himself called not to deliberate but act without casting of scruples or fore-casting of dangers or expecting Commission from men when he had his warrant sealed within he taketh his weapon dispatching his errand and leaveth the event to the providence of God Let no man now unless he be able to demonstrate Phinees spirit presume to imitate his fact Those Opera liberi spiritus as Divines call them as they proceed from an extraordinary spirit so they were done for special purposes but were never intended either by God that inspired them or by those Worthies that did them for ordinary or general examples The error is dangerous from the privileged examples of some few exempted ones to take liberty to transgress the common rules of Life and of Laws It is most true indeed the Spirit of God is a free spirit and not tyed to strictness of rule nor limited by any bounds of Laws But yet that free spirit hath astricted thee to a regular course of life and bounded thee with Laws which if thou shalt trangress no pretension of the Spirit can either excuse thee from sin or exempt thee from punishment It is not now every way as it was before the coming of Christ and the sealing up of the Scripture Canon God having now settled a perpetual form of government in his Church and given us a perfect and constant rule whereby to walk even his holy word And we are not therefore now vainly to expect nor boastingly to pretend a private spirit to lead us against or beyond or but beside the common rule nay we are commanded to try all pretensions of private spirits by that common rule Adlegem ad testimonium To the Law and to the Testimony at this Test examine and Try the spirits whether they are of God or no. If any thing within us if any thing without us exalt it self against the obedience of this Rule it is no sweet impulsion of the holy Spirit of God but a strong delusion of the lying spirit of Satan But is not all that is written written for our Example or why else is Phinees act recorded and commended if it may not be followed First indeed Saint Paul saith All that is written is written for our learning but Learning is one thing and Example is another and we may learn something from that which we may not follow Besides there are examples for Admonition as well as for Imitation Malefactors at the place of execution when they wish the by-standers to take example by them bequeath them not the Imitation of their courses what to do but Admonition from their punishments what to shun yea thirdly even the commended actions of good men are not ever exemplary in the very substance of the action it self but in some vertuous and gracious affections that give life and lustre thereunto And so this act of Phinees is imitable Not that either any private man should dare by his example to usurp the Magistrates office and to do justice upon Malefactors without a Calling or that any Magistrate should dare by his Example to cut off graceless offenders without a due judicial course but that every man who is by virtue of his Calling endued with lawful authority to execute justice upon transgressors should set himself to it with that stoutness and courage and zeal which was in Phinees If you will needs then imitate Phinees imitate him in that for which he is commended and rewarded by God and for which he is renowned amongst men and that is not barely the action the thing done but the affection the zeal wherewith it was done For that zeal God commendeth him Numb 25. vers 11. Phinees the son of Eleazer the son of Aaron the Priest hath turned away my wrath from the children of Israel whilst he was zealous for my sake among them And for that zeal God rewardeth him Ibid. 13. He shall have and his seed after him the Covenant of an everlasting Pristhood because he was zealous for his God And for that zeal did Posterity praise him the wise son of Syrac Eccl. 45. and good old Matthias upon his death bed 1 Macc. 2. And may not this phrase of speech he stood up and executed judgment very well imply that forwardness and heat of zeal To my seeming it may For whereas Moses and all the congregation sate weeping a gesture often accompanying sorrow or perhaps yet more to express their sorrow lay grovelling upon the earth mourning and sorrowing for their sin and for the Plague it could not be but the bold lewdness of Zimri in bringing his strumpet with such impudence before their noses must needs add much to the grief and bring fresh vexation to the souls of all that were righteous among them But the rest continued though with double grief yet in the same course of humiliation and in the same posture of body as before Only Phinees burning with an holy indignation thought it was now no time to sit still and weep but rowzing up himself and his spirits with zeal as hot as fire he stood up from the place where he was and made haste to execute judgment Here is a rich example for all you to imitate whom it doth concern I speak not only nor indeed so much to you the Honourable and Reverend Iudge of this Circuit of whose zeal to do justice and judgment I am by so much the better perswaded by how much the eminency of your place and the weight of your charge and the expectation of the people doth with greater importunity exact it at your hands But I speak withal and most especially to all you that are in Commission of the peace and whose daily and continual care it should be to see the wholsome laws of the Realm duly and seasonably executed Yea and to all you also that have any office appertaining to justice or any business about these Courts so as it may lie in you to give any kind of furtherance to the speeding either of Iustice in Civil or of judgment in Criminal causes Look upon the zeal of Phinees observe what approbation it had from God what a blessing it procured to his seed after him what glorious renown it hath won him with all after-ages what ease it did and what good it wrought for the present State and think if it be not worthy your imitation It is good saith the Apostle to be zealously affected always in a good thing And is it not a good thing to do justice and to execute judgment nay Religion excepted and then care of that is a branch of justice too do you know any better thing any thing you can do more acceptable to God more serviceable to the State more comfortable to your own souls If you be called to the Magistracy it is your own business as the proper work of your Calling and men
have offered the exposal of his Daughters to the Iusts of the beastly Sodomites though it were to redeem his guests from the abuse of â—ouler and more abominable filthiness Absolutely there cannot be a Case imagined wherein it should be impossible to avoid one sin unless by the committing of another The Case which of all other cometh nearest to a Perplexity is that of an erroneous Conscience Because of a double bond the bond of God's Law which to transgress is a sin and the bond of particular Conscience which also to transgress is a sin Whereupon there seemeth to follow an inevitable necessity of sinning when God's Law requireth one thing and particular conscience dictateth the flat contrary for in such a case a man must either obey God's Law and so sin against his own conscience or obey his own conscience and so sin against God's Law But neither in this case is there any perplexity at all in the things themselves that which there is is through the default of the man only whose judgment being erroneous mis-leadeth his conscience and so casteth him upon a necessity of sinning But yet the necessity is no simple and absolute and unavoidable and perpetual necessity for it is only a necessity ex hypothesi and for a time and continueth but stante tali errore And still there is a way out betwixt those sins and that without a third and that way is deponere erroneam conscientiam He must rectifie his judgment and reform the error of his Conscience and then all is well There is no perplexity no necessity no obligation no expediency which should either enforce or perswade us to any sin The resolution is damnable Let us do evil that good may come I must take leave before I pass from this point to make two Instances and to measure out from the Rule of my Text an answer to them both They are such as I would desire you of this place to take due and special consideration of I desire to deal plainly and I hope it shall be by God's blessing upon it effectually for your good and the Churches peace One instance shall be in a sin of Commission and the other in a sin of Omission The sin of Commission wherein I would instance is indeed a sin beyond Commission it is the usurping of the Magistrates Office without a Commission The Question is Whether the zealous intention of a good end may not warrant it good or at least excuse it from being evil and a sin I need not frame a Case for the illustration of this instance the inconsiderate forwardness of some hath made it to my hand You may read it in the disfigured windows and walls of this Church Pictures and Statua's and Images and for their sakes the windows and walls wherein they stood have been heretofore and of late pulled down and broken in pieces and defaced without the Command or so much as leave of those who have power to reform things amiss in that kind Charity bindeth us to think the best of those that have done it that is they did it out of a forward though misgoverned zeal intending therein Gods glory in the farther suppression of Idolatry by taking away these as they supposed likely occasions of it Now in such a case as this the question is Whether the intention of such an end can justifie such a deed And the fact of Phineas Numb 25. who for a much like end for the staying of the people from Idolatry executed vengeance upon Zimri and Cosbi being but a private man and no Magistrate seemeth to make for it But my Text ruleth it otherwise If it be evil it is not to be done no not for the preventing of Idolatry I pass by some considerations otherwise of good moment as namely first whether Statua's and Pictures may not be permitted in Christian Churches for the adorning of God's House and for civil and historical uses not only lawfully and decently but even profitably I must confess I never heard substantial reason given why they might not at the least so long as there is no apparent danger of superstition And secondly whether things either in their first erection or by succeeding abuse superstitious may not be profitably continued if the Superstition be abolished Otherwise not Pictures only and Crosses and Images but most of our Hospitals and Schools and Colleges and Churches too must down and so the hatred of Idolatry should but usher in licentious Sacrilege contrary to that passage of our Apostle in the next Chapter before this Thou that abhorrest Idols committest thou Sacrilege And thirdly whether these forward ones have not bewrayed somewhat their own self-guiltiness in this act at least for the manner of it in doing it secretly and in the dark A man should not dare to do that which he would not willingly either be seen when it is doing or own being done To pass by these consider no more but this one thing only into what dangerous and unsufferable absurdities a man might run if he should but follow these mens grounds Erranti nullus terminus Error knoweth no stay and a false Principle once received multiplieth into a thousand absurd conclusions It is good for men to go upon sure grounds else they may run and wander in insinitum A little error at the first if there be way given to it will increase beyond belief As a small spark may fire a large City and a cloud no bigger than a mans hand in short space overspread the face of the whole Heavens For grant for the suppression of Idolatry in case the Magistrate will not do his office that it is lawful for a private man to take upon him to reform what he thinketh amiss and to do the part and office of a Magistrate which must needs have been their ground if they had any for this action there can be no sufficient cause given why by the same reason and upon the same grounds a private man may not take upon him to establish Laws raise Powers administer Iustice execute Malefactors or do any other thing the Magistrate should do in case the Magistrate slack to do his duty in any of the premises Which if it were once granted as granted it must be if these mens fact be justifiable every wise man seeth the end could be no other but vast Anarchy and confusion both in Church and Commonwealth whereupon must unavoidably follow the speedy subversion both of Religion and State If things be amiss and the Magistrate help it not private men may lament it and as occasion serveth and their condition and calling permitteth soberly and discreetly put the Magistrate in mind of it But they not make themselves Magistrates to reform it And as to the act of Phinehas though I rather think he did yet what if he did not well in so doing It is a thing we are not certain of and we must
blood by Man shall his blood be shed And that Iudges should be very shy and tender how they grant Pardons or Reprievals in that case he established it afterwards among his own people by a most severe sanction Num. 35. Ye shall take no satisfaction for the life of a Murderer which is guilty of death but he shall surely be put to death And there is a reason of it there given also For blood saith he defileth the land and the land cannot be cleansed from the blood that is shed therein but by he blood of him that shed it Read that passage with attention and if both forehead and conscience be not harder than the neither milstone thou canst not have either the heart or the face to glory in it as a brave exploit whoever thou art that hast been the instrument to save the life of a Murderer 20. Indeed all offences are not of that hanious nature that Murder is nor do they cry so loud for vengeance as Murder doth And therefore to procure undeserved favour for a smaller offender is not so great a sin as to do it for a Murderer But yet so far as the proportion holdeth it is a sin still Especially where favour cannot be shewn to one Man but to the wrong and grievance of some other as it hapneth usually in those judicial controversies that are betwixt party and party for trial of right Or where favour cannot be shewn to an offender but with wrong and grievance to the publick as it most times falleth out in criminal causes wherein the King and Commonwealth are parties Solomon hath taught us that as well he that justifieth the wicked as he that condemneth the just are an abomination to the Lord. Yea and that for any thing that appeareth to the contrary from the Text and in thesi for circumstances may make a difference either way in hypothesi they are both equally abominable In doubtful cases it is doubtlesly better and safer to encline to Mercy than to Severity Better ten offenders should escape than one innocent person suffer But that is to be conceived only when things are doubtful so as the truth cannot be made appear but where things are notorious and evident there to justifie the guilty and to condemn the innocent are still equal abominations 21. That which you are to do then in the behalf of the poor is this First to be rightly informed and so far as morally you can well assured that their cause be just For mean and poor people are nothing less but ordinarily much more unreasonable than the great ones are and if they find the ear of the Magistrate open to hear their grievances as is very meet it should be they will be often clamorous and importunate without either cause or measure And if the Magistrate be not very wary and wise in receiving informations the Country swain may chance prove too cunning for him and make him but a stale whereby for himself to get the start of his Adversary and so the Magistrate may in fine and unwares become the instrument of oppression even then when his intention was to vindicate another from it The Truth of the matter therefore is to be first throughly sifted out the circumstances duly weighed and as well as the legal the equitable right examined and compared and this to be done with all requisite diligence and prudence before you engage in the poor Man's behalf 22. But if when this is done you then find that there is much right and equity on his side and that yet for want of skill or friends or means to manage his affairs he is in danger to be foiled in his righteous cause Or if you find that his Adversary hath a legal advantage of him or that he hath de rigore incurred the penalty of some dis-used statute yet did not offend wilfully out of the neglect of his known duty or a greedy covetous mind or other sinister and evil intention but meerly out of his ignorance and inexperience and in the simplicity of his heart as those two hundred Israelites that followed after Absalom when he called them not knowing any thing of his conspiracy had done an act of treason yet were not formally traitors In either of these cases I say you may not forsake the poor Man or despise him because he is poor or simple But you ought so much the rather to stick by him and to stand his friend to the utmost of your power You ought to give him your counsel and your countenance to speak for him and write for him and ride for him and do for him to procure him right against his Adversary in the former case and in the latter case favour from the Iudge In either case to hold back your hand to draw back your help from him if it be in the power of your hand to do him any help is that sin for which in the judgment of Solomon in the Text the Lord will admit no excuse 23. Come we now in the last place to some reasons or motives taken from the effects of the duty it self If carefully and conscionably performed it will gain honour and estimation both to our persons and places purchase for us the prayers and blessings of the poor yea and bring down a blessing from God not upon us and ours only but upon the State and Commonwealth also But where the duty is neglected the effects are quite contrary First do you know any other thing that will bring a Man more glory and renown in the common opinion of the World than to shew forth at once both justice and mercy by doing good and protecting the Innocent Let not mercy and truth forsake thee bind them about thy neck write them upon the table of thine heart so shalt thou find favour and good understanding or acceptance in the sight of God and Man Prov. 3. As a rich sparkling Diamond addeth both value and lustre to a golden Ring so do these vertues of justice and mercy well attempered bring a rich addition of glory to the Crowns of the greatest Monarchs Hoc reges habent magnificum ingens Prodesse miseris supplices fido lare Protegere c. Every Man is bound by the Law of God and of Charity as to give to every other Man his due honour so to preserve the honour that belongeth to his own person and place for Charity in performing the duties of every Commandment beginneth at home Now here is a fair and honest and sure way for all you that are in place of authority and judicature or sustain the persons of Magistrates to hold up the reputation both of your Persons and Places and to preserve them from scorn and contempt Execute judgment and justice with wisdom and diligence take knowledge of the vexations of those that are brought into the Courts or otherwise troubled without cause be sensible of the groans and pressures of poor Men in the
