Love to Christ, necessary to escape the curse at his coming

5. Love to Christ is the longest: Love that shall never end. Sirs, ere long, you will have done loving this World, even ye that love it most, and have your hearts most set upon it. Ye that now have your hearts full of Earth, when ye shall have your mouths full too, and your Corps lye rotting in the Earth, you shall have done loving of it: Death, that ends your life in the World; shall end ⟨p. 160⟩your love to the World, which Grace never did. Ye shall also have done, ere long, loving your Relations; ye shall have done loving Father and Mother, Brother and Sister, and Husband, and Wife and Children, as now in that relation, but the gracious Soul, the Lover of Christ, shall never have done loving of Christ: It is sweet to have it, but this doth make it more sweet, to think he shall always have it. Have it in Life, have it at Death, and have it after Death. O blessed Love, that shall never be lost, but ever last.

While I was Musing upon this, it came into my mind to consider, what those that never love Christ in this World, can love in the next; and I could not imagine any thing, that Damned Souls in Hell, can Love. (If it be that I understand not, nor am acquainted with the acting of their Souls, nor State, God grant I never may, as they do.) I thought, can they love God, Christ, the holy Spirit, Angels, Saints? Their hatred to all these, is, and shall be, more deeply radicated; that is, Rooted in them, than ever upon Earth. Can they love the place of Hell? They wish they never had come thither. Can they love the pains of Hell? They grieve and groan under them, and are weary to bear them. Can they love the Devils in Hell? They curse them for tempting them to Sin, that brought them to that place. Can they love their Companions in Hell? They are an aggravation of one another's misery. Can they love their Sin in Hell? Alas! all that was pleasurable in it is gone, and the pain and sting only doth remain. Can they love their Beings in Hell? They had rather dye than live, and ⟨p. 161⟩cease to be at all, than to continue to be there. I know not what it is that they can love. O loathsome place, where there is, and can be, no love! O lovely Heaven! where Love doth Reign, where Love doth Live! and the Life of them therein shall be for ever a Life of Love! And in this World, where Love is wanting, so far it looks like Hell. Where Love, and that which is the best, which is that which is to Christ, doth prevail, so far it looks like Heaven. Dear Lord! save me from Hell, because there, there is no love to thee, nor to any thing that is good. Sweet Saviour! lead me in thy way to Heaven, and bring me thither, where Love to thee shall live, and last for ever.