The saints everlasting rest

4. Another direction I would give you, is this: do it with all possible plainness and faithfulness. Do not dally with men, and hide from them their misery or danger, or any part of it. Do not make their sins less than they are; nor speak of them in extenuating language. Do not encourage them in a false hope, no more than you would discourage the found hopes of the righteous. If you see his case dangerous, tell him plainly of it: Neighbour, I am afraid GOD hath not yet renewed your soul; and that it is yet a stranger ⟨p. 205⟩to the great work of regeneration and sanctification: I doubt you are not yet recovered from the power of Satan to GOD, nor brought out of the state of wrath which you were born in, and have lived in: I doubt you have not chosen Christ above all, nor set your heart upon him, nor unfeignedly taken him for your sovereign Lord. If you had, sure you durst not so easily disobey him: you could not so neglect him and his worship in your family and in public: you could not so eagerly follow the world, and talk of almost nothing but the things of this world, while Christ is seldom mentioned by you. If you were in Christ, you would become a new creature; old things would be passed away, and all things would become new: you would have new thoughts, and new talk, and new company, and new endeavours, and a new conversation: certainly without these you can never be saved: you may think otherwise, and hope better as long as you will, but your hopes will deceive you, and perish with you. Alas! it is not as you will, nor as I will, who shall be saved, but it is a GOD will; and GOD hath told us, that without holiness none shall see him: and except we be born again, we cannot enter into his kingdom. And that all that would not have Christ to reign over them, shall be brought forth and destroyed before him: O therefore look to your state in time.

Thus must you deal roundly and faithfully with men, if ever you intend to do them good. It is not hovering at a distance in a general discourse that will serve the turn: it is not in curing men's souls, as in curing their bodies, where they must not know their danger, lest it sadden them, and hinder the cure. They are here agents in their own cure, and if they know not their misery, they will never bewail it, nor know how much need they have of a Saviour: if they know not the worst, they will not labour to prevent it; but will sit still or loiter till they drop into perdition,