not in itself which is so terrible but in causis as the Schools speak in its causes in those sins in which it is bound up and from which it cannot be fevered for sin carries it in its womb and if we sin we are condemned and dead already we may see it smile upon us in some alluring pleasure we may see it glitter in a piece of Gold or wooe us in the rayes of Beauty but every smile every resplendency every raie is a dart and strikes us through Why will ye die why the holy Ghost is high and full in the expressing it Amamus mortem we love death Prov. 8. and the last v. and love saith the Father is vehemens voluntas a vehement and an Active will it is said to have wings and to flie to its object but it needs them not for it is ever with it the covetous is kneaded in with the world they are but one lump It is his God one in him and he in it The wanton calls his strumpet his soul and when she departeth from him he is dead the ambitious feeds on honour as 't is said Camelions do on air a disgrace kill him amamus mortem we love death which implies a kind of union and connaturality and complacency in death Again exultamus rebus pessimis Prov. 2.14 we rejoyce and delight in evil Ecstasim patimur so some render it we are transported beyond our selves we talk of it we dream of it we sweat for it we fight for it we travel for it we triumph in it we have a kind of traunce and transformation we have a Jubile in sin and we are carried delicately and with triumph to our death Nay further yet 1 Kings 22.4 we are said to make a covenant with Death Isai 29.15 we joyn with it and help it to destroy our selves as Iehoshaphat said to Ahab I am as thou art and my people as thy people we have the same friends and the same enemies we love that that upholds its dominion and we fight against that that would destroy it we strengthen and harden our selves against the light of Nature and the light of grace against Gods whispers and against his loud calls against his exhortations and obtestations and expostulations which are strength enough to discern death and pull him from his pale horse and all these will make it a volumus at least not a velleity as to good but an absolute vehement will after we have weighed the circumstances pondered the danger considered and consulted we give sentence on deaths side and though we are unwilling to think so yet we are willing to die to love death to rejoyce in death to make a Covenant with death will make the volumus full to the question why will ye die no other answer can be given but we will For if we should ask further yea but why will ye here we are at a stand horror and amazement and confusion shuts up our mouth in silence as in the 22 of Matth. when the Guest was questioned quomodo huc how he came thither the Text saies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 capistratus est he was muzled he was silent he could not speak a word For conclusion then Let us as the Wise-man counsels keep our heart Prov. 4.23 our will with all diligence for out of it are the issues of life and out of it are the issues of death let us take it from death and consine and binde it to its proper object binde it with those bonds which were made to binde Kings and Nobles the most stout and stubborn and imperious heart binde it with the fear of death with the fear of that God which here doth ask the question and not seek to ease our selves by an indiscreet and ill applied consideration of our natural weaknesse For how many make themselves wicked because they were made weak how many never make any assay to go upon this thought that they were born lame Original weaknesse is an Article of our Creed and it is our Apologie but 't is the Apologie of the worst of the covetous of the ambitious of the wanton when 't is the lust of the eyes that buries the covetous in the earth the lusts of the flesh that sets the wanton on fire the pride of life that makes the Ambitious climb so high prima haec elementa these are the first Elements these are their Alphabet they learn from their Parents they learn from their friends they learn from servants to raise a bank to enoble their name to delight themselves in the things of this world these they are taught and they have their method drawn to their hands by these evil words which are the proper Language and Dialect of the world their manners are corrupted and for this our father Adam is brought to the bar when 't is Mammon Venus and the world that have bruised us more then his fall could do And secondly pretend not the want of Grace for a Christian cannot commit a greater soloecisme then to pretend the want of that which hath been so often offered which he might have had if he would or to conceive that God should be unwilling he should do his will unwilling he should repent and turn unto him This is a charge as well as a pretense even a charge against God for bidding us rise up and walk when we were lame and not affording us a staff or working a miracle Grace is of that nature that we may want it though it be not denied we may want it when we have it and indeed we want Grace as the covetous man wants money we want it because we will not use it and so we are starved to death with bread in our hands for if we will not eat our daily bread we must die And in the next place let us not shut up our selves in our own darknesse nor plead ignorance of that which we were bound to know which we do know and will not which is written with the Sun-beams which we