The
Practical Works of Richard Baxter comprise four large books. The pdf
files that Google made of Baxter's Practical Works comprise
twenty-three volumes. Therefore a 30-page paper must be something of
a survey rather than a comprehensive analysis of so much writing.
I
found a Nook book modern version of Baxter's Practical Works for .99
cents that eliminates the difficulties in reading the 1825 version
via Harvard and Google. Unfortunately one cannot transfer a Nook book
to a PC.
Baxter
has so many peers that were excellent Christian reformed writers like
Watson and Brooks that I was a little put off initially by his style
so full of 'directions' . Yet that first impression quickly
disappeared as I learned about the personality of Richard Baxter and
his personal experiences and methods of addressing the challenges of
his day. His style is to my knowledge unique amidst the Christian
theological writers; he might be a street-wise Christian sociologist
writing to the saved and lost alike. He is more than that; the good
conscious with good information writing the truth.
Baxter
may be regarded, I think, as a contemporary of the French rationalist
philosopher Rene Descartes. Descartes's Meditations treat of the mind
from 'first principles'-a self awareness reflection of what might be
known in mind itself-as if without learning and experience one might
not be an idiot. Baxter treats the mind with a comparative dualism
though-Cartesian dualism is a cliché sort of philosophical genre.
Baxter has the mind or spirit in distinction to the 'sensitive' or
sensual/sensing. I think that the sensitive is the body with its
sensory nature.
I
would not make a large issue or over-stress the Baxter criteria of
spirit vs sensitive. it is possibly the case that it is not a
physical versus mental distinction that he intended to describe. It
may be that it is simply a behavioral choice of how to use one's own
existence.
These
are perennial issues. Sartre in Being and Nothingness continues
Descartes's inquiries to describe all experience subjectively as
mental experience. He does go so far as to include the body as a
mental experience. Even if it is physical, subjective awareness of
the body is completely mental. A brain dead individual has no more
experience of the body than does a statue.
So
in a way, there are similar points in Baxter's and Sartre's
epistemology-each regard the mind-body distinction as in fact two
parts of one nature. One knows the animal or corporeal side with
mind, even as the spiritual side is mind in-itself and
self-cognition. In chapter eight section one Baxter provides
directions for the government of the senses. His point of view is
comparable to that of Socrates regarding virtue as superior to
sensuality. Baxter wrote that reason must govern the senses and that
in the unsaved the senses tend to be prior to reason. He wrote that
brutes are ruled by the senses and have no sense of guilt that must
arise within reason for brutish behavior. His opinion is that
sanctification occurs primarily within reason, and that with reason
one must pursue heaven and things of God; subordinating the senses to
reason so far as possible.
Contemporary
physics has several issues wherein the practical difference between
and unobserved side is effectively no a meaningful question. Perhaps
that pertains in the mind-body two-aspects of one nature
renormalization too. One never experiences a body without a mind,
though the mind does have a subconscious that influences and computes
data for the conscious mind. Virtual reality and phenomenal spacetime
experiences may be unique and have meaning as living things
for-oneself that occur as events greater than the sum of the parts.
People that are pure materialists might ask how material evolutions
can generate spirit with incredulity while being aware of the limits
to knowledge of mass and energy's ultimate origins (besides saying
that it appears from a mysterious field out of nowhere that existed
from eternity-and that seems like borrowing from Genesis) and that
spirit too might be phenomenal, contingent and emergent.
Gershner's
wondered if man's spirit might not be phenomenal, since if it could
not really be eternal in the same sense as God's, and it could not
have coexisted forever like the trinity. If the mind or spirit is
comparable to a computer operating system, one made by God yet unlike
a computer actually a living spirit, it could be continued forever in
one direction of eternity at least-like an infinite line originating
at a Cartesian point location 0,0.
Baxter
writes thousands of lines of good, practical advice and directions
about how the spiritual should overcome, with the grace of the Holy
Spirit, the sensitive and its predisposition to sin. If the mind-body
problem is not so much a dualism of substances and is more of a
circumstance of a unified mind with a sensitive corporeal extension
as body that is known with mind/spirit, is it easy to understand
Paul's paradigm of sin persisting through the sensitive (body) even
as he was being spiritually sanctified . '
Gershner
talked about the spirit going directly to heaven at death, yet the
new and improved, fit-for-eternity body is not returned to
unification with the spirit until the day of judgment. I believe that
the body at that time will lack the capability of having
characteristics of sensations that God would regard as sin. Though
heaven will be a joyful experience forever for worshiping God, it is
probably not a place where one would worry about mind-body dualism.
