themselves in the former chapter he denied that they had already received the promise of God and were made perfect but that their state and condition is such that perfection and eternall happinesse is now remaining to them in a way immutable so that the certainty of attaining it is such as if they did already really enjoy it In this very sense Saint Paul useth the same word of himselfe when hee saith Not as though I had already attained either were already perfect Phil. 3.12 that is not that I am now in that state as if I could no way faile of that blessed resurrection for of this it was that he spake in the former verse for otherwise that he had not yet really attained eternall life no man could be ignorant and it were a fond thing to affirme it The Author therefore shews that those just ones though they had not attained eternall salvation in perfection in regard now nothing of them was extant but their spirits yet without all doubt should certainely enjoy it by the immutable decree of God Hence it appeares what it is for God to be Judge of all and what happinesse is therein contained if a man come both to the Judge and to the spirits of the just and be admitted into their society For thereby he is certain though his life here-faile him yet he shall not faile of the reward of eternall life 24. And to Iesus the Mediatour of the new Testament The Israelites heretofore came to Moses the Mediatour of the old Testament but Christians come to Jesus the Mediatour of the New But how much Jesus is better then Moses and the new Covenant better then the old we have shewed before chap. 3.8 and chap. 8.6 The word Mediatour is in a manner proper to the holy Scripture and peradventure no where used among profane Authors as others have noted Yet it is found out of the Sciptures in Philo who being a Jew used a forme of language that had some affinity with the sacred writers And what this word signifies being used of Christ we are easily taught by the example of Moses to whom that name was first attributed For although of it owne nature it may signifie any one who intervenes as a meane betweene two parties yet the example of Moses and the name of Covenant added that thereby is signified no other but an herald or hee who intervenes as a mean between God and men to make a Covenant for the joyning of them in a mutuall and firme peace and friendship For the effecting whereof it is not forthwith necessary to appease and mitigate the minde either of one or both parties when it may be either both parties as it was in the making of the old Covenant or one of them as it was under the new namely God doth freely incline to peace and friendship yea doth alone seeke offer and procure it And to the blood of sprinkling An Hebraisme for the blood which is sprinkled or wherewith aspersion is made Hee alludes to that blood of the old Covenant wherewith Moses after hee had rehearsed all the precepts of the Law sprinkled both the booke of the Law and the whole people whereof he said This is the bloud of the Testament which God hath enjoyned unto you as we had it before chap. 9. vers 19 20. We Christians are in like manner sprinkled with bloud and that with the most precious blood of Christ himselfe And wee are sprinkled with the bloud of Christ when in our hearts wee conceave and embrace the force of that bloudy death which he suffered to confirme the new Covenant in such manner that thereby wee have an infallible assurance made us of the promises comprehended in the Covenant whence it comes to passe that wee are made parties to the Covenant and obtaine a right of attaining to all the blessings promised therein That speaketh better things then that of Abel He commends this bloud wherewith Christians are sprinkled by mentioning the force and effect of it that they may joy the more for their aspersion with it and may moreover more carefully endeavour that they wash not the droppes of that bloud from their soules that is that they never fall away from the new Covenant nor cease to feel the force of the bloud of Christ and so deprive themselves of that great blessing which they gained by the shedding of it namely a right to eternall happinesse To the blood of Christ hee ascribes speech in a figurative sense as likewise to the bloud of Abel Both their blouds speake or as the Scripture saith of the bloud of Abel both cry unto God but Abels bloud cryes for vengeance upon his fratricide but Christs bloud cryes for remission and pardon even upon paricides for they may justly be called paricides who murdered Christ And unto these no lesse then unto all other sinners the bloud of Christ begs pardon from God of all their sinnes if they will repent and be converted from them And he begs it as hee engageth God to grant forgivenesse of sinnes to all penitent persons whatsoever their sinnes have been And he engageth God as hee was employed of God to confirme and establish the new Covenant which is so remarkable for that promise 25. See that yee refuse not him that speaketh To his former passages hee now subjoynes an Exhortation and fortifies it with new reasons And herein he seemes to allude to that fact of the Israelites whereof we spake before when they were stricken with such terrour of Gods Majesty that they entreated that God would speak no more unto them which fact of theirs was a kinde of presage or token that afterward they would not carry an ear and mind obedient to the voice of God He therefore admonisheth Christians that now after they have given their ear and mind to the voyce of God in the Gospel they would not againe turne their ear and mind from it which is done both by Apostacy and by disobedience See i. take diligent heed for they who take diligent heed cast about