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it is the language of the foul God hears; nor can that fpeak, but by the Spirit; or groan aright to Almighty God, without the affiftance of it.

§. IV. The foul of man, however lively in other things, is dead to God, till he breathe the spirit of life into it: it cannot live to him, much lefs worship him without it. Thus God by Ezekiel tells us, when in a vifion of the reftoration of mankind, in the person of Ifrael, (an ufual way of speaking among the prophets, and as often mistaken) I will open your graves (faith the Lord) and put my spirit in you, and ye hall live. So, though Chrift taught his difciples to pray, they were, in fome fort, difciples before he taught them; not worldly men, whose prayers are an abomination to God. And his teaching them is not an argument that every one muft fay that prayer, whether he can fay it with the fame heart, and under the fame qualifications, as his poor difciples and followers did, or not, as is now too fuperftitiously and prefumptuously practised. But rather, that as they then, fo we now, are not to pray our own prayers, but his; that is, fuch as he enables us to make, as he enabled them then.

§. V. For if we are not to take thought what we shall fay when we come before worldly princes, because it fhall then be given us; and that it is not we that speak, but the spirit of our heavenly Father that speaketh in us'; much lefs can our ability be needed, or ought we to study to ourselves forms of fpeech in our approaches to the great Prince of princes, King of kings, and Lord of lords. For be it his greatnefs, we ought not by Chrift's command: be it our relation to him, as children, we need not: he will help us, he is our father; that is, if he be fo indeed. Thus not only the mouth of the body, but of the foul is fhut, till God opens it; and then he loves to hear the language of it. In which the body ought never to go before the foul: his ear is open to fuch requests, and his fpirit ftrongly intercedes for those that offer them.

1 Ezek. x. xxvii, 12, 13, 14.

Mat. x. 19, 20. • Mat. vi. §. VI. But

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§. VI. But it may be asked, how fhall this prepara

tion be obtained?

I answer: by waiting patiently, yet watchfully and intently upon God: Lord (fays the Pfalmift) thou haft heard the defire of the humble; thou wilt prepare their heart, thou wilt cause thine ear to hear':' and, (fays Wifdom) the preparation of the heart in man is from the Lord". Here it is thou must not think thy own thoughts, nor fpeak thy own words, (which indeed is the filence of the holy crofs) but be fequestered from all the confufed imaginations, that are apt to throng and prefs upon the mind in those holy retirements. It is not for thee to think to overcome the Almighty by the most compofed matter, caft into the apteft phrase: no, no; one groan, one figh, from a wounded foul, an heart touched with true remorse, a fincere and godly forrow, which is the work of God's fpirit, excels and prevails with God. Wherefore ftand ftill in thy mind, wait to feel fomething that is divine, to prepare and difpofe thee to worship God truly and acceptably. And thus taking up the cross, and shutting the doors and windows of the foul against every thing that would interrupt this attendance upon God, how pleasant foever the object be in itself, how lawful or needful at another feafon, the power of the Almighty will break in, his fpirit will work and prepare the heart, that it may offer up an acceptable facrifice. It is he that discovers and preffes wants upon the foul; and when it cries, it is he alone that fupplies them. Petitions, not fpringing from fuch a fenfe and preparation, are formal and fictitious; they are not true; for men pray in their own blind defires, and not in the will of God; and his ear is ftopped to them but for the very fighing of the poor, and crying of the needy, God has faid, he will arife; that is, the poor in fpirit, the needy foul, thofe that want his affiftance, who are ready to be overwhelmed, that feel a need, and cry aloud for a deliverer, and that have none * Prov. xvi. 1.

$ Pfal. X. 17.

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on earth to help ", none in heaven but him, nor in earth in comparison of him: he will deliver (faid David) the needy, when he cries, and the poor, and him that has no helper. He fhall redeem their foul from deceit and violence, and precious fhall their blood be in his fight. This poor man (fays he) < cried, and the Lord heard him, and faved him out of all his troubles. The angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him, and delivers them* :' and then invites all to come and tafte how good the Lord is. Yea, he will blefs them that fear the Lord, both small and great '.'

