Oliver Heywood, The Northern Puritan
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OLIVER HEYWOOD,
THE NORTHERN PURITAN
W. H. Davies
The avowed aim of this paper is to encourage an interest in the writings of Oliver Heywood, and as a consequence to increase our pursuit of that godliness, which he made so much a part of his life and ministry. The method we shall employ is first of all summarily to consider his life as recorded in his diaries, and then to proceed to examine his published writings.
The Life
“Herbert speaks to God like one that really believeth a God and whose business in the world is most with God. Heart-work and heaven work make up his books.” So wrote Richard Baxter of George Herbert. The words might equally be applied to one who owed so much to them both (as his writings testify), the subject of our paper, Oliver Heywood. For above all else, here is a patently godly man dominated by a twofold aim—the pursuit of godliness, and the promotion of this same pursuit in the hearts of his fellow men.
Oliver Heywood was born in 1629 in the Parish of Little Lever near Bolton in Lancashire. His godly parents early accustomed him to the things of God, and it is no surprise that he soon evinced signs of youthful piety. He entered Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1647, and himself comments, “I also met with some ingenuous and gracious scholars, with whom I had intimate familiarity and was furthered by them in the ways of God. . . . All the time I was in the University my heart was much deadened in philosophical studies, nor could I, as I desired, apply my mind so closely to human literature, though I prize learning above all sublunary excellencies, I might have been more useful, had I improved my time better therein. My times and thoughts were most employed on practical divinity, and experimental truths were most vivifying to my soul. I preferred Perkins, Bolton, Preston and Sibbes far above Aristotle, Plato, etc.”
Coley is a small district on the moors above the Yorkshire town of Halifax. Its parish church stood, as indeed it still stands, at a remote distance from the inhabitants of the parish. To this charge Heywood was called in 1650, agreeing to supply the pulpit for six months. He was to stay in the district for the whole length of his mortal life, exercising among its inhabitants an effective ministry for fifty-two years. This will make it apparent that we are dealing with a pastor par-excellence. His writings are essentially pastoral.
One thing is consistently to be noticed in Heywood’s life and that is his habit of continuous heart searchings. When after two years he was ordained, he questioned his own soul concerning his entrance to his charge, “But how camest thou into so high an office? Art thou not an intruder? I hope not. I came into it in a lawful way, according to God’s Word. Though the window was open, and every one might enter, that had a mind, yet I crept not in thereat, but entered by the door of an internal call, inclining, disposing, and in some measure qualifying me thereunto; and also of an external call from the church, moving, selecting, and designing me for that function. Here is mercy upon mercy. To be a minister, and a lawful minister of the gospel, to have to deal with souls in an authoritative way as having a commission from Jesus Christ my Lord and my Master.”
Heywood was now twenty-six years of age and unmarried. His deliberate search for a wife was almost clinical in its exactness, and here again we see that same self-examination and searching out of God’s will. “Many times I had good hopes that I was near a conjugal relation, but I was disappointed by some strange means or other. This was no small trouble to me, but was the means of humbling my heart, and sending me more frequently and earnestly to the Throne of Grace. I was often afraid of missing my way, and as often begged direction, pleading this promise that God will teach the humble his way and the meek He will guide in judgment. I desired not to follow my own fancy, but God’s counsel.” He spiritually improved these disappointments and delays in a soliloquy entitled “Hope Deferred”: “Moderate thy desires then, bridle thy affections, put a curb upon thy roving imaginations, stay a while and wait God’s time . . . in the meantime, if God cause thee to live more to Him and have more communion with Him, it will be equivalent to the blessing itself.” I shall quote at greater length to show how this man acts on his own principles of self-examination, and to show how he improves every providence. He did marry and his wife was Elisabeth Angier, daughter of a godly minister in Denton, Lancashire. His reflections on this happy event are themselves worth perusal and worth quoting in parts: “But this blessing as bestowed on me hath many attendant circumstances that heighten my comfort and gratitude. (1) It was given me as an answer to prayer, which multiplies the favour and gives it sweeter relish. (2) It came in God’s own time which is always the best and most seasonable. My impatient spirit had fixed limits to the Lord and I was loth to stay His time and wait His choice. (3) It came in God’s way. My wife is not carried off by me but sent by God. How much sorrow would a clandestine marriage have produced.”
