Thomas Watson-The Beatitudes Part two

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embowelled and locked up in the mine? And what is it the better to have a great estate if it be so

hoarded and cloistered up as never to see the light?

As God commands, so grace compels to works of mercy and beneficence. ‘The love of Christ

constraineth’ (2 Corinthians 5:14). Grace comes with majesty upon the heart. Grace does not lie

as a sleepy habit in the soul but will put forth itself in vigorous and glorious actings. Grace can no

more be concealed than fire. Like new wine it will have vent. Grace does not lie in the heart as a

stone in the earth, but as seed in the earth. It will spring up into good works.

This doctrine may serve to justify the Church of England against the calumny of malevolent men.

Julian upbraided the Christians that they were Solifidians, and the Church of Rome lays upon us

this aspersion, that we are against good works. Indeed we plead not for the merit of them but we

are for the use of them. ‘Let ours also learn to maintain good works for necessary uses’ (Titus 3:14).

We preach that they are needful both as they are enforced by the precept and as they are needful

for the general good of men. We read that the angels had wings, and hands under their wings

(Ezekiel 1:8). It may be emblematic of this truth. Christians must not only have the wings of faith

to fly, but hands under their wings to work the works of mercy. ‘This is a faithful saying, and these

things I will that thou affirm constantly, that they which have believed in God might be careful to

maintain good works’ (Titus 3:8). The lamp of faith must be filled with the oil of charity. Faith

alone justifies but justifying faith is not alone. You may as well separate weight from lead or heat

from fire as works from faith. Good works, though they are not the causes of salvation, yet they

are evidences. Though they are not the foundation yet they are the superstructure. Faith must not

be built upon works, but works must be built upon faith. ‘Ye are married to another that we should

bring forth fruit unto God’ (Romans 7:4). Faith is the grace which marries Christ and good works

are the children which faith bears. For the vindication of the doctrine of our Church, and in honour

of good works, I shall lay down four aphorisms.

1 Works are distinct from faith. It is vain to imagine that works are included in faith as the diamond

is enclosed in the ring. No, they are distinct, as the sap in the vine is different from the clusters that

grow upon it.

2 Works are the touchstone of faith. ‘Show me thy faith by thy works’ (James 2:18). Works are

faith’s letters of credence to show. If, says Saint Bernard, you see a man full of good works, then

by the rule of charity you are not to doubt of his faith. We judge the health of the body by the pulse

where the blood stirs and operates. O Christian, judge of the health of your faith by the pulse of

mercy and charitableness. It is with faith as with a deed in law. To make a deed valid, there are

three things requisite the writing, the seal, the witnesses. So for the trial and confirmation of faith

there must be these three things the writing, the Word of God; the seal, the Spirit of God; the

witnesses, good works. Bring your faith to this Scripture touchstone. Faith justifies works; works

testify faith.

3 Works honour faith. These fruits adorn the ‘trees of righteousness’. Let the liberality of your hand

(says Clemens Alexandrinus) be the ornament of your faith, and wear it as an holy bracelet about

your wrists. ‘I was eyes to the blind and feet was I to the lame. I put on righteousness and it clothed

me. My judgement was as a robe and a diadem’ (Job 29:14-15). While Job was the poor’s benefactor

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and advocate, this was the ensign of his honour; it clothed him as a robe and crowned him as a

diadem. This is that which takes off the odium and obloquy and makes others speak well of religion

when they see good works as handmaids waiting upon this queen.

4 Good works are in some sense more excellent than faith; in two respects:

Because they are of a more noble diffusive nature. Though faith be more needful for ourselves, yet

good works are more beneficial to others. Faith is a receptive grace. It is all for self-interest. It

moves within its own sphere. Works are for the good of others, and it is a more blessed thing to

give, than to receive.

Good works are more visible and conspicuous than faith. Faith is a more occult grace. It may lie

hidden in the heart and not be seen, but when works are joined with it, now it shines forth in its

native beauty. Though a garden be never so decked with flowers, yet they are not seen till the light

comes. So the heart of a Christian may be enriched with faith, but it is like a flower in the night. It

is not seen till works come. When this light shines before men, then faith appears in its orient

colours.

If this be the effigy of a good man, that he is of a merciful disposition, then it sharply reproves

those that are far from this temper. Their hearts are like the scales of the Leviathan, ’shut up together

as with a close seal’ (Job 41:15). They move only within their own circle, but do not indulge the

necessities of others. They have a flourishing estate, but like the man in the gospel, they have a

withered hand and cannot stretch it out to good uses. They have all as for themselves, not for Christ.

These are akin to the churl Nabal. ‘Shall I take my bread and my water and give it unto men, whom

I know not whence they be?’ (1 Samuel 25:11). It was said of the emperor Pertinax, that he had a

large empire but a narrow scanty heart.

There was a temple at Athens which was called the Temple of Mercy. It was dedicated to charitable

uses; and it was the greatest reproach to upbraid one with this, that he had never been in the Temple

of Mercy. It is the greatest disgrace to a Christian to be unmerciful. Covetous men, while they

enrich themselves, debase themselves, setting up a monopoly and committing idolatry with Mammon,

thus making themselves lower than their angels, as God made them lower than his angels. In the

time of pestilence, it is sad to have your houses shut up, but it is worse to have your hearts shut up.

How miserable is it to have a sea of sin and not a drop of mercy! Covetous hearts, like the Leviathan,

are ‘firm as a stone’ (Job 41:24). One may as well extract oil out of a flint, as the golden oil of

charity out of their flinty hearts. The philosopher says that the coldness of the heart is a presage of

death. When men’s affections to works of mercy are frozen, this coldness of heart is ominous and

sadly portends that they are dead in sin. We read in the law that the shellfish was accounted unclean.

This might probably be one reason, because the meat of it was enclosed in the shell and it was hard

to come by. They are to be reckoned among the unclean who enclose all their estate within the shell

of their own cabinet and will not let others be the better for it. How many have lost their souls by

being so saving!

There are some who perhaps will give the poor good words and that is all. ‘If a brother or sister be

naked and destitute of food and one of you say to them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled;

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notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body, what doth it profit?’

(James 2:15). Good words are but a cold kind of charity. The poor cannot live as the chameleon

upon this air.’ Let your words be as smooth as oil, they will not heal the wounded. Let them drop

as the honeycomb, they will not feed the hungry. ‘Though I speak with the tongues of angels and

have not charity, I am but as a tinkling cymbal’ (1 Corinthians 13:1). It is better to be charitable as

a saint than eloquent as an angel. Such as are cruel to the poor, let me tell you, you unchristian

yourselves. Unmercifulness is the sin of the heathen (Romans 1:31). While you put off the bowels

of mercy you put off the badge of Christianity. Saint Ambrose says that when we do not relieve

one whom we see ready to perish with hunger, we are guilty of his death. If this rule hold true there

are more guilty of the breach of the sixth commandment than we are aware of. St James speaks a

sad word: ‘For he shall have judgement without mercy that hath showed no mercy’ (James 2:13).

How do they think to find mercy from Christ, who never showed mercy to Christ in his members?

Dives denied Lazarus a crumb of bread and Dives was denied a drop of water. At the last day behold

the sinner’s indictment, ‘I was an hungered and ye gave me no meat; I was thirsty and ye gave me

no drink’ (Matthew 25:42). Christ does not say, ‘Ye took away my meat’, but ‘Ye gave me none;

ye did not feed my members’. Then follows the sentence, ‘Depart from me, ye cursed’. When

Christ’s poor come to your doors and you bid them depart from you, the time may come when you

shall knock at heaven’s gate, and Christ will say, Go from my door, ‘Depart from me, ye cursed’.

In short, covetousness is a foolish sin. God gave the rich man in the gospel that appellation, ‘Thou

fool’ (Luke 12:20). The covetous man does not enjoy what he possesses. He embitters his own life.

He discruciates himself with care either how to get or how to increase or how to secure an estate.

And what is the issue and result? Often as a just reward of sordid penuriousness, God blasts and

withers him in his outward estate. That saying of Gregory Nazianzen is to be seriously weighed:

God many times lets the thief take away and the moth consume that which is injuriously and

unmercifully withheld from the poor.

Before I leave this matter, I am sorry that any who pass for honest men should be brought into the

indictment. I mean, sorry that any who profess Christianity should be impeached as guilty of this

sin of covetousness and unmercifulness. Sure I am that God’s elect put on ‘bowels of mercies’

(Colossians 3:12); but I tell you that devout misers are the reproach of Christianity. They are wens

and spots in the face of religion. I remember Aelian in his History reports that in India there is a

griffin having four feet and wings, his bill like the eagle’s. It is hard whether to rank him among

the beasts or the fowl. So I may say of penurious votaries, they have the wings of profession by

which they seem to fly to heaven, but the feet of beasts, walking on earth and even licking the dust.

It is hard where to rank these, whether among the godly or the wicked. Oh take heed that, seeing

your religion will not destroy your covetousness, at last your covetousness does not destroy your

religion. The fabulist tells a story of the hedgehog that came to the cony-burrows in stormy weather

and desired harbour, promising that he would be a quiet guest, but when once he had gotten

entertainment, he set up his prickles and never left till he had thrust the poor conies out of their

burrows. So covetousness, though it has many fair pleas to insinuate and wind itself into the heart,

yet as soon as you have let it in, this thorn will never leave pricking till it has choked all good

beginnings and thrust all religion out of your hearts.

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I proceed next to the exhortation to beseech all Christians to put on ‘bowels of mercies’. Be ready

to indulge the miseries and necessities of others. Saint Ambrose calls charity the sum of Christianity,

and the apostle makes it the very definition of religion. ‘Pure religion and undefiled before God

and the Father is this, to visit the fatherless and the widows in their affliction’ (James 1:27). The

Hebrew word for ‘poor’ signifies ‘one that is empty’ or ‘drawn dry’. So the poor are exhausted of

their strength, beauty, substance; like ponds they are dried up. Therefore let them be filled again

with the silver streams of charity. The poor are as it were in the grave. The comfort of their life is

buried. Oh Christians, help with your merciful hands to raise them out of the sepulchre. God ’sendeth

his springs into the valleys’ (Psalm 104:10). Let the springs of your liberality run among the valleys

of poverty. Your sweetest and most benign influence should fall upon the lower grounds. What is

all your seeming devotion without bounty and mercifulness? I have known many, says Basil, pray

and fast, but relieve not such as are in distress. They are for a zeal that will put them to no charges.

What are they the better (says he) for all their seeming virtue? We read that the incense was to be

laid upon the fire (Leviticus 16:13). The flame of devotion must be perfumed with the incense of

charity. Aaron was to have a bell and a pomegranate. The pomegranate, as some of the learned

observe, was a symbol of good works. They lack the pomegranate (says Gregory Nazianzen) who

have no good works. The wise men not only bowed the knee to Christ, but presented him with gold,

myrrh and frankincense (Matthew 2:11). Pretences of zeal are insufficient. We must not only

worship Christ but bestow something upon his members. This is to present Christ with gold and

frankincense. Isaac would not bless Jacob by the voice, but he feels and handles him, and supposing

them to be Esau’s hands, he blessed him. God will not bless men by their voice, their loud prayers,

their devout discourses, but if he feel Esau’s hands, if their hands have wrought good works, then

he blesses them.

Let me exhort you therefore to deeds of mercy. Let your fingers drop with the myrrh of liberality.

