Instance 2. The truth of God is held in unrighteousness, when men's lusts will not suiFer them to restore what they have sinfully, and unjustly gotten into their hands. This sin lies boking in the consciences of some men, makes them very uneasy, and yet they make a hard shift to rub along under these regrets of conscience. Now those things which make a forcible entry into the conscience, take the truths of God prisoners, and bind them, that they can- not break forth, into the duty of restitution, are,
1, The shame which attends and follows the duty to which God and conscience, call the soul, O it is a shame and re- proach, they think, to get the name of a cheat ; loth, loth they are, that these works of darkness should come into the open light ; men will point, and hiss at them ; and say. There goes a thief, a cheat, an oppressor : This keeps many from restitution.
But dost thou not here commit a greater cheat than the former ? Which is the greater shame, thinkest thou, to commit sin, or to confess and reform it ? To tie the snare upon thy soul by com- mission, or loose it off from thy conscience by repentance and re- stitution ? to be the derision of wicked men, (for none else will deride thee for th}" duty), or be the contempt and derision of God, angels, and all good men for ever ? To attain inward peace at tliis hazard, or to He under the continual lashes and wounds of thy
2. Poverty, and inability, is sometimes pleaded, to quiet the troubled conscience ; and indeed this is a just, and very frequent blast of God upon ill-gotten goods ; The curse of God is upon them ; they melt away. O what a miserable snare have you now entangled your souls in ! Once you could, but would not restore, a worldly heart would not part with unjust gains ; now you would, but can- not. Thus a worldly heart, and an empty purse, hold you first and last, under the guilt of a known sin. A lamentable case !
3. Vain purposes do often suppress and silence convictions,: My condition may alter, I may be in a capacity hereafter, when I can better spare it, than, at present ; or I will do it in my last wUl, when I die, and charge my executors with it. Thus do men bribe their consciences, to get a httle quiet, whilst they continue under known guilt, and cannot tell how soon death shall summon them to the awful bar of a just and terrible God.
Sirs, as you value your peace, and, which is more, your souls ; release the Lord's prisoner which lies bound within you with cords and chains of Satan's making ; do it, I say, as you hope to see the face of God in peace : You know, without repent^ce there can bje
AN APPENDIX TO EXGLAXd's DUTY. S85
no salvation ; and without restitution no repentance : For how can you repent of a sin you still knowingly continue in ? Repentance is the souPs turning from sin, as well as its sorrow for sin. You can- not therefore repent of sin, and still continue in it ; " How shall " we that are dead to sin, continue any longer therein ?" Rom. vi. 2. Trust providence for the supply of your wants, and the wants of yours, in the ways of duty, and righteousness. A little that a righteous man hath is better than the riches of many wicked. You will have more comfort in bread and water, with peace of conscience, than in full tables with God's curse. You will lie more at ease on a burden of straw, than on a bed of down with a grumbling conscience.
Instance 3. How many lie under the condemnations of their own consciences, for the lusts of uncleanness in which they live : And though they read, and their consciences apply to them such scriptures as that, 1 Cor. vi. 9. " Be not deceived, neither forni- *' cators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers " of themselves with mankind, c^-c. shall inherit the kingdom of ^' God ;'■■ a dreadful sentence ! And that, Heb. xiii. 4. " Whore- '' mongers and adulterers God will judge ;" Yet convictions are overborne, and stifled by,
1. The impetuous violence of carnal lusts, which permit not of calm debates, but hurry them on to the sin, and leave them ta consider the evil and dangerous consequences afterward. Thus they go, " As an ox to the slaughter, or as a fool to the correction *^ of the stocks," Prov. vii. 22. Lust besots them. To give counsel now is but to give physic in a paroxism, or counsel to him that is running a race. Lust answers conscience as Antipater did one that presented him a book treating of happiness, s g^oXa^M, I have no leisure to read such discourses.
2. Others would fain solve their scruples with the sinful failings of good men, as David, Solomon, &c. not considering what bro- kenness of heart it cost David, Psal. li. and the other. Sorrow more bitter than death, Eccl. vii. 26. Lccta veiiire Venus, tristis abire solet. This is a presumptuous way of sinning, and how dreadful that is, see Numb. xv. 30.
Instance 4. Truth is often held in unrighteousness by sinful silence, in not reproving other men s sins, and thereby making them their own. We are sometimes cast into the company of ungodly men, where we hear the name of our God blasphemed, the truth, worship, or sevants of God reproached ; and have not so much courage to appear for God, as others have to appear against him : in such cases conscience useth to instigate men to their duty, and chai'ge it home upon them in the authority of such a scrij)ture as
286 AX APPENrix TO exclaxd''s duty.
that, Lev. xix. 17. " Thou shall not liate thy brother hi thy heart, " thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy neighbour, and not suffer sin " u|x>n him."" O, saith conscience, thy silence now will be thy sin. This poor wretch may perish for want of a seasonable, plain, and faithful rebuke. Thy silence will harden him in his wickedness. No sooner doth such a conviction stir in the conscience, but many things are ready to lay hold on it. As,
1. A spirit of cowardice, which makes us afraid to displease men, and chuses rather the wrath of God should fall on them, than that their wrath should fall on us. We dare not take as much liberty to reprove sm as others do to commit it. They glory in their shame, and we are ashamed of what is both our glory and our duty.
2. Dependence on, or near relation to the person sinning. It is a father, an husband, a superior, on whose favour I depend ; and should I displease him, I may ruin myself; this is the voice of the flesh. Hence duty is neglected, and the soul of a friend basely be- trayed ; our interest preferred to God's, and thereby frequently lost : for there is no better way to secure our own interest in any man's heart, than to settle it by our faithfulness in his conscience, and by being wilHng to hazard it for God's interest and glory. The Lord blesseth men's faithfulness above all their sinful carnal policies, Prov. xxviii. 23. " He that rebuketh a m^n, afterwards shall find *' more favour than he that flattereth with his lips."