SECTION 3.

The vicissitudes of health.

THOU art now sick :-Wert thou not before, a long time healthful? Canst thou not be content to take thy. turns? Job ii. 10. If thou hadst not more days of health than hours of sickness, how canst thou think thou hadst cause to repine? Had the divine wisdom thought fit to mitigate thy many days' pain with the ease of one hour, it had been well worthy of thy thanks; but now that it hath beforehand requited thy few painful hours with years of perfect health, how unthankfully dost thou grudge at thy condition!

It was a foul mistake, if thou didst not from all earthly things expect a vicissitude: they cannot have their being without a change. As well may day be without a succession of night, and life without death, as a mortal body without fits of distemper. And how much better are these momentary changes, than that last change of a misery unchangeable! It was a woeful word that father Abraham said to the damned glutton; Son, remember, that thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good things, and Lazarus evil things; but now he is comforted, and thou art tormented.' Luke xvi. 25. Oh happy stripes, wherewith we are chastened of the Lord, that we may not be condemned with the world. 1 Cor. xi. 32. Oh welcome fevers, that may quit my soul from everlasting burnings!

SECTION 4.

Sickness better than sinful health.

THOU complainest of sickness :--I have known those who have bestowed tears upon their too-much health; sadly bemoaning the fear and danger of God's displeasure because they ailed nothing. A devout man once bewailed

his continued welfare as no small affliction, and God soon after fitted him with pain enough. The poor man joyed in the change, and held his sickness as a mercy; nor was it otherwise intended by him that sent it. Why are we too much dejected with that which others want; or find that to be tedious which others have desired. There have been medicinal agues, which the wise physician hath cast his patient into, for the cure of a worse distemper. A secure and lawless health, however nature takes it, is the most dangerous indisposition of the soul: if that may be healed by some few bodily pangs, the advantage is unspeakable.

Observe some vigorous gallant, who in the height of his spirit and the heat of his blood, eagerly pursues his carnal delights, thinking of no other heaven than the free gratification of his senses: and compare thy present state with his. Here thou liest, groaning and sighing, panting and shifting thy weary sides, complaining of the heavy pace of thy tedious hours; while he is frolicking with his gay companions, carousing, and sporting himself with his wanton mistress, and bathing himself in sensual pleasures. Tell me which of the two thou thinkest in the happier condition. Surely, unless shrunk into nothing but mere sense, if thou hast not cast off all thoughts of another world, thou shalt pity the misery of that impious jollity; and gratulate thyself on the advantage of thine humble and faithful suffering, as that which shall at last make thee an abundant amends by yielding the peaceable fruits of righteousness. Heb. xii. 11.

SECTION 5.

The greater sufferings of holier men; and the fortitude of heathens.

THY pain is grievous:-I apprehend it such, and pity thee with all my soul. But let me tell thee it is not such, but that holier men have suffered more.

Dost thou not hear the great precedent of patience

crying out from his dunghill, Oh that my grief were thoroughly weighed, and my calamities laid in the balance together; for now it would be heavier than the sand of the sea: therefore my words are swallowed up. For the arrows of the Almighty are within me, the poison whereof drinketh up my spirits: the terrors of God do set themselves against me.' Job vi. 2-4. Dost thou not hear the man after God's own heart speak of the voice of his roaring?' Psal. xxii. 1. Dost thou not see him that shrunk not from the bear, the lion, the giant, drenching his bed with his tears? Psal. vi. 6. Dost thou not hear the faithful crying out, I am the man that hath suffered affliction by the rod of his wrath. Surely against me is he turned he turneth his hand against me all the day. My flesh and skin hath he made old: he hath broken my bones.' Lam. iii. 1-4.

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Might I not easily shew thee the prophets, apostles, martyrs, the great favourites of heaven, some on the gridirons, others in boiling caldrons; some on the spits, others under the saws; some on the racks, others in fiery furnaces: most of them in such torments as, in comparison whereof, thy pains are but sports?

