| LI BRARY OF CONGR ESS, t
J UNITED STATES OF AM E RICA. \
Seed Thoughts,
t) OR
V
SELECTIONS
FROM
CARYL'S EXPOSITION OF JOB,
WITH AN INTEODUCTI05,
BY THE
Rev. J. E. ROCKWELL, D.D.
PHILADELPHIA :
PRESBYTERIAN BOARD OF PUBLICATION,
No. 821 CHESTNUT STREET.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1869, by
THE TRUSTEES OF THE
PRESBYTERIAN BOARD OF PUBLICATION,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the
Eastern District of Pennsylvania.
Westoott & Thomson,
Stereotypers, Philada.
LC Control Number
tmp96 027366
INTRODUCTION.
In the course of a series of morning readings of the Scrip-
tures in connection with Kitto's Daily Bible Illustrations,
I met with the first notice of Caryl's Exposition of Job.
The passage which attracted my attention is as follows :
1 ' There is a work which few men possess, and which we
are assured that no man alive ever ventured to read through.
It is in two mighty folios, containing together between four
thousand and five thousand pages of closely-printed matter,
in double column. The grandfathers of our grandfathers
liked to write such books, and even liked to read them.
With patient diligence the author returned from day to
day during half a life to his task, slowly building, brick by
brick, the vast monument of his industry, his learning, his
fame, and, it may be, sometimes of his folly. But the
readers were of like sort. They had none of the modern
fancy for small books which one may hold in the hand
without wearying it as he lounges in his easy-chair. They
liked to see a great book, which required an effort to lift, and
which, therefore, remained a fixture upon their tables for
months or years, while with strong powers of digestion they
returned day by day to take in a fresh morsel of the pon-
derous meal. There belongs to these days a story of this
very book, that the son of a reverend divine left his father
engaged thereon when he departed on a voyage to India,
3
4 IX m 01) UCTION.
and on his return, found him still engaged on the first vol-
ume, though the pile of leaves to the left of the reader had
indeed considerably increased, and that to the right dimin-
ished."
All this work is upon the Book of Job, whose patience
the author seemed bent on affording the world an op-
portunity of exemplifying. It is by Joseph Caryl, " some-
times preacher to the honourable Society of Lincoln's Inn,
and more lately of St. Magnus, near London Bridge." It
was published in 1672, " Printed by Samuel Simmons, and
to be sold at his house, next door to the Golden Lion, in
Aldergate street."
The sarcastic Warburton says that ' ' Job was strangled
by Caryl," and Owen calls this process of exposition a
mode of treating the word of God which partakes more of
entombing than of exhibiting it. Nevertheless, the pa-
tience which the work exacts will in the end be rewarded,
as well as that of Job. It is not only an elaborate, but a
most learned, sound and pious work — a mine from which
he who has courage to explore it will come back laden with
precious things. In a foot-note the author asks, ' c How is
it that such books ever become scarce ? Why should not
all the copies have lasted as well as our own, which is in a
perfectly fresh and sound condition ? People do not will-
ingly destroy such books as these; what becomes of them?"
Shortly after reading the above, and having my interest in
the work more thoroughly awakened by reading the ex-
tracts from it which are found in Kitto, I met with the
Exposition in looking over the shelves of an old book-store,
and it has been in my library for more than twelve years.
INTRODUCTION. 5
The copy which I possess is in twelve quarto volumes, well
preserved, and has evidently been carefully studied. On a
fly-leaf of the twelfth volume, in the hand of one who was
its owner in the year 1740, is written these words: ''Lector,
si cupis Dominum Cognoscere Librr' — "Reader, if you
seek for the Lord, inquire in this hook." The first volume
was issued in 1651, and the last in 1666. There must have
been some delay in the printing of this work, as the first
preface was dated November 3, 1643, and the usual parlia-
mentary notice concerning its publication was issued in
May, 1645. Each volume of this work contains from five
hundred to one thousand pages. The title-page of the first
volume reads as follows :
AN
EXPOSITION
WITH
PRACTICAL OBSERVATIONS
UPON
The Three First Chapters of the Book of Job.
Delivered in xxi Lectures at Magnus,
near the Bridge, London.
By Joseph Caryl, Preacher to the Honourable Society of
Lincoln's Inn.
James 5: Verse 10, 11.
Take my brethren, the prophets, who have spoken in the name of the Lord,
for an example of suffering, affliction and patience.
Behold we count them happy which endure. Ye have heard of the patience
of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord : that the Lord is very pitiful and of
tender mercy.
LONDON :
Printed for Luke Fawn, at the Parrot in Paul's Church Yard, and
■ H. Cripps and L. Lloyd, in Pope's Head Alley, MDCLI.
6 INTRODUCTION.
In his preface to the last volume the learned and pious
author remarks: "Through the all-disposing providence of
God and the importunate call of not a few friends, I began
this work; and now, after twenty-four years of travel,
making twelve stages (in so many parts the whole has come
forth), I am come to the end of it." The fact that several
editions of his work were published within a few years
shows the value which was set upon it in those days. Be-
sides the folio copy alluded to by Kitto, and the edition
in twelve volumes first issued, Home, in his Introduction
to the Study of the Bible, speaks of it as having been pub-
lished in six books, and adds, ' ' I have never had an op-
portunity of examining it, but Wachi eulogizes it in very
high terms. It is now very little read or even consulted,
few readers being able to wade through two large folio
volumes. ' '
But little has been recorded of the life of Caryl. He was
a learned Nonconformist minister, who lived and laboured
during the time of Cromwell, and who was so much in
favour with him as to have been appointed one of his chap-
lains, in connection with Dr. Owen, to attend him to Scot-
land. In Neal's History of the Puritans we meet with this
brief notice of his life :
"Mr. Joseph Caryl, M. A., the ejected minister of St.
Magnus, London Bridge, was born of genteel parents, in
London, 1602, educated in Exeter College, and afterward
preacher in Lincoln's Inn. He was a member of the As-
sembly of Divines, and afterward one of the triers for the
approbation of ministers, in all of which stations he ap-
peared a man of great learning, piety and modesty. He
INTRODUCTION. 7
was sent by the Parliament to attend the king at Holmly
House, and was one of their commissioners in the treaty of
the Isle of Wight. After his ejectment in 1662, he lived
privately in London, and preached to his congregation as
the times would permit. He was a moderate Independent,
and distinguished himself by his learned Exposition upon
the Book of Job. He died universally lamented by all his
acquaintances, February 7, 1672-3, and in the seventy-first
year of his age. ' '
In a foot-note by the editor it is added of the Exposition :
" This work was printed in two volumes folio, consisting of
upward of six hundred sheets, and there was also an edition
in twelve volumes 4to." "One just remark," says Mr.
Granger, l ' has been made on its utility : that it is a very
sufficient exercise for the virtue of patience, which it was
chiefly intended to inculcate and improve."
In a second note by the American editor it is said : ' ' It
is not amiss to add that very few works of equal magnitude
contain so much piety and good sense. This commentary
— for such it may be termed — is highly prized, and a copy
is never to be met with in a London catalogue but at a high
price. It is one of the scarcest theological books, and, on
account of its size, not likely to meet a reprint."
This voluminous exposition of Job, of which such a va-
riety of opinions is held, was first delivered by Caryl in
the form of lectures to his people, few of which could have
occupied less than an hour in the delivery, and many must
have occupied an hour and a half. Many a congregation
of modern times, accustomed to brief essays on some moral
or religious subject, and looking anxiously for the last leaf
8 INTRODUCTION.
of the sermon if it exceed half an hour, would have deserted
such a preacher ; and many others, who prefer to hear po-
litical discussions or popular harangues, mingled with pleas-
ant stories and occasional flashes of wit, would have soon
wearied of hearing these long and connected unfoldings and
enforcements of gospel truths. But. in those days, "the
word of God was precious," and Christians were fed and
nourished by its glorious truths. Year after year they lis-
tened to that learned and godly pastor while he opened to
their minds the Scriptures, and Sabbath after Sabbath came
to see what new riches he had brought up from the mine in
which all the week he had been busily at work. His ser-
mon would never have drawn together a crowd in modern
times. Probably the most judicious of homiletical critics
would have called him prosy, and pronounced his style un-
suited to the wants of the Church. There is much of appa-
rently needless repetition, though the attentive reader will
find that each repetition is designed to bring out a fresh
thought, or to give to the first some new light. Each turn
of the diamond presents a new series of brilliant refractions
of the sunbeam that falls upon it.
There is much that appears prolix and dry, yet the pa-
tient reader will often be startled with some unexpected and
precious display of gospel truths, when the author seems to
dwell and insist upon some text that in his estimation
might be passed over with but a moment's notice. There
is a quaintness of speech which may sometimes excite a
smile, but it also serves to fix more indelibly in the mind
the thought which it embodies. There is a marvellous
facility of what might be called in a good sense "double
INTRO D TJCTIOX. 9
entendre," which startles the reader with the power of the
text of which he had never dreamed before. The author
often indulges in a play on words, which is exceedingly rich
and instructive. When speaking of the sin of rebelling
against the light he says, "As God sometimes brings judg-
ments upon men in perfection, so men sin against God some-
times in perfection. ' ' He often uses the same word several
times in the same sentence, but at each repetition brings
out a new truth. When commenting on the verse (Psalm
xcii. 12), "The righteous shall flourish like a palm tree,"
etc. , he says, ; ' Here is not only a mention of growing, but of
flourishing, and here's flourishing three times mentioned ;
and 'tis growing and flourishing not only like a tree, but
like a palm tree (which flourisheth under oppression), and
like a cedar (not growing in ordinary places, but) in Leba-
non, where were the goodliest cedars. ' '
The lectures of Caryl abound in proverbial and pithy
sayings, which are scattered in rich profusion through the
whole work, many of which appear in the selections here
made. The Exposition, which is a monument of his genius
and piety — and, many would say, of his folly — though volu-
minous and full of repetitions and often prolix, is still a vast
treasury of sound and learned criticism, of able and sug-
gestive comments, and of pious and profitable reflections.
It is too vast for any man to undertake to read through.
Yet every page on which the eye rests contains some wise
and pithy sentiment which may well be remembered, and
often may serve as a subject for long and serious study.
As a commentar3 7 on the Scriptures it is eminently thorough
and scholarly ; as a system of theology it is sound and com-
10 INTRODUCTION.
plete ; and as a work of practical and experimental religion
it is exceedingly rich and instructive. It is marvellous with
what readiness and skill the learned author has pressed in
other portions of the holy Scriptures to explain and illus-
trate the text of Job. His Exposition is indeed a thorough
commentary upon the Bible.
In each volume there is an Index of Texts, used for his
illustrations of the Book of Job. These indices extend
over five or six pages each, with three closed-printed
columns to each page. Frequently there is to be met a
full and rich exposition of the texts thus quoted, serving
to throw fresh light upon them in their new relations,
bringing clearly to light the gospel in that most ancient of
the biblical writings, and making thus a valuable com-
mentary upon the whole of the sacred volume. This vast
work is too voluminous ever to be reproduced from the
press ; nor, perhaps, is it desirable that it should be. Yet
there is a mine of precious thoughts which will well repay
the exploration on the part of those who have access
thereto. There are valuable suggestions which will give
to the thoughtful food for contemplation and subjects for in-
vestigation. There are instructions for the advanced Chris-
tian, comforting words for the afflicted, and clear and vivid
statements of gospel doctrine which all may read with profit.
The collation and arrangement of the few out of many
thoughts which are here brought together has been a work
full of pleasure and profit. If it shall prove so to others,
the labour expended thereon will not have been in vain.
J. E. R.
Edgewater, Staten Island, October, 1868.
ANALYSIS OF THE BOOK OF JOB.
The main subject of the Book of Job is contained in one
verse of the 34th Psalm : " Many are the afflictions of the
righteous, but the Lord delivereth him out of them all."
Two questions are handled and disputed fully and clearly :
1st. Whether it doth consist with the justice and good-
ness of God to afflict a righteous and sincere person, to
strip him naked, to take away all his outward comfort; or
whether it doth consist with the goodness and justice of
God that it should go ill with those that are good and well
with those that are evil.
2d. Whether we may judge of the righteousness or un-
righteousness, of the sincerity or hypocrisy, of any person
by the outward dealings and present dispensations of God
toward him.
The whole argument or dispute of the friends of Job may
be reduced to this one syllogism : " He that is afflicted, and
greatly afflicted, is certainly a great, open sinner or a noto-
rious hypocrite." But Job, thou art afflicted, and greatly
afflicted — therefore, certainly thou art, if not a great, open
sinner, a notorious hypocrite. Besides this, there are many
discourses falling in collaterally which concur to make up
the subject of the book.
11
12 ANALYSIS OF THE BOOK OF JOB.
1st. We have the character of a discreet and faithful
master and father in a family.
2d. We have the character of a faithful, zealous and just
magistrate.
3d. We have a great discovery made in the secrets of
Nature.
4th. Here are discourses of Christian morals, of the du-
ties of equity from man to man, of the duties of piety which
man oweth to God, and of the duties of sobriety and tem-
perance toward himself.
Lastly, here are many discoveries made of God in him-
self and his attributes — in his power, wisdom, justice, good-
ness and faithfulness. In a word, this book is a summary
of all knowledge, human and divine.
Respecting the division of this book, we may regard it —
1st. As a dialogue, having eight collocutors or speakers;
or,
2d. As a disputation, with opponents, respondents and a
moderator.
3d. We may divide the book into three parts, and so it
sets forth — 1st, Job's happy condition; 2d, his calamity;
3d, his restoration.
As for the scope or use of this book —
First. It aims at our instruction, and that in divers things :
1st. It instructs us how to handle a cross ; how to behave
ourselves when we are in a conflict, whether outward or in-
ward ; what the postures of the spiritual war are, and with
what patience we ought to bear the hand of God and his
dealings with us.
2d. God would have us learn that afflictions come not hy
ANALYSIS OF THE BOOK OF JOB. 13
chance — that the} 7 are all ordered by Providence, in the
matter, in the manner and in the measure.
3d. Another thing we are to learn from this book is this:
the sovereignty of God — that he hath power over us, over
our estates, our bodies, our families and our spirits ; that
he may use us as he pleases, and we must be quiet under
his hand ; when he cometh and will take from us all our
comforts, we must give all glory to him. This book is
written for this especially, to teach us the sovereignty of
G od and the submission of the creature.
4th. It teaches us that God doth sometimes afflict his
children out of prerogative ; that though there be no sin in
them, which he makes the occasion of afflicting them, yet
for the exercise of his grace in them, for the trial of their
graces and to set them up for patterns to the world, God
may and doth afflict them. Though no man be without sin,
yet the afflictions of many are not for their sins.
5th. There is this general instruction which God would
have us learn out of this book — that the most justly-pos-
sessed and best-secured estate in outward things is uncer-
tain ; that is, there is no trusting to any creature comforts.
6th. God would show his people the strength and stabil-
ity of faith. How unconquerable it is — what a kind of om-
ni potency there is in grace ! God would have all the world
take notice of this in the Book of Job, that a godly person
is in vain assaulted by friends or enemies, by men or devils,
by wants or wounds ; though he be even benighted in his
spirit, though God himself take away the light of his counte-
nance from him. yet God would have us learn and know that
over all these a true believer is more than conqueror. For
14 ANALYSIS OF THE BOOK OF JOB.
here is one of the greatest battles fought that ever was be-
tween man and man, between man and hell, yea, between
God and man ; yet Job went away with the victory. True,
grace is often assaulted ; it never was or ever shall be over-
thrown.
7th. This also we may learn — that God never leaves or
forsakes his totally or finally.
8th. Lastly, the book teaches us that the judgments
of God are often secret, but they are never unjust; that
though the creature be unable to give a reason of them,
yet there is an infinite reason for them. These are the
general uses from the general scope and intendment of the
book by way of instruction.
Secondly. This book serves to convince and reprove —
1st. That slander of worldly men and of Satan, who say
that the people of God serve him for their own end.
2d. It is to convince and reprove all those who judge of
the spiritual estate of those that are under the hand of God
in sore afflictions by some unbecoming and rash speeches
which may fall from them in the time of these their con-
flicts when troubles and sufferings are upon them.
3d. To convince and confute those who judge of men's
spiritual estates by God's dealing with them in their out-
ward estates.
4th. To convince and confute that cursed opinion that a
man may fall finally and totally away from grace and from
the favour of God. God hath showed by this history that
such an opinion is a lie. Certainly God would have all the
world know that free grace will uphold his for ever.
5th. To convince all those of pride and extreme presump-
ANALYSIS OF THE BOOK OF JOB. 15
tion who think to find out and to trace the secrets of God's
counsels, the secrets of God's eternal decrees, the secrets
of all his works of providence; whereas God showeth them
in this book that they are not able to find out or compre-
hend his ordinary works ; they are not able to comprehend
the works of creation : how are they able then to find out
the counsels of God in his decrees and purposes and judg-
ments?
Thirdly. There is much for consolation —
1st. That all things do work for the good of those that
love God.
2d. That no temptation shall ever take hold of us but
such as God will either make us able to have, or make a
way of escape out of it. We can be in no condition cast so
low but the hand of God can reach us, find us, send in de-
liverance and raise us up again.
Lastly. There are two general exhortations —
1st. We are exhorted to the meditation and admiration
of the power and wisdom of God from all the creatures.
2d. To glorify God in every condition, to have good
thoughts of God, to speak good words for God in every
condition. We are drawn to this by considering how Job
(though sometimes in vehemency of spirit he overshot him-
self, yet he recovers again and again) breathes sweetly con-
cerning God, showing that his spirit was full of sweetness
toward God, even when God was writing bitter things
against him, as when he saith, "Though he kill me, yet
will I trust in him ; ' ' than which nothing could express a
more holy or submissive frame of heart in reference to the
dealings of God with him.
Seed Thoughts,
. ABUNDANCE.
ABUNDANCE cannot satisfy. He only is well
who hath enough, and he is best who hath (in
temporals) the least, enough.
A MAN doth not live more days, nor more
cheerfully any day, because he lives plen-
tifully.
AS there are some graces of a Christian which
come not to trial till we are in want, so there
are other graces which come not to trial till we
have abundance. Want trieth our patience and
our dependence upon God, and abundance trieth
our temperance, our humility, our liberality, yea,
and our dependence upon and faith in God for the
sanctifying blessing and making comfortable to us,
which we have. — Job xxii. 28.
2 17
18 SEED THOUGHTS.
I
T is hard to abound in riches and not to trust in
them.
T
O see man rich in purse and poor in spirit is a
great wonder.
THE godly do not please themselves that they
have much good laid up for many years in
their own stock, in their lands, in their houses, in
their purses, in their shops ; but they please them-
selves that they have good laid up for many years,
yea, for eternity, in the promises of God.
SOME of the choice servants of God have been
afraid, when they have seen much of the world
come in, lest God should put them off with such
worldly things; when their table hath been full of
fatness and dainties, when they have had houses
and lands, gold and silver plenty, they have been
troubled lest God should say to them, " There is
your all." It is said of Luther, when he had a
considerable present sent to him from a great prince
(the duke of Saxony, I remember), this came from
his heart : " I hope God will not put me off with
these things. With gifts from princes I shall be
SEED THOUGHTS. 19
hungry as long as I live if I have nothing to feed
upon but what is of the world, and poor as long
as I live if I have no other treasure but what is
earthly ;" and thereupon protested he would not be
satisfied with the best things of this word, though
content with anything.
A
ACQUAINTANCE WITH GOD.
GODLY man is (as we may say) one of God's
acquaintances.
THOUGH God doth not refuse acquaintance
with many poor souls when their necessities
drive them to him, yet it is best to acquaint our-
selves with him for the love we bear to him or the
desire we have to enjoy him, rather than for the
need we have of him.
TILL we do acquaint ourselves with God we can
have no peace with him.
OUR daily holy walking is a daily acquainting
ourselves with God ; every step of a holy life
is both toward and with God.
20 SEED THOUGHTS.
G
OD is ready to give peace, or to be at peace with
those that acquaint themselves with him.
ADVOCATE.
SIN hath made a breach ; there needs a Mediator
to heal it. God and sinful man are two, and
they cannot be made one but by a third. Christ
appears for us in heaven (Heb. ix. 24). He ap-
pears as an attorney in court for his client.
C HEIST is very ready to speak for and plead
the cause of poor sinners before God his Father.
Christ is easy to be entreated ; he is found of them
that seek him not ; then surely he will be found of
those that seek him.
WE are sure all shall go well with us in the
court of heaven while we have Christ our Ad-
vocate with the Father. And that we may have
fulness of confidence to come to God by Christ, let
us consider these five things :
1st. Christ is most wise to manage our cause —
so wise that he is the wisdom of the Father.
