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4. But, beyond this, is the reason which is the consummation of all the faithful. The Gospel' is called the 'Spirit,' because by and in the Gospel, God hath given to us not only the Spirit of manifestation,' that is, of instruction and of catechism, of faith and confident assent; but the Spirit of confirmation, or obsignation' to all them that believe and obey the Gospel of Christ: that is, the power of God is come upon our hearts, by which, in an admirable manner, we are made sure of a glorious inheritance; made sure (I say) in the nature of the thing; and our own persuasions also are confirmed with an excellent, a comfortable, a discerning, and a reasonable hope: in the strength of which, and by whose aid, as we do not doubt of the performance of the promise, so we vigorously pursue all the parts of the condition, and are enabled to work all the work of God, so as not to be affrighted with fear, or seduced by vanity, or oppressed by lust, or drawn off by evil example, or abused by riches, or imprisoned by ambition and secular designs. This the Spirit of God does work in all his servants; and is called, Spirit of obsignation, or the confirming Spirit,' because it confirms our hope, and assures our title to life eternal; and by means of it, and other its collateral assistances, it also confirms us in our duty, that we may not only profess in word, but live lives according to the Gospel. And this is the sense of the Spirit" mentioned in the text; "Ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you:" that is, if ye be made partakers of the Gospel, or of the Spirit of manifestation;' if ye be truly entitled to God, and have received the promise of the Father, then are ye not carnal men; ye are 'spiritual,' ye are 'in the Spirit: if ye have the Spirit in one sense to any purpose, ye have it also in another: if the Spirit be in you, you are in it; if it hath given you hope, it hath also enabled and ascertained your duty. For the Spirit of manifestation' will but upbraid you in the shame and horrors of a sad eternity, if you have not the Spirit of obsignation:' if the Holy Ghost be not come upon you to great purposes of holiness, all other pretences are vain,-ye are still in the flesh, which shall never inherit the kingdom of God.

"In the Spirit :" that is, in the power of the Spirit. So the Greeks call him ov, who is possessed by a spirit, whom God hath filled with a celestial immission; he is said

to be in God, when God is in him. And it is a similitude taken from persons encompassed with guards; they are in custodia,' that is in their power,' under their command, moved at their dispose; they rest in their time, and receive laws from their authority, and admit visitors whom they appoint, and must be employed as they shall suffer: so are men who are in the Spirit; that is, they believe as he teaches, they work as he enables, they choose what he calls good, they are friends of his friends, and they hate with his hatred: with this only difference, that persons in custody are forced to do what their keepers please, and nothing is free but their wills; but they that are under the command of the Spirit, do all things which the Spirit commands, but they do them cheerfully; and their will is now the prisoner, but it is in libera custodia,' the will is where it ought to be, and where it desires to be and it cannot easily choose any thing else, because it is extremely in love with this, as the saints and angels in their state of beatific vision cannot choose but love God; and yet the liberty of their choice is not lessened, because the object fills all the capacities of the will and the understanding. Indifferency to an object is the lowest degree of liberty, and supposes unworthiness or defect in the object, or the apprehension: but the will is then the freest and most perfect in its operation, when it entirely pursues a good with so certain determination and clear election, that the contrary evil cannot come into dispute or pretence. Such in our proportions is the liberty of the sons of God; it is a holy and amiable captivity to the Spirit: the will of man is in love with those chains, which draw us to God, and loves the fetters that confine us to the pleasures and religion of the kingdom. And as no man will complain that his temples are restrained, and his head his prisoner, when it is encircled with a crown; so when the Son of God hath made us free, and hath only subjected us to the service and dominion of the Spirit, we are free as princes within the circle of their diadem, and our chains are bracelets, and the law is a law of liberty, and 'his service is perfect freedom;' and the more we are subjects, the more we shall reign as kings;' and the faster we run, the easier is our burden; and Christ's yoke is like feathers to a bird, not loads, but helps to motion, without them the body falls; and we do not pity birds, when in summer we wish them unfeathered and callow, or bald as

eggs, that they might be cooler and lighter. Such is the load and captivity of the soul, when we do the work of God, and are his servants, and under the government of the Spirit. They that strive to be quit of this subjection, love the liberty of outlaws, and the licentiousness of anarchy, and the freedom of sad widows and distressed orphans: for so rebels, and fools, and children, long to be rid of their princes, and their guardians, and their tutors, that they may be accursed without law, and be undone without control, and be ignorant and miserable without a teacher, and without discipline. He that is in the Spirit, is under tutors and governors, until the time appointed of the Father, just as all great heirs are; only, the first seizure the Spirit makes is upon the will. He that loves the yoke of Christ, and the discipline of the Gospel, he is in the Spirit, that is, in the Spirit's power.

Upon this foundation the Apostle hath built these two propositions. 1. Whosoever hath not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his he does not belong to Christ at all: he is not partaker of his Spirit, and therefore shall never be partaker of his glory. 2. Whosoever is in Christ is dead to sin, and lives to the Spirit of Christ: that is, lives a spiritual, a holy, and a sanctified life. These are to be considered distinctly.

