Human nature in its fourfold state ... In several practical discourses

Fourthly, The conscience is renewed. Now, that a new light is set up in the soul in regeneration; conscience is enlightened▪ instructed, and informed That candle of the Lord, (Prov xx. 27) is now snuffed and brightened; so as it shines, and sends forth its light into the most retired corners of the heart; discovering sins which the soul was not aware of before: and, in a special manner, discovering the corruption or depravity of nature, that seed and spawn whence all actual sins proceed This produces the new complaint, Rom vii 24. O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver m• from the body of this death? That conscience, which lay sleeping in the man's bosom before, is now awakened, and makes its voice to be heard through the whole soul: and therefore there is no more rest for him in the sluggard's bed; he must get up and be doing, arise, haste and escape for his life. It powerfully incites to obedience; even in the most spiritual acts, which lay not within the view of the natural conscience; and powerfully restrains from sin, even from these sins which do not lie open to the observation of the world. It urgeth the sovereign authority of God, to which the heart is now reconciled and which it willingly acknowledges: and so it engageth the man to his duty, whatever be the hazard from the world; for it fills the heart so with the fear of God, that the force of the fear of man is broken. This hath engaged many to put their life▪ in their hand, and follow the cause of religion they once contemned, and resolutely walk in the path they formerly abhorred, Gal. i. 23 ••e which persecuted us in sin […] past, now preacheth the faith which one▪ he destroyed. Guilt now makes the conscience to smart It hath bitter remorse for sins past, which fills the soul with anxiety, sorrow and self loathing. And every new reflection on these sins, is apt to affect, and make its wounds breed afresh with regret. It is made tender, in point of sin and duty, for the time to come; being once burnt, it dreads the fire; and f••r to break the hedge, where it was formerly bit by the serpent. Totally ▪ The renewed conscience ⟨p. 142⟩