these are in number many in regard of the blessed that are saved but in the other opinion making both first and last saved soules it is hard to solve how all that are called are not also chosen since every saved soule is elected to salvation But Malâ—onat solves it thus saying out of the precedent particular assertion that the first shall be last and the last first he now makes a generall conclusion affirming many are called but not many chosen as in such a kind of way he spake in the precedent Chapter ver 23. how hard it was for all rich men to be saved because once a wealthy young man refused the counsell of holy poverty given unto him others say by many called are included all because all are many though few onely are saved others will have it that all are called to observance of the Commandements but not all to the observance of evangelical Counsels or all to grace but few to glory The Application HOw ever S. Paul in his Epistle to day seems to set us all a running over the Race of this life each upon his uttermost speed for the gaining of his own soul onely yet S. Matthew in this Gospel gives us hope we may gaine heaven for others as well as for our selves while he sets us all on work in the Vineyard of our Lord where the fruits of our labours are common though our reward be but particular 2. Hence it is this days Gospel points directly at the Pastors of Gods Church and at the missionary Priests set on work in the Vineyard of Christ for gaining soules by converting of the whole world yet indirectly it alludes to every soules particular indeavours in cultivating of their own special land in hope of gaining heaven by the sweat of their browes 3. So still we see toyle and labour is to be the life of man upon earth who forfeited all his temporall rest by Adams sinne and though our Saviour purchas 't againe an eternall rest for us in the next world yet that future rest must be gained â—y a perpetuall present labour here most justly inflicted one us for the punishment of sinne Hence we fitly pray to day as above On SEXAGESIMA SUNDAY The Antiphon LUKE 8. ver 10. TO you it is given to know the mysterie of the Kingdome of God but to others in parables said Jesus to his disciples Vers Let my prayer c. Resp Even as Incense c. The Prayer O God who seest we confide not in any of our own Actions grant us propitiously that against all adversities we may be armed by the protection of the Doctor of the Gentiles The Illustration I Have known hundreds even Priests themselves much admire at this prayer wherein Saint Paul with his best attribute is so unexpectedly brought in when not the least mention of any feast to him sacred is made by holy Church either in the office or service of the day and though I might in so hard a condition as I am now plunged into for making my designe good to day pretend it were sufficient for all the whole Church to be commanded to pray as now the mother Church of Rome doth this day unto Saint Paul whose Station is now kept in that holy City with great concourse of people thereunto yet this were to runne my selfe upon the rock of why not other Saints to be brought as unexpectedly into the prayers of the Church by this account as well as two onely are in all the year Saint Paul to day Saint Cosmas and Saint Damian upon Midlent-Thursday though we shall find every day in the year made sacred to some Saint or other by the frequentation of their stations in the City of Rome besides if this might satisfie others it must not be satisfaction to me because it comes not home to my designe of adjusting the Prayer to the Epistle and Gospel of the day unlesse we can find it as suitable to the latter as it is indeed to the former relating from first to last the whole story in a manner of Saint Pauls life though truely in the Gospel there is not one syllable of him wherefore if meditation had not helped us out this concordant designe had been very discordantly broken off but upon a day or two spent in prayer to find out some report between these parts of holy Churches services and upon remembring it was but last Sunday we were taught our life was a mere labour here upon earth and that we were all hired as labourers to work in the Vineyard of Christ me thought it was not strange this next Gospell should bring us in labouring indeed and like so many husband men sowing with corne the Vineyard we had lately ploughed up nor was it then so strange to heare us call upon the chiefe labourer now in eternall rest Saint Paul to help us with his intercession that our labours might be if not as great or as profitable at least as incessant as his were who by the common suffrages of all the Church will easily be granted to have been the chiefe Seeds-man thereof though Saint Peter were the chiefe pastor or governour and if so then it will be a most proper prayer on that day when the Gospell runns all upon sowing seed in severall grounds as to day it doth that the principall Seeds-man be called upon to help us the chiefe Preacher he that is stiled the Doctor of Gentiles or Nations for his eminence in preaching that is to say in sowing the word of God in the hearts of men and that this word is the seed to day made mention off we have our Saviours own authority to avouch it so we cannot be said to have strained this sense out of the prayer to day because it is as genuine to it as the Word of God in the parable is to the seed our Saviour doth compare it unto and look how many waies Expositors make Analogies between the Word and Seed so many waies at least shall we find this a proper prayer both to the Epistle and Gospel of the day and we may hope for the same answer from heaven whilest we complaining like S. Paul do look up thither and say we cannot confide in any of our own actions and therefore begge Almighty God will propitiously grant us in all our adversities that we may be armed with the protection of the Doctor of the Gentiles that is to say not onely by his prayer for our perseverance who were with Adam last Sunday sent to gaine our bread with the sweat of our browes but further by his protection namely by the same protection which was S. Pauls in all his temptations and difficulties the grace of God for this is that answer which was given to him in the height of his complaints Saul Saul My Grace sufficeth thee and truly the same Grace is more than an abundant protection for all the world nor can any man in the whole vniverse ask this protection with more
seen the Example of Humane Frailty in the chief Pastour of Gods Church that since the Sword of spiritual Power was put into their hands they might also have reason to shew mercy and not to retain other mens sins being penitent fiâ—ding their own were remitted upon Repentance and it was not without Reason that Christ foretold his Apostles he would rise again and appear to them in Galilee because he knew after his Death the Apostles and all the rest of his Disciples or Friends would be both afraid to meet together in Judea and that the Jews were so malicious against Christ as they would not suffer so great a number of his Disciples as Christ had above the eleven Apostles to appear amongst them much less to make assemblies Again the Apostles were most of them Galileans and so Christ knew they would be retreating to their own homes when he was gone or soon after if he rose not presently Lastly he had himself done many miracles in Galilee and therefore chose to get belief of them all at once by this one above all the rest his rising from the dead to Life again besides Galilee imports as much as transmigration and Christ passing from Death to life chose to do it in a place proper to the mystery which was yet redoubled by his appearing to multitudes at once in Galilee to shew he found the Jews no longer worthy his aboad among them and so he passed from them to the Gentiles where he had left many Disciples besides those Twelve he chose Apostles and whereof Judas was turned Apostata and dyed despairing so when the Angel said to the Maries Go tell his Disciples he meant tell all his Friends who are many in Galilee and St. Paul 1 Cor. 15. v. 6. seems to say that at the first apparition of Christ in Galilee there were more then five hundred of his Disciples or Friends and such as believed religiously of him whom therefore he rewarded by making them undoubted witnesses of this most doubtful and much controverted Truth his rising from the dead The Application 1. THe scope of all this Gospel is to prove the real Resurrection of our Blessed Lord and by that means the Immortality of Humane Souls so to wean them from their Temporal desires and plant their Loves upon Eternity the doubt if not the ignorance whereof made them embrace the Transitory Pleasures of the World and laugh at those for fools who thought of any happiness or misery to come when this life had an end by Death 2. Hence when the Apostles preach't our Saviours Resurrection it was held a scandal to the Jews and a folly to the Gentiles because it brought the tidings of Eternity to men that knew not any thing before but fleeting time and so for want of hoping in eternal Happiness by leading holy Lives fell headlong in a trice to everlasting Misery by living viciously according as the Royal Prophet said They lead their days in Jollity and in an instant they descend to Hell 3. As therefore when our Saviour died good men began to think it folly to be good because their Vertue was not able to maintain them living still So when he rose again bad men began to fear they might as well revive to misery as happiness and consequently were more easily reclaimed from Vice and brought in Love with Vertue so that Eternity we see is made a special Root of Christianity when even a desire to live eternalâ—y is held a motive strong enough to work a Sanctity into our Souls Since Holy Church makes it her rule to day that as by Christ his Resurrection the door was open to a blest Eternity so our desires thereof may be preserved in us by him that gave them to us by his prevenient Grace On White or Low Sunday The Antiphon Joh. 20. v. 26. AFter eight days the doors being shut our Lord entring in said unto them Peace be to you Alleluja Alleluja Vers Tarry with us O Lord Alleluja Resp For night draweth on Alleluja The Prayer GRant we beseech thee Almighty God that we who have accomplished the Pascal Feasts may retain the same in our Manners and Lives by thy bounty inabling us so to do The Illustration WE heard last Sunday the Churches Prayers were now to run in a peculiar Channel of Life-giving Waters those of the Resurrection of our Lord See therefore this days Service sliding sweetly down that stream but in this Prayer I finde a Phrase so strange as needs a gloss to make it understood though it speak plain English too for how can we retain a thing that 's past as is the Paschal Feast and yet this is it we pray for to day and not onely to retain this feast in our memories but in our manners and our lives sure then the meaning is we must retain those good desires which we besought God to prosecute in us in our last Sundays Prayer and which as by his preventing grace they were afforded us so by his continued bounty we now beg ability to continue or retain them in our manners and lives Now albeit this makes the Prayer above to be as it were a recapitulation of the last Sundays Prayer since the Octave Day is a closing up one and the self same Feast that began seven days before yet we must finde a deeper sence in this days Prayer such as petitioneth we should retain the Vertues which did occur to the accomplishment of the Paschal Feast as the good desires to those Vertues and if we look back to what those Vertues were we shall finde them to be sincerity and verity or rather in a word perfect Sanctity such as might make the old Leaven in us of sin to be White Manchet of Sanctity as if it were nothing for us to make yearly Memory of Christ his Death and Passion and of his Resurrection for in these two Mysteries consist the Paschal Feast unless our selves did remain ever dead unto sin and ever alive to God by vertue of our resurrection in his holy grace assuredly this must be the sence of our Prayer to day for this is truly to retaine in our manners and lives the Feasts of Pasche that are past when we make our selves Paschall Lambes by the Sincerity and Sanctity of our lives and manners For thus we shall first by our Faith overcome the world and next by our good works give the testimony of Gods Holy Spirit being in us which this dayes Epistle so much insisteth on as the effect of our Faith and of our Victory over the world by the same Faith And to the Gospell this Prayer is literall whilst it beggs we may retaine in us that Paschall Feast which is the whole scope of this dayes Gospell telling us how our Saviour appeared in confirmation of his Resurrection to his Apostles and in the narration of Saint Thomas his infidelity exhorting us to a firmer Faith in that and in all the other mysteries of our Redemption To conclude
For as the Act of separated souls is necessarily unalterable like those of Angels so the last Act they had when they were united to their bodies remains eternally and is not unproperly said to be the same Act continued for all eternity and therefore free for ever because at first freely produced when the soul was in state of a viatour and out of that issued into the better state of an impatriated spirit nay though Purgatory intervene yet that remora alters not the nature or freedome of the Act because soules there retain their love to God wherewith they dyed however they suffer for former infirmities of their life past The Application 1. WHat may be to our special and present use in this Gospel is to observe that Holy Church culls it out as the most proper to the now flowing Feast of Pentecost though spoken by our Saviour to his Disciples before his Passion as appears ver 29. above but with intention they should then make memory and use thereof when they had received the holy Ghost as consequently we must do at the celebrating this Festivity The main scope of this Gospel is exhorting us to believe and love and telling us the sign of true love is to keep the word of God and that the effect of this love will be to draw down into our soules the Holy Trinity Father Son and holy Ghost as delighting to live in the hearts of those who love the Son of God and shew their love by keeping his holy word 2. But here is a special stile observable in this Gospel very profitable to be reflected on which is that our Saviour seems here only to relate or speak as v. 25. 26. and to leave it to the Holy Ghost to suggest and teach the true meaning of what he said as if it were a speech too profound for his Disciples to dive into without the help of the holy Ghost If then our B. Lord the wisdome of his eternal Father and consequently the best spokes-man in the world would not what ere he could speak so plain to his Apostles themselves as to be understood by them before the coming of the holy Ghost to explicate his meaning how absurdly shall it be done in those that are ignorant Lay-men to dare to understand or interpret holy writ 3. Hence we must infer that we are bound in the first place to believe the holy Ghost to be coequal God with the Father and the Son who sent him since none but God can be of Gods counsel and tell men the meaning of Gods holy word Again we must infer that it is the love of God who now must teach â—s the meaning of Gods holy word and that they are our Wills our Hearts which now must be instructed more then our understandings for these the wisdome of God our Saviour taught by the sight of Faith those the love of God the holy Ghost now teacheth by the fire of charity so that however Faith Rectifies yet it is charity must saintifie the soul how ever Christ Redeemed us yet he was pleased to send the holy Ghost to save us by his sayntifying grace and alas what had it availed us once to have been by God the Father Created once to have been by God the Son Redeemed if we were not more then once by God the holy Ghost sayntified as oft indeed as by sin we are made uncapable of the benefits of our Creation or Redemption Come therefore Holy Ghost come teaching come inamouring come comforting come sayntifying come saving Spirit into the open hearts thou hast of Christians ready to receive thee ready to be inkindled with the flames of thy most holy Love And Praying to day as above most fitly to the sense of this Holy Text. On Trinity Sunday THis Sunday is both the Octave of Pentecost and also the First Sunday after it therefore this week we have the Epistles Gospels and Prayers of two Sundayes for our entertainment and these both if I mistake not the most delightfull of any in the whole year The Antiphon Matth. 28. v. 19. THee God the Father unbegotten thee onely begotten Son thee Holy Ghost Comforter thee holy and undivided Trinity with all our heart and mouth we Confesse we Praise thee we Blesse thee to thee be Glory world without end Vers Blessed art thou O Lord in the firmament of heaven Resp Both praise-worthy and glorious for ever The Prayer ALmighty Everlasting God who hast granted to thy servants in confession of the true Faith to acknowledge the glory of the Eternal Trinity and in the power of Majesty to adore unity we beseech thee heartily that in the firmnesse of the same Faith we may ever be defended from all adversity The Illustration NOw the mysteries of our Redemption are compleat by the contribution of all the Three divine persons of the Blessed Trinity thereunto as of the Father sending his only Son to dye for us of the Son coming and actually dying for our sins and of the holy Ghost descending and sanctifying us with his holy grace to make us sin no more it is most necessary we should close up the said mysteries with a peculiar feast of the same Blessed Trinity and so put a glorious crown upon the work of our Redemption while we begin to work out our salvation from the first root thereof which is our Faith in the most Blessed and undivided Trinity a mystery so unheard of before Christ had taught it to the world that even to this day it is the hardest thing which can be told to men and the thing which the blessed Angels that behold it do not comprehend how the Divine Nature can be personally Trine which neverthelesse is essentially but One. In admiration whereof St. Paul in this dayes Epistle breaks out into a Triple Trinity of his expressing this Triunity saying O depth of the Riches of the wisdome and of the knowledge of God! Loe the first Who ever knew the sense of our Lord or who was ever of his Counsel or who gave first unto him and it shall be restored again Loe the second For of God by God and in God are all things Loe the last of his Triple expressions alluding all of them to the Blessed Trinity as by the Expositours of this Epistle we shall find and consequently must acknowledge it to be included in the Prayer above As also the Gospel is expressing how our B. Lord sent his mission of Apostles with commission to Baptize and teach all the world the mystery of this Blessed Trinity Father Son and Holy Ghost So we have this day the best of harmonies in the mystical musick of this book while we find all three parts of holy Churches service to day so neatly woven into one the Epistle Gospel and Prayer all singing forth the praises of the most Blessed and undivided Trinity Father Son and holy Ghost three Divine Persons and one onely God Hitherto the mysteries of our Redemption were all upon
person of another man so he cannot mean himself when he sayes the Lord but must needs mean the Bailiffes real master did praise his own Bailiffe of iniquity that is did commend the invention or manner of the cheat not the cheat it self and said that the children of this world used more wisdome and prudence in their worldly wayes then the children of light This may put us in mind how ill it is that we study more to damne then to save our soules 9. This verse cleares the sense of the former to be spoken in the name of the master to the Bailiffe for here Christ having told us that masters sense now makes profession to speak in his own name in these words I say unto you give almes do good deeds unto the poor with your Mammon of iniquity your treasures for by vertue of these almes the poor may plead your admittance into heaven and obtain by their intercession that your almes may cover a multitude of your sins So this is a parable speaking properly to rich men of this world who are not true Lords of their own estates but owe them to God and have the portions of the poor in their hands and own all their treasure but as Lords of iniquity as heapers up of wealth which they have cheated the poor of and when they pay them not by Almes they lye lyable to the like censure of this Bailiffe to render account for they are such to God The Application 1. THis Gospel being wholly Parabolical we are at the greater liberty to make our applications thereof according as we can best avail our selves by it further then what by the Illustration and Explication above is already done First therefore albeit this Parable aymes directly at rectifying the inordinate excesses of Rich men who abuse the trust God hath reposed in them of relieving the poor when they lavish away their estates vainly and do not by their charities pay the poor mens Portions which are included in the rich mens revenues yet we may very properly here mind the Priests of Gods holy Church that as they are indeed the chief Bailiffes of their heavenly Master trusted with more of his Estate and Treasure then all the world besides namely the receiving and distributing his holy graces the livelyhoods of their own and other mens soules so when they waste these Treasures either by their own idle mispending them or by their undue dispensing them to others especially by palliating the sins of the people and flattering them with needlesse dispensations from their Christian duties never valid but when really necessary then are they most properly such ill Bailiffes as this Gospel specifies 2. Secondly in regard there is no Lay-man free from the Bailifship of a huge though lesser trust also reposed in him by Almighty God of all those rich graces vertues and gifts which are bestowed upon us in holy Baptisme therefore every Lay-man as well as the Priest may piously fear he playes this ill Bailiffes part and that chiefly out of this root his giving way to unjust thoughts such as propend him to unrighteous actions by not being rejected but disputed with untill the temptation of sordid gain or pleasure overcome him and make him unjustly act that which at first was but unrightly thought 3. Now this evil holy Church hopes to amend in us by prayer adapted to the Bailifship we are intrusted with absolutely of our own soules and partly of our neighbours too in point of edification to him at least whereby we are charitably to contribute also to his salvation which we shall then perform in act if our thoughts be first set upon the doing it Thus we see how the debt we owe of charity to our neighbour puts us in mind of the greater debt we owe thereof unto our selves and to Almighty God And by this charity it is we are best able to perform what we this day Pray for with holy Church that by alwayes thinking thus charitably right we may do uprightly we may live spiritually to that good God without whom we have neither spiritual nor yet corporal Beeing On the ninth Sunday after Pentecost The Antiphon Luk. 19.46 FOr it is written that my house is the house of prayer to all Nations but you have made it a den of theeves And he was daily teaching in the Temple Vers Let my prayer O Lord c. Resp Even as Incense c. The Prayer LEt the eares of thy mercy O Lord be open to the prayers of thy suppliants and to the end thou mayst grant the things desired to those that ask make them ask such things as to thee are pleasing The Illustration BLessed Jesu that the holy Ghost should teach us perfection of prayer in a language arguing imperfection in Almighty God mutation from his not bearing to the opening of his mercifull ears to the prayers of his Suppliants Whereas his eyes being alwayes open to see our actions his cars cannot be shut from our petitions since we can as little speak what he doth not hear as we can do what he doth not see It is not therefore because he at any time hears us not but that we deserve not to be heard sometimes even when we pretend to pray that we are taught to beg his open ears to our petitions and that if we will hope to be heard we must ask such things as are pleasing to his Divine Majestie rather then what is desired by us wherefore we were taught by our Saviour himself to pray that the will of God might be done in earth as it is in heaven which in effect though in other terms we pray to day when we begg that to the end God may grant what we desire he will make us ask such things as are pleasing to his Divine Majestie Yes beloved this is the full scope and sense of the prayer above and by this we see 't is one and the same spirit that now dictates the form of prayer to holy Church which our blessed Saviour had when in the garden he gave us the most excellent method of praying called to this very day our Lords prayer onely this we find peculiar now that all prayers of holy Church are so set after the stile of our Lords prayer which alone includes all the requests we are able to make that they are adapted to peculiar emergencies and do specially relate unto the present service of the day As for example the prayer above now doth unto the Epistle and Gospel of the Masse in regard they both mind us of the severe punishments inflicted both upon the Gentiles and the Jews who in their prayers runne after their own inventions and made their sacrifices which should appease the wrath of God to be the highest provocations of his fury as the Idolaters fornicatours and murmurers did whereof S. Paul here minds the Christian Corinthians who it seems were also inclined to make idols of their own desires rather then to adore in true
