of all consider what reasons we may find out why God should hold so unrespective a hand and secondly we will draw some Uses from the Doctrines And first of the reasons why God doth thus proceed And first I ask what if peradventure we were able to render no reason at all of this action of God ought this to prejudice or call in question the justice of it Alas we are men of dull and slow understanding when we have turned our Books and spent our daies and nights in study and wearied our selves in searching out the causes of naturall things yet with all this sweat with all this oyle we cannot attain so far as to know why the grasse which growes under our feet is rather green then purple or scarlet or any other colour And think we then to dive into supernaturalls and search out those causes which God hath locked up in his secret Treasures St. Austin having written to a scholar of his and opened many points unto him tells him that if he had given him at all no reason of such things as he had written yet he ought to be with him of such authority and credit that he should take them upon his word without any farther question Was it thus betwixt St. Austin and his scholar how much more then ought it to be so betwixt God and us how readily ought we to take him on his word and willingly believe him above against our reason Hiero King of Sicilie when he had seen those wonderfull devises and engines which Archimedes that great Mathematician and Engineer had fram'd and considered what marvellous effâ—cts they were able to produce beyond all expectation he commanded to be proclaimed that whatsoever Archimedes hereafter affirmed how unlikely soever it seem'd to be yet sans question it should be taken to be true Beloved the great Geometrician of Heaven which made all things in number weight and measure hath infinitely surpassed all human inventions whatsoever and can we do him less honour then Hiero did to Archimedes then cause it to be proclaimed throughout the world that whatsoever he saith or doth shall be taken for just and true howsoever no probability no reason can be assigned The whole disputation of the book of Job doth drive at this very Doctrine for when that God had afflicted Job in that fearfull manner and his friends were come to comfort him there arises a question concerning the reason why Job should thus be handled His friends grounding themselves upon this conclusion that all affliction is for sin lay folly and iniquity to his charge and tell him that though he had made fair shew in publick yet certainly he had been a close irregular and though he had escaped the eye of the world yet the judgement of God had found him out But Job on the contrary stoutly pleades his innocency and marvels for what reason the hand of God should be so heavy upon him And when their controversie could have no issue behold Deus è machina God himself comes down from Heaven and puts an end unto the question and having condemned Job of ignorance and imbecillity tels him that it was not for him to seek a cause or to call his judgments in question Secondly it may well be that we may save our labour that we need not move the question or seek a reason at all For in these common calamities which befall whole Kingdoms it may be God doth provide for the righteous and deliver him though we perceive it not It is the property of God {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} to find means when all mens inventions faile He bringeth down into the grave and raiseth up again saith Hannah in the first of Samuel Some examples in Scripture make this very probable The old world is not drowned till Noah be provided for Sodom cannot be fired till Lot be escaped Daniel and his fellowes though they go away into captivity with rebellious Juda yet their captivity is sweetned with honours and good respect in the land into which they go And who knows whether God be not the same upon all the like occasions How many millions of righteous persons have thus peradventure been delivered whose names notwithstanding are no where recorded It was an observation of the Junior Plinie Facta dictaque virorum illustrium alia clariora alia majora All men have not gained credit in the world according to their desert Some things of no great worth are very famous in the world whereas many things of better worth are less spoken of or perchance ly altogether buried in obscurity caruerunt quia vate sacro because they lighted not on such who might transmit their memory to posterity The examples of Daniel and Lot and sundry others which because they stand upon record take up the talk and speech of the world may peradventure be of this rank perchance they are onely clariora they are onely more spoken of and others whose memory is lost are non minora sed obscuriora are no whit lesse then they onely they are lesse spoken of St. Austin observes out of Sallust that divers reading the ancient Stories and finding many famous persons mention'd in them much commended those times because they thought that all the men had been such as those As this was an errour in those that read the ancient Stories so let us take heed lest we reading the holy Stories of the Bible fall upon a contrary errour and finding the memory of Daniel and Lot and others so strangely in