Fathers as do touch upon it as may appear by that of Hilarie and Ambrose before delivered By which the other passages of holy writ as Iude v. 6. Mat. 8.29 and Rom. 2.5 it is plain and manifest that the torments of the damned and the Devils too which are inflicted on them for the present time are far lesse then the vengeance of eternal and external fire reserved untill the day of judgement and then augmented upon all the reprobate both men and Angels For grant the most which had been said by any of the Antients as to this particular and we shall finde that it amounteth to no more then this that the souls of wicked men departed are presently made to understand by the righteous judge the sentence due unto their sins and what they are to look for at the day of doome Postquam anima de corpore est egressa subito judicium Christi de salute cognoscit as St. Augustine hath it Which being once made known to the sinfull soul standing before the throne of Christ in the sight of heaven she is forthwith hurried by the evill angels to the mansions of hell where she is kept as in a Prison under chaines and darknesse untill the judgement of the great and terrible day Iude v. 6. And so we are to understand those words of St. Cyril saying Anima damnata continuo invaditur a daemonibus qui eam crudelissime rapiunt ad infernum deducunt unlesse we rather choose to refer the same unto the executing of the sentence of their condemnation at the day of doome as perhaps some may But howsoever they be hurryed by the Devils into the darknesse of hell as to the place wherein they are to be secured till the day of judgement yet that they feel that misery and extremity of torments which after the last day shall be laid upon them neither they nor any of the Antients have delivered to us For of that day it is not the day of their death of which Scriptures doe report such terrible things saying that the heavens shall vanish away and be rolled up like a scroule that all the mountaines and the hils shall be moved out of their places and that the Kings of the earth and the mighty men c. that is to say the wicked of what sort soever shall say unto the hils and rocks Fall on us and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb for the great day of his wrath is come and who is able to endure it And certainly the terrors of that day must needs be great incomprehensible not only to the guilty conscience but even unto the righteous souls who joyfully expect the coming of their Lord and Saviour For in that day the Sun shall be darkened and the Moon shall not give her light the Stars shall fall from heaven and all the powers thereof shall be shaken And the signe of the Son of man shall appear in heaven and then shall all the kindred of the earth mourne and they shall see the son of man coming in the cloudes of heaven with great power and glory And he shall send his Angels with the great sound of a trumpet and they shall gather together the Elect from the four windes from one end of the heaven to the other So far we have described the fashion of that dreadfull day from the Lords one mouth St. Luke unto these former terrors doth add the roaring of the Sea and the waters also St. Peter that the elements shall melt with fervent heat and that the earth also and the works thereof shall be utterly burned In this confusion of the world and general dissolution of the works of nature the Lord himself shall descend from heaven in a shout and in the voice of an Archangel and the sound of a trumpe and the dead in Christ shall rise first Then we which live and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds for though we shall not all die we shall all be changed 1 Cor. 15.51 and all together shall meet the Lord Jesus in the Aire The meaning is that at the sounding of this last trump the very same bodies which the Elect had before though mangled by tyrants devoured by wild beasts or burnt to ashes shall be raised again and being united to their souls shall be made alive and rise out of the bed of sleep like so many Iosephs out of prison or Daniels from the den of the roaring Lyons But as for such of the Elect who at that sudden coming of our Lord shall be found alive the fire which burneth up the corruptions of the world and the works thereof shall in a moment in the twinkling of an eye as St. Paul telleth us overtake them as it findeth them at their several businesses and burning up the drosse and corruption of their natural bodies of mortall shall make them to be immortall which change shall be to them in the stead of death In this sort shall they meet the Lord coming in the cloudes of the Aire where the Tribunall or judgement-seat of Christ shall be erected that the ungodly man the impenitent sinner who is not capable of coming into heaven for so much as a moment for no unclean thing or any one that worketh abomination shal finde entrance there Apocal. 21.27 may stand before his throne to receive his sentence So witnesseth St. Iohn in the Revelation And I saw a great white throne and him that sate on it from whose face fled away both the earth and the heaven And I saw the dead both small and great stand before God and the books were opened and another book was opened which is the book of life and the dead were judged of those things which were written in the books according to their deeds And the Sea gave up the dead which were in her and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them and they were judged every man according to his works And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire To the same purpose and effect doth Christ himself describe this day and the manner of his coming unto judgement in St. Matthews Gospell that which St. Iohn calleth the white throne being by Christ our Saviour called the throne of his majestie Mat. 25.31 At which time all the nations of the world being gathered together before him the good being separated from the bad and a brief repetition of their works being made unto them the righteous shall be called into the Kingdome prepared for them from the foundations of the world the wicked man be doomed to fire everlasting prepared for the Devil and his Angels For though Lactantius seem to think that the wicked shall not rise in the day of judgement and doth it as he sayeth himself literis sacris contestantibus
THEOLOGIA VETERVM OR THE SUMME OF Christian Theologie Positive Polemical and Philological CONTAINED IN THE Apostles CREED Or reducible to it According to the tendries of the Antients both GREEKS and LATINES IN THREE BOOKS By PETER HEYLYN D. in D. JER 6.16 Stand in the ways and see and aske for the OLD PATHES where is the good way and walk therein and you shall finde rest for your souls VINCENT LIRIN Cap. 3. In ipsa item Catholica Ecclesia magnopere curandum est ut id teneamus quod UBIQUE quod SEMPER quod AB OMNIBUS creditum est LONDON Printed by E. Cotes for Henry Seile over against St. Dunstans Church in Fleetstreet M. DC LIV. To the Right Honourable the LORD MARQUESSE of HARTFORD IT may seem strange unto your Lordship to see a name subscribed to this Dedication which neither hath an Interesse in your Noble and illustrious Family nor any relations to your Person But when I have acquainted you with the reasons of it I hope those reasons will not only justifie but indear my Confidence My large Cosmography having been Dedicated in the first Delineations and Essay thereof to one of the greatest Princes in the Christian world could not descend with any Fitnesse to a lower Patronage after so many Additions and so great Improvements And for such other Books of mine as have seen the light they were in justice and congruity to be Inscribed to him alone or to some of His by whose Appointment they were written and from whose service I was fain to borrow the greatest part of the time which I spent about them But being now unhappily at my own disposing and left unto the liberty of presenting the ensuing work as my own Genius should direct me I look upon your Lordship as a Person fitted with the best Capacities to receive this Present at my hands The Eminent zeal wherewith your Lordship stood so firmely for the established Doctrines and Devotions of the Church of England when there appeared so great a readinesse in too-many others to give them up as an Oblation or Peace-offering for their own security in the first place Entituleth you to the best performances in which the Orthodoxies of that Church and the Conformity thereof to the antient patterns are declared and vindicated To this as Seconds may come in your Lordships Interesse in that Vniversity where I had my breeding and more particularly in that Colledge whereof I had the happinesse to be once a Member your studiousnesse in the wayes of learning the faire esteem you hold of those which pretend unto it and the Incouragements you have given to the advancement of good letters in forwarding with a bountifull and liberall hand the new Impression of the holy Bible in so many Languages A work of such transcendent profit and so many advantages above all others of that kind as will not only redound to the honour of the Vndertakers but to the glory of the Furtherers and Promoters of it These are the motives which on your Lordships part have prompted me to this Dedication and there are reasons for it on my own part also Your Lordship cannot but remember what great cries were made At and before the beginning of the late long Parliament concerning a designe to bring in Popery the Bishops generally defamed as the chief Contrivers the regular and established Clergy my self as much if not more then any of my rank and quality traduced in publick Pamphlets as subsurvient Instruments And this was unicum eorum crimen qui crimine vacabant in the words of Tacitus the only Crimination laid upon those men who hitherto have been convicted of no crime at all How wrongfully accused even in that particular time which brings all things unto light hath now clearly evidenced For which is there of all the Bishops how few of all the Sequestred and exauctorated Clergy who notwithstanding all the provocations of want and scorn greater then which were never laid on generous and ingenuous Spirits have fallen off to Popery So few in all to the Eternall honour of both Orders be it spoken here that were the rekoning or account to be made in Greek it hardly would amount to a plurall number And for my self how free I am and have been alwayes from any Inclinations of that kind in my Epistle to the Reader I have shewn at large and manifested more particularly in this present work It had been else too great a folly or a frensie rather to present any thing of mine to your Lordships sight of whose sincerity in the true Protestant Religion here by Law established neither the jealousie nor malice of these last and worst times hath raised any suspicion And this I hope will be a full acquitment to me from all future clamours for where a Person of such eminent and known Integrity makes good the Entrance who dares suspect that any thing Popish or Profane is either harborred in the work or the Author of it And if I gain this point I have gained my purpose These are my Lord the principall Impulsions which have put me upon this Adventure And these I hope will be of so great prevalency with your Lordship also as to procure a favourable Entertainment to the following work that others may afford it the like fair Reception when they shall find it Owned and Countenanced by your Lordships name Which honour if your Lordship shall vouchsafe unto It the work shall have a sublunary Immortality beyond the Author who whatsoever he is now or shall be hereafter is and shall be at all times and on all occasions redeuable to your Lordship for so great a favour as best becomes My LORD Your Lordships most devoted And Most humble Servant Peter Heylyn Lacies Court in Abingdon Iuneâ— 1654. TO THE READER AND now Reader I am come to thee who mayest perhaps wonder and I cannot blame thee to see me so soon again in Print and that too in a Volume of so large a bulke 'T is like enough thou mayest conceive me guilty of that vanity which a devout Author finds in some sort of men who desire knowledge only that they may be known possibly of that vanity of vanities which the Wiseman speaks of consisting in the writing of many books of which there was no end to be expected as he there informes us And if this vanity were so strong in the time of Solomon when the art of Writing was not vulgar the art of Printing not invented and that there wanted many helps which we now enjoy it cannot be but that the humour must be more predominant in these latter dayes wherein there are so many advantages for publishing our own conceptions to the view of others as were not granted unto those of the elder ages And we may say more truly then the Poet did by how much more we have those helps and opportunities which they had not then Scriptorum plus est hodie quam muscarum olim cum caletur
England as it was constituted and confirmed by the best Authority which the Laws could give it when I began to set my self to this imployment and had brought it in â— manner to a full conclusion And though some alterations have since happened in the face of this Church and those so great as make no small matter of astonishment to the Christian world yet being there is no establishment of any other Doctrine Discipline or new forme of Government and that God knows how soon the prudence of this State may think it fitting if not necessary to revive the old I look upon it now as in the same condition and constitution in which it shined and flourished with the greatest beauty that any National Church in Christendome could justly boast of In all such points which come within the compasse of this discourse wherein the Church hath positively declared her judgement I keep my self to her determinations and decisions according to the literal sense and Grammatical meaning of the words as was required in the Declaration to the book of Articles not putting my own sense upon them nor drawing them aside to propagate and defend any foraine Doctrines by what great name soever proposed and countenanced But in such points as come before me in which I finde that the Church hath not publickly determined I shall conceive my self to be left at liberty to follow the dictamen of my own genius but so that I shall regulate that liberty by the Traditions of the Church and the unanimous consent of the Antient Fathers though in so doing I shall differ from many of the common and received opinions which are now on foot For why should I deny my self that liberty which the times allow me in which not only Libertas opinandi but Libertas prophetandi the liberty of Prophecying t is I mean hath found so many advocates and so much indulgence Common opinions many times are but common errors and we may truely say of them as Calderinas did in Ludovicus Vives when he went to Masse Eamus ergo quia sic placet in communes errores And as I shall make bold to use this liberty in representing to thy view my own opinions so I shall leave thee to the like liberty also of liking or rejecting such of my opinions as are here presented Hanc veniam petimusque damusque vicissim and good reason too for my opinions as they are but opinions so they are but mine As opinions I am not bound to stand to them my self as mine I have no reason to obtrude them on another man I may perhaps delight my self in some of my own fancies and possibly may think my self not unfortunate in them but I shall never be so wedded to my own opinions but that a clearer Judgement shall at any time divorce me from them As for the book which is now before thee I must confesse that there was nothing lesse in my first intention then to write a Comment on the Creed my purpose being only to informe my self in that part thereof which concernes Christs sufferings especially his descending into hell a question at that time very hotly agitated For having gotten the late Kings leave to retire to Winchester about the beginning of May An. 1645. I met there with the learned and laborious work of B. Bilsons entituled A Survey of Christs suffering for mans redemption c. which finding very copious and intermixed with many things not pertinent to the present subject though otherwise of great use and judgement I was resolved to extract out of it all such proofs and arguments as concerned the locall descent of Christ into hell â—o reduce them to a clearer Method and to add to them such conceptions and considerations which my own reading with the help of some other books could supply me with Which having finished and finding many things interspersed in the Bishops book touching the sufferings of Christ I thought it not amisse to collect out of him whatsoever did concerne that argument in the same manner as before and then to add to it such considerations and discourses upon the crucifixion death and burial of our Saviour Christ as might make the story of his Passion from the beginning of his sufferings under Pontius Pilate to his victorious triumph over Hell and Satan compleate and perfect And then considering with my self that not that Article alone of Christs descending into hell but the authority of the whole Creed had been lately quarrelled the opinion that it was not written by the holy Apostles being more openly maintained and more indulgently approved of then I could imagine I thought it of as great importance to vindicate the whole Creed as assert one part and then and not till then did I first entertain the thoughts of bringing the whole worke to that forme and order in which now thou feest it For though I knew it was an Argument much vexed and that many Commentaries and Expositions had been writ upon it yet I conceived that I was able by interweaving some Polemical Disputes and Philological Discourses to give it somewhat more then a new dresse only and that what other censure soever might be laid upon it that of Nil dictum est quod non dictum fuit prius should finde no place here But I had scarce gone through with the general Preface when the surrounding of Winchester by the forces of the Lords and Commons made me leave that City and with that City the thoughts and opportunities of proceeding forwards save that I made some entry on the first Article at a private friends house in a Parish of Wiltshire where I found some few tooles to begin the work with The miserable condition of the King my most gracious Master the impendent ruine of the Church my most pretious Mother the unsetledness of my own affaires and the dangers which every way did seem to threaten me were a sufficient Supersedeas to all matter of study even in the University it self to which I was again returned not without some difficulties where the war began to look more terrible then it had done formerly And I might say of writing books as the world then went as the Poet once did of making verses Carmina proveniunt animo deducta sereno Me mare me tellus me fera jactat hyems Carminibus metus omnis abest ego perditus ensem Haesurum jugulo jam puto jamque meo That is to say Verses proceed from minds compos'd and free Sea earth and tempests joyn to ruine me Poets must write secure from fears not feel As I do at my throat the threatning steel Yet so intent I was upon my designe that as soon as I had waded through my Composition and fixed my self on a certain dwelling near the place of my birth which was about the middle of April in the year 1647. I resumed the worke and there by Gods assistance as the necessity of my affaires gave me time and leasure put an end
of them in their severall Commentaries on the text saying the same thing though in divers words And finally it is so interpreted by St. Augustine also Nec frustra fortasse non satis fuit ut diceret mors aut infernus sed utrumque dictum est c. that is to say Nor happily without cause did he not think it enough to say that death or hell divisively had cast up their dead but he nameth both death for the just who might only suffer death and not also hell hell for the wicked and unrighteous who were there to be punished Thus have we looked over all those places where the word Hades doth occurre in the new Testament except that one which is in question whereof more anon and finde it constantly both englished and interpreted by that of hell according as we commonly understand the word for the place of torments T is true the word admits of other notions amongst some Greek Authors But that makes nothing to us Christians who are to use it in that sense in which it is presented to us in the book of God interpreted and expounded by the Antient Fathers and the tradition of the Church For though the sacred Penmen of the new Testament writing in Greek were of necessity to use such words as they found ready to their hands yet they restrained them many times to some certain and particular meaning which they retain unto this day as words of Ecclesiastical use and signification Of this kinde are Ecclesia Evangelium Episcopus Presbyter Diaconus Martyr and the like which being words of a more general signification in their first original are now restrained to such particular notions as the first Preachers of the Gospel thought most fit to reserve them for Of this kind also is Diabolus which properly and originally did signifie no more then an Accuser but is now used by all writers both in Greek and Latine to denote the Devil And of this kind is Hades also which whatsoever it might signifie in some old Greek writers more then the Place or Region of hell or the Prince thereof is now restrained in general speech to signifie only hell it self or the house of torments the habitation of the Devill and his Angels But this we shall the better see by taking a short view of the use and signification of the word amongst the best and most approved of the old Greek Ecclesiastical writers And first Iosephus though no Christian yet one that very well understood the difference between heaven and hell telleth us of those whose souls were cleansed and favoured of God that they inhabit in the holiest places of heaven but that they whose hands wax mad against themselves or who laid hands upon themselves 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their soules were to be received in the dark vaults of hell or Hades Theophilus the sixt B. of Antioch about 170. years after Christ citeth this verse out of the works of the Sibyls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that they sacrificed to the Devils in hell or Hades In the same times lived Iustin Martyr who doth thus informe us After the soul saith he is departed from the body straightwayes there is a separation of the unjust from the just both being carryed by the Angels into places meet for them that is to say the souls of the just into Paradise where is the fellowship and sight of Angels and Arch-angels with a kind of beholding of Christ our Saviour 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but the souls of the unjust to places in hell or Hades of which it was said in Scripture unto Nebuchadnezzar 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Hades below was stirred to meet him Isa. 14. And to this purpose he both citeth and alloweth those words of Plato where he affirmes that when death draweth near to any man then tales are told 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the things in Hades how he that here doth deal unjustly shall there be punished c. Next him Eusebius speaks thus in the person of Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. I see my descent to hell or Hades approach and the rebellion against me of the contrary powers which are enemies to God And that we may be sure to know what he means by Hades he tels us out of Plato in another place that the souls of wicked men departing hence immediately after death 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 endured the punishments of hell or Hades of their doings here After man was fallen saith Athanasius and by his fall death had prevailed from Adam to Christ the earth was accursed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hell or Hades opened Paradise shut up and heaven offended but after all things were delivered by Christ the earth received a blessing Paradise was opened 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hades or hell did shrink for fear and heaven set open to all believers And in another place he speaketh of two severall mansions provided by Almighty God for the wicked man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the grave and Hades whereof one is to receive his body and the other his soul. St. Basil thus Death is not altogether evill except you speak of the death of a sinner 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. because that their departure hence is the beginning of their punishments in hell or Hades and besides 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the evils which are in hell or Hades have not God for their cause but our selves c. And after shewing that Dathan and Abiram were swallowed up of the earth he addes that they were never a whit the better for this kind of punishment 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for how could they be so that went down to Hades or hell but they made the rest wiser by their example Infinite more might be alleaged from the Fathers of the Eastern Church to shew that when they spake of Hades they meant nothing but hell and should be here produced were not these sufficient Only I shall make bold to add the evidence of two or three of the most eminent of the latter writers to shew that in all times and ages the word retained that notion only which had been given it in the Scriptures and the old Greek Fathers Thus then Cydonius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. that there is in Hades hell vengeance for all sinnes committed not only the consent of all wise men but the equity of the divine justice doth most fully prove Aeneas Gazaeus he comes next and he tels us this that he who in a private life committeth smal sins and laments them escapeth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the punishments that are in Hades And finally Gregentius thus Christ took a rod out of the earth viz. his precious Crosse and stretching forth his hand struck all his enemies therewith and conquered them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. that is to say Hades or hell death sin and that subtile serpent So
