Direct. I. Remember when you are injured by censures, that God is now trying your humility, charity, and patience; and therefore be most studious to exercise and preserve these three. 1. Take heed lest pride make you disdainful to the censurer; a humble man can bear contempt; hard censures hurt men so far as they are proud. 2. Take heed lest imbecility add to your impatience, and concur with pride: cannot you bear greater things than these? Impatience will disclose that badness in yourselves, which will make you censured much more; and it will show you as weak in one respect as the censurers are in another. 3. Take heed lest their fault do not draw you to overlook or undervalue that serious godliness which is in many of the censorious; and that you do not presently judge them hypocrites or schismatics, and abate your charity to them, or incline to handle them more roughly than the tenderness of Christ alloweth you. Remember that in all ages it hath been thus: the church hath had peevish children within, as well as persecuting enemies without; insomuch as Paul, Rom. xiv. giveth you the copy of these times, and giveth them this counsel, which from him I am giving you. The weak in knowledge were censorious, and judged the strong; the strong in knowledge were weak in charity, and contemned the weak: just as now one party saith, These are superstitious persons, and antichristian; the other saith, What giddy schismatics are these! but Paul chideth them both; one sort for censuring, and the other for despising them.
Direct. II. Take heed lest whilst you are impatient under their censures, you fall into the same sin yourselves. Do they censure you for differing in some forms or ceremonies from them? Take heed lest you over-censure them for their censoriousness: if you censure them as hypocrites who censure you as superstitious, you condemn yourselves while you are condemning them. For why will not censuring too far, prove you hypocrites also, if it prove them such?
Direct. III. Remember that Christ beareth with their weakness, who is wronged by it more than you, and is more against it. He doth not quit his title to them for their frowardness, nor cease his love, nor turn every infant out of his family that will cry and wrangle, nor every patient out of his hospital that doth complain and groan; and we must imitate our Lord, and love where he loveth, and pity where he pitieth, and be merciful as our heavenly Father is merciful.
Direct. IV. Remember how amiable a thing the least degree of grace is, even when it is clouded and blotted with infirmities. It is the divine nature, and the image of God, and the seed of glory; and therefore as an infant hath the noble nature of a man, and in all his weakness is much more honourable than the best of brutes (so that it is death to kill an infant, but not a beast): so is the most infirm and froward true christian more honourable and amiable than the most splendid infidel. Bear with them in love and honour to the image and interest of Christ.
Direct. V. Remember that you were once weak in grace yourselves; and if happy education under peaceable guides did not prevent it, it is two to one but you were yourselves censorious. Bear therefore with others as you bear with crying children, because you were once a child yourself. Not that the sin is ever the better, but you should be the more compassionate.
Direct. VI. Remember that your own strength and judgment is so great a mercy, that you should the easilier bear with a censorious tongue. The rich and noble can bear with the envious, remembering that it is happy to have that worth or felicity which men do envy. You suffer fools gladly, seeing you yourselves are wise. If you are in the right let losers talk.
Direct. VII. Remember that we shall be shortly together in heaven, where they will recant their censures, and you will easily forgive them, and perfectly love them. And will not the foresight of such a meeting cause you to bear with them, and forgive and love them now?
Direct. VIII. Remember how inconsiderable a thing it is as to your own interest, to be judged of man; and that you stand or fall to the judgment of the Lord, 1 Cor. iv. 3, 4. What are you the better or the worse for the thoughts or words of a man; when your salvation or damnation lieth upon God's judgment. It is too much hypocrisy, to be too much desirous of man's esteem and approbation, and too much troubled at his disesteem and censure, and not to be satisfied with the approbation of God. Read what is written against man-pleasing, part i.
Direct. IX. Make some advantage of other men's censures, for your own proficiency. If good men censure you, be not too quick in concluding that you are innocent, and justifying yourselves; but be suspicious of yourselves, lest they should prove the right, and examine yourselves with double diligence. If you find that you are clear in the point that you are censured for, suspect and examine lest some other sin hath provoked God to try you by these censures; and if you find not any other notable fault, let it make you the more watchful by way of prevention, seeing the eyes of God and men are on you; and it may be God's warning, to bid you take heed for the time to come. If you are thus brought to repentance, or to the more careful life, by occasion of men's censures, they will prove so great a benefit to you, that you may bear them the more easily.
Quest. I. How are we forbidden to put our trust in man? And how may it be done?
Answ. 1. You must not trust man for more than his proportion, and what belongs to man to do: you must not expect that from him which God alone can do. 2. You must not trust a bad, unfaithful man to do that which is proper to a good and faithful man to do. 3. You must not trust the best man, being imperfect and fallible, as fully as if you supposed him perfect and infallible: but having to do with a corrupted world, we must live in it with some measure of distrust to all men (for all that Cicero thought this contrary to the laws of friendship). But especially ignorant, dishonest, and fraudulent men must be most distrusted. As Bucholtzer said to his friend that was going to be a courtier, Commendo tibi fidem diabolorum, crede et contremisce: he that converseth with diabolical men, must believe them no further than is due to the children of the father of lies. But we must trust men as men, according to the principles of veracity that are left in corrupted nature; and we must trust men so far as reason showeth us cause, from their skill, fidelity, honesty, or interest: so a surgeon, a physician, a pilot may be trusted with our lives: and the skilfuller and faithfuller any man is, the more he is to be trusted.
Quest. II. Whom should a man choose for a matter of trust?
