Full text of "The works of Thomas Goodwin"

BX 9315 .G66 1861 v. 7 
Goodwin, Thomas, 1600-1680. 
The works of Thomas Goodwin 



Xn 



NICHOUS SERIES OF STANDARD DIYINES. 



PUKITAN PEEIOD. 



THE 



WOEKS OF THOMAS GOODWIN, D D, 

VOL. VII. 



COUNCIL OF PUBLICATION. 



W. LINDSAY ALEXANDER, D.D., Professor of Tlieolo^y. Congregational 
Union, Edinburgh. 

JAMES BEGG, D.D, Minister of Newington Free Church, Edinburgh. 

THOMAS J. CRAWFORD, D.D., S.T.P., Professor of Divinity, University, 
Edinburgh. 

D. T. K. DRUMMOND, M.A., Minister of St Thomas's Episcopal Church, 
Edinburgh. 

WILLIAM H. GOOLD, D.D., Professor of Biblical Literature and Church 
History, Reformed Presbyterian Church. Edinburgh. 

ANDREW THOMSON, D.D., Minister of Broughton Plax:e United Presby- 
terian Church, Edinburorh. 



General (Biitox. 
REV. THOMAS SMITH, M.A., Edinburgh. 



\ 



THE WORKS 

OF 

/ 

THOMAS GOODWIN, D.D., 

SOMETIME PRESIDENT OF MAGDALENE COLLEGE, OXfORD. 



BY JOHN C. MILLER, D.D., 

LINCOLH COLLKOB ; HOHOICXRT CANo:i <JV WOBCCSIBB ; BECTOR 09 BX Ui.KTltl'S, BtRUlXQaXU. 

BY EGBERT HALLE Y, D.D., 

PUINUIPAL OF THE ISDKrENl>KNT NEW COLLLGE, LONDOX. 



VOL. VII. 

CONTAINING : 

OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION OF THEIR STATE BY CREATION 

OF GOSPEL HOLINESS IN THE HEART AND LIFE 

OF THE BLESSED STATE OF GLORY WHICH THE SAINTS POSSESS AFTER DEATH- 
THREE SEVERAL AGES OF CHRISTIANS IN FAITH AND OBEDIENCE 

man's RESTORATION BY GRACE ON REPENTANCE. 



EDINBURGH: JAMES NICHOL. 

LONDON : JA:\IES NISBET AND CO. DUBLIN : W. ROBERTSON. 



M.DCCC.LXIII. 



EDI>BnRGH : 

PRINTED BT JOHH GREIG AND SOS 

OLD PHYSIO GARDENS. 







CONTENTS. 



Paoe 

OF THE CREATUEES. AND THE CONDITION OF THEIR 

STATE BY CREATION. . . . . l 

Book I. — That the creatures are not God, but the works of his 
power. — They were not co-eternal with God. — The infinite 
distance between him and them. ... 3 

Book II. — Of the first estate of men and angels by their crea- 
tion. — What were the laws and rights of creation ; and 
what was equitably due between the Creator and his 
creature. — Of the state of the first man Adam in innocence, 
and what were his circumstances in that his primitive 
condition. ...... 22 



OF GOSPEL HOLINESS IN THE HEART AND LIFE, • 129 

B lOK I. — That graces and holy dispositions wrought in the 
soul are the springs and principles of evangelical obe- 
dience. — The first streams which flow from hence are 
inward actions of our souls in holy thoughts, and a lively 
sonsc and perception oi spiritual things, and a due appro- 
bation £n:l judgment of them as most excellent. — That 



Page 

our holiuess ought to be sincere and blameless. — That 
our obedience ought to abound in all fruits of righteous- 
ness, and to continue until the day of Chi-ist, . , 131 

Book II. — The demeanour of a Christian, as it is expressed 
under the notion of friendship with God. — The example 
of Abraham's being the friend of God. — How, in the sense 
of the apostle James, he was justified by works. — How 
great, excellent, and kind a friend God is to us. — How 
this consideration should engage us in a sincere friendship 
to him. — What are the duties and offices to be performed 
by us, as proper and owing to such a friendship. — Of the 
behaviour of a Christian, as it is named service to God, 178 

Book III. — Evangelical motives to obedience, drawn from the 
obligation which God hath laid upon us, by his appointing 
us unto good words, in his election of us, and by the 
greatness of his love manifested in the several instances 
of it. — Other motives urged from the consideration, that 
Christ having by his death conquered the devil, and 
destroyed his kingdom, we are by our Christian profes- 
sion engaged to hate him, and fight against him as a 
public enemy to Christ and us, and by all our actions to 
endeavour the ruin of his dark kingdom of sin. — Other 
motives deduced from the divine presence and majesty 
apparent in our holy services and performances ; and 
also from God's design in the revelation of his word, that 
1 we should not only read and know it, but practise it too. 23.3 

Book IV. — The danger of a loose, careless, and unfruitful 
profession ; or the danger of men's living under the dis- 
pensation and enjoyment of the ordinances of the gospel ; 
viz., the preaching of the word, the sacrament of the 
Lord's supper, and church communion, if they live in sin, 



CONTENTS. Vll 

Paob 



indulge their Insts, or bo unfruitful. — Two cases resolved : 
1. How fur a regenerate man is capable of sinning against 
knowledge ; 2, Wherein the sin against the Holy Ghost 
differs from other sins against knowledge. . . 296 



OF THK BLKSSlll) STATI<: OF GLORY WHICH THE 

SAIxXTS POSSESS AFTEli DEATH. ... 837 



THREE SEVERAL AGES OF CHRISTIANS IN FAITH 

AND OBEDIENCE. 473 



MAN'S RESTORATION BY GRACE. ... 619 



ON REPENTANCE. 543 



OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION OF 
THEIR STATE BY CREATION 



[ORIGINAL TITLE.] 



OF THE 

CREATURES, 

AND THE 

CONDITION 

OF THEIR 

STATE 

BY 

CREATION. 

BY 

THOMAS GOODWIN, D.D. 

LONDON, 

Printed in tlie Tear, MDCLXXXII. 



PROPElrP^^^. 






OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION OF 
THEIR STATE BY CREATION. 



BOOK I. 



TJiat the creatures are not God, hut the trorks of his potver. — Theij were not 
co-eternal uith God. — The infimte distance betu-een him and them. 



One God, . . of ivhom are all things. — 1 Cob. YIII. 6. 

CHAPTER I. 

The creatures are not God. — The absurdities of those ranting opinions ivhich 
assert it exposed. 

There hath risen up from out of the bottomless pit, in this age, a prodi- 
gious opinion, which hath been ventured and maintained with more daring 
impudence than men of themselves could have assumed, had not the devil 
inspired and blown up their fancies thereunto, viz., that all things which 
God hath made, are indeed but pieces and parcels of God himself; and 
that that which is caUed by the creation is but a turquoising of God, or 
God translated, as you do a great and large whole cloth when you cut it 
forth into garments of several fashions, as some of them have spoken ; 
whereas it is the creatures that are the ' garment that waxeth old,' Heb. i., but 
God is without so much as a ' shadow of turning.' If in his love to us (where- 
of that place speaks), much more in his essence, which is the ground of the 
unchangeableness of his love. They say, the visible appearance is indeed as 
of creatures, but really, materially, and substantially, they are all but God. 
So as I may rightly express this opinion of theirs, they would make a 
tran substantiation of the great God, such as the papists (though they in a 
contrary way to this) make a transubstantiated Christ. For what say they 
but that the creatures, or elements of bread and wine, are changed into the 
substance of the body and blood of Christ substantially ; yea, into Chi'ist 
himself, soul and body present, and lying veiled under the appearance of 



4 OF THE CEEATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK I. 

bread and wine. But these men would have the divine essence of God 
transubstantiated into the outward a^jpearance of several shapes of creatures, 
the substance of which is God, lying, as they would have it, hidden under 
that outward visibility. Thus they cursedly crumble the indivisible, 
simple nature of God into little fragments and parcels ; whereas that 
infinite, vast distance between him and us is, that *we are the clay, and he 
the potter.' They would have God to turn part of himself into clay, and 
become that clay ; and then the rest of himself, to become the potter over 
himself, and to metamorphose himself into shapes, as the heathens did 
their gods ; and to please himself in making himself, as children do their 
clay into clay pies, or the shapes of dogs, or lambs, and the like, as their 
fancies lead them. And yet forsooth they would seem to allow him the 
main bulk of his Godhead, to live abstracted from the creatures, and sepa- 
rate from their creature existence and appearance. For I do not find that 
they affirm the whole of God to be no other than what is shrouded under 
the appearance of the creature, and adequate to it ; yet they do make up 
some part of him, dispersed into creature appearance (as hath been said), 
and so as both make up together but one God, partly visible and partly 
invisible ; even like as Peter says of the earth that now is, that it ' partly 
stands out of the water and partly in the water,' 2 Pet. iii. 5, and both 
making but one globe, so here they frame one God ; whereas the Scrip- 
tures set him forth as a Being ' eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise 
God,' 1 Tim. i. 17, ' who dwelleth in hght inaccessible, whom no man 
hath seen, nor can see,' 1 Tim. vi. 16 ; and again, Isa. xlii. 8, * I am 
Jehovah, and my glory I will not give to another.' Now, that other is 
not, nor can be, any other but the creature, for it is only God and the 
creature that have any being, or pretence thereto ; when therefore God 
says, 'he will not give his glory to another,' the meaning is, he will not 
in any sort allow or endure the glory that is proper unto him as God to 
be given unto his creatures, any of them, in any respect ; much less hath 
he himself given that glory to them, that they should be God with himself, 
who are a different, yea, infinitely different, sort of being from him. And 
again, in Isa. xl. 15, having said 'that all nations before him are as no- 
thing, and are counted to him less than nothing and vanity,' the prophet's 
inference from thence is this, ' To whom then will ye liken me ? ' His 
next and immediate scope is, to confound their imaginations and outward 
lineaments made of him in graven images ; but then his argument for this 
runs higher and reacheth deeper : My being is such and so transcendent 
that you cannot match me with all nations or the souls of men, much less 
therefore draw any outward shape in graven images ; for ' who hath seen 
his shape at any time ?' Therefore also his being, wisdom, power, holi- 
ness is of another kind than ours ; the souls of men made wise and holy 
cannot match him. As thei'efore God is called the only good, and only 
wise, and only immortal, so by the same reason only is or hath a heinrj. 
And therefore the glory of his nature is, that it is incommunicable. Take 
his essence : we cannot attain to dwell in it, as he dwells in himself, that 
inhabiteth eternity — 1 Tim. vi. 16, ' Who only hath immortality, dwell- 
ing in the light which no man can approach unto, whom no man hath seen, 
nor can see ' — much less therefore can reach to the participation of him in 
his being and glory, so as to be himself. His being is proper to himself, 
and entire with himself. 

The devil of this opinion, that the creature is God, or at least a piece of 
him, hath haunted the world in former ages as well as it walks now. The 



Chap. I.J of their state by creation. 5 

philosophers had it up,- the poets amongst the heathen, and heretics among 
the Christians, downwards in all ages. My brethren, consider what Paul 
hath uttered, llom. i. 25 ; speaking of the heathen, he saith, ' They changed 
the truth of God into a lie' (that is, the essence and being of God), ' and 
worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed 
for ever. Amen.' In which speech at once he puts a bar and wall of sepa- 
ration between God's being and that of the creatures, and also adores the 
infinite blessedness of that his being entire within itself, as is not communi- 
cable to the creature ; and also speaks in opposition to the worshipping of 
creatures as God upon any account, much less as if they were essentially 
God. The Jews indeed, they would narrow God, by confining him to their 
temple ; and therefore God vindicates himself against that restraint by this, 
Isa. Ixvi. 1, ' I made all things : and where will you find me an house ?' 
But the heathen, they fancied God was like the creatures, and under that 
notion worshipped him in the creatures ; and in opposition thereunto said 
Isaiah also, ' To whom will ye liken me ?' speaking of heathenish 
idolatry. And Paul had an eye to both : Acts xvii. 24, ' God, that made 
the world, and all things therein, dwelleth not in temples made with 
hands ;' and again, ver. 29, ' We ought not to think that the Godhead is 
like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man's device.' The 
idolatry of the heathen did rise no higher (whatever the opinion of some 
of them was) than this, that ','they changed the truth' (or essence) 'of God 
into this lie,' by worshipping the creature as like unto God ; and yet 
thereby (whilst they knew it not) * they worshipped the creature more than 
God.' If God found fault with these, how must his jealousy rise up in 
fury against those that not only make the creature like to God, but make 
every creature to be God himself ! To these he might not only say, as to 
them, ' To whom will ye liken me ? ' but who, more impiously, do make 
the creature the same that I am. This is an idolatry which the generality 
of the heathen practised not. 

Are not we, as was said, the clay, and he the potter ? And are not 
those two distant enough, if we take but the distance between a man that 
is the potter and his clay, when yet the man himself, who is that potter, is 
made, as well as his pots are by him ? You find the comparison, Jer. 
xviii. 6, and Rom. ix. 21. But, to make God the potter, to turn himself 
to clay, and then to make vessels out of himself, and then for him to say 

* Hermes Trismegistus, 1. 5, ad filiam Tatium. ' Nihil est in universo mundo 
qnod non sit ipse. Deus est totum quod vides, totum quod non vides.' — Seneca. 
August. 1. contra Secundinum Manicheum, speaking against the opinion of the 
Manichees, argues thus : ' Si Dominus ejusdeni substantife Creator et Creatura 
essent, non reprehenderentur qui servi erant Creaturse potius quam Creatoris, quo- 
niam cuique serviissent ah eadem natura et substantia non recessissent ; cum vero 
reprehenduntur ab apostolo, et detestabiles habentur qui et servierunt Creaturis 
potius quam Creatori, satis ostenditur, illius et hujus diversas esse substantias,' 
Again, in Gerson's time, Gerhard : ' Qaidam se imaginati sunt per contemplationem 
ita uniri Deo, ut reipsa ipsorum natura in abyssali profundo submergantur ; pura 
humanitas annihiletur, et toto transeat in Divinitatem.' "Which also the Anabap- 
tists, which are called Methiists in Holland, have held of the humanity of Christ. 
Also Servetus, as Calvin hath it, held ' Deitatem in omnibus Creaturis esse sub- 
stantialiter.' So Calvin, Tract. Theolog., page 609 and 657. Also Sebastianus 
Franck, ' In trunco, Deum esse truncum, in porco porcum, in diabolo diabolum ' : 
Calvin, cap. 13, speaking of Lucretinus, one of them, ' Sum Deus,' saith he._ And 
since then, Wigelius ; and of old, Dionysius : ' Esse omnium est ipsa Divinitas, 
omne quod vides, et quod non vides.' Lucan, 1. 3, 'Jupiter is est quodcunque vides 
quocunqu© moveris.' 



6 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION I BoOK I. 

again unto his pots as made out of himself, ' Return, je sons of men, into 
God again' (as their fancies are), is not this a goodly religion ? A goodly 
religion indeed ! ' ye potsherds of the earth,' know your distance from 
your Creator ; you are of a diflering metal ! * Let the potsherds of the 
earth rant it against their fellow-potsherds of the earth,' as Isaiah hath it, 
chap. xlv. 9, and not think to vie with your Creator, as if you were pieces 
of him, yea, fellow-mates with him, whenas you are less than nothing : 
Isa. si. 17, ' They are nothing ; yea, less than nothing.' He hatli much 
ado to keep himself from denying them a name of being ; and even that 
vanisheth whilst compared with him. And if they had been a drop of him, 
taken altogether they could not have added to this ocean ; but if they be 
nothing, and less than nothing, then sure they are no parts of him ; of 
which afterwards. 

Again, To argue this from invincible reason. If all things were God, all 
difierence of good and evil would be taken away, and God should sin in all 
that is acted in and by the creature, which is that these men do aim at, 
to have their consciences discharged of all obligations. If they can once 
persuade their souls that they are God, then as God sins not, so nor do 
they. 

Again, If so, then there would be no obligation between the Creator and 
the creature, nor any law which they are obliged unto ; which also they 
would obliterate out of their own and other men's consciences, in saying 
that it proceeds from the degenerate ignorance of the creature, and their 
unbelief of what they truly are, that they think themselves subject to a law. 

Again, There could be no redemption, the creature needed it not; for it 
could never be lost from God, it being substantially a piece of himself. 
Nor God could make no election nor reprobation among his creatures ; for 
himself were both that which is chosen, and what is condemned ; and he 
would then be condemning himself, or self-condemned. And God should 
hate part of himself ; whereas ' no man ever yet hated his own flesh,' Eph. 
V. 29 ; but the Scripture says in the name of God, ' Esau have I hated,' 
&c., Rom. ix. 13. 

Again, All the idolatry of the nations would be justified by this ; yea, 
even such idolatiy as the light of the wisest of them condemned. 
' Oil sanctas gentes, quibus hsec nascuntur in hortis, 
Nuruina ! ' — Juven. 
Condemning the Egyptians worshipping herbs for gods ; yea, not only 
herbs, but serpents, * four-footed beasts and creeping things ; 'which the 
apostle, Rom. i. 23 (' And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into 
an image made like to con'uptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, 
and creeping things'), toucheth upon. Oh ! * these are the gods, Israel;' 
and not only these, but the devil himself, that old sei*pent, for he is a 
creature too. Yea, men might worship their own draught, and so make 
a god of that, which God himself, in so much scorn, speaks of the heathens' 
gods by the prophet, a dunghill god,* I)ii stercorarii. It might further be 
said that God creates himself, and creates nothing but himself ; that oijus 
est artifex, himself the work of his own hand, and yet the maker too. 

It is true indeed, the Scripture says, that ' all things are of him,' and 
* all things are thine,' as David in his panegyric made to God. It is also 
said of him, that he is ' above all, and in you all, and through all,' Eph. 
iv. 6. It is also said, that * God is all in all' ; but it is nowhere said, that 
God is all things, or that all things are God himself. 

* See Deut. xxix. 17, marginal reading. — Ed. 



Chap. II.] of their state by creation. 7 

CHAPTER n. 

The creatures u-ere not from eternity existing in God. 

Some Platonic divines have fancied the creatures to have been existent 
in God, and with God, from eternity ; and their creation to have been but 
God's putting them forth of himself into a visibihty, who yet when they 
thus lay hid, were then in as true a way of being as now they are. 

I will not enter into that controversy which the schoolmen have stirred, 
whether a creatui-e might have been from eternity or no. 

Only first we say, that it is an incommunicable attribute of God, that 
he ' inhabits eternity,' as it imports ; that he both dwelt himself alone from 
eternity, when there were none of these made things to dwell in, or with 
him, no heavens or earth to fill ; as also, that he is eternity alone to 
himself, and dwelt in himself. 

We do thus far acknowledge, that all things were in God's foreknowledge 
and decree ; in esse volito, as Aquinas speaks. So also in Acts xv. 18 : 
' Ivnown unto God are all his works from the beginning.' And to say 
that all things were in God virtually (as they would mince it, and distin- 
guish upon it) is but to say they have a being in the power of God, as 
worms have in the sun, which it will bring forth to-morrow ; and so all 
things that never were, and that never shall be, but were and remain mere 
possibilia, things only possible, may be said to be in God. But to the point 
itself. 

Eternity in God, and the creatures' being in time, is made a vast and 
broad distinction between God and them. Ps. xc. 2 : ' Before the mountains 
were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed the earth, even from ever- 
lasting to everlasting, thou art God.' His arms spanned both eternities. 
They are called ' the everlasting arms,' Deut. xxxiii. 27. Whereas the best 
of creatures have but half an eternity, they are to everlasting, but noi from 
everlasting. This is proper to God only, in opposition to the creatures, 
for it was before they were brought fox-th. And their being to everlasting 
is derived from God, for of him it is said, 1 Tim. vi. 16, ' T\Tio only hath 
immortality,' that is, of himself. 

2. Upon the same account it is made the difference between Christ and 
the creatures, that he is from eternity, not they ; and this because he 
is God. Ps. cii. 24, 25 (which, in the first of the Hebrews, is apphed by 
Paul unto Chi-ist) : ' I said, my God, take me not away in the midst of 
my days : thy years are throughout all generations. Of old hast thou laid 
the foundations of the earth.' Others read it, ' before thou laidst the foun- 
dations of the earth.' The word Lepanim* or ' of old,' refers to the words 
afore, thus, ' Thy years are throughout all generations, afore thou laidst 
the foundations of the earth.' And here also is found a general opposition 
to all creatm-es ; for as he had mentioned the earth, so he mentions ^the 
heavens, as it follows, ' and the heavens are the work of thy hands.' Now 
the heavens and the earth comprehend all. 

Again, 3dly, This very same difference and distinction of the creatures 
and Christ is held forth in John i. 1, compared with Hebrews i., where 
these words of the psahnist are cited. In John i. ver. 1, shewing Christ's 
pecuUar dignity, and his being God, he says, ' He was in the beginning :' 
the same beginning which Moses meant, when he said, ' In the begmning 
• That is, ' □''is'?.'— Ed. 



8 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK I. 

God created,' which notes out existence afore ; and it is spoken in oppo- 
sition to the world as made. So ver. 10, * the world was made by him ;' 
which that in that first of the Hebrews fully clears and explains, answering 
both to John and the psalmist : Heb. i. 10, ' And thou, Lord, in the begin- 
ning hast laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the works 
of thy hands ;' that is, he was so in the beginning of the making of all 
things whatsoever, so as to be the founder of them, and therefore existing 
afore them. In which place of John, two things are said of him in differ- 
ence from creatures : first, that he was * with God' before, which the creatures 
were not, nor existent in him as he was ; and further, secondly, much less 
were they God before, as he was, but they all were made by him. Add to 
this (to shew it was his pecuHar privilege above the creation, that he thus 
was with God) that in Prov. viii. ver. 24, ' When there was no depths, I 
was brought forth ; when there was no fountains abounding with water : 
before the mountains were settled ; before the hills was I brought forth : 
while as yet he had not made the earth,' &c. So on to the 30th verse, * Then 
was I with him as one brought up with him.' This Wisdom makes her boast 
of, as a prerogative no creature had ; and Wisdom, in the Proverbs, is put 
for the person of Christ himself. So Luke xi. 49, compared with Luke vii. 
34, 35, wherein Christ, speaking of himself, says in that 11th chap. 49, 
' Therefore also said the Wisdom of God, I will send them prophets and 
apostles,' &c. And in Luke vii. 35 he expressly says, ' This Wisdom is he 
who was the Son of man ;' ver. 34, ' The Son of man is come eating and 
drinking, and ye say. Behold a gluttonous man,' &c. * But Wisdom is jus- 
tified of her children' : so plainly afiirming of himself, I myself am that 
Wisdom spoken of, which is justified of my children ; and in Mat. xi. 19, 
he says the same. And that speech, ' The Wisdom of God said, I will send 
prophets and apostles,' &c., as it must refer in general to some speech or 
other, somewhere in the Old Testament, uttered by one that takes on him 
to be a person, as the I imports, and that person styled ' the Wisdom of 
God,' so particularly it refers unto what Wisdom had said of herself in the 
book of the Proverbs, chap, i., from ver. 29 to the end, of * sending forth 
preachers,' by whom she ' utters her voice in the streets, and cries in the 
chief places of concourse.' And when our Saviom' Christ speaks of that 
union which he had with the Father in that his prayer, John xvii., he says, 
that he had a * glory with the Father before the world was ;' and this he 
makes a peculiar privilege of himself, as being then a person who was then 
existing, and so were* that glory afore God the Father. Whereas, if all the 
elect had existed in God actually then, as well as Christ, this had not been 
peculiar unto him ; and yet there also he speaks of their existence in God's 
decree and election, ' Thine they were,' John xvii. 6. And, therefore, what 
he says of himself, of the glory that he had before the world was, must be 
spoken by reason of an existence besides that which he had in decree, which 
existence the elect had not. 

Thirdly, By this God doth set forth his own greatness to humble Job, 
and in him the whole creation ; and how poor a Job doth he make of him ! 
And if that God himself should speak unto these blasphemers of our days, 
as he did to Job there, how would they instantly shake and tremble, and 
fall to nothing, unless he supported them ! You have Job xxxviii. 2, 3, 
God steps in from behind the hangings, as one that had, undiscerned, over- 
heard Job's rantings and standings upon his points : ' Who is this,' says 
God, ' that darkens counsel by words without knowledge ? Gird up now 
■* Qu. ' wore ?' — Ed. 



Chap. II,] of their state by creation. 9 

thy loins like a man,' if thou hast any mettle, or the spirit of a man in 
thee ; and to confound thee, I will ask thee but one question : * For I will 
demand of thee, and answer thou me but this one thing : "Where wast thou 
when I laid the foundations of the earth ? declare, if thou hast under- 
standing. Nay; canst thou tell who hath laid the measures thereof? or 
who hath stretched the line upon it ? Whereupon are the foundations 
thereof fastened ? or who hath laid the corner-stone thereof ?' God 
hereby shook up Job so, and gave him such a rattling, and yet appeared 
not as he is in himself, but speaks all this out of a whirlwind, which he 
took to cover him. And the issue with Job of all this was, as in 
chap. xlii. 6, ' I abhor myself in dust and ashes.' You see this once and 
first query, which is home to the point in hand, and point-blank, as we say, 
against that wicked opinion, which asserts all things to be co-eternal with 
God. These God chose out of all other weapons, to overthrow Job with ; 
* Where wert thou ?' Alas ! thou hadst no being then, much less know- 
ledge of these things. But according to this wretched opinion, risen up 
in these days, if true. Job might have answered boldly, ' I was with thee,' 
and ' I was in thee,' and in a happier state of union with thee than I am in 
now : not in a state of union with flesh and blood, but one in spirit with 
thee. Ay, indeed, says God (speaking ironically to him), * Knowest thou 
it, because thou wast then born?' ver. 21. Thou art very old. Job, and 
of great standing, and ' the number of thy days is great,' as it follows there. 

Now, if the creatures, or the souls of men, had really been existent in 
God, and as truly as Chi-ist himself, as to his existence, no otherwise than 
they affirm themselves to have been, then God might as well have said to 
Christ, * Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth ?' But 
such a question Christ hath prevented, and put out of question, saying, 
Prov. viii. 29. ' Then I was by him ;' yea, and * was his counsellor,' as 
Isa. xl. 13. Both which are spoken there of Christ. 

And whereas it is objected by those men, that in that Proverbs viii. it is 
also affirmed, that the sons of men, who were his elect, did then exist in 
God, in a sportful life in God, together with Christ, because it is said, 
ver. 31, that he was ' rejoicing in the habitable part of his earth : and,' it 
follows, ' my delights were with the sons of men ; ' and that therefore, 
though men did not exist under the appearance of flesh and blood as now, 
yet they were existing in spirit in him and with him ; and that they being 
put out of God, into the veil of flesh and blood, therefore it was that 
Christ came forth from God after them, and took flesh and blood also ; for 
so they apply that of the Hebrews ii. 13, 14. 

The answer is clear, that it proves the clear contrary out of the very 
text ; for Christ's rejoicing then is said to have been ' in the habitable 
parts of his earth.' Therefore it must be meant of men as inhabiting the 
earth, and not as existing with him from eternity. Ver. 26 of Prov. viii. 
tells us that they ' were not then made.' Hence, therefore, his rejoicing 
in them must necessarily be spoken in respect of the foresight of what 
they should be, and so as existing afore the world, but in God's decree, in 
respect of what he would after make them to be, and thereby presented to 
him beforehand as foreviewing what those children should be whom God 
hath given to him, when once they should come to inhabit this earth ; and 
such, to be sure, they were not actually then, for he expressly saith, ver. 23, 
these his delights were afore the earth itself was. 

And had there been, as then, any other existence of them but in fore- 
sight and decree, as the cause of that he delighted in them, he would much 



10 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK I. 

rather have mentioned that as the object of his present delight, than this 
other -which was so long after to come, when they should inhabit and dwell 
here on earth below. And if alUhad been in God before in being, why 
then all might pray as well as Christ, ' Glorify us with that glory we had 
with thee before the world was ; ' and then they might say of themselves, 
even as Christ saith of himself, ' You shall see the Son of man ascend up 
where he was before.' 

And then likewise, that had not been true which the apostle says, 1 Cor. 
sv. 46, where, speaking of David's* creation, he says, ' That was not fii'st 
which is spmtual, but that which is natural, and afterwards, that which is 
spii-itual;' whereas, had they had an 'existence in God in spirit' before 
the world was, then he had first been that which is spiritual, and after- 
wards that which is natural. 

And then, again, that benefit of creation, which yet we are taught to 
praise God so much for, had been a worsting of the condition of these elect 
ones, a shooting them out of a spiritual condition into a natural, without 
any sin of theirs. 



CHAPTER in. 

The infinite distance hetiveen God and the creatures, in res2-)ect that he is the 
maker and preserver of them ; in that also he is eternal, and so before they 
had being he dwelt alone in himself, and possessed all things in himself. — 
He is the high and lofty One, and is so supiremely excellent, as it transcends 
all other ; his name is holy, and so is above the creatures, and separated 
from them. — The true name of Being is proper only to God: the creatures 
are but the shadows and appearances of being. 

For thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, ichose name is 
holy : I dwell in the high and holy jAace, ivith him also that is of a contrite 
and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart 
of the contrite ones. — Isaiah LVII. 15. 

Thus saith the Lord, The heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool: 
where is the house that ye build unto me ? and ivhere is the place of my rest ? 
For all those things hath mine hand made, and all those things have been, 
saith the Lord : but to this man icill I look, even to him that is j^oor, and 
of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word. — Isaiah LXVI. 1, 2. 

Here is the highest and the lowest met dwelling together : the highest 
God, and the lowest and poorest of his creatui'es. 

The prophet had just in the chapter afore, the 65th, ver. 25, foretold a 
like wonder to this : ' the wolf and the lamb shall feed together ;' which, 
in chap. xi. 6, is varied thus, ' The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the 
calf and the young lion,' &c., which, if literally understood, were a wonder 
in nature. But behold, a greater is here : ' the high and lofty One that 
inhabits eternity, whose name is holy,' dwells with the sinner who is 
' contrite ' and ' broken ' in heart for it. This is a wonder in grace ; or 
rather, the wonder of grace. 

The language the words are penned in is God's, and could be no other's 
for him. The thoughts of the creature could not have invented such a 
* Qu. ' Adam's ' ?— Ed. 



Chap. IIL] of tueir statk by creation. 11 

style to speak to him in ; and God's scope therein is by Ufting up and 
exalting his ovra greatness above all creatures, withal to discover the height 
and depth of his grace in so condescending to the meanest of creatures, 
than which himself accounts nothing more his glory. 

As to my presently scope, it is not to enlarge upon the description of a 
broken heart, or of God's aflfecting and delighting therein to dwell, or his 
grace shewn thereby ; but my present design is to enlarge upon the height 
and distance which God bears above us and his whole creation, considered 
as we are creatures. Nor is my scope simply to set forth what God is in 
himself, but as here he is set out comparatively with his creatures ; limit- 
ing my discourse herein, also, only unto what description he makes of 
himself here in the text. And the use I shall put it to will be, to humble 
us as creatures, even in our best estate, and not as sinners only. 

This comparative distance of this height above us, is set forth in these 
particulars : 

I. * I, the maker and preserver.' And these things were made and do 
exist by me. 

First, The maker. So in both places : in Isa. Ixvi. 2, ' All these have 
my hands made.' The very tenor of this speech is a slighting them as 
creatures : and being ' they are but made things, and will ye compare them 
to me ? ' It is as if an artificer should speak of his works made by him, 
that are different from himself. These are the clay and my pots, and I am 
the potter. He speaks of them as a potter would do of his potsherds, so 
distant from himself, the maker. Or he speaks thus of them, with differ- 
ence from his own internal acts of his mind within himself ; whereas these 
are utterly external, and out of himself. * These have my hands made, ' 
as an artificer would speak of his manufactures and works without him. 
And then in Isa. Ivii., the other scripture, ver. 16, ' The souls' (the subjects 
of this my grace) * which I have made.' In both, he speaks of them as 
made by him, and the souls made altogether, i.e., the whole of their being, 
as Ps. xxxiii. 15, for creation is productio totius entis ; Acts xvii. 25, ' He 
giveth to all life and all things ;' and ver. 28, being itself; * In him we live, 
and have our being ;' and Rom. xi. 36, ' Of him are all things ;' and there- 
fore, not so much as a first matter was existing to his hands. But ' all 
these have my hands made.' 

Secondly, The preserver, as giving and continuing. To give them exist- 
ence ; as those words in chap. Ixvi. 2, ' And all these things have been, 
saith the Lord,' Piscator renders. Per eum existunt omnia ; to which that 
of Acts xvii. 28 corresponds, ' In him we live, and move, and have our 
being,' i.e., as the original, so the continuance of them. He gives life, 
ver. 25, and then preserves it. In him we continue to have it ; thus both 
Paul and Isaiah. 

II. ' Inhabiting eternity,' which he speaks, first, with exclusion of all 
things made, as things that have not, de facto, been from eternity ; and 
notes out an eminent distinction put thereby between them and him, Ps. 
xc. 2 : * Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst 
formed the earth and the world, from everlasting to everlasting thou art 
God.' And whereas some creatures, as angels and men's souls, have an 
eternity of existence to come, yet that is but derived. It is he is said only 
to have ' immortality,' 1 Tim. vi., and therefore he is called the last as 
well as the first. That though they be eternal for time to come, yet he is 
after them all ; which could not have been said but in respect that creatures 
their eternity doth depend on him ; and so he is the last, though they 



12 OF THE CKEA.TURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK I. 

continue with liim foi' ever. God hath eternity, both past and to come ; 
and this is proper to him. 

Secondly, The phrase here, * inliahitinrj eternity,' is unusual, and signifi- 
cant of far more than simplj' that God is eternal in both respects aforesaid. 
It imports, over and besides, 1, That he hath dwelt alone, and shall dwell 
alone for ever apart, by and in himself ; whether afore any creature were 
or since, it is all one as to this. For himself is that eternity which he 
dwelt in, and shall dwell in : 1 Sam. xv. 29, ' The Eternity of Israel will 
not lie,' so it is varied in the margin. And since the creatui'es was, he is 
bis own proper mansion-house, even as he was before. 

First, That afore any creature was, he dwelt alone, that is evident; for they 
not being or existing, he must needs have had an eternity past alone to him- 
self, which he says he dwelt in, and no creature with him. Not only 
there was no other God with him (as Moses), but no creature with him (as 
Solomon), Prov. viii. from verse 23 to 32. So that what was said of 
Israel, that they were a people that dwelt alone, Deut. xxxiii. 28, the same 
may be said of the God of Israel ; he was utterly without all society of any 
creature. 

And secondly, It is all one after he hath made the creatures ; ho still 
dwells in his own eternity, apart by himself.* It is one of the attributes 
which Paul gives him, 1 Tim. vi. 16, ' Who only hath immortaUty, dweUing 
in the light which no man can approach unto.' And therefore you see in 
Isa. Ixvi., that since he hath made heaven and earth, how yet he speaks of 
the whole creation : * Where will ye fiaid me a place for my rest ?' which 
imports, that since he made the world, he dwells by himself apart in the 
same eternity he did. His making of creatures was not to add to or enlarge 
his dwelling, that he might inhabit more commodiously (as it is with man, 
whose person is one thing, and whose house is another). No. Their 
building is not a new piece of an house to him who alone inhabits eternity, 
that is, himself. 

It is true, that now he hath made all these things, if he should not be 
everywhere, where any of them are, and ' through them all,' as Paul's 
phrase is, Eph. iv., he should not be God, the immense God : ' I fill heaven 
and earth,' saith he, Jer. xxiii. 24 ; seeing they are made, he fills them also, 
yet so as still he is not beholding to them for room or place. As the sun 
filleth the air, but is not beholding to it for the place it afibrds it, but the air 
to the sun that fills it. 

Thirdly, That he inhabiteth eternity shews that he possesseth all things 
in himself, for himself is his own eternity to himself ; and that eternity 
being an house to himself, is furnished with all things within himself. 
He went not then out of himself for anything, nor needs he yet to do so 
— as Acts xvii. 25, 'He needs not anything' — but was abundantly 
supplied with all things within himself, as a gi-eat man in his own 
house, whose glory it is to have all things sufficiently about him therein 
and therewith. 

Fourthly, That he inhabiteth eternity imports that his being is so infinite, 
as he fills the immense expanse of all or both eternities in one moment. 
He comprehends and compasseth the whole, and all within himself, and 
extends himself through it all ; he is the king of ages, that is, of the courses 
of times, 1 Tim. i. 17 ; and so as a king hath all ages as subjects always 
extant afore him. In the 40th of Isaiah it is said, he ' spanneth the heavens,' 

* The Jews call him MaJcom [i. e., DipQ— Ed.], place, because he is place to 
himself — his own centre and his own circumference. 



CUAP. III.] OF THEIR STATE BY CREATION. 13 

and it is a good grasp that, you will say ; but that is spoken only of a thing 
that is now at present existing ; but in Dcut. xxxiii. 27 ye read, he hatli 
• everlasting arms :' a right arm to environ eternity, a parte ante, eternity 
past, and another that to come, and so encircles both eternities, past and 
to come, without succession of time to him. Eternity is but a moment to 
bim ; a to viiv atemitatis, as the schoolmen speak ; for he comprehends it 
within the arms of his infinitely extensive being. As he subsists not in 
place per partes, so nor in time by parts. He runs not through a time 
past, present, and to come. His duration is not measured by the differ- 
ences of time ; for then it might be said, as to time to come, he as yet is 
not. By the same reason that a ' thousand years are but as one day to him,' 
by the same j'ou may say, that eternity is but one instant. He inhabits, 
that is, possesseth even the whole continually ; he builds not one part of 
his eternity in one age, and another part in another, so that he should 
dwell in it by piecemeal and successively ; nor yet removes he his habi- 
tation, as men that have gi-eat houses do, from one part of their house, as 
in winter (suppose), and to another in summer, and the other part standing 
empty the while. No ; but from eternity to eternity is but one entire indi- 
vidual and complete house for the whole of him at once to fill, who is 
fulness of being in the intenseness of perfection. And hence he enjoyeth 
all blessedness in an instant ;* not as we, one part this moment, and another 
piece in another, which, when put together, do make a complete happiness, 
but in a succession. 

Fifthly, His house is always one and the same, and never hath any 
decay, or needs the least reparation in any part of it. His eternity is an 
immutability and unchangeableness. He is semj^er idem; his style is 
always I am, and I will he, Ehieh, that is, always the same, and the 
cause of my own being. And by this also his eternity is differenced from 
the creatures ; all of them ' wax old as a garment,' and of themselves they 
■would do so, did not God renew their being eveiy moment. The angels 
would wax old, as the children of Israel's garments in the wilderness did not, 
but it was because God perpetually kept them as new. But of God it fol- 
lows, * Thou art the same,' Ps. cii. 27 ; and therefore us and our years he 
compareth to a flood, Ps. xc. 5, that is always running and in succession, 
but him to a rock of ages that stands (as the phrase in the original is, Ps. 
cii. 26) immoveable. 

III. ' The high and lofty One.' 

The high One : for the transcendency and supreme excellency of his being. 
The lofty One : for the sovereignty and dominion of it. 

The high. It is a common title given him in the Old and New Testament, 
the ' high God,' and the ' Lord on high,' ' God most high ;' Ps. Ixxxiii. 18, 
' The most High over all the earth.' And in the New, * the Highest,' three 
times in one chapter, Luke i. 

And to take the height of him, let us first take into consideration the 
course and way the Scripture (as condescending to our sense) useth to set 
this forth by, which is by a comparative, and rising up fi:om one degree to 
another ; and it begins thus : 

1. In respect of place, which yet is the lowest kind of height. And for 
this take EHphaz his staff in Job xxii. 12, * Behold the height of the stars, 
how high they are.' (How high is God then ? so riseth he,) * Is not God 
in the height of the heavens ?' as it immediately follows thereupon. 

2. In dignity and dominion, he is said to be ' higher than all nations on 
♦ The philosopher said of him, that God doth aiu cc^rX^v ^al^nv Tjbovrjv. 



14 OF THE CREATURES, AKD THE CONDITION [BoOK I. 

earth' (which are in dignity exceeding, and more high than the stars), 
' higher than all the people,' Ps. xcis. 2, whom (as elsewhere it is said), 
' he rules and stills at his pleasure.' And Ps. cxiii. 4, ' The Lord is 
high above all nations.' 

3. But yet you will say. So are kings that are set over the nations. And if 
you do suppose but one man to be king of all the world (as the Koman 
emperors once), it may be said that he is higher than all the nations. 

But thirdly. He is over all the kings of the earth ; that is another ascent. 
' He is higher than the highest, and there are higher than they,' i. e., who 
are between him and them : Eccles. v. 8, For he is ' higher than the 
highest, and there be higher than they.' The iheij are the rulers of this 
earth, whom he there speaks of; and those that are ' higher than they' 
are the angels. But he is the highest absolutely, singularly, higher than 
the highest, above the angels themselves. All principalities and powers, 
both in heaven and earth, they are under his feet. ' He is the blessed and 
only potentate,' 1 Tim. vi. 15 ; and so in Ps. xcvii. 9, * Thou, Lord, art 
high above all the earth ;' it follows, ' Thou art exalted above all the gods,' 
i. e., angels, whether good or bad, which the heathens worshipped. 

4. To shew the height and super-excellency of his dignity and dominion, 
he was pleased to give this demonstration ; he did on purpose build a place 
for himself, separate from and far ' above all things' else which he had 
made, and calls it here, * The high and holy place,' in this 57th chapter, 
and * heaven is my throne,' in the 66th chapter ; and that is the ' highest 
of heavens,' as a place separate, and an apartment for himself to dwell in 
after he had made creatures, until Christ, that was made higher than the 
heavens, pierced (as the phrase in Heb. iv. is), and broke up that separate 
place ' prepared from the foundation of the world,' which is to the rest of 
heaven as the * holy of hoUes' was to the other parts of the temple, which 
the high priest only went into ; which the angels by the law of their crea- 
tion, and right of their creatureship, did not enjoy as the first place of 
their habitation, and in which, had the angels that fell been inhabitants, 
they had never fallen. For as it is the high, so the holy place, wherein the 
immutable glory of God so shiueth, as would immutably have fixed them 
in holiness unto God, that they should never have departed from him. 
God's height, even as in respect to this high place, is often set out there- 
by, as that he is ' higher than the highest heaven :' Ps. cxiii. 5, ' His glory 
is above the heavens ; who is like unto the Lord, who dwelleth on high ?' 

5. Let us rise one ascent yet higher, which the gospel afi"ords us of the 
man Jesus united personally to the Son of God, who is gone into heaven, 
and is on the right hand of God, angels, and authorities, and powers 
being made subject to him, as they are said to be under his feet, Eph. 
i, 21, 22, and who therefore is said by that personal union to ' be made 
higher than the heavens,' Heb vii. 26 ; and all this is spoken of the man 
Jesus, for it is said he was made thus high. And yet, lo, how afore this 
high and lofty One he humbleth himself; ' I am a worm,' which is lower 
than the footstool man treads on : Ps. xxii. 3, 6, * Thou art holy; but I am 
a worm, and no man.' Thus he speaks of himself before he ascended, and 
did thus humble himself at God's command. And now when he is ascended 
• far above all heavens,' as Eph. iv. 10, ' He that descended is the same 
also that ascended up far above all heavens, that he might fill all things,' 
he is yet but at God's right hand ; the throne is God's, who is higher 
than this highest. ' My Father is gi-eater than I.' 

But all this hath been but a comparative way of shewing his highness. 



Chap. III.] of their state by creation. 15 

His being the high and lofty One, notes forth the transcendency and 
super-excellency of his divine being itself in itself, and that it is utterly 
of another kind from creatures, and indeed that it only is being. In Ps. 
Ixxxiii. 18, * That men may know that thou, whose name alone is Jehovah, 
art the most High over all the earth,' he thereby argues his height from 
his name, that his name is alone Jehovah, and therefore he is most high, 
and in that very respect. Now Jehovah, we know, is the name of his 
essence, ' I am,' and here it is that men may know that thou, whose name 
alone is Jehovah, art the most High ; and therefore most high in respect 
of such a glorious being as is proper alone unto him. In Eph. iv. 6 he is 
said to be ' above all,' and yet to be ' through all,' i. e., his creatures. His 
being above all shews the transcendency of his being, spoken of separate 
from all ours, not intercommuning with ours, nor intermingled, although it 
is said he is through all too ; but as the sunbeams intermingle not with the 
air, though they shine through the air, so nor doth God with creatures. 

Here I might amplify upon the glory of this his title, that he is the most 
High in respect of his being, that he alone hath the name Jehovah, as the 
Psalmist saith, and also of being ; that all the creatures are but the shadow 
of being, but he only is. But I shall defer it unto the use. 

IV. ' T^Tiose name is Holy.' 
' First, It is a name that is proper to God, as Christ saith : Mat. xix. 17, 
* There is none good but God,' so nor holy. He is separate and alone in 
his holiness, as he is alone in his being. And if he only be good, then 
much more is he only holy, for holiness is the height and perfection of 
goodness ; so in man, and so in God. And Kev. xv. 4 you have it express, 
' who only is holy,' and * the holy One,' as elsewhere. Now of all that 
could have been said or attributed to him, this sets up God the highest, and 
as most sovereign. And this, of all others, layeth us low, both as we are 
creatures and as we are sinners. Holiness is said to be his dreadful name : 
Ps. xcix. 2, 3, * The Lord is high above all people ;' it follows, ' Let them 
praise thy great and terrible name ; for it is holy,' and that makes him 
high. Aid again, at the 5th verse, ' Exalt ye tlae Lord our God, and 
worship at his footstool ;' for he is holy ; nay, the margin varieth it, ' his 
footstool is holy,' i. e., the ground he sets his feet on. The like you have 
in the 9th verse. 

Secondly, This separates him fi-om the creatures ; for holiness imports 
a separation, as it is in common applied to anything, person, place, or 
time. Christ was separate from sinners, made higher than the heavens, 
but God from creatures. 

Thirdly, Holiness is that whereby God aims at his own glory, as the 
angels' cry shews in that 6th of Isaiah ver. 3, ' Holy, holy, holy : the 
whole earth is filled with thy glory ;' as being that which the attribute 
of holiness in him aims at from his creatures. And that being the only 
attribute mentioned when his glory doth there appear, ver. 1, and is beheld 
by Isaiah and the angels, this and the single conjunction to holiness and 
glory argues it. Now he being so great a God, his desii*es of glory fi-om 
the creature are so vast and so intensive, as the creatm'es cannot come up 
unto, nor satisfy ; for as Kom. i. 21 hath it, he would be glorified as God, 
which the creatures cannot reach to the height of. Two scriptures put 
together do shew this : Job xv. 15, ' Behold, he putteth no trust in his saints ; 
yea, the heavens are not clean in his sight ;' and he means the angels, who 
are called heavens. And they are the good angels he means is manifest, 
those who have kept their station in heaven ; and yet all their holiness, you 



16 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK I. 

see, makes tliem not clean in his pure eyes. Thus Joh iv. 17, 18, ' Shall 
mortal man be more just than God ? shall a man be more pure than his 
Maker ? Behold, he put no trust in his servants ; and his angels he 
charged with folly.' We sinners are unclean privatively, wanting that 
holiness we were created in, and positively defiled ; but the best of his 
creatures are negatively not clean, because they answer not, nor come up 
unto his immense desires of glory from them. He would have more, 
though it cannot be had. But of this deficiency and falling short of 
creature holiness as to God, I shall speak in the use. 

Use. To humble you, as you are creatures, afore this Majesty on high. 
I would humble ye, I say, as you are creatm-es, as well as that you are 
sinners ; which latter, I know, you do every day. I do not say that you 
are to humble yourselves as much simply as you are creatures as that you 
are sinners, yet you are to do it as truly. It is to be an humbling of our- 
selves this, though in another way. We humble ourselves as sinners by 
way of mom-ning and godly soitow ; but this as creatures by way of self- 
emptiness and sense of our own nothingness and vanity. They are both 
in the text ; he speaks of the humble considering themselves as creatures, 
and the contrite ones as sinners. And God is therefore represented, first, 
as the high and lofty One inhabiting eternity, to humble us as creatures ; 
and secondly, as holy, to humble us as sinners, though that will humble 
us as creatures too. I enforce this use from this, that to teach you to 
humble yourselves as creatm-es is a piece of the gospel ; and where you have 
the gospel spoken of, there you have this also. As in Isa. xl. 3, the 
beginning of the preaching of the gospel is prophesied of : ' The voice of 
him that crieth in the wilderness,' &c., which was John Baptist's ministry; 
and then follows the prophecy of all the apostles' preaching which succeeded 
John, * Zion, that bringeth good tidings,' ver. 9. Now among other 
things, what was it John was to cry and the apostles to preach ? Even 
this, ' All flesh is grass,' &c. Verses 6-8, ' The voice said. Cry. And he 
said. What shall I cry ? All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof 
is as the flower of the field : the grass withereth, the flower fadeth ; because 
the Spirit of the Lord bloweth upon it : surely the people is grass. The 
grass withereth, the flower fadeth ; but the word of our God shall stand 
for ever.' Which the apostle Peter applieth unto that very word and 
gospel which was spoken by himself and the other apostles : 1 Peter i. 25, 
* But the word of the Lord endureth for ever. And this is the word which 
by the gospel is preached unto you.' And this was done by the ' revealing 
of the glory of the Lord Christ,' namely, discovered in the gospel : Isa. 
xl. 5, ' And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see 
it together : for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.' Now observe that 
there is in that chapter a setting forth of God in his greatness, to the end 
thus to humble the creature, such as you have not in all the Scriptures. 
So as indeed we should lose a piece of our rehgion if we do not attend to 
this ; and I will here suppose myself to have a congregation of Adams and 
Eves, men and women, in that pure and first estate ; yea, and I will take 
the angels in also before they fell, and some angels are here at present this 
day ; but if all were here in their original estate, or those that are now in 
their confirmed estate, I might preach this seiTuon to them, reminding them 
©f their estate by creation, to humble them as they are cre9,tures in that 
estate. 

And to enforce this the more, I take in that additional to my text, Ps. 
cxiii. 5, 6, ' Who is like unto the Lord our God, who dwelleth on high, 



Chap. III.] of their state by creation. 17 

irho humbh'th himself to behold the things that aro in heaven, and in the 
earth ? ' He represents him as so great a God, as it is an humbling to him 
so much as to cast an eye upon any creature now he hath made it ; and 
yet he were not God if he did not behold tlic least motion of every creature, 
to the falling of a sparrow to the ground without his cognisance. Further, 
observe it, it is not only spoken of things on earth, but of things in heaven — 
his best saints, and angels, or whatever that high and holy place is furnished 
with. Now my inference is, that if it be an humbling to God to behold 
the best of these, it may much more be an humbling to us when we appear 
before this God. And that we may do so, let us take these considerations. 

1. Whereas God had the ideas of infinite worlds he could have made, 
and so of creatures reasonable, which lay before his eternal counsels, as 
candidates, and as fair to have been made existent as we that are made ; 
for not only all things were once nothing (that will afford a second con- 
sideration), but there was yet an higher remoteness from nothing,.and that 
is, of things possible to be, which in respect of God's not willing to create 
them, never did, nor ever shall, come into being, although when they should 
have done so it would have been out of nothing ; yet God said of us. 
Stand you forth, I decree and will you to exist afore me, whenas an infinite 
number of like creatures slept still, and to eternity shall sleep in darkness 
and non-existence. 

2. After God had decreed to make thee, and to give thee an existence 
and actual being, yet thou wert in reahty still nothing, pure nothing in 
entity. Thy pedigree is from nothing; thy ancestry, and that not far 
removed, is nothing. Job, in the view of his own rottenness and corrup- 
tion, humbles himself, chap. xvii. 14 : ' I have said to corruption. Thou 
art my father ; to the worm, Thou art my mother, and my sister.' But 
in rehearsing thy original from whence thou camest, I may say that nothing, 
pure nothing, was thy great grandmother. Thy body was immediately 
made of dust, that was thy next mother by that line ; but that dust was 
made of the first rude earth, without form, and that was thy grandmother ; 
but that earth was made purely of nothing ; so then nothing was thy great 
grandmother. Thus of thy body. Then for thy soul, that was immediately 
created by God out of nothing, and so by that line thy next mother was 
nothing. And whfft was thy soul twenty, thirty, or forty years ago, and 
so many years upwards ? Plain nothing. It is observable how, in the 
Scriptures, when God's confounding the creatures is expressed, the threaten- 
ing runs in these terms, a bringing them to nothing. So in 1 Cor. i. 28, he 
takes /MYj ovra, things that are not (that is, are as if they were not, as to such 
an effect as God useth them for), even to bring to nought things that are, 
that is, to nothing, as the opposition shews. In these terms the sentence 
of confusion, and the destruction of things that are, is penned, as thereby 
reminding them, how that their first root and original was nothing ; and 
so does speak in a way of reflection upon what once they were ; even as 
when he threatened Adam to turn him to dust: ' Out of dust thou earnest,' 
says he ; in a way of debasing of him, minds him of his descent and 
original. And in like phrase of speech Job utters their destruction : aheunt 
in nihilum, they go away, or vanish to nothing; that is, ^:)C)-6;(7i^, they 
perish. The like in Isa. xli. 11, and xxxiv. 12, and xl.^23, ' He bringeth 
the judges to nothing.' And further, as if the creatures had by instinct a 
common sense of their nothingness, if God do but chastise them, presently 
we cry out to God, Bring me not to nothing, — so afraid are they of becoming 
nothing ; yea, and in extremities of distress are apt to wish they were 

VOL. VII. B 

/ r 



18 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK I. 

nothing, nor had ever been. And in this language the prophet Jeremiah 
utters his fears : Jer. x. 24, ' Correct me not in thine anger, lest thou 
turn me to nothing.' If we are but touched, we apprehend that we are in 
danger of becoming nothing. All miseries are smaller vacillations or reel- 
ings of the creature towards their first nothing ; we are like those sHght, 
small green flies that creep upon leaves in summer ; we men cannot touch 
them so gently but they die. The whole creation is built upon a quagmire 
of nothing, and is continually ready to sink into it, and to be swallowed up 
by it, which maketh the whole or any part of it to quake and quiver when 
God is angry, as Jeremiah there did. The foundation of the creatures' 
changeability to sin (whenas at first made near to holy) is by our divines 
put upon this, that we being made out of nothing, are apt to verge and 
sink into nothing, and so fall towards it in sinning. And truly sin is a 
great leap, or fall rather, and tottering towards it, and we may view our 
own nothingness most by it. And did not God, in the just act of our 
reeling towards sinning, put a stop, and uphold our beings, we should fall 
to nothing. But then he should want an object or a subject to punish for 
sin, or to be sensible of sin. 

Humble yourselves therefore in the apprehension of this, and look, as in 
point of sanctification, although God giveth so great a measure of it to his 
children, and maketh them very holy, yet in the point of justifying them 
he would have them for ever to look upon themselves as ungodly, because 
once they were such, as Rom. iv. 5. And Paul, whilst he did never so 
much, saith, ' Yet I am nothing.' Thus here, though he hath given us a 
being and existence, yet because we once were nothing, and that was 
the state (if a state) he found us in, he would ever have us account our- 
selves as nothing, though now by his grace ' having all things,' as the 
apostle says. 

3. This made being of ours, when it is made and termed being (as it is 
in Acts xvii. 28, 'In him we live, and move, and have our being'), yet 
that being is not only derived purely from him, and his efficiency, but 
farther, it is but equivocally and falsely called being, as the apostle speaks 
of the knowledge the Gnostics boasted of, * science falsely so called.' It 
hath but the name of being, but in reality is but the shadow of being ; 
even as the shadow or picture of a man is falsely and 'equivocally termed 
a man. All of a picture is but a shadow of the man. 

4. God and Christ only have the name of substance, as Prov. viii. 21. 
Being, both name and thing, is proper only unto God, who is o dv, as the 
Septuagint still renders the name Jehovah ; or as Plato from thence, to ov, 
in truth is said of God alone. For which here the psalmist, Ps. Ixxxiii. 18, 
' That men may know that thou, whose name alone is Jehovah, art the 
most High over all the earth.' And what other is the Scripture language 
of man, and the greatest of men ? All of man, and about man, are therein 
compared to a shadow ; his actions, and courses, a shadow : Ps. xxxix. 6, 
' Surely every man walketh in a vain show ' (or image, as in the Hebrew) ; 
leads an imaginary Hfe, rather than life itself ; so Ainsworth. And as his 
ways, so is himself; and that in his best and most flourishing estate. Thus 
in the 5th verse of that Psalm, ' Verily, every man' (both in his person, 
his being, the circumstances of his life), take him at the best, every way, 
he and his best estate, ' is altogether vanity, all vanity,' which vanity is 
all one in account with nothing, or no being. As in the same verse. My 
worldly * time is as nothing before thee ;' ' my substance,' so the Septu- 
agint renders it ; 'my body,' as the Chaldee. As nothing, not only as 



CUAP. III. J OF THEIR STATE BY CREATION. 19 

compared with God, but aforo God, and in his judgment and valuation of 
him. And that he says it of his time in this world, ' that his days are 
nothing,' it imports that his existence and himself are such. For to say a 
man's time in this world is such or such, connotates his existence and being 
in the world. And to say a shadow is all one as to say it is but a being in 
show, and not in reality. And that we find abundantly said. Job xiv. 2, 
and chap, viii, 9, and Ps. cxxii. 11, and cxliv. 5, and make the best you 
can of it, a shadow is but a middle between nonentity and true being. 
The Platonists said,* God only in truth is, and all things else seem but 
to be, which answers unto David's expression, ' in a show.' And truly God 
himself speaks of all the whole creation at no other rate. And his valua- 
tion and judgment is a righteous judgment : Isa. xl. 15, ' Behold, the 
nations iire as a drop of a bucket, and are counted (namely, by God) as the 
small dust of the balance.' He first, in the balance wherein he weighs 
them, lessens them, and compares them to things that are of no value or 
regard with men — things neither here nor there, as we say. The drop of 
a bucket, when it falls from the bucket upon the earth, the matter thereof 
is so swallowed up into the earth and the dust of it, as it is not so much 
as seen any more, but vanisheth away as it were to nothing. The small 
dust of the balance hath no sway at all on the beam to stir it one way or 
other ; it makes it neither ligTater nor heavier. And if they be severed from 
the bucket and the balance, they are not missed ; they make no vacuum, 
no emptiness in either. 

But yet you will say, that however these speak some entity or being, 
though but small, and though of no moment or consequence, yet of entity 
they partake something. He goeth on, ver. 17, casting them yet lower, 
' All nations before him are as nothing,' &c. And yet still you will say, 
that particle as nothing, is but a diminutive ; that though in esteem and 
regard they are as nothing, yet still in some smaller kind of reality they are 
something, though compared with a greater they are as nothing. But I 
answer, that that kind of speech speaks what a thing is in deed and in 
truth. As in that speech John i. 14, ' The glory as of the only begotten 
Son of God,' the import of that as is not a diminution, as if it were not 
in reahty what is said of it, the excelling glory of the Son of God in truth ; 
but that it was truly and indeed such a glory as was proper to him, and 
proportionable to him that was the Son of God. And that he might here 
yet speak the reality of their nothingness more plainly, he adds, * they are 
counted to him less than nothing,' plusquam nihil, as the Hebrews hath 
it ; concerning which, if it be again said, that they were but nothing at the 
worst, but why less than nothing ? The account to me is this, that now 
when he made them, and had been at the expense and power to make them 
and uphold them, yet they hud, for anything he acquires by them, been as 
good have been nothing still ; and so are less than nothing by reason of 
the cost he hath been at, and expectation (as speaking after the manner of 

* Solum Deum revera esse, csetera vero videri. — Marsilius Ficinus, Epist. viii. Dr 
Twiss in his opposition to Dr Jackson on the Attributes, who discourseth this equi- 
vocal being of creatures at large, objects this, that yet a picture is a true picture, 
although not the man ; and so the creatures, though but shadows, and the best of 
them the image of God, yet still withal they are vere entia, truly beings. But I 
reply, If God only be said to be being itself, and to have both being, name, and thing 
proper to him alone, as the Scriptures speak, then by the same reason that the picture 
of a man is not the man, allowing it to be a true picture; so the creatures are not true 
being, but barely the shadow of it. And it is not enough to say they are not God ; 
but if to be God be only to have being, then they are but the shadows of being. 



20 OF THE CREATURES, AXD THE CONDITION [BoOK I. 

men) he miglit look from them, they were not worth his producing out of 
nothing ; yea, it had been better they had been nothing still. Another 
account is, that this being a comparative of what the creatures are unto the 
great God, there is, now that they are made, a less distance and dispro- 
portion between the creatures and nothing than is between God and the 
whole creation. For if you measure the distance between the creatures, 
now they are made, and nothing, if God should return them unto it, it were 
but a finite distance privatively considered ; for their annihilation would be 
hut jJrivat to Jiniti, the depriving them of a finite good and being; but the 
distance between God's being and theirs is infinite, yea, and in excellency 
and transcendency more distant than was betwixt nothing and the creatures 
before they were made, though philosophers would ascribe an infinite dis- 
tance negatively considered, yet no such as that wherein God is above us ; 
and so they are less eveiy way to God than nothing is to themselves. And 
therefore to conclude this, if there could have been supposed a greater 
distance any way imaginable, whereby to have expressed the distance of 
God and the creature, which should have cast them down lower than this 
of being less than nothing, God would have expressed it thereby. But take 
them barely as creatures, and you cannot speak lower of them. Oh the 
infinite height and depth of God, which Zophar speaks of. Job xi. 8, to 
whom the creatures are less than nothing. 

Our divines, therefore, reckon not God, in point of arithmetic, together 
with us. They cast not God and us into the same numbering. They do 
not say of him, that he is unus, or one, though he be the first and great 
one, and so go on to number the rest of things. No ; they suffer not 
creatures to bear or sustain the repute and account of number after him, 
or when he is spoken of. They say of him that he is nnicus, the only 
one, that stands apart by himself out of all arithmetic, as his transcendent 
being comes not under our logic ; which is in eftect the same that God, by 
the prophet Isaiah, speaks. Our acuter commentators on those passages 
in chapters iii. iv. v., wherein God sets himself out alone the true God — 
' I am Jehovah, and there is none else ; there is no God besides me ; I am 
the fii'st and the last' — and the like to these, which you find up and down 
in those chapters, do observe, that though his dispute, or rather an over- 
disputing discovery of his creatures, be pitched for the confusion of the idol 
gods of heathens, that yet his arguings do rise higher than simply against 
those idols their being gods, but involves, in the confutation thereof, that 
as creatures they had no being, much less as gods. Thus chap, xliii. 10, 
compared with ver. 13, ' Before the day was, I am he ;' * and therefore, 
accordingly, still mentions his name Jehovah — his name that assures wholly 
the name of being to him ; and as of them, speaks up and down of his 
being the creator and former of them, as merely out of nothing ; and will 
you take them, and make gods of them ? Thus his argument lies. And 
when, in chap. xlv. 5, as in the conclusion of that discourse, he speaks thus, 
vers. 5-7, ' I am the Lord, and there is none else, there is no God besides 
me : I ghded thee, though thou hast not known me ; that they may know 
from the rising of the sun and from the west, that there is none besides 
me : I am the Lord, and there is none else. I form the light, and create 
darkness ; I make peace and create evil. I the Lord do all these things.' 
He manifestly points the dint of his speech in relation to them as creatures, 
and not as gods only set up by men. And he was the creator of all things, 
who only had therefore being in himself, and so did or made all those 
* See Gataker in the English Annot. on the words. 



Chap. III.] of their state by creation. 21 

things, as his saying is, ver. 7. And that, therefore, there was not only 
no God besides him, but that their gods, as creatures, had no being, but 
he alone whose name was Being, or Jehovah. As to such a sense as this, 
I understand the order of those words in ver. 5 (taking in all these things 
that stand round about it), * I am Jehovah, and none else,nhere is no 
God besides me,' that the fore part of that speech is applied to the point 
of being and existence : ' I am Jehovah,' that is, being itself only, and 
none else. For then, over and above besides, he adds, ' There is no God 
besides me ;' that is, no creature is, no God, to be sure, besides him. So 
as their swelling words, used of the creatures to be styled ' all things' besides 
him, doth, in reality and effect, come but just to the same account as if you 
would set down a multitude of cyphers apart by themselves, and then say 
of the account of them, there is a million or many thousands of them, 
which is a vast number in sound of words, and reacheth a long way in 
figures, but yet still they are but a million of cyphers, and what comes 
that to ? Even to just nothing, because there is not so much as one real 
number of their rank or kind to set afore them. All and every creature 
being miUiiis numeri, as we say, bearing no account, all of them make not 
so much as an unit, an one in truth ; but they are empty shadows, appear- 
ances of being, all and every one of them. 

To apply all this to humble you as creatures : look as this false and ficti- 
tious name of idols, their being gods, is but an imposed and equivocal title, 
whereas an idol is really nothing — 1 Cor. viii. 4,5,' We know that an idol 
is nothing in the world, and that there is none other God but one. For 
though there be that are called gods, whether in heaven or in earth, as 
there be gods many and lords many,' it is no such thing — so in like 
manner we may say of the creatures. There are creatures many, that have 
the title of being, the name, yea, are styled 'all things' in that following 
16th verse, yet in reahty and truth they are nothing, as and afore God ; 
and humble yourselves, therefore, for your idolatry, and too high valuation 
of yourselves. All is as nothing. This parallel of ourselves with idols, in 
this respect to humble us, is not mine, but the prophet Isaiah's, chap. xli. 
29, ' Behold, you are as nothing, and your works are nothing.' He speaks 
there of their idols. They had made gods for themselves, and his intent 
and meaning is thereby to humble them, as if he had said, Lo, here the 
idols you make your gods, and give a being to : such, as such, are really 
nothing, though fictitiously, in your imaginations, made your gods. Even 
so your very selves, though you assume and arrogate the name of being 
and greatness to yourselves, yourselves are nothing if you be compared 
with the great God, whose glory you corrupt and turn into a lie, in your 
setting those creatures like yourselves up for gods. And his speech is 
similar unto that of the psalmist, ' They that made them are like unto 
them.' Even so Isaiah here : ' They are nothing, and you are nothing.' 



22 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK 11. 



BOOK 11. 

Of the first estate of men and angels hy their creation. — What were the laics 
and rights of creation ; and uhat uas equitably due between the Creator and 
his creature. — Of the state of the first man Adam in innocence, and what 
were his circumstances in that his primitive condition. 



CHAPTER I. 

What was the law of creation on God's part? — It ivas hut what became and 
was worthy of the great Creator to do all for his creatures that such a 
religion* required. — This consisted in two things : First, To endow them 
with the image of holiness, to qualify them to attain their designed end, which 
was to know, love, and enjoy him ; Secondly, To continue his goodness and 
favour to them as long as they continued in their duty and obedience. — 
The condition of both angels and men by the law of their creation common 
and equal for substance. 

My design in this discourse is, in tlie end, to magnify the supercreation 
grace of God in election, and the glory of Christ as our head and a Saviour, 
■which was to be revealed upon our fallen condition, though ordained afore 
all worlds. And I judged it greatly couducible to this end to begin next to 
set out the right and true measure of our state and condition by virtue of 
our first creation, as we came forth out of God's hands first, with the dues 
and privileges belonging to it, and not of ours only, but of the angels by 
their first creation ; by the view and compare of which we shall be capaci- 
tated and enabled to destroy! an infinite weight of that supercreation grace 
added by election, that was ordained us, as it were, over the head of mere 
natural or creation goodness. And we shall find that it is not only that we 
are sinful and fallen, that afibrds matter and occasion to exalt supernatural 
grace, but even our first original and best estate that preceded it. 

This first estate I would term, upon many accounts, the estate of pure 
nature by creation-law; and as rightly as our di\-ines do call the covenant 
we were by creation brought into fedus natnne, the covenant of nature, 
which is founded upon an equitable intercourse set up betwixt God the 
Creator and his intelligent unfallen creatures, by vu'tue of the law of his 
creating them, and as by then- creation they came forth of his hands ; God 
dealing with the creature singly and simply upon the terms thereof, and 
the creature being bound to deal with God according to that bond and 
obligation which God's having created him in his image, with sufficient 
power to stand, and having raised him up thereunto out of pure nothing, 
lays upon him, 

* Qu. ' relation ' '? — Ed. f Qu. ' descry ' ? — Ed. 



Chap. I.] op their state by creation, 23 

And in the substance of it the law was one and the same in common to 
us men, and the angels, in and by their creation. 

Now, that estate of the angels the apostle Jude calls their first, or rather 
original estate, which they were endowed with from their very beginning, 
and was by original justice their due, or their natural estate; that is, which 
they had from, by, or with their creation, and by the law thereof; which 
estate being alike common to the good angels as well as the bad, before 
they left it, as the apostle Jude says, is one part of the distinction between 
the estate which the angels, which are still good and standing, have by 
election, as in Timothy, and this other part, of the original estate of good- 
ness which in common they had by creation. 

And according to the true intent and import of the same distinction, I 
may style this goodness by creation man's original estate, and ours and 
Adam's first natural estate, in that holiness and righteousness, as we did 
come forth of God's hands. And if Adam had stood, and his children had 
been begotten holy of him (which is supposable by the law of creation they 
might have been), it might have been said of them, that they had been holy 
and righteous by nature, as truly as the apostle doth the contrary, speaking 
of men now fallen, that they are * children of wrath by nature ; ' yea, this 
latter is founded upon the former. Now, what estate we his children 
should have had (in that supposal) by generation, the same, and no other, 
Adam he had by creation. And as of us it would have been said, that we 
had that holiness by our creation, although we had received it by natural 
generation from him, yet it would have been the same every way, and no 
other (as to the state itself), which we his children should have had ; only 
the way of production should have diftered, that his was by creation, ours 
by birth. Yea, and it was given him by creation to convey it to us by 
birth, and in that respect it might and should have been termed their 
primitive, first, original, natural condition in him, and his children to be 
begotten by him. 

The first covenant of works under which Adam was created is tenned by 
divines ficdus naturae, the covenant of nature ; that is, of man's condition, 
which from and by his creation was natural to him ; yet I would rather 
call it the creation law, jus creationis, or of what was equitable between 
God considered merely as a Creator on one part, and his intelligent 
creatures that were endued with understanding and will on the other, 
simply considered as such creatures, whether angels or men, — the measure 
of which law, in general, lay in an equitable transaction between God and 
them, a congruity, dueness, meetness on either part. 

On God's part, I would call it a dueness, remembering how Paul prohi- 
bits the word ' recompence' as any way challengeable by any or all the 
creatures : Rom. xi. 35, ' Who hath first given to him, and it shall be 
recompensed unto him again ?' And he says it to exclude all recompence. 
So that this dueness imports only what it became God to do, and was 
worthy of him, in such or such a case ; as he useth the word Heb. ii. 10, 
'For it became him,' &c., so as the meaning is in this only respect, that 
if God would please to create two such ranks of creatures, angels and man, 
it became him to do to and for them what was worthy of such a relation, 
of a bountiful Creator, to each in their kind, not yet exceeding what that 
relation of a Creator, considered simplj' as such, required ; so as if he did 
exceed it, it was but what was an overplus, as his assisting them, in causing 
them to stand so long as they did ; otherwise God himself condescended to 
make an equity the rule of his will in that covenant of works, condescend- 



24 OF THE CREATUEES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

ing to mitigate the absolute rigidity of it, and to moderate it unto the Jews 
(who clamoured him in Ezekiel), yielding from his ' Cursed is every one 
that obeys not in every thing.' Upon this he answers the clamours of the 
Jews : Ezek. xviii. 17, 29, ' Are not my ways equal ?' saith he ; when he 
offered that if one, who had been never so great a sinner, would ' turn from 
his evil ways,' and the like, he would receive him, and abundantly pardon. 
As on the contrary, if, having been so righteous before, he begins to turn 
away from it, he must lose the benefit of all his former obedience. This 
was fair for God to ofier, and his ways therein equal. Yet God knew that 
this was impracticable by them ; but to convince them, he tried them by 
that offer, as Christ did the j'oung man in the Gospel, when he put him 
upon keeping the commandments, and there left him. 

And such like equity may be considered in God's fii-st founding the cove- 
nant of creation : first, in what he would bestow in and by the act of crea- 
tion itself, in them. He gave all that was due, or convenient and meet for 
the natures of such creatures, to attain their end of happiness in a propor- 
tioned communion with himself. And although it was free for him, whether 
to have created them or not created them, yet, if he resolved so to create 
such, his will regulated itself by what was meet for their natm-es, as such, 
to receive from him, and for him as a Creator to give. 

In every work of God's, he observeth a dueness or becomingness according 
to the kind of it. So in the work of redemption in its kind, in which he 
was yet at a far greater fi-eedom than in this of the first creation. And in 
this sense the apostle is bold to use the phrase of what becomes God in 
such or such a sphere to do. Thus (Heb. ii. 10) ' It became him, for 
whom are all thmgs, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons 
unto gloi-y, to make the Captain of their salvation perfect through suffer- 
ings.' Now, in the work of creation in its kind, as in other works in their 
kind, God regulates himself by the measm'e of a dueness and becomingness 
between him and the creature. And although there could be no obhgation, 
simply considered, in him ' that works all according to the counsel of his 
will' freely, yet his will regulated itself by what that same counsel judged 
most becoming him to do, as that which his counsel judged so to be. And 
so in this work of creation, God would bestow such facukies and powers as 
the creature itself could any way judge requisite to his perfoiTaing the 
work of a creature of an intelligent nature. Thus, in case God resolved 
to do such or such a thing, he would do it suitably to the matter of it, and 
what the nature of the thing required ; and worthy and like himself, and 
the relation he takes upon him, by doing such or such a work. The truth 
is, he observes it as his rule in all things, as that text forementioned insi- 
nuates ; and of all other works, let no man be offended to say, God set 
himself an equitable rule or law in this his first and bottom work of crea- 
tion, wherein yet he was most free to have begun it, or not begun it. Thus 
in general. 

For the particular requisites on God's part, and but so far as is now 
enough to my present scope, I shall mention but tw^o. 

First, That if God would create intelligent natures out of nothing, it 
became him to endow them with his own image of holiness, &c., whereby 
they might be able to know, to love, and to enjoy a communion with him, 
and happiness fi'om himself, as their chiefest good : which, as it was God's 
bountiful gift to bestow, so the very nature of such a creature required it 
as convenient, meet, and suitable to its nature, and without which it had 
been imperfect, yea, miserable ; for otherwise those vast faculties of under- 



CUAP. I.] OF THEIR STATE BY CREATION. 25 

standing and will had been left empty, and like an hungry stomach (of a 
giant, suppose) continually craving, when it hath only crumbs of food, and 
drops of weak water. Nor could they otherwise have attained their main 
end, or arrived at their convenient happiness, which the very natures of 
them were constituted and fitted for, which can be filled with nothing but 
a communion with God. And all creatures, and creature comforts, if alone 
vouchsafed without an intelligent communion with God himself, had been 
but as a drop to a cistern. That whereas God had provided for every sen- 
sitive or other faculty in man himself, and other creatures, a meet object 
suited in nature to them ; and for man's bodily person, all comfort, a meet 
help, &c., as the woman is teiined, he had left men's souls, and in them 
those noble powers of understanding and will, deprived of their chief object ; 
they had been shut out from the communication of the life of God, in which 
their happiness lay : which blessedness also must arise from a natural 
' suitableness concreated in those faculties, and with them, whereby they 
might be enabled to know, love, and delight in God. And in such a con- 
venient meetness to enjoy God must this holiness consist ; as also in an 
inward principle, and divine disposition in every faculty suited to, and 
agreeing with every law God had, as a creator, commanded ; naturally car- 
rying, and wholly inclining them to fulfil it, which was the law of God 
written in their hearts, in the full perfection of it, and as the due perfec- 
tion of them ; and thereby it did become their natural perfection by this 
creation law. And surely, if the things of the law are said, by nature, to 
be written in man's heart, now fallen, this is but a shadow of that full and 
perfect, exact copy of the whole and holy law, which was then man's 
nature much more. These things, therefore, were to intelligent natures a 
creation-due ; and in that respect natural to them, or which the nature of 
them required ; and it became God as a creator to give them when he 
would create them. 

2. And, secondly, on God's part as a creator, it was requisite to con- 
tinue his favour and goodness to them, and that happy estate he had set 
them in, whilst he did continue their being, whether of Adam in paradise, 
or the angels in the paradise above, the place of their creation, which they 
should enjoy, if they continued to keep their first estate of holiness, &c. 
This was also a meet and equitable due, for God, as a faithful creator, to 
give, and was correspondent to this their begun happy condition, and was 
all the promise that I know of, made to such obedience. 

That whereas God, in the view of his own heights of holiness and 
sovereignty, might, after some time and experiment, have said, I see at 
best you are but unprofitable servants, and so not have regarded their low 
creature-services, as anyway coming up to the immense desires and aims 
of his great holiness, yet he would continue his love and favour at the same 
height which he prosecuted them withal at their first creation, and so they 
should live in keeping his commandments. 

And this alone was of itself a great promise, and an abundant reward, 
though they had never been advanced to an higher glory or privilege. And 
this was all the promise we read of, ' If thou do these things, thou shalt 
live,' namely, in doing of them; and this was their life, and yet suitably 
but creation- dues, and an equity by creation-law. For if providence be a 
continual creation, then a providential law from God, and the continuation 
of our first parents, and so of us, in that first creation-life and happy estate, 
whilst they continued obedient, was but an extension of that first creation 
goodness out of which God first put them in that estate ; and so, but a 



2G OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

continuation of the same law, and but a repeating, every moment they 
stood, that complacency he had at first in them when he made them ; and 
it was but the like, in its proportion, unto what he continues to all his 
other creatures in their sphere, that keep his ordinances to this day. And 
it is a dueness that in meetness and equitableness is to be dispensed to him 
that worketh and continueth therein, out of that justice that is in God, as a 
creator, to his unsinning creature continuing holy. 

This condition of angels by the law of their creation, and of man, for 
substance, is common to them both. However men and angels might and 
do differ in degrees of excellencies in respect of their mere creation-holi- 
ness, even as they diflfer in their strength (the excelling wherein is given to 
the angels), as also in their habitation proper to each, as Jude 6, the one 
created on earth, the other in some of the heavens, yet it is a difference 
but of rank or degree, such as between nobles and commons, in an higher 
and lower house. God ' made man a little lower than the angels ;' that is, 
in respect of degrees, so far as that psalm is to be understood of Adam's 
or man's condition by creation. Though it hath an higher reference unto 
Christ Jesus as man, yet still this degree of lowness in the one, and 
height in the other, had for the substratum of it, in either, the same common 
law of creation-perfections, and the rules thereof do take hold of both alike 
in their several ranks, and with their several degrees. I will not therefore 
now debate what differing excellencies each of these had proper to them- 
selves in their several capacities and spheres ; or the differences of the 
original condition of both these, angels and men, from what their now 
present standing in grace, and hereafter in glory, do afford. 

This we may safely say, that the difference of their condition was not 
so gi-eat, as that they should see God's face in that manner as Christ doth. 
The angels, though created in one of the heavens, by their creation did not 
so enjoy God. It is Christ's sole honour to bring that first up. ' Who 
hath seen God at am^ time ? No man hath seen God at any time ; the 
only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared 
him,' John i. 18. This * gi'ace and truth came only by Jesus Christ,' 
verse 17. 

The law was the same for substance that ours [isj. That under a law 
they were made is evident, for else there had not been sin in them that 
fell ; but it is express they did, 2 Pet. ii. 4 ; and sin is a transgression of 
not only a law, as Eom. v. 13, but of the law, as being one in common 
to all creatures : 1 John iii. 3, 4, ' And every man that hath this hope in 
him purifieth himself, even as he is pure. Whosoever committeth sin 
transgresseth also the law : for sin is the transgression of the law.' That 
the first commandment duty is the common law to angels and men, as 
to love God, fear God, &c., this is so plain as none may deny it. 

2. The third, * Not to take God's name in vain.' The devil is a blas- 
phemer, and so breaks this command. 

3. If there be superior and inferior ranks of angels, as Michael an arch- 
angel, thrones, dominions, principalities, and powers. Col. i. 16, then a 
reverence from the inferior orders to all their superiors must be due ; and 
so the fifth commandment is an obligation upon them. 

4. The sixth command, ' Thou shalt not kill,' binds the angels as a law. 
For ' Satan is a murderer from the beginning ; ' which could not have been 
said, if that command had not been violated by him in seeking man's de- 
struction. 

0. The ninth command, ' Thou shalt not bear false witness,' reaches 



Chap. II.] of their state by creation. 27 

the angels themselves. For the devil, as a breaker of this law, is * a liar 
from the beginning ;' and Michael, in Jude 9, as obliged by this command, 
* durst not bring a railing accusation' against Satan. 

C. The tenth, ' Thou shalt not lust,' has a respect to the angels ; else 
why does Chi-ist charge lust on the devil as his sin ? John viii. 4-4, ' You 
are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father you will do.' 
What are they but pride, envy, hatred, malice, &c. And the good angels, 
in obedience to this command, have a love to the saints. * Daniel, 
greatly beloved,' says Gabriel to that prophet, Dan. x. 11. They have 
also a zeal for the saints, and joy in their conversion, Luke xv. 7. But if 
they should not have the same laws in all things that we men have, yet it 
must needs be said, that they are under very many laws that are given to 
us men. 

Yet it is enough for what I intend, that their covenant by creation ran 
upon the same terms that ours of works does ; the tenor or terms of the 
law is the same. So as, suppose they had not altogether the same law, yet 
they were under the same fundamental sanction of punishment and reward. 
Upon one sin, all their happiness was to be forfeited, as upon ours it was. 
Their estate was changed by sinning, as ours also was. 

The same punishments take hold upon them, though not the same bodily, 
as death, unto which the angels are not obnoxious, for they can never die. 
But what death spirits are capable of, we and they undergo the same. We 
were both alike cast off from God ; we were expelled paradise, they were 
thrown down out of heaven into hell ; and at the last day, the same 
sentence shall be pronounced against both, ' Go, you cursed, into everlasting 
fire, prepared for the devil and his angels,' Mat. xxv. 41. As in a state 
there may be different laws, yea, variety of privileges to nobles and others 
in a kingdom, and yet the fundamental maxims for life, death, and for- 
feiture, be the same to them all. 

They had also the same mutability that was in our condition, and stood 
upon the same gi'ounds and terms that we did. It was their being made 
out of nothing, and so mere creatures as well as we, that was the cause of 
their fall ; so that we are sure they stood as ticklishly as we, no more 
assistance in their state and proportion than Adam in his. We are sure 
that God took the forfeiture upon one act of sin committed by the angels 
that sinned, for ' God spared not the angels that fell,' but threw them im- 
mediately to hell, as well as he doth us men. Nor had they such an high 
way of knowing God or the enjoyment of him ; as it is the highest heavens 
that might have kept them infallibly from sinning, for that Christ only 
hath brought up to behold God's face in such a perfection of righteousness, 
as to exclude all sin acted, or the possibility of it. 

CHAPTER II. 

The mutahility of that first estate. — By its constitution and their own weak- 
ness, both anfjels and men ivere liable to fall from it. — God teas not at all 
obliged, as Creator, to preservehis creatures in that first condition effectually 
by his grace. — The causes of their mutability. — To be changeable is the 
nature of a creature, with difference from God, who only is immutable. — 
That the creature being made of nothing, tends to a deficiency. 

There needs no other nor more certain proof, both of the foregone and of 
those following assertions, than the event. 



28 OF TUE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

1. That these two sorts of creatures, angels and men, might fall from 
their original estate of perfect holiness ; for, de facto, of both sorts did fall, 
and the angels that did not were of the same frame, of the same brittle 
metal with the other of their creation, and the dues thereof were common 
to both : * The angels that sinned,' saj^s Peter, 2 Pet. ii. 4. ' The angels 
that kept not their first state, but left their own habitation,' says Jude, 
verse 6. How much more might this befall man, ' who dwells in houses 
of clay ? ' as it is argued in Job, from the stronger, the angels, unto the 
weaker : Job iv. 18, 19, ' Behold, he put no trust in his servants ; and his 
angels he charged with folly : how much less on them that dwell in houses 
of clay, whose foundation is in the dust, which are crushed before the 
moth ? ' And that, de facto, we are fallen, we all by sad and woeful experi- 
ence have found. 

2. The second is. That no obligation was upon God to keep either of 
them from so falling, by any law of his having created them. This the 
event also is a sufficient demonstration of; for if there had been such an 
obligation upon him, his faithfulness is such, and love unto his creature is 
such, as he would then certainly have kept them. That title of faithfulness 
is annexed to his being Creator : 1 Pet. iv. 19, * Wherefore let them that 
sufier according to the will of Grod commit the keeping of their souls to him 
in well-doing, as unto a faithful Creator.' The argument, then, from that 
he did not keep them, is invincible, that he was, as a Creator, absolutely 
free and disengaged from keeping them (without any breach of any due 
unto his creature by the law of his creation), and doth sufficiently confirm 
all that is foregone in the former chapter concerning that intercourse settled 
betwixt God and us by creation. Nor would the holy God have put that 
high sarcasm, or bitter (yet just) retortion upon man when he had sinned, 
which struck at the very spirit of his sin, * Man is become like one of us,' 
which had been the very inward pith and substance of his sinning, which 
compared together with the tentation — ' ye shall be as gods,' — shews that 
that was it had taken them. God, I say, would not have upbraided them 
with that severe sarcasm, if he had been engaged to preserve them from 
sinning, and yet was wanting to do it. 

3. Nor must we lay upon God any influence of his, into either of their 
falls. ' As God is not himself tempted with evil ; so, nor tempteth he his 
creature unto evil.' James i. 13, 14, ' Let no man say, when he is tempted, 
I am tempted of God : for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither 
tempteth he any man : but every man is tempted, when he is drawn away 
of his own lust, and enticed.' He carried himself in that matter precisely 
according to the exact dues of creation. He dispensed all the influence 
that was due thereby, and more he did not vouchsafe, merely because, as 
a Creator, he was not obliged thereto. And God ordered it thus, that the 
difi'erence between that creation influence and assistance, and the efficacious 
assistance of grace which he gave the angels that stood, and meant to give 
to his elect, ' called ones,' might be manifest from that which was by crea- 
tion due only ; that what was God's might be given to God and his grace, 
and what was the creature's might be given the creature ; for it is certain 
that, had God either inhibited the devil from tempting, or had cast in but 
a grain of assistance, more than by creation was due, into man's heart and 
will when tempted, and prevented but a mere negligence or non-attendancy 
to God and his word (for their sin began with these at first, and they were 
the ])rimiim momentum of their verging), they had not sinned. If when 
the eyes of their minds were next door towards a wink, God had given but 



Chap. II.j of tueiu state by creation. 

the least jog, it had kept them awake. Likewise, 
but bo was not bound to give, and it was free for him to do or not to do. 
And unto this, of God's not being bound thereto, as on his part, doth 
Arminius himself put it.* Nor had, nor could man be aforchand with God 
by anything he had or could do. For all must be only by virtue of what 
he had received by creation from God. And so, the apostle's general pro- 
clamation made on God's behalf, unto all his creatures, reached Adam in 
that estate : * Who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed 
unto him again ?' The sense whereof is, that God stands free, not upon 
prerogative, but equity, a debtor f unto man ; but at a perfect liberty to 
give, or not to give, what ho had not compacted for. And Christ says the 
same, on his behalf, to him that murmured, Mat. xx. 13, 'I do thee no 
wrong : didst not thou agree with mo for a penny ? ' And that I have paid 
thee. 

But besides this argument from the event, the Scripture says the same, 
with a Behold prefaced unto it, in two places: Job xv. 15, 'Behold, he 
putteth no trust in his saints.' And that he had put no trust in them is 
directly spoken in respect unto their mutability, and the hazard of their 
failing him, in their serving him, if left unto themselves. So as we have 
God's judgment declared, that they were such unstable creatures, that he 
had no confidence in them as such. Which, if it be understood in the 
present tense, that now, since the fall, he putteth no trust in his angels 
that stood, yet still it relates unto what in themselves they are, and were 
by nature, and would be, if God did not continue to uphold them. The 
same is said in chap. iv. 18, with another ' behold' again, * Behold, he put 
no trust in his servants, and his angels he charged with folly.' Which 
latter is spoken as of the time past, upon an experience of the fall of some 
of them, that shewed the same ehangeableness to be incident to the rest 
that stood ; and that if God should deal with them only according to that 
law of their creation, and leave them into the hands of their own counsels, 
they w^ould be as foolish as the rest had been. 

But the greater task of the tw'o is, to evince what this mutability was 
and what the rise of it was, in the creature. 

I begin with the latter, the rise or ground of it. 

1. This ehangeableness in the creature is the condition of the creature 
as a creature, with difference from God. Of God it is said, James i. 13, 
that ' God cannot be tempted with evil ;' and evil there is the evil of sin, 
with which the creature is tempted, and is an opposite to that goodness 
which is essential to God, whereof Christ speaks. Mat. xix. 17, * God only 
is good,' and thereby differenceth God's goodness from the creature's good- 
ness, by declaring that God alone is essentially good ; and it riseth to such 
a consistency in his nature, and height of transcendent perfection, that it 
cannot admit of the least impression, touch, or tincture of evil to stain, 
yea, not to discolour it ; and therefore James expresseth it by this, ' He 
cannot be tempted,' James i. 13, it being a contradiction to his nature 
as being God ; as elsewhere, that ' he cannot lie,' Titus i. 2, and * cannot 
deny himself,' 2 Tim. ii. 13. Now, if these things be said of God as he 
is God, then the opposite (a capacity of being tempted with evil) must be 
intended thereby of the creature considered in its creatureship. 

If any one say, James speaks in the words afore and after, of and unto 
man fallen, that is, tempted^with * his own lust,' ver. 14. And so it is not 

* Hoc impedimentum Deus prsestare non tenebatur. Thes. de primo hominis 
peccato. t Qi^' ' not a debtor' ?— Ed. 



30 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II, 

an argument to prove that the creature, in its original estate, was thus 
liable to temptation with difference from God, 

Ans. 1. His saying, ' God cannot be tempted,' being a setting forth an 
attribute proper unto God, therefore however, in the occasion of it, it 
may bo an exhortation unto men 'fallen, &c., yet the maxim extends 
further, and is not to be narrowed unto a comparison of God's nature, in 
this respect, with corrupted man ; but in that it is made proper unto God, 
it must needs, in its opposition, express the difference from all creatures 
as creatures. 

2. It had been short of the glory which is due unto God, in this purity 
of his, yea, dishonourable, to have intended it as a comparison only 
between a man fallen that hath lust in him already, that may tempt him, 
and the infinitely holy nature of God, that hath no such principle in him, 
as thereby to set out the perfection of God. For it might be said, that 
a creature uufallen hath nothing in him to tempt him neither. Therefore 
God his cannot be tempted must extend further, in full opposition to, 
and exclusion of, any creature in its best estate considered. 

3. It may be said of the strongest mere creature in its best estate, that 
it is liable to be tempted of its own lust that may arise up in him, though 
he have no sinful lust as yet in him. The first sin of our first parents 
was a lust inordinate, * to be as gods.' Self-love grew into a tumour when 
once it heard, but afar off, of such a preferment. And so of Satan it is 
said, that when he sinned, he sinned ' of his own.' John viii. 44, ' Ye are 
of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do ; he was a 
murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is 
no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own : for 
he is a liar, and the father of it ' — thereby also utterly exempting God 
from any the least influence into his sin. 

The Socinians, who hold man's nature in his first creation not to have 
been holy, but only indifferent unto good and evil, when we urge, ' that 
man was created after God's image,' &c., they would retort this absur- 
dity upon us, ' that then he must have been made immutably holy, for 
God's holiness is an immutable hoHness in him ; and therefore, if man had 
the image of it by creation, then he should have had it immutably.' 

But, we easily answer, God could not communicate to us his essential 
holiness, whereby he is differenced from the creatures. That must be 
communicated only so far as it is communicable to a creature. And all 
the images that are made of a man do not import a communication of his 
nature, but of his likeness ; that is, a communication accidental, artificial, 
and not substantial. And so God begat his Son indeed, who is his sub- 
stantial image, but the image of God in creatures is not so ; we had, and 
have, but the lineaments of his holiness. 

A second ground of mutability in the creatures' actings with difference 
from God, and his unchangeableness in acting, is, that God is not com- 
pounded of a power to act differing from himself, i. e., his essence; but 
himself is the power wherewith he acts. He is actus pnrus et simpUcissi- 
mus ; and therefore there is nothing can fall out or come between himself 
and his power in acting, to weaken or hinder him in acting, nor to cause 
any failure in his acting, and specially in his activity of holiness, which ia 
in Scripture termed himself. And therefore, whereas in one scripture you 
read, he sweareth by himself, in another you find, he sweareth by his 
holiness : these are all one. His holiness also is that in him whereby 
himself is his own end to himself. God's own good and happiness is his 



Chap. II.] of their state by creation. 81 

ultimate end, and therefore be can never but act bolily, for bo acts by bim- 
self and for bimself; and so cannot foil in acting, but is holy in all his 
ways and works, and cannot be otherwise. For all in his acting is himself, 
both his power and his end, and all ; yea, and are all one and the same. 
But the creature, his power to do or act, is one thing, and himself is 
another. lie acts not immediately by himself, but by a power given him 
to act ; and which is differing from himself, an accident in him, far differ- 
ing from himself. Neither is himself his own end in acting, but God, by 
his creature, is to be his end to act for, and by which he is to be moved in 
acting ; and God, that is his end, is without him and far above him. And 
therefore himself, with all these his powers or faculties, may falter in 
acting when they come to be used 'and put forth ; there may some defi- 
ciency come between his power to act and his act itself ; as either a cessa- 
tion to act (for he is but agens in 2>otentia) when he ought ; a falling short, 
in not putting forth all its power to the utmost ; a remissness, a slackness, 
may befall it : as in a line stretched to the utmost, a waggling may fall out. 
As particulax'ly, to instance, Jirst, the creature's understanding may fall 
into an incogitancy unawares, or a non-advertency, or the want of consi- 
deration ; in the twinkling of an eye it may be diverted from a stedfast act 
of eyeing God as its truest good. And though God gave assistance accord- 
ing to the due of creation, whereby he had power within himself to have 
kept attentive to God, yet take what was to be its own doing, its act there- 
upon, or duty ; there a cessation might fall out, an unattendancy, a failing 
in its acting. Secondly, also his will, whose voice and office still is, ' Who 
will shew us any good ? ' And thereupon it is stedfastly to cleave to God ; 
yet upon a buzz or hearsay, of being put into a better condition, even as 
gods, knowing good and evil, the will, to which it is innate to aim at its 
own good (though then in subordination to God it might), did, by as sudden 
deficiency and remiss station, make an halt in his way and tendency towards 
happiness. As one that, in the putting forth of his hand unto what is as 
high above him, as is possible for him to reach, takes hold by the way of 
something that is lower and short, through a finding some present ease to 
its motion in reaching unto what is higher, and the lower to suit his lower 
and inferior aims. And the will was agog upon it, and it fell into a tumour 
of seeking its own excellency. And then the will might influence the 
understanding to take in the consideration, whether there might not be 
something in that new proposed way of happiness ; and the appearance 
of it was so represented as the yielding to the temptation is plainly put 
upon this, that the woman's understanding was deceived ; so the apostle in 
2 Cor. xi. 3, and 1 Tim. ii. 14. 

And this defectibility may well be supposed, seeing it is granted by all 
that there was that difference between the condition of saints and angels 
now in glory, and of the angels and Adam in their creation estate ; that in 
that of glory, the manifestation of God to the understanding of the creatm-es, 
and the communication of his goodness to the will, is so superabundantly 
full, filling them with all the fulness of God, that these faculties and powers 
are swallowed up into God. God his being all in all, as it chains up and 
unchangeably fixeth the whole of the soul unto him, that it cannot cease or 
suspend to cleave immutably to him who is their incommutable happiness, 
and so they cannot sin. And had the angels (who yet we cannot say were 
in the highest heaven of all) so enjoyed God, they could not have sinned. 
But the law and measure, both for angels and men by creation, was that 
God should be so represented to them, as to give them a power to cleave 



82 OF THE CKEATUHES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

to God as their chiefest good, as thej began to do ; yet in comparison of 
the former, in so inferior a way of manifestation, that as for the understand- 
ing, in its own ampHtudc, and that variety of objects it might meet with, 
and that might be presented unto it, a room was left for a possibility, in 
its creature activit}^, to cast an unhappy glance towards the entertainment 
of a consideration of them. And that concourse was such with the will, as 
the will was still left to a possibility to cease its going out from itself up 
unto God, who was without itself, and to begin to afiect some other excel- 
lency proper unto itself, and as that which was suited unto that lower aim 
of self-love and self-excellency. And the evidence that they were so left 
(besides the evidence the event gives) is, that God applied legal threaten- 
ings — ' Thou shalt die the death,' — which in the life of glory have no place 
nor influence ; and all this might and did proceed from this, that according 
to the necessary constitution of a creator,* they were but agents in jwtentid ; 
they were not pure act, and so might cease to act holily, whilst yet they 
had the posse, the power from God to act holily. And by the law of crea- 
tion, God was not obliged to give the act of willing holily, but the power 
to will ; and therefore, also, he might not will when yet he ought, and so 
Binned. The act of willing what was holy and good was not necessary in 
them, and therefore it might fall out he might not will it. And the first 
sin lay, not in an act of willing something else than God, nor in a positive 
act of refusing God, but a not willing, a ceasing to will, as it had hitherto 
done. And yet this was not chance or contingency, but accompanied with 
an act of will, to cease or forbear to will that holy good thing it did. So 
as the first sinning began not with a motion of the will, but with a defect, 
or ceasing to move as it ought to have done : upon which the understand- 
ing was, withal, deprived of its spii'itual light to guide the will ; in that 
leaven was in the will, which, though but one faculty, yet was the proper 
seat of sin, the whole lump was leavened, and that small speck of taint, 
begun in the will, fumed up into the understanding, and darkened it ; 
and that spiritual light being gone, it began to judge what the devil proposed 
to be their best happiness, and was deceived, as the apostle says. And then 
the will, having been averted from cleaving to its true and only good, fell into 
a tumour, as I said, of affecting to be as gods ; and so sin grew irrecoverably 
more and more upon them. This for a second gi'ound of this mutability. 
3. Add unto this, that farther ground which the fathers (Austin espe- 
cially) have run upon, viz., that these creatures, though excellent, were 
made out of mere nothing ; their root was nothing, and the sap would be 
drawing down towards the root and withering, if not continually watered 
by efiicacious grace. The creature, as a creature, would be mouldering 
towards nothing again, and would do it every moment, if by the word of 
God's power it did not consist. And although God hath by charter endowed 
them with an immortality, which is an immutability as to the substance of 
their being, which yet is by a mere participation, God by essence having 
only immortality, 1 Tim. vi. 16 ; j-et still he left this token of mutability, 
that they might lose their well-being, which sin only could dispossess them 
of. And sin is but an imperfect tendency, or verging or reeling towards 
nothing ; only, in the falling, God keeps them in substantial being still, 
that they might live to find and know their frailty, &c. To sin, and to fail 
that way, is not indeed, says Austin, that which we call nothing ; but, says 
he, it is a tendency unto nothing.f And he gives this reason, that by how 

* Qu. 'creature"? — Ed. 

t Deficere, non est nihil ; sed tendit in niliilum. 



Chap. II.] of their state by creation. 83 

much any thing is excellent, and falls or declines unto what is worse, or 
by how much a thing is become worse than God made it, by so much it is 
become nearer unto nothing, and so is, in its degree, a foiling towards 
nothing. I would express it thus, that sin is not a falling into pure nothing 
for entity, but a falling besides, or sideways, into it ; and yet, into what is 
worse than nothing, the perfect destruction of the well-being of it. And 
God thought meet to preserve the substance of their being, that those he 
rejects might have a being continued, to feel the demerit of sin ; and in 
them he meant to recover, separating in the end their sin and their per- 
sons ; yet, that all might see their original and the defectibility, might see 
an experiment of their first nothingness (which also they know not but by 
faith), in that so many of both sorts are cast into sin, which is, if not lower 
than nothing, yet next degree unto it ; and know themselves to be but 
creatures that were nothing ; and that because, by the law of God's crea- 
tion, he was not bound to have preserved them in being, he therefore 
suffered the holiness he had endowed them with, and which was concreated 
with them, and yet was the flower, the excellency and perfection of their 
being, and of more worth than all their beings without it, utterly to come 
to nothing. 

But yet further, the holiness which, by creation, both angels and men 
had, were but adjuncts, accidents, and endowments, perfecting the well-being 
of them, and bestowed upon them to perfect their nature, as noble qualities 
and dispositions use to do. But they were not ingredients constitutive of 
the natures of them, or any part or ingredient into the essence of them, 
and yet natural to them, as perfectives of their nature. And such creatures, 
or rather concreateds with their nature, may cease and be lost, without the 
ceasing of the subject itself that is endowed with them. 

In the controversy we have with the papists, we rightly affirm that the 
image of God, in true holiness, was natural to man at his first creation. 
But then, they put this absurdity upon our assertion, that what is natural 
cannot be lost ; and that what was, by a supernatural act of God's, given 
the angels and us, must be supernatural. 

We answer to the first, that there were three things in man and angels 
at the first, that made up theirs and our nature : the substance of the soul, 
which was that it was a spirit, and the seat or subject of these other two 
that follow. As (2.) the faculties of that soul, that are essential to it in this 
sense, that they are principia natura constitiitiva, principles that do consti- 
tute the nature of a man, and which, if taken away, a man ceaseth to be a 
man ; and such are the understanding, and will, and affections in the soul ; 
and so in an angel, understanding and will. 3. There were, further, such 
ornaments and dispositions in those faculties, as were for the perfecting the 
nature of the soul, and whereby it might attain and be preserved in happi- 
ness and blessedness. The two first are, through God's ordination, immu- 
tably bestowed, both in angels and men ; so as if either the souls of men 
should cease to be spiritual substances, or the angels to be spirits, or come 
not to have an understanding or will, they would cease to be either angels 
or men ; and therefore, these two they retain, in omni statu, in all states, 
both fallen and unfallen angels, good and bad. But the third, which was 
this of holiness, which perfected their natures, they were and are liable to 
a mutation in. For it was and is but a perfection in the soul or angel, 
which may, abesse vel adesse sine siibjecti interitu, be lost, and cease without 
the ceasing of the subject they belonged unto, as precious stones or herbs 
may lose their virtue, and yet be stones and herbs still. 

VOL. VIT. C 



34 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

To the second we answer, that though the image of God were concreated 
with the soul by a supernatural operation of God's, that hinders not at all 
that it should be a natural perfection to man's nature, and natural in that 
very respect objected ; that because man came forth of God's hands by 
immediate creation, even therefore it was meet and requisite, yea, neces- 
sary, that those his rational creatm-es should have this image, as an endow- 
ment which was to enter into the composition of their nature. He had not 
else had that perfection, which, to the nature of their being intelligent 
creatures, was due ; and so, though it were supernatural in the production 
of it by God as the efficient, yet natural to the subject that was made by 
God. It hinders this no more, than that, because the creation of the soul 
and the faculties of it, and the union of it with the body, were by a super- 
natural operation of God's, that therefore he was not naturally a man. 

But this last demonstration proceeds upon this, that if these creatures 
themselves are, in the substance of them as creatures, mutable and apt to 
be changed, and would sink into their nothing, if God upheld them not by 
the word of his power (and this mutability, or aptness to perish, at least 
is affirmed of them, with difference from Christ, as [hej is God, Heb. i. 
10-12 : ' And, Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the 
earth ; and the heavens are the works of thine hands : they shall perish, 
but thou remainest ; and they all shall was old as doth a garment ; and 
as a vesture shalt thou fold them up, and they shall be changed : but thou 
art the same, and thy years shall not fail'), then much more are these 
accidental perfections mutable and apt to be changed, further than as God 
shall put a stability into them. 



CHAPTER III. 

Of the first stale men run through, viz., that of innocency. — A brief draft 
of all those several states or conditions through ivhich God leadeth the elect 
of mankind. — Together with a comparison of those states together. 

Our most holy, wise, and gracious God had, in his everlasting pui-poses, 
(as by the event appears) fore-ordained several estates and dispensations 
(whereof some are inferior and subordinate one unto the other, and whereof 
one is utterly contrary and perfectly opposite to that happiness he intended) 
which he would lead his elect of men through, as so many several degrees 
they take ; yea, and oppositions and hazards they are to pass through, ere 
the last and most royal crown of glory be set upon their heads. And this 
he chose to do, to the end to magnify and set forth the glory of his own 
grace at last, as also to carry and lead us still on with wonder from one 
unto the other, and to prepare us to entertain that consummate happiness 
at last with unalterable* astonishment and adoration. God hath not dealt 
thus with the elect angels, who have had no changes ; but us, the sons of 
men, he shifteth from vessel to vessel, and shifteth us first from one con- 
dition, then another, till he hath brought us to that utmost refinement 
which may render us in the highest manner meet and capable of himself 
immediately. To this end he at first created us in a pure and natural 
condition in Adam, and he the first of mankind ; to let ns see our iinum 
or bottom, what by the law of creation it was that was our due, and how 
remote we were by that due from that glory he supernaturally in Christ, 
* Qu. ' unutterable ' ? — Ed. 



Chap. III.] of their state by creatiom. 35 

the second Adam, bad intended ; that since fjraco freely had designed us 
an higher, the disproportion might appear, that so what was the gift of 
grace might rise up to its full glory. Then ho lets us fill into sin and 
wrath, which utterly spoiled and defaced that first native beauty we bad by 
creation, and plunged us into a contrary depth of misery. But then, after 
that again, ho gives forth the gospel, which discovers Christ as a redeemer 
from sin and wrath, who withal brings a life and immortality to light, 
which by faith apprehended by us, puts us into the state of grace, and a 
participation of Christ, such as is suitable to the relation of the gospel in 
this life, far excelling Adam's state. 

But then, last of all, and after all this, God hath a resei've, a surpassing 
weight of glory to be revealed in us, and that also admits of its degrees, of 
which anon. 

And these I thought best in this place to give the brief entire view of, 
not only for the pleasantness of the prospect when in brief set together, but 
because it will serve as the clearest introduction or general preface unto all 
the treatises that are to follow, which have for their particular and set 
subjects these several estates and conditions. This discourse being to 
handle the state of Adam in his purest naturals, with a comparison be- 
tween him and Christ, and his state and our state of grace under the 
gospel, in other discourses which are to follow, I shall, 1, treat of man's 
Binful and corrupt estate, and the misery thereof, which serves further, by 
way of contraries, to magnify the glory of God's grace, and his Christ, as 
revealed in the gospel ; then, 2dly, the state of salvation by Christ, which 
the elect are brought and raised up into by the grace and work of all three 
persons, which is rendered to us the more illustrious, both by the imme- 
diately preceding misery which we are delivered from, and then by its sur- 
passingly excelling that first and best estate ; then, 3dly, I shall discourse 
of the last and best condition of the elect, which is the state of glory. 

That which at present I am to do is only, 

1. To give an account of God's dispensations herein. 

2. Shortly to enumerate the particular states, and compare them in 
their comely gradations or subordinations of each to other. 

For the first, the account hereof consists in two things : 

1. That it is and hath been the manner of God, in other works of his, 
to proceed by like steps and degrees ; to proceed from less perfect to 
more perfect ; and to put great distances and disproportions, yea, from 
contraries. 

2. The reasons of it. 

The first contains two things in it. 

1. That it hath been his manner in other works, which will help ns to 
understand his proceeding in these. Thus, in making this visible world, 
he first began with a rude lump, that ' had no form,' Gen. i. 2, neither 
essential nor accidental ; which was actually nothing, potentially all things, 
therefore called earth and waters, but in truth a darkness and deep confusion 
without form. Then he divides that lump into four lofts and rooms, and 
puts in forms thereto to perfect that mass, and so makes the four elements ; 
then he finisheth and fits up those several lofts and chambers with inhabi- 
tants, garnisheth the fiery heavens with stars, fills the waters with fishes, 
the air with birds, the earth with beasts. And of these, those that had a 
more perfect kind of life were still created in order, after the other more 
imperfect, and still the latter containing in them the perfections of the 
former ; and then, last of all, man, the end, the existence, the lord of 



36 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

all, that hath the excellency of angels, sun, moon, and stars in him, as 
Eccles. xii. 2. 

And whereas God had another man to come, the Lord from heaven, who 
is God and man, and for him to make another world, a new heaven and a 
new earth, which he intended more than this, yet his ordination in his 
decrees was to make this first world more imperfect, as the prehuUum and 
preparative to this new world of Christ's ; which ordination and method of 
his the apostle hath expressly set before us, as heedfully to be noticed by 
us, 1 Cor. XV. 46, where, speaking of both these men, Adams, and their 
worlds, ' That was not first which was spiritual ; ' that is, that man Christ, 
and that estate of spiritual perfection he brings in, was not to be first, but 
last ; ' but first that which was natural, and afterwards that which is 
spiritual.' God laid that estate of Adam but as the first rude draught, the 
gi'oundwork to be filled up. God proceeded ab imperfectiore ad perfectius, 
by degrees fi'om natural to spiritual. And in the framing and rearing up 
this new second world, he observes the same method. 

1. In the very prophecy and foresignifying of it aforehand, God pro- 
ceeded c&Au/z.£g&;;, by several parcels, and cast the revelation of him into 
several shapes and representations, 'rro/.vrpo'rrug, Heb. i. 1, proceeding from 
more imperfect to what is perfect, as a preludium thereunto. 

