fair day after a storm For in the eight former verses there hath not been any mention made of God or godliness but marriage upon marriage murther upon murther vaunting of finne past and to come deriding of God and his holy word as if he were a person that favoured wicked men and not contenting himself with the punishment which God inflicted but a devising a new kinde of revenge as we see in Lamech who not contented with the punishment which God appointed for murtherers that is seven times would challenge to himself seventy times seven times Now at last we come to a verse that hath the mention and name of God and of a good man of whom a succession of good men should be raised And it was fit that the Man of God Moses should keep this order because the faith of Adam and Eve might quail and they might think God not true of his promise in regard of that which they saw For as for the threatning which God denounced against Cain wee see it is not performed but Cain and his posteritie in stead of being plagued for his wickednesse grow to be great men rich Grasyers such as have all things that tend either to delight or defense As for Adams promise which was That the seed of the woman should bruise the Serpents head it fell out clean contrary for we see to what a great number the spawne of the Serpent was grown when as there was none of the Womans seed And whereas God promised the Womans seed should bruise the head of the Serpent wee see the spawne of the Serpent 〈◊〉 the head of the Womans seed For Abel who was the Womans seed is slain by Cain who was of the Serpents seed which falls out many times in the world The promise made to Noah was That Cham should be a servant Genesis the ninth chapter and yet we see it fell out clean contrary for Genesis the tenth chapter 〈◊〉 who was of Chams race was the first Emperour upon earth And in the new Testament the people of God when Christ was born were in that state that Herod an Edomite was become their King Matthew the seoond chapter That wee may see that as the Prophet speakes in the one hundred and ninteenth Rsalm and the hundred twenty sixt verse Then it is time for God to lay to his hand when mankinde looking into his word and seeing that it is not fulfilled which God hath spoken doe decay in faith that he may shew himself a true God and able to accomplish that which he doth either promise or threaten that so the faith that was yet left upon earth might revive and take breath again The verse it self consisteth of two parts First Adams knowledge of his Wife Secondly The nativity of Seth. For the first Not to say any thing of the term which Moses useth which is Adams knowledge for that we have handled it heretofore we will consider the word iterum which gives us plainly to know that for a great while Adam gave over that Act being stricken and amazed with this consideration that one brother should kill another that is in bewailing Abel that was 〈◊〉 and Cain that was cut off from the Church Adam and Eve were in this state of minde that they were as it were dead seeing their first Ofspring sped so unhappily that the one was slain bodily the other was under the sentence of death both of body and soul when I say they considered that they should either beget children to be murthered which was Abels case or else to be cast into hell in respect of Cain it made them say with Rebecca Genesis the twenty fift chapter and the twenty second verse si mihi sic futurum est quia necesse est parere for these considerations they had clean given over Out of which example of Adam and Eve we learn to conform ourselves to crosses and heavy accidents as God layeth upon us that is to forbear and give over matters of pleasure when God calls us to mourning for it is a thing agreeable to Gods will If when the Lord God of hosts shall call to weeping and mourning there be nothing but joy and 〈◊〉 slaying of Oxen c. the Lord himself sayeth that is a sinne which shall not be pardoned or purged with any sacrifice till they die Isaiah the twenty second chapter and the twelfth verse It is that which Christ teacheth Matthew the ninth chapter and the fifteenth verse When the Bridegrome shall be taken away then shall they mourn and fast that is when either he shall be taken from us or when men shall drive him from them by their sinnes then there is cause of mourning and sorrow Therefore we see albeit it was Gods will that Aaron and his Children should eat the offerings of the Children of Israel yet he refused to eat them in regard of the Judgments of God upon Nadab and Abihu his Sonnes saying Thou knowest such and such things have come to me this day and if I had eaten the sin-offering 〈◊〉 it have been accepted in the sight of the Lord 〈◊〉 the 〈◊〉 chapter and the ninteenth verse Therefore David mourned so for the death of Abner that he said God doe so to me and more if I eat bread or 〈◊〉 else till the Sun be down in the second of Samuel the third chapter and the thirty fift verse But hence there appears another thing unto us which is that 〈◊〉 and earthly sorrow in a naturall man is a thing stronger than any