st v. we have him Singing of Iudgment as well as Mercy and so raising the sweetest Harmony out of the seeming discord of the most disagreeing Attributes There can be no Composition in any thing without some multiplicity and diversity of Parts and therefore we have a Catalogue of those Gifts which did as it were compound and make up the Primitive Church in the 8 9 and 10 th verses of this 12 th Chapter of the 1 st to the Corinthians Where the Apostle tells us That to one is given the Word of Wisdom to another the Word of Knowledge to another Faith with many more such like Gifts there reckoned up and indeed so many and various were the Gifts poured out by the Spirit of God upon the first Preachers of the Gospel that there is need almost of the Gift of Tongues to rehearse them Of which great Variety as we have hitherto observed the Vse so it is intended also for the Ornament of the Church I say Ornament for I cannot perswade my self that God ever designed his Church for a Rude Naked Unbeautified Lump or lay to the Foundations of Purity in the Ruines of decency The Entrance and Gate of Solomon's Temple was called Beautiful and as there were several Orders of Priests and Levites belonging to it so they had their several Offices their several Chambers and Apartments in that Temple It was a kind of Representation of Heaven in which our Saviour tells us there are many Mansions But behold there are Wiser much Wiser than Solomon amongst us who will have it quite otherwise in the Christian Church Nothing of Order or Distinction nothing of Splendour or Dress must be allowed of here No they are all for lying in the Dust before God as their word is and therefore will have nothing but Dust and Nastiness for the Churches Furniture To attempt a Confutation of such Persons would be superfluous and indeed I have no more to say for those who contend for such a sordid and mean Condition of the Church but that in this they do not so much speak their Devotion as their Education it being generally found that a slovenly way of breeding disposes Men to a kind of slovenly Religion Much might be spoken by way of Analogy between the Internal and External the Spiritual and the Material Ornaments of the Church But both of them serve to dress and set off the Spouse of Christ the first to recommend Her to his own Eyes and the latter to the Eyes of the World Where would be the Beauty of the Heavens themselves if it were not for the multitude of the Stars and the Variety of their Influences and then for the Earth here below and those who dwell therein certainly we might live without the Plumes of Peacocks and the Curious Colours of Flowers without so many different Odors so many several Tastes and such an Infinite diversity of Airs and Sounds But where would then be the glory and lustre of the Universe the flourish and gaiety of Nature if our Senses were forced to be always poring upon the same Things without the Diversion of Change and the quickning Relish of Variety And now when matters stand thus may we not justly say If God so cloathes the Fields so paints the Flowers and paves the very places we Tread upon and with such curiosity provides for all our senses which yet are but the Servants and under Officers of the Soul shall He not much more provide for the Soul it self and his own service thereby in the Glorious Oeconomy and great Concernments of the Church and moreover does not such a Liberal Effusion of Gifts equally Argue both the Power and the Bounty of the Giver Number and multitude are the signs of Riches and the materials of Plenty And therefore though Vnity in the Government and Communion of the Church is indeed a great blessing yet in the Gifts and endowments of it it would be but Penury and a Curse But Secondly As this diversity of the Spirits Gifts imports Variety so it excludes Contrariety Different they are but they are not opposite There is no Jarr no Combat or Contest between them but all are disposed of with mutual Agreements and a happy subordination For as Variety adorns so Opposition destroys Things most different in Nature may yet be united in the same design and the most distant Lines may meet an◠Clasp in the same Centre As for Instance One would Think that the Spirit of Meekness and the Spirit of Zeal stood at that distance of Contrariety as to defie all Possibility either of likeness or Reconcilement and yet as we have already shewn they both may and do equally serve and carry on the great End and business of Religion And the same Spirit which Baptizes with Water Baptizes also with Fire It is an Art to attain the same End by several Methods and to make things of a quite contrary Operation to concur in one and the same Effect Come we now to the third and last Thing proposed from the Words which is to shew What are the Consequences of this Emanation of so many and different Gifts from one and the same Spirit I shall instance in Four directly and naturally deducible from it As First If the