were, then it were but ill provided by God and the church, that preachers should call upon men to confess their sins, to be sorrowful for them, and utterly to leave them: for there is no question but such discourses will often remind us of our sins; and if we were then tied to repent, and did sin by not repenting, then such preachings would be the occasion of many sins, and the law would be an intolerable commandment, and Christ's yoke not to be endured; because men do not find it so easy to repent upon every notice :" so he.-But this consideration, turned with the right end forwards, is an excellent argument to enforce the duty, which I am now pressing of, a present actual repentance. For does God send preachers who every day call upon us to repent, and does not God intend we should repent on that day he calls to do it? Do the prophets and preachers of righteousness bid us repent next year? Have they commission to say, 'It were well and convenient if you would repent to-day; but you do not sin if you stay till next year, or till you are old, or till you die? To what purpose then do they preach? Does not God require our obedience? Do we not sin if the preachers say well and right, and we do it not? Is there any one minute, any one day, in which we may innocently stay from the service of God? Let us think of that. Every day on which a sinner defers his repentance, on that day he refuses to be God's servant and if God does command his service every day, then he every day sins on which he refuses. For unless God gives him leave to stay away, his very staying away is as much a sin as his going away, that is, his not repenting is a new sin. 17. And if by way of objection it be inquired, By what measures or rules of multiplication shall such sins be numbered? whether by every day, and why not by every night, or why not by every hour, or every half-hour?" I answer, that the question is captious and of no real use, but to serve instead of a temptation. But the answer is this; 1. That the sin of not repenting increases by intension of degrees, as the perpetuity of an act of hatred against God. He that continues a whole day in such actual hostility and defiance, increases his sin perpetually, not by the measures of wine and oil, or the strokes of the clock, but by spiritual and intentional measures; he still more and more provokes God, and in the eternal scrutiny God will fit him with numbers and measures of a proportionable judgment. 2. The sin of not repenting is also multiplied by extension; for every time a man does positively refuse to repent, every time a man is called upon or thinks of his duty and will not do it, every such negative is a new sin, and a multiplication of his scores: and it may happan that, every day, that may become twenty sins, and in a short time rise to an intolerable height. 18. (2.) He that remembers he hath committed a sin, either remembers it with joy or with displeasure. If with displeasure, it is an act of repentance; if with joy, it is a new sin; or if it be with neither, the man does not consider at all. But if it abides there, the sin will be apt to repeat its own pleasures to the memory, to act them in the fancy, and so endear them to the heart: and it is certain that all active considerations declare on one side or other, either for the sin or against it; and the devil is not so backward at tempting, and the pleasure of sin is not so inactive, but if ever it be thought upon without sorrow, it cannot easily be thought upon without some actual or potential delight: and therefore he that repents not, does sin anew. He that hath stolen is bound presently to restore if he can, and when it is in our hand it must also be in our heart to restore, and the evil must not be suffered so much as for an hour to dwell upon the injured person: so it is in the restitution of our hearts and our affections to God; there is an injustice done to God all the way by our detaining of his rights, the injury is upon him, he complains that we will not come in, and is delighted if we come speedily. Restitution therefore must be made presently; and for the satisfaction and amends for the wrong besides, God may longer expect, even till the day of its proper period. 19. (3.) Does not God, every day, send something of his grace upon us? Does he not always knock at the door of our hearts, as long as the day of salvation lasts? Does not he send his Spirit to invite, his arguments to persuade, and his mercies to endear, us? Would he have any thing of this lost? Is it not a sin once to resist the Holy Spirit? And he that remembers his sin, and knows it is an offence against God, and yet does not repent at that thought and that knowledge, does not he resist the Holy Spirit of God, so moving, so acting, so insinuating? It not every good sermon a part of the grace of God? "Qui monet, quasi adjuvat," says the comedy"; "He that counsels you, helps you :" and can it be imagined that he that resists the grace of God twenty years, is not a greater villain than he that stood against it but twenty months, and so on to twenty days, and twenty hours? "Peccatorem tanto sequitur districtior sententia, quanto peccanti ei magna est patientia prorogata: et divina severitas eo iniquum acrius punit, quo diutius pertulit,” saith St. Gregory: "The longer God hath expected our repentance, the more angry he is if we do not repent;"-now God's anger would not increase, if our sin did not. But I consider, must not a man repent of his resisting God's grace, of his refusing to hear, of his not attending, of his neglecting the means of salvation? And why all this, but that every delay is a quenching of the light of God's Spirit, and every such quenching cannot be innocent? And what can be expounded to be a contempt of God, if this be not; that when God, by his preventing, his exciting, his encouraging, his assisting grace, invites us to repentance, we nevertheless refuse to