Chapter 19: The Second Inference Drawn from the Proposition

It shows us a main difference between the godly and the wicked; the godly man has all his best things to come, the wicked man has all his worst things to come: as their way is different, so their end; "You in your lifetime received your good things." The wicked have all their good things here; they have not only what heart can wish, but they have more than heart can wish: their worst things are to come. Why, what is to come? The Apostle answers (1 Thessalonians 1:10): wrath to come. And here I shall briefly show you the wicked man's Charter: which consists in five things.

§. 1.

1. The awakening of conscience: this is to come. Conscience is God's deputy in the soul, his viceroy; a wicked man does what he can to unthrone conscience, and put it out of office. Conscience is God's echo, and sometimes it is so shrill and clamorous, that the sinner cannot endure the noise, but silences conscience, and at last by often sinning, conscience begins to be sleepy and seared; "having their conscience seared with a hot iron" (1 Timothy 4:2). This conscience is quiet, but not good, for the dumbness of conscience proceeds from the numbness of it: it is with him as with a sick patient, who having a confluence of diseases upon him, yet being asleep, is insensible of the pain. The conscience of many a man is like the body of Dionysius, so gross and corpulent, that though they did thrust needles into his flesh, he felt no pain. Time was when conscience was tender, but by often sinning he is like the ostrich, that can digest iron; or as it is said of Mithridates, that by often accustoming his body to poison, it never hurt him, but he could live upon it as his food. That sin which was before as the wounding of the eye, now is no more than the cutting of the nail. Well, there is a time coming when this sleepy conscience shall be awakened. Belshazzar was drinking wine in bowls, but there came out fingers on the wall, and his countenance changed — there conscience began to be awakened. Conscience is like a looking-glass: if it be foul and dusty, you can see nothing in it, but wipe away the dust, and you may see your face in it clearly; there's a time coming, when God will wipe off the dust from the glass of a man's conscience, and he shall see his sins clearly represented. Conscience is like a lion asleep; when he awakes he roars and tears his prey: when conscience awakes, then it roars upon a sinner, and tears him, as the devil did the man into which he entered; (Mark 9:22) he rent him, and threw him into the fire. When Moses's rod was turned into a serpent, he was afraid, and fled from it; oh what is it when conscience is turned into a serpent? Conscience is like the bee: if a man does well, then conscience gives honey, it speaks comfort; if he does ill, it puts forth a sting — it is called a worm (Mark 9:44): "Where the worm never dies." It is like Prometheus's vulture, it lies ever gnawing: it is God's bloodhound that pursues a man. When the jailer saw the prison-doors open, and as he thought the prisoners were missing, he drew his sword and would have killed himself: when the eye of conscience is opened, and the sinner begins to look about him for his evidences — faith, repentance, etc. — and sees they are missing, he will be ready to kill himself. A troubled conscience is the first-fruits of hell; and indeed it is a lesser hell. That it is so, appears two ways.

1. By the testimony of Scripture (Proverbs 18:14): "A wounded spirit who can bear?" A wound in the name, in the estate, in the body, is sad; but a wound in the conscience, who can bear? Especially when the wound can never be healed: for I speak of such as awake in the night of death.

2. By the experience both of good and bad. First, by the experience of good men: when the storm has risen in their conscience (though afterwards it has been allayed) yet for the present they have been in the suburbs of hell. David complains of his broken bones; he was like a man that had all his bones out of joint. What is the matter? You may see wherein his pain lay (Psalm 51:3): "My sin is ever before me;" he was in a spiritual agony. It was not the sword threatened, it was not the death of the child, but it was the roarings of his conscience — some of God's arrows stuck fast there. Though God will not damn his children, yet he may send them to hell in this life.

2. By the experience of bad men, who have been in the perpetual convulsions of conscience: "I have sinned," says Judas. Before he was nibbling upon the silver bait, the thirty pieces; but now the hook troubles him, conscience wounds him. Such was Judas's horror, being now like a man upon the rack, that he hangs himself to quiet his conscience. This shows what the hell of conscience is, that men account death easy to get rid of conscience — but in vain. It is with them as with a sick man: he removes out of one room into another, and changes the air, but still he carries his disease with him. You may think, O sinner, to laugh your sins out of countenance; but what will you do when conscience shall begin to fly upon you, and shall examine you with scourgings? It is a mercy when conscience is awakened in time, but the misery is when the wound is too late, there being then no balm in Gilead.

§. 2.

The second thing to come, His appearing before the Judge; For we must all appear before the judgment-seat of Christ: Jerome thought he ever heard that sounding in his ears, Surgite mortui, Arise you dead, and come to judgment. What solemnity is there at an Assizes, when the Judge comes to the Bench, and the Trumpets are sounded? Thus Christ the Judge shall be accompanied with Angels and Archangels, and the Trumpets shall be blown (1 Thessalonians 4:16). For the Lord himself shall descend from Heaven with a shout, with the voice of the Archangel, and with the Trump of God. This is the great and general Assizes. Then shall Christ sit down upon the Throne of Judicature, holding his sword in his hand, and a flame coming out of his mouth. Now the sinner being summoned before him as a prisoner at bar, he has his guilt written in his forehead, he is condemned before he comes — I mean in his conscience, which is the consistory or petty Sessions: and appearing before Christ, he begins to tremble and be amazed with horror; and not being covered with Christ's righteousness, for want of a better covering, he cries to the mountains to cover him. And the Kings and the great men said to the mountains and rocks, fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb. Nothing so dreadful as the sight of mercy abused. Now the Lamb will be turned into a Lion; and he who was once a Savior, will be a Judge.