so we must live rather content to die poor then seek to live rich after God will have us die beggars Note it is onely excesse of care or anxious solicitude that we are forbidden not ordinary diligence in our occasions 33. By first is here understood chiefly or principally so that we are allowed a secondary care of our temporals though our main imploy and study must be to get heaven for that is the Kingdome of God By Gods justice is here understood those virtues and good deeds that render us just in the sight of God and so capable of that heaven we are in the first place to seek since it was the end for which we were first created By those things which shall be given us besides are understood things of lesse moment and consequently which ought to take up lesse of our care such as are meat clothes and other temporalls The Application 1. GOd and Mammon are not so here declared to be the two masters meant who cannot be both served at once but that we may also take the spirit and the flesh for these two masters and this the rather because so the Gospel is more literally suting the Epistle and besides S. Matthew in the following verses of this present Text doth aim directly at the service we pretend unto the flesh when we neglect our souls to provide for our bodies 2. And see how to prevent this poor pretext our charity is led to day by Providence to shew us that we cannot any way pretend to corporall duty for excusing us from our spirituall obligations since God Almighties Providence is here brought in to furnish us with all things necessary for the body and so to ease us of that care and to send us about our main and onely businesse our secking in the first place the kingdome of heaven and the justice thereof by the works of charity such as in the Epistle above are enumerated and assuring us all things wanting else shall be provided us by his Providence who never relinquisheth the just man nor permits his seed to seek their bread so if neither for our selves nor for our posterity we need to interrupt our spiritual duties or to renounce our service to our souls for any tie we have to serve our bodies we have no pretence then left at all for our so doing 3. Yet least we be withdrawn from the saving works of charity by the hurtfull ones of the flesh which humane frailty would easily incline us to therefore we are taught upon the reading of this holy Text To pray as above alwayes for the help of Christ his perpetuall propitiation by the cordiall of his passion to relieve our fainting charity withall in her march to heaven On the fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost The Antiphon Luk. 7. v. 16. A Great Prophet is risen amongst us and because God hath visited his people c. Vers Let my Prayer O Lord c. Resp Even as Incense c. The Prayer LEt thy continued mercy O Lord both cleanse and defend thy Church and because without thee it cannot stand securely be it alwayes governed by thy bounty The Illustration WE heard in the exposition of the last Sundayes prayer that the perpetuall propitiation there begged was the continuation of our Saviours passion to be our continuall help in all occasions and now that to day we beg to have the mercy of our Lord continued to his Church we seem but to repeat the same prayer again in a varied phrase But if we cast our eyes upon the Epistle and Gospel here below and observe how the Expositours upon them apply the same as declaring all the office of Priestly function and telling us what should be the duty of the people thereupon we shall soon perceive as well a difference in the substance as in the phrase or language of these two prayers That alluding to the immediate influence of the passion into us by the personall help which our Saviour affords in the grace he gives us to repent us of our sinnes which relating to himself is fitly called his perpetuall propitiation but reporting to the mediate helps we have from our Saviour by the mediation of his Ministers the Doctours Teachers Preachers and Priests of holy Church it is rather stiled his continued mercy towards us because it was his mercy that moved him to supply his own personall presence amongst us by the mediation of the Priests whom in his place he left by means of catechising preaching and administration of the Sacraments to continue his mercy towards us and by the continuation thereof to cleanse and defend his holy Church cleansed indeed by participation of the Sacraments defended by the communication of the Priests their functions sacrifices and prayers in her behalf and yet our holy mother closeth up this Sundayes prayer with an immediate addresse again unto the fountain it self when she concludes affirming it is as well his bounty as his mercy that she subsisteth by when she professeth she cannot stand securely unlesse she be alwayes governed by his bounty that is to say by his holy grace derived unto us through the hands of his Ministers the Priests of holy Church so that this prayer instructs us whence our helps do flow and by what hands they are conveyed to us And requisite it is that we do pray in this sort to day when the Epistle runs all upon the Priests office to the people and their putting in practice the Christian doctrine taught them by the Priest all which is neatly couched under the spirituality wherewith the Epistle tells us both are rendred compleat as signifying neither the Master nor the Schollar must sow fleshly seeds since both must live by spirituall fruits And for the Gospel we hear the Fathers of the Church avouch it to be a parable alluding to the death of sinne and life of grace which is coincident with what the Epistle taught us of sowing spirituall seeds that might bring forth fruits of grace of Christ not fleshly which produce nothing at all but corruption and death Since then we have this prayer adjusted to the sense of the Expositours upon the other parts of this dayes service we make good our designe as hitherto we did in some one of the latitudes in the preface of this work allowable unto this mysticall Theologie The Epistle Galat. 5. and 6. Chap. Chap. 5. v. 26. If we live in the spirit in the spirit also let us walk let us not be made desirous of vain-glory provoking one another envying one another Chap. 6. v. 1. Brethren if a man be preoccupied in any fault you that are spirituall instruct such a one in the spirit of lenitie considering thine own self lest thou also be tempted 2 Bear ye one anothers burthens and so you shall fulfill the Law of Christ 3 For if any man esteem himself to be something where as he is nothing he seduceth himself 4 But let every one prove his own work and so in
The CHRISTIAN SODALITY OR Catholick Hive of Bees Sucking The Hony of the CHURCHES Prayers from the Blossomes of the Word of God blowne out of the Epistles and Gospels of the Divine Service throughout the yeare Collected by the Puny Bee of all the Hive not worthy to be named otherwise than by these Elements of his Name F. P. Divided into three Tomes whereof this the first Tome onely upon the Sundayes And that subdivided into three Parts The First From Advent to Lent The Second From Lent to Whitsontide The Third From Whitsontide to Advent That of one mind with one mouth you may glorifie God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ Rom. 15. Vers 6. Printed in the year of our Lord MDCLII To the Honourable Walter Mountague Esquire all health and happinesse SIR IT might argue I did acquiesce too much to flesh and bloud should I dedicate this book to any of my Kindred and least it seeme presumption in me to consecrate it unto you I must beseech you to believe 't is none of mine You know I have a gallant Master for this self-deniall who said His Doctrine was not His which yet none could lay claime unto besides his sacred self How justly then may I professe this book is not mine own being all of it upon the matter either Holy Churches Prayers or Holy Text or Holy Fathers Expositions on the same And as such it is rather your Defence than any waies in need of your Protection Now least you should reply I give it then unjustly as mine own to you and more unjustly begg your Patronage thereof as of a stollen Treasure I must confesse it is indeed a pious theft but such an one as the thiefe may take at noone day from the Coffers of the Church without a Sacrifice without a blush though all the world were lookers on and such as you may safely both receive and Patronize with as small remorse as men doe Hony brought unto the Hives which openly the Bees have stollen from the mellifluous flowers of other mens Gardens as I have done the sweet Connexion that I found between the Churches Prayers and Text of Holy Writ when I assay to shew the self-same Spirit annimates them all and makes them speak one sence in diverse Languages or Dialects And this sympathy between the parts of Holy Churches service is what I here present to you as my observation rather than my worke for had it not been there before I could not now have found it out if yet I may not rather feare I loose it when I look to find it by making it appeare lesse than it is for want of being able to shew it to the full But I will not tell you by how many titles I intitle this to you least I force the Lillyes of your modestie to change complexion with the Roses of your other Virtues or least I seeme to flatter you who are not to be flattered and therefore I shall rather silence my obligations to you than betray the secrets of your bounties which your left cannot accuse your right hand of although they both are stealing merrit whilst they give their Almes in ample manner unknown to one another as he well advised who knew the best way how to make benevolences meritorious nor shall I boast your more than ordinary favours showred upon me other waies as tyes to make me give you these my labours abstracting therefore from all self-relation and looking onely on the nature of this booke I find not any man more fit to Patronize it than your selfe because as it associates all the CHRISTIANS of the universe into one SODALITIE so you that are Eminent in making every man your owne will be the greatest help to this Association which I have founded on the Word of God and Prayers of Holy Church two subjects that I know not any one more versed in than you witnesse the excellent store of both which your Missive and your Misscelania doe afford wherein you shew your selfe not onely to have the Scripture lodg'd within your heart but even the genuine sense thereof ingrafted in your understanding as appears by your admirable Explications of the Texts and Applications of them to the purpose that you cite them for which as it was a motive for me to imitate you in so in justice it obligeth me to consecrate this book to you whose whole designe is either Notion or the use of the Holy Text. Againe Sir I looke upon you as a man designed to some thing more than yet the World is privie to for your Pauline Conversion makes me think you are the Vessell of Election which our Nation may one day hope to see as overflowing as I know you are now full of Eminent Perfections this I professe I doe not mind you of to puffe you up with self-conceit for of your self it is with you as with the rest of men made up of nothing but corruption and infirmity but to humble you rather to see how much of Grace doth shine upon the dunghill of Humane Nature while your Conversion from infidelity workes in you an aversion from all singularity and renders you a man partiall to none beneficiall to all that know you even unto those that are above you to who fare the better for your virtues while their Temporalls are raised from the spirituall foundations you have laid Thus from the Court unto the Cart from the Prince unto the Begger God hath adapted you to all his Holy Ends and therefore I that aime at Unanimity in this Sodality at Unity in our Community let me attest for this the Motto of my Book Saint Pauls words to the Romanes CHAP. 15. Vers 6. have made a right addresse when I petition you to Patronize my Labours in aggregating this SODALITIE who are one man most acceptable to all for your Equality or rather Equanimity to every one as if you were Omnibus omnia factus And seriously Sir I doe honour you most for the impartiality of your affections for that you are not biassed so as to runne one way but can and doe plie unto the mark of loving all in him whom all must love which way soever you are throwne upon request of this or that body Rich or Poore Clarke or Lay-man Secular or Regular Priest so much that I believe if I had failed of this my duty in choosing you for Patron of my Book I had been chidden for mistaking in my choyce of him whom all men would have voted for as well as I the design of this SODALITY and your simpathie to that design considered Please therefore I beseech you Sir to Patronize these labours of your humble Servant who am all your own and who beg your Patronage of this first Tome for one reason more than I have heer expressed or then is known as yet to any but my self which you will well approve of when you see to whom the next Tome shall bee consecrated as this is now to you
they said in saying it and thence grew bold to undervalue it to call it dry and barren Prayer in respect of other Books especially the Manuell consisting indeed of many Prayers derived from the Primmer but more abounding with a greater number made by private persons Pious enough no doubt yet not of such avowed authority as those who made the Primmer Prayers Hence it was I thought no subject fitter to be written on than that which should at once expound the holy Writ and Churches Prayers with all the other parts thereof contained in the Primmer both being so profound and so mysterious as they are Know therefore Christian Reader first The Antiphons are ever such as have report unto the present time or season of the year they are made proper to by holy Church Know secondly they ever are some part of holy Writ appointed by the like Authority or for Epistle or for Gospell of the Day Yet to know this is not enough unlesse you further know the meaning of the word it self that an Antiphon imports as much as a pre-toning of a Tune to follow not unlike the Birds recording in the winter time the tunes they chirp and sing aloud in the summer to the praise of their Creator And hence it is the Chorists or masters of the Quire where holy Office is ever sung in open Churches that allow this happy liberty come up unto the Canon who begins the Psalme and in a low Tone give the Tune to him who takes it thus then sings aloud and leads the Quire after him all singing out the Psalme in loudest voice which was Antiphonized as above pre-toned I mean recorded or pre-tuned by the Chorists first of all Now that you see these Antiphons end here with a Versicle and Responsory as they doe in every Primmer this argues all the Prayers and other parts of holy Churches Service that doe follow are exercises as well of Neighbourly as of Love Divine and that no jar ought to intercede in tempo all affaires between those who are tyed up to a harmony and concordancy in the spirituall duty of good Christians whilst we must be ever ready to answer with a Responsory him that begins with a Versicle to incite us to priase Almighty God and to give a testimony we are at peace with one another before we dare presume to make our joynt petition to the Heavenly Majesty for our own and our neighbours necessities in the following Prayer But of this more anon when we shall say who first prefixt the Antiphons before the Psalmes and Prayers Please gentle Reader onely here to know that hence it was I took the Rise of writing in the Method I observe throughout this Book For since I found the self-same Antiphons that here you have in English to be in all the Primmers of the world in all the severall languages that say this holy Office every day even in the Breviaries of the Priests I did conclude those Antiphons were as Pretonings to the tune of the Mysticall musick of the holy Church that was to follow then when such an Antiphon was read or to speak more plainly these Antiphons did seeme to point out what the Duty was that then we should be at Namely that all the Children of the Church should put in execution the practice of that Doctrine which the Preacher then delivered in the Pulpits when or that Antiphon or else some other part of holy Writ in that dayes service was the Preachers Text. And that we might doe this the better we thought the following Prayer was fitly given to petition grace to doe it Hence I inferred those Prayers must needs extend to more than yet the word Collecta or Collect did import for that betokens onely the collection of the peoples suffrages put into the mouth of the officiating Priest in his own and their behalfs and begging Grace that what the Preachers tell them is their present duty they may execute Religiously But further yet we thought this Prayer this Collect following such an Antiphon and being the open musick which every Christian was to make that day in the ears of the Heavenly Majesty while their hearts were to sing what their lips did say must also keep the Tune of that Antiphon speak I mean to God in the same sense and be as an Epitome or Abstract of the holy Text from whence that Antiphon was taken must be in fine a kind of summe or Quintessence of all the Preaching parts of that dayes Service and must from thence assume the name of Collect as if collecting up in few lines the larger Lessons of the holy Text both in the Epistle and Gospel of that day This I confesse seemed hugely consonant to reason and if it could be made appear would render sure the Prayers of holy Church extreamly proper to the Times and Dayes they were appointed for extreamly reverential extreamly gratefull to the People To see thereby the sweet connexion in all the parts of holy Churches Service This this Beloved is the hard attempt of all the following Book wherein how happy I shall be I know not yet before I hear you say you see it is in some proportion done By the Illustrations of the Prayers shewing how they allude unto how they exhaust indeed the holy Texts both of the Epistle and Gospell of the Day By the Explications of the Sacred Texts shewing how piously safe they are when rightly understood how dangerous when heretically wrested to a contrary sense than in themselves they bear And by the Applications not onely shewing us how to apply the whole Service of the day to our instructions but how to apply indeed our selves to God by a godlinesse of life made sweet and easie to us by the said Applications Now because this sweet connexion of Parts in holy Service is a Jewell rendring the Church extreamly Beautifull in the sight of her sacred Spouse even ravishing the eyes of Men and Angels therefore I shall desire the Reader not to huddle ore this Book as reading it for Recreation but purely for Devotion which yet will recreate the more by how much the lesse thereof is read at once by how much the oftner the Reader turnes to see and to compare the Parts reporting unto one another which generally they doe when in the Print you see the letter to vary the Character to change for ever then the changed letter in the Glosse is part of either Prayer or holy Text to which it doth report and whereunto the Reader shall doe well to turn before he doe proceed to further Lecture that so comparing one place to another he may see the simpathy between the parts compared and seeing this may praise Almighty God in the beauty of his beautifull Spouse the holy Church whose very daily service is a kind of picture of her lovelinesse in the sight of his Heavenly Majesty I doe not undertake to say that all the Churches Prayers are of so deep a sense as