on the authority and warrant of the holy Scriptures yet certainely the Scripture as we see by these two last passages is against him in it That which occasioned his mistake if I guesse aright was those words of David viz. Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgement which is not to be meant of their not appearing but of their not daring to stand to their tryall but shrinking under the heavy burden of their sinnes and wickednesses Thus have I made a brief but a full description of Christs coming to judge both the quick and the dead according as it is laid down in the book of God The substance of it we have there delivered in so plain a way that every one that reads it understands it also unlesse he wilfully mistake and turn all to Allegories But for the Circumstances of this great and most glorious action that is to say the method and the manner of it the time and place and other things co-incident to those particulars in those I shall crave leave to enlarge my self a little further as well for my own satisfaction as the content of the reader And first beginning with the time there is but little I confesse to be said of that Our Saviour telleth us in plain termes that of that day and that hour knoweth no man no not the Angels which are in heaven neither the Son but the Father And yet as plain as these words are they have given great matter of dispute in the Christian Church especially that part of them which concernes the Son and his not knowing when that day and that hour should come The Arians hereupon concluded against CHRISTS divinity as being ignorant of some things which the Father knew But unto this the Fathers of that age answered very rightly that Christ speaks not of himself as God or as the Word both made and manifested in the flesh but as he was the Son of man to whom the Father had not pleased to communicate the knowledge of so great a mysterie And of this minde were Athanasius Serm. 4. cont Arium Ambrose l. 5. de fide c. 8. Nazianzen Orat. 4. de Theolog. Theodoret Anathem 4. cont Cyrill Cyril of Alexandâ— l. 9. Thesaur c. 4. the Author of the imperfect work on St. Matthews Gospel ascribed to Chrysostome Which though no doubt it was the most ready and most satisfactory answer which could be given unto the objection yet when the learning of the Schooles came to be in credit this answer was conceived to be derogatory to the honour of CHRIST and many quaint devises found to avoid the Argument some of them so derogatory to the honour of Christ that I think a greater scandall could not possibly be laid upon him And such I take to be that of Estius though I thinke him to be one of the modestest men that ever came out of the Schoole of Ignatius Loyala who telleth us that Christ is said to be ignorant of that day and hour quia non sic eum didicerat a Patre ut illum ulterius hominibus mâ—nifestare deberet because he had not so learned it of his Father as that he ought to make it known to us men More briefly thus Christ saith he doth doth not know of that day and that hour ut videlicet nobis notum faciat he doth not know it so as to tell it us Which is in plain termes neither better nor worse then to make Christ the author of equivocation so much in use amongst the Iesuits For though our Saviour was not bound nor did thinke it expedient to communicate all those things unto his Disciples which had been imparted to him by his heavenly Father yet to put such a speech in the mouth of Christ viz. I know it not that is to say I do not know it so as to tell it you is such a cunning piece of Iesuitisme that it is hardly to be matched in all their writings And therefore leaving them to their strange devises we will look back again upon the answere of the Antient Fathers which though both right and satisfactorie as before I said yet was it so deserted in the age next following that the Themistiani in the time of the Emperour Mauritius were accounted hereticks and nick-named commonly Agnâ—etae because they taught that Christ considered in his humane nature was ignorant of that day and hour of his own coming to judgment And possible enough it is they might still passe for hereticks did they live amongst us if they maintained this universally of Christs humane nature as if he neither did know it nor were capable of it and not with reference to the time in which he spake it there being many things communicated to him after his resurrection which before were not known unto him And therefore I for my part shall subscribe unto that of Origen who telleth us that when our Saviour spake these words he was indeed ignorant of the day of judgement post resurrectionem vero seivisse quod tunâ— Rex Judex a Patre constitutus sit but that he knew it after his Resurrection because he was then made by God both our King and Iudge But whether Christ did know of that day or not seemes not much materiall to some men who because they would be wiser then Christ our Saviour have marked us out the precise time of his coming to judgement And some there be who think they do not trespasse at all upon Gods prerogative to whom it only doth belong to know the times and the seasons Act. 1.7 if they content themselves with a certain year and do not look so narrowly into it as to name the day Of the first sort was a Dutch Priest in the parts near Noremburg who being skilful in Arithmetical calculations concluded out of the numerical letters of this prediction in the Gospel videbunt in quem pupugerunt Ioh. 19.38 that the world should end Ann. 1562. And having fooled himself in that he presumed so far as to name the very day nay the hour it self in which the world should end and Christ come to judgement so far prevailing on his Parish that they gave beliefe to his prediction and at the day and hour appointed met all together in the Chappel or Parish Church to hear their Prophet preach and expect Christs coming It were pity to leave the story so and therefore I will tell the successe thereof which in brief is this No sooner were the people assembled together but there fell a great storme with thunder and lightning and that in such a violent and fearfull manner that they looked every minute for the Lords appearing But the day waxing fair again and no Saviour coming the people finding how they had been abused fall on the Priest and had doubtlesse slain him in the place if some of the more moderate men had not stayed their fury and helped the silly Prophet to get out of their fingers Somewhat
Viceroyes put upon him by the Papists and the Presbyterians THe title of King designed to Christ long before his birth given to him by the Souldiers and confirmed by Pilate The generall opinion of the Iews and of the Apostles and Disciples for a temporal Kingdome to be set up by their Messiah the like amongst the Gentiles also Christ called the head of the Church and upon what reasons The actuall possession of the Kingdome not conferred on Christ till his resurrection Severall texts of Scripture explained and applyed for the proof thereof Christ by his regall power defends his Church against all her enemies and what those enemies are against which he chiefly doth defend it Of the Legislative power of Christ of obedience to his lawes and the rewards and punishments appendent on them No Viceroy necessary on the earth to supply Christs absence The Monarchy of the Pope ill grounded under that pretence The many Viceroyes thrust upon the Church by the Presbyterians with the great prerogatives given unto them Bishops the Vicars of Christ in spirituall matters and Kings in the externall regiment of the holy Church That Kings are Deputies unto Christ not only unto God the Father proved both by Scriptures and by Fathers The Crosse why placed upon the top of the regall Crown How and in what respects Christs Kingdome is said to have an end Charity for what reasons greater then faith and hope The proper meaning of those words viz. Then shall he deliver up the Kingdome unto God the Father disputed canvassed and determined CHAP. XV. Touching the coming of our Saviour to judgement both of quick and dead the souls of just men not in the highest state of blisse till the day of judgement and of the time and place and other circumstances of that action THe severall degrees of CHRISTS exaltation A day of judgement granted by the sober Gentiles Considerations to induce a natural man to that perswasion and to inforce a Christian to it That Christ should execute his judgement kept as a mysterie from the Gentiles Reasons for which the act of judging both the quick and the dead should be conferred by God on his Son CHRIST IESVS That the souls of righteous men attain not to the highest degree of happinesse till the day of judgement proved by authority of Scriptures by the Greek Fathers and the Latine by Calvin and some leading men of the reformation The alteration of this Doctrine in the Church of Rome and the reason of it The torments of the wicked aggravated in the day of judgement The terrors of that day described with the manner of it The errour of Lactantius in the last particular How CHRIST is said to be ignorant of the time and hour of the day of judgement The grosse absurdity of Estius in his solution of the doubt and his aime therein The audaciousnesse of some late adventurers in pointing out the year and day of the finall judgement The valley of Iehosophat designed to the place of the generall judgement The Easterne part of heaven most honoured with our Saviours presence The use of praying towards the East of how great antiquity That by the signe of the Son of man Mat. 24.30 we are to understand the signe of the crosse proved by the Western Fathers and the Southerne Churches The sounding of the trumpet in the day of judgement whether Literally or Metaphorically to be understood The severall offices of the Angels in the day of judgement The Saints how said to judge the world The Method used by Christ in the act of judging The consideration of that day of what use and efficacy in the wayes of life LIBER III. CHAP. I. Touching the holy Ghost his divine nature power and office The controversie of his Procession laid down historically Of receiving the holy Ghost and of the severall Ministrations in the Church appointed by him SEverall significations of these words the holy Ghost in the new Testament The meaning of the Article according to the Doctrine of the Church of England The derivation of the name and the meaning of it in Greek Latine and English The generall extent of the word Spirit more appositely fitted to the holy Ghost The divinity of the holy Ghost clearly asserted from the constant current of the book of God The grosse absurdity of Harding in making the divinity of the holy Ghost to depend meerly upon tradition and humane authority The many differences among the writers of all ages and between St. Augustine with himself touching the sin or blasphemy against the holy Ghost The stating of the controversie by the learned Knight Sir R. F. That the differences between the Greek and Latine Churches concerning the procession of the holy Ghost are rather verball then material and so affirmed to be by most moderate men amongst the Papists The judgement of antiquity in the present controversie The clause a Filioque first added to the antient Creeds by some Spanish Prelates and after countenanced and confirby the Popes of Rome The great uncharitablenesse of the Romanists against the Grecians for not admitting of that clause The graces of the holy Ghost distributed into Gratis data and Gratum facientia with the use of either Why Simon Magus did assert the title of the great power of God Sanctification the peculiar work of the holy Ghost and where most descernible Christ the chief Pastor of the Church discharged not the Prophetical office untill he had received the unction of the holy Spirit The Ministration of holy things conferred by Christ on his Apostles actuated and inlarged by the holy Ghost The feast of Pentecost an holy Anniversary in the Church and of what antiquity The name and function of a Bishop in St. Pauls distribution of Ecclesiasticall offices included under that of Pastor None to officiate in the Church but those that have both mission and commission too The meaning and effect of those solemne words viz. receive the holy Ghost used in Ordination The use thereof asserted against factious Novelty The holy Ghost the primary Author of the whole Canon of the Scripture The Canon of the Evangelical and Prophetical writings closed and concluded by St. Iohn The dignity and sufficiency of the written word asserted both against some Prelates in the Church of Rome and our great Innovators in the Church of England CHAP. II. Of the name and definition of the Church Of the title of Catholick The Church in what respects called holy Touching the head and members of it The government thereof Aristocraticall THe name Church no where to be found in the old Testament The derivation of the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and what it signifyeth in old Authors The Christian Church called not improperly by the name of a Congregation The officiation of that word in our old Translators and the unsound construction of it by the Church of Rome Whence the word CHVRCH in English hath its derivation The word promiscuously used in the elder times
was said out of Austin formerly that whosoever contradicted that which was there delivered Aut haereticus aut a Christi fide alienus was either an Heretick or an Infidel If none of these particulars may be justly quarrelled it must be then that the Apostles thought not fit to commit it to writing but left it to depend on tradition only And yet St. Augustine saith the same Catholica fides in Symbolo nota fidelibus memoriaeque mandata c. The Catholick faith contained in the Creed saith he so well known to all faithful people and by them committed unto memory is comprehended in as narrow a compass as the nature of it will bear St. Hierome no great friend of Ruffines as I said before is more plain then he who tels us that the Symbolum of our faith and hope delivered by Tradition from the Apostles Non scribitur in charta atramento sed in tabulis cordis was not committed in those times to ink and paper but writ in the tables of mens hearts Irenaeus cals it in plain tearms 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is the Greek word for Tradition and Tertullian fetcheth it as high as from the first creating of the Gospel Hanc regulam ab initio Evangelii decurrisse as expressely he Compare these passages of Irenaeus and Tertullian whereof the first conversed with Polycarpus the Apostles Scholar with that which is told us by Ruffinus of Majores nostri that the relation which he makes came from the Tradition of their forefathers and we shall finde as strong as constant and as universal a Tradition for the antiquity and authority of the Creed in question as for the keeping of the Lords-Day or the baptizing of Infants and it may be also for the names and number of the Books of Canonical Scripture And yet behold two witnesses of more antiquity then Irenaeus and Tertullian The first Ignatius one of the Apostles scholars and successour unto St. Peter in the See of Antioch who summeth up those Articles which concern the knowledge of CHRIST IESVS in his incarnation birth and sufferings under Pontius Pilate his death and descending into Hell his rising on the third day c. as they stand in order in the Creed The second is Thaddeus whom St. Thomas the Apostle sent to Abgarus the King or Toparch of Edessa within few years after the death of our Redeemer who being to instruct that people in the Christian faith gives them the sum and abstract of it in the same words and method as concerning CHRIST in which we finde them in the Creed at this very day Nor shall I fear to fare the worse amongst knowing men for relying so far upon Traditions as if a gap were hereby opened for increase of Popery For there are many sorts of Traditions allowed of and received by the Protestant Doctors such as have laboured learnedly for the beating down of Popery and all Popish superstitions of what kinde soever Chemnitius that learned and laborious Canvasser of the Councel of Trent alloweth of six kindes of Tradition to be held in the Church with whom agreeth our learned Field in his fourth book of the Church and 20. chapter Of these he maketh the first kinde to be the Gospel it self delivered first by the Apostles viva voce by preaching conference and such ways of lively expressions Et postea literis consignata and after committed unto writing as they saw occasion The second is of such things as at first depend on the authority and approbation of the Church but after win credit of themselves and yeild sufficient satisfaction unto all men of their divine infallible truths contained in them and of this kinde is that Tradition which hath transmitted to us from time to time the names and number of the Books of Canonical Scripture The third is that which Irenaeus and Tertullian speak of and that saith he is the transmission of those Articles of the Christian faith quos Symbolum Apostolicum complectitur which are contained in the Apostles Creed or Symbol The fourth touching the Catholick sense and interpretation of the Word of God derived to us by the works and studies of the FATHERS by them received from the Apostles and recommended to posterity The fifth kinde is of such things as have been in continual practise whereof there is neither precept nor example in the holy Scripture though the grounds reasons and causes of such practise be therein contained of which sort is the Baptism of Infants and the keeping of the Lords-Day or first day of the week for which there is no manifest command in the Book of God but by way of probable deduction only The sixt and last sort is de quibusdam vetustis ritibus of many antient rites and customs which in regard of their Antiquity are usually referred unto the Apostles of which kind there were many in the Primitive times but alterable and dispensable according to the circumstances of times and persons And of this kinde are those Traditions spoken of in our Book of Articles where it is said that it is not necessary that Traditions and Ceremonies be in all places one or utterly like in that at all times they have been divers and may be changed according to the diversity of countreys times and mens manners so that nothing be ordained against Gods Word So that the question between us and the Church of Rome is not in this as many ignorant men are made believe wheâ—her there be or not any such Traditions as justly can derive themselves from the Apostles or whether such Traditions be to be admitted in a Church well constituted I know no moderate understanding Protestant who makes doubt of either The question briefly stated is no more but this that is to say whether the Traditions which the Church of Rome doth pretend unto be Apostolical or not Now for the finding out of such Traditions as are truly and undoubtedly Apostolical there are but these two rules to be considered the first St. Austins and is this Quod universa tenet Ecclesia that whatsoever the Church holdeth and hath alwayes held from time to time not being decreed in any Councel may justly be believed to proceed from no other ground then Apostolical authority The second rule is this and that 's a late learned Protestants that whatsoever all or the most famous and renowned in all Ages or at the least in divers ages have constantly delivered as from them that went before them no man gainsaying or doubting of it without check or censure that also is to be believed to be an Apostolical Tradition By which two rules if we do measure the Traditions of the Church of Rome such as they did ordain in the Councel of Trent to be imbraced and entertained pari pietatis affectu with the like ardor of affection as the written Word What will become of prayer for the dead and Purgatory the Invocation of the Saints departed the worshipping of Images adoration
