most ashamed to ask for longer life. How long would you stay, before you would be willing to come to God? If he desired our company no more than we, do his, and desired our happiness in heaven, no more than we desire it ourselves, we should linger here as Lot in Sodom! Must we be snatched away against our wills, and carried by force to our Father's presence?

and

Direct. XIII. Remember that all mankind are mortal, you are to go no other way than all that ever came into the world, have gone before you (except Enoch and Elias).' Yea, the poor brute creatures must die at your pleasure, to satisfy your hunger or delight. Beasts, and birds, and fishes, even many to make one meal, must die for you. And why then should you shrink at the entrance of such a trodden path, which leadeth you not to hell, as it doth the wicked, nor merely to corruption, as it doth the brutes, but to live in joy with Christ and his church triumphant?

Direct, XIV. Remember both how vile your body is, and how great an enemy it hath proved to your soul; and then you will the more patiently bear its dissolution.' It is not your dwelling house, but your tent or prison that God is pulling down. And yet even this vile body, when it is corrupted, shall at last be changed "into the likeness of Christ's glorious body, by the working of his irresistible power." And it is a flesh that hath so rebelled against the spirit, and made your way to heaven so difficult, and put the soul to so many conflicts, that we should the more easily submit it to the will of justice, and let it perish for a time, when we are assured that mercy will at last recover it.

Direct. xv. Remember what a world it is that you are to leave, and compare it with that which you are going to; and compare the life which is near at end, with that which you are next to enter upon.' Was it not Enoch's reward when he had walked with God, to be taken to him from a polluted world? 1. While you are here, you are yourselves defiled; sin is in your natures, and your graces are all imperfect; sin is in your lives, and your duties are all imperfect; you cannot be free from it one day or hour. And is it not a mercy to be delivered from it? Is it not desirable to you to sin no more? and to be perfect in holiness? to

a Phil. iii. 20, 21.

know God and love him as much and more than you can now desire? You are here every day lamenting your darkness, and unbelief, and estrangedness from God, and want of love to him. How oft have you prayed for a cure of all this! And now would you not have it, when God would give it you? Why hath God put that spark of heavenly life into you, but to fight against sin, and make you weary of it? And yet had you rather continue sinning, than have the victory and be with Christ! 2. It is a life of grief as well as sin and a life of cares, and doubts, and fears! When you are at the worst, you are fearing worse! If it were nothing but the fears of death itself, it should make you the more willing to submit to it, that you might be past those fears. 3. You are daily afflicted with the infirmities of that flesh, which you are so loath should be dissolved. To satisfy its hunger and thirst, to cover its nakedness, to provide it a habitation, and supply all its wants, what care and labour doth it cost you! Its infirmities, sicknesses, and pains do make you often weary of yourselves: so that you groan, being burdened," as Paul speaketh, 2 Cor. v. 3, 4. 6. And yet is it not desirable to be with Christ? 4. You are compassed with temptations, and are in continual danger through your weakness! And yet would you not be past the danger? Would you have more of those horrid and odious temptations? 5. You are purposely turned here into a wilderness, among wild beasts; you are as lambs among wolves, and through many tribulations you must enter into heaven. You must deny yourselves, and take up your cross, and forsake all that you have; and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus, must suffer persecution: in the world you must have trouble: the seed of the serpent must bruise your heel, before God bruise satan under your feet! And is such a life as this more desirable than to be with Christ? Are we afraid to land after such storms and tempests? Is a wicked world, a malicious world, a cruel world, an implacable world more pleasing to us than the joy of angels, and the sight of Christ, and God himself in the majesty of his glory? Hath God on purpose made the world so bitter to us, and permitted it to use us unjustly and cruelly, and all to make us love it less, and to drive home our hearts unto himself? and yet are we so unwilling to be gone?

Direct. xvI. Settle your estates betimes, that worldly matters may not distract or discompose you.' And if God have endowed you with riches, dispose of a due proportion to such pious or charitable uses, in which they may be most serviceable to him that gave them you. Though we should give what we can in the time of life and health, yet many that have but so much as will serve to their necessary maintenance, may well part with that to good uses at their death, which they could not spare in the time of their health: especially they that have no children, or such wicked children, as are like to do hurt with all that is given them above their daily bread.

Direct. XVII. If it may be, get some able, faithful guide and comforter to be with you in your sickness, to counsel you, and resolve your doubts, and pray with you, and discourse of heavenly things, when you are disabled by weakness for such exercises yourselves.' Let not carnal persons disturb you with their vain babblings. Though the difference between good company and bad, be very great in the time of health, yet now in sickness it will be more discernible. And though a faithful friend and spiritual pastor be always a great mercy, yet now especially in your last necessity. Therefore make use of them as far as your pain and weakness will permit.

