worke of ours The wages of sinne is death but eternall life is the gift of God through Iesus Christ our Lord Through Jesus Christ that is as we are considered in him and in him who is a Saviour a Redeemer we are not considered but as sinners So that Gods purpose works no otherwise upon us but as we are sinners neither did God meane ill to any man till that man was in his sight a sinner God shuts no man out of heaven by a lock on the inside except that man have clapped the doore after him and never knocked to have it opened againe that is except he have sinned and never repented Christ does not say in our text Follow me for I will prefer you he will not have that the reason the cause If I would not serve God except I might be saved for serving him I shall not be saved though I serve him My first end in serving God must not be my selfe but he and his glory It is but an addition from his own goodnesse Et faciam Follow me and I will doe this but yet it is as certaine and infallible as a debt or as an effect upon a naturall cause Those propositions in nature are not so certaine The Earth is at such a time just between the Sunne and the Moone therefore the Moone must be Eclipsed The Moone is at such time just betweene the Earth and the Sunne therefore the Sunne must be Eclipsed for upon the Sunne and those other bodies God can and hath sometimes wrought miraculously and changed the naturall courses of them The Sunne stood still in Ioshua And there was an unnaturall Eclipse at the death of Christ But God cannot by any Miracle so worke upon himselfe as to make himselfe not himselfe unmercifull or unjust And out of his mercy he makes this promise Doe this and thus it shall be with you and then of his justice he performes that promise which was made meerely and onely out of mercy If we doe it though not because we doe it we shall have eternall life Therefore did Andrew and Peter faithfully beleeve such a net should be put into their hands Christ had vouchsafed to fish for them and caught them with that net and they beleeved that he that made them fishers of men would also enable them to catch others with that net And that is truly the comfort that refreshes us in all our Lucubrations and night-studies through the course of our lives that that God that sets us to Sea will prosper our voyage that whether he six us upon our owne or send us to other Congregations he will open the hearts of those Congregations to us and blesse our labours to them For as S. Pauls Vaesi non lies upon us wheresoever we are Wo be unto us if wee doe not preach so as S. Paul sayes to we were of all men the most miserable if wee preached without hope of doing good With this net S. Peter caught three thousand soules in one day at one Sermon and five thousand in another Acts 2.41.4.4 With this net S. Paul fished all the Mediterranean Sea and caused the Gospel of Christ Jesus to abound from Jerusalem round about to Illyricum This is the net Rom. 15.19 with which if yee be willing to bee caught that is to lay downe all your hopes and affiances in the gracious promises of his Gospel then you are fishes reserved for that great Mariage-feast which is the Kingdome of heaven where whosoever is a dish is a ghest too whosoever is served in at the table sits at the table whosoever is caught by this net is called to this feast and there your soules shall be satisfied as with marrow and with fatnesse in an infallible assurance of an everlasting and undeterminable terme in inexpressible joy and glory Amen SERM. LXXIII Preached to the King in my Ordinary wayting at VVhite-hall 18. Aprill 1626. JOH 14.2 In my Fathers House are many Mansions If it were not so I would have told you THere are occasions of Controversies of all kinds in this one Verse And one is whether this be one Verse or no For as there are Doctrinall Controversies out of the sense and interpretation of the words so are there Grammatticall differences about the Distinction and Interpunction of them Some Translations differing therein from the Originall as the Originall Copies are distinguished and interpuncted now and some differing from one another The first Translation that was that into Syriaque as it is expressed by Tremellius renders these words absolutely precisely as our two Translations doe And as our two Translations doe applies the second clause and proposition Si quo minus If it were not so I would have told you as in affirmation and confirmation of the former In domo Patris In my Fathers house there are many Mansions For If it were not so I would have told you But then as both our Translations doe the Syriaque also admits into this Verse a third clause and proposition Vado parare I goe to prepare you a place Now Beza doth not so Piscator doth not so They determine this Verse in those two propositions which constitute our Text In my Fathers house c. and then they let fall the third proposition as an inducement and inchoation of the next Verse I goe to prepare a place for you and if I goe I will come againe Divers others doe otherwise and diversly For some doe assume as we and the Syriaque doe all three propositions into the Verse but then they doe not as we and the Syriaque doe make the second a proofe of the first In my Fathers house are many Mansions For If it were not so I would have told you But they refer the second to the third proposition If it were not so I would have told you For I goe to prepare you a place and being to goe from you would leave you ignorant of nothing But we find no reason to depart from that Distinction and Interpunction of these words which our own Church exhibits to us and therefore we shall pursue them so and so determine though not the Verse for into the Verse we admit all three propositions yet the whole purpose and intention of our Saviour in those two propositions which accomplish our Text In my Fathers house c. This Interpunction then offers and constitutes our two parts Divisic First A particular Doctrine which Christ infuses into his Disciples In domo Patris In my Fathers house are many Mansions And then a generall Rule and Scale by which we are to measure and waigh all Doctrines Si quo minus If it were not so I would have told you In the order of nature the later part fals first into consideration The rule of all Doctrines which in this place is The word of God in the mouth of Christ digested into the Scriptures In which wee shall have just more then just necessary occasion to note both their
use the Law lawfully Let us use our liberty of reading Scriptures according to the Law of liberty that is charitably to leave others to their liberty if they but differ from us and not differ from Fundamentall Truths Si quis quaerat ex me quid horum Moses senserit If any man ask me which of these which may be all true Moses meant Non sum sermones istiâ—â—onfessiones Lord sayes hee Ibid. This that I say is not said by way of Confession as I intend it should if I doe not freely confesse that I cannot tell which Moses meant But yet I can tell that this that I take to be his meaning is true and that is enough Let him that findes a true sense of any place rejoyce in it Let him that does not beg it of thee Vtquid mihi molest us est Why should any man presse me to give him the true sense of Moses here or of the holy Ghost in any darke place of Scripture Ego illuminem ullum hominen venientem in mundum 1.13 C. 10. saies he Is that said of me that I am the light that enlightned every man any man Iohn 1.9 that comes into this world So far I will goe saies he so far will we in his modesty and humility accompany him as still to propose Quod luce veritatis quod fruge utilitatis excellit such a sense as agrees with other Truths that are evident in other places of Scripture and such a sense as may conduce most to edisication For to those two does that heavenly Father reduce the foure Elements that make up a right exposition of Scripture which are first the glory of God such a sense as may most advance it secondly the analogie of faith such a sense as may violate no confessed Article of Religion and thirdly exaltation of devotion such a sense as may carry us most powerfully upon the apprehension of the next life and lastly extension of charity such a sense as may best hold us in peace or reconcile us if we differ from one another And within these limits wee shall containe our selves The glory of God the analogie of faith the exaltation of devotion the extension of charity In all the rest that belongs to the explication or application to the literall or spirituall sense of these words And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters to which having stopped a little upon this generall consideration the exposition of darke places we passe now Within these rules we proceed to enquire who this Spirit of God is or what it is Spiritus whether a Power or a Person The Jews who are afraid of the Truth lest they should meete evidences of the doctrine of the Trinity and so of the Messias the Son of God if they should admit any spirituall sense admit none but cleave so close to the letter as that to them the Scripture becomes Liter a occidens A killing Letter and the savour of death unto death They therefore in this Spirit of God are so far from admitting any Person that is God as they admit no extraordinary operation or vertue proceeding from God in this place but they take the word here as in many other places of Scripture it does to signifie onely a winde and then that that addition of the name of God The Spirit of God which is in their Language a denotation of a vehemency of a high degree of a superlative as when it is said of Saul Sopor Domini A sleepe of God was upon him it is intended of a deepe a dead sleepe inforces induces no more but that a very strong winde blew upon the face of the waters and so in a great part dryed them up And this opinion I should let flye away with the winde if onely the Jews had said it But Theodoret hath said it too and therefore we afford it so much answer That it is a strange anticipation that Winde which is a mixt Meteor to the making whereof divers occasions concurre with exhalations should be thus imagined before any of these causes of Winds were created or produced and that there should be an effect before a cause is somewhat irregular In Lapland the Witches are said to sell winds to all passengers but that is but to turne those windes that Nature does produce which way they will but