Since
I am commenting on Baxter and society then and now via Schopenhauer,
I will add that Schopenhauer and Nietzsche are equally aliens to the
Nazi Universe. The Nazis were pure animals devoid of spirit. Hitler's
fascism was that of plain self-interest assertive tribalism; another
ancient social mode. Nietzsche wrote a book titled appropriately to
the era 'Twilight of the Gods'. That title was apropos for Nietzsche
and Schopenhauer's affectation with Zarathustrianism and ancient
religions. Each philosopher were of the last of the west aqssociated
with ancient eastern faiths. Plainly Neitzsche included Christianity
in the genre of ancient religions in twilight too. He foresaw a world
arising not unlike Schopenhaur's evil Universe were evil animal
spirits would dominate all of society as supermen.
While
the ancient religions of the east were dying and scientific atheism
arising in the west, a paralell reactive populism of romanticism.
escapism and faithlessness appeared' then and now. faithless eras
tend toward submergence and transmogrification of faith in populism,
irrationalism and imperialism. The breakdown of social morality leads
into imperialism or other forms of authoritarianism as personal
boundaries, social borders and extreme libertinism permits elites to
rule with prima facie benevolence from a financial distance with
concentrated wealth and Universalism.
Christianity
is true, and the open door to God through the Son. Baxter recognizes
and replies to numerous problems of unbelief and reasons with readers
about them. If Nietzsche and Schopenhauer lived in the twilight of
the Gods era. Americans and Europeans live in Elton John's 'N.Y.
Times said God is dead era.' Modern man has built several
institutional biases against Christianity today that make it
difficult for pastors and theologians to enable faith and belief to
appear amidst to lost secularists given over to scientifically
cultured animal spiritlessness. It is a reactionary animal status
with recurrent attitudes against spirit. It is irrational materialism
motivated by physics and quantum energy. It is matter with
transformative equivalence into energy. It yields itself to quantum
phenomena and monads as infinite small mathematical points overcome
with quantum nominalism. Society is spiritual destroyed and a
supermen like Olympian Bruce Jenner transformed into a bride of
Frankenstein doll representing nothing more than mass. Social
management and society are depersonalized as quantum phenomena. It is
another mass disaster looking for a place to happen.
With
some reading of Ethics I formed an opinion that Baxter writes like a
scholastic theologian such as Aquinas, except his theology is limited
to Barth's criterion of theology being strictly scripture based.
Baxter reasons and develops points rather methodically including
proofs for the existence of God, yet these points in his writing to
graceless unconverted sinners are not of a dry, academic style. They
are practical, polished pedagogic prose understandable to anyone
literate.
There
are four primary texts comprising the Practical Works of Richard
Baxter. They are Ethics, Economics,
Ecclesiastics, and Politics.
The first; Ethics, is on my book book of 3500 pages. Of course with a
lesser type font size it may be reduced to a thousand pages. The
original 1825 edition is of about 526 pages I seem to recall. There
are this many ways to write a 30 page paper; several approaches that
could be developed would present various accents and insights of
value. Instead of writing a paper a mile wide and an inch deep in
content, I will concentrate more on the first volume; Ethics, and
save the other three volumes for another work, if should ever happen
to get to that.
Presently
I have numerous theology books of reformed writers that I have not
had the opportunity to read. In modern America with all of the
absolutely idiotic foreign policy approaches and domestic economic
administrative perfidy regarding purpose and method it would be
somewhat remarkable to just disregard news broadcasts and
contemporary concerns that do seem to stupid and misdirected and
simply read reformed theologians from four-hundred years past in some
cases. That does seem a healthy and definitely edifying choice
however. Some time in the future I hope to read all of the Economics,
Ecclesiastics and Politics even while the electro-magnetic spectrum
of rave politics is passing overhead like drone propaganda stealth
fighters.
Baxter's
introduction, or advertisement at the start of his vast publication,
is interesting reading. I am sure there are expert historians of the
period that would know fat more than I about the time. Baxter wrote
the four part book in 1664-1665, though he wrote far more on
contiguous matters that were not completed before his death.
