Use· 2. Branch 1. LET me in the next place perswade (Exhort) all to this great duty of Repentance. Sorrow is good for nothing but sin. If you shed tears for outward losses, it will not advantage you. Water for the Garden, if poured in the sink, doth no good. Powder for the eye, if applied to the1 arm, is of no benefit. Sorrow is medicinable for the soul, but if you apply it to wordly things, it doth no good. O that our tears may run in the right chanel, and our hearts even burst with sorrow for sin. That I may the more successfully press this Exhortation, I shall shew you that Repentance
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Is necessary.
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It is necessary for all persons.
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For all sins.
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Repentance is necessary, Luke 13. 5.2 Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish3. There’s no rowing to Paradise,4 but upon the stream of repenting tears. Repentance is required as a qualification. It is not so much to endear us to Christ, as to endear Christ to us. Till sin be bitter, Christ will not be sweet.
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Repentance is necessary for all persons.5 God commandeth all men, Act.6 17.30.
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It is necessary for great ones, Ier.7 13. 18. Say to the King and the Queen, humble your selves. The King of Niniveh and his Nobles changed their robes for sackcloth, Ionah 3. 6. Great mens sins do more hurt than others: the sins of leaders are leading sins; therefore they of all others had need to repent. If such as hold the Scepter repent not, God hath appointed a day to judge them, and a fire to burn them, Isa. 30. 33.
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Repentance is necessary for the flagitious8 sinners in the Nation. England had need put it self in mourning, and be humbled by solemn Repentance. —Anglica gens est optima flens— What horrible impieties are chargeable upon the Nation! We see persons daily listing themselves under Satan. Not only the banks of Religion, but Civility are broken down. Men seem to contend as the Jews of old, who should be most wicked9. In their filthiness is leudness, Ezek. 24. 13. If oaths and drunkenness, if perjury and luxury will make a people guilty, then it is to be feared England is in Gods black Book. Sure men have cancelled their vow in Baptism, and made a private contract with the Devil: Instead of crying to mercy to save them, they cry, God damn them! Never was there such riding post to Hell, as if men did despair of getting thither time enough. Hath it not been known that some have died with the guilt of fornication and blood upon them? Hath it not been told that others have boasted how many they have debauched and made drunk? Thus, they declare their sin as Sodom, Isa. 3. 9.10 Nay, mens sins are grown daring; as if they would hang out their flag of defiance, and give Heaven a broad-side (Psa 73. 9). Like the Thracians, who when it thunders, gather together in a body, and shoot their Arrows against Heaven. The sinners in Brittain do even send God a challenge, Iob 15. 25. They strengthen themselves against the Almighty; they run upon him even on his neck, on the thick bosses of his bucklers. The bosses in the buckler are for offence in war. Gods precepts and threatnings are as it were the thick bosses of his buckler, whereby he would deter men from wickedness; but they regard not, but are desperate in sin, and run furiously against the bosses of Gods buckler. O to what an height is sin boiled up! Men count it a shame not to be impudent.11. May it not be said of us as Iosephus speaks of the Iews; such was the excessive wickedness of those times, that if the Romans had not come and sacked their City, Ierusalem had been swallowed up with some Earthquake12, or drowned with a flood or fired from Heaven: And is it not high time then for this13 Nation to enter into a course of Physick, and take this pill of Repentance, who hath so many bad humours spreading in her body politick? England is an Island encompassed with two Oceans, an Ocean of water, and an Ocean of wickedness; O that it might be encompassed with a third Ocean, namely, repenting tears. If the Book of the Law chance to fall upon the ground, the Jews have a custom presently to proclaim a Fast. England hath let both Law and Gospel fall to the ground, therefore had need fast and mourn before the Lord: The Ephah of wickedness seems to be full, Good reason tears should empty apace, when sin fills so fast: Why then do not all faces gather paleness? Why are the Wells of Repentance stopped? Do not the sinners of the Land know they should repent? Have they had no warning? Have not Gods faithful Messengers lifted up their voice as a trumpet, and cryed to them to repent? but many of these Tools in the Ministry have been spent and worn out upon rocky hearts. Hath not God lighted strange Comets in the Heavens, as so many Preachers to call men to Repentance, but still they are settled on their lees, Zeph. 1. 12. Do we think God will alwaies put up our affronts? Will he endure thus to have his name and glory trampled upon? The Lord hath usually been more swift in the process of his justice against the sins of a professing people· God may a while reprieve this Land by Frerogative, but if ever he· save it without Repentance, he must go out of his ordinary Road: I say therefore with Mr. Bradford, REPENT O ENGLAND. Thou hast beleaper’d thy self with sin, and hadst need go and wash in the spiritual Iordan. Thou hast kindled Gods anger against thee, throw away thy weapons, and bring thy holy Engines and Water-works, that God may be appeased in the blood of Christ. Let thy tears run, lest Gods roll of curses fly (Zach. 5. 2). Either men must turn, or God will overturn: Either the fallow ground of their hearts must be broken up, or the Land broken down. If no words will prevail with sinners, it is because God hath a purpose to slay them (1 Sam. 2. 25). Among the Romans, he who was for his capital offence forbidden the use of water, was thereby concluded to be a condemned person. So they who by their prodigious sins have so far incensed the God of Heaven, that he denies them the water of Repentance, may look upon themselves as condemned persons.
