sin was pardoned, yet because of that sin of
his, a temporal stroke attended him and his family, to his dying day;
for not only did God cut off the child, (2 Sam. xv. 14.), but told him,
that the sword should never depart from his house, and that he would
raise up evil against him out of his own house, and give his wives to
one that should lie with them in the sight of the sun, vers. 10, 11. So
we read, that the Lord took vengeance on their inventions whose sins he
had pardoned, Psalm xcix. 8. God may see this fit and expedient, for his
own glory, and for humbling of them, and causing them to fear the more
to sin against him. Yea, not only may temporal calamities be inflicted,
because of sin pardoned, or continued, after sin is pardoned, but even
sense of God's displeasure may continue after pardon, as appeareth by
that penitential Psalm (the fifty-first) penned by David, after Nathan
had spoken to him concerning his sin.

QUESTIONS OR OBJECTIONS ANSWERED.

1. What course shall we take with secret sins? I answer, this same
course must be followed with them. There is an implicit repentance of
sins that have not been distinctly seen and observed, as who can see and
observe all their failings? And so there may be an implicit faith
acting; that is, the believer being persuaded that he is guilty of more
sins than he hath got a clear sight of, as he would bewail his condition
before God because of these, and sorrow for them after a godly manner,
so he would take them together in a heap, or as a closed bagful, and by
faith nail them to the cross of Christ, as if they were all distinctly
seen and known. "Who can understand his errors," said David, Psalm xix.
12: yet says he moreover, "cleanse thou me from secret faults."

2. But what if, after all this, I find no intimation of pardon to my
soul? _Ans._ As this should serve to keep thee humble, so it should
excite to more diligence, in this duty of going with thy sins to Christ,
and to ply him and his cross more, in and through the promises, and keep
thy soul constant in this duty of the running to Christ, as an
all-sufficient Mediator, and as an intercessor with the Father; and thus
wait on him waiteth to be gracious, even in this particular, of
intimating pardon to thy soul,--he knoweth when it is fittest for thee
to know that thy sins are forgiven.

3. But what can yield me any ground of peace while it is so, that I see
no pardon or remission granted to me? _Ans._ This