The
Westminster Standards were assembled beginning in 1643 under the
Presbyterian-Puritan dominated Long Parliament during the English
Civil War. Cromwell eventually rose to power and forced out the
Presbyterians. One history comments that Cromwell favored
independency, and Gill for example also appeared to favor
congregationalism rather than Presbyterianism that some theologians
believe is not a valid church office-that is, it is out of compliance
with first century Christian ecclesiastical intent.
In
1660 the monarchy was restored. Episcopacy and subscription to it was
required for pastors.
Thomas
Watson and perhaps Baxter continued being banned from pubic preaching
I would think. There was an Indulgence in 1672 that let
non-conformist ministers return to public work.
Baxter's
advertisement at the start of his work where we learn that he was
forbidden by law to preach is a qualification and explanation for the
form and history of development of the work. It is a remarkable piece
in-itself.
Baxter
had no library with him for references and quotes. He points out that
he thus avoids charges of plagiarism. The Google photocopy version of
Baxter's writings that I have will not apparently allow me to copy
and paste any quotations from Practical Divinity, so I cite a
technical reason for not making lengthy quotations in the present
paper.*
Baxter
opined that people complain if he writes too little and complain if
he writes too much. Some criticize his promulgation of directions as
too holier-than-thou an lacking humility. Baxter basically said that
he was just being practical and providing instructions to those that
need them.
Against
charges of pride and self-conceit for writing so much Baxter replies
that it is unfortunate that so much is wonted. Baxter notes that
there is too much to remember therefore he wrote it down. Baxter
accounts for the several ways in which his work is criticized from
offending the godly to offending the zealous with his pacific,
unifying air. If Baxter had lived in more stable times in a continuum
of religious and theocratic settlement he probably would not have
written with the apparent blunt eloquence that he did. When
government and leadership classes change rather swiftly in historical
terms the bureaucratic sycophants of church and state haven't
sufficient time to get their stores straight to follow along with
whatever it is they believe the rich and powerful want delivered unto
their eyes and ears. Baxter had to write what he thought as a kind of
principle of the faith-a facsimile 17th century disciple of Christ,
writing like James to the people of his day.
Yet
lest I appear too hasty to hagiographize St. Baxter I will point out
that he was of the generation of reformers that began with
compilation of the Westminster Standards during the period of
Presbyterian domination of the Long Parliament before the rise of
Cromwell who preferred more non-conformist Puritans I think-John
Bunyan was in his cabinet I see to recall. In other words, without
being kicked out of the insider set Baxter might not have ever taken
up the pen to produce his voluminous works. In that regard Baxter is
more like Israel when the physical Temple was not available for
worship, becoming more into the written form.
*
I have since found that a .txt file of Baxter's books, at least on
ethics, is available on-line. So I downloaded it and found it full of
typo errors that are probably a result of taking the pdf Google
photocopy version of the 1825 publication in the Harvard Library and
running it through a photo-into-text program that misunderstood many
words/spellings. Even so it is a very helpful text and potentially
can be corrected by someone with the time to do so.
I
have corrected a portion of Baxter's writing that I will reprint in
the commentary on chapter one- to unconverted, graceless sinners. My
intention is to comment on each of the ten primary sections of
Baxter's 'Ethics', in the order in which they appear in his book.
Baxter's
writing, as one proceeds through the Ethics, reads like a good
conscience comprising an armor-of-God defense ensemble against every
sort of wicked attack that might arise, so far as possible, without
especially seeming so. It is challenging to imagine anyone writing
such a work today with even a portion of the acuity and
effectiveness.
Even
so it is a little amusing to consider how some Christian with a
philosophical, theological and pastoral inclination might approach
reinforcing contemporary Christians and unbelievers-the graceless,
unwashed or overly body-washed, disposable culture, neo-sophisticated
pseudo-globalist corporatist followers of existential multi-isms-in a
world with a multi-cultural, networked, scientifically stamped
Satanic over-weaning and ubiquitous enemy.
One
might consider the philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer a little for
insight. People so far as they know who Schopenhauer was-The author
of The World as Will and Idea, regard him as a misogynist. He threw
some woman down a stairway-it might have been his land-lady
demanding rent-it is difficult to know. Reading Schopenhauer in a
feminist error is generally condemned as anyone doing so must be
regarded as misogynist too-a hater of women sympathizer or embodiment
example of the kind that have oppressed women for millennia.
