Judas went out as soon as he was discovered and left this part of Discipline upon record That when a crime is made publick and notorious the Governours of the Church according to their power are to deny to give the blessed Sacrament till by Repentance such persons be restored In private sins or sins not known by solemnities of Law or evidence of fact good and bad are entertained in publick communion and it is not to be accounted a crime in them that minister it because they cannot avoid it or have not competent authority to separate persons whom the publick act of the Church hath not separated but if once a publick separation be made or that the fact is notorious and the 〈◊〉 of Law is in such cases already declared they that come and he that rejects them not both pollute the bloud of the everlasting Covenant And here it is applicable what God spake by the Prophet If thou wilt separate the precious thing from the vile thou shalt be as my mouth But this is wholly a matter of Discipline arbitrary and in the power of the Church nothing in it of Divine commandment but what belongs to the Communicants themselves For S. Paul reproves them that receive disorderly but gives no orders to the Corinthian Presbyters to reject any that present themselves Neither did our Blessed Lord leave any Commandment concerning it nor hath the holy Scripture given rules or measures concerning its actual reduction to practice neither who are to be separated nor for what offences nor by what authority nor who is to be the Judge And indeed it is a judgment that can only belong to God who knows the secrets of hearts the degrees of every sin the beginnings and portions of Repentance the sincerity of purposes by what thoughts and designs men begin to be accepted who are hypocrites and who are true men But when many and common men come to judge they are angry upon trisling mistakes and weak disputes they call that Sin that angers their Party or grieves their Interest they turn Charity into Pride and Admonition into Tyranny they set up a tribunal that themselves may sit higher not that their Brethren may walk more securely And then concerning sins in most cases they are most incompetent 〈◊〉 they do not know all their kinds they miscall many they are ignorant of the ingredient and constituent parts and circumstances they themselves make false measures and give out according to them when they please and when they list not they can change the balance When the matter is publick evident and notorious the man is to be admonished of his danger by the Minister but not by him to be forced from it for the power of the Minister of holy things is but the power of a Preacher and a Counsellor of a Physician and a Guide it hath in it no coercion or violence but what is indulged to it by humane laws and by consent which may vary as its 〈◊〉 Add to this that the Grace of God can begin the work of Repentance in an instant and in what period or degree of Repentance the holy Communion is to be administred no Law of God declares which therefore plainly allows it to every period and leaves no difference except where the Discipline of the Church and the authority of the Supreme power doth intervene For since we do not find in Scripture that the Apostles did drive from the communion of holy things even those whom they delivered over to Satan or other Censures we are left to consider that in the nature of the thing those who are in the state of weakness and 〈◊〉 have more need of the solemn Prayers of the Church and therefore by presenting themselves to the holy Sacrament approach towards that Ministery which is the most effectual cure especially since the very presenting themselves is an act of Religion and therefore supposes an act of Repentance and Faith and other little introductions to its fair reception and if they may be prayed for and prayed with why they may not also be communicated which is the 〈◊〉 of the greatest Prayer is not yet clearly revealed This discourse relates only to private Ministery for when I affirm that there is no command from Christ to all his Ministers to refuse whom they are pleased to call scandalous or sinners I intend to defend good people from the tyranny and arbitrary power of those great companies of Ministers who in so many hundred places would have a Judicature supreme in Spirituals which would be more intolerable than if they had in one Province 20000 Judges of life and death But when the power of separation and interdiction is only in some more eminent and authorized persons who take publick cognizance of causes by solemnities of Law and exercise their power but in some rare instances and then also for the publick interest in which although they may be 〈◊〉 yet they are the most competent and likely Judges much of the inconvenience which might otherwise follow is avoided and then it only remains that they consider in what cases it can be a competent and a proper infliction upon sinners to take from them that which is the means and ministery of grace and recovery whether they have any warrant from Christ or precedent in the Apostles practice and how far As for the sorms and 〈◊〉 of the Primitive Church they were hugely different sometimes for one cause sometimes for another Sometimes whole Churches have been excommunicated sometimes the criminal and all his houshold for his offence as it happened in the Excommunication of Andronicus and Thoas in Synesius in the year 411 sometimes they were absolved and restored by Lay Confessors sometimes by Emperors as it happened to Eusebius of Nicomedia and Theognis of Nice who were absolved by Constantine from the sentence of Excommunication inflicted by the Nicene Fathers and a Monk did excommunicate Theodosius the younger So that in this there can be no certainty to make a measure and a rule The surest way most agreeable to the precedents of Scripture and the Analogy of the Gospel is that by the word of their proper ministery all sinners should be separate from the holy Communion that is threatned by the words of God with damnation and fearful temporal dangers if themselves knowing an unrepented sin and a remanent affection to sin to be within them shall dare to profane that Body and Bloud of our Lord by so impure an address The evil is to themselves and if the Ministers declare this powerfully they are acquitted But concerning other judgments or separations The Supreme power can forbid all assembling and therefore can permit them to all and therefore can deny them or grant them to single persons and therefore when he by Laws makes separations in order to publick benefit they are to be obeyed but it is not to be endured that single Presbyters should upon vain pretences erect so high a tribunal
wickedness as by keeping back part of his estate to think to deceive the Holy Ghost That before it was sold it was wholly at his own disposure and after it was perfectly in his own power fully to have performed his vow So that it was capable of no other interpretation than that herein he had not only abused and injured men but mocked God and what in him lay lyed to and cheated the Holy Ghost who he knew was privy to the most secret thoughts and purposes of his heart This vvas no sooner said but suddenly to the great terror and amazement of all that vvere present Ananias vvas arrested vvith a stroke from Heaven and fell dovvn dead to the ground Not long after his Wife came in vvhom Peter entertained vvith the same severe reproofs vvherevvith he had done her Husband adding that the like sad fate and doom should immediately seize upon her who thereupon dropt down dead As she had been Copartner with him in the Sin becoming sharer with him in the punishment An Instance of great severity filling all that heard of it with fear and terror and became a seasonable prevention of that hypocrisie and dissimulation wherewith many might possibly think to have imposed upon the Church 9. THIS severe Case being extraordinary the Apostles usually exerted their power in such Miracles as were more useful and beneficial to the World Curing all manner of Diseases and dispossessing Devils In so much that they brought the Sick into the Streets and laid them upon Beds and Couches that at least Peter's shadow as he passed by might come upon them These astonishing Miracles could not but mightily contribute to the propagation of the Gospel and convince the World that the Apostles were more considerable Persons than they took them for poverty and meanness being no bar to true worth and greatness And methinks Erasmus his reflection here is not unseasonable that no honour or soveraignty no power or dignity was comparable to this glory of the Apostle that the things of Christ though in another way were more noble and excellent than any thing that this World could afford And therefore he tells us that when he beheld the state and magnificence wherewith Pope Julius the Second appeared first at Bononia and then at Rome equalling the triumphs of a Pompey or a Caesar he could not but think how much all this was below the greatness and majesty of S. Peter who converted the World not by Power or Armies not by Engines or 〈◊〉 of pomp and grandeur but by faith in the power of Christ and drew it to the admiration of himself and the same state says he would no doubt attend the Apostles Successours were they Men of the same temper and holiness of life The Jewish Rulers alarm'd with this News and awakened with the growing numbers of the Church sent to apprehend the Apostles and cast them into Prison But God who is never wanting to his own cause sent that Night an Angel from Heaven to open the Prison doors commanding them to repair to the Temple and to the exercise of their Ministery Which they did early in the Morning and there taught the People How unsuccessful are the projects of the wisest Statesmen when God frowns upon them how little do any counsels against Heaven prosper In vain is it to shut the doors where God is resolved to open them the firmest Bars the strongest Chains cannot hold where once God has designed and decreed our liberty The Officers returning the next Morning found the Prison shut and guarded but the Prisoners gone Wherewith they acquainted the Council who much wondred at it but being told where the Apostles were they sent to bring them withóut any noise or violence before the Sanhedrim where the High Priest asked them how they durst go on to propagate that Doctrine which they had so strictly commanded them not to preach Peter in the name of the rest told them That they must in this case obey God rather than men That though they had so barbarously and contumeliously treated the Lord Jesus yet that God had raised him up and exalted him to be a Prince and a Saviour to give both repentance and remission of sins That they were witnesses of these things and so were those Miraculous Powers which the Holy Ghost conferred upon all true Christians Vexed was the