in our case the Jews and they that follow them dreame winds before any winds or cause of winds was created The Spirit of God here cannot be the Wind. It cannot be that neither which some great men in the Christian Church have imagined it to be Operatio Dei The power of God working upon the waters so some or Efficientia Dei A power by God infused into the waters so others August And to that S. Augustine comes so neare as to say once in the negative Spiritus Dei hic res dei est sed non ipse Deut est The Spirit of God in this place is something proceeding from God but it is not God himselfe And once in the affirmative Posse esse vitalem creaturam quâ universus mundus movetur That this Spirit of God may be that universall power which sustaines and inanimates the whole world which the Platoniques have called the Soule of the world and others intend by the name of Nature and we doe well if we call The providence of God Spiritus Sanctus But there is more of God in this Action then the Instrument of God Nature or the Vice-roy of God Providence for as the person of God the Son was in the Incarnation so the person of God the Holy Ghost was in this Action though far from that manner of becomming one and the same thing with the waters which was done in the Incarnation of Christ who became therein perfect man That this word the Spirit of God is intended of the Person of the Holy Ghost in other places of Scripture is evident undeniable unquestionable and that therefore it may be so taken here Where it is said The Spirit of God shall rest upon him Esay 11.2 upon the Messiah where it is said by himselfe The Lord and his Spirit is upon me And the Lord and his Spirit hath anointed me there it is certainly and therefore here it may be probably spoken of the Holy Ghost personally It is no impossible sense it implies no contradiction It is no inconvenient sense it offends no other article it is no new sense nor can we assigne any time when it was a new sense Basil The eldest Fathers adhere to it as the ancientest interpretation Saint Basil saies not onely Constantissimè asseverandum est We must constantly maintaine that interpretation for all that might be his owne opinion not onely therefore Quia verius est for that might be but because he found it to be the common opinion of those times but Quia à majoribus nostris approbatum because it is accepted for the true
In thy Treasury in thine Ordinance in thy Church Thou hast it to derive it to convey it upon us Here then is the first step of Sauls cure and of ours That there was not onely a word the Word Christ himselfe a Son of God in heaven but a Voyce the word uttered and preached Christ manifested in his Ordinance He heard a voyce He heard it How often does God speake and no body heares the voyce Audivit He speaks in his Canon in Thunder and he speaks in our Canon in the rumour of warres He speaks in his musique in the harmonious promises of the Gospel and in our musique in the temporall blessings of peace and plenty And we heare a noyse in his Judgements and wee heare a sound in his mercies but we heare no voyce we doe not discern that this noyse or this sound comes from any certain person we do not feele them to be mercies nor to be judgements uttered from God but naturall accidents casuall occurrencies emergent contingencies which as an Atheist might think would fall out though there were no God or no commerce no dealing no speaking between God and Man Though Saul came not instantly to a perfect discerning who spoke yet he saw instantly it was a Person above nature and therefore speakes to him in that phrase of submission Quis es Domine Lord who art thou And after with trembling and astonishment as the Text sayes Domine quid me vis facere Lord what wilt thou have me to do Then we are truliest said to hear when we know from whence the voyce comes Princes are Gods Trumpet and the Church is Gods Organ but Christ Jesus is his voyce When he speaks in the Prince when he speaks in the Church there we are bound to heare and happy if we doe hear Man hath a natural way to come to God by the eie by the creature Rom 2. So Visible things shew the Invisible God But then God hath super-induced a supernaturall way by the eare For though hearing be naturall yet that faith in God should come by hearing a man preach is supernatural God shut up the naturall way in Saul Seeing He struck him blind But he opened the super-naturall way he inabled him to heare and to heare him God would have us beholden to grace and not to nature and to come for our salvation to his Ordinances to the preaching of his Word and not to any other meanes Though hee were blinde even that blindnesse as it was a humiliation and a diverting of his former glaring lights was a degree of mercy of preparative mercy yet there was a voyce which was another degree And a voyce that he heard which was a degree above that and so farre we are gone And he heard it saying that is distinctly and intelligibly which is our next Circumstance He heares him saying that is He heares him so as that he knowes what he sayes so Dicentem as that he understands him for he that heares the word and understands it not is subject to that which Christ sayes That the wicked one comes Mat. 13.19 and catches away that that was sowne S. Augustine puts himselfe earnestly upon the contemplation of the Creation as Moses hath delivered it he findes it hard to conceive and he sayes Si esset ante me Moses Confes l. 1. c. 3. If Moses who writ this were here Tenerem eum per te obsecrarem I would hold him fast and beg of him for thy sake O my God that he would declare this worke of the Creation more plainly unto me But then sayes that blessed Father Si Hebraea voce loqueretur If Moses should speake Hebrew to mee mine eares might heare the sound but my minde would not heare the voyce I might heare him but I should not heare what he said This was that that distinguished betweene S. Paul and those who were in his company at this time Ver. 7. Acts 22.9 S. Luke sayes in this Chapter That they heard the voyce and S. Paul relating the story againe after sayes They heard not the voyce of him that spoke to me they heard a confused sound but they distinguished it not to be the voyce of God nor discerned Gods purpose in it Ver. 28. In the twelfth of Iohn there came a voyce from Heaven from God himselfe and the people said It thundred So apt is naturall man to ascribe even Gods immediate and miraculous actions to naturall causes apt to rest and determine in Nature and leave out God The Poet chides that weaknesse as he cals it to be afraid of Gods judgements or to call naturall accidents judgements Quo morbo mentem concusse timore Deorum sayes he he sayes The Conscience may be over-tender and that such timerous men are sick of the feare of God But it is a blessed disease The feare of God and the true way to true health And though there be a morall constancy that becomes a Christian well not to bee easily shaked with the variations and revolutions of this world yet it becomes him to establish his constancy in this That God hath a good purpose in that action not that God hath no hand in that action That God will produce good out of it not that God hath nothing to doe in it The Magicians themselves were forced to confesse Digitum Dei Exod. 6.16 The finger of God in a small matter Never thinke it a weakenesse to call that a judgement of God which others determine in Nature Doe so so far as works to thy edification who seest that judgement though not so far as to argue and conclude the finall condemnation of that man upon whom that judgement is fallen Certainely we were better call twenty naturall accidents judgements of God then frustrate Gods purpose in any of his powerfull deliverances by calling it a naturall accident and suffer the thing to vanish so and God be left unglorified in it or his Church unedified by it Then we heare God when we understand what he sayes And therefore as we are bound to blesse God that he speakes to us and heares us speake to him in a language which wee understand and not in such a strange language as that a stranger who should come in and heare it 1 Cor. 14.23 would thinke the Congregation mad So also let us blesse him for that holy tendernesse to be apt to feele his hand in every accident and to discerne his presence in every thing that befals us Saul heard the voyce saying He understood what it said and by that found that it was directed to him which is also another step in this last part This is an impropriation without sacriledge Sibi and an enclosure of a Common without damage to make God mine owne to finde that all that God sayes is spoken to me and all that Christ suffered was suffered for me And as Saul found this voyce at first to be directed to him so
because he may have roome in an Hospitall or reliefe by a pension when he comes home lame but because he may get something by going into a fat country and against a rich enemy Though honour may seeme to feed upon blowes and dangers men goe cheerefully against an enemy from whom something is to be got for profit is a good salve to knocks a good Cere-cloth to bruises and a good Balsamum to wounds God therefore here raises the reward out of the enemy feed him and thou shalt gaine by it But yet the profit that God promises by the enemy here is rather that we shall gaine a soule then any temporall gaine rather that we shall make that enemy a better man then that we shall make him a weaker enemy God respects his spirituall good as we shall see in that phrase which is our last branch Congeres carbones Thou shalt heape coales of fire upon his head It is true that S. Chrysostome and not he alone takes this phrase to imply a Revenge Carbones that Gods judgements shall be the more vehement upon such ungratefull persons Et terrebuntur beneficiis the good turnes that thou hast done to them shall be a scourge and a terror to their consciences This sense is not inconvenient but it is too narrow The Holy Ghost hath taken so large a Metaphor as implyes more then that It implyes the divers offices and effects of fire all this That if he have any gold any pure metall in him this fire of this kindnesse will purge out the drosse there is a friend made If he be nothing but straw and stubble combustible still still ready to take fire against thee this fire which Gods breath shall blow will consume him and burn him out and there is an enemy marred If he have any tendernesse