worldly pleasure that in regard of the naturall man there is more strength in grief than in pleasure or joy for if a man have 〈◊〉 in never so much pleasure all 〈◊〉 life yet if he come to a little sickness it takes away all remembrance of his former pleasure And this is a means to make a man think of such an estate Wherein he may have that pleasure and joy which shall not be taken from him as Christ speaketh John the sixteenth chapter and the twenty second verse Now when Adam had relieved himself with this cogitation that as the Prophet speaks Psalm the eighty ninth God hath not made all men for nought it made him to return whereupon there followed by Gods blessing not only a seed but a chosen and holy seed that is Seth. Concerning whom first we will speak of his birth wherein we have this to observe that those Children whom God gives to Parents upon a plentifull contrition and repentance doe usually prove men excellent in all spirituall graces The first example hereof is Seth who is not only the foundation of the Church but of mankinde for since the flood all the Sons of men are called the Children of Seth. It is also shewed in Joseph whom God gave to Rachel having opened her wombe which before was shut up so as she was barren Genesis the thirtieth chapter and the twenty second verse It also appeared in Hannah who having bewailed her own
to be understood as the Scriptures well teach us Augustine saith that the tree of life served not only ad alimenta sed etiam ad sacramenta for doubtlesse as Adam in his estate of innocency had a bodily Sabbath so therein he had a spirituall use of these trees in the mid'st of the Garden and that in this sort First for the tree of life it was not so called as if it gave life to him for God breathed that into him at the first But besides that the tree of life was a means to preserve it It was also a Symbolum and memoriall also to put him in minde to know that it was not 〈…〉 virtute arboris but vi virtute divina by which he had life at first and by which his life and length of dayes shall be continued hereafter In the middest of the Garden was the Pulpit and this is the Sermon which was preached unto him by these things which the trees did represent namely That God was his life and length of dayes 〈◊〉 30. 20. And that this gratious visitation did preserve his life Job 10. 12. As he breathed out his life into him at the first Again it did put him in minde that seeing he had received a spirituall life of immutability in esse so also he received a spirituall life of eternity in posse Therefore he had matter and just occasion of thankfulnesse for the one and of obedience for the other Adam had two things injoyned him the one was praeesse Creaturis the other subesse Creatori he had no need of a Caveat for the one for he was ready enough to govern and bear soveraignty but for his duty to God he had great need to be put in minde and for the try all and practise thereof he caused this tree of knowledge to be planted there with an inhibition not to eat of it upon pain of death which now and ever hath offended many Some wish it had not been in the Garden Others wish Adam had never tasted it But Saint Augustine saith if it were good and pleasant why should it not be there Gods purpose therefore in planting the forbidden tree was that it might be a triall of his obedience and practise of his duty that if he should continue as he might and had ability given him then he should have the greater reward afterward 〈◊〉 saith Rev. 2. 7. Vincenti dabo edere de ligno vitae in medio Paradisi Well saith St. Paul But no man can overcome except he strive first and fight the good fight 2 Tim. 2. 5. And no man that will or can strive well but he abstaineth from something 1 Cor. 9. 25. For which cause therefore that we might be rewarded it was necessary that there should be a commandement and forbidding for his abstinence that when there should be a tryall of the Tempter saying Eat of this he should strive and say I may not and so get the victory and be crowned that is eate of the tree of everlasting life and live for ever with God in Heaven On the contrary side 17. verse if in triall he should wilfully fall then for transgression the tree of life should be a tree of death Mortem morieris And the reason of this choice why God should prescribe him a law and form of obedience is because this should be primor dialis lex as one saith ut nostrum obsequi sit nostrum sapere Deut. 30. 20. This is our wisdome to know and doe that which God will have us to doe if God give a Law at large every one will consent to it As if God had said No man shall disobey or transgresse my will none will deny it But let it come to positive law and bring the triall and practise of that generall to a particular as to say I forbid and restrain this tree none shall break my will nor eat of it then is the triall of obedience indeed Object But some may say What hurt is it to know good and evill For we read Esay 7. 