cannot say we see not when we may run and read it For what mountainous evils do men run upon what grosse what visible what palpable sins do they foster quae se suâ corpulentiâ produnt sins which betray themselves to be so by their bulk and corpulency Sacriledge is no sin and I cannot see how it now should for there is scarce any thing left for its gripe Lying is no sin it is our Language and we speak as many lies almost as words perjury is no sin for how many be there that reverence an oath jura perjura it is an Axiome in our morality Iusjurandum rei servandae non perdendae conditum est Plaut Rud. Act 5 sc 3. mantile quo quotidianae noxae extergentur Laber. and policie and secures our estates and intailes them on our posterity Deceit is no sin for it is our trade nay Adultery is no sin you would think with the Heathen with those who never
Errors because they have so many and that none can Erre but he that sayes he cannot and for which we call him Antichrist This bandying of Censures and Curses hath been held up too long with some loss and injury to Religion on both sides Our best way certainly to confute them is by our practice so to live that all men say The Feare of God is in us of a Truth to weave Love and Feare into one Peece to serve the Lord in feare and rejoyce in Trembling Hilar. in Fs 2. ut sit timor exultans exultatio tremens that there may be Trembling in our Joy and Joy in our Feare not to Divorce Jesus from the LORD nor the Lord from Jesus not to Feare the Lord the lesse for Jesus nor love Jesus the less for the Lord but to joyne them both together and place Christ in the midst and then there will be a pax vobis peace unto us his Oyntment shall drop upon our Love that it be not too bold and distill upon our Feare that it faint not and end in despaire that our Love may not consume our Feare nor our Fear chill our love but we shall so Love him that we do not Despaire so Fear him that we do not presume That we may Feare him as a Lord and love him as Jesus and then when he shall come in Glory to Judge both the quick and the dead we shall find him a Lord but not to affright us and a Jesus to save us our Love shall be made perfect All doubting taken from our Faith nay Faith it self shall be done away and the feare of Death shall be swallowed up in Victory and we who have made such use of Death in its representation shall never dye but live for evermore And this we have learnt from the Moriemini Why will you Die THE TENTH SERMON PART VI. EZEKIEL 33.11 why will you die Oh House of Israel WEE have lead you through the Chambers of Death through the school of Discipline The School of feare For why will ye Die Look upon Death and feare it and you shall not Dye at all Thus farre are we gone We come now ad domum Israelis to the House of Israel Why will ye die oh house of Israel For to name Israel is an Argument Take them as Israel or take them as the House of Israel Take the House for a Building or take it for a family and it may seem strange and full of Admiration that Israel which should prevaile with God should embrace Death That the House of Israel compact in it self should ruine it self In Edom 't is no strange sight to see men run on in their evill wayes In Mesheck or the Tents of Kedar there might be at least some colour for a Reply but to Israel it is Gravis expostulatio a heavy and full Expostulation Let the Amorites and Hittites let the Edomites let Gods enemies perish but let not Israel the People of God Dye Why should they die The Devil may be an Edomite but God forbid he should be an Israelite The Quarè moriemini why will ye Die we see is levell'd to the marke is here in its right and proper place and being directed to Israel is a sharp and vehement exprobration Oh Israel why will ye die I would not have you die I have made you gentem selectam a chosen people that you may not Die I have set before you Life and Death Life that you may chuse it and Death that you may run from it and why will you die My sword is drawne to affright and not to kill you and I hold it up That I may not strike I have placed death in the way that you may stop and retreat and not go on I have set my Angel my Prophet with a sword drawne in his Hand That at least you may be as wise as the Beast was under Baalam and sink and fall down under your Burden I have imprinted the very Image of Death in every sinne will ye yet goe on will ye love sinne that hath such a foule face such a terrible countenance that is thus clothed and apparrell'd with Death Quis furor oh Cives what a madnesse is this oh ye Israelites As Herod once upbraiding Cassius for his seditious behaviour in the East 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 wrot no more but this Herod to Cassius Thou art mad Philostrat in vit Herodis so God may seem to send to his People God by his Prophet to the Israelites you are mad Therefore doe my people run on in their evill wayes Isa 5.13 because they have no understanding For now look upon Death and that affrights us Look upon God and he exhorts us Reflect upon our selves and we are an Israel a Church of God There is no cause of dying but not Turning no cause of destruction but Impenitency If we will not die we shall not die and if we will Turne we cannot die at all for that if we die God passeth sentence upon us and condemnes us but kills us not but perditio tua ex te Israel our destruction comes from our selves It is not God it is not death it self that kills us but we die because