The Affectionate Christian Vindicated, and the Sincere Soul Comforted under His Complaints of Deadness

We have seen what are the various advantages that may be derived from the exercise of the passions in the concerns of religion; and we have taken notice of the iii-egularities to which they are liable, and have endeavored to guard against the abuse of them. We proceed now to the fifth general head of discourse which was proposed, and that is, to vindicate the affectionate Christian from the unjust reproaches of men, in his warmest exercises of love to God and devotion. Surely one would think there appears sufficient reason for pious souls to indulge their most lively affections in worship, and that without any abuse of their reason, or abasement of their refigion. These inward sensations of holy delight, these secret joys which a stranger intermeddles not with, these experimental parts of godliness, may be set in a rational light, and be justified to the understanding of men. What is there in all this account of a Christian’s love to God, and the regulated exercise of pious passions, that is not agreeable to solid reason, and to the natural notions that we have of God and our duty, as well as to the brighter discoveries we have by divine revelation? What is there in all these workings of a holy soul, but what is the just and proper result of the nature of man, as an inferior spirit, in the present circumstances of flesh and blood, meditating on God, the infinite and supreme Spirit, with a lively hope of his favor and acceptance?

Will the deist and the infidel tell me, that “this is all mechanical religion, the mere effect of animal nature, the visionary scenes of fancy, and the boilings of a warm imagination?” Will they laugh at all this account, and say, “there is nothiag in it but the passionate ferments of flesh and blood, which we mistake for a reasonable religion and worship?” I would enter the lists with them, even upon the foot of reason, and justify these sensations of experimental Christianity, by a few plain and gradual steps of enraiment.

1. Is not the great God the Creator and supreme Governor of all things? Is he not the most glorious and most excellent Spirit? Is he not a Being of infinite majesty, of holiness, and of mercy? Is he not a God of awful sovereignty, a Avise ruler, and righteous judge? Is he not kind and compassionate toward his humble and obedient creatures? Is he not a fountain of eternal blessedness, and an all-sufficient and everlasting good to those that seek and serve him? Is he not a God that hath terrors to vindicate his government, and to punish those that break his law? Is not this the God that the wiser and better sort of heathens acknowledged, and do acknowledge, as well as the Christians?

2. Is not the mind of man made capable, in some measure, of knowing this God? And are we not bound to acquaint ourselves with him? Is not man therefore bound to get these notions and ideas of the attributes of God his Maker represented to his mind in the truest, the fairest, and the strongest light? Or are the faintest and feeblest notions of our Creator the best? Are we not under an obligation sometimes to recollect these ideas of God; when we come to converse humbly with him? Should we not endeavor to bring them fresh and strong into our memory, and to make his majesty and his mercy, as it were, present to our souls, by the fullest and brightest conceptions we can form, when we come to worship before him, when we address him with prayer for any blessing that w’e want, or when we praise him for any mercies that we have received from him?

3. Ought not this knowledge, this holy remembrance of God, to influence the other powers of our nature? Doth not conscience itself tell the deist, that his owm sentiments of so glorious a Being demand his highest honor, and his humblest worship? Do not his own thoughts require of him a behavior agreeable to all those high conceptions which he hath of the perfections of the divine nature? Are not our minds bound to think of him with high esteem? Are not our wills bound to resolve upon obedience to this wise and holy Governor, and to submit with patience to all his providences? Are not our eyes made to contemplate his works, and ought we not to give him the honor of his wdsdom and power, that formed this world of wonders which our eyes behold: And are not our tongues obliged to speak honorably of him, and to render him a just revenue of praise? Is it not our duty to offer the tribute of our lips in thankfulness for a thousand blessings we receive from his bounty and beneficence?

4. Are not our passions or affections a particular power of human nature that owes God some honor, as well as the understanding or

