Imatges de pàgina
PDF
EPUB

4. Shall we thus live the lives of the angels, fubfifting in God, feafting upon him, filled with him to all eternity? This may moderate our forrow which we conceive for the lofs of any created good, houses, lands, husband, wife, children, &c, yet a little while, and we shall not miss them, fhall not need them, fhall not defire them any more. The

bleffed angels live a glorious life, and they have none of these, but are perfectly fatisfied in the enjoyment of God alone; they have no wives. or children, yet they want none; and yet a little while, and we fhall have none, neither shall we want them, having all things in the God of all things: they neither marry, nor are given in marriage; but are in conjunction with the father, with love, and goodness, and truth itself; and fo they have no want of any thing. If you have no candles left in the house, yet it is towards day-break, and the fun will rife upon you, and you fhall need none, and yet have light enough too. In a word, learn to live befide them whilft you have them, and you will be better able to live without them, when they are removed.

5. I come now to the fifth and last use that I shall make of this doctrine; and Oh that you and I may make this happy use of it! Shall the faints be as the angels of God in their way of living, in living upon God, and enjoying all happiness in him alone for ever? Shall this certainly be our life in heaven? Oh then labour to begin this life upon earth! If you cannot perfectly transcribe, yet, at least, imitate that angelical kind of life. Though you are here imprifoned in a body of earth, and often cumbred and clogged

with bodily infirmities, and called to attend upon bodily neceffities; yet, as far as this animal fate will permit, live upon God. Do not excufe or vindicate that low kind of earthly life; do not justify your living below and befides God, but ftir up yourselves to behold where your happiness lies, and live not willingly below it. Certainly a godly foul hath more than bare hope in this world; God the bleffed, infinite, and communicative good, hath not locked up himself fo far out of fight, but that he gives his people a comfortable beholding of him, even whilft they are in their pilgrimage and what Solomon faith of the life of the godly, he means it of their prefent life. Prov. xv. 24. The way of life is above to the wife. Their living not only fhall be, but is now above; it is a a high way of living. They are certainly a puny fort of mechanical Christians, that think and talk only of a heaven to come, and dream of an happiness without them, and diftinct from them. The truly godly and God-like foul cannot fo content himself, but being fpirited and principled from above, is carried out after the Infinite and Almighty Good, as a thing is carried towards its centre; and haftens into his embraces, as the iron haftens to the loadstone, and longs to be in conjunction with it. If therefore If therefore ye be from heaven, live above all earthly things. If ye be rifen with Chrift, feck the things that are above, Col. iii. 1. If ye be born of God, live upon God, and fuck not the breafts of a ftranger. Deny felf, live befide felf, i. e. live not to your luft, live not to the fervice of your fenfes, to the luft of the flesh, to the luft of the eye, to the pride of life; let not your fouls be fervants to your fins, no nor to your

fenses;

fenses; that were for fervants to ride on horseback, and princes to walk on foot, Ecclef. x. 7. Live above felf, i. e. let your fouls quit all their own interest in themselves, and entirely refign themselves to God, as to all points of duty and service. But that is not all; neither is that it, which I prefs you to from these words, but live above the creature and whatsoever is in it, viz. delighting in God, converfing and communing with him alone, as the chief good. Defire not any creature any further than as it may help you forward to the Creator; neither delight in it any further than as it either represents fome of the divine perfections, witneffeth fomething of divine love, or leadeth to fome divine participátion or communion. Seeing we fhall come to live upon God, and delight in God alone without any creature, let us now live upon, feed upon, love God alone in every creature. Now to give you a more diftinct knowledge of this high and noble life, I will explain it in fome particulars, negatively and affirmatively. First, Negatively,

1. Live not upon felf; I speak not of living unto felf, but live not upon felf, Self-excellencies, felf-fufficiencies, any created accomplishments, which was the life of the Stoicks, those great philofophers, who placed happiness in the enjoyment of themfelves. To enjoy one's felf, indeed, is a high duty, a noble privilege, a duty of the gospel, Luke xxi. 19. Poffefs ye your fouls: but how muft we enjoy ourselves? Why only in God. He enjoys himself,

1. Not he who in a fullen melancholy, retires to a folitary and monaftical life, as many of the fourer fort of papists do.

2. Nor he, that in a proud mood, difdains the perfections of God, fhining forth in other men; and hiding himself from them through envy, contents himself to fit and admire his own perfonal accomplishments, as many humorists do.

3. Nor he, who finding nothing without him, or knowing nothing above him, to give his foul her full rest, settles upon a foundation of his own, and admires a self-fufficiency in the temper of his own fpirit, a little fubdued by philofophical precepts, as the Stoicks did, and our Quaker's do: but he, who enjoys himself in God, i. e. who doth not view himself in the narrow point of his own being, but taking a view of himself, in the unbounded effence of God, loves, and enjoys, and values himself, and all his perfonal excellencies, as he is in God, and partakes of his perfections. To live in a way, of felf-converfe, is below the end of man's creation, who was made for a higher good and hercby, a man fhall never obtain true happiness, for it is peculiar to God alone, to be happy in himself. "In a word, a soul, "that confines itself to itself, and lives, and moves, "and rejoices only within the narrow cell of its own particular being, deprives itself of that almighty and original goodness and glory that fills the world, and fhines through the whole "Creation."

[ocr errors]

66

2 Live not upon any creature without your felves. Self indeed, is a creature, but yet, for clearness in proceeding, we fhall diftinguish them. Now this is the life of the greatest fort of men, they live befide God, and move only within the fphere of the creature: You will eafily understand, that I

speak

fpeak not of the body's living upon the creature; for fo God hath appointed, that it fhall live: and yet as to this too, I fay with our Saviour, man liveth not by bread alone, &c. But I speak of the foul of man living upon the creature as its highest good, and feeding upon it, as its best fare: they rife up early, and fit up late, and God is not in all their thoughts: they are filled with domestic and foreign comforts, but behold not the father of lights, from whom all these descend: they live upon the good things of the world, yet, live without God in the world. Now by thefe men,

1. I do not mean those heathens, that in the most idolatrous manner, do in the literal fenfe, fet up the creatures for gods.

2. Nor thofe Christians that, in a most grofs manner, make idols of the creatures, and place their happiness in them.

3. No, nor only thofe earthly profeffors, who follow the world too eagerly, and have fuch a deep and rooted refpect for it, that they can be crdinarily content to fuffer creature-employments, to juftle God and duties out of their hearts and houfes, whose worldlinefs is apparently too hard for their religion. Who then? Shall we come any nearer? Yes.

4. Thofe are guilty of creature-converse, who do not enjoy all creatures in God; who love any thing in any creature with a diftinct love; who do not love it only in God, who love filver, gold, houfes, lands, trading, friends, with a particular pinching love. Oh! take heed of this creaturelove; of valuing any created thing any otherwise N

than

« AnteriorContinua »