Section 19
in this tabernacle do groan, being burthened ; but when death frees the soul from the load and encumbrance of the body, which hinders its repose in its spiritual satisfactions, how easy will it be! Let us think then of putting off the body at death, with as much pleasure as we do of putting off our clothes at night; be as loose to them as we are to our clothes; and comfort ourselves with this thought, that though we are unclothed at death, if we be clothed with
Christ and his grace, we shall not be found naked, but be clothed upon with immortality. We have new clothes a making, which shall be ready to put on next morning; a glorious body like Christ's, instead of a vile body like the beasts.
f3.] At death we shall lie down in the grave, as on our bed, shall lie down in the dust. Job xx. ll« To those who die in sin, and impenitence, the gve is a dungeon, their iniquities which are upon their bones, and which lie down with them, make it so; but those who ilie in Christ, who die in faith, it is a bed, a bed of rest, where there is no tossings to and fro until the dawning of the day, as sometimes there are upon the easiest beds we have in this world; where there is no danger of being scared with dreams, and terrified with visions of the night; there is no being chastened with pain on that bed, or the multitude of the bones with strong pain. It is the privilege of those, who while they live walk in their uprightness, that when they die they enter into peace, and rest in their beds, Isa. Ivii. 2. Holy Job comforts himself with this, in the midst of his ago nies, that he shall shortly make his bed in the darkness, and be easy there. It is a bed of roses, a bed of spices, to all believers ever since he lay in it, who is the Rose of Sharon, and the Lily of the Valleys,
Say then of thy grave, as thou dost of thy bed at night. There the weary are at rest; with this further consolation, that thou shalt not only rest there, but rise thence shortly, abundantly refreshed; shalt be called up to meet the Beloved of thy soul, and to be for ever with him ; shalt rise to a day which will not renew thy cares, as every day on earth does, but secure to thee unmixed and everlasting joys. How comfortably may we lie down at night, if such thoughts as these lie down with us ; and how comfortably may we lie down at death, if we have accustomed ourselves to such thoughts as these.
(3.) Let us lie down with penitent reflections upon the sins of the day past. Praising God and delighting ourselves in him is such pleasant work, and so much the work of angels, that methinks it is a pity that we should have any thing else to do; but the truth is, we make other work for ourselves by our own folly, that is not so pleasant, but absolutely needful, and that is, repentance. While we are at night solacing ourselves in God's goodness, we must intermix therewith the afflicting of ourselves for our own vileness ; both must have their place in us, and they will very well agree together; for we must take our work before us.
[1.] We must be convinced of it, that we are still contracting guilt; we carry corrupt natures about with us, which are bitter roots that bear gall and wormwood, ar-d all we say or do is imbittered by them. In many things we all offend, insomuch that there is not a just man upon earth that doeth good and sins not. We are in the midst of a defiling world, and cannot keep ourselves perfectly unspotted from it. If we say we have no sin, or that we have past a day and have not sinned, we deceive ourselves ; for if we know the truth by ourselves, we shall see cause to cry. Who can understand his errors? Cleanse us from our secret faults; faults which we ourselves
HOW TO SPEND THE DAY WITH GOD.
home, we are not under confinement, but have liberty to go abroad.
We must, therefore, have our eyes up to God at our setting out, '* Lord, go along with me where I go;" under his shelter we must travel, confiding in his care of us, and encouraging ourselves with that in all the dangers we meet with ; and in our return must own his goodness; all our bones must say. Lard, who is like unto thee, for he heepeth all our bones, not one of them is broken,
(10.) When we retire into solitude, to be alone walking in the fields, or alone reposing ourselves in our closets, still we must be waiting upon God; still we must keep up our communion witli him, when we are communing with our own hearts. When we are alone we must not be alone, but the Father must be with us, and we with him. We shall find temptations even in solitude, which we have need to guard against; Satan set upon our Saviour when he was alone in a wilderness; but there also we have opportunity, if we know but how to improve it, for that devout, for that divine, contemplation, which is the best conversation, so that we may never be less alone than when alone. If when we sit alone and keep silence,*withdrawn from business and conversation, we have but the art, I should say the heart, to fill up those vacant minutes with pious meditations of God and divine things, we then gather up the fragments of time which remain, that nothing may be lost, and so are we found waiting on God all the day.
2. Let me use some motives to persuade you thus to live a life of communion with God, by waiting on him all the day.
(1.) Consider, the eye of God is always upon you. When we are with our superiors, and observe them to look upon us, that engages us to look upon them; and shall we not then look up to God, whose eyes always behold, and whose eyelids try, the children of men ? He sees all the motions of our hearts, and sees with pleasure the motions of our hearts towards him, which should engage us to set him always before us.
The servant, though he be careless at other times, yet when he is under his master's eye, will wait in his place and keep close to his business; we need no more to engage us to diligence, than to do our work with eye-service, while our master looks on, and because he does so, for then we shall never look oflf.
(2.) The God you are to wait on, is one with whom you have to do, Heb. iv. 13. All things, even the thoughts and intents of the heart, are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do; irpoQ 6v tiiuv 6 XoyoQ-^with whom we have business, or word; who hath something to say to us, and to whom we have something to say : or, as some read it. To whom for us there is an account; there is a reckoning, a running account between us and him; and we must every one of us shortly ffive accout td ourselves to him» and of every thing done in the body; and therefore are concerned to wait on hin, that all may be made even daily, between us and him in the blood of Christ, which balances the account Did we consider how much we faaTe to do with God every day, we would be more diligent and constant in our attendance on him.
(3.) The God we are to wait upon, continaally waits to be gracious to us; he is always doing as good, precedes us with the blessings of his goodness, daily loads us with his benefits, and slips no opportunity of showing his care of us, when we are in danger, his bounty to us when we are in want, and his tenderness for us when we are in sorrow. His gfood providence waits on us all the day, to preserve our going out and our coming in, (Isa. xxx. 18.) to gve us relief and succour in due season, to be seen in the mount of the Lord. Nay, his good grace waits on us all the day, to help us in eveiy time of need ; to be strength to us according as oar day is, and all the occurrences of the day. Is God thus forward to do us good, and shall we be backward and remiss in doing him service ?
(4.) If we attend upon God, his holy angels shall have a charge to attend upon us. They are all appointed to be ministering spirits, to minister for the good of them who shall be heirs of salvation, and more good offices they do us every day than we are aware of. What an honour, what a privilege, is it to be waited on by holy angels, to be borne up in their arms, to be surrounded by their tents! What t security is the ministration of those good spiriti against the malice of evil spirits! This honoor have all they that wait on God all the day.
(6.) This life of communion with God, and constant attendance upon him, is a heaven upon earth. It is doing the work of heaven, and the will of CM, as they do it who are in heaven; whose business it is always to behold the face of our Father. It is an earnest of the blessedness of' heaven; it is a preparative for it, and a preludium to it; it is having oar conversation in heaven, whence we look for the Saviour. Looking for him as our Savioar, we look to him as our director; and by this we make it to appear that our hearts are there, which will give as good ground to expect that we shall be there shortly.
3. Let me close all with some directions, what you must do, that you may thus wait on God all the day.
(1.) See much of God in every creature; of hif wisdom and power in the making and placing of it, and of his goodness in its serviceahleness to ns. Look about you, and see what a variety of wonders, what an abundance of comforts, you are surrounded with; and let them all lead you to him, who is the fbon-tain of being, and the giver of all good; all oar
HOW TO CLOSE THE DAY WITH GOD.
4fiO bed, God opens the ears of men, and seals their instruction, Job xxxiii. 15,16. And with this Dayid's experience concurs. He found that God \isited him in the night, and tried him, and so discoyered him to himself, Ps. xvii. 3. And that God gave him counsel, and his reins instructed him in the night season, and so he discoyered himself to him, Ps. xvi. 7. He found that was a proper season for remembering God, and meditating upon him ; and in order to our due improvement of this proper season for conversing with God in solitude, we need the powerful and benign influences of the blessed Spirit, which, therefore, when we lie down we should earnestly pray for, and humbly put ourselves under, and submit ourselves to. How God's grace may work upon us when we are asleep we know not; the soul will act in a state of separation from the body, and how far it does act independent of the body, when the bodily senses are all locked up, we cannot say, but are sure, that the Spirit of the Lord is not bound. We have reason to pray, not only that our minds may not be either disturbed or polluted by evil dreams, in which for aught we know evil spirits sometimes have a hand, but may be instructed and quieted by good dreams; which Plutarch reckons among the evidences of increase and proficiency in virtue, and on which the good Spirit has an influence. I have heard of a good man, that used to pray at night for good dreams.
II. When we lay us down, our care and endeavour must be to lay us down in peace. It is promised to Abraham that he should go to his grave in peace, (Gen. XV. 16.) and this promise is sure to all his spiritual seed, for the end of the upright man it peace; Josiah dies in peace, though he is killed in a battle: now as an earnest of this let us every night lie down in peace. It is threatened to the wicked, that they shall lie down in sorrow, Isa. 1. 11. It is promised to the righteous, that they shall lie down, and none shall make them afraid. Lev. xxvi. 6. Job xi. 19. Let us then enter into this rest, this blessed sab-batism, and take care that we come not short of it
1. Let us lie down in peace with God; for without this there can be no peace at all; There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked, whom God is at war with. A state of sin is a state of enmity against God; they who continue in that state are under the wrath and curse of God, and cannot lie down in peace ; what have they to do with peace ? Hasten therefore, (sinner,) hasten to make thy peace with God in Jesus Christ, by repentance and faith; take hold on his strength, that thou mayst make peace with him; and thou shalt make peace, for fury is not in him. Conditions of peace are ofiiered, consent to them; close with him who is our peace; take Christ upon his own terms, Christ upon any terms. Defer not to do this; dare not to sleep in that condition, in which thou darest not die. Escape for thy life, look not behind thee. Acquaint now thyself with him, now presently, and be at peace, and thereby this good shall come onto thee, thou shalt lie down in peace.
Sin is ever and anon making mischief between God and our souls, provoking God against us, alienating us from God, we, therefore, need to be every night making peace, reconciling ourselves to him and to his holy will, by the agency of his Spirit upon us, and begging of him to be reconciled to us, through the intercession of his Son for us; that there may be no distance, no strangeness, between us and God, no interposing cloud to hinder his mercies from coming down upon us, or our prayers from coming up unto him. Being justified hy faith, we have this peace with God, through our Lord Jesus Christ; and then we may not only lie down in peace, but we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Let this be our first care, that God have no quarrel with us, nor we with him.
2. Let us lie down in peace with all men; we are concerned to go to sleep, as well as to die, in charity. Those who converse much with the world can scarcely pass a day but something or other happens that is provoking, some aifront is given them, some injury done them, at least they think so; when they retire at night and reflect upon it, they are apt to magnify the ofience, and while they are musing on it the fire burns, their resentments rise, and they begin to say / will eh so to him as he has done to me, Prov. xxlv. 29* Then is the time of ripening the passion into a rooted malice, and meditating revenge; then, therefore, let wisdom and grace be set on work, to extinguish this fire from hell before it get head; then let this root of bitterness be killed and plucked \xp, and let the mind be disposed to forgive the injury, and to think well of, and wish well to, him that did it If others incline to quarrel with us, yet let us resolve not to quarrel with them. Let us resolve, that whatever the affront or injury was, it shall neither disquiet our spirits nor make us to fret, which Penin-nah aimed at in provoking Hannah, (1 Sam. i. 6.) nor sour or imbitter our spirits, or make us peevish and spiteful; but that we still love ourselves, and love our neighbours as ourselves, and therefore not, by harbouring malice, do any wrong to ourselves or our neighbour. And we shall find it much easier in itself, and much more pleasant in the reflection, to forgive twenty injuries than to avenge one.
That it should be our particular care at night to reconcile ourselves to those who have been injurious to us, is intimated in that charge, (Eph. iv. 26.) Let not the sun go down upon your wrath. If your passion has not cooled before, let it be abated by the cool of the evening, and quite disappear with the setting sun. You are then to go to bed, and if you lie down with these unmortified passions boiling in your breasts, your soul is among lions, you.lie down in a bed of thorns, in a nest of scorpions. Na>, some
HOW TO CLOSE THE DAY WITH GOD.
bave observed from what follows immediately, neither gite place to the devil (v. 27.) that those who go to bed in malice have the devil for their bedfellow. We cannot lie down at peace with God, unless we be at peace with men; nor in faith pray to be forgiven, unless we forgive. Let us, therefore, study the things that make for peace, for the peace of our own spirits, by living, as much as in us lies, peaceably with all men. I am for peace, yea, though they are for war.
3. Let us lie down in peace with ourselves, with our own minds, with a sweet composure of spirit and enjoyment of ourselves; Return unto thy rest, O my 4oul, and be easy; let nothing disturb my soul, my darling.
But when may we lie down in peace at night ?
(1.) If we have by the grace of God in some measure done the work of the day, and filled it up with duty, we may then lie down in peace at night. If we have the testimony of our consciences for us, that in simplicity and godly sincerity not with fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of God, we have this day had onr convei'sation in the world, that we have done some good in our places, something that will turn to a good account; if our hearts do not reproach us with a diem perdidi, alas! / have lost a day; or with that which is worse, the spending of that time in the service of sin, which should have been spent in the service of God ; but if, on the contrary, we have abode with God, have been in his fear, and waited on him all the day long; we may then lie down in peace, for God says. Well done good and faithful sei'vant; and the sleep of the labouring man, of the labouring Christian, is sweet, is very sweet, when he can say. As I am a day's journey nearer my end, so I am a day's work fitter for it. Nothing will make our bed-chambers pleasant, and our beds easy, like the witness of the Spirit of God with our spirits, thai we are going forward for heaven ; and a conscience kept void of offence, which will be not only a continual feast, but a continual rest.
(2.) If we have by faith and patience, and submission to the divine will, reconciled ourselves to all the events of the day, so as to be uneasy at nothing that God has done, we may then lie down in peace at night. Whatever has fallen out cross to us, it shall not fret us, but we will kiss the rod, take up the cross, and say, '* All is well that God does." Thus we must in our patience keep possession of our own souls, and not suffer any affliction to put us out of the possession of them. We have met with disappointments in husbandry perhaps, in trade, at sea, debtors prove insolvent, creditors prove severe, but this and the other proceed from the Lord ; there is a providence in it, every creature is what God makes it to be, and therefore I am dumb, I open not my mouth; that which pleases God ought not to displease mc.
(3.) If we have renewed our repentance for sin* and made a fresh application of the blood of Cluiik to our souh for the purifying of oar conscieneei we may then lay us down in peace. Nothing an break in upon our peace but sin; that is it wbick troubles the camp; if that be taken away there skiD no evil befall us. The inhabitant, though he be fir from well, yet shall not say, I am sick, shall not con-plain of sickness, for the people that dwell thereii shall be forgiven their iniquity, Isa. xxxiii. 24. The pardon of sin has enough in it to balance all onr griefs, and therefore to silence all oar complaiots. A man sick of the palsy has yet reason to be easy, nay, and to be of good cheer, if Christ says to him, Thy sins are forgiven thee ; and / am thy solvation.
