Cain and Abel Malignity, Chapter 3
Chap. III. Undeniable Reasons against Malignant Enmity to serious Godliness.
1. TO deny that there is a God who is the Supreme Governour of Man, is to be mad in despight of the whole world which proveth it: And it deposeth all Kings, who claim their Authority as given them by God, and as his Officers; for if there be no God, there's none to give them Authority: And to grant that there is a God, and yet deny him our love, honour and obedience, is to speak gross contradiction, or else profess open malice against God himself. If he be God, he is perfectly Wise; and should not perfect Wisdom govern us? If he be God, he is perfectly Good, and mans chief Benefactor; and should he not then have our chiefest Love? If he be God, he is of absolute Power; and should he not then be obeyed? If he be God, he made us, and still maintaineth us, and we live continually by his will, and have all that we have of his bounty; and we, and all we have are wholly his own; and is not then all our thanks and service due to him? If he be God, he is our Judge, and will be just in punishing and rewarding; and should we not then serve him with the greatest fear, and with the highest hopes? These things are undeniable.
Dare any man that believeth there is a God, say, that man can Love him too much? or too much honour him, or obey him? Can we return him more than his due? It is therefore no less than practical Atheism, or else a rebellious defiance of God, to blame or hate men, for loving, honouring and serving him to the very utmost of their power. And to deny God, or defie him, is a thousand fold more damnable sin and treason, than to deny and defie the King, or your own Parents.
2. God hath himself commanded man, to Love him with all his heart, and soul, and might; and to obey him with his greatest fidelity and diligence, and to fear him more than any creature, and to place our chiefest hopes on his promised rewards, and to seek first his Kingdom and Righteousness, and not to sin wilfully to save our lives, or gain all the world, Deut. 6. 5, 6, 7. & 10. 12. & 11, 12, 13, 14. Mat. 22. 37. Heb. 11. 6. 1 Cor. 15. 58. Luke 12. 4. Heb. 12. 28, 29. Mat. 10. 39, 42. & 16. 25, 26. & 6. 33. Luke 14. 26, 33. Mat. 5. 19, 20. And the Law of Nature speaks no less. And if God command it, and you condemn it, do you not condemn God? If you command your Son, or Servant, or Subject any thing, he that blames him for obeying you, blames you more than him. If it be a fault of folly to love and serve God with all our heart, and mind, and might, the fault or folly would be Gods that requireth it, and not ours. And, is such a blasphemer meet for humane Society, who will accuse his Maker? If God be blame-worthy, he is not perfect: And if he be not perfect, he is not God: And so to be against our utmost obedience, doth amount to no less than Blasphemy or Atheism.
3. Do you think that Man is a creature that needs to be blamed for loving or obeying God too much? Do you not know that Nature is vitiated by sin, and Man is now backward to God, and all that's good and holy? You may as well blame a lame man for running too fast, as a sinful man for obeying God too much. It's more foolish than to blame a sick man for working or eating too much that can do neither? Or to hold a man in a Consumption from going up the Hill too fast? Do you find your own hearts so forward to a holy life, as that you need pulling back or hinderance, when no exhortation or necessity will perswade you to it? And if you need no such reproof or stop, why should you think others need it? Do you not use to say that all men are sinners? And do sinners need to be blamed for obedience? Do you not daily confess that you have done the things which you ought not to have done, and left undone the things that you ought to have done, and there is no health in you; And yet will you blame men for too much Obedience? It seems then that your Confessions of sin are Professions of it; and while you tell what you have done, you do but tell what you mean to do, and what you would have all others do: or else you blame your selves for sinning, and hate your Neighbours for not sinning.
4. If you hate men for holiness and avoiding sin, you hate Jesus Christ most: for he was most holy, and free from all sin: And you hate the Angels and all in Heaven, for they are holy and void of all transgression.
5. Have you any better Master to serve than God? or any better work to do than he commandeth, or any better thing to seek and hope for than he hath promised? If not, should not the best be preferred. What do you love and seek your selves? Is money or fleshly pleasure better than God and Heaven? Is Sin and Sensuality a better employment than his Service? Is your flesh and lust a better master? Compare them, and we are content that the best be preferred.
