But because this argument hath been already so fully handled in our practical treatises, particularly by the reverend Dr. Patrick in his Mensa Mystica, and Christian Sacrifice, I shall refer the reader thither for the farther consideration of it. And thus, with all the brevity I could, I have endeavoured to give an account of those duties which are necessary in the course and progress of our Christian warfare. SECT. IV. Containing certain motives to animate men against the difficulty of these duties which appertain to the course of our Christian warfare. How necessary and useful to us those aforenamed duties are, in the course of our Christian warfare, hath been sufficiently shewn. So that now there is nothing that our sloth and unwillingness can object against them, but only this, that they are very difficult, and do require more of our time and care and pains, than we can conveniently spare from our other necessary occasions; that the practice of them is so unpleasant and severe, and attended with so much cumber and trouble, that we very much doubt we shall never be able to go through with them. And therefore to remove this objection out of men's way, and to excite them to the practice of these necessary duties, I shall for a conclusion of this argument add, to what hath been said of it, these following considerations. 1. That whatsoever difficulty there is in the practice of them, we may thank ourselves for it. 2. That in the course of our sin there is a great deal of difficulty, as well as in our warfare against it. 3. That how difficult soever this warfare may be, it must be endured, or that which is a great deal worse. 4. That though it be difficult, yet there is nothing in it but what the grace of God will render possible to us, if we be not wanting to ourselves. 5. That the practice of these duties is not so difficult, but that it is fairly consistent with all our other necessary occasions and diversions. 6. That the difficulty is such as will certainly abate and wear off by degrees, if we constantly practise them. 7. That with the difficulty of them there is a world of present peace and satisfaction intermingled. 8. That their difficulty is abundantly compensated by the final reward of them. I. Consider, that whatsoever difficulty there is in the practice of them, we may thank ourselves for it. For if we had betaken ourselves to the practice of religion as soon as we were capable of it, before we had entered ourselves into sinful courses, and had therein contracted sinful habits and inclinations, we might have prevented those difficulties which we now complain of. For our religion was made for and adapted to our nature, and would have sweetly accorded with all its affections and propensions, had we not vitiated them by our own wilful sin, and clapped a preternatural bias upon them. But though the light be naturally congruous to the eye, yet if through a distillation of ill humours into it the eye grow sore and weak, there is nothing more grievous and offensive to it. And so it is with reli gion, which to the pure and uncontaminated nature of a man is the most grateful and agreeable thing in the world; but if by our own ill government we disease our nature, and deprave its primitive constitution, it is no wonder that religion, which was so well proportioned to it in its purity, should sit hard and uneasy upon it in its apostasy and corruption. For to a man that is in a fever every thing is bitter, even honey, which when he is well is exceeding sweet and grateful; but the bitterness which he tastes is not in the honey, but in the gall which overflows his own palate: and so to a nature that is diseased with any unnatural lust, that which is most congruous to itself will be most nauseous to its disease; and those duties which in its health it would have embraced with the greatest pleasure, will in its sickness be the greatest burden and oppression to it. And when we have spoiled the purity of our constitution, and are degenerated from the human nature into the brutal or diabolical, it is no great wonder that the religion of a man should be a burden to the nature of a beast or a devil. that whatsoever difficulties there are in religion, they arise not out of the nature of the things it requires, but out of the perverse indispositions of our natures to them: and these were for the most part contracted by ourselves: so that instead of complaining of the difficulty, we ought to strive and contend the more earnestly against it, because we may thank ourselves for it. When a man hath played the fool, and set his house on fire, the sense of his own folly ought to make him more industrious to extinguish it; but if, instead of so doing, he should sit with his hands in his bosom, and complain of the mischief, So and the difficulty of stopping it, what would folks say of him? Mischievous creature, doth it become thee to sit here idly complaining of the effect of thy own villainy, whilst it is yet in thy power, wouldst thou but bestir thyself, to quench the flame, and prevent the spreading of it? For shame get up, and do thy utmost endeavour to repair thy own act, and to extinguish this spreading mischief, of which thou art the author. Since therefore we have been so obstinately foolish, as to set fire to our own souls, and kindle in them by our vicious courses such destructive flames of unnatural lust, how monstrously ridiculous is it, whilst it is yet in our power to extinguish them, to sit whining and complaining of the difficulty of it, and in the mean time permit them to rage and burn on without interruption! O miserable men, if they are so hard to be quenched, who may ye thank for it? Was it not you that kindled them, and do you sit idly complaining of your own act, when you should be the more industrious to repair the mischief of it, because it is your own? For shame arise and bestir yourselves; and since you are conscious that the difficulties of your religion are of your own creating, and that those lusts which indispose ye to it are the products of your own actions, let this excite you to a more vigorous endeavour to subdue and conquer them. II. Consider, that in the course of your sins there is a great deal of difficulty, as well as in your warfare against them: for I dare appeal to your own experience, whether you have not found a great deal of hardship in wickedness, especially while you were educating and training up your natures to it. Did not your nature oftentimes recoil and start and boggle at your vicious actions; and were you not fain sometimes to curb and sometimes to spur it, to commit many outrages and violences upon it, whilst you were backing and managing it, before you could reduce it to a through pace in iniquity? How often have you put your modest nature to the blush, at the sense of a filthy and uncomely action, whilst your wicked will hath been dragging it along like a timorous virgin to an adulterer's bed! and what terrible shrieks have your consciences many times given in the midst of your sinful commissions, when you were acting the first rapes upon your innocence! How many a pensive mood hath the review of your sinful pleasures cost ye, and what swarms of horror and dreadful expectation hath the reflection on your past guilts raised in your minds! And then, with what excessive difficulty have you been fain to practise some vices, only to get an habit of practising them more easily; how often have you been forced to swallow sickness, to drink dead palsies and foaming epilepsies, to render your intemperances familiar to you; and in what qualms, and fainting sweats, and sottish confusions have you many times awaked, before ever you could connaturalize your midnight revels to your temper! And when, with so much labour and violence, you have pretty well trained and exercised yourselves in this hellish warfare, and thereby rendered it natural and habitual to you, to how many inconveniences hath it daily exposed you, and what base and unmanly shifts hath it put you upon, to extricate yourselves out of those difficulties wherein it hath involved you! What violent passions and perturbations doth it raise in your minds, and into what wild tumults of action doth it frequently hurry you! In a word, |