to exhaust the Epistles and Gospels of that day whereon they are appointed to be said but this I doe infer to be avouchable of that peculiar Prayer which here is set immediately after the Antiphon Responsory and Versicle of each respective Sunday which is ever the first Prayer in the Divine Service and which the Priest doth alwayes say with an addresse unto the People turning about to them and saying Dominus vobiscum Our Lord be with you meaning in your hearts that there you may sing forth his Praises which my lips are now going to pronounce in your names and in your behalfs True it is I have at the end of every part of this first Tome set out a Trinity of Prayers appropriated each to their respective dayes which I advise all those of this Sodality to say three times a day morning noon and night whereof this Prayer we call the Collect for the Reasons above is the first The second is that Prayer which is called the Secret being the very same the Priest then sayes when he hath turned himself unto the People saying Orate Fratres c. Brethren Pray that my Sacrifice and yours may bee acceptable to God the Father Almighty And this he doth immediatly after he hath made the Oblation or Offertory of the bread and wine which he is presently to consecrate into the body and bloud of Christ as his own and the peoples Sacrifice Not that it is therefore called the Secret because the people should not be privie to it being as they are remarkably concerned therein but that it represents the nature of our offerings to God to be rather hearty than heard of rather private then publike so far forth as they are ours though 't is most true that as the Priests they are to be made in open Churches upon open Altars yet with this respect that silence shall convey them to the heavenly Majesty rather than noise and so the Prayer that offers them is for this reason among others said softly by the Priest and thence is called the secret Whereas the Collects they are said aloud And however true it be that in the old Law the Priest went out of the Peoples sight from the sanctum or Holy into the sanctum sanctorum the holy of holiest for the Reasons alledged in the Exposition of the two first Verses on the Epistle upon Passion Sunday in the second part of this First Tome yet in the new Law which did abrogate the Ceremonies of the old Holy Church hath held it sufficient to maintain the Analogie between the sacrifices of both the Laws that the Priests of the new remaining still in the sight of the People shall go at least out of their hearing by saying some Prayers secretly though still in the Peoples behalf as if they were composing the controversies between grace and nature or mediating between God and his sinfull creatures by way of sacrifice the most powerfull of all mediations imaginable And hence it is to let the People know at least this secret Prayer is said in their names by the Priest in testimony of their offering up both by and with him the present sacrifice that I advise them joyntly with the Priest to say the self-same secret to the self-same end that prayer importing over an actuall oblation or offering to God The third Prayer which is called the Post-Communion I therefore also publish here in the end of this Book because it imports the peoples thanks-giving after the Communion thereby to shew that whereas then the Priest hath received actually in his own and their behalf so they have also received in Vote in wish or desire that they were also worthy to have actually received and this being a spirituall communion at the least I desire all the devotes of our sodality in thanks thereof to say this third prayer also with the Priest because immediatly before his saying it hee turns about and makes his application to the people as above by Dominus vobiscum Our Lord be with you And thus it is evident these Prayers are very proper for the People which are never said by the Priest but with addresse to them Now if any ask the Reason why I recommend this Trinity of Prayers to be said by our Sodality three times a day truly 't is because the sacrifice being a service to the sacred Trinity wherein God is acknowledged to have the sole command of life and death in his creatures therefore in honour of the three sacred Persons of the Blessed Trinitie I recommend this triple Repetition of this Trinity of Prayers as also further that thereby our sodality may partake of all the sacrifices which are daily made throughout the world not but that the morning is the proper time of this Homage but because 't is ever day in some part of the earth when 't is night with another and so by our saying these Prayers even at night we joyn in sacrifice to God with those who say the same prayers at the self-same time by day I could animate our Sodality farther yet to this Devotion by telling them what indulgences they may gain by this not that these are purchased by money as is objected by our adversaries but given gratis namely 15. dayes Pardon from Purgatory paines for every time they say any one of the Churches Prayers those I mean that are with publick authority avowed by our holy Mother to say nothing now of fifty dayes indulgence for every time they say their Primmer office which is not granted to their Manuall Prayers but I suffice my self with this that 't is the best of all Devotions in the world to praise the Blessed Trinity and even those that love to pray to Saints must know they do it best while with their holy Patrons they adore the Universall Patron of all the Saints The sacred and undivided Trinity To conclude in saying this Trinity of Prayers they doe not onely joyntly pray with the visible but also with the invisible Priest our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ who even now in Heaven dayly says the self-same Prayers as often as the Priest officiating sayes them here on Earth because our Priests are but the Instrumentall Ministers of Sacrifice the Principall is our Saviour Jesus Christ himself who in memory of his once Bloudy Sacrifice offers up dayly an unbloudy one unto his Heavenly Father and so makes that to be with God a Renovation in a Mysticall way of his bitter Death and Passion which is with us a dayly Commemoration thereof for which purpose see the Secret on the ninth Sunday after Pentecost in the book of Prayers below See further Molina in his Golden work of Priest-hood where he cites a Torrent of Fathers to avow this verity And for avowment of Jesus Christ Vocally Praying even in Heaven for us by way at least of claiming what he hath already merited in our behalfs See Cornelius a Lapide upon Saint Paul Rom. 8. ver 34. who backs himself
in this with a mighty authority of Fathers so 't is no weak assertion I hope of mine nor any ill-grounded recommends being thus supported O Beloved what an ineffable dignity doth this set upon these Prayers What an Emolument may we bring to our selves by saying them in such society What a vast Treasure of devotion shall we find wrapt up in them In fine what a supine negligence shall it be in us not to avail our selves of this devotion which without envie I may say is such as none that is vocall can equall it and which yet I have aymed to contrive into so short a method as shall not hinder us from any other pious exercises whatsoever onely let me beg this favour of our Sodality to ranke this way of prayer in the number of those duties towards Almighty God whereof it is truly said Mat. 23. ver 23. Haec oportet facere These things we ought to doe which yet shall nothing clash with what followes truly averrable of other Devotions to Et illa non omittere Those we need not omit for using these Not that I affirm we must of necessity say this Trinity of Prayer which here I have suggested to deserve the Title of good Christians or of Trinitarians as some from hence may call us but that I mean we must prefer the publike prayers of holy Church before all others whatsoever And truly since the first of these three Prayers will by this Book appear to bee an Abstract both of the Epistle and Gospel of the day rather than I shall attribute this devotion to my own Invention I will conceive it was the pristine practice of the Church because the very nature of the Piety is such as seems to draw its source from the better fountaines of devotion than any I can lay claim unto namely the zeals of the Antient Fathers of the Church True it is I can not positively say it was so but thus much I need not scruple to avouch That as the Epistles and Gospels are the expresse Doctrine of our blessed Saviour or of his Apostles as where S. Paul sayes Non Dominus sed ego Not our Lord but I c. 1 Cor. Chap. 7. so the Churches publike Prayers are the speciall Dictates of the Holy Ghost that is to say the avowed suggestions of that Holy Spirit which avowment our private praiers do want though whether the blessed spirit were resolv'd The holy Fathers who made these Publick Prayers should with reflection frame them suiteable to this Designe which I now draw them to that is more than I dare venture to affirme but certainly that holy Spirit did suggest unto the Pastors of the Church a stile so proper and so deep withall as might sound the lowest bottome of the Sea of holy Writ and so exhaust even the abstrusest sence thereof which whether I have alwayes done I know not but I beleive the meanest understanding will perceive I often make the Collect expresse the substance of the whole Epistle and Gospel of the day and where I come not home to this 't is rather that I see it not than that the Prayer extends no further or suits no better unto this Design suffice it now the door is open that stronger-sighted soules may see much farther into the Paradise of this Devotion than I have done and shew the world much rarer fruit therein To me the Honour is too much that I have made a great Attempt which is to render that Book sweet and easie wherein we may presume the Holy Ghost directed the Composers of it for the publick use of the Layety the Primmer I mean whose Prayers I hope henceforward will be found as sweet as they are sound and not so hard as to be laid aside for either barren or too deep to be understood by the common People The Hymmes whereof I conceive are lately made so smooth so eloquent and yet so easie too in the Manuell lately printed at Saint Omers that every one who can but read the English Tongue will find them very pleasing The Lessons I shall explicate in my second Tome of this Christian Sodality which I intend to Publish next following the like method as here I hold in this upon all the Feasts of our Lord as also upon those Festivals of his ever Blessed Mother the Virgin Mary those especially which allude to any Mystery of our Redemption As to the particular Feasts of other Saints I shall spare the labour to write upon them in this method but shall recommend them for daily Garnishing or Sawces to the Dishes added now and then as they occurre to the constant Table of the Churches Sundayes and weekly food out of the Epistles and Gospels of the Season First Because the Prayers we use to Saints are cheifly addrest to God by the merits of his sacred Son as in the close of every Prayer appeares ending still Through Jesus Christ our Lord Amen Secondly Because the particular honour we give to Saints must never interrupt the generall duty we owe to God at all times and upon all occasions Thirdly Because I find these Prayers have rather a Report to the Martyrologe or Stories of Saints lives and deaths than to the Epistle and Gospel of the day in regard one and the same Epistle and Gospel is common to divers Saints yet we may piously beleive those Saints whom then we serve have served God in their life time by being eminent in such perfections as the Epistles and Gospels read upon their Feasts doe recommend unto us all Neverthelesse I shall in my second Tome set out the Communion of Saints in such order as I intend to doe the Feasts of our Lord and of his sacred Mother that by this meanes the Layety may see in generall at least the severall Degrees of Saintity in Holy Church as those of Angels Apostles Martyrs Confessors Virgins and Widdowes whence they may easily distinguish the particular Proportion of every particular Saint as his or her Feast occurres in that line of Perfection which the common Glasse of Saintity shall represent As for the like regard I intend lastly in my second â—ome to add the Communion of Vigils the Embers and Rogation Dayes in this self-same method as these above because my third â—ome else of Lent will be too long if set forth after this manner there being six and thirty feriall Dayes in Lent besides the Sundayes already published in this first Tome and every day hath as well a particular Antiphon and Prayer as a particular Epistle and Gospel proper to it self whereof divers are very long besides those four long Gospels of the four Evangelists read all at length in Holy week which will swell this third Tome to a mighty bulk being done in this method where every verse is particularly gloss'd and by this meanes I shall render as much Scripture easie to the people as will occurre in the flux of the whole year which is the cheifest motive I have to give
no common Priviledge allowed to others that can be held too great for me in particular But lest the common Reader should be lost in this discourse that begs a School-prerogative I shall crave leave of the more learned to give unto the lesse intelligent examples of those three severall wayes how one thing is included in another As formally when the included doth denominate the includer So we say whiteness is in a wall that is white because whiteness is the form which gives the wall that denomination Virtually when effects are included in their causes as the Son in his Father as the greatest Tree or fairest fruit in the little seed thereof Eminentially when the creatures are contained in the Creator which last kind is the most excellent way of any thing being contained in another because the creature is more perfect in the Creator then any effect is in the virtuall cause thereof or any form in the subject which it denominates Or then indeed the creature is in it self where we find a world of imperfections though in God there can be none at all so to be eminentially contained in a thing is a more noble and excellent way of being included then either virtually or formally to be contained is And thus now and then wee shall find the Word of God to be as it were eminentially contained in the Churches prayers because in them the Holy Ghost seems to communicate himself most like himself most spiritually of all when by the spirit of prayer he opens the sense of the letter in the holy Writ And no marvell since our Saviour left his own sacred Word to the Exposition of the Holy Ghost who was sent on purpose to teach the world all truth upon all occasions of debate about the meaning of the Text. For as Christ is the word of his eternall Father so the Scripture is the word of Christ and so the prayers of Holy Church are the word of the Holy Ghost setting an eminentiall ground of harmonious musick unto the dayly descant of the Epistles and Gospels of the day since wee see the Antiphons commonly taken thence are still prefixt before the Prayer to shew how one reports unto the other Now if in this First Tome it happens here and there that some one Sundayes work bee longer then another yet there is not any so long which may not with much ease bee read in seven dayes and studyed diligently to thence to make the benefit of reading by a little meditation upon every Verse Nor have I suffered some of those Sundayes to passe much shorter then the rest namely those in the third Part of this Tome both because that Part alone containeth almost half the Sundayes in the year as also because I did there indeed begin this work in that brief way which afterwards I did inlarge because I was loath to lose so much sweetness of devotion as the larger Exposition of the Text affords And if any part shall prove lesse pleasant then other let me beseech the Reader to consider That as in Preachers there are three signall Faculties whereof any one renders the owner excellent Namely To teach To move To delight So it is in Books for these are all well written wherein some one at least of those three faculties throughout the Book appears either that of teaching what is true and solid Doctrine That of moving to amendment of our lives or that of delighting us with a sweet delivery of what is written whether it be by the eloquence of language or by the quaintness of conceit in which the Writer doth expresse his mind it imports not much and albeit I cannot boast of happiness in any one of these three faculties yet I will hope to have taken such advantage in the contriving of this Book that what is any where wanting in me will bee supplyed by the Authority of Texts both out of Holy Writ and out of the Expositors upon the same Thus having run over the parts of the Primmer whereunto I aim to adopt the whole work of these three Tomes intended thereupon I shall now desire the Reader to take such an account as I am able to give him of the Parts of this my present Book consisting of Antiphons Versicles Responsories Prayers Epistles and Gospels as for the Illustrations and Applications they being wholly mine the little that is already said thereof above is more then enough unlesse any thing I can doe were more considerable The Explications being all of them in substance though not in words the Fathers glosse upon the holy Text have their worth and authority in themselves more then I can add unto them Onely I desire the Reader to know I rather chose Cornelius à Lapide then any other Expositor both because he hath written largely upon all the Books of Holy Writ which do occur in the Churches Service throughout the year and because his Morals are more for my pious purpose then the other more literall Glosses would have been of more speculative Authors though withall he falls not short of the literal sense where it is requisite to follow it First therefore as to the Antiphons True it is they are now and then taken from some other Part of Holy Writ then commonly they use to be As for example That on the first Sunday of Advent is out of S. Luke Cap 1. v. 30. whereas the Epistle of that dayes service is taken from S. Paul Rom. 13. And the Gospel from S. Luke cap. 21. but the reason is that in this Antiphon the Church reports to the mystery of the Incarnation which must needs precede that of our Saviours Birth so here respect unto the Time or Season hath prevailed for omitting the usuall way of ordering the Antiphons before the Prayer and for the same reason the Anthiphon also on the Third Sunday of Advent varies in this manner to being taken out of Saint Luke cap. 1. v. 41. whereas the Gospel on that day is out of S. John cap. 1. v. 19. and so the prayer is answerable thereunto Thus for respect unto the Persons praying in those dayes as now the Church would have us do The Antiphon on the fourth Sunday of Advent alludes much to the ancient Patriarchs and Prophets manner of calling upon the Messias to come away after so long an expectation of him as four thousand years together hence that Antiphon is then taken as it were out of those ancient Patriarchs mouths rather then from the Epistle or Gospel of the day and therefore it is alwayes one of the seven great Os or exclamatory prayers of the holy Prophets groaning and crying out with an impatience of delay in the Messias our B. Saviour being born And these are the onely Three Antiphons in all the year that are not taken out of the Epistles and Gospels of the Divine Service proper to their day As for the Antiphon on Palme Sunday though it be not in that Gospell wihch I have here inserted in
this Book yet is it out of the true Gospell of the Day and the reason why I did presume to alter that dayes Gospell in this Tome is because I intend God willing to explicate the four long Gospels of the Passion that are read in holy Week in my third Tome as was said above in regard they will doe better altogether then apart Besides the Gospell I have here inserted though it be not directly upon the Passion as that of Palme Sunday is yet it reports unto it and is as it were the very mouth to that Red Sea so not incongruously placed here but suiting very well both with the true Epistle and Prayer of that day and is besides the very Gospell read in Blessing of the Palmes But further as to this particular of Antiphons the Reader may be pleas'd to understand that many times the words of these Antiphons are rather the sense of Holy Church than the absolute letter of the Text yet so as part if not all is ever taken according to the letter it self and again whereas I cite one verse onely for such Antiphons as many times runne through sundry verses this is done but for brevity sake since the diligent Reader will easily trace it out in his perusall of the Text it self Nor must our Adversaries presume to tax the Church with corruption of the Text in some of her Antiphons because she doth not alwayes professe to deliver the ipsissime letter but onely the sence thereof which is a priviledge no dutifull Child can deny a pious Mother who as she is the Spouse of Christ hath absolute authority to order the devotion of her Children according to her own pleasure and piety True it is I cannot retrive who set the order of the Antiphons before the Prayers but this we find in the Bull of Pius Quintus before the Breviaries that as the Councell of Trent referr'd the ordering of the Breviary to his said Holinesse so he consulting some Fathers of that Councell and other the best Antiquaries in Rome did let forth the Breviary as now we have it according to the Records in the Vatican containing all the Traditions of the Primitive Church for order of the Publick Prayers and consequently the Antiphons in the Primmer which are these we now treat of being the same with those of the Breviary were undeniably the same which now they are And what ever we may say of these Antiphons in particular at least we shall find Saint Ambrose a celebrated Father and Doctor of the Church to have been the Institutor of that Piety to sing in the Quier an Antiphon before the beginning of every Canonicall Hower in the Priest his Office grounded on the Vision which Saint Ignatius the third successour to Saint Peter in his chair of Antioch had of Angels thus Antiphonising and then alternatively singing sweetly one after another as now the Divine Office is sung in the Quier over all the Catholike Church And for this reason sure the Lay-people have their Antiphons out of the Epistles and Gospels to shew their work of Prayer which followes immediately is grounded on the charity of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ in whom they are to Love to Pray to doe for each other as they would doe for themselves And hence we may piously presume the Versicle and Responsory following every Antiphon is to incite the Church Militant to answer the Angels of the Church Triumphant inciting us to Pray and praise our Lord with them especially by such a Prayer as doth not onely exhaust the Epistle and Gospel of the Day but accompanies withall the Praying and the Preaching Priest amongst us the Angels and the Saints above us nay the Mediating Jesus Praying then and thus to his Heavenly Father in our behalfs as was said above Forasmuch as concernes the Epistles and Gospels themselves I have not dared to alter them in the least tittle out of a Reverentiall regard unto the Reverend and Learned Translators of the Bible into English though in many places perhaps if the same men were now alive they would themselves render the Language here and there more gratefull especially to curious Eares and yet keep as exact a sense of the Learned Languages of the Originall Tongues as now they have done which yet I dare not be so bold to doe The suiting of these Epistles and Gospels as now the Church hath ordered them was the work of Saint Hierome commanded so to doe by Saint Damasus Pope and Confessour Anno. Dom. 367. and this may suffice for a sufficient glosse upon the respective parts of this Book and why it is framed in this Methode Now the reason why I intitle it the Christian Sodality is because I would by that Name invite every Christian to be a member of it and to make profession of this Practise of Piety which is grounded on the Word of God and on the publick Prayers of Holy Church which certainly were not made without a deep design if yet that were any other than what I have guessed at who shall be glad to hear of a better for I am nothing wedded to my own conceit herein I shall not presume to give any Rules at all to our Sodality though I doe humbly suggest the saying Thrice a day the Trinity of Prayers in the end of every Part of this first Tome for the Reasons above and for this one more which I shall add because by a reverent rehearsall thereof they shall even kiss as it were in little the Picture of our Blessed Lord drawn out of the full Proportion it hath in the Epistles and Gospels of the Day as also by their weekly reading each respective Sundayes work belonging to the week they shall make themselves in a short space perfect masters of so much Scripture and be able not onely to sum it up in their daily Prayers but to season their discourse with it throughout the week throughout the year from year to year indeed throughout their lives Now that they may more zealously doe this I shall desire them to beleive the first Founder of this Sodality was Jesus Christ the Confirmer of it the Holy Ghost the first professed Member the B. Virgin Mary Keeping all the words of her sacred Son within her heart and listing with her self the twelve Apostles all the Disciples and Friends of our Lord Saint Mary Magdalene with her Sister Martha and the other two Maries celebrated for their zeale to Jesus Christ and so making up the Primitiae or first Fruits and Members of this same Sodality which every Christian is inrowl'd a happy Member of at the Holy Font nor can he be dismembred or cast out of this Sodality but by deserving excommunication unlesse he first renounce his Christianity and cast off Jesus Christ by turning Infidell Heathen Atheist Turk or Jew As for designing our Sodality into this method of Prayer abstracting all the other Parts of Holy Churches Services I am so farre from the vanity of