any way this fire will mollifie him towards thee Nimis durus animus sayes S. Augustine he is a very hard hearted man Qui si ultro dilectionem non vult impendere etiam nolit rependere Who though he will not requite thy love yet will not acknowledge it If he be waxe he melts with this fire and if he be clay he hardens with it and then thou wilt arme thy selfe against that pellet Thus much good Origen God intends to the enemy in this phrase that it is pia vindicta si resipiscant we have taken a blessed revenge upon our enemies if our charitable applying of our selves to them may bring them to apply themselves to God and to glorifie him si benefaciendo cicuremus sayes S. Hierome if we can tame a wilde beast by sitting up with him and reduce an enemy by offices of friendship it is well 〈◊〉 much good God intends him in this phrase and so much good he intends us that si non incendant if these coales do not purge him Aben Ezra Levi Gherson si non injiciant pudorem if they do not kindle a shame in him to have offended one that hath deserved so well yet this fire gives thee light to see him clearely and to run away from him and to assure thee that he whom so many benefits cannot reconcile is irreconcileable SERMON XI Preached upon Candlemas day MAT. 9.2 And Iesus seeing their faith said unto the sick of the palsie My son be of good cheare thy sins be forgiven thee IN these words Divisio and by occasion of them we shall present to you these two generall considerations first upon what occasion Christ did that which he did and then what it was that he did And in the first we shall see first some occasions that were remote but yet conduce to the Miracle it selfe some circumstances of time and place and some such dispositions and then the more immediate occasion the disposition of those persons who presented this sick man to Christ and there we shall see first that Faith was the occasion of all for without faith it is impossible to please God and without pleasing of God it is impossible to have remission of sins It was fides and fides illorum their faith all their faith for though in the faith of others there be an assistance yet without a personall faith in himselfe no man of ripe age comes so far as to the forgivenesse of sins And then this faith of them all was fides visa a faith that was seen Christ saw their faith and he saw it as man it was a faith expressed and declared in actions And yet when all was done it is but cum vidit it is not quia vidit Christ did it When he saw not Because he saw their faith that was not the principle and primary cause of his mercy for the mercy of God is all and above all it is the effect and it is the cause too there is no cause of his mercy but his mercy And when we come in the second part to consider what in his mercy he did we shall see first that he establishes him and comforts him with a gracious acceptation with that gracious appellation Fili Son He doth not disavow him he doth not disinherite him and then he doth not wound him whom God had striken he doth not flea him whom God had scourged he doth not salt him whom God had flead he doth not adde affliction to affliction he doth not shake but settle that faith which he had with more Confide fili My son be of good cheare and then he seales all with that assurance Dimittuntur peccata Thy sins are forgiven thee In which first he catechises this patient and gives him all these lessons first that he gives before we ask for he that was brought they who brought him had asked nothing in his behalfe when Christ unasked enlarged himself towards them Dat prius God gives before we ask that is first And then Dat meliora God gives better things then we ask All that all they meant to ask was but bodily health and Christ gave him spirituall and the third lesson was that sin was the cause of bodily sicknesse and that therefore he ought to have sought his spirituall recovery before his bodily health and then after he had thus rectified him by this Catechisme implyed in those few words Thy sins are forgiven thee he takes occasion by this act to rectifie the by-standers too which were the Pharisees who did not beleeve Christ to be God For for proofe of that first he takes knowledge of their inward thoughts not expressed by any act or word which none but God could doe And then he restores the patient to bodily health onely by his word without any naturall meanes applyed which none but God could doe neither And into fewer particulars then these this pregnant and abundant Text is not easily contracted First then to begin with the Branches of the first part of which the first was 1 Part. to consider some somewhat more remote circumstances and occasions conducing to this miracle we cannot avoid the making
Judge too I shall not be tried by an arbitrary Court where it may be wisdome enough to follow a wise leader and think as he thinks I shall not be tried by a Jury that had rather I suffered then they fasted rather I lost my life then they lost a meale Nor tryed by Peeres where Honour shall be the Bible But I shall be tryed by the King himselfe then which no man can propose a Nobler tryall and that King shall be the King of Kings too for He V. 5. who in the first of the Revelation is called The faithfull Witnesse is in the same place called The Prince of the Kings of the earth and as he is there produced as a Witnesse so Acts 10 42. Iohn 5.22 He is ordained to be the Iudge of the quick and the dedd and so All Iudgement is committed to him He that is my Witnesse is my Judge and the same person is my Jesus my Saviour my Redeemer He that hath taken my nature He that hath given me his blood So that he is my Witnesse in his owne cause and my Judge but of his owne Title and will in me preserve himselfe He will not let that nature that he hath invested perish nor that treasure which he hath poured out for me his blood be ineffectuall My Witnesse is in Heaven my Judge is in Heaven my Redeemer is in Heaven and in them who are but One I have not onely a constant hope that I shall be there too but an evident assurance that I am there already in his Person Go then in this peace That you alwaies study to preserve this testification of the Spirit of God by outward evidences of Sanctification You are naturally composed of foure Elements and three of those foure are evident and unquestioned The fourth Element the element of Fire is a more litigious element more problematicall more disputable Every good man every true Christian in his Metaphysicks for in a regenerate man all is Metaphysicall supernaturall hath foure Elements also and three of those foure are declared in this text First a good Name the good opinion of good men for honest dealing in the world and religious discharge of duties towards God That there be no injustice in our hands Also that our prayer be pure A second Element is a good conscience in my selfe That either a holy warinesse before or a holy repentance after settle me so in God as that I care not though all the world knew all my faults And a third element is my Hope in God that my Witnesse which is in Heaven will testifie for me as a witnesse in my behalfe here or acquit me as a mercifull Judge hereafter Now there may be a fourth Element an Infallibility of finall perseverance grounded upon the eternall knowledge of God but this is as the Element of fire which may be but is not at least is not so discernable so demonstrable as the rest And therefore as men argue of the Element of fire that whereas the other elements produce creatures in such abundance The Earth such heards of Cattell the Waters such shoales of Fish the Aire such flocks of Birds it is no unreasonable thing to stop upon this consideration whether there should be an element of fire more spacious and comprehensive then all the rest and yet produce no Creatures so if thy pretended Element of Infallibility produce no creatures no good works no holy actions thou maist justly doubt there is no such element in thee In all doubts that arise in thee still it will be a good rule to choose that now which thou wouldst choose upon thy death-bed If a tentation to Beauty to Riches to Honour be proposed to thee upon such and such conditions consider whether thou wouldst accept that upon those conditions upon thy death-bed when thou must part with them in a few minutes So when thou doubtest in what thou shouldst place thy assurance in God thinke seriously whether thou shalt not have more comfort then upon thy death-bed in being able to say I have finished my course I have fought a good fight I have fulfilled the sufferings of Christ in my flesh I have cloathed him when he was naked and fed him when he was poore then in any other thing that thou maiest conceive God to have done for thee And doe all the way as thou wouldst do then prove thy element of fire by the creatures it produces prove thine election by thy sanctification for that is the right method and shall deliver thee over infallibly to everlasting glory at last Amen SERMON XIV Preached at VVhite-hall March 3. 1619. AMOS 5.18 Woe unto you that desire the day of the Lord what have yee to doe with it the day of the Lord is darknesse and not light FOr the presenting of the woes and judgements of God denounced by the Prophets against Judah and Israel and the extending and applying them to others involved in the same sins as Judah and Israel were Solomon seemes to have given us somewhat a cleare direction Prov. 9.8 Reprove not a scorner lest he hate thee Rebuke a wise man and he will love thee But how if the wiseman and this scorner bee all in one man all one person If the wiseman of this world bee come to take S. Paul so literally at his word as to thinke scornefully that preaching is indeed but the foolishnesse of preaching and that as the Church is within the State so preaching is a part of State government flexible to the present occasions of time appliable to the present dispositions of men This fell upon this Prophet in this prophecie Amos 7.10 Amasias the Priest of Bethel informed the King that Amos medled with matters of State and that the Land was not able to beare his words and to Amos himselfe he saies Eate thy bread in someother place but prophecy here no more for this is the Kings Chappell Amos 23. and the Kings Court Amos replies I was no Prophet nor the son of a Prophet but in an other course and the Lord tooke me and said unto me Goe and Prophecie to my People Though we finde no Amasiah no mis-interpreting Priest here wee are farre from that because we are far from having a Ieroboam to our King as he had easie to give eare easie to give credit to false informations yet every man that comes with Gods Message hither brings a little Amasiah of his owne in his owne bosome a little wisperer in his owne heart that tels him This is the Kings Chappell and it is the Kings Court and these woes and judgements and the denouncers and proclaimers of them are not so acceptable here But we must have our owne Amos aswell as our Amasias this answer to this suggestion I was no Prophet and the Lord tooke me and bad me prophecy What shall I doe And besides since the woe in this Text is not S. Iohns wo his iterated his multiplied wo Vae vae