Answ. As the matter is: one that hath wisdom, skill, and fidelity, through conscience, honesty, friendship, or his own apparent interest.
Quest. III. In what cases may I commit a secret to another?
Answ. When there is a necessity of his knowing it, or a greater probability of good than hurt by it, in the evidence which a prudent man may see.
Quest. IV. What if another commit a thing to me with charge of secrecy, and I say nothing to him, and so promise it not; am I bound to secrecy in that case?
Answ. If you have cause to believe that he took your silence for consent, and would not else have committed it to you, you are obliged in point of fidelity, as well as friendship: except it be with robbers, or such as we are not bound to deal openly with, and on terms of equality.
Quest. V. What if it be a secret, but I am under no command or promise at all about it?
Answ. You must then proceed according to the laws of charity and friendship; and not reveal that which is to the injury of another, without a greater cause.
Quest. VI. What if it be against the king, or state, or common good?
Answ. You are bound to reveal it, so far as the safety of the king, or state, or common good requireth it; yea, though you swear the contrary.
Quest. VII. What if it be only against the good of some third ordinary person.
Answ. You must endeavour to prevent his wrong, either by revealing the thing, or dissuading from it, or by such means as prudence shall tell you are the meetest, by exercising your love to one, without doing wrong to the other.
Quest. VIII. What if a man secretly intrust his estate to me, for himself or children, when he is in debt, to defraud his creditors?
Answ. You ought not to take such a trust: and if you have done it, you ought not to hold it, but resign it to him that did intrust you. Yea, and to disclose the fraud, for the righting of the creditors, except it be in such a case as that the creditor is some such vicious or oppressing person, as you are not obliged to exercise that act of charity for; or when the consequents of revealing it will be a greater hurt, than the righting of him will compensate; especially when it is against the public good.
Quest. IX. What if a delinquent intrust me with his estate or person to secure it from penalty?
Answ. If it be one that is prosecuted by a due course of justice, cujus pœna debetur reipublicæ, whose punishment the common good requireth, the case must be decided as the former: you must not take nor keep such a trust. But if it be one whose repentance giveth you reason to believe, that his impunity will be more to the common good than his punishment, and that if the magistrate knew it, he ought to spare or pardon him, in this case you may conceal his person or estate; so be it you do it not by a lie, or any other sinful means, or such as will do more hurt than good.
Quest. X. What if a friend intrust me with his estate to secure it from some great taxes or tributes to the king? May I keep such a trust or not?
Answ. No: if they be just and legal taxes, for the maintenance of the magistrate or preservation of the commonwealth: but if it be done by a usurper that hath no authority, (or done without or beyond authority, the oppressing of the subject,) you may conceal his estate or your own by lawful means.
Quest. XI. What if a man that suffereth for religion, commit his person or estate to my trust?
Answ. You must be faithful to your trust, 1. If it be true religion and a good cause for which he suffereth. 2. Or if he be falsely accused of abuses in religion. 3. Or if he be faulty, but the penalty intended, from which you secure him, is incomparably beyond his fault and unjust. Supposing still that you save him only by lawful means, and that it be not like to tend to do more hurt than good, to the cause of religion or the commonwealth.
Quest. XII. What if a papist or other erroneous person intrust me (being of the same mind) to educate his children in that way, when he is dead, and afterward I come to see the error, must I perform that trust or not?
Answ. No: 1. Because no trust can oblige you to do hurt. 2. Because it is contrary to the primary intent of your friend; which was his children's good. And you may well suppose that had he seen his error, he would have intrusted you to do accordingly: you are bound therefore to answer his primary intention, and truly to endeavour his children's good.
Quest. XIII. But what if a man to whom another hath intrusted his children, turn papist or heretic, and so thinketh error to be truth? what must he do?
Answ. He is bound to turn back again to the truth, and do accordingly.
Object. But one saith this is the truth and another that; and he thinketh he is right.
Answ. There is but one of the contraries true. Men's thinking themselves to be in the right doth not make it so. And God will not change his laws, because they misunderstand or break them: therefore still that which God bindeth them to is to return unto the truth. And if they think that to be truth which is not, they are bound to think otherwise. If you say, They cannot; it is either not true, or it is long of themselves that they cannot: and they that cannot immediately, yet mediately can do it, in the due use of means.
Quest. XIV. What if I foresee that the taking a trust may hazard my estate, or otherwise hurt me, and yet my dying (or living) friend desireth it?
Answ. How far the law of christianity or friendship oblige you to hurt yourself for his good, must be discerned by a prudent considering, what your obligations are to the person, and whether the good of your granting his desires, or the hurt to yourself, is like to be the greater, and of more public consequence: and whether you injure not your own children or others by gratifying him. And upon such comparison, prudence must determine the case.
Quest. XV. But what if afterward the trust prove more to my hurt than I foresaw?
Answ. If it was your own fault that you foresaw it not, you must suffer proportionably for that fault; but otherwise you must compare your own hurt with the orphans', in case you do not perform the trust: and consider whether they may not be relieved another way; and whether you have reason to think that if the parent were alive and knew the danger, he would expect you should perform your trust, or would discharge you of it. If it be some great and unexpected dangers, which you think upon good grounds the parent would acquit you from if he were living, you fulfil your trust if you avoid them, and do that which would have been his will if he had known it. Otherwise you must perform your promise though it be to your loss and suffering.
Quest. XVI. But what if it was only a trust imposed by his desire and will, without my acceptance or promise to perform it?