(4.) If we have put ourselves under the divine protection for the ensuing night, we may then Uj us down in peace. If, by faith and prayer, we hsYC run into the name of the Lord as our strong tower, have fled to take shelter under the shadow of his wings, and made the Lord our refuge and habitation, we may then speak peace to ourselves, for God in his word speaks peace to us. If David has an eye to the cherubim, between which God is said to dwell, when he says, (Ps. Ivii. 1.) In the shadow sf thy wings will I mahe my refuge; yet, certainly, be has an eye to the similitude which Christ makes lue of, of a hen gathering her chickens under her wings, when he says, (Ps. xci. 4.) He shall cover thee wilA his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust; and the chickens under the wings of the ben, an not only safe but warm and pleased.
(5.) If wc have cast all our cares for the day following upon God, we may then lay us down in peace. Taking thought for the morrow is the great hinderance of our peace in the night; let ns but learn to live without disquieting care, and to refer the issue of all events to that God who may and can do what he will, and will do what is best for those that love and fear him; Father, thy will be dmu, and then we make ourselves easy. Our Saviour presses this very much upon his disciples, not to perplex themselves with thoughts what they shall eat and what they shall drink, and wherewithal they shall be clothed, because their Heavenly Father knows that they have need of these things, and will see that they be supplied. Let us, therefore, ease ourselves of this burthen, by casting it on him who careth for us; what need he care and we care too?
III. Having laid ourselves down in peace, we must compose ourselves to sleep; IwiU lay me down and sleep. The love of sleep for sleeping sake is the character of the sluggard, but as it is nature's physic for the recruiting of its weary powers, it is to be looked upon as a mercy equal to that of our food, and in its season to be received with thankfulness.
And with such thoughts as these we may go to sleep:
I
HOW TO CLOSE THE DAY WITH GOD
461
1. What poor bodies are these we carry about with US, that call for rest and relief so often, that are so soon tired, even with doing nothing, or next to nothing. It is an honour to man above the beasts, Ot homini sublime dedit — that he is made so erect; it was part of the serpent's carse, On thy belly shalt thou go; yet we have little reason to boast of this honour, when we observe how little a while we can stand upright, and how soon we are burthened with our honour, and are forced to lie down.. The powers of the soul, and the senses of the body, are our honour, but it is mortifying to consider, how after a few hours' use they are all locked up under a total disability of acting, and it is necessary they should be so. Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, or the strong man in his strength, since they both lie for a fourth part of their time utterly bereft of strength and wisdom, and on a level with the weak and foolish.
2. What a sad thing it is to be under the necessity of losing so much precious time as we do in sleep. That we should lie so many hours out of eyery four and twenty, in no capacity at all of serving God or our neighbour, of doing any work of piety or charity ! Those who consider how short our time is, and what a great deal of work we have to do, and how fast the day of account hastens on, cannot jbut grudge to spend so much time in sleep, cannot but wish to spend as little as may be in it; cannot but be quickened by it to redeem time, when they are awake, and cannot but long to be there where there shall be no need of sleep, but they shall be as the angels of God, and never rest day or night from the blessed work of praising God.
3. What a good Master do we serve, that allows US time for sleep, and furnishes us with conveniences for it, and makes it refreshing and reviving to us. By this it appears, the Lord is for the body, and it is a good reason why we should present our bodies lo him as living sacrifices, and glorify him with them. Nay, sleep is spoken of as given by promise to the saints, (Ps. cxxvii. 2.) So he givethhis beloved sleep. The godly man has the enjoyment of that in a quiet resignation to God, which the worldly man labours in vain for, in the eager pursuit of the world. What a difference is there between the sleep of a sinner, who is not sensible of his being within a step of hell, and the sleep of a saint, that has good hopes, through grace, of his being within a step of heaven : that is the sleep God gives to his beloved.
4. How piteous is the case of those from whose eyes sleep departs, through pain of body, or anguish of mind, and to whom wearisome nights are appointed ; who, when they lie down, say, When shall we mrise? and who are thus made a terror to themselves. It was said, that of all the inhuman tortures used by those whom the French king employed to force his protestant subjects to renounce their reli-lion, none prevailed more than keeping them by violence long waking. When we find how earnestly nature craves sleep, and how much it is refreshed by it, we should think with compassion of those, who upon any account want that and other comforts which we enjoy, and pray for them.
5. How ungrateful we have been to the God of our mercies, in suffering sleep, which is so great a support and comfort to us, to be our liinderance in that which is good. As when it has been the gratification of our sloth and laziness, when it has kept us from our hour of prayer in the morning, and dis-fitted us for our hour of prayer at night; or when we have slept unseasonably in the worship of God; as Eutychus, when Paul was preaching; and the disciples, when Christ was in his agony at prayer. How justly might we be deprived of the comfort of sleep, and upbraided with tiiis as the provoking cause of it! What! could ye not watch with me one hour ? Those who would sleep, and cannot, must think how often they should have kept awake, and would not
6. We have now one day less to live, than we had in the morning. The thread of time is winding off apace, its sands are running down, and as time goes eternity comes; it is hastening on. Our days are swifter than a weaver's shuttle; which passes and repasses in an instant. And what do we of the work of time ? What forwardness are we in to give up our account ? O that we could always go to sleep with death upon our thoughts, how would it quicken us to improve time! It would make our sleep not the less desirable, but it would make our death much the less formidable.
7. To thy glory, O God, I now go to sleep; whether we eat or drink, yea, or sleep, for that is included in whatever we do, we must do it to the glory of God. Why do I go to sleep now, but that my body may be fit to serve my soul, and able for a while to keep pace with it in the service of God tomorrow ? Thus common actions, by being directed toward our great end, are done after a godly sort, and abound to our account; and thus the advantages we have by them are sanctified to us. To the pure all things are pure; and whether we wake or sleepy we live together with Christy 1 Thess. v. 10.
8. To thy grace, O God, and to the word of thy grace, I now commend myself. It is good to fall asleep with a fresh surrender of our whole selves, body, soul, and spirit, to God : now. Return to God as thy rest, O my soul; for he has dealt bountifully with tfiee; thus we should commit the keeping of our souls to him, falling asleep, as David did, (Ps. xxxi. 6.) with. Into thy hands I commit my spirit; and as Stephen did. Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. Sleep does not only resemble death, but is sometimes an inlet to it; many go to sleep and never wake, but sleep the sleep of death ; which is a good reason why we should go to sleep with dying thoughts, and put ourselves onder the protection of
HOW TO CLOSE THE DAY WITH GOD.
a liviDg God, and then sudden death will be nosar-prise to us.
9. O that when I awake I may be still with God! that the parenthesis of sleep, though long, may not break off the thread of my communion with God, but that as soon as I awake I may resume it O that when I wake in the night I may have my mind turned to good thoughts I may remember God upon my bed, who then is at my right hand, and to whom the darkness and the light are both alike; and that I may sweetly meditate upon him in the night watches; that thus even that time may be redeemed, and improved to the best advantage, which otherwise is in danger not only of being lost in vain thoughts, but mispent in ill ones. O that when I awake in the morning, my first thoughts may be of God, that with them my heart may be seasoned for all day!
10. O that I may enter into a better rest than that which 1 am now entering upon! The apostle speaks of a rest, which we that have believed do enter into, even in this world, as well as of a rest which in the other world remains for the people of God, Heb. iv. 3, 9. Believers rest from sin and the world ; they rest in Christ, and in God through Christ; they enjoy a satisfaction in the covenant of grace, and their interest in that covenant; TJiis is my rest for ever, here will I dwell. They enter into this ark, and there are not only safe but easy. Now, O that I might enjoy this rest while I live, and when I die might enter into something more than rest, even the joy of my Lord, a fulness of joy !
IV. We must do all this in a believing dependence upon God, and his power, providence, and grace. Therefore I lay me dawn in peace, and compose myself to sleep, because thou. Lord, keepest me, and assurest me that thou dost so ; Thou, Lord, makest me to dwell in safety. David takes notice of God's compassing his path, and his lying down, as his observer, Ps. cxxxix. 3. He sees his eye upon him when he is retired into his bed-chamber, and none else sees him; when he is in the dark, and none else can see him. Here he takes notice of him, compassing his lying down as his preserver ; and sees his hand about him to protect him from evil, and keep him safe ; feels bis hand under him to support him, and to make him easy.
1. It is by the power of God's providence that we are kept safe in the night, and on that providence we must depend continually. It is he that preserveth man and beast, (Ps. xxxvi. 6.) that upholds all things by the word of his power. That death, which by sin entered into the world, would soon lay all waste, if God did not shelter bis creatures from its arrows, which are continually flying about, we cannot but see ourselves exposed to in the night. Our bodies carry about with them the seeds of all dis-Death is always working in us; a little thing would stop the circulation either of the blooi or the breath, and then we are gone; either never awake, or awake under the arrests of death. Ilea by sin are exposed to one another; many have bees murdered in their beds, and many bamed in tttir beds. And our greatest danger of all is from fhit malice of evil spirits, that go aboat seeking to devour.
We are very unable to help ourselves, and <mt friends unable to help us ; we are not aware of the particulars of our danger, nor can we foresee whid way it will arise; and, therefore, know not when to stand upon our guard ; or if we did, we know boC how. When Saul was asleep, be lost his spear and his cruse of water, and might as easily have lost his head, as Sisera did when he was asleep, by the band of a woman. What poor helpless creatures are we; and how easily are we overcome when sleep hai overcome us! Our friends are asleep top, and caa-not help us. An illness may seize ns in die night, which, if they be called up and come to us, thc cannot help us against; the most skilful and tender are physicians of no valne.
It is therefore God's providence that proteds ai night after night, his care, his goodness. That was the hedge about Job, about him and his bouse, aad all that he had round about, (Job i. 10.) a hedge that Satan himself could not break through, nor fiad a. gap in, though he traversed it round. There is a special protection which God's people are takea under, they are hid in his pavilion, in the secret of his tabernacle, under the protection of his promise, (Ps. xxvii. 5.) they are his own, and dear to hiau and he keeps them as the apple of his eye, Ps. xviL 8. He is round about them from henceforth aad for ever, as the mountains are round about Jerusalem, Ps. cxxv. 2. He protects their habitations, as he did the tents of Israel in the wilderness; for he has promised to create upon every dwelling-place of Mount Zion a pillar of cloud by d&y to dieher from heat, and the shining of a flaming fire hfwigk to shelter from cold, Isa. iv. 5. Thus he blesseth the habitation of the just, so that no real evil shall beftO it, nor any plague come nigh it
The care of the divine Providence concemiog as and our families we are to depend upon, so as to hMk upon no provision we make for our own safety sof-ficient, without the blessing of the divine Providence upon it; Except the Lord heepeth the city, the watchman waheth hut in vain. Be the house ever so well built, the doors and windows ever so well baned, the servants ever so careful, ever so watchful, it ii all to no purpose, unless he that keeps Israel, aad neither slumbers nor sleeps, undertake for onijsMj; and if he be thy Protector, at destruction emdfmm thou shalt laugh, and shalt know that thy tahenadi is in peace. Job v. 22, 24.
2. It is by the power of God's grace that we an
I
HOW TO CLOSE THE DAY WITH GQD.
enabled to think oane Wes safe, and on that grace we must continually depend. The fear of danger, thongh groundless, is as vexations as if it were ever
just And, therefore to complete the mercy of being made to dwell safely, it is requisite that, by: tte grace of God, we be delivered from our fears,
I (Ps. xxxiv. 4.) as well as from the things themselves that we were afraid of; that shadows may not be a, terror to us, no more than substantial evils.
I If, by the grace of God, we are enabled to keep f conscience void of offence, and still to preserve our
I Integrity ; if iniquity be put far away, and no wick-
? edness suffered to dwell in our tabernacles, then
shall we lift up our faces without spot, we shall be stedfast, and shall not need to fear, (Job xi. 14,15.)
for fear came in with sin, and goes out with it If our hearts condemn us not, then have we confidence toward God, and man too, and are made to dwell securely, for we are sure nothing can hurt us but sin : and' whatever does harm us, sin is the sting of it; and, therefore, if sin be pardoned and prevented,
HFC need not fear any trouble.
If, by the grace of God, we be enabled to live by faith; that faith which sets God alway before'us; that faith which applies the promises to ourselves, and puts them in suit at the throne of grace; that faith which purifies the heart, overcomes the world, and ^qaenches all the fiery darts of the wicked one; that faith which realizes unseen things, and is the substance and evidence of them: if we be actuated and governed by this grace we are made to dwell safely, and to bid defiance to death itself, and all its harbingers and terrors : O Death, where is thy sting ? This faith will not only silence our fears, but will open our lips in holy triumphs. If God be for iw, who emn be against us ?
Let ns lie down in peace, and sleep, not in the streng of a natural resolution against fear, nor merely of rational arguments against it, though they are of good use, but in a dependence upon the grace of God to work faith in us, and to fulfil in us the work of faith. This is going to sleep like a Christian under the shadow of God's wings, going to sleep in faith; and it will be to us a good earnest of dying in faith ; for the same faith that will carry us cheer-litlly through the short death of sleep, will carry ns through the long sleep of death.
The Application.
1. See how much it is our concern to carry our religion about with us wherever we go, and to have it always at our right hand; for at every turn we have occasion for it, lying down, rising up, going oat, coming in; and those are Christians indeed, who confine not their religion to the new moons and tike sabbaths, but bring the influences of it into all tike conunon actions and occurrences of human life.
We must sit down at our tables and rise from them, lie down in our beds and arise from them, with an eye to God's providence and promise. Thus we must live a life of communion with God, even while our conversation is with the world.
And in order to this, it is necessary that we have a living principle in our hearts, a principle of grace, which, like a well of living water, may be continually springing up to life eternal, John iv. 14. It is necessary likewise that we have a watchful eye upon our hearts, and keep them with all diligence, that we set a strict guard upon their motions, and have our thoughts more at command than I fear most Christians have. See what need we have of the constant supplies of divine grace, and of a union with Christ, that by faith we may partake of the root and fatness of the good olive continually.
2. See what a hidden life the life of good Christians is, and how much it lies from nnder the eye and observation of the world. The most important part bf their business lies between God and their own souls, in the frame of their spirits, and the workings of their hearts, in their retirements, which no eye sees but his, that is all eye. Justly are the saints called God's hidden ones, and his secret if said to be with them, for they have meat to eat, and work to do, which the world knows not of; and joys, and griefs, and cares which a stranger does not intermeddle with. Great is the mystery of godliness.
And this is a good reason why we should look upon ourselves as incompetent judges one of another because we know not each other's hearts, nor are witnesses to their retirements. It is to be feared, there are many whose religion lies all in the outside; they make a fair show in the flesh, and perhaps a great noise; and, yet, are strangers to this secret communion with God, in which consists so much of the power of godliness. And on the other hand it is to be hoped, there are many who do not distinguish themselves by any thing observable in their profession of religion, but pass through the world without being taken notice of, and yet converse much with God in solitude, and walk with him in the even, constant tenor of a regular devotion and conversation. The hingdom of God comes not with observation. Many merchants thrive by a secret trade, that make no bustle in the world. It is fit, therefore, that every man's judgment should proceed from the Lord, who knows men's hearts and sees in secret.
