The Rise Race and Royalty of the Kingdom of God, Part 1 (6 of 6)

The Rise Race and Royalty of the Kingdom of God · Part 1 (6 of 6)

p. 156St. Iohn calls Jesus Christ, Revel. 1. 5, 6. Him that loved us, &c. and made us Kings, and Priests to God his Father.

The Love of Christ Crowns us Kings: Kings to God, not Imaginary, but p. 157True Kings; not Puppet-Kings in the Play of this Life, but Real Kings; not Kings to shadows, for the Dream of Time, but Kings for Eternity, to God; Kings, as God and Christ, whose Kingdom is not in this world, but in heavenly places, and in the Power of an Endless Life.

6. A Conquering Sweetness. This is the last. Of this St. John testifies concerning Christ; Joh. 13. 1. Having loved his own, he loved them to the end. The Love of Christ hath a conquering and triumphant Sweetness indeed; for it bring all things, Sin, Misery, Fl…sh, Time, the World, Death, to an end, but hath itself no end.

Fear not lest thy corruptions or evil should outwear thy Saviour's Love. No; It is made of a durable and everlasting Sweetness, which will outlast all things besides it self, or subdue them to itself.

Here you may change the Riddle, and sing; Out of sweetness comes strength, and out of the heavenly meat of our Spirits comes forth the Eater, that devours all other things, and makes them its meat.

Eph. 3. 19. St. Paul saith of the Love of Christ, that it passeth knowledge. This is a Conquering Sweetness, which conquers all our faculties, our largest, even our Understanding itself.

The Understanding is the Gate of the Soul; according to the capacity of this, so is the capacity of the Will and Affections of the whole Soul of Man.

The Love of Christ is too strong, too great for them all.

All the Powers of Man are here overcome: They cannot take it in. Let' them then cast themselves into this depth of Sweetness, and say, Because we cannot take thee into us, do thou take us into thee.

2. Spring; Beauty. This is the second ground of Joy in the Person of God, H…s Beauty.

David speaks of this, Psa. 27. 4. One thing have I desired of the Lord, that will I, seek after, that I may dwell in the House of the Lord all the daies of my life, to behold the Beauty of the Lord, and to enquire in his Temple.

Three things are remarkable in these words concerning the Beauty of the Divine Nature.

1. David was a King, a King in the East, where the Pomp and Glory of Courts excelled that of these Western parts of the world, as much as Courts here ou…sh…ne the Countrey. Yet David could have for ever left his Court for the Temple, and the Glories of that, for a sight of those Beauties which are in the face of God.

2. David was a Husband, and a Father; he was sweet enough in both Relations, an Affectionate Husband, a Tender Father: Yet David could have been content never to have seen Wife or Children more, so he might have seen continually the Beauty of God.

3. The Soul of man hath a Seminal Infiniteness, by which her desires grow endlesly. She therefore is delighted most with those things, which least bound her, which still draw forth fresh desires by opening fresh delights.

p. 158The Spirit of Man loves that best, which makes the utmost Satisfaction an Engagement, upon a farther pursuit.

Such is the Beauty of God. David prays, that he may be in the Temple to behold it, and to be searching still. The Loveliness of the God-Head actuates that Seminal Infinitene…s in the Soul, giving her the sweetest rest by suffering her never to rest from fresh Enquiries in her fullest Discoveries.

There are Two things in the Beauty of God, which will make thee glad at all times, if thou turn thine Eye towards them.

1. The Beauty of God drowns all other Beauties, Luk. 5. 39. Our Saviour tells us: No man having drunk old Wine straightway desireth new, for he saith the old is better. If thou once drink the old Wine of Eternal Beauties in the face of Jesus Christ, thou canst not miss or desire the new Wine of any Creature Loveliness, while the relish of that Beauty is upon thy Spirit: For thou wilt say; The Loveliness of my Saviour is far lovelier, and all other Loveliness is not lovely, compared with this, which so much excels it.

2. The Beauty of God draws all other Beauties into itself.

Elibu saith, Io… 34. 14, 15. If he set his heart upon man, if he gather unto himself his Spirit, and his Breath: All Flesh shall perish together, and man shall turn again to dust.

All Creatures are moulded out of Darkness as out of Dust. The Beauty of each Creature is a Spirit or Blast from God shining upon this darkness, which makes thee different Flesh of all kinds.

As the Sun-beams put out the fire, by drawing up the finer fiery parts into themselves; So God sets his face on man, draws in the Spirit of Loveliness to that face of Loveliness in himself. Then the fleshly form fades, and the Dust remains alone.

Keep thine Eye upon this Loveliness in the Person of thy Saviour. So thou shalt never mourn for the loss of any lovely thing, which was, as the Light of thine Eyes to thee: For thou shalt meet with every lovely thing, with every relish of Beauty in this Beauty, as a man meets with the taste of the Sugar in the Wine into which it was melted, and dissolv'd.

3. Spring: Power. No man can ever want Matter of Rejoycing in any Case, that understands and considers the Power of God.

Our Saviour said to the S…dduces, that denied the Resurrection: Ye err not knowing the Scriptures and the Power of God. If you err and exceed in Grief at any time, it is, because ye know not the Power of God: For if ye did ye would see there the Resurrection, and Immortality of all your Desires, Hopes, and Joys.

When our Saviour was entring into the blackest Cloud of sufferings, that ever came upon any Creature; He comforted himself in the Power of God. Mark 14. 36. Abba Father, all things are possible to thee.

With this he comforts his Disciples in that great matter of their Salvation: p. 159Matth. 19. 26. With men this is Impossible, but with God all things are Possible.

The Power of God can do Three Things.

1. It can change One contrary into Another, and make them to Embrace each other.

2. It can call back time that is past.

3. It can give a Being to Things, that have been, and have ceased to be any more.

1. The Power of God can change One contrary into Another, and make them both to Embrace each other. Psal. 139. 11, 12. If I say, the Darkness shall cover me, even the Night shall be light about me. When thy Soul saith, the Darkness of this Affliction will over-whelm me, and quite swallow me up: then can the Power of God make that Night of Affliction to be a Light of Comfort, and Joy round about thee.

Yea, the Darkness hideth not from thee, saith David to God, but the Night shineth as the Day. No Darkness, no Mid-night of Sorrow can hide, or lock up itself, or a Soul from the Power and Glory of God. These will dwell together with the deepest darkness, and the blackest night. These can make themselves One with them, and so make them to shine equal with the cheerfullest day of Prosperity.

The Power of God can pierce into the thickest Cloud of Grief. It can bring in thither all the Love, Excellency, Delight of the God-Head. It can make the Darkness of Grief a bright Light to discover all these, and lay them open to the view of your Spirits.

David goeth on: The Darkness and the Light are both alike to thee. O Wonderful Union of Contraries! O Unsearchable Power! O Powerful Matter of universal Joy!

God is the onelyonly Truth, and the Measure of Truth, Darkness, and Light are both alike to him, who is the first, and last.

As Light holds forth Darkness, and makes Manifest all Excellencies in itself: So Darkness holds forth Light, and is a manifestation of all Glories, an Image of all Images of Beauty and Pleasure before God.

Light hath its own proper Appearance, and is seen by God in its own distinct Shape, as it is in itself. Yet in the seeing of it all Things are seen. So doth Darkness appear before God in its darkest and rightest Form; and all Lights of Comforts, Holiness, Truth appear together with it in the same Appearance.

Blessed are they that abide in God, or are like to God: For no Darkness hideth any Joy from them, not the Darkness of Death itself. The Grave shines to them, as Heaven, and shews the same Spirit, Life, and Glory to their eyes.

This is the work of the Power of God, which makes Light from above, and darkness from below to meet, and kiss; and like the Man, and the Woman to bear One Image, to become One Light.

p. 160Jesus Christ Mark 14. 35. prayed to his Father, That if it were possible that hour might pass from him. At the 36th verse he tells his Father, that All things were possible to him. Then it was possible to the Father, that That hour should pass away from him. And so his Prayer was absolutely for it.

Other Scriptures tell us, that God alwaies heard his Son, and denyed him no thing; and that he was heard in that which he feared.

Then it follows, that That Dreadful Hour did pass away from Jesus Christ, though it did not pass away. Th…s was the Comfort of Christ, that Power of God, which could reconcile two, which were contradictions; that the sad Hour should pass away, in not passing away.

2. Secondly, The Power of God can call back Time that is past, and make it to be present again. Heb. 13. 8. You read of Jesus, the same yesterday, to day and for ever. The Lord Jesus is the Fulness, the Image, and the shining out of the God-Head.

They are the Puttings forth, and Discoveries of Jesus Christ, which make all Times, Ages and States. Jesus Christ hath to day the same Powers and Appearances in himself, which being sent forth made yesterday. They are only drawn in. If then he please to day, to put forth the same Appearances to thee, or pull thee into them; he can make yesterday present to day.

When he shall open himself fully to thee from the Beginning to the End; then he will make the Sun to stand still over thy head; he will make all Times past to stand forth, as at the first, and to stand still before thee eternally. For he is the same yesterday, to day, and for ever.

Rev. 20. 12. We read, that at the Resurrection, the Books were opened. Time is as a Book, which Life opens, and Death shuts. Daies and years passing, are as the turning over of the Leaves of this Book. Whatever God doth, he doth it for ever, saith Solomon in Ecclesiastes. Whatever is written in this Book, is never to be blotted out, but remains there to be read to eternity. If any Leaf, or Line were pleasant to thee, and thou mournest, because it is turn'd over, and past; God can at his pleasure turn that leaf or line back to thee again.

3. The Power of God can make things which have been, and which have ceased to be, to be again. It is a sweet, spiritual, and deep discourse that, which is between the Lord and Martha, concerning Lazarus; Ioh. 11. 23. Jesus saith unto her, Thy Brother shall ris… again. V. 24. Martha saith unto him; I know that he shall rise again in the Resurrection at the last day. V. 25. Iesus said unto her, I am the Resurrection, and the Life.

Jesus Christ is the Power, the Treasury of God, from which all things are brought forth, in which they are laid up again, and ever to be found.

