of faith, which requires as much power to effect as was seen in the creationof the world.

And if any have not observed this power working thus in their hearts at first, in bringing them first to nothing (God working upon some insensibly and by degrees), yet they may discern the power of God working in their faith, in continuing, backing, strengthening, and preserving of it; for he fulfilleth the work of faith with power, as well as he begins it with power; and if man lives not by bread only, but by God's command and power, then the life of faith is much more continued with power. And indeed, if we would define faith, what is it but the power of God drawing the heart to Christ, and holding it to him? John vi. 44; and 1 Peter i. 5, Ye are kept by the power of God through faith;' that is, the power of God is seen in faith, and that in temptation especially, ver. 6, 7; and though in ordinary passages of a man's life, when faith is not put to it, a man will scarce discern this power backing it, when signs, and the witness of the Spirit, and assistance in duties, do take part with faith, yet in time of temptation this. will more evidently appear, when the spurious faith, that is but a fruit of the flesh, will fail; but if true, he that maintained the oil in the cruse, that it decayed not in the time of the famine, he will maintain that little drop of faith in the time of temptation. For this is a sure rule, that which backs thy faith in temptation was the begetter of it. As the woman, when her child was like to be divided, laboured to save it, because it was her child, so will God preserve that faith that is begotten by himself, when it is like to be overborne. And know this, that if thy faith be true, it will be tempted. Satan hath desired to winnow thee, but I have prayed' (says Christ) that thy faith fail not;' faith being that thing that Satan desires most to winnow. Dost thou therefore feel the power of God backing, strengthening, joining with thy faith, drawing thy heart to cleave to Christ, maugre all temptations? Dost thou feel faith an invincible thing, that will never be nonplussed? It is because God's power is in it. Let a flood of temptations come in, yet faith, like a small drop of oil, will be above them all; and like a man hanging upon the top of a pinnacle, though ordinarily he hath a stool to ease his hand, yet when the stool is taken away, still he hangs; so faith, when temptation takes all signs and props away, then upholdeth the heart; though the devil not only plucks the stool away, but also strikes at the hand that holds it, yet still faith cleaves to Christ, and that so as sometimes the hand is benumbed also, and feels not that it holds it.

Use 1. The first use is to convince those, who defer repentance, of their low and light esteem of the work of grace, they 'erring herein, not knowing the power of God;' whereas if men apprehended that this work is as much as to dissolve the world to nothing, and make it new again; and that it is as impossible for them, by their own power, to repent, as to do this, they would set all aside, and think this one thing necessary, as Mary did, and immediately begin to seek to God for it, and think that little time they have to live were little enough for to beg so great a thing at God's hands, and be glad if they could obtain it at last. But such is the foolish wisdom of men, that think to grasp both the pleasures of sin here and heaven in the end, that think to go beyond God and the devil also, thinking to put God off with any repentance at their cast-away leisure, after the strength and flower of their youth and years are spent in the service of sin; and after a long apprenticeship served to the devil, who takes them captive at his will, think yet to give him at last the slip, to knock off his fetters, and to escape; as if repentance were within their own power, so playing with

it as the cat with its silly prey, thinking that one sudden leap will translate them at once from death to life; between which yet there is as great a gulf as between heaven and hell. Away, you foolish sinners, that say in your hearts as he, Deut. xxix. 19, 'We shall have peace,' &c. Go on to make your own ghests* (as they, James iv. 13-15), chalk out what ways of pleasures this day and the next you mean to walk in, at last meaning (as your hearts tell you) to turn in and see where true repentance dwells, I tell you (as James says, in matters of far less dependence, and more in your own power than repentance is), you reckon without your host; it must be the exceeding greatness of God's power must work it. If you dare yet think it in your own power, go on and prosper, set your own times, put off God still, who it may be now offers and begins to work it, and in your own deceitful hearts appoint and take a longer day, and then break it and perish for ever; do. But if you think it be in God's power only (as, if this text be true, it is), tremble to have such a thought; take his time who hath appointed a time for every work under the sun, the grass to grow, flowers to spring, trees to blossom, and all in their season; which when past, dung and water, and use what means you will, they appear no more. But you will say, If the greatness of his power work it, then he is able to do it as well at one time as another; and so no time is past with him.

I answer, That his power is regulated by his will, for his power working anything, is his will. He worketh all things according to his good pleasure,' and the counsel of his will;' therefore, speaking of works of regeneration, it is said, 'Of his will he begat us,' James i. 18. He is a free agent, breathing when and where he pleaseth; and therefore presume not on his power at all times, unless thou beest sure of his will at all times. Now that thou art not; for after that day appointed, he swears in his wrath, they shall never enter,' Heb. iii. 18. As he dealt with Saul in the matter of his kingdom, 1 Sam. xiii. 13-15, so with men for matter of grace, Ezek. xxiv. 13: When I would, they would not; therefore I will not, says God.

But you will say, I will seek him, and that earnestly.