cals the Firmament that great expansion from Gods chaire to his footstoole from Heaven to earth there was a defect which God did not supply that day nor the next but the fourth day he did for that day he made those bodies those great and lightsome bodies the Sunne and Moone and Starres and placed them in the Firmament So also the Heaven of Heavens the Presence Chamber of God himselfe expects the presence of our bodies No State upon earth can subsist without those bodies Men of their owne For men that are supplied from others may either in necessity or in indignation be withdrawne and so that State which stood upon forraine legs sinks Let the head be gold Dan. 2.31 and the armes silver and the belly brasse if the feete be clay Men that may slip and molder away all is but an Image all is but a dreame of an Image for forraine helps are rather crutches then legs There must be bodies Men and able bodies able men Men that eate the good things of the land their owne figges and olives Men not macerated with extortions They are glorified bodies that make up the kingdome of Heaven bodies that partake of the good of the State that make up the State Bodies able bodies and lastly bodies inanimated with one soule one vegetative soule all must be sensible and compassionate of one anothers miserie and especially the Immortall soule one supreame soule one Religion For as God hath made us under good Princes a great example of all that Abundance of Men Men that live like men men united in one Religion so wee need not goe farre for an example of a slippery and uncertaine being where they must stand upon others Mens men and must over-load all men with exactions and distortions and convulsions and earthquakes in the multiplicity of Religions The Kingdome of Heaven must have bodies Kingdomes of the earth must have them and if upon the earth thou beest in the way to Heaven thou must have a body too a body of thine owne a body in thy possession for thy body hath thee and not thou it if thy body tyrannize over thee If thou canst not withdraw thine eye from an object of tentation or withhold thy hand from subscribing against thy conscience nor turne thine eare from a popular and seditious Libell what hast thou towards a man Thou hast no soule nay thou hast no body There is a body but thou hast it not it is not thine it is not in thy power Thy body will rebell against thee even in a sin It will not performe a sin when and where thou wouldst have it Much more will it rebell against any good worke till thou have imprinted Stigmata Iesu Gal. 6.17 The Markes of the Lord Iesus which were but exemplar in him but are essentiall and necessary to thee abstinencies and such discreete disciplines and mortifications as may subdue that body to thee and make it thine for till then it is but thine enemy and maintaines a warre against thee and war and enemie is the Metaphore which the holy Ghost hath taken here to expresse a want a kind of imperfectnesse even in Heaven it selfe Bellum Symbolum mali As peace is of all goodnesse so warre is an embleme a Hieroglyphique of all misery And that is our second step in this paraphrase If the feete of them that preach peace be beautifull And Vestig 2. Pax bellum O how beautifull are the feete of them that preach peace The Prophet Isaiah askes the question 52.7 And the Prophet Nahum askes it 1.15 and the Apostle S. Paul askes it Rom. 10.15 They all aske it but none answers it who shall answer us if we aske How beautifull is his face who is the Author of this peace when we shall see that in the glory of Heaven the Center of all true peace It was the inheritance of Christ Jesus upon the earth he had it at his birth he brought it with him Glory be to God on high peace upon earth Luke 2.14 Colos 1.20 It was his purchase upon earth He made peace indeed he bought peace through the blood of his Crosse It was his Testament Iohn 14.27 when he went from earth Peace I leave with you my peace I give unto you Divide with him in that blessed Inheritance partake with him in that blessed Purchase enrich thy selfe with that blessed Legacy his Peace Let the whole world be in thy consideration as one house and then consider in that in the peacefull harmony of creatures in the peacefull succession and connexion of causes and effects the peace of Nature Let this Kingdome where God hath blessed thee with a being be the Gallery the best roome of that house and consider in the two walls of that Gallery the Church and the State the peace of a royall and a religious Wisedome Let thine owne family be a Cabinet in this Gallery and finde in all the boxes thereof in the severall duties of Wife and Children and servants the peace of vertue and of the father and mother of all vertues active discretion passive obedience and then lastly let thine owne bosome be the secret box and reserve in this Cabinet and then the best Jewell in the best Cabinet and that in the best Gallery of the best house that can be had peace with the Creature peace in the Church peace in the State peace in thy house peace in thy heart is a faire Modell and a lovely designe even of the heavenly Jerusalem which is Visio pacis where there is no object but peace And therefore the holy Ghost to intimate to us that happy perfectnesse which wee shall have at last and not till then chooses the Metaphor of an enemy and enmity to avert us from looking for true peace from any thing that presents it selfe in the way Neither truly could the holy Ghost imprint more horror by any word then that which intimates war as the word enemy does It is but a little way that the Poet hath got in description of war Iam seges est that now that place is ploughed where the great City stood for it is not so great a depopulation to translate a City from Merchants to husbandmen from shops to ploughes as it is from many Husbandmen to one Shepheard and yet that hath beene often done And all that at most is but a depopulation it is not a devastation that Troy was ploughed But when the Prophet Isaiah comes to the devastation to the extermination of a war Esay 7.23 he expresses it first thus Where there were a thousand Vineyards at a cheape rate all the land become briars and thornes That is much but there is more Esay 13.13 The earth shall be removed out of her place that Land that Nation shall no more be called that Nation nor that Land But yet more then that too Not onely not that people Esay 13.19 but no othe shall ever inhabit it It shall
other Heretiques in the Primitive Church would rather admit and constitute two Gods a good God and a bad God then be drawn to think that he that was the good God indeed could produce any ill of himself or meane any ill to any man that had done none And therefore even from Plato himself some Christians might learn more moderation in expressing themselves in this point Plato sayes Creavit quia bonus therefore did God create us that he might be good to us and then he addes Bono nunquam inest invidia certainly that God that made us out of his goodnesse does not now envy us that goodnesse which he hath communicated to us certainly he does not wish us worse that so he might more justly damne us and therefore compell us by any positive decree to sin to justifie his desire of damning us Much lesse did this good God hate us or meane ill to us before he made us and made us only therefore that he might have glory in our destruction There is nothing good but God there is nothing but goodnesse in God How abusively then doe men call the things of this world Goods They may as well call them so they do in their hearts Gods as Goods for there is none good but God But how much more abusively do they force the world that call them Bona quia beant Goods because they make us good blessed happy In which sense Seneca uses the word shrewdly Insolens malum beata uxor a good wife a blessed wife sayes he that is a wife that brings a great estate is an insolent mischiefe If we doe but cast our eye upon that title in the Law Bonorum and De bonis of Goods we shall easily see what poor things they make shift to cal Goods And if we consider if it deserve a consideration how great a difference their Lawyers make Baldus makes that and others with him between Bonorum possessio and possessio bonorum that one should amount to a right and propriety in the goods and the other but to a sequestration of such goods we may easily see that they can scarce tell what to call or where to place such Goods Health and strength and stature and comelinesse must be called Goods though but of the body The body it self is in the substance it self but dust these are but the accidents of that dust and yet they must be Goods Land and Money honor must be called Goods though but of fortune Fortune her self is but such an Idol as that S. Aug. was ashamed ever to have named her in his works and therefore repents it in his Retractations her self is but an Idol and an Idol is nothing these but the accidents of that nothing and yet they must be Goods Are they such Goods as make him necessarily good that hath them Or such as no man can be good that is without them How many men make themselves miserable because they want these Goods And how many men have been made miserable by others because they had them Except thou see the face of God upon all thy money as well as the face of the King the hand of God to all thy Patents as well as the hand of the King Gods Amen as well as the Kings fiat to all thy creatiōs all these reach not to the title of Goods for there is none good but God Nothing in this world not if thou couldst have it all carry it higher to the highest to heaven heaven it self were not good without God For in the Schoole very many