is alleaged as it is also in the Constitutions of Odo Archbishop of Canterbury An. 943. cap. 10. Hee may see also K. Offa's gift An. 793. pag. 308. K. Ethelwulphs gift in the Councell at Winchester An. 855. pag. 348. K. Alureds Eccles lawes cap 9. pag 377. K. Edwards the elder cap. 6. pag. 392. K. Aethelstans cap. 1. pag. 402. K. Edmunds cap. 2. pag. 420. K. Edgars cap. 3. pag. 444. and the Canons of his time Can. 54. pag. 454. Tythes they are Gods portion hence when the Jewes tythed their flocks as the young passed thorow the doore of the fold the Levite stood with a rod in his hand and marking the Tenth that came out said This tenth is the Lords According to that Levit. 27.32 Whatsoever passeth under the rod the tenth shall bee the Lords And so they have ever been accounted although the Church have sometimes taken libertie to assigne them to other uses as those Decimae Saladinides which the Councell of Paris granted to Philip of France for his warre against Saladine the Mahumedan An. 1189. which as Matth. Paris Monk of St. Albans writeth Richard 1. the King of England obtained also for the same purpose the next yeare and others since though the pretence were altered But see the liberty of the antienter Church concerning Tythes in Gratian Caus 1. qu. 3. pervenit ad caus 13. qu. 1. 2. caus 16. qu. 1. Si quis Laicus and Ecclesiae antiquitus and In canonibus in Gangrensi and quaest 7. Decimas quas And for ours for the times he writ of and collected see Wilhelm Lyndewood Constitut lib. 1. pag. 13. z. pag. 14. f. pag. 15. 0. c. and largely De Decimis lib. 3. pag. 101. c. Concerning the Question Quo Jure besides the skirmishes of our men about it and which you shall finde in the reverend and godly Author of the following Commentary pertinent and full I doe referre to Bellarm. Tom. 2. De clericis lib. 1. cap. 25. Against whom in that place Guil. Amesius sayes nothing and Joh. Alsted in his Supplement of a Fifth Tome to Dan. Chamier Panstrat lib. 4. cap. 10. Paragr 2. Confesses in a manner that to object against him in this is to seek a knot in a bulrush See Dr. Thomas Ridley his learned Discourse of Tythes In his View of the Civill and Ecclesiastical Law pag. 124. c. And in Offerings Terumah The Oblation Elevation Offering or First fruit did also belong to God The Terumah gdolah The Great Oblation and the Bikkurim The severall sorts and other matters worth knowing concerning as well Tythes as these Oblations See in Ioh. Weemse Christian Synag lib. 1. cap. 6. sect 4. paragr 2. 3. And more fully in our owne Goodwyn Mos and Ar. lib. 6. cap. 2.3 And thus having argued against their sinne 2. He expostulates with them their unreasonablnes in this thing and that it were better for them to deale righteously in the maintenance of Gods Priests both 1. For the avoyding of evill ver 9. and 2. For the procuring of good ver 10 11 12. Vers 9 I. In defrauding God of tythes they brought themselves under the curse Yee are cursed with a curse for yee have robbed mee even this whole Nation Not one or few but all dealt ill with God in the matter of tythes and therefore God brought a curse upon the whole Nation The Vulg. and others take it for a curse of penury and scarcity of victualls a great curse in that land Meerah of Arar signifies penury want or barrennes Winkleman derives the word of Maar To gnaw or Pill but not so soundly The Lxx here take the word to come of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and upon that mistake render the place 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Anomalie in the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Text see Sixt. Amam in Anom Spec. ad locum II. In bringing of tythes justly they should finde 1. Their estates blessed verse 10.11 2. Their reputation cleared ver 12. So there are here two promises Vers 10 11. First a blessing on their estates ver 10.11 Bring yee all the Tythes into the storehouse that there may be meate in mine house and prove mee now herewith saith the Lord of hosts if I will not open unto you the windowes of Heaven and poure you out a blessing that there shall not bee roome enough to receive it And I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes and hee shall not destroy the fruites of your ground neither shall your vine cast her fruit before the time in the field saith the Lord of hosts A place often and pertinently applyed and pressed by such as have had occasion to declame on this subject and surely of great force to such as have faith in the promises of God A place which had well deserved more then a bare marginall note from the late author of the profitable Treatise of Divine promises lib. 3. p. 231. Bring yee all the tythes Our old authorised English Bring yee every tythe Men have made distinctions of tythes and some of their owne coyning to save something from God but ranke them under what heads you will all must bee brought and of every kinde Into the storehouse Vulg. Into the barne The tyth-barne So the word is Ioel. 1.17 The Garners are layd desolate the barnes are broken down But it is usually rendred Treasury Beth haozar The house of treasure or store It seemes they had a standing place for tythes as it is called Nehem. 13.11.12 13. see the place and 1. Chron. 26.20 That there may be meate in my house Vulg. That there may bee spoyle and the Hebr. Tereph signifies so much It is a Synechdoche and the affection of the Trope is a Catachresis Spoyle that is meate there 's the Catachresis the spoyle which the beast makes to get food being put for meate and then the Synechdoche meate put for all necessary provision Meate in my house that is in the storehouse for the use and necessity of my house that is of my Priests and Levites that serve in my house my temple And prove mee now herewith saith the Lord of hosts Menasseh Ben-Israel Quaest 3. in Deut. makes the doubt how these words may be reconciled to those in Deut. 6.16 Yee shall not tempt the Lord your God and answers well that Malachies words are not to bee understood Causaliter but Consecutivè namely that they should indeed finde by experience that if they offered their tythes they should finde the Lord gracious and bountifull See him more fully in the place cited in his Conciliator So that here the promise of good things followes In which let us observe the artifice used in persuading Prove me c. If I will not open you the windowes of Heaven whether I will not Piscat and our Comment make this forme If I will not an oath Which cannot bee cleare without some supply to the text to make up the sense which needs not
ye say The Table of the Lord is polluted and the fruit thereof even his meate is not to be regarded 13 Ye said also Behold it is a wearinesse and ye have snuffed at it saith the Lord of Hostes and ye offered that which was torne and the lame and the sick thus ye offered an offering should I accept this at your hand saith the Lord 14 But cursed be the deceiver which hath in his flock a male and voweth and sacrificeth unto the Lord a corrupt thing for I am a great King saith the Lord of Hostes and my Name is terrible among the Heathen The parts of this Chapter are two 1. A Preface or Inscription 2. The Oracle or Prophecy 1. The Preface in the first verse generall to the whole 2. The Prophecy in the rest 1. An expostulation with the people and Priest for their ingratitude and corrupting of his worship from verse 2. to the 9. 2. A Commination of judgment deserved by it or a Commination of divers judgments from vers 9. to the end In the Preface or Inscription we conceive two things The substance and circumstance of it 1. The substance being the subject or matter of the whole is in that it is-called a Burden 2. The Circumstance of the person which is three-fold 1. From whom as the Efficient 2. To whom as the Object 3. By whom as the Instrument VERSE I. The burden of the Word of the Lord to Israel by the ministery of Malachy THE Burden Here is the matter or subject of this Booke or Prophecy He calleth it a burden usuall with Prophets in their writings all almost in some place or other But Nahum Habakkuk and Malachy thus begin their prophecies It signifies as Hierome a woefull and sorrowfull prophecy full of threats and judgments called therefore a Burden because it presseth those against whom it is spoken the hearts and spirits of them as a burden the body and suffers them not to lift up their heads and themselves as in former times Some thinke it signifies not onely this but also the Commandement of the Lord by which the Prophet was burdened as from the Lord that he should declare it in so many words unto Israel which they thinke follows thence because it is to Israel not against but I feare this is somewhat nice for it was so to them as it was against them for their sinnes and that which is against is as much as a burden to the Prophet but this must be understood Tropicè here being a Synecdoche for the whole Prophecy is not a burden or threatning of punishment but part onely of it and so the whole is denominated of the part Doctrine The punishment of sinne the affliction God inflicts upon men for their sinnes and transgressions is a burden not a light one not such as are the feathers of a bird onus sine onere but as a talent of Lead spoken of Zach. 5.7 heavy and grievous so is it here and in many places of the Prophets as Nah. 1.1 Hab. 1.1 Jerem. 23.33 fine he shewes what is the burden I will cast you off and send you into Babel captives vers 36. that is whosoever shall say The burden he shall for that word beare his burden that is be punished of the Lord it is proved further by Matth. 7.9 Galat. 6.8 Hence is the complaint of David Psal 32.4 Thy hand was heavy upon me Reas 1 Because sinne the deserving and procuring cause is a very grievous burden Psal 38.4 Matth. 27.38 that is to living men and such as have the use of their sences not to dead and benummed men then the punishment is grievous Reas 2 Because the wrath and displeasure of God which is the efficient cause of it is very heavy and grievous The displeasure of a Prince is heavy the Kings wrath is as the roaring of a Lion Prov. 19.12 Now hence are afflictions heavy and burdensome Reas 3 Because none can give ease in it or deliver from it save God onely Hos 1.6 1 Sam. 2.25 2 King 6.26 27. The wound that is had by the biting of a Scorpion is grievous when nothing can cure it but the ashes of that Scorpion much more this Vse 1 This may teach us what to judge of those men who are in some affliction under a judgment and yet finde no burden but goe as light under them as a bird doth under her feathers and sometimes make advantage of them as beggers doe make gaine of their sores they are senselesse they are benummed they are dead men In common sence if any have halfe an hundreth weight laid upon his hand or foot and pressing him sore and he feele it not what judgment is to be given of it but to be a mortified and a dead member so alas how many dead men are in our times and daies The burden not of the Word onely but of the rod of the Lord not threatned but executed hath beene upon our Land and Church by the fearefull Plague now well towards three yeares wee have walked in the land of the dead we have beene in the house of mourning Indeed the living hath laid it to his heart but so few have done it that the dead are more than the living not onely our wanton women and voluptuous men to whom that 1 Tim. 5.6 They are dead while they live but our worldly men our ambitious and others all dead for this they have not felt We sorrowed for fifty odde thousands that dyed in the former yeare we have as much need to sorrow for so many thousands yet living and dead amongst us they never indeed felt nor yet doe feele this burden Their irreligious carriage when it was here amongst us both at home abroad in the City and abroad their small conformity since to the Law of God little reforming of their corruptions nay their monstrous deformity in themselves wives and children perswades my heart as 't is Psal 36.1 The transgression of the wicked saith within my heart there is no feare of God before my eyes so that they had no feeling of this at all for they who truely felt it would grow somewhat better if not altogether reformed If an heathenish people who knew not God at the burden of the Word of the Lord did so humble themselves that the Lord said Jonah 8.10 He repented of the evill he said he would doe to you and did it not what shall be thought of Christian men by profession living in the Church of God if at the burden of his Word they repent not nor depart from their evill wayes but Isaiah 8.8 Though they be stricken revolt more and more it is because they are dead men and cannot feele it Oh then weepe not for me but for your selves and children as those not for the departed but for the living dead for if it be true The beginning of the remedy is the sence and acknowledgment of the malady how farre are they from cure that have not yet