their eyes every way that they may escape the danger imminent For if they escaped not By an argument of comparison hee shewes that if they doe otherwise they shall not escape a grievous punishment for they the Israelites escaped not namely the punishment and avenging hand of God whereof wee treated chapters the 3. and 4. where wee saw that the Israelites for their unbeliefe and disobedience were debarred from entrance into that land of Promise wherein they should have rested after their grievous servitude in Egypt and perished in the wildernesse by divers destructions Who refused him that spake on earth much more shall not we escape if we turne away from him that speaketh from heaven He opposeth him who spake on earth to him who spake from heaven Now there can be no doubt but by him who spake from heaven hee understands God himselfe for presently after he addes verse 26. Whose voice then shooke the
narrowly and therein also the same things are expressed sometime more amply and sometime more briefly Whereof we must take notice for the better understanding and reconciling of severall places So the word Faith is sometime taken so narrowly that salvation and justification is ascribed to it alone and sometime again more largely to comprise other vertues in it sometime more sometime fewer according as the sense of the word is extended or restrained I will put my lawes into their minde and write them in their hearts Here he begins to describe the new Covenant q.d. In the old Covenant I wrote some of my Lawes in tables of stone and Moses wrote other some in a booke and they were put in the Arke to be kept there But my new Covenant shall not be according to that way but by it I will write my Laws in their hearts and put them in their mindes to be kept there They shall not be arbitrary and positive Lawes flowing from my sole will and pleasure whereof their hearts can conceive no reason and whereof their memories may easily faile such as were most Lawes in my former Covenant but they shall be only naturall Lawes grounded only upon naturall honesty and upon the dictates of right reason that their mindes may easily conceive them and their memories retaine them And their owne consciences shall acknowledge them to be convenient just right and good And besides they shall not have a bare understanding of my Lawes to know them but an hearty affection to doe them Now because Gods Covenant is described in these words therefore hence it appeares that this writing of Gods Laws in mens minds and hearts dependes and proceeds from the nature of the Covenant And therefore these words must bee taken within their force and efficacie and not necessarily extended to the very effect of the writing which is alway left in the free power of man For this is intimated unto us by the following words of God at the 12. verse wherein God opens unto us the cause manner or meanes of this which containeth wonderfull grace and mercy of God offered to his people for by this means he saith it would come to passe that they would serve him and keep his Laws with so great fervency But this way Gods Laws are written upon none but willing hearts The sense therefore is I will make such a Covenant that shall have sufficient force and power to containe my people in their duties For to have Gods Laws written in our mindes and hearts is nothing else but to be so knowing so mindfull and so affected with them that we never decline from them but alwayes observe them with all our endeavour And I will be to them a God This follows from the former as the former clause opposite to this and I regarded them not followed from the people 's not continuing in his Covenant which in like manner is opposed to the writing of Gods Laws in mens hearts For God to be a God unto us is to be our sovereigne Protector to defend us from all evill and to be our sovereigne Benefactor to accumulate us with all his blessings And they shall be to me a people Either this is really the same with the former and an amplification of it consisting of a mutuall relation such as we had before in these words I will be to him a father and he shall be to me a son chap. 1.5 Or else it is as much as if the Author had said And they shall deale by me as my people ought to doe both of us shall performe our parts respectively I by protecting and benefiting them they by worshipping and serving me 11. And they shall not teach every man his neighbour and every man his brother saying Know the Lord They shall not need to admonish and exhort one another first to know my lawes and decrees and after upon knowledge thereof to observe them but all of them shall bee carried with such alacrity of minde to know and obey mee that none shall need any remembrancer to put him in minde of it Neighbour and brother are taken here for the same for in the Law these three names are coincident neighbour brother and friend See Lev. 19.18 For all shall know me from the least to the greatest Here againe God speaks of the efficacie of this Covenant and not of the effect it selfe for it shall be able to produce an universall knowledge of God though in some single persons it produce it not actually All of al sorts from the least age to the greatest yong old from the least state to the greatest poor and rich and from the least degree to the greatest low and high 12. For I will be mercifull to their unrighteousnesse and their sinnes and their iniquities will I remember no more Here God opens unto us the cause of his ardent affection towards us and withall unfolds the nature of this Covenant namely that therein he will be mercifull to all the sinnes of his people to their unrighteousnesses their transgressions and iniquities and will never remember them more This so