Sow your golden seed. In this sense it is lawful to put out your money to use when you lay it out

for good uses. Remember that excellent saying of Augustine, Give those things to the poor which

you cannot keep that you may receive those things which you cannot lose. There are many occasions

of exercising your mercifulness. ‘The poor goes to the wall.’ Hear the orphans’ cry; pity the widows’

tears. Some there are who want employment. It would do well to set their wheel a-going. Others

who are past employment: be as eyes to the blind and feet to the lame. In some cases whole families

are sinking if some merciful hand does not help to shore them up. Before I press arguments to

liberality and munificence, there are three objections lie in the way which I shall endeavour to

remove:

1 We may give and so in time come ourselves to want.

Let Basil answer this. Wells (says he), which have their water drawn, spring ever more freely. ‘The

liberal soul shall be made fat ’ (Proverbs 11:25). Luther speaks of a monastery in Austria which

was very rich while it gave annually to the poor, but when it left off giving the monastery began

to decay. There is nothing lost by doing our duty. An estate may be imparted, yet not impaired.

The flowers yield honey to the bee yet do not hurt their own fruit. When the candle of prosperity

shines upon us we may light our neighbour that is in the dark and have never the less light ourselves.

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Whatever is disbursed to pious uses, God brings it in some other way. As the loaves in breaking

multiplied or as the widow’s oil increased by pouring out (1 Kings 17:10).

2 I cannot do so much as others — erect churches, build hospitals, augment libraries, maintain

scholars at the university.

If you cannot do so much, yet do something. Let there be much goodwill though there be not much

wealth to go with it. The widow’s two mites cast into the treasury were accepted (Luke 21:14).

God (as Chrysostom observes) looked not at the smallest of her gift, but at the largeness of her

heart. In the law, he that could not bring a lamb for an offering, if he brought but two turtledoves,

it sufficed. We read that the people brought ‘gold and silver, and goats, hair, to the building of the

tabernacle’ (Exodus 35:22-24); on which place (says Origen), ‘I desire, Lord, to bring something

to the building of thy temple, if not gold to make the mercy-seat on, if not silk to make the curtains

on, yet a little goats’ hair, that I may not be found in the number of those that have brought nothing

to thy temple’.

3 But I do not have anything to bestow upon the necessities of others.

Have you anything to bestow upon your lusts? Have you money to feed your pride, your Epicurism?

And can you find nothing to relieve the poor members of Christ?

Admit this excuse to be real, that you do not have such an estate; yet you may do something wherein

you may express your mercy to the poor. You may sympathise with them, pray for them, speak a

word of comfort to them. ‘Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem’ (Isaiah 40:2). If you can give them

no gold, you may speak a word in season which may be as ‘apples of gold in pictures of silver’.

Nay more, you may be helpful to the poor in stirring up others who have estates to relieve them.

As it is with the wind, if a man be hungry the wind will not fill him, but it can blow the sails of the

mill and make it grind corn for the use of man. So though you do not have an estate yourself to

help him who is in want, yet you may stir up others to help him. You may blow the sails of their

affections, causing them to show mercy, and so you may help your brother by a proxy.

Having answered these objections let me now pursue the exhortation to mercifulness. I shall lay

down several arguments which I desire may be weighed in the balance of reason and conscience.

1 To be diffusively good is the great end of our creation. ‘Created in Christ Jesus unto good works’

(Ephesians 2:10). Every creature answers the end of its creation. The star shines, the bird sings, the

plant bears; the end of life is service. He that does not answer his end in respect of usefulness,

cannot enjoy his end in respect of happiness. Many, says Seneca, have been long in the world, but

have not lived. They have done no good: ‘a useless weight of earth’. A useless person serves for

nothing but to ‘cumber the ground’. And because he is barren in figs he shall be fruitful in curses

(Hebrews 6:8).

2 By mercifulness we resemble God who is a God of mercy. He is said to ‘delight in mercy’ (Micah

7:18). ‘His tender mercies are over all his works, (Psalm 145:9). He requires good for evil, like the

clouds which receive ill vapours from us but return them to us again in sweet showers. There is not

a creature lives but tastes of the mercies of God. Every bird, says Ambrose, in its kind sings hymns

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of praise to God for his bounty, but men and angels in a more particular manner taste the cream

and quintessence of God’s mercies.

What temporal mercies have you received! Every time you draw your breath you suck in mercy.

Every bit of bread you eat, the hand of mercy carves it to you. You never drink but in a golden cup

of mercy.

What spiritual mercies has God enriched some of you with! Pardoning, adopting, saving mercy!

The picture of God’s mercy can never be drawn to the full. You cannot take the breadth of his

mercy, for it is infinite, nor the height of it, for it ‘reacheth above the clouds’, nor the length of it,

for it is ‘from everlasting to everlasting’ (Psalm 103:17). The works of mercy are the glory of the

Godhead. Moses prays, ‘Lord, show me thy glory’ (Exodus 33:18). Says God, ‘I will make all my

goodness to pass before thee’ (verse 19). God accounts himself most glorious in the shining robes

of his mercy. Now by works of mercy we resemble the God of mercy. We are bid to draw our lines

according to this copy. ‘Be ye merciful, as your Father also is merciful’ (Luke 6:36).

3 Alms are a sacrifice. ‘To do good and to communicate, forget not, for with such sacrifices God

is well pleased’ (Hebrews 13:16). When you are distributing to the poor, it is as if you were praying,

as if you were worshipping God. There are two sorts of sacrifices; expiatory the sacrifice of Christ’s

blood; and gratulatory the sacrifice of alms. This (says holy Greenham) is more acceptable to God

than any other sacrifice. The angel said to Cornelius, ‘Thy alms are come up for a memorial before

God’ (Acts 10:4). The backs of the poor are the altar on which this sacrifice is to be offered.

4 We ourselves live upon alms. Other creatures liberally contribute to our necessities. The sun does

not have its light for itself but for us; it enriches us with its golden beams. The earth brings us a

fruitful crop, and to show how joyful a mother she is in bringing forth, the psalmist says ‘The

valleys are covered over with corn, they shout for joy, they also sing’ (Psalm 65:13). One creature

gives us wool, another oil, another silk. We are fain to go a-begging to the creation. Shall every

creature be for the good of man and man only be for himself? How absurd and irrational is this!

5 We are to extend our liberality by virtue of a membership: ‘That thou hide not thyself from thine

own flesh’ (Isaiah 50:7). The poor are ‘of the same clay’. The members by a law of equity and

sympathy contribute one to another. The eye conveys light to the body, the heart blood, the head

spirits. That is a dead member in the body which does not communicate to the rest. Thus it is in

the body politic. Let no man think it is too far below him to mind the wants and necessities of

others. It is pity but that hand should be cut off which disdains to pluck a thorn out of the foot. It

is spoken in the honour of that renowned princess, the Empress of Theodosius the Great, that she

herself visited the sick and prepared relief for them with her own imperial hands.

6 We are not lords of an estate, but stewards, and how soon may we hear the word, ‘Give an account

of thy stewardship, for thou mayest be no longer steward!’ (Luke 16:2). An estate is a talent to

trade with. It is as dangerous to hide our talent as to spend it (Matthew 25:25, 30). If the covetous

man keeps his gold too long, it will begin to rust, and the rust of it will witness against him (James

5:3).

7 The examples of others who have been renowned for acts of mercy and munificence.

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Our Lord Christ is a great example of charity, he was not more full of merit than bounty. Trajan

the Emperor rent off a piece of his own robe to wrap his soldiers’ wounds. Christ did more. He rent

his flesh; He made a medicine of his body and blood to heal us. ‘By his stripes we are healed’

(Isaiah 53:5). Here was a pattern of charity without a parallel.

The Jews are noted in this kind. It is a rabbinical observation that those who live devoutly among

the Jews distribute a tenth part of their estate among the poor, and they give so freely (says Philo

the Jew) as if by giving they hope to receive some great gratuity. Now if the Jews are so devoted

to works of mercy, who live without priest, without temple, without Messiah, shall not we much

more profess our faith in the blessed Messiah!

Let me tell you of heathens. I have read of Titus Vespasian, he was so inured to works of mercy

that remembering he had given nothing that day, cried out, ‘I have lost a day’. It is reported of some

of the Turks that they have servants whom they employ on purpose to enquire what poor they have

and they send relief to them. And the Turks have a saying in their Alcoran, that if men knew what

a blessed thing it were to distribute alms, rather than spare, they would give some of their own flesh

to relieve the poor. And shall not a Christian’s creed be better than a Turk’s Alcoran?

Let all this persuade to works of mercy. ‘Believe me, it is a royal deed to succour the fallen.’

When poor indigent creatures like Moses are laid in the ark of bulrushes weeping and ready to sink

in the waters of affliction, be as temporal saviours to them and draw them out of the waters with a

golden cord. Let the breasts of your mercy nurse the poor. Be like the trees of the sanctuary both

for food and medicine (Ezekiel 47:12). When distressed and even starved souls are fainting, let

your costly ingredients revive and fetch spirits in them. Let others see the coats and garments which

you have made for the poor (Acts 9:39).

8 The sin of unmercifulness. The unmerciful man is an unthankful man, and what can be said worse?

You to whom the Lord has given an estate, your cup runs over, but you have a miserly heart and

will not part with anything for good uses; it is death to you to relieve them that are dying. Know

that you are in the highest degree ungrateful; you are not fit for human society. The Scripture has

put these two together ‘unthankful, without natural affection’ (2 Timothy 3:2, 3). God may repent

that ever he gave such men estates, and may say as Hosea 2:9: ‘Therefore will I return and take

away my corn and my wine in the season thereof and will recover my wool and my flax.’

The unmerciful man lacks love to Christ. All men would be thought to love Christ and would be

very angry with them that should question their love; but do they love Christ who let the members

of Christ starve? No, these love their money more than Christ, and come under that fearful

‘Anathema’ (1 Corinthians 16:22).

9 Lastly, I shall use but one argument more to persuade to works of mercy, and that is the reward

which follows alms-deeds. Giving of alms is a glorious work, and let me assure you it is not unfruitful

work. Whatsoever is disbursed to the poor is given to Christ. ‘Inasmuch as you have done it to one

of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me’ (Matthew 25:40). The poor man’s hand

is Christ’s treasury, and there is nothing lost that is put there. ‘Whatsoever you give by stretching

forth your hand on earth is as it were given in heaven’. The text says, ‘the merciful shall obtain

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mercy’. In the Greek it is, ‘they shall be bemercied’. What is it we need most? Is it not mercy?

Pardoning and saving mercy? What is it we desire on our deathbed? Is it not mercy? You that show

mercy shall find mercy. You that pour in the oil of compassion to others, God will pour in the

golden oil of salvation unto you (Matthew 7:2). The Shunammite woman showed mercy to the

prophet and she received kindness from him another way (2 Kings 4:8-37). She welcomed him to

her house, and he restored her dead child to life. They that sow mercy shall reap in kind; ‘they shall

obtain mercy’. Such is the sweetness and mercifulness of God’s nature, that he will not suffer any

man to be a loser. No kindness shown to him shall be unregarded or unrewarded. God will be in

no man’s debt. For a cup of cold water he shall have a draught of Christ’s warm blood to refresh

his soul. ‘For God is not unrighteous to forget your work and labour of love, which you have shown

toward his name, in that ye have ministered to the saints . . .’ (Hebrews 6:10). God’s mercy is a

tender mercy, a pure mercy, a rich mercy. Mercy shall follow and overtake the merciful man. He

shall be rewarded in this life and in the life to come.

The merciful man shall be rewarded in this life. He shall be blessed —

In his person: ‘Blessed is he that considers the poor’ (Psalm 41:1). Let him go whither he will, a

blessing goes along with him. He is in favour with God. God casts a smiling aspect upon him.

Blessed in his name: ‘He shall be had in everlasting remembrance’ (Psalm 112:6). When the

niggard’s name shall rot, the name of a merciful man shall be embalmed with honour, and give

forth its scent as the wine of Lebanon.

Blessed in his estate: ‘He shall abound in all things’. ‘The liberal soul shall be made fat’ (Proverbs

2:25). He shall have the fat of the earth and the dew of heaven. He shall not only have the venison,

but the blessing.

Blessed in his posterity: ‘He is ever merciful and lendeth; and his seed is blessed’ (Psalm 37:26).

