reckoned amongst the fruits of repentance, or penances and satisfactions. Such as was that of Zaccheus; "If I have wronged any man by false accusation, I restore him fourfold." In the law of Moses, thieves convicted by law were tied to it; but if a thief, or an injurious person, did repent before his conviction, and made restitution of the wrong; he was tied only to the payment of one fifth part above the principal, by way of amends for the injury; and to do this, is an excellent fruit of repentance, and a part of self-judicature, a judging ourselves, that we be not judged of the Lord :' and if the injured person be satisfied with the simple restitution, then this fruit of repentance is to be gathered for the poor. 85. These are the fruits of repentance, which grow in Paradise, and will bring health to the nations, for these are a just deletory to the state of sin; they oppose a good against every evil; they make amends to our brother exactly; and to the church competently, and to God acceptably, through his mercy in Jesus Christ. These are all we can do in relation to what is past; some of them are parts of direct obedience, and consequently of return to God, and the others are parts, and exercises, and acts, of turning from the sin. Now although, so we turn from sin, it matters not by what instruments so excellent a conversion is effected; yet there must care be taken that in our return, there be, 1. hatred of sin; and, 2. love of God; and, 3. love of our brother. The first is served by all or any penal duty internal or external but sin must be confessed, and it must be left. The second is served by future obedience, by prayer, and by hope of pardon; and the last by alms and forgiveness: and we have no liberty or choice but in the exercise of the penal or punitive part of repentance: but in that every man is left to himself, and hath no necessity upon him, unless where he hath first submitted to a spiritual guide; or is noted publicly by the church. But if our sorrow be so trifling, or our sins so slightly hated, or our flesh so,tender, or our sensuality so unmortified, that we will endure nothing of exterior severity to mortify our sin, or to punish it, to prevent God's anger, or to allay it; we may chance to feel the load of our sins in temporal judgments, and have cause to suspect the sincerity of our repentance, and consequently to fear the : eternal. "We feel the bitter smart of this rod and scourge [of God]; because there is in us neither care to please him with our good deeds, nor to satisfy him, or make amends for our evil," that is, we neither live innocently nor penitently. Let the delicate, and the effeminate, do their penances in scarlet, and Tyrian purple, and fine linen, and faring deliciously every day;' but he that passionately desires pardon, and with sad apprehensions fears the event of his sins and God's displeasure,-will not refuse to suffer any thing that may procure a mercy, and endear God's favour to him; no man is a true penitent, but he that, upon any terms, is willing to accept his pardon. I end this with the words of St. Austin: "It suffices not to change our life from worse to better, unless we make amends, and do our satisfactions for what is past." That is, no man shall be pardoned but he that turns from sin, and mortifies it; that confesses it humbly, and forsakes it; that accuses himself, and justifies God; that prays for pardon, and pardons his offending brother: that will rather punish his flesh, than nurse his sin; that judges himself, that he may be acquitted by God: so these things be done, let every man choose his own instruments of mortification, and the instances and indications of his penitential sorrow. SECTION VII. The former Doctrine reduced to Practice. 86. I. HE that will judge of his repentance by his sorrow, must not judge of his sorrow by his tears, or by any one manner of expression. For sorrow puts on divers shapes, according to the temper of the body, or the natural or accidental affections of the mind, or to the present consideration of things. Wise men and women do not very often grieve in the same manner, or signify the trouble of intellectual apprehensions by the same indications. But if sin does equally smart, it may be equally complained of in all persons, whose natures are alike querulous and complaining; that is, when men are forced into repentance, they are very apprehensive St. Cyprian. epist. 8. et epist. 26. e Homil. 50. c. 15. of their present evils, and consequent dangers, and past follies; but if they repent more wisely, and upon higher considerations than the affrights of women and weak persons, they will put on such affections, as are the proper effects of those apprehensions by which they were moved. But although this be true in the nature, and secret, and proportioned causes, of things, yet there is no such simplicity and purity of apprehensions in any person, or any instance whatsoever, but there is something of sense mingled with every tittle of reason, and the consideration of ourselves mingles with our apprehensions of God; and when philosophy does something, our interest does more; and there are so few that leave their sins upon immaterial speculations, that even of them that pretend to do it, there is oftentimes no other reason inducing them to believe they do so, than because they do not know the secrets of their own hearts, and cannot discern their intentions: and therefore, when there is not a material, sensible grief in penitents, there is too often a just cause of suspecting their repentances; it does not always proceed from an innocent or a laudable cause, unless the penitent be indisposed, in all accidents, to such effects and impresses of passion. 