Answ. You must do as you would be done by, and as the common good, and the laws of love and friendship, do require. Therefore the quality of the person, and your obligations to him, and especially the comparing of the consequent good and evil together, must decide the case.
Quest. XVII. What if the surviving kindred of the orphan be nearer to him than I am, and they censure me and calumniate me as injurious to the orphan, may I not ease myself of the trust, and cast it upon them?
Answ. In this case also, the measure of your suffering must first be compared with the measure of the orphan's good; and then your conscience must tell you whether you verily think the parent who intrusted you, would discharge you if he were alive and knew the case. If he would, though you promised, it is to be supposed that it was not the meaning of his desire or your promise, to incur such suffering: and if you would not believe that he would not discharge you if he were alive, then if you promised you must perform; but if you promised not, you must go no further than the law of love requireth.
Quest. XVIII. What is a minister of Christ to do, if a penitent person confess secretly some heinous or capital crime to him (as adultery, theft, robbery, murder); must it be concealed or not?
Answ. 1. If a purpose of sinning be antecedently confessed, it is unlawful to further the crime, or give opportunity to it by a concealment: but it must be so far opened as is necessary for the prevention of another's wrong, or the person's sin; especially if it be treason against the king or kingdom, or any thing against the common good.
2. When the punishment of the offender is apparently necessary to the good of others, especially to right the king or country, and to preserve them from danger by the offender or any other, it is a duty to open a past fault that is confessed, and to bring the offender to punishment, rather than injure the innocent by their impunity.
3. When restitution is necessary to a person injured, you may not by concealment hinder such restitution; but must procure it to your power where it may be had.
4. It is unlawful to promise universal secrecy absolutely to any penitent. But you must tell him before he confesseth, If your crime be such, as that opening it is necessary to the preservation or righting of king, or country, or your neighbour, or to my own safety, I shall not conceal it. That so men may know how far to trust you.
5. Yet in some rare cases, (as the preservation of our parents, king, or country,) it may be a duty to promise and perform concealment, when there is no hurt like to follow but the loss or hazard of our own lives, or liberties, or estates; and consequently if no hurt be like to follow but some private loss of another, which I cannot prevent without a greater hurt.
6. If a man ignorant of the law, and of his own danger, have rashly made a promise of secrecy, and yet be in doubt, he should open the case in hypothesi only, to some honest, able lawyer, inquiring if such a case should be, what the law requireth of the pastor, or what danger he is in if he conceal it; that he may be able further to judge of the case.
7. He that made no promise of secrecy, virtual or actual, may, cæteris paribus, bring the offender to shame or punishment rather than to fall into the like himself for the concealment.
8. He that rashly promised universal secrecy, must compare the penitent's danger and his own, and consider whose suffering is like to be more to the public detriment, all things considered, and that must be first avoided.
9. He that findeth it his duty to reveal the crime to save himself, must yet let the penitent have notice of it, that he may fly and escape; unless as aforesaid, when the interest of the king, or country, or others, doth more require his punishment.
10. But when there is no such necessity of the offender's punishment, for the prevention of the hurt or wrong of others, nor any great danger by concealment to the minister himself, I think that the crime, though it were capital, should be concealed. My reasons are,
(1.) Because though every man be bound to do his best to prevent sin, yet every man is not bound to bring offenders to punishment. He that is no magistrate, nor hath a special call so to do, may be in many cases not obliged to it.
(2.) It is commonly concluded that (in most cases) a capital offender is not bound to bring himself to punishment: and that which you could not know but by his free confession, is confessed to you only on your promise of concealment, seemeth to me to put you under no other obligation to bring him to punishment than he is under himself.
(3.) Christ's words and practice, in dismissing the woman taken in adultery, showeth that it is not always a duty for one that is no magistrate to prosecute a capital offender, but that sometimes his repentance and life may be preferred.
(4.) And magistrates' pardons show the same.
(5.) Otherwise no sinner would have the benefit of a counsellor to open his troubled conscience to: for if it be a duty to detect a great crime in order to a great punishment, why not a less also in order to a less punishment. And who would confess when it is to bring themselves to punishment?
11. In those countries where the laws allow pastors to conceal all crimes that penitents freely confess, it is left to the pastor's judgment to conceal all that he discerneth may be concealed without the greater injury of others, or of the king or commonwealth.
12. There is a knowledge of the faults of others, by common fame, especially many years after the committing, which doth not oblige the hearers to prosecute the offender. And yet a crime publicly known is more to be punished (lest impunity imbolden others to the like) than an unknown crime, revealed in confession.
Direct. I. Be not rash in receiving secrets or any other trusts: but first consider what you are thereby obliged to, and what difficulties may arise in the performance; and foresee all the consequents as far as is possible, before you undertake the trust; that you cast not yourselves into snares by mere inconsiderateness, and prepare not for perplexities and repentance.
Direct. II. Be very careful what persons you commit either trusts or secrets to; and be sure they be trusty by their wisdom, ability, and fidelity.
Direct. III. Be not too forward in revealing your own secrets to another's trust: for, 1. You cannot be certain of any one's secrecy, where you are most confident. 2. You oblige yourself too much to please that person, who by revealing your secrets may do you hurt; and are in fear lest carelessness, or unfaithfulness, or any accident should disclose it. 3. You burden your friend with the charge and care of secrecy.[168]
Direct. IV. Be faithful to your friend that doth intrust you; remembering that perfidiousness or falseness to a friend, is a crime against humanity, and all society, as well as against christianity; and stigmatizeth the guilty in the eyes of all men, with the brand of an odious, unsociable person.
