Heaven and if those of Sardis were to walk with him in white robes Because they were Worthie The Controversie may seem Concluded That Good Works are meritorious of heavenly Ioyes or of Eternal Life 5. To the latter Objections or frame of Arguments drawn from these and the like places For I was an hungry and you gave me meat c. Calvin makes Answer That these and the like particles Quia Etenim For or Because do not alwayes import or denote The true Cause of things but sometimes only the Order or connexion betwixt them But However this may be True it is not so Punctuall but that Bellarmine and others take their advantage from it as having the Authoritie of the Grammer Rule against it For the particles used in all the places alleged by them are Conjunctions not Copulative or Connexive but Causal And it may seem harsh to say That some conjunction causal doth not import a causalitie It is true Yet sometimes they import no cause at all of the thing it self but onely of our knowledge of it Oft-times again they import no Efficacious causalitie of the thing it self but only Causam sine qua non that is some necessary means or condition without which the Prime and Principal cause doth not produce its Effect To give you examples or Instances of both these observations If there should come into This or the like Corporation A stranger who knowes not any Magistrate by sight he would say surely this is the chief Magistrate Because all others give place unto him because the Ensignes of Authoritie are carried before him Here the word Because must necessarily denote A true cause but not the cause why he is the chief Magistrate for that is only his true and just Election What cause doth it then denote The cause of his knowledge of him to be the chief Magistrate Thus when we come to the knowledge of the cause by the Effect The effect is the cause of our knowledge of the cause As others giving place unto him or the carrying of the Ensignes of Authority before him is not the cause why this or that man is the chief Magistrate for the time being but rather his being the chief Magistrate is the cause why all others give him place and why the Ensignes of Authoritie are born before him Yet these and the like Effects are the true cause or reason of a strangers knowledge of him to be the chief Magistrate And by this Rule we are to interpret that saying of our Saviour many sins are forgiven her for she loved much In which speech it may not be denied but that the Particle For imports A true cause yet no cause of the thing it self to wit of her love For this were utterly to reverse or thwart our Saviours meaning which was no other then this That the forgivenesse of her sins was the cause of her love so was not her Love the cause of the forgiveness of her sins which by our adversaries confession being of Free Grace and of the First Grace which was bestowed upon her could not be merited or deserved Howbeit the manner of expressing of her loue by washing his feet with her tears and wiping them with her hairs was The true cause of every understanding or Observant mans knowledge that many sins were forgiven her and unlesse she had an apprehension of her manifold sins thus freely forgiven her she could not have loved him so much or made such expression of her Love 6. Sometimes again this Particle For or the like causal speech imports only a subordinate or instrumental cause or A necessary means or condition required without which the Positive the Principal and only efficacious cause especially if it work freely doth not produce its intended Effect To put the case home in this present business Suppose a great and potent Prince out of his own meer motion and free grace should proclaim a pardon to an Army of Traytors and Rebels which had in Justice deserved death if a man should ask What is the cause or reason why the Law doth not proceed against them no other cause could be assigned besides the gracious favour of the Prince But if one should further ask Why the pardon being freely promised to all the principal malefactors it may be are pardoned or restored to their blood or advanced to dignities whereas others which were included in the same pardon are exiled or put to death The speech would be proper and in its kinde Truly causal if we should say the one part submitted themselves and craved allowance of their pardon whereas the other stood out and rejected it For it is to be presumed that no Prince being able to quell his rebellious adversaries will suffer any to enjoy the benefit of a General Pardon how freely soever it be granted unlesse they submit themselves unto it and crave the benefit of it with such humility as becomes malefactors or men obnoxious Much lesse will he restore any to blood or advance them to dignities whom he knowes or suspects still to continue ill affected or disloyal in heart So then the not-submission or continuance in rebellion is The true and Positive Cause why the one sort enjoy no benefit of the General Pardon but are more severely dealt withall for rejecting the princes Grace then they should have been dealt withall if no Pardon had been granted The humble submission of the other and their penitence for their former misdeeds is Causa sine qua non that is a necessarie means or Condition without which the Prince how gracious soever would not suffer them to enjoy the benefit of their Pardon would not restore them to their blood would not advance them to greater dignities This is the very Case of Adam and all his sons All of us were Traytors and Rebels against the Great God and King of Heaven who is better able to quell the whole host of mankinde than any Prince his meanest Rebellious subjects yet it pleased him to pardon us more freely then any earthly Magistrate can do a malefactor If then the reason be demanded Why any of mankinde are saved Why they are restored unto their blood and advanced to greater dignitie then Adam in Paradise enjoyed no other true cause can be assigned of these Effects besides The meer grace and mercy of the Almighty Judge But if it be further demanded Why some of mankinde enjoy the benefit of this Pardon and inherit Eternal Life Why others are sentenced to everlasting death When as the free Pardon with its benefits were seriously and sincerely tendred to all The Answer is Orthodoxal and True Because some in true humilitie accepted of the Pardon and craved allowance of it whereas others rejected it and sleighted such Proclamations or significations of it as the God of mercy and compassion had given out not to this or that man only but To all the World So that the Omission of those good works which our Saviour mentions in the
imports the Real Cause of the thing it self which is known But oftentimes the Cause only of our knowledge of it Again such Causal Particles do not alwayes import some Efficacious Causalitie but only Causam sine qua non some necessarie means or condition without which the prime and principal Cause especially if it work freely doth not produce its intended effect To give you Examples or instances of these Observations If a stranger coming into a Citie should say surely yonder Gentleman is the chief Magistrate because the sword is born before him No wise man would hence collect that the bearing of the sword before him is The Cause why he is the chief Magistrate For his lawful Election is The Cause of that and that is the Cause why the sword is born before him Yet may we not for this reason deny that the former speech doth necessarily import a Cause for the bearing of the sword before him is the true True Cause of his knowing him to be the chief magistrate And in as much as we oftentimes come to know the Cause by the Effect this word For or other Conjunction Causal doth oft-times point out the Effect rather then the Cause of the thing it self So it doth in the speech of our Saviour Luke 7. 45. Wherefore I say unto thee her sins which are many are forgiven for she loved much However some Romanists whose delight it is to set Christian Charitie and faith at odds would hence collect that Charitie is the Cause of the forgiveness of sins yet their greatest Scholars acknowledge their error or oversight and ingenuously acknowledge their understanding being convinced by the evidence of truth that This womans Love was not the Cause why her sins were forgiven but that the Free forgiveness of her sins which were many was the True Cause why she loved so much however her extraordinary love being testified in such solemn sort was a true Cause or reason by which all that saw her might know both that her sins had been many and that she had an internal feeling or apprehension of their forgiveness And the true reason why the Pharisee did neither bear such love unto our Saviour nor exhibit the like signes of respect unto him was because he did not feel himself sick much lesse did he feel or apprehend the cure of his sickness as the woman did For if he had known either the measure of his own sins or that our Saviour was the Physician of his soul he would have given better Testification of his love and respect unto him then he did by a Complemental Invitation of him 12. To instance again If of two parties equally suspected of Felonie a man admitted to hear their examination or tryal should say This is the thief For Two competent witnesses have given evidence against him no man would hence infer that the evidence given in against him by two honest men was the Cause why he was a thief and yet was it the true Cause why he knew him to be the thief Every Revelation or authentick Declaration of any truth before unknown is the true Cause of our knowledge of it but not of the Truth it self for that is the Cause why the Declaration or our knowledge of it is true Now amongst such as professe Christ and call him Lord it is unknown to us who be the true heirs of this heavenly kingdom who be not but in the day of Final Judgement in which all shall be judged by their works the sheep shall be known from the goats and the