V1 PREFACE. But the shortness, the vanity, the miseries of human life, have been the subject of the complaints of all sorts ofconsidering persons, Heathens as well as Christians; nor is it my present business to insist upon them. My inquiry is only after the relief which we may obtain against all these evils, that we faint not under them, that we may have the victory over them. This in gen- eral is declared by the apostle, 2 Cor. iv. 8. We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed: we are per- plexed, but not in despair; verse 9. Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed, ver. 16. But for this cause we faint not, but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day, ver. 17. For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceedingand eter- nal weight of glory; ver. 18. While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen, are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal. Our beholding by faith things that are not seen, things spiritual and eternal, will alleviate all our afflic- tions, make their burden light, and preserve our souls froth fainting under them. Of these things the glory of Christ whereof we treat, is the principle, and in a due sense comprehensive of them all. For we behold the glory of God himself in the face of Jesus Christ. He that can at all times retreat unto the contemplation of this glory, will be carried above the perplexing pre- vailing sense of any of these evils, of a confluence of them all. Crus nil sentit in nervo dom animus est in ccelo. It is a woful kind of life, when men scramble for poor perishing reliefs in their distresses. This is the univer- sal remedy and cure, the only balsam for all our dis- eases.Whatever presseth, urgeth, perplexed]; if we can but retreat in our minds unto a view of this glory, and a due consideration of our own interest therein; comfort and supportment will be administered unto us. Wicked men in their distresses (which sometimes over- take them also) are like a troubled sea that cannot rest. Others are heartless and despond, not without secret repiuings at the wise disposals of divine Providence, especially when they look on the better conditions (as they suppose) of others. And the best of us are apt all to wax faint and weary, when these things press upon us in an unusual manner, or under their long continu- ance without a prospect of relief. This is the strong hold which such prisoners ofhope are to turn themselves unto. In this contemplation of the glory of Christ they will find rest unto their own souls. For, 1-. It will herein, and in the discharge of this duty, be made evident, how slight and inconsiderable all these things are, fromwhence our troubles and distresses do arise. For they all grow on this root of an over- valua- tion of temporal things. And unless we can arrive un- to a fixed judgment, that all things here below are tran- sitory and perishing, reaching only unto the outward man or the body, (perhaps unto the killing of it) that thebest of them have nothing that is truly substantial or abiding in them, that there are other things wherein. we have an assured interest, that are incomparablybet- ter than they, and above them, it is impossible but that we must spend our lives in fears, sorrows, and distrac- tions. One real viewof the gloryof Christ, and of our own concernment therein, will give us a full relief in this matter. For what are all the things of this life, what is the good or evil of them, in comparison of an interest in this transcendent glory? When we have due apprehensions hereof, when our minds are possessed with thoughts of it, when our affections reach out after its enjoyments, let pain, and sickness, and sorrows, and fears, and dangers, and death, any what they will, weshall have in readiness wherewith to combat with them, and overcome them; and that on this considera- tion, that they are all outward, transitory, and pass- ing away; whereas our minds are fixed on those things which are eternal, and filled with incomprehen- sible glory. 2. The minds of men are apt by their troubles to be cast into disorder, to be tossed up and down and dis- quieted with various affections and passions. So the psalmist found it in himself in the time of his distress; whence he calls himselfunto that account; why art thou cast down O my soul? and why art thou disquieted in me? And indeed the mind on all such occasions, is its own greatest troubler. It is apt to letloose its passions of fear and sorrow, which act themselves in innumera- ble perplexing thoughts until it is carried utterly out of its own power. But in this state a due contemplation of the glory of Christ, will restore and compose the mind, bring it into a sedate quiet frame, wherein faith will be able to say unto the winds and waves ofdistem- pered passions, Peace, be still, and they shall obey it.
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy OTcyMjk=