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§. VII. But what is that to them that are not hungry? The whole need not the phyfician; the full have no need to figh, nor the rich to cry for help. Those that are not fenfible of their inward wants, that have not fears and terrors upon them, who feel no need of God's power to help them, nor of the light of his countenance to comfort them; what have fuch to do with prayer? Their devotion is but, at best, a serious mockery of the Almighty. They know not, they want not, they defire not what they pray for. They pray the will of God may be done, and do conftantly their own: for, though it be foon faid, it is a moft terrible thing to them. They ask for grace, and abuse that they have: they pray for the fpirit, but refift it in themselves, and fcorn at it in others: they requeft the mercies and goodnefs of God, and feel no real want of them. And in this inward infenfibility, they are as unable to praise God for what they have, as to pray for what they have not. They fhall praife the Lord (fays David) that feek him: for he fatisfieth the longing foul, and filleth the hungry with good things. This also he referves for the poor and needy, and thofe that fear God. Let the (fpiritually) poor and the needy praise thy name: ye that fear the Lord, praise him; and ye the feed of Jacob, glorify him,' Jacob was

5.

w Pfal. xii. y Pfal. cxv. 13. Pfal. Ixxiv. 21.

Pfal. xxxiv. 6, 7, 8. Pfal. xxii. 26. Pfal. cvii. 9,

* Pfal. lxxii. 12, 14.
z Mat. ix. 12.
Pfal. xxii. 23.

a plain

a plain man, of an upright heart; and they that are fo are his feed. And though (with him) they may be as poor as worms in their own eyes, yet they receive power to wrestle with God, and prevail as he did.

§. VIII. But without the preparation and confecration of this power, no man is fit to come before God; elfe it were matter of lefs holiness and reverence to worship God under the gospel, than it was in the times of the law, when all facrifices were fprinkled before offered; the people confecrated that offered them, before they prefented themselves before the Lord. If the touching of a dead or unclean beast then made people unfit for temple or facrifice, yea, fociety with the clean, till first fprinkled and fanctified, how can we think fo meanly of the worship that is inftituted by Christ in gospel-times, as that it fhall admit of unprepared and uníanctified offerings? or, allow that thofe who either in thoughts, words, or deeds, do daily touch that which is morally unclean, can (without coming to the blood of Jefus, that fprinkles the confcience from dead works) acceptably worship the pure God: it is a downright contradiction to good sense: the unclean cannot acceptably worship that which is holy; the impure that which is perfect. There is an holy intercourse and communion betwixt Christ and his followers; but none at all betwixt Chrift and Belial; between him and those that disobey his commandments, and live not the life of his bleffed crofs and felfdenial d.

§. IX. But as fin, fo formality cannot worship God; no, though the manner were of his own ordination. Which made the prophet, perfonating one in a great ftreight, cry out, Wherewith fhall I come before the • Lord, and bow myself before the high God? Shall I come before him with burnt-offerings? With calves of a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with thou'fands of rams, or with ten thousands of rivers of oil?

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Numb. viii. and chap. xix. 2 Chron xxix, 36. and chap. xxx. 2 Cor. vi. 15, 16.

16, 17.

• Shall

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• Shall I give my firft-born for my tranfgreffions, the • fruit of my body for the fin of my foul? He hath fhewed thee, O man what is good. And what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do juftly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?' The royal prophet, fenfible of this, calls thus also upon God; O Lord, open thou my lips, and my mouth fhall • fhew forth thy praife. He did not dare open his own lips, he knew that could not praise God: and why?

For thou defireft not facrifice, elfe would I give it :' (if my formal offerings would serve, thou shouldst not want them) thou delightest not in burnt-offerings.

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The facrifices of God are a broken fpirit, a broken ⚫ and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise :' and why? Because this is God's work, the effect of his power; and his own works praife him. To the fame purpose doth God himself speak, by the mouth of Ifaiah, in oppofition to the formalities and lip-worship of the degenerate Jews: Thus faith the Lord, The heaven is my throne, and the earth is my foot-ftool, where is the house that ye build to me? And where is the place of my reft? For all these things hath my hand made. But to this man will I look, even him that is poor, and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word. O behold the true worshipper! one of God's preparing, circumcised in heart and ear, that refifts not the Holy Spirit, as thofe lofty profeffing Jews did. Was this fo then, even in the time of the law, which was the difpenfation of external and fhadowy performances, and can we now expect acceptance without the preparation of the Spirit of the Lord in thefe gofpel-times, which are the proper times for the effufion of the Spirit? By no means: God is what he was; and none else are his true worshippers, but fuch as worship him in his own fpirit: these he tenders as the apple of his eye: the reft do but mock him, and he defpifes them. Hear what follows to that people, for Pfal. li. 15, 16, 17. • Pfal. lxvi.

Mic. vi. 6, 7, 8. 1, 2, 3.

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