These treacherous kissers are of kin to that mad Hacket hanged in Queen Elizabeths days who bit off his honest schoolmasters nose as he embraced him under colour of renewing their love and ear it down before the poor mans face So and no better are the kisses that is the fawnings and flatteries of perfideous persons Vers 7. The full soul loatheth an hony comb Heb. treadeth it under feet as dung or dogs-meat Chrysostome reports the saying of a certain Philosopher to the same purpose Anima in satietate posita etiam favis illudit The sated soul rejecteth finest fare and most sweetest sustenance This holds true in spirituals too The hony of Gods holy word how is it trampled on by those stall-fed beasts in whom fulness hath bred forgetfulness saturity security Our soul loatheth this light meat said they of their Manna when once cloyed with it The Pharisees found no more sweetness or savouriness in our Saviours own Sermons than in the white of an egge or a dry chip Our Nation is also sick of a spiritual plethory or plurifie we begin to surfeit on the bread of life Now when God sees his mercies lying under Table 't is just with him to call to the enemy to take away Behold therefore I will deliver thee to the men of the East who shall eat thy fruit and drink thy milk Ezek. 25.4 But to the hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet Hunger is the best Cook say the Dutch the best sawce say we experience proves it so how sweetly doth it season homely cates Jejunus stomachus raro vulgaeria temâ—it Horat. coarse fare Artaxerxes Memor being put to flie for his life fed hungerly on barley-bread with dried figs and said he never made a better meal in all his life Huniades once driven out of the field by the Turks and lighting upon a shepheard craved for Gods sake of him something to eat who brought him to a poor cottage not farre off causing to be set before him bread and water with a few Onions who in the pleasant remembrance of that passed misery Turk Hist fol. 310. would oftentimes after in his greatest banguers say that he never in his life fared better or more daintily than when he supped with this shepheard Vers 8. As a bird that wandereth from her nest Doth it of inconstancy and oft meets with misery whereas God had taken order that none should molest a bird upon her nest Deut. 22.6 7. So is a man that wandreth from his place A vagrant an idleby or a busy-body that keeps not his station abides not in the calling wherein he was called 1 Cor. 7.20 exposed to misery and mischief to ruth and ruine Numb 16.32 2 Sam. 6.6 7. 2 Chron. 26.19 Jonah 1. Jude 6. Psal 107.4 An honest mans heart is where his calling is such an one when he is abroad is like a fish in the ayr whereinto if it leap for recreation or necessity yet it soon returns to its own element Vers 9. Oyntment and perfume rejoyce the heart Sweet oyntment sensum afficit spiritum reficit cerebrum juvat affects the sense refresheth the spirit comforteth the brain So doth the sweetness of a mans friend by hearty counsel It is as a fresh gale of sweet ayr to him that lives among walking dung-hils open sepulchres It preserveth the soul as a pomander and refresheth it more than musk or civet doth the brain The Counsel of such especially Ministers I mean of whom the Scripture saith that they are unto God a sweet savour of Christ unto them that are saved 2 Cor. 2.15 These are they that can sell us oyl for our lamps that we may buy for our selves Mat. 25.9 Such a Counsellour may be an Angel nay a God to another as Moses was to Aaron the comfort given by such as the blessing of Parents is usually most effectual because they are in Gods room See Job 33.23 If there be a messenger with him an interpreter one among a thousand Unus è millibus not Vnus è similibus as the Vulgar reads it falsely and from the purpose Vers 10. Thine own friend and thy Fathers friend forsake not To forsake a friend an old friend especially is to forsake ones self for a friend is a second self and friendship as wine is commendable from its oldness What a Price set Salomon upon Hiram who had been his fathers friend 1 King 5 and how did he seek his love as a precious inheritance left him as it were by his father and how courteously for his fathers sake likewise dealt hee with Abiathar that had dealt disloyally with him Neither go into thy brothers house Cajetan reads it and perhaps better Thy brothers house will not come in the day of thy calamity When thine old friend will visit thee and stick close to thee as Jonathan did to David and Onesiphorus to Paul David complains of his carnal kindred My lovers and my friends stand a far off from my sore and mine acquaintance stand aloof Psal 88.18 as the Priest and Levite did from the wounded man when the Samaritan a stranger but a neighbour indeed relieved him Vers 11. My sonne be wise and make my heart glad See the note on chap. 10.1 Vers 12. A prudent man foreseeth the evill See the note on Chap. 22.3 Vers 13. Take his garment that is surety See the note on chap. 20.16 Vers 14. He that blesseth his friend with a loud voice Qui leonum laudibus murem obruit that extols a man above measure as the false Prophets did Ahab and the People Herod that praiseth him to his face In vita Alphons which when a Court-parasite did to Sigismund the Emperour he gave him a sound box on the ear A Preacher in Constantines time ausus est Imperatorem in os beatum dicere Euseb de vit Const l. 4. c. 4. saith Eusebius presumed to call the Emperour a Saint to his face but he went away with a check When Aristobulus the Historian presented to Alexander the great book that he had written of his glorious acts wherein he had flatteringly made him greater than he was Alexander after he had read the book threw it into the River Hydaspes and said to the Authour It were a good deed to throw thee after it Rising early in the morning As afraid to be prevented by another or that he shall not have time enough all day after to do it in Vers 15. A continual dropping See the note on chap. 19.24 Vers 16. Whosoever hideth her hideth the wind i. e. One may as soon hide the wind or hold it from blowing as hide her shame or hush her brawling The wife should make her husband her covering when she is abroad especially but many wives are so intemperate and wilful that a man may as well hide the wind in his fist or oyl in his clutch-fist as his wives infirmities Let this be marked by those that venture upon shrews if rich fair
a diaphanous body as the word there signifies before the judgement-seat of Christ 2 Cor. 5.20 all shall bee laid naked and open the Books of Gods Omniscience and mans Conscience also shall bee then opened and secret sins shall bee as legible in thy fore-head as if written with the brightest Stars or the most glittering Sun-beams upon a wall of Crystal Mens actions are all in print in Heaven and God will at that day read them aloud in the ears of all the world Whether it bee good or evil Then it shall appear what it is which before was not so clear like as in April both wholesome roots and poisonable discover themselves which in winter were not seen Then men shall give an account 1 De bonis commissis of good things committed unto them 2. De bonis dimissis of good things neglected by them 3. De malis commissis of evils committed by them 4. Lastly De malis permissis of evils done by others suffered by them when they might have hindered it LAUS DEO A COMMENTARY OR EXPOSITION UPON THE CANTICLES OR Solomons Song of Songs CHAP. I. Vers 1. The Song of Songs NOt a light Love-song as some prophane persons have fancied and have therefore held it no part of the sacred Canon Theodoret. lib. 5. de Provid Sic coena a Dionysio caeremonia caeremoniarum ab alio Pascha celebritas celebritatum dicitur But a most excellent Epithalamium a very divine Ditty an heavenly Allegory a Mystical-marriage-song called here The Song of Songs as God is called the God of Gods Deut. 10.7 as Christ is called the King of Kings Rev. 19.16 as the Most Holy is called the Holy of Holies to the which the Jew-doctors liken this Canticle as they do Ecclesiastes to the Holy place and Proverbs to the Court to signifie that it is the treasury of the most sacred and highest mysteries of holy Scripture It streams out all along under the parable of a Marriage Hieron prooem in Ezech. that full torrent of spiritual love that is betwixt Christ and the Church This is a great mystery saith that great Apostle Ephes 5.32 It passeth the capacity of man to understand it in the perfection of it Hence the Jews permitted none to read this sacred Song before thirty years of age Let him that reads think hee sees written over this Solomons porch Holiness to the Lord T. W. on Canti◠Procul hinc procul este profani nihil hic nisi castum If any think this kind of dealing to bee over-light for so grave and weighty a matter let them take heed saith one that in the height of their own hearts they do not proudly censure God and his order who in many places useth the same similitude of marriage to express his love to his Church by and interchangeably her duty toward him as Hos 2.19 2 Cor. 11.2 Ephes 5.25 with vers 22 23 24. where the Apostle plainly alludeth and referreth to this Song of Songs in sundry passages borrowing both matter and frame of speech from hence Which is Solomons Hee was the Pen-man God the Author Of many other Songs hee was both Author and instrument 1 King 4.32 Not so of this which therefore the Chaldee Paraphrast here entituleth Songs and Hymns in the plural for the surpassing excellency of it which Solomon the Prophet the King of Israel uttered by the spirit of Prophecy before the Lord the Lord of all the Earth A Prophet hee was and is therefore now in the Kingdome of Heaven notwithstanding his foul fall whereof hee repented Luk. 11.28 For as it is not the falling into the water that drowns but lying in it So neither is it the falling into sin that damns but dying in it Solomon was also King of Israel and surpassed all the Kings of the Earth in wealth and wisdome 2 Chron. 9.22 yea hee was wiser than all men 1 King 4.31 And as himself was a King Psal 45.2 so hee made this singular Song as David did the 45 Psalm concerning the King Christ and his spiritual marriage to the Church who is also called Solomon Cant. 3.11 and greater than Solomon Matth. 12.42 If therefore either the worth of the writer or the weightiness of the matter may make to the commendation of any book this wants for neither That is a silly exception of some against this Song as if not Canonical because God is not once named in it for as oft as the Bridegroom is brought in speaking here Rom. 9. ◠so oft Christ himself speaketh who is God blessed for ever Besides whereas Solomon made a thousand Songs and five 1 King 4.32 this onely as being the chief of all and part of the holy Canon hath been hitherto kept safe when the rest are lost in the Cabinet of Gods special providence and in the chest of the Jews Gods faithful Library-keepers Rom. 3.2 Joh. 5.39 It being not the will of our heavenly Father that any one hair of that sacred head should fall to the ground Vers 2. Let him kiss mee with the kisses of his mouth It must bee premised and remembred that this Book is penitus allegoricus parabolicus as one saith allegorical throughout and aboundeth all along with types and figures with parables and similitudes Quot verba tot sacramenta So many words so many mysteries saith Hierome of the Revelation Apocalypsin fateor me nescire exponere c. exponat cui Deus concesserit Cajet Possev in Biblioth select which made Cajetan not dare to comment upon it The like may bee truly affirmed of the Canticles nay wee may say of it in a special manner as Possevinus doth of the whole Hebrew Bible tot esse sacramenta quot literae tot mysteria quot puncta tot arcana quot apices Hence Psellus in Theodoret asketh pardon for presuming to expound it But difficilium facilis est venia In magnis voluisse sat est In hard things the pardon is easie and in high things let a man shew his good will and it suffiseth The matter of this Book hath been pointed at already as for the form of it it is Dramatical and Dialogistical The chief speakers are not Solomon and the Shulamite as Castalio makes it but Christ and his Church John 3.29 Christ also hath his Associates those friends of the Bridegroom viz. the Prophets Apostles Pastors and Teachers who put in a word sometimes As likewise do the fellow-friends of the Bride viz. whole Churches or particular Christians The Bride begins here abruptly after the manner of a Tragedy through impatience of love and an holy impotency of desire after not an union onely but an unity also with him whom her soul loveth Let him kiss mee c. Kissing is a token of love 1 Pet. 5.14 Luk. 7.45 and of reconciliation 2 Sam. 14.33 And albeit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Philo observeth Love is not alwaies in a kiss Joab and Judas could kiss and kill
as far as to the Book of Ezra That upon the Pentateuch formerly published is much enlarged and the other newly added both in folio A COMMENTARY OR EXPOSITION UPON THE PROVERBS of SOLOMON CHAP. I. Vers 1. The Proverbs OR Master-sentences Maximes Axiomes Speeches of special precellency and prodominancy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Dominari quae vita dominae moderatices esse debent 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Received Rules that must over-rule matters and mightily prevail in the minds of men The principal no doubt they are of those three thousand mentioned 1 King 4.32 and far beyond those golden layings of Phocylides prophanely preferred before these holy parables by that Apostate Julian De Euripide Cicero pronuâ—ciavit plures esse in eo sententias quam verba ansu nefario as having in them more sentences than words and being so farre above all humane praise for weight and worth that as Salast writeth of Carthage I had better speak nothing of them than too little sith too much is too little Of Salomon who better a deal deserves to bee stiled Master of the Sentences than Peter Lombard and to bee esteemed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as one saith of Homer or as another saith of Hierome Zenophon that hee was a man quem nullum scibile latuit that knew all that was knowable by a man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Euripid. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Demost 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thucyd Diodor King of Israel Eccles 1.1 King of Jerusalem which was now the Israel of Israel as Athens was in its flourish said to bee the Greece of Greece yea the Soul and Sun and eye of Greece yea the common School of all mankind For King Solomon exceeded all the Kings of the Earth both in Riches and in Wisdome And all the world sought to see Solomon to hear his Wisdome which God had put into his heart 1 King 10.23 24. For the more wise the Preacher was the more hee taught the people knowledge and cause them to hear and searched forth many Parables Eccles 12.9 Even words of delight vers 10. See the Note there Vers 2. To know Wisdome That is to give others to know to wise them as Dan. 12.3 to give the knowledge of salvation Luk. 1.77 to shew men great and mighty things which they know not Jer. 33.3 but may here hence bee taught better than out of Lipsius his Bee-hive or Machiavels Spider-web Vers 3. To receive the instruction Tertullian calls the Bible and the Proverbs by a specialty Nostra digesta from the Lawyers and others our Pundects from them also Is there not a thin veil laid over them which is more rarified by reading and at last wholly worn away Surely as by much reading the Statute-book men grow worldly-wise And as a friend it is Chrysostomes comparison that is acquainted with his friend will get out the meaning of a letter or phrase which another could not that is a stranger so it is in Scripture And herein as one well observeth the poorest Ideot being a sound Christian goeth beyond the profoundest Clarks that are not sanctified that hee hath his own heart instead of a Commentary to help him to understand even the most needful points of the Scripture Vers 4. To give subtilty Serpentine subtilty Gen. 3.1 sacred sagacity a sharp wit a deep reach a Spirit that searcheth all things yea the deep things of God 1 Cor. 2.10 â—nd transformeth a man into the â—ame Image from glory to glory Pet. Marâ— in Rom. Ep. dedicat â— Cor. â— 1â— Equidem scâ—â— mâ—â—tos essâ— qui hâ—c non redanâ—â— non pâ—â—cos qui ea rideant nosque infâ—nire arbitâ—ntur faith Peter Martyre 〈…〉 velim c. that is I wot well there bee many that will not beleeve it and not a few that will deride it and think wee are â—ad in ascribing so much to the Scriptures But oh that they would bee entreated to make trial a while and to take to the reading of the Bible Male mihi sit 〈◊〉 eum in 〈◊〉 causa jure auâ—im nisi â—andem capiantur sentient dentiqua quamtum divina hac ab humanis distent c. Let mee never bee beleeved if they perceive not a plain and palpable difference betwixt these and all humane writings whatsoever And to the same purpose Erasmus Erasm Praefat. in Lucam expertus sum in â—â—cipso saith hee I can speak it by experience that there is little good to bee gotten by reading the Bible cursorily and carelesly But do it duly and diligently with attention and affection and you shall finde 〈◊〉 an efficacy as is 〈◊〉 bee found in no other Book that can bee named To the simple â—atuo 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fatuello Lipsius this diminutive to the silly-simple whose learning hangs not in his light who holds not 〈…〉 wise to bee taught that is not uncounsellable unperswadâ—â—le 〈…〉 qui sibi sapit Chytraâ—s hee is two fools that it wise in his own eyes Prâ—â—â— 3. 〈…〉 â—â—noro sed ignorantiam meam non ignoro Little though it 〈…〉 â—et this I know that I know but little Arist Ethic. lib. 1. Job 1â— 12 Eccles 11.10 To the young man Though rude and rash â—ead-long and â—ead long â—ntameable and untractable as a wilde-asse-colt though 〈…〉 lusts 2 Tim. 2.22 and madly set upon sin yet hee may cleanse his waies by cleaving to Gods Word Psal 119.9 and become a young Saint an old Angel whereas otherwise like young Lapwings hee is apt to bee snatched up by every Buzzard Vers 5. A wise man will hear Hearing and seeing are by Aristotle called the learned senses because by these doores learning yea life entreth into the soul Isa 55.3 David Chytrous when hee lay a dying lift up himself to hear the discourses of his friends that sate by him and said that hee should dye with better cheer if hee might dye learning something Si moriâ—undâ—â— etiam si quid â—idic â—sset Meich Adam And will encrease learning Take heed what you hear unto you that hear shall more bee given Mark 4.24 See the Note there Onely ponder and apply what you hear For they that do otherwise are like the Wolf who never attain to any more divine learning than to spell Pater but when they should come to put together and to apply it to their souls they say Agnus their minds running a madding after the profits and pleasures of the world and they thinking those little less than mad thaâ— run to and fro to encrease knowledge Dan. 12.4 Vers 6. To understand a Proverb and the Interpretation Or the sweetness thereof there being nothing so sweet to a good soul as the knowledge of dark and deep mysteries Psal 119.103 Heb. Meâ—it â—aâ— unde fortasse Graecum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Latiâ—um Mel. Rivet where the same word is used The little Book of the Revelation was in Johns mouth sweet as hony Rev. 10.9 10. See
of the chiefest good Serranus compiled and composed with such a picked frame of words with such pithy strength of sentences with such a thick series of demonstrative arguments that the sharp wit of all the Philosophers compared with this Divine discourse seems to be utterly cold and of small account 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Arist Experientia optima magistra their elaborate Treatises of Happiness to be learned dotages and laborious losse of time How many several opinions there were amongst them concerning the Chief Good in Solomon's days is uncertain divers of them hee confuteth in this book and that from his own experience the best School-dame But Varro the learned'st of the Romans reckoneth up 280 in his time and no wonder considering mans natural blindness not unlike that of the Syrians at Dothan Aug. de civ Dei lib. 18. or that of the Sodomites at Lots door What is an eye without the optick spirit but a dead member and what is all humane wisdom without divine illumination but wickedness of folly yea foolishness of madness as our Preacher not without good cause calleth it A spirit there is in man saith Elihu viz. the light of reason and thus far the Animal-man goes and there hee makes an halt Eccles 7.15 hee cannot transcend his orb but the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding Job 32.8 God had given Solomon wisdom above any man Abulensis saith above Adam in his innocency which I believe not He was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Macarius was called a man at twelve years old Niceph. His Father had taught him Prov. 4.4 His Mother had lessoned him Prov. 31.1 The Prophet Nathan had had the breeding of him But besides as he was Jedidiah loved of God so he was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 taught of God And being now when hee penned this Penitential Sermon grown an old man he had experimented all this that hee here affirmeth So that hee might better begin his speech to his scholars than once Augustus Caesar did to his souldiers Audite senem juvenes quem juvenem senes audierunt Young men hearken to mee an old man whom old men hearkened unto when I was yet but young Have not I written for you excellent things in counsels and knowledge Prov. 22.20 Or Have I not written three books for thee so some read those words Proverbial Penitential Nuptial See the Note there Nescis temerarie nescis Ovid. Metam Quem fugias ideoque fugis Job 4. Esay 55. Surely if thou knewest the gift of God and who it is that speaketh unto thee thou wouldst encline thine ear and hear thou wouldst listen as for life it self Knowest thou not that I am a Preacher a Prince Son of David King in Jerusalem 2 Cor. 3.1 Regis epistolis acceptis quo calamo scriptae sint ridiculum est quaerere Greg. Luke 13.28 Bellarminus Solomonem inter reprobos numerat and so do come multis nominibus tibi commendatissimus much commended to thee in many respects But need I as some others epistles of commendation to my Readers or Letters of commendation from them Is it not sufficient to know that this book of mine both for matter and words is the very work of the Holy Ghost speaking in mee and writing by mee For Prophecy comes not by the will of man but holy men of God speak it as they are moved by the holy Ghost 2 Pet. 1.21 And albeit this be proof good enough of my true though late repentance whereof some have doubted some denied it yet take another Of the Preacher Or of a preaching Soul for the Hebrew word Koheleth is of the feminine gender and hath Nephesh Soul understood or of a person re-united and reconciled to the Church Anima congregata cum Ecclesia se colligens Cartw. and in token of reconciliation to God re-admitted by him to this Office in his Church like as Christ sealed up his love to Peter after his shameful fall by bidding him feed his lambs and to the rest of the Apostles that had basely forsaken him by saying to them after his resurrection Peace be unto you As my Father hath sent mee even so send I you Receive yee the holy Ghost John 20.21 See the like mercy shewed to St. Paul 1 Tim. 1.12 Howbeit some learned men here observe that it is no new thing in the Hebrew tongue to put feminine names upon men as Ezra is called Sophereth descriptrix a Shee-scribe in the very same form as Solomon is here called Koheleth a Preacheress and the Gospel-preachers Mebaseroth Psal 68.11 with Esay 52.7 either to set forth the excellency and elegancy of the business or else to teach Ministers to keep themselves pure as Virgins whence they are also called Wisdomes Maids Prov. 9.3 and Christs Paranymphs John 3.29 to present the Church as a chaste Virgin to Christ 2 Cor. 11.2 The Son of David So Christ also is said to be Mat. 1.1 as if David had been his immediate father The glory of children are their fathers Prov. 17.6 to wit if they be godly and pious The Jews made great boasts that they were the seed of Abraham Mat. 3.9 John 8.33 And that caitiff Elymas the Sorcerer Act. 13.6 had surnamed himself Barjesus or the son of Jesus as if hee had been of neerest alliance to our Saviour of whom all the families of heaven and earth are called Eph. 3. What an honour is it now accounted to be of the posterity of Latimer Bradford Ridley c How much more of David that man of renown the Father of our princely Preacher who himself took also not scorn to teach and do the office of a Preacher Psal 32.9 and 34.11 though he were the Governour of Gods people Psal 78.71 and head of many Heathen Psal 18.43 The like may be said of Joseph of Arimathea who of a Counsellor of State became a preacher of the Gospel so did Chrysostome a noble Antiochian Ambrose Lieutenant and Consul of Millain George Prince of Anhalt Earl Martinengus John a Lasco a noble Polonian and sundry others of like quality and condition Psal 138.4 5. and 119.72 the Psalmist shews by prophecying that they that have tasted of the joys of a crown shall leave the throne and palace to sing with the Saints and to publish the excelling glory of God and godliness King in Jerusalem and of Jerusalem The Pope will allow the Duke of Millain to be King in Tuscany but not King of Tuscany Solomon was both Prov. 1.1 See the Note there Spec. Europ Hither came the Queen of Sheba from the utmost parts of the earth to hear him here hee wrote this excellent book these words of delight which he had learned from that one Shepheard the Lord Christ ch 12.10 11. and hath left them faithfully set down for the use of the Church so honouring learning with his own labours as Sylverius said of Caesar Here lastly it was that he soveraigned
