to this Christ, or grace of Christ, within thee, for life and salvation; for now thou prizest the creature above God, and settest Christ within thee to fight with Christ without thee. The bride doth well highly to esteem her husband's picture, which he hath given her, especially if very like him, and most of all if drawn by his own hand; but it were very ridiculous, if she should dote on that so far as to slight her husband, and when she wants money, clothes, or the like to go, not to her husband, but to the picture he gave her for all. The saint's grace is called Christ within him, because it is his picture, and makes the saint so like Christ: this, for the resemblance it bears to the holiness of Christ himself thy husband, who with the finger of his own Spirit, drew it on thy soul, deserves highly to be valued; but what a dotage were it for thee to turn thy back on the Lord Jesus Christ himself, to whom by faith thou art married, and when thou wantest pardon and comfort, wouldst have Heaven and happiness, to expect these not from Christ, but thy grace? O will Christ thank thee for honouring his creature to the dishonour of his person?

CHAP. VII.

AN EXHORTATION TO SUCH AS ARE AT PEACE WITH GOD, IN SIX PARTICULARS.

USE 2. Secondly, A few words by way of improvement to you whose peace is concluded with Christ.

First, Hast thou peace with God? Look thou makest no peace with sin. This broke thy peace with God; now let thy peace with God begin a war with that never to have end. Thou canst not sure forget the inestimable wrong and damage thou hast suffered by it; every moment's sweet enjoyment of God, whose bosom-love thou hast now happily recovered, will help to keep the fire of wrath and revenge burning in thy heart against that cursed enemy, that both threw and kept thee so long

thence. God hath now won thy heart, I hope, by his pardoning mercy, dearly to love him for his love to thee. How then canst thou with patience see any lust come braving forth from its treuch, thy heart I mean, defying thy God and his grace in thee? Paul's spirit was stirred in him at Athens, to see God dishonoured by the superstition of others; and is not thine, to see him reproached by the pride, unbelief, and other sins that do it from under thy own soul's roof? Ob! Christian, meditate some noble exploit against it. Now the more to steel thy heart, and harden it against all relenting towards it, carry the blood and wounds of thy Saviour into the field with thee, in the haud of thy faith; the sight of these will certainly enrage thy heart against thy lusts, that stabbed and killed him, more than the bloody garments of Cæsar, held up by Anthony, did the Roman citizens against his murderers. O see how cruelly they used the Lord of glory, and where they laid him in an ignominious grave, and that fastened with a sea, stronger than that which man set to it (the curse due to us sinners) never possible to have been broke up by any less than his own almighty arm. And now, Christian, shall these murderers, not of man but of God, for it was the blood of God that was shed, escape that vengeance which God would have done with thy hand upon them; wherefore else doth he leave thee any life in thy soul, but that thou shouldest have the opportunity of shewing thy love to Christ, by running thy dagger of mortification into their heart? Alexander got not more honour by his great victories in the field than by his piety to his dead father Philip, whose bloody death he avenged, as soon as he came into the throne, slaying the murderers upon his father's tomb. O shew thou, Christian, thy piety to thy dear Saviour, by falling upon thy cursed lusts, and that speedily; never rest till thon hast had their blood, that shed his; till thou doest this, thou art consenting to all the cruelty that was executed on him; this, this is the honour which all the saints shall have, and therefore the two-edged sword of the Spirit is put into their hands, that they may execute the vengeance written.

Secondly, Is God reconciled to thee? Be thou willing

to be reconciled to any that have wronged thee. Thy God expects it at thy hands. Thou hast reason to pardon thy brother for God's sake, who pardoned thee for his pure mercy's sake. Thou in pardoning dost no more than thou owest thy brother; but God pardoned thee when he did owe thee nothing but wrath. Thou needest not, I hope, think that thou dishonourest thyself in the act, though it be to the veriest beggar in the town: know thou doest it after thy betters. Thy God stooped lower when he reconciled himself to thee, yea sought it at thy hands, and no dishonour neither to the high and lofty One. Nay, by implacableness and revenge thou debasest thyself the most thou canst likely do; for by these thou stoopest not only beneath thy Heaven-born nature, but human; it is the devil, and none but such as bear his image, that are implacable enemies; Hell-fire it is that is unquenchable. "The wisdom from above is easy to be entreated." Thou a Christian, and carry Hellfire about thee! how can it be? When we see a child furious and revengeful, that comes of merciful parents, we use to say, we wonder of whom he got his currish, churl ish disposition: his father and mother was not so. Who learns thee, O Christian, to be so revengeful and unmerciful? thou hast it not of thy heavenly Father, I am sure.

