SECTION VII.
There is no greater argument in the world of
our spiritual danger and unwillingness to religion, than the backwardness which
most men have always, and all men have sometimes, to say their prayers - so
weary of their length, so glad when they are done, so witty to excuse and
frustrate an opportunity: and yet all is nothing but a desiring of God to give
us the greatest and the best things we can need, and which can make us happy -
it is a work so easy, so honourable, and to so great purpose, that in all the
instances of religion and providence (except only the incarnation of his Son)
God hath not given us a greater argument of his willingness to have us saved,
and of our unwillingness to accept it, his goodness and our gracelessness, his
infinite condescension and our carelessness and folly, than by rewarding so
easy a duty with so great blessings.
I cannot say anything beyond this very
consideration and its appendages to invite Christian people to pray often. But
we may consider that, 1. It is a duty commanded by God and his holy Son. 2. It
is an act of grace and highest honour, that we, dust and ashes, are admitted to
speak to the eternal God, to run to him as to a father, to lay open our wants,
to complain of our burdens, to explicate our scruples, to beg remedy and ease,
support and counsel, health and safety, deliverance and salvation: and, 3. God
hath invited us to it by many gracious promises of hearing us. 4. He hath
appointed his most glorious Son to be the precedent of prayer, and to make
continual intercession for us to the throne of grace. 5. He hath appointed an
angel to present the prayers of his servants: and, 6. Christ unites them to his
own, and sanctifies them, and makes them effective and prevalent: and, 7. Hath
put it into the hands of men to rescind, or alter, all the decrees of God,
which are of one kind, (that is, conditional, and concerning ourselves and our
final estate, and many instances of our intermedial or temporal,) by the power
of prayers. 8. And the prayers of men have saved cities and kingdoms from ruin:
prayer hath raised cities and kingdoms from ruin: prayer hath raised dead men
to life, hath stopped the violence of fire and shut the mouths of wild beasts,
hath altered the course of nature, caused rain in Egypt, and drought in the
sea: it made the sun to go from west to east, and the moon to stand still, and
rocks and mountains to wales; and it cures diseases without physic, and makes
physic to do the work of nature, and nature to do the work of grace, and grace
to do the work of God; and it does miracles of accident and event; and yet
prayer, that does all this, is, of itself, nothing but an ascent of the mind to
God, a desiring things fit to be desired, and an expression of this desire to
God as we can, and as becomes us. And our unwillingness to pray is nothing else
but a not desiring what we ought passionately to long for; or, if we do desire
it, it is a choosing rather to miss our satisfaction and felicity than to ask
for it.
There is no more to be said in this affair, but
that we reduce it to practice, according to the following rules:
1. We must be careful that we never ask
anything of God that is sinful, or that directly ministers to sin; for that is
to ask God to dishonour himself, and to undo us. We had need consider what we
pray; for before it returns in blessing it must be joined with Christ's
intercession, and presented to God. Let us principally ask of God power and
assistances to do our duty, to glorify God, to do good works, to live a good
life, to die in the fear and favor of God and eternal life: these things God
delights to give, and commands that we shall ask, and we may with confidence
expect to be answered graciously; for these things are promised without any
reservations of a secret condition: if we ask them, and do our duty towards the
obtaining them, we are sure never to miss them
2. We may lawfully pray to God for the gifts of
the Spirit that minister to holy ends; such as are the gift of preaching, the
spirit of prayer, good expression, a ready and unloosed tongue, good
understanding, learning, opportunities to publish them, etc., with these only
restraints: 1. That we cannot be so confident of the event of those prayers as
of the former. 2. That we must be curious to secure our intention in these
desires, that we may not ask them to serve our own ends, but only for God's
glory; and then we shall have them, or a blessing for desiring them. In order
to such purposes our intentions in the first desires cannot be amiss; because
they are able to sanctify other things, and therefore cannot be unhallowed
themselves. 3. We must submit to God's will, desiring him to choose our
employment, and to furnish our persons as he shall see expedient.
