VIctory is the happy Success of War, a thing worthy the best and most serious Thoughts of a Christian, whose Life is a continual Warfare, and whose chief study therefore should be, how he may conquer: and that the rather, be­cause it is not here as in other Wars, where a Man may hope to escape Misery, if not by prosperous Success, yet by a speedy and honourable Death. No, nothing here but [Page 6]plain overcoming will serve the turn: for if once he be vanquish'd in the main Issue of this War, there is no kind Sword to put an end to his Sufferings, nor will the Grave it self shelter him from those Eternal Mise­ries that are coming upon him. Well there­fore, I say, do all the probable and possible ways, that lead to this Victory, deserve our Consideration: but this of Faith should more especially be regarded by us, because Di­vine Wisdom and Truth it self have mark­ed it out as a certain and infallible one.

But alas! these are things that Men gene­rally little dream of, being so far from thinking and contriving how they may con­quer, that they have, in a manner, forgotten that they are in a State of War; the Con­science of their Baptismal Vow, which en­gag'd them in it, seeming as little to affect them now they are Men, as the Ceremo­nies, which it was accompanied with, did when they were Infants: and if you look into their Lives and Actions, you will find as little of its Power and Efficacy there, as you do of the Sign of the Cross upon their Foreheads, both seem to be worn out and vanish'd away: and what if their Godfa­thers [Page 7]and Godmothers did, by making a rash or formal Promise in their Names, entail this uneasie War upon them? They see no reason why they should be bound to the trouble of prosecuting it. The World and they are Friends, and content so to conti­nue; however, if for decency sake there must be at least some shew of fighting, be­tween them as Christians, and the World, against whom, by professing Christianity, they have denounced War; yet they cannot but secretly think it a thing sweeter than Victory it self would be, to be overcome by so charming an Enemy as they have to deal with. There are too many, who though they will not openly talk thus, yet all the World may see that they live like Men who think thus; and such will little care to hear a Warfare in which they are unwillingly engag'd, and a Victory which they had rather lose than win, discoursed of. I can therefore, with any hopes of being favourably heard, speak only to such as desire to be what their Baptism made them, and to do what that Vow obliges them; who, since they do profess a Faith that requires it of them, are resolv'd, in order [Page 8]to the gaining of this Victory, to fight man­fully under their Lord's Banner against Sin, the World, and the Devil, and to continue Christ's faithful Soldiers and Servants unto their Lives end.

What I have to say upon this Subject shall be confined to answering Three Questions, which any one, who has a mind to under­stand the Importance of these Words, will naturally ask.

• I. What this Victorious Faith is?
• II. What is meant by the World, which is to be overcome?
• III. How that Faith overcomes, and what kind of Victory it obtains for us.

I. What this Faith is the Apostle tells us in the Verse following the Text, name­ly, the believing that Jesus is the Son of God. A cheap Victory, will some say, if the gi­ving our Assent to so reasonable a proposi­tion will purchase it for us. If that will do, we are all of us already Conquerours. It was our Fate to be born such, by being [Page 9]born of Christian Parents, whose careful institution of us in this Faith in our tender years, gave us then so deep a tincture of it, that if we would, we cannot quite wash it out. The mighty Works which Jesus did, the Testimony of his Miracles (as they tell us who have been at the pains seriously to consider them) are so convincing and de­monstrative, that they who read them can­not but believe them, and therefore every Body amongst whom we live, profess accord­ingly, and what should we get by being sin­gular and pretending to disbelieve that, of the truth of which all the civiliz'd World seems fully satisfyed? no body that we know of denying it but a Company of Jews, Turks, and Heathens, People whose very Character is Ignorance and Obstinacy, and therefore their Infidelity is not much to be wondred at. So that, say they, if the giving our assent to so easie and plain a truth as this is, be this Conquering Faith, the day is Ours. Victory no longer hovers over our heads, but is lighted upon our Ensigns. This is the gross Notion of Faith which I fear too many have: namely, that it is only the giving our Assent to a Proposition or two, [Page 10]which we have all the Reason and Authority imaginable to think true, and should but be laught at and despised by wiser Men than our selves for denying them.

