Seasonable Counsel, Title page – Errata
Seasonable Counsel: OR, ADVICE TO Sufferers. BY JOHN BUNYAN.
LONDON, Printed for Benjamin Alsop, at the Angel and Bible in the Poultry. MDCLXXXIV.
TO THE CHRISTIAN READER.
BEloved, I thought it convenient, since many at this day are exposed to sufferings, to give my advice touching that to thee. Namely, that (thou wouldest take heed to thy self, and keep thy Soul diligently, and not suffer thy self to be entangled in those snares that God hath suffered to be laid in the World for some. Beware of men, is the counsel of Christ, for they will deliver you up. (Mat. 10 17.) Keep thou therefore within the bounds of uprightness and integrity towards both God and man: for that will fortifie, that will preserve thee, if not from, yet under the rage of men, in a comfortable and quiet frame of heart. Wherefore do that, and that only, that will justifie they innocency, and that will help thee, not with forced Speech, but with good Conscience (when oppressed) to make thy appeals to God, and to the Consciences of all men.
This is the advice that (I thank God.) I have taken my self: for I find that there is nothing, next to God and his Grace by Christ, that can stand one in such stead, as will a good and harmless Conscience.
I hope I can say God has made me a Christian: and a Christian must be a harmless Man, and, to that end, must imbrace nothing but harmless Principles. A Christian business, as a Christian, is to believe in Jesus Christ and in God the Father by him, and to seek the good of all about him, according as his place, state and capacity in this World will admit, not medling with other mens matters, but ever following that which is good.
A Christian is a Child of the Kingdom of God, and that Kingdom (take it as it begins in Grace, or as it is perfected in Glory,) is not of this World but of that which is to come: and though (men of old as) some may now be afraid of that Kingdom: yet that Kingdom will hurt no man, neither with its Principles, nor by it self. To instance somewhat. Faith in Christ: what harm can that do? A life regulated by a moral Law, what hurt is in that? Rejoycing in Spirit for the hope of the life to come, by Christ, who will that harm? Nor is the instituted worship of our Lord of any evil tendency, Christianity teaches us also to do our enemies good, to love them that hate us, and to pray for them that despitefully use us and persecute us, and what evil can be in that. This is the summ of the Christian Religion, (as by the word may be plainly made appear:) wherefore I counsel thee to keep close to these things, and touch with nothing that jostleth therewith.
Nor do thou marvel (thou living thus) if some should be so foolish as to seek thy hurt, and to afflict thee, because thy works are good. (1 John 3.12.) For there is need that thou shouldest at sometimes be in manifold temptations, thy good and innocent life notwithstanding. (1 Pet. 1.6.) For, to omit other things, there are some of the graces of God that are in thee, that as to some of their Acts, cannot shew themselves, nor their excellency, nor their power, nor what they can do: but as thou art in a suffering state. Faith and Patience, in persecution, has that to do, that to shew, and that to perform, that cannot be done, shewed, nor performed any where else but there. There is also a patience of hope; a rejoycing in hope, when we are in tribulation, that is, over and above that which we have when we are at ease and quiet. That also that all graces can endure, and triumph over, shall not be known, but when, and as we are in a state of affliction. Now these Acts of our Graces are of that worth and esteem with God, also he so much delighteth in them: that occasion thorough his righteous Judgment, must be ministred for them to shew their beauty, and what bravery there is in them.
It is also to be considered that those Acts of our Graces, that cannot be put forth, or shew themselves in their splendor, but when we Christianly suffer; will yield such fruit to those whose Tryals call them to exercise, that will in the day of God, abound to their comfort and tend to their perfection an glory. (1 Pet. 1.7. 2 Cor. 4.17.)
Why then should we think th…t our innocent lives will exempt us from sufferings, or that troubles shall do us such harm? For verily it is for our present and future good that our God doth send them upon us. I count therefore, that such things are necessary for the health of our Souls, as bodily pains and labour are for the Body. People that live high, and in idleness, bring diseases upon the Body: and they that live in all fulness of Gospel-Ordinances, and are not exercised with Tryals, grow gross, are diseased and full of bad humours in their Souls. And though this may to some seem strange: yet our day has given us such an experimental proof of the truth thereof, as has not been known for some ages past.
Alas we have need of those bitter, pills, at which we so whinch and shuck: and it will be well if at last we be purged as we should thereby. I am sure we are but little the better as yet, though the Physician has had us so long in hand. Some bad humo…rs may, possibly ere long be driven out: but at present the disease is so high, that it makes some professors fear more a Consumption will be made in their purses by these Doses, than they desire to be made better in their Souls thereby. I see that I still have need of these Tryals, and if God will by these, judge me as he judges his Saints, that I may not be condemned with the World, I will cry, Grace, Grace for ever.
The consideration also that we have deserved these things, much silence me as to what may yet happen unto me. I say, to think that we have deserved them of God (though against men we have done nothing) makes me lay my hand upon my mouth, and causes me to hold my tongue. Shall we deserve correction? And be angry because we have it! Or shall it come to save us? and shall we be offended with the hand that brings it. Our sickness is so great that our enemies take notice of it; let them know too that we also take our Purges patiently. We are willing to pay for those Potions that are given us for the health of our Body, how sick soever they make us: and if God will have us pay too for that which is to better our Souls, why should we grudge thereat? Those that bring us these Medicines have little enough for their pains: for my part, I profess, I would not for a great deal, be bound, for their wages, to do their work. True, Physicians are for the most part chargeable, and the niggards are too loth to part with their Money to them: but when necessity says they must either take Physick, or die: of two evils they desire to chuse the least. Why, affliction is better than sin, and if God sends the one to cleanse us from the other, let us thank him, and be also content to pay the messenger.
