if other actions of our life be suitable to that Profession It is a careful strictness that we will not accept of all that indulgence which Christ hath given us and yet it is St. Pauls mind that we should stand fast to that liberty to which Christ hath called us and that truth may not be prejudiced I must tell you that in the opinion of all learned men of all Churches throughout the World excepting a few among our selves joy and gladness are allowed for a portion of this day And that when God is sanctified in our holy Assemblies at Morning and Evening the remainder may be discreetly and soberly dispensed withall Remember what I said that the day wherein Christ suffered being pretermitted the day wherein he rose from the dead was selected for the weekly season of Divine Service not because his Resurrection was a greater Benefit to us than his Passion but because it was the Feast of Joy Diem Solis laetitiae indulgemus says Tertullian we set apart Sunday for gladness and chearfulness meaning that one use of that day was to refresh us after toil yet God being first serv'd with all due attendance for Recreations when they keep you from the House of God are not only vain but sacrilegious In the most ancient Church if any profest to last on this day or to put on the weed of sorrow he was excommunicated In the last Canon of the Nicene Council all Christians are exhorted to stand praying on this day and not to kneel because it betokened affliction and humiliation It was never denied but that it might harmlesly be divided between sanctity and harmless pleasure This would never be stumbled at if you would but mark and how can you choose but mark it that Sabbatical rest was a yoke upon the neck of the Jews a bodily exercise which in all the Gospel is never urg'd upon us who are only taught that perfect way of Spiritual Worship therefore Sunday succeeds the Sabbath in point of sanctification which is spiritual not in point of vacation which is bodily and ceremonial Our day is not figurative as theirs was and therefore requires no such nice prohibitions of that wherein no internal holiness can be placed and it is all one to tie Christians to the strict rest of the Jews as to their strict day Sanctification and Joy are the contents of this day which we are to cast our eye upon Inchoatur sanctificatione porficitur glorificatione we begin in sanctification we shall end in glorification it is a day which will bring us to that day which is not divided by light and darkness but it is all light fitting our perpetual joyes for evermore And now I could wish that the hour were to begin again being to speak of Festivals or Holidays for our extraordinary Assemblies I have spoken of them heretofore as they do carry the outward countenance of that joy which remaineth for us in Heaven as they are the agnition of great Benefits received and as they are fair Landmarks to teach unlearned people the principal Articles of Faith this was a prelibation of this point of Doctrin and that which the time will give me leave to add more will not be so much as to cloy you for I will but touch upon three things 1. What days may be allowed for Festivals 2. Why they may be allowed And 3. upon what a basis they are to be disallowed For the first it is nothing so with any Festivals that I shall name as it was with the Lords day that is founded in the practice of the Apostles and he is a sorry Divine qui nescit facere legem de prophetis that cannot frame a Law out of godly practice But no other Holy-days can claim their Example Says Socrates it was the purpose of the Apostles not to enact Laws for the celebration of Feasts but to give us lessons for the instruction of a godly life and for piety Only the Feast of Easter was kept solemn while some of the Apostles were living yet that hath no evidence in Scripture as Sunday hath but in humane Histories of good approbation nay the whole preceding week before Easter was strictly observed not with cessation of bodily labour but to call Christians to Church upon every day so that the day of Christs Passion was religiously solemnized and likewise the day of the Institution of his last Supper immediately before the memory of his Passion The next grand Peast that was anciently honour'd over all the Church as appears in Tertullian was Whitsunday or Pentecost yea in all the 50 days between Easter and Whitsunday solemn Service was celebrated without cessation from labour no fasting no kneeling upon their knees all that time Halleluia was sung Morning and Evening And Ascension-day was peculiarly dignified by it self and this held till the year 466. at which time Claudianus Mamercus Bishop of Vienna in France did begin Rogation week or the Supplication of three fasting days to desire God to bless the Fruits of the earth then sprouting up and of a sudden all the world did like his custom and follow it Neither Ignatius Justin Martyr Irenaeus or Tertullian speak of christmas-Christmas-day that I can tell of but Theophilus Bishop of Cesarea doth in his Paschal Epistle and so doth St. Cyprian so that in likelihood it was kept about the year 200 and long before Constantine's days that the Tyrant Maximinus knew for he burnt the Christians in their Churches upon the Feast of the Nativity as Maximinus says So that the five Feasts of Easter Whitsunday Christmas the Passion and Ascension were most anciently kept before Constantine's Reign while the Church was under persecution and had no leisure to invent superfluity of Ceremonies These are kept and no others by the Lutheran Churches as I find in Chemnitius by the Palatinat Churches as I find in Paraeus by the Low-Country Churches as I find in Rivetus by the Churches of Scotland brought in by the pious care of King James 1618. the Churches of Geneva are a little singular and observe none but the Feasts of Easter and Christmas the Churches of Helvetia acknowledg the five great Feasts as appears by Hospinian Yet moreover after the year 300 the Feast of Christs Circumcision grew famous especially in Alexandria and the Feast of the Epiphany was most gloriously hallowed in Constantinople These are dutifully reteined in our Church together with his Presentation in the Temple and his Annunciation by the Angel Gabriel We do likewise praise God publickly upon other days upon the Feasts of the Apostles and Evangelists and all Saints not named We keep the Memory of St. Stephen the Martyr one for all and the Memory of the bloud which the Innocents shed for Christ We celebrate John the Baptists Nativity for the Scripture says many shall rejoyce at his birth Finally we solemnize a day to God in the name of Michael the Archangel to give thanks for the protection of all the
of Heaven and all the Stars thereof Moreover Vna Sabbati litterally rendred is not the first but one day of the Week because one is the first ground to begin numbring and Theophilact says the Lords day is called the one day of the Week either because it is the only day from whence the blessing is procured for all the rest or besides it is a figure of the life to come Quando una tantum dies est nequaquam nocte interpolata when there shall be but one day for ever and no night of darkness to interrupt it Thus much of the words The matter of the Point is of a more profitable use And hence I begin that as God the Father upon the first day did begin to make this visible world of Creatures so Christ rose the same day from the dead to signifie that a new Age was then begun Resurrectio est alterius mundi spiritualis creatio says Justin Martyr The Resurrection is well called a creation of a new spiritual world On the first day of the Week God said Let there be light and he divided between the light and the darkness Verily on that wise on the first day of the Week God brought the light of the world out of the darkness of the Grave and the life says St. John was the light of men Now this infinite work to tread death under feet and to bring all flesh out of corruption into the state of immortality being more eximious than to make man in a possibility at first to die and perish therefore all Christian Churches have desisted to meet together at holy exercises upon the Sabbath of the Jews and the first day of the Week is the day appointed to sanctifie out selves unto the Lord for what reason I will now unfold and it is a case of no small perplexity And let me auspicate from the Text and Authority of Holy Scripture and these places following do conspire to verifie the Truth Acts xx 7. Paul abode seven days at Troas the seventh day of his abode was the first day of the Week then and not before it seems upon the first day of the Week when the Disciples came together to break Bread that is to partake of the Lords Supper Paul preacht unto them This seems to approve that in the Apostles time it was no more in use for their Disciples to meet upon the Sabbath but as well to honor the Resurrection as to separate from the Rites and Customs of the Jews in the Spirit of God they did convene together on the first day of the Week From Preaching and Administring the Holy Communion let us come to Collection of Alms. 1 Cor. xvi 2. Vpon the first day of the week let every one of you lay by him in store as God hath prospered him that there be no gatherings when I come How can this be expounded but that distributions were made to the poor upon the first day of the Week in their most solemn Assemblies For if the meaning were that every man should set apart a share of his own gains upon that day in his private Coffers and not in the publick Treasury when their Congregations were together then Collections had been to be made from house to house when Paul was to come who desires it might be laid up in readiness as it were in one stock before 'T is pity we are faln from that good order but in the most antient Church I find that they never miss'd to carry the Poors Box about every Lords Day witness this place of St. Cyprian Locuples es dives Dominicam celebrare te credis quae Corbanam omnino non respicis Thou that art rich and wealthy dost thou imagin thou keepest the Lords Day as thou oughtest and dost cast nothing into the Treasury Thirdly as the last day of the Week when God rested from his works was called the Sabbath of the Lord so it is of much moment to the point that the first day of the Week is called the Day of the Lord or the Lords Day Rev. i. 10. I was in the Spirit on the Lords Day as it appears Rev. i. 13. John was walking on the Sea shore meditating upon holy things in the Isle of Patmos Very probable that there was no solemn meeting to praise God as it ought to have been among those Pagan Islanders otherwise John had not betaken himself to solitary Meditations but see how he was recompensed Nactus est Doctorem ipsum Deum quando fortasse deessent quos ipse doceret when he was disconsolate because he wanted Auditors to teach God preached unto him the Mysteries of the Age to come But to enforce the Text forenamed for an Argument we have but two things in the New Testament called the Lords the Sacrament is called the Supper of the Lord 1 Cor. xi 20. and this day of Christian Assemblies is called the Lords Day the Lords Prayer and the Lords House are good Phrases but our own not the Scriptures but as we keep the Feast of Passeover no more but instead thereof eat the Lords Supper so neither do we observe the Jews Sabbath any more but instead thereof we keep the Lords Day Thus far I have prest the Authorities of Sacred Scripture The Authority of the Primitive Church and so downward to this Age will convince it clearly against any that is obstinate Ignatius was St. John's Scholar and as if he had learnt of his Teacher he writes thus Let every lover of Christ celebrate the Lords Day which is dedicated to the honor of his Resurrection the Queen and Princess of all days Justin Martyr commands the same day to be kept holy to the Lord every Week in his 2. Apolog. So doth Tertullian more than once and I cited St. Cyprian before The Council of Laodicea speaks thus resolutely Anathema to all those that rest upon the Sabbath let them keep the Lords Day when they observe a vacancy of labor and do as becometh Christians The great Council of Nice doth not command the first day of the Week to be kept holy but supposeth in the 20. Canon all good Christians would admit that without scruple and then appoints other significant Ceremonies to be kept upon the Lords Day from Easter to Whitsontide I need not reckon downward after the Nicen Council because in one word I have not heard or read that it was opposed by any of the Fathers They knew that an appointed time must be allotted for every necessary Duty and certainly upon the abrogation of the Old Sabbath not Man but God did appoint a time for so necessary a thing as the religious Service of his Name Christ made an end of all Sabbaths by his own Sabbath lying all that day and night in the Grave and to hold that the Sabbath which is but a Shadow is to continue is to hold that Christ the Body is not yet come yet that being laid apart let us
necessary Imperative Law Sometimes it binds as when we find them frequently joyn Fasting with Prayer and where we meet with their strict Discipline that they delivered up obstinate offenders to Satan and cast them out of the Church but elsewhere their practice draws on no absolute necessity but leaves us to our prudent liberty and ties no harder as appears by their Colledges of Widows to wash the Saints feet by their Feasts of Charity c. For whereas St. Paul says That which you have heard and seen in me that do Phil. iv 9. It is a Commission that they may imitate him in any thing he did for he did nothing but things lawful yet it infers it not to be necessary to do all things as he did As a Physician may say to his Patient eat whatsoever you see me eat which is spoken by way of warrant not of necessary observation Well then since the practice of the Apostles sometimes leaves us at liberty to follow them sometimes presseth the duty upon us and we must do as they did how shall we know the one from the other In my small reading I could never find it cleared yet but you shall have my opinion of it It is a rule in St. Austin Quod universa tenet Ecclesia nec Conciliis institutum sed semper retentumest c. Whatsoever is not defined by any General Council and yet is practised by the whole Church it hath been delivered from hand to hand by the Apostles Here I take the hint that some things were delivered by the Apostles for order and decency sake which were but temporary agreed only to some times and some places and every Church receiv'd them freely with their own liking but whatsoever is derived from their Exemple and is dispread over the whole Church and hath continued in all Ages so hath the observation of the Lords day that was at first grounded in the practice of the Apostles not to be received indifferently but to be admitted as a Divine Institution Now I sum up the Orthodox Truth as I take it by what right and tenure we keep the Lords day holy 1. Not by virtue of the Letter of the fourth Commandment but by the natural equity and moral contents of it and reasonable consequences deduced out of it 2. The glorious act of Christs rising from the dead did not constitute the first day of the week to be a day of perpetual sanctification but upon good congruity the Church took occasion from thence to celebrate this day unto the Lord. 3. There are no express imperative words in the New Testament immediately to command it but in general principles that we are to obey our Rulers in all things 4. and lastly It is establisht in the practice of the Apostles and so uniformly received in all Ages that it is most probable they purposed it not for an Ecclesiastical Sanction which is alterable but for a Divine Institution which is perpetual and unalterable This labour which is past hath been spent about this Day in reference to Gods making that which follows is upon the same Subject in reference to our own rejoycing we will rejoyce and be glad in it that is God hath sanctified the day and we will sanctifie it that is God hath sanctified it by ordeining it to sacred use and we must sanctify it with an holy gladness imploying it chiefly in religious conversation We must separate it from profane uses to divine we must meet in holy places we must come together about holy purposes hearken to holy things and this must be our chief delight that we keep Holy-day to the Lord. Attend the time therefore with all chearfulness and diligence which summons us to appear in the House of God 't is religionis discendae introducendae medium the only and most available means to keep Religion in life and being Our sins are very grievous I confess and there is much unjust communication in the world we do not deal usually as between Brother and Brother but as between faithless Infidels and utter Adversaries but to what extremity would our sins wax if we did not pray to the Lord in his good day to guide us with a good conscience all the week after Mark therefore that the fourth Commandment is set in the midst of the Decalogue in the end of the first Table and before the beginning of the second as if it were the common nerve of Religion take away this and we shall neither know the duties of the one Table or of the other either to God or our Neighbour It is very meet therefore and our bounden duty that we should every one set forth a large share of this Day to the honour of God in Publick Assemblies not for a spurt of time and then apply our selves to other affairs as Christ bid us go every day into our secret Chamber to praise the Lord but according to the appointment both of God and the Church the best part of the day must be surrendred up to the use of Prayer and Preaching that God may have both his Morning and his Evening Sacrifice to declare his truth in the morning and his faithfulness in the night season as David says And therefore I have noted it to my self how in every Age for at least 600 years after Christ Godly Bishops did lengthen out Service by little and little to keep us the longer at Church At first there was but an Epistle and Gospel read and the Lords Prayer said and then they went to the Communion then the reading of the Psalms was added then certain Lessons out of the Old and New Testament then came in the Litany then the Confession with divers Collects of Prayers And our own Church above all others draws out the Service with the Ten Commandments Some there are that complain we spend not the Lords day totally or sufficiently in the House of Sanctification and yet with the same breath they will complain of long Prayers and will of purpose decline Cathedral Churches and never come at them because Divine Service is continued there an hour longer at least than in Parochial Congregations But how can time be better spent than in this Holy Temple that commands all time The Sabbath was made for man under the Law and the Lords day is made for man under the Gospel yet it is called the Lords day and not mans it is made for man that is for the instruction of the Soul and the refreshing of his Body but it is his day to whose honor it is set apart for the spiritual worship of Christians in all days much more in this is terminated to God And I speak it with gladness that it is a good sign that the fire of Religion burns within our breasts when we devote our selves so much to pious Exercises on Sunday that a great number are loth to hear of external joy and gladness The more observant we are of this time the more we please God
before King James I. Vpon Amos ix 2. Though they dig into Hell thence shall my hand take them p. 742 II. Vpon Acts xxviii 5. And he shook the beast into the fire and felt no harm p. 752 II Sermons preached at Whitehall upon Gen. v. 24. And Enoch walked with God and he was not for God took him p. 762 Upon the same p. 771 III. Sermons preached at Whitehall upon Gen. viii 20 21. And Noah builded an Altar to the Lord and took of every clean Beast and of every clean Fowl and offered burnt offerings on the Altar And the Lord smelled a sweet savour p. 780 Upon the same p. 789 Upon the same p. 798 II Sermons preached at Whitehall upon Gen. xix 26. But his Wife lookt back from behind him and she became a pillar of salt p. 896 Upon the same p. 815 A Sermon preached at Whitehall upon Numb xxi 7. Pray unto the Lord that he take the Serpents from us p. 823 A Sermon upon Joshua xxii 20. And that man perished not alone in his iniquity p. 831 A Fast Sermon preached at Whitehall upon Nehem. i. 4. And it came to pass when I heard these words that I sat down and wept and mourned certain days and fasted and prayed before the God of heaven p. 849 A Sermon upon Prov. iii. 3. Let not mercy and truth forsake thee p. 862 II Sermons concerning the Rechabites upon Jer. xxxv 6. But they said we will drink no wine p. 873 II Sermons preached at Whitehall upon John iv 13 14. Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst p. 483 Upon the same p. 902 III Sermons preached at Whitehall upon John vi 11. And Jesus took the loaves and when he had given thanks distributed to the Disciples and the Disciples to them that were set down and likewise of the fishes as much as they would p. 911 Upon the same 921 Upon the same 931 A Sermon preached at Whitehall upon St. Lukes day upon Acts xi 26. And the Disciples were called Christians first in Antioch p. 941 A Commencement Sermon preached at Cambridge upon Acts xii 23. And immediately the Angel of the Lord smote him because he gave not God the glory p. 952 III Sermons preached at Whitehall upon Gal. iv 26. But Jerusalem which is above is free which is the Mother of us all p. 964 Upon the same 973 Upon the same 983 II Sermons preached upon All Saints day in Holbourn I. Upon Rev. vi 9. I saw under the Altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God and for the Testimony which they held p. 992. II. Vpon Rev. vi 10. And they cried with a loud voice saying How long O Lord holy and true dost thou not judg and avenge our bloud on them that dwell on the earth p. 1003 AN ACCOUNT OF THE LIFE and DEATH OF THE AUTHOR THE Son of Sirach a renowned Preacher in his Generation has given us counsel to commend Famous Men and our Fathers of whom we are begotten and in the close of his excellent Book has presented us with a large Catalogue of them together with an Encomium of their Actions whose remembrance sayes he is sweet as Honey in all Mouths and pleasant as Musick at a Banquet of Wine St. Paul has directly imitated the Son of Sirach and enumerated many antient Heroes not without a due Commemoration and farther given us a Precept To remember our Governors or Guides in the Christian Faith holy Bishops and Martyrs after their death as appears plainly by the following words whose faith follow considering the end of their Conversation Accordingly in the Primitive times the Bishops of Rome took care that the lives and actions of all holy Men and Martyrs especially should be recorded For this purpose publick Notaries were appointed by S. Clement say some though Platina first ascribes their institution to Anterus whose Records were far more large than the present Roman Martyrology or that of Bede and Vsuardus or the Menologue of the Greeks which for the most part contain only the Names and Deaths of the Martyrs but those were a Narrative of their whole Lives and Doctrines and Speeches at large their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 famous Acts and Sufferings for the Christian Faith which were also read sometimes in their Religious Assemblies for the encouragement of others and are said to have converted many to the Christian Faith But these long since perished through the malice and cruelty of Dioclesian in those fires which consumed their Bodies and their Books together Afterwards when Christian Religion reflourished the Christian Church resumed these Studies again St Ambrose did right to the memory of Theodosius Paulinus of St. Ambrose Nazianzen to Athanasius St. Hierom to Nepotian Possidonius to St. Austin Amphilochius to St. Basil St. Hierom and Gennadius wrot of all Ecclesiastical Writers and illustrious men in the Christian Church from the beginning of it to their own times And after all these there wanted not Martyrologers and Writers of Lives but such as perhaps we had better have wanted than enjoyed their Writings insomuch that a great Lieutenant under the Papal Standard durst affirm that the Stories of the Heathen Captains and Philosophers were more excellently written then of Christs own Apostles and Martyrs For those were done so notably that they were like to live for ever whereas the lives of many Saints in the Christian Church were so corruptly and shamefully penn'd that they could no way advantage the Reader so that at this day we have two things to bewail not only that we have lost the true reports of the Primitive Christians but likewise that the lives of the Saints we have remaining have not been written by Saints and true men but by liars who have stufft their fastidious Writings with so many prodigious Tales as are more apt to beget infidelity than faith and all honest and judicious men are ashamed and grieved to read them For my own part I intend not in this tumultuary haste to write an absolute Life of the Author or recollect all his Actions praise-worthy but only for satisfaction of some importunate friends to represent quaedam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 some few Memoirs and Passages of his Life which I have received from his Lordships most intimate acquaintance and for the most part from his own reports Tecum etenim longos memini consumere Soles and in them am resolved to sacrifice to Truth and not to Affection to the glory of God and not to humane fame to write nothing false or fictitious nor things true in an hyperbolical and flaunting manner as in a Panegyrick but only a Breviary of his most active and industrious life where the truth shall be recited without false Idea's and representations and his Lordship made to appear what really he was both in his Divine vertues and humane passions