and so make the Surges much more horrid than when they are caus'd by the most boisterous winds ploughing up onely the even surface of the waters but here probably the very Sands Stones and Rocks will all boil up from the deep roaring like Thunder in the ears of all Nations whatsoever And we may guess at the confusion of this sound when it shall be heard and known distinct from that of the generall summons given by the Angels in the sound of Trumpets breaking even the deepest sleep of death awaking and raising dead men from their graves 26. It is indeed an usuall effect of fear to make men pine away and look like withering plants nor is man other than a rationall plant if well considered in all his parts and though here the cause of pining seem to be the sadness of mans expectation what shall become not onely of himself but of the whole world besides yet what followes tells us this expectation is but an effect of the powers of Heaven being moved that is removed from us by having their usuall influence into earthly creatures obstructed for so we now depend upon their influencies that we see the least or shortest ecclipse of either Sun or Moon is sensibly felt in all the creatures of the earth by some present or future disturbance to their well-being insomuch that should the Sun but miss to make his annuall or diurnall revolution all the plants upon the earth would wither immediately and cause a famine over the whole universe so absolutely necessary is the Suns heat to the cold earthy nature that is cherisht by it 27. This verse will litterally occur in the 24. Sunday after Pentecost and shall be there expounded 28. We are here told the confusion of this dismall day shall not be void of comfort to the just at least while they are all advised to hold up their heads to Heaven in hope to receive the fruit of their redemption for when the Apostle tells them their redemption is at hand he means the fruits thereof since we all know the work of our redemption was the past passion of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ and it will be here with the just thus looking up to Heaven as with the holy Patriarchs and Prophets it formerly was when with the like action Isai c. 38. v. 14. tels us His eyes were weary with looking dayly for many years together up on high in hope to see the promised Messias come from thence Thus will it fare with the just at the time when these fore-running signes portend the second coming of our Saviour in the nature of a Judge sharing out to every Just the fruits of his Redemption Glory and salvation which then was said to be at hand because all time is but a moment or instant to eternity 29. The gloss above is made good by this verse following which likens the generall Judgement of the just unto the spring in respect of the then promised fruits of their labours unto all the husband-men upon the earth onely what Analogy St. Matthew chap. 21. makes between the fig-tree and this day of Doom St. Luke doth make between that and all other trees or plants whatsoever since as every springing plant first or last brings forth some fruit or other and therewith some seed to conserve the kind or species of the plant so every Christian soul that hath but the least vegetation of grace within her bringing forth thence some spiritual fruit may hope to reap in time the seed of her salvation by it and therefore with reason should look up to Heaven though Hell do seem to meet it when all things are in this confusion The 30 31 32 and 33 Verses following in this Gospel are in a manner verbatim the same with the close of the last Sundays gospel in this book and so being there largely expounded need here no further exposition The Application 1. THerefore holy Church to day joynes a Gospel of Judgement to an Epistle of the Incarnation to let us see we cannot at a less rate than the hazard of a most rigorous Judgement omit to celebrate the holy time of Advent by acknowledging the second coming of Christ shall be to punish those eternally in the next world who have not made him a Religious welcome into this 2. And because our holy Mother found we were not apt to do our Christian duties purely out of love to God therefore having given us at least that motive first in this dayes Epistle She addes now the other of holy Fear which the memory of the day of Judgment needs must striks into us O let us now by frequent acts of holy Fear prevent the danger of our then despair yes now while every minute of Repentance is able to purchase an eternall recompence Let us I say now do that which then in vain we shall wish to have done if we now omit to do it 3. But happy they who shall prevent the latter fear with a present love by making the whole doctrine of this day the rule of their practice by so securing Man-God to be their friend that they need not fear God-man to be their Judge and doubtless that is holy Churches aime to day whilst to prevent Christ calling us to a fearfull indeed a dreadfull Judgement She calls on him to a chearfull Incarnation Praying as above by the Protection of his grace to be freed from all dangers here and by the deliverance of a happy sentence to be finally saved there On the second Sunday of Advent The Antiphon MAT. 11. ver 3. ARt thou he that art to come or look we for another Goe and report to John what you have seen the Blind see the Dead rise again to the Poor the Gospel is preached Vers Drop c. as before pag. 1. Resp Be the Earth c. The Prayer RAise up our hearts O Lord towards preparing the wayes of thine onely begotten Son that by his coming amongst us we may deserve to serve thee with purifyed soules The Illustration IN the last Sundayes Prayer we besought Almighty God to rowse up his own power and come away to those that had four thousand years expected him now to day we beseech his Divine Majesty to raise up our hearts towards him left our but lately opened eyes from the sleep of sin do close again if our raised hearts affections do not keep them open for lumpish hearts are many times the cause of sleeping eyes and indeed what hearts so lumpish as those that are addicted unto lumps of flesh to carnall and terrene desires which as they ever draw us downward so must they of necessity make us dronish and drowsie in the service of Almighty God this day therefore finding the danger of a sinfull effect we deprecate the cause thereof we pray to be rid of the lumpishness of our hearts and that we may have them vigilant active vigorous raised and rowsed up by Almighty God to high and Heavenly thoughts
to us cooperating with the same what our sins retarded that is to say our own redemption was by our own sins retarded for 4000. years together the Indulgence of his propitiation may accelerate It was indeed a huge indulgence in Almighty God to make his sacred Son a propitiation for our sins and more to hasten him away for this purpose since fourty thousand years had been too short a time to have expected so much mercy as is now accelerated by the indulgence of his propitiation which would not give him leave to stay above 4000. years away And by this close of the Prayer we virtually include the whole Epistle and Gospell of the day while we beg the help of Gods Grace to accelerate unto us the benefit of the Indulgent propitiation that Christ his Birth-Day brings to every pious Christian which benefit lest our sins retard see how the Church prepares both Priest and People to a due regard against them by the counsell given to both in the Epistle and by exhorting both to be Baptistick Saints in the Gospel of the Day to be preparers of the way of Christ Angels of Men running this holy Advent before his face to sanctifie our own and our neighbours wayes unto the Crib where Christ on Christmas Day is mystically born again as often as Christians celebrate the Feast of his Nativity so saith Saint Leo in his nineth Sermon upon that Feast and the like is of all others We doe not so much recall the past as we behold the present Feast of our Saviours Birth so often as it comes about by Annuall revolution The Epistle 1 COR 4. ver 1. c. 1. SO let man esteem of us as the Ministers of Christ and the dispensers of the Mysteries of God 2. Here now is required among the dispensers that a man be found faithfull 3. But to me it is a thing of least account to be judged of you or of Mans day but I judge not my self neither 4. For I am not guilty in Conscience of any thing but I am not justified herein but he that judgeth me is our Lord. 5. Therefore judge not before the time untill our Lord doe come who also will lighten the hidden things of darkness and will manifest the counsels of the hearts and then the praise shall be to every Man of God The Explication 1. THe Apostle seemes here to bid Man esteem of him and his Associates in the Apostolate as if they were not men but Ministers of Christ for as much as they did the Offices of God by being dispensers of his Mysteries and indeed that is most true for though to be a Steward or master of a Family under any temporall Lord and to dispence and dispose of his Lords Monies and Goods be not to execute an office above man in regard all the goods and monies in the Stewards hands are temporall things and the properties of nothing above a humane creature yet to be Steward of the House of God and to have the dispensing of such goods as are Spirituall and cannot be the properties of any temporall Lord certainly this renders a man though not in nature more than Man yet by Office hugely more than an Angel for though we read of them that they are Heb. 1.14 Ministring Spirits in the House or Church of God both triumphant militant and patient yet we never read that they were stiled the dispensing spirits of Gods hidden Mysteries which yet as the Apostles were so must their suuccessours the Priests of holy Church be too and consequently are not in the execution of that Spirituall Office to be looked on or esteemed as men but as Ministers of a higher nature as persons indeed more than Angelicall since they have an Office and Power above Angels namely to forgive Sins and to dispence or dispose of Gods severall Graces by the conduit of holy Sacraments Pipes made on purpose by our Saviour Jesus Christ to convey unto our barren Souls the fertilizing waters of heavenly grace and these pipes are so put into the hands of Priests as they can turn the cock at pleasure give or retain this holy grace as they judge fit to administer a Sacrament or suspend a Sinner from the benefit thereof But we must further note the Apostle here as he speaks in generall to all Christians and bids them esteem Priests above men by reason of their office so he speaks particularly to the Corinthians in order to their main contention which was to make a difference betwixt the Dispensers of these Mysteries as if Baptism for example received from one were of more value than if they were baptized by another or as if the Ministers of Baptism were the Authors of grace and so they who received it at a more holy mans hands received more than if the conferror thereof were lesse holy to both these effects the Apostle speaks correcting the Corinthians errour in them both that is for thinking the Administrator of a Sacrament to be the Author of grace therein conferred or that grace was more abundantly conferred according as the Administrators thereof were more or lesse holy 2 This alludes to the vanity of the Corinthians who were men so curious that they judged of their Preachers as they found them more wise more grave more eloquent in their Sermons or Catechisms than others and particularly they adhered much to Apollo because they held him more eloquent than S. Paul whereas the same Apostle here tells them they must not regard in the Dispensers of Gods word the Rhetorick language or eloquence of the preachers but above all their fidelity or being faithfull that is to have them tell the true sence and meaning of Christ Jesus to have them give rather sound than flourishing doctrine least while they put too much force in words they lose the vigour of the Spirit which is and ought to be the life of a Sermon and least they seek by the Ostentation of their languages rather their own than the glory of God or preach themselves not Christ Whereas S. Paul tells them here fidelity is the principall part of a preacher that is to preach the Word of God and not the word of man to preach spirit rather than language to move the soul to Acts of love rather than the ear to delight of Eloquence 3. This Verse prosecutes the sense of the former telling them plainly he did not regard their fond judgements that esteemed men by their glib tongues rather than by their vertuous spirits for it is indeed Unction a speciall gift of the Holy Ghost that renders a Preacher most profitable to souls and so most accomplisht in his preaching whence the Apostle knowing what he said was pure spirit told them he did not regard their censures of him as if he were defective in his duty of preaching and what he sayes to them in this kinde he affirmes the like in respe of all men by his following words wherein he makes no account of
mans day that is of humane judgement in a point of Spirit for thus the day of man is often taken as by Jeremiah it was Chap. 17. v. 16. when being derided by the people who contemned his Prophecies he cryed out Thou knowest O Lord I desire not the dayes the applause of men nor regard their judgements of me Suffice it I have delivered unto them what thou hast to me revealed So in this sense S. Paul here cares not for the judgement of the Corinthians whether they like his preaching or not but is content that he tells them the genuine sense of his Lord and Master Christ Jesus and yet least he may by this speech seem arrogant See how hee takes off all suspition of vanity in himself by what follows saying Though I am not troubled O Corinthians at what you thinke or judge of me yet neither am I so vain as to presume I am without fault and so I neither will nor dare to judge my self this place might disswade Heretikes from presuming they are certain of their future salvation and of their being here in the state of grace if themselves thinke so assuredly S. Paul might better justifie himself and yet we see he does not indeed he dares not doe it 4. While in this next verse he saith though I am not guilty particularly of any infidelity vanity or ostentation in preaching for still he prosecutes that sense which yet generally may be understood of any sin neverthelesse I am not justified therein he will not justifie himself but he that judgeth me is our Lord and to him I must leave it to judge who not onely sees and knows all hearts but perfectly knows them too that is sees further and clearer into all mens hearts than any one man can see into his own 5. Here the Apostle referrs not onely his own judgement of himself and of his Ministery but even the judgements of all men whatsoever to the latter day of Doom for then and not till then Our Lord shall come and inlighten the hidden things of darkness by laying all things open and this not onely as some Hereticks will have it whether we believe right or wrong but also whether we doe good or bad deeds according to our Faith For so by the plurality of hidden things here mentioned to be revealed then is clearly meant in those words of the Apostle insomuch that Hereticks fondly pretend unto a certainty of their rectitude in Faith more than they can doe unto a rectitude in their works and therefore flatter themselves that be their works the counsels of their hearts what they will yet since it is by Faith men are justified and since they pretend to know certainly that they doe rightly beleeve they therefore scruple not to sâ—cure themselves of salvation be their lives never so bad being their Faith as they say to their certain knowledge is right For the Holy Ghost hath taught us a contrary doctrine to this presumption in Ecclesiastes Chap. 9. v. 1. A man knoweth not whether he be worthy of love or hatred So Prov. 20.9 Who can say my heart is clean So Job 9 21. If I bee simple or Innocent yet my soul knoweth it not So Jer. 17. v. 9. Wicked is the heart of man and inscrutable unlesse to God alone To conclude the sentence of Judgement shall not onely passe upon our Faith whether that be right or wrong but upon our works the Counsels of our hearts for every one shall in that day receive according to his works and Luke 20. we receive what our works deserve and in the mean time till the day of generall judgement come the Apostle forbids to judge each other since neither he nor any man can securely and rightly judge himself but then look who hath done and deserved well the praise shall be to every one of God though mistaking men have judged those perhaps worthy of blame whom God shall declare to be praise-worthy because he finds them to have been faithfull to the Ministery or trust which he reposed in them So here we see from first to last St Paul his true sense in this place is upon fidelity in the dispensers of the Mysteries of God and declares that no man but God can judge in that particular as being an office not appertaining to men but to God himself and unto him alone I must here advertise you that the Apostle in the next Verse declares that he useth his own and Apollo's name but figuratively thereby to represent to the Christians their faults in pretending to have one more light of grace than another or to be one better able than another to understand the Scriptures shewing it is a thing they ought as little to presume of in themselves as to censure whether he or Apollo did more faithfully perform the trust of God reposed in them by their ministery of dispensators of his Mysteries The Application 1. THe closing Advent season claimes a due regard in this dayes service so the prayer begins alluding unto that and ends besides with the accustomary reference to the Epistle of the day How like the out-cryes of the ancient Prophets is the stile of Holy Churches prayer to day They cryed out thus O Wisedome O Adonai O Root of Jesse O Key of David O Rising Sun O King of Nations O Emmanuel c. Come and save us thou that art our Lord God And we promising all these exclamations pray as above O Lord we beseech thee raise up thy power and with thy mighty vertue come away to our succour c. meaning all the power and all the Vertue included in those Attributes of Wisedome Adonai King and Saviour which the Prophets gave him as above 2. And least our sins do chase away the coming Jesus see this Epistle points us to the Priests of holy Church as to the Ministers of Christ and dispensers of the Mysteries of God Meaning of the Holy Sacraments that blot out sin and give us grace to bid our Saviour welcome 3. Hence we conclude the Pastors and the People are admonished to buckle to their severall Devoirs to day these in administring these in receiving of the Holy Sacraments and yet each having done his dutie neither to presume he hath done well enough but both referring of themselve to God his Judgements for the future and expecting his mercies for the present And to pray as Holy Church above appoints That our sinnes doe not retard the coming of his mercy towards us The Gospel Luke 3. ver 1. c. 1 ANd in the fifteenth year of the Empire of Tiberius Caesar Pontius Pilate being governour of Jewrie and Herod being Tetrarch of Galilee and Philip his brother Thtrarch of Iturea and the Countrie of Trachonitis and Lysanias Tetrarch of Abilina 2. Vnder the High Priests Annas and Caiphas the word of our Lord was made upon John the son of Zacharie in the desart 3. And he came into all the countrie of Jordan preaching the Baptism
