justified in thy sight These latter Corrections also or chastenings of our heavenly Father are called Iudgments too When we are judged we are chastened of the Lord but in a quite different notion Because God proceedeth therein not with Violence and Fury as men that are in passion use to do but coolly and advisedly and with judgment And therefore whereas David deprecated Gods judgment as we heard in that former notion and as judgment is opposed to Favour Ieremy on the other side desireth Gods judgment in this latter notion and as it is opposed to Fury Correct me O Lord yet in thy judgment not in thy fury Jer. 10. 6. Now we see the several sorts of Gods judgments which of all these may we think is here meant If we should take them all in the Conclusion would hold them and hold true too Iudicia Oris and judicia Operis publick and private judgments those Plagues wherewith in fury he punisheth his Enemies and those rods wherewith in mercy he correcteth his children most certain it is they are all right But yet I conceive those judicia oris not to be so properly meant in this place for the Exegesis in the latter part of the verse wherein what are here called judgments are there expounded by troubles seemeth to exclude them and to confine the Text in the proper intent thereof to these judicia operis only but yet to all them of what sort soever publick or private Plagues or Corrections Of all which he pronounceth that they are right which is the Predicate of the Conclusion and cometh next to be considered I know O Lord that thy judgments are right 7. And we may know it too if we will but care to know either God or Our selves First for God though we be not able to comprehend the reasons of his dispensations the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yet for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that the judgments are right it may satisfie us if we do but know that they are his Tua will infer recta strongly enough for the Lord who is righteous in all his ways must needs be so in the way of his judgments too 1. Mens judgments are sometimes not right through misinformations and sundry other mistakings and defects for which the Laws therefore allow Writs of Errour Appeals and other remedies But as for God he not only spieth out the goings but also searcheth into the hearts of all men he pondereth their spirits and by him all their actions are weighed 2. Mens judgments are sometimes not right because themselves are partial and unjust awed with Fear blinded with Gifts transported with Passion carried away with Favour or Dis affection or wearied with Importunity But as for God with him is no respect of Persons nor possibility of being corrupted Abraham took that for granted that the judge of all the world must needs do right Gen. 18. And the Apostle rejecteth all suspicion to the contrary with an Absit What shall we say then Is there unrighteousness with God God forbid Rom. 9. 3. Mens judgments are sometimes not right merely for want of zeal to justice They lay not the causes of poor men to heart nor are willing to put themselves to the pains or trouble of sifting a cause to the bottom nor care much which way it go so as they may but be at rest and enjoy their ease But as for God he is zealous of doing justice he loveth it himself he requireth it in others punishing the neglect of it and rewarding the administration of it in them to whom it belongeth The righteous Lord loveth righteousness Psal. 11. 8. And then secondly in our selves we may find if we will but look enough to satisfie us even for the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 too so far as is meet for us to expect satisfaction The judgments of God indeed are Abyssus multa his ways are in the Sea and his paths are in the deep waters and his footsteps are not known 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Soon may we lose our selves in the search but never find them out Yet even there where the judgments of God are like a great deep unfathomable by any finite understanding his righteousness yet standeth like the high mountains as it is in Psal. 36. visible to every eye If any of us shall search well into his own heart and weigh his own carriage and deservings if he shall not then find enough in himself to justifie God in all his proceedings I forbid him not to say which yet I tremble but to rehearse that God is unrighteous 9. The holy Saints of God therefore have ever acquitted him by condemning themselves The Prophet Ieremy in the behalf of himself and the whole Church of God The Lord is righteous for I have rebelled against his Commandments Lam. 1. So did Daniel in that his solemn Confession when he set his face to seek the Lord God by prayer and supplications with fasting and sack-cloth and ashes Dan. 9. O Lord righteousness belongeth unto thee but unto us confusion of face as it is this day to our Kings to our Princes and to our Fathers because we have sinned against thee ver 7. and again after at verse 14. Therefore hath the Lord watched upon the evil and brought it upon us for the Lord our God is righteous in all his works which he doth for we obeyed not his Voice Yea so illustrious many times is the righteousness of God in his judicial proceedings that it hath extorted an acknowledgment from men obstinately wicked Pharaoh who sometimes in the pride of his heart had said Who is the Lord was afterwards by the evidence of the fact it self forced to this confession I have sinned the Lord is righteous but I and my people are wicked Exod. 9. 