The Person of Christ is the Life, and the Resurrection; while things are, they are in him, as in their Root. When they are no more in themselves, they are still in him, as in a Repository. They return into him, as the beauty of dying Flowers into their Root, to come forth again at Spring, in a better manner.

p. 161The Person of the Lord Jesus is the Life. This world is but as the shadowy Image in the Glass, or Water. All things have their truest, and standing Life in him.

The Lord Jesus is the Resurrection. For when he discovers himself to us, then we see all things again in a full, high, immortal manner.

Hast thou lost any comfort by Death, or any other change in this world; do but look with a Spiritual Eye upon the Spiritual Person of thy Dear Saviour, there thou shalt see thy comforts still living. For he is the Life. Nay, thou shalt see them living immortally, never to dye more. For he is the Resurrection.

Thou shalt see them, and enjoy them substantially, satisfactorily, without fear of losing them. For that which thou seest in him is not a Shadowy Image, but the Life it self.

4. Spring; Wisdom. The Wisdom of God rightly understood is a Fountain of Peace and Pleasures, which will flow perpetually into the heart of man.

Two Scriptures testifie of this Wisdom.

1 Scripture, Eph. 1. 11. This Scripture speaketh of God, who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will.

These words hold forth four things:

1. A Workman. 2. The Latitude of his Workings. 3. The Pattern. 4. The Original of that Pattern.

1. The Workman. This is God, who worketh. The chief Agent, the Master-wheel in all Motions is the God-Head. Learned Men say, that if the Heavens should stand still, all Things here below would be immediately at a stand, as in the Aegyptian Darkness. It is most true of the Trinity, which moves, and makes, and works all things by the Movings of that Life, which it hath in itself.

If the Trinity should stop in the course of its mutual Communion, and Enjoyments: This stop would be a Spoke set in the Wheel of the Creation; nothing could stir any more.

2. The Latitude of his Workings, God worketh all Things.

God worketh all Things Collectively in the General and whole Sum.

God worketh all things Distributively, in Particulars. The Earth is the Lords Work, and the Fulness thereof, Psal. 24. 1. There is no time, nor any minute, or moment of Time, which is not fashioned, and carried on by God. My times are in thine Hand: Saith the Psalmist, Psal. 31. 15. There is no Affair nor the the least Circumstance of any Affair, be it good, or evil, which is not the Work, and the gift of God. Shall we receive Good, and not Evil from the Hand of God; saith Job, Job 2. 10.

God rides upon the Circuit of the Heavens, Psal. 68. 4. So he is the Universal Cause of Things.

God also fills All in All, Ephes. 1. 23. So He descends into the Lowest Relations, the narrowest Compass, and becomes every where the most Particular Cause of every Thing.

p. 162God saith of the Tree in the Prophet for the Clusters sake: Spare it, there is a Blessing in it. So mayst thou say of any Thing, whatever it be, great or small, for which thou mournest, or frettest: Spare thy self: There is a Blessing, for there is a God in this Thing.

God is not only a Concurrent cause, working his Part, and leaving to other Causes their Parts apart. But he is a Comprehensive Cause, uniting all in himself and spreading himself thorow all, 1 Corin. 8. 6. There is One God who worketh all in all.

Wherever there is any Agent that works: God works all in that Agent.

Wherever there is any Form of working: God works all in that Form.

Wherever there is any Subject to be wrought upon, or to receive the work: God works all in that Subject.

Wherever there is any Effect to be wrought: God works all in that Effect.

Not an Angel, or Bird flies, or falls: not a Thought, a Hair, a Dust moves; but as he moves in it, and moves it.

3. The Pattern of these Workings. God worketh all Things according to Counsel. Counsel, and Wisdom are both the same Thing.

This is the Glory of God, and the Happiness of the Creature, that nothing …omes to pass, which is not the Work of God; and nothing is wrought by God, which is not a Work of Wisdom. Philosophers, and the Scriptures agree in setting forth the excellent Nature of Wisdom by a Two-fold Description of it.

1. Description. Wisdom is Knowledge with a Head. Knowledge is the Image of Things. The Golden Head of this Image is the Heavenly Image of God in the Person of our Lord Jesus.

Colos. 2. 18. 19. St. Paul calls the Study of the Nature of Angels, not Wisdom, but Folly, and Vanity; a vain Puffing up of the Fleshly Mind, why? Is not this a High, and Excellent Knowledge? Yes. But now it was vanity, not Wisdom; a vain Swelling, not a Substantial Fulness, and Greatness of Spirit in those, of whom the Apostle speaks, Because they held not the Head.

God then, who works all things in Counsel, and true Wisdom, holds the Head in all His Workings: that is, whatever he brings forth, He brings it forth in the Divine Appearance of his Son; he brings forth the Divine Appearance of his Son upon it, as the Head.

Wisdom saith of God, and herself, Prov. 1. 27, 29, 30. When he prepared the Heavens, I was there, when He appointed the Foundations of the Earth: Then I was by Him, as his Delight.

This may be as truly spoken of every Passage of thy Life, of the least Accident, that concerns thy Person. For the same God in the same Wisdom hath wrought these; that prepared the Heavens, and laid the Foundation of the Earth.

Thou mayst with as great Assurance hear (in every Thing of Grief or Joy, which thou meetest with in Flesh, or Spirit) the Glorious Person of thy Beloved Saviour speaking to thee after this manner: God hath prepared this for thee, and p. 163I am here. This hath the Father appointed for thee; and now am I with thee, to be thy Delight, brought up, and growing up before thee, together with this, and every other Appearance.

You look upon things vainly, with a Fleshly mind, after a heedless manner, if you see not the Brightness, and Delight of the God-Head in the Person of Christ, as a Crown of Rejoycing upon every Providence. You deface the work of God, you look not upon it, as he hath wrought it, Holding the Head if you see not the Face of Christ in every Act, or Accident, as in a Glass.

God in this Sense hath made Christ his Only Begotten Son; in that he brings forth nothing but Discoveries of Jesus Christ. For he is the Head of all Things; and this is the Wisdom of God, the Holding of this Head in all.

This is the First Description of Wisdom.

2. Description: Wisdom is the Fulness of Things, Jesus Christ is the Wisdom of God, and the Fulness of all Things, Colos. 1. 19.

Wisdom is that Contrivance, that Harmony of Things, that casts the whole Fulness of Things into each Thing. As Members in the Body, amongst whom the Joy of all pertains to every one; and the Grief of each One to all: So are all the Parts of that work, which is wrought in Wisdom. Wisdom is a Spirit, that conveys the Life, Power, and Sense of all into each Particular; that all may rejoyce, and mourn together every where.

As in a good Picture, all the Proportions of the whole Face meet, and concenter as it were, in each Line, Point, or Touch; giving you from thence a Cast of the Beauty of the whole: So hath God prepared, and appointed all his Works in Wisdom, like an Excellent Picture; that the Fulness of the Whole, and the Beauty of all Parts may shew forth themselves from every Part.

Is there any thing so dark, so low, as that the Wisdom of God reacheth not to it, and shines not in it? If the Wisdom of God be there, then is there the Center, the Concurrency, the Union of all Things, of all Glory.

If the Wisdom of God shine there, then is there a Spiritual Light opening all Divine Beauties, making that Thing, the Gate of the Creation, of Paradise, Heaven, and the Divine Nature. This is that Traffique of Wisdom, which makes the Merchandise of it, better than that of Silver, Gold, or Pearl.

4. The Original of that Pattern. God works all things according to the Counsel of his will. The Will of God is the Principle, and Original of his Wisdom.

The Will of God is the highest Rule, Rest, and Rejoycing of all manner of Goodness.

The Phaenix is said to spring out of a Nest of all manner of Spices laid together, and fired by the Sun, the Will of God is such a Flaming Nest of all Beauties, and Sweetnesses at their Height. Out of this will the Wisdom of God springs forth into every Act of Providence, being Beautiful, and Precious in it.

The Will of God is the highest Reason of all things. What if God willing to shew the Riches of his Grace? What if God willing to shew the Power of his Wrath?

p. 164The Will in a Spirit is as the Sea to a River. All its workings flow out of it, and into it. It is its Spring, and Fulness.

Shall not thy Will rest, and rejoyce in that, which is the Will of God; that is the Highest Reason; the fullest Rest, and Blessedness of the Divine Nature?

The Will of God, out of which God himself drinks all his Delights, in which he bathes himself: this Will is the Eternal Fountain.

The Wisdom of God is a Large, and Broad River poured forth from this Fountain. Every Creature, each Passage of things in the Creature, is the Water of this River. Shall it not be Sweet to thee? Canst thou not drink of this Water of the River of God, sent forth from his own Fountain with Delight?

2. Scripture; Deut. 32. 4. Moses sings of God: He is the Rock: His work is perfect: All his ways are Iudgment.

The Work of God is Perfect in the whole. For all the ways of God in his work in Particular, are in Judgment, that is, in exact Wisdom.

This place affords us Three comfortable Observations concerning the ways, and works of God.

1. Observation: Nothing comes to pass, but that which is best.

2. Observation: Nothing falls out but in the best Time.

3. Nothing is brought about, but in the best manner.

The former place of Scripture taught us, that all things are the Work of God. This teacheth us, that his work is Perfect, and all the ways of it Exact, according to the best Judgment of things, and the rightest rules of Wisdom, which are the Weights in the Ballance of our Judgment.

1. Observation: Nothing comes to pass, but that, which is best. David saith: It was good for me, that I was afflicted: Psal. 119. 71.

Goodness is made up of all Perfections. Evil, by any one Defect. Affliction had not been good for David, if it had not been Best. If it had kept out any thing, that might have been better for him, it had been an Evil to him.

Rom. 8. All things work together for the good of those that love God. Where all things work together for good, there all things are like Stones in an Arch, in which every Stone is absolutely necessary. If you pull any one out of its place, the whole Arch falls. Where many things fall into Conspiracy, or Harmony for good, there the Stops, and Shakes make the Musick, as well, as the Stroaks, and Sounds; there every thing is Best. For the Alteration of any thing alters the Harmony. If all things work together for good, than each Particular thing with all the Circumstances, and Defects of it.

2. Observation: Nothing falls out, but in the best time. Eccles. 3. 11. We learn, that God hath made every thing Beautiful in its Season. Every thing is brought forth by God in the Season of its beauty, so that you may say; This Time, and this Thing were fitted one for another from Eternity.

