Dr BATTELY's SERMON Before the QUEEN IN Christ's-Church, Canterbury, MAY vi. 1694   

A SERMON Preached before the QUEEN, IN Christ's-Church, Canterbury; MAY vi. 1694.  
BY JOHN BATTELY, D. D. Archdeacon of Canterbury, and one of the Canons of the same Church.  
Published by Her Majesty's Command.  
LONDON, Printed by Tho. Warren, for Walter Kettilby, at the Bishop's Head in St. Paul's Churchyard, MDCXCIV.   

A SERMON Preached before the QUEEN.  1. John. v. latter part of v. 4. 
— And this is the Victory that overcometh the World, even our Faith.  
VIctory is the happy Success of War, a thing worthy the best and most serious Thoughts of a Christian, whose Life is a continual Warfare, and whose chief study therefore should be, how he may conquer: and that the rather, because it is not here as in other Wars, where a Man may hope to escape Misery, if not by prosperous Success, yet by a speedy and honourable Death. No, nothing here but plain overcoming will serve the turn: for if once he be vanquished in the main Issue of this War, there is no kind Sword to put an end to his Sufferings, nor will the Grave itself shelter him from those Eternal Miseries that are coming upon him. Well therefore, I say, do all the probable and possible ways, that lead to this Victory, deserve our Consideration: but this of Faith should more especially be regarded by us, because Divine Wisdom and Truth itself have marked it out as a certain and infallible one.  
But alas! these are things that Men generally little dream of, being so far from thinking and contriving how they may conquer, that they have, in a manner, forgotten that they are in a State of War; the Conscience of their Baptismal Vow, which engaged them in it, seeming as little to affect them now they are Men, as the Ceremonies, which it was accompanied with, did when they were Infants: and if you look into their Lives and Actions, you will find as little of its Power and Efficacy there, as you do of the Sign of the Cross upon their Foreheads, both seem to be worn out and vanished away: and what if their Godfathers and Godmothers did, by making a rash or formal Promise in their Names, entail this uneasy War upon them? They see no reason why they should be bound to the trouble of prosecuting it. The World and they are Friends, and content so to continue; however, if for decency sake there must be at least some show of fight, between them as Christians, and the World, against whom, by professing Christianity, they have denounced War; yet they cannot but secretly think it a thing sweeter than Victory itself would be, to be overcome by so charming an Enemy as they have to deal with. There are too many, who though they will not openly talk thus, yet all the World may see that they live like Men who think thus; and such will little care to hear a Warfare in which they are unwillingly engaged, and a Victory which they had rather lose than win, discoursed of. I can therefore, with any hopes of being favourably heard, speak only to such as desire to be what their Baptism made them, and to do what that Vow obliges them; who, since they do profess a Faith that requires it of them, are resolved, in order to the gaining of this Victory, to fight manfully under their Lord's Banner against Sin, the World, and the Devil, and to continue Christ's faithful Soldiers and Servants unto their Lives end.  
What I have to say upon this Subject shall be confined to answering Three Questions, which any one, who has a mind to understand the Importance of these Words, will naturally ask.  

I. What this Victorious Faith is?  
II. What is meant by the World, which is to be overcome?  
III. How that Faith overcomes, and what kind of Victory it obtains for us.   
I. What this Faith is the Apostle tells us in the Verse following the Text, namely, the believing that Jesus is the Son of God. A cheap Victory, will some say, if the giving our Assent to so reasonable a proposition will purchase it for us. If that will do, we are all of us already conquerors. It was our Fate to be born such, by being born of Christian Parents, whose careful institution of us in this Faith in our tender years, gave us then so deep a tincture of it, that if we would, we cannot quite wash it out. The mighty Works which Jesus did, the Testimony of his Miracles (as they tell us who have been at the pains seriously to consider them) are so convincing and demonstrative, that they who read them cannot but believe them, and therefore every Body amongst whom we live, profess accordingly, and what should we get by being singular and pretending to disbelieve that, of the truth of which all the civilised World seems fully satisfied? no body that we know of denying it but a Company of Jews, Turks, and Heathens, People whose very Character is Ignorance and Obstinacy, and therefore their Infidelity is not much to be wondered at. So that, say they, if the giving our assent to so easy and plain a truth as this is, be this Conquering Faith, the day is Ours. Victory no longer hovers over our heads, but is lighted upon our Ensigns. This is the gross Notion of Faith which I fear too many have: namely, that it is only the giving our Assent to a Proposition or two, which we have all the Reason and Authority imaginable to think true, and should but be laughed at and despised by wiser Men than ourselves for denying them.  