6. Why do you take on you to believe in Christ, if you be against holiness, and for sin? Christ came into the world to die for sin, to shew Gods hatred of it: And would you have us wilfully to commit it, and to despise his Blood? He came to destroy the works of the Devil; and will you plead for them? He came by his Doctrine, example and grace to bring man to holy obedience: And do you hate men for the same, and yet call your selves Christians?
7. How dangerously do you draw towards the sin against the Holy-Ghost, if you hate or blame men for being holy, or seeking to be such; when it is all the work of the Holy-Ghost on mens Souls to make them holy? It's a dangerous thing to hate the work of the Holy-Ghost; and as it were defy him, and do despite to him.
8. Are you not your selves in your baptism Vowed and Devoted to God the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, renouncing the world, the Flesh and the Devil? And do you hate men for being such as you have vowed to be your selves? And do you think that God will not severely reckon with you for such Perjury and base Perfidiousness.
9. Do you not in your daily hypocritical devotions condemn your selves by your own tongues? Do you not pray that the rest of your lives may be Pure and Holy? And at the same time hate Purity and Holiness? Do you not pray that Gods will may be done on Earth as it is done in Heaven? And can we have a higher, purer pattern? Do you know any that doth Gods will better than it's done in Heaven? Or is it not damnable hypocrisy to pray for that which you hate, and hate all men that desire and endeavour it? When you say or hear all the ten Commandments, you pray, [Lord have mercy upon us and incline our hearts to keep this Law:] And do you hate men for endeavouring to keep it? If you come to the Lords Table, you confess your sins, and bind your selves in Covenant to forsake them, and to live a holy life, and you take the Sacrament upon it; And the Liturgy warneth you to take heed that you dissemble not, nor be hinderers of Gods holy word, lest the Devil enter into you as he did into Judas, and fill you with all unrighteousness. And if you hate or oppose that holy obedience to God which you profess, after all this, what must be the portion of such hypocrites? And in your Creed you profess to believe in God, the Father, Son and Holy-Ghost, and to hold a Holy Catholick Church, and the Communion of Saints; And yet do you hate Saints that obey the Father, Son and Holy-Ghost, and hate their Communion?
10. Hath not God printed on mans nature such a sense of the difference between Good and Evil, as that all Laws and Government are founded in that sense? And no man loveth to be counted or called a bad or ungodly, or unconscionable man: A Lyar, a Knave, a Perjured man or a wicked man: And yet do you hate men for avoiding wickedness?
11. Do not you use to accuse Religious men of some sin or other. (Truly or falsly) and think by that to make them odious? And yet do you accuse them, and hate them most for not sinning? To be Sober, Just and Godly is but to avoid sins of Omission and Commission. And do you at once accuse them as sinners and hate them for obeying God, and sinning no more?
12. Doth it never affright you to find the Devils nature in you, as hating the Divine or holy nature which is in faithful Godly men? And to think how openly you serve the Devil, and do his work? No man that believeth there are Devils can doubt, but that the hatred of God, as holy, and the hatred of his holy Word, and Work, and Servants, is the Devils malignity, and the opposing of them his work. If he were to write you his Commandments, they would be contrary to Gods, and the chief of them should be, [Thou shalt not Love God, nor serve him with all thy Heart, and Soul, and Might, nor Love those that do so; but hate, deride, oppose and persecute them. And is it honourable openly to serve the Devil? Christ tells such men, Ioh. 8. That the Devil is their Father, because they have his nature, and that his work they do, for he was from the beginning a Lyar, and a Malignant Murderer, and turned man from obeying God. And can you think that he loveth you, or that his Service against God is better than Gods; or his reward better?
13. Doth it never touch your Consciences to consider that you are the Children and followers of cursed Cain; and how punctually his case against Abel, and yours against Gods Servants is the same? By faith Abel offered to God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his Gifts; and by it he being dead, yet speaketh, Heb. 11. 4. Cain hated him because God more accepted him and his offering; 1 Ioh. 3. 10, 11, 12. In this the Children of God are manifest, and the Children of the Devil: Whoever doth not righteousness is not of God, nor he that loveth not his Brother: For this is the message that ye heard from the beginning, that we should love one another: Not as Cain, who was of that wicked one, and slew his Brother: And wherefore slew he him? because his own works were evil and his brothers righteous.
