Christian geography and arithmetick, or, A true survey of the world together with the right art of numbering our dayes therein being the substance of some sermons preached in Bristol / by Thomas Hardcastle.

Rule 10.

The last Rule in Christian Arithme∣tic, is this; Number thy dayes to Eter∣nity, duly consider what mutual aspects Time and Eternity have upon each o∣ther. All the use of dayes is for Eterni∣ty; what-ever is looked upon as a means to an end, is upon that account less ex∣cellent than the end, and if it be not im∣ployed in order to that end, it becomes of no use; all that time that has not a fair and favourable look upon Eternity, is lost time, what-ever use it was put to; that

day is a Cipher, and stands for nothing in the Calendar, wherein nothing is put that has respect to another World. He that considers how great a change his last day will make with him, will have something to do for his last day in eve∣ry day.

The whole life is but a Contemplation of, and should be a Preparation for a dy∣ing day. He is a Fool that is merry, and makes much of himself in his Inn, and knows not that he has any thing when he comes at home; what-ever pleasure thou mightest take here in eat∣ing, and drinking, and visiting, and en∣tertainments, and riches, and relations, and rayment, and estate, &c. as soon as ever thy breath is out of thy nostrils; Good Lord, what a change is here all on a sudden! now no more Meats nor Drinks talked of, no more use of Wine, and reviving Liquors, not a word more of Discourse, not a dram of Mirth; Friends depart, Relations go out of the room, no more Visitors, his dearest Companions give over thoughts of ha∣ving any more to do with him, & great∣est Dealers will have no more Accounts with him; his dear Relations that a quarter of an hour ago would have part∣ed

with their own lives to have saved his now begin to consult to have his Body removed out of sight, and put into the cold ground, a Companion for Worms which they so friendly embraced and kis∣sed a little while ago, & there it may rot, and at the Resurrection go to Hell, for any thing they can help it; his Soul im∣mediately goes to God, and appears be∣fore his Tribunal, where there is no talk of, no profit in Gold or Silver, or thousands by the year; nor coming in here as Agrippa and Bernice came into the Common Hall,* 1.1 with great pomp and fancy, no respect to him that wears the Goldring; no discourse of Trades, or Feastings, or Houses, or Apparel, or Children, or Relations, but of a good Conscience; how thou stood affected towards a person thou will see there, The Lord Jesus Christ the Son of God; what Communication thou hadest with him, during the time thou wast upon Earth, what Apprehensions thou hadst of him, what Adresses thou madst to him as a Mediatour, an Advocate, and Saviour; what Faith thou hast had in him; whether there was an agreement made between him and thee whil'st thy dayes were in being, that thou, wouldst

give up thy Soul, and Body, and Sins to him, thy Unrighteousness, and Righte∣ousness, and that he would undertake to satisfie the Justice of God, and ap∣pease his Wrath for thee, and reconcile thee to his Father, that he would cloth thee with his Righteousness, and sancti∣fie thy Nature by his Holy Word and Spirit, that he would make thee meet to be a partaker of Glory, and present thee blameless and unreproveable in the sight of God, and give thee a full pos∣session of an everlasting Kingdom, and Glory with himself; what fear thou hadst upon thy Heart in thy dayes of the Great God; whether in every thing thou didst in Natural, Civil, and Religious A∣ctions thou didst design and aim at his Glory; How thy Affections were pla∣ced, and what kind of love passed be∣tween thee and the World, during their abode there; what acts of Self-denial, and Mortification thou put forth, what exercise of Heavenly-mindedness; what Duties thou didst, and how they were done; how thou didst honour God in the Conditions he placed thee; what patience and contentedness in a low con∣dition; what humility, meekness, and repentance in an high condition; how