we will Now by this Touch and short descant on the words so much Truth is conveyed unto us as may acquit and discharge God as no way accessary to our death and to make our Passage cleer and plain we will proceed by these steps or degrees draw out these three Conclusions 1. That God is not willing we should die 2. That he is so far from willing our death that he hath plenteously afforded sufficient meanes of life and salvation which will bring in the Third and last That if we die our death is voluntary That no other reason can be given of our death but our own will And the due consideration of these three may serve to awake our shame Naz. Or. 20. as death did our feare which is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Nazianzen speaks another Help and furtherance to worke out our Salvation Why will ye die oh House of Israel And first That God is not willing we should die is plaine enough First from the Obtestation or Expostulation it self Secondly from the Nature of God who thus expostulates For 1. why will ye die is the voice of a friend not of an enemy He that askes me why I will die by his very Question assures me he intends not to destroy me God is not as man that he should lie what he works he workes in the cleer and open day His fire is kindled to enflame us his water flows to purge and cleanse us his oyle is powred forth to supple us his commands are not snares nor his Precepts Accusations He stamps not the Devill 's face upon his Coyne He willeth not what he made not and he made not Death saith the Wiseman He wisheth he desireth we should live he is angry Wisd 1.12 and
sorry if we die He looks down upon us calls after us he exhorts and rebukes and even weepes over us as our Saviour did over Jerusalem and if we die we cannot think that he that is life it self should kill us If we must die why doth he yet complaine why doth he expostulate for if the Decree be come forth if we be lost already why doth he yet call after us how can a desire or command breath in those coasts which the power of an absolute will hath laid waste already if he hath decreed we should die he cannot desire we should live but rather the Contrary that his Decree be not void and of no effect otherwise to passe sentence an irrevocable sentence of Death and then bid us live is to look for liberty and freedome in Necessity for a sufficient effect from an unsufficient cause to command and desire that which himself had made impossible to ask a Dead man why he doth not live and to speak to a carcasse and bid it walk Indeed by some this why will you die is made but sancta simulatio but a kind of holy dissimulation so that God with them sets up man as a marke and then sticks his deadly arrows in his sides and after askes him why he will die And why may he not saith one with the same liberty Damne a soul as a Hunter kills a Deere a bloody instance as if an immortall soul which Christ set at a greater rate then the World it self nay then his own most pretious Blood were in his sight of no more valew then a Beast and God were a mighty Nimrod and did destroy mens souls for delight and pleasure Thus though they dare not call God the Author of sinne for who is so sinfull that could hear and not Anathematize it yet others and those no children in understanding think it a Conclusion that will naturally and necessarily follow upon such bloody premises and they are more encouraged by those ill-boding words which have dropt from their quills For say some vocat ut induret He calls them to no other end but that he may harden them he hardens them that he may destroy them He exhorts them to turn that they may not Turn◠He asks them why they will die that they may run on in their evill wayes even upon Death it self when they break his command they fulfill his will and 't is his pleasure they should sinne 't is his pleasure they should die and when he calls upon them not to sinne when he asks them why they will die he doth but Dissemble for they are dead already Horribili decreto by that horrible antecedaneous Decree of Reprobation And now tell me If we admit of this What 's become of the expostulation what use is there of the obtestation why doth he yet ask why will ye Die I called it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a reason unanswerable but if this Fancy this Interpretation take place it is no reason at all why will ye die the Answer is ready and what other answer can a poore praecondemned soul make Domine Deus tu nosti Lord God thou knowest Thou condemnest us before thou mad'st us Thou didst Destroy us before we were and if we die Even so Good Lord For it is thy good pleasure Fato volvimur it is our Destiny or rather Est deus in nobis not a stoicall fate but thy right hand and thy strong irresistible Arme hath destroyed us and so the expostulation is answered and the Quare mortemini is nothing else but mortui estis why will ye die that 's the Text the Glosse is you are dead already But in the Second place That this expostulation is true and Hearty may be seen in the very Nature of God who is Truth it self who hath but one property and Quality saith Trismegistus and that is Goodness and therefore cannot bid us live when he intends to kill us For consider God before man had fallen from him by sin and disobedience and we shall see nothing but the works of his Goodnesse and Love The heavens were the workes of his Fingers Basil Hem. in Famem sicci◠he created Angels and men he spake the word