and very great men have thought and taught That the humane nature of Christ though united Hypostatically to the Divine Nature was not meerly by that Union impeccable but might have sinned if besides that Union God had not infused and super-induced other graces of which other graces the Beatificall vision the present sight of the face and Essence of God was one Because say they Christ had from his Conception in his Humane Nature that Beatificall Vision of God which we shall have in the state of Glory therefore he could not sin This Beatificall Vision say they which Christ had here and which as they suppose and not improbably in the problematicall way of the Schoole God of his absolute power might have with-held and yet the Hypostaticall Union have remained perfect for say they the two Natures Humane Divine might have been so united and yet the Humane not have so seen the Divine This Beatificall Vision this sight of God was the Cause or Seal or Consummation of Christs Perfection and impeccability in his Humane Nature Much more is this Beatificall Vision this sight of God in Heaven the Cause or Consummation of all the joyes and glory which we shall receive in that place for howsoever they dispute whether that kinde of Blessednesse consist in seeing God formaliter or causaliter that is whether I shall see all things in God as in a glasse in which the species of all things are or whether I shall see all things by God as by the benefit of a light which shall discover all things to me yet they all agree though they differ de modo of the manner how that howsoever it be the substance of the Blessednesse is in this that I shall see God Blessed are the pure in heart sayes Christ for they shall see God If they should not see God they were not blessed And therefore they who place children that die unbaptised in a roome where though they feele no torment yet they shall never see God durst never call that roome a part of heaven but of hell rather Though there be no torment yet if they see not God it is hell There is nothing good in this life nothing in the next without God that is without sight and fruition of the face and presence of God which is that which S. Augustine intends when he sayes Secutio Dei est appetitus Beatitatis consecutio Beatitas our looking towards God is the way to Blessednesse but Blessednesse it self is only the sight of God himself That therefore thou maist begin thy heaven here put thy self in the sight of God put God in thy sight in every particular action We cannot come to the body of the Sun but we can use the light of the Sun many waies we cannot come to God himself here but yet here we can see him by many manifestations so many as that S. Augustine in his 20. Chapt. De moribus Ecclesiae Catholicae hath collected aright places of Scripture where every one of our senses is called a Seeing there is a Gustate videte and audite and palpate tasting and hearing and feeling and all to this purpose are called seeing In all our senses in our faculties we may see God if we will God sees us at midnight he sees us then when we had rather he looked off If we see him so it is a blessed interview How would he that were come abroad at mid-night
and make him like himself The implicite beleever stands in an open field and the enemy will ride over him easily the understanding beleever is in a fenced town and he hath out-works to lose before the town be pressed that is reasons to be answered before his faith be shaked and he will sell himself deare and lose himself by inches if he be sold or lost at last and therefore sciant omnes let all men know that is endeavour to informe themselves to understand That particular Iesum that generall particular if we may so say for it includes all which all were to know is that the same Jesus whom they Crucified was exalted above them all Suppose an impossibility S. Paul does so when he sayes to the Galatians If an Angell from heaven should preach any other Gospell for that is impossible If we could have been in Paradise and seen God take a clod of red earth and make that wretched clod of contemptible earth such a body as should be fit to receive his breath an immortall soule fit to be the house of the second person in the Trinity for God the Son to dwel in bodily fit to be the Temple for the third person for the Holy Ghost should we not have wondred more then at the production of all other creatures It is more that the same Jesus whom they had crucified is exalted thus to sit in that despised flesh at the right hand of our glorious God that all their spitting should but macerate him and dissolve him to a better mold a better plaister that all their buffetings should but knead him and presse him into a better forme that all their scoffes and contumelies should be prophesies that that Ecce Rex Behold your King and that Rex Iudaeorum This is the King of the Iews which words they who spoke them thought to be lies in their own mouthes should become truths and he be truly the King not of the Jews only but of all Nations too that their nayling him upon the Crosse should be a setling of him upon an everlasting Throne and their lifting him up upon the Crosse a waiting upon him so farre upon his way to heaven that this Jesus whom they had thus evacuated thus crucified should bee thus exalted was a subject of infinite admiration but mixt with infinite confusion too Wretched Blasphemer of the name of Jesus that Jesus whom thou crucifiest and treadest under thy feet in that oath is thus exalted Uncleane Adulterer that Jesus whom thou crucifiest in stretching out those forbidden armes in a strange bed thou that beheadest thy self castest off thy Head Christ Jesus that thou mightst make thy body the body of a Harlot that Jesus whom thou defilest there is exalted Let severall sinners passe this through their severall sins and remember with wonder but with confusion too that that Jesus whom they haue crucified is exalted above all How farre exalted Three steps which carry him above S. Pauls third heaven Factus He is Lord and he is Christ and he is made so by God God hath made him both Lord and Christ We return up these steps as they lie and take the lowest first Fecit Deus God made him so Nature did not make him so no not if we consider him in that Nature wherein he consists of two Natures God and Man We place in the Schoole for the most part the infinite Merit of Christ Jesus that his one act of dying once should be a sufficient satisfaction to God in his Justice for all the sins of all men we place it I say rather in pacto then in persona rather that this contract was thus made between the Father and the Son then that whatsoever that person thus consisting of God and Man should doe should onely in respect of the person bee of an infinite value and extention to that purpose for then any act of his his Incarnation his Circumcision any had been sufficient for our Redemption without his death But fecit Deus God made him that that he is The contract between the Father and him that all that he did should be done so and to that purpose that way and to that end this is that that hath exalted him and us in him If then not the subtilty and curiosity but the wisedome of the Schoole and of the Church of God have justly found it most commodious to place all the mysteries of our Religion in pacto rather then in persona in the Covenant rather then in the person though a person of incomprehensible value let us also in applying to our selves those mysteries of our Religion still adhaerere pactis and not personis still rely upon the Covenant of God with man revealed in his word and not upon the person of any man Not upon the persons of Martyrs as if they had done more then they needed for themselves and might relieve us with their supererogations for if they may work for us they may beleeve for us and Iustus fide sua vivet sayes the Prophet Habak 2.4 The righteous shall live by his owne faith Not upon that person who hath made himself supernumerary and a Controller upon the three persons in the Trinity the Bishop of Rome not upon the consideration of accidents upon persons when God suffers some to fall who would have advanced his cause and some to be advanced who would have throwne downe his cause but let us ever dwell in pacto and in the fecit Deus this Covenant God hath made in his word and in this we rest It is God then not nature not his nature that made him And what Christ Christus Christ is anointed And then Mary Magdalen made him Christ for she anointed him before his death And Ioseph of Arimathea made him Christ for he anointed him and embalmed him after his death But her anointing before kept him not from death nor his anointing after would not have kept him from putrefaction in the grave if God had not in a farre other manner made him Christ anointed him praeconsortibus above his fellows God hath anointed him embalmed him enwrapped him in the leaves of the Prophets That his flesh should not see corruption in the grave That the flames of hell should not take hold of him nor sindge him there so anointed him as that in his Humane nature He is ascended into heaven and set downe at the right hand of God For de eo quod ex Maria est Petrus loquitur sayes S. Basil That making of him Christ that is that anointing which S. Peter speakes of in this place is the dignifying of his humane nature that was anointed that was consecrated that was glorified in heaven But he had a higher step then that God made this Iesus Christ and he made him Lord Dominus He brought him to heaven in his own person in his humane nature so he shall all us but when we shall be all there he onely shall be Lord