14. Is it possible that any man can unfeignedly believe a Heaven as the reward of holy obedience, and yet think we can do too much to obtain it, or be too careful to make it sure? Is not everlasting glory worth the cost of a holy life? Or can it be too dearly bought?
15. Or is it possible to believe Gods Judgment, and Hells Punishment, and yet to hate those that do their best according to Gods own Counsel to escape it?
16. What monstrous cruelty is it in you to wish poor Souls to do that which God hath told us they shallbe damned for? God saith, Without holiness none shall see God, Heb. 12. 14. Except your righteousness exceed the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees, you shall in no wise enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, Mat. 5. 20. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God, Mat. 5. If ye live after the Flesh ye shall die, but if by the Spirit you mortify the deeds of the Body, ye shall live, Rom. 8. 7, 8. 13. What manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy Conversation and Godliness? 2 Pet. 3. 11. We receiving a Kingdom which cannot be moved, let us serve God acceptably, with Reverence and Godly fear, for our God is a Consuming Fire, Heb. 12. 28, 29. Be stedfast, unmoveable always abounding in the work of the Lord, for asmuch as you know that your Labour is not in vain in the Lord, 1 Cor. 15. 58. This is the very tenor of the Gospel: And would you wish men to damn their Souls for nothing? To lose Heaven, and suffer Hell for ever, and all to avoid a pure and holy life? What a bloody motion is this? Worse than if you intreated us all to cut our own throats. Let us try first whether you will do far less at our request? Will you give the poor all your Lands and Estates? Will you run into Fire or Water, or set your own houses on fire when any will but desire it? It's like you have heard of the Woman who being tempted to adultery, desired the tempter first to hold his Finger in the Fire for her; Which when he refused, she told him, it was less reason she should burn in Hell to Satisfy his lust. If you will not part with your Life or Estate when another desires you, why should we part with Heaven for ever, and choose Hell at your desire?
Yea we see that you will not leave an ill-gotten gain, or a Sport, or a Whore, or a Drunken Cup, for all the Love of God, the blood of Christ, and the hope of Heaven; And shall we part with God, and Heaven, and Christ to humour you?
And what is it that you offer us instead of all that we must part with? And to ease the pain which we must undergo? Nothing, or worse than nothing. If we should renounce God and our hope of Heaven, you cannot give us health or wealth for it: Much less can you secure these or life to us till to morrow. And will any thing that you can give us, be better than Heaven to us? Or will it make Hell tollerable?
Will you undertake to answer for it at the bar of God, if we are charged with an ungodly, fleshly life, or omitting our necessary duty? You cannot answer for your selves but by trembling confession: You cannot save your selves; Nor will all your wealth and honour get you one drop of Water to cool your tongues. And shall we trust that you can answer for us, or save us? When you would have any man wilfully to neglect that holy life which God enjoyneth, you would have him to be madder than one that would Burn his House, and Kill himself, if you did but require it. And what horrid cruelty is this? You are worse than man-eating Cannibals? But the best is you cannot force us to it; And if you think to hire or flatter us into Hell, you must have somewhat more to say, and to offer us than we yet ever heard of; Much less are we so much below Bedlams, as to forsake our Salvation, lest you should call us Precisians, or Puritans, or any such nick-name or word of scorn, as doth but shew the folly and misery of the speaker. You will not be laught or mockt out of your Estates, or Lives; Nor we out of our Salvation. In short, Nature is not willing to lie in Hell, and Grace maketh us desire Heaven; And we never yet found that any thing else was more desireable.
17. And what is there amiss in the Word or Work of God, and in a serious godly life, that should make us be against it? Doth God make bad Laws? Are your wills and lusts and appetites a better law? Or could you have taught God to amend the Bible, or to govern better? God needs us not: His Laws are all made for our good? All his ways are pleasantness, and all his paths are peace. Speak true reason. Is it a better life to love a Whore, or to please Lust and Appetite, than to love God? What is there in Love and Obedience to God that should make it detestable, or make us miserable? Is it a greater trouble to live in hope of Heavenly Glory, than to live in the despair either of a Sadducee or a Rebel? You may wiselier tempt us to fall out with our food, or friends, or health. We know that Faith and Godliness, are not only mans duty, but his interest, much more than health is to our bodies, food to our natures, and the converse of dearest friends to our delight.