and all was done 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Basil what necessity was there that he should thus break forth into Action who compell'd him who perswaded him who was his Counsellor He was All-sufficient and stood in need of nothing l. 4. c. 28. non quasi Indigens plasmavit Adam saith Irenaeus it was not out of any indigencie or Defect in himself that he made Adam after his Image He was all to himself before he made any thing nor could millions of Worlds have added to him What was it to him that there were Angels made or Seraphin or Cherubin he gain'd not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Athena Legatio pro Christianis said Aristotle for there could be no Accession nothing to heighten his perfection Did he make the world 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Athenagor as calls it as an Instrument to make him Musick Did he cloth the Lilies and dresse up Nature in various colours to delight himself or could he not reigne without man saith Mirandula God hath a most free and powerfull and immutable will and therefore it was not necessary for him to work or to begin to work but when he would for he might both will and not will the Creation of all Things without any change of his will but it pleased him out of his goodness thus to break forth into Action will you know the cause saith the Sceptique why he made world Sext. Emperic adv Mathemat pag. 327. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He was good Nihil ineptius saith one quam cogitare Deum nihil agentem There is nothing more vaine then to conceive that God could be idle or doing of nothing and were it not for his Goodnesse we could hardly conceive him ad extrà agentem working any thing out of himself who was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All-sufficient 1 Tim. 1.11 and Blessed for evermore infinitely happy though he had never created the Heaven and the Earth though there had neither been Angel or man to worship him but he did all these things because he was good Bonitas saith Tertul. otium sui non patitur hinc censetur Tert. adv Marcion l. 2. si agatur Goodness is an Active and restlesse quality and it is not when it is Idle it cannot containe it self in it self and by his Goodness he made man made him for his Glory and so to be partaker of his happiness placed him here on earth to raise him up to Heaven made him a living soul ut in vitâ hac compararet vitam that in this short and Transitory life he might fit himself for an Abiding City and in this moment work out Aeternity Thus of Himself God is good nor can any evill proceed from him if he frowne we first move him
People Crassum reddito cor populi hujus Make the heart of this people fatt and their eares Heavy lest they see with their Eyes and heare with their Eares and be converted Now to make their heart fatt and their eares heavy and to shut up their eyes is more then a bare permission is in a manner to destine and appoint them to Death most true if it can be proved out of this place that God did either But it is one thing to Prophesy a Thing shall be done and another to doe it Hector in Homer foretells Achilles Death and Herod the fall of Mezentius in Virgil and our Saviour the Destruction of Hierusalem but neither was Hectors Prophesy the cause of Achilles Death nor Herods of Mezentius nor our Saviour of the Destruction of Hierusalem vade dic Goe and tell them makes it a plame prediction what manner of men they would be to whom Christ was to speake stubborn and refractory and such as would harden their faces against the Truth If you will not take this Interpretation our Saviour is an Interpreter one of a Thousand nay one for all the world and tells the multitude that in them was fulfilled the Prophesy of Esay which saith By hearing you shall heare and not understand Matth. 13.14 for this Peoples heart is waxen fat and their eyes have they closed that they might not see And here if their eyes were shut it were fit one would Think they should be open'd True saith Chrysostome if they had been borne blinde or if this had been the immediate Act of God but because they wilfully shut their eyes he doth not say simply they do not see but seeing they do not see to shew what was the cause of their blindnesse even a perverse and froward heart they saw his Miracles they said he did them by Beelzebub He tells them that he is come to shew them the will of God they are peremptory and resolute that he is not of God and bring corrupt Judges against their own sight and understanding they were justly punisht with the losse of both For it is just that he should be blind that puts out his own eyes Yet was not this incrassation or blinding through any malevolent influence from God but this action is therefore attributed to God because whatsoever light he had afforded them whatsoever means he had offered them whatsoever he did for them was through their own fault and stubbornness of no more use to them then colours to a blinde man or as the Wise-man speaks a messe of Pottage on a Dead-mans Grave We might here Sylvam ingentem commovere meet with many other places of Scripture like to this but we will touch but one more and it is that which is so common in mens mouthes and at the first hearing conveighs to our understanding a shew and appearance of some positive act in God which is more then a bare permission For God tells Moses in plain termes Indurabo cor Pharaonis I will harden Pharaohs heart Exod. 7.3 And