But suppose we go further, that we search and read the Scriptures, and by their help unravel this close comprehensive Article, and believe explicitly all the glorious truths, concerning Jesus, the Author of our Faith and Religion, which are involved in it: Such as are, That his Generation is Eternal, his Substance the same with that of the Father, that he came into the World the true Messiah, the very Christ, our Anointed King, Prophet, and Priest, to rule us, to teach us, and to offer himself a Sacrifice for us. Suppose we be full and orthodox in our Creeds and Confessions of Faith, able to confute all sorts of Heretics out of Scripture and Tradition, Fathers and Counsels, and to talk learnedly of all the Errors and Controversies, which from Age to Age have sprung up in the Church of God: This surely must do much; and he that is thus qualifyed may well pass for a true Believer: but even this Faith wants somewhat: it may denominate a Man sound and orthodox, it may help him to run down a Gainsayer, or baffle a Disputer of this World, but it cannot overcome the World itself, and is not therefore that which my Text means.  
But what if besides all this with a lively apprehension I can lay hold on Christ, or make him mine? What if with an undaunted Confidence, without any care or consideration of my own Obedience, I can rely wholly upon his for my Justification? What if without any regard to my actions, let me live how I please, I can apply all those gracious and glorious Promises to myself which are made only to the good and holy? in a word, what if I can account myself justified, and in favour with God, only because I strongly imagine that I am so? Somewhat indeed very like this hath been taught for justifying Faith. But can a Man's believing that he is justified, be the cause of his justification? A Proposition is believed, because it is, we think, true; but does not therefore presently become true, because we believe it. In a word, let us not flatter ourselves, that God ever made natural assurance, confidence, or presumption, the Conditions of our Salvation. No, if ever such a Faith as this renders us Conquerors, 'tis but just as a pleasing Dream makes us happy, or as a strong but wild fancy may make Madmen think themselves Princes.  
That therefore by which we must conquer the World is none of these speculative, airy, fanciful things, but somewhat more real and substantial, more strong and active. Not a barren Assent, like that which we give to Mathematical Demonstration, whose influence reaches no further than the Judgement, and renders not our Life more fruitful at all in good actions; nor like the Historical Faith which the Devils have and yet continue Devils still. No, 'tis the belief of an the wholesome Doctrines of our Christian Religion, not lightly swimming and floating about in our heads, but by the Grace of God, and the Assistance of his Spirit, so inwardly grafted in our hearts, that it becomes a strong Principle of Action in us, powerfully swaying us against the inclinations of our corrupt Nature, and making us live at a quite different rate, as if we were not the same Men that we were before we believed. When we believe that Jesus is the Son of God, that is, when we so believe it that all the World may see a difference between us and those who do not: When we walk faster and with more concern towards Heaven in the ways of God's Commandments, than a little faint decayed Morality would carry us; and by that show that a good Christian has somewhat more in him than an honest Heathen: When we live in humble Obedience, like Men who believe their Lawgiver to be the Son of God; whose main business is Holiness and Devotion, who adore his Divine Person, reverence his high Authority, obey his just and wise Commands, and imitate his good and great Example: When we hearty espouse his Interest, and fight against the Lusts of the Flesh, his declared Enemies; resist the Devil, whose works he came to destroy; and trample upon the World, which he in our nature, and to encourage us by his Example, overcame before us.  
This is the Faith that must overcome the World, even an active one; for Heaven, the reward of this Victory, was never promised to them that did nothing. What a vain thing therefore were it, to think that bare believing will put us in possession of it? that the Crown of Glory is exposed as the prize, not of those who run and fight, but of such as idly sit still, and expect confidently, that without any more ado it should at last drop upon their heads, and that only because they fancy it will?  
