Puslapio vaizdai
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fools; and it is a sign that all is not quiet within, when they are so loud and clamorous to drown it. No: true pleasure consists in clear thoughts, sedate affections, sweet reflections; a mind even and stayed, true to its God, and true to itself. There is, indeed, a little sordid brutish pleasure in sin; but it vanishes like smoke, and, if we be not utterly hardened, like smoke it will leave us nothing but tears in our eyes: or, if customary sinning hath made us insensible, it is but like giving drink to a hydropic person, which, though it please his palate for the present, afterwards sadly encreaseth and enrageth his thirst.

Compare the pleasures, which a true pious Christian enjoys, with the muddy delights of a swinish sensualist who gratifies all his carnal desires; and you will find so vast a difference between them, that the very argument of pleasure, which usually lies as a main prejudice against a holy life, if it be rightly stated, will prove the most advantageous motive to induce us to embrace it. For, consider, whilst thou gratifiest all thy propensions and desires, what exquisite pleasures canst thou find, but such as are common to the very beasts as well as thee? Yea, and thou shewest thyself more irrational than the brute creatures; for they keep within the compass of their nature, but thou transgressest the laws of thine: and either shame or conscience will give thee many a secret twitch and gird, and whisper sad things to thee, which will, in spite of thee, make thy heart heavy, when thy face perhaps runs over with a counterfeit laughter. It is impossible, if thou hast any remainders of a man left within thee, to debauch away the natural impressions of a deity, of death, of judgment, and of future punishments: these cold and shivering thoughts will come in, and be like water cast upon all thy delights, when they flame highest; and, in the midst of thy cups and jollity and frolic extravagancies, be like a hand, not upon the wall, but in thine own conscience, writing bitter things against thee.

Well, when thou hast run through all the shapes of voluptuousness, what remains but only a damp and dulness upon thy spirits, a sting and anguish in thy soul, a grating remembrance of them, and dire presages of eternal vengeance? Dost thou not, when the phrenzy is over and the rage of thy lusts somewhat abated, dost thou not a thousand times call thyself beast and fool for them? Hast thou never seen a drunkard, the next morning spewing out his shame and his repentance together? Hast thou never observed the glutton to sigh and groan under the load of

his crude surfeits, and endeavour to disburden his conscience, as well as his stomach? These, who do not eat and drink that they may live, but live only that they may eat and drink, will then acknowledge, that temperance and sobriety are the only true voluptuousness; and, whilst their breath is still unsavoury with their undigested fumes, belch out a prayer to God to pardon them. And are these the bewitching pleasures of sin? for these, will any be persuaded to provoke his God, stain and wound his own conscience, dishonour his body and ruin his soul?

Certainly, there is nothing wherein the sorcery of sin doth more plainly appear, than in persuading men that there is any pleasure in being wicked; whereas their own experience can abundantly attest, that it is a very hell above ground, and damnation beforehand. Are these the men, who are frighted from religion, because of the irksomeness and difficulty of its duties, because it will expose them to sadness and melancholy? whereas, I dare avow to them, that the most melancholy and gloomy day, which a true Christian spends in the most rigorous parts of his religion, with sighs breaking from his heart and tears running down his cheeks, hath a thousand times more true pleasure and more true joy in it, than all the days of mirth, and laughter, and excess, and riot of voluptuous sinners.

III. But, here, common observation and experience will be cited, to DISPROVE all these speculations concerning the pleasure of religion.

For, "What!" will the voluptuary say, "can we believe that there is any such exquisite pleasure in a holy life, when we see those, who are its votaries, so pensive and melancholy, as if rust and soot were the only ingredients of their complexion? Their looks are sour and dejected; their discourses interrupted with sighs still they are lamenting themselves, and the iniquities or calamities of the times, and are fit for no other converse but with tombs or ghosts. Whereas the rest of the world are gay and frolic: mirth and laughter are the employment of their lives: not a thought lies heavy on their hearts, nor a day on their hands. And therefore, certainly, whatever advantages a pious life may have for the future, it cannot have that of pleasure for the present."

This is a common prejudice: and it is but a prejudice. For,

though I must confess, that the morose temper of too many Christians hath brought this scandal upon religion, who, by an affected and whining sadness and a querulous humour, occasion the ways of God to be evil spoken of, and affright others from them; yet, if we nearly examine the matter, we shall find, that abating the complexional infelicity of some, it is altogether as fallacious to judge of men's joys by their outward appearances, as of their thoughts and intentions.

And, therefore,

i. I grant that the JOYS OF RELIGION ARE NOT LOUD AND TUMULTUOUS; BUT GRAVE, solid, and SERIOUS.