18. We have had experience of both ways, and would you have us mad against our experience? We tryed the World and Sin too long, and found nothing in it but brutish pleasure and luscious Poyson: Nothing that will save Soul, life or health: And some tryal God in mercy hath given us of his love, and the life of obedient faith and hope: And the more we try it, the better we find it: Only we can reach to so small a degree as doth but tell us how good it is, and make us long for more. And whether the Devil would perswade, scorn or affright us from it, by his own mouth or by yours, we hope it shall be all in vain.
19. And who or what are you that would reason, mock or affright us from a life of obedience to God? Are you wiser than God, and dare you give him the lie, that we should believe you before him? Or are you better than God, that you can make a better choice for your selves and us? Are you more merciful than God, and would save us from some hurt that he would do us? Are you truer than God, and more to be believed? Are you greater than God, and more to be feared? Or are you not the most foolish, ignorant and damnably your selves deluded by the Devil: And shall the words or mocks of such, drive us to forsake our Souls and God? Should we obey you and lie in Hell for it for ever, it would be no small part of the torment of our Consciences, to think that we came thither by regarding the threats or scorns of worms and fools before all the Word, and Love of God and our Redeemer.
20. And before we change our Obedience to God for another course, let us know what we shall change it for, and whether it be for something better: Hath your course made you better or happier than the faithful are? Do we not see and feel with sorrow, that the worldly, fleshly, ungodly sort, are in all Nations the Plagues of the Earth, and worse to mankind than Wolves and Serpents? They will not let the world live in peace; striving and fighting for dominion and mastership, and more of the world, they are like Dogs about their Carrion, worrying and tearing one another: They turn Man into a more odious creature than Swine or Toads, by filthy lusts, and horrid prophaneness: They make their Countreys worse than Bedlam, raving against that which the God of Heaven hath commanded and made necessary to Salvation. And are these such good and pleasant fruits as should entice us to change our master, work and hopes, for this, and worse that followeth it?
And who shall be our Rule, if we forsake God and his Word? If Princes, how many minds are they of through the world? And are they all in the right? Or how shall we know which is right but by the Word of God? Or must all men be for the God and Religion of his King? If it were Prelates, of how many minds are they through the world, and how bitter in condemning one another? If it must be the major part, how shall obscure men know who those be that can have no just cognisance of the state of the Earth, whether Papists, Greeks, Jacobites, Nestorians, &c. be the major part? And how shall we know that the major part of the Clergy are the best and soundest, when we see that the major part of the Laity is usually the worst? Or is it certain that the Papists Bishops are sounder than our Protestant Bishops, because they are more? If we forsake our Concord in God and his Word, we can have none.
21. What mean you to do with Conscience, your own, and ours, and other mens? Conscience is Gods Officer in us, and judgeth of men and actions as they stand subject to God and his Judgment. To drive Conscience out of the world, and to drive all reverence and obedience to God out of the world, is all one. To subject Conscience to Lust or Man, is to subject God to Lust or Man in our estimation and practice. And is God so easily deposed? And will he give up his Scepter to a scorner, a drunkard, or a persecutor?
And what shift will you make at home to quiet Conscience in your selves? You little know how deep it biteth, and how hardly it is quieted, when it is awaked, as shortly and certainly it will be: Then Iudas will bring back his price, and say, I have sinned in betraying innocent blood; and all the comfort his companions will give him is, See thou to that: What's that to us? And hanging or precipitating himself is next. It's like he before thought as you do, that he could have better mastered his Conscience: But you may as wisely think to conquer pain and death.
But whatever you do with your own, if we should leave our obedience to God, to obey you, or any men, we know not what we should do with our own Consciences, nor how to quiet them. God hath brought us out of that Darkness and Lethargy which quieted them in sin heretofore: And we cannot now be ignorant of that duty to God, that self-interest, that danger to wilful sinners, and that evil of sin, which would begin Hell in us here: And are not your scorns and threatnings easier than this?