wherein thou shalt finde fulness of matter in fewness of words Or by these that is by the holy Scriptures which according to some interpreters are called in the former verse Lords of Collections because they are as Lords paramount above all other words and writings of men that ever were collected into volumes Odi ego meos libros saith Luther Luth. in Genes I do even hate the Books set forth by my self and could wish them utterly abolished because I fear that by reading them some are hindred from spending their time in reading the sacred Scriptures Of these it is that the Psalmist saith Moreover by them is thy servant warned or clearly admonished as the word signifies and in doing thereof there is great reward Psal 19.11 Of making many Books there is no end Ambition and covetousness sets many Authors a work in this scribling age Scribimus indocti doctique c. Presses are greatly oppressed and every fool will bee medling that hee may bee a fool in Print Multi mei similes hoc morbo laborant ut cum scribere nesciant tamen a scribendo temperare non possunt Many are sick of my very disease saith Erasmus that though they can do nothing worthy of the publick yet they must bee publishing hence the world so abounds with books even to satiety and surfeit many of them being no better than the scurf of scald and scabby heads And much study is a weariness to the flesh Hierome renders it Labor carnis a work of the flesh They will finde it so one day to their sorrow that are better read in Sir Philip than in St. Peter in Monsieur Balsaâ—s letters than St. Pauls Epistles The holy Bible is to bee chiefly studied and herein wee are to labour even to lassitude to read till being overcome with sleep wee bow down as it were to salute the leaves with a kiss Hierom ad Eust as Hierome exhorted some good women of his time All other Books in comparison of this wee are to account as waste Paper and not to read them further than they some way conduce to the better understanding or practising of the things herein contained and commended unto our care Vers 13. Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter scil Touching the attainment of true happiness Let us see for a perclose of all where and how it may bee had Shall I tell you in two words saith the Preacher I will so and see that yee mark it In the Original the word rendred conclusion here hath the first letter bigger than the rest to stir up the greater attention to that which follows sith in this short sentence is contained the sum of all Divinity Fear God and keep his commandements Bear an awful respect to the Divine Majesty a reverential fear and from this principle obey God in every part and point of duty Do this and live for ever Do it in an Evangelical way I mean for wee can do it now no otherwise Wish well to exact obedience as David doth Psal 119.4 5. Oh that I could keep thy commandements accurately and woe is mee that I cannot And then bee doing as thou canst for affection without indeavour is like Rachel beautiful but barren Bee doing I say at every thing as well as at any thing for thou must not bee funambulus vertutum as Tertullian phraseth it one that goeth in a narrow tract of obedience No thine obedience must bee universal extending to the compass of the whole Law which is but one copulative as the Schools speak And then Aug. beati sunt qui praecepta faciunt etiam si non perficiunt they are blessed that do what they can Bern. though they cannot but under-do And in libro tuo scribuntur omnes qui quod possunt faciunt si quod debent non possunt They are surely written all in Gods Book that do what they can though they cannot do as they ought I cannot let slip a Note given by one that was once a famous Preacher in this Kingdome and still lives in his printed Sermons The Book of Ecclesiastes saith hee begins with All is vanity and ends with fear God and keep his commandements Now if that sentence were knit to this which Solomon keepeth to the end as the haven of rest after the turmoils of vanity it is like that which Christ said to Martha Thou art troubled about many things but one thing is necessary That which troubleth us Solomon calls vanity that which is necessary hee calls the fear of God From that to this should bee every mans pilgrimage in this world Wee begin at vanity and never know perfectly that wee are vain till wee come to fear God and keep his commandements For this is the whole duty of man Heb. This is the whole man q. d. Hee is not a compleat man hee loseth all his other praises that fears not God It is the very nature and essence of man to bee a reasonable creature Now what more reasonable than that God should bee feared and served What more irrational than irreligion See 2 Thes 3.2 and what is man without true grace but praestantissimum brutum as one saith a very fair beast Vers 14. For God shall bring every work into judgement Full loth is sinful flesh to come to judgement but will they nill they come they must God will bring them Angels will hale them out of their hiding holes Rocks and mountains will then prove a sorry shelter sith rocks shall rent and mountains melt at the presence of the Judge Let us therefore judge our selves if hee shall not judge us and take unto us words against our sins if wee will not have him to take unto him words against our souls Hos 14.2 And then Ita vivamus ut rationem nobis reddendam arbitremur saith the Heathen Oratour Let us so live as those that must shortly bee called to an account For who can tell but that hee may suddenly hear as that Pope did and was soon after found dead Veni miser in judicium Come thou wretch receive thy judgement Let this bee firmly beleeved and thorowly digested and it will notably incite us to the fear and service of God This some Heathens knew Zaleucus Locrensis in the Proeme to his Laws hath these words Hoc inculcatum sit esse Deos venturum esse summum fatalem illum diem Remember to press often upon the people these two things First That there are Gods Next to these Gods an account of all must bee given The Areopagites at their Council were wont diligently to enquire what every of the Athenians did Rouz his Archaeol Atti. 125 and how hee lived that men knowing and remembring that once they must give an account of their lives though but to earthly Judges might imbrace honesty With every secret thing For at that day of Revelation as it is called Wee must all appear or bee made transparent pellucid and clear like
they might not hurt them Ver. 7. That ye might provoke me See chap 7.17 18. Ver. 8. Because ye have not heard i. e. Not heeded them as chap. 7 19. Ver. 9. Behold I will send and take By a secret instinct as chap. 1.15 And Nebuchadnezzar my servant i. e. Mine executioner the rod of my wrath Isa 10. and the scourge of the world as Attilâ—s stiled himself And against all these Nations round about Who were so infatuated that they did not combine against Nebuchadnezzar whom the Septuagint called a dove ver 38. of this chapter but he was a vulture rather and these Nations were as so many silly doves which save themselves by flight not fight and sitting in their dovecotes see their nests destroyed and their young ones killed before their eyes never offering to rescue or revenge as other souls do So dealt the old Britons when invaded by the Romans they joyned not their forces against the common enemy sed dum singuli pugnabant Tacitus universi vincebantur Ver. 10 Moreover I will take from them See chap. 7.34 and Rev. 18.22 Ver. 11. And this land shall be a desolation seventy yeares Which commenced at the deportation of Jeconiah 2 King 24.8 See Jer. 29.1 2 3. with Ezek. 4.1 and 33.21 Avignon in France was the residence of the Pope for seventy years Heyl Cosm fol. 188. which time the Romans yet remember till this day by the name of the Babylonian captivity Luther when he first began to stir against the Pope wrote a book bearing title De captivitate Babylonica which when Bugenhagius a Pomeranian Divine first read he pronounced it to be the most heretical piece that ever was written Scult Annal. but afterwards having better considered the contents of it he retracted his former censure he told his colleagues that all the world besides was in deep darkness and that Luther alone was in the light and in the right and him he would follow So he did and drew many more with hâ—m Ver. 12. I will punish the King of Babylon As had been forethreatned Isa 13 14 21 47. and was accomplished Dan. 5. Ver. 13. And I will bring upon that Lâ—nd sc By Cyrus and his Successours who out of the ruines of Babylon built two Cities Câ—esiphon and Seleucia Ver. 14. For many Nations The Medes and Persians together with the rest that served under them And great Kings Cyrus and Darius especially Vtitur demonstratione seu ostentâ— divino Ver. 15. Take the wine cup of this fury Or take this smoaking wine-cup A cup is oft put for affliction and wine for extream confusion and wrath Poison in wine works more furiously then in water See on Psal 75.8 And cause all the Nations According to that power which I have put into thine hands chap. 1.10 Vengeance is still in readiness for the disobedient 2 Cor. 10.6 as ready every whit in Gods hand as in the Ministers mouth who threatneth it Ver. 16. And be moved and be mad As men that are overcome by some hot and heady liquour are mad-drunk Because of the sword that I shall send For it is God who puts the sword in commission Jer. 47.6 7. and there it many times rideth circuit as a Judge in Scarlet There are certain seasons wherein as the Angel troubled the poole so doth God the Nations and commonly when he doth it to one he doth it to more as here and 2 Chron. 15.5 6. and as at this day in Europe Ver. 17. And made all drink viz. In vision and by denunciation Ver. 18. To wit in Jerusalem Judgement beginneth at Gods house 1 Pet. 4.17 See the Note there and on Mat. 25.41 Sed si in Hierosolymis maneat scrutinium quid fiet in Babylone saith an Ancient Ver. 19. Pharaoh King of Egypt Pharaoh Hophra chap. 44.30 of whom Herodotus writeth that he perswaded himself and boasted that his Kingdom was so strong that no god or man could take it from him Lib. 2. He was afterwards hanged by his own subjects The mixed people That lay scattered in the deserts and had no certain abode Scenitae and Hamaxobii And all the Kings of the land of Vz Jobs country called by the Greeks Ausitis Ver. 21. Edom and Moab c. By the destruction of all these Nations we may make a conjecture at the destruction of all the wicked when Christ shall come to judgement All that befalleth them in this world is but as drops of wrath foreruning the great storm or as a crack foretokening the fall of the whole house Here the leaves only fall upon them as it were but then the body of the tree in its full weight to crush them for ever Ver. 22. And all the Kings of the Isles As Cyprus Rhodes and the Cyclades subdued also by the Babylonian saith Hierom Rabanus and Vatablus Ver 23. Dedan and Temae and Buz The Hagarens or Saracens chap. 49. And all that are in the utmost corners Qui attonsi sunt in comam Roundheads See chap. 9.26 Ver. 24. And all the Kings of Arabia Petraea That dwell in the desert In Arabia deserta Ver. 25. And all the Kings of Zimri i. e. Of Arabia falix Lib. 6. cap. 28. Zamarens Pliny calleth them Ver. 26. And all the Kingdomes See on ver 16. And the King of Sheshac i. e. Baltasar that bezelling kink of Babylon whilest he is quaffing in the vessels of Gods house to the honour of Shac the Babylonian goddess whence those feast dayes were called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Shesac id est poculum laetitiae aut vanitatâ— vel sericum tuum being like the Roman Saturnalia Antichrist also who hath troubled all the Kingdomes of the earth shall himself perish together with his Babylon the great which hath made the Nations drunk with the wine of her fornications Ver. 27. Drink ye and be drunk and spew and fall Eckius or Eccius otherwise by some called Jeccius from his casting or spewing being nonplus't by Melancthon Manlii loc com 89. and well nigh madded fell to drinking for his own solace and drunk himself to death so should these do of the cup of Gods wrath not only till they were mad-drunk as ver 16. dut dead drunk Ver. 28. Ye shall certainly drink See on ver 15. Ver. 29. The City that is called by my Name Periphrasis Hierosolymae argumentosa And should ye be utterly unpunished See on ver 18. Ye shall not be unpunished But suffer as surely and as sorely Ver. 30. The Lord shall roar from on high As a lusty Lyon having discovered his prey runneth upon it roaring so horribly that he astonisheth the creatures and sets them at a stand He will mightily roar upon his habitation Pliny reporteth of the Lioness that she bringeth forth her whelps dead and so they remain for the space of three dayes until the Lyon coming near to the den where they lye lifteth up his voyce and roareth so fiercely
focum keeping himself warm in his winter chamber and carelesse of calling upon God whiles the people cold and empty were fasting and praying in the Temple and hearing the Word read by Baruch In the ninth moneth sc Of the sacred year which moneth was part of our November and part of December a cold season but that thing of nought his body which he now made so much of was shortly after to be cast out unburied in the day to the heat and in the night to the frost ver 30. Quintillan Ver. 23. When Jehudi had read three or four leaves Vespasian is said to have been patientissimus veri very patient of truth so was good Josiah whose heart melted at the hearing of the Law 2 Chron. 34.27 but so was not this degenerate son of his Jeboiakim but more like Tiberius that Tiger who tore with his teeth all that displeased him Lib. 3. hist or like Vitellius the Tyrant of whom Tacitus saith Ita formatae principis aures ut aspera quae utilia nec quidquam nisi jucundum non laesurum actiperet that his cares were of that temper that he could hear no counsel though never so profitable unless it were pleasant and did suit with his humours He cut it with the penknife Why what could he dislike in that precious piece Of Petronius his Satyricon one said well Tolle obscaena tollis omnia Of Jeremies prophecies I may safely say Tolle sancta tollis omnia But this brutish Prince could not away with downright-truth c. Oecolamp And cast it into the fire O stultitiam quid innocentes chartae commeruerant O madnesse what evil had those innocent papers deserved that they must dye this double death as it were Those Magical books at Ephesus were worthily burnt Act. 19. Aretines love-books are so lascivious that they deserve to be burned saith Boissard Bois biblioth together with their Authour Many seditious Pamphlets are now committed to Vulcan to be corrected and more should be But O sancta Apocalypsis as that Martyr once said when he took up the book of the Revelation cast into the same fire with himself So O holy Jeremy what hast thou said or written to be thus flasht and then cast into the fire Jehoiakim is the first we read of that ever offered to burn the Bible Antiochus indeed did the like afterwards and Dioclesian the Tyrant and now the Pope But though there were not a Bible left upon earth yet for ever O Lord thy Word is stablished in heaven saith David Psal 119 89. Vntill all the roll was consumed So far was he from repenting of that his wickednesse that he fed his eyes with such a sad spectacle and was ready to say as Solon did when he burnt the Usurers bonds in Athens that he never saw a fairer or clearer fire burn in all his life Ver. 24. Yet they were not afraid Ne paulum quidem perculsi sunt The King and his servants those Court-parasites were not stirred at all at such a Bible-bone-fire but jeared when they should have feared c. Nor rent their garments Such was their stupor seu non-curantia their security and insensibleness of that high offence for which their posterity keep a yearly fast See on ver 6. Rending of garments in token of grief was in use also among the Heathens Homer saith Priamus rent his clothes when he heard of the death of his son Hector The like hath Virgil of his Aeneas Tam pater Aeneas humeris abscindere vestem Auxilioque vocate deos Suetonius saith the like of Jalius Caesar c. Pro concione fidem militum flens veste à pectore dicissâ imploravit Suet. c. 55. Ver. 25. Neverthelesse Elnathan Who had before been active for the King in apprehending and slaughtering the Prophet Vriah chap. 26.22 but now haply touched with some rremorse for having any hand in so bloody an act Had made intercession to the King Verum frigide admodum but very coldly and such cold friends the truth hath still not a few at Kings Courts especially Ver. 26. But the King commanded Jerameel the son of Hammelech Or the Kings son whom he might employ against these two servants of God as once the King of France sent his son and heir with an Army against the Waldenses It is not for nothing therefore that the curse is denounced against Jehojakim and his posterity ver 30 31. But the Lord hid them i. e. He provided for them a hiding place in some good mans house and there safe guarded them from these blood-hounds who hunted after their precious lives There in no fence but flight nor counsel but concealement to secure an innocent subject against an enraged Soveraign Ver. 27. Then the Word of the Lord came to Jeremiah Jehojakim took an ill course to free himself forom trouble as he counted it by burning the Roll for Gods Word cannot be burnt no more then it can be bound 2 Tim. 2.9 And shall they thus escape by iniquity No verily for it followeth and it is not more votum then vaticinium a wish then a Prophecy In thine anger cast down the people O God Psal 56.7 Ver. 28. Take thee again another roll Revertere accipe Gods Ministers must be stedfast and unweariable alwaies abounding in the work of the Lord forasmuch as they know that their labour is not in vain in the Lord 1 Cor. 15. ult And write in it all the former words If all the Tyrants on earth should fight against the very paper of the Scriptures striving to abolish it yet they could not possibly do it There will be Bibles when they shall be laid low enough in the slimy valley where are many already like them and more shall come alter them Job 21.31 32. Ver. 29. And thou shalt say to Jehoiakim i. e. Add this doleful doom of his to the new written roule and direct it to Jehojakim Some think the Prophet told him these things to his face like as Eliah presented himself to Ahab whom before he had fled from and dealt freely with him but that is not so likely Ver. 30. He shall have none to sit upon the throne of David i. e. None to make any reckoning of for his son Jeconâ—ah raigned but three moneths and ten dayes And Zedekiah is not looked upon as his lawful successour because he was his Uncle and set up likely by Nebuchadnezzar for a reproach to Jehojakim and Jeconiah Of Jehojakim it may be said as was afterwards of Ethelred King of England Ejus vitae cursus saevus in principio miser in medio turpis in exitu asseritur Malms lib. 2. cap. 10. and in as great spite as once Attilus King of Suesia made a dog King of the Danes in revenge of a great many injuries received by them appointing Councellours to do all things under his title And his dead body shall be cast out in the day to the heat This was that infamous burial
This day have I paid my vows A votary then shee was by all means and so more than ordinarily religious So was Doeg why else was hee deteined before the Lord 1 Sam. 21.7 A Doeg may set his foot as far into Gods Sanctuary as a David That many Popish Votaries are no better than this huswife in the text see the Lisbon-Nunnery c. besides those thousands of Infants skulls found in the fish-pools by Gregory the Great Vers 15. Therefore came I forth As having much good chear at home Sine Cerere Libero frigâ—t Venâ—â— as at all peace-offerings they had Gluttony is the gallery that libidinousness walks through Diligently to seek thy face Or thy person not thy purse thee not thine do I seek Quis credit And I have found thee By a providence no doubt God must have a hand in it or else 't is marvel God hath given mee my hire said Leah because I have given my Maid to my Husband Gen. 30.18 See 1 Sam. 23.7 Zach. 11.5 Vers 16. I have decked my bed Lest haply by being abroad so late hee should question where to have a bed shee assures him of a dainty one with curious curtains Vers 17. With Myrrhe Aloes c. This might have minded the young man that hee was going to his grave for the bodies of the dead were so perfumed Such a meditation would have much rebated his edge cooled his courage Jerusalems filthiness was in her skirts and why shee remembred not her latter end Lam. 1.9 As the stroaking of a dead hand they say cureth a tympany and as the ashes of a viper applied to the part that is stung draws the venome out of it so the serious thought of death will prove a death to fleshly lusts Mr. Wards Sermons I meet with a story of one that gave a loose young man a Ring with a deaths-head with this condition that hee should one hour daily for seven daies together look and think upon it which bred a strange alteration in his life Vers 18. Until the morning But what if death draw the curtains and look in the while If death do not yet guilt will And here beasts are more happy in carnal contentments than sensual voluptuaries for in their delights they seldome surfeit but never sin and so never finde any cause or use for pangs of repentance as Epicures do whose pleasure passeth but a sting staies behinde Job calleth sparks the sons of fire being ingendred by it upon fuel as pleasures are the sons of mens lusts when the object and they lye and couple together And they are not long-lived they are but as sparks they dye as soon as begotten Vers 19. For the good man is not at home Heb. The man not my man or my husband c. the very mention how much more the presence of such a man might have marred the mirth Vers 20. Hee hath taken a bag of mony And so will not return in haste Let not the children of this world bee wiser than wee Lay up treasure in Heaven provide your selves baggs that wax not old Luk. 12.33 Do as Merchants that being to travel into a far Country deliver their mony here upon the Exchange that there they may receive it Evagrius in Cedrenus bequeathed three hundred pound to the poor in his will but took a bond beforehand of Synesius the Bishop for the re-payment of this in another life according to the promise of our Saviour of an hundred fold advantage Vers 21. With much fair speech Fair words make fools fain This Circe so enchanted the yonker with her fine language that now shee may do what she will with him for hee is wholly at her devotion Vers 22. Hee goeth after her straightway Without any consideration of the sad consequents Lust had blinded and besotted him and even transformed him into a brute Nos animas etiam incarnavimus saith one Many men have made their very spirit a lump of flesh and are hurried on to Hell with greatest violence Chide them you do but give physick in a fit counsel them you do but give advice to a man that is running a race bee your counsel never so good hee cannot stay to hear you but will bee ready to answer as Antipater did when one presented him with a book treating of happiness he rejected it and said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I have no leasure to read such discourses As an Oxe goeth to the slaughter When hee thinks hee goeth to the pasture or as those Oxen brought forth by Jupiters Priest with garlands unto the gates but it was for a slain-sacrifice Acts 14.13 Fatted ware are but fitted for the shambles Numella Beza in loc Or as a fool to the correction of the Stocks Such stocks as Paul and Silas yet no fools were thrust into feet and neck also as the word there signifieth Acts 14.24 This the fool fears not till hee feels till his head bee cooled and his heels too till hee hath slept out his drunkenness and then hee findes where hee is and must stick by it See this exemplified Prov. 5.11 How many such fools have wee now adaies Mori morantur quocunque sub axe morantur that rejoyce in their spiritual bondage and dance to Hell in their bolts as one saith nay are weary of deliverance They sit in the stocks when they are at prayers and come out of the Church when the tedious Sermon runs somewhat beyond the hour like prisoners out of a Gaol The Devil is at Iâ—ne with such saith Master Bradford and the Devil will keep holy-day as it were in Hell in respect of such saith another Vers 23. Till a dart strike thorow his liver i. e. Filthy lust that fiery dart of the Devil Plato in hepate 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ponit Horat Ode 1. lib. 4. Ode 25. lib. 5. Ovid. Trist pointed and poisoned as the Sythian darts are said to bee with the gall of Asps and Vipers Philosophers place lust in the liver Mathematicians subject the liver to Venus the Poets complain of Cupids wounding them in that part Cor sapit pulmo loquitur fel commovit iras Splen ridere facit cogit amare jecor Or as some sense it till the Adulterer bee by the Whores husband or friends or by the hand of justice deprived of life perhaps in the very act as Zimri and Cozbi were by Phineas in the very flagrancy of their lust Vers 24. Hearken now therefore Call up the ears of thy minde to the ears of thy body that one sound may pierce both Solomon knew well how hard it was to get ground of a raging lust even as hard as to get ground of the Sea Hence hee so sets on his exhortation Vers 25. Let not thine heart Think not of her lust not after her Thoughts and affections are sibi mutuo causae Whilest I mused the fire burned Psal 39. so that thoughts kindle affections and these cause thoughts to boyl See Job