3. Whatsoever we may lawfully desire of temporal
things, we may lawfully ask of God in prayer, and we may expect them, as they
are promised. 1. Whatsoever is necessary to our life and being is promised to
us; and therefore we may, with certainty, expect food and raiment, food to keep
us alive, clothing to keep us from nakedness and shame; so long as our life is
permitted to us, so long all things necessary to our life shall be ministered.
We may be secure of maintenance, but not secure of our life - for that is
promised, not this: only concerning food and raiment we are not to make
accounts by the measure of our desires, but by the measure of our needs. 2.
Whatsoever is convenient for us; pleasant, and modestly delectable, we may pray
for, so we do it, 1. With submission to God's will. 2. Without impatient
desires. 3. That it be not a trifle and inconsiderable, but a matter so grave
and concerning as to be a fit matter to be treated on between God and our
souls. 4. That we ask not to spend upon our lusts, but for ends of justice, or
charity, or religion, and that they be employed with sobriety.
4. He that would pray with effect must live with
care and piety.[224] For although God gives
to sinners and evil persons the common blessings of life and chance, yet either
they want the comfort and blessing of those blessings, or they become occasions
of sadder accidents to them, or serve to upbraid them in their ingratitude or
irreligion: and in all cases, they are not the effects of prayer, or the fruits
of promise, or instances of a father's love; for they cannot be expected with
confidence, or received without danger, or used without without a curse and
mischief in their company. But as all sin is an impediment to prayer, so some
have a special indisposition towards acceptation; such are uncharitableness and
wrath, hypocrisy in the present action, pride and lust; because these, by
defiling the body or the spirit, or by contradicting some necessary ingredient
in prayer, (such as are mercy, humility, purity, and sincerity,) do defile the
prayer, and make it a direct sin, in the circumstances or formality of the
action.
5. All prayer must be made with faith and hope,
that is, we must certainly believe[225] we
shall receive the grace which God hath commanded us to ask; and we must hope
for such things which he hath permitted us to ask, and our hope shall not be
vain, though we miss what is not absolutely promised; because we shall at least
have an equal blessing in the denial as in the grant. And, therefore, the
former conditions must first be secured; that is, that we ask things necessary,
or at least good and innocent and profitable, and that our persons be gracious
in the eyes of God: or else, what God hath promised to our natural needs he
may, in many degrees, deny to our personal incapacity; but the thing being
secured, and the person disposed, there can be no fault at all; for whatsoever
else remains is on God's part, and that cannot possibly fail. But because the
things which are not commanded cannot possibly be secured, (for we are not sure
they are good in all circumstances,) we can but hope for such things, even
after we have secured our good intentions. We are sure of a blessing, but in
what instance we are not yet assured.
6. Our prayers must be fervent, intense, earnest,
and importunate, when we pray for things of high concernment and necessity.
`Continuing instant in prayer; striving in prayer; labouring fervently in
prayer; night and day, praying exceedingly; praying always with all prayer:' so
St. Paul calls it.[226] `Watching unto
prayer:' so St. Peter.[227] `Praying
earnestly:' so St. James.[228] And this is
not at all to be abated in matters spiritual and of duty: for, according as our
desires are, so are our prayers; and as our prayers are, so shall be the grace;
and as that is, so shall be the measure of glory. But this admits of degrees
according to the perfection or imperfection of our state of life; but it hath
no other measures, but ought to be as great as it can, the bigger the better:
we must make no positive restraints upon ourselves. In other things they are to
use a bridle; and as we must limit our desires with submission to God's will,
so also we must limit the importunity of our prayers by the moderation and term
of our desires. Pray for it as earnestly as you may desire it.