somnum both when they rose when they betook themselves to sleep or put on their cloaths and diligently learning and retaining of it being commended also to all sorts of people omnis aetatis omnis sexus omnisque conditionis by the Councell holden in Friuli Ann. 791. And by a Canon superadded unto those of the last of the three Oecumenical Councels holden in Constantinople it was expresly ordered by the Fathers there not only that no person should be admitted unto Baptisme or to Confirmation or to stand Godfather for any in those sacred Acts except infants only who could not say the Creed and Lords prayer without book but also Catholicum esse non posse that he who was so negligent in the things which did so nearly concern him in the way of his salvation could not be a Catholick And yet this was not all the honour nor were these all the markes of difference which were put upon it to set it high in estimation above other Creeds For whereas that of Nice and Athanasius were ordered to be said or sung but at speciall times according to the usages of particular churches it was decreed by Damasus who sat Pope at Rome A. 370. or thereabouts that the Apostles Creed should be repeated every day in the publick Liturgies on the Canonicall houres of prayer And whereas it was ordered by Pope Anastasius that at the reading of the Gospell not the Priests only and the Ministers but all people present venerabiliter curvi in conspectu Evangelii starent should stand upon their feet and bow down their bodies as in the way of veneration it was not long before the same gesture had been taken up for I finde not that it was imposed by publick Sanction at the reading also of the Creed as being the summe and substance of the holy Gospels Et cum Symbolum est verbum Evangelicum quoad sensum ergo illud stando sicut Evangelium dicitur as Durandus hath it The like authority it had in all generall councels in which it is usuall to be recited as Baronius very well observeth quasi Basis et fundamentum totius Ecclesiae structurae as the foundation and ground-work of the whole Ecclesiasticall edifice and this he proves out of the acts of the Councels of Chalcedon Ephesus and Constantinople whither I refer you Finally as this Creed is sometimes called the Creed without any addition the Creed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or by way of eminence all other being called for distinction sake the Constantinopolitan the Nicene the Creed of Athanasius or the Creed of Damasus so was this antiently esteemed the one and only Creed devised for the generall use of all the Church the rest being only made as Expositions or as Comments on it upon occasion of particular and emergent heresies And so much Perkins doth confesse though he be otherwise perswaded of the Authors of it then had been taught him by the greatest and most eminent Writers of the Primitive times For against this that hath been said many Objections have been studied both by him and others to make the Creed of latter standing and of lesse authority And first they say that if the Creed were indeed framed by the Apostles in that form of words in which it is come unto our hands it must be then a part of the Canonicall Scriptures as the residue of their writings are which also I finde granted and I wonder at it in our learned Bilson The Creed saith he we do not urge as undoubtedly written by all the Apostles for then it must needs be Canonicall Scripture Which being said he answereth himself in the words next following where he affirmeth that it is the best and perfectest forme of faith delivered to the Christians at the first planting of the Gospel by the direction of the Apostles and by their Agreement If so if it was framed by their direction and agreement it is as much to my intent as if it had been written by them all together it being not their pen but their authority and consent which makes it be entituled to them and called Apostolicall St. Pauls Epistle to the Romans were not else Canonical because written by the hand of Tertius as it is said Rom. 16.22 And as to the conclusion which is thence inferred I answer that not every thing which was writ by the Apostles or by any of them was ipso facto to be called canonical Scripture because writ by them but only that which they committed unto writing by the dictamen and direction of the holy Ghost with an intent that it should be Canonical and for such received For otherwise the Epistles of St. Paul to Seneca supposing them for his which I here dispute not and all the letters of intercourse betwixt them and their private friends of which no question need be made but they writ many in their time as occasion was had we the copies of them extant must have been Canonical as well as those upon record in the book of God And this is that which we finde written by St. Austin Quicquid ille de suis dictis factisve nos scire voluit hoc illis scribendum tanquam suis manibus reposuit and in another place to the same effect Deus quantum satis esse judicavit locutus scripturam condidit His meaning in both places doth amount to this that whatsoever God conceived to be fit and necessary for the edification of his Church he did impart to the Apostles and when he had communicated so much as was fit and necessary he closeth the Canon of the Scripture not giving way that any thing should be added to it as the word of God but that which he did so communicate and impart unto them It is objected secondly that in the Primitive times it had not any exact forme at all but that the Fathers varied in the repetition of the heads thereof and to this end Ignatius Irenaeus Tertullian Origen and others of the antients are brought in as witnesses but prove no such thing All that can be collected from those antient writers is no more then this that many times the Fathers as learned men and great discoursers use to do inlarge the words and syllables of the Creed as they saw occasion the better to deliver the true meaning of it and sometimes they contract into fewer words the whole summe thereof as thinking it not pertinent to the present purpose to tie themselves unto the words Which appears plainly by Tertullian who doth acknowledge that there was but one only Creed or set rule of faith affirmed by him to be unalterable and unchangeable yet having three occasions to repeat the heads thereof doth vary every time in the words and phrases And yet it cannot be inferred upon these variations that at the first or rather in the Primitive times the Creed had no exrct forme at all or not the same in which it is retained now in the Christian Church no more then any
only teach Posterity to give none to himself And having thus asserted the authority of the Creed which I have in hand declared the course and purposes of this following work and shewn you what grounds I am especially resolved to proceed upon I shall with the assistance of Gods gracious Spirit fall roundly to the work it self taking the Articles in order as they lie before me And yet before I shall descend unto particulars I think it not amiss to adde the testimony and consent of Calvin to that which is before delivered touching the Authors and authority of this common Creed according as I finde it in an old Translation of his Book of Institutes for I have not the Original now by me printed at London in the year 1561. And thus saith he Hitherto I have followed the order of the Apostles Creed because whereas it comprehendeth shortly in few words the chief Articles of our Redemption it may serve us for a Table wherein we do distinctly and severally see those things that are in Christ worthy to be taken heed unto I call it the Apostles Creed not over carefully regarding who were the Authors of the same It is verily by great consent of old Writers ascribed to the Apostles either because they thought it was by common travail written and set out by the Apostles or for that they judged that this Abridgement being faithfully gathered out of the doctrine delivered by the hands of the Apostles was worthy to be confirmed by such a Title And I take it to be out of doubt that from whence soever it proceeded at the first it hath even from the first beginning of the Church and from the very time of the Apostles been used as a publick Confession and received by the consent of all men And it is likely that it was not privately written by any one man for as much as it is evident that even from the farthest age it hath alwayes continued of sacred authority and credit among all the godly But that which is only to be cared for we have wholly out of controversie which is that the whole History of our Faith is briefly and well in distinct order rehearsed in it and that there is nothing contained therein which is not sealed with sound testimonies of the Scripture Which being understanded it is to no purpose either curiously to doubt or to strive with any man who were the Authors of it unless perhaps it be not enough for some man to be assured of the truth of the holy Ghost but if he do also understand either by whose mouth it was spoken or by whose hand it was written So he And this is very much for one who was no greater Champion of the antient Farmulas THEOLOGIA VETERVM OR THE SUMME OF Christian Theologie Positive Polemical and Philological CONTAINED IN THE Apostles CREED Or reducible to it According to the tendries of the Antients both GREEKS and LATINES THE FIRST BOOK By PETER HEYLYN Heb. 11.6 3. He that cometh to God must believe that he is and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him Through faith we understand that the Worlds were framed by the word of God so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear LONDON Printed by E. Cotes for Henry Seile 1654. ΣΥΜΒΟΛΟΠΤΩΠΑΠΟΣΤΟΛΩΠSymbolum Apostolicum secundum Graecos 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 4. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 5. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 6. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 7. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 8. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 9. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 10. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 11. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 12. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Symbolum Apostolicum secundum Latinos St. PETRUS 1. Credo in Deum Patrem omnipotentem St. JOHANNES 2. Creatorem coeli terroe St. JACOBUS 3. Credo in Iesum Christum filium ejus unicum dominum nostrum St. ANDREAS 4. Qui conceptus est de Spiritu sancto natus ex Virgine Maria St. PHILIPPUS 5. Passus est sub Pontio Pilato crucifixus mortuus sepultus St. THOMAS 6. Descendit ad inferos tertia die resurrexit a mortuis St. BARTHOLOMAEUS 7. Ascendit in coelos sedet ad dextram dei Patris omnipotentis St. MATTHAEUS 8. Inde venturus judicare vivos mortuos St. JACOBUS ALPHAEI 9. Credo in Spiritum sanctum sanctam Ecclesiam Catholicam St. SIMOE ZELOTES 10. Sanctorum communionem remissionem peccatorum St. JUDAS JACOBI FR. 11. Carnis Resurrectionem St. MATTHIAS 12. Et vitam aeternam Amen ARTICLE I. Of the First ARTICLE OF THE CREED Ascribed to St. PETER 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Credo in Deum Patrem omnipotentem i. e. I beleeve in God the Father almighty CHAP. I. Of the name and definition of Faith the meaning of the Phrase in Deum credere the Exposition of it vindicated against all exceptions HAving thus vindicated the Authority of the common Creed and intimated the design and project of this present work I now proceed unto the Explication of it and every branch and Article therein contained as they lie in order beginning first of all with that which testifieth our Faith and belief in him which is the first of all beginnings A Iove principium was the rule of old and a more excellent Rule then that who can teach us now But first as a Praecognitum unto all the rest I must insist upon the nature and interpretation of the first word of it which hath a special influence and operation over the whole body of the Formula and giveth denomination to it For from the Latine Credo comes the name of Creed from the first English word which is I believe we call the whole the Articles of our belief and so the verb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 comes from the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which in the Ecclesiastical notion of it we interpret Faith So that in whatsoever language we behold the same the the word is verbum operativum as the Lawyers cal it a word which hath relation unto every Article to every branch and member of the whole Compositum as I believe in God the Father Almighty I believe in Iesus Christ his only Son I believe that Iesus was conceived of the holy Ghost I believe that he was born of the Virgin Mary I believe that he suffered under Pontus Pilate sic de caeteris And first for the quid nominis of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it signifieth to assent or to joyn credit or belief to such things as are laid before us As 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the old Poet Phocylides that is to say give no credit to the talk of the common people who are unconstant and uncertain in their words and actions Derived it is from the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which we render faith and that from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the
other Writers of good credit Deus unus est Principium omnium rerum Animatio motus universi that there is but one God the beginning of all things who animateth and giveth motion to the whole World or Universe In the next rank come the Philosophers or Sages of the Antient Gentiles who speak no less divinely of this one God then the Poets or Sibylline Oracles have done before And in the first place we meet with Socrates who by Apollo himself was pronounced to be the wisest man of all the Grecians but yet so little a friend of his or any of the rest of the Heathen gods that he used openly to deride them upon all occasions and at the last was poysoned by Decree of the Senate of Athens because he disallowed the multitude of gods whom the people worshipped endevouring to bring them to the knowledge of the only God Tertullian hereupon doth put this witty scorn on their great Apollo for giving the testimony of the wisest man of all Greece to him who only of that Nation did deny him and others of his rank and quality to be Gods indeed O Apollinem inconsideratum saith he sapientiae testimonium reddidit ei viro qui Deos esse negabat And though it grew into a by-word in the following times when any man thought otherwise of their many gods then the vulgar did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Socrates his cup was ready for him yet Plato who was his scholar did not only follow him in the same opinion but publickly maintained it in his Books and Writings Nay he was so resolved to make good this point that he gave it out for a rule to his special friends how they should know whether the business which he writ to them about were seriously proposed or not Cum serio ordior Epistolam ab uno Deo cum secus a pluribus when I intend the matter seriously I then begin my letters in the name of the one God only when otherwise in the names of many And as his rule was such was his Divinity or Theology also calling the true God by the name of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which may be rightly Englished Beeing or existing and is the name by which the LORD doth call himself in the holy Scriptures but for the Idol-gods he affirms of them that they were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 things which in very deed had no beeing at all which is the very same with that of St. Paul saying Idolum nihil est that an Idol is nothing In many places of his Writings he speaks of God as solely existing in himself the beginning and the end of all things by whom and for whom they were first created though otherwhiles especially in his Books de Legibus which were for every vulgar eye he seems to be inclinable to the vulgar errour The Platonists in general speak as divinely of this one God as their Master did Iamblicus affirming that there was one cause of all things and one God the Lord of all things whom he calleth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 both self-sufficient and self-being PROCLVS that this one God was the Supreme King who subsisting in and of himself gave life and beauty and perfection to all things besides Simplicuis that he was that one and only good from whence all goodness did proceed that unity from which all things took their Original the God of gods and the cause of causes Plotinus that there is one beginning of all things of self-sufficiency communicating life and beeing to all creatures else and that those others are no otherwise happy then by contemplating that intelligible light which shineth so gloriously in the God-head as the Moon borroweth all her light from the beams of the Sun Porphyrius the scholar of this Plotinus defining GOD to be both every where and no where filling all places whatsoever but contained in none and that from him alone do all things proceed which were and are and are to come Finally not to wander through more particular this seemeth to have been the general Tenet of all Plato's followers Quod 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ejusdem erant insaniae that Atheism and the worshipping of many gods were of equal madness Proceed we next unto the Peripateticks and their Master Aristotle who being loath to seem beholding to his Master Plato did purposely run cross to him in many things which otherwise his own excellent judgement would have gladly followed And yet though elsewhere a defender of their many gods yet in his Books of Metaphysicks and in that de Mundo he doth not only reduce all motion unto one first mover but doth expresly say of God that the World and the whole course of Nature is preserved by him that he gives motion to the Sun and Moon poiseth the Earth on her Basis and sustaineth all things And finally it is said of him that at the time of his death he brake out into this divine expression Ens entium miserere mei that is to say O thou eternal Beeing from whom all things exist have mercy upon me So many principles there are in his works and writings which may conduct a man to the knowledge of GOD and so divinely doth he speak of the Heavenly powers that the Divines of Colen have writ a Book but on what grounds and warrants it concerns them to look entituled De Salute Aristotelis of the Salvation of Aristotle Theophrastus that great Doctor in Physick but by Sect a Peripatetick maintaineth that there is one only Divine principle or beginning from whence all things exist one only God who out of nothing hath created all things And Alexander Aphrodiseus of the same Sect also composed a whole Tract of the divine Providence of God in which he sheweth that there is one God who ruleth all things and is of power to do whatsoever he pleaseth Let us next look upon the Academicks whose common guise it was to leave all things doubtful Qui omnia facerent incerta as Lactantius hath it and we shall finde it said by Tully who was one of that Sect Nihil est praestantius Deo c. that there was nothing more excellent then God and therefore that by him the whole world was governed who neither did subject himself unto FATE or Nature And Plutarch though much given to Fables doth advise expresly that we worship not the Heavens nor the heavenly bodies which are but as the Myrours or Looking-glasses in which we may behold his most wonderful Art who made and beautified the world Quid enim aliud est Mundus quam Templum ejus for what else is the World then the Temple of God Last of all for the antient Stoicks Zeno is said by Aristotle to have taught of God that there was only one or none and that this one God was Optimus Maximus both the best and greatest
Rome relapsed to her antient Gentilism revived again so many of her Gods and Goddesses that both the Iews and Infidels may have cause to question whether she doth believe in one God alone or that he only is the Father Almighty whom the Creed here mentioneth Of which and other of the Attributes of Almighty God I am next to speak Articuli 1. pars 2da 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Patrem Omnipotentem i. e. The Father Almighty CHAP. III. Of the Essence and Attributes of God according to the holy Scripture The name of Father how applyed unto God of his Mercy Justice and Omnipotency BY that which hath been said in the former Chapter out of the Monuments and Records of the antient Gentiles it is apparent that they knew that there is a GOD that he was one only and that this one God was an Eternal and Immortal Spirit existing of himself without any beginning invisible incomprehensible omnipotent without change or passion In which description we have all those Epithels summed up together out of the works and writings of those reverend Sages which Ruffinus a good Christian Writer of the Primitive times hath bestowed upon him in his Exposition of the Creed Deum cum audis substantiam intellige sine initio sine fine simplicem sine ulla admixtione invisibilem incorpoream ineffabilem inaestimabilem in quo nihil adjunctum nihil creatum And though it could not be expected that the Gentiles guided only by the light of Nature should have said so much yet for the better knowledge of the Essence Attributes and works of GOD we must not rest our selves contented with that measure of light which was discovered unto them but make a more exact search for it in the holy Scriptures Concerning which there is a memorable story of Iustin Martyr which he relateth in his Dialogue with Trypho the Iew. St. Paul hath noted of the Greeks that they seek after wisdome and never was the note more exactly true then in that particular For being inflamed with a desire of coming to a more perfect knowledge of the Nature of GOD then had been generally attained by the common people first he applyed himself unto the Stoicks who by the gravity and preciseness of their conversation did seem most likely to direct him But this knowledge was not with the Stoick 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nor could he learn much there of the nature of God Next he betook himself to the Peripateticks men most renowned for their knowledge in the works of Nature and the subtilties of disputation But there he profited less then before with the Stoicks the Peripateticks being more irresolute and speaking less divinely of the things of GOD then any of the other Sects of Philosophie Then had he severally recourse unto the Pythagorean and the Platonist who were most eminent in those times for the contemplative parts of learning 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and in the search of immaterials But true Divinity was not to be found in all the writings either of the Pythagoreans or the Platonists although these last did seeme to come more neer the truth then either the Peripatetick or the Stoick At last he was encountred by a Reverend old man a Christian Father and was by him directed to the Book of God writ by the Prophets and Apostles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as they which only knew the truth and which alone were able to unfold it rightly The counsel of which Reverend man he obeyed full gladly and profited so well in the Schools of CHRIST that he became a Martyr for the Faith and Gospel So we if we would come unto the perfect knowledge of GOD though we may sport our selves and refresh our thoughts in the pleasant walks and prospects of Philosophy must at the last apply our selves to the holy Scriptures where we shall be as far instructed in the things of GOD as he thinks fit to be communicated to the sons of men Now for our better method in the present search we will consider GOD in those names and Attributes by which he hath made known himself in his holy Covenants And first we meet with that of the Lord IEHOVAH which the Greeks usually called the Tetragrammaton or the name consisting of four letters for of no more it doth consist in the Hebrew language the Iews more properly nomen appropriatum gloriosum the most peculiar and most glorious name of the Lord our God appropriated unto him in so strict a manner that it was not lawful to communicate it unto any Creature By this name was he first pleased to make himself known unto Moses saying that he had appeared to Abraham Isaac and Jacob by the name of God Almighty but by this Name of Jehovah he had not made himself known unto them And in the Prophet Esay thus Ego sum Jehovah illud est nomen meum i. e. I am Jehovah that is my Name and my glory will I not give unto another Derived it is from Iah an old Hebrew root which signifieth ens existens Being or existing And hereupon was that when Moses in the third of Exod. v. 14. asked the name of GOD the Lord returned this answer to him I Am that I Am and thus shalt thou say unto the people I AM hath sent me unto you And hereupon it was that St. IOHN calleth him in the Book of the Revelation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is which was and which is to come Nor doth it signifie alone a self-existence by which he hath a Beeing in and of himself and doth communicate a beeing unto all the creatures but it is used in Scripture for a name of power by which he governeth all those creatures on which he hath been pleased to bestow a beeing And therefore if we mark it well though he appear unto us by the name of God in the first of Genesis when the Creation was an Embryo an imperfect work yet he is no where called by the name of the Lord Iehovah till the Creation was accomplished and his works made perfect The Fathers heereupon observe and the note is handsome that the name of GOD is absolute essential and coeternal with the Deitie but that of IEHOVAH or the Lord not used except in reference to the creature And it is noted by Tertullian in his Book against Hermogenes that in the first of Genesis it is often said Deus dixit Deus vidit Deus fecit God said and God saw and God created But that he was not called the Lord by the name of IEHOVAH till the second Chapter when he had finished all his works the Heaven and Earth and all things in the same contained and that there was some creature framed on which to exercise his Power and Supreme command Ex quo creata sunt in quae potestas ejus ageret ex eo factus est dictus DOMINVS for by the word Dominus do the Latines render