first certain knowledge which we shall have of this difference shall be from The Declarative sentence of the Judge who cannot erre and his Declaration as you see shall be made according to their works The ones performance of the Good works here mentioned declared and testified by the Judge shall be the True Cause by which men and Angels shall know them to be heirs of the everlasting Kingdom the others Omission of the like works testified likewise by the same Judge shall be the true cause by which we shall know them to be altogether unworthy of Gods favour or mercy most worthy of everlasting death We shall then truly know that the one sort are crowned as Saint Cyprian saith according to Gods Grace and that the other are condemned according to Justice That the ones omission of Good Works is the true Cause of condemnation and that the others performance of Good works is not the Cause of their salvation but the Declaration only or a Testimonie that they are the Sons of God and that they did Good works by the secret Operation of the spirit of Grace in them And thus much if you observe it is implyed in the Reply or Answer of them that be saved to their Judge Lord When saw we thee an hungred c So farre they shall be from conceiting their works to be meritorious or worthie of eternal bliss that they shall be ready to disclaim them as not worthie of it ready to blame their sluggish backwardness or want of chearfulness to have done much better seeing what they did unto their poor brethren as now they perceive shall be so graciously accepted that Christ in his Throne of Majestie will acknowledge that he takes them as kindly as if they had been done unto himself The Case is the same as if a Gracious Prince of his own free motion and goodness should proclaim a general Pardon to a multitude of Rebels Thieves and Traytors so they would accept of it and make their peace with their honest neighbors whom they have wronged All of them in shew accept the Pardon but some of them in the Interim secretly practise treason or disturb the publick peace If at the general Assize or at their Arraignment the Judge upon certain notice of their several demeanors should say to the one sort I restore you to your former state and dignity Because since the Proclamation of your Pardon you have demeaned your selves as becomes Loyal Subjects and thankful men And to the other you I condemn to death Because you have abused your Soveraigns Clemency No man would ascribe the restauration of the one unto their good demeanor in the Interim betwixt the getting of their Pardon and their Arraignment but unto the Princes Clemencie Albeit the condemnation of the other were wholly to be ascribed unto their misdemeanors not unto any want of Clemencie in the Prince towards them The good demeanor of the one could but be at the most Causasine qua non A necessary Condition without which the Princes Clemencie in his Pardon exprest could not profit them And so we say of Good Works They are Causae sine quibus non necessary Conditions or means without which no man shall inherit the Kingdom of Heaven but no Positive or meritorious Causes of our inheritance in it To conclude If any one should ask me Why all men that profess they beleive in Christ shall not be saved Albeit Christ
ΜΑΡΑΠΑΘΑ OR DOMINVS VENIET COMMENTARIES Upon these ARTICLES of the CREED Never heretofore Printed VIZ. Of Christs Session at the Right Hand of God and Exaltation thereby His being made LORD and Christ Of his Coming to Judge the Quick and the Dead The Resurrection of the Body And Life Everlasting both in Joy and Torments WITH DIVERS SERMONS Proper Attendants upon the Precedent TRACTS AND Befitting These PRESENT TIMES BY That Holy Man and Profound DIVINE Thomas Jackson D. D. President of CORPUS CHRISTI Coll. in OXFORD Inharet in mentibus quasi seculorum augurium quoddam futurorum c. M. T. C. Tusc Quest lib. 1. O praclarum Diem cum ad Divinum illud concilium animorum proficiscar cumque ex hac turba colluvione discedam Idem de Senect LONDON Printed by A. Maxey for Timothy Garthwait at the little North Door of S. Pauls 1657. To the REVERENCE LEARNING and VERTUES of D R SHELDON SIR THis comes not to bespeak you Patron of the Book to which it is prefixed but to acknowledge and to make known unto the world That you have been both a Faithful Friend to the Great Author thereof in Conserving and also a Publick Benefactor in producing the Manuscripts here printed in this and the precedent Volume the Tenth and Eleventh Books of His Commentaries upon the Creed But though I think I have done you some small right in making this Acknowledgment I fear by occasion thereof you may be thought by others to have done the Author and your self no smal wrong The Point wherein your Judgement may suffer will be The Concrediting so Precious Deposita to so mean a Person as my self And yet to vindicate your self and to comfort me The ensuing Narration may give some Arguments of Hope That this was not done sine Numine without the contrivance of Divine Providence first putting together diverse small particulars and then advancing them to the effecting of a Work not small The first stone of this Work was laid some 44 years ago in my School-Acquaintance with a Vertuous and studious young Gentleman Mr. Ro. Nettleton of Yorkshire This Friendship being intermitted by the space of fourteen yeers he going to Oxon and I to Cambridge Anno 1617. was afterwards renewed by meeting and Conference which though Casual and short did soon discover as the Ointment in the right Hand will not long be hid That we had all this while been Disciples to One Man though we had lived so many years without any the least Intelligence or Commerce in Two several Academies After This there followed a second Pause or Cessation of Twelve or fourteen years more Towards the end of which space The Difficulties of the Times brought me to seek retirement in Oxon where by the Mediation of Mr. Benson a very Ingenuous person and Amanuensis to Dr. Jackson I made suit to Dr. Newlin Successor to our Author in the Government of Corpus Christi Colledg to view some Papers for my private Information but could not obtein though upon condition to peruse them only in his own Lodgings So careful and cautelous was that Faithful Man for which I honour and commend him This just and kind denyal sharpned my former desires and made me seek out a Precator a very Grave and Learned Man well known to your self by whose Mediation I might obtein from you or by your help what I could not otherwise get Whereupon you were pleased to give me so fair an Advousion of your Favour as supported my hopes for the space of three yeers more when returning to Oxon and missing your self I made means a second time to Dr. Newlin and got a sight of some of Dr. Jacksons Papers This was in the Year 1646. In the year 1651 Mr. Nettleton being in London and being very disirous of the thing intreated me to expend that small Acquaintance I had with the Learned and Pious Dr. Hammond in obteining of your self and by your Mediation of Dr. Newlin a sight of such Papers as Dr. Jackson left behind him which you granted and effected with so memorable alacritie as did both mcourage Him divers others assisting the design also to contribute towards the reprinting of the first three Books ill printed in Quarto and after that towards the publishing of the Tenth besides some charge in writing out part of this Eleventh Book and obliged me to assist the best I could in doing of them all I have great cause to bless the Almighty for many blessings at all times but signally for Three bestowed upon me in these sad times of publick calamitie 1. That he hath ever fed me with Food convenient for me mine own bread being the Bread of my Desires 2. That he hath repaired my other losses with a great supply of Learned and Pious Acquaintance greater perhaps then the times continuing prosperous would ever have afforded me so true is the Good Word of God Mark 10. 30. Thirdly That though I was forced from My Nest wherein I said I shall dye yet he suffered me not to be utterly deprived of all opportunities to do him service And I think my self bound to profess that in this Price which God by your hand hath put into mine I take most comfort as hoping that my Negotiation therewith by Gods gracious acceptation will abound to mine Account and pass for a supplement or substituted Commutation of such duties as I have otherwise been defective in And I earnestly beseech all such as were ever committed to my Tuition in the University or to my Charge in Cure of Souls in the Countrie to serve themselves of these my endeavors in another mans Labors so as out of them to repair all their dammages sustained by my negligence omissions or deficiencie in duties towards them And now Honoured Sir if I have not wearied you with this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as it is very nauseous to my self I can subjoyn a second Series of Arguments That Gods good hand of Providence was in this Business throughout If I ever made any high menaces or had Projects of doing any thing worthy a Clerk the very thoughts thereof before I die are perisht And I became justly frighted into this humbled despereing Temper partly by conversing with this Great Authors Works published twentie years ago where I read this Passage and I cannot but subscribe to it If the sins of this Land for forty years past were divided into ten parts the sins of the Pulpit and of the Presse would make A Large Tenth Had not this Good Man been taken away from the evil to come but lived to hear the Pulpitings and read the Printings of these last twenty years what would he have said Would not he have reckoned them Nine parts of ten Being then resolved Periturae parcere Chartae never to increase the deplorable Bundels of Supervacuous Books by any composure of mine I acknowledg my self as Caelibes and Improles are in a more especial manner bound
