it were not so with me, I might doubt the root of the matter is wanting ; but if to my knowledge, affections be added ; a melting heart joined with a knowing head, then I may be confident all is well. I have often heard ministers cautioning and warning their people not to rest satisfied with idle and unpractical notions in their understandings, but to labour for impressions upon their hearts ; this I have attained., and therefore what danger of me ? I have often heard it given as a mark of a hypocrite, that he hath light in his head, but it sheds not down its influence upon the heart : whereas in those that are sincere, it works on their heart and affections: So I find it with me, therefore I am in a most safe estate. O soul ! of all the false signs of grace, npne more dan- gerous than those that most resemble true ones ; and never doth the devil more surely and incurably destroy, than when transform- ed into an angel of light. What if these meltings of thy heart be but a flower of nature ? What if thou art more beholden to a good temper of body, than a gracious change of spirit for these things ? Well, so it may be. Therefore be not secure, but fear, and watch. Possibly, if thou wouldest but search thine own heart in this matter, thou mayest find, that any other pathetical, mo- ving story, will have the like effects upon thee. Possibly too, thou mayest find, that, notwithstanding all thy raptures and joys at the hearing of heaven, and its glory, yet after that pang is over, thy heart is habitually earthly, and thy conversation is not there. 3For all thou canst mourn at the relations of Christ's sufferings, thou art not so affected with sin, that was the meritorious cause of the sufferings of Christ, as to crucify one corruption, or deny the next temptation, or part with any way of sin that is gainful, or pleasurable to thee for his sake.
Why now, reader, if it be so with thee, what art thou the bet- ter for the fluency of thy affections ? Dost thou think in earnest, that Christ hath the better thoughts of thee, because thou canst shed tears for him, when notwithstanding thou every day piercest and woundest him ? O ! be not deceived. Nay, for ought I know, thou mayest find, upon a narrow search, that thou puttest thy tears in the room of Christ's blood, and givest the confidence and dependence of thy soul to them ; and if so, they shall never do thee any good.
O therefore search thy heart, reader be not too confident : take not up too easily upon such poor weak grounds as these, a soul-un- doing confidence. Always remember the wheat and tares resem- ble each other in their first springing up ; that an egg is not liker to. an egg, than hypocrisy, in some shapes and forms into which it can cast itself, is like a genuine work of grace. O remember that among the ten virgins, that is, the reformed professors of religion
Hintf XXV. THE FOUNTAIN OF LIFE. 515
that have cast off and separated themselves from the worship and defilements of Antichrist, five of them were foolish.
There be first, that shall be last ; and last, that shall be first, JMat. xix. 30. Great is the deceitfulness of our hearts, Jer. xvii. 9- And many are the subtleties and devices of Satan, 2 Cor. xi. 3. Many also are the astonishing examples of self-deceiving souls re- corded in the word. Remember what you lately read of Judas. Great also will be the exactness of the last judgment. And how confident soever you be, that you shall speed well in that day, yet still remember that trial is not yet past. Your final sentence is not yet come from the mouth of your Judge. This I speak not to affright and trouble, but excite and warn you. The loss of a soul is no small loss, and, upon such grounds as these, they are every day cast away.
This may suffice to be spoken to the first observation, built on this supposition, that it was but a pang of mere natural affection in them. But if it were the effect of a better principle, the fruit of their faith, as some judge; then I told you, the observation from it would be this,
Doct. That the believing meditation of what Christ suffered for us, is of great force and efficacy to melt and break the heart.
It is promised, Zech. xii. 10. that " they shall look upon him *' whom they have pierced, and mourn for him, as one mourn- " eth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one "that is in bitterness for his first-born.'1 Ponder seriously, here, the spring and motive, They shall look upon me ; it is the eye of faith that melts and breaks the heart. The effect of such a sight of Christ ; they shall look and mourn ; be in bitterness and sorrow. True repentance is a drop out of the eye of faith ; and the measure or degree of that sorrow caused by a believing view of Christ. To express which, two of the fullest instances of grief we read of, are borrowed ; that of a tender father, mourning over a dear and only son ; that of the people of Israel, mourning over Josiah, that peerless prince, in the valley of Megiddo.
Now to shew you how the believing meditation of Christ, and his sufferings, come kindly and savingly to break and melt down the gracious heart, I shall propound these four considerations of the heart-breaking efficacy of faith, eveing a crucified Jesus.
First, The very realizing of Christ and his sufferings by faith, ia a most affecting and melting thing. Faith is a true glass that re- presents all those his sufferings and agonies to the life. It presents them not as a fiction, or idle tale, but as a true and faithful narra- tive. This (saith faith) is a true and faithful saying, that Christ
31 6 THE FOUNTAIN OF LIFE. SERM. XXV.
was not only clothed in our flesh ; even he that is over all, God blessed for ever, the only Lord, the Prince of the kings of the earth, became a man ; but it is also most certain, that in this body of his flesh, he grappled with the infinite wrath of God, which fil- led his soul with horror and amazement ; that the Lord of life did hang dead upon the tree ; that he went as a lamb to the slaughter, and was as a sheep dumb before the shearer ; that he endured all this, and more than any finite understanding can comprehend, in my room and stead ; for my sake he there groaned and bled ; for my pride, earthliness, lust, unbelief, hardness of heart, he endured all this. I say, to realize the sufferings of Christ thus, is of great power to affect the coldest, dullest heart. You cannot imagine the difference there is in presenting things as realities, with convincing and satisfying evidences, and our looking on them as a fiction or uncertainty.
Secondly, But faith can apply as well as realize; and if it do so, it must needs overcome the heart.