these generall plagues delivered suppose there were none but these Vixere fortes ante Agamemnona doubtless both before and since millions have made the like escapes though their memory lies buried in oblivion Thirdly be it granted that in these oecumenical these general plagues the righteous and sinner speed alike yet there is great reason it should be so For though in great and crying sins the righteous partake not with the wicked yet in smaller sins the righteous and sinner evermore concur For who is amongst the sons of men that can presume himself free from these kind of sins Now the greatest temporall punishment that is imaginable is far too little for the smallest sin you can conceive for the due reward of the smallest sin that is can be no lesse then eternall torment in hell This is enough to clear God of all injustice for who can complain of temporall that doth justly deserve eternall paines Or why should they be severed in the penalty that are thus joyned together in the cause And what though the fault of the one be much the lesse it will not therefore follow that the punishment should be lesse It will seem a paradox that I shall speak unto you yet will it stand with very good reason Great cause many times there is why the smaller sin should be amerced and fined with the greater punishment In the Poenitential Canons he that kills his mother is enjoyned ten years penance
First you must know what it is that is commanded you secondly wherefore that is upon what authority upon what reason It is reported of Aristotle that being sick when his Physician came to administer to him he asked him a reason of his action and told him that he would be cured like a man and not like a beast Deceit and error are the diseases of the mind he that strives to cure it upon bare command brings you indeed a Potion or rather a Drench which for ought you know may as well set on and increase as remove the error but when he opens his authorities when he makes you to conceive his grounds and reasons then and not before he cures your error They that come and tell you what you are to believe what you are to do and tell you not why they are not Medici but Veterinarii they are not Physicians but Leaches and if you so take things at their hands you do not like men but like beasts I know this is something an hard Doctrine for the many to hear neither is it usually taught by the common Teachers {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} one part you will be content to yield unto namely to take at our hands what it is you are to believe or do but the other part you stifly refuse To know the grounds and reasons of what you do or of what you believe this you remit to us non vestrum onus bos clitellas to require this at your hands were as improper as if we should clap the saddle on the back of the oxe And for this you have your reasons too as you think you are men whose time is taken up in your Trades and Callings you are unlearned unread of weak and shallow understandings it is therefore for you not onely modesty but even necessity to submit your selves to better judgement and for enquiry into the reasons and causes of commands this as a little too speculative you are content should lye upon your Teachers Felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas They are men born underhappier Stars then ordinary who attain to the discovery of Reasons and Causes of things Beloved all this I know yet I must still go on and require the performance of the Apostles precept be not deceived which is a point of perfection which you shall never arrive at except you forgoe these pretences Saint Hierom tells us that it was a precept of Pythagoras Oneratis superponendum opus deponentibus non communicandum Where you find a man laden there to increase his burthen and never to go about to ease him which would lay his burthen down which he he interprets ad virtutem incedentibus augmentanda praecepta tradentes se otio relinquendos The meaning saith he of that precept was To men that go on in virtue and industry you must still give and add new precepts new commands but idle persons must be forsaken Beloved it falls me by lot this day to act Pythagoras his part The burthen of this precept laid upon you by the blessed Apostle I told you consisted of two parts What and Why That part of your burthen which contains What I see you will willingly take up but that other which comprehends Why that is either too hot or too heavy you dare not meddle with it But I must add that also to your burthen or else I must leave you for idle persons For without the knowledge of Why of the true grounds or reasons of things there is no possibility of not being deceived Your Teachers and Instructors whom you follow they may be wise and learned yet may they be deceived But suppose they be not deceived yet if you know not so much you are not yet excused Something there is which makes those men not to be deceived if you will be sure not to be deceived then know you that as well as they Is it divine authority that preserves them from being deceived you must know that as well as they Is it strength of reason you must know it as well as they For still in following your Teachers you may be deceived for ought you know till you know they are not deceived