10. They are then at least in that respect worse than wicked Pharaoh that to justifie themselves will not stick to repine either at God himself or his judgments as if he were cruel and they unrighteous like the slothful Servant in the Parable that did his Master no service at all and yet as lazy as he was could blame his Master for being an hard man Cain when he had slain his righteous brother and God had laid a judgment upon him for it complained of the burden of it as if the Lord had dealt hardly with him in laying more upon him than he was able to bear never considering the weight of the sin which God in justice could not bear Solomon noteth it as a fault common among men when by their own sinful folly they have pulled misery upon themselves then to murmur against God and complain of his providence The folly of a man perverteth his ways and his heart fretteth against the Lord Prov. 19. As the Israelites in their passage through the Wilderness were ever and anon murmuring and complaining at somewhat or other either against God or which cometh much to one against
will do more mischief in a night than a thousand of them in a twelve-month And as sure he is a sorry Magistrate that stocketh and whippeth and hangeth poor Sneaks when they offend though that is to be done too but letteth the great Thieves do what they list and dareth not meddle with them like Saul who when God commanded him to kill all the Amalekites both man and beast slew indeed the rascality of both but spared the greatest of the men and the fattest of the Cattel and slew them not The good Magistrate should rather with Iob here break the jaws of the wicked and in the spight of his heart pluck the spoil out of his teeth Thus have you heard the four duties or properties of a good Magistrate contained in this Scripture with the grounds and reasons of most of them opened They are 1. A Love and Zeal to justice 2. Compassion to the poor and distressed 3. Pains and Patience in examination of causes 4. Stoutness and Courage in execution of justice The Uses and Inferences of all these yet remain to be handled now in the last place and altogether All which for order and brevities sake we will reduce unto three heads accordingly as from each of the four mentioned Duties or Properties or Rules call them which you will there arise Inferences of three sorts First of Direction for the choice and appointment of Magistrates according to these four properties Secondly of Reproof for a just rebuke of such Magistrates as fail in any of these four Duties Thirdly of Exhortation to those that are or shall be Magistrates to carry themselves therein according to these four Rules Wherein what I shall speak of Magistrates ought also to be extended and applied the due proportion ever observed to all kinds of Offices whatsoever any way appertaining unto Iustice. And first for directions S. Paul saith The powers that are are ordained of God and yet S. Peter calleth the Magistracy an humane ordinance Certainly the holy Spirit of God which speaketh in these two great Apostles is not contrary to it self The truth is the substance of the power of every Magistrate is the Ordinance of God and that is S. Paul's meaning but the Specification of the circumstances thereto belonging as in regard of places persons titles continuance jurisdiction subordination and the rest is as S. Peter termeth it an humane ordinance introduced by Custom or positive Law And therefore some kinds of Magistracy are higher some lower some annual or for a set time some during life some after one manner some after another according to the several Laws or Customs whereon they are grounded As in other circumstances so in this concerning the deputation of the Magistrates person there is great difference some having their power by Succession others by Nomination and other some by Election As amongst us the Supreme Magistrate the King hath his power by Succession some inferiour Magistrates theirs by Nomination or special appointment either immediately or mediately from the King as most of our Iudges and Iustices some again by the elections and voices of the multitude as most Officers and Governours in our Cities Corporations or Colleges The Directions which I would infer from my Text cannot reach the first kind because such Magistrates are born to us not chosen by us They do concern in some sort the second but most nearly the third kind viz. Those that are chosen by suffrages and voices and therefore unto this third kind only I will apply them We may not think because our voices are our own that therefore we may bestow them as we list neither must we suffer our selves in a matter of this nature to be carried by favour faction spite hope fear importunity or any other corrupt and partial respect from those rules which ought to level our choice But we must confer our voices and our best furtherance otherwise upon those whom all things duly considered we conceive to be the fittest and the greater the place is and the more the power is we give unto them and from our selves the greater ought our care in voycing to be It is true indeed when we have used all our best care and proceeded with the greatest caution we can we may be deceived and make an unworthy choice For we cannot judge of mens fitness by any demonstrative certainty all we can do is to go upon probabilities which can yield at the most but a conjectural certainty full of uncertainty Men ambitious and in appetite till they have obtained their desires use to dissemble those vices which might make a stop in their preferments which having once gotten what they fished for they bewray with greater freedom and they use likewise to make a shew of that zeal and forwardness in them to do good which afterwards cometh to just