[5] The doctrine of our Fall, the knowledge of our lost estate and condition, is of indispensible necessity to eternal salvation. Our Saviour tells us, that he came to seek and to save those that are lost: Luke xix. 10: and unless we are conscious of our sin, and misery by reason of sin; that we stand forfeited to the divine justice, liable to his severest wrath, exposed to all the dreadful curses of the Law; we shall never submit to the methods of our physician, when we are not sensible of our disease. [6] The doctrines of the Resurrection, Judgment to come, Heaven and Hell, and eternal Rewards approportioned to our present works; these are Fundamental Articles, and of absolute necessity to be believed. For he, who shall deny these, destroys all hopes and fears; and turns himself loose to follow his own lusts, without any check or controul. He cannot be in a possibility of salvation, who believeth none; who expects nothing at God's hands, whether rewards or punishments. For such a damnable doctrine as this, will necessarily engage him in a wicked and profligate life: in this our corrupt éstate, wherein we are so naturally prone. to sin, it is impossible that men should be holy gratis. Besides, it plucks up all religion by the very roots; and the whole doctrine of Christ falls to the ground, if the immortality of the soul, future judgment, and eternal rewards, he once denied: for both our religion, and all religions in the world, are founded upon these principles. Thus you see some of those Fundamental Truths, which are: necessary to salvation. And, therefore, though heresy look not so foul and ugly, as some vile and scandalous impieties in life and practice; and we are apt to have good opinions of men, whatsoever they hold, if so be we see them just and honest in their dealings, sober and temperate in their converse; though we think it no great matter what their notions and tenets be, so long as their lives are blameless and inoffensive: yet, believe it, heresy is altogether as damnable as profaneness: those poisons are as deadly, which work upon the head; as those, which work upon the heart and we ought as much to shun a heretic, and to refuse converse with him, as a wicked monster; as we ought to shun a murderer, a thief, a drunkard, an unclean sensualist, or the vilest sinner that can be named: yes, and rather more, inasmuch as there is more danger of being corrupted by the fair speeches of erroneous persons, than there is of being enticed by the lewd and hateful actions of notorious and debauched wretches and therefore St. John gives us this command, in his Second Epistle, v. 10, 11. If there come any unto you, and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, nor bid him God speed: For he, that biddeth him God speed, is partaker of his evil deeds. And, thus much, for Doctrinal Principles. But, then, (2) There are Practical Principles of Truth, whose immediate influence is only to guide the life and conversation. Many such there are, which I shall only reckon to you in the heap: That the word of God is the best rule of life: that godliness is the greatest gain: that sin is the worst of evils: that God, in Christ, is the chief good: that a holy life is the securest and sweetest: that we ought to look only to duty, and leave successes to God: that the best peace is peace of conscience: that self-denial is the greatest self-interest: that we ought to choose the greatest affliction, rather than to commit the least sin that whatsoever we lay out or lose for Christ, shall be repaid us with abundant use and advantage. These, and many other such like, are Practical Truths; which, unless we are fully persuaded and convinced of them in our own consciences, will never be able to influence and govern our lives and actions. And, unless we live according to such rules as these, it is utterly impossible, that ever we should be saved. And thus I have shewed you, what are the Principles of Truth which accompany salvation. 2. The Second Enquiry was, How we shall know, whether these Principles, both Doctrinal and Practical, are embraced by us in such a way, as may give us good hopes, that we are in a State of Salvation. Indeed, it is not enough merely to know these things, or to believe that they are great and precious truths: for there are not many, who have lived long under the dispensation of the Gospel, but have gotten a notion of these things, and their very reason forceth them to subscribe to the truth of them: but yet we see that multitudes, even of these, are profane and impious; and such ungodly persons, that, as the Psalmist speaks, salvation is far from them. Therefore I answer, (1) Then these principles are things accompanying salvation, when they are Leading Principles. When a man sails by this compass, and steers his course according to them: when they lie not floating and swimming in the brain; but soak and sink into the heart, and influence the life. (2) When they are Determining and Conquering Principles. When Christ and our interest come into competition, then see what thou art determined by. A carnal man may discourse by Scripture principles: but, when a time of trial and tempta tion comes, and he and Christ must part or he and the world must part, he then determines his choice by worldly principles; and, whatever he had speculatively talked before of preferring the peace and purity of conscience before all worldly enjoy ments, yet now he chooseth sin rather than affliction. (3) When they are Quieting Principles. When