Charity is no tale bearer. It goeth not about as a slander to reveal a secret, though true, Prov. xx. 19. It is of a faithful spirit to conceal the matter, Prov. xi. 13. Another man's good name is as a pledge laid down in our hand, which every man should faithfully restore, and take heed how he lose it, or alienate it by back-biting. Some would have nothing to say, if they had not other's faults and frailties to declaim upon, but it were better that such kept always silent, that either they had no ears to hear of them or know them, or had no tongues to vent them. If they do not lie grossly in it, they think they do no wrong. But let them judge it in reference to themselves. “A good name is better than precious ointment,” (Eccles. vii. 1.) “and rather to be chosen than great riches,” Prov. xxii. 1. And is that no wrong, to defile that precious ointment, and to rob or steal away that jewel more precious than great riches? There is a strange connection between these. “Thou shalt not go up and down as a tale-bearer, nor stand against the blood of thy neighbour,” Lev. xix. 16. It is a kind of murder, because it kills that which is as precious as life to an ingenuous heart. “The words of a tale bearer are as wounds, and they go down to the innermost parts of the belly,” Prov. xviii. 8 and xxvi. 22. They strike a wound to any man's heart, that can hardly be cured, and there is nothing that is such a seminary of contention and strife among brethren as this. It is the oil to feed the flame of alienation. Take away a tale-bearer, and strife ceaseth, Prov. xxvi. 20. Let there be but any (as there want not such who have no other trade or occupation), to whisper into the ears of brethren, and suggest evil apprehensions of them, they will separate chief friends, as we see it in daily experience, Prov. xvi. 28. “Revilers” are amongst these who are excluded out of the kingdom of God, 1 Cor. vi. 10. And therefore, as the Holy Ghost gives general precepts for the profitable and edifying improvement of the tongue, that so it may indeed be the glory of a man, (which truly is no small point of religion, as James expresses, Chap. iii. 2. “If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man,”) so that same spirit gives us particular directions about this, “Speak not evil one of another, brethren. He that speaketh evil of his brother, and judgeth his brother, speaketh evil of the law, and judgeth the law,” (James iv. 11.) because he puts himself in the place of the Lawgiver, and his own judgment and fancy in the room of the law, and so judges the law. And therefore the Apostle Peter makes a wise and significant connection, 1 Pet. ii. 1. “Laying aside all malice, and all guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, and all evil-speakings.” Truly, evil speaking of our brethren, though it may be true, yet it proceeds out of the abundance of these, in the heart, of guile, hypocrisy, and envy. While we catch at a name of piety from censuring others, and build our own estimation upon the ruins of another's good name, hypocrisy and envy are too predominant. If we would indeed grow in grace by the word, and taste more how gracious [pg 542] the Lord is, we must lay these aside, and become as little children, without guile, and without gall. Many account it excuse enough, that they did not invent evil tales, or were not the first broachers of them; but the Scripture joins both together. The man that “shall abide in his tabernacle” must neither vent nor invent them, neither cast them down nor take them up, “He backbiteth not with his tongue, nor taketh up a reproach against his neighbour;” (Psal. xv. 3.) or receiveth not or endureth not, as in the margin. He neither gives it nor receives he it, hath not a tongue to speak of others' faults, nor ear to hear them. Indeed he hath a tongue to confess his own, and an ear open to hear another confess his faults, according to that precept, “Confess your faults one to another.” We are forbidden to have much society or fellowship with tale-bearers; and it is added, Prov. xx. 19, “And meddle not with such as flatter with their mouth,” as indeed commonly they who reproach the absent, flatter the present; a backbiter is a face-flatterer. And therefore we should not only not meddle with them, but drive them away as enemies to human society. Charity would in such a case protect itself, if I may so say, by “an angry countenance,” an appearance of anger and real dislike. “As the north wind drives away rain,” so that entertainment would drive away a “backbiting tongue,” Prov. xxv. 23. If we do discountenance it, backbiters will be discouraged to open their pack of news and reports: and indeed the receiving readily of evil reports of brethren, is a partaking with the unfruitful works of darkness, which we should rather reprove, Eph. v. 11. To join with the teller is to complete the evil report; for if there were no receiver there would be no teller, no tale-bearer. “Charity covers a multitude of sins,” 1 Pet. iv. 8; and therefore “above all things have fervent charity among yourselves,” says he. What is above prayer and watching unto the end, above sobriety? Indeed, in reference to fellowship with God, these are above all; but in relation to comfortable fellowship one with another in this world, this is above all, and the crown or cream of other graces. He whose sins are covered by God's free love, cannot think it hard to spread the garment of his love over his brother's sins. Hatred stirreth up strife, all uncharitable affections, as envy, wrath. It stirreth up contentions, and blazeth abroad men's infirmities. But “love covereth all sins,” concealeth them from all to whom the knowledge of them doth not belong, Prov. x. 12. Love in a manner suffers not itself to know what it knoweth, or at least to remember it much. It will sometimes hoodwink itself to a favourable construction. It will pass by an infirmity and misken[418] it, but many stand still and commune with it. But he that covereth a transgression seeks love to bury offences in. Silence is a notable mean to preserve concord, and beget true amity and friendship. The keeping of faults long above ground unburied, doth make them cast forth an evil savour that will ever part friends. Therefore, says the wise man, “He that covereth a transgression seeketh love: but he that repeateth a matter separateth very friends,” Prov. xvii. 9. Covering faults christianly, will make a stranger a friend; but repeating and blazing of them will make a friend not only a stranger, but an enemy. Yet this is nothing to the prejudice of that Christian duty of reproving and admonishing one another, Eph. v. 11. “Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them.” Love commands to reprove in the “spirit of meekness,” (Gal. vi. 1.) as a man would restore an arm out of joint. And therefore thou “shall not hate him in thy heart, but shall in any ways reprove him, and not suffer sin upon him,” Lev. xix. 17. And he that reproves his brother after this manner from love, and in meekness and wisdom, “shall afterward find more favour of him than he that flatters with his tongue,” Prov. xxviii. 