03.05. CHAP. V. An expostulation with Christians concerning their remiss and shiggish temper
CHAP. IV An expostulation with Christians concerning their remiss and sluggish temper — an attempt to convince them of it by some considerations — which are — 1. The activity of worldly men — 2. The restless appetites of the body — 3. The strong propensions of every creature towards its own centre — An inquiry into the slothfulness and inactivity of christian souls — The grace of faith vindicated from the slander of being merely passive — A short attempt to awaken Christians unto greater vigour and activity.
We have seen in what respects religion is an active principle in the soul where it is seated: give me leave to enlarge a little here for conviction or reprehension. By this property of true religion we shall be able to discover much that is false and counterfeit in the world. If religion be no lazy, languid, sluggish, passive thing, but life, love, the spirit of power and freedom, a fire burning, a well of water springing up, as we have sufficiently seen, what shall we say then of that heavy, sluggish, spiritless kind of religion that most men take up with? Shall we call it a spirit of life, with the Apostle; and yet allow of a religion that is cold and dead.’ Shall we call it a spirit of love and power with the Apostle; and yet allow of it, though it be indifferent, low, and impotent? Or will such pass for current with the wise and holy God, if we should pass a favourable censure upon it? And why should it ever pass with men, if it will not for ever puss with God? But, indeed, how can this inactivity and sluggishness pass for religion amongst men? Who can think you are in pursuit of the infinite and Supreme Good, that sees you so slow in your motions towards it? Who can think that your treasure is in heaven, that sees your heart so far from thence? The more anything partakes of God, and the nearer it comes to him who is the fountain of life, and power, and virtue, the more active, powerful, and lively will it be. We read of an atheistical generation in Zephaniah 1:12, who fancied to themselves an idle and slothful God, that minded not the affairs of the world at all, saying, “ The Lord will not do good, neither will he do evil; which was also the false and gross conceit of many of the heathen, as Cicero confesses of some of the philosophers themselves, “ who maintain that God has no power in himself, and can impart no power to any other:” and, indeed, though it be not so blasphemous, yet it is almost as absurd, to fancy an idle saint, as an idle deity. Sure I am, if it be not altogether impossible, yet it is altogether a shameful and deformed sight, a holy soul in a lethargy, a pious soul that is not in pursuit of God. Moses indeed bids Israel ’* stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord;’*’ but there is no such divinity in the holy scriptures as this, ’ stand still and see the salvation of the soul,” though some have violently pressed those words, Exodus 14:13, to serve under their slothful standard: no, no, the scripture speaks to us in another manner, “ work out your own salvation:’’’’ and indeed the Spirit of God doth every where describe religion by the activity, industry, vigour, and quietness of it, as I hinted in the very beginning of this discourse, and could abundantly confirm and explain, if there were need of it. But that I may more powerfully convince and awaken the lazy and heavy spirit and temper of many professors, I will briefly touch upon a few particulars, which I will next propound to their serious consideration.
1. The children of this world, earthly and sensual men, are not so slothful, so lazy, so indifferent in the pursuit of earthly and sensual objects. You say you have laid up your treasure in heaven; we know they have laid up their treasure in the earth: now, who is it that behaves himself most suitably and seemly towards his treasure? you or they.’* You say you have a treasure in heaven, and are content to be able to say so, but make no haste to be fully and feelingly possessed of it, to enjoy the benefit and sweetness of it. But they “ rise up early and sit up late,’ and either pine themselves, or eat the bread of sorrow, to obtain earthly and perishing inheritances; they compass the world, travel far, sell all to purchase that part which is of so great price with them: and when they have accomplished it, O how do they set their heart upon it, bind up their very souls in the same bags with their money, and seal up their aiFections together with it: yea, and they are not at rest either, but find a gnawing hunger upon their hearts after more still, to add house to house, and land to land, and one bag to another: the covetous miser is ready to sit down and wring his hands, because he hath no more hands to scrape with; the voluptuous Epicure is angry that he hath not the neck of a crane the better to taste his dainties; and ambitious Alexander, when he domineers over the known world, is ready to sit down and whine, because there are no more worlds to conquer. What Christian but must be ashamed of himself, when he reads the description which Plautus the comedian gives of a covetous worldling, under the person of Euclio, how he hid his pot of gold, heeded it, watched it, visited it almost every hour, would not go from it in the day, could not sleep for it in the night, suspected every body that so much as looked towards it, and by all means kept it even as his life? For where is the like eager and ardent disposition to be found in a Christian towards God himself? Tell me, is it possible for a man that vehemently loves a virgin, to be content all his life long to court her at a distance, and not care whether ever he eventually marry her or not? Or must not such a one necessarily pursue a matrimonial and most intimate union with her? Let us now confess the truth, and every one judge himself. This dull and earthly body, is not so indifferently affected towards meat and drink, and rest, and the things that serve its necessities, and gratify its temper. Hunger will break down stone walls, and thirst will give away a kingdom for a cup of water; sickness will not be eased by good words, nor will a drowsy brain be bribed by any entertainments of company or recreation: no, no, the necessities of the body must and will be relieved with food, and physic, and sleep; the restless and raging appetite will never cease calling and crying to the soul for supplies till it arise and give them. Behold, O my soul! consider the mighty and incessant appetites and tendencies of the body after sensual objects, after its suitable good and proper perfection, and be ashamed of thy more remiss and sluggish inclinations towards the highest good, a God-like perfection.