3. See what enemies they are to themselves, who continue under the power of a vain and carnal mind, and live without God in the world. Multitudes I fear there are, to whom all that has been said of secret communion with Gpd is accounted as a strange thing, and they are ready to say of their ministers when they speak of it. Do they not speah parables ? They lie down and rise up, go out and come in, in
HOW TO CLOSE THE DAY WITH GOD.
the constant parsait either of worldly profits, or of sensual pleasures; but God is not in all their thoughts, not in any of them. They live upon him, and upon the gifts of his bounty from day to day, but they have no regard to him, never own their dependence on him, nor are in any care to secure his favour.
Those who live such a mere animal life as this, do not only put a great contempt upon God, but do a great deal of damage to themselves; they stand in their own light, and deprive themselves of the most valuable comforts that can be enjoyed on this side heaven. What peace can they have who are not at peace with God ? What satisfaction can they take in their hopes, who build them not upon God, the everlasting foundation? or in their joys, who derive them not from him, the fountain of life and living waters ? O that at length they would be wise for themselves, and remember their Creator and Benefactor !
4. See what easy, pleasant lives the people of God might live, if it were not their own faults. There are those who fear God and work righteousness, and are accepted of the Lord, but go drooping and disconsolate from day to day, are full of cares and fears and complaints, and make themselves always uneasy; and it is because they do not live that life of delight in God, and dependence on him, that they might and should live. God has effectually provided for their dwelling at ease, but they make not use of that provision he has laid up for them.
O that all who appear to be conscientious, and are afraid of sin, would appear to be cheerful, and afraid of nothing else; that all who call God Father, and are in care to please him, and keep themselves in his love, would learn to cast all their other care upon him, and commit their way to him as to a Father. He shall choose our inheritance for us, and knows what is best for us, better than we do for ourselves. *' Thou shalt answer. Lord, for me." It is what I have often said, and will abide by, *' That a holy, heavenly life, spent in the service of God, and in conmiunion with him, is the most pleasant, comfortable life any body can live in this world."
5. See in this, what is the best preparation we can make for the changes that may be before us in our present state; and that is, to keep up a constant acquaintance and communion with God, to converse with him daily, and keep up stated times for callinf on him, that so when trouble comes, it may find the wheels of prayer a going. And then may we come to God with a humble boldness and comfort, and hope to speed when we are in affliction, if we bate been no strangers to God at other times, but in oor peace and prosperity had our eyes ever toward him.
Even when we arrive to the greatest degree of holj security and serenity, and lie down most in peace, yet, still, we must keep up an expectation of trouble in the flesh. Our ease must be grounded not upon any stability in the creature; if it be, we put a cheat upon ourselves, and treasure up so much the greater vexation for ourselves. No, it must be built upon the faithfulness of God, which is unchangeable. Our Master has told us. In the world you shall htn tribulation, much tribulation, count upon it, it is only in me that you shall have peace. But if eveiy day be to us, as it should be, a sabbath of rest in God, and communion with him, nothing ean come amiss to us any day, be it ever so cross.
6. See in this, what is the best preparation we can make for the unchangeable world, that ia before us. We know God will bring us to death, and it is our great concern to get ready for it. It ought to be the business of every day, to prepare for our last day, and what can we do better for ourselves in the prospect of death, than, by frequent retirements for communion with God, to get more loose from that world which at death we must leave, and better acquabt-ed with that world which at death we must remove to. By going to our beds as to our graves, we shall make death familiar to us, and it will become as easy to us to close our eyes in peace and die, as it used to be to close our eyes in peace and sleep.
We hope God will bring us to heaven; and by keeping up daily communion with God, we grow more and more meet to partake of that inheritance; and have our conversation in heaven. It is certain, all that will go to heaven hereafter, begin their heaven now, and have their hearts there. If we thus enter into a spiritual rest every night, that will be a pledge of our blessed repose in the embraces of divine love, in that world wherein day and night come to an end, and we shall not rest day or night from praising him, who is and will be oor eternal rest.
I
HOW TO CLOSE THE DAY WITH GOD.
405
Mr. Flatman's HYMN for the Morning. Poems, p. 57.
Awake, my soul! Awake mine eyes,
Awake, my drowsy faculties;
Awake, and see the new-born light
Spring from the darksome womb of night.
liook up and see th' unwearied sun,
Already has his race begun ;
The pretty lark is mounted high,
And sings her matins in the sky.
Arise, my soul, and thou my voice,
In songs of praise early rejoice.
O Great Creator, Heavenly King!
Thy praises let mc ever sing!
Thy power has made, thy goodness kept
This fenceless body while I slept;
Yet one day more hast given me,
From all the powers of darkness free.
O keep my heart from sin secure.
My life unblamable and pure;
That when the last of all my days is come,
Cheerful and fearless I may wait my doom.
His ANTHEM for the Evening, p. 58.
Sleep, downy sleep! come close mine eyes, Tir'd with beholding vanities! Sweet slumbers come and chase away The toils and follies of the day. On your soft bosom will I lie. Forget the world and learn to die.
O Israel's watchful Shepherd, spread Tents of angels round my bed. Let not the spirits of the air While I slumber me insnare; Bat save thy suppliant free from harms, Clasp'd in thine everlasting arms.
Clouds and darkness is thy throne, Thy wonderful pavilion; O dart from thence a shining ray, And then my midnight shall be day: Thns when the mom, in crimson drest, Breaks through the windows of the east. My hymns of thankful praises shall arise. Like incense or the morning sacrifice.
Mr. Watt's Morning HYMN; Ps. xix. 5, 8. Ixxiii.
1 God of the morning, at whose voice The cheerful sun makes haste to rise. And like a gant doth rejoice.
To run bis journey through the skies.
2 From the fair chambers of the east The circuit of his race begins; And without weariness or rest
Round the whole earth he flies and shines.
3 O like the sun may I fulfil
Th' appointed duties of the day,
With ready mind and active will March on, and keep my heavenly way!
[4 But I shall rove and lose the race, If God my sun should disappear. And leave me in this world's wild maze To follow every wand'ring star.
5 Lord, thy commands are clean and pure, Enlight'ning our beclouded eyes.
Thy threat'nings just, thy promise sure, ' Thy gospel makes the simple wise.]
6 Give roe thy counsels for my guide, And then receive me to thy bliss; All my desires and hopes beside
Are faint and cold, compar'd with this.
An Evening HYMN; Ps. iv. 8. iii. 5, 6. cxliii. 8.
1 Thus far the Lord has led me on. Thus far his power prolongs my days; And every evening shall make known Some fresh memorial of his grace.
2 Much of my time has run to waste. And I perhaps am near my home; But he forgives my follies past.
He gives me strength for days to come.
3 I lay my body down to sleep. Peace is the pillow for my head. While well appointed angels keep Their watchful stations round my bed.
4 In vain the sons of earth or hell Tell me a thousand frightful things, My God in safety makes me dwell Beneath the shadow of his wings.
[5 Faith in his name forbids my fear: O may thy presence ne'er depart! And in the morning make me hear The love and kindness of thy heart.
6 Thus when the night of death shall come. My flesh shall rest beneath the ground, And wait thy voice to rouse my tomb. With sweat salvation in the sound.]
A SONG for Morning or Evening; Lam. iii. 23.
Isa. xlv. 7.
1 My God, how endless is thy love! Thy gifts are every evening new. And morning mercies from above Gently distil like early dew.
2 Thou spread'st the curtains of the night. Great guardian of my sleeping hours; Thy sovereign word restores the light, And quickens all my drowsy powers.
3 I yield my powers to thy command. To thee I consecrate my days *, Perpetual blessings from thine hand Demand perpetual songs of praise.
FOUR DISCOURSES
AGAINST
VICE AND PROFANENESS,
VIZ. AGAINST
I. DRUNKENNESS.
II. UNCLEANNESS.
III. SABBATH-BREAKING.
IV. PROFANE SPEAKING.
To THE Reader.
Without doubt it is possible that a man may be no drankard or adulterer, no swearer or sabbath-breaker, and yet be for ever ruined by his unmortified pride and passion, his worldliness and covetousness, his secret fraud and injustice, or his infidelity and close impiety; the pharisee in the parable went to hb house not justified, though he could say, / am not as other men are ; yet so great a decay is there of religion, even in the Christian world, and such a pre valency of sin, that it is easy to observe how far it goes toward the gaining a man a fair character among his neighbours, to be able to say of him, that he is free from these vices, as if it were a rare thing to find them that are so.
I hope the matter is not so bad; but it is too plain to be denied, that drunkenness and uncleanness, sabbath-breaking and profane speaking, the sins against which these four plain discourses are levelled, do still very much abound both in city and country, notwithstanding the good and wholesome laws of the land, made pursuant to the laws of God, for the suppressing of them ; and both enforced by her Majesty's proclamation, solemnly read at certain times, in the chief places of concourse ; and the pious endeavours in many parts of the kingdom, both of magistrates, and of others also in their places, formed into societies for that purpose, to reform the manners of the age. Though their endeavours have not been altogether in vain, yet it is evident the disease is not conquered.
It would be a vanity to think, that snch will be reclaimed and reformed by books, as will not be wrought upon by those more sensible methods of conviction; and yet our writing against these sins may be of some use, to give a check to those, who are entering into temptations to them, and who are therein checked by their own consciences likewise; with which, if we can but seasonably set in, thej may be prevailed with to start back in time, before their hearts be hardened.
It may likewise be of use to those who fall under the censure of the law for any of these sins, and are thereby awakened to some dege of consideratioD, to make the punishment answer the end aimed it, which is nothing else but their reformation ; and diat would contribute too to the reformation of others. If the rod and reproof together might but give wiadoBiD the foolish and disobedient, as there would be man joy in heaven, so there would be more benefit on eailk, by the example of one sinner that repenteth, than of ninety-nine just persons, that need no repentanee.
And we may hope there are some, who tbroi the strength of temptation, and the weakness of resolution, are drawn away by these lusts, and entieed, that yet are willing to be reasoned with, and to read and consider what is said to them; and may move probably be wrought upon by a book, which they niy peruse over and over again, than by a sermon whiek they hear once; and may in this way, by the giaee of God, be reoovered out of the snares of the devil, and become trophies of Christ's victory over him.
However, such endeavours as these to torn sinners from the error of their ways, though they may not have the desired success, will tarn to us for a testimony, that we would have healed them, and they would not be healed. By this and other methods the watchmen gve warning, and so deliver their own souls.
What more have we to do, but to be earnest witk God in prayer night and day, that the wickedae Mof the wicked may at leng come to an end, and the just be established by a more plentiful pouring out of the Spirit of grace upon us from on high, wkiA would soon turn the wilderness into a fruitful bad, and make even the desert to blossom as the rose
A FRIENDLY ADMONITION, tc.
407
And while wc yet see the wicked walk on every side, it is expected from us, that our souls weep in secret for it, that we complain of it to God, that we. sigh and cry for the abominations committed among us, and that by st regular and exemplary conversation, conformable to the gospel, we vindicate the honour of our holy religion, and approve ourselves God's faithful witnesses in the places where we live; then shall a mark be set upon us, and we shall be hid in the day of the Lord's anger, hid either in heaven or under heaven.
Matt. Henry.
A FRIENDLY ADMONITION
TO
DRUNKARDS AND TIPPLERS.
To address ourselves to you (sinners) when you are actually overcome with wine or strong drink, is to cast pearls before swine, that will trample them under their feet, and perhaps will turn again and rend us. You are then as incapable to hear reason, as you arc to speak it. It was the prudence of Abigail, that she would not reprove Nabal when he was drunk, I Sam. xxv. 36. TJiey liave smitten m«, then shah thou say, and I felt it noty (Prov. xxiii. 35.) and then to what purpose wast thou smitten ?
But I will take it for granted that you are sometimes sober, and allow yourselves liberty to think; and that Nebuchadnezzar's misery is not your chosen happiness, to be continually beasts from one year's end to another. I am willing to hope that sometimes your understanding returns to you ; and at such a happy hour, when you are your own men, and masters of your own reason, I heartily wish this paper might fall into your hands, to be read with a serious and unprejudiced eye, and grace with it into your hearts, to enable you to consider your ways, and to tarn from the error of them.
And now at length, I beseech you, show yourselves men, O ye transgressors (Isa. xlvi. 8.) and let me bespeak one hour's application of mind, and a little impartial consideration, while one, who really wishes you well, attempts to recover you out of the snare you are led captive in. You are, perhaps, many a time thankful to your friend, who helped you when yon were drunk, Belped you to your houses, helped you to your beds, when you were not able to help yourselves; I beseech you then, count not one your enemy, who would persuade you to such a cM>iirse of life, as that your own hands may be sufficient for you, and you may not again need their help upon any such occasion.
The transgressors to whom I address this paper, I shall choose to describe in the express words of scripture, hoping that such a description of them will be not only least exceptionable, but most effectual to discover them to themselves, and to their own consciences ; and further I do not desire to discover them ; for I write not these things to shame you, (unless it be to shame you out of your sin,) but as my beloved friends, to warn you, 1 Cor. iv. 14.
Those therefore that I am exhorting in God's name to repent and reform, are such as fall under some of the following characters:
1. Those who inordinately love drink, are hereby admonished. Solomon foretells the misery of him who loves pleasure, that he shall be a poor man, and particularly he who loves wine, Prov. xxi. 17. To use wine or strong drink soberly, and with a moderate delight, as a good creature of God, made for the service and comfort of man, is allowed us ; and it is sanctified, as other the good things of this life, by the word of God and prayer, and the pleasure more than doubled to a good man by thanksgiving. But to love wine and strong drink, to set the heart upon it, to let out the desire towards it, for the sake of the pleasure of drinking, and because it is a gratification of the sensual appetite ; this is a corrupt and vicious habit, which leads to drunkenness, as it is usually contracted by it.
To drink wine for the stomach's sake is prescribed as a medicine, (1 Tim. v. 23.) but then it is a little wine, for a little, a very little, will serve the necessities and regular desires of nature: but to cat or drink for drunkenness, that is, purely to please the palate, has a brand put upon it by the wise man, (Eccl. x. 17.) where it is made the character of virtuous princes, that (notwithstanding the temptation of dainties and varieties they have about them) they eat in due season, for strength and not for drunkenness.
It is the everlasting reproach of Israel in the wilderness, that when God gave them meat enough for their bodies, that did not content them, though it was bread from heaven, but they asked meat for their lusts, Ps. Ixxviii. 18. After the similitude of their transgression do those sin, who are not pleased with that which satisfies the just desires of nature, but they thirst after that which really puts a force upon nature.
This love of the pleasure of drinking is commonly jested with, as a *' spark in the throat;" but such a spark it is as must be quenched by true repentance and mortification, or it will break out shortly into such a flame, as will bum to the lowest hell.
2. Those who err through wine, and through strong drink are out of the way, are hereby admonished. Such are complained of by the prophet, (Isa. xxviii. 7.) who though they do not drink so far
A FRIENDLY ADMONITION
as ordinarily to deprive themselves of the common exercise of reason, yet they debaach their own consciences with the love of pleasure ; so that they are unable to make a right judgment of divine things, and especially of their own spiritual state and interest : so losing the exercise of their reason about that for the sake of which they had their reason given them.