to that purpose whereby he should be a Benedictin Monk or a Blessing to the Nation and not a Dominican Dominari in exercitu He preached before the Commissioners at Croydon and first read the Common-Prayer himself to them at that great meeting for the peace of the Country And afterward when his Royal Majesty was restored he laid aside his long Antipathy and came up to London where one going to congratulate his coming thither so he answered he did his own for he hoped in God he did not appear as a Porpoise only once in twenty years before a great storm but as an Halcyon for a sign of fair weather and when he was restored to his ancient Parish and Church again being one day visited by many sequestred and banished Friends returned again with himself whom he pleasantly called his Charonitae a By name which the Romans gave to them who were restored to their Possessions and Country after they had been proscribed by Sylla As if Charon had wafted them over the Lake of Death and brought them back again At the same time he gave to God great thanks for the opportunity of meeting them again in that place and prayed God that they might all take notice first of the real faults that brought down the late sad Judgments and be sure to repent of them and then also secondly take into consideration the supposed faults or scandals that seem'd to do it and as far as was meet take care likewise to prevent them for the time to come He had been installed one of the Residentiaries of St. Paul's Church a little before the beginning of the Civil War to which he was now restored whereby he was frequently called to preach there where he could not spare to tell his Country-men sometimes of their faults That however his Majesties most gracious Act of Oblivion had delivered them from all humane Penalties yet unless they abhorred those sins so easily forgiven by the most merciful and most courteous King in the world yet the Anger of God would find them out and though his Majesty had obliged the Royal Party to forget their sufferings yet the Presbyterians were ever bound to remember their doings But his deserts were too eminent and well known to be long in any Orb less than the highest in our Church therefore my Lord Chancellor sent to offer him the Bishoprick of Glocester which he begg'd his Majesties and his Lordships leave to refuse answering as Cato He had rather Future times should ask why Dr. Hacket had not a Bishoprick than why he had one Afterward it pleased his Majesty to confer upon him the Bishoprick of Lichfield and recommend that most ruined Cathedral City and Diocess to his prudent Circumspection and Government He first thought that now in his old age the Charge was too great for him but because Caesar had commanded it he would resign up himself to his Majesties Commands and willingly put his neck to the burden of the Chair and to his best abilities not be wanting in his duty to God and the King But he found in himself a great reluctancy to leave his old people in City and Country he had so long lived there that now the place was grown natural and stuck to him like the Bark to the Tree but again would sometime say Holbourn was not the same Parish he left it a new Generation for the most part rose up in twenty years that knew not Joseph nor the piety and conformity of ancient times and that probably young men might suit better with young men and therefore would accept his Sovereigns gracious offer and yet always retain a paternal affection and care for them too and would thereupon shew how vain some Canonists were in prescribing an eternal obligation between Pastor and People whereas he forsakes not the Church who serves it in another place but in some circumstances it is his duty to remove when better qualified for that other Church and his removal duly required of him For we are not to consecrate our studies and labours to Places but to Persons not to any particular people only but to the glory of God and best advantage of the Catholick Church He received his Consecration December 1661. upon the same day that he had forty three years before received his first Orders and the Spring following he took his journey to reside upon his Charge with great congratulations of the loyal Gentry and most dutiful salutations of the Orthodox Clergy and unconceivable joy and satisfaction of all people When his Lordship came to Coventry he was entertained with a Latin Speech made by Sir Thomas Norton Baronet and in holy Orders and again upon his first Entrance into Staffordshire by Mr. Powel Schoolmaster of Stafford with Another to which his Lordship presently in the same language gave an elegant reply to every particular The whole Clergy upon this first meeting were of opinion that his Majesty had still the old Apostolical spirit of discerning having sent to them a Prelate so wise and learned as they could scarce have wished one altogether so fit for themselves and 't is not to have been doubted if the sole election had been in themselves but that the Diocess would have chosen him as unanimously as the people of Constantinople did Nectarius to whom no man dissented insomuch that some say the place wherein they held the Election was ever after call'd Concord from the universal approbation of the Fact It is much to be admired that the people who for the most part are none of the best Judges in those antient times should oftentimes choose so luckily who yet sometimes chose men to be Bishops as St. Ambrose of Millain Synesius Bishop of Cyrene and Nectarius an Arch-Bishop at Constantinople besides others who had scarce received any former Orders and were some of them not well instructed in all parts of Christian Religion nor indeed baptized St. Hierom a learned but sharp Writer might well gird at this practise Heri Catechumenus hodie Pontifex but against our Bishop there lay no such exceptions who would sometimes rejoyce like Greg. Nazianzen that he had not been made a Bishop before long labour and much pains spent in preaching and converting others to the Christian Faith and gave God thanks he had run through all the lesser Offices had been long Scholar and Fellow of a Colledg then been made Deacon Priest Chaplain which was equal to Curat and sometime Vicar of a poor place afterwards Parson Doctor Prebendary Archdeacon and Residentiary of St. Pauls and had discharged all these with great pains in his own person in the heat of the day both in time of peace and persecution so that he did not leap but by his merits orderly arise to his Episcopal honour and dignity The City of Litchfield has its name from the old Saxon Lice or Carcase because of the great multitude of Christians thereabouts slain in the Persecution of Dioclesian which are in
to beg the Kings leave to let him go home before the end of the Session sometimes in frosty Winter weather to be like the good Pastor among his Sheep where they might hear his voice at Christmas and the other great Feasts and accounted silence a Womans vertue but not a Bishops who if sickness and great Affairs molested not was still bound to labour in the Word and Doctrine and held it a mistake to prefer Governing before Preaching whereas it was ever contrary as appeared by 1 Tim. 15.17 Let the Elders that rule well be accounted worthy of double honour especially they who labour in the Word and Doctrine and therefore the Bishop alwayes preached and the Presbyter never before him but when deputed or in his absence so that when he was sometimes told by his friends that he was now Miles emeritus and might lawfully lay aside his Preaching pains in his extreme old age he would by no means consent but still lay-by his other Studies upon Saturday afternoon and retire to his preaching Meditations and for the most part preacht once upon Sunday mornings both to profit others and to warm himself Three Sundays at least every Month he would preach up and down his Diocess and not only in his chief City of Lichfield or near to his own Cathedral but like to a benign Star would irradiate all places within his Orb He would often take Coach and go more than seven miles sometimes nine or ten upon Sunday morning and yet be at Church before most of the Parish and go home again to dinner and yet alwayes have the full Service of the Church before Sermon and many times afterwards rectify disorders in Churches and sometimes differences about Seats or Pews This Custom he continued till he died often mentioning the words of Bishop Andrews who was wont to institute all his Ministers in curam meam tuam and therefore thought he must no more hide his Talent in a Rochet than they might theirs under a Cassock Thus was his diligence equal to any of the Ancients and his success answerable reducing multitudes in all places to piety and conformity with the Church of England almost like another Gregorius Thaumaturgus Bishop of Neocaesarea a great and populous City who when he came thither found but seventeen Christians and when he died gave God thanks he left but seventeen Pagans This great success did owe it self not only to his frequent preaching and diligent study but to his eximious piety and perpetual prayer Formerly he had taken great pains in the Study of Antiquity and for Ecclesiastical History especially he was inferior to very few no man could give a better account of the Travels of the Apostles after the day of Pentecost and the Conversion of the World by the Primitive Christians and for the History of the Reformation after the second Pentecost no man I think could give the like Narrative how miraculously in all places it was effected In our own Church there was nothing whereof he was ignorant all the Councils and passages of the Reformation from the first beginning or Matrix thereof he perfectly understood But of late years he would say his Studies were not to be more wise and learned but more holy and good and therefore laid aside Polemical Divinity wholly and his principal study were Cases of Conscience Canon Law and the Liturgies of the Antient Church in which he was very skilful yet would often complain he found this last an unlearned study and much against his own nature who was a lover of Philology and Rationality But he much wondred that any learned men could contrary to the practice of the whole Church lay aside all use of Liturgies even against the sense of Calvin himself who wishes there might be in every Church an uniform Liturgy for preservation of Unity and prevention of Vainglory and other inconveniencies from which it should be unlawful for Ministers to depart but especially in our Church where so many young men are ordain'd he wondred any wise man would be against a set Liturgie and refer all the Service of God to free Prayer and would assert that it was more easie to marr than to mend the Book of Common-Prayer and therefore we ought not to adventure the one for the other but in regard the Minister of the Parish was permitted to compose a Prayer of his own before his Sermon he thought no Sectary had cause to complain Bidding of Prayer before Sermon he never practised and said no more did Dr. Ravis and Dr. Fletcher Archbishop Whitgift's Chaplains afterwards Bishops who drew up the 55. Canon whom he knew very well and often heard preach and always used a Form of their own and no Bishops Articles ever examined or found fault with it and was certainly used by St. Ambrose in Antiquity and therefore in the Convocation 1640 it was carried for a Form And although it was his mind that all Students were not to be tied up to Canonical hours but such only whose Devotion need not be interrupted by necessary study and employment yet he would rarely intermit them himself unless want of health or very extraordinary business constrained him In a morning he would rarely permit any to visit or disturb him but held that time was made for God rather than for men as the Historian says of Charles the fifth Manè frequentior cum Deo quà m cum hominibus sermo therefore the first thing after his sleep was his private Devotion with reading of the holy Bible Psalms and Chapters then gentle walking for health then Study then Publick Prayer then Private Prayers again before Dinner presently after Dinner to his Private Prayers again and then to his Study unless Ecclesiastical Affairs or sutable Company prevented him for an hour or so and of all sorts of Prayer he would especially abound in thanksgiving using St. Paul's words often In every thing give thanks for this is the will of God and wish that our Common Prayer had more Forms to that purpose and would sometimes wonder that when the world had been so cloyed with Religious Orders Predicants Humiliats Oratorians Mendicants and many other titles yet there was never any called Eucharistici a Congregation appointed to give God thanks for all the good things wherewith this World is replenished In the Evening of every day Recount thy own actions and the divine preservations was his rule to others and customary to himself and to pray for the pardon of the one and praise God for the receit of the other And in all his Prayers day and night he was a continual sollicitor for the peace of the Catholick Church All his counsels like Melanchton's were ever moderate and he often wished such a Form of Prayer were composed that all Christians might joyn in being a great Enemy to sharpness and violence in the matters of Religion and would often use Erasmus his words Mihi adeò est invisa discordia ut
tears and be clean many that are last may be first in the Kingdom of heaven I have satisfied you what comfort comes of it though these Magi which came to Christ had been the worst of all men though antiquity had said right that they were Impostors and deceivers after the great power of Satan yet they were not such as I conceive but men conversed in the studies of deep wisdom or wise-men as we translate the word Such as are most accurate to give the true sense of names do so perswade me Suidas saith that Magi were Philosophi 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Philosophers but of that tribe that dedicated themselves to the knowledge of God Phavorinus says they were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Priests that studied divine learning according to the Religion of that Country To go higher Pliny says the Magi were skilful in sacred learning and which moves me more Strabo says that in his days and about his days St. Mathew wrote his Gospel they were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Professors of a strict and austere life as you would say religious Whether they were by succession the Scholars of that great Oriental Patriarch for Philosophy Zoroastres or Prophets children derived from the succession of Balaam all is one which conjecture is true or whether both be false but in all likelihood they managed the sacred Offices of the Persian Religion For Eusebius says how in his days it troubled the Magi that the Persians became Christians for by Sacerdotal succession they lookt to their own religion that it should receive no detriment Diogenes Laertius in that book which every young Scholar turns over wherein he wrote very accurately of all Philosophical Sects says that the Magi attended the Religion of the Gods prayed and sacrificed and for their learning as well as their ministry Porphyrie says they were interpreters of divine controversies Though they were but a bad Priesthood yet a Priesthood and a very learned one in their superstitious way When I first took a hint of this I laboured to make it truth out of good Authors the notion must needs be pleasant to them who wear an Ephod in Christs service that as silly swains ignorant Lay-men were the first fruits among the Jews so Priests of a religious calling were the first fruits of the Gentiles and were incited by a divine assistance to seek and find out our Saviour But though this be true yet since my Text speaks not of their office and science about Religion but simply as they were Wise-men I will pitch upon that Such as the Grecians called Philosophers the Jews Scribes the Assyrians Chaldeans the Indians Gymnosophists the Gauls Druids this Island Bards the Romans Aruspices such were the Magi with the Persians men that had furnished themselves with all fit knowledge to be their Judges and Counsellors of state You shall find that seven Wise-men who knew the Law and Judgments stood before Ahasuerus the great King of Persia Esther i. 13. these were such as the Magi in my Text the most sufficient directors of all affairs in that mighty Kingdom Humane Learning and Political Wisdom are so far from being impediments to an man in the way to the Kingdom of heaven that they are excellent Pedestals for the Pillar of Faith to stand upon and wise men if pride do not puff them up with vain opinion are best able to resist the devil and his tentations because they best know why they serve the Lord and have most intelligence to ponder why they should not be conformed to the fashion of the world Certainly they are of that rank to whom much is given and much shall be required of them Plain ignorant shepherds came to Christ soon after the first minutes of his Nativity and those harmless unsuspected persons told it abroad in all Bethlehem that by the foolish things of the world God might confound the wise that 's a great mystery of our salvation yet that the Gospel might lose no opinion by illiterate messengers the Sophi the acutest wits of the East discharge the same office that God may be glorified both in the prudent and ignorant Learned men of all sorts believed and were saved Zenas a Lawyer Luke a Physician Paul brought up at Gamaliel's feet he had 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Felix said all sorts of art and literature these were wise men and never so wise as in this to seek out Christ and to prefer the simplicity of faith before all the rudiments of the world I approve it not that these Travellers were Kings it is an error I will remove by and by but after the manner of Persia they were honourable in their own Country yet their quality of wisdom is remembred before their honour Nay had they been Kings the Romish Expositors say it was most apt for the Gospel they should be called Wise men Majus est testimonium quod datur Christo à sapientibus quam quod datur a regibus it did more convince the Heathens that their Wise men and Philosophers bare testimony to Christ than if they had been Monarchs Those are the chariots and horsemen of Israel burning and shining lights It strengthens our part exceedingly when the eloquence of Apollo and the Athenian Education of Dionysius the Areopagite are converted to the edifying of the Church but for such as are wise and learned yet whet those weapons for the maintainance of pernicious errors against true Religion we pray as David did Lord turn the wisdom of Achitophel into foolishness and their subtilty into their own destruction I have declared my opinion for the Priest-hood and learning of these wise men and am not afraid to dissent from them who interpret Magi to be Nechromancers or vain Astrologers for even after they had worshipt Christ still they are called Magi. When Herod perceived he was mocked of the Magi or Wise men he was exceeding wroth ver 16. 'T is probable that a name of Odium and scandal should not be given them after they had worshipped our Saviour Thus far both these opinions may agree that the principal of those who visited Christ were reverend Sages of the East and that some ancient Authors had been informed by tradition that there were those in their train who secretly were Wizzards and Sorcerers The best complexion may have a tettar run into it and the best profession may have some followers that give themselves over to the Devil And this reconciliation I am more willing to embrace because it supposeth that a full Chorus a great company of wise men came to Christ from the East Not three only as some say who dare say any thing Leo the Great above 400 years after Christ was born is the most ancient Author that I have met with who stands precisely for the number of three and how much the circumstances of a true story may be falsified after 400 years it is too manifest by the records of all ages The Author of