9.17 God stands not upon multitudes he buried the old World in one universal grave of waters And turning the Cities of Sodome and Gomorrah into ashes condemned them with an overthrow 2 Pet. 2.6 This is a good sense Howbeit I cannot but incline to those that expound Hand to hand for Father and Childe in regard of the following hemistich But the seed of the righteous shall be delivered As if the Prophet should say The wicked traduce a cursed stock of sin to their Children and shall therefore bee punished in their own person or at least in their posterity Psal 49.11 13 14. This their way is their folly yet their posterity approve their sayings Therefore like sheep they are laid in the grave death shall feed on them c. Vers 22. As a Jewel of gold in a Swines snout It is a small praise saith one to have a good face and an evil nature No one means saith another hath so enriched Hell as beautiful faces Aureliae Orestillae praeter formam nihil unquam bonus laudavit saith Salust In Aurelia Orestilla there was nothing praise-worthy but her beauty Art thou fair saith an Author be not like an Aegyptian Temple or a painted Sepulcher Art thou foul let thy soul bee like a rich pearl in a rude shell Si mihi difficilis formam naturae negavit Sapph ap Ovid. Ingenio formae damna rependo meae So is a fair woman which is without discretion Sic dignitas in indigno est ornamentum in luto saith Salvian Fair and foolish ones abuse their beauty to pride and incontinency and so give occasion to some Diogenes to say O quam bona domus malus hospes O fair house but ill inhabitant Vers 23. The desire of the righteous is onely good i. e. So far as hee is righteous or spiritual hee delights in the Law of God after the inward man willing in all things to live honestly Heb. 13.18 Evil motions haunt his minde otherwhiles but there they inhabit not Lust was a stranger to David as Peter Martyr observes out of Nathans Parable There came a Traveller to this rich man 2 Sam. 12.4 The main stream of his desires the course and current of his heart ran upon God and godliness Psal 119.4 5. And Psal 39.1 3. Hee resolved to do better than hee did The spirit ever lusteth against the flesh howbeit when the flesh gets the wind and hill of the spirit all is not so well carried As the Ferry-man plyes the Oar and eyes the shore home-ward where hee would bee yet there comes a gust of wind that carries him back again so it is oft with a Christian But every man is with God so good as he desires to bee In vita libro scribuntur qui quod possunt faciunt et si quod debent non possunt â—ern They are written in the book of life that do what good they can though they cannot do as they would But the expectation of the wicked is wrath i. e. The good they expect proves to bee indignation and wrath tribulation and anguish Rom. 2.8 9. woful perplexities and convulsions of soul which will bee so great and so grievous as will make them rave and rage with madness and fury especially because they looked for a better state Vers 24. There is that scattereth and yet increaseth Bounty is the most compendious way to plenty neither is getting but giving the best thrift The five loaves in the Gospel by a strange kinde of Arithmetick were multiplied by Division and augmented by Substraction So it will bee in this case But it tendeth to poverty St. Austin descanting upon those words Psal 76.5 They have slept their sleep all the rich men and have found nothing in their hands for so hee reads that Text And why is this saith Hee Nihil invenerunt in manibus suis quia nihil posuerunt in manu Christi They found nothing in their own hands because they feared to lay up any thing in Christs hands Manus pauperum gazophylacium Christi saith another Father The poor mans hand is Christs treasury Vers 25. The liberal soul shall bee made fat See the Note on Matth. 5.7 and my Common-place of Almes Vers 26. The people shall curse him i. e. Complain and cry out of him as the people of Rome did of Pompey in another case Nostrâ miseriâ tu es Magnus In another case I say for in this I must acquit him remembring that speech of his when being by his office to bring in Corn from a far Country for the peoples necessity and wished by his friends to stay for a better wind hee hoysed up sail and said Necesse est ut eam non ut vivam There is a necessity of my going not so of my life If I perish I perish Hence hee was the peoples Corculum or Sweet-heart as it is said of Scipio Nasica Vers 27. Hee that diligently seeketh good Hebr. Hee that is up betime to promote the publike good as Joseph who came not in till noon to eat meat as Nehemiah who willingly brake his sleep and traded every talent for his peoples comfort As Scipio Africanus who usually went before day into the Capitol in cellam Jovis and there stayed a great while quasi consultans de Rep. cum Jove Gell. lib. 7. cap. 1. as consulting with his God about the Weal-publike whence his deeds were pleraque admiranda saith mine Author amiable and admirable the most of them And as Daniel who though sick yet rose up and did the Kings business Chap. 8.27 It shall come to him It shall come certainly suddenly irresistibly and as wee say of foul weather unsent for God will say to such as Aulus Fulvius did to his trayterous son and then slew him Non Catâ—linae te genui sed patriae The Lord shall pour upon him and not spare because hee cruelly oppressed spoiled his brother by violence and did that which is not good among his people therefore hee shall dye in his iniquity Ezek. 18.18 Vers 28. Hee that trusteth to his riches shall fall Riches were never true to any that trusted to them The rich Churl that trusted and boasted that hee had much goods laid up in store for many years when like a Jay hee was pruning himself in his boughes hee came tumbling down with the arrow in his side Luke 12.15 16. c. So did Nebuchadnezzar Belteshazzar Herod c. The righteous also shall see and fear and laugh at such a one saying Loe this is the man that made not God his strength but trusted in the abundance of his riches and strengthned himself in his wickedness Psal 52.6 7. But I am like a green Olive tree c. vers 8. Agreeable whereunto is this that follows here But the righteous shall flourish as a branch whiles the wicked Foenea quadam felicitate temporaliter florent Aug. Epist 120. exoriuntur ut exurantur flourish and ruffle for a time but shall
Cabbin Chest and corner above-board were searched and some things found to draw him further on so that the hatches must bee opened which seemed to bee unwillingly done and great signs of fear were shewed by their faces Speeds hist of great Britain fol. 1174. This drew on the Doctor to descend into the hold where now in the Trap the Mouse might well gnaw but could not get out for the hatches went down and the sails hoysed up which with a merry gale were blown into England where ere long hee was arraigned and condemned of high Treason and accordingly executed at Tiburn as hee had well deserved Vers 13. The wicked is snared by the transgression of his lips His heart is oft so full of venome that it cannot bee hid but blisters his tongue and breaks out at his lips to his own ruine as it befell Story Campian Garnet and other Popish poysonful Spiders who were swept down by the hand Justice and drew their last thred in the Triangle of Tiburn Detexit facinus fatnus non implevit as Tacitus saith of one that was sent by the Senate to dispatch Nero but bewrayed and betrayed himself But the just shall come out of trouble They suffer sometimes for their bold and free invectives against the evils of the times or otherwise for discharging their consciences but they shall surely bee delivered There is yet one man saith Ahab Micaiah the son of Imlah by whom wee may inquire of the Lord but I hate him for hee doth not prophesie good concerning mee but evil It is very probable that Micaiah was that disguised Prophet who brought to Ahab the fearful message of displeasure and death for dismissing Benhadad for which hee was ever since fast in Prison deep in disgrace But God with the temptation made a way for him to escape So hee did for Peter Act. 12. Paul 2 Tim. 4. All the Apostles Act. 4. John Baptist indeed was without any law right or reason beheaded in prison Act. Mon. fol. 1423. as though God had known nothing at all of him said George Marsh the Martyr And the same may bee said of sundry other faithful witness to the truth but then by death they entred into life eternal Mors fuit aerumnarum requies which was Chaucers Motto besides that heaven upon earth they had during their troubles Philip Lansgrave of Hesse being a long time prisoner under Charles the fifth was demanded what upheld him all that while Respondit divinas consolationes Martyrum se sensisse hee answered that hee had felt the divine comforts of the Martyrs The best comforts are usually reserved for the worst times Vers 14. A man shall bee satiated with good c. There are empty Vines that bear fruit to themselves Hos 10.1 And as empty Casks sound loudest and base metal rings shrillest so many empty Tatlers are full of discourse sed cui bono as hee said Plato and Xenophon thought it fit and profitable that mens speeches at meals should bee written And if Christians should so do what kinde of books would they bee Mat. 12. Mal. 3. And yet for every idle word account must bee given as for every good word there is a book of remembrance Much fruit will redound by holy speeches to our selves much to others Paul sheweth that the very report of his bands did a great deal of good in Cesars house A poor captive Maid was the means of Naamans conversion As afterwards the words of his servants were greater in operation with him than the words of the great Prophet Elisha One seasonable truth falling upon a prepared heart hath oft a strong and sweet influence Sometimes also though wee know that which wee ask of others as well as they do yet good speeches will draw us to know it better by giving occasion to speak more of it wherewith the Spirit works more effectually and imprints it deeper so that it shall bee a more rooted knowledge than before for that satiates the soul that is graciously known and that is graciously known that the Spirit seals upon our souls In the morning therefore sow thy seed and in the evening with-hold not thy hand for thou knowest not whether shall prosper this or that or whether they both shall bee alike good Eccles 11.6 And the recompence of a mans hands shall bee given unto him Hee shall eat the fruit of his doings Isa 3.10 For the talk of the lips if that bee all tendeth onely to penury Prov. 14.13 Nos non eloquimur magna sed vivimus said they of old Origens teaching and living were said to bee both one Hee cannot look to bee satisfied with good by the fruit of his mouth qui operibus destruit quod recte docet who sayes one thing and doth another A smoothe tongue and a rough hand carries away double judgement Vers 15. The way of a fool is right in his own eyes Hee thinks his own wit best Arachne ap Ovid. Consilii satis est in me mihi hee will not part with his Commonwealth of bables for the Tower of London And such a fool is every natural men Job 11.12 wise enough haply in his generation so is the Fox too wise with such a wisdome as like the Ostrich-wings makes him out-run others upon earth and in earthly things but helps him never a whit towards heaven nay hinders him and hangs in his light as it fared with the Pharisees Matth. 21.31 Of such it may bee said as Quintilian said of some over-weeners of themselves that they might have proved excellent Scholars if they had not been so perswaded already so might many have been wise if they had not been conceited of their own wisdome and saved if not over-well perswaded of their good estate to God-ward They clasp and hug the barn of their own brain with the Ape till they strangle it At parit ut vivat regnetque beatus Hor. Ep. 2. Cogi posse negat But hee that hearkneth to counsel is wise Hee that suspecting his own judgement takes advice of wiser than himself seldome miscarries There is that self-love in many that they think their Mole-hill a Mountain their Kestril an Eagle their Goose a Swan And being self-conceited they love to bee flattered Not so the wise man hee knows that humanum est errare And that Triste mortalitatis privilegium est licere aliquando peccare Hee is therefore glad of good counsel and thankful for a seasonable reproof Let the righteous smite mee Vers 16. A fools wrath is presently known Hee hath no power over his passions Hence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a fool and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 suddenly rashly is from the same root Like Tow hee is soon kindled like a pot hee soon boyls and like a candle whose tallow is mixt with brine as soon as lighted hee spits up and down the room A fool uttereth all his minde Prov. 29.11 The Septuagint render it All his anger 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
attended with the renting and roaring thunder of Gods wrath Vers 14. The Back-slider in heart shall bee filled with his own waies Hee hath made a match with mischief hee shall soon have enough of it hee hath sold himself to do wickedness and hee shall bee sure of his paiment hee hath drawn back to perdition hee hath stollen from his colours run away from his Captain 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Heb. 10.38 hee shall have Marshal-Law for it God will serve such odious Apostates as Theodorick King of Gothes did a Deacon that to engratiate with this Arrian Prince turned Arrian instead of preferring him hee cut off his head Or as that Turk served the traitour that betrayed the Rhodes His promised wife and portion were presented but the Turk told him that hee would not have a Christian to bee his Son-in-law but hee must bee a Musulman that is a beleeving Turk both within and without And therefore hee caused his baptized skin as hee called it to bee taken off and him to bee cast in a bed strawed with salt that hee might get a new skin and so hee should bee his Son-in-Law But the wicked wretch ended his life with shame and torment But a good man shall bee satisfied from himself For hee hath a spring within his own breast hee needs not shark abroad hee hath an Autarkie a self-sufficiency 1 Tim. 6.6 Hic sat lucis said Oecolampadius claping his hand on his breast when sick and asked whether the light did not offend him Another being likewise sick and asked how hee did answered My body is weak my mind is well Mr. Bolton A third when the pangs of death were upon him being asked by a very dear friend that took him by the hand whether hee felt not much pain Truly no said hee the greatest I finde is your cold hand These good men knew within themselves that they had in Heaven a better and a more enduring substance Heb. 10.34 within themselves they knew it not in others not in books but in their own experience and apprehension in the workings of their own hearts Their knowledge was non in eodicibus sed incordibus They could feelingly say that in doing of Gods will not onely for doing it or after it was now done but even whiles they were doing of it there was great reward Psal 19.11 Righteousness is its own reward and is never without a double joy to bee its strength Gaudium in re gaudium in spe gaudium de possessione Bern. gaudium de promissione gaudium de praesenti exhibitione gaudium de futura expectatione joy in hand and in hope in present possession and in certain reversion Vers 15. The simple beleeveth every word You may draw him any way with a wet finger perswade him to any thing as Rehoboam that old Baby 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was a very good rule of Epicharmus Bee not light of beleef Try before you trust look before you leap Bern. de bono desert Alioquâ— saliens antequà m videas casurus es antequà m debeas Wisdome would that as men should not bee over censorions This man blasphemeth said they of our Saviour so neither overcredulous as the giddy-headed Galathiaens were to their seducing Doctors Chap. 1.6 I wonder that yee are so soon removed c. Let us leave to the Papists Ministrorum muta officia populi caeca obsequia their Ministers dumb services their peoples blinde obediences And ever count it a singular folly to take mens bare authority in matters of faith and not to prove the spirits whether they are of God 1 Joh. 4.1 as those noble Beraeans did and are worthily renowned for it Act. 17. But the prudent man looketh well to his goings Hee looketh not so much what others beleeve or not beleeve do or not do as what hee is bound to beleeve or do Hee pins not his faith to another mans sleeve hee frames not his pace by another mans practice but walks by line and by rule treads gingerly steps warily lifts not up one foot till hee findes sure footing for the other as those Psal 35.6 This is to walk exactly accurately not as fools but as wise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Eph. 5.15 Vers 16. A wise man feareth and departeth from evil Hee trembleth at the judgements whiles they hang in the threatnings meets God with intreaties of peace and so redeems his own sorrows Solo auditu contremisco saith Hierom Speaking of that terrible text Ezek. 16.42 I tremble at the very hearing of it So Erasmus repeating those words Ezek. 3.18 His blood will I require at thy hands These saith hee are fulmina non verba not words but thunderbolts A good childe if but threatned only will amend his fault yea if hee but hear others threatned Daniel was more troubled than Nebuchadnezzar was Dan. 4.18 Habakkuck when in a vision hee saw the judgements of God that were to come upon the Caldeans it made his very heart to ake and quake within him Chap. 3.16 But the fool rageth and is confident Some render it Rangeth and is confident transit confidit so the Vulgar and Original will well enough bear it hee passeth on from sin to sin like a mad man and yet perswades himself that all shall do well such a desperate fool was Balaam though the Angel met him with a drawn sword yet hee would needs on and what was the issue hee dyed by the sword of Israel though hee seemed a friend to Israel Not to bee warned is both a just presage and desert of ruine Vers 17. Hee that is soon angry dealeth foolishly Alexander in his hot blood slew his dearest friend whom hee would have revived again with his heart-blood Qui non moderabitur irae Infectum velit esse dolor quod suaserit mens Rash anger differs from madness saith Seneca in nothing but in time onely See my Common-place of Anger And a man of wicked devices is hated i. e. Hee that beareth a grudge intending revenge as one that onely wants and therefore waits a fit time as Absolom did for Amnon this is a dangerous man and deservedly detested of all It is counted Manhood indeed its Doghooâ—â— The Curs of Congo they say bite but never bark Esau threatned Jacob. 〈◊〉 â—â—ius lentus in meditando ubi prorupisset tristioribus dictis atrocia facta conjungebat The more hee meditated revenge the more did time and delay sharpen it and the further off bee threatned the heavier the stroke fell therefore hee was generally hated as an odious miscreant Vers 18. The simple inherit folly Acceperunt per successionem seu hareditario jure so one renders it they are as wise as their fore-fathers and they are resolved to bee no wiser Me ex ea opinione quam à majoribus accepi de cultis deorum nullius unquam movebit oratio said Tully I will never forsake that way of divine service that I have received from my fore-fathers for any mans pleasure
of Sacrifices Prov. 7.14 And hereunto Saint James seems to allude Chap. 5.5 Vers 2. A wise servant shall have rule over a Son c. God hath a very gracious respect unto faithful servants and hath promised them the reward of inheritance Col. 4.24 which properly belongs to Sons This falls out sometimes here as to Joseph Joshuah those subjects that married Salomons Daughters 1 King 4.10 14. but infallibly hereafter when they shall come from East and West to sit down with Abraham Isaac and Jacob in the Kingdome of Heaven and to enter into their Masters joy but the children of the Kingdome shall bee cast out Mat. 8.11 12. Vers 3. The fining-pot is for silver c. God also hath his fire in Zion and his furnace in Jerusalem Isa 31.9 his conflatories and his crucibles wherein hee will refine his as silver is refined and try them as gold is tried Zech. 13.9 Not as if hee knew them not till hee had tried them for hee made them and therefore cannot but know them As Artificers know the several parts and properties of their works Sed tentat ut sciat id est ut scire nos faciat saith Augustin Hee therefore tries us that hee may make us know what is in us what drosse what pure metal and that all may see that wee are such as for a need can glorifie him in the very fires Isa 84.15 that the trial of our faith being much more precious than of gold that perisheth though tried in the fire may bee found to praise and honour and glory 1 Pet. 1.7 Vers 4. A wicked doer giveth heed to false lips It is an ill sign of a vicious nature to bee apt to beleeve scandalous reports of godly men If men loved not lyes they would not listen to them Some are of opinion that Solomon having said God tryeth the hearts doth in this and the two next following verses instance some particular sins so accounted by God which yet passe amongst men for no sins or peccadilloes at the utmost seeing no man seems to receive wrong by them such as these are to listen to lying lips to mock the poor to rejoyce at another mans calamity and the like Loe they that do thus though to themselves and others they may seem to have done nothing amisse yet God that tries the hearts will call them to account for these malicious miscarriages Vers 5. Hee that mocketh the poor c. See the Note on Chap. 14.31 And hee that is glad at calamities shall not bee unpunished Hee is sick of the Devils disease 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which Job was not tainted with Chap. 31. as the Edomites Ammonites Philistims and other of Sions enemies Lam. 1. were How bitterly did the Jews insult over our Saviour when they had nailed him to the Crosse And in like sort they served many of the Martyrs worrying them when they were down as Dogs do other Creatures and shooting sharp arrows at them when they had set them up for marks of their malice and mischief Herein they deal like barbarously with the Saints as the Turks did with one John de Chabes a Frenchman Turk Hist fol. 756. at the taking of Tripolis in Barbary They cut off his hands and nose and then when they had put him quick into the ground to the waste they for their pleasure shot at him with their arrows and afterwards cut his throat Mr. John Deuly Martyr being set in the fire with the burning flame about him sang a Psalm Then cruel Doctor Story commanded one of the tormentours to hurl a faggot at him whereupon being hurt therewith upon the face Act. Mon. fol. 1530. that hee bled again hee left his singing and clapt both his hands upon his face Truly said Doctor Story to him that hurled the fagot Thou hast marred a good old song This Story being after the coming in of Queen Elizabeth questioned in Parliament for many foul crimes and particularly for persecuting and burning the Martyrs hee denied not but that hee was once at the burning of an Herewigge for so hee termed it at Uxbridge Ibid. 1918. where hee cast a faggot at his face as hee was singing of Psalms and set a winnebush of thorns under his feet a little to prick him c. This wretch was afterwards hanged drawn and quartered and so this Proverb was fulfilled of him Anno. 1571. Hee that is glad at calamities shall not bee unpunished Vers 6. Childrens children are the Crown of old men That is if they bee not children that cause shame as vers 2. and that disgrace their Ancestors stain their blood If they obey their Parents counsel and follow their good example for otherwise they prove not Crowns but corrosives to their aged Sires as did Esau Absolom Andronicus and others And the glory of children are their Parents If those children so well descended do not degenerate as Jonathan the son of Gershom the son of Manasseh or rather of Moses as the Hebrews read it with a Nun suspensum Judg. 18.31 and as Elies Samuels and some of Davids sons did Heroum filii noxae Manasseh had a good Father but hee degenerated into his Grandfather Ahaz as if there had been no intervention of a Hezekiah So wee have seen the kernel of a well-fruited-plant degenerate into that crab or willow that gave the original to his stock But what an honour was it to Jacob that hee could swear by the fear of his Father Isaac To David that hee could in a real and heavenly complement say to his Maker Truly Lord I am thy servant â—â—am thy servant the son of thy handmaid Psal 116.16 To Timothy that the same Faith that was in him had dwelt first in his Mother Lois and his Grandmother Eunice 2 Tim. 1.15 To the children of the Elect Lady c. To Mark that hee was Barnabas his sisters son To Alexander and Rufus men mentioned onely Euseb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mark 15.21 but famously known in the Church to bee the sons of Simon of Cyrene To the sons of Constaintine the Great to come of such a Father whom they did wholly put on saith Eusebius and exactly resemble To bee descended of those glorious Martyrs and Confessors that suffered here in Queen Maries daies Vers 7. Excellent speech becometh not a fool A Nabal a sapless worthless fellow in whom all worth is withered and decayed qui nullas habet dicendi vires as Cicero hath it that can say no good except it bee by rote or at least by book what should hee do discoursing of high points God likes not fair words from a foul mouth Christ silenced the Devil Odi homineâ— ignava â— pâ—râ—â— philosopha sententia when hee confessed him to bee the Son of the most high God The leapers lips should bee covered according to the Law The Lacedemonians when a bad man had uttered a good speech in their Council-house liking the speech but not the speaker
