The Measures of Christian Obedience, Book 1 · Chapter 3
CHAP. III. Of Pardon promised to Repentance.
The CONTENTS.
Of Pardon promised to Repentance, Regeneration, a New Nature, a New Creature. The Nature of Repentance, it includes amendment and Obedience. The Nature of Regeneration and a New Creature. Its fitness to produce Obedience. Some mens Repentance ineffectual. The folly of it. Pardon promised to Repentance and Regeneration no further than they effect Obedience. In the case of dying Penitents a change of mind accepted without a change of practice. That only where God sees a change of Practice would ensue upon it. This would seldom happen upon death-bed resolutions and Repentance. The general ineffectiveness of this shown by experience. Two reasons of it. 1. Because it proceeds ordinarily upon an inconstant temporary principle, viz. nearness of Death and present fears of it. Though it always begins there, yet sometimes it grows up upon a principle that is more lasting, viz. a conviction of the absolute necessity of Heaven and a Holy Life. 2. Because it is ordinarily in a weak and incompetent degree. All TRVE resolution is not able to reform Men. Sick-bed resolutions generally unable. Such ineffective resolutions unavailing to mens Pardon.
THirdly, That condition which the Gospel exacts of us as the terms whereupon we must hope to find Life and Pardon at the last day, is oft-times called Repentance, Regeneration, a New Creature, or a New Nature. Christs fore-runner, John the Baptist, came preaching Repentance for the remission of sins, Luk. 3.3. And when Christ himself commissions his Apostles to publish his Gospel over all the world, their instructions are to preach Repentance and remission of Sins in his Name to all Nations, beginning at Jerusalem, Luk. 24.47. And according to this order they practised. Repent, says St Peter in his first Sermon, and be baptized for the remission of sins, Acts 2.38. And again, Repent that your sins may be blotted out, Acts 3.19. And then as for Regeneration, a New Creature, and a New Nature; they are such qualifications as fit us for Eternal Life, and without which we shall never be admitted to it. It is, says our Saviour to Nicodemus, a mans being born again that must capacitate him to enter into the Kingdom of God, Joh. 3.3. In Christ Jesus, or the Christian Religion saith St Paul, neither Circumcision availeth any thing, nor Vncircumcision, but a NEW CREATVRE, Gal. 6.15. The condition required of all men to Life and Pardon, as the truth is in Jesus, is this, that they put off the OLD MAN, and be RENEWED in the spirit of their mind; and that they put on the NEW MAN, which after the similitude of God is Created in righteousness and true holiness, Eph. 4.21, 22, 23, 24.
Repentance in the constant and plain notion of the Scriptures, is such a vertuous alteration of the mind and purpose, as begets a like vertuous change in the life and practice. It begins in our thoughts and resolutions, and is made perfect in our works and actions. It first casts all false principles and foolish judgments of the desireableness of sin, and the dreadfulness of vertue; all opinions that hinder a good life, and encourage wickedness; all inveagling thoughts and bewitching imaginations; all firm purposes and studied contrivances of evil out of our minds: and thereby purges all wickedness and disobedience out of our lives and actions.
It implies a change of mind, as is well noted by the Greek aforeign.name for Repentance, which is very expressive of its nature. For it signifies an alteration of the mind, a transformation of our thoughts and counsels; and is the same that St Paul calls a being renewed in the spirit of our mind, Eph. 4.23. And this God expressly calls for when he summons the wicked to repentance, Isa. 55. Let the wicked man forsake his thoughts, and turn them from his sin unto the Lord, and then he will have mercy upon him, vers. 7.