He shall not only leave an estate behind, but a blessing behind to his children, and God will see

that the entail of that blessing shall not be cut off.

Blessed in his negotiations: ‘For this thing the Lord thy God shall bless thee in all thy works, and

in all that thou puttest thine hand unto’ (Deuteronomy 15:10). The merciful man shall be blessed

in his building, planting, journeying. Whatever he is about, a blessing shall empty itself upon him.

‘Wherever he treads there shall be a rose’. He shall be a prosperous man. The honeycomb of a

blessing shall be still dropping upon him.

Blessed with long life: ‘The Lord will preserve him and keep him alive’ (Psalm 41:2). He has helped

to keep others alive, and God will keep him alive. Is there anything then lost by mercifulness? It

spins out the silver thread of life. Many are taken away the sooner for their unmercifulness. Because

their hearts are straitened, their lives are shortened.

Again, the merciful man shall be rewarded in the life to come. Aristotle joins these two together,

liberality and utility. God will reward the merciful man hereafter, though not for his works, yet

according to his works. ‘I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God, and the books were

opened, and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according

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to their works’ (Revelation 20:12). As God has a bottle to put our tears in, so he has a book to write

our alms in. As God will put a veil over his people’s sins, so he will in free grace set a crown upon

their works. The way to lay up is to lay out. Other parts of our estate are left behind (Ecclesiastes

2:18), but that which is given to Christ’s poor is hoarded up in heaven. That is a blessed kind of

giving which though it makes the purse lighter, it makes the crown heavier.

You that are mercifully inclined, remember whatever alms you distribute:

You shall have good security. ‘He that gives to the poor lends to the Lord; and that which he hath

given will he pay him again’ (Ecclesiastes 11:1; Luke 6:38; Proverbs 19:17). There is God’s

counter-band to save you harmless, which is better security than any public faith. Yet here is our

unbelief and atheism; we will not take God’s bond. We commonly put our deeds of mercy among

our desperate debts.

You shall be paid with over-plus. For a wedge of gold which you have parted with you shall have

a weight of glory. For a cup of cold water you shall have rivers of pleasure, which run at God’s

right hand for evermore. The interest comes to infinitely more than the principal. Pliny writes of a

country in Africa where the people for every bushel of seed they sow receive an hundred and

fifty-fold increase. For every penny you drop into Christ’s treasury, you shall receive above a

thousand-fold increase. Your after-crop of glory will be so great that, though you are still reaping,

you will never be able to inn the whole harvest. Let all this persuade rich men to honour the Lord

with their substance

Before I conclude this subject, let me lay down some rules briefly concerning works of mercy.

1 Charity must be free. ‘Thou shalt give, and thy heart must not be grieved . ..’ (Deuteronomy

15:10). That is, you must not be troubled at parting with your money. He that gives grievingly,

gives grudgingly. It is not a gift, but a tax. Charity must flow like spring-water. The heart must be

the spring, the hand the pipe, the poor the cistern. God loves a cheerful giver. Do not be like the

crab which has all the ver-juice squeezed and pressed out. You must not give to the poor as if you

were delivering your purse on the highway. Charity without alacrity is rather a fine than an offering.

It is rather doing of penance than giving of alms. Charity must be like the myrrh which drops from

the tree without cutting or forcing.

2 We must give that which is our own (Isaiah 58:7). To deal bread to the hungry, it must be ‘thy

bread’. The word for ‘alms, in the Syriac signifies ‘justice’, to show that alms must be of that which

is justly gotten. The Scripture puts them together, ‘To do justice, to love mercy.’ (Micah 6:8). We

must not make ‘a sacrifice out of robbery’, a sacrifice of sacrilege. ‘For I the Lord love judgement,

I hate robbery for burnt offering’ (Isaiah 61:8). He that shall build an almshouse or hospital with

goods ill-gotten displays the ensign of his pride and sets up the monument of his shame.

3 Do all in Christ and for Christ.

Do all in Christ. Labour that your persons may be in Christ. We are ‘accepted in him’ (Ephesians

1:6). Origen, Chrysostom, and Peter Martyr affirm that the best works not springing from faith are

lost. The Pelagians thought to have posed Augustine with that question, Whether it was sin in the

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heathen to clothe the naked? Augustine answered rightly: ‘The doing of good is not in itself simply

evil, but proceeding from infidelity it becomes evil’. ‘To them that are unbelieving is nothing pure’

(Titus 1:15). That fruit is most sweet and genuine which is brought forth in the vine (John 15:4).

Out of Christ all our alms-deeds are but the fruit of the wild olive. They are not good works but

dead works.

Do all for Christ, namely, for his sake, that you may testify your love to him. Love mellows and

ripens our alms-deeds. It makes them a precious perfume to God. As Mary did out of love bring

her ointments and sweet spices to anoint Christ’s dead body, so out of love to Christ bring your

ointments and anoint his living body, viz., saints and members.

4 Works of mercy are to be done in humility. Away with ostentation! The worm breeds in the fairest

fruit, the moth in the finest cloth. Pride will be creeping into our best things. Beware of this dead

fly in the box of ointment. When Moses’ face shone, he put a veil over it. So while your light shines

before men and they see your good works, cover yourselves with the veil of humility. As the

silkworm, while she weaves her curious works, hides herself within the silk and is not seen, so we

should hide ourselves from pride and vainglory.

It was the sin of the Pharisees while they were distributing alms that they blew the trumpet (Matthew

6:2). They did not give their alms, but sold them for applause. A proud man ‘casts his bread upon

the waters’, as a fisherman casts his angle upon the waters. He angles for vainglory. I have read of

one Cosmus Medices, a rich citizen of Florence, that he confessed to a near friend of his, he built

so many magnificent structures, and spent so much on scholars and libraries, not for any love to

learning but to raise up to himself trophies of fame and renown. An humble soul denies himself,

yes, even annihilates himself. He thinks how little it is he can do for God, and if he could do more,

it were but a due debt. Therefore he looks upon all his works as if he had done nothing. The saints

are brought in at the last day as disowning their works of charity. ‘Lord, when saw we thee an

hungered and fed thee . . .?’ (Matthew 25:37). A good Christian not only empties his hand of alms,

but empties his heart of pride. While he raises the poor out of the dust, he lays himself in the dust.

Works of mercy must be like the cassia which is a sweet spice, but grows low.

5 Dispose your alms prudentially. It is said of the merciful man, ‘He orders his affairs with discretion’

(Psalm 112:5). There is a great deal of wisdom in distinguishing between those that have sinned

themselves into poverty, and those who by the hand of God are brought into poverty. Discretion

in the distribution of alms consists of two things: in finding out a fit object; in taking a fit season.

The finding out a fit object comes under a double notion. Give to those who are in most need. Raise

the hedge where it is lowest. Feed the lamp which is going out. Give to those who may probably

be more serviceable. Though we bestow cost and dressing upon a weak plant, yet not upon a dead

plant. Breed up such as may help to build the house of Israel (Ruth 4:11), that may be pillars in

church and state, not caterpillars making your charity to blush.

Discretion in giving alms is in taking the fit season. Give to charitable uses in time of health and

prosperity. Distribute your silver and gold to the poor before ‘the silver cord be loosed or the golden

bowl be broken’ (Ecclesiastes 12:6). ‘He who gives quickly gives double’. Make your hands your

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executors; not as some who reserve all they give till the term of life is ready to expire, and truly

what is then bestowed is not given away, but taken away by death. It is not charity, but necessity.

Oh do not so marry yourselves to money that you are resolved nothing shall part you but death. Be

not like the medlar which is never good till it be rotten. A covetous man may be compared to a

Christmas-box. He receives money, but parts with none till death breaks this box in pieces. Then

the silver and the gold come tumbling out. Give in time of health. These are the alms which God

takes notice of, and (as Calvin says) puts in his book of accounts.

6 Give thankfully. They should be more thankful that give an alms than they that receive it. We

should (says Nazianzen) give a thank-offering to God that we are in the number of givers and not

receivers. Bless God for a willing mind. To have not only an estate, but an heart, is matter of

gratulation.

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16. A description of heart-purity

Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.

Matthew 5:8

The holy God, who is ‘of purer eyes than to behold iniquity’ calls here for heart-purity, and to such

as are adorned with this jewel, he promises a glorious and beatifical vision of himself: ‘they shall

see God’. Two things are to be explained the nature of purity; the subject of purity.

1 The nature of purity. Purity is a sacred refined thing. It stands diametrically opposed to whatsoever

defiles. We must distinguish the various kinds of purity. First, there is a primitive purity which is

in God originally and essentially as light is in the sun. Holiness is the glory of the Godhead: ‘Glorious

in holiness’ (Exodus 15:11). God is the pattern and prototype of all holiness. Second, there is a

created purity. Thus holiness is in the angels and was once in Adam. Adam’s heart did not have

the least spot or tincture of impurity. We call that wine pure which has no sophistication; and that

gold pure which has no dross mingled with it. Such was Adam’s holiness. It was like the wine

which comes from the grape, having no mixture. But this is not to be found on earth. We must go

to heaven for it.

Third, there is an evangelical purity; whence grace is mingled with some sin, like gold in the ore,

like air in the twilight, like wine that has a dash in it, like fine cloth with a coarse list, like

Nebuchadnezzar’s image, part of silver, and part of clay (Daniel 2:35). This mixture God calls

purity in a gospel-sense; as a face may be said to be fair which has some freckles in it. Where there

is a study of purity and a loathing ourselves for our impurity, this is to be ‘pure in heart’.

Some by pure in heart, understand chastity, others sincerity (Psalm 32:2). But I suppose purity here

is to be taken in a larger sense for the several kinds and degrees of holiness. They are said to be

pure who are consecrated persons, having the oil of graces poured upon them. This purity is much

mistaken.

Civility is not purity. A man may be clothed with moral virtues justice, prudence, temperance yet

go to hell.

Profession is not purity. A man may have a name to live and yet be dead (Revelation 3:1). He may

be swept by civility and garnished by profession, yet the devil may dwell in the house. The blazing

comet is no star. The hypocrite’s tongue may be silver, yet his heart stone. Purity consists in two

things; rectitude of mind, a prizing holiness in the judgement (Psalm 119:30); conformity of will,

an embracing of holiness in the affections (Psalm 119:97). A pure soul is cast into the mould of

holiness. Holiness is a blood that runs in his veins.

2 The subject of purity: the heart: ‘pure in heart’. Purity of heart does not exclude purity of life, no

more than the pureness of the fountain excludes the pureness of the stream. But it is called purity

of heart, because this is the main thing in religion, and there can be no purity of life without it. A

Christian’s great care should be to keep the heart pure, as one would especially preserve the spring

from being poisoned. In a duel, a man will chiefly guard and fence his heart, so a wise Christian

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should above all things keep his heart pure. Take heed that the love of sin does not get in there, lest

it prove mortal.

Christians should above all things breathe after heart purity: ‘Holding the mystery of the faith in a

pure conscience’ (1 Timothy 3:9). Justification causes our happiness, sanctification evidences it.

1 The reasons for purity are: (i) Purity is a thing called for in Scripture: ‘Be ye holy for I am holy’

(1 Peter 1:16). It is not only the minister bids you be holy, but God himself calls for it. What should

the Holy God do with unholy servants?