3. No creature in the whole world is so languid, slow, and indifferent in its motions towards its proper rest and centre. How easy were it to call heaven and earth to witness the free, pleasant, cheerful, eager progress of every creature according to its kind, towards its own centre and happiness? The sun in the firmament rejoices to run its race, and will not stand still one moment, except it be miraculously overpowered by the command of God himself; the rivers seem to be in pain, till by a continued flowing they have accomplished to themselves a kind of perfection, and be swallowed up in the bosom of the ocean, except they be benumbed with frost, or otherwise over-mastered and retarded by foreign violence; I need not instance in sensitive and vegetating things; all which you know with a natural vigour and activity grow up daily towards a perfect state and stature. Were it not a strange and monstrous sight to see a stone settling in the air, and not working towards its centre? Such a spectacle is a pious soul settling upon earth, and not endeavouring a nearer and more intimate union with its God. Wherefore, Christians, either cease to pretend that you have chosen God for your portion, centre, happiness, or else arise and cease not to pursue and accomplish the closest union and the most familiar conjunction with him that your souls are capable of: otherwise I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day: and the day is coming, when you will be put to shame by the whole creation. Doth every, even the meanest creature of God, pursue its end and perfection, and proper happiness, with ardent and vehement longings; and shall a soul, the noblest of all creatures, stand folding up itself in itself, or choking up its wide and divine capacity with dust and mire? Shall a pious soul, the noblest of all souls, hang the wing, suspend its motions towards the Supreme Good, or so much as once offer to faint and languish in its enterprises for eternal life? Tell it not at Athens, publish it not at Rome, lest the heathen philosophers deride and hiss us out of the world. But you will ask me, When a Christian may be said to be sluggish and inactive? and who these lazy souls are? I will premise two things, and then give you a brief account of them. (1.) When I speak of a sluggish and spiritless religion, I do not speak as the hot-spirited Anabaptists or Chiliasts, who being themselves acted by a strange fervour of mind, miscalled zeal, are wont to declaim against all men as cold and benumbed in their spirits, who do not call for fire from heaven to consume all Dissenters, under the notion of Antichristian; who are not afraid to reproach the divine, holy, gentle, yet generous spirit of religion; calling it weak, womanish, cowardly, low, cold, and I know not what.
These men, I believe, so far as I can guess at their spirit, if they had lived in the days of our Saviour, and had beheld that gentle, meek, humble, peaceable spirit, which did infinitely shine forth in him, would have gone nigh to have reproved him for not carrying on his own kingdom with sufficient vigour and activity; if not have judged Christ himself to be much Antichristian. I hope you see nothing in all my discoveries of the active spmt of religion that savours of such a fiery spirit as this. (2.) When I do so highly commend the active spirit of true religion, and the vigorous temper of truly religious souls, I would not be understood as if I thought all such souls were alike swift, or that any such soul did always move with like swiftness, and keep a like pace towards God. I know that there are different sizes of active souls, yea, and different degrees of activity in the same soul, as may be seen.
Song of Solomon 5:3, compared with the sixth verse of the same chapter, and in many other places of scripture. But yet, that none may flatter and deceive themselves with an opinion of their being what indeed they are not, I will briefly discover the sluggishness and inactivity of Christians in a few particulars. I pray take it not ill though the greater part of Christians be found guilty; for that is no other than what Christ himself has prophesied.
1. The active spirit of religion in the soul will not suffer men to take up their rest in a constant course of external performances; and they are but slothful souls that place their religion in anything without them. By external performances I mean not only open, and public, and solemn services, but even the most private, and secret performances that are in and by the body, and without the soul. It is not possible that a soul should be happy in anything that is extrinsical to itself, no, not in God himself, if we consider him only as something without the soul: the devil himself knows and sees much of God without him; but having no communications of a divine nature or life, being perfectly estranged from the life of God, he remains perfectly miserable. I doubt it is a common deceit in the world, men toil and labour in bodily acts of worship and religion in a slavish and mercenary manner, and think, with those labourers in the parable, that at the end they must needs receive great wages, and many thanks, because they have borne the heat and burden of the day. Alas! that ever men should so grossly mistake the nature of religion, as to sink it into a few bodily acts and carcase-services, and to think it is nothing else but a running the round of duties and ordinances, and a keeping up a constant set and course of actions!
