of operosity in sin; in regard whereof, sinners are styled the workers of iniquity." And, surely, there are sins wherein there is more toil and labour than in the holiest actions: what pains and care doth the thief take in setting his match, in watching for his prey! how doth he spend the darkest and coldest nights in the execution of his plot! what fears, what flights, what hazards, what shifts are here to avoid notice and punishment! The adulterer

says, that "stolen waters are sweet ;" but that sweet is sauced to him with many careful thoughts, with many deadly dangers. The superstitious bigot, who is himself besotted with error, how doth he traverse sea and land to make a proselyte! what adventures doth he make, what perils doth he run, what deaths doth he challenge, to mar a soul! So as some men take more pains to go to hell, than some others do to go to heaven. Oh, the sottishness of sinners, that with a temporary misery will needs purchase an eternal! How should we think no pains sufficient for the attainment of heaven, when we see wretched men toil so much for damnation!

LXVI.

With what elegance and force doth the Holy Ghost express our Saviour's leaving of the world; which he calls his taking home again, or his receiving up! In the former, implying that the Son of God was, for the time, sent out of his Father's house, to these lower regions of his exile or pilgrimage, and was now re-admitted into those his glorious mansions; in the latter, so inti

1 Luke, xiii. 27.

2 Ibid. ix. 51.

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mating his triumphant ascension, that he passeth over his bitter passion. Surely, he was to take death in his way; so he told his disciples in the walk to Emmaus: 'Ought not Christ to suffer these things, and to enter into his glory ?" He must be lifted up to the cross, ere his ascension to heaven. But, as if the thought of death were swallowed up in the blessed issue of his death, here is no mention of ought but his assumption. Lo! death truly swallowed up in victory. Neither is it otherwise, proportionally, with us; wholly so it cannot be. For as for him, death did but taste of him, could not devour him, much less put him over; it could not but yield him whole and entire the third day, without any impairing of his nature; yea, with a happy addition to it, of a glorious immortality, and in that glorified humanity he ascended by his own power into his heaven. For us, we must be content that one part of us lie rotting for the time in the dust; while our spiritual part shall, by the ministry of angels, be received up to those everlasting habitations. Here is an assumption therefore, true and happy, though not as yet total. And why should I not, therefore, have my heart taken up, with the assured expectation of this receiving up into my glory? Why do I not look beyond death, at the eternally-blessed condition of this soul of mine; which, in my dissolution, is thus crowned with immortality? So doth the sea-beaten mariner cheer up himself with the sight of that haven which he makes for. So doth the traveller comfort himself, when, after a tempestuous storm, he sees the sun

1 Luke xxiv. 26.

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breaking forth in his brightness. I am dying; but, O Saviour, thou art the resurrection and the life; he that believeth in thee, though he be dead, yet shall he live.'1 Awake and sing, ye that dwell in the dust; for thy dew is as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead.' 'Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord, for they rest from their labours, and their works follow them.'

LXVII.

2

What need I be troubled, that I find in myself a fear of death? What Israelite is not ready to run away at the sight of this Goliath? This fear is natural; and so far from being evil, that it was incident to the Son of God, who was heard in that which he feared.' Christianity serves not to destroy, but to rectify nature. Grace regulates this passion in us, and corrects the exorbitances of it, never intended to root it out. Let me, therefore, entertain this fear, but so that I may master it. If I cannot avoid fear, let it be such as may be incident to a faithful man. While my fear apprehends just terror in the face of death, let my faith lay fast hold on that blessed Saviour, who hath both overcome and sweetened it; on that blessed estate of glory, which accompanies it: my fear shall end in joy, my death in advantage.

LXVIII.

It is too plain, that we are fallen upon the old age of the world; the last times, and therefore nearest to the dissolution. And if time itself did

1 John xi. 25.

2 Isaiah xxvi. 19,

3 Rev. xiv. 13.

not evince it, the disposition and qnalities would most evidently do it: for to what a cold temper of charity are we grown! what mere ice is in these spiritual veins ! The unnatural and unkindly flushings of self-love abound indeed every where; but for true Christian love, it is come to old David's pass; it may be covered with clothes, but it can get no heat.1 Besides, what whimsies and fancies of dotage do we find the world possessed withal, beyond the examples of all former times! what wild and mad opinions have been lately broached, which the settled brains of better ages could never have imagined! Unto these how extremely choleric the world is grown in these later times, there needs no other proof than the effusion of so much blood in this present age, as many preceding centuries of years have been sparing to spill. What should I speak of the moral distempers of diseases; the confluence whereof hath made this age more wickedly miserable, than all the former? for whenever was there so much profaneness, atheism, blasphemy, schism, excess, disobedience, oppression, licentiousness, as we now sigh under? Lastly, that which is the common fault of age, loquacity, is a plain evidence of the world's declinedness; for was there ever age guilty of so much tongue and pen as the last? were ever the presses so cloyed with frivolous work? Every man thinks what he lists, and speaks what he thinks, and writes what he speaks, and prints what he writes. Neither would the world talk so much, did it not make account it cannot talk long. What should we do then, since we know the world truly

' 1 Kings, i. 1.

R

old, and now going upon his great and fatal climacterical; but as discreet men would carry themselves to impotent and decrepid age, bear with the infirmities of it, pity and bewail the distempers, strive against the enormities, and prepare for the dissolution.'

LXIX.

There cannot be a stronger motive to awe and obedience than that which St. Peter enforceth: 'That God is both a father and a judge;' the one is a title of love and mercy, the other of justice. Whatever God is, he is all that: he is all love and mercy; he is all justice. He is not so a judge, that he hath waved the title and affection of a father; he is not so a father, that he will remit ought of his infinite justice as a judge. He is, he will ever be, both these in one; and we must fasten our eyes upon both these at once, and be accordingly affected unto both. He is a father, therefore here must be a loving awe; he is a judge, and therefore here must be an awful love and obedience. So must we lay hold of the tender mercies of a father, that we may rejoice continually; so must we apprehend the justice of a righteous judge, that we do lovingly tremble. Why then should man despair? God is a Father. All the bowels

1 The circumstances alleged by Hall in support of this favourite, but not very philosophical notion, are, in several instances, unhappily chosen; of such as have a juster application, the greater part are no less prophetic than directly charac teristic; proving that the march of society proceeds in cycles, and not in a direct line, as is implied in the idea that the terms youth, maturity, and old age, indicate, when thus applied, a close analogy.

2 1 Peter, i. 17.