It includes also an alteration of the life and practice, a forbearing to repeat the sin which we repent of. And this is a natural effect of the former, in as much as our works and actions will still go along with our studies and contrivances, our purposes and resolutions. Now this part of repentance from sin, viz. a leaving or forsaking of it, is its prime ingredient, and the chief thing which the Scriptures express by it; it is the main end, whereto the former serves only as the principle and instrument. Godly sorrow, or the grief and trouble of our minds for having offended God, working, as St Paul says, that Repentance which will never fail us, nor ever need to be repented of, 2 Cor. 7.10. And that Repentance includes this alteration of our lives, as well as that other of our minds, the Scriptures plainly express to us, when they stile it a Repentance FROM dead works, Heb. 6.1. a TVRNING away from all transgressions, and doing that which is lawful and right, Ezek. 18.27, 30. A CONVERSION FROM darkness unto light, Acts 26.18. a putting AWAY the evil of our DOINGS, by ceasing to DO evil, and learning to DO well, Isa. 1.16, 17.
These two changes, a change of mind and a change of practice, make up the essence, and integrate the nature of a saving Repentance. It implies first a change in our minds and tempers, and upon that a correspondent change in our lives and actions.
Now as for the former of these, this change of our minds and tempers in new thoughts, new counsels, new desires and resolutions: this vertuous alteration both in our wills and understandings, which are those two powers that make up our rational nature, is that which the Scriptures call our new nature; the begetting of which in us is called our bNoah's preaching Righteousness and Repentance before the flood, 2 Pet. 2.5. and 1 Pet. 3.20. is thus expessed by St. Clement, foreign. 1. Epist. ad Cor. c. 9.regeneration, or our being born again. For the tempers and inclinations of our souls, are usually in our common discourse called our nature. A man of a loving condescensive disposition, is called a man of a good nature; and one of a sowr revengeful temper, is called a man of an ill nature. And the change from one to the other is called a change of Nature, a making of him a new Creature, and a new man. And thus we are daily wont to say of any person, who from wicked and sinful inclinations is changed to a disposition which is vertuous and holy, that he is become a new man. And as this is our language, so is it the Scriptures too. For our putting on the tempers and habitual inclinations of righteousness and true holiness, is called our putting on the new man, Eph. 4.24. The alteration from an unbelieving and uncharitable, to a believing loving temper, to a Faith that worketh by love, St Paul calls a New Creature, Gal. 5.6. compared with Chap. 6. vers. 15. And as for the renovation it self, it is called a regeneration or new birth; the Author of it, a Father; and the persons so renewed, his Sons or Children. All which are expressed to us by St John, when he tells us of all those which have received such vertuous and holy dispositions from God, as make them resemble him and like unto him, that they are the Sons of God, 1 Joh. 3.2. and born of him, 1 Joh. 5.1, 4. In like manner as the Disciples of the Prophets among the Jews, because they received those qualifications from their institution whereby they were made like unto them, are usually in the Old Testament called cProphetarum Filii. And in the like sence among the Gentiles, Poetarum Filii.Sons of the Prophets.
Now this first part of Repentance, or this inward change of mind and purpose, which is called a New Creature and a New nature; is a most direct cause and natural Author of a like change in our outward works, and of an obedient service. For it cuts off the very root of all Transgression, and plants that of Obedience instead of it. It makes us now in obeying, to follow our own temper and inclination; and our doing of Gods will to become our desire, as well as it is our duty. So that now when we perform Gods commands, we do nothing more than follow the natural tendencies of our own souls; our duty is become our choice and delight, and it is not without pains and difficulty that we can either omit, or transgress it. For it is an equal force and violence to a renewed and obedient nature to act sin, as it is for a wicked and debauched one to work obedience. He whose nature carries him on to love and pity, can as hardly be rigorous and cruel; as he on the contrary can abstain from cruelty, whose nature is harsh and revengeful. To act against nature any way is not without difficulty, and to follow it is always easie. And if it be changed from sin and disobedience, to obedience and holiness; it is then as truly a self-denial to sin and transgress, as it was before to perform and obey. Nay if this alteration gets up to a full growth, and obedience become perfectly our nature: it is then not only uneasie, but even almost impossible to sin against it. For then we shall be arrived to that pitch which St Johns words express, when he says that he who is born of God, or formed into this new nature which makes him like unto, and comes from God, CANNOT sin, 1 Joh. 3.9.
