Advice to an Only Child, Chapter 18
CHAP. XVIII. How to manage an Afflicted Condition.
1. USE your beſt endeavours to get good by all the Afflictions and Croſſes that ſhall befal you. I know indeed it may be with Chriſtians as with Meats; ſome are preſerved in Sugar, as Cherries and Plums, &c. others (as Beef) are preſerved in Brine. But yet I think, you have more reaſon to fear the ſweetneſs of a proſperous, rather than the ſharp Brine of an adverſe condition. Bees are killed with Honey, but quickened with Vinegar. If you read your Bible through, you ſhall find that few of God's Children have gone through a proſperous condition, without being enſnared thereby, and rarely find any but have been bettered by adverſity. In the Summer of proſperity it's well if you be not Fly-blown. In the budding Spring, and in the blooming Summer, then Pride and Vanity, Formality in Religion, and Satisfaction in Creature comforts will be apt to ſprout forth and taint you; but the ſharp Winter of Affliction will kill theſe Vermin. Sharp and bitter things are abſterſive, and cleanſe the body from many noxious and phlegmatick humours; whereas ſweet things, much uſed, do ſtuff up the paſſages of the body, and create many obſtructions. It's a high Character that is given of that Noble Perſon, that Mirrour of your Sex, the Lady Jane Gray, that ſhe ſo managed an afflicted condition, that ſhe made Miſery it ſelf ſeem amiable, and the Night-cloths of Adverſity did as much become her as her Day-dreſſing. God's Children are his Jewels, his rich Plate, which being ſcoured by Afflictions, look brighter; their Souls are bleacht and whitened in the Waters of Afflictions. Theſe are the ſharp Lemmon that take off their Mill-dews. Chriſtians ſeldom come to be great Scholars in the School of Chriſt without the Rod of Afflictions. Learn to value Afflictions as you do Phyſick, not according to the taſt and relliſh, but according to the profitable effects that it works. That is to be accounted a bleſſed Feaver that preſerves the Soul from everlaſting burnings.
2. If you be not better'd by God's Rod when he ſends it, take heed leſt he turn not his Rod into a Serpent, as Moſes Rod was. Is it not to be thought a dangerous ſymptom of God's rejection and that the Phyſician of our Souls is leaving us, when Afflictions, which uſually are God's Phyſick to purge out our Diſeaſe, do cooperate therewith, and ſo encreaſe it? it's then to be feared that we ſhall hardly recover.
3. Improve all Afflictions for your ſpiritual good by Prayers, and actings of Faith in a Promiſe. 1. By Prayer. Is any afflicted? let him pray, Jam. 5.13. Afflictions may be ſaid to be improv'd by Prayer, theſe two ways; 1. By making them a motive to put your ſelf on Prayer. The Rod then doth the Child good, when it brings his ſtubborn heart to his knees. God therefore lays his People on their backs, that he may make them to look up to Heaven. Every Croſs is an unſanctified Croſs, that is not attended with Prayer. 2. By uſing Prayer as a means to help you againſt thoſe ſins, which are apt to accompany an afflicted condition, as Impatience, Diſcontent, &c. and to fetch in thoſe graces which you have moſt need of therein, as Faith, Humility, Repentance, Contentment, Joy, and Submiſſion to the Will of God. Prayer will cauſe theſe precious fruits to grow on the Croſs, and ſo it will be ſanctified to you.
2. Improve Afflictions by actings of Faith in the Promiſes. Afflictions are ſweetned to Believers, they are rolled up in Sugar, they are ſteept in Honey, ſanctified by the word of the Promiſe, that they ſhall work together for good, Rom. 8.28. and yield the peaceable fruit of righteouſneſs, Heb. 12.1. The Promiſe gives them a moſt delicious relliſh to Faith. Faith can make a ſoveraign Oil of theſe Scorpions to heal the Soul. Faith can turn Water into Wine, even the bitter Waters of Marah into the Wine of Comfort.