sins: They will hearken what Cavillers can say for any sin, and against any part of Godliness; and with this they willfully delude themselves.

§. 45. Direct. 22. But if men are resolved to join with the Devil, and shut their eyes, and • avil against all that God speaketh to them to prevent their misery, and know not, because they will not know, what remedy is left, or who can save men against their wills? This is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men love darkness rather than light, because their deeds are evil. He that doth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. John 3. 19, 20. In Scripture, some things are hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable, wrest to their own destruction, 2 Pet. 3. 16. Of particulars read the end of my Treatise of Conversion.

§. 46. Temp. 23. Yea, Satan will do his worst to make them Heretics, and teach them some doctrine of licentiousness suitable is their lusts: Its hard being wicked still against Conscience in the open light: This is kicking against the pricks: too smarting work to be easily born: Therefore the Devil will make them a Religion which shall please them, and do their sins no ha • m: Either a Religion made up of loose Opinions, like the Familists, Ranters, Libertines and Antinomians ( and the Jesuits too much ); or else made up of trifling formalities, and a great deal of bodily exercise and Stage-actings and complement, as much of the Popish devotion is: And a little will draw a carnal heart to believe a carnal doctrine: Its easier to get such a new Religion, than a new heart. And then the Devil tells them that now they are in the right way, and therefore they shall be saved. A great part of the world think their case is good, because they are of such or such a Sect, or Party, and of that which (they are told by their Leaders) is the true Church and way.

§. 47. Direct. 23. But remember that what ever Law you make to yourselves, God will judge you by his own Law. Falsifying the Kings Coyn is no good way to pay a debt, but an addition of Treason to your former misery. It is a new and a holy heart and life, and not a new Creed, or a new Church or Sect that is necessary to your salvation. It will never save you to be in the soundest Church on earth, if you be unsound in it yourselves; and are but the dust in the Temple that must be swept ou • : Much less will it save you, to make yourselves a Rule, because God's Rule doth seem too strict.

§. 48. Tempt. 24. Another way of the Tempter is, to draw men to take up with mere Convictions, instead of true Conversion: when they have but learnt that it is Necessary to salvation, to be Regenerate, and have the Spirit of Christ, they are as quiet, as if this were indeed to be regenerate, and to have the Spirit: As some think they have attained to perfection, when they have but received the opinion that perfection may here be had; so abundance think they have sanctification and forgiveness, because now they see that they must be had, and without sanctification there is no salvation: And thus the knowledge of all Grace and Duty shall go with them for the grace and duty itself; and their judgment of the thing, instead of the possession of it: and instead of having grace, they force themselves to believe that they have it.

§. 49. Direct. 24. But remember God will not be mocked: He knoweth a convinced head from a holy heart: To think you are Rich, will not make you rich: To believe that you are well, or to know the remedy, is not enough to make you well. You may dream that you eat, and yet awake hungry: Isa. 29. 8. All the Land or money which you see is not therefore your own. To know that you should be holy, maketh your unholiness to have no excuse: Ahab did not scape by believing that he should return in peace: Self-flattery in so great and weighty a case, is the greatest folly. If you know these things, happy are ye if you do them, John 13. 17.

§. 50. Tempt. 25. Another great Temptation is, by hiding from men the intrinsic evil and odiousness of • in. What harm (saith the Drunkard, and Adulterer, and voluptuous Sensualists) is there in all this, that Preachers make so great ado against it? What hurt is this to God or man? that they would make us believe we must be damned for it, and that Christ died for it? and that the Holy Ghost must mortify it? Wherefore, say the Jews, Ier. 16. 10. hath God pronounced all this great evil against us? or what is our iniquity? or what is our sin that we have committed— He that knoweth not God, knoweth not what sin against God is: especially when the Love of it, and Delight in it blindeth them.

§. 51. Direct. 25. Against this I entreat you to ponder on those forty intrinsical evils in sin, which I have after named, Chap. 3. Dir. 8. §. 16. and the aggravations, §. 17, 18. If the Devil can but once persuade you, that sin is harmless, all Faith, all Religion, all Honesty, and your souls and all are gone. For then all God's Laws and Government must be fictions: Then there is no work for Christ as a Savior, or the Spirit as a Sanctifier to do: Then all Ordinances and Means are troublesome Vanities: and Godliness and Obedience deserve to be banished from the earth, as unnecessary troublers of mankind: Then may this poison be safely taken and made your food. But O how mad a conceit is this! How quickly will God make the proudest know, what harm it was to refuse the Government of his Maker, and set up the Goverment of his beastly appetite and misguided will! and that sin is bad, if Hell be bad.

