form of knowledge in their brains, caused the Gentiles to blaspheme when they saw they lived clean contrary thereunto; and, therefore, a brother that walks inordinately was to be delivered to Satan, to learn what it was to blaspheme,' 1 Tim. i. 20, that is, to learn to know how evil and bitter a thing it is, by the torments of an evil conscience, to live in such a course as made God and his ways evil spoken of, as it befell David when he thus sinned. Yea, 1 Cor. v. 10, 11, though they might keep company with a heathen, because he was ignorant and professed not the knowledge of God, yet if a brother, one that professed, and so was to walk by the same rules, did sin against those principles he professed, then keep him not company. Thus did Saul sin. All the religion he had and pretended to in his latter days was persecuting witches; yet in the end he went against this his principle, he went to a witch in his great extremity at last. And thus God will deal with all that are hollow, and sin secretly against knowledge, in the end. He suffers them to go on against their most professed principles. These are aggravations in general, applicable both to any act of sinning, or going on in a known state of sinning.

Use. Now, the use of all that hath been spoken, what is it but to move all those that have knowledge to take more heed of sinning than other men, and those of them that remain in their natural estate to turn speedily and effectually unto God? For if sinning against knowledge be so great an aggravation of sinning, then of all engagements to repentance knowledge is the greatest.

First, Thou who hast knowledge canst not sin so cheap as another who is ignorant. Therefore, if thou wilt be wicked, thy wickedness will cost thee ten times more than it would another. Places of much knowledge, and plentiful in the means of grace, are dear places to live in sin in. To be drunk and unclean after enlightening, and the motions of the Spirit, and powerful sermons, is more than twenty times afore; thou mightest have committed ten to one, and been damned less. This is condemnation,' says Christ,that light came into the world.' Neither canst thou have so much pleasure in thy sins as an ignorant person, for the conscience puts forth a sting in the act when thou hast knowledge, and does subject thee to bondage and the fear of death. When a man knows how dearly he must pay for it, there is an expectation of judgment embittereth all. Therefore the Gentiles sinned with more pleasure than we. Therefore, Eph. iv. 18, 19, the apostle, speaking of them, says that through their ignorance and darkness and want of feeling they committed sin with greediness, and so with more pleasure, they not having knowledge, or hearts sensible of the evils that attend upon their courses.

Secondly, Thou wilt, in sinning against knowledge, be given up to greater hardness. If the light that is in thee be darkness,' says Christ, how great is that darkness.' Therefore, the more light a man hath, and yet goes on in works of darkness, the more darkness will that man be left unto, even to a reprobate mind in the end.

Thirdly, It will procure thee to be given up to the worst of sins more than another man; for God, when he leaves men, makes one sin the punishment of another, and reserves the worst for sinners against knowledge. These Gentiles, when they knew God, they worshipped him not, God gave them up to the worst of sins whereof they were capable, as unnatural uncleanness, &c. But these are not sins great enough for thee, that art a sinner of the Christians, to be given up to drunkenness or adultery,

&c.; otherwise than to discover thy rottenness, these are too small sins; but thou shalt be given up to inward profaneness of heart (as Esau was, having been brought up in a good family), so as not to neglect holy duties only, but to despise them, to despise the good word of God and his saints, and to hate godliness and the appearance of it; thou shalt be given up to contemn God and his judgments, to trample under foot the blood of the covenant,' or else unto devilish opinions. Those other are too small to be punishments of thy sin, for still the end of such an one must be seven times worse than the beginning, as Christ says it shall. If thou wert a drunkard, a swearer, or an unclean person before, and thy knowledge wrought some alteration in thee, thou shalt not haply be so now at thy fall, but seven times worse, profane, injurious to saints, a blasphemer, or derider of God's ways and ordinances.