The Jews say; that Souls were match't, and pair'd in Heaven: and that Marriages prove happy on Earth, when they were first made in Heaven; when p. 165a Soul meets with its first Mate. God hath from Eternity match't every Thing to its Time. And every Thing meets fully with the same Time on Earth. So it proves a Lovely, and Glorious Marriage.

Psal. 1. 3. A good man is compared to a Tree, that brings forth his Fruit in its Season. The good God doth so, much more. He brings forth all the Fruits of his Providence, whether they be Bitter, or Sweet, in their proper Season; in that Season, in which they have a true, and full Beauty.

Good and Evil never befal us, but in their own Season, when they are Natural, kindly, and Beautiful. If a good should happen to thee in the Time of an Evil, or an Evil in the Time of a Good, it were like the Stars seen at Noon and the Sun at midnight; which would be a matter of Terrour, and astonishment to Mankind; arguing Disorder in Nature, and presaging Confusions to the world.

3. Observation: Nothing is brought about, but in the best manner. The Jews witnessed of Christ, that he had done all things well; not only good for the Matter, but also well for the Manner.

There are Three Things, which commend a Diamond. 1. The Goodness of the Stone. 2. The well-setting. 3. The well-cutting of it. Every Providence of God towards thee is such a Diamond. It is Best in itself. It is well-set, in the best Season, and State of Things. It is well-cut, all the Circumstances are ordered, and polish't with the best skill, like Points of the Diamond, to sparkle forth most Sweetness, and Beauty.

All His ways are Judgment. Every way of God, in each Circumstance of every work is scan'd, and judg'd, and so disposed in the most Judicious manner. Not a Mote, or a Hair in any business falls casually, or lies neglected, but is weighed in Judgment, and ordered with the highest skill, and care. Never then repine more or say; if it had not been This, or Then, or Thus, I could have born it. For now thou sinnest against the Wisdom of God, which hath ordered, and appointed all these Three; This, Then, and Thus: So that This was Best; Then it was most Beautiful; and Thus it was the greatest Blessing.

I will conclude this Particular, with that of Solomon in the Proverbs, Prov. 3. 17. All the ways of wisdom are Peace, and all her Paths are Pleasantness This is true Two ways.

First, all the goings forth of Wisdom in thy Spirit are Peaceful, and Pleasant. If Wisdom enlighten thy way, and lead thee forth into all things by the Beams of her Discoveries, as the Path of thy Spirit: then all the Out-goings of thy soul into Things, and all the Appearances of Things to thy Soul, will be like a Sweet Tune, or Pleasant Dance.

Secondly, all the goings forth of God in his Wisdom are Paths of Peace, and Pleasantness. No providences would be a Labyrinth or Wilderness to a man, to bring him to a loss; if he travelled thorow them with that Thread of Light, with which God went forth into them. Do but go by the Foot-steps of God, p. 166and track his Wisdom in the world; and you shall walk continually in a Smooth and quiet Path, in a Path of Rest, and Joy even thorow the Darkest Thickets.

I have spoken of the Fourth Spring of Joy in God, His Wisdom. Now let us pass to the next.

5. Spring: The Glory of God. Psal. 8. 1. David breaks forth into Admiration, O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is thy Name in all the Earth! Who hast set thy Glory above the Heavens.

Divines distinguish the Glory of God into Essential, and Manifestative. The Essential Glory of God is that which shines Eternally in the Person, and Nature of God. This Beauty is the God-Head's Self in the Image, which is Jesus Christ. But I am not now to speak of this. For I spake of this Glory before in the Second Spring, the Beauty of God.

The Manifestative Glory of God is that, which he holds forth to us in the Creature. David speaks of the Essential Glory of God, when he saith, that God hath set his Glory above the Heavens. No creature can bring forth, or bear the Essential Glory of God. It is above the highest, the most heavenly creature, in respect to its Excellency, or Capacity. David speaks of the Manifestative Glory of God in those words: How excellent is thy Name in all the Earth! The Name is the Image of God, the Appearance or Manifestation of his Glory. This Name of God is in All the Earth, in the lowest part, or state of the creature, and every thing of it. The Name of God is Excellent, to Admiration, in all the Earth. What a Foundation is this to build Joy upon in every condition? Thou canst not be so low in the Earth, but thou mayest read the Name of God, and see his Glory in thy lowest state.

Look then upon thy greatest Loss, or Cross, and say, My God, how excellent is thy Name in This also? The Death of my friend, mine own grief shall be precious in mine eyes, because they are the manifestations of thy Glory. I will call nothing dark, bitter, or base, in which thou writest thy Name, and hast thy Beauty shining forth with an excellency.

I have now finished my Answer to the second Mistake, which contains Directions, how to look upon the single Person of God, and Christ; what to look upon in That Person, which will fill us with Joy in every condition. Now I am arrived at the Third Mistake, which hinders the Soul from attaining to a state of Spiritual Joy.

3. Mistake: That Spiritual Grief and Joy are inconsistent, and cannot stand together. You shall perceive this, as a Principle laid down in the hearts of many Christians by the Reply which they will make, when they are pressed to Joy as a Grace, and to continual Delight, as a Duty. Woe is me, saith one, how can I have any Joy, who have so many corruptions, and sins to mourn for continually? Alas! saith another, should I rejoyce, or take any delight, who am still called to mourning and heaviness by private Afflictions, or publick Calamities? I answer all these, that they err, not understanding aright the p. 167Scriptures, and the Power of the Spirit of God in the Soul. They erre in supposing that Joy and Grief in the Spirit do hinder, and not help forward one another. I will endeavour the Removal of this Mistake by Two General Rules, and then by Particular Application of these Rules.

The Two General Rules are these:

1. Rule: Take heed of separating those things which God hath ioyned.

2. Rule: Take not any mourning to be holy, which hath not a holy mirth mingled with it.

1 Rule: Take heed of separating those things which God hath joyned. Solomon saith, That God hath set One thing over against another. We may read it; God hath set One thing By another, or For another. God often sets several things One By another, to compleat each other; and we set them One Against another, to fight, and destroy.

God is One, Gal. 3. 20. But the name of the Devil is L…gion: For he is many.

God by Beholding all things in One Light: by Possessing all things in One Life; by Enjoying all things in One Love, is One, and Blessed for ever.

The Devil by Dividing becomes a Destroyer, the Principle, and Seat of Destruction.

Jesus Christ is the Mediator: He makes things distant to meet in him: He gathers up all things into One, Ephes. 1. 10.

Jesus Christ by Reconciling divers Appearances of God, divers Administrations in Man, makes his Church to be of many Members One Body; and of all things makes One Beauty.

We by setting One Appearance, or State of the same thing, One Administration or Gift to sight with another, make the Church a Babel, and the Commonwealth a Field of Blood.

The Spirit is a Band of Unity, Eph. 4. 3. Unity is in the Spirit; Division is in the Flesh. The Spirit by binding up various Operations of the same Grace, various Illuminations of the same Truth, in One Band of Unity, makes us Spiritual in Judging, and Living. We first breaking off the Parcels of Truth, and Properties of Grace, then oppose them. So we become carnal, apt to miscarriages in our selves, and contentions with others. Take heed then of separating those things which God hath joyned. He is a growing Saint, a God-like man among men, who hath a Spirit Reconciling and Uniting Persons, Things, Duties, Graces, Factions, Affections, Parties, Properties.

This is the First Rule.

2. Rule: Take not any mourning to be holy or spiritual, which hath not a holy mirth mingled with it.

Be angry, and sin not, saith the Apostle. Let not the Sun go down upon your wrath, Eph. 4. 26.

So saith the spiritual man; I will mourn, and not sin. The Sun shall not go down upon my Griefs. The Sun of a Saint, the Sun of the Soul … Jesus Christ, p. 168who hath the Light of Life. The shining of his Face upon the Soul, makes it cheerful; fills it with beams of Joy; glads it more than store of Corn and Wine can glad any carnal heart. Spiritual Joy is the Sun-shine of Christ's face in the soul. The Bridegroom shall be taken from them, and then they shall fast, and mourn in those daies: saith Christ of his Disciples, Luk. 5. 35.

Jesus Christ is the Bridegroom of the Soul, as the Sun is of the Earth. His Presence and Appearance in the Soul is the Joy of it. Every thing is sinful in us, which casts down the Light of our Saviour's countenance in our Spirits. 'Tis Sin to grieve the Spirit of Christ, that is, to straiten it and hinder it from rejoycing, and putting forth its Joys in us.

If the Passion of Grief or Anger gather to a Thick Cloud, so as to Darken the bright Face of the Lord Jesus in us, it becomes a Corruption, and Transgression. We are commanded to Rejoyce evermore, 1 Thes. 5. 16. Rejoyce in the Lord always, Phil. 4. 4. Our Spirits are to be playing, and sporting themselves uncessantly in the Light of our Saviours Presence. It is from the Devil, and the Flesh, whatever interrupts this Joy, these Sportings.

The Rain-bow was the Covenant of God in the Cloud, that the Waters should no more cover the Earth: Genes. 9. 6, 15.

The Rain-bow is ever set in a Black, Watery Cloud. But it is begotten by the Reflection of the Sun-beams upon that Cloud, mixing their chearful Beauties, with its Melancholy Blackness.

Grief is then alone a Grace in thy soul, when the Sun shines upon the watery Cloud. When the Glory of Christ mingles its sweet Beams with thy Grief, and makes a Spiritual Rain-bow in thy Soul. Then is there the Covenant of God in the Cloud of thy Grief.

This Over-spreading of a Spiritual chearfulness upon thy Sorrows is a Sign from Heaven, that the waters of Sin, Despair, and Wrath shall never quite cover the Image of God in thee.

I now come to the Particular Applications of these General Rules.

I will do this under Two Heads:

1. Spiritual Mourning.

2. The mixture of Mirth with it.

1. Head: Spiritual Mourning. I will here set before you the Nature of a Holy Grief in these Four Particulars.

1. The Matter.

2. The Manner.

3. The Measure.

4. The Mystery.

1. The Matter of Spiritual Mourning is Evil in all the Kinds and Degrees of it.

Eccles. 3. 3, 4. Solomon couples Two Verses fitly together: A Time to Kill and a Time to Heal: a Time to break down, and a Time to build up. A Time to Weep, and a Time to Laugh, a Time to Mourn, and a Time to Dance.