Such an external legal righteousness the apostle Paul, after his conversion, could not take up with, but counted it all loss and dung in comparison of that God-like righteousness which was now brought into his soul, that inward and spiritual conformity to Christ, which was now wrought in him: “ That I may be found in Christ, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith; that I may know him, and the power of his resurrection; and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable imto his death.”’ I know indeed that men will be loth to confess that they place their religion in anything without them; but, I pray, consider seriously wherein you excel other men, save only in praying or hearing now and then, or some other outward acts, and judge yourselves by your nature, and not by your actions.
2. The active spirit of religion, where it is in the soul, will not suffer men to take up their rest in a mere pardon of sin; and they arc but slothful souls that could be so satisfied. Blessed is the man indeed whose iniquities are pardoned. But if we could suppose a soul to be acquitted of the guilt of all sin, and yet to lie bound under the dominion of lusts and passions, and to live without God in the world, he were yet far from true blessedness. A real hell and misery will arise out of the very bowels of sin and wickedness, though there should be no reserve of fire and brimstone in the world to come. It is utterly impossible that a soul should be happy out of God, though it had the greatest security imaginable that it should never suffer anything from him. The highest care and ambition indeed of a slavish and mercenary spirit is to be secured from the wrath and vengeance of God, but the breathings of the ingenuous and holy soul are after a divine life, and God-like perfections. This right gracious temper you may see in David, which is also the temper of every truly religious soul, ’’ Hide thy face from my sins, and blot out all mine iniquities. Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from thy presence; and take not thy Holy Spirit from me.^ Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation; and uphold me with thy free Spirit.’’
3. The active spirit of religion, where it is in the soul, will not suffer men to take up their rest in mere innocence, or freedom from sin; and they are slothful souls that could count it happiness enough to be harmless. I doubt men are much mistaken about holiness; it is more than mere innocence, or freedom from the guilt or power of sin, it is not a negative thing; there is something active, noble, divine, and powerful, in true religion. A soul that rightly understands its own penury and self-insufficiency, and the emptiness and meanness of all creature-good, cannot possibly take up its rest, or place its happiness in anything but in a real participation of God himself; and therefore is continually making out towards that God from whom it came, and is labouring to unite itself more and more unto him. Let a low-spirited, fleshly-minded Pharisee take up with a negative holiness and happiness, as he doth, “God, I thank thee that I am not’’ so and so: a noble and high-spirited Christian cannot take up his rest in any negation or freedom from sin. Every pious soul is not so learned, in.deed, as to be able to describe the nature and proper perfection of a soul, and to tell you how the happiness of a soul consists, not in cessation and rest, as the happiness of a stone doth, but in life, and power, and vigour, as the happiness of God himself doth: but yet the spirit of true religion is so excellent and powerful in every pious soul, that it is still carrying it to the fuller enjoyment of a higher good: and the soul doth find and feel within itself, though it cannot discourse philosophically of these thinojs, that thouch it were free from all distur])ance of sin and affliction in the world, yet still it wants some sunreme and positive good to make it completely happy, and so bends all its power thitherward. This is the description which you will every where find given in scripture of the true spirit of holiness, which hath always something positive and divine in it, as, “ Cease to do evil, learn to do well;” and, “Put off the old man, put on that new man which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.” And accordingly a truly pious person, to use the Apostle’s words, though he know nothing by himself, yet doth not thereby count himself happy.
4. The active spirit of true religion, where it is in the soul, will not suffer m-en to take up their rest in some measures of grace received; and so far as the soul doth so, it is sluggish and less active than it ought to be. This, indeed, ofttimes comes to pass when the soul is under some distemper of proud selfishness, earthly-mindedness, or the like, or is less apprehensive of its object and happiness; as it seems to have been the case of the spouse, “ I have put off my coat; how shall I put it on? I have washed my feet; how shall I defile them.
Some such fainting fits, languishings, surfeitings, insensibleness, must be allowed to be in the pious soul during its imprisoned and imperfect state: but we must not judge ourselves by any present distempers, or infirmities. The nature of religion, when it actuates the soul rightly and powerfully, is to carry it after a more lively resemblance of God, which is the most proper and excellent enjoyment of him. A mind rightly and actually sound is most sick of love; and the nature of love is, not to know when it is near enough to its object, but still to long after the most perfect conjunction with it. This well of water, if it be not violently obstructed for a time, is ever springing up till it be swallowed up in the ocean of divine love and grace. The soul that is rightly acquainted with itself and its God, sees something still wanting in itself, and to be enjoyed in him, which makes it that it cannot be at rest, but is still springing up into him, till it come to the measure of the stature of the fulness of its Lord. In this holy, loving, longing, striving, active temper, we find the great Apostle: “ Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect; but I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus. Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended, but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth imto those things which are before, I press toward the mark, for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.” And by how much the more of divine grace any soul hath drunk in, the more thirsty is it after much more.