Three sons were born to this marriage, one dying in infancy, the other two growing to manhood and becoming useful ministers of the gospel. True to the man, the birth of his children were occasions of happy meditation:
Now I have a son, and I beg his life and health as well as his mother’s. Since he is born in my own image in the likeness of sinful Adam, I now want for his soul the grace of regeneration, adoption and justification. I desire not great things for him in the world, but good things for his soul to prepare him for another and better world. . . . I now see and feel more experimentally, God’s infinite love and my parents’ warm affection for me than ever before. My passionate love for my child speaks my parents’ pathetic love to me. . . . What father’s love can equal God’s, what mother’s affection will run parallel with His . . . let me love God with all my might and soul, yea let me love God for Himself and all other things in and for Him and put all things in a due subordination to Him. Beware my soul of splitting on the rock of inordinate affection. Thou canst not over love thy God, but thou mayest easily transgress in overloving dear relations. Get natural love spiritualized and so live as a Christian lest strong affection exceed moderation.
So this man made every occasion a means of grace.
Oliver Heywood was not friendly to the rule of Cromwell, and the state of the nation at this period provided occasion for further reflection:
Come then my soul and view this guilty nation . . . alas, we have become a mere skeleton; alas, this is the greatest grief of all that God is leaving England, this is the quintessence of our calamity; alas, how can our land fare well when God has departed? Well, and if poor England’s best days alone may be past, we alone may thank ourselves, we must condemn ourselves and justify God. Our people have been surfeited with the gospel, they cry out away with formalities; the manna is like food, it creates loathing, we need not wonder then if God should take away what has become offensive to the nation . . . should not the sins of this poor island, the cause of all its miseries much affect thee my soul.
And again, “O that I could learn the mind of God in all these dispensations. Surely I may sing of mercy and judgment, floods of love and only drops of displeasure. How mysterious is God in His proceedings! O that I had wisdom from above to spell out his meaning. He hath a special design in all these national commotions.”
Heywood, being deeply moved by the religious condition of the nation, believing also in God’s sovereign purposes, sought in obedience to the Scripture to discover its outworking in the events of his day. This reveals the prophet’s heart as much as the pastor’s. Pacific in his intents, he writes, “Woe is me that I have lived to see this day when ecclesiastical divisions have produced civil opposition . . . how sad is it that those who are reconciled by the blood of Christ should thirst after one another’s blood. How unlike is this to the spirit and grace of the saints of God.” At this time, he suffered from suspicion without cause, the loss of his child and the loss of his wife, giving rise to some of the most affecting words he ever penned:
Alas, we poor mortals speak of heaven enigmatically. But the vail of natural and sinful infirmities is withdrawn from the blessed eyes of her immortal spirit. I have not the least grounds of fear relative to her, nay while she was with me I had always better hopes of her state than of my own, and though she expressed not much to others, yet she was familiarly acquainted with the Lord in secret duties, and with her own heart by observing its movements in self-examination. Her soul knew in some degree the way and fruit of ascending to heaven, and now she is gone to take possession. But here I am a poor bewildered creature left behind to conflict with a world of sinful allurements. Had I made the same haste in holiness I had also made haste to happiness . . . but why do I deplore my state, my work is to mind God’s design.
The accession of Charles II brought about unexpected opposition. In 1661 private meetings were ordered to be prevented. Heywood at first put a favorable construction on events, though he later had cause to change his mind: “The truth is, our dread Sovereign, at the first and hitherto, hath allowed us abundant liberty for religious exercises both in public and private, but his clemency has been abused which has occasioned this severe and universal prohibition. The fanatical and schismatical party truly so called, have by their unwise and unwarrantable practices troubled all the people of God throughout this nation, and have rendered the sweet savour of Christian converse to be abhorred.” And he continues with unsparing self-analysis:
But why do I lay the blame on others and not on ourselves? The actions of men and edicts of princes could not have abridged our liberties had not our sins procured these things. Just very just, is what has come upon us, for we have been unprofitable under our privileges. . . . they have been so ordinary that our hearts are grown indifferent and less than ordinary preparations have served for extraordinary duties. We meet as if loth to meet, our prayers were full of deadness, unbelief and vanity. It is therefore just we should not be permitted to meet for prayer. We too much aimed at applause for our gifts and God has taken away the occasion of venting the pride and hypocrisy of our hearts. We did not improve the society of our Christian friends and therefore we must not now enjoy it. I doubt not we have been too much abroad and too little at home, religious in company but careless in our closets. Now we must learn to enter into our closets and shut the door upon us. It is the property of a Christian to make a virtue of necessity and wisely to improve this present restraint of Christian liberty which our gracious God will restore to us if He sees it useful.