mitto lapidem in Sionem I lay or place a stone in Sion the meaning is as if he had said I lay or found Sion the spirituall Sion or new Jerusalem in a Stone or cheif corner stone elect and pretious But whether this be the grammatical or literal sense of the prophet I leave for Criticks in the Hebrew dialect to determine Both constructions the ordinary and this Critical are true and compatible both in respect of the matter are necessarie Christ God and man was layd in Sion as a sure foundation stone as Imus angularis Lapis as the lowest corner stone unto which S. Peter for precedencie of time so far wee yeild unto his primacie was first annexed Peter was the first living stone which was Built upon this foundation stone the other Apostles were layd not upon Peter but upon the same foundation stone whether one after another or all together wee will not dspute However all that beleive as Peter and the other Apostles did or shall so beleive unto the worlds end are immediately layd upon the same foundation stone not one upon another no one of them upon Peter or upon any other Apostle their union or annexion unto Christ is as immediate as Peters was and is or shal be as indissoluble as his was to Christ albeit their growth be not so great nor for qualitie so glorious The best inscription of this edifice thus immediately erected upon the same stone would be that of the Poet Crescet crescentibus illis As the number of living stones which are layd upon this foundation stone increase so the foundation or corner stone which God did promise to lay in Sion doth still increase As every particular living stone increaseth or groweth from a stone into a pillar of this house of God from a pillar in the house of God unto a temple of God so this foundation stone that is Christ as man still groweth still increaseth not in himselfe but in them For they grow by his growth in them or by diffusion of life from him into them 23. But though Christ be often called A stone a rock a living stone a living rock or a stone which being cut out of a mountain became a Mountain which filled all the earth yet the manner of his growth in us or the manner of his inlarged habitation through the Church may be best conceived by the manner of the soules growth or diffusion of his Vertue throughout Vegetable or sensible bodies that is through trees or plants or through the bodies of men of beasts or such as wee call living creatures There is a vegetable soul in the Ake-corn when it is first set or planted and this soul we may truely say dwelleth or abideth in the Akorn and is the cause why the Akorn sprouteth into a rod the same soul is the cause why the rod or twig groweth greater the true cause why this twig growes into a stemme why the stemme grown greater spreads it self into branches why every branch beareth leaf blossom or seed Now the greater the stemme doth grow the further the vegetable soul doth spread it self The same vegetable soul which was in the Akorn diffuseth it self into the stemme into the branches into the leaf into the blossom into the Fruit or seed None of these could thrive or prosper at all unlesse the vegetable soul did abide or dwell in them none of them can thrive or prosper any longer than the vegetable soul abideth or dwelleth in them Thus was Christ the root out of which S. Peter sprouted the soul of Peter as he was a living or Spiritual man He had no life but from Christ he grew by Christ dwelling or abiding in him And as he did grow by Christ abiding in him So he bare fruit by Christs dwelling in him by the diffusion of life and vegetation from Christ And so all they that abiding in Christ do grow in faith grow by Christ dwelling in them and spreading his vertue through them after such a manner as the vegetable soule doth diffuse it self throughout the Branches which spring from the root or stemme or through the branches which are ingrafted or inoculated into it And this manner of the vegetable souls diffusion of it self or of its vertue into all the Branches which are ingrafted into the same stock or root doth better resemble the manner of Christs dwelling in us than the diffusion of life or vegetation from the root into the stemmes stovens or branches which without ingraffing or inoculation naturally spring from it 24. But this later similitude of the Stock and Grafts although it well expresse the manner of Christs abiding or growing not in himself but in us and the manner of our abiding or dwelling in him it may seem to fail in this That ordinarie Stocks howsoever the ingrafted branches be supported by them and receive life and nutriment from them yet do they not receive their specifical kind of life from the stocks into which they are ingrafted but still retain their own native qualitie As a good Apple or Pear grafted into a Crab stock or Thorn doth not degenerate into a Crab or Thorn but reteins its native sweetnesse and bears the same fruit which it would have done although it had grown up into a Tree from its own root or from the root whereof it was a native Branch It would be a Soloecism to say That any such stock doth remain or dwell in the Graft because it doth not diffuse its specifical qualitie into it But Christ in this manner abideth or dwelleth in us He is the Root and Stem and we the Grafts and inset branches and yet he is said as truely to dwell in us as we in him This argues that the manner of our ingrafting and abiding in him is not natural because the Stock or Stem is for nature and qualitie much better than all the Branches or Grafts which are supported by it which receive life and nutriment by it Hence saith the Apostle Rom. 11. 24. That we Gentiles were cut out of the Olive tree which was wild by nature and were grafted contrary to nature into a good Olive tree This ingraftment is contrary unto nature two wayes First In that the Grafts being wild by nature without any root or fat or sweetness in themselves grow better qualified then they were by participation of the sweetness of the Stock Secondly In that the Stock whereinto they are ingrafted is a good Olive whereas the Olive tree naturally admits no ingraftment or incision being by nature so fat that it seems to envie or scorn to participate his fatness unto any other Branches In arbore pingui non vivunt insita Grafts do not thrive or prosper in any fat tree or stock saith A late Naturalist And as an Hebrew Doctor hath Observed the Olive being the fattest of Trees will admit no incision nor ingraftment Nor will any Olive Graft thrive or prosper unlesse it be ingrafted in an hungry
manner or ground of his inference would be impertinent if not contradictory to the principal conclusion intended by him which we are bound explicitly to believe For it is not enough to believe that the bodies of men which are committed to the grave shall not utterly perish but be quickned again as the corn which is covered with the ground but we are bound further to believe That every man shall arise with his own body with the same very body wherein he lived that he may receive his doom according to that which he hath done in the body whether it be good or bad This conclusion is not included in the Apostles inference or Experiment drawn from the corn which groweth out of the putrified seed for he expressly affirmes in the ver 37. that the body which springeth out of the ground is not the same seed that is sown 2. In Answer to the former difficultie some good Commentators there be which grant that our Apostles instance in the seed which first dies and is afterwards quickned is not a Concludent proof or forcible Reason but rather a similitude or Exemplification and it is the property or character of similitudes or examples illustrant non docent they may illustrate the truth taught they do not teach or confirm it Tertullian with other of the Fathers have diverse illustrations or exmeplifications of the Resurrection in the course of nature out of all which it would be hard to extract a full Concludent proof Lux quotidie interfect a resplendet The light dayly vanisheth and recovers brightnesse again darknesse goes and comes by an interparallel course to the removall of light Sidera defuncta reviviscunt The stars dayly set or fall and rise again The seeds of vegetables do not fructifie untill themselves be dissolved and corrupted All things sublunary are preserved by perishing their reformation or renewing supposeth a defacing Many of these and like observations taken out of the book of Nature may serve as Emblemes or devices for emblazoning or setting forth our hopes or belief of the Resurrection But concludent proofs they cannot be unlesse we grant that the Book of nature hath by Gods appointment Types or silent Prophecies of Divine mysteries as well as hath the book of Grace But shall we say or believe that the Apostles inference in this place is only Emblematical or Allegorical or rather a Physical or Metaphysical Concludent Proof Aproof not only against such as acknowledge the truth of the Old Testament or written word of God but a proof so far as it concerns the possibility of a Resurrection contained in the Book of nature His conclusion he supposeth might by observant Readers be extracted out of the Instance or Experiment which he brings For unlesse out of the Instance given in the Corn which first dies and afterwards is quickened the Possibilitie of the Resurrection of such a Resurrection as he taught might concludently be proved they which doubted of or denyed this truth had not incurr'd the censure of folly they had not deserved the Title or name of fools But not to be able to read that which was legible in their own books that is in the works of nature was a childish folly a folly which in men of years and discretion could not proceed but from insufferable incogitancy or negligence If we examine the Apostles inference according to the Rules of true Philosophie which never dissents from true Divinitie his Instances are concludent his Argument is an Argument of proportion a majore ad minus from the greater to the lesse All the difficultie