Part 1 › Chapter 4 › Part 2: Directions against Hardness of Heart., A Christian Directory by Richard Baxter (1673) | AskReformation

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Augustine found drunkenness so common in Afric, that he motioned that a Council might be called for the suppression of it: But if a General Council of all the Learned Bishops and Pastors in the world were called, they could not convert one hardened sinner, by all their Authority, Wit or diligence, without the power of the Almighty God. For will they be converted by Man, that are hardened against God? What can we devise to say to them that can reach their hearts, and get within them, and do them good? Shall we tell them of the Law and Judgements of the Lord, and of his wrath against them? Why all these things they have heard so often till they sleep under it, or laugh ⟨p. 206⟩at them? Shall we tell them of Death, and Judgement, and Eternity? Why we speak to the posts or men asleep: They hear us as if they heard us not. Shall we tell them of endless Joy and Torments: They feel not, and therefore fear not, nor regard not: They have heard of all these, till they are a weary of hearing them, and our words seem to them, but as the noise of the Wind or Water, which is of no signification. If Miracles were wrought among them by a Preacher, that healed the sick, and raised the dead, they would wonder at him, but would not be converted. For Christ did thus, and yet prevailed but with few, John 11. 48. 53. And the Apostles wrought Miracles and yet were rejected by the most, Acts 7. 57 . & 22. 22. Nay, if one of their old companions should be sent from the dead to give them warning, he might affright them, but not convert them, for Christ hath told us so himself, Luke 16. 31. Or if an Angel from Heaven should preach to them, they would be hardened still, as Balaam and others have been. Christ rose from the dead, and yet was after that rejected. We read not of the Conversion of the Soldiers that watched his Sepulchre, though they were affrighted with the sight of the Angels; but they were after that hired for a little money, to lye, and say that Christs Disciples stole him away. If Magistrates that have power on their bodies, should endeavour to bring them to Godliness, they would not obey them, nor be persuaded. King Hezekiahs messengers were but mocked by the people. David and Solomon could not convert their hardened subjects. Punish them and hang them, and they will be wicked to the death: Witness the impenitent Thief that dyed with Christ, and dyed reproaching him.

Augustine found drunkenness so common in Africk, that he motioned that a Council might be called for the suppression of it: But if a General Council of all the Learned Bishops and Pastors in the world were called, they could not convert one hardned sinner, by all their Authority, Wit or diligence, without the power of the Almighty God. For will they be converted by Man, that are hardned against God? What can we devise to say to them that can reach their hearts, and get within them, and do them good? Shall we tell them of the Law and Judgements of the Lord, and of his wrath against them? Why all these things they have heard so often till they sleep under it, or laugh ⟨p. 206⟩at them? Shall we tell them of Death, and Judgement, and Eternity? Why we speak to the posts or men asleep: They hear us as if they heard us not. Shall we tell them of endless Ioy and Torments: They feel not, and therefore fear not, nor regard not: They have heard of all these, till they are a weary of hearing them, and our words seem to them, but as the noise of the Wind or Water, which is of no signification. If Miracles were wrought among them by a Preacher, that healed the sick, and raised the dead, they would wonder at him, but would not be converted. For Christ did thus, and yet prevailed but with few, Iohn 11. 48. 53. And the Apostles wrought Miracles and yet were rejected by the most, Acts 7. 57 . & 22. 22. Nay, if one of their old companions should be sent from the dead to give them warning, he might affright them, but not convert them, for Christ hath told us so himself, Luke 16. 31. Or if an Angel from Heaven should preach to them, they would be hardned still, as Balaam and others have been. Christ rose from the dead, and yet was after that rejected. We read not of the Conversion of the Souldiers that watcht his Sepulch•e, though they were affrighted with the sight of the Angels; but they were after that hired for a little money, to lye, and say that Christs Disciples stole him away. If Magistrates that have power on their bodies, should endeavour to bring them to Godliness, they would not obey them, nor be perswaded. King Hezekiahs messengers were but mocked by the people. David and Solomon could not convert their hardned subjects. Punish them and hang them, and they will be wicked to the death: Witness the impenitent Thief that dyed with Christ, and dyed reproaching him.

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§. 8. Direct. 6. Take notice of the doleful effects of hard heartedness in the world. This fills the¹ world with wickedness and confusion; with Wars and bloodshed, and leaveth it under that lamentable desertion and delusion, which we behold in the far greatest part of the Earth. How many Kingdoms are left in the blindness of Heathenism and Mohammedanism, for hardening their hearts against the Lord! How many Christian Nations are given up to the most gross deceits of Popery, and Princes and people are enemies to Reformation; because they hardened their hearts against the light of truth. What vice so odious, even beastly filthiness, and bitterest hatred and persecution of the ways of God, which men of all degrees and ranks, do not securely wallow in through the hardness of their hearts. This is the thing that grieves the godly, that wearieth good Magistrates, and breaks the hearts of faithful Ministers: when they have done their best, they are fain, as Christ himself before them, to grieve for the hardness of mens hearts. Alas, we live among the dead: Our Towns and Countries are in a sadder case than Egypt, when every house had a dead man. Even in our Churches it were well if the dead were only under ground, and most of our seats had not a dead man, that sitteth as if he heard, and kneeleth as if he prayed, when nothing ever pierced to the quick. We have studied the most quickening words! we have preached with tears in the most earnest manner, and yet we cannot make them feel: As if we cried like Baals worshippers, O Baal hear us, or like the Irish to their dead [Why wouldst thou dye, and leave thy house, and lands, and friends?] So we talk to them about the death of their souls, and their wilful misery, who never feel the weight of any thing we say: we are left to ring them a peal of lamentation, and weep over them as the dead that are not moved by our tears: we cast the seed into stony ground, Matth. 13. 5, 20. It stops in the surface, and it is not in our power to open their hearts, and get within them. I confess that we are much too blame our selves, that ever we did speak to such miserable souls without more importunate earnestness and tears: (and it is because the stone of the heart is much uncured in our selves; for which God now justly layeth so many of us by): But yet we must say our importunity is such, as leaveth them without excuse:

§. 8. Direct. 6. Take notice of the doleful effects of hard heartedness in the world. This fills the¹ world with wickedness and confusion; with Wars and bloodshed, and leaveth it under that lamentable desertion and delusion, which we behold in the far greatest part of the Earth. How many Kingdoms are left in the blindness of Heathenism and Mahometanism, for hardning their hearts against the Lord! How many Christian Nations are given up to the most gross deceits of Popery, and Princes and people are enemies to Reformation; because they hardned their hearts against the light of truth. What vice so odious, even beastly filthiness, and bitterest hatred and persecution of the wayes of God, which men of all degrees and rancks, do not securely wallow in through the hardness of their hearts. This is the thing that grieves the godly, that wearieth good Magistrates, and breaks the hearts of faithful Ministers: when they have done their best, they are fain, as Christ himself before them, to grieve for the hardness of mens hearts. Alas, we live among the dead: Our Towns and Countreys are in a sadder case than Aegypt, when every house had a dead man. Even in our Churches it were well if the dead were only under ground, and most of our seats had not a dead man, that sitteth as if he heard, and kneeleth as if he prayed, when nothing ever pierced to the quick. We have studied the most quickning words! we have preached with tears in the most earnest manner, and yet we cannot make them feel: As if we cryed like Baals worshippers, O Baal hear us, or like the Irish to their dead [Why wouldst thou dye, and leave thy house, and lands, and friends?] So we talk to them about the death of their souls, and their wilful misery, who never feel the weight of any thing we say: we are left to ring them a peal of lamentation, and weep over them as the dead that are not moved by our tears: we cast the seed into stony ground, Matth. 13. 5, 20. It stops in the surface, and it is not in our power to open their hearts, and get within them. I confess that we are much too blame our selves, that ever we did speak to such miserable souls without more importunate earnestness and tears: (and it is because the stone of the heart is much uncured in our selves; for which God now justly layeth so many of us by): But yet we must say our importunity is such, as leaveth them without excuse:

1Direct. 6.

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we speak to them of the greatest matters in all the world: we speak it to them in the name of God: we show them his own word for it: and plead with them the Arguments which he hath put into our mouths: and yet we speak as to posts and stones, to men past feeling: what a pitiful sight was it to see Christ stand weeping over Jerusalem, for the hardness of their hearts, and the nearness and greatness of their misery? while they themselves were so far from weeping for it, that they raged against the life of him that so much pitied them? We bless God that it is not thus with all: He hath encouraged some of us with the heart-yielding obedient attention of many great Congregations: But among the best; alas, how many of these hardened sinners are mixed? and in many places how do they abound? Hence it is that such odious abominations are committed; such filthiness, and lying, and perjury, and acts of malicious enmity against the servants of the Lord; and that so many are haters of God and Godliness. If Satan had not first hardened their hearts, he could never have brought them to such odious crimes, as now with impudency are committed in the Land. As Lots daughters were fain to make their Father drunk, that he might commit the sin of incest, so the Devil doth first deprive men both of reason and feeling, that he may bring them to such heinous wickedness as this, and make them laugh at their own destruction, and abhor those most, that fain would save them: And they are not only past feeling, but so hate any quickening Ministry, or Truth, or Means which would recover their feeling, that they seem to go to Hell as some condemned Malefactors to the Gallows, that make themselves drunk before they go, as if it were all they had to care for to keep themselves hoodwinked, from knowing or feeling whither they go, till they are there.

we speak to them of the greatest matters in all the world: we speak it to them in the name of God: we shew them his own word for it: and plead with them the Arguments which he hath put into our mouths: and yet we speak as to posts and stones, to men past feeling: what a pittiful sight was it to see Christ stand weeping over Ierusalem, for the hardness of their hearts, and the nearness and greatness of their misery? while they themselves were so far from weeping for it, that they raged against the life of him that so much pityed them? We bless God that it is not thus with all: He hath encouraged some of us with the heart-yielding obedient attention of many great Congregations: But among the best; alas, how many of these hardned sinners are mixed? and in many places how do they abound? Hence it is that such odious abominations are committed; such filthiness, and lying, and perjury, and acts of malicious enmity against the servants of the Lord; and that so many are haters of God and Godliness. If Satan had not first hardned their hearts, he could never have brought them to such odious crimes, as now with impudency are committed in the Land. As Lots daughters were fain to make their Father drunk, that he might commit the sin of incest, so the Devil doth first deprive men both of reason and feeling, that he may bring them to such heinous wickedness as this, and make them laugh at their own destruction, and abhor those most, that fain would save them: And they are not only past feeling, but so hate any quickning Ministry, or Truth, or Means which would recover their feeling, that they seem to go to Hell as some condemned Malefactors to the Gallows, that make themselves drunk before they go, as if it were all they had to care for to keep themselves hoodwinkt, from knowing or feeling whither they go, till they are there.