Mareshah Vse 2 If our bloudy Romanists had prevailed in their barbarous and cruell plot to the supplanting and overthrow of our Kingdome Church the burning of our Cities the raizing of our Townes the sacking of our houses and our utter ruine we ought to have looked unto the Lord who destroyes and puls up and they but onely the instruments of his wrath Object Then you justifie their act and intent if it were the will of God and they but his instruments for it Answ I justify them as much as Luke did Judas and Herod and Pilate the Rulers and the Jewes because in the Crucifying of Christ they did the secret Counsell of God Act. 4.28 who were condemned to Hell for resisting his revealed will and committing murther and so must these without speedy repentance Besides Gods and their ends were indifferent God had done it to purge the Land of us and of our sinnes and that in just justice they of malice and for our principall good the profession of Piety and the Gospell and the hatred of their more then heathenish Idolatry Vse 3 To teach us if we would not bee destroyed and rooted out if we would be established and confirmed in despight of all Papists and Atheists to seek to have the Lord on our side If he be on our side who can bee against us or if they side against us they shall not prevaile to destroy us for if hee onely destroy then no other can Then though they provide their great armies though they have their secret plots though they straw our wayes with Gunpowder yet iniquity shall be upon the wicked and we shall escape and as we have so shall we still have occasion to praise God singing Psal 12 4 and 12.9 For he onely destroyes and saves when he will save nothing can destroy è contrà Men and Munition wise counsellors grave Senators valorous Captaines resolute Souldiers are some helpes and meanes It may be good to have peace with other Nations and Kingdoms about them But to establish a State to keepe it from falling nothing can be sure but to have peace and be at one with God that we may have him our protector then shall we not onely not fall and perish Quis ei de saeculo metus est cui in saeculo Deus tutorest Cypr. de Orat. Do. but bee without feare What need he feare the world who hath God to be his guardian And they shall call them the second thing that God theatens is shame to their destruction reproach and disgrace from other nations and people scorn and contempt expressing how great their misery should be when as for it they should become a by word to other people and nations They shall call them that is other nations that live about them or passe by them or heare of them shall take as it were this parable against them And say this mountaine of Seir is a border of wickednesse a region whom God hath cursed for their sinnes and layd wast for their iniquity this destruction is not come unto them by chance or naturall and humane revolutions and courses of things but for their wickednesse and impious manners hath God cursed and destroyed them for ever Doct. God makes men odious and contemptible among men a parable and by word for their sinnes and iniquities The border of Wickednesse the people from their judgement and utter destruction they gather their sinne and Gods wrath as the cause of their ruine and desolation Doctr. From the generall judgments of God upon a Country or Nation men may gather their sinnes and Gods wrath their deserts and Gods displeasure So here and threatned beforehand Deut. 29.21 22. and 1 King 9.8 9. and Jer. 2◠8 9. And many Nations shall passe by this Citty and they shall say every man to his neighbour wherefore hath the Lord done thus unto this great City Then they shall answer because they have forsaken the covenant of the Lord their God and worshipped other gods and served them Reas Because though it is read that he afflicteth particular men for some other respects as for the tryall of their faith the manifestation of their graces the glorifying of himselfe sometimes for preventing of sin and shewing they are but men though great things be done by them as he did Job the blind man and the Apostles yet was it never read that he afflicted a generall Land but for sinne and iniquity or a State generally And the reason of this and the whole is because generall judgments come upon the multitude who are ever wicked who have been a long time spared for the good who now being either taken away or intangled with their sinnes that is removed which hindered and so the wrath comes upon them then by these judgments may the sinnes be noted Vse 1 Then have the ministers of God done us no wrong when for the generall judgment that hath been upon our City and Land the spreading and devouring Plague they gather and affirme that we are marvellously defiled and polluted even the border of wickednesse Some wrong might haply have beene done to particular men so to judge of them when men either have not committed these sins which deserve it but for some other cause it is befallen them or they have humbled and reconciled themselves unto God which another cannot so discern But to the generall there can be none seeing God useth not to bring generall Plagues but where the sinnes of men are generall and full whereas then the whole head hath been sicke and the whole heart heavy c. Isa 1.5 6. It must needs follow that such hath been the state and time covered with iniquity for wise Physitians doe not administer Physick for the whole when one part only is ill affected nor just magistrates doe not shake or smite all with the sword when a few have offended much lesse will God onely wise and the most righteous judge destroy the righteous with the wicked send a generall judgment when but a few have deserved it one mans sinnes may bee an occasion of it but the merit is generall as in David and his people 2 Sam. 24.1 Vse 2 If others passingers lookers on may thus gather what may those who suffer themselves how may they gather their sins and his wrath That their sinnes are many and their fallings away generall because their judgments are thus The one the cause the other the proofe as did Daniel 9. a 5. ad 15. So may wee from our generall judgements argue our generall Apostacy and Impiety They shall call them the borders of wickednesse The first of Gods witnesses of such as give testimony to his judgments and the uprightnesse and justice of them is the heathen and other nations who know him not aright Doctr. God will have witnesse and testimony of his judgments from wicked and prophane nations and men the wicked shal be witnesses of his judgments upon others so here so Deut. 29.22 Dan. 5.22
parents by their experience respect and are able to discerne Reas 2 Because he may not dispose of the goods of his father without him not sell his land or alienate any thing from him but as he will dispose how then himselfe Vse 1 This reproveth those children that dispose themselves without their parents consent prey upon their right intangle and contract themselves yea and consummate marriages they not witting yea unwilling or by some necessity forced to shew some willingnesse which is the cause of so many untoward uncleane and polluted families and prophane succession as other times can witnesse so too many presidents in our dayes For as when children are compelled to match against their wills and where they have just occasion of exception for some sinister respect the parents have there follows much uncleannesse and impiety so when without the parents consent and not of their providing but they are their owne choosers shewing where parents consent is wanting there Gods blessing is away yea where parents consent is not there is Gods curse as in Esau and his posterity in Judah taking his Hoasts daughter Gen. 38.2 having Er and Onan such as God would not endure to live but slew them himselfe Yea that may also be seene Gen. 6.2 in the sonnes of Seth the Church which matched with cursed Chams seed of themselves without parents consent had such a wretched posterity This thing then is reproofe-worthy yea damnable in children without repentance parents are often causes of it and that first to some it is Gods retribution because they so served and abused their parents Secondly because they give such liberty to their daughters to wander as Dinah and so Ezek. 23.3 their brests come to be pressed and the teats of their virginity bruised or else their affections by often meeting are so intangled and inflamed as the fathers threats will not loose it nor the mothers teares cannot quench it It was not so Prov. 30.18 19. it should not be so Hierom to Demetr Epist 8.11 would not have Virgins alone solae sine matre for in a flocke of Doves the Kite often will prey upon one when they are abroad and it is a scabbed sheep that loves wandring and leaves the fold Thirdly because parents doe not take and use their right and provide for them in due time mates fit for them which makes them provide for themselves not without sinne but greatly sinning yet the parents partakers of it and oftentimes of much shame and griefe as it was with Tamar Gen. 38.26 But howsoever one mans sinne cannot excuse another nor yet the parents the childs sinne nor will not exempt them from the curse of God when they thus match to the griefe of their parents and the shortening of their dayes and life by whom they received life and should have their lives continued and lengthened Vse 2 To instruct children to be subject to their parents knowing what power they have over them to guide their choyce that without them they may not chuse and if they chuse for them they cannot without great cause and just exception stray themselves from liking smaller things they must endeavour to overcome they must not suffer themselves to be entangled by some who seeke by kind usage of them to steale away their hearts from their parents for their daughters to advance them as is the manner of some wretched and unconscionable men As Usurers get their fathers inheritance from them by feeding them with money so they must not set their affections by fervency of society and company upon others without parents and where never like to give allowance They ought to remember this is the fathers right to choose to dispose of them not onely in the generall but for the particular person But what if he be farre off and cannot see If he give thee liberty duely asking it of him he hath given his right from himselfe as Isaac to Jacob Gen. 28. But what if he upon some sinister respect deferre and passe the flower of her age I answer then hath God ordained the Magistrate as for their punishment so for their reliefe who is not to be sought to but when most urgent necessity requireth when the opposition stands betwixt Marriage and burning because that reveales the fathers fault and bewrayes his or her infirmity But what if he tender a match out of the Church a Papist or such like Then must the Child refuse with reverence not disposing of himselfe for as it were sinne to yeeld so the other is sinne to make choyce of himselfe But what if another that is not so religious and so fervent a lover of the Truth as is to be wished No direct denyall is lawfull but a wise delaying and a discreet gaining of time to sollicite God with their prayers who hath the heart of their Parents in his hand and to intreate them by mediation of best friends who if they can be diverted it is well if not I know no warrant a Child hath to deny his fathers choyce though he thinke and it may be he might choose better and he may looke for a blessing from God if in duty he thus submit himselfe to his Parents The last part of this honour is thankfulnesse which Children must performe to their Parents Doctrine Children must performe all thankfulnesse unto their Parents that is helpe them when they need and in age when their state and bodies are decayed and to be eyes and leggs and limbs unto them and to administer liberally according to their state and ability to them as they did to them when they were young and when yet they had nothing nor knew not how to get any thing that this is a part of honour Christ sheweth Math. 15.4 5 6. some thinke that of Psal 128.3 when children are made Olive plants not Olives onely and Olive branches which was a signe of peace so they to make peace and love betwixt their parents but plants such as might stand under them underproâ— and uphold them in their weaknesse and thus verily have good Children honoured their parents so did the sons of Jacob Gen. 42.1 2. so did Joseph Gen. 47.12 so did Ruth though but a daughter in law To this purpose Paul forbids that the Church should be burthened with widowes but their children Nephews ought to maintain them 1 Tim. 5.4 Reas 1 Because else he should not onely be unnaturall but unjust when the father by his speciall care for him and the mother by her prayers bearing and carrying of him watching with him lending eyes and legs and limbes to him feeding and nourishing of him deserveth it All which they the better deserve if they have children with whom they have the like labour and endeavour now justice requires to pay debt due and deserved Reas 2 Because they had forme from them as body and members and limbes so their education their trade their stocke and portion or both whereby they are that they are by the blessing of