First. He makes a covenant with the Jews, in outward appearance little 
better than a covenant of works (whereof it bears the name), then brings 
in that of gi-ace, established upon better principles and promises. The 
first at best, as the best of the Jews understood it, but imperfect to the 
end ; as Heb. xi. 40, ' That they without us should not be made perfect. 

And that first covenant, how doth he deliver it with all possible state 
and majesty ! brings down heaven to earth, and makes an heaven upon a 
dusty mountain in Sinai ! How gloriously speaks he in thunder ! By 
angels how terribly ! Makes Moses, a mediator, approach to him with his 
face shining, how brightly ! Erects a ministry, how richly clothed ! A 
tabernacle, after that a temple, how magnificent ! A worship therein, how 
costly ! And intends all this but as an imperfect show. For he finds 
fault with this covenant, ministi-y, worship, and all, Heb. viii ; disannuls 
it for the weakness and improfitableness of it, Heb. vii. 9, and then brings 
in * a better covenant,' ' a more excellent ministry,' Heb. viii. 7, 'a greater 
and more perfect tabernacle,' Heb. ix. 11. And even in that carnal way he 
proceeded by degrees : fii'st, there was but altars, then a tabernacle, then a 
temple. And then again, in that worldly temple, how was there first that 
which was imperfect ! and then comes that which was holy and more perfect. 
Three courts there w^ere. The outward court for the people, Rev. xi. 1, 
less glorious ; the second for the priests, wherein was the candlestick, and 
the table, and the shew-bread ; and after the second veil a third, * the 
holiest of all,' Heb. ix. 2-4, &c., which had the golden censer, the ark 
overlaid with gold, wherein was the golden pot that had manna, and the 
cherubims of glory ; and this was eminently called the ylonj, the type of 
heaven. And then, when God came indeed to erect the new world under 
the gospel, Heb. ii. 4, 5, how still doth he proceed from the more 
imperfect to what is perfect, ere he hath brought us to the height of all 
perfection ! Into how many heavens, one after the other, will he bring us I 

1. He makes a new creation in his people's hearts, a new work there ; 
so 2 Cor. V. 17, * Old things are passed away, all things are become new' 
in a believer's heart ; and this out of a darkness, a chaos, 2 Cor. iv. 6. 

And 2. Then he brings that new creature into a new world of the ordi- 



I 



Chap. III.] of their state by creation. 87 

nances and things revealed and fitted to this new creature, which are 
deservedly called, ' The kingdom of heaven ; ' whereby a man is said to 
have a being lift up to heaven, &c., as Capernaum. And all the glory of 
that revelation made on Sinai is called but earth to this, which is truly a 
heaven in comparison of it, Heb. xii. 25, 26, yet this heaven he will shake 
as he did that earth, and remove this heaven as he did that earth (so Heb. 
xii. 20, 27), and bring his elect into a new heaven — new in comparison 
to this now. Rev. xxi., whenas once again all is to become new, ver. 4, 5. 
And then, after that new heaven and new earth, where righteousness dwells, 
the epistles of Paul and Peter tell us that he will bring us into an ' heaven 
of heavens,' so called, not in relation only to natural heavens, but spiritual 
heavens foregoing it, which shall be the end, the perfection of all ; and so, 
Rom. vi. 22, is called rsXog [from rsXiu, perficio], the end, the perfection ; 
even as Christ is called ' the end of the law,' Rom. x. 4. And as the law 
made nothing perfect, but Christ, so even all these foregoing heavens are 
(though in themselves, some of them comparatively to others foregoing, 
perfect, yet) compared to this last and utmost, but imperfect, which is the 
end of ail. 

The second is, that in all these gradual representations of his, he so 
orders it, that the latter shall still exceed the former, and so exceed, as the 
former shall hold no comparison therewith ; and therefore, the more of 
them -we can find out the better. Thus how did the world, ordered, gar- 
nished, and adorned, exceed the chaos, which was darkness and confusion? 
The second day's work exceeded the first; the third the work of the 
second. And as much did the little world, man, the epitome of all the 
great world, excel all, so as heathens stood astonished at it. But infinitely 
more doth Christ, the second Adam, exceed the first, 1 Cor. xv. 45-47, 
&c., and his world, this of Adam's ; and likewise the ministration of the 
second covenant, the gospel, that of the first, the law, that, 2 Cor. iii. 
10, '.it had no glory in comparison of this which excelleth.' And then the 
new heavens and the new earth to come, will so exceed this heaven, even 
this kingdom of heaven we now, or the saints, enjoy, that ' the former shall 
not be remembered,' Isa. Ixv. 17. And as it was prophesied that the ark 
and service of the temple, Jer. iii. 16, should be so exceeded by the gospel, 
that it should be remembered no more, so will the new heavens exceed 
these, that all here shall be remembered no more, nor come into mind — 
an expression shewing how much the former should be excelled by the 
latter, even so much, that as it useth to fall out in things and objects 
eminently excelling, they so swallow up the mind that all other things are 
not thought on, but forgotten, as if they had never been. As the glory of 
the sun puts out the glory of the moon, so shall this exceed that former, 
that it shall not come to mind. 

Now, to add a true reason why God is pleased thus in his works to pro- 
ceed in general : 

1. To shew the perfection of his efficiency and workmanship. It argues 
a weakness in an efficient to do worse, when it hath done better ; but per- 
fection, still so to exceed, and put down the former. 

2. It shews his various and manifold wisdom, -roXuffo/x/Xo; cop/a, or his 
much or mighty varying wisdom, as Chrysostom expounds that phrase, 
Eph. iii. 11. His wisdom is in itself one, but we could not see it in itself 
at once. Therefore he shews it by several representations of it and him- 
self, in several efiects ; and that shews wisdom also not simply various, 
but much, mightily difiering and excelling, to shew the vastness of his 



38 OF THE CKEATUKES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK: II. 

wisdom, who could cast himself into so many forms, and frame so many 
several patterns of worlds and conditions, not only infinitely differing from, 
but as much excelling each other. 

And thirdly. This is a -way and course he knew would take the creature 
most, for unto its capacity hath God herein applied himself. Kow we find 
that our spirits are taken and led on with much more pleasure, and brought 
into a greater wonderment and admiration of a thing transcendently excel- 
lent, when things of less worth, yet to our apprehensions (whilst wc see no 
better) most excellent, are presented first. So we have heard, in enter- 
tainment of great ones, their cunning suitors have led them into stately 
rooms, where sumptuous banquets have been prepared, and from thence 
earned them into other far more exceeding, to set off' the latter so much 
the more, and make it great indeed. So it is in masques and shows, in 
which there are several presentments involved one beyond another. And 
thus doth and will God entertain his children. And what can be more to 
draw the creatm-es into wonderment, than first to present them with such 
a work, so perfect in their apprehensions as they know not where anything 
should be added to it, to make it more perfect, or taken away, as Solomon 
speaks of God's works, Eccles. iii. 14 (though haply in a further sense 
also), and yet then to bring them unto another frame and building differ- 
ing, infinitely exceeding, the other. T\Tiat is there will wrap up in more 
astonishments ! Now, never did the art of man present such a prospective 
piece which, as you know, carries the eye through several rooms, one beyond 
another, as is this which God hath made, and the world=;= reveals unto us. 

As for the second head propounded, the scheme of these several estates, 
and the subordination of them. 

1. The scheme of them. 

(1.) There is the estate of pure nature wherein Adam was created, and 
in him we, which he and we should have enjoyed on earth, which had an 
happiness in its kind most perfect and complete. 

(2.) The second is the estate of grace we are brought into here by the 
second Adam under the gospel, and the privileges enjoyed by faith and 
hope, which, if it were made up complete (though but within its own sphere, 
without addition of gloi^), would afford an higher and super-excelling hap- 
piness than that of Adam. 

(3.) The third is the estate of glory hereafter, in which there might haply 
be found out in Scriptm-e three degrees ; whereof two are but steps to the 
highest throne we shall be set in. 

[1.] That of the souls of men separate, till joined to the body, during 
which time, though made perfect in grace, and with addition of glory, 
yet not with that degree which at the resurrection soul and body shall 
receive. 

[2.] That estate of the soul and body, when first joined in Christ's 
visible kingdom, and the day of judgment, which transcends that of the 
soul's alone. 

[3.] That of the soul and body, when Christ shall have given up his 
kingdom to his Father, when God shall be all in all. 

All which may further be cast into this series : that whereas God, 
known and enjoyed, is the supreme happiness of man in all conditions, God 
hath ordained several ways, difl'ering not only in degrees, but kind, of 
knowing and enjoying of him. All which the apostle reduceth to a 
dichotomy, 1 Cor. xiii. 12, either, 1, in a glass, or in a riddle, darkly, now 
« Qu. ' word ' ?— Ed. 



Chap. III.] of theib state by creation. 89 

in this world ; or, 2, face to face in that to come. The one we may call 
specidaris corf)iilio ; the other, intuitiva : the one mediate and merely in 
alio, in another thing ; that other immediate in se, as in himself, face to 
face. And answerable to each of these knowledges of him, is there an 
enjoyment of him by the will, goes along therewith, to delight and rest 
satisfied in him. For the understanding and the will are commensurated 
and proportioned each to other, according to that known rule, in quantum 
co(jnuscimus, in tanlum amamus ; in quantum ainamus, in tantum r/audemus. 
So much, or so far as we know God aright, we love him ; so far as we love 
him, we rejoice in and are made happy by him. 

This specular or mediate knowledge of God in this world, is either, 
1, such as that which Adam had, seeing and enjoying him in the creatures, 
which was his glass, as it was said of old, speculum creature: ; or enjoying 
him in and by the covenant of works, the glass of the law, accompanied 
with peace of conscience following the doing his will ; or at the best, but 
seeing and enjoying him in visions and apparitions, as the fathers of old 
did. Or else, 2, it is that knowledge which we have of him by revelation 
iu the glass of the gospel, this covenant of grace, in which the glory of God 
shines forth in the face of Jesus Christ as in a glass, as 2 Cor. iii. 18 and 
chap. iv. 6 compared. Which is accompanied often with, ' peace which 
passeth understanding,' 'joy unspeakable and glorious,' as 1 Peter i., and 
but only as in this glass. And if we compare either this knowledge of God 
in Christ presented in this glass with that of Adam, his will be found to be 
but as in a riddle, darker and obscurer far, for the kind and way of knowing 
him, though for degrees in its own kind it was more complete. And in 
like manner, the least drop of joy of the Holy Ghost, the droppings of 
heaven, which he puts into the heart, will be found more than all Adam's 
full springs of peace, which arose but out of his own conscience, which was 
but as a spring on earth in comparison of this other. And both these 
ways of knowing and enjoying God, which a believer in part here hath, I 
take it to be the apostle aims at, ver. 8, calling the one, namely, that by 
relation* in the gospel, prophesying, which is the means of revealing God 
in Christ by the Scriptures, which are the glass and ordinance that present 
God in Christ most lively to us ; the other, knowledge, namely, that obtained 
by the creatures, as some have differenced these two. 

But then there is a knowledge which is ' face to face,' as being more 
immediate, after this life ; whereof, I take it, there are two degrees also, 
whereof the one shall exceed the other. The first is, the seeing and 
enjoying Christ the Lord personally in glory, face to face^ and so the God- 
head in him. So as still the chiefest and eminentest way of knowing and 
enjoying the Godhead should be in Christ only, which I take is the 
chiefest way both for the souls separate, both before and at the resurrec- 
tion, till the day of judgment be over, when * we shall see him as he is, 
and be made hke him ;' which infinitely transcends our seeing God in 
Christ here ; when Christ himself is made known but imperfectly in a glass, 
in ordinances of grace, and is truly a seeing face to face, namely, of the 
Lord Christ, being compared with our way of seeing him here absent, by 
faith, and not by sight, as Cor. v. 6-8. Yet so as there is a second and 
farther degree of seeing God in himself, face to face, far more exceeding, 
that is, for us to see him face to face, as Christ himself now doth ; when 
he shall have given his kingdom up, by which only, as by him administered, 
God is more eminently to be known, till the,day of judgment is over. Then 
* Qu. ' revelation ' ? — Ed 



40 OF THE CEEATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

shall God become all in all immediately himself, which must needs exceed 
all else, as God himself exceeds all these ways of revealing him. 

Thus hath God ordained to bring us by steps and degrees to that parti- 
cipation of himself which creatures are capable of. And in bringing us into 
his immediate presence and conjunction, to entertain us first with lower, 
though all most glorious representations of himself ; even as kings are 
wont to do, in admitting ambassadors into their presence, so God admits 
us, 1, by creatures and visible apparitions ; 2, in his Son revealed absent 
in a glass ; then, 3dly, by his Son's own personal entertainment of us ; 
who, 4thly, shall deliver us up to God, to enjoy God, as himself doth. 

And as I have given a brief delineation thus of the particulars, so I will 
make the like brief comparison of them each with other. 

1. If we compare the first branch of that last division given with the 
latter, how doth the latter way exceed it ! For to see God, and enjoy 
him but in creatures, as Adam did, and in the ordinances and revelations 
of the gospel, is as in a glass, and makes it at best but as an accidental 
happiness, as comparatively divines calls it. That only of seeing God and 
Christ face to face, as in himself essentially, is the truest happiness. 
The one is but the shadow ; the other, the substance in which true hap- 
piness consists. 

But, 2dly, more particularly, the distance between each of these four 
degrees is such, that, 1, all the knowledge which Adam had of God in the 
creatures, the law and apparitions, was but as seeing one in his footsteps 
and shadow, and in types and resemblances, as all these were semlum speculi, 
as was said of old. As in like manner were these revelations under the 
law, which were but the shadow, Heb. x. 1, and not the image. 2. That 
knowledge by revelation in the glass of the gospel, in seeing Christ therein, 
which is said to be the knowledge of God in the face of Jesus Christ, 2 Cor. 
iii. 18 and chap. iv. 6 compared, as yet but as seeing the image of one 
that is absent in a glass, and so but the representation of him in his Son, 
who is his image, and that but as presented in a glass absent, which though 
nearer than the other, yet how remote from the real communication of 
himself! 

8. That after this life ended, till after the day of judgment, will be but 
the enjoying God more eminently in his Son, who is not absent any more, 
but personally present in his glory : ' That they may see my glory,' John 
xvii. 24. Which adds infinitely to both the former, and is the seeing and 
enjoying the substance of that image of God, the image only of which 
we here enjoy. It is to view face to face the brightness of God's glory 
shining in Christ, of which but the glimpse or reflection we here could see. 
But then, 4thly, to behold that glory as in itself, and as this his Son, 
that before represented it to us, himself sees it ; and for God himself to be 
his own presenter of himself, will infinitely yet more transcend. 

And thus each of these are to what succeed them but as perfectibilla ad 
perfectivwn, as groundworks and foundations laid for the other still to 
perfect them and swallow them up ; that still, as that which is more 
perfect succeeds that which was before (and in comparison thereunto was but 
imperfect), is done away. And as the knowledge of God in the creatures 
is swallowed up, and vanisheth, as it were, in the presence of God in Christ 
presented in the gospel — and so indeed would Adam's certainly have done, 
if Christ had been propounded to him ; and so doth all Old Testament 
knowledge of God vanish before this same, as the shadow, as Col. ii. 17, 
or as the morning star, as 2 Peter i. 19, when the sun appears — so will. 



Chap. IV.] of their state by creation. 41 

much more, this of Christ now be swallowed up, and vanish afore the 
enjoyment of God in Christ, in his glory and his kingdom. And so the 
apostle tells us, that ' knowledge and prophecy shall cease and fail ; and 
this, ' that is but in part, shall be done away,' 1 Cor. xiii. 10. And so in 
hke manner, the same apostle tells us, 1 Cor. xv., that the kingdom or 
eminency of Christ himself shall in comparison cease, and be given up to 
the presence of his Father, when God shall be all in all. 1 Cor. xv. 24-28, 
' Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to 
God, even the Father ; when he shall have put down all rule, and all 
authority and power. For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies 
under his feet. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. For he 
hath put all things under his feet. But when he saith, All things are 
put under him, it is manifest that he is excepted which did put all things 
under him. And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall 
the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, 
that God may be all in all.' 



CHAPTER IV. 
Containing a short view of the happiness of Adam's condition. 

Adam's best estate was but a type and shadow of that which Christ was 
to bring in, and according to the law and proportion of that type, an excel- 
ling difference must needs be in the latter above the former. 

Let us but consider the height and true elevation of his state, simply 
and plainly, what it was in itself, without considering it as a shadow or 
type of the state of grace by Christ, and it will appear how short, and 
low, and mean his condition was, in comparison of what even the state of 
grace, now under the gospel, brings us into, and makes us the subjects of. 

Many things are written concerning the image of God in Adam, both 
internal, in hoHness and righteousness, and in knowledge, &c., as also 
external, in dominion over the works of God's hands. My scope is only 
so to speak of these things, as may serve to the illustration of Christ, and 
our estate of grace and glory by him. 

The blessed condition that Adam was created in, and estated into in 
paradise, is, in the general apprehensions of all men, made the object of 
their envy, and conceived to have been such, as their hearts know not how 
to desire a happier : and ordinarily we can still scarce think of it as lost, 
but with a secret kind of regret, that it did so unhappily fall out that 
Adam, and we in him, should fall from it, and, like great men's heirs, be 
disinherited for their father's treason ; we use to say within ourselves. Oh, 
what men should we have been, if Adam had not sinned ! 

To give, therefore, a small taste of this happiness of Adam : 

No sooner did he open his eyes, but he saw himself most happy. He 
had a world about him new made, and in its freshness and best hue, and 
furnished with all sorts of creatures, and all of them suited to his body 
(the epitome of them all), and to his senses, as well inward as outward, so 
to estate him in the fulness of all contentment. And he was made the 
centre of all the goodness that was in those creatures ; unto whom each of 
them, as unto their Lord, was fitted to pay a tribute of comfort : so suited 
was this little and great world together. There was not a desire could 
arise in him, but something or other he might find to satisfy it ; nor was 



42 OF TUE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [LoOK. II. 

there a creature in the universe towards -which he might not find some- 
thing in himself to be well pleased in it ; God having placed the world in 
man's heart, as man in the world. And for this first man, God seated him 
in a garden planted by himself, in the richest and most pleasant soil in the 
world, Eden, near Babylon, as the court and royal seat of the king of this 
great world — a garden, of all nature's pleasures the most delightful (and 
therefore affected so by Solomon, Eccles. ii. 5), planted by God himself, 
the best gardener for skill that ever was (and therefore often called in 
Ezekiel ' the garden of God'), and so furnished with all the choicest rari- 
ties and glories of the whole earth brought thither together (which in all 
other places were but thinly sprinkled), seated in a soil fertile and pleasant 
beyond expression, and therefore called Paradise, -/.ar e^oy^rjv, as being the 
garden of gardens. And the greatest monarch of Assyria is compared but 
to one of the trees of this garden, as other princes that envied him are 
compared to other trees, Ezek. sxxi. 6-8. And then God gave him a soul, 
able to search into, and so to know the natures of all creatures (for he 
gave names to them all), which, as Plato said of him who first did this, 
argued him to be sapieutissimus ; and much more able than Solomon was 
he to discern of all things, and so to see God clearly in each of them ; whom 
then, looking into his heart, he found by the covenant of works (as before 
he had tasted his favour in all the creatures) to be his God ; from whence 
issued an unmixed peace and joy, such as fully satisfied his heart in fel- 
lowship with him, as thus known to be his chiefest good, joined with a 
promise of having this God to be for ever his, whilst he should thus con- 
tinue to obey him. The promise to him was, that he should live by doing ; 
by which was meant, not only not to die, but to live to a life made up of 
nothing but of comforts and contentments. His heart did live, as the 
phrase is, Ps. Ixix. 32. And besides this, he seeing and tasting God's love 
and goodness in and by all the creatures, he was made capable of a super- 
added fellowship with God, which at times he was pleased to vouchsafe 
him by revelations, in visions and apparitions, wherein God ' talked with 
him' (as he did with the patriarchs after him), as appeareth in his story, 
Gen. 2d and 3d chapters : by which he was refreshed and cheered, and 
also instructed further, than simply by God enjoyed in and by the creatures. 
And surely we have now taken the height of that his happiness. 

Now this condition of his infinitely surpassed the best state that since 
the fall ever was, or can be supposed to be, on earth. Since sin subjected 
both the creature to vanity, and us to vexation of spirit, there never was 
the like enjoyed ,by any son of man. Yea, take but the contentment he 
took in the creatures, and his pleasures must needs as much exceed these 
which now men have, as the pleasures of a man, sound and in perfect 
health, do exceed those of a desperately sick man, who wants aU relish, 
as we now are said to be, Eccles. v. 17, by reason of lusts within us (as 
Solomon compares it). But, besides, the creatures now are but a husk, 
as they were to the prodigal, who was the type of sinners, Luke xv., 
whereas then God was as the kernel of them, and with his favour tasted in 
them, filled them with a transcendent sweetness. Neither was there then any 
gross accident added to this emptiness : no stings of conscience to cause 
any sadness in the midst of mhth ; no contrary passions to allay the plea- 
sures then enjoyed ; but all in man was subjected unto reason, and that 
unto God. He enjoyed a perfect peace and security, and a condition so 
happy, that God delighted himself therein when accomplished, and kept a 
day of rest in memory thereof, which estate of his the fallen angels did 



Chap. IY.] of their state by creation. 43 

envy and malign. And man liimself could not lut iLink tLis uorld, and 
his condition in it, good enough ; nor knew he how any thing could bo 
beyond it. 

Now, notwithstanding all this that hath or may be said of it, this is the 
position which I shall endeavour to assert and establish : 

That Adam's best knowledge and enjoyment was inferior, and of a lower 
rank, than is that knowledge and fellowship with God, which we in Christ, 
through faith, do hero enjoy, in that estate of grace which the gospel 
putteth us into. 

Than which (if well established) nothing will more tend to magnify the 
grace of God in Christ, and will abundantly serve to heighten our appre- 
hensions about heaven's glory, when we shall consider how infinitely trans- 
cendent that happiness must needs be, which God in the end doth beyond 
all this advance us unto. 

Now, to prevent mistakes, and to clear my meaning, that I be not mis- 
understood in casting Adam's condition thus low, I premise these two 
cautious : 

1 . My meaning is not, as if his condition did not then afford him a m.ore 
sensible, constant felicity, and a more actual quiet ease and contentment, 
than a believer's in any constant way doth, now under the estate of grace : 
which falls out so to them, because their happiness is disadvantaged by 
two things (whatever else there may be) by which his was not. As, 

(1.) From the annoyance of outward afflictions from men and the crea- 
tures, and the chastisements from God for sin : in which respect our con- 
dition now is rendered more miserable than other men's, and much more 
than Adam's, who had a fulness of contentment in God, and all the crea- 
tures, and a perfect freedom from all miseries whatever. 

(2.) In that, even that fellowship a believer hath with God in Christ 
(which should counterpoise these outward miseries), is for the degrees of 
it so imperfect, and allayed with the contrary admixture of ignorance, 
unbelief, guilt, and distress, and so often interrupted by these, that it can- 
not be supposed always to bring in that full and constant happiness, and 
the enjoyment of contentment, that Adam's fellowship with God did, which 
was sincere, without any such admixture or private imperfection, and was 
ordained to rise to a full perfection in its own sphere, and was ever con- 
stant and uninterrapted, whilst he sinned not. God not having ordained 
the state of grace to give us that quietness, and security, and contentment, 
in a constant way here, hath left it on purpose thus imperfect, that so "we 
might rather breathe after that bliss to come, whereof this is to be but the 
taste and earnest. 

2. Yet so as, if the way and manner of Adam's knowing and enjoying 
God (though in its kind complete) be compared with the way and manner 
of our knowing and enjoying God, thus imperfect, this of ours is unspeak- 
ably more divine, heavenly, glorious, and surpassing, and his more low 
and earthly. 

So that now, would we make a supposition (as for this purpose in hand 
we may), that a believer's knowledge and enjoyment of God were but com- 
pleted and filled up, though but within its own sphere, without the addi- 
tion of glory and the beatifical vision of God (so it be without this mixture 
of sin and miseries which are the punishment of sin) ; and it would ren- 
der us infinitely more happy, and more replete with glorious contentment, 
than ever entered into Adam's heart, and would make this estate of grace 
below a heaven in comparison of his paradise. 



44 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK 11. 



CHAPTER V. 

The image of God in Adam, how it was natural, how explained, and hoit 
faith is supernatural. — That hnowledge of God natural which is due and 
fit for a reasonable creature to have, and which he acquires by the exercise 
of his rational faculties. — That knowiedge supernatural which goes beyond 
ivhat man by the right of his creation was to have. — Adam's knowledge of 
God was in a natural icay, though it sanctified him, and ivas joined with 
holiness. 

Now, to state the true difference and give the true disproportion between 
these two estates, I must explain that known distinction (so much used of 
all sides, both schoolmen and our own divines) of natural righteousness and 
supernatural grace ; or the knowing and enjoying God in a way natural to 
man, and tending to a natural happiness in God, and the knowledge of and 
fellowship with God in a way supernatural or above nature, which tends 
to a supernatural happiness to be had in him. 

Now when it is said that there is a natural way of knowing God, the 
meaning is not of that natural knowledge in corrupt nature which heathens 
have of God ; but it hath reference to the pure nature of man in Adam 
uncorrupted, whereof that natural light left even in corrupt nature is but 
the shadow. Which shews that there was such a kind of knowledge of 
God in Adam, in an holy and perfect way, which knowledge of his 
the schoolmen call Adam's theologia naturalis, his natural divinity and 
knowledge. 

And, oppositely, a supernatural knowing God, is not so called in respect 
of corrupt nature, as being supernatural to it, but in respect to pure 
nature, as being above even the natural way thereof. 

Now the most radical and exact difference between these two, that I can 
search out, lies in these two things : 

1. That way of knowing God in pure nature, is so far called natural, as 
it may be supposed a natural due, meet and requisite to be in man by the 
law of nature, if God would at all make such a creature endued with reason 
and understanding ; for if God meant to make two such faculties, as are 
our wills and understandings, in their nature and capacities so unlimited, 
the law of nature required that God himself should become the object of 
them, and so to give man a power to know and delight in him ; for other- 
wise it had been to make those faculties in that vastness in vain, and 
without their due end, seeing they could not rest or be satisfied with all 
the particular truth and goodness in the creatures (as the senses can), they 
being vaster and more general faculties ; and therefore in a way that was 
due to the nature of man, if God would make him reasonable, God was to 
be both known and enjoyed by man, so as to satisfy both his understanding 
and will, and thereby to make him happy. And a happiness in God, so 
far proportioned thus to the nature of man, is called natural happiness. 

And so, oppositely, that which was vouchsafed to man over and above 
this natural due, and supra cxigentiam creatunr, more than it was simply 
meet for God to give him upon and with his creating him reasonable, — that, 
I say, is supernatural, and is therefore called grace, as being a free gift over 
and above that which was necessai'ily due to such a creature. 

Now for the present, to clear this in general by an instance ; for God to 
have for ever confirmed man whom he thus made in that goodness, and to 



Chap. V.] of their state by creation, 45 

have held him so to himself that he should not sin or fall, this had been a 
supernatural grace, because it is more than is due to any creature as 
reasonable ; for as it is a creature, it is defectible and may fail, and it is 
natural to the creature of itself so to be, God alone being ' without shadow 
of turning.' And therefore, though it was man's due (if God would make 
him reasonable) for God himself to become his happiness, yet to keep him 
from failing was above the due that the creature, as a creature, could 
challenge ; yea rather, it might become God to leave the creature, to shew 
itself to be but a creature that would fall. 

The second difierence is, that that knowledge and enjoyment of God was 
natural, which w^as suited, fitted, and proportioned to the natural way of 
man in his knowledge of things. So as that light that enabled him to know 
God was suited and made apt to close with the natural way and his under- 
standing, only it did withal sanctify it. 

> But that knowledge, oppositely, is supernatural, which is by a light above 
the way of nature, and the way of man's understanding things, as the light 
of our faith is. 

Now then, to bring down this distinction unto the thing in hand, I con- 
ceive that the ordinary way of Adam's knowing and enjoying God lay, if not 
wholly, yet for the most part, within the sphere and compass of a natural 
way ; that is, so far as was simply due to a creature reasonable, and was 
such as was also suited to the natural way of man's understanding and 
knowledge, though withal sanctifying of him. And accordingly, the happi- 
ness thence arising was, comparatively, but a natural kind of happiness ; 
so much as was due to the satisfying of man's understanding and will in 
God in their natural desires and appetites, so far as might become their 
object in such a natural way. 

For the clearing of which, 

1. You know that the image of God, which consisted in knowledge and 
holiness, wherein man was at first created, is by our divines (in opposition 
to the Romanists) argued to have been natural to him, then in that state 
considered : natural, not that it simply flowed from the principles of 
nature, it being from God, who adorned man's nature with it, but natural 
in this respect, that it was a requisite and due, even in the order of nature, 
that man should be created with it ; and so as you could not suppose 
him created by God reasonable, but he must withal know God as his 
chiefest good, and love God above all, and in that knowledge and love of 
him be happy. And this was the law of nature in his creation, unto which, 
if he had not been framed, he had not had that natural goodness in his 
kind which other creatures had in their kind. And such was the image of 
God wherein he was created. 

This point I will not now dispute, but may well take for granted, it being 
fundamental to all the protestant opinions about original sin, &c., wherein 
we difier from the papists. 

And 2. If thus the image of God was natural to Adam, then was it also 
such as was suited to that way of man's knowledge and desires, running 
along therewith in the same channel and way that man's nature was to 
take in knowing of other things. For otherwise, so far as it had been 
carried above its own way, it had been supernatural. 

Now then, let us consider what is the natural way of man's knowing 
things, and so of his knowing God. The way and progress of man's 
knowledge naturally lieth thus : 

In having at first a glimmering light, and common, yet obscure principles 



46 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

and glimpses of the notions of things sown in the mind by nature, which 
then by observation and laying things together, and so gathering one thing 
from another, the mind improveth and enlargeth, till it arise to a parti- 
cular, clear, distinct, and perfect knowledge of those things which it seeks 
to know. This is the natural way of man's understanding in both estates, 
both of innocent and corrupt nature ; and that in all things that are known 
by him in either of these estates wherein common principles (as that the 
whole is greater than its parts, &c.), -/.olvai hvoiai, as the Grecians call them, 
hints, glimpses, as I call them, many of which are even in the minds of 
children, and as it were connate with them ; these, I say, are as the seed 
sown, and reason and obseiwation are as the tillage and watering of them ; 
and a full knowledge arising from both is as the crop or harvest that springs 
from both, and is reaped by us. 

Now when God stamped his imago upon the understanding of man, that 
thereby he might know God himself, and so enjoy him, he so framed it, as 
that it might suit with this natural way of man's proceeding in his know- 
ledge in other things ; so as the mind of man might proceed its own way 
in the knowledge of God himself, and walk therein after the rule of nature. 
And unto that end God, in the instant of his creation, did sow in his mind 
holy and sanctifying notions and principles, both concerning his own nature, 
what a God he was, and also concerning his will, even as he did the like 
common notions of the knowledge of other things ; which principles were 
by rectified reason to be improved, enlarged, and confirmed, made clear 
and illustrious, out of his observations from the creatures and the works of 
providence, as also from the covenant of works, till it arise to a full, clear, 
and distinct knowledge of God, whom, as thus known, he should have 
enjoyed and delighted in, even as now we see man's mind hath the prin- 
ciples of other knowledge in it, which observation and reason do improve. 
And thus, as he was to till the garden of Eden, so was he to till and 
manure his own mind. 

Two things it then concerned man to know of God : — 

1. The nature and attributes of God ; what a God he was : how wise, 
powerful, eternal, &c. 

2. The will and mind of God towards man ; both what God would have 
him do, and what God was, and would be to him, even his God, if he did 
his will. 

And of both these he had the knowledge through natural infused principles, 
which sanctified his whole man then, as the knowledge of Christ, by faith, 
doth our whole man now. 

1. He had inbred, obscure notions of the attributes of God, which yet 
were not so full and distinct, but that from the creatures and works of God, 
he was to enlarge and confirm his knowledge of them ; and out of all laid 
together, to make up a perfect knowledge of God and of all his attributes : 
' For the invisible things of him are clearly seen from the creation of the 
world,' Eom. i. 20. And if thus to be seen by heathens, as the apostle 
there argues, then much more by Adam, for whom they were ordained. 
Those holy principles, or glimpses of the knowledge of God in him, were 
like letters written with the juice of lemon or the like, which, when they 
are held to the fire, do become legible and apparent ; so these, when 
he came once to view the creatures, presented God clearly to him : * The 
heavens declare the glory of God,' &c., says the psalmist, Psa. xix. 1. 

' Prseseutemque refert qusBlibet herba Deum,* 
says the poet. Adam's reason was able, through the light of those prin- 



Chap. V.] op their state by creation. 47 

ciples sown, to take God np as the cause from these effects, and so to attain 
a perfect knowledge of him, perfect, that is, in its kind, and in that sense, 
complete. 

2. He had, in like manner, the principles of God's whole mind and will 
sown in his heart ; even the seeds of all that moral law which we find in 
the Scriptures, Adam had then sown in him in the utmost spirituality 
thereof : the notions of it grew up naturally in his heart. So as, upon all 
occasions when ho was to practise any part of it, he might come fully to 
know what he was to do ; and it needed not to bo revealed, or ho to receive 
it by faith. But the whole law was to him even a law of nature written in 
his heart, naturally known to him by common dictates inbred in him. And 
thus in like manner was that promise known to him, that by doimi he should 
live, together with that threatening, that by transgression of the law, or any 
part of it, he should die the death. These were known to him by principles 
written in his heart, though further confirmed to him by two sacraments, 
the tree of life, and of the knowledge of good and evil, even as his other 
notions of God were helped and enlarged by the works of God ; yet so as 
the knowledge of this covenant, and of the promise and threatening annexed 
to it, was natural, though it were strengthened and enlarged by those two 
sacraments. 

And as an evidence to us that this was the natural primitive way of 
man's knowing God in the estate of innocency, God hath put into corrupt 
nature a shadow hereof, and an imperfect counterfeit of it in all mankind, 
to remain as a witness what an one his image in man at first was, and how 
stamped on him. He hath, I say, left some instances, prints, and footsteps 
of either kind of knowledge above-mentioned still in us ; both concerning 
the nature of God, and concerning his will, as we find them, the one in the 
first to the Eomans, and the other in the second. 

1. There are still in us some rude notions of a God, which the apostle 
shews the heathens to have had, Rom. i., which he calls ri yvwffrii/ rou 
0£oD, ver. 19, 'that which might be known of God;' that is, whereby 
thev might have seen, as some of them did, ' the invisible things' (or attri- 
butes) of God, ver. 20. 

And, 2dly, there are still like notions and engrafted principles, concern- 
ing some parts of the will and law of God, written in our hearts. So Rom. 
ii. 15, they have ' the work of the law writtten in their hearts,' and so 
' are a law to themselves,' as is in the foregoing verse ; and have also some 
glimmering of the threatening, and so, by consequence, of the promise, if 
they walk according to it. For, ver. 32 of chap, i., they are said to * know 
the judgment of God' (thus by instinct), ' that they who commit such things 
are worthy of death,' and by the rule of contraries, that they who obey the 
law are worthy of life ; and therefore, their thoughts do as well ' excuse ' 
in hope of life, as ' accuse ' in respect of condemnation, as you have it, 
ver. 15. 

Now these common principles engrafted, some divines call the relics of 
that former image, thinking them to be the same for substance with those 
more perfect ones which were in Adam ; as the sparks of a bigger fire, or 
as the rains of an house razed and disordered, which, for the matter, are 
the same that at first. 

But I shall shew elsewhere, that these are rather wholly renewed, and 
again put into us by Christ, who ' lighteneth' (with this light, more or less) 
' every man that comes into the world,' as it is in John i. 9 ; and so, that 
they do in reahty differ firom those in Adam, of which we have spoken. 



48 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK. II 

For those principles of the knowledge of God and of his law, written in 
Adam's heart, and Hkewise the improvement of them by reason, &e., were 
all holy in themselves and spiritual, and made his heart holy and sanctified 
him. For the most spiritual part of the law was no otherwise known to 
him, than by being thus written in his heart by natural principles, as the 
rest also was, and not by faith, as in us it is ; and so were as natural then 
to him, as moral principles are now in heathens. And thus, to love God 
above all, to believe on him, &c., was to Adam but the dictate of pure 
nature, by a way of common principles, which met with answerable holy 
dispositions, -which accompanied these dictates in his will and aflfections ; 
all which together made up true holiness and righteousness in a natural 
way. And in like manner, those notions which he had of God and of his 
attributes by nature, and that acquired knowledge which was to rise out of 
them by observation of God's works, were all holy and sanctifying. Why 
else are the Gentiles blamed for that, knowing God in a natural way, even 
from his works, they ' glorified not God as God,' Rom. i. ; and for that 
they, knowing the law, walked not according to it, but because the know- 
ledge of both these which Adam once had, and they in him, and which he 
should have acquired, enabled him thus to love God above all, and to 
glorify God as God ! And on purpose did God put this imperfect natural 
knowledge into corrupt nature, to shew us what was the way of knowing 
and glorifying God, one* in nature pure and innocent. And this is the 
first demonstration of it. 

A second demonstration that the way of Adam's knowledge was thus 
natural, and by the light of common infused principles, and by observation 
of God's works to be improved, may be taken from the use and end of the 
Sabbath, which God himself sanctified, and upon it rested, to contemplate 
his works of creation ; and this to be taken as an example unto Adam, how 
his mind upon this day was to be up, even in the contemplation of the 
works of God. And that that was the principal duty of the Sabbath, under 
the covenant of works, appears by Psa. xcii. 

And therefore, thirdly, the best of Adam's condition (for of his condition 
when first created the apostle, 1 Cor. xv. 45, quotes that speech in Genesis, 
'The first man, Adam, was made a living soul') is called animal and 
natural in the 46th verse of the aforesaid 15th to the Corinthians ; but 
that state unto which Christ brings us, is there called spiritual or super- 
natural. Both the condition of our souls here, and of our bodies and souls 
hereafter, is spiritual and supernatural. And such is Christ's whole image, 
■whereas Adam's was but natural. 

CHAPTER VI. 

That the covenant of works, the justification of Adam by that covenant, and 
the reward of his obedience, ivere all natural. — And that by covenant he 
should not have gone to heaven. 

As the way of his knowing God, and the image of God in him, were thus 
natural, and no higher than was due unto nature, and suited unto man as 
man, so were all things else which any way concerned him ; they were of 
the same elevation also, and reached no higher than the sphere of nature, 
in the sense explained ; namely, they were such as were due unto man's 
nature, or were founded upon the law of nature. For instance, 
» Qu. ' onco • ?— Ed. 



Chap. YL] of their state by creation. 49 

1. The covenant ho stood under was hi\if(cdHS natimr, the covenant of 
nature, and such as, for the conditions of it, was duo unto such a creature, 
and such as it became the Creator to make with him, if he at all mado 
him. And therefore the foundation of that covenant was but the title of 
creation, and the primitive integrity in which God fii-st mado man, and there 
was nothing at all supernatural in it. 

2. The righteousness whereby ho was justified was no other than that 
natural righteousness in which he was created, and which was conserved 
and preserved by continuing to act holily, and by doing good according to 
the principles of holiness at first implanted in him. And so it was but 
such a justification as was a natural due to the creature so obeying, that 
God should pronounce him just upon it ; for it was but God's giving him 
such an approbation, that he both was, and did continue, * good in his 
kind,' as he pronounced of all the other creatures in their kind. Gen. i. 31, 
when God saw that they were all good. Then likewise he viewed Adam, 
and pronounced him good also in holiness and righteousness, which was 
the proper goodness of his creation. So that his approbation of him was 
but natural, and according to a rule of nature common to other creatures, 
and so a due. Which may be the meaning of that place in Rom. iv. 4, 
where the apostle, speaking of the difierence between the justification under 
the covenant of works, and that under grace, he says the one is -/.ara rh 
ofiiXri/Ma, ' of debt,' the other, y.ara yji-oiv, merely ' of free gi'ace.' It is 
evident that he intends to afiirm, that by the first covenant of works the 
reward was in a just sense due (of debt) unto the creature, and that from 
God, whereas this new covenant is of grace. Now how is that other said 
to be of debt ? Not that God can owe anything, or be obliged unto his 
creature for anything received from it ; nor is it to be understood as if 
the holiness that Adam had was not from God's gift, as well as ours under 
the new covenant is ; but because, in a way of natural justice, or rather 
comeliness and dueness, such as is by the law of creation to be between a 
just creator and an holy creature, there is an approbation due unto him 
from God whilst that creature obeys him, and that as a deVitum naturale, 
a debt of nature, and not a debt of retribution in a mercenary way: * Who 
hath given unto him, and it shall be recompensed again?' Eom. xi. 35, as 
the apostle speaks. 

3. Answerably, the reward, the promised life and happiness that he 
should have had for doing and obeying, was but the continuance of the ■ 
same happy life which he enjoyed in paradise, together with God's favour 
towards him. Which continuance in happiness was natural to him ; even 
as our divines say that mortality* was, namely, in this sense, that it was 
a natural due unto him whilst he should keep from sin, for God to preserve 
him in that state wherein at first he stood ; and this preservation of him 
in that state, and in the favour of God, was the life promised, when God 
said, ' Do this, and thou shalt live ;' and not the translating him, in the 
end, unto that spiritual life in heaven, which the angels have, and which 
the saints shall have. And for this my reasons are — 

1. Because Christ, in 1 Cor. sv, 47, 48, is called ' the heavenly man,' 
and the ' Lord from heaven ; ' and that in opposition to Adam, when at 
the best, whom the apostle calls but an earthly man. And this difi'erenee 
in their condition he there evidently mentions, to shew that Christ was the 
first and only author of that heavenly life which the saints in heaven do 
enjoy, and he himself coming from heaven he carries us thither. But 
* Qu. 'immortality'? — Ed. 

VOL. VU. D 



50 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

on the contrary, Adam, as be was of earth, so he was but an earthly man, 
(so ver. 47), and his happiness should have reached no higher. The place 
fore-cited expressly sets the bounds between what the one Adam should, and 
the other doth convey unto his posterity. Yea, and the apostle doth put 
our carrying to heaven, as he there argues it, not so much upon the merit 
of Christ's death, as upon his being ' the Lord from heaven,' because heaven 
was his natural due, and he descended from his right when he came down 
upon earth. And so, because he was thus from heaven, therefore he is 
now gone thither himself, as unto his natural place, and advanceth us up 
thither also; whereas Adam was but a 'man from the earth,' and there- 
fore could never have come to heaven. And that place, John iii. 13, doth 
further back this argument, ' No man hath ascended up to heaven, but ho 
that came down from heaven, even the Son of man who is in heaven.' 
Christ there speaks of his revealing the mysteries of heaven, which no man 
ever could do, because no man had ascended up to heaven but himself, 
who came down from heaven, and now is in heaven, and this as Son of 
man. Now he is said to be ' in heaven,' through the communication of 
properties and privileges of the Son of God, and to ' come down from 
heaven,' because his due was ip have been incarnate there. And he 
expressly says, that no man ascends up thither, except he who came down 
from thence, and others by virtue of him. And so that text evidently holds 
forth this as the reason why none went up thither, because none came down 
from thence ; which reason makes against Adam, as well as against any 
son of his now in corrupt estate. For he came not from heaven — that was 
not his natural place — but he was of the earth, and therefore but earthly, 
1 Cor. XV. 48. And if no man but he who came down from heaven was 
able to know the mysteries of heaven — for that is the ascension there meant 
— then much less to enjoy the glory of heaven. And therefore our going 
to heaven is put upon his ascension as the fruit of it : John xiv. 2, 3, ' I 
go to prepare a place for you,' though it were ' prepared from the founda- 
tion of the world,' God having made heaven perfect the first day, and 
reserved it for his elect in Christ. 

2. That paradise that Adam enjoyed was but the type of the paradise 
above, and his Sabbath a type of heaven, as himself was of Christ. And 
therefore he was not to have entered into the heavenly paradise, except by 
this second Adam, Christ, whose paradise alone it was. So that, take away 
the second Adam that was to come, and there had been no second paradise 
for Adam to come into, which that paradise of his was the type of. Thus, 
Luke xxiii. 43, Christ foundeth the thief's going to paradise upon his own 
going thither : ' This day,' says he, ' shalt thou be with me in paradise.' 
With me ; that is, in my right. Even as also we are said to ' sit together 
with him in heavenly places,' Eph. ii. 6. With him, namely, as our 
head. And the aforesaid thief, answerably speaking of heaven, says, 
' Remember me when thou comest into thy kinffdom ; ' and Christ, in his 
answer unto him, owns it as his, only he calls it paradise ; for this is 
Christ's paradise, as the other was Adam's. And therefore when Christ 
was first inaugurated into his office, and his Father himself from heaven 
first preached him unto men, saying, * This is my Son, hear him,' then did 
the heavens fii'st open, and not till then, for men by hearing and obeying 
him to come thither. 

8. I observe, that the moral law (which was the law of nature) makes 
mention of no such promise as of going to heaven. It speaks no such 
language ; but only, * Do this, and thou shalt live ;' that is, live as thou 



Chap. VI.J of their state by creation. 51 

dost, in God's favour, but yet still as on earth enjoyed. And that is the 
reason why so little mention is made of heaven in the Old Testament ; and 
but only when the gospel is promulgated in that Old Testament, never 
when the pure law of nature is taught. And therefore Christ, in the 16th 
Psalm, speaks of heaven as being the purchase of his death, and as 
bestowed only by his righteousness, not that of the law: Ps. xvi. 10, 11, 
' For thou wilt not leave my soul in hell ; neither wilt thou suffer thine 
Holy One to see corruption. Thou wilt shew me the path of life : in thy 
presence is fulness of joy ; at thy right hand there are pleasures for ever- 
more.' And therefore, Luke xviii. 18, when a certain ruler asked our 
Saviour what he should do to inherit eternal life, says Christ, ' Thou 
knowest the commandments,' &c ; and his replying, ' All these have I 
kept,' ' Yet,' says Christ, ' thou lackest one thing ; sell all that thou hast, 
and follow me, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven.' Concerning 
which place observe, 

(1.) That it may be, here is a distinction intimated between 'treasure in 
heaven' and 'eternal life,' and that right to treasure in heaven comes by 
following Christ ; but a life eternal, that is, a living for ever in God's 
favour, is promised to keeping the commandments. And this life is here 
spoken of as a thing differing from heaven. 

(2.) If the ruler did here, in his question, intend heaven in that phrase 
' eternal life,' yet it may be observed out of Mat. xix. 17, that Christ 
diminisheth it yet more in his answer there : * If thou wilt enter into life,' 
says he, ' keep the commandments ;' that is, into a state of life ; Christ in 
that speech dealing with him upon his own principles, who thought by 
the commandments to live. Yet he says not, * Thou shalt enter into 
eternal life' (if by that phrase heaven should be meant), but into life ; for, 
' Do this, and thou shalt live,' was the tenor of the covenant of works. 
And ' the commandment is ordained for life,' saith the apostle, Rom. 
vii. 10. 

(3.) Or else, if the ruler in this question should by 'eternal life' mean 
heaven, Christ answers him. Though thou hast kept all the command- 
ments, yet thou art to sell all, and follow me, or else thou canst not have 
treasure in heaven. 

Reason 4. This accords with the like law of nature towards all the 
creatures besides, who, by observing their laws, obtain not a higher station 
than they were created in, only thereby they keep their own. The moon, 
by all the constancy of her motion, attains not to the glory of the sun. 
Nor should man, by the moral law (which was to him but the law of 
nature), have attained the condition of the angels, had he fully complied 
with it, as neither should the angels have attained a higher condition than 
their owa., though they had been exact ministers of God's will, according 
to the law of their creation, the fall of whom is expressed by theii* ' not 
keeping their first estate, but leaving their own habitation,' Jude 6 ; and 
for affecting an higher estate they lost all. 

Yea, 5thly, I think that Adam's covenant, and the obedience unto it, 
was not able to do so much as confirm him, and secure him in that con- 
dition he was created in, so far was it from being able to have transplanted 
him into heaven. For, 

(1.) I know no promise for it, that after such a time, and so long 
obedience performed, he should stand perpetually. And without such a 
promise, we have no warrant so to think or judge of it. 

And (2.) Surely a creature being defectible, the covenant of nature with 



52 OF THE CREATURES, AND TEE COKDITION [BoOK II. 

that creature, uliicb proceedeth according to its due, and the obedience of 
that creature, could never have procured indefectibilitj', for that must be 
of grace ; and he w^as more than a creature that did that for elect angels 
and men, even Christ, God-man. 

And if men will say, that the elect men in Christ (and so Adam among 
the rest) should in the end have been translated to heaven by Christ, 
although man had never fallen, I shall not gainsay it ; but then it is by 
another's right and covenant, and would have required a supernatural grace 
first wrought in them, to have owned and taken Christ for their head. 

And if it be objected, that hell, which the devils are in, was the reward 
of the disobedience of that covenant of works, and therefore oppositely, the 
heavens, where the angels are, should be the reward of the obedience of the 
same covenant. 

The answer is ready — even that which we give the papists in the like 
case, in the point of merit, who argued, that because sin deserves hell, 
grace therefore should merit heaven — That thei'e is not a like proportion 
between the sin of the creature, which is an undue act against the great 
God, and the grace of the creature, which is a due act from the creature 
unto God, and so that gi'ace deserveth not well like as sin doth ill : ' The 
wages of sin is death ; but the gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus 
Christ our Lord,' Eom vi. 23. 

And if it be asked, What reward should Adam then have had if he had 
stood ? I answer, Much every way. As, namely, that blessed life in 
paradise, which God planted for him ; communion with God in a natural 
way, through the creatures, and by the light of the law of nature ; frequent 
apparitions of God, and communications with him (of which I am yet to 
speak) ; and also immortality in that his state of blessedness, which 
immortality arose not out of the inward constitution of his body, which 
still was dependent on God's preservation and protection. And further, 
in bis conscience he should have had a persuasion of God's favour, through 
obedience, which was his life. His heart should have lived in the sense of 
God's love ; so as indeed much fruit he should have had in holiness, but 
still not 'the end, everlasting hfe,' namely, heaven, which is not ex dehito, 
is not due to nature under the covenant of works. Heaven is the gift of 
God through Jesus Christ, Kom. vi. 23, and is the sole fruit of election. 
And therefore the voice at the great day will be, ' Come, ye blessed of my 
Father.' 

But it may haply be objected, that the beatifical vision being the highest 
perfection of bliss, and the understanding of man being of capacity for it, 
the mind therefore would have desired it, and not have been satisfied with- 
out it ; and wanting such a satisfaction, it had consequently been not fully 
blessed. 

I answer, 1. That it is true that Adam was capable of that bliss (for so 
are sinners), but yet, by a way above his sphere ; his body and soul must 
first have been changed, for his flesh and blood could not have borne the 
glory of it ; and therefore in that state he was in he could not have desired 
it, as being a condition that would destroy him, even as for the same reason 
the eje hath no desire to look upon the sun, it being excellent sensihile, such 
a transcendent object, that it does destruere sensimi, it destroys the sight. 

2. If in that state he stood he was not ordained to it, though it was a 
higher perfection, and so desirable, yet it had been an unlawful and an 
inordinate desire in him, if ever he had'put it forth, even as that ambition 
of his was, to be as God ; and as that of the angels that fell was, when they 



Chap. YI.j of their state by creation. 53 

affected and aspired to a higher station than God had set them in. Had 
Adam desired this kind of happiness, he had gone out of his rank, and sat 
quite beside the cushion. And what angel or saint in heaven dares desire 
the hypostatical union, the most transcendent of all perfections, even to be 
joined to the Godhead, as the manhood of Christ was ? And yet they arc 
capable of it, say some. Those things which we know by God's ordinance 
to be impossible, we are not to affect ; nor do we desire them, when we 
conceive they are such. Who among the crowd of common people has 
any vehement desire to be a king, when he looks upon himself as one so 
inferior to, and far off from, such a state ? 

3. Neither had he been miserable, or his blessedness at all lessened by 
the want of it. He had not been in statu violento, had he not had it ; but 
i)i naturali, in his natural condition, wherein he had all things suited to 
his natural desire. He had rested as a stone in its centre, which desires 
not to go upward. His state had been perfect, and though not so abso- 
lutely perfect as theirs in heaven, yet in his own sphere it had been such. 
His happiness had been suitable to his condition on earth, as ours shall be 
to the heavenly condition of our souls and bodies in heaven. He had been 
perfect, jjeifectione competente, though not ahsoluta ; with a perfection suit- 
able and fit for him, though not with a perfection transcendent and absolute. 
And as a higher degree of glory lessens not the blessedness of any saint 
inferior in heaven itself, for he is full, so nor would nor ought this higher 
order of blessedness have at all diminished that competent happiness which 
he enjoyed, for it was full to him whilst in that earthly state. So that, to 
conclude, as Adam's covenant was fcedus nature, so his happiness should 
have been a perfect contentment in God, enjoyed per modum natur<B ; not in 
God himself immediately, neither should he have tasted this heavenly con- 
tentment by faith, which is a prelibation of heaven and of its beatifical 
vision, but only in effects. The creatures should have revealed God unto 
him, and been as testimonies of his favour, which he should have appre- 
hended as justifying and approvifag him in a covenant of works ; which 
apprehension would have wrought peace of conscience, joy, and security 
therein through well-doing, so far as the persuasion of God's love, which 
conscience and his own spirit begat in him, which was his comforter, could 
work. And this love apprehended was but hypothetical, and in a way of 
common providence, namely, whilst he should continue in his good beha- 
viour. The creator and author of nature in that relation loving him, a3 
being made righteous by him, he had not an assurance of a peculiar, 
unchangeable, and everlasting love, without ifs and cuids ; he had not the 
taste and earnest of heaven by faith supernatural, which is that heavenly 
gift that gives a taste of what it is to enjoy God in himself, which Adam did 
not; neither had he the testimony of the Spirit working in him 'joy 
unspeakable and glorious,' in the hope of heaven. 



54 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

CHAPTER VII. 

Whether Adavi l-neic God by the light of faith and S7ipernatural revelation, 
superadded to the light of reason. — His faith ivas natwaJ, both in its motives 
and grounds, being an assent to God's testimony as true, xchose veracity he 
knew by the light of nature. — Nor did his faith discover to him things that 
were above his then present natural state. — This proved by several arguments. 
— Our nay of knoiiing God by faith is supernatural, and in. what respect it 
is so. 

All that I have hitherto spoken of as appertaining unto Adam's condi- 
tion we have seen to have been but natural, according to those limits which 
at first I did set, namely, no other than what was due to the nature of man, 
and what was suitable also unto that his nature. 

There remains only one thing which may seem to have been supernatural 
in him in both these respects, and whereby he is judged to have been ele- 
vated to the same way of knowing God that we under the state of grace 
are, and that is, a principle of faith, which principle is wholly supernatural, 
both, 

1. In that the objects or things apprehended by it are such as are made 
known by revelation from God, and therefore over and above the due of 
nature. 

And 2dly, In that the light by which faith is enabled to apprehend things 
is above the light of nature, or of common principles or reason, it being 
infused. And so divines account it, and do therefore call it supernatural. 
Now it may also seem as evident, that besides that inbred hght of nature 
and of sanctified reason in Adam to know God by, he had another window 
and inlet of knowledge, even revelation from, and communication with, God. 
For we read of God's speaking to him, and reveahng his will unto him by 
word of mouth, both at his giving him dominion over all the creatures, 
Gen. i. 28, and also at his giving him those precepts about the tree of know- 
ledge and of life, which also were sacraments to him of his condition. 
Thus also he knew the law of the Sabbath ; and likewise, when his wife 
was made, he knew it either by inspiration or revelation from God that she 
was made by God, of his bone and flesh. And he believing the word and 
threatening of God, that was the matter in which he was tempted, and in 
which he failed. So that, besides that fore-mentioned light of nature, he 
had also, as may seem by all this, a revelation, and that of faith. 

I confess it is like to appear an hard and bold assertion, to deny that 
Adam had a supernatural knowledge of God by revelation, or by the same 
light and principle of faith by which we take God in, under the gospel. 
Yet I find some divines to have affirmed it, and I shall adventure it unto 
the disquisition in the fear of God, and with submission to cogent reason 
to the contrary. And, 

First, I would propound it to be considered, That all this concerning his 
faith, and the things revealed to him, were still but within the compass of 
nature, and those limits which at first I set to bound the natural knowledge 
of God with ; so as it was neither above the due to nature, nor the way 
and sphere of it. 

For, first, in the nature of man there is such an act to believe and to 
trust one that is faithful, as well as there is to think, and to be. We find 
it in corrupt nature : a disposition of believing another man, so as to believe 
is not simply and wholly a supernatural act. 



CilAP. VII.] OF TUEIU STATE BY CllEATlON. 55 

And, secondly, that man in his first creation should have a principle in 
him to converse with that God whom ho knew to bo God out of natural 
light, and to have made heaven and earth, whensoever that God should 
speak and communicate anything to him that might express his will to him, 
so for as might concern his present condition, was also natural in\\thi8 
sense, that it was a due to the nature of man. For man being a sociable 
creature, in that ho was reasonable, made in the imago of God, which was 
natural, it was meet he should be able to converse with that great God by 
mutual speech, as well as with his wife, or any other intelligent nature. 
Speech is the ground of fellowship. And therefore both prayer, which is 
speech to God, and to hear God speaking to us, are made natural duties 
by our divines, as well as to love him. 

And, thirdly, when God did thus speak, that man should believe, and 
receive the testimony of God as true, whatever it was that was revealed, 
was not above the due of nature, nor the way of nature : not above the 
due of nature, for else God had spoke in vain ; nor above the light of nature 
to'assent to it, for the ground of faith's assent is resolved into the light of 
this, that God is true. For he knew, out of the same principles and dictates of 
nature, that God was true, faithful, and just in his word, aSjWell as he knew 
he was powerful in his works ; for it was part of the ' law written in his 
heart ' in which the image of God consisted ; he should not lie, but speak 
truth ; therefore that God much more should be true. Truth was part of 
God's image in him, therefore, Eph. iv. 24, truth being made a part of 
God's image, it follows, ver, 25, * Wherefore put away lying.' Therefore 
in God much more truth is essential to his nature. He might take that 
attribute up out of his own heart by a natural light, as well as God's hoH- 
ness out of the righteous image of it in himself, so as he needed not that to 
be laid in his heart by faith. Therefore now to believe God when he speaks 
to him, and to receive his testimony, was but from the power of an inbred 
light ; yea, and although, suppose the thing revealed should have been 
above the light of nature, yet the divine authority upon which his belief 
was to receive was acknowledged by no other light than nature, and the 
dictate of it : that God must needs be true in what he speaks. And yet 
this is the greatest thing in faith, the receiving God's testimony. John 
iii. 33, ' He that hath received his testimony, hath set to his seal that God 
is true.' 

And then, fourthly, whereas the question might still be. By what light 
he should know it was God that spake, when God did speak ? I take it, 
In the way God used then to speak, it was but the natural light of sancti- 
fied reason, which might discern that also. It was with some such evi- 
dence as he might know it was God in the voice given, as truly as he knew 
it was God by his works ; such were the visible apparitions and visions 
made. For otherwise it had been easier for Satan to have counterfeited 
God's voice and appearance, and have sooner deceived Eve thereby (as 
the old prophet deceived the other with a false command*), than in that way 
he took. And it is more evident by this, that after his fall, when all holy 
light was extinguished, yet he knew and discerned the voice of God in the 
garden, and was afraid ; therefore much more afore. And it was a due to 
nature, that if God did speak, he should so speak as might evidence unto 
nature it was he that spake, which was easy for God to do some way or 
other, for Balaam discerned the difference and wondered at it, when at first 
he thought to have conversed with his devils. 

* See 1 Kings x-iii. 18.— Ed. 



56 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

And then, fifthly, the objects propounded to him to believe were of 
themselves no way supernatural ; they were nothing more of God's nature 
or attributes, but about some precepts of his will, or privileges granted to 
Adam ; only such things as first concerned his condition, and were within 
his own sphere of that world he was made in, and so suitable to his appre- 
hension to take in, though confirmed to him by divine authority. And 
therefore, secondly, such as he might have some hint of by the light of 
nature ; besides the revelation, they were realised to him by instinct or 
sanctified reason, though revealed and confirmed by divine testimony. Such 
were the precepts about the two trees, which were two sacraments. The 
things which they confirmed were the promises of life, and the mutability 
of his condition ; both which, as I shewed, the light of nature taught him, 
and made real to him ; as also was that acknowledgment and law promulged 
concerning his wife, that being flesh of his flesh and bone of his bone, a 
man should cleave to his wife ; natural light gave in the equity of such a 
conjugal aflection. 

So as, put all these five considerations together, the conclusion is that 
all the faith which Adam had may well be resolved into natural light, as 
the first principle and foundation of it, although further revealing and con- 
firming what else the light of nature could not, or would not so easily have 
known ; and though we suppose the things had been such as were out of 
the reach of natural light, yet still the bottom of his assent to divine 
authority had been but such a natural light aforesaid, and the principles of 
nature sown in his heart, which made him capable so to converse with God 
and believe his word, as to understand God out of his works. But it is 
otherwise in our faith. And so far I conceive it is that wicked men are 
blamed now for not believing the word of the law and gospel, so far as such 
natural light as was in Adam would have enabled them thereunto, seeing 
the law given was confirmed at first by such works and voices, as evidently 
would have argued to that first natural light that it was God that spake it, 
and they, if they had that light remaining, would have owned in their 
hearts. And the gospel also dehvered by Christ was confirmed by signs 
and wonders : Heb. ii. 3, 4, * How shall we escape, if we neglect so great 
salvation ; which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was con- 
firmed unto us by them that heard him ; God also bearing them witness, 
both with signs and wonders, and with divers miracles, and gifts of the 
Holy Ghost, according to his own will ?' And the whole word written 
derived to us, and then delivered, hath such peculiar characters of divine 
authority engraven upon it, so as even to natural light (if we had it pure as 
Adam had) would evidence itself to be of God, and so bind all men to 
believe it. And therefore men are both justly commanded to believe it, 
and justly blamed for not believing it. 

I am now to afiix some reasons and demonstrations that have prevailed 
with me to think that the way of Adam's faith (call it so if you please) was 
in the sense declared but natural, and ours comparatively supernatural. 

For the first. That his was but natural. 

1. Seeing all other things belonging to him were natural, his covenant, 
the covenant of works, was but fccdus natunn, founded upon the title of 
•what, as a reasonable creature, was due to his nature, his justification 
answerable, his reward also, and all things else appertaining to him ; and 
that the whole image of God is aflirmed so generally by our divines to have 
been natural, it were strange if the principle of faith in him, which then 
was not of general use neither, should alone be supernatural ; that the 



Chap. YII,J of tiieip. state by creation. 57 

image of God in him should consist of one part so heterogeneal to the 
other, of an higher niuk than its fellows. Yea, and seeing it is manifest 
that the main foundation of that his faith might he, and indeed was, but 
that natural Hght, that God was true, which was inbred in him as fully as 
that God was holy, as I shewed, it is strange if his faith should be made 
Bupernatural by some other small addition only, when the foundation was 
but natural light. 

Fwason 2. For him to have had such a supernatural principle of faith as 
we have, was in him superlluous, and to no end. The end that I find any 
divines, either popish or others, fix upon, for which they ascribe a superadded 
Bupernatural grace, is in relation to his translation to heaven, for which 
that supernatural grace should fit him and prepare him. Popish divines, 
who contend for a natural way of knowing God, and a natural righteousness 
in Adam, yet with a superadded supernatural one also, they make the use 
of that supernatural addition for him to merit heaven by, and make this 
the difference between natural righteousness and supernatural grace and 
faith ; that supernatural was given him to merit heaven by. But I find 
them not so distinctly explaining any different acts of natural or super- 
natural grace in themselves. Borne of ours, though not in relation to 
meriting heaven, yet ascribe it to him to fit him to know God, so as to 
long after heaven (as faith doth), which they make the reward of his 
obedience. And I confess, if the promise given him had been that of 
heaven, and the vision of God, as there, then it had been necessary for 
him to have such a supernatural faith as we. But seeing it hath been 
proved, and I think sufficiently, that his covenant would not have brought 
him thither, neither that it was intended in that his promise of life, there- 
fore I know no use at all of such a supernatural principle, as an optic glass, 
added to supernatural light, to help it to see further into another world, 
when he was in his condition and desires to be confined to this. For faith 
supernatural is given to prepare for heaven, and to supply sight or vision, 
till we come thither, to support us whilst absent from the Lord : 2 Cor. 
V. 5-7, ' Now he that hath wrought us for heaven is God, who hath given 
us the earnest of his Spirit also. Therefore we are always confident, 
knowing that, whilst we are at home in the body, we are absent from the 
Lord : for we walk by faith, not by sight.' The meaning is, God here by 
his Spirit works us and prepares us for heaven, and that by giving us light 
of faith, which in this our absence supplies the room of sight, and so he 
gives us a confidence of our coming thither. And so it is to be an evidence 
of things absent and not seen, and to give a present subsistence of things 
but in hopes further to be enjo^-ed. So Heb. xi. 1, * Now faith is the 
substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.' Now 
Adam not being ordained to sight, and always to be at home in his body, 
and so at no time to be absent from his body, to be present with the Lord, 
— as we are to be, 2 Cor. v. 8, ' We are confident, I say, and willing rather 
to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord' — for his body 
and earthly tabernacle was his natural only home. Neither was God absent 
to him, nor presented as absent, as in relation to a further way to bo 
enjoyed, not yet attained. And therefore to what end he should have faith, 
that faith which thus prepares for heaven, whose essence and definition 
lies in giving an evidence of things not seen, or enjoyed, but hoped for, I 
know not. 

Yea, thirdly, it would not only have been of no use, but have made him 
miserable. For the use and end of this supernatural faith being to give 



58 OF TUE CEEATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

ns a taste of that way of knowing God in himself, as in heaven, and so to 
Btir up groans and desires after sight and vision of him, as 2 Cor. v. 4 : 
' For we that are in this tabernacle do groan, being burdened : not for that 
we would be unclothed, but clothed upon, that mortality might be swallowed 
up of life.' We do groan, &c., and a confidence of it, as verses 6, 7, 
' Therefore we are always confident, knowing that, whilst we are at home in 
the body, we are absent from the Lord : for we walk by faith, not by sight.* 
So that it is such a faith as gives a taste of what it is to enjoy God by sight, 
and so stirs up groans and longings after it. And so it is a ' following after' 
to comprehend, as Phil, iii. 12, a ' looking for, and hastening to,' as in 2 Pet. 
iii. 12. Now if Adam had had such a principle and light thus to know God, 
and should have had desires thus to know him, and not have gone to heaven, 
and so there, by a full vision, to have had this groaning satisfied, the 
addition of such a way of knowing God not satisfied and filled up, as by 
faith it could never have been, this had been to have stirred up desires 
in vain, and to have made his condition, not in its own sphere perfect and 
complete, yea, miserable in this, that he should have wanted that con- 
fidence which our faith stirs up in us, together with our longings, which 
stills our desires ; yea, it had left him despairing of ever doing so. 

And therefore, fourthly, our way of faith must needs be supernatural, 
and altioris ordinis to his, and so our knowing God above his ; because it 
is thus a prelibation or taste of that vision which is ordained to us in 
heaven. Faith is an imperfect prelibation of that knowledge of God we 
shall have hereafter, and the inchoation of it ; so as by faith, we come at 
least to know what an happiness it is to know God in his essence, as in 
heaven, and so to long after it. And therefore, according as we have more 
faith, so there comes to be greater degrees of glory in heaven given, even 
in a like proportion as men's faith was more stirring up earnest groanings, 
happiness being expletio ajipetituion, the satisfying our desires. And there- 
fore faith doth, in an imperfect obscure way, know God in himself ; for it 
helps us to see and taste the happiness of knowing God so as he is, and 
60 stirs up desires accordingly. Now that knowledge of God in heaven is 
acknowledged by all to be so transcendently supernatural, that it is no way, 
in any respect, natural to any creature, but only to Jesus Christ ; as I 
shall shew hereafter. And therefore our faith, that is the inchoation of it, 
and is a beholding the glory of the Lord Christ, 2 Cor. iii. 18, and eternal 
life begun, must needs be ejusdem ordinis, of the same rank, and so doth 
difier from natural faith and knowledge of God in this, that the one is a 
seeing him in his work and efl'ects only from an inbred light of his attri- 
butes ; the other is a seeing God, though obscurely, as in himself; though 
as presented in another, yet with a taste imperfect of what it is to see God 
in himself, which stirs up the heart to long after it. Which puts the truest 
difference between knowing God naturally and supernaturally, and between 
Adam's way and ours. 

And therefore, as an evidence of this our way, God hath ordained a 
temporary faith in men enlightened, as the counterfeit of our way, as he 
doth and did that natural knowledge in heathens, and the vision of old to 
the forefathers, as the representation of what Adam's way of knowing God 
was. And therefore these temporaries are said to be enlightened, and to 
partake of the heavenly gift of faith, and the Holy Ghost, and to taste of 
the powers of the world to come, Heb. vi. 4, 5, as a counterfeit of that 
enhghtening and spirit of wisdom and revelation through the Holy Ghost, 
whereby believers know the hope of their caUing, Eph. i. 17, 18 ; which 



CjIAP. VII. j of TIIEIK STATK BY CREATION. E9 

work, even in them, is not supernatural only to corrupt nature, but to pure 
nature, though not sanctifying as Adam's was, yet working an assent to, 
and taste of the things of that world, such as Adam should never have had, 
into which world Adam should never have come, and therefore ho no ways 
tasted it. And therefoye it is called ' the heavenly gift,' and wrought by 
the Holy Ghost in a way above nature. 

To conclude. — Thus learned Cameron, though he gives but a touch in a 
word, yet his judgment falls this way : when differencing the faith in Adam 
and in us, he says. Fides in/a'dere natura; est a Deo, nt loquuntur in scholis, 
per modian iiaturcc : at fides qucc requiritxr in fccdere (jratict, a Deo est, sed 
per modum r/ratia siiper)iati(ralis (Thes. xiv. defmlere). 

Now, as to the opposite branch, that our faith, and God's revelation to 
us, is supernatural, this will appear in three or four respects : 

1. In respect of the objects revealed to our faith, which his mind should 
never have arrived at. 

2. In regard to the light by which our minds are acted and elevated, 
compared with that inbred light by which he knew things, that candle which 
the Lord set up in his heart, and was inbred in him. 

3. In respect of the way or manner of knowledge, or assent raised up 
thereby. 

1. For the objects revealed to us. They are such as were utterly above 
the due and right of pure nature in Adam. This comparison you have 
made (take in the whole context from fu'st to last) 1 Cor. ii, 7, 9, 10, and 
11 verses, where, setting forth and commending the excellency of the things 
revealed in the gospel, (1.) he calls it * the wisdom of God,' to shew how 
it excels human wisdom, which he had called ' the wisdom of men,' ver, 4, 
and ' of the world,' ver. 6, this by the way of excellency, the wisdom of 
God ; and so excelleth man's wisdom, as God doth man. Neither is it 
termed God's wisdom in a general sense ; such the law is, and the natural 
knowledge of God given to the heathen, chap. i. 21, where also he had 
shewed the inefficacy of it ; but this is in a transcendent manner, so tran- 
scendent, as God appropriates it to himself. It is a wisdom, proper and 
pecuhar to God, which he arrogateth and taketh the glory of, as having been 
hid and concealed in his own breast, not in any creature's ; and therefore is 
above the reach of the wisdom of any creature, man or angel, and so 
merely divine, and of God, and no way natural to any creature, as due to 
be revealed unto it. And therefore, Eph. iii. 9, it is ' the mystery of his 
will, made known according to his good pleasure,' freely, and of mere grace, 
no way as connatural to the understanding of any creature, man or angel. 
And in this sense, 1 Cor. ii. 11, they are called ' the things of God,' even 
as the proper peculiar thoughts in a man's heart, which are secret to him- 
self alone, are the things of a man. For so he doth compare them in that 
11th verse, ' For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of 
a man which is in him ? Even so the things of God knoweth no man, but 
the Spirit of God.' They are all God's notions, proper to him, the light 
of which were not to become inbred in any creature's heart ; for then it 
might have been called their wisdom, as the things naturally known by men 
or angels is, and may be called. And therefore, though he mentions only 
the corrupt wisdom of man in opposition to it, yet in that, upon occasion 
thereof, he particularly attributes it to God, he calls it his, in opposition to 
all wisdom attainable by the strength of nature in men or angels, fallen or 
not. It is merely divine. 

(2.) Further also, 2dly, he calls it a * mystery,' which implies a thing 



CO OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK. II. 

BO hidden as cannot be known but by revelation : Mat, xi. 25, ' At that 
time Jesus answered and said, I thank thee, Father, Lord of heaven and 
earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and 
hast revealed them unto babes.' As none can know the things of a man, 
but the spirit of a man, so nor these deep things of God, none but his 
Spirit; 1 Cor. ii. 11, ' For what man knoweth the things of a man, save 
the spirit of man which is in him ? Even so the things of God knoweth no 
man, but the Spirit of God.' He argues from the lesser to the greater, 
that if a man's peculiar thoughts cannot be known by another, then surely 
not God's private cabinet-council thoughts, as these were. The heart of a 
man is a deep well, but a man of understanding will draw it out. But 
God's heart is so infinitely deep, as no understanding could, by any inbred 
light proper to it, have sounded it ; so deep, that the phrase of searching 
the deep things of God is used of the Spirit himself, ver. 10 : ' But God 
hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit : for the Spirit searcheth all things, 
yea, the deep things of God.' This is to shew these depths, spjaking after 
the manner of men. 

(3.) He says it is a * wisdom hid :' Eph. iii. 10, ' To the intent that now, 
unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places, might be known by 
the church the manifold wisdom of God ;' to shew it was no way attain- 
able by the light even of angels, he says, ' From the beginning of the world 
it was hid in God ;' and then from the angels, who knew it but by the 
church. And then the apostle proves all this, 1 Cor. ii. 9, for that proof 
there brought out of Isaiah may refer, as interpreters refer, to the seventh 
verse, as well as to the eighth and ninth, and indeed to both : ' As it is 
written. Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into heart 
of man, the things which God hath prepared for those that love him.' If 
it refers to exclude the knowledge of the wise of the world, yet it is an 
argument fetched d majori, not a bare opposition only. For they are so 
far from having entered into the hearts of corrupt men, that not into inno- 
cent man ; for him the words will reach. For, first, if we consult the 
prophet Isaiah, chap. Isiv. 4, whence the words are quoted, you shall find 
he says, ' From the beginning of the world, ear hath not heard,' &c., 
instead of which the apostle puts in, ' nor hath entered into the heart of 
man,' that is, not of innocent man, no man, from the beginning of the 
world -when man was made. Secondhj, The apostle, in the phrases he 
enumerates, excludes all the light, and power, and means of the knowledge 
of innocent man by nature, by reckoning up all the means of knowledge. 
For his knowledge came in, either from the inbred light of nature in him, 
as was said, and so ascended out of his own heart, as the phrase is here, 
which notes out the natural way of man's knowledge from inbred principles ; 
or else, was improved either by observation of the creatures by the eye, or 
by communication with God to the ear. Now none of these ways should 
the things of the gospel have been known and received by him ; but it is 
merely supernatural, and so is said not to ascend, but to * descend from 
the Father of lights' by revelation. So James i. 5, 17, ' If any of you lack 
wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth 
not ; and it shall be given him. Every good gift and eveiy perfect gift is 
from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no 
variableness, neither shadow of turning.' He speaks of this wisdom, and 
so it is above the way of nature also. Thirdly, He excludes not the know- 
ledge of man only, but of angels also, though lie names man only. For in 
Isaiah you have it, Isa. kiv. 4, ' None besides thee have seen, God, what 



Cn\P. VII.] OF THEIR STATE BY CREATION. 01 

he hath prepared for him that waits for him.' The prophet speaks unto 
Christ, whom ho calls God, as a person distinct from the Father, that pre- 
pared these things ; therefore he changeth the person, Besides thee, what 
he ? No man or creature, hut he that was God as well as man, and so was 
in God's bosom, could naturally have known these things. Therefore 
he says, ' No man besides thee, God,' whom therefore he calls God 
and man, whom, verse the first, he had called upon to come down, and be 
incarnate, and deliver this gospel, as once the law, when the mountains 
melted, verses 1-3, ' Oh that thou wouldest rend the heavens, that thou 
wouldest come down, that the mountains might flow down at thy presence ; 
as when the melting fire burneth, the fire causeth the waters to boil ; to 
make thy name known to thine adversaries, that the nations may tremble 
at thy presence ! When thou didst terrible things which we looked not 
for, thou camest down, the mountains flowed down at thy presence.' And 
he threw the enemies out of Canaan, the type of spiritual enemies to bo 
destroyed by Christ, and by the revelation of the gospel ; so that those 
truths are supernatural every way to the knowledge of any creature but to 
Christ, as the vision of God also is. And therefore, the apostle concludes, 
there is no knowing them but by a revelation of the^Spirit, 1 Cor. ii. 10 : 

* But God hath revealed them to us by his Spirit,' over and above the Hght 
of natural faith and natural principles. 

But of this head I have treated moi'e largely, in shewing the glory and 
riches of the mystery of the gospel. To which I refer the reader. 

2. The second thing, wherein our state excels Adam's, is, that heavenly 
light wherewith our minds are acted and elevated to those supernatural 
objects ; so far as the light we are assisted with excels, so far must be the 
knowledge. It is light which makes all things manifest, as Eph. v. 13. The 
foundation of all Adam's knowledge of God was an inbred light, or candle 
setup by the Lord in the ' chambers of the belly,' as Solomon speaks of the 
relics of it, Prov. xx. 27, which, though holy, was but natural. But that 
light whereby we see the ' things of the gospel' is termed glorious, and so 
wholly supernatural. When Christ converted Paul, Acts xxii., Christ sur- 
rounded his body with a light which dazzled, yea, blinded his eyes with the 
glory of it, ver. 11 : ' I could not see for the glory of that light,' says he, 
which was but an outward sign to shew the glory of that light by which 
Christ did shine into his mind now at his conversion ; even as 2 Cor. iv. 6, 

* For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined 
in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in 
the face of Jesus Christ.' The light of the glory of God in the face of 
Christ is a further glory than what shined in the creation, and therefore 
requires a further light to see it. As is the object, such is the light we 
see it with. Any object that is light itself, held forth in its glory, cannot 
be seen but by a light answerably glorious ; for the light it is seen by is 
but the splendour of it, as the beams are of the sun, which is seen in itself 
only by its own beams and light. And so is God in Christ. Which 
therefore, 1 Peter ii. 9, is called a ' marvellous light,' yea, ' his marvellous 
light': marvellous or wonderful, because superexcelling ; for that is 
wonderful that is such which nature cannot comprehend, and is above the 
course of nature, Sai/zaffT-oi/ fojc, and it is also called his hght, that is, 
Christ. Not only which he gives, as Eph. v. 14, ' Arise, and Christ shall 
give thee light ; ' nor his only, that is, of him as the object of it ; but his 
as the same which resides in him, and was in his heart, by which he saw 
things here when below ; for, 1 Cor. ii. 16, ♦ We have the mind of Christ,' 



62 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

having the same spirit with Christ, only he above measure. It is called 
* his light,' as ' his inheritance,' Eph. i. 18. And Adam's light, though 
lighted at this sun, j'et but as the eiBcient cause of it, as John i. 4. It 
was but the light of men as they are human, and proceeded, 7twdo humano, 
and so lower. His was not the same with Christ's ; but this light of the 
gospel, the light of the Spirit that is in Christ, whose Spirit, so working, 
he had not. And so it was lower, as that light of the moon is to the sun, 
or as the light of glory will be to this of grace. Not as an optic glass only, 
which strengthens not the sight only, but brings down the object lower, 
but such as was added to Stephen's eyes, ' being full of the Holy Ghost ; * 
when he saw Christ in heaven, there was added a further light and ability 
than the inbred light of sight or of the sun, to see Christ by in heaven, 
Acts vii. 55, 56 ; as also to Paul in his conversion. Such is this light of 
faith to the mind, to see heavenly objects by, superadded to natural light, 
and that of reason. So as if j'ou could suppose Adam now alive, as in 
innocency, for him to see these things there must be an elevation of his 
light by the access of another light supernatural of the Spirit, as there was 
to Stephen's eye. And therefore our believing is attributed to the Spirit, 
as was said, and is called ' the spirit of wisdom and revelation,' and ' the 
spirit of faith,' 2 Cor. iv. 13. And 1 John ii. 20, 27, ' The unction that 
teacheth all things ; ' not only clearing the sight, but teaching it. Neither 
need it be strange that there should be several ranks of light from God to 
gee himself by. That as in heaven we ' see light in God's light,' Ps. 
xxxvi. 9, and so a further light than any here, so here we see Christ and 
God by the Spirit's light and representation, though of a lower kind than 
that whereby we shall see him in heaven, and not by natural light as it 
would present God to us, or take God up from the creatures. And the 
more immediate the light is from God, the more supernatural, the higher 
is it, and we the more passive in it. The light of glory will be God's light 
immediately ; he both is the object and efficient, ' all in all,' and so we 
shall be swallowed up with it, as when the sun is seen by its own light. 
This of the Spirit in us is efficiently his, and thei'ein we are more passive 
than active, though the subject of it, and that of Adam's inbred light had 
less of God's light in it, he not being enlightened by his spirit of revelation, 
but left to that inbred light to judge and give an assent to the things 
objected afore him. 

Add to these that place, Eph. i, 17, where he prays, ' that the God of 
our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of 
wisdom and revelation in (or for) the knowledge of him.' Every word and 
circumstance makes to demonstrate what I intend. 

[1.] His scope is to reckon up in this chapter the blessings heavenly, 
which we are blessed with in Christ, the second Adam, peculiar to the elect. 
So Eph. i. 3, they are all blessings heavenly, which we are blessed with in 
Christ, the second Adam. The blessings we were blessed with in the first 
Adam were but earthy, and served but for a life on earth ; as the opposi- 
tion, 1 Cor. XV. 47, 48, evidently shews: ' The first man is of the earth, 
earthy ; the second man is the Lord from heaven. As is the earthy, such 
are they that are earthy ; and as is the heavenly, such are they also that 
are heavenly.' Now after election, adoption, redemption, he mentions the 
wisdom and the prudence which is in Christ, the second Adam, as one of 
those heavenly and spiritual blessings peculiar to the elect, ' God hath 
abounded to us in, when he made known the gospel, the mystery of his will,' 
that is, the secrets of his will, * which he purposed in himself,' Eph. i, 8, 9. 



Chap. VII.] of THErp. state by creation. 63 

And then hero in his prayer he shews the heavenly supernatural rise and 
cause of it, even all the three persons. The vouchsafer of it is God the 
Father, [l.J not as the author of nature, but as the God of our Lord Jesus 
Christ ; for it is a blessing in Christ peculiar to his, and therefore called 
* the faith of God's elect,' Titus i. 1. None ever had it but the elect, and 
therefore Adam had it not ; seeing men not elected had all he had once 
in him. And therefore, though he was elect, yet he had not what he 
had then as elect, but as the common root of all, both elect and others. 

[2.] And 2dly, He makes the Father the fountain of it, as he is * the 
Father of glory.' He praying for his peculiar wisdom, mentions such 
attributes (as the manner of the apostles in their prayers is) as have a 
more proper relation of efficiency to the things prayed for. Elsewhere, 
when James bids them seek wisdom, he directs them to God as the ' Father 
of lights,' and here as the * Father of glory.' For this wisdom is so far 
from being the same in our primitive nature, that it is glory, a glorious 
gift, and therefore supernatural, not to corrupt but pure nature, and is of 
that rank comparatively to nature as glory in heaven is of, it being the 
beginning of glory, and therefore is called eternal life to know God, even 
as a behever doth : John xvii. 3, * And this is life eternal, that they might 
know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.' It 
raiseth the mind up to take in a taste or hint, a glimpse, a prelibation of 
glory, as it follows in the next verse, 18th of Eph. i., ' The eyes of your 
understanding being enlightened, that ye may know what is the hope of 
his calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the 
saints,' and so to desire and breathe after it. Now Adam's was not such. 

[3. J It is from the Holy Ghost, the Spirit of Christ given to us, and so 
working above the power of nature. And in that respect he is called here 
' The Spirit of wisdom and revelation,' as also elsewhere ' The Spirit of 
faith,' 2 Cor. iv. 13. The way of natural faith I conceive to have been, 
that the object being provided with evidence suitable to convince and per- 
suade the light of nature of the truth of itself, through an ordinary con- 
currence of the Holy Ghost to a natural free agent, it was left to the 
spirit of man to give its assent, so as then it was of and for that spirit in 
man rather. But now it is attributed more to the Spirit of Christ in us, 
who both works wisdom, the principle capable of it, and revealeth and 
draws out an acknowledgment by an overpowering Hght. For I take it, 
that the faith of God's elect is not resolved into principles inbred and 
begotten, as I said Adam's was, but into a prevailing work of the Spirit 
working wisdom, and a testimony of the Spirit giving light, and sealing up 
what he would have us beheve. A prevailing testimony of the Spirit is the 
ground of all our faith, of what kind soever it be. Not only when a 
persuasion is begotten of a man's interest in Christ, which is because the 
Spirit witnesseth with his spirit, which yet alone carries the name of the 
' testimony of the Spirit ; ' but when a man's spirit prevailingly assents to 
any spiritual truth, it is from the like overpowering testimony of the Spirit, 
sealing up that truth with a light beyond the light pure nature had, which 
was left to itself to give consent out of its own light, which was suited to 
the object. But here a divine light is superadded that casts the balance, 
and this in believing there is a God, or that Christ is the Son of God, as 
well as in believing the interest of a Christian in him. This I find, 1 John 
V. 5, 6, speaking of believing not only a man's self to be the son of God, 
but this truth, that Christ is the Son of God, ver. 5, he says that ' the 
Spirit bears witness ' to it ; and ver. 10, ' He that believes hatii the witness 



64 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

in himself.' Now his scope there is to speak of the witness, not only to a 
man's interest in Christ, of which ver. 12, but also of Christ's being ordained 
the fountain of life : vers. 10, 11, ' He that believeth on the Son of God, 
hath the witness in himself ; he that believeth not God, hath made him a 
liar, because he believeth not the record that God gave of his Son. And 
this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is his 
Son.' 

It is necessary, upon occasion of this discourse, to add a caution in this 
place, which is, that all this is not so to be understood as if the light of 
supernatural faith in us destroys that of reason and nature ; yea, it subor- 
dinates it to itself, and restoreth it again, and rectifies it, and then makes 
use of it, even as the light of reason doth subordinate and make use of 
sense. God possesseth and clotheth the natural powers of the mind with 
an higher light than ever inbred in us, through the revelation of the Spirit, 
and converts them all, as its engines, to get a further knowledge by. We 
see it by this, that the word written, unto which the light of faith is suited, 
as colours to the eye, though it reveals things beyond reason and light 
natural, as are the principles of the gospel, yet it reveals them in such a 
way as reason, enlightened by faith, may see the greatest harmony and 
correspondency in them, and receive as much satisfaction as ever in that 
other natural knowledge. And the principles being taken for granted once 
by faith, there is use of reason, to see the dependence of all things revealed 
one with another, and the collecting one thing from another ; so as God 
hath writ the Scriptures as to men endowed with reason, yea, and applied 
it to the way of human arts and sciences. Yet still so as the light of faith 
is a light beyond that of reason, which appears, 

First, In that the first principles of the gospel, as the apostle calls them, 
Heb. vi. 1, laid in the mind, are wholly above reason, and made evident 
by this supernatural light wholly. They are wholly new, and reason is 
incapable of them. So that there is much the same difierence between the 
principles inbred, and these by faith revealed in the gospel, that is, between 
the principles of sciences. Some sciences take their principles out of nature, 
being sucli as are known by nature, as philosophy doth ; and so did Adam's 
divinity and knowledge of God, the principles of it were inbred. But others 
take their principles from other sciences, as music, having use of numbers, 
borrows its skill in them from arithmetic. So faith doth fetch its principles 
about Christ, &c., from heaven, the bosom of God, the Spirit laying in the 
deep things of God's counsel, as principles wholly new and wholly above nature. 
And these it sees no other way than by a supernatural light and revelation 
of the Spirit : at first it is so, though reason may confirm them. Therein 
faith and reason differ, that )ii}t.U est in inteUectu, quod non prius in sensii 
but here many things are in faith which were never in reason. 

And, secondhj, it appears from this, that though faith useth reason to 
discuss the truth of deductions from those principles, and to gather conclu- 
sions from these principles laid ; as for example, the word hath motives 
which faith makes use of in a way of reason too, and it argues things in a 
rational w^ay. It argues the cause from the eflect, God's love from signs. 
In interpreting the Scriptures, we use reason to gather from the connection 
and dependence the meaning of the Holy Ghost. Yet still, even in these 
arguings and deductions, there accompanies a light that faith strikes in with, 
a light beyond the force in the reason. It seals up the truth collected by 
reason, beyond the power of reason. It superadds a light which casts the 
balance. It not only reveals the principles we reason from by an higher 



Chap. VII.] of their state by creation. G5 

light than natural, but it confirms tho reasonings and conclusions from 
thcnco by a light more tlian natural, of bare reason : as tho phrase in Job 
is, ' He sealeth instruction,' Job xxxiii. IG. If we be moved to any duty 
by a practical reason or motive, the spiritual makes it effectual beyond 
what the moral or rational force that is in it can set it on. If we be com- 
forted from any signs, tho Spu-it gives a light of revelation to cast the 
balance, and ' witnesseth with our spirits,' as Rom. viii. 16, beyond the 
power of the sign. If we read the Scriptures, and to get the moaning of 
them, observe the connection of one thing with another by reason, yet there 
comes often a light of the Spirit beyond the height of reason, which, by 
that observation of the connection, seals up this to be the Holy Ghost's 
meaning ; so as the Holy Ghost is to faith still his own intei-preter. For 
else the Scripture were of private interpretation, which it is not, 2 Pet. i. 20. 
For such is ratio humana to the Spirit. Yet as the Holy Ghost, in writing 
the Scriptures, writ them in a rational way, because unto men reasonable, 
so in giving us light to understand them, he useth reason, but joins a light 
bej'ond it. ' Some beheve,' says Christ to Thomas, ' that have not seen.' 
And though God used sense to confirm his faith, yet his faith was a light 
beyond the light of sense or reason from thence. 

And, thirdly, that this light of faith is above that of reason rectified, 
appears in this, that it depends not on the natural way of man's under- 
standing necessarily, but often proceeds above it. We see those that have 
low understandings, little reason in them, and are ignorant of the notional 
connection of one truth with another, cannot dispute for it, yet see further 
into things heavenly, see more in them than the greatest doctors. What 
is the reason ? A supernatural light of faith, a higher light abounds in 
them ; and being a light above the way of nature and reason, reveals things 
to them beyond the power of reason. 

"Yea, we may all see it in ourselves, at several times, that the same 
reasons, motives, and signs, considered by us at one time, persuade us not, 
as at another time they do, by reason of a superadded light of revelation 
that casts the balance. So that, as the light of vision in heaven is argued 
to be supernatural, because it depends not on the light of nature, or power 
or strength of reason, but taking the lowest, meanest idiot, raiseth and 
elevateth his mind above one of a larger understanding naturally, to see 
God more in heaven ; because the light there is above the light of nature, 
and proceeds without it, it raiseth not the mind according to the proportion 
of its understanding, but according to the measure of its light received, 
which is so glorious, as it wraps up the meanest understanding to the highest 
intention. Yea, natural understanding contributes no advancement unto it, 
but only an obediential faculty ; so the hght of faith also doth in a propor- 
tion. And that argues it supernatural. Strength of natural principles and 
of reason may help forward that knowledge, which is, of its own sphere, 
notional and rational ; and in a believer, it may help to advance knowledge 
of spiritual things in a rational way ; but it contributes nothing to the light 
of revelation by the Spirit, who works how much and when he pleaseth. 
But in Adam's children, their light and knowledge of God, being natural, 
would have been proportioned to the strength of inbred light and reason, 
so as stronger souls would have had more, and weaker less, for it ran in a 
natural way ; but not so here. 

3. The third particular propounded was this, wherein our_ knowledge of 
God, &c., excels that of Adam's, and so is supernatural to it, in the manner 
or way of knowledge. This third flows from the former. 

VOL. VII. E 



66 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

The liglit of faith is more intuitivo, and so more comprehensive. But 
the way of Adam's knowledge was discursive, hy way of gathering one 
thing from another, which is more imperfect and further about, and more 
at second hand. The perfection of the angels' knowledge of things is 
expressed above that of man's in this, that theirs is intuitive : they use not 
reason to gather one thing from another ; so much intuitive, say some, as 
they see at once the effect and the cause together, therefore called intelli- 
gentia. The one is as knowing of a man by his works and hearsay of him, 
whereby the mind gathers what an one he is by way of discourse. So did 
Adam what God was by his works, and visions, and revelations made. 
But this is the ' beholding the glory of the Lord,' John vi. 40 ; * seeing the 
Son, and believing on him ;' and, 1 Cor. xiii. 12, though it be but darkly, 
and in a glass, yet it is said, ' we see as in a glass.' So 1 John iii. 6, the 
like phrase is used : ' He that sinneth hath not seen him, neither known 
him ;' that is, not known him with this knowledge of sight. And thus 
faith is a knowledge of God, as he is in himself, though in the face of 
Christ, and the glass of the gospel. But Adam's was but in his works by 
collection. They gathered Hercules by his footsteps ; so Adam collected 
God's power, &c., from the works of creation. But this is the presenting 
God himself, though as in a glass, in the gospel. So it is not knowing 
God ex alio, by collection from another thing, but knowing God himself 
in alio, in another thing, wherein by his own light he presents himself, as a 
man doth in a glass. 

The difference may be 'expressed by way of similitude, by the several 
ways of assurance of God's love. Look what difference there is between 
that way, when we know God's love to us but by signs only: this is know- 
ing and gathering his love ex alio, by effect, collecting it from another 
thing, and so is but discursive ; as when the cause is known by the effects, 
though the Spirit secretly joins a testimony in the conclusion; and that 
other which comes from an immediate light of the Spirit's sealing up that 
light, and the taste of it, and revealing God's heart and mind in itself 
towards us. This is so transcendent, as it works joy unspeakable and 
glorious ; it is intuitive ; not so the other : such difference is there between 
Adam's knowing God and ours. Or to set out the diflerence by another 
instance. When Job at last, in the winding up of God's dealings with 
him, had a more distinct intuitive representation of God to his faith, com- 
paring it with many of his former apprehensions wrought, Job xlii. 5, he 
compares them to second-hand knowledge, a hearsay, ' by the hearing of 
the ear ;' ' but now,' says he, ' mine eyes have seen him.' How distinct 
and differing is sight to hearsay ! And it may be, that hearsay knowledge 
Job meant was, that knowing God by the works of creation and provi- 
dence, and by visions, &c. He may compare that way of knowledge which 
was familiar in those times even to believers, God training them up, 
though they had a principle of faith beyond it, in the elements of the world 
before the law, to study him in his works and ordinary visions, which is 
called comparatively but the hearing with the ear ; botla because the man- 
ner of the godly then was to talk together of God out of his works, and 
communicate such observations. And, as I find some interpreters observe 
on chap, xxxvi. 24, where Elihu, going about to instruct Job wdth a sense 
of the greatness of God's majesty, he calls upon him to look into his 
* works which men have sung ;' so Sanctius renders it. He minds him of 
the common songs men made of the works of God ; or else, because the 
heavens, and day and night, are said to have a voice, and utter speech, 



Chap. VILJ of their state by creation. G7 

Ps. xix. 1, 2, fis man an car to hear their sound, to declare the glory of 
God, to whoso voice Job had lent his mind to study God out. 

Add unto this that phrase used in that 3Gth chap. ver. 25, when Elihu 
calls upon Job to see God's greatness in his works, which Sanctius makes 
the beginning of that song which Elihu minds Job of, that holy men did 
sing. Every man may see what is the work of God. ' Man beholds afar 
off;' so it is in the original : that is, God afar off in his works. It is a 
remote, and but an obscure knowledge, and yet how great doth it arguo 
him 1 So it follows, ' Behold, God is great, and we know not ;' or, but 
little of him thus by his works. And therefore, Rom. i. 19, 20, that 
knowledge gotten by the works of God Paul calls rb yvoJATov roZ 0£oy, 
something that may be known of God, rather than the knowledge of him 
in himself, as indeed it is not. And though the godly then had faith, as 
well as we now, yet the covenant of works and nature being more predo- 
minately the dispensation under the law of nature, they were in that very 
first infancy of the world very much kept to that school, at least in that form. 

As the conclusion of this discourse, because I would not maintain a dis- 
pute against a multitude of divines who are of another mind in their 
writings, if we will grant and suppose that there was such a light of faith 
vouchsafed to Adam as was superior to the law of nature specified (whereby 
he knew God in his works, and such revelations as externally carried their 
own evidence with them), even unto natural faith, and to have been as 
supernatural as ours, yet still the assertion I aim at will hold true, that a 
believer's knowing of God, and enjoying of him, doth infinitely transcend 
that of his in many respects. 

For, 1. If we consider the uses of his faith then to him, and of ours to 
us now, there is a vast difference, for even the apostle lived not always* by 
faith, as a Christian, Gal. ii. 20, * The life I now lead is by faith,' &c. And 
Heb. X. 38, the just are said to do so. And it is spoken of a Christian, in 
opposition to a legal life, as appears by the coherence, ver. 19, of that 
Gal. ii., 'I am dead to the law,' &c. So not all, or the most of Adam's 
knowledge or enjoyment of God came in that way ; but the ordinary way 
he lived, knew, and enjoyed God by, was by that sanctified light of nature, 
joined with observation out of his works. And, therefore, although he 
might have another principle of faith, for particular occasions extraordi- 
nary, to know God's mind by, whenever God would now and then commu- 
nicate himself to him ; as also in case of temptation, when any part of 
God's will was questioned, or reasoned against, as it was by Satan to Eve, 
tken there was use of faith above reason to stick to the word ; but still he 
walked by nature's light, not that of faith ; whereas the apostle says of us, 
that ' we walk by faith, not sight,' 2 Cor. v. 7. Faith was then (whatever 
it was, whether natural or supernatural) but a private grace, which at 
times he had use of, as he had of the rest ; but now to us it is a general 
grace. All knowledge is let in by it ; every truth is sealed by it ; it is 
advanced to the supreme office, to be the general instructor ; whereas the 
light of nature and sanctified reason was then the predominant principle : 
for reason is predominant in man's nature as he is a man, as faith is in 
a Christian. The just now lives by faith ; not so Adam then. Again, 
faith is now the bond of the covenant between God and us, because it is a 
receiving grace, Rom iv. 13, 14, 16. But love and obedience from man was 
then the bond of his covenant, because the covenant was founded upon 
what man returned to God, and continued upon his doing homage. In a 
* Qu. ' lived always ' ?— Ed. 



68 OF THE CEEATUEES, AKD THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

word, faitli was then (supposing him to have had the same principle with 
us) but as sense and joy in the Holy Ghost is now to believers. It is true, 
such a communion a believer hath with God at times, when God will 
appear to him in an extraordinai-y manner ; but he ordinarily lives by faith, 
without such sense. So Adam, whereas he lived in the works of God, 
studying God in them, conversing with God in them, his task being, by 
observation, to till the seeds of light sowti in his mind, as well as to till 
the earth, ordinarily thus knowing and enjoying God but by the light of 
nature, and accordingly obeying and loving of him, God did now and then 
make an apparition to utter some word to his faith. Now, therefore, if the 
comparison be made between his estate and ours (if it be granted he had 
like faith with us), it must withal be granted, that the difference is as great 
as between a man that once a- week makes a meal of more than ordinary 
fare, and a king that fares deliciously every day ; for we ordinarily do, or 
might (if the fault were not our own) live by the faith of the Son of God, 
in the revelations of the word, as our proper element : he ordinarily, but 
in the works of God, and his own works. "What was extraordinary in him 
is ordinary with us ; his exceedings, our commons ; which if it were com- 
plete, and sin and unbelief fully subdued, how happy must it make us 
above him ! Look what difference there may be conceived now in the 
estate of grace, in respect of happy communion with God, between the 
present comfort of a believer, that always lives in joy unspeakable and glo- 
rious, and another that wants it, and lives merely by faith. Such, if not 
more, will be found to be in Adam, who lived ordinarily by the light of 
nature, and but sometimes had a revelation by faith, and us, who live all 
our lives by faith, and communicate with God wholly by the light thereof. 

2. Consider that yet in respect of the objects of his knowledge and ours 
whereby God was known to him and to us, we infinitely transcend him and 
his way, if our faith were made complete. For, first, the things revealed to 
him and to his faith were but some matters of precepts and duty, which 
being for the most part positivi juris, arbitrary, and so were not so clearly 
written in his heart, as that of the Sabbath ; and about the tree of life 
(which was a sacrament, and so must be instituted, and else he had not a 
second commandment), so it was to be known by revelation necessarily, 
neither could more have been revealed than was necessary, and what could 
be known no other way. But still all the knowledge he was to have of God 
himself, and what a God he was, &c., which is the knowledge wherein 
happiness lies, this was still left to be obtained in that natural way fore- 
mentioned. We read not of any descriptions God made of himself to Adam, 
as to us and Moses. For what might be known more clearly by natural 
light out of the works or written in his heart, God revealed not to faith. 
But we know all these attributes by revelation unto faith ; and so in a 
clearer, distincter, and indeed a more immediate manner we take in by 
faith that description which God makes of himself, and hear what him- 
self says of himself, and this by the hght of faith ; whereas he had the 
knowledge of these attributes no such way but from the light of nature, to 
be improved out of the works of God, as God had manifested himself therein. 
Again, secondly, consider that all that he knew whatsoever by such a 
natural light, or by faith either, whether of the nature of God or the love 
of God in his heai't, we know it all by faith ; and so to have the know- 
ledge of all he had, in an higher way than he, and so more evident and clear, 
whereas he had the knowledge of faith but about some few particulars. And 
the reason why we know all by faith, which he any way knew, is because 



Chap. VIII, ] of their state by creation. 69 

those things of God and the law which he knew by inbred Hght, that light 
being now extinct in us, it is necessary to be revealed by revelation, and so 
to be let in by faith. First, he by natural inbred light knew that there was 
a God, but wo by faith believe that God is, Heb. xi. 6, and a rewarder of 
them that seek him. And so all that theulogia naturalis, that natural 
divinity to pick God out of his works, and to see how the works of creation 
and providence shew God forth and argue him and his attributes, the rules 
hereof we have now revealed and written. The book of Job and the 
Psalms teach us how to fetch God out of the creation and to praise him, 
so as God reads to us his own logic, and a lecture on his own works ; 
whereas Adam was left to study the bare text but by natural light, yea, and 
this lecture is read to faith, a higher principle, more capable than nature 
is, God teaching us by faith how to interpret his works. So as out of the 
word, if we had faith enough, might we learn more of God, even in his 
works, reading the text with that God's own comment, than Adam ever 
could have done by his plodding and poring on them, and using his reason 
and natural light. 

3. By natural light he knew out of the creatures that God made the 
world, Rom. i. 20. But we know it by the light of faith and revelation 
from God how it was, &c. Heb. xi. 3, * By faith we understand the worlds 
were made by the word of God.' He, for aught we read, knew but of a 
new world made, that which he saw ; and whether he should ever have 
heard of heaven or angels is a question ; but we understand the worlds 
were made, the heaven of heavens, and this visible world. 

4. And then, last of all, add unto all that we have over and above what 
he had, a new edition of God and all his attributes, and all his mind bound 
up in one volume in Christ ; and the revelation of the gospel, the mystexy 
of his will, the least tittle whereof Adam should never have known. Faith 
brings us into another world, and the things of it infinitely transcending 
Adam's, and revealing more of God in the least creature of it than is in all his 
volume, and is as much vaster than his as heaven is above earth ; as much 
exceeds it as the second Adam, Christ, doth him, who was the epitome of 
his world, as Christ is of ours. We have the addition of new objects, and 
those glorious, heavenly, wholly supernatural. In Chiist, a new Indies is 
discovered, a new treasure broken up which Adam should never have 
heard of. 

CHAPTER VIII. 

How Adam and his state, according to the law of his first creation, was intended 
by God as a type of one ivho was to be a second Adam, Jesus Christ, and 
the founder of a supernatural condition. — Some things premised of the 
nature, and various division of a type. — Wherein Adam was a type of Christ, 
as he was in his state of innocency a public perso)i and the head of man- 
kind, and so derived to his posterity the imputation of his disobedience ; so 
he was a type of Christ, as pre-ordained before the world was, and ivithout 
consideration of the fall, to be the root and head of the elect, and to convey 
to them the supernatural benefits of grace. 

Who is the type of him that was to come. — Rom. V. 14. 

When I first considered this, and other scriptures in the New Testament 
which make the first Adam, and the whole story of him both before and after, 



70 OF TIIE CEEATUKES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

land] in, his sinning or falling, to be the type and lively shadow of Christ, 
the second Adam ; likewise observing that the apostle Paul stands admiring 
at the greatness of this mystery or mystical type, that Christ the second 
Adam should so wonderfully be shadowed forth therein, as, Eph. v. 32, 
he cries out, ' This is a great mystery,' which he speaks applying and 
fitting some passages about Adam and Eve unto Christ and his church ; it 
made me more to consider an interpretation of a passage in Heb. x. 7 out 
of Ps. xl. 7, which I before had not only not regarded, but wholly rejected, 
as being too like a postil gloss. The passage is, that ' when Christ came 
into the world ' to take our nature on him, he alleged the reason of it to be the 
fulfilling of a Scripture written in ' the beginning of God's book,' ev xs^aX/3/ 
BilSxicv, so out of the original the words maybe, and are by many interpreters, 
translated, though our translation reads them only thus, ' In the volume of 
thy book it is written of me.' It is true, indeed, that in that 40th Psalm, 
whence they are quoted, the words in the Hebrew may signify no more than 
that in God's book (the manner of writing Avhich was anciently in rolls of 
parchment, folded up in a volume) Christ was everywhere written and 
spoken of. Yet the word xiipaAlg, which out of the Septuagint's translation 
the apostle took, signifying, as all know, the beginning of a book ; and we 
finding such an emphasis set by the apostle in the 5th chapter of the Ephe- 
sians, upon the history of Adam in the beginning of Genesis, as containing 
the myster}', yea, the great mysteiy about Christ, it did somewhat induce, 
though not so fully persuade, me to think, that the Holy Ghost in those words 
might have some glance at the story of Adam in the first of the first book 
of Moses. And withal the rather because so, the words so understood do 
intimate a higher and further inducement to Christ to assume our nature, 
the scope of the speech, Heb. x., being to render the reason why he so 
willingly took man's nature : not only because God liked not sacrifice and 
burnt ofi'ering, which came in but upon occasion of sin and after the fall, 
and could not take sins away, but further, that he was prophesied of, and 
his assuming a body prophetically foresignified, as in the 40th Psalm, so 
even by Adam's stoiy before the fall, recorded in the very beginning of 
Genesis, which many other scriptures do expressly apply it unto. As in 
his first formation, and the condition of his person, 1 Cor. xv. 45, &c., 
' And so it is written. The first man Adam was made a living soul, the last 
Adam was made a quickening spirit ;' so in his marriage with Eve, Eph. 
V. '62, ' This is a great mystery ; but I speak concerning Christ and the 
church.' And then in his sovereignty over all, Ps. viii. G, ' Thou madest 
him to have dominion over the works of thy hands ; thou hast put all things 
under his feet.' And Heb. ii. 8, * Thou hast put all things in subjection 
under his feet. For in that he put all in subjection under him, he left 
nothing that is not put under him. But now we see not yet all things 
put under him.' So likewise in the communication of his sin he typified 
out the communication of Christ's obedience, as Kom. v. 

I shall choose to begin with this last place of Piom. v., as laying the 
general foundation for all the rest. The words there do (as you see) 
plainly affirm, that Adam was a type of Christ to come, ver. 14 ; and the 
occasion of uttering them was the comparing of Adam and Christ together 
(which the apostle in this chapter doth at large), as they were both of 
them public persons — the one conveying sin, the other righteousness, to 
all their posterity. And as the groundwork of that his comparing of 
them, he brings in this maxim, that Adam was a type of Christ to come ; 
that is, Christ being as surely to come after him as Adam was then come 



I 



Chap. VIII.] of their state by creation. 71 

already. Therefore God appointed Adam, as to be a public person to convey 
to bis posterity what be sbould do or be, so further also, to be a type of 
another Adam who was to come after him, namely, Jesus Christ; and 
said to be to come, not because that proved to be the event of it, that 
Christ did do so, but because it was foreseen, aimed at, and appointed by 
God, even by the history of Adam. And hereupon it is the apostle sets 
the one against the other as the type and antitype, exactly comparing 
them in what he hod propounded to compare them in. And although in 
that place it be but one particular wherein he doth compare them, 
namely, in Adam's conveying sin, wherein he typified out Christ to come, 
who should convey righteousness ; yet this axiom he brings as the warrant 
for it. For this collation is more general, and so extendeth to all parti- 
culars else of Adam's story, as wherein he was also a type as well as in 
this. For it is usual with the apostles (as it is with all other discoursers) 
in arguing, to bring general axioms for the proof of some one particular. 
Thus for the comfort of the saints in afflictions, Rom. viii. 25, 28, &c., 
he brings in a general axiom which I'eacheth to all things else, namely, 
that ' all things work together for their good,' ver. 28 ; and another, ver. 
29, * We are predestinated to be conformed to the image of his Son,' 
which conformation reacheth to all things both of grace and glory ; but he 
there allegeth it only in point of afflictions, and for a conformity to his 
sufferings, which is but one particular. And so here, when he calls Adam 
a type of him who was to come, he applies it indeed but to one particular 
in this place ; but it is a general maxim, extendible to many things more, 
wherein Christ was typified out by Adam, as by other scriptures doth appear. 
. But before I explain any of those scriptures, I will first shew what is 
meant by type as here it is taken. 