Council with this Answer and began to consider how to cut them off But Gamaliel a grave and learned Senator having commanded the Apostles to withdraw bad the Council take heed what they did to them putting them in mind that several persons had heretofore raised parties and factions and drawn vast Numbers after them but that they had miscarried and they and their designs come to nought that therefore they should do well to let these men alone that if their doctrines and designs were meerly humane they would in time of themselves fall to the ground but if they were of God it was not all their power and policies would be able to defeat and overturn them and that they themselves would herein appear to oppose the counsels and designs of Heaven With this prudent and rational advice they were satisfied and having commanded the Apostles to be scourged and charged them no more to preach this doctrine restored them to their liberty Who notwithstanding this charge and threatning returned home in a kind of triumph that they were accounted worthy to suffer in so good a cause and to undergo shame and reproach for the sake of so good a Master Nor could all the hard usage they met with from men discourage them in their duty to God or make them less zealous and diligent both publickly and privately to preach Christ in every place SECT VIII Of S. Peter's Acts from the Dispersion of the Church at Jerusalem till his contest with S. Paul at Antioch The great care of the Divine Providence over the Church Peter dispatched by the Apostles to confirm the Church newly planted at Samaria His 〈◊〉 and silencing Simon Magus there His going to Lydda and curing AEneas His raising Dorcas at Joppa The 〈◊〉 of all sorts of Creatures presented to him to prepare him for the conversion of the Gentiles His going to Cornelius and declaring God's readiness to receive the Gentiles into the Church The Baptizing Cornelius and his Family Peter censured by the Jews for conversing with the Gentiles The mighty prejudices of the Jews against the Gentiles noted out of Heathen Writers Peter cast into prison by Herod Agrippa miraculously delivered by an Angel His discourse in the Synod at Jerusalem that the Gentiles might be received without being put under the obligation of the Law of Moses His unworthy compliance with the Jews at Antioch in opposition to the Gentiles Severely checked and resisted by S. Paul The ill use Porphyry makes of this difference The conceit of some that it was not Peter the Apostle but one of the Seventy 1. THE Church had been
Epistles to the seven Churches of Asia all planted or at least cultivated by him the doctrine in it suitable to the Apostolick spirit and temper evidently bearing witness in this case That which seems to have given ground to doubt concerning both its Author and authority was its being long before it was usually joyned with the other Books of the holy Canon for containing in it some passages directly levell'd at Rome the Seat of the Roman Empire others which might be thought to symbolize with some Jewish dreams and 〈◊〉 it might possibly seem fit to the prudence of those Times for a while to suppress it Nor is the conjecture of a learned Man to be despised who thinks that it might be intrusted in the keeping of John the Presbyter Scholar to our Apostle whence probably the report might arise that he who was only the Keeper was the Author of it 15. HIS Gospel succeeds written say some in Patmos and published at Ephesus but as Irenaeus and others more truly written by him after his return to Ephesus composed at the earnest intreaty and sollicitation of the Asian Bishops and Embassadors from several Churches in order whereunto he first caused them to proclaim a general Fast to seek the blessing of Heaven on so great and solemn an undertaking which being done he set about it And if we may believe the report of Gregory Bishop of Tours he tells us that upon a Hill near Ephesus there was a Proseucha or uncovered Oratory whither our Apostle used often to retire for Prayer and Contemplation and where he obtained of God that it might not Rain in that Place till he had finished his Gospel Nay he adds that even in his time no shower or storm ever came upon it Two causes especially contributed to the writing of it the one that he might obviate the early heresies of those times especially of Ebion Cerinthus and the rest of that crew who began openly to deny Christ's Divinity and that he had any existence before his Incarnation the reason why our Evangelist is so express and copious in that subject The other was that he might supply those passages of the Evangelical History which the rest of the Sacred Writers had omitted Collecting therefore the other three Evangelists he first set to his Seal ratifying the truth of them with his approbation and consent and then added his own Gospel to the rest principally insisting upon the Acts of Christ from the first commencing of his Ministery to the Death of John the Baptist wherein the others are most defective giving 〈◊〉 any account of the first Year of our Saviour's Ministry which therefore he made up in very large and particular Narrations He largely records as Nazianzen observes our Saviour's discourses but takes little notice of his Miracles probably because so fully and particularly related by the rest The subject of his writing is very sublime and mysterious mainly designing to prove Christ's Divinity eternal pre-existence creating of the World c. Upon which account Theodoret stiles his Gospel 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Theology which humane understandings can never fully penetrate and find out Thence generally by the Ancients he is resembled to an Eagle soaring aloft within the Clouds whither the weak eye of Man was unable to follow him hence peculiarly honoured with the title of The Divine as if due to none but him at least to him in a more eminent and extraordinary manner Nay the very Gentile-Philosophers themselves could not but admire his Writings Witness Amelius the famous Platonist and Regent of Porphyries School at Alexandria who quoting a passage out of the beginning of S. John's Gospel sware by Jupiter that this Barbarian so the proud Greeks counted and called all that differed from them had hit upon the right notion when he affirmed that the Word that made all things was in the beginning and in place of prime dignity and authority with God and was that God that created all things in whom every thing that was made had according to its nature its life and being that he was incarnate and clothed with a body wherein he manifested the glory and magnificence of his nature that after his death he returned to the repossession of Divinity and became the same God which he was before his assuming a body and taking the humane nature and flesh upon him I have no more to observe but that his Gospel was afterwards translated into Hebrew and kept by the Jews 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 among their secret Archives and Records in their Treasury at Tiberias where a Copy of it was found by one Joseph a Jew afterwards converted and whom 〈◊〉 the Great advanced to the honour of a Count of the Empire who breaking open the Treasury though he missed of mony found 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Books beyond all Treasure S. Matthew and S. John's Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles in Hebrew the reading whereof greatly contributed towards his Conversion 16. BESIDES these our Apostle wrote three Epistles the first whereof is Catholick calculated for all times and places containing most excellent rules for the conduct of the Christian life pressing to 〈◊〉 and purity of manners and not to rest in a naked and empty profession of Religion not to be led away with the crafty insinuations of Seducers antidoting Men against the poyson of the Gnostick-principles and practices to whom it is not to be doubted but that the Apostle had a more particular respect in this Epistle According to his wonted modesty he conceals his name it being of more concernment with 〈◊〉 Men what it is that is said than who it is that says it And this Epistle Eusebius tells us was universally received and never questioned by any anciently as appears 〈◊〉 S. Augustin inscribed to the Parthians though for what reason I am yet to learn unless as we hinted before it was because he himself had heretofore Preached in those Parts of the World The other two Epistles are but short and directed to particular Persons the one a Lady of honourable Quality the other the charitable and hospitable Gaius so kind a friend so courteous an entertainer of all indigent Christians These Epistles indeed were not of old admitted into the Canon nor are owned by the Church in Syria at this Day ascribed by many to the younger John Disciple to our Apostle But there is no just cause to question who was their Father seeing both the Doctrine phrase and design of them do sufficiently challenge our Apostle for their Author These are all the Books wherein it pleased the Holy Spirit to make use of S. John for its Pen man and Secretary in the composure whereof though his stile and character be not florid and elegant yet is it grave and simple short and perspicuous Dionysius of Alexandria tells us that in his Gospel and first Epistle his phrase is more neat and