here I will not say with Garson aliud est litera aliud est literalis sensus that the letter is one thing and the litteral sense another Hil de Trin. l. 8. but rather with Hilary Optimus est lector qui dictorum in telligentiam ex dictis potius expectet quam imponat retulerit magis quam attulerit he is the best reader of Scripture who doth rather wait and expect what sense the words will beare then on the sudden rashly fasten what sense he please and carry away the meaning not bring one nor cry this must be the sense of the Scripture which his presumption formerly had set down Sure I am none of the Fathers which I have seen make this induration and hardning of Pharaohs heart a positive act of God not Saint Augustine himself who was more likely to look this way then any of the rest although he interprets this place of Scripture in divers places Augustin Feriâ 4 post 3. Dominic in Quadrages Pharaoh non potentiae sed patientiâ Dei indurabatur id Ser. 88. I will but mention one and it is in one of his Lent Sermons Quoties auditur cor Pharaonis Dominum obdurasse c. As often as it is read in the Church that God did harden Pharaohs heart some scruple presently ariseth not onely in the mindes of the ignorant Laity but of the Learned Clergy and for these very words the Manichees most Sacrilegiously condemned the old Testament and Marcion rather then he would yeeld that good and evil proceeded from the same God did run upon a grosser impiety and made another two principles one of good and another of evil But we may lay this saith he as a sure ground and an infallible Axiome Deus non deserit nisi prius deserentem God never forsakes any man till he first forsake God When we continue in sin when the multitude of our sins beget despair and despair obduration when we adde sin to sin and to make up the weight that sinks us when we are the worse for Gods mercy and the worse for his Judgements when his mercy hardens us and his light blindes us God then may be said to harden our hearts as a Father by way of upbrayding may tell his prodigal and Thristlesse son ego talem te feci t is my love and goodnesse hath occasioned this I have made thee so by sparing thee when I might have struck thee Dead I have nourished this thy pertinacy although all the Fathers love and indulgency was grounded upon a just hope and expectation of some change and alteration in his son Look upon every circumstance in the story of Pharaoh and we cannot finde one which was not as a Hammer to malleat and soften his stony heart nor do we read of any upon whom God did bestow so much paines His ten plagues were as ten Commandements to let the people go and had he relented at the first saith Chrysostom he had never felt a second so that it will plainly appear that the induration and hardning Pharaohs heart was not the cause but the effect of his malice and rebellion Magnam mansuetudinem contemptae gratiae major sequi solet ira vindictae for the contempt of Gods mercy and there is mercy even in his Judgements doth alwayes make way for that induration which calls down the wrath of God to revenge it We do not read that God decreed to harden Pharaohs heart but when Pharaoh was unwilling to bow when he was deaf to Gods Thunder and despised his Judgements and scorn'd his Miracles God determined to leave him to himself to set him up as an ensample of his wrath to work his Glory out of him to leave him to himself and his own lusts which he foresaw would lead him to ruine and destruction But if we will tie our selves to the letter we may finde these several expressions in several Texts 1. Pharaoh hardned his heart 2.
makes it gravell in our mouths and strips us of our rayment and drives us amongst Swine For Friendship It may tie a knot but it will fly in pieces of it self for the friendship of evill men is as false and deceitfull as themselves For our Families It raises a Tempest even in these Basons Fluctus in Simpulo Proverb Tull. 3. de leg these little bodies these petty resemblances of a Republick It sets Father against Sonne and sonne against Father makes a servant a Traytor and raises enemies within doores and draws out a Battalio in a Cottage For Common-wealths the least sinne may sooner overthrow them then the greatest set them up and of all their Glories they cannot shew any one of them that was brought in by either It may raise them for a time perhaps to some height butthen it gets up above them lies heavy upon them and presseth them downe breaks them to pieces and Buries them in their Rubbish this it doth and shall that which can doe nothing but worke desolation be a fit prop for Religion to leane on when shee seems to sink or to bring her back when the voice is that she is gone out of our Coasts Can evill be fitt for any Thing but that which is like it But we are told Tale critopus tuum qualis Intentio Bernard de modo bene vivendi c. 15. that our work doth follow the Nature and quality of our Intention True if the Intention be Evill If I build a Church to set up Idolls If I build a colledge to perpetuate my name If I be very holy on the sudden and pay my vow to usury a Crown if I do a good act in it self for some evil end for then the intention alters and changes the Nature of it and makes it like unto it self and the reason is plain because any one bad Circumstance is enough to make an Action evil but bonum ex causâ intergrâ the concurrence of all is required to denominate it good Greg. Past Cur Part. c. 4. multa non