Arthur
Schopenhauer was actually a brilliant as well as an anachronistic
philosopher at the same time-quite and achievement. He is also known
as a pessimist. His ego was rather large occasionally too-in his
introduction to The Principle of Sufficient Reason e describes
himself as the greatest philosopher in Europe I seem to recall, and
laments that he is not recognized as such.
Schopenhauer
had a well developed sense of self in a difficult period in Germany,
and it must be recalled that the average life span was about 25 then
and people dies young a lot with social ethics often being based on
the use of force to keep order and expel disorder micro-and
macro-socially. Being a philosopher couldn't have been well
paying,yet some intelligent guys might strive for that sort of thing.
Some more well known philosophers were wealthy or of a class able to
consort with the wealthy-and of course that tradition isn't entirely
historical yet continues to a certain extent though the prosperity of
the middle class has made professional philosophy rather common.
Schopenhauer's
Principle of Sufficient Reason' is the most brilliant and perhaps one
of the very few things written after Kant's 'Critique of Pure Reason'
that continues the work of the Critique in rather concrete terms.
While much commentary was written about the Critique and the summary
'Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics' , little if anyone else
besides Schopenhauer understood it so well as to be able to continue
the work and apply it somewhat with a few interesting proofs.
Unfortunately for Schopenhauer his 120 pages or so of interesting
reading in The Principle of Sufficient Reason' was not all that he
wrote.
Schopenhauer's
anachronistic side was in his religious and philosophical world-view
that exceed by far the rather technical philosophical Kantianism in
The Principle. It is as if another philosopher existed within his own
brain-as if he dual booted two philosophical-mind operating systems;
one of ultra-modern (in that era) epistemology and the other of the
most ancient religious and philosophical dualism. It is
Schopenhauer's dualism that let to his misogyny.
Like
ancient Romans and those of other societies, Schopenhauer believed
women were inferior, shorter, broad-based beings disfavored by the
dime-urge that created the world. Like Hindus and Buddhist
Schopenhauer believed the world is illusory or very contingent being.
Like the Zoroastrians with the perennial battle being good and evil
deities Schopenhauer believed that good and evil were in conflict
regarding the whole of creation that is commonly called the Universe.
Schopenhauer however believed that evil had won and the world is
entirely evil.
Schopenhauer
also believed that it is a bad thing to be born into the evil world.
Their sins of women were either carried over from prior lives and
their form was a kind of karmic pay-back, or perhaps some evil
demi-urge simply chose them to be in such wretched form. Schopenhauer
thought that everything in existence is evil I suppose, and that
further the world is an evil place and hence the people in it to
including women must be wicked. This idea is not the same as original
sin, yet is important to recognize that Schopenhauer's late 18th and
early 19th century ideas were in a way last-generation syncretistic
archetypes of some very ancient and wide-spread ideas from across
Eurasia. He seemed to have no sense of Reformed Christian ideas nor
even of Darwinism. I would guess that if Schopenhauer learned of
evolution paradigmata from pre-Darwinian scientific philosophers-and
such existed, he would have viewed the human phenomena of being as
some sort of grotesque morphing of broken and misshapen forms wherein
over the tragedy of time everything expresses itself in agony,
wickedness and pathos and dies after oozing forth another generation
of poor players walking and strutting about for an hour on stage
forgetting its pathetic lines.
Moderns
I suppose regard women as more phenomenal, though not statuesque,
than as competition creatures of less ability and with juicy
attributes. In post-dark ages Europe continuing to America clothing
sometimes was made to give one a larger appearance-how tall was Abe
Lincoln with a stove-pipe hat? Presently women are viewed I think as
phenomenal evolutionary creatures of beauty, yet almost never as
somewhat wicked neo-dwarf spawn of a wicked demi-urge being punished
for sins of past-lives. It is a little amusing that in the abeyance
of primitive competition, women become more competitive in society.
If their skulls were as thick as those of men, they too would
probably want a pro-football league to incur brain damage from
helmet-to-helmet collisions.
