John Trapp on Ecclesiastes 7:8

Verſ. 8. Better is the end of a thing, than the beginning] No right judgement can bee made of any thing, unleſs wee can ſee the end of it. God ſeems oft to go a contrary way to work; but by that time both ends bee brought together, all is as it ſhould bee, and it appears that hee doth all things in number, weight and meaſure.Acts and Mon. fol. 1377. Wee may learn (ſaid Mr. Hooper Martyr in a certain letter exhorting to patience) by things that nouriſh and maintain us, both meat and drink, to what loathſome and abhorring they come unto, before they work their perfection in us; From life they bee brought to the fire; and clean altered from what they were, when they were alive: from the fire to the trencher and knife, and all to bee hacked; from the trencher to the mouth, and as ſmall ground as the teeth can grinde them; from the mouth into the ſtomach, and there ſo boiled and digeſted before they nouriſh, that whoſoever ſaw the ſame would loathe and adhor his own nouriſhment, till it come to perfection. But as a man looketh for the nouriſhment of his meat, when it is full digeſted, and not before, ſo muſt hee look for deliverance when hee hath ſuffered much trouble, and for Salvation when hee hath paſſed thorow the ſtraight gate, &c. Let the wiſe man look to the end, and to the right which in the end God will do him, in the deſtruction of his oppreſſours; and this will patient his heart, and heal his diſtemper. Wee have heard of the patience of Job, Job 5. and what end the Lord made with him. Bee yee alſo patient, you ſhall ſhortly have help, if yee hold out waiting. Mark the upright man, and behold the juſt, for (whatever his beginning or his middle bee) the end of that man is peace, Pſal. 37.37. Onely hee muſt hold out Faith and Patience; and not fall off from good beginnings; for as the evening crowneth the day, and as the grace of an Interlude, is in the laſt Scene; ſo it is conſtancy that crowneth all graces, and hee onely that continueth to the end, that ſhall bee ſaved. Laban was very kinde at firſt, but hee ſhewed himſelf at parting. Sauls three firſt years were good. Judas carried himſelf fair, uſque ad loculorum officium, ſaith Tertullian, till the bag was committed to him. Many ſet out for Heaven wi[illegible: 1 letter]h as much ſeeming reſolution, as Lots wife did out of Sodom; as Orphah did out of Moab; as the young man in the Goſpel came to Chriſt. But after a while they fall away, they ſtumble at the croſs, and fall backwards. Now to ſuch it may well bee ſaid, The end is better than the beginning. Better it had been for ſuch never to have known the way of God, &c. Chriſt loves no lookers back: See how hee thunders againſt them, Heb. 10.26, 27, 38, 39. So doth St. Paul againſt the Galatians, becauſe they did run well, but lying down in that heat, they caught a ſurfeit, and fell into a conſumption.

And the patient in ſpirit is better than the proud, &c.] Pride is the Mother of impatiency, as infidelity is of pride. The just ſhall live by Faith, live upon promiſes, reverſions, hopes, wait deliverance, or want it, if God will have it ſo. But his ſoul, which (for want of Faith to ballaſt it) is lifted up, and ſo preſumes to ſet God a time wherein to come or never come, 2 King. 6.33. is not upright in him: ſome things hee doth, as it were a mad man, not knowing, or greatly caring what hee doth, ſaith Gregory. Hee frets at God,Greg. Paſtor. and rails at men, laies about him on all hands, and never ceaſeth, till in that diſtemperature hee depart the world, which ſo oftentimes himſelf had diſtempered,Daniel. as the Chronicler concludes the life of our Henry the ſecond.