23. To cover grudges and jealousies in our hearts, were to nourish a flame in our bosom, which doth but wait for a vent, and will at one occasion or other burst out. But to look too narrowly to every step, and to write up a register of men's mere frailties, especially so as to publish them to the world; that is inconsistent with the rule of love. And truly, it is a token of one “destitute of wisdom to despise his neighbour; but a man of understanding will hold his peace.” He that has most defects himself, will find maniest[419] in others, and strive to vilify them one way or other; but a wise man can pass by frailties, yea, offences done to him, and be silent, Prov. xi. 12.
Chapter V.
Humility is the root of charity, and meekness the fruit of both. There is no solid and pure ground of love to others, except the rubbish of self-love be first cast out of the soul; and when that superfluity of naughtiness is cast out, then charity hath a solid and deep foundation: “The end of the command is charity out of a pure heart,” 1 Tim. i. 5. It is only such a purified heart, cleansed from that poison and contagion of pride and self-estimation, that can send out such a sweet and wholesome stream, to the refreshing of the spirits and bowels of the church of God. If self-glory and pride have deep roots fastened into the soul, they draw all the sap and virtue downward, and send little or nothing up to the tree of charity, which makes it barren and unfruitful in the works of righteousness, and fruits of mercy and meekness. There are obstructions in the way of that communication, which only can be removed by the plucking up of these roots of pride and self-estimation, which prey upon all, and incorporate all in themselves, and yet, like the lean kine that had devoured the fat, are never the fatter or more well-favoured.
It is no wonder, then, that these are the first principles that we must learn in Christ's school, the very A B C of Christianity: “Learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls,” Matth. xi. 29. This is the great Prophet sent of the Father into the world to teach us, whom he hath, with a voice from heaven, commanded us to hear: “This is my well-beloved Son, hear him.” Should not the fame and report of such a Teacher move us? He was testified of very honourably, long before he came, that he had the Spirit above measure, that he had “the tongue of the learned;” (Isa. l. 4.) that he was a greater prophet than Moses, (Deut. xviii. 15, 18.) that is, the wonderful Counsellor of heaven and earth, (Isa. ix. 6.) the “Witness to the people,” a Teacher and “Leader to the people.” And then, when he came, he had the most glorious testimony from the most glorious persons,—the Father and the Holy Ghost,—in the most solemn manner that ever the world heard of, Matth. xvii. 5. “Behold, a voice out of the cloud, which said, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye him.” Now, this is our Master, our Rabbi, Matth. xxiii. 8. This is the Apostle and High Priest of our profession (Heb. iii. 1.); “the light of the world and life of men,” John viii. 12. and vi. 33, 51. Having, then, such a Teacher and Master, sent us from heaven, may we not glory in our Master? But some may suppose, that he who came down from heaven, filled with all the riches and treasures of heavenly wisdom, should reveal in his school unto his disciples, all the mysteries and profound secrets of nature and art, about which the world hath ploded since the first taste of the tree of knowledge, and beaten out their brains to the vexation of all their spirits, without any fruit, but the discovery of the impossibility of knowing, and the increase of sorrow by searching. Who would not expect, when the Wisdom of God descends among men, but that he should show unto the world that wisdom, in the understanding of all the works of God, which all men have been pursuing in vain; that he by whom all things were created, and so could unbowel and manifest all their hidden causes and virtues, all their admirable and wonderful qualities and operations, as easily by a word, as he made them by a word; who would not expect, I say, but that he should have made this world, and the mysteries of it, the subject of all his lessons, the more to illustrate his own glorious power and wisdom? And yet behold, they who had come into his school and heard this Master and Doctor teach his scholars, they who had been invited to come, through the fame and report of his name, would have stood astonished and surprised to hear the subject of his doctrine; one come from on high to teach so low things as these, “Learn of me, I am meek and lowly.” Other men that are masters of professions, and authors of sects or orders, do aspire unto some singularity in doctrine to make them famous. But behold our Lord and Master, this is the doctrine he vents! It hath nothing in it that sounds high, and looks big in the estimation of the world. In regard of the wisdom of the world, it is foolishness, a doctrine of humility from the most High! A lesson of lowliness and meekness from the Lord and Maker of all! There seems, at first, nothing in it to allure any to follow it. Who would travel [pg 544] so far as the college of Christianity to learn no more but this, when every man pretends to be a teacher of it?