7. Our desires must be lasting, and our prayers
frequent, assiduous, and continual; not asking for a blessing once, and then
leaving it, but daily renewing our suits, and exercising our hope, and faith,
and patience, and long-suffering, and religion, and resignation, and
self-denial, in all the degrees we shall be put to. This circumstance of duty
our blessed Saviour taught, saying, that `men ought always to pray, and not to
faint.'[229] Always to pray, signifies the
frequent doing of the duty in general; but because we cannot always ask several
things, and those are such as concern our great interest, the precept comes
home to this very circumstance; and St. Paul calls it `praying without
ceasing;'[230] and himself in his own case
gave a precedent-'For this cause I besought the Lord thrice.' And so did our
blessed Lord; he went thrice to God on the same errand, with the same words, in
a short space-about half a night; for his time to solicit his suit was but
short. And the Philippians were remembered by the apostle, their spiritual
father, `always pray for the pardon of our sins, for the assistance of God's
grace, for charity, for life eternal, never giving over till we die; and thus
also we pray for supply of great temporal needs in their several proportions;
in all cases being curious we do not give over out of weariness or impatience;
for God God oftentimes defers to grant our suit, because he loves to hear us
beg it, and hath a design to give us more than we ask, even a satisfaction of
our desires, and a blessing for the very importunity.
8. Let the words of our prayers be pertinent,
grave, material, not studiously many, but according to our need, sufficient to
express our wants, and to signify our importunity. God hears us not the sooner
for our many words, but much the sooner for an earnest desire; to which let apt
and sufficient words minister, be they few or many, according as it happens. A
long prayer and a short differ not in their capacities of being accepted, for
both of them take their value according to the fervency of spirit, and the
charity of the prayer. That prayer, which is short by reason of an impatient
spirit, or dulness, or despite of holy things, or indifferency of desires, is
very often criminal, always imperfect; and that prayer which is long out of
ostentation, or superstition, or a trifling spirit, is as criminal and
imperfect as the other in their several instances. This rule relates to private
prayer. In public, our devotion is to be measured by the appointed office, and
we are to support our spirit with spiritual arts, that our private spirit may
be a part of the public spirit, and be adopted into the society and blessings
of the communion of saints.
9. In all forms of prayer mingle petition with
thanksgiving, that you may endear the present prayer and the future blessing,
by returning praise and thanks for what we have already received. This is St.
Paul's advice - `Be careful for nothing; but in everything, by prayer and
supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto God.[231]
10. Whatever we beg of God, let us also work for
it, if the thing be matter of duty, or a consequent to industry; for God loves
to bless labour and to reward it, but not to support idleness.[232] And therefore our blessed Saviour in his sermons joins
watchfulness with prayer, for God's graces are but assistances, not new
creations of the whole habit, in every instant or period of our life. Read
Scriptures, and then pray to God for understanding. Pray against temptation;
but you must also resist the devil, and then he will flee from you. Ask of God
competency of living; but you must also work with your hands the things that
are honest, that ye may have to supply in time of need. We can but do our
endeavor, and pray for blessing, and then leave the success with God; and
beyond this we cannot deliberate, we cannot take care - but, so far, we
must.
11. To this purpose let every man study his
prayers and read his duty in his petitions. For the body of our prayer is the
sum of our duty; and as we must ask of God whatsoever we need, so we must
labour for all that we ask. Because it is our duty, therefore we must pray for
God's grace; but because God's grace is necessary, and without it we can do
nothing, we are sufficiently taught, that in the proper matter or our religious
prayers is the just matter of our duty; and if we shall turn our prayers into
precepts, we shall the easier turn our hearty desires into effective
practices.
12. In all our prayers we must be careful to
attend our present work,[233] having a
present mind, not wandering upon impertinent things, not distant from our
words, much less contrary to them; and if our thoughts do at any time wander,
and divert upon other objects, bring them back again with prudent and severe
arts - by all means striving to obtain a diligent, a sober, an untroubled, and
a composed spirit.
13. Let your posture and gesture of body in
prayers be reverend, grave, and humble - according to public order, or the best
examples, if it be in public - if it be in private, either stand or kneel, or
lie flat upon the ground on your face, in your ordinary and more solemn
prayers, but in extraordinary, casual, and ejaculatory prayers, the reverence
and devotion of the soul, and the lifting up the eyes and hands to God with any
other posture not indecent, is usual and commendable; for we may pray in bed,
on horseback, `everywhere,'[234]
and at all times, and in all circumstances; and it is well if we do so;
and some servants have not opportunity to pray so often as they would, unless
they supply the appetites of religion by such accidental devotions.