Direct. V. Be not intimate with too many, nor confident in too many; for he that hath too many intimates, will be opening the secrets of one to another.
Direct. VI. Abhor covetousness and ambition; or else a bribe or the promise of preferment, will tempt you to perfidiousness. There is no trusting a selfish, worldly man.
Direct. VII. Remember that God is the avenger of perfidiousness, who will do it severely: and that even they that are pleased and served by it, do yet secretly disdain and detest the person that doth it; because they would not be so used themselves.
Direct. VIII. Yet take not friendship or fidelity to be an obligation to perfidiousness to God, or the king, or commonwealth, or to another, or to any sin whatsoever.
[168] Quod tacitum esse velis nemini dixeris. Si tibi non imperasti, quomodo ab alio silentium speras? Martin. Dumiens, de morib.
The two tables of the law are summed up by our Saviour in two comprehensive precepts: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and soul, and might:" and, "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." In the decalogue the first of these is the true meaning of the first commandment, put first because it is the principle of all obedience: and the second is the true meaning of the tenth commandment, which is therefore put last, because it is the comprehensive sum of other duties to our neighbour or injuries against him, which any other particular instances may contain; and also the principle of the duty to, or sin against, our neighbour. The meaning of the tenth commandment is variously conjectured at by expositors: some say that it speaketh against inward concupiscence and the sinful thoughts of the heart; but so do all the rest, in the true meaning of them, and must not be supposed to forbid the outward action only, nor to be any way defective: some say that it forbiddeth coveting and commandeth contentment with our state; so doth the eighth commandment; yet there is some part of the truth in both these. And the plain truth is, (as far as I can understand it,) that the sin forbidden is selfishness as opposite to the love of others, and the duty commanded is to love our neighbours; and that it is as is said, the sum of the second table, "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself:" as the captain leadeth the van, and the lieutenant bringeth up the rear; so, "Thou shalt love God above all," is the first commandment, and "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself," is the last, for the aforesaid reason. I shall therefore in these following directions speak to the two parts of the tenth commandment.
Direct. I. The first help against selfishness is to understand well the nature and malignity of the sin. For want of this it commonly prevaileth, with little suspicion, lamentation, and opposition. Let me briefly therefore anatomize it.
1. It is the radical, positive sin of the soul, comprehending seminally or causally all the rest. The corruption of man's nature, or his radical sin, hath two parts, the positive part, and the privative part: the positive part is selfishness, or the inordinate love of carnal self; the privative part is ungodliness or want of the love of God. Man's fall was his turning from God to himself; and his regeneration consisteth in the turning of him from himself to God; or the generating of the love of God (as comprehending faith and obedience) and the mortifying of self-love. Selfishness therefore is all positive sin in one, as want of the love of God is all privative sin in one. And self-denial and the love of God are all duties virtually; for the true love of man is comprehended in the love of God. Understand this, and you will understand what original and actual sin is, and what grace and duty are.
2. Therefore selfishness is the cause of all sin in the world, both positive and privative, and is virtually the breach of every one of God's commandments. For even the want of the love of God is caused by the inordinate love of self; as the consuming of other parts is caused by the dropsy, which tumefieth the belly. It is only selfishness which breaketh the fifth commandment, by causing rulers to oppress and persecute their subjects, and causeth subjects to be seditious and rebellious; and causeth all the bitterness, and quarrellings, and uncomfortableness, which ariseth among all relations. It is only selfishness which causeth the cursed wars of the earth, and desolation of countries, by plundering and burning; the murders which cry for revenge to heaven (whether civil, military, or religious): which causeth all the railings, fightings, envyings, malice; the schisms, and proud overvaluings of men's own understandings and opinions; and the contending of pastors, who shall be the greatest, and who shall have his will in proud usurpations and tyrannical impositions and domination: it is selfishness which hath set up and maintaineth the papacy, and causeth all the divisions between the western and the eastern churches; and all the cruelties, lies, and treachery exercised upon that account. It is selfishness which troubleth families and corporations, churches and kingdoms; which violateth vows, and bonds of friendship, and causeth all the tumults, and strifes, and troubles in the world. It is selfishness which causeth all covetousness, all pride and ambition, all luxury and voluptuousness, all surfeiting and drunkenness, chambering and wantonness, time-wasting and heart-corrupting sports, and all the riots and revelling of the sensual; all the contending for honours and preferments, and all the deceit in buying and selling, the stealing and robbing, the bribery and simony, the law-suits which are unjust, the perjuries, false witnessing, unrighteous judging, the oppressions, the revenge, and in one word, all the uncharitable and unjust actions in the world. This is the true nature of carnal selfishness, and it is no better.
3. Selfishness is the corruption of all the faculties of the soul. It is the sin of the mind, by self-conceitedness and pride; it is the sin of the will and affections, by self-love, and all the selfish passions which attend it; selfish desires, angers, sorrows, discontents, jealousies, fears, audacities, &c. It is the corruption of all the inferior faculties, and the whole conversation by self-seeking, and all the forementioned evils.
4. Selfishness is the commonest sin in the world. Every man is now born with it, and hath it more or less; and therefore every man should fear it.