all the chief Prophesies about Christ came unto the Israelites when they were most out of heart and needed comfort Jacob's Balaam's Isaiah's Daniel's Haggai's either they were in Egypt or among fiery Serpents in the Wilderness or in Babylon or in some woful plight when Christ was promised but that was a suddain way to stop the course of all sorrow I cannot stand upon it for I must now declare the second reason why Jesus is said to be born in the days of Herod the King to refer the hearers to Jacobs Prophesie that if Herod reign then the Messias must come The tenour of Jacob's Prophesie bears that sense as the most learned Christians say it is extant Gen. xlix 10. The Scepter doth not depart from Judah nor a lawgiver from between his feet until Shiloh come The learned in the Hebrew tongue say that Shebeth is a Tribe as well as a Scepter and the sense may be the Tribe of Judah shall continue distinct until Christs coming whereas the other ten Tribes were scatter'd and confus'd by captivity But the most learned do assent what we translate a Scepter very well imports Princedom The Septuagint hath it A Prince shall not depart from Judah nay the Scripture gives light to that sense in other places Judah is my law-giver Psal lx 9. And again 1 Chron. v. 2. Judah prevailed above his brethren and of him came the chief rulers The Chaldee Paraphrase doth notably make good the words for the Christian cause He that hath dominion shall not be taken away from Judah nor a Scribe from his childrens children until the Christ come whose the Kingdom is and him shall the people obey The Jerusalem targum as I find it quoted by faithful Authors hath as famous a gloss as that Kings shall not cease from the house of Judah nor Doctors that teach the Law until the time that the King Christ do come whose the Kingdom is and all the Kingdoms of the earth shall be subject unto him the best judgments no way prejudicated did ever so interpret it Therefore Herod having wrung the Scepter from Judah this was the time for the Saviour of the world to come Two things are cast cross in the way to elude the Prophesie which doubts I must clear up for the honour of this day First that neither our Saviour or his Evangelists did ever make use of that saying of Jacob in the New Testament to prove that the day of the Lord was come why no more doth any Apostolical Writer in the New Testament apply that act of Abraham's to our Saviours Passion when he took his only Son Isaac to offer him up for a whole burnt-offering Yet the Church reads that Chapter for the first Lesson on Good Friday and did ever so conceive it and that for good reason for Isaac was a Type of Christ In Isaac shall thy seed be blessed But another scruple is more cumbersom to be removed It may seem that the Scepter was departed from Judah even from those days that Zedekiah was carried away into captivity from Zerobabel or a little after to Herod many hundred years some of the stock of Levi had the superiority therefore Shiloh did not come when the government was taken from Judah and then the Prophesie will not serve our turn to apply the Nativity of Christ to the days of Herod upon necessary connexion For answer there are many ways to the Wood as we say proverbially yet but one fair satisfaction that I can meet withal which consists of two heads First that the Scepter which Jacob foretold should not depart till Shiloh came belonged to the whole Nation of the Jews Secondly that appropriatively and principally it belong'd to the Tribe of Judah and upon these two hangs the truth of the Prophesie You know that which agrees with the event and success of a thing is the best interpretation of a Prophesie and upon the event it is manifest the Jews had a Governour of their own lineage from Moses until this Herod whose Father was an Edomite and his Mother an Ishmaelite That short interruption of 70 years in the Babylonish captivity is not considerable in so many hundred years but the Government at sundry ages sometimes fell to the lot of one Tribe sometimes to another From Moses to David the Judges were sometimes Ephramites sometimes Danites of Zabulon of Judah of other stocks promiscuously From David to Zedekiah 470 years the lineage of David had the preheminence from the return of the captivity to this Herod the Hasamonei or Levites sate at the stern but still he was an Israelite born and not a stranger till God appeared in the flesh All that time before it was Regnum Judaicum a Judaical Kingdom though not in the power of a man of Judah Saint Austin saw this was the safest construction Non defuit Judeorum Princeps ex ipsis Judeis usque ad Herodem alienigenam Jâ—dea did not want a Prince that was a a Jew until Herod the Foreigner usurpt upon them and before him in Eusebius days the current went that way says he The prediction of Jacob was not fulfilled while Princes lasted of the Jewish Progeny but from that time that Christ was born there were no Princes Ex Juda aut ex Judaeorum familia either of Judah or of the Jewish blood But because Jacob vented this Prophesie in the benediction of his Son Judah I will add briefly that the glory which was common to all the Jews did fall and rest principally upon the tribe of Judah To make this even you must put many considerations together their name and Nation did flourish most from that time that David a man of Judah was chosen King by God and anointed by Samuel all the Kings from him to Zedekiah for 470 years were of the same family So Judah had the most honourable time of government After they came home out of captivity 't is true that in a little while certain Levites had the principality yet still the glory was Judah's For Jacob foresaw that the whole band of Israelites that come from Babylon should be called Jews from Judah and after for ever Almost the whole Country they liv'd in was only Judah's lot and inheritance The chief Metropolis Jerusalem where the Prince resided was at first indeed in the lot of Benjamin but ever since David's conquest it fell to Judah Except the person of the Ruler all was Judah's the Scepter therefore did not depart from Judah though the person did And those Levites that commanded all were called not the Princes of Levi but of Judah therefore Judah did not lose his glory quite until Herod thrust him from it So that now the great work of the Lord was to come to pass that the Scripture might be fulfilled and Jesus was born in the days of Herod the King My Author whom I follow gives a good instance to illustrate it that the Crown of Spain is devolved by the Marriage of a female
much infirmity No mans counsel at hand to comfort him for he was in the Wilderness nothing to strengthen his feebless for he was fasting and hungry much abated in the vigour of his body Christus non solùm provocat sed velut arma ministrat hosti says St. Austin this might seem as if he did lend his enemie weapons to overcome him But what the Apostle said of himself through the grace of Christ Christ might more truly say of himself by his own power When I am weak I am strong as will appear in the sequel This is premised to let you know that the present matter which I have in hand consists herein to unfold with what outward infirmity Christ addressed himself to this terrible bickering with the Devil and that in four Points 1. From the place it was the Wilderness the greater solitude the more dangerous the tentation 2. He was fasting the more feeble the body the more flat and dull are the operations of the Spirits 3. The continuance of the fasting was as great as ever was read Forty days and forty nights a large while to get nothing for bodily sustenance 4. The consequent is he was afterwards an hungry Though the divine power had underpropt nature a long time yet nature was now left to it self still the more advantage for the enemy This Wilderness whatsoever it was for a barren desolate place it deserves my labour to survey it because it received this guest for forty days our Lord and Saviour A worthless and therefore a nameless piece of ground unprofitable to bring store into the Barn but profitable to yield some pious meditations Some devout Christians who lov'd to visit those Countries and Regions which Christ frequented have given it a name which it holds in Cosmographical descriptions to this day Quarantena quaranta implying no more than Christs continuance there for forty days There are other small Desarts in Palestina the Desart of Maon the Desart of Ziph the Desart of Judaea this was distinguished from all these by being called the great Desart where there was no habitation They that retired thither unless they brought their provision must resolve to keep a fast At this day our faithful relators say nothing grows upon the ground but a few Dates and Christ was there at such a time when the trees did bear nothing His Baptism at Jordan is calculated to fall out at Twelfth-tide and his departure into the Wilderness being next after his Baptism those forty days were in the Months of January and February when above all other seasons the Trees of the field a few excepted have not so much as Leaves to hang upon them The Devil could not have offered the first tentation in the Cities or Villages or in the fruitful grounds neighbouring to any habitation a bare Heath that yielded nothing but Flints did occasion this Proposition Command that these stones be made bread The first emergent observation from hence is noted in the interlineal gloss Tunc maximè instat Diabolus ad tentandum cum viderit solitarios The Adversary doth especially take hold of a man to tempt him upon a melancholy solitariness beware of those sad oppressing thoughts which a man loves to keep to himself alone take advise of them whose judgment can direct you and whose charity can comfort you When you feel instigations of iniquity grow upon you the chief thing which Satan desires is that you would smother them and not reveal them that you would break off conversation from all your friends and avoid Society He knows his advantages when he gets a man into a wilderness I mean a melancholy retirement 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says Euripides one hand can fight but weakly As a Dear that is struck knows by instinct what a danger it is to be single and therefore will heard himself if he can so do not separate your self from the face of men upon tentation that is the way to betray your soul but unite your force against the Tempter by mixing your self with good men and praise the Lord as David said in the great Congregation Quae facilitas Quae securitas Quae jucunditas est habere cum quo aequè audeas loqui ut tibi As I read it in a certain work that carries St. Austins name What felicity What security What hearts ease it is to talk to another with as good confidence as thou wouldst unto thy self Two are better than one as Solomon shews it in a threefold similitude 1. If one fall dangerously into a pit a good companion will lend him his hand to raise him he that is alone hath not another to help him up 2. If two lie together they have heat St. Hierom makes an Allegory of it between David and Abisag Frigidiores ferventiorum societate in virtute incalescent They that are colder in Piety will be warmed by their Society that are more fervent in charity 3. If one prevail against one two shall help him united force is a strong safegard 2 Sam. x. 11. Joab divided the battel between him and Abishai his brother Says Joab to Abishai If the Syrians be too strong for me then thou shalt help me but if the children of Ammon be too strong for thee then I will help thee Thus judgment will order the battel in our spiritual warfare I will not trust to my self alone lest tentation press me sore but I will have succours at need We are not like Eagles which never flie in a flush but one by one because no bird is so strong that it can prey upon it But we are compared to sheep that must be led to the Pastures in a flock and take heed of stragling This Doctrine is no way repugnant to that which I shall deliver by and by that it is profitable to abandon the contagion of the wicked world neither do I disrespect those tractates of the Fathers which extol the benefit that some have found by retiring for a while in to an Hermitage or the Cell of an Anchorite A few examples of some admirable men that have sped well in that fortune ought not to be a leading Card that it should be a condition of life to which weak ones should be exhorted What was good in a very few in times past says one with a good distinction it was Secundum preeminentiam gratiae non secundum congruentiam naturae It sorted well with the pre-eminence of the extraordinary grace which they had but it was not agreeable to the ordinary complexion of humane nature A man sequestred into a Desart and Solitude as he cannot always have his affections intent upon Prayer and divine Meditations so his vacant idle hours which must be very many will proffer him innumerable imaginations of the worst condition Grant says Chrysologus that for many hours he think of God yet for almost as many he hath nothing to think of but himself Si nihil excellens in seipso reperit tristatur de seipso
the people owe in the audience of the King and again they will preach how the King is tied to justice and equity far from Court in the audience of the People Inveigh against ingrossers of Grain in the City and against false Merchandise in the Country This is a most preposterous course and no way intended to edifie their Auditors So St. Peter might have tax'd the Idolatry of the Gentiles in the hearing of the Jews and the sin of the Jews that they killed Christ in the hearing of the Gentiles but that partition had been very ill divided For it were like that Paradox in Chirurgery called Vnguentum armarium to cure a man without application of the remedy at an hundred miles distance No St. Peter had no such Quacksalver tricks in Divinity but directs his reprehension to them that were before him Ye have taken c. And all the Jews were rightly thus accused except those few of men and women that were his Disciples and followed him for if they were not such as accused him falsely yet they were such as suborned Catives to betray him If they were not in the plot of betraying they were in the sin of delivering up to Pilate if not among those that delivered him up to judgment yet among those that cried out Crucifie him in the time of judgment Nay though they did not cry out nor so much as in their hearts consent to his unjust trial yet they held their peace they suffered wrong to prevail and did not resist it They did not put off the Roman Souldiers and stay their fatal hands in one respect or other they were all as guilty as St. Peter chargeth them By wicked hands ye have crucified and slain him Some of the Jewish Rabines slout at these words of St. Peters to this day saying the Christians are quite mistaken to impute unto them the crucifying of Christ for they had no such kind of death in their Law and they did all things à punto according to their Law they crucified no man They had but four capital punishments for Malefactors says Maimonides after the tradition of Moses killing with the Sword stoning to death hanging on a tree by the neck and burning But the infliction of crucifying was unheard of to their Nation Thus they And whereas Cardinal Baronius Cardinal Sigonius Justus Lipsius and some other learned men contradict the Rabbines in this I think they did amiss not to believe their great Doctors in their own Laws and Customs wherein they were most expert The true retortion is that in the days of Christ the power of life and death was taken out of the hands of the Jews by their Lords the Romans that reigned over them therefore they implore the Roman Magistrate that he would condemn and execute their Prisoner after the Roman Laws and the Romans did deal with him after the rigour of their Laws which sentenced all those that were convicted of sedition and raising tumults to the bitter death of the Cross So Christ foretold to his Disciples anon before he entred into Jerusalem That the Son of man should be betrayed unto the chief Priests and Scribes and they shall deliver him to the Gentiles to mock and to scourge and to crucifie him Mat. xx 19. It was not the custom in Israel to strike nails through the feet or hands of any that were hanged up says Maimonides Nay the most accurate Casaubon says that there is not one word in all the Hebrew tongue for being nailed to the Cross so little were they acquainted with the punishment This 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in my Text affigentes which the Vulgar Latine most ignorantly reads affligentes is heathen Language and unknown to the Jews The Rabbines in contempt of our Saviour call him in their Tongue sometimes as you would say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he that was hanged but their Tongue could not furnish them with a word to say he that was fastned to a tree There may be divers ways of hanging on a tree beside crucifying and the Old Testament useth ever the general phrase Cursed is every one that hangeth on a Tree The only place in the Old Law which hath respect particularly to the death of the Cross is Psal xxi 17. They pierced my hands and my feet Therefore the Rabbines have endeavoured to corrupt that place more than any other in all the Bible But the Psalmist alludes to that which the Jews should procure and the Romans execute One only place selected out of Sozomen by Casaubon avails much to prove that crucifying was not a Jewish but a Roman fashion For Constantine thought that no Malefactor was worthy to die on a Cross because our Lord had so suffered the just for the unjust therefore he took away that penalty of crucifying used before by the Romans says Sozomen Therefore the vulgar Latine Translation mistakes the words of my Text but hits the sense very well for it hath not Per manus impias by wicked hands but Per manus impiorum by the hands of the wicked as if it were in Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with an Article which would make it personal But then the meaning is ye Jews have taken him and by the hands of the wicked that is of the Gentiles have crucified him and slain him So Christ foretold The Son of man shall be delivered into the hands of sinners that is into the hands of the Gentiles We that are by nature Jews and not sinners of the Gentiles says St. Paul Gal. ii St. Chrysostome understands it two ways either by the hands of Judas or by the hands of the Souldiers It is all one for consider it well and it is rather the worse on their side than the better They suborned Judas they importuned Pilate they stirred up the Souldiers St. Peter passeth over these instrumental accidental coadjutors and directs his invectives against them that had the chief finger in the murder that set all the wheels a going Ye have taken him and crucified him If David could discern the hand of Joab in the woman of Tekoahs Parable then be sure the Lord doth espy the chief Actors and Complotters of all mischief and rebellion though others appear in the fact whom they have exposed to censure and dangers Statists love to bring about odious projects by the hands of underlings as the Ape in the Fable would take the Chesnut out of the hot Embers with the Cats foot But God will send his Angels to gather up the Tares in bundles all that were Complices in the same sin shall make one bundle both Jew and Gentile For there is no connivence in Gods justice no ignorance in his wisdom no partiality in his sentence To him therefore be glory for ever AMEN NINE SERMONS UPON THE RESURRECTION OF OUR SAVIOUR THE FIRST SERMON UPON THE RESURRECTION ACTS ii 24. Whom God hath raised up having loosed the pains of death because it was not possible that he should be
express when Christ did appear to his mother after his Resurrection to shew he was no accepter of persons in way of carnal Affinity He did appear to more than five hundred brethren at once doubtless she was one of them he did appear to the eleven and to them that were gathered together with them Luk. xxiv 33. I may suppose the Blessed Virgin was there because she was John's charge to take her with him but certainly she was none of that Train which came early in the morning with Mary Magdalen to the Sepulcher Then let us proceed and say from hence that God hath done great honour to this Sex to make them the first Instruments that should know and declare his Resurrection Where were the Apostles at this time Alas they were terrified and had â—â—ielded like Men to the Passions of the Flesh they were shut up close for fear of the Jews and durst not shew their heads only a few Women which had followed Christ were more adventurous than all the rest and as if it irked them to care for their Life any longer since the Life of the World was put to death una salus nullam sperare salutem they step out boldly let come what will Wherefore to give you St. Austins words Munus Apostolicum viris creptum ad breve tempus eis resignat the Apostolical Office was taken from the Disciples for a time and it was given to them to preach that wonderful work of God Christ risen from the dead Audentes tu Christe juvas you shall lose nothing to be couragious in a good cause that great glory to see the Son of God in a vision now alive again was given to them that did adventure to find him Secondly none wept so much for his death as these tender-hearted souls the Daughters of Jerusalem they were the first that mourned and they are the first that be comforted the greatest partakers of grief for his passion are made the first partakers of joy for his Resurrection Blessed are they that mourn for they shall be comforted And if there be any that repine much at their own daily misfortunes who say they have buâ—â—â—ttle joy in this world let them strike their hand upon their brest and say it is because they have taken but little grief Jesus is our Passeover that was sacrificed for us but you heard the Ceremony read to day which God appointed the Lamb must be eaten with sower herbs or else you must not taste of the Passeover Christian whosoever thou be that art taught this day what a victory thy Saviour obtained against the Grave and against the nethermost Hell if thy heart be not replenished with joy upon the tidings if it do not assure unto thee the seal of the Divine Promise which is the earnest of thine inheritance it is because thou hast not eaten sower herbs with the Passeover Thou hast not yet afflicted thy voluptuous heart sufficiently as Mary Magdalen did and the other women before they came unto the Sepulcher Thirdly women are the first witnesses in daily Childbirths how we are born into this world children of wrath and God hath revealed to their knowledge in the first place how we shall be made alive again and become heirs of salvation For Resurrection is the birth of the dust and when the Grave had given up the dead body of Christ these women came as it were unto the labour much about the time that the Monument did groan even when an Earthquake had gone just before it Once it was their curse to have a woe pronounced upon them In dolore paries In sorrow shalt thou bring forth Children Gen. iii. 16. Now they see another manner of travel that God can quicken us to life again not miserably but triumphantly and the earth shall give up the dead with joy and gladness Fourthly we may well know him to be the same Christ who was crucified and rose again the third day because he chose no better witnesses than these were for so great a mystery The world it may be will contemn such simplicity of the Spirit but because it so pleased our Saviour Mary Magdalen and the women are most authentick witnesses and beyond all exception Shepherds address unto his cratch where he was born Women unto his Tomb where he was risen from the dead that you may see how Satans method of deceiving is quite contrary to Gods method of saving The Devil dealt all by craft to tempt our first Parents in the shape of a Serpent and Christ deals all by simplicity and innocency through the testimony of Shepherds through the testimony of Women If you be hard to believe the things which were very strange at his Nativity and at his Resurrection examine these persons and ye shall have plain truth without tricks and turnings A righteous cause needs not a supportance by Art and subtilty a piercing wit may find a way to make a bad action seem good but when the action is without controversie good already the devices of a sharp wit will never make it seem better for truth is least suspected when it is not varnished over with Policy Lastly To end this Point among all other women Mary Magdalen the great sinner is with the first that comes unto the Sepulchre to refresh our conscience which is opprest with the fore burden of iniquity that our Redeemer liveth to gratifie repentant sinners in especial wise that fly unto his mercy If it were fit for Mary to bury her sins in that Grave it will be fit likewise for thee and me Repentance may be described to be the Resurrection of the soul from the death of sin And this Resurrection from sin which I may call Metaphorical hath a fast interest none so sure as it in Christ as he comes forth from the darkness of the grave and shines upon the world All men shall be restored to life just and unjust for the Son of God redeemed the whole nature of man from the corruption of the Grave and the Devil did utterly lose jus mortis the whole dominion of death because our Saviour being an innocent was put to death over whom he had no dominion But the glory of our Saviours victory was to conquer two at once Hell and Death So the Prophet Hosea cries out in form of an Epinicium O death where is thy sting O hell where is thy victory And from his own voice he declares his glory Rev. i. 18. I am he that liveth and was dead behold I am alive for evermore and have the keys of Hell and of Death Therefore this great Festival is the penitent sinners holy day for whose sakes both the Keys are turned for whose sakes both the Gates are opened that the soul may pass from the judgment of Hell and the body from the rottenness of corruption And thus it appears why Christ was first seen of Women in his bodily manifestation after death It was granted to their couragious attempt that durst
