Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

Yea, it would not only ennoble, but facilitate all my duties, and be to me as wings to a bird in flying, or fails to a fhip in motion. Non tardat uncta rota; oiled wheels run freely: "Or ever I was aware, my foul made me like the chariots of "Aminadab." O what is the reafon(my God) my delight in thee fhould be fo little? Is it not, because my unbelief is fo great? Rouze up my delights, Ở thou fountain of pleasure I and let me fwim down the ftream of holy joy in duty, into the boundlefs ocean of thofe immenfe delights that are in thy prefence, and at thy right hand for evermore.

[ocr errors]

The POE M.

What a dull, defpondent heart is mine!

That takes no more delight in things divine.
When all the creatures, both in heav'n and earth,
Enjoy their pleasures, and are big with mirth.
Angels and faints that are before the throne,
In extafies and raptures, ev'ry one
Perpetually is held; each bleffed fpirit
The pureit, higheft joys doth there inherit :
The faints on earth, in their imperfect ftate,
Thofe peerless joys, by faith do antedate.
To natʼral men, who favour not this pleasure,
Yet bounteous nature doth unlock her treasure
Of fenfitive delights; yea, ftrange to tell,
Bold finners rant it all the way to hell.
Like fifh that play in Jordan's filver stream,
So thefe in fenfual lufts, and never dream
Of that dead fea to which the ftream doth tend,
And to their pleasures puts a fatal end.
Yea, birds, and beafts, as well as men enjoy
Their innocent delights: these chirp, and play;
The chearful birds among the branches fing,
And make the neighb'ring groves with mufic ring:
With various warbling notes they all invite
Our ravifh'd ears, with pleasure and delight.
The new-fallen lambs will, in a fun-fhine day,
About their feeding dams jump up, and play.
Are cifterns fweet? And is the fountain bitter?
Or can the fun be dark, when glow-worms glitter?
Have inftruments their fweet, melodious airs?
All creatures their delights, and faints not theirs?
Yea, theirs tranfcend thefe fenfual ones, as far
As noon-day Phoebus doth a twinkling star.

Why droop I then, may any creature have
A life like mine for pleafure? Who e'er gave
The like encouragement that Chrift hath giv'n,
To do his will on earth, as 'tis in heav'n?

[blocks in formation]

Upon the due Quality of Arable Land.

Corn land muft neither be too fat, nor poor;
The middle ftate fuits best with Chriftians, fure.

OBSERVATION.

Ufbandmen find, by experience, that their arable lands

foil be over-rank, the feed fhoots up fo much into the stalk, that it seldom ears well; and if too thin, and poor, it wants its due nutriment, and comes not to perfection. Therefore their care is, to keep it in heart, but not to over-dress or under-dress it. 'The end of all their coft and pains about it, is fruit; and therefore reafon tells them, that such a state and temperament of it, as beft fits it for fruit, is best, both for it and them.

A

APPLICATIO N.

ND doth not fpiritual experience teach Chriftians that a mediocrity, and competency of the things of this life, beft fits them for the fruits of obedience, which is the end and. excellency of their beings? A man may be over-mercied, as well as over-afflicted; Rare fumant falicibus arae, the altars of the rich feldom finoke. When our outward enjoyments are by providence shaped, and fitted to our condition, as a fuit is to the body, that fits close, and neat, neither too fhort, nor long; we cannot defire a better condition in this world. This was it that wife Agur requfted of God, Prov. xxx. 8, 9. "Give

me neither poverty nor riches, but feed me with food con"venient for me, left I be full and deny thee, and say who is "the Lord? Or left I be poor and steal, and take the name "of my God in vain." Against both he prays equally, not ab folutely that had been his fin; but, comparatively, and fubmiffively to the will of God. He had rather, if God fee it fit, to avoid both of these extremes; but what would he have then? Why, food convenient. Or, according to the Hebrew, give me my prey, or ftatute-bread; which is a metaphor from birds which fly up and down to prey for their young, and what they get, they diftribute among them; they bring them enough to preferve their lives, but not more than enough to lie moulder

ing in the neft. Such a proportion Agur defired, and the reafon why he defired it, is drawn from the danger of both extremes. He measured, like a wife Chriftian, the conveniency or inconveniency of his eftate in the world, by its fuitablenefs or unsuitableness to the end of his being; which is the service of God. He accounted the true excellency of his life to confift in its reference and tendency to the glory of his God; and he could not fee how a redundancy, or too great a penury of earthly comforts could fit him for that; but a middle eftate,' equally removed from both extremes, beft fitted that end. And this was all that good Jacob, who was led by the fame spirit, looked at, Gen. xxviii. 20. " And Jacob vowed a vow, faying, "if God will be with me, and keep me in the way that I go, " and give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on, so that I come again to my father's house in peace, then shall the Lord "be my God." Poor Jacob, he defires no great matters in the world, food and raiment will fatisfy him; in fpiritual matters his defires are boundless, he is the most greedy and unsatisfied man in the world, Hof. xii. 4. but in the matters of this life, if he can get from God but offam et aquam, a morfel of meat, and a mouthful of water, he will not envy the richest Crœfus, or Craffus upon earth. Cibus et potus funt divitia. Chriftianorum; meat and drink are the riches of Chriftians.. Divitia funt ad legem naturæ compofita paupertas, faith Pomponius Atticus; riches are fuch a poverty, or mediocrity, as hath enough for nature's ufes; and fuch a ftate is beft accommodated, both to the condition, and to the defires of a faint.