But truly there is a majesty in this lowliness and there is a singularity in this commonness. If ye would stay and hear a little longer, and enter into a deep search of this doctrine, we would be surcharged and overcome with wonders. It seems shallow till ye enter but it has no bottom. Christianity makes no great noise, but it runs the deeper. It is a light and overly knowledge of it, a small smattering of the doctrine of it, that makes men despise it and prefer other things, but the deep and solid apprehension of it will make us adore and admire, and drive us to an O altitudo! “O the depth both of the wisdom and knowledge of God!” Rom. xi. 33. As the superficial knowledge of nature makes men atheists, but the profound understanding of it makes men pious so all other things, vilescit scientia, “grow more contemptible by the knowledge of them.” It is ignorance of them which is the mother of that devout admiration we bear to them. But Christianity only, vilescit ignorantia, clarescit scientia, is common and base, because not known. And that is no disparagement at all unto it, that there is none despises it, but he that knoweth it not, and none can do any thing, but despise all besides it that once knows it. That is the proper excellency and glory of it.
All arts and sciences have their principles, and common axioms of unquestionable authority. All kind of professions have some fundamental doctrines and points which are the character of them. Christianity hath its principles too. And principles must be plain and uncontroverted; they must be evident by their own light, and apt to give light to other things. All the rest of the conclusions of the art are but derivations and deductions from them. Our Master and Doctor follows the same method. He lays down some common principles some fundamental points of this profession, upon which all the building of Christianity hangs. “Learn of me, for I am meek and lowly.” This was the high lesson that his life preached so exemplarily, and his doctrine pressed so earnestly, and in this he is very unlike other teachers who impose burdens on others, and themselves do not so much as touch them. But he first practises his doctrine and then preaches it. He first casts a pattern in himself, and then presses to follow it. Examples teach better than rules, but both together are most effectual and sure. The rarest example and noblest rule that ever was given to men are here met together.
The rule is about a thing that has a low name, but a high nature. Lowliness and meekness in reputation and outward form, are like servants, yet they account it no robbery to be equal with the highest and most princely graces. The vein of gold and silver lies very low in the bowels of the earth, but it is not therefore base, but the more precious. Other virtues may come with more observation, but these, like the Master that teaches them, come with more reality. If they have less pomp, they have more power and virtue. Humility, how suitable is it to humanity! They are as near of kin one to another, as homo and humus,[420] and therefore, except a man cast off humanity, and forget his original, the ground, the dust from whence he was taken, I do not see how he can shake off humility. Self knowledge is the mother of it, the knowledge of that humus would make us humiles.[421] Look to the hole of the pit from whence thou art hewn. A man could not look high that looked so low as the pit from whence we were taken by nature, even the dust, and the pit from whence we are hewn by grace, even man's lost and ruined state. Such a low look would make a lowly mind. Therefore pride must be nothing else but an empty and vain tumour, a puffing up. “Knowledge puffeth up,” not self knowledge. That casts down, and brings down all superstructures, razes out all vain confidence to the very foundation, and then begins to build on a solid ground. But knowledge of other things without, joined with ignorance of ourselves [pg 545] within, is but a swelling, not a growing, it is a bladder or skin full of wind, a blast or breath of an airy applause or commendation, will extend it and fill it full. And what is this else but a monster in humanity, the skin of a man stuffed or blown up with wind and vanity, to the shadow and resemblance of a man; but no bones or sinews, nor real substance within? Pride is an excrescence. It is nature swelled beyond the intrinsic terms or limits of magnitude, the spirit of a mouse in a mountain. And now, if any thing be gone without the just bounds of the magnitude set to it, it is imperfect, disabled in its operations, vain and unprofitable, yea, prodigious like. If there be not so much real excellency as may fill up the circle of our self estimation, then surely it must be full of emptiness and vanity, fancy and imagination must supply the vacant room, where solid worth cannot extend so far. Now, I believe, if any man could but impartially and seriously reflect upon himself, he would see nothing of that kind, no true solid and real dignity to provoke love, but real baseness and misery to procure loathing. There is a lie in every sin, but the greatest and grossest lie is committed in pride, and attribution of that excellency to ourselves which is not. And upon what erroneous fancy, which is a sandy and vain foundation, is built the tower of self estimation, vain gloriation, and such like? Pride, which is the mother of these, says most presumptuously, “By the strength of my hand I have done it, and by my wisdom, for I am prudent,” (Isa. x. 13.) “I am and none else besides me,” Isa. xlvii. 10. It is such a false imagination, as “I am of perfect beauty,” “I am and none else,” “I am a god,” (Ezek. xxvii. 3. and xxviii. 2.) which swells and lifts up the heart. Now what a vain thing is it, an inordinate elevation of the heart upon a false misapprehension of the mind? The “soul which is lifted up, is not upright in him,” Hab. ii. 4. It must be a tottering building that is founded on such a gross mistake.