nothing Absalom to steal away the hearts of the people though he were even then most unnaturally unjust in his purposes against a farther and such a farther yet he made shew of much compassion to the injured and of a great desire to do justice O saith he that I were made a Iudge in the Land that every man that hath either suit or cause might come unto me and I would do him Iustice. And yet I doubt not but if things had so come to pass he would have been as bad as the worst When the Roman Soldiers had in a tumult proclaimed Galba Emperor they thought they had done a good days work every man promised himself so much good of the new Emperor But when he was in he proved no better than those that had been before him One giveth this censure of him Omnium consensu capax imperii nisi imperasset he had been a man in every mans judgment worthy to have been Emperor if he had not been Emperor and so shewed himself unworthy Magistratus indicat virum is a common saying and a true We may guess upon likelihoods what they will be when we choose them but the thing it self after they are chosen sheweth the certainty what they are But this uncertainty should be so far from making us careless in our choice that it should rather add so much the more to our care to put things so hazardous as near as we can out of hazard Now those very Rules that must direct them to Govern must direct us also to choose And namely an eye would be had to the four Properties specified in my Text. The first a zeal of justice and a delight therein Seest thou a man careless of the common good one that palpably preferreth his own before the publick weal one that loveth his ease so well that he careth not which way things go backward or forward so he may sit still and not be troubled one that would divide honorem ab onere be proud of the honour and Title and yet loth to undergo the envy and burthen
obedience to these ceremonial Constitutions she hath no other purpose than to reduce all her Children to an orderly uniformity in the outward worship of God so far is she from seeking to draw any opinion either of divine necessity upon the Constitution or of effectual holiness upon the Ceremony And as for the prejudice which seemeth hereby to be given to Christian Liberty it is so slender a conceit that it seemeth to bewray in the Objectors desire not so much of satisfaction as cavil For first the liberty of a Christian to all indifferent things is in the Mind and Conscience and is then infringed when the conscience is bound and straitned by imposing upon it an opinion of doctrinal necessity But it is no wrong to the Liberty of a Christian mans conscience to bind him to outward observance for Orders sake and to impose upon him a necessity of Obedience Which one distinction of Doctrinal and Obediential Necessity well weighed and rightly applied is of it self sufficient to clear all doubts in this point For to make all restraint of the outward man in matters indifferent an impeachment of Christian Liberty what were it else but even to bring flat Anabaptism and Anarchy into the Church and to overthrow all bond of subjection and obedience to lawful Authority I beseech you consider wherein can the immediate power and Authority of Fathers Masters and other Rulers over their Inferiors consist or the due obedience of Inferiors be shewn towards them if not in these Indifferent and Arbitrary things For things absolutely necessary as commanded by God we are bound to do whether humane Authority require them or no and things absolutely unlawful as prohibited by God we are bound not to do whether humane Authority forbid them or no. There are none other things left then wherein to express properly the Obedience due to superior Authority than these Indifferent things And if a Father or Master have power to prescribe to his Child or Servant in indifferent things and such restraint be no way prejudicial to Christian liberty in them why should any man either deny the like power to Church-Governours to make Ecclesiastical Constitutions concerning indifferent things or interpret that power to the prejudice of Christian Liberty And again Secondly Men must understand that it is an error to think Ceremonies and Constitutions to be things merely indifferent I mean in the general For howsoever every particular Ceremony be indifferent and every particular Constitution arbitrary and alterable yet that there should be some Ceremonies it is necessary Necessitate absolutâ in as much as no outward work can be performed without Ceremonial Circumstances some or other and that there should be some Constitutions concerning them it is also necessary though not simply and absolutely as the former yet Ex hypothese and necessitate convenientiae Otherwise since some Ceremonies must needs be used every Parish nay every Man would have his own fashion by himself as his humour led him wherefore what other could be the issue but infinite distraction and unorderly confusion in the Church And again thirdly To return their weapon upon themselves if every restraint in indifferent things be injurious to Christian Liberty then themselves are injurious no less by their negative restraint from some Ceremonies Wear not Cross not Kneel not c. than they would have the World believe our Church is by her positive restraint unto the Ceremonies of wearing and crossing and kneeling c. Let indifferent men judge nay let themselves that are parties judge Whether is more injurious to Christian Liberty publick Authority by mature advice commanding what might be forborn or private spirits through humorous dislikes forbidding what may be used the whole Church imposing