Their case is greatly to be lamented, who, by associating with drunkards, and liabituating themselves to loose practices, inconsistent with Ihe rules, and destructive to the seeds, of divine life, come to imbibe loose principles concerning Gcfd and Christ, and the Scriptures, and their souls, and another world, and entertain rooted prejudices against serious godliness, and a holy life. Thus the strong man armed gets and keeps possession of the heart, and it will be a miracle of free grace, if ever he be dispossessed.
It is sad to see how many form their notions of religion, and settle their rules of living, by their free conversation, as they call it, over a glass of wine ; and for instruction in the most weighty concerns of their souls, they have recourse not to reading, study, prayer, or the serious advice of their grave and pious teachers, but to the l>anter of their club in the ale-house or tavern ; by this they resolve to steer their course, and they take it for granted they are in the right. These are the oracles they con-sylt, in these schools they choose their education, and so they err through wine; and in the greatness of their folly wander endlessly.
3. Those who tarry long at the wine are also branded in the Scripture, Prov. xxiii. 90. Those who waste a great many of their precious hours thus idly and unprofitably, so as at the best to serve none of the purposes of the rational, much less of the divine, life. Those, I mean, who spend the best part of every day in piping, and sipping, and chatting over the glass, as if they had nothing else to do in this world, but to please as brutish an appetite of the mere animal life as any it has. They divide their time, perhaps even their sabbath time, between the bed and the bottle, and make tippling the constant business of a worthless, useless life. They do not stand in the market-place, but they sit in a worse place, all the day idle.
These are such as we call sots; the most insignificant animals under the sun, the unprofitable burthens of the earth, under which it groans: of whom we may truly say, it had been as good for the world if it bad never known them ; and they themselves will say shortly, when they come under the fearful doom of the wicked and slothful servant, that it had been better, a thousand times better, if they bad never been bom: for the time thus spent, thus mispent, will perhaps occasion melancholy reflections upon a death-bed; it will, however, pass very ill in the account, in the judgment of the great day.
4. Those who follow strong drink are under a woe, (Isa. V. 11.) Woe unto them that rite up emrlff in the moniing that they may follow strong drink: and is another scripture expresses it, They JUl tkemedtet with strong drink, Isa. Ivi. 12. These are deliberate drunkards, who are continually seeking opportimi-ties to make themselves drunk; who follow it u their trade, and are in it as in their element. The desire of excessive drinking will draw them at aoy time, into any place, among any company, thoagi ever so sordid and so much below them ; it will give them a diversion from the prosecution of any business, though ever so urgent. They are as solicitous in their inquiry " Where are the best liquors ?" as tkc most industrious tradesman is in inquiring'' Where are the best goods, and the best bargains?" When they awake out of a drunken fit, it is to seek it yet again, Prov. xxiii. 35.
5. Those who are mighty to drink wine, and men of strength to mingle strong drink, are likewise under a woe, Isa. v. 22. There are those who gloiy in it as a mighty perfection, that they are able to bear a great deal of strong liquor without sinking under it; and boast of it as an heroic achievement, that they have made shift to keep their seats, and to keep their feet, when they had laid so many dead drunk under the table. Probably such as these were those drunkards of Ephraim, who wore the crown of pride, the garlands they won by those sort of victories, Isa. xxviii. 1. But it is there threatened, (e. 3.) That those drunkards of Ephraim, with their crown of pride, shall be trodden under foot. Be aatonish-ed, O heavens, at this, and wonder, O earth, that ever any should arrive to such a pitch of impudence in sin, as thus to glory in their shame, and value themselves upon that which is rather the commendation of a brewer's horse, than of a man, to be able to carry a great deal of liquor. But the day is coming, when those who are so well able to bear the cap of drunkenness, will find themselves too weak to bear the cup of trembling.
6. Those whb are easifand commonly biooglit to drink themselves drunk, as the expression is, (1 Kings xvi. 9. and ch» xx. 16.) fall under his reproof. Those, I mean, who though they know their own weakness, the weakness of their heads, and their inability to bear drink, together with the weakness of their hearts, and their inability to resist temptations to this sin, yet are ordinarily drawn into such company as pr||ves a snare to them, awl are soon brought to take more than doe them good; the effect whereof is, that their reason is distniiied, their tongues stanmier, their feet stumble, and they reel to and fro, and are at their wits' end.^ Tbey become like the fool, whom Solomon describeit (Eccl. X. 3.) who when he walketk by the wcy, kit
TO DRUNKARDS AND TIPPLERS.
460 wisdom faileth Aim, and he tiyt to every one he meets, that he is a fooL Those certainly drink to excess, who by drinking lose the government of themselves, and disable their own bodies and minds for their respective offices.
They who are but once surprised into this excess, IS Noah was, have reason to lament their own un-wariness, and to double their guard for the future ; but they who are again and again overcome by it have no cloak for their sin. Wine is such a mocker, that if it thus deceive us once, it is its part, it may be its fault, but if twice, it is our own, wholly our own.
7. Those who make others drink and be drunk, though they themselves may escape being so, arc vnder a woe, (Hab. ii. 16.) Woe unto him that giveth Ais neighbour drinks and mahes him drunken also. Those who contrive by urging healths, or other the arts of drunkenness, to force this trade, must doubtless be accountable for all the sin they decoy others into, and the blood of those souls and bodies, which perish thereby, will be required at their hands. Those especially incur guilt, who not only make a jest of drawing an unguarded soul now and then into a particular act of drunkenness, but lay plots to debauch those who were soberly educated and inclined, and to engage them in the course and way of this sin; and triumph in their success herein as glorious victories, boasting how often they ha\e thus quenched the glowing sparks of virtue, and crushed its hopeful seeds. These have arrived at the highest pitch of this wickedness ; they are factors for hell, and betray such a malice against God and souls, and such a zeal for the propagating of sin, as is the very constitution of Satan himself.
Having thus described the disease, in the several symptoms and degrees of it, we must next attempt Che cure :' and that which makes the attempt more difficult, and yet more necessary, is, that the disease is epidemical; the contagion is spread through the nation, and multitudes are tainted with it. It is not here and there one that is thus deprived of his reason, and become distracted at times ; if so, hospitals might be built in which to keep them up, and endeavour their relief; but the iniquity abounds in every place. If the honour of temperance were to be carried by the major vote, we have reason to fear that tbe sober would be out-polled. Whether the former days were in this respect any whit better than these, I know not; but these are certainly very bad, and the prophet's complaint may too justly be revived, (Isa. xxviii. d.) All talms are full of vomit and fU-tkinesSj there is no place clean.
Now as when the pestilence rages in a city, whilst care- is taken by the government to confine the infected, that they appear not abroad to spread the infeetioD, it is likewise incumbent upon physicians, to prescribe and publish th%best methods they can think of both of prevention and cure; so, when this brutish vice of drunkenness is grown so very common as it is, it is high time to take the same course with it. It is the duty of magistrates with their power, to restrain and suppress it, that it appear not barefaced. Their sword ought to be a terror to these evil doers ; for without doubt a common drunkard is a common nuisance, which the conservators of the public peace ought to take cognizance of. It is also requisite that ministers in their places, as spiritual physicians, should direct people what course to take, and how to manage themselves, that they, who are yet sound, may be preserved from the infection, and they who are sick, who most need the physician, may be recovered.
I must alter the title of this paper, if I should here address myself to the sober, to give them rules for the preserving of their sobriety: Let the fear of God be kept up in the heart; let the flesh be crucified, with all its corrupt affections and lusts ; let not the dread and abhorrence of this sin be lessened by the frequent sight of those who indulge themselves in it; but let drunkards, as vile persons, be contemned in their eyes, (Ps. xv. 4.) and let their company be avoided, as much as is possible. Let temperance be a constant pleasure to them, and let them value themselves by it as their honour and reputation ; and let its rules be religiously and inviolably observed, and no sensual appetite gratified; but let the body be kept under, and brought into subjection to religion and right reason; and then, I hope, by the grace of God, daily prayed for, apd duly improved, he that is sober will be sober still, and will still hold fast his integrity.
But my business at present lies with those who are infected, and already captivated to the power of this lust; whether they be known and open drunkards, who declare their sin as Sodom, and seek not to hide it, or whether they be more close and secret tipplers, who roll it under their tongue as a sweet morsel. O that ye would, both the one and the other, suffer a word of exhortation; and let me beg of you with all earnestness and seriousness, if you have any regard to the eternal God that made you, or to the blessed Jesus that bought you, or to your own precious and immortal souls, that you will break off this sinful course of life you lead ; cease to do this evil, and learn to do well. Fain I would persuade those who have been drunk, to be drunk no more; to forsake the foolish and live, and to go in the way of understanding. Though the disease be inveterate and very threatening, yet I would not doubt but. by the grace of God, a cure might be effected, if the diseased were but willing to be made whole.
These sinners must be ranked under two heads, who must be differently dealt with, According as their case differs.
A FRIENDLY ADMONITION
I. There are some drunkards, who justify themselves in the sin, and so go on in it, under the protection of a debauched conscience; and these must be addressed to by way of conviction.
II. There are others, who condemn themselves for it, but not knowing how to disentangle themselves from it, they go on in it, notwithstanding the checks of an accusing conscience; and these must be addressed to by way of counsel and advice.
I. Let me begin with those who wallow in the mire of this sin, and think there is no harm in it; who insist upon their own justification in it; and plead for Baal. They are retained of counsel for this sin, and they confess the fact, that they are often in drink, yet they deny the fault, and with the adulterous woman, wipe their mouth and say, they have done no wickedness, Prov. xxx; 20. They have, if not satisfied, yet silenced, their own consciences, with the corrupt and foolish reasonings of that flesh and blood, which they make their delight and their counsellors. They are ready to ask. Why should not the natural appetite, which we brought into the world with us, be indulged and gratified ? And how can the time and estate be better spent than in the service of it ? And to show that they can quote Scripture as well as Satan, (Matt. iv. 6.) they will tell you that tlie fruit of the vine was created to make glad the heart, and in vain was it created, if it be not used for that purpose; you shall not persuade them that that is unlawful (how express soever the divine law is against it) which seems so natural.
They plead also the benefit and advantage of it; for their parts they know no way to ease the cares of this life, and take off the fears of death, but to drown them in good liquor. "What!" (say they) *' a man is never merry till he is half drunk ; never enjoys himself till he has thus raised himself." And, besides, they take it for granted that there can be no good fellowship with their friends, no free or pleasant conversation, but in the tavern or ale-house, and must either seek it there, or be perpetually me-lancholy, and never enjoy one another; they cannot, that is, they will not, believe that such a pleasant entertainment and diversion as this should have any evil in it: what if they be drunk, they hope it is no treason ; it is past off with a jest, and made a laughing matter the next day, among their companions.
But vnll you give me leave to ask you, (you that thus palliate the matter,) what if your drinking to excess, and your tippling, should not prove such an innocent harmless thing, as you would make yourselves believe it is? What if all these fig-leaves you sew together, prove too thin and too narrow to cover your shame ? Your consciences, which you have so often baffled and brow-beaten, now, perhaps, begin to let you alone, and give you no disturbance; you therefore with a great deal of security and carelessness, walk in the way of your own heart, and in the sight of your eyes, and allow yourselves all the looses of a vain and carnal conversation ; but what if for all these things God should bnnf you into judgment? Eccl. xi. 9. What will you do in the day of visitation, when you shall be called to account for all your drunken frolics and excesses? Can you think that these pleas you insist on will stand you in any stead at God's bar, or bring yoa off in the judgment of the great day ? No, they will all be overruled and rejected asffrivolous, and you yoar-selves will be ashamed of your confidence. You now say, that you shall have peace, though you go on to add drunkenness to thirst; you think God will not be so severe upon you as we are, and at the worst you shall fare as well as most of your neighbours, and if you go to hell, God help a great many! Bat what if this self-flattery prove a self-deceit ? What if your making light of the sin makes it really the heavier? What if you come at last within reach of that fearful threatening against the sinner, who thus promises himself impunity in the way of drunkenness? (Deut. xxix. 19, 20.) The Lord wUl not spare him, but the anger of the Lord, and his jealousy, shall smohe against that man. Is it not better for you to be undeceived in time, than to have this mistake discovered, when it is too late to rectify it? Come, therefore, and let us reason together: yon plead that drinking is natural, it is so; but drinking to excess is certainly unnatural. You plead it is pleasant and profitable, but the plea is false, there is no pleasure nor profit in it.
You ask what harm is there in being drunk? What hurt does it do to any body ? But will yon give me leave to ask you a few questions? and I will appeal to the impartial and unbiassed judgement of your own consciences for an answer to them.
1. Is it no harm to transgss the law of the great God, the God that made you and will judge yon? The very law of nature forbids this sin; the heathen condemned it, and cried out shame on it, though it is not expressly forbidden in the law of Moses, (only the use of all wine and strong drink is prohibited to the priests when they went in to minister, (Lev. X. 9.) and to the Nazarites, (Num. yL 3.) and Christians are spiritual priests and gospel Nazarites) yet it is frequently condemned by the prophets, and many a woe denounced against it, as in the places before quoted. And in the New Testament, which is more immediately our rule, we have many express laws against it. Luke xxi. 34. Tahe heed, lot your heart he overcharged with surfeiting anddrmnken' ness; and again, (Rom. xiifc 13.) Let us walk honestly as in the day, not in rioting and drunkenness ; and again, (Eph. v. 18.) Be not drunk with wine wherein is excess J but be filled with the Spint; and again, (I Thess. V. 7, 8.) They that be drunk, are dritnk w the night, but let us who are of the day be sober. Are these the commands of God pr are they not? If they be.
J'
TO DRUNKARDS AND TIPPLERS.
471 are tbey to be quarrelled with, and jested with, or are they to be obeyed ? Are they repealed or antiquated, or are they not still in as full force, power, and Tir-tue as ever ? Were these sacred laws enacted for the restraining and mortifying of our lusts, and can we think that they should be relaxed and dispensed with in favour of our lusts ? No; as long as the carnal mind is enmity to the just and holy God, the holiness and justice of God will be enmity to the carnal mind.
Yoa argue that drunkenness must needs be lawful, because it is grateful to the flesh, and you can-sot think that God should be so hard upon you, as to bind you out from that which you have so strong an appetite to; as if God were altogether such a one as yourselves, and as much a friend to the ease and pleasure of the body as you are: thus the sensual lives of Epicures are justified, by the atheistical doctrine of Epicurus. But stay awhile and you shall see this refuge of lies swept away, and shall know whose word shall stand, God's or yours, (Jer. xliv. 28.) Fools make a mock at tin; but be not deceived, Ood is not mocked. How light soever you now make of the divine law, and the injunctions of it, you will find to your cost, that if it shall not command you, it will condemn yon ; if it shall not rule you, it will ruin you ; for God will magnify his law and make it honourable, though you vilify it and make it contemptible.
2. Is it no harm to disturb the exercise of your own reason, and to break in upon that ? Reason is the crown and glory of the human nature, by the noble powers and faculties of which you are distinguished from, and dignified above, the inferior creatures : this is that which teaches you more than the beasts of the earth, and makes you wiser than the fowls of heaven. This is God's image upon the human soul; and is it no harm to deface that image ? It is this spirit of a man, that is the candle of the Lord ; and is it no harm to extinguish this candle, or at least for the present to put it into a dark lan-thom ? The inspiration of the Almighty has given us understanding; and will you throw away that gift as not worth your keeping ? Is it no harm thus to profane your crown by casting it to the ground, and to undervalue the honour God has put upon you, by patting yourselves upon a level with the beasts ?