against the person of the man in us is pride and self-love and towards others ungentleness and an immorigerous spirit Which is to be understood when the cause is not sufficient or when the anger continues longer or is excessive in the degrees of its proportion 29. The causes of allowable Anger are when we see God dishonoured or a sin committed or any irregularity or fault in matter of Government a fault against the laws of a family or good manners disobedience or stubbornness which in all instances where they may be prudently judged such by the Governour yet possibly they are not all direct sins against God and Religion In such cases we may be angry But then we may also sin if we exceed in time or measure of degree 30. The proportion of time S. Paul expresses by not letting the Sun set upon 〈◊〉 anger Leontius Patricius was one day extremely and unreasonably angry with John the Patriarch of Alexandria at Evening the Patriarch sent a servant to him with this message Sir the Sun is set upon which Patricius reflecting and the grace of God making the impression deep visible and permanent he threw away his anger and became wholly subject to the counsel and ghostly aids of the Patriarch This limit S. Paul borrowed from the Psalmist for that which in the fourth Psalm verse 5. we read Stand in awe and sin not the Septuagint reads Be angry but sin not And this measure is taken from the analogy of the Law of the Jews that a malefactor should not hang upon the accursed tree after the Sun was set and if the Laws laid down their just anger against Malefactors as soon as the Sun descended and took off his beams from beholding the example much more is it reasonable that a private anger which is not warranted by authority not measured by laws not examined by solemnities of Justice not made reasonable by considering the degree of the causes not made charitable by intending the publick good not secured from injuriousness by being disinterest and such an anger in which the party is judge and witness and executioner it is I say but reason such an anger should unyoke and go to bed with the Sun since Justice and Authority laid by the Rods and Axes as soon as the Sun unteamed his chariot Plutarch reports that the Pythagoreans were strict observers of the very letter of this caution For if Anger had boiled up to the height of injury or reproach before Sun set they would shake hands salute each other and depart friends for they were ashamed that the same anger which had disturbed the counsels of the day should also trouble the quiet and dreams of the night lest anger by mingling with their rest and nightly fancies should grow natural and habitual Well anger must last no longer but neither may a Christian's anger last so long for if his anger last a whole day it will certainly before night sour into a crime A man's anger is like the Spleen at the first it is natural but in its excess and distemper it swells into a disease and therefore although to be angry at the presence of certain objects is natural and therefore is indifferent because he that is an essential enemy to sin never made sin essential to a man yet unless it be also transient and pass off at the command of Reason and Religion it quickly becomes criminal The meaning is that it be no more but a transient Passion not permanent at all but that the anger against the man pass into indignation against the crime and pity of the person till the pity grows up into endeavours to help him For an angry violent and disturbed man is like that white Bramble of Judaea of which Josephus reports that it is set on 〈◊〉 by impetuous winds consumes it self and burns the neighbour-plants and the evil effects of a violent and passionate Anger are so great so dangerous so known to all the world that the very consideration of them is the best argument in the world to dispute against it Families and Kingdomes have suffered horrid calamities and whatsoever is violent in art or nature hath been made the instrument of sadness in the hands of Anger 31. The measure of the degree is to be estimated by humane prudence that it exceed not the value of the cause nor the proportion of other circumstances and that it cause no eruption into indiscretions or undecencies For therefore Moses's anger though for God and Religion was reproved because it went forth into a violent and troubled expression and shewed the degree to be inordinate For it is in this passion as in Lightning which if it only breaks the cloud and makes a noise shews a tempest and disturbance in nature but the hurt is none but if it seises upon a man or dwells upon a house or breaks a tree it becomes a judgment and a curse And as the one is a mischief in chance and accident so the other is in morality and choice if it passes from passion into action from a transient violence to a permanent injury if it abides it scorches the garment or burns the body and there is no way to make it innocent but to remove and extinguish it and while it remains to tie the hands and pare the nails and muzzle it that it may neither scratch nor bite nor talk An anger in God's cause may become unhallowed if it sees the Sun rise and set and an anger in the cause of a man is innocent according to the degrees of its suddenness and discontinuance for by its quickness and volatile motion it shews that it was 1. unavoidable in its production or 2. that it was 〈◊〉 in the event or 3. quickly suppressed according to which several cases Anger is either 1. natural or 2. excusable or 3. the matter of a vertue 32. The Vulgar 〈◊〉 Bible in this Precept of our Blessed Saviour reads not the appendix without a cause but indefinitely he that is angry with his Brother and S. 〈◊〉 affirms that the clause without a cause is not to be found in the true Greek copies upon supposition of which because it is not to be imagined that all Anger in 〈◊〉 causes and in all degrees is simply unlawful and S. Paul distinguishes being angry from committing a sin Be angry but sin not these words are left to signifie such an anger as is the crime of Homicide in the heart like the secret Lusting called by Christ Adultery in the heart and so here is forbidden not only the outward act but the inward inclinations to 〈◊〉 that is an Anger with deliberation and purpose of revenge this being explicative and additional to the Precept forbidding Murther which also our Blessed Saviour seems to have intended by threatning the same penalty to this anger or spiritual Homicide which the Law inflicted upon the actual and external that is judgment or condemnation And because this prohibition of
the flames of Hell that men may serve God without the incentives of hope and fear and purely for the love of God Whether the Woman were onely imaginative and sad or also zealous I know not But God knows he would have few Disciples if the arguments of invitation were not of greater promise than the labours of Vertue are of trouble And therefore the Spirit of God knowing to what we are inflexible and by what we are made most ductile and malleable hath propounded Vertue clothed and dressed with such advantages as may entertain even our Sensitive part and first desires that those also may be invited to Vertue who understand not what is just and reasonable but what is profitable who are more moved with advantage than justice And because emolument is more felt than innocence and a man may be poor for all his gift of 〈◊〉 the Holy Jesus to endear the practices of Religion hath represented Godliness unto us under the notion of gain and sin as unfruitful and yet besides all the natural and reasonable advantages every Vertue hath a supernatural reward a gracious promise attending and every Vice is not only naturally deformed but is made more ugly by a threatning and horrid by an appendent curse Henceforth therefore let no man complain that the Commandments of God are impossible for they are not onely possible but easie and they that say otherwise and do accordingly take more pains to carry the instruments of their own death than would serve to ascertain them of life And if we would do as much for Christ as we have done for Sin we should find the pains less and the pleasure more And therefore such complainers are without excuse for certain it is they that can go in foul ways must not say they cannot walk in fair they that march over rocks in despight of so many impediments can travel the even ways of Religion and Peace when the Holy Jesus is their Guide and the Spirit is their Guardian and infinite felicities are at their journey's end and all the reason of the world political oeconomical and personal do entertain and support them in the travel of the passage The PRAYER O Eternal Jesus who gavest Laws unto the world that man-kind being united to thee by the bands of Obedience might partake of all thy glories and felicities open our understanding give us the spirit of discerning and just apprehension of all the beauties with which thou hast enamelled Vertue to represent it beauteous and amiable in our eyes that by the allurements of exteriour decencies and appendent blessings our present desires may be entertained our hopes promoted our affections satisfied and Love entring in by these doors may dwell in the interiour regions of the Will O make us to love thee for thy self and Religion for thee and all the instruments of Religion in order to thy glory and our own felicities Pull off the visors of Sin and discover its deformities by the lantern of thy Word and the light of the Spirit that I may never be bewitched with sottish appetites Be pleased to build up all the contents I expect in this world upon the interests of a vertuous life and the support of Religion that I may be rich in Good works content in the issues of thy Providence my Health may be the result of Temperance and severity my Mirth in spiritual emanations my Rest in Hope my Peace in a good Conscience my Satisfaction and acquiescence in thee that from Content I may pass to an eternal Fulness from Health to Immortality from Grace to Glory walking in the paths of Righteousness by the waters of Comfort to the land of everlasting Rest to feast in the glorious communications of Eternity eternally adoring loving and enjoying the infinity of the ever-Blessed and mysterious Trinity to whom be glory and 〈◊〉 and dominion now and for ever Amen DISCOURSE XVI Of Certainty of Salvation 1. WHen the Holy Jesus took an account of the first Legation and voyage of his Apostles he found them rejoycing in priviledges and exteriour powers in their authority over unclean spirits but weighing it in his balance he found the cause too light and therefore diverted it upon the right object Rejoyce that your names are written in Heaven The revelation was confirmed and more personally applied in answer to S. Peter's Question We have for saken all and followed thee what shall we have therefore Their LORD answered Ye shall sit upon twelve thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel Amongst these persons to whom Christ spake Judas was he was one of the Twelve and he had a throne allotted for him his name was described in the book of life and a Scepter and a Crown was deposited for him too For we must not judge of Christ's meaning by the event since he spake these words to produce in them Faith comfort and joy in the best objects it was a Sermon of duty as well as a Homily of comfort and therefore was equally intended to all the Colledge and since the number of Thrones is proportioned to the number of men it is certain there was no exception of any man there included and yet it is as certain Judas never came to sit upon the throne and his name was blotted out of the book of life Now if we put these ends together that in Scripture it was not revealed to any man concerning his final condition but to the dying penitent Thief and to the twelve Apostles that twelve thrones were designed for them and a promise made of their inthronization and yet that no man's final estate is so clearly declared miserable and lost as that of Judas one of the Twelve to whom a throne was promised the result will be that the election of holy persons is a condition allied to duty absolute and infallible in the general and supposing all the dispositions and requisites concurring but fallible in the particular if we fall off from the mercies of the Covenant and prevaricate the conditions But the thing which is most observable is that if in persons so eminent and priviledged and to whom a revelation of their Election was made as a particular grace their condition had one weak leg upon which because it did rely for one half of the interest it could be no stronger than its supporters the condition of lower persons to whom no revelation is made no priviledges are indulged no greatness of spiritual eminency is appendent as they have no greater certainty in the thing so they have less in person and are therefore to work out their salvation with great fears and tremblings of spirit 2. The purpose of this consideration is that we do not judge of our final condition by any discourses of our own relying upon God's secret Counsels and Predestination of Eternity This is a mountain upon which whosoever climbs like Moses to behold the land of Canaan at great distances may please his eyes or