which you can never know untill you know the grounds and reasons upon which they stand for there is no other means not to be deceived but to know things your selves I will put on this Doctrine further and convince you by your own reason It is a question made by John Gerson sometimes Chancellor of Paris Quorsum mihi mea conscientia si mihi secundum alienam conscientiam vivendum est moriendum Wherefore hath God given me the light of reason and conscience if I must suffer my self to be led and governed by the reason and conscience of another man Will any of you befriend me so far as to assoile this question For I must confesse I cannot It was the speech of a good husbandman Non satis est agrum possidere velle si colere non possis It is but a folly to possesse a piece of ground except you till it And how then can it stand with reason that a man should be possessor of so godly a piece of the Lords pasture as is this light of understanding and reason which he hath endued us with in the day of our creation if he suffer it to lie untill'd or sow not in it the Lords seed Needs must our reason if it be suffered thus to lie fallow like the Vineyard of the sluggard in the Poverbs quickly {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} and be over-run with bryers and thornes Think we that the neglect of these our faculties shall escape unpunished with God Saint Basil tells us that the man that is utterly devoid of all education and hath nothing but his reason to be guided by {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} yet even such an one if he doth offend shall not escape unpunished because he hath not used those common notions ingrafted by God in his heart to that end for which they were given How much ever then shall that mans punishment be who in this great means of education amids so many so plain so easie waies of cultivation of our reasonable faculties yet neglects all and lets them lye fallow and is content another should have his wits in keeping It were a thing worth looking into to know the reason why men are so generally willing in point of Religion to cast themselves into other mens armes and leaving their own reason relie so much upon another mans Is it because it is modesty and humility to think another mans reason better then our own Indeed I know not how it comes to pass we account it a vice a part of envy to think another mans goods or another mans fortunes to be better then our own vicinum pecus grandius uber habet and yet we account it a singular virtue to esteem our reason and wit meaner then other mens Let
us not mistake our selves to contemn the advice and help of others in love and admiration to our own conceipts to depress and disgrace other mens this is the foul vice of pride on the contrary thankfully to entertain the advice of others to give it its due and ingenuously to prefer it before our own if it deserve it this is that gracious virtue of modesty but altogether to mistrust and relinquish our own faculties and commend our selves to others this is de ingenio suo pessimè mereri nothing but poverty of spirit and indiscretion I wil not forbear to open unto you what I conceive to be the causes of this so generall an error amongst men First peradventure the dreggs of the Church of Rome are not yet sufficiently washt from the hearts of many men We know it is the principall stay and supporter of that Church to suffer nothing to be inquired into which is once concluded by them Look through Spain and Italy jumenta sunt non homines they are not men but beasts and Issachar-like patiently couch down under every burthen their superiors lay upon them Secondly a fault or two may be in our own Ministery Thus to advise men as I have done to search into the reasons and grounds of Religion opens a way to dispute and quarrell and this might breed us some trouble and disquiet in our Cures more then we are willing to undergo therefore to purchase our own quiet and to banish all contention we are content to nourish this still humour in our hearers as the Sibarites to procure their ease banisht the Smiths because their Trade was full of noise In the mean time we do not see that peace which ariseth out of ignorance is but a kind of sloth or morall lethargie seeming quiet because it hath no power to move Again may be the portion of knowledge in the Minister himself is not over-great it may be therefore good policy for him to suppresse all busie enquiry in his auditory that so increase of knowledge in them might not at length discover some ignorance in him Last of all the fault may be in the people themselves who because they are loth to take pains and search into the grounds of knowledge is evermore painfull are well content to take their ease to gild their vice with goodly names and call their sloth modesty and their neglect of enquiry filiall obedience These reasons Beloved or some of kin to these may be the motives unto this easiness of the people of entertaining their Religion upon trust and of the neglect of inquiry into the grounds of it To return therefore and proceed in the refutation of this grosse neglect in men of their own reason and casting themselves upon others wits Hath God given you eyes to see and legs to support you that so your selves mightâ—ly still