§. 32. Tempt. 26. The Devil also tempteth them to think, that though they sin, yet their good works are a compensation for their bad; and therefore they pray and do some acts of Pharisaical devotion, to make God amends for what they do amiss.

§. 53. Direct. 26. Against this consider, that if you had never so many good works, they are all but your duty; and make no satisfaction for your sin. But what good works can you do, that shall save a wicked soul! and that God will accept without your Hearts! Your hearts must be first cleansed, and yourselves devoted and sanctified to God: For an evil Tree will bring forth evil fruit! First make the Tree good, and the fruit will be good! It is the Love of God, and the hatred of sin, and a holy and heavenly life which are the good works that God chiefly calleth for; and Faith, and Repentance, and Conversion in order to these: And will God take your lip-labor, or the leavings of your •••• sh by way of alms, while the world and fleshly pleasure have your hearts? Indeed, you do no work that's truly good! The matter may be good: but you poison it with bad Principles and Ends. The carnal mind is not subject to the Law of God, nor indeed can be; but is enmity to God, Rom. 8. 6, 7.

§. 54. Tempt. 27. Some are tempted to think, that God will not condemn them because they are poor and afflicted in this life, and have their sufferings here: And that he that condemneth the rich for not showing mer • y t • the p •• r, will himself show them mercy.

§. 55. Direct. 27. Hath he not shown you mercy? And is it not mercy which you vilify and re •• se? Even Christ, and his Spirit, and holy communion with God? Or must God show you the mercy of Glory, without the mercy of Grace? Which is a contradiction: Strange, that the same men that will not be entreated to accept of mercy, nor let it save them, are yet saying, that God will be merciful and save them.

And for your poverty and suffering, is it not against your will? You cannot deny it: And will God save any man, for that which is against his will? You would have riches, and honor, and pleasure, and your good things in this life as well as others, if you could tell how: You love the world as well as others, if you could get more of it. And to be carnal and worldly for so poor a pittance, and to have the world when you suffer in it, doth make you more inexcusable than the rich. The Devils have suffered more than you; and so have many thousand souls in Hell: And yet they shall be saved never the more. If you are poor in the world, but rich in faith, and holiness, then you may well expect salvation, James 2. 5. But if your sufferings make you no more holy, they do but aggravate your sin.

§. 56. Tempt. 28. Also the Devil blindeth sinners, by keeping them ignorant of the nature and power of Holiness of heart and life! They know it not by any experience: And he will not let them see it and judge of it in the Scripture, where it is to be seen without any mixed contraries; but he points them only to professors of holiness, and commonly to the weakest and the worst of them, and to that which is worst in them, and showeth them the miscarriages of hypocrites, and the falls of the weaker sort of Christians, and then tells them, This is their Godliness and Religion; They are all alike.

§. 57. Direct. 28. But it's easy to see, how these men deceive and condemn themselves. This is as if you should plead that a Beast is wiser than a man, because some men are drunk, and some are passionate, and some are mad. Drunkenness and passions which are the disturbances of Reason, are no disgrace to Reason, but to themselves: Nor were they a disgrace themselves, if Reason which they hinder were not honorable. So no man's sins are a disgrace to Holiness, which condemneth them: nor were they bad themselves, if holiness were not good, which they oppose. It is no disgrace to the day-light or Sun that there is night and darkness: Nor were darkness bad, if light were not good. Will you refuse health, because some men are sick? Nay, will you rather choose to be dead, because the living have infirmities? The Devils reasoning is foolisher than this! Holiness is of absolute necessity to salvation: If many that do more than you, are as bad as you imagine, what a case then are you in, that have not near so much as they? If they that make it their greatest care to please God and be saved, are as very Hypocrites as the Devil would persuade you, what a hopeless case then are you in, that come far short of them? If so, you must do more than they, and not less, if you will be saved▪ Or else out of your own mouths will you be condemned.

§. 58. Tempt. 29. Another way of the Tempter is, by drawing them desperately to venture their souls; Come on them what will, they will put it to the venture, rather than live so strict a life.

