many duties; and it contains in it all the parts of a holy life, from the time of our return, to the day of our death inclufively; and it hath in it fome things fpecially relating to the fins of our former days, which are now to be abolished by fpecial arts, and have obliged us to fpecial labours, and brought in many new neceffities, and put us into a very great deal of danger. And because it is a duty confifting of so many parts and fo much employment, it also repairs much time and leaves a man in the fame degree of hope or pardon, as is his reftitution to the state of righteoufnefs and holy living, for which we covenanted in Baptifim. For we must know that there is but one Repentance in a man's whole life, if Repentance be taken in the proper and strict Evangelical Covenant-fence, and not after the ordinary understanding of the word: That is, we are but once to change our whole ftate of life, from the power of the Devil and his intire pofleflion, from the ftate of fin and death, from the body of corruption to the life of grace, to the poffeffion of Jefus, to the Kingdom of the Gofpel; and this is done in the Baptifm of Water, or in the Baptilm of the Spirit, when the first Rite comes to be verified by God's Grace coming upon us, and by our obedience to the heavenly calling, we working toge ther with God. After this change, if ever we fall into the contrary ftate, and be wholly eftranged from God and Religion, and profefs our felves fervants of unrighteoufnels, God hath made no more covenant of reítitution to us, there is no place left for any more Repentance, or intire change of condition, birth: a man can be regenerated but once. And fuch are voluntary, malicious Apoftates, Witches, obstinate, impenitent perfons, and the like. But if we be overtaken by infirmity, or enter into the marches or borders of this eftate, and commit a grievous fin, or ten, or twenty, fo we be not in the intire poffeffion of the Devil, we are for the prefent in a damnable condition if we die: but if we live, we are in a recoverable condition; for fo we may repent often. We repent or rile from death but once, but from ficknels or new many many times; and by the grace of God we fhall be pardoned if fo we repent. But our hopes of pardon are just as is the Repentance; which if it be timely, hearty, induftrious and effective, God accepts, not by weighing grains or fcruples, but by eftimating the great proportions of our life. A hearty endeavour and an effectual general change fhall get the pardon; the unvoidable infirmities, and paft evils, and prefent imperfections, and fhort interruptions, against which we watch and pray, and strive, being put upon the accounts of the Crofs, and payed for by the holy Jefus. This is the ftate and condition of Repentance: its parts and actions must be valued according to the following Rules. As and Parts of Repentance. Ezek. 27.31 Jam. 4.9. 1. He that repents truly is greatly forrowful for his paft fins; not with a fuperficial figh or tear, but a pungent afflictive forrow; fuch a forrow as hates the fin fo much, that the man would chufe to die rather than act it any more. This forrow is called in Scri- Jer. 13. 17. pture [a weeping forely, a weeping with bitterness of joel 2. 13. heart, a weeping day and night, a forrow of heart, a breaking of the fpirit, mourning like a dove,and chattering like afwallow] and we may read the degree and manner of it by the lamentations and fad accents of the Prophet Jeremiah, when he wept for the fins of the nation; by the heart-breaking of David, when he mourned for his murther and adultery; and the bitter weeping of S. Peter, after the fhameful denying of his Mafter.* The expreffion of his forrow differs according to the temper of the body, the fex, the age, and circumftance of action, and the motive of forrow, and by many accidental tenderneffes, or mafculine hardneffes and the repentance is not to be estimated by the tears, but by the grief; and the grief is to be valued not by the fenfitive trouble, but by the cordial hatred of the fin, and ready actual direliction of it, and a resolution, and real refifting its confequent tempta : Hugo de temptations. Some people can fhed tears for nothing, fome for any thing: but the proper and true effects of a godly forrow are, fear of the Divine Judgments, apprehenfion of God's difpleasure, watchings and strivings against fin, patiently enduring the cross of forrows, (which God fend as their punishment,) in accufation of our felves, in perpetually begging pardon, in mean and bafe opinions of our felves, and in all the natural productions from thefe according to our temper and conftitution. For if we be apt to weep in other accidents, it is ill if we weep not alfo in the forrows of Repentance: not that weeping is of it felf a duty; but that the forrow, if it be as great, will be ftill expreffed in as great a manner. 2. Our forrow for fins muft retain the proportion of our fins, though not the equality: we have no particular measures of fins; we know not which is greater, of Sacrilege or Superftition, Idolatry or Covetoufnefs, Rebellion or Witchcraft: and therefore God ties us not to nice meafures of forrow, but only that we keep the general Rules of proportion; that is, that a great fin have a great grief, a fmaller crime being to be washed off with a leffer fhower. 