[DEATH LEAVES HIM FOR A SEASON, AND HE RETURNS TO HIS SIN LIKE A
SOW THAT HAS BEEN WASHED TO HER WALLOWING IN THE MIRE.]
But verily, I am apt to think that one reason of his no more
regarding or remembering of his sick-bed fears, and of being no
better for them was some words that the doctor that supplied him
with physic said to him when he was mending. For as soon as Mr.
Badman began to mend, the doctor comes and sits him down by him in
his house, and there fell into discourse with him about the nature
of his disease; and among other things they talked of Badman's
trouble, and how he would cry out, tremble, and express his fears
of going to hell when his sickness lay pretty hard upon him. To
which the doctor replied, that those fears and outcries did arise
from the height of his distemper; for that disease was often
attended with lightness of the head, by reason the sick party
could not sleep, and for that the vapours disturbed the brain: but
you see, Sir, quoth he, that so soon as you got sleep and betook
yourself to rest, you quickly mended, and your head settled, and
so those frenzies left you. And it was so indeed, thought Mr.
Badman; was my troubles only the effects of my distemper, and
because ill vapours got up into my brain? Then surely, since my
physician was my saviour, my lust again shall be my god. So he
never minded religion more, but betook him again to the world, his
lusts and wicked companions: and there was an end of Mr. Badman's
conversion.
ATTEN. I thought, as you told me of him, that this would be the
result of the whole; for I discerned, by your relating of things,
that the true symptoms of conversion were wanting in him, and that
those that appeared to be anything like them, were only such as
reprobates may have.
WISE. You say right, for there wanted in him, when he was most
sensible, a sense of the pollution of his nature; he only had
guilt for his sinful actions, the which Cain, and Pharaoh, and
Saul, and Judas, those reprobates, have had before him (Gen 4:13,14;
Exo 9:27; 1 Sam 15:24; Matt 27:3-5).
Besides, the great things that he desired, were to be delivered
from going to hell, and who would, willingly? and that his life
might be lengthened in this world. We find not, by all that he said
or did, that Jesus Christ the Saviour was desired by him, from a
sense of his need of his righteousness to clothe him, and of his
Spirit to sanctify him. His own strength was whole in him, he saw
nothing of the treachery of his own heart: for had he, he would
never have been so free to make promises to God of amendment. He
would rather have been afraid, that if he had mended, he should
have turned with the dog to his vomit, and have begged prayers of
the saints, and assistance from heaven upon that account, that he
might have been kept from doing so. It is true he did beg prayers
of good people, and so did Pharaoh of Moses and Aaron, and Simon
Magus of Simon Peter (Exo 9:28; Acts 8:24). His mind also seemed
to be turned to his wife and child; but, alas! it was rather from
conviction that God had given him concerning their happy estate
over his, than for that he had any true love to the work of God
that was in them. True, some shows of kindness he seemed to have
for them, and so had rich Dives when in hell, to his five brethren
that were yet in the world: yea, he had such love as to wish them
in heaven, that they might not come thither to be tormented (Luke
16:27,28).
ATTEN. Sick-bed repentance is seldom good for anything.
WISE. You say true, it is very rarely good for anything indeed.
Death is unwelcome to nature, and usually when sickness and death
visit the sinner; the first taking of him by the shoulder, and
the second standing at the bed-chamber door to receive him; then
the sinner begins to look about him, and to bethink with himself,
these will have me away before God; and I know that my life has
not been as it should, how shall I do to appear before God! Or
if it be more the sense of the punishment, and the place of the
punishment of sinners, that also is starting to a defiled conscience,
now roused by death's lumbering at the door. And hence usually is
sick-bed repentance, and the matter of it; to wit, to be saved from
hell, and from death, and that God will restore again to health
till they mend, concluding that it is in their power to mend, as
is evident by their large and lavishing promises to do it. I have
known many that, when they have been sick, have had large measures
of this kind of repentance, and while it has lasted, the noise
and sound thereof has made the town to ring again. But, alas! how
long has it lasted? ofttimes scarce so long as until the party now
sick has been well. It has passed away like a mist or a vapour,
it has been a thing of no continuance. But this kind of repentance
is by God compared to the howling of a dog. 'And they have not
cried unto me with their heart, when they howled upon their beds'
(Hosea 7:14).
ATTEN. Yet one may see by this the desperateness of man's heart;
for what is it but desperate wickedness to make promise to God
of amendment, if he will but spare them; and yet, so soon as they
are recovered, or quickly after, fall to sin as they did before,
and never to regard their promise more.
WISE. It is a sign of desperateness indeed; yea, of desperate
madness (Deut 1:34,35). For, surely, they must needs think that
God took notice of their promise, that he heard the words that
they spake, and that he hath laid them up against the time to
come; and will then bring out, and testify to their faces, that
they flattered him with their mouth, and lied unto him with their
tongue, when they lay sick, to their thinking, upon their death-bed,
and promised him that if he would recover them they would repent
and amend their ways (Psa 78:34-37). But thus, as I have told
you, Mr. Badman did. He made great promises that he would be a
new man, that he would leave his sins and become a convert, that
he would love, &c. his godly wife, &c. Yea, many fine words had
Mr. Badman in his sickness, but no good actions when he was well.