§. 59. Direct. 29. But, O man, consider what thou dost, and who will have the loss of it! and how quickly it may be too late to recall thy adventure! What should put thee on so mad a resolution? Is sin so good? Is Hell so easy? Is thy soul so contemptible? Is Heaven such a trifle? Is God so hard a Master? Is his work so grievous, and his way so bad? Doth he require anything unreasonable of you? Hath God set you such a grievous task, that it's better venture on damnation, than perform it? You cannot believe this, if you believe him to be God. Come near, and think more deliberately on it, and you will find you might better run from your food, your friend, your life, than from your God, and from a holy life, when you run but into sin and Hell.

§. 60. Tempt. 30. Another great Temptation is, in making them believe that their sins are but such common infirmities as the best have: They cannot deny but they have their faults; but are not all men sinners! They hope that they are not reigning unpardoned sins.

§. 61. Direct. 30. But O how great a difference is between a converted and an unconverted sinner! between the failings of a Child, and the contempt of a Rebel! between a sinner that hath no gross or mortal sin, and hateth, bewaileth, and striveth against his infirmities; and a sinner that loveth his sin, and is loath to leave it, and maketh light of it, and loveth not a holy life. God will one day show you a difference between these two, when you see that there are siners that are justified and saved, and sinners that are condemned.

§. 62. BUt here are many subordinate Temptations by which Satan persuades them that their sins Temp. 1. are but infirmities: One is, because their sin is but in the heart, and appeareth not in outward deeds: And they take restraint for sanctification.

§. 63. Direct. 1. Alas man, the Life and Reign of sin is in the Heart: That is it's Garrison and Throne: The life of sin lieth in the prevalence of your lusts within, against the Power of Reason and Will. All outward sins are but acts of obedience to the reigning sin within: and a gathering Tribute for this which is the King. For this it is that they make provision, Rom. 13. 14. On this all is consumed, James 4. 3. Original sin may be reigning sin (as a King may be born a King): Sin certainly reigneth, till the soul be converted and born again.

§. 64. Tempt. 2. The Devil tells them, it is but an infirmity, because it is no open gross disgraceful sin: It's hard to believe that they are in danger of Hell, for sins which are accounted small.

§. 65. Direct. 2. But do you think it is no mortal heinous sin, to be void of the Love of God and holiness? to Love the flesh and the world above him? to set more by Earth than Heaven, and do more for it? However they show themselves, these are the great and mortal sins. Sin is not less dangerous for lying secret in the heart. The root and heart are usually unseen. Some Kings (as in China, Persia, &c. ) keep out of sight for the honor of their Majesty. Kings are the spring of Government, but actions of State are executed by Officers. When you see a man go or work, you know that it is something within which is the Cause of all. If sin appeared without, as it is within, it would lose much of its Power and Majesty. Then Ministers, and friends, and every good man would cast a stone at it: but its secrecy is its peace. The Devil himself prevaileth by keeping out of sight. If he were seen, he would be less obeyed. So is it with the Reigning sins of the heart: Pride and Covetousness may be Reigning sins, though they appear not in any notorious disgraceful course of life. David's hiding his sin, or Rachel her Idol, made them not the better. It is a mercy to some men, that God permitteth them to fall into some open scandalous sin, which may tend to humble them, who would not have been humbled nor convinced by heart-sins alone. An Oven is hottest when it is stopped.

§. 66. Tempt. 3. Satan tells them, they are not unpardoned reigning sins, because they are common in the world: If all that are as bad as I must be condemned, say they, God help a great number.

§. 67. Direct. 3. But know you not that Reigning sin is much more common than saving holiness? and that the gate is wide, and the way is broad that leadeth to destruction, and many go in at it? Salvation is as rare as holiness: and damnation as common as Reigning sin, where it is not cured. This sign therefore makes against you.

§. 69. Tempt. 4. But, saith the Tempter, they are such sins as you see good men commit: You play at the same games as they: you do but what you see them do; and they are pardoned.