1. All that belong to Christ have the Spirit of Christ. Immediately before the ascension, our blessed Saviour bid his disciples "tarry in Jerusalem, till they should receive the promise of the Father." Whosoever stay at Jerusalem, and are in the actual communion of the church of God, shall certainly receive this promise." For it is made to you and to your children" (saith St. Peter,)" and to as many as the Lord our God shall call."-All shall receive the Spirit of Christ, the promise of the Father, because this was the great instrument of distinction between the law and the Gospel. In the law, God gave his Spirit, 1. to some; to them, 2. extraregularly; 3. without solemnity, 4. in small proportions, like the dew upon Gideon's fleece; a little portion was wet sometimes with the dew of heaven, when all the earth besides was dry. And the Jews called it filiam vocis,' the daughter of a voice," still, and small, and seldom, and that by secret whispers, and sometimes inarticulate, by way of enthusiasm, rather than of instruction; and God spake by

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the prophets, transmitting the sound as through an organ, pipe, things which themselves oftentimes understood not. But in the Gospel the Spirit is given without measure: first poured forth upon our head Christ Jesus; then descending upon the beard of Aaron, the fathers of the church, and thence falling, like the tears of the balsam of Judea, upon the foot of the plant, upon the lowest of the people. And this is given regularly to all that ask it, to all that can receive it, and by a solemn ceremony, and conveyed by a sacrament: and is now, not the daughter of a voice, but the mother of many voices, of divided tongues, and united hearts; of the tongues of prophets, and the duty of saints; of the sermons of apostles, and the wisdom of governors; it is the parent of boldness and fortitude to martyrs, the fountain of learning to doctors, an ocean of all things excellent to all who are within the ship and bounds of the catholic church: so that old men, and young men, maidens, and boys, the scribe and the unlearned, the judge and the advocate, the priest and the people, are full of the Spirit, if they belong to God. Moses's wish is fulfilled, and all the Lord's people are prophets in some sense or other.

In the wisdom of the ancients it was observed, that there are four great cords, which tie the heart of man to inconvenience, and a prison, make it a servant of vanity, and an heir of corruption; 1. pleasure, and, 2. pain; 3. fear, and, 4. desire.

Πρὸς τὸ τετράχορδον δ' ὅλον,

τὴν ἡδονὴν, ἐπιθυμίαν, λύπην, φόβον,

ἀσκήσεως καὶ πολλῆς μάχης δέοι.

These are they that exercise all the wisdom and resolutions of man, and all the powers that God hath given him.

οὗτοι γὰρ, οὗτοι καὶ διὰ σπλάγχνων ἀεὶ

χωροῦσι καὶ κυκῶσιν ἀνθρώπων κέαρ, said Agathon.

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These are those evil spirits that possess the heart of man, and mingle with all his actions; so that either men are tempted to, 1. lust by pleasure,' or, 2. to 'baser arts by covetousness,' or, 3. to impatience by sorrow,' or, 4. to dishonourable actions by fear:' and this is the state of man by nature, and under the law, and for ever, till the Spirit of God came, and by four special operations cured these four in

conveniences, and restrained or sweetened these unwholesome waters.

1. God gave us his Spirit that we might be insensible of worldly pleasures, having our souls wholly filled with spiritual and heavenly relishes. For when God's Spirit hath entered us, and possessed us as his temple, or as his dwelling, instantly we begin to taste manna, and to loathe the diet of Egypt; we begin to consider concerning heaven, and to prefer eternity before moments, and to love the pleasures of the soul above the sottish and beastly pleasures of the body. Then we can consider that the pleasures of a drunken meeting cannot make recompense for the pains of a surfeit, and that night's intemperance; much less for the torments of eternity: then we are quick to discern that the itch and scab of lustful appetites is not worth the charges of a chirurgeon: much less can it pay for the disgrace, the danger, the sickness, the death, and the hell, of lustful persons. Then we wonder that any man should venture his head to get a crown unjustly; or that, for the hazard of a victory, he should throw away all his hopes of heaven certainly.

nour.

A man that hath tasted of God's Spirit, can instantly discern the madness that is in rage, the folly and the disease that are in envy, the anguish and tediousness that are in lust, the dishonour that is in breaking our faith and telling a lie; and understands things truly as they are; that is, that charity is the greatest nobleness in the world; that religion hath in it the greatest pleasures; that temperance is the best security of health; that humility is the surest way to hoAnd all these relishes are nothing but antepasts of heaven, where the quintessence of all these pleasures shall be swallowed for ever; where the chaste shall follow the Lamb, and the virgins sing there where the mother of God shall reign; and the zealous converters of souls, and labourers in God's vineyard, shall worship eternally; where St. Peter and St. Paul do wear their crowns of righteousness; and the patient persons shall be rewarded with Job, and the meek persons with Christ and Moses, and all with God: the very expectation of which,-proceeded from a hope begotten in us by the Spirit of manifestation,—and bred up and strengthened by the Spirit of obsignation,'—is so delicious an entertainment of all our reasonable appetites, that a spiritual man can no more be removed or enticed from the love

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