I answer, Remember Esau, who in this is made a type of all neglecters of grace offered in the gospel, Heb. xii. 17, as the birthright is made a type of the grace offered in the gospel; so his father is a type of God offering it, he having sold it, as men do the offer of grace, for their lusts; his father could not change his mind, though he sought it with tears; he found no place for repentance: weep thy eyes out, it will do no good.

But you will say, I will then turn from my sins, take up new purposes and resolutions to forsake them and confess them, and then I hope he will repent and have mercy on me.

To this I answer, I confess you may do so; only take this with you, that there is a kind of repentance which is partly in your own power, such as Ahab had, who mourned and went softly; such as Judas, Matt. xxvii., who repented himself, confessed, and restored; such as they performed, Hosea vii. 16, They returned, but not to God,' not doing it out of a changed heart, which moves not God; but to have a changed heart, a new life of godliness put in, is not in thy power. For thou canst not make a hair black or white, nor can a blackamore alter his colour, though his blackness be but in his skin; and canst thou change thy heart, thinkest thou, sin being incorporated and blended with thy nature, so baked into thy bones and the spirit of thy mind? Tell me, can this heavy, massy lump, * From the connection, the meaning must be, arrangements,' or 'plans.'—ED.

the dregs of the world, the earth fastened in its own centre, can it remove itself and become a star? Can all the creatures, angels, men, if they set their shoulders to it, with all engines, move it a jot off the hinges it hangs on? No more can thy heart move itself, being as averse to what is good as the earth is to move upward, as fixed upon sin as the earth upon its centre; and as great a distance is there between the state of grace and nature as between heaven and earth.

But you will say, I will send for a minister or some good man to help me, and speak peace to me at my death.

Still this doctrine answers you; it is God's power only can do it. Send for all the angels from heaven, the whole college of physicians, let them come with all their balms, yet as he said, 2 Kings vi. 27, if God do not help thee, they cannot; for this birth is, John i. 13, not of itself, or the will of man, but of God. Though the minister preach then the gospel of peace to thee, yet unless God makes an echo to thy heart, they are but tinkling cymbals: Isa. lvii. 19, I create the fruit of the lips, peace;' talk they of peace never so much, unless God speak peace, and create it, as the fruit of those words, by an almighty power, thou canst not have peace. • The wicked are as the troubled sea, which cannot rest;' when the sea was troubled, Matt. viii. 24, could all the disciples still it? Could all their anchors save the ship and stay it? No; ver. 27, Christ only did it. So when thy conscience is tossed at death, and when the waves of thy sins arise, and the devils, as the winds, are let loose to join with those waves, who can command them silent? Sooner mayest thou command the thunder silent, that roars in the midst of heaven; and then thou, poor wicked wretch, art tossed, overwhelmed, and no anchor will hold or stay thee; no prince of peace comfort thee; and suppose now all men speak things of peace to thee, yet there is no peace to the wicked, says my God;' and if he says no, his word will stand.

But thou wilt say, I am of an ingenuous temper, and soft to the impressions of good, so as at any time when I consider things, I find my heart moved.

I answer, Suppose it; yet if this be true that God's power must work it, thou, for all thy good nature, art as far off as another in regard of any active concurrence to it; as take a piece of soft wax, and another of hard, the soft is no more able of itself to work the image and impression of any thing upon it than the hard, but a hand and seal must stamp the one as well as the other. So is a good nature, as you use to call it, as empty of the image of God as the crookedest, and as unable to stamp that image as the most perverse. It must be God's Spirit (for it is the seal of God, and so called, Eph. iv. 30) must stamp and work an impression, as well as upon the hardest heart, upon thy soft heart: this you may see in the example of the young man, who was ingenuous, soft, pliable, and Christ loved him; yet of him Christ says, and upon occasion of him, that it was as easy for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, as for a rich man to go to heaven.

But some will say, If I should now set myself to turn, I fear my case is desperate, and there is no hope, I am so hardened in evil.

Ans. The power of God being it which must do it, thou mayest come to repentance, though thy heart be never so hard. At the latter day the earth and elements shall melt with fervent heat, and is he not able to melt thy heart? Look now on the frosty weather: though all men could not thaw it, yet stay, thou shalt see it thawed; and cannot he dissolve thy heart?

But thou wilt say, My heart is full of sin, and of the works of the devil in it, and hath so long lain in them, that it cannot be healed.

I answer, He raised Lazarus, though dead four days, and he stunk ; and why not thee also, though thou art not only dead, but stinkest in thy sins?

CHAPTER VI.

That the virtual cause of regeneration is the resurrection of Jesus Christ.— What influence it hath to raise us to a newness of life.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which, according to his abundant mercy, hath begotten us again unto a lively hope, by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.-1 PETER I. 3.

By the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. The next thing to be considered is the virtual cause of regeneration, namely, the resurrection of Christ.