I have quoted this at some length partly for the example of Heywood’s rigorous self-examination and partly because it reveals the man’s humility and partly because it has no small relevance to our own situation.
Even before the notorious Act of Uniformity, Oliver Heywood was continually harassed, and being cited to appear at York for his persistent nonconformity. Though no charge was specified, he makes this also an occasion for honest self-examination:
I have this day the unaccustomed news of a citation to appear before an Ecclesiastical Court at York. The cause I imagine is for not reading the Book of Common Prayer. This is a strange trial to me and I am unfit to manage it. Reflect on myself O my soul and see what use thou canst make of this startling providence . . . examine on what grounds thou dost refuse this English liturgy. Is it from principles of conscience or contradiction? Hast thou no by-ends in what thou dost? Consider an erroneous conscience hath carried many very far astray, even to die for a mere whim. Self-made crosses will be uncomfortable and hast thou not cause to suspect thine own judgment? Consider seriously before thou dost enter on sufferings. . . . The sufferings of preachers for truth have a wonderful influence in confirming believers and making new converts. Leave God to look to his own interest and take thou care of thy duty.
Always the heart searching, always the tender conscience. If this man taught much concerning self-examination, his teaching was tested and grounded in his practice.
Heywood was ejected in 1662:
O my soul was ever the Hand of God so laid on a minister of these nations to change them in a day from being in some sense, the life and spirit of the world to become as dead carcasses . . . but have we merited at the hands of men such things as we now suffer, what is our transgression and our sin? At present our work is to ascertain clearly the reasons of our sufferings. Woe be to us if we preach not the gospel, but a double woe to us if we enervate the gospel by legal ceremonies. Our peoples’ souls are precious and we ought to take care of them, but our own souls are precious also and we must not destroy them under pretence of saving those of others. Our work is dear to us, but God is dearer, and we must not do the least evil to obtain the greatest good. There are worldly advantages enough to sway us to conformity, if conscience did not answer all the pleas of flesh and blood. Should we forsake our Christian liberty, and put our necks under such a yoke as neither we nor our fathers were able to bear? Should we build again what we have destroyed and make ourselves transgressors . . . the bargain will be too hard to provide a livelihood by making shipwreck of faith and a good conscience . . . suffering may benefit the gospel as much as service when God calls to it.
He was suspended from his ministerial work six months before the Act of Uniformity became law; he was turned out of his pulpit and out of his church: “We must not divine, men forbid and God doth say Amen, in severe displeasure. But shall we desist altogether? The word is as a burning fire shut up in our bones and though it cannot blaze in public as a beacon on a hill yet should be glowing in private to enlighten the houses of God’s people and to warm the hearts of those who are willing to entertain us or our message.” He now lived in a state of constant alarm, and yet exhibited a holy courage in all circumstances. We cannot enter into the many details of life at this troubled time, except here and there to see his sober reflections upon what came to him. Though he was in constant danger of arrest, he preached whenever opportunity presented itself. Frequently he engaged privately with other believers in fasting and prayer, and the measure of this engagement is seen in this extract from his account: “Tuesday, June 7th, we had a private day of seeking the Lord in prayer. There was a considerable number of Christians in the room. I was put to engage in the duty first, and continued about three hours, pouring out my soul before the Lord, principally on behalf of His Church.”
A considerable number of people met in Heywood’s home despite the restrictions of the Conventicle Act. The Five Mile Act resulted in his being driven from home, and he was obliged to wander from place to place, but once again our author improves this seemingly adverse providence:
Another step the restless adversary has taken by God’s permission to disquiet poor ejected ministers by casting them out of their own houses, from their flocks and families, but the enemy has overshot himself, for this cut above all other means, tendeth much to the furtherance of the gospel. Instead of one house that we had to preach in, we have now at least a score. By travelling abroad, our acquaintance is exceedingly enlarged, and so are our opportunities of doing good; the persecution of seedsmen is the dispersion of the seed, which much tends to the propagation of the gospel. Whereas, before this Act we were confined to our houses, we are now sent to many families with the Word of Life and every honest man’s house is our home.