whom with thee and the holy Ghost be praise for ever But leaving these more intricate speculations to more subtill heads The name of Father in this sense is ascribed to God by two severall titles First Iure Creationis by the right of Creation by which he is the Father of all mankinde And secondly Iure Adoptionis by the right and title of Adoption by which he hath anew begotten us in St. Peters language to an inheritance immortall undefiled and that fadeth not away reserved for us in the Heavens First GOD is said to be our Father in the right of Creation by which as all the World and all things in the same contained may be called the workmanship of his hands so may all mankinde be called his children not only those which trust and believe in him but also those which know him not nor ever read so much of him as the Book of nature those which yet live as out-lawes from the rule of reason and barbarous and savage people of both the Indies Thus Malachi the last Prophet of the Iewes Have we not all one Father hath not God created us Thus the Apostle of the Gentiles doth affirme of GOD that out of one bloud he hath made all kindreds of men And CHRIST himself who brake down the partition wall between Iew and Gentile Call no man Father on Earth for one is your Father which is in Heaven Not that the Lord would have us disobedient to our naturall Parents or ashamed to own them for this is plainly contrary both to Law and Gospeâ—t but that we should refer our being unto him alone which is the fountain of all beeing Solus vocandus est Pater qui creavit said Lactantius truly Now God is said to be our Father by the right of Creation for these following reasons as first because he was the Father of the first man Adam out of whose loyns we are descended or of whose likeness since the fall we are all begotten Therefore St. Luke when he had made the Genealogie of our Saviour CHRIST in the way of ascent doth conclude it thus which was the son of Seth which was the son of Adam which was the Son of God the son of God but not by generation for so our Saviour only was the Son of God and therefore it must be by Creation only Secondly GOD is called our Father because he hath implanted in our Parents the vertue Generative moulded and fashioned us in the secret closets of the Womb. Thy hands have made me and fashioned me Thine eyes did see my substance being yet imperfect and in thy book were all my members written saith the Royal Psalmist The bodies of us men are too brave a building for man and Nature to erect And therefore said Lactantius truly Hominem non patrem esse sed generandi ministrum Man only is the instrument which the Lord doth use for the effecting of his purpose to raise that godly edifice of flesh and bloud which he contemplates in his children Last of all for our souls which are the better part of us by which we live and move and have our beeing they are infused by GOD alone man hath no hand in it God breathes into our nosthrils the breath of life and by his mighty power doth animate and inform that matter which of it self is meerly passive in so great a wonder In each of these respects and in all together we may conclude with that of Aratus an old Greek Poet as he is cited by S. Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for we are all his off-spring all of us his children The second Interest which GOD hath in us as a Father in the way of adoption by which we are regenerate or anew begotten to a lively hope of being heirs unto the promises and in the end partakers of eternal glories by which we are transplanted from our Fathers house and out of the Wilderness and unprofitable Thickets of this present world and graffed or inoculated on the Tree of life Adoptare enim est juxta delectum sibi quos quisque velit in filios eligere Adoption is the taking of a childe from another family to plant and cherish in our own say the Civil Lawyers and he that so adopteth may be called our Father by approbation of the laws though not by nature Examples of this case have been very ordinary from Moses who was adopted for her son by the daughter of Pharaoh though he refused to be called the son of Pharaohs daughter as St. Paul said of him down through all the stories both of Greece and Rome And if it may be lawful to make such resemblances the motives which induced GOD to proceed this way and other the particulars of most moment in it do seem to carry a fair proportion or correspondency with such inducements and particulars as hath been used by men on the same occasions For in the Laws adoption was to be allowed but in these four cases First Quod quidam Matrimonii onera detrectarent because some men could not away with the cares of Wedlock Secondly Quod conjugium esset sterile because God had not blessed the marriage with a fruitful issue Thirdly Quod liberi ipsorum morerentur because their own children by untimely death or the unluckie chance of War had been taken from them in which last case adoption by especial dispensation was allowed to women Fourthy Quod liberi ipsorum improbi essent degeneres because their own children were debauched and shameless likely to ruine that estate and disgrace that family into which they were born And upon such grounds as these is GOD in Scripture said to adopt the Gentiles to make them who by nature were the sons of wrath and seemed to be excluded from the Covenant which he made with Abraham to be the heirs of God and Coheirs with Christ. God looked upon the Iews as his natural children And at the first one might have known them easily for the sons of God by the exemplarie piety of their lives and actions 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. as men know commonly their neighbour children by a resemblance to their Fathers St. Paul hath made a muster of some chiefs amongst them in the 11. chap. to the Heb. But they being took away by the hand of death there next succeeded in their room a gâ—neration little like them in the course of their lives and therefore little to the comfort of their heavenly Father For his part he was never wanting unto his Vineyard nor could there any thing be done to it which he did not do yet when he looked for grapes in their proper season it brought forth nothing but wilde grapes sit only for the wine-press of his indignation So that the Lord was either childless or else the Father of a stubborn and perverse generation of whose reclaim there was no hopes or but small if any
daughter of a Levite whose name was Isachar This I am sure may be affirmed in defence of the story that the Iews were not then so punctual in keeping themselves unto their Tribes as they had been formerly that even the High Priesthood it self had been bought and sold to persons both unworthy and uncapable of so high an honour that we finde IESVS to have preached in the Temple often and to have done in it other Ministerial Offices which questionless the Priests and Pharisees would never have suffered had he not had some calling to it which might authorize him And if by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Sacerdotes in the Text of Suidas we may have leave to understand some inferiour Ministers and not the very Priests themselves as possibly enough we may the story may then stand secure above all exceptions Next let us look amongst the Gentiles and they will tell us that Augustus the Roman Emperour in whose time the Lord CHRIST was born consulting with the Oracle of Apollo touching his successor received this answer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In English thus An Hebrew childe whom the blest Gods adore Commands me leave these shrines and back to Hel So that of Oracles I can no more In silence leave our Altars and farewell Which answer being so returned Augustus built an Altar in the Roman Capitol with this Inscription ARA PRIMOGENITI DEI i.e. the Altar of the first begotten of God The general ceasing of Oracles much about this time gives some strength to this And so doth that which we finde mentioned in Eusebius touching the falling of the Idols of Egypt upon our Saviours first coming into that countrey St. Ambrose in his Commentary on the 119. Psalm doth affirm as much Nor is it yet determined to the contrary by our greatest Criticks but that the Prophet Esaiah may allude to this where bringing in the burden of Egypts he saith Behold the Lord rideth upon a swift clowd and shall come into Egypt and the Idols of Egypt shall be moved at his presence But whether the Prophet do allude unto this or not we have no reason to misdoubt of the truth of the story and the acknowledgement which the false Gods of the Gentiles made to the Divinity of the true In and about these times lived the Poet Virgil one of whose Eclogues being a meer extract of some fragments of the Sibylline Oracles hath many passages which cannot properly be applyed to any but our Saviour Christ though by him wrested to the honour of Marcellus the Nephew and designed Heir of Augustus Caesar. For example these Iam redit Virgo redeunt Saturnia regna Iam nova progenes Coelo demittitur alto Chara Deunt soboles magnum Iovis incrementum Which may be Englished in these words Now shines the Virgin now the times of peace Return again and from the Heaven on high Comes down a sacred and new Progenie The issue of the Gods Ioves blest increase More testimonies of this nature might be added here but these shall serve at this time for a tast of the rest And so we end with that of the Centurion of Pilates guard who noting all that hapned in our Saviours passion could not but make acknowledgement of so great a Prophet saying Surely this was the Son of God And this was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as much as could possibly be delivered in so few words Which being so it is the more to be admired that such as take unto themselves the name of Christians should think and speak less honorably of their Lord and Saviour then the Iews Gentiles and the Devils themselves yet such vile miscreants have there been in the former ages and I doubt are still And of those Ebion was the first who savouring strongly of the Iew had made up such a mixture of Religion as might please their palates and taught no otherwise of CHRIST then that he was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an ordinary natural man begotten in the common course of generation Eusebius so informs us of him St. Hierome addes that for the suppression of this heresie St. Iohn at the request of some Asian Bishops wrote his holy Gospel of purpose to assert the Divinity of CHRIST ut divinam ejus nativitatem ediceret are St. Hieromes words of which but little had been said by the other Evangelists After him there arose up Artemon or Artemas in the days of the Emperour Heliogabalus who held the same opinion concerning CHRIST as the Ebionites did affirming him to be no other then a meer natural man saving that he was born of the Virgin Mary after a more peculiar manner then the rest of mankinde and was to be preferred before all the Prophets And against him there was a Book written as Eusebius telleth us though the name of the Author came not to his hands But that which is a matter of most admiration is that Paulus Samosatenus a Christian Bishop a Bishop of one of the four Patriarchal Sees even of the City of Antioch should not only set on foot again this condemned Heresie but have the impudence to affirm that it had been the antient and approved Doctrine of the Church of Christ No wonder if the Prelates of the Church did best in themselves when such a foul contagion was got in amongst them and therefore they assembled in the City of Antioch that by the authority of their presence and the sincerity of their doctrine so dangerous a Monster might be quelled in the face of his people This was about the time of the Emperour Aurelianus Nor had there been a more celebrious Councel in the Church of Christ from that of the Apostles mentioned in the 15. of the Acts unto that of Nice The issue and success whereof was so blessed by God that from those times until these last and worst ages of the Church wherein Socinus Osterodius and their followers have again revived it this wretched heresie was scarce heard of but in antient Histories And on the other side some of the antient Writers and the later Schoolmen the better to beat down the dotages of such frantick Hereticks as had impugned the Divinity of our Lord and Saviour have so intangled the simplicity of the Christian faith within the Labyrinth of curious and intricate speculations that it became at last a matter of great wit and judgement to know what was to be believed in the things of Christ. And of this nature I conceive are those inexplicable and perplexed discourses about the consubstantiality and coequality of the Persons which how it can consist with the School-distinction that the Father doth all things authoritative and the Son all things sub-authoritative it is hard to say that the Son is coeternal with the Father as in the Creed of Atâ—anasius and yet Principium a principio in the Schoolmens language that there should be two
and did apply it to the birth of Christ born of a most immaculate Virgin as a more punctual fulfilling of that sacred Prophesie then what before had hapned in the days of Ahaz But MARY as she was a Virgin a Virgin and the heir of the promise which was made to Eve and made to Eve when she was yet a Virgin though espoused to Adam so was she also a daughter if not an heir to all those blessings which God had promised unto David the heir as some suppose of the Royal Famiâ—y and thereby gave our Saviour an unquestioned title to the Realm of Iewry But this I take to be a supposition so ill grounded though I see great pains taken in defence thereof that I dare not lay any part of my building on it 'T is true the Iews who knew of his descent from David and greedily laid hold upon all occasions for the recovery of their lost liberties sought after him to make him King But this they did not on an opinion that he was the next heir unto the Crown but because they thought him best able to make good the Title For having seen him feed so many thousands of men with no more provision then only a few Barly loaves and two small fishes they presently conceived that he was able to raise victuals for a greater Army then could be possibly withstood by the powers of Rome The text and context make this plain to a Vulgar Reader For no sooner had the people beheld the miracle but presently they said of a truth this was the Prophet whom they did expect and if a Prophet and that Prophet whom they did expect then who more fit then he to be made their King Nor to say truth was our Redeemer a Descendent of the Royal line but the collateral line of David none of which ever claimed the Kingdome or the title of King or exercised any special power save Zorobabel only and that but temporary for the better setling of the people after the Captivity The Crown being entailed on Solomon and his posterity ended in Ieconiah the last King of that race on whom this curse was laid by the Lord himself that no man of his seed should prosper CHRIST therefore could not be of the seed of that wretched Prince because we know his work did prosper in his hands and that he is the Author of all prosperity both to Iew and Gentile And more then so the self same Prophet telleth us in the following chapter that the Lord would raise unto David a righteous branch a King which should both reign and prosper which is directly contradictory to that before whose name should be the Lord our righteousness and must be meant of Christ and of none but him Though Ioseph might naturally spring from this Ieconiah though it remain a question undecided to this very day whether Salathiel were his natural or adopted son yet this derives no title unto CHRIST our Saviour who was not of the seed of Ioseph though supposed his son Our Saviours own direct line by his Virgin-Mother was not from Solomon but Nathan the son of David of whom the holy Ghost saith nothing as concerning the Kingdome for Mary was the daughter of Heli the son of Matthat the son of Levi and so forth ascendendo till we come to Adam according as it is laid down in the third of Luke And this I call the line of Christ by his Virgin Mother on the authority of St. Augustine in some tracts of his the Author of the Book called De ortu Virginis extant amongst the works of Hierome and many late Writers of good credit besides the testimony of Rabbi Haccanas the son of Nehemiah a Doctor of great esteem amongst the Iews who telleth us that there was a Virgin in Bethlehem Iudah whose name was Mary the daughter of Heli of the kindred of Zerubbabel the son of Salathiel of the Tribe of Iudah who was betrothed to one Ioseph of the same kindred and Tribe Nor can I see to what end St. Luke writing after St. Matthew and having doubtless seen his Gospel should make another pedegree for Ioseph then was made already and that so different from it in the whole composure from Christ to David I take it therefore for a certain and undoubted truth that St. Luke reckoneth the descent of our Lord and Saviour by the line of his Mother the daughter of Heli Ioachim he is called in our Vulgar stories who is said to be the Father of Ioseph because he married his said daughter as Ioseph is there said to be the Father of Christ because he was husband to his Mother Some other difference there is in these two Genealogies as that St. Matthew goes no higher then Abraham and St. Luke followeth his as high as Adam the reason of the which is both plain and plausible For Matthew being himself a Iew and writing his Gospel originally in the Hebrew language for the instruction of that people could not bethink himself of a better way to gain upon them then to make proof that Christ our blessed Saviour was the Son of Abraham in whose seed the whole Nation did expect their blessedness And on the other side St. Luke being by birth a Gentile of the City of Antioch and so by consequence not within the Covenant which was made to Abraham carryeth on the descent of Christ as high as Adam who was the common Father both of Iews and Gentiles to shew that even the Gentiles were within the Covenant which was made in Paradise touching the restauration of lost man by the Promised seed For Maries birth and parentage I think this sufficient A little more may here be added of the title of Virgin because called in this Article the Virgin as by way of eminency The Virgin Mary saith the Article and not a Virgin known or called by the name of Mary Somewhat there is in this there is no doubt of that whether so much as many do from hence infer may be made a question That she continued still a Virgin after Christs nativity I am well resolved of notwithstanding all the cavils made against it by the Ebionites Helvidius Iovinian and the Eunomian Hereticks For who can think that Ioseph after such a revelation from the God of Heaven that she had conceived with childe of the holy Ghost should offer to converse with her in a conjugal manner or that the blessed Virgin if he had attempted it would have permitted that pure womb which had been made a Temple of the holy Ghost to be polluted and profaned with the lust of man The piety of both parties is a forcible argument to free them from an act so different from all sense of piety And yet Helvidius and his fellows had some Scripture for it for even the Devil could come in with his Scriptum est namely that passage in St. Matthew where it is said of Ioseph that he knew her not
in the Ordination of Paul and Barnabas and other Presbyters of the Church in the best and Apostolical times so gave it a fair hint to the times succeeding to institute four solemn times of publick fasting which they called jejunia quatuor temporum we the Ember-weeks to be the set and solemn times of giving Orders in the Church and calling men unto the Ministry of the same to the end that all the people might by prayer and fasting apply themselves unto the Lord humbly beseeching him to direct the Fathers of the Church to make choyce of fit and able labourers to attend his harvest as also to enable those who are called unto it and give them gifts and graces fitting for so great a business Which antient institution of the Church of God as it is prudently retained in this Church of England according to the 32 Canon of the year 1603. in which all Ordinations of Presbyters and Deacons are restrained to those four set times so were it to be wished that the same authority would establish publick meetings and set forms of Prayer to be observed at those times that so with one consent of heart both Priests and people might commend that religious work to the care and blessings of the Lord according as it was directed in the Common-Prayer Book intended for the use of the Church of Scotland There was another reason which induced our Saviour to make choyce of this time for his fast which was the better to draw on the Tempter to begin his assault but this will better fall within the compass of the third general point to be considered in this story that is to say the main act of it or the temptation it self In the mean time we may consider what might be the reason why he fasted forty days and forty nights neither more nor less In which it is first to be observed that it is not only said that he fasted forty days and no more then so but forty days and forty nights Which caution was observed by St. Matthew for this reason chiefly left else it might be thought by some carnal Gospellers that he fasted only after the manner of the Iews whose use it was to eat a sparing meal at night having religiously fasted all the day before Si ergo diceretur quod Christus jejunaret quadraginta diebus without making mention of the nights intelligeretur quod per noctes comedebat sicut Judaeis solitum erat as Tostatus notes upon the Text which also is observed by Maldonat Iansenius and some other of the Romish Writers and then there had been little in it of a miracle either to work upon the Iews or confound the Devil As well then forty nights as forty days to avoid that cavil And there was very good reason too why he should fast just forty days and forty nights neither more nor less Had he fasted fewer days then forty he had fallen short of the examples which both Moses and Elias left behinde them on the like occasions on like occasion I confess but on less by far both which were by the Lord enabled to so long a fast that by the miracle thereof they might confirm unto the Iews the truth of their doctrine For seeing that they fasted longer then the strength of nature could endure it must needs be that they were both assisted by the God of nature whose service and employment they were called unto And though perhaps a longer and more wonderful fasting might have been expected from our Saviour considering both who he was and of how much a better and more glorious Ministery he was to be employed by the Lord his God yet he resolved not to exceed the former number nor to make use of that assistance which he might easily have had of those blessed Angels who as St. Mark saith ministred unto him And this he did upon two reasons First to demonstrate to the world Evangelium non dissentire a lege Prophetis as St. Austin hath it what an excellent harmonie there was between the Law and the Prophets whereof Moses and Elias were of most eminent consideration and that his own most glorious and holy Gospel of which he was to be the Preacher and secondly lest peradventure by a longer and more unusual kinde of fast then any of the former ages had given witness to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as we read in Chrysostom the truth of his humanity his taking of our flesh upon him might be called in question Of any mystery which should be in the number of forty more then in another I am not Pythagorean enough to conceive a thought no not so much as in my dreams as never having been affected with that kinde of Theologie or the like curious and impertinent nothings Nor am I apt to think as many of the Papists do that men are bound by any Precept of our Saviour or of his Apostles to observe the like fast of forty days which we call commonly by the name of Lent Iejunium-Quadragesimale in the Latine Writers or that his glorious and divine example was purposely proposed unto us for our imitation as some others think The silence of the Evangelical Scriptures which say nothing in it and the unability of our weak nature to imitate an action of so vast a difficulty are arguments sufficient to perswade the contrary such as have finally prevailed on Iansenius and other modest Romanists to wave the plea of imitation and to ascribe the keeping of the Lent fast to such other reasons as shall be presently produced in maintenance of that antient and religious observance And on the other side I will not advocate for Calvin as I see some do who being at enmity with all the antient rites and Ordinances of the Church of Christ doth not alone affirm that the keeping of it in imitation of our Saviour is mera stultitia in plain tearms a flat piece of foolerie but tels us also of the Fathers who observed this fast that they did ludere ineptiis ut simiae play like old Apes with their own Anticks chargeth them with I know not what ridiculous zeal or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as he cals it and finally affirms the whole fast so kept to be impium detestabile Christi ludibrium a detestable and ungodly mockage of our Saviour Christ whether with less charity or wisdome I can hardly say For that I may crave leave to digress a little most sure it is that the Lent fast according as it was observed in the Primitive times was not alone of special use to the advancement of true godliness and increase of piety but also of such reverend Antiquity that it hath very good right and title to be reckoned amongst the Apostolical Traditions which have been recommended to the Church of God The Canons attributed to the Apostles which if not theirs as many learned men do conceive they are are questionless of very venerable Antiquity do
