Wherein he vainly attempts the defence of his abfurd Giving a brief Account of the Rise and Growth of AN- TINOMIANISM; the Deduction of the principal Er- GOSPEL-UNITY recommended to the Churches 1 Cor. 1. 10. Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; but SERMONL Rev. iii. 20. [Behold] I stand at the door, and knock, if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and fup with him, and he with me, 410 SERMONΠ. A PRACTICAL TREATISE OF F E A R. Wherein the various kinds, uses, causes, effects and remedies thereof are distinctly opened and prescribed, for the relief and encouragement of all those that fear God in these doubtful and distracting times. To the Right Worshipful Sir JOHN HARTOP, Knight and Baronet. SIR, AMONG all the creatures God hath made (devils only ex cepted) man is the most apt and able to be his own tormentor; and of all the scourges with which he lasheth and afflicteth both his mind and body, none is found so cruel and intolerable as his own fears. The worse the times are like to be, the more need the mind hath of fuccour and encouragement, to confirm and fortify it for hard encounters; but from the worst prospect, fear inflicts the deepest and most dangerous wounds upon the mind of man, cutting the very nerves of its passive fortitude and bearing ability. The grief we suffer from evil felt, would be light, and easy, were it not incenfed by fear; reason would do much, and religion more, to demulce and lenify our forrows, did not fear betray the succours of both. And it is from things to come that this prospecting creature raiseth up to himself vast hopes and fears: if he have a fair and encouraging prospect of ferene and profperous days, from the scheme, and position of fecond causes, hope immediately fills his heart with chearfulness, and displays the signals of it in his very face, answerable to that fair, benign aspect of things: but if the face of things to come, be threatening and inauspicious, fear gains the afcendant over the mind; an unmanly, and unchristian faintness pervades it, and, among the many other mischiefs it inflicts, this is not the least, that it brings the evil of to-morrow VOL. IV. A (2) upon to-day, and so makes the duties of to-day wholly unferviceable to the evils of to-morrow; which is as much as if a man having an intricate, and difficult business cut out for the next day, which requires the utmost intention, both of his mind and body, and (haply) might be profperoufly managed, if both were duely prepared, should lie, all the night, restless and difquieted about the event, torturing and spending himself with his own presaging fears, so that when the day is come, and the business calls for him, his strength is no way equal to the burden of it, but he faints, and fails under it. There is indeed an excellent use that God makes of our fears, to stimulate our flothful hearts, to greater vigilance and preparation for evils; and there is a mischievous use Satan makes of our fears, to cast us under despondency and unbecoming pufillanimity: and I reckon it one of the greatest difficulties of religion, to cut, by a thread, here, and so to manage ourselves under threatning or doubtful providences, as to be touched with so much sense of those approaching evils, as may prepare us to bear them; and yet to enjoy that constancy and firmness of mind, in the worst times, that may answer the excellent principles we are professedly governed by. These last times are certainly the most perilous times; great things are yet to be acted upon the stage of this world, before it be taken down; and the scena antepenultima, latter-end, I fay not the last, will be a tragedy. There is an ultima clades adhuc metuenda, a dismal slaughter of the witnesses of Christ yet to be expected: the last bite of the cruel beast will be deadly, and if we flatter not ourselves, all things seem to be disposing themselves in the course of providence towards it. 4 But, Sir, If our union with Christ be sure in itself, and fure to us also; if faith give us the daily visions and praelibations of the world to come, what well-composed spectators shall we be of these tragedies! Let things be tossed susque, deque, and the mountains caft into the midst of the fea, yet then Pfal. xlvi. the assured Christian may sing his fong upon Alamoth, A fong composed for God's hidden ones. This so poiseth and steddies the mind, that we may enjoy the comfort and tranquillity of a resigned will, when others are at their wit's end. With design to promote this blessed frame, in my own and others hearts, in these frightful times, I meditated, and now publish this small tract, to which a dear friend (from whom I have often had the fair idea and character of your excellent spirit) hath occasioned the prefixing of your worthy name; I beg |