22. Do not most men at death see the madness not only of enmity, but of neglect of a holy life, and wish that they might die the death of the righteous, and that their last end might be like his? Had you rather die a Dives or a Herod, or a Lazarus or a Paul? Is it not a shame to your devilish cause and you, to see men live in one mind and die in another? And scorn, hate and persecute serious Godliness till the Sentence of death is past upon them, and then to wish they were such themselves. Or if you be more hardened to the last, you are the more hopeless: But how quickly did such another change his note, and cry, Father Abraham, send one to my five brethren to warn them, that they come not to this place of torment? If you mock at these words, you mock at Christ that spake them, and sure you look not to be saved by a derided Christ. And it's base Hypocrisy to deride him, and yet call your selves Christians, and go to Church as if you served him. Live as you would die and be judged, for you shall be judged as you live and die. Either hold to the mind that you will never change, or change it quickly before it be too late.
23. If you know what a man is, you know that his Soul is better than his corruptible flesh; And if you think your Throats and Guts and Fancies worth all the Cost and Care and Labour which you bestow on them in the world, shall not we think our Souls worth more? What Godly man that you think makes too much a do for Heaven, doth bestow more time, and words, and labour for it, than you do for the Flesh and World? Do we not see how men will labour at land, and venture through dangerous Seas, and Fight in Wars, and Plot against all that stand in their way▪ and this all day, from year to year, and all for Provision for Flesh and Fancy. And do those that you accuse do more for their Salvation? If you know not now, you will shortly know, which makes the better choice and bargain.
24 What harm doth Godliness and Conscience do you in other men? Had you not rather have a son that takes Disobedience, Whoredom, Gaming and Drunkenness for sin, than one that makes no Conscience of them? Had you not rather have a Wife whose Conscience restrains her from Scolding and Adultery, and a Servant that makes Conscience of robbing or deceiving you, than one that doth not? Sure unconscionable Servants and Debtors are more troublesom than they that fear God and believe that injustice is a damning sin? But the truth is, most wicked men are for so much Conscience and Religion in others, as restrains them from wronging or hurting them; but no more, nor for that much in themselves which may restrain them from hurting others.
But if you resolve rather to be damned than to be Sober, Just and Godly, and obey God against the flesh; Why cannot you bear with other men that make a wiser choice? What hurt doth their praying do you; or their preaching, while they are responsible for any ill Doctrine? What if they be reading the Scripture, or hearing Directions for a holy life, while you are Drinking, or Gaming, or reading a Romance, or Railing Libel, doth their Piety hurt you? What if they dare not Swear and Drink as you do, doth this do you any harm? What is it but the Serpentine enmity that maketh you hate those that never hurt you?
25. If you will believe God, it is for the sake of Godly men that God preserves the World from ruine: He would have saved Sodom had there been but ten such persons in it: He will not destroy the world, till he hath gathered all his chosen out of it: And do they deserve to be most hated?
26. How exceeding dear a love hath God and our Redeemer exprest, to all holy, obedient believers? God calls them his Jewels, his Treasure, in whom he delighteth; He gave Christ specially for them: He sealeth them to Salvation by his Spirit: he justifieth them, and will glorify them in Heaven: Christ calls them Flesh of his Flesh, his Friends, his Spouse, they are united to him, he washeth them in his blood, and feedeth them with his Flesh, and will make them equal to the Angels, and will condemn their Enemies: And are not you devilish enemies to God and Christ, who cull out those for your malice and Enmity, whom God chooseth out to magnify the wonders of his Love on them for ever?
27. The Angels of Heaven rejoyce at the Conversion of a sinner, Luke 15. 10. And rejoyce to be Christ Servants for their defence continually: And is it not Devils then and their Servants and Souldiers that are against them? Take heed; Gods Angels that smote a Herod, may do execution on you ere long.
28. The Holy Ghost saith, 1 Cor. 6. That the Saints shall judge the world, and even the Angels, that is, the evil ones: Did you believe this, you would be afraid to hate and persecute them now.
29. Even Heathens are for much honouring and worshiping their Gods; yea many offer them too costly Sacrifice: What praises doth Iulian give to the Sun, and what strictness of life doth he Command his Priests? What great contempt of the Body and the World, did the Platonists, the Stoicks and the Cynicks profess? And shall profest Christians hate those that are obedient to the true God yea to shew that the War between Good and Evil goeth on in all the World; even among Heathens those that were for true virtue were despised and hated by the sensual.