great a benefit must needs oblige all mens mindes and in a manner constraine them to consecrate themselves wholly unto God and constantly to persist in the daily observation of his Lawes Which effect seeing every remission of sinne cannot produce therefore we must here understand such a one as hath the power to doe it namely a plenary and perfect remission whereby such as are truly and seriously penitent and afterward live holily are released from the guilt or bond of all their former sinnes not only in respect of temporall punishment and death but also of eternall death and withall eternall life is ordained for them For this remission of sinnes adding the condition of repentance hath this vertue and power in it to withdraw men from sinne and for the future to devote themselves to God The words unrighteousnesse sins and iniquities doe in like manner teach us that this remission is plenary and perfect extended to all manner of sinnes even the most heynous Hence we see that this plenary remission of sinnes is a promise proper to the new Covenant For in these words is evidently proved what he said before concerning the new Covenant that it was established upon better promises then the old This is the mysticall sense of those words of the Prophet the literall sense was that God would deliver the people of the Jewes from the captivity of Babylon and would so blot out their former wickednesse and foule sinnes that hee would acquit them from all further temporall punishments for them for which so great benefit the people must needs bee marveilously bound to God and induced to serve him constantly for ever after But this sense is far too slender to answer fully and solidly unto words of so high a nature For at that time to speake properly God neither made any new Covenant different from the former neither was
or censer whereon he was first to burne incense must needs bee without the oracle or else he could not first come at it And the arke of the Covenant overlaid round about with gold The Arke was a strong chest or coffer the matter forme and measures whereof see Exod. 25.10 This was called the Arke of the Covenant for the use of it which was to inclose the tables wherein the first Covenant was written Wherein was the golden pot that had Manna Wherein must be referred to the Arke as appears by the beginning of the next verse for in this verse the Author would shew what was in the Arke and in the next what was over it This pot of Manna was gathered before the building of the Tabernacle and commanded to be laid up before the Testimony there to be kept when the Tabernacle should be built See Ex. 16.33.34 And Aarons rod that budded Concerning Aarons rod how it budded and upon what occasion and for what purpose it did so See Num. 17. And the tables of the Covenant There were severall parcels of the old Covenant for there were the tables of the Covenant which the Lord wrote with his owne finger in stone containing the Decalog and there was the booke of the Covenant which Moses wrote and read in the audience of the people and sprinkled it with bloud when the Covenant was confirmed with a solemne sacrifice See Exod. 24.4 and afterward in this Chapter vers 19. Now wee finde none but the tables of the Covenant to bee laid up in the Arke yet not those tables that were first written for they were broken upon the indignation which Moses had at the worshipping of the golden Calfe but the tables written afterward were there reserved But how could the pot of Manna and Aarons rod bee in the Arke when wee read expresly that nothing was in the Arke save the two tables of stone 1 King 8.9 and 2 Chron. 5.10 The Answer is Either wee must say that in successe of time the pot of Manna and Aarons rod came to bee put into the Arke which before were not so Or wee must say that the particle In here must be a little extended in sense to include those things that were adjacent to the Arke being neare or about it So John is said to baptise in Bethabara because he baptised neare or about it John 1.28 So Joshua is said to be in Jericho when he was by or neare it Josh 5.13 And in this sense the Author first expresseth those things which were by or neare the Arke as the pot of Manna and Aarons tod then the things in the Arke as the tables of the Covenant And lastly in the following verse the things over the Arke as the Cherubims And this might happily bee the cause why under the particle in hee would first comprise the things by the. Arke before those in it that he might make use of this gradation 5. And over it the Cherubims of glory shadowing the Mercy-seate The Cherubims were two Images of solid gold fashioned like winged men whose wings did over shadow the Mercy-seate being one at the one end of it and the other at the other having their faces looking one towards another Of them see Exod. 25.17 And they were called the Cherubims of glory by an Hebraisme for glorious Cherubims because of their lustre and brightnesse which in Scripture is often called glory The Mercy-seate had two uses one to bee a Cover for the Arke to shut up the Tables of the Covenant the other to represent the seat or throne of God where God would speake with Moses to give answers for the people and to shew himselfe mercifull And the originall word in the Hebrew carries a twofold sence to answer and fit this two-fold use for Capporeth derived from the verbe Caphor which signifies to cover a vessell and to cover sinne which last is the proper act of mercy Therefore though the Hebrew word might have beene simply and fully enough rendred the Cover yet the Septuagint following the other signification of the word have translated Hilasterion i. a Propitiatory or Mercy-seate which distinguisheth this cover