the people they might say they were bare with their long journey and cost of building and they were growne old and if they were not tolerated thus to do they would bring nothing at all and his worship would fall to the ground The Prophet answereth That God hath commanded and therefore they are to doe it whatsoever come of it Doctrine Whatsoever God commandeth men or calleth them to that they must obey and do whatsoever inconvenience may follow of it they must shut their eyes against them all and put their hand into Gods hand to be led by him whither soever he will So with these Abraham obeyed God to go out of his owne countrey when God called him not objecting the inconveniences Gen. 12.4 And when to offer up Isaac not objecting as he might if he had consulted with flesh and blood infinite things against it Gen. 22. Hereto is that Exod. 34.23.24 Levit. 25.20 Galat 1.16 Reason 1 Because all inconveniences in the world will not excuse the fact mans disobedience it may sometime lessen it in mans reason but not defend it in Gods judgement Reason 2 Because God is able either to take away those inconveniences or to make them turne to his owne glory and the advantage of man who in a sincere conscience doth obey him And he will do so as in Daniel and the three Children Vse 1 To reprove all those who refuse to obey those things they are taught and shewed that God hath commanded because of some inconveniences they foresee will follow They shall happily be debarred of their pleasure or deprived of their profit or be discountenanced of great ones or derided of inferiours therefore they will not be religious nor professors nor reforme their manners nor be carefull of their lives and seek to make conscience of their wayes as if God cannot bring these upon them for evill as well and more then man for good Or as if these had not befallen men in their disobedience as well as those who have obeyed him As if these can excuse a man when he shal come before the Judge or he shall not be stript naked of them all and be left alone to answer for his disobedience Men are taught they ought to deale plainly and truly with others in weight and measure to speake truth and not to lie and such like They see then they shall not grow rich as others and be esteemed of as others as they think and therefore they chuse rather by such meanes to grow rich then to obey God as if their comming into the world was onely to get riches and not to honour and obey God Teach them to be liberall unto the poore for good causes and to make them friends with the riches of iniquity Luk. 10.9 and that God will give them use for it They will answer or thinke as the widow of Sarepta did 1 Kings 17. they have little enough for themselves and theirs and they feare to want before they die or not to leave enough for theirs As if that they left behinde them were theirs and not rather that they sent before As Princes have more use of that they send by their Harbingers then of that they leave in their standing houses so should they have more profit by that they give before then that they leave behinde Perswade them to make restitution of that they have wrongfully taken from men or else God will not justifie them but condemne them Micha 6.10.11 They see they shall call their names in question they pretend slandering of the Gospel To these I say Saul disobeyed God as he pretended to sacrifice to God or to have that he might and not for private use but it excused him not he lost his kingdome for it let them take heed they lose not the kingdome they say they hope and look for Vse 2 To teach every man when he hath a commandment of God to obey and not to cast at the inconveniences to hinder himselfe from obeying for he that will looke at such things shall be like him Eccles 11.4 He that observeth the winde shall not sow and he that regardeth the clouds shall not reap he shall neither sow any obedience nor reap any reward If he see no inconvenience imminent and obey it is not much worth for he pleaseth himselfe rather then God but if there be it is the more acceptable As disobedience in small things is more offensive because the obedience was easie so obedience in great things and when there are great inconveniences is more acceptable because it is harder Therefore if God command we must shew our selves the children of Abraham and of the faithfull What though inconveniences will follow what though the world shall condemne us and the wicked flout us and the Divell and our owne flesh set themselves against us Deny thy selfe as Abraham did and thine owne reason dispute not of the commandment of God but obey and commit the event to God Worthy is that saying of * Qui habet certum Dei verbum in quacunque vocatione credat tantū audeat dabit Deus haud dubia secundos exitus Luth. Luther to be written in the tables of our hearts He that hath Gods word for what he doth in any calling let him beleeve and go boldly on and no doubt God will give a good issue If God command them and they see great inconvenience passe and mount over them all by thy faith as Abraham did and beleeve Gen. 22.8 God will give an evasion and thou shalt have occasion to say vers 14. In the mount the Lord will provide And as Philo when he pleaded the cause of his Nation being brought to a great exigent before Caligula said It cannot be but that Gods aid is neer when all mens help faileth us This commandment is for you The care of Gods service to see it be done as it ought to direct the people to reprove their corruption to refine their corrupt offerings belongeth to the Minister of which I have spoken in the former Chapter VERS II. If ye will not heare it nor consider it in your heart to give glory unto my Name saith the Lord of hosts I will even send a curse upon you and will curse your blessings yea I have cursed them already because ye do not consider it in your heart IF ye will not heare it In the matter of this curse we consider first the exception which is treble to heare and apply and give glory to God The summe is repentance unlesse they will consider things well and enter into their hearts and returne to do things worthy their place and fitting their calling these things must come upon them so that without this these must come nothing can hinder it Doctrine 1 There is no means to keep away or turn away Gods judgements but repentance Revel 2.5 Except thou repent In the particulars the first is to hear they were the Ministers of the Assemblies such as were able to teach
Physitians are murtherers who poyson in stead of curing yet I condemne not the Art but such as abuse it Many Mariners make shipwracke yet we condemne not the Art of Navigation but their badnesse And mens mindes who in such things must needs be occupied should rather exercise themselves to meditate of the justice of God and to justifie him that spares not sinne no not in those who are most nigh unto him giving a purgation as it were to his owne house as David said he would do to his Psal 101. And laying the fault where it is not upon the profession but the person In this Iobs friends were better then many who of the two when they could not found the depth of Gods dealing they accused him rather then his profession that he had been but an hypocrite in it And as not anothers profession so never his own where he findes Gods judgements in it As many men draw neere to God and take some holy profession upon them and thinke then all should be safe with them and then feare nothing which when it befalleth unto them begin to contemne their profession as the Jewes Jer. 44.15.16.17.18 so they But as the Jewes never considered their present corrupt service of God nor their by-past corruption and Idolatry unrepented of vers 21. whereby they might have seen that it came upon them for that not for their profession So with these Vse 2 To teach all who draw neere to the Lord either by some speciall office in the Church or profession of his Word not for that to presume to live in any sin as if that should be his sanctuary for if others have been smiten as it were at the hornes of the Altar why should he thinke to escape nay he shall the lesse escape then an other further from God because he hath these examples and hath not feared 1 Pet. 4.17 And for profession as Salvian of a particular sin yea of all Licet gravè in omnibus praecipuè in iis tamen quae in consimili crimine etiam profâ—ssio sanctitatis accusat nay he ought the rather to labour for more holinesse the neerer he comes to God and to avoyd even the lesse corruptions for the Lord will lesse bear it in them for he will be sanctified in them that draw neer unto him if not by their holinesse yet by his own justice in punishing them more sharply to the end that as the wax the more neerer it approcheth to the fire so much more the heat of the fire approacheth in melting of it so the holinesse of God may better be known in uncasing of such hypocrites or hypocrisie approaching to him and so he may be the more glorified of the people in such judgements And will curse your blessings The first particular curses in cursing their blessings already bestowed on them which is either by taking from them the power they have to nourish and he hath by his ordinance given unto them or else so that they shall not be comfortable unto them or else in making them turn to their hurt Doctrine 1 Then doth God curse men when they have abundance of outward things and have not the comfort by them which happens either by his taking away the staffe from the creature or the strength from the eater Micha 6.14 Thou shalt eate and not be satisfied Doctrine 2 All creatures have the power to help nourish and comfort man and to preserve his life not of themselves but from God and his blessing Meat without him are fitter to choke then feed as clay to put out eyes Joh. 9. rather then to give sight Vse 1 This teacheth why the rich as well as the poore must pray Give us the day c. and those who have abundance as well as those who want Vse 2 Not to trust and rely upon them when we have them and use them for Luke 12.15 A mans life consists not in the abundance of things which he possesseth Vse 3 Not to feare or distrust when our means are never so small nay wanting because he that can by the means can also help without them where he hath himselfe denied them and man not by his fault deprived himselfe of them so much is that of Matth. 4.4.7 There is another remedy in the hand of God who though he give not food can prolong the life of man with his beck and will and word onely he that could make the garments of the Israelites last longer then by reason or in their nature they could can make the life of man which is more excellent to last Yea I have cursed them already An amplification or confirmation by way of correction shewing how they had not profited by his judgements though they were upon them and had been long Doctrine The judgements of God profit not the wicked but rather of themselves make them worse They benefit not by them but grow worse and worse They diminish not their sins but adde to them The experience of all times in the Church sheweth it Isaiah 1.6 Jer. 5.3 Pharaoh and his servants Saul and his court Reason 1 Because they are ignorant and blinde not knowing who smit them nor why neither the authour nor the end nor the cause Like the pur-blinde Philistims 1 Sam. 6.9 who would rather impute it to chance then the hand of God and so think some other cause then their sin and some other end then their forsaking their sin Reason 2 Because they are like to the servant in the Law Exod. 21.5.6 that when he should have gone out free yet so loved his wife and children that he would remaine a servant for ever and with a publicke disgrace So these love their sins that they had rather be servants still and under affliction and judgements then part with their sins which makes them impute that they suffer to any thing rather then their sins finde out some other causes and so blinde themselves Like men when they have surfeited of some meat when the Physitian comes to them had rather hazard their health then tel him what is the cause left he should forbid it them Vse 1 To put a difference betwixt the good and bad Gods children and the wicked who often happen into the same judgement and affliction together as chaffe and wheat into the same sive gold and drosse into the same fornace yet are they diversly affected in it and by it Gods children are made the better more neere heaven more holy As trees when they are pruned and lopped from their water boughes do grow higher and bring forth fruit more plentifully So he increaseth the more and is more excellent As the Arke of Noah the more the waters of the flood increased the higher it was carried and came neerer to heaven So they But the wicked are more hardened as the Smiths Anvill or Stithie Vse 2 This may teach us that nothing but the Word is able to win men unto God and to bring them out of their sins and
such meanes then will the Lord take his rod in hand to punish and gird his sword unto him to cut off every one so sinning and so spared So here So when Adam the Prince of the earth and Magistrate of his sonnes let passe the murther of Abel because Cain was his first borne and his possession yet the Lord did lay to his hand and did punish him Gen. 4.11.12 c. So of the sonnes of Eli 1 Sam. 2.23.24 and 4.11 not simply a judgement to fall in battell but because it was prophesied of them Chap. 2.34 This is manifest further out of the story of Achan while by ignorance of the fact Ioshua did not punish it the Lord did it in the whole people but after the knowledge of it when Iosua had punished it the Lord put up his sword and his wrath ceased Josh 7. To these we may adde that of Numb 25.3.4 c. the cause of the great famine 2 Sam. 21. was the Kings not punishing of a sinne committed by Sauls house which done the famine ended Reason 1 Because as Iehosaphat told the Judges their judgements were his which if they executed he will not because he will not punish one fact twice but if not they then will he because he is just and else should be unjust as well as they for if it be injustice in them to spare the wicked it would be in him Reason 2 Because impunity from the Magistrate makes impenitencie in the offenders and brings them on to hardnesse of heart and security so that they never judge themselves and so neither judged by authority nor by themselves they are judged of the Lord as the contrary proves 1 Cor. 11. For I take it it will hold not onely of those sinnes a man is guilty in foro conscientiae but in foro civili Vse 1 This sheweth the folly of those men who as they make conscience of no sinne and onely care to avoid those sinnes the lawes of men and state will punish them for so when they are fallen into any such offences care onely how to escape the punishment of the law and the hands of the Magistrate which if they can by favour or friendship by bribes or the countenance of others or by dissembling or covering of the fault or howsoever the care is taken and they never feare more Their folly appeareth because then the Lord will take them into his owne hands and that saith the Apostle is a fearfull thing And more cause of feare as Christ speaketh Matth. 