I have read of two who cut off their right hand one for another, and then made it an excuse, a put off, they were lame, and so could not serve in the galleys of Francis the First, King of France ; but this practice of theirs did so provoke the king that he sent them both to the gallows. I suppose the reader is not so young but knows how to apply it.
Object % If I should begin to be good betimes, and to seek and serve the Lord in the spring and morning of my days, I should lose my friends, I should lose their favours ; for they are carnal and worldly, and had rather I should seek after gold than God, the creature than Christ, earth than heaven. Sec.
Now to this I answer, Surely you are out, for
1. First, This is the highway, the ready way, to gain the best, the surest, and the soundest friends. ' When a man's ways please the Lord, he maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him/ Prov. xvi. 7. When a man falls in with God, God will work the creatures to fall in with him, Job lii. 23-28. Joseph found it so, and Jacob found it so,
• Young men, if you will but go into burial places, you shall find graves exactly of your length.
3 It was an unspeakable vexation to King Lysimachus, that his staying to drink one draught of water lost him his kingdom. [As before. — G.]
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and Job found it so, the three children found it so, and Daniel found it so, as you all know that have but read the Scripture. And many in this age, as bad as it is, have found, that the best way to make friends is, first to make God our friend. Ah ! young men, young men, you shall not lose your friends by seeking and serving of the Lord in the spring and morning of your days, but only exchange bad ones for good ones, the worst for the best. He that gives up himself betimes to the Lord shall have God for his friend, and Christ for his friend, and the angels for his friends, and the saints for his friends. Christ will be to such, first, an omnipotent friend ; secondly, an omniscient friend ; thirdly, an omnipresent friend ; fourthly, an indeficient friend ; fifthly, an independent friend ; sixthly, an immutable friend ; seventhly, a watchful friend ; eighthly, a loving friend ; ninthly, a faithful friend ; tenthly, a compassionate friend ; eleventhly, a close friend, 'There is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother/ Prov. xviii. 24. Such a friend is Christ, and such a friend is as one's own soul, a rare happiness, hardly to be matched. Twelfthly, an universal friend ; a friend in all cases and a friend in all places. Christ is so a friend to every one of his, as if he were a friend to none besides. Hence it is that they say, not only our Lord, our God, but my Lord, and my God. Christ is such an universal friend, as that he supplies the place, and acts the part of every friend, Thirteenthly, ' He is our first friend,' Ps. xc. 1 ; before we had a friend in all the world he was our friend, Prov. viii. 21. Lastly, he is a constant friend : ' Whom he loves, he loves to the end,' John xhi. I.1 2
Augustus Csesar would not suddenly entertain a league of friendship with any, but was a constant friend to those he loved, Amare nee cito desisto, nee temere incipio, late ere I love, as long ere I leave. Where Christ begins to love, he always loves, Jer. xxxi. 3, ' I have loved thee with an everlasting love.' Now who would not venture the loss of all friends in the world to gain such a friend as this is ?
Ah ! young men and women, let me say to you what Seneca said to his friend Polibius, Fas tibi non est de fortuna conqueri, salvo Gcesare, never complain of thy hard fortune as long as Csesar is thy friend. So say I ; never complain of your loss of friends so long as by losing of them you gain Christ to be your friend.
2. Secondly, Thou wert better be without their friendship and favour than to enjoy it upon any sinful aud unworthy accounts. Thou wert better run the hazard of losing thy friends and their favour by seeking and serving the Lord in the primrose of thy days, than to run the hazard of losing God, Christ, heaven, eternity, and thy soul for ever by neglecting the things of thy peace, Matt. xvi. 26, Mark viii. 36. It was a gallant return which the noble Rutilius made his friend, re- questing of him an unlawful favour in such language as this : I had as good be without such a friend as with him who will not let me speed in what I ask ; to whom he replied, I can want such a friend as you, if
1 Luke xv. 7 : Isa. vi. 7-9 ; Heb. iv. 13 ; Isa. lix. 16, 17, xliv. 24 ; Mai. iii. 6 ; Ps. exxi. 4-6 ; 1 John iv. 16 ; Titus i. 2 ; Isa. lxiii. 9 ; Luke i. 45 ; John xx. 28; Philip, iv. 19.
2 Alexander the Great cannot cut that knot of friendship that is tied betwixt Christ and his. [The allusion is to the sword-cut Gordian knot. — G.]
2(U APPLES OF GOLD. [1 KlNGS XIV. 13.
for your sake I must do that which is not honest. The application is easy.
Well ! young men, remember this, the torments of a thousand hells, were there so many, comes far short of this one voice, to be turned out of God's presence with a Non novi vos, I know you not, Mat. vii. 23.
Ah, young man, young man! thou wert better ten thousand thousand times to be cast out of the thoughts and hearts of thy carnal friends and relations, than to be cast out of God's presence with cursed Cain, Gen. iv., for ever, than to be excommunicated out of ' the general assembly of the saints, and congregation of the first-born which are written in heaven,' Heb. xii. 23; and therefore away with this objection. But,
3. Thirdly, The favour and friendship of such carnal persons is very fickle and inconstant ; it is very fading and withering. Now they stroke, and anon they strike ; now they lift up, and anon they cast down ; now they smile, and anon -Ahey frown ; now they kiss, and anon they kill ; now they cry, 'Hosannah ! hosannah !' and anon they cry, 'Crucify him, crucify him !' Haman is one day feasted with the king, and the next day made a feast for crows, Esther vii. The princes of Babylon were highly in king Darius his favour one day, and cast into the lion's den the next, Dan. vi. The scribes and pharisees that cried up Judas one day, did in effect bid him go and hang himself the next day, Mat. xxvii. 3-5.
Such men's favour and friendship are as Venice glasses, quickly broken, and therefore not much to be prized or minded. Histories abound with instances of this nature.1 But I must hasten : only re- member this, that every day's experience tells us that wicked men can soon turn tables, and cross their books ; their favour and friendship is usually like to a morning cloud, or like to Jonah's gourd : one hour flourishing and the next hour withering ; and why then shouldest thou set thy heart upon that which is more changeable than the moon ? But,