or sleep and require the use of other mens eyes and legs That faculty of reason which is in every one of you even in the meanest that heares me this day next to the help of God is your eyes to direct you and your legs to support you in your course of integrity and sanctity you may no more refuse or neglect the use of it and rest your selves upon the use of other mens reason then neglect your own and call for the use of other mens eyes and legs The man in the Gospel who had bought a Farm excuses himself from going to the Marriage-supper because himself would go and see it But we have taken an easier course we can buy our Farm and go to supper too and that only by saving our paines to see it we profess our selves to have made a great purchase of Heavenly Doctrine yet we refuse to see it and survey it our selves but trust other mens eyes and our surveyors and wot you to what end I know not except it be that so we may with the better leisure go to the Marriage-supper that with Haman we may the more merrily go in to the banquet provided for us that so we may the more freely betake our selves to our pleasures to our profits to our trades to our preferments and Ambition Never was there any business of weight so usually discharged by Proxy and Deputy as this sacred business hath been from time to time Slâ—idan the Historian observes that it was grown a custom in his time for great persons to provide them Chanteries and Chaplains to celebrate their Obits and to offer for their souls health even in their life-times whilest they themselves intended other matters and thus they discharged the cure of their own souls by deputy Not onely in Germany where Sleidan lived but even in England amongst us that custom had taken footing and was sometimes practised even in this place by one sometimes of this Body Margaret of Valois not long since Queen of France built her a Chappel provided her Chaplains and large endowment for them that so perpetually day and night every hour successively without intermission by some one or other there might intercession be made to God for her unto the worlds end a thing which her self had little care or thought of in her life-time as having other business to think on So confident are we of the eternall good of our soules upon the Knowledge Devotion and Industry of others and so loth to take any paines our selves in that behalf and that in a businesse which doth so nearly concern us Would you see how ridiculously we abuse our selves when we thus neglect our own knowledge and securely hazard our selves upon others skill Give me leave then to shew you a perfect pattern of it and to report to you what I find in Seneca the Philosopher recorded of a Gentleman in Rome who being purely ignorant yet greatly desirous to seem learned procured himself many servants of which some he caused to study the Poets some the Orators some the Historians some the Philosophers and in a strange kind of fancy all their learning he verily thought to be his own and perswaded himself that he knew all that his servants understood yea he grew to that height of madness in this kind that being weak of body and diseased in his feet he provided himself of wrestlers and runners and proclaim'd games and races and performed them by his servants still applauding himself as if himself had done them Beloved you are this man when you neglect to try the spirits to study the meanes of salvation your selves but content your selves to take them up on trust and repose your selves altogether on the wit and knowledge of us that are your Teachers what is this in a manner but to account with your selves that our knowledge is yours that you know all that we know who are but your servants in Jesus Christ We have a common saying {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Many Scholars prove far better then their Masters Would you bear a part in this saying and prove better then we that
that he delighted himself much in often feasting and being reproved for it by some friends of his he gave them this answer If feasting were not a good thing men would not honour God and the Saints so much with it Lo here Beloved the natural consequence of Church-feasts they are nothing else but an Apology for luxury For when the Ministers of God shall out of these and the like places reprove superfluity of diet the people have their answer ready If this were a fault then why is Christ and his Saints thus honoured with it This splendor of feasting and eating in memory of the Saints hath a little dazel'd the eyes of some great persons St. Hierom although a great Clerk and singular contemner of secular superfluities yet we see in what a strange passion he was when he wrote his book against Vigilantius And what think you might be the cause of so much heat Understand you must that there was a custom in the Church in sundry places for men and women young and old of all qualities and conditions upon the Vigils of the Martyrs to come together by night and meet in Church-yards and there eat and drink upon the Tombs of the Martyrs This corruption Vigilantius had reproved And good cause I think he had so to do Nox vinum mulier when men women maids shall meet together by night in Church-yards to eat and drink I think your own discretion will