be their End to make themselves great and rich howsoever are not much moved with arguments of this nature The evidence of God's Law and conscience of their own duty work little upon them Gain is the thing they look after as for Equity they little regard it Let me tell them then that unjust gain is not gain but loss Nor is this a Paradox when a mere heathen Man could say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and another Lucrum puta lucrum si justum fiet St. Paul placeth gain in godliness not in wealth and our Saviour teacheth that he that should gain the whole world if he should for that lose his own soul should have little cause to boast of his peniworth Lucrum in arca damnum inconscientia the gain will no ways countervail the loss All this is most certain truth but still we hit not upon the right string The Worldling hath his portion in this present life and in these outward things and therefore what losses befal him therein he can feel as soon as another Man and value them as well But he is not much sensible either of a spiritual or an eternal loss To come home to him then let him know that the gain of unrighteousness shall not long prosper with him and his Treasures of wickedness profit little saith Solomon Prov. 10. His meaning is take them à primo ad ultimum and they profit nothing A Man may seem to profit by them and to come up wonderfully for a time but time and experience thew that they moulder away again at the last and crumble to nothing and that for the most part within the compass of an age Seldom shall you see them hold so long but very rarely beyond the next Generation An inheritance may be gotten hastily at the beginning but the end thereof shall not be blessed the same Solomon Prov. 20. The morsels of deceit and violence that were so pleasant in the chewing the time will come when they shall be vomited up again with sorrow and bitterness What gained Ahab by it when he had made himself Master of Naboth's Vineyard but the hastning of his own destruction And what was Gehazi the better for the gifts he received from Naaman which brought an hereditary Leprosie with them And what was Achan the richer for the golden Wedg he had saved out of the spoils and hidden in his Tent which brought destruction upon him and all that appertained to him 24. Brethren let us be wise and wary and not deceive our selves These gobbets are but Saâ—ans baits which when we swallow we swallow a hook with them wherewith he will strike us through at the last though he suffer us a while to play upon the line and to please our selves with those new morsels Let us therefore beware that we suffer not the least portion of unjust gain to cleave to our fingers or to mingle with our other substance There is a secret poison in it which in time will diffuse it self through the whole heap and seize upon every part and like Mercury-water or Aqua-fortis eat out all as some write of the Ostriches feather that it will in time moult and consume all the feathers in the tub wherein it is put Know you not that a small handful of leaven if it be hidden in a great trough full of meal will work it self into every part of it sowre the whole lump And that a single rood of Capite-land will bring the whole estate into wardship though containing many thousand Acres of never so free a Tenure It was wisely done therefore of Samuel as well as justly not to meddle with the taking of any Man's Ox or Ass. 25. It ought to be the care of every private Man thus far to follow Samuel's example that he keep himself from doing any Man wrong But Men that are in place of Government as Samuel was have yet a further charge lying upon them over and besides the former and that is to preserve others from wrong and being wronged to releive them to the utmost of their power A Magistrate should be so far from taking any Man's Ox or Ass from him that so far as he can hinder it he should not suffer any other Man so to do Where Commutative Iustice is by private persons violated through fraud oppression or bribery there it behoveth the Magistrate to set in and do his part in the administration of Distributive Iustice for the rectifying and redressing thereof It is the very end for which principally Laws and Courts and Magistrates were ordained 26. The more have they to answer for that abuse any part of this so sacred an Ordinance for the abetting countenancing or strengthning of any injurious act They that have skill in the Laws by giving dangerous counsel in the Chamber or pleading smoothly at the Bar. They that attend about the Courts by keeping back just complaints or doing other casts of their office in favour of an evil person or cause but especially the Magistrates themselves by a perfunctory or partial hearing by pressing the Laws with rigour or qualifying them with some mitigation where they ought not Where others do wrong if they know it and can help it their very connivance maketh them Accessaries and then the greatness and eminency of their places enhanceth the crime yet further and maketh them Principals Qui non prohibet peccare cum potest jubet He that suffereth another to take any Man's Ox or Ass from him or his house or land or common from him or his tithe or glebe from him or his liberty or good name from him or his life or any part of his livelihood from him being able to remedy it it is all one as if he should bid him do it Me nemo ministro Fur erit is a fit Motto for every good Magistrate 27. I have now done with the Genus the Species follow which I shall dispatch with more brevity The particulars are three Fraud Oppression and Bribery Whom have I defrauded whom have I oppressed Or of whose hand have I received a bribe to blind mine eyes therewith Most Injuries are reduced to the two first heads Fraus and Vis. Sometimes a Man is wronged and perceiveth it not till afterwards which if he had known in time he might have prevented this is Defrauding Sometimes he seeth and feeleth how and wherein he is wronged but knoweth not which way in the world to avoid it this is Oppression There he met with a Fox here with a Lion In that he is over-wrought by Craft in this over-born by Might Both are joyned together in the Psalm He shall redeem their soul from falshood and violence Psal. 72. And in the Prophet I will punish those that leap on the threshold which fill their Masters houses with violence and deceit Zeph. 1. and they are sometimes joyned together in practice As Pharaoh said consulting the destruction of the
〈◊〉 to believe and the Noun 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 faith or belief are both of them found sundry times in this Chapter yet seem not to signifie in any place thereof either the Verb the Act or the Noun the habit of this saving or justifying Faith of which we now speak But being opposed every where and namely in this last verse unto doubtfulness of judgment concerning the lawfulness of some indifferent things must therefore needs be understood of such a perswasion of judgment concerning such lawfulness as is opposite to such doubting Which kind of Faith may be found in a meer heathen man who never having heard the least syllable of the mystery of Salvation by Christ may yet be assured out of clear evidence of reason that many of the things he doth are such as he may and ought to do And as it may be found in a meer heathen man so it may be wanting in a true believer who stedfastly resting upon the blood of Christ for his eternal redemption may yet through the strength of temptation sway of passion or other distemper or subreption incident to humane frailty do some particular act or acts of the lawfulness whereof he is not sufficiently perswaded The Apostle then here speaking of such a Faith as may be both found in an unbeliever and also wanting in a true believer it appeareth that by Faith he meaneth not that justifying Faith which maketh a true believer to differ from an unbeleiver but the word must be understood in some other notion Yet thus much I may add withal in the behalf of those worthy men that have alledged this Scripture for the purpose aforesaid to excuse them from the imputation of having at least wilfully handled the Word of God deceitfully First that thing it self being true and the words also sounding so much that way might easily enduce them to conceive that to be the very meaning And common equity will not that men should be presently condemned if they should sometimes confirm a point from a place of Scripture not altogether pertinent if yet they think it to be so especially so long as the substance of what they write is according to the analogy of Faith and Godliness Secondly that albeit these words in their most proper and immediate sense will not necessarily enforce that Conclusion yet it may seem deducible there-from with the help of some topical arguments and by more remote inferences as some learned men have endeavoured to shew not altogether improbable And Thirdly that they who interpret this Text as aforesaid are neither singular nor novel therein but walk in the same path which some of the ancient Fathers have trod before them The Rhemists themselves confess it of S. Augustine to whom they might have added also S. Prosper and whose authority alone is enough to stop their mouths for ever Leo Bishop of Rome who have all cited these words for the self same purpose But we are content for the reasons already shewn to let it pass as a collection impertinent and that I suppose is the worst that can be made of it There is a second acception of the word Faith put either for the whole system of that truth which God hath been pleased to reveal to his Church in the Scriptures of the old and new Testament or some part thereof or else 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the assent of the mind thereunto In which signification some conceiving the words of this Text to be meant do hence infer a false and dangerous conclusion which yet they would obtrude upon the Christian Church as an undoubted principle of truth That men are bound for every particular action they do to have direction and warrant from the written word of God or else they sin in the doing of it For say they faith must be grounded upon the word of God Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God Rom. 10. Where there is no Word then there can be no Faith and then by the Apostles doctrine that which is done without the Word to warrant it must needs be sin for whatsoever is not of Faith is sin This is their opinion and thus they would infer it I know not any piece of counterfeit Doctrine that hath passed so currently in the world with so little suspicion of falshood and so little open contradiction as this hath done One chief cause whereof I conjecture to be for that it seemeth to make very much for the honour and perfection of Gods sacred Law the fulness and sufficiency whereof none in the Christian Church but Papists or Atheists will deny In which respect the very questioning of it now will perhaps seem a strange novelty to many and occasion their mis-censures But as God himself so the Holy Word of God is so full of all requisite perfection that it needeth not to beg honour from an untruth Will you speak wickedly for God Or talk deceitfully for him I hold it very needful therefoe both for the vindicating of my Text from a common abuse and for the arming of all my brethren as well of the Clergy as Laity against a common and plausible errour that neither they teach it nor these receive it briefly and clearly to shew that the aforesaid opinion in such sort as some have proposed it and many have understood it for it is capable of a good interpretation wherein it may be allowed First is utterly devoid of Truth and Secondly draweth after it many dangerous consequents and evil effects and thirdly hath no good warrant from my present Text. The Opinion is that to do any thing at all without direction from the Scripture is unlawful and sinful Which if they would understand only of the substantials of Gods worship and of the exercises of spiritual and supernatural graces the assertion were true and sound but as they extend it to all the actions of common life whatsoever whether natural or civil even so far as to the taking up of a straw so it is altogether false and indefensible I marvel what warrant they that so teach have from the Scripture for that very doctrine or where they are commanded so to believe or teach One of their chiefest refuges is the Text we now have in hand but I shall anon drive them from this shelter The other places usually alledged speak only either of Divine and Supernatural truths to be believed or else of works of grace or worship to be performed as of necessity unto Salvation which is not to the point in issue For it is freely confessed that in things of such nature the holy Scripture is and so we are to account it a most absolute and sufficient direction Upon which ground we heartily reject all humane Traditions devised and intended as supplements to the Doctrine of Faith contained in the Bible and annexed as Codicils to the Holy Testament of Christ for to supply the
it is not much better now nay God grant it be not generally even much worse Receive now in the last place and as the third and last inference a word of Exhortation and it shall be but a word You whom God hath called to any honour or office appertaining to justice as you tender the glory of God and the good of the Commonwealth as you tender the honour of the King and the prosperity of the Kingdom as you tender the peace and tranquillity of your selves and neighbours as you tender the comfort of your own consciences and the salvation of your own souls set your selves throughly and cheerfully and constantly and conscionably to discharge with faithfulness all those duties which belong unto you in your several stations and callings and to advance to the utmost of your power the due administration and execution of justice Do not decline those burdens which cleave to the honours you sustain Do not post off those businesses from your selves to others which you should rather do than they or at least may as well do as they Stand up with the zeal of Phinees and by executing judgment help to turn away those heavy plagues which God hath already begun to bring upon us and to prevent those yet heavier ones which having so rightly deserved we have all just cause to fear Breathe fresh life into the languishing laws by mature and severe and discreet execution Put on righteousness as a Garment and cloath your selves with Iudgment as with a Robe and Diadem Among so many Oppressions as in these evil days are done under the Sun to whom should the fatherless and the Widow and the wronged complain but to you whence seek for relief but from you Be not you wanting to their necessities Let your eyes be open unto their miseries and your ears open unto their cries and your hands open unto their wants Give friendly Counsel to those that stand need of your Direction afford convenient help to those that stand need of your assistance carry a Fatherly affection to all those that stand in need of any comfort protection or relief from you Be eyes to the Blind and feet to the lame and be you instead of Fathers to the poor But yet do not countenance no not a poor man in his cause farther than he hath equity on his side Remember one point of wisdom not to be too credulous of every suggestion and information But do your best to spie out the chinks and starting holes and secret conveyances and packings of cunning and crafty companions and when you have found them out bring them to light and do exemplary justice upon them Sell not your ears to your servants nor tie your selves to the informations of some one or a few or of him that cometh first but let every party have a fair and an equal hearing Examine proofs Consider circumstances be content to hear simple men tell their tales in such language as they have think no pains no patience too much to sift out the truth Neither by inconsiderate haste prejudice any mans right nor weary him out of it by torturing delays The cause which you know not use all diligence and covenient both care and speed to search it out But ever withal remember your standing is slippery and you shall have many and sore assaultâ— and very shrewd temptations so that unless you arm your selves with invincible resolution you are gone The wicked ones of this world will conjure you by your old friendship and acquaintance and by all the bonds of Neighbourhood and kindness bribe your Wives and Children and Servants to corrupt you procure great mens Letters or Favorites as engines to move you convey a bribe into your own bosoms but under a handsomer name and in some other shape so cunningly and secretly sometimes that your selves shall not know it to be a bribe when you receive it Harden your faces and strengthen your resolution with a holy obstinacy against these and all other like temptations Count him an enemy that will alledge friendship to pervert justice When you sit in the place of justice think you are not now Husbands or Parents or Neighbours but Iudges Contemn the frowns and the favours and the Letters of great ones in comparison of that trust which greater ones than they the King and State and a yet Greater than they the great God of heaven and earth hath reposed in you and expecteth from you Chastise him with severe indignation if he begin and if he continue spit defiance in his face who ere he be that shall think you so base as to sell your freedom for a bribe Gird your sword upon your thigh and keeping your selves ever within the compass of your Commissions and Callings as the Sun in the Zodiack go through stitch right on in the course of Iustice as the Sun in the firmament with unresisted violence and as a Giant that rejoyceth to run his race and who can stop him Bear not the sword in vain but let your right hand teach you terrible things Defend the poor and fatherless and deliver the oppressed from them that are mightier than he Smite through the loyns of those that rise up to do wrong that they rise not again Break the jaws of the wicked and pluck the spoil out of his teeth Thus if you do the wicked shall fear you the good shall bless you the poor shall pray for you posterity shall praise you your own hearts shall â—hear you and the great God of Heaven shall reward you This that you may do in some good measure the same God of Heaven enable you and give you and every of us grace in our several places and callings to seek his glory and to endeavour the discharge of a good conscience To which God blessed for ever Fathers Son and Holy Ghost three Persons and one eternal invisible and only wise God be ascribed all the Kingdom Power and Glory for ever and ever Amen AD MAGISTRATUM The Second Sermon At the Assises at Lincoln 7 March 1624. at the request of William Lister Esq then high Sheriff of the County EXOD. XXIII ver 1 2 3. 