30. And is it not a self-condemning thing in those that accuse Gods Servants as making too much adoe in obeying the Law of God, and yet make (as the Church of Rome doth) abundance more Laws or Canons of their own, and require precise obedience to them all? Yea will burn men at a Stake for breaking their Laws; Doth God make too much work in the Judgment of them that think it not enough without much more, as if Gods Law were too narrow and insufficient? Yea learn by the Church of England, whose Canons (5, 6, 7, 8.) ipso facto excommunicate them that do but affirm any thing to be repugnant to Gods word in their Liturgy, Ceremonies or Church Governing Offices: And can you think that obeying God deserveth hatred, when disobeying men deserveth excommunication? Learn of our late Laws, which account all the Ministers of England worthy to be cast out and silenced if they dare not take the imposed Declarations, Oaths and Subscriptions, and do what the Act of Uniformity imposeth; And do you think it worthy of reproach to be as strict in obeying Gods known Laws, as is required to the Act of Uniformity and the Canons?
31. Even the Church of Rome applaudeth great Rigor and Strictness of life, in such as will obey the Pope; And they have allowed Orders of Fryars whose rules tye them to great abstinence, to much praying, and some to much Preaching, so that Religion is all their calling. And shall the strict obeying of Gods known Laws render men odious among professed Protestants? Yea the Papists honour the very Bones and Relicks of their dead Saints? And you your selves keep holy days for many Saints: And will you at the same time hate and hurt those that endeavour to imitate them? Will you imitate those Pharisees whom Christ pronounceth Woe against, who at once honoured the dead Prophets with building them Monuments or Tombs, and murdered the living that succeeded them?
32. You can never come to Heaven, or be saved from Hell your selves, without serious Holiness, Justice and Sobriety: And will you hate that without which you cannot be saved?
33. Scarce any sin doth more certainly prove you to be ungodly, than hating godliness: What ever hope there may be of those that sin against Conscience, and wish to be better, and purpose Repentance, that man cannot be a truly Godly man, that is an Enemy to godliness, so that this is a dreadful deaths mark on you.
34. You would extirpate the principle of self-love, which God hath made inseparable from us. There is somewhat in our nature which we cannot lay by, which makes us unwilling to be damned. If you that believe no Hell, dare venture into it, we cannot do so, who do believe it. If you say, that it is our folly to believe that none shall be saved without Holiness, and mortifying the deeds of the body by the Spirit, bear with that folly which doth you no harm: It is not Men or Devils that we had it from, but the Holy Ghost in Scripture. If it be your wisdom to give God the lie, and believe a Drunken sot, or the Devil, before him, it shall be none of ours: Speed as you choose, and let us speed as we choose: we shall meet your Souls shortly in another mind and tune. Strive not to make us choose damnation now our Eyes are open: We were once too easily befool'd: but cannot now so hate our selves.
35. Moreover, he that would not have a man live a life of holy obedience to God, would have him lay by that which he was made for, and that which God continueth his life for, and that which he hath his reason and all his daily mercies for. What else have we to do in the World? Have men going to the Grave and Eternity, nothing to do but Eat and Drink, and Laugh, and Play, and run up and down like Ants with sticks and straws, and then die, and call all vanity and vexation too late? If we may not spend our time in making sure of a better World, we had rather we had never been born, or had died in infancy, or that we had a dose of Opium that would make us sleep out the rest of our lives in quietness, rather than spend it as you do, and then give a sad ac…ount of all: we had rather we had been Birds or Beasts, Dogs or Swine than Men, were it not for that life which you hate, and the hopes which depend on it. It had been a greater kindness to us to have murdered us at the birth, than to tempt us to live for our damnation.
36. What do you think it is that is Gods Image on mans Soul, you know that it's said in Scripture that God made man at first in his own Image, and that Christ by his Spirit reneweth them to that Image. What is it think you, God hath not hands and feet, and bodily parts as we have? It is the Soul that hath his Image. And do you think it is the love of Money, and Lust, and Sport, or Gluttony, or Drunkenness that is his Image? Scripture saith Eph. 4. 23, 24. Colos. 3. 10. it is Holiness: And this is called the Divine nature, as coming from God, and inclining nature unto God. Either Holiness, Wisdom and Righteousness is Gods Image, or else there is none such on man; And then you make Gods Word to be false. And if this be it, and this it which you hate, are you not haters of God? And is not that to be devilish and hated by God?
