let our ability be perfect and let our knowledge be also absolute yet if we have no mind if we want a love unto our duty if we suffer our selves to be over-swayed by affection to other things yet shall we not do our duty For which of us being at liberty will do that which he hath no love unto Beloved as for our knowledge God hath left unto us Scripture the perfect Register of all our duty the absolute Itinerary and Map of all the course which in this life we are to run and as for love he plentifully sheds it in the hearts of all those that by faithful prayer beg it of him If we shall search the Scripture to improve our knowledge if we shall earnestly beg at his hands to inflame our love Let our natural possibilities be what they will he that now doth little amongst us shall do much and he that doth much shall do much more and the promises made unto the Iews concerning their carnal enemies shall be made good on us concerning our spiritual and ghostly enemies one of us shall chace a thousand and if they come out against us one way they shall flee before us seven ways And thus much for the first use There is a second benefit of great weight and moment which we reap out of the consideration of the errours of these excellent Ministers of God namely a lesson teaching us to beware of spiritual pride Of all the vices which our nature is subject unto this is the most dangerous and of which we had need be most cautelous For whereas all other vices proceed from some ill in us from some sinful imbecillity of our nature this alone arises out of our good parts Other sins draw their being from that original corruption which we drew from our Parents but this may seem to be the mother of that as by which even natures unstained and in their primitive purity may most easily fall And therefore not without some probability is it concluded in the Schools That no other crime could throw the Angels down from heaven but this That which one leaves for a memorial to great men that in dangerous times Non minus periculum ex magna fama quam ex mala it was a matter of like danger to have a great name as an ill that may I pronounce of a Christian man the danger of his innocency is not much less then of his faults For this Divil when he cannot drive us to despair by reason of our sin takes another course to see if he can make us presume upon conceit of our righteousness For when by the preventing grace of God we keep our selves from greater offences if we find our selves to have a love unto the Word of God and the true Professours of it to be rich in alms-deeds to have a part in other acts of righteousness he makes us first take notice of these good things in us notice taken draws us to love and admire them in usâ— self-love draws us on to compare our selves with others then to prefer our selves before others and thirdly to disdain others in respect of our selves Here now is a gap laid open to a thousand inconveniences And hence it is that we see divers times men otherwise of life and reputation pure and unblameable upon conceit and inconsiderateness by a secret judgment of God to fall upon extremes no less fearful then are the issues of open profaneness and impiety To cut off therefore all way that may be opened to let in spiritual pride it hath pleased God to make use of this as of a sovereign remedy namely to permit even in his most chosen vessels evermore secret and hidden infirmities and sometimes gross and open scapes which may serve when they look into themselves to abate all over-weening conceit of their own righteousness and when they shall look into the errours of others may be secret admonitioners unto them not rashly to condemn them considering their own weakness I will therefore shut up this place with the saying of St. Ambrose Etiam Iapsus sanctorum utilis est Nihil mihi obfuit quod negavit Petrus etiam profuit quod emendavit The fall of the Saints is a very profitable thing It hurts not me that St. Peter denied Christ and the example of his amendment is very beneficial unto me And so I come unto the preparative unto St. Peter's Repentance in these words and he went forth THE wisdom of God hath taught the Church sometime by express message delivered by words of mouth sometime by dumb signes and actions When Ieremy walk'd up and down the City with a yoke of wood about his neck when Ezekiel lay upon his side beseiged a Slate with the draught of Ierusalem upon it and like a banish'd man carried his stuff upon his shoulders from place to place they did no less prophesie the captivity desolation famine and wo which was to fall upon Ierusalem then when they denounced it by direct word and speech yea many of the ordinary actions of the Patriarks which seem to participate of chance and to be in the same rank with those of other men themselves as a learned Divine of our Age Mercerus observes not intending or understanding any such thing contained by the dispensation of the holy Ghost especial lessons and instructions for us That speech of Sarah Cast out the bond-woman and her son c. seemed to Abraham onely a speech of a curst heart and she her self perceives not her self to speak by direction from God but moved with impatience of Ismael's petulant behaviour toward her son Yet the holy Ghost himself hath taught us that this act of her prefigured a great mystery Many disputations there are concerning the cause of this action of St. Peter's going forth whether it were out of the common infirmity that is in most men namely a greater shame to repent then to offend or whether it were out of modesty and good nature that he could not endure the sight of Christ whom he had so greivously offended Howsoever it were we shall do this Scripture no wrong if we think it to contain an act in outward shew casual and like unto the actions of other men but inwardly indeed an especial action of a person great in the sight of God and therefore comprehending some especial instruction And to speak plainly this abandoning the place wherein he fell the company for fear of whom he fell and those things that were occasioners of his sin doth not obscurely point out unto us an especial duty of speedy relinquishing and leaving of all either Freinds or Place or Means or whatsoever else though dearer unto us then our right hand then our right eye if once they become unto us inducements to sin In former days before the Fulness of time came the Calling of the Elect of God was not by any one-act more often prefigured then by this action of going forth When the purpose of God was to select