Direct. XVIII. Be fortified against all the temptations of satan by which he useth to assault men in their extremity' stand it out in the last conflict, and the crown is yours. I shall instance in particulars.

Directions for resisting the Temptations of Satan, in the time of Sickness.

Tempt. 1. The most ordinary temptation against the comfort of believers, (for I have already spoken of those that are against their safety) is to doubt of their own sincerity, and consequently of their part in Christ. Saith the tempter, • All that thou hast done, hath been but in hypocrisy; thou wast never a true believer, nor ever didst truly repent of sin, nor truly love God; and therefore thou art unjustified, and shalt speedily be condemned.'

Against this temptation a believer hath two remedies.

The first is, to confute the tempter by those evidences which will prove that he hath been sincere (such as I have often mentioned before). And by repelling those reasonings, by which the tempter would prove him to have been an hypocrite. As when it is objected, 'Thou hast repented and been humbled but slightly and by the halves;' Answ. Yet was it sincerely; and weak grace is not no grace. Obj. "Thou hast been a lover of the world, and a neglecter of thy soul, and cold in all that thou didst for thy salvation.' Answ. Yet did I set more by heaven than earth, and I first sought the kingdom of God and his righteousness, as esteeming it above all the riches of the world. Object.' Thou hast kept thy sins while thou wentest on in a profession of religion.' Answ. I had no sin but what in the habitual, ordinary temper of my soul, I hated more than I loved it, and had rather have been delivered from it, than have kept it, and none but what I unfeignedly repented of. Object. • Thou didst not truly believe the promises of God, and the life to come; or else thou wouldst never have doubted as thou hast done, nor sought such a kingdom with such weak desires.' Answ. Though my faith was weak, it overcame the world: I so far believed the promise of another life, as that I preferred it before this life, and was resolved rather to forsake all the world, than to part with my hopes of that promised blessedness: and that faith is sincere (how weak soever) that can do this. Object.' But thou hast done thy works to be seen of men, and been troubled when men have not approved thee, nor honoured thee; and what was this but mere hypocrisy?' Answ. Though I had some hypocrisy, yet was I not a hypocrite, because it was not in a reigning and prevalent degree; though I too much regarded the esteem of men, yet I did more regard the esteem of God. Thus if a Christian discern his evidences, the false reasonings of satan are to be refuted.

2. But ordinarily it is a readier way to take the second course, which is, at present, to believe, and repent, and so confute satan that saith you are not penitent believers. But then you must truly understand what believing and repenting are; or else you may think that you do not believe and repent when you do. Believing in Christ, is a believing that he is the Saviour of the world, and a consent of will

that he be your Saviour, to justify you by his blood, and sanctify you by his Spirit. To repent, is to be so sorry that you have sinned, that if it were to do again, you would not do it (as to gross sin and a state of sin); and the smallest infirmities, your will is so far set against, that you desire to be delivered from them. Believing to justification, is not the believing that you are already justified, and your sins forgiven you; and repenting consisteth not in such degrees of sorrow as some expect; but in the change of the mind and will, from a life of sensuality to a life of holiness. When you know this, then answer the tempter thus, If I should suffer thee to deprive me of the comfort of all my former uprightness, yet shalt thou not so deprive me of the comfort of my present sincerity, and of my hopes; I am now too weak and distempered to try all that is past and gone. Past actions are now known but by remembering them; and they are seldom judged of, as indeed they then were; but according to the temper and apprehension of the mind when it revieweth them: and I am now so changed and weakened myself, that I cannot tell whether I truly remember the just temper and thoughts of my heart in all that is past or not. Nor doth it most concern me now, to know what I have been, but to know what I am. Christ will not judge according to what I was; but according to what he findeth me; never did he refuse a penitent, believing soul, because he repented and believed late: I do now unfeignedly repent of all my sins, and am heartily willing to be both pardoned, ́and cleansed, and sanctified by Christ, and here I give up myself to him as my Saviour, and to this covenant I will stand; and this is true repenting and believing.' Thus a poor Christian in the time of sickness, may ofttimes much easier clear it up to himself, that he repenteth now, than that he repented formerly; and it is his surest way.

Tempt. 11. And yet sometimes he cometh with the quite contrary temptation, and must be resisted by the contrary way. When he findeth a Christian so perplexed, and distempered with sickness, that his understanding is disabled from any composed thoughts, then he asketh him, Now where is thy faith and repentance? If thou hast any, or ever hadst any, let it now appear.' In this case a Christian is to take up with the remembrance of his former sincerity,