they will be willing to let Israel go, then they will be willing to let drunkenness go, and pride go, and uncleanness go, and worldliness go, &c. ; but when their sickness is over, and the pangs of conscience abated, and judgments removed, oh! then they return with the dog to his vomit, and with the sow to the wallowing in the mire again. There was a man well known to a minister in this city, who, in the time of his sick- ness, was so terrified in his conscience for his sins, that he made the very bed to shake upon wdiich he lay, and cried out all night long, ' I am damned, I am damned, I am damned ;' and this man, in the days of his outward and inward distresses, made many and great protestations of amend- ment of life if God would be pleased to recover him ; in a little while he did recover, and being recovered he was as bad and as wicked, if not worse, than he was before, 2 Pet. ii. 20-22. So in the time of the great sweat in king Edward's days, as long as the heat of the plague lasted, all sorts and ranks of people wera still a-crying out, Peccavi: ' Mercy, good Lord, mercy, mercy, merc^M' Then lords and ladies, and other persons of quality, cried out to the ministers, ' For God's sake tell us what we shall do to avoid the wrath of God ; take these bags ; pay so much to such a one whom I have deceived, and so much restore unto another, whom in bargaining I over-reached ; oh ! give so much to the poor, and give so much to such and such pious uses.' But after the sickness was over, they were just the same men that they were before. Men in time of trouble are very ready to cry out, ' Arise and save us,' Jer. ii. 27 ; and with them, 'Deliver us this tiixie,' Judges x. 15 ; and with the Samaritans, who when God had sent lions among tliem, in- quired after the manner of his worship, 2 Kings xvii. 25, 26 ; and yet after all this to remain as vile and wicked as tliey did : Jer. ii. 20, ' For of old time I have broken thy yoke, and burst thy bands, and thou saidst, I will not transgress, when upon every high hill, and under every green tree thou wanderedst, playing the harlot.' A wicked man's willingness to be rid of his sins is transient, not constant ; it is like the morning cloud and the early dew, that passeth away, Hosea vi. 4. The Jews were a very unstable people, a people bent to backsliding, a people that would often start aside like a deceitful bow, Hosea xi. 7 ; Ps. Ixxviii. 81, 87, 57; Hosea vii. 16. Sometimes when the judgments of God were heavy upon them, or wdien they were under the reign of some good kings, then down went their groves, their altars, their idols, and their high places ; but soon after you shall have them as much set upon idolatry as before ; sometimes they were willing to be rid of their idols, and at other times they were mad to go a-whoring after their idols. But now a godly man, when he is himself, he is never unwilling to be rid of his sins, yea, to be rid of all his sins. The fixed, standing, and abiding disposition and bent of a godly man's soul, of a godly man's will, is to be rid of every sin ; and thrice happy is that man that is habitually under such a choice and blessed frame.
[8.] Thirdly, A transcendant willingness, a superlative ivilling- ness, an overtopping willingness to he rid of sin, is an infallible evidence of the truth of grace in the soul. When a man's willingness to be rid of his sins overtops his unwillingness ; when a man is more willing to be rid of his sins than he is to continue in sin, then his spiritual state is certainly good. A gracious heart had much rather,
310 A CABINET OF JEWELS. [ChAP. II.
if it were put to his choice, live without all sin, than to have allowance to wallow in any sin ; he had rather live without the least sin, than to have liberty to live in the greatest, or the most flesh-pleasing sin. It is certain that sin is more afflictive to a gracious soul than all the losses, crosses, troubles, and trials that he meets with in the world. David cries, not Peril, but Peccavi ; not ' I am undone,' but ' I have done foolishly,' 2 Sam. xxiv. 10. He does not cry, Take away the pestilence, but, Take away the iniquity of thy servant. Nor Daniel cries not out, Oh we are sadly reproached, we are greatly distressed, we are wofully oppressed, but. We have rebelled, Dan. ix. 5. And the church cries not out. Take away our captivity, but, Take away all ini- quity. It is not. Take away our chains, but, Take away our sins ; it is not, Take away our afllictions, but, Take away our pollutions ; it is not, Take away all our enemies' lives, but, Take away the lives of all our lusts, Hosea xiv. 2. And so Paul cries not out of his reproaches, or persecutors, or bonds, or chains, or stripes, or perils, or prisons ; he rather glories in these. But he cries out of a law in his members, re- belling against the law of his mind, and bringing of him into captivity to the law of sin, which is in his members, 2 Cor. xi. 16; Rom. vii. 23. Paul does not cry out, O wretched man that I am ! who shall deliver me from all my soitows and sufferings 1 but ' O -wretched man that I am ! who shall deliver me from this body of death ?' ver. 24. A sin- cere heart, when he is himself, had much rather be rid of his sins than of his sufferings, yea, of the least sins than of the greatest sufferings. It was a sweet saying of Bernard : ' I had rather,' saith he, * that God should better my heart than remove his hand ; I had rather that God should continue my strokes than my sins.' And the same noble spirit was working bravely in Job when he was under the heavy hand of God : Job xxxiv. 31, 32, ' Surely it is meet to be said unto God, I have borne chastisement, I will not offend any more : that which I see not, teach thou me ; if I have done iniquity, I will do no more.' (See Job vii. 20, 21.)