is in framing or setting the Termes of it aright 3. All the exceptions which are taken against his proof are reducible to this one general Head That he argues or makes his inference from the works of nature unto a work supernatural or from the generation of vegetables ordinary in the course of nature unto the Resurrection of our bodies which can be no work of nature no generation but a work as supernatural as Creation But they which thus Object should consider that those works which we term works of Nature as generation of vegetables the increase of the earth the fruit of trees and the like are not in our Apostles Philosophie any way opposite to the works of God or to works miraculous and supernatural This Proposition is in his Divinitie and in true Philosophie most certain Whatsoever nature works God doth work the same and he works the same immediatly though not by himself alone for nature worketh with him though immediatly by him But the former Proposition is not convertible that is we cannot say that God works nothing without the Co-agencie of nature as we say that nature worketh nothing without the co-operation or Power of God Nature worketh nothing cannot possibly work without the power and direction of God God worketh many things since the world was made by him or nature created by him without the association or co-operation of nature or any causes naturall And the works which he worketh by himself alone either without the association or interposition of causes naturall or contrary to the ordinary course of nature are properly called works miraculous or supernaturall and Miraculous they are called not because they alwayes argue a greater or more immediate exercise of Gods Power then is contained in the works of nature but in that they are unusuall and without the compasse of ordinary Observation Sometimes those works which are truly miraculous may less participate of the Almighty Power then the usual works of nature do It was a true miracle that the Sun should stand still in the vale of Aialon but not therefore a Miracle in that it did argue a greater manifestation of Gods Power then is dayly manifested in the course of nature or works of other creatures But a great Miracle only in that it was so rare and unusual The dayly motion of the Sun about the earth if we search into the true and prime causes of it includes a greater measure or more branches of the Almighty Ceators Power then the standing still of the Sun did in the dayes of Joshua or the going back of it did in the dayes of Hezekiah For in our Apostles Divinitie Act. 17. 28. We live and move and have our being in God that is all things that are have their being in him and from him their being is but a participation of his infinite being The life of all things living is but a participation or shadow of his Life The Motion of all things that move is but the participation of his Power so that when the Sun did cease to move or stand still in the dayes of Joshua it was partaker only of his Power sustentative or of that power by which he supporteth all things It ceased to move only by meer substraction or cessation of his motive Power by whose vertue or influence it dayly like a Gyant-runs his course Thus dayly to run
its course it could not without a positive force or power communicated unto it from The Creator in whom as the Apostle speakes it moves But it ceased for a while to move without any positive force or power to inhibit or restrain its course But as we said by meer substraction of that power by which it moves So long as it continues its course it both moves and hath its Being in God and it is partaker of two branches of His Almighty Power But when it stood still it onely had its Being in him The influence of the other branch of Power was intercepted Now the Argument drawn from those works which we call The works of nature unto works miraculous or supernatural would in this case hold a majore He that dayly makes the Sun to compasse the world is able to stay its course when he pleaseth 4. A miracle likewise it was and a great one too that The three Children should be untouched in the midst of the flaming furnace yet neither was there a greater nor more immediate positive effect of Gods Power in the restraint of that fire then then was in the sustaining other Fire which at other times devoured the bodies of his Saints The Holy Martyrs who loved not their lives unto the death but gave them up for the Testimonie of the Lord Jesus For Without the co-operation or concurse of Gods Power the fire could not have touched their bodies Wherein then did the Miracle Recorded in Daniel and experienced in the three children properly consist Not so much if at all in fencing their bodies from the violence of the flame by imposition or infusion of any new created qualitie into their bodies as in substracting or withdrawing his ordinary Co-operation from the fire whose natural propertie is to consume or devour bodies combustible such as the bodies of the three Children by nature were The only cause why the fire did not burn them was the substraction or withdrawing of Gods Co-operative Power without whose strength or assistance the hottest furnace that Art or experience can devise cannot exercise the most natural operation of fire For as the substance of the fire cannot subsist or have any place in the Fabrick of this universe unless it be supported by Gods Power sustentative So neither whilst it subsists or hath actual being amongst Gods creatures can it work or move without the assistance of Gods co-operative or all-working Power In Him both these Powers are one both as he is are infinite But as communicated unto his creatures they are not altogether one but two participated branches of his infinite Power And in the burning of the Martyrs or in other destructions made by fire both branches as well of his sustentative as of his co-operative power are manifested Whereas in the preserving of the three Children from the violence of the flaming furnace the one branch only to wit His Power sustentative was communicated to the fire the other branch to wit the participation of his co-operative or working Power was for the time being lop't off from the body or substance of the fire Now this withdrawing of his co-operative Power from the fire was a true document or proof that he is the God and guide of nature That without him the fire even whilst it is for nature and substance most compleat cannot perform the proper work or exercise of its nature The necessary consequence of which Proof or experiment is this That he is the Author or fountain as well of all the works or exercises of natural causes as of natural bodies or substances themselves And if we consider his Power not in it self but as communicated to his Creatures or natural Agents it is and ought to be acknowledged greater in those works which we call works of nature and of which we have dayly experience then it was in either of these two Miracles before mentioned Both of them were for this Reason only Miraculous in that they were most unusual and without the circuit of any experiment or observation in the course of nature before the times wherein they hapned 5. To raise Mens Bodies out of the Grave or out of the Elements into which they have been dissolved is far more unusual then to raise up Corn out of putrified seed and in this respect the Resurrection which we hope for must be acknowledged a work more Miraculous and wonderful then the yearly springing of Corn of fruits of herbs or grass But may we say in this Case as in the former that the Power of God is no less but rather greater in these ordinary works of nature as in causing herbs fruit or corn to sprout or fructifie with advantage of increase then it shall be in the Resurrection of the dead which is a work not of Nature but miraculous and supernatural a work in which natural Causes shall not be entertained nor imployed by God No there shall be a manifestation of greater Power then either of Gods Sustentative Power by which all things that were created are still preserved or of His Co-operative Power without whose participation nothing which is so preserved can work at all or perform the exercises of its proper nature The Power indeed by which He Preserveth all things is the self same Power by which He Made all things out of nothing The Preservation of things that are is but a continuation or proroguing of the first Creation As all things are made of Nothing so would they instantly return into Nothing were they not continually supported and preserved by the self same Power by which they begun to Be when they were not Creation and preservation differ onely in sensu connotativo only in relation not in substance Creation includes a Negation of Being before For all things that are took their beginning by Creation Conservation supposeth a beginning of things that are and includes a Negation of their returning into nothing These Two Negations being abstracted or sequestred the Creation of all things and their Conservation are as truly and properly the same Power or work of one and the same party as the way from Athens to Thebes and from Thebes to Athens is the same But if the Continuation of things that are be a Creation or if the self same Almighty Power be still manifested in the preservation of things temporal that was manifested in the first Creation what greater power can be manifested in the Resurrection from the dead then is daily manifested and ought to be acknowledged in the preservation and daily increase of herbs of fruits of corn sown and springing out of the earth Or if any greater power shall be manifested in the Resurrection from the dead then is daily experienced in these works of nature how shall we justifie our Apostles Argument in this place to be an Argument of proportion or an Argument as we said before from the greater to the lesse or an Argument à pari from The like Case or Instance The Argument