He was a constant traveler, both by necessity of the harsh laws of the land, and by an almost apostolic zeal. He was ready to expose himself to any discomfort and danger for the good of souls. He remarried in 1667 and a little later was imprisoned for a brief period, once again improving this adversity to his soul. The more severe the measures, the more he improved them; the greater the restriction, the more he labored in the gospel: “Whoever hardened himself against God and prospered? . . . the enemies of the gospel are so far from hindering that they shall help Christ up to his Throne . . . O my soul, mourn for thy sins that have procured these acts, pity those that have framed them, alas that swearing blasphemy and drunkenness and Sabbath breaking should find so little discouragement by the laws of man, that all their care is to suppress religious exercises. Lord open rulers’ eyes to see that true religion is the support, and profaneness the undermining, of the nation.” It was the custom of the nonconformists annually to celebrate the ejection of 1662. On August 24, 1665, he wrote, “This being the killing day of all non-conformist ministers, I appointed a fast at my house, and propounded four things: 1. To lament before the Lord this sad judgment; 2. To enquire of God what was the cause; 3. To beg of God the sanctified use of this dreadful stroke; 4. To entreat God to remove it.”
During this period, though he could not preach as freely as he might, Heywood used his pen and completed three of his publications, Heart-Treasure, Closet Prayer, and The Sure Mercies of David.1 During this period we have an excellent example of self-examination:
This day, July 31st, 1671, having the opportunity of solitariness, all my family being from home, I set myself solemnly to religious exercises. I first read the 139th Psalm concerning God’s omniscience and omnipresence with tears in my eyes, commenting on it and applying it to myself. I accordingly set myself as in the presence of God desiring to deal truly and faithfully with my own soul in self-examination, and to lay open all my known sins. I fell down upon my knees and for about an hour the Lord helped me to open my heart before Him . . . God brought my bitterest enemies to my thoughts and helped me seriously to beg mercy for their souls . . . the Lord hath given me some secret intimations of pardon and acceptance, and did communicate Himself graciously to my heart.
After ten years of restriction and oppression came the declaration of public liberty to the nonconformists. This new liberty was short lived, and persecution was soon renewed. As for Heywood, he traveled widely and preached much, his preaching being noticeably owned of God. Places of worship were erected in a score of places as a result of his itinerant labors in Yorkshire; and all the while he did not neglect his own soul: “Having the opportunity of secrecy and having to dispense and partake of the Lord’s supper tomorrow I have this afternoon, February 1st, 1673, been setting myself to examine my conscience, renew my faith and repentance and to pour out my soul before God. Having experienced some degree of enlargement I am pressed in spirit to lift up my hands to the Most High and bind myself to the Lord in a further vow of self-dedication to Him.”
In 1673, though the persecution was renewed, God continued to be gracious: “How sweetly,” says he, recording some pleasant meditations while traveling to preach, “did God melt my heart with a sense of His mercies towards me.” Again, “God melted my heart in secret prayer,” and on another occasion, “O how little power have I over my own thoughts, I feel the truth of that word ‘when He giveth quietness who then can make trouble, and when He hideth His face, who then can behold Him?’ But now I feel the benefit of prayer.” He was always recollecting God’s mercies, and always examining himself, not morbidly, but with profit.
Heywood was again apprehended in 1679 and again excommunicated in 1680. Severely treated, he was imprisoned in York Castle in 1685, spending his days there in prayer and study of the Word, preaching both to prisoners and jailors during his twelve months of imprisonment. When liberty finally came, the Dissenters at North-Owram adjacent to Coley erected a Chapel in 1688, or better still it was Heywood himself who personally bore the larger part of the cost. Here he continued to his end, and when unable to bear the fatigue of walking to his chapel (called Heywood Chapel to this day) his people being unwilling to be deprived of his services, and he unwilling to desist, carried him to the pulpit in his chair, and so he ministered with his usual power. He closed his public ministry the Lord’s Day but one before his death on May 4, 1702, in the seventy-third year of his age, and the fifty-second year of his ministry. One summing up his life said, “He dared to be good, in a bad time.”
The Writings
Heywood’s published treatises are sixteen in number, excluding his sermons and his voluminous diary. They are almost wholly taken up with experimental religion. The titles themselves suggest this: Heart-Treasure, Closet Prayer, Life in God’s Favour, Family Altar, Heavenly Converse.2 They are written in a plain style, as Heywood himself puts it: “It is true, it is simply and plainly dressed, not with ornaments of art or rhetorical flourishes to set it off to the learned, being adapted in intelligible language to ordinary capacities and possibly it may prove more profitable to country hearers.” He often brings home the truth by pungent sayings and delightful aphorisms, with not a little artifice of punning and rhyming of sentences. His power of application is so great that he must be a very dull soul indeed who can read his works and fail to be moved.