illcitavitiat animus the minde and intention doth bring in a guilt upon those Actions which are otherwise lawful but cannot make that just which is forbidden cannot answer for the breach of a Law Briefly a good intention and a good action may be joyned together and be one nor can they be good but in this conjunction but to joyn a good intention to a bad action is with Mezentius in the Poet to tie a living Body to a Carcase it may colour indeed and hide a bad Action but it cannot consecrate it it may disguise a man of Belial but it cannot make him a Saint it may be as a Ticket or a passe to carry a wicked man to the end which he sets up and there leave him more secure it may be but without doubt more wicked then before For Murder now hath no voice Faction is Devotion Sacriledge is zeal all is well because we mean well we fix up a good intention in our fancy and that is our pole-star and having that in our eye we may steer our course as we please and buldge but swell our sayles and bear forward boldly till at last we are carried upon that rock which sinks us for ever and therefore to conclude this a good intention cannot pull out the sting from death nor the guilt from sin but if we sin though it be with an honest minde we sin voluntarily in brief though we know it not to be a sin though from the Tribunal of conscience we check our selves before we commit it though we do evil but intend good though we see it not though we approve it not though we intend it not as evil yet evil it is and a voluntary evil and without repentance hath no better wages then death and this expostulation may be put up to us Quare moriemini Why will ye die for we cannot say but they are willing to die who make such hast to the pit of ruine and in their swift and eager pursuit of death do but cast back a faint look toward the land of the living We must now draw towards a conclusion and we must conclude and shut up all even death it self in the will of man we cannot lay it upon any natural weaknesse nor upon the want of grace and Asistance we cannot plead ignorance nor the distaste and reluctancy of our minde nor can a good intention name that will good which is fixt on evil nor the means which we use commend and secure that end which is the work of sin and hath death waiting upon it if we die we can finde no other answer to this question Why will ye die but that which is not worth the putting up 't is quiavolumus because we will die Take all the weaknesse or corruption of our nature look upon that inexhaustible sountain of Grace but as we think dryed up take the darknesse of our understanding the cloud is from the will Nolumus intelligere we will not understand take all those sad symptomes and prognosticks of death a wandring unruly fancy 't is the will whiffs it about turbulent passions the tempest is from the will etiam quod invitus facere videor si facio voluntate facio even that which I do with some reluctancy if I do it I do it willingly all provocations and incitements imaginable being supposed no love no fear no anger not the devil himself can determine the will or force us into action and if we die it is quia volumus because we will die If death be the conclusion that which infers it is the will of man which brought sin and death into the world And this may seem strange that any should be willing to die Ask the prophanest person living that hath sold himself to wickednesse and so is even bound over to death and he will tell you he is willing to be saved heaven is his wish and eternal happines his desire as for death the Remembrance of it is bitter unto him death if you do but name it he trembles The Glutton is greedy after meat but loathes a disease the wanton seeks out pleasures but not those evils they carry with them under their wing the Revenger would wash his feet in the blood of his enemy but not be drownd in 't the Thief would steal but would not grinde in the prison but the Philosopher will tell us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Aristot. Ath. 2.1 the beginning of all these is in the will and he that will be intemperate will surfet he that will be wanton will be weak he that taketh the sword will perish by the sword he that will spoil will be spoiled and he that will sin will die Clem. Alex. strom 2. every mans death is a voluntary act not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 out of any natural appetite to perish but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by his own choice who did chuse it though not in se
God to remember him in his last Chap. v. 22. he interprets himself and pardon me according to the multitude of thy mercies when the Thief on the Crosse bespeaks Christ to remember him when he came into his kingdome he then beg'd a kingdome Indeed such a benefit deserves to be had in everlasting remembrance for what is a jewell of a rich price in the hands of a foole who hath no heart to receive and keep it what were all the glory of the Starres of the Sun and the Moon which he hath ordained if there were no eye to behold them How can seed be quickned if the womb of the earth receive it not or what a pearl is the Gospel if the heart be not the Cabinet what is Christ if he be not remembred We must then and upon this occasion especially open the register of our soul and enroll Christ there in deep and living characters For the memory is a preserver of that which she receives but then it is not enough for us to behold these glorious Phantasmes