St. James tells us, 
II. 26.  That Faith without Works is dead. How then shall its feeble, lifeless hands wield all the mighty Weapons of our spiritual Warfare? How shall it demolish the strong Holds of Satan, disarm and bind that powerful one, bring away the Spoils, and set up the Trophies of its Conquests? If in such a Faith only as this is we have hope, we are of all Men most deceived, of all Men most miserable: For this Victory will cost us labour and toil and sweat, nay and perhaps blood too, as well as Worldly Conquests do, none of which can be expected from a mere dead Belief.  
Some are so spiritual and refined in their Religion, that they are afraid that Works, let them be never so good, should mar their Faith, and hinder its Efficacy: And so indeed they may, if we abuse them: if we trust in them for Salvation, and think to merit Heaven by them, and justify ourselves by their Righteousness. The abusing them thus may, but the doing them can never harm us. No, they give us good hopes and assurance, that our Faith is alive and vigorous in us, that it has or will at length, if we thus persist, conquer for us. And this you may gather from the xi. Chapter. of the Epistle to the Hebrews, which is nothing else but a lofty rehearsal of these Triumphs of Faith: where the Apostle, when he hath told you of Enoch's Faith, which translated him an extraordinary way into the Regions of Life, without so much as ever touching upon the Confines of Death, subjoins, as the cause of it, his walking with God, and pleasing him with his good Conversation: When he has told you of Noah's Faith, he shows you immediately that it was such a Faith, as set his hands on work about the Ark, and making provision for the saving himself and his Family in the Deluge: when he has mentioned Abraham's Faith, the next things you hear of, are its noble and wonderful Effects, his leaving his native Country at God's Command, going he knew not whither, and making a foreign and strange Land his home; how it enabled him, in Obedience to God's Command, to conquer the strong affection of a Father to an only Son, and to lift up the Sacrificing Knife against the Fruit of his own Body, the Object of his most passionate love. Such a Faith therefore as will strengthen Men in doing what God would have them, even when he commands the hardest things, is the Faith here meant.  
II. I proceed now in the second place to speak of the World, which 'tis here said to conquer: And this, like the visible World, is of so large an extent, that we cannot possibly view it all at one prospect: it hath such a variety of dark and horrid Regions, full of Labyrinths and Monsters, that it is scarce possible to describe them, and therefore it must be very hard to overcome them: It hath its Depths and Abysses not to be fathomed, Rocks and Sands hardly to be avoided, Storms and Tempests every where threatening us. There is nothing in the Elementary World so full of difficulty, danger, and terror, but that this World of iniquity can show somewhat far more dangerous and terrible.  
If we will describe it plainly in its proper Colours, which are black enough, it includes all the evils and mischiefs that a Man who hath a mind to be good, can reasonably be afraid of; all allurements to what is bad, and all discouragements from what is good; all those innumerable temptations to Sin and Folly, which on every side encompass us, which meet us wherever we go, like the air we breath in, and as if they would seem like the Providence and Majesty of God, to be every where, are about our Beds, and about our Paths, and beset us in all our ways.  
For instance, on our right hands we have Pleasures bewitching us into their impure Embraces, Profit casting out its golden Baits to entice us, Applause and Honour displaying their Pomp's and Vanities to draw us after them, through all the unlawful ways they would lead us. We have Sloth, and Ease, and Security, like heavy dead weights hanging upon and hindering us from running the Race that is set before us; Plenty and Prosperity tempting us to forget God who gave us them, or to misemploy them to his disservice.  
On the left hand the World presents us with a quite different unpleasant prospect of Oppositions and Hardships, of Scorn and Shame, of Poverty and Want, nay sometimes (and may that Scene never open in our days, as it once threatened to do) with Bonds and Imprisonments, with Torments and Death to be undergone by those who would live godly in the true profession of the Faith of Jesus Christ.  
It has indeed pleased God in mercy to remove these extraordinary discouragements in our duty; but still we have ordinary and common ones enough to encounter with, such as are the general neglect of real true Religion, which makes it disregarded as a thing out of fashion: The disputes about it among the seemingly Learned and Wise, but really contentious, which shake and unsettle it: It's being derided by the pretended Wits, and consequently decried by their Admirers the Atheistical Fools of this Age, which makes it every where a sport and a byword, and a subject for those ill-furnisht heads and ill-disposed minds, who cannot be witty without being profane, to trifle with: all which determents from the paths of true Wisdom, our Faith alone, and that a lively active one, must and can overcome for us.  