1. Thou shalt not raise a false report â—ut not thine hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness 2. Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil neither shalt thou speak in a cause to decline after many to wrest judgment 3. Neither shalt thou countenance a poor man in his cause THere is no one thing Religion ever excepted that more secureth and adorneth the State than Iustice doth It is both Columna and Corona Reipublicae as a Prop to make it subsist firm in it self and as a Crown to render it glorious in the eyes of others As the Cement in a building that holdeth all together so is justice to the publick Body as whereunto it oweth a great part both of its strength for by it
the throne is established in the sixteenth and of its height too for it exalteth a Nation in the 14th of the Proverbs As then in a Building when for want of good looking to the Mortar getting wet dissolveth and the walls belly out the house cannot but settle apace and without speedy repairs fall to the ground so there is not a more certain symptom of a declining and decaying and tottering State than is the general dissolution of manners for want of the due execution and administration of Iustice. The more cause have we that are Gods Ministers by frequent exhortations admonitions obsecrations expostulations even out of season sometimes but especially upon such seasonable opportunities as this to be instant with all them that have any thing to do in matters of Iustice but especially with you who are Gods Ministers too though in another kind you who are in commission to sit upon the Bench of Judicature either for Sentence or Assistance to do your God and King service to do your Country and Calling honour to do your selves and others right by advancing to the utmost of your powers the due course of Iustice. Wherein as I verily think none dare but the guilty so I am well assured none can justly mislike in us the choise either of our Argument that we beat upon these things or of our Method that we begin first with you For as we cannot be perswaded on the one side but that we are bound for the discharge of our duties to put you in mind of yours so we cannot be perswaded on the other side but that if there were generally in the greater ones that care and conscience and zeal there ought to be of the common good a thousand corruptions rife among inferiours would be if not wholly reformed as leastwise practised with less connivence from you confidence in them grievance to others But right and reason will that every man bear his own burthen And therefore as we may not make you innocent if you be faulty by transferring your faults upon others so far be it from us to impute their faults to you otherwise than as by not doing your best to hinder them you make them yours For Iustice we know is an Engine that turneth upon many hinges And to the exercise of judicature besides the Sentence which is properly yours there are divers other things required Informations and Testimonies and Arguings and Inquests and sundry Formalites which I am neither able to name nor yet covetous to learn wherein you are to rest much upon the faithfulness of other men In any of whom if there be as sometimes there will be foul and unfaithful dealing such as you either cannot spie or cannot help wrong sentence may proceed from out your lips without your fault As in a curious Watch or Clock that moveth upon many wheels the finger may point a wrong hour though the wheel that next moveth it be most exactly true if but some little pinn or notch or spring be out of order in or about any of the baser and inferiour wheels What he said of old Non fieri potest quin Principes etiam valde boni iniqua faciant was then and ever since and yet is and ever will be most true For say a Iudge be never so honestly minded never so zealous of the truth never so careful to do right yet if there be a spiteful Accuser that will suggest any thing or an audacious witness that will swear any thing or a crafty Pleader that will maintain any thing or a tame Iury that will swallow any thing or a craving Clark or Officer that for a bribe will foist in any thing the Iudge who is tied as it is meet he should to proceed secundùm allegata probata cannot with his best care and wisdom prevent it but that sometimes justice shall be perverted innocency oppressed and guilty ones justified Out of which consideration I the rather desired for this Assise-Assembly to choose a Text as near as I could of equal latitude with the Assise-Business For which purpose I could not readily think of any other portion of Scripture so proper and full to meet with all sorts of persons and all sorts of abuses as these three verses are Is there either Calumny in the Accuser or Perjury in the Witness Supinity in the Iurer or Sophistry in the Pleader or Partiality in any Officer or any close corruption any where lurking amid those many passages and conveyances that belong to a Iudicial proceeding my Text searcheth it out and indicteth â—â—e offender at the tribunal of that impartial Judge that keepeth a privy Sessions in each mans breast The words are laid down so distinctly in five Rules or Precepts or rather being all negative in so many Prohibitions that I may spare the labour of making other division of them All that I shall need to do about them will be to set out the several portions in such sort as that every man who hath any part or fellowship in this business may have his due share in them Art thou first an Accuser in any kind either as a party in a Iudicial controversie or bound over to prosecute for the King in a criminal Cause or as a voluntary Informer upon some penal statute here is something for thee Thou shalt not raise a false report Art thou secondly a Witness either fetched in by Process to give publick testimony upon oath or come of good or ill will privately to speak a good word for or to cast out a shrewd word against any person here is something for thee too Put not thine hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness Art thou thirdly returned to serve as a sworn man in a matter of grand or petty inquest here is something for thee too Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil Comest thou hither fourthly to advocate the cause of thy Client who flyeth to thy learning experience and authority for succour against his adversary and commendeth his state and sute to thy care and trust here is something for thee too Neither shalt thou speak in a cause to decline after many to wrest Iudgment Art thou lastly in any Office of trust or place of service in or about the Courts so as it may sometimes fall within thy power or opportunity to do a suiter a favour or a spite here is something for thee too Thou shalt not countenance no not a poor man in his cause The two first in the first the two next in the second this last in the third verse In which distribution of the Offices of Justice in my Text let none imagine because I have shared out all among them that are below the Bench that therefore there is nothing left for them that sit upon it Rather as in dividing the land of Canaan Levi who had no distinct plot by himself
cause to do that which in regard of the thing done may bring them within the compass of some Statute or branch of a statute yet such as circumstances duly considered no wise and indifferent man but would well approve of Now if in such cases always rigour should be used Laws intended for the benefit should by such hard construction become the bane of humane society As Solomon saith Qui torquet nasum elicit sanguinem He that wringeth the nose too hard forceth blood Guilty this way are not only those contentious spirits whereof are too many in the world with whom there is no more ado but a Word and an Action a Trespass and a Process But most of our common Informers withal Sycophants you may call them for that was their old name like Verres his blood hounds in Tully that lie in the wind for game and if they can but trip any man upon any breach of a penal statute there they fasten their teeth and tugg him into the Courts without help unless he will dare offam Cerbero for that is it they look for give them a Sop and then they are charmed for that time Zacheus besides that he was a Publican was it seemeth such a kind of Informer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the word Luke 19. If I have played the Sycophant with any man If I have wronged any man by forged cavilation or wrung any thing from him by false accusation A report of this third kind is false as devoid of equity But it may be thought I injure these men in making them raisers of false reports and am my self a false accuser of them whilst I seek to make them false accusers of others when as they dare appeal to the world they report not any thing but what is most true and what they shall be well able to prove so to be At once to answer them and clear my self know that in Gods estimation and to common intendment in the language of Scripture it is all one to speak an untruth and to speak a truth in undue time and place and manner and with undue circumstances One instance shall make all this most clear Dog the Edomoite one of the servants of the house of Saul saw when David went into the house of Ahimelech the Priest and how Ahimelech there entertained him and what kindness he did for him of all which he afterwards gave Saul particular information in every point according to what he had seen Wherein though he spake no more than what was true and what he had seen with his own eyes yet because he did it with an intent to bring mischief upon Ahimelech who had done nothing but what well became an honest man to do David chargeth him with telling of lyes and telleth him he had a false tongue of his own for it Psal. 52. Thy tongue imagineth wickedness and with lies thou cuttest like a sharp rasor Thou hast loved unrighteousness more than goodness and to talk of lies more than righteousness Thou hast loved all words that may do hurt O thou false tongue Conclude hence he that telleth the truth where it may do hurt but especially if he tell it with that purpose and to that end that it may do hurt he hath a false tongue and he telleth a false lye and he must pardon us if we take him for no better than the raiser of a false report We see what it is to raise a false report let us now see what a fault it is The first Accuser that ever was in the world was a false Accuser and that was the Devil Who as he began betimes for he was a lyer from the beginning so he began aloft for the first false report he raised was of the most High Unjustly accusing God himself unto our mother Eve in a few words of no fewer than three great crimes at once Falshood Tyranny and Envy He was then a slanderous accuser of his Maker and he hath continued ever since a malicious accuser of his Brethren Satan 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. he hath his name from it is most languages Slanderers and Backbiters and false Accusers may here hence learn to take knowledge of the rock whence they were hewn here they may behold the top of their Pedigree We may not deny them the ancienty of their descent though they have small cause to boast of it semen serpentis the spawn of the old Serpent children of their father the Devil And they do not shame the store they come of for the works of their Father they readily do That Hellish Aphorism they so faithfully practise is one of his Principles it was he first instilled it into them Calumniare fortiter aliquid adhaerebit Smite with the tongue and be sure to smite home and then be sure either the grief or the blemish of the stroke will stick by it A Devilish practice hateful both to God and man And that most justly whether we consider the sin or the injury or the mischief of it the Sin in the Doer the injury to the Sufferer the mischief to the Common-wealth Every false report raised in judgment besides that it is a lye and every lye is a sin against the truth slaying the soul of him that maketh it and excluding him from heaven and binding him over unto the second death it is also a pernicious lye and that is the worst sort of lies and so a sin both against Charity and Iustice. Which whoso committeth let him never look to dwell in the Tabernacle of God or to rest upon his holy Mountain God having threatned Psal. 50. to take special knowledge of this sin and though he seem for a time to dissemble yet at least to reprove the bold offender to his face Thou satest and speakest against thy brother yea and hast slandered thine own mrothers Son These things hast thou done and I held my tongue and thou thoughtest wickedly that I was even such an one as thy self but I will reprove thee and set before thee the things that thou hast done And as for the Injury done hereby to the grieved party it is incomparable If a man have his house broken or his purse taken from him by the high way or sustain any wrong or loss in his person goods or state otherwise by fraud or violence or casualty he may possibly either by good fortune hear of his own again and recover it or he may have restitution and satisfaction made him by those that wronged him or by his good industry and providence he may live to see that loss repaired and be in as good state as before But he that hath his Name and Credit and Reputation causelesly called into question sustaineth a loss by so much greater than any Theft by how much a good Name is better than great Riches A man may out-wear other Injuries or out-live them