words of the Prophet Isaias are above explicated in the Present tense for the reasons alledged yet they were fitly spoken in the future and prophetically too by Isaias when he foretold what Iohn should say to us in the present tense at his coming or else Isaias might begin with the Baptists voice to say of him prophetically I am the voice of one crying in the Wilderness prepare the wayes of our Lord. Though if in this future tense we allow even the Baptist also to speak it will not be unproper to him for however his principle Office be that of forerunner or pointer out of our Saviour to be the long expected Messias come at last now standing in the midst of them yet he may in a secondary respect be allowed the Title and Office of a Prophet also telling us for the future what will follow if we believe in Christ and cast our cares upon him namely that all shall goe well with us both in the outward and inward man since our Saviour avowes him to be a Prophet though not onely such but more his Fore-runner his humane Angel going before the face of his Divine Humanity to tell us that this Man-Divine Christ Iesus was true God as well as Man who came to redeem and save the whole world The Application 1. AS the Epistle so the Gospel to bids us prepare the way for Iesus his Nativity alluded to all over but clearly mentioned in the close of the Gospel while the Fore-runner of our Lord is set before our eyes to day giving Instructions how to demean our selves in the Sacrament of Confession whereunto the Baptisme of Pennance unto Remission of Sins preached by the Baptist here alludes 2. How that Confession shall be rightly made is told in the penultime or last Verse but one of the Gospell doe as the Exposition of it bids and it will be rightly done at least prepare for it now that you may performe it well at Christmas 3. Now that we may doe this see if the holy Church could frame a fitter Prayer than what She sayes to day If not Then say it as above and so confess there is an admirable Harmony between the Preaching and the Praying parts of holy Churches services On Sunday within the Octaves of the Nativity The Antiphon LUKE 1. ver 25. THe Child Jesus did profit in age and wisdome before God and Man Vers The word became Flesh Allelujah Resp And dwelt in us Alleluja NOte this Antiphon above being much to the same purpose with the 40. Verse of this Chapter which is the last in this dayes Gospel I doe not change it though differing a little from that because I find it thus appointed by the Church The Prayer OMnipotent Sempiternall God direct our actions in thy good pleasure that in the Name of thy Beloved Son we may deserve to abound in Good Works The Illustration HOly Church hath hitherto taught us in our Prayers to Court down God from Heaven and now he is come unto us little in Appearance great in Power an Infant amongst men see how this day our Prayer make Infants of us too such as know not which way to turn but are glad to beg directions of Almighty God that our Actions may be done according to his will and pleasure or rather that his holy will may be our actions for so the words of the Prayer import when we beg that God will direct our actions in his good pleasure as who should say if he so please they shall be well done nor can we indeed please him in our doings if he doe not please to doe well in us For our actions are more his than our own insomuch that when we love God or please him he rather loves and pleaseth himself in us than that we of our selves can love or please his Divine Majesty by any thing we are able to doe And thus we see how with our new-born Iesus we pray like Infants unable to help our selves and for this purpose both the Epistle and Gospel of the day run upon infantile actions the former shewing us that men by Adoption of Grace became new-born Babes of God who were before ancient slaves of the Devill and telling us further how infants must be nurtured and tutoured up even by their own servants as long as they are under age The latter relating how our infant Iesus was this day presented to his Heavenly Father in the Temple as the first gratefull present humane nature durst make a tender of to his offended Majesty in hope thereby to appease his wrath and so confident we are that this will be a present appeasing as well as pleasing that we have no sooner offered him up to his Heavenly Father then we grow bold not onely in the name of this his beloved you to beg we may doe well but presume to hope that in his Name we may even deserve to abound in good workes and with good reason because we acknowledge this infant of Time to be coequal and coeternal God with his Eternal Father and consequently what we doe in his Name since it is more principally done by him than us may merrit the reputation of being abundantly well done and thus we doing it also may deserve to abound in good Works even such as shall not want the happinesse of a plentiful reward of grace in this life and of glory in the next But so that all our desert or merit must be still in his Name as the Prayer professeth inconsequence to what was said upon the close of the two first Prayers in this Book The Epistle GAL. 4. ver 1. c. 1. ANd I say as long as the Heir is a little one he differeth nothing from a Servant although he be Lord of all 2. But is under Tutors and Governours untill the time limited of the Father 3. So we also when we were little ones were serving under the elements of the World 4. But when the fulness of time came God sent his Son made of a Woman made under the Law 5. That he might redeeme them that were under the Law that they might receive the Adoption of Sons 6. And because you are Sons God hath sent the Spirit of his Son into your hearts crying Abba Father 7. Therefore now he is not a servant but a a son and if a son an heir also by God The Explication 1. ST Paul had in the precedent Chapter told the Galathians that the old Law of the Jews was a Paedagogue or Usher rather to the new Law of Christ and so was to cease when the new Law came This doctrine he follows now here closely saying The Jewes that were the chosen people of God his first begotten as it were and so his heirs were by all the help of their Lawes but as little ones in the sight of God that is as children or infants wanting maturity of yeares and ripenesse of judgement to govern themselves and thus were nothing different from servants
the will to it Thus these Baptismal vertues make of children men hence the Graces of the Holy Ghost brook no delay but make an Infant Christian as soon the Masculine sacrifice as he is able to be the Sacrificant O Happy Christianity 2. And 't is great reason that new creatures should operate according to the newnesse of their Being Since therefore we are all by Baptism newly made to be children of God who were born slaves of the Divell it is but reason we embrace the Apostles counsell here and live reformed according to the newness of our mind who have new Beings given us such as propend to a conformity unto the will of God and renounce all self-will for ever As then that Renunciation was made last Sunday so this Conformation must be made from this day forward 3. Now least we should erre in this Conformity the close of this Epistle tells us how to scape that Errour by a sweet subordination unto one another such as may make up the mysticall body of Christ which Christians are as perfect as our naturall bodies bee whose every member is subordinate unto the Head whilst they remain subservient to one another and the Head commands them Learn therefore subject Christians to be dutifull to your superiours Learn Commandants to live your selves obedient to the great Commander of us all And that we may learn these Lessons let us pray as above The Gospel Luke 2. ver 42. c. 42. ANd when he was twelve years old they going up into Hierusalem according to the custome of the Festivall day 43. And having ended the dayes when they returned the child Jesus remained in Hierusalem and his parents knew it not 44. And thinking that he was in the companie they came a daies journey and sought him among their kinsfolk and acquaintance 45. And not finding him they returned into Hierusalem seeking him 46. And it came to passe after three dayes they found him in the Temple sitting in the midst of the Doctors hearing them and asking them 47. And all were astonished that heard him upon his wisdome and answers 48. And seeing him they wondered and his mother said to him Son Why hast thou so done to us Behold thy Father and I sorrowing did seek Thee 49. And he said unto them what is it that you sought mee did you not know that I must be about those things which are my Fathers 50. And they understood not the word that he spake unto them 51. And he went down with them and came to Nazareth and was subject to them And his mother kept all these words in her heart 52. And Jesus proceeded in wisedome and age and grace with God and men The Explication 42. THe twelve years of the childs age are here specified to shew that Jesus who was not onely Doctor of the heavenly chaire but even the wisedome it self of his heavenly Father lost no time in taking hold of all opportunities offered unto him to shew how great a zeal he came withall from heaven to teach and play the Doctors part on earth so as at the twelfth year of age childhood expires and youth begins in us to spell man at least if not to write it wholly Jesus who was as wise an Infant as a youth would not before the years of discretion assume unto himself the office of a Teacher but so soon as by course of nature he was held among men capable of discourse and judgement then he mixed himself mostestly amongst the Doctors in the Temple to shew he came not thither to play the boy as children at that age doe but the man assoon as men would look upon him for such who knew no more of him than what they saw They vvho are here said to goe up into Jerusalem according to the custome of the Festivall Day which was that of the Jewish Easter or Pascha were Jesus Mary and Joseph the childs Mother and Father as also with them wee may presume there went diverse others of their allies and kindred as the custome was for friends to goe in troops together to this celebrated Feast once a year from all neighbouring Countries that being the Metropolis or head City of the Jewes where the grand Synagogue was held 43. The dayes that are here mentioned to be ended were those seven daies which they held continually solemn as now the Catholick Church doth the Octaves of the greatest Feasts in the year consisting of eight solemn dayes to shew that as by seven of those dayes we consecrate all time to God as well that of work as that of rest so by the eighth day we offer up unto him here all the eternity wherein we hope to rest with him in glory after we have ended our laborious time upon earth and by this we give testimony that the Evangelicall Law is much more perfect than the Iewish in regard we labour here in hope of eternal rest and this by the prescript of our law whereas the Law of the Jewes was onely temporary and so prescribed order for no further than the time they lived here upon earth which whole time was mystically represented by their Feast of seven day s continuance and ours hath one day more to shew that we hope for a blessed Eternity after time is gone Here then the Story tells us the Parents of Iesus returned to Nazareth after the seven dayes of this solemnity were ended which yet was more than others spent in the celebrating this festivity for none were tyed to be there all the dayes thereof it being sufficient that they appeared once upon any one of the seven Festivall dayes but as the Devotion of this humane Trinity of Saints Iesus Mary and Ioseph was greater than that of others so they spent the whole time of this Festivity in continuall Prayer and Devotion which time being ended and Iesus having asked leave of his Parents to goe visite some of his kindred whilst they were getting things ready to return home again it was through God Almighties permission that he by this slight gat loose from his Parents making a very short stay with those he went to see nor did he make a false pretence though he concealed the other truth of his further meaning partly out of humility to cover his devotion which lead him to a longer stay in the Temple partly to let his parents see that however they were holy Saints yet they were not exempt from the infirmities of humane nature and so though not sinning therein were short of that home-care they ought to have had of keeping Jesus alwayes in their own eyes as thinking him safe enough for so short a time amongst his kindred hence it was they knew not that their charge stayd behinde them in Ierusalem 44 45. So thinking he had been with his kindred where they presum'd at night to find him but missing of him they returned a dayes journey back full of trouble and yet were carryed on with the comfort of hope
thence retrive that sweet connexion we are at a seeming losse of and shall conclude the key we want to open this connexion lyes hidden in the preamble of this Prayer in the very courtship we use when we call upon God as moderating at once heavenly and earthly Things that is making the earthly obedient to his will when he pleaseth to have them suitable to those that are heavenly Things Thus water by the heavenly will of God became this day wine thus all the materiall parts of this dayes service became as it were immateriall that is to say spirituall Thus the Temporall gifts mentioned in the Epistle of Prophecy Ministery Teaching Exhorting Ruling Mercy Love Joy Hope Patience Prayer Almes Hospitality Vnanimity and Humility are made spirituall in being ordained to a spirituall end by conformity in us earthly creatures to the will of our Creator which is effected by vertue of that moderation God hath set between heaven and earth when he so moderates humane minds and actions as they become subservient to his heavenly will Thus carnall pleasure between man and wife is in them limited by Gods holy grace moderating the excesse and intemperance in that pleasure which indeed carnall men commit but spirituall men avoid God moderating fleshly appetites in them so as they shall not intrench upon spirituall duties but give way to serving God though with abridgement of their own delights and this is done when Saint Pauls counsell is followed Let those that have wives be as if they had none 1 Cor. c. 7. v. 29. when God Almighties service so requires as when attending first to prayer they afterwards return to the same corporall pleasure they forsook to pray and this is called a spirituall continence even in the bed of incontinency not as that term imports sin but as it argues lesse perfection than virginity or absolute containing from all corporall commixture but further and more prodigiously yet this miraculous moderation between heavenly and earthly Things is seen when married people have liberty allowed them for their due and seasonable mutuall pleasures with one another and yet withall at the same instant they have a limit set them beyond which they must not passe but like to flowing Seas must ebbe just at their own bounds and fall to the low-water of a non-temptation towards any other carnall pleasure than between themselves Here I say if ever more eminently than other it doth appear God moderates heavenly and earthly Things at once for here is a kind of continuall miracle betwâ—en man and wife when Saint Pauls counsell is followed as above and since the Story of this dayes Gospel runs upon a marriage and the Prayer concludes with begging peace here is the grant of that petition when man and wife thus moderated live happily together not defrauding one another here is further that peace granted to all sorts of Christians when they apply the Temporall gifts recited in the Epistle to spirituall to heavenly ends and when in the prayer we say Grant us thy peace in our dayes it is no lesse than the peace of that God who at once moderates heavenly and earthly things which we demand Now if any would dive further into that peace let them look back to the seventh verse in the Epistle on the Third Sunday of Advent and to the Explication thereof There they shall see how ravishing how plentifull a peace it is And having thus wrought out our design of connexion here where it was so seeming hard at first but now to flowing from every part like honey from the Combes of this dayes Epistle and Gospel upon the bread of the Prayer let us never despair of as good successe all the year along nor can there be a sweeter Prayer than this thus glossed and in this sense reiterated as often as we find reluctancy in us between nature and grace For then thus to call upon God as moderatour between heaven and earth is to quell all rebellion of nature against grace which God grant we may doe by praying as above The Epistle ROM 12. ver 6. c. 6. ANd having gifts according to the grace that is given us different either prophecy according to the rule of Faith 7. Or ministery in ministring or he that teacheth in doctrine 8. He that exhorteth in exhorting he that giveth in simplicity he that ruleth in carefulnesse he that sheweth mercy in cheerfulnesse 9. Love without simulation hating evill cleaving to good 10. Loving the charity of the Brotherhood one toward another with honour preventing one another 11. In carefulnesse not sloathfull in spirit fervent serving our Lord. 12. Rejoycing in hope patient in tribulation instant in prayer 13. Communicating to the necessities of the Saints pursuing hospitality 14. Blesse them that persecute you Blesse and Curse not 15. To rejoyce with them that rejoyce to weep with them that weep 16. Being of one mind one towards another not minding high things but consenting to the humble The Explication IN regard there was reference made to this place on Sunday last concerning the rule of Faith therefore we shall here take hold of the last part of this verse first and having premised what is peculiarly necessary upon this which is hugely controversiall we shall then proceed in our wonted manner for expounding the rest of the Text. We are therefore here to note That by the Rule of Faith is not understood onely the Apostles Creed branched into twelve Articles as we have received it from age to age but a set Form of life delivered by word of mouth unto the People by the Apostles who had first held Counsels about it amongst themselves and stood resolved all their teaching should be conformable thereunto And this Rule is not as Hereticks will have it the holy Scripture written by the Apostles for this Rule was made long before any Scripture was written and it was never delivered abroad but by word of mouth in their preaching and exhortations so it is properly called the Apostolicall Tradition which is yet even unto this very day the Rule of Faith to the whole Catholick Church to the Decrees of all Councels to the sense or exposition of the holy Scriptures and consequently Scripture cannot be as Hereticks pretend the sole Rule of Faith though true it is there must be nothing nor is there any thing at all in holy Writ contrary to this Rule or Apostolicall Tradition which was much larger than the written Word and therefore it ever was and still is even to the sacred Word a kind of Rule or Test to try it by since before the Apostles issued out their written books of Scripture those books were examined by this Rule of Faith which was framed by common consent of the whole number or Colledge of Apostles whereas all of them did not write nay two onely of the twelve were Evangelists or Writers of the Gospels for Saint Mark and Saint Luke the other two Evangelists were not dignified with the stile
deal of Sin and though it be a greater effect to remit sin of the Soul than to cure diseases of the Body yet this will not be miraculous as the other was and consequently if we ask a favour with like zeal as they did beg a Miracle surely we may hope to have it and truly not to ask it is not onely not to deserve it but to confound our selves knowing it is but Ask and Have with so good so puissant so merciful a God And thus we see again there is a deeper sense latent in the Prayers of holy Church than lazy Souls that will not meditate it out can easily retrive but once found out must needs prove hugely consonant unto the Epistle and Gospell of the day since holy Church gives us this Prayer for an abstract of her doctrine in the Pulpit that so we may unanimously and with one mouth honour God and whom he sent our Lord and Saviour Iesus Christ The Epistle ROM 12. ver 17. c. 17. TO no man rendring evill for evill providing good things not onely before God but before Man 18. If it may be as much as in you holding peace with all men 19. Not revenging your selves my dearest but give place unto wrath for it is written Revenge to me I will reward saith our Lord. 20. But if thine enemy hunger give him meat if he thirst give him drink for doing this thou shalt heap coals of fire upon his head 21. Be not overcome of evill but overcome in good the evill The Explication 17. THis Epistle begins with the end of the seventeenth Verse the beginning being explicated in the last Sundayes Epistle nor is there any thing of moment can be said more than the Text it self speaks disswading us to render evill for evill but exhorting to provide as much good as we can to all men which Saint Bernard explicates as alluding to conversation and counselling it may be good both in the sight of God and Man saying We owe our Consciences to God our Fame to Man though perhaps this may be an addition of perfection to the former part of the Counsell as who should say we were not onely to avoid rendring evill for evill but rather instead of so doing to repay an ill turn done unto us with a good deed done by us to those that doe us hurt 18. And to that purpose the next Verse alludes saying If it may be for perhaps all the good we can doe will not gain upon our enemeis at least we must endeavour on our part there be no defect but that if possible we be at peace with all men as we desire God to be in peace with us and not to wage against us the warre of his wrath and fury since we offend him hourly and that infinitely more than any enemy we have can offend us 19. The Latine phrase is not defending your selves but because commonly the defense of Man against Man is made by way of Revenge therefore here the Apostles sense is extended thereunto as if what resistance we may make under the moderation of an unblamed defence must be sure to savour nothing of Revenge if we will hold the integrity of a good Christians reputation but instead of Revenging give place to wrath that is as some will have it to the Divine Wrath which is provoked in God against all those that doe injury to any one of his creatures as Princes take the wrong done to their Ministers for affronts to them and so revenge the same others say to be silent to depart when you are exasperated is to give place to wrath The last and best meaning is if your enemy begin to be angry oppose him not but let him go on till his anger be over and this as it is truly to give way or place to wrath so oftentimes it is the means to appease the fury of the Enemy who if resisted might increase in fury whereas not being opposed he cools within himself and so there is double way given both by the receiver of a wrong and by him that through the patience of the injured surceaseth to doe further injury by his further wrath and this way is sutable to that of our Saviour saying Luke 10. v. 29. If any strike your right cheek turn him your left rather than strike him again So this place thus given to wrath imports as much as a pardon given to our neighbours offence against us as we hope for pardon of our offences against God For thus we shall give way that the injurious words passing through our humane ears into our Christian hearts and there buried in the bowels of brotherly affection may die and be no more remembred than if they never had been heard by us or spoken by our enemy and lest we should say if neither I nor any friend else revenge my wrongs I shall never live in quiet therefore the Apostle knowing this was an objection obvious against him adds presently what is written Deut. 32. v. 35. Revenge to me I will reward as who should say Be not O Christians sollicitous how to redeeme your vexation for injuries unless you revenge them be it your part to receive all wrong patiently and leave it to God to right you let him revenge your quarrells he both can as omnipotent and will as just infallibly revenge your wrongs rather we should pitty those who fall into the hands of the living God for that is terrible as the Scripture sayes Heb. 10 3â— and wish they had not done us wrong to pull upon themselves so great a revenge 20 Contrariwise If thine enemy hunger give him meat c. which is advised Prov. 25. v. 21. as if we should like loving mothers feed our enemies as our children and the manner here expressed is like to that indeed which mothers or nurses use to little ones first giving them a bit of meat then a little drinke and so continue till the child covet no longer feeding and in very truth the fury of an enemie menacing our ruine is a kind of reducing himself from the state of a man to that of a little child void of reason stamping and staring for anger without cause since no man will anger a child This phrase of the Proverbs heaping coals of fire upon our enemies heads is variously explicated some thinke our patience to an implacable enemy makes him guilty of hell fire but this cannot stand with a sound sense if our patience bee to any such end though perhaps rather than be provoked our selves to impatience wee may permit our enemy to incurre that danger and so permissively cast coals of eternall fire upon his head The second sense therefore is better of those that say our patience causing an enemies blush is a kind of firing him with his own passions of fury and shame together but best of all they explicate this place who say we cast coals of charity upon an enemies head by our patient bearing his injuries and