they have determined your choice and then can satisfy and quiet your minds, then are they saving. It may be, that sometimes conscience hath well determined, and doth sway a man to a good choice: but yet he is angry with it; and could curse his conscience for being so tender, and forcing him to forego his earthly interests. (4) When they are Fixed Principles; not only in the assent of the judgment, but in the consent of the will. When they become habitual to us, and grow up in us as another nature: that, as the great natural principle of all our natural actions, is self-preservation; so the great swaying principle of all our actions, is these holy maxims, which naturally lead us to the preservation of that, which is our dearest self, even our precious souls and their eternal interests and concerns. Thus we have shewn you the First sort of things, that accompany salvation: viz. the Principles of Belief, both Doctrinal and Practical as, likewise, what is necessarily required to make these principles Saving. ii. Let us now proceed to the Second General Head: To consider THOSE IMPRESSIONS, WHICH MUST BE WROUGHT UPON THE HEART, WILL, AND AFFECTIONS. And, herein, I shall, as before, make these Two enquiries: What are the Evidences, by which we know them to be 1. What these Impressions are: (1) To this I answer, in the general, they are those habits of true and divine grace infused into the will and affections, by the power of the Holy Spirit, whereby they are wholly renewed, and, of earthly and sensual, become heavenly and spiritual. They do, indeed, comprehend all the lineaments and features of the image of God: so that, when we speak of the graces of faith, love, hope, patience, humility, self-denial, &c. these are those impressions and habits, wrought in the heart, that accompany salvation; and the whole system and complexion of them taken together, is that, which the Scripture calls, the New Man, the New Creature, the Image of God, the Divine Nature, Conversion, Sanctification, Effectual Calling, and the like. And this great change must, of necessity, pass upon the soul, before it can be brought into a capacity of obtaining heaven and ernal salvation for that God, whom the Prophet describes to be of purer eyes than to behold iniquity, will not certainly behold it in heaven, his own throne and palace: but, as all, who were unclean, and leprous, and ulcerated, were to be removed out of the camp of Israel, because God walked in the midst of it; so shall all such spiritually unclean persons be excluded out of heaven, the palace of the Great King, the camp of innumerable hosts of angels, in the midst of whom the Holy God walks, and converses only with pure and holy spirits. ་ These holy habits of grace, which are infused into the soul in its new birth and renovation, accompany salvation Two ways: As Preparations unto it.. As Parts of it. [1] As Preparations to it. For, as God hath prepared an inheritance of glory for us, hereafter; so, by grace, he prepares us for that inheritance. And therefore the Apostle, Col. i. 12. gives thanks to God, who hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light. And this meetness is Twofold: 1st. In the Nature of the thing. Holiness is naturally required unto eternal happiness. As all the goodliness of fruits and flowers must first spring from some seminal virtue; so glory springs from grace, salvation from conversion, as the flower from the seed. Whence the Psalmist expresseth it, Light is sown for the righteous, and gladness for the upright in heart: Ps. xcvii. 11. And, as naturally as a small seed, when it is received into good ground and watered with the dew and refreshing showers of heaven, sprouts up, and spreads itself into the beauties of a flower; so this seed of grace, when it is watered with the dew of heaven and called forth by the quickening influences of the Spirit of God, begins to bud forth, spreads its branches, and will at last display all its glories when it is perfect and consummate in heaven. And, 2dly. By the Divine Appointment. God hath, by his promises, entailed happiness and salvation upon the graces and holiness of his saints. It is a reward due unto them, by virtue of his promise and covenant. So that they are meet to be partakers of this inheritance; not only because grace doth naturally tend to glory, as naturally as the dawning of the morn tends to a noon-day brightness; but because also it is a meet and just thing with God, to recompense unto them joy and refreshing and everlasting peace and bliss, chaving obliged himself so to do by the tenor of bis unalterable word of promise. And, as holiness, is thus preparatory to salvation, so, [2] It is Part of salvation. It is happiness, in this vale; of misery: it is heaven, on this side heaven. Grace and glory differ not in nature, but only in degrees: grace is glory begun; and glory is but grace elevated to its acme and perfection. St. John, in his First Epistle, ch. iii. v. 2. tells us, that all we can know of the state of glory, is, that we shall be like God. It doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know, that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. And this resemblance unto God, the saints do here, in some measure, bear upon them: there are come strictures, some lineaments and proportions, of their Father's image, drawn upon them: and, as the clear, and immesdiate vision of God in heaven is a trausforming vision, where, by the bright reflections of God's purity and holiness cast upon |