10.28 What will it profit them then to escape the one and fall into the hands of the other As much as if a murderer should by means and money either get his fact passed over at the Sessions and fall into the hands of the Judges at the Assizes or scape their hands either by corrupting the Judge or the Sheriffe to pack a Jury for his purpose or the fore-man to lead the rest when the next of kindred is ready to enter an appeale to the Kings Bench where there shall be no such packing All he hath got by it is his repriving for a while but to his greater shame and punishment So with these Many a great man lives in oppressing and injuring others his tenants and inferiours and either there is no civill law against him or if there be either his greatnesse or purse will carry it out well enough that no punishment shall come upon him or take hold of him and then hee sleepeth without feare when he is as a man that hath escaped the rage of a foole and is fallen into the power of a Bear robbed of her whelps As Masters if they live in oppression or usury or deceit or drunkennesse or adultery or some such like and can escape the Magistrates hands by the meanes they make feare nothing That is their folly there is more cause of feare God will take them into his hand Many servants when they have injured and dealt deceitfully with their Masters stealing from them or serving them with eye-service mis-spending their goods and not furthering by their endevours their profites if they can escape their masters hands by lying or shifting or dissembling or by his negligence lenity or remisnesse they never feare this is their folly there is now more cause of feare God will take them into his hand to cut them off by the plague or some other judgement Finally let these and all the like see their folly that thinke there is no feare if they can escape the hand and sword of man by such meanes yet there will be no escaping of the hand of God who will as he saith send serpents that will not be charmed Jerem. 8.17 O consider this yee that forget God! as if hee would not judge the earth when men neglect it least hee teare you in pieces Vse 2 The cause why God sendeth generall judgements upon such a City or Land as ours is why he drawes forth his sword or sends famine pestilence plague or such like It is because the Magistrates of that country or towne are remisse and carelesse suffer sinne unpunished and uncensured for some respect or other making either munera oris or manus or officii For if these did not let them but they would purge the land from the bloud and the adulteries whoredomes thefts oppressions blasphemies and such things wherewith it is defiled there would never come any such generall judgements For if the Justices at the Sessions should reforme throughly and deliver the goale every one to his severall punishment the Judges should have little cause to ride circuit or if they did but to make short ones So if Magistrates God would not punish or if he did yet not so long as three yeares famine and three yeares pestilence So that of all the enemies of a Common-wealth none is so great as remisse carelesse and corrupt Magistrates for they are a cause of Gods generall judgements when as their severity would prevent And none such a fore-runner of some generall judgement as they and their remisnesse and in a Magistrate it is better for the generall good that he be too severe punishing some he ought and might spare then remisse passing by others that deserve it As a Surgeon better too deepe or too nigh then too little in tenting or cutting To teach every inferiour not to seeke and labour to escape the hand and punishing of the Magistrate or his superior who is as a Magistrate unto him his master or parent if he have offended and deserved it specially remaining by that immunity impenitent in his sin for besides that it is sinne to him so to avoyde it it will be but a further meanes to bring him to the hands of God who will punish him more severely and fearefully cut him off from the tents of Iaakob If any say this falls but out seldome here and there one and so no such feare of it I answer with Cyprian l. de laps Plectuntur interim
put one another away but they are still man and wife till the cause be lawfully heard of a lawfull Magistrate judged and determined That riseth hence that God saith she is his wife Further Abraham with consent of Sarah tooke Hagar who can excuse him of adultery yet was Sarah his wife still else should the seed in whom all the nations of the earth was blessed and the first be an adulterous seed Gen. 16. So after her death of Keturah and his Concubines Gen. 25. So of David when he married Bathshebah though it is most probable he had no wife yet he had Concubines then afterwards as 2 Sam. 16.21 sheweth yet still was she his wife and so accounted to his dying day so of others might be said Besides though Christ hath allowed it to the innocent party that he or she may commence the action and being judged put the other away yet no where hath he comanded it that he should put her away which if she had ceased to be a wife he would Math. 19.9 Againe onely he that joyned them can separate them and make them not man and wife which is God only that he did by the Minister this by the Minister and Magistrate Math. 19.6 Hierom reports of Fabiola that without the judgement of the Church or Magistrate she put away her husband being a vitious and an adulterous man and full of all filthy lusts But though hee writ not the rest yet others report that she was made to doe publique pennance not that she made a divorce but that she did it of her selfe without the iudgement of the Church Reason 1 Because as private and clandestine and secret marriages are not allowable for manifold inconveniences to all so privy and secret divorces are not allowable because they will be as prejudiciall to the good of many Reason 2 Because they are man and wife till a just cause be justly known to the contrary that cannot be in private but before a competent Judge God allowing none to be accounted adulterers but such as are lawfully convicted of it which is not betwixt themselves but before a lawfull Magistrate of Judge for by no right can a man be both a party and the Judge Reason 3 Because if the adultery be not knowne to the innocent then they are still man and wife though there be great presumption of it And why not if knowne It never a whit breakes the bond more knowne then unknowne unlesse it be proved and judged and determined Reason 4 Because it is a punishment of a fault committed none may punish but a lawfull Judge Vse 1 To reprove those who thinke it to be in the power of the innocent man or woman to make the divorce after once just cause is knowne of themselves without the authority of the lawfull Judge As if man might destroy that which God hath joyned A woman cannot release her joyncture in prejudice of her selfe nor a man take it from her if she were willing to the prejudice of her estate unlesse it be done before a lawfull Judge How then this that is such a prejudice to her and many others A recognizance made in the Court of Chancery cannot be released but by the consent of the same Court. And when a recognizance is made to God can man release it without his consent Vse 2 It reproveth those who as unsoundly as boldly deliver that after adultery is committed specially if it be known so long as they live together afterwards they live as adulterers Can man and wife be adulterers I would thinke not by the meere act of knowing one another nay sure not now the Prophet saith they are man and wife still Neither is there any place in the Scripture that bindeth the innocent party to put away the nocent but gives him liberty if he will and if he be not bound to it it is no adultery if he doe it not but live still with her But adultery hath broken the bond of marriage I know it well yet not so but the innocent party may if he will repaire it and knit it againe specially if she repent both charity and piety requires but if not why he may not if he will I know not As in the matter of offence from a man when he repents he is not onely bound to doe it as Luke 17.3.4 but if he doe it without repentance in private injuries not prejudiciall to the common good I thinke he is not reproveable So in this And though it were horrible for a man to beare such an indignity from his wife if she shall continue in it to bring the judgement of God upon him and his house yet if he passe it over once or twice upon hope he is not an adulterer though he go in unto her for they are still man and wife Vse 3 To instruct married parties that notwithstanding a fault be committed yet they remaine man and wife and it is in their power to repaire the breach the one by repentance and the other by pardoning and better a great deale it should be so then the divorce sued out to make up the breach privately rather then bring it publicke That which the Scripture commends in Ioseph Mat. 1. may by proportion instruct men not to traduce their wives so soone as they have offended but seeke to reclaime them privately Men that have taken a wound in some secret and uncomely part will assay to cure it privately before they goe to a Physitian They should do so in this If any man saith one have an unsound tooth how putrified soever it be will not forthwith send for a tooth-drawer to have it pulled out neither if his hand be ulcerated and wounded will he forthwith call for a Chyrurgian to cut it off but he will rather use all meanes possible and assay every thing to cure it and keep it still Reason because no man hates his owne flesh why not then the same to his wife which is his owne flesh VERS XV. And did not he make one yet had he abundance of spirit and wherefore one because he sought a godly seed therefore keep your selves in your spirit and let none trespasse against the wife of his youth ANd did not he make one Thus is it to be read and not Hath not one done it being referred to God And so S. Hierom upon this place And Chrysost de libell repud The summe and meaning is Hath not God made man and woman and ordained by his perpetuall and inviolable decree that they shall be one flesh even they two and no more that mankinde might be increased of them joyned together by a perpetuall knot of matrimony And this set downe briefly by the Prophet hath our Saviour Christ set downe largely and explained Matth. 19.4.5.6 Yet had he abundance of Spirit This is added for amplification of the former As if he had said this did not God at the first because he wanted spirit to make more women for one man for he
onely the place but notes the cause and end as well and so it is both to the Temple and for it noting the spirituall Temple to the materiall Temple and for the spirituall that the type this the truth Now the person of Christ is described First he is called the Lord that is King and governour of his Church of whom is that Psal 110.1 Which Lord the Prophet affirmeth that they desired the Jewes all of them some in one respect some in another desired him some as an earthly King and deliverer and some as a spirituall King and the true Messias who should be their redeemer and saviour from sinne and the wrath of God Luke 2.25.38 Even the messenger of the Covenant The second description of his person that he is the messenger or Angell so called because he was to reveale his Fathers will to his people and to be their Prophet to teach them what God requireth of them Called the Angel of the Covenant partly because he was promised and God did so Covenant with them to be their Prophet Deut. 18.15 16. and Rom. 15.8 and partly as some thinke because he it is that makes the Covenant betwixt God and his people being mediator of it and partly because he is the messenger of the new law or the new testament wherein heavenly blessings are promised unto us So St. August de civit Dei 18 35. Behold he shall come The conclusion for confirmation of the former to establish the certainty of it i. At the time appointed he shall certainly come so God hath decreed it and the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it Some understand these words of his second comming as the others of the first As August and Theodoret But Cyril and Rupert otherwise as we and the third and fourth verses prove it because those things are exercises of the Church upon earth In the Prophesie we first observe what toucheth the forerunner That he is sent and the end of his sending I send Math. 11.10 It is said God the Father sendeth noting the unity of essence Doctrine 1 Christ is God equall to the Father and coeternall with him Revel 2.8 first and last Doctrine 2 Christ he sendeth Ministers and appoints them over particular charges as Pastors Re. 2.1 My messenger or Angel Iohn is the messenger of Christ one by whom he would make his will known and the spirituall and heavenly verity manifest unto his people which is not peculiar to Iohn but that which is given unto all the Ministers of God and so teacheth us a generall thing Doctrine The Ministers of God are his messengers and Angels to receive from him and reveale to and teach his people his will and pleasure those by whom he will convey unto them the knowledge of his divine Mysteries which is not to be understood exclusively as if they should have no knowledge of it by any other means But this is the principall means by which he hath ordained thus to manifest it Hence is this name of Angel or messenger so usually given unto them And that of Embassadours 2. Cor. 5.20 And that of any Interpreter Iob 33.23 And that they bring is called the Lords message Haggai 1.13 Hence that Math. 29.19 go ye and teach Luke 16.29 Abraham said unto him they have Moses and the Prophets let them hear them Reason 1 Because of mans infirmity therefore he speakes not himselfe neither sendeth by an Angel which is one by nature knowing the naturall feare of a man that he is able to indure neither As that sheweth Deuter. 5.25 26. Now therefore why should we die For this great fire will consume us if we heare the voice of the Lord our God any more we shall die For what flesh was there ever that heard the voice of the living God speaking out of the midst of the fire as we have and lived Luke 1.11 12. Then appeared unto him an Angel of the Lord standing at the right side of the Altar of incense And when Zacharias saw him he was troubled and fear fell upon him As also his superstition who would leave attending the message and worship the messenger As Revelat. 22.8 But he willing to have the message rather regarded sends it in earthen vessells Reason 2 Because they might know better and more fitly to deliver and apply this word both with more compassion and with other affections seeing they are partakers of the like infirmities and so better know the infirmities of men It is the reason the Apostle giveth why the Priesthood was taken from men to be for men in things appertaining to God Heb. 5.1 2. Which is that the Apostle said 1. Cor. 9.20 Vnto the Iewes I become as a Iew that I may win the Iewes to them that are under the law as though I were under the law that I may win them that are under the law Which was saith Augustine * Compassione misericordiae non simulatione fallaciae fit enim tanquam aegrotus qui ministrat aegroto non cum se febrem habere mentitur sed cum animo condolent is quemadmodum sibi ministare vellet si ipse aegrotaret sic ipse aliis aegrotantibus ministrando compatitur August Epist Hierom Epist 9. In compassion pitying them not in dissimulation to deceive them He became as a sicke man himselfe to tend the sicke not feigning that he had a fever but with such a tender and condoling heart as he would be tended with if himselfe were sicke Vse 1 To confute those who thinke any sufficient for the Ministery to be Gods Messenger Vide. Cap. 2. verse 7. doc 1. use 1. Vse 2 To reprove all ignorant Ministers and to admonish men to take heed how they take this calling Vide ibid. verse 6. and 4. Vse 3 To confute those who thinke there is no necessity to heare Gods Ministers Vide ibid. doc 2. use 1. Vse 4 To teach men to make conscience to heare the Ministers Vide ibid. And he shall prepare the way before me Here is Iohns office alluding to an harbindger before a Prince whose duty it is to prepare the way for his Prince remove all lets and impediments that he may passe more easily and more freely So ought Iohn according to that Luke 3.4.5 And it is all one with that Luke 1.17 To make ready a people for the Lord. To whom he would come Iohns preaching then is the preparing of a people and Christ comes when men have entertained that Doctrine Men who would receive Christ must entertaine his word by his Ministers and be first prepared by it and then will he come Luke 1.76 and Rev. 3.20 If any heare my voice He shall prepare the way Iohn prepares the way for Christ by preaching repentance and bringing men to the sight and acknowledgement of their sins which is manifest by his preaching Matth. 3.2 3 7 8. Doctrine As Christ comes to none but such as have received the word So to none but to such who