for sin should he not redeeme us Since therefore he was at this time to bear the burden of our sins in his body and to have the chastisement of our peace laid upon him and did withall behold the fiercenesse of Gods wrath against sinfull man how could he choose but fear the effects thereof and pray against them For though he were assured that this wrath of God would not proceed against him unto condemnation yet he knew well that God had infinite means to presse and punish humane nature above that which it was able to bear And therefore he addressed himself to his heavenly Father being sure that God at his most earnest and fervent prayer would proportion the pain he was to suffer according to the weaknesse of that flesh which he bare about him that neither his obedience might be staggered nor patience overwhelmed and swallowed up in despair Besides there might be somewhat else in the cup provided for him then the wrath of God with all the fears and terrors which depend upon it which might make him so unwilling to tast thereof so earnestly desirous to decline the same For many of the Fathers think that Christ did pray more vehemently to have that cup passe from him because he saw the Iews so eagerly inclined to force it on him and knew that if he drank thereof and took it from their murderous and bloudy hands it could not but draw down upon them such most grievous punishments as the dispersing of their nation and the rejection of them from the Covenant and grace of God For thus saith Origen for those men then whom he would not have perish by his passion he said Father if it be possible let this cup passe from me that both the world might be saved which was the principal matter aimed at and the Jews not perish by his suffering St. Ambrose thus Therefore said Christ take this cup from me not because the Son of God feared death but for that he would not have the Jews though wicked to perish Ne exitialis esset populo Passio sua quae omnibus esset salutaris lest his passion should be destructive to them which was to be healthfull unto all Of the same minde is Hierome also Christ said not let the cup passe from me but let this cup passe from me i. e. this cup provided by the Jews which can have no excuse of ignorance if they put me to death considering that they have the Law and the Prophets which foretell of me So that Christ makes not this request as as fearing to suffer but in mercy to the former people Sed misericordia prioris populi ne calicem ab illis propinatum bibat that he might not drink the cup which was offered by them Whose judgement in this point is so well approved by venerable Bede our Country-man that he is loath to change the words And certainly this consideration of those worthies stands on very good reason For if he so much pitied the ruine of the City and desolation of their land by the hands of the Romans that he wept upon the thought thereof what sorrow and disconsolation shall we think he took to thinke of the perpertual destruction of so many thousands and their posterities for ever thorow their own madnesse in thirsting after his bloud What grief and anguish must it be unto him to foresee the rejection of that people from the favour of God by their rash and wicked desire to have his bloud upon them and upon their children at his arraignment before Pilate For if Moses and Paul so vehemently grieved at the fall of their Brethren according to the flesh that for their sakes the one wished to be wiped out of the book of God the other most sacredly protested the great heavinesse and continual anguish which he felt for them in his heart how much more might it grieve the Saviour of the world who much exceeded both the other in compassion and mercy to see himself who came to blesse them and to save them to be the rock and stone of offence that should stumble them and their children striking them with perpetual blindnesse and bruising them with everlasting perdition through their unbelief But whether this was so or not as it may be probable most sure it is that many things concurred together to make up the measure of those sarrowes fears and terrors which were then upon him and against which he prayed so fervently and with such prostration Insomuch that having offered up his prayers and supplication to him that was able to save him from death with strong crying and tears to him who was able had he pleased to take away that cup from him but howsoever able and willing both to mitigate the sharpnesse of it and abate the bitternesse the Lord thought fit to send him comfort from above by his heavenly Ministers And there appeared an Angel unto him from heaven strengthning him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Greek which by the vulgar Latine is translated confortans eum comforting him by the translatour of the Syriack confirmans eum strengthning or confirming him as our last translation The word in the Original will bear both constructions both being of especial use in the present businesse For if we look upon our Saviour in the middest of his anguish praying unto the Lord that if it were possible that cup might passe from him the Angel may be thought to be sent unto him with a message of Comfort touching the mitigation of his sorrows the speedy end they were to have and the inestimable benefit that by his sufferings should redound unto all the world and then it is confortans eâ—m as the vulgar Latine But if we look upon him as resolved to submit himself to his Fathers pleasure not my will but thy will be done and patiently to endure whatever he should lay upon him the Angel may be thought to be sent unto him to strengthen and confirme him in that resolution and then it is confirmans eum as the translatour of the Syriack reads it But which soever of the two it was certain it is that the appearance of the Angel had some special end God doth not use to send about those heavenly messengers but on businesses of great importance And though there be no constat in the book of God what this businesse was on which the Angel was sent down by the Lords appointment yet we may probably conceive that it was to give him this assurance that his prayers were heard whether they tended to the mitigation of his present sorrows or the accepting of his death and passion as a full perfect and sufficient satisfaction for the sinnes of the world For the Apostle having told us in the fift to the Hebrews that when in the days of his flesh he had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save him from
Article by their corrupt glosses and interpretations since the first wrestling of it from the native sense came principally and originally from the Church of Rome But far lesse reason had he to impose upon them a more grosse absurdity in making Calvin and Brentius both to deliver this interpretation of it that to descend into hell was nothing else but to be utterly annihilated and extinct â—or ever A folly shall I call it or a frenzie rather which never came within their dreams for as much as doth appear by their works and writings from whence the Cardinal must collect it Nor was the scene so well contrived as it should have been for the acting of this grand Imposture the book of Calvins which it cited for the proof thereof being that entituled Psychopannychia purposely written as appeareth by the Preface of it against the Anabaptists of those times by whom indeed that monstrous Paradox had been lately published This therefore being flung aside as a fraud or slander the first of those three new constructions which have been made of this descent into hell by the writers of the reformed Churches is that thereby the Authors of the Creed whosoever they were meant nothing but our Saviours burial Bucer I take it was the first though otherwise a moderate man and one not very apt to follow any new devise that puts this sense upon the Article Ad infernum descendere nil aliud est quam recendi corpus sub terra to deseend into hell saith he is nothing else but for the bodie to be buried under the ground And presently he gives this reason why he so expounds it Sheol enim pro quo in scripturis nos fere infernum legimus sepulchrum significat that the word Sheol in the Hebrew which in the Scriptures we interpret commonly by that of hell doth properly signifie the grave What the word Sheol signifyeth in the Hebrew tongue is not now the businesse but what was meant by the Apostles in the Greek word Hades by which St. Peter did translate it and that we proved before in the former Chapter to be meant literally of hell of the place of torments Or were it so that the word Hades might be used in some places to expresse the grave yet were it very improbable that descendere in infernum in this place of the Creed should signifie no more then to be buried And in my minde Calvin doth reason very strongly against this construction where he affirmes that what an unlikely thing it must needs be thought that in so short an Abstract of the Christian faith that of our Saviours burial should be twice expressed First in plain termes and after by a figurative Metaphorical speech Non est verisimile irrepere potuisse superfluam ejusmodi battologiam in compendium hoc ubi summatim quam fieri potuit paucissimus verbis praecipua fidei capita notantur So he judiciously and to the purpose But then withall I needs must say that though Calvin did reject this interpretation as inconsistent with the nature of so short a Summary having indeed a new devise of his own to set up in stead of it yet gave he much incouragement to others to expound it so who were too apt to learn from so great a Master For whereas in the old translation of the Psalmes of David which has so long been generally received in the Western Church the words ran thus Non derelinques animam meam in inferno i. e. thou shalt not leave my soul in hell Calvin in his translation was so bold as to change it thus Non deseres animam meam in sepulchro thou shalt not leave my soul in the grave or sepulchre and then by soul expounds himself to mean the whole person of David Which coming unto Bezas hands he saw no reason as indeed there was not but that he might make as bold with St. Peter in the book of the Acts as Calvin did with David in the book of Psalmes And therefore when he first put out his new translation of the new Testament he thus translated Peters words into Calvins meaning and made the passage to run thus in Terminis without any disguise Non relinques corpus meum in sepulchro i. e. thou shalt not leave my body in the grave nor suffer thine holy one to see corruption But after finding how great clamour he had raised thereby in the next edition of that work he retained in words the old translation Non relinques animam meam in inferno but in his Notes or Annotations on the same did declare expressely that by infernus there he did mean sepulchrum and by anima the whole person whether Christs or Davids and then the glosse upon the text must in brief be this Non relinques animam meam in inferno i. e. Non relinques corpus meum in sepulchro A glosse like that of Orleans which corrupts the text and brings into my minde that with which we use sometimes to jeare the old glossary on the Canon-laws Statuimus i. e. abrogamus that is to say we do ordain that is we annul or abrogate A glosse not much unlike unto that of Bellarmine and hard it is to say which of the two is most absurd who being asked this question by some Protestant Doctors viz. to whom the Pope should make complaint when offence is given him if he be so supreme in the Church of Christ as they say he is returns this answer thereunto Papa potest dicere Ecclesiae i. e. sibi ipsi the Pope may tell the Church that is himselfe And indeed this interpretation of the Article seemed as absurd as either of these two fine glosses insomuch that Beza lived to see it every were deserted in some parts exploded And now and long before these times as Aretius very well observeth Tota Ecclesia ubique terrarum c. The whole Church thoughout the world doth receive this Article all opposition notwithstanding Et diversum a sepultura recitat and doth recite it as a different point from that of the burial Now that which Calvin said in the former case touching the unlikelyhood and improbability that in so short a Summary of the Christian faith the same thing should be twice repeated first in plain terms and presently in the very next words in a figurative speech the same may be returned to a second construction made by some late Divines on the present Article Who willing to be singular and in a way by themselves and finding that it would not down amongst knowing men that Christs descent into hell should be all one with his burial have ransacked all the Hebrew Rabbines to finde out their conceptions on the Hebrew Sheol and all the old Greek Philosophers and antient Poets to finde what they intended by the Greek word Hades And having made a general muster of collections out of several Heathenish and Iewish writers extracted out of them this sense of the
by unfaigned repentance Those of the first sort according to the rules of Divine justice must be eternal in regard of duration and by consequence accompanyed with desperation which is always found where there is an impossibility of ever coming to enjoy a better estate whereas it is not any way necessary nor doth the justice of God require it that the punishments of sin which is repented of ceasing and forsaken should be either everlasting or joyned with despair For as in every act of sin on the aversion from God who is objectively infinite and incommutably good there followeth poena damni or the loss of God which is an infinite loss and as to the inordinate conversion of the sinner to things transitory which must needs be finite there answereth poena sensus which though violent and bitter for a time is yet finite also so to the eternity of sin remaining everlastingly in sâ—ain or guilt answereth the eternity of punishment which followeth on it so to sins intermitted ceasing and repented of a suffering also for a time proportioned to it So that though every sinner sinneth in suo aeterno as St. Gregory speaketh in that he would sin ever might he live for ever and thereby casts himself into an impossibility of giving off in himself and consequently into an eternity of punishment which is due to him for the same yet if he make such use of the grace of God as to cease from sin and turn from his iniquities to the living Lord Gods justice may require extremity of punishment proportionable to the sin committed but the eternity of punishment it requireth not And therefore seeing our Saviour suffered for such sins and for such alone as might be broken off by grace and the benefit of true repentance it was no way necessary to the satisfaction of the Divine justice of God that he should endure eternal punishment Which being summed together make a perfect answer to the question formerly proposed that is to say Whether Christ ought to suffer all those punishments for the redemption of man which man himself must needs have suffered had not Christ come to redeem him The summe of which is briefly this that Christ suffered the whole general punishment of sin that onely excepted which is sin or consequent on the inherence and eternity of it as remorse of conscience and despair and that although he did not suffer the pains of Hell or any punishment of the damned either in specie or in loco yet did he undergo some punishments conformable and answerable to them in extremity as the apprehension of the wrath and anger of the Lord avenging himself upon the sinner but neither infinite nor eternal as the rejection of a sinner from the sight of God Against this truth thus stated and determined by us there remain only two objections the one relating generally to the doctrine of Christs descent into hell the other to it as it stands established in the Church of England And first as to the Doctrine generally it is thus objected that if there were no more in the sufferings of Christ then the submitting of himself to a bodily death and to the anger of the Lord for so short a season it could not possibly occasion such a consternation such a fear and horrour as he expressed both in the Garden and upon the Cross or if he did how infinitely short must he fall of that magnanimity which is found in ordinary Theeves and Robbers which is Calvins argument or of the gallantry of the Primitive Martyrs as other more modestly infer who most couragiously both did and do go forth continually to meet their deaths and satisfie the fury even of partial Judges For answer unto which though it may be said that those particulars of whom they speak endure a stronger conflict with the powers of death then we are conscious of which look on at random and are not sensible at all of the pains they feel or the extremities in the last act of their Tragedy yet we shall give a more particular and punctual answer And first we say for Malefactors that God doth many times give them over to a reprobate sense so that they carelessely seeme to contemn Gods judgements in this present world and so prepare themselves more fully for the judgments of the world to come As for the Martyrs they know well that the wrath of God towards them is appeased by Christ that they shall feel no more but the hands of men and that as the cruelty of men increaseth towards them so God doth give them strength and comfort to undergo what ever shall be laid upon them whereas CHRIST was to satisfie Gods wrath for the sins of mankinde to undergo the punishment which was due unto them according to the Rules and limitations before laid down and not alone to fall into the hands of men but to endure a bitter conflict with the powers of hell which did on every side assault him which never any Martyr was markt out to do Next in relation to this doctrine as now it stands established in the Church of England it is objected that howsoever the Articles of Religion in King Edwards days might seem to intimate a local descent into hell according to the sense of the Antient Fathers yet no such thing could be inferred from the present Article established in the form and manner declared before Their reason is because that allegation of St. Peters words touching Christs preaching to the spirits in prison which was contained in the Book of King Edwards time to shew what manner of descent it was they meant is totally left out in the present Article established in the reign of Queen Elizabeth This they conceive to be an evident declaration that the Church doth not now understand that Article as at first it did and therefore since it doth not mean such a local descent as hath been hitherto maintained in this discourse it may be construed in that sense which they put upon it To which we need but answer this that the words alleadged from St. Peter in the former Article were omitted by the Synod in the late Queenes times not because they did not so understand the Article as both their Predecessors and the Fathers did but either because Christs preaching to the spirits in prison seemed to be set down for the sole reason of his descent into hell or that they thought not fit to impose that for the meaning of St. Peters words to be beleived of necessity by all good people in the Church of England As for the putting their own sense upon it as indeed they do I will but adde this declaration or Injunction of his Sacred Majesty that is to say that no man shall hereafter either print or preach to draw the Articles aside any way but shall submit unto it in the plain and full meaning thereof and shall not put his own sense or comment to be the meaning
of death Why then do they denie it unto this of Christ Not because they did not think it possible but because they would not have it believed It stood not with their interesse and private ends to have it passe for currant with the common people Our Saviour Christ had been too diligent as they thought in the discharge of his great office in the discovery and anatomizing of their corruptions and impieties and they were loath to have his doctrine justifyed by so great a miracle Rather then so to save their superstitions they will lose themselves Non tam de suis Religionibus bene meriti quam de se male Now as the Iews believed the Scripture relating the occurrences of the ages past so gave they as full credit to them foretelling things which were to come which is our last sort of proofs delivered from the old Testament in the way of Prophecie And first we meet with that of David in the book of Psalmes viz. Thou shall not leave my soul in hell neither shalt thou suffer thy holy One to see corruption A priviledge which did not appertain at all to David who was dead and buried and had seen corruption his Sepulchre which continued till our Saviours time being nothing but a glorious emptinesse therefore by him or rather by the holy Spirit speaking in him intended to our Lord and Saviour the fruit and glorie of his loynes A matter in it self so clear and evident that when St. Peter pressed it home as a proof and evidence relating to the resurrection of the son of David those very Iews who had so wilfully cryed down this truth had nothing to oppose against it Thus also did Isaiah prophecie concerning him that the Lord would break him and make him subject to infirmities making his soul to be an offering for sin but yet withall that notwithstanding this he would prolong his dayes and the work of the Lord should prosper in his hands as the Iews could not but perceive that indeed it did But most exactly that of Hosea in whom we do not only finde the substance of this resurrection prophecied but the very Circumstances Come saith the Prophet Let us return unto the Lord for he hath spoyled us and he will heal us he hath wounded us and he will binde us up After two days will he revive us and the third day will he raise us up and we shall live in his sight A text so plain and evident to the present purpose though possibly entended by the Prophet of some speedy deliverance which by his mouth the Lord was pleased to promise to the house of Iudah that as it clearly doth foretell of a Resurrection so the accomplishment thereof in the man Christ Iesus might serve abundantly to convince the most stubborn Iew that it was principally meant and foretold of him Impleta in plerisque Prophetarum vaticinia c. The undeniable fulfilling of so many Scriptures might very well perswade men not possessed with prejudice first that our Saviour CRRIST did rise again according to the holy Scriptures and secondly that because he rose again according to the holy Scriptures that therefore he was CHRIST the Saviour We come next in order to this miracle not as foreshadowed in types or foretold in Prophecies or otherwise exemplifyed in the book of God but as accomplished in its time and left upon record in the Evangelists And here we will not beg the Iews to assent unto our Gospell but our proofs Themselves had seen our Saviour raise his dead friend Lazarus from the stench of the grave after he had been dead four days and began to putrifie They also knew as well as any of his own Disciples that he had formerly restored from death to life the widowes son of Naim and the daughter of Iairus How then can they denie him power to work the like miracle on himself At least why might not God be able to restore him unto the benefit of life again by whose ministery if not also power the benefit of life was restored to others True it is that had this mighty work of wonder been done in a corner or in some darke and solitary descent there might have been suspicion of imposture conceived against it But God well knew with what a wilfull generation he had to do what opposition he was like to finde in the promulgation of this Gospell For this cause as he made choice of a great and mighty City for the stage or Theatre whereon to act this work of wonder so did he also take a time in which that mighty City was most full and populous even the feast of the Passeover A time in which not only those which were Iews by birth resorted thither for the solemnizing of that festival but even such Proselytes of every nation under heaven as were daily added to the Covenant Once I am sure that Cestius a Roman President numbring the people which came thither to observe this Feast found them to be two millions and 700000 souls all clean and purifyed fit for the legall eating of the Paschal Lamb. God certainly had thus disposed it in his heavenly wisdome that so the tidings of the resurrection might with a swifter wing flie over all the parts of the world then known and with more ease prepare the people for salvation Which circumstance considered rightly as it ought to be were of it self sufficient to convince the Iews of a most obstinate incredulity who seeing could not choose but see yet would not perceive Ampla civitas ampla persona rem quaerentes latere non sinit as St. Austin hath it But the malice of that people will not so be satisfyed For when the Lord was risen as he had foretold them the Souldiers must first be corrupted to accuse the Disciples of Felonie and when that failed themselves are ever forwards to condemn them of folly The Lord had often signifyed unto them that the third day he would be raised from the dead that the Temple of his body should be destroyed and in three days built up again and they were resolute if strength and cunning could prevail to defeat him of the glory of his resurrection Upon this ground they had a warrant from the Governour to make sure the Sepulchre to place a watch about it and to seal the stone But when the dawning of the third day and the relation of the Souldiers had proclaimed the miracle they then gave money to the Souldiers to say and if need were to swear that his Disciples came by night and stole him away whilest they slept Dormientes testes adhibent as said St. Augustine of them in the way of scorne This is the most they have to trust to and this report as it seems clearly by the text did hold long amongst them but this if well considered is both false and foolish Never was accusation worse contrived then this For first