Of
all the statuary made in ancient Rome, 99% was destroyed or ground up
for construction. Those pagan once-painted pieces of the ancient
world remaining today are faded reminders that some made caryatids of
women holding up society while some ancient Greeks also thought of
them in a way similar to Schopenhauer. While the cult of Dionysus was
making human sacrifices Sappho was writing beautiful dactylic
hexameter. The world was as confused and variegated socially then as
now. It was more dangerous from natural causes and crime, yet not
capable of mass destruction. Human society itself because of its
economic methods assures mass-species extinctions and alteration of
the entire ecosystem. The Christian religion is failing to adapt and
upgrade because their is no pressing need or Schmalkaldic War lurking,
to post-millennialism , Genesis time scales comprehensive of general
relativity, and a priesthood of believers with just three offices in
which all members progress supported by planetary attendance records
and support networks. It seems like a comedy of ignorance, tragic in
many respects, yet one that God can and will attend to in his own
time.
In
modern society, after evolving through symbolic logic, scientific
empiricism, evolutionary capitalism and authoritarian mass-market
government, existential consumerism and Hollywood brave-new-world
militarism and patriotism, ordinary people have become clustered in
cities and suburbs while the wilderness has become eroded with the
greatest mass species die-off in 65 million years resulting from
human demographic and technical sprawl. Christian theologians may
encounter incorrect creation theory of their own, incorrect
eschatology and incorrect ecclesiastic and lack the reforming vigor
of 16th and 17th century reformers to change it in order to move
closer to understanding the truth of scripture. A reformer's insight
into scripture could produce a modern church that would be relevant
rather than apocalyptic or museum like.
I
believe that Schopenhauer's intellectual and social paradigm is in
some ways illustrative as a kind of archetype of men and women in
present day America. He was in some ways brilliant, with a sense of
the divine yet overcome by the pervasiveness of perceived evil,
uncertain of any sort of truth, tentative and syncretistic on
epistemology and metaphysics, and in some respects pagan.
With
the active presence of Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit Arthur
Schopenhauer was too much like the general run of humanity in that
day, and perhaps in all times, and too willing to tolerate
wickedness. Like Ivan Karamazov talking with his monk-brother Alyosha
in a restaurant, people may express themselves as cultured, worldly
skeptics ready to say, like Bill Clinton-'been there, done that' as
they have moved through their 'bucket list' before time expires.
Unlike modern Americans with such willingness to be irresponsible
that they allow imperialism to return to the nation through British
globalism and the concentration of wealth, Schopenhauer with his
wrong religious metaphysics or Nietzsche with his somewhat comparable
Zaratustrian bent, those German philosophers were not terribly happy
unsuccessful in success writers of ideas. Americans too have Andy
Warhol kind of mass-produced pop lives these days though the
tomato-cans are splattered more in movies than in Vietnam. It is
difficult to communicate with these people in drive-in churches with
parking lots full of nice cars, and ministers with gel goop on their
hair, sometimes with nice homes that have never known a day of
hardship or sleeping outside involuntarily.
Even
American intellectuals may have complex mind-collages with large
elements of mass production. Christianity is not mass-produced
however. God transcends every material thing and human construct or
even expression from any pastor. Baxter's directions are a continuous
conscientious coaching to return to thinking about God and the will
of God for human conduct and salvation unto eternal life. Who can
write like that today? Who can write with sufficient knowledge of how
the ecosphere works, of how society works, of who cosmology works to
the limit of modern physics, with complete understanding of scripture
so far as the grace of God permits adequate learning to resemble
nominal completeness of the major points at least?
Fortunately
Baxter's Practical Works are still relevant today.
"Chapter
1: Directions to Unconverted, Graceless Sinners, For the Attainment
of Saving Grace"
Following
is a typo corrected version along with a few usage updates I made to
an excerpt from this section of Baxter's 'Practical Divinity';
quote-"
If ungodly, miserable sinners were as few, as the devil and their
self-love would make themselves believe, I might forbear this part of
my work as needless. For the whole need not the physician, but the
sick. If you go into twenty families, and ask them all. Whether any
of them are in an unsanctified state, unrenewed and unpardoned, and
under the wrath and curse of God? you will meet with few that will
not tell you, they hope it is better with them than so; and thou they
are sinners, as all are, yet that they are repenting, pardoned
sinners. Nay, there is scarce one of many of the most wicked and
notoriously ungodly, but hope they are in a penitent, pardoned state.
Even the haters of God will say they love him ; and the scorners at
godliness will say that they are not ungodly; and that it is but
hypocrisy and singularity that they deride:: and it were well for
them, if saying so would go for proof, and he that will be their
judge would take their words.