14. `Let prayers and supplications and giving of
thanks be made for all men; for kings, and all that are in authority; for this
is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour.'[235] We, who must love our neighbours as ourselves, must
also pray for them as for ourselves, with this only difference, that we may
enlarge in our temporal desires for kings, and pray for secular prosperity to
them with more importunity than for ourselves; because they need more to enable
their duty and government, and for the interests of religion and justice. This
part of prayer is by the apostle called intercession; in which, with
special care, we are to remember our relatives, our family, our charge, our
benefactors, our creditors, not forgetting to beg pardon and charity for our
enemies, and protection against them.
15. Rely not on a single prayer in matters of
great concernment; but make it as public as you can, by obtaining of others to
pray for you - this being the great blessing of the communion of saints, that a
prayer united is strong, like a well-ordered army; and God loves to be tied
fast with such cords of love, and constrained by a holy violence.
16. Every time that is not seized upon by some
other duty is seasonable enough for prayer; but let it be performed as a solemn
duty morning and evening, that God may begin and end all our business; that the
outgoing of the morning and evening may praise him; for so we bless God, and
God blesses us. And yet fail not to find or make opportunities to worship God
at some other times of the day, at least by ejaculations and short addresses,
more or less, longer or shorter, solemnly or without solemnity, privately or
publicly, as you can, or are permitted, always remembering, that as every sin
is a degree of danger and unsafety, so every pious prayer and well-employed
opportunity is a degree of return to hope and pardon.
17. A vow to God is an act of prayer, and a
great degree and instance of opportunity, and an increase of duty by some new
uncommanded instance, or some more eminent degree of duty, or frequency of
action, or earnestness of spirit in the same. And because it hath pleased God,
in all ages of the world, to admit of intercourse with his servants in the
matters of vows, it is not ill advice that we make vows to God in such cases in
which we have great need or great danger. But let it be done according to these
rules and by these cautions:
1. That the matter of the vow be lawful. 2. That
it be useful in order to religion or charity. 3. That it be grave, not trifling
or impertinent; but great in our proportion of duty towards the blessing. 4.
That it be an uncommanded instance, that is, that it be of something, or in
some manner, or in some degree, to which formerly we were not obliged, or which
we might have omitted without sin. 5. That it be done with prudence; that is,
that it be safe in all the circumstances of person, lest we beg a blessing and
fall into a snare. 6. That every vow of a new action be also accompanied with a
new degree and enforcement of our essential and unalterable duty - such as was
Jacob's vow, that (besides the payment of the tithe) God should be his God;
that so he might strengthen his duty to him, first in essentials and precepts,
and then in additionals and accidentals. For it is but an ill tree that spends
more in leaves and suckers and gums than in fruit; and that thankfulness and
religion is best that first secures duty and then enlarges in counsels.
Therefore, let every great prayer and great need and great danger draw us
nearer to God by the approach of a pious purpose to live more strictly, and let
every mercy of God answering that prayer produce a real performance of it. 7.
Let not young beginners in religion enlarge their hearts and straighten their
liberty by vows of long continuance; nor, indeed, any one else, without a great
experience of himself and of all accidental dangers.[236] Vows of single actions are safest, and proportionable
to those single blessings ever begged in such cases of sudden and transient
importunities. 8. Let no action which is matter of question and dispute in
religion ever become the matter of a vow. He vows foolishly that promises to
God to live and die in such an opinion in an article not necessary nor certain;
or that, upon confidence of his present guide, binds himself for ever to the
profession of what he may afterwards more reasonably contradict, or may find
not to be useful, or not profitable, but of some danger or of no necessity.