If, indeed, you have but little value for the sacred ties and honours of religion ; yet, is reason become of so small account with you, that you can tamely resign tiiat too, and prostitute it to the tyranny and arbitrary government of a brutish appetite ? Hast thou DO concern, no jealousy, for the liberty and property of thy own soul; but shall it be contentedly, and without any struggle or regret, sacrificed to a base and imperious lust? Wilt thou sell such a birthright, as that which has so many privileges annexed to it, like profane Esau, for a mess of pottage ? Is thy own soul, that precious soul of thine, which is capable of such noble services and enjoyments, so little worth in thy esteem, that thou art so easily persuaded to put thyself out of the possession of it ?
By excess of drink the understanding is clouded, that sun in the little world is for the time eclipsed; it has no government of the thoughts, they are all in confusion, and a perfect tumult; no command of the passions, they are in an uproar, and are carried headlong ; no command of the tongue, it utters perverse things, (Prov. xxiii. 33.) and the whole soul is for the present incapacitated to perform its offices, all its foundations are out of course. This is thy case (man) when thou art drunk; thy wisdom is departed from thee, and folly ascends the throne in thy soul; and is there no harm in this ? If a man wound, or maim, or lame his body, or any way disable it for its services, he is justly accounted either a mad man, or a bad man; and is he neither the one nor the other, who does worse than this to his own soul, his nobler and better part ? Is not he the worst of robbers, who deprives himself of the use of his reason, and says to that seer, *' See not;" who puts out his own eyes, that, Samson-like, he may grind in Satan's prison. Consider (man) if the light that is in thee be darkness, Itaw great is that darkness ! We pity those who are either born idiots, or become mad by disease; yet drunkards, who make themselves little better than idiots and mad, think all the world should envy them their liberty and pleasures: it is such a liberty as is the worst of slavery, such a pleasure as will be bitterness in the end.
Wicked men are often in Scripture compared to brute beasts, and particularly to swine, who wallow in the mire; (2 Pet ii. 22.) but of all sinners none have more of the resemblance than drunkards have. They say of any other brute creature, that if once it has been intoxicated with any liquor, it will never be brought to drink of that liquor again; only the swine will again and again be drunk with the same liquor; and a thousand pities it is that ever the same should be said of a man, who has so much more to lose by being drunk, than a beast has, and is endowed with so much better powers for the correcting of the appetite than the beasts are. Man being in honour, understands not, abides not, but thus becomes like the beasts that perish. The Lord pity these poor sinners, and show them their foHy, that they may pity themselves.
I confess I have often wondered that any, who think themselves in reputation for wisdom and honour, should yield themselves willing captives to this vice, which does so much degrade and diminish a man, and make him mean and despicable. If he that is drunk is in his own imagination as geat as d king, yet he is, in the eyes of all wise and sober men, as contemptible as a brute, and in some re-
A FRIENDLY ADMONITION
spects more so; and his conceit of himself does but make him so much the more ridiculous.
A man may sweep the streets and rake the kennel, and yet have the honour of being a man, while his reason remains with him ; but he who voluntarily drinks himself out of his reason, has resigned his crown, and is so much more vile than a beast, that he becomes one by his own act, and still retains the shape and name of a man. It is an excellent distich of Mr. Herbert's, among other weighty sayings against this sin, in his Church-Porch ;
The drunkard forfeits man, and doth divest All worldly right, save what he hath by beast.
For this reason the ancient Lacedaemonians, if any man happened to be drunk in their streets, (and they thought none but scoundrels would be so,) they brought their children out to look at him; not to divert them and make them merry, but that seeing the foolish carriage, and hearing the foolish talk, of a drunken man, they might conceive a loathing of that detestable sin, and might be afraid of ever making such fools of themselves. And verily it is strange by what charms any rational man can be drawn to drunkenness, who has ever seen and observed the motions of a drunken man.
3. Is it no harm to abuse the gifts of God's bounty to you ? If God has created wine to refresh the spirits of men, and has allowed them the sober and moderate use of it, as far as is for their real good; will you by using it intemperately, pervert the design of the donor, and make that the food and fuel of your lusts, which he gave for the support and comfort of your lives? What is this but fighting against God with his own weapons ? It is alienating the inherit-ance of the Lord to his enemies, and suffering the strong man armed to divide his spoils; it is a traitorous assigning over of the prince's grants to the rebels.
Surely (sinner) thou dost not know, at least thou dost not consider, that God by his providence gives wine and strong drink, and gives them thee: that he makes the earth to yield her increase, and gives thee thy share of it, a large share it may be: and shall this be sacrificed to Baal, to a dunghill god ? Doubtless they do so whose God is their belly, Hos. ii. 8. And is this of thy whoredoms a small matter ? that thou hast taken God's gifts, and used them to his dishonour, and hast made a calf of these spoils of the Egyptians, which ought in gratitude to have been consecrated to the service of the tabernacle ? Justly may God by some judgment or other recover his com and his wine, for the property is not altered by thy alienation. It aggravated the barbarous idolatry of the bigoted and besotted Jews, in sacrificing their children to Moloch, that they were God's children whom they had born unto him, Ezek. xvi. 20. It likewise aggravates thy sin, that what God gave thee to serve him with, thou servest the devil and a base lust with.
Know then that thou art but a steward of these things, and thou must very shortly gve account of thy stewardship, when thou must be no longer steward. And if this be not wasting thy Lord's goods, I know not what is. Thy account, therefore, unleis it be first balanced by repentance and faith, will be gven up with grief and not with joy. Strong drink should be given to him who through emptiness is ready to perish, that so it may help to save a life ; not to him who is so full already, that be is ready to vonut, so to destroy a life. Wine should be given, not to them who are of a merry heart, who have more need of a curb to their mirth than a spur, but to them that are of a heavy heart, to revive their drooping spirits: thus Solomon's mother taught him, Prov. xxxi. 6. Those, therefore, who make that the support of corruption, which was intended for the refreshment of nature, pervert that which is right, and must be accountable for the injury: to what purpose is this waste ?
Know also that this abuse of the creatures, is that which makes the whole creation groan, being bor-thcned because of its subjection to vanity, by diis means, Rom. viii. 20—^22. But when it shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption. Woe be to that man by whom the offence came. As the 8t(»ie cries out of the wall, against him who builds his house by iniquity, (Hab. ii. 11.) so the com and the wine cry against those who make them the instruments of unrighteousness to God's dishonour.
4. Is it no harm to endanger the health and life of your own bodies ? Let us reason with you from a topic that is very sensible, and try what impression that will make. The Lord is for the body, and be would have you to be for it too in a regular way; but while you indulge its brutish appetites, you prejudice its trae interest, and by advancing it to the power of a master, you really abuse it worse than a slave.
Consider then how many are the dangers yon are imminently exposed to, when you are drunk, and incapable of self-preservation; your souls are continually in your hands, but never more so than when the liquor is in your heads. That foolish proverb, which passes current, as an answer to this argument, that drunken people catch no harm, is convicted of falsehood by frequent instances to the contrary. How often do we hear of those to whom, being in diink, a fall down stairs, or off a house, or into a shallow water, has been fatal, and (which is a dreadful thought) has sent them drunk out of the world, under the black and heavy charge of being self-murderen! And not only so, but has hastened them to the judgment immediately after death, without giving them time to cry. Lord have mercy upon me ! So great a death do drunkards often die, a sudden death, a
473 violent death, a death in their sin, and a death to irhich they themse Wes are highly accessary. And shall this consideration sway nothing with you ? Do
tile perils of the wars and the seas keep you upon
' dry ground, and in a land of peace, and shall not
' the perils of drunkenness prevail to keep you soher?
' Bare you put yoar lives in your hand for the service of sin, and at the same time put yourselves out of
God's protection ? To say you have often been drunk,
and yet never got any hyrt, and therefore you will venture still, is such a contempt of the patience and forbearance of God, as will certainly treasure up
^vrath against the day of wrath, except you repent.
But besides this danger which you run your own iKMiies into by this sin, consider further the real wrong
prejudice that is done to them by every act of drunkenness. It is a sin that does violence to nature,
overcharges the heart; drunkenness is a present nckness, a present distemper and disorder. You will own you take more than does you good, and when it is so much more, how can it choose but to do you hurt ? And why must those bodies of yours, which are so fearfully and Wonderfully made, which were made to be instruments of righteousness, and temples of the Holy Ghost, be thus basely abused ?
Why must those vessels, which should be possessed in sanctification and honour, be thus unsanctified and dishonoured? that curious structure made a sink and a swine-sty ? Shall that which has been washed in the waters of baptism, and so dedicated to the service of the sanctuary, thus wallow in the mire of sin, and be alienated to the slavery of Satan ?
Shall the shield of the mighty be thus vilely cast away end prostitutedy as though it had not been anointed iHtkoil? 2 Sam. 1.21.
Art thou not told what will be in the end hereof? If the sorrow of the world slays its thousands; this Hiirth of the world, running into these excesses, slays Its ten thousands. And art thou so much in love '^th woe, (man,) so fond of sorrow, and redness of ^yes, and wounds without cause, so well pleased ^rith all the instances of a dying life and a lingering fleath, that thou wilt sell thy soul, and all thy tiappiness in the other world, to purchase all these ^nijeries and calamities in this world ? - You who drive a trade of drunkenness, if I thooght you were capable of looking a little way 1>efore you, I would desire you to foresee, for without a spirit of prophecy it is easy to foretell, the threatening and fatal diseases, which by every debauch you are preparing matter for. Are there not a great many instances, and those melancholy ones, daily before your eyes, of persons who have drunk themselves into dropsies, consumptions, and other diseases, which have soon carried them off in the tnidst of their days, and have sent many a green and flourishing head, in the flower of youth, unpitied to the grave ? And is the honour of being a martyr to Bacchus, or at least a faithful confessor to his shrine, so valuable, so desirable, that you are willing to be at the expense of your all, to purchase it? Those are unwise, unthinking prodigals indeed, who can sell their health and strength so shamefully cheap; and they have indeed made their belly their god, their supreme god, who have prevailed with themselves, not only to let out their blood as the worshippers of Baal, or to bum their children, as the worshippers of Moloch, but voluntarily to sacrifice their own lives at its altar; and by resolutely persisting in these paths of death, even to bind the sacrifice with cords to the horns of that altar. There needs no faith, nor is there much occasion to appeal to reason; sense itself, one would think, were enough to make this argument cogent: for surely in vain is the net spread in the sight of any bird.
I entreat you therefore, for the sake of your own bodies, which you pretend to be indulgent of, that you will break off" this destructive course of life. Have you no regard to their ease, and health, and safety, and honour, and life? Will you disorder, and defile, and destroy your ownselves, after we have ao often cried unto you with a loud voice, as St. Paul to the jailer, when he had his sword at his own breast. Do yourselves no harm? Be not your own murderers. Why (man) there is death in the cup, there is poison in the glass, of which thou drinkest immoderately. Thou dost not think how fatal the consequences of thy drunken surfeits may prove; but I desire thee to consider this one thing, while thou canst not but have (if conscience be awake) a most uncomfortable prospect of another world, it is certain thou hast no reason to hasten thy departure out of this world.
5. Is it no harm to waste and mispend precious time ? If we would but seriously consider for what great and excellent purposes time is appointed us and continued to us, we should reckon that an enemy to us which robs us of it, and alienates it from the intentions for which it was designed us. Nothing does this more than tippling; nor are there any who are worse husbands of their time than those who tarry long at the wine. Therefore when the apostle had minded us to redeem the time, (Eph. v. 16.) he presently adds, (v. 18.) and be not drunk.
Time is a talent that must shortly be accounted for; a price put into the hand to get wisdom; but what account will they give of it who spend, not only hours, but days and nights, in this folly ? They sit sotting in the ale-house or tavern day after day, because they know not how otherwise to pass away their time. Pass away the time (man)! why, thou wouldstsee thy time pass away fast enough, if thou wert but sensible what work thou hast to do, which is yet undone, and which, if it be never done, thou art undone for ever; and thou wouldst rather cod-
A FRIENDLY ADMONITION
trive how to recover the time that is past away, by a close and vigorous application to the great business of lifcy than how to lavish away the few remaining minutes, in that which is opposite and destructive to thy great and true interests.
Believe it (sirs) you have an eternal God to serve, an immortal soul to save, an everlasting state to provide for, and it is no time to trifle. So much of the stock of life, the quick stock, is spent, and so little of the work of life done, that you must not think of spare hours; you have none to spare for the service of sin, who have already lost so many that should have been spent in the service of God. Yet a little while is this light with you, and you know not what you do, while you waste it in the works of darkness.
Judge within yourselves ; do not you think that the time which you spend in drinking and tippling, might be much better spent in reading the word of God, and meditating upon it, and in prayer and acts of devotion in their season ? But you leave no room for these, or next to none; and one of the proper times for them, which is the evening of the day, is the time you ordinarily spend in this service of the flesh. Or if your untoward hearts would snuff at the religious exercises that are drawn out to any length, and say. Behold whui a weariness is ii! yet, might not you better spend your time in reading and profitable conversation with wise and sober people, for the cultivating and improving yourselves in useful knowledge? Have you not a calling to attend, a family to take care of, children to educate ? And do not these press urgently for the time you idle away ? Or if not these, might not your time be better spent in doing good to your neighbours, and serving your generation some way or other, according to the will of God ? You might find work enough to do, if you had but a heart to it, which would be fruit abounding to your comfort in the day of reckoning; while the unprofitable talk, and idle words, spent over your cups, will come against you, when they must all be accounted for in the day of judgment.
Thou sayst, that they are but vain words, that it is better to spend thy time thus than spend it as many do, in doing mischief to their neighbours, and creating trouble and vexation to all about them ; you thank God you do nobody any hurt: but others spending their time worse, will be far from justifying or excusing you in spending it ill, while there are so many ways of spending it well, and much better than you do: may you be allowed to bury your talents, because others waste theirs ?
Let those therefore who tarry long at the wine, and sit at it, as they say, consider how in the mean time their souls are neglected, and become like the Jieid of the slothful, and the vineyard of (he man void of understanding; their families are neglected, and they leave them as the ostrich leaves her eggs in Uie earth, forgetting that the foot may crush them; they are hardened against their young ones, as thoagk they were not theirs, because they are deprived of wisdom. Job xxxix. 14, &c. The duties of their callings are neglected, and the duties of God's worship in their closets and families neglected too, and, in short, they live in the world to no good porpoie at all; the good which they should do, they do it not; the business they were made for, they mind it not; the time that should be spent in serving God and doing good, is thrown away upon the 0esh and the lust thereof.