2d. Christ is an eloquent Advocate, a powerful
SEED THOUGHTS. 21
Orator. As no man ever spake like him to man,
so no man ever spake like him to God.
3d. Christ is a faithful Advocate. His interces-
sion is a part of his priestly office. We have a
faithful High Priest, therefore a faithful Advocate.
4th. Christ is a merciful Advocate. He lays our
cause to heart ; our cause is his cause. He hath
espoused the interests of his people, and does all
upon his own account. Christ had an ability of
sufficiency to be merciful to us as God, though he
had never been made like unto us by becoming
man, but he had not that ability (as some speak)
of idoneity or fitness to be merciful. His being
made like unto us hath given him a double idoneity
for the tenderness of his heart toward us. First,
in that he himself suffered, being tempted; his
passions in the flesh w T ere great. Secondly, in that
himself suffers still in all our temptations ; his
compassions with our flesh are great. Now an ad-
vocate who either hath had a trouble of experience
in his ow r n person, or is full of the sense of his cli-
ent's trouble, will certainly do his utmost to relieve
him, because in his relief himself is relieved also.
5th. Christ is the favourite of the Judge; it is a
great advantage to have one pleading for us at the
bar who is a favourite of the bench. Christ is
22 SEED THOUGHTS.
highly in favour with the bench. God hath testi-
fied from heaven, " This is my beloved Son, in
whom I am well pleased." The Judge is our Ad-
vocate, Friend and Father.
Lastly, that we may be well assured that he will
do his utmost for us, our Advocate calls us his
friends. As the Judge is his friend before whom
he pleads, so every saint is his friend for whom he
pleads. Some will do more for friendship than for
a fee. We know it is so w T ith Jesus Christ ; he
pleads for his people because they are his friends.
This, Job makes use of here : " He will plead for a
man with God and the son of man for his friend."
As if Job had said, " I know that I have a friend
in Christ, and Christ looks on me as his friend,
and therefore I have highest confidence that he
will plead my cause and take off this scandal." —
Job xvi. 21.
THE Mediator between God and man hath been
known in all ages under a twofold nature — both
God and man.
ADVICE,
11 HE good which others do by our advice and
- counsel is reckoned as done by ourselves.
SEED THOUGHTS. 23
IT is a wise course in advising others to show
ourselves ready to follow the same advice. It
was a speech of one of the ancients, " I never taught
my people anything but what I had first practiced
and experimented myself." Doctrine is sooner fol-
lowed by the eye than by the ear. He that, like
the Pharisees, saith and doeth not, shall find but
few to do what he saith. It is very sinful to give
counsel which we will not take. Our works ought
to be the practice of our words, and as practicable
as our words. Woe unto those of whom it may be
said, as Christ of the Pharisees (Matt, xxiii. 3),
" Whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe
and do, but do not ye after their works." — Job v. 8.
IT wins exceedingly upon others to take our coun-
sel when it appears we are ready to follow the
same.
(COUNSEL ourselves. It puts strength into a
^ rule when he that gives it is ready to enliven
it by his own practice.
COUNSEL is the extract of reason, both about
what we are to do or leave undone.
24 SEED THOUGHTS.
H
ASTINESS in counsel always makes waste,
and so doth hastiness in action.
THEY who will not take time to consult about
what they do may have time enough to repent
of what they have done.
AFFLICTIONS.
AFFLICTION is the trial and touchstone of sin-
cerity. When God doth afflict you, then he
doth bring you to the touchstone to see whether
you are good metal or no ; he doth bring you then
to the furnace to try whether you be dross or gold.
Affliction is the great discoverer that unmasks us.
Some will hold on with God as long as the sun
shineth, as long as it is fair weather. But if the
storm arise, if troubles come — whether personal or
public— then they pull in their heads, then they
deny and forsake God, then they draw back from
and betray his truth. While religion and prosperity
go together, it is hard to say which a man follows ;
but when once they are forced to a separation,
where the heart was will soon be manifest. — Job
i. 11.
SEED THOUGHTS. 25
AFFLICTIONS send the people of God home to
God. "Then Job fell down and worshipped."
Afflictions are a great advantage to the servants of
God ; for when the world frowns most, then they
beg most for the smiles of God ; when the world is
strange to them and will not look on them, then
they get more familiarity and close communion
with God. When God is striking, then Job is
praying ; when God is afflicting, then Job falls to
worshipping. Grace makes every condition work
glory to God, and God makes every condition work
good to them who have grace. — Job i. 20.
IF we bless God in our afflictions, then our afflic-
tions are blessings unto us. We have so much
blessing in our afflictions as we can bless God for
our afflictions. Here is an heavenly alchemy :
Whatsoever affliction you touch with blessing God,
you turn that affliction to a blessing. If you have
an iron yoke of affliction upon you, do but touch it
w^ith blessing God, it turneth it into gold. When
you have a heavy cross upon you, ready to weigh
►you down, do but touch it with this word from the
heart, and it makes it as a crown of glory upon
your head. — Job i. 21.
26 SEED THOUGHTS.
TT^HEN God afflideth us with sufferings we ought
* * to afflict ourselves, to humble our souls for sin.
Smarting times are good repenting times, and world-
ly sorrow should get the company of godly sorrow.
It is not safe to be alone with worldly sorrow that
works death ; but if we mingle a few tears for sin
and our unkindness to Christ with these tears, then
they will refresh us. No question but Job at this
time (of his affliction) fell a-searching of his heart
and a-trying of his ways, renewing his repentance
and assuring of his peace with God.. When afflic-
tions cause us to return thus within our own hearts,
they have then a secret influence, a blessed opera-
tion upon us. — Job i. 20.
ACROSS without a Christ never made any man
better, but with Christ all are made better by
the cross.
NATURALLY every man seeks the reason of
his sorrows and afflictions out of himself.
When man is afflicted, he is not willing to own him-
self as the cause of his afflictions, or to acknowledge
that they spring from his sin. — Job v. 6.
SEED THOUGHTS. 27
AFFLICTIONS come from God. When God
gives, it is an act of bounty, and when he
takes, it is an act of justice, for he is sovereign
Lord in both. Every evil of affliction or of trou-
ble is said to be the Lord's doing, because it cannot
be done without the Lord. Wicked men in all
their plots and all their successes are either the rod
of God to chasten his people for their sins, or else
they are God's furnace to try his people's graces
and purge them from their sins. Hence we should
in all our afflictions look beyond the creature. In
all the evils we either feel or fear, let our hearts be
carried up unto God. — Job i. 20.
GOLD is never wronged by being tried,
I
T is not correction, but the hand of God in it and
with it, which makes us happy.
WHEN God lays the rod of correction upon his
child, he aims at the purging out of his sin,
at the preventing of his sin, at the revealing of a
fatherly displeasure against him for sin.
28 SEED THOUGHTS.
EVERY affliction is a messenger from God. It
hath somewhat to say to us from heaven, and
God will not bear it if his messenger be despised
how much soever.
WHEN God lays his hand upon us, he would
have us lay it to our hearts. Some err by
neglecting the hand of God as light, and others by
fainting under it as too heavy. As a good heart
takes notice of or will not despise a little the least
comfort, so it will take notice of and not despise
the least cross.
A FFLICTIONS are but the higher services and
A
employments of grace,
AFFLICTIONS, blessed and made effectual by
God, make a gracious change in man. How
many ignorant men have, with correction, received
instruction ! How many proud men been made
humble, and of carnal spiritual ! How many unruly
spirits have been brought in compass, and stubborn
ones subdued with a rod ! The rod and the word
work miracles when God works with them. — Job
xi. 12.
SEED THOUGHTS. 29
GOD takes the most eminent and choicest of his
servants for the choicest and most eminent
afflictions. They who have received most grace
from God are able to bear most afflictions from God.
AFFLICTION doth not hit the saints by chance,
but by direction. God doth not draw his bow
at a venture. Every one of his arrows goes upon
a special errand, and touches no breast but that
against whom it was sent. It is not only the grace
but the glory of a believer when he can stand as a
butt-mark and take affliction quietly.
A GODLY man may see two things in the
heaviest strokes of his affliction, which may
provoke him to thanksgiving — at least which may
stop him from all immoderate complaining. First,
that God hath a respect to his good in his heaviest
afflictions, and that the issue shall certainly be good
to him ; and secondly, that how heavy soever his
stroke is, his sin hath deserved a heavier, and that
God could have made it heavier, even his little
finger heavier upon him than his loins have been. —
Job xxiii. 2.
30 SEED THOUGHTS.
A LL the afflictions of this life are less than our
-^ sins.
AFFLICTION is called a rod because of the
smart of it, in regard to the hand that useth it
and the end for which it is sent.
AFFLICTION doth not separate from Christ.
When Job could call nothing in or of the
world his, he could call Christ his; though he
could not say, My health, my strength, my riches,
my friends, my beauty — for all these had departed
from him — yet he could say, My Redeemer, for
Christ was not departed from him. This was
Paul's assurance and the triumph of his faith (Ro-
mans viii. 35). Unless saints were conquered, yea,
unless Christ himself were conquered, they cannot
be separated from Christ. — Job xix. 25.
WHEN prayer is sent out with a cry to God in
affliction, it is a wonder if it be not presently
heard. As affliction puts us upon crying to God,
so crying puts God upon doing for us.
s
SEED THOUGHTS. 31
AJNTS have affliction days, and the wicked an
eternity of affliction.
WE can never be brought so low by any afflic-
tion or disease but God can bring us up again.
How easily can God command a resurrection from
affliction who can command it from the grave!
And therefore he, by a resurrection from the grave,
represented to Ezekiel the resurrection of his people
Israel from their affliction. Both or all things are
alike easy to Him to whom nothing is hard. — Job
xxx. 19.
k
S frost and cold kill the weeds and worms which
-£*- eat the roots and hinder the growth of herbs,
corn and plants, so afflictions kill our lusts — those
worms and weeds that breed and grow 7 in our hearts,
always hindering the fruit-fulness, sometimes to the
utter unfruitfulness, of the seed of the Word sown
among us and upon us. So when we are in the
winter of affliction let us not be impatient nor
unquiet; let us not think that the past will ruin
and undo us. Cold weather doeth good as well as
hot. — Job xxxviii. 28.
32 SEED THOUGHTS.
THE scope of God in the afflictions of his people
is not their hurt, but good; it is not to destroy
them for their sin, but to destroy sin in them ; it is
not to withdraw himself from them, but to draw
them nearer to himself. All the hurt that the
Lord intends us by any affliction is but to get
out our dross and to fetch out our filth— to bring us
from those things that will undo and ruin us for
ever. And how great an argument of the goodness
of God is it that he designeth the evils which we
suffer in these dying bodies to heal the evils and
help on the good of our immortal souls ! That's all
the hurt that the Lord means us. And the Lord's
heart is so much in this design (the return of those
he afflicts from their iniquity) that he seems confi-
dent of it that when they are in affliction surely
they will return. And therefore the prophet
(Isaiah ix. 10) speaks of the Lord as defeated and
disappointed of his purpose when he seeth such as
he has afflicted continuing in their sins. Remem-
ber, the Lord therefore suffers you to be bound in
fetters that you may be loosed from your sins ; he
therefore suffers you to be hoklen in the cords of
affliction that you might let go your transgressions.
Take heed you be not found disappointing him of
his purpose. — Job xxx. 10.
G
SEED THOUGHTS. 33
OD doth usually reveal himself most to his
people after great sufferings.
GRACE never grows more in a gracious heart
than in a day of trouble.
A BELIEVER thrives (as to the inner man) in
affliction, how much soever he loseth and goeth
backward as a man.
BLESSED afflictions, which make us less to
ourselves and all creatures less to us ! We are
never so much in God's eye as when we are least
in our own, nor have we ever so much of God as
when we expect little or least from man. Say,
therefore, it is well with the righteous when they
are in the deeps of affliction ; for it is but to bring
them off their mountain of pride, that they may be
exalted in the strength and love of God, even upon
the mountains of his holiness and their glory for
ever.
AFFLICTIONS (as in the prodigal's example)
put us upon thoughts of returning to God.
34 SEED THOUGHTS.
AFFLICTIONS bring the saints nearer to God.
Troubles abroad cause the soul to look inward
and homeward.
IT is our duty to pray most, and usually we pray
best, when 'tis worst with us ; when we are nigh
the mire and dust, prayer is not only most season-
able, but most pure.
BRIBERY.
BRIBE-TAKING hands are blotted hands, not
only because to take bribes is a blot, but be-
cause the taking of them makes many a blot both
in the mind of the taker and in the matter or busi-
ness which he undertaketh.
A TRAVELLER coming to Rome, and viewing
many famous structures and goodly houses
there, asked who built them? It was answered,
" These are the sins of Germany." The meaning
was, the money bought for pardons out of Germany
built these houses. So we may say of many fair
places and goodly dwellings, These are bribes and
oppressions ; such a man built these by iniquity.
SEED THOUGHTS. 35
HOME have built houses with what they have
^ gotten by bribes, and many, by taking bribes,
have gotten enough to build houses.
BRIBES may build houses, but bribe-takers can-
not protect them. The tabernacles of bribery
shall be consumed. — Job xv. 34.
M
ANY give bribes to undo others, and all who
receive bribes undo themselves.
CHARITY.
CHARITIES done in faith as a holy offering to
God produce a sure increase. To give with a
right heart to the poor is the best w r ay of growing
rich.
CHARITY, especially spiritual charity, is very
liberal and open-hearted. Job instructed not
only his own, but he instructed others. He did
not confine his doctrine and advice to his own walls,
but the sound thereof went wherever he went. He
instructed many.
36 SEED THOUGHTS.
THERE are four special acts of spiritual charity ;
so we may call and extinguish them. First,
instructing the ignorant; secondly, encouraging of
the weak and slothful ; thirdly, supporting of those
that are ready to fall ; and, fourthly, comforting
those that are ready to faint. — Job iv. 1.
IT is a duty of those that are full to give to their
empty brethren. It is their sin if they give
not, and it is their shame if they are not most free
in giving to those who are most modest in asking.
CHASTISEMENTS.
CHASTISEMENTS are usually taken for those
afflictions which God layeth upon his own chil-
dren. He layeth judgment upon the wicked and
punishments upon the ungodly, but properly and
strictly that which falls upon his own people is
called chastisement.
CHASTISEMENT is for amendment. The evil
of affliction is brought upon us that we may
take heed of and turn from the evil of sin. There-
fore, to go on offending while God is chastening is
to add rebellion to our sin.
SEED THOUGHTS. 37
THE chastisements of God upon us are our doc-
uments. He speaketh by the rod beyond all
the eloquence of words (Micah vi. 9). Hear ye the
rod. The voice of God is his rod ; that speaks so
loud from heaven in many strokes that the pro-
fanest sinners are sometimes forced to hear and ac-
knowledge it.
THE cross is a school in which they who are dull
in hearing what God speaks to them in his
word are wonderfully quickened up by his rod.
" The words of the wise are as goads ;" and surely
these goads of affliction are pricking, piercing words
for the promoting and putting on of a lazy soul in
God's work. — Job xxxiii. 19.
FEW hear when they are spoken to until they
feel as well as hear ; and therefore the Lord
first sends them into trouble that they may hear,
and having by that means opened their ears to hear,
he brings them out of trouble, When we are truly
humbled by affliction we are near deliverance from
affliction. The plaster must be kept on till the
wound be healed. The Lord will not leave off
scourging or correcting his people till he hath
38 SEED THOUGHTS.
brought them to such a posture that they are lit
for mercy.
THE godly never increase more in knowledge
than under the cross.
CHRIST.
CHRIST doth not only plead our cause for us,
but pays our debts. He entered into bond for
us, and took all our debts and duties, whatsoever
we owe to God, upon himself, to see all performed,
that we might go free and accepted. — Job xvii. 3.
TO a soul in bitterness everything is bitter except
Christ, and to a darkened soul no sun shines
bright but the Sun of Righteousness.
AS the needle in the compass is in continual mo-
tion till it points toward the north, where (it
is conceived) there are rocks of loadstone with
which it sympathizeth, so the soul is in continual
motion until it points to Christ, who (we are sure)
is that living Rock with which all believers sym-
pathize, and the true loadstone which attracts all
believers to him. — Job iii. 3.
SEED THOUGHTS. 39
A GODLY man is an epicure in Christ. In the
thoughts of Christ he sits clown and would
take his fill. He saith to his soul, Dost thou see
that Christ and take notice of these promises?
Thou hast goods laid up in him, in them for many
years, yea, for eternity. Soul, take thine ease ; take
it fully ; thou hast riches, thou hast an estate that
can never be spent. Soul, eat, drink and be merry.
His flesh is meat indeed and his blood is drink in-
deed. Joy in Christ is joy indeed — unspeakable
joy here, and fulness of joy hereafter.
CHRIST is not only the principle of holiness, but
also the pattern of holiness to his people.
They that say they abide in him must walk as also
he walked. His works (except those which were
miraculous and works of mediation between God
and us) are our rule as well as his Word. Look to
Jesus when you are in sufferings and have a race
of patience to run ; let your eye always be upon
Christ, and draw the lines of your carriage, both in
your spirits and outward actions, according to what
you see in him. We must follow his steps both in
the matter and manner of our sufferings. There-
fore Christ saith, " Take my yoke upon you, and
learn of me." — Job v. 1.
40 SEED THOUGHTS.
CHRIST saves to the uttermost because he suf-
fered to the uttermost. He was not spared one
blow, one drop, one sigh, one sorrow, one shame,
one circumstance of all or any one of those which
Justice could demand as a satisfaction for man's
sin. Yea, though (in a sense) he cried to his Father
that he might be spared, yet he was not.
THERE is no stability in any state out of Christ.
When Adam fell, if God should have repaired
him again and set him up in the same condition
wherein he was, yea in a better (if a better could
be had), without a Mediator, and so tried his obe-
dience once more; or should every particular man
have stood for himself and not one for all, cer-
tainly, as we fell at first in a lump all together, so
we should have all fallen single (as it w T ere), by re-
tail, one for another ! There is no assurance on any
estate this side Christ. Christ is called the "surety
of the covenant," because he undertakes for us that
we shall do our parts, that we shall be faithful and
believing, that we shall be holy and humble, that
we shall do what God expects from those whom
free grace shall save. Christ undertakes for all the
grace and holiness and faithfulness which is re-
SEED THOUGHTS, 41
quired in believers. He gives no command but
what himself helps us to fulfil, nor calls he for any
duty but what himself works in and for us. — Job
iv. 18.
LET us be much in remembrance of Christ hum-
bling and abasing himself for us. What can kill
pride if the humblings of Christ do not? Oh how
many of us school and catechise our souls with the
remembrance of Christ in his abasements ! What an
humble Christ and a proud Christian, an humble
Master and a proud disciple! Did Christ empty
himself and make himself of no reputation, and
shall we who are but emptiness be lifted up with a
reputation of ourselves, with a reputation which
others have of us? Did he abase himself to the
form of a servant, and shall we lift up ourselves as
if we reigned as kings? He humbled himself and
became obedient to the death of the cross, and what
have we to glory in but the cross of our Lord Jesus
Christ? Think often and much of the humblings
of Christ, and then you will think of yourselves as
mere nothings. This is the most effectual means
through the Spirit to bring down the swellings
of the heart and to hide pride from man. — Job
xxxiii. 17.
42 SEED THOUGHTS.
SINNERS under a fourfold consideration may
hide themselves in Christ: 1st, if humbled,
sinners ; 2d, if confessing sinners ; 3d, ff reforming
sinners ; 4th, if believing sinners. Christ is a
hiding-place to all such sinners. — Job xxxiv. 32.
CONFIDENCE.
(CONFIDENCE is an act beyond faith ; a soul
' confiding walks in a higher region of grace and
comfort than a soul believing; there may be believ-
ing when there is not this confiding. As patience
is hope lengthened, so confidence is hope strength-
ened. Assurance is the highest degree of faith,
and confidence is the highest degree of assurance.
It carries with it — first, cheerfulness, opposite to sor-
row ; secondly, courage, opposite to fear and des-
pondency of spirit ; thirdly, boldness and adven-
turousness, opposite to cowardice. Confidence
having a good cause and a good call, will take a
bear by the tooth or a lion by the beard. Fourth-
ly, it notes boasting, or a kind of a spiritual wise
bragging, opposite to sinful modesty or a conceal-
ment of what God hath done for us. Or take it
thus : confidence is the noblest exercise of faith,
which, looking steadily upon God in himself, and
SEED THOUGHTS. 43
in Christ through the promises, raises the soul
above all fears and discouragements, above all
doubts and disquietments, either about the remov-
ing of evil or the obtaining of good. Hence, con-
fidence is called the rest of the soul ; therefore such
as attain to confidence are said to be in peace, in per-
fect "peace (Isaiah xxvi. 3). And this act of confi-
dence or trust is proper and peculiar to God ; no
creature must share in it. This is worship com-
manded in the first precept. Whatsoever we con-
fide in, unless it be in subordination unto God, we
make it our god. And it is one of the highest
acts of the soul, not only as we respect the taking
in our own comforts, but also the giving out glory
to God. This confidence is well coupled with holy
fear; the more we fear God, the more we trust him.