richer yet neither am I poorer then I was for that But if I have no comfort from the Holy Ghost I am worse then if all mankinde had been left in the Putrifaction of Adams loynes and in the condemnation of Adams sin For then I should have had but my equall part in the common misery But now having had that extraordinary favour of an offer of the Holy Ghost if I feele no comfort in that I must have an extraordinary condemnation The Father came neare me when he breathed the breath of life into me and gave me my flesh The Son came neare me when he took my flesh upon him and laid downe his life for me The Holy Ghost is alwaies neare me alwaies with me with me now if now I shed any drops of his dew his Manna upon you With me anon if anon I turne any thing that I say to you now to good nourishment in my selfe then and doe then as I say now With me when I eate or drink to say Grace at my meale and to blesse Gods Blessings to me With me in my sleep to keep out the Tempter from the fancy and imagination which is his proper Sceane and Spheare That he triumph not in that in such dreames as may be effects of sin or causes of sin or sins themselves The Father is a Propitious Person The Son is a Meritorious Person The Holy Ghost is a Familiar Person The Heavens must open to shew me the Son of Man at the right hand of the Father as they did to Steven But if I doe but open my heart to my selfe I may see the Holy Ghost there and in him all that the Father hath Thought and Decreed all that the Son hath Said and Done and Suffered for the whole World made mine Accustome your selves therefore to the Contemplation to the Meditation of this Blessed Person of the glorious Trinity Keep up that holy cheerefulnesse which Christ makes the Ballast of a Christian and his Fraight too to give him a rich Returne in the Heavenly Jerusalem Be alwayes comforted and alwayes determine your comfort in the Holy Ghost For that is Christs promise here in this first Branch A Comforter which is the Holy Ghost And Him sayes our second Branch the Father shall send There was a Mission of the Son Missio God sent his Son There was a Mission of the Holy Ghost This day God sent the Comforter which is the Holy Ghost But betweene these two Missions that of the Son and this of the holy Ghost we consider this difference that the first the sending of the Son was without any merit preceding There could be nothing but the meere mercy of God to move God to send his Son Man was so far from meriting that that as we said before he could not nor might if he could have wisht it But for this second Mission the sending of the holy Ghost there was a preceding merit Christ by his dying had merited that mankinde who by the fall of Adam had lost as S. August speaks Possibilitatem boni All possibilitie of Redintegration should not only be restored to a possibility of Salvation but that actually that that was done should be pursued farther and that by this Mission and Operation of the holy Ghost actually really effectually men should be saved So that as the work of our Redemption fals under our consideration that is not in the Decree but in the execution of the Decree in this Mission of the holy Ghost into the World Man hath so far an interest not any particular man but Man as all Mankind was in Christ as that we may truly say The holy Ghost was due to us Luâ—â— 24. And as Christ said of himselfe Nonne haec oportuit pati Ought not Christ to suffer all this Was not Christ bound to all this by the Contract betweene him and his Father to which Contract himselfe had a Privity it was his owne Act He signed it He sealed it so we may say Nonne hunc oportuit mitti Ought not the holy Ghost to be sent Had not Christ merited that the holy Ghost should be sent to perfect the worke of the Redemption So that in such a respect and in such a holy and devout sense we may say that the holy Ghost is more ours then either of the other Persons of the Trinity Because though Christ be so ours as that he is our selves the same nature and flesh and blood The holy Ghost is so ours as that we we in Christ Christ in our nature merited the holy Ghost purchased the holy Ghost bought the holy Ghost Which is a sanctified Simony and hath a faire and a pious truth in it We we in Christ Christ in our nature bought the holy Ghost that is merited the holy Ghost Christ then was so sent A Patre as that till we consider the Contract which was his owne Act there was no Oportuit pati no obligation upon him that he must have been sent The Holy Ghost was so sent as that the Merit of Christ of Christ who was Man as well as God which was the Act of another required and deserved that he should bee sent Therefore he was sent A Patre By the Father Now not so by the Father as not by the Son too For there is an Ego mittam If I depart I will send him unto you But Iohn 16.7 cleane thorough Christs History in all his proceedings still you may observe that he ascribes all that he does as to his Superiour to his Father though in one Capacity as he was God he were equall to the Father yet to declare the meekenesse and the humility of his Soule still he makes his recourse to his inferiour state and to his lower nature and still ascribes all to his Father Thouh he might say and doe say there I will send him yet every where the Father enters I will send him saies he Whom Luke 24.49 I will send the Promise of my Father Still the Father hath all the glory and Christ sinks downe to his inferiour state and lower nature In the World it is far otherwise Here men for the most part doe all things according to their greatest capacity If they be Bishops if they be Counsellors if they be Justices nay if they be but Constables they will doe every thing according to that capacity As though that authority confined to certaine places limited in certaine persons and determined in certaine times gave them alwaies the same power in all actions And because to some purposes hee may be my superiour he will be my equall no where in nothing Christ still withdrew himselfe to his lower capacity And howsoever worldly men engrosse the thanks of the world to themselves Christ cast all the honour of all the benefits that he bestowed upon others upon his Father And in his Veruntamen Yet not my will but thine O Father be done He humbled himselfe as low as David in his Non nobis
the ordinary and outward meanes of our salvation When the anger of the Body the Church is thus heavy what is the anger of the Head of Christ himselfe who is Judge in his owne cause When an unjust judgement was executed upon him how was the frame of nature shaked in Eclipses in Earth-quakes in renting of the Temple and cleaving the Monuments of the dead When his pleasure is to execute a just judgement upon a Nation upon a Church upon a Man in the infatuation of Princes in the recidivation of the Clergy in the consternation of particular consciences Quis stabit who shall be able to stand in that Judgement Kisse the Son lest he be angry But when he is angry he will not kisse you nor be kissed by you but throw you into unquenchable fire if you be cold and if you be luke-warme spit you out of his mouth remove you from the benefit and comfort of his Word This is the anger of God that reaches to all the world and the anger of the Son Osculum amovet that comes home to us and all this is removed with this holy and spirituall kisse Osculamini Filium Kisse the Son lest he be angry implies this If ye kisse him he will not bee angry What this kisse is we have seene all the way It is to hang at his lips for the Rule of our life To depend upon his Word for our Religion and to succour our selves by the promises of his Gospel in all our calamities and not to provoke him to farther judgements by a perverse and froward use of those judgements which he hath laid upon us As it is in this point towards man it is towards God too Nihil mansuetudine violentius There is not so violent a thing as gentlenesse so forcible so powerfull upon man Chrysost or upon God This is such a saying as one would think he that said it should be ready to retract by the multiplicity of examples to the contrary every day Such Rules as this He that puts up one wrong invites and calls for another will shake Chrysostomes Rule shrewdly Nihil mansuetudine violentius That no battery is so strong against an enemy as gentlenesse Say if you will Nihilmelius There is no better thing then gentlenesse and we can make up that with a Comment that is nothing better for some purposes Say if you will Nihil frugalius There is not a thriftier thing then gentlenesse It saves charges to suffer It is a more expensive thing to revenge then to suffer whether we consider expense of soule or body or fortune And by the way that which we use to adde in this account opinion reputation that which we call Honour is none of the Elements of which man is made It may be the ayre that the Bird flies in It may be the water that the Fish swimmes in but it is none of the Elements that man is made of for those are onely soule and body and fortune Say also if you will Nihil accommodatius Nothing conformes us more to our great patterne Christ Jesus then mildnesse then gentlenesse for that is our lesson from him Discite à me quiamitis Learne of me for I am meeke All this Chrysostome might say but will he say Nihil violentius There is not so violent so forcible a thing as mildnesse That there is no such Bullet as a Pillow no such Action as Passion no such revenge as suffering an injury Yet even this is true Nothing defeats an anger so much as patience nothing reproaches a chiding so much as silence Reprehendis iratum accusas indignationem sayes that Father Art thou sorry to see a man angry Cur magis irasci vis Why dost thou adde thy anger to his Why dost thou fuell his anger with thine Quodigni aqua hoc irae mansuetudo As water works upon fire so would thy patience upon his anger S. Ambrose hath expressed it well too Haec sunt armajusti ut cedendo vincat This is the warre of the righteous man to conquer by yeelding Esay 36.21 It was Ezechiahs way when Rabshakeh reviled They held their peace where the very phrase affords us this note That silence is called holding of our peace we continue our peace best by silence They held their peace sayes that text and answered him not a word for the King had commanded them not to answer Why S. Hierom tels us why Ne ad majores blasphemias provocaret Lest the multiplying of cholerique words amongst men should have occasioned more blasphemies against God And as it is thus with man with God it is thus too Nothing spends his judgements and his corrections so soone as our patience nothing kindles them exasperates them so much as our frowardnesse and murmuring Kisse the Son and he will not be angry If he be kisse the rod and he will be angry no longer love him lest hee be feare him when hee is angry The preservative is easie and so is the restorative too The Balsamum of this kisse is all To suck spirituall milke out of the left breast as well as out of the right To finde mercy in his judgements reparation in his ruines feasts in his Lents joy in his anger But yet we have reserved it for our last Consideration what will make him angry what sins are especially directed upon the