A type of a thing to come is a prophetical resemblance, wherein some- 
thing more imperfect going before is intended by God to signify some other 
thing more noble and perfect to follow after. In the proper signification 
of the word, it signifies a print, stamp, or impression, bearing the resem- 
blance of that which made it. As the letters wherewith men print are 
called r'oirot {Typis mandetur, says the privilege), because they leave the print 
of themselves upon paper, and the letters printed bear the resemblance of 
those stamps which made them, so that, 

1. It notes out a resemblance between two things which sometimes in 
Scripture are called allegories. So Gal. iv. 24, the story_ of Hagar and 
Sarah is made the allegory of the two covenants ; that is, a continued 
similitude. So likewise they are called va^aZoXal , Heb ix, 9 ; that is, 
comparisons made of things like, such as Christ used, and hmhilyiiara, 
subostensiones, obscure, underhand resemblances, Heb. viii. 5, and shadows; 
and, Heb. vii. 4, Melchisedec is said to be made like to Christ, as being 
his type. 

2. Secondly, When the thing typified is to come, then it notes out a 
prophetical resemblance intended by God; and so it differs from a mere 
likeness, or allusion, or pattern, or example. There are many stories in 
the Scripture which fell out exceeding like to many passages about Christ ; as 
the instance of Job in his sufferings, which in as many particulars resembles 
Christ's sufferings as any other whatever in Holy Writ ; as in his being 
emptied of all, and from being one who ' thought it no robbery to be equal 
with' the princes of the earth in riches and honours, becoming poor (even 

poor that it grew into a proverb, and is current to this day), and stripped 
ked of all, being abhorred of his acquaintance, mocked by those who had 



72 OF THE CBEATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

been his vassals, and forsaken of his friends (as Christ of his disciples), 
God himself hiding his face from him, and holding him for his enemy, 
Job xiii. 24, as he did hide his face from Christ, when he hung naked on 
the cross, and cried out, ' My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?' 
And yet for all this, that Job was herein a type of Christ to come, we have 
no warrant to affirm, though some have done it. So likewise may many 
other stories more hold the like resemblance ; but types they are not, 
unless they be propheticall}^ intended by God so to signify. Thus, Heb. 
ix. 8, the apostle, speaking of a type in the Old, says, ' The Holy Ghost 
thereby signifying,' &c. ; and therefore, Heb. viii. 5, he says they did 
serve as ' examples,' but as instituted by God ; for he allegeth God's 
words to Moses on the mount, ' See,' says he, ' that you make all accord- 
ing to the pattern on the mount.' Wherefore no more of the histories, or 
whatever institutions else in the Old Testament, than we find applied by 
the Holy Ghost, either in the prophets, by way of prophecy of what 
should be under the New Testament (they speaking of the worship, &c., 
of the New Testament under the language of the old types), or which else 
in the New Testament itself are so applied by the Holy Ghost, may we 
dare to make use of or call types. And the reason is, because for things 
historical to signify is ex instituto, they do it naturally ; therefore we must 
have a word of institution or warrant from God, that so intended them ; 
or otherwise we can found no matter of certainty upon them, neither will 
they be sanctified in the opening of them ; to work upon the heart, as 
being human significations only, and as unlawful as they are. Allusions, 
I gi'ant, we may make of them, for illustration's sake ; as Amos vi. 6, the 
Holy Ghost, laying forth their sin, expresseth it under the similitude of 
Joseph's story, and of the chief butler of Pharaoh, ' They di'ink wine in 
bowls, but are not grieved for the afliiction cf Joseph ;' yet none will say 
it was intended as a type of this carriage of theirs, but he aptly expresseth 
it by that. And so Isa. i. 10, he calls the princes of Israel ' rulers of 
Sodom.' In hke manner things in nature we may make similitudes of, 
by reason of a fitness in them to resemble ; and so God intended them to 
help us (whose understandings are tied to our senses here) in our appre- 
hensions of spiritual things ; for which reason our Saviour Christ abounded 
in such similitudes and parables. As in that sermon to Nicodemus, 
where he expressed the work of grace by a new birth, and the working of 
God's Spirit therein by the blowing of the wind, John iii, 8, which Nico- 
demus not yet understanding, says Christ, ' If I have told you earthly 
things, and you believe not,' &c. ; that is, have endeavoured by similitudes 
drawn from earthly things, to make you understand heavenly. So that, as 
they say, God hath made no kind of thing on the earth but it hath its like 
in the sea, so there is scarce anything heavenly but he appointed something 
in nature to resemble it, which notwithstanding is no type (although it be 
a resemblance) of it, because not prophetically intended by God to fore- 
signify them as to come ; which types do serve not only to help us to 
conceive aright of the things to come, but also are predictions that they 
will come to pass, and so may help our faith as well as our understanding ; 
so that a word from God to explain these was needful, but those other are 
left to man's wit to fit and apply them. 

3. Thirdly, In the description of a type I add, ' to signify,' which 
differenceth these types from bare and mere examples, which do only fore- 
warn or call to an imitation. And therefore, though they be of things past, 
yet are they not in this sense of things to come ; although, because they 



Chap. VIIL] of their state by creation. 73 

are patterns, the word be used of them, as Phil. iii. 17, you have the word 
ru-rroi/ put for an example, and so all God's dealings with the Israelites are 
called TL/To/, examples or types, as the margin hath it. But how ? Not as 
foresignifying, so much as forewarning, and therefore it follows ' they were 
written for our admonition.' But so, Adam could not be a typo of Christ 
for him to imitate or to be forewarned by, but to forcsignify. Many things 
indeed in the story of the Old Testament were types foresignifying as well 
as forewarning ; as their not entering into Canaan, and God's swearing in 
his wrath, is made a tj'pe of not entering into heaven in Heb. iii. 11 and 
chap. iv. 3, and so I deny not but that those passages they recorded might 
typify out the hypocrisy of many professing the gospel (which seems also 
to be the apostle's scope), yet principally they are to forewarn. And if so, 
yet it follows not that all things then fell out as types foresignifying. For 
he says not simply ra a'xcvra, but 'xavra rauTa, ' ail these things ; ' that is, 
those particulars mentioned in the former verses, so as none but such things 
as God hath in some word or other declared to be signs and types, are to 
be so judged, though otherwise never so like in view. 

4. Fourthly, I put in that the things that are thus made types of things 
to come are things more imperfect, and the things typified by them more 
glorious and perfect. Thus Col. ii. 17, the types of the law are called but 
the shadows of good things to come ; and Christ signified by them the 
body, that is, he is as the body of the sun, and they but as the shadow 
which the sun makes. So the dwelling of God in the temple was a type, 
yet but as the presence of a man in his shadow ; but oppositely it is said, 
' In Christ dwells the fulness of the Godhead bodily,' Col. ii. 9. So Heb. 
ix. 24, those things that are typical are but figures of the things typified ; 
and no other were all those brave men who were made types of Christ. -. 

6. Fifthly, I inserted that in a way of resemblance the things signified 
do answer fitly unto them that signify, as the impress does to the stamp 
that made it. Therefore, 1 Peter iii. 21, baptism is called avTirvTrov, that 
is, a Uke figure. 

Now sometimes they resemble either, 

1. In a likeness or simiUtude. So Adam was like Christ : Eph. v. 32, 
* This is a great mystery ; but I speak concerning Christ and the church.' 

2. In a way of antithesis or opposition : so Rom. v. 18, * Therefore, as 
by the oflence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation ; even 
so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justi- 
fication of life.' Adam conveyed sin, and Christ conveyed grace. Or, 

3. In a way of eminency or transcendency. So Christ excels Adam : 
1 Cor. XV. 45, 46, * And so it is written. The first man Adam was made a 
living soul, the last Adam was made a quickening spirit. Howbeit that 
was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural ; and afterward 
that which is spiritual.' Yet they some way answer and are correspondent 
as type and antitype, which is enough. 

Now having thus explained what a type is, I proceed to shew how Adam 
and his whole story was intended by God as a more imperfect type going 
before, to signify and set forth Christ as to come. Now I find some* who 
do indeed acknowledge a similitude between the first and second Adam, and 
that Adam may in that respect be called a type of Christ ; but yet only 
natiiralis typus, and so to signify him but as a natural thing or story may 
be brought to represent and illustrate another like unto it, by way of 
parallel, but not ex mstituto, as so intended by God in a way of institution, 
* Cameron in Myrothec. cap. 5, ad Ephes. 



7-4 OF THE CBEATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK 11. 

as the types of the old law were, which did serve to the example and 
shadow of Christ, Heb. viii. 5, aud were on purpose framed to that end. 
But so, says he, Adam was not intended by God, for that would insinuate 
that God intended Christ should be incarnate, before the fall, and ordained 
Adam but as his forerunner. Now therefore the point which I intend to 
manifest, and first to prove in the general only, is, that Adam and his story 
are not only things which hold a likeness with things about Christ, and out 
of which similitude may be drawn for illustration, but v.'hich were intended 
by God to foresignify Christ to come and to assume an human nature. 
And this not only in respect unto the fall, but for other respects also. 
Wherefore Adam was ordained to be Christ's type, as to come, and that not 
simply upon the fall, but before in his first creation and estate of innocency. 
And though it be true indeed that he had not come thus in the form of a 
servant into this world, but upon a supposition of the fall, nor had his 
human nature been the seed of the woman, nor he born of the Virgin Mary 
else ; which promise of Christ was therefore, in respect of such a way of 
coming into the world, given after the fall only. And though in the execu- 
tion of things Christ first took frail flesh and came in the form of a servant, 
and God so decreed it as he had done the fall, yet in his primary intention, 
his chief and primary decree, his eye and fij-st aim was at his Son's having 
such a state and condition in his human nature as he hath now in heaven 
glorified. This was first in God's intention, though last in execution. And 
of this state and condition of Christ's human nature glorified as to come, 
was Adam before his fall the type, as in the sequel will appear. 

Now for the proof of this, namely, that Adam and all his story before the 
fall was a type of Christ in the sense before given ; not only by way of 
illustration (as any other similitude or thing like may be brought to illus- 
trate another), but by way of ordination, as so intended by God to fore- 
typify and shadow out Christ as to come. 

First, Let us see what these words, Rom. v. 14 — ' Who is the type of 
him that was to come ' — will afford ; out of which this seems to be made 
plain. 

1, In that Adam is called not only a type, which (as formerly hath been 
explained) imports more than a bare similitude, but also a type * of him 
that was to come,' he says not ' of him that was come ;' this argues him to 
be a prophetical type, and that Christ was intended as the antitype fore- 
signified thereby ; and so Adam not to be only as a similitude that would 
serve to illustrate Christ then when he is come. The like phrase we have 
used of the ceremonial types, whose institution (all grant) was more for to 
typify Christ to come than to serve for a present use in worship, though so 
they also did. Now of them it is said, Col. ii. 7, ' They were a shadow,' or 
type, ' of things to come ;' so likewise Heb. x. 1 and Heb. viii. 5, where they 
are said Xar^i-jnv, to serve in worship to this end for a double use they then 
had. 1. To make up a worship to God in those times. 2. As types to 
foresignify things to come. Therefore Heb. ix. 9 they are called a ' figure 
for the present time' (then when in use as parts of worship), to figure out 
things to come ; and that was their primary use. Now the like say I of 
Adam and his story, and the world made for him in innocency, that 
although it was a glorious instance and manifestation of many of God's 
attributes, as of his holiness in making him after God's image, so of his 
power, and justice, and wisdom, more than all God's other visible works, 
all which God made for him ; and this it was, simply in itself considered, 
although God should never have intended anythmg further thereby, but 



Chap. VIII.] of tueir state by creation. 75 

bavo rested iu it. Yet I say further, that besides this it was intended as 
much, yea more, to be a type and a figure of Christ and his ' world which 
was to come' (as the phrase is, Heb. ii. 15), and of Christ here, Horn. v. 14, 
that ' he was to come,' and in comparison thereof Adam was but as a 
shadow to the body of this sun. 

And in the second place, for the confirmation of that latter part of this 
assertion, or rather the appendix unto it, that Christ was appointed a root 
to his elect before, or rather without respect had unto the full, I argue out 
of this place thus, and ask wherein it was that Adam was a type of Christ 
to come ? Why (as it is plain by the context), in his conveying disobe- 
dience. So verses 12-14, ' In him all men sinned ; and so sin and 
death came upon all.' He shews how, iu a vray of antithesis or opposition 
(yet bearing a likeness and resemblance), he typified out Christ in his 
obedience (so verses 17-19), which comes upon all his elect by the 
like imputation : and they are made righteous by that one man's obedience, 
as sinners by that one man's disobedience. Now, if we examine the 
ground why all sinned in him, and why his disobedience made all sinners, 
it was in that he was a public person, representing all mankind, as Christ 
also was. And so the main ground of the apostle's comparing them lies 
in this, that both of them, as public persons, were two roots and principles, 
and so Adam the type of him, who was also, says he, ' to come ' and be a 
common head and root, as Adam was. Now I ask when did Adam become 
a common person first ? What ! not until the moment of his sinning ? 
Surely yes ; he was such before, even in the state of innocency ; for he had 
not in justice been a public person in sinning, if he had not first been such 
in standing ; he had not been such for evil if he had not first been such 
for good. And so he was therefore a public person in sinning, because 
formerly in innocency he had been so considered by God, so as, in God's 
first decree to create him, he must needs have ordained him withal to be a 
common person ; and therefore at the instant before, or at the time when 
God made Adam, he says. Gen. i. 26, ' Let us make man ' — it is in the 
Hebrew, Adam — * according to our image.' In which words Adam, or 
man, in the singular number, is put for all mankind ; even as in that pro- 
mise. Gal. iii. 16, it was observed by the apostle that he had said, ' not 
unto seeds,' as many apart of themselves, but to ' seed,' as to one, a public 
person, for all the rest, which seed was Christ, as including all the elect in 
him. Now, so he says in that place of Genesis, not men, as speaking of 
them sevei'ally in their own persons, but man, or rather Adam, that one 
first man as the root of all, in whom, as in a public person, all were 
created. And therefore, that so he might be understood in that speech, 
he adds in the next words following the plural number, saying, ' And let 
them subdue,' &c., as speaking of all his posterity considered in him. 
Thus, therefore, God looks at him in his decree of creation. Now, from 
this Rom. v., it is evident that when he became to be a public person then 
he began also to be a type ; for he was a type as he was a public person 
and a root of mankind ; that is the ground of it, and lies not in his sinning 
only ; for he had not been a type in sinning if he had not first been a 
public person in respect of good and holy actions, to have conveyed the 
benefit of them, as well as of his sin to convey the evil of it ; and so before 
this his fall he was a type of Christ to come, as a root to his elect, to 
convey some benefit to them, namely, the glory in heaven ; and this, 
before the consideration of Adam's fall, as will afterwards appear out of 
another scripture. 



76 OF TUE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK 11. 



CHAPTER IX. 

The explication of the ivords of the text ; in what particulars they make a 
comparison of Christ the type and Adam the anti-type. — In their persons, 
as Adam had in him a principle of natural life, so Christ has of spiritual. 
— As public persons and heads of mankind, as Adam conveys his natural 
life, so Christ his spiritual. — It is j^roved out of the same text, that Adam, 
before his fall, ivas thus intended as a prophetic type of Christ to come, as 
the head of the elect, ivho as a ptuhlic pierson, should advance them to the 
like glorious condition as himself had in heaven. — The ylory of this accom- 
plishment was ap>pointed for him, without consideration of the fall. — That 
interposing he came and suffered and died to remove the obstacles that the 
fall had laid in the way of the execution of the work first designed. 

There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body. And so it is written, 
The first man Adam teas made a living soul, the last Adam ivas made a 
quickening spirit. Howbeit that was not first ivhich is spiritual, but that 
which is natural ; and afterward that which is spiritual. The first man is 
of the earth, earthy ; the second man is the Lord from heaven. As is the 
earthy, such are they that are earthy ; and as is the heavenly, such are they 
that are heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall 
also bear the image of the heavenly. — 1 Cor. XV. 44-49. 

Those words out of Rom. v. I took but for a general groundwork, 
because they so expressly call Adam ' a t3'pe of Christ to come.' And 
though that scripture delivers this general maxim, which in many parti- 
culars doth hold, yet it instanceth in nothing but the imputation of his 
disobedience, which is indeed in order the last particular wherein Adam 
did sustain a public person, and wherein he was a type of Christ, convey- 
ing the benefit of his most perfect obedience, after which he ceased to be 
a public person in all other acts of his, and so that particular is to be in- 
sisted on last in this discourse. But other scriptures do instance in many 
other particulars before his fall (at which time, as I shewed, he was a 
public person as well as in his fall), and do make him to have been the 
type of Christ therein also, as pre-ordained by God to come, which will 
more fully confirm that assertion already laid down. 

I will take the scriptures as they lie in order ; and first, this in 1 Cor. 
sv. 44, 45, &c., because indeed it makes Adam a type of Christ from the 
first of his creation, which is the highest that we can go. And as in that 
Rom. V. the scope is to shew that Adam was a type of Christ, as he was a 
public person in respect of his actions, to convey the merit or demerit of 
them, as in like manner Christ by his actions conveys righteousness and 
life ; so here, the apostle's scope is to shew that Adam was also his type in 
respect of that condition and state of life, and qualifications of his own 
person, given him as a public person, and of what at his first creation, 
before his fall (even in his formation) he received, to convey the like to 
us, which is the thing I out of this place shall chiefly urge. 

The resemblance between these two in that Rom. v. is (in respect of the 
things conveyed) a similitude of contraries or opposites : 

By the one came sin, by the other, righteousness ; by the one came 
death, by the other life, with this dissimilitude for the measure of what is 



Chap, IX.] of their state by creation. 77 

conveyed, that Christ exceeds in his ; he conveys abundance of righteous- 
ness, and a better life, whereof sin and death were the privation. 

But the resemblance between these two in this of the Corinthians is 
carried on by a comparing the condition of the one with the other (which 
is the thing conveyed) in a way of eminency and disparity, which yet 
answer each to other, as type and antitype. The one was made a living 
soul, and the other a quickening spirit ; between w^hich, for excellency, 
there is as much disparity as between earth and heaven, and yet an 
answering of each other in that disparity, as type and antitype use to do. 

Lirinr/ answering to quickenuui ; soul to spirit; nalural to spiritual, 
ver. 46 ; earthly to keavenhj, ver. 48 ; yet so as, for the ground of convey- 
ing both, they agree alike ; as in the former, that they were ordained tvyo 
roots, correspondent each to other. 

Now, in handling this scripture, I shall observe this method : 

1. I will shew the coherence, scope, and connection of these words, and 
open those phrases in them which most conduce to the understanding of 
them. 

2. Secondly, When they are explained, I will raise arguments from them, 
to confirm that assertion already laid down, namely, that Adam was before 
his fall a prophetic tj'pe of Christ to come. 

3. And thirdly, I will open those particulars which this scripture holds 
forth, wherein he was ordained Christ's type as then. 

1. The apostle's scope in that chapter is (as all know) to prove the 
resurrection, which he had by many arguments done, unto ver. 35, the 
main of which was drawn from the resurrection of Christ, in whom all his 
elect must live, as in Adam all died, ver. 21, 22. 

But then, if the question be made, With what body, or in what state 
and condition of life they shall rise, and afterwards live in (which question 
he puts ver. 35) ? he answers, ver. 38 (as in the 36th and 37th he had 
done to a former query), that for matter and substance it is the same body 
that they had before, 'their own body,' ver. 38; but for qualifications 
and adornments, and so for the condition of their persons and their state 
of life then, these shall differ from what they are now, as much as a clod of 
earth, 'a body terrestrial,' diifers from a star in heaven, ' a body celestial.' 
It is the apostle's own illustration, ver. 40, and so he goes on to difierence 
them unto ver. 44, where he adds another difference between them, call- 
ing the one ' a natural body,' the other ' a spiritual body,' which, though 
differing in teiTns, is notwithstanding the same with the former. 

But because these similitudes, though they illustrate this difference of 
bodies, yet prove nothing, therefore, from the 44th verse, he proceeds to 
prove that God had ordained two such differing conditions of life, and of 
bodies, for the sons of men — the one common to all men, the other more 
glorious, peculiar to his elect — which he positively lays down, and expresseth 
in this thesis or proposition : ' There is a natural body, and there is a spi- 
ritual body ;' that is, there are to be two such conditions for some of mankind ; 
God hath ordained both these states for men ; or, as some copies have it, 
and as the vulgar translation reads those words, ' If there be a natural body, 
then there is a spmtual body ;' so making the one the consequence of the 
other, £/ g'oT/ ffw/xa -^•jyjyjjv, icri y.al rrZ/MX -Truiu/J.aTr/.hv ;* which assertion he 
proves, ver. 45, 46, and then foi-ms up the conclusion, ver. 49, that as cer- 
tainly as we see the one, we shall in like manner see the other. This 
thesis he proves from the differing condition of the first and second Adam ; 
* Vide Flaccium in Var. Lect. 



78 OF THE CREATUEES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

the former being a type of the latter, and hoth of them ordained to convey 
their likeness to mankind. The substance and condition of Adam's nature 
(the best of it) was but a reasonable soul becoming a principle of life to a 
body created out of the earth, and ordained to live in the earth, which is 
meant by living soul. But Christ's person is the Godhead in the person 
of the Son, or Spirit quickening an human nature, ordained to live in 
heaven, whereof he was Lord by inheritance, ver. 47, and his argument lies 
in three things thus : if the soul can advance an earthly body to such an 
excellent state of life as Adam on earth enjoyed, then what a glorious spi- 
ritual condition shall the Godhead, united to an human nature, raise that 
nature up unto ! And by consequent, his elect also shall be raised to the 
like ; for as Adam conveyed his image (ver. 48, 49) to his posterity, so 
shall Christ transform his elect to the image of that condition, which his 
human nature is raised up unto ; which, if that of Adam's was but earthy, 
this must needs be heavenly ; if that were animal, this must be spiritual. 
This is, in brief, the sum of his discourse ; which I shall make good by a 
larger opening, both of the principal phrases and of his argumentation ; 
for the ground upon which the apostle builds the proof of both parts of his 
assertion, are the words spoken by Moses of Adam, when he was first 
made ; ' And so it is written,' says he, * the first man Adam was made a 
living soul ; the last Adam was made a quickening Spirit.' You see that 
for his proof, he boldly hath recourse to the words spoken of Adam's state 
of life, and condition of body at his first formation. Now, ere that I can 
shew whereupon the ground of the apostle's argument from thence derived 
is founded, I must explain what is meant by livimi soul and quickening 
spirit. Soul, as was said, is opposed to spirit, and livinf/ to quickeninfj. 

(1.) By soul is primarily meant that moi'e noble part of man. By a synec- 
doche, such as is familiar both with Jews and Grecians, thereby is also 
meant the whole man, consisting both of soul and body. The Grecians 
use the word hody for the whole : ' A body hast thou fitted me,' Heb. x. 5 ; 
that is, an human nature, consisting of body and soul. The Jews put the 
soul for the whole : ' So many souls came out of Jacob's loins,' Exod. i. 
So as the whole person of Adam, the whole nature, substance of man he 
consisted of, is expressed by sotil, putting that which was the most excel- 
lent part to express the whole man. So that his scope is first to com- 
pai-e the substance of which Adam's person consisted with that of Christ's : 
Adam, but a soul giving life to a body ; but Christ, a Spirit or God, 
quickening an human nature. He mentions the difference of them, quoad 
suhstantiam, because it was the foundation of the diSerence in their con- 
ditions. 

(2.) And so, secondly, living soid doth connotate and import also that 
animal state of life which Adam's soul enjoyed in his body, far short of that 
which the Spirit in Christ raiseth the human nature to, yea, or such a con- 
dition as pure spirits, the angels, do enjoy. That reasonable soul inspired 
into Adam being confined, and clogged with a body taken out of earth, 
depending in its operations upon the organs in it, and lived in it an earthly 
life, depending on meat, drink, sleep, &c., in its own proper works of rea- 
soning depending on fancy, and joined with a possibility of dying, though 
not then reducible to act, till after the fall, the curse said Morieris. And 
that Uvinrj soul is thus here to be taken, appears by that which he in the 
other verses expresseth it by calling it ■^•oyjxhv, an animal bod}^ such as 
beasts have, and yj)i%m, earthly, ver. 47, 48, that is, a state and condition 
of his soul in a body suitable to this earth, and assimilated to the things 



Chap. IX.] of their state by creation. 79 

of the earth, to take in help and comfort from them, and in working to 
depend on them. Now for the opposite phrase of quickening spirit. 

1. By spirit, he means the divine nature or Godhead in Christ, which 
heing ordained to assume an human nature, and therein to hecome a 
second Adam, he was made a quickening Spirit, namely, to that human 
nature, by raising up that human nature to a Godhke glory and sovereignty, 
and exalting it in the form of God, to have life in himself independently, 
as God hath, yea, even a fountain of life within himself; and so as to 
have the very body of that human nature spiritualised, and advanced to a 
glory higher than the heavens, or angels, who are spirits. 

Now that the divine nature of the second person, or Son of God, as ho 
is God, is called Spirit, we have many scriptures besides which give in 
their testimony. Thus, Heb. ix. 14, it is said, ' He offered up himself 
(that is, his human nature, as the sacrifice) * by the eternal Spirit ' (that 
is, his Godhead, as the priest). So, 1 Pet. iii. 18, it is said, ' He was put 
to death in the flesh' (that is, in the human nature), ' but quickened by the 
Spirit,' or his divine nature ; being thereby raised up, and exalted to that 
high and glorious spiritual life, which that flesh of his now in heaven 
enjoys. Thus also John vi. 63, ' It is the Spirit that quickeneth ;' that is, 
the Godhead of Christ ; it is that which hath that transcendent power of 
giving life and glory ; ' the flesh' (or human nature of itself) * profiteth 
nothing,' were it not quickened and raised by the Spirit, to which it is 
united. And so answerably, by quickening is meant, the communicating all 
that glorious life and power, in the utmost extent of it, which from the 
union of that human nature with the Spirit, or divine nature, must needs 
flow to it ; even the ' dwelling of the fulness of the Godhead therein 
bodily,' and communicating Godlike properties and excellencies, and glory, 
and a life suitable to such an union ; and so as to have a fountain of life 
within himself, and of himself, and power over all flesh ; and to live a life 
above what earthly souls do ; yea, above what is enjoyed by angels, the life 
of a ' Lord from heaven' (as ver. 47), and so an heavenly life, unto which 
his body was not only to be raised, but he to be the Lord of that life, 
having life and quickening in himself, not depending upon anything else, 
as the life of men on earth does, and as the Hfe of the first Adam was 
dependent on creatures for nourishment, &c., and the acting and opera- 
tion of his soul, and motion of his body, depending on bodily spirits, main- 
tained and supphed by other creatures. But Christ's Godhead supplies 
life, motion, qaickening, vigour, power, and all unto his human nature 
immediately from itself. And so the comparison runs thus : if Adam's 
soul caused his body, made of earth, and remaining such, to live, and put 
such a glory upon it (above what is in beasts), that the image of God 
shined in it, then what a life, what a glory, must the whole human nature, 
both body and soul, of Christ be raised up unto, whenas the Godhead or 
Spirit shall be, in a manner, unto both the body and soul that which 
Adam's soul was to his body, the quickener and immediate principle of 
life, motion, and glory unto both ! and dwelling therein, break forth in its 
fulness, and so cause such an image of the Godhead to shine forth therein, 
as in a transcendent proportion shall excel that in Adam, as much as the 
Godhead excels Adam's soul, which was the supreme immediate principle 
of life in him. Thus Christ and Adam are compared together in their 
own persons, singly and alone considered ; and in this sense given, the one 
was but a ' living soul,' the other is a * quickening spirit.' 

But 2dly, There is a further meaning or look which these phrases do 



80 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

cast, and that is, as tliey are coBsidered as two roots or principles of the 
like life they themselves have, which they communicate to those that are 
of them. 

Thus, 1. Adam is called a living soul, not simply in respect to that life 
■which his soul ^nye his own body, and which his own particular person 
enjoyed from the union of both, but further, as he was to be a conveyer 
of the like life to his posterity. And so the phrase here, of his being a 
living soul, is such another as we use in philosophy, whenas we speak of 
the general principle of nature, calling it natura naturans. So Adam, being 
to be a root of life to mankind, he is called (as it were, anima aniinans), a 
' living soul,' to shew that Adam had power, through God's ordinance, to 
convey that life and soully estate which himself had received (living being 
taken actively, or causally) unto others, as shewing what he was to be the 
root of to others, as well as subjectively, as noting out that life which was 
in himself. 

And answerably in the second place, the word quickening, which is attri- 
buted to Christ, may be understood, not only in respect of that glorious 
life which the Godhead quickeneth, or raiseth the human nature unto (as 
yet in the places quoted, 1 Peter iii. 18, and John vi. 63, it is principally 
taken, and so also here), but further, it is spoken of him as he is to be 
the means, or principle of life unto us, to quicken, raise, or advance our 
earthly bodies, which we received from Adam, unto a spiritual and heavenly 
condition. And further, to import what he will make our souls to be in a 
conformity unto himself. To be even quickening spirits to our bodies, so 
as that our soul's motion and acting shall not depend on our bodies, nor 
they on other creatures, as Adam did, but the soul itself through his quicken- 
ing of it shall quicken, and move, and act the body of itself immediately, 
without the help of bodily spirits ; and so (in a resemblance) be unto it, 
as the Spirit or Godhead in Christ is unto his human nature, even a 
quickening spirit. And so quickeninfi is here causally taken for what Christ 
is to others ; and this the rather, because he speaks in this chapter of 
raising our bodies, when dead, unto a spiritual condition, which the word 
qnickeniii// likewise imports, namely, a giving life to dead men; and so 
shews Christ's further power than Adam's, who could only convey life to 
his posterity, who were not before, but could not quicken or raise dead 
men, as Christ can. 

But although this be one extent of the signification of the word quickening, 
yet it is not to be confined to this only, as noting out only and merely a 
raising up of dead men ; for Christ is also a quickening spirit to those who 
shall be changed at the latter day, who shall not die. So that it ultimately 
imports rather an advancing men's bodies and souls to a more transcendent 
spiritual life, than such as depends on creatures in an earthly way, as 
Adam's life (he being but a living soul) did, and making us to have such 
a life as the angels have, w's "AyysXoi ; our souls in our bodies living the 
like life, independent on bodily spirits, or creatm-es, as they do, being 
made wholly a principle of life and motion of themselves to themselves, 
and the body also ; when our bodies shall not need to eat and drink, to 
maintain hfe and motion, but shall be quickened by the soul, and Christ 
our life immediately ; our bodies then shall not be earthly (as the phrase 
is, verse 47), suited to earthly contentments and comforts, the belly (or 
the suitableness in respect of receiving comfort, and need of meat) being 
destroyed, as well as meat itself. And the body then being suited with 
new habits, and fitness to receive that comfort from Christ which once it 



Chap. IX.] or their state by creation. 81 

(lid from these outward and earthly things, the body being ordained for 
the Lord, and the Lord for the body, even as he had said, the belly was 
for meat, and meat for the belly, in this world. This you have, 1 Cor. 
vi. 13-15, diligently compared. The body then shall be turned spiritual, 
as here, verse AG, and heavenly, as verses 47, 48, and so fitted to Christ 
and that heavenly world, as afore to this earthly world, himself then 
becoming a quickener to us. 

And the word here used both of Christ and Adam, * was made,' the one 
* a living soul,' the other * a quickening spirit,' will very well serve both 
these senses given. So first, when it is said of Adam, he was * made a 
living soul,' it properly and fitly imports, what he was personally in him- 
self, and that in his first creation he was made a living soul. And so, 
when it is said of Christ, he was ' viade a quickening spirit,' the meaning is 
the same with that in John i. 18, where it is said, * The word was viade 
flesh.' So here, he who was God before (and so not made), is yet said to 
be made a quickening spirit. For, for the Godhead to become a quickener 
of an human nature, was a new work done in the earth, and a work of 
power ; he was made that which he was not before. 

Or, secondly, it will fit the other sense also, namely, to signify what both 
were appointed to be, namely, to others. For the word made to he is 
often taken for appointed to he, as Heb. iii. 2, ' Moses was faithful to him 
who appointed him ;' in the Greek it is, ' who made him,' as referring to 
that public ofiice into which God had put him. So 1 Sam. xii. 6, ' God 
made Aaron and Moses' (so it is in the Hebrew) ; that is, advanced them 
to that public ofiice. Many such instances might be given. So that 
the words quoted out of that place in Genesis do imply, that God ap- 
pointed that first man Adam to be a public person, a common root, to 
convey to his posterity that condition of souls aed persons which he had 
received. And that this is meant in those words of Genesis, the manner 
of speech does further argue. For it is not simply said, that he became a 
living soul, but thus in the original, both Hebrew there and Greek here, it 
is to be rendered, ' He became, or was made for a living soul,' lyhsro Big 
■^'^'X/iv ^Sjgav, that is, causally so to others. As 2 Chron. xviii. 21, ' I will 
he for a lying spirit ;' that is, unto all Ahab's prophets, making them to 
lie, and so deceive him. It implies not only what that spirit was in him- 
self, but what he became to them. So here, ' he became into, or for, a 
living soul ;' that is, unto all other men, in propagating that hfe to them 
which he had received. And though it be true that he was in himself a 
living soul, as also in that other place, that the devil was a lying spirit in 
himself, is true, for he is so in himself, as well as to others ; and therefore 
whereas in the Chronicles it is said, ' I will be for a lying spirit,' in the 
book of the Kings it is only said, * 1 will be a lying spirit,' yet that also 
was spoken in respect of what he was to be unto others. And hence, 
because the apostle knew that the Holy Ghost's pm'pose, in that speech in 
Genesis, was to signify that he was so to us, and constituted a public 
person herein, therefore, by way of comment, he is bold to add to the 
test that which more fully explains the words quoted, saying, * And so it is 
written. The first man Adam,' &c. Those words, the first man, are not in 
Genesis. But he knowing it was the Holy Ghost's scope, adds them. 
And that that phrase here imports him to have been a public person, I 
shall shew anon. Now the same meaning of the word icas made, will suit 
with what was said of Christ also, he was made ; that is, appointed to be 
a quickening spirit, in the sense afore given, to his elect, which is spoken 



82 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

as if then, when Adam was appointed as a public person, to be a living 
soul to his posterity, Christ was looked at as appointed also, Adam being 
therein but his type, and so, as more imperfect, ordained to represent 
what Christ in a more transcendent and perfect manner was made or 
ordained of God to be. 

The phrase here being thus opened, we may the better discern wherein 
the foundation and ground of the apostle's argumentation lies. The thing 
which he was to prove was (as hath been said), that there is an heavenly, 
spiritual condition for men's bodies, far transcending their present condition 
in earth : ' there is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body.' For the 
proof of which, he allegeth those words in Genesis : * So it is written,' 
says he, ' The first man Adam was made a living soul ;' which words, if 
you take them literally only, and as meant of Adam alone, do prove no 
more but the first part of that assertion, namely, that there was to be an 
animal body, such as Adam had, which was to be communicated to all 
mankind from him, he being to propagate all in his image. And that part 
these cavillers against the resurrection made no question of; for to prove 
this, common experience had been enough ; but thence to argue that other 
part that follows, that the * last man should be a quickening Spirit,' and 
60 raise up the bodies of his members to a spiritual condition, can no 
other ways be done but by making God's intent in that place of Genesis 
to have been to make that first Adam a type therein of Christ, a second 
Adam ; and this is truly intended (in a type) as the first Adam himself 
was, of whom only the words Hterally do run. Yea, and further, Adam 
therein to be but such a type, as this other, that was to succeed, should 
excel ; and he accordingly therefore should raise his members to a higher 
and more glorious condition, such as Spirit in him raised him unto, even 
above soul, or that estate which the soul in Adam's earthly body enjoyed. 
And upon this gi'ound the apostle's argument will fully hold, to prove the 
one as well as the other, this being supposed, that it was as much the 
Holy Ghost's meaning in those words of Genesis to intend the one as the 
other. And that was so evidently thus, that the apostle hath a recourse 
to those words as a sufficient proof of what he said ; which is founded 
upon this, that types may be alleged for proof, when we are sure of the 
Holy Ghost's intendment in them, — as Paul, who had the Spirit, and wrote 
infallibly, here was, — as well as any other scriptures. It hath passed for a 
received maxim among some divines, that the mystical sense of Scripture 
cannot be alleged to prove matters of faith, and that therefore all such 
mystical significations serve only for illustration : symhoUca theologia nihil 
prohat. And this axiom is of use against the boldness of them who turn 
all the letter into mystical meanings, not from any warrant from Scripture, 
but out of their own fancies, where they found things that had any mutual 
resemblance. But when we know, and are assui-ed, that the Holy Ghost 
hath made a thing a type, and know his meaning therein, we may as 
boldly, warrantably, and efiicaciously allege it as any literal text whatso- 
ever. For so that which is said of the paschal lamb, Exod. xii., that the 
bones were not to be broken, this being the type, it is said, John xix. 36, 
* They brake not his legs ; that the scripture might be fulfilled,' &c. So 
the apostle allegeth a type, 1 Tim. v. 17, 18, where, urging the duty of 
honouring those who labour in the word, he says, * For it is written, Thou 
shalt not muzzle the ox that treadeth out the corn.' * 

To return therefore to the matter in hand ; observe we farther, that the 
* Vide Tena. in Hebr. Proelud. 4. 92 Num. 



CUAP. IX.] OF THEIR STATE BY CREATION. 83 

apostle not only hath recourse to these words in Genesis for his proof, but 
is bold to add to the text (and to the literal sense there, to annex the mys- 
tical meaning, as if it were therein as much intended as the literal), saying, 
' The last Adam was made a quickening Spirit,' which words are not in 
the text in Genesis ; for he knowing this to be the Holy Ghost's aim in 
those words concerning Adam, supplied it, as if it were in the text, and a 
part of what was written, so to make up the sense and meaning full and 
complete. 

2. And so I come to the second head propounded, which, from what hath 
been last said, riseth naturally up unto us, as the general doctrine of this 
scripture, namely, that former assertion, that Adam was intended by God 
before his fall as a prophetic type of Christ to come, who as a head or 
public person should advance his elect to the like glorious condition as 
himself had in heaven ; which assertion, though it hath been the natural 
consequent of what hath been already said, yet it is further established 
unto us by these considerations out of the text added unto the former. I 
shall make out the proofs of the whole, by proving each particular by piece- 
meal and apart, and all out of the words of the text. 

As (1.) that Adam was Christ's type, is further evident to have been the 
apostle's meaning, in that he calls Christ Adam, ' the last Adam,' of which 
there is no other reason but this, that he calls him by the name of his type, 
it being usual in Scripture to call the thing typified by the name of the type. 
So Christ is elsewhere called the high priest, &c., his body the temple, and 
his blood the propitiation. 

(2.) He makes Adam to have been Christ's type, as he was ordained a 
public person or head of mankind ; and therefore he here calls Adam ' the 
first man Adam.' Now in what respect or relation was he the first man ? 
Not simply as being first in order, as the Scripture means when it says, 
the first day of the week, but as a common root, who had received what 
he was, that he might convey it to all other men ; which appears by the 
opposition, in that he calls Christ the ' last Adam,' in the following words, 
and ' the second man ' in verse 47 ; and therefore, in relation unto Adam's 
typifying out of Christ, he calls him the first man. Now, if it had been 
spoken in respect of order, Cain was the second man, and God knows who 
shall be the last. But this is so spoken of these two, as if God had made 
and looked at two men only for ever to be in the world, because he looked 
at them as including all, and as two roots of all, who had all men at their 
girdles, as being both of them pubhc persons, set to convey what they were 
and received unto their several posterities. 

(3.) He is made Christ's type in respect of his conveying the like con- 
dition of soul and body as himself had to those that came of him, in that 
Christ should in like manner convey the same glorious qualifications which 
his soul and body received. Therefore, ver. 48, it is said, * As is the 
earthly Adam, such are those of him ; and as is the heavenly Adam, such 
are his elect,' even ordained to be heavenly like him. These import like- 
ness in the quaUfications of their persons. And again, ver. 49, it is said, 
' As we have borne the image of the earthly, so we shall bear the image of 
the heavenly.' So that, in respect of the condition and glory of his person, 
he was a type of Christ, as well as in his actions. 

(4.) And in the fourth place, he was herein a prophetic type of Christ, 
not only a natural similitude that may serve to illustrate, but as further 
intended by God to foresignify such another second Adam (yet more per- 
fect), as certainly decreed by God for to come, as that himself then was 



84 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK 11. 

made a living soul. For the manifestation of tliis (besides that which 
follows in the fifth head, which makes for this also) there are these two 
things, evidencing it to us out of the words of the text. 

[1.] That the apostle hath recourse to Adam and his condition as a 
proof and argument to make good this assertion, that the elect were to be 
advanced in their bodies unto a spiritual condition in heaven by Christ a 
second Adam as a quickening Spirit, because it was written of the first 
Adam, that he was made a living soul. Now, if Adam had been but a 
natural type, by way of similitude only, this had then been no argument, 
for such similitudes do illustrate, but prove nothing. It remains therefore 
that he must necessarily be a prophetic type, intended by God to fore- 
signify Christ to come. 

[2. J Add to this, secondly, the words of the 49th verse, which are the 
conclusions of his argument, wherewith he winds up this part of his dis- 
course, aflirming out of his former allegations, that ' as we have borne the 
image of the earthly, so we shall bear the image of the heavenly Adam ;' 
that is, as certainly the one as the other. He brings in this as an infer- 
ence that must certainly and necessarily follow, that as we have borne 
Adam's image, we shall also bear Christ's. He mentions it as a support 
for our faith to make use of, as a certain prediction that this other will 
and must come to pass ; whereas, had Adam and his condition been only a 
natural type or similitude, as unto which Christ might be compared and. 
appear to hold parallel, it could nor ought not to have been thus far urged. 
It might indeed have been brought to help our understandings, by way of 
illustration, to evince how Christ might convey his like glorious state, even 
as Adam had done his ; but it could not have been thus alleged to help our 
faith in it, by w^ay of demonstration and certain proof, had he not been a 
prophetic type. And further, to confirm this, let us but compare the words 
of the 48th verse and these in the 49th together, and we shall discern 
a very difierent use and improvement made by the apostle. In the 48th 
verse he says (speaking of Adam's sons), ' As is the earthy, such are 
they that are earthy ; and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are 
heavenly.' See how in these words he makes use of Adam's type and 
condition but barely, as by way of illustration and parallel, for prophetic 
types serve also to illustrate, as well as natural ; but not content with this, 
he further adds, that ' as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall 
also bear the image of the heavenly.' In which words he speaks a further 
thing than in the former, by way of inference, assuring our faith, fi'om our 
having borne Adam's image, that we shall one day most certainly bear 
Christ's also in gloiy ; he makes use of Adam's type as an argument to 
confu-m it ; and therefore it was more than a natural type, even a prophetic 
type also. 

(5.) In the fifth and last place, I add to all this, that Adam was thus 
appointed and intended by God as a prophetic type of Christ to come, and 
this before his fall ; he then foresignifying Christ to come, as here he is 
parallel-ed with him, even to be a quickening Spirit to his elect, as certainly 
as himself was then made a living soul. 

For, first, when was it, or wherein, that, according to what the apostlo 
here allegeth of Adam, he was Christ's type ? If you observe it, not in 
respect of conveying his sinful image when fallen, namely, the qualifications 
he had by sinning, as the corruption and mortality of his body and sinful 
image on his soul ; for though all that is said here hold true of these, and 
may by imphcation be inferred from hence, yet these are not the things 



Chap. IX.J of their state by creation. 85 

here spoken of by the apostle, but he is here brought in as the type of Christ 
in respect of conveyinj:; that image and state of Ufe which he received at his 
creating, before his fall, as being then a type of Christ to come, as a Ijord 
from heaven. For unto what he was when he was at his best, even at the 
first formation of his body, and the breathing his soul into it, those words 
here alleged have reference : ' Adam was made a living soul,' as appears, 
Gen. ii. 7, wherein notwithstanding he is here alleged as the type of Christ. 
And indeed therefore it was, that he conveyed that corrupt image acquired 
by his fall, because he was ordained as a common person before the fall, to 
convey the image in which he was created. And therefore it must needs 
be that he was a type of Christ to come as well before his fall as after ; 
even as well as that he was a public person before his fall as well as after. 

Secondhj, It appears also that he calls Adam his type, as in his very first 
creation he was the first man ; and this not only, as was said, in relation to 
all other men (his sons) who were to succeed him, and in respect of order 
in their succeeding, but chiefly in respect to this second man Christ, as, 
ver. 47, he calls him, and also the last Adam, ver. 45, in relation to this 
first man and first Adam, as he is called. So that the opposition shews 
that those titles given Adam do bear relation unto Christ. Now as the 
apostle argues, Heb. viii, 13, out of the word new covenant an old covenant 
to have been, which is now to be abolished — ' In that he says a new, he hath 
made the first old ' — so in that he calls Adam, even at the first, when he 
stood up out of the earth and became a man, the first man, and that, as the 
apostle explains himself, in relation to Christ, as the second man, it argued 
Christ to have been then, and as soon intended. Y ox first and second are 
relatives, and relata sunt siimd natura, and so must be in God's decrees. 
And that which further strengthens this is that phrase * was made,' which 
in the time past he attributes alike to both. He says, ' So it is written,' 
referring to Adam's creation, ' The first Adam was made a living soul, the 
last Adam was made a quickening Spirit,' speaking of both with reference 
to the same time past ; even when Adam was made or appointed, then was 
Christ also appointed, so that he was as ancient in God's purpose as the 
other, and both without any consideration had to the fall. 

Yea, thirdhj, Christ was first, and more principally intended of the two ; 
for Adam being but as the type, and so the more imperfect every way, 
Christ, the second Adam, must needs be not only at the same time with 
him intended, but primarily, and in the first place ; for so it is in all types 
else, their antitype is that for which they are ordained, and they are but 
' figures for the present,' as you have it, Heb. ix. 9, and so are but subordinate 
to their anti-type, as first and chiefly intended. And therefore they are 
said but to * serve unto the pattern,' &c., Heb. viii. 5, even as the house is 
more in the mind of the workman, and intended before the platform or 
draught of it on parchment, which only serves towards the building of it. 
And therefore the type is still rather said to be made like the thing typified 
than the thing typified to be made like unto its type. So Heb. vii. 3, 
Melchisedec being to be a type of Christ, was said to be * made like unto 
the Son of God ;' God framed him and his condition to resemble Christ, 
and not Christ to resemble Melchisedec ; which holds in all other type^ 
also, and therefore so in this, wherein God did intend Adam and his earthly 
and soully condition, as the more imperfect, to forerun Christ, and that 
spiritual and heavenly condition by him. And therefore also Christ is called 
' the last Adam,' not in respect of order, but to shew he was the perfection 
of the other, as last sometimes signifies in whom all is bounded and deter- 



86 OF THE CREATUHES, AKD THE CONDITION [BcOK II. 

mined. So Mat. xxi. 37, ' Last of all he sent his Bon,' as the utmost 
remedy and completest. This always holds in other of God's works, 
which are suhordinate to each other, that the last notes out perfection. So 
here, ' the first ' notes out imperfection ; ' the last ' the sum, complement, 
and perfection of all, as rs}.oc signifies the end, and rsXiiog, iierfcct. And 
that this is the apostle's meaning here is evident by the connection of ver. 
46 with what went before in verses 44 and 45. For having affirmed, ver. 44, 
that it was God's purpose to make two ranks of men and conditions of 
them, animal and heavenly or spiritual, ' there is' (that is, there is 
ordained to be) ' a natural body and a spiritual body ;' and then having 
proved it to be God's meaning, in that when he made the first Adam a 
living soul, he then in him, as the type also, made or ordained, as we said, 
Christ a quickening Spirit, ver. 45, thereby shewing that in God's decree 
the one was as ancient as the other. Then, in ver, 46, he adds by way of 
explanation or correction, ' Howbeit that was not first which is spiritual,' 
(that is, not first in execution or in order of time, because that was to be 
most perfect), ' but that which was natural,' that was ordained to come into 
the world first, ' and afterward that which is spiritual,' as the perfection of 
the other ; God's manner of proceeding in his works being to begin ah iw- 
perfectioriliKs, with what is imperfect, and so to go on ad perfcctiora, to what is 
more perfect. He ordered that Adam should come first with his natural 
or animal body, to usher in Christ afterwards with his spiritual body. And 
that state which Adam brought in being the first draught, as that of a coal 
in a picture, that state which Christ brings in is as the last hand put to it, 
filling up the piece with the brightest colours of perfection. And as nature 
is a groundwork to grace, so was the animal substance to that which was 
spiritual, even to be clothed with it, and swallowed up by it ; yet so as 
the first draught served withal as a shadow to tell that the other more per- 
fect w^as to come, and primarily intended. And therefore, in the 49th verse 
he brings in this as the closure of this his proof, that ' as certainly as we 
have borne the image of the earthy, so certainly shall we bear the image of 
the heavenly.' 

3. I shall wind up all with a consideration or two, which put together 
will fitly serve both as the general conclusion of this whole discourse, and 
particularly also further to confirm this last branch in hand. 

You have seen how Adam was a type of Christ, both in his falling, as 
hath been shewn out of Kom. v. 14, and before his fall in his first creation, 
as here in this place. And Adam, in both states, did as a public person 
represent Christ. Now observe but how Christ his antitype doth in a 
correspondency, and answering to both these, run through two estates also 
suitable to these two of Adam. And in each of these estates Christ, as a 
public person representing us, doth two distinct things for us. 1. He, in 
our nature, ' takes on him the form of a servant,' to redeem us from that 
condemnation and misery which Adam's fall had brought upon us ; which 
having finished, then, 2dly, he assumes and puts upon his human nature 
that glorious condition which was his due by inheritance in the first moment 
that he should be made a man ; and by virtue of this condition due to him 
by inheritance, he will bestow upon us, who are in him, the like glory which 
was ordained himself. Now then, that work of redemption performed by 
him under the form of a servant, whereby he frees and delivers us from 
that guilt and condemnation into which we, through Adam's fall, were 
plunged, and his restoring us to a state of justification of life through his 
perfect obedience, this was typified out by Adam's disobedience imputed to 



Chap. IX.] of their state by creation. 87 

us for condemnation, as you have it Rom. v. And herein was Adam, in 
the evil he brought upon us, made Christ's opposite type, freeing us from 
all that evil, even to his subduing the power of death, the last enemy of 
all, which Christ did at his resurrection. 

But then, in that other work, his bestowing upon us that spiritual and 
heavenly condition of life, in a conformity to his own personal glory, after 
this work of deliverance perfectly performed at the resurrection, and which 
we receive after all that evil which Adam brought upon us is removed out 
of the way, in this, Christ had for his type Adam's estate and condition 
before his fall, when at his creation he was made a living soul and lord of 
the earth, to convey the same privilege and perfection he was created in 
unto his posterity ; and this this place hath held forth unto us. 
• And set but these things in their due order and correspondency, and 
how fitly do they suit and answer each other ! That so far as Adam had 
spoiled us by his fall, so far he should be the type of Christ's restoring us 
again ; and then that his primitive original estate which he had before his 
fall should be the type of that glorious estate which we shall have through 
Christ after that redemption of our bodies in the resurrection completed, 
as being indeed their ancient and first intended inheritance decreed unto 
them in Christ, as their head, before the consideration of the fall, but 
which, Adam's sin falling out between, had kept them from, and hitherto 
had letted, which, this sin of his being now by Christ first removed out of 
the way, they are then estated in ; how fitly and suitably commensurated 
and proportioned each to other are these two. 

And to this purpose you may further observe in this place (which is a 
second consideration), that the apostle doth here found that heavenly 
estate of ours to come merely upon that glory due to Christ, as the Lord 
from heaven, and this upon the sole and single consideration of the per- 
sonal union of that human nature with the Godhead, and therein ordained 
a common person to us, and noted out by that other phrase, his being 
made a quickening Spirit ; and that to us his elect, that we may be made 
in a conformity unto him, he being ordained to that union, and to that 
gloiy, as a public person, whenever he should fii-st assume it and be made 
man ; even as Adam, in his very first formation and creation, was made a 
public person. And in these very respects it is that Adam is here made 
his type, even before his fall, in his fii'st creation, as hath been declared. 
All which to me do more than hint, if not clearly evince, taking in all the 
former considerations with it, that this spiritual and heavenly estate which 
Christ now hath in heaven, and that personal union whereby he was made 
a quickening Spirit, was ordained and intended to Christ first, appointed as 
a public head ; and so to the elect in him, before the consideration of the 
fall, and that simply and absolutely unto them, as considered in massa jmra; 
and so that Adam's fall, and sin, and death, and then thereupon Christ's 
death and work of redemption to remove these, came in in the order of 
God's decrees, and were appointed but as means to improve Christ, and to 
commend and set forth his love the more unto us, and also to render that 
condition to which we were primitively in Christ ordained the more 
illustrious and glorious by this deliverance. And so all Christ's work, 
until this spirituaHsing of our bodies, was but the taking out of the way 
(as the apostle's phrase is, Col. ii. 14) that which letted and was cast in 
as an impediment of this their first intended glory, which so breaks out 
from under this great eclipse with the more brightness and lustre. 

That I may more distinctly explain this last consideration, you may 



88 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK 11. 

observe that in tliis part of the chapter, -wherein the apostle sets himself to 
prove what manner of bodies are ordained for us after the resurrection, he 
maketh the rise of that their state to be, not so much the death or resur- 
rection of Christ, of -^-hich he makes no mention at all in this part of his 
discourse wherein he comes to speak thereof, but he allegeth, as the highest 
and primaiy foundation hereof, this ground, even the personal excellency 
and glory due unto Christ's human nature above that which was due to the 
first Adam before his fall, which he brings as the sole ground of this our 
intended gloiy, as being fu-st due unto Christ merely upon the considera- 
tion of his union with the Godhead, of which glory of Christ in heaven he 
brings in Adam's estate of innocency in paradise as the fittest type, which 
is expressed unto us under that phrase, as it hath been opened, ' He was 
made,' or appointed to be, ' a quickening Spirit; ' that is, the Godhead was 
appointed to become the life and quickener of an human nature, even as 
Adam was made a living soul ; that is, to consist of a soul giving life to 
an earthly body, by virtue of which he instantly did become ' the Lord 
from heaven,' ver. 47 ; that is, the Lord of heaven ; to whom by inherit- 
ance, as to a lord, heaven and all the glory of it was due, and so he became 
' an heavenly man,' as the expression also is. And then he being withal 
in and together with the ordaining him to this union with the Godhead, 
ordained to be a head unto us, hence it is that our bodies are to be made 
spiritual and heavenly like unto his. And this is the most ancient, primi- 
tive title in God's decree, that we have unto glor}', and therefore in this 
place only and alone alleged. And although it be trae that the very 
resurrection of our bodies, considered simply as it is the subduing that last 
enemy death (as the apostle speaks, ver. 26), is the fruit of Christ's 
resuiTcction as the cause of it ; and therefore in that former part of the 
chapter the apostle argueth it from thence ; yet still that at the resun-ection 
our souls and bodies shall be raised up to so glorious and spiritual a life, 
and that we should rise with such a kind of body as we had not before in 
Adam (which is made a distinct query by the apostle from the 35th verse), 
this, I say, is founded by the apostle here only upon that heavenly condition 
which Christ was ordained unto, and which was his due merely upon his 
\ery assuming an human nature, of which we his members were together 
with him ordained to bear the image. And thus to shew that he, and we in 
him, were ordained unto this estate before, or rather without the considera- 
tion of the fall, therefore it is Adam's state of innocency in his first 
formation is made the type of Christ's personal union, and so of that 
glory to which both he as a public person and we as his members are 
ordained. 

Use 1. So then that which is the corollary from all is this, that the plot 
or order of God's decrees concerning Christ and us was thus laid in God's 
breast ; that though unto Christ and us in him this glory was simply 
intended (for God looks unto the end of his works at first, and so fii'st to 
what he meant ultimately to raise Christ and us up unto, even that glory 
which we shall have in heaven), yet God withal decreeing in the way to this 
glory the fall of all mankind, and so of the elect to fall in Adam as well as 
others ; therefore Christ, in the way to the execution or accomplishment of 
this original decree, was ordained for their sakes, and in respect to them, 
not to take on him first that glorious condition upon his first union with 
our nature, which yet was his due ; but is said to condescend to come down 
from heaven, even as the Son of man (John vi. 38 and 62 compared), and 
to take on him frail flesh and the form of a servant instead hereof; and 



Chap. IX.] of their state by creation. 89 

that to this end, that he might first redeem us, his members, from under 
that misery which the fall had brought upon us ; and all this to this end, that 
by this means this glorious condition, both of his and ours, might be made 
the more illustrious. But then, after he should have taken out of the way 
that which hindered his members elected in him from the glory originally 
designed to them, and so should thus first have made up what Adam had 
spoiled, then should he himself first cast off that veil or condition of frail 
flesh, and endow the human nature with that spiritual state of body which 
was by a right of inheritance inseparably and immediately annexed to the 
personal union with the Godhead. And then, by virtue of this, when he 
raiseth up his members, he will bestow on them the like spiritual estate, 
which was also ordained them by an inheritance, in being members of him, 
as well as by the purchase of his death. And so we come to have a double 
title unto this glory : one by inheritance through our election in Christ, 
which is this original, primitive title, and before the consideration of any 
other in God's intention ; and another by the purchase of that death of 
Christ, which besides the restoring us out of that estate into which Adam's 
sin had plunged us, does by an overflow of merit purchase also this life 
unto us. Therefore, Eph. i. 14, this glory is called ' our inheritance,' as 
well as a ' purchased possession.' And when Christ hath thus raised us 
to this glory, then, and not till then, are we restored to what, at oTir first 
creation, we were ordained to ; and then, and not till then, did God (as it 
were) account Christ to have been begotten — ' This day have I begotten 
thee.' — It is spoken of him in respect of his human nature, and that when 
spiritualised at his resurrection ; and it is spoken by God, as if then first 
Christ were become that which he had primitively ordained him to be ; as 
if, not until that time ; and so God reckons him, as it were, then anew 
begotten, because not till then did Christ's condition answer, and become 
like to what, when he was first as man conceived in God's womb of elec- 
tion by his decree, he was appointed to be. And thus in like manner doth 
God reckon us to be such as he at first chose us to be when he chose us 
to be men, and primitively intended to make us in the end (and for which 
indeed he ordained to create us), not until we be raised to the like spiritiial 
glorified condition unto which, in and together with Christ, we together 
were ordained to be. And so, all that befell us in sinning, through Adam's 
fall, and all that thereupon befell Christ in assuming frail flesh, is to be 
looked at as to have been but in transitu, ' in the way' (as Ps. ex. hath it) 
to this intended glory ; and to have been decreed, as also the elect's several 
conditions in this world are, as subordinate means appointed by God to 
make this his primitive and first-intended decree the more glorious, and, as 
it were, to add a deep shadow to it, so to set off" the lustre of it. 

Use 2. Admire we at that which the angels stand aghast at, namely, the 
' manifold wisdom of God in his manifestations ol himself,' as you have it 
Eph. iii, 10. That being one of God's ends of revealing this mystery of 
Christ, that the angels might see the ' manifold wisdom of God,' -rro/.u-c/V./Xo?, 
many ways various, by reason of those several ways God hath gone about 
to discover himself and his Son by. The story of the world, and of the 
creation of it, what a glorious contrivement was it, taken simply alone in 
itself ; and how wonderfully did these visible things shew forth the invisible 
things of God, his wisdom, power, &c., and how proud were the wisest of 
the heathen of their contemplations and knowledge of its story, whiles they 
searched out the harmony and the secrets of this visible frame ! The 
angels, who were made the first day, as most conceive, with the heavens, 



90 OF THE CEEATUEES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOS II. 

or the third day, as Piscator, whilst they stood by as spectators to behold 
how God, by degrees, finished this fabric, and out of the chaos drew the 
elements, the fii'st lines and ruder draught of all things visible, and then 
saw him proceed to garnish, embellish, and adorn those void spaces — the 
firmament with sun, moon, and lesser stars ; the air with fowl ; the earth 
with beasts, herbs, &c. ; and the water with fishes ; and last of all, brought 
forth man, the Lord of all, and made him little lower than themselves, being 
crowned with glory and honour, and, as it were, the epitome of all — how 
did this chorus, or choir, shout out in joy and admiration at the end of 
every act and new day's work ! Or to use the metaphor which God useth 
in Job xxxviii. 4-6, where he speaks in the language of an architect, to 
express how he reared this glorious frame ; W'hen he ' laid the foundation 
of the earth,' and took measure of all the proportions of every creature 
which he made in it, then (ver. 7) ' the morning stars sang together, and 
all the sons of God shouted for joy ;' that is, the angels, who are called stars, 
because they arc the creatures appointed to live in the third heaven, their 
element, as fishes in the sea, and fowl in the air ; and but stars, for there 
was a sun to rise would make them hide their faces, and pull in their beams, 
even Christ, before whose glory (for it is his glory spoken of Isa. vi., as 
appears by John x. 12) they cover their faces, as the stars, like tapers are 
put out before the sun. And they are called the morning stars, because 
they were up early, being created in the morning of the first day. He that 
is early up is in Latin called matutimis, and so in Hebrew. They both at 
the foundation, and at the finishing of this building, especially when they 
saw man brought in, the owner of all, shouted for joy, admiring at God's 
handiworks and wisdom manifested in them, God herein alluding to the 
custom of men, who, when they lay the foundation of a work, and especially 
at the finishing of some gi-eat building, have all their fiiends with acclama- 
tions and shoutings about them, as at the first stone of the temple laid, 
Ezra iii. 10, and Zech. iv. 7, the last stone was brought forth with joy and 
shouting, crying Grace, grace, to it. Just so was it here. And as a skilful 
and curious artist will stand looking upon the exquisite workmanship of 
some one part (suppose upon an eye or hand in a picture) many hours 
together with much delight, so did the angels greedily view every part of 
this world, admiring and praising God's artifice in it (which likewise God 
himself did, as delighting to see how good all was that he had made) ; and 
whilst they were doing so they might behold God, as if he had been dis- 
pleased at the coarseness of this his work which he had drawn, sufier all to 
be dashed by one unwary stroke of the pencil, suffering his image in man 
to be razed, and this whole fi-ame subjected to vanity, confusion, and dis- 
order ; which made them wonder, in that they surely thought that this 
was all the works of wonder that ever God meant to make, especially when 
they saw him at first rest fi'om all his works, and sit down as delighted in 
them, and to appoint a day for the memorial of them. They could not 
choose but wonder to see that God should throw so costly a piece away, 
being such a world as they could never imagine how a better could ever be 
framed ; and how great a God must they needs think him to be, that 
regarded not the loss and spoiling of such a world ! But, alas ! God had a 
further plot and platform of another Adam and another world in his head, 
whereof all this, though so perfect, was but the type and shadow, and of all 
which they knew not one tittle, nor had the least inkling ; therefore, Eph. 
iii. 9, it is called a ' mystery hid in God.' God had not spoken one word 
of it to them (as not of his temple to David). In comparison of which, this 



Chap. X.] of their state by creation. 91 

world was but a stngo to act a part upon a while, and man, the lord of it, 
but as a king iu a plaj', a mere type and resemblance of another king, the 
King of glory, who, when he should bo brought into the world, these 
angels must all down upon their knees and worship. Themselves are but 
the stars, as Job calls them, and David too, in Ps. viii. 3, where he speaks 
(as was said) of Christ's world, and the creatures thereof, the angels, who 
become subjects of it, are but the stars, and the church the moon ; but there 
is no sun mentioned, for Christ himself is the sun, and the light thereof, 
before whom these stars were to lose their light, with which at best they do 
but twinkle. And when Christ and his world shall appear, then this ' moon 
shall be confounded, and this sun ashamed, when he shall reign in mount 
Sion, and before his ancients gloriously,' Isa. xxiv. 23. And how must 
this needs shew forth the manifold wisdom of God, that he hath plots 
beyond plots, though he begins with a ruder show at first, as in the 
making of the world, in which the wisdom that lies in it, taken simply by 
itself, how glorious is it! It is called ' the wisdom of God,' 1 Cor. i. 21. 
And if that even the heathen studied and admired this when without rela- 
tion to God, when his wisdom in it was not discovered and discerned by 
them, how much more of wisdom saw the angels in it, who saw him that 
was the first mover and creator of all therein ! But there is yet a further 
mystery in the story of it, even a great mystery therein couched, the 
moral of all being, ' Christ the wisdom of God,' whom to illustrate, all the 
creatures are not suflicient to be similitudes, nor man, the glory and epitome 
of them, fit to be his type. Here is wisdom hid in wisdom, a mystery in 
a mystery, a world in a world. And all this world, and Adam the inhabiter 
of it, are but as the swaddling-clouts of him who was once a babe and lay 
in a manger. 



CHAPTER X. 

A more particular comparison between Adam and Jesus Christ in their persons. 
— llie formation of Adam's body by God's immediate hand, typifies the 
assumptio)i of the human nature by the Son of God, whose body was formed 
immediately by the Holy Ghost. — The union of soul and body in Adam 
typifies the hypostatical union. — In ichat there is an agreement in the com- 
parison between them., icherein a disparity. — What teas the state of Adam's 
body : it comprised the perfections of all creatures ; it teas suited to take in 
all the p)leasu.res and comforts which they could afford ; it had a natural 
beauty in it ; it was guarded from injuries, and uxis imrnortal, yet in its 
original it was but earth ; it depended on the creatures for its subsistence, 
and H'fls subject to many alterations. — To ichat a higher degree of glory the 
divine nature of Christ, united to the human, raised the body of Christ, as 
he is one uith God, and the Lord from heaven. — It ivas necessanj that the 
glory of his human nature should excel all creatures, even the angels them- 
selves. — The glory of his body ivas illustrated by his transfiguration on the 
mount ; and yet that fell short of the glory it has now in heaven. 

Having thus in the general demonstrated Adam to have been Christ's 
type, I come now to lay the particulars together, wherein this typicalness 
consisted ; for the fitting of which each to other, as also concerning all 
other types, I will premise this rule, which I take to be safe and warrant- 



92 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

able, that although, for what are types and what are not, as also for the 
general scope intended in them, we must find a special warrant by the 
Holy Ghost's own interpreting and applying of them, as hath been said ; 
yet so as, when once that scope is found, wc may, for the particulars wherein 
the types agree with the things typified, take liberty, as in all other simili- 
tudes, to enlarge them, and extend them as far, and to as many particulars, 
as the likeness will hold in, whilst that we keep to the analogy of that their 
general scope, although we have not an express word for each particular 
part wherein there seems to be a resemblance. For which rule there is 
both this reason and instance : 

The reason is, because when God useth a similitude to any purpose, all 
parts of that similitude, wherein to spiritual reason it is evident they are 
alike, as well in what is not so expressly applied by the Holy Ghost already 
as in what is, they all are sanctified to resemble it, and are so intended, 
seeing that the similitude doth as readily and fully arise at the first blush 
in the one as in the other. 

The instance I would give is in the interpretation of parables, in which 
this rule holds good. Now, Heb. ix. 9, the types of the old law are called 
parables : TJng craffaCoXi^, ' which was a parable ; ' rendered by our trans- 
lation, ' which was a figure.' Now concerning the interpretation of parables, 
you usually have the general scope annexed by Christ in them all, but no 
more ; he leaving us, according to the analogy of faith, and of that scope 
given us as a pole-star to steer our course by therein, to apply the several 
particulars ourselves, according to that resemblance that unto spiritual 
reason doth appear. This rule, therefore, will I observe herein, and keep 
to it as sacred, not to make anything a type which the Holy Ghost hath 
not designed out for one, but in opening the similitude between such as he 
hath designed and the things signified, to take liberty for the fitting of 
particulars, without once sailing out of the sight of the general scope given, 
or applying the similitude of any particular to signify anything concerning 
Christ, which otherwise I have not authentic warrant for in the express 
letter of the word. 

This rule thus premised, I descend to the particulars. Now the com- 
parison lies in two things : 

1. In respect of their own persons, 

2. As they both are ordained public persons, to convey the likeness or 
image of their condition unto their posterity. 

1. Their persons are compared ; and that, 

(1.) In the substance whereof each consisted. Adam was a ' living soul,' 
that is, a reasonable soul, giving life to a body made of earth, and to live 
on earth ; not a soul simply, but a * living soul.' And that attribute of 
livinrf is given to soul, as it communicated life to that body into which it 
was inspired, Gen. ii. 7. And so, Christ was a ' Spirit' (or God), ' quicken- 
ing' an human nature joined unto it. And that that was the nature assumed 
for the Godhead to quicken and give life unto, the apostle declares, ver. 47, 
calling him a ' man.' 

(2.) In the infinitely differing conditions of their persons, or state of life 
which that human nature, by virtue of that union, must needs enjoy, tran- 
scending that which a soul could convey to a body of earth. This second 
comparison, namely, of their condition, is couched in these words, ' lirbirf,' 
' quickeninr/,'' as that other of the substance of their persons in those words,- 
• soul,' * spirit,' 
^ Now the first particular of this resemblance lies, as I take it, in compar- 



ClIAP. X.] OF TUEIR STATE BY CREATION. 93 

iug the formation of Adam's body, and the union of Lis soul with it, w ith 
tho formation of Christ's human nature, and the hypostatical union of it 
with tho divine, which is tho foundation of all that Christ as a public 
person did for us. 

For, first, this being tho first formation of Adam, by which he became a 
man, must needs typify out tho first formation and assumption of our nature 
by Christ, by which he became a man. 

And, secondly, the thing compared is the one's becoming a living soul, 
and the other's being a quickening Spirit, which notes out a comparison of 
their natures or substances. Adam was made soul when into his body the 
rational soul was inspired, which, being united to it, used it as an instru- 
ment to perform the functions of that life which it led on earth. But Christ 
became a quickening Spirit when his Godhead assumed the human nature 
to work and dwell in it, and to glorify it. And the apostle calls the whole 
person of Adam now made by that which was most excellent in it, the 
soul : mens ciijnsque qidsque est. And so, the person of Christ made man 
is, by that which is most excellent in that person. Spirit, or the Godhead, 
which is the foundation of all that which Christ is made unto us. 

Thirdly, That his scope is, by Adam's formation, to signify the assump- 
tion of the human nature by the Godhead, appears by ver. 47, where he 
calls the first man, Adam, but mere man, ' the first man,' &c. ; but he calls 
Christ as ' the second man,' so ' the Lord' (namely, God) also, as being 
become God and man. Therefore we may warrantably conclude that to 
be the first thing typified by Adam's creation. Let us now see how they 
agree. 

The first making of Adam a man is described in two things : 

1. The forming of his bod}'. 

2. The breathing in, and uniting the soul unto it, which, together united, 
do make up one person. Now, the forming of Adam's body doth clearly 
typify out the formation of Christ's human nature assumed, which whole 
nature is accordingly called his body ; for so, comparatively to the God- 
head, it may be called. Thus, Heb. x. 5, * A body hast thou fitted me,' 
(that is, an human nature), says Christ there of his coming into the world. 
And the agreement lies in two things : 

(1.) Adam's body and Christ's do agree in this, that Adam's body was 
immediately formed by God himself, without man's help, he being the 
first man. It was God who fashioned his body, whereas it is vis plastica, 
the formative faculty, that doth it in ours begotten of him. And so Christ's 
body assumed is also said, Heb. ix. 11, to be a 'tabernacle not made 
with hands ;' not by the help of any creature, not by generation, as ours 
is, but immediately by God. 

And, (2dly,) as God formed the body of Adam, even as a potter doth 
mould or fashion his clay (as the word denotes), and as God did this 
immediately, even so the Holy Ghost did Christ's body. That word in 
Heb. X. 5, which we translate 'fitted me,' signifies also to articulate, or 
form joint by joint [xaTri^ricfoj) ; and the Hebrew words in Psalm xl. (from 
whence this is taken), which we translate, ' My ear hast thou bored through,' 
as having allusion unto the servants under the old law. Genebrard says 
that the ear is by a synecdoche put for the whole body ; and that which 
we translate perfodisti, is rather foclicasti, to fashion with the hand as a 
potter doth ; and so the apostle renders it, ' a body hast thou formed (or 
fitted) me.' The Holy Ghost therein supplied that which the plastic 
faculty doth in our conception, consisting partly in the seed of the man, 



94 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK. II. 

nnd partly in the nature of the womb ; and this that so Christ might be 
born without sin. 

Therefore, (3dly,) as Adam was without father and mother, so was Christ 
also; who, Heb. vii. 4, is therein made like unto Melchisedec ; but he is 
much more like to Adam, who herein was a more perfect type of Christ 
than Melchisedec was ; for Melchisedec having no fiither nor mother, was 
not that he had none indeed, but that in Scripture none were recorded, as 
appears by ver. 6. But Adam really had no man to his father nor woman 
to his mother ; he was not born from the conjunction of man and woman, 
which Melchisedec was. 

(4.) Fourthly, As Adam was in a peculiar manner, in respect of his forma- 
tion, the son of God, and that in such a respect as other men are not — 
for, Luke iii., whereas others are in that genealogy said to be the sons of 
such and such men, as Enoch the son of Seth, and Seth of Adam, Adam 
is said to be the son of God, ver. 38, because he was his son by immediate 
creation, which they were not, who yet in another respect, namely, as they 
were elect, were adopted sons of God — this typified that Christ, even as 
having assumed an human nature, was in a transcendent manner God's 
Son, even as he was man he was God's natural (not adopted) Son ; for 
else there had been two relations of sonship in that person, the person 
being the subject of that relation, not the nature. So Luke i. 35, because 
* the Holy Ghost shall come upon thee : therefore that holy thing which 
shall be born of thee, shall be called the Son of God,' that is, so the Son, 
as no man else : ' the only begotten Son of God,' John iii. 16. 

2. In the second place, the uniting of the soul and body together 
(which was done at that breathing of life into him) so as they both made 
one man, and the first Adam so became a living soul, this of all things 
doth the most lively set forth the hypostatical union of the divine and 
human nature. And so I find all divines acknowledge that the nearest 
instance that can in nature be found of this mystery is therein held forth. 
And therefore, 1 Pet. iii. 18, the human nature of Christ is called flesh, 
and the divine nature spirit, which in the very naming of it seems to 
bear an allusion to the soul or spirit in man, conjoined with his body and 
flesh. And it seems a fair interpretation which is given by some of that 
place, * the fulness of the Godhead dwells bodily ;' that is, by a more near 
and firm union than a man's soul doth in his body, as speaking by way of 
similitude to illustrate this. And so I find the schoolmen labouring much 
to shew how nearly this instance resembles it ; as Thom. Aqu. lib. iv. 
cont. gent. cap. 41 ; and Athanasius in his very creed taketh up this 
similitude of all others to express it. But I did not think to have found 
such a ground in the word to have made this the type of it as this place 
holds forth. 

For, first, considering the distance that is between the reasonable soul 
(a spirit immortal, more glorious than the sun, but a step inferior to the 
angels, bearing God's image in its substance and faculties, and capable of 
holiness) and a piece of earth, that that should dwell in and inform this, 
the conjoining of two such extremes best resembled the union of the 
divine nature with the human, God with man. The angels they are spirits 
without bodies, and the souls of beasts are but earthly like the bodies which 
they inform, and indeed the spirits of elements only. 

Secondhj, The nearness of their union does yet further help to resemble 
it ; for this soul dwells not in bodies, as a man in a house, or as angels 
did in bodies assumed, to move them, &c,, but is conjoined to them as a 



Chap. X.] of their state by creation. 95 

form, that together with the body makes up a person ; whereas the souls 
of beasts, though they make a nature, yet not a person. And as tho 
rational soul's union, so this union of God and man makes one Christ, one 
person. 

Thirdly, The supereminent manner of subsisting that this soul hath in 
the body, is the highest resemblance of that of the Godhead in an human 
nature. Other souls have their being fi'om the matter ; they are extracted 
out of its passive power, as spirits of wine are out of wine ; but this is God's 
breath, and is from without. And in the body it is semi-persona, it is not 
that only quo subsistit, but quod. Other forms are but principles of the 
whole ; this is more. It can of itself subsist, only whilst it is in the body 
it subsists after another manner, namely, in a body. Therefore men's souls 
are said to ' give an account for what was done in the body.' And it can 
subsist when severed from the body, which the souls of beasts cannot, 
Eccles. xii. 7. It, moreover, bears the name of the whole. Therefore 
Christ, arguing the immortality of the soul, saith that Abraham is alive ; 
that is, the soul of Abraham, for * God is the God of the living,' &c. Thus 
the second person is a person of himself, who subsisted before a body was 
assumed. * Before Abraham was I am ;' and when this person subsists in 
the human nature, it is the same subsistence that was before, only he takes 
a body up unto himself to partake of his subsistence. 

Fourthly, As the body is but the soul's instrument, its members are 
called u-eapons or tools he acts by. Eom. vi. 13, ' Neither yield ye your 
members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin : but yield yourselves 
unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as 
instruments of righteousness unto God,' And the sheath thereof: Dan. 
vii, 15, * I Daniel was grieved in my spirit in the midst of my body, and 
the visions of my head troubled me.' And its house of clay : Job iv. 19, 
' How much less on them that dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is 
in the dust, which are crushed before the moth.' Such is this assumed 
body unto the Godhead, which many interpret that place of, * The flesh 
profiteth nothing, but the Spirit quickeneth,' John vi. 63. And the thing 
is a truth, though there is another meaning given of the words. 

Fifthly, As these two remain distinct — the soul is one thing, and the body 
another — so do the two natures in Christ. 

Sixthly, As the soul hath faculties and actions distinct from those of 
the body — the body hath its appetite, which we call the sensitive ; the 
soul a distinct appetite, which we call rational, the will — so the divine 
nature in Christ hath powers and operations distinct and severed from 
those of his human. The will of the human nature is distinct from the 
divine. 

But yet this comparison is not without a world of difference in these 
two ; for. 

First, The Godhead and the human nature are not as two parts of that 
person, as the soul and body are of a man ; for though the soul be of itself 
a subsistence, yet it is ordained to be a part of the man, and hath not its 
full and natural perfection and intended state, without union with the body. 
And although, in respect of holiness, ' the spirits of just men' departed are 
said to be ' perfect,' Heb. xii. 23, yet in respect of God's ordination to a 
conjunction with the body, they are not for happiness so perfect as when 
again united to the body. But the Son of God was as perfect afore assum- 
ing man's nature as after, and nothing of perfection is added unto him 
thereby. And if we could now suppose a separation, he should lose none 



9G OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

of his perfectiou thereby, being of himself ' God blessed,' aud so perfect in 
himself, ' for ever.' 

Secondly, Man is a third thing different from his soul and body, though 
made up of both ; but it is not so here, the person of Christ is God, and the 
person of Christ is man. 

Thirdhj, The soul, though it can subsist without the body, yet did not 
alone subsist before it was joined to the body. But the divinity of Christ 
was from all eternity, and was then as perfect without this human nature 
assumed as now it is. He is the person, and the human nature but an 
adjunct of it, and perfected by it. 

Fourthly, This hypostatical union is more intimate than that of the 
soul and body. For we cannot say of man that he is the soul or the body, 
but the Son of God assuming our nature, may properly and truly be called 
both God and man. 

Fifthly, The soul and body may be and are severed, but so cannot 
Christ's divine and human nature be. No ; nor were they in death ; but 
when Chi-ist was in the grave, that union held. 

Thus you have seen a comparison made between the person of Adam, 
singly considered in his being made up of soul and body united, to make 
one person, and the person of Christ singly considered as God and man 
in one person also. 

I come now to the second head, which is the conveyance of an image by 
each of these persons to the posterity of each of them, and the different 
manner of conveying it. 

And as to that point, the text in 1 Cor. xv. 45, 46, shews the eminently 
transcendent difference held by God between these two : 1. That Adam 
conveys his image as a living soul ; and by virtue of that conveyance, we are 
merely made living souls ourselves, such as Adam was. We have barely 
that animal life conveyed. Thus all those that came of Adam were to be, 
in likeness to him, living souls. But Christ conveys his image and hea- 
venly life and state, as a ' quickening Spirit,' viz., the same life which 
Christ himself hath. So that there is a different manner of these two con- 
veyances of life. The one, that of Adam, is by natural generation, to make 
us men hke himself. But Christ's conveyance is by immediate quicken- 
ing and causation of his new life. And therein there is this difference 
between Adam's conveyance to his members and Christ's to us, that Christ, 
' the Lord from heaven,' is alone that ' quickening Spirit,' and we are not to 
become quickening spirits to others. We are quickened, not quickencrs ; we 
are not made living souls ourselves to others, as in Adam his sons were : God 
' blessed them to multiply,' Gen. i. 28. But the hoHest men that ever 
were could never convey the new birth and life to any ; Abraham could 
not to Ishmael, for it goes not by the will of man: John i. 13, 'Which 
were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of 
man, but of God.' And this is to be understood not only of Christ's 
quickening at the resurrection, though that only be here spoken of, but 
that of our first birth is called a ' quickening us together with Chi-ist ' as 
the sole author of it : Eph. ii. 5, ' Even when we were dead in sins, hath 
quickened us together with Christ ; (by grace ye are saved).' And in that 
respect for, and by the same reason, that Christ is a quickening Spirit at 
the resurrection of our bodies, which was there the particular subject of 
the apostle's discourse in 1 Cor. xv. 45, 46, is Christ the quickening Spirit 
at our first conversion ; and it is answerably termed a resurrection : Col. ii. 12, 
• Buried with him in baptism, wherein also you are risen with him through 



Chap. X.] of their state by creation. 97 

the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead.' 
And this is a work of no less power than the other of raising our bodies 
at last. And Christ is expressly termed that Spirit which quickens us, 
and changcth us into his image : 2 Cor. iii. 17th and 18th verses com- 
pared, ' Now the Lord is that Spirit : and where the Spirit of the Lord is, 
there is liberty. But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the 
glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image, from glory to glory, 
even as by the Spirit of the Lord.' It is spoken of Christ : ' The Lord is 
that Spirit,' ver. 17. The diflference is in this (as the very words here do 
shew), that it is Chi-ist's prerogative to have life in himself, as the Father 
hath, and we are to live by him. And as the personal union in Christ 
and this his prerogative are inseparable, it cannot be communicated unto 
others. 

Only this is to be understood, that the same image in that 2 Cor. iii. 18 
is as to a likeness in qualities, and a similitude of what is in Christ, 
according to the sphere and proportion of that union which is our lot to 
have in subordination under him, and which, in a next degree unto him, 
is to be conveyed to us, both as to our souls and bodies. 

Christ's and Adam's communication in this respect are as vastly different 
as the communication of light from a candle to another, and the derivation 
of light from the sun to the moon and stars. The communication of light 
from one candle or torch to another, sets the torch or candle lighted in as 
full a condition of light, and to propagate light to other torches, as itself 
hath ; and so it is that we are made living souls from him who was a 
living soul as fully as himself, both for ourselves and others our children. 
But Christ, he communicates light and life to us, as the sun doth to the 
moon and stars ; he makes them light and bright with that light which is in 
himself, but he makes them not to be suns as himself is. There is but one 
sun still, the fountain of light and the quickener of all things. 

I might enlarge, to shew that likeness we shall have with Christ in glory, 
both in all sorts of quahfications of soul as well as body. But I shall, by 
way of infei'ence from the lesser, argue to the greater, and so pursue only 
the glory our bodies shall then have from the glorious body of Christ. And 
it is the proper argument of this 1 Cor. xv. to shew the vastly differing 
state of Adam's body, as enlivened by a reasonable soul, and that of the 
glory of Christ's body as then in heaven, unto which ours are in heavenly 
qualifications and endowments to be conformed at the resurrection. Our 
bodies are the 'vile' part of us, as Paul terms them, Phil. iii. 21, which 
yet Christ will conform to his most glorious body ; and he speaks this to 
the end that from the instance of this body we may infer from that honour 
which the vilest part hath, what glorious and heavenly spiritualised souls 
we shall have, and that by Christ, when we are glorified together with him 
in heaven. 

In handling of this, I am to perform three things : to shew, 

1. "What was the state of Adam's body when he was made a living soul, 
that is, had a reasonable soul that dwelt in his body. 

2. How glorious the body, the human nature, of Chi'ist was, being 
quickened by the Godhead, the glory of Adam's body, and his soul dwell- 
ing in it, being a type of the glory of the Godhead dwelling in the human 
nature. 

3. That our bodies they were made and intended by God to be conformed 
unto Christ's body and human nature in that his glory heavenly. 

1 . For the first, will you take Adam's body as it had a reasonable soul 



98 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

joined to it, and in the dignity it was thereby raised unto at the first crea- 
tion ? The body of Adam taken thus, with the reasonable soul dwelling in 
it, abstracting and cutting off the image of God which yet dwelt in it, for 
that is a fourth thing to be handled, it had, 

(1.) All the world in it subject ive, and it had all the world in it objective; 
that is, there is no excellency that is in the world which he had not in him 
inherent. Nor is there any excellency or comfort in the world but he had 
something in him to take it in suited to it, and to take comfort from it. 

He had, first, all excellencies in him subjectively. There is no perfec- 
tion in any creature but it is in man, that is certain. In his soul he 
partakes with the angels. In his body, and the actions of it, and the 
perfections of it, he is the epitome, the sum of all the world ; he is called 
therefore a little world. The poets did feign, and they said well in it, 
only the story they tell is a fiction. When man was made, say they, then 
did God take a piece out of every creature, and make man out of it. The 
thing hath a truth in it ; not that God indeed did take out of every crea- 
ture a piece, but he framed up man in an answerable excellency to what 
is in any of the creatures : ' Preach the gospel,' saith Christ, ' unto every 
creature,' Mark xvi. 15 ; that is, to men, for man is every creature. 

Then, secondhj, the body of Adam, as it had this reasonable soul dwell- 
ing in it, it was fitted and suited to take in comfort from all things in the 
world. It was capable of all the comforts in this world ; and of them 
above, some taste of them. His soul could look up to heaven, to God ; 
his body, his senses, were suited to the creatures. This is a certain truth, 
there is no creature, but go take the original institution of it, and it did 
some way serve for the comfort of man. And look as the eye is fitted to 
colours, so there is something in man, in his body, suited to every crea- 
ture, in the original constitution of them. There is no creature but there 
is something in man to answer it, and to take comfort fi'om it, or an use 
in some way of it for man's help. And there is nothing in man but there 
is some creature made to answer to it. In a word, there is nothing that 
is in this life, that we behold with our eyes or hear with our ears, nothing 
in this world, but was some way suited to something in the nature of man 
to make use of, to have benefit hy. And was not this a great gloiy and 
dignity that was given to Adam's soul, living in such a poor tabernacle of 
dust and ashes, that it should have a whole world made for it, suited to 
it ? And thus glorious a creature was man in his first creation. 

(2.) Go take the beauty that God stamped upon man. The beauty 
which we have now ariseth as from our garments, from our clothing, but the 
beauty that Adam's body had then, it was innate ; therefore it is said, they 
' knew not that they were naked,' Gen. ii. 25. Christ saith that the lilies are 
clothed better than Solomon was in all his royalty, Mat. vi. 28, 29. What 
is the reason of it ? Because Solomon in all his royalty he was beholden 
to the silkworm, beholden to his clothes ; beholden to the earth, or rivers, 
wherein the veins of gold do run, for the golden crown he wore upon his head, 
and for the precious stones that were in that crown ; but the lilies wear their 
own glory about them, it is innate in them. So now there was a beauty 
in Adam and Eve innate, inherent in them, which was their glory and their 
excellency, and they had that then which all the kings of the earth in all 
their royalty, and all the beauties of the world put in one, have not now. 

(3.) This body which Adam's soul did dwell in, was made free from all 
hurt from all the creatures without him. You use to say of some men's 
bodies, that they are shot-free ; why, Adam was shot-free, as I may say, 



ClIAP. X.] OF THEIR STATE BY CREATION. 99 

from fill hurt from tlic creatures. There was not a gnat to sting hlin, or a 
flea (I instance in these lower creatures, to exemplify how free he was from 
all evil) ; therefore, though ho lived in a hot country, for paradise was 
seated near Babylon, a very hot climate, yet he could sleep quietly ; though 
naked, ho was exposed neither to sun or weather, to have received any hurt 
from thence, for ho was naked, and he had as great a comfort in his life 
that way, and a freedom from all injury, infinitely more than we have now. 
He had no sickness, nor no diseases, nor no suffering of any kind. 

(4.) His body had immortality, it should never have died, for in Rom. 
V. 15 it is said, that * death entered by sin ; ' and therefore, if he had not 
sinned, he should not have died. These were the perfections of Adam's 
bod}', as it was first created. He had a world made for him ; he had a 
world in him. He was free from all evil, free from pain. He was immor- 
tal ; that soul of his, dwelling in that body, should never have been parted. 
And he had that native original beauty, which putteth do\An all the additions 
of any kind, whereby man now acquircth a beauty to himself. These, I 
say, were the privileges of that body, which, by the reasonable soul of Adam 
having the image of God, it was raised up to, by the union of that soul to 
that body ; and he should have conveyed this to all his posterity, as a 
public person. 

Yea, but now let me tell you also, how short it fell of that spiritual body 
which Jesus Christ, the second Adam, bringeth with him, whereof this body 
of Adam's was but a type ; and so you shall see what will lose it, notwith- 
standing it was thus perfect. 

(1.) For the original of this body, it was but an animal body, it was but 
earth ; and all the senses in the body, and whatever was in the body, and 
the soul, as it was joined to this body, and working by the body, and in the 
body, was but earth. It had actions as a soul, which it works, without the 
help of the body outward, toward God ; but the actions which it wrought 
in the body, they were all but earthy, suited to earthy things. The first 
man is of the earth earthy, and is no better. The apostle in this, 1 Cor. 
XV. 46, 47, &c., you see, speaks of Adam at his best. If you take his cor- 
poreal state, as the reasonable soul did work and did dwell in his body, he 
speaks merely, you see, of it ; and as he called the law ' the beggarly 
rudiments of the world' in comparison of the gospel, so saith he, this state 
of Adam's body, though it had this soul in it, it was but earthy, and it was 
suited to take comfort from earthly things, if you take the animal and bodil}'- 
state of it. In Philip, iii. 21, we translate it, ' our vile bodies ;' but the 
truth is, in the original it is, our 'humble bodies,' our 'mean bodies,' that 
depend upon, and are beholding unto, eating and drinking, and the actions 
that follow thereupon, which humble them and lower them : Luke i. 48, 
' He had regard to the louiiness of his handmaid ; ' it is the same word we 
translate vile bodies, the lowhness of our bodies, or our mean bodies, whose 
life and subsistence depends upon such mean actions as we do, and poor 
creatures without us ; and Adam did so too. His body was an earthly 
body, that had such earthly actions as these are. 

(2.) His body, though it was not exposed to hurt or injuries, yet it was 
in a dependence upon creatures ; it depended upon meat, and drink, and 
sleep, and upon all such things to uphold itself. 

(3.) Though it was not subject to dying, yet it was subject to many alte- 
rations. If Adam had begotten a child, it would have been Httle when it 
had been born ; it must have grown in augmentation. He was subject to 
expense of spirits, to weariness, and therefore refreshed himself by sleep 



100 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

and by meats ; so as though he had not a decay in the whole by death, 
yet he had a decay in the parts which was supplied and renewed again ; 
even as we now have not the same bodies we had when we were first born, 
for our spirits waste, and our blood wastes, and new comes in the room. 
It is the same body indeed, because it hath the soul, yet notwithstanding 
there is a wasting ; so there was in his. A man eateth more in a year than 
his own bulk over and over again. Why ? Because he wasteth and 
spendeth ; there is a partial alteration still ; and so it was in Adam. 

(4.) It is true he was immortal, as it is in Rom. viii. 10, 11, ' The body 
is dead because of sin ;' that is, the reason W'hy the body shall die is, because 
of sin. Had not man sinned, he should not have died ; therefore, Adam 
having no sin, he was immortal. And it is clear he speaks of natural bodies 
in that place. I will give you two reasons for it, because it is controverted. 
He saith, ' The body is dead for sin,' or ' because of sin.' If he had spoken 
of the body of sin, he would not have used that phrase, ' It is dead, because 
of sin,' for itself was dead in sin ; therefore he meaneth a natural body, for 
the death cometh only by sin. And that he speaks of the natural body is 
clear also ; for in ver. 11 he saith that ' God shall quicken, when he shall 
raise up our mortal bodies :' he speaks, therefore, of the mortal body. Now, 
my brethren, the temper of the elements in us are unequal ; as we have 
' warring in our lusts,' as James saith, James iv. 1, ' in our souls,' so there 
is a warring in the elements in our bodies. There are contrary factions in 
every man's body. There is fire against water, and water against fire (for 
we are made up of the elements), and ' a kingdom divided within itself 
cannot stand ; ' and that is the reason why all men die. Whereas, in 
Adam's body in innocency, the elements were so poised that he should 
never have died, God did so temper them, so poise them. We do find 
this in experience, in monuments that have been digged up in those places 
where the Romans have died, that there have been urns digged up, in 
which they have made a perpetual lamp in a double glass, a continued 
flame that was fed with oil, that hath lasted even to this day. Such a 
perpetual lamp was the radical moisture in Adam ; and if man was able to 
make a perpetual flame, God was able to make it much more ; and so he 
did in Adam's body. 

Yet though his body was thus immortal, it was not immortal by virtue 
of its own principles ; his immortality was not natural to him, for he had 
the four elements in him, the one fighting against the other ; and had it 
not been for a promise that God would poise them, it would in the end 
have wrought old age and death. His immortality was natural indeed, as 
a natm-al due to such a creature created in God's image, while he stood in 
that state, but it was not natural, as arising from the principles of nature, 
and from the natural constitution that was in his body, but the contrary. 
Rather it was God's promise, ' Do this and thou shalt live,' and his pro- 
tection over him, that made him immortal. Our divines use to say this, 
that Adam had a posse non mori, that he could not have died, but he had 
not a non posse mori ; that is, he had not such a principle as that no way 
he could die ; for he might die and he might live, as he might sin and he 
might not sin, he had but a conditional immortality ; he was not indeed 
moriturus, but he was viortalis ; he should not have died for the act, but 
take the power, and he might have died. There was a possibility of 
Adam's being killed if he had fallen off from on high, as well as any of us ; 
only the promise was, that God would keep him by his providence, and 
therein lay his immortality ; and he had the tree of life to eat of, for to 



Chap. X.] of their state by ceeation. 101 

repair nature, and so to live for ever. It is not natural to the body of 
man to live for ever, for the contrary elements would bring a man to ruin ; 
nor was it in the power of the soul to keep the body ; it was not like salt 
to keep the body from corruption or putrefaction ; but, as I said afore, it 
was the promise of God did it, that if he did thus and thus he would pro- 
tect him and keep him, he should live ; and that it was by virtue of the 
promise of God that he was thus immortal is clear by this, that the 
sacrament of the tree of life did seal up this promise. He might eat of 
that tree of life, and it was a sacrament to him that he lived by promise of 
God, that said, ' Do this and thou shalt live.' So as, if you ask whether 
immortality was natural to Adam ? I answer, It was natural in this 
respect, it was a due to that condition according to the covenant of works ; 
it was a suitable promise, and a due promise to man in that condition ; 
but it was not natural in that respect, as arising out of the principles of 
his own nature ; for neither could the body have kept itself immortal, nor 
could the soul have kept that body immortal ; the temperature of his body 
would never of itself and its own mixture been so equally poised, but it 
would have been ruinated ; only he was under God's protection, he was 
under God's promise, he was under the covenant of the tree of life, and so 
he should have been immortal. And to me this is clearly hinted in these 
■words, ' Thou art dust,' saith he ; that is, in that thou art not fallen to 
dust again, it doth not arise from the constitution of thy original, for thou 
art but a dust-heap, and thou wilt easily mould and fall to nothing, it is 
easy for dust to return to dust ; but it is my protection that hath kept 
thee from falling to dust ; and therefore the Lord saith, ' Thou art dust, 
and to dust thou shalt return ; ' I will now withdraw this promise of pro- 
tection from thee, and then to dust thou shalt return. Which evidently 
implieth, that he was not immortal from the union of soul and body, or 
from the constitution of his own body, but that the covenant of works, to 
which the promise was made that was everlastingly to keep him, so he was 
immortal. 

Here is the state of Adam's body, and so I have despatched the first 
thing that I was to do, namely, to shew you what was the state of Adam's 
body in his first creation, when he was made a living soul. 

2. I am, secondly, to shew you unto what a glorious state and condition 
the union of the Godhead must needs raise up the body of Christ when he 
had performed the work of redemption (for that is the apostle's scope here), 
that as the soul of Adam did advance a poor piece of clay to so high and 
great a dignity, as the body of a man is advanced by the soul joined to it, 
and did so ennoble it that it hath all things under it, hath all this world 
made for it, and suited to it, and itself was the compendiwn and epitome of 
the world (as you have heard), and what a great deal of difference there is 
between the body of a man having a reasonable soul joined to it, and 
dwelling in it, and the body of a beast, you all know. Answerably, and in 
a proportion infinitely greater ; for the first Adam was but a type and an 
imperfect shadow of the second Adam ; if that the Godhead shall become 
to a human nature that which the soul was unto Adam's body, will be the 
height and dignity unto which the Godhead will raise that human nature. 
If, saith the apostle, the first Adam was a living soul ; that is, if that 
reasonable soul which Adam had created for him, and put into his body, 
upon which God stamped his image, did so enliven a body of earth, raise 
it to such a glorious condition, all which was but a type and an imperfect 
shadow of something more perfect to come, then, saith he, the second 



102 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BcOK 11. 

Adam must be a quickening Spirit ; and by Spirit be meanetb tbe God- 
bead of tbe Son of God, whicb did quicken or communicate a glory 
suitable (it must needs do so) unto tbe buman nature it assumed. To 
wbat a glorious life tben must tbat buman nature be ordained, unto wbicb 
tbe Godbead becometb, as it were, tbe soul, and is a quickening Spirit ? 

Now to sbew you wbat tbat state of body is tbat Jesus Cbrist is to bave, 
and batb in beaven, and is due unto bim by virtue of tbe union of tbe 
buman nature witb tbe Godbead, I sball only give you wbat arguments tbe 
text affordetb. And tbere are tbree tbings in tbe text from wbicb it may be 
argued, wbicb indeed do all tbree come unto one, yet tbere is by way of 
argument sometbing distinct in tbem all. 

First, Tbe apostle argues it from tbe inhabitation of tbe Godbead in tbe 
body and buman nature of Cbrist, tbat it is united to a Spii'it, to tbe God- 
bead, tbat sball quicken it and raise it up to a proportion suitable to itself. 
And bis argument, as I bave said, lies tbus : If tbat a poor reasonable 
soul, created by God, baving tbe image of God upon it, raised up Adam's 
body to sucb a state, wbat sball tbe Spirit, tbe Godbead, raise up tbe body 
of Cbrist unto ! For you must keep a proportion between tbe one and tbe 
otber, Tbe union between tbe buman nature of Cbrist and bis Godbead 
is nearer and stricter than tbe union of tbe body and soul, and doth tbere- 
fore require in a proportion tbat tbat buman nature, tbe very body of Cbrist, 
should be advanced to a state suitable. Adam, saitb be, was a living soul, 
but Cbrist is a quickening Spirit. 

I sball give you a wild similitude, but indeed I do not know wbat simili- 
tude else to use, and I do it merely for illustration's sake. Suppose tbe 
sun bad a ciystal case round about it, and tbere were a poor mean candle 
in a lantern, wbat a world of diflerence would tbere be between tbe glory 
of tbe sun shining through this crystal case, and the light that the candle 
doth diffuse through that poor lantern ! Just thus, even in this proportion, 
and infinitely greater, must tbe difference be between wbat Adam's soul 
raised the lantern of his body unto, when it dwelt in it, and shined in it, 
and through it, and that advancement that the Godbead, tbe fulness of 
tbe Godhead, dwelling bodily or personally in tbe human nature of Chiist, 
raised up bis body unto. 

God bath made here a world, and God batb stamped a great deal of his 
glory upon it ; but if we could suppose that which Plato and other philo- 
sophers supposed, that God was the soul of this world, what a world of 
glory must this world needs bave beyond wbat it now batb ! Even as much 
as the dead carcase of a man hath when the soul comes into it, from wbat 
it had when it was a dead carcase. "Why, but, my brethren, God bath made 
a little world, and that is the human nature of Cbrist, and he himself bath 
become the very soul of it ; and there is not only the manifestation of tbe 
tbings of God, as there is in tbe world, but there is God manifested in tbat 
human nature. 

I shall exemplify it unto you further, thus : there is a glorious redemp- 
tion to come of the sous of God. And in Rom. viii, 19, 20, the apostle 
tells us tbat ' tbe whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain,' to be 
delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of tbe 
children of God. ' For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for 
tbe manifestation of the sons of God. For tbe creature was made subject 
to vanity ; not willingly, but by reason of him who bath subjected tbe 
same in hope.' Now mark, see bow be reasoneth ; when tbe saints shall 
be in their ruff and glory, for their sakes, and to gi-ace their coming into 



Chap. X.] of theiu state by creation. 103 

the world at latter day of judgment, tliis world shall be new hung ; and all 
the glory that is now, it will vanish and bo nothing in comparison of that 
glory the glorious liberty of the sons of God shall make the world par- 
takers of, and that God shall do for their sakes. Shall the world be thus 
made glorious by the coming of the people of God into it, when they are 
in their glory at latter day ? how much more glorious must the human 
nature of Christ be made, when the Godhead shall put forth a full glory in 
it, whenas that human nature shall be made partaker of the glorious liberty 
of the Godhead and of the Son of God ! 

Christ himself saith, that ' those that live in king's courts are clothed 
in costly raiment.' My brethren, our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, he 
was to be • God's fellow,' Zech. xiii. 7. If he be God's fellow — and to 
come so near him, nearer than all the angels, and to converse continually 
with God in the greatest nearness that can be (for he is united to the God- 
head) — he must have costly raiment, for his body is but raiment, and it 
shall be made a glorious body ; for he is to be God's fellow, therefore he 
shall wear, and doth wear, a glorious body in heaven. That is the first 
argument. 

Secondhj, The apostle telleth us that he is the Lord, 1 Cor. xv. ver. 47. 
And therefore this human nature is to be advanced above all the angels, 
and to be worshipped by all the angels ; ' Let all the angels of God worship 
him,' Heb. i. G. Therefore his body is to be raised up to a condition^ above 
angels. You may judge what is due to the body of Christ, by this : go 
take his body when it lay in the grave ; his soul was then out of it ; yet 
notwithstanding, then, when it was in the grave, the Son of God was per- 
sonally united to that body, or otherwise Christ had not been said to be 
buried (as he is said to be in the Creed). When that body was in the grave, 
the angels came into the grave to worship him ; it was his due that they 
should do so. Mary likewise, when he was in the grave (at least as she 
thought), she called him Lord ; ' Where have they laid my Lord?' saith 
she. She meaneth his body. Now therefore, this human nature of his, 
body and soul thus united together, is made higher than the heavens, saith 
the seventh to the Hebrews ver. 26. It is said of us, that we shall be like 
the angels ; he is above the angels, his body is not turned into a spirit, 
but is made spiritual. And this must needs be because he is the Lord : 
his human nature, body and soul, is Lord above angels ; therefore must 
have a condition raised up to a greater glory than theirs is. And then, 

Thirdly, By virtue of this union of the human natm-e with the Godhead, 
he is « the Lord from heaven ' ; mark the words, it is a strange speech that 
he should be called the Lord from heaven. Was ever the human nature 
of Christ there ? No ; not till such time as he did ascend. Upon this 
place many have said, and been deceived with it, that Jesus Christ had a 
human nature in heaven before the world was, and that he came down from 
heaven into the virgin by an elapse. No ; that is not the meaning of the 
place, my brethren, to shew that his human nature had its original from 
heaven, in respect of the matter of it, for then he had not took the seed of 
the virgin, he had not took the seed of Abraham, and so had not been that 
proportioned Redeemer to save us which the Scripture telleth us he was. 
What is the meaning then of this, that he is the Lord from heaven, speak- 
ing of him as he is man ? And in John iii. 13, * No man hath ascended 
up to heaven, but he that is come down from heaven, even the Son of 
man ' (he speaks of himself as man) ' who is in heaven.' He never came 
down from heaven, in respect of taking his body there, and so came into 



104 OF TUE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK 11. 

the womb of the virgin. How is he then said, as he is the Son of man, to 
be the Lord of heaven, and to come down from heaven ? My brethren, 
the riddle is opened thus : that ye take what was his due ; when that Son 
of God should take a human nature, his right it was to be in heaven the 
very first moment ; and therefore, if he take human nature with the frailties 
of it, this is to condescend from what is due to that human nature thus 
assumed, so as indeed, my brethren, all the glory that he hath now in 
heaven is connatural to him. It was suspended indeed for our redemption ; 
he was ordained to take the likeness of sinful flesh, as the apostle saith, 
that he might redeem us, and till such time as that was finished he did 
suspend himself and his right ; for he should never have set his foot upon 
this earth, according to what is his due, if he would assume human nature ; 
and therefore, because he did condescend from this due of his, he is said to 
be the Lord from heaven, and to come down from heaven. Now hence it 
cometh to pass, that it being his due, as he is the Son of God, for to be in 
heaven, the human nature that he assumed must one day be made heavenly, 
though it be suspended a while for man's redemption ; and when he hath 
done that work, it must be made heavenly by virtue of this very union of 
the Son of God ; his body must up to heaven and be made like to the 
heavens. ' Flesh and blood it cannot inherit the kingdom of God,' it will 
not bear it. Adam therefore, because he was not in himself ordained to go 
to heaven, he had but an earthly body ; that is, his reasonable soul dwelt 
in a body suitable to this earth ; but this man Christ Jesus, saith he, is an 
heavenly man. And however for our sakes he took the frailties of flesh 
and blood, yet his due is to be in heaven ; hence therefore (here lies the 
apostle's argument) he must have an heavenly body. Why ? Because that 
every nature hath a body suited to the place it Hveth in : ' There is one 
kind of flesh of beasts, and another of fishes, and another of birds.' Why ? 
Because they live in several elements. Fishes they live in the water, 
therefore they have bodies suited to that watery element they live in ; 
beasts and birds, they living here in the earth and in the air, they have 
bodies suited likewise to those elements they live in. Hence, saith he, if 
Jesus Christ be to be the heavenly man, if he be the Lord from heaven 
when he goeth up to heaven, his body must be made like the heavens ; 
therefore he must have a spiritual body. 

And so now you have the three reasons couched in the text, why that 
Jesus Christ being a quickening Spirit, that is, a God that quickeneth the 
human nature, that human nature must needs be made spiritual, and raised 
up (even his very body) to a heavenly state and condition. 

Now I will give you but one instance, because if I should lay open all 
that concerneth the body of Jesus Christ, and the glory of it, it would ask 
a long time. I will therefore single out but one instance which he himself 
did give, to shew how glorious his body should be one day, and I will but 
argue from that to the glory he hath now in heaven. 

The instance I shall give you is, that of the transfiguration of his body 
upon the mount, that you read of in Mat. xvii. 1, and so on, and in Mark 
ix. 2, &c., and in Luke ix. 48 ; which yet was but a mere transient flush- 
ing of the glory of the Godhead appearing in him. You shall read there, 
that he was transfigured before those three great apostles, Peter, James, 
and John, and that ' his face did shine as the sun, and his raiment was 
white as the light,' and there did converse with him in their bodies, ' Moses 
and Elias, appearing in glory with him.' And what was this, but to bring 
down heaven a little to earth, to make a masque, a show of it ? It was to 



Chap. X.] of their state by cueation. 105 

shew what glory the body of Jesus Christ should have in his kingdom. 
That that is his scope in this transfiguration is most clear and evident ; 
for if you read the preface to this story in all the three evangelists, you 
shall find it in them all to be this, ' The Sou of man shall come in the glory 
of his Father ; and then he shall reward every one according to his works. 
Verily I say unto you. There be some standing here which shall not see 
death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom.' When he had 
told them what a great glory he shall come in at latter day, saith he, 
There be some of you here shall see a glimpse of it. And hence, in relation 
to this promise, ' after six days,' saith Matthew and Mark ; ' about an eight 
days after,' saith Luke (namely, after the mention of that promise) ; * he 
taketh Peter, and James, and John, and bringeth them up into an high 
mountain apart,' and there he fulfilled his promise, giving them a glimpse 
of the glory of that kingdom of his which he had spoken of. And hence 
now, both Moses and Elias they do accompany him, and they do accom- 
pany him in that glory which they shall have at latter day ; for Luke telleth 
us, * They appeared with him in glory.' And that this is the meaning too, 
is plain by what Peter saith of it in 2 Peter i. 16 : ' We have not followed 
cunningly- devised fables, when we made known to you the power and 
coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eye-witnesses of his majesty. 
For he received from God the Father honour and glory, when there came 
such a voice to him from the excellent glory, This is my well-beloved Son, 
in whom I am well pleased.' It is clear he speaks of this transfiguration of 
Christ, and he makes it an instance of that glory which he should have to 
come. And that he doth so, observe the words ; saith he, ' We have not 
followed cunningly-devised fables, when we made known to you the power 
and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ,' for we saw him coming in his king- 
dom, according as his promise was. And that Peter, when he saith, ' We 
made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ,' 
meaneth his second coming, it is evident by this, because his scope was 
(as appears by chap, iii) to confirm men in the faith of his second coming. 
And he saith, there should ' come in the last days scofiers, that should 
walk after their own lusts, saying. Where is the promise of his coming ? 
But, saith he, we have not told you fables in this, for we had an instance 
of it, and we saw, and were eye-witnesses of his majesty. They saw no 
more but the transfiguration of his body. And therefore the word in 
1 Peter i. 16, which is used for the coming of Christ, is the same that is 
used for that coming of his in chap. iii. ver. 4, and is nowhere applied to his 
first coming. 

