PHIL. There is; when David saith, Psalm lxxxv. 8, I will hear what God the Lord will speak, for he will speak peace unto his people, and to his saints, but let them not turn again to folly this imports that if his saints turn again to folly, which by woful experience we find too frequently done, God may change his voice, and turn his peace, formerly spoken, into a warlike defiance to their conscience.

TIM. But this methinks is a diminution to the majesty of God, that a man, once completely cured of a wounded conscience, should again be pained therewith: let mountebanks palliate, cures break out again, being never soundly, but superficially healed: he that is all in all never doth his work by halves, so that it shall be undone afterwards.

PHIL. It is not the same individual wound in number, but the same in kind, and perchance a deeper in degree: nor is it any ignorance or falsehood in the surgeon, but folly and fury in the patient, who, by committing fresh sins, causes a new pain in the old place.

TIM. In such relapses men are only troubled for such sins which they have run on score since their last recovery from a wounded conscience.

PHIL. Not those alone, but all the sins which they have committed, both before and since their conversion, may be started up afresh in their minds and memories, and grieve and perplex them, with the guiltiness thereof.

TIM. But those sins were formerly fully forgiven, and the pardon thereof solemnly sealed,

and assured unto them; and can the guilt of the same recoil again upon their consciences?

PHIL. I will not dispute what God may do in the strictness of his justice. Such seals, though still standing firm and fast in themselves, may notwithstanding break off, and fly open in the feeling of the sick soul: he will be ready to conceive with himself, that as Shimei,* though once forgiver his railing on David, was afterwards executed for the same offence, though upon his committing of a new transgression, following his servants to Gath, against the positive command of the king so God, upon his committing of new trespasses, may justly take occasion to punish all former offences; yea, in his apprehension, the very foundation of his faith may be shaken, all his former title to heaven brought into question, and he tormented with the consideration that he was never a true child of God.

TIM. What remedies do you commend to such souls in relapses?

PHIL. Even the self-same receipts which I first prescribed to wounded consciences, the very same promises, precepts, comforts, counsels, cautions. Only as Jacob the second time that his sons went down into Egypt,+ commanded them to carry double money in their hands; so I would advise such to apply the former remedies with double diligence, double watchfulness, double industry, because the malignity of a disease is riveted firmer and deeper in a relapse.

* 1 Kings ii. 44.

+ Genesis xliii. 12.

DIALOGUE XXI.

Whether it be lawful to pray for, or to pray against, or to praise God for a wounded Conscience.

TIMOTHEUS.

Is a man to to

S it lawful for a man to pray to God to visit

PHIL. He may and must pray to have his high and hard heart truly humbled, and bruised with the sight and sense of his sins, and with unfeigned sorrow for the same: but may not explicitly and directly pray for a wounded conscience, in the highest degree and extremity thereof.

2

TIM. Why interpose you those terms explicitly and directly?

PHIL. Because implicitly and by consequence, one may pray for a wounded conscience: namely, when he submits himself to be disposed by God's pleasure, referring the particulars thereof wholly to his infinite wisdom, tendering, as I may say, a blank paper to God in his prayers, and requesting him to write therein what particulars he pleases; therein generally and by consequence, he may pray for a wounded conscience, in case God sees the same for his own glory, and the parties' good; otherwise, directly he may not pray for it.

TIM. How prove you the same?

PHIL. First, because a wounded conscience is

a judgment, and one of the sorest, as the resem

A A

blance of the torments of hell. Now it is not congruous to nature, or grace, for a man to be a free and active instrument, purposely to pull down upon himself the greatest evil that can befall him in this world. Secondly, we have neither direction nor precedent of any saint, recorded in God's word, to justify and warrant such prayers. Lastly, though praying for a wounded conscience may seemingly scent of pretended humility, it doth really and rankly savour of pride, limiting the holy one of Israel. It ill becoming the patient to prescribe to his heavenly physician what kind of physic he shall minister unto him.

TIM. But we may pray for all means to increase grace in us, and therefore may pray for a wounded conscience, seeing thereby at last, piety is improved in God's servants.

PHIL. We may pray for and make use of all means whereby grace is increased: namely, such means as by God are appointed for that purpose; and therefore by virtue of God's institution, have both a proportionableness and attendency in order thereunto. But properly, those things are not means, or ordained by God, for the increase of piety, which are only accidentally overruled to that end by God's power against the intention and inclination of the things themselves. Such is a wounded conscience, being always actually an evil of punishment, and too often occasionally an evil of sin; the bias whereof doth bend and bow to wickedness: though overruled by the aim of God's eye, and strength of his arm, it may bring men to the mark of more grace and goodness.

God can and will extract light out of darkness, good out of evil, order out of confusion, and comfort out of a wounded conscience: and yet darkness, evil, confusion, &c. are not to be prayed for.

TIM. But a wounded conscience, in God's children, infallibly ends in comfort here, or glory hereafter, and therefore is to be desired.

PHIL. Though the ultimate end of a wounded conscience winds off in comfort, yet it brings with it many intermediate mischiefs and maladies, especially as managed by human corruption: namely, dulness in divine service, impatience, taking God's name in vain, despair for the time, blasphemy; which a saint should decline, not desire; shun, not seek; not pursue, but avoid, with his utmost endeavours.

TIM. Is it lawful positively to pray against a wounded conscience?

*

PHIL. It is, as appears from an argument taken from the lesser to the greater. If a man may pray against pinching poverty, as wise Agur did; then may he much more against a wounded conscience, as a far heavier judgment. Secondly, if God's servants may pray for ease under their burthens, whereof we see divers particulars in that worthy prayer of Solomon ;+ I say, if we pray to God to remove a lesser judgment by way of subvention, questionless we may beseech him to deliver us from the great evil of a wounded conscience, by way of prevention.

* Proverbs xxx. 8.

+1 Kings viii. 33.