If yet you will not see, you shall see and be ashamed; Isa. xxvi. 11. When you have heard your last and dreadful doom, and seen the Lord make up his jewels; "then shall you discern between the righteous and the wicked; between him that serveth God, and him that serveth him not;" Mal. iii. 17, 18.

CHAPTER X.

Holiness is the most Pleasant way.

I HAVE proved beyond all reasonable contradiction that holiness is the safe, the honest, the profitable, and the honourable state and course. But my hardest task is yet to be done; and that is, to prove it the most pleasant way. And the difficulty of this is not at all from the matter, but from the persons with whom I have to do. For nothing is pleasant unto men but what is suitable to their natures, and apprehended by them to be for their good, or in itself more excellent than their good. That is pleasant to one man that is loathsome to another. As the food and converse is delightful to a beast, that is loathsome and as bad as death to man, so one man's pleasure is another's pain. Even about the common matters of this life, variety of complexions, educations, customs, and dispositions, doth cause a variety of affections; the difference between the sanctified and unsanctified, the spiritual and the carnal mind, doth cause a greater contrariety. If therefore the error of wicked minds, or the distemper of your souls, do make the best things seem the worst, and the sweetest things to seem most bitter, this is no confutation of my argument, that proves the way of godliness most pleasant. If I would prove that wine is pleasanter than vinegar, or bread than dirt or ashes, I mean not to appeal to the appetites of the sick; it is the sound and healthful that must be judges. If a man will suffer his mind to be possessed with prejudice and base thoughts of God himself, no wonder if he cannot love him, nor take any delight in him.

And if men have a malignant enmity to godliness, no reason will persuade them that it is most pleasant, but what persuades them from that enmity. No reason will persuade a slothful person that labour is better than sleep and idleness; no reason will persuade a drunkard, glutton, or voluptuous wretch, that abstinence and continence are the sweetest life. Could we change their hearts, we should change their pleasures. Such as men are, such are their delights. But the thing that I undertake, is, to manifest to any competent discerner, that holiness is the most pleasant course; and that all the pleasures of the earth are nothing to the pleasures which the godly find in God, and in a holy life. And if any be not of this mind, it is because his soul's diseases have made him an incompetent judge. And that godliness is the most pleasant state of life, will appear to you, I. From the nature of the thing itself. II. From the encouragements and helps with which it is attended. III. From the effects and fruits.

I. The nature of holiness is to be found, 1. In the understanding. II. In the will and affections. And III. In the practice of men's lives. And in all these I shall shew you that it is the most delightful course.

1. Knowledge in itself is a pleasant thing to human nature. Ignorance is the blindness of the soul. It is not so pleasant for the eye to behold the sun, as for the mind of man to discern the truth. To know good and evil had never been the matter of so strong a temptation to Adam, if knowledge had not been very desirable to innocent nature. How hard do many even ungodly persons study to know the mysteries of nature. And nothing hath more strongly tempted some wretches to witchcraft or contracts with the devil, than a desire of knowing unrevealed things, which by his means they have hoped to attain. A studious man hath far more natural, valuable delight in his reading and successful studies, than a voluptuous epicure hath in his sensual delights.

But it is a special kind of knowledge that holiness doth (initially) consist in, which transcendeth in true pleasure all the common wisdom of the world. For,

1. How pleasant a thing must it needs be to know things of so high a nature! To know the Almighty, living God; to behold his wisdom, goodness, and power, in his glorious

works; to be led to him by all the creatures, and hear of him by every providence, and find his holy, blessed name in every leaf of his sacred word; how sweet and pleasant a thing is this! To know the Divine nature, persons, attributes, and will; to know the mystery of the incarnation, of the person, nature, undertaking, performance of the blessed Mediator, Jesus Christ; to know his birth, his life, temptations, conquests, his righteousness, his holy doctrine and example, the law and promise, the law of nature and the covenant of grace; the sufferings, resurrection, ascension, glorification, and intercession of our Lord; to know his kingdom, laws, and government, and his judgment, with his rewards and punishments; to know the sanctifying works of the Holy Ghost, by which we are prepared for everlasting life; and to know that life (though but by faith) for which we are here prepared; how high and pleasant a thing is this! If it be pleasant to know the course of nature, in those higher parts that are above the vulgar reach, what is it to know the God of nature, and the true use and end of nature? What high things doth the poorest Christian know! He knoweth the things that are invisible.