allow God a seventh day for sanctification so much is divine in the fourth Commandment and what seventh day but the same which Christ sanctified in his Resurrection which is the new Creation of the World the same which the Scriptures point at the same which the Church hath constantly kept in all successions Salve festa dies toto venerabilis anno says Lactantius and Origen says that Manna did begin to fall down about the Tents of the Israelites the first day of the Week and in the same day you are bound to bring your Omer to gather Spiritual Manna in your holy Assemblies that your Soul may eat and be satisfied When the Proconsuls of several Provinces enquired who were Christians to punish them you shall find in the Acts of the Martyrs this was their Question to descry them Dominicam servâsti What do you keep the Lords Day The good man being persecuted answers Christianus sum intermittere non possum I am a Christian and cannot intermit it Do we differ from the Jews then in nothing but exchanging day for day Yes Beloved as in sanctifying Gods name we are to go beyond them because the Spirit is given to us in more abundant measure than it was to them so in nice Points of rest and cessation from all bodily labour and exercise we are not tied so strictly as they were I wonder from whom they had their Doctrine that teach the contrary I know they will not say they had it from the Fathers I know they cannot say it justly I appeal to the best lights of this latter Age. Out of the French Reformed Churches I cite Beza Thus he The keeping of the Lords day is an Apostolical and a divine Tradition yet so that we are not tied he means by Gods Law to observe the Judaical cessation from all kind of work for to observe the Judaical rest were to change the day and not the Judaism Imperial Laws made by Constantine and other godly Princes did first interdict that no open and usual buying and selling or other Merchandise should be used for it is fit for the better sanctifying of the day that we should sequester worldly affairs and be altogether vacant to God Thus far he Out of the German Reformed Churches I will cite Paraeus This is his Argument Who first approves that the Lords day is to be kept with a decent cessation from manual labours and that it is very scandalous to pollute it with usual secular affairs but if any will run further to impose upon Christians the Rites and Ceremonies of the Jewish rest in their Sabbath thus he convinceth them The observation of the Jewish rest was figurative and typical and all those figures of truth were to be kept under pain of severe judgment because the figure was the pledge and Protestation of the truth which should come to pass now there being no such figurative dependence upon the sanctification of the Lords day we are tied only to such rest as shall adorn and beautifie our Worship of God upon that day I mean both our Morning and Evening Sacrifice Beware therefore to be a Jew in opinion but beware to be a dissolute Libertine in practice Violate not this day nor any the like in the whole year with Negligence Idleness Luxurious Pastimes or Riot give thy body rest that the soul may be more busie in the holy work 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 rest which is not imployed in the fear of God is the Mother of all wickedness I cannot end this Point better than with those words of St. Basil Let me adventure with your patience upon the next Point and I will defer the handling of the last That which I mean only to speak of is Mary Magdalens expedition her restless diligence her watchfulness without all sloath She came early when it was yet dark Every hour seemed seven to this pious Matron till she came to the body of Christ the Sabbath of the Jews was but now ended and she had much ado to refrain coming before it was done The Stars of the night had not yet run their courses when she set forth toward the Monument for it is probable she kept the Sabbath at her own Town and she dwelt at Bethany two miles from Jerusalem yet by Sun-rising when it was yet dark she was come to the Sepulcher a journey of two miles and had brought her Spices with her She had no sleep I believe fell upon her eyes for thinking of her Saviour I am sure she had no leisure to paint her face to powder her hair or to dress her self with finical curiosity We had divers I confess that came early this morning to the holy Sacrament when it was yet dark I praise them for it We have others that seldom or never find the way to Church till the Afternoon you may know by their vain Attire trickt up in Print what they were doing all the Morning At last we have their company scarce with half a thought to please God but with their whole heart to be praised of fools and to please such wanton and adulterous eyes that gaze upon them What a coil is here with this carion flesh Ye are but painted Sepulchers full of rotten bones and not worthy to come with Mary to the Sepulcher of Christ much less to come to the Communion of his body and bloud O proud mortality they that make their Looking-glass all the Text which they take out in the Morning little think that the Grave may be the Pew in the Church wherein they shall be placed before Evening Now they walk abroad so strong with sweet smells that they are able to perfume a Sepulcher with Spices in less than four days all this delicacy may turn to stink and rottenness Come early to the Sepulcher that is think of death in your young blossoming years how suddenly ye may be cut off then leave to fashion your selves after this French or that Italian dressing and spin a poor shrowding sheet which may wrap you up in the earth against the day of the Resurrection I hasten Was it yet dark when Mary came when St. Mark says punctually it was at the rising of the Sun What an intricate case some have made of this objection which is nothing in it self For the Evangelist doth not mean it was so dark that the women could not see about them for then all they reported would be taken to be fancy and not a known truth But the Sun newly rising some obscurity of darkness remains in some places especially it might be so about a Monument which was cut of a Rock in the Earth and the Monument in a Garden where shady trees do not suddenly admit light and the Garden perhaps lying under an Hill and compassed about with a Wall some dusky darkness may incloud such a place early in the Morning They shoot wide therefore that expound the darkness figuratively that the Scriptures were not opened as yet how
that her Lords body was gone but then Christ appears first unto her whom she took to be the Gardener Presently she goes and tells the Disciples she had seen the Lord. The other women who had fled from the Sepulcher and were amazed said nothing to any man of that which the Angel before did bid them say for they are yet incredulous and then comes in St. Lukes relation that they looked again into the Sepulcher and the two men in white whom they saw said unto them Why seek ye the living among the dead He is not here but he is risen And as St. Matthew adds he goeth before you into Galilee there shall ye see him Then they returned and told all these things to the Eleven but they seemed to them as idle tales And as these women went to tell the Disciples Christ did meet them according to the Angels promise and saluted them and they held him by the feet and worshipped him These rumours went abroad into every mans mouth and toward the setting of the Sun Christ adjoyned himself to Cleophas and the other Disciple as a waifaring man and was known of them in the breaking of bread whereupon they return to Jerusalem and tell the Disciples Now the Disciples had a message sent them to go into Galilee and there they should see the Lord but out of fear and incredulity they durst not move out of doors Therefore on the same day at Evening being the first day of the week when the doors were shut where the Disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews came Jesus and stood in the midst of them and said peace be unto you This was the fourth Apparition which he made on this very day A day of so many noble acts and chances that it is able alone to make an history and a history of that great moment that St. Paul writes as if a lively and effectual assent to this Article of the Creed to this one Article were able alone to make a Christian Rom. x. 9. If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus and shalt believe in thy heart that God raised him from the dead thou shalt be saved And although there are other limbs of truth which make up the body of Christian Faith yet if any man ask me about Faith as one askt Christ about the Commandments which is the first and greatest Commandment So in the Point of belief if any one shall say which is the first and great Article of the Creed I would boldly reply this before any other The third day he rose again from the dead The matter then which it behoves us to speak on at this solemn Feast for the quality it is the very Essence and Elixar of our faith and for the quantity so copious that above all the narrations of the Gospel it is most venerable and delightful for the variety of the story I have passed already as the year hath come about into these Points how Mary Magdalen and the other women brought sweet Odours and Spices on the first day of the Week to embalm his body and that as they were on their way three strange motions came to pass the one in the whole Element of Earth the foundations whereof were opened behold there was a great Earthquake and then the heavens were opened for an Angel came down from thence and then the Grave was opened by the rouling away of the stone Now follows the Text which I have read in order wherein is contained this section of the story the Angel puts on a terrible appearance and removes away those that would not believe and so makes room for those that came devoutly prepared If the Band of Souldiers had staid at the Sepulcher these godly women durst not approach for fear of violent ravishment nor durst the Disciples have come near lest these hirelings should spill their bloud But to prevent all outrage the Angel put on a look like lightning and made the hearts of these miscreants faint and when they were driven off the zealous women and the Disciples were admitted to see this glorious work which the Lord had wrought and to testifie what they had seen to all the world The two verses which enter us into this part of the story may be thus distinguished The first is a description of Gods Watchman of his coelestial guard His Countenance was like lightning and his Rayment white as snow The second is a description of Pilates Watchmen and his Roman Guard For fear of him the Keepers did shake and became as dead men Gods Angel is notified by his Visage His Countenance was like lightning and by his Rayment it was white as snow Pilates Ruffians are much betrayed by outward fear for fear of him the Keepers did shake but the inward damp of conscience was most terrible they became as dead men Of these particulars that God may be glorified and you edified You have seen the figures of many Angels and Cherubims about the Tombs of Princes and great men carved by the Art of the Statuary but all the histories of the world afford not such an instance that a very Angel sate upon a Grave-stone excepting this occurrence at our Saviours Resurrection St. Luke says that the women saw two men cloathed in white St. Mark says it was a young man cloathed in a long white garment but they were not very men that came from the dead as Moses and Elias were seen in the Mount at the Transfiguration they were true Angels in the visible shapes of men who took it now for a dignity to be seen in a body because our body was exalted to be incorruptible in the Resurrection of Christ Whether then they be called Angels or men all is one but when St. Matthew mentions one Angel and St. John reckons two when St. Mark says there was one young man in white St. Luke says there were two men in shining garments Is not this a discord No not at all There was but one Angel that spake to the women now St. Matthew and St. Mark refer us only to that person that was the speaker St. Luke and St. John labour to tell us the number of those witnesses that were present and testified of his Resurrection and they were two This is no difference when some write of the singular person of that Angel which spake and others in the plural person of those Angels that witnessed You have heard the reason why this Angel is called a man and why but one is named though there were two in place now I will put this unto it that he came to the Sepulcher neither as a man alone nor as an Angel alone but as an Angel and a Man John Baptist the fore runner of the Nativity came poorly clad with a vesture of Camels skins and a leathern Girdle about his loyns his Errand was to witness to the Son of God coming to us in great humility but this Angel who is the fore-runner of the
ours is both a more joyful condition to enjoy the halcyon days of peace than to be renowned for the most triumphant days of war As Seneca said of the innocent days of Saturns Age that there were no terrible Battels fought by seditious Princes odium omne in feras verterant they kill'd none but wild Beasts in hunting so it is far more Christian in our days to hear it talked that Dogs do chace Stags than that Men devour Men as they do in our neighbour Nations But as David was the first King of Israel that maintained a Navy of Ships at Sea both to procure safety and honour and wealth to his people so it will be written of our Dread Soveraign that he hath matched if not exceeded all his Predecessors in that glory Touching the Personal Qualities of David Gifts of Virtue and Grace I confess they were rare and will admit but of few Comparisons never such an Enditer of holy Songs never any did exceed him in Zeal and Piety never since the world began did any Monarch heap up such a mass of Treasure to build up the Temple an hundred thousand Talents of Gold a thousand thousand Talents of Silver and Gold and Silver without number 1 Chron. xxii for ordering the Service of God in the disposition of the Priests in settling the sacred Musick he was so exquisite as the like was never heard of and in ordering all temporal affairs he was wise as an Angel of God says the woman of Tekoa for his mercy in forgiving offendors you shall not meet with the like till you ascend up to God himself how soon did a few courteous words in the mouth of Abigail cool his anger when he was in a most chaffing indignation what horrid revilings did he put up which Shemei cast upon him how indulgent he was to have spared Absolom the lewdest Son that did ever rise up against a Father When God did give such Ornaments to his Servant it may well be said that he made the day wherein he crowned him and for our due acknowledgment of Gods favours poured upon the head of our Augustious Sovereign you cannot deny but he is religious pious temperate gentle prudent good in all respects as David was but blemished with none of his vices But I will not make my Sermon a Cento of his deserved Praises not for that reason which Plato gives that it is folly to commend any man while he lives 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because man is a changeable creature and may alter from good to worse I fear not this I see such constancy and stiff perseverance in all virtuous ways in our Illustrious King but partly because all Encomiastick Exercises are censur'd for flattery and do soon prove scandalous to the Auditors partly because the Temple is a place selected for the Praise of God and not of Man but I will confidently say that since we are so prosperous a People in a religious wise just chast merciful and temperate Sovereign no Nation under the Sun all things duly weighed hath more cause to confess than we this is the day which the Lord hath made And I may well say hitherto I have spoken of a Benefit now I am come to our bounden thankfulness we will rejoyce and be glad in it as who should say this is the Day which God made for this very end that we should rejoyce and be glad in it As the Lord loveth a chearful Giver so he loveth a chearful Receiver of his mercies he would have us consign it in our countenance and gesture that it pleaseth us and delights us exceedingly to be partakers of his Propitiations And surely this is no hard request no heavy yoke I am certain to require us to rejoyce and be merry with them that keep holy day to accommodate our selves to the season It becometh the righteous to be glad it becometh them to be merry and joyful says our Psalmist If we descend into the consideration of our manifold sins we had need of a long Lent set apart to bewail them nay the Church very anciently provided that every week in the year we should cast up that reckoning and singled out two whole days Wednesday and Friday for fasting weeping and mourning Yet since there is nothing worse for our proficiency in sanctification than to be swallowed up in grief and melancholy therefore it is the will of our Father that we should recreate our selves in solemn Festivals for the remembrance of his benefits which my Text calls to rejoyce and be glad The same passion of Exhilaration perhaps is set forth in both these terms yet it is usual to ascribe them severally the one to the Body the other to the Soul referring joy to the Body and gladness to the Soul for we owe our selves to God in both and we must honour him both in the inward and in the outward man Cor meum caro mea they go both together Psal xvi 9. therefore my heart is glad and my glory rejoyceth my flesh also shall rest in hope In such times as great Benefits are to be celebrated we must not think it enough to joy in our bosom it must break out into some sensible tokens and yet again we must not have a clear face and a cloudy overcast heart but let our Body and Soul be equally devoted to triumph in the name of the Lord. I dare not open too wide a gap for mirth lest instead of thanksgiving it prove to be licentiousness Solomon among other varieties would prove his own heart with mirth and pleasure and behold it turned to vanity Eccl. ii no passion more obnoxious to degenerate into vice therefore gaudete in Domino let the Lord be in the joy both of Body and Soul and forget not that the speakers in my Text promise not a carnal but a religious Festival wherein the Lord should be praised For the 27 verse of this Psalm in our reading promiseth a Sacrifice to God upon that Day in his holy Temple Bind the Sacrifice with cords unto the horns of the Altar but the Septuagint 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. and it is followed by the Vulgar Latin which reads it Constituite diem solemnem in condensis usque ad cornua altaris appoint an holy day that the People may stand thick in the Temple from the Porch up to the horns of the Altar Some part of the day must be spent in the Church upon our Solemn times or else our rejoycing is not sanctified It is the mirth of Fools or rather of Mad-men to suppose that Christmas Holidays are well kept with gaming and revelling that Whitsun Holidays were made for nothing but Wakes and Dancing that the Solemnity of May-day being the Feast of two Apostles Philip and Jacob consists in decking up houses with green boughs or as in old time the Common People celebrated Allhollan-day with nothing but ringing of Bells Lawful Exercises and Pastimes may be used to refresh both the body and
Gospel we must always rejoyce for the Kingdom of Christ Upon the establishment of this Kingdom all the Creatures are adjured to express their gladness Psal xcvi I quote that place for there is none like it to this purpose thus the Psalmist ver 10. Say among the Heathen that the Lord reigneth let the Heavens rejoyce and let the Earth be glad let the Sea roar and the fulness thereof let the field be joyful and all that is therein then shall all the trees of the Wood rejoyce before the Lord for he cometh for he cometh to judge the earth Tenerae militiae delicatus conflictus as Gregory says We call our Pilgrimage upon earth a Christian warfare a wrestling with Powers and Principalities an affliction of the flesh the sufferance of the Cross c. And are all those affrighting words converted into this Lesson Rejoyce and be glad He that will stick with God for the duty Jubeas miserum esse libenter let him eat the bread of sorrow let him live in misery and mourning when he need not Can the Children of the Bride-chamber mourn while the Bridegroom is with them Says our Saviour to the Pharisees when they grudg'd that his Disciples did not humble and macerate themselves with fasting But the days will come that the Bridegroom shall be taken from them and then they shall mourn Two things I deduce from hence Out of the latter words it appears that dismal times will befal the Church Evangelical by bloody persecutions by the venemous tongues of Hereticks sharper than any two-edged Sword Yet those woful Calamities result not out of the Gospel it self but are extrinsecal mischiefs that force themselves upon it And though the Bridegroom be gone he hath sent the Comforter and in the midst of sorrows his enlightnings do enrich the soul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we converse says St. Paul among sad events as if we were sorrowful but in good earnest we are alway rejoycing But secondly it appears from the exordium of our Saviours Sermon Can the Children of the Bride-chamber mourn while the Bridegroom is with them That the Gospel in its own nature is a Bride-chamber or solemnization of a great Marriage wherein there is nothing but joyfulness and festivity Says the Apostle Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us that was the constitution of the Gospel Well what follows Therefore let us keep the Feast 1 Cor. v. 8. St. Cyprian reads it Festa celebremus let us keep the Feasts let us all days festival for Christs sake St. Paul alludes to the Feast of unleavened bread among the Jews which was held seven days continually without ceasing In like sort let us celebrate such a feast with the unleavened bread of sincerity and Numerus septenarius est symbolum universitatis to keep it for seven days is from the mystical number of eternity to keep it for ever and ever Clemens says Vniversa vita justi est quidam celebris ac sanctus dies All the life of a good Christian is holy day Pope Sylvester meant it so when he changed the common names of the week days and called them all Ferias Feria prima secunda and so forth Nay our own Church intends it so likewise therefore in our Cathedral Churches solemn praise are sung to the Organ all the year long with the voice of melody and in Parochial Churches every day of the year when Morning Prayer is read after the Confession and Absolution of our sins the Introitus or Introduction appointed is an Hymn and thus it begins Come let us sing unto the Lord let us heartily rejoyce in the strength of our salvation If I descend to some particulars wherein our Evangelical gladness consists I know it will be more satisfactory to the Auditory First It brings with it a spiritual delight Secondly An external gladness which opens it self in signs and tokens The spiritual delight which we treasure up within the soul looking stedfastly upon Jesus that died for our sins and rose again for our justification is heavenly and unutterable it is a superlative joy that cries down all other petty delights It is risus ex serenitate conscientiae as the Fathers call it not Sarahs gigling but Abrahams laughter when he believed that Isaac should be born and involved in the same belief that Christ the Redeemer should be born out of the stock of Isaac The external utterances of a pious joy are these 1. Days of rest from bodily labour for the meaner labour must give way when a better and a worthier is to be undertaken And while the mind hath just occasion to make its abode in the house of gladness the weed of ordinary toil and travel doth not become us therefore it is fit that ordinary labour should sometimes surrender it self up to the service of God 2. To laud the name of the Lord and to give thanks unto him are the only language of our thankfulness Says David I went with the multitude unto the house of the Lord in the voice of praise and thanksgiving among such as keep holy day Psal xlii 5.3 God doth not deny it but he that offereth him praise doth honour him but will you know how that honour is best exalted Make a chearful noise to the God of Jacob singing and making melody to the Lord with Psalms and Hymns and spiritual Songs If the Jews might justly say how can we sing the Lords song while we are in a strange Land while we are in Captivity Then we must acknowledge on the contrary how can we choose but sing the Lords Song being delivered out of captivity Singing of Psalms is a most proper exercise of our reasonable service Curious Musick upon costly Instruments is an admirable alarm for devotion in Cathedral and Collegiate places where such as are wise and skilful do come together to enjoy it Yet still the people have their Vulgar Psalms to solace their hearts and they that mock at such innocent harmony have great want of charity that they will not descend to the weakness of their poor brethren St. Hierom tells it of his days that as the people walk'd about the Market as they sailed in Ships as they wrought with their Needle they sung these holy Ditties Says St. Basil this is irksome to none but to the Devil let scoffers mark that for the evil Spirit went out of Saul when David played upon the Harp and David was no profane Minstril but an holy Singer 4. Another effect of Christian joy is to give because it abounds A joy that will not distribute to the needy is a shrunken withered joy nay a joy that will carry the curse of God with it because it wants fruits And a joy that will carry the curse of the poor with it because they are suffered to pine and languish in our publick gladness 5. And lastly all sorts of mirth and innocent recreation wherein our Substance is not exhausted nor our time trifled away are agreeable