the use or a few Brethren requiring the forbearance of such things as are otherwise and in themselves equally indifferent for use or for forbearance But they say Our Church maketh greater matters of Ceremonies than thus and preferreth them even before the most necessary duties of Preaching and administring the Sacraments in as much as they are imposed upon Ministers under pain of Suspension and Deprivation from their Ministerial Functions and Charges First for actual Deprivation I take it unconforming Ministers have no great cause to complain Our Church it is well known hath not always used that rigor she might have done Where she hath been forced to proceed as far as Deprivation she hath ordinarily by her fair and slow and compassionate proceedings therein sufficiently manifested her unwillingness thereto and declared her self a Mother every way indulgent enough to such ill-nurtured Children as will not be ruled by her Secondly Those that are suspended or deprived suffer it but justly for their obstinacy and contempt For howsoever they would bear the World in hand that they are the only persecuted ones and that they suffered for their Consciences yet in truth they do but abuse the credulity of the simple therein and herein as in many other things jump with the Papists whom they would seem above all others most abhorrent from For as Seminary Priests and Iesuits give it out they are martyr'd for their Religion when the very truth is they are justly executed for their prodigious Treasons and felonious or treacherous Practices against lawful Princes and Estates So the Brethren pretend they are persecuted for their Consciences when indeed they are but justly censured for their obstinate and pertinacious contempt of lawful Authority For it is not the refusal of these Ceremonies they are deprived for otherwise than as the matter wherein they shew their contempt it is the Contempt it self which formerly and properly subjecteth them to just Ecclesiastical censure of Suspension or Deprivation And contempt of Authority though in the smallest matter deserveth no small punishment all Authority having been ever solicitous as it hath good reason above all things to vindicate and preserve it self from contempt by inflicting sharp punishments upon contemptuous persons in the smallest matters above all other sorts of offenders in any degree whatsoever Thus have we shewed and cleared the first and main difference betwixt the case of my Text and the case of our Church in regard of the matter the things whereabout they differed being every way indifferent ours not so And as the Matter so there is secondly much odds in the condition of the Persons The refusers in the Case of my Text being truly weak in the Faith as being but lately converted to the Christian Faith and not sufficiently instructed by the Church in the Doctrine and Use of Christian Liberty in things indifferent whereas with our refusers it is much otherwise First They are not new Proselytes but Men born and bred and brought up in the bosom of the Church yea many and the chiefest of them such as have taken upon them the calling of the Ministry and the charge of Souls
him to be first assured his cause was right and good for that purpose if it were doubtful I searched it out and examined it before I would countenance either him or it Certainly thus to do is agreeable to the rule of Iustice yea and of Mercy too for it is one Rule in shewing Mercy that it be ever done salvis pietate justitiâ without prejudice done to piety and justice And as to this particular the commandment of God is express for it in Exod. 23. Thou shalt not countenance no not a poor man in his cause Now if we should thus understand the coherence of the words the special duty which Magistrates should hence learn would be indifferency in the administration of Justice not to make difference of rich or poor far or near friend or foe one or other but to consider only and barely the equity and right of the cause without any respect of persons or partial inclination this way or that way This is a very necessary duty indeed in a Magistrate of Justice and I deny not but it may be gathered without any violence from these very words of my Text though to my apprehension not so much by way of immediate observation from the necessity of any such coherence as by way of consequence from the words themselves otherwise For what need all that care and pains and diligence in searching out the cause if the condition of the person might over-rule the cause after all that search and were not the judgment to be given meerly according to the goodness or badness of the cause without respect had to the person But the special duty which these words seem most naturally and immediately to impose upon the Magistrate and let that be the third Observation is diligence and patience and care to hear and examine and enquire into the truth of things and into the equity of mens causes As the Physician before he prescribe receipt or diet to his patient will first feel the pulse and view the urine and observe the temper and changes in the body and be inquisitive how the disease began and when and what sits it hath and where and in what manner it holdeth him and inform himself every other way as fully as he can in the true state of his body that so he may proportion the remedies accordingly without error so ought every Magistrate in causes of Justice before he pronounce sentence or give his determination whether in matters judicial or criminal to hear both parties with equal patience to examine witnesses and other evidences advisedly and throughly to consider and wisely lay together