were much better then their present in mercie favour and loving kindnesse 5. But whilst they thus contend for the merit of works done by Grace do they not derogate from the merits of Christ who is the only fountain of all Grace We say They do But They Reply They do not but rather magnifie the merits of Christ more then we do who deny the merits of Saints For Christ as they alledge did not only merit Grace for us but this also that we by Grace might truly Merit Now grace itself and the merit of grace is a more Magnificent Effect of Christs Merits then grace alone Here is a Double Effect of Christs Merits by their Doctrine whereas we admit but a single One. Thus they reply But if the One of those two effects which they imagine or conceive doth derogate more in true construction from the merits of Christ then the supposal or admission of it can add unto them We attribute more unto his merits by the admission of One single Effect only to wit meer grace then they do by acknowledgment of Two to wit grace it self and the merit of grace in us But the more we are to merit by grace for our selves the less measure of merit we leave unto Christ For as that which he merited for us is not ours but his so that which we merit for ourselves is not His but Ours The merit of grace supposeth a Fulnesse or Fountain of grace and Fountain of grace there is no other but Christ himself nor is there any Fulness of grace but in him only For of his fulnesse as the Evangelist saith Iohn 1. 16. we all have received grace for grace that is grace upon Grace Every degree or greater measure of Grace which we receive doth flow alike immediatly from the fulness of this inexhaustible Fountain of Grace without any secondary Fountain or Feeders Grace doth not grow in us as Rivers do which although they have one main spring or fountain yet they grow not to any greatness without the help of secondary Fountains or concurrence of many springs or feeders Grace doth so immediatly come from Christ as the Rivers do from the sea Increase of Grace doth come as immediatly from Christ as the increase of Rivers from rain or as the increase of light in the waxing Moon comes from the Sun 6. The state of this Question concerning The merits of works comes to the same issue with that other Great question concering Justification As whether it be by faith alone or by faith and works The Romish Church grants that we are justified by faith in Christs blood or merits Tanquam per Causam efficientem as by a true efficient Cause seeing all the Grace which we first receive is bestowed upon us for Christs sake But they hold withall that it is the Grace which for Christs sake is bestowed upon us by which we are formally justified that is As water poured into a vessel doth immediatly expell the air which was in it before so the infusion of Grace for the merits of Christ doth expell sin whether Original or actuall out of our souls And this in their Language is The remission of sins for the attaining whereof There needs no imputation of Christs righteousness after Grace be once infused The formall Cause of every thing requires some efficient or Agent for the production or resultance of it but being once produced or existent it excludes the interposition or intervention of any other Cause whatsoever for the production or existence of its formall Effect To produce heat in the water it is impossible without the Agency or Efficiency of fire but the water being made scalding hot by the heat of fire will heat or scald the flesh of of man or other living creature although it be removed from the fire although it work only in its own strength or of the heat inherent in it Thus say the Romanists that grace cannot be produced in us but by the vertue and efficiency of Christs merits but being by them once produced it doth justifie us immediatly by the strength and vertue of it inherent in us and by the same strength and vertue working in us it doth produce its formall effect to wit the increase of grace and lastly eternal life But if this Doctrine of theirs so far as it concerns Justification or the Remission of sins were true then this inconvenience as I have elsewhere shewed would necessarily follow That no man already after this manner justified could say or repeat that Petition in our Lords Prayer Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive them that trespasse against us without a mockerie of God or Christ For if our sins be formally remitted by the infusion of grace and if by the infusion of the same grace we be formally justified the only true meaning of this Petition is in true Resolution This Lord makes us such or remit our sins after such a manner that we shall not stand in need of thy remission or forgivenss of them or that we shall not stand in need of the mediation of thine only Son For if they be remitted immediatly by grace so long as this grace endures all mediation is superfluous is impossible This Inconvenience is farther improved by the same Doctrine so far as it concerns the merits of works done in charitie And prophanes those Two other Petitions in the same our Lords Prayer Thy Kingdom come Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven no lesse then their Doctrine of Justification doth that Petition Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive them that trespasse against us For if works done by grace or charitie could truly merit eternal life the effect of all the three Petitions should be but this Lord let thy Kingdom of Grace so come unto us Lord let thy will be so done by us here on earth that as we have been long debters unto thee for giving thine only Son to die for our sins and for the purchasing of the First Grace unto us so let us by this grace be inabled to make both Thee and Him debters to us by the merit of this grace and debters in no meaner a sum then the retribution or payment of Eternal Life For if that life can be merited by our works then God doth owe it unto us for our works And if it be due unto us by merit or by debt then it is not as our Apostle hath it in this 23. verse the gift of God or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Original hath it the Grace of God The Apostle might as well have said that Eternal Life was as truly the wages of our righteousness as death is the wages of our sin And so the best Scholars in the Romish Church do grant he might have said What then is the Reason why he did not say so Of this they give us This Reason Inasmuch say they as the First grace by which we merit the Kingdom of heaven is
died for All albeit the Pardon General be proclaimed to all The best Cause or Reason I could render would be This Because All that profess they believe in Christ do not truly believe in Him For if they did They would be careful to maintain Good Works and glorifie God by being Fruitful in them The End of the Fifth Section The sixth SECTION A Transition of the Publishers WE have by Gods Good Blessing dispatched The main of this Book the Five first Sections so many Commentaries or Expositions of such Points or Articles of Christian Faith as are most proper by way of Dread and Terror to awake the Conscience and stirre the Affections To perswade men to reflect seriously upon all their Actions or Omissions Failings or Atchievements and to prepare themselves for that Account which must shortly be Rendred To God the Judge of All who will respect no Persons nor endure Pretences If these have their kindly perfect work They will Produce Judging our selves to prevent the Judgement of the Lord Repentance and Restitution of all things Circumspect walking for the Future and passing the Remnant of our Pilgrimage here in Fear To inrich the volume and to benefit the Reader I have thought good to annex this sixth Section which is A Collection of such Sermons of this Authors as I conceive likely to prove most effectual to the ends above mentioned and be most proper not only for this Place in the Body of His works but for these Times also which may perhaps be startled to see their present sins so flagrantly reproved many years ago by one who knew not any of their persons that commit them Our great Author had in his Eighth Book and third Chapter sadly complained of some that made this Great Rule of Charitie Equitie and Justice Do as you would be done unto This Law of nature and Precept of our Law-giver A nose of wax A verie Lesbian Leaden Rule He had more sadly complained in his Tenth Book Chapter 23. That not only the Practise of this Transcendent Rule was extinct amongst men But that the very Sense of it was if not utterly lost among the Learned Casuists or Expositors yet most shamefully decocted and Piteously shrunk up for want of improving and deducing it into several pipes and Branches of Good Life Lastly in the 29 Chapter of this Book amongst other useful things concerning this Rule He told us That God would Judge the world by it So then This next Discourse I mean the three Sermons upon this Text Comes not in unseasonably And I hope the next but One will follow this as sutably as a silver Thred can follow a needle of Gold And I shall endeavour to pick chuse and so place the rest that the Reader shall not deny their Consequencie to the five precedent Sections treating Of Christs Power to raise the Dead to judge the quick and dead and finally to sentence Both according to the things done in the Body be they Good or Bad. At which day God send this present sinful Generation and amongst them my Soul A Good deliverance and in order thereto a Timely unfeigned Repentance especially of their applauded and avowed transgressions This for Jesus sake who is our Ransom would be our Peace and shall be our Judge Amen The First Sermon upon this Text. CHAP. XXXII MATTH 7. 12. All things Therefore whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you even so do ye unto them For this is the Law and the Prophets Prov. xx 22. Say not thou I will recompence Evil Wait on the Lord and He shall save thee Prov. 24. 