§. 68. Direct. 4. You must judge the man by his works, and not the works by the man. And there is more to be looked at, than the bare matter of an act. A good man and a bad may play at the same game, but not with the same end, nor with the same love to sport, nor so frequently and long to the loss of time. Many drops may wear a stone: Many stripes with small twigs may draw blood. Many mean men in a Senate have been as great Kings: You may have many of these little sins set all together, which plainly make up a carnal life. The power of a sin, is more considerable than the outward show. A poor man if he be in the place of a Magistrate, may be a Ruler. And a sin materially small, and such as better men commit, may be a sin in Power and Rule with you, and concur with others which are greater.

§. 70. Tempt. 5. But, saith the Tempter, they are but sins of Omission, and such are not reigning sins.

§. 71. Direct. 5. Sins of Omission are always accompanied with some positive sensual affection to the creature, which diverteth the soul, and causeth the omission. And so Omission is no small part of the Reigning sin. The not using of Reason and the Will for God, and for the mastering of sensuality, is much of the state of ungodliness in man. Denying God the heart and life, is no small sin. God made you to do good, and not only to do no harm: Else a Stone or Corpse were as good a Christian as you; for they do less harm than you. If sin have a Negative Voice in your Religion, whether God shall be worshipped and obeyed or not, it is your King: It may show its power as well by commanding you not to pray, and not to consider, and not to read, as in commanding you to be drunk or swear. The wicked are described by omissions: such as will not seek after God: God is not in all his thoughts, Psal. 10. 4. Such as know not God, and call not on his name, Jer. 10. 25. That have no truth, or mercy, or knowledge of God, Hos. 4. 1. That feed not, clothe not, visit not Christ in his members, Matth. 25. that hide their Talents, Matth. 25. Indeed, if God have not your hearts, the creature hath it; and so it is omission and commission that go together in your reigning sin.

§. 72. Tempt. 6. But, saith the Tempter, they are but sins of ignorance, and therefore they are not reigning sins: At least you are not certain that they are sins.

§ 73. Direct. 6. And indeed do you not know that it is a sin to love the world better than God? and fleshly pleasure better than God's service; and Riches better than grace and holiness? and to do more for the body than for the soul, and for earth, than for Heaven? Are you uncertain whether these are sins? And do you not feel that they are your sins? You cannot pretend ignorance for these. But what causeth your Ignorance? Is it because you would fain know, and cannot? Do you read, and hear, and study, and inquire, and pray for knowledge, and yet cannot know? Or is it not because you would not know, or think it not worth the pains to get it? or because you love your sin? And will such willful ignorance as this excuse you? No, it doth make your sin the greater. It showeth the greater dominion of sin, when it can use thee as the Philistines, did Sampson, put out thy eyes, and make a • rudge of thee; and conquer thy Reason, and make thee believe that evil is good, and good is evil. Now it hath mastered the principal fortress of thy soul, when thy understanding is mastered by it. He is reconciled indeed to his enemy, who taketh him to be a friend▪ Do you not know, that God should have your heart, and Heaven should have your chiefest care and diligence; and that you should make the Word of God your Rule, and your delight and meditation day and night? If you know not these things, it is because you would not know them. And it is a miserable case to be given up to a blinded mind! Take heed lest at last you commit the horridest sins, and do not know them to be sins. For such there are that mock at Godliness, and persecute Christians and Ministers of Christ, and know not that they do ill, but think they do God service, John 16. 2. If a man will make himself drunk, and then kill, and steal; and abuse his neighbors, and say, I knew not that I did ill, it shall not excuse him: This is your case. You are drunken with the love of fleshly pleasure and worldly things, and these carry you so away, that you have neither heart nor time to study the Scriptures, and hear, and think what God saith to you, and then say, that you did not know.

§. 74. Tempt. 7. But, saith the Tempter, it cannot be a mortal reigning sin, because it is not committed with the whole heart, nor without some struggling and resistance: Dost thou not feel the Spirit striving against the flesh? And so it is with the Regenerate, Gal. 5. 17. Rom. 7. 20, 21, 22, 23. The good which thou dost not do, thou wouldst do; and the evil, which thou dost, thou wouldst not do: so then it is no more thou that dost it, but sin that dwelleth in thee. In a sensual unregenerate person, there is but one party, there is nothing but flesh; but thou feelest the combat between the Flesh and the Spirit within thee.