all Allegations and Circumstances to put in quaeries and doubts upon the by and use all possible expedient means for the boulting out of the truth that so he may do that which is equal and right without error A duty not without both Precept and President in holy Scripture Moses prescribeth it in Deut. 17. in the case of Idolatry If there be found among you one that hath done thus or thus c. And it be told thee and thou hast heard of it and inquired diligently and behold it to be true and the thing certain that such abomination is wrought in Israel Then thou shalt bring forth that man c. The offender must be stoned to death and no eye pity him but it must be done orderly and in a legal course not upon a bare hear-say but upon diligent examination and inquisition and upon such full evidence given in as may render the fact certain so far as such cases ordinarily are capable of certainty And the like is again ordered in Deut. 19. in the case of false witness Both the men between whom the controversie is shall stand before the Iudges and the Iudges shall make diligent inquisition c. And in Iudg. 19. in the wronged Levites case whose Concubine was abused to death at Gibeah the Tribes of Israel stirred up one another to do justice upon the inhabitants thereof and the method they proposed was this first to consider and consult of it and then to give their opinions But the most famous example in this kind is that of King Solomon in 3 Kings 3. in the difficult case of the two Mothers Either of them challenged the living Child with a like eagerness either of them accused other of the same wrong and with the same allegations neither was there witness or other evidence on either part to give light unto the matter yet Solomon by that wisdom which he had obtained from God found a means to search out the truth in this difficulty by making as if he would cut the child into halfs and give either of them one half at the mentioning whereof the compassion of the right mother betrayed the falshood of her clamorous competitor And we read in the Apocryphal Story of Susanna how Daniel by x examining the two Elders severally and apart found them to differ in one circumstance of their relation and thereby discovered the whole accusation to be false Iudges for this reason were anciently called Cognitores and in approved Authors Cognoscere is as much as to do the office of a Judge to teach Iudges that one chief point of there care should be to know the Truth For if of private men and in things of ordinary discourse that of Solomon be true He that answereth a matter before he heareth it it is folly and shame unto him certainly much more is it true of publick Magistrates and in matters of Justice and Judgment by how much both the men are of better note and the things of greater moment But in difficult and intricate businesses covered with darkness and obscurity and perplexed with many windings and turnings and cunning and crafty conveyances to find a fair issue out and to spy light at a narrow hole and by wisdom and diligence to rip up a foul matter and search a cause to the bottom and make a discovery of all is a thing worthy the labour and a thing that will add to the honour I say not only of inferiour governours but even of the Supreme Magistrate the King It is the glory of God to conceal a thing but the honour of Kings is to search out the matter To understand the necessity of this duty consider First that as sometimes Democritus said the truth lyeth in profundo and in abdito dark and deep as in the bottom of a pit and it will ask some time yea and cunning too to find it out and to bring it to light Secondly that through favour faction envy greediness ambition and otherwise innocency it self is often laden with false accusations You may observe in the Scriptures how Naboth Ieremy S. Paul and others and you may see by too much experience in these wretched times how many men of fair and honest conversation have been accused and troubled
it is not much better now nay God grant it be not generally even much worse Receive now in the last place and as the third and last inference a word of Exhortation and it shall be but a word You whom God hath called to any honour or office appertaining to justice as you tender the glory of God and the good of the Commonwealth as you tender the honour of the King and the prosperity of the Kingdom as you tender the peace and tranquillity of your selves and neighbours as you tender the comfort of your own consciences and the salvation of your own souls set your selves throughly and cheerfully and constantly and conscionably to discharge with faithfulness all those duties which belong unto you in your several stations and callings and to advance to the utmost of your power the due administration and execution of justice Do not decline those burdens which cleave to the honours you sustain Do not post off those businesses from your selves to others which you should rather do than they or at least may as well do as they Stand up with the zeal of Phinees and by executing judgment help to turn away those heavy plagues which God hath already begun to bring upon us and to prevent those yet heavier ones which having so rightly deserved we have all just cause to fear Breathe fresh life into the languishing laws by mature and severe and discreet execution Put on righteousness as a Garment and cloath your selves with Iudgment as with a Robe and Diadem Among so many Oppressions as in these evil days are done under the Sun to whom should the fatherless and the Widow and the wronged complain but to you whence seek for relief but from you Be not you wanting to their