Such fear is the mother and nurse of confidence ;
but confidence is directly contrary, yea, contradic-
tory, to carnal fear. He that trusts God indeed
leaves both soul and body, temporal and eternal
estate, with him, without even sending a fearful
thought or a jealous look after either. — Job iv. 6.
THAT'S a sad confidence that proceeds from ig-
norance, and a sad fearlessness that hath no
ground but carelessness.
44 SEED THOUGHTS.
TRUST or confidence in God settles the heart in
all conditions. When there was an unquiet-
ness upon the soul of David he first questions his
soul about it : " Why art thou disquieted, O my
soul ?" and then directs trust in God. So the pro-
phet promiseth (Isaiah xxvi. 3) : " Thou wilt keep
him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on thee ;
because he trusteth in thee." He that is carried
and tossed thus about w T ith every wind of trouble
and gust of sorrow shows he hath not cast out this
anchor of hope upon the Rock, Jesus Christ.
IT is a great part of the happiness of our lives to
have a confidence or quietness of spirit about the
things of this life ; nor is anything more uncomely
for or uncomfortable to a saint than distrustful
thoughts and fears. To carry a troubled mind and
a troubling frame of spirit about us, lest some evil
should befall us, is more grievous than the present
suffering of evil. Distrust is one of the worst dis-
eases or sicknesses of the mind, and to be anxious
about our earthly enjoyments is as bad as to trust
upon them. As our hopes should be above the
creature, so likewise should our fears be.
SEED THOUGHTS. 45
CONFESSION OF SIN.
TIMES of affliction are special times of confes-
sion and repentance. Usually in prosperity
men will not be at leisure to search their hearts
and take notice of their sins. Therefore the Lord
draweth them to confession by drawing them from
the world, by laying them upon sick beds, or by
bringing them into straits.
A MAN had better fall into the hands of the
most cruel tyrants in the world than into the
hands of his own conscience. The awakened con-
science carries in it as a thousand witnesses, so a
thousand terrors.
THE holiest man on earth hath cause to confess
that he hath sinned.
in VERY confession of the evil we do is a new
obligation not to do it any more.
H
OLY confession of sin leads the way to gratui-
tous pardoning of sin.
46 SEED THOUGHTS.
TO dig in the earth and hide our sins in the nap-
kin of our excuses is worse than to hide our
talents in the napkin of our idleness.
SOME confess sin in general terms only because
they know not what their sins are ; or have
quite forgot them.
CONSCIENCE.
THAT man can never want music whose con-
science speaks in concert and is harmonious
with himself.
A
GOOD conscience is the best pillow to sleep
upon and the best dish to feed upon.
•\JOTHING beside the blood of Christ can stop
-L l the voice and still the cry of an awakened
conscience.
WHEN our own book of conscience has nothing
but good in it, we need not fear and not much
care who writes books against us.
SEED THOUGHTS. 47
IT is better to have the reproaches of all the men
in the world fall upon us than the reproaches
of conscience. Better that all the men in the world
should call us hypocrite and wicked than that con-
science should tell us so.
CONSCIENCE is a very busy faculty of the soul,
and it hath many offices. First, conscience is
a register, to take notice of and record what we do.
Secondly, conscience is a witness against us when
we do amiss. Thirdly, conscience is a judge, and
gives sentence ; it sits upon a throne as God's dep-
uty to award life or death. Fourthly, conscience
has the office of a to rm enter ; it is that worm which
dieth not and a fire that never goeth out. The
damned shall feel the sting and teeth of conscience
for ever, though here they have bribed it and
blinded it that it might not trouble them.
CONVERSION.
IN conversion, not only the acts, but the state and
nature, of a man are changed. He who before
was nothing but a bundle of unrighteousness, be-
comes a righteous man ; that is, he has a righteous
principle planted in him and abiding with him.
48 SEED THOUGHTS.
BARE reason is farther from grace than sense
is from reason. It is as easy to change a beast
into a man, or to make a beast understand reason,
as to change a sinner into a saint or to make a be-
liever of an infidel. Conversion is not the change
of actions only, but of nature.
GOD must convert the sinner, not the preacher.
; Tis God who both thrusteth man down by a
gracious work of repentance and self-abhorrence,
and raiseth him up by a powerful work of faith and
holy confidence in Jesus Christ. When man has
done his best, he can do nothing effectually ; only
God can.
A CARNAL man will never submit quietly to
duty till God hath changed his nature and
made him a new man, or until his mind is renewed
after the image of God. Conversion is first a
change of our nature and then of our way. This
makes conversion so difficult a work. Good edu-
cation and human instruction may change a man's
way, but nothing less than the power of God can
change his nature.
SEED THOUGHTS. 49
CONSISTENT CONDUCT.
NEVER brag of your good meanings, or that
you have good hearts when your hands are
foul. The heart may keep in its filthiness while
the hands are washed, but if the heart be washed
the hand will not keep its filthiness.
IT is very possible for a man that hath a clear
heart to foul his fingers, but he will not wear
them foul.
THE preparation of the heart will be seen at the
fingers' ends ; purity of spirit cannot consist
with impurity of life.
THERE is no holiness in having a show of good-
ness, but the very shows of sin are evil.
THE two heads of religion, or the tw r o main
hinges on which all religion turneth, are purity
of doctrine and clearness of practice. Holiness of
life and soundness of opinion constitute a perfect
man. — Job xi. 4.
4
50 SEED THOUGHTS.
rilHERE are two things which exceedingly de-
J~ clare the holiness of a man's spirit: First,
when he can patiently bear loads of evils and
wrongs in his own case, or w r hich have but a pri-
vate respect. Secondly, when he is ready to take
fire in the cause of God. When we are angry with
sin, we are angry and sin not.
TT^HEN Alexander the Great met a common
» » soldier whose name was Alexander, he said
to him, " Be sure thou do nothing unworthy the
name of Alexander." The apostle exhorts, "Let
every one that nameth the name of Christ depart
from iniquity." It is a great argument, seeing all
who profess the gospel are called Christians from
Christ, that therefore they should adorn that most
worthy name by worthy walking.
TO be plain and simple, to have a spirit without
tricks and turnings, without knots and riddles,
is better and more honourable than the highest
titles of honour. Integrity is our perfection under
the covenant of grace, and simplicity is our greatest
excellency. 'Tis the fundamental excellency of
SEED THOUGHTS. 51
God himself, and so it is of his people. That
which is truly simple is truly perfect in its kind,
and therefore the same word signifies both simple
and perfect; this is the glory of grace and the grace
of glory. How glorious are we when this precious
stone of integrity, this spiritual Thummim fixed
in our hearts, sparkleth in all our ways !
THEY who are truly humbled and touched with
a clear sight and deep sense of their sins, will
do whatsoever the Lord commandeth and as he
commandeth.
COMFORT.
HE only can comfort us in outward afflictions
who can command the creature, and he only
can comfort us in our inward grief who can con-
vince the conscience. None can do either of these
but God, therefore consolations are from God.
Luther spake true, " It is easier to make a world
than to comfort the conscience/'
TO minister comfort to the sorrowful is a greater
point of charity than to minister bread to the
hungry or clothing to the naked.
52 SEED THOUGHTS.
CHRIST is the true Noah. Lameeh spake of
Noah (Gen. v. 29) : This man shall comfort us
concerning our work and the toil of our hands. It
was not in Noah to comfort, but as God made him
a comfort, and he was said to comfort as a type
of Christ. Christ is true comfort; he is comfort
clothed in our flesh. Noah sent a dove out of the
ark, which returned with an olive branch. Jesus
Christ sends the Holy Ghost, who is the Com-
forter, with the olive branch of true peace to our
wearied souls.
THERE are three things which should much
comfort us in our afflictions. First, that they
cannot last always ; they will have an end. Sec-
ondly, that they are medicinal and healthful ; they
are for our good while they continue upon us.
Thirdly, we may expect that as they will surely
have an end, so they will end comfortably. God
will not only bring our troubles to an end, but he
will give us sweet fruit at the end of them as a
recompense for all our trouble.
SEED THOUGHTS. 53
COMPASSION.
TO weep for those that are in hard days, to be
grieved for those that are pinched and pinned
with poverty, is a duty to which we are called
under a threefold consideration :
1st. As men, being of the self-same nature, mould
and matter with them that are troubled or poor.
2d. As being ourselves subject to the same spe-
cial troubles wherewith others are troubled.
3d. .We should compassionate the troubles of
many as being of the same faith with us.
HE that hath helped others out of their afflic-
tions may probably look for pity in and help
out of his affliction.
THOSE who have experienced the compassions
of God to themselves (as every gracious soul
hath), cannot but be moved with compassion to
others.
EVERY helpless and comfortless soul is as an
orphan without parents, as a widow without
a husband. To relieve such is pure religion.
54 SEED THOUGHTS.
AS it is the support and comfort of the whole
Church, as also every believer, to remember
that Jesus Christ bears their burdens with them,
so it is a great stay and comfort to suffering saints
that their fellow-brethren are affected with their
condition and take compassion on them.
OUR verbal compassions of the poor are poor
things, and our tears but dry things, unless w r e
give them bread. The heart of Christ was full of
trouble for us that were sick and in trouble ; but
he stayed not then ; he took care to deliver us out
of our trouble, to cure us of our sicknesses and to
make us happy for ever. He did not only pity us
in our poverty, but took a course to make us rich
and to set us up in a good and plentiful estate again.
A TRUE friend can hardly be discovered in
prosperity, and a false friend can hardly be
hid in adversity.
WE have not done our duty in pitying the dis-
tressed unless we come to real assisting them.
We satisfy not our obligation to the bond and law
SEED THOUGHTS. 55
of love by giving comfortable words. As that faith
which is alone without works doth not justify us,
so the pity which is alone without works doth not
justify our faith. Such empty pity will go for
little better than cruelty, and not to help will be
interpreted oppression.
EXPERIENCE.
EXPERIENCE is the mistress of truth. Truth
is called the daughter of time, because experi-
ence bringeth forth many truths and the w r ord of
God is made visible in the works of God. In ex-
periences the promises of God stand forth, and in
experiences the threaten ings of God stand forth and
show themselves. All the experiences that we have
in the world are only so many exemplifications of
the truths contained in the promises or threaten-
ings of the word. — Job v. 3.
THE experience we have of God's power and
mercy in saving us out of former troubles breeds
and nourishes hope against future times of trouble.
Tribulation worketh patience, and patience experi-
56 SEED THOUGHTS.
ence, and experience hope. Graces have a genera-
tion one from another, though all have but one
generation from Christ at once. We have here the
genealogy of hope in their descents. Experience is
the next or immediate parent of hope. So the poor
hath hope. Thus it is begotten. God who doth
deliver us from so great a death, and doth deliver,
in him we trust, that he will yet deliver us. An
armed, daring Goliath should be looked upon as
vanquished already when we can but remember a
vanquished lion and bear. — Job v. 16.
DAYSMAN.
THERE are five things belonging to a daysman
or an umpire :
1. He must be agreed upon and chosen by both
parties ; for unless he be accepted by both of them,
he can have no power to determine for or against
either of them.
2. He must hear both sides speak, and allege
what they can for themselves before he determines.
3. He must beat out the matter by interrogato-
ries and questions ; he must not stay upon the bare
narrative of the persons.
SEED THOUGHTS. 57
4. He must have power to conclude and deter-
mine of the differences between them.
5. Both parties must be bound, at least by prom-
ise, to stand to the determination which he shall
make.
There is indeed a Daysman betwixt God and man,
but God himself hath appointed him. God hath
referred the difference betwixt himself and man
unto Jesus Christ; and his own good-will and free
grace moving him thereunto, he stands engaged in
the bonds of everlasting truth and faithfulness to
perform what Jesus Christ, as Mediator, should
ask for us. Unto him we may safely commit our
cause and our souls with that assurance of the
apostle (2 Tim. i. 12), "I know whom I have
believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep
that which I have committed unto him against that
day." Christ, God-man, is umpire between God
and man. What we trust him with shall not mis-
carry ; he will make our cause good and our per-
sons acceptable before God in that great day. — Job
ix. 33.
58 SEED THOUGHTS.
DEATH.
PiLEEP is a short death, and death is but a long
K-- sleep.
WHEN the saints die, they have a change and
no change, as a worthy among us once said
when he was ready to die, "I shall change my
place, but not my company. I shall have a new
house, but my old society." The saints converse
with God; they live with God while they live in
the world ; they converse with Christ and have
communion with the Spirit; they converse (among
men) chiefly with good men on earth; and with all
these they shall have converse in heaven. Here is
no change. Yet the saints have a great change,
and a blessed one, when they die. They change
from all outward evils — all their troubles shall be
removed ; they change also from spiritual evils —
all their corruptions shall remove; there shall not
be so much as any sin or any remnant of sin re-
maining in them when they remove from hence.
Here is a happy change. Yea, they shall have not
only no sin within them, but no temptation with-
out them ; no Satan to tempt, as well as no corrup-
tion to side with temptation. — Job xiv. 14.
T
SEED THOUGHTS, 59
HE saints receive their call to death as a call to
-*- rest; and though the body for awhile lie down
in the dust, yet they know what is prepared for the
soul, and when they two meet together again both
shall be called to an everlasting rest. — Job xiv. 15.
TY\0 have death, the king of terrors, and the living,
J- the ever-living God, falling upon a poor crea-
ture at once, is a ten thousand deaths at once.
THAT which makes a man die with true courage
and step with holy boldness into the grave is
believingly to remember that Jesus Christ died and
lay in the grave, not only before us, but for us, and
that he hath worsted and conquered that king of
terrors upon his own ground, the grave.
DEATH is good to those that are good. Death
carries them beyond the reach of affliction, and
freeth them from all the evils of this life.
THEY who live like the wicked shall die like
the wicked, and live with them — if theirs may
be called a life — for evermore.
60 SEED THOUGHTS.
SOME translate death into such terrible shapes,
and represent it to themselves under such af-
frighting forms, that they live in bondage through
the fear of death all their days. Do as the Spirit
of God teacheth you. Clothe it with pleasant ex-
pressions ; call it the undressing and unclothing of
of yourselves ; call it rest ; conceive it under the
notion of sleep, and then you will not fear, but wel-
come it. — Job xiv. 12.
DELIGHT IN GOD.
IT^ALSE and carnal spirits will express a great
deal of desire after salvation. Oh they like
salvation, heaven and glory well, but they never
express any longing desire after God and Jesus
Christ. They love salvation, but they care not for
a Saviour. Now that which faith pitcheth most
upon is God himself: he shall be my salvation ;
let me have him, and there's salvation enough. It
pleased holy David more (Ps. xviii. 1, 2) that God
was his strength than that God gave him strength
— that God was his deliverer than that he was de-
livered. It pleased David and it pleases all saints
more that God is their salvation (whether temporal
or eternal) than that he saves them. — Job xiii. 16.
SEED THOUGHTS. 61
AS it is the spirit of sinfulness to delight in sin,
so it is the spirit of godliness to delight in
God.
THEY who have seen and tasted how gracious
the Lord is, will be calling for more such sights
and tastes ; and the more they have had of these
sights and tastes, the more they will desire them.
As it is the property of a godly man to delight in
God, so he doth promise, yea, assure himself, of
more delights in God could lie but get and keep his
heart more to the meditation of God.
DELIVERANCE FROM TROUBLE.
THE Lord can deliver us as often as we need de-
liverance; in six troubles, yea, in seven. This
should bear up our hearts in the multiplied returns
of troubles. Though (as rheumatic old age is de-
scribed, Eccles. xii. 2) the clouds return after the
rain — that is, though one evil follows or treads
upon the heel of another — though as soon as one
black cloud 'is dissolved and we begin to say (as in
nature), This was a rainy day, but the next will be
fair, yet the next proves more overcast and lower-
62 SEED THOUGHTS.
ing than that; even in such a case know God hath
a wind in his fist which he can let out to scatter
those clouds before they dissolve ; or, if they dis-
solve, he hath a sun at command to dry up the
fallen rain. The Lord hath a succession of mercies
for our succession of sorrows. Say not then, We
have got off this trouble, but what if another come ?
If another come, you have the same God, and he
can give you another deliverance. — Job v. 19.
GOD saves and delivers his people from all evil,
even while they are in the midst of trouble.
If God be with us, though all evils are upon us,
yet no evil touches us. The presence of the Chief
Good is banishment to every evil. To be kept
from the evil of trouble is a deliverance from trou-
ble while we are in trouble.
NOT only our eternal deliverance, but even our
temporal deliverances and mercies, are pur-
chased by the blood of Christ. A believer doth not
eat a bit of bread but he hath it by virtue of the
purchase of Christ. Christ hath bought all good
for us, and Christ hath bought us out of all evil.
SEED THOUGHTS. 63
EXAMPLE.
IT was the error of the old Pelagians that error
was not traduced into the nature of man by the
fall of the first man, but that sin is continued by
imitation. Children (say they), seeing their parents
or others do evil, take it by example. Now, though
this hath been justly condemned as a gross error,
and the contrary asserted both as a scriptural and
experimental truth, that the whole mass of man-
kind is by nature steeped in sin, and that we have
the root of every evil matter in ourselves, yet it is
a truth also that we do ill by example, and that
sin is mightily increased by imitation. What one
does others are apt to do, and the most of men go
where they see others go, rather than where they
ought to go ; yea, they begin to conclude that they
may go safely enough in a bad way if they see
others go before them in it.
THERE is a great power in example. What is
done persuades as w T ell as what is spoken.
64 SEED THOUGHTS.
EXPOSITION OF SCRIPTURE.
TRANSLATE the sense of Scripture into your
lives, and expound the Word of God by your
works. Interpret it by your feet and teach it by
your fingers ; that is, let your workings and your
walkings be Scripture explications.
TI1HE teachings of the Spirit, the teachings of God
Jl himself, are chiefly to be looked after and prayed
for, that we may know the mind of the Spirit, the
will of God in Scripture.
I HAD rather know five words of Scripture by
my own practice and experience than ten thou-
sand words of Scripture — yea, than the whole Scrip-
ture — by the bare exposition of another.
HE hath his pulpit in heaven who teacheth hearts
the heart of Scripture. Paul was a learned
Pharisee and much versed in the law, and yet he
saith of himself before his conversion that he was
without the law. But when Christ came to him,
then the commandment came to him.
SEED THOUGHTS. 65
A WALKING or breathing commentary goeth
infinitely beyond the written or spoken com-
mentary.
IT is easy to paddle in a clear stream till it runs
muddily, but it will not be for any man's ease
or peace to do so in the clear, crystal streams of
the holy Scriptures. We should labour to deliver
our minds plainly concerning the mind of God,
that what we utter may not be found a darkening
of his counsel, but as much as is in us a clearing
of it.
FAITH.
WE must often believe where knowledge is shut
out — believe where we cannot understand.
Abraham by faith followed the call of God, not
knowing where he went.
IF God works marvels and we believe him not,
hath he not reason to marvel at our unbelief?
God loves and values the faith of man so highly
that sometimes he bids a miracle for it rather than
go without it. — Job v. 9. '
66 SEED THOUGHTS,
THE eye of faith is usually quickest in a dark
night, and while trouble is near at hand, be-
hold Christ near at hand. He can never be with-
out help who carries help about him or within
him. — Job vi. 14.
FAITH is the souPs taster. Faith is the mouth
of the soul, which not onlvtasteth but cheweth
the promises and manifestations of God to his peo-
ple, and so makes meat of them.
AS faith is one principal piece of our spiritual
armour whereby we overcome temptation, so
it fetches in that which is the whole of the armour
of God, even the strength of God.
A GODLY man takes God as his own, and ap-
propriates him by faith in all his relations.
Faith takes not only a share in God, but all of God.
A believer doth, as it were, engross God to himself,
yet desires and endeavours that all as well as him-
self may have their part and portion in God — yea,
God for all their portion.
SEED THOUGHTS. 67
LET us not pin our faith or our consciences upon
men, how great or how ancient soever they are.