5. Selfishness is the hardest sin in the world to overcome. In all the unregenerate it is predominant; for nothing but the sanctifying Spirit of God can overcome it. And in many thousands that seem very zealous in religion, and very mortified in all other respects, yet in some way or other selfishness doth so lamentably appear, yea, and is so strong in many that are sincere, that it is the greatest dishonour to the church of Christ, and hath tempted many to infidelity, or to doubt whether there be any such thing as true sanctification in the world. The persons that seemed the most mortified saints, if you do but cross them in their self-interest, or opinion, or will, or seem to slight them, or have a low esteem of them, what swellings, what heart-burnings, what bitter censurings, what proud impatience, if not schisms and separations, will it cause? God hath better servants; but too many which seem to themselves and others to be the best, are no better. How then should every christian abhor and watch against this universal evil!
Direct. II. Consider oft how amiable a creature man would be, and what a blessed condition the world and all societies would be in, if selfishness were but overcome. There would then be no pride, no covetousness, no sensuality, no tyranny or oppressing of the poor, no malice, cruelty, or persecution; no church divisions, no scandals, nothing to dishonour religion, or to hinder the saving progress of the gospel; no fraud or treacheries, no over-reaching or abusing others; no lying nor deceit, no neglect of our duty to others; in a word, no injustice or uncharitableness in the world.
Direct. III. Judge of good and evil by sober reason, and not by brutish sense. And then oft consider, whether really there be not a more excellent end than your selfish interest? even the public good of many, and the pleasing and glorifying of God. And whether all mediate good or evil should not be judged of principally by those highest ends? Sense leadeth men to selfishness or privateness of design; but true reason leadeth men to prefer the public, or any thing that is better than our self-interest.
Direct. IV. Nothing but returning by converting grace to the true love of God, and of man for his sake, will conquer selfishness. Make out therefore by earnest prayer for the Spirit of sanctification; and be sure that you have a true apprehension of the state of grace; that is, that it is indeed the love of God and man. Love is the fulfilling of the law; therefore love is the holiness of the soul: set your whole study upon the exercise and increase of love, and selfishness will die as love reviveth.
Direct. V. Study much the self-denying example and precepts of your Saviour. His life and doctrine are the liveliest representation of self-denial that ever was given to the world. Learn Christ, and you will learn self-denial. He had not sinful selfishness to mortify, yet natural self was so wonderfully denied by him, for his Father's will and our salvation, that no other book or teacher in the world will teach us this lesson so perfectly as he. Follow him from the manger, or rather from the womb, to the cross and grave; behold him in his poverty and contempt; enduring the contradiction and ingratitude of sinners, and making himself of no reputation; behold him apprehended, accused, condemned, crowned with thorns, clothed in purple, with a reed in his hand, scourged, and led away to execution, bearing his cross, and hanged up among thieves; forsaken by his own disciples, and all the world, and in part by him who is more than all the world; and consider why all this was done; for whom he did it, and what lesson he purposed hereby to teach us. Consider why be made it one half the condition of our salvation, and so great a part of the christian religion, to deny ourselves, and take up our cross and follow him; and will have no other to be his disciples, Luke xiv. 26, 31, 33. Were a crucified Christ more of our daily study, and did we make it our religion to learn and follow his holy example, self-denial would be better known and practised, and christianity would appear as it is, and not as it is misunderstood, adulterated and abused in the world. But because I have long ago written a "Treatise of Self-denial," I shall add no more.
Quest. I. In what sense is it that I must love my neighbour as myself? Whether in the kind, of love, or in the degree, or only in the reality.
Answ. The true meaning of the text is, you must love him according to his true worth, without the diversion and hinderance of selfishness and partiality. As you must love yourself according to that degree of goodness which is in you, and no more; so must you as impartially love your neighbour according to that degree of goodness which is in him. So that it truly extendeth to the reality, the kind and the degree of love, supposing it in both proportioned to the goodness of the object. But before this can be understood, the true nature of love must be well understood.
Quest. II. What is the true nature of love, both as to myself and neighbour?
Answ. Love is nothing but the prime motion of the will to its proper object; which is called complacence: the object of it is simple goodness, or good as such: it ariseth from suitableness between the object and the will, as appetite doth from the suitableness of the appetent fancy and food. This good, as it is variously modified, or any way differeth, doth accordingly cause or require a difference in our love; therefore that love which in its prime act and nature is but one, is diversely denominated, as its objects are diversified. To an object as simply good, in itself, it followeth the understanding's estimation, and is called, as I said, mere complacence or adhesion: to an object as not yet attained, but absent, or distant, and attainable, it is called desire or desiring love: and as expected, hope, or hoping love (which is a conjunction of desire and expectation): to an object nearest and attained, it is called fruition, or delight, or delighting love: to an object which by means must be attained, it is called seeking love, as it exciteth to the use of those means: and to an object missed it is, by accident, mourning love. But still love itself in its essential act is one and the same. As it respecteth an object which wanteth something to make it perfect, and desireth the supply of that want, it is called love of benevolence; denominated from this occasion, as it desireth to do good to him that is loved. And it is a love of the same nature which we exercise towards God, who needeth nothing, as we rejoice in that perfection and happiness which he hath; though it be not to be called properly by the same name. Goodness being the true object of love, is the true measure of it; and therefore God is infinitely and primitively good, is the prime and only simple object of our absolute, total love. And therefore those who understand no goodness in any being, but as profitable to them, or to some other creature, do know no God, nor love God as God, nor have any love but selfish and idolatrous. By this you may perceive the nature of love.