It is no surprise then that real godliness is greatly emphasized in Heywood’s works. We shall look for the remainder of this paper at some of the aspects of the pursuit of godliness, as seen therein.
The Centrality of Godliness
Godliness is central in Heywood’s writings, and central to godliness is the fellowship, the communion with God to be enjoyed by the believer. “Here,” he writes, “is the end of this new creature which is two-fold, first the glory of God, and secondly the soul’s present and everlasting communion with Him. Both these are wrapped up together and are very consistent, yea cannot be separated.” For him communion with God was founded in union with God. Communion with God was the believer’s worship of Him: “these holy souls are they that worship in the temple of God and at the altar, God admits them into His Presence as a people near to Him, the Christian is the man who sanctified God’s Name in his worship, and is satisfied with the fatness of God’s House. Here is the blessed merchant that trades in rich pearls, that goes from port to port, from ordinance to ordinance, not to see places but to take in his lading of communications, graces, privileges, assurance and comfort from God.” Again, “the first instant of this new creation commences a communion with God . . . God has two thrones, one in heaven, and the other in a holy heart. . . . This communion with God is a mystery to most men. Every one that hangs about the court does not speak with the King, many meddle with duties, but meet not with God. . . . This new creature puts a bias in the soul Godwards, it naturally carries the believer upwards, to engage his heart in approaching God.” Again, “a hypocrite dare not come before God but a saint can draw near with boldness through Christ, for he is like God and communion is founded in similitude.” “Communion with God is the heaven upon earth of the gracious heart . . . every child of God after the first impartation of grace to him and the change of estate and relation Godwards, is put into a capacity for communion with God, in this and in the other world, but increase in grace and exercise of grace do daily capacitate him for further communion with God.”
He makes us to see communion with God in its eternal context: “There are heaven born principles implanted in believing souls that make them soar aloft after the enjoyment of God. . . . This blissful sight of Christ is that which makes heaven, for where the King is, there is the Court. This glory consists in conformity to Him and communion with Him.”
The importance of communion with God is further stressed: “There, there is a Christian’s life, his love and his delight, thither he is mounting as on eagles’ wings, and is never satisfied until he is wallowed up in the divine embraces. He is glad of communion with saints below, more glad of a communion with God . . . it is true that the infinite God is ultimately and objectively the saints’ proper delight both here and in heaven.”
Following the insistence on the centrality of communion in the godly life, Heywood has much to say concerning the means, both internal and external, of pursuing fellowship with God.
Internal Means to Fellowship with God
We shall pass over the teaching on conversion and regeneration, and come immediately to conformity: “So that you may take this account of our sanctity, that holiness as it is in us consists in our complete conformity to the Holy One; godliness is Godlikeness. God is the Holy One by way of eminency, far surpassing both men and angels. He is essentially holy, but we are participatively so; it is but a quality in us, it is essence to Him. He is holy effectively, for He makes others so. Our holiness requires that there be conformity to the will of God. The will of God is the rule of holiness, as His nature is the pattern of it, and there is no more of holiness in any work than there is of the will of God in it.”
“Our conformity to God is our imitation of Him, and by our walking with Him we make Him our pattern and His will our rule.” This communion with God, according to Heywood, is firmly grounded in an ethical basis. Not only is it a pleasurable pursuit, but it is a holy duty and a clean delight. We are to conform to God’s will in our delight as well as in our duty; holiness is essential to communion, and communion is essential to continuance in holiness. “Secret duties of religion must be performed by those who walk in the way of holiness. These are prayer and meditation and heart examination, which must be looked after in secret. Many duties a pious person has to perform that none must be privy to but God and his own soul. He has much work alone; there he must look into his own heart, there he must look up to God to fetch down blessings from above. . . . And here take notice of one thing, these duties must all be performed one as well as another. We must not pick and choose those only that are suited to our humours, we need all the help heavenward that we can get.”
This holiness, so essential to communion, is not merely intellectual, an enlightened and orthodox head:
Alas, what are you better for having Christ revealed to you, unless He be revealed in you? O woe will be to you if you prove Christless after hearing so much of Christ. . . . We know that we all have knowledge, what kind of knowledge is yours? Devils have more knowledge than you, nor ever will be new creatures; thousands go knowingly to hell, and the more knowledge without grace, the more torment . . . thou mayest have an orthodox head, and heterodox feet. . . . There must be an inward principle so that there is something more required than an orthodox judgment. A learned head with an unholy heart, and ungodly life will not do. Alas, many have light in their heads, but no heat in their hearts.