But why speak I of these mortal, and at the best, sinful men; when thou mayest see the Son of God, the Lord of life, the King of glory, sweating drops of blood in his dreadful agony; and mayest hear him cry upon the tree of shame and curse, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?' Alas; what are we capable of suffering, in comparison of these tortures? Who are we, that we should think much to share with the best of God's saints; yea with the dear and eternal Son of his love, our ever blessed Redeemer? Had not God found this the way to their heaven, they had not trod so deep in blood. Why then do we grudge to wet our feet, where they waded?

If from these holy ones, thou shalt turn thine eyes to some mere Pagans, let me show thee a man accounted infamous for his voluptousness, Epicurus the philosopher; who on his dying day, when he lay extremely tormented with an acute disease, and gasping for life, could even then profess his cheerfulness, and style

even that day blessed: The same mouth could also boast that if he were frying in the brazen bull of Phalaris, he could even there find contentment. Why should I tell thee of another, who in a glorious self-revenge, voluntarily burnt off his own right-hand; or of another, who after having a high provocation, offered himself to the worst of the merciless fury of his tormentors? Why shouldst thou think it strange,' said Seneca, that some men should be well pleased to be scorched, to be wounded, to be racked, to be killed? Frugality is a pain to the riotous labour is a punishment to the lazy: continence is a misery to the wanton: study is a torture to the slothful. All these things are not, in their own nature, difficult; but we are feeble and false-hearted.'

Shall these pagans attain to this height of magnanimity, out of the bravery of their manly resolutions: and. shall we christians droop and faint under gentler sufferings, while we profess to have moreover the advantage of faith to uphold and cheer us? Poor heathen souls! they never heard of any gracious engagements of a merciful God to stand by and comfort them. They never had met with those sweet messages from heaven, Call upon me in the day of trouble, and thou shalt glorify me.' Psal. 1. 15. Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.' Matt. xi. 28. 'Strengthen ye the weak hands, and confirm the feeble knees. Say to them that are of a fearful heart, Be strong, fear not; behold your God will come with vengeance, even God with a recompense: he will come and save you.' Isai. xxxv. 3, 4. They had not the heart of a Job to say, 'I know that my Redeemer liveth;' nor the eyes of a Stephen, to pierce the heaven, and to see their Saviour standing at the right-hand of God. They merely stood it out, in the strength of their natural courage, heightened with a vainglorious ambition of the fame which they believed would survive them. Whereas, we christians know that we have a God, the Father of all mercies, to stand by us; a Redeemer to deliver us; sweet and unfailable promises to sustain us; and at last, a crown of eternal glory to recompense us.

SECTION 6.

Our sufferings far below our deservings.

THOU art pained with sickness :-Look not at what thou feelest, but at what thou hast deserved to feel. Why doth a living man complain? Man suffereth for his sin. Lam. iii. 39. Alas, the wages of every sin is death, a double death; of body and of soul, temporal and eternal. Any thing below this is mercy. There is not the least of thy many thousand transgressions, but hath merited the infinite wrath of a just God; and thereby, more torments than thou art able to undergo.

What, dost thou complain of ease? Where thou owedst a thousand talents, thou art bidden to take thy Fill, and sit down and write fifty. Wilt thou not magnify the clemency of so favourable a creditor? Surely, were every twig, wherewith thou smartest, a scorpion; and every breath that thou sendest forth, a flame; this were far less than thy due. Oh the infinite goodness of our indulgent Father, that takes up with so gentle a correction!

Tell me, thou nice and delicate patient, if thou canst not bear these stripes, how wilt thou be able to endure those that are infinitely sorer? Alas, what are these to that hell, which abides for the impatient? There are exquisite pains, without intermission, which thou canst neither suffer nor avoid. Fear them, while thou grudgest at these. Lay thyself low, under the hand of thy God, and be thankful for a tolerable misery.

How graciously also hath the wisdom of God thought fit to temper our afflictions, by so contriving them, that if they be sharp, they are not long; and if they be long, they are not over sharp; that our strength might not be overlaid by our trials, either way. Be content; for either thy languishment shall be easy, or thy pain soon over. Extreme and everlasting are terms reserved for God's enemies in the other world. That is truly long which hath no end: that is truly painful which is not capable of any relaxation. What a short moment is it

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