So that if Obedience has got this hank of us, if by this first part of Repentance, or this new nature, it be engraffed in our tempers and inclinations; and become the employment of our thoughts, the desire of our hearts, and the matter of our firm purposes and resolutions: it cannot miss of our works and actions. It has won the principles that command them; so that nothing more is needful to be done towards their procurement, but they will be sure to follow after them.
Now because Repentance in its whole nature implies Obedience as its chief ingredient; and because the first part of it, viz. a change of mind, which is called a new nature, or a new creature, is so natural a principle, and so powerful a cause to work and effect it: therefore, and upon no other reason, doth God in the Scriptures so far encourage them. He means not in any wise at the last day to acquit and reward men upon such repentance and new birth as is void of obedient works and actions; but upon such only as include or effect them.
'Tis true, indeed, the wicked and disobedient, who will not reform and obey, but would notwithstanding have right to Life and Pardon, call something else repentance, which is void of all amendment and obedience. If they confess their sin, and are sad upon it, if they wring their hands, and beat their breasts, and then, giving it hard names and reproachful titles, beg God to forgive them; they think they have done an acceptable service, and sufficiently repented of it. They take no care to keep off from it, provided they continue to bewail and confess it. For although they bring in before God large Catalogues of sins, yet they never strive to lessen them. But when they profess to him how they have deserved his wrath and Eternal judgment; they want nothing but opportunity still further to provoke it. When they acknowledge how vilely they have affronted him in the breach of his Laws, they are still ready to repeat it. All the hard names which they give their sins, are false and forced expressions, they mean no hurt to them all the while. For although they revile them in their words, yet they honour and applaud them in their practice. They are still in love with them at their next meeting, and for all the ill language which they gave them when they spake of them before God, they will embrace them upon the first occasion, and repeat them upon every return of temptation.
But can any considerate man think that such a Repentance as this shall avail him before God, and save him from perishing when Christ comes to judgment? Surely he must know nothing, either of Gods nature, or of his word, who can be imposed upon so grossly. For God by the necessity of his very nature perfectly hates all sin, and so can never be reconciled to any man barely for telling him that he is a sinner. To inform him only that we have rebell'd against him, is to acquaint him that we are his enemies, whom, to vindicate himself, and the Authority of his Government, he should destroy and ruine, not cherish and protect. The Gospel declares that he will take severe and endless vengeance on all that dye unreformed, and finally disobedient: and then to own our disobedience to his face, without a true turn and a firm purpose of reformation, is to bid him maintain his Law, and execute his Sentence; to provoke justice, and not to appease it; to hasten and assure our misery, but by no means to prevent or retard it.
But that Repentance whereupon God will Pardon us, and that Regeneration which he will eternally Reward, is such only as either includes, or ends in Obedience and reformation. When he graciously proclaims, that whosoever repenteth him of his former sins, and is born again, shall be saved; he means whosoever doth the one, and is the other, and obeys with them. His speech is metonymical, he intends obedience, and the thing implies it, although his words do not express it. For all the while it is only a repentance which is obedient, and a new Nature that is operative which in the last judgment he will eternally reward, and pronounce for ever Blessed.