But
God will not be deceived, though foolish men are wise enough to
deceive themselves. Wickedness will be wickedness when it hath
clothed itself with the fairest names : God will condemn it when it
hath found out the most plausible pretenses and excuses. Though the
ungodly think to bear it out in pride and scorn, and think to be
saved by their hypocritical lip-service, as soon as the most holy
worshipers of the Lord, yet "shall they be like chaff which the
wind driveth away: they shall not be able to stand in judgment, nor
sinners in the congregation of the righteous*." And if God know
better than foolish men, then certainly the flock is little to whom
the "Father will give the kingdom'*." And "wide is the
gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many
there be that go in thereat": because strait is the gate, and
narrow is the way which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find
it."
When
Christ was asked, "Lord, are there few that be saved?" he
answered, "Strive to enter in at the strait gate ; for many I
say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall not be able."
But, alas! we need no other information than common experience, to
tell us whether the greatest part of men be holy and heavenly, and
self-denying; that seek first the kingdom of God and his
righteousness, and love God above all, and will forsake all they have
for the sake of Christ, and undoubtedly none but such are saved; as
you may see Heb. xii. 14. Matt. vi.20, 21. 33.
Seeing
then the godly are so few, and the ungodly so many; and that God will
take nothing for holiness that is not such indeed ; and seeing it is
so terrible a thing to any man that hath his wits about him, to live
one day in an unconverted state, because he that dieth so, is lost
for ever; methinks it should be our wisdom to be suspicious of
ourselves, and careful lest we be deceived in so great a business,
and diligent in searching and examining our hearts, whether they are
truly sanctified or not ; because it can be no harm to make sure work
for our salvation ; whereas presumption, carelessness, and
negligence, may betray us to remediless misery and despair.
I
do not here suppose the reader to have any such acquaintance with his
heart, or care of his salvation, or obedient willingness to be taught
by Jesus Christ, as is proper to those that are truly sanctified ;
for it is ungodly persons to whom I am now speaking. And, yet, if I
should not suppose them to have some capacity and disposition to make
use of the Directions which I give them, I might as well pass them
by, and spare my labour. I tell thee therefore, reader, what it is
that I presuppose in thee, and expect from thee, and I think thou
wilt not judge me unreasonable in my suppositions and expectations.
1.
I suppose thee to be a (hu)man, and therefore that thou has reason
and natural free-will (that is, the natural faculty of choosing and
refusing), which should keep thy sensitive appetite in obedience; and
that thou art capable of loving and serving thy Creator, and enjoying
him in everlasting life.
2.
I suppose that thou knowest thyself to be a (hu)man; and therefore
that thy sensitive part, or flesh, should no more rule thee, or be
ungoverned by thee, than the horse should rule the rider, or be
unruled by him ; and that thou understandest that thou art made on
purpose to love and serve thy Maker, and to be happy in his love and
glory for ever. If thou know not this much, thou knowest not that
thou art (hu)man, or else knowest not what a (hu)man is.
3.
I suppose thee to have a natural self-love, and a desire of thy own
preservation and happiness; and that thou has no desire to be
miserable, or to be hated of God, or to cast out of his favour and
presence into hell, and there to be tormented with devils
everlastingly: yea, I will suppose that thou art not indifferent
whether thou dwell in heaven or hell, in joy or torment; but would
fain be saved and happy; whether thou be godly or ungodly, wise or
foolish; I will be bold to take all this for granted: and I hope in I
this i do not wrong thee.
4.
I suppose thee to be one that knowest that thou did not make thyself;
nor give thyself that power or wisdom which thou has; and that he
that made thee and all the world, must needs be before all the world;
and that he is eternal, having no beginning (for if ever there had
been time when there was nothing, there never would have been any
thing; because nothing can make nothing); and I suppose thou dost
confess that all the power, and wisdom, and goodness of the whole
creation set together, is less than the power, and wisdom, and
goodness of the Creator; because nothing can give more than it hath
to give. I suppose, therefore, that thou dost confess that there is a
God ; for to be eternal, infinite Being, and the most powerful, wise,
and good and the first cause of all created being, and power, wisdom.
and goodness, this (with the subsequent relations to the creature) is
to be GOD. If thou wilt deny that there is a God. thou must deny that
thou art a (hu)man, and that there is any (hu)man, or any being*.
5.