§. 75. Direct. 7. This is a snare so subtle and dangerous, that you have need of eyes in your head to scape it. Understand therefore, 1. That as to the two Texts of Scripture much abused by the Tempter, they speak not at all of mortal reigning sin, but of the unwilling infirmities of such as had subdued all such sin, and walked not after the flesh, but after the Spirit; and whose wills were habitually bent to good; and fain would have been perfect, and not have been guilty of an idle thought, or word, or of any imperfection in their holiest service, but lived up to all that the Law requireth: but this they could not do, because the flesh did cast many stops before the will in the performance. But this is nothing to the case of one that liveth in gross sin, and an ungodly life, and hath strivings and convictions, and ineffectual wishes to be better and to turn, but never doth it: This is but sinning against Conscience, and resisting the Spirit that would convert you; and it maketh you worthy of many stripes, as being rebellious against the importunities of Grace. Sin may be resisted, where it is never conquered: It may Reign nevertheless for some contradiction. Everyone that resisteth the King, doth not depose him from his Throne. It's a dangerous deceit to think that every good desire that contradicteth sin, doth conquer it, and is a sign of saving grace. It must be a desire after a state of godliness, and an effectual desire too. There are degrees of Power: some may have a less and limited power, and yet be Rulers. As the evil Spirits that possessed men's bodies, were a Legion in one, and but one in others, yet both were possessed: So is it here. Grace is not without resistance in a holy Soul: there is some remnants of corruption in the will itself, resisting the good: and yet it followeth not, that Grace doth not Rule: So is it in the sin of the unregenerate. No man in this life is so good, as he will be in Heaven, or so bad, as he will be in Hell: Therefore none is void of all moral good. And the least good will resist evil, in its degree, as Light doth darkness. As in these cases,

§. 76. 1. There is in the unregenerate a remnant of natural knowledge and conscience: some discoveries of God and his will there are in his works: God hath not left himself without witness. See Acts 14. 17. & 17. 27. Rom. 1. 19, 20. & 2. 7, 8, 9. This Light and Law of Nature governed the Heathens: And this in its measure resisteth sin, and assisteth conscience.

§. 77. 2. When supernatural extrinsic Revelation in the Scripture, is added to the Light and Law of Nature, and the ungodly have all the same Law as the best; it may do more.

§. 78. 3. Moreover an ungodly man may live under a most powerful Preacher, that will never let him alone in his sins, and may stir up much fear in him, and many good purposes, and almost persuade him to be a true Christian, and not only to have some ineffectual wishings and strivings against sin, but to do many things after the Preacher, as Herod did after John, and to escape the common pollutions of the world, 2 Pet. 2. 20.

§. 79. 4. Some sharp affliction added to the rest, may make him seem to others a true penitent: when he is stopped in his course of sin, as Balaam was by the Angel with a drawn Sword, and feeth that he cannot go on but in danger of his life; and that God is still meeting him with some cross, and hedging up his way with thorns (for such mercy he showeth to some of the ungodly) this may not only breed resistance of sin, but some reformation. When the Babylonians were planted in Samaria, they feared not God, and he sent Lions among them; and then they feared him, and set up some kind of service to him, performed by a base sort of Priests; they feared the Lord, and served their own God's, thinking it was safest to please all, 2 Kings 17. 25, 32, 33. Affliction maketh bad men, likest to the good.

§. 80. 5. Good education and company may do very much: It may help them to much knowledge, and make them professors of strict Religion; and constant companions with those that fear sin, and avoid it, and therefore they must needs go far then, as Joash did all the days of Jehoiada, 2 Chron. 24. 2. As plants and fruits change with the soil by transplantation, and as the Climate maketh some Bl •• kmoors and some White, so education and converse have so great a power on the mind, that they come next to grace, and are oft the means of it.

§. 81. 6. And God giveth to many internally some grace of the Spirit, which is not proper to them that are saved, but comm • n or preparatory only. And this may make much resistance against sin, though it do not mortify it. One that should live but under the convictions that Iud • s had when he hanged himself, I warrant him would have strivings and combats against sin in him, though he were unsanctified.

§. 82. 7. Yea, the interest and power of one sin, may resist another. As covetousness may make much resistance against sensuality and pride of life, and pride may resist all disgraceful sin.

§. 83. Tempt. 8. But, saith the Tempter, it is not unpardoned sin, because thou art sorry and dost repent for it when thou hast committed it: and all sin is pardoned that is repented of.