If we observe the former rules we shall pray
piously and effectually; but because even this duty hath in it some special
temptations, it is necessary that we are armed by special remedies against
them. The dangers are, 1. Wandering thoughts; 2. Tediousness of spirit. Against
the first these advices are profitable:
If we feel our spirits apt to wander in our
prayers, and to retire into the world, or to things unprofitable, or vain and
impertinent:
1. Use prayer to be assisted in prayer; pray for
the spirit of supplication, for a sober, fixed, and recollected spirit; and
when to this you add a moral industry to be steady in your thoughts, whatsoever
wanderings after this do return irremediably are a misery of nature and an
imperfection, but no sin, while it is not cherished and indulged to.
2. In private it is not amiss to attempt the cure
by reducing your prayers into collects and short forms of prayer, making
voluntary interruptions, and beginning again, that the want of spirit and
breath may be supplied by the short stages and periods.
3. When you have observed any considerable
wanderings of your thoughts, bind yourself to repeat thy prayer again with
actual attention, or else revolve the full sense of it in your spirit, and
repeat it in all the effect and desires of it; and, possibly, the tempter may
be driven away with his own art, and may cease to interpose his trifles when he
perceives they do but vex the person into carefulness and piety; and yet he
loses nothing of his devotion, but doubles the earnestness of his care.
4. If this be not seasonable or opportune, or apt
to any man's circumstances, yet be sure, with actual attention, to say a hearty
Amen to the whole prayer with one united desire, earnestly begging the graces
mentioned in the prayer; for that desire does the great work of the prayer, and
secures the blessing, if the wandering thoughts were against our will, and
disclaimed by contending against them.
5. Avoid multiplicity of businesses of the world,
and in those that are unavoidable, labour for an evenness and tranquillity of
spirit, that you may be untroubled and smooth in all tempests of fortune; for
so we shall better tend religion when we are not torn in pieces with the cares
of the world, and seized upon with low affections, passions, and interest.
6. It helps much to attention and actual
advertisement in our prayers, if we say our prayers silently, without the
voice, only by the spirit. For, in mental prayer, if our thoughts wander we
only stand still; when our mind returns we go on again - there is none of the
prayer lost, as it is if our mouths speak and our hearts wander.
7. To incite you to the use of these, or any
other counsels you shall meet with, remember that it is a great indecency to
desire of God to hear those prayers, a great part whereof we do not hear
ourselves. If they be not worthy of our attention they are far more unworthy of
God's.
The second temptation in our prayer is a
tediousness of spirit or a weariness of the employment; like that of the Jews,
who complained that they were weary of the new moons, and their souls loathed
the frequent return of their Sabbaths: so do very many Christians, who first
pray without fervour or earnestness of spirit; and, secondly, meditate but
seldom, and that without fruit, or sense, or affection; or, thirdly, who seldom
examine their consciences, and when they do it, they do it but sleepily,
slightly, without compunction, or hearty purpose, or fruits of amendment. 4.
They enlarge themselves in the thoughts and fruitation of temporal things,
running for comfort to them only in any sadness and misfortune. 5. They love
not to frequent the sacraments, nor any the instruments of religion, as
sermons, confessions, prayers in public, fastings; but love ease and a loose
undisciplined life. 6. They obey not their superiors, but follow their own
judgment when their judgment follows their affections, and their affections
follow sense and worldly pleasures. 7. They neglect, or dissemble, or defer, or
do not attend to the motions and inclinations to virtue which the Spirit of God
puts into their soul. 8. They repent them of their vows and holy purposes, not
because they discover any indiscretion in them, or intolerable inconvenience,
but because they have within them labour (as the case now stands) to them
displeasure. 9. They content themselves with the first degrees and necessary
parts of virtue; and when they are arrived thither, they sit down as if they
were come to the mountain of the Lord, and care not to proceed on toward
perfection. 10. They inquire into all cases in which it may be lawful to omit a
duty; and, though they will not do less than they are bound to, yet they will
do no more than needs must; for they do out of fear and self-love, not out of
the love of God, or the spirit of holiness and zeal. The event of which will be
this: he that will do no more than needs must, will soon be brought to omit
something of his duty, and will be apt to believe less to be necessary than is.