15. that Christ shall doe that And therefore it is no sinne Resp. I answer that God forbiddeth not to eat the fruit nor that he would have us ignorant of that knowledge quam quis quaerit a Deo sed quam quis quaerit a seipso And no doubt Adam had the knowledge both of good and evill per intelligentiam si non per experientiam And he knew how to choose the one and to refuse the other to pursue the one and to fly from the other he understood it then but when he would know both by experience Gen. 3. 6. He could not see why God should forbid him and therefore the Tempter taking occasion by it made him make an experiment of it This is the cause then why at last Adam came to know evill by sense and experience and saw to his shame what evill was for to take he knew and confessed by experience that bonum erat adhaerere Deo as the Prophet saith Jer. 2. 19. And now he knew by tast how bitter a thing it was to forsake the Lord And that he knew it appeareth Gen. 3. 8. by hiding himself for fear he shewed that he knew it when he did feel ante-ambulatores mortis which is sorrow and sicknesse and when he saw the Statute of death that now it must necessarily come to him and all his posterity to dye the death then he knew evill by wofull experience You see the cause of the Law and of his sinne of good and evill it remaineth that we believe Adam in his knowledge and in his experience both of good and evill For by his good lost we come to the knowledge of the means by which our good may be lost that is if we seek to satisfie our lusts and curiously not contented with the open knowledge of his revealed will shall try conclusions with God and say what if we should break the Law Wherefore abandoning these faults which by experience we see were the cause of evill in him it behoveth us to receive more thankfully of God the good things we have and live obediently resting on the Sonne of God for good things to come And so at last Christ will be unto us the tree of eternal life hereafter as we have made him the tree of knowledge wisdome and sanctification to us in this life Fluvius autem procedit ex Hedene ad irrigandum hunc hortum inde sese dividit ferturque in quatuor capita Primi nomen est Pischon hic est qui alluit totam Regionem Chavilae ubi est aurum Et aurum illius Regionis praestans ibidem est Bdellium lapis Sardonyx Gen. 2. 10,11,12 June 10. 1591. THe verse going before containeth as we have seen the planting of the Garden and the devise of God framed and set in the middest of Paradise which is a plain resemblance of all Divinity both touching our duty in knowledge and
he did now For as the Angells which though they were unmarried yet notwithstanding did fall and not keep their first estate So no doubt the Divell would have been as strong in his delusions to have made him to fall as he was in deceiving his wife we may therefore lay the fault of this finne upon Eve or the Divell for as St. James saith Jam. 1. 14. It was not so much any outward occasion as his inward and corrupt concupifcence which made him to sinne But be it that she was the cause of fall yet from whence then came that occasion of evill to him Non'e e latere viri why then out of himself came all this cause of sinne But if any shall complain yet further of the womans hurt and fault let us know that this woman was made by the counsell of God the means and occasion by which amends was made and that with advantage for the evill for all the evill which she had first done for as she brought forth sinne and death so she was a means to bring forth a holy seed which should bring eternall righteousnesse and life unto all for as the Serpent should deceive the woman So it was Gods purpose that the seed of the 〈◊〉 should destroy the Serpent and his works wherefore we must not so much with grief marvail that the womans sinne was made the occasion of all our misery as with joy and comfort to wonder that God made the seed of the woman to save us from sinne and to bring us to 〈◊〉 And thus much for the resolution of these two doubts Now for the second part we see that after deliberation God cometh to this determination and saith Faciam adjutricem where we may mark that God saith not fiat as when he made other Creatures but faciam which is a word of advisement and wise deliberation whereas fiat is a word of haste and expedition to be presently done without delay which almighty God doth to put us in minde that when we goe about to get our selves wives or to give our children in marriage that we must not 〈◊〉 about it rashly or suddenly to post up such matters on the sudden but with great discretion wise advice and consultation to attempt so weighty a matter that is first by considering whether it be good or no for us that a match should be made Again seeing it is plain that God only is the giver of good and meet marriages and wives we learn that therefore it is our duty when we lack this help to pray earnestly unto God that it would please him to say unto us as he said unto Adam I will make a meet help for 〈◊〉 For want of observing which rules in 〈◊〉 it often cometh to passe that very unmeet matches and marriages hath been in the world and foul corruptions and abhominable abuses have crep into this holy ordinance to the slander and disgrace thereof for this is set down as the chiefest cause of all the monstrous sinnes of the first age of the world Gen 6. 