A constant repentance is necessary to a constant communion. The work of the conscience is much stressed. It has four offices: a guide to discover our duty; a correct and faithful register of our actions, expressions, and thoughts of the heart and imaginations; a judge to pass sentence; an avenger and self-tormentor (the godly man must take the whip of conscience with a hand of grace, and scourge himself for his sins, or God will take it with His hand, and chastise him for it). Sin is to be avoided, “Custom in sin, takes away conscience of sin, the more men travel, the more brawny are their feet.”
Among the internal means to godliness you will not be surprised to hear this man urgently pressing the duty of self-examination, giving detailed instructions for this duty in several of his works. “My spiritual duties need spiritualizing; my repentance needs repenting of; my exercise of grace needs a gracious pardon; my Lord Jesus must take away the iniquity of my holy things, perfume my poor services, and offer my ‘prayers with his much incense, upon the golden altar before the throne.’” Heywood urges the believer to this duty: “It is of very great concernment for every rational soul to know and be sure on some certain grounds whether he be a new creature.” Among the things to be looked for in this duty are a sense of sin, a discovery of helplessness, and consequent “sad thoughts of heart.” The understanding, the will, the affections, all are to be searched out. “Christians try yourselves.”
External Means to Fellowship with God
Turning to some of the external means of pursuing godliness, Heywood has much to say about the Word of God and obedience to its authority: “Here is the rule of this new creature, which is expressed, by turning the heart and the life to the rule of the Word . . . the soul is the metal, the Word is the mould into which the sinner is cast, therefore he receives a new stamp, is formed into a new shape, which naturally terminates in a new course of life according to the scriptural rule. The Christian is both drawn and determined by its authority more than by a whole team of human arguments.” Again, “The new creation introduces a new counsellor. Now the Christian goes to the sanctuary in arduous cases, and makes the Scriptures his chief counsellors in his actions, natural civil and spiritual; and dare venture upon nothing but that for which he hath a warrant from God.”
The fellowship of believers is another external means. Heywood urges believers to attend together on a “lively ministry.” He urges the communion of saints:
Gather yourselves together in solemn exercises of religion; especially in times of public calamity and common danger. Persons may be helpful one to another, God sometimes expects unanimous votes which make a great sound in His ears. Many combustibles make a great blaze; grapes put together ripen one another. Is communion of saints good in heaven, and is it not good here? Are not some Christians ignorant and want informing? Are not some dead and want quickening; hard and want softening; wandering and want reclaiming? Are not some staggering and want settling? Are not some weak, and should not we lift up the hands that hang down and the feeble knees? Get together here as you hope to come together hereafter.
The ordinances are yet other external means to the same end:
Yet privileges are not to be slighted nor ordinances despised. . . . Ordinances can do us no good without the concurrance of divine grace. . . . It becomes us to obey God in hearing, praying, reading, meditating and tending on God in His own ways; the seals of the covenant are not insignificant ceremonies; ordinances are channels through which God conveys His grace to the soul (canales gratiae) . . . shall the bucket be thrown away because it hath not water in itself without letting it down into the well by the chains of faith? . . . Let our dependence be upon God in the way of His appointments. Affect not to be above, but go beyond all ordinances. God is present in all, that we may despise none; He withdraws in some, sometimes in all, that we may idolize none. When you enter upon a duty, look up to the blessed Jesus, make it your business to get communion with God therein. If you miss of God in ordinances, you lose your ends, yea, you are in danger of losing your souls.”
By this, he understands the soul to suffer a loss in so far as it misses God in the ordinance.
Ordinances are not to be abused however: “If you make your services your saviours, you will perish with them . . . things good in themselves may, by man’s abuse prove rather snares and hindrances than helps and furtherances in heaven’s road . . . they become not only dead but deadly. Nay, the best duties, ordinances and privileges rested in short of Christ will rather ruin than raise us, undo us rather than enrich us, grace here or glory hereafter.”
Much more could be said of the place of prayer, private and public, of the proper use of all things, of the improvement of providences, of the fear of hell and joys of heaven, of the coming again of the Lord Jesus Christ, all of which are pressed into the service of souls. To close with a quotation: “Remember sirs, you are new creatures; an old heart would have served well enough to have done the devil’s drudgery, you are new born to higher employment . . . now it becomes you to act as you are.”