But suppose we go further, that we search and read the Scriptures, and by their help unravel this close comprehensive Article, and believe explicitly all the glorious truths, concerning Jesus, the Author of our Faith and Religion, which are involv'd in it: Such as are, That his Generation is Eternal, his Substance the same with that of the Fa­ther, that he came into the World the true Messiah, the very Christ, our Anointed King, Prophet, and Priest, to rule us, to teach us, and to offer himself a Sacrifice for us. Sup­pose we be full and orthodox in our Creeds and Confessions of Faith, able to confute all sorts of Hereticks out of Scripture and Tra­dition, Fathers and Councels, and to talk learnedly of all the Errors and Controver­sies, which from Age to Age have sprung up in the Church of God: This surely must do much; and he that is thus qualifyed may well pass for a true Believer: but even this Faith wants somewhat: it may denominate a Man sound and orthodox, it may help him [Page 11]to run down a Gainsayer, or baffle a Dispu­ter of this World, but it cannot overcome the World it self, and is not therefore that which my Text means.

But what if besides all this with a lively apprehension I can lay hold on Christ, or make him mine? What if with an undaun­ted Confidence, without any care or consi­deration of my own Obedience, I can rely wholly upon his for my Justification? What if without any regard to my actions, let me live how I please, I can apply all those gra­cious and glorious Promises to my self which are made only to the good and holy? in a word, what if I can account my self justify­ed, and in favour with God, only because I strongly imagine that I am so? Somewhat indeed very like this hath been taught for justifying Faith. But can a Man's believing that he is justified, be the cause of his justi­fication? A Proposition is believed, because it is, we think, true; but does not there­fore presently become true, because we be­lieve it. In a word, let us not flatter our selves, that God ever made natural assu­rance, confidence, or presumption, the Con­ditions of our Salvation. No, if ever such a [Page 12]Faith as this renders us Conquerors, 'tis but just as a pleasing Dream makes us happy, or as a strong but wild fancy may make Mad­men think themselves Princes.

That therefore by which we must conquer the World is none of these speculative, aiery, fanciful things, but somewhat more real and substantial, more strong and active. Not a barren Assent, like that which we give to Ma­thematical Demonstration, whose influence reaches no further than the Judgment, and renders not our Life more fruitful at all in good actions; nor like the Historical Faith which the Devils have and yet continue De­vils still. No, 'tis the belief of an the whol­some Doctrines of our Christian Religion, not lightly swimming and floating about in our heads, but by the Grace of God, and the Assistance of his Spirit, so inwardly graf­ted in our hearts, that it becomes a strong Principle of Action in us, powerfully sway­ing us against the inclinations of our corrupt Nature, and making us live at a quite diffe­rent rate, as if we were not the same Men that we were before we believed. When we believe that Jesus is the Son of God, that is, when we so believe it that all the World [Page 13]may see a difference between us and those who do not: When we walk faster and with more concern towards Heaven in the ways of God's Commandments, than a little faint decay'd Morality would carry us; and by that shew that a good Christian has some­what more in him than an honest Heathen: When we live in humble Obedience, like Men who believe their Lawgiver to be the Son of God; whose main business is Holiness and Devotion, who adore his Divine Person, reverence his high Authority, obey his just and wise Commands, and imitate his good and great Example: When we heartily e­spouse his Interest, and fight against the Lusts of the Flesh, his declar'd Enemies; resist the Devil, whose works he came to destroy; and trample upon the World, which he in our nature, and to encourage us by his Example, overcame before us.

This is the Faith that must overcome the World, even an active one; for Heaven, the reward of this Victory, was never promis'd to them that did nothing. What a vain thing therefore were it, to think that bare believing will put us in possession of it? that the Crown of Glory is expos'd as the prize, [Page 14]not of those who run and fight, but of such as idlely sit still, and expect confidently, that without any more ado it should at last drop upon their heads, and that only because they fansie it will?

St. James tells us, II. 26. That Faith without Works is dead. How then shall its feeble, lifeless hands weild all the mighty Weapons of our spiritual Warfare? How shall it demolish the strong Holds of Satan, disarm and bind that powerful one, bring away the Spoils, and set up the Trophies of its Conquests? If in such a Faith only as this is we have hope, we are of all Men most deceiv'd, of all Men most miserable: For this Victory will cost us labour and toyl and sweat, nay and perhaps blood too, as well as Worldly Conquests do, none of which can be expected from a mere dead Belief.