mourn for our sins and to repent? This is the very argument which the Spirit of God himself' uses, and therefore is not capable of reproof or confutation. "Because I have called and ye refused, I have stretched out my hand and no man regarded: but ye have set at nought all my counsel, and would none of my reproof;-I will also laugh at your calamity, and mock when your fear cometh." Is not therefore every call to be regarded? and consequently is not every refusing criminal? and does not God call every day? Put these things together, and the natural consequent of them is this, that he who sins and does not repent speedily, does at least sin twice, and every day of delay is a further provocation of the wrath of God. To this purpose are those excellent words of St. Paul, "Despisest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance and long-suffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance?" That is, every action of God's loving-kindness and forbearance of thee, is an argument for, and an exhortation to, repentance ;'-and the not making use of it is called by the Apostle, Plautus, Curculio. act. 3. 89. Schmieder, page 207. • Prov. i. 24. s Rom. ii. 4. "a despising of his goodness;" and the not repenting is on every day of delay, "a treasuring up of wrath." Αἷμα γὰρ ἐν κακότητι βροτοὶ καταγηράσκουσι. "Men wax old and grow gray in their iniquity," while they think every day too short for their sin, and too soon for their repentance. But (if I may have leave to complain) it is a sad thing to see a man who is well instructed in religion, able to give counsel to others, wise enough to conduct the affairs of his family, sober in his resolution concerning the things of this world, to see such a person come to church every festival, and hear the perpetual sermons of the gospel, the clamours of God's Holy Spirit, the continual noise of Aaron's bells ringing in his ears; a man that knows the danger of a sinner if he dies without pardon, that the wrath of God cannot be endured, and yet that without a timely and sufficient repentance it cannot be avoided; to see such a man day after day sin against God, enter into all temptations, and fall under every one, and never think of his repentance, but unalterably resolve to venture for it, and for the acceptance of it at last: for it is a venture whether he shall repent; and if he does, it is yet a greater venture whether that repentance shall be accepted, because without all peradventure in that case it can never be perfected. But the evil of this will further appear in the next argument. 20. (4.) He that does not repent presently, as soon as he remembers and considers that he hath sinned, does certainly sin in that very procrastination, because he certainly exposes himself to a certain and unavoidable danger of committing other and new sins. And therefore I cannot but wonder at the assertors of the opposite doctrine, who observe this danger, and signify it publicly, and yet condemn such persons of imprudence only, but not of sin. The words of Reginaldus, and according to the sense of Navarre, are these; "Ad quod tamen tempus pœnitentiam differre esse salutem animæ in magnum discrimen adducere patet per illud quod ex D. Augustino refertur in cap. Siquis; et cap. finali de Pœniten. dist. 7. dubiam esse salutem illorem quos non ante sed post ægritudinem pœnitet. Ratio vero esse potest quod in eo cernatur interpretativus contemptus Dei, qui sæpius per gratias b Lib. 5. prax. fori Pœnit. cap. 2. sect. 4. n. 23. prævenientes illos excitat ac movet ad resipiscentiam, agendamque pœnitentiam, conterendumve de suis peccatis: nihilominus non curant atque negligunt:" "He that defers his repentance brings his soul into manifest and great danger, according to the doctrine of St. Austin; for it is an interpretative contempt of God, who often excites them by his preventing graces, to repent and do penance, and to be contrite for their sins, but they neglect it and care not." Now since thus much is observed and acknowledged, it is a strange violence to reason and to religion, that it should not also be confessed to be the design and intention of God, his will and pleasure, the purpose of his grace, and the economy of heaven, the work of his Spirit, and the meaning and interpretation of his commandment, that we should repent presently. For when the question is concerning the sense and limit of an indefinite commandment, what can be a better commentary to the law than the actions of God himself? for he understands his own meaning best; and certainly by these things he hath very competently and sufficiently declared it. 21. If it be objected that these actions of the divine grace are not sufficient to declare it to be a sin not to do it, whenever the grace of God prompts us to repent, because we find that the Spirit of God does use rare arts to invite us forward to such degrees of perfection and excellency, to which whoever arrives shall be greatly rewarded, but if a man falls short, he does not sin; I reply, that the case is not the same in the matter of counsel, and in the matter of a commandment: for when the question is concerning the sense and signification, the definition and limit, of that which is acknowledged to be a commandment, the actions of the divine grace signifying God's pleasure and meaning, do wholly relate to the commandment: when the thing is only matter of counsel, then the actions of the divine grace relate to that, and are to be expounded accordingly. But thus they are alike; that as God by his arguments and inducements, his assistances and aids, declares, that to do the thing he counsels would be very pleasing to him; so they declare, that what he commands, is to be done, that he intends the commandment then to bind, that whenever the one is good, the other is necessary. But his pleasure which he signifies concerning a counsel, does not mean like his pleasure concerning a commandment; but |