But this is not all, The World (I mean, what is bad in it) stops not here, but maliciously pursues us in all the circumstances of our lives; so that nothing either good or bad can happen to us, but that the World mixes some of its Poison with it, and turns it to a Temptation: Thus how apt are Strength and Power to tempt us to Violence and Oppression; Beauty to Pride and Unchastity, Sickness to Impatience, Health to Security and not considering our latter end? Our Table frequently becomes a Snare to us, and those things which should have been for our health, prove the occasion of our falling: The Pleasure and Refreshment we find in our lawful Recreations, tempt us to a more large and greedy enjoyment of them than is fit: Our Civility and good Manners put us upon compliances in Excess; and the torrent of Mirth and Company too often carries us beyond our due bounds.  
But besides this World without us, we have one within us. That without this would do us little harm. Those Enemies abroad hold a treacherous Correspondence with false Friends at home: The Flesh is willing to comply with all that the World shall propose, and is as industrious to betray, as that is to destroy us. That under this expression The World our carnal Lusts are comprehended, this same Apostle tells us: For all that is in the World, 
C. 11. v. 16.  the lust of the flesh, the lust of the Eye, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but of the World. This is a World not of God's but of our own Creating. The Foundation of it was laid in the ruins of our Original Righteousness, it began the same moment with Sin, and hence are those Temptations that sit so close to us, or rather live in us, wearying us with their constant Solicitations, and melting us with their warm Entreaties, warring against our Souls with the gentle but dangerous Weapons of pretended Kindness. When they dispute, no Arguments are so hardly answered as theirs, which carry the convictions of Interest, and Pleasure, and Self-love along with them: When they stand up to plead their own Cause, they must almost necessarily prevail, their Oratory has Charms, and Violence hard to be resisted. They seem all the while to talk on our side, and therefore to deny them what they would have, is called in Scripture Language, denying ourselves, which few have the heart and resolution to do.  
The Devil also, the Prince of this World, may here be understood, who by insinuating himself into us, by learning and observing all our secret Inclinations, and then fitting his Temptations to our Lusts, knows how and where to wound us: as long therefore as he remains Unconquered, our Victory is imperfect: and from a consideration of this dangerous Station in which we are set, and the many and powerful and subtle Enemies we have to deal with, we may conclude, that as by the mere strength of nature we cannot be safe; so, that nothing less than so powerful an assistance as that of Faith can make us conquerors.  
III. I come now in the last place to show how our Faith overcomes, and what kind of Victory it is, that it obtains for us.  
And first, 'tis not from any strength of ours that our Faith conquers; Had that Weapon no force but what it received from our weak Arms, it would do little Execution. No, 'tis the Lord of Hosts, the Lord mighty in Battle, who even in this Spiritual Warfare teaches our hands to War, and our Fingers to fight; to him therefore must our Success be ascribed, in his Temple must the spoils be hung up. It is he who works in us all the good we do, and if we can do all, nay any thing, 'tis through Christ who strengthens us.  
But secondly, though it be through the Grace of God, and by the powerful assistance of his Holy Spirit, that our Faith becomes Victorious; yet is the concurrence of a willing mind in us thereto required. For whatever God by his Omnipotence may do, yet he does not ordinarily work this Work in us directly against our Wills, nor inspire this Faith into our Hearts as irresistibly as at first he did the breath of Life into our Nostrils, making us as purely passive in our Spiritual, as we were in our natural Birth. He has enabled us to do somewhat ourselves, else he would never be so hard, so austere a Master, as to require any thing of us.  
Again our Faith doth not (as some vainly expect it should) Conquer this World in a moment, or like a flash of Lightning from Heaven consume all our Sins, and melt our Hearts, and change us into quite other Men in an instant. No, it carries on its Victorious Arms a slow but sure and steady pace; it gains ground Foot by Foot, and is forced to dispute every step that it moves. From small beginnings it proceeds by degrees to greater strength; and is therefore frequently in Scripture compared to such things, whose Originals are weak and almost unperceivable, their increase slow and in a manner unsensible, but their effects certain and powerful.  