Think how bitter the reflection upon this will be when you come to die, if your consciences be not seared: (hen you will wish you had those houn again which you wasted in unprofitable talk, and, perhaps, will cry in vain (as one did) '^ Call back time, call back time.'' A thousand worlds for aa inch of time, to be spent in making your peace with God, and sure work for your souls. What woaU damned sinners in hell give for a few of those minutes in a state of probation, which you are now so lavish of. You may now, if you be wise, redeen time, but you cannot then recall it
6. Is it no harm to misemploy your estates, and the gain of your callings, and to take the moit effectual course to bring yourselves and yours to want and beggary ? Perhaps you have much to spend, and can gratify this sensual appetite, without doing any considerable damage to your estate; but then will you consider that your estates are not your own, to be spent as you please; no, you are but stewards of them, and are accountable to God for them. If you thus waste them, you waste you Lord's goods, and pervert the design of giving ihtm to you; your families, which you ought to provide for, according to your rank, are robbed; the poor are defrauded, for tlie more you spend upon yoar own lusts, the less you have to give for the supply of their wants; the commonwealth is injured, for that which should be expended for the encouragement of honest labour, which would enrich tbe nation, is wasted in the support of idleness and luxury, which impoverish the nation.
But there are many that have but little to spend, and that little shall be spent in the ale-house, to that at last they spend their all there. Solomons observation is confirmed by daily experience, that he that loves pleasure shall he a poor Yuan, (Prov. xxi. 17.) and that the drunkard shall come to pavertfft Prov. xxiii. 21. Have we not seen many a fair patrimony sacrificed to this brutish lust ? Many a portion we have known spent, many a house and field sold, and many a good estate mortgaged and made away, to maintain an idle drunken sot in h\» excess of riot. Many a gentleman we have heaid of, and many a farmer, and many a tradesman, whs
TO DRUNKARDS AND TIPPLERS.
475 have been reduced to rags and beggary, brought to a morsel of bread, and perhaps lodged at last in a prison, and it was drunkenness that brought them to it. One sinner dettroys much good, Eccl. ix. 18. And is there no harm in all this ? no sin ? no shame ?
How amazing is the power which the god of this world has over the children of disobedience ! The Lord that bought them, cannot persuade them to expose themselves to a little loss, hardship, and reproach, in his service, though they shall be abundantly recompensed for it another day. But Satan, their sworn enemy, can prevail with them for the serving of him and of his lusts, to ruin themselves in both worlds; so wretchedly are they led captive by him at his will.
But think how very dismal and insupportable those calamities will be, which you thus bring upon yourselves, by your own sin and folly. The devil's poor are the most miserable, and yet the least commiserated of any poor whatsoever. What wilt thou have to comfort thyself with, when thou art brought into straits by thy own wickedness? what wilt thou do in such a day of visitation ? when the remembrance of what thou hast mispent, will gte upon thee? when thy lusts virill continue craving, and thou wilt not have that plenty of fuel for them which thou hast had ? but especially when divine consolations, the only support of an afflicted state, shall be denied thee? Awake ye drunkards, and weep and how!, all ye drinkers of wine, because of t/ie new wine, for tt is cut off from your mouth, Joel i. 5.
7. Is it no harm to unfit yourselves for the duties of God's worship, and to put yourselves out of a capacity to perform them ? Dare you go to bed at night without solemn prayer ? Dare you sleep from under God's protection? and can you see yourselves under that protection, if you do not by prayer commit yourselves to it ? Can you expect the mercies of the night, when you have not penitently asked pardon for the sins of the day, nor given God thanks for the favours you have received ? and can this be done, when your hearts arc overcharged with surfeiting and drunkenness, and you scarcely know where you are, or what you say ? Dare you venture to speak to God, when you are not able to speak sense to a man like yourselves ?
When the evening has been spent in the ale-house or tavern, and in immoderate drinking there, the evening worship, not only in the family, but in secret, will be either wholly omitted, or miserably performed, so that it were better let alone. Either there will be no evening sacrifice at all, or (which is worse) it will be the sacrifice of fools, the torn, and the lame, and the sick, and an affront to God rather than a service of him. Pretend not to address your God, when you arc in such a condition, that it would be mdeness to address your governor.
8. Is it no harm to lay yourselves open to Satan'.i temptations, and to make yourselves an easy prey to them ? By this sin you expose yourselves to many other sins, and disable yourselves to discern or resist the most dangerous assaults of Satan. Is mocking a sin ? Is rage a sin ? Behold, wine is a mocker, strong drink is raging, Prov. xx. 1. The drunkard's bench is commonly the seat of the scornful; and David was the song of the drunkards. Is strife and contention a sin? Are wounds given without cause a sin ? these are the practices of them who tarry long at the wine, Prov. xxiii. 29, 30. Drunken frays, and those sometimes ending in barbarous murders, are the common products of that, which, yet, will be called good fellowship. When reason is sunk and drowned, rage and passion will ride admiral; and when men have drunk themselves out of the possession of their own souls, no wonder if the devil (who is too watchful an enemy to lose any advantages against us) soon get possession of them, and oftentimes cast them intc the fire and into the water. Are chambering and wantonness sins? These are the companions of rioting and drunkenness, Rom* xui. 13.
What mischief may not that man do, who neither knows nor cares what he does, neither fears God nor regards man, nor has any conduct or government of himself? Yet this inability will be no excuse for the sin that you are thus betrayed into, because it is a self-created inability. Be not deceived ; a man's offence will never be his defence, nor will one sin serve for a cloak to another. He who sins when he is drunk, must repent when he is sober or do worse
You who think that it is but a little sin to be drunk, yet, dread it because it may be the inlet of great sins. I knew one who was effectually reclaimed from this sin of drunkenness, by being once in danger of killing a man when he was drunk, the horror of which, when he came to himself, made such an impression upon him, as proved a happy occasion of his conversion : I wish others would in like manner consider it and be wise.
9. Is it no harm to make yourselves obnoxious to God's wrath and curse in the other world ? You have fair warning given you, and are cautioned to take heed of deceiving yourselves with a fancy to the contrary, drunkards shall not inherit the kingdom of God, If God be true they shall not, for so it is written, (1 Cor. vi. 9,10.) and thy case is miserable, when it is come to this dilemma, that either God must be false, or thou must be damned. If heaven be not thy portion, hell will, unless thou repent and reform in time.
Assure yourselves (sinners) heaven is no place for beasts and self-made fools. Has God need of madmen ? The word of God has said it, and all the world cannot unsay it; If ye live after the flesh ye shall die, die eternally, (Rom. viii« 13.) thine end
A FRIENDLY ADMONITION
u destruction if thy god be thy helly Phil. iii. 19. Nothing that defiles shall enter into the New Jerusalem ; no, hell is the proper recepticle of unclean spirits.
When you are serious, (if ever you can persuade yourselves to be so,) heaven and hell will not be looked upon as jesting matters; for a few years certainly Vill, nay, a few hours possibly may, demonstrate the reality of those invisible things, which now you make so light of: Behold the Judge stand-€th be/ore the door.
Now lay all this together, and then tell me whether drunkenness be indeed an innocent diversion, a harmless entertainment, or at worst but a venial sin, which will be pardoned of course though it be still persisted in ? No, I hope by this time the thing appears to you in other colours, and you will grant that those, who make a mock at this sin, are like the madman, who casteth firebrands, arrows, and death, and yet says, " Am not I in sport V
II. Wc are in the next place to apply ourselves to those who are convinoed in some measure, that their drunkenness is their sin, and a dangerous one, at least their own consciences sometimes tell them so; but they know not how to leave it off, it is become so habitual to them that they are perfectly captivated and overcome by it.
Is this thy case, sinner? Wouldst thou then be delivered from this bondage of corruption, and brought into the glorious liberty of the children of God ? God in his infinite mercy deliver thee! And O that I could say something to pluck thee as a brand out of this burning! This paper comes to call upon thee to repent, and amend thy ways and doings, which, certainly, are not right. But who can call loud enough to awaken drunkards ? Their sin takes away their heart, it blinds their understandings, perverts their judgments, and bribes their consciences, so that they cannot weigh things in an even balance ; they drink and forget the law, Prov. xxxi. 5. Strike them and they are not sick, beat them and they feel it not, Prov. xxiii. 35. And is it possible to convince and reclaim such ? We cannot do it; but if God himself will take the work into his own hands, and by his grace do wonderfully, who knows what good may be effected ? To him, therefore, we commit the success of this endeavour, and will try to put you into the right method of cure.
If then you be willing to be cleansed horn this pollution, you will thankfully take the following directions, not as the commands of a taskmaster, who would insult over you, but as the prescriptions of a faithful physician, who consults your good.
I. Indulge not an excuse for this sin. There is no sin so sinful, so shameful, but the wicked wit of sinners has found out some fig-leaves or other to cover it with ; and if you are fond of the fig-leaves, it is a sign that you arc in love with the sin, and it is your own iniquity. While the word of God sayi so much to aggravate it, you confront that, and put a cheat upon your own souls, if you are indnstriots to extenuate it.
Custom will not excuse you in it; neither your own custom, nor the custom of the place yon live is; there can be no prescription pleaded for a thing ii itself evil. If this has been thy way and thy manner from thy youth up, thou hast the more reason ta be humbled and ashamed ; but know, that a sinner a hundred years old shall be accursed. To say, '* I have long used myself to this course of life, and therefore I must be excused, if I go on in it ;*' is te say in effect, '* I have long been walking in the way that leads to hell, and therefore I will go on to the end of it." The longer you have persisted in this sin, the more reason there is why the time past of your life should suffice that you have thus wrought the will of the Gentiles, walking in excess of wine, revellings, banquctings, 1 Pet. iv. 3, 4. Custom ii sin (I know) is a great bar to conversion, and renders it extremely difficult; but it is such a bar tt must be broken, or you are undone.
Nor will it excuse you that you are drawn in by your wicked companions: it is your fault to cboofe such for your companions, who have fellowship with sin, and those for your friends, who are enemies to your souls. But how bad soever your companiotti arc, you are then tempted, when you are drawn aside of your own lust and enticed. Jam. i. 14. If thoa scornest, thou alone shalt bear it; and thy partnen in sin shall be thy partners in ruin; Bind tkem ts bundles to bum them.
Your calling will not excuse you, whatever it is; That is not a calling for a Christian, which will not be followed without sin, or unavoidable and invincible temptation; and, therefore, if thou canst not otherwise leave thy sin, leave thy calling, and choose another more safe and innocent: it cannot be dearer to thee than a right eye or a right hand, which mnst be plucked out and cut off, if it become sin to thee. But are there not some of the same calling who preserve their sobriety, and will be witnesses against thee? If thy calling be laborious, and require more refreshment and diversion than others, wilt tboa, therefore, disfit thyself for it by overcharging thy heart?
Never go about to palliate this sin; say not, it is but being a little merry, it is but being somewhat too free in keeping company, it hurts nobody, and therefore what needs so much ado about it ? This if agreeing with your corruptions against your convie-tions, and taking part with the house of Saul against the bouse of David. But by thus diminishing ov sins we deceive ourselves; for God will not stand to our definitions and distinctions: we are snrettat the judgment of God is according to truth.
2. Persuade yourselves to consider. If yon wonld
TO DRUNKARDS AND TIPPLERS.
477 bat be subject to the great and fundamental law of consideration, I cannot think that you would ever rebel against the royal law of temperance and sobriety, which effectually secure both the prerogative of the prince in thy soul, that is, thy reason, and the liberty of the subject, that is, thy inferior faculties.
Consider what thou art; a rational creature, do not dethrone thy reason; a noble creature, do not stain thy honour. Thou art an embodied spirit; let not the interests of the spirit, by which thou art akin to the upper world, be crushed and ruined by tbe tyranny of the body, which is of the earth earthy.
Consider who made thee* The eternal God gave tbee that noble and excellent being, and did he give it thee to be thus abused ? Is this to answer the ends of thy creation, and to do that which thou earnest into the world for ? Is this to serve and honour thy Creator, who made thee for himself, to show forth his praise ? Thou canst not think it is.
Consider whom thou servest by this sensual course of life thou livest The devil is the master thou obeyest; he it is who puts the cup of drunkenness into thy hand, and bids thee drink it, and laughs at thee when thou art overcome by it; and wilt thou please the devil thy worst enemy, rather than God the best friend ?
Consider that thou art a Christian, a baptized Christian; and by these evil practices of thine, thou reproachest that worthy name by which thou art called, and forfeitest all the honours and privileges of thy Christianity. What ? A Christian, and yet a tippler! a sot! Called a brother, and yet a drunkard! 1 Cor. V. 11. What an absurdity is this! Dost thou partake of the cup of the Lord, and yet partake of the eup of devils? Canst thou think to compound light and darkness, or to maintain a fellowship both with Christ and Belial ? It cannot be; if thou treat thy Christianity thus disdainfully, thou dost in effect renounce it, and shalt be for ever abandoned by it. It is not for kings, O Lemuel, it is not for kings to drink wine Prov. xxxi. 4. So it is not for Christians: it is not for the professors pf that holy religion, to make themselves slaves to a base lust; it is not for them who have tasted the wine of God*i consolations, and hope to drink it new in the kingdom of the Father, to put their mouths out of taste to it, by the sordid pleasures of drunkenness.
Consider how near death and eternity are, how ODcertain the time of thy continuance here below is, and how certain thy removal very shortly to an unchangeable world is; and what if death should surprise thee the next time that thou art drunk, as it did Amnon when his heart was merry with wine ? Barest thou go to judgement in such a condition ? Ckn thy heart endure, or can thy hands be strong, when the righteous God shall come to deal with thee ? Thou say est, Soul, take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry; but what if God should say to thee, T%>u fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee, Luke xii. 19, 20.
Couldst thou but see with an eye of faith, as Bel-sbazzar did with an eye of sense, in the midst of his drunken frolics, the handwriting upon the wall determining thy fatal doom, surely it would frighten thee from this vitious course, and make thd pretended pleasures of it sapless and insipid to thee. And believe it, those mystical characters upon Belshaz-zar's wall are more applicable to thee than thou art aware, (Dan. v. 26.) Mene, Tekel, Peres, may be rendered deatk, judgment, hell. The two first are very easy, Mene, numbered, for thy days upon earth will very shortly be numbered, andfinisked ; Tekel, weigk-ed, after death we must be weighed in the balance of God's judgment, and drunkards, I am sure, will be found too light. And the third is not much forced, Peres, divided, for damned sinners are cut asunder, (Matt. xxiv. 51.) their kingdom is for ever separated from them ; and if there be an allusion to the Persians, they are to be looked upon as the executioners of the doom, and hell is the execution of the sentence of the great day: angels both good and bad employed as executioners. Now consider this, ye that forget God.
3. Humble yourselves gatly before God for your former excesses. While after a debauch or drunken fit, which your consciences reproach you for tbe sin and folly of, you can make all whole again, with a cold. Lord kave mercy upon me, and can forgive yourselves, before you have any good reason to think that God has forgiven you, no wonder if you easily return to the sin again; and, therefore, deep sorrow is made necessary in repentance, as a means to im-bitter the sin, and so to prevent a relapse.