29. Say not I will do to him as he hath done to me I will render to the man according to his work The miserie of man of the wisest of men in their Pilgrimage to be wanderers too The short way to Happiness The pearl of the Ocean The Epitome Essence Spirits of the Law and Prophets Do as you would be done unto The Cohaerence The Method Christ advanceth This dictate of nature into an Evangelical Law Fortifies it and gives us proper motives to practise it Two grounds of Equitie in this Law 1. Actual equalitie of all men by nature 2. Possible equalitie of all men in Condition Exceptions against the Rule Answers to those Exceptions This Rule forbids not to wage or invoke Law so it be done with Charitie Whether nature alone bind us to do good to our enemies God has right to command us to love them Plato 's Good Communion The compendious way to do our selves most Good is to do as much good as we can to others The Application IT is whether you list to term it A follie or A Calamitie incident to all sorts of men that when they take a perfect Survey of all their former courses they find their wandrings and digressions far larger then their direct proceedings The more excellent the End is whereat we aim the greater commonly is our Error the more our By-paths from the right way that leads unto it Because The greatest Good is alwayes hardest to come by Thus such as hunt most eagerly after the knowledge of Best matters seeing the Best are worst to find after natures Glass is almost run out and most of their spirits spent whilst they look back upon their former labors like weary Passingers that have wandred up and down in unknown coasts without a Guide desirous to see the way they missed in a Map when they come to their Journeys end begin to discern what Toyl and pains they might have saved had they been acquainted with such good Rules directions at the first as now they know Nor have we so great cause to be ashamed of our folly as to bewail The common miserie of our nature seeing the wisest among the sons of men either for Civil knowledge or speculative learning Solomon himself had almost lost himself in this Maze never finding any other issue of his Tedious course but only this All is vanitie and vexition of Spirit Untill he had almost come to the End of his dayes Then he found out That short compendious way of godly Life Eccles 12. 13. Let us hear the End of all Fear God and keep his Commandments for this is the whole dutie of man In this is contained all we seek 2. Had Solomon in his yonger dayes fixed his eyes upon this Rule which he hath left us as the Mariner doth his upon the Pole or other Celestial sign he might have arrived in half that Time at that Haven which He hardly reached in his old Age after continual danger of Shipwrack by his wandring to and Fro. But how-so-ever This fear of God and our observation of his Commandments be the Readiest the safest and the shortest Cut that Solomon knew unto that True Happiness which all men seek but most seek amiss yet these Commandments cannot be kept unless they be known And known they cannot be without good studie and industrie either in reading or
entertained with battel invade the borders of any Nation In such a Case t is held a point of politick husbandry to waste the Country round about them least it might maintain their Armies But heretofore I have had and elsewhere shall have occasion to decypher all the symptoms of a dying State either set down by the Word of God or observed by the expert Anatomists of former dead bodies politick 14. My message unto you my Brethren the Sons of Levi is briefly this Add not Gods anger to our Countries Curse which at this day whether just or no is bitter and rife against us as if we were all or most of us like the companions of Jesus the son of Josedech persons Prodigious but in a worse sense then they were Persons that had procured her much and did yet portend her greater sorrow partly by our Dastardly silence in good causes but especially by our prophesying for Rewards and humoring the great Dispensers of those dignities on which our unsatiable desires are now unseasonably set It was a saying amongst the Ancient Romans Qui Beneficium accipit libertatem vendit It is thus far improved in true modern English He that will purchase preferments Ecclesiastick especially must adventure to lay his soul to pawn What remedie Only this to make a virtue of necessitie For so must every one do that means to live as a Christian ought Let us not look so much upon the sinister intentions of corrupt minds as upon the purpose of our God even in mens most wicked projects And who knowes whether The Lord by acquainting us with mens bad dealings in dispensing Ecclesiastical honour do not lay the same restraint upon us his children which he did upon Baruch Without all question he absolutely forbids us to seek afer great matters in this age in that he hath cut off all hopes of attaining them by means lawfull and honest And all this he doth for our good that using Baruchs freedom or Jeremies Resolution in our ambassage we may be partakers of their Priviledge in the Great day of visitation wherein such as in the mean time crush and keep us under by their greatness will be ready to give their wealth for our poverty and change their honor for our disgrace upon condition they might but enjoy life with such libertie and contentments as we do Or in Case they shorten our dayes by vexation or oppression yet faithfully discharging our duties whether we live or die we are the Lords And though they out live us an hundred years yet shall they be willing to give a thousand yea ten thousand lives if so many they had so they might be but like us for one hour in the day of death We need not search forain Chronicles nor look far back into ancient Annales The registers of our own memories and our fathers relations may afford examples of some sons of Levi men if we rightly value their admirable worth of place and fortunes mean in respect of our selves which after their death hastned perhaps by hard usage have fild both this and forrain Lands with their good name as with a perfume sweet and precious in the nostrils of God and man whilst those great lights of state so they seemed whilst parasitical breath did blaze their fame which had condemned them to privacie and obscuritie were suddenly put out but with an everlasting Stinch God grant their successors better successe that a precious well deserved fame may long survive them For our selves Beloved as we all consort in earnest desires and hearty prayers that the Lord would renew his Covenant made with Levi his Covenant of life and peace so let us joyn hearts in this meditation The only way to derive this blessing from this our father unto us his sons must be by arraying our selves with Phineas our eldest brothers integritie by putting on his zeal and courage to walk with the Lord our God in peace and equitie and to turn many away from iniquitie And now remember them O my God that defile their Priesthood and break the Covenant of the Priesthood and of Levi Smite them through their loyns that make a prey of his possessions and grinde their heads as thou didst Abimelechs with broken milstones from the wals or with the reliques from the ruinated houses yea grinde all their heads O Lord to powder that grinde the faces of his poor and needy children But peace be upon all such as walk according to this Rule here set to Baruch and upon all those that Love God To this God The Father The Son and the holy Ghost be ascribed all honour and glory now and ever Amen Imprimatur Ric. Baylie Vicecan Oxon. The Publisher To the Readers of these two last Sermons WHo may see That this great Author was not affraid Most aculâ—atly to reprove the sins of his own Time nor is The Advertiser ashamed to set his seal to the justnesse of them by a full and true Publishing his Reproofes Let the Lord be glorified though with our shame and justified when he speaketh Judgement And to Gods glory be it spoken This word hath prospered in the thing where unto God sent it in some of the Gentrie and Clergie Yet can it not be denied but there is still too great store of matter of Reproof in the same kinde Many whose estates are sore diminished have minds still set upon Great Things what ever they have lost they find pleasure Had The Author lived to this day I am perswaded he would have gone on with The Holy Bishops complaints Perdidere tot calamitatum utilitates Pacem et divitias priorum Temporum non habent Omnia aut ablata aut imminuta sunt sola tantum vitia creverunt nihil de Prosperitate pristina reliquum nisi peccata quae prosperitatem non esse fecerunt c. These are wracks indeed To Misse the Good which may be got by suffering evil is the worst of evils To lose that gain which should be gotten by losses is of losses the greatest But to grow worse with suffering evil is perdition it self Now if any one of Prosperous condition when he reads this shall triumph and bless himself in his heart saying We have not sinned in devouring these men I beg his Pardon and beseech him to read on if he saw our faults in the last he may perhaps see his own in the next And humbly desire leave to say 1. A man may punish sin and yet inter puniendum Commit a sin greater then that be punisheth 2. In these times and among the persons promising Reformation there hath been Greater seeking after great things and that with greater Inordination too then was in former Times Our Author complained that the Baruchs of his Time sought great things by the Art of Philip of Macedon Would God my Clergy Brethren so I do esteem such and none but such as were begotten to our mother by the R. R. Fathers of the Church had not used