§. 84. Direct. 8. All the foresaid causes which may make some resistance of sin in the ungodly, may cause also some sorrow and repenting in them. There is repenting and sorrow for sin in Hell. All men repent and are sorry at last: but few repent so as to be pardoned and saved. When a sinner hath had all the sweetness out of sin that it can yield him, and seeth that its all gone, and the sting is left behind, no marvel if he repent. I think there is scarce any Drunkard, or Whoremonger, or Glutton, (that is not a flat Infidel▪) but he repenteth of the sin that's past, because he hath had all out of it that it can yield him, and there is nothing left of it that's lovely: But yet he goeth on still; which showeth that his Repentance was unsound: True Repentance is a through change of the heart and life: a turning from sin to a holy life: and such a sorrow for what is past, as would not let you do it, if it were to do again. If you truly Repent, you would not do so again if you had all the same temptations.

§. 85. Tempt. 9. But, saith the Tempter, it is but one sin, and the rest of thy life is good and blameless: and God judgeth by the greater part of thy life: whether the evil or the good be most.

§. 86. Direct. 9. If a man be a Murderer, or a Traitor, will you excuse him, because the rest of his life is good, and it is but one sin that he is charged with? One sort of poison may kill a man; and one stab at the heart, though all his body else be whole: you may surfeit on one dish: One leak may sink a Ship. Jam. 2. 10. Whosoever shall keep the whole Law, and yet offend in one point, is guilty of all. S • e Ezek. 18. 10, 11. Indeed God doth judge by the bent of thy heart, and the main drift and endeavor of thy life. But canst thou say, that the bent of thy heart, and the main endeavor of thy life, is for God, and Heaven, and Holiness? No: if it were, thou wert Regenerate; and this would not let thee live in any one beloved, chosen, willful sin. The bent of a man's heart and life may be sinful, earthly, fleshly, though it run but in the channel of one way of gross sinning! As a man may be covetous, that hath but one Trade; and a Whoremonger, that hath but one Whore; and an Idolater, that hath but one Idol. If thou lovedst God better, thou wouldst let go thy sin: And if thou love any one sin better than God, the whole bent of thy heart and life is wicked: For it is not set upon God and Heaven, and therefore is ungodly.

§. 87. Tempt. 10. But, saith the Tempter, it is not reigning unpardoned sin, because thou believest in Jesus Christ: And all that Believe, are pardoned and justified from all their sins.

§. 89. Direct. 10. He that savingly believeth in Christ, doth take him entirely for his Savior and Governor; and giveth up himself to be saved, sanctified and ruled by him: As Trusting your Physician, implieth that you take his Medicines, and follow his advice, and so trust him: and not that you trust to be cured while you disobey him, by bare trusting: so is it as to your faith and trust in Christ: It is a belief or trust that he will save all those, that are ruled by him in order to salvation. He is the author of eternal salvation to all them that obey him: Heb. 5. 9. If you believe in Christ, you believe Christ: And if you believe Christ, you believe that except a man be converted and born again, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, John 3. 3, 5. Matth. 18. 3. and that he that is in Christ, is a new creature; old things are past away, and all is become new, 2 Cor. 5. 17. And that without holiness none shall see God. Heb. 12. 14. And that no fornicator, effeminate, thieves, covetous, drunkards, revilers, extortioners, murderers, liars, shall enter into, or have any inheritance in the Kingdom of Christ, 1 Cor. 6. 9, 10. Ephes. 5. 4, 5, 6. Rev. 21. 27. & 22. 14, 15. If you believe Christ, you must believe that you cannot be saved, unless you be converted. It is the Devil and not Christ, that telleth you you may be pardoned and saved in an unholy unregenerate state: And it's sad, that men should believe the Devil, and call this a Believing in Christ, and think to be saved for so believing! as if false faith and presumption pleased God. Christ will not save men for believing a lie, and believing the Father of lies before him: Nor will he save all that are confident they shall be saved. If you think you have any part in Christ remember, Rom. 8. 9. If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, the same is none of his.

CHAP. II. Directions to young Christians or Beginners in Religion, for their establishment and safe proceeding.

BEfore I come to the Common Directions for the Exercise of Grace, and walking with God, containing the common duties of Christianity, I shall lay down some previous Instructions proper to those that are but newly entered into Religion, (presupposing what is said in my Book of Directions to those that are yet under the work of Conversion, to prevent their miscarrying by a false or superficial change.)