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will, the eyes and the tongue? Were not lliese affectionate powers made to be excited by tliouglits of the mind, and to be exercised agreeably to the judgment and conscience? Or are the passions the only powers of our nature that owe no homage to the God that made them, and must not be employed in his service? Many of the affections are pleasing to nature in their various exercises, and can they not have leave to be employed in piety? Must religion be made so dry and tasteless and melancholy a thing as to forbid all pleasure? Have we not permission to love God, the most amiable Spirit, whose perfections and glories surpass all created beings? Must we never take delight in God, the Author of our nature, and the source of eternal blessedness? Is religion the only thing whence all pleasing affection must be for ever banished and excluded? And must I withhold all these pleasant and powerful sensations of nature from intermingling with the things of God? Hath my wise and merciful Creator given me such a faculty as admiration, and may I admire the heavens and the earth, the fishes, the beasts, and the birds, and not admire that all-wise and almighty Being that made me and them? May I lay out my wonder on any thing or on every thing besides the great God who created all these wonders? Hath he formed my soul to delight and love, and hath he confined these sweet and pleasurable capacities only to be employed about creatures, when the Creator himself is infinite and supreme in loveliness? Will not this most amiable of Beings expect that I should love himself, and give me leave to make him my delight? Is it lawful for me to fear a lion or an adder, a whirlwind or a flash of lightning, and may I not indulge a holy and solemn dread of that glorious IBeing that made hghtnings and whirlwinds, adders and hons, and has unknown thunders in reserve for profane sinners? Doth he give me leave to mourn and weep for the loss of my ease, or my health, or my friends, and may I never indulge my sorrow to arise for all my multipHed offences against his law, my former rebellions against his government, and my refusals of his grace? Thus far I have begged leave for the passions to assist religion, and I think reason gives an ample permission. But I may rise to bolder language here, and pronounce my argument with stronger force, if I should resume the first part of this head of reasoning, and make all these enquiries turn upon the point of obligation and duty. Since I know this God to be infinite in goodness, and the author of all my comforts, am I not bound to love him with all my strength, and with all my soul? If he is a Being of sovereign power, holiness and justice, ought I not always to fear before hlm and to grieve heartily that I have offended against his holy laws? Is it not my duty to mourn for sin, and to be ashamed of my unuatm-al and unreasonable conduct? And doth not God require that I should rejoice before him with thankfulness, when I have some hope that he hath accepted my submission, pardoned my sin, and holds me in his favor and love?

But let me proceed yet farther in this argument, and say, have not my passions themselves been too often engaged in folly and sin? And must they do nothing for the interests of religion and virtue? Hath not the great and blessed God been affronted and dishonored by these warm and active powers of my nature? And may not he make some reprisals on them, by leading them captive by his grace, and devoting them to his own service? Must the passions, which have been defiled with so much iniquity, and which have helped to defile the soul, never be refined? Never be sanctified? Never attempt to restore that tribute of honor and obedience to the great God, of which they have long defrauded him? Have I loved vanity? Have I delighted in sin? Has my desire, my hope and my joy, been heretofore employed on criminal objects? And must these affections of desire and hope, of love and delight, be forbid to pursue objects divine and heavenly, and be for ever excluded from all pious emjjloymeut? Have I grieved for the loss of a sinful pleasure, or been angry with my brother and hated him without a cause? And ought I not to turn the stream of my wrath and hatred against my sins, and to give a loose to the passion of grief and pious sorrow for my guilty behavior toward God and man? Are these faculties of my nature capable of sinning only, and incapable of practising lartue and goodness? Or is it not lawful to attempt to employ them in the service of religion? Let the deists, and the men of cold philosophy, tell me, that virtue and piety, and goodness, consist only in sublime ideas of God, and in a will devoted to him; and that it is only the pure affections of the mind or spirit that are to be exercised toward God and religion; but the motions of flesh and blood must have nothing to do here, nor passions of the animal have any part or share in the religion of the man. To such objectors I would reply thus:

5. Is it possible that the purest affections can be exerted in any vigorous efforts in our present state of mortality, but flesh and blood will feel and follow them a little? Can these sublime ideas of the blessed God, and these pure and spiritual affections, be raised to any high degree, but the powers and passions of animal nature will be suitably touched and moved, at least in some degree, according to the natural temper? All persons are not equally capable of warm afFection, and vigorous ferments of blood; But there is not a son or daughter of Adam without some degree of these natural emotions. They have been felt by wise and holy men, that have lived in all ages of the world; and it must be so, in some measure, while we are such a composition of flesh and spirit.

I grant, indeed, that some such cold and indifferent worshippers as can make this objection, whose religion consists only in a philosophical thought of the great God, and a devout wish perhaps once in a week or two, may not feel any of these sensible effects in animal nature. Those also may be excepted who are brought up in a mere round of forms, and never say their prayeres but at the sound of a bell and a public hour; I except also those popish devotees, who mutter over their Latin service, their “paternosters” and “ave marias” by tale, and drop their beads to count their prayers right, and to secure themselves from mistaking the number. All these sorts of worshippers may join in the same opinion, and renounce their affections in their religion, and that for this reason, because they have not religion enough to employ them. But where a constant and supreme love to God is the real spring that moves us to our duties, the rest of the natural passions will have some correspondent share in the work. And it is a very false way of judging for these kinds of people, to compare all men with themselves, and make their cold indifference and their lazy practice the standing model of the religion of all mankind.