Spirit Works such Variety of Gifts and those in so vast a Multitude and for the most part above the force of Nature certainly it is but Rational to Conclude That it is a Being superiour to Nature and so may justly Challenge to it self a Deity There have been several who have impugned the Deity of the Holy Ghost though not in the same manner but the Principal of them come within these two sorts 1. Macedonius and his followers who allowed Him to be a Person but denyed his Deity Affirming Him to be the Chief Angel the supreme and most Excellent of those Blessed Spirits imployed by God in Administring the Affairs of the Church and Conveying good suggestions to the minds of Men and for that cause to be called the Holy Spirit and sometimes simply and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or by way of Eminence The Spirit And the same was held also by one Biddle an Heretick of some Note here in England a little before the Restauration That is to say while Confusion and Toleration gave Countenance to almost all Religions except the True 2. But secondly Socinus and his School deny both the Deity of the Holy Ghost and his Personal subsistence too not granting Him to be a Person but only the Power of God To wit That Vis or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by which he effects or produces Things And amongst those who assert this none have given such bold strokes at the Deity of the Holy Ghost as Crellius in his Book de uno Deo Patre and his other de Spiritu Sancto Now to draw forth and Insist upon all the Arguments and Texts of Scripture which use to be traversed on both sides in this Controversy would be a
Thing neither to be done within this Compass of time nor perhaps so proper for this Exercise and therefore let it suffice us upon the warrant of express Scripture not Sophisticated by Nice and forced Expositions but plainly interpreted by the General Tradition of the Church to which all private Reason ought in Reason to give place to confess and adore the Deity of the Holy Ghost Now this Holy Spirit is in the Church as the Soul in the Natural Body For as the same Soul does in and by the several parts of the Body exercise several functions and Operations so the Holy Ghost while He animates the mystical Body of Christ Causes in it several Gifts and Powers by which He Enables it to exert Variety of Actions And as in the River Nilus it is the same fountain which supplies the seven streams So when we read of the seven Spirits Revelation 4.5 They are but so many several Gifts of the same Spirit all bearing the Name and Title of their Donor as it is usual for so many several Volumes to bear the single denomination of their Author and we say properly enough that such an one has read Cicero or Plutarch when he has read their Works But now surely this Glorious Person or Being who thus enlightens the minds of all Men coming into the World in some measure and of the Church more Especially cannot be in the Rank and Number of Created Beings The Heathens attributed a kind of Divinity or Godhead to springs because of that Continual Inexhaustible Emanation from them Resembling a kind of Infinity But here we see the very Gifts of the Spirit to be Divine and where we find such a Divinity in the stream certainly we may well ascribe it in a more transcendent manner to the Fountain Besides if the Holy Ghost were not God I cannot see how our Bodies could be well called his Temples since none but God can Challenge to Himself the Prerogative of a Temple And so much for the first Consequent But Secondly This great diversity of the Spirits Gifts may read a Lecture of Humility to some and of Contentment to others God indeed in this great Scheme of the Creation has drawn some Capital Letters set forth some Master-Pieces and furnished them with Higher Abilities than ordinary and given them Gifts as it were with both hands But for all that none can brag of a Monopoly of them none has so absolutely engrossed them all as to be that Thing of which we may say Here we see what and how much God can do No God has wrote upon no Created Being the utmost stint of his Power but only the free Issues and Products of his Pleasure God has made no Man in Opprobrium Naturae only to overlook his Fellow Creatures to upbraid them with their Defects and to discourage them with the Amazing distance of the Comparison He has filled no Man's Intellectuals so full but He has left some Vacuities in them that may sometimes send Him for supplies to Minds of a much Lower Pitch He has Stocked no Land or Countrey with Such Universal Plenty without the mixture of some wants to be the ground and Cause of Commerce for mutual wants and mutual perfections together are the Bond and Cement of Conversation The vast Knowledge and Ruling Abilities of Moses might yet stand in need of Aaron's Elocution And He who speaks with the Tongue of Angels and the greatest Fluency of Spiritual Rhetorick may yet be at a loss when He comes to matters