a great calamity within a little while after the Spirit of God had sent them two Epistles by the ministery of S. Paul their Cities were buried in an Earthquake and yet we have reason to think they were Churches beloved of God and Congregations of holy People The PRAYER OEternal and powerful God thou just and righteous Governour of the world who callest all orders of men by Precepts Promises and Threatnings by Mercies and by Judgments teach us to admire and adore all the Wisdome the effects and infinite varieties of thy Providence and make us to dispose our selves so by Obedience by Repentance by all the manners of Holy living that we may never provoke thee to jealousie much less to wrath and indignation against us Keep far from us the Sword of the destroying Angel and let us never perish in the publick expresses of thy wrath in diseases Epidemical with the furies of War with calamitous sudden and horrid Accidents with unusual Diseases unless that our so strange fall be more for thy glory and our eternal benefit and then thy will be done We beg thy grace that we may chearfully conform to thy holy will and pleasure Lord open our understandings that we may know the meaning of thy voice and the signification of thy language when thou speakest 〈◊〉 Heaven in signs and Judgments and let a holy fear so soften our spirits and an intense love so 〈◊〉 and sanctifie our desires that we may apprehend every intimation of thy pleasure at its first and remotest and most obscure representment that so we may with Repentance go out to meet thee and prevent the expresses of thine anger Let thy restraining grace and the observation of the issues of thy Justice so allay our spirits that we be not severe and forward in condemning others nor backward in passing sentence upon our selves Make us to obey thy voice described in holy Scripture to tremble at thy voice expressed in wonders and great effects of Providence to condemn none but our selves nor to enter into the recesses of thy Sanctuary and search the forbidden records of Predestination but that we may read our duty in the pages of Revelation not in the labels of accidental effects that thy Judgments may confirm thy Word and thy Word teach us our Duty and we by such excellent instruments may enter in and grow up in the ways of Godliness through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen SECT XV. Of the Accidents happening from the Death of Lazarus untill the Death and Burial of JESVS Bartimeus healed of blindnesse Mark 10. 46. And as he went out of Iericho with his Disciples and a great number of people blind Bartimeus sate by the high way begging 47. And when he heard that it was Iesus of Nazareth he began to cry out and say Iesus thou son of David have mercy on me Lazarus raysed from death Ioh. 11. 44. And he that was dead came forth bound hand and foot with gravecloths and his face was bound about with a napkin Iesus saith unto them Loose him and let him go 45. Then Many of the Iewes which came to Mary and had seen the things which Iesus did believed on him 1. VVHile Jesus was in Galilee messengers came to him from Martha and her Sister Mary that he would hasten into Judaea to Bethany to relieve the sickness and imminent dangers of their Brother Lazarus But he deferred his going till Lazarus was dead purposing to give a great probation of his Divinity Power and Mission by a glorious Miracle and to give God glory and to receive reflexions of the glory upon himself For after he had stayed two days he called his Disciples to go with him into Judaea telling them that Lazarus was dead but he would raise him out of that sleep of death But by that time Jesus was arrived at Bethany he found that Lazarus had been dead four days and now near to putrefaction But when Martha and Mary met him weeping their pious tears for their dead Brother Jesus suffered the passions of piety and humanity and wept distilling that precious liquor into the grave of Lazarus watering the dead plant that it might spring into a new life and raise his head above the ground 2. When Jesus had by his words of comfort and institution strengthened the Faith of the two mourning Sisters and commanded the stone to be removed from the grave he made an address of Adoration and Eucharist to his Father confessing his perpetual propensity to hear him and then cried out Lazarus come forth And he that was dead came forth from his bed of darkness with his night-cloaths on him whom when the Apostles had unloosed at the command of Jesus he went to Bethany and many that were present believed on him but others wondring and malicious went and told the Pharisees the story of the Miracle who upon that advice called their great Council whose great and solemn cognisance was of the greater causes of Prophets of Kings and of the holy Law At this great Assembly it was that Caiaphas the High Priest prophesied that it was expedient one should die for the people And thence they determined the death of Jesus But he knowing they had passed a decretory sentence against him retired to the City 〈◊〉 in the Tribe of Judah near the desart where he stayed a few days till the approximation of the Feast of Easter 3. Against which Feast when Jesus with his Disciples was going to Jerusalem he told them the event of the journey would be that the Jews should deliver him to the Gentiles that they should scourge him and mock him and crucifie him and the third day he should rise again After which discourse the Mother of 〈◊〉 's Children begg'd of Jesus for her two Sons that one of them might sit at his right hand the other at the left in his Kingdom For no discourses of his Passion or intimations of the mysteriousness of his Kingdom could yet put them into right understandings of their condition But Jesus whose heart and thoughts were full of phancy and apprehensions of the neighbour Passion gave them answer in proportion to his present conceptions and their future condition For if they desired the honours of his Kingdom such as they were they should have them unless themselves did decline them they should drink of his Cup and dip in his Lavatory and be washed with his baptism and sit in his Kingdom if the heavenly Father had prepared it for them but the donation of that immediately was an issue of Divine election and predestination and was only competent to them who by holy living and patient suffering put themselves into a disposition of becoming vessels of Election 4. But as Jesus in this journey came near Jericho he cures a blind man who sate begging by the way-side and espying Zaccheus the chief of the Publicans upon a tree that he being low of stature might upon that advantage of station see Jesus passing by he invited
though less perfectly it ought not to be denied and they less ought to neglect it 25. But as every man must put himself so also he must put his house in order make his Will if he have an Estate to dispose of and in that he must be careful to do Justice to every man and Charity to the poor according as God hath enabled him and though Charity is then very late if it begins not earlier yet if this be but an act of an ancient habit it is still more perfect as it succeeds in time and superadds to the former stock And among other acts of Duty let it be remembred that it is excellent Charity to leave our Will and desires clear plain and determinate that contention and Law-suits may be prevented by the explicate declaration of the Legacies At last and in all instances and periods of our following days let the former good acts be renewed let God be praised for all his Graces and Blessings of our life let him be intreated for Pardon of our sins let acts of Love and Contrition of Hope of Joy of Humility be the work of every day which God still permits us always remembring to ask remission for those sins we remember not And if the condition of our sickness permits it let our last breath expire with an act of Love that it may begin the Charities of Eternity and like a Taper burnt to its lowest base it may go out with a great emission of light leaving a sweet smell behind us to perfume our Coffin and that these lights newly made brighter or trimmed up in our sickness may shine about our Herse that they may become arguments of a pious sadness to our friends as the charitable Coats which Dorcas made were to the widows and exemplar to all those who observed or shall hear of our holy life and religious death But if it shall happen that the disease be productive of evil accidents as a disturbed phancy a weakned understanding wild discoursings or any deprivation of the use of Reason it concerns the sick persons in the happy intervalls of a quiet untroubled spirit to pray earnestly to God that nothing may pass from him in the rages of a Fever or worse distemper which may less become his duty or give scandal or cause trouble to the persons in attendance and if he shall also renounce and disclaim all such evil words which his disease may speak not himself he shall do the duty of a Christian and a prudent person And after these 〈◊〉 he may with Piety and confidence resign his Soul into the hands of God to be deposited in holy receptacles till the day of restitution of all things and in the mean time with a quiet spirit descend into that state which is the lot of Caesars and where all Kings and Conquerours have laid aside their glories The PRAYER O Eternal and Holy Jesus who by Death hast overcome Death and by thy Passion hast taken out its sting and made it to become one of the gates of Heaven and an entrance to Felicity have mercy upon me now and at the hour of my death let thy Grace accompany me all the days of my life that I may by a holy Conversation and an habitual performance of my Duty wait for the coming of our Lord and be ready to enter with thee at whatsoever hour thou shalt come Lord let not my death be in any sence unprovided nor untimely nor hasty but after the common manner of men having in it nothing extraordinary but an extraordinary Piety and the manifestation of a great and miraculous Mercy Let my Senses and Understanding be preserved intire till the last of my days and grant that I may die the death of the righteous having first discharged all my obligations of justice leaving none miserable and unprovided in my departure but be thou the portion of all my friends and relatives and let thy blessing descend upon their heads and abide there till they shall meet me in the bosom of our Lord. Preserve me ever in the communion and peace of the Church and bless my Death bed with the opportunity of a holy and a spiritual Guide with the assistence and guard of Angels with the perception of the holy Sacrament with Patience and dereliction of my own 〈◊〉 with a strong Faith and a firm and humble Hope with just measures of Repentance and great treasures of Charity to thee my God and to all the world that my Soul in the arms of the Holy Jesus may be deposited with safety and joy there to expect the revelation of thy Day and then to partake the glories of thy Kingdom O Eternal and Holy Jesus Amen Considerations upon the Crucifixion of the Holy JESUS He beareth his Cross Ioh 19. 