The words may, first, either refer to our hope, as being the cause of it: for in that Christ is risen and ascended, lies our hope that we also shall, as the apostle connects them, 1 Cor. xv. 17, 20, and it is the inference which the apostle makes, Col. iii. 1, 3, 4 compared, that he, being risen, ver. 1, and being our life, ver. 4, therefore when he appears in glory, we shall appear with him. And this it was that made the primitive Christians (as with good news) thus to salute one another, Christ is risen, Christ is risen.' Because I live' (says Christ), 'you shall live also,' John xiv. 19; and therefore, 1 Tim. i., Christ is called our hope.'

Or else, 2, it refers to being begotten again. And this seems here to be the most probable reference. Only this is a rule I take in interpreting scriptures, that when any passage relates to two things, I take them both. But here I shall only speak of the last reference, because the dependence between Christ's resurrection and the new birth is the most difficult to discern. To shew the affinity of these two, and to explain this in general, I shall say two things.

(1.) That Christ's own resurrection is called his being begotten; so, Acts xiii. 33, that place in the 2d Psalm is applied to his resurrection, This day have I begotten thee,' &c. The reason whereof I take to be this, because when the human nature first entered into that estate, which primitively was ordained for him by his Father (for he should not have come into this world clothed with infirmities but for sin, Rom. viii. 3. But the world to come was ordained for him, as this world was for the first Adam); his first entrance into that his world being at his resurrection, it may truly be called his begetting, as being then first brought forth into that his world. And so I understand the coherence of those two verses, Heb. i. 5, 6. That begetting spoken of, ver. 5, was his resurrection, which was that his first coming into the world' mentioned, ver. 6, namely, that world which is called the world to come,' chap. ii. 5. Now, as his resurrection is called his begetting again, so our resurrection is called our regeneration. So you have it in those words of Christ, Mat. xix. 28, Those that follow me, in the regeneration shall sit on twelve thrones,' &c., which refer rather to the time of the resurrection, which is the restitution of all things (as Peter calls it), than to the time of following Christ here, although they may relate to both. And therefore we find, Luke xx. 36,

The

the children of God are called by a new title, which ariseth from God's raising them up, it being a begetting them anew as his children. words are observable, for they are said to be the children of God, they being the children of the resurrection,' or peculiarly for this, that they are raised up by God. And there is this particular reason in it: for in their first begetting, as men, God was but the Father of their spirits,' they having other bodily parents of their bodies and flesh,' Heb. xii. 9; but now, in the resurrection, God becomes a father anew unto their bodies, and the whole man, raising them up, and joining both body and soul together; and so they become the children of God, being the children of the resurrection.' And therefore also it is that the redemption at the resurrection of the body is called 'the adoption,' Rom. viii. And to this purpose also is that phrase, Col. i. 18, where Christ is called 'the first-begotten of the dead;' the resurrection being a begetting both unto him and them, and because they are raised by virtue of his resurrection, therefore he is called 'the first-begotten.' Wherefore, that there should be some special affinity between Christ's resurrection and our new birth is not unlikely. But more expressly those two places, Col. ii. 12 and 1 Peter iii. 21, do ascribe the new birth of a believer unto the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The like figure whereunto even baptism doth now save us, by the resurrection of Jesus Christ.' Baptism is the sacrament of regeneration; and when the apostle says, Baptism saves,' his meaning is, that the grace in baptism, which is regeneration (for that is the thing sealed up) wrought by Christ's resurrection, doth save us. And the like to this is that in Col. ii. 12.

(2.) The second thing in general to be observed is, that though all the works of Christ for us have an influence into his works in us and upon us, yet so as some are more especially attributed to some work of Christ than to another, and some things in every work in us, more peculiarly to some of his works for us than to others. That being true of Christ's work for us, that is of the works of the trinity, that though all works are common to all the persons, yet some are more peculiarly attributed to the Father, as election; some to the Son, as redemption, &c.; and likewise in every work something more peculiarly attributed to one than to another: as in conversion, drawing us to Christ is attributed to the Father, John vi. 44, and sanctification to the Holy Ghost. And answerably is it in the thing in hand, the work of regeneration, wherein mortification, or destroying the body of sin, which is one part of it, is attributed to his death, Rom. vi. 4, and the begetting, or infusing a new principle of life into us, unto his resurrection, ver. 5 of the same chapter. And thus likewise in justification; the matter of our righteousness which is imputed is Christ's obedience unto death, but the imputation itself is ascribed to his resurrection, Rom. iv. 25. And so, Rom. v. 10, our reconciliation is attributed to his death, but our preservation in that estate unto his life and intercession.

And then, to shew why this new birth is thus peculiarly attributed to his resurrection.

1. It is not by way of merit only, for the merit or price laid down was fully accomplished and paid at that instant when he arose out of the grave (which was the last part of his satisfaction, and when he arose out of debasement), but his resurrection was the entrance and first step into his glorified condition.

Neither, 2, is it simply in respect of application; that he arose again to live and send the Spirit to work regeneration in us (as Rom. v. 10, where we are said to be saved by his life'). For in this respect, his resurrection

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