storm at sea we are minded of the many dangers sin hath brought upon us so by the check Christ gave to his Apostles wee are taught in dangers to recurr to Faith in him who never failes to succour firm believers in their greatest tribulations 2. As in stormes your Marrinâ—â—s cast veâ—-board their heaviest lading and commodities to save the ship from sinking so in affliction at the least we shall doe well to lighten the vessels of our soulâ— by casting over-board those heavie burdens of most grievous sins which many times in calmnesse of our mindes we dare to carry with us 3. We may piously presume our Saviour never sleeps but unto souls remiss and then doth wake again immediatly when they affrighted at the danger they are in by the least close of his all-seeing eyes I doe call upon him for his succour by their instant prayer Such as the Church to day doth use to teach us how to pray in time of Danger On the Fifth Sunday after the EPIPHANIE The Antiphon MAT. 13. ver 30. GAther first the darnell and bind it together in bundles to be burnt but the wheat gather into my barne saith our Lord. Vers Let my prayer c. Resp Even as Incense c. The Prayer KEepe we beseech the O Lord thy family in continuall piety that resting on the onely hope of heavenly grace it may ever by thy protection be defended The Illustration SEe how this day we are taught to pray as in the Epistle and Gospel we are taught to doe to live all together as one family of God in continual piety resting on the onely hope of heavenly grace for our protection and defence Yes thus to day we pray and to this purpose holy Church doth this day preach for the whole Epistle is upon uniting us all in one affection towards another and exhorting us that whatsoever we doe in word or work all things be done in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ And the Gospel commanding in the Parable of Corne and Cockle that even under pretence of good and bad we make no separation amongst our selves but live and continue lovingly together leaving it to God the master of the family to sever what he likes not from that which pleaseth his divine majestie and this to shew how perfectly we must be all as one amongst our selves all in continuall piety all resting on the hope of heavenly grace all relying upon God to protect and defend us not squaring out our own courses but resting in that which is appointed us by the Master of our family And see while in this prayer Holy Church calleth us all one family we ought to live in peace with all the world and not to graspe from our neighbour as if he and we were of two houses but to esteem him as a domesticke with us as one that eares at the same table of Christ who feeds us commonly with heavenly grace and oftentimes with his own sacred body and bloud the fountaine of grace it self O could we once come to doe as in this prayer we beg we may what an united family of Christians should we be How of divers members should we grow into one perfect body each proportioned to the will and pleasure of our head Christ Jesus How ill doe we then fall into divisions as if our hands would cut off our armes about disputes of divers Interests whereas all our relation is to one master all our hope of preferment must come from him and that hope must be radicated in the proportion of such heavenly grace as he pleaseth to give us so if in him our hopes be rightly fixed they wil bring us all to one happy end he in whom wâ— hope protecting and defending us so much the better by how much the more our hope in him is the firmer and by how much the lesse we are solcitous who neither can do nor with so well unto our selves as God doth for us The Epistle COL 3. ver 12. c. 12. PVt ye on therefore as the Elect of God holy and beloved the bowells of mercy benignity humility modesty patience 13 Supporting one another and pardoning one another if any have a quarrell against any man as also our Lord hath pardoned us so you also 14. But above all these things have Charity which is the band of perfection 15 And let the peace of Christ exult in your hearts wherein also you are called in one body and be thankful 16. Let the word of Christ dwell in you abundantly in all wisdome teaching and admonishing your own selves with psalmes hymnes and spiritual Canticles in grace singing in your hearts to God 17. All whatsoever you doe in word or work all things in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ giving thanks to God and the Father by him The Explication 12. THE Apostle began this Chapter with telling the Colossians that as they were dead in Christ whilst Christ dyed for them so if they meant to rise with Christ from the grave of their sin they must look upward and seek from hence forward such things as were to be found in heaven not what was common upon earth as before they had done and when he had bid them Cast off the old man Colos 3. vers 9. now in this verse he begins to tell them how to vest themselves anew with ornaments fit for the spiritual and inward man and that they may doe this with more alacrity the Apostle bids them doe it under the confidence that they are now the elect and chosen of God his holy and beloved people mâ—de so by the lavacrum or cleansing of his sacred bloud shed for them and least they might doubt of this he had in the immediate verses before told them they were now in Christ a new creature that though formerly the Jewes were the onely favourites and chosen people of God yet in Christ both Jewes and Gentiles Slave or Free-man all were alike if they did all equally believe in Jesus the Messias and Saviour of them all who had chosen them not onely to Grace but to Glory and this incouragement premised he bids them now put on the bowels of mercy benignity humility modesty patience Virtues not heard of among the Iewes who had hardned their hearts against God who had inhumanely butchered his sacred Sonne who proudly aymed at nothing but worldly pompe who immodestly reviled Iesus to his face who like furies would have stoned and at last tore in pieces their Lord and Saviour so far thâ—y were from patient hearing him tell them Truth not were the Gentiles or Barbarians men of any Vertue at all but either superstitious or savage people so these Colossians being people of no better extract by nature hee had need tell them what Bowels what affections of heart they were by Grace at least to have what inward Vertues what outward deportment 13. As for example supporting one another a thing unheard of by those who aimed at nothing more than
in Evang. upon these words of S. Luke Chap. 21. v. 9. When you hear of warrs and seditions be not troubled at such evils because sayes hee many evils must here fore-run that they may put us in minde of evills without end and so make us avoid Temporary lest we plunge our selves into eternall evils confiding in his that wee serve a God who alâ—ne is able to cull good out of evill 30. Hence therefore the Master bids his men let the weeds grow up with the corn untill harvest let the bad men live together with the good till the day of judgement which is the true harvest indeed that brings home the whole crop of nature rectified by grace into the barn of glorie We are here to note that though formerly the word of God were called the seed or good wheat yet here the just are called by the same name as if the cause weâ—e â—xpressed by the effect for Saints are indeed the fruitfull effects of the Gospel the holy word of God On the other side sinners are the ill seed or cockle in this place specified and by the Reapers we may account are here meant the Angels that are to summon all the world to Judgement and in that summons to sever the cockle from the corn the wicked from the just binding up these in bundles as so many piles of fuell for hell-fire and ranging those as stacks of corn fit to be made bread of life for the heavenly Table of Almighty God The Application 1. SInce it is by his protecting Grace wee must hope whilst we are asleep to bee defended from the enemie who then doth machinate our mischief let it be our parts while we are awake not to sow any cockle our selves of ill manners if not of false doctrine in the field of our soules for then no marvell if while we sleep this ill seed sown by us grow up and choak the good corn sowed in our hearts by the seeds-men of holy Church the Pastors of our souls 2. Since wee are not able to avoid the alternate rest of night after a toylesome day let us at least in the day time stand upon a close guard and be sure not to sleep that is not to loose the presence of Almighty God and fall into the trance of transitory pleasures such as pash us in pieces against the Rocks of sin and under pretence of yeelding us a present momentary dâ—light purchase us eternall torments 3. Since we cannot tell even when we doe best whether we deserve love or hatred we have great reason to fear lest we may be separated at the latter day from the blessed as Cockle sit for nothing but hell fire and out of that religious fear let us work out our salvation with trembling by planting in our souls the roots and seeds of vertues and for better doing it Let us pray to day with Holy Church as above to be secured from the danger of damnation by our sole hope in the protecting and saving grace of Jesus Christ our Lord. On the sixth Sunday after the EPIPHANY The Antiphon MAT. 13. ver 33. THE kingdome of heaven is like to leaven which a woman tooke and hid in three measures of meale untill the whole was leavened Vers Let my prayer c. Resp Even as Incense c. The Prayer GRant we beseech thee Almighty God that alwaies meditating those things which are reasonable we may both in our words and deeds doe what is pleasing unto Thee The Illustration I Have met with some prodigious wits of both sexes who conferring with me about this my designe when it was in hand would laughing say I might perhaps as well adjust this Prayer to the Epistle and Gospel of the day as I should be able to perswade them it was other than a meere paradox and if it were possible for men alwaies to meditate upon reasonable things considering how irrationally all the world was commonly distracted so as friends they advised me if I would goe on to change at least this Prayer and put some other in the place of it lesse paradoxicall in it self and more suiteable than this could be either to the Epistle or Gospel of the day which they read over and over before they spent this judgement upon me and my designe To these I answered pleasantly as me thought they spake to me though I perceived they were serious too That if they observed the Gospel it was all Parabolicall and therefore admit that were true they said it was not unsuiteable on this day to have a Prayer Paradoxicall since Parables and Paradoxes were of near allyance but further let me now ask all the world if it be not reasonable the Church should pray most fervently for that which is most hard to doe as it seemes men account it the hardest thing in the world alwaies to meditate on reasonable things and yet the harder this is to doe the more necessary it is to pray for grace at least to enable us thereunto since even â—hese prodigious wits would think a man unmannerly that should tell them th y were irrationall soules at any time and yet what difference there is between being irrationall and thinking and doing for the most part unreasonable things I doe not well know sure I am reason alwaies dictates to doe well and as sure I am that a sinne is an irrationall act as it is certainely a thing ill done nay if I had said every sinne were so farre forth against nature as it is against reason I think I should not exceed verity in that assertion and since all that men doe like men they premeditate therefore with reason we pray this day least our actions should prove unnaturall that our meditations or thoughts should be rational for none other are connaturall to men as men though often they creep upon us and so render our actions more bestiall than rationall more unnaturall than naturall To conclude though many of our actions passe among men as rationall which yet are not so indeed therefore we pray to day that really they may be so since God is not deceiveable as man is and since no unreasonable thought or deed can passe with him for reason or be pleasing to him see then if it be not very fitting to pray that corrupted Nature may by Grace be elevated to the operations suiting Nature in her best rectitude when even so she is crooked enough in the sight of God who is Rectitude Essentiall But least while we condescend to satisfie curiosity we forget our maine designe let us see how this Prayer suits indeed with the other parts of this daies service which with the Epistle it seemes to doe whilest petitioning Reason to be the guide of all our actions it puts us in mind of a rationall persisting to doe well since by Gods grace we are called with the Thessalonians to the profession of the same faith which this daies Epistle from first to last exhorts them to continue in maugre
the intervening persecutions that may divert them from it And look what was then said to them for perseverance both in faith and good workes is also to day by holy Church applied to us in this Prayer that beggs us grace ever to think and consequently alwaies to doe well that is reasonable things because none else can be pleasing to Almighty God It remaines onely to shew how this Prayer does also exhaust the Gospel whereunto it is the better suiting if it be as some witts will have it paradoxicall since that is wholly parabolicall yet nothing lesse rationall than is the prayer petitioning reason in all we think or doe for who can deny but the little mustard-seed of Gods holy word is hugely rationall or who can say but the deeper it falls into the earthly hearts of men the faster root it takes growes the stronger up and brings the riper fruit because as well the reason of it as the grace is hugely convincing Againe who can deny but the leaven of the same word hidden in our Soules shall with reason operate upon the whole mass of our bodies and give them a taste thereof harsh perhaps to the corrupted pallats of worldly men but delitious to the relish of God and his holy Angels who delight to taste of such leavened loaves as we call sower when they esteeme them sweet and such are Converts from the Court who are by the leaven of Gods holy word become Princes to Heaven though seeming Clownes to Earth Thus mystically have we adjusted the parabolicall Gospel to the paradoxicall Prayer of this day if wits will have it to be a paradox that men should alwaies meditate on rational things which yet when they do not they cease to be men I will not say what might follow that they become beasts The Epistle 1 THES 1. v. 2. c. 2. WE give thanks to God alwaies for all you making a memory of you in our prayers without intermission 3. Mindfull of the work of your Faith and labour and of the Charity and of the enduring of the hope of our Lord Jesus Christ before God and our Father 4. Knowing Brethren beloved of God your Election 5. That our Gospel hath not been to you in word onely but in power and the holy Ghost and in much fullnesse as you know what manner of men we have been among you for your sakes 6. And you became followers of us and of our Lord receiving the word in much tribulation with joy of the holy Ghost 7. So that ye were made a pattern to all that believe in Macedonia and in Achaia 8. For from you was bruited the word of our Lord not onely in Macedonia and in Achaia but in every place your faith which is to God-ward is proceeded so that it is not necessary for us to speak any thing 9. For they themselves report of us what manner of entering we had to you and how you turned to God from Idols to serve the living and true God 10. And to expect his Sonne from heaven whom he raised up from the dead Jesus who hath delivered us from the wrath to come The Explication 2. THe Apostle speaks not here in the plurall number of himself as Princes and great Persons but in a quite contrary way derogates from himself rather by attributing his own writings joyntly to other his associates and companions as namely here he doth in the first verse of this Epiâ—â—le specifie both Sylvanus and Timothy as if he had no more share in this than they and as if what ere he writ they did suggâ—st or dictate to him as much thereof as came from his own much deeper Spirit an excellent example for all Writers to fellow and attribute their works to their helpers in them rather than to themselves alone besides Sylvanus being Bishop of the Thessalonians there was great reason for the Apostle to consult him in all his proceedings amongst his own Diocesans In their own Bishops name therefore and in his companions who went the circuite with him Saint Timothy whom he had made Bishop of Ephesus the Apostle sayes We give thanks to God for the Conversion of you Thessalonians in our incessant Prayers for your preservation in the Faith of Christ and that by your example others may receive the like Faith and be alike converted 3. Here as in almost all other places of holy Writ we are to note the Apostle joynes good Works with Faith to make it recommendable and availing lest Hereticks should as yet wilfully thâ—y doe mistake and think Faith alone without gooâ— Wâ—â—ks werâ— saving whereas it is the active and laborious Faith that brings us to Heaven The Faith which is continually working by Charity that is to doing good deeds for lest they should mistake and think he meant their Faith was onely the Work of God which as it is a gift indeed is true see how immediately he illustrates his own other meaning to the sense above of operative Faith when he addes to the works of their Faith the labor of their Charity as who should say the sole habit of Faith is not enough to those who are able to produce acts thereof and those acts of Faith are then best when accompanyed with deeds of Charity giving life to Faith which without good Works were a dead habit nothing at all availing us But the Apostle proceeds yet further and to make his sense full of perfection adds also to their Faith and Charity which he took speciall notice of their hope in God which made them endure persecution for their Faith and indeed in this Verse he hath artificially and solidly too given the three fittest Epithetes to these three Theologicall Vertues that could be whilst he takes notice of their working Faith their laborious Charity their susteinning Hope whence Saint Chrysostome and others note the Apostle commends not Faith without Workes in the acts thereof nor Charity without Paines in Almes towards the Poor and Sickly nor Hope without Patience or suffering in persecution for Justice And not without reason doth the Apostle here take notice of these three Vertues in the Thessalonians in regard Jason a Thessalonian by name was summoned to the Tribunall of publike Justice as we read Acts 17. ver 6. for having concurred to Saint Pauls escape from his persecutours as also diverse othâ—r Thessalonians were molested both by the Jewes and Gentiles for their becoming Christians and in this the Apostle commends the work of their Faith for their paines in relieving the Apostles and cherishing all the poor Christians they met with hence he commends their laborious Charity their imprisonment patiently endured for their Religion their sustaining Hope that gave them courage to endure temporall losses in expectation of eternall rewards which he calls the hope of our Lord Jesus Christ that is to say the hope of what Jesus Christ brought us news of eternall Glory For before he came most men lived and dyed like Beasts without regard to any
supernaturall propensions by hearing the most elevating Word of God Symbolically Saint Hilary sayes This leaven of the Gospell was hid in the three measures of meal the Law the Psalmes and the Prophets and now appears in the Trinity of the three Theologicall Vertues Faith Hope and Charity or as others will have it to the three sorts of Believers Beginners Proficients and Perfect who bring forth loaves of fruit swollen to these correspondent proportions of Thirty Sixty or an Hundred fold increase of bigness Allegorically Saint Bernard makes the wombe of the Blessed Virgin Mother of Christ to be the leaven of the Hypostaticall union having a seasoning influence into the three parts of Christ his Soul his Body his Divinity uniting them all in one Person or one loaf made of these three measures of meal as above Anagogically Caesarius Dial. 4. Sayes the woman is the divine wisdome or deity of Christ the three measures oâ— meal are all humane natures death and hell and the leaven Christs humanity hid in his grave and in hell whither his humane soul went with his deity seasoning all mankind into the blessed condition of a resurrection from death and purgatory to life eternall in everlasting glory 34 35. There is no more mystery in these two verses than litterally they sound onely this we may observe that as all the whole 77 Psalme of David is a kind of parabolicall or aenigmaticall grave sententious speech because in that psalme he speakes prophetically of this manner of parabolicall speech of Christ therefore to verifie that prophesie Christ here speakes both in grave and truely parabolicall senses though David have much of litterall sence in his said psalme as where he recounts the Benefits God bestowed on the Synagogue or children of Israel in their forty years march with Moses through the red sea and the desert from Aegypt to Canaan the land of promise yet S. Hierome saies that David the type of Christ speakes there mystically as in Christs person promising to his Church infinite blessings namely to man passing through the red sea of his passion and through the desert of this world into the heavenly Canaan or promised land of Glory And for that purpose Christ here ends his parabolical discourse with this second verse of that 77 Psalme of the royall Prophet David I will open my mouth in parables I will utter things hidden from the foundation of the world The Application 1. AS it was reason Christ should speak in Parables to verifie what was prophecied of him according to the last Verse in this Gospell so with those Parables he is said with great reason doubtless To utter things hidden from the foundation of the World we may suppose the hidden Mysteries of the Blessed Trinity and of the Incarnation in particular and in generall the workes of Faith whereof Saint Paul in this dayes Epistle mindes the Thessalonians and in them all after Believers For it was indeed the main business our Saviour had to doe upon Earth to plant a Faith in mens mindes whereby they might work out their salvation Hope and Charity assisting the said work of Faith as Saint Paul above cited sayes 2. As it was reason Christ should verifie the Prophets sayings of him so was it reason he should draw the Ignorant multitude to a belief of the greatest Mysteries of Faith by degrees as he did in first speaking Parables and then expounding of them by his Apostles at least in so rationall a way that they easily took all he said for good when they had heard good sense to be wrapt up in his Parabolicall speeches which at first they understood not so what seemed to be spoken to blind their understandings was indeed intended to open them and thus did Christ reasonably condescend when he seemed most unreasonably to transcend the capacities of the People 3. As the Mustard seed of Divine Faith and the leaven of Christian Doctrine have seasoned the whole world with Christianity so is it great reason they being both received into our hearts should in such sort season the little world we are within our selves that all our actions may be answerable to those hidden roots of Religion planted in our hearts as then they will bee when our thoughts are alwayes meditating upon those Christian Duties which in reason we are alwayes bound unto And that we may doe this the Church reasonably prayes to day as above On SEPTUAGESIMA Sunday The Antiphon MAT. 20. ver 6. THe housholder said unto his workmen What stand you here all the day idle but they answering said Because no man hath hired us Goe ye also into my Vineyard and what shall be just I will give you Vers Let my prayer c. Resp Even as Incense c. The Prayer VVEe beseech thee O Lord clemently to hear the Prayers of thy People that we who for our sinnes are justly punished for the Glory of thy Name may be mercifully delivered The Illustration WEe were in the fourth Sunday after the Epiphany taught to pray much to this purpose but we must not think much of repeating the same Prayer when we dayly repeat the same Sins which are the cause of our increased punishments yet we shall finde that danger was there the punishment we deprecated here it is labour either in the race we are by the Epistle bid to run or in the paines the Gospell calls us too in the Vineyard of Christ as if we were hereby given to understand our life in this world is a continuall toil and labour to deserve an eternall rest in the next But further we are to note this Prayer is particularly proper to this day not onely as referring literally in a manner to the Epistle and Gospell but even to the whole Series of holy Churches service upon this Septuagesima Sunday when the Priest in his office is bid begin the story of Genesis thereby to minde us we should from this day begin to serve God as if we were but newly created for that purpose and yet lest we should forget that we were no sooner created than we had by sin annihilated as it were our selves and lost our right of return to that All-being the Creator of Heaven and Earth from whence we came out of our nothing See the Prayer of this Day puts us in minde of our degenerating from God by Sin But withall of our return to him by Repentance if we cooperate with his holy Grace who is ever more ready to give than we are to ask him Pardon Now in regard the Epistle of this day falls from the simile between a Christians life and those who runn a race and mindes us of the Children of Israels going out of Aegypt into the Land of promise of the Cloud and of the Red Sea wherein they were by Moses as it were Baptized as also the Rock which followed them to quench their Thirst and of the Manna from Heaven to be their Food we must observe that this Story