For of repentance he tells us plainly, how that which he means when he promises Life and Pardon to it, is such only as implies a forsaking in our works and actions those Sins which we repent of. It is a Repentance FROM dead works, Heb. 6.1. A forbearing to act what we confess is evil. They repented not, says he, of the works of their hands, in making and worshipping Idols, that they should not ANY LONGER worship them, Rev. 9.20. And because it includes a turn and a change of our works and actions, from Sin and Transgression, to Vertue and Obedience; therefore is it expressed by forsaking and dJer. 8.6. So St. Clement uses the words foreign and foreign promiscuously. foreign. And what in the Septuagint, whom he follows in Citations, is expressed by foreign, Ezek. 33.11. foreign, &c. he, giving the sence, though not the words, according to the Apostolical usage, expresses thus,— foreign, Clem. Rom. 1. Ep. ad Cor. c. 7.8. And agreeably to this, the compilers of our Liturgy in the Sentences before Morning Service in our Old Common Prayer Books, translate Matt. 3.2. Repent ye, for the Kingdom of God is at hand; thus— Amend your lives, for the Kingdom, &c. As on the other side, they expound Ezek. 18.21. If the wicked turn from all his sins that he hath committed, and keep all my statutes, and do that which is lawful and right, &c. thus— At what time soever a sinner repenteth, &c.returning. Repent and TVRN to God, and do works meet for Repentance, Acts 26.20. Repent and turn from all your transgressions, and so iniquity shall not be your ruine, Ezek. 18.30. For it is only when the wicked man TVRNETH away from his wickedness that he hath committed, and in his works DOTH that which is lawful and right, that he shall save his soul alive, vers. 27.
Let no man therefore think that he ever savingly repents of any damning sin, so long as he perseveres to practise and repeat it. …his Repentance must deliver him from sin, before it rescue him from suffering; for 'tis then only when the wicked man forsakes his way, and returns unto the Lord, that God will have mercy upon him and abundantly pardon, Isa. 55.7.
And as for that part of Repentance, viz. Regeneration, a New Nature, or a New Creature; God tells us plainly that he accepts of them no further than they are principles of a new service, and we obey with them. The new Creature in Christs Religion, is a being Created, as St. Paul speaks, unto good WORKS, which God hath before ordained for us that we should walk in them, Eph. 2.10. It is our actions which must evidence our nature; the tree, says our Saviour, is known by its fruits; so that we must either make the fruit good as well as the tree is good, or, if the fruit be evil, the tree will be known to be so too, Matt. 12.33. For do men gather Grapes of Thorns, or Figs of Thistles? Even so a good tree CANNOT bring forth evil fruit, neither CAN a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit: by their fruits therefore you shall know them, Matt. 7.16, 17, 18. Nothing less than a good life will be allowed, either by God or Men, for a sufficient proof of a good heart; nor any thing below a new Conversation and Obedience, will pass for a good evidence of a new Nature. Doth a Fountain send forth at the same place sweet water and bitter, saith St James; can the Fig-tree bear Olive-berries or a Vine Figs? Who is a wise man, and endued with knowledge among you? Let HIM show out of a good CONVERSATION his works with meekness of wisdom, Jam. 3.11, 12, 13. Let no man therefore dare to think himself regenerate and born of God, so long as he is disobedient, and his works are sinful. For whosoever is born of God doth not COMMIT sin, because his seed, his new nature, remaineth in him; and through the determining power and strength of that, he is almost come to this that he cannot sin; it is become the bent of his nature to do otherwise, he is born of God, Joh. 3.9. If any man therefore would pass a true judgment upon his nature, whether it be the new or old Man; from God, or from the Devil; let him consult his works and actions, those undissembling effects of it, and from thence he may have a sure evidence which will not deceive him. For in this, as St John goes on in the next words, is manifested who are Children of God, and who are Children of the Devil; whosoever DOTH not Righteousness is not of God, vers. 10.
So that when Christ comes to judge us according to his Gospel, we see plainly that no repentance will bear us out, nor any pretended regeneration or new Nature avail us unto life, but that only which either implies, or ends in our Obedience. For no man can with any show of reason hope to be acquitted and rewarded at that Bar, but he that repents unto amendment, that is Created unto good works, and is born again, to a new practice and obedience.
One case indeed there is, wherein a new birth will surely save a man without a new practice; and that is when a man is forthwith called away upon the change, before any opportunities of action come. Some men are listed into Gods service late, at the eleventh hour of the day, Matt. 20.6. They have just time to become obedient in will and purpose, but not in life and practice; they have no leisure left them to work in, but the night comes suddenly upon them, when all the time of labour is at an end. And this is the case of all dying Penitents.