I speak this to take away the interpretation of some popish writers, that 
apply it to his first coming ; but the apostle's scope is clearly this, to give 
an instance of that glory he shall have by that glory which he had then ; 
the word which is used for his first coming is always another word. Peter, 
you see, makes a great matter of it ; and so likewise doth John : John i. 14, 
* We saw his glory, as of the only begotten Son of God ;' that is, such a glory 
as none could have but he that was the only begotten Son of God. We 
saw it, saith he. John, you know, was one of them that was in the mount, 
and Peter was another ; and both these give testimony of it in their writings. 
There was a third, James, not he that wrote the epistle, but he that was 
put to death by Herod ; and he dying so soon after, could give no testimony 
of it ; but the two apostles that survived, both of them did. Now to con- 
firm further, that this transfiguration of Christ in the mount was on pur- 
pose to shew how glorious he should be in the latter day, and glorious in 



lOG OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK 11. 

his body, hence therefore did Elias and Moses, both of them, come and 
appear in their bodies. God was pleased to raise up the body of Moses, 
together with his soul ; and he appeared with Elias, and that in body too ; 
for Elias, you know, went to heaven in his body, and he was changed 
as those at latter day shall be ; and they were to testify to him his 
resurrection, by their having their bodies there, and that he also should 
come unto glory after he had suifered. Moses he was in his body too, 
not only because he was called Moses, which was argument enough, but 
they are said to be ' two men,' Luke ix. 29. If Elias had his body, cer- 
tainly Moses had ; and the scope was to shew the glory of the body of 
Christ, and therefore both were in their bodies. The Lord had made two 
promises to Moses : the one, that he should see his face ; the other, that 
he would speak with him mouth to mouth. And here he hath made a 
second fulfilling of it ; for the Son of God, whom he had prophesied of, 
speaks with him mouth to mouth, and he beholds his face in his glory. 
Now to speak a little of this glory that was thus appearing in the body 
of Christ. 

It was an internal glory ; it was not a glory that did shine about Christ, 
as if the sun should shine upon a glass, or upon a thing making it to shine ; 
it was not extrinsecal, it came from within, it was the Godhead quickening 
him ; and therefore he is said to be ' transfigured,' and his ' face to shine 
as the sun ; ' it was not that the sun did shine upon his face and made it 
to shine. And hence it was that his very garments did shine ; so saith 
Mark, chap. ix. ver. 3, ' And his raiment became shining, exceeding white 
as snow, so as no fuller on earth can white them.' Therefore the glory of 
his garments was from the glory appeared in his body, and his garments 
did shine by a redundancy, by an overplus ; for if it had been by an 
external light, it would have fallen first upon his garments, and then upon 
his body ; but here it falleth upon his body first, and that is made the 
reason why his garments did thus shine. The glory that Moses had, who 
was Christ's tj'pe, it was but an external glory put upon the face of Moses 
by reason of his talking with God, but the glory that Christ's body had 
was from the breakings forth of the Godhead within it. And that is the 
difference (by the way) between worldly glory and heavenly glory : hea- 
venly glory springeth from within, and so diffuseth itself to the body, from 
the Spirit's dwelling in the saints, and from the Godhead dwelling in the 
human nature of Christ ; but worldly glory is a mere external thing put 
upon men, it is but an outward splendour that environeth men. And his 
whole body was thus transfigured ; and therefore Mark saith plainly, * He 
was transfigured,' Mark ix. 2 (not his face only), ' and his raiment became 
shining,' implying that his whole body was transformed into a glory which 
did shine through his very garments. My brethren, if vile garments (for 
so I may call the garments of Christ, they were but mean garments) if 
they did shine so, what shall these bodies of ours do when they are trans- 
formed into ' the likeness of his glorious body ' ? 

Consider further the greatness of this glory that did shine in his body ; 
for we do not read of anything else. Peter calleth it ' majesty :' 2 Peter 
i. 16, ' We were eye-witnesses of his majesty ; ' the same word that is used 
for that great glory in heaven, in Heb. i. 3, ' He is set down at the right 
hand of the Majesty on high.' The evangelists do compare it to the glory 
of the sun ; it is said, ' His face did shine as the sun,' Mat. xvii. 2. If 
you say it did but shine like the sun, I answer, The reason of that expres- 
sion is this, not that it was a light of the same kind with the sun, but 



Chap. X.J of thkir state «y creation. 107 

because thero was nothing else to convey the glory, iincl the beauty, and 
excellency of it to human apprehension but the sun. My brethren, now that 
Christ is in heaven, it is more glorious than the sun. Paul, you know, he 
saw him from heaven ; saith he in Acts xxvi. 12, 13, ' I saw from heaven 
a light above the brightness of the sun ' (mark his expression, he riseth 
higher, above the brightness of the sun) * shining round about me ; ' yet it 
was not the body of Christ in the air, but the body of Christ in heaven ; 
and this brightness he saw was but a light that came from it, which yet 
was far above the brightness of the sun itself, though it was confined to 
that company, and did not shine to all the world. 

Consider the greatness of it likewise in this, that it made his garments 
to shine ; so you shall find it in all three evangelists : Matthew saith, 
chap. xvii. 2, ' His raiment was white as the light ; ' Mark, chap. ix. 3, 
that * His raiment became shining exceeding white as snow, so as no fuller 
on earth can white them ; ' Luke, chap. ix. 29, that ' His raiment was 
white and glistering.' They compare the light of the face and body of 
Christ to that of the body of the sun, and the light of his raiment to the 
light of the sun, or of the moon in the air, which makes it white, or to the 
sun shining upon snow, or the like. 

Lastly, How infinitely did it afi'ect the apostles, though they themselves 
were not transformed into the same glory with him ! What saith the 
apostle Peter, poor man ? ' Master,' saith he, ' it is good for us to be 
here ; ' and upon what occasion did he say this ? When he saw Moses 
and EKas going away. So Luke, chap. ix. ver. 33, ' And it came to pass, 
as they departed from him, Peter said unto Jesus, Master, it is good for us 
to be here : and let us make three tabernacles ; one for thee, and one for 
Moses, and one for Elias : not knowing what he said.' He had but a 
little glimpse of it, and yet notwithstanding, his heart was infinitely affected 
with it, and yet he had a mixture of great fear and astonishment too, which 
must needs allay it ; one that is afraid, you know (and the text saith they 
were all afraid), would rather have the thing removed that he feareth ; yet 
notwithstanding, though he was full of fear, full of astonishment rather, his 
desire breaks out : Oh, saith he, that we might be ever here ; and let us 
make three tabernacles, saith he. The text saith, he spake he knew 
not what. And why spake he he knew not what ? Because he would 
stay there ; and because he would have earthly tabernacles, _ made 
of boughs and booths, such as the Jews had, for to be a covering to 
glorified bodies, that have tabernacles made without hands ; as the apostle 
speaks, 2 Cor. v. 1, ' For we know, that, if our earthly house of this 
tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made 
with hands, eternal in the heavens.' Our Saviour Christ had other work to 
do ; for they had been talking of Christ's death, which he should accom- 
plish at Jerusalem. And herein lay the folly of his speech ; yet so as it 
shewed how mightily his heart was taken. Oh, saith he, let us be ever 
here, let us never go down to the world again ; and yet, poor men, they 
were half asleep, they awaked on the sudden, and they heard Moses and 
Elias talking with Christ, and they heard them talking of his sufferings, an 
unpleasing subject, yet, say they, Let us go down no more ; and yet they 
themselves were not made glorious, nay, they were astonished, and that 
allayed their joy. How much then shall we be affected when we shall 
see Jesus Christ as he is, and be made like to him, and have our bodies 
transformed, able to bear all the glory, and to view him with open face, 
as the apostle saith, with an allusion to it, 2 Cor. iii. 18, * But we all, 



108 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

\vith open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed 
into the same image, from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.' 

Here you see now, my brethren, what a great glory it was ; yet let me 
tell you this too, that this glory which Christ had at his transfiguration 
falleth short of that glory he hath now in heaven ; and that is as clear many 
ways — it was but a mere resemblance of it, a mere symbolical representa- 
tion of it, in comparison of what that is. For, 

(1.) He did not let the glory of his body shine out to the full ; for if he 
had, these poor disciples had not been able to have borne it. Paul, you 
know, his eyes were put out with seeing it, Acts xxvi. 13 ; therefore he 
kept it in from what now shineth forth, and breaketh forth in heaven. And, 

(2.) It was but a transient glory ; whereas that glory which is in his 
glorified body in heaven, it is a permanent quality, that hath unchangeable- 
ness and unalterableness for ever, whereas this was but a blush of it. What 
saith the apostle in 2 Cor. iii. 7, 8 ? * But if the ministration of death, 
written and engraven in stones, was glorious, so that the children of Israel 
could not stedfastly behold the face of Moses for the glory of his counte- 
nance, which glory was to be done away ; how shall not the ministration 
of the Spirit be rather glorious ?' He argueth that therefore Moses his 
glory was no glory in comparison of the glory of Christ. By what ? Be- 
cause, saith he, the glory of Moses his countenance was to be done away ; 
and therefore it was no glory in comparison of the glory of Christ .which 
contiuueth. So do I argue, the glory which appeared here upon the mount 
in Christ's transfiguration, is no glory in comparison of that he hath in 
heaven. Why ? Because it was to be done away, for, when the cloud had 
taken up Moses and Elias, Christ was the same man he was afore. There- 
fore now, the glory which Christ had in the mount, which Peter magnified 
so, in comparison of what he hath in heaven, it is but like^the joy of the 
Holy Ghost, which, in comparison of what the soul shall have in heaven, 
is but a little flushing of it. Yet you see how mightily it did affect, and 
what a glory it was. Consider, 

(3.) His body was still subject to infirmities, and therefore was not glo- 
rified ; for Moses and Elias did talk of his dying while he was in this glory, 
and therefore now it was by a miracle ; it was not in that connatural way 
it shall be in the world to come, when his body shall be steeled, nay, it is 
steeled with glory. For, my brethren, the glory that is now in heaven put 
upon him, it hath changed his body, so that it is impossible he can sutler 
from anything, and death hath no more dominion over him, nor anything 
tending to death, not the least alteration ; but here he was to come down 
ofi" the mount and to be crucified when he had done. And then, 

(4.) These disciples here could tell what they saw, and they could tell 
what the speech was between Moses and Ehas and him. But go, take 
Paul rapt up into the third heavens, and he telleth us that he heard words 
that were unlawful and impossible to utter ; and so he saw sights, he saw 
the human nature of Christ in his glory certainly ; but when he came down 
again, that vision which he had, he could tell no news of it. But these 
here, they could tell what they saw, and who they were, and what they said, 
* They heard a voice from heaven, saying. This is my well-beloved Son, in 
whom I am well pleased.' 

(5.) Christ, in this transfiguration of his, did but give an instance of one 
property of glory, namely, shining brightness, such as is in the body of 
the sun ; but there is likewise other as glorious properties of a spiritual 
body, that it can move up and down, as he did when he ascended up into 



Chap. X.] of their state by creation, 109 

heaven ; he was not long a-going certainly, though it is a mighty vast space 
from earth to heaven ; and he moved up and down after his resurrection ; 
and then he was impassible. But I will not stand upon that. 

Thus I have shewn you what a great glory must needs be in the human 
nature of Christ, in his body. The grounds are in the text ; the instance 
is this which I have given you out of the story of his transfiguration ; and 
so I have despatched the second thing. Before I come to the third and 
last, I will make a use or two of this, and then proceed. 

Use 1. In the first place, my brethren, will you see and value the infinite 
love of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ? As I said before, the glory of 
his human nature is founded upon the union of that nature with the Son 
of God ; it was his due as soon as ever he should assume a human nature, 
and therefore he is called the man from heaven, for it was his due to be 
there ; it was a condescending for him to take upon him our frailties, our 
infirmities, and to have a passible body as he had. And therefore now 
for him that was thus in God's decree in the very form of God, and was 
the image of the invisible God, for so in his very human nature he is, he 
could have challenged all this glory as his due the very first moment that 
he should first subject himself, and that human nature of his, to all those 
sufferings and debasements that he subjected it unto ; how infinitely should 
this raise up our hearts to see the love of our Lord and Saviour Jesus 
Christ ! I shall but make this a little clear to you out of the very story of 
his transfiguration. You shall find that when he was transfigured, the 
evangelists tell us, that Moses and Elias did talk to him of his death and 
of his sufferings ; * they spake of his decease,' saith Luke, * which he 
should accomplish at Jerusalem.' Our Saviour Christ, to shew what was 
his due instead of this suffering, he transfigureth himself; and whereas 
Moses and Elias went up to heaven in their bodies again to that glory 
which they had before, he is left behind here below, and all his glory is 
gone, and to Jerusalem he must go, and there he must suffer. Why ? He 
should have been in heaven first if he had had his due. This glory of his, 
I say, and his death, were both represented at once ; Moses and Elias spake 
to him about his death at the same time when his transfiguration was, on 
purpose to set a value upon it, to take the hearts of the sons of men. This 
Christ, that was so glorious upon the mount, he might then have gone to 
heaven as well as descended, and then where had been our salvation ? 
But he letteth Moses and Elias go to heaven : Go you, saith he, and pos- 
sess your glory ; but as for his own glory, he sheweth what was his due, 
but layeth it aside for a while that he might suffer. 

Use 2. Again, secondly. See whence the valuation of the bodily suflfer- 
ings of Christ before God doth arise. There were the sufferings of his 
soul, and there were the sufferings of his body. The suff'erings of his soul 
the Scripture speaks least of, though they were the greatest sufferings of 
all the rest ; as the Scripture speaks but little of the glory of the soul, 
but speaks much of the glory of the body, and would have us argue from 
that to the greatness of the glory of the soul in the world to come. Learn, 
I say, to value the sufferings of Christ at a due rate, consider whose body 
it was that suffered ; it was the body of him in whom the Godhead dwelt 
bodily and fully ; of him that was life itself, was a quickening Spirit (he 
was so in assuming human nature), his body was ordained to another 
world ; and the valuation of the person was it that put a valuation upon 
everything he suffered. Therefore, my brethren, whenever you would put 
a value upon the bodily sufferings of Christ, I will tell you what to do : 



110 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

first, look upon him as he is now crowned with glory and honour in heaven, 
and then think with yourselves that all this was due to him when he was 
here helow, when he was in the mount, yea, when in the womb, to have 
taken that body up and made it so glorious ; and when you have brought 
him down from all the glory he hath in heaven, do but think what a man 
he was when he hung upon the cross. This should make us put a valua- 
tion upon all his sufferings : this makes us see w^hat it is that God doth 
value his bodily sufferings for ; they were the sufferings of Jiis body, whose 
due it was to be thus glorified, and never to have suffered ; but God so 
ordered it that he must first suffer, and then rise and enter into, and pos- 
sess his glory. 



CHAPTER XL 

What a more glorious condition than was Adam's in innocence Christ will 
raise us up unto, proved in the lowest instance of it, viz., the glory our 
bodies shall have at the resurrection. — Wherein that glory shall consist. — A 
comparison beticcen that glory our bodies shall then possess, and what Adam's 
had in jmradise : and in what respect ours shall far excel his. 

3. The third thing that I am to handle is this, to shew you that our 
bodies shall be conformed to Jesus Christ's body, that as we have borne 
the image of the earthly (which we all do in the bodies which we now have), 
so we shall bear the image of the heavenly ; for so the apostle reasoneth, 
ver. 49. For the apostle's scope in these words is to argue that there is 
a spiritual body which the saints shall have in the other world after the 
resurrection ; and he argueth it from this, because that Christ, who is our 
head, he shall have a spiritual body ; and he argueth that Christ shall have 
a spiritual body, by comparing Adam's body and Christ's together. Adam, 
he saith, was Christ's type and shadow, and therefore by way of eminency, 
if Adam was a living soul, that is, had a reasonable soul that dwelt in a 
body of clay, which advanced it to such a dignity as all this world was 
made for it, then, saith he, Christ shall be a quickening Spirit ; that is, 
he shall have the Godhead to dwell in him, and quicken the human nature, 
and raise it up in a proportion to a higher degi-ee of glory, than the rea- 
sonable soul of Adam raised up his body unto. And having proved this, 
he argueth from thence, that our bodies shall be like unto Christ's.^ Why ? 
Because those two were two common persons and roots of mankind, and 
they were to propagate the like condition, the like state and qualification 
that should be in either of them, to those that should come of them : ' As 
is the earthy,' saith he, namely, Adam, ' such are those that are earthy ; 
and as is the heavenly,' namely Christ, the Lord from heaven, ' such are 
they also that are heavenly; and as we have borne the image of the 
earthly, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.' This, I say, is the 
apostle's scope ; his scope is not so much to hold forth the state of Adam's 
soul, taking it as having the image of God upon it, having communion 
with God, for that is held forth sufficiently and abundantly in other Scrip- 
tures, but rather to compare that animal condition, that is, that state that 
this soul had in this body, as it was suited to earthly things, as_ it was a 
living soul, quickening and giving life to an earthly body, partaking of all 
the comforts of things here below ; to compare, I say, the state of this 
body, and this soul living in it, with the state of that glorified body which 



Chap. XI.] of tukir state by creatiox. Ill 

Jesus Christ bath in heaven, and which he will raise up our bodies unto 
at latter day. That I may distinctly express myself to all your appre- 
hensions, let me say this in a word : Adam, you see, here is made a type 
of Christ ; his condition wherein he was created, it is a type or a shadow 
of that glorious condition that Christ wdll raise up his members to. Now 
the glory of heaven lies in two things, and the happiness of Adam lay in 
two things, whereof the one answereth the other. The glory of heaven 
doth lie first in that immediate communion with and vision of the God- 
head which the soul hath, and whether it hath the body about it or no it 
would have ; for, saith Paul, when he was rapt up into the third heavens, 
in 2 Cor. xii., ' Whether I was in the body, or out of the body, I cannot 
tell ;' nor was it any matter. But, in the second place, because that this 
soul, that thus seeth God immediately without the help of the body, hath a 
body that must be carried up thither to it, hence, besides the happiness that 
the soul hath by immediate communion with God, the body hath a happi- 
ness and glory, as the soul dwelleth in it, and the Holy Ghost in both, that is 
proper and peculiar to itself. Just so it was with Adam : he had an 
immortal soul that was created with the image of God in it, the image of 
holiness, by virtue of which he had communion with God ; and his soul 
thus having communion with God, answereth to that vision of God which 
the soul hath in heaven, although joined with the body after the resurrec- 
tion. But then, secondly, as this soul dwelling in this body, beside the 
communion it had with God, it had an animal state, a natural, an outward 
state of life, taking in the comforts of things here below, in and through 
the senses, both inward and outward, which here the apostle calleth the 
natural body, and interpreteth it by that in Genesis, a living soul, that is, 
a soul living or dwelling in an earthly body, having all the creatures in the 
world suited to this body to comfort it, and the soul by it. Answerably 
there is in the world to come something that answereth to this spiritual 
body, and the spiritual state and condition of it. Now then, the scope of 
the apostle, I say, it is not to compare the state of Adam's soul, as he had 
the image of God upon it, having immediate communion with God, to 
make him a type of Christ therein, or of his elect in heaven ; but to shew, 
e\ten from that animal, natural, earthy estate that his soul had in his 
body, what glorious spiritual estate the very bodies of the saints shall have 
hereafter. 

My brethren, the design I had is this, to compare the state of Adam's 
body in innocency with the glorious estate that the body of Christ hath, 
and that the bodies of the saints shall have after the resurrection. And I 
have endeavoured to shew how the state and condition of Adam's body, in 
which he was first created, it was a type and a shadow of the state and 
condition both of Christ's body and ours. To demonstrate this I have. 

First, Shewed what condition Adam's body was advanced unto by his 
being made a living soul, what an high estate that piece of earth, that lump 
of clay which God made Adam's body of, was advanced unto by being 
united to that reasonable soul which God put into him at first. I have, 

Secondly, Shewn what a glorious condition the human natm-e of Christ, 
by being united to the Godhead, which is here in the text called a quicken- 
ing Spirit, this Godhead raiseth up this human nature unto. And now 
I am, 

Thirdly, To shew that the state and condition of the bodies of the saints 
hereafter at the resurrection shall be made conformable unto Jesus Christ's 
body ; and there I must also make up a comparison betwen the state of 



112 OF TUE CREATURES, AND THE COXDITION [BoOK II. 

Adam's body at his first creation, and our bodies when they are thus raised 
up at latter day, and shew how the one was but a type and an imperfect 
shadow of the other. 

That our bodies at latter day shall be conformed to the image of Jesug 
Christ's body, the Scripture is clear for it. I will give you but a place or 
two, instead of many others. In 1 John iii. 1-3, • Behold what manner of 
love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons 
of God ! Beloved, now are we the sons of God ; and it doth not yet appear 
what we shall be : but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be 
like him; for we shall see him as he is.' Now, how is it that we shall see 
Christ ? Not only with our souls, but we shall ' see him with our eyes ; ' 
so saith Job, chap. xix. 26, 27. And seeing of him with these eyes, we 
shall be made like unto him ; as we shall see him with the sense of our 
bodies, our bodies shall be made also like unto him. Another place you 
have is in Philip, iii. 21, ' We look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ.' 
As what to do ? ' Who shall change our vile bodies,' — or our body that, 
in comparison of that body, is contemptible ; so I have opened it afore, it is 
not a vileness in itself, but it is spoken comparatively, — ' that it may be 
fashioned according to his glorious body, according to the working whereby 
he is able even to subdue all things unto himself.' 

Our bodies they have two patterns propounded in Scripture that they 
shall be conformed unto. The one is, they shall be like the angels. ' The 
sons of the resurrection,' saith Chi'ist in the evangelist Matthew, * they 
shall be like the angels.' And there is a second pattern : we shall be con- 
formed into Christ's glorious body. How glorious that was you have heard : 
' We shall be like him.' It is not in equality, but it is only in respect of 
the same qualities that his body had. I would clear one mistake that some 
run into. When it is said, We shall bear the image of the body and human 
nature of Christ in heaven, and that Christ is a quickening Spirit, some 
have run into this conceit, that as the Godhead is united in a personal 
manner to the human nature of Christ, so it shall also be united to our 
bodies. But that is not the meaning, my brethren ; and my reason is this, 
because if we come to heaven by virtue of Christ, it is impossible we should 
ever be raised up to the same union with the Godhead he hath. The 
hypostatical union is a thing of so high a nature as it can never be merited ; 
but all that can be done is this, that we shall be made like unto him. He 
by virtue of being God, his body is made so and so glorious, as I have 
described it unto you ; that, as I said, suppose the sun should dwell in a 
crystal glass, how glorious would that glass be ! So the Godhead dwelling 
in the human natm-e, he is the Lord from heaven, raised up above angels ; 
therefore his body is glorious. Now we shall not be raised up to the same 
height and degree of glory he is. No ; let Christ for ever enjoy that to him- 
self ; but all our happiness lieth in this, we shall be conformed to him, even 
in our bodies we shall be made like unto him. 

Now the reason why I insist first upon this of the body is this, because 
the Scripture speaks little of the glory of the soul, neither can it be con- 
veyed to our senses ; but it would have us raise up our thoughts, how 
glorious the soul shall be, by laying open how glorious our bodies shall 
be. And so now I come to open to you the glory of that spiritual body we 
shall have after the resurrection. 

In laying open this, I shall do these four things by way of premise :" 

1. To shew you that it shall be the same body which we now have that 
our souls shall then dwell in. 



CUAP. XI.] OF THEIR STATE BY CREATION. 113 

2. That this body shall have all its parts and members that now it hath. 

8. That all these parts and members shall have some use or other in 
heaven. And then, 

4. That this body shall bo a spiritual body ; and open and interpret what 
is meant by a spiritual body ; and so I shall come to make out the com- 
parison between the state of Adam's body at his first creation, and our 
bodies when they are thus raised up at latter day. 

1. In the first place, it is the same body for substance ; for, my brethren, 
when Adam's body, the natural body we now have, is said to be a type 
of our bodies in heaven, the meaning is not that it is a type of another 
kind of body for substance. He calleth both the one and the other a body, 
only he saith the one is a natural body, and the other is a spiritual body. 
He doth not say our bodies shall be turned into spirits, as some have 
thought, but they shall be made spiritual. As for example : go take a piece 
of iron and put it in the fire ; it is one thing to have this iron to be turned 
into fire, and another thing to have it filled with fire, and to be fiery, that 
if you look upon it you shall not see iron, but see fire ; yet iron it is still. 
So is it here ; it is the same body, it is not changed into spirit ; it is only 
made spiritual, it hath new properties, new qualities put upon it, as iron 
hath when it is mightily heated with fire ; it is malleable when it is heated 
with fire — you may bow it or bend it or work it which way you will, though 
it is stiff naturally; audit is hot if you touch it — you shall not feel cold iron 
but fire, though it is cold naturally. Therefore, in Scripture it is not said 
we are made angels, our bodies are not made spirits, but they are made 
as the angels. I speak thus much, the rather because it is a great heresy 
that is risen up in these latter times, that we shall not have the same bodies 
in heaven for substance that we have here below. The apostle plainly saith 
the contrary. He saith not that our bodies shall be made spirits, but 
spiritual, and that the very same body that we have now, and bear about 
with us, even that very body shall be glorified. How is that proved ? Out 
of this very chapter, in verses 53 and 54. * This same corruptible,' saith 
he (mark the phrase, in the Greek it is most emphatical), ' must put 
on incorruption ; ' it shall not be another body. Now he must needs mean the 
same body for substance ; for to say a corruptible thing, qua corruptible, 
shall be incorruptible, is a contradiction. And he addeth also, ' And this 
same mortal must put on immortality.' And he is not content with that, 
but he saith further, ' When this same mortal shall put on immortality, 
and this same corruptible have put on incorruption.' There are four 
the sames. The same mortal, the same corruptible, is that that shall be 
glorified hereafter. 

And, my brethren, else we were not conformed unto Christ ; for what 
body hath Christ in heaven ? The very same body he rose in. "We must 
rise as he rose, for he is * the first fruits of them that sleep.' Now it is 
clear and evident that Christ rose in the same body he died ; for he saith 
his body should not see corruption ; it was kept in the grave, it rose again. 
* Feel,' saith he. It is certain that he did ascend with the same body he 
rose in. Acts i. 11, say the angels there to the apostles that beheld him 
ascend, * This same Jesus ' (it is a very emphatical place), the very same 
' whom you see taken up into heaven, shall so come in like manner ; ' he 
expresseth it every way, the sameness of the one and the other. I will not 
stand to mention or open that place, which is commonly known. Job 
xix. 25, * With these eyes I shall see him ; I myself (saith he), and not 
another.' That is the first thing, the same body riseth. 

VOL. VII. H 



114 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

2. Secondly, Tlie same body shall have all its parts and members that 
now it hath, and that is plain and evident from our conformity to Christ, 
for still you see here, our bodies are to be conformed unto, his, we shall 
bear his image at the resurrection. Now it is clear that Jesus Christ rose 
with every part of his body that he had when he died ; there was not a 
member that saw corruption. And in Heb. xi. 35, compared with ver. 37, 
it is said of them that were sawn asunder, one piece of their bodies broken 
from another, they shall rise a whole body. Why ? Because, saith he, 
they shall ' obtain a better resurrection.' Now it was not a better resur- 
rection if that all the parts did not rise again, and if that all these parts 
were not mended, or if they had any imperfection in them. And if you 
mark it, he speaks it of the resurrection of the body, for he speaks of their 
being tortured, limb pulled from limb, sawn asunder ; well, saith he, they 
shall not only have a resurrection, but a better resurrection one day. 

3. Thirdly, It is as evident, too, that all these parts shall have an use in 
heaven, some or other, in a spiritual way, and have objects suited to them. 
I shall make this plain unto you. 

(1.) By instancing in some particulars. It is evident that some parts of 
the body have an use in heaven. It is evident in seeing. * With these eyes,' 
saith Job, ' shall I see him.' It is evident in speaking. In that trans- 
figuration which I have spoken of before, it is said that Moses, and Elias, 
and Christ did talk together. And at latter day it is certain that Christ 
will speak so as all the world shall hear him ; he shall so judge all men as 
that eveiy man shall be able for to judge, therefore he shall do it audibly ; 
for in 1 Cor. iv. 5 saith the apostle, ' Judge no man before the time, until 
the Lord come,' and he cometh as a man to judge, * who will bring to light 
the hidden things of darkness, and make manifest the counsels of the heart ;' 
implying, judge no man's heart aforehand, for one day you shall judge. 
And how shall you come to judge ? Because the Lord will bring them all 
to light, and he will do it as a man ; for he hath appointed the man Christ 
Jesus to judge the world. And when I say he shall pronounce the sentence 
with a voice that all the world shall hear, it is not to be conceived that he 
shall speak so as to thunder, but he shall have a spiritual voice, and they 
shall have spiritual ears, and how we know not, as I shall shew you by and 
by. Stephen's eye, his bodily eye, could see up into heaven, ' and he saw 
the heavens opened, and the Son of God standing on the right hand of his 
Father.' To see a man of Christ's stature so far off, he must have the eye 
spiritualised ; and so Stephen's was. And so for all the world to hear the 
voice of Christ at latter day, it is because they shall have ears spiritualised. 
Now, I say if all these parts of the body remain, why should those have a 
privilege and a prerogative more than all the rest of the parts of the body, 
which certainly shall serve for some use or other ? 

(2.) I shall give you the reason which some divines give for it, viz., 
that else it is not a resurrection unto life. The resurrection is called a 
waking ; for death, you know, is a sleep. Now if there were not an 
employment for all the parts of the body in a spiritual way (what we know 
not), there were a resurrection of some of them to sleep, rather than to 
waking, rather than to life : ' When I awake,' saith he, ' I shall see thy 
face,' Ps. xvii. 15. 

(3.) I shall propound you this reason likewise for it, that the principal aim 
of God in decreeing men to salvation, it did fall upon their bodies as well as 
their souls. He chose not the soul only to heaven, and the body to come 
thither accidentally, but he pitched upon this soul as dwelling in this body, 



Chap. XI.J of their state by creation. 115 

and therefore makes the soul stay for its full glory till the body is joined 
unto it ; and therefore ho hath as well ordained that which shall bo for the 
happiness and glory even of the body, objects suitable to it, being made 
spiritual, as he hath done for the soul itself. 

Thus having explained, 1. That for the substance, it is the same body ; 
and 2. That it is the same body with all the parts of it ; and 3. That all 
these parts have their use ; I must, 

4. Explain what is meant by a spiritual body, and so make out the 
comparison between the state of Adam's body in his first creation, and our 
bodies when they shall be raised up at latter day. There are three inter- 
pretations, which being put altogether make up the full scope and intent of 
what is here meant by a spiritual body. 

(1.) Some say it is therefore called spiritual, because that all earthly, 
animal uses of it shall cease, such as the body hath now. The eye shall 
not be suited to colours or beauty, nor the ear to sounds, such sounds as 
now, nor the mouth and stomach to meats and drinks. There is a very 
plain place for this in 1 Cor. vi. 13, ' Meats for the belly, and the belly for 
meats : but God shall destroy both it and them ; ' that is, that suitableness 
that is between the body and meats, the eye and colours or beauty, the 
fancy and the things here in this world fancied ; all this suitableness wherein 
God hath made the one for the other, as faculties for objects, belly for 
meats, and meats for the belly, God will dissolve; he will destroy, he will 
evacuate, he will make void all this suitableness, that the mouth nor the 
stomach shall not desire meats or drinks, &c. Why ? Because God will 
destroy this suitableness, he will destroy both the belly and the meats in 
the world to come. As the angels, they are not taken with bodily pleasures, 
with beauty, nor any such thing, no more shall our bodily senses, other- 
wise than as to that use they shall be then put unto. If you could suppose 
a man to be taken out of heaven in the body, he would find no pleasure in 
anything here, he would not be taken with meats, or beauty, or pleasures, 
or any such thing; he would be as an angel. Here in this world God hath 
suited one to the other ; there this suitableness shall be dissolved. There- 
fore you know our Saviour Christ saith, Mat. xxii. 30, ' That they are as 
the angels of God in heaven, they neither marry nor give in marriage ; ' and 
the pleasures that depend thereupon they shall not have, nor any such 
carnal thing, for their bodies are spiritual ; though they have all the same 
parts and senses they had before, yet they are turned unto other objects, 
and put unto other uses. And hence therefore it is said, that ' flesh and 
blood cannot inherit the kingdom of heaven ; ' that is, take these poor 
earthly bodies of ours, we are so unsuited to that glory that it would sink 
us, so that if a man could be put into heaven with this body as it is now, 
that glory would kill him, he were not able to bear it, he were not able to 
inherit. It is then a truth that they are called spiritual bodies in this 
respect, that look as spirits cannot find a suitableness between worldly 
things and them — what do the angels care for all the beauty in the 
world, or for all the pleasures of meat and drinks? &c. Nothing at all — 
no more shall these bodies of ours, when they shall be raised up at the 
latter day. God will destroy both it and them ; that is, the suitableness 
between the one and the other. 

(2.) Others interpret a spiritual body to be a body able to pass, pierce, 
or move as spirits up and down ; that our bodies shall be able to move 
from earth to heaven presently. Popish interpreters say. That Christ's 
body did move even through the gravestone, while the stone lay upon the 



116 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

mouth of the sepulchre. But whether that be true or no I will not stand 
to dispute ; our protestant divines are against it. Yet this is certain, that 
that is not the whole meaning of the apostle here, when he saith our bodies 
shall be spiritual, and that for this reason clearly, because he doth oppose 
spiritual to the whole animal life, the natural life that Adam's soul had in 
his body in all the operations of it whatsoever ; therefore to restrain a 
spiritual body only to nimbleness and agility, it is too narrow an inter- 
pretation ; it is but to take in one property instead of all the rest. But 
then, 

(3.) That which I especially pitch upon (though I take in all these in 
their degi-ee) is this ; it is called a spiritual body, because that the whole 
body it shall be in a spiritual way suited to spiritual objects made for it ; 
and so now I shall come to make out the comparison between the state of 
Adam's body in innocency, and our bodies as they shall be after the resur- 
rection, and shew you how the one was a type of the other. 

The first excellency of Adam's body, which is called a natural body, I 
told you was this : it had a whole world made for it, — meats for his belly, 
coloui's for his eyes, sounds for his ears, &c. ; and as he had an animal 
body, so he had a world suited to it. So now, likewise, there is a spiritual 
body we shall have, which shall be so changed, and have new qualities put 
upon all these senses of ours, that there shall be spiritual objects suited 
thereunto ; that as the suitableness between earthly objects and it shall 
be taken away, meats for the belly, and the belly for meats, shall both be 
destroyed, so there will be spiritual objects which the body will be suited 
to. Thus you shall find in nature, and you shall find it to hold in grace 
too, that God hath always suited objects and faculties one to another. If 
he hath made an eye, he hath made colours for it ; if he hath made an ear, 
he hath made sounds for it. And such as the faculty is, such are the 
objects. If the faculty be spiritual, the object shall be spiritual also. If 
he makes belly, he makes meat ; and if he makes meat, he makes belly ; 
and if the meat be earthly things, the belly shall be earthly too. If you 
could suppose a spiritual belly (but we cannot tell how to speak in such a 
language), you should have something spiritual suitable unto it. The 
apostle, in 1 Cor. ii. 18, he saith of the Holy Ghost (he speaks it, indeed, 
of teaching men how to preach the word), that as he hath made spiritual 
things to be taught, so he teacheth men to express those spiritual things in 
spiritual language ; he suiteth (so the word signifies), he fitteth spiritual 
things to spiritual. So in heaven, if God have made a spiritual body, which 
takes up all the parts of it, he hath suited spiritual objects to it. There 
are two instances in Scripture of the glory of the body : the one is of 
Christ's when he was transfigured ; the other is of Stephen, when his face 
shined as it had been the face of an angel, and he looked up to heaven, and 
he saw two things : he saw Christ, and he saw the glory of God ; there was 
a spiritual glory which he saw with his bodily eyes made spiritual. 

Now, I know you will ask me this question, If that a man's body, and 
all the parts of it, shall be carried up to heaven, and shall have objects 
suited thereunto, what manner of objects shall these be ? and what manner 
of senses shall these be ? and to what uses shall all these be turned ? 
What senses we have here we know ; what we shall have there, can you 
tell us ? 

The truth is, my brethren, I cannot tell you, I profess it. I can no more 
tell you than I can tell you, if God should say from heaven that he would 
add a sixth sense to your bodies, and create an object suitable to it, what 



Chap. XI.] of their state by creation. 117 

this sense, nor what the object of it should be ; neither could all angels and 
men, if they laid their heads together, tell you what sense and object thereof 
that should bo. Paul, you know, saith that he heard words, when he was 
rapt up into the third heavens, that were unutterable, 2 Cor. xii. When 
he came down from heaven, they were things of another kind, of such a 
nature, that he was not able to speak them, or make any impression what 
they were upon any man's understanding in the world. Therefore, in 1 Cor. 
ii. 9 (though it is meant principally of the things of the gospel, yet as 
evidently too of the things of heaven), ' The ear hath not heard, nor the 
eye seen, nor hath it entered into the heart of man, the things that God 
hath prepared for them that love him.' I may as well tell you how it is 
possible that our bodies should be spiritual ; the truth is, it is in nature a 
contradiction ; for to say a spiritual body, it is as if you should say, a 
wooden stone. Were not this an absurdity ? You would all think so. 
And therefore, now, to tell you what shall be the spiritualncss of this body, 
and yet a body still, and what shall be the objects suited to this spiritual 
body, for my part I cannot ; but out of the clear word of God and this very 
text, it is plain that as there was an animal body that Adam had, suited to 
animal things, so here shall be a spiritual body, suited to spiritual things ; 
and so much we may safely say in the general. Luther, when he took into 
consideration this phrase, * a spiritual body,' saith he. Hie senno est j^^ane 
inauditus, Here is a speech never heard of. What, a spiritual body ! Yet 
so it is. It is a ' glory shall be revealed ;' that is the phrase, Rom. viii. 16. 
I bring it for this purpose, to shew that we know not what glory it shall be, 
for it shall be revealed. And that he speaks of the glory of the body is 
clear by ver. 11, 'If the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead 
dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your 
mortal bodies.' And likewise, at ver. 23, he saith, ' We wait for the 
redemption of our bodies.' It is a glory, therefore, to be revealed, and for 
my part, I cannot tell you what it is ; only we argue one thing out of 
another, and so raise up our thoughts to think what it may be. My 
brethren, suppose the angels had stood by (as it is likely some of them did, 
for the ' morning stars sang,' as I shewed out of Job), and beheld when 
God was making Adam's body : they saw him take a piece of earth, and 
mould it to a head, to eyes, to nose, to mouth, and all those parts ; what 
this body, while it was thus a-making, should be made for (suppose the 
body was first made, as it seems it was, for God did then breathe the breath 
of life into it), what those eyes, and that nose and mouth should serve for, 
all the angels in heaven could not tell. Ay, but when once God breathed 
a soul into it, then they saw that the eyes could discern colours, and the 
mouth could taste meat, and the ears could hear sounds. So will God do 
at latter day : he will take up our bodies, and make them spiritual ; put 
new senses upon them, as I may say, or rather spiritualise these senses we 
have, and then what these shall serve for in the other world, w^e no more 
know than, indeed and in truth, in this supposition, the angels could have 
known. But when the Holy Ghost shall come as a soul into these bodies 
(as he will do, for we are all ' the temples of the Holy Ghost'), and shall 
act all these, then those things that are in heaven they will know and see, 
and we shall find and feel them suited as truly to these spiritual bodies of 
om-s that we shall have there, as our animal bodies are to the things of this 
world. Let a poor, plain man come into an artificer's shop, and there see 
a great many tools, it may be two or three hundred several tools, as some 
curious artificers have — what this tool serveth for he knoweth not, and what 



118 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

that tool servetli for he knoweth not ; the artificer he hath a use for them 
all. So when we come to heaven, what all the parts of these bodies of ours 
shall then serve for, we know not now ; but he that made them, and made 
them principally not for this world (mark what I say), your bodies were not 
made for this world chiefly ; that is clear in all the Scripture ; this text 
holds it forth, * That which was natural,' saith he, * is first :' first, indeed, in 
execution, * and afterward that which is spiritual ; ' God's eye was upon the 
spiritual. Now he that did order our very bodies for heaven, as well as our 
souls, and doth not bring the body to heaven by accident only because the 
soul is there and will not part company, but he pitched upon the one as well 
as the other ; he knows what to do with all these tools, though we do not. 
Our own experience will tell us that there may be a great change in the 
use of things; we eat, and drink, and take in nourishment every meal. Is 
it not a strange thing that all this meat we eat should within four or five 
hours after, hear, and see, and feel, that it should beget spirits that shall 
do all this by the instruments of it ? Is not here a strange spiritualising of 
these poor creatures ? Thus will God spiritualise eyes, ears, and all, and 
advance them to more noble objects ten thousand times there than here. 
So that, my brethren, as God will make a spiritual body at the resurrec- 
tion, so he hath suited spiritual things in the other world for this spiritual 
body, as he made and suited this world to Adam's animal body in the first 
creation ; and there is nothing in the other world that is corporeal or 
bodily (and there must needs be many things corporeal there, for the place 
is a body), but it shall be suited to the body of man when it is thus made 
spiritual. 

If you ask me more particularly, what one object there is that shall be 
suited to our bodies, for us to have happiness in our bodies by it ? 

I answer. The human nature of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. It 
is a notion that the schoolmen had of old, that the body of Christ is the 
happiness of heaven, and is suited to our bodies in heaven, to be the 
happiness of them, as seeing of the body of Christ shall be the happiness 
of that sense ; and how he is otherwise suited to all our other senses, we 
know not. I shall give you a place or two for it : 1 Cor. vi. 13, 14, 
' Meats for the belly, and the belly for meats : but God shall destroy both 
it and them. The body is not for fornication, but for the Lord, and the 
Lord for the body. And God hath both raised up the Lord, and will also 
raise us up by his own power.' The apostle here speaks against unlawful 
pleasures and sensual lusts, and his argument lies upon a twofold ground : 
first, it is taken from a common argument. Why should you give up your- 
selves to these lusts, saith he, seeing your bodies were made for other 
things ? Suppose inordinate eating and drinking were lawful, it is but for 
the belly, saith he, it is but for this world, ' God will destroy both belly 
and meats.' Then there is a special argument, ' The body is not for 
fornication, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body.' Now then, 
look, as the belly is for meats, and meats for the belly here in this world, 
so, in a spiritual way (which we know not of), is the Lord for the body, 
and the body for the Lord in the other world. There are other inter- 
pretations given of this ; I wiU but name them, and give you reasons 
against them. 

First, Say some, the meaning is this, that the body is made to serve the 
Lord, and therefore, because you are to serve the Lord with your bodies, 
give not yourselves up to such lusts. That that is not the only meaning 
is clear by this, because he doth not say only that our body is for the Lord, 



Chap. XI.] op their state by creation. 119 

but he addcth, ' and the Lord is for the body.' Now, Jesus Christ is not 
ordained to servo the body, that is certain. And then again, secondly, ho 
speaks of our bodies what they shall be at the resurrection. How do you 
prove that ? By two reasons ; for first, he saith, The body is for the Lord, 
and the Lord for the body, when the belly and meats shall be destroyed. 
* Meats for the belly,' saith he, ' and the belly for meats : but God shall 
destroy both it and them ; ' and then afterward he saith, ' The body is for 
the Lord, and the Lord for the body.' Secondly, it is evident that he 
meaneth what correspondency and suitableness shall bo between the body 
of Christ and our bodies in the world to come, it appears by this which he 
saith, ' And God hath both raised up the Lord, and will also raise us up 
by his own power,' implying that as God did make the belly for meats, and 
meats for the belly, in a corporeal way, in an animal way here, so he ha,th 
suited, in a spiritual way, our bodies for Christ, and Christ for our bodies 
in the other world ; and therefore that God that made this ordination, he 
that hath raised up Christ already and given him a spiritual body, he will 
raise us up too, that so we being ordained one for another, our bodies may 
be for him, and his body for us. 

Secondly, Others give this interpretation, that the apostle's argument 
against these lusts is grounded upon the resurrection ; because your bodies 
shall be one day raised up again, therefore do not thus abuse them. ^ But 
it is clear that the reason here given why God doth raise up our bodies as 
he hath raised up Christ's body, is because he had first ordained in his 
decree the body for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. Hence, there- 
fore, my brethren, Christ's human nature being spiritualised, and the same 
spirit that dwelleth in him dwelling in us, raising up our bodies and human 
natures, and so spiritualising them, there will be some way whereby the 
body will be refreshed in and by the Lord Jesus Christ ; the body is made 
for Christ, saith he, and Christ for the body, even as here in this life the 
world is made for our bodies and our bodies for the world, to take in com- 
forts from it. If you ask me, how shall this be ? Truly, I say only we 
shall be conformed to the glorious body of Christ thus, and spiritualised by 
that power that hath subdued all things. It is Calvin's saying upon the 
text, God hath fitted and suited his Son for us ; the body is for the Lord, 
and the Lord for the body. 

Now, do but think with yourselves, how happy we in heaven shall be, 
whenas our bodies, having new spiritualised qualities put upon all the parts 
of them (which we know not what they will be suited to, nor how),_ and 
whenas all things in heaven, the human nature of Christ in an eminent 
manner, the angels and all things here (being all spiritual)_ shall be suited 
to these spiritual bodies, for us to have comfort and happiness from them 
some way or other. 

I will give you but one other place of Scripture for this ; it is in Ps. 
xvii. 15, ' When I awake, I shall be satisfied with thine image.' He speaks 
there of the resurrection ; he calls it an awaking, for you know death is 
called a sleep : ' Those that are asleep in the Lord shall rise first.' He 
had spoken before of those that had put their happiness in the comforts of 
this life, suitable to their bodies, to the animal state of their bodies ; that 
is clear by the 14th verse, ' Deliver me from the men that are thine hand, 
Lord, who have their portion in this life, whose belly thou fiUest with 
thy treasure : they are full of children, and leave to them outward things,' 
bodily things. ' But as for me,' saith he, ' I will behold thy face in the 
righteousness' (there is the vision of God which is his happiness m his 



120 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

soul) : ' and I shall be satisfied, when I awake' (when I arise again), * with 
thine imaae.' It is not the image of God only upon himself that he means 
here. Why ? Because that doth not satisfy a holy heart, but it is that 
image of the invisible God which the human nature of Jesus Christ is, who, 
in opposition to all these outward pleasures, will be all in all to us ; he is a 
spiritual creature, his human nature is spiritualised, made glorious, and 
our bodies shall be made spiritual likewise. * The body is made for the 
Lord, and the Lord for the body,' and this when they are both raised up ; 
Christ is raised up already, and because he hath ordained the one to be 
serviceable to the other, he will also raise up our bodies : and when he 
doth raise me up, saith David, though other men have their bellies full 
here, and have animal pleasures they delight in ; yet when I shall awake 
at latter day, and shall see this image of thine, shall see thy Son, I shall 
be satisfied : ' When I awake, I shall be satisfied with thine image.' 

Thus you see what a glorious state God would raise up our bodies unto 
at the resurrection. All this hath been said to this purpose, to compare 
Adam's body, that had a world made for the animal state of it, and our 
bodies as they shall be at latter day, when they shall be made spiritual 
bodies, and have likewise provision for them in the world to come. Now 
to make up the comparison, in respect of this first excellency that Adam's 
body was advanced unto, yet more full, I shall only add one thing more 
in a word, and that is this, that as our God did make this visible world, 
made it complete before ever he brought Adam into it, for whom it was 
made and to whom it was suited, so hath God prepared a glory in heaven, 
and he hath prepared it from the beginning of the world for his elect for 
whom it is appointed. In Gen. i. 1 it is said, that on the first day * God 
created the heaven and the earth ;' by earth is meant the confused chaos, 
the matter of sun, and moon, and stars, and men, and beasts, and fire, and 
water, and earth, and all. ' The earth,' saith he, * was without form, and 
void,' so that the matter of all those creatures we see with our eyes, they 
are called earth. And by heaven here, in this first verse, is meant that 
heaven above where the saints shall be for ever. And that it is so to be 
understood is clear in the text, for if you read the work of the fourth day, 
at the 14th verse, you shall find that God created the sun, and the moon, 
and the stars, which are the visible heavens, after he had created heaven 
and earth in the first day. And therefore, by heaven in the first day is 
meant the glorious heaven which God will bring the souls and bodies of all 
his elect unto when they are raised up at latter day. Now as he made a 
world for Adam afore he brought him into it, so he made heaven, that 
glorious heaven, the first day, and all the things in it (and what is in it we 
do not know) ; he made all these from the foundation of the world for his 
elect. You have a plain place for it. Matt. xxv. 34, ' Come ye blessed, 
inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the beginning of the world.' 
And if you observe the words, he tells us that this kingdom in heaven was 
prepared for us. Now read ver. 41, when he speaks of wicked men, whom 
he meaneth to throw to hell, that stood on his left hand, saith he, * Depart 
from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.' 
Mark the difference ; hell, my brethren, was not made primarily for men, but 
for the devil ; for he sinned and his angels. Now if Christ would have kept 
the proportion, he would have said, ' Inherit the kingdom prepared for the 
holy angels.' He doth not say so ; but he saith, ' Inherit the kingdom 
prepared for you,'' suited to you ; the things in heaven being made as 
primarily, if not more primarily, for Christ and the elect of mankind, than 



Chap. XI.] of their state by creation. 121 

for the holy angels, though hell was made primarily for the devil and his 
angels ; we do but go into what was prepared for them. But when we 
are carried into heaven, bodies and souls (for he speaks of the resurrection), 
we are earned to that place which was prepared immediately and primarily 
for us ; ' Inherit the kingdom prepared for you,' as much for you, and as 
primarily for you in God's intentions, as for the holy angels that were made 
in it the first day. That which I quote and allege it for is this, for it is 
pertinent to my scope, that as God did first make this visible world, and 
then brought Adam into it six days after, and when he came into it he 
found all things in it suitable to him, to that body and soul that God had 
made, so God, to whom all his works are known from the beginning, he 
made this glorious heaven the first day ; he then prepared it — they are 
called the things ' prepared from the beginning of the world,' Mat. xxv. 3-1 
— this heaven hath stood empty of the bodies of men, and doth to this 
day ; there is Christ's body indeed now, and some few bodies else, Elias, 
and Moses, and Enoch, who perhaps are there now in their todies ; but 
the shoal and the flush of mankind, whom all the things there are prepared 
for, and prepared from the beginning of the world, they shall not come into 
it till after the resurrection ; not bodies and souls they shall not till then ; 
and they shall find then that all things in that world are prepared for them 
as truly as all things in this world were made for Adam. And so now I 
have despatched the first thing, the excellency of Adam's body ; it lay in 
this, that he had a world prepared for him, into which he was brought at 
last ; so hath God prepared another world, heaven, even from the founda- 
tion of the world, which the godly, the elect shall, when they arise again, 
be brought into, and find all things prepared for them. What these are I 
do not know, for, as he saith in 1 Cor. ii. 9, ' Eye hath not seen, nor ear 
heard, what he hath prepared for them that love him.' And add to it that 
place, with which I will end this, 1 Peter i. 4, he saith, ' We have an 
inheritance incorruptible, undefiied, reserved in heaven for us,' ' ready to be 
revealed (mark the phrase, verse 5) in the last times, when we shall be 
raised up at latter day ; ' but prepared it is already, and God brings us 
into it at last, even as he did Adam at the last, when he had made the world 
and all creatures else in it. 

The second thing wherein the excellency of Adam's animal state of body 
consisted, I told you, was beauty. He had a native beauty, as I may so 
call it, an inbred beauty ; he needed no clothes, nor no such thing to set 
it out ; and in that respect you fixid, that though they were naked, and had 
nothing to adorn them, yet they were in a glory ; for when they had sinned, 
then they fell to shame by reason of their nakedness. Adam had a beautiful 
body, and so had Eve ; it is said ' he built the woman,' that expression is 
used. But yet all that beauty that Adam's body had, it is but a shadow 
to that beauty and that glory which Christ will put upon the bodies of his 
saints at latter day, upon these spiritual bodies here in the text. We no- 
where read that the beauty of Adam is called glory, but here we find it is 
called glory. Mark the expression in verse 43 of this loth chapter of 
the first to the Corinthians : ' It is sown in dishonour' (the body, namely), 
* it is raised in glory.' The word tjlonj here hath a special relation to that 
beauty, that excess of beauty, which God will put upon the bodies of the 
saints in heaven. You must know this, that in Scripture the excess of any 
excellency is called glory. We say that fire hath a light in it, but we do 
not call fire glorious ; but because that the sun hath an excess of light in it, 
we call the sun glorious. We rejoice in outward things, but if this joy doth 



122 OF THE CREATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK 11. 

grow to an excess, it is called a glorious joy ; as in 1 Pet. i. 8, ' We 
rejoice with joy unspeakable, and full of glory.' Thus whatsoever is such 
an excellency as super-excelleth, is in Scripture called glory. Now answer- 
ably the beauty of the body, in heaven, because it shall super-excel, it is 
called glory. When Christ saith of Solomon, that in all his royalty he 
was not like to a lily, the word we translate royalty is, in all his glory ; 
that is, take all the outward pomp and splendour of Solomon that his 
body was adorned with when he sat upon his throne, it was not like the 
beauty and the glory that is put upon a lily. I quote it for this, that 
glory it is taken for excellency of beauty. So likewise when he saith, 
1 Pet. i. 24, ' For all flesh is grass, and all the glory of man as the flower 
of grass : the grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away.' He 
calleth beauty there glory; so doth he here, 1 Cor. xv. 43, ' It is raised,' 
saith he, ' in glory.' If you would know how much the glory of the bodies 
of the saints in heaven slaall exceed the glory of what they have now, read 
verses 40, 41, of this 15th chapter: 'There are celestial bodies,' saith he, 
♦and bodies terrestrial : but the glory,' or the beauty, or the excellency, ' of 
the celestial is one, and the glory,' or the beauty, ' of the terrestrial is an- 
other.' And even amongst the celestials themselves there is a difiering 
glory : ' There is one glory of the sun, another of the moon, another of the 
stars. So also,' saith he, ' is the resurrection of the dead.' His meaning 
is this, that look how a clod of earth doth differ in glory from the sun or 
the moon, how the glory of a terrestrial body diflereth from a celestial, so 
doth the glory of the bodies of the saints in heaven difier from that glory 
that was put upon the body of Adam, he being in all his glory but an earthly 
man, as the text hath it. Take the beautifulest man or woman that ever 
was in the world, they have but the glory of a clod of earth, but of a 
terrestrial body, in comparison of that celestial glory that shall be put 
upon the bodies of the saints at latter day. And to shew the degrees of 
glory that shall be in heaven amongst the saints, comparing one celestial 
body with another, he saith, ' There is one glory of the sun, another of 
the moon,' &c. Now, when I opened the transfiguration of Christ, I did 
shew you then that Christ's * face did shine as the sun.' Now, in Mat. 
xiii. 34, he saith the same thing of all the saints : ' Then shall the right- 
eous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of the Father ; who hath ears 
to hear, let him hear.' Then, saith he; namely, after the resurrection, 
for of that, and of the day of judgment, he had discoursed in the former 
words. And they shall shine as the sun, saith he, although among them- 
selves there shall be degrees of glory, as in that place in the Corinthians 
even now quoted, one may shine as the sun, another as the moon, another 
as the stars, one in comparison of another. Jesus Christ will be as the 
sun, Paul and those eminent saints will be as bigger stars ; yet if you will 
compare the glory of the least of the saints in heaven with this sun, they 
shall all shine, saith he, as this sun ; and because Christ speaks a very 
high word, therefore he addeth (as usually he doth so), ' Who hath ears 
to hear, let him hear ;' for, saith he, it is a thing people will not believe, 
but it is true. 

Yea, my brethren, it is most certain that the bodies of the saints shall 
so shine as to put down or eclipse the glory of the sun ; that look, as a 
candle waxeth pale in the presence of the sun, or as the fire is put out by 
the sun shining upon it in the summer, so shall the bodies of the saints 
do. In Isa. xxiv. 23, ' Then the moon shall be confounded, and the sun 
shall be _^ashamed,' just as you see a candle looks pale, or as the fire 



Chap. XI. 1 of their state by creation. 



123 



draws in its own beams of light before the sun, ' when the Lord of hosts 
shall reign in mount Zion, and in Jerusalem, and before his ancients 
gloriously.' Now, although this place may not be meant of the complete 
fulfilling of the glory of tke saints at latter day, yet it is an allusion to it. 
This sun and moon shall be all ashamed and confounded ; and as a candle 
now appears before this sun, so shall this sun appear before that glory that 
shall be put upon the body of Christ, and upon the bodies of the saints. 

I shall only add this to it, that this glory and beauty (for indeed glory is 
but an excess of beauty), which shall be thus put upon the bodies of the 
saints, it shall not be of the same kind with that of the light of the sun ; I 
may very well and truly say, that the light of the sun is but terrestrial, but 
that is celestial, for it is the light of another heaven than what the sun is 
placed in ; therefore the Scripture doth not say that we shall have the 
light of the sun, but we ' shall be as the sun,' having no higher thing to 
compare it to ; and the reason is plain : for the light of the sun, it is 
indeed the light of fire, for upon the fourth day God created light, that is, 
the element of fire (for you shall find earth, fire, air, and water, created 
then), and he took that light, that fire, and crushed it, as I may say, 
together into one body, into one globe, put it into the body of the sun, and 
therefore it is but indeed the element of fire in the excess of it, in the 
strength of it, therefore the light of the sun heateth, fireth bodies ; but 
this glory of the bodies of the saints shall not do so, it is not of the same 
kind. The light of the sun it is but an elementary light, it is but fire con- 
globated and made condense and thickened together, it is but a natural 
light, and terrestrial light, whereas this is supernatural and heavenly, and 
therefore it is of a higher kind. And therefore, now in Phil. iii. 21, the 
text telleth us, that we shall be conformed not to the glory of the sun, but 
to the glory of the glorious body of Christ ; that look as the sun is the 
fountain of all that glory which the stars have, so shall our Lord and 
Saviour Christ's glory be of all the glory we have. It is, I say, a glory of 
a higher kind than that of the sun ; in Rev. xxi. 11, the new Jerusalem is 
said to have ' the glory of God upon it,' not the glory of the sun : and at 
ver. 23, ' It hath no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it, 
for the glory of God doth lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof.' 
That I quote it for is this, that the glory that is put upon the bodies of 
the saints, though it is likened to that of the sun, because we know 
nothing more glorious than it, yet it is a glory of another kind, of an 
higher degree, it is indeed the glory of God that is upon them : that as 
it is said of Christ in Mat. xvi. 27, that ' he shall come in the glory of 
his Father ;' therefore his glory will be an higher glory, a glory of another 
kind than that of the sun : so we shall have the glory of God upon us, 
and therefore a glory of an higher kind than what is in the sun, which we 
no more know now, than (as I have said afore) we know what the sixth 
sense would be, if God should say he would create one, or an object 
suitable to it. I have the larger insisted upon this second property, 
because I find that in Christ's transfiguration, the only excellency that he 
held forth before his disciples, when they saw his majesty, was the glory 
that did shine forth in his body ; ' his face,' the text saith, ' did shine as 
the sun.' j • +i, 

A third excellency in Adam's body, which I have mentioned, is tne 
healthful constitution that was in that animal body of his, and his being 
free from all injuries of weather or whatever else ; and therefore though 
he was naked, yet he felt no hurt ; but yet this I told you withal, which 



124 OF THE OEEATURES, AND THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

might lone his condition, that he stood in need of creatures, he depended 
upon sleep and upon meats. Bat now the bodies that God will put upon 
us at latter day, they shall depend upon none of all these ; and not only 
not depend upon sleep, and meat, and drink, and the hke, but they shall 
be free from any possibility of being injured by any thing. Adam, he 
might have been injured (though, as I have said, God had promised to 
keep him), if he had fallen off from an high place, his body would have 
been bruised as well as ours, for he was flesh and blood. But these spi- 
ritual bodies we shall have hereafter, they shall be wholly impassible and 
incorruptible. Adam's body, though it was healthful, and should not 
finally have decayed, if he had stood in innocency, yet it was subject to 
alterations ; the meat that he ate one day, it did evaporate in spirits ; 
be was subject to weariness, to expense of spirits, though he should not 
die ; but the bodies that God shall give us at latter day, they shall be 
bodies incorruptible, bodies raised up in strength. I will give you but 
those two places for it : the one is 1 Cor. xv. 63, ' It is sown in weak- 
ness, and it is raised in power,' or in strength ; and the other is ver. 53, 
' This corruptible must put on incorruptible, and this mortal must put on 
immortality ; and when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, 
and this mortal shall have put on immortality,' &c. Here seems to be two 
different things, between corruption and immortality. I shall express to 
you the difference thus : that thing is said to be immortal which shall not 
die ; but that thing is said to be corruptible, which, though it shall not die, 
yet may be subject to alteration. As, for example, it is said that the body 
of Christ in the grave saw no corruption ; the meaning is, there was not 
the least alteration in it at all, nothing tending to putrefaction, not the 
least dissolution of the humours in it. Now Adam's body, though it was 
immortal, yet it was not incorruptible, it was subject to alteration, there 
was an expense in it, it was subject to a corruption ; my meaning is this, 
it was not that to day it was yesterday, and the meat he ate went out in 
the draught, and the like. Hence, therefore, that he might live for ever, 
he had the tree of light to eat of, for to repair his spirits when they were 
worn. He was but flesh and blood, though he was immortal, and he was 
not able to have inherited the kingdom of heaven, for ' flesh and blood 
cannot inherit the kingdom of heaven,' 1 Cor. xv. 20. And the apostle, 
by flesh and blood, doth not mean original corruption, but, take man's body 
as it is mere flesh and blood, such as Adam had, it would not have borne 
it, to have the glory of heaven put upon it ; that glory would have sunk 
him, it would have killed him. Now the saints at latter day shall not 
only have bodies immortal, but incorruptible ; that is, they shall have 
bodies which shall be subject to no alteration, they shall have no expense 
of spirits, though they shall be employed about the highest objects. The 
angels, they are not only immortal, but they are incorruptible, and they 
are able, unwearicdly active, day and night, without any expense of spirits 
for to serve God ; so shall the saints likewise be in heaven. Moses was in 
the mount (and he was a type of Christ and of us therein) forty days, and 
in all that time he neither did eat nor drink, he had no repair ; he had a 
glory upon him, and he had for that time an incorruptibleness upon him, 
for his eye was not weary with seeing, nor his ear of hearing ; his eye 
waxed not dim, no, not when he was old, much less when upon the mount. 
Incorruptibleness therefore is this, a continual vigour, such as is subject 
to no alteration whatsoever. In Kev. vii. 15, he saith, that * they shall 
serve God day and night,' as the angels do ; ' and they shall hunger no 



Chap. XI.J of tueir state by creation. 125 

moi'e, neither thirst any more ; neither shall the sun light on them, nor 
any heat.' The meaning is, they shall suffer from nothing. There is, 
1, no ^veariness, for they rest not day or night ; 2, there is no misery, for 
' all tears shall bo wiped from their eyes,' verse 17 ; there is, 3, no need 
of repairing of spirits, for ' they shall hunger no more, neither thirst any 
more ;' 4, there is no injury from anything without, for ' the sun shall not 
light on them' to hurt them, ' nor any heat.' And although this place is 
meant (as our best interpreters have shewn), of the state of the world to 
come, I mean of the kingdom of Christ, and so may fall short of the glory 
of heaven, yet it speaks in the language of heaven, and is an allusion to it, 
and heaven must needs be a higher and more glorious condition. My 
brethren, I take it there is this ditierence between the bodies of wicked 
men in hell, and the bodies of the saints in heaven. It is true, they are both 
immortal ; but yet the bodies of wicked men, they are corruptible, they do 
not put on incorruption ; that is, they are subject to all sorts of passions and 
of miseries, and fire can burn them ; and therefore let us take heed of hell ; 
they are as sensible of all sorts of miseries as now, only the power of God 
upholds them that they are immortal. But now the saints, their bodies 
shall not only put on immortality, but incorruption too. Adam's body, it 
was subject to corruption in this sense, it was subject to expense of spirits, 
to weariness, to sense from outward things, though he might be protected 
by the providence of God from such injuries as might any way hinder his 
happiness, but our bodies shall wholly put on incorruption. And so now 
that is a third thing, wherein I compare the state of Adam's body at best, 
with that state and condition the bodies of the saints shall have after the 
resurrection. 

I shall give you a fourth, which, I confess, might be implied in the 
other, and that is, immortality. I shewed you, when I opened the perfec- 
tions and state of Adam's body, that indeed his body was immortal, that 
is clear ; for death came in only by sin, as appears in Rom. v. 12, and 
Rom. viii. 10, 11, ' Wherefore, as by one man sin entered the world, and 
death by sin ; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.' 

* And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin ; but the Spirit 
is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of him that raised up 
Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead 
shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.' 
But yet, let me tell you this, that though Adam's body was immortal, yet 
it could have died, it had a principle in it that tended unto death. Now, 
in opposition to this, to shew you that his immortality is but a shadow of 
that that the saints shall have at latter day, do but look Luke xx. 35, 

• They which shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world, and the 
resurrection from the dead, neither marry, nor are given in marriage : 
neither can they die any more : for they are equal unto the angels ; and 
are the children of God, being the children of the resurrection.' Our 
Saviour Christ here, you see, speaks expressly, and in a way of clear dif- 
ference from that state of Adam. The words which are translated, ' neither 
can they die any more,' in the original they are, '/o/- they cannot die any 
more,' and so indeed they are to be read, and they are a reason of the 
former words, that therefore ' they neither marry, nor are given in marriage ' : 
*/o/-,' saith he, * they cannot die any more.' The meaning is this, they 
are put into an higher state of immortality than Adam had, for though he 
was immortal, that is, he should never have died, yet he did marry, and 
should have procreated children ; but, saith he, these are put into such an 



120 OF THE CEEATUBES, AJSD THE CONDITION [BoOK II. 

estate of immortality, as they shall not die, therefore (he bringeth it in as 
a reason) they shall no more mariT, neither be given in marriage ; they 
are not capable of such an estate, for they are immortal. And how im- 
mortal ? It is not only that they may Hve, or may die, and God will keep 
them for ever, but they cannot die, there is impotentia moriendi, plainly. 
And as their not marrying is brought in as a reason of the former assertion, 
60 Christ giveth two reasons why they have such an estate of immortality 
as Adam (take him at best) had not, for he applies it to that. First, saith 
he, ' they ai-e equal to the angels ;' and secondly, ' they are the sons of 
God, being the sons of the resurrection.' First, they are equal to the 
angels. Now it is certain, my brethren, that the angels being created 
immediately out of nothing, though indeed God may annihilate them, he 
may bring them into nothing again, yet they cannot die, they have not 
principles to be dissolved, they have not a form and a matter, a soul and 
a body that may be separated. All things created immediately out of 
nothing, they cannot die ; as now, take the soul of a man, because it is 
created of nothing, it is therefore immortal, as the angels are ; and there- 
fore our earthly parents are said to be the fathers of our bodies, and God 
the Father of our spuits, Heb. xii. 9. Now, saith Christ, the bodies and 
souls of those that shall be counted worthy to obtain that world, they shall 
both of them be put into that state the angels are in ; and in the same 
sense that the angels are said that they cannot die, in the same sense shall 
it be true of them, they cannot die neither ; and, secondly, they are the 
children of God, being the children of the resurrection ; that is, we have 
bodies of flesh and blood, and these bodies we have them from our parents, 
we are the childi-en of Adam. So the saints, as their souls are born again, 
so their bodies are, as it were, born again by the resurrection ; they have 
new kind of bodies, and therefore they are called the children of the resur- 
rection, and being children of the resurrection, having bodies now framed 
immediately by the power of God, which subdueth all things to himself by 
as great a work as he created at first ; hence it comes to pass that they 
are sons of God in a more transcendent manner than Adam was. And as 
the angels are said in a transcendent manner to be the sons of God, as 
immediately made by him, so these children of the resurrection may be 
said to be. Nowthen, being sons of God in this transcendent sense, in 
opposition to Adam, and in opposition to all mankind that are sons of men, 
being thus the children of the resurrection, their bodies being bom again 
by a new creation at the resurrection, hence, saith he, as God liveth of 
himself, and dieth no more, these are in this respect transformed into his 
image, that as he is immutable and unchangeable, so shall they ; he puts 
it as a reason why they cannot die ; for, saith he, they are the sons of God, 
and they bear the image of God in that very thing, that as he hath immor- 
tality, so they have immortality suitable thereunto. So that, I say, it is 
clear from this text, which is an evident text, and I confess I have won- 
dered at many of our divines who have handled this argument of the immor- 
tahty of our bodies at latter day, have not pitched upon this Scripture, for 
there is nothing more clear. He saith plainly they shall not die. 

I might add other properties which are usually mentioned in comparing 
the state of Adam's body and ours, but then I should be too tedious. I 
will only conclude with this. Our Lord and Saviour Christ in his human 
nature, the Godhead personally united thereto, quickened it ; he is there- 
fore said to be a quickening Spiiit. What is it shall quicken our mortal 
bodies at latter day ? It shall not be the Godhead personally united to us j 



Chap. XL J op their state by creation. 127 

but it shall be the Spirit of Christ, making our bodies his temple in a moro 
peculiar manner : 1 Cor. vi. 19, ' Your bodies,' saith he, ' arc the temples 
of the Holy Ghost who is now in you.' But then when he hath raised you 
up again, your bodies are to be his temple in a more immediate manner, 
ver. 14. In Rom. viii. 11, ' For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, 
they are the sons of God. If the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus Christ 
from the dead do dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall 
also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.' Ho 
saith of Jesus Christ, that he is a quickening Spirit ; the Godhead being 
personally united to him, quickened his human nature ; but so it shall not 
be with us. That is his prerogative alone ; but he hath put his Spirit, the 
third person of the Trinity, into us, who doth dwell in us ; and that blessed 
Spirit he shall quicken our mortal bodies, and shall not only raise them up 
again at latter day, but look what Adam's soul was to his body, that shall 
the Holy Ghost be to our bodies in a transcendent manner, though not by 
a personal union, yet by such an union as is between the human nature of 
Christ and the Holy Ghost. For, my brethren, though the Godhead of 
the second person doth dwell in a personal manner in the human nature of 
Christ, yet the Holy Ghost doth not dwell personally in him ; he is united 
unto the human nature but as he is unto us, and that Spirit thus dwelling 
in us he shall quicken, and advance, and raise up our bodies to that state 
and height as becometh the Holy Ghost (if he will take a temple up unto 
himself) to raise ^, our bodies up unto. He saith, 'the Holy Ghost shall 
quicken your mortal bodies ;' he doth not only speak of the first act of 
raising them, but in respect of spiritualising and glorifying their bodies, 
the Holy Ghost shall dwell in them, and shall make that God shall be all 
in all unto them. And so now I have finished this text, which only holds 
forth a comparison between the animal, the natural state of Adam's body, 
and the state our bodies shall have at latter day. 

I will but name an use or two, being loath to dismiss you without one- 
All this that hath been said hath been but to this purpose, to compare 
Adam's body, that had a world made for it, for the animal state of it, with 
the state our bodies shall have hereafter, which shall be made spiritual, and 
have objects suited to them in the world to come. You have seen what a 
state God will raise up our bodies to ; let us therefore abstain from fleshly 
lusts, let us get our souls to spirituaHse our bodies all we can while we are 
here, for it is that Hfe we shall certainly live hereafter. My brethren, our 
bodies can never be made spiritual here ; we are here in an animal state, 
we are in Adam's world, and we have Adam's image upon us, and we need 
meat, and drink, and sleep, &c., and must live upon those things which are 
necessary to this hfe ; but yet we may look upon ourselves as pilgrims and 
strangers, and we may go and spiritualise all these, because all these shall 
one day be spiritualised ; let us live the hfe of heaven here as much as we 
can, even in the use of all these outward things, because our bodies are 
ordained to such a spiritual condition one day. 

Secondly, Let those that do groan under weak bodies be comforted with 
the assurance of their being restored to a full vigour, health, and strength. 
The truth is, our bodies here, they do hinder us from a great deal of that 
very hoUness we might have ; for holiness cannot be had without taking 
pains, and there is no pains doth spend the spirits and lick them up more 
than intention upon God and spiritual things. And besides all hindrances 
•we have here, the very hindrances of these poor animal carcases of ours, 
which we have from Adam, hinder us as much or more than anything else. 



128 or THE CREATURES, AND THEIR STATE BY CREATION. 

And there is flesh and corruption that dwells in them, that inordinately 
carries them out to earthly things. Therefore let us ' groan,' as the 
apostle saith, ' for the redemption of our bodies,' whenas there will be no 
weariness, whenas all the suitableness that is now between earthly things 
and us will be done away ; we shall have new objects fitted for these bodies 
when made spiritual, that will no way hinder us from the vision of God, 
but rather fifrther us in it. Weakness and imperfections of our bodies now 
hinder us very much from holiness, and to build holiness upon our weak 
and frail bodies, it is as the building of an house upon a quagmire. Let 
us therefore groan after that time ; and in the mean season, let us sanctify 
God in our hearts to the uttermost endeavour, waiting for that redemption, 
when we shall have bodies that shall need neither meat, nor drink, nor 
sleep, nor refreshing of spirits, all which are now temptations and inter- 
ruptions to us. 



OF GOSPEL HOLINESS IN THE HEART 
AND LIFE. 



OF GOSPEL HOLINESS; 

IMPLANTED IN THE HEART, AND CONTINUED IN THE WHOLE 
CONVERSATION OF LIFE. 



BOOK L 

That graces and holy dispositions ivroiight in the soul are the springs and 
principles of evangelical obedience. — The Jirst streams which flow from hence 
are inward actions of our souls in holy thoughts, and a lively sense and per- 
ception of spiritual things, and a due apjyrohation and judgment of them as 
most excellent. — That our holiness ought to be sincere and blameless. — That 
our obedience ought to abound in all fruits of righteousness, and to continue 
■until the day of Christ. 



And this I pray, that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge, 
and in all judgment ; that ye may approve things that are excellent ; that ye 
may be sincere, and without offence, till the day of Christ ; being filled with 
the fruits of righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ, unto the glory and 
praise of God. — Philip. I. 9-11. 

CHAPTER L 

The words of the text explained ; wliat the apostle means by abounding in all 
knowledge, and sense, or judgment. 

This is one of Paul's prayers, several whereof we find dispersed up and 
down in his epistles, and they are put up to God for those he wrote to. 
The prayers of holy men are usually the utmost and choicest expressions 
of their graces — the drawings forth, or pourings forth rather, of their deep- 
est affections and desires, for things which the light of the Spirit in them 
judgeth to be most excellent. And the words of the text are the prayer of 
the apostle Paul, who was filled with the Holy Ghost ; and you see it is 
for holiness, and the increase of it. 

* This I pray,' &c. ; so he begins. You that have very holy hearts, if 
God should from heaven bid you ask some one thing, — as David speaks, 
• This one thing have I asked,' — it should be roZro, this thing, Paul prays 



132 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

for here, to be ' holy before bim in love.' That which concerning holiness 
he prays for may be reduced to three heads : 

I. Such graces and dispositions as are the inward springs, or primary 
essential principles, of holiness, which are three : 1. Love ; 2. Knowledge ; 
3. Sense. 

II. The next immediate consequents of these ; the next streams from 
these in their inward man are, that in their judgments (which is to rr/ifJ'O- 
viTiov of all both holy affections and actions) they might, 1. ' Approve of 
things most excellent ;' 2. ' Discern things different :' the words import 
either ; 3. That in their hearts they might be ' sincere.' These are inward. 

III. The third thing which the apostle prays for is, that holiness be 
perfectly, and all sorts of "ways, held forth in their lives : 1. Negatively, 
* blameless,' or ' without offence,' or ' without accusation,' as the word is 
used, 1 Thes. v. 23. 2. Positively, that they might be ' filled with the 
fruits of righteousness.' And yet, 3. Because it is not the outward appear- 
ance of fruit, bigness, colour, fairness, but the kind, the constitution, and 
rehsh of it that commends it, he therefore describes these fruits he prays 
for in the highest spiritualness of them. (1.) That they are such as are 
by Jesus Christ, which grow on that tree, and on hearts engrafted on that 
root. Paradise, no, nor the tree of life, knew none such ; that is, these 
are a more excellent kind of fruit than ever did or should have gi'own on 
Adam's heart. (2.) He describes them to be such fruit, which are imme- 
diately and eminently directed ' to the glory and praise of God,' that have 
Christ and union with him for their efficient, and God's glory for their end. 
And as the end makes the means lovely and desirable, so this great end of 
God's glory gives the relish to all the fruit that comes from us, since none 
other is fruit to God, as the apostle speaks, Rom. vii. 4, that is, for God's 
taste and acceptation. 

IV. The fom-th and last thing is, the extent and continuance of this holi- 
ness for the time of it. It is to be found in them, ' in the day of Christ,' 
or ' until the day of Christ.' 

These are the main branches that the bulk and body of this tree divides 
itself into ; and this is a gross view of what grows thereon. Let us but 
shake a little, and gather up what will easily and naturally fall. 

The 9th verse is such, that in it (as the psalmist says) * all our springs 
are found,' namely, the inward springs of true hoHness. I may call them 
springs, not without the apostle's allusion here : the word is msigoivrj, that 
it may abundantly flow, as fr-om a spring; so Musculus. In ver. 11 he 
useth the metaphor of fruit and a tree ; but here, of streams and of a 
spring. The principles of holiness in us are in Scripture compared to 
both, to a root from whence fruit grows (Gal. v. 22, 23, ' the fruits of the 
Spirit'), and to a fountain : John iv. 14, ' There shall be a well of water 
in him that believes, springing up into everlasting life.' 

1. Grace and love to God should flow naturally; springs do so. Trees 
must be watered (that metaphor is not enough expressive of the natural- 
ness of the workings of gi'ace), but springs flow readily ; 1 Thes. iv. 9, 
' I need not to write to you to love ; ye are taught that of God.' ' Out of his 
belly,' says Christ, ' shall these waters flow.' The inwards he calls the 
belly, which should have love in them, as the earth hath water in the 
bowels of it. 

2. In a fountain, as you take away, still more comes, and the faster it 
comes ; and thus as a spring retains not its water to itself, so love keeps 
nothing to itself, but it flows to the use and benefit of God and men. 



Chap. I.] in the heart and life. 133 

8. As fountains have their rise in hills, so this of love is first in God's 
heart in heaven : ' We love God, because he loved us first,' 1 John iv. 10. 
' It springeth up,' says Christ, ' to eternal life,' i. e., its original. Aqua in 
tantum ascendit, &c. 

I have done with the metaphor ; I come to the naked sense intended, 'in 
fiaXkov %at iJMKkov msiaarjri, ' may abound yet more and more.' It had 
abounded already; the love of the primitive times it abounded, as you read, 
1 Thess. iv. 9, 10. One rivulet remains of the former metaphor to convey 
this to us, which we have, John vii. 38, 39, ' He that believeth on me, as 
the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. 
But this,' says John, ' he spake of the Spirit, which they that believe on 
him should receive : for the Holy Ghost was not yet given ; because that 
Jesus was not yet glorified.' When Christ was now glorified, the graces 
of the Spirit were not brooks, but rivers ; he poured, not dropped, down his 
Spirit, and love made the greatest channel. Ecce qui diVujunt, was the 
common observation of the heathens, ' See how they love one another,' 
speaking of Christians. It held till TertuUian's time. Were there a cause 
concerned the common good of saints ? Their principle was, they would ' lay 
down their lives for the brethren,' 1 John iii. 6. Was it the cause of God? 
' They loved not [their lives to the death.' It is the character of Hhose 
Christians, Rev. xii. 11. Our springs are not only dried up, but turned 
back, as Jordan was ; the hatred among the saints abounds yet more and 
more, and is like to swell higher yet. Oh, my brethren, is not Christ yet 
glorified ? 

The apostle adds these words, * yet more and more.' To have said that 
it may abound, had an emphasis with it ; but he adds 'in, yet, and adds to 
that /xaXXov, more, and xa/ /MoiXXov, more still. God can never have enough 
of your love, nor you of grace. Paul that knew him thought so, and there- 
fore prayed so. Seest thou a spark of fire ; lay straw to it, and then add 
more fuel, it abounds more and more 3-ccording to its fuel. This whole 
inferior world will not be a sufficient prey for the fire one day ; it will 
melt the elements, as Peter says, yea, the heavens that now are it will con- 
sume. Such a thing is grace and love : all the excellencies in God are 
ordained to be the object, the fuel of it ; yet it can neither consume, nor 
be consumed,, but abounds still yet more and more. 

But why is love first ? Doth not faith and knowledge in order of nature 
go before ? You must remember (as I told you) he speaks here of the 
principles of obedience, and so love is the more immediate, for faith works 
by love. It is love (says the apostle, 1 John v. 3) makes all the ' com- 
mands not grievous.' ' Provoke one another,' says the apostle Paul, Heb. 
s. 24, ' to love and to good works.' Enkindle, stir up that principle, and 
then good works, as the flame, will arise. When Christ would move Peter 
to take pains for him and feed his lambs, and in doing so run through all 
the difficulties that attended an apostle's work and calling, what says he to 
him ? ' Peter, lovest thou me ? ' He says no more. And what says 
Peter ? ' Lord, I love thee.' It was enough between them two, to put 
him on to anything. Faith is indeed the only principle by which we deal 
with God and Christ for justification and communion with them ; but love 
is that which incites us to holiness and obedience. We are ' ordained to 
be holy before him in love ;' holiness riseth from love. Oh, therefore, get 
your hearts inflamed with the love of God ! 

The apostle farther adds these words, ' that your love may abound in 
knowledge.' Ordinarily men had need pray that their love might grow up 



134 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

to their knowledge ; but Paul here prays that their knowledge might grow 
up with, and to, their love. Usually men's knowledge is larger than their 
affections. It was, it seems, otherwise with these Philippians. There are 
usually extant these two sorts of Christians : affectionate, fond souls of 
Christ, but less knowing ; others more knowing, yet less passionate, though 
true Christians both. The primitive times give instances of both. The 
Corinthians were knowing Christians: 1 Cor. i. 4, 5, ' I thank God that in 
every thing ye are enriched in all knowledge and utterance ; ' but they were 
short in love. 1 Cor. viii. 2, 3, ' If any man thinks that he knoweth any- 
thing,' — he speaks home to them — ' he knoweth nothing yet as he ought 
to know. But if any man love God, the same is known of him.' And 
chap. xii. 31, they were for gifts : ' But yet shew I unto you a more excel- 
lent way.' And what was that ? Love. So in chap. xiii. 1, ' Though I 
speak with tongues of men and angels, and have not love,' &c., through- 
out. But to return to that chap. viii. 3, ' If any man love God, the same 
is known of him.' The speech carries the highest reproof with it ; it is as 
if he had said, You take care to get more knowledge, but God knows enough 
for you, if he knows you to be his. Take care to get more love, for ' if 
any man love God, the same is known of him.' And conform yourselves 
to God herein. God's loving of you is termed his knowing of you ; they 
are adequate, let them be so in you to him. 

But the Philippians and the Thessalonians were a more plain, sincere, 
affectionate sort of Christians, whose affections had been hitherto more 
than their knowledge ; he therefore prays that their distinct knowledge 
might grow up with their love — ' That their love might abound in know- 
ledge ' — and both grow together. As 2 Pet. iii. 18, ' Grow in grace, and in 
the knowledge of Jesus Christ ;' not in blind affections, but such which 
spiritual knowledge may stir up. What is grace ? It is bxxt knowledge 
concocted into the affections, to have suitable impressions, dispositions on 
the affections to the things known. 2 Cor. iii. 18, ' "We are changed ' (by 
beholding) ' into the same image.' 

3. The apostle adds these words, ' and in all sense,' %at 'rrderi aJcdrjgu. 
It is translated 'judgment,' but in the Greek, ' sense,' and so in your mar- 
gins varied. The apostle puts the emphasis here, saying, ' in all sense ' as 
the main, for it is such knowledge as hath sense added to. We are to 
inquire what is meant by sense, and why it is added to knowledge. It is 
all sense, let us therefore take in all senses may be given of it. 

(1.) Sense is here added to knowledge, to express the true nature of 
spiritual faith in two words, added the one to the other, which is elsewhere 
expressed by one single word. Faith, what is it ? A spiritual sense of 
spiritual things, or things excellent (as it follows in the text, Philip, i. 10). 
And the same apostle speaking of grown Christians, says, that they have 
' their senses exercised,' rd a'lG&nTrj^ia, Heb. v. 14. Though he speaks this 
indeed of grown Christians, that they have their senses exercised, yet he sup- 
poseth that as Christians they have the senses themselves, that is, the faculties 
of them ; and he says not sense only in the singular, as here (Philip, i. 9), 
but senses, making an allusion of the new creation of the spiritual man to 
the outward man ; for as the outward man hath divers organs and instru- 
ments of sense, so hath the new creation. That look as God made an out- 
ward world, in which are all sorts of objects, beauty, colours, sw^eet smells, 
pleasant fruits, so he placed in man's body ai6()rir7]^ia, senses suited to these, 
to take in the real comfort from these ; and there is no creature outward, 
but there is a sense suited to it. So he hath made an invisible world, with 



Chap. I.J in the ueart and life. 135 

variety of things spiritual, and that variety is but tho several appearances 
of himself; and in the new creature there arc suitable spiritual senses made 
to entertain them, and take them into tho soul. In the Scripture you find 
that there is no particular sense, but faith is expressed by it ; you have 
seeing and tasting in one verse : Ps. xxxiv. 9, ' Taste and see that the Lord 
is good ; ' and both put to express faith, for it follows, ' Blessed is the man 
that trusts in him.' To see God in his beauty and goodness, and in the 
heart and alTection, and to taste of that goodness (to which Peter alludes, 
1 Peter ii. 2), ai-e the acts of faith. Then, for hearing, I need not enlarge 
upon it. ' He that hath an ear, let him hear' with an inward ear, Eev. ii. 7. 
For men may naturally hear and see God's wonders, and yet not with a 
spiritual ear ; for, Deut. xxix. 3, 4, ' The great signs and miracles which 
thine eyes have seen, yet the Lord hath not given you eyes to see, and 
ears to hear, to this day.' But Christ gives another character of believers, 
when he says, John x. 3, ' My sheep hear my voice ;' that is, discern and 
distinguish his voice by an inward sense; for it follows, ver. 5, ' The voice 
of a stranger they will not follow.' As the ear tries words, says Job, so 
they by an instinct know the mind of Christ, 1 Cor. ii. 15, 16. Thus 
likewise as to smelling: 2 Cor. ii. 15, 16, ' We are unto God a sweet savour 
of Christ, in them that are saved, and in them that perish : to the one we 
ai'e the savour of death unto death ; and to the other the savour of life 
unto life.' We are, that is, our ministry ; he compares the effect of it to 
that of vapours or smells*. There are some vapours and smells that, as 
soon as they come into the nostrils, suffocate the spirits, strike dead, as in 
those famous caverns in Italy. Such are the threatenings of the gospel to 
a man that will not leave his lusts and believe, they are the savour of 
death, the occasion of his ruin ; and not only so, but his conscience (which 
is a principle suited to the threatening, as smell is to savour) smells the 
savour of fire and brimstone of hell in them, and he goes away with sense 
of condemnation unto him, for those courses he is resolved to go on in. 
But it is contrary to those that beheve and obey, for unto them this ministry 
is the savour of life unto life. Some smells recover men when in a swoon ; 
so do the promises quicken and revive men's souls by their scent from them. 
They send forth the perfume of heaven, of God's love and free grace ; it is 
the savour of life unto life. And as to feeling, which is another sense, 
what says the apostle? 1 John i. 1, ' What our hands have handled of the 
word of faith.' He speaks not of outward conversion, but inward, as ver. 3, 
* that which we have seen and heard,' &c., of that fellowship their souls 
had had with him, as seals on that of their senses. 

(2.) By sense is meant experience, as it is a distinct thing from faith ; 
for the apostle, Rom. v., after he had said, by faith a Christian hath peace 
with God, shews how faith is improved and added unto, through God's 
dealings with us : ' tribulation worketh patience,' and submission to God ; 
' and patience, experience.' So in such and such afllictions, after we had 
submitted to God, God came in and delivered or upheld with comforts, and 
thereby faith was strengthened against the next ; for ' experience breeds 
hope,' or confidence of God's carrying us on to life and glory, when we 
have found God faithful in relieving us, and sticking close to us in all sorts 
. of trials, and so it grows up to assurance (as hope is there, and 1 John 
iii. 1, taken in that sense). Now experience is an acquired knowledge in 
matters spiritual, founded on sense — a collection of conclusions from what 
we have the sense of, as all artists gather conclusions from experiments 
made. A man at first sets out to believe with faith barely founded on the 



136 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

promise; as suppose he relies on this, that God favours him and loves him, 
and will do him good, and that God is faithful in such and such promises, 
afore ever he sees any performance, a man believes this with spiritual faith, 
and a faith that hath sense in it. Take seeing for the reality of the things, as 
they He in the promise, and that God is the promiser. But afterwards look 
as God performeth in process of time any promises of his, there is then a 
sense of experience superadded, and a collection from thence of the truth 
of the promise. Ps. xli. 11, ' By this I know that thou favourest me, 
because my enemies do not triumph over me ; ' especially when withal I 
find, as it follows, that ' as for me, thou upholdest me in mine integrity.' 
A man believes that * there is a God, who is the rewarder of them that seek 
him,' Heb. xi. ; a God that judgeth the earth, and therefore comes to him 
as a God that suffers not the wicked always to prosper, but in the end 
heareth the prayers of his poor people. And the man hath learned this, 
first (as the psalmist says, Ps. Ixxiii. 17, 18) in the sanctuary, that is, out 
of the bare word. But having now believed this, he afterwards sees with 
his eyes a vengeance executed, as in Ps. Iviii. 10, ' The righteous shall 
rejoice when he seeth the vengeance.' He sees the vengeance by experi- 
ence, and so fi-om experience collects and strengthens faith anew, namely, 
in this great point of faith which follows there : ' A man shall say. Verily 
there is a reward for the righteous : verily there is a God that judgeth in 
the earth.' Thus also David, Ps. xxxvii. 34, ' Wait on the Lord, and 
keep his way, and he shall exalt thee to inherit the land : when the wicked 
are cut off, thou shalt see it,' that is, have experience of it. And David 
confirms this by his own instance, ver. 35, 36, ' I have seen the wicked in 
great power, and spreading himself like a green bay tree : yet he passed 
away, and, lo, he was not ; yea, I sought him, but he could not be found.' 
Thus promises brought home in trials and temptations breed experience : 
Ps. cxix. 50, ' This is my comfort in my affliction,' says he, ' for thy word 
hath quickened me.' Here is a conclusion, a trial of a receipt in time of 
malady, with a prohatum est from experience. And such was the experi- 
ence of a dying Chi-istian: ' Is there^not (said he) such a promise — I will 
be with thee in the fire and in the water? ' ' Yes,' said they that stood by. 
* Read, I pray ' (replied he) ; which done, ' Bear witness (said he) that I 
die, testifying that God is true in that promise to my soul,' which is the 
similar to that of David's, ' This is my comfort in my affliction,' &c. Thus 
in hearing a man's prayer, what a world of experiments hath an experienced 
Christian. The whole 116th Psalm is a record of it, and so likewise the 
18th Psalm : ' In my distress I called upon the Lord, and cried unto my 
God : he heard my voice out of his temple, and my cry came before him, 
even into his ears.' And how it doth set heaven and earth on work, the 
rest of that psalm shews ; and therefore, as David learnt himself by experi- 
ence, so he teacheth others : Ps. Ixvi. 16, 17, 19, ' Come and hear, all ye 
that fear God, and I will declare what he hath done for my soul. I cried 
unto him with my mouth, and he was extolled with my tongue. But verily 
God hath heard me ; he hath attended to the voice of my prayer.' Thus 
by experience we know our own graces, and ' things given us of God,' as 
1 Cor. ii. and the 119th Psalm throughout shews. And ' Oh how good is 
it to draw near to God ! ' says David, upon a taste and experiment of it, 
Ps. Ixxiii. 28. Of grown Christians we say, they are experimental Chris- 
tians ; and those that were babes, the apostle describes such to be umipoi, 
such that have no experience ; whereas a grown Christian hath * his senses 
exercised to discern both good and evil.' Such an one discerns the difi'or- 



Chap. I.] in the heart and life. 137 

ence of things readily, not from reason, but skill that hath been contracted 
from the sense of experience. Thus of Christ it is said, * that he learned 
obedience by the things he suffered,' Heb. v. 8. Take a man that hath 
naturally a wise head, and the grain, the current of his understanding lies 
and runs that way ; yet if such a man hath been further versed in the 
world, and hath been tumbled and tossed up and down therein, and hath been 
used to business or affairs of state, &c., he will have an experimental 
acquired wisdom added, if not to increase, yet to confirm all those principles 
naturally engrafted in him ; and through both these a man proves a wise 
man indeed, as Solomon throughout did. 

Thus Christ our Lord, though his manhood was furnished with all sorts 
of abilities, principles of faith and knowledge spiritual, yet God did put this 
great scholar to school, to learn (says the apostle, Heb. v. 8) knowledge of 
this other kind. And the schoolmaster he sets him to was patience, which 
breeds up experience, as the same apostle saith, Rom. v. 4. The school 
was obedience, that so he might have sense added to his faith and know- 
ledge. The heart of Christ had an ocean of love natm-ally flowing in it, 
and yet he must learn mercy and pity to us, in a way of sense, as it is 
said, 'inasmuch as he also was tempted,' Heb. ii. 18. And this is the 
meaning of that passage in the 10th verse of that chapter, ' He was made 
perfect through sufferings.' God would have his eldest Son educated in 
all sorts of faculties and learnings (whose type was Moses), that so he might 
be perfect ; and therefore he ran through all courses as we mortals run 
through, that he might be perfect in all sorts of experimental knowledge ; 
and especially because sufferings teach most compendiously, he was there- 
fore made perfect through sufferings. And as use, we say, makes perfect, 
so did experience him ; and thus as to us (as the apostle says, Heb. xii. 11), 
' Afflictions bring forth the peaceable fruits of righteousness, to them that 
are exercised therein.' The word exercised is the same that is used in that 
forementioned Heb. v. 14, concerning our senses being exercised ; and it 
is a metaphor taken from the knowledge that is obtained in schools, whether 
either of arts and sciences, through exercising themselves therein, as 
fencing, grammar, &c., by performing such exercises whereby youths grow 
up to such a perfection. The same word we have again, 1 Tim. iv. 7, 
' Exercise {yv/xm^B) thyself to godliness ; ' that is, get such a skill by per- 
forming the exercises of it as scholars at school do ; run through all sorts 
of duties, as scholars do thi-ough all sorts of forms (which seeing the Holy 
Ghost so often alludes unto, to express the practical part of godliness 
hereby, it is unsavoury to call, as some do, the set performance of such 
holy duties, forms, and tasks) ; but, says the apostle in direct opposition 
to these, they diligently run through all parts of piety, which will procure 
an exquisite knowledge by experience, which is equivalent to sense here 
in the text. So then when the apostle here prays they might abound in 
all sense, his meaning is, they might run thi-ough all courses of godliness, 
and be carried through all the varieties of God's dealings and dispensations, 
all sorts of trial of graces on their part, and performance of promises on 
God's; that so, having tried all conclusions, they might be perfect Chris- 
tians in experimental knowledge, even in all sense. 

(3.) By sense he means deep and glorious impressions on the soul, over 
and above the Hght of faith or knowledge by ordinary experiences ; and 
such impressions are truly rather sense than knowledge, as all find that 
enjoy them; and they are therefore said to 'pass knowledge,' Eph. iii. 19, 
and are entitled, ' the peace of God which passeth understanding,' Phil. iv. 7. 



138 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

And the same is hinted Rom. v. 5, G, ' Patience breedeth experience, and 
experience hope : and hope maketh not ashamed ; because the love of God 
is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, which is given unto us.' 
A man had before by faith peace with God (thus ver. 1), but now he comes 
to have experience with hope or assurance from the love of God shed, not 
manifested or apprehended by knowledge so much as shed, whereof the 
subject is said to be the heart rather than the understanding ; and this is 
that which Christ promiseth, John xiv. 21. And this the primitive Chris- 
tians more generally enjoyed : 1 Peter i. 8, ' Whom having not seen, ye 
love ; in whom, though now you see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with 
joy unspeakable, and full of glory.' Thus were those Peter wrote to, 
and so were the Philippians and Romans, as you heard ; as for the 
Thessalonians, the word ' came unto them in much assurance, and joy in 
the Holy Ghost,' 1 Thes. i. 5. And this high and heavenly sense and 
enjoyment the apostles used to pray for in behalf of those they wrote to. 
Thus Paul for the Romans, Rom. xv. 13, ' Now the God of hope fill you 
with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope, through 
the power of the Holy Ghost.' And Peter exhorts those Christians he 
wrote unto to maintain and not to lose this ; for having said, 1 Peter i. 8, 9, 
that they had been filled (as at conversion, or soon after ordinarily) with 
joy unspeakable and glorious, he exhorts them (chap. ii. 2, 3) that they 
would keep up that sense and taste, even as new-born babes ; he would 
have them, though men in understanding, yet always to be as babes in 
their appetites and tastings of the love and goodness of God, and if they 
wanted it, to cry for it. 

Use 1. Hath faith and the new creature these senses joined to and 
implanted in them ? Then may a Christian, if it be not his fault, lead the 
most sensual life (pardon the expression) of any creature. For as God 
hath made a world for sense, so God hath prepared Christ, and all things 
spiritual to the new creature. You see what pleasures are in the visible 
world, which the senses let in ; but the soul is able to drink in more at one 
draught in a moment than all the senses can let in, or the world afford us in 
ages. Now, what the world is to the body, that God and Christ are to the 
soul. Of this sense the Psalmist speaks, Ps. xxxvi. 8, 9, * They shall be 
abimdantly satisfied with the fatness of thy house ; and thou shalt make 
them drink of the river of thy pleasures. For with thee is the fountain of 
life : in thy hght shall we see light.' He instanceth in those senses of 
sight, and taste, and the objects thereof, which bring in so much pleasm-e 
to the body. 

Use 2. See the reason why the same truth meditated on, or conferred 
on, or heard again and again, to hearts prepared to relish spirituals, still 
afiects with a new and fresh sweetness. If our souls only entertained, and 
took them in by bare knowledge, 'it would not be so ; but faith, containing 
all the senses in it, hence, if we receive them by faith, a fresh and rich 
pleasure springs out of them. 

Use 3. See the reason why faith hath the greatest certainty of know- 
ledge about its objects of any other knowledge. The philosopher says, 
Se7isus non falUtur circa j)rnprium objection : the senses are not deceived 
about their proper objects (due circumstances and proportions of distance, 
&c., being obsei*ved), and that the speech of Christ confii-ms it. When 
the disciples thought Christ to be but a spirit, he appeals for the final 
determination to two senses, seeing and feeling ; for, says he, ' Hath a 
spu-it flesh and bones as I have ? ' Now, faith hath not one only, but all 



Cn.\J>, II.] IN THE HEART AND LIFE. IHO 

tho senses conjunct with it, and implanted in the nature of it ; so far, 
therefore, as we believe, we arc certain of tho object, the reality, the exist- 
ence of it, though of our interest therein we may be doubtful. 



CHAPTER II. 

The imcarcl effects of an holy disposition and temper in the soul are an abilitij 
in the understandinri to discern, jmhje of, and approve spiritual thinrjs, and 
a sincerity in tho heart, incUniny a man to ivalk in God's ivays ; what it is 
to be sincere and icithout offence. 

The inward fruits and effects that flow from a principle of holiness, and 
do constitute and form such an habitual frame of spirit as may practically 
fit a man to walk holily, are next to be considered, and they are two : 

1. In the understanding, an ability to discern upon all occasions tho 
difference of things, and upon an act of discretion choose and approve what 
is best ; or (as the words may be varied) a judgment to discern of the 
excellency of things in the ways of religion, what is more excellent than 
other, and to approve of and cleave thereto. 

2. In the heart (' that ye may be sincere,' which respects walking), a sin- 
cerity to incline and direct a man in his way, to keep him so as not 
to turn to the right hand or the left, and to preserve him from stmn- 
bling and falling from his course ; and therefore it is joined here with 
d'TT^oaxo'Troi, which signifies both those that walk without wandering from 
their scope, their mark,* which in their course they are bound for, as also 
that are void of ofience, or stumbling, or giving occasion to others so to 
do ; and therefore I added, which practically fit a man to walk holily. 

1. In the understanding there are holy principles : s/g rh hoxiijA^m to, 
diap'sPovTot,. Both words here used have an amplitude, a comprehensiveness 
in them. I will open each apart, and fit them each to the other, and all 
to the thing in hand. 

(1.) It signifies to try and discern the difference of things from their 
counterfeit or contraries — a word taken from goldsmiths, as the use of 
the word in 1 Peter i. 7 evidently shews, where he speaks of the 
trial {do-/.i,(Mm) of faith, which is ' found more precious than gold, though 
tried with the fire' (the goldsmith tries gold and metals either by the 
touchstone or by the fire). And in an allusion to this metaphor, it is 
applied to a discerning the difference of doctrines, whether about things to 
be done or believed : 1 Thes. v. 21, * Prove,' or try, ' all things.' He had 
spoken of prophesying in the words afore, in which ordinary gifted men 
being not infallible, might mingle verisimilia, errors like truth, or dross 
and corrupt doctrine with truth, he exhorts them 8orj/j^d^siv, to try, or 
prove, and so hold fast what is good. 

(2.) It imports, withal, an approving in judgment of what is good, a 
savouring, relishing, closing with and cleaving to the goodness of it as good 
and best for him. Thus, Rom. xii. 2, 3, ' Be renewed in your mind, that 
you may prove what is that good, that perfect will of God ' (it is the same 
word), not only to discern the will of God in its truth from falsehood in all 
the latitude and perfection of it (as David speaks, Ps. cxix. 97, ' I have 
seen an end of all perfection, but thy commandments are exceeding broad'), 
but to approve it. There is a vastness and variety of duties commanded, 
* Metaphora sumpta ab iis qui aliqiio contendunt. — Beza. 



HO OF GOSPEL HOLINESS fBoOK I 

sins forbidden ; and to discern those, especially the spiritual part of them, 
•which is the perfection that gives the acceptation, this no man can do 
but by being renewed in his mind ; but farther, so as withal to prove and 
close with the goodness of that will of God in each particular thereof, to 
like it, relish it, savour it (as Rom. i. 28 the word is used), under this 
consideration and respect, that it is acceptable to God, as well as perfect in 
itself; yea, and also as good, yea, best for a man's self that is to do it, 
and all this out of a suitableness : this, to be sure, is found only in and 
from a renewed mind. And thus in that former place, 1 Thes. v. 21, this 
word hoy.ifia^iiv is to be understood, ' Try and prove all things, hold fast 
what is good.' There is, you see, 1, a discerning the difference, prove or 
try, joined with holding fast, or cleaving to the mind of God as good, as 
good for me ; that if I were to make my own statutes I would live by, 
it should be those and no other which I find revealed in God's word. Ps. 
cxix. 127, 128, ' Therefore I love thy commandments above gold, yea, above 
fine gold. Therefore I esteem all thy precepts concerning all things to be 
right ; and I hate every false way.' The expressions are as full as full 
may be : I esteem, I love, yea, I esteem thy precepts out of love to their 
suitableness ; therefore I esteem them because I love them, and all and 
every one of them, and that concerning all things, as they direct me in all 
and each circumstance of my ways, as they concern any part of my life, 
oppose my dearest lusts, or cross my strongest desires. And not content 
with this, he expresseth it by his hatred of its contrary, * I hate every 
false way.' 

As these are the two imports of the word doxi/Ma^iiv, namely, both, 1, to 
tiy, and 2, to approve, so suitably the other word, which here expresses 
the object of these acts, ra oia(pl^o^Ta, translated ' things that differ,' is 
such a word, and so industriously singled out, as answers to both, clasps 
in with both ; for it signifies either, 1, ' things that differ,' and so yokes 
well udth ' to try or discern,' the object of which is the difference of things. 
2. They are ' things that excel,' and are more excellent, and so yokes with 
the other import, to ' apj)rove as best,' or most excellent. I need not give 
you an account of the first, that o/apl^oi/ra signifies things that differ, 
abtd(p(i^u, are things indifferent. But for the second import of the word 
take Luke xii. 7, ' Ye are of more value,' of more excellency in God's 
esteem, * than many spaiTows.' Yet it is the same word that is used here. 
So likewise when it is said, 1 Cor. xv. 41, that ' one star differs from another 
star in gloiy ;' that is, excels another. We say of things more excellent, 
compared with things less, that there is a great deal of difference. Christ 
' obtained a more excellent name,' oia^po^uiri^ov. So then let us take up the 
apostle's meaning, as it comprehendeth both these senses. 

1. He prays their understanding may be so habited with spiritual judg- 
ment and sense upon all occasions, whether of proposals of doctrines to 
them, matters of controversy, wherein there is an aptness to deceit, through 
a likeness, that yet when they see reasons on this side and on that side, 
they might be able out of sense to say, This is truth ; that they might dis- 
cern truth from falsehood, and approve it ; or in matters of practice, in all 
turnings of their lives, or cases of conscience, they might quickly discern 
and judge what they were to do, to see and say. This is my way ; and that 
they might know this clearly, so as not to be deceived, but so as to walk 
comfortably, as knowing they are doing the will of God. And this is one 
frame or constitution of spirit the judgments of God's people are clothed 
with. Of Christ it is said, Isa. xi. 2, 3, ' The Spirit of the Lord,' and ' a 



Chap. II.] in the nEAUx and life. Ill 

Spirit of wisdom and understanding,' as the fruit of that Spirit,' should 
' rest on him,' and he should be of ' quick understanding in the foar of the 
Lord'; that is, he should be quick-eyed, nimble-sighted, to discern the dif- 
ference of things ; and answerably every Christian is made more or less a 
sagacious creature. He receives wisdom in matters doctrinal, prudence in 
matters practical, Eph. i. 8, Col. i. 9, a skill to know at the instant how 
to walk, which all the notional knowledge in the world cannot stamp on the 
mind ; for that is not ad mamim at every turn when a man is to act, but a 
practical skill is needful. If a scholar had learnt all the art of.'fencing in 
all the postures of it, and had the rules imprinted on his fancy, yet a fencer 
brought up to it hath a skill beyond him, a sagacity impressed through use 
on his eye, his hand, to spy out every advantage. Such a practical art in 
discerning a man's way doth the Holy Ghost stamp on the judgment of a 
man regenerate, which no use nor learning can ever enable unto. Then 
again, apply the use of this word to a discerning a ditierence in things. 
When a man is turned to God, how is this fulfilled in him ? He is enabled 
to see a strange difference, as in things and persons both worldly and 
spiritual, so in the ways of men, and in the difference of ministers. When 
a man is unregenerate, he is darkness, and to men in the dark color omni- 
bus laiits, all coloui-s are alike. Morality and natural devotion in men go 
for grace and hoHness. Glow-worms shine as well as stars, but when a man 
is converted, ' the darkness is past, and the true light shineth,' as John 
speaks. And then he discerns and knows, as the same John says, 1 John 
V. 19, that * we are of God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness.' The 
Scriptures afford a thousand such instances. And all this the regenerate 
man discerns by a kind of sense and infused sagacity. For the farther 
increase of such light doth the apostle here pray ; for as this increaseth, so 
like-wise hohness increaseth in the heart and Ufe. 

2. He prays that their judgment might be so habited as to close with, 
approve, savour the goodness and excellency of things spiritual, according 
to their several degrees of excellency as best for them ; that they might 
approve the excellency of spiritual things in comparison of things and persons 
worldly, and answerably esteem and value Christ and all his excellencies, 
so as to give up all for him, as Paul did, Phil. iii. 8, ' I account all things 
as loss and dung, for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ.' And thus 
Peter speaks, * To you that believe he is precious,' 1 Peter ii. 7, whenas all 
disobedient ones refuse him. To such a man the saints of God are the 
excellent ones of the earth, as they were to David and Christ, Ps. xvi. 
Likewise the things of the law are excellent things, as the prophet speaks, 
and accordingly are valued by such a man. And he so values them as to 
choose these as best, and best for him. Ps. cxix. 30, * I have chosen the 
way of truth, thy judgments have I laid before me.' I have deliberately 
viewed and considered them all, and as deliberately chosen them, and that 
as my heritage to live upon ; ver. Ill of that psalm. 