Be convinced of the evil of this sin, apply it to your own guilt, and charge it home upon your conscience, in the heinous nature of it, and all its aggravating circumstances, which make it exceeding sinful; be pricked to the heart at the remembrance of it, and say. So foolisk have I been and ignorant yea, I have been as a beast, and worse, before thee, Ps. Ixxiii. 22. Surely I am more brutish tkan any man, Prov. xxx. 2. What a fool have I been, to hazard the life of my soul, for the gtifying of the lusts of my flesh ! And for the pleasing of a brutish appetite, to unchristian and unman myself, and so to pawn and forfeit all I have, and all I hope for, that is valuable and honourable! For these things! have reason to weep, and let my eye, my eye run down with tears day and night As a sword in my bones is the remembrance of my folly herein, and the just reproaches of a guilty wounded conscience: if God be not merciful to me in Christ, I am undone for ever, this iniquity will be my ruin.
They who have conceived such a horror as this of the sin, and of the fatal consequences of it, and
A FRIENDLY ADMONITION
have felt the pain and smart of it in their souls, will not be easily decoyed into it again. The burnt child dreads the fire,
4. Pray earnestly to God for his grace. The divine power can cure the most obstinate and inveterate disease, and can conquer and change the most depraved and vitious habits. You find by sad experience that you cannot keep nor govern yourselves; commit yourselves therefore, by prayer, to the protection and government of that grace, which alone is sufficient for you.
Pray for grace to enable yon to discern, resist, and vanquish all temptations to this sin, that you may never be surprised into it by the suddenness of the temptation, nor overcome by the strength of it You pray every day that you may not be led into temptation, but delivered from evil. If this be the sin that most easily besets you, level your prayers against it particularly, *< Lord, lead me not into this temptation, but deliver me from this evil.*'
Pray for grace likewise, effectual grace, to mortify and subdue all inward inclinations to this sin, and to work in you a holy aversion and antipathy to it; pray that the axe may be laid to the root of bitterness, and that, not only these polluted streams may be closed up, but the corrupt fountain dried up. Nothing is too hard for the grace of God to do, nor shall that grace be denied to those who in sincerity seek it, with a resolution to submit to it b. Take up a firm and stedfast resolution, in the strength of divine grace, against this sin, and all appearances of it, and approaches to it Will you be persuaded to resolve this day, that you will never be drunk again, never sit to drink unseasonably, nor ever drink immoderately; that you will never by drinking distemper your bodies, or disturb your minds, or unfit yourselves for the service of God ; that you will never keep improper hours, nor be in the ale-house or tavern when you should be about business, or worshipping God with your families; and that you will never suffer your free conversation with your friends, to indispose you for, or divert you from, your communion with your God.
Be peremptory and at a point in these resolutions; and let not a secret inclination, either to the drink, or to the company, make your resolutions weak or wavering; but as the people said in general with an air of resolution, iVay, hut we will serve the Lard, Josh. xxiv. 21. so do you say in particular, ** Nay, but I will be sober;'' I am resolved by the gce of God I will. Do not resolve, as you say children do, that you will never be drunk again till the next time; Be not deceived, God wiU not he mocked.
You would take up an invincible resolution, grounded upon an antipathy against the cup, if you knew there were poison in it; and would drink with a great deal of caution, if you were sure that you should be hanged if you were drunk ; and will you not be as solicitous not to exceed, when you ait told that the drunkard's feet go down io demik, eCenni Ik death, and his steps take hold on hell.
Let your resolution be very solemn, and coatrife all the ways you can to make it strong and btndiai, and to remind conscience of it, that these bonds mf never be broken asunder, nor these cords cast fipon you. And it will be your wisdom to renew tiui • resolution, with a fresh dependence on divine graee, when you see yourselves entering into any fmrticiiltr temptation.
6. Industriously avoid the place and compaoj that insnare you. If you would have no fellowdiip with the sin, you must have no unnecessary fellowship with those who practise it, but keep at a distance from them, that you may keep out of harm's way. Enter not into the path of the wicked, lest you be drawn to walk in that path ; awid it therefore, f§n not hy it, turn from it, and pass away Prov. It. 14,15.
You may think the company good innocent company, pleasant, and diverting, and obliging to yoa; but be it what it will, it is no company for yoa if you cannot keep sober in it Think not that your easiness, and good nature, and complaisance to yoor friends, will excuse your continuing in that society, which you find ordinarily draws you to sin ; or that your engagement to the company can weaken your obligations to your God. Art thou linked with t drunken club, know that thou art snared with the words of thy mouth, and do this now, my son, deliver thyself as a roe from the hand of the hunter, Prof. vi. 2, 3, 6.
Go to thy companions, and tell them thou findest it impossible to preserve thy virtue in their compaoy, and that therefore thou art resolved to take leave of them. Tell them that thou canst not look upon those as thy friends who entice thee to sin, and that thoa wouldst rather lose their society and good will, than lose thy God and thy soul. Be deaf to their allurements, and be above their reproaches; say as David, (Ps. cxix. 115.) Depart from me, ye eml doers, for I will keep the commandments of my God, and I cannot keep in with yon and keep in with God too.
7. Look not upon the wine when it is red. This is a scripture caution, Prov. xxiii. 31. Take heed of the beginnings of this sin, and do not entertaia a pleasant thought of it. Crush the first risings of the irregular appetite toward wine and strong drink, and when you find you begin to love them, then try whether yon have learned the first lesson in the school of Christ, which is, to deny yourselves.
Watch against all advances toward this sin, let the experience you have had of your own weakness make you very cautious and jealous over yoorselves. Be afraid of every thing that borders upon dmnken-ness, and leads toward it insensibly. He that will
TO DRUNKARDS AND TIPPLERS.
479 ilways veoture as far as he may, will sometimes ere le is aware be drawn further.
"When the wine giyea its colour in the cap, and AOTcs itself aright, be blind and deaf to all its noniles and chaims, remembering what follows there; liat at the last it bite* like a serpent, and stings like m adder, Knowest thou not that it will be bitterness 'm the latter end ?
8. Abhor all those drunken ceremonies, which force this cursed trade; such as drinking healths by measure; with an obligation upon the company \o keep the round in pledging them. What a brutish senseless thing is it for men to offer yiolence to nature, and coiret to make beasts, not only of them-lel ves but of one another; what pleasure, what profit, what honour can there be in this ? Surely nothing bat sin for sin's sake.
The law of the Persians will shame and condemn the practice of many who are called Christians; for in the court of a prince, an arbitrary prince, yet the drinking was according to the law, wnie did compel, far so the king had appointed to all the officers of his house, Esth. i. 8. Let all who wish well to sobriety do what they can, in their places, to put these arts of propagating vice out of countenance, and to run tiiem down.
If you find you cannot govern yourselves, engage some friend or relation to govern you. If, after the most vigorous resistances and resolutions you have made, you still find yourselves baffled and foiled, think it not a disparagement to you to call in help, and pray the aid of your neighbours. You would do so if your house were on fire, and will you not do so when your souls are so ?
Fix upon some discreet and serious friends; some toch you may find, who heartily wish well to the prosperity of your souls, and would gladly contri-hate their best assistance to it. Beg of them to watch over you, to have an eye to you, and to warn you when you are entering into this temptation. Desire them, when there is occasion, to limit your drinking, and to control your expenses, and put it in their power to do so. Entreat them to fetch you from your drunken companions, though it be to your shame, rather than leave you with them, which will be to your ruin. When you are in your right BBud, bespeak those about you, that they give you no more drink than they see does you good, though you call for it; and assure them, that though they may have your drunken reproach, yet, they shall have your sober thanks, for so doing; and when you eome to yourselves make your words good.
Say not that it is below yen thus to put yourselves ander government, as if you were infants or idiots; for to be drunk is much more below you, and thereby you render yourselves more mean than either infants or idiots.
Lastly, See that there be a living principle of true gprace in your hearts, and that will effectually fortify you against all temptations to this sin. Let but wisdom, heavenly wisdom, enter into thy heart Let it have the innermost and uppermost place there, and it will keep thee from this way of the evil man, Prov. ii. 10, 12. The law of God in Christ written in the heart, and the love of God in Christ shed abroad there, would arm you against this temptation, and quench all his fiery darts.
When the apostle had cautioned us not to walk in rioting and drunkenness, (Rom. xiii. 13.) to make that caution effectual, he adds, But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, v, 14. Submit to the grace of Christ, conform to the law of Christ, follow the example of Christ, and thus make good your baptismal covenant, by which you did in profession put on Christ, and then you will be well principled and well guarded against all these temptations. Study the cross of Christ, the riches of his love, and the design of his gospel, and then surely, being called by his name, you will not dare so directly to contradict the designs of his gospel, nor soungtefully to spurn at the bowels of his love, and spit in the face of it
And in another place we find, when the apostle had warned us not to be drunk with wine wherein is excess, he immediately subjoins. But be JUled with the Spirit, (Eph. v. 18.) plainly intimating, that the best defence against drunkenness, is to lay our souls under the sanctifying operations of the blessed Spirit of grace, and to fill ourselves with spiritual things. This is the sovereign remedy for the cure of this disease, and the most powerful antidote for the prevention of it, (Gal. v. 16.) Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh. An experimental taste of the spiritual pleasures of serious godliness, antt a believing foretaste of the eternal pleasures that are at God's right hand for evermore, would enable us to look upon all sensual pleasures and delights with a holy loathing and disdain.
And now (sinners) is the point yet gained, or is it not? What issue have we brought it to at last? What shall be the result of this debate, and what the conclusion of the whole matter ?
Are there any of these sinners in Sion, who through grace are now at length become willing that religion and reason shoul<^form them and rule them? Are there any who now, at least in this their day, will begin to understand the things that belong to their peace, and to be wise for themselves? Are there any who are weary of the toil and shame of an intemperate life, and are resolved to try the true and noble delights of a sober religious conversation ? The Lord keep it always in the imagination of the thought of the heart, and establish their way before him.
But to those who, after all, hate to be reformed, I must conclude with this word, and God by his grace
A WORD OF ADVICE
make it an awakening word ! If all the fair warnings given you stiall still be slighted, if you will set at nought all our counsel, and will none of our reproof, but say you shall have peace, though you go on to add drunkenness to thirst, know this, that when the cup of the Lord's wrath poured out without mixture shall be put into your hands, and shall be to you a cup of trembling, everlasting trembling, this will greatly aggravate your condemnation, that your blood will be upon your own heads, your watchmen, by giving you warning, having delivered their souls.
A WORD OF ADVICE
TO THE
WANTON AND UNCLEAN.
Of all gross sinners, none lie more hid from the eye of the world, and yet none more open to their own .consciences, than those we are now dealing with, and endeavouring the reformation of. For though the eye of the adulterer waits for the twilight, and he is very solicitous to draw a veil over his lewd-* ness, yet the works of the flesh are manifest, that is, manifestly bad, and such as the sinner's own heart cannot but disallow: though they are works of darkness, yet they cannot avoid the discovery of that light, that candle of the Lord,
The apostle tells us, that the works of the flesh which are thus manifest, are these; Adultery,fornication, uncleannets, latciviousness, (Gal. v. 19.) in short, all seventh-commandment sins, which are not to be named among Christians but with the greatest abhorrence and detestation. Nor are they to be treated of, but with purity and caution, and a strict and careful watch over our own hearts, lest sin should take occasion by the commandment: they are as thorns, which cannot be taken with hands; but the man who shall touch them, in order to the removal of them, must be fenced with iron, and the staff* of a spear, 2 Sam. xxiii. 6,7.
And it were to be wished that there were no need to name them, no need to discourse of them; it is a kennel which one cannot take any delight to rake in ; but while this iniquity abounds, as it does in all places, while so much of it comes to light, and we have reason to fear there is much more that lies concealed, it must be named; Jerusalem must be made to know her abomination, and the filthiness that is in her skirts (as the prophet speaks) must be witnessed against, as one of the crjring sins of the land, and one of the danming sins of sinners.
The prophet Ezekiel little thought, till God showed him in a vision, the great abominations which the house of Israel committed, (Ezek. viii. 6.) and afterwards he showed him greater, and yet greater aboo-i nations, v. 13, 15. I wish it were not ao as to this abomination in our own land, which the day will declare, when God shall bring every work iato judgment, with every secret thing. We desire not to know these depths of Satan; we are willingly ignorant of them; but we earnestly desire that tiMK who are fallen into those depths, and are sinking to the lowest hell, may by the gce of God be effeeti-ally recovered, that their everlasting min may be I prevented in time.
To you then who call yourselves the sons aid daughters of pleasure, but whom the word of God calls children of disobedience, and children ofwreA, who live in the fire of lust, and wallow in the fihk of whoredom and fomication,^ esett to yon is tk word of this exhortation sent in God's name, witk a kind and sincere design, if possible, to lift yoa sp out of this mire, and to snatch yon as brands ont of the burning. Assure yourselves nothing is intended but your good. This paper comes not to infom against you, or to expose yoa to shame or pnniab-ment; but to persuade you to turn from your evfl way, that you may live and not die, that you nay have everlasting life, and may not be hurt by the second death.
And O that I could now choose out proper wwdii wherewith to reason with you; and that words of truth might, by the grace of God, be made words of power! I draw the bow at a venture, not having an eye to any particular person, but God can direct the arrow between the joints of the harness, so that it may pierce the heart of the sinner to his hamiliatioi< and the heart of the sin to its mortification, for the word of God is quick and powerful. God by his Spirit make this word so !
Let me tell you then, who are the sinners to whom this discourse is now addressed,
1. You that make a constant practice of this an, and gve yourselves over to lascivioosness, to woik all uncleanness with greediness, must be pat in the front of this black regiment of unclean spirits, which we are now charging, in the name of the Captain of our salvation, who came into the world to oonqner and cast out andean spirits.
If this paper should ever come into the gailty and polluted hands of any of those wretched creatans who have abandoned themselves to a life of whoredoms, who are the devil's sworn slaves and votaries, and who, as factors for hell, and avowed enemies to God and virtue, drive a trade of debauching others and making themselves vile; those, I mean, who keep houses of uncleanness, those nests of wickedness, or who live in those houses, or who frequent them, or acquaint themse Wes with them: let such know and consider, that Sodom's doom will infallibly be the lot of all those who thus tread
TO THE WANTON AND UNCLEAN.
481 in Sodom's steps, unless they speedily repent and reform : Fire and brimstone and a horrible tempett, this shall be the portion of their cup.
That is a miserable calling which lust only lives by, and which soul and body will certainly be ruined by. That is a miserable service wherein the devil is the master, sin's drudgery is the work, and hell-fire the wages, for the end of those things is death. Such houses, and their inhabitants and maintaincrs, are the scandal of a Christian nation, the pests of the towns and countries where they arc, the slaughter-houses of precious souls, the rendezvous of the vilest of creatures ; and more frightful habitations of devils, holds of foul spirits, and cages of unclean and hateful birds, than Babylon the great will be when it is fallen, Rev. xviii. 2. Solomon tells as, that such houses are the way to hell, going down to the chambers of death. Pro v. vii. 27.
And therefore, as it is the duty of those who have power over them, vigorously to suppress such houses, in which the strong man armed keeps his palace ; and the duty of those who have power in them, to alter the property of them, and to put away iniquity, this abominable iniquity, far from their tabernacles ; so it is the wisdom of every one, with the greatest dread, caution, and resolution imaginable, to avoid such houses, to shun them as they would a house infected with the plague, and not to come nigh the door of them, or enter into any familiarity with them, upon any colour or pretence whatsoever. It is Solomon's advice, (Prov. v. 8.) Remove thy way far from her ; he having observed that that unwary young man, who was drawn into the mining snares of the adulteress, was caught passing through the street near her comer, at an unseasonable time, Prov. vii. 8, 9.