and then Iam. 2.13 There shall be judgement mercilesse to him that sheweth no mercy and mercy rejoyceth against judgement Reason 2 Because God he professeth himselfe the helper of the helplesse and the patron of such as are without succour and friends therefore as he must right their wrongs so must he relieve them oppressed and revenge their oppressions Vse 1 This may admonish those who are in authority and place of justice This will make them like unto the Lord to defend the widowes cause when it comes before them or what power soever they have in their hands as Isaiah 1.17 Plead for the widow whether she be rich or poore for if rich it is but justice but if poore it is both justice and mercy That many will do and it is lesse thanke worthy because they are able to recompence them by some gratefullnesse and other meanes In whom there is a shew of justice but no justice indeed and in truth but a desire of gaine The other is the harder and as just so mercifull and hath the promise of good from God as in the generall Luke 14.14 And thou shalt be blessed because they cannot recompence thee for thou shalt be recompenced at the resurrection of the just Those shall be recompenced of men these of God This they ought then to doe chearefully and not as the unrighteous Judge unwillingly but as Iob 31.16 who would not suffer the eies of the widow to faile Vse 2 Then may all those who are vexers oppressors and injurers of widowes know what they are to looke for from the Lord that howsoever they thinke all safe and he is farre off yet he will come nigh to them to judgement and be swift when they thinke he is slacke either to make their houses destitute or their wives widowes or to bring some such fearefull judgement against them besides the afterclaps that which is to come after this life But who are these that some men may see themselves touched Verily there are divers sorts of them some injure rich widowes who left by their husbands under whose shadow they prospered well are by unjust Executors long kept without their portions and widowes part and never recover it but by long sute in law where the best part is spent before the other is recovered If they have it without any such troubles then are they by unconscionable kindred bought and sold by a peece of money to a man that hath neither wealth vertue nor grace many a man labouring for her making great shew of wealth which in truth many pounds is worse then nothing for poore widowes utterly forsaken of all kindred and friends on both sides never deserving the commendations given by Boaz Ruth 2.20 for they soone cease to do good both to the living and dead And doing thus to kindred what can be expected of those who are not allied to them but that they should leave them destitute and soone subvert their cause or not right their wrong but be readier to vex them some as the Creditors of that widow 2. Kings 4. though in this generally this City lesse capable if they find any reasonable dealing Vse 3 This may perswade every one to avoid this sin if he have no love to justice no affection to mercy yet if he have any feare of punishment let him vex neither the rich nor the poore neither his friend nor one that is friend to him But if he would have his curse turned into a blessing he must have care and do his best that when he rejoyceth and is full the widow may be so too as is commanded in the feast of the Tabernacle Deut. 16.13.14.15 and let her have a part with thee both of the field and vineyard Deut. 24.19.20.21 that thou maiest pray with more boldnesse before the Lord. Deuter. 26.13.15 Then thou shalt say before the Lord thy God I have brought the hallowed thing out of mine house and also have given it unto the Levites and to the strangers to the fathers and to the widow according to all thy commandements which thou hast commanded me I have transgressed none of thy commandements nor forgotten them Looke downe from thy holy habitation euen from Heaven and blesse thy people Israel and the land which thou hast given us as thou swarest unto our fathers the land that floweth with milke and honey And the fatherlesse The third particular of oppression when they injure and vex the fatherlesse such as are without all helpe and hope Doctrine The Lord will come nigh to judgment to all such as vex oppresse and injure the fatherlesse such as are left yong not able for age and counsell and advice to defend themselves So here so in Exod. 22.22.23 And Deut. 27.19 Jer. 22.3.5 Iob shewes this was just with God Job 31.21.22 If I have lift up my hand against the fatherlesse when I saw that I might helpe him in the gate let mine arme fall from my shoulder and mine arme be broken from the bone Reasons as in the former Vse 1 To perswade all in authority to judge for the fatherlesse when his cause comes before them as is commanded Isaiah 1.17 which is not that they should accept persons and pervert justice for the fatherlesse because he is so a thing forbidden by God and horrible before him to favour the person of the poore as to feare the great and rich in an unjust cause but that when the poore fatherlesse cause comes before them against some great men or rich deceivers that seek to vex them they should defend their cause though they sue but in forma pauperis and respect the justice of it as if they were rich and do for them that which is right so shall they shew themselves Gods for where the name is given to them there the duty is injoyned them Psal 82.1.2.3.4 For the Magistrate is specially ordained for these not for such as are great men who neither will doe right nor suffer wrong able enough to right themselves and defend their own causes or not so much for these as for the poore orphanes widowes and such like As the defence is for the little coppes and small trees of grooth not for the great okes they have not such need of fencing against beasts as those Vse 2 Then may many men expect the judgments of God who vex and oppresse for their owne gaine many pore orphanes and fatherlesse children sometimes colourably sometimes openly Often they colour it by pretence of law and are legall oppressors who obtaining Wards do fell them from one to another as men do horses and when they are marriagable tender them such matches as they must live miserably all their lives with if they accept them so far different in nature state religion and such like or if they accept not when they tender of purpose such as they know they wil not regard then make they a further commodity of them that they happily recover not that oppression of many yeares
my house Which is not as some interpret it that the Priest and Levites might be maintained but rather as others that the offerings of God might be continued and so his worship maintained Doctrine The maintaining of the Ministery is a speciall means to further the worship of God on the contrary the withdrawing of that is the hindering of this Manifest here and that Nehem. 13.10.11 When the Levites were neglected the house of God was forsaken and that Numb 18.21 that they might be able to doe him service and so his worship be maintained Prov. 3.9 for by the paying and giving to them maintenance is his honour procured and that those comparisons 1 Cor. 9. prove no lesse for as the warres must needes be unfought if the souldiers be not maintained c so must Gods service needs be neglected if his Ministers be not maintained Reason 1 Because the Ministers else cannot as Paul to Timothy 1 Tim. 4 13. Give attendance to reading but must needs entangle themselves with the affaires of this life as 2 Timoth. 2.4 that is about private affaires and so must needs neglect the publique worship of God Reason 2 Because the seede of the Ministery will decay for it is reward that nourisheth arts and furthereth a mans study the hope of a reward and recompence afterward for though this should not be the end of a mans study but the glory of God and salvation of his people yet seeing men are not all nor at first sanctified to have the right end yea and many men who never have the right end may attaine the end to save others Gods end as the builders of the Arke who never intended Gods glory or the salvation of Noah and his family So it is in this therefore maintenance must be proposed and if it faile the worke failes Vse 1 This noteth unto us the vile impiety of the man of sinne the Pope of Rome who in nothing more hath sought to undermine the Church and overthrow the worship of God then in robbing and bereaving it of the goods that belonged unto it by impropriations donatives and such like And to make way for this hee deprived the people of the worship of God and turned the exercise of religion into a dumbe and ridiculous spectacle which done it was thought convenient that to be a Priest required no gifts but that every common man might easily undergoe the burthen of it for if the gifts of learning had still remained as necessary the maintenance that belongeth unto them could under no colour have beene taken away but when every one that was able to read his Portuise was thought sufficiently furnished to that office it easily followed that the living given to the Church for the edification thereof was thought too much for so meane a man in so base a labour And another way or colour for this was that though they were taken from the Ministery yet they were not alienated from the Church because they were not appropriated to lay men but Abbeyes Fryers Monasteries and other Cloysters which vermine beganne then to multiply as Grashoppers on the face of the earth and to devour all things that were before them And in the meane time the worship of God decayed for those who had the spoile made an endowment of the Vicurage at so low a rate by composition namely ten or twenty Nobles that no man of parts and gifts was able to live of it but one that had some other trade to live by which he followed closely or no other meanes and so he made this his last refuge and by this meanes they did more overthrow the worship of God and his Church then by all the persecutions they used or can which they learned from their Grandsire Apostata Iulian who by this meanes is noted more to have overthrowne the Church then all the persecuting Emperors before him Because they tooke away Presbyters and their martyrs blood was the seede of the Church but he tooke away Presbyterium the Ministery in withdrawing the maintenance from the Church and so overthrew the worship of God In the same steps hath this his sonne Apostata and others his slaves followed by which they have made more decay of the worship of God then by any meanes whatsoever Vse 2 This teacheth us the cause why in many places the worship and service of God is not performed or carelessely and slubberd over as men that worke by great doe their worke because the maintenance being taken away by Popery hath not yet beene restored unto Gods house againe and for his worship whereby they who hold them are not onely guilty of sacriledge as before nor of theft taking that which is proper to others for no man hath right in tithes but they who can give and doe give spirituall things as Damasus Deut. 3. Quâ fronte quâ conscien tiâ c. Damasus Deut. 3. With what face with what conscience can ye receive oblations who can scarce for your selves much lesse for others make prayers unto God speaking to lay men but they are guilty of the hindering and overthrow of his worship and that not onely of the present hindering of it but leaving things still alienated to their posterity and keeping the Church without hope of having them restored they are guilty of the overthrow of the worship of God after them so that when they are dead yet their sinnes shall live Vse 3 To teach men willingly and cheerefully to give to the Church that which is in law and conscience due unto it seeing by it the worship of God is maintained and without it it must needes decay What ought to be more deare unto men and wherein ought they and should more labour to shew themselves more cheerefull and forward then in the erecting and maintenance of the worship of God and his service whether they consider the greatnesse of his Majesty in himselfe or what he is in respect of them when it is so small a thing he requires of men but the tenth who might require all having as much right to them as to the tenth when he then requires so little is it a great thing if it be given him of them whose goods onely ought not to be deare unto them but not their lives that they might honour him And prove me herewith Make triall of mee of my goodnesse and bountifulnesse in giving and faithfulnesse in keeping my promise Doctrine Then doe men make triall of the goodnesse bounty and faithfulnesse of God in keeping promises when they doe the things that he requires of them and doe looke for in them and by them the things he hath promised They who doe otherwise doe but tempt him that is who doe thinke to obtaine his goodnesse though they never performe any such thing as he required So much is implyed here and in that Deuteronom 6.17.18 Ye shall not tempt the Lord your God as ye did tempt him in Massah but ye shall keepe diligently the commandements of