from all imputation of unnecessary rigour and his Justice from seeming Injustice and Incongruity and on the other side it is a noble resolution so to humble our selves under the hand of Almighty God as that we can with patience hear yea think it an honour that so base creatures as our selves should become the instruments of the glory of so great a Majesty whether it be by eternal life or by eternal death though for no other reason but for Gods good will and pleasures sake The Authours of these conceits might both freely if peaceably speak their minds and both singularly profit the Church for since it is impossible where Scripture is ambiguous that all conceits should run alike it remains that we seek out a way not so much to establish an unity of opinion in the minds of all which I take to be a thing likewise impossible as to provide that multiplicity of conceit trouble not the Churches peace A better way my conceit cannot reach unto then that we would be willing to think that these things which with some shew of probability we deduce from Scripture are at the best but our Opinions for this peremptory manner of setting down our own conclusions under this high commanding form of necessary truths is generally one of the greatest causes which keeps the Churches this day so far asunder when as a gracious receiving of each other by mutual forbearance in this kind might peradventure in time bring them nearer together This peradventure may some man say may content us in case of opinion indifferent out of which no great inconvenience by necessary and evident proof is concluded but what Recipe have we for him that is fallen into some known and desperate Heresie Even the same with the former And therefore anciently Heretical and Orthodox Christians many times even in publick holy exercise converst together without offence It 's noted in the Ecclesiastick stories that the Arrians and Right Beleivers so communicated together in holy Prayers that you could not distinguish them till they came to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Gloria Patri which the Arrians used with some difference from other Christians But those were times quorum lectionem habemus virtutem non habemus we read of them in our books but we have lost the practise of their patience Some prejudice was done unto the Church by those who first began to intermingle with publick Ecclesiastical duties things respective unto private conceits For those Christian offices in the Church ought as much as possibly they may be common unto all and not to descend to the differences of particular opinions Severity against and separation from Heretical companies took its beginning from the Hereticks themselves and if we search the stories we shall find that the Church did not at their first arising thrust them from her themselves went out and as for severity that which the Donatists sometimes spake in their own defence Illam esse veram Ecclesiam quae persecutionem patitur non quae facit She was the true Church not which raised but which suffered persecution was de facto true for a great space For when Heresies and Schisms first arose in the Church all kinds of violence were used by the erring Factions but the Church seem'd not for a long time to have known any use of a Sword but onely of a Buckler and when she began to use the Sword some of her best and cheifest Captains much misliked it The first Law in this kind that ever was made was Enacted by Theodosius against the Donatists but with this restraint that it should extend against none but onely such as were tumultuous and till that time they were not so much as touch'd with any mulct though but pecuniary till that shameful outrage committed against Bishop Maximian whom they beat down with bats and clubs even as he stood at the Altar So that not so much the errour of the Donatists as their Riots and Mutinies were by Imperial Laws restrained That the Church had afterward good reason to think that she ought to be salubrior quam dulcior that sometimes there was more mercy in punishing then forbearing there can no doubt be made St. Austin a man of as mild and gentle spirit as ever bare rule in the Church having according to his natural sweetness of disposition earnestly written against violent and sharp dealing with Hereticks being taught by experience did afterward retract and confess an excellent use of wholesome severity in the Church Yet could I wish that it might be said of the Church which was sometimes observed of Augustus In nullius unquam suorum nccem duravit He had been angry with and severely punish'd many of his kin but he could never endure to cut any of them off by death But this I must request you to take onely as my private wish and not as a censure if any thing have been done to the contrary When Absolom was up in arms against his Father it was necessary for David to take order to curb him and pull him on his knees yet we see how careful he was he should not die and how lamentably he bewail'd him in his death what cause was it that drove David into this extreme passion Was it doubt of Heir to the Kingdom that could not be for Solomon was now born to whom the promise of the Kingdom was made Was it the strength of natural affection I somewhat doubt of it three years together was Absolom in banishment and David did not very eagerly desire to see him The Scripture indeed notes that the King long'd for him yet in this longing was there not any such fierceness of passion for Absolom saw not the Kings face for two years more after his return from banishment to Hierusalem What then might be the cause of his strength of passion and commiseration in the King I perswade my self it was the fear of his sons final miscarriage and reprobation which made the King secure of the mercies of God unto himself to wish he had died in his stead that so he might have gain'd for his ungracious child some time of repentance The Church who is the common Mother of us all when her Absoloms her unnatural sons do lift up their hands and pens against her must so use means to repress them that she forget not that they are the sons of her womb and be compassionate over them as David was over Absolom loth to unsheath either sword but most of all the Temporal for this were to send them quick dispatch to Hell And here I may not pass by that singular moderation of this Church of ours which she hath most Christianly exprest towards her adversaries of Rome here at home in her bosom above all the reformed Churches I have read of For out of desire to make the breach seem no greater then indeed it is and to hold eommunion and Christian fellowship with her so far as we possibly can we have