to our Christian Conversation the heart cannot always be intentive upon the glory of God Miro modo ex amore Dei homo aliquando non cogitat de Deo At our times of respite from sacred Offices to delight our sullen nature with harmless pleasure it rubs off the rust of melancholy and puts alacrity in us to rejoyce always in the Lord. Away with the lowring of the Pharisee and take heed of austerity which is groundless and hath no foundation in the Word of God And here I stint my self to proceed no further upon the first part which I laid forth for you have heard enough that the whole current of the Gospel is that Day which the gracious mercy of the Lord did make all things without it are anxious and grievous all things with it are sweet and delicious and therefore it is the very joy of our heart But as commonly a Diamond is more valuable than the Ring wherein it is set so if I will take our Grammarians at their word annus quasi annulus that a Year is a Circumvolution of Time that hath no end but runs round like a Ring then I may speak it out of the mouth of all antiquity that the High Feast of Easter is the Jewel of the Year whose lustre hath been most beautiful in the eyes of godly men in all Ages As there is mention in Scripture of an Holy of Holies and a Song of Songs so Nazianzen calls this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Solemnity of Solemnities others the Metropolis of sacred Feasts the Queen of Holy-dayes and like the Virgin Mary among Women so this among the Days of the Year all Generations shall call it blessed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by Epiphanius the great Assembly the greatest Concourse of Christians throughout all the year Such a Concourse that when that day came the most bloudy Persecutions could not deter them from assembling together they that hid their heads in dark places and Caves of the earth would come abroad and fill up a Congregation as if they had rather choose death than be wanting to praise God for the Resurrection of Jesus Christ A goodly fair Church being built at Alexandria but not yet consecrated Athanasius was blamed that he suffered the People to meet together for the performance of Divine Service in a Church that wanted Episcopal Consecration his answer was it was the Feast of Easter and all other Churches were too little to receive those multitudes of Christians in the City and their ardor was so great that in despight of my authority they would fill up the most capacious Church against that principal Solemnity I should make you surfeit with story if I should tell you what religious care Christian Emperors and General Councils of most famous Bishops had to settle this holy Festival that it might be kept more solemnly than all the Feasts of the year Cui non dictus Hylas who doth not know that it was worthy to be consider'd and ratified by 318 Bishops in the first Nicene Council and they had reason to do so for it appears though other Holy-days dropt in one after another in later times yet the Apostles themselves and all Ages deduced from them did celebrate one day yearly for the Resurrection of our Lord. Therefore says Constantine the Great in his Oration at the Nicene Council be it lawful for us Christians rejecting the Jewish manner to honour that day which ever since the Passion of Christ hath been observantly kept until this time and let us transmit the due constitution of it to all Ages to come And so St. Austin commending the pious use of this Feast that which is an inviolable Custom in all Orthodox Churches of the world and hath none to gainsay it it must be confest that it was established by the Apostles themselves and that 's authority enough And those were most concordious and happy times that it being but a Ceremony of Decency and Order none did lift up their tongues against it These latter Ages have been more froward and combustious though David pointed it out with so clear a Prophesie This is the day which the Lord hath made though the Angels appeared in white early this morning in our Saviour's Tomb that is in the Garments of joy and gladness though St. Paul says upon our Christian Pasche Let us keep the Feast with the unleavened bread of sincerity though the Apostles in all likelihood ordein'd it though both Eastern and Western Churches kept a solemn Jubilee upon it yet some have snarl'd at it and would neither give it any particular honour nor appoint any Service suitable for that happy occasion The Church of Geneva was at that point once but I am far from blaming Calvin for it as some have done for their giddy-headed multitude had banisht him out of their City at what time they quite erased out all Holy-days and when he return'd again he did prevail with them to reestablish the two great Feasts of Christmas and Easter And for that which hapned before he answer'd se nescio invito factum esse it was neither done with his will nor with his knowledg It is more than I know if any other Christian Church in the world did keep no Feast for the Resurrection of Christ saving that this thankful remembrance of Christs victory over Death was forgot in the Church of Scotland till by the learned and pious industry of King James of Blessed Memory about eighteen years past they did consent at an Ecclesiastical Synod to receive five solemn Feasts in honour of our Saviour and Easter for the principal O how these Churches would have been inveighed at in Athanasius and Hierom and Austin's days I dare confidently say it they would have been excommunicated by General Councils none would have held communion with them during the time that they had no solemn Easter as long as they did not keep the Day which the Lord hath made Aerius excepted against that Holy-day and presently he was scored up for an Heretick But our Church which is most decent in all good order and reasonable Ceremony doth not only give honour to the grand Day but to the two Days following as the enlarging of our faith and joy and this is exact according to ancient order For in Nyssen's first Sermon on the Pasque it is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Three days Festival and St. Austin speaks of it as a thing known that there was tertius festi dies a third day solemnized that as Christ rose the third day so the memory of it was kept in three days continuation Some have stood much upon it that the time when Christ rose out of the Grave is not called a Feast but a Day as if there had been somewhat in it to make it a Day rather than any other time Chrysologus gives his reason as one that is transported with joy beyond the truth that in the Morning wherein our Champion overcame
get that the very Walls of Gods House might bear a part in their rejoycing As for Processions from one Church to another on this day I find no such Custom in the best Ages of Religion Although in some late hundred years it is in use at Rome that their chief Prelates visit the seven principal Churches in grand Procession because and alass for so poor a cause that Christ after He was risen bad his Disciples go before him into Galilee Thirdly the Word of God was preached laboriously and studied for that occasion Ex verbo illud potissimum quod est tempori convenientissimum says Nazianzen let that Scripture be handled which belongs to the Season and beside the Sermon their Service was set forth with all gravity and sweetness of Musick Laeti exultantesque celebremus says St. Ambrose c. let our shrill voices proclaim it that we are glad and Theodoret gives warning that this Panegyrical Day be kept honestly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not with drunkenness and riot and profuse laughter but singing Psalms and hearing the Word attentively Fourthly this Feast was the solemn time for receiving Baptism this and the Feast of Whitsuntide and unless in case of necessity it was never given of old at other times all that were presented at Baptism coming in white Garments professing thereby that they would keep their righteousness pure and immaculate until the second coming of the Lord. Fifthly as Baptism is the washing away of sins which could not choose but comfort their hearts over all the Church and make them chearful so the confirmation of that Faith was the receiving of the Holy Communion of Christs Body and Bloud which all did universally apply themselves to that could examin themselves and none did fail whereupon says Leo this is the peculiar Blessing of Easter-day ut in remissione peccatorum universa gaudeat Ecclesia that the whole Church had cause to rejoyce that remission of sins was sealed unto them that is either in the Sacrament of Baptism or in the Supper of the Lord. Sixthly whereas it was disputed and tossed about extremely at what time all Christians should keep their Easter the holy Bishops that were otherwise at odds consented in two things the one that it should begin immediately after the sorrowful affliction of Lent was laid aside The other that it should be appointed in the sweetness of the Spring when the year is most delightsom and beautiful Et laetitiam conciliat huic festo verna amaenitas says one the amiable verdure of the Spring is joyn'd unto it to make Easter more joyful Seventhly some did alter the year and set the beginning of it from the Feast of the Resurrection We come very near it in one computation our selves This I find that as some friends do send Presents one to the other at the beginning of the new year So Nazianzen says that at Easter all were wont to give either Oblations to God or Gifts to their Neighbours or Alms to the Poor For Festival Solemnities are a due mixture of Praise and Bounty The Jews at the Passover did offer to God the first fruits of their Barly at the Feast of Pentecost Loaves made of new Wheat at the Feast of Tabernacles the first fruits of other Fruits which they had gathered All pompous days had some mixture of liberality Eighthly in Theodosius the Emperors time a Law passed to the end that all might keep their Easter merrily without interruption that no Process or Arrest should go forth in any Court against any man from the Sunday before Easter to the Sunday after Easter that is for the space of fifteen days Ninthly as the Political Magistrate was so respectful of this Festival so was the Ecclesiastical For the ancient Council of Ancyra order'd that to the end all might rejoyce and be glad this day Excommunications Suspensions and all Censures should end at Easter nay the great Council of Nice took care that in every Province or Diocess a Synod of the Clergy should be held every Lent to set all matters strait against this time that there might be no variance no quarrel no complaint remaining As if this were our Jubilee wherein Servants were manumitted from Bondage Debts were remitted and Possessions restored to the owners that had sold them Certainly the holy Fathers meant that above all the Feasts of the year this was our joyful Jubilee Tenthly and lastly the principal stamp of gladness set upon this day was that the first day of the week namely Sunday is kept holy every day of the week for easter-Easter-days sake of which I will make a larger work hereafter But every Sunday was strictly kept with such solemn postures of joy that the last Canon of the Nicene Council interdicted all Christians from kneeling on those days they must pray standing that is chearfully and kneeling was supposed to be the gesture of affliction and humiliation The end of all these Edicts and Ceremonies was to let us know that the Lord had done great things for us for which we ought to rejoyce 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 even to skip for joy for true joy will break forth as John did in the womb of Elizabeth Death is a comfort against all sorrows and the Resurrection is a comfort against Death and Christ is our comfort that we shall have a joyful resurrection and the holy Sacrament is our visible comfort that we still live in Christ for evermore AMEN A SERMON UPON THE Church Festivals PSAL. cxviii 24. This is the day which the Lord hath made we will rejoyce and be glad in it THE Substance of Religion is to fear God and to praise him The Circumstances thereof are to perform this in fit time and place and to do all things belonging to his Worship decently and in order It is for the sutableness of time that I continue my Meditations upon this Text for there are many things which are but accidentary to the main and yet of such forcible consequence that nothing can stand without them So opportunity of time is such a forcible annexion to the performance of Divine Service as no external thing is more available The sweet tongue of Musick would be unpleasant if it kept not time so the Christian Melody which we make to God would want the grace and delight that is in it if days and times were not solemnly and prudently divided to call holy Assemblies together for the work of the Lord. If I speak of time like a Naturalist it is but the measure of the continuance of things that have a being given unto them and it neither works in them any real effect nor is it self capable of any But passing it by in this low regard and taking it in hand Theologically so the hours which are appointed to present our reasonable Sacrifice in the House of the Almighty are of such great consideration to the furtherance of Piety that they are woven into Religion like sinews into the body neither
non in domo sed in viâ nascitur Our Saviour himself was born but in an Inn as if he took up his lodging for a night in this world and were but a Passenger They that were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sine aris focisque without an hearth to kindle a fire says Aristotle of all men they were the most poor and wretched That is no good Divinity says St. Austin writing concerning the tears of Judah by the waters of Babylon Mirum hoc esset si aliquò duci poterant ubi Deus eorum non esset If they that were hurried into Babylon could be carried away where God was not with them then and not till then their translation were a misery But as the Israelites removed from one journey to another according as the Pillar of smoke did remove by day and the Pillar of fire by night so I tell you of such men in my Text that turned their station every where as Gods Glory and his Worship did direct them Whether it be affliction or whether it be fear to give offence when we are in a strange Land sure I am somewhat is in it that makes such men most careful of their Religious Conversation Deborah found the Kenites those sojourners most ready to pursue that Tyrant Sisera Jehu could find no man to cleave unto him against the Idolatry of Baal but even this Jonadab the Founder of this order of the Rechabites who renounce all Mansion dwelling and vow for ever to live in Tents And as Abigail said to David Let thine Handmaid be a servant to wash the feet of the Servants of my Lord the King So Jonadab puts his Children in a way to think themselves not worthy of Cities and Possessions among the Royal Nation whom God had chosen but Shepherds they must be and underlings to tend the Flocks of the Servants of the Lord. Foelix illud saeculum fuit ante architectonas says one Fair buildings and curious houses had they been unreared the Kitchins had not been plied so much to provide Banqueting and Luxury It was a scoff cast upon the Rhodians that they built as if they would live three Ages and they fed as if they would die in three days As if their fair Palaces moved them to make Feasts and their Feasts were occasions to make them surfeit and to sleep out their days in a Lethargy You shall not wag your heads another day at these mens Tenements and cry woe unto the houses that were built by Extortion The stone out of the Wall and the Beam of the Roof cannot condemn the Master You shall not censure them as Seneca did his own Country-men the Romans Vnicuique suum si restituerent ad casas reducerentur If every Nation whom they have robb'd and spoiled had their own they would have nothing left them but that which they began with their Shepherds Cottages And when you have erected such a place that you may set your name upon it says the Psalmist yet what have you done but pay'd Tribute where ye needed not says Plutarch Quare homines in auratis lectis dormiant c. Why should men put themselves to such cost to pay for their sleep when if they will chuse the open fields with Vriah or chuse a Tent with the Rechabites it will cost them little or nothing Nay some are so curious that they will not only have their houses for their lives but set up Tombs for their dead Carkasses before they die Nay they dare endite Hic jacet upon their Monument when they are yet alive when God knows whether their dust shall be scattered into all the quarters of the earth This that hath been spoken may serve to let you know how plausible it did seem to Jonadab to institute such a Vow because his Brethren were strangers in the Land of Jury And secondly it was well considered because their fortune might turn worse and worse they might be greater strangers For who is he that had not heard the threatning of the Babylonish Captivity Nay There are Psalms of Thanksgiving for their joyful return in the Prophet David Did not Solomons heart misgive him in this matter Observe but one passage in his heavenly Prayer at the Dedication of the Temple 1 Kings ix 46. If they carry us away captive into the Land of the enemies far or near and thy people repent then hear our supplication in heaven and maintain our cause The time drew so near that Jeremy and many Prophets spoke of it as if the Calamity were already begun in the borders of the Country Now when Captivity did ring in their ears who would only live as if one day would be every day and never provide for the Evening sorrow which might fall upon them Who would not exercise his mind to know what it was to lose Who would not cast away his burden against the flight of persecution So did the Rechabites For when the Chaldaeans should sweep away the people as an Ox licketh the grass they were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one Wain could carry them their Tent and their Family Tectumque laremque armaque it was but a progress to pass over Euphrates but great was the sorrow of all the Tribes leaving their Houses and Vineyards it made Jeremy endite a book of Lamentation Noah left all he had unto the world seven days before the Floud began and what got they who thought him foolish and themselves happy to divide the spoils Lot forsook his house and the Sodomites did not enjoy it an hour who succeeded him A good Christian is indifferent to be cast into any mould by the hand of God He that is prepared to die but one kind of death is not yet fit to be a Martyr And he that is prepared to live but one kind of life is not yet fit to be a Confessor for the name of Christ A good Actor says Synesius can represent either Creon or Telephus and all is one in his skil to play the Prince or the Bondslave Hence ariseth all the misery of mankind says Athenagoras in Plutarch Quod quippiam nobis inexpectato accidit That something befals us which we did not expect nor were provided for it Foolish men who love nothing but their present life are like bad roots that grow sullen if you remove them from the earth that feeds them There is no life to Shemei if he may not run at random and rail and backbite in every corner As good it were to hang him out of the way as to confine him to one City though it were Jerusalem Such as can look no further into the world than that they may retire to their own home if need be are comprized under the Emblem of the Snail that goes a very little space from her Shell with this word Si pluit ingrediar a dash of rain drives them back again Your constant setled man is made for every fortune that is cast upon him his Emblem is Corpus quadratum
and his Conspiracy against King David And so much hath been spoken for the four just Conditions of the Vow of the Rechabites 1. It was a thing indifferent but reducible to the fulfilling of the Law 2. Let it be possible in the Sphere of our own ability 3. Let it be just and lawful 4. Let it be full of weight and moment to draw us to the fear of the Lord. The third part of my Text I have destined out to shew unto you that the Romish Monks whose strictness and devotion is so famous among our Adversaries that their Canons are not built upon the imitation of the Rechabites That any particular Church may have Religious Orders and Votaries I grant it That point shall break no peace between us In points not fundamental our Saviours rule must hold He that is not against us is with us But Vows undertaken wherein they do neither consult with the strength of man if they can be done nor with conscience if they may be profitably done nor with the Text of Scripture if they may be lawfully done this cannot but break out into a quarrel And in Essential points it is also a Maxim from our Saviours mouth He that is not with us is against us Whatsoever is in the world says St. John it is either the concupiscence of the flesh the concupiscence of the eye or the pride of life For the correcting of these three Tentations the Friers have propounded three Vows The Concupiscence of the Eye is remedied by Monastical Poverty say they and why not as well by a contented mind The Concupiscence of the Flesh is remedied by the Vow of Chastity says the Romanist I am sure experience doth tell us that Gods Remedy is the surest the Bed of Marriage The Pride of Life is remedied by Blind Obedience says the Papist and why not as well by humility and acknowledgment of our own unworthiness Wonder you so much that so many should retire themselves into Voluntary Poverty is this such news abroad when you cannot walk the Streets at home but swarms of Canters meet you who will not live by the hope of their labour but by alms and charity The poor Artisan the painful Plowman who cannot make his long days labour feed him and refresh him at night doth this man I pray you look like one who deserves relief or an obstinat Mendicant a Rechabite that watcheth night and day to feed his Flock or a Capuchin that trudgeth night and noon about the City to feed his belly Did Christ descend of the seed of Jonadab and Lazarus no but of Abraham a mighty Prince Crates and Antisthenes may cast their Silver from them and retain their vices true Christians give up themselves to God and with themselves they give up all things Cosmus and Damianus who grudged a Monk his Christian Burial because he had laid up a little Silver in his Study were too prodigal of their zeal and mist our Saviours meaning To leave Lands and Houses for his Names same was to beget an exercised mind for patience to prepare Worldlings to be ready to cast away their Burdens for the flight of persecution It is good for a man in some sort to depend upon Gods temporal blessings lest we grow careless of Prayer In Egypt where the River Nilus waters the earth and fats the ground without rain nemo oratorum coelos aspicit Pray who will they trust in Nilus Then I may contest against the Sectaries of St. Francis and the like that Voluntary Poverty is not built upon the foundation of the Rechabites and those idle swarms of the Cloisters have not left the World but civility But for the Covenant of perpetual Virginity there they think to bear the Bell away and that they only shall be the men who carry Palm Branches before the Lamb among the Virgins Rev. 7. It is in weak man to afford God as much chastity as he pleaseth Can our frail will cast anchor in the depth of concupiscence and say unto the surging waves of lust as Christ did to the Sea Peace be still So Xerxes threw chains into the Ocean to bind it but trow you the Tide was the calmer St. Paul durst not do so He would admit no Widows into the strict Orders of the Primitive Church under sixty years of age Yea says Leo the first of that name rather than want a College full I will entertain them at fourty nay says Pius the first what if they profess Virginity at five and twenty And now the Canons have opened the Market a little more every Girl may enter into a Cloyster at fifteen if she like them As Elias set the Sacrifice on fire when the Trenches were filled with cold water round about so unchast acts may get predominance of the will notwithstanding all the spiritual Scleragogie and exercise to tame the body Fasting humbleth Prayer is powerful honest Communication apparelleth the mind with good thoughts Watching tameth the flesh All this is spiritual but I am carnal Quoque magis premitur tanto magis aestuat ignis Is it not usual in the Court of Rome to grant Dispensations to supply the decay of Noble Families but they are never granted to entangle an ensnared conscience And do they love Virginity In the Council of Chalcedon it was decreed that there should be reserved for the Bishop 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the absolute authority of Indulgence to pardon a distressed Maid who disaccording to her Vow had married But such a Marriage by the Romish Doctrin now adays is esteemed worse than Adultery and do they love Chastity Finally it was the Discipline of Numa against a Vestal Virgin who had committed folly to bury her alive Such a fault in the Roman Monasteries is passed by either with a full connivance or with the smallest penance For wot you why it may be every mans case and do they love Virginity I am sure the Rechabites did honour Marriage and propagated a good Generation to the World They knew that the gift of perpetual continence is not a Grace of common course and extraordinary Dispensations are not presumptuously to be arrogated to the use of every regenerate Christian no nor for the command of any Prophet Why should St. Paul leave Trophimus sick at Miletum Why was Bishop Timothy his stomach weak Paul could not help it Grace allotted for extraordinary operations is not every mans portion nor always at hand for them who at some seasons have a taste of it and such is the Rose of the Garland the gift of Chastity Finally Obedience which in our Voyage in this World is like a sweet gale that fills the sails and makes our Vessel fly swift upon the wings of the wind yet as it is blind and Monastical it is like a Serena such a calm whereby the Bark can go neither backward nor forward and it is not built upon the foundation of the Rechabites not upon obedience to their own Father but upon the