Quest. III. But may none be loved above the measure of his goodness? How then did God love us when we were not, or were his enemies? And how must we love the wicked? And how must an ungodly person love himself?
Answ. If only good, as such, be the object of love, then certainly none should be loved but in proportion to his goodness. But you must distinguish between mere natural and sensitive love or appetite, and rational love; and between love, and the effects of love; and between natural goodness in the object, and moral goodness. And so I further answer, 1. There is in every man a natural and sensitive love of himself and his own pleasure and felicity, and an averseness to death and pain and sorrow, as there is in every brute: and this God hath planted there for the preservation of the creature. This falleth not under commands or prohibitions directly, because it is not free but necessary; as no man is commanded or forbidden to be hungry, or thirsty, or weary, or the like: it is not this love which is meant when we are commanded to love our neighbour as ourselves. For I am not commanded to feel hunger, and thirst, nor to desire meat and drink by the sensitive appetite for my neighbour: nor sensitively to feel his pain or pleasure, nor to have that natural aversation from death and pain, nor sensitive desire of life and pleasure, for him as for myself. But the love here spoken of, is that volition with the due affection conjunct, which is our rational love, as being the act of our highest faculty, and falling under God's command. As to the sensitive love, it proceedeth not upon the sense or estimate of goodness in the person who loveth himself or any other (as beasts love their young ones without respect to their excellency). But it is rational love which is proportioned to the estimated goodness of the thing beloved. 2. Physical goodness may be in an object which hath no moral goodness; and this may contain a capacity of moral goodness: and each of them is amiable according to its nature and degree. 3. Beneficence is sometimes an effect of love, and sometimes an effect of wisdom only as to the object, and of love to something else; but it is never love itself. Usually benevolence is an act of love, and beneficence an effect, but not always. I may do good to another without any love to him, for some ends of my own, or for the sake of another. And a man may be obliged to greater beneficence, where he is not obliged to greater love.
And now to the instances, I further answer, 1. When we had no being, God did not properly love us in esse reali (unless you will go to our co-existence in eternity; for we were not in esse reali); but only as we were in esse cognito; which is but to love the idea in himself: but he purposed to make us, and to make us lovely, and to do us good, and so he had that which is called amor benevolentiæ to us: which properly was not love to us, but a love to himself, and the idea in his own eternal mind, which is called a loving us in esse cognito, and a purpose to make us good and lovely. That which is not lovely is not an object of love: man was not lovely indeed, when he was not; therefore he was not an object of love (but in esse cognito.) The same we say of God's loving us when we were enemies: he really loved us with complacency so far as our physical goodness made us lovely; and as morally lovely he did not love us, otherwise than in esse cognito. But he purposed to make us morally lovely, and gave us his mercies to that end; and so loved us with a love of benevolence, as it is called; which signifieth no more than out of a complacence (or love) to himself, and to us, as physically good, to purpose to make us morally good and happy. As to the incident difficulty of love beginning de novo in God, I have fully resolved it elsewhere.[169]
2. So also we must love a wicked man with a love of benevolence: which properly is but to love him in his physical worth, and his capacity of moral goodness and happiness, and thereupon (but especially through the love of God) to desire his happiness.
3. And as to the loving of ourselves, (besides the sensitive love before mentioned which respecteth self as self, and not as good,) a wicked man may rationally love himself according to his physical goodness as a man, which containeth his capacity of moral goodness, and so of being holy and serviceable to God and to good men, and happy in the fruition of God. But beyond all such goodness (which only is amiableness) no man may rationally love himself or any other, with the true formal act of love, which is complacence; though he may wish good to himself or another beyond the present goodness which is in them; nay, he wisheth them good, not because they are good, but because they want good.
And though some define loving to be bene velle alicui ut illi bene sit, to desire another's welfare, yet indeed this may be without any true formal love at all. As I may desire the welfare of my horse, without any proper love to him, even for myself and use. When God from eternity willeth to make Paul, and to convert and save him, ut illi bene sit, it is called love of benevolence; but properly it is only to be called, a will to make Paul good and lovely;[170] it being only God himself who is the original and ultimate end of that will and purpose; and himself only which he then loveth, there being nothing but himself to love; till in that instant that Paul is existent, and so really lovely. For Paul in esse cognito is not Paul; yet no reality doth oriri de novo in God; but a new respect and denomination, and in the creature new effects. (Of which elsewhere.)
Quest. IV. Must I love every one as much as myself in degree, or only some?
Answ. You must love every one impartially as yourself, according to his goodness; and you must wish as well to every one as to yourself; but you must love no man complacentially so much as yourself, who is not or seemeth not to have as much loveliness, that is, as much goodness, or as much of God, as yourself.
Quest. V. Must I love any one more than myself?
Answ. Yes, every one that is and appeareth better than yourself. Your sensitive love to another cannot be as much as to yourself; and your beneficence (ordinarily) must be most to yourself, because God in nature and his laws hath so appointed it; and your benevolence to yourself and to others must be alike; but your rational estimation, and love or complacence, (with the honour and praise attending it,) must be more to every one that is better than yourself; for that which is best is most amiable, and that which hath most of God.
Quest. VI. Will it not then follow, that I must love another man's wife and children better than mine own, when they are really better?