Let us suppose for once, that we were confined to the mere religion of nature; hath it not been sufficiently proved, that reason and the light of nature provide for the passions some share of employment, even in natural religion? And it is to be feared, that it is not merely the unbelief of Christianity, but the want of serious inward religion of any kind, that inclines the infidels of our age to oppose and ridicule the exercise of devout affection. Is not the book of Psalms a noble and sublime collection of lyric poesy? Are not several parts of these sacred odes confined to such notions and practices in religion, as the light of nature and reason dictates? Now if these persons had true piety at heart, one would think they should rejoice in these sprightly and pious composures, and use them as a help to raise their souls to God, their Creator, in love and praise. Will they make this excuse, that the language is too warm, too much animated and pathetic, that there is too much of the beauty of metaphor, too many bright images that strike powerfully upr)n the passions, whereas the religion of nature, in their opinion is a more calm and sedate thing? Surely it is much to be feared and suspected, that their prayers and their praises, and all their pretences to piety, will go but a little way to raise their souls to heaven, when their modes of worship cannot bear the language of such devout affection, and admit of no elevations above calm ideas and sedate indolence. But I return to my Aandication of the affectionate Christian, in his warmest exercises of devout passion.

I might proceed much further on this point, and say, when the affections are impressed and awakened to a powerful exercise by divine truths will not these lively powers have a farther and a reflexive influence on the mind and the will? Do they not sensibly impress the ideas of divine things with much stronger force on the mind? Do they not set all the affairs of religion in a more lovely and attractive light? Do they not confirm the will in all its holy resolutions for God and heaven? Have they not often been found to stamp divine things on the memory and conscience with more lasting efficacy? Do not the devout passions awaken the latent images of fancy, and dress all the chambers of the soul with divine ideas and ornaments? And have they not by this means assisted the soul to maintain its constant converse with heaven? Is it not in the power of the sacred passions to raise and brighten the language of the tongue, as well as command the tears of the eyelids and the smiles of the countenance? Are not our hope and our fear given us to be living spurs to duty, and wakeful guards against temptation and disobedience; and do they not often employ the hands and the feet, direct the eyes, and awaken the voice? Will not holy love and joy give a lively and pleasing motion to the blood and spirits? And the hope of having sin forgiven, and our souls made for ever happy, excite a thousand pleasures in human nature? Will it not fill the soul with overflowings of gratitude, and make the lips abound in expressions of* joy and praise? And will not these be attended with a peaceful and pleasing aspect, and establish a sweet serenity- in the heart and eyes? And all concur to maintain religion in the power and the joy of it?

Christians, be not afraid of professing the pleasures of religion! These men of pretended reason are vanquished at their own weapons, when they dare deride your converse with God, and fight against the inward power of your devotions. Be ye convinced therefore, and be established in this truth, that it is not the warmest exercise of our affections that can be ridiculous in religion, when they are excited by a just apprehension of divine things: But then it is, the passions are justly censured, when they are indulged to raptures in the confusion and darkness of the mind; when they flutter and make a tumult in the twilight of the understanding, or when they are raised high by mere enthusiasm and the visions of fancy, without the solid foundation of knowledge and judgment to support them, as I have shewn in a foregoing discourse.

Give diligence therefore O my friends, to improve in the knowledge of God the Father, and in the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ! Maintain your humble converse with heaven, labor and strive in meditation and prayer, till you get near the seat of God, and find sweet access to his throne, through the blood of Christ and the aids of the blessed Spirit: Awaken all the springs of holy love and divine joy. These sacred pleasures will animate you to every duty, will be a guard to your souls against temptation, and give you courage to stand the ridicule of an unbelieving age: These divine refreshments, like the heavenly manna, will support your spirits through all the wilderness, and make your travels easy and delightful. These will lead you on with joy to the jyromised land and prepare you to dwell for ever with that God, with whom you have here enjoyed so long and blessed a correspondence. — We proceed now to the sixth general.