than the Lion they have no power to flye from him Kings have long hands strong clutches Good therefore is the wise mans counsel Eccles 8.2 3 4. See the Note on Chap. 16.14 15. Vers 13. A foolish Son is the calamity of his Father Children are certain cares but uncertain comforts Let them prove never so towardly yet there is somewhat to do to breed them up and bring them to good But if they answer not expectation the Parents grief is unexpressible See the Note on Chap. 10.1 and 15.20 How many an unhappy Father is tempted to wish with Augustus O utinam caelebs vixissem orbusque perissem And the contentions of a wife are a continual dropping Like as a man that hath met with hard usage abroad thinks to mend himself at home but is no sooner sate down there but the rain dropping thorow the roof upon his head drives him out of doors again Conjugium Conjurgium De discordi conjugio Theomistocles dixit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Such is the case of him that hath a contentious wife a far greater cross than that of ungracious children which yet are the Fathers calamities and heart-breaks Augustus had been happy if hee had had no children Sylla if hee had had no wife All evils as elements are most troublesome when out of their proper place as impiety in Professours injustice in Judges discomfort in a wife This is like a tempest in the Haven most troublesome most dangerous Vers 14. House and riches are the inheritance of the Fathers Viz. More immediately God gives them to the Parents and they leave them to their children being moved thereto by God Though a carnal heart looks no higher than Parents cares not so hee may have it whence hee hath it It is Dos non Deus that maketh marriages with them good enough if goods enough mony is the greatest medlet and drives the bargain and business to an upsho◠Mostly such matches prove unhappy and uncomfortable How can it bee otherwise sith Hic Deus nihil fecit God indeed had a hand in it but for their just punishment that so followed after lying vanities and so forsook their own mercies But a prudent wife is of the Lord Nature makes a Woman Election a Wife but to bee prudent wise and virtuous is of the Lord. A good wife was one of the first real and royal gifts bestowed on Adam God set all the creatures before him ere hee gave him a wife that seeing no other fit help hee might prize such a gift not a gift of industry but of destiny as one saith for Marriages are made in Heaven as the common sort can say and as very Heathens acknowledge The Governour of Eskichisar hearing Othoman the Great Turk his relation of a fair Lady whom hee was in love with and had highly commended for her virtues seemed greatly to like of his choice saying that shee was by the divine providence appointed onely for him to have Turk Hist fol. 136. Vers 15. Slothfulness casteth into a deep sleep Sloth bringeth sleep and sleep poverty See this excellently set forth Chap. 6.9 10 11. See the Notes there and on chap. 10.4 Vers 16. Hee that keepeth the Commandement keepeth his own soul This is the first fruit of shaking off sloth and sleepiness Hee that stirs up himself to take hold of God Isa 64.7 and to take hold of his Covenant Isa 56.4 to love the name of the Lord and to bee his servant vers 6. to love him and keep his Commandements Exod. 20.6 to do that little hee does out of love if it bee no more than to think upon his Commandements to do them Psal 103.18 this mans soul shall bee bound up in the bundle of life hee shall finde his name written in the book of life For in vitae libro scribuntur omnes qui quod possunt faciunt etsi quod debeut non possunt saith Bernard Their names are written in Heaven who do what they can though they cannot do what they ought If there bee a willing mind 2 Cor. 8.12 God accepts according to what a man hath not according to what hee hath not Aug. Exchir cap. 32. And here also Nolentem praevenit Deus ut velit volentem subsequitur ne frustrà velit God that gives both to will and to do causeth his people to keep his Commandements Ezek. 36. Isa 26. and worketh all their works in them and for them Lex jubet gratia juvat petamus ut det quod ut habeamus jubet Aug. in Exod. quast 55. The Law commandeth but Grace helpeth let us beg that God would make us to be what hee requires us to be But hee that despiseth his waies That is Gods waies chalked out in his word See the Note on chap. 13.13 Or Hee that despiseth his own waies Aut mentem aut restim comparandum Chrysip lives carelesly and at randome walks at all adventures with God cui vita est incomposita possimè morata contra gnomonem canonem Decalogi a loose and lawless person hee shall dye not a natural death onely as all do but spiritual and eternal There is but an inch betwixt him and hell which already gapes for him and will certainly swallow him up Vers 17. Hee that hath pitty upon the poor lendeth c. This is a second fruit of shaking off sloth and working with the hands the thing that is good Ephes 4.28 that one may have to give to him that needeth Hee doth not give it but lend it God accepts it both as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as a gift and a Loue saith Basil Nay Orat. de Eleemos he lends it upon usury Faeneratur Domino and that to the Lord who both binds himself to repay and gives us security for it under his own hand here Hee will pay him again to bee sure of it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Piel hee will fully and abundantly repay him mostly in this world but infallibly in the world to come Evagrius in Cedrenus bequeathed three hundred pounds to the poor in his Will but took a bond before-hand of Synesius the Bishop for the repayment of it in another life And the very next night saith the history after his departure appearing to him in his shape delivered in the bond cancelled and fully discharged Vers 18. Chasten thy Son while there is hope See the Note on chap. 13.24 Vers 19. A man of great wrath shall suffer punishment Hee that laies the reynes in the neck and sets no bounds to his wrath whether in chastising his childe or otherwise shall bee sure to smart for it shall bring himself and his friends into great trouble Such therefore as are cholerick should pray much and prevent all occasions of wrath as Callius and Cotis because they would not bee stirred up to anger burned their enemies letters before they were read The like did Pompey to the Letters of Sertorius and Casar to Pompey's Letters
Ep 120. whiles as grasse they flourish and then de-flourish And thine expectation shall not be cut off As the wickeds shall Psal 37.38 Chear up therefore and doe not despond Flebile principium melior fortuna sequatur as Queen Elizabeth was wont to say whiles she was yet a prisoner Then she envied the Milk-maid that sang so merrily But if she had known what a glorious reign she should have had for four and forty years she would not have envied her Vers 19. Hear thou my son and be wise Hearing is one of the learned senses as Aristotle calls it Wisedome entreth into the soul by this door as folly did at first when the woman listned to the old Serpents illusions This sense is first up in a morning and this preface the Wise-man purposely premiseth to his following discourse as well knowing how hardly young men are drawn off from drinking matches and Good-fellow-meetings And guide thine heart in the way That is to say let knowledge and affection be as twins and run parallel let them mutually transfuse life and vigour the one into the other Practise Gods Will as fast as thou understandest it The Tigurine translation reads it Vt beatum fit in via cor tuum that thine heart may be blessed in the way Vers 20. Be not amongst Wine-bibbers Follow not the custom nor company of such thou knowest not what thou maist be drawn to doe though of thy self averse to such evil courses Noah got no good by the luxurious old world Matth. 24.38 with whom he lived Nor Lot by the intemperate Sodomites Ezek. 16.49 Vriah a good man was at length over-perswaded to over-drink himself 2 Sam. 11.13 Let him that stands take heed last he fall That evil servant that presumes to eat and drink with the drunken 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shall be cut off in the middle Matth. 24.49 Among â—iâ—tous caters of flesh Amongst flesh-mongers qui crapula indulgent that pamper their panches In cute curanda plus aequo operaci See my Common-place of abstinence These be all for themselves as Nabal was Helluantursibi carnem so the Hebrew runs they ravin up flesh for themselves Vers 21. For the drunkard shall come to poverty Nay to eternal misery in Hell 1 Cor. 6.10 but few men fear that beggery they hold worse than any hell Per mare pauperiem fuginal per saxa per ignes Herat. But poverty to such is but a prelude to a worse matter Vers 22. Hearken to thy father c. See the Note on chap. 1.8 And despise not thy mother when she is old Dr. Taylour Martyr said to his Son among other things when he was to suffer When thy mother is waxed old forsake her not Act. M on 138. but provide for her to thy power and see that shee lack nothing for so will God blesse thee and give thee long life upon Earth and prosperity Vers 23. Buy the truth and sell it not Every parcell of truth is precious as the filings of gold as the Bezar-stone when beaten are carefully lookt to and preserved Hold last the faithfull word as with both hands Tit. 1.9 Strive together for the faith of the Gospel Phil. 1.27 Be zealous for it Jude 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Either live with it or dye for it As we have received it as a legacy from our fore-fathers who sealed it with their bloud and paid dear for it so we must transmit it to our Posterity pure and entire Arrii 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nestorii 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whatever it stands us in They were so religious that they would not exchange a letter or syllable of the faith wherewith Christ had betrusted them So zealous in buying the truth that they would give five marks and more for a good book and that was more mony than ten pound is now Some gave a load of hay for a few Chapters of Saint James or of Saint Paul in English sitting up all night in reading and hearing c. What a deal of charge was the Queen of Sheba at for Salomons wisdome The wise Merchant for the pearl of price Act. Mon. fol. 756. Hieron and Reuchlin for their Hebrew-learning Pro singulis horis singulos aureos numerabant Reuchlin gave a crown an hour to the Jew that read to him Mat. 13.44 Hieron ventured his life to repair by night to a Jew-doctor Vers 24. The Father of the righteous c. See the Note on chap. 10.1 Vers 26. My son give me thy heart There is a strange strife not of earthly but of spiritual powers after the possession of mans heart and through mans transgression Satan hath gotten strong hold thereon Act. 5.3 Luke 22.3 Once he strove about a dead mans body Jude 9. but doubtlesse his purpose was therein to have set up an Idol for himself in the hearts of the living If Satan can get the heart he is safe and so is Satans Vicar It was a watch-word in Pope Gregory the thirteenths time in Queen Elizabeths days My son give me thy heart Be in heart a Papist and then go to Church dissemble do what ye will Among the Heathens when the beast was cut up for sacrifice the first thing the Priest lookt upon was the heart and if the heart were naught the sacrifice was rejected As among the Jews Philo observeth that the heart and the horns or brains were never offered with the sacrifices for they are the fountains and secret cels wherein lurks and out of which flows all impiety But whatever was in the type this is in the truth As the heart is by nature the Lord will have none of it yet till the heart be renewed and given to the Lord he will accept nothing can come from man Esay 29.13 and 66.3 Jer. 42.20 Of the heart God seems to say to us as Joseph did to his brethren concerning Benjamin Gen. 43.3 Ye shall not see my face without it The heart is Christs bed of spices Cant. 6.2 wherein the delights Psal 50.17 and for which he wisheth Deut. 5.29 O that there were such an heart c. And let thine eyes observe my ways Look well to thy pattern so fairly pensild out unto thee take true stitches out of this perfect sampler take right strokes after this incomparable Copy The Hebr. here hath it Let thine eyes run through my ways Get a full prospect of them and diligently peruse them Fix and feed thine eyes upon the best objects and restrain them from gazing up on forbidden beauties lest they prove to be windows of wickedness and loopholes of lust Vers 27. For an whore is a deep ditch Fitly so called quod nullus neque modus neque finis sit in amore meritricio because lust is boundless bottomless Hee is a perfect slave that serves a whore See the Note on Prov. 22.14 Vers 28. She also lyeth in wait Terence calls harlots Cruces crumeninculgas sordida poscinummia c. base beg-pennies
that found his Glove with a desire to restore it him Mr. Sam. Ward but pursued inwardly with a guilty conscience leaps over a hedge plunges into a Marle-pit behind it unseen and unthought of wherein he was drowned But the righteous is bold as a Lion Conscientia pura semper secura a good Conscience hath sure confidence and he that hath it sits Noah like Medius tranquillus in undis quiet in the greatest combustions freed if not from the common destruction yet from the common distraction for he knows whom hee hath trusted and is sure that neither life nor death nor things present nor things to come Rom. 8.38 can ever sunder him from Gods love in Christ He is bold as a Lion saith the Text yea as a young Lion that is in his hot bloud and therefore fears no other creature yea when he is fiercely pursued hee will never once alter his gate though he dye for it No more will the righteous man his resolution against sin such is his Christian courage Daniel chose rather to be cast to the lyons than to bear a lyon in his own bosome to violate his conscience The primitive Christians chose rather to be abandoned ad leones quam ad lenones they preferred affliction before sin And this their persecutors counted not courage and magnanimity but wilfulness and obstinacy Tertul. in Apolog But they knew not the power of the Spirit nor the privy armour of proof that the righteous have about their hearts that insuperable faith whereby some have stopped the mouths of lyons quenched the violence of fire c. Heb. 11.33.34 and whereby they do all daily encounter and conquer that roaring lyon the devil quenching his fiery darts c. Eph. 6. Vers 2. For the transgression of a land many are the Princes Either many at once or many ejecting and succeeding one another to the great calamity and utter undoing of the People as may be seen in the books of Judges and Kings as in the Roman state after Nero's death by the succession of Galba Otho and Vitellius What a deal of trouble was here in the time of the Heptarchy and in the dissensions of the two houses of York and Lancaster causing the death of twice as many natives of England Daniels hist 249. as were lost in the two conquests of France besides 80 Princes of the blood royal slain And all this is said to be for the transgression of a land thus chastised by the LORD Elihu tells Job that the hypocrite is set to reign for the peoples sin Job 34. and Levit. 26. it is threatned as an heavy curse If yee still trespass against mee I will set Princes over you that shall hate you mischievous odious Princes odious to God malignant to the People And Isa 3.4 I will give children to be their Princes and babes shall rule over them How many Kings had the ten Tribes after their defection from the house of David and not one good one amongst them all And what got most of the Roman Cesars by their hasty honours nisi ut citius interficorentur saith one but to be slain the sooner Very few of them till Constantine but died unnatural deaths If ye do wickedly ye shall perish both you and your King 1 Sam. 12.25 But by a man of understanding and knowledge As one sinner may destroy much good Eccles 9.18 so one excellently wise man called here a man of understanding knowledge there is no copulative in the Original the state may be prolonged there may be a lengthening of its tranquillity it may be delivered by the pureness of thine hands Job 22.30 See 2 Sam. 20.16 c. Eccles 9.13 c. Jer. 5.1 Religious and prudent Princes especially may do much in this case 2 King 22.20 Vers 3. A poor man that oppresseth the poor c. Such an oppressour bites hard as a lean louse doth makes clean work plunders to the life as they say omnia corradit converret Poor men should pitty poor men as knowing the misery of poverty but to oppress or defraud their comperes is greatest inhumanity as that merciless fellow servant did Matth. 18.28 c. A Weesel is a ravenous beast as well as a Lyon a Sparrow-hauk as greedy as an Eagle and more mercy is to be expected from those more noble creatures than from the base and abject Vers 4. They that forsake the Law praise the wicked As Machiavel doth Cesar Borgia that bipedum nequissimum proposing him for a pattern to all Christian Princes as Onuphrius the Popes Biographer doth Hildebrand or Gregory 7th in five books written of his noble acts and great virtues whom Cardinal Benno truly describeth to have been a murtherer an adulterer Epiphan barcâ— 38. a conjurer a Schismatick an heretick and every way as bad as might be Epiphanius tells us that there were a sort of brain-sick hereticks that cried up Cain and were therefore called Cainites They also commended the Sodomites Korah Judas the traitour c. In the book of Judith the act of Simeon and Levi upon the Shechemites is extolled and there was one Bruno that wrote an Oration in commendation of the devil But they that keep the law contend with them Moved with a zeal of God they cannot be silent As Craesus his dumb son they cry out Wilt thou â—ill my father dishonour my God c Good blood will never belye it self good metal will appear How did young David bristle against black-mouthed Goliah and enter the lists with him Do not I hate them that hate thee saith he Psal 139. Yea I hate them with a perfeâ—â— hatred I cast down the gauntlet of defiance against them I count them mine enemies Asa cannot bear with Idolatry no not in his own mother Our Edward the sixth would by no means yield to a toleration for his sister Mary though solicited thereunto by Cranmer and Ridley for politick respects Mihi quâ—dem Auxentius non alius erit quam diabolus quamdiu Arrianus said Hilary I shall look upon Auxentius as a devil so long as he is an Arrian It was the speech of blessed Luther who though he was very earnest to have the Communion administred in both kinds contrary to the doctrine and custome of Rome yet if the Pope saith he as Pope commanded me to receive it in both kinds I would but receive it in one kind sith to obey what he commands as Pope is a receiving of the mark of the beast Vers 5. Evill men understand not judgement They are wise to do evil but to do good they have no knowledge their wits work not that way they are bard and brutish as horse and asse Psal 32. Yea they fall beneath the stirrup of reason and know not their owner which yet the ox and asse doth Esa 1.3 no wiser at 70 years old than at seven Ut liberius peccent libenter ignorant not willing to know what they are not minded to practice But they
behold the face of God the Father and of his Son here is one held forth in the next verse Vers 5. Every word of God is pure Oda septima Pind. tanta fuit admirationis apud Rhodios ut fuerit scripta in templo aure is literis c. Joh. Manl. loc Com. 414. he is a shield Albeit all the sacred sentences contain'd in this blessed book are pure precious and profitable yet as one star in Heaven out-shineth another so doth one Proverb another and this is among the rest velut inter stellas luna minores an eminent sentence often recorded in Scripture and far better worthy than ever Pindarus his seventh Ode was to be written in letters of gold Every word of God is pure purer than gold tried in the fire Rev. 3.17 purer than silver tried in a furnace and seven times purified Psal 12.6 Julian therefore that odious Apostate is not to be hearkened to who said there was as good stuff in Phocillides as in Salomon in Pindarus his Odes as in Davids Psalms Nor is that brawling dog Porphyry to be regarded who blasphemously accuseth Daniel the Prophet and Matthew the Evangelist Spec. Europae as writers of lies Os durum The Jesuits some of them say little less of Saint Pauls Epistles which they could wish by some means censured and reformed as dangerous to be read and savouring of heresie in some places Traditions they commonly account the touch-stone of doctrine and foundation of faith the Scriptures to be rather a Commonitorium as Bellarmine calls it a kind of store-house for advice Greg. in 3. Reg. then Cor animam Dei the heart and soul of God as Gregory calls them a Fortress against Errours Firmamentum contra errores Aug. in Johan 1. Tract 2. Possevin Appar sac verbo Pat. Antiq as Augustine The Apostle calleth concupiscence sin at non licet nobis ita loqui but we may not call it so saith Possevine the Jesuit The Author to the Hebrews saith Marriage is honourable among all men but the Rhemists on 1 Cor. 7.9 say that the marriage of Priests is the worst sort of incontinency Christ saith the Sin against the Holy Ghost hath no remission Bellarmine saith that it may be forgiven The Council of Constance comes in with a non-obstance against Christs institution Lib. 2. de Paeâ—it cap. 16. Montan. in 1 Cor. 14. withholding the Cup from the People at the Sacrament And a Parisian Doctor tells us that although the Apostle would have sermons and service celebrated in a known tongue yet the Church for very good cause hath otherwise ordered it Bishop Bonners Chaplain called the Bible in scorn his little pretty Gods book and judged it worthy to be burnt tanquam doctrina peregrina as strange doctrine Gilford and Raynolds said it contained some things prophane and apocryphal Others have stiled it the mother of heresie and therefore not fit to be read by the common people lest they suck poyson out of it Prodigious blasphemy Of the purity and perennity of the holy Scriptures See more in my True treasure pag. 85.139 He is a shield to them that put their trust in him See Gen. 15.1 with the note and Prov. 29.25 Buxtorf Tiberias Vers 6. Adde thou not unto his words As the Jews at this day do by their traditions which they arrogantly call Mashlamnutha Completio perfectio because they think that thereby the Law is compleated and perfected as the Artemonites Brightm upon Rev. p. 292. and after them the school-men corrupted the Scripture out of Aristotle and Theophrastus turning all into questions and quillets As Mahomet joyned his Alfurta his service book an horrible heap of all blasphemies to the three parts of holy Scripture as he divides them the Law Psalmes and Gospel As the Papists adde their humane inventions and unwritten verities which they equallize unto if not prefer before the book of God as appears by that Heathenish decree of the Council of Trent And when at the Council of Basil the Hussites denied to receive any doctrine that could not be proved by Scripture Jacob Revius hist Pontif. p. 235. Cardinal Cusan answered that Scriptures were not of the being of the Church but of the well-being and that they were to be expounded according to the current rite of the Church which if it change its mind the judgement of God is also changed Lastly such adde to Gods Word as wrest it and rack it making it speak that which it never thought causing it to go two miles where it would go but one gnawing and tawing it to their own purposes as the Shoo-maker taws his upper-leather with his teeth Tertullian calls Marcion the heretick Mus Ponticus of his arroding and gnawing the Scripture to make it serviceable to his errours Lest he reprove thee Both verbally and penally both with words and blows Lest he severely punish thee as one that addes to his will or imbaseth his coyn And thou be found a lier As all Popish forgers and foysters at this day are found to be God hath ever raised up such as have detected their impostures and vindicated the purity and perfection of the sacred Scriptures Vers 7. Two things have I required of thee Two special requests he had among many for our present condition is a condition of singular vanity and indigency we get our living by begging and are never without somewhat to bee required of God never without out wants and aylments and sutes for supplies Deny me them not See here both his familiarity with God in Prayer and his importunity for a lazie Sutâ—r beggs a denial Agur therefore re-enforceth his request it was honest else he would never have begun it but being so he is resolved to follow it So doth David with his one thing which hee did desire and he would desire Psal 27.4 he would never give it over So Jacob would have a blessing and therefore wrastles with might and slight and this he doth in the night and alone and when God was leaving him and upon one legge He had a hard pull of it and yet he prevailed Let me goe saith God No thou shalt not goe saith Jacob till I have my request It is not unlawful for us to be unmannerly in Prayer to be importunate and after a sort impudent 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Luke 11.8 Propter improbitatem Luke 18.8 Was not the Woman of Canaan so Matth. 15.22 Shee came for a Cure and a Cure she would have and had it too with an high commendation of her heroical faith Christ he was no Penny-father he had more blessings than one even the abundance of Spirit for them that ask it When poor men make requests to us we usually answer them as the Eccho doth the voyce the answer cuts off half the Petition if they ask us two things we think we deal well if we grant them one Few Naamans that when you beg one talent will force