And here indeed the will shall be accepted for the deed. For in heart and mind such Penitents are become Gods honest servants; their desires are in great strength, and their inward purposes are come up to effectual degrees, that want nothing but time wherein to show themselves, and are sufficient, whensoever an opportunity should occur, to beget a change of life, and to make their actions answer them. So that if they are destitute of an entire obedience, and have not as yet evidenced their change of nature in their change of practice; that is not for want of inward readiness but of outward opportunities; and therefore it is not so' much their fault as their unhappiness. And when God sees it is thus, he takes the inward will and choice, for the outward service and performance. He judges us by our wills, which are in our own power; and not by chance and fortune, which are utterly without it. This he doth in evil actions, as shall be shown afterwards; the will in them is taken for the deed, and if once our hearts are effectually resolved and fully set upon them, in his account we are guilty of them, though by some intervening accidents we are hindred from committing them. And since,Quid planius quàm quod voluntas pro facto reput…tur, ubi factum excl…dic necessitas? nisi forte putetur in malo, quàm in bono efficacior inveniri voluntas apud Deum, qui charitas est; & promptioresset ad ulciscendum, quam ad remunerandum misericors & miserator Dominus. Bernard. Ep. ad Hugonem de Sancto Victore quae est Ep. 77. p. op. 1458. as St Bernard argues undeniably in this matter, he is much more prone to pity than he is to punish, and had far rather interpret things to our profit than to our prejudice: we may be sure that our obedient purposes shall have as much force to the full as our disobedient have, and that an effectual will in them, when nothing but time is wanting to perform in, shall pass for the deed likewise. God is by no means forward to seek our hurt, and to take advantages of our necessities; but in this, and all other cases, where there is first an effectually willing mind, and nothing but opportunity is wanting to an answerable practice, he takes, as St Paul says, the will for the deed, and accepts men according to that sufficient and effectual desire which they have; and not according to that outward performance, which through some unhappy and preventing accidents, they have not, 2 Cor. 8.12.
And of this we have a clear instance in one dying Penitent, the Thief upon the Cross. His return was late indeed, he begun not to befit himself for the next world, till he was in his departure out of this. His conversion was in his very last hour, under the pangs of Death, and at the instant of Execution. But when Christ saw that his change of heart was true, full, and sufficient; and needed nothing but opportunity to show it self effectual; he tells him that it should serve his turn, and secure his happiness. Because he would have been obedient in his practice if he had lived to it, he shall be rewarded at the last day as if he had. For this very day, says he, shalt thou be with me in Paradise, Luk. 23.42.
Thus available, I say, a new nature and an inward change is, although it want an outward practice, when it is sufficient and effectual to produce it, and would certainly effect it, if there were but time and opportunity allow'd for it.
But then here is the dangerous state and deplorable case of all such dying Penitents, that 'tis twenty to one, if they defer repentance to their death-bed, that all the change which then appears in them is not so sufficient, nor would, were there a due time allow'd for it, prove so effectual. And of this we have a clear argument, in that among all the holy vows and pious purposes, which are begun by men upon a sick-bed, when they are in sight of death and expect a dissolution; there are so few that continue with them, and prove effectual to make their lives and actions answer them when they recover. There is not, I believe, one unconverted Christian in five hundred, but will show some signs of sorrow, and put up devout Prayers, and make holy vows and purposes when he apprehends himself about to dye: and yet of all them who are raised up again, 'tis a very small and inconsiderable number that make good those vows, and effect what they had resolved upon. And now if these men had dyed when they thus repented, in what a miserable state had they been! For this change in their will and purpose is no further available to their Salvation, than it would be effectual to a like change in their lives and practice. God accepts the holiness of the mind only as it is a holy principle, and imputes the reward of obedience to it no farther than he foresees, that if he allow'd time, obedience would ensue upon it. The will is never taken for the deed, but when it is able to effect it, when the deed would be sure to follow so soon as an opportunity were offer'd for it. And this God sees before hand, although we do not: he is able to judge of the sincerity of mens desires, and of the sufficiency of their purposes before their following works declare them. And according to what he foresees they would afterwards effect; he either accepts, or rejects them. But when mens after-works come as a clear evidence of the unsincerity, or insufficiency of their sick-bed resolutions; they may see plainly themselves, what God saw long before, that all the change of mind, which was then wrought, was utterly insignificant and unavailing. When they trusted to it, they relyed upon a broken reed; their confidence upon it was ill grounded, and if they had dyed with it, it would most certainly have deceived them.