it is as dayly experience sheweth that many men who make no conscience of a lye do yet take some bog at an Oath And it cannot but open a wide gap to the raising and receiving of false reports and to many other abuses of very noisom consequence in the common weal if the Magistrate when he may help it to enrich himself or his Officers or for any other indirect end shall suffer men to be impleaded and brought into trouble upon Bills and Presentments tendered without Oath Secondly since Laws cannot be so conceived but that through the infinite variety of humane occurrences they may sometimes fall heavy upon particular men and yet for the preventing of more general inconveniences it is necessary there should be Laws for better a mischief sometimes than always an Inconvenience there hath been left for any thing I find to the contrary in all well governed Policies a kind of latitude more or less and power in the Magistrates even in those Courts that were strictissimi juris upon fit occasion to qualifie and to mitigate something the rigour of the Laws by the Rules of Equity For I know not any extremity of wrong beyond the extremity of Right when Laws intended for fences are made snares and are calumniously wrested to oppress that innocency which they should protect And this is most properly Calumny in the prime notion of the word for a man upon a meer trick or quillet from the letters and syllables of the Law or other writing or evidence pressed with advantage to bring his Action or lay his Accusation against another man who yet bonâ fide and in Equity and Conscience hath done nothing worthy to bring him into such trouble Now if the Magistrate of Justice shall use his full power by interpreting the Law in rigour where he should not to second the boldness of a calumnious Accuser or if he shall not use his full power by affording his lawful favour in due time and place to succour the innocency of the so accused he shall thereby but give encouragement to the Raisers and he must look to answer for it one day as the Receiver of a false report Thirdly since that Iustice which especially supporteth the Common-weal consisteth in nothing more than in the right distribution of rewards and punishments many Law-givers have been careful by proposing rewards to encourage men to give in true and needful Informations and on the contrary to suppress those that are false or idle by proposing punishments For the Informers Office though it be as we heard a necessary yet it is in truth a very thankless office and men would be loth without special grievance to undergo the hatred and envy which commonly attendeth such as are officious that way unless there were some profit mixt withal to sweeten that hatred and to countervail that envy For which cause in most penal Statutes a moiety or a third or fourth which was the usual proportion in Rome whence the name of quadruplatores came or some other greater or lesser part of the fine penalty or forfeiture expressed in the Law is by the said Law allowed to the Informer by way of recompence for the service he hath done the State by his information And if he be faithful and conscionable in his Office good reason he should have it For he that hath an office in any lawful Calling and the Informers calling is such howsoever through the iniquity of those that have usually exercised it it hath long laboured of an ill name but he that hath such an office as it is meet he should attend it so it is meet it should maintain him for Who goeth to warfare at any time of his own cost But if such an Informer shall indict one man for an offence pretending it to be done to the great hurt of the Common-weal yet for favour fear or fee balk another man whom he knoweth to have committed the same offence or a greater or if having entred his complaint in the open Court he shall afterwards let the suit fall and take up the matter in a private Chamber this is Collusion and so far forth a false report as every thing may be called false when it is partial and should be entire And the Magistrate if he have power to chastise such an Informer some semblance whereof there was in that Iudicium Praevaricationis in Rome he shall do the Common-weal good service and himself much honour now and then to use it Fourthly since nothing is so powerful to repress audacious Accusers as severe punishment is it is observable what care and caution was used among the Romans whilst that state flourished to deter men from unjust Calumniations In private and civil Controversies for trial of right between party and party they had their Sponsiones which was a Sum of Money in some proportionable rate to the value of the thing in Question which the Plaintiff entred Bond to pay to the Defendant in case he should not be able to prove his Action the Defendant also making the like Sponsion and entring the like Bond in case he should be cast But in publick and criminal matters whether Capital or Penal if for want of due proof on the Accusers part the party accused were quit in judgment there went a Trial upon the Accuser at the suit of the accused which they called Iudicium Calumniae wherein they examined the original ground and foundation of the accusation which if it appeared to have proceeded from some just error or mistake bonâfide it excused him but if it should appear the Accusation to have proceeded from some left handed respect as Malice Envy Gain c. he was then condemned of Calumny And his ordinary punishment then was whereunto he had virtually bound himself by suscribing his Libel Poena talionis the same kind of punishment whatsoever it was which by the Laws had been due to the party accused if the libel had been proved against him Yea and for his farther shame it was provided by one Law that he should be burnt in the forehead with the Letter K. to proclaim him a Calumniator to the world that in old Orthography being the first letter of the word Kalumnia The same letter would serve the turn very well with us also though we use it to signifie another thing and yet not so much another thing as a thing more general but comprehending this as one species of it But as I said I may not prescribe especially beyond Law The thing for which I mention all this is this If all that care and severity in them could not prevent it but that still unjust actions would be brought and false accusations raised what a world of unconscionable Suits and wrongful Informations may we think there would be if contenticus Plantiffs and calumnious Sycophants when they have failed their proof should yet get off easily and
escape out of the Courts without Censure or Punishment or at the most but with some light check and the poor injured innocent the while be held in as in a prison till he have paid the utmost farthing I say not of what is due but of what shall be demanded by every man that hath but a piece of an Office about the Courts It is a strong heartning to Accusers and multiplieth false reports beyond belief when they that are wrongfully accused though the cause go with them shall yet have the worst of the day and shall have cause to answer the congratulations of their friends as Pyrrhus did his after he had gotten two famous victories over the Romans that if they should get a few more such victories it would be to their utter undoing If the Magistrate had power to make the wronged party full restitution allowing him all costs and damages to a half penny nay if he had power to allow him double or treble out of his unjust adversaries estate it were all little enough and but too little Zacheus took himself bound to do more when for this very sin of false accusation he imposed upon himself as a kind of satisfactory penance a four-fold restitution Luk. 19. Here was a right Quadruplator indeed and in the best sence you shall not lightly read of such another Lastly men have not fenestrata pectora that we can see them throughly and within yet there want not means of probable discovery Of ordinary private men we make conjecture by their gestures by their speeches by their companions but Magistrates and great ones who live more in the eye of the world and are ever as it were upon the stage and so do personati incedere walk under a continual disguise in respect of their outward deportment are not so well discoverable by those means They are best known by their servants and retinue by their Favorites and Officers by those they keep about them or employ under them If these be plain and down-right if these be just and upright if these be free and conscionable Sycophants will pluck in their horns and be out of heart and hope to find the Masters of such servants facile to give way to their false Calumniations But if these be insolent and hungry companions if these be impudent and shameless exactors it is presently thought they are then but brokers for the Masters and there is no question then made but that false reports will be received as fast as they can be raised and entertained with both arms We have learned from Solomon Prov. 29. that if a ruler hearken to lies then all his servants are wicked They durst not be so openly wicked if they were not first sure of him It was but a sorry one when it was at best but is now withal grown a stale excuse for great ones to impute their own wilful oversights to the faults or negligence of their Servants Caius Verres whom I cannot but now and then mention because there is scarce to be found such another complete Exemplar of a wicked Magistrate would usually complain that he was unjustly oppressed not with his own but with the crimes of his followers But why then did he keep such a kennel of Sharks about him why did he not either speedily reform them or utterly discard them It were indeed an unrighteous thing to condemn the Master for the Servants fault and an uncharitable inference because the Servant is naught to conclude straight the Master is little better For a just Master may have an unconscionable Servant and if he have a numerous family and keep many it is a rare thing if he have not some bad as in a great herd there will be some rascal Deer But then it is but one or a few and they play their prises closely without their Masters privity and they are not a little sollicitous to carry matters so fairly outward that their Master shall be the last man shall hear of their false dealing and when he heareth of it shall scarce believe it for the good opinion he hath of them But when in the generality they are such when they are openly and impudently such when every body seeth and saith the Master cannot chuse but know they are such it cannot be thought but the Master is well enough content they should be such Even their Servants bear rule over the people saith good Nehemiah of the Governours that were before him but so did not I because of the fear of God Neh. 5. What did not Nehemiah bear rule over the people yes that he did there is nothing surer His meaning then must be so did not I that is I did not suffer my Servants so to do as they did theirs implying that when the Servants of the former Governours oppressed the people it was their Masters doing at leastwise their Masters suffering Even their Servants bare rule over the people but so did not I because of the fear of God The Magistrate therefore that would speedily smoke away these Gnats that swarm about the Courts of Iustice and will be offering at his ear to buz false reports thereinto he shall do well to begin his reformation at home and if he have a Servant that heareth not well deservedly to pack him away out of hand and to get an honester in his room Say he be of never so serviceable qualities and useful abilities otherwise so as the Master might almost as well spare his right eye or his right hand as forgo his service yet in this case he must not spare him Our Saviours speech is peremptory Erue abscinde projice if either eye or hand cause or tempt thee to offend pull out that eye cut off that hand cast them both from thee with indignation rather want both than suffer corruption in either David's resolution was excellent in Psal. 101. and worthy thy imitation Whoso privily slandereth his Neighbour him will I destroy whoso hath a proud look and high stomach I will not suffer him Mine eyes look to such as be faithful in the land that they may dwell with me whoso leadeth a godly life he shall be my Servant There shall no deceitful person dwell in my house he that telleth lies shall not tarry in my sight He that will thus resolve and thus do it may be presumed he will not knowingly give either way to a false report or countenance to the reporter And so much for our first Rule Thou shalt not raise a false Report My first purpose I confess was to have spoken also to the Witness and to the Iuror and to the Pleader and to the Officer from the other four Rules in my Text as punctually and particularly as to the Accuser from this first for I therefore made choice of a Text that taketh them all in that I might speak to them all alike But if I should enlarge my self upon the
rest as I have done in this my Meditations would swell to the proportion rather of a Treatise than a Sermon and what patience were able to sit them out therefore I must not do it And indeed if what I have spoken to this first point were duly considered and conscionably practised I should the less need to do it For it is the Accuser that layeth the first stone the rest do but build upon his Foundation And if there were no false reports raised or received there would be the less use of and the less work for false and suborned Witnesses ignorant or pack'd Iuries crafty and sly Pleaders cogging and extorting Officers but unto these I have no more to say at this time but only to desire each of them to lay that portion of my Text to their hearts which in the first division was allotted them as their proper share and withal to make application mutatis mutandis unto themselves of whatsoever hath been presently spoken to the Accuser and to the Magistrate from this first Rulē Whereof for the better furtherance of their Application and relief of our memories the summ in brief is thus First concerning the Accuser and that is every party in a Cause or Trial he must take heed he do not raise a false report which is done first by forging a meer untruth and secondly by perverting or aggravating a truth and thirdly by taking advantage of strict Law against Equity any of which whoever doth he first committeth a heinous sin himself and secondly grievously wrongeth his neighbour and thirdly bringeth a great deal of mischief to the Commonwealth All which evils are best avoided first by considering how we would others should deal with us and resolving so to deal with them and secondly by avoiding as all other inducements and occasions so especially those four things which ordinarily engage men in unjust quarrels Malice Obsequiousness Coverture and Greediness Next concerning the Iudge or Magistrate he must take heed he do not receive a false report which he shall hardly avoid unless he beware first of taking private informations secondly of passing over Causes slightly without mature disquisition and thirdly of countenancing accusers more than is meet For whose discountenancing and deterring he may consider whether or no these five may not be good helps so far as it lyeth in his power and the Laws will permit first to reject informations tendered without Oath secondly to give such Interpretations as may stand with Equity as well as Law thirdly to chastise Informers that use partiality or collusion fourthly to allow the wronged party a liberal Satisfaction from his Adversary fifthly to carry a sharp Eye and a strait Hand over his own Servants Followers and Officers Now what remaineth but that the several Premises be earnestly recommended to the godly consideration and conscionable practice of every one of you whom they may concern and all your persons and affairs both in the present weighty businesses and ever hereafter to the good guidance and providence of Almighty God we should humbly beseech him of his gracious goodness to give a Blessing to that which hath been spoken agreeably to his Word that it may bring forth in us the fruits of Godliness Charity and Iustice to the Glory of his Grace the Good of our Brethren and the Comfort of our own Souls even for his blessed Son's sake our blessed Saviour Jesus Christ To whom with c. AD MAGISTRATUM The Third Sermon At the Assises at Lincoln August 4th 1625. at the Request of the High-Sheriff aforesaid William Lister Esquire Psal. CVI. 30. Then stood up Phinees and executed Iudgment and the Plague was stayed THE Abridgment is short which some have made of the whole Book of Psalms but into two words Hosannah and Hallelujah most of the Psalms spending themselves as in their proper Arguments either in Supplication praying unto God for his Blessings and that is Hosannah or in Thanksgiving blessing God for his goodness and that is Hallelujah This Psalm is of the latter sort The word Hallelujah both prefixed in the Title and repeated in the close of it sufficiently giveth it to be a Psalm of Thanksgiving as are also the three next before it and the next after it All which five Psalms together as they agree in the same general Argument the magnifying of God's holy Name so they differ one from another in choice of those special and topical Arguments whereby the Praises of God are set forth therein In the rest the Psalmist draweth his Argument from other Considerations in this from the Consideration of God's merciful removal of those Iudgments he had in his just wrath brought upon his own People Israel for their Sins upon their Repentance For this purpose there are sundry instances given in the Psalm taken out of the Histories of former times out of which there is framed as it were a Catalogue though not of all yet of sundry the most famous rebellions of that people against their God and of Gods both Iustice and Mercy abundantly manifested in his proceedings with them thereupon In all which we may observe the passages betwixt God and them in the ordinary course of things ever to have stood in this order First he preventeth them with undeserved favours they unmindful of his benefits provoke him by their rebellions he in his just wrath chastiseth them with heavy Plagues they humbled under the rod seek to him for ease he upon their submission withdraweth his judgments from them The Psalmist hath wrapped all these five together in Vers. 43 44. Many times did he deliver them but they provoked him with their Counsels and were brought low for their iniquity the three first Nevertheless he regarded their affliction when he heard their cry the other two The particular rebellions of the people in this Psalm instanced in are many some before and some after the verse of my Text. For brevity sake those that are in the following verses I wholly omit and but name the rest which are their wretched Infidelity and Cowardice upon the first approach of danger at the Red Sea vers 7. Their tempting of God in the desert when loathing Manna they lusted for flesh vers 13. Their seditious conspiracy under Corah and his confederates against Moses vers 16. Their gross Idolatry at Horeb in making and worshipping the golden Calf ver 19. Their distrustful murmuring at their portion in thinking scorn of the promised pleasant land ver 24. Their fornicating both bodily with the daughters and spiritually with the Idols of Moab and of Midian ver 28. To the prosecution of which last mentioned story the words of my Text do appertain The original story it self whereto this part of the Psalm referreth is written at full by Moses in Numb 25. and here by David but briefly touched as the present purpose and occasion led him yet so as that the most