from all others as a peculiar use and property of it And it is very consonant to reason that by the ambiguity of the word the Spirit of God would signifie so much Of which we cannot now speake particularly Though each of these particulars concerning the first Covenant might require particular explication and serve highly for advancing the dignity of Christs Priesthood and of the new Covenant yet the time will not now permit it because our purpose calls us on to other matters 6. Now when these things were thus ordained Having briefly described the Tabernacle and the severall furniture of it now he comes to describe the way of divine service therein which according to the two partitions or roomes of the Tabernacle was twofold whereof he toucheth the first in this verse and handleth the other in those following The Priests went alwayes into the first Tabernacle accomplishing the service of God The ordinary Priests went onely into the first Tabernacle for none but the high Priest went into the second And into the first they went alwayes that is every day daily for herein they are opposed to the high Priest who went into the second Tabernacle once every yeare The daily services of God accomplished by the Priests in the first Tabernacle were to burne Incense on the golden Censer and to light up or mend the Lamps of the Candlestick c. 7. But into the second went the high Priest alone once every yeare The high Priest went in alone and therefore he onely yet he went not in daily but yearely once every yeare at the solemne fast of Expiation whereof see Levit. 16. Not without bloud which he offered Not without bloud is with bloud and with bloud onely for the high Priest offered in the second Tabernacle nothing else but bloud For he must enter thither with the bloud of a Bullock and of a Goate and offer it by sprinkling it with his finger upon and before the Mercy-seate seven times Whence it appeares that this offering of the high Priest did not consist in the slaughter of those beasts whose bloud he offered and therefore neither did the offering of Christ answerable thereto whereof the Author treates consist in the death of Christ but by his entrance into heaven after his death Indeed the death of Christ is called an offering and sacrifice yet it is so called for the resemblance of it with the free-will and peace-offerings and therefore especially because it was most gratefull and acceptable to God in which respect also other notable works of piety may be and are called in Scripture offerings and sactifices unto God For himselfe and for the errours of the people Here is a little trajection of the words for the right sence is thus for the errours of himselfe and of the people For in this sacrifice the Priest
in use among men and to be of force before it was ratified by the bloudshed of beasts For this bloud gave beginning to that testament in respect of the force of it The Author useth the very same word afterward Chap. 10.20 where our English Translation renders it consecrated By a new and living way which he hath consecrated unto us whereof in it due place 19. For when Moses had spoken every precept to all the people That the first Testament was not dedicated without bloud hee now proves by a narration of the carriage of the action shewing the dedication or confirmation of that Testament both for the manner and matter wherby it was confirmed and his narration hereof is for the most part taken out of Scripture Exod. 24. Moses did both speake and read all the precepts to the people For first he spake them by word of mouth as the Lord had delivered them to him and upon his rehearsing or speaking of them the people gave their unanimous approbation and consented to doe them Exod. 24.3 Then he wrote them in a book and read them in the audience of the people and the people againe the second time gave their approbation ibid. ver 7. The word spoken includes both these actions of reciting and reading for all reading is speaking also because he that reads speaks out of a booke The precepts by Moses confirmed were all those Lawes of the Old Testament that did binde universally both persons and times which all persons were bound to observe perpetually for such were properly the precepts of Gods league with the people although happily they were not all assigned to the preceding Chapters in Exod. but are related in other places and in the following books of Moses For those preceps which after the confirmation of the league or testament are described in the following Chapters of Exodus are not properly Lawes but certaine Ordinances of God for the present concerning the framing and ordering of the Tabernacle the furniture of it and other things whereby the worship of God was then to bee performed And yet there besome who think that the passages recited Exod. 24. concerning the confirmation of the Covenant are spoken only by way of historicall anticipation And this opinion is not without some shew of probability According to the Law This is a limitation of the universall word every precept to shew that he spake not of all precepts in generall but of every precept in the Law delivered to Moses and written by Moses in the booke and read by Moses to the people Hee tooke the bloud of calves and of goats It is not expressed in the story of Moses that he tooke or shed the bloud of goats for that action Yet it is very credible that there were goats among the burnt-offerings and peace-offerings then slaine unto God For that Moses nameth only calves it might therefore be because they are the more worthy creatures Unlesse wee should rather say that first the whole people was sprinkled and expiated by Moses which the Author chiefly respected and might know it some other way for the bloud of goats was usually shed to expiate the sinnes of the whole people With water and scarlet wooll and hysop Neither doe wee read this in the fore-cited place of Moses but the Author who undoubtedly was very skilfull in the Jewish customes doth perhaps therefore mention water because hee knew that water was mingled with the bloud which was sprinkled as was usuall in other purifyings for bloud unlesse it bee mingled with water doth quickly congeale and being congealed is unfit for sprinkling But of hysop and scarlet wooll tyed to a cedar sticke was made a sprinkler whereof as of water mixt with bloud see Exod. 12.22 and Levit. 