Thirdly, Is God at peace with thee? hath he pardoned thy sins? Never then distrust his providence for any thing thou wantest as to this life; two things, well weighed, would help thy faith in this particular. First, when he pardoned thy sins, he did more for thee than this comes. to, and did he give the greater and will he grudge thee the less? Thou hast Christ in thy pardon bestowed on thee: "how shall he not with him also freely give thee all things?" Rom. viii. 32. When the father gives his child the whole orchard, it were folly to question whether he gives him this apple or that in it. "All things are your's, and you are Christ's." 1 Cor. iii. 22. The reconciled soul hath a right to all; the whole world is his; but as a father, though he settles a fair estate on his child, yet lets him hold no more in his own hand than he can well manage; so God gives believers a right to all the comforts of this life, but proportions so much out

to them, for their actual use, as his infinite wisdom sees meet; so that he that hath less than another in his present possession ought to impute it not to any want of love or care in God, but to the wisdom both of his love and care, that gives stock as we have grace to work it out; we pour the wine according as the cup is; that which but fills one would half be lost, if poured into a less. Secondly, consider how God gives these temporals to those he denies peace and pardon to. Though within awhile they are to be tumbled into Hell, yet while on earth his providence reacheth unto them; and doth God feed these ravens, unclean birds? doth he cause his rain to drop fatness on their fields, and will he neglect thee thinkest thou, that art a believer? If the prince feeds the traitor in prison, surely the child in his house shall not starve. In a word, to allude to that, Luke xii. 28. if God in his providence so abounds to the ungodly, as we see he doth, if he clothes this grass, for to this the wicked may well be compared, which is to-day in the field, and to-morrow is cast into Hell's burning oven, "how much more will he clothe you, O ye of little faith?"

Fourthly, Art thou at peace with God? O then shew no discontent at any cross or affliction that God visiteth thee with. If he hath visited thee first with his mercy, thou hast reason to bid him kindly welcome when he comes to visit thee with his rod. Thou hast sugar by thee now, to sweeten thy bitter cup. When the prophet Samuel came to Bethlehem, it is said, "the elders of the town trembled at his coming, and said, Comest thou peaceably? and he said, Peaceably." 1 Sam. xvi. 4. Thus when God comes with some heavy affliction to us, it may make us tremble till we know what it comes for, whether peaceably or no. Now, if thou art at peace with God, the fear is over; it cannot but come peaceably: thou mayest conclude it comes on mercy's errand. What condition canst thou, O pardoned soul, be in, that should part thee and the joy of thy peace with God? Is it the wrath of man thou fearest? Possibly thou hast many enemies, and those great ones, and their wrath as great as such can express. Let it be so; is God among them or no? doth God let out, their wrath in his wrath against

thee? if not, thou exceedingly wrongest God, if overmuch troubled, and thyself also. Thou wrongest God by not sanctifying his name in thy heart, whose mercy, I hope, is able to secure thee from their wrath: "If God be for us, who can be against us?" Rom. viii. 31. Thou needest not fear them, though an army of them about thee, no. more than if they were so many whisps of straw. And thou wrongest thyself also; how indeed can we wrong God and not ourselves? so long as thou art under the power of such a fear from man's wrath thou canst never have the taste of God's love in its true sweetness.

Again, Art thou sick, poor, and what not beside? May not God reasonably expect that reconciling mercy should stop thy mouth from whispering any word of discontent against him, and prevent all envious glances of thy eye at the prosperity of the wicked? Remember, man, that thou canst say one great word, which they cannot, in the midst of all their pomp and worldly glory: "Though I lie here, poor and sick, yet I am, through mercy, at peace with God." This, well thought on, would soon change both your notes: the joy of the prosperous sinner into bitter mourning, and thy sorrow, Christian, into joy. The Lady Elizabeth (afterwards England's gracious queen) hearing a simple milk-maid, sing merrily in the field, when she, poor princess (being then a sorrowful prisoner), had more mind to sigh than sing (though served at the same time in state as a princess), said that poor maid was happier than herself. And so would the sinner (how great and high soever in the world) think the poorest Christian with his rags and penury, a better man, and happier in his liberty and peace with God, than himself in all his grandeur and worldly gaieties, did he but consider that in the midst of all these he is a prisoner, not to man but God, out of whose hands there is no escaping.

Fifthly, Comfort thyself with this, that thou, who art at peace with God, now on earth, shalt feast with God ere long in Heaven. "And whom he justified, them be also glorified." Roma, viii. 30. And do not think this news too good or great to be true. Here is a word for it, you see. Heaven's number of glorified saints is made