(ii) Because of that filthy and cursed condition we are in before purity be wrought in us. We are a

lump of clay and sin mingled together. Sin not only blinds us, but defiles us. It is called filthiness

(James 1:21). And to show how befilthying a thing it is, it is compared to a plague-sore (1 Kings

8:38), to spots (Deuteronomy 32:5), to a vomit (2 Peter 2:22), to the infants ‘tumbling in blood’

(Ezekiel 16:6), and to a ‘menstruous cloth’ (Isaiah 30:22), which (as Jerome says) was the most

defiling thing under the law. All the legal warnings which God appointed were but to put men in

mind of their loathsomeness before they were washed in the blood of Christ. If all the evils in the

world were put together and their quintessence strained out, they could not make a thing so black

and polluted as sin does. A sinner is a devil in man’s shape. When Moses’ rod was turned into a

serpent, he fled from it. Would God open men’s eyes and show them their deformities and damnable

spots, they would be afraid and fly from themselves as serpents! This shows what need we have

of purity. When grace comes it washes off this hellish filth. Of Ethiopians it makes us Israelites. It

turns ravens into swans. It makes them who are as black as hell to become white as snow.

(iii) Because none but the pure in heart are interested in the covenant of grace. Covenanted persons

have ‘the sprinkling with clean water’ (Ezekiel 36:25). Now, till we are thus sprinkled, we have

nothing to do with the new covenant and by consequence with the new Jerusalem. If a will be made

only to such persons as are so qualified, none can come in for a part, but such as have those

qualifications. So, God has made a will and covenant that he will be our God, and will settle heaven

upon us by entail, but with this clause or proviso in the will, that we be purified persons, having

the ‘clean water sprinkled, upon us. Now till then, we have nothing to do with God or mercy.

(iv) Purity is the end of our election. ‘He has chosen us that we should be holy’ (Ephesians 1:4).

Not for holiness, but to holiness. ‘Whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed

to the image of his Son’ (Romans 8:29). God predestinates us to Christ’s image, which image

consists ‘in righteousness and true holiness’ (Ephesians 4:24). So that till you are holy, you cannot

show any sign of election upon you, but rather the devil’s brand-mark.

(v) Purity is the end of our redemption. If we could have gone to heaven in our sins, Christ needed

not have died. Why did he shed his blood but to redeem us from ‘a vain conversation’? (1 Peter:18,

19); and, ‘who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself

a peculiar people’ (Titus 2:14). Christ shed his blood to wash off our filth. The cross was both an

altar and a laver. Jesus died not only to save us from wrath (1 Thessalonians 1:10), but to save us

from sin (Matthew 1:21). Out of his side came water which signifies our cleansing, as well as blood

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which signifies our justifying (1 John 5:6). The truth is, it were to make the body of Christ monstrous,

if the head should be pure and not the members.

2 Why purity must be chiefly in the heart.

(i) Because if the heart be not pure, we differ nothing from a Pharisaic purity. The Pharisees’

holiness consisted chiefly in externals. Theirs was an outside purity. They never minded the inside

of the heart. ‘Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For ye make clean the outside of

the cup and of the platter, but within they are full of extortion’, and ‘Ye are like unto whited

sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men’s bones’

(Matthew 23:25, 27). The Pharisees were good only on the surface. They were whited over, not

white. They were like a rotten post laid in vermilion colour, like a fair chimney-piece gilded without,

but within nothing but soot. Of such hypocrites Salvian complains, who had Christ in their mouths

but to no purpose. We must go further. Be ‘pure in heart’, like the king’s daughter ‘all glorious

within’ (Psalm 45:13); else ours is but a Pharisaic purity; and Christ says, ‘Except your righteousness

shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom

of heaven’ (Matthew 5:20).

(ii) The heart must especially be kept pure, because the heart is the chief seat or place of God’s

residence. God dwells in the heart. He takes up the heart for his own lodging (Isaiah 57:15; Ephesians

3:17), therefore it must be pure and holy. A king’s palace must be kept from defilement, especially

his presence-chamber. How holy ought that to be! If the body be the temple of the Holy Ghost (1

Corinthians 6:19), the heart is the holy of holies! Oh take heed of defiling the room where God is

to come. Let that room be washed with holy tears.

(iii) The heart must especially be pure, because it is the heart that sanctifies all we do. If the heart

be holy, all is holy — our affections holy, our duties holy. ‘The altar sanctifieth the gift’ (Matthew

23:19). The heart is the altar that sanctifies the offering. The Romans kept their springs from being

poisoned. The heart is the spring of all our actions; let us keep this spring from poison. Be ‘pure

in heart’.

See here what is the beauty that sets off a soul in God’s eye, namely, purity of heart. You who are

never so beautiful are but a spiritual leper till you are pure in heart. God is in love with the pure

heart for he sees his own picture drawn there. Holiness is a beam of God; it is the angels’ glory.

They are pure virgin-spirits. Take away purity from an angel and he is no more an angel but a devil.

You who are pure in heart have the angels’ glory shining in you. You have the embroidery and

workmanship of the Holy Ghost upon you. The pure heart is God’s paradise where he delights to

walk. It is his lesser heaven. The dove delights in the purest air. The Holy Ghost who descended

in the likeness of a dove delights in the purest soul. God says of the pure in heart as of Zion, ‘This

is my rest for ever, here will I dwell’ (Psalm 132:14). God loves the fairest complexion. The pure

in heart is Christ’s bride, decked and bespangled with the jewels of holiness. ‘Thou hast ravished

my heart with one of thine eyes’ (Canticles 4:9). Thine eyes, that is, thy graces; these as a chain of

pearl have drawn mine heart to thee. Of all hearts God loves the pure heart best. You who dress

yourself by the glass of the Word and adorn ‘the hidden man of thy heart’ (1 Peter 3:4), are most

precious in God’s eyes, though you may be blear-eyed as Leah, lame as Barzillai,’ yet being ‘pure

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in heart, you are the mirror of beauty and may say ‘Yet shall I be glorious in the eyes of the Lord’

(Isaiah 49:5). How may this raise the esteem of purity! This is a beauty that never fades and which

makes God himself fall in love with us.

If we must be pure in heart then we must not rest in outward purity. Civility is not sufficient. A

swine may be washed, yet a swine still. Civility does but wash a man, grace changes him. Civility,

like a star may shine in the eyes of the world, but it differs as much from purity as the crystal from

the diamond. Civility is but strewing flowers on a dead corpse. A man may be wonderfully moralised,

yet but a tame devil. How many have made civility their saviour! Morality may damn as well as

vice. A vessel may be sunk with gold, as well as with dung.

Observe two things:

1 The civil person, though he will not commit gross sins, yet he is not sensible of heart sins. He

does not discern the ‘law in his members’ (Romans 7:23). He is not troubled for unbelief, hardness

of heart, vanity of thoughts. He abhors gaol-sins, not gospel-sins.

2 The civil person has an aching tooth at religion. His heart rises against holiness. The snake is of

a fine colour, but has a deadly sting. The civil man is fair to look to, but has a secret antipathy

against the ways of God. He hates grace as much as vice. Zeal is as odious to him as uncleanness.

So that civility is not to be rested in. The heart must be pure. God would have Aaron wash the

inwards of the sacrifice (Leviticus 9:14). Civility does but wash the outside; the inwards must be

washed. ‘Blessed are the pure in heart’.

Let us put ourselves on trial whether we are pure-hearted or no. Here I shall do two things to show

the signs, first, of an impure heart; second, of a pure heart.

1 An ignorant heart is an impure heart. To be ignorant of sin or Christ argues impurity of heart.

Nahash the Ammonite would enter into covenant with the men of Jabesh-Gilead so he might thrust

out their right eyes (1 Samuel 11:2). Satan leaves men their left eye. In worldly knowledge they

are quick-sighted enough but the right eye of spiritual knowledge is quite put out (2 Corinthians

4:4). Ignorance is Satan’s stronghold (Acts 26:18). The devils are bound in chains of darkness (Jude

6). So are all ignorant persons. Impossible it is that an ignorant heart should be good. It is knowledge

makes the heart good. ‘That the soul be without knowledge is not good’ (Proverbs 19:2). For any

to say that, though their mind be ignorant yet their heart is good, they may as well say that, though

they are blind yet their eyes are good. In the law, when the plague of leprosy was in a man’s head

the priest was to pronounce him unclean. This is the case of an ignorant man. The leprosy is in his

head, ‘he is unclean’. That heart cannot be very pure which is a dungeon. Grace cannot reign where

ignorance reigns. An ignorant man can have no love to God. ‘He cannot love that which he does

not know’. He can have no faith. Knowledge must usher in faith (Psalm 9:10). He cannot worship

God aright (John 4:22). Though he may worship the true God, yet in a wrong manner. Ignorance

is the root of sin. Blindness leads to lasciviousness (Ephesians 4:18, 19; Proverbs 7:23). Ignorance

is the mother of pride (Revelation 3:17). It is the cause of error (2 Timothy 3:7), and, which is

worse, an affected ignorance. ‘It is one thing to be ignorant; it is another thing to be unwilling to

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know’. Many are in love with ignorance. They hug their disease (Job 21:14; 2 Peter 3:5). Ignorant

minds are impure. There is no going to heaven in the dark.

2 That heart is impure which sees no need of purity. ‘I am rich and have need of nothing’ (Revelation

3:17). Not to be sensible of a disease is worse than the disease. You shall hear a sick man say, ‘I

am well, I ail nothing’. There are some who ‘need no repentance’ (Luke 15:7). Some sinners are

too well to be cured. Heart purity is as great a wonder to the natural man as the new birth was to

Nicodemus (John 3:4). It is sad to think how many go on confidently and are ready to bless

themselves, never suspecting their condition till it be too late.

3 He has an impure heart who regards iniquity in his heart. ‘If I regard iniquity in my heart, the

Lord will not hear me’ (Psalm 66:18). In the original it is ‘If I look upon sin’, that is, with a lustful

look. Sin-regarding is inconsistent with heart-purity.

What is it to ‘regard iniquity,?

(i) When we indulge in sin. When sin not only lives in us, but when we live in sin. Some will leave

all their sins but one. Jacob would let all his sons go but Benjamin. Satan can hold a man by one

sin. The fowler holds the bird fast enough by a wing or a claw. Others hide their sins like one that

shuts up his shop-windows but follows his trade within doors. Many deal with their sins as Moses,

mother dealt with her son. She hid him in the ark of bulrushes, as if she had left him quite, but her

eye was still upon him and in conclusion she became his nurse (Exodus 2:9). So, many seem to

leave their sins, but they only hide them from the eye of others. Their heart still goes after them

and at last they nurse and give breast to their sins.

(ii) To regard iniquity is to delight in iniquity. A child of God, though he sins, yet he does not take

a complacency in sin. ‘What I hate, that do I’ (Romans 7:15). But impure souls make a recreation

of sin. ‘They had pleasure in unrighteousness’ (2 Thessalonians 2:12). Never did one feed with

more delight on a dish he loves than a wicked man does upon the forbidden fruit. This delight shows

that the will is in the sin. And ‘the will is the rule and measure of the deed’.

(iii) To regard iniquity is to lay in provision for sin. ‘Make not provision for the flesh’ (Romans

13:14). Sinners are caterers for their lusts. It is a metaphor taken from such as make provision for

a family, or victual a garrison. The Greek word here signifies a projecting and forecasting in the

mind how to bring a thing about. This is to make provision for the flesh when one studies to satisfy

the flesh and lay in fuel for lust. Thus Amnon made provision for the flesh (2 Samuel 13:5). He

fains himself sick, and his sister, Tamar, must be his nurse. She must cook and dress his meat for

him. By which means he defiled the breasts of her virginity. It is sad when men’s care is not to

discharge conscience, but to satisfy lust.

(iv) To regard iniquity is to give it respect and entertainment, as Lot showed respect to the angels.

‘He bowed himself with his face toward the ground and said, Behold now, my lords, turn in, I pray

you . . .’ (Genesis 19:2). When the Spirit of God comes He is repulsed and grieved, but when

temptation comes, the sinner bows to it, sets open the gates, and says ‘Turn in, my lord’. This is to

regard iniquity.