pleasure to the prejudice of the Adversaries person or cause Seek not preposterously to win the name of a Good Lawyer by wresting and perverting good Laws or the opinion of the best Counsellor by giving the worst and the shrewdest Counsel Count it not as Protagoras did the glory of thy profession by subtilty of wit and volubility of tongue to make the worse cause the better but like a Good Man as well as Good Orator use the power of thy tongue and wit to shame impudence and protect innocency to crush oppressors and succour the afflicted to advance Justice and Equity and to help them to right that suffer wrong Let it be as a Ruled case to thee in all thy pleadings not to speak in any cause to wrest judgment If lastly thou art in any place or office of service or trust or command or attendance about the Courts rejoyce not as if it were now in thy power to do a friend a courtesie or a foe a spite Do not shew a cast of thy Office for the promise or hope of a reward in helping a great Offender out of the Briars Compel not men that have been long weather-beaten in the Main and are now arrived at the Haven of their business to weather for their Passports until they have offered some sacrifice to that great Diana Expedition Let no fear or hope or bribe or letter or envy or favour no not charity it self and compassion to the poverty or distressedness of any make you partial for the person to disregard the Cause If you would be charitable to the poor give them from your own but do not carve them from another's Trencher To relieve a poor man in his wants is the proper Office of Charity but Iustice must have no eyes to see nor bowels to yern at the wants of any man Be he rich or poor that bringeth his cause hither Currat Lex Let him find such as he bringeth Let him have as his cause deserveth The last of those Rules must be thine Thou shalt not countenance no not a poor man in his cause If any of these to whom I have now spoken Accusers Witnesses Iurers Pleaders Officers shall transgress these Rules to the perverting of Iustice our refuge must be next under God to you that are the Magistrates of Justice and sit upon the Bench of Judicature At your gravity and authority we must take sanctuary against them that pursue us wrongfully as at the horns of the Altar It is your Duty or if it be as to most men it is a more pleasing thing to be remembred of their Power than of their Duty it is in your power if not to reform all the abuses and corruptions of these persons yet to curb their open insolencies and to contain them at least within modest bounds Nay since I have begun to magnifie your power let me speak it with all the due reverence to God and the King there is no power so great over which in a qualified sence you have not a greater power It is in your power to bear up the pillars of the State when the land is even dissolved and the pillars thereof grown weak for that is done by judging the Congregation according to right Psal. 75. In yours to make this yet flourishing Country and Kingdom glorious or despicable for Righteousness exalteth a Nation but sin is a reproach to any people Prov. 14. In yours to settle the Throne upon the King and to entail it by a kind of perpetuity unto the right heir for many succeeding generations for The Throne is established by justice Prov. 16. In yours to discharge Gods punishing Angel who now destroyeth us with a grievous destruction and by unsheathing your Sword to make him sheath his as here in my Text Phinees stood up and executed judgment and the plague ceased In yours though you be but Gods on Earth and in these Courts mortal and petty Gods yet to send prohibitions into the Court of Heaven and there to stop the judgments of the great and Eternal God before they come forth yea and when the Decree is gone forth to stay Execution In a word as it was said to Ieremy but in another sence you are Set over Nations and over Kingdoms to root out and to destroy to build and to plant Only then be intreated to use that power God hath given you unto edification and not unto destruction And now I have done my message God grant unto all of us that by our hearty sorrow and repentance for our sins past by our stedfast resolutions of future amendment and by setting our selves faithfully and uprightly in our several places and callings to do God and the King and our Country service in beating down sin and rooting out sinners we may by his good grace and mercy obtain pardon of our sins and deliverance from his wrath and be preserved by his power through faith unto salvation Now to God the Father the Son c. AD POPULUM The First Sermon At Grantham Linc. Octob. 3. 1620. 3 KINGS 21. 29. Seest thou how Ahab humbleth himself before me because he humbleth himself before me I will not bring the evil in his days but in his sons days will I bring the evil upon his house THE History of this whole Chapter affordeth matter of much Variety and Use but no passage in it so much either of Wonder or Comfort as this in the close of the whole both Story and Chapter That there should be Mighty ones sick with longing after their meaner Neighbours Vineyards That there should be crafty heads to contrive for Greedy Great Ones what they unjustly desire That there should be officious instruments to do a piece of legal injustice upon a great mans letter That there should be Knights of the Post to depose any thing though never so false in any cause though never so bad against any man though never so innocent That an honest man cannot be secure of his life so long as he hath any thing else worth the losing There is instance in the fore-part of the Chapter of all this in Ahab sickning and Iezebel plotting and the Elders obeying and the Witnesses accusing and poor Naboth suffering But what is there in all this singularly either Strange or Comfortable All is but Oppression Active in the rest Passive in Naboth And what wonder in either of these stupet haec qui jam post terga reliquit Sexaginta annos himself may pass for a wonder if he be of any standing or experience in the world that taketh either of these for a wonder And as for matter of Comfort there is matter indeed but of Detestation in the one of Pity in the other in neither of Comfort To pass by the other Occurrents also in the latter part of the Chapter as That a great Oppressor should hug himself in the cleanly carriage and
to Christian liberty by enthralling the conscience where it ought to be free But if on the other side which is the truth the Constitution of the Magistrate bind the conscience of the subject not immediately and by its own virtue but by consequent only and by vertue of that Law of God which commandeth all men to obey their superiours in lawful things then is there a liberty left to the subject in cases extraordinary and of some pressing necessity not otherwise well to be avoided to do otherwise sometimes than the Constitution requireth And he may so do with a free conscience so long as he is sure of these two things First that he be driven thereunto by a true and real and not by a pretended necessity only and secondly that in the manner of doing he use such godly discretion as neither to shew the least contempt of the Law in himself nor to give ill example to others to despise Government or Governors And this first difference is material And so is the second also if not much more which is this If the Magistrates Constitution did bind the conscience virtute propriâ— and immediately then should the conscience of the subject be bound to obey the Constitution of the Magistrate ex intuitu praecepti upon the bare knowledge and by â—he bare warrant thereof without farther enquiry and consequently should be bound to obey as well in unlawful things as lawful Which consequence though they that teach otherwise will not admit yet in truth they cannot avoid for the proper and immediate cause being supposed the effect must needs follow Neither do I yet see what sufficient reason they that think otherwise can shew why the conscience of the subject should be bound to obey the Laws of the Magistrate in lawful things and not as well in unlawful things The true reason of it is well known to be this even because God hath commanded us to obey in lawful things but not in unlawful But for them to assign this reason were evidently to overthrow their own Tenent because it evidently deriveth the bond of Conscience from a higher power than that of the Magistrate even the Commandment of God And so the Apostles indeed do both of them derive it St. Paul in Rom. 13. men must be subject to the higher powers Why Because the powers are commanded of God And that for conscience sake too Why Because the Magistrates are the Ministers of God Neither may they be resisted And why Because to resist them is to resist the Ordinance of God That is St. Pauls doctrine And St. Peter accordeth with him Submit your selves saith he to every ordinance of man What for the mans sake Or for the Ordinance sake No but propter Dominum for the Lords sake verâ— 13. And all this may very well stand with Christian liberty for the conscience all this while is subject to none but God By these Answers to their Objections you may see what little reason some men have to make so much noise as they do about Christian liberty Whereupon if I have insisted far beyond both your expectations and my own first purpose I have now no other thing whereby to excuse it but the earnestness of my desire if it be possible to contain within some reasonable bounds of sobriety and duty those of my brethren who think they can never run far enough from superstition unless they run themselves quite out of their allegiance There are sundry other things which I am forced to pass by very needful to be rightly understood and very useful for the resolution of many cases of conscience which may arise from the joynt consideration of these two points of Christian Obedience and of Christian Liberty For the winding of our selves out of which perplexities when they may concern us I know not how to commend both to my own practice and yours a shorter and fuller rule of direction than to follow the clew of this Text Wherein the Apostle hath set just bounds both to our obedience and liberty Bounds to our obedience that we obey so far as we may without prejudice to our Christian liberty in all our acts of obedience to our superiors still keeping our consciences free by subjecting them to none but God Submit your selves c. but yet as free and as the servants of God and of none besides Bounds to our Liberty that the freedom of our judgments and consciences ever reserved we must yet in the use of indifferent things moderate our liberty by ordering our selves according unto Christian sobriety by condescending sometimes to our brethren in Christian Charity and by submitting our selves to the lawful commands of our Governors in Christian duty In any of which respects if we shall fail and that under the pretension of Christian liberty we shall thereby quite contrary to the express direction of both the Apostles but abuse the name of liberty for an occasion to the flesh and for a cloak of maliciousness As free but not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness but as the servants of God And so I pass from this second to my third and last Observation wherein if I have been too long or too obscure in the former I shall now endeavour to recompence it by being both shorter and plainer The Observation was this In the whole exercise both of the liberty we have in Christ and of those respects we owe unto men we must evermore remember our selves to be and accordingly behave our selves as those that are Gods servants in these last words But as the servants of God containing our condition and our carriage By our condition we are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the servants of God and our carriage must be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the the servants of God I shall fit my method to this division and first shew you sundry reasons for which we should desire to be in this Condition to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the servants of God and then give some directions how we may frame our carriage answerably thereunto to demean our selves 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the servants of God For the first We cannot imagine any consideration that may be found in any service in the world to render it desirable which is not to be found and that in a far more eminent degree in this service of God If Iustice may provoke us or Necessity enforce us or Easiness hearten us or Honour allure us or Profit draw us to any service behold here they all concur the service of God and of Christ is excellently all these It is of all other the most just the most necessary the most easie the most honourable the most profitable service And what would you have more First It is the most just service whether we look at the title of Right on his part or reasons of Equity on ours As for him he is our Lord and Master pleno jure he hath right
confident that friend will not fail to assist him therein to his utmost power Now if a man be bold to do but what he may and should do and that withal he have some good ground for his confidence from the consideration of his friends ability the experience of his love some former promises on his friends or merit on his own part or other like so as every man would be ready to say he had reason to presume so far of his friend this is a good reasonable and warrantable presumption But if he fail in either respect as if he presume either to do unlawful unworthy or unbefitting things or to do even lawful things when there appeareth no great cause why any man should think his friend obliged by the laws of friendship to assist him therein then is such his presumption a faulty and an evil presumption And whatsoever may bear the name of a Presumptuous sin in any respect is some way or other tainted with such an evil irrational presumption 9. But we are further to note that presumption in the worser sence and as applied to sin may be taken either Materially or Formally If these terms seem obscure with a little opening I hope the difference between these two will be easily understood Taken materially the sin of presumption is a special kind of sin distinguished from other species of sins by its proper Object or Matter when the very matter wherein we sin and whereby we offend God is Presumption and so it is a branch of Pride When a man presuming either upon his own strength or upon Gods assisting him undertaketh to do something of himself not having in himself by the ordinary course of nature and the common aid which God affordeth to the actions of his creatures in the ordinary ways of his providence sufficient strength to go through therewithal or expecteth to receive some extraordinary assistance from the Mercy Power c. of God not having any sufficient ground either from the general Promises contained in the Scriptures or by particular immediate revelation that God will certainly so assist him therein 10. All those men that over-value themselves or out of an overweening conceit of their own abilities attempt things beyond their power That lean to their own understandings as Solomon That mind high things and are wise in their own conceits as St. Paul That exercise themselves in great matters and such as are too high for them as David expresseth it All those that perswade themselves they can persist in an holy course without a continual supply of Grace or that think they can continue in their sins so long as they think good and then repent of them and forsake them at their leisure whensoever they list or that doubt not but to be able by their own strength to stand out against any temptation All these I say and all other like by presuming too much upon themselves are guilty of the sin of Presumption ' 'To omit the Poets who have set forth the folly of this kind of Presumption in the Fables of Phaethon and Icarus A notable example we have of it in the Apostle Peter and therein a fair warning for others not to be high-minded but to fear who in the great confidence of his own strength could not believe his Master though he knew him to be the God of truth when he foretold him he would yield but still protested that if all the world should forsake him yet he would never do it 11. Nor only may a man offend in this kind by presuming upon himself too much but also by presuming even upon God himself without warrant He that repenteth truly of his sins presuming of Gods mercy in the forgiveness thereof or that walketh uprightly and conscionably in the ways of his Calling presuming of Gods Power for his protection therein sinneth not in so presuming Such a presumption is a fruit of Faith and a good presumption because it hath a sure ground a double sure ground for failing first in the Nature and then in the Promise of God As a man may with good reason presume upon his Friend that he will not be wanting to him in any good Office that by the just Laws of true friendship one friend ought to do for another But as he presumeth too much upon his friend that careth not into what desperate exigents and dangers he casteth himself in hope his friend will perpetually redeem him and relieve him at every turn So whosoever trusteth to the Mercy or to the Power of God without the warrant of a Promise presumeth farther than he hath cause And though he may flatter himself and call it by some better name as Faith or Hope or Affiance in God yet is it in truth no better than a groundless and a wicked Presumption Such was the Presumption of those Sons of Sceva who took upon them but to their shame and sorrow to call over them that had evil spirits the name of the Lord Iesus in a form of adjuration Acts 19. when they had no calling or warrant from God so to do And all those men that going on in a wretched course of life do yet hope they shall find mercy at the hour of death All those that cast themselves into unnecessary either dangers or temptations with expectance that God should manifest his extraordinary Power in their preservation All those that promise to themselves the End without applying themselves to the means that God hath appointed thereunto as to have Learning without Study Wealth without Industry Comfort from Children without careful Education c. forasmuch as they presume upon Gods help without sufficient Warrant are guilty of the sin of Presumption taken in the former notion and Materially 12. But I conceive the Presumptuous sins here in the Text to belong clearly to the other notion of the word Presumption taken formally and as it importeth not a distinct kind of sin in it self as that Groundless Presumption whereof we have hitherto spoken doth but a common accidental difference that may adhere to sins of any kind even as Ignorance and Infirmity whereunto it is opposed also may Theft and Murther which are sins of special kinds distinguished either from other by their special and proper Objects are yet both of them capable of these common differences inasmuch as either of them may be committed as sometimes through Ignorance and sometimes through Infirmity so also sometimes through Wilfulness or Presumption 13. The distribution of Sins into sins of Ignorance of Infirmity and of Presumption is very usual and very useful and compleat enough without the addition which some make of a fourth sort to wit Sins of Negligence or Inadvertency all such sins being easily reducible to some of the former three The ground of the distinction is laid in the Soul of man wherein there are three distinct prime faculties from which all our actions flow the Understanding the Will and the sensual
