Again, repentance doth include, not only a loathing of sin, but also a loathing of ourselves for sin. As a man doth not only loathe poison, but he loathes the very dish or vessel that hath the smell of the poison ; so a true penitent doth not only loathe his sin, but he loathes himself,
1 It is said of Ithacus, that the hatred of the Priscilian heresy was all the virtue that he had. The evil servant did not riot out his talent, Mat. xxv. 18. Those reprobates, Mat. xxiii. 2, robbed not the saints, but relieved them not ; for this they must eternally perish.
34 PRECIOUS REMEDIES [2 COR. II. 11.
the vessel that smells of it ; so Ezek. xx. 43, ' And there shall ye re- member your ways and all your doings, wherein ye have been defiled ; and ye shall loathe yourselves in your own sight for all your evils that ye have committed.' True repentance will work your hearts, not only to loathe your sins, but also to loathe yourselves.1
Again, true repentance doth not only work a man to loathe himself for his sins, but it makes him ashamed of his sin also : ' What fruit have ye of those things whereof ye are now ashamed?' saith the apostle, Rom. vi. 21. So Ezekiel, 'And thou shalt be confounded, and never open thy mouth any more, because of thy shame, when I am pacified toward thee for all that thou hast done, saith the Lord God,' xxxvi. 32. When a penitential soul sees his sins pardoned, the anger of God pacified, the divine justice satisfied, then he sits down and blushes, as the Hebrew hath it, as one ashamed. Yea, true re- pentance doth work a man to cross his sinful self, and to walk con- trary to sinful self, to take a holy revenge upon sin, as you may see in Paul, the jailor, Mary Magdalene, and Manasseh. This the apostle shews in 2 Cor. vii. 10, 11: 'For godly sorrow worketh repentance never to be repented of ; but the sorrow of the world worketh death. For behold the self-same thing, that ye sorrowed after a godly sort, what carefulness it wrought in you, yea, what clearing of yourselves, yea, what indignation, yea, what fear, yea, what vehement desire, yea, what zeal, yea, what revenge.'2 Now, souls, sum up all these things together, and tell me whether it be such an easy thing to repent as Satan would make the soul to believe, and I am confident your heart will answer that it is as hard a thing to repent as it is to make a world, or raise the dead.
I shall conclude this second remedy with a worthy saying of a pre- cious holy man : ' Repentance,' saith he, ' strips us stark naked of all the garments of the old Adam, and leaves not so much as a shirt be- hind.' In this rotten building it leaves not a stone upon a stone. As the flood drowned Noah's own friends and servants, so must the flood of repenting tears drown our sweetest and most profitable sins.
Remedy (3). The third remedy against this device of Satan is seri- ously to consider, That repentance is a continued act. The word repent implies the continuation of it.3 True repentance inclines a man's heart to perform God's statutes always, even unto the end. A true penitent must go on from faith to faith, from strength to strength ; he must never stand still nor turn back. Repentance is a grace, and must have its daily operation as well as other graces. True repent- ance is a continued spring, where the waters of godly sorrow are
1 True repentance is a sorrowing for sin, as it is offensivum Dei, aversivum a Deo. This both comes from God, and drives a man to God, as it did the church in the Canticles, and the prodigal : Ezek. xiii. 22, 23.
2 Quantum displicet Deo immunditia peccati, in tantum placet Deo erubescentia pcenitentis. — Ber\nard~\: i. e. So much the more God hath been displeased with the blackness of sin, the more will he bo pleased with the blushing of the sinner. They that do not bum now in zeal against sin, must ere long burn in hell for sin.
s Anselm in his Meditations confesseth, that all his life was either damnable for sin committed, or unprofitable for good omitted ; at last concludes, Quid restat, 0 peccalor, nisi tit in tota vita tua dqdores totam vitam tuam, Oh, what then remains but in our whole life to lament the sins of our whole life.
2 Cor. II. 11.] against satan's devices. 35
always flowing : ' My sins are ever before me,' Ps. li. 3. A true peni- tent is often casting his eyes back to the days of his former vanity, and this makes him morning and evening to ' water his coach with his tears.' ' Remember not against me the sins of my youth,' saith one blessed penitent ; and ' I was a blasphemer, and a persecutor, and injurious,' saith another penitent.1 Repentance is a continued act of turning, a repentance never to be repented of, a turning never to turn again to folly. A true penitent hath ever something within him to turn from ; he can never get near enough to God ; no, not so near him as once he was ; and therefore he is still turning and turning that he may get nearer and nearer to him, that is his chiefest good and his only happiness, optimum maximum, the best and the greatest.2 They are every day a-crying out, ' O wretched men that we are, who shall deliver us from this body of death !' Rom. vii. 24 They are still sen- sible of sin, and still conflicting with sin, and still sorrowing for sin, and still loathing of themselves for sin. Repentance is no transient act, but a continued act of the soul. And tell me, O tempted soul, whether it be such an easy thing as Satan would make thee believe, to be every day a-turning more and more from sin, and a-turning nearer and nearer to God, thj choicest blessedness. A true penitent can as easily content himself with one act of faith, or one act of love, as he can content himself with one act of repentance.
A Jewish Rabbi, pressing the practice of repentance upon his dis- ciples, exhorting them to be sure to repent the day before they died, one of them replied, that the day of any man's death was very uncer- tain. ' Repent, therefore, every day,' said the Rabbi, ' and then you shall be sure to repent the day before you die/ You are wise, and know how to apply it to your own advantage.