and opinion must needs condemne all the generation of Gods children who sometimes have had such abundance plenty and prosperous estate and that which hath beene may be for as there is no new thing under the sunne so nothing hath beene but it may be renued Vse 2 This will confute the doctrine of Popery making this a note of the Church for being but sometimes befalling it it cannot note the Church which is certainely knowne onely by such things as are inseparable which this is not being oftner under persecution then in prosperity and how otherwise seeing here it is but a stranger and sojourner compared to a Dove lodged in the rockes Cant. 2.14 to a ship shaken with the windes but not sunke to a house upon the rocke beaten with winde and weather but not cast downe Therefore is it but a weake argument which Bell. Sad. Stapl. and others use to prove the true Church and to deny ours to be and indeed no other then that which the Heathen and Pagans have used against Christians Symachus against whom Prudentius writ in an Epistle to Theodosius the Emperor which is in Ambros Epist 30. used this argument and almost no other to prove that the Emperor should still abide in the religion of the Romans because that Common-wealth was most flourishing and prosperous so long as they worshipped Iupiter Apollo and other Gods Also the old Tyrants Persecuters of the Church were wont to impute to chance the cause of all calamities and miseries for they used to say when calamities were upon them we are now lesse fortunate then in former times because we suffer the Christians and because we do not with that religion and devotion worship Iupiter and other of the Gods as we did before therefore are the Gods angry with us so the Papists from a temporal felicity measure piety and gather that God doth favour them because he gives them these outward things by it would condemne us and al other Churches But if the Heathen reasoned absurdly they conclude not well but very impudently but if the conclusion would follow it would be on our sides rather then theirs who have for these 48. yeares not been inferiour to any Kingdome in the world for peace plenty and prosperity and specially when we have beene most severe not in persecuting but correcting of their impieties Idolatries For pro justitiâ persequentes persecutores sunt propter flagitìum correctores August contra lit Petil. lib. 21. ca. 84. And for victory in warre which is the principallest they stand of we have given them more foiles then ever they us and have often carried the day and triumph both by sea and land blessed be our God for it Therefore must they let this argument this weapon goe or else we will sheath it in their owne sides Vse 3 If this be a blessing then have we cause to stirre up our selves and soules to God to give him thankes for that he hath performed to us which he promised to this land and people that we have had such peace plenty and prosperity as we have beene accounted of all blessed and happy and of our enemies mightily maligned and envied That we use that of August de Civit. D. l. 1. c. 7. Quisquis non videt caecus quisquis nec laudat ingratus quisquis laudanti reluctatis in sanus est And yet seeing it is no perpetuall blessing but such as the Church is often deprived of and hath beene let us see we walke worthy of it lest he pull us downe as low as he lifted us up high and make us as vile as he hath made us honourable As he did divers times with his people Deuter. 29.22.24.25 which was then and shall be when they are worse and walke unworthy of this and we be as Salvian ad Catholicum Ecclessiam lib. 1. * Ac sic nescio quomodo c. I know not how but thy felicity fights against thy selfe so much as thou art encreased in people thou art almost as much encreast in vices by how much thou hast more abounded thou hast lost in discipline and thy prosperity hath brought with it a great encrease of evills for the professors of the faith being multiplyed the faith it selfe is lessened and her children encreasing the mother is sicke and thou O Church of God! art made weaker by thy fruitfulnesse and the more children the lesse strength for thou hast spread through the whole world the professors of thy religious name but not having the power of religion as if thou wert rich in men poore in faith wealthy in multitude needy in devotion enlarged in body strengthned in spirit c. VERS XIII Your words have been stout against me saith the Lord yet yee say What have we spoken against thee YOur words have been stout against me Your words have been stout against me saith the Lord of Hosts The Prophet proceedeth to reprove this people of another sinne and to expostulate the thing with them The sinne of it is the denying of Gods providence both over the evill and good not punishing the one and not providing for the other This people afflicted of God with penury and want for other of their sinnes but especially for spoiling God his Levits and Church they thought and spoke blasphemously against God but accusing his providence as not regarding those who worship and professe him but such as dishonoured him and were wicked and never would they accuse themselves of their sinnes which is that he saith their words have been great against him they spoke hard and odious things of him as the words following shew that these were they Yet yee say What have we spoken against thee They answer for themselves not denying simply that they had spoken any such thing but putting God to his proofe as thinking that he did not know nor understand as those who had oftentimes said among themselves that God regarded not the things here below neither tooke notice of what men did Therefore this question of theirs tendeth not to any deniall of the deed but to the tempting of God For if hee could not or did not answer directly and shew them what they had said then would they conclude as before they had that he did not regard nor understand the things that were said and done by men which if he did then could he tell in particular what words they had spoken against him and not thus insist in the generall Doctrine Your words have been stout Observe God takes notice of the words of men as well as their actions and will reprove them for them and call them to an account and judge them Jam. 2.12 Your words have been stout against me They deny the providence of God and his wise disposing of things upon earth among men as the verses following shew and so are accused to have spoken against God himselfe though they have not denied him or blasphemed him Doctrine They who deny the providence of God and his
to his word which witnesseth the contrary every where that they shall be happy and have all things necessary that feare him Psa 1. and 34.9.10 with infinite other places and many examples in the Scriptures Reason 2 Because by this they make God unfaithfull and so no God who hath promised such fruit to them who sow in righteousnesse Reason 3 Because by this they deny the bounty and liberality of God and is a great prejudice to his honour and glory that hee should dimisse such as serve him and belong to him empty handed Vse 1 Then have we many who must answer at Gods judgement seate for blasphemy and proud speaking against him with whom nothing is so common as upon any even the slightest occasion to condemne piety and the feare of God for the most fruitlesse and the unprofitablest profession in the world If they see any man who professeth Gods feare and seemes carefull of his wayes if he any way miscarry in his state and decay in that the world deemed him to have had or if he increase not as other men doe by a lawfull and honest profession as they by all their by waies and indirect courses What doe they will they enquire the just cause of it and search what may be a let he prospers no better of which many just causes may be given of severall men and well found out yet they never search further then this their piety and profession and the service of God though they will not directly speake as these because that were palpable yet they spare not these speeches you may see what comes of this professing of all their piety and godlinesse And this they whisper every where like the ten spies of the holy and promised Land and bring up an evill report of it Num. 13.33 and a slande rupon it Num. 14.37 But let them know that upon those ten spies upon all who beleeved them the judgements of God befell and they fell in the wildernesse and never came to set foote in the Land of Canaan Such recompence let these expect from the Lord not to come into the promised Land when as those they said should bee a prey If we may allude to Numb 17.31 they shall not lose their recompence Vse 2 To teach men when they see those who professe the feare of God and piety not to grow in the world or to decay not to be in so prosperous estate as others are not to accuse their profession and piety lest they be found upon the returne of their triall guilty of blasphemy against God denying his faithfulnesse dishonouring him as suffering his followers to be without reward and recompence for their service And of two evills it is lesse and the better to accuse man of hypocrisie in his service and of some secret sinne which lying hid hinders his encreasing as Iron in a wound hinders the curing of it Or safer it is to apprehend here the wisedome of God who dealing like a wise Physitian and seeing a full dyet hinders the health of his Patient he for the time forbids him many things as possessed with a fever forbids him strong wines and drinkes and hard meates of digestion and such like So God Or were it not safer and the best course to impute it to his particular profession that it is not so gainefull or his want of skill he cannot make it or his want of providence in disposing of businesse or to imagine the truth that the prosperous estate of Gods stands not so much in riches as in graces not so much in that they must leave behinde them as that they must carry with them as the wealth of pilgrimes and strangers standeth more in their Jewells and gold things light of carriage and well portable then in house and land Vse 3 To instruct men who do professe the feare and service of God to walke carefully and prudently in their callings that they may increase in an outward estate to prevent the blasphemies and slanders of the wicked who will sooner blaspheme God for their poverty then glorifie him for their piety which exhortation is necessary for some who thinke it enough to professe and excuse their poverty by the condition of Gods Saints when the neglected lawfull meanes by which they might have encreased and beene able to give rather then receive which is a more blessed thing and whereby they might have more honoured God and therein the more culpable that they make this a cover of their idlenesse and happily injustice for which God curseth them adding this sinne to the other that they dishonour God But if any man shall upon this or the like pretence neglect the best things the onely thing necessary and growing in spirituall graces when God and his owne heart can tell him it is but upon a covetous and ambitious humour that man shall beare his iniquity But if for conscience as to be able to discharge the necessity of nature person or place so the rather to glorifie God and to stop the mouthes of such as would reproach their profession he first seeking Gods Kingdome shall have these things cast to him here and so in all things he seeking the glory of God in the kingdome of grace shall find glory and happinesse in the kingdome of glory Doctr. 1 What profit is it that we have kept his commandments These wicked men doe chalenge unto themselves righteousnesse and obedience and upon that accuse God of injustice for their want and affliction whence we may observe That hypocrites and wicked men chalenge to themselves righteousnesse and obedience in the pride of their heart when they have no such thing verse 7. Wherein shall we returne Doctr. 2 It is the property of Hypocrites and wicked men when they are in Gods judgements in misery and affliction to justifie themselves as not having deserved any such thing to accuse God of injustice as an angry God that hath causlesly afflicted them So did these and those Isaiah 58.2.3 And Iehoram 2. Kings 3.13 And Elisha said unto the King of Israel What have I to do with thee Get thee to the Prophets of thy father and to the Prophets of thy mother And the King of Israel said unto him nay for the Lord hath called these three Kings to give them into the hand of Moab i. it is but your spleene against me to upbraide me with any such things because I favour them more then you but if it were a finne yet is not that the cause seeing these two Kings are in the like misery with me So far were they Jer. 44.17.18 from acknowledging their sinnes the cause of any misery either present or falling upon them that they thought it came because they had not gone forwards in them This is the cause why the Prophets when the people were in any judgement did still put them in minde of their sins and cleared the Lord and put the people often to accuse God if they could Mich.