4.4,5,6 And sprinkled both the booke and all the people Of the booke being sprinkled we likewise read not in Moses Yet this divine Author knew the certainty of this no lesse then of the rest But all the people is said to be sprinkled because they among the people who stood nearest were sprinkled and in that respect represented the person of the whole people so that thereby all the people were accounted sprinkled 20. Saying this is the bloud of the Testament In the Hebrew for this is Behold but the sense is the same Now the bloud of calves and goats is called the bloud of the Testament because by means of it the Old Testament was confirmed and established Which God hath enjoyned unto you In the Hebrew it is which God hath made with you God had not yet made it preteritively but did then make it presentively and therefore the preter tense is there figuratively put for the present But because God himselfe in his owne person did not confirme that Covenant with the people but Moses did it at the command and in the name of God therefore the Author expressing the verity of the thing for the word made puts the word enjoyned as if Moses had said This is the bloud of the Testament which God hath enjoyned me to make with you Yet this injunction or command did not rest upon the person of Moses only but was extended unto the people also for as the confirmation of the testament was enjoyned to Moses that he should speed it is Gods name So the observation of it was enjoyned unto the people that they should keep it because the Testament for the matter contained Laws and Precepts which God enjoyned to the people as if Moses had further said This is the bloud of the Testament which God enjoyned unto me to confirme and hath enjoyned unto you to observe 21. Moreover he sprinkled with the bloud both the Tabernacle and all the vessels of the Ministery Hee shews that not only the Old Testament it selfe was confirmed with bloud but also that under the Old Testament divers consecrations and expiation were made by bloud especially of sinnes as hee mentions it ver 22. This hee doth that from hence he might gather that under the New Testament also the shedding of bloud must fitly intervene to consecrate and expiate the conscience and a bloud so much more pretious as he is more pretious by whom the conscience is expiated And the Author doth so joyne the consecration of the Tabernacle and the vessels of it made with bloud with the confirmation of the Testament it selfe that he specifies no difference of time between them And if the Tabernacle and ministeriall vessels were consecrated at the time wherin the Testament was confirmed then without all doubt the history of confirming the Testament Exod. 24. is delivered by way of anticipation seeing that after that Confirmation mentioned there precepts are delivered in the following chapters for the making of the Tabernacle and ministeriall vessels and for ordering of the publike worship and service of God as also the making and consecration of them is particularly described But from the words of the Author it cannot bee gathered that both these were done
the Old Testament pertinent to his purpose or because he thought them not to be mentioned by reason of that sinne whereby they made themselves and their posterity subject unto death especially seeing in those Canonicall bookes we no where reade that God ever pardoned our first Parents for their sinne although the Author of the booke of Wisdome in the beginning of the tenth chapter affirmes That Wisdome preserved the first formed father of the world that was created alone and brought him out of his fall that is she freed him from the guilt and punishment of his sinne Therefore he begins with Abel their son placing him in the first place as the first person among those whose piety towards God and Gods love toward them is celebrated in Scripture and then shews what Abel obtained by his faith Of him therefore he saith That he offered a more excellent sacrifice then Cain Some render it a more bountifull sacrifice others a more valuable thinking the Author intended to note that Cain as an ungratefull and a distrustfull person offered onely a few fruits but Abel to testifie his affection and faith offered things of more value namely the firstlings and fattest of his sheepe But the more simple and certaine meaning is that Abels sacrifice was not more bountifull or more valuable of it selfe then the others but more acceptable unto God who accepted and esteemed it better and more excellent by reason of the righteousnesse and godlinesse of the person that offered it for upon that ground it is that God esteemes and values all offerings made unto him Now there was no other cause of that godlinesse and consequently of Gods acceptation of Abels sacrifice but onely Abels saith whereby he stood perswaded that God was and was a Rewarder of those that seeke him and sue to him for his favour by godlinesse and righteousnesse And there was no other cause of his faith but that he had in him the substance of things hoped for for his hope of Gods favour