of Controversy and to assert the Truth against the Assaults and Sophistry of a subtle opponent God indeed can and sometimes happily does unite both these Gifts in the same Person But where He does not let not Him who can Preach condemn Him who can only Dispute neither let Him who can dispute despise Him who can only Preach For as we have shewn before the Church is served by both and has equally need of some Men to speak and declare the Word and of others to Defend it it being enough and too often more than enough for one Man to maintain what another says In which Work the speaking part is indeed the more Easy but the Defensive the more glorious And as this may give some Check to the Presumption of the most raised Understandings so it should prevent the despondency of the meanest For the Apostle makes this very use of it in the 21. and 22. v. Where He would not have even the lowest and poorest member of the Church to be dejected upon the Consideration of what it wants but rather be Comforted in the sense of what it has Let not the foot Trample upon it self because it does not rule the Body but consider that it has the honour to support it Nay the greatest Abilities are sometimes beholding to the very meanest if but for this only that without them they would want the Gloss and Lustre of a Foyl The Two Talents went into Heaven as easily as the Five And God has put a Peculiar usefulness even into the smallest Members of the Body answerable to some Need or Defect in the greatest thereby to level them to a mutual Intercourse of Compliance and Benefaction which alone can keep things equal and is indeed the very Poise and bâ—last of Society And thus much for the second Consequent But Thirdly The foregoing Doctrine affords us also a Touchstone for the Tryal of Spirits For such as are the Gifts such must be also the Spirit from which they flow And since both of them have been so much pretended to it is well for the Church that it has rule of judgment and a note of Discrimination There is none who is not willfully a stranger to the Affairs of our Israel but has had the Noise and blusters of Gifted Brethren and of persons pretending to the Spirit ringing in his Ears Concerning which Plea of theirs since we all know that there are Spirits both Good and Bad it cannot be denyed but that in some sence they might have the Spirit such a Spirit as it was and that in a very large measure But as for their Gifts we must Examine them by the standard of those here mentioned by the Apostle And first for that of Prophecy These Men were once full of a Prophecy that the World should be destroyed in the Year 1656 Because forsooth the Flood came upon the Old World in that Year Reckoning from the Creation And again that the Downfal of Pope and Antichrist together with that of Monarchy and Episcopacy which they always accounted as Limbs of Antichrist should be in the Year 1666. And that because some Remarkable mention is made of the Number 666 in the Revelation with many other such like Predictions The Event of all which has shewn that those Men were not of God's Privy Council but on the Contrary that all their Prophecies were like those of Almanacks which warn every Wise Body to prepare against foul weather by their foretelling
Fair. And then for the Gift of Healing let a bleeding Church and State shew how notably they were gifted that way They played the Chirurgeons indeed with a Witness but we never yet heard that they Acted the Physitian all their Practice upon the Body Politick was with Powder and Ball Sword and Pistol No saving of Life with those Men but by Purging away the Estate And likewise for the Gift of discerning of Spirits They had their Tryers that is a Court appointed for the Tryal of Ministers but most properly called Cromwell's Inquisition In which they would pretend to know Men's hearts and inward Bent of their Spirits as their word was by their very looks But the Truth is as the Chief Pretence of those Tryers was to enquire into Men's Gifts so if they found them but well Gifted in the Hand they never looked any further for a full and Free hand was with them an Abundant demonstration of a Gracious Heart a word in great request in those times And moreover for the Gift of diverse Tongues it is certain that they scarce spake the same Thing for two days together Though otherwise it must be Confessed that they were none of the greatest Linguists their own Mother Tongue serving all their Occasions without ever so much as looking into the Fathers who always spoke the Language of the Beast to such as could not understand them Latin was with them a Mortal Crime and Greek instead of being owned for the Language of the Holy Ghost as in the New Testament it is was looked upon like the Sin against it so that in a Word they had all the Confusions of Babel amongst them without the Diversity of Tongues And then Lastly For the Gift of Interpreting they thought themselves no ordinary Men at Expounding a Chapter