2. Because the sonnes of God looking upon the daughters of men took them wives according to their own fancies that is rashly and headily without advice and deliberation and they took them at the first sight as pleased themselves and did not crave of God to give them such as might please him Micholl Davids wife is said to be a wife of Saules making and giving and therefore because God made not the match and marriage between them she was not a meet help but a snare to intangle him And so God doth threaten Joshua 23. 12 13. verses that if the Israelites doe after their own wills take unto them heathenish woman to be their wives which he had forbid they should be no helps to them but hurts namely They should be thorns to their eyes whips to their sides and snares to their feet because they doe not take wives at Gods hands that is such as he alloweth and willeth them to take Nam quum formavisset Jehova Deus è terrâ omnes bestias agri omnesque volucres coeli adduxisset ad Adamum ut videret quî vocaret singulas etenim quocunque nomine vocavit illas Adam animantem quamque id nomen ejus est Gen. 2. 19. Octob. 16 1591. THese words contain the occasion of the former deliberation for that there might be an orderly proceeding it was necessary that man being alone and wanting a meet help which was good for him therefore that first a generall view and survey might be taken of all the Creatures which God had made to see whether amongst so many millions of goodly creatures some one might be found for Adam to be a meet mate for him and then if the man should not finde any one fit for him God might proceed in his former purpose in making one woman meet for his company In these words therefore we have first to consider Gods commission and warrant for the ministring and bringing together all the creatures before the man Secondly Adams answer returned non est inventus for after his diligent search it is said he found no meet help for the first because it is Gods royall prerogative to cause all the creatures to make their appearance at a certain place and time which man of himself might not presume to take upon him therefore God giveth over his right by a letter of Attourny and dedimus potestatem to Adam by which he might lawfully both take a streight survey of them all and also impose names to every one of them as he pleaseth which see that this writ and warrant is given out to all the living creatures here below saving unto fishes the reason whereof is because that if there were any likelyhood at all that man might finde a meet companion and mate for himself any where then it must needs be amongst one of these two kinds of creatures either amongst beasts of the field or fowls of the aire for there be some agreement and conformity between man and beasts and birds naturally but none at all between the fish and us the beasts as we have seen are made of the same mould and matter which we are made of and the fishes were made of the slyme of the waters and not of slyme of the earth Secondly because they have naturally divers notes and voices as well as man but the fish are mute and dumb and therefore unmeet for our company Thirdly beasts and birds doe feed on earthly things as we and breathe and live in the same aire and place which we doe and doe delight naturally in the sight and company of man and easily will be made tame sociable and serviceable for man whereas è contra the fish neither feed nor breathe as we doe they cannot live in the same place and element which we doe but are as it were inhabitants of another world below us and besides this they will by no means be made tame and
a condemning of his action because it is a foolish thing to doe that which hath no good reason to be rendred to warrant the doing of it Therefore God divideth the sense into two parts either the reason must be in God or in Abel in God for favouring him or in Abel because favoured of God Now God in the former part hath acquitted himself saying If thou dost well shalt not thou be accepted for behold I am just and will regard thy well doing therefore thou hast no cause to be grieved for that Or else thou shalt be rewarded according to justice and that in bounty and liberality which is by ancient Fathers grounded upon the words of God to Abraham Fear not for I will be thine exceeding great reward Genesis the fifteenth chapter and the first verse that is If thou dost well thou shalt be 〈◊〉 be rewarded for it but if thou dost not well thou hast no cause to be grieved neither for as I am just and will talk with thee one day thou shalt hear of it so yet my justice is full of mercy I intend not presenly to take thee by the throat but give thee space to repent 〈◊〉 shall but lye at thy dore so that not only Gods justice 〈◊〉 herein but his mercy is exceeding great and mixed with justice If God took order that after his sinne committed Cain should 〈◊〉 by and by come to judgement but should have time first