3. Besides approving in common the excellency of things spiritual in 
comparison to earthly and carnal, the apostle's meaning is of their approving 
among things spiritual those that are most excelling. Our apostle praying 
for grown Christians, as these Philippians were, the aim of his prayer was, 
that among those more excellent things they might still more and more, as 
he had spoken of abounding, approve of what was most excelling. In those 
primitive times, though there were not several forms of religion, and all of 
them acceptable to God, as some have dangerously spoken, for there is but 
one God, one faith, one baptism — which latter is by a synecdoche put for 



142 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

all other instituted ways of worship — yet according to the several degrees 
of light there were in some churches and persons further and more excellent 
attainments ; and in this regard it is he prays for these PhiUppians that 
they might be heightened to the approbation of what was most excellent, 
that they might abound in knowledge, love, and sense, so as to embrace 
and pursue after of all other what was most excellent, by perceiving the 
comparative different excellency that was between spiritual things. Acts 
xviii. 25, 26, you read of a man of God, ApoUos, who was ' instructed in 
the way of God,' and one that was ' fervent in spirit,' that taught and 
' spoke diligently the things of the Lord,' yet ' knowing only the baptism 
of John.' You read likewise, chapter xix., of certain disciples that were 
true Christians, and have that testimony given them, both here in the story 
of ApoUos, chapter xviii. 27, and also in that succeeding chapter xix. 1-3, 
&c. ; and these had all been instructed in what was fundamental, for even 
John had taught them that * they should believe on him who should come 
after him, that is, on Christ Jesus, so ver. 4, who yet, ver. 2, are said ' not 
to have heard so much as whether there be any Holy Ghost,' that is, either 
in those his gifts which accompanied the profession of Christ, as risen and 
ascended, or perhaps because they were not struck with any special inten- 
sive apprehension of it, to take up their heedful regard to him ; yet it was 
accounted sufficient that they and he believed on Christ. And therefore 
Aquila and Priscilla took ApoUos, as Paul also those disciples, and instructed 
him, as it is said, more perfectly, or ' expounded unto him more perfectly 
the way of the Lord,' Acts xviii. 26. It was not teaching him a new way, 
but in a way of superstruction of what he knew before. What says the 
apostle, 1 Cor. iii. 11 ? * Other foundation can no man lay than what is 
laid,' and, as you see, was unto them laid, even Jesus Christ ; and yet, 
says Paul, ' I shew you a more excellent way.' Take the apostles them- 
selves : there were many things which they could not bear ; their weak 
stomachs would have cast them up again. John xvi. 12, ' I have yet many 
things to say unto you, but you cannot bear them now.' And that them 
now refers to an after time, in which they should ' receive a Spirit of truth,' 
ver. 13. To the apostles there was a double coming of the Spirit, as to us 
and them there is of Christ, The one secret, when he regenerated them, 
as of Christ when he stole into the world unknown : John i. 10, 11, ' He 
was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew 
him not. He came unto his own, and his own received him not.' The 
other coming of the Spirit is, when he comes as a comforter : John 
xiv. 20, ' And in that day,' says Christ, ' you shaU know that I am in the 
Father, and you in me, and I in you.' As you see an instance of attain- 
ing things more excellent in the apostles themselves, and ApoUos, and 
those at Ephesus, so you may see the like in the Corinthians, 1 Cor. ii. 6 
and 1 Cor. iii. 1, 2. The apostle is bold to distinguish and put diflference 
between them that are perfect, and- what he taught unto such, and the 
Corinthians themselves he wrote to. Of the first says he, * we speak 
wisdom among them that are perfect,' so chap. ii. 6 ; but as for the other, 
vou read what he says, chap. iii. 1, 2, 'And I, brethren, could not speak 
to you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in Christ. 
I have fed you with milk, and not with meat : for hitherto ye were not 
able to bear it, neither yet now are ye able.' Nay, after he had written 
and almost concluded that epistle (that I may bring it to the very language 
of the text), 1 Cor. xii. 31, he says to the same Corinthians, 'And yet I 
shew unto you a more exceUent way.' 



Chap. II.] in the heart and life. 143 

This I insinuate, 1, to shew how remote those are from this primitive 
spirit, that would include all within their circle, and that circle must be 
what a whole nation, yea, churches of nations, agree upon, as if there 
wore not room still for something more excelling, built on the former 
foundations ; though indeed to destroy or alter principles fundamental, is 
to destroy the church universal, both that which is now on earth and hath 
been. But soberly compare these instances (if there were no other) with 
the attempts and principles of this and the former times, and let none of 
us exclude himself out of Paul's prayers ; that is, of professing ourselves to 
be in a capacity still to approve of things more excelling than j'^et we do ; 
and let us pray to God daily to deprive us of no manifestation of himself 
which saints in this life are and have been capable of. 

The only observation (besides those which have been insinuated and 
scattered as I have gone along) I centre on, is from the coherence of those 
words, ver. 9 and ver. 10, ' That your love may abound yet more and 
more in knowledge, and in all judgment ; that ye may approve things that 
are excellent ; that ye may be sincere and without offence till the day of 
Christ :' i!g rb boxiij^d^nv, to the end you may approve, &c., and it is this. 

Obs. That the readiest and speediest way for any or every Christian to 
come to discern and judge aright of things that differ (as matters of doc- 
trine controverted, cases of conscience, and also of ways that are more 
excellent in religion) is this, that they abound in love, knowledge, with all 
sense, as was explained. This observation is natural from the words ug 
rh doxifid^uv, ' to the end you approve,' &c. Take sense here in all the 
senses I have mentioned ; for faith, as it hath all senses annexed to it and 
found in it, Heb. v. 14, seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling, so faith con- 
duceth to the discerning of things spiritual, which are not taken by reason 
only, but by a spiritual sense joined thereto: Job xii. 11, 'Doth not 
the ear try words, and the mouth taste its meats ? ' which conjunction and 
comparison signifies, that the discerning of truths is as discerning by the 
taste. The understanding, as made spiritual, is the palate of the soul : 
' The spiritual man discerneth all things,' 1 Cor. ii. 15. The word (p^ovuv, 
put for wisdom, is savouring ; and says Job, Job vi. 30, ' Cannot my taste 
discern perverse things ? ' He appeals to sense for things that are grossly 
perverse, as a man by taste discerns his meat if it be stale or corrupted. 
Peter's judgment having a vitiated humour overflowing it, hereupon says 
Christ, ' Thou savourest not the things of God,' Mat. xvi. 23. My 
brethren, the regenerate part hath all truth and goodness originally wrought 
and interwoven into the temper and constitution of it, itself is nothing but 
truth and goodness; and so all spiritual things are but prepared (as 
1 Cor. ii.) or suited and fitted for it, and so thereby a Christian hath a 
great predisposition to judge of doctrines and practices. This suits, or 
this suits not, says he, with the regenerate part ; and however, though 
that is not the sole determiner (for then there would be no want nor need 
of reason or others' teaching), yet when reason hath done all it can, if this 
neither approves nor relisheth, there is a bearing off, a not closing with 
what is propounded. 

Or if we take sense for experience, as it is superadded to faith, Eom. v., 
this is an help to judge. The apostle speaks, Heb. v. 14, of strong meat. 
The strongest truths are suited to be digested and taken in by those that 
have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil. He speaks of 
experimental Christians trained up in temptations and cases of difficulty ; 
whereas one (as afore) that is unskilful in the word of righteousness (the 



144 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

word in the margin is, hath no experience) will be able to digest only milk. 
A man discerns in things spiritual the difference, not by argument merely, 
but by aim, that he presently says, This is crooked, that is straight; as a 
merchant's taste who is used to wines, or an experienced apothecary 
judgeth of drugs, and as jewellers judge even by sense of jewels. Or if we 
take sense for extraordinary impressions from communion with God and 
sense of his love in the heart, these mightily enable and guide a man, con- 
firm him, and lead him into truth. How come men to discern ci^oXov ya?.a, 
'the sincere milk of the word' ? 1 Pet. ii. 2, It follows, 'If so be you 
have tasted,' says he, 'that the Lord is gracious.' Infants discern the 
sweetness of their milk by sense, not reason. I cannot dispute, but can 
die for the truth, said the holy woman martyr. Thus John exhorts them 
to communion with God the Father, shewing this as one privilege of it, 
that being pre-informed therewith, he tells them, chap, ii., 'Ye have 
received an anointing that teacheth you all things ;' not that they needed 
not teaching, for then why should he have written to them against them 
that seduced them ? but he recalls them in those words unto that principle 
which would exceedingly further them in judging of truths ; even as Paul 
in the case of justification by works bids them but to have recourse to the 
thoughts they had at conversion, when they were first humbled for sin — 
Did you then trust in your works for salvation ? — this was enough to con- 
fute that wicked opinion. ' This persuasion came not of him that called 
you,' says Gal. v. 8 ; and so chap. iii. 2, he appeals to experience in the 
same or like question to decide it : ' This only would I learn of you, 
Eeceived ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of 
faith?' 

Lastly, to grow up in love. Working by faith is the shortest way to 
know God's will. There is a blessing of God that guideth such a man : 
John vii. 17, 'If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine, 
whether it be of God, or whether I speak of myself.' And David con- 
fii-ms it: Ps. cxix. 98-100, ' Thou, through thy commandments, hast made 
me wiser than mine enemies ; for they are ever with me. I have more 
understanding than all my teachers : for thy testimonies are my medita- 
tion. I understand more than the ancients, because I keep thy precepts.' 

Having shewed you what it is to approve the things that are excellent, 
I come in the next place to explain to you what it is to be sincere. 

1. Sincerity is opposed to what is counterfeit. Thus the apostle joins 
sincerity and truth together, 1 Cor. v. 8. That then is sincere which is 
genuine, which is right, which is true, as when we say. This is true gold. 

2. Sincerity is opposed,* also, to that which is void of mixture. Thus 
sincera, in the Roman language, is sine cerd, without wax mingled. We do 
not huckster the truth, saith Paul, we do not mingle it with false wares, 
but as in sincerity, 2 Cor. ii. 17. Sincerity there is opposed to mixture. 
Now then, apply it to grace. A sincere heart is, as the apostle calls it, a 
ti'ue heart, an heart genuinely holy. Heb. x. 22, ' Let us draw near with 
a true heart,' true to God, faithful to him in all things, as David is said to 
have been. A sincere heart is a sound heart, 2 Tim. ii. 22, an heart that 
hath a principle of life and health in it, which works out all mixture of ill 
humours, and purgeth itself from all filthiness of flesh and spii-it, and 
mingleth with no sin, in the constancy of a man's course. He keeps him- 
self that the evil one touch him not, as sound, pure wine bokes, and seeks 
to cast out the scum. 

* Qu. ' applied ' ?— Ed. 



Chap. II.] in the heart and life. 145 

3. Sincerity signifies tliat which may be brought to the sun ; so in 2 Cor. 
i. 12, ' We have had our conversation in this world, not in fleshly wisdom, 
but in godly sincerity,' or in the sincerity of God, ilXr/.^mia ©joD, that is, 
whereof God is witness, which may be brought to him, be held up to the 
sun, and be judged to be such, according to that of Christ, John iii. 21, 
' But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made 
manifest that they are wrought in God.' 

4. But sincerity hath a peculiar relation to walking with God (as the 
word shews with which it is joined, a-Poffxcro/, without stumbling in his 
way, for that word is properly used only of the feet), and so it importeth 
a sound constitution of spirit both towards God and the commandments 
of God in walking with him, &c. (as David expresseth it), being upright in 
the way : 1 Kings ix. 4, ' If thou wilt walk before me' (speaking to 
Solomon), * in integrity of heart, and in uprightness, to do according to all 
that I command thee, and keep my statutes and my judgments,' &c. 

5. But sincerity implies more particularly these two things : 

(1.) A right intention aiming at God. It is therefore called the sincerity 
of God in that 2 Cor. i. 12, and it is opposed there to fleshly wisdom, 
whereby a man seeks to bring the world and religion together. No (saith 
the apostle) ; I aimed at God sincerely, and that is the testimony of my 
conscience. In that 2 Cor. i. 12, he joins with it simplicity. Now in 
Mat. vi. 22, that which the apostle calleth simplicity, Christ there calleth 
singleness. * If thine eye be single,' saith he ; it is the same word. Now 
Christ his aim and scope is evidently in that place to speak of sincerity of 
intention in aiming at God, and in throwing out worldly ends ; for he 
speaks it in relation to a sincere purpose of not serving two masters. Men 
think to compound with both, to have the world and religion too . No, saith 
he ; God will have all ; he thafserveth him must serve him singly, and his 
eye must be single. And because Christ spake of the aim and intention 
which guides the whole conversation, therefore he adds, ' If the eye be 
single, the whole body is full of light.' For a sincere intention is to direct 
the whole man in his walking, as the eye doth the body in acting ; if this 
intention be kept single, a man will not err. John vii. 18, He who seeks 
his glory that sent him (viz., God's), the same is true, sincere, and upright, 
and there is no unrighteousness in him, he having nothing to bias him, or 
to make him swerve. And then take sincerity for such a temper of heart 
as can come to the sun, and abide the light of it ; he who thus sincerely 
aims at God's glory * comes to the light' (as Christ says), John iii. 21, 
' that his deeds may be manifest that they are wrought in God,' and for 
God, because such an heart can bear all that the word says. 

(2.) It notes out a bent of will to all the commandments that he knoweth 
to be such. I shall only name but one place : Ps. cxix. 112, * I have 
inclined my heart to perform thy statutes alway, even unto the end.' In 
such an inclination of heart that is thus constant to all the commandments, 
lies sincerity. 

Which sincerity ariseth, 1, from a love to God and his commands ; 
therefore the apostle prayeth that they may abound in love. 2. It ariseth 
from a sense and taste that a man hath of the sweetness of God (through 
communion with him), and of that which he finds in his commands ; he 
tasteth how good God is, and how good the word is. ' Oh how I love thy 
law !' says David. And 3, it ariseth from knowledge ; for, as David says 
in Ps. cxix. 30, ' Thy judgments have I laid before me,' therefore (saith he, 
verse 128) * I esteem all thy precepts concerning all things to be right, 

VOL. VIT. K 



146 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

and I hate every false way ;' as he also saith in the 112th verse. Eead 
that whole psalm. I may style it a mirror of sincerity. As the Holy 
Ghost hath used the penmen of Holy Writ to utter divine truths scatteredly 
and apart, so some more special subjects he hath been pleased to write set 
treatises of. Thus Solomon's Song is of Christ and the church, and his 
Ecclesiastes is of the vanity of all things. Thus John wrote an epistle of 
an union with God, and Jude wrote another of false teachers ; and so David 
wrote this psalm of sincerity and the characters of it, and accordingly he 
begins, ' Blessed are they that are upright in the way of God.' And this 
is called the integrity of God, as to give one instance concerning the meanest 
service done to God : Eph. vi. 5, ' Servants, be obedient unto them that 
are your masters according to the flesh, in singleness of your heart, as unto 
Christ ;' that is, aiming at him, even as if you served the Lord Jesus, and 
as if he bid you do everything. And do this, ' not with eye-service, as men- 
pleasers, but as servants of Christ,' * doing the will of God from the heart,' 
* with good will doing service, as to the Lord and not to men.' I instance 
in this, to let you see how a sincere heart works towards God in one par- 
ticular condition and part of obedience, that you may understand what it is 
to be sincere in any other part, be it recreation, or whatever work God sets 
thee about. All these put together make up this integrity, this sincerity, 
this right frame of spirit towards God and his commands, that here the 
apostle prays for. This is that which Job saith he would not part with, 
that though he was not able to answer God one of a thousand, that is, if 
he came to actions and thoughts, yet for this frame of spirit, saith he, ' till 
I die I will not remove my integrity from me,' and let me be weighed in 
an even balance, that God may know my integrity. 

It remains that we explain what it is to be without offence. It is to walk 
without stumbling, as the word signifies. The place in Acts xxiv. 16 
(where the same word is used) openeth it : ' Herein do I exercise myself,' 
saith Paul, * to have always a conscience void of offence towards God and 
towards men ;' that is, that I might not sin against light in my inward 
converse before God, or outward before men, grossly and willingly against 
light ; for otherwise in all things we do oflend, as James saith. And cer- 
tainly Paul to the day of his death lived so, for we find no sin against light, 
either in his epistles or in the story of the Acts recorded of him, but 
rather the conti'ary. Elsewhere also you have it explained ; as in Luke 
i. 6, it is said of Zacharias and Elizabeth, that they walked blameless in 
all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord ; that is, the precepts 
of the moral law, and also ordinances of worship. You have the like 
phrase 2 Cor. i. 8, 1 Thess. v. 23, that you may be preserved blameless, 
aiMifi'TTToi, without reproof or accusation, or just cause of it ; sine querela, 
without just cause of complaint by men, 1 Peter iii. 16 ; or of Satan, 
1 Tim. iii. 7, and v. 14, who is called the adversary and the accuser. Rev. 
xii. 10. But he hath not power to accuse in such cases where the believer 
walks without offence. 

To be without offence is to be air^oaxo'xoi. Ugoffxavrj is put properly to 
signify the errings, mistreadings, stumblings and bruisings of the feet in 
walking.* As afore in that of sincerity, the intention of the mind signified 
therein was compared to the eye, so this hath allusion to the steps. I 
shall make up the full comprehension of what this word holds forth, by 
what offences I find in the New Testament the word is applied to. 

1. Heedfully to avoid all such footsteps and ways before others, as may 
* 'AffgoVzo'To/, proprie £t/ mbuv, metaphoric de aliis. — H. Stephanus. 



Chap. II.] in the heart and life. 147 

induce them to sin, or wo know may prove an occasion to others of stumbling, 
or that edify them in their corrupt principles, — this is to be drpoSKO'roi, or 
void of offence in walking. Thus, 1 Cor. x. 32, uT^oax.o'roi y'msOs (the same 
word that is used here), ' be not offensive,' or be blameless ; give no scandal 
(the particular instance he was upon, was eating in the idol's temple), 
' neither to the Jews, nor to the Gentiles, nor to the church of God.' He 
reckons up all sorts of religion then in the world, to all which that one 
action would be an occasion of off'ence. The Jews would say, These men 
profess to worship one God as we do, and yet partake with idols, as we do 
not. The Gi-ecians would say. We may then lawfully sacrifice to our gods, 
for lo these Christians join with us in eating the sacrifices offbred up to 
them in the temples of our gods, which we (as they know) intend as a part 
of our worship and religion performed unto them. The church of God 
would be scandalised, 1, passively, in that religion was blamed for it, that 
it would allow men any kind of practices, though contradictory to the 
principles of itself ; 2, actively, that weak ones would and were thereby 
drawn and encouraged against the scruples of their consciences (to avoid 
persecution) to the like compliance, which also proved a step to apostasy 
in many. Thus when, by our footsteps and example, we invite others to 
follow us in evil, or give occasion to others to stumble, we are not a-ir^ltfs- 
Ko-TToi, blameless or inoffensive. 

2. To walk in any action contradictory to a man's own principles he profes- 
seth before others, is to be offensive, and not d>rgo(T;cocTog, in the apostle's 
sense. Besides what the foregoing instance contributes, that phrase which 
Paul applies to Peter and his companions in that case is the opposite to 
this. The word here, as was said, properly regards J-/' mduv, and is properly 
applied to walking, and but metaphorically to other things ; therefore, 
inoffenso j)ede; with an inoffensive foot, say some ; inojfeiiso cursu, others. 
Most fitly therefore doth that of Paul, Gal. ii. 16, explain it, when he 
charged Peter ' not to have walked with a right foot,' and that according 
to the principles himself professed ; therefore it follows, * and not accord- 
ing to the truth of the gospel,' that is, as the principles thereof, and those 
professed by a man's self, do require. This was Peter's apparent fault there, 
for he, of all the apostles, was the first that, by a revelation given in and 
warranted by a vision from heaven, was himself the first who had been 
taught not to forbear eating with Gentiles as unclean,' Acts x. 28, * Ye 
know,' says he, ' that it is an unlawful thing for a man that is a Jew to 
keep company, or to come unto one of another nation. But God hath 
shewed me that I should not call any man common or unclean.' That 
principle was, and had been, a partition- wall between Jew and Gentile, 
Acts xi. 3, &c., and so on in that chapter ; yea, and himself glories of it, 
as a peculiar honour vouchsafed him by God, in a public synod. Acts xv. 7 ; 
yea, and at Antioch himself practised it, and did freely eat with the Gentiles ; 
but when certain Jews came thither, he, for fear of them, separated himself, 
Gal. ii. 12. This was a contradiction so notorious and visible, and his 
example had such influence on others, and so justly off'ended them, that 
Paul could not forbear, but openly falls upon him : ' When I saw,' says the 
apostle, ' that they walked not with a right foot, I said to Peter, before them 
all,' that is, reproved him, for, ver. 11, * he was to be blamed ;' and so it 
comes home to the text, to explain it in the very phrase of it. 

3. As thus to be void of offence before men, so not to do anything con- 
tradictory to that light which a man's own conscience hath received to walk 
by, not between God and himself, is to be without off'ence. In this sense 



148 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK. I. 

also, Acts xxiv. 16, Paul useth the word, applying it to himself, so as we 
may understand his prayers for them here from his own principles in walk- 
ing, instanced in by himself: ' Herein,' says he, ' I exercise myself, to have 
a conscience void of offence towards God and towards men : ' d'j^ixr-A.o-Trov 
euvi'ihriGtv, it is the same word, * a blameless conscience,' nil conscire sibi. 
He says not only a blameless conversation, that others shall not be able to 
blame me, but a blameless conscience, not to men only, so as not to offend 
them, or give them cause of accusation, but before God also. Conscience 
is that principle which is the seat and principle of all that practical light 
which is to guide us in our walkings with God, and is the receptacle of all 
the guilt, or opposition to that light in any action of ours, which is refunded 
back into it. Now Paul's conscience had received in more light than any 
man's in the world, and had therefore the hardest task of it that any man 
ever had, to walk up to it, and needed the more diligence and study how 
to manage every action, and the circumstances of it (which is the greatest 
study of the two), that not only his outward conversation to men might be 
without blame or offence, his conscience bearing witness of that (as 1 Pet. 
iii. 16, ' Having a good conscience, that whereas they speak evil of you, as 
of evil doers, Ihey may be ashamed that falsely accuse your good conversa- 
tion in Christ'), but so as if you brought his outward walking to his con- 
science itself, and that conscience to God, the Searcher of hearts, he 
endeavoured so to walk, as that conscience might not have a spot, a dark- 
ness, a contrariety in actings of spirit, or converse, to that light which 
shined into his soul from God, no, not in his actings between God and 
himself. I follow this metaphor, because the apostle's parallel expression 
glanceth at it, 2 Cor. i. 12, ' For our rejoicing is this, the testimony of our 
conscience, that in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom, 
but by the grace of God, w^e have had our conversation in the world, and 
more abundantly to you-wards.' That hV^r/.^mia Qiov is a metaphor from 
bringing fine linen, as lawn, &c., to the sun, to view if there be any spots 
in them, by putting them between our eye and the sun. Now, saj'S Paul, 
so have I done, and so I do ; I hold my conscience (for of the rejoicing of 
his conscience he there speaks) to God, as to my sun and judge ; and I am 
not conscious, says he, no, not between him and me, of any action in my 
converse wherein I made an interposition, or cast a shadow against that 
light he hath seated therein to guide me. He brought his works to the 
hght of God in his conscience, to see whether they were ' wrought in God,' 
John iii. 21, for thus Christ speaks of him that doth the truth. Or if you 
will take it up in the metaphor used in the text, when a man, in all duties 
between God and him, as well as men, hath not dashed his foot against his 
light, and so is free from all bruises and wounds which his conscience 
would feel, and which a tender conscience easily feels, and which all men's 
consciences one day shall feel, when the heat of lust and pleasure of action 
are past and gone, it is then that man is without offence. This light of 
God in the conscience is, as Christ himself is said to be, ' a stone of stum- 
bling, on which if a man fall, it bruiseth or breaks him ;' and a sin against 
conscience is a dashing against it, a kicking against the prickings of it. 
But Paul professeth his religion to consist in two things : 1. For matter of 
faith and opinion, and way of worship, he confesseth himself a Christian : 
Acts xxiv. 14, ' After the way which they call heresy,' says he, * so worship 
I the God of my fathers, believing all things which are written in the law 
and the prophets.' And ' herein,' saith he, ver. 16, ' I exercise myself to 
have a good conscience.' The translation, ' I exercise myself,' is, methinks, 



Chap, III.] in the heart and life. 149 

a little too low and flat, for it doth not reach the higher emphasis of the 
words in the original, iv rovruj di aoxu, i.e., ' in this,' or ' unto this,' as the 
main study and design of my life and soul, ' do I give up myself, devote 
myself.' Those devout Christians were anciently called Ascetce, that gave 
up themselves wholly to God in contemplation and mortification therewith, 
and made it their business. And as Paul made this his study, so (as I take 
it by all that ever I have observed recorded of him) he made this his glory, 
that he never, after his conversion, sinned against his light, no, not between 
God and himself, which was rarely any man's glory before or since ; to be 
sure it was not Peter's. He had set that down as an excellency he affected, 
to keep his conscience a virgin pure ; and this made him so studious, and 
versed, and exercised in this point. Unto this, says he, I give all my study, 
meditation, aaxM, the best study in the world, for conscience unblotted is 
the best, 3'ea, only book in the world that will remain unburnt, and be 
opened and exposed, and we examined by it, at the latter day ; and when 
a man hath studied to get much knowledge, he is thereby (if he will be 
answerably holy) further and anew put upon a far greater and more exact 
study, exercise, and meditation ; and that is, how to walk up to the light 
of what he knows. And that this Paul made his glory, the Scripture every- 
where testifies upon all occasions : Acts xxiii. 1, ' And Paul, earnestly 
beholding the council, said, Men and brethren, I have lived in all good 
conscience before God until this day.' So 1 Cor. iv. 4, ' For I know 
nothing by myself, yet am I not hereby justified ; but he that judgeth me 
is the Lord.' It is as if he had said, I am not conscious to myself of any- 
thing, though I am not hereby justified ; that is, I do not say I am without 
sin (for we must accord Paul with John, who says, * He that says he hath 
no sin deceives himself), because God knows that sin in me for which I 
cannot be justified ; yet I have not to my knowledge in any action gone 
against my light. Also, 2 Cor. i. 12, he thus speaks, ' For our rejoicing 
is this, the testimony of our conscience, that in simpHcity and godly sin- 
cerity, not with fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of God, we have had our 
conversation in the world, and more abundantly to you-wards.' And 2 Tim. 
i. 3, 'I thank God, whom I serve from my forefathers with pure conscience, 
that without ceasing I have remembrance of thee in my prayers night and 
day,' And Heb. xiii. 18, ' Pray for us, for we trust we have a good con- 
science in all things, willing to live honestly.' This blamelessness himself 
having kept, he prays might be in these Philippians, and ought to be in all 
Christians, and possibly might be, for it was in Paul. 

CHAPTEE III. 

What is meant by these words in Philip, i. 10, * until the clay of Christ.' The 
different significations of those j^hrases used in Scripture, ' unto the end,' 
and ' until the day of Christ.' 

The next words to be considered in the text, Philip, i. 10, are these, 
' till the day of Christ.' 

I should come next, according to the order of the division of the text 
given, to the positive part of holiness, ' being filled,' &c. ; but these words 
cominw in between, I had rather handle them as the Holy Ghost hath placed 
them. And indeed, these words come in in the midst between both, and 
so appertain in common to both, and that as to this sense and purpose, 
both, * that you may be without offence until that day,' or ' in that day,' 



150 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

and also, * that ye be filled with the fruits of righteousness in and at that 
day.' This is inserted as a matter of greatest moment, both, 1, in itself, 
as a necessary requisite, that holiness in us be continued until that day 
without interruption, and also crowned with perseverance. And also, 2, in 
that relation which holiness hath unto that day, or the stead which in that 
day it will stand us in ; that day is the special time and season which holi- 
ness and blamelessness is Jordained and serves for, the day when it will 
stand us in most stead, and shine in its greatest lustre. Which therefore, 
3, we should have most in our eye, as a great incentive to abound in it, 
that in and at that day we may be found to have been blameless, that in 
and at that day we may appear filled with the fruits of righteousness, &c. 

Now, 1st, to clear this phrase itself, as the words refer to that first import, 
being blameless until that day, there is a difficulty hath often presented 
itself to my thoughts which I will endeavour to assoil : why the apostle 
should not rather have said in his petition, till the day of death ; but still 
almost everywhere in his epistles, should mention the day of Christ. Now 
that he should assign that day to bear the date of his prayers and consola- 
tion to expire at, not extending his petitions to that eternity after that day, 
it looks as if he supposed, even after death, some danger to remain until 
that day, which after that day they are for ever free from, and after which 
they would not need any such petition, but were secure for ever. 

1. Some make the foundation of these and such like phrases to be, that 
Paul was of the mind and opinion that the day of judgment would fall out 
in his and their days. And that this was his opinion they allege other 
like expressions that seem to look that way, 1 Cor. xv. 51, where, speaking 
of the judgment-day, he says, as in the person of himself, and them of that 
age, ' we shall not all die, but we shall all be changed ;' why did he not 
rather say, they then living shall not all die, but he says, ive, &c. And he 
again utters himself in like manner, 1 Thes. iv. 17, ' Then we which are 
alive and remain, shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to 
meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we ever be with the Lord.' And to 
the same purpose (say they), he supposing that Timothy might live to that 
day, it was that he says, 1 Tim. vi. 4, ' That thou keep this commandment 
without spot unrebukable, until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ.' 
All which is further backed with that of Christ's speech, ' Watch ye ; you 
know not what hour;' &c., 'and what I say to you, I say to all.' He 
speaks not as* if he would have those his disciples then living and present, 
to apprehend the day of judgment might fall out in their time. 

But (1.) on the contrary, it seems evident that Paul did think and judge 
that the day of judgment would not be in that age, and that therefore this 
is not the import of this and the like phrases. And to that end compare 
we but his speech in two epistles to the same persons, the Thessalonians : 
in the first of which he maketh the same prayer that is here, 1 Thess. v. 
23, he prays for them in the same style that here : ' I pray God your 
whole spirit, and soul, and body be preserv^ed blameless unto the coming 
of our Lord Jesus Christ.' Yet again speaking to the same persons, 
2 Thess. ii. 2, he exhorts them ' not to be troubled, neither by spirit, nor 
by word, nor by letter as from him, as that the day of Christ is at hand.' 
That one particular enumerated, not by letter, sufiiciently cuts ofi" any 
expression in his former epistle written, to import so much, and therefore 
cuts off too that fore-mentioned prayer, to keep them blameless to that day. 
And this reason is the same by which we may argue the like even in these 
* Qu. ' speaks as ' ? — Ed. 



Chap. III.] in the heabt and life. 151 

latter days, that this day cannot fall out in this age, because there is yet 
so much business to bo done in the world, for which there is express pro- 
phecy unfulfilled, as it will ask more than the time of an age : ' For that 
day (2 Thess. ii. 3) shall not come except there be a falling away first, and 
the man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition.' And so we may say, the 
ten kings must destroy the whore, and the Jews be called, and the whole 
earth be filled with the knowledge of the Lord, ere that day come. As 
therefore, as he says, so say I, they deceive you that tell you so ; and for 
those phrases, ' We that are aUve,' &c., they are easily solved. He con- 
siders the succession of Christians in all generations as one body and com- 
munity, in distinction from all others reprobated, and accordingly says, we 
shall not all die. 

But (2.) in the original, the word translated until, is not a'/^>i, as at the 
6th ver., nor j^'^xi'' ^^ ^ Tim. vi. 14, but it is i!;, which is often put for sv, 
and so signifies m that day, as 1 Cor. i, 8 ; h rfj r,/j,i^a, in the day of 
Christ, and 1 Thes. v. 23, kept blameless, h -zaso-jsia, in the coming of 
Christ ; and so it is all one as to say, in, at, or against, that day — a day 
for which holiness is mainly designed, when blamelessness and holiness will 
be at the highest value, and of more use to you than at all times else. And 
so there may be an observable difference made between the phrase he had 
used in the 6th ver. of Philip, i., where, expressing his confidence that God 
would perfect the work he had begun, he says manifestly, until the day of 
Christ, a^si. For the perfection of glory (whereof grace is the founda- 
tion) is not till then and there both in body and soul accomplished ; but 
here in 1 Thes. v. 23 it is, ' that you may be blameless, in or at the day 
of Christ.' And in this sense wicked men are said to treasui-e up wrath 
ev rfj ri/MB^a, ' against that day of wrath,' Rom. ii. 5 ; so it is there trans- 
lated, and might be here. 

There is only one place, 1 Tim. vi. 14, hath /A2%f/, rintil: ' That thou 
keep this commandment without spot, unrebukable, until the appearing of 
our Lord Jesus Christ.' But the answer to that one place is ready and 
easy, and carries a great truth with it. Paul wrote to Timothy as an evan- 
gehst, who being set over churches in that age, when churches were to be 
constituted, to set them in order, they accordingly received directions from 
the apostles according to Christ's institutions ; yet so as their ofiices ceasing 
(which, whether they did or no, I will not here dispute), the same direc- 
tions were intended to all ordinary officers of churches settled. Now then, 
in speaking to him, he in him speaks unto all saints and officers betrusted, 
how to guide and govern churches in the ordinary way unto the end : 1 Tim. 
iii. 15, ' That thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in 
the house of God.' To instruct all saints and ofiicers betrusted with the 
government of churches to the end of the world, and to shew he intended 
the succession of officers and Christians in what he wrote to Timothy, he 
gives him, and in him them, warning of what should fall out in several 
successions at the latter days of the church: ' 1 Tim. iv. 1, 'Now the 
(Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some should depart from 
the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils ;' wherein 
he forewarns them of the apostasy of popery, which fell out in the latter 
days, the middle age of Christianity, when Paul and Timothy were dust. 
He speaks here too of carnal protestants, that have a form of godliness; 
and he speaks too of all that fry of errors that should infest the churches ; 
from all which his counsel is to turn away and separate from them, ver. 5. 
I allege these places for this, that he speaks to Timothy, as bearing the 



152 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

person of them that should come after him many hundred years (as Peter 
also did in receiving the keys), and so that charge, 1 Tim. vi. 13, is not 
barely personal, but to others after him to the end of the world ; and so he 
might well lay a charge /■/•s^f , ' loitil the day of Christ,' and the ' command- 
ment' there is all the doctrine in that epistle, where church institution and 
rules for worship and government take up a great part. Thus ' command- 
ment' is taken for the whole doctrine delivered : 2 Pet. ii. 21, * For it had 
been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than after 
they have known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto 
them.' Thus also in chap. iii. 2, ' That ye may be mindful of the words 
which were spoken before by the holy prophets, and of the commandment 
of us the apostles of the Lord and Saviour.' And the truth which I said 
this explication carries with it, is this great and manifest one ; that church 
institution for worship and government contained in that and other epistles 
(I say other also, for who shall put the difference of these in this, from 
those in other epistles ?) are the commandments of Jesus Christ, the charge 
of which lies upon the churches of God to the coming of Christ. Similarly 
unto the style of which injunction here in Timothy, Paul elsewhere speaks, 
when he says of the great ordinance of the Lord's supper, ' ye shew forth 
his death till he comes ; ' and Christ answerably gives forth his promise, 
reaching to the same date that Paul's charge doth. And as he speaks to 
the saints under Timothy's name, so Christ under his disciples' names 
speaks to all others: ' Go, teach and baptize' (synecdochically put for all 
outward administrations) ; ' I will be with you to the end of the world.' So 
then ordinances and the command for them continues to the end. This 
we have only gained by the way, to give an account w'hy /J'i/Ji, u7iiU, is 
used in that passage, more especially as noting out the whole continuance 
of time till the day of judgment, w^hich yet is not in these other passages 
of Paul's prayers, which are rather to be understood of being kept blame- 
less in the day, and in the coming of Christ. 

But a third satisfaction to the objection mentioned is, that if the reading 
be retained until, iJg for usque ad (as Beza explains it), as noting the con- 
tinuance of their being preserved all the time until then (which, because the 
word may signify, I would take in), yet for the thing itself, both phrases 
come all to one, as in the reality of the event ; and it is all one to say, to 
be kept till the day of death, or till the day of Christ. And this intei7)re- 
tation two places do warrant : the first is Rev. ii. 10, ' Be thou faithful 
unto the death, and I will give thee a crown of life,' which manifestly 
argues that the faithfulness which is continued until death hath an imme- 
diate reward of a crown of life, and is completed then, so as to admit no 
addition of flowers to that crown by any faithfulness after ; for only so 
much as till death is rewarded, and no more accounted. And thus Paul 
reckons his account finished, his computes perfected at death : 2 Tim. iv. 7, 
' I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the 
faith.' When I come to die, there is an end of, a finishing of all, unto 
which any degree of glory is accounted ; when I come to die, I shall have 
done my part, I shall have finished my course. As for that to Xoi'tov (which 
we translate 'henceforth'), that remainder for ever after, that noway lies in 
me, it is God's part, I shall have done all mine ; nothing remains but for 
him to give me a crown of life. So then to be kept blameless to the day 
of death, as it is enough for our parts, so it is all one with this here, until 
the day of Christ. The second text is 1 Cor. i. 8, ' Who shall confirm you 
unto the end, that ye may be blameless in the day of om* Lord Jesus Christ.' 



CUAP. rV.l IN THE HEAKT AND LIFE. 153 

Here is both the one and the other mentioned together, to that sense which 

1 have given ; for to confirm to the end, is to the end of our lives ; and if 
we are so confirmed till the end of our lives, we shall be blameless in the 
day of Christ. For such we shall be found at the latter day, as we were in 
our lives to the day of our death. And thus it is necessary to distinguish 
these two phrases, to the end, as meant of death, from that other, as of the 
daij of Christ, for else it had been a tautology, when yet the latter is made 
the end of the former ; and the reason why yet these two are one in the 
issue and reality and event is, because as the tree falls it lies, qualis hinc 
exit, talis Judicandiis in isto die, there being indeed no account to arise 
from all that passeth between the day of death and this of judgment ; for, 

2 Cor. V. 10, we are to be judged only for what the soul doth in the body : 
' For we must all appear before the judgment-seat of Christ, that every one 
may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, 
whether it be good or bad.' The account is not for what is done out of 
the body, which is alike common both to wicked and godly men, to those 
that have done good or evil ; and therefore Paul, Heb. ix. 27, makes no 
more between, but that it is appointed for all men to die, and after this the 
judgment ; and he speaks of the general judgment, for it is brought as a 
parallel instance, to prove Christ's coming the second time, as it foUoweth 
there, ver. 28, • So Christ was once otiered to bear the sins of many : and 
unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time, without sin 
unto salvation.' 

But if the question be asked why, since these two phrases, ' to the 
end,' and ' to the day of Christ,' come both to one sense in reahty, he 
should choose rather and more frequently to use this latter, ' till the day of 
Christ' ? the answer is, Because holiness is of more concernment to us 
at that day than at all times else ; therefore he contents not himself here, 
nor also, 1 Cor. i. 8, to have said, who shall confirm you to the end, viz., 
till death, but adds also, in the day of Christ. 



CHAPTEK lY. 

How we may be said to he kept blameless until the day of Christ. 

Thus much touching the difficulty in the phrase ; there is another remain- 
ing in the thing itself, which is concerning the blamelessness, or being void 
of olfence ; how both in this and other places, as 1 Cor. i. 8, 1 Thes. 
V. 23, the promise included in these prayers, to present us blameless in 
that day, is to be understood. For men shall be presented such as they 
were in this life ; and in this life in many things, as James says, we offend 
all ; and many of the saints after conversion run into scandals and offences 
to others, and their own consciences. How then are such prayers and pro- 
mises fulfilled ■? 

To this an antinomian would be ready to give an easy answer with 
respect to their principles : that all this is accomphshed in justification ; 
because Christ shall present us then to himself and his Father, clothed 
with his righteousness, we shall be spotless and without wrinkle. But the 
blamelessness of the saints here, and in other the hke places at that day, 
is not that of justification, but sanctification. 1. For here he speaks of sin- 
cerity, ' being filled with the fruits of righteousness.' 2. And elsewhere, 
1 Thes. V. 23, ' The God of peace sanctify you wholly, that your whole 



154 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

soul and body be preserved blameless at the coming of Christ.' It is spoken 
of sanctification, you see ; and as so taken, I find it sometimes uttered (1.) 
as an absolute promise which God undertakes to perform, as well as that 
the saints shall persevere ; 2. sometimes as a prayer for, and exhortation 
to, us to be found as such, so here. And the several consideration of either 
will answerably afford a double distinction of blamelessness, even of sanc- 
tification intended in this and the like places. 

1. We find absolute promises annexed to the prayers he makes for 
their being kept blameless to that day, that God will perform it : 1 Cor. 
i. 8, ' Who shall also confirm you, to the end, that ye may be blameless in 
the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.' And that it is an absolute promise the 
9th verse shews : ' God is faithful, by whom ye were called into the fellow- 
ship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord.' And in more absolute terms yet, 
1 Thes. v., you have heard how he prays, even as here in ver. 23; and 
yet, verse 24, it follows, ' Faithful is he that calleth you, who also will do it.' 
He first engageth God's faithfulness, and then doubles the assurance, * he 
will do it,' yea ' also do it,' as sure as he hath called you. Yea, and it is 
such a promise as shall be performed unto all saints called, small and 
great ; for the promise is founded upon a consideration, that in common 
holds true of all the saints, ' faithful is he that calleth you ;' and all saints 
are saints by calling, in the same 1 Cor. i. 2. Of necessity, therefore, 
such a blamelessness, of that latitude and size, must be understood in these 
places, as is a common privilege to all saints that ever were, or shall be, 
and common even to those that have run into offences, as many of those 
he wTote to also did. And to interpret this only of that perfect sanctifi- 
cation, wrought just at the parting of soul and body, is too dilute ; because 
Paul prays and exhorts, and accordingly promiseth from God, that during 
the whole com-se and time of their lives they be so kept, even blameless. 
There is therefore, brethren, a blamelessness and sincerity in the saints, 
some especially, in respect of all that vacuity of aU sorts of offences, such 
as in the sense the word was interpreted. But in respect to those prin- 
ciples and laws which the state of gi-ace is bounded with, and men pre- 
served in that state, notwithstanding such particular ofi'ences, there are 
certain principles which are essential to the being and keeping of us in the 
state of grace, as that a man should live in no known sin, but live in the 
constant practice of known duties, seeking the glory of God in all. The 
apostle John hath everlastingly stated such principles as the bounds, the 
limits between both estates : 1 John iii. 7, ' Let no man deceive you ; he 
that doth righteousness is righteous, even as he is righteous.' He speaks 
not of particular acts ; wicked men may do some things righteous, and 
godly men do things that are evil. But his to/s/V, is a man's course, work, 
business, to go on in an ill track, as the devil from the beginning. Another 
like principle^ Paul inculcates, Piom. xiv. 7, 8 : ' None of us lives to him- 
self, but to the Lord ;' that is, maketh God's glory the end of his coui'se 
and ways. This is a fundamental maxim of our lively, they are none of 
us that do not ; we own them not, nor will Christ own them. To be kept 
then to the practice of these and such hke, is radically and essentially 
necessary to the being kept in the state of grace. Again, if a man falls 
into particular acts of sin through temptation, wherein a Christian ofi'endeth 
his own conscience or others, an essential law to the being kept in the 
state of grace is to return and convert, humbling themselves, renewing their 
repentance, as Peter did whose faith was recovered. ' I have prayed,' says 
Christ, • thy faith fail not.' He wept bitterly, repentance was renewed, 



Chap. IV.] in the heart and lu'e. 155 

and he loved Christ more than ever : ' Lord,' says he, ' thou knowest I love 
thee.' Now then, as in respect to such principles as these there is a blame- 
lessness, a being void of ofl'ence according to the rules of the gospel, whenas 
in respect of acts there is not a blamelessness in conversation, this is 
such a blamelessness as that perfection of heart is said to be in David,* 
1 Chron. xxviii. 9, and in Asa all his days, 2 Chron. xv. 17, though with 
a nevertheless (as there) of many foul acts, the particulars of which you may 
read in chap. xvi. It was a comparative perfection, taking their whole 
course and summing up the account of all their days, as it is there said ; 
yea, and further, when in respect of such acts committed a man is to be 
blamed, Gal. ii. 11, yet if a man renews faith and repentance, he is, 
according to the rules and verdict of the gospel (which is that royal law of 
liberty), rendered pure and void of oflence. Again, this Paul upon these 
principles pronounceth of the Corinthians in a matter wherein they had 
been highly guilty (as in the business about the incestuous person, 1 Cor. 
V.) ; yet in 2 Cor. vii., after he had related how they had * sorrowed' (for 
their sin) ' to God,' and ' after a godly manner' (witness all those gracious 
dispositions he rehearseth, ver. 11), in the conclusion he gives forth this 
gracious sentence of the gospel thereupon : * In all things you have 
approved yourselves clear in this matter,' ayvovg (as high a woi'd as any 
other, equivalent to that ' without spot or wrinkle'), clear, not in respect only 
to other things in their lives wherein they had done worthily ; but even in 
this very matter wherein they had afore been so foully fault}'. The sin 
they had committed could not be undone, but yet they had done all (* in 
all things we have shewn,' &c.), all, namely, which the law of liberty, the 
gospel, requires in such a case (the particulars of which he had reckoned 
up), upon which it declares a man pure. Neither speaks he of purity 
through justification, that is, only by faith, not repentance; but according 
to the rules and maxims which about sanctification the gospel holds forth, 
and according to which the day of judgment shall proceed. 

So then we see one sense in which those speeches of the apostle (take 
them as absolute promises) are to be understood ; and this kind of blame- 
lessness must needs be supposed at least to be intended in these prayers of 
Paul, especially in that parallel prayer of his (1 Thes. v. 23), where the 
promise of keeping all the saints in this respect blameless is also annexed ; 
and this to be sui-e his prayers attained for them that were true saints 
among them. 

But yet, my brethren, this is the lowest, and if I may call it so, the 
worser sort of blamelessness ; though indeed thus to be kept all a man's 
days in the midst of many offences, still within the circle and limits of the 
state of grace, is an infinite privilege and high specimen and argument of 
God's free grace, according to that of Hosea xiv. 4, ' I will heal their back- 
slidings, I will love them freely.' In the state of nature, God gives examples 
in various proportions, and degrees, and sizes, how far in common righteous- 
ness men unregenerate may proceed, and yet remain unregenerate, and be 
still in that estate. Some attain to the height of morality, as Socrates ; 
others of legality, * as concerning the law blameless,' as Paul, Philip, iii. 6 ; 
others attain to a degree of a work evangelical, yet not saving : 2 Peter 
ii. 19, 20, ' While they promise them liberty, they themselves are the 
servants of corruption : for of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he 
brought in bondage. For if after they have escaped the pollutions of the 
world, through the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, they 
« Qu. ' Solomon ' ?— Ed. 



156 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

are again entangled therein, and overcome, tlie latter end is worse with 
them than the beginning.' They do escape the pollutions of the world 
through the knowledge of Christ, who yet remain in their nature ; swines 
washed outwardly yet not renewed, but returning to their former vomit. 
And God in his actings towards those in a state of grace, to shew the glory 
of his free grace in the variety of dispensations, doth preserve in and amidst 
several sizes and dcgi-ees of unblameworthiness those whom he saves. 
Some run out farther, others in lesser measures as to particular acts of sin, 
and yet still so as they remain within the line of communication of those 
principles mentioned. And as it is a matter of difficulty to define how far 
a man unregenerate may go in external acts of virtue, and yet still continue 
within the sphere and dominion of that unregenerate estate, so it is as 
hard to say how far saints may fall, or how often, into oflence and blame- 
worthiness, and yet this radical fundamental blamelessness as to the 
principles of the state of grace, both for his whole course and reducements 
by repentance, be preserved. Some are more scarcely saved, though 
certainly saved ; some are suffered to put the sure mercies of David to it. 
Thus the sureness of God's mercies were exemplified in David and Solomon, 
for they tried, especially Solomon, how far they would hold. I sinned, 
saith Solomon, to the utmost of the tether, as far as the lines of the 
principles of grace would reach, as far as would be consistent with them. 
Himself expresseth it thus in the sad story of all his vanities, in Eccles. 
chap. i. and ii. He inserts this, Eccles. ii. 3, that he ' yet acquainted his 
heart with wisdom ;' and his reducements by repentance are known to 
you, for the title of his book is a testimony of it, and yet he was so scarcely 
saved, that it is a controversy in the church to this day whether he were 
saved yea or no. And although this may be an encouragement to some 
souls who have had great diversions from God in their lives since their 
calling, that the prerogative sovereignty and the faithfulness of that grace 
they are under the dominion of hath reduced them, and hath in all their 
goings astray kept them within the fore-mentioned principles of this state, 
and hath reduced them from their wanderings ; yet whoever he be that, 
having the work of God upon his soul, will think with himself, I will be sure 
to sin but so as to keep within that compass, let that soul know that he 
into whose heart this thought enters, or takes any hold in, is at the next 
step to outsin those principles, and to sink into eternal perdition. For, 
poor soul, though the free grace that is in God may say it, I will suffer 
such an one to sin, and yet keep him blameless according to the covenant 
of grace, yet it is desperate daring for thee to say this, or to presume upon 
it ; and it is indeed utterly against the ingenuity* of grace, and argues 
nothing but selfishness in thy soul. Thus much of the first sort of blame- 
lessness which the absolute promise is made to. 

2. There is certainly, in the second place, another sort intended; for the 
apostle prays not barely that they may be kept blameless, according to the 
principles of the state of grace ; but this being a prayer indefinitely uttered, 
therefore that sort of blamelessness which is possible to be attained by saints 
must be intended here; and my reasons are, 1. Because in prayer we are 
allowed to seek for ourselves and others the utmost good which by any kind 
of promise we judge they may possibly attain to. And 2. It is evident he 
stints not himself here barely to pray for perseverance, but for their abound- 
ing more and more, so ver. 9, and that they might be filled down, laden 
with the fruits of righteousness ; and he aimed therefore at the highest 
* That is, ' ingenuousness.' — Ed. 



Chap. IV.] in the heart and life. 157 

blamelessness in his prayer for these. I will not dispute now whether the 
desires of our prayer may not be extended beyond what we know God in 
his decrees will grant, when yet his revealed will propounds it as what 
should and ought to be in us, and as what wc should aim at and endeavour 
to attain. Thus, in Mat. vi. 10, ' Thy will be done on earth, as it is in 
heaven ; ' and also, 2 Cor. xiii. 7, ' I pray God ye do no evil ; ' all which 
will one day bo accompUshcd on this earth when Clirist comes to judgment. 
But take this blamelessness de facto, attained at the highest pin (without 
breaking the strings of mortality) it hath in any been wound up unto, and 
as we descended to the lowest degrees in the other interpretation, so let us 
ascend up to the highest possible in this other. And such a blamelessness 
(we may well understand) he intended for these Philippians ; and what was 
the aim of his prayers should be the aim, yea, hope, of our endeavours ; 
and to understand what blamelessness this is, let us take his ov/n example, 
1 Cor. iv. 4, *I know nothing by myself (not any fact against light, and 
he speaks it as in relation to a censure of him by the Corinthians), and 
though I am not justified (which belongs to another court) by this kind of 
blamelessness (for I do not say I am without sin), yet this blamelessness I 
have (says he) that I never sinned against light from the first of my con- 
version, I know nothing by myself. If he had so sinned he must have 
known it, and his conscience have checked him in the writing this. 

So then, from hence I gather that besides the former there is a blame- 
lessness possible to be attained as a more special privilege, and to be aimed 
at by Christians, even to be void of oflence against light of conscience all 
the residue of a man's days. I say it is a special privilege for him who 
attains to it. The chief of the apostles, that forsook Christ, did not attain 
it, yet Paul did; therefore propounds himself as an example: Follow me, as 
I follow Christ. And it would seem that Paul was kept to the very end of 
his days, to his ofiering up. For, 2 Tim. iv. 18, he expresseth his confi- 
dence in him that had hitherto kept him, ' that he would deliver him from 
every evil work, and would preserve him unto his heavenly kingdom.' His 
meaning is not simply that God would save his soul, and accordingly keep 
him from such ways of sinning as could not stand with the principles of 
grace ; but further, so to keep him in his heavenly kingdom as he might 
be kept from every evil work, such as was contrary to the principles which 
he professed before others, or which his own conscience had the impression 
of. And that place is not so fairly or honourably enough to Paul's spirit, 
nor rightly as to his scope, interpreted of deliverance from persecution, and 
the evil workings of evil men against him. For this interpretation is 
grounded on that false pretence that the occasion of that speech was the 
narrative of his being delivered out of the mouth of the lion Nero, in the 
words before, and so as that confidence of his should intend only like 
deliverances fi'om the bloody hands of persecutors. No ; for he was not 
delivered, but died by the sword of the same Nero, whose power he had 
now escaped. But Paul's confidence had a further deliverance in his eye, 
which that very deliverence was a pledge of. His case stood thus : I 
Paul (I speak in his person to utter his sense) have been often before the 
bars of kings and great ones for my life in the profession of Christianity, 
(you read how before Felix, Agrippa, and the high priest in the Acts), in all 
Buch pressures I never did anything at any time (I thank God) unworthy 
of my profession. You read how, instead of pleading for his hfe, he still 
endeavours at the bar to turn them Christians he spake to. God still pre- 
served him from every evil work ; upon all such sore trials he came not off 



158 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK L 

halting. Now in my old age (for so it was when he wrote this, now he 
was ready to be offered, and the time of his departure was at hand, and 
this story was then newly acted) I was called before Nero, and I was more 
put to it than ever. Ver. 16, ' At my first answer no man stood with me, 
but all men forsook me : I pray God that it may not be laid to their 
charge.' Yet, as at all other times you have heard or read of, I have 
undergone great trials, this time of temptation is as great as I ever under- 
went, and yet, notwithstanding, the Lord stood with me and strengthened 
me. The chief of his intention, you see, was not upon outward deliver- 
ance, but how not to sin, how to carry it so as to credit religion, to come 
off so as to make a good confession for the advantage of the gospel, as 
elsewhere he had done ; and that this is his meaning the next words shew : 
* that by me the preaching might be fully known, and that all the Gentiles 
might hear.' Paul having thus as a lion kept his integrity in this great 
certamen in his old age, and having made this his glory, besides his being" 
delivered out of the mouth of the lion, what was his reward ? God came 
in upon his spirit with fresh assurance, not only that he would preserve 
him unto his heavenly kingdom, so as not to fall away, but that he would 
from thenceforth deliver him from every evil work. Oh, that gladded 
Paul's heart ! I shewed you formerly how Paul made this his glory, but 
we could not tell certainly whether he might not blemish his glory after ; 
but this scripture shews that, as he had made it' his ambition not to sin 
against his light, to be void of offence all along, so he had now the security 
of it as a special privilege. An holy man that affected the same exemption 
came once to me, and professed he had read all the Scriptures over, and 
could not find one promise to keep a believer from a gross sin as long as 
he lived. I thought of this, I know no other, I observe that, upon eminent 
trials, such as that was of Paul's, God useth to seal up something to a 
man's soul of special grace to him. In the 28th of this 1st chapter of the 
Philippians, when Christians are called to bear witness for Christ, ' Be you 
in nothing,' says he, ' terrified by your adversaries, which is to them an 
evident token of perdition ; but to you of salvation, and that of God.' 
God at such times, and upon such occasions, used to give (ordinarily to 
martyrs and confessors of him) an evidence and token of their salvation ; 
as unto the persecutors, a consternation of spirit, which is to them an 
evident token of perdition. Now therefore upon this occasion he gave unto 
Paul a double assurance at last, who had served him in so many trials : 1. 
He gave him an assurance of preserving him to his heavenly kingdom, which 
is common to other Christians. 2. He gives him an assurance, which was 
more special, of delivering him from every evil work, which he had so much 
desired. God said to him. As hitherto thou hast not, so thou shalt from 
henceforth never commit any evil work against thy light and principles. 

I have been the larger in this, to set before you the examples, the possi- 
bility of attaining this kind of blamelessness, for which he therefore prays 
for these Philippians. I would provoke your spirits hereby to affect it, and 
endeavour it. It would seem attainable also by other instances, as that of 
Elizabeth and Zacharias, the parents of the Baptist. Luke i. 6, it is said 
they were ' both righteous before God, walking in the commandments and 
ordinances of the Lord blameless.' You profess to live in obedience to 
commandments. I beseech you, do the same with respect to ordinances, 
and all ordinances ; for they are all of a like necessity, and the second 
commandment commands j'ou this duty. From this doctrine, though the 
papists would fondly gather their perfection and possibility of keeping all 



Chap. IV.] in the heart and life. 159 

the commandments without sin (however John and James contradict it, 
saying, * in many things we oflend all '), yet we may well allow them (their 
errors having usually a shadow of some truth, which they miss, speaking 
either over or under) a possibility to be blameless in respect of sinning 
against light, and so to have a conscience void of offence before God and 
man. And the reason for it is this, because if an holy man be, and is often 
kept from such sins a week, a month, a year, then it is also possible with 
this state of frailty to be kept all his lifetime ; but for the papists' perfection, 
a man is not kept an hour, a moment, sin cleaving to all we do. The 
apostle Peter, though he had not so lived from the time of his conversion, 
yet from experience now perhaps he had learned the way how thus to be 
kept, and accordingly directs those primitive churches he wrote to, 2 Peter 
i. 10, where, exhorting them to all diligence, &c., he adds this motive, ' If 
ye do these things, ye shall never fall.' What ! fall away ? There is no danger 
to men, partakers of the divine nature, so to do ; but as the word imports 
never, firrrrors, not at anytime. And that doxology of Jude seems more clearly 
and fully to hold forth such a meaning as I have put upon this petition of 
Paul for these Philippians, and so wuthal to argue the possibility of obtaining 
it, which he would have those primitive Christians to have in their eye to 
obtain at God's hand. Jude ver. 24, ' Now unto him that is able to keep 
you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his 
glory with exceeding great joy,' &c. I observe how the apostle had afore 
made mention of very great errors and miscarriages in doctrine and life, 
which some professors in those times had ran into, and he had also spoken 
of the day of judgment ; and to be kept faultless hath relation to those gross 
sins in judgment and practice, which would be of infinite moment to them 
at that day, for it would cause mighty exultation and a triumphant joy. 
And as Paul prays here, so he there sets out God to them as able to keep 
them, to the end they should have recourse to him, and so to do with 
encouragement ; that as he was able, so that he might do it for them. For 
to that end is God set forth to them as able to do this for them, and so he 
concludes his epistle. 

Obs. The only observation or meditation I shall now make is, that the 
solemnity of the great day ought to be continually in our eyes, as that 
which should move us to be sincere and blameless. For therefore it is that 
the apostle chooseth to use the phrase, until, or in the day of Christ (for 
either serves a bottom for this meditation), rather than until the day of 
death. We should so walk and live and die as if we were immediately to 
go to judgment at the very hour of our deaths. And though both the one 
and the other import the same thing in the event, yet the consideration of 
this latter strikes a greater awe, and that is the true reason, which is a 
remaining part of the former objection, why Christ in his cautions to watch 
and be sober, under which he expresseth the highest care to be holy, and 
to be continually ready, still mentions this day. Mat. xxiv. 42, ' Watch 
ye therefore, for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come.' Mark xiii. 
35, 36, ' Watch ye therefore : for ye know not when the master of the house 
Cometh, at even, or at midnight, or at the cock-crowing, or in the morning ; 
lest, coming suddenly, he find you sleeping.' And ver. 87, ' What I say 
to you, I say to all in all ages.' And he speaks of the day of judgment, 
and presseth this readiness and preparedness upon the uncertainty of the 
coming and approach thereof, both to them in that age who knew it not, 
and to us, and those after that did and do know, it could not be in their or 
our times ; yet because judgment finds us as death leaves us, and as our 



IGO OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

behaviour in this world hath been, therefore it is that Christ gives forth the 
caution to all ages of watching for the day of judgment, thereby to make 
the greater impression. It always moves men, both as it contains a pro- 
mise sealed with Christ's last prayer and blood, and as withal it carries the 
greatest warning for our care and study how to behave ourselves in this 
world. Thus Christ at last, when himself was to go to God out of this 
world, as having seen and passed through the temptations of it, as a signal 
instance of his love for us, prays that we should be kept whilst in this 
world. Thus in his last prayer, wherein you may see wherein his solici- 
tude ran out , most : John xvii, 12, ' While I was with them in the world, 

1 kept them in thy name ; those that thou gavest me, I have kept, and none 
of them is lost but the son of perdition, that the scripture might be fulfilled.' 
And ver. 15, ' I pray not that thou shouldst take them out of the world, 
but that thou shouldst keep them from the evil.' The time of their being 
in the world had all the danger in it, and he had a special memento and 
occasion at that time to put up his prayer ; for Peter was to deny him, the 
disciples to leave him. I have been glad that Paul in saying, that neither 
death nor life shall separate us from Christ, did put in life, for I profess I 
fear life and the temptations of it, and how to go through this world 
comelily, more than death. Now then, as the time and concernment of 
danger is in this life, so the consideration of a judgment to come should have 
a great influence to keep us blameless in this world, and free from the evil 
of it; therefore here he mentions that day, as also Christ doth, Luke xxi. 36, 
' Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye m.ay be accounted worthy to 
escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of 
man.' To stand, namely, in judgment (as Ps. i., the phrase is), and thus 
Paul likewise aweth Timothy, and us in him, 1 Tim. vi. 14, ' That thou 
keep this commandment without spot, unrebukable, until the appearing of 
our Lord Jesus Christ.' The force of this motive lies thus : as Christ 
appeared before Pilate (for that was God's day of judging Christ standing 
in our stead), so thou, says Paul, must appear before Christ ; therefore I 
charge thee keep this commandment ; and therefore the apostles turned 
the eyes of all the primitive Christians upon that day, or the coming of 
Christ. It was a great part of the religion of the primitive Christians to 
wait for the coming of Jesus Christ, and they are described to us to have 
been such as those that walked in view of it, as those that had that day in 
their eye, and should then be judged ; and in this they are set forth as a 
pattern to us : 1 Cor. i. 7, ' So that ye come behind in no gift; waiting for 
the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.' He makes this an evidence of their 
excelling in all other gifts : 2 Tim. iv. 8, ' Which he shall give me at that 
day : and not to me only, but unto them also that love his appearance.' 
This latter, you see, is a paraphrase, a description of the saints in those 
times, and all ages ; and as he describes them by it, so he sets it before 
them as his own principle, which did keep him steady in his walking : 

2 Cor. V. 9, 10, * Wherefore we labour, that, whether present or absent, 
we may be accepted of him. For we must all appear before the judgment- 
seat of Christ ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, 
according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.' There is a 
necessity of it, we must so appear, none can avoid it ; and we shall not be 
present only as in a crowd, so as to hope to shrink aside and hide ourselves 
unseen, but we must be singled out, be presented (as Col. i. 28), and stand 
forth apart as at a bar. Men that are personally called to appear ought 
'xoc^acrrivai ffw/iar/, personally to answer, Rom. iv. 10, ifirr^oadsv, in conspicuo, 



Chap. IV.] tn the heart and life. IGl 

to be seen of all, 2 Cor. v. 10, to the end they may be made trans- 
parent, and be seen through and through, what they are or have been in 
their lives, i^avisudrimi ; and this is then to be made apparent to men, as 
now unto God, ' We are now manifest to God, and we trust also in your 
consciences.'* However, this place implies, that at that day we shall be 
made manifest one to another, even as now we are unto God, 

It is a great scripture, and full of majesty, in 1 Thes. iii. 12 ; he 
prayeth they may ' abound in love more and more (as here), to the end 
their hearts might be established unblameable in hohness before God, even 
the Father, at the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints.' 
He presenteth before them the solemnity of that day, by all such ways as 
might strike their hearts. 1. He tells them they must appear before God, 
the judge of all, as Heb. xii. he is set forth. 2. Before Jesus Christ, who, 
Heb. iv., is said to have a sword in his hand to rip up every man's heart 
and conscience, to divide between the marrow and the bones, and the 
intentions of the heart ; and that description of him referreth to judgment, 
as the close of that discourse shews : noi$ ov 6 Xoyog, to whom we must give 
an account, as speaking of judgment, though it is otherwise translated. 
3. He tells them that the saiuts will be all present there, and the general 
assembly of angels and first-born ; and these as witnesses, yea, judges, 
when all of a man shall be ripped up. And to this place add that of Jude 
14, 15, ' Lo, he comes with ten thousand of his saints, to execute judgment 
upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their 
ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard 
speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.' Now therefore, 
when Paul considered what a judicatory, a presence there will be, and how 
that all secrets shall be ripped open and laid together, he falls a-praying 
that their hearts might be established in holiness ; for, as I will shew you, 
God will make out every man's state by his works, and the casting of men's 
conditions shall, according to an evangelical rule, depend thereon. Now 
observe it, that this prayer is plainly and directly for this, that then at that 
day their hearts might be established in holiness. Now it would seem 
strange, that for men who are to be in heaven a long time before that day, 
there should be supposed a need to pray that their hearts should be then 
thoroughly estabhshed in holiness, which they should have here in this life, 
to the end they might then be without wavering or fear established. Yet 
to me the reason is clear, for they are not then to be judged, nor is their 
condition to be sentenced by that holiness they have had in heaven, but 
barely by that which men have had here on earth, whilst in the body, as 
you heard. All is put upon this, whether such holiness accompanied here 
their faith, as puts a manifest difference between them and hypocrites, and 
by that evidence it must and shall be made forth to others. Thus Jude, 
because he had said Christ comes with ten thousand of his saints, prays, 
ver. 24, ' Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present 
you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy,' &c.^^ And 
thus I understand Peter, 2 Peter iii. 14, ' Wherefore, beloved, seeing that 
ye look for such things, be dilig«nt, that ye may be found of him in peace, 
without spot, and blameless.' In peace, that is, in their spirits ; and there- 
fore John still makes a great matter of it, to have boldness at that day : 
1 John ii. 28, ' And now, little children, abide in him; that, when he shall 
appear, we may have confidence, and not be ashamed before him at his 

* Non modo sisti praesenter, sed illic in nos inquiri, ut palam fiat qui fuerimus. — 
Beza. 

VOL. vn. L 



162 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

coming.' And again, chap. iv. 17, ' Herein is our love made perfect, that 
we may have boldness in the day of judgment : because as he is, so are we 
in this world.' And there will be a confidence and a quietness in the soul 
when heaven and earth shall shake. 



CHAPTER V. 

What it is to be filled with the fruits of righteousness in our course of obedience. 

I would turn Paul's prayer, Philip, i. 11, here for these PhiHppians, into 
exhortations unto you. His prayer is for, and the bent of my exhortation 
is unto, holiness, in all the eminent parts and principles of it : in heart, 
ver. 9, 10; in life, in this 11th verse, where I am now arrived, which 
holds forth the positive part of an holy conversation, 'being filled,' &c., as 
being blameless did the negative. There are three things to be spoken 
unto, for the opening of these words : 

1. What it is to be filled with the fruits of righteousness. 

2. The kind of these fruits, such as are by Jesus Christ to the glory and 
praise of God. He prays for such, because he knew no other would be 
accepted. 

3. The third is, of what concernment it is, at or against that day of 
Christ, that saints be filled with such fruits. For those words, ' in that 
day,' coming in between the former word blameless and this ver. 11, do 
indiflferently refer to both ; and so to the words of ver. 11 in this sense, 
that look what fruits any man hath brought forth, he shall appear laden 
with at that day, as a tree in autumn with all its fruits. 

1. To explain what is meant by fruits of righteousness, three particulars 
might be handled: (1.) the metaphor there used, 'fruits;' (2.) the gene- 
rical nature, substance, or matter of them, ' fruits of righteousness ;' (3.) 
what it is to be ' filled ' with them, which is the main thing that his peti- 
tion is directed to. 

(1.) For that similitude of fruits, I will forbear to gather it from all the 
branches of that metaphor, though it might afibrd good store to be laid 
up. It is a metaphor the Holy Ghost doth frequently delight to set forth 
abounding in holiness by ; yet in such a variety of allusion, it is difiicult 
to define what more specially he aimed at. Instead of a large prosecution 
or drawing out the allegory in any one, I shall content myself to present 
rather the severals, which this allusion may have respect unto. There are 
three sorts of fruit which the Holy Ghost is pleased to compare the good 
works of holy men unto: [l.j the fruits of trees; [2.] the fruits of the 
earth ; [3.] the fruit of the body and womb, children. I shall give you 
express scriptures for each. 

[1.] As for the fruits of trees, you find man thus growing up and down 
the Scriptures ; as whilst David, Ps. i. 3, compares him to ' a tree planted 
by the rivers of water, that brings forth his fruits in due season ;' ' planted 
in the house of God, that brings forth fruit in old age,' Ps. xcii. 12, 13. 
And Christ compares himself and his members to a vine when he says, 
' Eveiy branch in me that beareth fi-uit,' John xv. 2. 

[2.] As to fruits that grow promiscuously out of the earth, holy speeches 
and thanksgivings are called the fruit of the lips, Heb. xiii. 15, in allusion 
to the first-fruits of the earth, all sorts of which were consecrated to God, 
as well as the first-fruits of trees. And the apostle, Heb. vi. 7, compares 



Chap. V.J in the ueart and life. 1G3 

(as Christ afore him in the parable of the sower) a good heart fruitful of 
goodness unto ' that earth, which brings forth herbs meet for the dresser ;' 
or as Christ says, Luke viii, 15, ' that brings forth fruit with patience.' 

[3. J As to the fruits of the womb, of the body, or children, fruitfulness 
in gospel obedience by Christ is under that metaphor presented : Rom. 
vii. 4, * Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by 
the body of Christ ; that ye should be married to another, even to him 
who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God.' 
He compares Christ to a second husband we are anew married unto, as 
the law to a former husband to whom we are dead, to the end that being 
married to him, we should bring forth all sorts of acts of new obedience, 
as children begotten in us by his body ; which fruits of Christ's body, and 
of our hearts the wombs of them, he calls fruit to God, as to whom they 
are born, the gi-andfather of them all, even as children are called the fruit of 
the body and of the womb. Now, whether unto all these, or unto which 
more particularly this metaphor is directed, is hard to determine ; there is 
none of them but may put in for it, else I would not have so distinctly 
mentioned them. Of the allusion to that of children, that place last 
quoted seems parallel ; for as there we are said to bring forth fruit to God 
by Christ, so here it is expressed, 'which are by Jesus Christ to the glory 
and praise of God.' And so at the latter day, as Christ shall say of all his 
members, * Lo, here am I, and the children that thou hast given me,' so 
a Christian, being encompassed about with all his good works that follow 
him, shall have it said by Christ, Lo, here is such a one, and the children 
have been brought forth by him, and begotten by me ; and blessed is the 
man that then hath his quiver full of them, he shall not be ashamed in 
the gate, Ps. csxvii. 5. But then this makes it not so clear ; for children 
(when many) in the Scripture (when spoken of together in a cluster) are 
not called fruits, but fruit; but the word here in Philip, i. 11 is in the 
plural, fruits; and the term fruit, as given to children, being itself a 
metaphor in derivation from the fruits of the earth, it must be one 
metaphor borrowed from another metaphor to call good works ' fruits of 
righteousness,' in allusion unto children being called fruits. And if we 
should carry the allusion to the earth, where it is true there are plenty 
and variety of fruits, yet that metaphor here, Philip, i. 11, taking in Christ 
as the root from whom they spring — which are by Jesus Christ-f-that 
similitude of the heart to the earth, will not so pertinently afford a room 
or meet ground for it. But these words of Christ, John xv., 'I am that 
vine, and every branch in me that brings forth good fruit,' are genuine, 
and proper, and agreeable to that expression here, Philip, i. 11, 'fruits of 
righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ.' This suits also with the 
apostolical exhortations in their epistles, ' Be fruitful in every good work,' 
&c. I will not here (for it would be fruit out of season) enlarge upon the 
similitude of Christ the root, the heart of man the tree, every faculty the 
branch, the Holy Ghost the sap, opportunity of doing good the seasons, 
God the husbandman, union with Christ the engrafture, and many the like. 
But having thus fixed the metaphor to its right foundation, I come to that 
which is proper to my text and scope, to explain what it is to be filled with 
these fruits of righteousness. 

Therefore, secondly, to shew what it is to be filled with these fruits. I 
will suppose that by fruits of righteousness are meant all sorts of holy 
actions both towards God and man, springing from a heart made righteous, 
and conformable to, and brought forth according to the righteous law of 



164 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

God ; no other are fruits of righteousness. But now the inquiry is, what 
it is to be filled with them ? It is an Hebrew phrase, to express abound- 
ing in them ; as ' full of children,' Ps. xvii. 14 ; ' a land full of silver,' Isa. 
ii, 7. I shall, in explaining it, keep to the allusion, to a tree full of fruits, 
as that which will guide me. 

(1.) A tree is said to be filled with fruit when all its branches are down- 
laden with them, so as there is not a twig empty or thin-set therewith. 
Now, as the heart of man is the bulk and body of this tree, so every power 
of the soul, member of the body, is a branch, and is so to be understood 
in this allusion. When the Holy Ghost w^ould set forth the abounding 
wickedness in ungodly men's hearts and lives, he reads an anatomy lecture 
on every part and member, and shews how every member (which are the 
branches of these trees) is full of that wickedness that it is proper to grow 
upon : ' their mouth is full of cursing and deceit ' (it is the expression Ps. 
X. 7), full of that foam and filth to flowing over. There is a superfluity of 
naughtiness continually issues thence. And so in James iii. 8, ' Their 
tongue is an unruly member, full of deadly poison.' Thus also in 2 Pet. 
ii. 14, ' eyes full of adultery ;' and Isa. i. 15, ' hands full of blood,' that 
is, of all sorts of oppression. In a word, the heart is said to be ' full of 
all readiness to evil,' Acts xiii. 10; the whole man to be 'filled with all 
unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness ; 
full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity,' Piom. i. 29. So, on the 
contrary, a good man should have all members and faculties filled with all 
righteousness proper to them; the mind, the understanding, and medita- 
tive part ' filled with all knowledge,' Piom. xv. 14 ; with a full stock and 
treasury of gracious thoughts and instructions, which might enable him to 
do spiritual good to others upon occasion ; so it follows, Piom. xv. 14, 'Able 
also to admonish one another.' In the first psalm, the psalmist compares 
a godly man to a tree ; among other fruit, he instanceth in the continual 
buddings of thoughts : ' He meditates on the law of God day and night ; ' 
he is a man whose ' mind deviseth good,' Prov. xiv. 22. He contrives with 
himself how most acceptably to serve and please God ; for such as the man 
is, such are his devices, Isa. xxxii. 8. And thus the memory is stored with 
the word, promises, commands, directions, laid up to guide and comfort a 
man in his way : Psa. Ixiii. 6, ' When I remember thee on my bed,' &c. 
And thus, when the will and afi'ections are full of all goodness, Piom. xv. 14, 
there will be fresh love to God every day, as his mercies are renewed every 
morning. He will ' keep himself in the love of God,' as the phrase is, Jude 
21. He will keep the heart steeped in it, and will put fresh liquor to keep 
it quick and sweet every day. He will ' dwell in love,' 1 John iv. 16. He 
is full of mercy to the souls and miseries of others, James iii. 17. And if 
so, he is then full of good fruits, as these will follow, and he is full of joy 
and hope, Rom. xv. 13, ' Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and 
peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope through the power of the 
Holy Ghost.' As thus the inward, so the outward man, and every member 
of it, will be so many ' weapons of righteousness ' (which is an allusion to 
our Christian warfare, Rom. vi. 13), and 'trees of righteousness ' too, Isa. 
Ixi. 3. The tongue, to instance in that one member, will be a ' tree of life :' 
Prov. XV. 4, ' A sound tongue is a tree of life.' He compares that one 
member to a whole tree, and of all trees to that which was in the midst of 
the paradise of God, the tree of life, to which Isaiah alludes, when he calls 
them ' the planting of the Lord,' for so those trees were in a special manner, 
Gen. ii. 8, 9, whereas other trees were left to grow wild. And when this 



Chap. V.J in the heart and life. 105 

holy tree bears such communicative fruit, that may minister ffcacQ to others 
(as the apostle speaks, Eph. iv. 29), then it is fruitful indeed. Solomon 
tells us that ' the fruit of the righteous is a tree of life,' Prov. xi. 30, because 
the fruit of his lips, the fruit of his actions, do become trees, from whence 
do often other trees arise, and souls are won and converted to God ; for so 
it follows, ' He that winneth souls is wise.' If any of us should gather all 
the fruit that grows but in one daji on this member, the tongue, and, as the 
prophet saw in his vision, put it into two baskets, the one of good, the 
other of bad, how little good should we find in the one, how much that is 
rotten and naught in the other ! If the story of all the outward actions 
■were written on each member, and appeared at once, as at the latter day 
they shall, what a world of evil would be found in each, when the tongue 
is a world of evil, as St James speaks ! 

(2.) A Christian is then filled with fruit, when good works of all sorts 
do, and have grown there. Col. i. 10, ' Unto all pleasing, being fruitful in 
every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God.' ' In all pleas- 
ing,' that is, all the ways whereby God is pleased ; in all that is the will 
of God concerning us, to be done by us. And we must be fruitful in every 
good work, that is, of all kinds and sorts, not to be wanting or barren in 
any. What says the apostle ? 2 Cor. viii. 7, 'As you abound in everything 
(else), in faith, utterance, knowledge, all diligence, love to us, see that ye 
abound in this grace also.' They had been more empty in the bringing 
forth of this grace. So then a Christian should look back, and think with 
himself, What dut}^ what grace, what part, or course, or practice of godli- 
ness is there, which I have been hitherto deficient or scanty in ? I have 
abounded in such and such, but not in fruitfulness of speech, or the like : 
Oh I will set myself to abound in this also, that I may be found filled with 
all sorts at that day. And herein indeed a Christian difi'ers from other 
trees, unless, as was said out of Solomon, we consider every member of him 
as a tree of life, and the whole man a paradise to God. Take any one 
natural tree, and though every branch may be filled with fruit, yet but with 
fruit of one kind — said God, ' Let every one bring forth according to its 
kind ' — for the seed by nature limits it to one. But here the Holy Ghost 
is the seed and sap, and seminallj', yea, eminently, containeth all that is 
holy in himself, and so doth the spirit of regeneration begotten by him : 
Eph. V. 9, ' The fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness, righteousness, and 
truth.' And accordingly, you find a variety of them named as fruits of the 
Spirit : Gal. v. 22, 23, ' But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long- 
suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance : against such 
there is no law.' And let me add this as a reason and incentive : God 
loves a variety of good works, though some be of an inferior kind and sort, 
rather than that we should abound in any one sort that is more excellent. 
Though God would have us lay out our strength most in what is most 
excellent, and we are most fitted for, yet we must fulfil, as Christ did, ' all 
righteousness,' one part as well as another ; and this God delighteth in. 
It is better to perform duties of every kind, though we do the less of some 
others. 2 Pet. i. 5, the apostle exhorts to this variety, which he calls, 
adding grace to grace : ' Add to your faith, virtue ; to virtue, knowledge ; 
to knowledge, temperance ; and to temperance, patience ; and to patience, 
godliness ; and to godliness, brotherly- kindness ; and to brotherly-kind- 
ness, charity.' And he is exceeding vehement in this exhortation, to set 
it home : x.al aurb toijto di, <xe^l or T^og is to be understood ; and then his 
meaning is, Bend your minds unto this, this very thing, mainly and ami- 



1C6 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

nently ; give your diligence and study, and all diligence unto it. Ua^sia- 
inyyM\7ic, : the Jesuits, obsening a double composition, Trata and s/'j, take 
advantage of the addition of this particle Traga, besides, to prove that, besides 
the grace of God, man's will must co-operate, crapa, sub, or prater, &c. 
But as I take it, there is another emphasis of it, suitable to the apostle's 
scope, which being to exhort to add one grace to another, his meaning is, 
they should still apply their study to some things besides ; that though they 
had exercised this, and that, and the other grace, yet still they were to reckon 
that there was something besides to be done by them. Our translators have 
taken the particle off from its own place, the verb it stands on, and have 
put and joined it to the pronoun, ' besides this,' and so made the emphasis 
less. But Peter's scope is, as Paul's, to exhort to forget what is behind, 
and to press to what is before ; never to think they had done all, but that 
they had something besides still to do. And, says he, if you will bend your 
minds, cff&; aorh toZzo 6:-, if you have this rule in your eye, ' you will never 
be barren or unfruitful.' So then, you see, it is proper to what I am upon, 
namely, to exhort you to add gi-ace to grace ; and still some grace besides, 
and over and above what you have had hitherto. Add to this the force of 
that phrase, ' add grace to grace,' and it will be evident that this is one 
way to be filled with fruit. As men heap up land to land, buy whole towns 
to lay one to another, so do you add grace to grace. This should be the 
ambition of a Christian. And go to God to enable you to it ; for he is, as 
Paul says, a God that is ' able to make all grace to abound towards you,' 
2 Cor. ix. 8. 

(3.) To be filled with fruits of righteousness, is to be filled with them at 
all times, to have, if possible, no time of our lives barren, always filling up 
our time with some fi-uit or other. Other trees, when young, bear no fruit ; 
but a Christian, fi'om his first conversion, doth. Col. i. 6, the gospel is 
said to have ' brought forth fruit among them, since the first day they heard 
of it, and knew the grace of God in trath.' They fell instantly on acting 
holily, and for God, and stayed not a day, a moment after their conversion, 
Piev. xxii. 2, and Ezek. xlvii. 12. And these trees of the Lord's planting 
are not only said to be such whose leaves fade not, whose fi-uit withers not, 
but to bring forth ' fruit every month,' ' twelve sorts of fruit,' says the 
Pievelation (there is that variety afore spoken of), ' new fruit according to 
their months,' says Ezekiel, that is, all sorts in their seasons. In nature, 
some fruits are in season one month, others in another ; but no time is 
ban-en in a holy heart, it bears the whole twelve months, the whole of the 
year, which is the epitome of time. They bear fruit aU their lives con- 
tinually ; and if so, then they will be found filled with fruit. 

Now, when I say ' at all times,' it may be enlarged to three particulars : 
[1.] That our whole time be filled up with some good fruit or other. 
Now there are these things our time is to be filled up withal, our callings, 
recreations, holy duties ; and we are to subordinate the one to the other, 
and then we are holy in all. A man brings forth fruit in recreations as 
well as in holy duties, if his end be to have spirits to perfoim holy duties 
with. Blossoms, that fall off and wither, yet prepare for fruit. Now it is 
impossible to give certain rules what time is to be allotted for each of these, 
the conditions, tempers, constitutions of men do so vary. Poor men, that 
live by their daily labour, are necessitated to spend more time in their call- 
ing, than in recreations and duties. Men that are of weak and fiery spirits, 
and have callings that are exhausters of them, are as much necessitated to 
spend more time in recreations, than in their callings or holy duties, though 



Chap. V.] in the heart and life. 1G7 

perhaps if such men had grace enough, even the most serious duties might 
be a recreation to them. Rich men that are strong and vigorous, and want 
employments, they may and ought to spend the more time in holy duties ; 
their strength and leisure will afford it. But if a man proportions wisely 
and conscientiously forth his time, according to his conditions, between all 
these, and puts holy ends on all, he will be found for the circumstance he 
stood in, and the ground he was planted in, filled with fruits of righteous- 
ness. This the apostle gives us as a rule, to be holy in all manner of con- 
versation, be it whatsoever. The mower that hath occasion often to whet 
his scythe, and cease his work with many interruptions, shall be paid for 
bis time therein (if he otherwise loiter not), as well as for doing the work 
itself. This rule is certain, a man is to spend that time in duties as may 
serve to keep his heart up with God, and not to spend that time in recrea- 
tions as may dull and flat the heart unto holiness. My brethren, the Holy 
Ghost sets a price, a value upon time and every moment of it, when he 
says, ' Redeem the time.' ^Now, time hath its preciousness from the things 
to be done and acted in it. And because the fruits we bring forth are said 
to be precious (as James calls the fruit of the earth precious fruit, James 
V. 7, as also Paul the fruits of the Spirit ; for, Philip, iv. 17, they are termed 
' fruit that abounds to our account,' namely, at that day, that is, with 
infinite profit and advantage), we should therefore improve every moment. 
There are twelve hours in the day, saith Christ (John xi. 9), to work in, 
but night^comes, and no man^works. Christ, you see, reckons every hour 
as to be employed in working, and why are you idle in the market-place ? 
Mat. xxvi. 6. Buy thy time out, let the time past suffice for lusts, says 
Peter, 1 Peter iv. 3, and the time remaining is short, 1 Cor. vii. 29, and 
we have much ground to ride, much work to do. Peter therefore, 2 Peter 
iii. 11, 12, exhorts, ' What manner of persons ought we to be in all holy 
conversation and godliness ; hasting unto the coming of the day of God.' 
He doth not say only that the day of the Lord hastens, to affright them to 
turn to God; he supposeth that work done ; but do you, says he, hasten 
against that day. He speaks to them as to men that were to do work 
against that day, which will require the utmost intention and improvement 
of time, making account they had done already so little towards it ; and 
that therefore the rest of their lives should be a continual hurry towards it, 
as men that are making a great removing at such a day, how full of business 
and haste are they ! 

[2.] In the time of a man's life, there are special opportunities; and to 
bring forth that fruit in that special opportunity God calls for it, that 
makes it doubly acceptable. Ps. i. 3, a good man is compared to a tree, 
and is said to ' bring forth his fruit in due season.' ' New fruits according 
to their months,' as you heard out of Ezekiel. There is a ' time of fruit,' 
as Christ speaks, Mat. xxi. 84. Many men lose not time, that yet lose 
special opportunities ; and though they be found doing of good, yet not 
that good at that time God calls for. ' Do with all thy might,' says Solo- 
mon, ' what thy hand finds to do,' not what thou thyself hast rather a mind 
to do. And says the apostle, Heb. xii. 1, ' Let us run the race set before 
us.' God chalks out our works, our journal every day, and we should 
heedfully attend it ; to omit doing of work at such a season God calls for, 
is to be in a gi-eat measure unfruitful. I have judged it the more special 
meaning of that passage, Titus iii. 14, ' Let ours also' (that is, those of 
our profession) ' learn to maintain good works for necessary uses, that they 
be not unfruitful.' Besides a general scope which the words have, in 



168 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

reference to all goods works, he had a particular aspect, by comparing the 
words immediately afore, upon that duty of bringing two evangelists, Zenas 
and Apollos, on their journey, that nothing might be wanting to them ; and 
then subjoins as the reason of it, ' And let ours also learn,' &c., as well as 
heathens, who perform such duties of humanity. And let Christians, says 
he, look upon all such occasions as opportunities of expressing a grace, 
which if they omit when put into their hands, they are rendered so far, and 
as' to that special season, unfruitful. Parallel to which is that text. Gal. vi. 10, 
' Whilst we have opportunity, let us do good to all, especially to the household 
of faith.' That which puts a value upon fruit is their season ; and this is 
a great part of that duty, so often inculcated, ' watch,' as merchants for a 
bargain ; s^ayo^a^o/j.ivoi rov xaiohv, buj'ing out our time, Eph. v. 16, it is a 
metaphor from merchants that watch for bargains, and their chiefest skill 
lies in taking seasons to buy commodities in. Of Christ it is said. Acts 
X. 38, that ' he went up and down doing good ;' that is, he sought out 
opportunities. 

[3.j To be fruitful, is in all ages and conditions to bring forth fruit more 
proper to that age ; as young men to fly youthful lusts (2 Tim. ii. 22), the 
lusts proper to that age ; old widows (1 Tim. v. 5) to give themselves up 
to prayer, as their very callings proper to that age do require ; the younger 
women to guide the house, 1 Tim. v. 14 ; rich men to be rich in good 
works, 1 Tim. vi. 18 ; poor men to be humble, content with their wages, as 
John said to the soldiers. 

Lastly, Let men endeavour to be filled with fruits toward their end (Ps. 
xcii. 14), to ' bring forth fruit in their old age ;' there is a special blessed- 
ness put upon it. ' Blessed is the man whom his Master, when he comes, 
shall find so doing,' Luke xii. 43. Else we shall be in danger to ' lose 
■what we have wrought,' 2 John 8, and not to have ' a full reward.' Of 
Christ it is said, John iv. 14, that it was his ' meat and drink as to do his 
Father's will,' so to finish his work. And in the last week of his life, when 
he saw he should die, he did nothing else but spend himself, he went out 
in the nights to pray, and in the morning taught the people, knowing it 
was his last ; he took his fill, insomuch as he was so spent, that he could 
not carry his cross alone, but for fear he should faint and die, they called 
in another to help him. The fruit of old trees is most concocted and 
pleasantest. 



CHAPTER VL 

Of what kind those fruits of righteousness are, with tchich our obedience should 
abound ; what is requisite to make them true and genuine. 

Having thus shewed what it is to be filled with the fruits of righteousness, 
I come new to explain of what sort or kind these fruits are. 

1. The man who performs them must be a righteous man ; he must have 
an inward frame of righteousness in his heart, whence these grow ; ' Make 
the tree good' (saith Christ, Mat. vii. 17, 18, &c.), * and the fruit will be 
good ; for can an evil tree bring forth good fruit ? Can you gather figs of 
thorns ?' So that, unless the heart be made holy and righteous, it cannot 
bring forth the fruits of righteousness ; and they are therefore said to be 
fruits of righteousness, because they spring from a righteous frame of heart, 
a workmanship created unto good works, Eph. ii. 10. And that which is said 



Chap. VI. J in the heart and life. 1C9 

in Isa. xxxvii. 31, of the kingdom of Judah, expressing its continuance, 'it 
shall take root downward, and bear fruit upward,' that I say of the fruits 
of righteousness, that as there should be fruits growing upward, so there 
shall be a root growing downward, which is the root of those fruits. And 
as a man doth grow and hold forth profession outwardly, so he should grow 
inwardly holy and righteous, having the image of God, which is created in 
holiness and righteousness, renewed in his heart ; and works proceeding 
from thence are righteous works. 

2. They are called righteous fruits, which are agreeable to the law of 
God, and which have the word of God for the rule. The commandments 
of God (Deut. xii. 9'^) are called our righteousness (so it is in the original), 
and anssverably every work which a man hath a rule and a warrant for, 
which a man doth in obedience to a law and a word, it is a fruit of right- 
eousness. The apostle John doth answerably exhort us to such holy 
obedience, 1 John iii. 3-10, That good old apostle, who writes about 
communion with God, and knew best what it was, and what was the fruit 
of such communion, cloth not take men off from the righteous law of God 
as the rule of obedience ; though there were those that went about, even 
in his time, to take men off from attending to the law as a perfect' rule, and 
that because God dwelt in them, and they had communion with him. No, 
saith he ; ver. 7, ' Let no man deceive you : he that doth righteousness is 
righteous, even as he is righteous.' And ver. 4, * Whosoever committeth 
sin transgresseth also the law, for sin is the transgression of the law.' 
Answerably therefore, the righteousness which he intended is a conformity 
to that law. And, saith he, besides the motive that you have from Christ 
(for mark it, so the context clearly runs, ' he was manifested to take away 
our sin,' and ' he that hath this hope in him,' that hath any assurance to 
be saved, and hath any communion with God, ' he purifieth himself), but 
besides that (saith he), * whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the 
law.' The righteousness therefore of a holy man that is truly righteous, is 
that which is a conformity to the law ; and the law as a rule of righteous- 
ness standeth to that man, and ought to stand, and he ought to act accord- 
ing to that law, and then it is a fruit of righteousness. 

3. These fruits must be such as are by Jesus Christ unto the glory and 
praise of God. The Scripture insisteth much upon the kind f of our actions, 
as well as upon the actions themselves. It is not enough for them to be 
conformed unto the law outwardly, yea (if it might be), inwardly too : 
2 Tim. ii. 5, ' If a man strive for masteries, yet is he not crowned except 
he strive lawfully.' The meaning is this, it is an allusion to those games 
usual amongst the Greeks, which were for crowns, where there were certain 
rules set for the manner of doing them ; and if a man did not keep to the 
manner as well as to the matter or thing to be done, he had not the laurel 
given him. It is not therefore striving only, but doing of it lawfully. The 
same apostle discourseth to the same purpose, Eom. vii, 4 : ' Ye are become 
dead to the law by the body of Christ, that ye should be married to another, 
even unto him that is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit 
unto God ; ' and saith he, ver. 6, ' We are delivered from the law, that we 
should serve in newness of the spirit, and not in oldness of the letter.' It 
is not the having a conformity to that old letter of Moses's law, which will 
make a fruit of righteousness, but it is (saith he) serving inthe newness 
of the spirit, that is, of the gospel ; for clearly there spirit is opposed to 
letter, and to perform such obedience and bring forth such fruits of right- 

* Qu. ' vi. 25 ' ?— Ed. t Qu. ' mind ' ?— Ed. 



170 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

eousness as the gospel doth suggest and require, this, saith he, is to bring 
forth fruit according to the newness of the spirit ; and no other fruit is 
accepted of God. And therefore whereas before the law brought forth 
fruits of righteousness in us, we are now dead to the motions of it, though 
it is a rule still ; j-et for begetting fruits of righteousness upon us, so we 
are dead to it, and we are married on purpose unto Jesus Chi'ist, that by 
him we might have fruit ; that is, children unto God, for he useth a mar- 
riage phrase here. Before, when we were in the flesh, ' the motions of sin 
which were by the law did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto 
death ; but now, being married unto Jesus Christ, we serve in the newness 
of the spirit, and by him bring forth fruit unto God.' And he calls it fruit, 
because good works are children begotten upon the heart by Jesus Christ ; 
for fruit, you know, is not only taken for the fruit of a tree, but there is the 
fruit of the womb and the fruit of the loins. So that the fruit which is 
accepted of God must be such as is by Jesus Christ. And agreeably to 
what hath been said, the apostle speaks (2 Tim. iii. 12) of our ' living godly 
in Christ Jesus.' And in the same chapter he speaks of a mere form of 
godliness as insignificant. Godliness therefore in Christ Jesus is that alone 
which is the distinguishing character from the form of godliness, which is 
a conformity to the old letter. 

Now then, for the kind of the fruits of righteousness, he says two things : 

1. They must be by Jesus Christ. 

2. They must be performed by the heart, so as to be directed to the 
glory and praise of God. 

1. They must be by Jesus Christ. Now fruits are by Jesus Christ in 
all these respects. 

(1.) Because they are from a workmanship created in Christ Jesus. And 
certainly the image of holiness, which is created in Christ Jesus, is of an 
higher strain than that image of holiness, which the law could stamp upon 
the heart of a man. It is of another kind, for it is suited and fitted to 
gospel-motives and considerations, unto which hoHness in Adam was not 
suited, Eph. ii. 10. 

(2.) Because they are such fruits as do arise from the Spirit of Jesus 
Christ, received from him, and dwelling in the heart. ' Love, joy, peace, 
long-sufi'ering, gentleness, meekness, temperance,' &c., all those excellent 
virtues are called, in Gal. v. 22, the fruit of the Spirit; and ' against such' 
(saith the apostle) ' there is no law,' there needeth no threatening of con- 
demnation to such men as are led by the Spirit, as you have it, ver. 18, 
* If yo be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law.' There was temper- 
ance, and meekness, and gentleness, and long-suffering in divers of the 
heathen, but they were not fruits of the Spirit of Christ, and therefore they 
were not fruits of righteousness by Jesus Christ, and from his Spirit dwell- 
ing in their hearts ; neither were those men led into them by the Holy 
Ghost, and acted by the Holy Ghost as dweUing in them, and united to 
them, and becoming one spirit w'ith them. 

(3.) Fruits of righteousness are by Jesus Christ, because they are the 
fruits that follow upon a man's apprehending the righteousness of the Lord 
Jesus Christ for his righteousness. And indeed so some do interpret this 
place ; say they, they are fruits of righteousness, that is, of the righteous- 
ness of Christ imputed to us by faith ; they being both joined here in the 
text, of righteousness, and that by Jesus Christ. It is evident and clear 
by the Scriptm-e, that the great spring of holiness and obedience is faith in 
the righteousness of the Lord Jesus ; I will give you one scripture for it, 



Chap. VI.] in thk heart and life. 171 

it is in Tit. iii. 8, where the apostle having spoken in the former part of 
the chapter, how that we are saved not by works, and that we are justified 
freely by grace, and made heirs according to the hope of eternal life, he 
saith, ' These things I will that thou affirm constantly, that they which have 
believed in God may bo careful to maintain good works.' So that to 
believe upon Jesus Christ for righteousness, and to be efiectually convinced 
that all our own works will stand us in no stead, and to go to Christ for 
his righteousness, is the greatest spring of good works, and the best stock 
to maintain them, 

(4.) Fruits of righteousness are by Christ, because they are so by motives 
drawn from Christ, When a man feels the ' virtue of his resurrection ' (as 
Paul saith, Philip, iii. 10), that is, when he considereth that Jesus Christ is 
risen as a common person, and that he arose for him as he died for him, 
or he believeth on him that his death and the fruit of it may be his ; when 
a man feels a virtue coming to his soul from the consideration hereof, which 
quickeneth him to holiness and obedience, to die unto sin and to live to 
righteousness ; when the love of Christ thus constrains, when these are the 
motives of the fruits of righteousness, these fruits are likewise by Jesus 
Christ. When ' the grace of Christ teacheth us to deny all ungodliness 
and worldly lusts, and to Hve soberly' to a man's self, and ' righteously' 
to others, ' and godly' in this present world, in all the duties that concern 
God, a man's self, and others, as knowing that Christ hath ' redeemed us 
to be a peculiar people, zealous of good works ; ' when the redemption of 
Christ makes a man zealous of good jrorks ; when these are the motives 
(which are the gospel motives) whereby a man is acted, and the peace of 
God ruleth in his heart, and the love of God ruleth in his spirit, and the love 
of Christ constraineth him, then his holy actions are fruits of righteousness 
by Jesus Christ. 

(5.) Fruits of righteousness are by Christ, because they flow from our union 
with the person of the Lord Jesus ; and therefore the apostle speaks of 
our 'growing up into Christ in all things' (Eph. iv. 15), and of our 
' increasing with the increase of God,' Col. ii. 19. The way to grow up 
in all things is to grow up in him, into nearer union and communion with 
him and his person, and fellowship with him ; and when from such a union 
and communion with Jesus Christ, and growing up herein, a man grows 
more holy — ' Abide in me (saith Christ, John xv. 4, 5), and I in you, 
that you may bring forth much fruit' — when, I say, from this union there 
flow works of righteousness, these are fruits of righteousness by Jesus 
Christ. 

(6.) They are fruits of righteousness by Jesus Christ, when the example 
of Christ is before me to move me to the like righteousness. ' He that 
pi-ofesseth he abidethin him' (saith the apostle, 1 John ii. 6), ' ought him- 
self also so to walk, even as he walked.' 

(7.) Then my actions are fruits of righteousness, whenas I look for all 
my acceptation of all my fruits of righteousness in Jesus Christ, or when I 
expect that they should all be accepted of God in and through Jesus Christ, 
and not as they come from me. Thus our services are expressed (1 Pet. 
ii. 5) to be ' sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ,' as they are found 
in him, and as God relisheth Christ in them. I say, when the heart is 
thus carried out to bring forth fruits of righteousness, though the law be 
the rule that guideth me for the matter, what fruits of righteousness to bring 
forth ; yet I say, when they are thus brought forth (for the kind* of them) 
* Qu. ' mind' ?— Ed, 



172 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

by Jesus Christ, then they are accepted by God, for God accepted nothing 
out of the Lord Jesus. 

Thus I have shewed you that those actions are the fruits of righteous- 
ness, which are done in and by Christ Jesus. But, 

2. Then our actions are the fruits of righteousness, when they are 
directed by the heart to the glory and praise of God. This the apostle 
plainly intimates, 1 Pet. iv. 11, where, speaking only of giving alms (which 
is one fruit of righteousness), he saith, ' If any man minister, let him do 
it as of the ability which God giveth, that God in all things may be glori- 
fied through Jesus Christ.' He must do it to that end, that God may be 
glorified through Jesus Christ ; for Christ himself is ordained to the glory 
of God, and all the fruits of righteousness are to be presented to God in 
and through Jesus Christ, and God is to be glorified through Jesus Christ. 
He speaks it, you see, of an action, a deed of charity ; that in all things 
(saith he) God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. But it may be 
asked, why he doth not only say, ' to the glory of God,' but * to the glory 
and praise of God ?' Is there any difference between these two ? To resolve 
the question, we must consider that those things are done to the glory of 
God (as you will have it in a way of distinction from the praise of God), 
■whenas a man, personally between God and himself, endeavours to glorify 
him ; and those things are done to the praise of God, which are done by a 
man before others. That is properly praise, which is the shine of glory, 
for praise is the manifestation of glory ; therefore that which is done in 
the heart, or personally between God and a man's self, that is properly to 
his glory ; what cometh forth in the outward conversation of a man before 
others, that is properly to the praise of God. But it is usual in the Scrip- 
ture to double things thus, to put the more emphasis upon them ; to shew 
that all we do ought to be to the praise and glory of God, that our eye 
should be sure to be upon that ; and therefore the apostle useth two phrases, 
not unto glory only, but unto praise also. To shew the abundance of a 
thing, it is doubled often in Scripture. I will give you but one instance, 
which is pertinent to the thing in hand ; it is in 1 Pet. i. 7, where he 
speaks of the great glory which our faith shall have in that day, as here he 
speaks of the glory our works give to God in this day of ours ; he saith, it 
shall be ' found unto pi'aise, and honour, and glory.' He heaps up those 
words to shew the abundance of glory which God will give our faith at the 
appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ. And let me add this, that the greatest 
glorifying of God, that is done by the creature, none knows but God him- 
self and the soul of a man. I say none knows, nor is privy to it ; and 
therefore those works are the most acceptable works unto God which are 
in a man's own spirit, whereof the outward works are but the fruit. Why ? 
Because therein a man so glorifieth God, as no creature can see it, and 
that is glory indeed ; and all secret glorifyings of God in a man's own 
heart, and also between God and a man's self, whereof God alone is the 
witness, they are those that God especially accepteth ; ' he seeth in secret' 
(saith Christ, Mat. vi. 4), * and shall reward thee openly.' And indeed 
therein lies the glory of God, that he is so respected by his creature, that 
a man doth glorify him so, as God himself only is the witness of that glory ; 
and that is properly by what is done between God and a man's self, and in 
a man's heart. Therefore the greatest glory God hath from the saints and 
angels, is that which no creature can give a witness of. Now then, to do 
a thing to the glory of God, is to do it so as to please God, aiming at him, 
moved by his glory, referring it to his glory, and intending it so ; and 



Chap. VII.] in the heart and life. 173 

this is necessary to every good work that is a fruit of righteousness. I 
shall give you but a place or two : Col. i. 10, he prays that they might 
' walk worthy of the Lord unto all well-pleasing, being fruitful in every 
good work.' A man never walkcth worthy of the Lord, that is, as becomes 
one that hath communion with God, unless he aims at him in all things to 
please him. The like scripture you have in 2 Tim. ii. 5, G, compared (for 
I still choose out such scriptures as near as I can that liave the metaphor 
of fruit in them), ' The husbandman that labours,' saith he, ' must be first 
partaker of the fruits'; so must God. And, saith he, verse 4, ' No man 
that warreth entangleth himself in the affairs of this life, that he may please 
him who hath chosen him to be a soldier.' It was the law of the militia 
of Rome, and of that empire, that they should do nothing else but give 
themselves up to the commands of their general, and unto matters of war ; 
they were not to be sent of an errand by their captains, nor employed by 
them in any private business ; and all was that they might please him that 
had chosen them, that they might please their general, to whom, and unto 
whose service they were assigned. Thus now to give a man's self up 
wholly unto God, to aim to please him in all things, and to act all to the 
glory of God, to make that the chiefest guide and rule of all my actions, 
this is to do all to the praise and glory of God. 



CHAPTER VIL 

That our obedience ought to he continued ; that a man shall in the day of 
Christ appear ivith all those fruits of righteousness which he hath brought 
forth in Christ to the glory of God. 

There is only a third thing to be explained, and that is, what is meant 
by the words of the text, Philip, i. 10, ' till the day of Christ.' 
Now, as in relation to that reference, I do observe from thence, 
1. All the good acts and fruits of righteousness, inward and outward, 
that any man hath done by Jesus Christ to the glory and praise of God, 
though in never so weak a measure, he shall appear with them all at the 
day of Christ. It shall not be with him as with other trees that have long 
borne fruit, and at the last have none appearing on them ; but all the fruit 
that a man hath borne successively in his whole life, he shall appear withal 
at the latter day. Wicked men shall appear with all their bad works, and 
godly men shall appear with all their good works ; and therefore the end 
of the world (Matt. xiii. 39) is called a harvest ; and it is called a reaping. 
Gal. vi. 5-7, where the apostle alludeth to the day of judgment, though he 
speaks of our liberality — * what a man soweth that shall. he reap ;' and at 
the harvest the crop comes in all at once : whatsoever a man soweth, though 
he sow barley at one time, and wheat at another, and rye at another, yet 
at the harvest all the crop comes in. ' He goeth forth,' saith the psalmist, 
' carrying precious seed with him;' but when the harvest is, he shall come 
again, ' bringing all his sheaves with him,' Ps. cxxvi. 6. AH the works 
that he hath done, he brings them with him at the day of judgment. Now, 
then, that which the apostle prays for in the behalf of these Philippians is, 
that at that day they might appear filled with all the fruits of righteousness, 
and fruits of that kind, which are by Jesus Christ to the glory and praise 
of God. And the reason is this, because a man's fruit remaineth, John 
XV. 14, 16, and remaining for ever, they meet him there at the day of judg- 



174 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

ment. * Charge them that are rich' (saith the apostle, in 1 Tim. vi. 17-19), 
' that they be rich in good works, laying up in store for themselves a good 
foundation against the time to come,' It will be a store and a treasury, 
which a man shall meet withal at that day. 

2. As a man shall appear thus with all his fruits of righteousness, so to 
appear at that day filled with the fruits of righteousness which he brought 
forth in the whole course of his life, shall be of exceeding great moment 
and concernment. It will be of concernment every way then, besides all 
the uses of it now. For, 

(1.) As all these fruits were by Jesus Christ, so there will be a great 
deal of honour arise to Jesus Christ, ' who shall then come to be glorified 
in his saints' (as you have it in 2 Thes. i. 10), * and to be made wonderful 
in them that believe.' For Jesus Christ shall present us to the Father at 
the latter day. Col, i. 22, and our fruit will be found on him : ' All thy 
fruit is found in me,' saith he in Hos. xiv. 8. All our fruit, I say, will be 
found on him, and he will have the glory of all ; therefore to have brought 
forth fruits of righteousness which are by Jesus Chiist, will be infinitely to 
the glory of Jesus Christ. As he will say, * Here are the children which 
thou hast given me,' so here are the fruits these children have brought 
forth. We are married unto Christ, saith the apostle, that we may bring 
forth fruit unto God. I am the husband, will Christ say, and these are 
the children of those unto whom I am married ; and therefore a saint is 
called the glory of Christ, 2 Cor. viii. 19. 

(2.) And this will be for the glory of Christ, so for the glory of God the 
Father, to whom all this was done. Therefore the apostle Peter, 1 Pet. ii., 
exhorts them to hold forth the virtues and graces of Jesus Christ, to have 
their conversation honest amongst the Gentiles ; that whereas they speak 
against them as evil doers, they may by their good works, which they shall 
behold, glorify God in the day of visitation, that at that great and general 
muster, as I may so call it, when every man shall shew his arms, God may 
then be glorified. So that in respect of the glory that shall arise to God 
the Father at that day, and that even before others also, it is of great use 
to be filled with fruits of righteousness ; not only that God may be glorified 
here in this world (as you have it. Mat. v. 16, ' That they may see your 
good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven'), but that there 
may also a great deal of glory arise unto God, and confusion of face unto 
wicked men, even in that day of visitation. 