good his reckoning But against this it is objected not without good reason that this solution of the doubt without some further ground first laid comes not home enough but leaves it as unsatisfied as before it was For though this may be good as unto the days in which our Saviours blessed body was interred in the grave yet neither by a Logical nor a Legal allowance can it reach at all unto three nights he being in the grave two whole nights indeed but not the least part of any third night as is plain in Scripture Therefore to bring the business home they who dislike the former Exposition do it on this reason that contrary to the account and computation of the antient Iews the night is distinguished from the day whereas indeed according to their Calculation the night is but a part of the day ensuing And the evening and the morning were the first day Et sic de caeteris both of them making up together but one natural day So that when Christ said unto the Iews that the Son of man should be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth he only meant three natural days reckoning according as the Iews did unto whom he spake who began their natural day at the Sun-setting Which ground so laid the former Legal allowance or Synecdoche serves exceeding fitly our Saviour being in the grave part of the sixt evening and morning or the sixt night and day conjunct which was the Friday or the day whereupon he suffered the whole seventh evening and morning or the seventh night and day which was the Sabbath of the Iews or Saturday and the first evening and morning or the first day and night which is our Saturday night and Sunday morning Maldonate a very learned Iesuite was the first who went this way to work in which he hath been followed or rather countenanced by that great Magazine of learning Bishop Andrews Dr. Iackson the late Dean of Peterburgh and divers others To verifie his being there three days saith that Revend Prelate it is enough if he were there but a part of every one of them for it is not three whole days As in common phrase of speech we say the Sun shone or it rained these three days past though it did not so all day long but some part only of each And if it rained at all in every one of them we say true It is enough there it is so here To verifie the three nights that do we reckoning as did the Iews and that by warrant out of Gen. 19. the evening and morning but for one so drawing still the precedent night and counting it with the succeeding day So do they still the night past with the day following as in Greece they are taught to do and we doing so it will fall out right Nor stayeth that learned Father here but thus compares the Type and the Truth together and makes the case of Christ thus come home to Ionah The first day of the three Ionas was in the Ship and Christ upon the Cross till Friday somewhat before the Sun-set All the second day Ionas was in the Whale and Christ in his Sepulchre The third day Ionas came out of the Whale and Christ out of his Grave as it might be about the Sun-rising for this day both Suns rose together A fuller and more perfect Parallel betwixt Christ and Ionas he that lists to see shall finde it excellently done in the prosecution of that notable Sermon Some other ways have been found out to salve this doubt and such as seem more handsomely to decide the Controversie then any of the three before delivered But whether they do so indeed or rather doe not leave the matter more perplext and difficult I will not take upon me to determine in it but leave the matter wholly to the Readers judgement But amongst these I must profess that I can by no means reckon that of Gregory Nyssen be it spoken with due reverence to that holy man who to make up the three days and the three nights which our Saviour speaks of makes that to be the first night in which he kept the Passeover with his Disciples and in the instituting of his holy Supper 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 offered himselfe in sacrifice for the sins of man The second night he makes to be that terrible darkness which continued from the sixt houre unto the ninth and divided that day into two the first begining at Sun-rising and ending at the sixt hour when that darkness began the other beginning at that ninth hour about three of the clock in the afternoon and holding on untill Sun-set The third night which was indeed the very first he makes to be the night which preceded the Sabbath or Friday night in our account and so conceives that he hath found three days and three nights which our Saviour rested in the grave fixing his Resurrection in the evening of the Sabbath day which after their Calculation was the beginning of the first day of the week by us called Sunday So he iu his Oration de Christi Resurrectione Which resolution of the doubt if I may so call it the good Father doth not offer as a Demonstration but leaves it to the Readers judgement 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and so do I. The first of those I shall first lay down is Dr. Alabasters who with a great deal of good Greek and Hebrew had many whimseys in his Brain as may appear to any one who hath read the book which he entituled Ecce Sponsus venit And his opinion is that the three days and three nights which our Saviour speaks of are to be interpreted Secundum universas Coeli plagas according to the latitude and condition of the several Hemispheres it being night always in the one when it is day in the other Et sic e contra By this compute the three days and three nights must be reckoned thus From six of the clock on Friday night upon our account till six of the clock on Saturday morning it was night in all the land of Iewrie and day with their Antipodes in the other Hemisphere which makes the first night and the first day From six of the clock on Saturday morning till six that night was night with the Antipodes and day in Iewrie which makes the second day and the second night and then from six of the clock on Saturday night till six next morning which was about the time of our Saviours rising it was night again amongst the Iews and day again with their Antipodes which makes the third night and the third day This if you take for a Capricio as indeed the Doctor hath too many throughout that Book Let us next look on that of Paulus Semproniensis Bishop of Friuli according as by him laid down in his Book de Die Passionis Domini where he states it thus The Iews saith he being spoiled and
certainly this his sitting at the right hand of God will not do it for him For building on the grounds which before we laid though sitting at the right hand of a Prince or Potentate were a great honour to the man that sate there and gave him the next place to the Prince himself yet that it gave him an equality of power and Majesty neither the nature of Soveraignty which can brook no equals nor any of the instances before remembred can evince or evidence Not that of David and his Queen if of her he means it for David was too well acquainted with his own authority as to divide it with his wife and become joynt Tenant with her to the Crown of Israel Nor that of Solomon and his Mother which the Iesuite stands on for then the King had done her wrong to reject her suit and more then so to put his brother to the sword for whom and in whose cause she came a suiter Though Solomon was then very young and as much indebted to Bathsheba for the Crown of Israel as a son could be unto a Mother yet he knew how to keep his distance and preserve his power Young Princes have their jealousies in point of State aswell as those of riper years and can as ill endure or admit a Rivall Omnisque potestas impatiens consoriis erit as the Poet hath it Their hearts are equally made up of Caesar and Pompey as unable to endure an equal as admit a Superior Though Nero was advanced to the Empire of Rome by the power and practises of Agrippina his Mother and came as young unto the Crown as King Solomon did yet would he not permit her to be partner with him no not so much as in the outward signs and pomps of Majesty And therefore when he saw her come into the Senate with an intent to sit down with him as he thought in the Throne Imperial he cunningly rose up to meet her Atque ita specie pietatis obviam itum est dedecori saith the wise Historian and under pretence of doing his duty to her did prevent the infamy So then the sitting of our Saviour at the right hand of God importing neither an equality with him nor any superiority at all above him the phrase being measured as it ought according to the standard of the Iewish Idiom and the received customes of that Nation we must enquire a little further to finde out the meaning Most like it is that by these words And sitteth at the right hand of God the Father Almighty is meant the exaltation of the man CHRIST IESVS our blessed Lord and Saviour in his humane nature to the next degree of power and glory unto God himself whereby he was made Lord and Christ the Prince and Saviour of his people as St. Peter cals him the head over all things unto his Church as St. Paul entitles him that to inable him the better to discharge those Offices wherewith by God he is intrusted he hath received withall a participation of Gods Almighty power and most infinite goodness for the defence and preservation of the Church committed to him with all those other powers and faculties which are in Scripture called the right hand of God and finally that sitting there in rest and quiet after all his labours he is continually intent on his Churches safety which he stands ready to defend against all its enemies to govern aâ—d direct it in the ways of godliness and to reward or punish as he sees occasion Which exaltation of our Saviour in his humane nature I can no better liken then to that of Ioseph when Pharaoh made him Ruler over all the land of Egypt and placed him also over his house that according to his word they might all be ruled and made him to ride in the second Charet that he had with an Officer to crie before him Bow the knee All he reserved unto himself was the Regal Throne in which he could not brook an equal Onely in the Throne said he will I be greater then thou So stands the case as I conceive it between God the Father and his Christ. Christ by his exaltation to the right hand of God hath gained the neerest place both of power and glory unto God himself a participation of Gods divine power and goodness an absolute command over all the Church consisting both of men and Angels Only the Divine Throne the Supreme transcendency the Lord God Almighty reserves unto himself not to part with that And if we look into the Scriptures with a careful eye we shall finde Christ standing neer the Throne of Almighty God but not sitting on it St. Paul informs us to that purpose where he saith of Christ that he sate down at the right hand of the Throne of God And St. Iohn telleth us in the Book of the Revelation that he saw in the right hand of him that sate upon the Throne which was God the Father a Book written within and on the backside And the Lamb which had been slain came and tooke the Book out of the right hand of him that sate on the Throne A matter which the strongest Angel mentioned in the second verse did not dare to meddle with knowing his distance from the Throne and how ill it became him to attempt too neer it For though the Angels of themselves are of a more excellent glorious nature and far surpassing all the children of the loyns of Adam yet in this point they fall short of those infinite glories which CHRIST acquired in his person to our humane Nature First in his birth God did in no wise take the Angels saith the great Apostle but the seed of Abraham he took the meaning is that when God was to send a Saviour to redeem the world and that both men and Angels stood at once before him both coveting to be advanced to so high a dignity he did confer that honour on the seed of Abraham on one descended from his loyns and not on any of the Angels of what rank soever Who being born into the world was honoured presently with the name of the Son of God the first begotten Son of the Lord most high and therein was much better and more excellent then the Angels were in that he did inherit a more excellent name That 's the first point in which our Saviour had the better of those glorious creatures For unto which of the Angels that is to say none at all said he at any time Thou art my Son this day have I begotten thee Though he was made lower then the Angels of inferiour metal and for a while of less esteem in the eyes of men yet did they worship him at his birth by Gods own command and cheerfully proclaimed the news to the sons of men Now as God honoured him with a name above all the Angels so he advanced him to a place at his own right hand which
before the blessed Angels coming out to meet him the Saints incompassing him about to wait upon him the Devil and his Angels led in chaines behind After this comes his inthronizing at the right hand of God the Angelâ— and Archangels all the hosts of heaven falling down before him the Saints and Martyrs joyning to make up the consort and saying with a loud voice Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power and riches and strength and wisdome and honour and glory and blessing Blessing and honour glory and power be unto him that sitteth upon the throne and unto the Lamb for evermore The last and greatest as I said is his coming to judgment solemnized in the sight both of men and Angels of the unjust and righteous person yea and the Devill and his Ministers all which shall be attendant at that grand Assize some to receive their severall and particular sentences and some to put the same into execution In my discourse upon this Article I shall take for granted that there shall be a day of judgment He ill deserves the name of Christian that makes question of it And to say truth it is a point of so clear an evidence that the wiser and more sober men amongst the Gentiles though guided by no other light then that of natural reason did subscribe unto it For as Lactantius one much versed in their books and writings hath told us of them not only the Sibyls who may seem to have been inspired with the Spirit of Prophecie but Hydaspes and Mercurius surnamed Trismegistus were of that opinion delivering as with one assent this most certain truth that in the last age the godly being severed from the wicked men with tears and groans shall lift up their hands to Jupiter and implore his aide for their deliverance and that Jupiter shall hear their prayers and destroy the wicked And all these things saith he are true and shall accordingly come to passe as they have delivered nisi quod Iovem illa facturum dicunt quae deus faciet but that they do ascribe to Iupiter what belongs to God Nor want there pregnant reasons which may induce a natural man if wilfully he do not quench that light of reason which is planted in him to be perswaded strongly of a future judgment For granting that there is a God and that God is just and seeing that in this present world such men as were indued with most moral virtues were subject to disgrace and scorn and many times brought to calamitous ends and on the other side voluptuous persons who made their belly their God and their glory their shame to live in peace and plentie much reverenced and respected by all sorts of people right reason could not but conlude that certainly there must be some rewards and punishments after this life ended which God in his eternall justice would proportion to them according as they had deserved And this was Davids contemplation in the book of Psalmes He had observed of wicked and ungodly men that they came unto no misfortune like other folks neither were they plagued like other men that they did prosper in the world had riches in possession and left the rest of their substance to their babes but that he himself and other children of God who cleansed their hearts and washed their hands in innocencie were not only chastened every morning but punished also all day long Which though at first it made him stagger in the way of Godlinesse so that his feet had welnigh slipped yet upon further consideration he resolved it thus that God did set them up in slippery places but it was only to destroy them and cast them down and that at last for all their glories they should perish and be brought to a fearfull end The Parable of Dives and Lazarus serves for confirmation of this Upon whose different fortunes Abraham gave this censure Son remember that thou in thy life time enjoyedst thy good things and Lazarus received evili But now he is comforted and thou art tormented Some sins the Lord is pleased to punish in this present world left else the wicked man should grow too secure and think Gods justice were asleep and observed him not and some he leaves unpunished till the world to come to keep the righteous soul in hope of a better day in which he shall obtain the Crown of his well deserving And to this purpose the good Father reasoneth very strongly Should every sinner be punished in this present life nihil ultimo judicio reservari putaretur c. It would be thought that there was nothing for Christ to do at the day of judgment And on the other side if none the providence and justice of Almighty God would be called in question by each sensual man Qui numina sensu Ambiguo vel nulla putat vel nescia nostri And therefore it is necessary also in respect of God that there should be a day of judgement both of quick and dead at least as to vindicating of his Divine justice which else would suffer much in the eye of men when they observe what we have noted from the Psalmist with what prosperity and peace the ungodly flourish but go not as he did into the Sanctuary to understand of God what their end should be Add yet the Poets contemplation on this point was both good and pious and such as might become a right honest Christian had he intended that of eternal punishments which he speaks of temporal But howsoever thus he hath it Saepe mihi dubiam traxit sententia mentem Curarent Superi terras an nullus inesset Rector incerto fluerent mortalia casu c. Abstulit hunc tandem Ruffini poena tumultum Absolvitque Deos jam non ad culmina rerum Injustos crevisse queror tolluntur in altum Vt lapsu gravore ruant Oft had I been perplex'd in minde to know Whether the Gods took charge of things below Or that uncertain chance the world did sway Finding no higher ruler to obey Ruffino's fall at last to this distraction Gave a full end and ample satisfaction To the wrong'd Gods I shall no more complain That wicked men to great power attain For now I see they are advanc'd on high To make their ruine look more wretchedly Something there also is which may make us Christians not only to believe but expect this day considering that we are told in the holy Scriptures that we shall all appear before the judgement-seat of Christ that every man may receive according to that which he hath done in his body whether good or evill The strength and efficacie of the Argument in brief is this The bodies of us men being the servants of the soul to righteousnesse or else the instruments to sin in justice ought to be partakers of that weal and woe which is adjudged unto the soul and therefore to be raised at the day of judgment
