whither he himself would come.' After this, when our Saviour had left the earth, Paul and Barnabas go together; and when they are parted, Paul and Silas, Barnabas and Mark, are sorted. Single endeavours seldom prosper; many hands make the work both quick and sure. They can be no friends to the happy estate of a family or church that labour to cause distractions: division makes certain way for ruin. LXXIII. Under the law, there was difference, as of ages, so of sexes. Circumcision was appropriated to the male. In the temple there was the court of the Jews; and without that, the court of the women; neither might that sex go beyond their bounds; and still it is so in their Jewish synagogues. But in Christ, there is neither male nor female.' As the soul hath no sex, so God makes no difference in the acceptation of either. As it is the honour of the one sex that Christ, the Son of God, was a man, so it is the honour of the other sex that he was born of a woman. And if the woman be, as she is in nature, the weaker vessel, yet she is no less capable of grace than the stronger; as the thinnest glass may receive as precious liquor as the best plate. Good Anna, as well as Simeon, gave glory to their new-born Saviour, 'to all that looked for redemption in Jerusalem.' And afterwards, the holy women were no less zealous attendants of Christ, both in his life and death, than the most forward disciples; yea, they followed him when his domestic followers forsook him; neither could be 2 1 Luke, x. 1. 2 Ib. ii. 38. 3 Ib. viii. 2, 3. parted by either his cross or his grave.' And they were the first that were honoured with the notice and message of their Saviour's blessed resurrection and ascension;' than which, what employment could be more noble? The Lord gave the word,' saith the Psalmist, 'great was the company of the preacheresses;' the word is feminine. However, therefore, in natural and polite respects, the philosopher might have some reason to bless God, that he had made him a man, and not a woman; yet in spiritual, which are the best regards, here is no inequality; so that it is the great mercy and goodness of our common Creator, that though he hath made a difference in the smallest matters, yet he makes none in the greatest; and that he so indifferently peoples heaven with both sexes, that for ought we know, the greatest saint there is of the weaker sex. 4 LXXIV. There is nothing more easy than for a man to be courageous in a time of safety, and to defy those dangers which he neither feels nor sees. While the coast is clear every man can be ready to say with Peter, 'Though all men, yet not I; if I should die with thee, I will not deny thee in any wise.' But when the evil hour cometh, when our enemy appears armed in the lists ready to encounter us, then to call up our spirits, and to grapple resolutely with dangers and death, it is the praise and proof of a true Christian valour. And this is 1 "Last at his cross, and earliest at his grave."-ED. 4 9 Psalm, lxviii. 11. King James's Preface Monitory. 2 John, xx. 17. 5 Mark, xiv. 29, 31. · that which the apostle calls 'standing;" in opposition to both falling and fleeing; falling out of faintness, and fleeing for fear. It shall not be possible for us thus to stand if we shall trust to our feet. In and of ourselves the best of us are but mere cowards; neither can be able so much as to look our enemy in the face. Would we be perfect victors? we must go out of ourselves, into the God of our strength. If we have made him ours, who shall, yea, who can, be against us? We can do all things, through him that strengthens us;'* all things-therefore conquer death and hell. If we be weakness, he is omnipotence. Put we on the Lord Jesus Christ by a lively faith,3 what enemy can come within us to do us hurt? What time I am afraid, I will trust in thee, O God: in thee, O God, have I trusted; I will not fear what (either) flesh (or spirit) can do unto me.' 'The Lord is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer; my God, my strength, in whom I will trust; my buckler, and the horn of my salvation: I will call upon the Lord, who is worthy to be praised; so shall I be saved from mine enemies.'" LXXV. 4 It is disparagement enough that the apostle casts upon all the visible things of this world, that 'the things which are seen are temporary.' Be they never so glorious, yet being transitory, they cannot be worthy of our hearts. Who would care for a house of glass, if never so curiously painted and gilded? All things that are measured by time are Eph. vi. 13, 14. 2 Phil. iv. 13. thus brittle. Bodily substances, of what kind soever, lie open to the eye; and, being seen, can be in no other than a fading condition. Even that goodly fabric of heaven, which we see and admire, must be changed, and, in a sort, dissolved.' How much more vanishing are all earthly glories! And, by how much shorter their continuance is, so much lower must be their valuation. We account him foolish that will dote too much upon a flower, though never so beautiful, because we know it can be but a month's pleasure; and no care, no art can preserve it from withering: amongst the rest the hemerocallis is the least esteemed, because one day ends its beauty. What madness then were it in us to set our hearts upon these perishing contentments, which we must soon mutually leave; we them, they us! Eternity is that only thing which is worthy to take up the thoughts of a wise man: that, being added to evil, makes the evil infinitely more intolerable; and, being added to good, makes the good infinitely more desirable. O eternity! thou bottomless abyss of misery to the wicked, thou indeterminable pitch of joy to the saints of God, what soul is able to comprehend thee? What strength of understanding is able to conceive of thee? Be thou ever in my thoughts, ever before mine eyes. Be thou the scope of all my actions, of all my endeavours; and, in respect of thee, let all this visible world be to me as nothing: and, since only 'the things which are not seen' by the eye of sense, ‘are eternal,' Lord, sharpen thou the eyes of my faith, that may see those things invisible, and may, in that sight, enjoy thy blessed eternity. 1 2 Peter, iii. 7, 12. 2 The day-lily.-ED. LXXVI. What is all the world to us, in comparison of the bird in our bosom, our conscience? In vain shall all the world acquit and magnify us, if that secretly condemn us; and if that condemn us not, 'we have confidence towards God,'' and may bid defiance to men and devils. Now, that it may not condemn us, it must be both pacified and purgedpacified, in respect of the guilt of sin; purged, in respect of the corruption. For so long as there is guilt in the soul, the clamours of an accusing and condemning conscience can no more be stilled, than the waters of the sea can stand still in a storm. There is then no pacification without removing the guilt of sin, no removing of guilt without remission, no remission without satisfaction, no satisfaction without a price of infinite value, answerable to the infiniteness of the justice offended; and this is no where to be had but in the blood.of Christ, God and man. All created and finite powers are but miserable comforters, physicians of no value, to this one. And the same power that pacifieth the conscience from guilt, must also purge it from the filthiness of sin; even that blood of the Son of God, who is made unto us of God sanctification and redemption.' That faith, which brings Christ home to the soul, doth, by the efficacy of his blessed Spirit, purify the heart from all filthiness' both 'of flesh and spirit. Being justified by' this 'faith, we have peace with God.' 3 When once the heart is quieted from the uproars of self-accusation, and ' 1 John, iii. 21. 2 Heb. ix. 14; 1 John, i. 7. |