second Person the Sonne of God and then wee have done all Though those three Attributes of God Sapientia Power and Wisdome and Goodnesse he all three in all the three Persons of the Trinity for they are all as we say in the Schoole Co-omnipotentes they have all a joynt-Almightinesse a joynt-Wisdome and a joynt-Goodnesse yet because the Father is Principium The roote of all Independent not proceeding from any other as both the other Persons do and Power and Soveraignty best resembles that Independency therefore we attribute Power to the Father And because the Son proceeds Per modum intellectus which is the phrase that passes through the Fathers and the Schoole That as our understanding proceeds from our reasonable soule so the second Person the Son proceeds from the Father therefore we attribute Wisdome to the Son And then because the Holy Ghost is said to proceed Per modum voluntatis That as our soule as the roote and our understanding proceeding from that soule produce our will and the object of our will is evermore Bonum that which is good in our apprehension therefore we attribute to the Holy Ghost Goodnesse And therefore David formes his prayer Psal 51. in that manner plurally Miserere mei Elohim Be mercifull unto me all because in his sin upon Vriah which he laments in that Psalme he had transgressed against all the three Persons in all their Attributes against the Power and the Wisdome and the Goodnesse of God That then which we consider principally in the Son is Wisdome And truly those very many things which are spoken of Wisdome in the Proverbs of
the face of the whole Church of God even to the end of the world for so long these Records are to last he proposes himselfe for an Exemplary sinner for a sinfull Example and for a subject of Gods Indignation whilst he remained so When I kept silence and yet roared Thy hand lay heavy upon me and my moysture was turned into the drought of Summer And so we are come to our third Part He teaches by Example He proposes himselfe for the Example and of himselfe he confesses those particulars which constitute our Text. Three things he confesses in this Example 3 Part. First that it was he himselfe that was in doloso spiritu that had deceit in his spirit Quia tacuit because he held his tongue he disguised his sins he did not confesse them And yet in the midst of this silence of his God brought him Ad Rugitum to voyces of Roaring of Exclamation To a sense of paine or shame or losse so farre he had a voyce But still he was in silence for any matter of repentance Secondly he confesses a lamentable effect of this silence and this roaring Inveteraverunt ossa His bones were consumed waxen old and his moisture dried up and then he takes knowledge of the cause of all this calamity the waight of Gods heavy hand upon him And to this Confession he sets to that seale which is intended in the last word Selah First then David confesses his silence therefore it was a fault And he confesses it Silentium as an instance as an example of his being In doloso spiritu That there was deceit in his spirit as long as he was silent he thought to delude God to deceive God and this was the greatest fault If I be afraid of Gods power because I consider that he can destroy a sinner yet I have his will for my Buckler I remember that he would not the death of a sinner If I be afraid that his will may be otherwise bent for what can I tell whether it may not be his will to glorifie himselfe in surprizing me in my sins I have his Word for my Buckler Miserationes ejus super omnia opera ejus God does nothing but that his Mercy is supereminent in that work whatsoever But if I think to scape his knowledge by hiding my sins from him by my silence I am In doloso spiritu if I think to deceive God I deceive my selfe and there is no truth in me When we are to deale with fooles we must or we must not answer Christi Prov. 26.4.5 as they may receive profit or inconvenience by our answer or our silence Answer not a foole according to his foolishnesse lest thou be like him But yet in the next verse Answer a foole according to his foolishnesse lest he be wise in his own conceit But answer God alwaies Though he speak in the foolishnesse of preaching as himselfe calls it yet he speaks wisedome that is Peace to thy soule We are sure that there is a good silence for we have a Rule for it from Christ whose Actions are more then Examples for his Actions are Rules His patience wrought so that he would not speak his afflictions wrought so that he could not He was brought as a sheep to the slaughter and he was dumb Esay 59. Psal 22.15 There he would not speake My strength is dried up like a potsheard and my tongue cleaveth to my jawes and thou hast brought me into the dust of death sayes David in the Person of Christ and here he could not speak Here is a good silence in our Rule So is there also in Examples derived from that Rule Reverentiae Hab. 2. ult There is Silentium reverentiae A silence of reverence for respect of the presence The Lord is in his holy Temple let all the world keep silence before him When the Lord is working in his Temple in his Ordinances and Institutions let not the wisdome of all the world dispute why God instituted those Ordinances the foolishnesse of preaching or the simplicity of Sacraments in his Church Let not the wisedome of private men dispute why those whom God hath accepted as the representation of the Church those of whom Christ sayes Dic Ecclesiae Tell the Church have ordained these or these Ceremonies for Decency and Uniformity and advancing of Gods glory and mens Devotion in the Church Let all the earth be silent In Sacramentis The whole Church may change no Sacraments nor Articles of faith and let particular men be silent In Sacramentalibus in those things which the Church hath ordained for the better conveying and imprinting and advancing of those fundamentall mysteries for this silence of reverence which is an acquiescence in those things which God hath ordained immediately as Sacraments or Ministerially as other Rituall things in the Church David would not have complained of nor repented And to this may well be referred Silentium subjectionis Subjectionis 1 Cor. 14.34 1 Tim. 2.11 That silence which is a recognition a testimony of subjection Let the women keep silence in the Church for they ought to be subject And Let the women learne in silence with all subjection As farre as any just Commandement either expresly or tacitly reaches in injoyning silence we are bound to be silent In Morall seales of secrets not to discover those things which others upon confidence or for our counsell have trusted us withall In charitable seales not to discover those sins of others which are come to our particular knowledge but not by a judiciall way In religious seales not to discover those things which are delivered us in Confession except in cases excepted in that Canon In secrets delivered under these seales of Nature of Law of Ecclesiasticall Canons we are bound to be silent for this is Silentium subjectionis An evidence of our subjection to Superiours But since God hath made man with that distinctive property that he can speak and no other creature since God made the first man able to speak as soone as he was in the world since in the order of the Nazarites instituted in the old Testament though they forbore wine and outward care of their comelinesse in cutting their haire and otherwise yet they bound not themselves to any silence since in the other sects which grew up amongst the Jews Pharisees and Sadduces and Esseans amongst all their superfluous and superstitious austerities there was no inhibition of speaking and Communication since in the twilight between the Old and New Testament Luk. 1.20 that dumbnesse which was cast upon Zacharic was inflicted for a punishment upon him because hee beleeved not that that the Angel had said unto him we may be bold to say That if not that silence which is enjoyned in the Romane Church yet that silence which is practised amongst them for the concealing of Treasons and those silences which are imposed upon some of their Orders That the Carthusians may never speake
yet this is still limited by the law of God so far as God hath instituted this power by his Gospel in his Church and far from inducing amongst us that torture of the Conscience that usurpation of Gods power that spying into the counsails of Princes supplanting of their purposes with which the Church of Rome hath been deeply charged And this usefull and un-mis-interpretable Confession which we speake of Adversum me is the more recommended to us in that with which David shuts up his Act as out of S. Hierome and out of our former translation we intimated unto you that he doth all this Adversum se I will confesse my sinnes unto the Lord against my selfe The more I finde Confession or any religious practise to be against my selfe and repugnant to mine owne nature the farther I will goe in it For still the Adversum me is Cum Deo The more I say against my selfe the more I vilifie my selfe the more I glorifie my God As S. Chry sostome sayes every man is Spontaneus Satan a Satan to himselfe as Satan is a Tempter every man can tempt himselfe so I will be Spontaneus Satan as Satan is an Accuser an Adversary I will accuse my selfe I consider often that passionate humiliation of S. Peter Exi à me Domine He fell at Iesus knees saying Depart from me for I am a sinfull man O Lord Luk. 5.8 And I am often ready to say so and more Depart from me O Lord for I am sinfull inough to infect thee As I may persecute thee in thy Children so I may infect thee in thine Ordinances Depart in withdrawing thy word from me for I am corrupt inough to make even thy saving Gospel the savor of death unto death Depart in withholding thy Sacrament for I am leprous inough to taint thy flesh and to make the balme of thy blood poyson to my soule Depart in withdrawing the protection of thine Angels from me for I am vicious inough to imprint corruption and rebellion into their nature And if I be too foule for God himselfe to come neare me for his Ordinances to worke upon me I am no companion for my selfe I must not be alone with my selfe for I am as apt to take as to give infection I am a reciprocall plague passively and actively contagious I breath corruption and breath it upon my selfe and I am the Babylon that I must goe out of Gen. 32.10 Mat. 8.8 or I perish I am not onely under Iacobs Non