We must not reverence any man's person to the
prejudice of the truth. Believe w T hat is said be-
cause you judge it true; do not believe it true be-
cause such or such a man has said it. How strictly
and religiously is this to be observed in hearing the
word of God and the doctrines of faith ! In that
case be sure and lay aside all that concerns the
speaker, and weigh what he speaks alone and sin-
gle in the balance of the sanctuary. — Job xxxii. 9.
"ATOTHING but faith in God can make us stand
L* still when we are ready to fall.
HE that hath not faith, hath nothing to get a
mercy with, and he that hath not a broken
heart, hath nothing to put a mercy in.
FAITH gives the soul a view of Christ in all his
excellency and glory, in his love and in his
loveliness, in his righteousness and holiness. Faith
gets a view of Christ in all his beauty, and behold-
ing him we rejoice with joy unspeakable.
68 SEED THOUGHTS.
FRIENDSHIP.
THIS is the great difference between the love of
God and that of most men : God is the best
friend to us at all times (he is best to us in the best
times ; if we had not him to friend, it would be
very ill with us when we have most friends) ; but
God is best of all to us in the worst times ; a best
friend to us when we have no friends ; he is our
spring when the rain falls, but he is our surest,
sweetest spring when there is no rain nor dew upon
the face of the earth. Therefore he is compared (as
in Jer. ii. 30, in other places) unto a living foun-
tain, where you may be sure to find living water in
the hottest season. This infinitely commends the
love of God beyond that of men, who, at the best,
are but broken cisterns, which leak out the com-
forts they are trusted with, and for the most part
are like Job's brooks — they turn aside and pass
away when we have most need of them. — Job vi. 21.
RUTH was a true pattern of a faithful friend
and brother, though a daughter. I went out
full (said her mother-in-law), but the Lord hath
brought me home empty. But though she was
SEED THOUGHTS, 69
emptied of the world, yet Ruth's heart was full of
love to her : " I will not leave thee. God do so to
me and more also if aught but death part thee and
me." So saith faithfulness among Christian friends.
It is one of the greatest duties and commendations
of Christian profession to stick to and stand by
one another ; be it foul weather or be it fair, blow
the winds high or low, let it be stormy or calm —
ever to be the same. — Job vi. 21.
ADVERSITY and affliction are the touchstone
of friendship.
A
THE FAMILY.
FAMILY well visited and ordered is usually
a prosperous family.
SIN spoils the comforts and cankers the blessings
of a family. Sin brought into a house rots the
timber and pulls down the house, or it undermines
the foundation and blows up the house. The sin
of families is the ruin and consumption of families.
— Job v. 24.
70 SEED THOUGHTS.
IT is a great and special point of godly wisdom
well to order and visit a family. Families are
the principles or seeds of a commonwealth. As
every man is a little w T orld, so every house is a
little kingdom. A family is a commonwealth in a
little volume, and the rules of it are an epitome of
all laws by which whole nations are governed.
The apostle makes it a special character of his
bishop that he must be one who rules his own
house well, and subjoins the reason : " For if a
man know not how to rule his own house, how
shall he take care of the Church of God T 9 (1 Tim.
iv. 5). And therein wraps up this truth, that he
who knows how to rule his own house well is in
good posture of spirit for public rule. — Job v. 24.
FROWARD MAN.
" \I7ITH the froward thou wilt show thyself fro-
' » ward." That is, if men w 7 ill be winding and
turning and thinking to catch others, or overreach
the Lord himself with tricks and turnings of wit,
the Lord will meet and answer them in their own
kind. He can turn as fast as they; he can put
himself into such intricate labyrinths of wisdom
and craft as shall entangle and ensnare the most
SEED THOUGHTS. 71
cunning wrestler or tumbler of them all. He will
Cretize the Cretians, supplant the supplanters of
his people. — Job xiii. 5.
WHEN once the heart is free, not only bent
and inclined, but set and resolved to do a
thing, then it is far enough from any fear in doing
it. And when some men have ventured to sin
once and come off (as to any sensible hurt) safe,
they will venture again and again, and so often till
at last they are persuaded there is no venture in
sinning, and that there is no more (possibly not so
much) of hazard in transgressing or in disobeying.
GOD.
THE knowledge of God cometh down from God.
We know him when he makes himself known
to us, and usually he doth not make his fulness
known to us till we make our emptiness known to
him.
MAN'S inability to reach the perfection of crea-
tures should teach him his utter inability to
reach God in his perfection.
72 SEED THOUGHTS.
GOD is himself most just and pure. Justice and
purity are not qualities in God, but they are
his very nature. A man may be a man and yet be
unjust, but God cannot be God and yet be unjust.
A man may be a man and yet be impure, but God
cannot be God and yet be impure; so that justice
and purity are not accidents or qualities in God,
but his very essence and being. Destroy or deny
the justice and purity of God, and you put God out
of the world as much as in you lies : for he cannot
be God unless he be both just to others and pure
to himself. — Job iv. 17.
GOD is usually the last, but he is the best refuge.
When we have told over the story of our sor-
rows and sad condition, and poured our wants into
the bosoms of our most faithful friends, yet this
apostrophe is the sweetest to the soul when we can
turn to God : Oh remember me ! He who knows
not how to complain to God, or to speak out his
sorrows and his griefs in the ear of Christ, shall
gain little (though he receive much) by complain-
ing to the creature. But so long as we have a God
to turn to and spread our cause before, though men
turn from us and forget us, yet it is enough that
we have said, Lord, remember me ! — Job vii. 7.
SEED THOUGHTS. 73
NE God helping is more than all men oppos-
ing.
IF at any time we have any unbecoming thoughts
of the justice of God, either that he afflicts the
good without reason or prospers the wicked against
it, all this ariseth from our ignorance or the short-
ness of our sight. We have not a full or perfect
prospect of things ; we see but a little way back-
ward ; we are not wise to compare what is past
with what is present, nor can we at all infallibly
foresee anything future or discern what shall be.
Whereas God at once hath all things before him; he
seeth what is past as well as what is present, and
what shall be hereafter as well as what hath been ;
and so the completeness and indefectibility of his
own justice in all. And when we iii the great day
shall see all the works of God in the world brought
and presented together as in one view, we shall
then say, from the evidence of sight as now we
ought from the evidence of faith, that the Almighty
hath not in any one thing perverted judgment.
And therefore the apostle doth most excellently and
appositely call that day, " The day of the revela-
tion of the righteous judgment of God." — Job
xxxiv. 13.
74 SEED THOUGHTS.
11HE power of God is primitive or underived
power. His power is of himself — yea, his
power is himself. God doth not rule by deputa-
tion or commission. All ruling power is funda-
mentally in him, as also the rule of that power,
both which in God are one.
As the power of God is underived or proceeds
only from himself, so it is absolute and unlimited.
His is, in the strictest sense imaginable, supreme
power. None may presume to say to him, "What'
doest thou ?" ; Tis his prerogative to do w T hat he
will ; and how much soever he acts by prerogative,
he will do only that which is right. We may con-
sider the absolute supremacy of God in a fivefold
exercise of power :
1st. In commanding. He commandeth what he
pleaseth to be done; nor may his commands be dis-
puted. They must be obeyed, because his.
2d. In prohibiting. He forbiddeth whatsoever
displeaseth him to be done. And how pleasing,
how right soever anything is in our eyes, yet if he
forbiddeth it, we must for ever forbear it. We all
know by our own smart how dangerous it is to eat
of a forbidden tree.
3d. In suffering. I mean it not of any suffer-
ing of evil in himself (God is infinitely above that),
SEED THOUGHTS. 75
but of his suffering others to do evil, or of his suf-
fering any evil to be done. God doth permit that
which is naught, wicked and unrighteous to be
done in the world, and yet himself remains alto-
gether holy, righteous, just and good. This is a
great part of the transcendency of his power.
4th. In rewarding. God hath absolute power
to reward — 1st, when he will; 2d, for what he will ;
3d, in what kind he will ; 4th, in what degree or
measure he will ; 5th, for how long he will. He
can give (which none of the princes of the earth
can) everlasting reward.
5th. In punishing. God hath absolute power
to punish, and the absoluteness of his power in
punishing may be exemplified in those five partic-
ulars wherein his power of rewarding was. And
forasmuch as there is such a supremacy, such an
absoluteness of pow T er in God, take these three in-
ferences from it :
First. How freely should w T e yield ourselves to
the commands of God, not questioning this as un-
equal nor saying that is hard. AVe are more apt
to find fault with the work which God requires us
to do, than to remember that it is a great fault not
to do it.
Secondly. Seeing God hath charge of all the
76 SEED THOUGHTS.
earth, we should as readily submit to his dispensa-
tions, works and dealings as to his commands.
Thirdly. If the Lord be supreme, then let us set
him up as supreme in all things. Let his ends be
above our ends. Let us design God in all we do.
He who is over all ought to be honoured by all.
All our actions, as so many lines, ought to centre
in his honour who is the centre of power. — Job
xxxiv. 13.
GRACE.
A GODLY man labours to exalt God, both in
his thoughts and in his w r ords, when* God de-
presses and humbles him most. Grace prompts
the heart to indite a good matter, and bids the
tongue be as the pen of a ready writer, to advance
God, when sense feels nothing but smart and sees
nothing but sorrow round about. Grace is in her
heights when she can lift up God highest while he
is casting us down and laying us lowest. When
we can honour God frowning as well as smiling
upon us, smiting and wounding as well as kissing
and embracing us, then we have learned to honour
God indeed. — Job ix. 10.
A gracious spirit is a teachable spirit,
SEED THOUGHTS. 77
GRACE will preserve itself in the midst of the
greatest opposition. It is such a fire as no
water can quench or w T holly put out. True grace
will keep itself sound and clean among those that
are leprous and unclean. It is such a thing as
overcomes and masters all the evil that is about it.
God hath put such a mighty power into grace that
if it once possess the heart in truth — though there
be but little of it, though there be but as much as
a grain of mustard-seed — not all the wickedness in
the world, no, not all the devils in hell, can dis-
possess it. As all the water in the salt sea cannot
make the fish salt, but still the fish retains its
freshness, so all the wickedness and filthiness that
is in the world cannot destroy, cannot defile true
grace; that will bear up its head and hold up itself
for ever. — Job i. 1.
A GRACIOUS heart is willing to know and see
the worst of himself. He would have God
teach him what iniquity he hath done. A godly
man never thinks he seeth his sin enough. How
little soever he sins, he thinks he sins too much,
and how much soever he sees his sin, he thinks he
sees it too little.
78 SEED THOUGHTS.
GRACE is as much magnified in working in us
as in saving us without works. That's the
reason why we are so often called to duty, though
we have no power.
ALL our mercies flow out from the gr&ceof God.
That's the fountain, yea that's the ocean,
which feeds and fills all the channels of mercy
which stream to us as our happiness in this world,
and for our everlasting happiness in thva world
which is to come.
GRACIOUS men do not always hold out the
same gracious frame of spirit. There was a
time when Job was far from striving with God, or
speaking anything which had the least shadow or
favour of it. Yet in the process of the business
Job did not only speak such things as had a shadow
of striving with God, but were real strivings and
uncomely pleadings with him. His heart did not
retain that first sweet, submissive frame through-
out the affliction which appeareth to admiration at
the beginning of it. The state of grace abideth
always. 'Tis not (as some affirm) losable; 'tis not,
like the best things of the world, perishing. But
SEED THOUGHTS. 79
though a state of grace abideth always, yet every
man's grace (if any man's) doth not always abide
in the same state. The heat of grace may be
cooled, the height of it abated, the strength of it
weakened and the beauty of it faded. Such changes
and varieties are found upon the most gracious
frame of spirit, which the best of saints have in this
world. We have only this to hold to : The state
of grace is unchangeable, and we are waiting for
such a frame of grace as shall never change.
NO man can merit the least favour from God ;
his is free grace. All good cometh to us
through the Son of his love, and it was merely of
his love that ever his Son came to us and died for
us.
GROWTH IN GRACE.
A TRULY humbled and repenting soul is as
careful to avoid the act of sin for time to come
as to be freed from the guilt of sin past. He that
loves God cannot live in the doing of any one thing
which God hates, but as he expects good out of all
the promises, so he hath respect to all the com-
mandments.
80 SEED THOUGHTS.
CONTINUED and repeated acts, though small,
produce great effects. A believer finds no
growth in grace or in the knowledge of our Lord
and Saviour Jesus Christ by some one exercise,
either in prayer or hearing the Word ; yet by a
constant attendance upon the Lord in these du-
ties he grows to a perfect man unto the measure
of the stature of the fulness of Christ. — Job
xiv. 19.
TRUE grace increaseth by the ordinary use of it
— much more by the extraordinary trials of it.
A believer thrives (as to the inner man) in afflic-
tion, how much soever he loseth and goeth back-
ward as a man.
HAPPINESS.
A GODLY man is happy in the largest sense, in
all senses, because his is not this or that par-
ticular good, but all good. And he is not happy
only at this or that particular time, but at all times.
He is as happy when he is suffering under the
hand of God as when he is serving God — as happy
in his passive as in his active obedience.
SEED THOUGHTS. 81
HAPPINESS is the enjoyment of good commen-
surate to all our desires. Happiness is the
sum of all our desires and the aim of all our en-
deavours, and when we have attained perfect hap-
piness, we shall be at a full point both of our de-
sires and endeavours.
GLORIFIED saints shall for ever feed their eyes
with unutterable delights in beholding the
glory of Jesus Christ.
THE HEART.
THE heart of man is the ark or cabinet in which
the Word must be laid up. As Christ hath
been the ark of the law to protect and cover us
from the condemning power of it, so the hearts of
believers must be the ark of the law, where it must
be laid up with a readiness of mind, to yield our-
selves up to the commanding power of it.
THE heart is God's peculiar. As he only hath
the lock and key of the heart to shut or open
it, so he only hath a window to look into it.
6
82 SEED THOUGHTS.
THE tongue should always be the heart's inter-
preter, and the heart should always be the
tongue's suggester. What is spoken with the
tongue should be first stamped upon the heart and
wrought off from it.
A hard heart is Satan's cushion,
IF your hearts are disorderly, it is a kind of curs-
ing God. Remember not only to keep your
hearts when you are praying, and when you are
hearing, and when you are in holy duties, but re-
member to keep your hearts when you are feasting
and refreshing yourselves, when you are in your
callings, when you are buying and selling.
HEAVEN.
IN heaven saints shall have their interest in God
clear, undoubtedly clear, to them for ever.
There are very few who see God always for them-
selves in this life, or whose hearts are cleared from
all scruples and fears about their interest in Christ.
This is reserved for glory, where love shall be per-
fected. — Job xix. 27.
SEED THOUGHTS. 83
SAINTS glorified shall ever behold and see the
glorious body of Jesus Christ.
OUR complete happiness consists in the vision of
God. Christ placeth the future happiness of
the saints in the vision of his mediatorial glory:
" Father, I will that they also whom thou hast
given me be with me where I am, that they may
behold my glory that thou hast given me."
HELL
T1TE find this word "Sheol" taken five ways in
' » Scripture :
1st. Strictly and properly for the place of the
damned (Prov. xv. 11). God looks through the
darkness of hell, which is utter darkness.
2d. It is put metaphorically for great and ex-
treme dangers or miseries, which seem irrecoverable
and remediless. These are figuratively called hell,
because hell properly taken is a place from whence
there is no recovery. When David praises the
Lord (Ps. Ixxxvi. 13) for delivering his soul from
the lowest hell, he meaneth an estate on earth of
the lowest and deepest danger imaginable. Mercy
helped him at the worst.
84 SEED THOUGHTS.
3d. The word signifies the lowest parts of the
earth without relation to punishment (Ps. exxxix.
8) : " If I go down into hell, thou art there." He
had said before, "If I ascend into heaven, thou art
there." By heaven he means the upper region of
the world, without any respect to the state of bless-
edness, and hell is the most opposite and remote in
distance, without respect to misery. As if he had
said, Let me go whither I will, thy presence finds
me out.
4th. It is taken for the state of the dead, whether
these dead are in the grave or no (Ps. xxx. 3 ; Isa.
xxxviii. 18, 19; Gen. xxxvii. 35); in all which
places to go out of the world is to go to Sheol.
Jacob said, " He would go down into the grave to
his son mourning," yet Jacob thought his son was
devoured by a wild beast. He could not go down
into the grave to his son, for the bowels of a wild
beast are his supposed grave ; but he meaneth only
this — I will even die, as he is dead.
5th. Sheol signifies the place where the body is
laid after death, namely the grave (Prov. xxx. 16).
Man hath a dimension of earth fitted to the dimen-
sions of his body; this portion or allotment is his
Sheol. Yet it signifies the grave only in general
as it is natural to mankind; not that grave which
SEED THOUGHTS. 85
is artificial and proper to any particular man ; this
the Hebrew expresses by another word : " He that
goeth down to his grave goeth to his long home — to
a house out of which he is never able to see or
make his way.?' — Job vii. 10.
HELL is large to take in, but strait to let out
— so strait that it will not let one out for
ever.
HERESY,
HERESY hath these three things in it :
1st. In regard of the matter, it must be in
regard of some great and fundamental truths. The
word heresy is by some derived from choosing, by
others from taking away, because it takes us off
from Christ or from the foundations of saving
knowledge.
2d. Heresy is accompanied with pertinacy and
obstinacy after clear light is offered. It is possible
one may have an error about things fundamental,
and yet be no heretic. An heretic is condemned
of himself (Tit. iii. 10), but he will not be con-
vinced by another. Not that he doth formally and
86 SEED THOUGHTS.
in terms give sentence against or condemn himself,
but equivalently he doth, as the apostle (Acts xiii.
46) speaks to the unbelieving Jews : " Seeing ye put
the word from you and judge yourselves unworthy
of everlasting life," etc. These men did not judge
themselves such formally ; they came not to the
apostles and said, We willingly submit ourselves to
hell and wrath. No, they thought very well of
themselves and judged themselves worthy of eter-
nal life. But their practice judged them and gave
a real sentence against them, while they acquitted
themselves. Thus also a heretic (whoever hath a
high opinion of himself and his opinions) is con-
demned of himself.
3d. In heresy there is taking of pleasure and de-
light; therefore heresy is numbered among the
lusts of the flesh (Gal. v. 20). Heretics desire to
disperse and vend their opinions. A man only in
an error will weep over his opinions, and it grieves
him that he differs and goes contrary unto others.
But he that stiffly maintains an error insults over
others and delights to maintain his opposition ; he
triumphs and boasts of his war, though he can never
obtain victory. Truth only is victorious, and some
learned critics observe as much from the form of
the Greek word (Tit. iii. 11). So then heresy is
SEED THOUGHTS. 87
not only an error in judgment but a pertinacy in
the will, and it takes in delight at the affections. —
Job vi. 24.
GOD is able to stop those seas of error and give
a bound to those floods of false doctrine which
are ready to overflow the face of the world. The
sea or flood of the Arian heresy (which denied the
deity of Christ, or made him barely a man by nature,
only clothed with wonderful powers and privileges
— this heresy, I say, like a sea or flood) had almost
overwhelmed the whole world, yet God compassed
these black waters with bound and gave them a
commandment which they could not pass; and
though in this age they strive to return and over-
flow the earth, yet both the waters of this heresy
and of all other damnable heresies (as the Apos-
tle Peter calls them), which abound in these days
and threaten us with a fearful inundation, are
compassed with bounds which they shall not
exceed.
88 SEED THOUGHTS.
T
HOLINESS.
HE holiness of man consists in his conformity
unto God.
GOD is the objective cause of holiness; looking
upon him we become holy. " We (saith the
apostle, 2 Cor. iii. 18) all with open face, beholding
as in a glass the glory of the Lord (that is, we look-
ing upon that glory, holiness and excellence which
is in the Lord), are changed into the same image;"
that is, we are made conformable unto him. We
receive (as it were), the engravings of holiness in
our souls by beholding the Holy One. The eye of
faith (as well, yea more than the eye of sense) affects
the heart. Vision assimilates both in nature and
in grace, yea and in glory too. In heaven we shall
be perfectly holy, because we shall perfectly (in
Christ, who is the express image of his person) see
God, and so be like him. And proportionably
here, such as our visions of God are, such is our
likeness unto God.
SEEING God is everywhere present, we should
be everywhere holy.
SEED THOUGHTS. 89
THEY who want holiness must go to God for it,
for he is the Holy One. Are any of your hearts
unholy? Whither will you go? To what coast
will you trade for holiness ? Or where shall you
find the merchandise of it ? Go whither you will —
to what holy ordinance, to what holy duty, to what
holy minister you will— your vessels will return
unfreight and empty of holiness if you tread not to
the holy God. We must deal with ordinances and
by ordinances ; but if we have only to deal with
them, neglecting to meet with God, we shall make
nothing of them ; we shall not traffic in them to
any spiritual enriching or advantage. They are
conduit pipes, not springs, on the well-head. — Job
vi. 10.
rilO follow God is our duty. Godliness is god-
-L likeness or an imitation of God, and practical
Christianity is nothing else but our imitation of
Christ; and that not only in doing, but in suffering.