Since it appears to be a matter of such importance to have the affections engaged in the affairs of religion, some humble and sincere souls may be ready to pronounce hard things concerning themselves, and conclude they have no true religion, because they feel their atfeclions but little moved: We proposed, therefore, that the sixth general head of discourse should offer some “consolations to such honest and humble Christians, who endeavor to love and serve the Lord their God with all their powers, but find very little of this exercise of the pious passions in comparison with what others feel.” Let me address such persons as these in the following manner:

I. Since you doubt whether you love God with all your hearty that is, with your warmest affections, “search and enquire with holy fear, and with the greater diligence, whether you love him with all your mind with all your soul, and with all your strength” Do you love him with all your mind? Have you the highest esteem of him in your judgment as the most excellent and best of Beings, and as your only sufficient good? Do you love him with all your soul? Have you chosen him for your eternal portion both in this world and that which is to come? Is your will firmly resolved for God and religion? Are you sincerely willing to forsake every sin and to return to God, to give up yourself to him as your Lord and Ruler, and receive him as your God and reconciled Father, according to the discoveries of his grace in Christ Jesus? Do you love him with all your strength? Do you desire to obey and serve him all your days? Do you worship him with holy diligence, and promote his honor in the world, according to the utmost of your capacity?

If you niid these things wrought in you, and done by you, you have abundant reason to take comfort in this evidence of your Christianity. Where the mind and will are sincerely engaged on the side of God and religion in this manner, the love of the heart is not utterly wanting; the atiections must be in some measure sanctified, though perhaps you may not feel so frequent, so powerful, and so lively an exercise of them as other Christians may enjoy. These things are a better proof of true faith and real piety, than a sudden flash of affection can be, where these more steady operations of the mind and will are wanting.

II. Though all the sons and daughters of Adam have some degrees of passion in their very frame and nature, yet rememoer that the temper of all men is not equally atfectionate. Consider now and enquiie, whether your temper has so much of these affectionate principles wrought in it as some of your neighbors may possess: There are some of a much calmer and more sedate constitution; their passions of desire and joy, of fear and hope, of sorrow and anger, are seldom moved about earthly things; and then it is no wonder that they are not so sensibly impressed with things heavenly. God requires no more than he gives; where he has wrought these pathetic principles in the constitution, he requires the exercise of them in the things of religion: But where persons are of a more dispassionate and a calmer frame, there God will require less of the sensible exercises of aflection in the Christian life. 2 Cor. viii, 12. i/* there he a willing mind, it is accepted according to what a 7nan has and not according to what he has not.

I confess, if you have warm and lively passions for all other things, and none at all for God and religion and heavenly objects; if your fear, joy, sorrow, and desire are vigorous in their emotions, and are immediately raised by the affairs and occurrences of this life, and yet lie always asleep with regard to divine things, it is a very bad sign indeed, and has a very unfavorable aspect on the case of your soul: For where much is given, much shall be required; Luke xiv. 48.

III.” Consider what is your present stage of life: Are you in the flower of youth, when all the powers of nature are active, when the passions are warm and lively? Or are you in the decay of nature, and on the verge of life? Is old age coming upon you, or is it already come, when the animal powers are weakened, when the operaations of flesh and blood are more languid V An old man cannot have those lively passions and appetites with regard to sensible things as belong to the years of youth, and vigor of nature. Old Barzillai could not feel his desires awakened and tempted to dwell at court by all the dishes of a royal table, or the spriiyhtly music, or the rich entertainments there; 2 Sam. xix. 35. And therefore it is no wonder if the devout passions be then more languid and unmoved. An aged Christian may have the most fixed resolution for God, and the firmest principles of piety rooted in his soul; he may do much service for God, and in this sense maij Jlourish and bring forth fruit in old age; Psalm xcii. 14. and may have great advancements in real g(jdliness, though thei’e may be few such sensible evidences of it given to himself or to his neighbors, in the lively motion of his pathetic powers.

But on the other hand, it is a very sad and melancholy symptom, if the evil passions of covetousness, of anger, of revenge, of envy, reign and exert themselves with violence in old age, while there is little or nothing of warm affection exercised in the things of religion.

IV. “Let humble and sincere Christians remember also for their encouragement, that though spiritual things may be the chief object of our hope and desire, yet our passions may not always be so powerfully impressed by them, as they are by sensible and carnal things, and the reason is, because they are spiritual and invisible.”

The passions which are wrought into our present frame, belong partly to animal nature as well as to the mind; and therefore the things of sense are nearer akin to them: They touch and strike our passions sooner, and awaken them to more vivacity, and engage them with more vehemence than things which are unseen. The passions are certain principles in man which depend much on flesh and blood; and therefore they are more naturally impressed by things that strike our eyes and our ears, and by them find a way to our hearts. It is possible that God and heaven may be really more beloved than men and this earth, though the animal powers of joy, hope, fear and desire, may not be so sensible and vehement in their operations toward spiritual, absent, and future objects, as towards things present and sensible. There is not therefore sufficient ground to conclude that we do not love God above creatures, because we sometimes feel the more passionate exercises and commotions of flesh and blood about creatures, than we do about God himself: And indeed were it not for this reasonable salvo, this spring of consolation, a multitude of Christians would be ready to give themselves up to despair, and I doubt there would be very few of us who would not have reason to suspect the truth and power of our inward religion. i.