and fears within insomuch as he was troubled on every side and his flesh had no rest at the fifth verse there Nevertheless saith he God that comforteth those that are cast down comforted us by the coming of Titus at vers 6. 35. Thirdly God manifesteth his love and faithfulness to his children in their troubles by the issues that he giveth out of them Deliverance and Honour Deliverance first That God hath often promised Call upon me in the time of trouble and I will hear thee Psal. 50. And he hath faithfully performed it Many or great are the troubles of the Righteous but the Lord delivereth them out of all Psal. 34. And he delivereth him safe and sound many times without the breaking of a bone yea sometimes without so much as the loss of a hair of his head How oft do we hear it repeated in one Psalm and made good by sundry instances So when they cried unto the Lord in their trouble he delivered them from their distress 36. Some evidence it is of his love and faithfulness that he delivered them at all but much more that he doth it with the addition of honour Yet hath he bound himself by his gracious promise to that also He shall call upon me and I will hear him yea I am with him in trouble I will deliver him and bring him to honour Psal. 91. As gold cast into the furnace receiveth there a new lustre and shineth brighter when it cometh forth than it did before so are the Saints of God more glorious after their great afflictions their graces ever more resplendent and many times even their outward estate also more honourable We may see in the examples of Ioseph of Iob of David himself and others if we had time to produce them that of Psal. 113. verified He raiseth the poor out of the dust and lifteth the needy out of the mire and from the dunghil that he may set him with Princes even with the Princes of his people But we have an example beyond all example even our blessed Saviour Iesus Christ. Never any sufferings so grievous as his never man so emptied and trodden down and made a man of sorrows as he never any issues so honourable as his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God hath highly exalted him and given him a name above every name that at the name of Iesus every knee should bow and every tongue should confess to his honour And what hath befallen him the head concerneth us also his members not only by way of merit but by way of conformity also Si compatimur conregnabimus If we be partakers of his sufferings we shall be also of his glory God as out of very faithfulness he doth cause us to be troubled so will he out of the very same faithfulness give an honourable issue also to all our troubles if we cleave unto him by stedfast faith and constant obedience possibly in this life if he see it useful for us but undoubtedly in the life to come Whereunto c. AD AULAM. The Eleventh Sermon WHITEHALL JULY 5. 1640. 1 Cor. 10. 23. All things are lawful for me But all things are not expedient All things are lawful for me But all things edifie not 1. IN which words the Apostle with much holy wisdom by setting just bounds unto our Christian Liberty in the Power first and then in the exercise of that power excellently preventeth both the Error of those that would shrink it in and the Presumption of those that would stretch it out more than they ought He extendeth our Liberty in the Power but restraineth it in the Use. Would you know what a large power God hath permitted unto you in indifferent things and what may be done ex plenitudine potestatis and without scruple of conscience For that you have Omnia licent All things are lawful But would you know withal with what caution you ought to use that power and what at all times is fit to be done ex intuitu charitatis and for the avoiding of offence You have for that too Non omnia expediunt All things are not expedient All things edifie not If we will sail by this Card regulate our judgement and practice by our Apostles rule and example in the Text we shall neither dash against the Rock of Superstition on the right hand nor fall into the Gulph of Profaneness on the left we shall neither betray our Christian Liberty nor abuse it 2. In the words themselves are apparently observable concerning that Liberty two things the Extension first and then the Limitation of it The extension is in the former clause Wherein we have the Things and the Persons 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All things lawful and All lawful for me The Limitation is in the latter clauses wherein is declared first what it is must limit us and that is the reason of Expediency But all things are not expedient And secondly one special means whereby to judge of that Expediency which is the usefulness of it unto Edification But all things edifie not I am to begin with the Extension of which only at this time And first and chiefly in respect of the things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All things are lawful 3. What All things Simply and â—ithout exception All What meant Iohn Baptist then to come in with his Non licet to Herod about his Brothers Wife It is not lawful for thee to have her Mat. 14. Or if Iohn were an austere man and had too much of Elias's spirit in him Yet how is it that our blessed Saviour the very pattern of love and meekness when the Pharisees put a question to him Whether it were lawful for a man to put away his Wife for every cause resolveth it in effect as if he had said No it is not lawful St. Peter saith the wicked Sodomites vexed the righteous soul of Lot daily with their unlawful deeds And who that hearkneth to the holy Law of God or but to the dictates of natural conscience will not acknowledge Blasphemy Idolatry Sacriledge Perjury Oppression Incest Parricide Treason c. to be things altogether unlawful And doth St. Paul now dissent so far from the judgement of his Master of his Fellow-Apostle of the whole world besides as to pronounce of all these things that they are lawful 4. Here the rule of Logicians must help Signa distributiva sunt intelligenda accommodatè ad subjectam materiam Notes of Universality are not ever to be understood in that fulness of latitude which the words seem to import but most often with such convenient restrictions as the matter in hand will require Now the Apostle by mentioning Expediency in the Text giveth us clearly to understand that by All things he intendeth all such things only whose Expediency or Inexpediency are meet to be taken into consideration as much as to say All indifferent things and none other For things absolutely necessary although it may
friends acquaintance or indeed more generally yet all wordly comforts stays and helps whatsoever 2. But then why these named the rarest and the rest to be included in these Because we promise to our selves more help from them than from any of the other We have a nearer relation to and a greater interest in them than any other and they of all other are the unlikest to forsake us The very brute Creatures forsake not their young ones A Hen will not desert her Chickens nor a Bear indure to be robbed of her Whelps 3. But then Thirdly why both named Father and Mother too Partly because it can hardly be imagined that both of them should forsake their child though one should hap to be unkind Partly because the Fathers love being commonly with more providence the Mothers with more tenderness both together do better express than alone either would do the abundant love of God towards us who is infinitely dear over us beyond the care of the most provident Father beyond the affection of the tenderest Mother 4. But then Fourthly When may they be said to forsake us When at any time they leave us destitute of such help as we stand in need of Whether it be out of Choice when they list not to help us though they might if they would or out of necessity when they cannot help us though they would if they could 4. The meaning of the words in the former part of the verse thus opened the result thereof is that There is a possibility of failing in all inferiour helps Fathers and Mothers our nearest and dearest friends all earthly visible helps and comforts always may fail us sometimes will fail us and at last must fail us leaving us destitute and succourless The truth whereof will the better appear if instancing especially in our natural Parents as the Text leadeth us we take a view of sundry particular causes of their so failing us under the two general heads but now mentioned to wit Choice and Necessity Under either kind three Sometimes they forsake us voluntarily aad of their own accord and through their own default when it is in their power to help us if they were so pleased which kind of forsaking may arise from three several Causes 5. First Natural Parents may prove unnatural meerly out of the naughtiness of their own hard and incompassionate hearts For although God hath imprinted this natural affection towards their own off-spring in the hearts of men in as deep and indelible characters as almost any other branch of the Law of Nature O nimiùm potens Quanto parentes sanguinis vinculo tenes Natura yet so desperately wicked is the heart of man that if it should be left to the wildness of its own corruption without any other bridle than the light of natural principles only it would eftsoons shake off that also and quite raze out all impressions of the Law of Nature at least so blur and confound the Characters that the Conscience should be able to spell very little or nothing at all of Duty out of them Else what needed the Apostle among other sins to have listed this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this want of natural affection in two several Catalogues Rom. 1. and 2 Tim. 3. Or to have charged Titus that young women should be taught among other things to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to love their Children If he had not observed some to have neglected their duty in that particular whereof Histories and experience afford us many examples Can a woman forget her sucking Child that she should not have compassion of the Son of her womb Saith the Lord by the Prophet He speaketh of it as of a monstrous thing and scarce credible of any Can she forget she in the single number But withal in the same words implyedly confessing it possible in more than one Yea they may forget They in the plural number Isa. 49. 15. 6. Secondly Parents not altogether void of natural affection may yet have their affections so alienated from their children upon some personal dislike as to forsake them Of which dislike I deny not but there may be just cause As among the Hebrews in the case of Blasphemy the Fathers hand was to be first in the execution of his Son Deut. 13. And both Civilians and Casuists allow the Father jus abdicationis a right of abdication in some cases But such cases are not much pertinent here or considerable as to our purpose For they that give their earthly Parents just cause to forsake them can have little confidence that God as their heavenly Father should take them up But when Parents shall withdraw their love and help from their Children upon some small oversights or venial miscarriages or take distaste at them either without cause or more than there is cause upon some wrong either surmise of their own or suggestion of others as Saul reviled Ionathan and threw a Iavelin at him to smite him interpreting his friendship with David as it had been a plotted Conspiracy between his Son and his Servant to take his Crown and his life from him Or when they shall disinherit their Children for some deformity of Body or defect of parts or the like As reason sheweth it to be a great sin and not to be excused by any pretence so it is an observation grounded upon manifold experience that where the right heirs have been disinherited upon almost whatsoever pretence the blessing of God hath not usually followed upon the persons and seldom hath the estate prospered in the hands of those that have succeeded in their rooms 7. Thirdly Parents whose affection towards their Children hath not been sowred by any personal dislike may yet have their affection so over-powered by some stronger lust as to become cruel to their children and forsake them For as in the World Might oftentimes over-beareth Right so in the soul of man the violence of a stronger passion or affection which in the case in hand may happen sundry ways beareth down the weaker It may happen as sometimes it hath done out of Superstition So Agamemnon sacrificed his Daughter Iphigenia The Heathens generally deceived by their cheating Oracles and some of the Iews led by their example sacrificed their sons and daughters unto devils and caused their children to pass through the fire to Moloch Sometimes out of revenge As Medea to be revenged of Iason for leaving her and placing his affection elsewhere slew her own two Sons begotten by him in his sight Saevus amor docuit natorum sanguine matres Commaculâsse manus Sometimes out of fear So the Parents of the blind man owned their Son indeed Ioh. 9. but for fear of being cast out of the Synagogue durst not speak a word in his just defence but left him to shift as well as he could for himself And Herod the great for no other cause than his own causeless fears and jealousies
Man from whom the provocation cometh Such curses as they proceed from the bitterness of the soul of the grieved person in the mean time so they will be in the end bitterness to the soul of him that gave cause of grievance And if there were not on the other side some comfort in the deserved blessings of the poor it had been no wisdom for Iob to comfort himself with it as we see he did in the day of his great distress The blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon me and I caused the widows heart to sing for joy Job 29. 