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Fourthly, When thou comest to lay hold on mercy at death, thy knowledge will give thee up to more despair than another man. Knowledge, though when it is but newly revealed, it is an help; yet not made use of, turns against the soul, to wound it, and to work despair; and this both because we have sinned against the means that should have saved us, as also because such as sin against knowledge, sin with more presumption; and the more presumption in thy life, the more despair thou art apt to fall into at death. Therefore, Isa. lix. 11, 12, what brought such trouble and roarings like bears' upon these Jews? and that when salvation was looked for, that yet it was so far off from them, in their apprehensions? Our iniquities' (say they) testify to our face, and we know them.' Now, then, sins testify to our face when our conscience took notice of them, even to our faces when we were committing them; and then also the same sins themselves will again testify to our faces, when we have recourse for the pardon of them. Therefore thou wilt lie roaring on thy deathbed, and that thou knowest them will come as an argument that thou shalt not have mercy. As ignorance is a plea for mercy, I did it ignorantly, therefore I obtained mercy,' so I did it knowingly, will come in as a bar and a plea against thee, therefore I shall not have mercy.

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Fifthly, Both here and in hell, it is the greatest executioner and tormentor. In this sense it may be said, Qui auget scientiam, auget dolorem, He that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow,' as Solomon speaks; for knowledge enlargeth our apprehension of our guilt, and that brings more fear and torment. Have they no knowledge who eat up my people? Yes, there is their fear,' says David. Therefore, Heb. x. 28, after sinning after knowledge, there remains not only a more fearful punishment, but a more fearful expectation' in the parties' consciences. And this is the worm in hell that gnaws for ever. Light breeds these worms.

But then you will say, It is best for us to be ignorant, and to keep ourselves so.

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I answer, No. For to refuse knowledge will damn as much as abusing it. This you may see in Prov. i. 23, Ye fools' (says Wisdom), you that hate knowledge, turn, and I will pour my spirit upon you, and make known my words to you.' Well, ver. 24, they refused,' and would none of his reproof; therefore, says God, I will laugh at your calamity,' that is, I will have no pity, but instead of pity, God will laugh at you; and when your fear comes, I will not answer, because ye hated knowledge,' ver. 29; so as this is as bad, there remains therefore no middle way of refuge to extricate thyself at, and avoid all this, no remedy but turning unto God; otherwise thou canst not but be more miserable than other men.

Yea, and

this must be done speedily also. For thou having knowledge, God is quicker in denying thee grace, and in giving thee up to a reprobate mind, than another man who is ignorant. He will wait upon another that knows not his will and ways, twenty, thirty, forty years, as he did upon the children of the Israelites that were born in the wilderness, and had not seen his wonders in Egypt, and at the Red Sea; but those that had, he soon sware against many of them, that they should never enter into his rest.' Christ comes as a 'swift witness' against those to whom the gospel is preached, Mal. iii. 5; he makes quick despatch of the treaty of grace with them. Therefore few that have knowledge are converted when they are old, or that lived long under the means. And therefore you that have knowledge are engaged to repent and to turn to God, and to bring your hearts to your knowledge, and that speedily also, or else your damnation will not only be more intolerable than others, but the sentence of it pass out more quickly against you. Therefore as Christ says, John xii. 36, Whilst you have the light, walk in it.' For that day of grace which is very clear and bright, is usually a short one. And though men may live many natural days after, and enjoy the common light of the sun, yet the day of grace and of gracious excitements to repent may be but a short one.

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AGGRAVATIONS OF SINNING AGAINST

MERCY.

Or despisest thou the riches of his goodness, and forbearance, and longsuffering; not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance? But, after thy hardness and impenitent heart, treasurest up unto thyself wrath against the day of wrath, and revelation of the righteous judgment of God.-ROM. II. 4, 5.

THIS is the last and most weighty aggravation which the apostle puts into the measure of the Gentiles' sinfulness (which in the former chapter he had, verse 29, pronounced full before), to make it fuller yet. Their sinning against mercies, and despising the riches of God's goodness, patience, and forbearance, the hateful evil and iniquity whereof can be better no way set off and illustrated unto men's consciences, than by a display of the riches of that goodness which men sin against.