HOLINESS consists in a complete uniformity
or in conformity to the whole will of God.
Some are first-table Christians — others are second-
table Christians. Some are zealous for prayer, who
90 SEED THOUGHTS.
are extreme cold in doing justice; some are extreme
honest and just to men, righteous in all their deal-
ings, but they care not for prayer, nor have they
any delight in communion with God. The law of
God is one entire thing, and so must man's obedi-
ence be. He that offends in one point is guilty of
all. — Job xvi. 17.
HOPE.
NO man would be stirring, much less bestir him-
self about any business, were it not for the
hope of getting. And as it is the hope of attaining
that puts us upon doing, so it is the hope of attain-
ing that puts us upon suffering. Who would
suffer for Jesus Christ if he had not a hope of at-
taining somewhat better than he can lose by his
sufferings ? Therefore Jesus Christ hath set that
hope before us. To suffer rightly for Jesus Christ
is so honourable that we should suffer willingly,
though we get nothing by it. Yet he hath set a
reward before us — a crown by his cross ; he hath
assured us all our losses — even our loss of life for
his sake — shall turn to our gain and profit. Hope
of attaining is the motive to every undertaking.
No wise man will meddle with doing that which is
SEED THOUGHTS, 91
either impossible to be done, or altogether unprofit-
able when it is done. Was it not for hope the
heart would faint — first, in labouring; secondly, in
suffering; thirdly, in waiting. Hope is like a hel-
met upon the head when we are in danger of blows
(2 Thess. v. 8), and like an anchor, both sure and
steadfast, when we are in storms. — Job xli. 9.
THE loss of hope is the greatest loss. When
God would show man's worst condition, he
saith his hope is in vain ; that pincheth worst of
all, and that's it which will pinch hypocrites most
at last, who were in hope of enjoying God. But
not only their labour, but their hope shall be in
vain. This loss of hope will grieve more than the
loss of heaven.
LET a night be never so dark or tempestuous,
yet the hope of the morning is a mercy and a
light. How sick, then, are they who are hopeless ?
Everlastingness is the head of the arrow, the sting
and poison of all miseries ; it is, indeed, the sting
of hell. That hell is such a night as shall never
see the dawning of day, hath more torment and
pains in it than all the pains of hell. As that
92 SEED THOUGHTS.
which makes heaven so full of joy is that heaven is
above all fear, so that which makes hell so full of
terror is that hell is below all hope. Heaven is a
day that shall never see any approaches of night ;
so hell is a night that shall never see any dawning
of day. — Job iii. 3.
THE HOLY SPIRIT.
WE cannot make pure prayer with our own
breath, parts and gifts. The Holy Spirit
breathes pure prayer into and draws it out of our
hearts.
AS it is the office of Christ to intercede for us
with God, so it is the office of the Holy Ghost
to make those intercessions in us which we put up
to God.
THERE is a threefold influence or work of the
Spirit of God upon the soul of man :
First. To enlighten or to give the light of the
knowledge of his own glory in the face of Jesus
Christ.
Secondly. To convert, to work faith and repent-
ance together with love, humility, etc.
SEED THOUGHTS. 93
Thirdly. To refresh and comfort. These are un-
speakable influences of joy distilled from the Spirit
upon believers, and when God will let them down
from heaven, who can let them, what can let them ?
All the troubles and sorrows, all the pains and tor-
tures that man can invent or inflict upon the be-
liever, cannot bind these influences of the Spirit
nor hinder joy in believing. The greatest evils in
this life cannot shut up or shut out that comfort
which the Spirit speak eth. The most churlish
winds that can blow from the coldest quarters of
the world cannot chill, much less kill or blast, these
fruits of the Spirit — love, joy, peace, long-suffering,
gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance.
The soul grows green like a garden of pasture in
the spring; the soul buds, blossoms and brings forth
these blessed fruits abundantly when fed w 7 ith these
dainties and delicacies of the Spirit. Those great
floods of trouble and persecution which the serpent
anywhere and at any time calls out of his mouth,
cannot prevail against the least drop of consolation
wrought in the heart by the Spirit's influences.
Paul and Silas were bound in the prison, but then
their persecutors could not bind the sweet influ-
ences of the Spirit from comforting them, nor daunt
them by any terror from triumphing in Christ.
94 SEED THOUGHTS,
They could sing in prison, yea they sung at mid-
night. — Job xxxviii. 31.
w
HUMAN JUDGMENT.
E are more ready to judge the sins of others
great than our own.
WE are ready to judge their sins great who are
the greatest sufferers. The worst of sinners
never suffered more in this world than the best of
saints.
SUPPOSITIONS and conjectures are no fit
grounds upon which to build a judgment con-
cerning the faultiness of others. We must not cen-
sure upon I hear so, I suppose so, I think so, but I
know it so. Many have run into great sin by judging
the sins of others great. — Job xxii. 5.
WISE men may err in judgment and in speech.
Job's friends spake many truths, but did not
apply them truly to Job's case. The best men may
not only miss, but mistake their mark. They who
SEED THOUGHTS. 95
are in the light — yea who are in the light in the
Lord — have yet some darkness in them, and may
both do and speak from that darkness.
w
E are very apt to judge one another, but very
backward to judge ourselves.
IF we consider the sum of wdiat Eliphaz and his
two friends spake of God, we shall find Eliphaz
in this great mistake — affirming that all the suffer-
ings and afflictions which befall man in this world
are laid upon him by God as a punishment for sin.
And all these joined in two other mistakes : First.
That all wicked men sooner or later are visibly
punished for sin in this life. Secondly. That
though a good man may possibly suffer grievous
afflictions in this life, yet God always delivers him
out of them before he departs this life. Hence it
must needs follow that if a man for long continu-
ance of time, especially if all his life long, be con-
tinued in great calamity, that man must be judged
wicked, though no apparent wickedness can be
charged upon or proved against him. Upon these
unsound principles they were all confident to infer
against Job that he was a hypocrite, and that all
96 SEED THOUGHTS.
those troubles which befell him were inflicted by
the righteous hand of God as a punishment for his
sin. — Job xlii. 7.
HUMILITY.
THE way for us to humble ourselves for our own
sinfulness is to look and consider the purity
and holiness of God. If we set ourselves before
him, we shall see how vile and corrupt we are.
The Pharisee could pride himself in his comparison
with men (Luke xviii). But, Pharisee, art thou as
God? pure and holy and just as he? Look up-
ward, and pride will down. — Job ix. 2.
IF the best man's faults were written in his fore-
head, it would make him pull his hat over his
eyes.
A GODLY man's thoughts are lowest of himself.
■£*■ No man ever received a fairer or more valu-
able certificate from God than Job did, and yet no
man could speak more undervaluingly of himself
than Job did.— Job. ix. 14.
SEED THOUGHTS. 97
THE more holiness any soul hath, the more hu-
mility it hath.
THE better any man is, the more he is willing
to know the worst of himself.
THERE is no greater argument of height in
grace than low thoughts of ourselves.
THE dealings of God with man aim mostly to
humble him or make him see his own vileness.
WHEN our hearts are truly humbled, mercy
and deliverance are at hand. Job was no
sooner made deeply sensible of his vileness but
mercy came. The only skill of this excellent wrest-
ler (as one calls him) was to cast himself down at
God's foot. There is no way of getting in to God
or prevailing with him but by submitting to
him. The Lord layeth down his rod when we
lay down our pride, and casts his sword out of
his hand when we cast ourselves at his feet. —
Job xl. 4.
7
98 SEED THOUGHTS.
T
HE more we know God, the more humble we
are before him.
HYPOCRISY,
HYPOCRITES are well compared to a rush,
because in windy weather they set whichever
way the wind sets. They take no harm by a storm,
because they yield to every turn; let the wind blow
which way it will, the rush neither breaks body
nor branch. Hypocrites keep their standing be-
cause they never stand. A great man being asked
how he kept his honour and preferment in so many
changes of wind and weather, of times and princes,
answered, " By being a willow and not an oak." He
that can sway seldom breaks. Hypocrites in the
Church and State live by the same principles. —
Job viii. 12.
WE ought to reprove and not flatter sin in others ;
yet they who are extremely severe against a
sin in others usually favour either the same or a
worse in themselves.
A
N hypocrite never doeth good out of love to
God, but out of design for himself.
SEED THOUGHTS. 99
AX hypocrite is not worse than other wicked men
because he has more sin than they, but because
he hides his sin. Nor doth the greatness of his sin
lie simply in this, because he hides how sinful he
is, but because he appears holy, which he is not.
WE may wrong a wicked man by calling him
a hypocrite, but w r e cannot wrong any hypo-
crite by thinking him all that' s wicked.
HYPOCRITES in heart grow more wicked
while the hand of God — his afflicting hand — is
upon them. The more they are under the rod, the
more they rebel. If they did not heap up sin,
they should not heap up wrath.
HYPOCRITES cry not to the Lord, though he
makes them cry. They are readier to find
fault with God than with themselves in the day of
adversity. They neither cry the cry of godly sor-
row for their sin, nor the cry of godly prayers to
help out of their affliction. They who are false
with God in times of peace, seldom, if at all, repent,
or duly apply themselves to God to help them in
times of trouble.
100 SEED THOUGHTS.
IDLENESS.
SLOTHFUL persons are to be numbered among
thieves. They who will get nothing for them-
selves by labour steal all they have from others.
TO nourish idle persons is to nourish theft. To
succour lazy poor is not so much a relieving
of their wants as a strengthening of their vices.
A playing life is the life of a beast,
ADAM was not put into that pleasant garden
only to take his pleasure and to eat the fruit
of it ; but to dress and keep it.
INABILITY.
WE may be called to do what is not in our power
to do. The apostle exhorts (Phil. ii. 12),
"Work out your own salvation with fear and trem-
bling." He seems to give a strange reason in the
next verse : " For it is God that worketh in you
SEED THOUGHTS, 101
both to will and to do of his good pleasure." Our
inability to work doth not exempt us from working,
we having a promise from God to make us able.
We are commanded to do what we have not so
much as a will to do, because God is engaged in us
both to will and to do ; and that not according to
any predisposition of ours, but of his own good
pleasure. Our Master in heaven shows us our
duty, and then helps us to perform it.
THE JUDGMENT.
THAT there shall be a general judgment hath
been known and believed in all ages. As
Scripture authorities are full of it, so there are many
rational demonstrations of it. For, first, the judg-
ments that have been shown that there shall be a
judgment. Secondly, the lesser external days
argue it, so do internal judgment days. There is
a day of judgment kept in the conscience of man,
which tells that God will keep a day of judgment
at last concerning all men. Thirdly, judgment
hath not been fully executed in any age of the
world. Fourthly, as the Lord will have a time to
acquit himself and to declare the righteousness of
his judgments, so he will have a time to quit the
102 SEED THOUGHTS.
integrity of his people and to set them right in the
eye of all the world. He will have a day in which
there shall be a fresh edition of the works of all his
saints, with a comment of their own upright and
honest meaning upon them, not racked and wire-
drawn with the malice and misconception either of
enemies or mistaken friends.
11HE great work of judgment is appropriated to
the Son as a part, or as the completion, of his
mediatorial office. And it is but equal that judg-
ment should be put into the hand of the Redeemer,
and that he should come in all his glory when he
comes to sit in judgment, because he hath been
judged and condemned, because he hath borne
shame and dishonour while himself stood in judg-
ment. Christ did not only die for us, but he was
condemned to death as an evil-doer. There was
not only pain in his death, but shame. He in this
humbled himself indeed, and, which is more, he be-
came obedient, and (which is the lowest obedience)
he became obedient unto death (and which is the
lowest and most ignominious death), the death of
the cross. The apostle makes this threefold hu-
miliation the ground of his threefold exaltation
SEED THOUGHTS. 103
(Phil. ii. 9, 10): " Wherefore God hath highly ex-
alted him/' etc. He exalted him above the grave
in his resurrection, above the earth in his ascension,
above the heavens in his session at the right hand
of the Father.
This honour of Christ the Redeemer to be the
Judge of the world carries a twofold effect in it,
according to that twofold distribution of those who
are the objects of this judgment :
First. It carries terror to the wicked who know
not God and who have not obeyed the gospel.
There is nothing in condemnation more dreadful
than to be condemned by a Redeemer. They who
are without Christ are without hope ; how hope-
less, then, and helpless are they who are cast out
by Christ ! Who can stand before his wrath
as a Judge, who as a Redeemer came to deliver
us from the wrath to come? There are five
things in this Judge which make his wrath most
dreadful :
1st. He is such a Judge as the power of the most
powerful cannot daunt.
2d. He is such a Judge as the wealth of the
wealthiest cannot bribe.
3d. He is such a Judge as the wit and subtlety
of the wisest cannot elude.
104 SEED THOUGHTS.
4 th. He is such a Judge as there is no appealing
from his sentence. What he sets down shall stand
for ever.
Second. This carries comfort and speaks joy to
the saints. How sweet is it to remember that their
Redeemer is their Judge. For,
1st. He being their Judge, the judge is their
friend.
2d. He is their kinsman, their brother.
3d. Their Judge is also their priest and propitia-
tion. He shall judge them who hath satisfied for
them, and knows how all reckoning and accounts
stand between God and their souls ; for he it is
that hath by his own blood balanced and made
them up.
4th. The Judge is their advocate and intercessor.
Lastly. The Judge is he who was judged in their
behalf, and seeing he was condemned, bearing their
sins, he will not lay those sins again upon them
who have laid hold on him, and so condemn them.
All these considerations laid together show how
sweet it is for saints to remember that the Redeemer
shall stand upon the earth to judge them. — Job
xix. 25.
SEED THOUGHTS. 105
JUSTIFICATION.
NO man can be justified by his works. He that
mixeth but one sin with a thousand good ac-
tions cannot be justified by his works ; how, then,
shall he be justified by his works who hath not one
perfectly good action among a thousand sins ? He
that would be justified by his works must not have
one ill action among all his actions. One fly in
the box of ointment corrupts all ; one defect makes
a sinner, but many good actions cannot make one
righteous. — Job ix. 3.
MAN hath nothing of his own to justify him be-
fore God. First, because the best of his right-
eousness is imperfect. God never took cockle-
shells for payment ; he must have pure gold, and
he seeth well enough what poor stuff, what base
coin the best of our righteousness is, and therefore
cannot admit any of it in justification. Secondly,
all the righteousness wrought by man is a due debt.
How can we acquit ourselves of any evil we have
done by any good which we can do, seeing all the
good we do we ought to have done, though we have
never done any evil ?
106 SEED THOUGHTS.
a
IF I say I am perfect, it shall also prove me
perverse." Observe hence that famous gospel
doctrine, No man can be justified before God by
the works of the law. It is as noble a proof of free
justification in the Old Testament as any in the
New.
THE saints have been acquainted with this truth
from the beginning — that man is nothing in
himself and that free grace doth all. — Job ix. 20.
rilHEY who would make themselves most holy
JL appear most unholy before God. Thoughts
of our own purity render us impure. We are
never so black before God as when we are whitest
in our own eyes. We find the Pharisee (Luke
xviii.) washing himself in snow-water and making
his hands very clean. He tells us that he had
fasted , and prayed, and given alms and paid tithes
(this is to wash ourselves in snow-water), but the
Lord plunged this Pharisee in the ditch ; he cast
him for a wicked man. The poor Publican plunged
himself in the ditch, and judged himself fit to be
thrown into the mire. But he went down to his
house justified, rather than the other. — Job ix. 31.
SEED THOUGHTS. 107
JUSTIFICATION (considered in the gospel no-
tion) is that gracious sentence of God wherein,
with respect to Christ apprehended by faith, he
absolveth the believer from sin and death, and doth
repute him just and righteous unto eternal life.
This doctrine of free justification is the foundation
and corner-stone of all our comfort. For whereas
there is a double change in the state of the sinner —
first, a relative change ; secondly, an absolute and
real change — the one is made in sanctification, the
other in justification. Sanctification is a real
change, subduing corruption, destroying the power
of sin in us. But justification is not a physical or
real change in the person; it doth not make him
that is unrighteous righteous in himself, nor is man
at all justified (in this sense) by any self-righteous-
ness, but it is only a relative change as to his state.
To justify is a law term, signifying the pronouncing
or declaring of a man righteous; so that justifica-
tion is an act of God upon us or toward us. Sanc-
tification is an act of God in us. This blessed
grace of sanctification always followeth the grace
of justification as an effect or fruit of it; and though
it may be easily distinguished from it, yet it can no
more be separated or divided from it than heat
from fire or motion from life. — Job xxv. 4.
108 SEED THOUGHTS.
GOD does not justify a sinner for anything that
he finds or sees in us.
LIFE.
THE life of man is nothing else but a coming
and a returning. It is but a flood and an ebb,
and then we are carried into the ocean of eternity.
AS a man would give skin for skin, one outward
thing for another, so a man will give all out-
ward things for his life.
IF life be worth all, then hereby we may take
measure of the love and bounty of Christ to
poor sinners, who not only spent himself in all to
his life, but spent life and all that they might not
perish.
— •<>♦- —
SOUL and life are sometimes taken promiscu-
ously or indifferently for the same thing, yet
there is a very great difference between soul and
life. The life is nothing else but the union be-
tween soul and body, but the soul is a spiritual
SEED THOUGHTS. 109
substance, distinct from the body while remaining
in it and subsisting itself alone when separated
from it.
THE LIVING REDEEMER.
" T7^^ ■"" know that my Redeemer liyeth, and
J- that he shall stand at the latter day upon
the earth." For the clearing of these words I
shall premise two general veins of interpreta-
tion :
First. The Jewish writers interpret this context
of a metaphysical resurrection in reference to Job's
outward condition, or of his resurrection from a
state of affliction. We have this sense of a resur-
rection illustriously held forth (Ezekiel xxxvii.),
when the return of the people of Israel out of Bab-
ylon is described by the reviving of dry bones.
Now I say the Rabbins generally, as also some of
our learned expositors, run upon this strain here,
conceiving that Job therefore calls God his Re-
deemer, because he had to that day preserved him
alive in the midst of so many deaths and dangers,
and also because he had a sure hope that he should,
through the power of God, survive them and be
restored to such a state of honour and riches as he
110 SEED THOUGHTS.
had enjoyed in the former part of his life. This
they call his resurrection and redemption.
Three special reasons may be urged against this
opinion :
1st. The height and spirit ualness of Job's lan-
guage tell us that his hopes were fixed above this
world's felicity.
2d. Though his expressions in the letter may be
fitted to this inferior sense, yet if we remember
what hath been touched more than once in the
former passages of this book, w T e find that Job had
disclaimed, as it were, all hope of restoration unto
any temporal happiness in this life, affirming that
his hope was gone, and that he was worse than a
tree cut down, of which there is hope that it will
grow again, and that as he had no desire, so no
expectation, of recovering his former beauty and
greatness.
3d. He saith that he should see God with the
same eyes — that he should see him for himself and
not another ; which argueth that he intended not a
resurrection of his outward estate ; for what doubt
could there be that, if he were raised from affliction,
but that he should see God with the same eyes,
and that he himself should see him ? But to believe
the restoring of the same body or the identity of
SEED THOUGHTS. Ill
the eyes of the body after all had mouldered into
dust, this was a high act of believing.- From
these reasons it appears that Job holds forth his
faith in a resurrection not to a temporal good in
this life, but to eternal life. The argument of Job
is this: " He that waits by faith in the Redeemer
for the resurrection of his body to eternal life after
death hath done its worst is not a wicked man or
an hypocrite, as you have charged me. But such
is my faith. I believe in the Redeemer, and I look
to rise (after this body is consumed and eaten of
worms) to an eternal happy life. You accuse me
as rejected of God, yet I know that God is my Re-
deemer and that he lives for ever ; and therefore do
not think, because I have no hope in this life, that
I therefore despair of life. For I know that my
Redeemer liveth, and shall stand upon the earth at
the latter day."
The Avord w T hich we translate Redeemer comes
from a root which is applied three ways in Scrip-
ture : First, to buying again that which was alien-
ated by sale or mortgage; secondly, to the rescuing
or bringing back those who had been taken prison-
ers, by force or power, or by a price or ransom ;
thirdly, this word is applied to the avenging of
their death who have been wrongfully slain, God
112 SEED THOUGHTS,
(Numb. xxxv. 12) is the avenger of blood, or the
redeemer of blood, because he came to take ven-
geance on such as had unjustly shed the blood of
his kinsman.