thou bore sickness; and straits, and how thou used thy riches, and how honest thou wast in thy dealings. There will be no discourses there of such vain mat∣ters as are here below, but as Paul dis∣coursed of Temperance, and Righteous∣ness, and the Judgment to come, of Up∣rightness, and Sincerity, and unfeigned Repentance, and a true and full closing with the Person of Christ, the Son of the Living God, equal with the Father, the Mediatour for poor Sinners, the Savi∣our of all that truly believe on his Name and come to him; what Obedience thou manifested to his Laws, how thou lo∣ved him and kept his Commandments, how thou loved the Brethren and there by manifested thy being passed from Death to life, how fruitful thou wast in all good works, and thereby didst justify thy Faith to be sound and true, and of the right kind; how willing and desir∣ous thou was to do much for God, and how little thou didst esteem thy self the better for what thou didst, but how much thou didst abhor thy self and hate thy self, for thy daily defects, manifold in∣firmities, and much unsuitable carriage to such great goodness, and loving kindness and unworthiness of such rich

Grace, and Mercy &c. Of this Nature will be the Discourses then, and the more thou hast been exercised in these thing, the greater will be thy conso∣lation: Oh my Beloved where is that Professor that lives under the serious fre∣quent and powerful meditation of these things; this and the other work I am imployed in, this and the other thing I am discoursing of; if God should now cut off the threed of my Life, what should I be advantaged hereby, would it turn to my advantage when I come in the presence of the Great God, shall I be glad that I was exercised, or rather wish that I had never medled or been concerned in such affairs and matters? our dayes are not intended to be the dayes of Noah and Lot wherein Men built and planted, and bought and sold, and married and were given in Marri∣age, (all these Lawful things and not one of them sinful) that is, that did do all these things as the work of the day, for themselves and rested in them, & re∣joiced themselves in them; and did not do them with respect: to another Life, with such fear, regularity, moderation, righteous principles, and designs as would have yeelded them comfort:

(when those dayes had been cut off) in another world; * 1.2 & are we not fallen into such dayes as Noah's and Lot's were eating & drinking &c. Eating & Drink∣ing is an unlawful thing if you do not do it to the Glory of God, and honour God in it: observe it, as there is no time allotted for sin, so neither are there any dayes allowed for the doing of lawful and good actions, if they have not a re∣ference to Eternity; thy Prayers and Almes and duties are not numbred a∣right, if they be not numbred for God and another world; if they be numbred for thy self and thy present interest, they are quite lost, and which is worse do become sin, and so prove mortal and damning: * 1.3 you see how necessary it is to number every day for Eternity; if thou mindest this Rule, thou wilt reap much fruit hereafter from thy com∣mon and worldly actions, because hereby those actions which otherwise are but common and worldly actions, as the actions of our ordinary and homliest callings, we shall sanctifie them, and translate them out of themselves, and their own base Element, into an high∣er Orb and Element, viz. to go as for ac∣tions, truly holy and Religious, and

parts of God's own worship before him, and rewardable as so at his hand's, what a comfort might this be to Men in going about worldly callings, to the very Shuttleman and Sheersman, Spinster and Carder, and the veriest drudge and droil in the servilest condition? what a comfort this, to consider, that if they do but honestly and faithfully, in obedience to God that hath set them in those callings go about them, they might sanctifie those, and the like acti∣ons, and translate them, out of a World∣ly into an Heavenly Orb and Element, and Glorifie God (and by that thou providest for Eternity) as well in their proportion by those actions, as the Angels that stand continually before God, do by their standing and praising and singing Hallelujahs to him. The poor Servants that in obedience to God do faithful and honest service, (be it in never such drudgeries) to their Ma∣ster, are said to adorn thereby the Doc∣trine of God; Titus 2.10. And is not this a working? a numbring time, and work for Eternity? those that ho∣nour him and his Gospel, he will ho∣nour them another day.