My purpose therefore is to unlock and carry you into that more common treasury of outward mercies, and lead you through the several rooms thereof, all which do continually lead you unto repentance; that then, reflecting upon our ungrateful waste and abuse of so many mercies in sinning, thereby our sins, every sin, the least, may yet appear more sinful unto us, who are less than the least of all mercies.' 6 Know then, that

besides that peculiar treasure of unsearchable riches of grace laid up in Christ,' Eph. ii. 7, the offer of which neglected and despised adds yet to all that sinfulness, a guilt as far exceeding all that which shall be spoken of, as heaven exceeds the earth, there is another untold mine of riches the earth is full of, as the Psalmist tells us, Ps. civ. 24, and the apostle here, which these Gentiles only heard of, and which we partake of all as much as they. As there are riches of grace offered to you which can never be exhausted, so there are riches of patience spent upon you which you will have spent out in the end, the expense of which cast up, will alone amount to an immense treasure, both of guilt in you and of wrath in God, as these words inform us.

To help you in this account, I will,

1. In general, shew what goodness or bounty, patience, and longsuffering are in God.

2. That there are riches of these spent upon all the sons of men.

3. That these all lead men to repentance. And then,

4. I will expostulate with you and aggravate your sinfulness in going on to despise all these by unrepentance, as the apostle here doth.

1. First, In that God is said here to be (1.) good or bountiful; (2.) patient or forbearing; (8.) longsuffering; they seem to note out three degrees of his common mercies unto men.

(1.) First, He is a good or a bountiful God; for so as goodness is here used, I exegetically expound it. For though it be true that goodness and bounty may differ, yet when riches of goodness are said to be communicated, it imports the same, and is all one with bounty. And such is God. And all those noble and royal qualifications and properties which concur to make one truly good and bountiful, do meet and abound in him, in all those good things which he doth bestow, and are found truly in none but in him, so that it may be truly said, that there is none good but God, as Christ says of him.

Now bounty in the general, which is in God, may be thus described.

It is a free, willing, and a large giving of what is merely his own, looking for no recompence again.

To explain this, that you may see that all these conditions are required to true goodness, and all of them to be found in God only.

[1.] He that is bountiful, he must be a giver and bestower of good things; and all he bestows it must be by way of gift, not by way of recompence unto, or by desert from the party he bestows all on. Therefore Christ says, Luke vi. 33, that to do good to those who have done or do good to us, is not thankworthy, nor is it bounty. But God is therefore truly good, because he simply, merely, and absolutely gives away all which he bestows. For he was not, nor can any way become, beholden to any of his creatures, nor had formerly received anything from them which might move him hereunto; so Rom. xi. 35, Who hath first given him, that he may recompense him again?' Nay, until he gave us a being, we were not capable of so much as receiving any good thing from him.

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[2.] He who is truly termed good or bountiful, all that he gives away must be his own; and so all which God bestows it is his own. So Ps. xxiv. 1, The earth is the Lord's,' the ground we tread on, the place we dwell in; he is our landlord. But is that all? For the house may be the landlord's when the furniture is, the tenant's. Therefore he further adds, ‘And the fulness of it' is his also; that is, all the things that fill the world, all the furniture and provision of it both, all the moveables. So Ps. 1. 11, 12, 'The cattle and the fowls upon a thousand hills are mine,' says he; and also all the standing goods, the corn and oil' which you set and plant, 'are mine,' Hos. ii. 9; yea, and the Psalmist, in the 24th Psalm, adds further, that they who dwell therein' are his also; not the house and furniture only, but the inhabitants themselves. And this by the most sure and most sovereign title that can be, better than that of purchase or inheritance of and from another; for he hath made them. All is thine, because all comes of thee,' says the same David, 1 Chron. xxix. 11, 12. And all things are not only of him, but through him, Rom. xi. 36; that is, they cannot stand nor subsist without him. Even kings, the greatest and most bountiful of men, their bounty is but as that of the clouds, which though they shower down plentifully, yet they first received all from the earth below them.

[3.] He must give largely, it is not bounty else. Now God is therefore said to be rich in goodness, because he is abundant in it. So we find it, comparing Ps. xxxiii. 5, with Ps. civ. 24, in which it is said, that the