28. But say these poor ones should be so charitable as very seldom they be as not to curse us when we have despised them or so unthankful as seldom they are otherwise as not to bless us when we have relieved them yet the Lord who hath given every Man a charge concerning his brother and committed the distresses of the poor to our care and trust will take district knowledge how we deal with them and impartially recompense us thereafter Doth not he consider And shall not he render to every Man according to his works The last words of the Text. If therefore you have done your duty faithfully let it never discourage you that unrighteous and unthankful Men forget it They do but their kind the comfort is that yet God will both remember it and requite it God is not unrighteous to forget your work and labour of love saith the Apostle Heb. 5. He will remember it you see And then saith David Psal. 41. Blessed is he that considereth the poor and needy the Lord shall deliver him in the time of trouble He will requite it too He that for God's sake helpeth his poor brother to right that suffereth wrong he doth therein at once first an act of mercy because it is done in the behalf of a distressed Man and an act secondly of Iustice because it is done in a righteous cause and thirdly being done for the Lord's sake an act of Religion also Pure Religion and undefiled before God even the father is this to visit the fatherless and widow in their afflictions Jam. 1. And is it possible that God who delighteth in the exercise of every one of them singly should suffer an act to pass unrewarded wherein there is a happy concurrence of three such excellent vertues together as are Iustice Mercy and Religion The Prophet Ieremy to reprove Iehoiachin's tyranny and oppression upbraideth him with his good father Iosiah's care and conscience to do justice and to shew mercy after this manner Did not thy father eat and drink and do judgment and justice and then it was well with him He judged the cause of the poor and needy then it was well with him was not this to know me saith the Lord But now on the contrary He shall have judment without mercy that sheweth no mercy He that stoppeth his ears against the cry of the poor he shall also cry himself but shall not he heard c. Many other like passages there are in the Scriptures to the same effect 29. Nay moreover the general neglect of this duty pulleth down the wrath of God not only upon those particular persons that neglect it but also upon the whole nation where it is in such general sort neglected O house of David thus saith the Lord execute judgment in the morning and deliver him that is spoiled out of the hand of the oppressor lest my fury go out like fire and burn that none can quench it because of the evil of your doings Jer. 21. Brethren we of this nation have cause to look to it in time against whom the Lord hath of late manifested his just wrath though tempered as we must all confess with much clemency yea and his hand is streched out against us still in the heavy plagues both of dearth and death Though the Land be full of all manner of sins and lewdness and so the Lord might have a controversie with us for any of them yet I am verily persuaded there are no other kinds of sins that have overspread the face of the whole Land with such an universal contagion as it were of a Leprosy as the sins of Riot and Oppression have done Which two sins are not only the provoking causes as any kind of sins may be in regard of the justice of God but also the sensible instrumental causes in the eye of reason and experience of much penury and mortality among us 30. Surely then as to quench the fire we use to withdraw the fewel so to turn away the heavy wrath of God from us we should all put to our helping-hands each in his place and calling but especially the Minister and the Magistrate the one to cry down the other to beat down as all sins in general so especially these of Riot and Oppression Never think it will be well with us or that it will be much better with us than now it is or that it will not be rather every day much worse with us than it is never look that disorders in the Church distempers in the State distractions in our judgments diseases in our bodies should be remedied or removed and not rather more and more encreased if we hold on as we do in pampering every Man his own Flesh and despising every Man his poor brother So long as we think no pleasures too much for our selves no pressures too heavy for our brethren stretch our selves along and at ease upon our Couches eat of the fat and drink of the sweet without any touch of compassion in our bowels for the afflictions of others we can expect no other but that the rod of God should abide upon us either in dearths of pestilences or if they be removed for God loveth sometimes to shift his rods in greater and heavier judgments in some other kind 31. But as to the particular of Oppression for that of Riot and Intemperance being beside the Text I shall no farther press my humble request to those that are in place of authority and all others that have any office or attendance about the Courts is this For the love of God and of your selves and your Country be not so indulgent to your own appetites and affections either of Ease as to reject the complaints or of Partiality as to despise the persons or of filthy Lucre as to betray the cause of the fatherless and friendless Suffer not when his cause is good a simple Man to be circumvented by the wiliness or a mean Man to be over powred by the greatness of a crafty or mighty Adversary Favour not a known Sycophant nor open your lips to speak in a cause to pervert judgment or to procure favour for a mischievous person Turn not judgment into wormwood by making him that meant no hurt an offender for a word Wrangle not in the behalf of a contentious person to the prejudice
with vain pretentions 28. But the more apt we are by nature to justifie our selves by causeless excuses the greater ought to be the care of every good man the only use I shall now make of this point to examine the truth and the weight of those excuses which he pretendeth in his own defence Whether they have justae excusationis instar and will bear a good and sufficient plea or be but rather shifts devised to serve a present turn more for outward shew than real satisfaction within Which is that judicium cordis the judgment of the heart whereunto Solomon as I told you referreth over this pretention Behold we knew it not to receive its first and most immediate trial Doth not he that pondereth the heart consider it What the tongue pleadeth is not a thing so considerable with God as how the heart standeth affected 29. For the approving his heart therefore in this business before him that knoweth it perfectly and is able to ponder it exactly let every Magistrate and other Officer of justice consider in the fear of God First Whether he hath been willing so far as his leisure amidst the throng of other his weighty imployments would permit to receive the petitions and with patience to hear the complaints of those poor Men that have fled to him as to a Sanctuary for refuge and succour Iob professeth himself to have been a father to the poor and he is a very unnatural father that stoppeth his ears against the cries of his children or so terrifieth them with his angry countenance that they dare not speak to him Solomon in the twenty ninth of this book distinguisheth a righteous Man from a wicked by this that the righteous considereth the cause of the poor but the wicked regardeth not to know it He that rejecteth their complaints or beateth them off with bug-words and terrour in his looks either out of the hardness of his heart or the love of ease or for whatsoever other respect when he might have liesture to give them audience if he were so minded and to take notice of their grievances cannot justly excuse himself by pleading Behold we knew it not But I must hasten Let him consider secondly Whether he have kept his ear and his affection equally free to both parties without suffering himself to be possessed with prejudices against or to be carried away with favourable inclinations towards the one side more than the other He is too little a judge that is too much either a friend or an enemy Thirdly Whether he hath used all requisite diligence patience and wisdom in the examination of those causes that have been brought before him for the better finding out of the truth as Iob searched out the cause which he knew not without shuffling over business in post-haste not caring which way causes go so he can but dispatch them out of the way quickly and rid his hands of them Fourthly Whether he hath indeed endeavoured to his power to repress or discountenance those that do ill offices in any kind tending to the perverting of justice as namely Those that lay traps for honest Men to fetch them into trouble without desert Those that sow discord among neighbours and stir up suits for petty trespasses and trifles of no value Those that abet contentious persons by opening their mouths in their behalf in evil causes Those that devise new shifts to elude good Laws Lastly whether he hath gone on stoutly in a righteous way to break the jaw-bones of the Lyons in their mouths and to pluck the spoil from between their teeth by delivering them that were ready to be slain or destinated to utter undoing by their powerful oppressors without fearing the faces of Men or fainting in the day of their brothers adversity He that hath done all this in a good mediocrity so far as his understanding upon power would serve tho he have not been able to remedy all the evils and to do all the good he desired may yet say with a good Conscience and with comfort Behold we knew it not and his excuse will be taken in the judgment both of his own heart and of God who knoweth his heart whatsoever other Men think of him or howsoever they censure him But if he have failed in all or any the premisses though he may blear the eyes of Men with colourable pretences he cannot so secure his own conscience much less escape the judgment of God before whose eyes causeless excuses are of no avail Which is the last of the three points proposed whereunto I now proceed 30. The judgment of a Man 's own heart is of greater regard in utramque partem than the censures of all the Men in the world besides Better the world should condemn us if our own hearts acquit us than that our hearts should condemn us and all the world acquit us This is our rejoycing the testimony of our Conscience saith St. Paul The approbation of Men may give some accession to the rejoycing the other being first supposed but the main of it lieth in the testimony of the Conscience This is the biggest Tribunal under Heaven but not absolutely the highest there is one in Heaven above it St. Paul who thought it safe for him to appeal hither from the unjust censures of Men yet durst not think it safe for him to rest here but appealeth from it to a higher Court and to the judgment of the great God 1 Cor. 4. It was a very small thing with him to be judged of man's judgment So long as he knew nothing by himself so long as his own heart condemned him not he passed not much for the censures of Men. Yet durst not justifie himself upon the acquittal of his own heart He knew there was much blindness and deceitfulness in the heart of every sinful Man and it were no wisdom to trust to that that might fail He would up therefore to a higher and an unerring Iudge that neither would deceive nor could be deceived and that was the Lord. I judge not mine own self saith he but he that judgeth me is the Lord. Even so here Solomon remitteth us over for the trial of our pretended excuses from our mouths to our hearts and from our hearts unto God If thou sayest Behold we knew it not doth not he that pondereth the heart consider it c. As if he had said No matter for the words look to thy heart If thou pretendest one thing without and thy conscience tell thee another thing within thou art 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 cast and condemned by the sentence of thine own heart But if thy heart condemn thee not the more indeed is thy comfort and the stronger thy hope yet be not too confident upon it There is an abyssus a depth in thy heart which thou canst not fathom with all the line thou hast Thou hast not a just ballance wherein to weigh and to ponder thy own
and punisheth it wheresoever he findeth it with severe chastisements in his own dearest servants and children but with fiery vengeance and fury poured out upon his Adversaries Where he enjoineth a duty he looketh for obedience and therefore where the duty is unperformed the disobedience is sure to be punished let the offender pretend and alledge never so largely to excuse it Quid verba audiam factacum videam It is the work he looketh at in all his retributions and where the work is not done vain words will not ward off the blows that are to be inflicted for the neglect nor any whit lessen them either in their number or weight Will they not rather provoke the Lord in his just indignation to lay on both more and heavier strokes For where a Duty is ill neglected and the neglect ill excused the Offender deserveth to be doubly punished once for the omission of the Duty and once more for the vanity of the Excuse 36. Let me beseech you therefore dearly beloved brethren for the love of God and your own safety to deal clearly and impartially betwixt God and your own Souls in this Affair without shuffling or dawbing and to make straight paths to your feet lest that which is lame be turned out of the way Remember that they that trust to lying vanities and false pretences are no better forsake their own mercy And that feigned excuses are but as a staff of Reed a very weak stay for a heavy body to trust to for support which will not only crack under the weight but the sharp splinters thereof will also run up into the hand of him that leaneth upon it You see what God looketh at It is the heart that he pondereth and the Soul that he observeth and the work that he recompenseth Look therefore that your hearts be true and your souls upright and your works perfect that you may never stand in need of such poor and beggarly shifts as forged pretences are nor be driven to fly for refuge to that which will nothing at all profit you in the day of wrath and of trial Let your desires be unfeigned and your endeavours faithful to the utmost of your power to do Iustice and to shew Mercy to your Brethren and to discharge a good Conscience in the performance of all those duties that lie upon you by virtue either of your general Callings as Christians or of your particular Vocations whatever they be with all diligence and godly wisdom that you may be able to stand before the Iudgment-seat of the great God with comfort and out of an humble and well-grounded confidence of his gracious acceptance of your imperfect but sincere desires and endeavours in Christ not fear to put your selves upon the trial each of you in the words of holy David Psal. 139. Try me O God and seek the ground of my heart prove me and examine my thoughts Look well if there be any way of wickedness in me and lead me in the way everlasting in the way that leadeth to everlasting life Which great Mercy the Lord of his infinite goodness vouchsafe unto us all for his dear Son's sake Iesus Christ our blessed Saviour To whom c. AD MAGISTRATUM The Third Sermon At the Assizes at Notingham in the Year 1634. at the Request of ROBERT MELLISH Esq then High-Sheriff of that County 1 Sam. 12. 3. Behold here I am witness against me before the Lord and before his Anointed Whose Oxe have I taken or whose Ass have I taken or whom have I defrauded whom have I oppressed or of whose hand have I received any bribe to blind mine eyes therewith And I will restore it you 1. ABold and just challenge of an old Iudg made before all the People upon his resignal of the Government into the hands of a new King Samuel was the Man Who having continued whilst Eli lived in the Service of the Tabernacle as a Levite and a private Man was after his death to undergo a new business in the exercise of Publick Iudicature For that phanatical Opinion which hath possessed some in these later times That no Ecclesiastical Person might lawfully exercise any Secular Power was in those days unheard of in the World Eli though a a Priest was a Iudg also and so was Samuel though a Levite after him And we find not that either the People made any question at all or that themselves made any scruple at all of the lawfulness of those concurrent Powers Samuel was now as it is collected by those that have travelled in the Chronology aged about five and thirty Years and so in his full strength when he was first Iudg Which so long as it continued in any measure he little respected his own case in comparison of the common Good but took his yearly Circuits about the Country keeping Courts in the most convenient places abroad besides his constant sittings at Rama where his dwelling was for the hearing and determining of Causes to the great ease of all and content no doubt of the most or best 2. But by that he had spent about 30 years more in his Countries Service he could not but find such decays in his Body as would call upon him in his now declining Age to provide for some ease under that great burden of Years and Business Which that he might so do as that yet the publick Service should not be neglected he thought good to joyn his two Sons in commission with him He therefore maketh them Iudges in Israel in hope that they would frame themselves by his example to judg the people with such-like diligence and uprightness as himself had done But the young Men as they had far other aims than the good old Father had so they took quite other ways than he did Their care was not to advance Iustice but to fill their own Coffers which made them soon to turn aside after lucre to take bribes and to pervert judgment This fell out right for the Elders of Israel who now had by their miscarriage a fair opportunity opened to move at length for that they had long thirsted after viz. the change of the Government They gather themselves therefore together that the cry might be the fuller and to Ramah they come to Samuel with many complaints and alledgments in their mouths But the short of the business was a King they must have and a King they will have or they will not rest satisfied It troubled Samuel not a little both to hear of the misdemeanour of his sons of whom he had hoped better and to see the wilfulness of a discontented people bent upon an Innovation Yet he would consult with God before he would give them their answer And then he answereth them not by peremptorily denying them the thing they so much desired but by earnestly dissuading them from so inordinate a desire But they persisting obstinately in their first resolution by