dignus Not worthy the least of all thy mercies nor onely under the Centurions Non dignus I am not worthy that thou shouldest come under my roofe That thy Spirit should ever speake to my spirit which was the forme of words in which every Communicant received the Sacrament in the Primitive Church Lord I am not worthy that thou shouldest enter under my roofe Nor onely under the Prodigals Non dignus Luke 15.21 Not worthy to be called thy sonne neither in the filiation of Adoption for I have deserved to be dis-inherited nor in the filiation of Creation for I have deserved to be annihilated Mark 1.7 But Non dignus procumbere I am not worthy to stoop down to fall down to kneele before thee in thy Minister the Almoner of thy Mercy the Treasurer of thine Absolutions So farre doe I confesse Adversum me against my selfe as that I confesse I am not worthy to confesse nor to be admitted to any accesse any approach to thee much lesse to an act so neare Reconciliation to thee as an accusation of my selfe or so neare thy acquitting as a self-condemning Be this the issue in all Controversies whensoever any new opinions distract us Be that still thought best that is most Adversum nos most against our selves That that most layes flat the nature of man so it take it not quite away and blast all vertuous indeavours That that most exalts the Grace and Glory of God be that the Truth And so have you the whole mystery of Davids Confession in both his Acts preparatory in resenting his sinfull condition in generall and survaying his conscience in particular And then his Deliberation his Resolution his Execution his Confession Confession of true sins and of them onely and of all them of his sins and all this to the Lord and all that against himselfe That which was proposed for the second Part must fall into the compasse of a Conclusion and a short one that is Gods Act Thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin This is a wide doore 2 Part. and would let out Armies of Instructions to you but we will shut up this doore with these two leaves thereof The fulnesse of Gods Mercy He forgives the sin and the punishment And the seasonablenesse the acceleration of his mercy in this expression in our text that Davids is but Actus inchoatus He sayes he will confesse And Gods is Actus consummatus Thou forgavest Thou hadst already forgiven the iniquity and punishment of my sin These will be the two leaves of this doore and let the hand that shuts them be this And this Particle of Connection which we have in the text I said And thou didst For though this Remission of sin be not presented here as an effect upon that cause of Davids Confession It is not delivered in a Quia and an Ergo Because David did this God did that for mans wil leads not the will of God as a cause who does all his acts of mercy for his mercies sake yet though it be not an effect as from a cause yet it is at least as a consequent from an occasion so assured so infallible as let any man confesse as David did and he shall be sure to be forgiven as David was For though this forgivenesse be a flower of mercy yet the roote growes in the Justice of God If wee acknowledge our sin 1 John 1.9 he is faithfull and just to forgive us our sin It growes out of his faithfulnesse as he hath vouchsafed to binde himselfe by a promise And out of his Justice as he hath received a full satisfaction for all our sins So that this Hand this And in our Text is as a ligament as a sinew to connect and knit together that glorious body of Gods preventing grace and his subsequent grace if our Confession come between and tie the knot God that moved us to that act will perfect all Here enters the fulnesse of his mercy Plenitudo Rev. 3 20. at one leafe of this doore well expressed at our doore in that Ecce sto pulso Behold I stand at the doore and knock for first he comes here is no mention of our calling of him before He comes of himselfe And then he suffers not us to be ignorant of his comming he comes so as that he manifests himself Ecce Behold And then he expects not that we should wake with that light and look out of our selves but he knocks
flatterer shall condense a yeoman into a Worshipfull person and the Worshipfull into Honorable and so that which duly was intended for distinction shall occasion confusion But that which we purpose in noting this Tu is rather the singularity the particularity then the familiarity That the Holy Ghost in this collects Man abridges Man summes up Man in an unity Clem Alex. in the consideration of one of himselfe Oportet hominem fieri unum Man must grow in his consideration till he be but one man one individuall man If he consider himselfe in Humanitate in the whole mankinde a glorious creature an immortall soule he shall see this immortall soule as well in Goats at the left hand as in Sheepe at the right hand of Christ at the Resurrection Men on both sides If he consider himselfe in Qualitate Mat. 7.22 in his quality in his calling he shall heare many then plead their Prophetavimus we have prophecied and their Ejecimus we have exercised and their Virtutes secimus we have done wonders and all in thy Name and yet receive that answer Nunquam cognovi I doe not know you now I never did know you Oportet unum fieri he must consider himselfe in individuo that one man not that man in nature not that man in calling Origen Homil. unica in lib. râ—g but that man in actions Origen makes this use of those words as he found them Erat vir unus There was one man which was Elkanah He addes Nomen ejus possessio Dei this one man sayes he was in his Name Gods possession Nam quem Daemones possident non unus sed mulii for he whom the Devill possesses is not one The same sinner is not the same thing still he clambers in his ambitious purposes there he is an Eagle yet lies still groveling and trodden upon at any greater mans threshold there he is a worme He swells to all that are under him there he is a full Sea and his dog that is above him may wade over him there he is a shallow an empty River In the compasse of a few dayes he neighes like a horse in the rage of his lust over all the City and groanes in a corner of the City in an hospitall A sinner is as many men as he hath vices he that is Elkanah Possessio Dei possessed by God and in possession of God he is unus homo one and the same man And when God calls upon man so particularly he intends him some particular good It is S. Hieromes note Hieron That when God in the Scriptures speakes of divers things in the singular number it is ever in things of grace And it is S. Augustins note that when he speaks of any one thing in the plurall Number it is of heavy and sorrowfull things as Ieptha was buryed In civitatibus Gilead Judg. 12.7 in the Cities but he had but one grave And so that is they made Aureos vitulos Golden Calves when it was but one Calfe When Gods voyce comes to thee in this Text in particular Tu Hast thou found he would have thee remember how many seeke and have sought with teares with sweat with blood and lacke that that thou aboundest in That whereas his Evidence to them whom he loves not in the next world shall be Esurivi I was hungry Mat. 25.42 and yee gave me no meate And his proceeding with them whom he loves not in this world is Si esuriero If I be hungry I will not tell thee I will not awaken thee not remember thy conscience Psal 50.12 wherein thou mayest doe me a service He does call upon thee in particular and ask thee Nonne tu Hast thou not fortune enough to let fall some crums upon him that starves and Nonne tu hast not thou favour enough to shed some beams upon him that is frozen in disgrace There is a squint eye that lookes side-long to looke upon riches and honor on the left hand and long life here on the right is a squint eye There is a squint eye that lookes upwards and downwards to looke after God and Mammon is a squint eye There are squint eyes that looke upon one another to looke upon ones own beauty or wisedome or power is a squint eye The direct looke is to looke inward upon thine own Conscience Not with Nabuchadnezzar Is not this great Babylon Dan. 4.30 which I have built by the might of my power and for the honor of my Majesty But with David Quid retribuam for if thou looke upon them with a cleare eye thou wilt see that though thou hast them thou hast but found them which is our next step Now if you have but found them thou hast them but by chance by contingency Invenisti Co. l. 10. Pand. by fortune The Emperour Leo he calls money found Dei beneficium It is a benefit derived from God but the great Lawyer Triphonius calls it Donum fortunae too An immediate gift of fortune They consist well enough together God and fortune S. Augustine in his Retract makes a conscience of having named her too oft lest other men should be scandalized and so the Prophet complaines of that Esa 65.11 as the Vulgat reads it Ponitis mensam fortunae You sacrifice to fortune you make fortune a god that you should not doe but yet you should acknowledge that God hath such a servant such an instrument as fortune too Gods ordinary working is by Nature these causes must produce these effects and that is his common Law He goes sometimes above that by Prerogative and that is by miracle and sometimes below that as by custome and that is fortune that is contingency Fortune is as far out of the ordinary way as miracle no man knows in Nature in reason why such or such persons grow great but it falls out so often as we do not call it miracle and therefore rest in the Name of Fortune We need not quarrell the words of the Poet Tu quamcunque Deus tibi fortunaverit horam Grata sume manu Thanke God for any good fortune since the Apostle sayes too that Godlinesse hath the promise of this life The godly man shall be fortunate God will blesse him with good fortune here but still it is fortune and chance in the sight and reason of man and therefore he hath but found whatsoever he hath in that kinde It is intimated in the very word which we use for all worldly things It is Inventarium an Inventory we found them here and here our successors finde them when we are gone from hence 2 King 9.30 Iezabel had an estimation of beauty and she thought to have drawne the King with that beauty but she found it she found it in her box and in her wardrope she was not truly fayre Achitophel had an estimation of wisedome in Counsell I know not how he found it he counselled by an example which no man would follow he