no not in Israel Nor is this a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Heathen called it an embasement of a good courage for the humble man hath the loftiest mind of all others if it be well observed for he reckons not by the magnificent pomp and praise of the World though he have no little part in it but esteems God and nothing else to be his glory and because he doth give God the glory in all things that are excellent therefore he doth invite the Spirit of Grace unto himself by a religious policy as thus Grace is no longer Grace than you confess it is conferred by meer gift and frank benevolence The proud is so arrogant in all his thoughts that he would not yield to that he thinks it was his due which could not justly or at least congruously be denied him Needs must the rain fall down from such a steepy Mountain and where will it find a place to rest but in a little Valley in a lowly heart which magnifies the love and favour of Christ for the gift of the Spirit above all things but we had no right to ask it because we were sinful we had no understanding to desire it because we were foolish it is omni modo gratuita a good turn freely bestowed in all respects why do you not see says Bernard gratia nullibi nomen suum tuetur nisi in humili the Grace of God should quite lose its nature unless it dropt upon the humble man sink down therefore like a valley to receive this water for the Lord resisteth the proud and giveth grace to the humble 1 Pet. v. 5. Secondly The Spirit holds this Analogy with water it washeth away all filth from the soul and maketh the heart clean which was defiled No superstition hath lasted longer or spread further than one I shall name unto you that an external sousing of the body in water did quite take away the guilt of all those sins which had been committed by the body So Euripides as wise an Heathen as any in the pack 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Dive but into the Sea and it would rense away all their iniquities then the Jews encurred this errour by that corruption which the Romans brought among them especially the Pharisees who if they had walked in the streets or been in the Market presently washt as soon as they came home lest they had toucht or been toucht by somewhat unawares which was defiled by the Gentiles And if they washt all was well No marvel therefore if the savage Moriscoes have a strong fancy to this day how their filthiness is purged away if they bath in some river water every morning It is more strange that the Russian Christians in these times should attribute secret power to such an idle Ceremony but most foppish of all that the Priests of Rome would lead their whole Church into this delusion that venial sins are done away if a few drops of an hallowed casting bottel light upon the gaping people and many a shrewd knavery passeth under the name of a venial sin as it is to be seen in their Cases of Conscience Against all their errours which I have recited I lay my conclusion again nothing but the grace of God that water indeed which is above the heavens doth wash away all filth from the soul and make the heart clean which was defiled The which will appear the better by noting this preeminence in their difference Elementary water well applied takes away all impure soil that cleaves to a vessel But can it add a brightness to the Vessel better than it had in the first making No you will say that is not to be expected I but such is the operation of inward grace when it maketh clean an earthen vessel is still no better than earth when it is rensed in a River but if the Spirit from above abide within us if it wash and sanctifie this Vessel of clay it overlays it with Gold and makes it more precious by far than ever Then but a word spoken with grace and in due season is like apples of gold with pictures of silver says Solomon O how much have we need of it We are all black before God like the Children of an Ethiopian says the Prophet Amos. We have Vultus adustos faces as if they were scorched with flames Jer. xiii 8. And of others whom God did begin to loath their visage is blacker than a coal Lam. iv 8. Black will take no colour we use to say there is no help for it either by Art or Nature but if the supernatural hand be stretched out upon us then the Blackmore shall change his skin and the Leopard his spots As the bloud of the Mother after the birth of her Child keeps not the colour of bloud but becomes milk in her breasts so after we are begotten again by the Spirit and bring forth the fruits thereof our bloudy sins shall become milk and though they be read as Scarlet they shall be white as snow Isa i. 18. Yea the Prophet says of Jerusalem while it served the Lord her Nazarites were whiter than snow purer than milk Lam. iv 7. Doth not David promise as much unto himself if the Lord would renew a right spirit within him Lavabis me dealbabor super nivem Thou shalt wash me and I shall be whiter than the snow As if by the Sacred Unction from heaven his soul should have a new beauty which it never had before a plain Transfiguration such as our Saviours was in the Mount so that no Fuller upon earth could make a thing so white Solomon in all his Royalty was not cloathed like a Lilly of the field But take Solomon in his repentance whereof I perswade my self and his soul was much whiter than any Lilly in the field This is a superlative vertue wherewith the water in my Text is endowed to cleanse that which was foul from every spot and to make it surpass the whiteness which it had by nature Thirdly Happy is the tree that grows by the Rivers of waters No Plant can prosper unless sap and moysture nourish it So Grace is that coelestial water which supplies the root within us it makes the conscience abundant in good works and without it it is impossible to bring forth the fruits of righteousness Mark the rain which falls from heaven and the same shower which dropt out of one cloud increaseth sundry Plants in the same Garden according to the nature of the Plant. In one stalk it makes a Rose in another a Violet divers in a third but sweet in all So the Spirit is a moistning dew which works rare effects in several dispositions and all most acceptable to God Is your Complexion Cholerick Try thine own heart if it be apt to be zealous in a good cause If it be so it is the fruit of the Spirit that works upon your constitution Is Melancholy predominant The grace of God turns that sad
of the Spring and Harvest must give it blade and mature it but Christ had all these in the palm of his hand eminenter he took a fragment of a barly loaf into his hand and to teach his Church that his grasp had in it the fecundity of the earth the moisture of the showers the influence of the Sun the comprehension of all times and seasons and the excellency of all power as he broke it it enlarged it self far beyond those goodly ears of Wheat which Pharaoh saw in his Dream and every crum became an handful quinque panes erant quinque semina non terrae mandata sed ab illo qui terram fecit multiplicata says St. Austin the five loaves were after the manner of five seeds of corn not fructifying in the earth but multiplying in his hand that made the earth But because all kind of pulse and grane yea though it were Manna it self that came from Heaven is of that condition that it must run through much art before it be made bread but that which Christ brake and gave to his Disciples was bread in the first existence and production therefore St. Hilary had rather compare the loaves that swelled thus by Christs blessing to a River whose fountain supplies one wave to run after another with an indifferent succession and whatsoever the Cattle drink riseth again out of the Spring and the channel is always filled so the loaves received no diminution by the portions which were broken off sed quicquid aufertur usurario quodam meatu reparatur nay the principal was not only repaired but it was requited with interest Having stood at gaze a while to behold that which was done shall we walk round about it as it were to observe if we can after what manner it was done he that takes upon him to search into the modus how a Miracle was effected must beware of two rocks in his way that he do not distrust and say in his mind how is it possible to be and that he do not circumscribe the Divine power and say necessarily thus it must be Steering my self by these advisoes I say first Christ could amplify that little portion of bread into those great exceedings by creating some new substance to eek out that which was in his hand before qui sine seminibus operatur semina he spake the word and the first seeds that ever grew came out of nothing nothing is not removed at such vast distance from his power but that it may be made something because he is infinite in doing all things Secondly He that turned water into wine with the same vertue could turn the adjacent air into the substance of Bread and Fish Which sudden alteration in a thin and a fluid body unprepared to take such an impression was an action proper to God and no less transcendent than the principal Creation Thirdly Though growth be the affection only of a living thing yet he could make every fragment of those victuals to grow in an instant of time as the dry stick in Aarons hand did shoot out Leaves and Almonds Fourthly If he pleased it was not difficult to him but that he could distend and widen that small matter into a far broader substance as when a little water is rarified and boiles over a Cauldron when it is vehemently heated or as the Rib which was taken out of Adams side was extended to make a Woman which surpassed it self an hundred fold in magnitude Finally I may miss in all these for the ways of the Lord are past finding out and some other means may be used upon which the eye of Philosophy did never open You may as soon tell the number of the Stars as reckon in what divers fashions such an unwonted augmentation should come to pass and my Text is read in some old Copies very consonant hereunto that our Saviour distributed of both species Bread and Fish not quantum volebant as much as the five thousand desired but quantum volebat as much as he would Whatsoever his will affects his strength effects or else there were not only impotency but contristation in the Divine Nature but his goodness is not bounded by our imperfect desires nor his truth by our weak understanding In which title the Apostle had reason to glorifie him Eph. iii. 20. Vnto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think unto him be glory throughout all ages world without end The report which Pliny makes of the Lioness that she whelps but once in all her life perhaps is mistaken yet the principle toward which he lookt in that report is a good one that great births and great effects fall out but seldom Christ did not make many such distributions as this was and yet it was not like Plinies Lioness once more he brought forth the like First He shewed what strange things his Divinity could command among the Jews for first he was sent to them Soon after and in the very next Chapter after the order of St. Matthew he fed four thousand with seven Loaves and a few Fishes near to Decapolis among those of Tyre and Sidon and they were Gentiles If Miracles would prove infallible means to convert sinners commonly we think so but it is our ignorance if they were natural nourishment to beget sound and wholsom Faith they had seen them oftner But to lay it open to you that this Miracle upon which I preach did not take with them as it deserved the very same persons that had eat of his Banquet expostulate with Christ in the thirtieth verse of this Chapter What sign shewest thou that we may see and believe thee What dost thou work See what it is come to That which was done but the other day was forgotten and a Sign they ask for as if they had never seen any before Nay before the end of this Chapter Ver. 66. Many of these whom he had engaged unto him by his miraculous benefits they dropt off like withered Leaves from that time many of his Disciples went back and walked no more with him No better came of his great work done upon the Loaves and Fishes no better came of Manna in the days of Moses which was every morning spread about their Tents And yet we are perswaded if God would shew such tokens among us it would make us such earnest such thankful Christians that the kindness would not be lost upon us And doth that conceit hold you that to see five thousand fed with a few fragments would do your Faith and Conscience such a pleasure Why then I tell you you see a greater Argument of Gods infinite power every day in the year Millions of People being in the world as many as there be drops in the Sea yet all these have their daily bread and the celestial benignity is never exhausted This is customary indeed but much more than the other Et insolita stupendo vident quibus quotidiana
people was and we seek a Country in the heavens What are five Loaves and two Fishes the poor pittances of Nature to procure us felicity Some say send them to the next Village for succour to the intercession of Saints and Angels No sweet Saviour but as the eyes of a servant look unto the hands of his Master so our soul waits upon thee until thou have mercy upon us Nor did our Saviour distribute his Largess only to stop the gap of necessity For had they been runnagates David doth award them to be unpitied Let them continue in scarceness but flagrante ptetate when their hearts were set upon zeal and their ears attentive by the space of an whole day to hear the Doctrine of the Kingdom of Heaven then this Miracle falls out as a reward of their Piety For even as the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Feasts of Charity were wont to be celebrated among the Christians in the Primitive Church immediately after the divine Mysteries had been solemnized So when these Jews had lent their patience to a good Sermon I am sure for never man spake like him by his enemies confession the close of it was that they eat bread together joyfully with singleness of heart And I do not amiss to say that this diligence to hear and learn did attract his love to do this for them for did they importune him by Prayer Did any one among so many beseech him to shew his power and pity them no but they had done enough to open his bowels though they held their peace for first seek the Kingdom of Heaven and the righteousness thereof and all these things shall be added unto you Hallow his name advance his Kingdom and do his will and that which follows comes in by course you cannot fail of your daily bread In this Assembly that sanctified the whole day in the Desart to wait on Christ you may imagine there were sundry of them that lived by their sweat and labour from hand to mouth Will not these be much damnified by their godliness The night was come they had earned nothing by their labour they may go home and starve yea nothing less they that had committed themselves to his providence like the fowls of the air shall fair as well as the fowls of the air For the Lions do lack and suffer hunger but they that fear the Lord do want no good thing Psal xxxiv 10. The Apostles not long before this accident in my Text were sent abroad without Scrip without provision without change of raiment Lacked you any thing says our Saviour the Heathen could not say that the Christians were the poorer for not working the seventh day your Trade is increasing while your shop is shut up on Holidays if you serve the Lord. Godliness is profitable unto all things having promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come 1 Tim. iv 8. We had Brethren in diebus illis in those noble times that came near to the Apostles who durst urge the Lord upon his word in the face of Infidels that the soul of the righteous should not famish In the year 176 Marcus Aurelius was ready to give battel to the Marcomans but the day was so hot and the drought so sore that his Army fainted and could not strike a stroke The Christians that served under him to shew the glory of their great Master Jesus the Son of God joyned their Prayers together and instantly obtained so much rain as refreshed all the Roman Legions and so much thunder as consumed the Marcomans with fire and lightening I make not the Doctors of the Church my Authors for it but Dion Cassius an Heathen confesseth the accident and Xiphiline another of the same ascribes it to the Christians and that Legion which consisted of Christians was called from hence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the thundring Legion long after The blessings of the Lord they are not viscata beneficia they do not hang in his fingers like birdlime when his Children need them but they drop like an Honeycomb without straining But men are so apt to object against this as if they stretcht their wits to make God a liar they will tell you that they have known and heard of righteous men that have been forsaken and destitute Digito terebrare Salinum contentus perages si cum Jove vivere tentas Poverty ever was and will be the obloquy of honesty Neither is bread to the wise nor riches to men of understanding nor favour to men of skill Eccles ix 11. Well the knot is soon untied if you do not over-reckon with God and extend his word to a greater proportion of temporal blessings than he hath promised There is a Son that grudged at his Father Luke xv quia nusquam haedum dedisset he had never given him a Kid to make merry with his friends Must every one that is a Son look for a Kid and for enough wherewith he may be merry and voluptuous no no if you have pabulum latibulum any thing to stay hunger and a Cave to put your head in God is not in your debt and you may do as well as they that have the Kid for life is oftner lost by surfeiting than by starving Every Levite that serves faithfully at the Altar must not think to wear a Mitre like Aaron as St. Hierom speaks of Praetextatus that would be baptized and become a Christian if he might be Bishop of Rome All men must not look to be requited like Valentinian that refused the Tribune-ship of Julian upon condition of Idolatry and became an Emperor They that gape for so much tenter Gods promise to the stretch of their own greediness First They seek dominion and wealth and think the Kingdom of Heaven will come into the vantage Miserable souls that do not fear lest their dignity should be their total recompence and all that ever they shall have for their service They that put themselves upon Gods providence as these men did in the Desart they shall not want but remember then that they must accept of barley loaves for current payment Peter and John had neither silver nor gold yet they had food and raiment and for the most part the most fortunate are they that be no such Camels but they may pass through the eye of the needle I will work out of the point but this little more these five hundred men that waited upon Christ had kept their Fast to the full Canonical time they had eat nothing until night therefore he distributes the loaves dissolves their fast and would not suffer them to continue it any longer than might do them good A man in the fervour of his desire will pursue that he desires so hard as he will quite forget his meat so Esau felt no hunger when he was in the chase a hunting but as soon as that was over he longed for meat upon any terms so during the whole day that our Saviour