(3.) It is of infinite use likewise unto us ; for I do believe it to be a great 
truth in the word of God, if I had time to open it, that there are degrees 
of glory, and especially at that great day of judgment, which will be accord- 
ing as a man hath been filled with fruits of righteousness, which are by 
Jesus Christ to the glory of God, here in this world. The prophet (in 
Jer, xvii. 8, 10, verses compared) compares a man that trusts in the Lord, 
and so out of faith worketh and bringeth forth fruit, to ' a tree planted by 
the waters, and that spreadeth out her root by the river ; that hath her 
leaf green, and is not careful in the year of drought, neither doth cease 
from yielding fruit.' And ver. 10 saith he, ' The Lord shall reward every 
man according to his doings ;' that is, by an Hebraism, according to their 
doings, which were their fruits. Compare the two verses together, and you 
shall fijid them pertinent to the thing in hand ; and answerably in Gal. vi. 
8, 10, saith the apostle, ' as a man soweth so shall he reap.' Now a man 
soweth either to the flesh, to his lusts, or to the Spirit ; all his thoughts 
and afi'ections are laid out either upon things spiritual, or else upon things 



Chap. YII.] in the heart and life. 175 

carnal, or else, as others interpret it, either on things of the soul and the 
eternal glory thereof, or on things of the body. Now, saith the apostle, 
whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap, both according to the kind 
and according to the measure ; look what a man sows to his lusts, to the 
flesh, he shall of the flesh reap corruption ; even to a godly man, whatso- 
ever he sows to the flesh will be all lost. But what is sown to the Spirit 
it will rise up to eternal life ; * He that soweth to the Spirit,' saith he, 
' shall of the Spirit reap Hfe everlasting.' He compares every action that 
a man doth to a seed ; every action hath a seed (let us look to it, my 
brethren), a man sows a seed in every thought, in every afiection, in every 
word, in every action that he doth in any kind ; and there will either come 
up corruption if it be bad seed, or it will come up to eternal life if it be 
good. ' Be not deceived,' saith he, ' God is not mocked,' for he seeth and 
observeth every seed that is sown, and it is he that makes the harvest (for 
so I take those words in Gal. vi. to refer to that coherence) : * Be not 
deceived ; God is not mocked : for whatsoever a man soweth, he shall also 
reap.' He will look to that ; he seeth every seed you sow, every thought, 
and every affection, and every action, and he will be sure to make the 
harvest accordingly. James speaketh in the same language too ; chap, v., 
he exhorteth them there to patience in well-doing, and he doth it under 
this very metaphor I have now spoken of. ' Be patient,' saith he ver. 7, 
' till the coming of our Lord,' do but stay till then. Whence hath be his 
similitude ? What shall we expect at the coming of our Lord ? ' Behold,' 
saith he, ' the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and 
hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain. Be ye 
also patient ; stablish your hearts ; for the coming of the Lord draweth 
nigh.' He compares the coming of the Lord to the hai'vest, and the time 
of this life to sowing of seed. ' The husbandman waiteth,' saith he, * for 
the precious fruit of the earth,' It is called precious fruit, because, indeed, 
the fruit of the earth is more precious than gold, for a man cannot eat 
gold ; gold, and silver, and pearl, are not so precious as corn. And some- 
times it is precious seed which is sown, because it cost him a great deal of 
money, and he saves it out of his own belly to sow it in the earth ; and 
when he hath done, he endureth all weathers, and still waiteth and hath 
long patience for the harvest. * Do you also,' saith he, ' wait for the 
coming of the Lord, because then is the harvest, and he will reward every 
man according to the fruit of his doings.' And hence therefore you shall 
find (still that I may speak in the language of the metaphor) in this epistle 
to the Philippians, chap. iv. ver. 17, whenas they had sent him a benevo- 
lence, saith he, ' It is not that I desire a gift,' or that I rejoice in what 
you have done, ' but I desire fruit that may abound to your account.' He 
compares it to merchandising ; there is, saith he, so much set upon your 
account in heaven for it, it is a fruit of righteousness, and a seed sown, 
which you will have an account of at the latter day. Certainly, my 
brethren, God, as he will reward every man according to the kind of his 
works, that is, those that have done good shall go into eternal life, as the 
expression is ; and he will make it out by the kind of the works that this 
man is a good man and the other not ; so he will reward according to the 
proportion, the proportionality. But why should I call it proportion, since 
it holds no proportion with degrees of glory ? You have a place very con- 
siderable, Kev. xxii. 11, it is Christ's last speech from heaven, his last 
sermon that he makes : ' He that is unjust, let him be unjust still ; and he 
that is filthy, let him be filthy still ; and he that is righteous, let him be 



176 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK I. 

righteous still ; and he that is holy, lot him be holy still.' The reason 
why he speaks thus of wicked men, * he that is unjust, let him be unjust 
still,' is because, that notwithstanding all that he had said in this book, 
and in the whole book of God, they would go on in their wickedness ; and 
because the day of judgment is deferred, they would be more wicked (as 
Daniel also had foretold in his prophecy, chap. xii. 10) ; but be not 
offended at it, ' But he that is righteous, let him be righteous still ; and 
he that is holy, let him be holy still ;' let him continue and increase in 
holiness. And why ? ' Behold, I come quickly, and my reward is with 
me ;' that is, I have it ready, for so in 1 Peter iv. 5 he is said to be * ready 
to judge the quick and the dead.' I have every man's account in my head, 
and I have the reward he shall have, for I have summed up all the holiness 
that is in the heart and life of a godly man, and my reward is with me, to 
give every man according as his work shall be, not only for the kind but 
for the degree. Why ? Clearly because he that is righteous let him be 
more righteous ; he that is holy, let him be more holy ; for my reward is 
with me, and I will give every man according as his work shall be found at 
that day. Therefore doth the apostle here (Philip, i. 10) pray that they 
may be filled with fruits of righteousness; for the more they are filled 
with such fruits, the more will there be fruit come in then to their account. 
Truly they hold no proportion with what shall be then, that is certain, 
none at all ; yet as a man that is casting up of what is due to him 
may do it with counters, when the money that is paid holds no proportion 
with the counters, and yet may truly say the money that is paid him is 
according to that account made up with the counters ; so here, though 
all the fruit we bring forth here, all the works we do here, are not worthy 
of that glory that shall be revealed, they have nothing in them proportion- 
able to it, yet notwithstanding it shall be according to that account. How 
this stands with free grace, and is not of works, I have shewed in my 
sermons on Eph. ii. 

How should these thoughts make us for ever grow up in holiness, and to 
endeavour to be filled with the fruits of righteousness ! ' Every man,' 
saith the apostle, 1 Cor. iii. 8, ' shall receive his proper reward.' It is a 
reward proper to his work, to his labour. And to the same purpose is what 
the apostle says, 2 Cor. v. 10, ' For we must all appear before the judgment- 
seat of Christ, that every one may receive the things done in his body, 
according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.' ' In the body,' 
that is, proper to the body, as some read it ; or as it followeth, as he hath 
behaved himself in the body. And he speaks suitable, 1 Cor. iii. 8, ' Now 
he that planteth, and he that watereth, are one, and every man shall receive 
his own reward, according to his own labour.' It is meant of heaven, for 
saith he, ver. 15, * He shall be saved, yet by fire ;' he shall suffer so much 
loss, for the Spirit of God will reveal all. Consider also another place of 
the apostle, Eph. vi. 8, 9, he speaks upon occasion of ordinary duties, of 
the duties of servants that do service in their callings ; but you may apply 
it to anything else that is good, that hath any ingenuity* in it, that is done 
through Christ to the glory of God. ' Servants,' saith he, ' be obedient, 
&c., not with ej'e-service ;' he speaks not only of holy duties, but of all that 
a man doth, of servants serving their masters, ' knowing that whatsoever 
good thing a man doth, the same shall he receive of the Lord.' A man 
doth such a one a good turn, and he doth it out of a principle of grace and 
holiness ; whatsoever good thing any man doth, whatsoever ingenuity any 
* That is, ' ingenuousness.'— Ed. 



Chap. VII.J in the heart and life. 177 

man sheweth of any kind, tho same he shall receive of the Lord. He would 
never condescend to i)articulars else, to a cup of cold water, as he doth in 
Mark ix. All yield, even those that are against degrees of glory, that at 
the last day there shall more approbation be given to one man than to 
another ; but why not for ever, seeing a man's righteousness remaineth 
for ever ? 

And therefore, my brethren, how should all these things make us endea- 
vour after holiness, as Peter saith (sufl'er the words of exhortation, for these 
things tho holy apostles pressed upon the hearts and spirits of men) : 2 Pet. 
iii. 14, ' Seeing that ye look for such things, be diligent, that ye may be 
found of him in peace, without spot and blameless,' which is the first 
part ; • And seeing that these things must be dissolved, what manner 
of persons ought ye to be, in all holy and godly conversation !' so it is in 
the original. The apostle Peter, who doth in his epistles sparkle forth so 
much holiness, yet he hath so great and so vast a sight of holiness, which 
yet he would attain to, that he knows not how to express it. * What manner 
of men,' saith he, ' ought we to be !' It is a word of admiration, as when 
Christ did still the sea in Mat. viii. 27, ' What manner of man is this !' say 
they ; so here, what manner of holiness should we use, ' looking for and 
hastening unto the coming of the day of the Lord ;' that is, despatching and 
doing all we can for our lives against that day ; and if we have neglected 
our time, let us begin now to hasten, and to be holy in all manner of con- 
versations. It is expressed in the plural number, to instruct us that in all 
ways, towards a man's self and towards others, and in all duties towards 
God, we should be holy. Our lives should, as it were, be in a hurry after 
the day of judgment ; as those that are to remove at the quarter-day, they 
hasten to do all against the time. Let a man think with himself, I must 
have all my time filled up, with every grace I must abound, and hold forth 
Christ in everything, in every condition, and in every relation ; and the 
more fruitful I have been, I shall appear so at the latter day, and it shall 
all redound to my account. Let a man consider this ; it will make him to 
be like one in a continual haste, despatching as much business as he can 
for his Ufe. 



178 OF GOSPEL nOLINKSS [BoOK II. 



BOOK II. 

The demeanour of a Christian, as it is expressed under the notion of friendship 
with God. — The example of Abraham's being the friend of God. — How, 
in the sense of the apostle James, he was justified by works. — How great, 
excellent, and kind a friend God is to us. — How this consideration should 
engage us in a sincere friendship to him. — What are the duties and offices 
to be j)erformed by us, as proper and owing to such a friendship ? — Of the 
behaviour of a Christian, as it is named service to God. 

Was not Abraham our father justified by ivorks, when he had offered Isaac his 
son upon the altar? Seest thou how faith wrought with his icorks, and by 
ivorks li'os faith made perfect ? And the scripture was ful filled which saith, 
Abraham believed God, and it was imputed unto him for righteousness: and 
he was called the Friend of God. — James II. 21-23. 



CHAPTER I. 

The obedience of a Christian expressed under the notion of friendship to God. 
— The title of being * God's friend ' is given to Abraham — The meaning of 
the apostle James, when he says, Abraham was justified by works. 

My present subject is the obedience of a man already regenerated ; and 
this the notion of friendship with God will in a large manner serve to 
illustrate unto us. Friendship is the strength of love, and the highest im- 
provement of it. ' Thy friend,' says Moses, ' that is as thy own soul,' 
Deut. xiii. 6. Friendship is common to, and included in, all relations of 
love. A brother is (or ought to be) a friend ; it is but friendship natural. 
Husband and wife are friends ; that knot is but friendship conjugal. See 
one instance for both. Cant. v. : Christ had first called his church sister, 
and then spouse ; and as not contented with both, though put together, 
he adds another compellation as the top of all, ' Oh my friends ! ' This 
friendship to God will therefore most perfectly and completely serve to 
express the love and obedience of the saints to God, which is here set forth 
in the text, in the example of Abraham, the state of whose person and 
temper of heart is herein made the common standard of all believers. 

This phrase of being friends to God is not only expressive of the first 
work of God upon us, but it is sufiicient to instruct and direct us, and (as 
the Holy Ghost speaks upon another occasion) ' to make the man of God 
perfect.' The whole of that charge given to Abraham, who is here made 
our pattern, Gen. xvii. 1, ' Walk before me, and be thou perfect,' is sum- 
marily comprehended in this testimony of his carriage, whereby he made 
good the character of a friend, and so was called the friend of God. Other 
titles given us do more express our privileges, as to be called a son, an 



Chap. I.] in the heabt and life. 179 

heir ; but this of being a friend to God (the essential constitution and 
essence of wliich regeneration first gives us) expresseth more of duty and 
of the inward disposition of a Christian towards God, though it also be as 
high a title for dignity as any other. God writ upon the palms of his 
hands, and as a signet and a memorial on his right hand, the name of 
* Abraham his friend ; ' ho remembers him and his seed by it again and 
again, as if all were spoken in that one word. Our privilege by it I will 
not insist on, but the duty, the dispositions of it, I cannot omit, having 
gone so far in it, which Christ also insinuates, John xv. 14, ' Ye are my 
friends, if ye do whatever I command you.' 

That I may arrive at this portion of Scripture (my text), as it stands in 
coherence with the foregoing words, I must necessarily open the aim and 
intent of James therein, which hath had so much controversy upon it. 
The point which he pursues in this chapter and this epistle was to con- 
vince loose professors, who, building themselves upon Paul's doctrine 
(which if it had not been current in those times there had been no colour 
for their mistake), that faith alone being that which saved us, and justified 
us without works, they thereupon had taken up a looseness of profession 
in practice, not judging inward holiness in their hearts, or an outward 
strictness in their lives necessary, seeing it was faith alone that saveth. 
Now, in this chapter, there are two mediums by which he evinceth the 
vanity of that deceit. 

1. That even under the gospel, universal respect to all the command- 
ments, one as well as another, is required, and upon the same ground to 
all as unto any one ; yea, and that at the latter day, God will judge every 
man according to this rule, which he terms the ' law of liberty,' ver. 12. 
The gospel requires a sincere respect unto all commandments ; this you 
have from ver. 8 to the 14th, ' If ye fulfil the royal law according to the 
scripture. Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself, ye do well : but if ye 
have respect to persons, ye commit sin, and are convinced of the law as 
transgressors. For whosoever shall keep the whole lavv-, and yet ofiend in 
one point, he is guilty of all. For he that said. Do not commit adultery, 
said also. Do not kill. Now, if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, 
thou art become a transgressor of the law. So speak ye, and so do, as 
they that shall be judged by the law of liberty. For he shall have judg- 
ment without mercy that hath shewed no mercy ; and mercy rejoiceth 
against judgment. What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he 
hath faith, and have not works ? can faith save him ? ' 

The second part of this discourse, and which he prosecutes to the end of 
the chapter is, 1. That true saving faith hath always works of holiness, or 
such a respect unto all the commandments, accompanying it both in the 
heart and life. And 2. On the contrary, that faith which hath not these 
fruits is but a dead faith, and not the true genuine faith, such as all be- 
lievers have that are saved. Yea, and 3. That every man's faith (and so 
together therewith every man that professeth himself to have true faith) 
must one day be put to an open trial, to justify the truth of itself, and of 
his profession, and this afore all the world. And the believer also wiU be 
put upon the justification of his having had such a faith as God (ex conse- 
quenti, or in the sequel) professeth only to justify man upon ; for at the 
latter day it is faith is the grace that must be tried and found unto honour 
and glory, 1 Peter i. 7. And the man that shall plead justification by faith 
alone (which James contradicts not), and that he had a saving faith, must 
undergo this examination, whether his faith produced such works, yea or 



180 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK II. 

no, as the nature of true faith, with difference from false and unfeigned 
faith (which James disputes against), doth note. 

These three assertions he intermingledly lays down. The first, ver. 14, 
* "^Tiat doth it profit a man, though he say he hath faith, and have not 
works ?' ' Can r, rrlsn:, that faith, save him ?' The second is in ver. 17, 
' Even so faith, which hath not works, is dead, being alone,' and but such 
a faith as the devils have, ver. 19. The third is in verses 21 and 24, ' A 
man is justified by works, and not by faith only.' The issue of all which 
comes to this, that true sanctification and holiness of heart and life is 
required by God unto the possession and the enjoyment of salvation as well 
as faith, and serves to justify the truth of the faith, by which he hath alone 
the right to it. 

Now, for the confirmation of all this, he allegeth the instance of Abraham 
as an undeniable conviction and sufficient evidence, as his preface to it 
shews : ' Wilt thou know, vain man ? ' says he, ver. 20. He gives such 
possessors the title of vain men, because they are vain in their imaginations, 
Rom, i., and deceived in what they build on, and their rehgion will prove 
vain (as in chap. i. 26 he speaks) ; such a man ' deceives his own heart, 
and his religion is vain.' 

Now wilt thou know, that is, shall I give thee an invincible demonstra- 
tion for all these things ? Both that that faith which is without works is 
a dead faith, a counterfeit faith, and so of another kind fi-om saving faith. 
And 2dly, that whoever pleads he hath faith, must have a justification (in 
a right and true sense) by works, &c. For this, take that instance of our 
father Abraham: James ii. 21, 'Was not Abraham our father justified by 
works, when he had offered up his son Isaac upon the altar ? ' We must 
understand him here closely to prosecute those assertions he had begun, 
whereof one was, that it was not enough for a man that would be saved to 
say that he had faith, but he must make this good, and shew it forth in 
his works. And accordingly, as to this sense, the apostle must be tmder- 
stood to speak this of Abraham (for he speaks pertinently to his own con- 
clusions laid), that if Abraham our father were now ahve, or to appear at 
the day of judgment, and would say or plead that he had faith, upon which 
God had imputed righteousness unto him, that yet even he, as well as any 
other, must shew that he had such a faith by his works, or he had not 
approved himself to have been a true believer. And so to be justified by 
works is but to approve himself a true believer in difference to a false faith 
(which is the main point which James his scope was to disprove) ; and 
accordingly, there is recorded (to which James his words do refer) a justifi- 
cation of him that followed upon that work of his: ver. 22-24, 'Seest thou 
how faith wrought with his works, and by works was faith made perfect ? 
And the scripture was fulfilled which saith, Abraham believed God, and it 
was imputed to him for righteousness : and he was called the Friend of God. 
Ye see then how that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only.' 



CHAPTER II. 

How the apostle Paul and the apostle James are consistent in the account 
uhich they give of Abrahams justification. 

If you ask how this is to be reconciled to what Paul says, Rom. 3d and 4th 
chapters, where he says the clean contrary, that Abraham was justified by 



^■■" 



CUAP. II.] IN THE HEART AND LIFE. 181 

faith without works ? the answer (besides what hath been now said) is 
clear out of the scope of both places compared. There is a double justifi- 
cation bj God: the one authoritative, the other declarative or demonstrative. 
Though this is also before God, yet it is that which is to be made before all 
the world b}' God ; and in order thereunto, the one is the justification of 
men's persons coram Deo, before God, as they appear before him nakedly, 
and have to do with him alone for the right to salvation ; and so they are 
justified by faith without works, either as looked at by God or by them- 
selves. God therein passeth an act of Christ's righteousness, out of his 
pure prerogative ; as a king, when he pardons, or creates a nobleman, and 
the like. And this part of the distinction Paul himself puts, in stating it 
under the example of Abraham ; that coram Deo, before God, nor Abraham, 
nor any flesh shall be justified by works : Rom. iv. 2-5, ' For if Abraham 
were justified by works, he hath whereof to glory, but not before God. 
For what saith the Scripture ? Abraham believed God, and it was counted 
to him for righteousness. Now to him that worketh is the reward not 
reckoned of grace, but of debt. But to him that worketh not, but believeth 
on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.' 
Observe it, he saith, * not before God ; ' that is, not in that justification, 
which is an act passed between God and a man's own soul, and in respect 
of the private transactions between both. 

But God, at the latter day, is to proceed as the judge of all the world (as 
Abraham calls him), and as such, to put a difference between man and man, 
and that upon this account, that the one were true believers when he justi- 
fied them ; the other were unsound, even in their very acts of faith which 
they did put forth. And so he is to shew forth a difierence between those 
whom he hath justified thus out of his prerogative, and those whom he hath 
left under wrath. He is to own the one with a ' Come, ye blessed,' and 
reject the other with a ' Go, ye cursed.' 

Now God hath ordered it so, that he will not put the possession of 
salvation upon that private act of his own, without having anything else to 
shew for it. He shews grace and favour to a man without works, but yet 
he will go demonstratively to work, and difierence believing Abraham from 
unbelieving Ishmael and Laban ; and this by such works as the other had 
not to shew for themselves. He will justify his own acts of justification, 
of this man and not of that ; and he will justify the faith of him he had 
justified (which is James's main scope), or, if you will, the person himself, 
as he professed himself to have had faith. And this is as evidently James's 
scope, as the other is Paul's. In a word, Abraham's person, considered 
singly and alone, yea, as ungodly, is the object of Paul's justification with- 
out works, Rom. iv. 3-5. But Abraham, as professing himself to have 
such a true justifying faith, and to have been justified thereupon, and 
claiming right to salvation by it, Abraham, as such, is to be justified by 
works. Now, that this is James's scope is evident, for — 

1. It agrees with the language he useth, which imports his meaning to 
intend but an outward demonstration in this his justification which he 
intended, ver. 18, ' Shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew 
thee my faith by my works.' And ver, 22, ' Seest thou how faith wrought 
with his works ?' So, then, he speaks of a visible, demonstrative justifica- 
tion, as the words seeing and shewing import. 

2. This instance of Abraham's justification, he saith, was after he had 
ofi'ered up his son. Now what was that justification, but that famous testi- 
mony of God himself, given him thereupon ? ' Now know I,' says God, 



182 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK II. 

Geu. xxii. 12, ' that thou fearest God,' which is no more but this : I have 
now a visible evidence and demonstration of it ; so that whereas before I, 
upon a private act of my own, justified thee upon beheving, I can now own 
thee to all the world, and have an evidence to give upon certain knowledge. 
And this testimony was Abraham's justification. 

3, The 23d verse also tells us, that he had that character or title of 
honour given him thereupon : 1. That he was called the friend of God, 
which is spoken in relation unto that act ; 2. He is spoken of, also, as one 
whom God was not ashamed of to be called his God, nor to own him 
as a friend, for he had had it upon an experience what would justify his 
doing so. 

4. And yet further, he herein prosecutes what he had said, ver. 12, that 
we should be judged by our works, and so speaks this in relation thereunto. 
And look in what sense a man may be said to be judged by his works at 
the latter day, in the same sense, and that sense only, he intends this his 
justification by works, and in no other ; for all judging and passing of sen- 
tence must have either a justification or a condemnation, as the sentence 
of it in the close. So as there is no more danger to say, a man at the latter 
day shall be justified by his works, as evidences of his state and faith, than 
to say he shall be judged according thereto ; and the one is to be taken in 
a similar or like sense unto the other. Now, to be judged ' according to 
works' (when it is spoken of a good man), is meant demonstratively, as 
they are evidence of his estate. The apostle's scope being also to shew, 
by God's approbation given Abraham, upon the story of his offering up his 
son in his lifetime, what like approbation or justification Christ will declare 
and hold forth concerning true believers, when the story of their lives and 
all the good they have done, or was wrought in them, shall be ripped up : 
' I was naked, and ye clothed me ;' and so gives them the testimony of his 
knowing that they had done so. As, on the contrary, to them that regarded 
not good works, he says, ' I know you not,' Mat. vii. 23. And David, 
speaking of standing in judgment, useth the same phrase, Ps. i. 6, 6, ' The 
Lord knows the way of the righteous,' that is, justifies and approves ; as 
in that speech God did Abraham, * Now I know thou fearest me,' &c. 

And in relation to this outward judgment at the latter day, our sentence 
of salvation is termed expressly a justification ; and this very thing is asserted 
by Christ himself : Mat. xii. 36, 37, ' I say unto you, that every idle word 
that men shall speak, they shall give an account thereof in the day of judg- 
ment ; for by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou 
shalt be condemned.' Neither is it anywhere said, that God will judge 
men according to their faith only ; nor will it be a sufficient plea at the 
latter day to say. Lord, thou knowest I believed, and cast myself at thy 
grace. God will say, I am to judge thee so as every one shall be able to 
judge my sentence righteous together with me : 1 Cor. iv. 5, ' Therefore, 
shew me thy faith by thy works ;' let me know by them thou feared st me ; 
for as I did judge Abraham, and gave thereupon a testimony of him, so I 
must proceed towards thee. And this God will do, to the end that all the 
sons of Israel, yea, the whole world, may know that he justified one that 
had true faith indeed. 

So then, Paul's judging according to works, and James his justification 
by works, are all one, and are alike consistent with Paul's justification by 
faith only. For in the same epistle where he argues so strongly for justi- 
fication by faith without works, as Horn. iii. iv., he in chap. ii. also declares, 
that ' he will judge every man according to his works.' He doth so to the 



Chap, II.] in the heart and life. 183 

good : ver. 7, ' To them who, by patient continuance in well-doing, seek for 
glory, and honour, and immortality, eternal life.' As well as to the bad he 
pronounceth a contrary judgment: vers. 8, 9, ' But unto them that are con- 
tentious, and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, indignation 
and wrath, tribulation and anguish, upon every soul of man that doth evil, 
of the Jew first, and also of the Gentile.' 

Now then, to proceed in the exposition of James : * Thou seest how faith 
wrought with Abraham's works.' Which imports, first, that his faith was 
a working faith, which is the principal point that James drives at. And 
secondly, that his works did proceed out of faith, and so were accepted. 
Thus in Heb. xi. 17, ' By faith Abraham ofiered up Isaac,' says the apostle 
there. ' And by works faith was made perfect ; ' that is, declared and 
manifested to be true and perfect faith. Thus we are said to bless God, 
when we shew his blessedness. And thus, in 2 Cor. xii. 9, ' God's power' 
is said to be ' perfected in weakness ; ' not that it receives any perfection 
from us, but because it is manifested in its divineness and perfection. And 
this the reason of the thing also enforceth, for the cause is not perfected 
by the effect, but is declared perfected. Fruits perfect not, or make not 
the tree good, but shew the goodness of it. Now faith is the cause of works ; 
and so his faith was perfected by works, by being manifested, upon trial (as, 
Heb. xi. 17, the apostle speaks), to be perfect faith, that is, true and genuine 
faith (for so perfect is taken by James, chap. i. 17, * every perfect gift'), 
in distinction from faith that proves itself hypocritical in the issue. Thus 
you say of a true dye, it is a perfect colour. 

Again, then, a thing is said to be perfected, when it hath attained the 
end which it was ordained for, or which was aimed at. Thus in 1 John 
ii. 5, * Whoso keepeth his words, in him the love of God is perfected.' 
Understand it either of the grace of love in us, it is perfected when it brings 
forth the actions and fruits of obedience it was ordained to bring forth ; or 
take it in respect of God's love towards us, holiness is the end and aim 
thereof. It receives its intended end and accomplishment in a man that 
keeps the commandments, for we were ' chosen to be holy before him in 
love.' 

But let us proceed in the exposition of James's words. James ii. 23, 
' And the scripture was fulfilled which saith, Abraham believed God, and 
it was imputed to him for righteousness ; ' that is, upon this his ofi'ering 
up his son there was a fulfilling of that thing which aforehand had been 
spoken of Abraham, whereof the Scripture is the record. 1. First, let us 
consider the thing. 2. The i^hrase fulfilled. 

1. Let us consider the thing in other passages of the New Testament, 
where it is said a scripture is fulfilled, when it is first done or accomplished, 
with reference to some scripture or prophecy recorded and written long 
afore the thing was accomplished. Now that cannot be James his meaning 
here, for Moses his books (and so this Book of Genesis) were written after, 
both this imputation of righteousness by God, and that ofi'ering up of Isaac 
by Abraham. The intent of this saying then must rest upon this, that 
what is recorded in Scripture, as said long before of Abraham's faith, was 
afterward fulfilled and demonstrated, though both passages were at one and 
the same time written by the same hand of Moses long after both. And so 
it refers to the priority of matter, that one passage fell out afore the other, 
not to the writing itself. Now it is evident by the story, that about thirty 
years before Abraham ofiered up his son, God had (as the Scripture records 
it) imputed righteousness to him upon believing, Gen. xv. 6. Yea, and 



184 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK II. 

upon a bare and naked act of believing was it that Grod did impute righteous- 
ness to him. But then, as hath been said, God that justified Abraham as 
his elect gave him such a faith ; and such an act of faith was then put forth 
by Abraham, as God, to use the words said of Christ, knowing by intuition 
and foresight the kind of it (he also out of election having given him such 
a faith) to be true and genuine, justified him upon it; it being such a faith 
as he meant to follow with all these good works, that which Abraham after- 
ward out of faith wrought; and indeed Abraham's faith after so many years 
brought forth those many acts of obedience, Heb. xi. 17. There was an 
evident demonstration of making good, a fulfilling or justifying of what God 
had done, and of that faith he had justified him then upon, clearly shewing 
that God in justifying him upon that, though a single act of faith, yet had 
kept to that eternal rule of his in justifying any, that such a faith should 
be operative and working of holiness. This Abraham in the sequel fulfilled 
and made good, and God foresaw he would. And it is observable, that in 
the 15th of Genesis God gave forth the promise absolutely unto Abraham 
first, and then he put forth that act of faith towards it. The promise was 
a declaration of God's immediate counsel towards him, not founded on any 
work precedent, no, nor faith, but uttered for him by faith to receive : 
ver. 1, ' I am thy shield and exceeding great reward.' And ver. 6, ' As the 
stars shall thy seed be' (in which Abraham spied out Christ). * And he 
believed in the Lord, and he counted it to him for righteousness.' Therefore 
Paul argues that God justified him, as considering him an ungodly person, 
neither therein respecting his works nor his faith, as that for which he 
justified him. Now then, upon that eminent act of obedience, the ofiering 
up his son (which is recorded Gen. xxii.), doth God renew the same 
promise, confirming it with an oath ; I say, he renews the very same promise 
for substance given afore : ver. 16, 17, ' By myself have I sworn, that 
because thou hast done this thing, and hast not withheld thy son, thine 
only son : that in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will 
multiply thy seed as the stars of heaven, and as the sand which is upon 
the sea shore ; and thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies.' Now 
the fulfilling here is in part interpreted by the word the apostle useth of 
this very speech Heb. vi. 17, that it was a ' confirmation of a promise 
formerly given by an oath,' referring to the declaration of himself, 
Gen xxii., as by the 13th and 14th verses appears, * For when God made 
promise to Abraham, because he could swear by no gi-eater, he sware by 
himself, saying. Surely blessing I will bless thee, and multiplying I will 
multiply thee.' So then, as this renewing the promise was but a further 
confirmation of what was sure afore on God's part there, so here in James 
this fulfilling was but a making for, or open verification, or demonstration, 
or shewing forth on Abraham's part, that hisjfaith God had justified him 
upon was true and real, perfect faith, such as God only professed to justify 
men upon. And as the first promise given. Gen. xv., was sufiicient alone 
to have assured us, and the addition of that oath made it not more true or 
full in real verity than it was afore, only ex ahmdantl was added for con- 
firmation, so Abraham's justification upon that bare act of believing was 
as full and complete in the thing itself, as it was now upon the ofi"ering up 
of his son ; only hereupon a new ratification was made to his faith thereof. 
And so the saying was but fulfilled, and Abraham's faith (upon which it 
was first uttered) justified and declared true, namely, by that testimony of 
God's then given, ' Now I know thou fearest me.' 

2. And, secondly, the phrase well bears it ; for in this sense a thing is 



Chap. IL] in the heart and life. IBS 

said to be fulfilled in Scripture when declared and ratified by some eminent 
signal of it. Acts xiii. 32, 33, when Peter brought the Jews tidings that they 
should have God's own Son for their Messiah (for which he quotes Ps. ii., 
' Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee'), says he, ' God hath 
fulfilled the same unto us, in that he hath raised up Christ from the dead.' 
Now Jesus Christ was not made any whit more God's Son by his resurrec- 
tion than he was before ; how is it then said by his resurrection to be 
fulfilled '? Paul hath resolved us : Rom. i. 4, ' He was declared to be the 
Son of God by the resurrection from the dead.' It is he that was the Son 
of God by eternal generation, and there was no other such a son of God, 
and of whom it was accordingly said in Scripture, ' This day have I begotten 
thee.' This scripture is said to be fulfilled, when this is manifestly made 
forth and demonstrated. And this is but the same which God doth every 
day, when upon occasion of some eminent act of self-denial or sufi'ering he 
renews assurance of his love, and of the justification of them that have afore 
believed, as John xiv. 21. 

Now then, that justification, which in reality, and for the thing itself, was 
as complete upon a bare act of believing as ever it shall be to all eternity 
(and the very words import it, in that thirty years before Abraham's 
ottering up his son, righteousness was imputed to him by believing), yet is 
said to be fulfilled, when demonstratively and signally held forth. And as 
the resurrection of the Son of God added nothing to his Sonship that was 
essential thereunto, so neither did this justification of Abraham by works, 
James ii. 21, add anything to God's real imputing of Christ's righteous- 
ness, but was the signal of it. 

So then, let us conceive aright of God's proceedings herein. Says God 
of a man that now but begins to put forth a naked act of faith, I do here 
justify this man, and I do justify him for ever, and I will never recall it. But 
a carnal heart might object, Will God beforehand thus rashly give forth an 
eternal justification of man ? Will he not stay until he sees works to spring 
from it ? No, says God, I will adventure to do it now ; for when I mean 
to justify according to my decree of election, I give him faith, the faith of 
my elect; and I see (for he sees all our thoughts and wants afar off) this 
faith I justify this man now upon, this sole act of believing for justification, 
to be so genuine, so true and unfeigned faith, and of the true and right 
breed, that I will adventure it, or rather undertake for it, that in the 
future course of this man's life it shall bring forth in his heart and life 
acts and dispositions suitable, which shall justify this my justifying of this 
man ; which when it shall do, then is God's sentence of justifying him said 
to be fulfilled. 

When a man first believes upon a bare word of God, God in like manner 
justifies upon that bare act of believing ; and as he trasts God, so God 
trusts his faith, or rather undertakes for it, and pronounceth such a 
sentence upon him of justification as he hath sworn (as he did to Abraham) 
never to recall. And yet the case is such, as if in the future course of his 
life that man did not walk so as, by works and dispositions of hohness 
accompanying that faith, to give demonstration of himself to be a true believer, 
God at the latter day must recall that sentence, as pronounced upon a dead 
and empty act of faith. When therefore in his future course he walks 
suitably, he is said to fulfil or make good that first act of God ; for he 
gives sufficient proof and demonstration that he had, and hath that kind of 
faith upon which God alone will be sure to justify a man, even a working 
faith that is lively. And in this sense is that saying of James here to be 



186 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK II. 

understood : ' And the scripture was fulfilled which says, Abraham believed 
God, and it was imputed to him for righteousness.' 



CHAPTER III. 

Abraham called the friend of God, upon the performance of that act of 
obedience in offering xip his son. — That what is said of Abraham is spoken of 
him as the father and pattern of all believers. — The true faith works in the 
heart friendly dispositions toward God. 

The apostle James withal adds, ' And he was called the Friend of God.* 

1. Some ado there is where in the Old Testament to find this saying. 
Some think it not anywhere uttered in words, and must therefore be fetched 
from such passages recorded betwixt Abraham and God, as argued he owned 
him for his friend, as that promise Gen. xii. 4, ' I will bless them that 
bless thee, and I will curse them that curse thee.' And to be a friend to 
one's friend, and an enemy to all one's enemies, is the strictest league of 
friendship that can be. Also those familiar conferences and colloquies 
vouchsafed to Abraham do argue it. God in reality used him as a friend, 
and so did in effect call him so. But over and above there are two evident 
testimonies of God in express terms giving this title to Abraham by God. 
2 Chron. xx. 7, Isa. xli. 8, ' The seed of Abraham my friend.' And this 
honourable mention of him, compared with those real transactions of 
friendship, does put all out of question as to the authenticness of this 
quotation. 

2. For the scope and pertinency of James in this quotation to the pur- 
pose he had in hand, it must be considered, 

(1.) That he joins and couples, you see, two several testimonies, fetched 
out of several scriptures, concerning one and the same person, Abraham, 
whose instance he had before him to make forth his assertions out of it — 
one in his story in Genesis, the other in the Chronicles and prophet. And 
thereby he would prove and shew that which he intended, tlaat in him 
justification, or justifying faith, and sanctification, or works answerable, did 
meet ; yea, and that from his faith by which he was justified, did flow true 
holiness and love to God. So as that from his instance, who is our pattern, 
he argues that where God imputes righteousness by believing, the person 
is made such in heart and life, as God may approve of him as a true and 
real friend. ' Abraham believed, and it was imputed to him for righteous- 
ness.' There is the one. And (says James) take this in too, ' He was 
called the friend of God,' that is, approved by God as such ; and he really 
was such, for God calls things as they are. Now a friend to God, in James 
his interpretation of it, imports such inward dispositions of heart, and such 
a behaviour and deportment in life towards God, as a true friend beareth to 
a friend ; and so is set to express sanctification in its distinction from faith, 
and as inseparable from faith. 

(2.) He pertinently mentions this title of Abraham's being God's friend, 
as given him more especially upon that act of oifei-ing up his son. A friend, 
we know, is Imown in trial. Now God tried him in the dearest thing he 
had, in requiring that he himself should sacrifice his own son, which God 
took so kindly at his hands, as he ever after upon mention of him termed 
him friend, this having baen so high an act of pure friendship toward him. 



Chap. III.] in the heabt and life. 187 

(3.) The apostle pertinently allegeth it upon this disconrso of true faith, 
to shew what a powerlul working thing it is, where it is. You see how it 
wrought in Abraham's heart ; it framed and changed his heart into friend- 
ship with God. Abraham believed God, and he was called the friend of 
God. You see then what a faith his was. 

(4.) And lastly, it indeed interprets what James meant by Abraham's 
being justified by works ; not the imputing of righteousness, but the calling 
and owning a man as God's friend. And in the same sense that God called 
Abraham friend, upon that act of oflfering up his son, in the same sense he 
is said to be justified by works in the verse before. You use to say, such 
an one is an approved friend ; such did Abraham demonstrate himself to be ; 
and God owned him, and entitled him such for ever, which is a clear dis- 
tinct thing from either Paul's or James's interpretation of righteousness, and 
justifying the ungodly. 

I have but this to add in the close, which I began with in opening this 
difiicult scripture, that all this is spoken of Abraham, not as a person 
extraordinary, but as a pattern and father unto all believers. For, 1, else 
James's alleging his instance had not come home to his scope, to shew that 
all professors must have that faith and sanctifieation that Abraham had. 
And therefore, 2, in ver. 21, when he begins to allege it, he says, ' Was not 
Abraham our father ' thus and thus ? And therefore we that profess our- 
selves sons and children of Abraham, must be herein like and conform to 
him. Yea, 3, it is observable that in the places to which he refers us, that 
Abraham was called the friend of God, it is still spoken of him in 
relation to us his seed and children. You have it in two places, Isa. 
xli. 8, 2 Chron. xx. 7, and in both it runs thus, * The seed of Abraham 
my friend.' It is given him when his seed is mentioned, and the 
entail to them is from him, because they all are to be friends to God as 
well as he. 

So then to conclude ; look as that glory, that heaven which we all expect, 
and which is the common receptacle of all believers, is termed in this very 
respect ' the bosom of Abraham,' Luke xv. — and we are said to sit down 
with Abraham, &c., because both he and we go to one and the same common 
place — so that same kind of faith, the same effect and fruit of faith, 
sanctifieation and friendship to God, is to be wrought in us here, if we be 
saved with Abraham. Now friendship being put here to express Abraham's 
suitable can-iage towards God, in the actings of his heart and life after 
believing, the deductions from hence are two, and they are proper to 
his scope. 

1. That true faith, wherever it is, worketh and frameth the heart to 
friendlike dispositions unto God, and brings forth friendlike carriage in the 
life towards God. This the 23d verse holds forth, ' And the scripture was 
fulfilled which saith, Abraham believed God, and it was imputed unto h im 
for righteousness : and he was called the Friend of God.' This the stream 
of his text fully carries along with it. James his scope is not only chiefly 
to shew that whom God justifies, he doth reconcile them to himself, or 
works in their hearts friendiike dispositions toward him ; but that a friend- 
like deportment, that is, sincere obedience, is thereby signified, and doth 
flow from thence, and accompanies it in their hearts and lives. And to 
this very end and scope it is that this is cited out of the Old Testament, 
and again and again repeated ; so that, however reconciliation elsewhere 
mainly imports the work of God upon us at first in the alteration of our 
states, yet Abraham's being a friend properly and mainly relates to obedi- 



188 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS lBoOK II. 

ence, and a behaviour suitable to friendsbip, as witnessing and testifying 
that work and aUeration. 

2. Another inference is, that every man's faith, whether it be true or 
feigned, shall and must have this trial, whether it hath brought forth holi- 
ness in heart and life ; and every man is thereby to be declaratively justified, 
and differenced from all men that shall be damned. 

I shall insist now on the first of these inferences, to shew how true justi- 
fying faith works this friendly temper to God, which is the apostle's scope 
here. I shall give you a reason or two for it. 

(1.) From the ingenuity- of faith, if it be true and genuine, that is, 
suitable and answerable unto the object it apprehends ; for in a suitableness 
there unto the truth, the genuineness of faith consists. For what is indeed 
the aim of faith ? When it comes to God and Christ, believing on him, 
what would it have ? What is the thing it looks for from God ? And what 
would it have at his hands ? The mind and intent and scope of my faith, 
when I come to believe, is to have God, out of an infinite love (the same 
out of which he gave his Son to die, and which would yet move him to give 
him if he had not done it), out of such a love to pardon me all my sins, 
and to justify me, and to become an everlasting Father and friend unto me, 
and to love me with that love he loves his Son with, and out of that love 
to bestow all things on me. If you ask your hearts, and your faith could 
but tell you what the meaning of it is (as the scripture, Rom. viii., speaks 
of the Spirit in prayer), what is its errand, what its business is with God, 
when it casts itself upon God in Christ for salvation, you will find the very 
bottom-reach of it to have been spoken in what hath been said ; and that 
this it would have of God, or it is never quiet. Now then, if this faith be 
but genuine and true, honest and unfeigned (as Christ in the parable, and 
the apostle speaks of it), and so is answerable to its own aim, if it have 
any truth, honesty, justice, equity, or reality in it, how is it possible it 
should come to God for such a great love from him, such a large fruit and 
effect of such an entire friendship on God's part ; but it must work the 
heart to a correspondent, an answerable fi-ame in some sincerity towards 
God again on our parts ? 

The faith that justifies us is called a * working faith' (ver. 22), and 
surely if it work anything, it must needs work a suitable disposition to God, 
such as it expects from God towards itself. So it is evident from the 
example of Abraham here ; look what his faith expected to have from God, 
it wrought in a way of ingenuity the like in his heart unto God. Abraham 
when he believed unto righteousness, it was founded upon the promise God 
had made him of his own Son, his only Son, ' in whom' God told Abraham, 
' he and all nations would be blessed.' Now doth Abraham believe to have 
God's Son given to him and for him ? (For ' Abraham saw his day and 
rejoiced,' Abraham being a prophet, Gen. xx. 7, and the father of the 
faithful, to whom the first promise of Christ, the blessed seed, was made.) 
He must then be understood to have had the same temper which David 
had, of whom it is said. Acts ii. 30, ' That being a prophet, and knowing 
that God had sworn that of his loins, according to the flesh, he would raise 
up Christ : he, seeing this before, spake of the resurrection of Christ.' So 
Abraham, I say, must necessarily be understood, upon the same account, 
to know and apprehend Christ and his offering up, and resurrection repre- 
sented in that of his son's, which is expressly affirmed : Rom. iv. Jind Heb. 
xi. 17-19, ' By faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered up Isaac : and 
* That is, ' ingenuousness.' — Ed. 



CUAP. III.] IN THE HEART AND LIFE. 189 

he that had received the promises offered up his only begotten son, of whom 
it was said, That in Isaac shall thy seed be called : accounting that God 
was able to raise him up, even from the dead ; from whence also he received 
him in a figure.' And Abraham, considering these things, said with him- 
self, Why then God shall have my son, now he calls for him, my only son, 
or whatever else is dear to me. ' Seest thou not then how faith wrought 
with his works, when he offered up his son Isaac on the altar ?' If his 
faith would have God be so great a friend to him, as God in that promise 
had declared himself to be, then faith frames his heart to be a friend to 
God. * He believed,' this, namely, which hath been now discoursed, ' and 
it was imputed to him for righteousness : and he was called the Friend of 
God ;' that is, this effect the faith that justified him did work in him. 

And if faith be but equal, if faith be but faithful, if it be but honest (as 
Christ himself speaks, he calling the heart, by which the promise is savingly 
received, * an honest heart,' in the parable of the sower), if it be but a 
principle of humanity, and deal with God but according to the principles 
of men, as a man, a sinful man, deals with man, it must needs work this 
frame. For this is made by Christ (Mat. v. 46) a common principle of 
humanity, ' to love those again that love us.' And Solomon speaks the 
same, that * he that hath friends must shew himself friendly,' Prov. xviii. 
24. Now faith is an higher principle than humanity ; it is a divine prin- 
ciple of the operation of God (Col. ii. 12), and therefore must needs, by 
the same power of God, which from first to last accompanies it, frame the 
heart it is seated in unto this ingenuity of friendship unto God. And it is 
seated in the whole heart, as the Scripture tells us, Rom. x. And that 
faith works in this manner to return to God what it receives from God, 
that place likewise holds forth, 2 Cor. v. 14, 15, ' The love of Christ con- 
strains us ; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, and that when 
all were dead, to the end that they might live ; that then they should not 
live unto themselves, but unto him that died for them, and rose again.' 
This the law of common equity requires, to live to him that should have 
given his life unto us, especially by his own death ; and this (if you observe 
it) is put upon this reason, ' because we thus judge,' which judgment is 
the product of this principle and act of faith, which both believes these 
things as of and from God towards us, and withal hath in it an equity, an 
ingenuity to make the like retm-ns to God ; and therefore it must needs 
constrain us, when we thus in earnest judge. 

And this holds true of the faith of dependence, as well as of faith of assur- 
ance (if it be genuine), for even faith of dependence expects this great 
friendship at God's hands, desires it, waits for it, and is not quiet without 
it. Surely because it so judgeth, and waiteth for and desireth this, it must 
needs frame the heart to the like again. And this is the first reason. 

(2.) The second reason is from what hath been noticed, that to be sure 
God accepts of no other faith, but such as in the kind of it is such as will 
bring forth holiness and works by love ; neither doth he justify upon any 
other, this being the faith of God's elect. Where his election bestows 
justification, there and then, and in them, he works that kind of faith. That 
there is such a distinction of faith, James holds forth ; and God, to whom 
all his works are known from the beginning, knoweth where he worketh 
such genuine acts of faith, and where there is such a root as will bring 
forth according to its kind holiness in heart and life, and that works by 
love. God foreknows whom he justifies, and knows things in their causes, 
and the properties of causes. Souls of all sorts come with their faith unto 



190 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK: II. 

him, and do alike cast themselves upon him and his gi'ace. And he knows 
what is in man, even their thoughts afar off; and as a skilful herbalist 
knows the differing roots of herbs and fruits ere they have brought forth, 
so doth God know of what kind that faith is wherewith men come unto him, 
and so never errs in bestowing his justification upon an unsound faith, that 
hath not love to accompany it. God doth not justify any man rashly, or 
inconsiderately, so as if afterwards he sees a soul to withdraw, and not 
answer his faith in works and obedience, he should then call back his grant. 
No ; he makes sure work, and whom he foreknew or chose unto faith, in 
them he works true faith, and in them alone ; and them he justifies upon 
their believing. The just is said to have his faith, which is proper to him, 
in distinction from that faith which those that withdraw have, Heb. x. 
compared with that of the prophet, Hab. ii. 4, ' The just shall live by his 
faith, but he that makes haste' (though he seems to believe), 'his soul is 
not upright in him ;' that is, his faith is not sound, and of the right breed. 
' We are not of those that withdraw, but that believe to the saving of the 
soul ; ' that is, we are of the number of those that so believe, as to be infal- 
libly saved ; it is spoken by way of distinction of their faith, for the other 
believe too, as the opposition implies. So as though many come to God, 
and put forth acts of faith, yet their faith being not spiritual, nor genuine, 
God justifies not upon it ; for he hath not given them a faith to the saving 
of the soul. He knowing what manner of faith it is, bestows not that grace 
of justification upon it. I may say of it, as of Christ it is said, John ii. 24, 
upon his like discerning beforehand, the ineflectualness and unsoundness of 
their faith, ' Many believed on him, but Jesus committed not himself into 
their hands, because he knew them all.' So God doth in this case. 

(3.) A third reason is, God's end in saving us by faith, was not to lose 
by us a whit of that love and holiness he expects from us ; but rather he 
chose faith, because whilst it gave all to free grace, and his infinite love, it 
might withal reflect and carry all that love down unto the heart again, 
and shed it abroad in the soul, and so cause love to God to spring up 
with a redoubled increase and advance. He did not choose love imme- 
diately, not because he regarded it not, but because if it had not sprung 
from faith, as first apprehending his love, it would have boasted itself, for 
it had returned something of itself unto God. But whilst faith is made 
the receiver of all from God, and thereupon the worker of love in us, upon 
that account God's free love is at once exalted and magnified, and our 
hearts quickened and inflamed with love to him again. 



CHAPTER IV. 

An exhortation rmto fnendship with God, from the considerations how great, 
excellent, and kind a friend he from eternity hath been, and perpetually, 
and for ever is to us. 

My exhortation now shall be unto those that are reconciled, and become 
(in respect to their states) friends to God already. You see your high 
calling, brethren; you have the honour to be called, as Abraham was, the 
friends of God. You are entered into a covenant of friendship with God, 
make something of it ; and indeed it is the scope even of that place also, 
2 Cor. v., ' Be ye reconciled to God.' For he speaks unto the Corinthians 



ClIAP. IV.] IN THE HEART AND LIFE. 191 

who already believed, and were converted and reconciled : but be you, even 
you, reconciled more, for even you have need of it, and at the best your 
friendship is but imperfect ; and as you ' know but in part,' so you love 
but in part. As Christ says to his disciples, * Except ye be converted,' 
Mat. xviii. 3, so say I, ' Except ye be reconciled,' that is, except you more 
and more renew your covenants with God, • ye cannot be saved.' And 
besides, you make many breaches with God ; and though the covenant 
through his grace and goodness notwithstanding holds, yet you had need 
to make those breaches up again. Amantium ira arnoris redintegratio est, 
and reconciliation is but the renewing of love. 

Consider that those who are perfect enemies and rebels to God, whilst 
they are in that estate, do but their kind ; but you know what it is to 
oflend God, and how it grieves him, his Spirit hath at times set it upon 
your hearts, how unkindly he takes any sin from you. You have felt in 
part what it cost him to reconcile you, and have tasted how good the Lord 
is, and you have a principle of love in you which needs but stirring up. 
Consider what Solomon says, Prov. xviii. 24, ' A man that hath friends 
must shew himself friendly ; and there is a Friend that sticketh closer than 
a brother.' It is the law of friendship, you see, to answer it with friend- 
ship again, mutuis officiis vivitur. 

And besides, the sweetness that is found in reciprocal friendship, loyally 
and sacredly maintained and kept up, it should move you. God will find 
a sweet savour in you, and you again will have pleasure in communion 
with him. Friendship is the sweetest, and of all comforts the greatest ; 
therefore Solomon, though he were a king, and had the sum of all delights, 
yet he would have one in an especial manner be his friend, 1 Kings iv. 5. 
And God, though he need no comfort nor happiness to be added to him, yet 
he would have friends to delight himself in, and that should delight in him. 
It was this that moved him, and therefore that the comfort of his love and 
yours be not much of it lost or impaired, demean yourselves as friends. It 
is Christ's own argument in his last sermon to his disciples, in which he 
treats them, and admires them by his sacred name of fi'iends, John 
XV. 13-15 ; and amongst other arguments he useth this in exhorting them 
to obedience : * So my joy shall be in you, and your joy shall be full,' 
verses 10, 11. There will be mutual and reciprocal joy and delights in 
the intercourses of it. You will add to Christ's joy, whose joy is yet full ; 
and to be sure yours, which is imperfect, will be made full by it. As we 
use to say, if people do not mean to love, let them never marry ; so if men 
do not set themselves to walk with God, let them renounce this sweet and 
obliging relation of being friends to him. Especially this is to be done, if a 
man find one who is a friend indeed ; so says Solomon in that place, 
* There is a Friend is nearer than a brother,' that will do more for thee 
than one that cometh out of the same loins. And therefore Moses, Deut. 
xiii. 6, seems to prefer the love of some friends to that of some wives. ' If 
thy wife,' says he ' entice thee, yea, if thy friend who is as thine own soul.' 
Now, to such a friend, if you meet with him (says Solomon), ' shew your- 
self friendly.' And truly as faith, so friendship is rare on earth. It is 
hard to find a good piece of stufi" indeed to make a friend of. 

I have two things, therefore, which will make up the measure of this 
my exhortation full. 1. What a fi'iend God is, and hath been, and will be 
unto you ; and, 2. Wherein you are to express friendship again unto him. 
You find them both in that exhortation of Christ, what a friend he was, 
John XV. 13, ' Greater love than this hath no man, to lay down his life for 



192 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK 11. 

his friend.' And from thence he presseth this on them, * If ye be my 
friends, do what I command you.' 

(1.) Consider, first, that God hath been your ancient friend, even from 
everlasting. The older friends are, the more we ought to prize them. We 
esteem of an old servant, but especially of an old friend. Therefore, saith 
Solomon, ' thine own friend and thy father's friend, forsake not,' Prov. 
xxvii. 10. That is, leave not one who hath been an old friend to thee, 
and thy family before thee. Now God hath been thy Friend and Father 
from everlasting, therefore forsake him not ; he hath loved thee ever since 
he loved himself. Now if one had loved another ever since himself was, 
how would this endear him ! God hath done this. 

(2.) He is such a friend as never had his thoughts off from us. There 
is not a moment in which he hath not loved us, and had his thoughts upon 
us. Other friends sometimes think and speak of you, but not always ; 

* But God withdraweth not his eyes from the righteous,' Job xxxvi. 7 ; and 
Cant. viii. 6. We are said to be ' set as a seal upon his hand,' so as he 
continually looks upon us. It is an allusion to that type, Exod. xxviii., 
wherein Israel is engraven, first, upon two stones placed upon the high 
priest (Christ's) shoulders and arms, ver. 11, 12, then on a breastplate, or 
(as it is there interpreted) upon his heart, ver. 29. Upon his arms, to 
shew his power is engaged ; upon his heart, to shew that his love is ; and 
placed visibly on both for a memorial : Isa. xlix. 15, 16, ' Can a woman 
forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son 
of her womb ? yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee. Behold, I 
have graven thee upon the palms of my hands, thy walls are continually 
before me.' Jerusalem, the type of his elect, her walls are continually 
before him. And in the like type, Deut. xi. 12, they are termed a land 
(for selection of people) ' which the Lord thy God careth for. The eyes of 
the Lord thy God are always upon it.' Therefore David also saith, ' How 
many are thy thoughts to us- ward ! They cannot be numbered.' If a king 
casteth but a glance upon a man, and thinks of his suit and business, he 
counts it a great favour. What is it then for the great God never to have 
had his eye off" thee to do thee good ? And think with yourselves, what, 
and how old are your thoughts towards him ? They are but of yester- 
day. Your friendship began but the other day, but his hath been from 
everlasting. 

(3.) As it is from everlasting, so to everlasting. The one is called 

* choosing us from the beginning,' Eph. i. 4. The other is called loving 
us to the end: ' Whom he loved, he loved to the end,' John xiii. 1. For a 
couple to have been twenty years married, and to hold out in loving, how 
great a wonder is it amongst the sons of men, especially when many unkind- 
nesses have passed ! 

(4.) The first moment he took up as much love as he hath ever since had, 
or can manifest to eternity. This is high, brethren, if ye consider it. God 
loves not as man, as he is not as man that repents of his loving ; not as man 
that begins to love a little, that hath a velleity at first, an aflection stirring, 
and having his heart inclined, is drawn on to do what at first he meant 
not to do. No ; but all the grace and favour which in time is bestowed 
on us, was given us in one lump from eternity, and all to eternity is but the 
manifestation of it : 2 Tim. i. 9, 10, ' The grace which was given us before 
the world began ; but now is made manifest in Christ, who hath brought 
immortality to light.' And so that immortality serves but to manifest, or 
bring to light the grace which was given at the first, or (as it is 1 Cor. ii. 9), 



Chap. IV.] in the heart and life. 193 

* which was then prepared for them that love him.' So as all that is done 
since, is but a show love hath prepared to entertain you with, and is set 
out with new inventions and studied ways to take your hearts. And 
therefore the very giving Christ is termed but the ' commending,' that is, 
the setting out his love, Horn. v. 8. And John in plainer terms says, ' In 
this was the love of God manifest,' 1 John iv. 7, 8. The love in solido, 
in bullion, was all (the whole mass of it) in his heart before. And all he 
doth to eternity is but the coining of it, stamping this or that particular 
mercy, and so paying it forth unto us : Ps. cxxxviii. 8, * The mercy of the 
Lord is for ever. The Lord vs-ill perfect that which concerns me.' The 
connection of those words is this, that God having beforehand set down 
■with himself what he would do for him, his mercy which -was for ever was 
but a perfecting, a limning out that happiness love did conceive the idea 
of, and that perfect from everlasting. And because an eternity of time was 
required to this vast work, therefore it is he adds, ' Thy mercy, Lord, 
endureth for ever ;' for so much time to perfect v/hat concerns me (a poor 
atom placed in the eye, or because of thy love) will take thee up. And 
will not this atlect your hearts, that have any love in you to him, or hopes, 
or pursuits after such a love ? 

(5.) Consider what his love hath caused him to do for thee. He first 
gave thee a paradise ; but that was not good enough. He prepares heaven, 
not as that which thou wert worthy of from thine original, but which he 
thought meet to bestow, to shew how great a God he is : Heb. ii. 11, 'He 
was not ashamed to be called their God, for he prepared for them a city.' 
Yea, he was not contented with the ordinaiy direct means of loving ; but, 
as those that are vast and lavish in entertainments, he must have uncouth 
artificial ways to love such as are extraordinary. To love us only the plain 
direct and downright way, and to give us heaven the first day, as he did 
the angels that never sinned, this was too low, too mean. His love must 
have meanders, windings, difficulties, yea, much water to encounter it, 
and so endanger the quenching of it ; all this to commend the greatness 
and transcendency of it. * Love is as strong as death ;' and ' much water 
cannot quench it,' Cant. viii. 6. And Rom. v. 8, ' In this God commends 
his love, that whilst we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.' So says St 
Paul. And Christ, that was to perform it, knew what he did lay down : 

* Greater love than this hath no man, that he lays his life down for his 
friends,' John xv. V6. And yet, dear Redeemer, at how low a price dost 
thou set thy love, whilst thou enterest into comparative suppositions of one 
man (a mortal, sinful man) dying for another ! ' Greater love than this 
hath no man ;' and in that supposition art fain to put in this too, as the 
highest elevation of man's love in supposition, ' to lay down his life for 
his friends,' to be sure not for his enemies. But yet because there could 
be no higher supposition made, he is therefore fain to represent his love to 
tis hereby. Paul makes the supposition thus : Rom. v, 7, * For a righteous 
man will one die ? yet peradventure for a good man,' that is, one eminently 
and publicly useful to such a proportion as his life, as it is said of David's, 
is worth ten thousand of other men, * a man would even dare to die.' Well, 
let all these qualifications meet, and when they do, it is yet but a ' scarcely,' 
but a peradventure, that any would be found to die for such an one. It is 
but a supposition of one that is otherwise weary of life ; and yet if he comes 
to the point, he will shrink at it ; therefore it is added, 'to dare to die;' it is 
so gi-eat an evil. But to do it not for friends, but enemies ; and to this 
end, to make them friends, when he could have created new ones cheaper, 

VOL.. VTT. N 



194 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK II. 

and enough of them ; yet to die for ungodly sinners, enemies (as Paul 
exaggerates our case and condition there), and for him to die that had such 
a life to lay down, is an admirable instance of extraordinary love. For a 
mere man, a sinful man, to die (the case which both Christ and Paul do 
put), is but to give up a game that must be lost a little after, to restore a 
forfeiture, a debt that must be paid ; but ' my life' (saith Christ with an 
emphasis), ' none can take from me,' John x. 18, ' I lay it down of my- 
self.' Let me say it (which he hints there), his Father could not take it, 
but that himself consented to it ; for ' his Father had given him to have 
life in himself,' John v. 26. And will ye know the value of that life he 
laid down ? It is the dignity of the person gives the worth to the life. 
You have it, and you cannot have more said, 1 John iii. IG, ' Hereby we 
perceive the love of God, that he laid down his life.' Well, thus dear it 
cost Christ, who was God. And was this nothing to God the Father too, 
think ye ? Was it nothing for God to see one that was God, of the same 
nature, and his fellow, so debased ? As it moves man to see any of their 
nature despised, so it moved God to see God the Son, God equal with 
him, to lay down his hfe ; it touched the Godhead in common, as in the 
three persons. But for a Father to give and offer up his Son, is a love 
above our thoughts to conceive, or our words to express. Your father 
Abraham, though he had too big an heart to weep for it (you see no tears 
in his eyes, nor mention of them when he was about to do it), yet he knew 
full well what it was to offer up a son, an only son. To be sure God 
knew it, and measured it by his own heart to his own Son, out of the sense 
of which God uttered those words to Abraham, ' Now I know thou fearest 
me, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, from me,' Gen. 
xxii. 12. And was not God's Son's life proportionably dear to him, inas- 
much as he is his Father by a more substantial and transcendent generation ? 
' My God, my God' (says Christ, Mat. xxvii. 40), why hast thou forsaken 
me ?' thou who art in so special a respect my God and my Father (see 
Eph. i. 3). And he speaks thus, knowing it would strike and affect his 
soul. And yet he speaks but the half of what God did in it, and yet in 
that consider how he parted with, yea, forsook an old friend, a bosom 
friend ; and how Christ also forsook father and mother for his wife, the 
church, Eph. v. 25. And do you think God to be so insensible, or impas- 
sible, or without natural affection to such a Son, as that all those speeches 
should be but rhetorical figures, and feignings of a sorrowful part ? When, 
as you have it inculcated 1 John iv, 9, 10, ' In this was manifested the 
love of God towards us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into 
the world, that we might live through him. Herein is love, not that we 
loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation 
for our sins.' And you have the same also in Rom. viii. 32, ' He that 
spared not his Son, but delivered him up for us all.' Yea, further, think 
with yourselves, that his father was himself obliged to be the infiicter of 
his own justice, to bruise and break him, ' when he made his soul an 
offering for sin,' Isa. liii. 10 ; for no creature could strike strokes hard 
enough to satisfy for sin. He laid the wood of the sacrifice, viz., our sins, 
about his soul, for ' he laid upon him the iniquities of us all,' and he blew 
the fire too. All earthly bellows would themselves have been burnt, at 
least not been able to have made the furnace hot enough ; yea, his wrath 
against sin was the fire. Think but with yourselves if his mother Mary 
must have been the crucifier of him, and must have knocked in every nail 
with her feeble trembling hands (whilst at every stroke a sword is said 



Chap. IV. J in the heart and life. 195 

to havo * pierced through her soul'), what excess of sorrow wouhl have 
oppressed her ! But now, even what man did against him is said to be by 
God the Father's own hand and counsel. And 3'et to what end was all 
this grief and loss ? I might say it, and could defend it, it might have 
been spared. God in his prerogative could have saved sinners without it. 
That outcry of Christ cries thus loud in mine ears, ' Let this cup pass ; all 
things are possible to thee.' In which prayer we ro.ust suppose it entered 
not into Christ's heart to desire the elect might not be saved when he 
uttered it ; and yd supposeth it consistent with that cup's passing from 
him. But love was set upon it to have our salvation thus, and no other- 
wise, transacted. If justice might have permitted it, and havo let that 
dismal cup pass and slip, ,yet love was engaged and resolved to manifest 
itself this way rather ; and the more possible another way might have been, 
the more should love be commended in taking this, ' that when we were 
sinners, Christ died for us.' It was an extravagancy, a superabundancy of 
love, love's device, an invention of love, that knew not how to shew love 
enough. And, my brethren, these are not notions or ideas, these are the 
greatest realities and existences, which are only to be understood with 
our hearts, and not by our understandings ; for * the love of God' and 
Christ ' passeth understanding,' Eph.1 iii. 19, and so is not taken in, 
but by the immediate impress of the Holy Ghost, who is the ' shedder of 
this love of God abroad into our hearts' (not so much into our understand- 
ings), as the apostle speaks. 

(6.) I come next to God's dealings and dispensations towards us ; and 
herein all the ways of God are ways of love and friendship ; he is never 
but doing us good : Ps. xxv., ' All his ways are mercy and truth.' He is 
never out of the road of fulfilling one promise or truth, or of bestowing one 
mercy or other. In his very afflicting he fulfils a promise : ' In very faith- 
fulness hast thou chastised me,' Ps. cxix. And faithfulness is the perform- 
ance of some trust or promise out of love. 

(7.) All he doth he doth freely for us, and thinks not much at it. A 
man must hold pace with other friends, and do one kindness for another. 
But says God, Hos. xiv. 4, ' I will love thee freely, and heal thy backslid 
ings.' And he will (says Zephaniah, chap. iii. 17) ' rest in his love.' He 
is glad, and rejoiceth to do his people a kindness : Jer. xxxii. 41, ' I will 
rejoice over them to do them good, with my whole heart and my w^hole 
soul.' In James i. 5 it is said, * he giveth freely and upbraids not;' the 
word is a--X'Sjg, that is, smphj or singly, that is, for no other end than to 
give, for who can recompense him ? So true liberality, even in us, is 
termed a^rXor^jc, 2 Cor. viii. 2. He doth it merely to do good, rejoicing 
in so doing ; and therefore when he hath done upbraids not, and doth not 
use to say, I have given thee thus and thus. Often in case of great pro- 
vocations indeed thou mayest hear of him, as David did, but it was but to 
melt his heart (2 Sam. xii. 8), but otherwise he is silent ; whereas other 
friends will be ever and anon twitting you with kindnesses. 

(8.) His inward valuation and real esteem of you is answerable to, and 
more than his outward kindnesses ; and really to do so is the greatest 
attractive of friendship. He prizeth you above all the world : Isa. xliii. 
3, 4, ' I gave Egypt for thy ransom, Ethiopia and Seba for thee. Since 
thou wast precious in my sight, thou hast been honourable, and I have 
loved thee : therefore will I give men for thee, and people for thy life.' 
And he gave real testimony of this in giving his Son, which was more than 
a thousand worlds : Mat. x. 30 and Luke xii. 7, * Even your very hairs are 



196 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK II. 

all numbered' — the hair, -which is the meanest, unvaluablest appurtenance 
of man, and -which in a proverb the Latins express as a thing of no value, 
ne pili astimo, as we say, I value it not a straw. Things of worth use only 
to be numbered, and things that are not are said to be nullius numeri. 
David made it a great occasion of God's love to him, that ' all his members 
were written in God's book,' Ps. cxxxix. 16. But Christ descends to our 
very hairs ; and not your hair in the comb, the bush of them, but every 
one, the smallest, all are numbered ; how much more our persons. 

(9.) Other friends will be ashamed of you when you fall into disgrace 
and poverty, though they knew you never so well before : Prov. xix. 7, 
' All the brethren of the poor do hate him ; how much more his friends 
that go afar off from him ? ' But the great God is so far from being 
ashamed of us, that he takes his denomination from us, and takes us into 
his style ; witness that expression, ' the God of Abraham,' &c. to which 
that of Heb. xi. 16 refers. 

(10.) In all afflictions he will stand thy friend. When thou art in greatest 
trials and distresses, then he will shew himself most to be a friend, which 
indeed is the time for the trial of a friend : Prov. xvii. 17, * A friend loves 
at all times, but a brother is born for adversity.' That is the special season 
that a man hath use of a friend for. ' In time of adversity' (saith Job, 
chap. vi. 14) ' a man would have pity from his friend.' But usually it 
falls out (as Solomon says, Prov. xix. 7), ' A man follows them with words, 
and they are wanting to him.' But then will the Lord own thee most 
especially, if thou foUowest him with words, with prayers, and seekest 
earnestly unto him. Therefore David (Ps. xxxi. 7) says, ' Thou hast known 
my soul in adversity.' And David speaks it out of the sense of his love, 
that he did it then most, when others would not know him nor regard him. 
And whereas other friends may be absent, and not able to help thee or 
advise thee, ' he is a present help in trouble,' Ps. xlvi. 1. Yea, there are 
cases wherein all thy friends in the world, if present, could stand thee in 
no stead, but would be miserable comforters, as in case of scandal, &c., 
and then will God break in and own thee. Yea, further it is said, Ps. xli. 3, 
that ' he makes our bed in our sickness.' It is put to express the highest 
tenderness in distress, a condescending to do the meanest office, a readiness 
to supply all wants and deficiencies ; and in that he says, he will make all 
thy bed, it imports utmost and universal diligence and care in that which 
is committed to servants of the lowest rank. He will as a friend sit by thy 
bedside, lay thy pillow for thee, make thy bed easy ; that is, make a dis- 
tressed condition comfortable, fetch thee anything, take care of everything, 
apply himself so to thee that thou shalt then say, thou art in ease in the 
midst of trouble, 

(11.) God will not cast thee off when thou art old, and wantest strength 
to serve him ; but (as it is in Jer. iii. 14) he then remembers the kindness 
and pains taken in thy youth. David prays, Ps. Ixxi. 9, ' Cast me not off 
in time of old age, forsake me not when my strength faileth.' You know 
God's answer, long before he prayed it and since, is repeated with five 
negatives to assure us of it, ' I will never, at no hand, upon no occasion, 
leave thee, or forsake thee.' 

(12.) Other fi.-iends, for an ill turn, will forget all foimer good turns and 
kindnesses done, though never so many ; but God on the contrary will 
forget all thy sins, and remember them no more (Isa. xliii. 25) ; but not 
one good deed or office of love, no, not one good thought from the first to 
the last, shall be forgotten, but it sticks in him, and takes deep impression. 



Chap. V.] in the heart and life. 197 

Those things thou hast forgotten, at the latter day he will remember them, 
and that to requite them. Every cup of cold water shall have a reward : 
' God is not forgetful of your labour of love to his name,' Heb. vi. 10. 

(13.) Yea, when thou art dead he will remember thee and thine. Other 
friends bury their friendship in the graves of the deceased, but God not 
only will take care of thy very bones, Ps. xxxiv. 20, but remember thee 
in thy seed, as David did Jonathan's posterity. Thus he remembered 
Abraham's seed for their father's sake : ' The seed of Abraham my friend,' 
says he, Isa. xli. 8 ; and so he remembered David's seed, 1 Kings xi. 31 ; 
and Rom. xi., ' They are beloved' (and it is gospel) 'for their fathers' 
sake.' 

(11.) Lastly, Whatsoever he hath thou shalt have part of it ; nay, all 
he hath thou"^ shalt inherit, Rev. xxi. 7. God himself can have but all 
things, and thou shalt have all that he hath, John xvii. 21 and John xii. 21. 
Christ speaks with an heart, as if his own single personal glory would do 
him no good unless we should be with him and have part of it. All his 
attributes shall be for thy happiness as well as for his own glory ; his power, 
wisdom, and mercy, shall be set on work for thy good ; and though aU 
these attributes serve for his own glory, yet they shall as truly and really 
serve for thy comfort as for his glory. AU within him and without him 
shall be set on work for thy good. What canst thou have more of a friend ? 

Now if God hath been, is, and will be such a friend to us, what manner 
of persons should we be in returns again unto him ! My brethren, this is 
your calling ; you are called to be friends of God, see you walk worthily 
and answerably unto it, so as to fill up the measure of that relation, and 
observe as far as possibly the laws of friendship that ever were or can be 
feigned to have been between two fi'iends, for God full well deserves it at 
thy hands. And it should move you that you were a long time before 
enemies, and had nothing but wars in your thoughts against him, and 
therefore you had need now endeavour to make him amends. 



CHAPTER V. 

What the conversation of a believer owjht to he in performing the part of a 
friend towards God. — That we should keep up an entire and near com- 
munion with him. — What this communion is, explained in . several 
particulars. 

I come to that main and principally intended subject, which is, the con- 
versation of a Christian towards God, in performing the part of a friend. 
I shall insist on some particulars wherein these returns of friendship do 
consist. 

1. The first and primary head (which will contain divers particulars in 
it) is pursuing after, and preserving entire communion with, God. Mutual 
communion is the soul of all true friendship ; and a familiar converse with 
a friend hath the greatest sweetness in it. Sometimes Solomon compares 
it to honey, which as it is pleasant to the taste, so enlighteneth the eyes, 
Prov. XXV. 16, 17 compared, reading, as Cartwright* doth, for ' neighbour' 
' friend,' ver. 17. Sometimes it is compared to perfumes and odours, 
which refresh the brain ani animal spirits : ' Prov. xxvii. 9, ' Ointment 
and perfume rejoice the heart; so doth the sweetness of a man's friend. 
* Cartwright in loc. 



198 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK II. 

And he calleth it sweetness in the abstract rather than sweet ; for it is 
certain, where it is found close and entire, it is the most spiritual cordial 
of man's life. And indeed communion is that which distinguisheth this of 
friendship from the intercourses that are in other relations, unless it falls 
out that friendship be intermingled with them, as in conjugal it often doth. 
Parents take care for and love their children when young, and they again 
do honour their parents and obey them, when yet during their non-age 
there is not much communion nor acquaintance between them. Between 
masters and servants there is an intercourse by way of command and 
obedience. Masters maintain their servants, and servants render fear and 
service to their masters ; but yet there is not a mutual communion and 
acquaintance between them. And by this doth Christ distinguish friends 
and servants, when he sets himself to heighten the privilege of this rela- 
tion, and to endear it to them : John xv. 15, ' Henceforth I call you not 
servants, but friends.' For I have unbosomed myself unto you ; ' whatever 
I^have heard of my Father I have made known unto you, but the servant 
knoweth not what his lord doth ;' that is, there is no communion between 
them. 

Now, although God beareth all these relations, of father, lord, master, 
&c., which his distance between him and us exacts, yet he also hath con- 
descended to admit us to communion with himself. John seems to speak 
of it as with an holy boasting of the eminent privilege which himself and 
others, that lived up to their principles, enjoyed : 1 John i. 3, ' And truly 
our fellowship is with the Father, and the Son.' The rise of it lies thus, 
Christ was God's fellow, Zech. xiii. 7, which privilege he hath by being 
a Son equal with God. And God found this fellowship so sweet, as he 
calls us up to the participation of it : 1 Cor. i. 9, ' God is faithful, by 
whom ye are called unto the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord.' 
He speaks of it likewise as that which is the height and top of our calling 
as we are Christians. And this fellowship with the Lord Jesus doth not 
only consist in his and our sharing jointly in the same privileges, as in his 
graces, glory, &c., but it is the ' fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ ;' and so 
also of his person, in all the sweetnesses of, and converses with, and rela- 
tions to him. And yet, lest in too much familiarity we should forget our 
distance, he adds, 'our Lord!' as in the psalm fore-cited upon the like 
occasion, having called us his fellows, ver. 7, he adds, ver. 11, ' He is the 
Lord, and worship thou him.' Now, this communion, as on our part it is 
to be transacted, is summed up in these things : 

1. Besides the common tribute of daily worship you owe to him, take 
occasion to come into his presence on purpose to have communion with 
him. This is truly friendly, for friendship is most maintained and kept 
up by visits ; and these, the more free and the less occasioned by urgent 
business, or solemnity, or custom they are, the more friendly they are. 
It is made a diminution, though in his own people : ' Lord, in trouble 
have they visited thee ; they poured out a prayer when thy chastening 
was upon them,' Isa. xxvi. 10. A stranger will visit one whom he hath a 
suit unto and business with ; and we use to check our friends with this 
upbraiding. You still come when you have some business, but when will 
you come to see me ? David, who hath this testimony from God, to be 
' a man after God's own heart,' which is equivalent to this of God's con- 
cerning Abraham's being his friend, hath this disposition of spirit recorded 
of him, Ps. Ixiii. 1-3, ' God, thou art my God ;' he embraceth him at 
first word, as we use to do friends at first meeting. ' Early will I seek 



Chap. V.] in tue heart and life. 199 

thee,' says he: 'my soul thirstcth for thee, my flesh' (that is, myself) 
* longeth foi* thee in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is.' Surely 
David had some extraordinary business now with God to be done for him- 
self, which made him thus eager after him ; no, truly, nothing but to see 
God himself; as it follows, ver. 2, 'To see thy power and thy glory, so 
as I have seen thee in thy sanctuary,' where God had met him, and mani- 
fested himself to him. ' To see thee,' hath the same emphasis here that 
those words, ' against thee I have sinned,' have elsewhere. And further, 
what was it in God that specially drew forth his heart, and was the object 
of his inquest ? Ver, 3, * Because thy loving-kindness is better than life ;' 
and ver. 4, thus (if I have no other reason) ' will I bless thee whilst I live.' 
It is all along the pure language of friendship. The very sight of a friend 
rejoiceth a man : Prov. xxvii. 17, ' As iron sharpeneth iron, so doth a man 
the face of his friend.' It alone whets up joy by a sympathy of spirits ; 
and in answer hereunto it is characteristically to God's people called the 
seeking of God's face, that is, himself, for so his face is taken : ' Thou 
shalt have no other gods before my face,' that is, thou shalt have myself, 
or none but myself. Personal communion with God is the end of our 
graces ; for as reason and the intercourse of it makes men sociable one 
with another, so the divine nature makes us sociable with God himself; 
and the faith we live by is but an engine, a glass to bring God down to us. 
And as for duties, the journey's end of them is fellowship with God ; and 
our backwardness to them, if you resolve it into its original, is a back- 
wardness to entire communion with God ; the soul therefore saith it hath 
no pleasure in them. But this communion was the apostles' Eden and 
proper walk. John calls us all up unto it, as that which we are alike 
born to, 1 John i. 3. It was Moses his perfection as he was Christ's type : 
Exod. xxxiii. 11, 'And the Lord spake to Moses face to face, as a man 
useth to do to his friend.' You see the Scripture lodgeth this in the 
notion of friendship ; therefore attempt, if thou hast not yet tried, this 
way of seeking God. I have known those who have come to God as for 
nothing else ; so when they have been come, could mention nothing else, 
but scorned to blur or soil the noble" and royal intention of their visit of 
him with any lower request than that of obtaining communion with him. 
And take my counsel, when the Spirit at some by-time moves thee, and it 
is merely a motion of his, go and stand in the presence-chamber ; that is, 
put thyself on duty with this aim and design mentioned, and see if he hold 
not out his golden sceptre to thee. This shall prevail with him more than 
the sacrifice of rams. 

(2.) A second way of intercourse and expressing friendship to God is this : 
when thou comest into his presence, be telling him still how well thou 
lovest him ; labour to abound in expressions of that kind, than which 
(when founded in a reality in the Spirit) there is nothing more taking with 
the heart of any friend. That famous pair of friends, David and Jonathan, 
when they met they spent the most of their time (they had got by stealth, 
and with hazard of their lives) in vying and revying, and therein seeking 
which of them should utter and declare most love and manifest most 
faithfulness. They weep over one another's necks, as overcome with the 
overflowings of each other's kindness. The story aflbrds the pleasantest 
contention of love and friendship, and strivings for masteries ; and accord- 
ingly, as to the passionate part, the victory is decided on David's side, 
1 Sam. XX. 41. They both wept one with another, ' until David exceeded,' 
says the text. And yet again, for the real part and demonstration of 



200 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK II. 

friendship, Jonathan had the advantage to outvie David. Jonathan had a 
kingdom to lose for his sake, being heir-apparent by birth ; yet he ventures 
his own Hfe to save his, who he beheved should be king in his room : 
' And let me but live,' saith he, ' and not die,' ver, 14. ' And let me be 
the next in the kingdom,' chap, xxiii. 17. But David had another and 
greater fi-iend, even God ; and how his afiections overflowed the banks 
towards him, the Psalms do shew. How often have we him breaking 
forth, ' I love thee. Lord ! ' and ' Oh how do I love thy law ! ' And how 
eloquent is he in that his solemn and his almost last thanksgiving, 
1 Chron. xxix. Now, the truth is, the real part is God's ; the fond, 
affectionate part of fiiendship, it should be ours. He had a Son to give 
away, and his Son a life, a kingdom ; and both of them agreed to do it. 
We have little to lose, and can do less for them : Oh yet let us love them, 
and love to tell them so ! Hast thou ever yet lain in those everlasting 
arms ? Or when thou at any time dost, and his banner of love is spread 
over thee, what hath thy heart meditated concerning God at such a time ? 
As a liberal heart is said to devise liberal things, so a loving heart will 
devise loving things. I use to say, whatever ingenuity, wit, rhetoric any 
one hath (and I speak of those that excel therein), there are times wherein 
God hath the flower, the eminency of them, vented in strains of love to him 
in prayer. He hath at one time or other every man's strength and prime. 
What affections or expressions thou hast to bestow on friend or wife, God 
will have them from thee to himself ; and if thy spirit be narrow, and shut 
up to such a way, yet thou wilt and mayest be able to vent that love thou 
bearest him in blunt and downright expressions : ' Lord,' said Peter, ' thou 
knowest I love thee,' if I ever loved anything. Yea, I have known some 
bad and churlish natures to their other relations, in whose spirits, upon 
observation of them, you should scarce find any strains of pure ingenuity 
pass from them to any other ; yet in their narrations of what hath been 
between God and them, they have been brought to the lowest submission, 
the highest resignations of themselves for him and his glory, and as great 
strains of ingenuity as any other. As physicians say of a child in the 
womb, if there be any good blood or spirits in the mother's body, the child 
will have it ; the nutritive and formative virtue doth and will attract it. So 
if there be any good nature in thee, God will have it at one time or other. 
Yea, how often falls it out, that even souls that want assurance of God's 
love to themselves, yet can please themselves in blessing God, or at least 
admiring him for that goodness and blessedness which is in him, and which 
he enjoys for loving himself, and aiming at his own glory : for his so dearly 
loving his Son (whom also their souls love), and for his being good to others ! 
And they find it real in their souls to do so. Yea, and sometimes when 
they come to pray, and are shut up for want of vent in other desires, they 
yet can fall a-telling God how well they love him, and what (if he would be 
pleased to enable them) they would do for him ; and they can do these things 
when they can do nothing else. Yea, and because in real performances 
they find they can do little, and are not satisfied with the opportunities they 
have in view at present, the heart will be venting itself in suppositions and 
feignings with itself, what in case of God's condemning them at the latter 
day ; so that, should they lose their labour, they would say, in way of 
ingenuity, what farewell they would then take of him ; how they would 
demean themselves in hell, when their souls should be filled with the noise 
of others' blasphemies ; how they would speak well of him, and rebuke their 
fellow-thieves, as that good thief did. And because in suppositions higher 



Chap. V,] in the heart and life. 201 

strains of love may be vented than God will ever put us really to act, there- 
fore the heart often seeks vent for its vast desires this way. 

Thus Christ, to shew his love to his Father, in submitting to his will and 
love, made a supposition of the cup's passing from him, which yet he knew 
could not by God's decree. And thus Paul wished himself accursed from 
Christ for his brethren's sake. Or else the heart will go about to do it, by 
separating acts of obedience from self-respects ; and this in a way of suppo- 
sition of such things as will not fall out. But yet, suppose they should, 
yet. Lord, say they, I will trust thee. As Job, ' though he kill me, yet 
will I trust in him.' It was a supposition of the worst. Or else the heart 
will be chalking out within itself, what it would do for God if it were in such 
a power, in such a place of opportunity of service, as Herbert in his poems 
speaks. At these, and a thousand other ways, love will be creeping out 
when it cannot go, nor, alas, is ever able to perform. And these stirrings 
and ventings of love, God is infinitely taken with, and knows the mind of 
the spirit in them. These strains are pleasant : this is melody and music 
in his ears. Ivnow this, that communion with God lies not only /xsr' 
d/.X?3>.wi/, as John speaks of it, 1 John i. 7 (as I understand the place), when 
it is mutual, he teUing us his love, and so drawing forth ours, when there 
is an astus, a reciprocation of love from him to us, and so from us again to 
him ; but also, when he doth not shed abroad his in our hearts, to an 
overcoming assurance, and yet strongly draws forth ours to him, as hath 
been expressed ; and that is true communion with him as on our parts, and 
aii'ects the soul accordingly. For though it be true that we love him 
because he loves us, as to the reality of the thing, yet it is not always so 
in our apprehension, nor necessary to the drawing forth of our love to him. 

(3.) Delight much in him. Friendship well placed aflbrds the highest 
delight. Besides what I noted out of Solomon, of the sweetness of a friend, 
David, the father, also had experimented it, 2 Sam. i. 2G, in his beloved 
Jonathan : ' Thou hast been very pleasant to me,' says he there. And 
again of Jonathan it is said, he ' delighted much in David,' 1 Sam. xix. 2. 
If, therefore, God and thou be friends, retire thyself into him, and make up 
thy delights in him. And thus both Christ and his church do mutually 
express themselves touching each other : ' Oh how fair and pleasant art thou, 

love, for delights,' Cant. vii. 6, says he of her ; ' Behold, thou art lair, 
my beloved, yea, pleasant,' says she of him. Cant. i. 16. Ps. xxxvii. 4 : 
' Delight thyself also in the Lord.' Yea, and the psalmist prescribes it as 
the readiest, speediest way to get despatch of all our particular suits and 
requests : so it follows, ' And he shall give thee the desires of thy heart.' 
As it is said of God, that ' to the pure he will shew himself pure,' Ps. xviii. 
26, so to the ingenuous he will shew himself ingenuous. A soul that 
hath many wants and requests to put up to him, and yet comes to him and 
really says. Lord, though I want these and these things in my outward 
condition, yet I am well pleased, for I have enough in thee alone ; though 

1 had nothing, and though thou hast made me these and these promises, 
besides the making over of thyself unto me, yet thou art my portion, mine 
inheritance, and my lot is fallen in a pleasant place in thee, Ps. xvi. 6 ; 
thou art my exceeding great reward. Whilst God sees that thou thus 
settest thyself to delight in him, he at once grants thee all else thou wouldst 
desire. This is the most compendious art of begging. ' Be acquainted with 
him,' saith Eliphaz to Job, Job xxii. 21, ' and thou shalt have thy delight 
in the Almighty,' ver. 26 ; ' and thou shalt have gold,' ver. 24 ; ' and thou 
shalt have silver,' ver. 25. Thou shalt have anything of him, take but that 



202 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK II. 

method. Art thou in any great distress ? Go alone, think of his love, 
think of himself, what a God thou hast whom thou servest and lovest. His 
love, and himself apprehended, embraced and meditated on, afibrds the 
greatest delight : Ps. civ. 34, ' My meditation of him shall be sweet, I will 
be glad in the Lord.' Life we say is sweet, and death is bitter (as Agag's 
speech implies, ' the bitterness of death is past') ; but ' thy loving-kindness, 
God, is better than life,' and hath the sweetness of all good in it, if the 
Holy Ghost gives thee but a taste of it. Christ's love was such as sweet- 
ened death itself to him, which we account so bitter : ' It was stronger than 
death' (says Solomon), Cant. viii. 6. How sweet then must that love in 
itself be, and to the soul that tastes it ? Therefore ' Rejoice in the Lord ; 
and again I say, Rejoice.' Let God be your chiefest good in the most 
prosperous days, and he will be your only good in your worst days. A 
friend is for adversity ; and therefore, ' though the fig-tree blossom not,' 
&c., ' and all things fail me, yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the 
God of my salvation,' Hab. iii. 17, 18. What is the reason men pray not 
often, nor much, and in the end perhaps do give it over ? You have the 
reason : Job xxvii. 10, ' They delight not in the Almighty.' But yet con- 
tent not thyself with the performance of duties : Isa. Iviii. 2, ' They take 
dehght in approaching to God ;' that is, in the outward performance of it ; 
but let thy delight be in God himself. We rejoice in God, saith the apostle, 
Rom. V. 11. And let not delights derived from God only content thee ; 
but let thy delight be in God, and the excellencies that are in him. 

(4.) A fourth particular wherein the communion of friendship lies, is 
unfolding secrets. There is a kind of civil shrift between friends, saith 
Verulam ; the style of friend is a ' man of my secret,' Job xix, 19. That 
which is translated ' my inward friends,' is in the Hebrew, and varied in 
the margin, ' the men of my secret.' A friend is ' as a man's own soul,' 
Deut. xiii. 6. As in respect of love, so in respect of laying up all that is 
in a friend's soul, all that is one's own. And this use and advantage, or 
improvement, a man is to make of his friendship with God, to unburden 
his mind, and spread his heart before him. In Scripture, prayer is termed 
a pouring out one's soul to God. So it is spoken of Hannah's prayer, 
1 Sam. i. 15, which is interpreted by that in Lam. ii. 19, ' a pouring out 
the soul like water, before the face of the Lord.' She had, as it were, wept 
it out at her eyes, and poured it forth in tears. The same is eminent also 
in David : Ps. cxlii. 2, ' I poured out my complaint before him ; ' that is, 
as it follows, ' I shewed before him my trouble.' And this is done in case 
of distress, when the ' heart is overwhelmed,' as in ver. 3. And in the 
very same words, the title of the 102d Psalm expresseth it, ' A prayer of 
the afflicted, when he is overwhelmed, and poureth out his complaint before 
the Lord.' If thou hast some great affliction or secret, which is not fit to 
trust man, no, not thy nearest friend with, and yet thy heart is ready to 
break with it, the heart, in that case, is apt to tell it to man, that it may 
have some present ease. But take my counsel, try God alone first, and 
hereby shew how only a friend thou makest of him, by telling it alone to 
him, easing thy heart to him alone. He thinks himself honoured by it, 
and takes it well at thy hands ; and if he encourageth thee, or necessitates 
thee to tell it to another (as in some cases, James v. 10), then do so. As 
for distresses thou art in, so for thy sin ; the more communion there is 
betwixt God and us, the more secret sins will God discover to us, and the 
more will we again disclose to God. This is made an absolute consequence 
of holding fellowship with God; for the apostle having spoken of fellowship 



CUAP. YL] IN THE HEART AND LIFE. 203 

with God, 1 John i. 3, G, 7, he adds, ver. 9, ' If we confess our sins, he 
is faithful and just to forgive.' He speaks it, as without which none can 
preserve communion with God entire ; for whilst we labour to walk in 
nearer, so closer communion with God, yet ' if we say we have no sin, we 
deceive ourselves,' ver. 8. Now then, here lies the coherence of the 9th 
verse with the former, confess your sin, if you say you have fellowship with 
him ; for the law and nature of true and entire communion and fellowship 
between two as friends requires, that if the one sins against the other, he 
should disclose and confess it ; this friendship cannot hold else, and it is 
well we can have pardon so. Now, says John, we do all sin ; therefore, in 
order to hold communion with God, confess thy sins. And a further reason 
is, that one great part of God's friendship towards us is seen in pardoning 
sins. John hints it, he is faithful to forgive, as a friend is faithful to per- 
form his promise. And if he should not, none could retain friendship a 
moment with him ; but if he pardons, he will have the score acknowledged ; 
even as though he promiseth, he yet will be sought to, as the prophet 
speaks. And the more the soul finds that God pardons, the more willing 
and free it is to confess, Ezek. xvi. 61-63, knowing it is to a friend that 
will not take advantage of the acknowledgment. Likewise lay open all thy 
jealousies thou hast of his love ; another friend would never bear it; but, 
alas ! God knows them all already, and is used to them, and will ease thee 
of them. Tell him all thy doubts'^ scruples, and objections thou hast about 
thy estate and of his love ; spread even all, lay open thy case plainly, 
without guile (as David speaks, Ps. xxxii.), and he will answer them all, 
and discover to thee that sincerity of heart that is in thee towards him, 
and how well he loves thee notwithstanding ; and this other friends will 
not do. 



CHAPTER YL 

What our behaviour toward God, as his friends, ought to be, u'ith respect unto 
his providential dispensations to lis. — We should ask his advice and counsel 
on all occasions. — We should make use of and depend upon his favour and 
assistance in all affairs. — We should have an entire conjidence in him, with- 
out any jealousy or distrust. 

I shall now begin a new and second set of duties, which our relation of 
friendship with him brings upon us ; such as do respect his providential 
outward dispensations towards us, as the former related to communion with 
his person. As much of God's friendship unto us is given forth in his 
ordering all things that fall out unto us for good, so much on our part lies 
in observing those his dealings, and applying ourselves to him therein. And 
for that I give these following directions : — 

1. First, Ask his advice and counsel upon all occasions, and in all (espe- 
cially great) turnings of thy life. This is an improvement of a friend whom 
we count wise and faithful. Thus David sets out a man who had been his 
friend : * Thou, man, my guide' (says he, Ps. Iv. 13) ; ' and we took 
sweet counsel together,' says he, ver. 14. Yea, when one that we have 
chosen for our friend, and is a friend indeed, is yet below us in parts and 
wisdom, yet we love to see how our thoughts look in the glass of his mmd 
and apprehensions. You may see it in God himself, who is the most per- 
fect pattern of friendship, as of all relations else. He, you well know, 



204; OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK II. 

needs no advice ; for who is his counsellor ? Eom. xi. 34. Yet when he 
was to do a great act, whereof the whole world would ring, and when he 
knew it would certainly come to Abraham's ears, though it did not concern 
Abraham's particular at all, yet, says God -with himself, I have singled 
forth this poor man to be my friend, and shall I do so great an act, that 
will make such a report, and not tell Abraham of it ? Gen. xviii. 17, 
' Shall I hide from Abraham that thing which I do ? ' That ingenuity that 
works in the heart of a friend, wrought in the heart of God, insomuch as 
he could not do a great thing, but he must tell his friend of it. He speaks 
as one shackled and restrained by the laws of friendship ; and upon that 
law he had an inward regret when he came to the execution of it. The 
ground and account thereof the text gives you, Abraham was the friend of 
God. And Abraham followed God in the same path, and upon the same 
principle, though Jtaud j^fissibus aquis, not with equal pace ; he stirred not 
a foot without God"s direction, Isa. xli, 2, where it is said, ' God called 
him' (that is, Abraham*) ' to his foot;' which the apostle, in Heb. xi. 8, 
interprets thus : he went out, not knowing whither he went, but gave up 
himself and every step unto God's direction and appointment. And we 
have the like instance of friendship to God in David : Ps. Ixiii. 23, 24, 
' Nevertheless I am continually with thee ; thou hast holden me by thy right 
hand. Thou shalt guide me by thy counsel, and afterwards receive me to 
glory.' That word nevertheless brings this as a lesson and experiment he 
had learned from the contrary. He had had the reins laid upon his own 
neck for a while, and was left to the counsel of his own heart, and so he 
had miscarried. ' So foolish was I,' says he, ' and as a beast before thee;' 
ver. 22, ' Nevertheless thou boldest me by my right hand ; ' that is, I have 
found by this experience, that when I, being left to myself, am gone out of 
the way, yet thou secretly and invisibly boldest me by the hand, to reduce 
and bring me back again. And what lesson learns he from it, and what 
conclusion issues thence ? You have it in ver. 24, ' Thou shalt guide me 
with thy counsel,' and I will never more follow my own, but give myself 
up to thee (as Herbert well expresseth it in his poems), only give me thy 
hand, since both mine ejes are thine. Neither doth the psalmist mean his 
hand merely to guide, but to support and strengthen : ' Thou boldest me 
by my right hand.' And I also observe it, that God's guiding of us by his 
counsel serves us but in this life ; but afterwards he is said to receive us to 
glory ; he pulls us up, by the same hand which here guided us, unto that 
glory above. You have seen an instance or example of this. See a pro- 
mise also on God's part for this, which calls loud upon us for this duty : 
Isa. XXX. 21, ' And thine ears shall hear a word behind thee saying. This 
is the way, walk in it, when ye turn to the right hand, or when ye turn to 
the left.' God had promised in the words before to give them teachers, who 
doctrinally, or by the delivery of the right rules, should teach them the good 
and right way : ' Thy teachers shall not be removed from thee,' (fee. Well, 
but we poor Christians are to put those rules and instructions our teachers 
give us into practice and execution ; and when we are personally to act, we 
have not our teachers and tutors by us, and (God wot) we through ignor- 
ance (as the psalmist, Ps. Ixxiii.) or forgetfulness are, when we come to act, 
at a loss, and know not which way to turn us. Hence therefore at the 
voice of thy cry, when he shall hear it, he will answer thee, ver. 19, and 
upon such outcries and occasions promiseth his Snirit, who can be and is 
always with us : ' Thine ears shall hear a word bemnd thee saying. This is 
* It is by uo means clear that the reference in this passage is to Abraham. — Ed. 



ClIAP. YI. j IN THE IIEAHT AND LIFE. 205 

tho way,' See. Tho psalmist had said, ' Thou hoklest mo by my ri^ht 
band, unknown to me, and wilt guide mo by thy counsel.' The i)rophet 
says, • Thou shalt hear a word behind thee,' wherein he compares him to 
a friend or companion, that secretly watchcth aloof of another friend ho 
takes care of, whom he lets go to see how he will order his steps of himself, 
yet in great straits and turnings, or (as the text expresseth it) when ho 
turns to the right hand or the left, comes stealing behind thee ; so the 
phrase is, comes behind thee, and whispers (for it is called a word). This 
is the way, walk in it. The prophet compares him to a loinis f/eiiiics, who 
doth aiiron rcllicarc, pull him by tho ear, and brings things practicable ' to 
our remembrance,' as Christ hath it. The psalmist compares him to a 
companion that never leaves us, but gives strength as well as guidance : 
* Thou art continually with me, and boldest me by the hand.' These things 
are evidently spoken of guiding us in practice, as these phrases, ' This is 
the way, walk in it,' as also ' turning to the right hand and the left,' do import. 
They declare the various occasions and affairs of man's life, his going hither 
and thither, as elsewhere it is expressed. This for the promise of God. 
Now then, that^God de facto effectually performs when he is sought to by 
thee, that other'passage of the psalmist assures us : Ps. xxxvii. 23, ' The 
steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord ; ' which is spoken in respect 
of that happy issue and success which good men's actions are through the 
blessing of God accompanied withal. But what if he falls into any disaster? 
It follows, ver. 24, ' Though he fall, he shall not utterly be cast down; for 
the Lord upholdeth him with his hand,' Therefore in all thy ways take 
Solomon's counsel: Prov. iii. 6, ' In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he 
shall direct thy paths.' To acknowledge God in all thy ways doth in 
Solomon's sense import, 

(1.) To come to God in a sensibleness of a man's own inability to guide 
himself in any of his ways, which the same Solomon pathetically utters, 
' How can a man understand his ways ? ' And Jeremiah having by vision 
understood that great calamity that was in his time to come upon his 
nation, not knowing what might become of himself, nor which way to take 
to help himself, comes to God, and cries out concerning his own person : 
Jer. X. 23, ' I know that the way of a man is not in himself : it is not in 
man that walketh to direct his steps.' And therefore seeing I must be 
involved in a common calamity, I submit to thy correcting hand : ' Correct 
me' (if thou pleasest), ' but not with judgment ; not in anger.' And God 
dealt with him accordingly, he had the best quarter from the king of Babel 
of all the Jews. 

(2.) It imports that we should acknowledge him, by giving ourselves up 
to his direction, as is evident from what follows : ' He shall direct thy 
paths.' His meaning therefore is, so to acknowledge him as to give a man's 
self up to his direction ; or if you will have it in the terms this aphorism 
was first expressed in, take his advice and counsel. And so the opposition 
both before and after carries it : * Lean not to thine own understanding, 
and be not wise in thine own eyes.' Often, though man knows not his 
own yf&j, yet having distrusted his own understanding, and coming in 
simplicity to God for counsel by prayer, either God in prayer leaves a 
biassing impression on his heart, which is the voice behind him, or by pro- 
vidence casts him upon it. And truly when a soul hath thus come unto 
God, he may blindfold cast it on him. I end this direction with this great 
consolatory, that look as Jesus Christ is thy priest to obtain and accomplish 
thy salvation, so he is thy prophet ; that is, his prophetical office is in its 



206 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK II- 

kind fis mnch for tliee and thy good, and for ordering thy ways, as his 
priestly office is for thy salvation hereafter. And he being the mighty 
counsellor, that knows all events and issues, will, if thou hast addressed 
unto him under that relation, put forth his abilities and power given him 
in that office for thee, to direct thee as effectually as to save thee, therefore 
present all to him. 

2. When thou hast thus asked and sought his advice, be sure thou follow 
it. To that end, observe the impressions which God upon seeking him maketh 
upon thy spirit in prayer. Observe the most swaying weight that God 
casts into the balance, when otherwise the scales are even. Observe 
especially what spiritual motives, that are purely for God, are cast into thy 
heart (for they are from God which are most for God), and follow them 
fully, as Caleb is said to do. Our Lord and Saviour Christ is in this (as 
in all things else practicable by us) a pattern to us. He was (as you know) 
to die andoffer up himself to God, and to enter into a conflict with his 
wrath for sin. He saw the black cloud and the storm coming, and some 
drops had been let fall upon his soul : John xii. 27, 28, and nature (as 
you know) wrought in him, and you have heard the voice and cry of it, 
' Lord, let this cup pass ! ' Now j'ou read in Ps. xvi. 7, Christ blessing 
the Lord for giving him counsel : ' I will bless the Lord, who hath given 
me counsel ; my reins also instruct me in the night-seasons. I have set 
the Lord always before me, &c. Therefore my flesh rests in hope : thou 
wilt not leave my soul in hell.' Concerning which passages in this Psalm 
Peter hath plainly instructed us. Acts ii. 25, 29-37, that they were imme- 
diately intended of Christ, and not of David at all, as his type or shadow, 
as in other psalms and passages of prophecy. And they are (being thus 
appUed unto Christ) the inward workings and discussions of his soul when 
he was to give up himself to that great encounter and adventure, the 
greatest that ever creature was to undergo. You have the inward agita- 
tions of his spirit, and the considerations that heartened him to give him- 
self up unto it, ver. 8-11. He mentions the night seasons, in which his 
reins instructed him. Now you read, Luke xxi. 37, that immediately 
before his passover, chap. xxii. 1, 2, he spent the mornings in preaching, 
but the nights in mount Olivet, to pray all night to God, according to his 
custom, Luke vi. 12. And the cofttext immediately before this, ver. 37 of 
Luke xxi. shews it, ' Watch ye therefore and pray,' ver. 36, for which his 
example is propounded, ver. 37. Thus he spent the night before his 
passion ; for Jesus knew beforehand all that should come upon him, John 
xviii. 4. But thus especially he spent that night in which he was betrayed 
and taken. You know how he spent the time in prayers and conflicts, 
with strong cries and tears, being heard in that he feared ; Heb. v. 7, 
great fears and conflicts were upon him, he was at a stand : ' Father, if it 
be possible, let this cup pass from me.' And when his soul was thus 
wrestling it out, God evidently came in with a new and peremptory declara- 
tion that he would have him go through with it, which that speech that 
immediately follows shews : * Not my will, but thine, be done,' which, say 
I, was Christ's motto. Why, now that which I aim at to my purpose in 
hand is, that Christ blesseth his Father for giving him this counsel, and 
supporting him with this advice : ' I will bless the Lord who hath given 
me counsel.' To be sure we have cause to bless God that gave him that 
counsel ; it was good counsel for us ; and you hear of this conflicting no 
more ; but after that, though he knew all that should come upon him, he 
went forth, and said unto them, ' Whom seek ye ? ' John xviii. 4. Peter 



Chap. VI.] in the heart and life. 207 

had given him other counsel, 'Master, spare thyself; ' hut God, that was 
his ancient friend, gave him this counsel, and he thankfully receives it, 
follows it, and blesseth him for it that ever he gave it him. My brethren, 
such advices in great and diflicult cases God gives us in prayer and by the 
word, and the flesh comes and gives the contrary. Solomon, Eccles. vii. IG, 
brings in a man solicited by flesh and spirit, by contrary counsels. Says 
the flesh, ' Ue not righteous overmuch,' not too strict; ' why shouldest 
thou destroy thyself,' waste thy spirits in duties, and bring miseries and 
hazards of ruin to thy name, estate, and life, which attend ordinarily a liv- 
ing godly in Christ Jesus ? On the contrary, replies the spirit, ' Be not 
over much wicked ; why shouldest thou die before thy time ? ' Loose ways 
and courses will bring thee to thy grave sooner than the course of nature ; 
'A dart will strike though thy liver,' &c., and thou wilt go to hell when 
thou hast done. And Paul speaks similarly unto this, liom. viii. 12-14, 
* Therefore, brethen, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh. 
For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die : but if ye through the Spirit do 
mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live. For as many as are led by 
the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.' The meaning whereof is, 
follow not the counsel of the flesh, it is the counsel of a flatterer, an enemy. 
It adviseth thee, as the young men did Rehoboam, for thy hurt ; or its 
advice is like that of Job's wife, 'Curse God and die'; or like that of Peter 
to Christ, ' Master, spare thyself.' Where had our salvation been then ? 
And where will thine be if thou followest it ? But, on the contraiy, Paul 
exhorts them to give themselves up to the Spirit, to be led by him as God"s 
sons, ver. 1-4. His advice is the advice of a father, of a comforter ; and 
though his advice for the present may lead thee into such a way and course, 
as for which thou mayest hazard life, yet consider, said he, ver. 11, that 
he that raised up Jesus from the dead, and, as you heard, gave him counsel 
to die, will raise up thy mortal body again ; whereas, if you follow the 
flesh's advice, and mortify not the deeds thereof, ye shall die. Above all, 
take heed of rejecting his counsel when thou hast asked it; as the Pharisees 
are said to have done against themselves, Luke vii. 30, and the people in 
the prophet Jeremiah did. The heathen, when they inquired of their 
oracles, durst not go and do contrary; nor would Socrates act against what 
his genius dictated ; much less let us act against the counsel of God and 
his Spirit, for this breaks friendship with him. Yea, let me cast in this, 
take his very reproof kindly ; Prov. xxvii. 5, C, ' Even the wounds of a 
friend are faithful.' He speaks it of rebukes : ver. 5, ' Let the righteous 
smite me,' says David, Ps. cxli. 5, ' it shall be a kindness ; let him reprove 
me, it shall be an excellent oil, which shall not break, but cure my head.' 
If, therefore, the righteous God shall smite me, if the Holy Spirit, who is 
that holy anointing, rebukes thee in thy way, it is to save thee, to heal 
thee, and to comfort thee in the end : ' He went on frowardly in the way 
of his heart, and I smote him,' says God, Isa. Ivii. 17. But it was to heal 
him : ' I will heal him, and restore comforts to him.' 

3. Make use of his favour and friendship in all businesses, and depend 
thereon alone. God would have all kindnesses run through his hands, for 
he would have all your thanks; as David said to Barzillai, 2 Sam. xix. 38, 
' Whatever thou requestest of me, that will I do for thee,' that doth God 
say to us. Great men in power that are friends take it iU, if it be a suit 
wherein they can stead us, if we use or trust to other friends beside them, 
for by doing so, we either question their power or their love. 

There are two things which this direction holds forth : 1. To use God in 



208 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK 11. 

small matters as well as great. And 2. To make use of his special favour 
and peculiar love in all. 

1st. Let us make use of God in small things as well as great, even all. 
It is said, Isa. xxvi. 12, he works all our works in us and for us. It is 
read both wavs, for we have two sorts of works to be done : 1. Inward, in 
our own spirits ; and 2. Outward, which are for us in the course of provi- 
dence ; and of the two, the inward is of the greater concernment, not to 
fear what we shall suifer, but what we shall do. "We are to use God in 
small things, and herein God's friendship exceeds that of men's ; for men 
are shy to use great friends about trifles, but reserve their interest for 
greater; for they are both loath to be troubled, and cannot mind us therein, 
and their stock of favour is soon spent ; but God doth not deal so with us. 
I observe in the parable made on purpose (as one evangelist hath it) to 
encourage us and provoke us to pray, Christ represents the -Trooraaig, or 
story of it, thus : Luke xi. 5, that a man having a friend, goes to him at 
midnight, and says to him, Lend me three loaves. What ! trouble a friend 
for so small a matter as three loaves, and that at midnight ; and those not 
for himself neither, it is for his friend's friend ; ver. 6, ' For a friend of mine 
is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him.' Christ shews the 
disposition of a man in this case: ver. 7, 'He from within shall answer and 
sav. Trouble me not : the door is now shut, and my children are with me 
in'bed ; I cannot rise and give thee.' They are loath to be troubled in such 
a case, though they are neighbours and friends, and may themselves need 
the like at another time. And yet, ver. 8, for importunity's sake, though 
not for friendship, he will rise and give him them. Now the reddition or 
moral of this is, that much more God, that professeth himself a friend and 
father, ver. 13, will hear you in whatever you ask, even the smallest, if a 
man asks an egg, or asks a fish, as Christ insinuates, ver. 11, 12, or daily 
bread, as he had taught them, ver. 3. And he thinks it no trouble, at all 
seasons, upon all occasions, to be visited. Come to him at midnight, come 
to him for thy friend's friend, for what thou wilt; this is an honour to him, 
he is hereby acknowledged to be God that ruleth and governeth all things, 
even the least. 

2dly. Make use of God's peculiar love in all. Outward providential 
mercies do come to the people of God out of peculiar love, as the connection 
of Kom. viii. 28, 29, tells us. The love of friendship in God is the fountain 
and spring of all ; out of that he bestows all, and therefore will have it 
acknowledged in all. If therefore, in thy outward affairs, thou seekest God 
for a mercy, and thou hast found a particular promise which mentions the 
verv thing thou needest, yet let me advise thee to go to eternal love, and 
treat with it to bestow it on thee, and treat with it in all as well as for thy 
salvation. My brethren, the effectualness of this cause* is not known 
enough ; to be sure the thing is not enough practised by saints. 

1. It is utterly a fault that either, even in great matters, they treat not 
with God, or walk rashly whilst they are in dependence on God for them ; 
that is, they leave the issue and casting of such a matter to all adventures, 
and seek him not in it ; which often provokes God to give a man a sound 
stroke, a shrewd blow, ere he is aware, in what is most near to him, as if 
he cared not where he did hit him. The Israelites would have a king, but 
God gave him in his anger, and took him away in his wrath. 

2. Or else they treat not his special favour, but leave it to bare ordi- 
nary providence ; and things which accordingly come out of ordinary pro- 

* Qu ' course ' ?— Ed. 