Some cover their pride with the pretence of high spiritedness, and please themselves in apprehensions of some magnanimity and generosity. But the truth is, it is not true magnitude, but a swelling out of the superabundance of pestilent humours. True greatness of spirit is inwardly and throughout solid, firm from the bottom, and the foundation of it is truth. Which of the two do ye think hath the better spirit, he that calls dust, dust, and accounts of dung as dung, or he that, upon a false imagination, thinks dust and dung is gold and silver, esteems himself a rich man, and raises up himself above others? Humility is only true magnanimity, for it digs down low, that it may set and establish the foundation of true worth. It is true, it is lowly, and bows down low. But as the water that comes from a height, the lower it comes down the higher it ascends up again, so the humble spirit, the lower it fall in its own estimation, the higher it is raised in real worth and in God's estimation. “He that humbles himself shall be exalted, and he that exalts himself shall be abased,” Matt. xxiii. 12. He is like a growing tree, the deeper the roots go down in the earth, the higher the tree grows above ground, as Jacob's ladder, the foot of it is fastened in the earth, but the top of it reaches the heaven. And this is the sure way to ascend to heaven. Pride would fly up upon its own wings. But the humble man will enter at the lowest step, and so goes up by degrees, and in the end is made manifest. Pride catches a fall,[422] and humility is raised on high; it descended that it might ascend. “A man's pride shall bring him low, but honour shall uphold the humble in spirit,” Prov. xxix. 23. “Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall.” But “before honour is humility,” Prov. xvi. 18. and xviii. 12. The first week of creation, as it were, afforded two signal examples of this wise permutation of divine justice, angels cast out of heaven, and man out of paradise, a high and wretched aim at wisdom brought both as low as hell. The pride of angels and men was but the rising up to a height, or climbing up a steep to the pinnacle of glory, that they might catch the lower fall. But the last week of the creation, to speak so, shall afford us rare and eminent demonstrations of the other, poor, wretched, and miserable sinners lifted up to heaven by humility, when angels were thrown down from heaven for pride. What a strange sight, an angel, once so glorious, so low, and a sinner, once so wretched and miserable, so high! Truly may any man [pg 546] conclude within himself, “Better it is to be of an humble spirit with the lowly, than to divide the spoil with the proud,” Prov. xvi. 19. Happy lowliness, that is the foundation of true highness! “But miserable highness that is the beginning of eternal baseness.” “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven,” Matt. v. 3. Blessedness begins low, in poverty of spirit. And Christ's sermon upon blessedness begins at it, but it arises in the end to the riches of a kingdom, a heavenly kingdom. Grace is the seed of glory, and poverty of spirit is the seed, first dead before it be quickened to grow up in fruits. And indeed the grain “is not quickened except it die,” (1 Cor. xv. 36) and then it gets a body, and “bringeth forth much fruit,” John xii. 24. Even so, grace is sown into the heart, but it is not quickened except it die in humility, and then God gives it a body, when it springs up in other beautiful graces, of meekness, patience, love, &c. But these are never ripe till the day that the soul get the warm beams of heaven, being separated from the body, and then is the harvest a rich crop of blessedness. Holiness is the ladder to go up to happiness by, or rather our Lord Jesus Christ as adorned with all these graces. Now these are the steps of it, mentioned Matt. v., and the lowest step that a soul first ascends to him by, is poverty of spirit, or humility. And truly the spirit cannot meet with Jesus Christ till he first bring it down low, because he hath come so low himself, as that no soul can ascend up to heaven by him, except they bow down to his lowliness, and rise upon that step.