These Times answer one another. The Killing Time is the Weeping Time: the Healing Time is the Laughing Time. The Time of Breaking is the Time p. 169for Mourning, and the time of Building is the time for Dancing. Man is Gods Cymbal, or Harp. Our Affections, and Passions are the Strings upon it. It makes good Musick, when it keeps Time with the Administration of God. When the Lord brings forth Good Things for us, then he toucheth our Sweet Affections, and awakens them. When he brings any Evil upon us, then he strikes upon our sharp, and sad Passions, to make them sound.

There are Two Sorts of Evil: The Evil of Sin, and of Misery. Moses expresseth both these Evils by a Contrariety, Levit. 26. 23. 24. If ye will walk contrary unto me: I also will walk contrary unto you. The Evil of Sin is the Contrariety of Man to God: The Evil of Misery is the Contrariety of God to Man. Sin is the Running out of Things from the Glory of God: the breaking of the Harmony of Divine Love, Beauty, and Wisdom by a Discord. Sorrow is the Return of Things into this Glory: the bringing of the Discord into a Harmony again. Both these Evils are the Matter of Spiritual Mourning.

1. The Evil of Sin. We are to grieve for the Evil of Sin in our selves, and in others.

1. We are to grieve for Sin in our selves, Psa. 51. 3. David cryes to God, I acknowledge my transgression; my sin is before me. When Sin appears in its right shape to us, it brings forth sorrow, as its Image in our souls, as naturally, as the face of God begets a face of Joy in our hearts. Mourning is as the Mouth by which we confess our corruptions. It is the Image and Form, in which the sense of guilt holds forth it self in the Spirit. He that grieves, and glories not in the Glory of God, calls Good Evil, and Light Darkness. He that is merry, and mourns not under guilt, he calls Evil Good, and Darkness Light. Both lye under a Curse; one for turning the Glory of God into a Lye; the other for Boasting himself in a Lie against the Truth. Not to feel a Sorrow for Sin, is to deny the Nature of it, to destroy the Person of Christ, to make void his Cross, to confound, and dissolve the Mystery of God.

2. We are to grieve for Sin in others, Psal. 119. 53. David complains, Horrour hath taken hold of me, because of the Wicked, that forsake thy Law.

When the Sun, the Light of the World, laboureth under an Eclipse by the Moon, the Sight of it naturally strikes a kind of Horrour upon the Spirits of Men. For it portends Blood, and Ruine in one Kind or another. In each Sin there is a more Dreadful Eclipse. The Image of God, which is the True Life, and Light of all Creatures, laboureth, and groaneth being opprest under, and darkned by the Image and will of Man. He that understands this Sight, sees in it a certain Presage of Wrath, and Desolation, which fills him with Astonishment.

Ephes. 4. 30. Grieve not, saith St. Paul, the Holy Spirit of Christ. Sin grieves the Spirit of Christ. As Jesus Christ Sympathizeth, and Suffereth with us, having a fellow-feeling of our Infirmities by a Union of Spirits. So a good man hath a Sympathy, and fellow-feeling with his Saviour, when he sees his Spirit grieved by the Sins of other men. Thus we are to Mourn for the First Evil▪ the Evil of Sin.

p. 1702. The Evil of Suffering. We are to mourn for our own Sufferings, and the Sufferings of others.

1. We are to mourn for our own Sufferings, Es. 22. 12. In that day did the Lord God of Hosts call to weeping, and to mourning. What Day was this? It was a Day of Calamity, when Death was before their Eyes. So you may see at the 13th verse: They said: Let us eat, and drink, for to morrow we shall die. The Providences, and Appearances of God are his Language, in which he speaks to us. God requires of us, that we should have an Ear to hear, and a Tongue to answer him in his own Language. It is said in one place, that the Heaven, should hear the Earth. Is it not much more fit then, that the Earth should hear the Heavens? The Heavens are the Image of God, the Heart of Man is the Earth. Shall God speak to us in Wrath, and Ruine; and shall not we hear, and answer him with Fear and Trembling? Shall God speak to us in Thunder, Storms and Blood; And shall not we hear, and answer him with Tears, and Broken Hearts?

2. We are to mourn for the Sufferings of Others, 2 Corin. 11. 2, 9. Who, saith St. Paul, is sick, and I am not afflicted? who is offended, and I burn not?

Every good Man is like his God, and Father. All Things are his, because he is the Spouse of Christ, the Child and Heir of God, one Spirit with Christ, and God. So he suffers in all. As St. Paul said; I make up the Sufferings of Christ in my Flesh: So saith he; All Things that Suffer, add to my Sorrows, and make up my Sufferings in their Flesh.

A good Man is One spirit with Christ. Thus he is like Christ, a Spirit of Univeral Sweetness, which longs, and labours to bring forth itself in Peace, and Pleasures every where. When it meets with a Soul shut up in Griefs, it is straitned and afflicted there, and burns like a Fire, to be at liberty in that Heart. This Spirit suffers with each Heart, till it can make every Heart to rejoyce with itself. It is never entirely Risen from the Dead, while there is any one in the Grave of Sorrows. That One is a Member of its Body; and it is ever present with the whole Body, being all of itself in every Part of that; all in the Sorrows of the Militant and Suffering Part, as truly as it is all in the Joys of the Triumphant, and Rejoycing Part. This is the Matter of our Mourning, Evil in both kinds, of Sin, and Suffering.

2. The manner of our Mourning. This is the Second Particular. My way in this shall be to give you some Distinctions, and then some Rules drawn from those Distinctions.

The Distinctions are Three.

First, of the Appearances of God. Secondly, of the State of Things. Thirdly, of the Life of Man.

1. Distinction, of the Appearances of God: These are Two-fold.

1. The Supream.

2. Subordinate Appearance.

1. The Supream Appearance of God is One, Blessed for ever, perfect in p. 171Glory, Unchangeable. This is Jesus Christ, the same Yesterday, to Day, and for Ever: Heb. 13. 8. This is that Heavenly Image of the God-Head, which gathers up into one, in itself, all Images of things, in all Times. David speaks of this, Psal. 16. 11. In thy Presence (or Face) is fulness of Joy: at thy Right Hand are pleasures for evermore. In these words are Four Things.

1. The Presence, or Face, and the Right Hand of God. Both these expressions signify God in his Naked, Highest, and Rightest Appearance. 2. Pleasures are here doubly exprest by Joy, and Pleasures. 3. There is Perfection in those Pleasures, a Fulness of Joy. This fulness intimates a Solidity, or Substantiality of Joy for the kind; and Abundance, and Satisfactoriness for Degree.

4. A Perpetuity is added to all this. The Pleasures are for evermore. This is the Description of God in his Supream Appearance, in which there is all Variety; but no Mixture: all Communion, and Communication; but no Chance. This Appearance is Light without any Darkness.

2. The Subordinate Appearance of God is Manifold. God in this respect is called, the Lord of Hosts, because he comes forth in an Army of Appearances, which are his Ten Thousand Chariots, his Millions of Angels. God in his Supream Appearance, is Light: in his Subordinate Appearance, a Fire. He is in this Appearance a Mixture of Light, and Darkness. He hath various effects, Cherishing, and Consuming: Drawing forth all Things, and devouring them again. Here God is various; sometimes blazing forth brightly; sometimes wrapping up himself in a thick Smoak: sometimes Burning Dreadfully; sometimes shining out Sweetly. This is the Appearance of God, as he comes forth in a Created Image to the Creature of the First Creation. This is called by Moses the Back-parts of God, in which he hath many Names proclaimed before him, which have Change, and Contrariety in them: Exod. 34. 6, 7. Gracious, and Jealous; Long-suffering, and visiting, &c.

This is the First Distinction.

2. Distinction, of the State of Things. This is Two-fold:

1. The State of Things in the Spirit, or God.

2. The State of Things in the Flesh, or the Creature.

You have this Distinction taught you, Heb. 2. 14. For as much, as the Children are made Partakers of Flesh and Blood. Here you have the Children before their Clothing of Flesh and Blood; again you have the Children in that Clothing. There is such another place as this, which expounds it, and is expounded by it, Rom. 8. 20, 21. The Creature was made subject to Vanity, not willingly, but in Hope, &c. It shall be delivered into the glorious Liberty of the Sons of God. Here is the Creature before, above, after the Vanity of this Creation, in the Liberty of the Sons of God. Here is the Creature under vanity, and in the Corruptible Creation.

1. State: The State of Things in the Spirit, or in God. This is a State of Immortal Beauty, and Joys. All things live to God, Luk. 20. 38. To God, p. 172that is, in God. All Things live to God, that is, as they are seen by God for all things are seen by God, in God. God never looks off, or looks out from Himself.

Rom. 8. 6. To be spiritually-minded is life and peace. All things live and flourish to the spiritual mind, which is born of God, which is both the Eye and Image of God in the Soul, as they do to God. He that hath the Eternal Spirit for the Eye of his Mind, hath it also for the Object of his Mind. He that seeth things by the Spirit, seeth them in the Spirit. All things in the Spirit are One Spirit with that Spirit, Spiritual Appearances of the Spirit. So they are living and pleasant Images of that Life and Peace which is the Activity and Harmony of the Divine Nature.

Rom. 11. 36, St. Paul saith of God; Of him, and through him, and to him, are all things; to whom be glory for ever, Amen. God is blessed for ever; the Spring and Seat of Blessedness. All things cannot but be Branches of Blessedness, as they have their beginning, their way, their ends in him, who is the Eternal Spirit of Blessedness and Glory.

2. State. The State of things in the flesh, or in the creature, or in themselves. This is a Flourishing, Fading, and Flaming State of Things.

We have it described by St. Peter, 1 Pet. 1. 24. All Flesh is as Grass, and all the Glory of the Flesh, as the Flower of the Field: the Grass withereth, and the Flower thereof falleth away.

All Things in the Flesh are, at best, Vanity, and change in their Principles. Their Path is Corruption, their Conclusion is Consumption, as by Fire.

This is the Second Distinction.