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Repentance is necessary for the14 cheating crew, Psal. 11. 9. 18. Their deceit is falshood; who are wise to do evil (Jer. 4. 22); making use of their invention, only for circumvention: instead of living by their faith, they live by their shifts. These are they who make themselves poor, that by this artifice they may grow rich. I would not be misunderstood, I mean not such as the providence of God hath brought low, whose estates have failed, not their honesty; but such as feign a break, that they may cheat their Creditors. There are some who get more by breaking, than others can by trading: these are like beggars that discolour and blister their arms, that they may move charity; they live by their sores: So these live by their breaking. When the Frost breaks, the streets are more full of water: So many trades-men, when they break, are fuller of money: These make as if they had nothing, but out of this nothing, great estates are created. Remember, the Kingdom of Heaven is taken by force (Mat. 11. 12), not by fraud. Let men know, after this golden sop· the Devil enters: they squeeze a curse into their estates: they had need repent quickly: Though the bread of falshood be sweet, Prov. 20. 17. yet many vomit up their sweet morsels in Hell.
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Repentance is necessary for civil15 persons: these have no visible spots on them; they are free from gross sin, and one would think they were unconcerned in the business of Repentance16. They are so good, that they scorn a Psalm of mercy. Indeed these are often in the worst condition: these are they who17 need no Repentance, Luke 15. 7. Their civility undoes them; they make a Christ of it, and so on this shelf suffer shipwrack. Morality shoots short of Heaven; it is only nature refined. A moral man is but old Adam dressed in fine cloths. The Kings Image counterfeited and stamped upon Brass, will not go currant. The civil person seems to have the Image of God, but he is but brass metal, which will never pass for currant: Civility is insufficient to salvation: though the life be moralized, the lust may be unmortified. The heart may be full of pride and Atheism. Under the fair leaves of a tree there may be a worm. I say not, repent that you are civil, but that you are no more than civil. The house that was only swept and garnished, Satan entred into, Luke 11. 26. This was the emblem of a moral man, who is swept by civility, and garnished with common gifts, but is not washed by true Repentance; the unclean spirit enters into such an one. If civility were sufficient to salvation, Christ needed not to have died. The Civilian hath a fair Lamp, but it wants the oyl of grace.
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Repentance is needful for Hypocrites:18 I mean, such as allow themselves in the sin. Hypocrisie is the counterfeiting of sanctity. The Hypocrite or (stageplayer19) is gotten a step beyond the moralist, and doth dress himself in the garb20 of Religion: he pretends to a form of godliness, but denies the power, 2 Tim. 3. 5. The Hypocrite is a Saint in jest; he makes a majestick shew, like an Ape clothed in Ermyn, or Purple. The Hypocrite is like an house with a beautiful frontispiece, but every room within is dark: he is a rotten post fairly gilded21: under his mask of profession he hides his plague-sores22. The Hypocrite is against painting of faces, but he paints holiness: he is seemingly good, that he may be really bad23. In Samuels mantle he plaies the Devil; therefore the same word in the original signifies to use Hypocrisie, and to be prophane *. The Hypocrite24 seems to have his eyes nailed to Heaven, but his heart is full of impure lustings; he lives in secret sin against his conscience25; he can be as his company is, and act both the Dove and the Vulture; he hears the word, but is all ear; he is for Templedevotion, where others may look upon him, and admire him, but he neglects family and closet prayer. Indeed, if prayer doth not make a man leave sin, sin will make him leave prayer. The Hypocrite feigns humility, but it is that he may rise in the world; he is a pretender to faith, but he makes use of it rather for a cloak, than a shield; he carries his Bible under his arm, but not in his heart; his whole Religion is a demure lye, Hos. 11. 12.