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(v) He is said to regard sin that does not regard the threatenings of God against sin. We read of

’seven thunders uttering their voices’ (Revelation 10:3). How many thunders in Scripture utter their

voice against sin! ‘God shall wound the hairy scalp of such an one as goeth on still in his trespasses’

(Psalm 68:21). Here is a thundering scripture, but sinners fear not this thunder. Let a minister come

as a Boanerges, clothed with the spirit of Elijah, and denounce all the curses of God against men’s

sins, they regard it not. They can laugh at the shaking of a spear (Job 41:29). This is to regard

iniquity, and argues an impure heart.

4 An unbelieving heart is an impure heart. The Scripture calls it expressly ‘an evil heart of unbelief’

(Hebrews 3:12). An unbelieving heart is evil in the highest degree. It is full of the poison of hell.

Unbelief is the foul medley of all sins, the root and receptacle of sin.

(i) Unbelief is a God-affronting sin. It puts the lie upon God. It calls in question his power (Psalm

78:19), mercy and truth. ‘He that believeth not hath made God a liar’ (1 John 5:10). And can a

greater affront be cast upon the God of glory? It makes us trust to second causes, which is setting

the creature in the room of God. ‘Asa in his disease sought not to the Lord, but to the physicians’

(2 Chronicles 16:12). He relied more on the physician than upon God. Saul seeks to the witch of

Endor. O high affront, to lean upon the reed and neglect the Rock of Ages!

(ii) Unbelief hardens the heart. These two sins are linked together. ‘He upbraided them with their

unbelief and hardness of heart’ (Mark 16:14). Unbelief breeds the stone of the heart. He that believes

not God’s threatenings will never fear him. He that believes not God’s promises will never love

him. What is said of the Leviathan is true of the unbeliever. ‘His heart is as firm as a stone’ (Job

41:24). Unbelief first pollutes the heart and then hardens it.

(iii) Unbelief breeds hypocrisy. Atheists do not believe that God is a jealous God and will call them

to account. Therefore it is they put on a mask of religion and are saints in jest, that they may play

the devil in earnest (2 Timothy 3:4, 5). They pretend God, but Self is the idol they worship. Like

barge-men they look one way and row another. The unbeliever is the greatest hypocrite.

(iv) Unbelief causes the fear of men. ‘Fear is proof of a baseborn soul’. Fear is a debasing thing.

It unmans a man. It makes him afraid to be good. The fearful man studies rather compliance than

conscience. ‘The fear of man bringeth a snare’ (Proverbs 29:25). What made Abraham equivocate,

David feign himself mad, Peter deny Christ? Was it not their fear? And whence does fear spring,

but from unbelief? Therefore the Scripture joins them together. ‘The fearful and unbelieving’

(Revelation 21:8).

(v) Unbelief is the root of apostasy: ‘an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God’

(Hebrews 3:12). What is the reason those who seemed once zealous now despise prophesying and

leave off prayer in their families? Is it not their unbelief? They believed not that God is, and that

he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him (Hebrews 11:6). Infidelity is the cause of apostasy.

In the Greek, ‘apistia’ (unbelief) leads to ‘apostasia’ (apostasy). And if infidelity be the breeder

and fomenter of so much sin, then the unbelieving heart must needs be an impure heart.

5 A covetous heart is an impure heart. The earth is the most impure element. The purity of the heart

lies in the spirituality of it, and what more opposite to spiritualness than earthiness? Covetousness

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is ‘the root of all evil’ (1 Timothy 6:10). ‘To what cost thou not drive mortal hearts, thou accursed

lust for gold?’

(i) Covetousness is the root of discontent. Why do any repine at their condition, but because they

think they do not have enough? The Greek word for covetousness signifies an immoderate desire

of getting. Covetousness is a dry dropsy, and because the thirst is not satisfied, therefore the heart

frets through discontent and impatience.

(ii) Covetousness is the root of theft. Achan’s covetous humour made him steal that wedge of gold

which served to cleave asunder his soul from God (Joshua 7:21).

(iii) Covetousness is the root of treason. It made Judas betray Christ. ‘What will ye give me and I

will deliver him unto you?’ (Matthew 26:15). Absalom’s covetousness made him attempt to pluck

the crown from his father’s head. He that is a Demas will soon prove a Judas. ‘Men shall be covetous’

(2 Timothy 3:2), and it follows in the next verse, ‘traitors’. Where covetousness is in the premises,

treason will be in the conclusion.

(iv) Covetousness is the root of murder. Why did Ahab stone Naboth to death but to possess his

vineyard? (1 Kings 21:13). Covetousness has made many swim to the crown in blood. And can the

heart be pure, when the ‘hands are full of blood’? (Isaiah 1:15).

(v) Covetousness is the root of perjury. ‘Men shall be covetous, and it follows, ‘trucebreakers’ (2

Timothy 3:2, 3). For love of money will take a false oath and break a just oath. He that lives a

Midas, will die a perjurer.

(vi) Covetousness is the root of necromancy. Why do persons indent with the devil, but for money?

They study the black art for yellow gold. Alexander the Sixth pawned his soul to the devil for a

popedom.

(vii) It is the root of fraud and cezenage in dealings. Such as would be over-rich, will overreach. It

is the covetous hand that holds false weights (Amos 8:5).

(viii) Covetousness is the root of bribery and injustice. It makes the courts of judicature, ‘great

places of robbery’, as Augustine speaks. At Athens causes were bought and sold for money.

(ix) It is the cause of uncleanness. The Scripture mentions ‘the hire of a whore’ (Deuteronomy

23:18). For money both conscience and chastity are set to sale.

(x) Covetousness is the root of idolatry: ‘Covetousness which is idolatry’ (Colossians 3:5). The

covetous person bows down to the image of gold. His money is his god, for he puts his trust in it.

Money is his creator. When he has abundance of wealth, then he thinks he is made. It is his redeemer.

If he be in any strait or trouble, he flies to his money and that must redeem him. It is his comforter.

When he is sad he counts over his money and with this golden harp he drives away the evil spirit.

When you see a covetous man, you may say, There goes an idolater.

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(xi) Covetousness is the cause of unprofitableness under the means. In the parable the thorns choked

the seed (Matthew 13:7). This is the reason the Word preached does no more good. The seed often

falls among thorns. Thousands of sermons lie buried in earthly hearts.

(xii) Covetousness is the root of penuriousness and baseness. It hinders hospitality. A covetous

man has a withered hand. He cannot reach it out to clothe or feed such as are in want. The covetous

person is so sordid that if his estate may flourish he is content to let his name lie dead and buried.

What a cursed sin is avarice! And can he be pure in heart that has such a ‘root of bitterness’ growing

in him? We may as well say the wine is pure which runs dregs or the body is pure which is full of

plague-spots.

6 Those hearts are impure which are ‘haters of purity’ (Micah 3:2), which ‘hate knowledge’ (Proverbs

1:29). Some things in nature have an antipathy; the serpent will not come near the boughs of the

wild ash. There is an antipathy in a carnal heart against holiness; and when hatred is boiled up to

malice, it is dangerous. Thus Julian maliciously opposed holiness. Making war against the Persians,

and receiving a mortal wound through his armour, he threw up an handful of his blood into the air

in indignation saying, ‘Thou Galilean, hast thou overcome me?’

7 He that decries purity has an impure heart. ‘There shall come in the last days scoffers’ (Luke

16:14; 2 Peter 3:3). There are some that make a jeer of religion. These are (say they) ‘your holy

brethren!’ It is a sign of an Ishmael spirit to scoff at holiness. Are we not commanded to be perfect

as God is? (Matthew 5:48). One would wonder that those who dare open their mouths in derision

against holiness, the earth does not open her mouth to swallow them up as it did Korah and Dathan.

These are devils covered over with flesh. They have damnation written on their foreheads. Lucian

who in the time of the Emperor Trajan had professed religion, afterwards became so profane as to

make a mock at the Christians and by his jeers and taunts went about to rend religion. At last he

himself was rent asunder and devoured by dogs. When the scab of the leper appeared, he was to

be shut out of the camp (Leviticus 13:8, 46). Those who flout at religion, if God give them not

repentance, are sure to be shut out of the camp of heaven.

I shall next show you the signs of a pure heart.

1 A sincere heart is a pure heart: ‘In whose spirit there is no guile’ (Psalm 32:2). There are four

characters of a sincere-hearted Christian.

(i) A sincere heart serves God with the whole heart.

First, he serves God with the heart. The hypocrite does but make a show of obedience. ‘Thou art

near in their mouth and far from their reins’ (Jeremiah 12:2). There may be a fair complexion when

the lungs and vitals are rotten. The hypocrite is fair to look on. He has a devout eye but a hollow

heart. But he who is sincere, his inside is his best side. In the law God would have ‘the inwards’

offered up (Leviticus 4:11). A good Christian gives God ‘the inwards’. When he prays his heart

prays. ‘Hannah prayed in her heart’ (1 Samuel 1:13). In his thanksgiving the heart is the chief

instrument of praise (Psalm 111:1). Then is the sweetest music when we ‘make melody in our hearts

to the Lord’ (Ephesians 5:19).

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Secondly, the sincere Christian serves God with the ‘whole heart’ (Psalm 119:2). Hypocrites have

a double heart (Psalm 12:2). An heart for God and an heart for sin. ‘Their heart is divided’ (Hosea

10:2). God loves a broken heart, but not a divided heart. An upright heart is a whole heart. The full

stream and torrent of the affections runs out after God. A sincere heart ‘follows God fully’ (Numbers

14:24).

(ii) A sincere heart is willing to come under a trial. ‘Search me, O God, and try me’ (Psalm 139:23).

That metal is to be suspected which men are afraid to bring to the touchstone. A sound heart likes

the touchstone of the Word. It is for a searching ministry. Hypocrites fly from the light of truth;

they fly from that light which would discover sin. They hate that physic of the Word which, meeting

with their ill humours, begins to make them sick and trouble their conscience. A gracious soul loves

that preaching best which makes an heart-anatomy.

Thirdly, a man of sincere heart dares not act in the least against his conscience. He is the most

magnanimous, yet the most pusillanimous. He is bold in suffering (Proverbs 28:1) but fearful of

sin (Genesis 39:9). He dares not get an estate by sinful shifts, or rise upon the ruins of another.

Jacob got his father’s blessing by fraud, but that is not the way to get God’s blessing.

Fourthly, a sincere heart is a suspicious heart. The hypocrite suspects others and has charitable

thoughts of himself. The sincere Christian has charitable thoughts of others and suspects himself.

He calls himself often to account: O my soul, have you any evidences for heaven? Are they not to

seek when they should be to show? Is there no flaw in your evidences? You may mistake common

for saving grace. Weeds in the cornfields look like flowers. The foolish virgins’ lamps looked as

if they had oil in them. O my soul, is it not so with you? The man of sincere soul, being ever jealous,

plays the critic upon himself and so traverses things in the court of conscience as if he were presently

to be cited to God’s bar. This is to be pure in heart.

2 A pure heart breathes after purity. If God should stretch out the golden sceptre and say to him,

‘Ask, and it shall be given thee, to half the kingdom’, he would say, ‘Lord, a pure heart!’ Let my

heart have this inscription, ‘Holiness to the Lord’. Let my heart be thy temple and do thou dwell

in it. Lord, what should I do in heaven with this unholy heart? What converse could I have with

God or angels? A gracious soul is so in love with purity that he prizes a pure heart above all blessings.

(i) Above riches; he knows he may be clothed in purple and fine linen, and yet go to hell. He is

content to be poor, so long as he may be pure. He knows heart-purity is a special certificate of

God’s love. ‘The pure in heart’ shall see God.

(ii) Above gifts: gifts do not at all set us off in God’s eye. A pure heart is the jewel. ‘O woman,

great is thy faith!’ (Matthew 15:28). It was not her rhetorical language Christ was taken with, but

her faith. Hypocrites have had rare gifts. Saul had the spirit of prophecy. Judas no doubt could

make an elegant oration. Hypocrites have come into God’s church loaded with the Egyptian gold

of human learning. There may be illumination without sanctification. A small diamond is better

than a great deal of brass. A little grace excels the most flourishing parts. Now if the out-goings of

your soul are after holiness, you desire rather a pure heart than an eloquent tongue. You have the

oil of the Spirit poured on you and you shall be crowned with a sight of God.