Think not that faith is so void of evidence as not to deserve the name of knowledge. We know the things which we do believe. Nicodemus could say from the evidence of miracles, "We know that thou art a teacher come from God; for no man could do these miracles that thou dost, except God be with him;" John iii. 2. "We know that God spake to Moses" (chap. ix. 29), say the Jews. We know that the Scripture testimony is true; chap. xxi. 24. "We know (even by believing) that if this earthly house of our tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens;" 2 Cor,v. 1. "We know that when he shall appear, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is;" 1 John iii. 2. "At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you;" chap. xiv. 20. We know that no whoremonger or such like shall inherit eternal life; Eph. v. 5. We know that our "labour is not in vain in the Lord;" 1 Cor. xv. 58. Many such passages of Scripture tell us, that faith is a certain knowledge, and that invisible things revealed by God are certainly known. We know what saints and angels are now doing in the highest heavens; for God hath told us. We know the most high

and glorious things revealed by God, which we never saw. And is not the pleasure of such knowledge greater than the pleasure of all the wealth, the honour, and sensual enjoyments in this world! I durst almost refer the case to one of you that are most befooled by your own sensuality. If you could go to-morrow and meet with a soul from heaven, or with an angel, that could tell you what becomes of souls, and what is done in another world, would you not rather go to such a conference, than go as far to a drinking, or a bowling, or some such recreation? I think you would, if it were but to satisfy your curiosity and desire of knowing. Why then should not the servants of Christ more delight in the reading and hearing the words of Christ, that came from the bosom of the Father, that hath seen God, and is with God, and is God himself, that telleth them more certainly of the invisible things than any saints or angels can tell them? Why should not this, I say, be sweeter to them than all the fleshly pleasures in the world? O that I could know more of God, and more of the mystery of redemption, even of an obedient, crucified, glorified Christ; and more of the invisible world, and of the blessed state of souls, on condition I left all the pleasures of this world to sensual men! O that I had more clear and firm apprehensions of these transcendent, glorious things! How easily could I spare the pleasures of the flesh, and leave those husks to swine to feed on! 0 could my soul get nearer to God, and be more irradiated with his heavenly beams, my mind would need no other recreation, and I should as little relish carnal pleasures, as carnal minds do relish the heavenly delights. As earthly things are poor and low, so is the knowledge of them. As things spiritual and heavenly are high and glorious, mysterious and profound, the knowledge of them is accordingly delightful. "And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness. God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached to the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory;" 1 Tim. iii. 16. "Faith is the evidence of things not seen;" Heb. xi. 1. It is far more pleasant by faith to see the Lord, than to see any creature by the eye of flesh; and sweeter by faith to see heaven opened, and there behold our glorified Lord, than to see a horse-race, or stage-play, or any of the fooleries of the world.

2. The knowledge of things to come is specially desired,

come.

and godliness containeth that faith which knoweth things to How glad would men be to be told what shall befal them to the last hour of their lives! The woman of Samaria (John iv.) called out her neighbours with admiration to see Christ, as one that had told her all that she had done. But if he had told her all that ever she would do, for the time to come, and all that ever should befal her, it might have astonished her much more. Believers know what hath been, even before the world was made, and how it was made, and what hath been since then, and they know what will be to all eternity. A true believer knows from Scripture, whither men's souls go after death, and how their bodies shall be raised again, and how Christ will come to judge the world, and who shall then be justified, and who shall be condemned; and what shall be the case of the godly and the ungodly to all eternity. And is it not more pleasure to know these things, than to possess all the vain delights of the earth? Can the flesh afford you any thing so delightful?

3. Especially, it is desirable and pleasant to know those things that most concern us. Needless speculations and curiosities we can spare. There is a knowledge that brings more pain than pleasure; yea, there is a knowledge that will torment. But to know our own affairs, our greatest and most necessary affairs; to know our threatened misery to prevent it, and to know our offered happiness to attain it; to know our portion, our honour, our God, what can be more pleasant to the mind of man! Other men's matters we can pass by. But to know such things concerning our own souls as what we must be and do for ever, and what course we must take to be everlastingly happy, must needs be a feast to the mind of a wise man. Ask but a soul that is haunted with temptations to unbelief, whether any thing would be more welcome to him, than the clear and satisfying apprehensions of a lively faith? Ask one that lieth in tears and groans, through the feeling of their sin, and the fears of the wrath of God, and doubtings of his love, whether the satisfying knowledge of pardon and reconciliation, and divine acceptance, would not be more pleasant to them, than any of your merriments can be to you? Ask that poor soul that hath lost the apprehension of his evidences of grace, and walks in darkness, and hath no light, that seeks, and cries, and perceives no hearing whether the discovery of his evidences,