5. The active spirit of true religion, where it is powerfully seated in the minds of men, will not sufter them to settle into a love of this animal life, nor indeed suffer them to be content to live for ever in such a kind of body as this; and that soul is in a degree lazy and slothful, that dotli not desire to depart and be with his Lord. The pious soul eyeing God as his perfect and full happiness, and finding that his being in the body doth separate him from God, keep him in a poor and imperfect state, and hinder his blissful communion with the highest good, groans within himself, with the Apostle, that mortality were swallowed up of life. I know not how much, but I think he hath not very much of God, neither sight of him nor love of him, that could be content to abide for ever in this imperfect, mixed, low state, and never be perfected in the full enjoyment of him. And it seems that they in whom the love of God is rightly predominant, potent, flourishing, do also look earnestly “for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life,” as without doubt they ought to do. “ What manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness, looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God?’’’’
Let this suffice by way of general reprehension. But more particularly, the consideration of the active nature of true religion may well serve to correct a mistake «ibout the noble grace of faith.
How dishonourably do some speak of this excellent and powerful grace, when they make it to be a slothful, passive thing, an idle kind of waiting, or a melancholic sitting still; where, indeed and in truth, is life and power. Be not mistaken in so high and eminent a grace: true faith doth not only accept the imputed righteousness of Christ for justifieation, but by a lively dependence upon God drinks in divine influences, and eagerly draws in grace, and virtue, and life, from the fountain of grace, for more perfect sanctification: and for this cause, I think, a purifying virtue is ascribed to it. Acts 15:9. Faith is not a lazy languid thing, content to wait for salvation till the world to come; but is even now panting after it, and accomplishing it too in a way of mortification, self-denial, and growing up in God, it is not content to be a candidate waiting for life and happiness, but is actually drawing down heaven into the soul, attracting God to itself, and gaining still further participations of divine grace for its aid: its motto is that of the famous painter, “ No day without a line:” it longs to find some divine lineament, some line of God’s image drawn upon the soul daily. Faith is a giving grace, as well as receiving; it gives up the whole soul to God, and is troubled that it can give him no more: it binds over the soul afresh to God every day, and is troubled that it can bind it no faster nor closer to him. The believing soul is wearied because of murderers, murdering loves, lusts, cares, earthly pleasures, and calls mightily upon Christ to come and take vengeance upon them: it is wearied because of those robbers that are daily stealing away precious time and affections from God, which are due unto him, and calls upon Christ to come and scourge these thieves, these buyers and sellers, out of his own temple. In a word, the pious soul is active, and faith is the very life and action of the soul itself.
Lastly, Let me exhort all Christians from hence to be zealous, to be fervent in spirit, serving the Lord, and longing after him; “ stir up the grace of God that is in you; quench not,” that is, blow up, enflame “the Spirit of God in you.” Awake, christian soul, out of thy lethargy, and rejoice, as the sun, to run the race that is set before thee, and, as a mighty man refreshed with wine, to fight thy spiritual battles against the armies of uncircumcised, profane, and earthly concupiscences, loves, and passions. Eye God as your centre, the enjoyment of him as the happiness, and full conformity to him as the perfection of your souls; and then say, Awake, arise, O my soul, and hide not thy hand in thy bosom, but throw thyself into the very heart and bosom of God; lay hold upon eternal life. Again, Observe how all things in the world pursue their several perfections with unwearied and impatient longings, and say. Come, my soul, and do thou likewise. Converse not with God so much under the notion of a lawgiver, but as with love itself; nor with his commands, as having authority in them, but as having goodness, and life, and sweetness in them. Again, Consider your poverty as creatures, and how utterly impossible it is for you to be happy in yourselves, and say. Arise, O my souly from off this weak and tottering foundation, and build thyself upon God, cease pinching thyself within the straits of self-sufficiencies, and come stretch thyself upon infinite goodness and fulness.
Again, Pore not upon your attainments; do not sit brooding upon your present accomplishments, but forget the things that are behind, and say. Awake, O my soul, there is yet infinitely much more in God; pursue after him for it, till thou hast gotten as much as a created being is capable to receive of the divine nature. In a word, take heed you live not by the lowest examples, (which thing keeps many in a dwindling state all their days) but by the highest: read over the spouse”*s temper, sick of love; David’s temper, waiting for God more than they that watch for the morning, breaking in heart for the longing that he had to the Lord, and say, Arise, O my soul, and live as high as the highest.
It is no fault to desire to be as good, as holy, as happy as an angel of God; and thus, O my soul, open thy mouth wide, and God hath promised to fill thee.