preached the time was so well taken up that they minded not the emptiness of their body so their ears were filled but when these raptures were over the tortures of hunger must needs ensue then our Lord supplies them with a moderate refreshment to teach us that religious Fasting should be used as the friend of Grace and not as the foe of Nature Many have put themselves to the pain of long abstinence to subdue their carnal desires Palladius and some legendary Authors will give you the report of some that took no sustenance for three whole months and forty days I had rather believe such an Author as Hippocrites in this subject he says Where natural heat is weak and phlegm abounds upon which the heat may spend its force a sick man may continue long and eat nothing but such as are of sound health cannot preserve life above seven days without meat therefore St. Austin keeping himself to the modesty of truth tells it with admiration that some mortified Christians would taste neither meats nor drinks for three days Yea this is credible but the Church which would not over-lay mans weakness with severity did never in her Canons prorogue a Fast longer than the Evening of one day adding that the Supper should be frugal and without all delicacy so in my Text here was an abstinence kept for an whole day then followed after St. Hieroms Phrase Cibus vilis vespertinus a crust of a barly loaf and a little fish Whether the worship of God may consist in Fasting taken single by it self I dispute it not all will agree that it is medium cultus a good disposition to Gods service because it removes the impediments Now mark how our Saviour limited this Fast and take heed of excessive macerations Make not that which is ordeined for the Handmaid to be the hinderer of devotion fasting doth as it were bring the Bow to ejaculate prayer with the greater force now that Fast is frustrate of the due end which brings such infirmity upon the body that it is unfit for prayer The Church therefore hath always provided like a tender Mother so to circumscribe the strictest Fast that no man should put his life to hazard nor his health to prejudice and he that shortens his days by such immoderate penance is as much to be blamed as if he would offer a Sacrifice and play the thief to compass it It is St. Hieroms similitude and this to boot in an Epistle to Laeta whom he chid for that fault Experientia didici assellum cum in via fessus fuerit diverticula quaerere the body over-pined with fasting is the Ass that being tired too much will never keep the high-way but turn aside into every Lane and Corner To dispatch this for I think we need not a Bridie in this kind I would we did Maior the School-man could say that we were never such scrupulous fasters in this Island as in the neighbour Kingdoms but for the truths sake the summ is Fasting is not to be preferred before Charity and it must be proportioned that it may not stiffen our devotion but make it more limber for Prayer and Piety And so far that this distribution of our Lord came from his manifold goodness with respect to the convenience of time The same goodness takes us along into a fresh consideration respecting his Instruments by whom he wrought he distributed to his Disciples A Feast where there were five thousand Guests could not be served without many waiters and loe the Twelve were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 those diligent Ministers that did the office for them all or you may say it doth very much resemble a Maundy and the Apostles were the Maundy-men And because the time will not suffer me to insist long upon it I will give you the substance of it in short particulars First The latest motion that came from the Disciples was an hearty good wishing to this poor people Sir send them away and let them go to the Villages as who should say I would they were in some courteous place where they might rest and be refreshed There was brotherly affection in this charitable wish of theirs and behold Christ promotes it to bring forth fruits and turns their Optative Mood into a Potential as who should say do you moan their necessity and long to see them better provided for It is well done go your ways and with your own hands deliver them as much as shall suffice them There was none of the holy Race that did so much bewail the oppression of the Israelites in Egypt as Moses did many time his mind did run upon it when he kept the Flocks of Jethro instantly God made his vows and wishes grow up into a solid substance Come says the Lord I will send thee unto Pharaoh and thou shalt bring forth my people out of Egypt If you see any thing that wants the blessing of the Lord to help it or reform it at the least send forth the desires of your soul for a gracious time to mend it and you know not whether God will give your own arm ability to effect it Secondly See what Christ hath done miraculi gloriam quasi à se in Apostolos transtulit he made his Disciples sharers with him in this Miracle which was more than the most ambitious among them did ever ask for it was not so much to sit at his right hand and at his left in an earthly Kingdom as to be partners with him in such a grand exploit which was wrought by the puissant finger of his Diety But which is most of all Christ did as it were conveigh the glory of this Miracle from himself to his Disciples what he did himself was not before the eyes of the Company the Twelve received all and gave all to the People Why what if they had got all the honour by it be it so if it hapned so he had lost that which he never sought for the praise of men They that love to have their memory feather'd with applause and fame will rather entitle themselves to other mens beneficence and rather encroach upon the glory of other mens deserts than part with their own as the gibe went upon a Roman Vide quam liberalis fit qui non sua solum sed etiam aliena largiatur But when the Holy Spirit is in that plenty as to work a Miracle nothing that the Actor doth will ever smell of boasting or popularity Elisha would neither receive from Naamans Purse nor from his Praise would not come before him to be known by face but sent him word by a Deputy what he should do to be healed But still take Christ for an Example rather than any Prophet he restored a sick man to health and he that was healed wist not who it was for Jesus had conveighed himself away Joh. v. 13. He did not this work in the light to be seen because he would not be haunted with the shadow of
find whose ambition is pained like a woman in travel till it bring forth a bigger fortune who covet forty that it may beget an hundred and drive on an hundred till it make a thousand and so forth you may say that these have lickt of the Devils hony and if they might have their own will they would burst their belly Now to conclude all To say that this Wilderness-ful of people had as much as they could eat out of two or three Omers of corn out of a little that a poor Lad perhaps had gleaned it is marvelous in our ears Yet take all and it goes much beyond this for the Fragments which remained did fill twelve Baskets Yea says the common Gloss there are Speculations of Divinity with secret Traditions which the rude unlearned people cannot digest these the Apostles and their Successors keep close in their own baskets it may be this note is of that kind therefore I pass it over and let them reserve it to themselves The plain truth is that was done 1. Ad miraculi evidentiam it could not have been evident that all were filled unless somewhat had been left 2. It was done ad miraculi claritatem to make it exceed above any thing that could be compared It was beyond Manna that would not keep if any of it were laid up this did It was beyond the meat which the Ravens brought to Elias he had but a morsel at once to serve necessity It was beyond the Widows meal and her oil they increased no more after the rain fell but here was an increase after an universal satuâ—ity 3. When this miraculous Feast was done a great deal superabounded to admonish them they must not think to live always upon Miracles 4. As the beginning of this noble work was a lesson against covetousness and thrust us on to distribute so the end of it is a lesson against Prodigality and bids us lay up that which remains 5. Let them to whom it belongs do the due work of Evangelists and though they earn but little here the remainder will be great which comes hereafter God will give to each Apostle a Basket full nay a Barnful in the Kingdom of Heaven Both Cedrenus and Nicephorus take them as they be relate what precious Monuments these baskets were in after Ages it is thus Constantine intending the splendor of his own City brought from Rome the largest Pillar of Porphyrite stone Upon the top he set an Image of Brass praised for the best Piece in the world it was the Statue of Apollo in old Troy In a Vault under the Base he laid up as his choicest Reliques an Axe with which Noah made the Ark and these twelve Baskets in which the Fragments were carried away of the Loaves and Fishes Why these more than any other Reliques Nicephorus says nothing to it you shall have my conjecture He chose the Relique belonging to the Ark rather than any other to preserve the City standing upon the Sea from Inundation He chose these twelve Baskets as a deprecation against Famine I will dispatch Other mysteries I could enumerate upon this which was over and above all that was eaten One thing I must not omit which hath busied divers to no great purpose that when five thousand eat of five Loaves and two Fishes twelve Baskets remained when four thousand eat of seven Loaves and a few Fishes but seven Baskets remained What is this to us if Christ would shew the riches of his Liberality unequally where he pleased But what if it cannot be decided for all this at which Feast most was remaining The twelve Baskets are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they were such as you might dandle in your hand the Jews carried them under their arm in the days of Juvenal the Poet. The seven Baskets are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as big as Paniers There is a large difference between Amos his little basket of Summer fruit and the basket wherein St. Paul escaped out of a Window at Damascus that is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Acts. Now you see that seven Dossars may come to more than twelve Hand-baskets But I determine nothing mighty was the power of our Lord Jesus in both and his Liberality never to be forgotten Nay the increase which he gives us year by year is so plentiful as our latest harvest can testifie that no memory so short but will remember it no heart so ingrate but accepts it with all thankfulness no tongue so slow but will praise him AMEN A SERMON Preached at WHITE-HALL UPON S t LUKE'S DAY ACTS xi 26. And the Disciples were called Christians first in Antioch SAint Luke the Pen-man of this Book of Scripture hath a threefold interest in this Text in every principal word of it an interest He was a Disciple by calling whether one of the 70 is a disputable question an Antiochian by birth and a Christian by his Title Then who could better put these three together than himself that the Disciples were called Christians first in Antioch It is not expedient doubtless to glory but if we should glory we should speak the truth that the Congregation of the Church hath reaped more honor by this Record than all the Grandees of the Earth can shew for themselves in their best Charters and Monuments Civil Histories will confess that earthly things of what pomp and splendor soever they receive little grace from their first original for either the evidences of their beginning are obscure consisting upon such weak proofs as cannot command us to believe them The Inscription of an old piece of money coined who knows why And the Characters of a broken Stone digged up who knows where These are the Models that Cities and Kingdoms do greedily embrace and thrust upon you for your best Memorials If the Evidences be more authentical then ten to one but their novelty will disparage them for what is it to reckon upon one or two Ages past a thing may be quickly famous but it must ask longer time to be venerable Finally if Antiquity and clear Evidence do both concur quando haec rara avis est which lights but seldom what mean and contemptible beginnings shall you find of those Nations and Republiques upon whose glory the Heavens have shined with most propitious influence The Persian Dynastie once so rich and puissant look back to the Founder and it was a Child exposed in the Woods taken up by the charity of a Shepherd and fostered a while by his poverty They that laid the foundation of Romes greatness and had the heart afterward to think how to conquer the whole Earth were at first but a Crue of Thieves I will not displease to call to mind upon what slight and almost ridiculous occasions Titles of brave estimation did first grow into credit it holds in them all that Almighty God willing to advance Religious honor above Secular hath blurr'd the Secular honor with one of these three diminutions vel
that the worst they could say slander us so and spare not says St. Austin upon it maledictio sit super nos super nostros liberos let that reproach fall upon us and our Children for ever But if any Age were more in jeopardy than another to wrest the word Disciple to an ill sense I am perswaded 't is ours For if a Disciple be a learner of the Divine Testimonies there are many that affect to be Discipulissimi by their good will there is no day of the week but they would sit at the feet of their own Gamaliels the pretence of learning is so great in these our days that I am sure all former times come short of this double diligence And were they such Disciples that were first called Christians Certainly the word of God was very precious unto them and as St. James bids it be so they were swift to hear Seek the Lord while he may be found seek his face evermore quaeramus inveniendum quaeramus inventum seek him for He is glorious seek him evermore for He is infinite And that Heathen saying was to good purpose when we have one foot in the Grave be still willing to learn But these Disciples gathered their heavenly Manna by moderate measure in a fit proportion to digest it not like our open-ear'd people in a numberless quantity to make them loath it Always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth says the great Doctor 1 Thes iv always walking and never going home not desiring to have instruction fall down in sweet drops to make the seed of the Word fructifie but with an Inundation to make it putrifie and continually gaping for somewhat that tends to the curiosity of knowledg rarher than the conscience of practice And where have they got this use but from outlandish fashions where there is no decent face of a Church no air of Devotion no solemn Liturgie to employ the time in whereby they must needs make up that which is wanting with continual preaching But you will say if this ravening after Sermons as I may call it be a fault it flows from the zeal of them that mean well and charity may construe it to the best There 's more in it than so as I conceive First it is too manifest to conceal it or deny it that superfluity of hearing is a cloak of dissimulation and hath bred a consumption of practising and scire est propter ire say the old Friers we know the way that we may go the way 2. Let any one descend skilfully into the nature of man and he shall see that it is our humour to grow too familiar with that which is told too often a decent distance and intermission would breed more reverence and attention 3. Whom doth it not afflict that hath a right sense of piety to see so much havock and loss of that which is so precious A Carpenter may hew off large chips from a Block but a Lapidary will make no waste of a Diamond when he pares it It was not the itching ear then which thinks it can never hear enough that made a Disciple in the Primitive Church they did not heap to themselves vain Teachers that every one of the common sort might prove a Doctor rather than a Learner and controul the best as if they were Masters rather than Disciples yet their heart was bent with meekness to receive the Word as St. James says they discharged their duty in good sort to hear and learn for hearing is the Key of knowledge but they did not turn the Key continually in the Lock and never open the door they were wise builders that heard the truth and did if and their desire was set to incarnate the written Word in their Souls by doing it as the blessed Virgin gave flesh to the Eternal Word by bearing it In a word they were such Disciples as gave the tongue of praise just occasion to call them Christians I will recite but a little of that which antiquity hath witnessed for their sakes Their Vessel was kept so chaste and clean that every day if persecutions dispersed them not they partaked of the body and bloud of their Saviour their temperance so great their fasting so constant that one says The Constitution of Lent began not till such time as their perpetual sobriety began to be unimitated Their Charity drew this admiration out of their forest enemies See how they love one another Even their Tormentors while their bodies lay bleeding under their hands were converted to believe and suffer with them by their Patience and Fortitude Finally Their contempt of the world was testified in this That no man said that ought which he had was his own but they had all their possessions in common Angelica respublica nihil dicere proprium says St. Chrysostom That made it no less than a Society of Angels to renounce their part in any proper possession It was not therefore hearing upon hearing that denominated them Disciples these were the Elements of which their Piety consisted and then they proceeded to be called Christians Yet before I come to the birth of this new title which is the chief corner-stone of my Text it will suit well to speak a little of the privation or cessation of their old names by which in former times they were known And they are of two sorts Such as the Church claimed to her self and delighted in or such wherewith flanderous tongues did think to wound her And they may be equally divided into three of the one sort and of the other First you meet it every where in the Epistles of the New Testament that such as professed to obey the Gospel were called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the brethren One is the Mother of us all in our natural being the earth One Mother of our spiritual Connexion the Church one common Father of our flesh the first man Adam one Father of our Regeneration the Holy Ghost But certainly Charity was the special scope in this appellation for no relation of love is so complete in all points as between Brother and Brother The love between Husband and Wife is not born with them The love between Father and Son is not level and reciprocal because it is not between persons that are equal the love between Friend and Friend is of our own choice nor of necessary duty only the love of Brothers is from the Womb from instinct of nature stands upon equal conditions and is underpropt with all circumstances that ingender affection And to give Charity the pre-eminence this was the first precious oyntment that was poured upon our head we were called brethren And secondly Saints to the Saints that are at Ephesus to the Saints at Colossi And many of the Saints did I shut up in prison says St. Paul before King Agrippa Acts xxvi 10. And this Attribute was given to our famous Predecessors from the Sacramental Seal of Baptism as
it is 1 Cor. vi 11. But ye are washed but ye are sanctified In that sacred Laver we are sprinkled with the bloud of Christ and so made Saints Sancti quasi sanguine tincti it is a bloud which purifieth from uncleanness for of old they that desired to be purified did dip some part of their body in the bloud of the Sacrifice Baptism is Pactum vitae purioris cum Deo a Covenant with God to lead a pure and unspotted life a sequestration of that which is holy from all profane abuses it is jus gentium says Tully a national and received Law throughout all the world Vt ne mortales quod Deorum immortalium cultui consecratum est usu capere possint that no man usurp that for common uses which was consecrated to the service of the immortal Gods so that a Saint is as much as one that is washt and made clean in Christ and engaged unto holiness all the days of his life 3. For the confession of the true doctrines sake which flesh and bloud could not reveal unto us but our Father which is in heaven our reward was to be called the faithful the faithful of the circumcision Acts x. 45. and in many places beside This continued our note of distinction more than any other in ancient Liturgies and so remains in some of our own Collects as grant we beseech thee merciful Lord to thy faithful people pardon and peace And it stuck more close to the Church than any title in St. Cyprians days as appears by these words Quid Christiana plebs faceret cui de fide nomen est What should Christian people do in this case whose name is given them from the Faith So I have represented to you that in the earliest days of the Gospel the Disciples were called Brethen from their sincerity of love Saints from the purification of Baptism Faithful from that Orrhodox truth which they professed and hope in Christ which St. Paul hath put all together in one verse To the Saints and faithful Brethren in Christ which are at Colosse chap. i. ver 2. But as St. Paul says By honour and dishonour by evil report and by good report we approve our selves the Ministers of Chrisft And they that scoffed at the way of salvation did load us with contumelious taunts that they might soil our Profession The first bitter arrow that our Enemies shot forth was to call us Nazarens Tertullus the spruce Orator was aware of that and charged St. Paul that he was a ring leader of the Sect of the Nazarens Act. xxiv 5. Surely they delighted the more in this Nickname because of that opprobrious by word can there any good come out of Nazareth St. Hierom says that the spiteful Jews had no other term for the Christians in his days and how in that term they cursed us thrice every day in their Synagogues Now when they thought to gall us both with their curse and their venemous scorn Epiphanius says that the Apostles liked it well enough to be called Nazarens 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their intention was to put the name of Nazareth upon him where the Angel Gabriel saluted the Blessed Virgin and where she conceived Christ and they were contented It seems so for because they held it no disgrace Julian the Emperor would not call them Nazarens but Galilaeans and proclaimed it says Nazianzen that they should plead or be empleaded by no other name throughout all his Dominions the name of Christian says the same Father it grated his ear some Divine Majesty was in the syllables that it put horror into his conscience but for his own quiet and their wrongs he thought it better to call them Galilaeans his slanderous intention was all that was ill in it for the appellation it self was not slanderous an Angel of God directed his Message to them in that form Ye men of Galilee why stand ye gazing up into heaven Act. i. 11. But here was the secret gibe one Judas of Galilee a Firebrand of sedition had lodged an ill opinion in many of the Jews who were born in that Region that such as paid Tithes to God were not to pay Tribute to Cesar neither ought they to call any one their Lord but him that created Heaven and Earth In plain meaning he and his Consorts of Galilee were errant Rebels and though none were so far from faction and disobedience as these modest Disciples yet to perswade the World that they had an Anti-monarchichal grudg in their bosom this Apostate called them Galilaeans Lastly because the Orthodox Champions of the Church confounded the obstinate Gentiles with certain verses cited out of the Books of the Sibyls therefore in despite they invented the name Sibyllistae and pointed at us for the Disciples of those Prophetesses the Sibyls whereas it was their own doing to make us urge them with those proofs since they would not believe the Old Testament and the Prophets of the Lord. I cannot forget how Albertus Pighius played such a wise part or rather a far worse being the first that called our Reformed Divines Scripturarios Scripture-men because they grounded all their Doctrin upon the written word of the holy Scriptures yet in my judgment Sibyllist was not so ill a scoff as Scripturarian Now you know from that which hath been spoken what good Titles adorned the Primitive Saints and how their Enemies drew their name with a black coal in terms of scurrillity the bad appellations vanished away by the brightness of their vertue the good ones were like a scanty Robe too short to cover all their excellency they bore the Cross of Christ gladly and triumphantly wherefore this eximious Inscription was given them which is here in my Text all other names were but as a trail of golden beams to beautify this which includes them all Christian 'T is very much that no Author is mentioned here who was so lucky to impose this name which will be glorious no doubt in all the World as long as the Sun and Moon endure Carthusian hath his opinion that Infidels were the Inventers in disdain at Christ whom that pious Generation worshipped Comestor imputes it to the converted Greeks and Gentiles to the end that they and the believing Jews might have one common cognizance There are more than enough that think it may proceed from St. Peter whose first Episcopal See was at Antioch and then they think they have engrossed all Christians to be under the Pastoral charge of him and his Successors his Successors at Rome they mean and not at Antioch Turrian the Jesuit is far more reasonable sayiâ—â— that the Nomenclator is not known but that the name was ratified by a Synod of Apostles for he mentions a Synod held at Antioch in which these three Canons passed 1. That none should be circumcised for Baptism was the true Circumcision made without hands 2. That all Nations that believed might be collected into the Catholick