and carry them about with us as pretious Antidotes unlesse we bring them ab intestino memoriae ad os cogitationis as Saint Aust speaks from the inward part of the memory to the mouth and stomack of the cogitative faculty which is our spirituall rumination August cont Faust Manich. l. 6. c. 7. our chewing of the cud unlesse we do Colloqui cum fide hold a Colloquie within us and Catechize our faith and enquire whether we remember Christ as we should whether our faith be as strong our hop eas stedfast our charity as fervent as so great love requireth whether it be such a faith and such as hope and so intensive a charity as Christ and his love thus diffused abroad might beget whether Christ be hung up in this gallery of our soule onely as a picture or whether he be a Living Christ and dwelleth in us of a truth For the memory as it is the womb to forme and fashion Christ so it may yield good blood to nourish him and in this sence Plato solus in tanta gentium sylvâ in tanto sapientum prato dearum oblitus recordatus est Tertull de anim c. 24. that of Plato may be true 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we learn and are instructed by those notions which were formerly imprinted in our Memory we do conceive and are in travell as Saint Paul speakes with Christ till he be fully formed in us we work him out in Cogitatoria in the Elaboratory of our hearts When we have him in our thoughts and his precepts alwaies before our eyes as in a book which checkes us at every turn and by a frequent Contemplation of them draw our soules out of those encumbrances which many times involve and fetter them when we recollect our mind into it self and fasten it to this rock where it may rest as upon a holy hill from whence it may look down and behold every object in its proper shape look upon an injury as a benefit persecution as a blessing and see life in the face and countenance of death then and not till then we may be said to remember him For can he remember a meek Christ who will be angry without a cause can he remember a poore Christ that makes Mammon his God can he remember the Prince of Peace who is wholly bent to war can he remember Christ who is as ready to betray him as Judas and naile him to the Crosse as Pilat Better he were quite raced out of our memory then that we should thus set him there as a mark to be shot at then to be thus set up to be scorned and reviled and spit upon and Crucified again better never to have known him then to know and put him to shame And therefore if we will remember him we must contemplate him in his own sphere in that site and aspect which he looks upon us deliberare causas expendere well weigh and consider upon what termes and conditions we did first receive him and entertain him in our thoughts and memories and this will drive Christianity home make it enter into the soule and spirit fasten and rivet Christ into us and make him a part of us that his promises and precepts and the virtue of his death and passion may be in our memory as vessels are in a well-ordered family whence upon every occasion we may readily take them out for our use find a defence against every temptation a buckler for evey dart that so the love of Christ may swallow up all reluctancy in us in victory This gives us a true taste and relish of the sweetnesse of those blessings and benefits which we receive in the Sacrament For the sweetnesse of honey saith Basil is not known so well by the Philosophers discourse as by the taste which is a better and surer judge then the most subtile Naturalists no more are the benefits of Christ and his Gospel though uttered by the Tongue of men and Angels in the words which conveigh them as in a heart melted and transformed into the Love of Christ then in the mind of man when it is the same mind which is in Christ Jesus there he is remembred indeed there he is placed not as in the High Priests Hall to be mockt and derided and blasphemed but as in his throne in his heaven where he dispenseth his light his joy his glory such glory as no Eloquence is equall to no language can expresse not Saint Paul himself who was caught up into Paradise and tasted the sweetnesse of it and then tells us no more then this that they were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the words were unspeakable words words which it was not possible for a man to utter which was in effect 2 Cor. 12.4 to tell us he did feele it but could not tell us what it was and thus to taste him is to remember him And first It takes in our faith I do not meane a dead and unactive faith for that leaves us dead and buried in a land of Oblivion never looking upon Christ or his benefits nor gathering any strength or virtue from him and no more considering this our High Priest then if he had never offered himself never satisfied never been but a faith that worketh by love a faith that followes Christ through every Period and stage and passage of his blessed oeconomy a faith that is a disciple and followes him whithersoever he goes looks upon him in time of prosperity and cloths him in the dayes of affliction forgets them remembring him in injuries and forgives them in death it self and makes him our Resurrection makes us one with him that we cannot think or speak or move that we cannot live nor dye without him Now the time of receiving the Sacrament of the receiving these pledges of his love and these pignora fidei these pledges of our faith is the time of actuating of quickning