1 It is reported in the life of Luther, that ^\'hen he prayed, it was Tanta reverentia ut si Deo, et tanta fiducia ut si amico, Ac.
2 So did the publican ; he prayed much, though he spake little, oratio Irevis peneirat ccelum ; the hottest springs send forth their waters by ebullitions. Augustine cries out against them that did not profit by afflictions, Perdidistis utilitatem calamitatis— August. de Civit. lib. ii. c. xxxiii.
3 Saints should be like the seraphim, beset all over with eyes and lights, as Bassarian said. The fearful hare, they say, sleepeth with her eyes open. Oh, how watchful, then, should a Christian be 1
134! THE UNSEARCHABLE [EPH. III. 8.
to do for God ; our strength to wait on God, and walk with God ; our strength to bear for God; our strength to suffer for God.^ By decaying in grace, we come to lose that 'joy that is unspeakable and full of glory/ and that comfort and ' peace that passes understanding,' and to lose the sense of that ' favour that is better than life.' Now our faith will be turned into fear, our dancing into mourning, our rejoicing into sighing; and when, 0 Christian! thou beginnest to fall, and to decay, who knows how far thou mayest fall, how much thy graces may be im- paired, and how long it may be before thy sun rise when once it is set ; therefore you had need to exercise and improve your graces.
[12.] Tivelfthly, and lastly. You are to improve your graces, because souls truly gracious have a povjer to do good. I do not say that a man in his natural estate — though Arminians do — hath power in himself to do supernatural acts, as to believe in God, to love God, and the like, &c., for I think a toad may as well spit cordials as a natural man do supernatural actions, 1 Cor. ii. 14; Jer. xiii. 23; James i. 17; Eph. ii. 1-3. No ; I do not say that all the grace we have is not from God, nor that man in his natural estate is not dead God-ward, and Christ-ward, and holiness-ward, and heaven-ward. But this I say, that souls truly gracious have a power to do good. It is sad to think how many pro- fessors do excuse their negligence by pretending an inability to do good, or by sitting down discouraged, as having in their hands no power at all. What can we do, say they, if the Lord do not breathe upon us, as at first conversion ? We can do nothing,^ I think in my very conscience, that this is one reason of much of that slightness, neglect, and omission of duties, that is among professors in these days, so that God may com- plain, as he doth, Isa. Ixiv. 7, ' There is no man that stirreth up himself to take hold of me, they are as men asleep,' that sit still and do nothing. But certainly they that are truly united to Christ, are not acted as dead stocks, as if every time and moment of their acting God-wards and holiness-ward they received new life from the Spirit of Christ, as at first conversion they did. And I am confident, for want of the knowledge and due consideration of this truth, many professors take such liberty to themselves, as to live in the neglect of many precious duties of godli- ness, for which, first or last, they will pay dear. But remembering that it is not a flood of words, but weighty arguments, that convince and per- suade the souls and consciences of men, I shall give you four reasons to demonstrate, that believers have a power to do good ; and the first is this.
First, because they have life ; and all life is a poiver to act by? Natural life is a power to act by ; spiritual life is a power to act by ; eternal life is a power to act by. The philosopher saith, ' That a fly is more excellent than the heavens, because the fly hath life, which the heavens have not,' &c.
Secondly, Else there is no just ground for Ch^t to charge tlie guilt
' Spiritual losses are hardly recovered. A man may easily run down the bill, but he cannot so easily get up. Philosophers say tliat the way from the habit to privation is easier than the way from the privation to the habit ; as a man may soon put an instru- ment out of tune, but not so soon put it in again.
* When Charles Langius had excited Lipsius to the study of true wisdom, My mind is to it, said Lipsius ; and then he falls to wishing. What, said Langius, art thou pur- posing when thou shouldst be doing? — Just. Lip. de Constan. lib. ii. cap. v.
' Omnia vita est jjropter delectationcm.
EpH. III. 8.] RICHES OF CHRIST. 135
of sins upon thevi ; as neglect of prayer, repentance, mortification ; nor the guilt of carelessness and slothfulness, &c., which he doth. If they can act no further, nor no longer than the Holy Ghost acts them, as at their first conversion, notwithstanding their union with Christ, and that spiritual principle of life that at first they received from Christ,' certainly if it be so, it will not stand with the unspotted justice of God to charge the guilt of sins of omission upon believing souls, if they have no power to act, but are as stocks and stones, &c., as some dream.
A third ground is this : if there be not some power in believers to do good, then ive should not have as much benefit by the second Adam as ive had by the first. The first Adam, if he had stood, would have communicated a power to all his sons and daughters to have done good, as being corrupted he doth communicate power to sin, as all his children find by sad and woful experience ; and shall not Christ much more communicate a power to us to do good in our measure ? Surely he doth, though few mind it, and fewer improve it as they should.^ If there be not such a power in believers, how have they gained more by the second Adam than they lost by the first ? and wherein lies the excellency of the second above the first ?
Fourthly and lastly. All those exhortations are void, and of none effect, if there be not some power in souls truly gracious to do good ; as all those exhortations to watchfulness, to stir up * the grace of God that is in us,' and to ' work out our own salvation with fear and trem- bling,' and that also, 'give all dilligence to make your calling and election sure.' To what purpose are all these precious exhortations, if the regenerate man have no power at all to act anything that is good ? Nay, then, believers under the covenant of grace should be in no better a condition than unregenerate men that are under a covenant of works, who see their duties discovered, but have no power to perform ; which is contrary, as to other scriptures, so to that Ps. xl. 7-9, ' Then said I, Lo I come : in the volume of thy book it is written of me, I delight to do thy will, O my God : yea, thy law is within my heart,' or, ' thy law is in the midst of my bowels,' as the Hebrew reads it ; and to that of Ezek. xxxvi. 25-27, &c. A soul truly gracious can sincerely say, ' Thy law, O Lord, is in the midst of my bowels, and I delight to do thy will,
0 Lord.' I confess I cannot do as I should, nor I shall never do it as