Again, to be a redeemer is taken in two ways :
1st. More largely for a deliverer or helper; so
'tis one of the names of God, and to redeem is both
his work and his honour.
2d. More strictly to redeem, and the title Re-
deemer is applied to Jesus Christ, to whom also, I
conceive, we may apply all those works of redemp-
tion which in the Old Testament are ascribed to
God. For he was God the Redeemer from the be-
ginning, long before he was God manifest in the
flesh. In this strict sense the word Redeemer suits
Christ fullv, for God signifies one that is near to
us in consanguinity, and such were under special
obligation to redeem (Ruth iii. 12). In this strict
sense, besides hi in there is no redeemer. For though
God the Father in the Son by the Holy Spirit be
our Redeemer, yet properly, and according to the
signification of the word, Jesus Christ alone is our
Redeemer, who, taking our nature upon him and
becoming our brother, had right to redeem us,
even as being God in our nature he had full power
to redeem us.
SEED THOUGHTS. 113
The blood of Christ may be considered two ways
in the work of redemption :
First. As the price of our redemption. " We
are bought with a price" (1 Cor. vi. 20) ; " not
with corruptible things, as silver and gold, but
With the precious blood of Christ" (1 Peter i. 20).
Secondly. The blood of Christ carries the right
of redemption. Blood implies nearness of relation.
As God made all nations of men of one blood, so
he hath made Christ and us of one blood (Heb. ii.
14). " Forasmuch as the children are partakers
of flesh and blood, he also himself took part of the
same." Christ as God had power to redeem us,
but as being (Immanuel) God with us, one with us,
a kinsman and brother, he not only had a right,
but was obliged to redeem us.
To clear the point a little further, there are five
things concurring to complete the office and service
of our Redeemer:
1st. The Redeemer must be a kinsman.
2d. He must redeem upon that ground or no-
tion.
3d. He must deliver those who were under re-
straint or captivity from the hand of their enemies
and oppressors.
4th. He must not pay any price to the oppressor.
114 SEED THOUGHTS.
5 th. He must pay the price to the true Lord, or
into his hands, to whom the redeemed originally or
of right do belong.
These five considerations meet in Christ our Re-
deemer. Mankind fallen may be looked upon in
two ways :
First. As under the power of sin and Satan.
Secondly. As under the power and justice of God.
When Christ came to redeem us, he paid nothing
to the devil but blows. " He spoiled principalities
and powers," but he did not make their satisfac-
tion. We owed the devil nothing; he was only an
executioner to vex and afflict us ; but he paid the
price to the Father, under w r hose justice we were
fallen, and so he exactly fulfilled all the duties and
sustained all the parts of a Redeemer to the ut-
most.
Further, Job doth not only profess faith in a Re-
deemer, but in his Redeemer — my Redeemer liveth.
Every word in this confession is precious and
weighty. Here he useth an appropriating word,
yet he doth not engross the Redeemer to himself,
excluding others, but he takes his part with others.
Those pronouns, mine, thine, his, are words of love,
and drop like honeycomb with sweetness of affection.
The first work of faith is to believe that Christ is
SEED THOUGHTS. 115
a Redeemer ; the second is to believe and rely upon
Christ as a Redeemer ; the third is to see an inter-
est in Christ as my Redeemer. The faith of Job
did not run upon generals, but was fixed, set down
and resolved to live and die by his living Redeemer.
As if he had said, Though I am mortal and dying,
as also you my friends are, yet my Redeemer liveth.
He speaks of his life without any distinction of
time, past or to come ; God is for ever " I Am."
Again, when he saith, My Redeemer liveth, we
must look on Christ not only as having life, but as
the Lord and Prince of life. Christ as the eternal
Word hath life in himself, so also hath life to be-
stow at his pleasure or upon whom he pleaseth.
Again, the words, " My Redeemer liveth" note
the strength, activity and power of Jesus Christ —
not a mere being or substance only, but might and
strength. As if he had said, " Though I am weak,
poor and miserable, though my life be so low and
my body so dispirited that I may more fitly be
numbered among the dead than among the living,
yet my Redeemer liveth and is mighty." And
thus Job ascribed efficiency and strength to him as
well as life.
From this part of Job's confession observe —
First. Affliction doth not separate from Christ.
116 SEED THOUGHTS.
When Job could call nothing in or of the world
his, he could call Christ his.
Secondly. Observe that a believer may arrive at
an assurance, at the full assurance, of his interest in
Jesus Christ the Redeemer. Faith acts upon a
sure ground ; 'tis bottomed on the knowledge of a
sure word — not upon an opinion — and it is not sat-
isfied until it can say, Jesus is mine and I am his.
Thirdly. Observe that Jesus Christ was the Re-
deemer from the beginning. Christ speaks of the
times as high as Abraham : " Before Abraham was,
I am." And the apostle Jude speaks higher of
him, that Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophe-
sied of the coming of Jesus Christ to judge the
world ; therefore certainly he was acquainted with
the promise of Jesus Christ to redeem the world.
Fourthly. Learn that there is but one Redeemer.
One is all, as the apostle testifies (Acts iv. 12) :
" Neither is there any name under heaven whereby
we must be saved, but only by the Lord Jesus."
Fifthly. Note we have a living Redeemer.
" Christ being raised from the dead, dieth no more."
In this life of Christ our comfort lives. First, in
that he liveth to us ; that is, for our good, both in
a temporal salvation from troubles, and in an eter-
nal salvation from sin and condemnation. Sec-
SEED THOUGHTS. 117
ondly, that we live in him ; he is our life, and our
life is as safe as his. From this double comfort, is-
suing out of this great truth, I shall only intimate
this single duty incumbent upon all believers —
Live to Christ.
The second article of Job's confession is not only
that his Eedeemer liveth, but that he shall stand
at the latter day upon the earth. As the whole
gospel-time is called the last time or the latter clays,
so there is a latter day which is more special and
particular, and that is the day of the resurrection
or the day of judgment, which we may call the last
of the latter days.
1st. The vulgar translation renders the clause,
" He shall stand at the latter day," in the first per-
son, as Job's profession of his faith about his own
resurrection.
2d. This clause is understood by some metaphor-
ically : " He shall stand" — that is, Christ shall
conquer all his enemies.
3d. These words (as others conceive) at least in-
timate to us the incarnation of Christ.
4th. Others conceive these words speaking Job's
faith in the resurrection of Christ from the earth.
5th. Yet (as I conceive) these words are more
strictly to be understood of his coming to raise all
118 SEED THOUGHTS.
flesh out of the dust, and then to proceed in judg-
ment with them. Our bodies shall be raised out
of the dust in the latter day by the power of Christ.
Then they who are dead shall be redeemed from
the power of the grave, and they who are found
alive shall be redeemed from all the troubles and
sorrows of life. Then Christ will wipe all tears
from the eyes of every afflicted Job; then he will
heal all the sores of his Jobs ; then he will make
all his Jobs like himself; they that lay on a dung-
hill scraping their sores with a potsherd, when
Christ appears shall appear with him in glory.
Yea, when the Redeemer shall stand upon the
earth in the latter day, he will marry all his Jobs
to himself; he will take them from the dust and
lay them in his bosom for ever. Therefore, well
might Job, and well may any saint in his or in a
worse condition than his, rejoice and triumph in
this faith : " I know that my Redeemer liveth, and
that he shall stand in the latter day upon the
earth." — Job xix. 25.
SEED THOUGHTS. 119
MAGISTRATES.
MEN in power should not satisfy themselves with
what will pass among or be countenanced by
men, but consider what is right in itself, what is right
in the sight of God, and that they are in the sight of
God. A bad business may pass very well among
men, and we may have advocates who will answer
for us and stop the mouths of all gainsayers ; but
can they stop the mouth of conscience? Can they
blind the eyes of God or impose upon him? God
is the Judge of all the earth, and he will at last sit
in judgment upon all the judges of the earth. — Job
xxxi. 21.
A GODLY magistrate will do just and righteous
things, though all the world rise up against
him.
BY how much magistrates are lifted up above
the fear of men, and by how much all other
men ought to fear them, by so much should they
be carried out more than other men in the fear of
God.
120 SEED THOUGHTS.
SOME men are set to rule men who keep no
rules. A wise man would not set them over
his dogs.
M
MEDITATION.
EDITATION turns the promises of God into
marrow.
MEDITATION is the inward view of a thing,
or the beholding of it with the intellectual
eye; it is the continual turning of things over in
the mind to behold the excellences and perfections
that are in them.
THERE are two things which should be the
daily meditation of saints, or they should be
continually acquainting themselves with them :
First, the cross of Christ, that they may know how
and be willing to suffer for him ; secondly, the
yoke of Christ, that they may know how and be
willing to serve him.
SEED THOUGHTS. 121
#
MINISTERS.
TTIIS enough to make all ministers of Christ trem-
JL ble and cry out in the apostle's words, " Who
is sufficient for these things?" to remember that
when they speak to men, they speak in God's stead.
GOD hath not made his ministers lions to scare
his flock, nor bulls to gore them, but shep-
herds to feed them and watch over them.
T11IS not enough barely to receive Christ's mes-
J- sengers ; they must be received as the messen-
gers of Christ.
NATIVE DEPRAVITY.
MAN being naturally unclean, his children and
posterity are unclean too. The copy cannot
be better than the original, nor the effect nobler
than the cause. This flesh hath an ill name all the
Scriptures over. The son of an Ethiopian is also
an Ethiopian. Our father was an Ammonite, and
so are we. The natural constitution of everything
is transmitted by natural generation. Man is him-
122 SEED THOUGHTS.
self unclean, and all his issue is like himself. God
created man pure, in his own likeness, after his
image, and man begets man impure, in his own
likeness, after his image. There are two things in
this uncleanness :
1st. There is a privation of that comeliness and
beauty which was stamped upon man in his original
creation.
2d. The actions which he brings forth are un-
clean.
There are seven considerable properties in this
uncleanness :
1st. It is an internal uncleanness, for even the
mind and conscience are defiled.
2d. It is an abiding uncleanness. All the water
in the ocean cannot wash it out ; all the fire in hell
cannot burn it out.
3d. It is an abounding uncleanness. It is not in
the hand or face only, but in and upon the whole
man; it goes quite through.
4th. It is an active or powerful uncleanness,
stirring up an unholy war in man against the holy
will of God.
5th. It is a diffusive or infectious uncleanness,
like a leprosy or plague — first, by way of propaga-
tion from Adam ; secondly, by way of imitation ;
SEED THOUGHTS. 123
and so one man doing evil, another seeth and catch-
eth it, he is infected and defiled with it.
6th. It is a bewitching and ensnaring unclean-
ness. All the bodily beauty in the world did never
entice so many as the deformity and foul face of
sin hath.
7th. It is a murderous and mortal uncleanness.
There is no escaping death if we live in it; it is the
ruin as well as the dishonour of man. — Job xiv. 4.
OLD AGE,
THAT old age is venerable, not which hath white
hair, but which whiteneth with virtuous and
worthy actions.
OLD age hath no glory without wisdom to do
righteous things, and when an old man is
without righteousness his old age is not his crown,
but his reproach.
OLD age is a blessing, and good indeed when we
are old in goodness or grow old doing good.
Better to die young than to live to old age, and
then die in sin.
124 SEED THOUGHTS.
SOME old men have nothing of old age in them
but the infirmities of it.
H
OMNISCIENCE OF GOD.
E that seeth our ways and counteth all our
steps cannot be a stranger to what we are, to
what we are doing or have done.
A GRACIOUS heart considers himself much
and always under the eye of God. And as it
shows a very holy frame of heart to do so, so it is
an excellent means to keep the heart in a steady
frame of holiness.
A
S the Lord marks all our paths, so it will be
our wisdom to mark our own paths.
OPPORTUNITIES.
Qi AT AN observeth and watcheth his time to fasten
^ his temptations most strongly upon the soul.
As the mercies of God are exceedingly endeared to
us by the season in which they come to us, when
they come to us in our special need, how sweet is a
SEED THOUGHTS. 125
mercy then ! And as our obedience is exceedingly
commended to God when it is upon a fit day — when
it is on a day wherein he calls for and expects it —
and as our sins are exceedingly aggravated by the
season and time wherein they are committed, what!
sin upon this day — a day of trouble, a day of hu-
miliation ? As Elisha rebuked Gehazi (2 Kings v.
26), Is this a time to receive money? Is this a
time for thy heart to run out sinfully after the
world ? — so likewise the temptations of Satan are
exceedingly embittered by the season, and he knows
well enough what seasons will make them most
bitter ; and what can more embitter a cup of sor-
row than to have it brought upon us in a day of
rejoicing?
Thus he did with Christ. It is observed that
when Christ had fasted forty days and forty nights,
and afterward was hungry, then the tempter came.
He lays hold of this advantage. He would not
come till he was hungry, to persuade him to turn
stones into bread. What a strength had this temp-
tation from the season ! Had Christ been full,
there w r ould not have been such an edgp upon, such
a weight in, this temptation. How many doth
Satan tempt to turn stones into bread when he
comes to them in their hunger ! Thou art in a
126 SEED THOUGHTS,
strait, like to starve and perish; procure thyself
meat and provision by unlawful and sinful ways —
this is indeed to turn stones into bread.
It were well if we could be wise in this respect
to imitate Satan — to choose out our day to do good
when there is the greatest probability of success, as
he chose out his day to do mischief. It is the apos-
tle's rule, u As you have opportunity to do good."
If we could be wise to lay hold of opportunities, it
would be a w r onderful advantage to us. As a word
fitly spoken is a w r ord upon the wheel, so a work
fitly done is a work upon the wheel ; it goeth on —
takes upon the heart both of God and man. Let
us consider whether now we have not a season —
whether this be not a day that holds forth to us a
glorious opportunity. Let us therefore be as quick
in our clay to do good as Satan was in that day to
do hurt.
This is a day wherein great things are doing and
grievous things are a-suffering by many of our
brethren ; therefore you should be working this
day. This is a day in which sons of Belial — men
that will not have Christ's yoke — are combining to
break it and cast his cord from them. Then join
this day to help Christ, else, as Mordecai said to
Esther, " If thou altogether holdest thy peace at
SEED THOUGHTS. 127
this time (this was a day for Esther to work in),
then shall there enlargement and deliverance arise
to the Jews from another quarter, but thou and thy
father's house shall be destroyed." So I may say
to you in reference to the present opportunity : if
you altogether hold your peace, hold your purses
and hold your hand at this time, enlargement will
come to the Church some other way, but you may
be destroyed who think to hold and keep your
peace, either by saying or doing nothing; if ever
you will appear, this is a day to appear in to do
good. Let us be wise to manage and improve our
day, so that it may never be said of us as our Lord
did of Jerusalem, " If ye had known, even in this
your day, the things which belong unto your peace !"
—Job i. 13.
PAPAL INFALLIBILITY.
THAT which hath fastened so many errors to the
pope's chair, and from thence scattered them
over all the world, is an opinion that he in his chair
cannot err; his supposed spirit of infallibility hath
made him the great deceiver, and deceived him. He
that thinks he cannot err, errs in thinking so, and
seldom speaks or thinks or does anything but it is
128 SEED THOUGHTS.
an error. He is most secured from error who sus-
pects he hath erred, and humbly acknowledges that
he may. — Job vi. 24.
WISDOM is no man's peculiar, and a great opin-
ion of our own wisdom savours of great folly.
The very head of that monster, papal pride, appears
in this point. The pope thinks himself to be the
man, that he is the people, that all the wisdom and
judgment of the world is contracted into him and
fastened to the pummels of his chair, whence he
w T ould be believed to utter oracles with a spirit of
infallibility. — Job xii. 2.
THE great cheat which the pope hath put upon
the world is, that the Spirit of God is tied to
the pummels of his chair, so that there he cannot
err. But as particular men, so whole councils of
learned and aged men have erred.
TRUE wisdom is not the birth of time nor the
peculiar of a party, but the free gift of the
Spirit of God, who is most free both in what he
giveth and to whom he giveth.
SEED THOUGHTS. 129
THE pope challengeth to himself that though he
may err in his private actions, as he is a man,
yet as he is {in cathedra) seated in the apostolic
chair, as he is the visible head of the Church, he
cannot err; his will is the rule. We see what rule
it is by the rule which it has given. Who can say
that is clean which brings forth an unclean thing,
or straight and true which brings forth that which
is crooked and erroneous ? Sinful actings bespeak
sinful men, and his actings have been sinful enough
to speak him (what is written of him) "the man
of sin."
PARDON OF SIN.
PARDONED sins cannot hurt the sinner, and
though it troubles him that he hath sinned,
yet his sins cannot trouble him. He w T ho is once
purged hath no more conscience of sin. This is
the glory of the gospel. Free grace in justification
takes all our sins off the file as if they were not at
all. Pardon is the blotting of transgressions out
of God's book, and if they are once blotted out
of. God's book, we need not care who writes them
in their book, nor w T hat books men or devils write
against us. — Job xxxi. 37.
130 SEED THOUGHTS.
THE greatest sins fall within the compass of
God's pardoning mercy. The grace of the
gospel is large as any evil of sin the law can charge
us with. Whatever the law can call or show to be
sin, the gospel can show a pardon for it; whatever
the law can bind us with, the gospel can unloose.
The mercy-seat covered the whole ark. The mercy-
seat noted the forgiveness of sins, and if you read
the description of it (Exodus xxv.), you shall find
that it was exactly to a hair's breadth of the same
dimensions with the ark wherein the Law was put,
intimating that there was mercy and pardon for sin,
let it come out of any part of that Law laid up in
the ark.
THE sin-pardoning mercy of God is one of the
highest and most spiritual arguments by which
the soul is kept from sin.
BE not discouraged, though your sins are great,
when you come to ask the pardon of them. As
the greatness of sin puts a very great damp upon
the spirit of man in asking pardon, so the greatness
of God should take off that damp. There is noth-
ing wherein God doth more exceed man than in
V-
SEED THOUGHTS. 131
pardoning sin. If sin be great, the mercy of God
is great too — infinitely greater than the sin of man ;
if sin be great, remember we have a great High
Priest (Heb. iv. 14) ; not only a Priest, but a High
Priest, and a great High Priest: therefore fear not
to ask the pardon even of the greatest sin in his
name and for his sake.
PASSIONS.
PASSIONS in the mind are like a tempest in the
air. They disturb others much, but ourselves
more.
HE that fills his own mind with passionate
thoughts will soon fill the ears of others with
unprofitable words.
T
O show much reason and little passion is our
wisdom.
]^EAR will not be blown away with a breath.
- Our passions are never truly quieted nor attem-
pered but by reason.
132 SEED THOUGHTS.
PATIENCE,
PATIENCE ascends by three steps to the per-
fection of her work. The first is a silent (not a
sullen) submission in resignation of ourselves to the
disposal of God. Secondly, a kind of thankful ac-
ceptation, or kissing of the rod which smites us.
The third step is spiritual joy and serious cheerful-
ness under sorrowful dispensations.
THE Lord waits to be gracious. He waits the
working of this or that means, of a second or
third means, and he waits the working of them all
over and over again, or oftentimes. Here is pa-
tience with long-sufferance.
PERSEVERANCE.
PERSEVERANCE is at once the duty and the
privilege of the saints.
IT is not the hold which we have of God, but that
which he hath of us, that makes us hold on our
way. We should quickly let go our hold of God,
if God had not infinite faster hold of us.
SEED THOUGHTS. 133
TRUE grace lives, and therefore it must needs
grow. The grain of mustard seed proves a
great tree.
TO persevere is best when we persevere in good,
and to persevere is worst when we persevere
in evil.
PRAYER.
IN prayer there is a reasoning with God, and the
reasonings and pleadings that are in prayer are
the life and strength of prayer. The prayers of
the saints recorded in Scripture are full of argu-
ments. I shall show it in one example, as a taste
of the rest : Jacob, in his distress at the approach
of his brother Esau, flees to God in prayer (Gen.
xxxii.), and he doth more than speak in prayer;
he argues, yea he wrestles, with God in prayer.
The sum of it is set down (v. 11) : " Deliver me, I
pray thee I" To the undertaking of this deliverance
he urgeth the Lord by no fewer than seven argu-
ments : First, from God's covenant with his ances-
tors, " O God of my father Abraham/ 7 etc. ; as if
he had said, Remember those names with whom
thou madest solemn covenants of protection, both to
134 SEED THOUGHTS.
them and their posterity. The second is from God's
particular command for this journey, "Thou saidst
unto me, Return ;" I departed not on my own head,
but by thy direction, and therefore thou canst not
for thy honour but free me from danger, seeing at
thy word I am fallen into it. Thou, O Lord, art
ever engaged to give me defence while I yield thee
obedience. Thirdly, he puts him in mind of his
promises. Thou saidst, "I will deal well with
thee," and that includes all other promises made
unto him ; these he makes as a bulwark to defend
him, as his anchor in the storm. This anchor must
fail and this bulwark be broken down before danger
comes to me. If thy promise stand, I cannot fall.