Answ. Yes, no doubt; but it is only with that rational, estimative love. But there is besides a love to wife and children, which is in some measure sensitive, which you are not obliged to give to others; and rationally they are more amiable to you, in their peculiar relations and respects, though others are more amiable in other respects; and besides, though you value and rationally love another more, yet the expressions must not be the same; for those must follow the relation according to God's command. You may not cohabit or embrace, nor maintain and provide for others as your own, even when you rationally love them more; the common good requires this order in the expressive part, as well as God's command.
Quest. VII. Who is my neighbour that I must love as myself?
Answ. Not devils or damned souls, who are under justice and from under mercy, and are none of our society: but, 1. Every natural man in via, being a member of God's kingdom in the same world, is to be loved as my natural self; and every spiritual man as a member of the same kingdom of Christ, must be loved as my spiritual self; and every spiritual man as such, above my natural self as such; and no natural man as such, so much as my spiritual self as such: so that no man on earth is excluded from your love, which must be impartial to all as to yourself, but proportioned to their goodness.
Quest. VIII. Are not antichrist and those that sin against the Holy Ghost excepted out of this our love, and out of our prayers and endeavours of their good?
Answ. Those that (with Zanchy) think Mahomet to be antichrist, may so conclude, because he is dead and out of our communion. Those that take the papacy to be antichrist (as most protestants do) cannot so conclude; because, as there is but one antichrist, that is, one papacy, though a hundred popes be in that seat, so every one of those popes is in via, and under mercy, and recoverable out of that condition; and therefore is to be loved and prayed for accordingly. And as for those that blaspheme the Holy Ghost, it is a sin that one man cannot certainly know in another, ordinarily at least; and therefore cannot characterize a person unfit for our love, and prayers, and endeavours.
Quest. IX. May we not hate the enemies of God? How then must we love them as ourselves?
Answ. We may and must hate sin in every one; and where it is predominant, as God is said to hate the sinner for his sin, so must we; and yet still love him as ourselves: for you must hate sin in yourselves as much or more than in any other; and if you are wicked you must hate yourselves as such; yea, if you are godly, you must secundum quid, or in that measure as you are sinful, abhor, and loathe, and hate yourselves as such; and yet you must love yourselves according to the measure of all that natural and moral goodness which is in you; and you must desire and endeavour all the good to yourselves that you can. Just so must you hate and love another; love them and hate them impartially as you must do yourselves.
Quest. X. May I not wish hurt sometimes to another, more than to myself?
Answ. You may wish a mediate hurt which tendeth to his good, or to the good of others; but you must never wish any final hurt and misery to him. You may wish your friend a vomit or bloodletting for his cure; and you may wish him some affliction, when it is needful and apt to humble him and do him good, or to restrain him from doing hurt to others; and on the same accounts, and for the public good, you may desire penal justice to be done upon him, yea, sometimes unto death; but still with a desire of the saving of his soul. And such hurt you may also wish yourself as is necessary to your good; but you are not to wish the same penalties to yourself, 1. Because you have somewhat else first to wish and do, even to repent and prevent it. 2. Because you are not bound ordinarily to do execution upon yourself. It is more in your power to repent yourself, and make repentance less necessary by humble confession and amendment, than to bring another to repentance. Yet I may add also, that hypothetically you may wish that destruction to the enemies of God in this life, which absolutely you may not wish; that is, you must desire first that they may repent, and secondly, that they may be restrained from hurting others; but if neither of these may be attained, that they may be cut off.
Direct. I. Take heed of selfishness and covetousness, the two great enemies of love. Of which I have spoken more at large before.
Direct. II. Fall out with no man; or if you do, be speedily reconciled; for passions and dissensions are the extinguishers of love.
Direct. III. Love God truly, and you will easily love your neighbour; for you will see God's image on him, or interest in him, and feel all his precepts and mercies obliging you hereunto. As 1 John iii. 11, 23; and iv. 7, 12, 20, 21.
Direct. IV. To this end let Christ be your continual study. He is the full revelation of the love of God; the lively pattern of love, and the best teacher of it that ever was in the world: his incarnation, life, and sufferings, his gospel and covenant, his intercession and preparations for our heavenly felicity, all are the great demonstrations of condescending, matchless love. Mark both God's love to us in him, and his love to man, and you will have the best directive and incentive of your love.
Direct. V. Observe all the good which is in every man. Consider of the good of humanity in his nature, and the goodness of all that truth which he confesseth, and of all that moral good which appeareth in his heart and life; and let not oversight or partiality cause you to overlook it, or make light of it. For it is goodness which is the only attractive of love; and if you overlook men's goodness, you cannot love them.
Direct. VI. Abhor and beware of a censorious disposition, which magnifieth men's faults, and vilifieth their virtues, and maketh men seem worse than indeed they are. For as this cometh from the want of love, so doth it destroy that little which is left.
Direct. VII. Beware of superstition and an erring judgment, which maketh men place religion where God never placed it. For when this hath taught you to make duties and sins of your own humour and invention, it will quickly teach you to love or hate men accordingly as they fit or cross your opinion and humour: thus many a papist loveth not those that are not subjects of the Roman monarch, and that follow not all his irrational fopperies. Many an anabaptist loveth not those that are against his opinion of re-baptizing: one loveth not those who are for liturgies, forms of worship, and church music; and many love not those who are against them; and so of other things (of which more anon).