Thus utterly uncertain and uncomfortable a thing is a mere unworking change, and a late death-bed Repentance. It may sometimes prove sufficient to beget an after-change of practice, and when God sees it would, he will undoubtedly accept it. But it very seldom doth, and no man who dyes in it can possibly tell whether it would or no. It is very great odds that it would prove too weak; so that although there be some, yet is there very small hope that any dying man can place in it.
And that which renders it ordinarily so insufficient, and thereupon so uncertain and uncomfortable, is either,
First, Because it generally proceeds from an unconstant, temporary principle: Or,
Secondly, Because, when the principle is genuine and lasting, it is still too weak and in an incompetent measure and degree.
1. That penitential grief and change of mind which is wrought upon a Death-bed, is ordinarily ineffective, and insufficient to produce a constant change of life and practice, because it generally proceeds from an inconstant and temporary principle. It is commonly founded upon a reason that doth not hold in all times, a reason that is good in sickness, but not in health; that concludes for a Pious change, whilst we are under our sick-bed sorrows; but not when, being freed from them, we come under the pleasure of temptations. For the great and general motive which makes all those, who never thought of reforming in all their lives before, to resolve upon it when they are on their Death-bed; is plainly the nearness of the next world, and their apprehension of their sudden death and departure. Could they hope to live longer, they would sin still. But they look upon themselves as going to Judgment, and they have so much Conscience left in them, as to believe that there is a Hell for the impenitent; and their own self-love is extreamly startled at that, and makes them run to any shelter: So that they make many fearful confessions, and fervent Prayers, and Holy purposes, and say and do any thing whereby they may quiet their present fears, and catch at any comfortable hopes of avoiding it. The ordinary cause then of all this work, is not any love of God, or hatred of Sin; but only a fear of Punishment. And that too not a fear of it at a distance, and as at some removes from them; but only as near at hand, and just hanging over them. But now as for this apparant nearness of Death, and this confounding fear upon it; it is plainly a short and transient, an unconstant, temporary Principle. It is a reason to them no longer than they are sick; for when they recover and are well again, Death is as far off, and they are become again as fearless as ever. They are got out of its neighbourhood, and it gives them no further trouble: So that all their former fears abate, and their vertuous resolutions fall, as beginning now to want that which first gave life to them, and should support them. And now when opportunities of Sin are offered, and the pleasurable baits of Temptations invite; they have nothing left that is able to resist them. Whilst they were sick, they were not capable to be tempted; and then Death being near, it enabled them to purpose well, and to make a pious resolution. But now, since they are well, Temptations are become as strong as ever; and the thoughts of Death being far removed, they have no resolutions that can withstand them, but are quickly changed again into the same men, as sensual and sinful as they were before.