Chap. VI. j in thk heart and life. 209 

vidonce, arc by tbo course of that providence turned into bitter crosses, 
even to God's own people ; though when they are taught otherwise, and 
humbled, his love at last turns them again into blessings. But those 
wherein eternal love is sought, prove pure blessings, and God adds no sor- 
row with them. The Israelites did seek a king at the hands of God, and 
yet God complains: Hos. viii. 4, ' They have set up kings, but not by 
me ; they have made princes, but I knew it not.' And yet how could so 
great a matter be done without him by whom kings reign, and who knows 
all that is done in the world ? But they carried it so as they sought not 
God in it, nor acquainted him with it. They did it ipso inconsulto, with- 
out advising with him, or interesting him in them ; and without having 
recourse to, and dependence upon, his favour. If a man should see his son 
or his friend stand among the crowd of beggars that wait at his door for a 
common dole, and that he casts his lot for his meals with them, to be 
served as his turn comes, as they are, would not this provoke him ? would 
he not say. What do you mean thus to stand there ? are you not at home ? 
Why do you not come to me for money for all necessaries ? Or why do you 
not come in and sit down at table, and eat with me as becomes sons and friends 
to do ? Thus doth God take it ill to see his own childi'en carelessly stand at 
the common door of providence, when they should come in and seek what 
they want by prayer, and interest his fatherly love in the business. The 
truth is, that those blessings only prove pure, stable blessings, which are 
fetched ex isto doUo. As God gives, so he would have you receive ; now 
he gives out of eternal love, and that therefore he will have us apply unto. 

4. Yet I add, take some seeming denials of particular requests of thine 
kindly from him. Remember it is friendship with a superior, who is only 
wise, knows what is best for thee, hath many great and vast ends in the 
government of this world ; and some things thou hast earnestly desired for 
thy particular, may and do cross some other and greater designs for his 
glory. As kings that have large interests, multitude of persons and things 
to deal with, are forced to deny some things which their dearest favourites 
ask of them, as crossing some other engagement, or more general project. 
But if God denies thee, he will be sure to remember thee in some other 
thing. 

The truth is, we shew ourselves unfriendly to God, and usurp upon the 
privileges and dues of friendship, if we expect everything should be as we 
would have it. ' Should it be as thou wilt ?' as God said to Job. God 
denied Moses his request of entering into Canaan, and it was a great 
request of him ; and yet he murmurs not, but quietly goes up and dies, 
as God bade him. 

5. Trust God especially in great exigents, and take heed of being jealous 
of him. Mutual confidence is a great part of friendship ; therefore David, 
speaking of his friend, saith, ' Yea mine own familiar friend whom I 
trusted,' Ps. xli. 9. If a man were to procure the friendship of another, he 
would deal with him in his kind : as if you were to deal with a covetous man, 
ye would bring him gold ; if with a vain-glorious man, you would flatter 
him. But now the way to deal with God, and to procure friendship w^th 
him, is to trust him ; and the reason is, because he doth all his kindnesses 
freely ; and one that doth all freely desires to be trusted before he doth 
the benefit, and to be thanked after. Since I knew what love and friend- 
ship was, I have the less wondered why God chose our faith rather than 
our love to save us by, and that he calls so much for it. The reason is 
plain, that one that loves much desires rather (and prefers it far) to have 

VOL. VII. 



210 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK II. 

the party lie fi'eely loves to believe much that he loves him, than that he 
should love him, for he desires to magnify his own love to them. Now that 
is God's distinction, for it is his main end, in loving us, to commend his 
love. The Holy Ghost exhorts, Ps. xxxvii. 8, * Trust in the Lord, and 
cast all thy care upon him.' Friends are jmrticipes curarum, they are 
partners in our cares. There are two eminent places for this : 1 Pet. v. 7, 
' Cast all your care upon God, for he careth for you ;' and Phil. iv. 6, ' Be 
careful for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with 
thanksgiving, let your request be made known unto God.' Be careful or 
solicitous in nothing ; he doth not say, God leaves small things unto us, 
or that we should not be anxious, but avoid rug fiiBi/Mmg, those cares that 
divide and distract the soul. Great momentous care is God's work, not 
ours. ' Cast all your care upon him,' says Peter, ' for he careth for you.' 
He speaks it of the sorest trials under God's mighty hand, ver. 6. He 
quotes Ps. Iv. ver. 22, * Cast thy burden on the Lord.' So much care as 
is a burden on thy thoughts, lay it on God. What a friendly part is this, 
that God loves us so well as he would have no bm-den lie on our spirits, 
but is willing to take that burden on himself ! Let me have all the load, 
says he, like a friend that travels with another, and for his friend's ease 
carries and takes off all the baggage. God is not only willing to bear it with 
us, but to take it wholly off from us on himself. He doth not only offer 
to take one end of it, and so ease us (as the word is, Piom. viii. 26, oumvrt- 
Xafj.Qdvirai), to help us only by taking it together with us at the other end 
of our burden, but he takes it wholly off; ' Cast thy burden on him, for 
he careth for you.' The truth is, says he, whether you trust him or no, he 
careth for you : or it is spoken thus, his is the great care ; as if we should 
say to a wife that hath a good husband to her consort, he takes all the 
care, and is so wise as you need take none, but may sleep quietly and take 
your ease ; so doth God say to us. Qui hahiiit tid curam antcquam esses, 
qiiomodo non habehit cum jam. es ? says Augustine. He took care how to 
redeem thee from sin, and he will for all things else. Yea, he takes such 
care for every one, as if he took care of none else Only, indeed, this 
Paul requires, Philip, iv., * that in every thing our requests should be made 
known to God.' He would not have us so much as troubled ; only, says he, 
come and tell me ; that is enough, and it is but what a man would do to a 
friend when burdened, if it were but to ease his mind ; not that God needs 
that we should make known our requests to him, for he knows, says Christ, 
* you have need of these things ;' but that there may be a recourse to him, 
that he may be acknowledged to be the carer for you, and also your depend- 
ence on him may be owned : Prov. iii. 5, 6, ' Trust in the Lord with all 
thine heart, and lean not to thine own understanding. In aU thy ways 
acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.' He speaks it as a friend, 
that would have his friends but come and tell him when they want. It is 
as if he said. Come, and but communicate your wants and your necessities 
to me, and I will supply them. Thus our Abraham in the text did trust 
in God as a friend, when he went to offer up Isaac. father, says 
Isaac, ' but where is the sacrifice ?' ' Take no care, son,' says he ; ' God 
will provide,' Gen. xxii. 8, 9, 13, 14. Hence that proverb went amongst 
the Jews, when any one was afiiicted, that ' in the mount the Lord would 
be seen,' and provide, as he did for Abraham and Isaac in their straits. Let 
your heart, therefore, in all occurrences be quiet, and repose itself safely 
in him ; 'trust him at all times,' Ps. Ixii. 8, and trust him in all things, and 
in small things as well as great ; make use of him, and come to him for 



Chap. VI.] in the heart and life. 211 

every thing, for ho thinks you account him not your friend else, and he 
thinks it no trouble but an honour to him. 

I add to this an appendix of it : be not jealous of him. There cannot 
be a greater wrong done to friendship. Trust hath made many a friend ; and 
so, on the contrary, suspicion hath broke many fast and entire friendships. 
Hence charity, or love to men, binds us to interpret all things well. 1 Cor. 
xiii. 5, ' Charity thinketh no evil, believing all things for the present, hopeth 
all things for the future.' And if this rule hold of men, who are a lie, as 
the Scripture speaks, and of whom a suspicion may be that they are false, 
and a lie is in their ways, then much more is this true in love, and much 
more ought we to act thus to God, who is truth itself, Rom. iii. 4, and love 
itself, 1 John iv. 16. And accordingly, as his nature is love and truth, so 
all his ways are mercy and truth, Ps. xxv. 10. They are mercy in respect 
of aiming at our good, and truth in respect of fulfilling his promises and 
faithful carriage to us ; therefore whatsoever befalls thee, though it be clean 
contrary to thy expectation, interpret it in love. Many actions of men are 
such as a good interpretation cannot be put upon them, nor a good con- 
struction made of them ; therefore interpreters restrain those sayings of 
love, that it believes all, &c. ; that is, credibiUa, all things believable, other- 
wise to put all upon charity, will eat out charity. But none of God's ways 
are such, but love and faith may pick a good meaning out of them. ^ A bono 
Deo nil nisi homon, from a good God there comes nothing but what is good ; 
and therefore says Job, ' Though he kill me, I will trust in him.' Endeavour 
to spy out some end of his for good at the present, and if none ariseth to 
thy conjecture, resolve it into faith, and make the best of it. To be jealous 
provoketh God exceedingly, for no faithful friend can endure to be suspected. 
It breaks amity between man and v/ife when they live never so entirely ; 
and the reason is because one that loves and makes a business of it to shew 
himself a friend, and counts it one of his greatest excellencies, as God doth 
(for all his attributes seem but to set out his love), cannot therefore bear 
to have it questioned. Take a man that is both wise and loving, and he 
had rather be thought unwise by his friend, than unloving or false to him. 
It provoked God much, well nigh as much as anything, that the people of 
Israel said that he brought them into the wilderness to destroy them, which 
sin moved him to destroy many of them. And yet thus, and worse, do 
many wrong God, who though God hath humbled them, and given them 
many evident tokens of his love and everlasting good will, yet still they 
suspect it to be but a common work, that God hath enlightened them, to 
make their damnation greater. He hath brought us out of Egypt indeed, 
say they, the gross sins that others lie in, but it is but to destroy us : Jer. 
xxix. 11, ' I know the thoughts that I think towards you, saith the Lord : 
thoughts of peace, not of evil, to give an expected end.' It was when the 
people were carried away captive into Babylon, they thought God carried 
them thither to destroy them, these were their thoughts ; and therefore, in 
opposition unto their thoughts, saith God, it is no matter what you thmk, 
I know the thoughts I think, even to give an expected end ; that is, as good 
an end as you could wish. God speaks like one suspected, and is fain to 
comfort himself, as it were, with the consciousness of his own thoughts 
toward them, against the hard thoughts and speeches they had of him. 
Well, but I know mine own heart, says God. His eyes were as much and 
more upon the end of their deliverance and peace after seventy years, than 
upon the captivity itself, as appears by the verse going before ; for the end 
is first ordained, and chiefly in an agent's eye. Let but God alone. See 



21 2 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK II. 

the end he made with Job ; says James, chap. v. 11, whilst God was 
a- pulling down Job's estate and house piece after piece. Job nor no stander 
by could have known what to have made of God's purpose in it ; but the 
issue was such as was evident to the eye of all beholders, that all this was 
in love. Therefore he useth this phrase, ' Ye have seen the end of the Lord 
in it.' He did but put down the old house to set up a new one ; some 
interpret it of Christ's passion, you have seen the end of the Lord Jesus. 
Whilst the apostles and believers beheld him on the cross, yea, the angels 
themselves, they might wonder what God meant to do with him, what 
should be in his thoughts to hang his Son there ; but ye have seen the end 
of the Lord, saith he. ' For we have seen Jesus, through the suffering of 
death, crowned with glory and honour,' Heb. ii. 9. This was fresh news 
in those days, for it was new done, so as they saw it. When thou art in 
affliction, thou art apt to think that he is a-destroj^ng thee, but thou 
knowest not his thoughts. If a man be poor and down in the world, then 
he is apt to say, If God did love me, he would not suffer me to be so low ; 
if rich, he is apt to say that God puts him off as Abraham did his younger 
sons, and reserves his inheritance for others. So likewise young Christians 
are often jealous that God will one day take advantage against them for 
their offending him and backslidings, and take his favour from them and 
cast them off ; but do not suspect him, for he is a constant friend. It is a 
slander papists and Ai-minians have raised on him, that he should cast away 
those are entered into friendship with him, and discard his old fiiends ; and 
therefore, Isa. Iv. 3, God's mercies are called ' the sure mercies of David.' 
If others have comfort, joy, and peace, which such an one wants, the poor 
man begins to be jealous of God, as if God did not love him ; as when the 
Gentiles were called, Zion was jealous, and took it amiss, Isa. xlix. 14, and 
says, ' God hath forgotten me.' 

6. Study his favours, how to find out his loving-kindness in them. God 
would not willingly lose his kindness in what he doth. As a wise man 
would not his notions on one that is not apprehensive or capable of them, 
and a man's love is dearer to him than his notions ; this is the least recipro- 
cation of fiiendship that can be expected. God doth study how to contrive 
all the circumstances of his mercies, so as to make them mercies, and to 
shew his love in them, and accordingly orders them. He thinks how to 
bring them in best to make them take, when and where they will be best 
placed and bestowed, and most seen and taken notice of. He waits to be 
gracious, Isaiah tells us, even as a curious orator orders all his matters, 
brings in this after this, and sets out all with metaphors and elegancies, and 
all to make it take and please his hearers ; so doth God strew mercies 
through thy whole life, and you should study them and the circumstances 
of them, as you would study and delight to read a curious speech, and 
obsei-ve all the art that love hath bestowed upon the whole. As you shall 
have a world of wit and matter couched in a word, a short sentence, so God 
casts out sometimes a sea of love in a di'op of providence, in a small 
by-passage that a man would scarce take notice of. Ps. cxxxix., when 
David considered but that part of it, of his outward and ordinary providence 
only, he wonders : ' Marvellous are thy works,' says he ; * and that my soul 
knows right well,' ver, 14. David had studied them, he was versed and 
skilful in them. ' How precious,' saith he, * are thy thoughts, or the 
thoughts of thee unto me ? Lord, how great are the number of them !' 
And Ps. cxi. 2-4, ' The works of the Lord are great, sought out of all them 
that have pleasure therein. His work is honourable and glorious ; and his 



Chap. VII.] in the heart and life. 213 

righteousness endurcth for ever. He hath made his wonderful works to bo 
remembered : the Lord is gracious, and full of compassion.' His goodness 
and compassion he would have observed by us ; more especially, ' the Lord 
is gracious, and full of compassion,' so it is in the close of all, and therein 
lies the glory that is the conclusion of all. And as in searching into any 
experiments in nature, there is an infinite pleasure that accompanies such 
a study to them that are addicted thereunto ; so to him that hath pleasure 
in such works of God, and is addicted to spy out his kindness in them, 
there is nothing so pleasant as the discovery of such or such a new circum- 
stance of mercy, that renders it glorious and honourable. Get therefore 
skill in his dealings with thee, and study thy friend's carriage to thee. It 
is the end why he raised thee up, and admitted thee into friendship with 
him, to shew his art of love and friendship to thee, how well he could 
love thee. 

CHAPTER VIL 

What obedience and duty tee oive unto God, as ice are his friends. — We shoidd 
be fearful of do in ff anijthin/f to displease him, observe his commands, and do 
all from the jyrincijdes of love and gratitude. 

The next thing to be treated of concerneth what in obedience we owe 
unto him, what correspondencies, what returns, observances, and compli- 
ances are due to him in our walkings with him, upon the account of friend- 
ship. Now the general consideration I would premise to all that follows 
is, that this friendship being contracted between an infinite God, and 
creatures subjected perfectly to his sovereign power, he might exact all 
from us, as simple obedience due from absolute servants and vassals. But 
he hath been pleased to quit (as it were) that consideration : John xv. 15, 
' Henceforth I call you not servants, but friends ;' as if he were content 
on his part to forget the relation of servants, and take up all from us as 
from friends, provided he hath the same that as servants we owe to 
him, which must needs so sweeten all obedience to him, as not to make 
the commandments grievous ; and it also puts the stricter obligation unto 
obedience, due as servants, and superadds some strains and dispositions 
thereunto, upon the pure account of friendship. So respectful is he of us, 
that he is content to veil and cover this hard and severe tax, and to take 
it up from us under the notion of gratitude and thankfulness. And this 
notion will run along, and accompany us through the whole. Now of such 
compliances and returns of obedience, there are two branches, which are a 
known and common trodden place by every tongue and pen. 

1st. There is a fearfulness to displease or offend him as our friend. 

2dly. All possible care to please and render ourselves friendly and 
respectful to him. I must not instance in particular duties, nor be large 
in anything, only hint such considerations as not the notion only, but the 
power of friendship, doth bind us to. 

1. There is fearfulness to displease him, as a man is fearful to displease 
a friend. This is to ' fear the Lord and his goodness,' as the prophet speaks. 
Every sin, by reason of friendship to him, comes under the crime and guilt 
of falsehood and petit treason. When thou sinnest, then think with thyself 
that God's Spirit looks back, and says to thee as Absalom to Hushai, 
2 Sam. xvi. 17, ' Is this thy kindness to thy friend ?' Or as God himself, 
Deut. xxxii. 6, ' Do ye thus requite the Lord, ye foolish and unwise ? is 



214 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK II. 

not he thy father that hath bought thee ? hath he not made and established 
thee ?' ' If it had been mine enemy, I could have borne it, but it was thou 
my friend,' Ps. Iv. 12, said David of his friend. And says God again of 
David (who had felt the smart of wounds received in the behalf of his 
friends, and therefore every word pierced him), 2 Sam. xii. 7-9, I anointed 
thee king over Israel, delivered thee from Saul, gave thee thy master's 
wives, yea, gave thee the whole house of Israel and Judah to be thy subjects 
and to reign over ; and if this (which for this world might well content the 
largest heart) would not have contented thee, I Jlove thee so well, that I 
would have given thee such and such things. And you know how the 
sense of this ingratitude brake his heart. Now translate this word for 
word into the style and language of the New Testament. I have loved 
thee (may God say), and chosen thee my friend in Christ Jesus afore the 
world began. I have delivered my Son unto death for thee, and with him 
how shall I not give thee all things ? Heaven, and glory, and an everlast- 
ing kingdom I have prepared for thee, not to tell thee how many sins I 
have pardoned, when thou first camest to me, and since ; and wilt thou serve 
me thus ? Is this thy kindness to thy friend ? This grieves God. Against 
his enemies he hath a relief, he can ease himself: Isa. i. 24, ' I will ease 
myself on mine adversaries ;' but on his friends he hath no remedy, no 
other, but having seen their ways, to heal them ; for he cannot, must not, 
ease himself by revenge. Such things as these should move us. Oh, 
when thou art about to sin next, and hast the cup of pleasure at thy mouth 
and lips, think with thyself at the instant, that it is the price of thy friend's 
blood, and pour it upon the ground : you know I allude to the story and 
passage in 1 Chron. xi. 19. Think what was in that cup which he trembled 
at. Let this cup pass, cried he. Dost thou begin at any time to sip of 
pleasure's cup ? Oh cry out then likewise, Let this cup pass from me ; 
my Saviour drank all these as turned to gall and vinegar, and shall I make 
that my pleasure, which was such hoiTor and bitterness to him ! And of 
sins, take heed of presumptuous sins, which is a making bold with his 
friendship, and the continuance of his love still notwithstanding. These 
strike directly at the root, the soul, at the marrow of friendship ; this is a 
strain higher than treason. David, a king, might have aggravated Ahitho- 
phel's fault, in that he was his prince, his sovereign ; but it was ' Thou my 
friend' which he upbraids him with, and lays to his charge his treason 
against friendship. And Ahithophel was therein the type of Judas, whose 
sin to this day is branded with the name of treason — treason the highest 
that ever was, that he who eats my bread (says Christ) should betray me. 
'Oh keep me from presumptuous sins !' (saith David, Ps. xix. 19) for they 
are the next step to the great offence ; * so shall I be free from the great 
transgression,' than which nothing is higher, or nearer than the sin of pre- 
suming on God's love. The oppression of good nature in any good and 
sweet soul we stand in relation unto, is the greatest oppression in the 
world ; and what oppresseth good nature more than under presumption of 
friendship to abuse it ? So also upon the same account take heed of sins 
that wound the name of God in thee. How doth one cast shame upon all 
his friends, when he runs into an enormity ! Noscitur ex socio, &c., they 
account all his friends and companions such. David's sin is aggravated by 
this, that he made the enemies of God to blaspheme ; and nothing puts 
God more into a strait, how to acquit himself toward you, and save his own 
honour, than in such a case either to lose the service you may yet do, or 
to dishonour himself by using you any longer therein. 



Chap. VII.] in the heart and life. 215 

2. The second branch of obedience is (as you know), keeping his com- 
mandments: 'Ye are my friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you,' says 
Christ, John xv. 14. Thus also says Jonathan to David his friend : 1 Sam. 
XX. 4, ' Whatsoever thy soul desireth, I will even do it for thee.' Yea, friend- 
ship will turn that sovereign word of commands into that more easy style, 
' whatsoever will please him,' Isa. Ivi. 4. And yet 'yours to command' is 
stylus amicitue, the style of friendship. A man can requite a friend but two 
ways, either by protiting him, or by pleasing him. Now profit God we 
cannot : ' What is it to him that thou art righteous ?' (says Job). Christ 
himself could not profit God ; witness that speech spoken of him, ' My good- 
ness extends not to thee,' Ps. xvi. But yet please him he did in all things, 
John viii. 39. 

(1.) Let us study with ourselves what in our way, and in his will con- 
cerning us, will most please him, and let us make it the pleasure of our 
souls to do it. Let us think with ourselves, as David did: Ps. Ixix. 31, 
' This also shall please the Lord better than an ox or bullock that hath horns 
and hoofs.' Let us do what is done by us out of a free spirit, and not only 
or barely as commanded. Let us think, that of Paul's looks fully this way : 
1 Cor. ix. 16, 17, ' Though I preach the gospel, I have nothing to glory of: 
for necessity is laid upon me ; yea, woe is unto me, if I preach not the 
gospel ! ' ver. 17, ' For if I do this thing willingly, I have a reward : but 
if unwillingly, a dispensation is committed to me.' The plain result of which 
place is this, 1, that to do the best woi'k for God that can be done in this 
world, is to preach the gospel ; therefore, by way of supposition, he heightens 
and gi-eatens it, ' Though I preach the gospel,' than which the angels them- 
selves have not a better work committed to them ; yea, 2, if I outwardly 
do this work (says he) with all the pains and diligence that flesh and blood 
can perform it with, even to the utmost of the dispensation and commis- 
sion enjoined me, as ver. 17 implies ; yet, 3, to do this, having this only 
in my eye, that I am commanded by God to do it, is not enough. That 
this was his scope is clearly acknowledged out of these his words, ' for 
necessity is laid upon me.' This necessity was not of any outward restraint ; 
no man could have compelled him, no more than they could Demas, who 
left his preaching, embraced the present world, and fell a merchandising, 
taking the advantage of growing rich at Thessalonica, 2 Tim. iv. 10. It 
was not for maintenance and livelihood, for it was that he was speaking of, 
that he refused it for preaching. Yea, the necessity he in these words 
intends, is severed from that other necessity of being damned if he did it 
not, for so it is emphatically expressed by our translators. Yea {tanquam 
aliquid amplius), Woe is me if I preach not the gospel. He adds it as 
some further thing, so that the single necessity of the command was at first 
considered by him ; which therefore, ver. 17, he thus expresseth, ' A dis- 
pensation is committed to me.' But to have preached the gospel out of 
such a necessity only, had not been matter of glory or acceptation with God ; 
yea, to have preached it upon these or such grounds only, had been to 
preach it cixm, unwillingly — the unwillingness being to be interpreted by 
what he opposeth to it, namely, willingness out of choice, heartily and 
freely to choose the work out of love to God chiefly, and the souls of men. 
As one well observes, unwilling is not invitus, but jussus ;* and our trans- 
lators have shot that bolt too far to translate it against my will. So then, 
to conclude this, to do a thing merely upon the necessity of the obligation 
of the command, though of God, and only because such a dispensation is 
• Grotiua. 



216 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK 11. 

committed and laid upon one, although in itself the greatest service in the 
world, is not with God acceptable alone, in the terms which we stand in 
with him, which are of friendship and not of mere servants. And there- 
fore, over and above, there must be a freeness and willingness, out of 
ingenuity to God, which is to do it for him as to a friend ; which that 
Paul might manifest, he did preach the gospel freely, to which yet others 
(he says) were not obliged, but it had been his profession so to do. And 
in doing this out of this principle, and in this manner, the work had a glory, 
that is, a gi-ace, an acceptableness in it, which else it would have lost. 
Peter thus expresseth it : 1 Pet. ii. 19, 20, that it is thankworthy, and 
that from God, tovto %Ǥ/; Tapu Qs'SJ, which in the same verse he also terms 
glory ; what glory is it ? He speaks it upon the like occasion of doing 
noble, free, and heroical acts of obedience unto God. To be patient and 
quiet, to be buffeted for what is truly faulty, this is good (says he) ; but 
this comes merely under the notion of justice, and duty, and command, and 
so what glory is in it ? ' But if, when you do well and suffer for it, ye take 
it patiently, this is thankworthy before God.' The style and language 
imports that such actions God takes not only well, as a master that com- 
mands things as a duty, but also as a friend doth from the hands of a friend ; 
not only with an acknowledgment, * "Well done, good and faithful servant,' 
but with thanks, which we use not to give to servants, but to friends, as 
having done us free courtesies. So that, although there are not works of 
supererogation (as in respect of what God doth and may command : Luke 
xvii. 19, ' Doth he thank that servant, because he did those things that 
were commanded him ? I trow not,' says Christ), yet there is such a per- 
forming of things commanded for the manner of it, as is over and above 
the force of the command, even out of freeness and ingenuity as friends. 
And there are some such noble and heroical acts of obedience, as carry in 
their very appearance a principle above that of semce, which respect the 
necessity of the command, that God thanks them for them, as a man doth 
his friend for a matter of courtesy; and they come to have a glory, a special 
grace in them, which simple obedience hath not. And they also have 
thanks, which not the intercourse of servant and master, but between friend 
and fi-iend requires, and which chiefly respect the freeness and nobleness 
of the mind we do it with. Now that Christ should use the same word 
that Peter doth, %a^/c, thanks ; and that Peter should say, that to such 
and such actions thanks, and those thanks from God, were due or suit- 
able ; and that Christ should, on the contrary, say, Yfill that master thank 
his servant ? I know not how otherwise to reconcile than thus, that when 
we shall lift up our obedience out of the crowd and common rank of services 
(which God might stand upon, since he, as lord and master, could so 
command, and we must be forced to say. We are unprofitable servants, 
when we have done, as having done nothing but what was commanded us), 
and shall perform it to God upon terms and grounds of gratitude and thank- 
fulness, yea, as friends, then God condescends also to accept it as it is given, 
not as duty only, but as free, and gives thanks for it : so gracious is he if 
we be thus noble. And all these places shew, that otherwise (suppose we 
be saved) yet we lose that glory, splendour, and lustre which might be 
found in oui- obedience, if we thus performed it. 

(2.) We should study and search outworks so excellent for the manner of 
performance, or seek a heart so noble, as should render such common 
actions exti-aordinaiy. God hath studied how to commend and set out his 
kindness (witness the death of his Son), and prevent us with his loving- 



Chap. VII.] in the heart and life. 217 

kindness, as the psalmist speaks. And we should (if possible) study out some 
free-born acts of obedience, and prevent him with them. . Thus David, 
unspoken to by God, out of his vast desires to glorify him, thinks of building 
a temple for him ; and, says God, I never spake a word of it, 2 Sam. vii. 7. 
Yet because what was in God's heart rose up so nobly in David's (it was 
an ingenuous thought occasioned it, ' I dwell in an house of cedar, but the 
ark of God dwells in curtains,' ver. 2), God took this kindly : ' Tell him' 
(says God to Nathan), * I will build him an house for it,' ver. 11. In ser- 
vices we do let us study to put an emphasis of love upon them, as Paul, 
who (when he might have done otherwise) preached the gospel for nothing. 

(3.) I shall mention some special seasons (instead of other particulars) which 
thou mayest take the advantage of, to render a quick and diligent obedience 
exceeding acceptable to him as a friend, and thanksworthy as from a friend, 
ffasa Tou Qbov, even by God himself. 

[1.] One season is, when after great falls you are anew reconciled to 
him, and he hath pardoned you great sins. You know what vows David 
made after his falls, Ps. li. 13 : he vowed to convert others, to celebrate his 
praise, and to ofler the choicest of sacrifices, a broken heart. This made 
Peter bestir himself, but upon two words spoken by Christ after his fall, 
Lovest thou me ? Politic friendship bids you take heed of a reconciled 
friend that hath been treacherous, and done you a mischief; but God delights 
in such to choose. He therefore chose forth his entirest friends (and he knew 
what he did in doing it) out of the sons of men that had otiended him, 
rather than make new ones, for he knew they would love him better. A 
friend that is in his radical disposition of a good and ingenuous nature, 
and hath wronged you, such a one when reconciled, and you have pardoned 
him, is the best and fastest friend in the world. And God will in the end 
be sure to make those good-natured, and true-hearted to him, whom he 
pardons : Ps. xxxii. 1, ' Blessed is the man whose sins are forgiven, in 
whose heart is no guile.' He couples these two for ever together : Hast thou 
sinned, and hath God pardoned and loved thee freely ? This is a new 
conversion to thee, a redintegration of a new love between you; love much, 
and obey much, as Mary and Peter did. 

[2.] Labour then most, when in view thou art in least dependence on 
him for outward mercies, and thinkest thy mountain most strong. In 
some times of a man's life he is set in an enlarged and free state, so as he 
looks over the present horizon of his condition, and sees not one cloud that 
anyway threatens rain. He is hedged about (as Job), and sees not whence 
a breach should come. At such a time meditate (if ever) to act in a more 
extraordinary manner for God's interest and honour. When was it that 
David meditated that fore-mentioned high and generous act of testifying his 
love in building God an house ? It is prefaced thereunto, 2 Sam. vii. 2, 
' that it came to pass, when David sat in his house, and the Lord had 
given him rest round about from all his enemies.' The coast was clear (as 
we use to say), and then the king said, ver. 2, ' He would build God an 
house.' He took this special season to express his love towards God in, 
and God took thereupon that special advantage to confirm his house to 
him. Hezekiah, on the contrary, whilst Sennacherib lay with his army 
before the city, and the ten tribes were carried captive before his face, 
walked with a perfect heart ; but when his kingdom was settled, and a 
lease of his life freely sealed for fifteen years, you know then how he forgat 
God, and how God took it at his hands. Joshua (who was a man God 
honoui'ed to bring his people into rest, having that testimony given him, 



218 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK II. 

that he followed God full}-), you see, a long time after (Josh, xxiii. 1) that 
God had given rest unto Israel from all their enemies round about, how he 
engaged afresh all the people to serve God, chap, xxiv., and himself espe- 
cially, ver. 15, ' I and my household will serve the Lord.' This was 
friendly, and God took it accordingly, and recorded it for ever. 

[3.] On the contrary, when God afflicts and crosseth thee in thy desires, 
and hath denied for the present the request thou hast made, apply thyself 
most unto him. These, though contrary seasons, are yet times alike of 
winning upon God by obedience : Eccles. vii. 15, ' In the day of good, or 
prosperity, be in good ; ' that is, as our critics explain it, be conversant, 
and exercise thyself wholly in what is good ; ' and in the day of evil, see 
to thy ways and consider.' Thus he calls for holiness alike in both. That 
was also true ingenuity which they expressed, Ps. xliv, 17, 18, &c., * All 
this is come upon us ; yet we have not forgotten thee, nor our steps 
declined from thy ways.' Paul glories more in the obedience he did in his 
infirmities than in all his revelations. 

[4.] Though thou hast served him long, and waited, and perhaps he hath 
done little for thee in comparison of what for others, yet take occasion still 
to serve him, and that the more diligently, and be far from thinking much. 
Amicitia non est revocanda ad calculos, friends are not as partners that 
keep accounts of their receipts and expenses from each other. God ' gives 
mercies,' ' and upbraids not,' James i. 5. And we should return obedi- 
ence, and not repine. Paul served God many years, did more than all the 
apostles, as himself says, and yet (says he), ' I forget what is past and 
behind,' Phihp. iii., ' and reach and roam after still what is before.' And 
though many years were past already, yet he thought not much at it, that his 
condition was not bettered, nor his ways mended : 1 Cor. iv. 11, ' Even to this 
present hour we both hunger and thirst, and are naked, and are buffeted, and 
have not certain dwelling place ; and labour, working with our own hands : 
being reviled, we bless ; being persecuted, we suffer it ; being defamed, we 
entreat : we are made as the filth of the world, and as the ofF-scoui-ing of 
all things unto this day,' You see he puts it into the account, that to that 
hour (ver. 11), to that very day (ver. 13), he and his fellow- apostles (the 
greatest saints that ever the world had, or was to have) had done such high 
and so great works of service for God as the world did then, yea, doth to this 
day, and shall to the end of the world, owe their salvation and Christian 
religion to them ; and yet though they had run out so many years, 
they were not a whit amended as to their outward condition. They had 
neither meat to put in their mouths, nor houses of abode to dwell in ; yea, 
and which still heightens all this, other Christians that were saved as well 
as they, that had less grace, and done far less service, yea, for whose sakes 
they had been employed to do all this, were gratified by God with these 
kind of accommodations. The apostle on purpose sets the instance of such 
by this other, vers. 8 and 10, ' Now ye are full, now ye are rich, ye have 
reigned as kings without us ; and I would to God ye did reign, that we also 
might reign with you. We are fools for Christ's sake, but ye are wise in 
Christ : we are weak, but ye are strong : ye are honourable, but we are 
despised.' Yea, and ver. 9, * I think that God hath set forth us apostles 
last, as it were appointed unto death.' You that are scholars know what 
he alludes to : it is to the Roman spectacles, either those in which men 
were thrown to beasts, as the last and lowest sort of men, to make sport 
unto the common sort of people (which is TertuUian's interpretation) ; or 
rather to those gladiators or sword-players, who came up last, of which 



Chap. VII.] in the heart and life. 219 

there were two sorts : 1. of such as fenced to shew skill, as now-a-days ; 
2. of those that fought but to wouudiug, aud then wore fetched olf; but 
the 8d and last sort was of slaves, or men condemned to die, who were to 
fight till they had killed their fellows, or were killed. And thus God had 
pre-ordained to his dearest friends and servants, his apostles, whilst they 
lived, to run through all these difficulties and wants, and at last to be 
killed ; and all this too to make them spectacles to the world, yea, both 
worlds, angels, and men, and set them all aghast at them. God had pro- 
vided a greater stage and theatre than that at Rome, and he sets and brings 
these poor men forth to play their prize for his glory, that he might only 
say to them all (as he said to Satan of Job) * See you not my servants' 
Paul and Peter ? But what ! doth God deal with his best friends, that do 
most for him, thus ? Then who will serve him ? That will I, says Paul. 
' I know whom I trusted ; and I have fought a good fight, and will die in 
the quarrel.' They thought not much at this, they knew whom^ they 
served. And let that consideration at first specified cheer thy spirit in this 
case, which surely was it that carried on the apostles themselves. They 
knew and considered that their radical and original subjection by the law 
of creation to God was such, that God might command all this, and exact 
it of them as pure servants to him, and give them no wages ; that (as it is 
in verse 7 of that chapter) ' whatever they had they had received ; ' and 
they owed all they could do for him upon that account, as David says : 
1 Chron. xxix. 16, ' Of thine own we have given thee.' Our Saviour had 
laid in this consideration in the hearts of his apostles, whom afterwards he 
meant thus to use. He spends one parable on purpose to let them know 
their native condition as they were creatures, and what subjection they 
stood in to God as mere and perfect servants, yea, and unprofitable too, 
when they should have done never so much. He made them know this, 
that being humbled and prepared hereby, they might see the infinite grace 
and favour in God tow-ards them, when afterwards he should adopt, own, 
and admit them to be his friends (John xv. 15, ' Henceforth I call you not 
servants, but friends'), and how upon that account he would accept of all 
they should do, the utmost of which they owed, as unprofitable servants. 
The parable you have, Luke xvii., from the 7th verse to the 11th, ' But 
which of you, having a servant ploughing or feeding cattle, will^say unto him 
by and by, when he is come fi-om the field, Go and sit down to meat ? 
and will not rather say unto him. Make ready wherewith I may sup, and 
gird thyself, and serve me, till I have eaten and drunken ; and afterward 
thou shalt eat and drink ? Doth he thank that servant because he did the 
things that were commanded him ? I trow not. So likewise ye, when 
ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We 
are unprofitable servants : we have only done that which was our duty to 
do.' He lays before them the common condition of servants unto men, and 
what was expected from them after the customs of men. A servant that 
hath been doing hard and laborious work, as ploughing or keepmg cattle 
abroad in the fields, in all weathers, winds, and storms, and this all day, 
when he hath done these long and tedious works, might seem to expect, 
when he comes home, to have his supper prepared and ready dressed for 
him, that he might eat and go to rest after so tedious a travel. No, says 
Christ, none deals thus with his servants ; but he must yet stay, though 
weary and an-hungry.— ' To this hour,' says Paul, ' we hunger and thirst : 
nay, have not so much as an house in this world to come to.'— He must 
yet do another work, and di-ess his Master's supper ; but yet then he might 



220 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK 11. 

expect to sit down or eat at the lower end of the table. No ; but after he 
had dressed it, and served it up, he must stand and wait at table, run hither 
and thither, see his master eat the meat which himself dressed before his 
face, and perfectly stay till he had eaten and drunken, and afterwards he 
shall eat and drink, so as he must not do one, but all sorts of services. 
And what when all this is done ? Doth his master thank him ? ' I trow 
not,' says Christ. Nay, he teacheth him to say he is an unprofitable ser- 
vant, and hath but done his duty. How then should this move us ? That 
God should take us up out of this servile condition, which not our sins, 
but our creation, hath condemned us to, and constitute us friends to him- 
self, and profess, if performed with such an heart by us, to own and accept 
all these our services as acts of friendship, for which he will thank us and 
reward us in the highest measure. Who would not be content to serve so 
great, and withal so good a God, as this ? 

I shall go on to mention other genuine properties of right and true friend- 
ship, in the point of their obedience to him. 

(4.) Manage all with all simplicity and plain-heartedness towards him, in 
all thy walkings, which is the truest and rarest jewel in friendship. A 
reserv'ed, cunning politician never makes a good friend, who is * an 
Israelite indeed,' (as Christ says of Nathanael, John i. 48), ' in whom is no 
guile.' Our Saviour not only puts a value, but a rarity upon him ; there- 
fore points him out with an "lo;, ^Behold, an Israelite indeed,' such as you 
should not find amongst a million of men. And he entitleth him an 
Israelite in this respect, because this is that which made Jacob's or Israel's 
commendation,' Gen. xxv. 27, that he was a plain man, airXoxic, of a 
sincere heart, without false or cunning ends and reaches in his way ; 
whereas Esau was a cunning hunter, a cunning gamester, as you say, in 
his. Now, let a man naturally have what guile or cunning he will, real 
converse and acfjuaintance with God will put him out of it, with respect to 
God himself, whatever God alloweth him to exercise towards enemies that 
seek advantage. For a man knows he hath to do with a God that cuts up 
to the marrow, and to the joints, the socket bones and the heart, and all 
the wheels it turns upon. He wi-iggles his anatomising knife through them, 
Heb. iv. 12. David had carried the business of Uriah cunningly, as to 
men ; but when his heart was set in God's sun, in the light of God, that 
light discovered this work to be a deceitful close-spun web of wickedness, 
a plotted and continued villany, which made him, upon that occasion, cry 
out, Ps. li. G, ' Behold, thou requirest truth in the inward parts, and in the 
hidden part thou shalt make me to know wisdom.' The inwards of a man 
are the seat of guile, as well as of truth and plainness ; and upon the dis- 
coveiy of this his sin to him, he entitleth grace by the name of truth, or 
plainness, in the inward parts, and acknowlodgeth such a plain spirit to be 
the only wise spirit. David thought himself to be very wise, in ridding his 
hands so handsomely of Uriah, but he must not think to caiTy it thus, and 
escape God so ; he now saw it to have been the greatest folly in the world, 
and that it should teach him wisdom for hereafter : ' In the hidden part 
thou shalt make me to know wisdom.' And again you have him at it, Ps. 
xxxii. 3 ; when he hid his sin and kept silence, he had distinctions to fence 
with, and endeavoured to distinguish himself out from being a murderer, 
and day and night lay roaring ; but in the end he confesseth it, and then 
God pardoned it : vcr. 5, ' I acknowledged my sin unto thee, and mine 
iniquity have I not hid ; I said, I will confess my transgressions unto the 
Lord, and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin.' And from thence he ever 



Chap. VII.] in the heart and life. 221 

learnt this lesson, that whom God pardons, and receives to grace and favour 
with himself, from them ho takes out that venomous vein or sting, that runs 
through the backbone of guile and deceit towards himself. Therefore, at 
the second verse, he couples these two for over together, * Blessed is tho 
man whom thou pardonest, and in whose spirit there is no guile.' It is 
observable that the apostle makes these two equivalent, to do a thing 
heartily, and to do it as to tho Lord : Col. iii. 23, ' Whatsoever ye do, do 
it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men.' And in the words before, 
he says, ' Not as men-pleasers, but in singleness of heart, fearing God.' 
That which I observe out of it is this, that nothing will fix the nature of 
man, and make it void of ends, but this knowing God, this fear of him, and 
conversing with him. If a servant would propound to please his master, 
yet his own purpose will not make him constant in what is his duty, both 
absent as well as present ; it will be an uncertain rule, he will be a weather- 
cock in his actions, observing the wind, and turning uncertainly with it. 
Now, you walk not plain-heartedly, when you seek out excuses to put ofi 
duties, and are glad of them ; and when you labour to find out distinctions, 
to make good those sins you are loath to leave ; and when you walk 
unevenly in several companies, as Peter did : Gal. ii. 14, * He walked not 
with an even foot ; ' when, also, you use your wisdom to hold correspond- 
ence with God and the world, as they in Gal. vi. 12 ; when ye have 
ends of the flesh in all, and yet would make as if ye did much for God, as 
Jehu did : ' See what zeal I have for the Lord of hosts.' To magnify 
kindnesses, when we design only our own ends, and to make them seem 
greater, is guile in friendship. Friends often lay aside some things they 
would else do, merely to avoid the suspicion of by-ends to their friends. 
Paul walked in simplicity, or with a spirit without folds or doublings, as 
the word signifies, 2 Cor. i. 12. 

(5.) Be faithful to him, in whatever is committed to thy trust by him, and 
let thy friendship move thee. This is the special epithet of a friend, that 
he is a ' faithful friend,' Exod. xxxiii. 11. God treateth Moses, at the first 
entry into his office, as a friend : * The Lord spake to Moses face to face, 
as a man speaketh to his friend.' And this obliged and endeared Moses 
to that faithfulness he shewed in all and every particular about his house. 
Compare with this Num. xii. 7, 8, ' My servant Moses, who is faithful in 
all my house, with him will I speak mouth to mouth,' that is, face to face, 
as a man with his friend ; which manifestly refers to what God had before 
done and said of him, Exod. xxxiii. 11, to which also the margin doth refer 
us. There is none of us but God hath betrusted with something : with 
pupils, who are precious ware, and their souls, as well as their outward 
state, are committed to their governors ; with riches : ' Be faithful, then, in 
the unrighteous mammon ; ' with his name : keep it unspotted in thee ; 
with gifts and talents : improve them to his advantage ; with power : let it 
be used and turned for God ; with thy voice in elections : let God dispose 
of it, and let those that are God's friends, and godly, have it rather than 
any other. If God hath entrusted thee vv^ith the truth, ' keep that good 
thing committed to thee,' as Paul speaks to Timothy ; ' be faithful unto 
death, and he will give thee a crown of life.' Let not God be a loser in 
what is committed to thee, whatever thou mayest be. Thou mayest, in 
the management of what is for God, perhaps lose a friend, disgust this or 
that person. It is no matter ; be in all things faithful to God, as Jacob 
was to Laban, and served him fourteen, yea, twenty years, day and night ; 
and if there were any loss, he bare it, Gen. xxsi. 39, 41. 



222 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS '[BoOK II. 

(6.) Deny him notliing, and yet take his denials kindly. Friends that 
are critical in friendship, if they think they shall be denied, will not so much 
as ask, for it will trouble them. Abraham spared not his son when God 
called for him, and he was called the friend of God. God, to endear thy 
friendship to him, sometimes will seem to stand in need of something thou 
hast. When Christ was on earth, he was poor, and good souls ministered 
unto him. Another time he sends to a poor man for his ass, with this 
message, which was a strange one, Luke xix. 31, ' The Lord hath need of 
him,' though the cattle on a thousand hills ai-e his. It was but to fulfil a 
prophecy ; else we never read he rode, but went afoot many a wearisome 
step, from Galilee to Jerusalem, to and fro unto the feasts. God hath 
business in this world that concerns his glory, needs thy help against the 
mighty, needs thy good word in a good cause, and thou perhaps art sluggish, 
or loath to appear in it. Think nothing thou hast too dear for him, when 
he calls for it : ' I count not my life dear to me,' says Paul, ' to fulfil 
my ministration with joy,' Acts xx. 24. And take this for a rule to guide 
thee to know what he calls for from thee. When either thou canst not 
hold that which thou hast without sinning against him, or when the laying 
of it down tends to promote his glory, then God calls for it, and deny him 
not, he is a special friend. Kemark that speech of Christ, « He that for- 
sakes not father, mother, &c., for my sake and the gospel's, is not worthy 
of me, ''Mat. x. 37, that is, ' of my friendship ;' he is not worthy to be held 
in correspondency withal by me. 

(7.) Stick close to him in the time of trial. A friend, though he loves at 
all times, yet is specially * born for a time of adversity,' Prov. xvii. 17, as 
in a great case of distress it is said of Esther, she * came to the kingdom 
for such a time as that ; ' it was the greatest thing God had in his eye, 
when and for which he advanced her. There are special times in our lives 
in which God hath ordained to try us, and bring us to offer up our Isaacs, 
as he required of Abraham. Think with thyself, I was converted, born 
again for such a time as this ; shall I fail God now, and bid farewell to his 
friendship, when there are such obhgations between God and me ? Ah, no ! 
they are as bills of exchange, and you break all future correspondency if you 
pay them not. 

(8.) Suffer for him, if there be occasion, gladly, and be greedy of such 
opportunities when brought upon thee by others. As the wounds of a 
friend are faithful, as Solomon says, so for a friend they are honourable ; 
and Paul calls them Christ's marks and scars. The apostles thought they 
had a kindness done them when they suffered for him, and the primitive 
saints loved not their lives to the death, Rev. xii. 11. Do thou stand for 
him among his enemies, and take his part. This we expect of those that 
profess an eminency of friendship ; and in what company soever they be, 
if they are silent at such a time, when they hear their friend reviled, they 
strengthen his enemies in their evil speeches of him. See how Jonathan 
shewed the part of a friend for David, 1 Sam. xix. 4 ; how he pleads for 
him to Saul when his life was in danger at every word, for he threw javelins 
at him. And do thou vindicate God and his ways the rather because thou 
shalt have opportunity to do this for him only in this life ; at the latter day 
he will appear to defend himself, as Jude says. You glorify God amongst 
his enemies only here. ' He that confesseth me before men,' that is, here, 
* him,' says Christ, ' will I acknowledge,' namely then, at that day. 

(9.) Be afflicted at all things done to his dishonour, as if it were thine own, 
nay, more than thou wouldst at thine own. Thus Jonathan did for David : 



Chap. VIII.] in the heart and life. 228 

1 Sam. XX. 34 it is said, ' ho grieved for David, because his father had done 
him shame.' Friends are like lute strings tuned to each, which will sUr 
and tremble if one of them be struck. Was God displeased at the sins of 
the Israelites? It is added, Num. xi. 10, that 'Moses was displeased 
also.' And in another place it is said that he stood weeping in the tent 
door, and knew not how to help it, when God was so openly dishonoured 
by Zimri leading Cosbi. Paul's ' spirit was stirred,' Acts xvii., ' when he 
saw their idolatry.' And as thou art to moan on occasion of sorrow, so 
to rejoice on occasion of joy. When souls are converted, and the lost sheep 
and lost groat are found, he calls his friends to rejoice with him, says the 
parable, Luke xv. 5, 6. John being a friend of the bridegroom, rejoiced 
that ' he should decrease, and Christ increase,' John iii. 29. 



CHAPTER YIII. 

Obedience to God described, as it is a service joerfonned to him. The character 
and properties of those icho are his sincere and faithful servants. 

But God be thanked, that ye icere the servants of sin ; hut ye have obeyed from 
the heart that form of doctrine u-hich was delivered you. Beiufj then made 
free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness. — PtOM. VI. 17, 18. 

In these words (as of old in the tjrpes of Isaac, Ishmael, the one the son 
of a bondwoman, the other of a free, Gal. iv. 24) you have set forth unto 
your view the twofold condition of those two contrary estates, the one of 
nature, the other of grace ; and that in the example and pattern of these 
lately converted Romans, to whom the apostle wi'ote, that had experience 
of both, who first, while in their estate of nature, had been servants to sin, 
but now their condition being altered by grace, they were made free fi'om 
sin, and became the servants of righteousness ; where by righteousness is 
meant that universal spiritual strictness and exactness which the word of God 
requires. For it is here opposed to sin, and therefore to be taken as largely 
as that is. And it hath reference unto the word ' doctrine ' in the former 
words, as being the whole entire matter and substance which that doctrine 
commands, and which Christ gave in charge to his apostles, ' to teach all 
that believe in him to do whatsoever he commanded,' Mat. xxviii. 20. 
And the apostles coming among these Romans, and teaching them that 
righteousness which is required of them, God so wrought by their preach- 
ings, that their hearts were framed and fashioned to the obedience of it, 
like as a piece of clay or metal cast into a mould is fashioned to the like- 
ness of the prints in that mould, and made serviceable to some use. Thus 
it was with their hearts ; for God, that hath the hearts of all men in his hands, 
hke a skilful artificer, used their doctrine, the words of weak men, as a 
mould of righteousness, as I may call it, whereinto casting and delivering 
thereinto, casting and fashioning their hearts, they had the same image and 
prints of righteousness stamped on them, and were made as serviceable and 
fit instruments to be employed therein. They became servants of right- 
eousness, shewing and manifesting this in their lives, obeying that word of 
righteousness to the utmost of their endeavours, and this from the heart, 
being thus changed and framed thereunto. This is the meaning of the 
words, as both the words in the original, the scope of the apostle, and the 
best intei-preters do manifestly shew. 



224 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK II. 

Obs. The condition of God's children is to be servants of righteousness, 
or, which is all one, servants to God in righteousness, or according to that 
strictness which he requires in his will. For what he calls here serving of 
righteousness, he calls ver. 22 serving of God ; please but God's law, and 
you please him. It is true, indeed, that the estate of God's children is an 
estate of liberty, inasmuch as they are made free from sin in regard of 
bondage to it ; but there are two masters, which, as we cannot serve both, 
so we must serve one of them ; and if we are free from the one, we become 
servants to the other. Mat. vi. 24. And also, although it be true, that, as 
Christ saith, ' henceforth I call you not servants, but friends,' John xv. 15, 
yea, brethren and sons also in other places, yet Christ speaks not as 
exempting them from the obedience of servants to his command ; for he 
tells them they are not his friends, in the 14th verse, unless they do what he 
commands. And he speaks that to shew his love to them, in that he would 
deal with them more graciously than the lords of the world do with their 
servants, though they be men like themselves, and he is God blessed for 
ever ; for he would reveal all his secrets to them, make them his bosom 
friends, as it follows there ; for the servants know not their master's will, 
that is, are not of their counsel, as you are, my favourites, my friends, my 
privy councillors. ' For all things that I have heard of my Father, I have 
made known to you.' God indeed hath other servants, that are the servants 
of his secret will and righteous judgments ; and so the devil is, and all 
wicked men, Isa. xliv. 28 ; but such servants the saints are not, but of his 
revealed will, they are servants of his righteousness. They are indeed 
rather sons than servants, he useth them so kindly. God serves himself of 
wicked men, but the saints do serve God in righteousness and true holiness. 

For the proof of this, why should I heap up Scripture, which is so 
plentiful ? To be the servants of the Lord, was the title that all the old 
patriarchs delighted in so much, boasting to wear God's livery ; so David, 
Ps. cxvi. 16. And it is the title that the apostles prefix in all their epistles, 
as esteeming it most honourable ; yea, the angels themselves do make it 
to be the top of their honour : Rev. xix. 10, ' I am thy fellow- servant to 
Jesus Christ.' I will omit also the reasons which may be drawn from our 
creation and regeneration. By the first creation, every creature is bound 
to be the servant of its Maker. By virtue of our regeneration, and being 
created again, as also of our election, we are to be the servants of right- 
eousness. ' For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto 
good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them,' 
Eph. ii. 10. In which words observe, first, that God's giving us a new 
frame of heart at our regeneration, is to that end, it is to the obedience of 
righteousness to good works. Every creature is created to an end, and 
tied, by virtue of its creation, to that work and service it was created unto, 
and therefore never rests till it hath attained that end. So all the creatures 
serve, yea, and rejoice to serve God in that employment he hath created 
them in. And then, secondly, observe, that by virtue of our election we 
are bound unto these works, we were ordained to walk in them, and we 
are indeed chosen servants. But I shall insist more particularly on these 
following reasons. 

1. We are obliged to God's service, because it is the end and fruit of 
our redemption by Christ. Titus ii. 14, Christ is said to have * given 
himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purge us to 
be a pecuHar people to himself, zealous of good works.' I pray mark the 
scope of the words. 



Chap. VIII.] in the heart and life. 225 

(1.) It is said that Christ gavo himself for us ; that is, rcsif^ned up him- 
self, devoted himself in all that ever he did here upon the earth for us. It 
was not for himself, since himself was given for us ; he became our servant : 
Philip, ii. 6, 7, * He took upon him the form of a servant, and was obedient 
to death ;' and in his death, submitting himself to obey all righteousness, 
he was righteousness's servant, and in that our servant. And why was 
this ? It was to make us a peculiar people to himself, and to be peculiarly 
laid up for himself ; to bo set apart, devoted, and given up wholly unto 
him. And therefore in that place of the Philippians, the apostle exhorts 
in the 5th verse, that * the same mind should be in us,' that we should 
become servants of righteousness for him, as he hath been for us. 

(2.) Observe in that place of Titus, that Christ giving himself for us, 
redeemed us ; that is, bought us, purchased us out of our enemies' hands. 
We are redeemed ones to God, by the blood of Christ. Now the law of 
nations gives it, that the redeemed should be servants to the laws of the 
Redeemer. ' You are not your own' (says the apostle, 1 Cor. vi. 20) ; 
* for ye are bought with a price : therefore glorify God in your bodies, and 
in your spirits, for you are God's' by the right of redemption. But yet 
because it might be thought, that though God's children are thus redeemed 
and bought, all the question is, whether they will or do become servants, 
yea or no ; for many out of unthankfulness deny the Lord that bought 
them, 2 Peter ii. 1. But do any of his redeemed ones do so ? No ; they 
are made wilHng to serve him. 

(3.) And therefore, thirdly, observe out of that place of Titus ii. 14, that 
they are said to be redeemed, that they might be zealous of good works ; 
not only willing, but earnest, forward, zealously and hotly pursuing after 
good works of righteousness ; and were it not so, he would lose his end in 
redeeming us. And therefore God brings home this redemption of Christ 
to their hearts, how he became a servant to righteousness, yea, to death 
for them, and so frames the same disposition in them to Christ that was in 
him to us, Philip, ii. 5. And therefore the apostle Peter (1 Peter i. 14-18), 
exhorting them to be as obedient children to God, and to walk in holiness 
and righteousness, useth this as an argviment in the 18th verse, ' Knowing 
that you were redeemed, not with corruptible things, but with the blood of 
Christ ;' as if he had said. If you did but truly know and beheve that Christ 
did this for you, and that you have a part in this redemption, it would frame 
your spirits to the like willingness of obedience unto him ; yea, if men's 
hearts did but seriously make account to have salvation by Christ, and did 
seek after it truly, they would be willing to obey him in anything. 

But though they are made willing, yet still the question will be, whether 
they are made able thereunto, yea or no, and so do really become his ser- 
vants, and obey him ? Therefore, 

(4.) Fourthly, Know that those whom God calls to be his servants, he 
doth in some measure enable them thereunto. Every ordinary tradesman, 
when he takes an apprentice, binds himself to teach him his trade, and 
therefore how much more God ! And therefore old Zacharias, Luke i. 74, 
speaking of the frait of Christ's redemption in his redeemed, says, that it 
is not only to deliver them out of the hands of their enemies, but ' to grant 
them to serve him in holiness and true righteousness all their days.' To 
grant them, that is, to vouchsafe and give strength and ability thereunto ; 
and to that end we are called by the apostle, Eph. ii. 10, * a new work- 
manship, created to good works, which he had ordained that we should walk 
in them,' Here I pray observe three things. 



226 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK II. 

1st. That God creates a new frame of heart which was not before. 

2dly. Observe the end to which he created it, ' unto good works.' The 
phrase implies a giving a power and abiUty in some measure to do them. 
For as when God is said to create the heavens to move, what is meant by 
it, but that he gives a power to do it, abilities and endowments tending to 
that end ! When an artificer makes a clock to strike, what is meant by it, 
but that he so frames it as it shall do so ! "WTien God created anything, 
he bade it to be, and in that gave powers to act. 

3dly. Observe that God had ordained that we should walk in them ; his 
decree was for it long since, and he cannot be frustrated of his end. 

These things being thus clear, what use shall we make of them ? 

Use 1. The first use shall be for trial, whether we be in the estate of 
grace or no, namely, by this, whether we are the servants of righteousness 
or no ? Ai'e we the redeemed ones, as we all profess ourselves to be, 
when we receive the sacrament ? This inquiry is the more necessary, 
because this is the usual plea of men, that they are the true and dear ser- 
vants of God, and do serve him day and night, come to his service and to 
church, and think that is enough. I will name a few properties of a good 
servant, which I desire you to examine your hearts by, whether they be in 
you or no. 

(1.) It is a necessary thing in a good servant to know his master's will 
and humour, and what will please him ; and though I confess there are 
unprofitable knowers of God's will spoken of, that do it not, and who there- 
fore shall be beaten with many stripes, yet necessai-y it is, that he that 
doth it should know it, and that not only for the matter, for so wicked 
men do, but for the manner, so to do it as it may be pleasing to God. A 
clown that goes to the court to serve his prince, if he do not know the 
fashion of the court, will do but untoward service. And therefore, Eph. 
v. 15, the apostle, exhorting to holiness of life, and walking circumspectly, or 
exactly in that strictness God requires, adds these words, * not as fools, but 
as wise ;' that is, not going about good duties as fools and bunglers, that 
do they know not what, but as cunning and wise artists that know what 
they do. And therefore at the 10th and 17th verses of that chapter, he, 
expressing his meaning, bids them ' understand what the will of the Lord 
is,' and what was acceptable to him ; and to know this aright, it is requisite 
to know truly what a God he is, whom we have to serve ; and therefore in 
Gen, xxxi. 33,* the knowing of God is made as it were the groundwork of 
all his service in the new covenant. To come therefore to the application 
of the sign, all men in then- natural estate having but low conceits of God, 
do also fall short in their apprehensions of that righteousness which would 
please him (even as fools out of their shallow conceits can never please 
wise men), and hence they never come to be the servants of God in true 
holiness and righteousness. For the apostle, Rom. xii. 1, 2, requires a 
true work of grace to ' discern what that good, and perfect, and acceptable 
will of God is.' Now by this truth, f therefore, it is easy to shew that the 
most sorts of people in the world are not the true servants of God, because 
they never dream of, or do follow after, that true righteousness that he 
requires. To omit the righteousness of the papists, consisting merely in 
carnal, sensual pomp and ostentation, in their mass, music, crosses, holy 
water, and the like, I shall consider the outward righteousness of those 
sorts of people who live among ourselves. 

[1.] There is the vulgar sort of ignorant people, that think they serve 
* Probably ' Jer. xxxi. 33.'— Ed. t Qu. ' test' ?-Ed. 



Chap. VIII.] in the heart and life. 227 

God well enough with then- good meaning, and by mumbling over their 
creed and ten commandments, and saying the Lord's prayer without under- 
standing. Here is a poor blind sacrifice indeed. Alas, poor people, you 
worship you know not what ; for what God do you think he is that will be 
thus served with saying even what you know not, nor understand aright ? 
Your God must needs be a sottish God, an ignorant God, a foolish God, 
that would be put oft' with such ignorant, blind, and sottish service. 

[2.] There are profane persons, that will drink, swear, and blaspheme 
God, rail upon him and his servants in every tavern ; and yet because they 
come to church, and there bow themselves to God, think they serve him 
well enough. But I pray, consider what manner of God you make of him, 
whom you think you may thus easily deceive, mock, and cozen with fair 
words and outward compliments. Tell me, wouldst thou own such a ser- 
vant thyself for one minute, that should rail, conspire against thee, and 
only now and then come into thy presence (as Gehazi did into Elisha's), 
and there compliment thee with good words ? 

[3.j There are civil men, that live in the bosom of the church, and 
think by their just dealing and giving content to men, and by carrying 
themselves smoothly and evenly in the world, to please God. Will this 
righteousness, thinkest thou, carry thee to heaven ? God must then be 
such an one as thyself, that careth not much for his Sabbath, his word, 
his sacraments, or his children, but will be put off with the little morality 
which thou contentest thyself with. Didst thou never hear that God was 
an holy God, and that thou oughtest to follow after holiness, or thoa shalt 
never see the face of God with comfort ? Remember the righteousness 
of the Pharisees, which if thou exceedest not, thou shalt never enter into 
heaven. 

[4.] There is a formal righteousness in professors of religion, who, 
because they side with good men, make a show, perform family duties, 
though deadly, perfunctorily, yet think thus to please God well enough ; 
if they hear the word, delight in it, speak well of the preacher, and say of 
him that his voice is pleasant, Ezek. sxxiii. 32, and Ezek. xxxi. 18. But, 
alas 1 ' bodily exercise profiteth nothing ;' that is, fleshly and outward per- 
formances slubbered over, prevail nothing with God without true godliness : 
faith in Christ and a new nature aims at his glory, it is godliness must do 
the deed. The hypocrite in the 50th Psalm thought to please God with 
multitudes of sacrifices, which was the outward worship of the law ; and 
these he offered up, though without faith, zeal, and sincerity of heart. He 
thought it would please God well enough ; and what was the reason ? You 
have it at verse 21 ; he thought God like himself, and what pleased his 
own carnal fancy, he thought it would please God. I say to these that 
think to please God with a half righteousness, a dead, dull righteousness, 
as God says to the people, Mai. i. 6-8. A mortal man would not be 
served so, and yet they thought God would. I desire every one to look 
into his own conscience, and let him but ask his heart this question, 
whether he thinks that that measure and pitch of obedience which he per- 
forms, will pass for current in God's acceptation at the day of judgment. ^ 

(2.) A good servant will be careful of his master's business, bear^it in his 
memory, and not let it sHp. Some servants, when they are sent of an 
errand, if they be careful to do it, they will be thinking of their message 
all the way ; and so it is with a servant of righteousness : the duties which 
God hath enjoined him in his word, he is careful of them. What says 
David? Ps. cxix. 15, IG, ' I will meditate on thy precepts, and consider 



228 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK II. 

thy ways ; and I will not forget thy word ;' and though other busi- 
ness comes in, it shall not put that out of my head. And therefore, as 
God commands, he remembers the Sabbath, and hath it in his mind all 
the week to plot and contrive his business, so as that he may attend alone 
on that day. 

(3.) A good servant will stand for his master's credit, and not be ashamed 
of his livery. He will stand in defence of his master, and will not hear 
him wronged ; and so is a good Christian : he is for righteousness whereso- 
ever he comes, and he will take its part, turn him whither you will, and is 
not ashamed to make profession to all the world whose servant he is. He 
will practise that strictness which the world cries down so much ; and there- 
fore no wonder if he gets so many a scoff, and snubs, and wry-looks for his 
Master's sake. And if men break out against nnj of the ways of righteous- 
ness, he will be for the defence of it with all his might ; and if he be called 
to it, will spend his dearest blood in the quarrel. What shall we then 
think of those meal-mouthed professors, that are only for goodness in the 
company of their fellow- servants ; but when they are in the company of 
their Master's enemies, turn their coats, and will serve righteousness but 
so far as it may stand with the good liking of their friends, parents, mas- 
ters, or neighbours ; and for fear of displeasing them, cut themselves short, 
and will go no further than may stand with their good liking ! 

But did men know and consider that God whom they serve is a just God, 
and righteous in all his laws, how durst they content themselves with a 
half obedience, seeing the same God that gave one precept gave another, 
as James saith ? No ; they would have a respect to all his command- 
ments if they had a respect to him, for it is universal obedience which he 
requires. Again, did men consider God to be a holy God, and to be most 
delighted in such duties, wherein we have to do with him, in his ordinances, 
as his Sabbaths, word, sacraments, and holy meditations, they would labour 
to please him herein most, and would strive to be holy, as he is holy. Did 
men also consider him to be an almighty God, they would come with fear 
and reverence, with hearts broke and humbled in all their performances. 
If God had ' delighted in sacrifices,' says David, * I would have given it 
him;' but he knew his delight, viz., a broken heart: such, saith he, * thou 
wilt not despise ;' and this he therefore brought with him in all his per- 
formances. If men did but consider God was a Spirit, they would labour 
to ' worship him in spirit and truth,' as our Saviour says — that is, with 
changed hearts and renewed spirits — and durst not bring their old hearts 
with them, which they had from Adam. And if men did also but consider 
him to be the searcher of the heart and reins, they would in all their perform- 
ances have an eye to their inward man, and humble themselves for their 
secretest corruptions therein. And did men consider God to be a God 
jealous of his honour, they would not dare to rest in things done out of 
self-love, and for by-respects, though never so secret, but would labour to 
work their hearts in all their performances, to have an eye to God's glory, 
and to deny their own interest and honour. 

(4.) A good servant is content to submit, and to be subject to his master's 
will in anything he commands. ' Speak, Lord' (says Samuel, 1 Sam. iii. 
9, 10), ' for thy servant heareth.' Let God say what he will, he is his 
servant, and must and will obey, and is content to hear, and willing to yield 
any part of that righteousness God hath revealed in his word. * Lord, 
what wilt thou have me to do ?' says Paul, Acts ix, 6. To do ! Why, 
he undid all that he ever had done, and took a clean contrary course to 



CUAP. YIII.J IN THE HEART AND LIFE. 229 

what before he had walked in. Yea, and what wilt thou have me suffer ? 
he might have said as well, for what imprisonments did he undergo, 
and all for righteousness' sake ! * I count not my life dear,' says he, 
* so I may fulfil my ministration with joy ;' here was a good servant. 
We will suppose now God calls thee to offer up thy Isaac, to cut the 
throat of thy dearest son, to part with that sin which before thou didst 
love as thy life ; art thou willing to do this ? Thou art a good servant. 
Or suppose he call thee to deny thy tredit and reputation in the world for 
the despised profession of his truth ; and though thou beest trampled on, 
80 he may have glory thou carest not, thou art a good servant. And so 
likewise when he calls thee, as he doth us all, in his word, to deny thy cor- 
respondences with thy former company in the unfruitful works of darkness, 
and to fall a reproving them rather, and to gather up thyself from con- 
formity with the world in their corruptions, and thou obeyest, though 
against the liking of all thy friends, thou art a good servant, and shalt not 
lose thy reward. And thus also, he calling thee to the spiritual and constant 
performance of such duties as thou formerly didst neglect or slightly per- 
form — as to hear the word, and to repeat it, and so pray it into thy heart, 
and to pour out thy soul in daily faithful prayer, and to deal plainly with 
God in confessing thy sins to him in private prayer, and to tell all, and to 
deal as honestly in confessing and forsaking as thou wouldst have God deal 
with thee in forgiving, and to turn thy heart inside outward to him — art 
thou herein also willing and careful to obey ? Thou art a good servant. 
And God also requiring thee to sanctify the Sabbath, and to be at more 
cost than ordinary in a strict care of thoughts, words, and actions, Isa. 
Iviii. 13, 14, art thou willing to submit? Thou art a good servant. 
And God also requiring thee in outward conversation, not only to avoid 
such actions as are scandalous before men, but to beware of unprofitable 
speeches, of spending away of time, as also to have an eye to the carriage 
of thy heart, watching over it continually to see how it is within doors, 
searching and ferreting thy corruptions out of their lurking-holes. This 
strictness God requires, and it is that great commandment given : Prov. 
iv. 23, ' Above all keeping, keep thy heart.' Art thou careful to do this ? 
Thou art a good servant. I could name an abundance more of that 
spiritual strictness and righteousness, but I should be too long. By all the 
instances mentioned, examine yourselves whether your hearts have been 
brought to stoop and submit to be made ' subject to the will of God,' 
Rom. viii. 7. 2 Cor. x. 5, Is ' every thought brought into the obedience of 
Christ ?' that is, is it made pliable, willing, ready and glad to yield, what- 
ever comes of it ? Dost thou come to God saying, ' Lord, what wilt thou 
have me do ?' Oh how many are there in the world that would go for the 
servants of God, whose hearts yet will never yield to half of this, that never 
left any of their old sins for God, nor set themselves in a true earnest 
course to do any of these good duties ; nay, whose hearts are so stout and 
proud, as they stand out against, and are at enmity with, all these ? They 
cannot endm-e this strictness. Tell them of sanctifying the Sabbath, and 
what a waspishness, a peevishness, frowardness, and perverseness appears 
in them, for they cannot endure to hear of it ! 

(5.) A good servant is he that sets himself apart from all other men's 
business, yea, even his own, to follow his master's. We use to say of 
servants, that they are not their own men, much less other men's. * If I 
seek to please men,' says Paul, ' I am not the servant of Christ,' Gal. i. 10 ; 
that is, a good servant lives no longer to the lusts of men, no longer 



230 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BqOK II. 

squares his life so as to please them, by living in the same lusts as they 
do. No ; but he lives to the vt'ill of God, 1 Peter iii. 4. We must not do 
our own cursed wills in anything, we are not our own, that we should live 
unto ourselves, but to him that paid a price for us. * If any man serve 
me,' says Christ, ' let him follow me,' John xii. 26. And you know what 
elsewhere follows upon the denying of a man's self. A man must deny his 
own will, his own business, and not follow the strain of his own heart in 
doing what he pleaseth and leaving undone the rest. How far short do 
men come of this, as those that will not deny themselves in their carnal 
credit, ease, or sloth, for the performance of good duties. They will serve 
righteousness but so far as it may stand with the good liking of their 
parents, friends, wives, husbands, masters, neighbours ; and for fear of 
displeasing them, cut themselves short and pluck in their hands. 

(6.) A good servant, as he knows and is content to submit, so he makes a 
necessity too of doing his master's will, and whatsoever comes in the way 
is not so necessary to him as this, David, a tried servant of God, says of 
himself, Ps. cxix. 31, ' I have stuck to thy testimonies;' it is not meant 
only in regard of defending them, but practising them ; he sticks to it as a 
conclusion. This must be done, this sin must not be committed, this duty 
must not be omitted constantly, whatsoever comes between ; as Paul 
thought that a necessity lay upon him to preach the gospel, and whenas 
his friends persuaded him not to go because of persecution at Jerusalem, 
' I count not my life dear,' says he ; die or live, I will go. Daniel also is 
an example without all contradiction in this case. When the decree was 
made that no petition should be put up to any God but the king only for 
thirty days, Daniel would not baulk a whit of his praying thrice a day, though 
it should cost him his life ; he made therefore, you must think, a case of 
necessity of it, he could not live thirty days without private prayer. Every 
man's heart pitcheth upon some cause as necessary for him to follow, and 
to it he sticks, and will not be beaten off of it. Thus a covetous man layeth 
this for a conclusion, that he will be rich (it is the apostle's own phrase), 
and an ambitious man is for applause, and a voluptuous man is for pleasure ; 
let the commandment do what it will, what care they ? There is no 
wicked man but sticks to false necessities, and they hinder his heart from 
turning. One man is hampered with correspondency with friends, another 
entangled in the world, and his heart hath interest in many things, and 
when he thinks of turning to God he sticks to these things as more 
necessary. But those that are servants to God in righteousness, in .deed, 
and in truth, count obedience to God the one thing necessary, and that in 
comparison to it it is not necessary to be rich or learned, &c. There is in 
every man's life, yea, even in every day, a time that falls out wherein a 
man's dearest lusts will be hazarded for righteousness' service. Observe 
now in such passages what it is your hearts stick to as most necessary ; is 
it either the obeying thy lust or doing thy duties ? Let men have a calling 
in which they must uphold many unlawful practices or they cannot live, 
what doth the man plead ? It is necessary (says he) that I must live. 
When men are cast into straitness, that either they must sin or lose their 
credit, what is the usual plea ? It is a case of necessity (say they), what 
would you have had me do ? Our own lives afford many of tlae like 
instances to them ; examine now yourselves, what in these cases you 
usually do. Do you rather lay this conclusion. Let things be how they will, 
howsoever God must be obeyed ; thy will, Lord, not my will, be done. 
Hath thy heart such an eye to the will and command of God ? Thou art 



Chap. VIII. J in the heart and life. 231 

then a good servant, and though thou failest sometimes in a particular 
action, yet still thy heart in thy course is firmly set for the commandment, 
and makes account so to be wheresoever thou goest. Thou knowest what 
thou meanest to do, and all the world shall not beat thee from it. I con- 
fess a child of God may have a great deal ado in his own heart to deny 
himself in some cases, yet still his heart cleaves to the commandment, and 
still thinks that to be more necessaiy ; whereas a wicked man's heart slights 
the commandment in such a case, and thinks much it should stand in his 
way, and he leaps over the biggest of all, if need be, for his master lust 
commands. 

(7.) Another property in a good servant is to expect warrant from his 
master for what he doth, and not to go about his business hand over head, 
or to do so much as he lists, and leave the other undone. Those that are 
servants of righteousness should look into the word as the great counsel, 
and should inquire of the Lord and of his word. Servants use every 
morning to come to their masters and know what their will is ; and so 
should we in all our actions, that we may have warrant for them. He who 
in Micah vi. thought to serve the Lord with will-worship, says, ' Wherewith 
shall I come before the Lord ? shall I offer up rivers of oil, or a thousand 
rams ?' What says God there to him ? ' He hath shewed thee,' saith he, 
' man, what is good ; and what the Lord requireth of thee in his word.' 
Mariners that sail at random often cast their ships away, whenas if they 
would sail by compass and chart, they might safely arrive at the port. 
That which is called in Scripture walking with God is to do as Enoch did, 
who had God ever in his presence, had an eye to his commands, and 
observed his orders in every particular case, directing him. This thou shalt 
not do, this thou shalt now do. ' As the eyes of the handmaids were upon 
the mistress,' as David speaks in the case of salvation, Ps. cxxiii. 2, so 
should our eyes wait on the Lord in the case of his service. The apostle 
condemns eye-service in the servants of men, because their masters are not 
always present with them, and cannot behold them always ; but it is com- 
mendable in the servants of God, because they are always in his presence, 
and his eyes behold whatever they do ; and therefore they should do all as 
seen of him. 

(8.) The last, and indeed chiefest, property of a good servant (which must 
be added to all these) is not only to know his master's will, and to be con- 
tent to submit to it, but to do it effectually. You know there was one 
said he would go work in the vineyard, but yet did not, Mat. xxi. 30, 31. 
It is not enough to enter into the profession of God's service, and to call 
him Master, and give him good words : 'For not every one that saith. Lord, 
Lord, but he who doth the will of God the Father, shall enter into heaven,' 
Mat. vii. 21. For the same purpose John speaks, 1 John iii. 7, 'Little 
children, let no man deceive you : he who doth righteousness is righteous.' 
And as he that doth sin (as in John viii. 34) is the servant of it, so he 
that doth righteousness, that is, that makes it his trade, constant practice, 
and his course (for the word cro/sTi/ notes out an habitual continued practice), 
is the servant of it ; and ' herein,' says John, 1 John iii. 10, ' are the 
children of God and the devil manifest : he who doth not righteousness is 
not of God.' There be many that in their good mood will come and proffer 
their service, and set their hand to God's work, but they look back again, 
and as those in Hosea vi. 4, their ' goodness is as the morning cloud, and 
as the early dew ' it goes away ; like as a mist, or dew fallen in the morn- 
ing, and seems to water the earth, but when the sun ariseth, it vanisheth 



232 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK 11. 

away. When they had heard a powerful sermon, and had judgments 
threatened, being ' hewed by the prophets ' (as it is at the 5th verse), and 
being wounded, pricked, terrified by the word of his mouth, then they 
would come and submit themselves, and do God a spurt of service. But 
yet, alas ! their reformation was but as the lightning (as it is at the 8th 
verse), that flasheth, and is soon gone again. For (as it is at the 7th 
verse) ^ still they broke their faith, and dealt treacherously in God's cove- 
nant. Thus traitors, when they ai-e in prison, will do anything till 
released ; but their traitorous heart remaining still, they are as bad as ever 
when at liberty. These are not servants, but runaways, and God wiU not 
own them, for he can scarce keep them for one day together. 

Xor is it enough to do service to God constantly, and to abide by it, 
but we must do it thoroughly, having a respect to every commandment. 
This is God's testimony of David his servant, Acts xiii. 22, * that he did 
perform all his will ;' and it is Paul's prayer for the Colossians, that they 
might ' walk worthy of the Lord, and please him in all things, being fi-uit- 
ful in all good works,' Col. i. 10. To walk worthy of him, is so to walk 
as God may not be ashamed of us, but may say, rejoicing in us as he did 
in his servant Job, Job i. 8, ' Seest thou not my servant Job, an upright 
man, one that feareth God and escheweth evil ? ' We must endeavour to 
please him in all things, to obey him in one thing as well as another. A 
man will not own a servant who does but what he hsts, and what pleaseth 
himself, and leaves his master's choisest business undone; who insists on 
tithing mint and cumin, and leaves the great things of the law, as sancti- 
fying the Sabbath, and constant private prayer, unperformed. And we 
must be fruitful in all good works too ; that is, making trial, and doing 
some of all sorts, always abounding in the work of the Lord. Let us look 
to ourselves, for there are many, Titus i. 16, 'that profess they know God,' 
and acknowledge him for their Master, wear his livery, ' but yet in works 
they deny him.' When a man in a constancy acts contrary to what God 
wills, he denies him. For if his course was but traced, it would be said, 
Surely God is none of his master, he will own no such servants ; and 
therefore in works they deny him. 



Chap. I.l in the heaut and life. 233 



BOOK III. 

Evangelical motives to obedience, drawn from the obligation which God hath 
laid upon us, by his appointing us unto good words, in his election of us, 
and by the greatness of his love manifested in the several instances of it. — 
Other motives urged from the consideration, that Christ having by his death 
conquered the devil, and destroyed his kingdom, ive are by our Christian 
profession engaged to hate him, and fight against him as a j)ublic enemy to 
Christ and us, and by all our actions to endeavour the ruin of his dark 
kingdom of sin. — Other motives deduced from the divine presence and 
majesty apparent in our holy services and performances ; and also from 
God's design in the revelation of his word, that we should not only read and 
know it, but practise it too. 

This is a faithful saying, and these things I will that thou affirm constantly, 
that they ivho have believed in God might be careful to maintain good works. 
These things are good and profitable unto men. — Titus III. 8. 



CHAPTEK I. 

A motive to love and obedience, drawn from the consideration, that this obedi- 
ence is a business, an holy emplotjment committed to us, which we should be 
careful to discharge. — "That the doctrine of free grace enforceth the perform- 
ance, and suits our spirits to it. 

My design is to consider the motives which the New Testament affords to 
invite men regenerate, to hohness, obedience, and fruitfulness in all good 
works ; and to this purpose I have chosen this text as the most eminent, 
which hath in its coherence and connection a comprehension of many the 
chiefest things that might move us thereto included in it. The introduction 
in those words, ' This is a faithful saying,' refers to what forewent, of 
which he gives that encomium, and should rather close the former verse 
than begin this, as Luther and others observe. But because the apostle's 
scope is to bring upon those he would exhort to good works, the weight of 
all said in the foregoing verses, therefore it is fitly joined to this in this 
coherence, and is as if the apostle had said. That which I have now spoken 
is of all sayings or doctrines the most faithful, and tends the most of all 
others to provoke them that believe it to be careful to maintain good works ; 
therefore, says he to Titus, affirm these things constantly. Ere I insist on 
those motives, which this so faithful a saying affords to good works, I am 
to speak to four things which serve to open the text. 

1. That the exhortation to good works and obedience follows their having 
believed : ' that they which have beheved in God,' &c. 

(1.) Faith, then, is clearly founded upon no work m us or upon us, which 



234 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III. 

is the apostle's scope to prove, as appears by the 5th verse, where, treating 
of that which is the ground of faith for salvation, he says, * Not by works 
of righteousness, but according to his mercy, hath he saved us.' What God 
doth to save us, that is the only foundation for our faith ; and a man there- 
fore clearly and nakedly believes on God without consideration of works, 
* that they who have believed in God,' &c. 

(2.) It is in vain to exhort any to good works till they have first believed. 
Papists slander our doctrine, that by crying up free grace and faith, we 
deny good works ; and upbraid us, that our doctrine afibrds not any motives 
thereto sufficient ; and because (forsooth) we do not urge them to that end 
for which they would have them, namely, to merit heaven, therefore they 
reproach us that we proceed not upon sufiicient grounds. But we do 
indeed proceed in the right order : first, we teach men to believe on free 
grace as if there were no works ; and then to fall a- doing as if there was 
no faith to be justified by : ' that they who believe in God may be careful 
to maintain good works.' Yea, we add further, we urge good works upon 
a higher gi-ound, for a better and more noble end than they can pretend 
to who assert that we are justified by them. You will say. What is that ? 
It is to glorify God. All the world must needs gi-ant that to glorify God 
is a higher end than to justify man : John xv. 8, ' Herein is my Father 
glorified, that ye bring forth much fruit.' That is the motive which Christ 
urgeth. Again, they say, we proceed not on good ground, because we do 
not good works to merit by them. Ay, but we go on a better ground, 
which is love and thankfulness ; whereas theirs is a motive suited only to 
self-love. The devil endeavoured to blemish Job : Job i. 9, ' Doth Job 
serve God for nought ? ' And indeed religion founded wholly on self-love 
and interest would be mercenary and base ; but to serve God from a 
principle of love and gratitude, is a noble act of friendship : John xv. 14, 
' Ye are my friends, if ye do whatever I command you.' But of the others 
it might be said. You are my hirelings only ; you only seek to merit by 
your services, and do all to merit heaven. When Paul, Rom. vi. 22, 
exhorts to sanctification, he gives this as a motive, that ' the end is ever- 
lasting life ;' but yet this life is a free gift of God, not what we merit, but 
what he freely bestows. That is a poor religion in which, when men have 
done all, they are workers of iniquity ; but now if men work only for self, 
they are workers of iniquity, for setting up a man's self is original sin ; 
and therefore, if we live according to that principle, we rise no higher than 
corrupt nature. 

2. It is to be considered what is the import of that phrase, * maintain 
good works.' The words are, 'x^oardedai kuXuv soySjv. Beza renders it, 
that they excel, or go before others (namely, heathens) in good works. 
The same word is used ver. 14 ; and that sense of comparison is favoured 
by that expression, Tit. iii. 14, ' Let ours also,' &c., speaking of Christians 
as in distinction from heathens ; and so then they that have believed (in 
the text) are set in opposition to unbelievers. It were the greatest dis- 
honour to Christian religion (which the apostle boasts of to be so glorious 
and faithful a doctrine) if it should produce less, or not eminently more, 
of good works than moral principles in heathens have done : ' What 
singular thing do you ? ' says Christ ; ' for these things do the heathens 
and publicans,' Mat. v. 47. T/ 'xspiealv, what over and above other men, 
yea, what that is abundant in comparison of them, and which they think 
superfluous ? Christ had used the verb of the same noun, ver. 20, con- 
cerning the Pharisees, w^ho were so full of works that they looked to be 



Chap. I.] in the heart and life. 235 

justified by them. But, says Christ, except your righteousness doth -ziiia- 
oixjiiv, overflow, exceed their righteousness, you cannot be saved. 

Another meaning is, that they should take care of good works, as their 
business, function, otfice, which they are set over, so the word more 
naturally signifies; as in 1 Thes. v. 12, 'Know them that are over you' 
(speaking of officers). It is the same word, and doth govern a genitive 
case, as here also ; so likewise the apostle, 1 Tim. iii. 5, when he speaks 
of ruling one's family well, useth the same word to express a man's being 
over it as chief orderer, governor, and disposer of it, as a president, which 
is applied to being over things as well as persons. Take any ofiice of 
charge or trust, especially such wherein one hath others under him, and 
it hath such a name in the Greek and Latin tongues as to express the 
matter committed to his charge ; and so we in English express the office 
in the title of the officer when we call him the treasurer, master of the 
ordnance or ammunition. These names import an office, and a man's 
having a gi-eat charge committed to his trust to manage, and this not as a 
petty under-officer, but as in chief. And so the word vPooTas^ai in the text 
is an elegant metaphor, and is as if he had said, Exhort them that believe 
in God to consider what office and function by so doing they have taken 
on them, and are hereby engaged in, even to be in chief over good works. 
And thus it imports three things : 

(1.) Thp.t they have all sorts of good works committed to them, as their 
business and employment. 

(2.) That they have them committed to them as the ware, the goods, the 
treasure they deal in, to see to it that no kind of good work be wanting (as 
one when anything is committed to his charge is careful of it), and which 
they are to improve and manage, as the most precious treasure committed 
to them as a trust by God. They are to husband it, and to have the care 
of it ; and therein they are in chief too, in comparison of all other men, 
and are therefore to excel all others by far in faithfulness, care, and dili- 
gence therein. Moral civil heathens and formal Christians may pretend 
to this, but you are in chief; you are bo)wrum opemm prafecti, the fore- 
men, the presidents of the good work office ; and God will require that at 
your hands which he will not at theirs (as states and princes do of their 
chief officers the account of such things), and therefore as your place is, 
so let your care be to abound and excel therein. And this interpretation, 
as it is more natural to the Greek phrase, so it is more genuine to the 
former words, ' that they be careful.' That which such places and offices 
of trust do properly requii-e is care ; and therefore the apostle using this 
metaphor, that he might answer the force of it, useth also the word 
' careful ;' and both together do urge with a doubled strength this that is 
required of them. And with this falls in (though expressed here with a 
more emphatical addition) that which is used as a more ordinary ground 
of exhortation to holiness so frequently in Scripture : 1 Thes. iv. 7, ' He 
hath not called us to uncleanness, but to holiness ;' you are to make holi- 
ness your vocation, your calling, trade, and business ; and so in 1 Peter 
ii. 21, ' whereunto you are called;' and every one is to walk in his voca- 
tion. Thus good works are the very calling of a Christian. 

(3.) The third thing to be considered is the motives, the incentives here 
used, which the former part of the words does direct us to, when he saith, 
• This is a faithful saying, these things I will that thou affirm constantly, 
that,' &c. It directs us to the words or sum of doctrine afore delivered. 
Now, that doctrine delivered afore is the doctrine of fi-ee grace, as it is set 



236 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III. 

out to US in the work of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, which he had 
insisted on to this very end in the verse immediately before, and in the 
foregoing chapter, ver. 11-13, all of which came in under the comprehen- 
sion of these things in the text, and all which he himself here brings in 
(as, if you read what is afore and after, appears) to this end, to urge all 
sorts of good works upon all sorts of beUevers. Now, the doctrine of free 
grace is that to which in an eminent manner the apostle useth to give the 
style of a faithful saying. Thus, 1 Tim. i. 15, 'This is a faithful saying, 
and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to 
save sinners, whereof I am chief.' Which doctrine he would have 
ministers most frequent in, to affirm constantly, and to affirm with a 
special certainty and assurance ; for so the word to affirm imports, to 
speak of them as things that hath the greatest reaUty in them, and which, 
when so delivered and so uttered, do mightily work upon men. And so, I 
come to the main doctrine intended, which shall be made good out of this 
context and epistle, viz., that the doctrine of the free grace in God the 
Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, doth afibrd sufficient motives and induce- 
ments to men, already saved by faith through that grace without works, to 
cause them to be careful to abound (above all others) in obedience and 
good works. 

1. The doctrine of free grace is that faithful saying here intended, as 
that which he sets his probation est upon to be effectual to this end. * These 
things,' saith he, namely, to teach, ' are good and profitable unto men.' 

2. You have here the free grace both of God the Father, Son, and Holy 
Ghost, in their several works ; you have them all here. 

(1.) You have the free grace of God the Father. Ver. 4, ' After that 
the kindness and love of God our Saviour towards man appeared.' He 
intends the Father of our Saviour Jesus Christ, viz., God, so in the Greek, 
whom he calls Saviour in distinction from Christ ; ver. 6, ' For he,' says he, 
namely, this God our Saviour, ver. 4, ' through Jesus Christ our Saviour,' 
&c. Therefore these are two distinct persons, and both our Saviours : the 
one the Father, the other the Son ; and he speaks of this his grace as an 
hidden mystery, which we knew not of, being of old concealed in his breast 
towards us, and therefore used the word ' appeared,' imi^avri, broke out 
suddenly, unexpectedly, as Joseph's love to his brethren did. 

(2.) There is the grace and love of Jesus Christ and his work, whom he 
therefore calls our Saviour ; and he says no more there, because he had 
told' us (but seven verses afore, chap. ii. 4), that ' our Saviour Jesus Christ 
gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify 
to himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.' 

(3.) There is the grace of God seen in the Holy Ghost, and his work. 

[1.1 The gift of him and his person unto us to dwell in us. Ver. 6, 6, 

* The Holy Ghost, whom he shed on us richly,' as the word is ; and it is 
indeed the richest gift that ever was given. 

[2.] In his work upon us, that he regenerated and renewed us ; ver. 5, 

♦ By the w^ashing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Spirit.' 

[3.] In the concomitants of the gift of him unto us, expressed first in 
general and comprehensive terms, ' saved us,' estating us into the w^hole of 
salvation, absolutely and indefeasibly, fully and completely, in respect of the 
right to it ; and this not of works, but according to his mercy, mei'e mercy. 
And then, secondly, it is particularly expressed in the parts of it : 1, justi- 
fication from all sin, and a fulness of righteousness, ver. 7, 8 ; and, 2, 
a perfect title to eternal life, ' He then make us heirs of eternal life ; ' not 



Ch\P. I.] IN THE HEABT AND LIFK. 2B7 

children onl}^ which is Peter's motive, ' hut heirs of eternal life accordinj^ 
to hope,' for so the words are to be divided from the other. Heirs of 
eternal life being relatives one to the other, these intermediate words, and 
' according to hope,' being intended to distinguish our being made heirs here 
in this life from that hereafter. Here it is in hope, * we are heirs according 
to hope,' but not according to possession ; for as the apostle says, Rom. 
viii. 24, * What a man sees (or posscsseth) why doth he yet hope for it ? ' 
Yet so as it is as sure as if we had it, for it is an inheritance, and we are saved, 
ver. 5, fully, completely already; and so the last clause of this doctrine is made 
good out of the words, that to men already saved through faith, or of grace 
without works, the doctrine of this grace affords motives to all good works. 
Now before I come to demonstrate this in each particular, I shall premise 
this general proof concerning the whole of the grace of God in all three 
persons. 1 Peter i. 13, when he would exhort them to behave themselves 
as obedient children, and to be holy in all manner of conversation, ver. 14, 
15, to move them to this, he had said before, ver. 13, ' Trust perfectly in 
the grace that is brought unto you in the revelation of Jesus Christ.' So 
do I rather read the words, than as our translators have rendered them. 
Trust, nXiiui, is perfectly, not by halves (so in the margin), for this grace 
afibrds a perfect ground and stay for faith to rest upon ; and then it is plain 
that (pioo/MsvTiv, which they translate, in the grace ' which is to be brought,' 
as in the future and for time to come, may more naturally be understood, 
' is brought,' it noting what at the present is brought, and so is to be read. 
It was the word ' hope,' and the Syriac translation together, that diverted 
this reading ; whereas hope is often put for faith and trust, both in the Old 
and New Testament. In the Old, Job xiii. 15, that known place, ' Though 
he kill me, yet will I trust in him ; I will hope in him,' And in the New, 
Eph. i. 12, ' That we should be to the praise of the glory of his grace, who 
first trusted in Christ.' In the margin it is 'hoped,' and so in the Greek. 
Thus then the words, 1 Pet. i. 13, may run, ' Trust perfectly on the grace 
which is brought to you,' or, as the vulgar, * is offered to you.' And the 
other phrase, rendered ' at the revelation,' as if it were at the day of judg- 
ment, is manifestly, h d-zoxaXv-^si, 'in the revelation of Jesus Christ,' in 
whom this grace is made known, and is termed a revelation in respect of 
the former hiddenness and secrecy of it compared to the manifestation of 
it now, God having kept it secret in the times of the Old Testament. Thus, 
in Eom. xvi. 25, the preaching of Christ is called ' the revelation of the 
mystery, which was kept secret since the world began.' And at this Peter 
hath as evident an aim in using this word here, having, in the words before, 
ver. 12, 13, said that it was kept hid from those of the Old Testament, 
yea, the angels, who desired to pry into it ; but it is brought to you, even 
home to your doors, in the revelation of Christ, namely, through the gospel- 
Now having thus restored this Scripture in 1 Pet. i. 13 to its right meaning, 
that which I produce it for and apply it unto is, that the trusting perfectly 
in this grace should make us obedient, yea, and the more perfectly we 
trust, the more we shall be obedient ; and you can never trust enough or too 
much upon it, and upon it alone, whilst (as it follows) you are obedient 
children, or as the children of obedience, made up of nothing else, 
you carry yourselves towards this grace. For why should the apostle upon 
this connection and coherence mention their relation of children, when he 
would have the grace of God to move them, but because it is the sweetest 
connection and comprehension of these two in the heart ? For no man 
rationally is moved to anything which he hath not a principle within him 



238 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III. 

suited to, and which answers that motive, and which is to be the life and 
soul of it. If a man be a slave, one of a mere servile spirit, this gi-ace 
speaks not reason to him ; for that is practical reason to every one that 
suits his spirit. Now one under the law, as the apostle opposeth it to 
grace, Eom. vi., can find no reason, no strength, no efficacy in such cords 
of love and free grace, no more than a beast doth in principles of common 
reason ; but if one be a child, and have the spirit of a child, and is ' under 
grace,' as the apostle speaks, then this grace, that is his sovereign, teacheth 
him this obedience, and he obeys it naturally, for he is a meet scholar and 
disciple to be taught this lesson. And this another parallel place in this 
epistle to Titus confirmeth : chap. ii. 11, 12, ' The grace of God, that brings 
salvation, hath appeared.' Which is all one with what Peter had said, 
1 Pet. i. 13, ' Which is brought to you in the revelation of Christ.' And 
because that this grace, that is in God himself, is the subject of the gospel, 
therefore that doctrine of it is called grace ; as likewise because withal it is 
the object of our faith, it is called faith, ' teaching us, 'rraihimusa,'' teaching 
and instructing us, as children are taught by their instructors and tutors. 
Now therefore as in the Old Testament they are under the law as their 
' schoolmaster,' as their ' tutor ' and ' governor ' (I put two or three of the 
phrases together used by the apostle, Rom. vi., Gal. iii.), so being under 
gi'ace, their spirits are taught and disciplined by it, formed and framed to 
the principles thereof and the lessons it reads, which do all teach denying 
of ungodliness, and subjection to* all dispositions and duties to God, as he is 
holy and gracious, which may make him perfect to all and every good work 
of all sorts, which he owes to himself in temperance, to live ' soberly ' to 
his neighbour in justice, to live 'righteously ' and to God in living ' godly.' 
That is, it teacheth perfect holiness to all we owe any kind of duty unto ; 
for all we do, or can be supposed to owe, are either what is due to God, 
our neighbour, or ourselves ; and it teacheth, as for the motive or incentive 
thereto, all these in one lesson, the grace of God appearing to the heart, 
and being manifest to a man's soul. 

CHAPTER II. 

That God's love, in electing us, is a great motive to all acts of love and obedi- 
ence. That in this his election of us, he hath ordained and appointed us to 

love and good works. 

1 come now particularly to demonstrate that the grace and love of God, 
manifested in our salvation, eugageth us to holiness, obedience, and service. 

The proper work of God the Father is election, and his grace shines 
most eminently there. Thus in the mention of all three persons, and in 
the ascribing the proper work to each, the apostle, 1 Pet. i. 2, attributes 
election to the Father. Now, therein I consider two things : 1. the act 
itself ; 2. the love, the greatness of the grace and love shewn in it, and 
how strongly by both we are obhged to holiness and obedience. 

1. That God should choose, and single, and design thee forth to this 
prefecture, to this office of care over good works, engageth to all diligence 
and faithfulness. The apostle judgeth it but reasonable, and upon that 
ground urgeth Timothy to give himself wholly up to that office the great 
God had chose and designed him unto ; and he urgeth his engagement to 
do so by what obligation is found amongst men : 2 Tim. ii. 4, ' No man 
*Qu. 'of'?— Ed. 



Chap. II.] in the heart and life. 239 

that warreth entangleth himself with the aflfairs of this life,' but gives over 
all other callings whatever, as the law of a soldier then was, ' that he may 
please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier.' Paul, when he was 
chosen to the greatest service that ever man underwent but Christ, was told 
by Ananias, Acts xxii. 14, ' The Lord God of our fathers,' that chose them, 
* hath chosen thee, that thou shouldest know his will,' &c., ' and hear the 
word of his mouth,' that is, obey him ; and the sense of this fired Paul's 
heart. And Christ also. Acts ix. 15, calls him * a chosen vessel.' To what 
end ? ' To carry my name ;' that is, to bear my name about the whole 
world, and unto all ages after, in holiness of life and purity of doctrine ; a 
vessel singled out to do it, purged, and ' made meet for his Master's use, 
prepared to every good work ;' God having known, owned, and set his seal 
upon him for his own by election, as Paul speaks, 2 Tim. ii. 19, alluding 
to that in Isaiah, * Be ye pure, ye that bear the vessels of the Lord : touch 
no unclean thing,' Isa. lii. 11 ; much more the vessels themselves, chosen 
to bear his name, ought not to do so. It was a great and effectual argu- 
ment to Cyrus, though an heathen prince, to persuade him to give leave 
and commission to the Jews to build the temple, even this, that God had, 
so many years before, designed him by name ; that God had said, in Isaiah's 
time, of Cyrus, ' He is my shepherd, that shall perform all my pleasure,' 
Isa. xliv. 28. This thus written of him long before he was born, and this 
coming to his knowledge, he was moved, and efiectually moved hereby to 
perform it : Ezra i. 2, ' Thus saith Cyrus, King of Persia, The Lord hath 
charged me to build an house at Jerusalem, which is in Judea.' How much 
more should it move thee, that hast found, or hast good hope of (or thou 
hast hope of nothing), that God hath writ down thy name in his book from 
all eternity, as a chosen vessel that should know and perform his will ? 
Paul, in like manner, strengthens this charge to Timothy with those pro- 
phecies that had been given forth of him at his ordination, when he had 
hands laid on him by the appointment of the Spirit of prophecy : 1 Tim. 
i. 18, ' This charge I commit unto thee, son Timothy, according to the 
prophecies which went before on thee, that thou by liiem mightest war 
the good warfare.' By them, that is, to be stirred up the more by them, 
because it was thus foretold of thee ; much more should we be stirred up 
to our holy duty, when from everlasting God hath chosen us hereunto. 
Now, Eph. i., Paul expressly tells us that ' God hath chosen us before the 
foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him 
in love.' 

2. Holy obedience being found to be the main thing pitched upon by 
God in those decrees of his, as the principal end, under his own glory, 
unto which he designed us, we should be the more excited to it. The first 
and primary, yet so in that place the apostle makes it ; for the apostle's 
scope is, ver. 3, to enumerate the blessings, and the acts of blessing, with 
the proper designments of them as we are blessed with them in Christ, and 
to set them in their order. He begins with election : ver. 4, ' According as 
he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world ;' and withal 
lays forth the proper principal designment of election, as the first act of all 
other towards us ; and the first and principal is holiness, ' to be holy and 
unblameable before him in love.' So that as the act of election is distin- 
guished from predestination, and is the fu-st of the two, so the primary and 
first aim God in that first act of election had was holiness, as essential to 
the person who was to be in Christ ; and then adoption, or sonship, or 
right to eternal life and glory, which is the act of predestination, as it is 



240 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III. 

distinguished from election, is but as an outward privilege or dignity 
superadded. When God chooseth a man, he chooseth him for himself, 
Ps. iv. 3 ; for himself to converse with, to communicate himself unto him 
as a friend, a companion, and his delight. Now, it is holiness that makes 
ns fit to live with the Holy God for ever, since without it we cannot see 
him, Heb. xii. 14, which is God's main aim, and more than our being his 
children ; as one must be supposed a man, one of mankind, having a 
soul reasonable, ere we can suppose him capable of adoption, or to be 
another man's heir. As therefore it was the main first design in God's 
eye, before the consideration of our happiness, let it be so in ours. It is 
not only the means through which God hath chosen us to salvation : 
2 Thes. ii. 13, 14, 'Who hath chosen you through sanctification,' &c. 
So sufi'erings are also said to be the means, but this is the end also, and 
that more than our glory and happiness ; and therefore holiness for ever 
remains, and love, 1 Cor. siii. ; and we are ' chosen to be holy before him 
in love.' This portion has made me understand the reason of that order 
and placing of those benefits and fruits of election, namely, why election 
to sanctification is put fii-st, and so sprinkling of Christ's blood put after 
it, yea, after obedience : 1 Peter i. 2, * Elect according to the foreknow- 
ledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto 
obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ.' It is not to shew 
that sanctification, obedience should go before the sprinkling of the blood 
of Christ upon us, which is our sanctification ; but his speaking of elec- 
tion sheweth (as Paul also doth) what was the most eminent and principal 
designment and end whereto we were elected, even sanctification unto 
obedience. Election was unto holiness immediately and primarily, and 
was first and chiefly intended — I do not say it is greater in the worth of 
the thing, so Christ's blood is of infinite value — as that which God ulti- 
mately aimed to bring us unto. And though Christ's blood is of infinite 
more value, yet this is more than the sprinkhng of that blood on us, for 
it remains for ever in heaven, when we need no more sprinkling of that 
blood. 

3. To make this obligation laid on us by election the stronger, let us 
consider that as God hath chosen us unto holiness, and unto good works, 
so it is said reciprocally that he hath ordained good works for us. Thus 
the Scripture, that it might infonn us, turns it both ways, that as he 
ordained us to good works, so he ordained good works for us to walk in ; 
even as when election to glory is spoken of, to shew the certainty, and 
God's love in it, the Scripture doth not only say we are ordained and pre- 
pared to glory (as in Piom. ix. 23, and elsewhere), but that this glory is 
prepared for us : ' Come and inherit the kingdom prepared for you,' says 
Christ ; and so says the apostle, 1 Cor. ii. 9, ' Eye hath not seen the 
things prepared for them that love him,' suited aforehand to make them 
happy. The same we find of good works, that a chosen vessel is said to 
be prepared for every good work, as you heard out of Timothy. And so 
in Eph. ii. 10, good works are said to be prepared for us to walk in ; not 
ordained only by way of precept, for so they are ordained to wicked men, 
but by decree and predestination, set out as a man's work and way ; 
■whence that phrase of Solomon is, ' "V^Tiat thy hand finds to do, do with 
all thy might.' A godly man's work (as Christ's was) is given him ; and 
the apostle speaks it to shew what ordination good works have in our 
salvation, yet so as they might not derogate from free grace, for by grace 
we are saved without works. God, that made us new creatures, and suited 



Chap. III.] in the heart and life. 241 

us to good works, bad prepared and ordained all sorts of good works, to 
which this new creature was fitted ; as when he made man, he made para- 
dise for him to walk in, and set out his way beforehand. Thus God hath 
chose out work for us, and (as Christ says, John xv. 16) 'hath ordained 
us to bring forth fruit, and that our fruit should remain ;' for both are of 
eternal purpose. 

4. The consideration that he hath chosen you, not others, how doth it 
call for holiness! 1 Peter ii. 8, 9, 'Christ,' says he, 'is a stone of 
stumbling to the disobedient, whereunto also they were appointed ; ' that 
is, with that kind of appointment which is to permit them to act as crea- 
tures, and to shew themselves such. He needed not have added that (for 
he brings it in with an also, or over and above), but to that end, to move 
them the more to obedience ; now then, to move them, he adds, ' But you 
are a chosen generation, that you should shew forth the praises of him that 
called you ' (which follows), so that he chose you, as in the former words ; 
and this is spoken as in manifest opposition unto appointing others to dis- 
obedience. The like you have 2 Thes. ii. 13, 14. 



CHAPTER III. 

That the great love of God in electing of us should be a strong motive and 
incentive to love and good ixorks. 

I come now to the love shewn in these acts, and shall demonstrate that 
all the mercies and other graces or love that are to found in election should 
move us to obedience : Rom. xii. 1, ' I beseech you therefore, brethren, by 
the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, 
acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.' It is a transition 
from doctrinal points to practical duties ; and the illative therefore sends us 
to justification, sanctification (handled in chapters iii. iv. v. vi.) ; but it 
especially sends us to election, and the mercies in the bowels of it, of which 
he had treated in three chapters immediately before. This love of God 
bestowed on us, in and at election, the Scripture makes use of a double 
way to work holiness and obedience in us. 

1, By way of imitation, it some way or other teacheth all sorts of 
graces, and is the lively pattern of them to us. 

2. By way of incentive or motive, so as in such things wherein it doth 
not so fully serve as a pattern to be imitated (as in all it cannot), yet in 
those it serves as motives and inflamers thereunto. 

1. By way of imitation. God's love in electing us is propounded as a 
motive to obedience: Eph. v. 1, ' Be ye therefore followers of God, as dear 
children, and walk in love,' He speaks it of God's love, as distinct from 
Christ's ; for of that he speaks as a further motive in the next words. I 
confess he speaks it upon occasion of God's love in justification there, that 
we should imitate it in forgiving others, as God, for Christ's sake, hath 
forgiven us, Eph. iv. 32. Yet the force of the argument therein holds as 
strong, yea, more strong, in all considerations about his eternal love, which 
was the original, the spring, the fountain, the cause of justification, and all 
else ; yea, out of which he then justified, adopted, bestowed all blessings 
upon us in Christ. And as the virtues in a sovereign water are stronger 
in the spring than in the streams, so is this love in God's heart ; and 
though it be appUed only to love to brethren, yet it extends to all obe- 

VOL. VIT. Q 



242 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III. 

dience, the fountain whereof is love to God ; and the terms he expresseth 
himself in this are generals, which will reach to all in his love, and to all 
compliance therewith in us unto all commands. For when we are exhorted 
to be followers of God, it is a general that comes in upon occasion of that 
particular act of love shewn in forgiveness ; as often general rules, and 
reasons, and promises are brought in upon occasion of particular instances, 
to confirm and enforce them. Then when it follows, ' Walk in love,' 
what ! doth he mean it in this one act of it, of forgiveness, which is a 
going forth of love ? No ; but in all the duties of love besides. And 
though the apostle instances in this as a more broad and conspicuous way 
of God's love in forgiving us, and thereupon more particularly exhorts us 
to chalk out the like path to ourselves to walk in, of forgiving others, yet 
this is but one of those walks his love delights in. He hath dwelt in love 
(as John speaks), walked in love within his own grounds, within himself 
(which I speak as warranted by that phrase, ' which he purposed in him- 
self to us,' Eph. i. 9), with infinite delight from all eternity ; and in all 
these, all so far as he hath made known to us, the head ways of them, we 
should be followers of him, as well as in forgiveness or the duties of love 
to brethren. Thus we should walk in love, and out of love to him, in all 
those ways which he hath chalked out for us ; and this we should do to 
shew our love unto him by it. This word, ' Be ye followers of God ' (that 
is, as one that follows another in the same step), is too dull, too flat a 
word, falls short of what the apostle seems to intend, and therefore is to 
be taken in, corresponding with those that follow, 'and walk in love' ; that 
is, in the same steps. In the original it is, be ye imitators, //.i/xt^rai. This 
farther sense is also aimed at, that we should be like unto God in his love, 
as children are to their parents in feature and disposition ; let our love 
answer to his, as limb to limb in a parent. Therefore he adds these 
words, ' as children,' that resemble the father, yea, often the grandfather 
most. And everlasting love is as the grandfather that begat, and brings 
forth all these effects and fruits of love, adoption, forgiveness, &c. Yet 
still this word /xiixT^ral would speak something more, viz., we should act 
over to the life the love of God, as actors do stories ; we should not only 
have in our hearts the image of it, but we should act to the life the pos- 
tures, the passions, the gestures, the looks, and the casts of that love of 
God ; and we should have all these continually, as far as may be, before 
our eyes, to imitate them in our ways. 