Ephes 2.14 New attendance Psal 91.11 New wages new work Isa 62.11 A new Commandement 1 Joh. 2.8 A new Covenant Jer. 31.33 A new way to Heaven Heb. 10.20 And a new Mansion in Heaven Joh. 14.2 2 Cor. 5.8 Vers 11. There is no remembrance of former things None to speak of How many memorable matters were never recorded How many ancient records long since perished How many fragments of very good Authors are come bleeding to our hands that live as many of our Castles doe but only by their ruines God hath by a Miracle preserved the holy Bible from the injury of times and Tyrants who have sought to abolish it There wee have a true remembrance of former things done in the Church by Abraham and his off-spring when the Grandees of the Earth Ninus Belus c. lye wrapt up in the sheet of shame or buried in the grave of utter oblivion Diodorus Siculus confesseth that all Heathen antiquities before the Theban and Trojan Warres are either fabulous relations or little better Ezra that wrote one of the last in the Old Testament lived afore any Chronicles of the world now extant in the world Neither shall there be any remembrance Unless transmitted to posterity by Books and Writings which may preserve and keep alive their memory and testifie for their Authors that such have one day lived Quis nosset Erasmum Chilias aeternum si latuisset opus Niniveh that great City is nothing else but a sepulture of her self no more shall Rome be ere long Time shall triumph over it when it shall but then live by fame if at all as others now doe Vers 12. I the Preacher was King over Israel And so had all the helps that heart could wish the benefit of the best Books and Records that men or mony could bring me in the happinesse of holy conference beside mine own plentiful experience and therefore you may well give credit to my verdict Mr. Fox had a large Commission under the Great Seal to search for all such Monuments Manuscripts Registers legier-Legier-books as might make for his purpose in setting forth that worthy Work the Acts and Monuments of the Church of England And the like had Polydor Virgil for the framing of his History though with unlike successe for he had the ill hap to write nothing well saith one Peacham save the life of Henry the seventh wherein he had reason to take a little more pains than ordinary the Book being dedicated to Henry the eighth his Son See the note on vers 1. Vers 13. And I gave my heart to seek and search out by wisdome God had given Solomon a large heart and great store of wisdome and this made him not more idle but more industrious more sedulous and serious in seeking and searching out by wisdome i. e. by the best skill that hee had maturely and methodically the causes properties and effects with the reason of all things that are and are done under heaven Neither did he this in pride and curiosity as Hugo de Sancto Victore here sharply censureth him but soberly and modestly setting down his disquisitions and observations of things Political and Natural for the use of posterity And forasmuch as these are now lost because haply too much admired and trusted to 1 King 4 3â— by those that had the use of them under the first Temple in and with the which some Jewes say they were burnt what an high price should we all set upon this and the other two Books of Solomon the wisest of men as not Apollo but the true God of Heaven hath called him and commended him unto us Surely as in the Revelation Heaven never opened but some great Mystery was revealed some Divine Oracle uttered So we may be confident that the Holy Ghost never sets any Pen-man of Scripture a work but for excellent purpose And if we dis-regard it he will complain of us as once Hos 8.12 I have written for them the great things of my Law but they were counted as a strange thing As for those other worthy Works of Solomon the fruits of this privie search into the natures of the Creatures here mentioned that the injury of time hath bereft us of how much better may we say of them Rolloc de vocatione p. 130. than a godly and learned man once did of Origens Octapla Hujus operis jacturam deplorare possumus compensare non possumus This great losse we may well bewayl but cannot help Vers 14. I have seen all the works that are done I have seen them and set down mine observations of them 1 King 4.33 Pliny did somewhat like unto this in his Natural History which work of his saith Erasmus Non minus varium est quam ipsa rerum natura imo non opus sed the saurus sed vere mundus rerum cognitu dignissimarum it hath as much variety in it as Nature her self hath To speak truth it is not a Work but a Treasury nay a world of things most worthy to be known of all men And behold all is vanity and vexation of spirit Nothing in themselves and yet of sufficient activity to inflict vengeance and vexation upon the spirit of a man so farre are they from making him truly happy They doe but feed the soul with wind as the text may be rendred wind gotten into the veins is a sore vexation Vers 15. That which is crooked cannot bee made streight Most men are so wedded and wedged to their wicked wayes that they cannot bee rectified but by an extraordinary touch from the hand of Heaven 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hes Hesiod speaking of God saith that he can easily set crooked things streight and only hee Holy Melanchthon being himself newly converted thought it impossible for his Hearers to withstand the evidence of the Gospel But after he had been a Preacher a while he complained that old Adam was too hard for young Melanchthon and yet besides the singular skil and learning that God had given him for the which he merited to be called the Phoenix of Germany Ad cum modum in hoc vitae theatro versatum Philippum Melanchthonem apparet saith a friend and Scholar of his i. e. It well appeareth that Melanchthon was Solomon-like on this wise busied upon the Theatre of his life that seeing and observing all he could he made profit of every thing and stored his heart as the Bee doth her Hive out of all sorts of flowers for the common benefit Howbeit he met with much crosness and crookedness that wrâ—ng many tears from him as it did likewise from St. Paul Phil. 3.18 not in open enemies only as Eccius and other Papists but in professed friends as Flaccius Osiander Melch. Adam in vita Mel Melanchthon mortuus tantum non ut blasphemus in Deum cruci affigitur Zanch. Miscel ep ded c. who not only vexed him grievously whiles alive but also fell foul upon him when he was dead
rich fool in the Gospel either knew not or considered not Eat drink and bee merry said he to himself but God was not in all his thoughts How much better David Hope in the Lord saith he to himself and others and be doing good dwell in the Land and verily thou shalt be fed Psal 37.3 Vers 14. I know that whatsoever God doth it shall be for ever i. e. That his Decree is unchangeable that his counsel shall stand Prov. 19. that the Sun may sooner be stopt in his course than God hindered of his will or in his work sith his power and grace is irresistable Nature Angels Devils Men may all be resisted and so miss of their design Not so God For who hath resisted his will Vain men whiles like proud and yet brittle clay they will be knocking their sides against the solid and eternal Decree of God break themselves in peeces 1 King 1. as Adoniah did And whilest with Pompey vanquished by Julius Caesar they complain that there is a great mist upon the eye of Divine Providence they doe but blame the Sun because of the sorenesse of their blear eyes Certain it is and Solomon knows it though the best of Heathens doubted of it when they saw good men suffer bad men prosper that every Creature walks blind-fold only he that dwels in light sees whither they goe and that the Charrets of all effects and actions come forth from between those mountains of Brasse Gods provident Decrees and counsels most firm and immutable Zach. 5.6 That men should fear before him And not lay the reigns in the neck casting away all care upon pretence of Gods decree as that French King did Ludo. 11. that thus desperately argued Si salvabor salvabor si vero damnabor damnabor If I shall bee saved I shall bee saved and if I shall bee damned I shall bee damned therefore I will live as I list This was to suck poyson out of a sweet flower to dash against the Rock of ages to fall into the pit like a profane beast which was digged for better purpose Exod. 21.23 to stumble at the word an ill sign and yet an ordinary sinne whereunto also they were appointed 1 Pet. 2.8 A bridge is made to give men safe passage over a dangerous River but hee that stumbleth on the bridge is in danger to fall into the River So here Vers 15. That which hath been is now c. viz. With God to whom all things are present Rom. 4.17 2 Pet. 3.8 Jer. 1.5 6 7. Hence God is said to know future things Exod. 3.9 John 18.4 not to foreknow them For indeed neither foreknowledge nor remembrance are properly in God sith his whole Essence is wholly an eye or a mind it is the example or pattern of all things so that hee needs but to look upon himself and then hee seeth all things as in a glass The eye of man beholds many things at once as Ants in a mole-hill but if it will see other things at the same time it must remove the sight The mind of man can take in a larger circuit even a City a Country a World but this it doth onely in the lump or whole masse of it for else it must remove from form to form and from thought to thought But God takes all at once most stedfastly and perfectly All things without him are but as a point or ball which with as much ease hee discerneth as wee turn our eyes And God requireth that which is past Or enquireth asketh that which is by-gone hee bespeaks it as present calling those things that are not as if they were Non aliter scivit Deus creatae quam creanda saith Austin God knew things to be created as if they had been before created Vers 16. The place of judgement that wickedness was there i. e. That wrong reigned in the places of Judicature that Justice was shamefully perverted and publick Authority abused to publick injury Cato saw as much in the Roman States and complained that private robbers were laid in cold irons A. Gell. lib. 21. cap. 16. when publick theeves went in gold chains and were cloathed in Purple Another not without cause complains that even among us Christians some follow the administration of Justice as a trade onely with an unquenchable and unconscionable desire of gain which justifies the common resemblance of the Courts of Justice to the Bush whereto whiles the Sheep flyes for defence in ill weather hee is sure to lose part of his fleece Such wickedness saw the Wiseman in the place of Judgement where hee least looked for it God himself looked for judgement but behold a scab Isa 5.7 So the Hebrew hath it Vers 17. I said in my heart God shall judge c. Hee did not deny the Divine Providence as Averroes for this cause did much less did hee turn Atheist with Diagoras because hee could not have Justice done upon a fellow that had stollen a Poem of his and published it in his own name But hee concluded within himself Psal 37. that God would surely take the matter into his own hand Judge those unrighteous Judges right and relieve the oppressed bring forth their righteousness as the light and their innocency as the noon-day if not in this world yet certainly at that great Assizes to bee held by his sonne Because hee hath appointed a day in the which hee will judge the world in righteousness whereof hee hath given assurance to allmen c. Act. 17 31. His petty Sessions he keepeth now letting the Law pass upon some few corrupt Judges by untimely death disgraces banishment remorse of conscience c. as hee did upon Judge Morgan that condemned the Lady Jane Gray Judge Hales Belknap Empson Dudley that I speak not of Pilate Felix c. reserving the rest till the great Assizes 1 Tim. 5.24 Some hee punisheth here lest his Providence but not all lest his patience and promise of Judgement should be called into question as Austin well observeth His two and twenty learned Books De civitate Dei were purposely written to clear up this truth And so were Salvians eight Books De gubernatione Dei de justo praesentique ejus judicio Vers 18. That they might see that they themselves are beasts It is reckoned a great matter that wicked men are made to know themselves to bee but men and no more Psal 37 22. Psal 9.20 But God will make good men see and say with David Ambr. in Psal 72. So foolish was I and ignorant I was as a Beast before thee Pulchre addidit Apúd te saith Ambrose upon those words Elegantly said the Psalmist Before thee because in respect of God what is man but an unreasonable Beast He that is wisest among men Socrat. apud Platon said Socrates who himself was held the wisest of men if hee bee compared to God Simia videbitur non sapiens hee will seem rather an Ape
Mon. 865. than swear The Merindolians those antient French Protestants were known by this through all the Country of Province that they would not swear nor easily bee brought to take an oath except it were in judgement or making some solemn covenant Vers 3. This is an evil Hoc est pessimum so Hierome the Vulgar and Tremellius renders it this is the worst evil this is wickedness with a witness scil that sith there is one event to all graceless men should therehence conclude that sith there is one event to all graceless men should therehence conclude that it is a bootless business a course of no profit to serve God Hence they walk about the world with hearts as full as hell of lewd and lawless lusts Hence they run a madding after the pleasures of sin which with a restlesse giddiness they earnestly pursue yea they live and die in so doing saith the Wise-man here noting their final impenitency that hate of Heaven and gate to Hell Ex primis per 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 eorum sermones Lav. Joh. 24. Sic Benedic 9. Alexand. 6. Leo. 10. Vers 4. For to him that is joyned to all the living there is hope These are the words of those wicked ones whose lives and hopes end together whose song is Post mortem nulla voluptas when life ends there is an end of all Is there not such language in some mens hearts who knows whether there bee any such thing as a life to come c. Now I shall know said that dying Pope whether the soul of man bee immortal yea or no and whether that tale concerning Christ have any truth in it Oh wretch So a living Dogg is better than a dead Lion But so is not a living sinner better that a dead Saint for the righteous hath hope in his death and they that dye in the Lord are blessed Rev. 14.13 how much more if they also dye for the Lord these love not their lives unto the death Rev. 12.11 but go as willingly to dye as ever they did to dine being as glad to leave the world for a better especially as men are wont to bee to rise from the board when they have eaten their fill to take possession of a Lordship Cur non ut plenus vitae conviva recedis Lucret. Vers 5. For the living know that they shall dye Hence that Proverb amongst us As sure as death Howbeit that they think little of it to any good purpose appears by that other Proverb I thought no more of it than of my dying-day But the dead know not any thing So it seemeth to those Atheists that deny the immortality of the soul but they shall know at death that there is another life beyond this wherein the righteous shall bee comforted Luk. 16.25 and their knowledge perfected but the wicked tormented and with nothing more than to know that such and such poor souls as they would have disdained to have set with the Doggs of their flocks are now sitting down with Abraham Job 30.1 Luk. 13.28 Isaac and Jacob in the Kingdome of God and themselves thrust out into utter darkness Augustin in tenebras extenebris infeliciter exclusi infelicius excludendi Neither have they any more a reward What Psal 58.11 not a reward for the righteous Not a certain fearful looking for of judgement and fiery indignation which shall devour evil-doers That were strange Heb. 10.27 But wicked men would fain perswade themselves so ut liberius peccent libenter ignorant Bern 2 Pet. 2.5 Of these things they are willingly ignorant For the memory of them is forgotten This is true in part but not altogether Joseph was forgotten in Egypt Gideon in Israel Exod. 1 Judg. 9 Joash remembred not the kindness which Jehoiadah had done to him but slew his son 2 Chron. 24.22 Nevertheless the foundation of God stands firm having this seal the Lord knoweth them that are his 2 Tim. 2 Mal. 3.16 Luk. 10.20 and there is a book of remembrance written before him for them that fear the Lord their names are written in Heaven and the memory of the just is blessed Proverbs 10.7 See the Note there Vers 6. Also their love and their hatred c. Here is lie upon lie The Atheist as hee had denyed knowledge to the dead so here hee denies affections as love hatred envy or zeal as Hierome renders it But it is certain that those that are dead in Jesus do very dearly love God and hate evil with a perfect hatred The wicked on the other side continue in that other world to hate God and goodness to love such as themselves are to stomach the happiness of those in Heaven c. Vers 7. Go thy way eat thy bread with joy Vade juste Go thy way thou righteous man live in cheerfulness of mind proceeding from the testimony of a good conscience so Lyra senseth the words Gods grace and favour turned brown bread and water into manchet and wine to the Martyrs in prison Rejoyce not thou O Israel for joy as other people for thou hast gone a whoring from thy God Hos 9.1 Thou eatest thy bane thou drinkest thy poison because to the impure all things are impure and without faith it is impossible to please God Prov. 29.6 In the transgression of an evil man there is a snare or a cord to strangle his joy with but the righteous doth sing and rejoyce Hee may do so hee must do so what should hinder him hee hath made his peace with God and is rectus in curia let him bee merry at his meals lightsome and spruise in his cloaths cheerful with his wife and children 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Jam. 5.13 c. Is any man merry at heart saith St. James is hee right set and hath hee a right frame of soul is all well within let him sing Psalms yea as a traveller rides on merrily and wears out the rediousnesse of the way by singing sweet songs unto himself so should the Saints Thy statutes have been my songs in the house of my pilgrimage Psal 119.54 Vers 8. Let thy garments bee alwayes white i. e. Neat spruse cleanly comely Or by a metaphor it may signifie Be merry in good manner for they used to wear white clothing on Festivals Devita theoretica Stuckius in Antiq. conviv Anton. Margarit and at Weddings as Philo witnesseth At this day also the Jewes come to their Synagogues in white rayment the day before the Calends of September which is their New-years-tide Purple was affected by the Romans white by the Jewes see Jam. 2.2 Hence Pilate clad Christ in purple Matth. 27.28 Herod in white Luke 23.11 Herod himself Acts 12.21 was arrayed in royal apparrel that is in cloth of silver saith Josephus which being beaten upon by the Sun-beams dazeled the peoples eyes and drew from them that blasphemous acclamation The voyce of God and not of man And let thine
gold that is upon a foundation both fine and firm for gold hardly rusteth or cankereth whence it was likely that Tithonus and his Son Memnon when they built the City of Susa in Persia they joyned the stones together with gold as Cassiodorus writeth Christs power is founded upon his divine Nature and this is the Rock upon which the Church is built and whereby it is set in safety from all miseries and molestations satanical or secular The gates of Hell shall not prevail against her Christ and the Father are one Psal 89.19 therefore none shall take her out of his hands God hath laid help upon one that is mighty even upon Emanuel the mighty strong God as hee is called Isa 9.6 declared to bee the Son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness by the resurrection from the dead Rom. 1.4 that your Faith and hope might bee in God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Prorsus perpotuo perfecte 1 Pet. 1.21 Trust perfectly therefore to or hope to the end for the grace that is to bee brought unto you at the Revelation of Jesus sith hee is able to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him 1 Pet. 1.13 Heb. 7.25 His countenance is as Lebanon His aspect his look or general view i. e. Whatsoever of himself Christ is pleased to manifest and lay open unto us is pleasant and delightful goodly and glorious excellent and eximious choice as the Cedars that are chosen before other trees and why see the Note on chap. 1.17 Vers 16. His mouth is most sweet Heb. His palat that is his word and promises which are as it were the breath of Christs mouth is all sweet This shee had celebrated before vers 13. but as not satisfied therewith shee repeats it and rolls it again as sugar under her tongue Shee doubles this commendation to shew that that is the chief lovely thing in Christ his Word this fruit shee had found sweet unto her palat chap. 2.3 and shee spareth not to set it forth as here the second time Mallemus carere c. Wee had rather bee without Fire Water Bread Sun Air c. saith a Dutch Divine than that one sweet sentence of our blessed Saviour Come unto mee all yee that are weary c. Yea hee is altogether lovely Totus totus desiderabilis wholly amiable every whit of him to bee desired Moses thought him so when hee preferred the reproach of Christ the worst part of him the heaviest peece of his cross before all the treasures in Egypt that Magazin of the world Heb. 11.26 Those of this world see no such excellency and desireableness in Christ and his waies Psal 22.7 nor can do till soundly shaken Hag. 2.7 I will shake all Nations and then the desire of all Nations that is Christ shall come with stirring affections saying as Isa 26.9 with my soul have I desired thee in the night yea with my spirit within mee will I seek thee early Loe this is the voice of every true childe of the Church and these desires of the righteous shall bee satisfied Prov. 10.24 This is my Beloved c. q.d. You may see I have cause to seek after him neither can you do better than to do likewise howsoever when you see him do my errand to him as vers 7. And here wee have most excellent Rhetorick which in the beginning of a speech requires 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 milder affections in the end of it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 stronger passions that may leaved deepest impressions CHAP. VI. Vers 1. Whither is thy Beloved gone c ALL Christs Disciples are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 inquisitive after the truth that is in Jesus Ephes 4.21 and are fellow-helpers to it John 3.8 There is also quid divinum in auscultatione as one well noteth that is a strange and strong energy or forcibleness in hearing whether publiquely or in private conference Christ and his excellencies displayed and discoursed of Let but his name as an ointment bee powred out and the Virgins can do no less than love him Cant. 1.3 These daughters of Jerusalem are by hearing the Church describing her Spouse and painting him out in lively colours fired up to an holy contention in godliness and might they but know where to have him they would bee at any pains to partake of the benefit 1 Tim. 6.2 They wondred at first why shee should make such ado about Christ But when they conversed a while with her and had heard her speak with such affection and admiration they are turned and will now go seek him with her God is pleased many times to water the holy meetings and conferences of his people with blessing beyond expectation or belief Wee should frame our selves to an easie discourse of the glory of Christs Kingdome and talk of his power Psal 145.8 9. Our tongues in this argument should bee as the pen of a ready writer Psal 45.1 that wee may bee able to speak oft to one another with profit and power in the best thing Mal. 3.10 Little do wee know what a deal of good may bee done hereby Mr. Fox speaking of Gods little flock in the days of Henry the 8. saith in such rarity of good books and want of teachers Act. Mon. fol. 750. this one thing I cannot but marvell and muse at to note in the registers and consider how the word of God did multiply so exceedingly amongst them For I finde that one neighbour resorting and conferring with another eftsoons with a few words of their first or second talk did win and turn their minds to that wherein they desired to perswade them touching the truth of Gods Word and Sacraments c. In all ages such as were ordained to eternal life believed Acts 13.48 after that they had heard the Word of truth they beleeved and were sealed Irridentis vex non interrogantis Contrariwise reprobates either refuse to hear the Church preaching Christ John 8.47 Of else they hear and jear as Pilat with his What 's truth in meer mockage John 18.38 hear and blaspheme Acts 13.45 or at best hear and admire and that 's all they leave the Word where they found it for any thing they will practice They think they do a great chare to sit out a Sermon and then commend it But Wisdoms children will not onely justifie her Mat. 11.19 but also glorifie her Acts 13.48 they will seek the Lord and his strength seek his face evermore Psal 105.4 Seek him in his holy Temple seek him in and with the Church as here They know that extra Ecclesiam nulla salus The Church is the pillar and ground of truth 1 Tim. 3.15 in as much as by her ministery the authority dignity knowledge virtue and use of the truth of the Gospel is preserved in the world and held out Philip. 2.16 as the hand holds forth the torch or the watch-tower the light and so the haven to the weather-beaten Mariners
haply by exceeding his commission as Zach. 1.15 he might prove a deceitful razor as Psal 52.2 that instead of shaving the hair lanceth the flesh That is hired Whether by Ahaz himself but for a better purpose 2 King 16.7 8. not to hurt but to help though it fell out otherwise or by God who paid the Assyrian for his hire the Lands of Israel and of Syria see the like Ezek. 29.18 19. Barbers use not their razors but for reward Beyond the river Euphrates that ran between Syria and Assyria but could not keep off the Assyrian Destroyer The head and the hair of the feet Elsewhere called head and tail that is high and low Prince and Pesant And it shall also consume the beard 1. the Priests Psal 133.2 as some sense it or as others all the comeliness and virility of the Jewish nation Ver. 21. A man shall nourish two sheep He that was wont to say Virg. eclog. Mille meae Siculis errant in montibus agnae shall now be reduced to so great penury as to be glad of two sheep and have scarce a yong Heifer left for his necessary subsistence who was wont to have many ploughs going They shall not now as heretofore joyn house to house and land to land they shall not keep race-horses or hunting dogs c. Ver. 22. For the abundance of milk yielded him by his two Cows through the paucity of people and plenty of grass He shall eat butter eat his fill sith there are none to buy it of him none to pull it out of his mouth For butter and honey shall every one eat not cates and dainties as chap. 5.12 but mean fare such as he can get as wild-honey such as the Baptist fed on Ver. 23. Where there were a thousand vines Which once were to the sensual Jews an occasion of drunkenness and forgetfulness of God chap. 5.11 12. A Lapide on chap. 5.2 telleth us that at Herbipolis in Germany there are abundance of vineyards so that they have more wine there then water and such huge wine-vessels that the vintners have doors in the sides of them whereby they enter as Diogenes did into his tub to make them clean and fit for their use Shall be briars and thorns Agri quondam vitibus consiti erunt obsiti vepribus dumetis densissimis hirsuti Ver. 24. With arrows and with bows shall they come for their necessary defence against the wild beasts that haunt those desert places propter densa ferarum lustra hominibus infesta This was threatened Lev. 26.22 Ver. 25. And on all the hills that shall be digged Assemb Annot. c. A good Translation of a text is instead of a good Commentary Some very learned render the words thus And on the hills that had wont to be digged with mattock or spade that no fear of bryar or thorn might come thither shall a place also be for sending in of oxen and the treading of lesser cattle Which shall range and graze freely say they by way of gloss after their wonted manner in those places from whence they and their owners had formerly been ejected and excluded by the violent oppressions and undue enclosures of the richer and greater sort chap. 5.17 CHAP. VIII Ver. 1. TAke thee a great roll Or volume so called either because it was rolled up together like the web upon the pinne or as others because it revealeth that unto us which otherwise we knew not Blasphemous was that jear of the Jews who called the Evangel or Gospel Aven gillaion a volume of vanity And no better was that of B. Bonners Chaplain who called the Bible that blessed Book in scorn his little pretty Gods book Chald. vertit Scripturamclaram See Isa 30.8 This one small piece of it is here stiled grande volumen a great roll for the fulness of the matter in fewness of words And write in it with a mans pen that is plainly and clearly that when it shall be fastened to the gate of the Temple or some way else be exposed to publike view he that runneth may read it Habac. 2.2 and he that readeth may understand it and not be so written as that was Dan. 5.5 7. which none could read and unriddle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but the Prophet himself nor be as Aristotles Acroamaticks published and yet unpublished Concerning Maher-shalal-hash-baz 1. Make speed to the spoil hasten the prey words whereby God calleth the King of Assyria out of his countrey to take the spoil speedily of Syria and Samaria both which groaned for his coming and hangd for his mowing This was afterwards given for a name to Isaiah's new-born babe viz. at his circumcision and that before two sufficient witnesses who might attest both the childs name and the reason of it which the Prophet likely told them Such another compound name was Shear-jashub chap. 7. Zorobabel Hagio-Christophorites c. and amongst us Keep-sabbath Hope-still c. Ver. 2. And I took unto me faithful witnesses So they might be and yet not godly men as Galba and our Rich. 3. were said to be bad men but yet good Princes Some think that this Vriah was the same with him that brought in the Altar of Damascus He had been better perhaps but at last revolted as did Demas of whom Dorotheus saith that he became a Priest in an idol temple at Thessalonica and Damascen who turned Mahometan as some write Zechariah the other witness was a man of great eminency as being grand-father by the mothers side to good Hezekiah Ver. 3. And I went unto the Prophetess Prophets wives were anciently called Prophetesses like as Bishops wives saith à Lapide the Jesuit were also called Bishoppesses Presbyters wives Presbyteresses Deacons wives Deaconesses Jesuits have still their Jesuitesses as Majors their Majoresses c. Maber-shalal-hash-baz q. d. Make haste come away to so rich a booty to the rifling and ruinating of these two potent and opulent Kingdoms God hereby seemeth to bespeak the Assyrian as Cicero once did his friend Si dormis expergiscere si stas ingredere si ingrederis curre si curris advola c. and at the calling of this child by his name the prediction was remembred and the thing ascertained Ver. 4. For before the child c. That is within a year or two for it was an extraordinary thing that is reported of Maximilian the Emperour that he was eight year old at least ere he spake any thing but afterwards he became a fluent and elegant Speaker The riches of Damascus Riches do many times change their masters and Kingdoms are oft turned upside down when they fall to persecuting the people of God especially as did these Syrians and Israelites Before the King of Assyria Spoils taken from the enemy were and are usually carried in triumph before the Conqueror Ver. 5. The Lord spake also unto me again saying Heb. And the Lord further added to speak unto me Here the Israelites a part from the Syrians