16. 17. And they took Iesus and lead him away 17. And he bearing his Cross went forth into a place called the place of a Scult which is called in y e Hebrew Golgotha They Erect the Crucifixe Ioh 3. 14. 15. And as Moses lifted up the Serpent in y e wilderness even so must y e Son of man be lifted up 15. That whosoever believeth on him should not perish but haue eternall life 1. WHen the Sentence of Death pronounced against the Lord was to be put in execution the Souldiers pulled off the Robe of mockery the scarlet Mantle which in jest they put upon him and put on his own garments But as Origen observes the Evangelist mentioned not that they took off the Crown of thorns what might serve their interest they pursue but nothing of remission or mercy to the afflicted Son of man but so it became the King of Sufferings not to lay aside his Imperial thorns till they were changed into Diadems of Glory But now Abel is led forth by his brother to be slain A gay spectacle to satisfie impious eyes who would not stay behind but attended and waited upon the hangman to see the Catastrophe of this bloudy Tragedy But when Piety looks on she beholds a glorious mystery Sin laughed to see the King of Heaven and Earth and the great lover of Souls in stead of the Scepter of his Kingdom to bear a Tree of 〈◊〉 and shame But Plety wept tears of pity and knew they would melt into joy when she should behold that Cross which loaded the shoulders of her Lord afterward sit upon the Scepters and be engraved and signed upon the Foreheads of Kings 2. It cannot be thought but the Ministers of Jewish malice used all the circumstances of affliction which in any case were accustomed towards malefactors and persons to be crucified and therefore it was that in some old Figures we see our Blessed Lord described with a Table appendent to the fringe of his garment set full of nails and pointed iron for so sometimes they afflicted persons condemned to that kind of Death and S. Cyprian affirms that Christ did stick to the wood that he carried being
in his name to plant the Faith to govern and superintend the Church at present and by their wise and prudent settlement of affairs to provide for the future exigencies of the Church III. The next thing then to be considered is the nature of their Office and under this enquiry we shall make these following remarks First it is not to be doubted but that our Lord in founding this Office had some respect to the state of things in the Jewish Church I mean not only in general that there should be superiour and subordinate Officers as there were superiour and inferiour Orders under the Mosaic dispensation but that herein he had an eye to some usage and custom common among them Now amongst the Jews as all Messengers were called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Apostles so were they wont to dispatch some with peculiar letters of authority and Commission whereby they acted as Proxies and Deputies of those that sent them thence their Proverb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 every man's Apostle is as himself that is whatever he does is look'd upon to be as firm and valid as if the person himself had done it Thus when Saul was sent by the Sanhedrim to Damascus to apprehend the Jewish converts he was furnished with letters from the High Priest enabling him to act as his Commissary in that matter Indeed Epiphanius tells us of a sort of persons called Apostles who were Assessors and Counsellors to the Jewish Patriarch constantly attending upon him to advise him in matters pertaining to the Law and sent by him as he intimates sometimes to inspect and reform the manners of the Priests and Jewish Clergy and the irregularities of Country-Synagogues with commission to gather the Tenths and First-fruits due in all the Provinces under his jurisdiction Such Apostles we find mention'd both by Julian the Emperor in an Epistle to the Jews and in a Law of the Emperor Honorius imploy'd by the Patriarch to gather once a year the Aurum Coronarium or Crown-Gold a Tribute annually paid by them to the Roman Emperors But these Apostles could not under that notion be extant in our Saviour's time though sure we are there was then something like it Philo the Jew more than once mentioning the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the sacred messengers annually sent to collect the holy treasure paid by way of First-fruits and to carry it to the Temple at Jerusalem However our Lord in conformity to the general custom of those times of appointing Apostles or Messengers as their Proxies and Deputies to act in their names call'd and denominated those Apostles whom he peculiarly chose to represent his person to communicate his mind and will to the World and to act as Embassadors or Commissioners in his room and stead IV. Secondly We observe that the persons thus deputed by our Saviour were not left uncertain but reduced to a fixed definite number confin'd to the just number of Twelve he ordained twelve that they should be with him A number that seems to carry something of mystery and peculiar design in it as appears in that the Apostles were so careful upon the fall of Judas immediately to supply it The Fathers are very wide and different in their conjectures about the reason of it S. Augustine thinks our Lord herein had respect to the four quarters of the World which were to be called by the preaching of the Gospel which being multiplied by three to denote the Trinity in whose name they were to be called make Twelve Tertullian will have them typified by the twelve fountains in Elim the Apostles being sent out to water and refresh the dry thirsty World with the knowledge of the truth by the twelve precious stones in Aaron's breast-plate to illuminate the Church the garment which Christ our great High Priest has put on by the twelve stones which Joshua chose out of Jordan to lay up within the Ark of the Testament respecting the firmness and solidity of the Apostles Faith their being chosen by the true Jesus or Joshua at their Baptism in Jordan and their being admitted in the inner Sanctuary of his Covenant By others we are told that it was shadowed out by the twelve Spies taken out of every Tribe and sent to discover the Land of Promise or by the twelve gates of the City in Ezekiel's vision or by the twelve Bells appendant to Aaron's garment their sound going out into all the World and their words unto the ends of the Earth But it were endless and to very little purpose to reckon up all the conjectures of this nature there being scarce any one number of Twelve mentioned in the Scripture which is not by some of the Ancients adapted and applied to this of the Twelve Apostles wherein an ordinary fancy might easily enough pick out a mystery That which seems to put in the most rational plea is that our Lord pitched upon this number in conformity either to the twelve Patriarchs as founders of the twelve Tribes of Israel or to the twelve 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or chief heads as standing Rulers of those Tribes among the Jews as we shall afterwards possibly more particularly remark Thirdly these Apostles were immediately called and sent by Christ himself elected out of the body of his Disciples and followers and receiv'd their Commission from his own mouth Indeed Matthias was not one of the first election being taken in upon Judas his Apostasie after our Lord's Ascension into Heaven But besides that he had been one of the seventy Disciples called and sent out by our Saviour that extraordinary declaration of the Divine will and pleasure that appeared in determining his election was in a manner equivalent to the first election As for S. Paul he was not one of the Twelve taken in as a supernumerary Apostle but yet an Apostle as well as they and that not of men neither by man but by Jesus Christ as he pleads his own cause against the insinuations of those Impostors who traduced him as an Apostle only at the second hand whereas he was immediately call'd by Christ as well as they and in a more extraordinary manner they were called by him while he was yet in his state of meanness and humiliation he when Christ was now advanced upon the Throne and appeared to him encircled with those glorious emanations of brightness and majesty which he was not able to endure V. Fourthly The main work and imployment of these Apostles was to preach the Gospel to establish Christianity and to govern the Church that was to be founded as Christ's immediate Deputies and Vicegerents they were to instruct men in the doctrines of the Gospel to disciple the World and to baptize and initiate men into the Faith of Christ to constitute and ordain Guides and Ministers of Religion persons peculiarly set apart for holy ministrations to censure and punish obstinate and contumacious offenders to compose and over-rule