1. To his condition, for what is a faint but a stranger and pilgrim upon earth, a man in a ftrange country travelling homeward? So David profeffed himself, Pfalm cxix. 19. "I am a "ftranger in this earth." And fo those worthies, who are now at home in heaven, Heb. xi. 13. they profeffed themselves to be ftrangers and pilgrims upon earth, and to feek a country; a viaticum contents a traveller, he will not incumber himself with fuperfluous things, which would rather clog and tire, than expedite and help him in his journey.

2. It fuits beft with his defires, I mean his regular and advifed defires. For,

1. A gracious foul earneftly defires a free condition in the world, he is fenfible he hath much work to do, a race to run, and is loth to be clogged, or have his foot in the snare of the cares or pleasures of this life. He knows that fulness exposes to wantonness and irreligion, Deut. vi. 12. Hof. xiii. 6. It is hard, in the midst of fo many tempting objects, to keep the gold

en bridle of moderation upon the affections. The heart of a Chriftian, like the moon, commonly fuffers an eclipse when it is at the full, and that by the interpofition of the earth.

It was Solomon's fulness that drew out and diffolved his fpirits, and brought him to fuch a law ebb in fpirituals, that it remains a queftion with fome, Whether he ever recovered it to his dying day. As it is the mifery of the poor to be neglected of men, fo it is the mifery of the rich to neglect God. Who can be poorer than to have the world, and love it? Or richer, than to enjoy but little of it, and live above it?

[ocr errors]

And, on the other fide, extreme poverty is no lefs expofed to fin and danger, Lév. vi. 2, 3, 4. As high and lofty trees are fubject to storms and tempefts, fo the lowest fhrubs to be browfed on by every beaft; and therefore a faint defires a just competency as the fitteft, because the freeft ftate.

2. A gracious perfon defires no more but a competency, because there is moft of God's love and care difcovered in giving in cur daily bread, by a daily providence. It is betwixt fuch a condition, and a fulness of creature-provifions in our land, as it was betwixt Egypt and Canaan; Egypt was watered with the foot from the river Nilus, and little of God was feen in that mercy; but Canaan depended upon the dews and fhowers of heaven; and fo every fhower of rain was a refreshing fhower to their fouls, as well as bodies. Moft men that have a stock of creature-comforts in their hands, look upon all as coming in an ordinary, natural course, and fee very little of God in their mercies. Pope Adrian built a college at Louvain, and caufed this infcription to be written in letters of gold on the gates thereof; Trajectum plantavit, Louvanium rigavit, Cæfar dedit incrementum; fi. e.) Utrecht planted me, Louvain watered me, and Cæfar gave the increase. One to reprove his folly wrote underneath, Hic Deus nihil fecit; here God did nothing. Carnal men, they fow, and reap, and eat, and look no further.

But now, when a man fees his mercies come in by the fpecial and affiduous care of God for him, there is a double fweetnefs in those mercies; the natural sweetness which comes from the creature itself, every one, even the beafts, can taste that as well as thee; but, befides that, there is a fpiritual fweetness, far exceeding the former, which none but a believer taftes; and much of that comes from the manner in which he receives it, because it comes (be it never fo coarse or little) as a covenant-mercy to him. "He hath given bread to them that fear

him, he is ever mindful of his covenant," Pfal. cxi. 5. Luther, who made many a meal upon a broiled herring, was wont

to fay, Mendicato. pane hic vivamus, annon hoc pulchre farcitur in eo, quod pafcimur pane cum angelis et vita aterna, Chrifto et facramentis: Let us be content with coarse fare here, have we not the bread that came down from heaven? Do we not feed with angels? A pregnant inftance of the sweetness of fuch mercies, is given us by a worthy divine of our own, Mr. Ifaac Ambrofe,+For my own part (faith he) however the Lord hath feen caufe to give me but a poor pittance of outward things, for which I blefs his name, yet in the income thereof, I have many times obferved fo much of his peculiar provi dence, that thereby they have been very much sweetened, and my heart hath been raised to admire his grace. When of • late under an hard dispensation (which I judge not meet to mention, wherein I fuffered with inward peace confcientiously) all streams of wonted fupplies being stopt, the waters of relief ⚫ for myself and family did run low. I went to bed with fome ⚫ftaggerings and doubtings of the fountain's letting out itself < for our refreshing; but e'er I did awake in the morning, a

letter was brought to my bed-fide, which was figned by a ⚫ choice friend, Mr. Anthony Ash, which reported fome un⚫ expected breakings out of God's goodness for my comfort. These are fome of his lines,--Your God, who hath given you an heart thankfully to record your experiences of his goodness, doth renew experiences for your encouragement. Now I fhall report one which will raise your spirit towards the God of your mercy, &c.' Whereupon he fweetly conclades, One morfel of God's provifion, (especially if it comes unexpected, and upon prayer, when wants are moft) will be more fweet to a spiritual relish, than all former full enjoyments were."

[ocr errors]

Many mercies come unasked for, and they require thankfulness, but when mercies come in upon prayer, and as a return of prayer, their sweetness more than doubles; for now it is both God's bleffing upon his own inftitution, and a feal set to his promife at once, Pfal. lxvi. 16, 17. Doubtless Hannah found more comfort in her Samuel, and Rachel in her Naphtali, the one being afked of God, and the other wreitled for with God, (as their names import) than mothers ordinarily do in their children.

[ocr errors]

REFLECTION S.

Do the people of God defire only fo much of the creature as may fit them for the fervice of God? What wretch then am I that

Epiftle to the Earl of Bedford; ante ultima.;

The reflection of the designing hypocrite.

« ZurückWeiter »