of Bribes as a Man would shake off a Viper or other venemous beast that should offer to fasten upon his hand as Paul did at Malta Acts 28. The word that here in the Text is rendred Munus a Gift or a Bribe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Targum there rendreth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mammon dishquar whereunto that Mammon of unrighteousness mentioned Luke 16. and wherewith our Saviour would have rich Men make themselves friends may very well seem to have reference Altho I confess that phrase there may not improbably be conceived in another notion somewhat different from this to note the falseness deceitfulness and uncertainty of these worldly riches in opposition to spiritual riches a little after there called the true riches for so the words Mammon dishquar do properly import as who say the false or lying riches or in comparison of the true and durable riches falsly so called However the phrase seemeth to be proverbial and taken in the former sense to bear this meaning in that place As worldly wise Men that have Suits depending in the Courts will attempt by bestowing gifts upon him or his servants to make the Iudg their friend that so the cause may be carried on their side when it cometh to an hearing with the like wisdom should Christian Men make themselves friends of the poor who are God's favourites by giving Alms to them out of their worldly goods that so they may find favour with him at the day of judgment The proverbial use of that phrase which made me the rather observe it sheweth what was the common opinion Men held of gifts bestowed to procure favour in judgment to wit that they were the Mammon of unrighteousness And that in a double respect first As the price of an unrighteous sentence in the intention of the giver and then as a piece of unjust and unrighteous gain in the receiver prohibited by the Lord in the Law as well as the other two branches of Injustice were and that both frequently and expresly and taxed by the Prophet as a sin of a very high nature a mighty sin I know your manifold transgressions and your mighty sins they afflict the just they take a bribe and they turn aside the poor in the gate from their right Amos 5. 36. But it may be said Since we have aready comprehended all injuries under the two former heads Fraud and Oppression how cometh it to be here mentioned as a third thing and distinct from them both Either we must free it from being injurious or reduce it to one of the two Fraud or Oppression I answer in short that Bribery is properly a branch of Oppression For if the bribe be exacted or but expected yet so as that there can be little hope of a favourable or but so much as a fair hearing without it then is it a manifest oppression in the receiver because he maketh an advantage of that power wherewith he is intrusted for the administration of justice to his own proper benefit which ought not to be and is clearly an oppression But if it proceed rather from the voluntary offer of the giver for the compassing of his own ends then is it an oppression in him because thereby he getteth an advantage in the favour of the Court against his adversary and to his prejudice For observe it the greatest oppressors are ever the greatest bribers and freest of their gifts to those that may bestead them in their suits Which is one manifest cause besides the secret and just judgment of God upon them why oppressors seldom thrive in their estates near the proportion of their gettings Even because so much of what cometh in by their oppressions goeth out again for the upholding of their oppressions It was not for nothing you may well think that Solomon so yoked these two things together oppressing the poor and giving to the rich in Prov. 22. He that oppresseth the poor to encrease his riches and he that giveth to the rich shall surely come to want As he hath a spring one way so he hath a drain another way which keepeth him from rising to that excess or heighth he aimeth at 37. Bribery then is a branch of Oppression That we have cleared But yet one part of the doubt remaineth why if it belong to one of the two is it here mentioned as a third species different from both For this I say First It might be specially mentioned as a corruption more particularly incident to the Office of Iudicature in respect whereof especially Samuel now stood upon his justification whereas Frauds and most other Oppressions are of a larger and more comprehensive extent And secondly Because it hath a peculiar formality by it self whereby it differeth from other injuries of either sort in this that whereas all other whether Frauds and Oppressions are involuntary on one part for Volenti non fit injuria no Man is willing to be either defrauded or oppressed if he knew it and knew how to help it this of Bribery is done with the mutual knowledg and consent both of the Giver and Receiver 38. Which circumstance maketh it at least in this one respect somewhat worse than either of the former that whereas in other frauds and oppressions the one party only is guilty because they are done without the consent of the other party in this of Bribery both parties are guilty because both consent Neither doth this joynt consent of both parties hinder but that it is still injurious Because the injury that is hereby done is not done to either of the parties thereunto consenting supposing the consent on both parts free and spontaneous but it is done by them both to a third party namely to the adversary of him that giveth the bribe whose consent you will easily suppose never to have been asked in the business So that the injury is still done non volenti 39. Of the commonness of which sin especially in inferiour Officers who are ever and anon trucking for expedition it would be impertinent to speak from this Text wherein Samuel speaketh of it only as it might concern himself who was a Iudg. Of the heinousness of it in the sight of God and the mischief it doth to the Commonwealth when it is found in Iudges and Magistrates I shall forbear to speak the time being withal now well-nigh spent because out of the confidence I have of the sincernity of those that now hear me I deem the labour needless Only I cannot the Text offering it but touch somewhat at that property which Samuel here ascribeth to a bribe of blinding the eyes Solomon speaketh much of the powerful operation of gifts and bribes how they pacifie anger procure access into the presence of great persons and favour from them and sundry the like which are all of easie understanding and the truth of them as well as the meaning obvious But the effect here mentioned of blinding the eyes
Divin nomin 2. b Marlorat in Enchirid. 3. c Acts. 15. 9. d Joh. 1. 12. Galat. 4. 26. e Rom. 3. 28. 5. 1. f Hab. 2. 4. Gal. 2. 20. g Rom. 15. 13. 1 Pet. 1. 8. h Rom. 5. 1. i Acts 16. 34. Ephes. 1. 8. k Si quis dixerit opera omnia quae ante justificationem fiunt verè esse peccata Anathema sit Con. Trident. Sess. 6. Can. 7. 4. 5. 1. 2. l Though S. August sometimes applyeth it also to prove that all the actions of infidels meaning c be sin Rhem. annot in Loc. m Et omne quod non est ex fide peccatum est ut sc. intelligat justitiam infidelium non esse justitiam quia sordet natura sine gratia Prosper in Epist ad Rufin Vid. etiam eundem contra Collat. n Extra Ecclesiam Catholicam nihil est integrum nihil castum dicente Apostolo Omne quod non c. Leo serm 2. de jejun Penitent 6. o T. C. l. 1. p. 59 c. apud Hooker lib. 2. p Rom. 10. 17. q T. C. l. p. 27. apud Hooker lib. 2. Sect. 4. 7. r Job 13. 7. 8. s I say that the Word of God containeth whatsoever things can fall into any part of mans life T. C. lib. 1. p. 20. apud Hooker lib. 2. §. 1. 9. t Rom. 4. 15. u Rom. 2. 15. x Rom. 2. 15. y Tertul. de coron milit cap. 4. 10. 1. 2. 3. z Matth. 7. 12. a 1 Cor. 14. 40. II. 12. b Ver. 4 10 13. 13. c verse 3. 14. * It is indeed fully handled by M Hooker in his second book of Eccles Policy but few men of that party will read his works though written with singular learning wisdom godliness and moderation d Pet. Blesens Epist. 131. e Delicata satis imo nimis molesta est ista obedientia c. Bern. de praecept dispens f Infirmae prorsus voluntatis indicium est statuta seniorum studiosiùs discutere haerere ad singulae quae injunguntur exigere de quibusque rationem male suspicari de omni praecepto cujus causa latuerit nec unquam libenter ordire nisi c Bern. Ibid. 15. g Esay 40. 1 2. h Esay 61. 1 3. i Rom. 8. 15. k 1 Tim. 1. 7. l Psal. 45. 7. m Psal. 30. 11. 16. n See Articles of the Church of England Artic. 6. 17. o Himing in Rom. 14. 1. p Piscat Ibid. q Joh. 3. 36. Acts 14. 1 2. r Hic Verse 2. 2. s Verse 14. 3. t Verse 22. 4. u Verse 23. 18. 19. 1. x Respectus non mutant naturam y Opinio nostra nobis legem facit Ambr. de Paradis 2. z Joh. 16. 2. a Acts 26. 9. b 1 Tim. 1. 13. c Acts 23. 3 4. Phil. 3. 6. 3. 20. 1. 2. 3. Ubi est suspicio ibi discussiâ— necessaria Bernard Ep. 7. d Ratio in rebus manifestis non inquirit sed statim judicat Aquin. 1 2. qu. 14. 4. ad 2. e 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Arist. 1. Mag. Moral 18. f 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Arist. 2. Eth. 5. 21. g Verse 5. hic plene certus sit Heming h Quasi plenis velis feratur Piscat in Schol. ad Rom. 14. 5. i Luke 9. 50. k 1 Cor. 14. 40. l 1 Tim. 4. 4. m Tit. 1. 15. n Rom. 14. 14. o 1 Cor. 6. 12. 22. p Herodot in Clio Senec. 3. De Ira 21. 23. q Qui agit contra conscientiam qua credit Deum aliquid prohibuisse licet erret contemnit Deum Bonavent 2. sent dist 39. r Menand s Pres. Satyr 5. t Jam. 4. 17. u Quod sit contra conscientiam aedificat ad gehennam c. 28. qu. 1. Omnes Sect. ex his x Rom. 14. 22. y Dan. 3. 16 18. z c. 11. qu. 3. Qui resistet ex Augustino 24. 25. a animo nunc huc nunc fluctuat illuc Virg. Aeneid 10. b Jam. 1. 8. 1. c Ibid. d Eph. 4. 14. 2. 3. 4. 26. 1. 2. e 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Arist. 3. Ethic 4. 3. f 1 Cor. 7. 36. g Non tibi imputabitur ad culpam quod invitus ignoras Aug. de nat grat 27. h Nil faciendum de quo dubites sit necne rectè factum Cic l. 1. de offic 28. h Is damnum dat qui jubet dare ejus ver ê° nulla culpa est cui parere necesse sit L. 169. F. de div Reg. jur i Bernard â—e praecept dis-pens l Rom. 13. 1. 1 Peâ— 2. 13. 29. m Rom. 15. 6. n Isidor o Dubius incertus quasi duarum viarum Isid. 10. Etym. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p Plus est standum praecepto praelati quà m conscientiae Bonav 2. â—sen distinct 39. 30. q Gregor 31. 32. r 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Solon apud Stob. Serm. 3. 33. 1. 2. 3. 34. Luk. 12. 1 Matth. 16. 12. 1 Cor. 5. 8. Percuâ—it illos atrociore recriminatione Eras. in Paraph 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrys. Hom. 15. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrys. ibid. Isa. 29. 13. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Act. 26. 5. Luk. 16. 15. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Tim. 4. 2. 1 Thes. 5. 21. 1 Joh. 4. 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Mark 10. 19. Luk. 18. 10. Jer. 45. 6. Jer. 35. 18 19. Abridgm Linc. p. 44. Per appositionem Eras. Bez. Jer. 23. 28. 1 Cor. 3. 12 15. Gal. 1. 8. 2 Joh. 10. Mat. 15. 12. 1 Cor. 3. 12. 15. Andradus Multò maxima pars Evangelii pervenit ad nos traditione perexigua literis est mandata Hos. Confes. c. 92. Egenum elementum Hosius Plumbea regula Pighius c. a V. Chamier Tom. 1 Panstrat Lib. 9. c. 16. Jewels defence 2. c. 9. b Non male comparari Pharisaeos Catholicis Serarius apud Hal. Seron Mat. 5. 30. c Sadoc discipulus Antiqui Sochaei author sectae Sadducaeorum secundum Rabbinos V. El. Tisb in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Schindler in Lexic Pentagl Sed hoc ut Commentum Rabbinicum exigit Montacutius qui Sadducaeorum originem ad Dositheum quendam refert ex authoritate Epiphanii aliorum eosque Sadducaeos dictos confirmat à 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Iustitia ob mores austeros in judiciis severitatem V. Montacut Appar 7. sect 49. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Ios. 13. Antiq. 18. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Epiph. in Ptol. Iustin. Nuell 146. alii 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrys. Hom 51. in Mat. Mox subsecuta est corruptela Calvin in loc Exod. 8. 14. 1 Cor. 8. 8. Rom. 13. 5. 20. Every particular or National Church hath authority to ordain change and abolish Ceremonies c. Art 34. a The Ceremonies that remain are retained for Discipline and Order which upon just causes may be altered and changed and therefore are not to be esteemed equal with Gods law Pref. of Cerem b The Church hath power to decree Rites and Ceremonies but it ought not besides the
up before the Lord against the Sun If the Land be defiled with blood it is in vain to think of any other course when God himself hath pronounced it impossible that the Land should be purged from the blood that is shed in it otherwise than by the blood of him that shed it Up then with the zeal of Phinees up for the love of God and of his people all you that are in place of authority Gird your Swords upon your thigh and with your Iavelins in your hand pursue the Idolater and the Adulterer and the Murtherer and the Oppressor and every known Offender into his Tent and nail him to the Earth that he never rise again to do more mischief Let it appear what love you bear to the State by your hatred to them and shew your pity to us by shewing none to them The destroying Angel of God attendeth upon you for his dispatch if you would but set in stoutly he would soon be gone Why should either sloth or fear or any partial or corrupt respect whatsoever make you cruel to the good in sparing the bad or why should you suffer your selves for want of courage and zeal to execute Judgment to lose either the Opportunity or the Glory of being the instruments to appease Gods wrath and to stay his plagues But for that matters appertaining to Iustice and Iudgment must pass through many hands before they come to yours and there may be so much juggling used in conveying them from hand to hand that they may be represented unto you many times in much different forms from what they were in truth and at the first That your care and zeal to execute Iustice and Iudgment faithfully according to your knowledge may not through the fault and miscarriage of other men fail of the blessed end and success that Phinees found I desire that every of them also as well as you would receive the word of Exhortation each in his place and office to set himself uprightly and unpartially as in the sight of God to advance to the utmost of his power the due course and administration of Iustice. And for this purpose by occasion of this Scripture which pointeth us to the End of these Assemblies I shall crave leave to reflect upon another which giveth us sundry particular directions conducing to that End And it is that Scripture whereinto we made some entrance the last Assizes and would have now proceeded farther had not the heavy hand of God upon us in this his grievous Visitation led me rather to make choice of this Text as the more seasonable That other is written in Exodus 23. the Three first Verses Thou shalt not raise a false report put not thine hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil neither shalt thou speak in a cause to decline after many to wrest judgment Neither shalt thou countenance a poor man in his cause Wherein were noted five special Rules shared out among five sorts of persons the Accuser the Witness the Iurer the Pleader the Officer I will but give each of them some brief intimation of their duty from their several proper rules and conclude If thou comest hither then as a Plaintiff or other Party in a civil cause or to give voluntary Information upon a Statute or to prosecute against a Malefactor or any way in the nature of an Accuser Let neither the hope of Gain or of any other advantage to thy self not secret malice or envy against thine adversary nor thy desire to give satisfaction to any third party sway thee beyond the bounds of Truth and Equity no not a little either to devise an untruth against thy neighbour of thine own head or by an hard construction to deprave the harmless actions or speeches of others or to make them worse than they are by unjust aggravations or to take advantage of letters and syllables to entrap innocency without a fault When thou art to open thy mouth against thy brother set the first Rule of that Text as a watch before the door of thy lips Thou shalt not raise a false report If thou comest hither secondly to be used as a Witness perhaps Graecâ fide like a down-right Knight of the Post that maketh of an Oath a jest and a pastime of a Deposition or dealt withal by a bribe or suborned by thy Landlord or great Neighbour or egged on with thine own spleen or malice to swear and forswear as they shall prompt thee or to s enterchange deposition with thy friend as they use to do in Greece Hodie mihi cras tibi Swear thou for me to day I 'll swear for thee to morrow or tempted with any corrupt respect whatsoever by thy Word or Oath to strengthen a false and unrighteous report When thou comest to lay thy hand upon the book lay the second Rule in that Text to thy heart Put not thy hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness Though hand joyn in hand The false witness shall not be unpunished If thou comest hither thirdly to serve for the King upon the Grand Inquest or between party and party in any cause whatsoever like those selecti judices among the Romans whom the Praetor for the year being was to nominate and that upon Oath out of the most able and serviceable men in his judgment both for Estate Understanding and Integrity or to serve upon the Tales perhaps at thine own suit to get something toward bearing charges for thy journey or yoked with a crafty or a wilful foreman that is made before-hand and a mess of tame after men withal that dare not think of being wiser than their Leader or unwilling to stickle against a Major part whether they go right or wrong or resolved already upon the Verdict no matter what the Evidence be Consider what is the weight and religion of an Oath Remember that he sinneth not less that sinneth with company Whatsoever the rest do resolve thou to do no otherwise than as God shall put into thy heart and as the Evidence shall lead thee The third Rule in that Text must be thy rule Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil They are silly that in point either of Religion or Iustice would teach us to measure either Truth or Right by multitudes If thou comest hither fourthly as to thine Harvest to reap some fruit of thy long and expenceful study in the Laws to assist thy Client and his Cause with thy Counsel Learning and Eloquence think not because thou speakest for thy Fee that therefore thy tongue is not thine own but thou must speak what thy Client will have thee speak be it true or false neither think because thou hast the liberty of the Court and perhaps the favour of the Iudg that therefore thy tongue is thine own and thou mayest speak thy