and of Gods reward did breed this faith of God in him Furthermore he whose offering God hath in esteeme his person must needs be in more esteeme with God for from this roote growes the true happinesse of every man But that Cain offered the fruits of the earth and Abel the firstlings of his cattell the reason was because Cain was an husbandman and Abel an heards-man So both of them offered their sacrifice to God out of that substance wherein each abounded And that the word sacrifice which properly signifies an offering from the Herd which is slaine should be tacitly referred to Cains offering which was onely of fruits this must be attributed to the runne of the comparison the fitting whereof doth many times make way to some abusions or improprieties By which he obtained witnesse that he was righteous The words by which are better referred to Abels faith then to his sacrifice for the following words and by it he being dead yet speaketh are in like manner referred to his faith for they expresse a peculiar fruit of it But where did Abel obtaine this testimony of his righteousnesse even in that passage of Scripture where God had respect to him and to his sacrifice but not to that which Cain offered as we reade it Gen. 4.4,5 or as the Author declares himselfe in the words following God testifying of his gifts For therein God testified of his gifts or offerings that they were acceptable unto him in that he had respect unto them And very probable it is that God shewed his testimony and acceptance thereof by some fire sent from heaven which consumed the sacrifice and offering of Abel And when God doth accept of a mans gifts and offerings being graciously pleased to receive them he doth thereby testifie and witnesse that man to be a righteous person seeing no gifts or offerings are acceptable to God but such as come from a righteous man for the sacrifice of fooles or sinners is an abomination to him And when God in his discourse with Cain rendred him a reason why he had no respect to his offering he shewed cleerely enough that both Cain did not well and that Abel did well which is to be just See Gen. 4.7 And by it be being dead yet speaketh Another fruit of Abels faith which was the cause that God would be an avenger of his innocent bloud to persecute and banish from his presence his brother that had murdered him Abels bloud is said to speake or cry unto God by way of metaphor because God thereby is vehemently incited and moved to take vengeance for the murder of a person that was righteous and acceptable to God as if his bloud had cried and sued to God for justice to be done upon the murtherer So in the Revelation the souls of them that were slaine for the word of God are said to cry with a loud voice How long O Lord holy and true dost thou not judge and avenge our bloud on them that dwell on the earth Revel 6.10 5. By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death and was not found because God had translated him In the second place hee brings the Example of Enoch and sheweth what he obtained by his faith Into what place Enoch was translated the Scripture expresseth not but from what the Authour addes that he should not see death it appeares hee was translated into such a place wherein men see not death i. Are exempt and free from dying which seemes to be no other or at least no other knowne to us then that heavenly habitacle of Immortalitie wherein God and Christ and the holy Angels dwell But because the Scripture expresly saith not that Enoch obtained this favour by his faith therefore the Authour proves it by adding For before his translation he had this testimony that he pleased God The reason may runne thus Enoch was translated because he pleased God which the thing it selfe shewes and the Scripture testifies that before his translation he pleased God But without faith it is impossible to please God therefore Enoch was translated by his faith The consequence of this argument shal be defended afterward Or rather the reason may thus be gathered Enoch was translated because he pleased God and because he pleased God therefore hee had Gods testimoniall of it And againe because hee pleased God therefore hee had in himselfe some substance of things hoped for and some evidence of things not seene and because hee had in him this substance and evidence of things hoped for and not seene therefore hee had faith and because he had faith therefore by his faith hee was translated For in affirmative arguments that which is first in nature is last in course of reason He had this testimony namely either from the holy Scripture or from the holy Ghost by whom the Scripture was indited But the giving or the taking of this testimony must not be joyned with the preceding words before his translation
faith of it unto us And the Scriptures make faith unto us of the Creation not only for the act of it that such a worke was done but for the manner how it was done as Moses describes it even by the word and sole command of God and for the matter whereof it was made in that the things seene were made of things not seene That the worlds were framed Worlds for world the number plurall for the singular by a Grecisme where originally it is ages putting the adjuncts of the world for the subject By the word of God by the only fiat or command of God God used no other instrument for the framing of the world besides his bare word For God only said the word Let there be light and there was light Gen. 1.3 And by the word of the Lord even by the breath of his mouth were the heavens made and all the host of them Psal 33.6 And as the heavens so also the earth was framed and setled by his word For he spake and it was done he commanded and it stood fast Psal 33.9 So