were prayed to take the office and to help to govern the State but here were none left for such a purpose Ver. 13. A Court for Owles Or Ostritches see on ver 11. Ver. 14. The wild beasts of the desart Heb. Ziim Jiim See Chap. 12.21 22. where these monstrous creatures are said to dance whence Basil noteth that men learned of devils to dance Conr. Clingius And another saith that a dance is a circle the centre whereof is the devil the circumference all his Angels And the Satyr shall cry to his fellow Heb. the rough or hairy one Chald. Daemones inter se colludent the devils shall play among themselves Satan is a rough harsh spirit so are his See Levit. 17.7 Ver. 15. There shall the great Owle make her nest Heb. Kippoz The Hebrews themselves agree not what creatures these are here mentioned so far are they faln from the knowledge of the Scripture Their tale about Lilits once Adams first wife but now a scriech-Owle or an evil spirit is not worthy the mentioning Ver. 16. Seek ye out of the book of the Lord Sciscitamini ex libro Domini the Holy Bible which Bishop Bonneri Chaplain called in scorn of the Martyrs Your little pretty gods-Gods-book Another Bohemian blasphemer for Biblia called it Vitlia which in the Bohemian language signifieth Vomit But let us search the Scriptures and particularly this Prophecy commanded to be written in a book chap. 30.8 and compare the truth of these predictions with the events None shall want her mate Some write of the Asp he never wandreth alone without his companion and none of these birds of desolation want their mate so craft and cruelty do ever go together in the Churches enemies Ver. 17. And he hath cast the lot for them i. e. For those creatures of prey aforementioned From generation i. e. For many generations CHAP. XXXV Ver. 1. THe wildernesse and the solitary place shall be glad for them The Edomites and other enemyes have had their part It hath been sufficiently said Woe unto the wicked it shall be ill with him for the reward of his hands shall be given him And now the Prophet is bidden to say to the Righteous to tell him so from the Lord that it shall be well with him for the reward of his hands shall be given him Isa 3.10 11. The wildernesse and the desart that is the poor people of God that have been oppressed and slighted in this world shall be restored into a happy and flourishing estate the Church shall have her Halcyons under Hezekiah but especially under Christ She shall have it both in temporals and spirituals ver 2. Ver. 2. The glory of Lebanon shall be given unto it the excellency of Carmel c. Outward blessings shall be heaped upon Gods people even all that heart can wish or need require They shall see the glory of the Lord Spiritual blessings in heavenly things in Christ Jesus shall be conferred upon them also even every good gift and perfect giving from the Father of lights Qui icturatos intexit floribus hortos Quique jubet rutilis albescere lilia campis Ver. 3. Strengthen ye the weak hands q. d. Chear up my hearts be of good courage and God shall strengthen your hearts all ye that hope in the Lord. Comfort ye also one another with these words and build up each other on your most holy Faith and I will shew you how and in what termes you shall do it Ver. 4. Say to them that are of a fearful heart Inconsideratis to them that consider not the Promises but forget the consolations Heb. 12.5 so poring upon their sins that they see not their Saviour Behold your God will come with vengeance He will tread Satan under your feet shortly Rom. 16.20 Even your God with a recompence Diabolo par pari retribuet Christus saith Hierom Christ will be even with the devil He had got one of Christs Disciples Judas and to cry quittance Christ gat one of his Paul Cyprian was wont thus to comfort his hearers Veniet Antichristus sed superveniet Christus Antichrist will come but Christ will not be long behind him Ver. 5. Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened This was fulfilled corporally in cures wrought by Christ Mat. 4.27 and 11.5 c. and spiritually in the preaching of the Gospel by the efficacy of his spirit Act. 26.18 and 16.14 Apollonius Tyanaeus could never do such miracles nor any other This sheweth that Jesus of Nazareth was the true Messiah Ver. 6. Then shall the lame man leap as an hart As that impotent man did Act. 3.8 and those Loripedes Heb. 12.13 And the tongue of the dumb sing As good old Zacharies did Luk. 1. Not so much for his speech restored or his son received as for his Saviour now at hand and as did those that sang He hath done all things well he maketh both the deaf to hear and the dumb to speak Mac. 7.37 yea to utter the great things of God and to speak good of his name Lo here saith Luther miracles to confirm the Gospel to be of God against those that deride his Ministers saying They cannot make so much as a lame horse sound For all they in whose hearts it taketh effect of blind are made to see of deaf to hear of lame to go and of dumb to speak For in the wildernesse shall waters break out This and that which followeth in the next verse Junius maketh to be the matter of their song viz. the grace of God abundantly communicated to his Church See Joh. 7.38 39. The Jews dream that when their Messiah cometh the red sea shall again be divided and the rock cloven much water gushing out c. Thus they work themselves into the fooles Paradise of a sublime dotage by misunderstanding this text Ver. 7. And the parched ground c. See on ver 6. Ver. 8. And an high-way shall be there i. e. In the Church of Christ and a way 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Kings high-way to Heaven arcta ampla latet lucet The way of holinesse Or the way of the Sanctuary But it shall be for those Those Beneficiaries of Christ mentioned ver 5 6. the ransomed of the Lord ver 10. The wayfaring men though fooles Simple Christians Shall not erre Misse their way or miscarry in it Ver. 9. No Lyon shall be there The Devil that roaring Lyon nor his actuaries tyrants and hereticks shall haunt these holy high-wayes God will preserve his people from all deveratory evils as Tertullian calleth them 2 Thes 3.3 that wicked one the devil shall not once touch them 1 John 5.18 so as to thrust his deadly sting into them Ver. 10. And the ransomed of the Lord Those happy ones Deut. 33.29 Shall return To the Lord from whom they had deeply revolted Tantum gaudebimus quantum amabimus Tantum amabimus quantum cognoscemus Aug. With songs As they were wont to do in their
told an English Embassadour that he had lately read St. Paul and that he disliked nothing in him but this that he had changed his religion Which yet are no gods Sed hominum figmenta ludibria daemonum when Hercules came into a Temple and found the Image or statue of Adonis in it he pull'd it down with this expression Certe nil sacri es Sure thou art no god the like may be said of all Idols But my people have changed their glory i. e. Their God of whom they might glory saying as Deut. 32.31 their Rock is not as our Rock our enemies themselves being Judges Ver. 12. Be astonished O heavens A poetical and pathetical expression Confer Deut. 32.1 Isa 1.2 Be horribly afraid Horripilamini portento malitiae quod jam dicturus sum be agast at such a prodigious wickednesse Be very desolate As the Sun seemed to be when at the death of Christ he hid his head in a mantle of black which made they say the Heathen Astrologer break out into these words Either the God of nature suffereth Dionys or else the world is at an end Ver. 13. For my people have committed two evils Contrary to those two good things that I have commanded them viz. Depart from evil and do good Psal 34.14 Lust doth first 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 draw a man from God and then it doth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 deceive him with a bait of the creature Jam. 1.14 They have forsaken me the fountain of living water The all-sufficient ever-flowing Dialog 7. over-flowing well-spring of all welfare Jam. 1.17 Trismegist a Heathen could say Respicite O mortales resipiscite ad fontem vitae ricurrite Look back O mortals and repent and run back again to the fountain of life Seneca also saith that Sin is so foul a thing that he would not commit it though he could hide it from men and get pardon of it of God for that were to turn his back upon God the chife good Comment in Rom. 1.19 So little reason was there that Alex. Hales should be called first Fons vitae then Doctor irrefragabilis c. How well might Bullinger say that Seneca alone had left to posterity more sincere Divinity then all the books of almost all the School men And hewed them out cisterns broken cisterns Such and no better are all Idols humane helps creature-comforts friends means merits c. what are they all but cisterns that hold but muddy rain-water at best but then being broken cisterns riven vessels what hold they else but limum lapides mud and gravel Such cisternes therefore to hew out what is it better then industrious folly laborious losse of time to say no worse of it Now Turpe est difficiles habere nugas Et stultus labor est ineptiarum Servus emptitius Ver. 14. Is Israel a servant sc Bought with mony Is he a home-born slave Verna a slave by birth q. d. If he be either of the two he may thank himself He was my son nay my Spouse if he could have kept him so but he hath sold himself to commit wickednesse and I have therefore sold him into the hands of the Caldeans Loe this is the product of his forsaking me the fountain of living waters c. Ver. 15. The young Lions roared upon him and yelled i. e. The King of Babylon and his forces more fierce and fell then young Lions Would any take the Churches picture Loc. com tit de persecut ver Eccles saith Luther then let him paint a silly poor maid sitting in a wood or wildernesse compassed about with hungry Lions Wolves Boars and Bears for this is her condition in the world And they made his land waste i. e. They shall shortly so make it Ver. 16. Also the children of Noph and Tahapanes Two chief Cities of Egypt the Inhabitants whereof were said to be most effeminate and servile fellows even these shall overtop thee Hero dot l. 2. knock thee down as an Ox by a blow on the brain-pan and make havock of those things that thou holdest the chiefest and most desirable Gen. 42.22 Ver. 17. Hast thou not procured this to thy self The same may the Lord say to every sufferer and further add Did not I warn you saying Sin not against the childe Oh do not this abominable thing your iniquities will undoubtedly be your ruine c. When he led thee by the way The way that is called holy the high-way to heaven fitly here opposed to those by-waies of carnal wisdom mentioned in the following verses Ver. 18. And now what hast thou to do in the way of Egypt Why trustest thou to carnal combinations which thou hast formerly found to be so successlesse wilt thou never be warned of these broken cisterns or hast thou a mind to be ground to powder betwixt those two mil-stones of Egypt and Assyria after whom thou hankerest Psal 146.3 David having entered a Caveat against creature confidence perswades people to trust in God alone See also Psal 62.8 9 10. To drink the waters of Sihor i. e. Of Nilus called Sihor of its blacknesse Limosus est Nilus oblimat Aegypt or muddinesse and in Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Black to drink the waters of it here is to draw the Egyptian forces to thine assistance and as some think to partake with them in their superstitions To drink of the water of the river i. e. Of Euphrates that river by an eminency Ver. 19. Thine own wickednesse shall correct thee Eâ—udiat te malitia tua Let thine own wickednesse with the sad consequents thereof teach thee better things as chap. 6.8 Let it for shame let it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 let smart make wit Isa 28.19 Prov. 29.15 Know therefore and see Learn at least by sad experience for thou hast paid for thy learning Piscator ictus sapiet That it is an evil thing and bitter So all sin will prove in the issue and when the bottom of the bag is turned upward There will be bitternesse in the end as Abner said to Joab 2 Sam. 3.15 Laban will shew himself at parting howsoever Tamar will be more hated then ever shee was loved Amor amaror pius aloes quam mellis habet Laeta venire Venus tristis abire solet Drunkennesse is sweet but wormwood is bitter These Inhabitants of Jerusalem were made drunk but with wormwood Lam. 3.15 they found that sin was a Dulcacidum a bitter-sweet sweet in the mouth but bitter in the maw 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Philo. as that book in the Revelation like Adam's apple or Esau's pottage or Jonathan's hony or Judas his thirty pieces whereof he would fain have been rid but could not they burnt like a spark of hell-fire in his hand but especially in his conscience The Devil with the Panther hideth his deformed head till the sweet sent have drawn other beasts into his danger and then he devoureth them Did we but
was a prayer-hearing God Psal 65.2 O thou that art hearing prayers so the Hebrew hath it alwayes hearing some and ready to hear the rest Our God is not like Jupiter of Creet that had no cares nor as those other heathen-deities of whom Cicero sadly complaineth to his brother Quintus in these words I would pray to the gods for those things but that they have given over to hear my prayers Jeremy could upon better ground pray then ever he in Plato did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In English thus Great God the good thou hast to give Plat. in Alcibiad Whether we ask't or no Let 's still receive no mischief thrive To work our overthrow Ver. 17. Seest thou not what they do And hast thou yet an heart to pray for them and should I yet have an heart to pitty them there is only this hope left sometimes that something God will yeild to the prayers of his people Ratio additur quasi digito ad Jeremiam extenso even when he is most bitterly bent against them Flectitur iratus voce rogante Deus Distribuunt inter se munera Ver. 18. The children gather wood All sorts sizes and sexes are as busie as bees Sed turpis labor est ineptiarum Oh that we were so intent with united forces to the worship of the true God of heaven Vae torpori nostro Oh take heed of industrious folly dispirâ—t not your selves in the pursuit of trifles c. Scilicet tenui popano corruptus Osiris Juven Sal. 6. To make cakes Popana cakes stampt with stars To the Queen of heaven i. e. To the heavenly bodies and as some will have it to the Moon in special The Hebrews have a saying that God is to be praised in the least gnat to be magnified in the Elephant but to be admired in the Sun Moon and Stars And if the Jews in the text had stayed here who could have blamed them but to deifie these creatures was gross Idolatry and an inexpiable sin Epiphanius telleth us of certain heretikes called Collyridians that they baked cakes and offered them to the Virgin Mary whom they called the Queen of heaven and do not the Papists at this day the very same Haeres 79. saying that hyperdulia is due unto her not to speak of Bonaventure his blasphemous Lady-Psalter Bernard Bauhusius the Jesuite hath set forth a book in praise of the Virgin Mary by changing this one verse Tot tibi sunt dotes Virgo quot sidera caelo A thousand twenty and two wayes according to the number of the known stars The Jesuites commonly write at the end of their books Laus Deo beatae Virgini Praise be given to God and to the blessed Virgin but this is the badge of the beast Let us say Soli Deo Gloria and yet not in the sense of that Persian Embassadour who whensoever his business lay with Christians was wont to have Soli Deo gloria very much in his mouth but by Soli he meant the Sun whom he honoured for his God Why the women here and chap. 44. should be so busie in kneading cakes to the Moon these reasons are given 1. Because the Moon was a Queen 2. Because the women at their labour were most beholden to the Moon who by her great moisture mollifies the secundines and makes the passage easie for their delivery This custom of offering cakes to the Moon saith one our Ancestors may seem not to have been ignorant of Greg. Posth 202. to this day our women make cakes at such times yea the child is no sooner born but called cake-bread Add that the Saxons did adore the Moon Ibid. 132. to whom they set a day apart which to this day we call Moonday The same Author telleth us that he who not long since conquered the Indies perswaded the Natives that he had complained of them to their Moon and that such a day the goddess should frown upon them which was nothing else but an Eclipse which he had found out in the Almanack Ver. 19. Do they provoke me to anger i. e. Hurt they me by their provocations or hope they to get the better of me and to cause me to lay down the bucklers first Surely as Vlysses his companions said to him when he would needs provoke Polydamas may we better say to such as provoke the Almighty 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Or as the wise-man contend not with him that is mightier then thou meddle with thy match man Ver. 20. Mine anger and mine fury A very dreadful doom denounced against these daring monsters Those that provoke God to anger shall soon have enough of it It is a fearful thing to fall into the punishing hands of the living God Heb. 10. Oh keep out of them Ver. 21. Put your burnt-offerings to your sacrifices and eat flesh Congerite ingerite digerite egerite take away all your sacrifices wherewith ye fondly think to expiate your sins and feast your carcasses with them for I wot well that you offer them to me ventris potius gratiâ quam internae pietatis rather of gourmandise then good devotion You have therefore my good leave to make your best of them for I account them no other then ordinary and profane food such flesh as is bought and sold in the shambles So Hos 9.4 their meat-offering Lev. 2.5 is in scorn called their bread for their soul or life that is for their natural sustenance And no better are the elements in the Lords Supper to the unworthy Receiver whatever he may promise himself by them Videlicet solum aut simpliciter Ver. 22. For I spake not unto your Fathers I gave them not those holy rites as the substance of my service or that ye should thus hold them up against my threats for your rebellions as a buckler of defence Sacrifices without obedience nec placent nec placant Deum Ver. 23. But this thing I commanded them i. e. I principally commanded them giving them therefore first the Decalogue and then afterwards the ceremonial Law which was or should have been their Gospel Ver. 24. But they hearkened not nor inclined So crosse-grained they were and thwart from the very first In the imagination of their evil heart In sententia animi sui pessimi Trem. Heb. aspectu cordis ut Deut. 19.9 They went backward and not forward As Crabfish do as vise Apostates in pejus proficiunt grow every day worse then other being not only averse but adverse to any good they dayly grow worse and worse deceiving and being deceived seipsit indies facti deteriores Islebius first became an Antinomian and the Father of that Sect and then a Papist and lastly Atheist and Epicure as Osiander testifieth Whilest he was an Antinomian only Cent. 16. pag. 802. he many times promised amendment being convinced of his errour but performed it not After that he condemned his errour and recanted it in a publike auditory and printed his
But Gods eye is like the Sun yea far brighter and more peircing then that eye of the world neither needeth he a window in mans breast as Momus wisht to look in at for every man before God is all window totus totus transparens pellucidus This Thales and other Philosophers saw and confessed Ver. 11. As the Partridge sitteth on eggs and hatcheth them not Because either she is taken in an evil net or the eggs are marred by the male or otherwise before they can be hatched So he that getteth riches and not by right That cryeth Rem rem quocunque modo rem Vnde habeat nemo quaerit sed oportet habere Right or wrong many are resolved to be rich but are usually crossed or else cursed with a blessing for treasures of wickedness profit not but righteousness delivereth from death Prov. 10.2 God sometimes giveth wealth to the wicked as men put money into an earthen bottle which that they may get out again they break the bottle in pieces Shall leave them in the midst of his dayes Either they shall leave him or he them to his unmedicinable grief and heart-break A poor fool God will be sure to make of him He that trusteth in his riches as every Mammonist doth shall fall Prov. 11.28 for although he blesse himself as well underlaid and what should ayle such an one saith the world yet the Lord abhorreth him Psal 10.3 so that he many times cometh in the midst of his daies to an untimely end as did Judas Ahab Achan Balaam Ananias and Sapphira c. And thus many a rich wretch spinneth a fair thred to strangle himself both temporally and eternally he by his covetousness not onely killeth others Prov. 1.19 but himself too Ver. 12. A glorious high throne from the beginning Therefore its best to trust in God at all times ye people and to pour out your hearts before him sith God is a refuge for us Psal 62.8 All that do otherwise shall be ashamed ver 12. and worthily because having so glorious a God resiant amongst them they so basely forsake him to serve and seek to Idols Ver. 13. Shall be written in the earth i. e. Aeternâ morte damnabuntur they shall be hurled into hell as not having their names written in Heaven Luke 10.20 where all that are written among the living in Jerusalem Isa 4.3 are enrolled Heb. 12.23 non pro gloriosis sed pro probrosis habiti See Psal 17.14 Prudentius rightly saith that their names that are written in red letters of blood in the Churches Calendar are written in golden letters in Christs register in the book of life As on the contrary these Idolaters whose sin was with an Iron-pen ingraven on the tables of their hearts as ver 1. are justly written in the earth i. e. cast to hell Ver. 14. Heal me O Lord and I shall be healed viz. of that cordolium that my malicious country-men cause me The Prophet was even sick at heart of their unworthy usages and prayes help and healing ne totus ipse labascat inter auditores deploratissimos lest he should perish by them and with them Ver. 15. Behold they say unto me Heb. they are saying unto me it is their daily dicterium or jear Where is the Word of the Lord Whereby thou so oft threatenest us with desolation Thus prophane persons flear when they should fear Vbi est i. e. nusquam est Piscat See 2 Pet. 3 4. Isa 5.19 Amos 5.18 Ver. 16. I have not hastned from being a Pastor before thee I have neither rashly taken up the work of the Ministry quo secundus abe te essem Pastor wherein I have been thine under-shepheard but was rightly called by thee thereunto and have obeyed thy call neither have I been over-hasty to rid my hands of this so troublesom and thanklesse an employment Latimer in one of his Sermons speaking of a Minister who gave this answer why he left off preaching because he saw he did no good but got the hatred of many This saith He was a naughty a very naughty answer Neither have I desired the woful day The doleful or deadly day sc of their desolation or my denunciation of it Gods Ministers take no delight to fling daggers at the faces of gracelesse persons whatever they may think or to terrify them causelesly but as knowing the terrour of the Lord they seek to affright them by the menaces of Gods mouth from such sinful practises as will be their ruine and hence they are hated an expectes ut Quintilianus ametur Juven Thou knowest it See chap. 12 1. 15.15 2 Cor. 1.12 Ver. 17. Be not a terrour unto me Let me have fair weather over head how foul soever it be under foot If we have peace with God though trouble in the world we can take no hurt If vapours be not got into the bowels of the earth and stir not there storms and tempests abroad cannot cause an earth-quake so if there be peace within c. But like as all the letters in the Alphabet without a Vowel will not make one word nor all the Stars in the firmament without a Sun will make a day so neither can all this worlds good make one happy without God and his favour Ver. 18. Let them be confounded A heavy imprecation Let persecutours take heed how they move Ministers to make intercession to God against them as Elias did against Israel Rom. 11.2 as Jeremy here and elsewhere doth against the Jews as the Christian Churches did against Julian the Apostate God will set to his Fiat Let them be dismaied but let not me be dismaied Paveant illi non paveam ego So the Vulgar Latin hath it But what a Lack-latin dolt was that Popish Priest who alledged to his Parishioners this text to prove that not he but they were to pave the Church-way So Another of them finding it written in the end of Paul's Epistles Missa est c. bragged he had found the Masse in his bible So another reading Joh. 1.44 Invenimus Messiam made the same conclusion Ver. 19. Go and stand in the gate of the children The sheep-gate say some whereof see Neh. 3.1 32. 12.39 or as others the water-gate whereof Neh. 3.26 a place it was of great resort and concourse and therefore fittest for this new Sermon to be made in first though afterwards also he was to preach it in all the gates of Jerusalem forasmuch as it was about a matter of greatest importance even the serious sanctification of the Sabbath-day Diem septimum Opifex mundi natalem sibi sacravit observari praecepit That fourth Commandement saith Philo is a famous precept and profitable to excite to all kind of virtue and piety Ver. 20. Ye Kings of Judah Magistrates being Lord-keepers of both the Tables of the Law should carefully see to it that both be duely observed Our King Edgar made laws for the sanctification of the Lords-day-Sabbath