Section 3.

The third thing to come, is, His Charge read: I will reprove you, and set your sins in order before you (Psalm 50:21). As God has a bottle for tears, so he has a book to register men's sins (Revelation 20:12). The books were opened. Oh what a black charge will be read against a sinner; not only the sins which have damnation written in their forehead, as drunkenness, swearing, blasphemy, shall be brought into the charge, but those sins which he slighted; as follows.

1. Secret sins, such as the world never took notice of: many a man does not forsake his sins, but grows more cunning: with the Vintner, he pulls down the bush, but his heart gives as much vent to sin as ever; his care is rather that sin should be covered than cured: not unlike to him that shuts up his shop-windows, but follows his trade within doors — he sits brooding upon sin; he does with his sins as Rachel did with her father's idols, she put them under her that he might not find them; so does he put his sins in a secret place: all these sins shall be set in order before him (Luke 12:2). For there is nothing covered that shall not be revealed: God has a key for the heart.

2. Little sins, as the world calls them; though I know no such thing as little Treason; the Majesty against which it is committed, does accent and enhance the sin. Besides, little sins (suppose them so) yet multiplied, become great. What is lesser than a grain of sand, yet when multiplied, what is heavier than the sands of the sea? A little sum multiplied is great; a little sin unrepented of will damn; as one leak in the Ship, if it is not looked to, will drown. You would think it is no great matter to forget God, yet (Psalm 50:22) it has a heavy doom. The non-improvement of Talents, the world looks upon as a small thing; yet we read of him that hid his Talent in the earth (Matthew 25:25) — he had not spent it, only not trading it, is sentenced.

3. Sins that in the eye of the world were looked upon as graces; sins that were colored and masked over for God and good intentions, and so on — men put fine glosses upon their sins, that they may obtain credit, and be the more vendible. It is said of Alcibiades, that he embroidered a curtain with Lions and Eagles, that he might hide the picture under, full of Owls and Satyrs. So does Satan embroider the curtain with the image of Virtue, that he may hide the foul picture of sin under. The devil is like the Spider, first she weaves her web and then hangs the fly in it: so he helps men to weave the web of sin with religious pretenses, and then he hangs them in the snare; all these sins shall be read in the sinner's charge, and set in order before him.

Section 4.

4. The next thing is, The passing of the Sentence (Matthew 25:41), Ite maledicti, Depart from me, you cursed. At the hearing of this sentence, the heart of a sinner will be rent through with horror; that heart which before would not break with sorrow for sin shall now break with despair. At the pronouncing of this dreadful sentence, depart from me, the sinner would be glad if he could depart from himself, and be annihilated; O it will be a sad departing! We use to say, when a man is dead, he is departed; but this will be a departing without a deceasing. As soon as Christ has pronounced the curse, the sinner will begin to curse himself. Oh what have I been doing! I have lain in wait for my own blood, I have twisted the cord of my own damnation. While he lived, he blessed himself; oh how happy am I, how does providence smile upon me! (Psalm 49:18). Though while he lived he blessed his soul, yet when this sentence is passed, he is the first that will curse himself.

Section 5.

5. The pouring out of the vial (Psalm 75:8): For in the hand of the Lord there is a cup, and the wine is red, it is full of mixture, and he pours out of the same. This is the sad execution: hell is set out by Tophet (Isaiah 30:33), which was a place situated near Jerusalem, where they offered their children in the fire to Moloch. A metaphor to figure out the infinite torments of hell: the sinner shall lie in the furnace of God's wrath, and the breath of the Lord, as a pair of bellows, shall blow the fire. Hell is said to be prepared, as if God had been sitting down to study and devise some exquisite torment: hell is set out in one place by fire, and in another place by darkness; to show that hell is a fire without light: the hypocrite while he lived, was all light, no fire, and in hell he shall be all fire, no light; nothing there to give comfort, no music but the shrieks of the damned; no wine but what is burnt with the flame of God's wrath: There shall be weeping, and wailing, and gnashing of teeth. The weeping hypocrite shall go to the place of weeping: while he lived, he lifted up his eyes in a false devotion, and now being in hell he shall lift up his eyes. He that gnashed his teeth at the godly, shall now have gnashing enough; before he gnashed in envy, now in despair; and this for ever. He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire, the word unquenchable scorches hotter than the fire. The fire of hell is like that stone in Arcadia I have read of, which being once kindled, could not be extinguished. Eternity is the hell of hell; the loss of the soul is irreparable; if all the angels in Heaven should go to make a purse, they could not make up this loss. Si rursum corruerit anima, unde reparabitur? num potest alter Christus, aut idem iterum crucifigi? When a sinner is in hell, shall another Christ be found to die for him, or will the same Christ be crucified again? Oh no: they are everlasting burnings. Thus the sinner has all his worst things to come: but a believer has all his best things to come, the things which eye has not seen, nor ear heard, namely the beatific vision, the crystal streams of joy that run at God's right hand: his Heaven is to come.