3. Our forrow for fin is then beft accounted of for its degree, when it, together with all the penal and afflictive duties of Repentance, fhall have equalled or exceeded the pleature we had in Commiffion of the fin. 4 True Repentance is a punishing duty, and acts its forrow, and judges and condemns the fin by voluntary tubmitting to fuch fadneffes as God fends on us; or (to prevent the judgment of God) by judging our felves, and punishing our bodies and our fpirits by fuch inftruments of Piety as are troublefome to the body: fuch as are fafting, watching, long prayers, troublesome poftures in our prayers, expenfive alms, and all outward acts of humiliation. For he that muft judge himfelf, mult condemn himself if he be guilty and if he be condemned he must be punished; and if he be lo judged, it will help to prevent the judgment of the Cor.11.31 Lord, S. Paul inftructing us in this particular. But I before before intimated that the punishing actions of Repentance are only actions of forrow, and therefore are to make up the proportions of it. For our grief may be fo full of trouble, as to outweigh all the burthens of fafts and bodily afflictions, and then the other are the lefs neceffary; and when they are used, the benefit of them is to obtain of God a remiffion or a leffening of fuch temporal judgments which God hath decreed against the fins, as it was in the cafe of Abab: but the finner is not by any thing of this reconciled to the eternal favour of God; for as yet this is but the introduction to Repentance. 5. Every true penitent is obliged to confefs his fins, and to humble himself before God for ever. Confeffion 1 John 1. 9. of fins hath a fpecial promife: If we confess our fins,he is faithful and juft to forgive us our fins: meaning, that God hath bound himself to forgive us if we duly confefs our fins, and do all that for which confeffion was appointed; that is, be afhamed of them,and own them no more. For confeffion of our fins to God can figni fie nothing of it felf in its direct nature: He fees us when we act them, and keeps a record of them; and we forget them unless he reminds us of them by his grace. So that to confefs them to God does not punifh us, or make us afhamed; but confeffion to him, if it proceed from fhame and forrow, and is an act of humiliation and felf condemnation, and is a laying open our wounds for cure, then it is a duty God delights in. In all which circumftances, because we may very much be helped if we take in the affiftance of a fpiritual Guide; therefore the Church of God in all ages hath commended, and in moft * Αναγκαῖον τοῖς πεπιςεύεις ages enjoined, that we confels τὴν οἰκονομίαν εν μυσηρίων το δει our fins, and difcover the fare ἐξομολογείθαι τα ομαρτήμα πιο and condition of our fouls to S. Bafil. reg. brev. 228. Concil. Laod. č. 2 fuch a person whom we or our Concil. Quin. fext. c. 102. Tertul: de pœnit fuperiours judge fit to help us in fuch needs. For fo Lif we confess our fins one to another] as S. James adviles, we fhall obtain the prayers of the holy man whom God and the Church hath appointed folemnly to pray for us: and when he knows our needs, he * T can can beft minifter comfort or reproof, oil or caufticks; he can more opportunely recommend your particular ftate to God, he can determine your cafes of confcience, and judge better for you than you do for your felf; and the fhame of opening fuchUlcers may reftrain your forwardnefs to contract them: and all thefe circumftances of advantage will do very much towards the forgiveness. And this course was taken by the new Converts in the days of the Apostles, Acts 19. 18. [For many that believed, came and confeffed, and shewed their deeds.] And it were well if this duty were practifed prudently and innocently in order to publick difcipline, or private comfort and inftruction : but that it be done to God is a duty, not directly for it felf, but for its adjuncts and the duties that go with it, or before it, or after it: which duties because they are all to be helped and guided by our Paftors and Curates of Souls, he is careful of his eternal intereft that will not lofe the advantage of using a private Guide and Judge. He that hideth his fins Prov. 28. 13.hall not profper; [Non dirigetur, faith the vulgar Latin, he hall want a guide] but whofo confeffeth and for faketh them fhall have mercy. And to this purpole Climachus reports, that divers holy perfons in that Age did ufe to carry Table-books with them, and in them defcribed an account of all their determinate thoughts, purposes, words and actions, in which they had fuffered infirmity; that by communicating the estate of their Souls they might be inftructed and guided, and corrected or encouraged. 6. True Repentance muft reduce to act all its holy purposes, and enter into and Rom. 6. 3, 4, 7. & 8. 10. & 13. 13, run through the state of holy *living, which is contrary to that ftate of darknets in which in times paft we walked. (a) For to refolve to do it, and yet 14. & 11. 22, 27. Gal. 5. 6, 24.& 6. 15. 1 Cor. 7. 19. 2 Cor. 13. 5. Coloff, 1. 21, 22, 23. Heb. 12. 1, 14, 16. & 10. 16, 22. 1 Pet. 1.15. 2 Pet. 1.4, 9, 10. & 3.11. 1 John 1.6. & 3.8, 9. & 5. 16. (4) Nequam illud verbum, Benè vult not to do it is to break our nifi qui benè facit. Trinummus. refolution and our faith, to mock God, to falfifie and eva cuate all the preceeding acts of Repentance, and to make |