Proseucha's or houses of Prayer usually uncovered and standing in the fields the Jews had in several places wherein our Lord continued all night not in one continued and intire act of devotion but probably by intervals and repeated returns of duty 2. EARLY the next morning his Disciples came to him out of whom he made choice of Twelve to be his Apostles that they might be the constant attendants upon his person to hear his Discourses and be Eye-witnesses of his Miracles to be always conversant with him while he was upon Earth and afterwards to be sent abroad up and down the World to carry on that work which he himself had begun whom therefore he invested with the power of working Miracles which was more completely conferr'd upon them after his Ascension into Heaven Passing by the several fancies and conjectures of the Ancients why our Saviour pitch'd upon the just number of Twelve whereof before it may deserve to be considered whether our Lord being now to appoint the Supreme Officers and Governours of his Church which the Apostle styles the Commonwealth of Israel might not herein have a more peculiar allusion to the twelve Patriarchs as founders of their several Tribes or to the constant Heads and Rulers of those twelve Tribes of which the body of the Jewish Nation did consist Especially since he himself seems elsewhere to give countenance to it when he tells the Apostles that when the Son of man shall sit on the Throne of his Glory that is be gone back to Heaven and have taken full possession of his Evangelical Kingdom which principally commenc'd from his Resurrection that then they also should sit upon twelve Thrones judging the twelve Tribes of Israel that is they should have great powers and authorities in the Church such as the power of the Keys and other Rights of Spiritual Judicature and Sovereignty answerable in some proportion to the power and dignity which the Heads and Rulers of the twelve Tribes of Israel did enjoy 3. IN the enumeration of these twelve Apostles all the Evangelists constantly place S. Peter in the front and S. Matthew expresly tells us that he was the first that is he was the first that was called to be an Apostle his Age also and the gravity of his person more particularly qualifying him for a Primacy of Order amongst the rest of the Apostles as that without which no society of men can be managed or maintained 〈◊〉 than this as none will deny him so more than this neither Scripture nor 〈◊〉 antiquity do allow him And now it was that our Lord actually conferr'd that 〈◊〉 upon him which before he had promised him Simon he surnamed Peter It 〈◊〉 here be enquired when and by whom the Apostles were baptized That they were is unquestionable being themselves appointed to confer it upon others but when or how the Scripture is altogether silent Nicephorus from no worse an Author as he pretends than Euodius next 〈◊〉 S. Peter's immediate successor in the 〈◊〉 of Autioch tells us That of all the Apostles Christ baptized none but Peter with his own hands that Peter baptized Andrew and the two sons of 〈◊〉 and they the rest of the Apostles This if so would greatly make for the honour of S. Peter But alas his authority is not only suspicious but 〈◊〉 in a manner deserted by S. Peter's best friends and the strongest champions of his cause Baronius himself however 〈◊〉 willing to make use of him elsewhere confessing that this Epistle of 〈◊〉 is altogether unknown to any of the Ancients As for the testimony of Clemens Alexandrinus which to the same purpose he quotes out of Sophronius though not Sophronius but Johannes Moschus as is notoriously known be the Author of that Book besides that it is delivered upon an uncertain report pretended to have been alledged in a discourse between one Dionysius Bishop of Ascalon and his Clergy out of a Book of Clemens not now extant his Authors are much alike that is of no great value and authority 4. AMONGST these Apostles our Lord chose a Triumvirate Peter and the two sons of Zebedee to be his more intimate companions whom he admitted more familiarly than the rest unto all the more secret passages and transactions of his Life The first instance of which was on this occasion Jairus a Ruler of the Synagogue had a daughter desperately sick whose disease having baffled all the arts of Physick was 〈◊〉 curable by the immediate agency of the God of Nature He therefore in all humility addresses himself to our Saviour which he had no sooner done but servants 〈◊〉 post to tell him that it was in vain to trouble our Lord for that his daughter was dead Christ bids him not despond if his Faith held out there was no danger And 〈◊〉 none to follow him but Peter James and John goes along with him to the house where he was derided by the sorrowful friends and neighbours for telling them that she was not perfectly dead But our Lord entering in with the commanding efficacy of two words restor'd her at once both to life and perfect health 5. OUR Lord after this preached many Sermons and wrought many Miracles amongst which none more remarkable than his feeding a multitude of five thousand men besides women and children with but five Loaves and two Fishes of which nevertheless twelve Baskets of sragments were taken up Which being done and the multitude dismissed he commanded the Apostles to take Ship it being now near night and to cross over to Capernaum whilest he himself as his manner was retired to a neighbouring mountain to dispose himself to Prayer and Contemplation The Apostles were 〈◊〉 got into the middle of the Sea when on a sudden a violent Storm and Tempest began to arise whereby they were brought into present danger of their lives Our Saviour who knew how the case stood with them and how much they laboured under infinite pains and fears having himself caused this Tempest for the greater trial of their Faith a little before morning for so long they remained in this imminent danger immediately conveyed himself upon the Sea where the Waves received him being proud to carry their Master He who refused to 〈◊〉 the Devil when tempting him to throw himself down from the Pinnacle of the Temple did here commit himself to a boisterous instable Element and that in a violent Storm walking upon the water as if it had been dry ground But that infinite power that made and supports the World as it gave rules to all particular beings so can when it please countermand the Laws of their Creation and make them act contrary to their natural inclinations If God say the word the Sun will stand still in the middle of the Heavens if Go back 't will retrocede as upon the Dial of Ahaz if he command it the Heavens will become as Brass and the Earth as
on to preach confidently and securely for that he himself would stand by him and preserve him 2. ABOUT this time as is most probable he wrote his first Epistle to the Thessalonians Silas and Timothy being lately returned from thence and having done the message for which he had sent them thither The main design of the Epistle is to confirm them in the belief of the Christian Religion and that they would persevere in it notwithstanding all the afflictions and persecutions which he had told them would ensue upon their profession of the Gospel and to instruct them in the main duties of a Christian and Religious life While the Apostle was thus imployed the malice of the Jews was no less at work against him and universally combining together they brought him before Gallio the Proconsul of the Province elder Brother to the famous Seneca Before him they accused the Apostle as an Innovator in Religion that sought to introduce a new way of worship contrary to what was established by the Jewish Law and permitted by the Roman Powers The Apostle was ready to have pleaded his own cause but the Proconsul told them that had it been a matter of right or wrong that had faln under the cognizance of the Civil Judicature it had been very fit and reasonable that he should have heard and determined the case but since the controversie was only concerning the punctilio's and niceties of their Religion it was very improper for him to be a Judge in such matters And when they still clamoured about it he threw out their Indictment and commanded his officers to drive them out of Court Whereupon some of the Towns men seised upon Sosthenes one of the Rulers of the Jewish Consistory a man active and busie in this Insurrection and beat him even before the Court of Judicature the Proconsul not at all concerning himself about it A year and an half S. Paul continued in this place and before his departure thence wrote his second Epistle to the Thessalonians to supply the want of his coming to them which in his former he had resolved on and for which in a manner he had engaged his promise In this therefore he endeavours again to confirm their minds in the truth of the Gospel and that they would not be shaken with those troubles which the wicked unbelieving Jews would not cease to create them a lost and undone race of men and whom the Divine vengeance was ready finally to overtake And because some passages in his 〈◊〉 Letter relating to this destruction had been mis-understood as if this day of the Lord were just then at hand he rectifies those mistakes and shews what must precede our Lord's coming unto Judgment 3. S. 〈◊〉 having thus fully planted and cultivated the Church at Corinth resolved now for Syria And taking along with him Aquila and Priscilla at Cenchrea the Port and Harbour of Corinth Aquila for of him it is certainly to be understood shaved his head in performance of a Nazarite-Vow he had formerly made the time whereof was now run out In his passage into Syria he came to Ephesus where he preached a while in the Synagogue of the Jews And though desired to stay with them yet having resolved to be at Jerusalem at the Passeover probably that he might have the fitter opportunity to meet his friends and preach the Gospel to those vast numbers that usually 〈◊〉 to that great solemnity he promised that in his return he would come again to them Sailing thence he landed at Caesarca and thence went up to Jerusalem where having visited the Church and kept the Feast he went down to Antioch Here having staid some time he traversed the Countries of Galatia and Phrygia confirming as he went the new-converted Christians and so came to 〈◊〉 where finding certain Christian Disciples he enquired of them whether since their conversion they had received the miraculous gifts and powers of the Holy Ghost They told him that the Doctrine which they had received had nothing in it of that nature nor had they ever heard that any such extraordinary Spirit had of late been bestowed upon the Church Hereupon he further enquired unto what they had been baptized the Christian Baptism being administred in the name of the Holy Ghost They answered they had received no more than John's Baptism which though it 〈◊〉 them to repentance yet did explicitly speak nothing of the Holy Ghost or its gists and powers To this the Apostle replied That though John's Baptism did openly oblige to nothing but Repentance yet that it did implicitly acknowledge the whole Doctrine concerning Christ and the Holy Ghost Whereto they assenting were solemnly initiated by Christian Baptism and the Apostle laying his hands upon them they immediately received the Holy Ghost in the gift of Tongues Prophecy and other miraculous powers conferred upon them 4. AFTER this he 〈◊〉 into the Jewish Synagogues where for the first three months he contended and disputed with the Jews endeavouring with great earnestness and resolution to convince them of the truth of those things that concerned the Christian Religion But when instead of success he met with nothing but refractoriness and infidelity he left the Synagogue and taking those with him whom he had converted instructed them and others that resorted to him in the School of one Tyrannus a place where Scholars were wont to be educated and instructed In this manner he continued for two years together In which time the Jews and Proselytes of the whole 〈◊〉 Asia had opportunity of having the Gospel preached to them And because Miracles are the clearest evidence of a Divine commission and the most immediate Credentials of Heaven those which do nearliest affect our senses and consequently have the strongest influence upon our minds therefore God was pleased to ratifie the doctrine which S. Paul delivered by great and miraculous operations and those of somewhat a more peculiar and extraordinary nature Insomuch that he did not only heal those that came to him but if Napkins or Handkerchiefs were but touched by him and applied unto the sick their diseases immediately vanished and the Daemons and evil Spirits departed out of those that were possessed by them 5. EPHESUS above all other places in the World was noted of old for the study of Magick and all secret and hidden Arts whence the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so often spoken of by the Ancients which were certain obscure and mystical Spells and Charms by which they endeavoured to heal Diseases and drive away evil Spirits and do things beyond the reach and apprehensions of common people Besides other professors of this black Art there were at this time at Ephesus certain Jews who dealt in the arts of 〈◊〉 and Incantation a craft and mystery which Josephus affirms to have been derived from Solomon who he tells us did not only find it out but composed forms of Exorcism and Inchantment whereby to cure diseases and expel