Some are so spiritual and refin'd in their Religion, that they are afraid that Works, let them be never so good, should marr their Faith, and hinder its Efficacy: And so in­deed they may, if we abuse them: if we trust in them for Salvation, and think to merit Heaven by them, and justify our selves by their Righteousness. The abusing them [Page 15]thus may, but the doing them can never harm us. No, they give us good hopes and assurance, that our Faith is alive and vigo­rous in us, that it has or will at length, if we thus persist, conquer for us. And this you may gather from the xi. Chapter. of the Epistle to the Hebrews, which is nothing else but a lofty rehearsal of these Triumphs of Faith: where the Apostle, when he hath told you of Enoch's Faith, which translated him an extraordinary way into the Regions of Life, without so much as ever touching upon the Confines of Death, subjoins, as the cause of it, his walking with God, and plea­sing hun with his good Conversation: When he has told you of Noah's Faith, he shews you immediately that it was such a Faith, as set his hands on work about the Ark, and making provision for the saving himself and his Family in the Deluge: when he has men­tioned Abraham's Faith, the next things you hear of, are its noble and wonderful Effects, his leaving his native Country at God's Com­mand, going he knew not whither, and making a foreign and strange Land his home; how it enabled him, in Obedience to God's Command, to conquer the strong affection [Page 16]of a Father to an only Son, and to lift up the Sacrificing Knife against the Fruit of his own Body, the Object of his most passionate love. Such a Faith therefore as will strength­en Men in doing what God would have them, even when he commands the hardest things, is the Faith here meant.

II. I proceed now in the second place to speak of the World, which 'tis here said to conquer: And this, like the visible World, is of so large an extent, that we cannot pos­sibly view it all at one prospect: it hath such a variety of dark and horrid Regions, full of Labyrinths and Monsters, that it is scarce possible to describe them, and therefore it must be very hard to overcome them: It hath its Depths and Abysses not to be fathom'd, Rocks and Sands hardly to be avoided, Storms and Tempests every where threat­ning us. There is nothing in the Elementary World so full of difficulty, danger, and ter­rour, but that this World of iniquity can shew somewhat far more dangerous and ter­rible.

If we will describe it plainly in its proper Colours, which are black enough, it in­cludes [Page 17]all the evils and mischiefs that a Man who hath a mind to be good, can reasonably be afraid of; all allurements to what is bad, and all discouragements from what is good; all those innumerable temptations to Sin and Folly, which on every side encompass us, which meet us wherever we go, like the air we breath in, and as if they would seem like the Providence and Majesty of God, to be every where, are about our Beds, and about our Paths, and beset us in all our ways.

For instance, on our right hands we have Pleasures bewitching us into their impure Embraces, Profit casting out its golden Baits to entice us, Applause and Honour display­ing their Pomps and Vanities to draw us af­ter them, through all the unlawful ways they would lead us. We have Sloth, and Ease, and Security, like heavy dead weights hanging upon and hindring us from running the Race that is set before us; Plenty and Prosperity tempting us to forget God who gave us them, or to misemploy them to his disservice.

On the left hand the World presents us with a quite different unpleasant prospect of [Page 18]Oppositions and Hardships, of Scorn and Shame, of Poverty and Want, nay some­times (and may that Scene never open in our days, as it once threatned to do) with Bonds and Imprisonments, with Torments and Death to be undergone by those who would live godly in the true profession of the Faith of Jesus Christ.

It has indeed pleas'd God in mercy to re­move these extraordinary discouragements in our duty; but still we have ordinary and common ones enough to encounter with, such as are the general neglect of real true Religion, which makes it disregarded as a thing out of fashion: The disputes about it among the seemingly Learned and Wise, but really contentious, which shake and un­settle it: It's being derided by the preten­ded Wits, and consequently decried by their Admirers the Atheistical Fools of this Age, which makes it every where a sport and a by-word, and a subject for those ill-furnisht heads and ill-disposed minds, who cannot be witty without being prophane, to trifle with: all which determents from the paths of true Wisdom, our Faith alone, and that a lively active one, must and can overcome for us.