to children that obey their Parents Where ye be strangers The Rechabites were originally Midianites but Jethro of whom they came was a famour proselite to the Church his son Hobab a guide to Gods people in the wildernesse and his posterity imped and incorporated into the body of Gods people Judg. 1.16 Neverthelesse they counted and called themselves strangers alienigenae as those that looked for a better country above See Heb. 11.9 Ver. 8. Thus have we obeyed the voyce of Jonadab Obedience to Parents in things not unlawful is very commendable Aristotle saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ar. Rhet. it is not good for a man to dissent from the Gods from his Father and from his Teacher We read of a King of Poland who carried the picture of his Father in a plate of gold about his neck and when he was going about any great businesse he would kisse that picture and say God grant I may observe my Fathers charge and do nothing unworthy of him c. We our wives our sons and our daughters As themselves were obedient to their Father so had they their children obedient to them whereas ill children are punished in their posterity Fullers holy State One complained that never Father had so undutiful a child as he had yes said his son with lesse grace then truth my Grand-father had Ver. 9. Nor to build houses c. Jonadab being a prudent and withal a mortified man might foresee that the Israelites being so wicked a people could not long continue He knew also that wine was oft an occasion of drunkenness trading in the world of earthlimindedness fair houses of lothness to leave the world Haec sunt quae nos invitos faciunt mori as that Emperour once said of stately buildings He therefore for a quiet life and for their souls health forbad them the use of these lawful things and they accordingly forbare them Ver. 10. But we have dwelt in tents And fed much upon whitemeats as did Heber the Kenite who was one of them Judg. 4. living in abstinence and bodily labour that we might be free to divine contemplations Ver. 11. Come and let us go to Jerusalem So then it was lawful for them to dispense with those their observances in that inevitable necessity like as also they might have drunk wine rather then have perished But what can be reasonably pleaded for that man of sin who taketh upon him to dispense with Gods holy law Bellarm. lib. 4. de Pontif. Rom. and de injustitia facere justitiam ex nihilo aliquid ex virtute vitium to make righteousnesse of unrighteousnesse vice of vertue something of nothing So we dwell at Jerusalem But better they had kept out and held to their old course for so they might have escaped some way Ver. 12. Then came the Word of the Lord Then after this famous example of obedience thus proposed an excellent way of teaching surely Reason should rule and therefore lodgeth in the braine but when reason cannot perswade example will Ver. 13. Will ye not receive instruction to hearken to my Words Quae est illa portentosa pertinacia what a strange stiffeness and obstinacy in you is this am not I to be better esteemed and obeyed by you then Jonadab is by the Rechabites Ver. 14. The words of Jonadab not to drink wine are performed So are the words of Mahomet to like purpose to this day by the Turks so are the commands of the Popish Padres to their young Novices though it be to make a voyage to China or Peru Per varios casm per tot discriminarerum For unto this day they drink none Neither dwell in houses as you do and may do eating of the fat and drinking of the sweet without restraint so that you keep within the bounds of sobriety I command you nothing but what in reason should be done for a worldly good as well as for a spiritual Rising early and speaking I began betimes with you my Law I gave you in Horeb eight or nine hundred years since and from that time to this I have constantly and instantly called upon you by my messengers for obedience whereas it is not yet full three hundred years since Jonadab left this charge with his Rechabites and dying left none to see it fulfilled or to reprove them for their neglects Ver. 15. I have sent unto you all my servants the Prophets But all to no purpose See on ver 14. Saying Return ye now every man from his evil way And was this so great a matter to part with that which profiteth you nothing yea which undoubtedly will undo you And go not after other gods For wherein can they bestead you And ye shall dwell in the land This was more then ever Jonadab could promise or promising perform to his Nephews But ye have not enclined your ear See chap. 7.24 26. and 11.8 and 17.23 and 34.14 Ver. 16. Because the sons of Jonadab This was a lively way of confuting their contumacy far more convincing then that of the heathens not changing their gods or the beasts knowing their owners the birds their seasons But this people have not hearkened unto me Whereas if I be a Father where is mine honour and if a Master where is mine obedience Mal. 1.6 See the Notes there Ver. 17. Behold I will bring upon Judah Aut poenitendum aut pereundum Men must either repent or perish obey Gods Law or bear the penalty no remedy Heb. 2.2 2 Thes 1.8 Ver. 18. Because ye have obeyed the Commandement Obedience to Parents hath an ample recompence of reward as that which is good and acceptable before God and men 1 Tim. 5.4 Ver. 19. Jonadab the son of Rechab shall not want a man to stand before me for ever i. e. To be beloved by me and to be in special favour with me lifting up pure hands in all places of their abode Captive they were carried among the Jews but they returned also again with them as appeareth 1 Chron. 2. sub finem erantque Deo cordi curae and they were dear to God CHAP. XXXVI Ver. 1. ANd it came to passe in the fourth year This whole Chapter is historical and narrative as also are some others besides this Historias lege ne fias historia Oâ—im liber erat instar mappae Geographicae Ver. 2. Take thee a role of a book i. e. A volume as Isa 8.1 See the Note there And write therein Jeremy had a command to write so have not our empty Scripturients whose rapes on the innocency of paper as one phraseth it make the Presse almost execrable Pineda Ista prurientis calami scabies potius est quam scriptio All the words that I have spoken unto thee The sum and substance of all thy Sermons for these three and twenty years past See chap. 1.2 and 25.3 Ver. 3. It may be that the house of Judah will hear c. See here the utility of the holy
Scriptures and the excellent use that may be made of reading them A man may be thereby doubtlesse converted where preaching is wanting as divers were in Queen Maries dayes Fox Martyrol when the Word of God was precious as Austin was by reading Rom. 13. Fulgentius by the Prophet Jonah Franciscus Junius by Joh. 1. c. The Eunuch Act. 8. and those noble Bereans Act. 17.11 were notably prepared for conversion by this ordinance That I may forgive their iniquity and their sin i. e. Their sins of all sorts giving them a free and full discharge Baruch Isle notarius diaconus Jeremiae simâ—â—que Propheta fuit Oecol Ver. 4. Then Jeremiah called Baruch and Baruch wrote from the mouth Dictantis ab ore pependit Jeremy it seemeth had either not written his prophecies or not so legibly or in loose papers only now he hath them fair written out into a book making the same use of Baruch as afterward Paul did of Tertius Rom. 16.22 who himself wrote no very good hand as some have gathered from Gal. 6.11 See my Notes there Ver. 5. I am shut up Or I am detained or restrained haply by some legal pollution that he had contracted as by touching a dead carcasse c. or by some bodily infirmity or by the lying in wait of his enemyes or by the Spirit of God as Act. 16 6 7. for a punishment to the Jews by the Prophets absence and silence and for the safety of his servant in those perilous times Ver. 6. Therefore go thou and read in the roll A Minister when he cannot himself officiate must provide another in his room Which thou hast written from my mouth And which the holy Ghost hath put into my mouth both matter and words Vpon the fasting-day A very fit time for the reading of the Scriptures that the people then convened might hear and fear and supplicate and convert and God might heal them The Fast here mentioned was not the ordinary yearly fast called the day of Expiation or Atonement but another that was conceptivum liberum kept on some special occasion for the averting of Gods judgement such as was that at Nineveh There was afterwards indeed a yearly Fast kept in November to bewaile this wicked practise of King Jehoiakim in cutting and casting into the fire this blessed-book Genebrard ex Menologio Hebraeor Ver. 7. It may be they will present their supplication Heb. Their supplication will fall before the Lord. Fasting of it self is but a bodily exercise and profiteth little If the soul be not afflicted rebel-flesh tamed prayers edged and reformation effected men fast to no purpose Isa 58.3 5. Zach. 5.5 7. Ver. 8. And Baruch the son of Neriâ—h did according c. Nihil de sua saliva admiscens He faithfully performed the Prophet Jeremyes commands not standing to cast perils being thereunto heartened and hardened by Jeremy chap. 45. Ver. 9. They proclaimed a fast Haply for fear of the Chaldaeans who having lately beaten Pharaoh-Necho was like enough to invade Judea or else because of that great dearth chap. 14 1 2 12 See on ver 6. Ver. 10. Then Baruch read in the book He read with a courage verbis non solum disertis sed exertis out of a chamber-window that the people under him might the better hear In the chamber of Gemariah Who himself it seemeth was not present but his son Micajah was and carried his father and the rest of the Princes the news ver 12. Ver. 11. When Micajah the son of Gemariah had heard With what affection he heard the book read by Baruch is uncertain We have many Herodian hearers before us eftsoones such I mean as have an Herods heart toward the Preacher and little do we know who they are that sit before us those precious balmes we bring break their heads with a witnesse and make the blood run about their eares Ver. 12. Then he went down into the Kings house For there was his Father and the rest of the Princes suam aulam vel gulam consectantes following their court-delights whilest the people were now humbling themselves before the Lord and trembling at his Word Great men are many of them of that Earle of Westmerlands mind who profanely said I need not pray to God as having tenants enow to pray for me Ver. 13. Then Micajah declared unto them See ver 11. Ver. 14. Therefore all the Princes sent Jehudi Apparitorem Regis ut ex sequentibus constat Jun. Ver. 15. And they said Sit down now This was some curtesie Reverenter sedere susserunt Oecol Alter alterum intuentes vel alloquentes Piscat and token of good respect to Baruch These Princes were not all out so bad as their King Ver. 16. They were afraid both one and other Expavescunt sese mutuo respiciunt they were afraid and looked one upon another being much distracted at this new and unexpected occurrence neither wist they at first what to do being affected after a sort and smitten with the weightinesse of the businesse We will surely tell the King They durst do no otherwise for if these things should have come to the Kings ear and they not first tell him they might come into the danger of his displeasure Ver. 17. Tell us how didst thou write all these words at his mouth Praeposterum movent interrogationem they put an odd question saith one Hos fere simili responso eludere videtur sanctus Dei homo Zeg when they should rather have bethought themselves of breaking off their sins by Repentance God loves Currists and not Quaerists saith Luther Ver. 18. And Baruch answered them Answerably to the question they asked him ver 17. Dignum patellâ operculum And I wrote them with inke in the book The use then of writing with pen and ink is ancient among the Hebrews Ver. 19 Go hide thee thou and Jeremy This was well but not all They draw not Baruch before the King to answer what he had done but why do they not take him to the King with his roll and plead both for it and him too had they been true Patriots and hearty friends to the truth they would have done so But they knew that this wicked King could not endure the Prophets chap. 26.21 and 36.26 and one of their company had been the Kings agent in bringing Vriah the Prophet out of Egypt to be butchered by him chap. 26.22 Ver. 20. And they went in to the King God by his providence so disposed it that both King and Princes whether they would or not should hear their doom and as for some of the Princes they seem to have some good affections wrought in them but too weak to work unto true repentance to salvation Ver. 21. So the King sent Jehudi See on ver 14. Ver. 22. Now the King sat in the winter-house There sat he in that his stately and sumptuous Pallace built by iniquity chap. 22. curant cuticulam ad
gracelesnesse She remembreth not her last end i. e. What a black tail of plagues sin draweth after it Plura de extremis loqui pars ignaviae est Tacit. lib. 2. Hist and that for all these things she must come to Judgment Memorare novissima is a good preservative from sin but most men are of Otho the Emperours mind who thought it a piece of dastardy to speak or think much of death whereas Moses assureth us that by keeping out the thoughts of death we keep our spirits void of true magnanimity and that one of those that will consider their latter end would chase a thousand Deut 32.30 Therefore she came down wonderfully Heb. with wondermentâ— Her incogitancy and inconsideratnesse together with the licentious wickednesse following thereupon being more heavy then a talent of lead Zach. 5.7 brought her down with a powder as we say ita ut ad miraculum corruerit O Lord behold mine affliction If not me as utterly unworthy yet mine affliction as thou once didst Hagar's Gen. 16.13 and if I may obtain no favour yet why should the enemy insult to thy dishonour Deut. 32.27 Psal 35.26 38.16 Jer. 48.26 42. Zeph. 2.20 Ver. 10. The adversary The common enemy both of God and us out of hatred of the truth and the professors thereof Hath spread out his hand His plundring and sacrilegious hand Vpon her pleasant things But especially those that were consecrated to the service of God in the Temple The Rabbines here by pleasant or desirable things understand principally the book of the Law which say they the Moabites and the Ammonites sought for in the Temple that they might burn it because therein was forbidden their admission into the Church for ever Ver. 11. All her people sigh And so think to ease their grief They shall seek bread The staff of life which without repaire by nutrition would be soon extinct so in the spiritual life which made Job prefer the word before his necessary food There is a famine of the Word which is much worse Amos 8. Isa 5. Pray against it and prevent it They have given their pleasant things for meat Which must be had at any rate much more must the food of the soul Act. Mon. 750. Keckerm praefat Geograph Our forefathers gave five Markes or more for a good book a load of hay for a few Chapters of St. James or of St. Paul in English saith Mr. Fox The Queen of Castile sold her jewels to furnish Columbus for his discovering voyage to the West Indies when he had shewed his Maps though our Henry the seventh loth to part with mony slâ—ghted his proffers and thereby the golden mines were found and gained to the Spanish Crown Let no man think much to part with his pleasant things for his precious soul or to sacrifice all that he hath to the service of his life which next to his soul should be most dear unto him Our ancestours in Queen Maries dayes were glad to eat the bread of their souls in peril of their lives To relieve the soul Heb. to make the soul come again For Animantis cujusque vita in fuga est Life must be fetcht again by food when it is fainting away See O Lord and consider Quam delicata epulatrix facta sim to what hard meat I am held to how strait an allowance See it and be sensible of my prisoners pittance and how I have made many a meals meat upon the promises when I have wanted bread as that good woman once said Ver. 12. Is it nothing to you all ye that passe by the way Siste viator Stay passenger hast not a tear to shed c. Sanchez thinks that this is Jerusalem's Epitaph made by her self as to be engraven on her tomb to move compassion The Septuagint have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hei ad vos subaudi clamo Woe and Alasse cry I to you Make ye nothing of my misery I wish the like may never befal you Ne sit super vos for so some render the words Behold and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow What we see in the water seemeth greater then it is so in the waters of Marah See chap. 3.1 T is sure that no temptation taketh us but what is humane or common to man 1 Cor. 10.13 But what did the man Christ Jesus suffer All our sufferings are but chips of his cross saith Luther not worthy to be named in the same day c. Wherein the Lord hath afflicted me This was yet no smal allay to her grief that God had done it The Stoicks who held that all came by destiny were noted for their patience or rather tolerance and aequanimity in all conditions Ver. 13. Form above hath he sent fire into my bones Like as when the marrow and natural moisture is dryed up by a violent fever or rather as when the solid parts of bodies below are lightening-struk from above and scorcht by these sulphureous flames that pierce unto them And it prevailed against them Or. And he ruled it viz. the fire i. e. he directed and disposed it He hath spred a net for my feet And so hamperd me an unruly creature ut constricta fuerim in ruinam that there is no escaping from him yea the more I strive to get out the faster I stick He hath turned me back Laid me on my back He hath made me desolate and faint My calamities come thick one in the neck of another words are too weak to utter them and yet here is very great copy and variety of words so that Paschasius saith this book may well be called the Lamentations of Lamentations like as Solomon's Song is called for its excellenty The Song of Songs Ver. 14. The yoke of my transgressions is bound by his hand Compactum est Or is bound upon his hand that is the Lord carrieth them in his continual remembrance They are wreathed Wrapped and wreathed together as a strong cord My sins are twisted together saith One and sadly accented so are the punishments of my sins saith the Church here neither can I get free but as the heifer by wriggling against the yoke galleth her neck so do I. And come up upon my neck Praeclarum scilicet monile torques mearum virtutum index insigne He hath made my strength to fall Heb. he hath caused my power to stumble i. e. so to stumble as to fall for he who stumbleth and yet falleth not getteth ground From whom I am not able to arise Only God can raise me and it is a work worthy of God who Dejicit ut relevet premit ut solatia praestet Ver. 15. The Lord hath trodden under foot As unsavory salt that is he hath covered with the greatest contempt All my mighty men Vulg. My Magnifico's or Gallants in whom I too much trusted In the midst of me In the very bosom of their mother as Caracalla killed his brother Geta consecrating the sword wherewith he
rather choose to dye said Calvin then comply with those that refuse to submit to Church discipline Quasi boves oestro agitati Theodoret. Monitoribus asperi Hor. Semper in ictu est Plin. l. 8. c. 29. Ferit obliquo ictu inflexu Though bryars or rebels and thorns be with thee Refractarii spinei such as thou canst not handle without hurt deal with without danger 2 Sam. 23.6 Psal 55.21 58.10 Mic. 7.4 catching they are and scratching as sharp-pointed thorns Num. 32.55 And thou dost dwell among scorpions Which are most venemous and perilous creatures joyned with fiery serpents Deut. 8.15 Pliny saith that there is not one minute wherein it doth not put forth the sting to do mischief It is also a crafty creature occultis machinationibus ferit The Churches enemies are cruel-crafties Neh. 4.11 Be not afraid of their words Their bubbles of words Nor be dismaid at their looks Their swellings and brow-beatings Though they be a rebellious house A race of rebels Ver. 7. And thou shalt speak my words Gods Word must be spoken however it be taken Whither they will hear See ver 5. Christ once at least preached away the most of his hearers Joh. 6.66 Beza so delivered himself with that evidence and efficacy of truth in Colloquio Possiaceno that Cardinal Lorrain wished that either he had been dumb or that his hearers had been deaf Too many of ours are so c. For they are most rebellious Heb. rebellion in the abstract as if they had been transfomed into sins nature Ver. 8. Be not thou rebellious like that rebellious house It is no hard matter to symbolize with sinners See Isa 6.5 with the Note to dwell among them is dangerous for sin is catching and oft Epidemical Precious therefore and worthy of all acceptation is the Apostles counsel Rom. 12.2 Lawyers tell us that we must not look so much what men do at Rome as what they ought to do Eat that I give thee i. e. The roul ver 9. that is whatsoever I shall henceforth dictate unto thee do thou get it by heart disgest it propound it to the people work it first upon thine own and then upon the affections of thine hearers See Rev. 4. and observe how alike the Lord dealt with Ezekiel and John the Divine Ver. 9. Behold a hand was sent A hand from heaven A hand is index rei instrumentum operationis Palmoni hammidabber Dan. 10. And loe a roul of a book The Jews folded or rouled up their books upon a cedar stick to preserve them from dust and other dangers See on Isa 8.1 Ver. 10. And he spred it before me Till Christ unfold heavenly mysteries men understand them not Rev. 5.5 Matth. 11.27 1 Joh. 1.18 15.15 He is the excellent Interpreter And it was written within and without To shew abundance of miseries coming on the Jews and others 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 gemitus sicut coâ—â—mbae Isa 38.14 Lamentation and mourning and wo Foretold all along this volume till Chapter 40. sad songs doleful ditties CHAP. III. Ver. 1. SOn of man eat that thou findest Eat this roul or volume without tergiversation or so much as sciscitation yeild simple obedience to the heavenly vision It was in vision doubtlesse that the Prophet did eat the roul Act. Mon. and not in very deed as the foolish Patient did the Physicians Recipe or as Mr. Lewis of Manchester made the Bishops Summoner eat the citation which he brough for his wife a Martyr in Queen Maries dayes by setting a dagger to his heart and to drink to it when he had done It was non reipsa sed spiritu saith an Interpreter See ver 10. Eat this roul and go speak unto the house of Israel First learn and then teach others that thou maist utter my mind readily dexterously and affectionately speaking à corde ad cor and digging thy discourses out of thine own bosom as it is said of Origen and after him of Petrus Comestor who merited that title Ex intimo cordis affectu because by his often allegations of the holy Scripture he seemed to have eaten it up and disgested it Ver. 2. So I opened my mouth Without delayes or consults Alsted Chronol 347. I obeyed Christ's command hausi quodammodo donum prophetiae and yielded to become a Prophet This was well but not long after Ezekiel through infirmity of the flesh would have declined the office and therefore sought to lurk among his countrymen-at Thelabib ver 15. till Christ called him out again and new-employed him v. 16. And he caused me to eat that roul See on ver 1. Ver. 3. Cause thy belly to eat and fill thy bowels i. e. Deeply and duely ponder and practise those holy truths thou hast to presse upon others preach thine own experiences c. See 1 Tim. 4.15 And it was in my mouth as hony for sweetnesse So was Gods Law to good David Psal 119.29.103 to Austin Scripturae tuae sunt deliciae meae saith he Thy Scriptures are my delight to Alphonsus King of Arragon who professed he had rather lose his Kingdoms then be without the knowledge of Gods blessed book which he had read over above a dozen times together with such Commentaries thereupon as those times afforded See Rev. 10.10 Ver. 4. Go get thee unto the house of Israel This was a hard task Vbi mel ibi fel. all things considered but hard or not hard there was a necessity of going on Gods errand Necesse est ut eat non ut vivat as he once said And speak with my words unto them But see they be mine and then I 'l bear thee out then also they will the sooner take impression Speak as the Oracles of God 1 Pet. 4.11 Ver. 5. For thou art not sent to a people of a strange speech and of an hard language Heb. deep of lip and heavy of tongue as Jonas was so sent Qui strident sermone quast è profundo gutture barbarum loquuntur and those that now preach to the Natives in New-England in their own language not without some good successe But to the house of Israel Amongst whom thou must use vulgari vernaculo sermone who also are well seen in the Scriptures they are indeed Gods Library-keepers which is no small priviledge Rom. 3.2 and therefore the better to be dealt with Ver. 6. Surely had I sent unto them they would have hearkened Or If I had sent thee to them would they not have hearkened unto thee It may seem by the Ninivites that they would for they repented at the preaching of Jonas Matth. 12.41 at one single Sermon made by a meer stranger who sang so doleful a ditty to them that their City should be shortly destroyed c. Vatabus rendreth this text Dispeream nisi te audissent si ad eos te misissem And couldest thou but skill of forraign languages thou couldest not easily be without