Indeed it sometimes happens, that those souls which were at first awakened by such a transient, temporary motive; go on to others afterwards, that are more fixt and lasting: and then they are furnished with Armour in all times, and have a motive that may bear them out when Death is far off, as well as when 'tis near at hand; in time of health, as well as in time of sickness. For they who were at first affrighted into a change of mind and holy purposes, by the near approach of Death and Judgment, go on sometimes to confirm their resolutions upon more lasting principles. They think themselves into a deep sense of that ingratitude towards God which is in Sin, and of its mischievousness to their own selves; how it robs them of all that Eternal Good which their hearts desire, and brings them under all those insupportable and endless evils which they fear: all which it doth for the purchase of some light, empty, and transient Pleasures, which are vastly below the joys of Heaven; and for the avoidance of some short pain and uneasiness, which are infinitely nothing in comparison of the Pains of Hell. And these thoughts give them a firm and lasting conviction of the utter necessity of renouncing all evil courses, which are so destructive; and of leading a holy and obedient life, which are so infinitely becoming them, and beneficial to them. And this conviction now can beget and preserve a resolution that is sufficient and effectual, victorious and prevailing. It will be a reason to them to resolve and practise at all times, in sickness and in health; when they are not tempted, and also when they are. For Heaven and the Love of God is always a necessary end, and Obedience is always a necessary means or instrument. So that if Men resolve upon a conviction of this necessity, they resolve upon a reason that may well hold always. They will constantly have the highest reason to be so convinced; and still to repeat and fortifie their resolution upon such conviction; and to act and practise that which they have so wisely resolved. And when a Sick-mans change is built upon this ground, and proceeds upon this motive; it may be permanent and fixt, effectual and prevailing. As it is in all those who are Converted by Sickness and Afflictions, that great, and usually last means which God makes use of for the reclaiming of sinful Men.
But generally Mens sick-bed purposes go no further than the first ground. They always begin upon the fears of present Death, and the near approach of Judgment; and though sometimes they go higher still, yet ordinarily they rest there; so that they have no change longer than their sickness lasts. And this Repentance is certainly insufficient; this will can never be accepted for the deed; because if they were allow'd to recover again, and to live on till an opportunity of Doing came, the good will and purpose would be quite lost, and able to effect nothing.
But although a Death-bed change should proceed upon both these grounds, and the dying men should resolve to amend, both upon the sense of sudden Death, which will maintain their resolution so long as it is near, and also upon a conviction of the absolute necessity of Heaven and a Holy Life, which may make them resolve still when the present danger is over: yet may their Repentance after all be insufficient and avail nothing. For a Death-bed Repentance when it doth proceed upon a genuine and lasting motive, is still oft times ineffectual, because the change is,
2. In too weak and incompetent a measure and degree. It is not every degree even of true and undissembled resolution that will overcome a mans Lusts, and strengthen him to such a pitch as to make him prevail over all Temptations. A thousand good resolutions go to Hell, because although they are sincere and true, yet they are weak and ineffectual. For how many men are there who resolve against their sins, who do not yet get quit of them? They purpose to leave them; but for all that they live still in them: their mind and will is against them; but yet they continue to work and practise them. When once men have got violent lusts, and vicious habits, and Sin by a long use is become almost a second nature to them: it is not every measure, no nor every moderate degree of resolution that can mortifie and overcome them. For a weak resolution is quickly overthrown, mens Lusts are too hard for it, and quite overbear it: it may make some resistance, create some trouble, and cause some delay; but that is all that it can do: it can only contend and struggle, but it is not able to overcome. This is plain from every Religious Mans experience; and this St Paul sets down expressly in his character of the unregenerate striver in the seventh Chapter of the Epistle to the Romans. For there was a real change in his mind, without a change in his practice; a resolution without effect; and a will without performance: the violence of his Lusts was too hard for the convictions of his Conscience, and led him Captive, even against his will, into a course of Sin and disobedience. With the MIND, says he, I serve the Law of God, but with the FLESH the Law of Sin, v. 25. What I DO, I ALLOW not; for what I WOVLD that I DO not; but what I HATE, that I DO, v. 15, 19. To WILL is present with me, but how to PERFORM that which is good I find not, v. 18. For the Law of my MEMBERS wars against the Law of my MIND, and brings me into CAPTIVITY to the Law of Sin, v. 23.
Thus weak and unable, ineffective and idle, are many true and real resolutions. They have not strength enough to do their work; the opposition is greater than they can overcome; so that they are able to make no alteration, but for all this change of mind, men will continue wicked and disobedient in their practice still.