The fourth is the confession of his own un worthiness.
Faith is always humble, and while we are most con-
fident in God's word we are most distrustful of our
own undesert: "I am not worthy of the least of all
thy mercies." Though I am thus bold to urge thy
covenant, yet I am as ready to acknowledge my
own undesert. Thou art a debtor by the promise
thou hast made me, not by any performance of mine
to thee. Fifthly, he seeks to continue the current
of God's favour by showing how plentifully it had
already streamed unto him, which he doth by way
of antithesis, setting his former poverty in opposi-
SEED THOUGHTS. 135
tion to his present riches : " With my staff I passed
over this Jordan, and now I am become two bands;"
that is, thou hast blessed me abundantly, and shall
my brother's malice blast all ? Am I increased
only to make him abound ? The sixth argument
is the greatness and eminence of his peril : u I fear
lest he come and slay the mother upon the chil-
dren" — a proverbial speech in the holy Scriptures,
like that of cutting off branch and root in one day,
both denoting total excision or an utter overthrow.
Seventhly, he shuts up by reinforcing the mention
of the promise which he urgeth more strongly than
before. There it was only, "Thou saidst I will
deal well with thee ;" but here it is, " Thou saidst,
In doing good I will do thee good" — that is, as it
is rendered in our translation, " I will surely do
thee good," and therefore let not my brother do me
evil. We see Jacob's prayer was a reasoning with
God, and himself in the issue got not only a new
blessing but a new name : Israel, a prince with God,
a prevailer both with God and men. — Job ix. 14.
PRAYER without faith is like a gun discharged
without a bullet, which makes a noise, but doth
no execution.
136 SEED THOUGHTS.
ANSWER of our prayer is the grant of God.
Nothing stands between us and our desires
but his will. If he sign our petition, no creature
can hinder us of our expectation.
THE return of prayer is the soul's solace and
satisfaction.
IN seeking God we must look to receive all from
his free grace and undeserved favour. Mercy
in God is the spring of all mercies received by man.
In all our approaches to God we should reflect
upon ourselves, not only as having many wants
and no worthiness, but as having many sins and
(of our own) no goodness. — Job viii. 5.
A praying soul is an expecting soul,
DO not think your prayers are lost because your
afflictions are not removed, or that God doth
not hear you because he doth not presently relieve
you. God forbears when he doth not deny. He
answers to our profit when he doth not to our
feeling.
G
SEED THOUGHTS. 137
OD is a sure paymaster, and yet he expects we
should seek him before he pays.
TPHE will of God is the rule, not only of things
J- to be done by us, but of things which w r e are
to ask of God to do for us.
IN prayer we prevail with God, but the strength
whereby we prevail with God comes from God ;
yea, he doth not only give us strength in prayer to
act by, but he acts that strength in prayer.
w
IXGED prayers have usually a winged an-
swer — they are answered speedily.
INWROUGHT prayer, or prayer that hath a
spirit in it, carrieth all before it. Surely that
prayer which is acted by the Holy Spirit nothing
can bind or hold from prevailing.
GODLY men are ever answered in effect though
not in kind.
138 SEED THOUGHTS.
GOD certainly hears what we speak, but we many
times do not hear what he speaks, though he
speaks peace to us. God always hears the prayer
of faith and answers it, but we do not always hear
what the answer is.
JOB thought he was not heard because he had
not present deliverance, and in that sense in-
deed he was not heard ; and thus many of the
saints may pray and not be heard — that is, they
may pray and have not present deliverance. But
how may we know that we are heard at any time,
especially then when we have not present deliver-
ance? I answer it, in four things :
1st. By the quietness of our spirits. ; Tis a sign
prayer is answered when we are satisfied, though
the thing be not given in which we prayed for.
Hannah, having poured out her soul before the
Lord, went her way and did eat, and her counte-
nance was no more sad (1 Sam. i. 18). The text
saith nothing of the answer of her prayer at that
time. But the peace and satisfaction which she
had in her own spirit about it was an argument
that the thing was granted, as indeed it was.
2d. Though we receive not the mercy presently,
yet if we receive fresh strength to bear the want of
SEED THOUGHTS. 139
it, that's an answer. So Paul was answered. God
did not remove the messenger of Satan from him,
but he said, " My grace is sufficient for thee, and
my strength is made perfect in weakness ;" though
I remove not the evil, yet my power shall support
thee under it.
3d. We are answered when, though the evil be
not removed, yet we have faith and patience to
tarry the Lord's leisure for the removal of it.
When patience hath a perfect work (either in ex-
pecting or suffering) w T e are perfect and entire,
wanting nothing, though we have not what we want.
Lastly. He is answered in prayer that is more
heavenly or more in heaven after prayer. He that
is edified in his holy faith hath certainly prayed in
the Holy Ghost (Jude 20); and sure enough, every
such prayer is heard.
"\yOTHING is tunable nor takes the ear and
i- 1 heart of Christ like the voice of prayer and
praise from a gracious heart.
PRAYER is as it were a battle fought in heaven
— not in wrath or revenge, but with faith and
holy submission.
140 SEED THOUGHTS.
THERE is a threefold strength needful in prayer,
and God by his Spirit puts these three strengths
in us :
First. The Spirit helps us with strength of argu-
ment to plead with God.
Secondly. The Spirit helps us with strength of
faith in taking hold upon God.
Thirdly. The Spirit helps us with strength of
patience in waiting upon God till we receive what
we prayed for.
PELAGIANISM.
IT was the ancient error of the Pelagians that the
sin of man came only by imitation. They de-
nied that a man had a stock of corruption in his
nature, or that his nature was corrupted ; but see-
ing others sin, he sinned — an opinion which carries
its condemnation in its own face as well as in our
hearts. And though similitudes are no proofs, yet
the reason of a similitude is. Man's sinning is
therefore compared to sparks flying, to show how
naturally he sins. A spark flies upward without
any guide to lead it the way, and a bird would fly
though she should never see another bird fly. And
if a man could live so as never to see any one ex-
SEED THOUGHTS, 141
ample of sin all his days, yet that man out of his
own heart might bring forth every sin every day.
Example quickens and encourages the principles
of sin within us, but we can sin without any ex-
trinsic motion or provocation, without pattern or
precedent from without. — Job v. 7.
PREACHING.
WE should w^ell consider the state of every per-
son to whom we speak, and apply our speech
or doctrine accordingly. Christ would not put his
new wine into old bottles, but attempered his speech
to the tempers and capacity of his hearers. The
dividing of the Word is the dividing of it spiritu-
ally to the several states and conditions of men,
giving to such a word of instruction, to others a
word of reproof, to a third sort words of comfort.
Paul would have Timothy a workman that needeth
not to be ashamed. He would have him to know
to Avhom he uttered words, to know when he spake
to sinners and when to saints, when he spake to the
afflicted and when to them that were in a comfort-
able state. And thus as every man who uttereth
words, so ministers of the gospel especially should
be well advised to whom they utter them. For as
142 SEED THOUGHTS.
the same garments will not serve everybody to
wear nor the same bed to lie upon, so the same
Word will not suit every soul. When we have
duly weighed the matter which, the persons to
whom, the season when, the measure how much
and the manner in which we ought to speak, then
we are like to speak to purpose, and shall be above
the reproof which Job gives to Bildad : " To whom
hast thou uttered words ?" — Job xxiv. 4.
TWO things are the grace and excellency of a
speaker : First, to speak boldly and freely, to
speak the truth out — not to clip nor straighten it.
Secondly, to speak plainly, to open the truth and
not to intricate nor involve it.
PERFECTION.
FT! HERE is a twofold perfection ascribed to the
J- saints in this life — a perfection of justification
and perfection of sanctification. The first of these
in a strict sense is a complete perfection. The
saints are complete in Christ; they are perfectly
justified; there is not any sin left uncovered, nor
any guilt left unwashed in the blood of Christ, nor
SEED THOUGHTS. 143
the least spot but is taken away. His garment is
large enough to cover all our nakedness and defor-
mities. By one offering Christ hath perfected for
ever them that are sanctified. Then there is a per-
fection of holiness or sanctification, and that is
called so either in regard of the beginning of, or in
regard of desires after and aims at, perfection. The
saints in this life have a perfect beginning of holi-
ness, because they are' begun to be sanctified in
every part (1 Thess. v. 23), though every part be
not throughout sanctified. When sanctification is
begun in all parts, it is a perfect work begin-
ning. They are likewise perfect in regard of their
desires and intendments. Perfect holiness is the
aim of the saints on earth — it is the reward of the
saints in heaven. — Job i. 1.
IF any say, " Why doth God call us to a perfec-
tion of sanctification in this life if it be not at-
tainable in this life ly I answer, he doth it — first, to
show how holy he is ; secondly, to show how holy
we ought to be; thirdly, he doth it that Ave might
run to Christ, who is the Lord our righteousness,
we being altogether short of righteousness and short
in righteousness may go to him and have a com-
plete and perfect righteousness. — Job xxxiv. 5.
144 SEED THOUGHTS.
POPULARITY.
THE affections and opinions of men are very va-
riable. How great a change did Christ him-
self find ! He is the same yesterday, to-day, and
for ever ; yet one day the Jews cry. Hosanna ; they
will needs make him a king; he had much ado to
keep himself from a crown; the air echoes with
" Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord !"
Yet presently after the cry was, Crucify him, cru-
cify him; he is not worthy to live; he could not
keep himself (by all his power as a man) from the
cross. A murderer is preferred before him : " Not
this man, but Barabbas." — Job xvii. 6.
IIVE not upon the breath of men, upon popular
-J air, or the speech of the people.
YT7HEN Job did swim in the full streams of
T' riches and honours, all respected him; but
no sooner were the waters fallen and his worldly
greatness ebbed or abated, but all sorts of men,
especially the worst of men, abated their respects
to him. No sooner was he afflicted, but slighted
and derided. — Job xxx. 1.
SEED THOUGHTS. 145
PRIDE.
MAN naturally preferreth himself, not only above
other men, but even before God himself. A
principle of pride dwells in our hearts by nature,
which at some times and in some cases breeds bet-
ter thoughts of ourselves than of God himself.
We know it was the first sin of man that man de-
sired to be like God. The first temptation was
baited with a parity to the divine powers : Ye shall
be as gods, knowing good and evil. This also was
the language of Lucifer (Isaiah xiv. 13, 14). And
the practice of the man of sin is thus prophesied
that he shall exalt himself above all that is called
God. But the heart of man is more mad and hath
outgrown these simple principles. For in troubles
and temptations, when things go not according to
his mind, he sometimes has thoughts that he is not
only like God, but that he is more just than God,
and that if he had the ordering of things he would
order them better than God, and if he had the pun-
ishing of offenders, justice should proceed more
freely and impartially than it doth. — Job iv. 17.
F)BJDE is such a weed as often grows in the best
SOI
10
146 SEED THOUGHTS.
PRIDE is a bad mother of many bad children,
these three especially : first, boasting of our-
selves ; secondly, contending with others; thirdly,
despising of others.
PROMISES.
WHILE a believer reads the Book of God, he
sees great riches, many precious things in the
promises, and whatever good he finds there, there
is nothing of it too good for him ; he may know it all
for his own good. Those sweet delicious promises
of the pardon of sin, of the love of God, of the free-
ness of grace, of the glory to come, the promises of
Christ and of all that is Christ's, — all these things
are his ; w r hen he reads them he may set his mark
upon them and know for his good — know them as
his own proper good. — Job v. 27.
LET us be sure to stick to the commandments of
God, for we may be sure God will stick to his
promises. To keep commandments is our work — to
keep promises is God's work ; though we may fail
much in our work, God will not fail at all in his
w r ork. To believe this is our highest and truest
work of faith.
SEED THOUGHTS. 147
THERE are four things ascribed to God in Scrip-
ture which may assure us he will be just in
performing all his promises : First, he remembers
them all (Ps. cxi. 5) : secondly, he is unchangeable
and in one mind (Job xxiii. 13, 14); thirdly, he is
the Almighty, and ever furnished with power to
perform them; fourthly, he is most faithful^ and
will not deny nor falsify them (Heb. x. 23).
A
AYORD from God is as sure as his deed ; our
hope upon promises as good as possession.
PROVIDENCE.
THE very confusions that are in the world are
an argument for the power of God. For see-
ing the world continue in the midst of such confu-
sions, it shows there is a mighty power balancing
those confusions so exactly that they cannot ruin
the world. If there were not an overruling power
in God, wicked men ruling would soon ruin all.
There are mysteries of Providence as w T ell as of
faith, and many are as much troubled to interpret
w r hat God doeth as what he hath spoken. — Job ix. 24.
148 SEED THOUGHTS.
rilHE common blessings of God are not dispensed
J- without a special providence. Nature works
not without the God of Nature. — Job v. 10.
THE providence of God watches over all his
creatures. All their motions are by his per-
mission or commission. They stir not without his
leave. The providence of God is his watch, and
therefore it is called the eye of Providence; and
Providence hath such an eye as never slumbers nor
sleeps, and therein lieth our security that we have
a providential eye open for us when ours are shut
and we asleep.
— •<>• —
SOME providences of God put the wisest to a
stand. Not only are fools and wicked men,
but men of the greatest experience and understand-
ing in the ways of God, so puzzled that they know
not what to say or how to answer. The Lord is
pleased to give us hard texts and chapters in his
works, as he doth in his Word.
THOUGH providences appear cross to promises
and prophecies, yet they never frustrate either.
mm THOUGHTS. 149
THE date of God's order for disposing the crea-
tion is from the beginning, yea from everlast-
ing. As the model of the creation what things
should be was with him from everlasting, so was
the model of providence how all things should be
governed and disposed of. The government of the
world is as much of God as the giving of it a being.
Creation was a work that ended in six days, but
providence is a work that never ends ; thus God
always worketh, though always at rest.
Providence is creation continued.
PRUDENCE.
PRUDENCE uses to go softly — wisdom keeps a
kind of state in her pace and loves to go step
by step, not headlong. A prudent man sets his
head before his feet in consultation, but he loves to
go upon his feet — not upon his head — in action.
HASTY counsels are successless counsels. They
who will not take time to consult about
what they do, may have time enough to repent
150 SEED THOUGHTS.
about what they have done. And they who will
not take the time for doing what they consult, lose
all the time they took for consultation.
REDEMPTION.
TO redeem properly is to take a man out of the
power of another by price or by greater power.
Redemption is an act of special favour, and it notes
a special distinction by favour. When God threat-
ened Pharaoh with swarms of flies, and promised
that his own people should be free, this act of di-
vine discrimination is called redemption. " And I
will put a division (Heb. a redemption) between
my people and thy people ;" that is, those armies
of flies which invade thy people shall not meddle
with my people. To see one perish with, and our-
selves saved from, the sword is redemption in war.
To see others hunger-starved and ourselves still
fed, is redemption from famine, though ourselves
were never in the hands or between the teeth of
famine. A people divided from the troubles of
others are redeemed from those troubles. Such re-
demption our Saviour speaks of (Matt. xxiv. 40,
41): " Two shall be in the field; the one shall be
taken, the other left, — Job v. 20.
SEED THOUGHTS. 151
AS Christ will not save presumptuous sinners
who believe without repenting, so neither will
he save incredulous sinners who repent without
believing:.
JESUS CHRIST came to save us from our sins,
not to save us in our sins.
REPENTANCE.
NEVER think to have help for the cure of your
souls by the diseases of your bodies ; usually
we find that sick persons repent not, or theirs is a
sickly repentance.
TILL the heart be prepared we cannot pray ;
until iniquity be purged out prayer is not ac-
cepted ; unless all three be done, we have not re-
pented, or our repentance must be repented of.
Except we repent thus we cannot be saved, and
only that repentance is not to be repented of which
is unto salvation.
THERE is no way for us to get our sin covered
but by revealing it, nor hid but by confessing it.
152 SEED THOUGHTS.
HOW pitifully are they mistaken who put off
repentance till their bodies be in pain — till
they are sick and weak ! They do it upon this
ground, because they think when they are in pain
they shall do it with more ease. Observe, if Satan
thinks to have such an advantage upon a holy man
(as Job) as to make him blaspheme when he is in
pain, dost thou think pain will be an advantage to
thy repentance? It is said that at the pouring out
of the fourth vial (Rev. xvi. 9), when God did smite
the inhabitants of the earth and scorched them with
great heat, that they blasphemed the name of God
(they did that which Satan presumed Job would
do), and they repented not to give him glory.
AS in true repentance there is a change from a
bad to a good mind, and from a perverse to a
right and righteous way ; so there is a change from
a troubled to a quiet mind, and from a painful to
a pleasant and delightful way.
NEITHER a weeping eye nor a confessing
tongue, nor (in case of wrong done to man) a
restoring hand, will be taken for repentance with-
out a broken heart.
SEED THOUGHTS. 153
REPENTANCE is a grace of the gospel wrought
in the heart of a sinner by the Word and Spirit,
turning the whole man from all sin to God in the
sincere and universal obedience of his holy will. —
Job xlii. 6.
THE whole body of gospel duty moves upon
these two feet — faith and repentance.
REPENTANCE for and continuance in sin can-
not consist in the same subject.
RESTITUTION,
THAT which is ill-gotten must be restored. Put
it out of thy house, out of thy family ; it will
be a fire to burn, a moth to consume, a canker to
fret all thy comforts. That which is ill got will
poison that which is well got.
RESURRECTION.
THE resurrection is a birth-day to the world.
The earth and sea shall be in travail and be de-
livered. They took dead men into their womb,
and shall (by the pow T er of God) return them living.
154 SEED THOUGHTS.
IN the morning of the resurrection we shall all
put on fresh suits — fresh suits of flesh and robes
of glory upon them, such as shall never change,
much less wear out. — Job xiv. 4.
THE total consumption of the body of man is no
impediment in the way of faith to stop us from
believing the resurrection. Job speaks in such lan-
guage as might represent the greatest difficulty to
faith, and yet conquers it. As death shall triumph
over my body, so my faith shall triumph over
death. — Job xix. 26.
THE body after the resurrection shall be true
flesh, or shall have true flesh. There will be
an adding somewhat to that which was before, not
a taking away of that that was before. The flesh
shall be refined and purified; it shall not be laid
aside or annihilated.
RETRIBUTION.
GOD doth sometimes give the riches of wicked
men to poor godly men whom they have op-
pressed. Job himself (Job xxvii. 16) gives us this
truth in express terms. When speaking of a wicked
SEED THOUGHTS. 155
man he saith, " Though he heap up silver as the
dust and prepare raiment as the clay, he may pre-
pare it (let him prepare it, let him scrape it together
as fast as he can), but the just shall put it on and
the innocent shall divide the silver;" that is, those
just and innocent persons whom he hath wronged
shall by a divine retaliation enter upon his estate.
The wicked grind the faces of the poor to make
themselves bread, but at last the poor shall make
bread of their corn and grist. We may see the
track and footstep of this judgment in our days.
How many sons of violence who have made many
persons — yea, families — hungry, naked and desolate,
are now made desolate and naked ! God hath so
wrought and answered us by terrible things in
righteousness, that oppressed innocents have been
put into the houses and fed upon the fatness of un-
righteous oppressors. — Job v. 5.
SACRIFICES.
BEFORE the giving of the Law, the father or
the elder of the family was as a priest to the
whole family, and he had the right and the power
to perform all holy family duties, as the duty of
sacrificing and the like.
156 SEED THOUGHTS.
SACRIFICES in themselves were nothing either
to God or to man ; they had no power in them
either to pacify God or purge the soul of man.
But look upon the sacrifice as it was an institution,
and there God saw his Son Jesus Christ in it and
was well pleased, and likewise man beheld and be-
lieved Christ in it and was purged. When the
sacrifice was offering, man saw Christ suffering;
this took away his sin and pacified his conscience.
God saw the death of his Son, and that satisfied
him ; and man saw the death of his Saviour, and
that justified him. — Job i. 5.
THERE was never any w r ay in the world, from
first to last, to help a sinner but by a sacrifice,
and who was the sacrifice ? Surely Jesus Christ
was the sacrifice. It was not the blood of bulls
and goats that could take away sin; these only
pointed at Jesus Christ, who alone did it by bear-
ing our sins and by being made a sacrifice for them.