And thou that art so loth to pay for thy sinning, and for the means that puts thee upon that exercise of thy graces, as will be for thy good hereafter: take heed of tempting of God lest he doubleth this Potion unto thee. The Child by eating of raw Fruit stands in need of Physick, but the Child of a childish humour refuseth to take the Potion, what follows but a doubling of the affliction, to wit frowns, chides, and further threatnings and a forcing of the bitter Pills upon him. But let me, to perswade thee to lie down and take thy Potion, tell thee, 'tis of absolute necessity, to wit for thy spiritual and internal health. For,
First, Is it better that thou receive judgment in this World, or that thou stay for it to be condemned with the ungodly in the next?
Secondly, Is it better that thou shouldest, as to some acts of thy Graces, be foreign, and a stranger, and consequently that thou shouldest lose that far more exceeding, and eternal weight of glory that is prepared as the reward thereof? or that thou should'st receive it at the hand of God, when the day shall come that every man, shall have praise of him for their doings?
Thirdly, And I say again, since chastisements are a sign of senship, a token of love: and the contrary a sign of Bastardy, and a token of hatred. (Heb. 12.6, 7, 8. Hos. 4.14.) Is it not better that we bear those tokens and marks in our flesh that bespeak us to belong to Christ, than those that declare us to be none of his. For my part, God help me to chuse rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season: and God of his mercy prepare me for his will. I am not for running my self into sufferings: but if Godliness will expose me to them, the Lord God make me more godly still: for I believe there is a World to come.
But Christian Reader, I would not detain thee from a sight of those sheets in thy hand: only let me beg of thee, that thou wilt not be offended either with God, or men, if the cross is laid heavy upon thee. Not with God, for he doth nothing without a cause: nor with men, for they are the hand of God: and will they, will they; they are the servants of God to thee for good. (Psal. 17.14. Jer. 24.5.) Take therefore what comes to thee from God by them, thankfully. If the messenger that brings it is glad that 'tis in his power to do thee hurt, and to afflict thee; if he skips for joy at thy calamity: be sorry for him; pity him, and pray to thy Father for him: he is ignorant and understandeth not the judgment of thy God, yea he sheweth by this his behaviour, that though he as Gods ordnance serveth thee by afflicting of thee: yet means he nothing less than to destroy thee: by the which also he prognosticates before thee that he is working out his own damnation by dong of thee-good. Lay therefore the woful state of such to heart, and render him that which is good for his evil; and love for his hatred to thee: then shalt thou shew that thou art acted by a Spirit of holiness, and art like thy heavenly Father. And be it so, that thy pity and Prayers can do such an one no good, yet they must light some where: or return again, as Ships come loaden from the Indies, full of blessings into thine own bosome.
And besides all this, is there nothing in dark Providences for the sake of the sight, and observation of which, such a day may be rendred lovely, when 'tis upon us. Is there nothing of God, of his Wisdom and Power and goodness to be seen in Thunder, and Lightning, in Hailstones? in Storms, and darkness and tempests? Why, then is it said, he hath his way in the whirlwind and storm. (Nahum 1.3.)? And why have Gods servants of old made such notes, and observed from them, such excellent and wonderful things. There is that of God to be seen in such a day as cannot be seen in another. His power in holding up some, his wrath in leaving of others; his making of Shrubs to stand, and his suffering of Cedars to fall; his infatuating of the Counsels of men, and his making of the Devil to out witt himself; his giving of his presence to his people, and his leaving of his foes in the dark; his discovering the uprightness of the hearts of his sanctified ones, and laying open the Hypocrisie of others, is a working of spiritual Wonders in the day of his wrath, and of the whirlwind and storm. These days! these days are the days that do most aptly give an occasion to Christians, of any, to take the exactest measures and scantlings of our selves. We are apt to overshoot, in days that are calm, and to think our selves far higher, and more strong than we find we be, when the trying day is upon us. The mouth of Gaal and the boasts of Peter were great and high before the Tryal came, but when that came, they found themselves to fall far short of the courage they thought they had. (Judges 9.38.)
We also, before the temptation comes, think we can walk upon the Sea, but when the winds blow, we feel our selves begin to sink. Hence such a time is rightly said to be a time to try us, or to find out what we are, and is there no good in this? Is it not this that rightly rectifies our judgment about our selves, that makes us to know our selves, that tends to cut off those superfluous spriggs of pride and self-conceitedness, wherewith we are subject to be overcome? Is not such a day, the day that bends us, humbleth us, and that makes us bow before God, for our faults committed in our prosperity? and yet doth it yield no good unto us? we could not live without such turnings of the hand of God upon us. We should be overgrown with flesh, if we had not our seasonable Winters. 'Tis said that in some Countreys Trees will grow, but will bear no fruit, because there is no Winter there. The Lord bless all seasons to his peop… and help them rightly to behave themselves under all the times that go over them.
Farewel. I am thine to serve thee in the Gospel, John Bunyan.
Ingenious Reader,
BY reason of the Authors absence, some small faults are escaped, notwithstanding the diligence of the Printer; which thou art desired to mend with thy Pen: And particularly in Page 192. l. 25. for buffeted read butted. p. 194. l. 13. r, so I could,