The remedies against this temptation are
these:
1. Order your private devotions so that they
become not arguments and causes of tediousness by their indiscreet length, but
reduce your words into a narrow compass, still keeping all the matter; and what
is cut off in the length of your prayers supply in the earnestness of your
spirit; for so nothing is lost, while the words are changed into matter, and
length of time into fervency of devotion. The forms are made not the less
perfect, and the spirit is more, and the scruple is removed.
2. It is not imprudent, if we provide variety of
forms of prayer to the same purposes, that the change, by consulting with the
appetites of fancy, may better entertain the spirit; and, possibly, we may be
pleased to recite a hymn when a collect seems flat to us and unpleasant; and we
are willing to sing rather than to say, or to sing this rather than that: we
are certain that variety is delightful; and whether that be natural to us, or
an imperfection, yet if it be complied with, it any remove some part of the
temptation.
3.Break your office and devotion into fragments,
and make frequent returnings by ejaculations and abrupt intercourses with God;
for so no length can oppress your tenderness and sickliness of spirit; and, by
often praying in such manner and in all circumstances, we shall habituate our
souls to prayer by making it the business of many lesser portions of our time;
and by thrusting in between all our other employments, it will make everything
relish of religion, and by degrees turn all into its nature.
4. Learn to abstract your thoughts and desires
from pleasures and things of the world; for nothing is a direct cure to this
evil but cutting off all other loves and adherences. Order your affairs so that
religion may be propounded to you as a reward, and prayer as your defence, and
holy actions as your security, and charity and good works as your treasure.
Consider that all things else are satisfactions but to the brutish part of a
man; and that these are the refreshments and relishes of that noble part of us
by which we are better than beasts; and whatsoever other instrument, exercise,
or consideration, is of use to take our loves from the world, the same is apt
to place them upon God.
5. Do not seek for deliciousness and sensible
consolations in the actions of religion, but only regard the duty and the
conscience of it; for although in the beginning of religion most frequently,
and at some other times irregularly, God complies with our infirmity, and
encourages our duty with little overflowings of spiritual joy, and sensible
pleasure, and delicacies in prayer, so as we seem to feel some little beam of
heaven, and great refreshments from the spirit of consolation, yet this is not
always safe for us to have, neither safe for us to expect and look for; and
when we do, it is apt to make us cool in our inquires and waitings upon Christ
when we want them: it is a running after him, not for the miracles but for the
loaves; not for the wonderful things of God, and the desires of pleasing him,
but for the pleasures of pleasing ourselves. And as we must not judge our
devotion to be barren or unfruitful when we want the overflowings of joy
running over, so neither must we cease for want of them. If our spirits can
serve God choosingly and greedily out of pure conscience of our duty, it is
better in itself and more safe for us.
6. Let him use to soften his spirit with frequent
meditation upon sad and dolorous objects, as of death, the terrors of the day
of judgment, fearful judgments upon sinners, strange horrorid accidents, fear
of God's wrath, the pains of hell, the unspeakable amazements of the damned,
the intolerable load of a sad eternity: for whatsoever creates fear, or makes
the spirit to dwell in a religious sadness, is apt to entender the spirit, and
make it devout and pliant to any part of duty; for a great fear, when it is
ill-managed, is the parent of superstition; but a discreet and well-guided fear
produces religion.
7. Pray often, and you shall pray oftener; and
when you are accustomed to a frequent devotion, it will so insensibly unite to
your nature and affections, that it will become a trouble to omit your usual or
appointed prayers; and what you obtain at first by doing violence to your
inclinations, at last will not be left without as great unwillingness as that
by which at first it entered. This rule relies not only upon reason derived
from the nature, of habits, which turn into a second nature, and make their
actions easy, frequent, and delightful' but it relies upon a reason depending
upon the nature and constitution of grace, whose productions are of the same
nature with the parent, and increases itself, naturally growing from grains to
huge trees, from minutes to vast proportions, and from moments to eternity. But
be sure not to omit your usual prayers without great reason, though without sin
it may be done; because after you have omitted something, in a little while you
will be past the scruple of that, and begin to be tempted to leave out more.