3. Distinction: of the Life of Man. Man hath a Two-fold Principl…

1. A Heavenly.

2. An Earthly Principle.

This Distinction is laid down, 1 Cor. 15. 45. The First Man Adam was made a living Soul: the New Adam is a quickning Spirit. Adam is a Universal Name, which includes all Mankind; as in its Root, or Principle. The Two Adams are the Two Principles, or distinct Roots of Man. One is a Living Soul, the Soul of all Mankind in its Natural State. The other is a Quickning Spirit, the Spirit, or Principle of men, as they are converted from Nature to Grace, or Glory. These Principles are called by the Apostle in this place, one Heavenly; the other Earthly. v. 47. The First Man is from the Earth; the Second Man is the Lord from Heaven. v. 48. As is the Earthy, such are they that are Earthy; as is the Heavenly, such are they that are Heavenly. These Two Principles are likewise called Two Images, the Image of the Heavenly, and of the Earthly Man. v. 49. As we have born the Image of the Earthly, we shall also bear the Image of the Heavenly Man.

They are likewise stiled in Scripture the Inward, and the Outward Man, Corin. 2. 4, 14. Though our Outward Man perish, our Inward is renewed day by day. The Heavenly Principle is as the Center; the Earthly, as a Point in the Circumference shooting forth its Beams from thence only.

p. 173The Heavenly, and Earthly Principle lie mutually infolded in one another. The Earthly Principle is in the Heavenly, as the Seed in the full-blown Flower. The Heavenly Principle is in the Earthly, as the Flower lies hid in the Seed. The Earthly is in the Heavenly, as the Flowers of all Colours are in the Light. The Heavenly is in the Earthly, as Light is in every Colour. These Two are also expressed by the Spiritual, and Natural Man, 1 Cor. 2. 14, 15. So also by the New, and Old Man, Coloss. 3. 9, 10. Man according to the Diversity of these Two Principles is capable of a Five-fold life at once.

1. The Life of the Heavenly Principle in itself.

2. The Life of the Earthly Principle, as it is Comprehended in the Heavenly.

3. The Life of the Heavenly, as it is in the Earthly.

4. The Life of the Earthly, as it is Subordinate to the Heavenly.

5. The Life of the Earthly Principle in itself.

1. Life: The Life of the Heavenly Principle in itself. Man, as he lives this Life, is uncapable of any blot of Sin, or spot of Sorrow. The Apostle speaks with reference to this Life, Ephes. 5. 8. Now are ye Light in the Lord: Walk, as Children of the Light.

As we live in the Heavenly Principle, and that lives in itself, we are Children of Light; clear Beams of the God-Head, like Christ, Brightnesses of the Fathers Glory, which can neither be Defiled, nor Darkned. That which is born of God, sins not, nor cannot sin. I may add, it grieves not, nor cannot grieve, according to its Heavenly Birth. In this Principle we are Light in the Lord. Our Saviour tells us, that we shall be in the Resurrection, as the Angels. He tells us again; that the Angels of Little Children behold the Face of God in Heaven. This Life in the Heavenly Principle is the Resurrection. In this we are alwaies, as Angels. While we are like little Ones on Earth; we are as the most Glorious Angels, beholding the Face of our Father in Heaven: while we are inclosed in the Darkness of Flesh, we are at the same time Light in the Lord. It is the Opinion of some very learned men, that the Supream part of the Soul which is above sensible Things, ever living in the midst of Invisible Things, the Head, and Spirit of the Soul; that this is each Mans Angel.

But man hath a Head above this Head. The Head of Man is Christ, as the Head of Christ is God, 1 Cor. 11. 3. Man hath a Spirit above this Spirit: Whom I with my Spirit serve in the Gospel of his Son: Saith St. Paul, Rom. 1. 9. The Heavenly Principle is this Head, and Spirit. Thou hast an Eternal Life in this Head, and Spirit of thine. In this Life thou art more than an Angel in the midst of the Throne: thou art Light in the Lord: thou art in the Light of the Lord, as He Himself is in that Light.

This is the First Life.

2. Life: The Life of the Earthly Principle, as it is Comprehended in the Heavenly. The Earthly Principle in the Heavenly, is as the Heavenly. Behold, saith Jesus Christ, I make all Things new, 2 Corin. 5. 17. As the Sun riseth upon p. 174the Earth; so doth the New Man upon the Old, making that also to have a New Face of Immortality, as it is comprehended in the Beams of the New Man. The Glory of God taking up Elijah, was as a Chariot of Fire, because as it catcheth up, it changeth, and conforms to itself that which it catcheth up into itself. Such is the Heavenly Principle taking up the Earthly into it.

When St. Paul was caught up into the Third Heaven, and Paradise: then he was another man. I knew a Man, saith he. Then he was that Man of Paradise. If he was caught up in the Body: then was his Earthly Body a Paradisical Body, comprehended in the Body of Paradise. When he was let down again, he was an Earthly Man in an Earthly Body, 2 Cor. 12. The Graecian Poet tells us of an Herb, which had one Name among the Gods, and another Name among Men. All the Things of this world, have one sort of Names and Natures, as they are in their own Principle. But as they are Comprehended, and Converst with by a Heavenly Principle, they have quite other Names, and Natures, which are Heavenly. As Adam, so each Principle gives Names to all Things according to itself, and by those Names they are called in that Principle. The Sickness, and Death of the Earthly Principle have other Names, Names of Life in the Heavenly Principle.

This is the Second Life.

3. Life: The Life of the Heavenly Principle in the Earthly This is, as the Life of Christ in the Flesh. It is the Life of the Son of God in Flesh.

This is the Firmament, which divides between the Waters of Life above, and the Waters of Grief, and Death below. It reacheth to both, and drinks of both. It hath in its own Principle all the Springs of Peace, and Joy. But as it is in one Person, and Principle with the Fleshly Man, it takes the Infirmities of that upon itself, and bears all its Diseases. And besides all, it hath one Disease of its own, which the Earthly Man bears no part in, and that is, the Imprisonment, Restraint, and Contradiction of Sins, and Sinners, which it suffers in the Earthly Principle. The Heavenly Principle in the Earthly is both the Primary Inflicter of all Sufferings, and the Principle afflicted by those Sufferings.

4. Life: The Life of the Earthly Principle, as it is Subordinate to the Heavenly. This is that Flesh of Christ, of which St. Paul speaks in the Mystery, as of the Spouse of Christ, Ephes. 5. 31, 32. This is that Spouse, which though it have still a Head, a Principle of its own, yet it vails this Head, and subordinates this Principle to the Heavenly Principle, as to its Husband, till it be taken up into it, that so there may be no more Male and Female; but one Man in Christ: no more Flesh and Spirit; but all according to the New Adam, a Quickning Spirit. This Flesh is indeed washt with pure water, that it cannot sin. But it is Baptized unto Christ, as the Jews were unto Moses, 1 Cor. 10, 2. in the Cloud, and in the Sea. It is the Immediate, and Proper Subject of all Sufferings. This is the Man, that saith, Lamen. 3. 1. I am the Man that hath seen affliction by the Rod of his Wrath.

p. 175This is a Beast for Slaughter. But it is the Lamb among the Beasts. It is a Lamb without Spot, which is slain all the day long. But it is slain, as a Sacrifice, not as an Abomination.

5. Life: The Life of the Earthly Principle in itself. This is the Wild Ass that runs, and snuffs up the Wind. This is the Seat of Sorrows, and the Pit of Pollutions. St. Paul, Colos. 2. 11. calls this the Body of the Sins of the Flesh. The Flesh, as it is in its own Principle is the Womb, and Mother of all Evil. The Devil sows all his several Seeds in this Womb. So the Body that springs forth from the Flesh, is the Devils Body, in which all the Members are the several puttings forth of those various Seeds, and Divers Principles of Evil cast by the Devil into the Flesh. These Principles are in truth so many particular Devils in him, who is their Prince, and Head. The Body of the Sins of the Flesh is then a Cluster of Devils Incarnated, in which each Member in particular is a particular Devil in Flesh,

Rom. 6. 19. As ye have yielded your Members Servants (in a verse before St. Paul called them Instruments) unto Uncleanness, and Iniquity, (that is, to the Principle of Uncleanness, and Iniquity, which is the Devil) to Iniquity, (that is, to make themselves one with that Principle, and the various Images, or manifestations of the various Powers in that Principle:) so yield your Members Servants to Righteousness, (that is, Jesus Christ the Righteousness of God) unto Holiness. (to the pure, unmixt, unclouded holding forth of the several vertues of Christ, thorow your several Members.) You see the Life of the Earthly Principle in itself; that it is the Center, or Spring thorow which the Prince of Darkness, and Devils thrusts forth all his Evil Powers, and Spirits into a Body.

By this means it is made the Beast, that bears the Whore; it is made an Ass, which bows down its back to all the Burthens of every Devil, and Evil. Thus much for the Distinctions, which concern the manner of our grieving. Now follow the Rules which are drawn from these Distinctions to direct us in the Spiritual manner of Mourning.

1. Rule: Know the Ground of your Mourning to be the Subordinate only, and not the Supream Appearance of God, Psal. 30. 5. His anger endureth but a moment; in his favour is Life: Weeping may endure for a Night, but Joy comes in the Morning. When thou grievest, and lamentest most bitterly, then remember; that this Discovery of God, which covers thee with so much Horrour, is but a momentary, and dark one; it is the Night, the Back-part of God. The Morning-appearance, the Face of thy God is Bright, and Shining with Joy. The Living, True, Eternal Discovery, which is above all other Discoveries, is favourable, and kind. When thou lookest upon God, and takest the Rise of thy Mourning at the highest: then say; my Soul, there is yet a Sight of God higher than this, into which if thou couldst raise thy self, thou shouldst find all their Love and Delight. It is a Rule among Divines, that there is no Supream p. 176Evil. Evil hath its Root in the Subordinate Manifestations of God, in his Clothings, and Disguises. Travel on to the Naked Person, to the open Face of God, and thou Travellest beyond all the Fountains, and Heads of Grief, or Evil.

2. Rule: Understand well, that the Object of all Sorrow is the State of Things in flesh, not in the Spirit. The Law is the Ministry of Death, and Condemnation, 2 Cor. 3. 7. Sin comes in by Occasion of the Law, Rom. 7. 8. The Law is the Occasion of Sin, and the ministry of Death by reason of the Flesh, Rom. 8. 3. What the Law could not do (that is, to make us Holy, or Happy,) thorow the weakness of the Flesh. The weakness of the Flesh is the Ground, on which all wickedness, and woe is wrought.