Direct. VIII. Avoid the company of censorious backbiters and proud contemners of their brethren: hearken not to them that are causelessly vilifying others, aggravating their faults and extenuating their virtues. For such proud, supercilious persons (religious or profane) are but the messengers of Satan, by whom he entreateth you to hate your neighbour, or abate your love to him. And to hear them speak evil of others, is but to go hear a sermon against charity, which may take with such hearts as ours before we are aware.
Direct. IX. Keep still the motives and incentives of love upon your minds. Which I shall here next set before you.
Motive I. Consider well of the image and interest of God in man. The worst man is his creature, and hath his natural image, though not his moral image; and you should love the work for the workman's sake. There is something of God upon all human nature above the brutes; it is intelligent, and capable of knowing him, of loving him, and of serving him; and possibly may be brought to do all this better than you can do it. Undervalue not the noble nature of man, nor overlook that of God which is upon them, nor the interest which he hath in them.
Motive II. Consider well of God's own love to man. He hateth their sins more than any of us; and yet he loveth his workmanship upon them: "And maketh his sun to shine and his rain to fall on the evil and on the good, on the just and on the unjust," Matt. v. 45. And what should more stir us up to love, than to be like to God?
Motive III. And think oft of the love of Christ unto mankind; yea, even unto his enemies. Can you have a better example, a livelier incentive, or a surer guide?
Motive IV. Consider of our unity of nature with all men: suitableness breedeth and maintaineth love. Even birds and beasts do love their kind; and man should much more have a love to man, as being of the same specific form.
Motive V. Love is the principle of doing good to others. It inclineth men to beneficence: and all men call him good who is inclined to do good.
Motive VI. Love is the bond of societies; of families, cities, kingdoms, and churches: without love, they will be but enemies conjunct; who are so much the more hurtful and pernicious to each other, by how much they are nearer to each other. The soul of societies is gone when love is gone.
Motive VII. Consider why it is that you love yourselves, (rationally,) and why it is that you would be beloved of others. And you will see that the same reasons will be of equal force to call for love to others from you.
Motive VIII. What abundance of duty is summarily performed in love! And what abundance of sin is avoided and prevented by it! If it be the fulfilling of the law, it avoideth all the violations of the law (proportionably). So far as you have love, you will neither dishonour superiors, nor oppress inferiors, nor injure equals: you will neither covet that which is your neighbour's, nor envy, nor malice them, nor defame, nor backbite, nor censure them unjustly; nor will you rob them or defraud them, nor withhold any duty or kindness to them.
Motive IX. Consider how much love pleaseth God; and why it is made so great a part of all your duty; and why the gospel doth so highly commend it, and so strictly command it, and so terribly condemn the want of it! And also how suitable a duty it is for you, who are obliged by so much love of God! These things well studied will not be without effect.
Motive X. Consider also that it is your own interest, as well as your great duty. 1. It is the soundness and honesty of your hearts. 2. It is pleasing to that God on whom only you depend. 3. It is a condition of your receiving the saving benefits of his love. 4. It is an amiable virtue, and maketh you lovely to all sober men: all men love a loving nature, and hate those that hate and hurt their neighbours. Love commandeth love, and hurtfulness is hatefulness. 5. It is a sweet, delightful duty: all love is essentiated with some complacence and delight. 6. It tendeth to the ease and quietness of your lives. What contentions and troubles will love avoid! What peace and pleasure doth it cause in families, neighbourhoods, and all societies! And what brawling vexations come where it is wanting! It will make all your neighbours and relations to be a comfort and delight to you, which would be a burden and trouble, if love were absent. 7. It maketh all other men's felicity and comforts to be yours. If you love them as yourselves, their riches, their health, their honours, their lordships, their kingdoms, yea, more, their knowledge, and learning, and grace, and happiness, are partly to you as your own: as the comforts of wife and children, and your dearest friends, are; and as our love to Christ, and the blessed angels and saints in heaven, do make their joys to be partly ours. How excellent, and easy, and honest a way is this, of making all the world your own, and receiving that benefit and pleasure from all things both in heaven and earth, which no distance, no malice of enemies can deny you! If those whom you truly love have it, you have it. Why then do you complain that you have no more health, or wealth, or honour, or that others are preferred before you? Love your neighbour as yourselves, and then you will be comforted in his health, his wealth, and his preferment, and say, Those have it whom I love as myself, and therefore it is to me as mine own. When you see your neighbour's houses, pastures, corn, and cattle, love will make it as good and pleasant to you as if it were your own. Why else do you rejoice in the portions and estates of your children as if it were your own? The covetous man saith, Oh how glad should I be if this house, this land, this corn were mine: but love will make you say, It is all to me as mine own. What a sure and cheap way is this of making all the world your own! Oh what a mercy doth God bestow on his servants' souls, in the day that he sanctifieth them with unfeigned love! How much doth he give us in that one grace! And oh what a world of blessing and comforts do the ungodly, the malicious, the selfish, and the censorious cast away, when they cast away or quench the love of their neighbours; and what abundance of calamity do they bring upon themselves! In this one summary instance we may see, how much religion and obedience to God doth tend to our own felicity and delight; and how easy a work it would be, if a wicked heart did not make it difficult! and how great a plague sin is unto the sinner; and how sore a punishment of itself! And by this you may see, what it is that all fallings-out, divisions, and contentions tend to; and all temptations to the abatement of our love; and who it is that is the greater loser by it, when love to our neighbour is lost; and that backbiters and censurers who speak ill of others, come to us as the greatest enemies and thieves, to rob us of our chiefest jewel and greatest comfort in this world; and accordingly should they be entertained.