As for the manner of the Combat, a Man's Faith or Religion teaches him to set the Battle regularly in array, confronting every Vice which shall assault him with the exercise of some contrary Grace, or Christian Virtue; and than it fares with these Combatants as it does with the contrary qualities in natural Bodies, as one grows intense, the other becomes remiss, what one loses, the other gains, and at length one of them will and must expel the other. Nor is it wanting (if I may without affectation pursue a Metaphor in which St. Paul seems to delight and use upon all occasions) in all the other arts and advantages of War by which Worldly Victories are gained. For fear of surprises, it sets a diligent watch upon all the ways by which temptations can have access to the Heart; to avoid disorder, confusion, mutiny in its own Camp, it wisely holds the reins of our tumultuous Passions, checks the host and violence of their Motions, guides their Strength, and directs their Force, and applies it aright and where it may be most effectual. By fasting and mortification it starves our Lusts, and reduces those stubborn Enemies by cutting off all Provision from them. It encourages us by the noble Example of those that have been Conquerors in this War before us, especially recounting to us the great Achievements of Christ Jesus the Captain of our Salvation, the Author and Finisher of our Faith. It fixes our Eyes upon the inestimable rewards laid up for those, who courageously fight this fight, an Eternal weight of Glory, a thing which in this Life we can apprehend no more, than Infant-Princes can the greatness of the Empires they are born to.  
Thus it is that Faith overcomes, and the Victory, which it obtains, consists in this, that it at last sets us above the World, above fearing its Frowns, or courting its Favours, fixing us upon the sure Foundation of a good Conscience, and a resolution to keep it by doing our Duty, so that temptations of what sort soever may press in upon us, but never move us from our Station. It inspires us with Heavenly Wisdom, Gratitude and Courage to answer all the solicitations to Sin, as once the virtuous Joseph did, 
Gen. xxxix. 9.  How can I do this great Wickedness, and sin against God? But by the way we must not flatter ourselves, that our Victory can in this Life be perfect, so that no Sin shall be left undestroyed to make head against us. No, we must go down into our Graves fight, and conquer dying, and at the Resurrection our Victory shall be complete, and our Eternal Triumphs begin, when Death, our last Enemy, shall be destroyed.  
Thus have I endeavoured briefly and plainly to show you the true meaning of the Apostle in these words, namely, That the main work and business of Faith is to make us first good and holy, and then happy Men; that the only end Religion was intended for, is the saving of our Souls by subduing our Spiritual Enemies. They who contrary to this interpretation of the Text make Faith to be nothing else but the persuasion of their own Party, and its Victory nothing else but the prevailing of that persuasion over all other Religions in the World, introduce a new Faith quite different from that which is truly Christian; A restless troublesome Faith, which will neither suffer the subject to live an honest and peaceable, nor the Prince, under whom it is professed, a quiet and an easy Life; A Faith apt to destroy men's lives than to mend them; A Faith debased with an unnatural mixture of Passion, Prejudice, Interest, and I know not what other designs and practices, to which true Religion is utterly a Stranger, and has nothing to do with them.  
Whereas the Faith in my Text is quite another thing; its Victories are gained without Noise or Tumult, without giving any the least disturbance to the State where 'tis professed. It's aim is to make men kind and good-natured, Just and Temperate, Meek and Humble, Religious and Devout, Loyal and Obedient; to such a Faith Princes are beholden for its good Effects, as That is to Them for their kind and gracious Protection. And if we practise according to this Holy Faith, besides the spiritual advantages we gain by it, we shall most effectually second the generous designs and endeavours of a Prince, who would make us Happy in this World. We shall engage God, the Almighty giver of Success and Victory on his side, to preserve his Person, to prosper his Arms, and to bless him in all his just and wise Undertake. As we thus Profess and Believe, God grant we may Do accordingly, that our Church may never want this Faith, nor this Faith such a King and Queen as it now enjoys, and may it long enjoy them to be the Defenders of it.  
Now to the Blessed and only Potentate, 
1 Tim. VI 15, 16.  the King of kings and Lord of lords, who only hath immortality dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto, whom no Man hath seen nor can see, Be honour and power Everlasting, Amen.  
FINIS.