Under this head we must also rank those who, though they do not thus declare their sin as Sodom, yet by their cursed arts of deceiving under the disguise of love and honour, diversion and entertainment, keep up and carry on a more secret, less flospected, trade of debauchery and nncleanness; who (as they arc described by the apostle, 2 Pet. ii. 14.) have eyes full of adultery and that cannot ctasefrom sin from this sin, beguiling unstable souls by their wiles, and decoying them gdually, and by steps which seem harmless, into the fatal snare. These are they who are continually projecting and making provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts of it, out of the road of common prostitutes, and among those who have yet preserved some degrees of inno-cency and reputation; and the wickedness of these is so much greater than the former, as the methods they take, and the snares they lay, by plays, dances, and other recreations, have a more fatal tendency to the cormptioii of those, *' who" (as one of the proclamations against vice and immorality expresses it) ^' have been soberly educated, and whose incli-
2 I nations would lead them to the exercise of virtue and piety, did they not daily find such frequent and repeated instances of dissolute living." Let such know, that the sin is never the less sinful for its being carried on with 7/it and intrigue, and all the plot and management that the playhouse instmcts them in ; but it is rather so much the worse, as it speaks the more design and deliberation in the tempters, and the more danger to the tempted. Tbe more there is of subtilty in any wickedness, the more there is of Satan in it.
Nor is their guilt and danger much less, who, though they traverse not the ranges of an unbounded lust, yet keep up a cursed league with some one particular person, with whom they live in adultery or fornication, directly contrary to the law of God, or in contempt of his ordinance, and yet flattering themselves with a fancy, that this is of their abominations a small matter. And is it indeed a small matter, for the gratifying of a base lust to live in disobedience to the divine precept, and in defiance of the divine wrath and threatenings ? This is a covenant with death which must be broken, and an agreement with hell which must be disannulled, or it will certainly bind over to that judgment which whoremongers and adulterers must expect.
2. You who at any time yield to this temptation, and in any instance suffer yourselves to be overcome by it, must next look upon yourselves as concerned in this call to repentance. I speak to those, who, though they are not arrived to that height of wickedness, nor have so far seared their consciences, as to make a common practice of this wickedness, yet have such favourable thoughts of this sin, and these sinners, as to be drawn into their snare without any great resistance or reluctance, thinking it, though a sin, yet a very excusable one, and which they can easily pardon both to themselves and others. When a fair opportunity offers itself, that they can admit the sin, and yet avoid the shame, they can promise themselves to pass off the guilt with a " Lord, have mercy upon me," or, " God forgive me," and a little regret, when the pleasure is over, they think will atone for the crime, and all will be well.
Such as these have need to be told, that every particular act of this sin is exceeding sinful, that it is highly provoking to God Almighty, contrary to, and destructive of, the spiritual and divine life in the soul, and that it puts the eternal happiness very much to a present doubt and a future hazard. You flatter yourselves that you will commit it but once, and will repent of that. But how can you be sure that it will be truly repented of, when it is but per-adventure whether God will give you repentance to recover yourselves out of this snare? The grace of repentance is promised to those who sincerely pray for it, but it is forfeited by those who boldly presume upon it, and venture to sin in expectation of it: and
A WORD OF ADVICE
how can you be sure that you will not relapse into the same sin another time, when, by yielding to one temptation you strengthen the next, give the devil hold of you, and provoke the Holy Spirit to withdraw from you ? What Solomon says of strife is true of this sin, The beginning of it it like the letting fm'th of water; therefore it is wisdom to leave it off before it be meddled with, that is, never to begin k.
3. You who perhaps keep yourselves from the gioss acts of adultery and fornication, but allow yourselves in other instances of lewdness and lasci-viousness, must be numbered among those to whom this word of advice and warning is sent. You bless yourselves in your own way, and thank God, with the Pharisee, that you are not adulterers, when at the same time unclean lusts reign in your hearts, are indulged and harboured, lodged and welcomed there. Have you never read of committing adultery in the heart ? And is not that heart chargeable therewith which bums continually in an inordinate affection and evil concupiscence ? Arc not those heart-adulterers who give up themselves to vile affections, and make filthy thoughts and imaginations, unchaste reflections and desires, the constant entertainments and disports of a lewd and vicious fancy.
Those are to be reckoned among the wanton and unclean, out of whose mouth filthy communication daily comes, produced by the unclean lusts that reign in their ovm hearts, and designed to provoke the like in the hearts of others; whose stinking breath plainly manifests that their inwards, their very vitals, arc corrupted. No subject is so grateful to them, so pleasing, as this, nor any discourse so agreeable as that which is offensive to chaste cars. These are unclean, their speech betrays them. No song, no story, no jest entertains fhem so as a lewd one does, nor can they laugh at any thing with so much pleasure as that which they ought to blush at. These plainly show that the unclean spirit is upon the throne in their souls; for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.
Those also must be numbered with the unclean, whose wanton carriage, lascivious dalliances, are upon all occasions their delight, and the fuel that feeds the fire of lust in their hearts, (I should call it the fire of hell,) and keeps it burning.
Now these are the sinners we would endeavour to reform, and reduce into subjection to the sacred laws of chastity and modesty; and we should hope, by the grace of God, to do them some good, if they would but be persuaded to hear reason, and not desperately to resolve against a change of their way. When you are called (as you are at this time in God's name) to return and repent, I beseech you be willing to take it into your consideration, and do not say, as they did who hated to be reformed, (Jer. xviii. 12.) There is no hope, no, for we will walk after our oicn devices.
Admit a parley then; enter into a treaty, and let us see whether we cannot propose such inducementt as shall overcome yon, and prevail with you to sm-render to the Lord Jesus (your Lord and ours) tbtt heart which has long been garrisoned against hia by the unclean spirit.
Shall I ask thee seriously, Wouldst thou not be helped ? Wouldst thou not be healed ? Woaldstthon not be made whole? Wouldst thou not be made clean? Wouldst thou not have this devil, this unclean devil, dispossessed, which oftentimes casli thee into the fire of sin, and often into the water of sorrow for it? Tell nie, wouldst thou not exchange the filthy sordid pleasures of a carnal, sensaal life, for the pure, rational, and divine pleasures of a spiritual, heavenly life?
If you be indeed in this good mind, will yoo be convinced of the great evil of this sin ? And will you be put into a way to break off from it ? These are the two things I shall endeavour in this address to you, and I am willing to hope the attempt shall not be altogether in vain; the Lord choose out words for me wherewith to reason with you !
I. I shall endeavour to convince you of the evil of this sin of uncleanness. Till the mistakes of the judgment are rectified, the errors of the life will never be reformed. Here, therefore,, we must begin : and God by his grace begin here! The carnal mind suggests to you the pleasures of it, tells yoo that stolen waters are sweety and bread eaten tn seersi is pleasant, Prov. ix. 17. That this pleasure is present and certain, but that the hurt of it is future and doubtful: but that you may not be cheated intoyoor own ruin by this fallacy, I shall not question hut to make it out to you, that the hurt of it is not at all doubtful, but of unquestionable certainty, nor only future, but so much present, that, if you will weigh things in an even balance, you will find the evil of it to be infinitely greater than the good of it, and that therefore our exhortations to virtue should have your ears and hearts, and that your ears should be deaf, and your hearts shut, against all temptations to this vice.
This will appear, if you consider both the malignity and guilt there is in this sin, and the miseiy and wrath that follows after it They who choose and wear the garment spotted with the flesh, most th\is be saved with fear, and plucked with a shriek out of the very fire, Jude 23. If you have any dread either of sin or its punishment, you will acknowledge the evil of wantonness and uncleanness.
I. Consider the malignity and guilt there is in it It is a sin, an exceeding sinful sin, one of those that are as scarlet and crimson, an abonunable thing which the Lord hates.
There is no sin so heinous, so odious, but a resolved custom in it will do much towards the reoon-ciling of the judgment to it, so that either it is
TO THE WANTON AND UNCLEAN.
483 tboaght no sin at all, or but a little one, an excusable trick of youth : and thus, if it be not justified, yet it is palliated and excused, and a thousand arts used to shift off the conviction of it. And verily the case is bad, and extremely dangerous, when consci ence, which should be of counsel for the government to detect and prosecute the'sin, is so debauched and vitiated that it is retained on the other side, and becomes an advocate for the sin. If this light which is in thee he darkness, h<fw great is that darkness ? If the judgment be bribed, the judge is so, and the sentence will be accordingly.
Let me, therefore, beg of you to favour the case with an impartial trial; be willing to hear what we have to say, upon the principles of revelation and right reason, to prove uncleanness to be a sin, and a very great sin. And if we prove in the general that it is a sin, we desire you will do us and yourselves the justice to acknowledge that your uncleanness, and the lasciviousness you allow yourselves in, is a sin, a daring and dangerous transgression of the divine law; that it is so to be accounted now, and must so be accounted for shortly, whatever you have imagined to the contrary.
Let us then carefully consider the intrinsic evil that there is in adultery, fornication, uncleanness, and lasciviousness, and in the indulgence of these Beshly lusts.
(1.) It is contrary to God, and to his purity and holiness, and, therefore, it is sin, both in its root and in all its branches.
God who governs the world is a Spirit; you impeach the equity of his dominion, if you, who consist of flesh and spirit, give the pre-eminence to the flesh, and be governed by that; for the spirit ought to rule, and the body to be in subjection.
God is a holy Spirit; his holiness is his glory; it becomes his house and servants for ever to be holy; you contradict the design of the divine revelation of God's holiness, if you wallow in uncleanness. The more spiritual you are, the more conformable you are to God, but the carnal mind is enmity against him, Rom. viii. 7. Nor is any thing more directly opposite to that divine nature which the saints, through grace, partake of, than the corruption that is in the world through lust, 2 Pet i. 4! The laws made for the restraint of these fleshly lusts are ratified with this reason. For I the Lord am holy. Lev. xix. 2. and xx. 7, 26. For no sin more defaces the image of God*s holiness upon the soul than uncleanness, nor renders it more odious in the eyes of the pure and holy God.
When Joseph was tempted to this sin he called it great wickedness, because it was a sin against God,
Gen. xxxix. 9. When David had been surprised into this sin, be laid the emphasis of his confession upon thiSy Against thee, thee only have I sinned, Ps.
K. 4. As the prodigal son also, when he was re- ' turned from his harlots, thus aggravated his folly, / have sinned against heaven and be/ore thee, Luke XV. 18.
And is this nothing with you ? Have you no regard to'the God who made you, and maintains you, and will judge you ? Is it nothing to you to be in a state of enmity against him, and war with him? With what satisfaction can you walk contrary to him whose nature and will are the eternal original and rule of good and right ? Are you his creatures, and dare you be his enemies ? Have you a necessary dependence upon him, and yet dare you persist in an avowed rebellion against him ? Consider this, ye that forget God.
(2.) It thwarts the design of the gospel of Christ You are Christians, you profess that holy religion which the Lord Jesus came into the world to institute and establish ; you are baptized into the profession of it, and by your baptism you are bound to obey the laws of it, and to answer the intentions of it The gospel of Christ is a remedial law, and you hope to have remedy by it. It is a charter of privileges, and you hope to be privileged by it; but how can you expect either remedy or privilege by it if you will not observe its precepts, nor come up to its conditions ? The gospel will never save you if it shall not rule you.
The design of Christ's coming into the world, was to purify a people to himself. Tit ii. 14. The design of his gospel, is to cleanse us from all filthiness both of flesh and spirit, 2 Cor. vii. 1. He has established a religion, which, as far as it has the ascendant brings all carnal lusts and appetites to be subject to the dictates of right reason, sanctified by the grace of God. Christ suffered in the flesh, that we might die to the flesh, 1 Pet. iv. 1—3. Now uncleanness, as far as that is yielded to, contradicts this design, and supports the works of darkness, and consequently the powers of darkness, in opposition to the interests of the kingdom of light. For, what eom-munion hath light with darkness ?
We are not dealing with professed pagans, nor witli the worshippers of Baal-Peor, who learned of the gods they adored to be vile and unclean; no, the religion you profess gives us some hold of you ; for it is a pure religion and undeflled; you arc called by the name of the holy Jesus, that great pattern of mortification and purity. You are enlisted under the banner of the cross, and profess to believe in Christ, and him crucified, and to be planted together in the likeness of his death ; but while you live in uncleanness yon espouse the opposite cause, you are the deviPs soldiers, and fight under his banner, with his weapons, for his interest ' Now Christ and Belial are contrary the one to the other; in God's name, therefore, I charge you, either to forsake your uncleanness, or (at your peril) to renounce your Christianity. Aut nomen, out mores
A WORD OF ADVICE
muta — Either change your namcj or reform your manners ; cither be what you seem to be, or seem not to be what you are not.
(3.) It grieves the blessed Spirit of God, and always resists the Holy Ghost. As it contradicts the designs of him that was sent by the Father to save us, so it fights against the intentions of him that was sent by the Son to sanctify us, and to carry on his undertaking for us. It forfeits all his comforts, and counterworks his operations.
The fleshly lusts of the old world provoked God to say, *' His Spirit should not always strive with them;" Gen. vi. 3. for his motions are quenched by the motions of the flesh. When the apostle cautions us (Eph. iv. 30.) not to grieve the Spirit of God, he tells us, (r. 29.) what grieves him ; nothing more than corrupt and filthy communication. That pure and holy Dove will not dwell in a cage of unclean and filthy birds.
Now, if the Spirit of the Lord depart from you, as he did from Saul, if he withdraw his influences and operations from you, you are undone. If he let you alone you are in the suburbs of hell already, abandoned of God, past conviction, past help, past hope, given up to a reprobate mind and vile affections; and this you have reason to fear will be the consequence of your persisting in that which is a constant grief to him. What reason have you to expect the continuance of the Spirit's powers if you yield to the power of the carnal mind, and side with the unclean spirit against him ? What have you to do with spiritual comforts, who prefer sensual pleasures before them ? If you thus sin against the Spirit, take heed lest you sin away the Spirit.
(4.) It is a great abuse of your own bodies. He who commits fornication, or any other actof unclean-ness, sins against his own body, 1 Cor. vi. 18. If self-murder be therefore justly condemned as the worst of murders, because it is against our own bodies, shall not uncleanness for the same reason be an abomination to us ? No man, no man in his wits, ever yet hated his own flesh, so as to destroy it, yet multitudes hate it so as to defile it.
Those who indulge the pleasures of their bodies forget the honour of them; and the honour of the body we should be as careful to support and maintain, as to nourish and cherish the life of it. Some people insist more upon honour than upon life itself. This makes seventh-commandment sins their own punishment, and sometimes the punishment of other sins too, that by them sinners dishonour thir own bodies, Rom. i. 24. It is as good an argument agnst adultery as it is against murder, that in the image of God made he man. Gen. ix. 6. Wilt thou deface the image of God, and quite destroy the poor remains of it? Wilt thou pervert the intention of him that made thy body so fearfully and wonderfully, and formed it for himself, to show forth