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3 A pure heart abhors all sin. A man may forbear and forsake sin, yet not have a pure heart.

(i) He may forbear sin as one may hold his breath while he dives under water, and then take breath

again. And a man may forbear sin for want of occasion. The gunpowder makes no noise till the

fire be put to it. The clock stands still till the weights are put on. Let a temptation come, which is

like the hanging on of the weights, and the heart goes as fast in sin as ever.

(ii) He may forbear sin for fear of the penalty. A man forbears a dish he loves for fear it should

bring his disease upon him of the stone or gout. There is conflict in a sinner between the passions

of desire and fear. Desire spurs him on to sin, but fear as a curb and bit checks him. Nor is it the

crookedness of the serpent he fears, but the sting of the serpent.

(iii) He may forbear sin out of a design. He has a plot in hand and his sin might spoil his plot. Some

rich heir would fly out in excess, but he carries it fair to prevent a cutting off the entail. How good

was Joash while Jehoiada the priest lived! Prudence as well as conscience may restrain from sin.

Again, a man may forsake sin yet not have a pure heart. It is a great matter, I confess, to forsake

sin. So dear is sin to men that they will part with the fruit of their body for the sin of their souls.

Sin is the Delilah that bewitches, and it is much to see men divorced from it. This is some fruit of

the ministry to civilise, but there may be a forsaking of sin, yet no heart purity. Sin may be forsaken

upon wrong principles.

From morality: moral arguments may suppress sin. I have read of a debauched heathen who, hearing

Socrates ’ read an ethical lecture of virtue and vice (though he came with a purpose to deride

Socrates, yet) he went away changed and no more followed his former exorbitancies. Cato, Seneca,

Aristides, seeing beauty in virtue, led unblameable lives.

From policy: a man may forsake sin, not out of respect to God’s glory, but his own credit. Vice

will waste his estate, eclipse the honour of his family, therefore out of policy he will divorce his

sin.

From necessity. Perhaps he can now follow the trade of sin no longer. The adulterer is grown old,

the drunkard poor. His heart is toward sin, but either his purse fails him or his strength; as a man

that loves hunting, but his prison-fetters will not suffer him to follow the sport. This man, who is

necessitated to put a stop to sin, does not so much forsake sin as sin forsakes him.

But he is pure in God’s eye who abhors sin. ‘I hate every false way’ (Psalm 119:104). This is

excellent indeed, because now the love of sin is crucified. A hypocrite may leave sin, yet love it;

as the serpent casts her coat, yet keeps her sting. But when a man can say he abhors sin, now is sin

killed in the root. A pure heart abstains from sin, as a man does from a dish that he has an antipathy

against. This is a sign of a new nature, when a man hates what he once loved; and because he hates

sin therefore he fights against it with the ’sword of the Spirit’, as a man that hates a serpent seeks

the destruction of it.

4 A pure heart avoids the appearance of evil. ‘Abstain from all show of evil’ (1 Thessalonians

5:22). A pure heart avoids that which may be interpreted as evil. He that is loyal to his prince not

only forbears to have his hand in treason, but he takes heed of that which has a show of treason. A

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gracious heart is shy of that which looks like sin. When Joseph’s mistress took hold of him and

said, ‘Lie with me’, he left his garment in her hand and fled from her (Genesis 39:12). He avoided

the appearance of evil. He would not be seen in her company. Thus a pure heart avoids whatever

may have the suspicion of sin:

(i) In regard of himself, and that two ways. First, because the appearance of evil is oftentimes an

occasion of evil. Effeminate dalliance is an appearance of evil, and many times occasions evil. Had

Joseph been familiar with his mistress in a wanton sporting manner, he might in time have been

drawn to commit folly with her. Some out of novelty and curiosity have gone to hear mass, and

afterwards have lent the idol not only their ear but their knee. In our times are there not many who

have gone with itching ears into sectarian company and have come home with the plague in their

head? When Dinah would be gadding, she lost her chastity (Genesis 34:2). A pure heart foreseeing

the danger avoids the appearance of evil. It is dangerous to go near a hornets’ nest. The men who

went near the furnace were burned (Daniel 3:22). Second, because the appearance of evil may

eclipse his good name. A good name is a precious ointment. It is better than ‘fine gold’ (Proverbs

22:1). It commends us to God and angels, which riches cannot do. Now a godly man avoids the

appearance of evil, lest he wound his good name. What comfort can there be of life, when the name

lies buried?

(ii) A pure heart avoids the suspicion of sin out of reverence and respect to the holiness of God.

God hates the very appearance of evil. God abhors hypocrites because they have no more than the

appearance of good, and he is angry with his children if they have so much as the appearance of

evil. A gracious heart knows God is a jealous God and cannot endure that his people should border

upon sin. Therefore he keeps aloof off and will not come near the smell of infection.

(iii) A pure heart avoids the show of sin in regard of the godly. The appearance of evil may scandalise

a weak brother. A gracious heart is not only fearful lest he should defile his own conscience, but

lest he should offend his brother’s conscience. Were it only a thing indifferent, yet if it be an

appearance of evil and may grieve another, we are to forbear (1 Corinthians 10:25-28). For ‘when

we sin against the brethren and wound their weak conscience, we sin against Christ’ (1 Corinthians

8:12). The weak Christian is a member of Christ. Therefore the sinning against a member is a

sinning against Christ.

(iv) A pure heart avoids the very appearance of evil in regard of the wicked. The apostle would

have us walk wisely ‘towards them that are without’ (1 Thessalonians 4:12). The wicked watch for

our halting. How glad would they be of anything to reproach religion? Professors are placed as

stars in the highest orb of the church, and if there be but the appearance of any eccentric, or irregular

motion, the wicked would presently open their mouths with a fresh cry against religion. Now to a

godly heart the fame and honour of the gospel is so dear that he had rather die than impeach or

eclipse it. By this then let us try ourselves whether we are pure in heart. Do we avoid the least

apparition of sin? Alas, how many run themselves into the occasions of sin! They tempt the devil

to tempt them. Some go to masques and comedies, the very fuel and temptation to lust. Others

frequent erroneous meetings, and truly God often in just judgement leaves them to the acts of sin,

that do not avoid the appearance of sin. ‘They were mingled among the heathen and learned their

works’ (Psalm 106:35). Pure hearts fly the occasion. John would not endure the company of

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Cerinthus in the bath, as Nicephorus notes. Polycarp would have no conference with Marcion the

heretic, but called him ‘the devil’s firstborn’. Basil says that the Christians in his time avoided the

meetings of sectaries as the ‘very schools of error’. Oh, avoid the appearance of evil. The apostle

bids us to follow those things which are ‘of good report’ (Philippians 4:8).

5 A pure heart performs holy duties in an holy manner. This holy manner, or due order, consists

in three things:

(i) Preparing the heart before a duty. An unholy heart does not care how it rushes upon an ordinance.

It comes without preparation and goes away without profit. The pure heart is a prepared heart. It

dresses itself, before it comes to a duty, by examination and ejaculation. When the earth is prepared,

then it is fit to receive the seed. When the instrument is prepared and tuned it is fit for music.

(ii) Watching the heart in a duty. An holy heart labours to be affected and wrought upon. His heart

burns within him. There was no sacrifice without fire. A pure saint labours to have his heart broken

in a duty (Psalm 51:17). The incense, when it was broken, cast the sweetest savour. Impure souls

care not in what a dead or perfunctory manner they serve God (Ezekiel 33:31). They pray more

out of fashion than out of faith. They are no more affected with an ordinance than the tombs of the

church. God complains of offering up the blind (Malachi 1:8). And is it not as bad to offer up the

dead? O Christian, say to yourself, How can this deadness of heart stand with pureness of heart?

Do not dead things putrefy?

(iii) Outward reverence. Purity of heart will express itself by the reverend gesture of the body, the

lifting up of the eye and hand, the uncovering the head, the bending the knee. Constantine the

Emperor bore great reverence to the Word. When God gave the law, ‘the mount was on fire and

trembled’ (Exodus 19:18). The reason was that the people might prostrate themselves more reverently

before the Lord. The ark wherein the law was put was carried upon bars that the Levites might not

touch it (Exodus 25:11, 14). To show what reverence God would have about holy things: sitting in

prayer (unless in case of weakness) and having the hat half on in prayer, is a very indecent, irreverent

practice. Let such as are guilty reform it. We must not only offer up our souls, but our bodies

(Romans 12:1). The Lord takes notice what posture and gesture we use in his worship. If a man

were to deliver a petition to the king, would he deliver it with his hat half on? The careless irreverence

of some would make us think they did not much regard whether God heard them or no. We are run

from one extreme to another, from superstition to unmannerliness. Let Christians think of the

dreadful majesty of God who is present. ‘How dreadful is this place! This is none other but the

house of God and this is the gate of heaven’ (Genesis 28:17). The blessed angels ‘cover their faces

crying, Holy, holy holy’ (Isaiah 6:3). An holy heart will have an holy gesture.

6 A pure heart will have a pure life. ‘Let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and

spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God’. (2 Corinthians 7:1). Where there is a good conscience

there will be a good conversation. Some bless God they have good hearts, but their lives are evil.

‘There is a generation that are pure in their own eyes and yet is not washed from their filthiness’

(Proverbs 30:12). If the stream be corrupt we may suspect the spring-head to be impure. Aaron was

called the saint of the Lord (Psalm 106:16). He had not only an holy heart, but there was a golden

plate on his forehead on which was written ‘Holiness to the Lord’. Purity must not only be woven

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into the heart but engraver upon the life. Grace is most beautiful when it shines abroad with its

golden beams. The clock has not only its motion within, but the finger moves without upon the

dial. Pureness of heart shows itself upon the dial of the conversation.

(i) A pure soul talks of God (Psalm 37:30). His heart is seen in his tongue. The Latins call the roof

of the mouth Caelum (heaven). He that is pure in heart, his mouth is full of heaven.

(ii) He walks with God (Genesis 6:9). He is still doing angel’s work, praising God, serving God.

He lives as Christ did upon earth. Holy duties are the Jacob’s ladder by which he is still ascending

to heaven. Purity of heart and life are in Scripture made twins. ‘I will put my Spirit within you’

(Ezekiel 36:27); there is purity of heart. ‘And cause you to walk in my statutes’; there is purity of

life. Shall we account them pure whose conversation is not in heaven (Philippians 3:20), but rather

in hell? ‘Shall I count them pure with the wicked balances and with the bag of deceitful weights?’

(Micah 6:11). How justly may others reproach religion when they see it kicked down with our

unholy feet! A pure heart has a golden frontispiece. Grace like new wine will have vent; it can be

no more concealed than lost. The saints are called ‘jewels’ (Malachi 3:17), because of that shining

lustre they cast in the eyes of others.

7 A pure heart is so in love with purity that nothing can draw him off from it.

(i) Let others reproach purity, he loves it. As David, when he danced before the ark, and Michal

scoffed, if (says he) this be to be vile, ‘I will yet be more vile’ (2 Samuel 6:22). So says a pure

heart: If to follow after holiness be to be vile, I will yet be more vile. Let water be sprinkled upon

the fire, it burns the more. The more others deride holiness, the more a gracious soul burns in love

and zeal to it. If a man had an inheritance befallen him, would he be laughed out of it? What is a

Christian the worse for another’s reproach? A blind man’s disparaging a diamond does not make

it sparkle the less.