The Flesh is the Shadow, the Vail, Hebr. 10. 20. Whatever evil is the Object of thy Grief, so grieve, as knowing it to be in the Shadowy part, in the Out-side of Things only. 'Tis but a Leprosie in the Skin. Job calls the Fleshly State of Things in themselves, and not in the Spirit, but Skin, Job 19. 26. So doth the Devil in the Proverb: Skin for Skin. The Inside, the Substance, the Spiritual; and Life-part of those Things, over which thou so sadly breakest thy heart, is Peace. The Altar for Sacrifices was without the vail, all thy Evils are without the vail, let thy griefs then abid without the vail, like the Servants of Abraham at the Foot of the Mount. But let thy Spirit enter within the vail, and let Isaac only go thither with thee, the Child of Mirth, and Laughter. The Sea, and Storms are without the Vail, only in the Shadow. The Anchor, and the Rock; Rest is within the Vail, in the Spirit, and Truth of Things.

3. Rule: Grieve so, as having thy Head still above the Clouds of Grief in a clear Light of Peace and Joy. Thy Head is Christ; thy Head is thy Heavenly Principle, thy Life hid with Christ in God, Colos. 3. 3. This is your Head, hiding itself in a Divine Light, and Glory, above all Storms and Changes.

Divide your self then in your Sorrows. Let your grief be upon your Inferiour parts: but let your Head be in Joys. And as your Inferiour Parts are subordinate to your Head: So let the Joys of that be, as the head of your Griefs. They that are washt, need to have their Feet only washt; said our Saviour. Let your Feet only be washt with Tears. And then remember, that the Anointing of Glory, and the Oyl of gladness is upon your Heads. So mourn, as that you may be like the Description of Christ, Revel. 1. 14. 15. that your Face may shine like the Sun in its Strength, while your Feet are in the Furnace. Feel your God stroaking your Head with his right hand, while his left hand is striking your Feet with an Iron Rod of Affliction. See how Job in a Tempest of Miseries yet Glories in his Head lift up above the Storm, Job 16. 18, 19. O Earth cover not thou my Blood, and let my Cry have no place. Also now behold! My Witnes is in Heaven, and my Record is on High.

When thy Tears and Blood run down upon the ground, when thy Cries fill the Earth; then raise thy self like Job, and say: even now, behold! My Head p. 177is in Heaven, now I have a Life in my Heavenly Principle, which is an Eternal Record of my Glory, and Blessedness. This testifies of a Beauty, and Joy to me in these very Sorrows.

4. Rule: Let the Heavenly Principle, as it lives in the Earthly, be the Spring of your Sorrows. Let not thy Griefs be an Oppression to the Spiritual Man in thee, but an Oblation from it. Thy Griefs will be an oppression to it, if they proceed not from itself Originally. For then its Joys in the Flesh are taken away from it by another, by the Fleshly Principle. Thy Griefs are an Oblation by the Spirit, when they flow Primarily from the Spirit. For then itself layeth down its Joys, as Christ speaketh of his Life. The Blood, which our Saviour shed, is called in Scripture the Blood of God. Though the Blood ran thorow the Humane Nature. Yet the Person, or Principle, that bled in that Nature, was God.

Our Divinity ordinarily teacheth us this: that Christ was Man, that he might Suffer; God, that he might Merit. His Blood had been of no value with God, if it had not been the Blood of God. In like manner your Tears cannot be Heavenly and Divine; if they be not the Tears of the Heavenly, and Divine Principle in you. Though the Earthly Principle be as the Earth, in which these bitter Waters bubble up, and run along: yet the Heavenly Principle must be the Spring in this Earth, out of which they arise: Otherwise they will be of no use to you, nor value with God.

5. Rule: Let the Mourning of your Earthly Principle be a Subordination, and Submission to your Heavenly Principle. This makes your Sorrow a Sacrifice, when without this your Mourning is but Murmuring.

Heb. 10. 5, 6, 7. Jesus Christ is brought in speaking to God his Father: Sacrifice, and Burnt-Offering thou wouldst not, but a Body hast thou prepared m…. Then said I, lo I come, to do thy Will O God.

Thus the Heavenly Principle speaks the same Language in every St. Thou wilt have no more Sacrifices of Beasts. The Time is past, in which thou hast taken pleasure to have the Inferiour Earthly Principle to be Sacrificed to, and by the Superiour Heavenly Principle, while thine Image was present only in the Type, and Shadow. But now thou hast prepared a Body for me, thou hast brought me into the Earthly Principle, that I should make a Burnt-Offering of my self to thee, as of my own Body. They were to bring no Strange Fire to the Sacrifice, but to wait till Fire from Heaven fall down upon it and consume it. In like manner is the Earthly man to lay itself on the Altar by the Power of the Heavenly Man, and to wait, till that bring forth a Flame of Sorrow upon it. The Earthly man should say alwaies to the Heavenly, I mourn, that I may do thy Will, and not mine own.

Est quaedam flere Libido. There may be a Lust in weeping, and so there is, when the Outward Man fulfils his own will in weeping, and not the Will of the Inward Man, which is one with the Will of Christ and God.

p. 1786. Rule: Let the Earthly Principle, as it is in itself, be only a Slave to you in your Griefs. If the Flesh have a Power of its own to make you Grieve, to qualifie, or measure your Griefs, it will bring the Curse of the Serpent upon you: it will make you to go upon your Belly, to sink altogether into your sensual and Corruptible Part. It will make you feed upon Dust, seek a merit in, and a Nourishment from your Sorrows. When the Flesh hath Liberty to interpose it self in our mourning, it makes our mourning Brutish, or Devilish. It makes our mourning Brutish by deriving it from outward, and Temporal Things; by terminating it on these. So our Lamentations are as the howl of Dogs, and cry of Bears. It makes our mourning Devilish by mingling it with discontent, and despair. So the Roarings of our Spirits are like the yellings of Devils to Christ: Art thou come to Torment us? The Flesh is to be kept as a Hewer of Wood, & Drawer of Water. We are to make use of the ways and weaknesses of it, to help to break our Hearts, and bring forth Tears at the direction of the Spirit in us.

The work of our Grief upon our Natural Part, as it is in itself, must be to keep it under; to beat it as a Slave, to destroy it as an Enemy.

This is the Ass, which is not for Sacrifice, but to have its neck broke, except it be redeemed by its Subordination to the Spiritual Part.

I have done speaking of the manner of Spiritual Mourning.

I come now to the Third Particular in the opening of the Nature of this Grief, which is the Measure.

The Measure of Spiritual Grief hath Three Limits.

1. Limit: The casting out of Filth.

2. Limit: The casting down of Flesh.

3. Limit: The clearing up of the Face of God towards us.

1. Limit: The casting out of Filth. St. Paul 1 Corin. 5. 3. in the case of the incestuous Person blames the Church, that they had not mourned, that he, who had done this Thing might be cast out from among them.

The Case is the same in our own Persons. We are to mourn, that every Evil Thing may be cast out of us. We are to keep our Hearts in a melting temper, till our Lusts be quite melted down, till the Gold, and the Dross be separated one from another. We are to weep, till we have washed our selves clean in our Tears.

Obj. But you may here ask: What Power is there in our Tears, or Sorrows to cleanse us from our Filth, shall we say with the Papist, that our mourning merits Grace, if not of Desert, yet for desire, out of Congruity? Or shall we say with the Arminian, that our griefs are a moral way of working upon our will, to mortifie that, and make it weary of the Pleasures of Sin, for the Pennance of Sorrow?

Ans. I answer to this, that there is neither any merit in the Tears of any Creature to move God; For if thou be Righteous, it is to thy self. And the Heavens with all their Hosts are Folly, and Filth before Him:

p. 179Neither is there any Efficacy in the woes of man to purge the will of man. For who can bring a clean Thing out of an unclean? Can any one redeem his Brother from Death? Can one Passion or affection in Man by a Death in Sorrow redeem his Brother, another Passion, or affection from the Death of Sin? They must let this alone for ever.

But the Spiritual Griefs of a Saint are the Buddings of Aaron's Rod, of the the Cross of the Lord Jesus in him. And from hence they have their value with God, and their Vertue on us.

1. First, my Sorrows have a value with God, as they are the Sufferings of my Saviour in me. St. Paul saith of himself, 1 Colos. 24. I rejoyce in my Sufferings, while I fill up that which is behind of the Afflictions of Christ in my Flesh for his Bodies sake. All the Sufferings of Believers are the Sufferings of Christ propagating themselves thorow his mystical Members. We are one Spirit with our Lord Jesus in our Tribulations as well as in our Consolations. Our Groans, as much as our Gloryings, are the Breathings of that Spirit. As the Soul is all in all the Parts of the Body, making every Member a part of the Humane Nature, putting upon it the Beauty of that Nature: So is Jesus Christ in every Thing of the actings, or Sufferings of Christ any where, giving a Divine Beauty, and worth to it, by vertue of the Union.

2 Corin. 4. 10. Always bearing about in my Body the Dying of the Lord Jesus, that the Life of the Lord Jesus may be made manifest in my Body: This St. Paul saith of himself. The Tears from our eyes are the Blood from the Heart of the Lord Jesus. Though not as our Tears, yet as his Blood, they have Power with God to bring forth his life in us. Jesus Christ dies over again in thy griefs; that so he may act his Resurrection over again in thy Graces. The Father makes a Promise to the Lord Jesus, Es. 53. 10. When he shall make his Soul an offering for Sin, he shall he see his Seed. This is an Everlasting Covenant between the Father, and the Son, that when he hath descended to the lowermost parts of the Earth, he should then begin to ascend.