that as oft as he heard him he seemed to hear not words but thunder that in all his citations he made use of the most prudent artifices using simple words and which seemed to carry nothing but plainness along with them but which way soever a Man turned breathed force and thunder He seems intangled in his cause but catches all that comes near him turns his back as if intending to fly when 't is only that he may overcome 9. SAINT Peter long since observed that in Paul's Epistles there were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 some things hard to be understood which surely is not altogether owing to the profoundness of his sence and the mysteriousness of the subject that he treats of but in some degree to his manner of expression his frequent Hebraisms common to him with all the Holy Writers of the New Testament his peculiar forms and ways of speech his often inserting Jewish Opinions and yet but tacitly touching them his using 〈◊〉 words in a new and uncommon sence but above all his frequent and abrupt transitions suddainly starting aside from one thing to another whereby his Reader is left at a loss not knowing which way to follow him not a little contributing to the perplex'd obscurity os his discourses Irenaeus took notice of old that S. Paul makes frequent use of these Hyperbata by reason of the swiftness of his arguings and the great fervour and impetus that was in him leaving many times the designed srame and texture of his discourse not bringing in what should have immediately connected the sence and order till some distance after which indeed to Men of a more nice and delicate temper and who will not give themselves leave patiently to trace out his reasonings must needs create some obscurity Origen and S. Hierom sometimes observe that besides this he uses many of his Native phrases of the Cilician dialect which being in a great measure forraign and exotick to the ordinary Greek introduces a kind of strangeness into his discourse and renders it less intelligible Epiphanius tells us that by these methods he acted like a skilful Archer hitting the mark before his adversaries were aware of it by words misplaced making the frame of his discourse seem obscure and intangled while in it self it was not only most true but elaborate and not difficult to be understood that to careless and trifling Readers it might sometimes seem dissonant and incoherent but to them that are diligent and will take their reason along with them it would appear full of truth and to be disposed with great care and order 10. AS for the order of these Epistles we have already given a particular account of the times when and the places whence they were written That which is here considerable is the Order according to which they are disposed in the sacred Canon Certain it is that they are not plac'd according to the just order of time wherein they were written the two Epistles to the Thessalonians being on all hands agreed to have been first written though set almost last in order Most probable therefore it is that they were plac'd according to the dignity of those to whom they were sent the reason why those to whole Churches have the precedency of those to particular persons and among those to Churches that to the Romans had the first place and rank assigned to it because of the majesty of the Imperial City and the eminency and honourable respect which that Church derived thence and whether the same reason do not hold in others though I will not positively assert yet I think none will over-confidently deny The last enquiry concerns the subscriptions added to the end of these Epistles which were they authentick would determine some doubts concerning the time and place of their writing But alas they are of no just value and authority not the same in all Copies different in the Syriac and Arabic Versions nay wholly wanting in some ancient Greek Copies of the New Testament and were doubtless at first added at best upon probable conjectures When at any time they truly represent the place whence or the Person by whom the Epistle was sent 't is not that they are to be relied upon in it but because the thing is either intimated or expressed in the body of the Epistle I shall add no more but this observation that S. Paul was wont to subscribe every Epistle with his own hand which is my token in every Epistle so I write Which was done says one of the Ancients to prevent impostures that his Epistles might not be interpolated and corrupted and that if any vented Epistles under his name the cheat might be discovered by the Apostles own hand not being to them And this brings me to the last consideration that shall conclude this Chapter 11. THAT there were some even in the most early Ages of Christianity who took upon them for what ends I stand not now to enquire to write Books and publish them under the name of some Apostle is notoriously known to any though but never so little conversant in Church-Antiquities Herein S. Paul had his part and share several supposititious Writings being fathered and thrust upon him We find a Gospel ascribed by some of the Ancients to him which surely arose from no other cause than that in some of his Epistles he makes mention of my Gospel Which as S. Hierom observes can be meant of no other than the Gospel of S. Luke his constant Attendant and from whom he chiefly derived his intelligence If he wrote another Epistle to the Corinthians precedent to those two extant at this Day as he seems to imply in a passage in his first Epistle I have wrote unto you in an Epistle not to keep company c. a passage not conveniently appliable to any part either in that or the other Epistle nay a Verse or two after the first Epistle is directly opposed to it all that can be said in the case is that it long since perished the Divine providence not seeing it necessary to be preserved for the service of the Church Frequent mention there is also of an Epistle of his to the Laodiceans grounded upon a mistaken passage in the Epistle to the Colossians but besides that the Apostle does not there speak of an Epistle written to the Laodiceans but of one from them Tertullian tells us that by the Epistle to the Laodiceans is meant that to the Ephesians and that Marcion the Heretick was the first that changed the title and therefore in his enumeration of S. Paul's Epistles he omits that to the 〈◊〉 for no other reason doubtless but that according to Marcion's opinion he had reckoned it up under the title of that to the Laodiceans Which yet is more clear if we consider that Epiphanius citing a place quoted by Marcion out of the Epistle to the Laodiceans it is in the very same words found
in that to the Ephesians at this Day This Epistle is still extant forged no doubt 〈◊〉 S. Hierem's time who tells us that it was read by some but yet exploded and rejected by all Besides these there was his Revelation call'd also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or his Ascension grounded on his ecstasie or rapture into Heaven first forged by the Cainian Hereticks and in great use and estimation among the Gnosticks Sozomen tells us that this Apocalypse was owned by none of the Ancients though much commended by some Monks in his time and he further adds that in the time of the Emperour Theodosius it was said to have been found in an under-ground Chest of Marble in S. Paul's house at Tarsus and that by a particular revelation A story which upon enquiry he found to be as false as the Book it self was forged and spurious The Acts of S. Paul are mentioned both by Origen and Eusebius but not as Writings of approved and unquestionable credit and authority The Epistles that are said to have passed between S. Paul and Seneca how early soever they started in the Church yet the falshood and fabulousness of them is now too notoriously known to need any further account or description of them SECT IX The principal Controversies that exercised the Church in his time Simon Magus the Father of Hereticks The wretched principles and practices of him and his followers Their asserting Angel-worship and how countermin'd by S. Paul Their holding it lawful to sacrifice to Idols and abjure the Faith in times of persecution discovered and opposed by S. Paul Their maintaining an universal licence to sin Their manners and opinions herein described by S. Paul in his Epistles The great controversie of those times about the obligation of the Law of Mofes upon the Gentile Converts The Original of it whence The mighty veneration which the Jews had for the Law of Moses The true state of the Controversie what The Determination made in it by the Apostolick Synod at Jerusalem Meats offered to Idols what Abstinence from Bloud why enjoyned of old Things strangled why forbidden Fornication commonly practised and accounted lawful among the Gentiles The hire of the Harlot what How dedicated to their Deities among the Heathens The main passages in S. Paul's Epistles concerning Justification and Salvation shewed to have respect to this Controversie What meant by Law and what by Faith in S. Paul's Epistles The Persons whom he has to deal with in this Controversie who The Jew's strange doting upon Circumcision The way and manner of the Apostles Reasoning in this Controversie considered His chief Arguments shewed immediately to respect the case of the Jewish and Gentile Converts No other controversie in those times which his discourses could