(ii) Let others persecute holiness, a pure heart will pursue it. Holiness is the queen every gracious

soul is espoused to and he will rather die than be divorced. Paul would be holy, ‘though bonds and

persecutions did abide him’ (Acts 20:23). The way of religion is often thorny and bloody, but a

gracious heart prefers inward purity before outward peace. I have heard of one who, having a jewel

he much prized, the king sent for his jewel. Tell the king (says he) I honour his Majesty, but I will

rather lose my life than part with my jewel. He who is enriched with the jewel of holiness will

rather die than part with this jewel. When his honour and riches will do him no good, his holiness

will stand him instead. ‘Ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life’.

Let me persuade Christians to heart purity. The harlot ‘wipes her mouth’ (Proverbs 30:20). But that

is not enough. ‘Wash thine heart, O Jerusalem’ (Jeremiah 4:14). And here I shall lay down some

arguments or motives to persuade to heart purity.

1 The necessity of heart-purity. It is necessary:

(i) In respect of ourselves. Till the heart be pure, all our holy things are polluted. They are ’splendid

sins’. To the unclean all things are unclean (Titus 1:15). Their offering is unclean. Under the law,

if a man who was unclean by a dead body, carried a piece of holy flesh in his skirt, the holy flesh

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could not cleanse him, but he polluted that. (Haggai 2:12,13). He who had the leprosy, whatever

he touched was unclean. If he had touched the altar or sacrifice, the altar had not cleansed him, but

he had defiled the altar. A foul hand defiles the purest water. An impure heart defiles prayers,

sacraments. He drops poison upon all. A pure stream running through muddy ground is polluted.

The holiest ordinances are stained, running through an impure heart. A sinner’s works are called

‘dead works’ (Hebrews 6:1). And those works which are dead cannot please God. A dead wife

cannot please her husband.

(ii) Heart purity is necessary in respect of God. God is holy. Purity is the chief robe wherewith God

himself is clothed. ‘Thou art of purer eyes than to behold evil’ (Habakkuk 1:13). And will this holy

God endure to have an impure heart come near him? Will a man lay a viper in his bosom? The holy

God and the sinner cannot dwell together. None can dwell together but friends, but there is no

friendship between God and the sinner, both of them being of a contrary judgement and disposition.

An impure heart is more odious to God than a serpent. God gave the serpent its venom, but Satan

fills the heart with sin. ‘Why hath Satan filled thine heart?’ (Acts 5:3). The Lord abhors a sinner.

He will not come near him, having his plague-sores running. ‘My soul loathed them’ (Zechariah

11:8).

(iii) Heart purity is necessary in regard of angels. They are pure creatures. The Cherubims, which

typified the angels, were made of fine gold to denote the purity of their essence. No unholy thought

enters into the angels, therefore there must be purity of heart that there may be some resemblance

between us and them. What should unholy hearts do among those pure angelic spirits?

(iv) In regard of the saints glorified. They are pure, being refined from all lees and dregs of sin.

Their title is ’spirits of just men made perfect’ (Hebrews 12:23). Now what should profane spirits

do among ’spirits made perfect’? I tell you, if you who wallow in your sins could come near God

and angels and spirits of men made perfect, and have a sight of their lustre, you would soon wish

yourselves out of their company. As a man that is dirty and in his rags, if he should stand before

the king and his nobles and see them glistering in their cloth of gold and sparkling with their jewels,

he would be ashamed of himself, and wish himself out of their presence.

(v) There must be heart purity in regard of heaven. Heaven is a pure place. It is an ‘inheritance

undefiled’ (1 Peter 1:4). No unclean beasts come into the heavenly ark. There shall not enter into

it ‘anything that defileth’ (Revelation 21:27). The Lord will not put the new wine of glory into a

musty impure heart, all which considered shows the necessity of heart purity.

2 It is the will of God that we should be pure in heart. ‘This is the will of God, your sanctification’

(1 Thessalonians 4:3). Are you low in the world? Perhaps it is not the will of God that you should

be rich, but it is the will of God that you should be holy. ‘This is the will of God, your sanctification’

(1 Thessalonians 4:3). Let God have his will by being holy, and you shall have your will by being

happy. God’s will must either be fulfilled by us or upon us.

3 Purity of heart is the characteristic note of God’s people. ‘God is good to Israel, even to such as

are of a clean heart’ (Psalm 73:1). Heart-purity denominates us the ‘Israel of God’. It is not profession

which makes us the Israel of God. It makes us of Israel indeed, but ‘all are not Israel, which are of

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Israel’ (Romans 9:6). Purity of heart is the jewel which is hung only upon the elect. As chastity

distinguishes a virtuous woman from an harlot, so the true saint is distinguished from the hypocrite

by his heart-purity. This is like the nobleman’s star or garter, which is a peculiar ensign of honour,

differing him from the vulgar. When the bright star of purity shines in a Christian’s heart, it

distinguishes him from a formal professor.

4 Purity of heart makes us like God. It was Adam’s unhappiness once, that he aspired to be like

God in omniscience; but we must endeavour to be like God in sanctity. God’s image consists in

holiness. To those who do not have this image and superscription upon them, he will say ‘I know

you not’. God delights in no heart but where he may see his own face and likeness. You cannot see

your face in a glass when it is dusty. God’s face cannot be seen in a dusty impure soul. A pure heart

(like a clean glass) gives forth some idea and representation of God. There is little comfort in being

like God in other things besides purity. Are we like God in that we have a being? So have stones.

Are we like him in that we have motion? So have stars. Are we like him in that we have life? So

have trees and birds. Are we like him in that we have knowledge? So have devils. There is no

likeness to God will prove comfortable and blissful, but our being like him in purity. God loves

the pure in heart. Love is founded upon likeness.

5 The excellency of the heart lies in the purity of it. Purity was the glory of the soul in innocence.

The purer a thing is, the better. The purer the air is, and the more free from noxious vapours, the

better it is. The spirits of water distilled are most precious. The purer the gold is, the more valuable.

The purer the wine is when it is taken off from the lees and dregs, the more excellent it is. The more

the soul is clarified by grace and taken off from the lees and dregs of sin, the more precious account

God makes of it. The purer the heart is, the more spiritual it is, and the more spiritual the more fit

to entertain him who is a Spirit.

6 God is good to the pure in heart. ‘God is good to Israel, even to such as are of a clean heart’

(Psalm 73:1). We all desire that God should be good to us. It is the sick man’s prayer, ‘The Lord

be good to me’. God is good to such as are of a clean heart.

But how is God good to them? Two ways —

(i) To them that are pure, all things are sanctified. ‘To the pure all things are pure’ (Titus 1:15).

Estate is sanctified, relations are sanctified, as the temple sanctified the gold and the altar sanctified

the offering. To the unclean nothing is clean. Their table is a snare; their temple-devotion is sin.

There is a curse entailed upon a wicked man (Deuteronomy 28:15-20), but holiness removes the

curse and cuts off the entail. ‘To the pure all things are pure’.

(ii) The pure-hearted have all things work for their good (Romans 8:28). Mercies and afflictions

shall turn to their good. The most poisonful drug shall be medicinable. The most cross providence

shall carry on the design of their salvation. Who then would not be pure in heart? ‘God is good to

such as are of a clean heart’.

7 Heart purity makes way for heaven. The pure in heart ’shall see God’. Happiness is nothing but

the quintessence of holiness. Purity of heart is heaven begun in a man. Holiness is called in Scripture

‘the anointing of God’ (1 John 2:27). Solomon was first anointed with the holy oil, and then he was

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made king (1 Kings 1:39). The people of God are first anointed with the oil of the Spirit and made

pure in heart, and then the crown of glory is set upon their head. And is not purity to be highly

valued? It lays a train for glory. ‘Purity of heart’ and ’seeing of God’ are linked together.

8 Note the examples of those who have been eminent for heart-purity. The Lord Jesus was a pattern

of purity. ‘Which of you convinceth me of sin?’ (John 8:46). In this we are to imitate Christ. We

are not to imitate him in raising the dead or in working miracles, but in being holy (1 Peter 1:16).

Besides this golden pattern of Christ, we are to write after the fair copy of those saints who have

been of a dove-like purity. David was so pure in heart, that he was a man ‘after God’s heart’.

Abraham was so purified by faith that he was one of God’s cabinet-counsel (Genesis 18:17). Moses

was so holy that God spake with him face to face. What were the rest of the patriarchs but so many

plants of renown flourishing in holiness? The fathers in the primitive church were exemplary for

purity. Gregory Nazianzen, Basil, Augustine, they were so inlaid and adorned with purity that envy

itself could not tax them. Therefore, as Caesar wished he had such soldiers as were in the time of

Alexander the Great, so we may wish we had such saints as were in the primitive times, so just

were they in their dealings, so decent in their attire, so true in their promises, so devout in their

religion, so unblameable in their lives that they were living sermons, walking Bibles, real pictures

of Christ, and helped to keep up the credit of godliness in the world.

9 Heart-purity is the only jewel you can carry out of the world. Have you a child you delight in, or

an estate? You can ‘carry nothing out of the world’ (1 Timothy 6:7). Purity of heart is the only

commodity that can be with comfort transported. This is that will stay longest with you. Usually

we love those things which last longest. We prize a diamond or piece of gold above the most

beautiful flower, because fading. Heart-purity has perpetuity. It will go with us beyond the grave.

But how shall we attain to heart-purity?

1 Often look into the Word of God. ‘Now ye are clean through the word’ (John 15:3). ‘Thy word

is very pure’ (Psalm 119:140). God’s Word is pure, not only for the matter of it, but the effect,

because it makes us pure. ‘Sanctify them through thy truth; thy word is truth’ (John 17:17). By

looking into this pure crystal we are changed into the image of it. The Word is both a glass to show

us the spots of our souls and a laver to wash them away. The Word breathes nothing but purity; it

irradiates the mind; it consecrates the heart.

2 Go to the bath. There are two baths Christians should wash in.

(i) The bath of tears. Go into this bath. Peter had sullied and defiled himself with sin and he washed

himself with penitential tears. Mary Magdalene, who was an impure sinner, ’stood at Jesus’ feet

weeping’ (Luke 7:38). Mary’s tears washed her heart as well as Christ’s feet. Oh sinners, let your

eyes be a fountain of tears! Weep for those sins which are so many as have passed all arithmetic.

This water of contrition is healing and purifying.

(ii) The bath of Christ’s blood. This is that ‘fountain opened for sin and uncleanness’ (Zechariah

13:1). A soul steeped in the brinish tears of repentance and bathed in the blood of Christ is made

pure. This is that ’spiritual washing’. All the legal washings and purifications were but types and

emblems representing Christ’s blood. This blood lays the soul a-whitening.

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3 Get faith. It is a soul-cleansing grace. ‘Having purified their hearts by faith’ (Acts 15:9). The

woman in the gospel that but touched the hem of Christ’s garment was healed. A touch of faith

heals. If I believe Christ and all his merits are mine, how can I sin against him? We do not willingly

injure those friends who, we believe, love us. Nothing can have a greater force and efficacy upon

the heart to make it pure than faith. Faith will remove mountains, the mountains of pride, lust, envy.

Faith and the love of sin are inconsistent.

4 Breathe after the Spirit. He is called the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 1:13). It purgeth the heart as

lightning purgeth the air. That we may see what a purifying virtue the Spirit has, it is compared:

(i) To fire (Acts 2:3). Fire is of a purifying nature. It refines and cleans metals. It separates the dross

from the gold. The Spirit of God in the heart refines and sanctifies it. It burns up the dross of sin.

(ii) The Spirit is compared to wind. ‘There came a sound from heaven as of a mighty rushing wind,

and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost’ (Acts 2:24). The wind purifies the air. When the air

by reason of foggy vapours is unwholesome, the wind is a fan to winnow and purify it. Thus when

the vapours of sin arise in the heart, vapours of pride and covetousness, earthly vapours, the Spirit

of God arises and blows upon the soul and so purges away these impure vapours. The spouse in

the Canticles prays for a gale of the Spirit, that she might be made pure (4:16).