37. While you are angry at them that say few are saved, or that none but Saints or serious godly obedient men are saved, you would sink all the World into utter despair, and make none or next none to be saved. One part of the haters of godliness believe no life to come; And these would have all men despair. For if there be none, there is none to be hoped for: and they that think men die but as Dogs & Swine do, must be expected to live like Dogs & Swine. The other part of you, labour by all means to make themselves and others believe that the profession of more godliness than worldly carnal men have, is but hypocrisy, and that such are at the heart as bad as others: And if this be so, what is the consequence, but that none are saved? For unless you will give God the lie, or be saved in spite of him, you must believe that none are saved that are not sanctified by the Spirit of Christ, and live not after the Spirit, mortifying the flesh, Ioh. 3 3, 5. Heb. 12. 14. Rom. 8. 6, 7. 8, 9, 13. 2 Cor. 5. 17. And that no man can be saved that loveth the world more than God and Heaven, and fleshly pleasure more than holiness. And therefore if there be none such, then none are saved. Hypocrisy will not save men: God tells us that Drunkards, Fornicators, Covetous, Thieves, Extortioners, Revilers, Effeminate, Idolaters, cannot enter into the Kingdom of God, 1 Cor. 6. 9, 10. Eph. 5. 5. And if any man love the world (best) the love of the Father is not in him, 1 Ioh. 2. 5. And if all that pretend to be better are hypocrites, than none at all are saved.
It may be you have the kindness to except some few. But if those few be all that be not either carnal men (described Rom. 8. 5, 6, 7, 9.) or hypocrites, how few then do you make to be saved, if God be true?
38. Who do you think it is that Christ meaneth, when he saith, I send you as Lambs among Wolves? Ye shall be hated of all men for my names sakes; Blessed are they that suffer persecution for righteousness sake? When they say all manner of evil of you falsly for my sake: The World will hate you as it hated me, because you are not of the World, but I have chosen you out of the World: Marvel not if the World hate you? As many as will live godly in Christ Iesus shall suffer Persecution, &c. Who do you think all this is spoken of? It is not of you, that are fleshly, worldly, ungodly men; Who Persecuteth you for righteousness sake? Who hateth, revileth or imprisoneth, or fineth you, for living godly in Christ Jesus? Do you suffer as much for reviling Preachers, as we have done for Preaching? What suffer you for all the Oaths that be sworn daily in Streets and Taverns, and the horrid prophaneness, Atheism, Sadduceism, Infidelity that men are guilty or? If you did suffer for Whoredom, Drunkenness, Blasphemy is that for Christ or righteousness? When the Holy Ghost saith, As he that was born after the Flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit, even so it is now, is it such as you that he meaneth? When Peter saith, [They speak evil of you, and falsly accuse your good conversation in Christ, 1 Pet. 3. 16. whom meaneth he? When he saith, 1 Pet. 4. They think it strange that you run not with them to all excess of ryot (lasciviousness, lusts, excess of wine, revellings, banquetings and abominable idolatry) who do you think he meaneth? And when he saith, 1. Pet. 2. 9. Ye are a chosen Generation, a royal Priest-hood, a holy Nation, a peculiar People, that ye should shew forth the praises of him that hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light; who is it that he meaneth? You'll say, It is Christians: True: But is it Hypocrites? Is it those that will say at last, Lord we have Prophesied in thy Name, and Eat and Drunk in thy presence, to whom Christ will say, Depart from me, ye workers of Iniquity, I know you not? Sure false Christians are worse than Heathens.
39. The way which you take against Religious persons doth shew who it is that sets you on work, and what it is that is the root of your enmity. As Gods Image is in the understanding, will and executive power of man, so is Satans; and he is accordingly described by Christ, to be 1. A Liar and Deceiver; 2. A Malignant, Hater of Goodness, or Holiness; and a cause of sin; 3. A hurtful murderer or destroyer. And these are the three ways by which Godly people are prosecuted in the world. 1. Belying them is grown so common with their enemies, that there is nothing scarcely so notoriously false which they will not affirm of them, and it's well if some will not preach it, print it, or swear it: And they make one another easily believe it. Till experience proved it, I did not think that humane nature had been liable to such impudent, monstrous lying.
2. The daily business of many is, by wit and diligence to draw men to hate Religious men on false pretences: As plainly as Christ preacheth and urgeth Love, as his great Commandment; so plainly do these press and urge men to Hatred: But of this before.
