6. If there be a crack and a flaw in your conscience, all your trading with heaven is at a stand ; there cannot be any serious dealing with God, nor holy boldness in prayer: 1 John iii. 31, 'If our hearts condemn us not, then have we confidence towards God/ Wlien you have sinned away your peace, a strangeness and distance groweth between God and you : Ps. xxxii. 3, ' When I kept silence, my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long ; ' Gen. iii. 8, ' And Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden.' Adam ran to the bushes. Tour hearts will grow shy of God, and you cannot so comfortably look him in the face, and so the sweetness of holy privacy and communion with God will be lost. Time was when you could go boldly, and open your hearts to God, but now you are afraid of him, and every act of commerce is a reviving of your bondage ; the remembrance of God is a trouble to you.
7. If conscience speaketh not, it writeth, for it is not only a witness, but a register and book of record : Jer. xvii. 1, ' The sin of Judah is written with a pen of iron, and with the point of a diamond/ We know not what conscience writeth, being occupied and taken up with carnal vanities, and carried away with foolish and hiu'tful lusts, but we shall know afterwards, when the book of conscience shall be opened : Kev. XX. 12, ' And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God : and the books were opened ; and another book was opened, which is the book of life ; and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.' These books are the book of conscience and the book of God's remembrance. The remembrance of our actions shall be forced upon us. Conscience is God's register, and keepeth a diary, and sets down everything. This book, though it be in the sinner s keeping, cannot be razed : what con-
436 SERMONS UPON ACTS XXIV. 14-16.
science writeth is written to eternity, unless it be blotted out by repentance and a serious application of the blood of Christ. Well, then, cipnsider a sleepy conscience will not always sleep : if we suffer it not to awaken here, it will awaken in hell, where there is no remedy ; for the present it sleepeth in many, in regard of motion, check, or smiting, but not in regard of notice and observation. This secret spy is privy to more than it speaketh of ; it is laid up as matter for the worm that never dieth to feed upon.
8. If the stings of an evil conscience be not always felt, yet they are soon awakened by serious thoughts of death and judgment to come, and then forced upon us. There is a fire smothering in our bosoms, and it is soon blown up into a flame. Sometimes by the word : Acts xxiv. 25, *And as he reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come, Felix trembled.' Belshazzar's edge was taken off in the midst of his carousing : Dan. v. 6, ' Then the king's countenance was changed, and his thoughts troubled him, so that the joints of his loins were loosed, and his knees smote one against another.' Sometimes by some great troubles : Isa. lix. 12, ' For our transgressions are multiplied before thee, and our sins testify against us : for our transgressions are with us, and as for our iniquities, we know them.' Therefore ' we roar like beasts, and mourn like doves,' ver. 11. In atempest, that which is at the bot- tom Cometh a-top. Or by death ; whatever silence there be in conscience before, yet death usually reviveth these fears : 1 Cor. xv. 56, ' The sting of death is sin.' Men are wise and more serious as they are entering on the confines of eternity ; near things afiect us ; the baits of the flesh have then lost their allurement. The devil, that was before a tempter, will then be a tormentor. Things overlooked before are then seriously considered ; then the stings of sin work more sensibly, and in a lively manner, and the deluded sinner begins to see what he would not take notice of before.
9. If conscience do not speak to you, you must speak to it, and call upon it to do its office. Call yourselves to an account for the expense of your time and employment : Ps. iv. 4, ' Commune with your own heart upon your bed, and be still ; ' Ps. Ixxvii. 6, ' I commune with mine own heart, and my spirit made diligent search.' Take a time to parley with yourselves, and consider how matters stand between you and God. When the clock striketh not, it is a sign the plummets are down, and we must wind them up again. Every day we must do something, as Job sacrificed for his sons day by day : Job i. 5, 'It may be that my sons have sinned, and cursed God in their hearts.' And God himself reviewed every day's work, and ' saw that it was good,' Gen. i. 4, 10, 12, &c. So should we review every day's work, and cast up the account at the foot of every page. Short reckonings prevent mistakes. Pythagoras taught his scholars that they should never give way to sleep till they had posed themselves with these questions, Quid feci, &c. — What have I done ? what good have I omitted ? wherein have I transgressed ? Conscience, what hast thou to say to me ? And Seneca telleth of his friend Sextius, that before he would betake himself to rest he would ask his soul, Quid liodie mcdtim iuum sanasti? cui vitio obstitisti? qua parte melior es? — What evil hast thou got rid of to-dav ? what sin hast thou resisted ? wherein art thoi?