(iii) The Spirit is compared to water. ‘He that believeth on me, out of his belly shall flow rivers of

living water; but this spake he of the Spirit’ (John 7:38, 39). The Spirit is like water, not only to

make the soul fruitful, for it causes the desert to blossom as the rose (Isaiah 32:15; 35:1), but the

Spirit is like water to purify. Whereas, before, the heart of a sinner was unclean and whatever he

touched had a tincture of impurity (Numbers 19:22), when once the Spirit comes into the heart, it

does with its continual showers wash off the filthiness of it, making it pure and fit for the God of

spirits to dwell in.

5 Take heed of familiar converse and intercourse with the wicked. One vain mind makes another.

One hard heart makes another. The stone in the body is not infectious, but the stone in the heart is.

One profane spirit poisons another. Beware of the society of the wicked.

Some may object: But what hurt is in this? Did not Jesus converse with sinners? (Luke 5:29).

(i) There was a necessity for that. If Jesus had not come among sinners, how could any have been

saved? He went among sinners, not to join with them in their sins. He was not a companion of

sinners but a physician of sinners.

(ii) Though Christ did converse with sinners, he could not be polluted with their sin. His divine

nature was a sufficient antidote to preserve him from infection. Christ could be no more defiled

with their sin than the sun is defiled by shining on a dunghill. Sin could no more stick on Christ

than a burr on a glass of crystal. The soil of his heart was so pure that no viper of sin could breed

there. But the case is altered with us. We have a stock of corruption within and the least thing will

increase this stock. Therefore it is dangerous mingling ourselves among the wicked. If we would

be pure in heart let us shun their society. He that would preserve his garment clean avoids the dirt.

The wicked are as the mire (Isaiah 57:20). The fresh waters running among the salt taste brackish.

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6 If you would be pure, walk with them that are pure. As the communion of the saints is in our

Creed, so it should be in our company. ‘He that walketh with the wise shall be wise’ (Proverbs

13:20), and he that walketh with the pure shall be pure. The saints are like a bed of spices. By

intermixing ourselves with them we shall partake of their savouriness. Association begets

assimilation. Sometimes God blesses good society to the conversion of others.

7 Wait at the posts of wisdom’s doors. Reverence the word preached. The Word of God sucked in

by faith (Hebrews 4:2) transforms the heart into the likeness of it (Romans 6:17). The word is an

holy seed (James 1:18), which being cast into the heart makes it partake of the divine nature (2

Peter 1:4).

8 Pray for heart purity. Job propounds the question, ‘Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean?’

(Job 14:4; 15:14). God can do it. Out of an impure heart he can produce grace. Pray that prayer of

David, ‘Create in me a clean heart, O God’ (Psalm 51:10). Most men pray more for full purses than

pure hearts. We should pray for heart-purity fervently. It is a matter we are most nearly concerned

in. ‘Without holiness no man shall see the Lord’ (Hebrews 12:14). Our prayer must be with sighs

and groans (Romans 8:23-26). There must not only be elocution but affection. Jacob wrestled in

prayer (Genesis 32:24). Hannah poured out her soul (1 Samuel 1:15). We often pray so coldly (our

petitions even freezing between our lips), as if we would teach God to deny. We pray as if we cared

not whether God heard us or no. Oh Christian, be earnest with God for a pure heart. Lay your heart

before the Lord and say, Lord, Thou who hast given me a heart, give me a pure heart. My heart is

good for nothing as it is. It defiles everything it touches. Lord, I am not fit to live with this heart,

for I cannot honour thee; nor to die with it, for I cannot see thee. Oh purge me with hyssop. Let

Christ’s blood be sprinkled upon me. Let the Holy Ghost descend upon me. ‘Create in me a clean

heart, O God’. Thou who biddest me give thee my heart, Lord, make my heart pure and thou shalt

have it.

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17. The blessed privilege of seeing God explained

They shall see God.

Matthew 5:8

These words are linked to the former and they are a great incentive to heart-purity. The pure heart

shall see the pure God. There is a double sight which the saints have of God.

1 In this life; that is, spiritually by the eye of faith. Faith sees God’s glorious attributes in the glass

of his Word. Faith beholds him showing forth himself through the lattice of his ordinances. Thus

Moses saw him who was invisible (Hebrews 11:27). Believers see God’s glory as it were veiled

over. They behold his ‘back parts’ (Exodus 33:23).

2 In the life to come; and this glorious sight is meant in the text, ‘They shall see God.’ A pleasant

prospect! This divines call ‘the beatifical vision’. At that day the veil will be pulled off, and God

will show himself in all his glory to the soul, as a king on a day of coronation shows himself in all

his royalty and magnificence. This sight of God will be the heaven of heaven. We shall indeed have

a sight of angels and that will be sweet, but the quintessence of happiness and the diamond in the

ring will be this, ‘We shall see God’. If the sun be absent it is night for all the stars. The angels are

called ’stars’ (Job 38:7). But it would be night in heaven if the Sun of Righteousness did not shine

there. It is the king’s presence makes the court. Absalom counted himself half-alive unless he might

see the king’s face (2 Samuel 14:32). ‘Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God’. This

sight of God in glory is, first, partly mental and intellectual. We shall see him with the eyes of our

mind. If there be not an intellectual sight of God, how do the ’spirits of just men made perfect, see

him? But second, it is partly corporeal; not that we can with bodily eyes behold the bright essence

of God. Indeed the Anthromorphites and Vorstians erroneously held that God had a visible shape

and figure. As man was made in God’s image so they thought that God was made in man’s image;

but God is a Spirit (John 4:24), and being a Spirit is invisible (1 Timothy 1:17). He cannot be beheld

by bodily eyes. ‘Whom no man hath seen nor can see’ (1 Timothy 6:16). A sight of his glory would

overwhelm us. This wine is too strong for our weak heads.

But when I say our seeing of God in heaven is corporeal, my meaning is that we shall with bodily

eyes behold Jesus Christ, through whom the glory of God, his wisdom, holiness, and mercy, shall

shine forth to the soul. Put a back of steel to the glass and you may see a face in it. So the human

nature of Christ is as it were a back of steel through which we may see the glory of God (2

Corinthians 4:6). In this sense that scripture is to be understood, ‘With these eyes shall I see God’

(Job 19:26, 27).

Now concerning this blessed sight of God, it is so sublime and sweet that I can but draw a dark

shadow of it. We shall better understand it when we come to heaven. Only at present I shall lay

down these nine aphorisms or maxims.

1 Our sight of God in heaven shall be a transparent sight. Here we see him ‘through a glass darkly’

(1 Corinthians 13:12). But through Christ we shall behold God in a very illustrious manner. God

will unveil himself and show forth his glory so far as the soul is capable to receive. If Adam had

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not sinned yet it is probable he should never have had such a clear sight of God as the saints in

glory shall have. ‘We shall see him as he is’ (1 John 3:2). Now we see him as he is not. He is not

mutable, not mortal. There we shall see him ‘as he is’ in a very transparent manner. ‘Then shall I

know even as also I am known’ (1 Corinthians 13:12), that is, ‘clearly’. Does not God know us

clearly and fully? Then shall the saints know him (according to their capacity) as they are known.

As their love to God, so their sight of God shall be perfect.

2 This sight of God will be a transcendent sight. It will surpass in glory. Such glittering beams shall

sparkle forth from the Lord Jesus as shall infinitely amaze and delight the eyes of the beholders.

Imagine what a blessed sight it will be to see Christ wearing the robe of our human nature and to

see that nature sitting in glory above the angels. If God be so beautiful here in his ordinances, Word,

prayer, sacraments; if there be such excellency in him when we see him by the eye of faith through

the prospective glass of a promise, O what will it be when we shall see him ‘face to face’! When

Christ was transfigured on the mount he was full of glory (Matthew 17:2). If his transfiguration

were so glorious, what will his inauguration be? What a glorious time will it be when (as it was

said of Mordecai) we shall see him in the presence of his Father, ‘arrayed in royal apparel, and with

a great crown of gold upon his head’ (Esther 8:15). There will be glory beyond hyperbole. If the

sun were ten thousand times brighter than it is, it could not so much as shadow out this glory. In

the heavenly horizon we behold beauty in its first magnitude and highest elevation. There we shall

’see the king in his glory’ (Isaiah 33:17). All lights are but eclipses compared with that glorious

vision. Apelles’ pencil would blot, angels, tongues would but disparage it.

3 This sight of God will be a transforming sight. ‘We shall be like him’ (1 John 3:2). The saints

shall be changed into glory. As when the light springs into a dark room, the room may be said to

be changed from what it was; the saints shall so see God as to be changed into his image (Psalm

17:15). Here God’s people are blackened and sullied with infirmities, but in heaven they shall be

as the dove covered with silver wings. They shall have some rays and beams of God’s glory shining

in them. As a man that rolls himself in the snow is of a snow-like whiteness; as the crystal, by

having the sun shine on it, sparkles and looks like the sun; so the saints by beholding the brightness

of God’s glory shall have a tincture of that glory upon them. Not that they shall partake of God’s

very essence, for as the iron in the fire becomes fire, yet remains iron still, so the saints by beholding

the lustre of God’s majesty shall be glorious creatures but yet creatures still.

4 This sight of God will be a joyful sight: ‘Thou shalt make me glad with the light of thy

countenance’ (Acts 2:28). After a sharp winter, how pleasant will it be to see the Sun of

Righteousness displaying himself in all his glory! Does faith breed joy? ‘In whom, though now ye

see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable’ (1 Peter 1:8). If the joy of faith be such,

what will the joy of vision be? The sight of Christ will amaze the eye with wonder and ravish the

heart with joy. If the face of a friend whom we entirely love so affects us and drives away sorrow,

O how cheering will the sight of God be to the saints in heaven! Then indeed it may be said, ‘Your

heart shall rejoice’ (John 16:22). And there are two things which will make the saints’ vision of

God in heaven joyful.

(i) Through Jesus Christ the dread and terror of the divine essence shall be taken away. Majesty

shall appear in God to preserve reverence, but withal majesty clothed with beauty and tempered

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with sweetness to excite joy in the saints. We shall see God as a friend, not as guilty Adam did,

who was afraid, and hid himself (Genesis 3:10), but as Queen Esther looked upon King Ahasuerus

holding forth the golden sceptre (Esther 5:2). Surely this sight of God will not be formidable but

comfortable!

(ii) The saints shall not only have vision but fruition. They shall so see God as to enjoy him. Aquinas

and Scotus dispute the case whether the ‘formalis ratio’, the very formality and essence of

blessedness, be an act of the understanding or the will. Aquinas says that happiness consists in the

intellectual part, ‘the bare seeing of God’. Scotus says that happiness is an act of the will, the

enjoying of God. But certainly true blessedness comprehends both. It lies partly in the understanding,

by seeing the glory of God richly displayed, and partly in the will, by a sweet delicious taste of it

and acquiescence of the soul in it. We shall so see God as to love him, and so love him as to be

filled with him. The seeing of God implies fruition. ‘Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord’ (Matthew

25:21) not only behold it but enter into it. ‘In thy light we shall see light’ (Psalm 36:9); there is

vision. ‘At thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore’ (Psalm 16:11); there is fruition. So great

is the joy which flows from the sight of God as will make the saints break forth into triumphant

praises and hallelujahs.

5 This sight of God will be a satisfying sight. Cast three worlds into the heart and they will not fill

it, but the sight of God satisfies. ‘I shall be satisfied when I awake with thy likeness’ (Psalm 17:15).

Solomon says ‘The eye is not satisfied with seeing’ (Ecclesiastes 1:8). But there the eye will be

satisfied with seeing. God and nothing but God can satisfy. The saints shall have their heads so full

of knowledge and their hearts so full of joy that they shall find no want.

6 It will be an unweariable sight. Let a man see the rarest sight that is, he will soo