that by reason of their calling they debar themselves of many the thriving Arts of the world it must needs be that if riches do come upon them that God himself doth extraordinarily pour them on Wherefore good men must not consider how much or how little it is they have but the means by which it comes unto them All the Prophets and Apostles which were hungry had not that offer which St. Peter had all kind of flesh let down from heaven and free choice to eat of what they listed When Daniel was in Babylon in the Lions Den God sends his Angel into Iewry takes a Prophet by the hair of the head carries him into Babylon and all to carry but a mess of pottage for Daniel's dinner Daniel's fare is meaner then St. Peter's but the miracle is as great and the care of God is the same The righteous man that hath much is as St. Peter he that hath least is as Daniel the word and promise of God is alike made good unto them both And thus much of these two Errours of which the due avoiding shall keep us from mistaking of those promises and charging God foolishly Now because much of that which we have formerly spoken was spent in proving that God doth force the world many times even in a very eminent sort to serve the necessities and purposes of those that are his yet since ordinarily the case of good men in the things of this world is meaner then that of the world's children their riches are many times small if they be any at all and promotion looks little after them That we may a little the better content our selves and know in what case we stand give me leave to shew you how it comes about that the wicked though they have no promise yet have a larger portion in the world's blessings then the godly Where it shall appear that it cannot otherwise be except it should please God to alter the ordinary course of the world The first cause therefore that the sons of this world thus usually climb aloft above the sons of God and nest themselves in the tallest Cedars is their infinite and importunate Ambition From this root hath sprung forth both that infinite mass of wealth which private men and that boundless compass of Government which great princes have attain'd unto Nothing was ever more unjust then the raising of these great Kingdoms and if the Laws of equity and moderation might have taken place they had never been St. Austin saw no difference between the Roman Empire and Spartacus his conspiracy onely the one lasted a little longer and this makes no difference in the thing it self And hence it is that God gave limits and bounds unto the Kingdom which his people had and having poured out the vials of his wrath upon the usurping people that held the Land of promise from them to whom it was due he permitted not the Iews to grate too much upon the bordering Nations And this is the reason why the Iews that in all other respects went side by side or rather before the rest of the world onely in latitude of Kingdom yeilded to the Monarchs of the earth For the one made the will of God the other their own ambition the measure of their desires The most moderate and wisest kind of men are many times slowest in giving entertainment to these great thoughts of heart In Iotham's parable in the Book of Iudges where the Trees go forth to chuse a King the Olive would not leave his fatness nor the Vine his fruit nor the Fig-tree his sweetness no not for a Kingdom Onely the Brier the basest of all shrubs no sooner had the Trees made the motion to him but he is very apprehensive of it and thinks himself a goodly creature fit to make a King of Sober men who best understand the nature of business know well how great a charge extraordinary wealth◠and places of Authority bring with them There is none so poor but hath his time to make an account of were there nothing but this what a sum would this amount unto Add unto these our Words unto Words Actions unto all these Wealth and Ability and last of all Honour and Authority how do each of these successively like places in Arithmetick infinitely increase the sum of our accounts No marvel then if wise and considerate men are slow in tasking themselves so heavily and rather content themselves quietly at home Let the world go well or ill so it be not long of them The second thing that makes them come on in the world is their spacious wide and unlimited conscience which can enlarge it self to the swallowing of any means that bring gain and preferment with them he that once hath cauterized and seared his conscience and put on a resolution to gain by all occasions must needs quickly grow rich But good men are evermore shie and scrupulous what they do though there be no apparent occasion Evil is of a slie insinuating nature it will creep in at every little passage all the care and wariness we can possibly use to prevent it is too little When David had cut off the lap of Saul's garment the Scripture tells us that his heart smote him because he had done this thing I have often wondred with my self what it was that in an action so innocent and harmless done with so hohourable intent onely to bring a testimony of his innocency and righteousness might thus importunately trouble his conscience He intended no wrong unto Saul not so much as in his thought yet had he but a little advised himself through scruple and tenderness of conscience he would not have used so harmless a witness of his innocency Common reason told St. Paul that the labourer is worthy of his hire and by instinct of the holy Ghost himself learn'd and taught that it was but justice and equity that men that labour in the Gospel should live by the Gospel Who feeds a flock eats not the milk and clothes not himself with the wooll of it yet notwithstanding that he might take away all occasion of evil that lazie and idle drones who suck the sweet of other men's labours might not take example by him to live at other mens cost that he might make the Gospel 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 free without any charge that men that have no silver might come and buy and eat might come I say and buy the wine and milk of the Word without money that the Gospel might not be slandered as a means of gain he would not use that liberty that God and men gave him neither would he eat the milk or wear the wooll of his own flock but with his own hands and labours purchas'd himself his necessary maintenance What hope of these mens extraordinary thriving who are so nice and scrupulous of what they finger What then must we think of those that abuse godliness unto gain that refuse to do deeds of charity except