necessities Let your eyes be open unto their miseries and your ears open unto their cries and your hands open unto their wants Give friendly Counsel to those that stand need of your Direction afford convenient help to those that stand need of your assistance carry a Fatherly affection to all those that stand in need of any comfort protection or relief from you Be eyes to the Blind and feet to the lame and be you instead of Fathers to the poor But yet do not countenance no not a poor man in his cause farther than he hath equity on his side Remember one point of wisdom not to be too credulous of every suggestion and information But do your best to spie out the chinks and starting holes and secret conveyances and packings of cunning and crafty companions and when you have found them out bring them to light and do exemplary justice upon them Sell not your ears to your servants nor tie your selves to the informations of some one or a few or of him that cometh first but let every party have a fair and an equal hearing Examine proofs Consider circumstances be content to hear simple men tell their tales in such language as they have think no pains no patience too much to sift out the truth Neither by inconsiderate haste prejudice any mans right nor weary him out of it by torturing delays The cause which you know not use all diligence and covenient both care and speed to search it out But ever withal remember your standing is slippery and you shall have many and sore assaultâ— and very shrewd temptations so that unless you arm your selves with invincible resolution you are gone The wicked ones of this world will conjure you by your old friendship and acquaintance and by all the bonds of Neighbourhood and kindness bribe your Wives and Children and Servants to corrupt you procure great mens Letters or Favorites as engines to move you convey a bribe into your own bosoms but under a handsomer name and in some other shape so cunningly and secretly sometimes that your selves shall not know it to be a bribe when you receive it Harden your faces and strengthen your resolution with a holy obstinacy against these and all other like temptations Count him an enemy that will alledge friendship to pervert justice When you sit in the place of justice think you are not now Husbands or Parents or Neighbours but Iudges Contemn the frowns and the favours and the Letters of great ones in comparison of that trust which greater ones than they the King and State and a yet Greater than they the great God of heaven and earth hath reposed in you and expecteth from you Chastise him with severe indignation if he begin and if he continue spit defiance in his face who ere he be that shall think you so base as to sell your freedom for a bribe Gird your sword upon your thigh and keeping your selves ever within the compass of your Commissions and Callings as the Sun in the Zodiack go through stitch right on in the course of Iustice as the Sun in the firmament with unresisted violence and as a Giant that rejoyceth to run his race and who can stop him Bear not the sword in vain but let your right hand teach you terrible things Defend the poor and fatherless and deliver the oppressed from them that are mightier than he Smite through the loyns of those that rise up to do wrong that they rise not again Break the jaws of the wicked and pluck the spoil out of his teeth Thus if you do the wicked shall fear you the good shall bless you the poor shall pray for you posterity shall praise you your own hearts shall â—hear you and the great God of Heaven shall reward you This that you may do in some good measure the same God of Heaven enable you and give you and every of us grace in our several places and callings to seek his glory and to endeavour the discharge of a good conscience To which God blessed for ever Fathers Son and Holy Ghost three Persons and one eternal invisible and only wise God be ascribed all the Kingdom Power and Glory for ever and ever Amen AD MAGISTRATUM The Second Sermon At the Assises at Lincoln 7 March 1624. at the request of William Lister Esq then high Sheriff of the County EXOD. XXIII ver 1 2 3. 1. Thou shalt not raise a false report â—ut not thine hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness 2. Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil neither shalt thou speak in a cause to decline after many to wrest judgment 3. Neither shalt thou countenance a poor man in his cause THere is no one thing Religion ever excepted that more secureth and adorneth the State than Iustice doth It is both Columna and Corona Reipublicae as a Prop to make it subsist firm in it self and as a Crown to render it glorious in the eyes of others As the Cement in a building that holdeth all together so is justice to the publick Body as whereunto it oweth a great part both of its strength for by it