refer to Two Consectaries 〈◊〉 this Discourse I. That works of Evangelical Obedience are not opposed to Faith in Justification What meant by works of Evangelical Obedience This method of Justification excludes boasting and intirely gives the glory to God II. That the doctrines of S. Paul and S. James about Justification are fairly consistent with each other These two Apostles shewed to pursue the same design S. James his excellent Reasonings to that purpose 1. THOUGH our Lord and his Apostles delivered the Christian Religion especially as to the main and essential parts of it in words as plain as words could express it yet were there men of perverse and corrupt minds and reprobate concerning the Faith who from different causes some ignorantly or wilfully mistaking the doctrines of Christianity others to serve ill purposes and designs began to introduce errors and unsound opinions into the Church and to debauch the minds of men from the simplicity of the Gospel hereby disquieting the thoughts and alienating the affections of men and disturbing the peace and order of the Church The first Ring-leader of this Heretical crue was Simon Magus who not being able to attain his ends of the Apostles by getting a power to confer miraculous gifts whereby he designed to greaten and enrich himself resolved to be revenged of them scattering the most poisonous tares among the good wheat that they had sown bringing in the most pernicious principles and as the natural consequent of that patronizing the most debauched villainous practises and this under a pretence of still being Christians To enumerate the several Dogmata and damnable Heresies first broached by Simon and then vented and propagated by his disciples and followers who though passing under different Titles yet all centred at last in the name of Gnosticks a term which we shall sometimes use for conveniency though it took not place till after S. Paul's time were as endless as 't is alien to my purpose I shall only take notice of a few of more signal remark and such as S. Paul in his Epistles does eminently reflect upon 2. AMONGST the opinions and principles of Simon and his followers this was one That God did not create the World that it was made by Angels that Divine honours were due to them and they to be adored as subordinate mediators between God and us This our Apostle saw growing up apace and struck betimes at the root in that early caution he gave to the Colossians to let no man beguile them in a voluntary humility and worshipping of Angels intruding into those things which he hath not seen vainly puft up by his fleshly mind and not holding the head i. e. hereby disclaiming Christ the head of the Church But notwithstanding this warning this error still continued and spread it self in those parts for several Ages till expresly condemned by the 〈◊〉 Council Nay Theodoret tells us that in his time there were still Oratories erected to the Archangel Michael in those places wherein they were wont to meet and pray to Angels Another Gnostick principle was that men might freely and indifferently eat what had been offered in sacrifice to Idols yea sacrifice to the Idol it self it being lawful confidently to abjure the Faith in time of persecution The first part whereof S. Paul does largely and frequently discuss up and down his Epistles the latter wherein the sting and poison was more immediately couched was craftily adapted to those times of suffering and greedily swallowed by many hereby drawn into Apostasie Against this our Apostle antidotes the Christians especially the Jewish Converts among whom the Gnosticks had mixed themselves that they would not suffer themselves to be drawn aside by an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God That notwithstanding sufferings and persecutions they would hold fast the profession of the Faith without wavering not forsaking the assembling of themselves together as the manner of some is the Gnostick Hereticks remembring how severely God has threatned Apostates that if any man draw back his Soul shall have no pleasure in him and what a fearful thing it is thus to fall into the hands of the living God 3. BUT
Macedonia where he spared no pains declined no dangers that he might faithfully discharge the trust committed to him The Ancients are not very well agreed either about the time or manner of his death some affirming him to die in Egypt others in Greece the Roman Martyrologie in Bithynia 〈◊〉 at Ephesus some make him die a natural others a violent death Indeed neither Eusebius nor S. Hierom take any notice of it But Nazianzen Paulinus Bishop of Nola and several other expresly assert his Martyrdom whereof Nicephorus gives this particular account that coming into Greece he successfully preached and baptized many Converts into the Christian Faith till a party of Infidels making head against him drew him to execution and in want of a Cross whereon to dispatch him presently hanged him upon an Olive-Tree in the eightieth the eighty fourth says S. Hierom year of his age Kirstenius from an ancient Arabick writer makes him to have suffered Martyrdom at Rome which he thinks might probably be after S. Paul's first imprisonment there and departure thence when S. Luke being left behind as his deputy to supply his place was shortly after put to death the reason says he why he no longer continued his History of the Apostles Acts which surely he would have done had he lived any considerable time after S. Paul's departure His Body afterwards by the command of Constantine or his Son Constantius was solemnly removed to Constantinople and buried in the great Church built to the memory of the Apostles 4. TWO Books he wrote for the use of the Church his Gospel and the History of the Apostles Acts both dedicated to Theophilus which many of the Ancients suppose to be but a feigned name denoting no more than a lover of God a title common to every Christian. While others with better reason conclude it the proper name of a particular person especially since the stile of most excellent is attributed to him the usual title and form of address in those times to Princes and great men Theophylact stiles him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a man of Consular dignity and probably a Prince the Author of the Recognitions makes him a Nobleman of Antioch converted by Peter and who upon his conversion gave his house to the Church for the place of their publick and solemn meetings We may probably suppose him to have been some Magistrate whom S. Luke had converted and baptised to whom he now dedicated these Books not only as a testimony of honourable respect but as a means of giving him further certainty and assurance of those things wherein he had been instructed by him For his Gospel S. Hierom supposes it to have been written in Achaia during his travels with S. Paul in those parts whose help he is generally said to have made use of in the composing of it and that this the Apostle primarily intends when he so often speaks of his Gospel But whatever assistance S. Paul might contribute towards it we are sure the Evangelist himself tells us that he derived his intelligence in these matters from those who from the beginning had been eye-witnesses and Ministers of the Word Nor does it in the least detract from the authority of his relations that he himself was not present at the doing of them for if we consider who they were from whom he derived his accounts of things Habuit utique authenticam paraturam as Tertullian speaks he had a stock both of credit and intelligence sufficiently authentick to proceed upon delivering nothing in his whole History but what he had immediately received from persons present at and concerned in the things which he has lest upon record The occasion of his writing it is thought to have been partly to prevent those false and fabulous relations which even then began to be obtruded upon the World partly to supply what seemed wanting in those two Evangelists that wrote before him and the additions or larger explications of things are particularly enumerated by Irenaeus He mainly insists upon what relates to Christ's Priestly Office and though recording other parts of the Evangelical story yet it ever is with a peculiar respect to his Priesthood Upon which account the Ancients in accommodating the four Symbolical representments in the Prophets Vision to the four Evangelists assigned the Oxe or 〈◊〉 to S. Luke 5. His History of the Apostolick Acts was written no doubt at Rome at the end of S. Paul's two years imprisonment there with which he concludes his story it contains the Actions and sometimes the sufferings of some principal Apostles especially S. Paul for besides that his activity in the cause of Christ made him bear a greater part both in doing and suffering S. Luke was his constant attendant an eye-witness of the whole carriage of his life and privy to his most intimate transactions and therefore capable of giving a more full and satisfactory account and relation of them seeing no evidence or testimony in matters of fact can be more rational and convictive than his who reports nothing but what he has heard and seen Among other things he gives us a particular account of those great miracles which the Apostles did for the confirmation of their doctrine And this as Chrysostom informs us was the reason why in the Primitive times the Book of the Acts though containing those Actions of the Apostles that were done 〈◊〉 Pentecost were yet usually read in the Church before it in the space between that and Easter when as at all other times those parts of the Gospel were read which were proper to the season it was says he because the Apostles miracles being the grand confirmation of the truth of Christ's Resurrection and those Miracles recorded in that Book it was therefore thought most proper to be read next to the feast of the Resurrection In both these Books his way and manner of writing is exact and accurate his stile polite and elegant sublime and lofty and yet clear and perspicuous flowing with an easie and natural grace and sweetness admirably accommodate to an historical design all along expressing himself in a vein of purer Greek than is to be found in the other writers of the holy Story Indeed being born and bred at Antioch than which no place more famous for Oratory and Eloquence he could not but carry away a great share of the native genius of that place though his stile is sometimes allayed with a tang of the Syriack and Hebrew dialect It was observed of old as S. Hierom tells us that his skill was greater in Greek than Hebrew that therefore he always makes use of the Septuagint Translation and refuses sometimes to render words when the propriety of the Greek tongue will not bear it In short as an Historian he was faithful in his relations elegant in his writings as a Minister careful and diligent for the good of Souls as a Christian devout