When the Image of the Invisible God hath put itself off into the Strange Forms of Darkness, and Death; then is it to spring up again out of these, and again to behold itself in its own proper shape and power, which is its Seed. Thy Saviour, and Husband makes his Soul an Offering, for Sin in all the Sufferings of thy Soul. Therefore mayest thou now challenge it of the Father in the name of Jesus Christ, that he may see in thee his Seed, which is the Power of an endless Life. Thou mayest say; behold, O my God! by him, whose the Signet, and the Staff is; the Glory and Power of thy God-Head; by him am I in these Pangs and Sorrows. Let then a Man-child be born in my Heart, which may be called after his name, that I may rejoyce in it, and remember my Sorrow no more. Thy Benjamin is come before thee into the Land of Aegypt, as thy servant in my servitude. Thy Darling hath brought himself into my guilt, and griefs; he stands before thee in them. The Lamb of God p. 180a slain in my sufferings. O then let it be a Passover, that the evil Angel of Lust and Misery may pass from the house of my Spirit, when he sees the blood of this Lamb in my Tears sprinkled upon the Posts of the Door.

2. Secondly, Our Sorrows have a vertue on us, as they are the Sufferings of Iesus Christ in us. Galat. 6. 14. God forbid, saith Paul, that I should glory in any thing, save in the Cross of our Lord Iesus, by which the world is crucified to me, and I to the World.

As the Person of Christ is the Seed of God, which springs up into many Sons to God: so is the Cross of the Lord Jesus a Seed that remains not alone, but brings forth much Fruit. It grows up into a multitude of Crosses, a Cross in each good Heart, a Cross in every Creature of this world. This Cross of Christ is the wisdom and Power of God making themselves first the Tree of the Curse, on which all the Principles, and Spirits of this world must hang: Then the Tree of Life bringing forth the Fruits of Paradise, and the Third Heaven. Every care or cross in a Saint is this Cross of his Saviour sprouting in his Person. The Lord Jesus lies hid in each Tear, in each sigh of a Holy Spirit. He is there, as the Seed falling into the Earth, and Dying. By this Death he delivers himself from Death in thy Heart, and breaks out on every side into Discoveries of his Grace and Glory.

Say of thy Trouble; why art thou cast down O my Soul? This is that Death of my Saviour in me▪ by which he destroys the power of Death in my Spirit, Sin and the Devil. This is the way in which thou shalt praise him, and see him swallowing up the Principle of Darkness in Darkness, that he may bring forth himself in the Light of his Countenance, to be the Light of thy Countenance. I have been the larger in this Objection, that so I may be the more clearly understood both in this, and in the following Particulars. Whatever mention is made of any Beauty, or Grace in a Saint, is not to be imputed to the Saint, but to the Grace, and Face of Jesus Christ in him: so is the Excellency or Efficacy of our mourning, the Discovery of our dying Saviour in it. No Persons, no Sorrows are Spiritual, if they be not one Spirit with Jesus Christ. But thus much for the First limit in the measure of our Sorrows, the casting out of Filth.

2. Limit: The casting down of the Flesh, 1 Cor. 9. 27. I, saith the Apostle, keep under my body, and bring it into Subjection. The words are foreign, I beat it black and blew, and foreign, I make it to serve. The end, and so the bound of Humiliation is First to bring down the Principle of the Natural Man into a Principle of Darkness, that it may no more put forth itself in its own Light and Life. Secondly, it is to subdue that Principle to the Heavenly Principle, that it may be quite slain in itself, and revived in the Spiritual Man a Spiritual Principle.

Rom. 7. 24. St. Paul calls the Natural Man, this body of Death, or the body of this Death. It is a body of Death in a Two-fold sense.

p. 181First, Thy Outward Man is the shadow of Death cast upon thy Spirit. It is the Valley of the Shadow of Death thorow which thou walkest here below. Thou art in the Body sunk down to the borders of Death, being already come within the shadow of it. The whole face of things upon thy Person, and round about thee, is a dead Image, and the Image of Death: For he, who hath the Power of Death, hath entred into it with his Principality, and taken away the true Life of it, setting it up now, as an Appearance in, and of himself.

Secondly, Thy Outward Man is a Body of Death, because it is appointed to Death. The Body by one Death hath brought it self out of the Divine Life into the Power of Darkness, into a Hellish Root. Now by another Death it must be broken off from this Root, and brought back again into an Eternal Stock. Our mourning then must last, while we are in the Body of this Death, till this be no more this Body, but perish in Death. The Devil cast us out of our Innocency, and from the face of God; he set up himself, by setting up the Natural Man in it self. We were turn'd out of Paradise, when we came into this Body, which is now the Beast's skin. Again, By the Ruine of the Natural Man, we must raise the Building of God, and cast down the Devil. By putting off the Beast's skin, by the dissolution of the Tabernacle of Beasts skins in Death, we return into Paradise. We are therefore to go mourning to our Graves.

3. Limit: The clearing of the face of God towards us, Matth. 9. 15. Our Saviour tells the Jews, That his Disciples could not fast while the Bridegroom was with them. But the Bridegroom should be taken away. And then they should fast in those days. The Face of God in Jesus Christ, is the Soul's Bridegroom. Who, that is the Bride of this Bridegroom, can take joy in any thing, when this Face is withdrawn and hid from him? Shall not our Souls fast from the Freedom and Fulness of Natural Delights, when our Spirits are made to fast from the Beauties and Delicacies of Jesus Christ? This is the season of Mournning. It is now beautiful to see a holy Soul Widow-like, with a Vail upon the face of all her Glory and Content; when her God is gone a great Journey from her. What can she do but mourn, when he is absent, who was the Light of her Eyes, the Anointing of her Face and Head? What can set an end to her mournings, till he return, and wipe away all Tears from her Eyes, by setting himself in the Eye of her Spirit?

Psal. 30. 7. Thou didst hide thy face, and I was troubled, saith David. Will it not be Winter when your Sun is gone? Can you expect a Spring, till he turns toward your Earth again? Is it not the Presence of the Lord Jesus, that makes all things fresh, and full of Beauty round about thee? When he is withdrawn, who was the Image of God in them, do not all things droop and languish in thine Eyes? Canst thou then chuse but languish with them? If the Lord Jesus be the Root of thy Spirit, and his Spirit the Sap of thy Comforts, p. 182thou wilt grieve in his absence without arguments to persuade thee to it; as naturally, as Flowers nipt with Frosts hang the head. Nay no arguments will be able to raise thee to any degree of chearfulness, except he come, and make himself the argument. When thy Corruptions, like Fogs from the Earth, have gathered into Clouds, which hide the Heaven of thy Lords Face from thee: weep then, till these Clouds be again dissolv'd by the Showers of thy Tears, and so thy Jesus again discover himself over thee as a clear sky.

I have done with the Third particular in the Nature of Spiritual mourning, which was the measure of it.

4. The Mystery. The Mystery of every thing is in God, Ephes. 3. 9. the Mystery hid in God who created all Things by Jesus Christ. This is the Mystery of Things, their ground, their beginning, and end in the Person of God and Christ. Neither can we be Spiritual in any thing any further than we see the Mystery of it, and stand in the Mystery.

The Mystery of a holy Grief is Threefold.

1. Mystery: Conformity to Iesus Christ.

2. Mystery: Complyance with the Will of God.

3. Mystery: The Compleating of our Persons.

1. Mystery: Conformity to Jesus Christ. We read, Ephes. 1. 4, 5. that we were chosen in Christ before the Foundation of the world: We were predestinated to the Adoption of Children by Jesus Christ. We sprung up in Eternity, in the Heart of God, out of the Person of the Lord Jesus there, as Images of him, who as he rose up in the Divine Nature, the essential Image of it, was Fruitful from the Root of that Nature according to the Power of Life, and Store of Spirit in it. So he multiplied himself by the strength of the Father into many such Images in the heart, and thoughts of God. Thus we were chosen in, and by him. Thus also we were chosen to be Conformed to the Image of this Son, as you shall read, Rom. 8. 29. Whom he did foreknow, he did also predestinate to be conform'd to the Image of his Son. The Fathers fore-knowledge of us in his Son, was the ground of our predestination by him, and conformity to him. A chief part in Christ is the dark part, his Sufferings, a chief part of our Conformity to him lies in our Sufferings and Sorrows.

Rom. 8. 17. Joynt-heirs with Christ, if so be we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together. Our whole inheritance is our conformity to the Lord Jesus. This Inheritance lies as well in Suffering, as in being glorified. We have a double interest in Christ: One in the Unity of his Spirit: Another in the variety of his Body. According to our First interest we are one with Christ, that is, by the Unity of the Spirit, 1 Cor. 6. 17. So we are to have the fulness of Christs Sufferings form'd over again upon our Persons in the Spirit, 2 Cor. 4. 10. According to our Second interest in the Body of Christ we are only particular members, 1 Cor. 6. 15. In this particular membership a particular … of Sufferings pertains to us, according to our p. 183place in the Body. The portion of sorrow allotted to every Saint in this capacity, is as much inferiour to the miseries of our Blessed Saviour, as that Member is inferiour to the Head. But for this reason the Providence of God leads us to occasions of sorrow, and then opens in us a spring of Sorrow, that we may fulfil our measure in the sufferings of Christ, Col. 1. 21. This is the first Mystery of our Griefs, our Conformity to Christ; that we may be Brethren, Spouses and Members of Christ.

2 Mystery. Our Complyance with the Will of God. We mourn, that we may be like Christ; Brethren grown up from one Root with him; Spouses drawn forth from his side, Bone of his Bone, Flesh of his Flesh; Principle of his Principle, Image of his Image; Strength of his Strength; Weakness of his Weakness. But now you may ask, what the mystery of all sufferings and griefs are, as they are Christ's first, and so ours?

Answ. I answer to that by a place of Scripture, Heb. 5. 8. Though he were a Son, yet learned he Obedience by the things which he suffered. There are Two Waies of Learning; one Speculative, in the Contemplations of the Spirit; the other Practical in the Conformity of the Person. There are Two Waies of Obedience; one in the Will, being prepared, and ready to all things; the other in the Work of Doing or Suffering, being actually undertaken, and thorowly undergone. Our Lord Jesus was ever in all things obedient to his Father, so far as that State in which he was, would permit. While he liv'd in Heaven, he was obedient to the Death, in the Contemplations of his Mind, and the Conformity of his Will, so far as these two Wings could carry him.