everlasting punishments are they wherein Gods Iustice shall be manifested to every eye in due time at that last day which is therefore called by Saint Paul Rom. 2. The day of wrath and of the revelation of the righteous judgment of God Implying that howsoever God is just in all his Judgments and acts of providence even upon earth yet the Counsels and Purposes of God in these things are often secret and past finding out but at the last great day when He shall render to every man according to his works his everlasting recompence then his vengeance shall manifest his wrath and the righteousness of his judgment shall be revealed to every eye in the condign punishment of unreconciled sinners This is the Second Certainty Temporal evils are not always nor simply nor properly the punishments for sin If any man shall be yet unsatisfied and desire to have Gods justice somewhat farther cleared even in the disposing of these temporal things although it be neither safe nor possible for us to search far into particulars yet some general satisfaction we may have from a third Certainty and that is this Every evil of pain whatsoever it be or howsoever considered which is brought upon any man is brought upon him evermore for sin yea and that also for his own personal sin Every branch of this assertion would be well marked I say first Every evil of pain whatsoever it be whether natural defects and infirmities in soul or body or outward afflictions in goods friends or good name whether inward distresses of an afflicted or terrors of an affrighted Conscience whether temporal or eternal Death whether evils of this life or after it or whatsoever other evil it be that is any way grievous to any man every such evil is for sin I say secondly every evil of pain howsoever considered whether formally and sub ratione poenae as the proper effect of Gods vengeance and wrath against sin or as a fatherly correction chastisement to nurture us from some past sin or as a medicinal preservative to strengthen us against some future sin or as a clogging chain to keep under disable us from some outward work of sin or as a fit matter and object whereon to exercise our Christian graces of faith charity patience humility and the rest or as an occasion given and taken by Almighty God for the greater manifestation of the glory of his Wisdom and Power and Goodness in the removal of it or as an act of Exemplary Iustice for the Admonition and Terror of others or for whatsoever other end purpose or respect it be inflicted I say thirdly Every such evil of pain is brought upon us for sin There may be other Ends there may be other Occasions there may be other Vses of such Evils but still the Original Cause of them all is sin When thou with rebukes dost chasten man for sin It was not for any extraordinary notorious sins either of the blind man himself or of his Parents above other men that he was born blind Our Savious Christ acquitteth them of that Iohn 9. in answer to his Disciples who were but too forward as God knoweth most men are to judge the worst Our Saviour's Answer there never intended other but that still the true Cause deserving that blindness was his and his parents sin but his purpose was to instruct his Disciples that that infirmity was not laid upon him rather than upon another man meerly for that reason because he or his Parents had deserved it more than other men but for some farther Ends which God had in it in his secret and everlasting purpose and namely this among the rest That the works of God might be manifest in him and the Godhead of the Son made glorious in his miraculous Cure As in Nature the intention of the End doth not overthrow but rather suppose the Necessity of the Matter so is it in the works of God and the dispensations of his wonderful Providence It is from Gods Mercy ordering them to those Ends he hath purposed that his punishments are good but it is withal from our sins deserving them as the Cause that they are just Even as the Rain that falleth upon the Earth whether it moisten it kindly and make it fruitful or whether it choak and slocken and drown it yet still had its beginning from the Vapours which the Earth it self sent up All those Evils which fall so daily and thick upon us from Heaven whether to warn us or to plague us are but Arrows which our selves first shot up against Heaven and now drop down again with doubled force upon our heads Omnis poena propter culpam all evils of pain are for the evils of sin I say fourthly All such evils are for our own sins The Scriptures are plain God judgeth every man according to his own works Every man shall bear his own burden c. God hath enjoyned it as a Law for Magistrates wherein they have also his Example to lead them that not the fathers for the children nor the children for the fathers but every man should be put to death for his own sin Deut. 24. If Israel take up a Proverb of their own heads The fathers have eaten sowre grapes and the childrens teeth are set on edge they do it without cause and they are checked for it The soul that sinneth it shall die and if any man eat sowre grapes his own teeth and not anothers for him shall be set on èdge thereby For indeed how can it be otherwise or who can reasonably think that our most gracious God who is so ready to take from us the guilt of our own should yet lay upon us the guilt of other mens sins The only exception to be made in this kind is that alone satisfactory Punishment of our blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ not at all for his own sins far be the impiety from us so to imagine for He did no sin neither was there any guilt found in his mouth but for ours He payed that which he never took it was for our transgressions that he was wounded and the chastisement of our Peace was laid upon him Yet even those meritorious sufferings of his may be said in a qualified sence to have been for his own sins although in my judgment it be far better to abstain from such like speeches as are of ill and suspicious sound though they may be in some sort defended But how for his own sins his own by Commission by no means God forbid any man should teach any man should conceive so the least thought of this were Blasphemy but his own by Imputation Not that he had sinned and so deserved punishment but that he had taken upon him our sins which deserved that punishment As he that undertaketh for another mans debt maketh it his own and standeth Chargeable