And of this sort generally, even when they proceed upon a genuine and lasting motive, are the Penitential purposes of Dying-men. For, alas! when Men have lived all their Lives in a course of Sin, and their minds have been always taken up with it, and their hearts wholly inslaved to it: it is no easie matter to bring them off, and to fill them with such firmness of purpose, and strength of pious resolution as would be able effectually to mortifie and subdue it. This is a most laborious work, and a difficult undertaking. It requires much time, and the freedom of all our faculties. For how hard a thing is it, even for men in health, when their thoughts are free, distracted by no business, interrupted by no pain, and disturbed by no disease or other hindrance, to work themselves up to an effectual and prevailing resolution against any one Sin which they have been habitually inured, and for a long time enslaved to? And even of them who do at last effectually resolve against it, how few are there who came to such a pitch of resolution at the first tryal? No, their proceeding is gradual, they go on from step to step; every following resolution is more firm, and stronger than that which went before; till after several repetitions and advances, they arrive at last to a degree and pitch of holy purpose so compleat as can effect that vertuous change of life and action which they aim at. So that their spiritual Life is not brought on to perfection in a moment, more than their natural; but requires much time, and much exercise: for as their sinful habits were not at first acquired, so neither are they to be conquered by one action, but by many. And since the process in Repentance, even from one single Sin, is so long and tedious ere it has arrived to a saving pitch, and so difficult to a healthy man, who has nothing to trouble and distract him: what must an universal reformation be to a dying person, whose time is short, and much disturbed; who cannot repeat many resolutions, nor make a tryal of the force and power of any one, and who is most likely to be weak and languid in all those good purposes which he makes, by reason that his thoughts are heavy, and his attention broken, and all his faculties are oppressed with pain, and become weary and unactive through a wasting Disease? Surely if the first resolutions of healthy Men are generally so ineffective and insufficient; these purposes of dying Penitents, which in all advantages for a strong and prevailing resolution fall much below them, must needs be generally of this ineffective sort too.
And when they are so, they stand us in no stead in Gods account, but are utterly unavailable to any mans Salvation. A man who only purposeth, but doth not practise; who barely wills, but is not able to perform; is in the way to life indeed, but he is far from having yet attained to it. He is still in a sad case, and under a damning Sentence. For he is, as St Paul says in that seventh Chapter to the Romans where he describes him, slain by Sin, vers. 11. It works death in him, vers. 13. he is yet under, as the Law of Sin, so the body of Death too, vers. 24. But the change of mind which God requires of us, is such as works a change of practice. If he sees it sufficient to effect that, he accepts it indeed before the effect follows: he takes the will for the deed, when he sees the will is so strong as that upon any fit occasion it would produce it; and upon this account he accepted the dying Thief, Luk. 23.42. But if it be only an impotent and ineffective will, and he discerns plainly that no obedient works would follow it: it is no such will as he rewards, and for such Penitents, he will by no means absolve, but utterly condemn them.
And since the change of mind and penitential purposes of dying persons, even when they are upon genuine and lasting grounds, so as in the following parts of a mans life, if God should please to spare him, they would do something; would yet be weak and insufficient, and so unable to do enough: here is still a further reason of the ordinary insufficiency of such Repentance, and why those dying men will not ordinarily be saved by it, but perish notwithstanding it.
To conclude this point then, we see that 'tis possible for such New-birth to save a Man, as has not yet produced a New practice; and for dying Penitents to be accepted upon a change of mind, without a like change of life and actions. This I say is possible, it sometimes is, and sometimes has been done: but this indeed is very rare and very seldom, so that no Man in his sober wits, who has time before him, will dare to trust to it. And the sum of all is this, That to men who are so unhappy as to be brought into it, it has, as is expressed in fQuid dicam nescio, quid promittam penitus ignoro; revocare ab inquisitione ultimi remedii periclitantes, durum & impium; spondere autem aliquid in tam sera cautione, temerarium. Salv. de Avaritia, l. 1. p. 363. Ed. Oxon.Salvians determination, just so much hope as may excite a good endeavour: but to men who are yet out of it, it is altogether so desperate, as utterly to discourage all delay.