But this is not all, The World (I mean, what is bad in it) stops not here, but mali­tiously pursues us in all the circumstances of our lives; so that nothing either good or bad can happen to us, but that the World mixes some of its Poyson with it, and turns it to a Temptation: Thus how apt are Strength and Power to tempt us to Violence and Oppression; Beauty to Pride and Un­chastity, Sickness to Impatience, Health to Security and not considering our latter end? Our Table frequently becomes a Snare to us, and those things which should have been for our health, prove the occasion of our fal­ling: The Pleasure and Refreshment we find in our lawful Recreations, tempt us to a more large and greedy enjoyment of them than is fit: Our Civility and good Manners put us upon compliances in Excess; and the torrent of Mirth and Company too often carries us beyond our due bounds.

But besides this World without us, we have one within us. That without this would do us little harm. Those Enemies abroad hold a treacherous Correspondence with false Friends at home: The Flesh is willing to comply with all that the World shall pro­pose, [Page 20]and is as industrious to betray, as that is to destroy us. That under this expression The World our carnal Lusts are comprehen­ded, this same Apostle tells us: For all that is in the World, C. 11. v. 16. the lust of the flesh, the lust of the Eye, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but of the World. This is a World not of God's but of our own Creating. The Foundation of it was laid in the ruins of our Original Righteousness, it began the same moment with Sin, and hence are those Tem­ptations that sit so close to us, or rather live in us, wearying us with their constant Solli­citations, and melting us with their warm Entreaties, warring against our Souls with the gentle but dangerous Weapons of pre­tended Kindness. When they dispute, no Arguments are so hardly answered as theirs, which carry the convictions of Interest, and Pleasure, and Self-love along with them: When they stand up to plead their own Cause, they must almost necessarily prevail, their Oratory has Charms, and Violence hard to be resisted. They seem all the while to talk on our side, and therefore to deny them what they would have, is called in Scri­pture Language, denying our selves, which [Page 21]few have the heart and resolution to do.

The Devil also, the Prince of this World, may here be understood, who by insinuating himself into us, by learning and observing all our secret Inclinations, and then fitting his Temptations to our Lusts, knows how and where to wound us: as long therefore as he remains Unconquer'd, our Victory is imperfect: and from a consideration of this dangerous Station in which we are set, and the many and powerful and subtle Enemies we have to deal with, we may conclude, that as by the mere strength of nature we cannot be safe; so, that nothing less than so powerful an assistance as that of Faith can make us Conquerours.

III. I come now in the last place to shew how our Faith overcomes, and what kind of Victory it is, that it obtains for us.

And first, 'tis not from any strength of ours that our Faith conquers; Had that Weapon no force but what it receiv'd from our weak Arms, it would do little Execu­tion. No, 'tis the Lord of Hosts, the Lord mighty in Battle, who even in this Spiritual [Page 22]Warfare teaches our hands to War, and our Fingers to fight; to him therefore must our Success be ascribed, in his Temple must the spoils be hung up. It is he who works in us all the good we do, and if we can do all, nay any thing, 'tis through Christ who strengthens us.

But secondly, though it be through the Grace of God, and by the powerful assistance of his Holy Spirit, that our Faith becomes Victorious; yet is the concurrence of a wil­ling mind in us thereto requir'd. For what­ever God by his Omnipotence may do, yet he does not ordinarily work this Work in us directly against our Wills, nor inspire this Faith into our Hearts as irresistibly as at first he did the breath of Life into our Nostrils, making us as purely passive in our Spiritual, as we were in our natural Birth. He has enabled us to do somewhat our selves, else he would never be so hard, so austere a Ma­ster, as to require any thing of us.

Again our Faith doth not (as some vainly expect it should) Conquer this World in a moment, or like a flash of Lightning from Heaven consume all our Sins, and melt our Hearts, and change us into quite other Men [Page 23]in an instant. No, it carries on its Victori­ous Arms a slow but sure and steady pace; it gains ground Foot by Foot, and is forc'd to dispute every step that it moves. From small beginnings it proceeds by degrees to greater strength; and is therefore frequently in Scri­pture compared to such things, whose Ori­ginals are weak and almost unperceivable, their increase slow and in a manner unsensi­ble, but their effects certain and powerful.