3. And Hatred tends to Hurtfulness: What plotting and labouring is there in the world, to ruine and destroy each other? The malignant spirit is blood-thirsty. It's strange how the unclean Devils thirst to draw or suck some blood from Witches. Nothing more alienates me from the Papal Kingdom, than that it lives like Leeches upon blood. To read over the History of the Inquisition, and of their Massacres, would make Men take Toads, and Adders, and mad Dogs, and Wolves, for harmless things in comparison of some Men. If any would requite them (or others) with the like, I hate it in Protestant or Papist. The Turks conquered the Greek Empire, partly by the mutinous divisions of the Christians, and partly by promising them Liberty of Religion: And when the Christians thought they should have that, they yielded up the Empire with the less resistance. And that which was so advantageous to the Infidels, might, well used and limited, be more advantageous to the Christian Truth and Church.
But though good things may be used in an ill cause, it is a sign of a bad cause which needeth bad means. That cause which is carried on by Lying, Perjury and Deceit, by malignant Love-killing, endeavours, and by cruelty, and hurtfulness, and blood, is thereby made suspicious to all wise men. It is a wonder of impudency in Baronius, Binnius and other Papists, to justifie Martin, a Canonized Saint, for renouncing Communion to the death with the Synods and Bishops who perswaded the Emperor to draw the Sword against the Gnostick Priscillianists; and themselves to defend a thousand-fold greater cruelties and murders in their own Church on the account of Religion: But sin is mad self-contradiction.
4. I conclude with this great truth: They that hate and oppose Godly mens obedience to God, do seek to silence the chief Witness of Christ, and to cast out Christianity from the Earth. Christianity cannot be proved to be true, but by the Spirit, which is its Seal and Witness. This Witness of the Spirit was not only extraordinary in Languages and numerous Miracles, but also ordinary in the work of Sanctification. This Seal is set on all that shall be saved in all times and places. The Lord knoweth who are his: And let him that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity. He redeemed us to purifie to himself a peculiar people zealous of good works: Teaching us, that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously and godly in this present world: Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Iesus Christ, Tit. 2. 12, 13, 14. By this healing work Christ is known to be indeed our Physician, the real Saviour that saveth his people from their sins. As man generateth man, and the Father is known by the similitude of the Child; and as he is known to be a good Artist that can make others such. This is Christs standing Witness in all times and places. And when you would turn this into scorn, and cloud it with slanders, or the charge of Hypocrisie, and would have such judged an odious people, and have them driven out of the world, what do you in effect but spit in the face of Christ, and crown him with Thorns, and call him a Deceiver, and crucifie him afresh, and seek to expel Christianity from the Earth? What reasonable man could believe Christ to be Christ, the Saviour of the world, if he did not sanctifie men, and make them much better and fitter for Heaven than other men?
So that in this you directly militate for the Devil, the World and the Flesh, against God the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, against the Holy Catholick Church, and the Communion of Saints, and the Hope of Resurrection and life everlasting; which if you did openly under the name of Infidels or Heathens, or rather as the profest Souldiers of the Devil, it were less disingenuous and hypocritical, than to do it in the Church, and under Christs colours, and in the Christian name.
And you must be sure that you are stronger than God and our Saviour, if you will prevail to the last. God hath undertaken the defence of the Just: Christ hath undertaken to present them triumphant before his Father, and cast their Enemies into Hell. Are you sure you can overcome him? Vile Worms that cannot fetch a breath without him! When began you to be stronger than God? Was it in the womb? or in Infancy when you could not go? Or was it when the Devil and the Flesh made you mad or drunken in ignorant malice? If so, the drunken fit will soon be over, and God will awake a tormenting Wit. If you can conquer God, try your strength first on his works: Stop the Sun: change Night and Day: turn the Tide of the Sea: live without Meat or Air: resolve that you will never die: save all your Friends from death. Can you do none of this, and yet will you venture a War against God? Or do you think to fight against his Servants, and bribe him to be on your side, and forsake them to your rage? Did Christ take Mans Nature, and die to save them, and will he now turn on Satans side against them? He overcame the Devils temptation on Earth; yea called Peter Satan, Mat. 16. when he would have tempted him not to die for his chosen. Let Men or Devils go try him in his Glory, whether he will change his mind, and take your part against his own holy Truth and Servants.