87. II. He that cannot find any sensitive and pungent, material grief for his sins, may suspect himself, because so doing, he may serve some good ends: but on no wise may we suspect another upon that account: for we may be judges of ourselves, but not of others; and although we know enough of ourselves to suspect every thing of ourselves, yet we do not know so much of others, but that there may, for aught we know, be enough to excuse or acquit them in their inquiries after the worthiness of their repentance. 88. III. He that inquires after his own repentance, and finds no sharpnesses of grief or active, sensitive sorrow, is only so far to suspect his repentance, that he use all means to improve it; which is to be done by a long, serious, and lasting conversation with arguments of sorrow, which, like a continual dropping, will intenerate the spirit, and make it malleable to the first motives of repentance. No man repents but he that fears some evil to stand at the end of his evil course; and whoever feareth, unless he be abused by some collateral false persuasion, will be troubled for putting him self into so evil a condition and state of things: and not to be moved with sad apprehensions, is nothing else but not to have considered, or to have promised to himself pardon upon easier conditions than God hath promised. Therefore, let the penitent often meditate of the four last things, death and the day of judgment; the portion of the godly, and the sad, intolerable portion of accursed souls; of the greatness and extension of the duty of repentance, and the intention of its acts, or the spirit and manner of its performance; of the uncertainty of pardon in respect of his own secret, and sometimes undiscerned defects; the sad evils that God hath inflicted sometimes even upon penitent persons; the volatile nature of pleasure, and the shame of being a fool in the eyes of God and good men: the unworthy usages of ourselves, and evil returns to God for his great kindnesses; let him consider, that the last night's pleasure is not now at all, and how infinite a folly it is to die for that which hath no being; that one of the greatest torments of hell will be the very indignation at their own folly, for that foolish exchange which they have made; and there is nothing to allay the misery, or to support the spirit, of a man, who shall so extremely suffer, for so very a nothing: that it is an unspeakable horror, for a man eternally to be restless in the vexations of an everlasting fever, and that such a fever is as much short of the eternal anger of God, as a single sigh is of that fever; that a man cannot think what eternity is, nor suffer with patience, for one minute, the pains which are provided for that eternity; and to apply all this to himself, for aught every great sinner knows, this shall be in his lot; and if he dies before his sin is pardoned, he is too sure it shall be so: and whether his sin is pardoned or no, few men ever know till they be dead; but very many men presume; and they commonly, who have the least reason. He that often and long considers these things, will not have cause to complain of too merry a heart: but when men repent only in feasts, and company, and open house, and carelessness, and inconsideration, they will have cause to repent that they have not repented. 89. IV. Every true penitential sorrow is rather natural than solemn; that is, it is the product of our internal apprehensions, rather than outward order and command.. He that repents only by solemnity, at a certain period, by the expectation of to-morrow's sun, may indeed act a sorrow, but cannot be sure that he shall then be sorrowful. Other acts of repentance may be done in their proper period, by order, and command, upon set days, and indicted solemnities; such as is, fasting, and prayer, and alms, and confession, and disciplines, and all the instances of humiliation: but sorrow is not to be reckoned in this account, unless it dwells there before. When there is a natural abiding sorrow for our sins, any public day of humiliation can bring it forth, and put it into activity; but when a sinner is gay and intemperately merry upon Shrove-Tuesday, and resolves to mourn upon Ash-Wednesday; his sorrow hath in it more of the theatre than of the temple, and is not at all to be relied upon by him, that resolves to take severe accounts of himself. 90. V. In taking accounts of our penitential sorrow, we must be careful that we do not compare it with secular sorrow, and the passions effected by natural or sad accidents. For he that measures the passions of the mind by disproportionate objects, may as well compare music and a rose, and measure weights by the bushel, and think that every great man must have a great understanding, or that an ox hath a great courage, because he hath a great heart. He that finds fault with his repentance, because his sorrow is not so great in it, as in the saddest accidents of the world, should do well to make them equal if he can; if he can, or if he cannot, his work is done. If he can, let it be done, and then the inquiry and the scruple are at an end. If he cannot, let him not trouble himself; for what cannot be done, God never requires of us to do. 91. VI. Let no man overvalue a single act of sorrow, and call it repentance, or be at rest as soon as he hath wiped his eyes. For to be sorrowful (which is in the commandment) is something more than an act of sorrow; it is a permanent effect, and must abide as long as its cause is in being; not always actual and pungent, but habitual and ready, apt to pass into its symbolical expressions upon all just occasions, and it must always have this signification, viz. 92. VII. No man can be said ever truly to have grieved for his sins, if he, at any time after, does remember them with pleasure. Such a man might indeed have had an act of sor: |