What a comfort is this, that meer

drudgeries, and Worldly Actions that, might seem only to smell of the World, and this present life and time, that these being gone about in the Obedience and Fear of God, baulking iniquity and injustice in them, may go for Holy and Heavenly actions; The actions of the ver∣tuous Woman, Prov. 31. a Man would think were the actions only of a meer worldling, * 1.4 she seeketh wool and flax &c. yet those and such-like, are all the actions for which, she is called a ver∣tuous Woman in the Beginning, and to have done vertuously above all in the latter end: Many Daughters have done vertuously, * 1.5 but thou excellest them all; and the next verse shews the reason, because she did these in the Fear of the Lord; A Woman that feareth the Lord she shall be praised: * 1.6 shall have praise at the end of dayes. Another Woman there may be that may do the same things, may seek wool and flax, and work willingly with her hands, may rise early, put her hand to the wheel &c, and yet may be a meer scraper, a meer worldling, a meer progger for Earthly trash and subsistence for these dayes, a meer vitious and not a vertuous Woman; Why? Because she does them not from the same ground

out of obedience and fear of God, and re∣spect to another World; but from a pro∣phane heart, greedy of the world: so how many precepts are there in Proverbs that might seem to smell of meer worldliness, as that of taking heed of suretiship, and that of diligently looking after the state of their flocks and looking well to their herds: * 1.7 And yet no Worldliness that Solomon meant in them, * 1.8 but rather Heavenliness: mark his General rule in the Begi〈…〉〈…〉 the Fear of the Lord is the Beginn〈…〉〈…〉 Wisdoms; * 1.9 all other precepts are to be per∣formed by vertue of this general precept, and guided by it.

Let this lastly be added, that you may see how necessary it is to number time and dayes (and what-ever fills them) for Eternity; if we do not do it, we shall lose the comfort of our best and most specious Actions.

To be painful in the Ministry, to be forward in Works of Charity &c. How goodly and how good are these Actions in themselves; and yet spend my Spi∣rits I may, consume and wait my strength I may, in the Ministry, and yet if I do this as a task only that the world looks I should discharge, or to get my own maintenance, or to set up my own

credit, and not chiefly in all this, my labour be guided by that which he I that was so laborious in the Ministry was guided by. To me to live is Christ, (the honour of Christ) and to die is gain; (here is Eternity in the case) I lose all the comfort I might have in this so good an Action, and the reward I might ex∣pect from Christ in the other World. So 〈◊〉〈◊〉 Works of charity, I may do many things, I may feed the hungry, 〈◊〉〈◊〉 the Naked, entertain good Mini∣sters and good People, build Hospitals &c. and yet if by-respects (which sup∣position, I put not that the world should in such cases where Good appears be sus∣picious, but that Man that does Good should look still to his own Heart which is deceitful) if I say, by-respects sway too much, and these things be not done chiefly in obedience to God that he might be glorified, and that we might lay up a good Foundation for the time to come, * 1.10 that we might lay hold up∣on Eternal Life; and that we might make to our selves Friends of the un∣righteous Mammon, that when we want they may receive us into Everlasting habita∣tions; We lose the great comfort that we might expect from so good actions. To

conclude this Point, if you be careful observe this rule of making all thy time, all thy dayes and actions, look with their Faces directly upon Eternity, and the World to come; thou wilt meet with wonderful advantage and benefit by it; thou wilt bring all thy works in∣to a narrow compass, into a single channel, into constant view and obser∣vation? Thou will render all thy Du∣ties and performances, all thy labours under the Sun to be more sweet, more easie, unperplexed, and affording much peace, rest, and tranquillity to the Soul; by a perfect removing the fears of future evils, (publick judgments, poverty &c.) and especially of the day of thy Death which by this means will be so facilitat∣ed and familiarized, that it will become rather a day desireable, than formid∣able, nay, thou will look upon the day of thy Death, as better than any of the dayes of thy Life; these and other things, I might enlarge upon, and they do indeed deserve a serious discussion: but I design brevity, and therefore ha∣sten to the second Observation, which I shall but touch upon, and that is from this consideration, that the Psalmist prayes for teaching, and instruction

in this point of numbring Dayes; which is so plain, so common, so ordinary, so obvious a thing; besides that he had numbred them, in ver. 10. The Dayes of our years, &c.

Notes

• * 1.1

  〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉.
• * 1.2

  Luk. 17.28.
• * 1.3

  Mr. G.
• * 1.4

  V. 13. &c.
• * 1.5

  V. 29.
• * 1.6

  V. 30.
• * 1.7

  Prov. 6.1.
• * 1.8

  C. 27.23.
• * 1.9

  1.7.
• * 1.10

  1 Tim. 6.19.