I suppose thou knowest that God, who gave a being unto all things, is
by this title of creation, the absolute Owner or Lord of all : and
that he that made the reasonable creatures, with natures to be
governed, in order to a further end, is by that title, their supreme
Governor; and therefore hath his laws commanding duty, and promising
reward, and threatening punishment; and therefore will judge men
according to these laws, and will be just in judgment, and in his
rewards and punishments. And that he
that
freely gave the creature its being, and all the good it hath, and
must give it all that ever it shall have, is the Father or most
bountiful Benefactor to his creatures. Surely I screw thee not too
high in supposing thee to know all this; for all this is no more than
that there is a God. For he is not God, if he be not the creator, and
therefore our owner, our ruler, and benefactor, our absolute Lord,
our most righteous governor, and our most loving father, or
benefactor.
6.
I suppose therefore that thou art convinced, that God must be
absolutely submitted to, and obeyed before all others in the world,
and loved above all friends, or pleasures, or creatures whatsoever.
For to say, ' He is my Owner,' is to say, ' I must yield myself to
him as his own:' to say, 'I take him for my supreme Governor,' is to
say, that 'I will absolutely be ruled by him:' and to say, 'I take
him as my dearest Father or chief Benefactor,' is to say, that 'I am
obliged to give him my dearest love, and highest thanks:' otherwise
you do but jest, or say you know not what, or contradict yourselves,
while you say, 'He is your God.'
7.
I suppose that thou art easily convinced, that in all the world there
is no creature that can shew so full a title to thee as God ; or that
hath so great authority to govern thee, or that can be so good to
thee, or do so much for thee, as God can do, or hath done, and will
do. if thou do thy part; and therefore that there is nothing to be
preferred before him, or compared with him in our obedience or love:
nor is there any that can save us from His justice, if we stand out
against him.
8.
I suppose that as thou knowest God is just, in his laws and
judgements, so that he is so faithful that he will not, and so
all-sufficient, that he need not deceive mankind, and govern them by
mere deceit: this better beseems the devil, than God: and therefore
that as he governeth man on earth by the hopes and fears of another
life, he doth not delude them into such hopes or fears: and as he
doth not procure obedience by any rewards or punishments in this
life, as the principal means (the wicked prospering, and the rest
being persecuted and afflicted here), therefore his rewards or
punishments, must needs be principally hereafter in the life to come.
For if he have no rewards and punishments, he hath no judgment ; and
if he have no judgment, he hath no laws (or else no justice); and if
he have no laws (or justice), he is no governor of man (or not a
righteous governor) ; and if he be not our governor (and just), he is
not our God ; and if he were not our God, we had never been his
creatures, nor had a being, or been men'.
9.
I suppose thou knowest that if God had not discovered what he would
do with us, in the life to come,. yet man is highliest bound to obey
and love his Maker, because he is our absolute Lord, our highest
ruler, and our chief benefactor; and all that we are or have is from
him. And that if man be bound to spend his life in the service of
this God, it is certain that he shall be no loser by him, no not by
the costliest obedience that we can perform ; for God cannot appoint
us any thing that is vain ; nor can he be worse to us than an honest
man, that will see that we lose not by his service. Therefore that
God for whom we must spend and forsake this life, and all those
pleasures which sensualists enjoy, hath certainly some greater thing
to give us, in another life.
10.
I may take it for granted at the worst, that neither thyself, nor any
infidel in the world, can say that you are sure that there is not
another life for man, in which his present obedience shall be
rewarded, and disobedience punished. The worst that ever infidel
could say was, that 'He thinketh that there is no other life.' None
of you dare deny the possibility of it, nor can with any reason deny
the probability. Well, then, let this be remembered while we proceed
a little further with you.
11.
I suppose or expect that you have so much use of sense and reason, as
to know the brevity and vanity of all the glory and pleasures of the
flesh; and that they are all so quickly gone, that were they greater
than they are, they can be of no considerable value. Alas, what is
time! How quickly gone, and then it is Nothing! and all things then
are nothing which are passed with it! So that the joys or sorrows of
so short a life, are no great matter of gain or loss.