Keep yourself up to your usual forms - you may enlarge when you will; but do
not contract or lesson them without a very probable reason.
8. Let a man frequently and seriously, by
imagination, place himself upon his death-bed, and consider what great joys he
shall have for the remembrance of every day well spent, and what then he would
give that he had so spent all his days. He may guess at it by proportions; for
it is certain he shall have a joyful and prosperous night who hath spent his
day holily; and he resigns his soul with peace into the hands of God, who hath
lived in the peace of God and the works of religion in his lifetime. This
consideration is of a real event; it is of a thing that will certainly come to
pass. `It is appointed for all men once to die;' and after death comes
judgment; the apprehension of which is dreadful, and the presence of it is
intolerable; unless, by religion and sanctity, we are disposed for so venerable
an appearance.
9. To this may be useful that we consider the
easiness of Christ's yoke,[237] the
excellences and sweetnesses that are in religion, the peace of conscience, the
joy of the Holy Ghost, the rejoicing in God, the simplicity and pleasure of
virtue, the intricacy, trouble, and business of sin; the blessings and health
and reward of that; the curses the sicknesses and sad consequences of this; and
that, if we are weary of the labours of religion, we must sit still and do
nothing; for whatsoever we do contrary to it is infinitely more full of labour,
care, difficulty, and vexation.
10. Consider this also, that tediousness of
spirit is the beginning of the most dangerous condition and estate in the whole
world. For it is a great disposition to the sin against the Holy Ghost: it is
apt to bring a man to backsliding and the state of unregeneration; to make him
return to his vomit and his sink; and either to make the man impatient, or his
condition scrupulous, unsatisfied, irksome, and desperate: and it is better
that he had never known the way of godliness, than, after the knowledge of it,
that he should fall away. There is not in the world a greater sign that the
spirit of reprobation is beginning upon a man than when he is habitually and
constantly, or very frequently, weary, and slights or loathes holy offices.
11. The last remedy that preserves the hope of
such a man, and can reduce him to the state of zeal and the love of God, is a
pungent, sad, and a heavy affliction; not desperate, but recreated with some
intervals of kindness, or little comforts, or entertained with hopes of
deliverance; which condition if a man shall fall into, by the grace of God he
is likely to recover; but if this help him not, it is infinite odds but he will
quench the spirit.
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[224] 1 John, iii. 22; John, ix.31; Isa.
iv15, lviii. 5; Mal. iii. 10; 2 Tim. ii.8; Psalm, iv.6, lxvi. 8.
[225] Mark, xi. 24; Jam. i. 6,7.
[226] Rom. xii.12, xv. 30; Col. iv. 12; 1
Thess. iii. 10; Eph. vi. 18.
[227] 1 Pet. iv. 7.
[228] 1 James, v. 16.
[229] Luke, xviii. 1; xxi. 36.
[230] 1 Thess. v. 17.
[231] Phil. iv. 6.
[232] Elta leagomen
Kurte s zeos, pws mlagwnw; mwoe,Ceiras ouk eceis: ouk epoimse soi autas s ceos;
eucou nun kazmmenos opws ai mueat sou mh rewsin apomneai mallon. Arrian,
1.c.16.
[233] Inter sacra et vota, verbis etiam
profanis abstinere.-Tacit.
[234] 1 Tim. ii. 8.
[235] 1 Tim. ii. 2.
[236] Angustum annulum non gesta, disit
Pythag, id est, vitae genus liberum sectare, nec vinculo temetipsum
obstringe.-Plutarch. Sic Novatus novitios suos compulit ad jurandum, ne
unquarm ad Catholicos episcopos redirent.-Euseb. 1. ii. Eccl. Hist.
[237] See the Great Exemplar, Part iii.
Disc. xiv. of the Easiness of Christian religion.