As for the manner of the Combat, a Man's Faith or Religion teaches him to set the Bat­tle regularly in array, confronting every Vice which shall assault him with the exer­cise of some contrary Grace, or Christian Virtue; and then it fares with these Com­batants as it does with the contrary qualities in natural Bodies, as one grows intense, the other becomes remiss, what one loses, the other gains, and at length one of them will and must expel the other. Nor is it want­ing (if I may without affectation pursue a Metaphor in which St. Paul seems to delight and use upon all occasions) in all the other arts and advantages of War by which World­ly Victories are gain'd. For fear of surpri­zes, it sets a diligent watch upon all the ways [Page 24]by which temptations can have access to the Heart; to avoid disorder, confusion, mutiny in its own Camp, it wisely holds the reins of our tumultuous Passions, checks the host and violence of their Motions, guides their Strength, and directs their Force, and applies it aright and where it may be most effectual. By fasting and mor­tification it starves our Lusts, and reduces those stubborn Enemies by cutting off all Provision from them. It encourages us by the noble Example of those that have been Conquerours in this War before us, especi­ally recounting to us the great Atchieve­ments of Christ Jesus the Captain of our Sal­vation, the Author and Finisher of our Faith. It fixes our Eyes upon the inestima­ble rewards laid up for those, who couragi­ously fight this fight, an Eternal weight of Glory, a thing which in this Life we can apprehend no more, than Infant-Princes can the greatness of the Empires they are born to.

Thus it is that Faith overcomes, and the Victory, which it obtains, consists in this, that it at last sets us above the World, above fearing its Frowns, or courting its Favours, [Page 25]fixing us upon the sure Foundation of a good Conscience, and a resolution to keep it by doing our Duty, so that temptations of what sort soever may press in upon us, but never move us from our Station. It inspires us with Heavenly Wisdom, Gratitude and Courage to answer all the sollicitations to Sin, as once the virtuous Joseph did, Gen. xxxix.9. How can I do this great Wickedness, and sin against God? But by the way we must not flatter our selves, that our Victory can in this Life be perfect, so that no Sin shall be left un­destroyed to make head against us. No, we must go down into our Graves fighting, and conquer dying, and at the Resurrection our Victory shall be compleat, and our Eternal Triumphs begin, when Death, our last Ene­my, shall be destroyed.

Thus have I endeavour'd briefly and plainly to show you the true meaning of the Apostle in these words, namely, That the main work and business of Faith is to make us first good and holy, and then happy Men; that the only end Religion was in­tended for, is the saving of our Souls by sub­duing our Spiritual Enemies. They who contrary to this interpretation of the Text [Page 26]make Faith to be nothing else but the per­swasion of their own Party, and its Victory nothing else but the prevailing of that per­swasion over all other Religions in the World, introduce a new Faith quite diffe­rent from that which is truly Christian; A restless troublesome Faith, which will nei­ther suffer the subject to live an honest and peaceable, nor the Prince, under whom it is profest, a quiet and an easy Life; A Faith apter to destroy Mens lives than to mend them; A Faith debased with an unnatural mixture of Passion, Prejudice, Interest, and I know not what other designs and practi­ces, to which true Religion is utterly a Stranger, and has nothing to do with them.

Whereas the Faith in my Text is quite another thing; its Victories are gain'd with­out Noise or Tumult, without giving any the least disturbance to the State where 'tis profest. Its aim is to make men kind and good-natur'd, Just and Temperate, Meek and Humble, Religious and Devout, Loyal and Obedient; to such a Faith Princes are beholden for its good Effects, as That is to Them for their kind and gracious Protection. [Page 27]And if we practise according to this Holy Faith, besides the spiritual advantages we gain by it, we shall most effectually second the generous designs and endeavours of a Prince, who would make us Happy in this World. We shall engage God, the Almigh­ty giver of Success and Victory on his side, to preserve his Person, to prosper his Arms, and to bless him in all his just and wise Un­dertakings. As we thus Profess and Believe, God grant we may Do accordingly, that our Church may never want this Faith, nor this Faith such a King and Queen as it now en­joys, and may it long enjoy them to be the Defenders of it.

Now to the Blessed and only Potentate, 1 Tim. VI.15, 16. the King of kings and Lord of lords, who only hath immortality dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto, whom no Man hath seen nor can see, Be honour and power Everlasting, Amen.