2. We should set up God's love, not as a pattern only to us, but as an 
incentive to inflame us ; and therefore he adds these words, * as dear chil- 
dren.' The words are in the original ug Tixva aya'K'riTa. 1. As children, 
to imitate, to act over his love in all your walkings towards himself and 
others. And 2. As beloved children, to take in his peculiar love to you, 
to invigorate and act you. Children are to imitate their parents, as they 
are their parents and their superiors ; and so Christ urgeth it. Mat. v. 48, 
• Be ye perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.' And so the apostle 
urgeth it, 1 Peter i. 14, ' As obedient children, fashion not yourselves ; ' 
that is, imitate not your former lusts, iiri G\j(syjriixaTiZj)(x,iwi ; that is, be not 
cast into the garb, the mode of them, frame not yourselves to them ; but 
be holy as I am holy ; imitate me your Father. But the apostle, in Eph. 
V. 1, was enforcing a point of love. 3. And therefore he adds, * as beloved 
children ; ' as darlings whom God loved and delighted to love ; this is put 
in to make God's love the enkindler and incentive of this divine fire in us. 
Consider but how beloved, how dear you are and have been to him; 



Chap. III.] in the heart and life. 243 

consider the endearments of his lovo in all the sinf^alarities and eminent 
properties of it. What love was it you were wrapt in when brought forth ? 
Everlasting love. What womb of lovo was it in which you as children 
were first conceived ? It was in everlasting love. By what love were you 
chosen and predestinated to the adoption of sons before the world was ? 
Eph. i. 5. It was that love which made you children ; neither can any 
come to know how dear you are to God till they come to discover and 
drink of this love, the fountain, the original of all. And indeed it is with 
respect to having been beloved with this love that they are called beloved 
children. As also, in 2 Thes. ii. 13, ho gives them this title and com- 
pellation on purpose, in reference to election : ' We are bound to give 
thanks always unto God for you, brethren and beloved of the Lord, because 
God hath chosen you from the beginning.' He contents not himself to 
have called them brethren, but on purpose adds the other word, ' beloved,' 
because it was in election they were first and chiefly beloved. And, ia 
Col. iii. 12, Paul joins both, and makes them an argument to all graces of 
every kind : ' As the elect of God,' says he, ' holy and beloved, put on 
bowels of mercy, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, long-suffering.' 
It is easy to conceive how bowels of mercy and kindness are required of us, 
as resemblances of that love which was accompanied with such infinite 
bowels and heroic kindness in God towards us ; for out of these God chose 
you at first. It is also to be considered how much kindness, meekness, 
riches of long-suftering, and forbearance, and forgiveness God ordained in 
election to shew forth toward you. The fountain of them all was electing 
love, and in electing love was found all these, or it designed to shew forth 
these ; only how humbleness of mind was shewn therein as a pattern to us 
may be a doubt ; but it may be easily resolved by what I have said on 
Eph. ii.,* where I shewed the greatness of God's love, in this respect, that 
it was an humbling condescension in him, the great God, to look down on 
creatures. Ps. cxiii. 6, * Who humbleth himself to behold the things that 
are in heaven and in the earth.' If to look on them is condescending good- 
ness, much more to love them, and ordain them sons, and friends, and 
companions with himself. And it was yet a greater condescension to 
ordain his eternal Son to dwell in human nature, and that nature to become 
one person with him, which was the fundamental decree of all, for we are 
chosen in Christ as in our head, Eph. i. 3. Look, therefore, whatever 
singularities, particularities there are of graces of any kind to be found in 
this love, they should either be patterns or motives unto us, to answer 
them in love and obedience: Eph. v. 1, 'As dear or beloved children, be 
imitators of God.' Take the words as a motive, and judge within your- 
selves how forcible it is to any heart possessed with childlike love to God. 
Suppose God from heaven should say. What, my child (as that mother to 
Solomon), my beloved child, yea, as thou art my beloved child, do this or 
that, and therein obey me ; how should this move any of you ! Set this 
before every command, and think that God thus speaks to thee : ' As thou 
art my dear child, thou shalt have no other gods ; thou shalt not commit 
adultery, murder,' &c. 

Let us now run over all those special properties and singularities by 
which this love is commended to us, and see how they all enforce and 
persuade to holiness and obedience, and the giving of all love to God. 

1st, Let us view the priority of this love, that he loved us first, not we 

* In Vol. I. of Ms works. [Vol. IT. of this edition.— Ed.] 



244 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III. 

him. Upon this ground Christ first, then the apostle John, enforceth all 
obedience to all commands. 

First, Christ doth it, John xv. 16. When Christ would move his apostles 
to that great and hazardous work of preaching the gospel over all the world 
when he was gone (as he moved Peter in those words, ' Lovest thou me?' ), 
he urgeth this, that he had loved them first : ' You have not chosen me ' 
(says he), ' but I have chosen you.' He mentions election to them, and 
therein this endearing consideration, that he had first chosen them, not 
they him ; and then subjoins that he had ordained them to go all the world 
over, and * bring forth fruit, and that their fruit should remain.' It is as 
if he had thus spoke to them : You did not first provoke me to set my 
heart on you, and single you out, but I freely chose and loved you. Then 
John (1 John iv.) insists on the same argument, which he expresseth more 
takingly thus : * Not that we loved God, but that he loved us,' ver. 10; ' and 
loved us first,' ver. 19; and we loved not him at all for a long while after 
his love and pity shewn to us. All the commandments are by Christ 
reduced to two heads : Mat. xxii. 37, &c., ' Thou shalt love the Lord thy 
God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This 
is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it. Thou 
shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang 
all the law and the prophets.' Now John's scope also (in 1 John iv.) is 
to exhort to both, and to move to both. He useth this as the argument 
twice in that chapter: 1, in verses 10, 11 ; then, 2, in verses 19-21. At the 
10th verse he heightens the love of God : ' Herein is love ; ' that is, herein 
is love indeed ; and he doth this on purpose to draw from us obedience 
to that command, and love to our brethren. Ver. 11, * Beloved, if God 
so loved us, we ought also to love one another.' Therein are compre- 
hended all the duties of the second table : Rom. xiii. 8, 9, ' He that lovelh 
another hath fulfilled the law. For this, Thou shalt not commit adultery, 
Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness, 
Thou shalt not covet: and if there be any other commandment, it is briefly 
comprehended in this. Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.' Then 
again, says John, 1 John iv. 19, ' "We love him' (so ours render it), or ' Let 
us love him' (so others render it, and indeed the word uyaTrxfj^sv is indif- 
ferent to both, and favours both alike), ' because he loved us first;' and from 
thence, ver. 20, 21, he infers love to our brethren, and that as a com- 
mandment from that God that so loved us : ver. 21, ' This commandment 
have we from him, that he who loveth God love his brother also.' So 
that love to God, the sum of the first table, is enjoined, or rather sweetly 
flows from what the law of love requires ; and we are bound to requite love 
with love to one that loved us first, and so highly loved us too, ver. 11. 
The other argument is fetched from a superadded commandment, 1 John 
iv. 21, from him that thus loved us; and it is enforced from what Christ had 
said, John xiv., * If ye love me, keep my commandments.' Now in the 
midst between both these arguments he inserts this axiom, 1 John iv. 17, 
* As he is, so are we in this world.' This belongeth to the argument, why 
we should imitate God. The coherence carries it to God in his love, 
especially that love before all worlds, which he had treated of so largely 
before : ver. 16, ' We have known the love that God hath to us. God is 
love, &c. And herein is love, that he loved us first, &c. If then, as he 
is, so are we in this world, we shall have boldness at the latter day, because 
we behave ourselves so as to be like him.' Because as he is, that is, as 
he is in loving us first, and giving his Son for us, such we are in this world 



Chap. III.] in the heart and life. 246 

in loving others in imitation of him ; or ' as he is, we are in this world ; ' 
that is, wo being imitators of that everlasting love of his, * wo shall have 
boldness at the day of judgment,' it being impossible God should disap- 
prove of those that are like him in that which is most dear to him, viz., 
his love and the eternal acts of it. Thus Piscator and others interpret it. 

2dly. Consider the peculiarity of his love, that he hath loved you above 
all others, in which there is another eminency of love : Deut. x. 14, 15, 
' Behold, the heaven, and the heaven of heavens, is the Lord's thy God, the 
earth also, with all that is therein. Only the Lord had a delight in thy 
fathers to love them, and he chose their seed after them, even you above 
all people, as it is this day.' He here sets out the special love of God in 
choosing them. 

(1.) He had choice enough ; heaven and earth lay all before him, and all 
things in both, and he could have made every star, every pebble, so many 
eons to Abraham. As in the mass or chaos, the matter of all creatures, 
which lay alike before his power, out of the same matter he made the dull 
earth, he might have made the vigorous and shining sun ; so he had all 
creatures in heaven and earth out of which to have made sons to Abraham 
(as John the Baptist speaks), but he chose them out of mankind, the seed 
of mankind. 

. (2.) He had before him all people of mankind, made all of one blood. 
Acts xvii., and out of all ' he chose thy fathers and their seed,' out of all 
(as choice implies), yea, above all. 

(3.) And 3dly, He made this choice, not out of a bare act of will, as one 
resolved to choose some person with a delight to love them, and deHghting 
to shew this peculiar love to them. 

(4.) And 4thly, That love and delight was all, and the alone cause 
thereto him moving, as that word 'only' (in Deut. x. 14, 15) implies: 
* Only the Lord had a delight in thy fathers,' &c. Now to what end is all 
this electing love thus set forth to us, but to the point I have in hand ? 
Deut. X. 12, 'And now, Israel, what doth the Lord thy God require of 
thee, but to fear the Lord thy God, to walk in all his ways, and to love 
him, and to serve the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy 
soul, to keep the commandments of the Lord and his statutes, which I 
command thee this day for thy good ? ' This Lord, the God of gods, Lord 
of lords, a great God, ver. 17, who is withal so good, so full of love, of all 
love to thee,. what doth this God require of thee (the Hebrew signifies also 
to ask, request, entreat; so 1 Sam. i. 17, 20, 27, in the petition which 
Hannah put up to God, the same word is used) ? What doth this glorious 
God, after all this love manifested, fall a-petitioning thee for (as though God 
did beseech, as the apostle hath it, 2 Cor. v. 20) ? What doth he ask 
again of thee, as in answer to all this love ? Nothing but thy love and thy 
obedience, which by the law of justice is a debt from equals, namely, to 
requite love with love, Rom. xii. 8. He requires nothing but love, which 
(as Christ says) sinners, the worst of sinners, the most notorious sinners 
in the world, pay mutually : ' Publicans and sinners love those that love 
them,' Mat. v. 46, Luke vi. 32. 



2iG OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III, 



CHAPTER IV. 

Another motive to obedience deduced from God's great love in givinrf his Son 
to die for us. — That he requires nothing in requital of so inestimable a gift, 
hut that v:e should love, obey, and serve him. — Other considerations of God's 
love urged, as motives to obedience ; that he delights in loving vs, and there- 
fore it should be our delight to love and obey him. — The eternity and immu- 
tability of his love, urged as motives to faithful and constant obedience. 

The gi-eatness and immenseness of God's love in electing us was such, 
that he designed to shew it hy a gift answerable : and that was the gift of 
his Son to death, to be a propitiation for our sins ; and for this let us 
return again to that scripture in 1 John iv. 10 ; ' Herein is love, not that 
we loved God, but God loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation 
for our sins.' And then it follows, ' Beloved, if God so loved us', &c., he 
puts a so upon it, as leaving it to the Holy Ghost to heighten this so by 
him unutterable. Our Saviour had done the hke : John iii. 16, ' God so 
loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son' — a gift so great, that 
he hath nothing now left he values : ' He that spared not his Son, how 
shall he not with him give us all things ?' Rom. viii. 32. Kow then consider, 
man, what doth this God, that designed to give so great a gift merely 
to commend his love, require of thee again '? What ! ' Thousands of rams, 
ten thousand I'ivers of oil, thy first-born in requital of his first-born ?' lie 
twice renounceth all or any of these, both in Ps. 1. and Micah vi. WTiat is 
it the Lord asks of thee (says Moses also, Deut. x. 12j ? It is all a dimi- 
nutive : alas ! as good as nothing to him. It is but thy love, thy service, 
which when thou hast returned to him to the utmost thou art able, fall 
down on thy knees, and say, thou art an unprofitable servant. All of it is 
that which he hath no need of, of which he might say as of sacrifice, ' If I 
had need thereof, would I ask thee ?' It is that God who asks thy ser- 
vice, who might command it, and it is a favour that he gives thee leave to 
love and serve him. And it is but that love and service, which the worth 
and excellency of this God, if known by thee (though his love to thee were 
as yet unknown), would draw it from thee, and move thee to fear him that 
is so great, ver. 17, to love him that is so good and loving, ver. 15, 16, 
and to serve him, namely, in outward obedience, by walking in his ways, 
who commands all he doth command for thy good, ver. 14, and so thou 
seiwest, providest for thyself most in semng him. And as for that which 
he desii-es thee to pai't with for him, what is it but what is merely an hin- 
drance to this love and service of him according to his greatness and excel- 
lency ? and to part with it is for thine own good : ' Circumcise therefore 
the foreskin of your hearts, and be no more stifl'-necked,' Deut. x. 16. It 
is an inference fi-om what he had said before. Now what is that foreskin 
that makes thee thus stifl'-necked ? It is inordinate self-love. Self-love 
is the sum of the law of sin, as love to God is the sum of the laws of God. 
The laws of sin tell thee, thou shalt not fear God, nor worship him ; thou 
shalt take his name in vain, thou shalt kill, steal, or commit adultery, &c. 
And if there be any other commandment of sin, it is briefly comprehended 
in this saying, engi-afted so deep in all men's hearts, \^' Thou shalt love, thy- 
self above all things whatsoever.' But the law of God commands love to 
God, and obedience to him springing thence, and requu'ing the whole soul 
and strength (as Christ speaks) to love God above one's self, as by the pro- 



CUAP. IV.] IN TUE HEA.RT AND LIFE. 247 

portion Christ sets is evident, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself, 
therefore God above thyself. Hence this self called flesh, which opposeth 
true love to God, is enmity with God and his law, Rom. viii., and must 
be therefore cut ofl* and cast away, ere we can love him and be subject to 
his law, as the apostle there speaks. And to this purpose the same Moses, 
preaching the gospel in another place, speaks, Deut. xxx. G, ' The Lord 
will circumcise thy heart, to love thy God with all thy heart, and all thy 
soul.' What is it that this great God, that hath out of his love given a gift 
so great, and so dear to him, requires of thee ? Not any part of what is 
truly and substantially love unto thyself; he permits the whole of it in 
substance still to remain, and requires only the superfluity of it. The 
Hebrew word used for the foreskin, which is to be cut ofi", signifies a super- 
fluity, as that part of the skin which the Jews in circumcision did cut off 
is. And therefore Ainsworth emphatically translates it so here, and usually 
elsewhere, circumcise the superfluous foreskin ; and by the choice of that 
superfluous skin to be the subject of circumcision, was fitly signified how 
little and small a matter it is that God requires of self-denial in us. What 
doth the Lord require of thee ? Not to cut off self entirely, but only the 
inordinacy, the excrescency ; and so some have understood that of James 
i. 21, ' Lay aside all superfluity of naughtiness.' God requires no more 
than that thou shouldst part with what will hinder thy loving him above 
thyself; and the word in its signification suiteth this also, for it signifies a 
stoppage that hindereth, and so is to be cut off", as that which letteth thee 
in thy loving and obeying him. And upon the whole to conclude, consider 
that in Deut. x. 12, 13, it is expressed, that ' it is for thy good that 
thou art to serve the Lord with all thy soul, to keep the commandments 
w^hich he commands thee for thy good.' These words, ' for thy good,' are 
added to this thy loving and serving him ; and so to bring this further 
home to the thing in hand, herein thy love and obedience unto God doth 
but fitly and meetly answer as an imitation of that his love in election, and 
the contrivements of it, as was observed. For as God in that his loving 
us had eminently and above all a respect to his own glory, Eph. i. 6, ' to 
the praise of the glory of his grace,' yet so as he did withal take in such 
conspicuous aflections of love to our persons, that he is said to have 
delighted to love us, and to love us most in this, that he makes himself, 
and his love and glory, our happiness and highest end, and accordingly so 
contrived his designs therein, as to hold forth both these, decreeing all for 
our good, as well as his own glory ; thus in the like proportion and subor- 
dination, in imitation of this love of his, he allows us to love ourselves in 
loving him, and to that end hath given all his commands for our good, as 
out of Moses was observed ; yet so as to set him up above ourselves, and 
make his glory, and the praise of it, our chiefest and greatest good. And 
thus Moses concludes that 10th chapter of Deuteronomy, verse 21, * He 
is thy praise, and he is thy God.' 

Let us proceed on to whatever other singularities or rarities are to be 
found in this love, and shew how we should answer them all in love and 
obedience, and that all and each should become the highest and most 
inflaming motives to us. Concerning all which let me premise this general 
consideration once for all, that by the same reason that the apostle urgeth 
this circumstance in God's love, viz., the priority of it, that God loved us 
first, as a motive to obedience to his commands, 1 John iv. 19-21, and 
as Moses urged the peculiarity of this love, Deut. x., by the same reason 
may and should any other consideration that commends it move us. 



248 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III. 

Therefore consider that God, in choosing thee, not only loved thee, but 
delighted to love thee. It was not barely an act of will that he would 
choose some, he cared not whom, as being indifferent about it ; but it was 
an act of love, and not of love only, but of good pleasure, Eph. i., and of 
delight too, as you heard, Deut. x. How should the consideration of this 
sweeten obedience to thee, not only to do his will, but to do it willingly ? 
This love should make not only the commandment not gi'ievous, 1 John v., 
but a delight. It is hard to find an instance of this in the hearts of the 
ordinary sons of men ; only in Christ our head we may find and have the 
great example. How ready and wiUing did the fore-mentioned considera- 
tion make him to do God's will in all things, to fulfil all righteousness, and 
to make this work his meat and drink ! ' I have a baptism to be baptized 
with,' says he, ' and how do I long till it is accomplished.' And what was 
one spring and motive hereunto ? It was even the consideration that God 
had chosen him and delighted in him, which made him his servant and 
obedient : Isa. xlii. 1, ' My servant whom I uphold, my elect in whom my 
soul delighteth.' And therefore he took courage and resolution to go 
through with the work he was chosen to. Thus it follows, ' He shall not 
fail, nor be discouraged,' ver. 4. The sense and apprehension which 
Christ had, that God had written his name as the head, at the top of his 
book of life, and that his name was also engraven deeply on his heart, 
made him speak thus in Heb. x. 7, ' Then said I, Lo, I come (in the 
volume of the book it is written of me) to do thy will, God.' But if 
you consult the place this is taken out of, there is more of the disposition 
of his spirit added : Ps. xl., ' I delight to do thy will, God.' And in 
both places this it was that moved him, ' In the volume of thy book, thus 
it is written of me.' God had predestinated him as a man before all 
worlds, 1 Peter i. 20 ; God had delighted in him, as thus decreed, before 
his works of old, Prov. viii. 30. And now that his time came to shew his 
love to God, and work for him, this infinitely quickened him ; and there- 
fore, having run his race and despatched his work, he says, John xvii. 4, 
' I have glorified thee on earth : I have finished the work which thou 
gavest me to do.' And it follows, ver. 5, ' And now, Father, glorify 
thou me with thine own self with tlie glory which I had with thee before 
the world was ;' which is interpreted by that verse 24, ' The glory thou 
hast given me' (and so ordainedst it) 'before the world was: for thou 
lovedst me before the foundation of the world.' You may easily discern 
by the connection of the 4th and 5th verses, interpreted by the 23d, what 
had set him on work, and what he had in his eye, in despatching all his 
work on earth so willingly, so eagerly : it was God's everlasting love, that 
had designed to him so great a glory, which therefore as soon as now his 
work was done, he utters as that the thoughts of which, and of his having 
been eternally ordained unto it, out of so great a love, had set him a-work. 
Now, then, hath God rejoiced over thee from everlasting, in his intentions 
to do thee good, with his whole heart and his whole soul (as Jeremiah 
speaks) ? How should this consideration draw out, suck out thy whole heart 
from thee, to love and serve the Lord with all thy heart and with all thy 
soul ! Was his whole soul thus delighted to love'thee ? Deut. x. 12, 15. 
Was it a pure act of good pleasure in him ? Oh how shouldst thou strive, 
Col. i. 10, ' to walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in 
every good work.' 

5. Consider that this love hath been from everlasting, Jer. xxxi. 3. 
This antiquity of it, that it is of so long continuance, of so long a stand- 



CUAP. lY.j IN THE HEART AND LIFE. 210 

ing, should have its distinct influonco also upon thco. This is therefore 
inserted, Eph. i. 8, ' who hath chosen us before the foundation of the 
world, to be holy before him iu love.' Paul minds the Thessalonians of it 
also, to move them to holiness : 2 Thes. ii. 13, * God hath from the 
beginning chosen you to salvation, through sanctification of the Spirit, 
and belief of the truth.' ' From the beginning,' that is, from everlasting : 
1 John i. 1, * The Word of life, that was from the beginning.' This con- 
sideration hath much in it to move us. 

(1.) When one hath had his eyes and his heart long upon a thing which 
he desires to see accomplished, how greedy of it, how delighted in it is he, 
when he sees it begun to be accomplished ! As Christ sitting in heaven, 
and expecting till his enemies be made his footstool, when he sees any new 
degree of it accomplished, how doth it rejoice him ! If God hath so long 
since, even from eternity, designed out holiness for his children, he expects 
earnestly to have holy obedience and service from them. 

(2.) Consider, that as this hath been in his eye so long, so how little a 
time it is since thou wert holy, or begannest to look towards it. His eyes 
and heart were toward thee before the foundation of the world ; and it hath 
been half thy time perhaps before thou begannest to look after him or his 
ways, or to set thyself to be holy before him. And when thou didst begin 
after so long time, thou didst find thyself enwrapt in the designs of 
eternal love upon thee, that ordained thee to this very thing before the 
world was. Oh how should this quicken thee to hasten thy work, and to 
make speed, as one born out of time ! God loved and chose thee from the 
beginning, 2 Thes. ii., and had no other thoughts nor stirrings of affections 
but of love and kindness to thee ; but thou from thy beginning hast had 
no other but thoughts of provocation and enmity against him, for thy 
thoughts had been only evil from thy infancy, Gen. vi. 5. As therefore 
when David would move God not to cut him off in the midst of his days, 
what says he ? Ps. cii. 24, 25, ' I said, my God, take me not away in 
the midst of my days : thy years are throughout all generations. Of old 
hast thou laid the foundations of the earth.' This speech of David I turn 
into an exhortation unto thee. His love hath been to thee before he laid 
the foundations of the earth, and throughout all generations ; thy being 
and existence was but as this morning unto him, and it was the midst of 
thy days ere thou brokest off thy iniquities by repentance. Thy time of 
love is short, and thou hast already shortened it ; Oh now fall to work 
and ply thee, and make, if possible, the rest of thy life an whole life to 
him. Peter had a touch of it, 1 Peter iv. 3, yet without upbraiding ; for 
our God is so good, as he upbraideth no man that turns to him from his 
former sins. Well, what says Peter ? * The time past of our life may 
suffice us to have wrought the will of the Gentiles.' He says no more, 
yet it is enough to quicken us ; yea, it is the scope of the apostle to do it. 
The consideration of this, with the other of God's love, he sets together 
on purpose to press this exhortation, that those that have believed should 
maintain good works. He fetcheth his rise from the third verse : ' We 
ourselves were sometimes ' (too long a time) ' foolish, disobedient, serving 
divers lusts ;' and j-et God loved us all that while. So ver. 4, ' When 
the love of God appeared, that had been hidden,' &c. You therefore that 
served nothing but sin before, should be the more diligent now in serving 
God, &c. 

6. Consider that this love of God hath been constant to thee and 
unchangeable, ever since and all along from the beginning, the same. 



250 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III. 

2 Thes. ii. 13, and so continues to the end, John xiii, 1. Yea, it is such as 
nothing can separate from it : Rom. viii. 38, 39, ' I am persuaded that neither 
death, nor Hfe, nor angels, nor principaUties, nor powers, nor things present, 
nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be 
able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Jesus Christ our 
Lord.' And this should move to constancy and continuance in well doing 
always, in which we should suffer nothing to interrupt us, nothing to 
separate us from it. The apostle (in that 2 Thes. ii., from verse 13 to the 
end, and chap. iii. 5) improves this consideration of the everlastingness, 
unchangeableness of God's love (for this place speaks at once to both) to 
move them to stability in every good word and work, and to cleave fast to 
all the doctrines and commandments both by faith and obedience. He had 
spoken before how God would give up the reprobate number of professors of 
Christianity to antichristian doctrine and unrighteousness (in plain words), 
' that they might be damned.' But (says he, ver. 13) ' We are bound to 
give thanks to God always for you, brethren, beloved of the Lord, because 
God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation, through sanctification 
of the Spirit, and belief of the truth ; ' both these two being necessary to 
salvation. 1st, It is necessary to believe the truth as it is in Jesus; 2dly, 
to be sanctified and made holy men by it, and God from the beginning hath 
chosen you to be saved through both. Therefoi-e, says he, vers. 15-17, 
* Stand fast, and hold the traditions which you have been taught, whether 
by word, or our epistle. Now our Lord Jesus Christ himself, and God, 
even our Father, which hath loved us, and hath given us everlasting con- 
solation, and good hope through grace, comfort your hearts, and stablish 
you in every good word and work.' It is therefore an exhortation, seconded 
with a prayer for their establishment in faith and holiness, ver, 16, 17, 
manifestly founded upon and deduced from what he had spoken, ver. 13, 
now alleged, God hath from the beginning chosen you. In verse 16, he 
makes use of it as a prayer, ' God, even our Father, who hath loved us, 
and given us everlasting consolation, establish you in every good word and 
work.' The sum of which is, that God hath out of love chosen us from 
the beginning or everlasting, and thereby hath given us consolation ever- 
lasting ; the object of it being his unchangeable love, his love which hath 
been from everlasting, and will be to everlasting. Consolation is put 
chiefly for the object matter, that might and doth afford everlasting conso- 
lation, as the doctrine of faith is called faith. And thus it is rather to be 
taken, because his petition thereupon in the 17th verse is, ' Comfort your 
hearts,' namely, with this which is so comfortable a ground of everlasting 
comfort; as also because he adds in the 16th verse, 'And good hope 
through grace.' He might well say so, for the matter and ground of con- 
solation is founded on the pillars of eternity, on that unchangeable love of 
God of which he speaks, whose love and gifts are without repentance. 
Now the things he suitably exhorts to and prays for, as that which is and 
should be the fruit and operation of that love in our hearts, are two. The 
first is, ver. 15, to stand fast against all opposition made against the truth 
deUvered, as soldiers that keep their ground. The second exhortation is, 
to lay hold, sure hold, and hold fast with strength, zpaTiTrs ; therefore the 
Syriac adds fortiter, as Judas bade them hold Christ: Mat. xxiv. 40, ' Whom 
I shall kiss, hold him fast.' Be you as stable, fast, and immoveable in 
your faith and obedience, as God is in his love, who hath loved you from 
the beginning, from everlasting. God hath held you fast, and none can, 
or shall pull you out of his hands ; do you hold as fast to his commands. 



Chap. IV.J in the heart and life. 251 

The word signifies also studiously and carefully to observe, Mark vii. 3, 4, 
and so it relates to commands given for practice and obedience, and imports 
withal constancy therein. And by the way, as for their direction to know 
what was truth to hold, and duties and ordinances to be observed by them, 
what to stick to when in those times antichristian dreamers should come 
to draw them away from the truth with all deceivableness of unrighteous- 
ness, he refers to what they had been taught, either by word or by epistle, 
Bo leaving nothing tOjTevelation immediate as their rule. Now they had 
then the apostle's teaching by word of mouth ; we wanting that, are left to 
stick to what is written as sufficient for us, and as having nothing else to 
have recourse, to, and therefore we must not leave the Scripture, or admit 
any other dui-ing all the time that antichrist is to deceive the world (for 
this is the only direction that is given for the whole of those times), and 
we are sure antichrist is not yet out of the world. Now this standing fast 
in the doctrines, and holding fast the observation of these traditions given 
them, he further interprets to be constancy in well-doing : chap. iii. 4, 
* And we have confidence in the Lord touching you, that you both do and 
will do the things which we command you ; ' that is, will be constant and 
immutable in your obedience, which still in the enforcement of it hath a 
correspondency with, an aspect upon, and an inference from, that love of 
God from the beginning. This is in his exhortation. Then, 2dly, in his 
prayer, by which he further insinuates their duty, this inference may yet a 
little further also appear ; for he grounds his petition upon those acts of 
God's eternal love: ' God, even our Father, that loved us, and hath given 
us everlasting consolation, and good hope through grace, comfort your 
hearts, and stablish you in every good word and work.' And chap. iii. 3, 
he interprets this establishing to be keeping them from evil : ' But the 
Lord is faithful, who shall stablish you and keep you from evil ; ' and he 
adds in ver. 4, ' And we have confidence in the Lord touching you, that ye 
both do and will do the things which we command you ; ' that is, will be 
constant, immoveable, uninterrupted in the doing of them. You both do 
and will do as God hath loved you and will love you evermore ; so then, to 
be stable in every good word and work is to keep themselves from evil, 
both for the present and for time to come for ever. This becomes those 
who profess to hope that God hath chosen them from the beginning, that 
God hath loved them with everlasting love, and thereby given them matter 
of such everlasting consolation. And look what arguments Paul in prayer 
useth unto God to grant this to them, which are thus suited to the matter 
of his petition, as you may discern ; the same may be turned upon us as 
motives to move us thereunto ; for what we would move God with in 
prayer, God expects should move us in practice. Now it is the eternity, 
stability, and the immutabihty of that love, which he useth as a motive, to 
stablish them in every good word and work. 

The very same exhortation to constancy, diligence, and unchangeableness 
in well-doing, if I mistake not, the apostle in like manner foundeth upon the 
immutability of God's counsels towards the heirs of salvation, expressed 
in his promises to them, out of the coherence of Heb. vi. 11-13, 17, 18 
verses compared, 'We desire' (says he, ver. 11), that is, exhort, 'that 
every one of you do shew forth the same dihgence,' which out of love they 
had formerly and at first shewn, ver. 10, ' to the full assurance of hope to 
the end.' He provokes them to diligence with constancy, that they be not 
slothful, but laborious, ver. 10, in every good work, and ' followers of them 
who, through faith and patience,' or constancy in well-doing, joined with 



252 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III. 

patient suffering for it, ' inherit the promises.' And what promises are 
they he lays before them, and what is more eminently held foi'th in the pro- 
mise ? As he had exhorted them to diligence and constancy without 
slackening, so suitably he lays before them that in the promise which 
answereth thereto as on God's part, citing the great promise made to 
Abraham the fother, in the name and for the behalf of all the heirs of 
promise : ver. 13, 'For when God made promise to Abraham,' who after 
he had patiently endured, obtained the promise, ver. 15. And in the 
promise the apostle, to quicken them hereto, singleth out (with an eminent 
observation) the faithfulness and immutabihty of God's counsel, which is 
the point in hand, and unfoldeth in the tenor of the promise the oath 
annexed to it, ' Wherein,' says he, ' God willing more abundantly to shew 
to the heu'S of pi'omise the immutability of his counsel, confirmed it with 
an oath,' ver, 17. As God therefore cleaves to us in his love without 
separation, we should in obedience cleave to him therein ' with full purpose 
of heart,' Acts xi. 23. As God hath stuck to us, and would suffer none to 
divert his love, we should inviolably stick to his commands, as David did : 
Ps. cxix. 81, 'I have stuck unto thy testimonies.' And as nothing shall 
or can separate us from the love of God in Christ, as on his part ; and as 
none of all those miUions of heroes far excelling us, that have been in all 
generations, so took his heart as to alter his purpose of love towards us, or 
to allure him from us ; so neither let anything ever separate us throughout 
our course from pursuing after communion with that love in keeping his 
commands. Let not wife, children, honours, riches, pleasures, temptations 
on the left hand or right hand, or whatsoever can fall out or present itself 
unto us, ever separate us from the love and service of God. He that for- 
sakes not these, being wooed by so great a love (as hath been described), 
he is not worthy of him and his love, nor of the least beam of it. An heart 
inflamed with this love will do or suffer anything. I make a great observa- 
tion of this in the instance of Paul, when Christ had brought him first upon 
his knees, and had humbled him, having struck him off his horse. ' Lord,' 
said Paul then, ' what wilt thou have me do ?' But when afterwards this 
love of God had fired his heart, then what was it he was not content to do 
and suffer ? And when (in this Eom. viii.) the tide and full sea came in 
and overflowed his heart, insomuch as he cries out, ' Who shall separate 
me from the love of God in Christ ?' then it was that he was willing to have 
been himself separated from Christ, accursed from Christ, as Christ was 
from God on the cross, for the glory of God in the conversion of his 
brethren. Now nothing but this love could have raised up his heart 
thus high. 

I shall conclude this part of this discourse with what Paul concludeth his 
in the 2d and 3d chapters of the 2d Thessalonians. He had exhorted them 
to constancy, praying for stability in every good word and work, laid before 
them the eternal love of God to move them, and also put the Lord in mind 
of it to move him to gi-ant it to them, and had expressed his confidence 
herein : chap. iii. 4, ' And we have confidence in the Lord touching you, 
that you both do and will do the things that we command you.' But how 
should we attain this ? might they say, and what is the best, the readiest way 
of all other to arrive thereunto ? He immediately adds, ' And the Lord 
direct your hearts into the love of God !' So prays he, and in praying 
thus for them suggests the most effectual way to attain to this obedience. 
By the coherence before mentioned, I understand it of the love of God 
towards them, that love spoken of chap. ii. 16. And this is that single, 



Chap. IY.] in the heart and life. 253 

and only, and all-sufllcient direction Paul gives them unto all obedience, 
viz., to iiavo their hearts guided into that love, and the comprehension of 
the heights and depths of it, as elsewhere he prays for the Ephesians. And 
this is to be obtained no way but by prayer to the Lord to lead them into 
this. When you hear any duty pressed, you presently call for directions ; 
and those are usually as dithcult to practise and attain as the things or 
graces they are prescribed for. Paul here prescribes but one, but it is a 
sovereign one, and withal the only way to attain it, viz., prayer. The 
Lord or person he prays unto is the Holy Ghost, manifestly distinguished 
from God, namely, the Father and Jesus Christ. The love of God the 
Father, and the longing after and waiting for the revelation of Christ in his 
glory, are here made the subject matter, the journey's end, the sight, the 
enjoyment, the object of the Spirit's giving them. And so elsewhere it is made 
the proper office of the Holy Ghost, to lead us into all truth, John xvi., to 
guide our feet into the ways of peace, and as meetly it is appropriated to 
him here to direct our hearts into the love of God, and longings after 
Christ. For as he it is who is given us of God, to communicate the love 
of these other two, who sustain the consideration of objects to be revealed 
and communicated by him, so, Piom. v., * the love of God ' is said to be 
' shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost,' whom he hath given unto 
us, as on purpose to that end. So then you have all three persons in this 
small verse, and a prayer is made to the Holy Ghost under the title of 
Lord, M'hich some deny to be found in the Scripture. The word that is 
here translated to direct is xareuduvai, that is, to guide you by a straight way, 
or by a right line. It hints this further to me, which hath been in my 
heart from other considerations, that of all ways and means that tend to 
work and keep us, the love of God apprehended, and inflaming love in our 
hearts to God again (for so I take the love here, both passively and actively, 
for he leads us into love unto God, by discovering the love of God), is the 
direct straightest way of all other ; the shortest cut, as we use to say, for it is 
by a straight line. There are other motives and persuasives that have done 
victoriously, but this excels them all. As I use to say of that way of living 
by faith immediately, in comparison of poring upon graces in ourselves, 
and importing assurance therefrom, that this latter is rather a going about, 
and fetching a compass with a great deal of difficulty and uncertainty ; but 
that other way of faith is as the north-east passage to the Indies, the 
shortest and speediest way of comforting and upholding the heart when 
found out. The love of God shed abroad will contribute more in a moment 
towards our comfort and peace, than all other considerations in a man's 
whole hfe. And therefore pray as Paul did, that ' the Holy Ghost would 
direct your hearts into the love of God. And withal, this prayer informs 
us, that our hearts do of themselves seek out other ways to encourage and 
uphold them in obedience, and other motives are more suited to the natural 
disposition of them, and we are apt to neglect these considerations of God's 
love ; therefore it is that he so solemnly prays to the Holy Ghost to 
guide and direct them into it, because otherwise they would never find this 
\ia.y, or light upon it. 

And observe lastly, that the subject of this the Spirit's guidance is said 
here to be the heart, for indeed that is the proper seat and vessel for God 
to shed abroad his love into, as, Kom. v., the apostle doth in Hke manner 
express it. It is the heart, and not the understanding (for this love passeth 
knowledge). And I having upon occasion of handling the greatness of this 
love (on Eph. ii. 6), viewed all that I could find in the Scripture to set 



254 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III. 

out the greatness of this love by, found little to what might have been 
expected, to exaggerate and greaten a subject of that magnitude this is of. 
I resolved the reason of it into this, that it is left to the Spirit to make an 
immediate report of this love by impressions of it, rather than by notions, 
or rational arguments, or inferences. It is left to him to speak that to the 
heart which can be but whispered unto the mind. It is too big for words, 
and too glorious to be clothed with man's apprehensions, much less expres- 
sions, and it is fit only to speak itself ; and that may be a reason also, why 
we find so little of rational inducements drawn from this eternal love to 
enforce obedience. I have given you all I could find in the New Testament. 
I attribute it to this, that this love spoken by the Spiritto the heart per- 
suades to it without any more arguments, and will not take in the assistance 
of reason, or notions, or inferences to urge the commands of itself, but will 
itself do it, and doth it abundantly. It remains that I pray as the apostle 
doth, 2 Thes. iii. 5, ' The Lord dii-ect your hearts into the love of God !' 



CHAPTER V. 

Motives against sin, because it is Satan s great work and interest, who is Christ's 
greatest enemy. 

He that committeth sin is of the devil ; for the devil sinneth from the begin- 
ning. For this jmrpose the Son of God tvas manifested, that he might 
destroy the works of the devil. — 1 John III. 8. 

The subject on which I intend to discourse, is motives to holiness and 
against sin, drawn from such arguments as the New Testament aflbrds, such 
as arise from the thoughts of Christ and his love, and fi'om the considera- 
tion of the end and design of his death. 

One great end of his death I have already shewn in another discourse,* 
to be his overcoming Satan thereby, and so redeeming us from the power 
of him that had the power of death. What motives to holiness the con- 
sideration hereof will afford is the thing now to be considered, and what 
use faith may make hereof to strengthen and help the heart against sin. 
Now the scope of this test is punctual to it. The apostle's scope is to 
give an exhortation unto holiness and against sin ; and to this end he sets 
forth Christ and Satan as two opposites and antagonists : Satan, as is denoted 
to us, having set up sin as his work ; and Christ is described as the founder 
of holiness, and destroyer of Satan's work. These two have drawn after 
them all the sons of men into two several parties, who are here, and shall 
be hereafter, distinguished for ever, by the poise and inclination of their 
spirits, and course and sway of their lives, as they stood to sin or right- 
eousness, and shall accordingly be judged to belong to either Christ or 
Satan. * Little children' (says the apostle, verse 7), ' let no man deceive 
you : he that doth righteousness is righteous, even as he is righteous. 
And he that committeth sin is of the devil ; for the devil sinneth from the 
beginning. For this purpose was the Son of God manifest, that he might 
destroy the works of the devil,' verse 8. 

Christ the Son of God is the fountain of holiness and righteousness to 
all that hope for, or expect, salvation from him ; verse 3, ' Every man that 
* In the discourse of Christ the Mediator. Vol. III. of his works. [Vol. V. of this 
edition. — Ed.] 



Chap. V.] in the heart and life. 255 

hath this hopo in him purifieth himself, even as ho is pure.' And vcr. 5, 
' In him is no sin.' And vcr. G, ' Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not : 
■whosoever sinneth hath not seen him, neither known him.' So as (verse 
7), ' Ho that doth righteousness is righteous, even as ho is righteous.' 
Christ requires of all he justifies (although ho imputes a righteousness of 
his own to them), that they themselves bo so truly and really righteous in 
their hearts and lives, as rightly from thence to be denominated righteous, 
as truly as all other denominations are from what qualifications are in a 
man, from which he acts accordingly. A man is termed a wise man, that 
hath a principle of wisdom, and acts wisely, though he may have mixtures 
and strains of folly ; so giving the like allowance to a holy man, he that 
doth righteousness, makes it his business, work, trade, and study to do so, 
is righteous. Let no man deceive you with the doctrine of the imputed 
righteousness of Christ, as if it dischai'ged you from having a true inherent 
hoHness of your own, such and the same for kind as he had. No ; it 
obligeth you unto it, to be yourselves * righteous, even as he is righteous.' 
Now to sharpen the exhortation, and make it yet more pungent, he sets 
forth withal Satan, Christ's enemy and opposite, and the contrary head, 
fountain, leader and author of all sin, and opposer of all righteousness, 
who sinned from the beginning, and was himself the first that brought sin 
into the creation, perpetrated it himself, and was the cause of it in all 
others ; and who not only then sinned and diffused it, but he ' sinneth 
from the beginning,' that is, hath continually made it his trade to sin, and 
to cause others to sin. Though Adam brought it in among men, yet it 
was but by one act, and of that act Satan was the designer ; but Adam 
was not the continual cause of sin to others, and is dead long since, and 
ceased to sin, but Satan sins still from the beginning. He sins not only 
personally from the beginning, but by provoking and tempting others con- 
tinually ; for so the devil's sinning from the beginning is here principally 
to be understood, as he is the causer of men to sin, as at the beginning he 
did to our first parents, and he thereby makes the sins we commit his 
works ; for our sins, or the sins in us, as caused by him, are called his 
work. 

1. Our apostle brings in this of Satan's interest to sin as a distinct, yea, 
a farther motive to the saints against sin, to be superadded to the former. 
He had said that sin was a transgression of the law, ver. 4. That con- 
sideration is to move you as creatures and subjects to God, for you are 
therefore to be such as live under law and obedience ; but that is denied 
now-a-days to be any obligation, though to John it was. But consider 
yourselves as persons redeemed by a righteous Saviour, bearing your sins, 
who took sins away, ver. 5, and in whom is no sin ; he could else never 
have taken sin away in us, nor could he have any other end in dying than 
to take sins away, seeing himself had none. Will not the ingenuity of this 
move you ? Then (as the apostle John says) consider whose interest and 
whose cause sin is ; it is the devil's work, and if the law of subjects will 
not move you, let the law of arms. That sin is the force and strength of 
the kingdom of Satan, Christ's enemy, is an higher aggravation of it than 
[that] it is a transgression of the law. What is but felony in time of peace 
as a breach of the law, is treason in time of a common engagement ; and 
to gratify a professed enemy at such a time is as witchcraft and rebellion. 

2. As he thus sets forth sin as the devil's proper work, thereby to deter 
from it, and exhort the more powerfully to constant holiness, so he pro- 
nounceth every one that commits sin to be of the devil, and that hereby 



256 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III. 

tlie children of God and Satan are manifestly distinguished : ver. 10, 'In 
this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil ; who- 
soever doth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his 
brother.' He instanceth in that one dutj', and he turns it both waj'S, either 
to omission or commission ; and the reason he gives is full, for the devil 
sins from the beginning, that is, makes a trade, a practice of it. He 
interprets it to be meant of a way or a course of sinning, as by the other he 
signifies a course of righteousness. Of the devil he saith, ' he sins' (not, 
hath sinned) ' from the beginning ;' he hath made it his work without 
interruption, without ceasing ; therefore whosoever he be that continues in 
sin, commits it, makes a trade and practice of it, is of the devil, for he sins 
as he doth. As a gentleman may do an ignoble work of a tradesman, but 
yet ceaseth not to be noble by it, for he lives upon his lands, and not upon 
his work, so may a godly man do a piece of a sinner's work, and he doth 
it too often ; but he doth not make it a trade, nor live on it (1 John i. 10, 
and ii. 1, 2) : he lives on higher things, and if he belongs to Christ, Christ 
will not suffer him to continue in sin ; for Christ came to dissolve the work, 
as the trade, the haunt of the devil in him ; and he would wholly lose his 
end if he preserved not his own, if he broke not that haunt, that way of 
sinning, and the dominion, the rule, the work of Satan in him, and so 
defaced that character wherein the children of Satan resemble their father, 
in being workers of iniquity, as Christ calls those, Luke xiii. 27, that have 
been the greatest pretenders to him. They shall be found to have been 
(if you take their whole course) ' such workers of iniquity' ('Eoyara/), 
Luke xiii. 27. And in this sense he that commits sin is here taken, as by 
the opposite afore, he that doth righteousness is righteous. Where not 
one alone act of righteousness, but he that worketh righteousness, that 
makes it his study, business, and life, is meant : ' He that lives in sin is 
of the devil.' He speaks of the differing states of a believer and unbeliever ; 
because! Christ was manifested to do this (or to do nothing), namely, to 
dissolve the devil's trade and work in us. He hath spoiled the devil's 
business, and he will suffer no man (whom he died for), after he is engrafted 
into him, to be the devil's factor. 

3. The apostle holds forth Christ and Satan to be two fountains, the one 
of sin, the other of righteousness. All mankind (according as their courses 
and ways are) fall either to the one or the other, and are either of God or 
of the devil. Though men consider it not, they hold of the one or the 
other in capite, as of their head ; yea, they are children of one of these. 
John viii. 44, ' You are of your father the devil, and his lusts you will do.' 
Their indoles, genius, disposition, and practices, are the same that his are, 
and he is their prince, their sovereign, their natural, or rather unnatural, 
lord ; and in this the children of God and of the devil are manifest ; even 
as here the apostle says, ' He that commits sin is of the devil, and he that 
doth not righteousness is not of God.' He knows not Christ, nor ever 
truly saw him, or was acquainted with him, ver. G, for he came to take ein 
away, to dissolve the works of the devil, &c. ; and therefore, all you that 
profess the name of Christ (says John), look to this, and examine your- 
selves by it, deceive not yourselves, but walk by this example. 

I have thus given you the general scope of the apostle's words ; and the 
design of my following discourse is not now to urge that point of the dis- 
tinction of a regenei-ate and unregenerate man, by their several courses of 
sin and righteousness, but to exhort believers in Christ unto all practices 
of all sorts of righteousness, and to dehort them from all sin upon all 



Chap. V.] in the heart and life. 257 

occasions. Now unto this end (which is also John's scope), I shall present 
unto you, which this scripture is so great a ground for, the great and 
dividing interests of these two opposites, Jesus Christ and Satan, in respect 
of sin and righteousness. The devil sinned from the beginning, and drew 
men after him, and set up his design ; and Christ was promised from the 
beginning, and in the end appeared to bi-eak this design of Satan. The 
devil had always a faction for him and for sin from the first ; and therefore 
John instanceth, 1 John iii. 12, in the eldest son of reprobation, Cain : 
* Not as Cain,' saith he, ' who was of that wicked one, and slew his brother.' 
So that if you profess yourselves to belong to Christ, you are thereby 
instantly engaged to set upon the practice and advancement of hoUness and 
righteousness ; and to oppose and destroy sin, upon this interest and 
account, that you are engaged together with Christ, and so his interest in 
this became yours. And to put an addition of strength hereto, and to 
encourage you the more therein, I shall join to this another scripture, 
which is the close of Peter's first epistle : 1 Peter v. 8, ' Be sober, be 
vigilant ; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, 
seeking whom he may devour.' The things which out of this text I have 
designed to handle are principally two. 

1. That there is a general engagement of all Christians against Satan, 
as against a common enemy, against whom as such they should all direct, 
intend, and point their opposition in fighting against sin, and the force of 
that engagement. 

2. I shall propound the encom-agements we may take to ourselves in this 
great conflict. 

1. There is a general engagement of all Christians against Satan as their 
common enemy. 

(1.) The devil is a common adversary (so Peter speaks of him), a mali- 
cious enemy, ' seeking whom he may devour,' making that his chief end and 
business, to destroy and devour men's souls, as a Hon doth his prey — an 
industrious enemy, walking about, and spying out advantages privately and 
particularly against every soul. 

(2.) Satan's chief work and business, wherein he shews himself our 
adversary, lies in drawing us to sin. This the coherence of the apostle 
Peter shews, for his exhortation is, ' Be sober, and watch,' which evidently 
hath respect unto lusts, inordinate affections growing upon a man's spirit, 
and those are the advantages which Satan seeks ; and by the prevailing 
thereof it is, that a man is devoured by Satan, and to effect this it is, that 
he walks up and down to do this his business. 

(3.) The saints' resistance of Satan herein is a common engagement. 
He is your adversary (verse 8), and not yours only, but of all the brother- 
hood (as the word is) * that are in the world,' who suffer and are in danger 
and jeopardy in this respect from him ; who therefore, as one man, are all 
engaged against him to resist him. And in fighting against sin, they should 
point, and direct, and intend their opposition against Satan also (whom 
resist, says Peter), and have an aim at him in their resisting of sin, sharpen- 
ing and whetting up their spirits against him. 

(4.) The force of this engagement is to be considered. 

[1.] For the fia-st, that the devil is our adversary, and a common enemy, 
I will not insist on it. 

[2.] That to draw us to sin, and to preserve ourselves from sin, is the 
great interest on both sides : namely, to draw us to sin, and to move us to 
yield to loose affections, is the devil's interest ; and to be sober, and to 

VOL. VII. K 



258 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III. 

resist him herein, is ours. Heb. xii. 4, ' You have not yet resisted unto 
blood, fighting against sin,' To what purpose comes in that addition, 
' fighting against sin' ? It is to shew that the eminent matter of contest, 
and contention, and scope of a Christian is to fight against sin, which every 
true behever hath set up as the principal business of his life in this world. 
A Christian is sin's antagonist, as the word here rendered ' fighting against' 
is in the original (di'7aywi'/^o'/>t-si'o/). Well, but how is it connected with 
the former speech ? He had minded them, chap, x., how they had 
already in their goods and names been prejudiced and spoiled. What was 
the bottom cause of it, but fighting against sin, because they would not 
deny Christ, or forsake their profession, and so sin against Christ ! On 
this account the apostle puts all those their former sufierings. Now (says 
the apostle), for this principle and resolution, if you continue in it, as it is 
indeed your end and interest, you may be brought to martyrdom, unto 
blood, which yet j'ou have not been, as many others have afore you. And 
it hath not been resisting authority, or opposition to men, and a contending 
with them about a worldly power, or interest ; but the world through 
Satan's instigation comes upon them, to urge them to a compliance with 
sinful customs and practices, and they hold fast to their principle, to fight 
against sin (that they would not sin, was the bottom ground of their oppo- 
sition), and so chose to suffer rather. So then not to sin, to fight against 
sin, is at once the interest of all Christians, and the cause of all persecutions, 
which by sinning they might avoid ; but (as it is in chap, xi,) ' they chose 
rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures 
of sin for a season,' This is our part and interest ; but then, on the con- 
trary, the devil's part is to sin, and to draw men to sin is his interest ; yea, 
it is the main end and design of that other part of his power, viz., the 
bringing persecutions on the saints, for he doth it to draw and tempt them 
unto sin ; that is in his eye and design more than to vex them, or to bring 
an outward misery upon them. 

That subject therefore which I shall a little insist on, is the demonstra- 
tion how much, and how properly and peculiarly, our sinning is both the 
work of Satan and also the interest of his kingdom, to set forth both which, 
that place, 1 John iii. 8, doth most fully serve of any other scripture. 

1. That scripture tells us he hath sinned from the beginning, therein 
charging him, as he that was the first that brought it into the creation of 
God. He was the first that sinned himself; John viii. 44, he is said to 
' speak a lie of his own,' for none tempted or tempteth him to sin ; and 
he is ' the father of it,' as the first inventor of any trade is termed in Gen. 
iv. 20, 21. And, moreover, he was the cause of it in all others, and that 
in a far different manner than Adam was, or any of mankind have been to 
others, as Jeroboam or the like. Adam brought in sin by one act traduced 
down to us, but himself is long since dead, and hath ceased to sin ; but the 
devil sins from the beginning, and hath made it his trade continually to 
sin, and draw others to sin ; and they are the sins in us men, as caused by 
him, that are termed his works, for they are those works of the devil, 
which Christ came to dissolve and to take away, verse 5. But Christ was 
not manifested to take away the devil's sins that are personally in himself, 
nor shed a drop of blood to hinder him from sinning ; but his sins and his 
works as in us, these Christ came to dissolve, these sins which are his 
wicked work in us. 

2. Sin is in a peculiar and proper manner termed his work more than 
ours, and is owned by him accordingly ; and thus though we are the actors 



Chap. V.] in the heart and life. 259 

of these sins more immediately, yet it is Satan who loves sin, as it is a 
work of iniquity. He is the very inventor, and loves the very workmanship 
of it in us, as Christ loves in a believer the new creature, ' which in Christ 
Jesus is created unto good works,' Eph. ii. 10. A mechanic that works 
to get his living, loves not so much the work ho makes, as the livelihood 
that comes by it (as of the makers of Diana's shrines it is said, Acts 
xix. 2-4), and so men love sin for the pleasure, that cannot be enjoyed 
without it ; but there are principal 'artists (as they are termed), the curious 
painters and inventors, who when they have invented a curious piece that 
pleases their fancy, love the work itself. Thus doth the devil love sin as 
his own work ; and as God, having made the world, upholds it, gives virtue 
to nature, and works hitherto (as Christ says), so sin being the devil's 
creature, he preserves it, upholds it, diffuseth it, and so sins from the 
beginning in tempting and provoking us. Adam, poor man, when fallen 
(by whom it is said that sin entered into the world, Rom. v.), as also our 
mother Eve, but looked upon all the sins he or she saw any of their sons 
commit, as evils of which themselves were the cause, and viewed them with 
a sad and heavy heai't, and with this mournful reflection, I have made all 
this work in the world. But the devil looks with another eye upon all the 
sijis which are done under the sun ; and says as Nebuchadnezzar, This 
Babel and confusion in the world have I built for the honour of my majesty, 
in my opposition to God. He looks as God did upon his works, and is 
refreshed, for it is merely, purely his own. 

3. It being his work, and he the inventor, he hath the monopoly of it, 
the gains of it, — and let him enjoy them, as by the ordinary law all first 
inventors use to do, — and all we men work but under him, though we are 
also said to seek out many inventions, as Solomon speaks, but so as he 
hath the chief business and affair in it. Sinners take pains, like the mer- 
chants from far that travel sea and land, that is, go over all things delightful 
in this world, the delights of the sons of men, and seek to and fro to bring 
in pleasures from them to themselves, and fall into mauy snares and tempta- 
tions, that pierce their souls with many sorrows ; but the devil hath the 
custom out of all, and they bring in but the buUion to this great sovereign's 
mint. The coinage, the prerogative thereof, is his, and it is his stamp and 
superscription the works bear. Sinners, like the poor Israelites, gather 
straw where they can find it, do burn, 1 Cor. vii. 9, and are inflamed with 
lusts, but it is his brick which they make. If you ask how his glory, his 
kingdom, his greatness is increased by it, I answer, 

(1.) The power, the glory of his kingdom lies in sinning ; for sin, as sin, 
is his interest, and sin (as it opposeth God) set him up at first to build 
pyramids and trophies for his own glory in dishonouring of God. You are 
busy like bees flying to and fro to a thousand flowers ; and, poor souls, you 
aim at honey, but then you return with it unto his hive, where you, and 
he, and honey, are all burnt together. Look as Christ's kingdom consists 
in peace, joy, righteousness (Rom xiv. 17, Heb. vii. 2), so the devil's 
kingdom consists in sin, and his throne is established by it. Eph, vi. 12, 
the devils are called * rulers of the darkness of this world,' and the world 
is the bound of his dominion ; but that wherein properly his rule lies, is 
the * darkness,' the sin of the world, which he is the ruler of; insomuch 
as that which is his top interest is sin, and his throne is established by 
it, and founded and built upon it, as Christ's sceptre and throne is ' a 
sceptre of righteousness,' Heb. i. 8. A sceptre is an ensign of power, and 
kings' sceptres are made of gold ; but Christ's sceptre is formed of right- 



2G0 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III. 

eousness, pure righteousness ; and this is that interest of his kingdom, so 
as iniquity is the interest of that of Satan. 

(2.) Our sinnings through his temptations are the greatest, if not the 
only deHght and pleasure he hath. They are as meat and drink to him, 
his food and nourishment, and we thereby become caterers and providers 
for the devil's banqueting. This is founded on 1 Peter v. 8, for wherefore 
is it that Peter gives him here the character of a roaring lion, and compares 
him thereunto, but to represent him as one that seeks for a prey ! for 
roaring is here attributed to him, as to terrify, in respect of the dreadfulness 
of the danger, so in relation to his own hungering after a prey ; a soul acting 
sin is his prey: Ps. civ. 21, ' The young lions roar after their prey,' and 
so the devil doth too ; for it follows in 1 Peter v. 8, that he seeks whom 
to devour, and to that end walks up and down, and seeks a prey both by 
spying out a Christian's looseness of spirit, and also by eyeing God to have 
a commission from him to fall upon him. In Ps. xxviii. 5, a roaring lion 
is translated by the Septuagint X'suv 'tthmuv, the same word which Peter here 
useth for devouring.* When a lion is hungry, he roars more terribly ; and 
as roaring is from the speediness and impatiency of desire, so the satisfac- 
tion of that appetite is delight, and devouring the prey is his pleasing 
enjoyment ; suitably his pleasure is sin, that is his prey, and when you sin 
much, and draw others to sin, you feast the devil with the blood of your 
own souls. His curse was to eat dust for his food. Gen. iii. 14 ; being 
banished heaven, he lives on men's lusts, and on things earthly, in which 
yet he delights not, for he tastes not meat or drink ; but to tempt others 
herewith, and to draw them to sin, this delights him, and is a joy to him. 
The apostle termeth all our righteousness ff/cu/SaXa, dogs'-meat ; but sins 
are the devil's meat, and therefore he walks to and fro seeking it, as lions 
do their food, Ps. civ. 22 ; yea, he calls other devils to feast with him. 
Plutarch says, the manner of young lions is, when they have their prey, to 
roar to invite other lions to come and eat with them ; so the devil brings 
seven other devils worse than himself; and as there is joy in heaven if a 
sinner be converted, so in hell when a converted sinner falls into sinning. 

4. Let us but view what expressions the Scriptures use of men's sinning 
against God, and turning aside from him to serve any lust, and we shall 
see that they evidently argue that our sinnings are the devil's interest. 
Thus the apostle, 1 Tim. v. 15, speaking of younger widows marrying 
again when they had vowed themselves to Christ, as was the practice then, 
says, that they had ' already turned aside after Satan.' If we never so little 
decline from Christ, return to Satan ; and if we give way to any passion, it 
is to ' give place to the devil,' Eph. iv. 27. And what he says of anger, 
wrath, &c., he intends also of any other sin or lust. ' Let him that hath 
stolen, steal no more,' as giving place to the devil. Thus also when Peter 
would exaggerate Ananias's sin. Acts v., he saith not only. Why hast thou 
sinned ? but ' AVhy hath Satan filled thy heart ?' Thus ' he that commits 
sin is of the devil,' 1 John iii. 2. He is of his side and party, yea, of the 
devil as of a father, John viii. 44. Yea, the measure of men's wickedness, 
more or less, is expressed by their having fewer or more devils in them. 
Mary Magdalene had seven devils, Mark xvi. 9. And the devil is said to 
return to an apostate backslider with seven devils worse than himself, to 

* There is no allusion to a ' roaring lion ' in Ps. xxviii. 5 ; and Peter's word for 
' devouring,' is not 'mimv, but zc.ra'riojv. The reference is probably to Ps. xxii. 13, 
where, in the Septuagint version, the expression X'iuv <Ajgv6f/,evog occurs, identica 
with that in Peter.— Ed. 



Chap. Y.J in the heart and life. 2G1 

exj^ress that bis latter days shall be more wicked tban bis former ; yea, the 
Scripture calls a sinner ' devil,' John vi. 70. And as Judas joined with 
the devil in betraying Christ, the devil is said to have ' entered into him,' 
Luke xxii. 3. Yea (consider it, brethren), though a man be a good man 
(as Peter was), yet in any foul act or sin he puts off the Christian, and 
turns devil for that time. It was the sharpest word that ever Christ 
uttered to a man that was holy, ' Get thee behind me, Satan : thou art an 
offence to me,' Mat. xvi. 23. It was the worst word that could be given 
him, and yet Christ, who is truth, spake it ; and he exceeded not in pas- 
sion above the merit of the thing, for guile was not found in his mouth. 
And he speaks it with indignation, as of one he abhorred, Get out of my 
sight, I cannot endure to look on thee. It doth not signify that Christ 
loved him not, but Christ spoke thus, that he might the more pungently 
and piercingly set on his sin upon him. Thus the incestuous Corinthian, 
though a good man, 1 Cor. v. 13, is called rov rro^^hv, that wicked person. 
The man was good ; he had spirit or grace in him to be saved, ver. 5, yet 
in the act he was a devil ; for 6 'rovrisoi is the style of the devil in John, and 
elsewhere. And therefore it is that excommunication is to be a delivering 
up to Satan ; and the apostle would have him delivered up to Satan, ver. 5, 
as a suitable punishment. Thus you say, when you turn an untoward ser- 
vant or child out of doors. Now go to your companions. And thus an 
excommunicated person is delivered to Satan, as it were in these words, 
You acted the part of the devil in sinning ; he entered into you, and you 
cast your lot with him (as Solomon speaks), and therefore let the devil 
keep you company a- while, and affright and torment you, that so you may 
learn what it is to have the devil again. And accordingly at last wicked 
men, as having followed the devil's design, are cast into ' the fire prepared 
for the devil and his angels,' and they and he are tormented together in the 
same lake of fire and brimstone common to both, because the cause, the 
engagement, was common to both. All these and many more expres- 
sions, which might haply be gathered together, evince this, that sin is the 
devil's great interest, and that to sin is to maintain the devil's quarrel, to 
fight Satan's battles against the Lord, to build up his kingdom, to strengthen 
his cause, to side and take part with him. 

Use 1. If it be so, as I have proved, that sin is the devil's great busi- 
ness, and the interest of his kingdom, then we may be sure, that in every 
sin to which we are indulgent, we have dealings with the devil : whilst we 
are in this world (as Peter speaks), we are subject to be tempted (as Paul 
says. Gal. vi. 1), and therefore ' let us be sober and watch ;' and (as Christ 
exhorts. Mat. xxvi. 41), ' watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation.' 
Our dear Lord had then taken three of his strongest disciples to assist him 
in his temptation, the sorest that ever was : they fell asleep. Well, says 
he, you will have your turn ; your time of temptation will come, and you 
had need watch better for yourselves than you have done for me, or you 
will be undone. And in that compendium of prayers our Lord gave us, he 
puts in two petitions much to one purpose : ' Lead us not into temptation, 
but deliver us from that evil one' (so in the Greek), the head, the author 
of all evil. That particle aXXa, but, shews its coherence and conjunction 
with the former petition ; and so the meaning is, that God would not so 
give us over to Satan, as that he should devour us, or undo us. He doubles 
this petition, and twines it both ways, because temptations to sins are all 
our lots ; and therefore we should eye the devil in them, as one with whom 
we have to do. And though it is true that no man is tempted but of his 



262 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III 

own lust (saysjTames, chap, i.), yet there is no lust stirs, but this temper 
blows it up. He observes which way the stream is inclined to run, and he 
applies his winds to blow in accordingly : there is no great sin but he hath 
a hand in it, if not by beginning it, yet by promoting it. This' you may 
leam of the same James : ' From whence come wars T says he, James iv. 1. 
It is true that they arise from our lusts, that war in our members, prone 
enough to rise up in arms upon every occasion, and from thence is all inor- 
dinate love of the world. And the spii'it that is in us lusts after envy fast 
enough of itself ; but yet there is over and above a devil that acts and 
inflames all these ; and therefore when he gives counsel against all these, he 
closeth all with this, ver. 7, ' Resist the devil,' as the great leader of all these 
warring lusts. • If you have bitter envyings and strife in your hearts, this 
spirit' is not only ' earthly and sensual,' but the devil is in it, ' it is 
devilish.' Are there divisions and offences in churches ? Rom. xvi. 17, 
the devil is in them ; so Paul suggests, ver. 20, comforting them, that the 
God of peace, that loves peace, and is among them, would tread down 
Satan, the head, the ringleader of them, shortly. Doth anger arise ? Take 
heed, the devil stands at the door watching to enter : Eph. iv. 26, 27, ' Be 
angry, and sin not,' &c., ' neither give place to the devil.' A lust given 
way to, opens the door for him to enter and fill the heart ; and what he 
speaks of anger, is true of all those sins he there names afore and after, 
viz., lying, stealing, uncleanness, &c. Is a man covetous, and resolved to 
be rich ? ' He falls into temptation and into a snare,' 1 Tim. vi. 9. Whose 
snare it is you mav'^ easily know by what is joined with it, viz., temptation. 
It is the snare of the tempter, which in 2 Tim. ii. 26 is called ' the snare 
of the devil.' Thus every lust is, and by it he entered into Ananias's 
heart and filled it. Acts v. Hath a man an evil tongue ? Though it is 
bad enough of itself, yet the devil heats it in his forge, inflames the lust of 
it, and sharpens the wit to it : James iii. 6, ' The tongue is a fire, a world 
of iniquity amongst our members ; it defileth the whole body, and setteth 
on fire the course of nature ; and is set on fire of hell.' In like manner, 
with respect unto uncleanness, this unclean spirit takes all occasions to 
tempt us, 1 Cor. vii. 5. The apostle exhorts man and wife not to be a 
long time asunder (but upon absolute necessity), ' lest Satan,' says he, 
' tempt you for your incontinency ;' that is, whereas the most of men have 
not that gift of contincncy (which, ver. 7, he says he had), and therefore 
to avoid fornication and burning, are supposed to marry, ver. 2. Satan 
spies out all advantages to stir up that lust ere 3"ou are aware, you having 
that in you which the apostle calls your incontinency, and to provoke you 
to some unclean act. All lusts else are the devil's snares; and in a word, 
in all these cobwebs there inhabit spiders, and every straggling love of 
inordinate affection that goes out, and is fastened to anything in the world, 
is the spider's dancing-rope to go in and out of his house upon. 

JJse 2. What weight should the serious consideration hereof have upon our 
spirits, both to preserve us from sinning, and to humble us for having sinned. 

(1.) To preserve us, and to be a motive against sinning. Doth any lust 
begin to boil within thee ? Think with thyself, and say, This is Satan's 
scout, he is in ambushment not far off, and the devil is now approaching, 
for, lo, I feel his darts, his fiery inflaming darts, as Paul calls them. These ■ 
darts cast into my heart came out of his forge, I feel them as fire in my 
bones ; and as in war darts use to be thrown at the first onset, when the 
enemy is approaching, so are these ; but he will come on with sharper 
weapons and sorer assaults, and enter into me if I take not heed. Our 



Chap, V.] in the heart and life. 263 

Saviour Christ espied him afar off: ' Now is the prince of this world 
a-coming,' says he; so mayestthon, as one army doth another, when their 
forlorn is approaching. Christ indeed could say with comfort, ' He hath 
nothing in me ; ' but thou canst not say so, for he hath that in thee will 
betray thee to him, and join with him against thee. Think then with thy- 
self, Now I have to do with the devil ; and now resist, and give not place 
to the devil. If thou wert sure thou hadst to do with the devil, thou wouldst 
avoid him ; if he took a shape and appeared to thee, thou wouldst not deal 
or truck with him ; but know, that when thy lust, thy passion, thy pride 
or covetousness is up, he is surely at thy elbow. As therefore the apostle, 
Heb. xiii. 2, exliorts to works of hospitality, because ' thereby some 
unawares have entertained angels,' as Lot and Abraham did; so for certain 
thou, by letting in this or that sin, lettest in the devil, and entertainest him, 
though thou seest him not. And though thou yieldeat but to one act of sin 
only (as thou thinkest), yet thou servest the devil, and dost his work, yea, 
and hast communion with him. The poor prodigal aimed but at husks to 
fill his belly, Luke xv. 15, but he could not enjoy them but by joining 
himself to the farmer, the devil, whose all the swine and pleasures of sin 
in this world are. Oh consider this ! ' I would not,' says the apostle, 
1 Cor. X. 20, ' that you should have communion with devils.' All men, 
especially Christians, abhor that ; he takes that for granted, and yet it is 
in the nature of the thing itself; by yielding to sin, you become companions 
with the devils, as they in eating things sacrificed to him did. In eating his 
dainties of sinful pleasures he seems to feast you, but really and indeed you 
entertain him. In sinning, we have communion with Satan, as in righteous- 
ness we have with God ; only with this difference : in works of righteous- 
ness we have communion with God in a work that is God's (for as Christ 
saith, we ' work the works of God') ; and then, further, we have communion 
with his person by faith eyeing him, and walking in the light of him, and 
in so doing he often manifests himself to us ; but though we have not such 
sensible communion with the person of Satan as with God by faith, yet 
having to do with his works wherein he acts us, we have remotely to do 
with his person. For as merchants each with other, we have to do with 
his wares, and his commodities, not only for the present, but for hereafter. 
Now then, in the entrance to any sin, consider upon what is said, that it is 
the devil who is thy guide, and wilt thou follow him ? Thou makest thereby 
a kind of covenant to serve him ere thou art aware of it. All men do it 
implicitly, as we say of them that go to cunning wizards, but in such a 
case thou wilt do it explicitly. 

(2.) Hast thou sinned, and therein acted the devil's part? Humble thy- 
self greatly, and that upon this consideration, that thou hast sided with 
Satan, and the devil hath cause to say, thou hast manfully, or rather 
devilishly, took my part this day. The apostle James having shewn, that 
in yielding to their lusts they closed with the devil (chap. iv. 1, 2, and 7 
compared), exhorts them to renounce Satan, and to draw nigh to God, and 
then to be afflicted and mourn. * Humble yourselves,' says he, ' in the 
sight of the Lord.' Would it not break thy heart to hear Christ from 
heaven, after such or such a sin or fact, to call thee devil, and to bid thee 
get thee behind him, as he did to Peter ? Now Christ hath the same 
affection in this respect whilst he is in heaven, and when he was on earth, 
not only to turn away his face, and withdraw the light of his countenance 
from thee ; but with indignation (for the present) to reject thee, and cast 
thee behind his back, and to remove thee as an accursed thing in his sight. 



264 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III. 

Christ said thus to Peter, and thou deservest it ; but humble thyself and 
be not discouraged ; for at another time, when the same Peter had played the 
devil worse by far, in forswearing his Saviour, and had acted the devil in 
his colours — for the devil is a blasphemer, and the father of lies, and Peter 
had done both by lying and forswearing Christ — yet then Christ turned not 
his back but his face upon him. Christ looked back, and one look of 
Christ cast the devil out, as the believer doth experience, that when Christ 
appears by faith in the heart, the devil is gone, and Peter went forth and 
wept bitterly. Be not therefore discouraged, for Christ still loved and 
prayed for this Peter, and exercised these varieties of dispensations to the 
same Peter, to shew us that he useth both upon occasion to his children, 
and we should have the one in our eye to humble us, the other to encourage 
us. We have an enemy on earth, Satan, but an advocate in heaven, 
1 John ii. 1. 

CHAPTER VI. 

A motive to holiness, and to frjlit against sin, drawn from the consideration, 
that this holy icar is a common engagement in vsliich all angels and saints 
are confederates. 

' I shall now demonstrate that there is a common engagement of all 
believers against Satan in fighting against sin, and that they are to point 
and direct their opposition against him. My purpose is not to enlarge upon 
the warfare of a Christian, the subject of so many tongues and pens, but 
my scope is to whet and edge your spirits against sin, whenever you find 
your spirits tempted and lusts high, and to animate you unto an opposition 
to the devil. 

I shall give you the story of this war against Satan, and shew how 
ancient and how long a continued and universal an engagement this is. 

1. God in paradise proclaimed this war, and stated it there, so old is it'; 
it began there, and it was proclaimed there. I will not for the present go 
so high to say, that it began before between the Son of God and these evil 
angels in heaven, though some affirm it. This devil he afironted our great 
God in both his courts : his court in heaven, where angels are ; and his court 
on earth, paradise, which God himself built for Adam personally, as the 
seat of him who was made king of all the earth, and flither of all men. The 
devil, by tempting our first father and mother, was the cause of their first 
sin, which was the original and fountain of all ours. ' Because thou hast 
done this' (says God, Gen. iii. 14), and done it enviously, maliciously, 
and subtilly, knowing what would be the consequence of it to all mankind, 
' thou art therefore accursed.' The man and woman were deceived, as 
birds by the fowler, but the devil was the deceiver, and therefore he is 
cursed above all. It is therefore the common quarrel of our nature, as we 
are men, to make war against him. 

This engaged God himself. God laid it to heart on our behalf, and shall 
not we ? Yea, it drew in all the three persons, who appeared in making 
man, and said, ' Let us make man after our image,' which this devil sought 
to deface. They are all auswerably" disgusted at this destroying of their 
image, and are resolved to renew it. 

1. It was God the Father who dealt then personally with the devil, and 
who cursed him ; for it was he that gave the law to Adam of not eating 
the forbidden fruit, as appears by this discourse, and it is the same person 



Chap. YI.] in the heart and life. 2G5 

that cursetli Satan, and ho it is that is that God of peace who treads him 
under, Rom. xvi. 20. And it is the same * God of all grace' that helps us 
against him, 1 Peter v. 9, 10. 

2. God the Son was hu that was to become the promised seed, and who 
was on purpose designed out by God to deal with him. It was he who was 
instantly proclaimed the general upon the place of the aflront, and the head 
of this quarrel ; and so he was then professedly engaged, and that by his 
own consent standing by. 

3. The Holy Ghost, though not mentioned, yet to be sure we may find 
him to be there, as he must needs be Satan's opposite hereupon. For the 
devil spoiled that in man which is more properly his work (holiness being 
the work of the Holy Spirit) ; and their very titles ever hereafter shew 
their opposition. Thus the one is called the Holy Spirit, and Satan is 
termed the unclean spirit in the Evangelists and in the Acts no less than 
tvvo-and-twenty times ; and so he is called too in the Old Testament, 
Zech. xiii. 2 ; and he and his angels are frequently called evil spirits both 
in the Old and New Testament. And the opposition of these two is seen 
in every saint's heart every day. These words also in Gen. iii. 15, ' I 
w^ill put enmity between her seed and thy seed,' do involve the whole seed 
of elect men as well as Christ, as I have shewn in another discourse.* 
Thus it is an universal engagement ; yea, and as you see God's heart was 
so upon it, and his counsels and resolutions in this point so ripe and ready, 
as he stands not deliberating ; but upon the ver}' place in paradise where 
the mischief was done, and well nigh as soon as it was done, he proclaimed 
war. He stays not so long as till he had turned man out of paradise ; yea, 
and he professeth himself to be the beginner, contriver, and undertaker of 
this war : ' I will put,' says he, ' enmity,' &c. It is a war, then, of God's 
own making ; and properly hi,s more than ours. Thus great and solemn 
it is, not a quarrel only against sin, but against the devil ; between thee 
and the serpent, that is, the devil. 

As the war was thus early proclaimed, so you read how accordingly it 
was carried on from the first, that men began to multiply in the earth, 
even by the two fu-st sons of men, sons of Adam, that were in the world ; 
the devil took the one, Cain, and God took the other, Abel. This early 
division and parting of the seed John takes notice of: 1 John iii. 10-12, 
' In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil ; 
whosoever doth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not 
his brother. For this is the message that ye heard from the beginning, 
that we should love one another. Not as Cain, who was of that wicked 
one, and slew his brother. And wherefore slew he him '? Because his own 
works were evil, and his brother's righteous.' As if he had said. This 
diflerent seed and quarrel, which in Gen. iii. was spoken of, caused arms 
to be taken up presently. The devil, as he had set up, so he carried on 
his design, and drew men after him from the beginning. He had a party 
for him from the first of the sons of Adam, Cain ; and God carried on this 
quarrel in like manner against sin and the devil in the heart of the next 
son, Abel. Sin was the interest that made the division ; for Cain killed 
him ' because his works were evil, and his brother's righteous,' says the 
text. And these two, Cain and Abel, led on all that followed under the 
whole Old Testament ; all under it fell the one way or the other. The 
elect, then, as they had the promised seed in their eye, so withal they had 

* Of. Christ the Mediator, Book v. chap. xvii. in Vol. III. of his works. [Vol. V. 
of this edition. — Ed.] 



20G OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III. 

Satan as their adversary in their eye, whom they should oppose ; for by 
their being instructed in the one part of the promise, they were also in the 
other. And hence the word Satan (or adversary) was the usual name both 
anciently and frequently in the Old Testament given to the devil, even from 
Job's time : Job i. 6 and chap, ii., 1 Sam. xxix. 4, 1 Chron. xxi. 1, Ps. 
cix. 6, and Zech. iii. 1. 

In the end, the general himself came down into the field, and he was 
' manifest to destroy the works of the devil,' yea, and he died in the quarrel 
(I need not repeat what I have said at large about this*) ; and when he 
had by death destroyed him, he triumphed over him, and left it to you 
iTiTBT'.iiadai (as Peter's word is) to accomplish the victory. So then unto 
that war, which against Satan and sin as his work was proclaimed by God 
in paradise, Christ sounded the alarm, and upon his cross set up his royal 
standard thereon, appointed that the rendezvous to draw elect men to him 
when he was lift up, John xii. 32 ; and unto it and him hath been the 
gathering of all the saints ever since. Know then that Christ, in redeem- 
ing us, not only intended an obedience to his Father, and glory to him, and 
our salvation with it, but withal he aimed at the destruction of Satan ; he 
acted not only the part of a son that learned obedience, and of a saviour, 
but also of a warrior, an avenger and destroyer. Now, the saints are to 
fight in this quarrel out of the same interest Jesus Christ doth, and they 
ought to be spirited with his aims and ends ; and therefore, 1 Peter iv. 7, 
we are exhorted to arm ourselves with the same mind that was in Jesus 
Christ our general, and therefore to direct our opposition as Christ did. 
And whereas, Heb. ii. 14, he is said to have ' destroyed him that had the 
power of death,' in the 10th verse he is set before us as the captain of our 
salvation, d^-^riyhv. 

No sooner was Christ gone to heaven, but unto his standard all the saints 
and brotherhood on earth, the church universal, have and do flock in all 
ages, and enrol their names : ' We,' says the apostle Paul, ' wrestle against 
principalities,' &c., Eph. vi. 12. We, he speaks it indefinitely in the 
name of all the saints ; and so Peter speaks too : * Resist your adversary,' 
says he, ' knowing that the same afflictions ' (that is, the same temptation 
from him) ' are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world ;' 
that is, this is the common cause in which all saints ai'e engaged, not one 
excepted ; and is not this a great engagement, then ? That which is 
translated 'brethren' is in the original 'brotherhood,' udsX(p6Tr}Ti, shew- 
ing that they are engaged, not only all and every saint, nor singly all and 
every one, but as a joint body they all strive together as one man ; so then 
these are the two eminent parts of the communion of saints, namely, to 
love the saints and to resist this common enemy ; and the whole brother- 
hood is engaged in both. And the same God that hath put in love into 
the brethren, hath put into all their hearts also an enmity against Satan 
in fighting against sin. The apostle adds, ' in the world ;' and so speaks 
of all saints in all places, and in all times present and to come. The 
catholic church and the communion of saints are joined together in the 
creed, and are of equal extent in this. 

Your baptism is the sign and sacrament of this universal engagement, so 
the primitive Christians understood it. Hi sunt anyeli quibus in lavacro 
renwttiamus.]- In the Common Prayer-book it is made sacramentum militare, 
manfully to fight under Christ's banner against sin, the world, and the 

* In the Discourse of Christ the Mediator, in Vol. III. of his works, 
t TertuU. rle habitu muliebri, c. 2. 



CUAP. VI. j IN TIIK HEART AND LIFE. 2G7 

devil, and to continue Christ's faithful soldier ; and a^^ain particularly it is 
interpreted to be a promise to forsake the devil and all his works ; and the 
scripture is not averse to this very notion, if the whole coherence of the Gth 
chapter of the llomans be observed. The apostle speaks of our being bap- 
tized into Christ, and our conformity to him professedly avowed in baptism, 
ver. 3, 4, to the 12th; and what is his inference from thence? ver. 12, 13, 
' Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal bodies, neither yield you your 
members, as arms, or weapons of unrighteousness, but yield yourselves 
unto God.' So then through baptism, they were viilites sncrameulo ohstrkli 
duel, in allusion to the lloman custom of being by an oath (which was 
called sacramenium) engaged to their general. And whereas he says, yield 
yourselves unto God, add but that of James iv. 1, and it carries it to this 
engagement against Satan I insist on; for whereas the apostle (in Rom.vi.) 
had in mihtnry language expressed it thus, ' Let not sin reign, to obey it in 
the lusts thereof, but yield your members as weapons to God,' James 
following the same metaphor (chap. iv. 1-8) thus speaks, ' Whereas lusts 
war in the members, yield yourselves to God, resist the devil.' The devil 
is the leader, lusts are but the common soldiers. 

All men therefore must of necessity fall to one side or the other, either 
he subject to God, and so resist the devil, or be subject to that evil spirit. 
He supposeth every man, when tempted, to be set in the midst between 
God and the devil, putting themselves under God's protection, or yielding 
themselves unto God ; they are engaged in a war as against their lusts, so 
against the devil, and are thus to direct their opposition'in fighting against 
sin. Calvin* hath a good speech on those three passages of James, as they 
lie, whereof the first concerns our duty to men, humility: ' God gives grace 
to the humble.' 2. Submit to God. 3. Resist the devil. He shews 
(says he) whither or against whom we should direct our opposition ; for 
whereas he had taught modesty and humility towards men, and submission 
towards God, he with the same breath sets Satan as our professed enemy, 
whom we should rise up against and resist, and give no quarter to him ; 
but whenever thou wouldst mortify a lust, in laying the knife to the throat 
thereof, thrust it down even unto the devil's heart also, give that one blow, 
and all with the more violence as;"spiting him therein. Reach him in 
thy intention and aim, for God warrants thee to do it in that blessed curse, 
' I will put enmity between thee and the serpent ; ' and Christ loves that 
you should do it (for himself did so) for his sake, and in his quarrel. 

The last thing to be considered is, what force and eflficacy this engage- 
ment against Satan should have upon our hearts to make us holy, to resist 
the devil, and to fight against sin, as it is Satan's interest ; which, if you 
please, you may take and turn into the use of the former. We have lived 
an times in which we have all felt, more or less, the power of a public 
engagement in our spirits, and have seen by experience of what efficacy it 
is. Let me speak to you then in the language of the times you have run 
through. When, after thou first gavest up thy name to Christ, thou didst 
oblige thyself in this so solemnly a stated and public war, yea, and further 
from that time, every one of you was then set as in a garrison, to keep his 
own soul, and to preserve it from lusts which fight against the soul ; so as 
it is not to be looked at by thee only or singly, as thine own soul, and thine 
own salvation, but also as now made a castle and fortress of Jesus Christ 

* Ostendit quorsum referre debemus nostram, contentionem, ubi erga homines 
modestiam, erga Deum submissionem docuit, Satanam proponit liostem, inquiens 
suigeie debemus. — Calvin in Epist. Jacobi. 



208 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III. 

delivered up unto thee to be kept as with a garrison. This allusion is 
warranted by all these scriptures put together, Luke xi. 21, 22, and Peter's 
words, 1 Epist. i. 5, ' kept as with a garrison,' and Paul's words, Philip, 
iv. 7, to which may be added that of 1 John v. 18, ' He that is born of 
God keeps himself, that the evil one touch him not.' So then thou hast 
iu charge, as John speaks, to keep thyself that the evil one touch thee not, 
nor come within thee. Now think what a trust this is, not only of thine 
own soul, but of a garrison of Christ's, and what a wickedness must it be at 
any time to betray it, or to hold correspondency with the enemy ; yet so in 
every indulgence unto sin thou dost. And moreover, consider that though 
a transgression in time of peace is but a small matter, as to steal some trifle, 
or for a servant or apprentice to run away, yet to run away, yea, to step 
aside in time of war, is death. Adam's sinning at the first was a transgres- 
sion of the law, but it was but as in time of peace ; yea, all thy sinning in 
unregeneracy, was but'as in a time of peace, in comparison to this now (when 
Satan kept his house, thy heart was in peace, says Christ, Luke xi. 21), 
but every sin now is against the law of arms ; it is a sending supplies to the 
enemy, or a letting in a foreign power into Christ's quarters and dominions. 
But to urge more particularly the force of what hath been but even now 
discoursed, Peter's exhortation here, you see, is to resist the devil, which is 
done in resisting sin, and in doing that we must have our aim at Satan, and 
be moved the more with an opposition unto him ; and what spirit truly 
exalted would not the consideration of each of those particulars move and 
raise ? The next time then that thou art tempted to pride, uncleanness, 
envy, revenge, covetousness, or any other lust (in which the devil is always 
at the head), make use of these considerations to strengthen thy spirit 
against both them and him. 

1. Is it nothing to thee to consider how ancient a war this is, and hath 
been, an old feud descended from hand to hand, till brought down to thee 
from paradise, and an old hatred though in a successive body, as a nation 
whets on to pursue the destruction of the enemy ? Ezek. xxv. 15. The 
devil as he is the old serpent, so he is the old enemy. As Solomon says, 
to sharpen friendship, ' Thy friend and thy father's friend forgot not ! ' 
So say I, to sharpen thy hatred against the devil, thy enemy and thy father's 
enemy forget thou not. Satan is thy enemy, thy first father's enemy, the 
empoisoner of our nature, the adversary of all the saints, remember this 
and resist him. Therefore, when the next temptation from him riseth, 
think with thyself, Shall I ever yield to such an enemy ? 

2. All that is holy in heaven or earth are combined with thee in this 
quarrel, thou art environed not only with a cloud of witnesses and spectators, 
but with a crowd of fellovr-engagers. All the three persons were drawn in, 
and espoused this thy quarrel ; all the holy angels have fallen in, and in 
respect of their opposition unto Satan it is that they are termed an heavenly 
host, the militia of heaven, Luke ii. 14 ; and their opposition to the devil 
is on our behalf, as appears from Kev. xii. 7. And as these engaged with 
thee are greedy and curious spectators and beholders of the issue of every 
temptation, and as I told you there was an invisible world you shall one 
day judge, so there is an invisible world that beholds you in all your actings 
with or for Satan. We are members of that other world, and in fighting 
against sin do carry on that general cause of that other world, striving to 
do God's will on earth as it is done in heaven. God hath ' made us a 
spectacle to angels and to men ' herein, 1 Cor. iv. 9. When Christ had to 



Chap. VI.] in the heart and life. 209 

do with Satan in the wilderness and in the garden, he had angels both 
times to view him and to guard him, and minister unto him. I have 
shewed in another discourse •'■• how Christ had made the devil a public 
example before the world. Col. ii. ; and if the devil gets thee to sin, he 
makes thee a public shame before the same world. ' I charge thee,' says 
Panl to Timothy, ' before Jesus Christ and the elect angels,' walk so and' 
so, 1 Tim. Y. 21. And as the things of this life are made small matters in 
comparison of those of the other world by the apostle, 1 Cor. vi., so thy sin, 
as it is known amongst men (which is but man's day) is a small matter 
unto the blot thou hast in thy reputation before God and Christ, and the 
angels in that other world. And God himself and Christ are the greatest 
spectators of all : 2 Chron. xvi. 9, ' The eyes of the Lord run to and fro 
through the whole earth, to shew himself strong in the behalf of them whose 
heart is perfect towards him : herein therefore thou hast done foolishly,' 
said Hanani the seer unto Asa. Thou hast shamed thyself quite before 
the great God ; you may behold this in the case of Job (and it is worth our 
considering), how both God's heart wrought, and how the devil's, concern- 
ing Job. That conference between God and the devil about him is carried 
so, that you see the heart of each how they are afiected with this spectacle; 
You find God begins and boasteth of Job, as one he liked to talk of: Job 
i. 8, ' Seest thou not my servant Job ? There is none like him on the earth, 
fearing God and resisting evil ;' which the devil could never fasten on him 
or bring him to, as you may see by his conversation. Job xxxi. throughout. 
God boasts of him, as a general would do of some eminent worthy that was 
never yet foiled or taken captive, or as a master or tutor would boast of 
some eminent scholar ; and Oh how this pleased God at the very heart, as I 
may speak with reverence ! Well, when he had given Satan leave to bring 
all these evils on him, and Satan came before God another time, chap. ii. 
10, the thing God again spoke of was still concerning Job : ver. 3, ' And 
the Lord said unto Satan, Hast thou considered my servant Job ? There is 
none like him in the earth, fearing God and eschewing evil, and still he 
holds fast his integrity.' And though thou hast moved me against him, yet 
all thou hast done hath not moved him. Those words, * and still he holds 
fast his integrity,' God let fall on purpose to vex and confound the devil, 
and to shew how much he gloried in it ; and the devil, as put to the foil in 
it, puts it off upon want of some further and greater trial, in which God lets 
him use his skill. The result of both maketh this apparent, how much it 
confounds the devil, to think, I have tempted this man, and I cannot for 
my heart get him to yield ; and on the contrary, how much it rejoiceth God 
to see Satan so often assault a man, and yet still to hold fast his integrity. 
God puts the emphasis there, as on the other side he observes with grief 
how often a man hath been foiled : ' This they have done these ten times,' 
says God, Num. xiv. 22. It mightily heightens the spirit of a soldier to 
fight in the view of his general, that, as Paul says to Timothy ' he may 
please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier,' 2 Tim. ii. 4. True 
stories have many instances, and romances imitate the truth herein, and 
bring in great champions fighting in the sight of their lover, whose honour 
and service they have undertaken. Let us look to Jesus, the author, 
finisher, and crowner of our faith. ' Blessed is he that endureth tempta- 
tion ; for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the 
Lord hath promised to them that love him,' James i. 12. This Paul had in 
his eye. ' I have fought,' says he, ' a good fight ; henceforth there is laid 
* In discourse of Christ the Mediator, B, v. in Vol. III. of his works. 



270 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III. 

up for me a crown of rigliteousness, wbich God, the righteous judge, shall 
give me at that day,' 2 Tim. iv. 7, 8. He eyed God (as they in their 
Olympic concertations did the judges) to see how he stood with a crown and 
a shield. Ps. v. 12, ' Thou, Lord, wilt bless the righteous with favour, thou 
shalt crown him about as with a shield;' so in the original, God both 
assisting as with a shield in the combat, and ready afterwards to crown him 
that overcomes. Oh, whom would not the consideration of these things 
hearten to stand out against sin and Satan therein ! Oh, where are Jobs 
and Pauls to be found on earth, that hold fast their integrity ! 

3. Consider how the general came down into the field, was tempted in all 
things as 3'ou are, and at last died in this quarrel, to overcome on your 
behalf. Now the death of the general enrageth the soldiers, as was seen in 
the battle where Gustavus Adolphus, king of Sweden, lost his life, and they 
make their enemies' lives go for it ; and by his death Christ hath begun to 
make thee free, and hath, as was said, betrusted thine own soul to thee, as 
a castle for thee to defend. If a town or castle hath cost blood, the blood 
of many soldiers to win it, and he to whom it is betrusted should yield it 
up, how heinous would the action be ! So much blood as it cost the 
gaining, so much will be reckoned to the betrayers of it. But hath it been 
the life of ordinary soldiers, or your own conquests, that gained you Hberty ? 
No ; it was the precious blood of Jesus Christ, which redeemed you from 
your vain conversations ; and shalt thou now give it up to his utter enemy 
whom he came to destroy, and whom he by force threw out ? and M'ilt thou 
do this for a few good words, for husks, and such wretched allurements ? 

4. Remember bow it was told thee that thy Saviour perfectly triumphed 
for thee over this devil, as conquered in thy name and stead. Now this is 
a great incentive. As the apostle reasons from his death against sin — ' How 
shall we, that are dead, live any longer therein ? ' — so I from his triumph. 
Thou art more than a conqueror in him, and conquerors fight with other 
spirits than other men, as those that know not how to be foiled. This 
know, that it is thy duty by faith, and thou oughtest and art bound to 
triumph in Christ, and to give thanks for the victory as already past. Paul 
in the midst of the conflict falls a-thanking God : Rom. vii. 25, ' I thank 
my God, through Jesus Christ.' And, 1 Cor. xv. 51, ' Thanks be to God, 
that giveth us the victory, through Jesus Christ our Lord.' 

Now then, 1, if it were but barely betraying what Christ triumphed for, 
how dishonourable were it ! In so doing, look as Christ put the de\'il then 
to open shame, thou puttest Christ to open shame before the devils : as 
Heb. vi., the apostle speaks. Thou makest what in thee lies, Christ's glory- 
ing void, which Paul professeth be would rather die than do. But it is more 
especially so when thou thyself hast also given thanks for the victory 
through faith. View this in the glass of the times, if public thanks have 
been given for a victory, or the gaining of a stronghold, and a triumph 
made upon it, and the great guns let oft' ; for the same persons to yield up 
what themselves thus joined in triumph for, how dishonourable and hateful 
were it ! As thou art to shew forth Christ's death till he comes, so Christ's 
triumph also, and so to act as a conqueror, as to be able to say, I have 
overcome that evil one. Nay, let me tell thee, in case thou yieldest to thy 
lust, thou givest occasion to Satan to triumph ; and that not only against 
thee, but against Christ also ; and so thou not only failest Christ, but 
sharnest hirn. Oh that ever Satan should with an easy suggestion win 
that from Christ which he so triumphed for ! The reason why the devil 
and wicked men rage so in open scandal, and a saint's known falling, is. 



Chap. YI.] in tue heart and life. 271 

because be remembers tbe sbame Cbrlst once put bim to ; and now, tbiuks 
be, I am revenged for it ; and so witb tbe greatest joy bo spreads and 
multipHes tbe report of it, so infinitely dotb be please bimsclf witb it. You 
find in tbe Psalms bow David still prays be migbt not be made a scorn to 
bis enemies, nor tbat tbcy sbould triumpb over bim ; tbe same bolds mucb 
more in respect of spiritual enemies. 

Add unto tbis tbe further baseness of it in this respect, to yield to, and 
to be overcome by, a routed enemy rallying again, by a stigmatized enemy 
(for remember bow Christ used bim), by an enemy tbrust through. If a 
known cheater sbould come to your shop, whose nose is slit, or ears cut 
off, would it not be accounted the greatest folly to be gulled by such an one ? 

Last of all, let it something move thee that we are to be his judges. 
You are to judge the fallen angels ; how will you be fit to do it if you sin 
witb them ! How dishonourable is it for judges to be found to have cast 
their lots with cut-purses and thieves ; or for judges to leave their seats 
(now you ' sit with Christ in heavenly places,' Eph. ii. G), bow unworthy 
and unbecoming is it ! 

I shall conclude witb a few words of further direction and encouragement, 
drawn from what Peter says, 1 Peter v. 9, ' Whom resist.' 

1. From the word ' resist,' consider tbat Satan, who tempts you, is an 
adversary without you, the word dvr/rr-'/jrs dotb import this. Peter speaks 
of them in whom Christ dwells, and bids us understand ourselves herein ; 
that when Satan tempteth any of us, be is but as one that stands without 
us, and we are to withstand bim as one tbat attempteth to come in upon 
us. Compare tbis 1 Peter v. 9 with Eph. vi. 13, ' Take unto you,' says 
Paul, ' tbe whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand,' 
dcr/ffr5;!/a/, those principalities and powers spoken of, ver. 12. Not only 
the like word avTiorr^mi, u-ithstand, imports this, but the other metaphor 
here also ; for it were in vain to exhort a man that bad his enemy in bis 
bosom to put armour on (which is a thing be is clothed with), to withstand 
bim. It is tbe case indeed of every unregenerate man, to have tbe devil 
within bim, who is therefore in the first place to be exhorted to turn from 
Satan to God, and to have Satan cast out of bim ; but a godly man is 
assaulted by Satan from without. Tbat other exhortation also (Eph, iv. 27, 
' Give not place to the devil') argues bim without us, seeking to come in, 
and to get room or place in our hearts. If you give way to a lust, be 
enters in ; yea, it is made one eminent difference between a man uncon- 
verted and converted, tbat Satan is within them whilst unregenerate. 
Hence Christ is said to have cast out of Mary Magdalene seven devils that 
were within her, dwelling as in their own bouse, Luke xii. 24. So in 
1 John iv. 4, tbis difference is put between the world and godly men, that 
Christ is in one, Satan in the other : ' Stronger is he that is in you, than 
he that is in the world.' He doth not only work in wicked men effectually, 
but be himself is ' in them ;' yea, as Christ is said to be in us, and we in 
Christ mutually ; so of tbe world it is said, tbat the devil is in them, and 
tbat they are in the devil : 1 John v. 19, ' The whole world lieth in 
wickedness.' The words in the original are, 0X05 Iv rw ffovjjew -/.u-ai. He bad 
said before, ' He that is born of God keepetb himself (that is, take bis 
■whole course), ' that tbe evil one' 6 rrcr/ifog, ' toucheth him not ;' which 
evidently argues tbat Satan is not in bim, but without him, mucb less is be 
in Satan ; and then be adds these words, ' the whole world lieth,' sv rSi 
<7rov7jsr2i, ' in tbat evil one' (as be had done in the former verse), tbat is, tbe 
devil,' the author of all wickedness. And John in this epistle had designed 



272 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III, 

out the devil by 6 vovTi^hg, that wicked one, chap. ii. 13, 14. Chap. iii. 12, 
* Cain was of that evil one.' And this is a deeper phrase than to say they 
are under his power ; for it implies in its analogy, that as of their natural 
life it is said, they ' live, move, and have their being in God,' so of their 
life as sinful, that they lie and move in Satan, and he is their element as 
it were. They are all as young ones in his belly, and are quickened and 
nourished by that wickedness they take in from him, as the child is by the 
mother. But it is a great advantage to a believer that his enemy is with- 
out him. A strong party may be kept out by a few that are in an house, 
and will stand to defend it ; and therefore give not place to the devil ; but 
if he knocks, open not to him, for if he sets in his bill he will turn the 
master out. Yea, let me strengthen this yet further, that there is a stronger 
within us than is without us : 1 John iv. 4, ' Ye are of God, Httle children, 
and have overcome them ; because greater is he,' viz., Christ, 'that is in 
you, than he that is in the world.' And so it concerns Christ to help us 
to keep possession, more than it doth us, for we are his house, and he as 
a Son is to take care over his own house, Heb. iii. 6 ; and Christ's graces 
in us are the goods. Now it concerns the governor that hath a fort com- 
mitted to him, and is in possession, most to defend it. It concerns him 
in point of honour, though the goods within be of little worth, to defend 
and maintain his own, especially whenas he hath already triumphed over 
the enemy. All our conflicts, therefore, are mainly to shew forth Christ's 
power the more in us. It is true, that against these ships that bunch forth 
with Christ in them, the devil (who is the prince of the air) wuU be sure to 
raise up storms ; but be of good comfort, Christ is in thee, though thou 
art but a poor cock-boat, ready ever and anon to be overwhelmed, and 
Christ will never sufier himself to be cast away. Julius Caesar said to the 
mariner in a storm. Tecum fortunam Casaris vehis ; but a greater than 
Caesar is in thee. All those storms and waves are but to shew his power 
in rebuking them ; go to him and awaken him, and he will do it for thee. 

2. Another encouragement is, that if thou standest stedfast and fixed in 
thine own wall, he cannot hurt thee; this both words, 'resist' and ' sted- 
fast,' do imply. There can be no greater security given to combat with 
any adversary than this, that he cannot wound thee unless thyself will. I 
shall but add this illustration to it : when Christ was tempted by Satan, 
and he had had power to carry his body up to the top of a pinnacle of 
the temple, from whence a child with a push might have thrown him down 
with ease, yet the devil could not ; which is the more observable, in that 
he could hurry and bring his body to the very place (as he can us to an 
object that shall tempt us and bring us into ticklish and tottering circum- 
stances), yet still throw him down he could not, he must have his own 
consent to that, and he could do nothing but persuade. Thus it is with 
thy will, for Christ's temptations are the patterns of ours. Austin makes 
this the wonder, that whereas the devil is a dog in chains, yet lo, how he 
doth prevail, when yet he can only bark and solicit, but hurt and bite 
none but him that is willing, and joins himself to him.* The like hath 
Bernard: Videte fratres qudrn dehilis est hostis, qui von vincit nisi volentem. 

3. Be but stedfast in believing and thou art victorious. Have but an 
inward courage, let not thy heart fail thee, and thou conquerest. ' I have 
prayed,' saith Christ, ' that thy faith fail not.' Keep up thy heart but in 
confidence (so saith the apostle, ' Hold fast your confidence '), for faith 

* Neminem potest mordere nisi enm qui se ei conjunxerit ; latrare potest, sollici- 
tare potest, mordere omnino non potest nisi volentem. 



Chap. VI. j in THii heart and life. 273 

supports it ; yea, it is but having an eye, a look unto Christ, * the author 
aod finisher of our faith,' and unto God, ' the God of all grace,' as the 
10th verse points out. It is but to cry out to him for help in time of need 
(as the word signifies, and as the apostle, Heb. iv. 10, directs us) ; it is 
but to see our own weakness, and to look out for a strength in the grace 
that is in God and in Jesus Christ, and we overcome. 2 Tim. ii. 1, 
' Above all, take' (says the apostle, Eph. vi. 10) ' the shield of faith, where- 
with (alone) ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked 
one.' And the reason the apostle here puts the article, iv rn 'ziarsi, is not 
to note out religion in general, but the eminent use of that grace in this 
victory. ' This is your victory, even your faith,' 1 John v. 4. I enlarge 
not on this, only observe the easiness of such a victory, as an encourage- 
ment to us ; as Christ says, ' Fear not, only believe,' Luke viii. 50. 

I go on unto what is more directly propounded by Peter purposely for 
encouragement, in those words, ' Knowing that the same afflictions are 
accomplished in your brethren that are in the world.' It ought to be a 
comfort and encouragement to us, that to be thus tempted is the common 
lot of all the brotherhood universally in the world. They are all fellow- 
sutferers with us in this kind, not from men only, but from Satan by sore 
and grievous temptations ; and this will afford unto us a double considera- 
tion for encouragement against temptations. 

1. That there are all sorts of temptations dispensed amongst them. If 
they have not that which thou hast, they have some other ; yea, and every 
one hath that which shall be personally most grievous to him. There are 
' manifold temptations,' as James and Peter says, and God eserciseth all 
with one or other ; and the more to lead thee through them, is the more to 
make thee perfect, for Christ was thus made perfect that he ran through 
all ; therefore be not discontented with thy lot. Yea, the apostle intimates 
that the same, the very same that befall any one, do befall some other in 
the world (which is a wide place, and hath many saints in it), ra aura ruv 
'TraQri/j^d'Tuv, ' the same of sufferings ; ' that is, the same sort or kind of 
sufferings that befall one befall some other ; they have all sorts amongst 
them. We have heard Job complaining, says Calvin, did ever the Hke 
befall another ? (in his 3d, 4th, 5th chapters). But the apostle here on 
the contrary saith, that nothing doth befall us in this which we may not 
behold in some or other members of the church. In 1 Cor. x. 13, the 
apostle comforts the Corinthians with this : ' There hath no temptation 
taken you,' saith he, 'but what is common toman; but God is faithful,' &c. 

(1.) He speaks to them as believers, and as considered in the state of 
grace, and as those that were under the protection of God and his promises. 
"Why else doth he comfort them with this word, ' but God is faithful ' ? &c. 

(2.) He speaks of temptations to sin ; yea, of their having been over- 
come of sins, and great sins, idolatry, fornication, murmuring ; and he had 
laid before them great punishments for such sins : 'Let him that standeth,' 
saith he, ' take heed lest he fall,' namely, into sin for time to come. And 
then to comfort them for their having fallen, he adds, there is no tempta- 
tion hath befallen you but what is common to man ; that is, to the saints 
of God as clothed with human infirmity, by reason of which a saint may 
fall into sin. Camero says, sins cannot be meant, because the pronaise is, 
* they shall be able to bear them ; ' now it is not a promise to the saints to 
be alDle to bear sins. But I answer, that promise imports two things. 

1. That sins are sufferings to the saints, and the greatest. Why else 
doth he speak of bearing them, and speak of this as proper to a saint ? 



274 OF GOSPEL HOLINESS [BoOK III. 

2. The promise is not that their spirits should bear them, that is, brook 
them, as being contented with them as sins, but that they should be able 
to submit to the providence of God under them, and not despair, as Calvin 
saith ; and submission to God in point of sinnings, and bearing up one's 
heart not to despair, is the greatest patience. 

A second ground of encouragement is from this, that all the brotherhood's 
being involved thus in temptations is part of the communion of saints. 
Consider how not all singly, but all jointly as one man, are engaged with 
you in the same strivings ; and so helping one another, ye strive together 
as one man, and 

Multorum manibus grande levatur opus ; 
one is fighting in one place, another in another ; one against one lust, 
another against another ; and this should hearten all and every one. This 
mightily encourageth soldiers that they fight together. Now thou hast the 
hearts of all the saints with thee ; yea, every one helps each other by their 
prayers, by their victories ; yea, by virtue of this communion of saints, all 
the prayers thou puttest up for thyself are for the whole, and what thou 
losest is lost to the whole party. How doth this move the Jesuits in their 
undertakings everywhere in the world ! What thou winnest is won to the 
whole party ; every prayer thou puttest up for thyself is put up for the 
whole, as Christ in that his form of prayer hath instructed us. And at the 
latter day you will all rejoice together, and stories will be told who did 
most valiantly at such and such a time ; how thou wert stormed, and the 
devil's mine sprung, which he had been a long while a- contriving, and how 
thou stoodest it out against all. 

CHAPTER VII. 

Motives unto holy obedience, and unto a boldness in our Christian profession, 
drawn from the majesty of the Lord that appears therein. — With an exhor- 
tation to preserve it, and the means of maintaining the honour of our pro- 
fession. 

For Herod feared John, knoiriny that he was a just man and an holy, and 
observed him ; and when he heard him, he did many things, and heard him 
gladly.— KhRS. VI. 20. 

We have here a great and strange wonder — a wolf, or as Christ called 
him, * a fox,' afraid of a lamb. Herod, a king, is afraid of John Baptist, 
which shews a plain contest between two majesties, which should overcome. 
We have here a king reverencing a greater majesty than his own, in a sub- 
ject, and in a subject too of the meanest outside, clad not in silk, ' as those 
in king's houses ' (as Christ said of him), but in camel's hair. I may upon 
such a strange encounter say, What ailest thou, Herod, that thou fear- 
est John ? Look on him ; what is it thou viewest in him to work the least 
degree of fear ? Art not thou a king ? Take heart, reassume spirit. Ay, 
but he is an holy and a just man, and overcomes me (says Herod), and 
that is all the reason indeed. ' Herod feared John, knowing him that he 
was a just man and an holy, and reverenced him ; and when he heard him, 
he did many things, and heard him gladly.' 

There are two doctrines natural to this scripture. 

1. That there is a glory and majesty shines in the graces and lives of 
holy and just men, so far as they are holy. 



Chap. VII. J is the heart and life. 275 

2. That there is a special majesty and authority discovers itself in the 
■word of God preached, when it is delivered and administered by holy men. 
Here is both fear and reverence, as the etfects assigned to a double cause : 
(1.) Reverence to his preaching upon hearing of him. (2.) Fear, because 
be knew that he in his person was a just and holy man. 

1. I say there is, as an authority, so a majesty, for it encounters here 
with the majesty of a king, and outshines it to an awe and reverence : and 
therefore must be in its kind, a majesty greater than what was stamped 
upon him. There are other proofs of it, as in Isa. xxvi. 10, ' the majesty 
of the Lord ' is said to ' shine in the land of uprightness.' And these two 
sentences are strictly to be conjoined as to this sense, that where up- 
rightness in righteous men dwells, there, in those upright men, the majesty 
of the Lord shines and appears, which wicked men's consciences, though 
glimmeringly, do discern, although they will not behold, that is, acknow- 
ledge it. The reasons of the doctrine are, 

(1.) Because God is in them, and darteth eminent beams of his majesty 
out from them, in their conversations : 2 Cor. vi. 16, ' I will dwell in them 
and walk in them ; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people ; ' 
and 1 John iv. 16, 'He dwelleth in God, and God in him.' God is said 
to be in them ; therefore, as the body hath a majesty in it, which appears 
in the subjection of beasts to the face of man, because a reasonable soul 
dwells in it, and a majesty answerable to such a soul appears in it, so it is 
here. And as Solomon's temple, wherein God manifested his glorious pre- 
sence, is therefore said to be glorious in the Scriptures, much more are 
these living temples of the Holy Ghost, wherein God keeps his court and 
residence. The King of glory cannot come into the heart (as he is said to 
come into the hearts of his people as such, Ps. xxiv. 9, 10), but some 
glory of himself will appear ; and as God doth accompany the word with 
majesty, because it is his word, so he doth accompany his own children, 
and their ways, with majesty, yea, even in their greatest debasements. As 
when Stephen was brought before the council, as a prisoner at the bar for 
his life, then God manifested his presence to him, for it is said, ' his face 
shone as the face of an angel of God,' Acts vi. 15; in a proportionable 
manner it is ordinarily true what Solomon says of all righteous men, ' A 
man's wisdom makes his face to shine,' Eccles. viii. 1. Thus Peter also 
speaks : 1 Pet. iv. 14, 'If you be reproached for the name of Christ, happy 
are you : for the Spirit ' not only of God, or of grace, but ' of glory resteth 
upon you.' And so in the martyrs, their innocency, and carriage, and 
godly behaviour, what majesty had it with it. "What an amiableness in the 
sight of the people, which daunted, dashed, and confounded their most 
wretched opposers ; so that, although the wicked persecutors ' did eat up 
God's people as bread' (as it is Ps. xiv. 4, 5), yet it is added that they 
were in great fear upon this very account, ' that God is in the generation 
of the just.' God stands, as it were, astonished at their dealings : '_Have 
the workers of iniquity no knowledge ' (so in the words afore) ' that^ eat 
up my people as bread,' and make no more ado of it than a man doth that 
heartily eats his meat ? They seem to do thus, they would carry it and bear 
it out ; but for all that they are in great fear whilst they do thus, and God 
strikes their hearts with terror then when they most insult. Why ? For 
' God is in the generation of, or dwelleth in the just,' and God gives often 
some glimmerings, hints, and warnings to the wicked (such as Pilate had 
concerning Christ) that his people are righteous. And this you may see in 
Philip, i. 28, * And in n