Yet I cannot conclude without this observation: In the last place, that “what comfortable evidences soever of our love to God may be derived from the high esteem of him in our minds, and the attachment of our wills to him, yet these evidences and comforts will be greatly brightened and increased by feeling the affectionate love of God in the heart.” To love the Lord our God with all the mind, and with all the soul, and with all the strength, becomes more glorious when it influences the affectionate powers of the heart to join in the practice of religion.

It is granted, that the mere flashes of sudden passion in a devout moment, without a settled supreme esteem of God in the mind, without a firm attachment of the will to him, and careful obedience to his commands, will yield but small and feeble consolation in a time of trial and enquiry: The hearers who receive the word, like seed in stony ground, are said to receive it with joy, but their religion was but a flash; it endured but for a short season; it sprung up on a sudden and quickly withered, because it had no root in the understanding and the will; Matt. xiii. 20, 21. Yet it is better, infinitely better, to find and feel that we love God with all our powers; we should therefore use all proper methods to stir up our drowsy affections, and engage them in divine things, that we may live in the pleasures of godliness, as well as in the power of it, and have our hopes rising high, and approaching to the joys of heaven, while we dwell here on earth. What these proper methods are, whereby the devout passions may be raised, will be the subject of our next enquiry.

Meditation. “It is strange that any person should cavil against the exercises of the warmest affections of man in the things that relate to the great God, and in matters of our own immortal interest. It is strange to hear any dispute arise against the engagement of our strongest and most sprightly powers in the service of the best of Beings, and our eternal friend. Oh! may I know him, and love him, and fear him, and delight in him, as becomes a creature to fear and to love a God, that is, in a supreme degree. In vain shall the world assault me with their keenest reproaches, in vain shall a bantering and Godless age attempt to laugh me out of countenance for indulging the divine sensations of religion. Let them tell me, “It is mere animal nature, and the caprices of flesh and blood,” let them charge me with enthusiastical folly, and feverish heats of religion, I dare pronounce boldly, in the face of ridicule and scandal, that the prudent affectionate Christian, in his devoutest houi’s, does nothing beneath the dignity of reason, nor unbecoming the character of the wisest of men. I have David and the prophets, I have Christ and his apostles engaged on this side of the question by their own practice, and I shall count it my honor to be an humble imitator of such blessed patterns.

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“Oh! may I find the secret joys of religious retirement, joys which a stranger intermeddles not with! May I feel some pious affection animating me to all the duties of the Christian life! May I see myself rising high above earthly things with holy contempt, mounting as on eagles’ wings toward heaven; and then I shall not be frighted nor discouraged at all the arrows of reproach that are shot against me. The afiectionate Christian has much more reason on his side than all those indolent worshippers, those dry and joyless creatures, those cold pretenders to religion, who have renounced their affections in the things of God, and creep on at a low and grovelling rate, feeding on some natural truths and speculations without life, power, or pleasure.

“But if I find my natural temper has very little of the pathetic composition in it, and that my affections by nature are not so vigorous as those of my neighbor; if I feel the more vehement efforts of love and fear, and holy sorrow, and pious pleasure, sink and decline, through the decay of nature or growing age, I will comfort myself with this, that it is the desire of my soul to have all its powers and passions engaged for God in their most vital and active exercises.

“If at any time I am so unhappy as to feel my affections exert themselves in a more vigorous manner toward the objects of flesh and sense which are present, than they do toward things absent, divine and heavenly, I would mourn over the frailty of human nature, in this present state, where we are so much attached to the things of this body. I will endeavor through divine grace to love the Lord my God with all my mind, and with all my soul, to raise him higher in the esteem of my judgment, and to cleave to him more firmly by a resolute bent of my will, to abide daily with him, and live upon him, as my all-suflScient and everlasting good, that I may attain some comfortable establishment in the hope of his love: And when my flesh and heart, and all my animal powers shall fail me, I may still rejoice in having God for my God, who will be the strength of my heart, the life of my spirit, and my portion for ever;” Psalm lxxiii. 26. Amen.