I
may therefore suppose that thou canst easily conclude,that the bare
probability or possibility of an endless happiness, should be
infinitely preferred before such transitory vanity, even the greatest
matters that can be expected here; and that the probability or
possibility of endless misery in hell, should engage us with far
greater care and diligence to avoid it, than is due for the avoiding
any thing that you can think to escape by sinning ; or any of the
sufferings of this momentary life. If you see not this, you have lost
your reason ; that the mere probability or possibility of a heaven
and hell, should much more command our care and diligence, than the
fading vanities of this dreaming, transitory life.
12.
Well, then ; we have got thus far in the clearest light. You see that
a religious, holy life, is every man's duty, not only as they owe it
to God as their creator, their owner, governor, and benefactor; but
also, because as lovers of ourselves, our reason commandeth us to
have ten thousandfold more regard of a probable or possible joy and
torment which are endless, than of any that is small and of short
continuance. And if this be so, that a holy life is every man's duty,
with respect to the life that is to come, then it is most evident,
that there is such a life to come indeed, and that it is more than
probable or possible, even certain.
For
if it be but man's duty to manage this life, by the hopes and fears
of another life, then it must follow, that either there is such a
life to come, or else that God hath made it man's duty to hope, and
fear, and care, and labour, and live in vain; and that he himself
doth tantalize and cheat his creatures, and rule the world by motives
of deceit, and make religion and obedience to our Maker to be a life
of folly, delusion, and our loss. And he that believeth this of God,
doth scarcely believe him to be God. Though I have mentioned this
argument in another treatise, I think it not unmeet here to repeat it
for thy benefit.
13.
And seeing I suppose thee to be convinced of the life to come, and
that man's happiness and misery is there, I must needs suppose that
thou dost confess, that all things in this life, whether prosperity
or adversity, honour or dishonour, are to be esteemed and used as
they refer to the life to come. For nothing is more plain, than that
the means are to have all their esteem and use in order to their end.
That only is good in this life, which tendeth to the happiness of our
endless life ; and that is evil indeed in this life, that tendeth to
our endless hurt, and to deprive us of the everlasting good. And
therefore no price or motive should hire us to sin against God, and
to forfeit or hinder our endless happiness.
14.
I may suppose, if thou have reason, that thou wilt confess that God
cannot be too much loved, nor obeyed too exactly, nor served too
diligently (especially by such backward sinners, that have scarce any
mind to love or worship him at all) ; and that no man can make too
sure of heaven, or pay too dear for it, or do too much for his
salvation, if it be but that which God hath appointed him to do. And
that you have nothing else that is so much worth your time, and love,
and care, and labour. And therefore though you have need to be
stopped in your love, and care, and labor for the world, because for
it you may easily pay too dear, and do too much ; yet there is no
need of stopping (humanity)men in their love, and care, and labour
for God and their salvation ; which is worth more than ever we can
do, and where the best are apt to do too little.
15.
I also suppose thee to be one that knowest, that this present life is
given us on trial, to prepare for the life that shall come after; and
that as men live here, they shall speed for ever ; and that time
cannot be recalled, when it is gone ; and therefore that we should
make the best of it while we have it.
16.
I suppose thee also to be easily convinced, that seeing man hath his
reason and life for matters of everlasting consequence, his thoughts
of them should be frequent and very serious, and his reason should be
used about these things, by retired, sober deliberation.
17.
And I suppose thee to be a man, and therefore so far acquainted with
thyself, as that thou mayst know, if thou wilt, whether thy heart and
life do answer thy convictions, and whether they are more for heaven
or earth ; and therefore that thou art capable of self-judging in
this case. Perhaps you will say, that while I am directing you to be
holy, I suppose you to be holy first ; for all this seemeth to go far
towards it. But I must profess that I see not any thing in all these
suppositions, but what I may suppose to be in a heathen ; and that I
think all this is but supposing thee to have the use of thy reason,
in the points in hand.
Speak
freely: Is there any one of all these points that thou canst or
darest deny? I think there is not. And therefore if heathens and
wicked men deny them in their practice, that doth but show that sin
doth brutify them, and that, as men asleep, or in a crowd of
business, they have not the use of the reason which they possess, in
the matters which their minds are turned from.
18.
Yea, one thing more I think I may suppose in all or most that will
read this book ; that you take on you also to believe in Jesus
Christ, and in the Holy Ghost the Sanctifier, and that the Scriptures
are the Word of God, And if you do so indeed, I may then hope that my
work is in a manner done, before I begin it: but if you do it but
opinionatively and uneffectually, yet God and man may plead with you
the truths which you profess. "