But all this while, the Devil might say of Jesus, as he did of Job; He dyes for his Father in his Speculations, and Purposes at a distance; while his Father maintains a hedge of Life, and Joys round about him; while he sees not Death, but as Death it self is a living and beautiful Image in a Prospect of Glory. Therefore Jesus Christ is brought down into Flesh, that he may try, and so experimentally learn another way of suffering, by an Actual Descent into the Power of Darkness, and Misery, as it is in its own Principle. Our Father could have prevented the Rising up of the Spring, or Principle of Sin in the Heart of the creature: So he could have cut off all occasions of sorrow or suffering: He could have taken away Sin by a change, and not by a Death; Transfiguring instead of Crucifying us; and this too, by the heavenly Person resting upon us in a White Cloud, and taking us up in it self, without its Descent into the Dark Cloud of this earthly Body. Thy Father could restrain the Issues of Lust in thee, which send forth so much Filth, upon which we pour forth so many Tears. So our Tears might have been spared. But if all this had been, where had been the Testimony of our Obedience to the Father? There are Two Waies of Obeying God: One in the concurrency of his Will, and ours; the other, in a contradiction between his Will and ours. A holy Spirit obeys God the first way in Heaven and Joys. For there it takes up its Joys, and tasts a Sweetness in them, much more out of Obedience, p. 184than Appetite; because they are the Will of God, rather than because they agree with its own will.

But we obey God the Second way on Earth in Afflictions. In Heaven we give up our will to be swallowed up in the Will of God, as a River in the Sea. In our Sorrows we Sacrifice our wills to the Will of God, as the Beasts were Sacrificed by their Death, and by Fire. So Jesus Christ, when his will was at the height of contrariety to the Will of God according to its own proper inclination; If it be possible, let this Cup pass from me. Yet then he cut the Throat of his will, and laid it panting upon the Altar, to be wholly consumed in the dreadfullest way, in the Fire of divine wrath and vengeance. Thou in all thy Griefs accomplishest the same Mystery after the same manner. Thou Feastest the will of the Father by the Fast of thine own will. Thou obeyest thy God, and servest his Pleasure by the binding, and Offering up of thy Isaac, all thy Pleasures.

3. Mystery: The Compleating of our Persons. This is yet a Further, and the utmost depth in the Mystery of our Sorrows. The Scripture holds it forth in the Person of Christ as the Pattern; in our Persons, as the Copies of that Pattern. We read of Jesus Christ, Heb 2. 10. that, he was made Perfect through Sufferings. That is Perfect, which hath all parts belonging to it. It belonged to the Person of Jesus Christ to act all parts, to appear in all shapes. For he was to be the dwelling place of all Fulness, 1 Colos. 19. He was to unfold the manifold wisdom of God in his own Person, Ephes. 3. 10. He came forth as the Word, to make a full and distinct expression of God. The Nature of God is the Glass, in which all Natures are first formed, and seen. The Natures of Light and Darkness, Shame and Glory, Joy and Misery; to say all, the Natures of Love and Wrath, the two Contrary heads of all distinct Natures are Originally in God according to their Eternal Ideas, or First Forms. If Jesus Christ had not come forth into all these Forms, and taken upon himself these several Natures in their utmost varieties, and contrarieties: he had wanted some parts belonging to his Person, and been imperfect in his Relation, as a Son, a Saviour; in his Office as a Representer, a Reconciler. Therefore, as St. Paul witnesseth, He descended first to the lowermost Parts of the Earth, then He ascended above all Heavens, and that for this reason; that He might fill All: Eph…s. 4. 10. Thus he was made perfect by Sufferings. The descent of Christ was the drawing of the Picture of the God-Head upon him in its lowest and outermost Mysteries, or wonders of Glory; in its Back-parts or Feet. The Ascent, was the Uniting of the lowest to the highest: the bringing of the outermost into the bosom of the Innermost: the drawing up of the Feet into the Bed, into the rest, and Glory of the head. The Scripture holds forth the accomplishment of the same Mystery in our Persons after the same manner. Jesus Christ went thorow these Sufferings, as our Captain, that he might lead us the same way to the same end; that he might bring us, as Sons to inherit the same p. 185Glory; to fulfil all Righteousness, all the goings forth of the God-Head in our selves thorow Christ, Heb. 2. 10.

St. James c. 1. v. 2, 4. exhorts the Saints to account it all Joy, when they fall into all manner of Temptations: and to let Patience have her perfect work, which would make them Perfect, entire, wanting nothing. We were brought forth upon the uppermost parts, the Face of the Earth in Paradise. Let us now with Jesus Christ go down into the Deep, to the lowermost parts of the Earth, by Sufferings and Sorrows. Let us patiently endure till we are carried thorow all the Chambers of Death, and the innermost corners of that Cave of Darkness; till we be carried out of all, up into Heaven: So we shall be clothed with all the Wonders of God, and have his manifold Wisdom, his Fulness displaid in our Persons as his Sons also, together with our Saviour. Willingly then Travel thorow the valley of Baca, of Mourning, and Lamentation; as the way of Perfection, the Accomplishment of the Mystery of God in you. Now I have performed the first part of my promise, which was to speak of the Nature of Spiritual Mourning. There remains behind, the Second part of my promise, which is to speak of the Mixture of Spiritual Mirth, and Spiritual Mourning.

I will direct you to this Mixture by Five Rules:

1. Rule: So grieve, as giving Glory to God in your Griefs. 1 Cor. 10. 31. Whether ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the Glory of God. whether ye Mourn or be merry, let both be to the Glory of God. Mourn not, as questioning the Sweetness in the Will of God, the Wisdom in the Counsels of God, the Strength in the Power of God, the Beauty in the Face of God, the Pleasures in the Person of God, the Infiniteness in all. Grieve not to the Clouding, but the clearing of the Appearances of God in your Spirit. Let not your Sorrows be as a troubled Sea, but as a Sea of Christal, thorow which you may see the glorious face of God. As the Beams of the Sun shining thorow red Glass, so will the glory of God be appearing thorow your Sorrows. It will beget a Pleasantness in your bloodiest Pangs.

2. Rule: Let your Mourning raise, not ruine the Life of the Spiritual Man in you. Though the Outward Man perishes, the Inward Man is renewed day by day, 2 Cor. 4. 16. Let your Sorrows weigh down the Natural Man only, as one of the Buckets, that the Spiritual Man as the other of the Buckets, may be lifted up. If that Life which is Light in the Lord, be lifted up by your Griefs, It will draw up your Person, and your Griefs themselves into the Pleasantness of its own Light.

3. Rule: Mourn in the Name of Christ, Colos. 3. 17. Whatsoever ye do in Word, or Deed, do all in the Name of the Lord Iesus. The Name of the Lord Iesus wraps up Four Things in it, which I shall express by Four Rules in this present case.

1. Mourn in the Power of Christ, The Power of Christ is the Power of p. 186Eternal Life, which carries an unexpressible sweetness along with it, even then, when it goes forth into the saddest operations. Thy Tears will be a Spiritual Wine, if they be the Fruit of this Vine.

2. Mourn in the Image of Christ. Every thing is delightful to us, which brings our well-beloved into our Thoughts, though it be, but as a Picture, or Shadow of him. Love delights in likeness, especially to be itself made like that which it loves. This will make thy Sorrows Comfortable to thy Heart, and Glorious in thine Eye, if thou Transferrest them upon thy self, as in a Figure of Jesus Christ.

3. Meurn for Christ. Make him the end of thy Sorrows. Christ is the end of the Law for Righteousness sake, Rom. 10. 4. Let Jesus Christ be the end of thy Griefs for thy Joys sake. The End puts a Loveliness, and Pleasantness upon the means, and way to it. If thy Sorrows be for Self, and from Self-love: they will be like Brine, they will have a Gnawing, Burning Saltness in them. But if they be for thy Saviour, and from his Love, they will be Fresh, and Sweet on thy Spirit, as the Dew of Heaven on the tender Grass.

4. Mourn, as in Union with the Person of Christ. A Sai…t is a Name of Anointing, which signifies Two in one; the Ointment, or Oyl, and the Anointed: the Sanctifier, and the Sanctified. He that Sanctifies, and they that are Sanctified are of one, Heb. 2. 11. They must also be in One. Our Griefs are never Saintlike, or Holy; if they be not in Consort, and Fellowship with Iesus Christ.

Rom. 8. 17. Joint-heirs with Christ, if so be we suffer with him. Our Sufferings are a Murther, not a Sacrifice; they are to Death, not to Life; if they be not in Union with Jesus Christ. If they be in Union with Christ, that Union unites a Sweetness, and Joy to them.

These are the Branches of the Third Rule.

4. Rule: Let your Grief be a Grace. If your Grief be from Nature only, it is carnal, not spiritual; it is such a Death, as is a Sowing to the Flesh, which will bring forth Corruption, and Death. Whatever is not of Faith is Sin, Rom. 14. 23. If your Mourning be not a Grace in you, one of the Daughters of Faith, which is the mother of all Grace: it is Sin, and to be resisted by you, as the Devil. But if your Mourning be Gracious, then it is a Sowing to the Spirit, of which you shall reap Immortality Such Tears are Precious Seed, Spiritual Seed, which have the Sweet Rellish, and Power of Immortal Life in them.

5. Rule: Let your Mourning be in God. In him, saith St. Paul of God, we live, and move, and have our Being, Acts 17. 28. It is true Naturally of all men. It is much more true of Saints in a Spiritual sense. We live the life of Grace, we Mourn, we have our Spiritual Being and Motions in God. A Natural, and Spiritual Man have their Being in God after a different manner. A Natural Man hath his Being in God, as he is the Principle of the First Creation, in which he is as in Thick Darkness. A Spiritual Man hath his Being in God, as God is in Christ, who is the Brightness of the Glory of God. Abide in me, p. 187saith Christ, that is in the Brightness of the Glory of God, and ye shall bring forth much Fruit, John 15. 4. 5.

If you will bring forth your Tears, as Fruit to God, you must weep in the midst of the Glory, and Joys of the Divine Nature. God in his Naked Beauties must be the Stage, on which you must act the saddest part of your Sorrows. What Part will not such a Stage, and Scene of Delights make Pleasant?

If thou mournest right, thou art in God, while thou mournest, thou seest nothing below, above, on every side of thee, but the Gold, and Curious Work of his Glory. Will not this Guild thy Grief, and put a chearfulness upon it?