To typify or show this we read in the law of Moses
that the sin of the offender was laid upon the sacri-
fice, and a sacrifice for sin was called sin by the
prophet long before Christ came (Daniel ix. 24).
We shall make an end of sin — that is, when Christ
SEED THOUGHTS. 157
shall come in the flesh he shall make an end of all
sacrifices for sin, and so the apostle called it after
Christ had come and suffered in the flesh (1 Cor. v.
12). The sacrifice was called sin because the sin
of the person who brought it and in whose behalf
it was offered was laid upon the sacrifice; there
was, as it were, a translation of the sin from the
person to the sacrifice. And there is no atonement
of sin but by a sacrifice. So the Lord ordained
the offering up of a whole burnt-offering for the
taking away of sin, that sinners might see what
they had deserved — even to die, and not only so,
but to be wholly burnt and consumed in the fire of
his wrath. They who rest not upon the sacrifice
of Christ once offered, must be a sacrifice them-
selves always offered to the justice and wrath of
God. — Job xlii. 8.
SALVATION.
THE Arminians maintain a propitiation made or
a sacrifice offered by Christ for all, yet they
dare not say it is effectual for all. Christ died (say
they) for those he doth not save, but Christ prayed
for none but those that shall be saved. They are
not for a universal intercession, though they are for
158 SEED THOUGHTS.
a universal sacrifice or propitiation ; and their rea-
son is, because they cannot deny but many shall
perish for ever, which they could not did Christ
but pray for them. We believe that his sacrifice is
as effectual as his intercession, and that therefore
he died for none but those for whom he prays, his
intercession being for the drawing out and bringing
home the benefit of his sacrifice to those and to all
those for whom he offered himself to God.
NOTHING can hide us from the wrath of God
but the mercy of God.
SANCTIFICATION.
TY\0 sanctify in Scripture notes two things :
-L 1st. The infusion of a holy habit — the infusion
of a new principle into the soul.
2d. A preparation of the soul to holy duties.
When it is said Job sent and sanctified them, it
is not meant as if Job did infuse holy habits into
his children — as if it were in his power to make
them gracious indeed ; that is impossible. It is
only the work of the Spirit of God. But this it is:
he sent them to prepare themselves, to advise and
SEED THOUGHTS. 159
warn them to prepare themselves, that they might
be ready for that duty, for the duty of sacrificing.
And this preparation for holy duties is often called
sanctifying, as Gen. xxxv. 2, etc. — Job i. 5.
H
E that is a holy person himself, desires to make
others holy too.
SLANDER.
TO commend a man with a "but" is a wound
instead of a commendation. "Thou hast in-
structed many, but," etc. How many are there
who salute their friends very fair to their faces, or
speak them very fair behind their backs, yet sud-
denly (as Joab to Amasa) draw out this secret dag-
ger and stab their honour and honesty to the heart !
As it is said of Naaman (2 Kings v. 1), "He was
an honourable man and a mighty man of valour,
but he teas a leper." — Job iv. 5.
THE most innocent persons are often charged with
the foulest and sinfulest crimes. Who is there
of so unspotted a conversation that he may not be
spotted with accusation? Who while his conscience
is pure may not have much dirt cast in his face ?
160 SEED THOUGHTS.
SATAN.
"ATOW what doth Satan when he walks up and
-L* down the world? Doth he walk like an idle
vagrant that hath nothing to do? Doth he walk
with his hands in his pockets, as having no busi-
ness ? Doth he walk merely to take the air or to
take his pleasure, to see and be seen ? No ; when
Satan walks about the world, his walking is work-
ing ; he goeth about to tempt, to try and lay snares
and baits to catch and captivate the souls of men.
SELF-KNOWLEDGE.
IT is harder to know the nature than the number —
what, than how many, our sins are. For as
some have whole books written full of sermon-notes
by them who have not one line of a sermon written
upon their hearts or ways, so a man may have a
whole book written full of sin-notes, and yet not
one sin making impression upon his heart. There
are but few who know what they are. — Job xiii. 23.
THE reason why we are so proud of ourselves is
because we are so ignorant of ourselves.
SEED THOUGHTS. 161
MANY are apt to overvalue and overrate their
own abilities, as if they had engrossed all
knowledge, and had the monopoly of wisdom in
their own hearts — as if all must borrow or buy of
their store/ and light their candle at their torch.
THEY who think all are blind who see not with
their eyes, are yet blind and have never seen
themselves. It is the emptiness of knowledge, not
the fulness of it, which makes so great a sound.
SEPULCHRES.
SOME take in their life more care for their se-
pulchres than they do for their souls. Great
men build desolate places ; they will be sure to
have stately monuments, and they have gold. They
will be sure to fill their graves with treasure; they
will be buried richly, or they will have their riches
buried with them. But what care did these take
for their poor souls in the mean time, where they
should lie? When all things are disposed of, this
choice piece is for the most part left unprovided
for. The great business of the saints on earth is to
11
162 SEED THOUGHTS.
get assurance of a place for their souls to lodge in
when they die. It troubles them not much what
lodgings their bodies have, if they can put their
spirits into the hands of Christ.
SIN.
IT is not safe to let sin lie a moment unrepented
of or unpardoned upon our own consciences or
the consciences of others. If a man's house be on
fire, he will not only rise in the morning, but
he will rise at midnight, to quench it. Certainly,
when you have guilt on your souls, you have a fire
in your souls; your souls are on a flame; there-
fore you have need to rise and rise early, and get
up as soon in the morning as you can, to get it
quenched and put out. — Job i. 5.
THERE is no created excellency but if left to
itself will quickly undo itself. There is no
trusting to any estate out of Christ.
s
IN despoils the creature of all its comfort and
honour at once.
SEED THOUGHTS. 163
WICKED and ungodly men, while they satisfy
their own lusts, are but doing the work of
Satan and executing his designs. " Ye are of your
father, the devil, and his lusts ye will do," saith
Christ to the Jews. While they do their own,
they fulfil the lusts and designs of Satan.
TO be a wicked man is no easy task ; he must go
to plough for it. Wicked men in Scripture
are called sons of Belial; that is, such as will not
endure the yoke. They will not endure the yoke
of Christ, though it be an easy yoke ; but they are
content slavishly to yield their (otherwise) proud
and delicate necks to Satan's yoke, to tug and sweat
at his plough all their days. — Job iv. 8.
THOUGH a man doth not formally commit or
bring forth every sin, yet virtually and radi-
cally a man hath every sin in him, or it is possible
for any sin to be formed and shaped out of the na-
ture of man. And as the spark lies closely in the
fire or flint till you smite or blow them up, so sin
lies secretly in our hearts till some temptation or
occasion smites and brings it out.
\
164 SEED THOUGHTS.
TO be kept from sin is a greater blessing than
are outward blessings. When Eliphaz had
reckoned up all the comforts which repenting Job
is promised, " Thou shalt be delivered in six trou-
bles and in seven; sword and famine shall not hurt
thee, peace and plenty shall dwell within thy walls
and lodge in every chamber; yet (saith he) I will
tell thee of a blessing beyond all these: Thou shalt
not sin." It is more mercy to be delivered from
one sin than from sword and famine. Grace is
better than peace, and holiness than abundance.
Riches, honour and health are all obscured in this
one blessing — a holy, a gracious and an humble
heart. — Job v. 25.
rjIHE sins of youth may prove the sufferings of
J- old age.
THE punishment of sin may come long after the
committing of sin ; the one is the seed-time
and the other is the reaping-time.
o
UR sins spring not out of the dust, but out of
the dirt and filth of our own corruptions.
T
SEED THOUGHTS. 165
1HEY who are sensible of the evil of sin will
pay heartily for the pardon of sin. Pie that is
greatly in debt, and fears every hour to be arrested
and cast into prison, is trying all friends to get se-
curity and protection. Sinning is a running in
debt with God, and it brings us under the danger
of his arrest every moment. Forgiveness cancels
the bond, when the sin is pardoned, the debt is paid
and the soul discharged. — Job vii. 21.
SIN begins with turning the heart from God, and
sin ends with turning the heart against God.
The first step in sin is a neglect of God, the second
is contempt of God, the third and last is a war
with God. — Job xv. 25.
s
IN runs against ^eason, and causeth us to act
not only wickedly, but foolishly.
SIN hath by so much the greater evil in it by
how much it is committed against the greater
goodness. As good things received bind us stronger
unto duty, so good things abused bind us stronger
under guilt.
166 SEED THOUGHTS.
SOME sins are not only in themselves a con-
tempt of God, but they are committed in con-
tempt of God. When men sin presumptuously
and with a high hand, when they sin with a com-
mand shining in their eye, with a threat sounding
in their ear, they even send a defiance to Heaven
and bid God do his worst.
SUPPOSE sin appear not in a full body, yet if
it put out but a little finger, we must have
nothing to do with it.
SIN promiseth gold, and pays with dross ; it
promiseth bread, and pays with stones; it prom-
iseth honour, and pays with disgrace ; it promiseth
a paradise, and payeth with a. wilderness; it prom-
iseth liberty, and payeth with bondage ; in a word,
it promiseth all manner of content, and pays us
with utter disappointment and dissatisfaction. If
any man have a mind to be fed with mallows, and
lodged in caves, and torn with bushes, and stung
with nettles, and scorched with everlasting burn-
ings, let him but hearken to the voice, believe the
promises and take the word of sin. — Job xxx. 7.
SEED THOUGHTS. 167
FT1HAT sin may be avoided, we must avoid what-
J- ever leads to or occasions it. He that feareth
burning must take heed of playing with fire. He
that feareth drowning must keep out of deep water.
He that feareth the plague must not go into an in-
fected house. Would they avoid sin who present
themselves to the opportunities of it, and bring
their corruptions and temptations as it were into an
interview? "I (saith Job) have made a covenant
with mine eyes." — Job xxxi. 1.
THERE are three eminent evils in sin : First.
There is a pollution in sin ; it defiles. Sec-
ondly. There is a dishonour in sin : it dishonours.
Thirdly. There is a deceitful ri ess in sin ; it would
make us believe we shall be and receive that which
it is not able to perform.
EVERY step in sin is a step to misery ; and the
farther any man proceed eth on in sin, the far-
ther he wanders from God, and the farther he wan-
ders from God, the nearer he comes to misery.
Every motion toward sin is a hasting into the arms
and embrace of death.
168 SEED THOUGHTS.
A LL sin is either against ourselves, strictly called
■£*- intemperance ; or against God, strictly called
impiety; or against man, strictly called unright-
eousness.
SINCERITY.
HE that is sincere desires not to be open, but
silently satisfieth his soul with the conscious-
ness of doing his duty, and takes more content in
knowing his own integrity than in knowing that
others know it. Like the earth, he keeps his rich-
est minerals and most precious gems of grace and
goodness below in his bowels, or at the centre of
his heart, and will not let them be seen till a kind
of necessity digs them out. Every true Moses whose
acquaintance and fiducial familiarity with God hath
stamped upon him the impressions of divine light,
is so far from affecting to dazzle the eyes of others
with it that he rather puts a veil of gracious mod-
esty upon it, and w T ill not let so much as the light
of his good works be seen, but as thereby (in which
Christ commands it) he may glorify his Father
which is in heaven. — Job xxxiv. 30.
A
SOUL that is sincere and well-bottomed upon
the grace of God in Christ is unconquerable.
SEED THOUGHTS. 169
SINNERS.
TT RICKED men make the blessings of God fuel
' » to their lusts, and beat their outward com-
forts into the weapons of an unholy war against
him.
THEY take little care for their souls who take
overmuch for their bodies. They who desire
to please appetite cannot endeavour to please God.
WICKED men take more pains to go to hell
and eternal destruction than godly men do in
the way of eternal life and salvation. A wicked
man cannot go to hell w r ith ease ; he goes with pain
to eternal pains. — Job xv. 20.
"TT^HERE can a sinner be hid from Him w r ho is
^ T everywhere ? Or what thing can be our cov-
ering from Him in whose sight all things are open ?
Then let none think they have made a good market
in sinning when they have hid their sins from the
eyes of men. What will it avail to hide yourselves
from men, when you lie open and manifest to the
eye of God ? — Job xxxiv. 22.
170 SEED THOUGHTS.
H
E makes an ill market who puts off his soul at
any price.
SOUL
THE marriage of the soul and body together is
life; the breaking of this marriage bond is
death.
WHAT is the body without the soul but a lump
of clay? As soon as ever the soul departs,
life departs ; yet such is the folly of most men that
all their care is for the life of the body, which is (at
best) a dying life. They utterly neglect the soul,
which, as it is the life of the body, so itself never
dieth. The soul is the jewel, the body is but the
cabinet ; the soul is the kernel, the body is but the
shell. Will you be solicitous about the cabinet or
the shell, and slight the jewel or throw away the
kernel ?
SOVEREIGNTY OF GOD,
THE absolute sovereignty of the Lord over us is
enough to acquit him from doing us any wrong,
whatsoever he doeth with us. Job saith only this,
" The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away."
SEED THOUGHTS. 171
He is the sovereign Lord, therefore I have no rea-
son to complain. He cloeth it upon whom I have
laid no engagement — upon whom I have no tie at
all to do this or that for me. He doeth it who may
resolve all the reason of his own actions into his
own will; he is the Lord. God cannot injure his
creatures ; therefore the apostle hath recourse to
that only in the ninth chapter of Romans for the
answer of all cavils and objections against God's
dealings with man : " Hath not the potter power
over the clay?" — Job i. 21.
GOD is the only Lawgiver, and we must receive
the law from his mouth. He that will please
God must shut all of his own imaginations out of
doors and have nothing to do with them. ? Tis not
what man hath a mind to do, but what the mind
of God is he should do, that pleaseth him, or is
either a worship or service acceptable to him. We
never dishonour God more than when we take upon
us to serve him our ow 7 n way, and, leaving his rule,
make a rule for ourselves.
MAN is never displeased with what God doth
till he forgetteth w T hat himself is.
172 SEED THOUGHTS.
GOD electeth tliose in whom he seeth no good,
nor doth he elect any for their goodness, either
because he seeth them good or foreseeth they will
be good. He beholdeth no excellency, beauty or
worthiness in them. He elects according to the
pleasure of his own will. Man's goodness is not
the cause, but the effect, of God's election. The
election of God maketh men good, but it doth not
find them so.
TEARS.
THE voice of tears is very significant, yet God
only knows the special signification of it. Man
knows only the general, that it signifies sorrow.
Teaks are powerful orators,
G
OD reads our hearts in those lines which tears
draw on our faces.
THE TONGUE.
THE tongue is a little member, and yet it falls
heavy.
SEED THOUGHTS. 173
THE tongue is the scholar of the heart, and
speaks what that dictates. A man is justly
condemned by evil words because they testify that
he is evil.
THERE is a speedy passage between the heart
and the tongue. Evil thoughts are soon formed
up into evil words.
HE hath a mighty command over his spirit that
can command his tongue, especially when he
is provoked. It is a real part of perfection not to
offend in word.
TRUST.
PURE spiritual trust is the highest exercise of
faith, whereby looking upon God in himself
and in his Son, through the promises, the soul is
raised above all fears or discouragements, above all
doubts and disquietments, either for the removing
of that which is evil or the obtaining of that which
is good. — Job xiii. 15.
TRUST in God is the best ease to the soul, and a
remedy of evils before the remedy comes.
174 SEED THOUGHTS.
A BELIEVER seeth God good to him or a
friend to him, when he receiveth nothing but
evil from his hand and sees nothing but frowns
upon his face.
NOTHING fixes the soul but trust in God. We
are unquiet, yea we boil with unquietness and
toss as the angry sea with the winds, till we trust
fully upon God, upon his wisdom and power, upon
his goodness and faithfulness, and can say, " Let
him do as seems good in his eyes."
WHEN we can once stay our minds on God, we
are quiet ; but w T hen we must bring God to
our mind, and must have God go our pace, or come
at our time and work in our way (none of which
he will do, what ado soever we make to have it so),
oh how restless and troubled are we, even like the
troubled sea when it cannot rest !
WHEN things are not clear to us, when we have
no light about what God is doing or what he
will do, yet it is our duty to trust and wait upon
God.
SEED THOUGHTS. 175
TRUST in God though you are in darkness,
though you see no light; this is light before
light, pardon before pardon. Trust God in temp-
tations, and you are above temptations while you
groan under the burden of them. Trust God in
weakness, and you are strong. When in rest with
our weakness upon Christ, the power of Christ
rests upon us.
w
7E can never trust God too much nor creatures
too little.
M
ANY trust God (as they do some men) no fur-
ther than they can see him.
TRUTH.
TRUTH is the meat of the mind, the nourish-
ment of the understanding.
HE is a soul physician of no value who makes
wrong applications of truths, as well as he
who applies that which is false. The Word of God
must be rightly divided; every soul must have his
own portion. The children's bread is not for dogs.
176 SEED THOUGHTS.
WHEN truth is honoured and applauded, it is
easy to own, but it is our greatest honour to
own a dishonoured and despised truth.
IT is no new thing for him that speaks truth to
be counted a liar, nor for him that speaks seri-
ously to be counted a mocker. — Job xi. 3.
H
E that judgeth himself to be in the truth should
not leave it because others call it error.
HE that hath truth on his side need not fear the
opposition of many — no, nor the opposition of
all men.
A
LONG train of followers will do us no good
if our cause be bad.
ONE man and the truth are strong enough to
oppose a multitude in error and a multitude
of errors.
SEED THOUGHTS. 177
THE WILL.
THE will of man is as perverse as his under-
standing is blind. Man hath not only a wound
or a weakness in his will unto that which is good,
but he hath a rebellion in his heart against that
which is good ; and that not by some occasional
disgust or sudden gust of passion, but he is natu-
rally set and resolved against that which is good. —
Job xxxiii. 14.
"I I" AN hath not only an inability to know, but an
-l-'-L enmity against the knowledge of that which
is spiritual.
/f AN would have everything go according to his
own mind. He would have his mind the
measure, both of all that he is to do for God and
of all that God doth to him. We love to do all
things according to our own minds, and we love to
have all things done according to our own minds.
— Job xxxiv. 33.
12
178' SEED THOUGHTS.
WORSHIP.
WE must worship God aright — first, for the out-
ward manner of his commands and institu-
tions, else we dishonour him while we intend to
worship him; secondly, the inward manner must
be according to the command of God. The Lord
searcheth the heart; he knoweth what is within,
and must be worshipped in spirit and in truth —
that is, according to the truth of the rule made
known in his Word, and in truth of heart.
GOD is not only to be praised with joy and
thankfulness, but with fear and reverence, for
with him is terrible praise. We should not be
afraid to praise God — no, we should be most for-
ward to praise him — but we should have a holy fear
upon our hearts when we praise him. Praise is
the work of heaven, from whence fear shall for ever
be banished ; and even in this life, praise, which is
the work of heaven on earth, should be performed
with such a spirit of love and joy as is without all
base, tormenting fear. We should have so much
love to God, in and for all the good things he doth
for our souls especially, yea and for our bodies too,
SEED THOUGHTS. 179
in dealing out daily mercies, that it should cast
out all that fear that hath torment in it. Yet there
is a fear which should possess our spirits while we
are praising God ; a fear of reverence, I mean,
which fear (I doubt not) will remain in heaven for
ever. Glorified saints shall praise God with that
fear: that is, having an everlasting awe of the ma-
jesty of God upon their hearts. He is fearful in
praises ; and therefore let us so praise him as re-
membering our distance, so praise him as to fear
of miscarrying in the duty, and so, instead of prais-
ing him, instead of honouring, grieve him.
A
BODY exercised and a soul sitting still is not
worship.
THE Scripture assureth us that God looks upon
or reckoneth prayer as an honour done to him.
'Tis an eminent part of worship — 'tis the giving of
him glory.
YOUTH.
THE strength of a young man profits little if he
have not the virtues and good qualities of an
old man.
180 SEED THOUGHTS.
WE ought not to despise what young men say
because of their youth. If old men be not
always wise, their wisdom may be with the young.
That which is the true glory of gray hairs doth
sometimes crown the youthful head— wisdom (I
mean) and ripeness of understanding. It was said
of a godly woman, " She had a youthful body but
an aged mind." Samuel was young in years, but
in grace elder than Eli; Jeremiah was young, but
how wise did the inspiration of God make him!
Daniel was young, yet wiser than all the magicians
and astrologers ; Timothy and Titus were young,
yet honourable for prudence and piety. Therefore,
as we should not always accept what old men say
because of their age, so let us not slight what young
men say because of their youth. — Job xxxii. 9.
MODESTY should bridle young men from being
over-forward to show themselves, but it must
not shut or seal up their lips.
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