with all Christian Churches throughout the World We write our selves Christians and nothing else The name of Protestant as it was ever harmless so properly it concerned but the pleading of some grievances upon one day when a Diet of the Princes was held at Spire and when Sects were sprung up among Christians to be a Protestant was no more than to be a good Christian If our ill-willers call us by any other by-word the sin is theirs we have not the tongues of wicked men in a string that they shall give us no attributes but such as are worthy of us Non sumus Pauliani non sumus Petriani sumus Christiani Pastors must beget Children to Christ and not unto themselves therefore we are neither of Paul or Cephas but the Off-spring of Christ say the Divines of Doway and I would their deeds were suitable to their Annotation More smartly St. Hierom if you take the name of Marcionite or Valentinian you cease to be a Christian Not so will some say I can take the name of some excellent man upon me as a subordinate Servant to Christ But Ignatius goes on if you do take the name of man upon you you do lose the name of the Lord. A whole hour is not enough for all that can be said upon this point but this is enough for them that will learn how the faithful of the Circumcision and the Uncircumcision were in danger to be divided therefore they were both enclosed in the identity of one blessed name And c. So I have shewn what my Text speaks of fell out in a ripe season and a profitable opportunity now all times are capable of that which follows what this name imports and what it imposeth Our dear Redeemer having wedded the Church unto himself and having given it an interest in his precious bloud here and a lively hope to possess his glory hereafter it was meet that his Spouse should be called by his name and then either from Jesus or from Christ Jesus He was called for his Divinity for He that is Man could not save us from our sins unless He were the offended Party as well as the Ransom God and Man Christ he was called from being Man for he was anointed to execute the Offices of his Mediatorship in his humane nature Now judg in your selves whether we that are partakers of flesh and blood should have our nomination from his Godhead or from his Manhood rather only the Jesuit some Divine creature I warrant you is not contented with the common name of Christian but after much opposition of Courts of Parliament in France or Consistories in Rome he calls himself by the dear remembrance of the Epithet in which our salvation is sealed unto us But save us good Lord from such Saviours What will suffice them whom the Roialty to be called a Christian will not suffice In quo omnium sublimium nominum communionem adipiscimur says Nyssen whereby we have our share in all Titles that have sublimity in them as he that holds the fastning links of a Chain in his finger draws on all the rest to use the same Fathers Similitude The Heathen that looked for the signification of the word in their own learning and not in the Scriptures surnamed us Chrestiani à 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as you would say benign and gentle So Tertullian Cum perperam Chrestianus a vobis pronunciatur de suavitate vel benignitate compositum est when you miss our right name and pronounce us Chrestians it imports sweetness and benignity It seems there was a placidness and facility of nature in the Disciples which was far from giving just offence and won it self the affections of others And is not much better than a jarring harshness which is prone to discords and contentions The spirit of wisdom it courteous and humane Wisd vii 23. Yet this fell short of the true notation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who knows it not is unctus The Anointed not every Anointed but The Anointed as if it were written in capital letters whom the old Testament in the same sense calls the Messiah and the Hellenists 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but Caninius says that the wrathful Jews who will not own him for their Messias call him not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not unctum but delibutum as you would say not anointed but stained and besmeared To whom I rejoyn videbunt quem transfixerunt they shall see him whom they have pierced with their blasphemies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Anointed of the Lord He is our Chief from whom we derive our nomination He was a King as the Psalms stile him Yet have I set my King upon my holy hill of Sion and so anointed He was a Priest a Priest for ever after the Order of Melchisedech and so anointed He was a Prophet that Prophet whom God promised to raise up to Israel among their Brethren Deutr. xviii and so anointed Ter Christus a triple anointed a triple Christ that sacred one to whom God giveth not the Spirit by measure but he is anointed with the oil of gladness above his fellows and so is an infinite Christ from his superabundant unction we are replenished of his fulness we have all received some drops have trickled down from the head to the skirts nay to the feet and ancles to the lowest parts of the body and by the power of his Christhood we are transformed to be Christian Aptly hath St. Bernard ratified all this from that of Solomon Cant. ii 3. Oleum effusum nomen tuum Thy name is as ointment poured forth therefore do the Virgins love thee Christianus then to put good Greek into bad Latin is all one with Vunctianus anointed with the sprinkling of water in Baptism for the remission of sins and therefore Crism or Oil hath been applied as a significant Ceremony to the Infant baptized not only abroad but in our own Church I mean since it was reformed After this of Baptism follows the Unction of true Doctrin Ye have an unction from the holy one and ye know all things 1 Joh. ii 20. To these is added the Unction of Grace that we may be a sweet savour of life unto life and above all these the bloud of Christ is anointed upon the posts of our doors that the Destroyer may pass by and spare us and all these Lines meet in this one Center to call us Christian Is it not a grievous case that this Name so musical to the ear so melodious to the heart should be almost obscur'd to bring in another Catholick a word to be very well approved of it finds more acceptance with some than Christian These words of St. Luke in my Text are not more authentick with them hardly so much as those of Pacianus Christianus mihi nomen est Catholicus cognomen illud me nuncupat istud ostendit Christian is my name Catholick my surname the indignity is
to distort this saying as if Christian were general to every Schismatick and Sectary and Catholick were appropriated to the Orthodox abiding in the bosom of the true Church Nay some are so senseless to make the Apostles the Authors of such childish counsel that because good and bad would invade the name of Christian therefore the Disciples should call themselves Catholicks for distinction sake Why list I pray you he that can falsly say Christian is my name can he not with as much impudency and falshood say that Catholick is my surname the word becomes the Creed most divinely the holy Catholick Church for what Church shall I adhere to That which is for Time universal from the preaching of Christ unto these dayes that which is for Place universal dispersed wheresoever the Faith of the Elect is received that which is for Truth universal believing all that the Prophets and Apostles have delivered and whatsoever the Church hath ratified by its continual interpretation But our fine Italian Wits have spun out another notion that particular Church is Catholick which hath reteined the pure Truth in all Ages since Christ and never failed from whence hath resulted that proud inclosure of Roman Catholick an error not to be argued me thinks but to be whooped at I am sure Catholick in their sense is neither name nor surname of them that seek for peace They pour it on as Vinegar to make the wounds of the Church smart The Name of Christian is the Sanctuary of Unity and Oil to heal the wound let that be our Badg then which was the good Disciples c. But if you wear this Livery of Christ what service will you do him do you consider it unto what holiness you are engaged if your Title be derived from so pure a Fountain Now I am at the top of the spire at that point of my Text which is nearer to Heaven than any other It is well that we were Infants when we were first inrolled to be Christians in those sucking days we did not feel the weight that was laid upon our shoulders if we came with ripe years to Baptism and with premeditated understanding it would make us sink down when we put our foot into the waters and tremble all over to bethink us what heavenly part a Christian is to act upon the Earth as if he were an Angel incarnate Alexander Severus the Emperor whose Mother Mammaea was a Christian was saluted in the name of Antoninus by the Romans a name which had been most auspicious in that Republick By no means says the Emperor do not engage me to the necessity of that expectation Nomina insignia onerosa sunt illustrious names are burdensom and I cannot satisfie that which is looked for from them Alas but a trifle was looked for from an Antoninus in comparison of that is looked for from a Christian A few sins were esteemed no blemish in one of them one sin and unrepented of shall be an everlasting woe to one of us The similitude of a few Vertues made up a gallant Heathen the defect of one Vertue degrades a Christian In whom there is not meekness and mercies there 's no print of Christ in whom there is not humility there 's no colour of Christ in whom there is not perfect charity there is no agreement with Christ non potest esse concors cum Christo qui est discors cum Christiano he that doth not abrenuntiate and deny himself he hath no part in Christ for he that thinks his good works are estimable with Heaven and looks to be saved by his own merits est latro insultans cruci Domini says St. Austin he is the wicked Thief that insults over the Cross of Christ He that hath Christ alwayes in his eye to follow him in his heart to love him in his faith to trust in him in his works to glorifie him he is co Christus he shall communicate of his name here and he shall be cohaeres Co-heir with him in his Fathers Kingdom hereafter St. Austin calls us Heirs in this World by the usurpation of this Name sicut sunt haeredes nominis ita sunt imitatores sanctitatis Christian thou art Heir of his Name thou shalt do well therefore to be Executor of his Sanctity There are three things as the same Father hath filed them together with which our Christendom holds a secret antipathy in his short book of true Religion Neque in confusione Paganorum neque in caecitate Judaeorum neque in purgamentis Haeâ—eticorum quaerenda est it is neither to be found in the confusion of Pagans nor in the blindness of the Jews nor in the filthiness of Hereticks Justin Martyr is well rejected by the great Annalist for condescending to call all the Heathen Christians qui 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 vixerunt who from the beginning of the World had instituted themselves by well guided reason This can never be concocted with truth for Christianity in the very essence is an explicit knowledg of the Son of God that died for our sins and rose again for our justification Beside Gentilism doth incorporate in it the worshipping of vain Gods and how abhorrent is that to this Name When the Roman Deputy urged Polycarpus to swear by the Genius of Cesar his answer was no more but I am a Christian a Negative to all Idolatry in that Affirmative Secondly Where there is Judaism there is no Christianism He that hath relished the honey of the Gospel says St. Austin cannot endure the bitter waters of the Law Circumcision hath a bitter acrimony in it to offend his taste nec hostiarum ferre cruorem valet nec Sabbati observantiam custodire he will not offer the bloud of Sacrifices he will not keep the observation of the Sabbath Let them note that who strive to have the entire fourth Commandment to be moral and perpetual A strange refractariness in some men that cannot endure to be Christians in Ceremonies and yet are content to fall back to those beggarly Elements of Moses and to be Jews in Ceremonies Thirdly The filthiness of Hereticks either in Doctrin or Life it draws a dash through the Name of Christian and blots it out No lie is of the truth and he that denies that Jesus is the Christ he is a liar and an Antichrist Jesus is the name of the Person of our Lord Christ is the name of his Office how every Heresie clasheth either against his Person or his Office and such a one doth so little merit to pass for a Christian that he is published for an Antichrist Or be it that you are undepraved in the truth but most depraved in manners there again you forfeit your interest in this spotless Name For why call ye me Lord Lord and do not the things which I say Luk. vi 46. Cum impiis homines sumus sed non cum impiis Christiani sumuâ—â— I do not yield clearly to that but
Luke by the motion of the Holy Ghost had made a true relation of the story 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but though all men dissembled with their double tongue here 's one Michaiah left one Evangelist that will defame him and deal plainly that he gave not God the glory The French Proverb says that the boiling pot doth discover the little pea which is in the bottom of it and the applause of a little vain glory doth discover the disposition of the mind of man more than any other passion tum qualis quisque sit scies si quemadmodum laudetur aspexeris the gravity or fickleness of mans spirit may easily be guest at as you shall see him disgest some publick praise and acclamation as you may see in Herod he came into Cesarea with the Majesty of a King the People gave him the Divinity of a God but the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the itch of praise made him lower than a Servant Nocet laus si non rerum cupiditatem facit sed sui says Seneca glory is the fire that kindles vertue when it provokes vertue to good atchievments but when glory begets nothing but the desire of glory it is but childish popularity Therefore of tame Beasts none rends so much or makes such a waste in a well-affected mind as a Flatterer Si gulam ventrem ab inquinamentis liberamus quantò magis augustiora nostra oculos aures says Tertullian a pretty absurdity indeed not to suffer a crum in our drink or a mite in our meat to go down our throat and so into the very droff as Christ calls it but if an immodest spectacle if a dangerous flattery be presented our more curious senses are never watched but our eyes wink not and our ears are opened All flattery is the corruption of true glory but to flatter any man in his vices is a sacrilege against vertue Plato spent but few words in the praise of any man while he was living 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for by nature we are prone to change from better to worse there was more reason in his Philosophy than in their Christianity that lick the deformities of other mens actions and feature their unshapen whelps as if they were beautiful It is a note of a Reprobate that he speaketh good of the covetous whom God abhorreth How can this man be good says Licurgus of Charilaus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who is not rough and sharp with those that are vitious Such glozing tongues says St. Austin that commend other mens faults are like the dogs that lapt in Lazarus his sores But if flattery tickle the tongue of the Sycophant that it cannot keep in have the young Courtiers none to infect but Rehoboam If Vriah the Priest have a fancy to Idolatry is there none to be corrupted but Ahaz the King of Judah If men have such levity that praise and glory will transport them was there none to be abused but Herod A Democrcay is not a greater enemy to the honour nor a Jesuit to the life of a King than is a Flatterer to his prosperity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says Plutarch as we use to say that the Gout is the rich mans disease so Flattery is the corruption of the Great and Honorable As by the Ordinance of our Church we give one day to the Honour of a Saints Name and no more so the Romans to claw their Governors stiled a whole Month by the name of an Emperor as if one proud Pagan had been worth thirty humble Christians Like Asahel it pursues none but Abner the Captain of the Host Volscentem petit in solo Volscente moratur turn to the right hand or to the left says Abner apprehende unum de adolescentibus fasten upon any of my Servants and take his spoils But that would not serve Abner is the mark he shot at Qui fontem corrumpunt non ab acervo sed à semente furantur ungracious practicers while they corrupt the fountain the Prince of the People they do not filch from our Stack or from our Barns but from our Seed Corn it self which is double thievery Flattery you see is the adulterating of vertue it self to flatter vice is to promote Satans Kingdom to flatter Princes is to destroy their Kingdoms to flatter Princes as the Sidonians did Herod Voces Dei non hominis the voice of God and not of man is to pluck down Gods Kingdom as David said of the raging of the Sea that it lifted up the Ship to heaven to bring it down again unto the deep so such blasphemous flattery lifts you up like the top of Corazin unto heaven to cast you headlong into hell The Athenians who were but Gentiles at the wisest could not endure such injury to be offered Deo ignoto to the God whom they knew not but put Timagoras their Ambassador to death quod regem Persarum tanquam Deum saâ—utasset because he adored the King of Persia like a God I pray you what mark of a God was in Herod that he was thus exalted He was nothing less than a God for speaking eloquently the holy Scripture is written stylo piscatorio in the humble stile of Fishermen nothing less than a God for suffering Blastus of his Chamber to be corrupted and bribed by the Sidonians to win his favour nothing less than a God for being so gracious with the multitude 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 alas put it to the hair-brain'd multitude to make a God and the first that ever they made was a Calf in Horeb and I cannot perceive that they made any better of Herod Finally nothing less than a God that could not discern how unworthy they were to be reconciled to man who were sacrilegious against God Constantius the Emperor pretending that he would lessen the Train that followed him offered this condition they that would stay with him should forsake Christianity and worship Idols and let the rest depart But upon the trial what did the Emperor discard all those that sacrificed to Idols and retained those that did not shrink from the true Religion supposing that they would prove most disloyal to him who had abandoned their faith to God And as Constantius punished his Servants so Canutus one of our own Princes punished himself to expiate the flattery of his followers Upon some good success no voice was heard among his People but that he was a God and that shall be tried presently says Canutus and sitting by the Sea-shore commanded that the waves should not touch him but the water coming to the soles of his feet Fie says the King how you have abused me the man whom yon call a God cannot keep his feet dry upon the Sea-shore so turning to the Palace of Winchester took off his Crown of Gold and putting it upon our Saviours Image never wore it more upon his own head I have said ye are Gods Mark Beloved I have said it
convenient to begin your Reformation from the moment wherein you heard the Word taught in that place that then you stand slip off the old Serpents skin and renew your youth become a new Creature No man would sin so fast but he that thinks his Age runs away but slowly no man would be an unrepentant sinner to day but that he hopes for to morrow And why to morrow Nemo non suo die moritur My day to die was every day since I had an hour to live And I was a sinner before the first minute of that hour expired therefore why should not my heart smite me and contrition humble me lest Judgment should begin as soon as this word is spoken It is the Devils muttering and not a Christians to say Art thou come to torment us before thy time Of three things Cato did repent of more than the rest this is one Quod unum diem mansisset intestatus A day past over his head wherein his Will was not made he might have died intestate If a Heathen were so sollicitous that upon every day the things of this life might be duly ordered what care ought to be taken that we suffer not our eyes to flumber untill all things be accorded for the peace of our conscience for our reconciliation in Christ Jesus against the world to come Sickness and Death and Judgment who knows whether they be not as near to us as the avenging Angel was unto Herod who did immediately smite him that he was eaten c. Now I am faln in the last place upon the true castigation of Herods pride Tantus tam luctuosè that such a Potentate should die so miserably eaten up of Worms for five days says Josephus after he was smitten and then gave up the Ghost Lest he should glory that he was smitten by no less than an Angel Aeneae magni dextrâ behold the meanest of all Creatures the Worms are made his Executioners And lest he should domineer as Eusebius said he did that he died not sordidly in the rank of a mean man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with the dignity of a King which is the much admired happiness therefore the loathsomness of his Disease the ignobleness of the Scourge the irrecoverableness of the Mischief all are conjoyn'd to debase his Spirit O torture little dreamt of at this time Had he not the Physicians of Arabia about him How could he feel mortality Was he not in perfect strength to make Orations to the People What could be doubted of his health Was not his body kept sweet and clean like the body of a King Who would have suspected the putrefaction of Worms But remember that Manna bred Worms and stank though it came from heaven when it was too long preserved against Gods Commandment So though the Soveraignty of a King do come from heaven yet if it offend the Lord it will consume and putrifie He that humbled himself to be vermis non homo a worm and no man he is exalted above men to the right hand of God He that would have been Deus non homo a God and not a man is dejected below a man and made a worm See what contrariety of Instruments God did use to make his death the stranger an Angel and a Worm An Angel that he might say with the Philistines Who is able to endure these mighty Gods A Worm that he might say Et tu Brute the meanest of Creatures can conquer a King by Gods ordination An Angel for his sake who was the Judge to shew his mightiness A Worm for his sake that was judged to shew his baseness An Angel to shew how a sinner cannot look upon heaven for it is full of wrath A Worm to shew he cannot tread safely upon the earth for it is full of vengeance An Angel is an immortal Creature to threaten such pain unto the soul A Worm is a most corruptible creature to shew the fading of the body As St. Paul said of his Widows which were busie-bodies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 She that is wanton is dead while she is alive because she is dead to Faith and good Works So I may say of Herod that he died while he was alive for Worms which feed sweetly upon the dead as Job says fed upon him in his life-time as if he had been buried after he had solemnly made his own Funeral Oration As the Poet spake of a poysonous death which wasted the body first and separated the soul afterward Eripiunt omnes animam tu sola cadaver So I may say of this Phthiriasis First it did eat up the body and so left no room for the soul to inhabite in the members Expertes opes ignaros quid vulnera vellent says Lucretius When anguish doth tear their heart skill cannot afford recovery when their whole body is but one sore they know not where they are wounded This disease is more observed in Histories to be the Arrow of the Lord against sinners of high presumption than any other Thus Sylla died thus Antiochus Epiphanes thus Herod the Great thus Arnulphus that spoiled the Churches of the Christians thus Phericides that gloried he never offered Sacrifice and yet lived as prosperously Quà m qui heccatombas immolant What do we talk of Blazing-stars that they are only fatal and ominous to the life of Noble Personages a few Worms have often bereaved them of their soul as easily as the little Worm smote the Gourd of Jonas But will some man say Do you make this disease an infallible sign of Gods especial indignation Brethren God forbid For Judgments fall promiscuously in this life upon the good and bad Seest thou a man rent with as many torments of infirmities as there be members in his body to receive them let your first Meditation be Acerrimum est praelium in viâ magnus erit triumphus in patriâ He suffers much in this life his triumph will be the greater in the world to come And let your second consideration be the dreadfulness of Gods anger Says Tertullian to the Roman Lords the tortures of your Bondslaves are Fetters your reward is a Cap of Liberty but we are servants of the most high Cujus judicium in suos non in compede aut pileo vertitur sed in aeternitate poenae aut salutis Whose judgment gives sentence either of Hell or Everlasting salvation To answer you more copiously One circumstance alone had bred no ill opinion of Herods death Many circumstances raise a suspicion that his Life was Criminal and his Death Exemplary 1. To be smitten in a sin immediately upon the fact to be smitten by an Angel to be gnawn to death with Worms the divine hand was over this Sentence and no natural cause Unless as Tertullian said of their lascivious Theaters that resounded with scurrility Ipse aer qui desuper incubat scelestis vocibus constupratur So that Sacrilegious shout which the people gave against the