that as they sinned together or served God together so they may share together of reward or punishment But because many times the soul sins without the body and many times without it doth some works of piety which God is pleased to accept of therefore as requisite it is that the soul separated from the body should either suffer torment or enjoy felicity according as it hath deserved in the sight of God whilest yet the body sleepeth in the grave of death And on these grounds next to the dictates and authority of the book of God the doctrine of the general judgement hath been built so strongly that only some few Atheists amongst the Gentiles and none but the wicked Sect of Manichees amongst the Christians had ever the impudence to denie it That which concernes us most as Christians and doth especially relate to the present Article is that this judgement shall be executed by our Saviour Christ sitting with power at the right hand of God the Father but in the nature and capacity of the Son of man Hereafter shall ye see the Son of man sitting at the right hand of the power of God and coming in the clouds of the Aire Mat. 26.64 See the same also Mark 14.62 and Luk. 22.69 The like we have also in St. Iohns Gospell The Father judgeth no man but hath committed all judgement to the Son Chap. 5 22. What to the Son according to his eternal generation as the Word of God Not so but to the Son of man For so it followeth in that Chapter viz. And hath given him power also to judge because he is the Son of man V. 27. And this we have directly from the Lords one mouth The Apostles also say the same St. Peter first God raised him up the third day and shewed him openly And he commanded us to preach unto the people and to testifie that it is he which is ordained of God to be judge both of quick and dead St. Paul next Henceforth there is laid up for me a Crown of righteousnesse which the Lord the righteous judge shall give me at that day and not to me only but to all those that love his appearing So for St. Iude Behold the Lord shall come with thousands of his Saints to give judgment against all men and to rebuke all that are ungodly amongst them of all their ungodly deeds which they have committed and of all the cruel speakings which ungodly sinners have spoken against him And this he citeth out of the Prophecies of Enoch the seventh from Adam which sheweth that even the Patriarchs before the flood were thoroughly possessed with this sacred truth and therefore not concealed from the holy Prophets which have been since the world began That it was manifested also to the antient Gentiles I have no reason to believe For though they might collect upon grounds of reason that there should be a day of judgement in the world to come yet that this judgement should be executed by the man CHRIST IESVS could not in possibility be discovered to them by the light of reason nor indeed by any other sight then by his alone who was to be a light to lighten the Gentiles as well as to be the glory of his people Israel And therefore in my minde Lactantius might have spared that part of his censure upon the judgment of Hydaspes before remembred in which he approves of his opinion concerning the last day or the day of doom but addeth that his not ascribing this great work to the Son of God was omitted non sine daemonum fraude by the fraud and suggestion of the Devill If Hermes or Mercurius surnamed Trismegistus understood so much quod tamen non dissimulavit Hermes as it followeth after and that the verses by him cited from the antient Sibyls were by them spoken and intended as he saith they were of CHRIST our Saviour and of his coming unto judgement in that dreadfull day we must needs say they had a clearer Revelation of it then any of the Prophets of the most high God which for my part I have not confidence enough to say For in which of all the Prophets finde we such a description of Christs coming to judgement as this which he ascribeth to one of the Sibyls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is to say Rolling up heaven earths depths I shall disclose Then raise the dead the bonds of fate unloose And deaths sharpe sting and next to judgment call Both quick and dead judging the lives of all Letting this therfore passe as a thing improbable that any of the Heathen Prophetesses should know more of Christs coming to judgement then was revealed to any of the holy Prophets or else deliver it in more clear expressions then do occurre in any of the Prophetical writers we shall proceed unto the execution of this judgement by our Lord and Saviour according to the scope of this present Article For which although no reason was or could be given by those antient sages as those which lived before the coming of CHRIST and consequently were not made acquainted with his life and actions yet there is reason to induce a Christian unto this belief were we not biassed to it by the text of Scripture For what could be more just in Almighty God then to advance his Son to the seat of judgment to the end that having been dishonoured publickly both in life and death scorned and contemned and brought unto a shamefull end in the eye of men he might have opportunity to shew his great power and majesty in the sight of all but specially of his barbarous and ungodly enemies And unto this the Prophet Zachariah alludeth saying They shall look on me whom they have pierced Which words although St. Iohn applyeth in his holy Gospel unto the piercing of Christs side Chap. 19.37 yet in the Revelation he applyeth it to his sitting in judgement Behold saith he he cometh in the clouds and all eyes shall see him and they also that pierced him Chap. 1.17 And from these words it is conceived I think not improbably that the wounds in our Saviours body shall then be visible to the eyes of all spectatours to the great comfort of the faithfull who do acknowledge their redemption to the bloud of the Lamb and to the astonishment and confusion of all his enemies but most especially of them qui vulnera ista inflixerunt by whose ungodly hands he was so tormented Here then we have good grounds to proceed upon both in the way of faith and reason for the asserting of the day of general judgement And yet somewhat further must be said to remove a difficultie which may else disturbe us in our way before we look into the particulars of it For possibly it may be said that there will be but little use of a general judgement except it be
first of the Evangelical Scriptures was the Epistle Decretory which we finde in the fifteenth of the Acts and that was countenanced by a visum est spiritui sancto i. e. It seemed good to the Holy Ghost And when St. Paul writ his Epistle unto those of Corinth for fear he might be thought by that factious people to injoyn any thing upon them without very good warrant he vouched the Spirit of God for his Author in it They preached the Gospel first to others as Christ did to them by word of mouth that being the more speedy way to promote the Work But being they could not live to the end of the world and that the purest waters will corrupt at last by passing through muddy or polluted Chanels they thought it best to leave so much thereof in writing as might serve in all succeeding Ages for the Rule of Faith Postea vero per voluntatem Dei in Scripturis nobis Evangelium tradiderunt firmamentum columnam fidei nostrae futuram as in Irenaeus A man might marvel why St. Iohn should give that testimony to the Gospel which was writ by him that it was written to the end That men might believe that JESUS is the CHRIST the Son of God and that believing they might have Faith through his Name considering that none of the rest of the Evangelists say the like of theirs or why he thundred at the end of his Revelation that most fearful curse against all those who should presume to adde anything to the words of that Book or take any thing from it being a course that none of all the sacred Pen-men had took but he But when I call to minde the Spirit by which Iohn was guided and the time in which those Books of his were first put in writing methinks the marvel is took off without more ado For seeing that his Gospel was writ after all the rest as is generally affirmed by all the Antients those words relate not as I guess to his own Book onely but to the whole Body of the Evangelical History now perfectly composed and finished for otherwise how impertinent had it been for him to say That IESVS did many other signs in the presence of his Disciples which were not written in that Book if he had spoken those words of his own Book onely Considering that he had neither written of the signs done in the way to Emaus mentioned by St. Luke or his appearing to the eleven in a Mountain of Galilee which St. Matthew speaks of or his Ascension into Heaven which St. Mark relateth which every vulgar Reader could not chuse but know The like I do conceive of those words of his in the Revelation viz. That they relate not to that Book alone but to the whole body of the Bible St. Iohn being the Survivor of that glorious company on whom the Holy Ghost descended in the Feast of Pentecost and the Apocalypse the last of those Sacred Volumes which were dictated by the Spirit of God for the use of his Church and now make up the Body of the holy Scriptures God had now said as much by the mouths and pens of the Prophets Evangelists and Apostles as he conceived sufficient for our salvation and so closed up the Canon of the Scriptures as St. Augustine telleth Deus quantum satis esse judicavit locutus Scripturam condidit as his own words are which certainly God had not done nor the Evangelist declared nor St. Augustine said had not the Scripture been a sufficient rule able to make us wise unto salvation and thoroughly furnished unto all good works Which being so it cannot but be a great dishonor to the Scripture and consequently to the Spirit of God who is Author of it to have it called as many of the Papists do Atramentariam Scripturam Plumbeam Regulam Literam Mortuam that is to say An Ink-horn Text a Leaden Rule and a Dead Letter Pighius for one as I remember gives it all these Titles or to affirm That it hath no authority in the Church of Christ but what it borroweth from the Pope without whose approbation it were scarce more estimable than the Fables of Aesop which was one of the blasphemous speeches of Wolf Hermannus or that is not a sufficient means to gain Souls to Christ or to instruct the Church in all duties necessary to salvation without the adding of Traditional Doctrines neither in terminis extant in the Book of God nor yet derived from thence by good Logical inference which is the general Tenet of the Church of Rome or that to make the Canon of the Scripture compleat and absolute the Church as it hath added to it already the Apocryphal Writings so may it adde and authorize for the Word of God the Decretals of the Antient Popes and their own Canon Law as some of the Professors of it have not sticked to say So strongly are they byassed with their private interess and a desire of carrying on their faction in the Church of Christ as to place the holy Spirit where he doth not move in their Traditions in Apochryphal and meer Humane writings and not to see and honor him where indeed he is in the holy Scriptures Of the Authority Sufficiency and Perspicuity of which holy Scriptures I do not purpose at the present any debate 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is a work more fit for another place and such as of it self would require a Volume onely I say that if the written Word be no rule at all but as it hath authority from the Church which it is to direct and then not an entire but a partial rule like a Noune Adjective in Grammar which cannot stand by it self but requireth somewhat else to be joyned with it in Construction and that too so obscure and difficult that men of ordinary wits cannot profit by it and therefore must not be permitted to consult the same the Holy Ghost might very well have spared his pains of speaking by the Prophets in the time of the Law or guiding the pens of the Apostles in the time of the Gospel and the great Body of the Scripture had been the most impertinent and imperfect peece the most unable to attain to the end it aims at that was ever writ in any Science since the world began Which what an horrid blasphemy it must needs be thought against the majesty and wisdom of the holy Spirit let any sober Christian judge And yet as horrid as those blasphemies may be thought to be some of the most profest enemies of the Church of Rome and such as think that the further they depart from Rome they are the nearer to Christ have faln upon the like if not worse extravagancies For to say nothing of the Anabaptists and that new brood of Sectaries which now swarms amongst us whom I look on onely as a company of Fanatical Spirits did not Cartwright and the rest of our new
Reformers in Queen Elizabeths time say as much as this The Scriptures say the Papists in their Council of Trent for I regard not the unsavory Speeches of particular men Is not sufficient to Salvation without Traditions that is to say without such unwritten Doctrinals as have from hand to hand been delivered to us Said not the Puritans the same when they affirmed That Preaching onely viva voce which is verbum traditum is able to convert the sinner That the Word sermonized not written is alone the food which nourisheth to life eternal that reading of the Word of God is of no greater power to bring men to Heaven than studying of the Book of Nature that the Word written was written to no other end but to afford some Texts and Topicks for the Preachers descant If so as so they say it is then is the written word no better than an Ink-horn Scripture a Dead Letter or a Leaden Rule and whatsoever else the Papists in the height of scorn have been pleased to call it Nay of the two these last have more detracted from the perfection and sufficiency of the holy Scripture than the others did They onely did decree in the Council of Trent That Traditions were to be received Paripietatis affectu with equal Reverence and Affection to the written Word and proceed no further These magnifie their verbum traditum so much above it that in comparison thereof the Scripture is Gods Word in name but not in efficacy They onely adde Traditions in the way of Supplement where they conceive the Scriptures to be defective These make the Scriptures every where deficient to the work intended unless the Preacher do inspire them with a better Spirit than that which they received from the Holy Ghost Good God that the same breath should blow so hot upon the Papists and yet so cold upon the Scriptures that the same men who so much blame the Church of Rome for derogating from the dignity and perfection of the Holy Scriptures should yet prefer their own indigested crudities in the way of Salvation before the most divine dictates of the Word of God But such are men when they leave off the conduct of the Holy Ghost to follow the delusions of a private Spirit Articuli IX Pars Secunda 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Sanctam Ecclesiam Catholicam i. e. The Holy Catholick Church CHAP. II. Of the name and definition of the Church Of the Title of Catholick The Church in what respects called Holy Touching the Head and Members of it The Government thereof Aristocratical IN the same Article in which we testifie our Faith in the Holy Ghost do we acknowledge That there is a Body or Society of faithful people which being animated by the power of that Blessed Spirit hath gained unto it self the name of the Church and with that name the attribute or title of Catholick in regard of the extent thereof over all the World of Holy in relation to that piety of life and manners which is or ought to be in each several Member And not unfitly are they joyned together in the self same Article the Holy Ghost being given to the Apostles for the use of the Church and the Church nothing but a dead and lifeless carcass without the powerful influence of the Holy Ghost As is the Soul in the Body of Man so is the Holy Ghost in the Church of Christ that which first gives it life that it may have a Being and afterward preserves it from the danger of putrefaction into which it would otherwise fall in small tract of time Having therefore spoken in the former Chapter of the Nature Property and Office of the Holy Ghost and therein also of the Volume of the Book of God dictated by that Blessed Spirit for that constant Rule by which the Church was to be guided both in Life and Doctrine We now proceed in order to the Church it self so guided and directed by it And first for the Quid nominis to begin with that it is a name not found in all the writings of the Old Testament in which the body of Gods people the Spiritual body is represented to us after a figurative manner of Speech in the names of Sion and Ierusalem as Pray for the peace of Jerusalem Psal. 121. And the Lord loveth the gates of Sion Psal. 87. The name of Church occurreth not till the time of the Gospel and then it was imposed by him who had power to call it what he pleased and to entitle it by a name which was fittest for it The Disciples gave themselves the name of Christians the name of Church was given them by our Saviour Christ. No sooner had St. Peter made this confession for himself and the rest of the Apostles Thou art Christ the Son of the living God but presently our Saviour added Upon this Rock that is to say The Rock of this Confession as most of the Antients and some Writers also of the darker times do expound the same will I build my Church 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Greek The word used by our Lord and Saviour is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whence the Latines borrowed their Ecclesia the French their Eglise and signifieth Coetum evocatum a chosen or selected company a company chosen out of others derived from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is as much as evocare to call out or segregate In that sense as the word is used to signifie a company of men called by the special Grace to the Faith in Christ and to the hopes of life eternal by his death and passion is the word Ecclesia taken in the writings of the holy Apostles and in most Christian Authors since the times they lived in though with some difference or variety rather in the application to their purposes But antiently it was of a larger extent by far and signified any Publick meeting of Citizens for the dispatch of business and affairs of State For so Thucidides 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. That the Assembly being formed the different parties fell upon their disputes and so doth Aristophanes use it in his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. That the people should now give the Thracians a Publick meeting in their Guild-hal or Common forum of the City St. Luke who understood the true propriety as well as the best Critick of them all gives it in this sense also Acts 19.32 where speaking of the tumult which was raised at Ephesus he telleth us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That the Assembly was confused And in the 26. Psal. Ecclesia malignantium is used for the Congregation of ungodly men APPLICATION BUt after Christ had given this name unto the Body of the Faithful which confessed his Name and the Apostles in their writings had applied it so as to make it a word of Ecclesiastical use and notion the Fathers in the following Ages did so appropriate the same to the state of
this plea as a sorry shift which onely seemed to be excogitated for the present pinch If any ask me Where the Church was before Luthers time I answer generally First That if the Church had failed in these North-west parts of the world as indeed it did not yet were there many Christian Churches in the East and South the Greeks Nestorians Melchites Abassins with divers others with whom the first Reformers might have held communion though differing from them in some points of inferior moment And secondly I answer more particularly that our Church was before Luther where it hath been since in Germany France England Italy yea and Rome it self A sick Church then but since by Gods grace brought to more perfect health a corrupt Church then but since reformed of those particular abuses both in life and doctrine which seemed most offensive That the Church of Rome is a true Church though not the true Church no sober Protestant will deny Iunius grants it in his Book De Ecclesia cap. 19. and so doth Dr. Whitakers also Cont. 2. Qu. 3. cap. 2. as great an enemy as any of the Romish factions The like doth Dr. Raynolds in his fifth Thesis though he deny it as he might to be either the Catholick Church it self as they vainly boast or any found member of the same Nay even the very Separatists do not grutch them that as Francis Iohnson in his Treatise called A Christian Plea Printed 1627. pag. 123 c. A true Church in the verity of essence as the Church is a company of men which profess the Faith of Christ and are baptized into his Name but neither Orthodox in all points of doctrine nor sound or justifiable in all points of practise And a true Church in reference to the Fundamentals of the Christian Faith which they maintain as constantly and defend as strongly against the several Hereticks and Sectaries of this present age as any Doctor of the Protestant or Reformed Churches though in the Superstructures they are faln aside from the received opinions of the Catholick Church A true Church too in which Salvation may be had for why should we deny the possibility of their salvation who have been the chief instruments of ours saith judicious Hooker by those especially who ignorantly follow their blinde guides and do not pertinaciously embrace any Popish error either against their Science or against their Conscience Of whom as of the greatest numbers in the Church of Christ we may very safely say with Augustine Coeteram turbam non intelligendi vivacitas sed credendi simplicitas tutissimam facit i. e. That amongst ordinary men it is not the vivacity of understanding but the simplicity of believing which makes them safe Of this Church were the Protestants Members before they did withdraw themselves from the errors of it before by this their separating from the errors of it they were schismatically expelled and thrust out of the communion of the Church of Rome by those which had the conduct of the affairs thereof in the beginning of that breach And from this Church do we of the Church of England derive immediately our interess in Christ by the door of Baptism the Body of the holy Scriptures the Hierarchy or Publick Government our Liturgy and Solemn Forms of Administration not as originally theirs but as derived to them from the Primitive times and by them transmitted unto us This Bristo doth acknowledge in his Book of Motives and this we think it no reproach unto our Religion to acknowledge also That Aphorism of King Iames of most famous memory deserving to be writ in Letters of Gold viz. That no Church under colour of Reformation for of that he speaketh ought further to separate it self from the Church of Rome either in Doctrine or Ceremony than she had departed from her self when she was in her flourishing and best estate and from Iesus Christ our Lord and Head And yet I know not how it hath come to pass but so it is that instead of reforming of an old Church which is all we did the building of a new Church will we nill we is by some Zelots of boâ—h sides obtruded on us Whereas the case if rightly stated is but like that of a sick and wounded man that had long lien weltering in his own blood or languishing under a tedious burden of diseases and afterwards by Gods great mercy and the skilful dâ—ligence of honest Chirurgions and Physitians is at the last restored to his former health No new man in this case created that is Gods sole privilege but the old man cured No new Church founded in the other that belongs to Christ but the old Reformed When Hezekiah purged the Temple and other godly Kings and Princes of the Land of Iudah did reform Religion as we know they did Neither did the one erect a new Temple or the others frame a new Religion but onely rectified in both what they found amiss And so it was also in the Reformation of the Church of Rome further than which we need not go to look where our Church was before Luthers time or to finde out that constant and perpetual visibility of the Church of Christ which hath been hitherto the subject of this Disquisition But put the case the worst that may be and let it be supposed this once That the Church of Rome had so apostated from the Faith of Christ that it ceased to be a Church at all both in name and nature yet were there many Christian Churches in the East and South all of them visible no doubt as they still continue which constantly maintained all those several Truths that had been banished and exploded in the Church of Rome For that the Vniversal Church should so fall away as to teach any doctrine contrary to the Faith and Gospel is plainly to the promise made by Christ our Saviour It is true indeed Christ hath not bound himself nor annexed his spirit so inseparably to a National or Provincial Church but that it may fall at last unto such desperate and dangerous Errors as finally may cut it off as an unsound Member from the residue of the Body Mystical The Candlestick may be removed as well out of any Church as from that of Ephesus if wilfully they put out the light which shined amongst them and so it is determined by the Church of England As the Church of Jerusalem Alexandria and Antioch hath erred so also the Church of Rome hath erred not onely in their living and manner of Ceremonies but also in matters of Faith saith the Nineteenth Article But so it is not with the Universal the Body Collective of Gods people the Church essential nor can it be colourably inferred though it be the best Argument of Dr. Raynolds to evince his Thesis that because many of those who are outwardly called and some of the Elect themselves many of the Flock and some of the Pastors and that not