to 〈◊〉 himself of it this is matter of comfort that no man should despair by and by when he hath sinned far that God is a 〈…〉 God and would not the death of sinner and therefore giveth him time to repent This sheweth that God gave him no cause of grief There remains that the grief must be conceived against Abel because God so much respected him but so the sense is as if God should say Cain art thou grieved for Abels good and fearest he should grow insolent by the favour I have shewed him and so he should despise and thou shouldst be vile in his eyes If Abel have offended thee why his desire shall be subject to thee but that is no cause why thou shouldst be grieved for he being the Child of grace doth not affect any such manner of superiority as thou fearest but is as modest and as humble as he was before and so thou hast no reason of impatiencie against him And not only that first but this second that God shewed plainly that it is his will that in and by the sin committed no man should lose any priviledge which of right is due to him and which before hee had and every motion in a Superior to sinne doth not discharge him of his authority Which is contrary to that false opinion and censure of them which thinke that even Princes themselves after sinne committed lose all their prerogative and supremacy of government which they had before and that their Subjects are not bound to doe their service any longer to them but that ever after their allegiance shall cease which is false and contrary to all reason and not Gods intent and will here For as in the chapter before after Adam had sinned yet Eve was still subject to him so the same God saith and ratifieth here that Cain though he had thus sinned both against God and his brother yet being the elder and first born and so before Abel so there should be a superiority and dominion that he should still retain by nature And it is Gods assertion that that superiority should be reteined still and that Abel should not seek to be his Superior neither did he That was the prerogative which Cain had before Abel as the elder But to yeeld this obedience hath been the continuall practise of all the Saints and Children of God King Saul was a wicked man yet David rebelled not against him because he knew him to be the Lords annointed so the Prophet Jeremy saith of Nebuchadnezar a wicked King that he will visite the Nation and Kingdome that will not serve him the twenty seventh chapter of Jeremiah and the ninth verse and for the new Testament both Paul and Peter confess the same Paul in the first to Timothy the second chapter and the second verse and Peter in the first epistle of Peter the second chapter and the fourteenth verse doe will that duty and allegiance be given to the higher powers not only if they be good but though they be Tyrants and wicked Princes that fear not God And it is it that God saith by Job Job the thirty fourth chapter and the thirtieth verse that by him the Hypocrite reigneth that is for their sinnes God will send wicked Princes and Cain shall bear rule over Abel God doth not only alledg that thus it was but thus he would have it This Government thus by God established in the beginning was by David Jeremy Paul Peter Job and all the rest of the Patriarchs and Saints of God confessed and allowed So that if we regard Abel either in respect of himself or his demeanour towards Cain or we respect Gods goodness herein no just cause can be of grief neither was it Gods will that Abel should resist neither doth he any such thing and so indeed there was no just cause why Cain should fear it or be grieved And this may suffice for the first which I will shut up with this Caveat of instruction 〈◊〉 Our own sinne of malice and envy is cause of our grief that for as much as the grief of malice and envy cannot be 〈◊〉 from God who is just nor from Abel who is mild and modest then it remains that it came from Cain himself whom God repeats four times together in the words of this Text thou and thee and so he must return to his own heart and remember how his own sinne is cause of his grief as God himself speaketh by Isaiah the fourty sixth chapter and the eighth verse Remember thus and be ashamed bring it again to minde you transgressors Note And for the new Testament Luke the fifteenth chapter the prodigall Sonne when he came to himself confessed his own unworthiness and said Father I have sinned which is another main point of Divinity established from the beginning that as God saith Hosea the fifteenth and the ninth perditio tua ex te Israel salus autem ex me so our well doing or ill doing is cause of our regarding or destruction so saith James no man is tempted of God for God cannot be tempted of ill neither doth he tempt any man but every one is tempted of his own concupiscence James the first chapter and the thirteenth verse So that from the first we have this Doctrine that if God be judged he is innocent and if Abel there is no fault in him and to come to Cain he is in all the fault But now if we come about and say it is not meant of the person but of the things that is