Matthew Zacâ—etu the Disciples after their shameful flight Austin all us who like sheep were gone astray c. But I will destroy the fat Pâ—nguem petulcam such as in whom fulnesse breedeth forgetfulnesse as in Jeshurun Deut. 32.15 Queen Elizabeth was told in a Sermon by Mr. Deering that once she was Tanquam ovis like a meek sheep but now tanquam indomita juvenca as an untamed heifer and therefore wished her to meet God by repentance Here good Oecolampadius complaineth and cause enough he had of some of Christs fatter sheep who were too too taunty and troublesome to their fellows The Lutherans of Suevia he might well mean who in their Syngramma used him very coursely and Luther himself in his book of private Masse set forth An. Dom. 1533. passeth a very uncharitable censure upon his disease and death And I will feed them with judgement Putting a difference and dealing with them as it is fit Ver. 17. And as for you O my flock I have a saying to you also such as are unruly especially as well as to your shepheards Behold I judge between cattle and cattle Between sincere Christians and hypocrites sheep and goats and can soon shed them and shew them to the world who are fierce rams and who are nasty goats at last day howsoever all shall out and a separation shall be made the precious shall be taken out from the vile Ver. 18. Seemeth it a small thing unto you Extenuant hypocritae suam culpam honesto titulo Hypocrites make the best and the least of their sins Oecol which good men acknowledge with aggravation but the works of the flesh are manifest and here we have a lively picture of the Popâ—sh Clergy who eat up the best and tread down the rest pro salutaribus aquis suam salivam hominibus obtrudunt and for wholesome obtrude brackish waters upon men to quench their thirst Ver. 19. And as for my flock they eat The poor misled and muzzled people are glad to eat such as they can catch they are fed with traditions legendary fables indulgences vowed pilgrimages pennances c. If Luther had not come in our way say they we could have perswaded the people to have eat grasse Ver. 20. I even I will judge between the fat cattle These are saith Austin those that presume of their own strength and boast of their own righteousnesse being proud insolent and void of charity Ver. 21. Because ye have thrust with side and with shoulder i. e. With pretence of law on your side and with power in your hand to do what you list Toto corpore et conatu for who can withstand you And pushed all the diseased with your hornes i. e. With your excommunications and persecutions See Esa 66.5 Till ye have scattered them abroad For how should they abide it they drive them out of the fold flock pasture so that they must either fly or dye Ver. 22. Therefore will I save my flock Viz. By Christ the true Shepheard who once found out him whom the Jews had unjustly excommunicated Joh. 9.35 and gave him encouragement He knows all his sheep by name as Exod. 33.12 17. and hath promised them safety here and salvation hereafter Joh. 10.27 It is not with the Saints as Esa 31.4 or as Amos 3.12 but as Jer. 31.10 11 12. See the places Ver. 23. And I will set up one Shepheard Who indeed is the only Shepheard Magistrates and Ministers are Shepheards but Christ is the good Shepheard Joh. 10.11 the great Shepheard and Bishop of souls 1 Pet. 2.25 Heb. 13.20 the true Shepheard above all for skill love and power above Jacob above David of whom he descended and by whose name he is here called so Jer. 30.9 Hos 3.5 Ezek. 37.24 Even my servant David i. e. Christ the Son and successour of David not David George as that odious heretike who dyed at Basile blasphemously applied this text to himself as if he had been the man here intended The Jews themselves confesse that Messias is here meant He shall feed them This is thus repeated as that which containeth a world of comfort It sheweth also that Christ will do it to the utmost Jacob was a sedulous Shepherd Christ much more Ver. 24. And I the Lord will be their God This is that Bee-hive of heavenly honey we so oft meet with in the Old Testament which therefore those Sectaries have so little reason to reject And my servant David a Prince among them Captain of the Lords hosts Josh 6.2 Captain also of his peoples salvation Heb. 2.10 Messias the Prince Dan. 9.25 Ver. 25. And I will make with them a Covenant of peace Pactum pacis pacis omnimodae Jer. 31.13 Esa 11.10 Joh. 14.27 And will cause the evil beasts That were wont to worry the flock I will set them safe from Satan and his impes his instruments such as was Nero the lion and bloody Bonner the Popes slaughter-slave here Ver. 26. And I will make them a blessing By blessing them with all spiritual benedictions in Christ Jesus Eph. 1.3 so that they shall be felices faecundi happy and fruitful There shall be shâ—wres of blessing Or very large showres 2 Cor. 9.6 of divine doctrine Esa 55.9 and of righteousnesse Hos 10.12 Ver. 27. And the tree of the field shall yield her fruit There shall be a confluence of all comforts and contentments When I have broken the bands of their yoke Freed them from the Babylonish bondage but especially from the Tyranny of sin and terrour of hell when I have broke the devils yoke from off the necks of their souls Out of the hands of those that served themselves of them As did the devil whose drudges they were and who had them wholly at his beck and check Ver. 28. And they shall be no more a prey to the heathen As the Jews then were and are to this day being used by the Papists as spunges The Christian Hebrews also suffered with joy the spoiling of their goods but then for an allay to their grief they knew within themselves that which did sufficiently support them and make up their losse Heb. 10.34 Sept. plantam pacis Ver. 29. And I will raise up for them a plant of renowne i. e. Christ the true tree of life Or the Church planted and rooted in Christ and much renowned all the world over Christ mystical is a vine covering the whole earth And they shall be no more consumed with hunger They shall have enough of all good things a sufficiency though not a superfluity a Davids sat habeo because the Lord hath heard the voyce of my supplications Psal 116.1 Neither bear the shame of the heathen any more God will bring them in credit with those which formerly slighted and reproached them God fashioneth mens opinions ruleth their tongues promiseth to them who by patient continuance in well-doing seek for glory and honour and immortality eternal life where the Saints
prepared for them that love him and sith this City is a type of heavens happiness which is fitter to be believed then possible to be expressed therefore I am the less troubled saith good Oecolampadius here that I understand no more of this surmounting matter Ver. 34. At the West-side c. See on ver 32 33. Ver. 35. It was round about eighteen thousand measures See on ver 32. and on Rev. 21.16 The Lord is there Jehovah-shammah this is the true Churches name and the true Christians happiness such as no good can match no evil overmatch viz. that wheresoever he is there God is and therefore there heaven is like as where the King is there his Court is this very name implyes Gods everlasting being with his Church according to those precious texts of Scripture every syllable whereof dropeth myrrh and mercy Lev. 26.11 12. Mat. 18.20 28.20 Joh. 14.23 1 Cor. 15.28 Rev. 7.14 c 21.3 4 5. 22.3 4 5 6. This is the truth of that which the Temple whil'st it stood as a type or figure did represent This is my rest for ever here will I dwell Psal 132.14 God will not forsake his Church as he did the Synagogue but have it up to heaven to him Rev. 21. where are crowns scepters Kingdoms beatifical visions unutterable exstasies sweetest varieties felicities eternities and all because Jehovah shammah the Lord is there to him be glory and praise everlasting Amen So be it Soli Deo Gloria The Jews having finished a book adde Benedictus qui dat fatigato robur FINIS A COMMENTARY OR EXPOSITION ON THE BOOK of the Prophet DANIEL Ver. 1. THE book of Daniel Written by himself not by another of his name Lib 12. contra Christian in the days of Antiochus Epiphanes as wicked Porphyry that professed enemy of Christianity Mr Ascham blaterateth like as Xenophon and Julius Caesar wrot their own acts so wisely and impartially as none have been so upright in writing the histories of others This divine Book is for the matter of it partly Historical and partly Prophetical The historical part we have in the six first Chapters sc a continuation of the history of the Books of Kings Hieron Ep. 103. ad Paulin during the whole time of the Captivity and after it Hence Hierom calleth Daniel Multiscum totius Mundi Polyhistorem a general Historian The Prophetical part beginning at the seventh Chapter foretelleth future things in the several Monarchies but very obscurely according to that of the Angel chap. 12.9 10. Go thy way Daniel for the words ore closed up and sealed till the end of the time c. and according to that Hieroglyphick of Prophecy which hangs they say among other pictures in the Vatican Library at Rome like a Matrone with the eyes covered for the difficulty Whence it was that Paulinus Bishop of Nola though able would never be drawn to write Commentaries Cajetan and Calvin would set no Notes upon the Revelation and Piscator after that he had commented upon the other Prophets when he came to Daniel he met with so many dark and difficult passages ut parum obfuerit saith he quin in medio commentandi cursu subsisterem calamum è manu deponerem that he was even ready to lay down his pen Piscat Epist dedicat ante Com. in Dan. and to lay aside the businesse But this he did not as considering that the best whiles here know but in part Prophecy but in part c. and that the promise is though none of the wicked understand this Prophecy yet the wise shall chap. 12.10 Hierom well saith Quod alio tempore canitur alio cernitur De vir perfect that a Prophecy is therefore obscure because it is said at one time and seen at another And one thing that causeth a cloud in Daniel is the transposing of the history here often used as the Prophesies contained in the seventh and eighth Chapters which were shewed unto Daniel under the reign of Belshazzar in order should be set before the sixth Chapter c. He seemeth indeed to have been laid aside in the dayes of Belshazzar that drunken Sot till the hand-writing on the wall brought him more in request again chap. 5. That cock on the dunghil knew not the worth of this peerlesse pearl highly prized both by his Predecessor and Successors to whom he was a secretis of their privy Coucil Famous he was grown and worthily for his extraordinary wisdom Ezek. 28.3 and holinesse Ezek. 14.14 so that the Angel Gabriel stileth him a man of Desires or a Desirable man Dan. 9.23 Seneca calleth Cato Virtutum vivam imaginem a lively picture of Virtues Pliny saith that the same Cato Censorius was an excellent Orator an excellent Senator an excellent Commander Lib. 2. and a Master of all good Arts. Paterculus saith that he was a man as like Virtue Dec. 4. lib. 9. as ever he could look per omnia virtutâ— diis quam hominibus propior Livy saith he was a man of rigid innocency and invincible integrity In vita Catonis Cornelius Nepos that being assayed and assaulted by many he not only never lost any part of his reputation but as long as he lived grew still in the praise of his virtues as being in all things of singular prudence and industry Lastly Cicero saith of Cato Cato Major that whereas he underwent the enmities of many potent persons Splendida peccata and suffered no little hardship all his time yet was he one of those few who lived and dyed with glory How much more truely might all this be affirmed of Daniel the Prophet then of Cato the Censor all whose virtues were but glistring sins and all whose praise-worthy parts and practises were but tinckling cymbals in comparison Daniel's whole life was a kind of Heaven adorned with most radiant stars of divine virtues Sixt. Senens Bib. Sanct. lib. 4. And although we cannot say of him as Aleander of Hales did of his scholar Bonavanture in an Hyperbolical strain that Adam seemed to him not to have sinned in Bonavanture such was his sanctity and knowledge yet with more colour of truth might the like he said of Daniel the Jews Jewel and the Worlds darlâ—ng Torshel He wrot this Book part of it in Hebrew and part in Chaldee all in a short but grave stile evident and elegant being a divine Polychronicon to the worlds end or as One calleth it the Apocalypse of the Old Testament CHAP. I. Ver. 1. IN the third year of the reign of Jehojakim That wicked King who killed the Prophet Vriah Jer. 26. cut Jeremia's Prophecy with a knife and cast it into the fire Jer. 36. was a grosse Idolater 2 Chron. 36.8 and therefore justly suffered Came Nebucahdnezzar Surnamed Magnus son to Nebuchadnezzar surnanamed Priscus See 2 King 24.1 2. 2 Chron. 36.8 with the Notes Ver. 2. And the Lord gave Jehojakim Because the affliction by
it be considered whether they be not Spain Germany and France or whether this prefigured not saith One his triple crown And behold in this horn were eyes like the eyes of a man In respect of his feined curtesy and profound policy To be sharpsighted is commendable but to be wittily wicked is to do the devil doubty service And a mouth speaking great thing Big swoln with blasphemies both against God and his Vicegerents upon earth Pope Boniface wrot to Philip the Fair King of France Volumus te scire te in temporali spirituali nobis subjacere We would you should know Sir that you are to subject your selves to us Alsted Chron. both in temporals and spirituals c. Accordingly he took upon him to overtop and command at pleasure all Christian Kings and Emperours The application that the malicious Jew-doctours blasphemously make of this little horn to our Lord Jesus Christ is worthy of all execration Ver. 9. I beheld till the thrones were cast down All these tyrannous dominions overturned Some read it till the thrones were set up for till the last Judgement Antichrist is to continue ver 21 22 25 26. And the Ancient of dayes did sit i. e. God Almighty whom Thales also an Heathen Philosopher called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the most Ancient of all that are The Poets say also that Saturn the father of their gods had his name from his fulnesse of years Gods Eternity and Wisdom is set forth by this his Title here Laert. in vlt. Thalet Saturnus est appellatus quòd saturetur annâ— Cic. de nat deor lib. 2. like as also is by his white garments his Majesty and Authority by his hair as pure wooll his Innocency and Integrity in Judgement by his throne like the fiery flame his just Anger and Severity against the man of sin especially by his wheels or the wheels thereof viz. of his Throne for Princes thrones used in those dayes to be set upon wheels as burning fire is set forth his Facility and Dexterity in executing his Judgements his Efficacy also sith all things are fiery Ver. 10. A fiery stream issued and came forth from before him The last and great Judgement must needs be very dreadful when as beside that wicked men shall give account with all the world flaming about their ears the Law they shall be judged by is a fiery Law Deut 32.2 the tribunal of fire Ezek. 1.27 the Judge a consuming fire Heb. 12.29 His Attendants flaming Seraphims his pleading with sinners shall be in flames of fire 2 Thes 1.7 The trial of their works shall be by fire 1 Cor. 3.13 The place of punishment a lake of fire fed with tormenting temper and kindled by the breath of the Lord Isa 30 33. Well may the sinners in Zion be afraid and fearfulnesse surprize hypocrites well may they run away if they can at least tell whither with these words in their mouths Who among us shall dwell with this devouring fire who amongst us shall dwell with everlasting burnings Isa 33.14 Thousand thousands ministred unto him There is an innumerable company of Angels Heb. 12.22 and when Christ cometh to judge the world he shall bring them all with him not one being left behind him in heaven Mat. 16.27 that he may have their assistance in the sentence and execution of Judgement 1 Cor. 6.2 3. Sedendo quiescendo animasit prudens Aristot Physic lib. 6. The Judgement was set and the books were opened Terms taken from judgements amongst men wherein inditements are read proofs are produced Laws also are considered The books that shall here be opened are Gods Records and Consciences Register quae scripta sunt non atrameâ—â—o sed flagitiorum inquinamento saith Ambrose which are written not with ink but with sins filth I beheld then because of the voice of the great words As Antichrist shall be judged for his blasphemies so shall all ungodly men for their hard speeches Jude 12. yea for their waste words Mat. 12. Cotton the Jesuite confesseth that the authority of the Pope is incomparably lesse then it was and that now the Christian Church is but a diminutive Ver. 11. I beheld even till the beast was slain Till the whole body of the monster and with it the Papal kingdom came to ruine This Bellarmine confesseth and lamenteth that ever since we began to call the Pope Antichrist the Church of Rome hath suffered losse And his body destroyed and given to the burning flame The Revelation which is an heavenly Commentary upon this Prophecy hath it thus The beast and the false Prophet were cast alive for more torment into a lake of fiâ—e burning with brimstone Chap. 19.20 Ver. 12. As concerning the rest of the beasts The four great Monarchies as was before noted had their times and their turns their rise and their ruine Yet their lives were prolonged for a season Such is the Lords lenity respiting his enemies for a time 1 Kings 21.29 The Persian and Turk are yet puissant Princes The successe that the Antichristian rout yet hath in some places maketh good that which was sometime said of dying Carthage Morientium nempe bestiarum violentiores esse morsus i. e. The bites of dying beasts are more violent then ordinary Ver. 13. I saw in the night visions c. Here comes in the fifth Monarchy properly so called the kingdom being wrested from the fourth tyrant Well might Hierom call Daniel Polyhistora the general Historian And behold one like the son of man So Christ shewed himself oft to the Fathers before his Incarnation for their confirmation in that Article which being the ground of his Passion was to be especially believed for the foundation of Christian faith Christs Godhead also another main Article is here not obscurely deciphered whilest he is said to be like the son of man therefore he is more then a mere man Again he came with the clouds confer Mat. 24.30 Then shall they see the son of man coming in the clouds as in his charet of State Adde hereunto his solemn glorious accesse unto the Father that Ancient of dayes that is the Eternal God as being his Coâ—qual of the same nature power glory c. with his Father and Coeternal unto him So the Lamb is said to approach to him that sat upon the Throne to receive the Book Rev. 5.7 Et qui assistebaâ—â— ei abtulerant eum sic Cyprian legit And they brought him near before him The Angels did as great mens Attendants are said to bring their Masters to the Court. Ver. 14. And there was given him dominion Christ hath a manyfold right to the kingdom it is his by Inheritance conquest donation c. This is comfortable to consider of forasmuch as he will not reign without his Members who all hold all in capite and have all already 1. In precio 2. In promisso 3. In primitiis That all people nations and languages c. Christs Kingdiom is
6.2 Shall he honour This doubling of the word seemeth to shew the Angels indignation at the indignity of the fact See the like Gen. 49.4 Ver. 31. Ver. 39. Thus shall he do in the most strong holds Heb. in the fortresses of munitions i. e. both in the Temple called elsewhere a strong-hold and in the places of defence near unto the Temple where he set a garrison to force the people to worship his Idols Whom he shall acknowledge and increase with glory Or those whom he shall acknowledge to be favourers and furtherers of his abominable idolatry those he shall increase with glory he shall raise and prefer them as he did Jason Menelaus c. And he shall cause them to rule over many In praestantes illos so Piscator rendreth it over the godly Jews Gods Rabbines And he shall divide the land sc Of Judaea For gain Heb. for a price Sic omnia Romae vaenalia All things are saleable and soluble at Rome Ver. 40. And at the time of the end The year before his death Shall the King of the South Ptolomie Philometor And the King of the North Antiochus his third expedition into Egypt see ver 39 in favour of Physcon And shall overflow i. e. Victoriously overrun Egypt Ver. 41. He shall enter also into the glorious land Judaea as ver 16. but for no good In Greece they say Where the Grand Signior once setteth his foot there groweth no more grasse But these shall escape Because they shall side with him Ver. 42. He shall stretch forth his hand also He shall be very victorious toward his latter end that he may be the riper for ruine fatted ware are but fitted for destruction Ver. 43. Shall be at his steps i. e. Obey him as their Captain Ver. 44. But tidings out of the East c. It it seldom seen that God alloweth to the greatest darlings of the world a perfect contentment but something or other they must have to trouble them still Ver. 45. And he shall plant the Tabernacles of his palace i e 1 Mac. 3.40 4 3. He shall pitch his tent royal in token of full power given to his Captains Lysias and the rest in Emmaus near to Jerusalem to keep the Jews in subjection Between the Seas The Dead Sea and the Midland Sea Polyb. Joseph l. 12. c. 12. which are the bounds of Judaea called here the glorious holy mountain Yet he shall come to his end A loathsome and lamentable one See 1 Maccab. 6.8 2 Maccab. 9. not so much because he would have spoiled the Temple of Diana but because he did spoil the Temple at Jerusalem CHAP. XII Ver. 1. ANd at that time i. e. In the last dayes and toward the end of the World for in this Chapter seemeth to be set forth the State of the Church in the last times that it shall be most afflicted yet she shall be fully delivered by Christs second coming to Judgement Cyprian was in like sort wont to comfort his friends thus Venit Antichristus sed superveniet Christus Antichrist will come but then Christ will come after him and overcome him Shall Michael stand up i. e. The Lord Christ that Prince of Angels and Protector of his people not a created Angel much lesse Michael Servetus that blasphemous heretike burnt at Geneva who was not afraid to say as Calvin reporteth it se esse Michaelem illum Ecclesiae custodem that he was that Michael the Churches Guardian David George also another blackmouthed heretike said that he was that David foretold by the Prophets Jer. 30.9 Ezek. 34.23 Hos 3.5 and that he was confident that the whole World would in time submit to him Which standeth for the children of thy people For all the Israel of God to whom Christ is a fast friend and will he while the government is upon his shoulder Isa 9.6 And there shall be a time of trouble To the Jews by the Romans after Christs ascension Mat. 24.21 to the Christians by the Romists And at that time thy people shall be delivered The elect both Jews and Gentiles shall be secured and saved Every one that shall be found written in the book Called the writing or catalogue of the house of Israel Ezek. 13.9 and the Lambs book of life Rev. 21.27 which is nothing else but conscriptio electorum in mente divina saith Lyra the writing of the elect in the divine mind or knowledge such are said to be written among the living in Jerusalem Isa 4.4 Ver. 2. And many of them that sleep in the dust Many for all as Rom. 5.18 19. these are said to sleep which denoteth the immortality of the soul and the resurrection of the body The soul liveth in the sleep of death as it doth in the sleep of the body in this life And this the poor Jews when to lose land and life for the truth are here seasonably and plainly told of amidst other things that are but darkly delivered to bear up their sinking spirits Awake they shall as out of a sweet sleep those that are good and then be full of Gods Image Psal 17. â—it The wicked also shall come forth but by another principle and for another purpose they shall come out of their graves like filthy roads against this terrible storm c. Some to everlasting life Which is here first mentioned in the old Testament See Matth. 25.45 Joh. 5.29 And some to shame and everlasting contempt Christ shall shame them in that ample Amphitheatre and doom them to eternal destruction Graevissima paenarum pudor est saith Chrysostom Oh when Christ shall upbraid reprobates and say Ego vos pavi lavi vestivi c. which way will they look or who shall say for them They shall look then upon him whom they have pierced and lament 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but all too late they shall be sore ashamed of their sinful practises which shall all be written in their foreheads and this shall be as a bodkin at their hearts that ever they turned their backs upon Christs bleeding embracements whilst they refused to be reformed hated to be healed Ver. 3. And they that be wise And withal do what they can do to wise others to salvation as all wise ones will for Goodnesse is diffusive of itself and would have others to share with it charity is no churl Shall shine as the brightnesse of the firmament A good amends for their present sufferings chap. 11.33 with Rom. 8.18 Solomon allowed little or no considerable reward to his workmen Mat. 13.42 Cant. 8.12 but Christ doth For they shall shine as the firmament yea as the Stars yea as the Sun in his strength yea as Christ himself shineth they shall appear with him in glory Colos 3.4 Their souls shall shine through their bodies as the candle doth through the lanthorn their bodies shall also be so light-some and transparent saith Aquinas that all the veins humours nerves and bowels shall be