the sin against the Holy Ghost or utterly past hope of pardon Nor is the case much better if we read it wilfully though better with some sort of men than it is with others For miserable were the state of us mortal men if every sin that is committed wilfully which too often hapneth either against the truth of science or the light of conscience should make a man uncapable of the mercy of God as one that blasphemed or sinned take which word you will against the power and vertue of the Holy Ghost A doctrine never countenanced in the Primitive times the Church extending her indulgence to the worst of Hereticks and opening both her arms and bosom unto those Apostataes which with true sorrow for their sins did return unto her condemning the Novatians for too rigid and severe in their bitter Tenet touching the non-admittance of them unto publick penance and after that unto the Sacraments of the Church again Which being premised the meaning of the Text will appear to be onely this That they who willingly offend after they have received the knowledge of the truth and Gospel must not expect another Christ to die for them or that he who died once for their sins should again die for them St. Ambrose and St. Chrysostom do expound it so Out of whom Clictoveus in his Continuation of St. Cyrils Commentaries upon the Gospel of St. Iohn informs us That the Apostle doth not hereby take away the second or third remission of sins for he is not such an enemy to our Salvation but saith onely that Christ our Sacrifice shall not be offered any more upon the Cross for the man so sinning And this is further proved to be the very meaning of the Apostle in the place disputed out of the scope and purpose of his discourse which was to shew unto the Iews that it was not with them now as it was under the Law For under the Law they had daily Sacrifices for their sins but under the Gospel they had but one Sacrifice once for all Every Priest saith he doth stand daily ministring and offering often times the same sacrifice but this man JESUS after he had offered one sacrifice sate down for ever at the right-hand of God than which there cannot be a clearer explanation of the Text in question Though Sacrifices were often reiterated in the times of the Law Hic vero nec baptismus repetitur neque Christus bis nisi cum ludibrio mori pro peccato yet neither is Baptism to be reiterated in the times of the Gospel nor can Christ be exposed for sin to a second death without a great deal of scorn as Heinsius hath observed from Chrysostom Some light doth also rise to this Exposition from the words immmediately succeeding where the Apostle speaks of a certain expectation of a fearful judgment Which joyned unto the former verse have this sense between them That he which doth not put his whole trust and confidence in the sufficiency of the Sacrifice already offered but for every sin expects a new Sacrifice also must look for nothing in the end but a fearful judgment which most undoubtedly first or last shall fall upon him The third and last place which is commonly alleged for proof that there are some sins irremissible in their own nature is that of St. Iohn If any man saith he see his brother sin a sin which is not unto death he shall ask and God shall give life for them that sin not unto death There is a sin unto death I do not say he shall pray for it In which words we finde two sorts of sins a sin to death and a sin that is not to death a sin which is not unto death for the remission of the which a man is bound to pray in behalf of his Brother a sin to death concerning which it seems unlawful for one man to pray for another And yet it doth but seem so neither For the Apostles words I do not say he shall pray for it amount not to a Negative that he shall not pray for it as the fautors of the contrary opinion would full gladly have it 〈◊〉 â—ather to a toleration that they might pray if they would the business being of 〈◊〉 a nature that the Apostle had no minde to encourage them in it because he could not promise them the success desired but leaving every man to himself to pray or not to pray as his affections to the party or Christian pity of the case might induce him to That by peccatum ad mortem somewhat more is meant than ordinary mortal sins is a thing past question but what it is is not so easie to discover St. Augustine will have the sin which is here called a sin unto death to be that sin wherein a mam continueth until his death without repentance but addes withal That in as much as the name of the sin is not expressed many and different things may be thought to be it Pacianus an old Catholick writer interprets it of peccata manentia Such sins as men continue in till the hour of death St. Ierom reckoneth such men to commit this sin Qui in sceliribus permanent who abide in their wickedness and express no sense nor sorrow of their lost estate The Protestant writers do expound it generally of the sin against the Holy Ghost For which say they no man ought to pray because our Saviour hath testified it to be irremissible And to this end they do allege a place from Ierom affirming Stultum esse pro eo orare qui peccaverit ad mortem That it is a foolish thing to pray for him which sins unto death because the man that is marked out to some visible ruine nullis precibus erui potest cannot possibly be reprieved by prayer But herein Ierom is not consonant to himself elswhere for in another place he telleth us with more probability that nothing else is here meant but that a prayer for such a sin whatsoever it be is very difficulty heard And this I take to be the truer or at least the more probable meaning of the Apostle who saith immediately before This is the confidence which we have in him that if we ask any thing according to his will he heareth us 1 Iohn 5.14 And therefore lest we should conceive that this holds true in all Petitions whatsoever which we make for others he addes That if it be a great sin such as is not ordinarily forgiven but punished with death I dare not say that you can either pray with confidence or that I can give you any great hopes of prevailing in it According as God said to the Prophet Ieremy Pray not for this people for I will not hear thee And though St. Augustine sometimes thought this sin to be final impenitency or a continuance in sin till death without repentance yet in his Book of Retractations he resolves the contrary affirming That
established in the Convocation of the year 1640. for a perpetual rule and standard in all Episcopal and Archidiaconal Visitations and proposed thus to the Church-wardens viz. Have you ever heard that your said Priest or Minister hath revealed and made known at any time to any person whatsoever any crime or offence committed to his trust and secresie either in extremity of sickness or in any other case whatsoever except they be such crimes as by the Laws of this Land c. declare the name of the Offender when and by whom you heard the same In which we see this Church allows of one Key onely to unlock Confession and that the Gallican Church doth allow of also For in the Re-admission of the Iesuites into the University of Paris it was especially conditioned and provided for amongst other things That if they heard of any attempt or conspiracy against the King or his Realm or any matter of treason in Confession they and all other Clergy-men on the like occasions should reveal the same unto the Magistrate But to proceed As is the purpose of the Church such also is the judgment of those learned men which are most eminent therein both for parts and piety especially for their aversness from all Popish fancies First Bishop Iewel thus for one Abuses and errors being removed and specially the Priest being learned we mislike no manner of Confession whether it be private or publick For as we think it not unlawful to make open Confession before many so we think it not unlawful abuses always excepted to make the like confession in private either before a few or before one alone The like saith Bishop Morton in his Appeal It is not questioned between us whether it be convenient for a man burdened with sin to lay open his conscience in private unto the Minister of God and to seek at his hands both counsel of instruction and the comfort of Gods pardon But whether there be as from Christs institution such an absolute necessity of this private confession both for all sorts of men and every Ordinance and particular sin so as without it there is no pardon and remission to be hoped for from God Bishop Overal put it into his Enquiries amongst the Articles of his Episcopal Visitation Anno 1619. Whether the Minister did his duty in exhorting people to confession according to the order of the Common-Prayer Book or had revealed any thing so made known unto him contrary to the 113 Canon that so he might be punished accordingly And finally thus Bishop Usher the now Primate of Armagh Be it therefore known that no kinde of confession either publick or private is disallowed by us which is any ways requisite for the due execution of the antient power of the Keys which Christ bestowed upon his Church The thing which we reject is that new Pick-lock of Sacramental Confession obtruded upon mens consciences as a matter necessary to salvation Others as eminent as they might be here produced But I content my self with these because that even in the opinion of those very men who have cast scandals upon those others as inclined to Popery they are not chargable with any correspondence with the Church of Rome Nor shall I shew how consonant this doctrine is to the Antient Fathers who require this confession of us nor of the Lutheran Churches who do still retain it as appears plainly by the Augustane confession saying Nam nos confessionem retinemus c. and by the Testimony of Gerrardus and other of their learned Writers Onely I shall adde here what Bellarmine hath affirmed of Calvin because his judgment I am sure will be worth the having Admittit etiam Calvinus privatam confessionem coram Pastore quando quis ita angitur afflictatur peccatorum sensu ut se explicare nisi alieno adjutorio nequeat Calvin saith he admits of private confession before a Minister when a man is so perplexed and troubled in his minde that he cannot extricate himself no otherwise out of these anxieties What then Is there no difference in this point between Rome and us Assuredly much every way especially as to the necessity and particularity For those of Rome impose an absolute necessity of this Sacramental Confession as they call it and that De jure divino by vertue of some positive and direct command even from Christ himself and that too of all sins and with all the circumstances which is a tyranny and torture to the souls of men But the Protestants saith Bishop Morton acknowledge the use of it with these two restrictions The first That it be free in regard of Conscience the second That it be possible in regard of performance And Bellarmine informs of Calvin also that he puts these limitations upon Confession Ut libera sit nec ab omnibus exigatur nec necessario de omnibus that is to say That it be left at liberty and neither exacted of all men nor the enumeration of all particular sins required of them First then the Papists make it absolutely necessary to a mans salvation and that too by Divine precept Without it there is no way to Heaven saith P. Lombard Pope Innocent the third denied Christian burial unto such as die without Confession And Hugo in his Book De potestate Ecclesiae is bold to say That whosoever cometh to the Communion unconfessed be he never so repentant and sorry for his sins doth without doubt receive it to his condemnation How so for that we will enquire of the Council of Trent where we shall finde Ad salutem necessariam esse jure divino That it is necessary to salvation by the Law of God one of the Sacraments of the New Testament and therefore not to be omitted upon any terms And yet for all their great brags of the Ius Divinum of Sacramental or Auricular Confession call it which you will though they have ransacked many Texts of Scripture to finde it out it hath been hitherto but to little purpose Some build it on those words in St. Matthews Gospel where he speaks of those that were baptized by John in Jordan confessing their sins Matth. 3.6 But what saith Maldonate to this Quis unquam Catholicus tam indoctus fuit ut ex hoc loco Confessionis probaret Sacramentum Was ever Catholick so unlearned as to go about to prove Sacramental Confession from that Text Some hope to finde it in those words of our Saviour Christ Whose sins ye remit they are remitted c. Iohn 20.23 But Vasquez saith that of all those who have undertook it Vix invenies qui efficaciter inde deducat You shall hardly meet with any that have effectually deduced a good proof from thence Others presume as much on that place of the Acts where it is said That many which beleeved came and confessed and shewed their deeds Acts 19.18 But this saâ—th
Of the Eleventh Article OF THE CREED Ascribed to St. IVDE the Brother of IAMES 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Carnis Resurrectionem i. e. The Resurrection of the Body CHAP. VII Of the Resurrection of the Body and the Proofs thereof The Objections against it answered Touching the circumstances and manner of it The History and grounds of the Millenarians WE are now come unto that Article of the Christian Faith which hath received most opposition both at home and abroad Abroad amongst the Gentiles of the Primitive times who used all their wit and learning to cry down this Doctrine at home within the pale of the Church it self by some who had the name of Christians but did adulterate the prime Articles of Christian belief by their wicked Heresies First for the Gentiles it was a thing much quarrelled and opposed amongst them that Christ himself should be affirmed to have risen again insomuch that St. Paul was counted mad by Festus and but a babler at the best by the great wits of Athens for venturing to Preach before them of IESUS and the Resurrection i.e. of Iesus and his resurrection for of that onely he did speak when they so judged of him but of this quarrel they grew soon weary and so gave it off For being it was a matter of fact confirmed at the first by so many witnesses who had seen him and converted with him after his raising from the dead and thereupon received in the Church with such unanimity that the faithful rather chose to lay down their lives than to alter their Beleef in that particular the world became the sooner satisfied in the truth thereof But for the Resurrection of the dead which was grounded on it and that his Resurrection was of so great efficacy as that by vertue of it all the dead should rise which had deceased from the beginning of the world to the end thereof that they accounted such a monstrous and ridiculous paradox as could not find admittance amongst men of reason For this it was which was so scoffed at by Cecilius in that witty Dialogue Reâ—ase ferunt post mortem post favillas they give it out saith he that they shall live again after death and that they shall resume those very bodies which now they have though burnt to ashes or devoured by wilde beasts or howsoever putrified and brought to nothing Putes eos jam revixisse And this saith he they speak with so great a confidence as if they were already raised from the dust of the grave and spake as of a matter past not of things to come And it did stomack them the worse in that the Christians did not onely promise a Resurrection and new life to the bodies of men which all Philosophers and men of ordinary sense knew to be subject to corruption but threaten and foretel of the destruction of the Heavenly Bodies the Sun the Moon and all the glorious Lights in the starry Firmament which most Philosophers did hold to be incorruptible as the same Cecilius doth object in the aforesaid Dialogue That Christ was raised from the dead besides the many witnesses which gave credit to it the Gentiles could not well deny especially as to the possibility of such a thing without calling some of their own gods in question For not onely the deity of Romulus did depend on the bare testimony of one Proculus who made Oath in the Senate that he had seen him ascend up into heaven augustiore forma quam fuisset in a more glorious shape than before he had but that of Drusilla and Augustus and Tiberius Caesar which were all Roman gods of the last Edition must fall unto the ground also for lack of evidence if either it were impossible for a dead man to be raised to life again or taken up into the Heavens as our Saviour was But that from this particular instance supposing it for true as it might be possibly they should infer a general Doctrine that all the dead should rise again at the Day of Judgement this would not sink into their heads unless it might be made apparent as they thought it could not that any of that sect had been raised again to confirm all the rest in that opinion Without some such Protesilaus no credit to be given to the resurrection preach it they that would It seems the Gentiles in this point were like the rich man mentioned in our Saviours Parable Except one rise up from the dead they will not beleeve It was not Moses and the Prophets nor Christ and his Apostles that could do the deed Leaving these therefore for a while and keeping those who did assume the name of Christians and yet denied this Article of the Christian Faith unto the close of this discourse Let us for our parts rest our selves on the Word of God and see what Moses and the Prophets what CHRIST and his Apostles have delivered to us in affirmation of this Doctrine For Moses first it is the general opinion of most learned men that he was the Author of the Book of Iob and that he wrote it purposely for a Cordial to the house of Israel whom he found very apt to despair of Gods mercies towards them and easily out of comfort in all times of trouble Which granted we shall have from Moses a most ample testimony where he reports these words of that Myrror of patience I know that my Redeemer liveth and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth And though after my skin worms destroy this body yet in my flesh shall I see God Whom I shall see for my self and mine eyes shall behold and not another though my reins be consumed within me St. Hierom notes upon these words that no man since Christs time did ever speak so clearly of Christs resurrection and his own as Iob doth here before Christs coming Nullum tam apertè post Christum quam ipse hic ante Christum de Christi resurrectione loquitur sua as the Father hath it And on the same a Reverend Father of our own makes this glosse or descant It is affirmed saith he by Iob that his Redeemer liveth and shall rise again which is as much as to say He is the resurrection and the life St. Iohn could say no more It is his hope He is by it regenerate to a lively hope St. Peter could say no more than that He enters into such particulars this flesh and these eyes which is as much as was or could be said by St. Paul himself There is not in all the Old there is not in all the New Testament a more pregnant and direct proof for the resurrection St. Hierom as we saw before was of this opinion St. Gregory comes not much behind who on these words of Iob gives us this short Paraphrase Victurum me certa fide credo libera voce profiteor quia Redemptor mens
doth exclude a Metaphor Nor do there want good Reasons to confirm this truth against the cavils and exceptions of unquiet men For first considering that the fire of Hell is so often threatned in the Scriptures to ungodly men unless we hold fast to this good old Rule in expounding Scripture to take it in the literal sense according as the native meaning of the words import but where the same may be against the truth of faith and honesty of manners it is St. Augustines Rule we shall leave nothing safe nor sound in the Book of God And then it is to be considered That Christ our Saviour shall pronounce this sentence in the day judgment Depart from me ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels Which if it be not spoken in the literal sense according to the plain meaning of the words neither the guilty can perceive what they are to suffer nor the Ministers what they are to execute nor the Saints what belongs to them to approve and applaud but all things will be left in most strange perplexities Besides it was the custom of our Lord and Saviour when he had spoken to the Iews in Tropes and Parables to make an exposition of them to his own Disciples and in that exposition to speak so plainly that every one might be able to understand him As in the Parables of the Tares and the Casting Net delivered in the thirteenth of St. Matthews Gospel the Disciples understood not what he meant by either but were as ignorant of his scope and purpose as the rest of the Iews But when he did expound himself unto them in private touching the sending of his Angels in the day of judgment to sever the wicked from the just and to cast them being severed so into the furnace of fire and then demanded if they understood what was said unto them they made answer yea It must not therefore be a Metaphor but a proper Speech by which our Saviour Christ did expound his meaning and open the obscurity of the said two Parables for to expound a Parable by a Trope or Metaphor had neither been agreeable to our Saviours goodness nor any way conducing to their Edification So then the fire of Hell shall be true and real not Figurative and Metaphorical and as it is a real fire a devouring fire so is it ignis inextinguibilis an unquenchable fire in the third and ignis aeternus an everlasting fire in the five and twentieth of Matthew The smoke whereof goeth up for ever saith the Prophet Isaiah A fire which feedeth both on the body and the soul yet shall never consume them and such a fire as breeds a kinde of worm within it which shall never die but always gnaw upon the conscience of the man condemned and create far more anguish to him than all bodily torments And of this worm it is which St. Basil speaketh where reckoning up the terrors which shall be presented to the wicked in the day of judgment amongst them he recounteth a darkish fire which though it hath lost his light shall retain its burning 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and a most venemous kinde of worm feeding on flesh and raising intolerable torments with continual biting See to this purpose also that of Gregory Nyssen in his Homily De Resurrectione Christi nor is it thus delivered in the writings of the Christians onely Iosephus also hath the like a Iew but a learned and a modest Iew in an Oration of his which he made to the Grecians not extant in his works indeed but mentioned by Damascene and preserved by Zonaras For speaking also his opinion of the final judgment to be executed by the Messiah in the last day he saith That there remaineth for the lovers of wickedness an unquenchable and never ending fire 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. And a fiery worm not dying nor destroying the body but breaking forth of the body with unceasing anguish And to this truth as to the miserable state of those in Hell all the old Catholick Doctors do attest unanimously whether Greeks or Latines Tatianus one of the most antientest of the Grecian Doctors calleth the estate of the damned in Hell 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a death which never dieth an immortal misery Tertullian the most antient Latin Cruciatum non diuturnum sed sempiternum Not onely a long and lingring torrant but an everlasting one St. Augustine answerably unto that of Tatianus doth call it Mortem sine morte adding more over of those sires Punire non finire corpora that they torment the body but destroy it not Tertullian he goeth further yet saith That it burns the body but repairs it also and calls it poenam nutrientem A fire which so devoureth that it also nourisheth With him Lactantius doth consent so also doth Minutius Felix Prudentius Cassiodorus and indeed who not And why should this be thought a wonder so far beyond the reason and belief of a meer natural man or such who taking on themselves the names of Christians will yet believe no more than will stand with reason Doth not the Scripture tell us of a burning bush a bush that burned with the fire and was not consumed And the Historians of the Hills of Aetna and Vesuvius which do almost continually send out dreadful flames and yet never waste And the Philosophers of a Worm or Beast which they call the Salamander whose natural habitation is in the midst of the fire and the Poets of Prometheus and Titius Vultures which having fed so many hundred years upon their Bowels had not yet devoured them Doth not experience tell us daily That the lightning glanceth on our Bodies often but doth seldom hurt us And doth not Ovid say expresly Nec mortis poenas mors altera finiet hujus That there is a second death which shall never end yet I confess that the prevailing Heresie which pretends to such wit and piety hath no small reason to declare Interire posse animas aut ab exitio liberari That the souls of wicked and impenitent men shall either be annihilated or in fine released For we may safely say of these new Pretenders as once Minutius did of the old Philosophers Malunt penitus extingui quam ad supplicia reparari Considering how they have subverted all the Fundamentals of the Christian Faith it is all the reason in the world that they should rather wish to be annihilated than survive to torments such torments as shall know neither end nor measure BUt blessed JESUS why do we waste our time in such nice disputes in proving and disproving points of so clear an evidence which were much better spent in pursutes of those ways and courses by which we might have hope to flie from the wrath to come Thou Lord hast set before us both Heaven and Hell commandest us to choose the one and avoid the other and tracedst