if the Turning of a few Rational significant Words and Sentences into a loose tedious Impertinent Harangue could be called an Exposition But above all for their Interpreting Gift you must take them upon Ezekiel Daniel and the Revelation and from thence as it were out of a Dark Prophetick Cloud Thundring against the Old Cavaleirs and the Church of England and as I may but too appositely express it breaking them upon the wheels in Ezekiel Casting them to the Beasts in Daniel and pouring upon them all the Vials in the Revelation After which let any one deny it who durst that the Black Decree was Absolutely passed upon those Malignants and that they were all of them to a Man Sons of Reprobation And thus I think I have Reckoned up most of the Extraordinary Gifts of the Spirit and Compared them with those of our late Gifted Brethren Amongst all which Divine Gifts I must declare that I cannot find the Gift of Canting and whining and making Faces that is of Speaking Bad sence with worse looks which yet those Men used to call the Language of Canaan Nor can I find the Gift of uttering every suddain crude undigested thought coming over their minds and of being Impudently bold and Familiar with Almighty God in Prayer I cannot find the Gift of exploding the Mysteries and peculiar Credenda of the Gospel in order to the turning Christianity into bare Morality I cannot find the Gift of accounting Tenderness of Conscience against Law as a Thing Sacred but Tenderness of Conscience according to Law as a Crime to be prosecuted almost to Death In a word I cannot find the Gifts of Rebelling Plundering Sequestring Robbing Churches and Murdering Kings and all this purely for the sake of Conscience and Religion These Things I say whether it be through the Weakness of my discerning Faculties or whatsoever else may be the Cause I cannot for my Life find amongst the Primitive Gifts of the Spirit And therefore wheresoever I do find them let Men talk never so much of Inward Motions and Extraordinary Calls of the Spirit of the Kingdom of Iesus Christ and of the Publick good of Moderation and of an Healing Spirit and the like yet long and sad Experience having taught us the true meaning of all these fine and fallacious Terms I must needs say both of them and the Spirit from which they proceed in those words of St. Iames 3.18 That they descend not from above but are Earthly Sensual and Devilish These are the Names which God knows and calls them by though Schismaticks and Hypocrites may call them Reformation But Fourthly In the fourth and last place This Emanation of Gifts from the Spirit assures us that Knowledge and Learning are by no means opposite to Grace since we see Gifts as well as Graces conferred by the same Spirit But amongst those of the late Reforming Age whom we have been speaking of all Learning was utterly cryed down So that with them the best Preachers were such as could not read and the ablest Divines such as could not write In all their Preachments they so highly pretended to the Spirit that they could hardly so much as spell the Letter To be blind was with them the Proper Qualification of a Spiritual Guide and to be Book-Learned as they called it and to be Irreligious were almost Terms Convertible None were thought fit for the Ministry but Tradesmen and Mechanicks because none else were allowed to have the Spirit Those only were accounted like St. Paul who could work with their hands and in a litteral sence drive the Nail home and be able to make a Pulpit before they preached in it But the Spirit in the Primitive Church took quite another Method being still as Careful to furnish the Head as to sanctifie the Heart and as He wrought Miracles to found and establish a Church by these extraordinary Gifts so it would have been a greater Miracle to have done it without them God as He is the giver of Grace so He is the Father of Lights He neither Admits Darkness in Himself nor approves it in others And therefore those who place all Religion in the Heats of a furious Zeal without the due Illuminations of Knowledge Know not of what Spirit they are indeed of such a Spirit as begins in Darkness Leads to it and Ends in it But certainly we shall one day find that a Religion so much Resembling Hell neither was nor could be the Readiest way to Heaven But on the Contrary That the Spirit always Guides and instructs before He saves and that as He brings to Happiness only by the ways of Holiness so He never leads to true Holiness but by the Paths of Knowledge To which Holy Spirit together with the Father and the Son Three Persons and one God be rendred and ascribed as is most due all Praise Might Majesty and Dominion both now and for evermore Amen THE Peculiar Care AND Concern of Providence FOR THE Protection and Defense of Kings Set forth in a SERMON Preached At Westminster-Abbey Nov. 5. 1675. Psalm CXLIV 10 former part It is He that giveth Salvation unto Kings THE greatest and most magnificent Title by which God