duties The Gospel MAT. 20. ver 1 c. 1. THe Kingdom of heaven is like to a man that is an housholder which went forth early in the morning to hire workmen into his vineyard 2. And having made covenant with the workmen for a penny a day he sent them into his vineyard 3. And going forth about the third hour hee saw others standing in the market place idle 4. And he said unto them Go you also into the vineyard and that which shall be just I will give you 5. And they went their way And again hee went forth about the sixth and the ninth hour and did likewise 6. But about the eleventh hour hee weâ— forth and found other standing and he saith to them What stand you here all the day idle 7. They say unto him because no man hath hired us He saith to them Go you also into the vineyard 8 And when evening was come the Lord of the vineyard saith to his Bailiffe Call the workmen and pay them their hire beginning from the last even to the first 9. Therefore when they were come that came about the eleventh hour they received every one a penny 10. But when the first also came they thought that they should receive more and they also received every one a penny 11. And receiving it they murmured against the good-man of the house 12. Saying These last have continued one hour and thou hast made them equall to us that have born the burden of the day and the heats 13. But he answering said to one of them Friend I doe thee no wrong didst thou not covenant with mee for a penny 14. Take that is thine and goe I will also give to this last even as to thee also 15. Or is it not lawfull for mee to doe that I will Is thine eie naught because I am good 16. So shall the last be first and the first last for many bee called but few elected The Explication 1. WHen it is said the kingdome of heaven is like a man doing as this Parable relates the meaning is that in heaven it is done as here by such a man is said to be done though true it is this alludes also to the great ones in this world Let us therefore state the Parable thus By the Vineyard is meant the Church by the market the world by those called at the first the third and sixth hour are understood the Jews signfied in their forefathers Abraham Jacob and Moses called to Gods service in that sort as hee was pleased to lay his commands upon his Church or Synagogue rather by the last called are signified the Gentiles in their primitiae or first fruits the holy Apostles who were made the Pillars and Props of the Christian Church By the evening is meant the day of Judgement when every one shall receive his hire according to his labours in the Church of Christ that is the penny which was promised unto him for his pains and this penny is eternall glory to the blessed deserving well though withall by the word penny is understood pence of severall coins or rather values that is to say monie called a penny at pleasure though worth perhaps much more Again we are to note the greater reward is not given for the the greater pains but for the greater grace or greater co-operation with equall grace and according to this sense by the first are understood the blessed or saved souls by the last the accursed or damned men and Angels but divers of the Fathers explicate this Parable thus As by the first made last to understand those who have been longest Catholikes but making lesse use of time and grace than those who are later called to the Catholike Faith and yet make more profit of their little time and more use perhaps of their lesse grace than others have done So then the penny which is heaven is equally divided to each each being saved and none damned though the last called have the greater glory which makes no essentiall difference in the Beatitude common to them all that is in their genericall or objective bliss which consists in seeing God the Beatifying object whom all shall see though there shall be a difference in their more or lesse cleerly seeing this blissefull Object or Objective blisse according to their more or lesse Merit or Co-operation with the Grace given unto them in this life So though they have an equality of a most happy eternity yet shall they not be equally happy by equality of glory in that eternity of happinesse and in this sense the parts of the parable are thus to be applyed That by the day we understand the whole course of this world by the severall houres of this day we understand the particular ages thereof by the first hour from Adam to Noe by the next from Noe to Abraham by the third from Abraham to Moses by the sixth from Moses to Christ by the eleventh or last from Christ to the day of doom Thus S. Chrysostome and others Or by the day may be meant the whole time of each mans life by the severall hours his Infancie youth virility old age and decrepicie Thus S. Hierome and others But the fullest sense and that which best exhausts the whole Parable is to joyn all these together so what falls short in one will come home and be supplyed by the other for though here S. Chrysostomes enumeration of parts in the Parable seem different from S. Hieromes yet they both agree in the sense of the equall penny given to first and la t whereas the former enumeration of these parts casteth out the last from all reward and supposeth them damned souls so there are but two senses in three Enumerations of parts to this Parable And this long Preamble in the first Verse will ease us much in the explication of all the rest and shorten what is to be said upon them 2. The covenant here made with the Workmen for a pennie is the promise God makes of heaven to those that live here in the Church of Christ which is called his Vineyard according to the Apostolicall Rule of Faith including good works and co-operation with the grace of God answerable to the proportion thereof given unto us 3. The Romans first and then the Jewes under them divided as well the day as the night into twelve parts by four equall divisions answerable to their four watches or changes of their Guards The first hour of the day when the first guard mounted was from Sun-rising The third was three hours after The sixth six hours after that which was noon-day The ninth was three hours after noon The last was at Sun-setting and to these houres allude what is here said of the severall hours of mens being called to the vineyard of Christ By those who were found standing idle are meant remiss soules who make it not their studie or labour to gain heaven but expect it should be given them gratis 4. Observe here
instance than S. Paul did or in a case more important than was his perpetuall flaile of the flesh wherewith the devill did continuall buffet him so we asking the same protection this day when the Church hath set us a sowing a labovring in her Vineyard doe ask it most seasonably and most properly even in the sence of that designe I now prosecute in adjusting the Prayers to the Epistls and the Gospells of the day The Epistle 2 COR. 11. v. 19. c. CAP. 12. vers 1. c. 19. YOu doe gladly suffer the foolish whereas your selves are wise 20. For you suffer if a man bring you into servitude if a man devoure if a man take if a man be extolled if a man strike you on the face 21. I speak according to dishonour as though we had been weak in this part wherein any man dare I speak foolishly I dare also 22. They are Hebrews and I. They are Israelites and I. They are the seed of Abraham and I. 23. They are the ministers of Christ and I. I speak as one scarce wise more I in many moe labours in prisons more abundantly in stripes above measure in deaths often 24. Of the Jewes five times did I receive fourty save one 25. Thrice was I beaten with rods once I was stoned thrice I suffered shipwrack night and day have I been in the depth of the sea 26. In journying often perils of waters perils of theeves perils of my nation perils of Gentiles perils in the City perils in the wildernesse perils in the sea perils among false Brethren 27. In labour and misery in much watchings in hunger and thirst in fastings often in cold and nakednesse 28. Beside those things which are outwardly may daily instance the carefullnesse of all Churches 29. Who is weak and I am not weak who is scandalized and I am not burnt 30. If I must glory I will glory of the things that concerne my infirmity 31. The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who is blessed for ever knoweth that I lye not 32. At Damascus the governour of the nation under Aretas the king kept the city of the Damascens for to apprehend me 33. And through the window in a basket was I let down by the wall and so escaped his hands CHAP. 12. vers 1. 1. IF I must glory it is not expedient indeed but I will come to the visions and revelations of our Lord. 2. I know a man in Christ above fourteen years agoe whether in the body I know not or out of the body I know not God doth know such a one rapt even to the third heaven 3. And I know such a man whether in the body or out of the body I know not God doth know that he was rapt into Paradise and heard secret words which it is not lawful for man to speak 4. For such a one I will glory but for my self I will glory nothing saving in mine infirmities 5. For and if I will glory I shall not be foolish for I shall say truth 6. But I spare least any man should esteem me above that which he seeth in me or heareth any thing of me 7. And least the greatnesse of revelations might extoll me there was given me a pricke of my flesh an Angel of Satan to buffet me 8. For the which thing thrise I besought our Lord that it might depart from me 9. And he said to me My Grace sufficeth thee for power is perfected in infirmity 10. Gladly therefore will I glory in mine infirmity that the power of Christ may dwell in me The Explication 19. NOte the Apostle in the beginning of this Chapter tells the Corinthians v. 3. as Eve was seduced into a curiosity by the subtility of the Serpent from her innate simplicity and obedience so by these false Apostles they are drawn being tickled in the eares with novelties of doctrine to a curiosity of knowing and imbracing it and consequently fall from their simplicity and obedience to Christ Note v. 7. he professeth to have preached gratis without taking by way of taxe any thing from the Corinthians but supplying himself of means from Macedonia rather than he would burthen them This he alludes to v. 20. if any take as false Apostles did Note v. 16. of this Chapter he desires them to beare with the folly of his now pretended nay intended boasting to shew how they were fooled by their false Apostles in that way and tels them v. 15. he is not in his labours interiour to the greatest of those boasting Apostles and some expositors understand that verse of the reall Apostles and of his non-inferiority even unto Peter in his paines but not in his Power as heretickes wrest it to import contrary to the true meaning of Paul and sense of the whole Catholick Church Again ver 13. he bids them beware of the crafty workers transfiguring themselves into Apostles of Christ as Satan did himself into an Angell of light ver 14. Note lastly ver â—8 he professeth as others glory according to the flesh that is either of their birth or naturall abilities so he will now boast himself of his good parts and labours which he declareth is not according to the Spirit of God ver 17. nay he confesseth it is enough to make him seeme a fool but he useth this way onely to retort folly on them who are fooled by false Apostles with this Art For we are to note Saint Paul had huge opposition against him by these Silver-tongued men and persons of quality who partly by their power with Friends partly by their transcendent Eloquence did much mischief amongst the Faithfull so that the Apostle here was fain to use part of his enemies Arts by vaunting himself to try if that might keep the faithfull from being seduced by such slights and who can deny but a pious slight is more avouchable than an impious one so in this Verse he partly jeers partly flatters as who should say You are wise in Christ and yet let the fools his enemies carry you away from him 20. It was indeed notorious the thraldome which these false Apostles brought their adhaerents into by attendance on them as little Gods by exhausting their estates in maintaining these mens prides which he calls devouring them and buffeting them on the face with contumelious reproaching them of their faults in the open hearing of others 21. In this verse the Apostle pretends he can if it please him act the tyrannicall part also take from them as much as others doe extoll himself as high as others doe and depresse them as much as any dares to doe it and this kinde of speech he professeth to be ignoble dishonourable nay foolish yet some others prevail by such means therefore he gives himself leave to act that part awhile 22. In this Verse he vaunts to be of the Hebrews Race as well as others who boasted of it where we are to note the Caldeans by passing the River Euphrates were
Corn wants no inward cause of prospering but is outwardly hindred by being choaked or kept down with over growing bryars and thorns that hinder the rising thereof Now though our Saviour best knew how to explicate his own meaning and hath declared that by these Thornes he means Riches which prick the Soules of those that possesse them in their rising up to acts of love towards God and so force them down again to the love of earthly things yet Saint Gregory found this exposition so beyond his expectation of this Text that he admiring sayes If he had thus expounded it the world would not have believed him to attinge the true sense thereof as being possessed what they handle and hugge dayly sn their armes their wealth and riches cannot prick nor gall them yet now our Saviour sayes they doe so we must believe it and truly so it is for what more ordinary than to see the high and mighty men of the world mighty I mean in wealth abject and lowe in their growth upwards to Heaven to see them still pricking down their rising Souls and under the title of riches we may here understand honours pleasures pastimes of the vain licentious and idle people of the world whose own conscience tells them they doe ill in following such courses as yet they will not leave 8. 15. By the good ground is here understood a tender Conscience which makes a Religion of each action and so hearing Gods Word first labours to understand it then puts in execution the Doctrine thereof and thereby brings forth fruits of all sorts of Vertue and good Works nay brings forth indeed an hundred fold or more according to the proportion and measure of grace received from Almighty God but we are here to observe the reduplicative speech of a good and a very good heart that is to say a heart illuminated with Faith but working by Charity or as Albertus will have it Good by being free from Sin very good by being in all things conformabled to the Will of God or as Saint Bonaventure sayes Good by verity or rectitude in the understanding very good by rectitude in the affections or as Saint Augustine will have it Good by loving our neighbour as our selves very good by loving God above all things saying and they properly retaine the Word as the Blessed Virgin did and bring forth the fruit thereof in patience that is by bearing with unperturbed minds the perturbations of this world And though S. Luke do not mention the quantities of fruits produced yet S. Matthew chap. 13 ver 23. speaks of the Thirty fold the sixty fold and the hundred fold fruit of those who hear the Word of God as they ought to doe meaning it makes some good men others better others best of all according to the respective measures of dispositions in their Souls answerable to their severall proportions of Grace and co-operations therewith or if we will have these three-fold quantities all in one Soul then say we bring forth Thirty when we think well Sixty when we speak well an hundred fold when we do well or when we begin to be vertuous profit therein and at last attain to the perfection of vertue till we arrive at the top of all Vertues or when we observe not onely Gods Commandements but his Counsells too and at last his transcendent charity being ready to die his Martyrs in requitall of his dying our Saviour and so make degrees and steps in our own hearts up to Heaven as the Royall Prophet sayes he did Psal 83. Making Ascents in his heart by rising up towards Heaven from Vertue to Vertue The Application 1. THis Parable shewes how many wayes we may labour in vain by sowing the grounds we have plowed up and be still in danger lest the Devill reap what we have sown namely that beside the way When for company sake we goe to Church not for Devotion But to see and to be seen rather than to hear the VVord of God 2. That on the Rock when out of fear of Parents anger or the punishments of Magistrates we are forced to Church and hearing there the VVord must needs with open hearts receive it in being of it self sâ— forceable as to peirce the very stones but then because we hear it by compulsion every difficulty nature frames against Grace shuts up our hearts again and will not let it in to take good rooting there 3. That on the thorny ground when rich men hear the VVord of God for custome or for curiosity to recreate and not to edifie to censure rather than conâ—orm to what they hear No marvell thâ—n if to prevent the danger of our going to the Devills Chappell even in the Church of God Our holy Mother pray to Day as above for the best seeds-mans protection against so many dangers hoping by so praying to render our hearts such as the Gospell closeth with to Day On QUINQUAGESIMA Sunday The Antiphon LUKE 18. ver 40. ANd Jesus staying commanded the blinde man to be brought unto him what wilt thou that I do to thee O Lord that I may see and Jesus said to him Look up thy Faith hath made thee safe and he forthwith did see and followed magnifying God Vers Let my prayer c. Resp Even as Incense c. The Prayer O Lord we beseech thee hear clemently our Prayers and being loosened from the fetters of our sins keep us from all adversity The Illustration NO marvell if many of my friends told me here the common place of this Prayer would not easily be made particularly proper to our design of a sweet connexion between that prayer and the other parts of this days service for see in the Epistle charity in the Gospel faith insisted on whereas in the Prayer neither of these vertues are mentioned What remedy truly none but by applying mystically to our selves that now which was actually done when our Saviour lived and by remembring that as the propagation of faith amongst Infidels was the chief work of Christ so the conservation and augmentation of charity is the chief thing Christians have to doe for as Faith was the Basis or foundation of the Church whilest it was a building so charity must bee the covering and top thereof now it is built What wonder then while the Gospel tells us how Christ confirmed in his Disciples by the miracle upon the blinde the faith of his Deity That the Epistle exhorts us who need not God be praised any confirmation of our faith to an augmentation of our charity by seeing it laid to day before us in such lively colours as S. Paul hath drawn it in so that whilest holy Church tells us what Christ then did towrds the Jews by introducing faith among them with miracles we that now need no miracles should doe towards him by acts of love to the divine goodness that is to say labour to shew our loves to him as he did to beget faith in them but what