easily suggest unto you what fruits were like to come It seems the Churches found some which they liked not well of for by common consent these kinds of meetings have been long since laid down and in some Churches express Canons by Synods have been made to decry them Yet the maintenance of this was that great matter which cast St. Hierom into so great choler Yet these men have brought feasts into the Militant Church what shall we think of those who have brought feasting into the Church Triumphant There was an error in the Church very ancient and very general called the error of the Millenaries which arose immediately after the Apostles times and strongly prevailed with almost all the Fathers of the Church before the Nicene Council These men taught that there would be a time when our Saviour should come from Heaven and raise out of the dust all those that were his and reign with them here on earth a thousand years in all abundance in all secular pomp imaginable Would you know what bâ—essings these men did expect in that imaginary Kingdom Let Irenaeus Bishop of Lyons in France tell it you who was one of the great Patrons of that error and lived within two hundred yeares of Christ He bringing in our Saviour discoursing to his Disciples concerning the state of that Kingdom amongst other instances of great happinesse there to be found makes him report this There shall be saith he in a field ten thousand vines every vine shall have ten thousand branches every branch ten thousand stalks every stalk ten thousand clusters every cluster ten thousand grapes and every grape viginti quinque metretas five and twenty pottles of wine More to that purpose doth that Father speak by which he evidently betrayed what a childish gross conceit he had of the spiritual Kingdome of Christ which he took to be like Mahomets Paradise and measured out the Kingdome of Heaven by meats and drinks which above all things in the world that carry any necessity in them are the most vain Again for the better countenance of this outward jollity in the Church I see some men have attempted to entitle our Saviour Jesus Christ himself unto it for First it is espied in Scripture that our Saviour is often found at feasts Now for the rest that which the Scripture cannot do Tradition shall help us out in for in the Second place Tradition will instruct us that the seamlesse Coat which he wore was of a precious stuff and admirable texture Thirdly Tradition will tell us that he had a silver cup wherein at his last Supper he gave the Wine and that this cup is to be seen at this day in some one of the Parish-Churches of Rome Fourthly in the publick Treasury of the Common-wealth of Genoa there is a Charger made of an holy Emerald a very rich and precious piece If we consult with Tradition that will tell us and the whole Common-wealth of Genoa doth believe it that this was the dish wherein our Saviour Christ had his diet served Thus Beloved we who should frame the world to fit Christ have framed a Christ to fit the world And if we hearken but a little to the belly the issue of all will be this not onely the World but the Church Religion Heaven Christ himself will turn to good-fellowship If the world joyn with the belly and meats it doth what becomes it Habent enim qualitatem symbolam they sympathize all three for as God shall destroy both it and them so must this world pass away and the form of it onely let Christians and the Churches hope be immortality Give me leave to conclude with the very words with which I began What then remains but that we take the counsel which St. Ambrose gives us Tanquam defunctus c. THE FOURTH SERMON MAT. 23.38 Behold your House is left unto you desolate SEverity in God seems to be a quality not natural but casual and occasioned unto which in a manner he is constrained besides his nature {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} For God saith Trismegistus hath but one onely property one quality and that is Goodness Prior bonitas Dei secundum naturam posterior severitas secuncum causam illa ingenita haec accidens illa propria haec accommodata illa edita haec adhibita saith Tertullian The prime quality in God is goodnes for that is natural severity is later as being occasioned that is eternal this is adventitious that is proper unto him this is but borrowed that inwardly flowes from him this is forreignly fixed upon him We usually observe that if we would know things what they are by nature and of themselves we must consider their first actions and operations which voluntarily flow from them before that either Art or Custom hath altered them Beloved will you know the truth of what I but now spake that God of himself and by his nature is onely good then observe his first actions into which his own nature carried him Number all his acts from the Creation till the Fall of Man and you shall find in them nothing but goodness When he created this beautiful frame of Heaven and Earth Men and Angels in that wonderful order who counselled him or what moved him thus to do He was of himself all-sufficient and needed nothing why then did he thus break out into action certainly because he was good For goodness otium sui naturá non patitur hinc censetur si agatur Goodness is a restless thing alwayes in doing and