table of the Lord is contemptible or as the Geneva Not to bee regarded As if it were no matter what brought and layd upon it The table of the Lord So hee calls The Altar because the sacrifice is as it were a feast to the Lord and for the Priests And so the Altar is expressely called Ezek. 41.22 The Altar was three Cubits and hee said unto mee This is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Table that is before the Lord And no doubt The Lords Table may also bee called an Altar in that harmelesse sense in which the fathers used it before Transubstantiation was hatched or thought of Ioh. Alsted Paratitla Theol. in verbo Propositionis mensa observes that the Greekes use both names but not or the same table They have two tables one upon which the Bread and Wine stands before the consecration which they call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the Table and another to which the elements are carried from thence where they are also consecrated and that they call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The holy Seate and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Altar But the fruitlesse Logomachy in this point which hath beene already hath beene but too much The table is put for the Altar a metaphor being like a Table the Lord being feasted at his Altar The Metaphor is cleare Esay 6 5.11 Yee are they that prepare a table for that troope 1 That make an Altar and sacrifice to good fortune as Mr. Selden interprets it in his learned booke De dis Syris Syntag. 1. cap. 1. pag. 4. Such is that of the Apostle when hee calleth the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Ara which wee have not a fit english word for but wee usually though unfitly call the Altar of Divells The Table of Devills 1 Cor. 10.21 Ye say The Table is contemptible The Lxx. here have the same word againe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But t is in the Hebr as ours have rendred it Contemptible Either 1. They saw the Sacrificing to be despised sleighted through such long dis-use by reason of the 70 yeares Captivity they had not recovered the fervour of former time to be so frequently before the Lord or 2. They look't scornefully on the meane building and ornaments of the Temple for it did not answer the glory of the former house So Tarnovius or 3. Because the Iewes were newly returned and were yet but poore and could not bring such rich oblations therefore the Priests grew cold and carelesse in attending on the altar or 4. Because they saw what was brought consumed with fire they thought any thing good enough for the fire good enough to be burnt The truth is The low and cheape opinion of Gods worship hath ever made a greater waste upon religion than an over-high and there is lesse danger though there be danger in superstition then in profanenesse Hence it was that the piety of ancient Christian times was so much in their reverent demeanour in Gods house though otherwise their devotion had much faeculentie and drosse ad mixt Among the many Canons to this purpose of other Churches and our owne every where obvious I cannot but here insert that every devout one which fell into my observation at the time of the collecting of these notes which Sir Hen. Spelman hath imparted to the world out of Bennet Colledge manuscript Non de bere ad ecclesiam c. We ordaine That men come not to the Church for any other cause then to praise God and to doe him service But Contendings a Pleadings and matters of arbitrement Tumults and Vaine talkings and all other like actions let them by no meanes be suffered in that holy place For there where Gods Name is called upon and Sacrifice offered unto God and where no doubt the Angels are frequent it is dangerous to doe or say any such thing as agrees not to that holy place For if the Lord cast those out of the Temple which bought or sold such victimes as were to be offered to himselfe â— how much more offended will he cast out them who pollute that place set apart for divine worship with vaine leasings mirthes and such like toâ—â—â— The place is Inter Capitula incertae editionis Cap. 10. In Concil Pam. brit pag. 591. Where you shall finde it both after the Latine and the Saxon Copy A devout Canon of that ancient but well nigh most corrupt age since Christ if it were made as Sr. H. Spelm. seemes to guesse by his placing it about An. Dom. 1050. And indeed all ages of the Church have beene tender in this point but ours But what a diseased mind is it to finde fault with the serving of God with comlinesse and honor and that it will not bee indured that wee should bee splendid at our owne tables and sordid at Gods as Bellarmin also complained even in that overdoting and superstitious Church Bellarm. in Gemitu Columbae of some prelats that they would provide rich wines for their owne tables and cared not what Tap-lash was served at Gods An instance that wee may easilyer complaine of then have remedied at least in our Country parish Churches This profanenesse is argued to be 1. against Gods Law 2. against the rule of common honesty and comelinesse vers 8. Verse 8 First against Gods law And if yee offer the blind for sacrifice or to sacrifice Is it not evill And if yee offer the lame and sicke is it not evill thus also the Lxx. and the Chald and Tremell reade it by an interrogation But Vatablus with the Tigurine on which hee noted as Cornel. a lap proem in min. proph pag. 6. affirmes which I have not seene but onely those notes of his which being taken from his mouth by Bertinus who succeeded him in his professor-ship at Paris were set out together with the Vulgar and Pagnin's version by Rob. Stephens An 1556. which I note here onely by the way and once for all and Pagn and Montan the French the English of Geneva and Iohn Tarnov who here and usually followes Luther they reade it affirmatively When ye offer the blind c. It is not evill The autorised Engl. before our last and Piscat supply it when yee offer the blind yee say it is not evill That is It is well enough though it be blind or lame It is not evill in your opinion who rather then you would lose any gaine say Melius est Il quam nil It is Lucas Osianders rime upon this place not mine better that which is ill and bad then nothing at all But the sense is much clearer in the interrogative Is it not evill That is It is evill And so it is the first argument against their profanenesse See the particulars explicated in the commentary The second is that it is Secondly Against the rule of coÌ„mon honesty and comlines Offer it now unto thy governor or as the Geneva to thy Prince will hee bee pleased with it or as the Genev.
Creed and the Sacraments in the English tongue Can. 10. see S. H. Spelmans margin ad locum this Canon is inserted afterward by Egbert into his Excerp 6. See also the Ecclesiasticall lawes of Canutus cap. 22. apud Spelman page 549. an excellent and serious exhortation to this purpose but too long here to transcribe And the Canon 23. of Aelfric pag. 578. Yea it seemes by the Capitula incertae editionis which by Sr. H. Spelmans placeing of them should bee about Anno. 1050 cap. 28. to have beene the custome of our Bishops here when they met in their Synods with their Clergy to examine them in the manner of their teaching and how they profited their people After these times Catechising was not much heard of till after Luthers preaching when perceiving that the Protestant Churches wanne much ground by this kinde of diligence the practise was renued by a decree of the Councell of Trent in the Romish Church For our part what ground we got by Catechising wee are most likely to keepe and hold it by the same course and to lose it all againe by the neglect which was the observation of our judicious King Iames That the cause why so many fell to popery and other errors was their ungroundednesse in points of Catechisme Upon such a reason as this it was that an elder Article of a former Synod was renewed in the Synod at Dort That all pastors should Catechise in the afternoone on the Lords day Acta Synodi sess 14 15. The very same with his Majesties Injunctions to the Clergy of England and which is provided for by Canon and enquired into by the Articles of Visitations but on all hands too too much neglected which hath given mee occasion to transgresse my purpose in these shorter notes and to enlarge this discourse which yet I cannot leave till I have noted that observeable passage of the present Reverend Bishop of Exeter in his Preface to his Old Religion That there is nothing whereof hee repents so much as that hee had not bestowed more houres in publique Catechising And That in regard hereof hee could quarrell his very sermons And his sermons are excellent ones as all know that know them to two of them namely his Columba Noae preached to the English Clergy in their Convocation here in England and to another upon Eccles 7.16 preached to the Divines at Dort at their 16th Session I refer the Reader where hee shall finde an eloquent and zealous exhortation in this matter But of this point enough I returne to the Text. And they should seeke the law at his mouth Here the Vulg. reades as before as if it were a promise of their infallibility But it is onely an intimation of the peoples duty and the reason followes For hee is the messenger of the Lord of hosts 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Lxx and the Vulg. reade The Angell The Priest is called so 1. Because hee ministers to God as the Angels doe before him who stand before him and prayse him but 2. specially and here bccause hee is Gods messenger to men from God and from men to God Accordingly the Tigurine here Hee is Gods Legat or Embassadour And that learned Knight in his Glossary or Archaeolog hath observed to us out of Ekkehard that the name hath been given even to the Embassadors of Kings Cedamus Angelo Imperii We have seen how the former Priests caried themselves The next is Verse 8 III. The degenerating of these Priests from the practise of their fathers in regard of their covenant verse 8. In three particulars First that they were gone from their piety But yee are departed out of the way or out of that way as the Article is in the Hebr. that is either out of my way or out of that way in which your fathers walked You have diverted or turned out or as the Lxx 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Declined Your course is opposite to that of your fathers They caused many to returne to me you are returned and gon from me But this opposition is more direct in the next member Secondly that they caused many to fall by their example partly and partly by their corrupt glosses Yee have caused many to stumble at the law Or To fall in the law The Geneva reades it By the law The Vulg. Yee have scandalized many Montanus Yee were a stumbling block or an offence Others yee have caused that men should stumble at the law or goe against the law and so fall into sinne and consequently into calamities So Piscator Lxx. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Yee have weakned many in the law yee have offended snared caused to strike or dash or stumble for all these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 will beare Thirdly that they had in summe broken the covenant Yee have corrupted the covenant of Levi saith the Lord of hosts Geneva yee have broken Vulg. yee have made void The Lxx reade as we doe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 corrupted The Covenant of Levi that is the covenant made with Levi. A metonymy of the efficient Thus we have seene the threatnings more largely Verse 9 II. Those threatnings are repeated more briefely again together with the justnesse of them shewed also in the repetition of the causes verse 9. where we have 1. The judgements Therefore have I also made you contemptible and base before all the people the Geneva to bee despised and vile To be abject and humble not in affection but condition 2. The causes According as yee have not kept my wayes but have been partiall in the law According 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For in this place 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is not OS the mouth as Pagnin and Tremell c. render it Secundum Os c. but an expletive particle which useth to be added to the servile letters ﬥ and ב to make them distinct words as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is here and elsewhere as Num. 6.21 Iob. 33.6.30.18 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Exod. 16.18 Genes 47.12 and then they signifie as not onely our translators in all those places and here but the Lxx also have exprest it by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Propterea quod Because that or according as Yee have not kept my wayes or watched my wayes or beene as it is in the text 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 watchfull or watching to keepe my way For so the word is Esa 62.6 But have been partiall in the law Or lifted up the face against the law Or Accepted faces in the law The first of these is the text reading of our English Bibles the two later are in the margin To the last of these agree the Lxx Vulg and Pagnin and Deodates Italian yee have regard to the qualitie of the person in the law To the second Montanus Most agree in the sense you Priests that should judge according to the law you accept persons you respect the rich you deale partially in the law in expounding of