they were imployed Now the manner of their imployment no man whose Ancestors have been Parties in this business will take upon him to justifie Nor have the posterity of such as were at that time most inriched with the spoils of the superstitious Church any great cause to rejoyce at their Ancestors easie purchase It was a practise just and right as being authorized by God himself that the Israelites should despoile the Egyptians of their costly ear-rings and gawdy jewels But albeit the Israelites who were the borrowers had better right unto them then the Egyptians which did lend them yet much better had it been if the Egyptians had either not lent them or after the lone recovered them than that they should have afforded as they did both matter and opportunity for erecting golden Calves in Israel And of two Evils it had been the lesse if the Churches Revenues had been possessed by their first Owners and not been mis-imployed in ryot luxurie and other branches of prophaneness whereby the measure of this Lands Iniquity was rather augmented then diminished however the nutriment of superstition and Idolatry was by this means abated But be our Fore-elders fault if not in alienating yet in mis-imploying Church Revenues as it may be worse then superstition equivalent to Idolatry it self it was in no wise the fault of Reformed Religion nor of the Reformers of it it must be charged upon the mainteiners of superstition For at the Dissolution of Abbies and other Religious Houses there was no Publick Reformation of Religion attempted save only the denyal or Abjuration of the Popes Transcendent Authority and Restauration of the King unto his antient and hereditary right of Jurisdiction in Causes Ecclesiastick Nor was that Boysterous King so much to blame in dissolving material Temples or houses rather abused then consecrated to superstition as he was after this Reformation if so it may be called in destroying so many living Temples of God which sought not the dissolution of his Kingdom nor any other Reformation of him and his people save only the clearing and purifying of their hearts and brests which had been consecrated unto Gods service from the infection of Romish superstition and Idolatry 2. Idolatry was that which in the first place required Reformation because it did pollute the whole service of God And I think it would be hard to finde any generation of Christian men since the first plantation of Christianity which did more abhor idols or adoration of images in the Church then the first Reformers of that Religion which we now professe did witness Those learned Homilies against the peril of Idolatry And yet would to God that many of those times of high authoritie and most zealously forward in the work of Reformation had not condemned themselves by judging the Romish Church or their fore Elders which lived in it Or that our Apostles censure of the Jewes hate or opposition unto Gentilism had not fallen as jump and fit upon the times of Edward the sixt as it did upon the times and people to whom it was first purposely fitted Our fore Elders especially the Nobilitie and Gentry of those times did abhor idols no lesse then the Jewes did and yet did commit more grosse and palpable sacriledge then the Jewes to my observation at any time had done And what could it boote them to deface Images or pull down Idols in the material Churches so long as by their very spoils they nourished that Great Idol Covetousness in their own hearts Thus to seek to inrich themselves or fill their private Coffers with the spoils of Abbies or Churches or by Tithes and offerings was but to continue the practise of the Prelacie or Clergie in destroying Parishes to erect Monasteries or demolishing lesser Religious houses to build up others more sumptuous more Luxurious 3. Many at this day there be which out of zeal complain that the Lawes against superstition and Idolatry are not severe enough and there is no moderate man unlesse of the Romish faction but could wish that such lawes as have been made for suppressing the growth of it were more constantly more impartially executed then they are In all this neither of them are to blame And yet by soliciting Gods cause and the cause of true Religion against the mainteiners of superstition and Idolatry we shall but solicite our own condemnation unless we bear a like zealous desire and good affection for the depressing and rooting out of all sacrilegious Practises or Opinions And yet seriously to attempt the Reformation of this foul sin which is Equivalent to Idolatry and hath the same burthen of Gods curse would be a matter I am perswaded as full of difficultie and danger in this Land as to attempt the defacing of Images in the Church of Rome or in any Province subject to her Jurisdiction But the further prosecution of this point would better befit an Audience of States-men of Parliament-men or Lawyers then this place or Audience Only let me forewarn you That your Predecessors have been grievous offenders in this kinde witness the short revenues or poor Endowments of your goodly Churches 4. But this sin of sacrilege or Church robbing hath been though not common to all yet in a manner peculiar to such as exercise the Co-active Power of Reformation The Clergie in whom the Power directive was did either not at all or unwillingly partake with them in this offence they have been and are the Patients that is the men which suffer wrong not Doers of wrong in this kinde And if we set aside those Points of Romish Religion which did not come to opposition or counterpoize with Power Royall or with the Interest of Potentates or commodities of private men The Reformation made by our fore elders in other points of Doctrine was judicious and Religious They did no way condemn themselves by judging the Romish Church The judgement which they exercised was the judgement of the Lord. The Reformation which they intended and accomplished was The Lords doing But many which have enjoyed the benefit of that wholsome Reformation and of true Christian libertie restored by it have not submitted themselves their opinions or Practises to the Lawes or Rules prescribed by it Many have taken upon them and yet do not only to judge or censure the Romish Church but even to condemn the Reformation of their Ancestors as if it did to this day savour of the superstition from which it was severed of those men I only speak which out of an hatred Antipathy or loathing the Romish Church do cast themselves out of all Churches and will be members of none unlesse they may be heads of some one new one of their own making or of some that hath no real patern or Module save only in their own busie heads or brains 5. To instance in some particular errors into which the very hate of Romish errors hath transported them One of the most waightie Masses of Poperie which required
it is neither warranted by Scriptures nor by any good Writer Neither is it credible that the Jews then living would kill the Prophet of the Lord immediately after their deliverance from captivity At least the Reverence to the Temple then scarce finished would have made them abstain from shedding his blood within the walls of it near the Altar Others there be amongst the Ancients but few later Writers of better note which think this Zacharias should be John Baptists Father what reason they should have so to think I cannot conjecture save only Our Saviours words in the 35. verse VVhom ye slew between the Temple and the Altar This in ordinary speech may seem to implie that this just man had been killed by this people now living not by their Fathers For so our Saviour happly had said Whom your Fathers slew not Whom YE slew But it is a Rule in Divinity to gather our Saviours and his Apostles meaning by the usual Phrase of Scriptures not by our common manner of speech Now it is usual to the Prophets and Sacred Writers to lay the fathers sins unto the childrens charge if they continue in the like or repent not for them And if this people now living must be plagued for the ancient Prophets blood no question but they were guilty of it and may be said to have slain them in the same sense they are endicted as guilty of it That our Saviour should not mean John Baptists Father is more then probable for these reasons First His death is not mentioned in the New Testament nor in any Good Ecclesiastical Writer Secondly Because it no way benefits the Authors of this Opinion but rather increaseth the difficultie For if he were slain by Herod the Great who was a Philistine by Parentage why should not John Baptist's death be laid to their charge being slain by Herods Son Nay why not our Saviours or his Apostles whom he fore-tels they would shortly kill and persecute This plainly argues that the reason why he names this Zacharias was not his slaughter And besides this reason there is none why we should think this Zacharias was John Baptist's Father As for the Apocriphal Stories or Traditions which are pretended for this guesse or groundless conjecture we have just cause to suspect that it rather brought forth them then that they should first deliver it Not to trouble your patience with any more Reasons for refuting those Opinions it is agreed upon by most late Writers I have read Papists or Protestants and by St. Hierom the best in this kind of all the Ancient that this Zachariah here spoken of was the son of Jehoiada the Priest whose death we have set down 2 Chron. 