that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear The particle not seems to be transposed for it should affect the word appeare because the minde and sense of this clause is not negative but affirmative thus So that things which are seen were made of things which doe not appeare though for the matter it come all to one because a terme finite denyed of any subject is all one with the same terme infinited and affirmed yet this latter expression leaves in our mindes a cleare apprehension of the matter The Author seems as his manner is to follow and reflect upon the Greek Translation of the Old Testament wherein at the beginning of Genesis it is said that the Earth was invisible for that which we from the Hebrew translate that the Earth was without forme and void And the Author made choice rather to say things not appearing then things invisible when he would shew us the prime materialls whereof the world was made For that is properly invisible which naturally cannot be perceived by the sight and that is rightly tearmed not appearing which though it be naturally visible yet really it appears not especially then when it lyes hidden and covered with thicke darknesse Although in this place the word not-appearing seems to have yet a more ample sense and to comprise that want of forme and force noted by the Hebrew words for which the Greek Translation reads invisible Wherefore by things not appearing is meant that chaos or elements of the world which at the beginning were confused because partly that chaos wanted forme shape and outward beauty in regard the severall parts of it were not yet digested and disposed into that elegant order figure and proportion which afterward was given it by the Creation and therefore the Scripture saith it was without forme and partly because it wanted vertue and force to produce those creatures and adorne it selfe that afterward God by the Creation gave it power to produce but to any such purpose it was wholly feeble and barren and therefore the Scripture saith it was void and partly againe because it wanted light to manifest and make it visible to the sight that it might be seene for though in it selfe it were visible and appearable yet actually it appeared not and therefore the Scripture saith that darkenesse was upon the face of it Wherefore when God entered upon the worke of the world the first perfect creature that he made was the light and that being finished he framed all the other parts of the world in a most beautifull order And this chaos is in the Scripture called the Deepe because it was vast both for quantity and quality for it wanted the three beautifull qualities of forme force and light which afterward were induced into it Yet sometimes the Scriptures expresse it by names Synecdochicall which signifie onely a part of it calling it sometime the heaven sometime the earth and sometime the waters because it was a Deepe or chaos composed and confused of all these together or at least of those materials whereof all these were afterward produced and created as in the same tub of milke there lye confused together those three materials from which are afterward produced the distinct white meates of butter cheese and whey Hereby the Author plainely declares and it sufficiently also appeares from the history of the Creation described by Moses that God when he began the Creation or frame of the world as it is delivered in the beginning of Genesis did not produce it meerely from nothing but from that Chaos or Deepe which positively was confused of the three materials whereof afterward was made the three elements of heaven earth and water and privitively wanted the three qualities of forme force and light And this opinion was anciently received among the people of God as it appeares by the Author of the booke of Wisdome chap. 11.17 where speaking to God he saith For thy almighty hand that made the world of matter without forme for so it is in the Greek and the vulgar Latin hath it of matter unseene But of the creation of this matter there is no mention made in the Scriptures for to the holy Ghost it seemed good to conceale it By things which are seene are here meant all those creatures which we see in this world as this beautifull order and posture of all things whereby those things which before were confused and blended together are now digested into their severall ranks and places for the use and benefit of man and beast and all the rest of the Creatures both animate and inanimate both in heaven earth and waters were produced by the word or command of God For in these words of the Author is signified not onely that change whereby things not appearing became appearing by vertue of that light which God made and made to shine upon them which change God made first of all by his creation of light but also that change whereby the things which now appeare were made of things not-appearing as from the informed matter of the Chaos or Deepe which wanting forme force and light was so rude so weake and so darke that from it selfe of it selfe nothing would ever have beene produced but by the accesse of Gods almighty power 4. By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice then Cain Now he begins to reckon up speciall and particular examples of persons endued with faith and withall he declares both what they performed by vertue of their faith and also what blessings they obtained from God by it that by so many illustrious examples he might winne the Hebrewes to an imitation of those persons First of all he mentions Abel as a person neerely approaching to the beginning of the world He mentions not our first Parents either because concerning them there is nothing read memorable in the Canonicall books of