It is a true saying, Res severa est verum gaudium: "True joy is a severe thing." It is not so light and frothy, as to float upon the superficies of the face. It lies deep and recondite, in the centre of the soul; and fills it with calm thoughts, sedate affections, an uniform peace and tranquillity; and diffuses such a sweetness through all the powers of it, that a true Christian, who loves his God, loves likewise himself, and the entertainment that he finds at home in his own bosom: and this ravishing joy so wholly possesseth him, that, if he seem less affected with the ludicrous follies of this world, it is but as grave and wise men are, not much pleased with the play-games of children, because they have nobler and more generous delights of their own: the mirth and jollity of slight persons is too trivial, and their laughter itself too ridiculous, to recreate him: the soft and peaceful whispers of his dear conscience are a thousand times more diverting to him, than all the wit and merriment of those pleasant companions, whose whole life is but a jest and a tale: and, if at any time he seem reserved and retired in their company, it is, that he may listen to the more cheerful discourses of his own heart; or that he is really concerned that the noise and din about him hath disturbed that secret communication; or, lastly, that he is cautious, lest he should be betrayed to any thing that might grieve a better friend, than any of them. And, now, can you really think, that such a person is melancholy and displeased, who carries himself thus, only lest he should be so? the mirth of the sensual and debauched world would violate all his delights: it would be but like a dirty torrent tumbling into a clear river, troubling its pure streams, and leaving nothing but defilement, mud, and disturbance behind it: and shall we think that man's life sad and disconsolate, because he seems less merry

and jovial than others; whereas, in truth, he is so wholly addicted to pleasure, so much a servant to his own content, that he would much rather displease all the world than himself, and studies nothing more, than how he may keep his joys free from mixture and abatement?

But,

ii. IF, AT ANY TIME, HE BE REALLY SAD AND DEJECTED, THIS IS NOT TO BE IMPUTED TO RELIGION AND PIETY; BUT TO THE WANT OF IT, EITHER IN HIMSELF OR OTHERS.

The irreligion and impieties of the age in which he lives, often draw tears from his eyes and sighs from his heart: and, when the flood-gates of wickedness are opened, and a deluge of sin and profaness overspreads the face of the whole earth, can you think it an unreasonable melancholy; that he should wish, with the Prophet Jeremiah, that his head were waters, and his eyes fountains of tears, that he might weep day and night for the slain of.....his people, for so many thousands that fall, and are slain by their vices and debaucheries? Were but the world more holy, there would not be so great occasion for grief and sadness as there is; neither would the godly lament so mournfully, nor all smart so sorely as they do. But, whilst wicked men are merrily sporting themselves to death and plucking vengeance upon their own heads, his charity and compassion move him to mourn for those, who do not, who will not mourn for themselves; and to deprecate those judgments, which they are defying. And, therefore, for them to object melancholy and pensiveness, to abuse their gravity and turn their seriousness into ridicule, is both disingenuous and ungrateful: disingenuous it is, to upbraid them with that sorrow and sadness, of which they themselves are the cause; and it is ungrateful, to upbraid them with it, since it many times averts those plagues and judgments, which else would soon turn their rants and frolics into roarings and howlings.

But, as they have too much cause to mourn for the sins of the times and places in which they live, so likewise for the sins of which they themselves are guilty. They often weep over the review of their own faults and follies; and, with the holy Apostle, cry out, O wretched men that we are! who shall deliver us from this body of death! And, indeed, it is but fit and just, that, whilst the heart is a fountain of sin, the eyes should be fountains of tears. But, what! shall we therefore be so un

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reasonable, as to charge their holiness with their grief and sorrow; whereas, were they not in part unholy, they would have no cause for it? It is not their walking in the ways of wisdom, but their deviating from them, that makes their lives unpleasant: it is their wanton straying into the world's common, and seeking the foreign delights of sin, that disturbs their peace, fills their hearts with heaviness, their eyes with tears, and their face with shame: whereas, had they kept themselves within the limits of their duty, and the boundaries which God had prescribed them, their peace had been as secure as their innocence. Did you ever hear any of them complain, that they had been too holy and strict, too circumspect and conscientious? this is the complaint of the world against them, but it was never theirs. Whereas there are thousands and ten thousands, who sadly lament their former ways of sin and wickedness, (for sorrow and shame are the necessary consequences of guilt) either here on earth to true repentance, or else in hell to everlasting despair. So that, it is not holiness and piety, but the want and defects of it, which are the cause of all that sadness, which so much discourages the world, and makes them wrongfully accuse religion for it.

But,

iii. EVEN THE TEARS AND SORROWS OF A TRUE PIOUS CHRISTIAN HAVE A MORE SOLID JOY IN THEM, THAN ALL THE NOISE AND EXTRAVAGANT JÓLLITY OF WICKED MEN.

There is a sweetness even in mourning, when it is filial and ingenuous. Tears are a solace, and grief itself an entertainment. Sometimes, the very delicacy of a man's spirit will make him dissolve into weeping; and the love of God, as a heavenly flame enkindled in the heart, will distil tears through his eyes. The tenderness of his affection will engage him to a sweet mourning over his faults and miscarriages. And, whilst the Spirit of God moves upon the face of these waters; the next thing to be created in that soul, is light, peace, and joy. Those, who have

experienced it can tell you, that the most transporting consolations of the Holy Ghost are then given in, when they are most retired and pensive: they can rejoice that they are sad, because such a kind and child-like sorrow is to them a most certain evidence of the favour of God, and the remission of those sins for which they mourn. Whereas, on the contrary, Solomon tells

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