Because the Lord hath beene witnesse betweene thee and thy wife Hee alludes to the use of contracting Deo teste God being called to witnesse and his name being called upon in the action And he as it were protested then the word is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that is as Mont. of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Protestatus or Obtestatus est that his mind and will was that marriage should bee insoluble to you two and you two should remaine solely to each other This sense S. Hierom gives and those that usually follow him Theod. Remig. Lyr. Hugo but most clearly Ribera The wife of thy youth Hebr. of thy youthes Thy young wife so Piscator Or thy wife whom thou didst marry when thou were young In whom thy first love did rejoyce 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is that whole age of Adolescence or youth from infancy till the 25th yeare The wife The Lxx every where 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The woman We render it here Wife and that rightly for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A woman when a Genitive followes is written 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as it is here and presently after and then it constantly signifies a Woman a Wife and it is so written once Psalme 58.9 though not in construction Against whom thou hast dealt treacherously The Geneva transgressed The Chald. Lyed Montan. Praevaricated dealt cunningly and falsely The Lxx 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 leavest or forsakest that is treacherously for another Yet is shee thy companion Vulg. Thy partner Pagn Thy fellow The Tigur thy consort the name as Menochius observes by which the Italians doe call their wives So Eve was made for Adam that he might not be alone Gene. 2.18 The Lxx 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here used by them in the Faeminine shee partakes with thee in common And the Wife of thy Covenant The Wife with whom thou didst Covenant 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as before And did not hee make one 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Here is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The note of interrogation is wanting which is usuall in Scripture 2 Sam. 13.26 2 King 5.26 Iob. 2.10 As 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 usually also in the new Testament Matthew 6.26 and 17.24 Marke 6.3 and 11.17 1 Cor. 9.8 9. 2 Thes 2.5 So also the Latines speake as Virgil Eclog. 3. Non ego te Vidi Damonis pessime Caprum Excipere insidiis Non for Nonne But besides the various interpretation of this hath made the place very obscure The Vulg. Did not one thus Pagnin boldly inserted Abraham here Did not one Abraham thus as you doe Montan. in his correction of Pagnin leaves out Abraham yet seemes to understand it in the same manner so doth Vatablus Hence many stumbling at this stone interpreted it as a prevention of an objection that they might make for their owne excuse that they did but as Abraham did who had Sarah to his wife yet hee tooke Hagar also But Abraham did it having an excellent spirit and knowing what hee did expecting the promise of God concerning a blessed seed and not knowing that hee should receive him of Sarah therefore tooke Hagar that the promise might not bee voide and he tooke Hagar with Sarah's consent Hee had no children by Sarah as you have he despised not Sarah as yee doe so that his fact and yours are much unlike The Chalde paraphrase seemes to have layd this stone and led to this exposition and most of them that use the Vulg. follow it and among the protestants Winkleman and Osiander Lutherans But S. Hierom found out a righter and Theodoret Lyra Remigius and of moderns Junius Tarnovius The Italian of Deodate both in the text and margin the Geneva our old and our last English doe entertaine it Did not he that is God make one God made one Eve for Adam and therefore the first sanction of unity in marriage is not to bee infringed This sense also Menochius gives though the translation that he is tyed unto will not yield it Yet had he the residue of the spirit or The excellence so our margin But I am not satisfied why our most learned translators have put it in for I find not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in that signification Yet I will not conceale that the Tigurine Vatabl. and Pagn so translate it and not only A lapide but Conrad Kircher in his greeke Concordance who in the Rootes usually followes Forster but in this Sanct. Pagn at the Roote 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 tells us that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies both Remainder or Residue and excellencie However the text reading of our last translation is here as for ought I know every where else to be preferd before the marginall And the meaning is God made but one Woman for Adam though hee had the Remainder of the spirit or breath so that hee could have made many Hee gave part to Adam and the rest to Eve and made no more in that extraordinary way though it had bin easy unto him as our old English and the Geneva expresse it Hee had aboundance of spirit That is that spirit or breath which hee breathed into Man And wherefore one 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That hee might seeke a godly seed or A seed of God That is God requires you should cleave to your Wives and not take the daughters of a strange God lest your seed bee educated in Idolatry So S. Hierom. But I suppose there is more in it The very issue of Polygamy is spurious in some sense It is not a godly seed or the seed of God that is which he appoints but accursed Thus every member of these two verses have afforded severall arguments against Polygamie But all this is to bee understood to bee against Simultaneous Polygamy but not Successive against the having two wives at once not against Second marriages though troopes of the ancients as Mr. Gataker speakes in his Treat of Lots cap. 8. sect 18. have condemned them yet as he saith what Divine or other doth now make doubt of them Not Protestants See instead of all that Sermon which upon this verse the late Reverend and godly Bishop of Bath and Wells D. Lake preached and applyed at the pennance of a man that had two Wives together to which Sermon I refer the Reader for more upon this 15th verse Nor Papists See Gregor Tholosanus Syntag. Iuris lib. 9. cap. 29. Guil. Cantarell Var. Quaest in Decal lib. 1. cap. 98. Num. 4.26 427. And if you will that great pretender to devotion Nic. Caussin the French Jesuite in his Holy Court pt 1. lib. 3. sect 37. Though hee discourse a long while upon this argument like a Montanist as indeed all the Church of Rome have a little tang of Montanisme in that 1. They deny a blessing in the Church to second
marriages See Canones Aelfrici can 9. apud Spelman Cone p. 574. but whether it bee agreeable to the Canon of Concil Neocaesar quoted by Gratian. caus 31. qu. 1. De his qui frequenter let the Reader compare the places with the glosse at the letters m and o and judge and 2. That they put Bigamie even successive Bigamie among Irregularities as it to be seene in their Casuists and Canonists See excerptiones Egberti ad An. Dom. 750. excerp 32. and 89. apud D. H. Spelm. in Conc. Pambrit p. 261. The reason such as it is we have in Pet. Damian a devout Author in a most corrupt time lib. cui titulus Dominus Nobiscum cap. 12. apud Ioh. Cochlaei Speculum p. 156. who yet speakes of it with a Quis non miretur that Bigamy successive Bigamie he speaks of allowed by the ancient Ecclesiasticall Canons should bee a greater Irregularitie and sinne then Fornication expressely condemned in holy writ But of this also enough being only obiter And thus much of the reproofe of the sin we have next 2. A dehortation from this sin in the latter part of the 15. verse and vers 16. which is 1. Propounded 2. Repeated First the dehortation is propounded verse 15. Therefore take heed unto your spirit and lot none deale treacherously against the Wife of his youth Verse 16 Vers 16. For the Lord the God of Israel saith That hee hates putting away for one covereth violence with his garment sayth the Lord of hosts Take heede to your spirits The Geneva keepe your selves in your spirit Remigius and Lyra keepe your spirit your Wife is the residue of your spirit keepe and cherish her The Tigurine keepe and preserve and tender your Wives as dearely as you doe your owne soules Corn. a lap Take heede to your breath your breath on one another breath not on a stranger keep thy self solely to thy Wife Conceited interpretations Arias Montanus came nearer the sense Be wary and not rash I like best that of our Commentary Be sober and containe your selves keep a watch upon your spirits and affections to content your selves with your lawfull Wives And let none deale treacherously Or unfaithfully That is In taking other Wives and when you are convinced of the sinfulnesse of keeping two Wives deale not treacherously to put away your old pretending law for divorces and that you may safely doe it for the Lord hates this treachery in making needlesse divorces and thereby cloaking your sin And this I take to be the meaning of these and the next words For the Lord the God of Israel saith That hee hates putting away for one covereth violence with his garment saith the Lord Deale not treacherously with your Wives after your vexing them by taking other Wives unto them then to put them away and pretend that the law allowes you to give them Bills of divorce for this is but the covering of your violence and injury with that garment or cloake but the Lord is so farre from allowing divorces in such cases that he hates them The Lord hateth putting away Or To put away The younger Tarnovius gives here the same sense with us The Lord hates your 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Dimitte the imperative in Piel you have Dimitte Dimitte much in your mouthes Put her away Put her away but the Lord hates your Dimitte So it is an ironicall repetition of their owne usuall word which the Lord rejects with indignation Or else he takes it for the Infinitive in Piel put for a Noune Hee hates to put away that is putting away And so is our text-reading Our margin indeed is If he hate her put her away Pagnin otherwise If shee that is thy Wife hate thee that is be perverse Put her away The Geneva and our old English If thou hatest her put her away And so doth Zanchy reade it in that discourse of divorces which he wrote upon occasion of Andreas Pizzardus his divorce as indeed agreeing best with the matter hee undertooke to defend And so reade The Vulg. Vatabl and among others Michael Walther a Lutheran in his Harmonia Scripturae lib. 2. sect 185. Followes this reading of the Vulg. and therefore takes a needlesse paines in reconciling this place to that of Christ Mat. 19.11 for reading it aright according to our last and approved translation there is no 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 at all between them And Montanus tells us that Rab. Hananus a Jewish interpreter interprets it also as we doe God hates him who puts away his wife For one covereth violence with his garments The Vulg. Latine But iniquitie will cover his garment Corn. a Lap. who is bound to follow it labours much to make good sense of it First he tells us we must take His for Thine Put her away but iniquity will or shall cover thy garment But how is that meant 1. Iniquity that is the punishment of thy iniquity shall cover thy garment that is shall be upon thy body in regard of diseases c. 2. Upon thy garment that is thou shalt be punished in thy cloathing naked ragged c. 3. punishment shall be upon thee the garment taken for the man Thou shalt be openly punished Thus he from others for the Vulg. of which translation Steph. Menochius a latter Iesuite gives another sense The Iewes excuse themselves Why doe you reprehend us seeing the law permits us to put away our Wives If thou hate her put her away But which he makes the Prophets answer your iniquity shall thereby so abound and swell that no garment will be able to cover it The Law permitting it onely for the hardnesse of your hearts but not freeing you from sinne if rashly and without cause you put them away A better sense then that of A lapide but for which he is faine to take his farewell of the authorized Vulgar translation If thou put her away give her some part of thy garments to cover her something to live on So Luther occasionally expounds it which sense Osiander followes give her a good dowry that if she be put away shee may marry another Let him put her away for while hee keepes her he covers his injury and makes as if he loved her so the Geneva and Winkleman Much like to the Chalde paraphrase Put her away and cover not thy hatred with a pretense that thou lovest her and keepest her and makest her a drudge Vatablus is singular as if their fault were that they put away their Wives and covered their iniquity under a garment that is discovered not their fault as the Law required they should and so wanting a formall bill of divorce they were made uncapable of a second marriage and so they added to the injury Some take it for an Ironie Put her away doe so but thy sinne shall overtake thee All these mistake the sense I rest in that above The Lord hates needlesse divorces and the more when the Law is pretended for one that is the man