24. verse 21. And they conspired against him and stoned him with stones at the Commandement of the King in the Court of the House of the Lord. In what Court it is not specified but it is most probable from the circumstance of the Text that it was in the Court where the Priests offered sacrifices or in the place where he instructed or blessed the people for it is evident that Zechariah was slain in his Pue or publick seat appointed for instructing the People And hereunto the ancient Jews in their Traditions accord This is that our Saviour saith in my Text that he was slain between the Temple and the Altar By the Temple we are to understand the outward Courts or Iles or as we distinguish betwixt the Church and the Chancel the body of the Temple comprehending Atrium Israelis mulierum the Courts wherein the Congregation of men and women stood By the place between these and the Altar the Court where the Priests taught or celebrated their service And so it is said verse 20. That Zachariah should stand above the people when he delivered that message unto them for which they stoned him to death Why this Zachariah should be called the son of Barachiah divers Expositors bring divers reasons all probable in themselves and each agreeable with other Some think his father as was not unusual amongst the Jews had two names or a name and a sur-name Jehoiada and Barachiah Others think that our Saviour did not so much respect the usual Name whereby the Prophets father was called as his Conditions or vertues unto which the name of Barachiah did as well or better agree then Jehoiada although the one of these cannot much disagree in sense from the other for the one signifies The knowledge of the Lord the other to wit Barachiah The blessing of the Lord or Man blessed of the Lord. Well might both names befit that Famous High-Priest famous both for his wisdom and piety every way blessed of God and a great blessing to this people For as it is said 2 Chronicles chap. 24. verse 16. He had done good in Israel both towards God and towards his house In which respect he was buried in the City of David amongst their Kings Admitting then Jehoiada either usually had or were for the reasons intimated capable of these two Names it is not without a special Reason perhaps a Mystery that our Saviour in this place should call Zachariah rather the son of Barachiah then of Jehoiada For the more blessed his Father was of God the greater blessing he had been to Israel the more accursed was this ungratious people in killing his vertuous and religious son in the House of the Lord for disswading them from Idolatry And the more fully did they prefigure the sin of this wicked generation their children which for the like cause did now go about to kill the Son of God Christ Jesus Blessed for ever For hereafter they were to acknowledge Him to be the True Barachiah as it is intimated in the last verse of this chapter Blessed is he that cometh in the Name of the Lord. Thus much of the first Point Who this Zachariah was gives some light unto the Second 6. And the Second Question Why our Saviour should make such special instance in or peculiar mention of the Blood of Zachariah is the least difficult of all the rest and yet a Question not so easily answered as the learned Spanish Iesuite Maldonate in his Comments upon this place would perswade us His best Answer to this Question solemnly proposed by him is This. Christs purpose was only to instance in those Prophets whose slaughter was expresly testified in the Bible least the Scribes and Pharisees might deny them to have been slain by their fore-fathers Now of Prophets whose deaths are mentioned in Scripture Zacharias the son of Jehoiada was the last We have just occasion to suspect his conjecture were it true to be impertinent because the Reason whereby he seeks to confirm it is evidently untrue Seeing Zacharias the son of Jehoiada was not the last of all the Prophets whose bloody deaths are recorded in Scripture For in the 26. chap. of Ieremie There is express mention of one Uriah the son of Shemaiah of
nature in the veins that inclosed it Albeit we may with good probability presume that Zachariah's blood if we consider the manner of his death might continue by Gods permission or appointment farre above the time that any Ordinary Experience can testifie More strange it is which Ecclesiastical Writers report of this Prophets body that being crushed with stones it should be found otherwise intire and uncorrupt in the dayes of Theodosius which was above a thousand years after his death Unless they had greater Occasion then I can conceive to lie I neither dare distrust this Report of theirs nor the other Tradition of the Jews by whose account the stain of His blood remained a greater part of two hundred years in the Temple However we may with good probability conclude that the true Reason why our Saviour mentioned Zachariah's death as one special Cause of Ierusalems last destruction was not because he was the last or one of the last of the Prophets that had been murthered by the Scribes and Pharisees Fore-elders but rather because his murther was the most foul Prodigious Fact that was committed in that Land and did from the very Commission of it portend Destruction to the Temple and the Consequents of it fore-shadowed the miseries which were afterwards to befal the Nation The truth of this Conclusion will better appear from Discussion of the third Point proposed 7. And this was Whether the blood of Zacharias and other Prophets or of our Saviour and others after him were more especially required of this Generation Or Whether this Generation and their posterity were so grievously plagued as we know they were for their own personal offences against the Person of the Son of God or for communicating with their fathers in shedding the blood of the Prophets and of other righteous men The modern Jews peremptorily deny Their long Exile and Calamitie to have been inflicted upon them as a just punishment for putting Christ to death because their Fathers did not in their judgment therein offend Divers Christian Writers as it usually fals out refuting this Error of theirs run into a Contrary ascribing the Greivousness of their memorable plagues unto their personal offences against our Saviour being otherwise free from the sins wherein their fathers grievously trespassed Maldonate the Iesuite is so farre addicted to this Opinion that he thinks our Saviour in my Text spake but according to Vulgar Language As if to a Malefactor which had escaped often but is afterward taken for some notorious murther which cannot be pardoned men would say he should now pay for all his villanies not that they mean he shall suffer several punishments for several offences or more greivous tortures then were due for his last fact alone but that he should have judgement without mercie and be punished as grievously as might be though for it only Thus much then and no more he thinks our Saviour would have signified That the Scribes and Pharisees should suffer such greivous calamities for murthering Him and his Apostles as they might well seem to be plagued for their Fathers cruelties Howbeit they were not at all punished for them but only for their own For saith he although neither they nor their Fathers had killed either Prophet Apostle or Disciple but Christ alone they had deserved greater plagues for killing him then are recorded by Iosephus This last Assertion I confess is no less true then Non-concludent for the Conclusion to be inferred was not what manner of Plagues they did deserve for putting our Saviour to death but whether these punishments were de Facto inflicted for putting him to death or for the murther of Zachariah and other Prophets whom not their fathers only but they had slain for so our Saviour layeth the Charge of Zachariah's blood unto them in particular whom YE slew between the Temple and the Altar 8. A good Auditor must be able not only to give a true Onus or Charge but withal to make right Allocations or Deductions otherwise he shall often over-reckon himself or wrong such as are to deal with him The like skill is required in making such Calculatory Arguments as Maldonate and many other good Christians use in aggravating the offences of this Present Generation of the Jews against Our Saviour Let them lay the Charge of the later Jews trespasses as deep as they list or can we shall be able to make the Deductions or Allocations much-what equal so that Computatis computandis the greatest part or fullest measure of the blood which came now to be required of this Generation must arise as the literal meaning of my Text imports from the righteous blood of Zacharias and other Prophets unjustly shed in former Ages and unrepented of by this present Generation They must lay their Charge from the Infinite Excess of Christs Dignitie in respect of other Prophets for His Person was in Majestie truly Infinite We are to make the Deduction from his Infinite Power and Facility to forgive offences against himself or his Person For questionless he did as farre exceed all the Prophets in Goodness in Mercie and loving kindness as he did in Majestie and Greatness And had Peculiar Power and Authority to forgive sins and remit those plagues which the Prophets had denounced against Jerusalem and her children Nor could the malice of his enemies against him be more available to procure then His prayers and tears for Jerusalems peace were to pacifie his Fathers wrath against it especially for their offences against his Person alone 9. The flagrant Expressions of his special Love unto Ierusalem not yet alienated from the worst sort of this present Generation if we compare them with this Threatning fore-warning in my Text and in the words before it will bear this sense or brook this Paraphrase However I see and know you more maliciously bent against me then Cain was against his brother Abel then your fore-fathers Prince or People were against Zachariah the son of Iehoiada or of Barachiah however you thirst more greedily and more irrelentingly after my blood then the chafed Hart doth after the brooks of water yet when-ever you have glutted your selves with the sight of it pouout upon the ground In-stead of covering it with dust cast not this foul aspersion or slander upon me or it as if either it or I did or shall sollicit vengeance against you for the cruel indignities which ye have done or shall do either to me or to my followers when I am dead The blood of my Apostles will not speak so bad And My blood shall speak much better things for you then the blood of Abel did for his brother Cain then the blood of Zachariah whom your Fathers slew betwixt the Altar and the Temple did for the then King and the Princes or people of Iudah For my Heavenly Father hath not sent me nor will I give any Commission to my Followers or Embassadors to curse but to bless you not to wound and