will this avail to our design though we admit the Epistle may fitly talk of charity while the Gospel runs all upon faith since the prayer which wee must have to suit with both these vertues makes not the least mention of either Truly we must look back to some rules given us in the Preface to this work and thereunto add that there are many rare hidden things which are causes of admirable visible effects for example we see not the root whilest yet the beauty of the Tree is pleasing to our eyes In like manner if we reflect upon what we deprecate in this dayes prayer namely the innumerable evils and visible adversities we groan beneath which are all rooted in our sins wee shall then confess this prayer is not so void of coherence with this dayes service as at first it appears to be for holy Church like a prudent Mother goes the direct and shortest way to work by curing our adversities with cutting up the root or cause thereof whiles she asks humbly in this dayes prayer to bee loosened from the fetters of sin which are the causes of all our sorrows and adversities and which produce a greater blindness in our souls than was cured in the eyes of the blind man specified in this dayes Gospel Nor can holy Church be blamed to make her prayer to day generall that is a deprecation of all our adversities out of the memory of this particular misery of blindness set now before our eyes since this single corporal infirmitie is a figure of the general contagion in our souls by a world of adversities falling upon us through our reiterated sins And therefore Holy Church to day begs that by a precedent absolution from the fetters of our sins we may injoy a consequent cure of all our adversities nor is this desired absolution dissonant from our purpose since as charity is so much this day inculcated to us in the Epistle so we may remember charity was the onely cure of the greatest sinner reputed at least in this world S. Mary Magdalen for we are told many sins are remitted to her because she loved much Hence we may be confident that the best way to untie the fetters of present sin and so to take off present adversities is to love much and to conserve and augment charity But to find out the connection of parts here this I must confess was the Priests work and could hardly be expected from the Laity yet now we see Holy Church doth in this sense to day present us the prayer above we shall soon confess it is not thus understood discordant to the Epistle and Gospel of the day and consequently wee shall believe Holy Church is ever present to her self and hath reason for what she doth much beyond what our distracted thoughts are able easily to reach unto whilest we make onely a slothfull lip-labour of those holy Prayers which should be our deepest studie our most serious meditation and which so studied will be understood in their genuine sense as under correction of better judgements I humbly conceive this sacramentall or mysterious prayer is being thus expounded as above The Epistle 1 COR. 13. ver 1. c. 1. IF I speak with the tongues of men and Angels and have not charity I am become as sounding brasse or a tinkling Cymball 2. And if I should have prophesie and knew all mysteries and all knowledge and if I should have all faith so that I could remove mountains and have not charitie I am nothing 3. And if I should distribute all my goods to be meat for the poor and if I should deliver my body so that I burn and â—ave not charity it doth profit me nothing 4. Charity is patient is benign charity envieth not dealeth not perversely is not puffed up 5. Is not ambitious seeketh not her own is not provoked to anger thinketh not evill 6. Rejoyceth not upon iniquitie but rejoyceth with the truth 7 Suffereth all things believeth all things hopeth all things beareth all things 8. Charity never falleth away whether prophesies shall be made void or tongues shall cease or knowlâ—dge shall be destroyed 9 For in part we know and in part we prophesie 10. But when that shall come which is perfect that shall be made void which is in part 11. When I was a little one I spake as a little one I understood as a little one I thought as a little one But when I was made a man I did away the things that belonged to a little one 12. We see now by a glasse in a dark sort but then face to face now I know in part but then I shall know as also I am known 13. And now there remain faith hope charitie these three but the greater of these is charity The Explication 1. IN these three fiâ—â—â— verses the Apostle tells us charitie is the top and crown of all gifts and vertues insomuch â—t without it no other vertue profits us at all which â— Paul dilates upon in all this Chapter because he found the Corinthians apt to flatter themselves that the gift of tongues was the greatest of all other gifts And in having that they boasted of equall favour and grace even with the Apostles whereas he ended the twelfth Chapter of this Epistle with these words pursue the better gifts and yet I shew pou a more excellent way by the better gifts he means the Apostolate wisedome science counsel discretion of spirits miracles prophesie and the like by the more excellent way he means this of charity transcending all the rest and to shew he meant it was particularly surpassing their so much boasted gift of tongues he begins first to beat that errour down saying If I speak with tongues of men and Angels c. and have not charitty all is nothing worth But by the tongues of men he alludes both to the learned tongues as Hebrew Greek Latine which were ever held kinde of roots to all others as also to those all tongues or severall Languages which by the gift of the Holy Ghost many men and women even the most ignorant amongst both sexes had bestowed upon them and in particular that naturall gift of tongue which many men had in such perfection that by their eloquence and facundity of speech they were able to ravish their Auditorie and perswade them into any abominable errour schism or heresie whatsoever as we heard S. Paul professe the false Apostles did when they made him Apologize for his defect of their Eloquence See what was said upon last Sundayes Epistle v 19 20 21. to this effect All these wayes therefore he here takes the tongues of men and sayes if he were the most excellent in them yet without charity all were nothing worth Now for the tongues of Angels what he means oâ— those tongueless creatures language or eloquence it is not easie to express yet we may conceive his meaning is if Angels should take upon them the shapes of men and vouchsafe
Octave of the Epiphanie The Prayer VVEe beseech thee O Lord prosecute with heavenly Piety the desires of thy suppliant people that they may both see what is by them to be done and be able to perform what they see they are to doe The Secret GRant O Lord that this Sacrifice offered unto thee may quicken alwayes and defend us The Post-Communion VVEe humbly beseech thee Omnipotent God that whom thou hast with thy Sacraments refreshed thou wilt gratiously grant they may serve thee with an agreeable comportment On the second Sunday after the Epiphanie The Prayer ALmighty everlasting God who doest moderate at once both Heavenly and Earthly things hear clemently the Prayers of thy people and grant us thy peace in our times The Secret SAnctifie O Lord our offered gifts and purge us from the spots of our Sinnes The Post-Communion O Lord we beseech thee let the operation of thy vertue be increased in us that nourished by thy Divine Sacraments we may be prepared through thy bounty to receive thy promises On the third Sunday after the EPIPHANIE The Prayer OMnipotent eternall God look we beseech thee propitiously on our infirmity and extend to our protection the right hand of thy Majesty The Secret VVEe pray thee O Lord let this Host cleanse our sins and sanctifie the bodies and soules of thy subjects towards the celebrating of thy sacrifice The Post-Communion TO whom thou doest O Lord grant the use of so great mysteries vouchsafe we beseech thee that we may truly be adopted unto their effects On the fourth Sunday after the EPIPHANIE The Prayer O God who knowest us set in so great dangers that we cannot through humane frailtie subsist gran unto us health of mind and body that what we suffer for our sins thou helping we may overcome The Secret GRant we beseech thee almighty God that the offered gift of this sacrifice may ever purge our frailtie and defend it from all evill The Post-Communion LEt thy gifts O God free us from terrene delights and refresh us alwayes with heavenly food On the fifth Sunday after the Epiphanie The Prayer KEep we beseech thee O Lord thy family in continuall pietie that resting on the onely hope of heavenly grace it may ever by thy protection be defended The Secret WEe offer unto thee O Lord the Host of Pacification and that thou mayest mercifully absolve us from our sins direct our drowsie hearts The Post-Communion WEe beseech thee almightie God that we may have the effect of that safety the pledge whereof we have received by these Mysteries On the sixth Sunday after the Epiphanie The Prayer GRant we beseech thee Almighty God that alwaies meditating those things which are reasonable we may both in our words and deeds doe what is pleasing unto Thee The Secret LEt this oblation O God cleanse and renew govern and protect us we beseech thee The Post-Communion BEing fed O Lord with heavenly delights we beseech thee that we may alwaies covet those things by which we truly live On SEPTUAGESIMA SUNDAY The Prayer VVEe beseech thee O Lord clemently to hear the Prayers of thy People that we who for our sins are justly afflicted may for the glory of thy Name be mercifully delivered The Secret THou having received our gifts O Lord and our prayers cleanse us with thy heavenly mysteries and hear us clemently we beseech thee The Post-Communion BEe thy faithfull O God strengthened by thy gifts that they may without end knowing seek and seeking know the same On SEXAGESIMA SUNDAY The Prayer O God who seest we confide not in any of our own Actions grant us propitiously that against all adversities we may be armed by the protection of the Doctor of the Gentiles The Secret MAy this sacrifice offered unto thee O Lord alwaies revive and protect us The Post-Communion WEe humbly beseech thee Almighty God to grant that those whom thou doest refresh with thy Sacraments may graciously serve thee with their good behaviour On QUINQUAGESIMA Sunday The Prayer O Lord we beseech thee hear clemently our Prayers and being loosened from the fetters of our sins keep us from all adversity The Secret MAy this oblation O Lord we beseech thee purge away our sins and sanctifie the bodies and souls of thy subjects for the celebrating of this sacrifice The Post-Communion VVEe pray thee O God Omnipotent that we who have received Heavenly food may thereby be guarded from all adversity FINIS The END Of the FIRST PART THE SECOND PART Of the first TOME On the first Sunday in Lent The Antiphon 2 Cor. 6. v. 2 c. BEhold now the acceptable time behold now the dayes of health in these dayes therefore let us exhibite our selves as the Servants of God in much patience in fastings in watchings and in unfeigned charity Vers To his Angels God hath given charge of thee Resp That in all thy wayes they may keepe thee The Prayer O God who doest purifie thy Church with an annuall observation of Lent grant unto thy Family that what it endeavoureth to obtaine of thee by Fasting it may finish the same by good workes The Illustration IF in the holy time of Lent we find not so exact a report between the Epistle Gospell and Prayer of the day as at other times of the yeer it must be given to the more then ordinary regard had unto the Lenten Fast which we shall observe all these Prayers make speciall mention of as if holy Church intended nothing more then a recommends of that wholesome Fast unto us neverthelesse I shall not despaire to find the Epistle and Gospell even like full-sail'd Vessels falling down this channell of holy abstinence and directed by the helme of the Prayer come full fraughted with the same concording Spirits into the Ports of our ever open hearts to Ghostly comforts which the other seasons of the yeare afford unto us But before we venture upon a thing so hard let us facilitate the way by first cleering the full sense of the Prayer for when we know what we aske therein we shall see what relation the Petition hath to the Epistle and Gospell whence we must draw it out Observe then first in this Prayer an acknowledgement that Almighty God doth purifie his Church with an annuall observation of Lent so the end of this Fast is the Churches purification Next see how the Prayer begs that what we endeavour to obtaine by Fasting we may finish by good workes so though purification be the end of our Fast yet the Fast alone is but an endeavour towards that end and nothing brings us home unto it unlesse to the endeavouring fast we adde the finishing help of good works and this with great reason too for as we are never said to be perfectly purified untill we can in a chaste body represent a pure Soule to God so by Fasting alone we onely chastize our bodies but by good workes the grand affaire is finished our Soule is made pure and then the Churches
end is accomplisht then the whole creatures we are become as was intended purified but least I should be thought to state this sense to my own designe let us heare Saint Leo in his Homily upon this day which the Priest reads in his Office tell us his opinion wherein consists the perfection of our Lenten Fasts Not in the sole abstaining from meat consisteth the integrity of our Fast but in the joynt taking away our affections from sinne thus hee and how shall we give better Testimony of our not being sinners then in doing good works such as may make us Saints see here then the Scope of holy Fast is as it were to starve the body and to feed the Soul for in vaine this forbears to eat flesh if that doe not feast upon Spirituall Cates such as are good works of Prayer Almes-deeds and other sorts of vertues especially recommended in this holy time of Lent nor is it without mystery the Prayer to day begges we may finish by good workes what we indeavour only by Fasting our annuall purifications by this Lenten Abstinence since though we have the grace to keep the fast exactly in point of dyet yet in vaine our bodies fast towards purification of the whole creature which we are unlesse our Soules at the same time feast upon vertues by abandoning all vices in this the Prayer to day observes the method of the Epistle in vaine the Ministers of holy Church receive the grace of God unlesse they make use of the acceptable time the dayes of salvation that now are flowing and this by rendring themselves with good workes pleasing to all men offensive to none unlesse to their Fast they adde the good works expressed in the Antiphon above taken out of the same Epistle and many more which those few referre unto from one end of the Epistle to another nor can we say these are counsels proper for Church-men only since those the expositours understand by Helpers in the Ministery of God because the Apostle layes himselfe open to the Corinthians not only as a Minister of God requiring such perfections as this Epistle mentions but as a patterne to the people to imitate so that all the good workes he tells them Churchmen should be perfect in he exhorts lay-men to practise too as if he would have the sheep equal Saints with their shepheards and indeed this is no strained sense of mine for we see holy Church to day exhibits unto us not only Apostolicall perfection in the Epistle but even that of Jesus Christ himselfe the Master of the Apostles when his forty-dayes Fast is set before our eyes in the Gospell and not that Fast alone but withall the addition of his good workes his Watching and his praying his resisting the strongest temptations that the Devill could accost him with now who that seeth this can say there wants sufficient Harmony betweene the preaching and the Praying part of this dayes service and that ample as can be in an abstract of Prayer exhausting two such large Texts as are the Epistle and Gospell of the first Sunday in Lent The Epistle 2 ad Cor. 6. v. 1 c. 1 And we helping doe exhort that you receive not the grace of God in vaine 2 For he saith In time accepted have I heard thee and in the day of Salvation have I holpen thee Behold now is the time acceptable behold now the day of salvation 3 To no man giving offence that our Ministery bee not blamed 4 But in all things let us exhibite our selves as the Ministers of God in much patience in tribulation in neâ—cssities in distresses 5 In Stripes in Prisons in Seditions in Labours in Watchings in Fastings 6 In chastity in knowledge in longanimity in Sweetnesse in the holy Ghost in charity not fained 7 In the word of Truth in the vertue of God by the Armour of Iustice on the right hand and on the left 8 By honour and dishonour by infamy and good fame as Seducers and True as they that are unknown and knowne 9 As dying and behold we live as chastened and not killed 10 As sorrowfull but alwayes rejoycing as needy but inriching many as having nothing and possessing all things The Explication 1. THe Apostles stiling themselvs Helpers in this verse allude to what was said more plainly in the immediate Chapter before to the Corinthians v. 19. where they were told Christ was the true reconciler of the people to God and his Apostles had given unto them by Christ the Ministery of this reconciliation the Administration of the Sacraments whereby we receive the grace of God and so are reconcil'd to him principally by himselfe Secondarily or Ministerially by his Apostles And the like is done by their Successours the Priests of holy Church to which alludes that saying of the Apostle Coloss 1. v. 24. That his Ministery and sufferings for the Faith doth accomplish those things which are wanting of the Passion of Christ not but that Christ did suffer personally all he was to suffer as head of his Church but that hee was yet to suffer more in his Members and even their sufferings he esteemed his own in so much as he gives the Apostle leave to say his and the other sufferings of Christians are supplies even of what was wanting in Christ his passion to shew us how neer and deer our sufferings are to God while he esteemes them as those of his own sacred Sonne and as thus by suffering for Justice all Christians supply what was wanting of Christ his passion so particularly all Priests by their exhortations and administration of the Sacraments are helpers of Christ in the reconciliation of Christians to Almighty God his favour through the grace of the holy Sacraments dispensed to them by the hands of the Priests who onely have this prerogative of reconciliation between God and Man what by their Sacrifices what by their exhortations and Sacraments which are dispensed unto us While the Apostle exhorts us not to receive the grace of God in vain he destroyes the fond doctrine of heretikes who will have grace alone without cooperation on our behalfe to be sufficient whereas out of this very Text the Catholike Church first teacheth that that Gods grace offers no violence to our free will but that it comes so sweet unto us as it is in our powers to reject or receive it as we please and that further we are taught that by our own free act of cooperation and this gratuite grace joyned together we are made gratefull to God whereas if we have never so much grace given us unlesse we doe freely cooperate therewith it is in vaine received as the Apostle sayes here in plaine termes whatsoever Heretikes pretend to the contrary thereby to make a gap open to their lazy liberties perswading themselves Christ hath already saved them and that it boots not what they doe so they have his grace or rather Faith alone without his grace a doctrine diametrically opposite to
intrinsical flowing from the Deity The causes of this Fast were many As that thereby he might satisfie for Adams eating the forbidden Apple That his own humane Soul might be more apt to contemplation by this means That he might sanctifie the Lenten fast of forty days which he knew his Apostles would erect and deliver over for the Church to follow until the worlds end in imitation of this example he had given them When it is said That after forty dayes he was hungry this argues not but he might sooner have felt the want of meat however his divinity supplyed the defect thereof and when he was sensible of hunger afterwards it was not that he could no longer fast but to have the merit of being tempted against his holy purpose and of resisting that Temptation for our future instructions in like occasions 3. The Tempters approaching argues he came visibly in the shape of a man which he had assumed for Christ had his internals so regulated as likewise Adam by Original Justice had that he could not be tempted by any inward Suggestion against Reason nor was Adam what-ere he might have been so tempted but by Eve and she by a Serpent outwardly appearing When the Devil said If thou be the Son of God it argues he was doubtful of it for he had heard the voyce from heaven saying This is my beloved Son when Christ was Baptized as also he had heard how John the Baptist preached him to be the Messias the Son of God and yet seeing him appear to be a man and finding he was hungry as men are he tempts him to break his fast by the subtilty of telling him it would shew him to be the Son of God if he would turn stone into bread to satisfie his hunger 4. Excellent answer giving no advantage to the aggressor but repelling him rather by his own weapons turned upon him by holy Writ saying Man doth not onely live by bread but by every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God Deut. c. 8. v. 3. and what need he convert the stones to bread to manifest his power who with the least word of his mouth could feed the better part of man his Soul intimating thereby Prayer and Meditation to be as fit a food for the refreshment of a Christian as his daily bread the one enabling him to live eternally the other helping out a momentary breathing onely 5 6 7. The evil Spirit finding Gluttony to be no motive able to prevail with Deity flies to the medium that had wrought upon himself the Titillation of Ambition or Vain-glory when he said he would be like the Highest fondly thinking what prevailed with him in Heaven would work upon our Lord on Earth To be forsooth attended on by holy Angels though in an act of diabolical presumption Precipitation of himself from the pinacle of the Temple Too short a cloak to hide so large a sin as the Revenge thou aymest at beneath it Thou hadst thy self a Fall from Heaven down to Hell which thou wouldst now repay by giving Christ another from off the Temple where God is adored down to the ground where thy High Altar is when men adore low Creatures of the earth before their high Creator This this fond Serpent is thine aym to make thy God lye sprawling on the earth as thou dost lye in everlasting flames and this thou wouldst have done before the doors of all the holy Priests whose houses were about the Temple so to make them scorn and trample ore the God they had adored upon their holy Altars Alas how short is thy Serpentine wisdom of his that is eternal of his that sees thy specious pretexts are all deceits and tells thee so when he replies Thou shalt not tempt thy Lord thy God Deut. 6.16 How canst thou hope to Tempt hereafter any man to evil under shew of good this thou hast got to make poor man thy Master by ayming at the Mastery upon thy God To conclude by the Hands of Angels in this Text is understood their ayd for Spirits have no hands nor any other limbs or parts at all 8 9 10. Alas how poor a thing is Avarice to tempt a God withall say who is able first to give him any thing and it shall be restored Rom. 11. v. 35. Thus creatures seeme to uncreate their God in their foolish imaginations thinking him to be imperfect as themselves needy or indigent as they who yet hath made and given to the universe a being out of nothing But for the devill to presume God should adore him too for that he could not give this is a fondnesse not to be exprest as passing all imagination and so was best returned with a scorn of bidding the fond usurper know his distance go like a Lacquey at the heeles of his creator and well he was not yet reduc't to his first principle to nothing by an immediate annihilation It was indeed high time to tame his insolence when nothing but an homage due to God an Adoration would suffice him No devil no maugre thy pride Thou must adorâ— thy Lord thy God and he alone it is that thou and we and all the world must serve His are the Heavens and the earth is his and well it is thou art the Lacquey yet of him thou wouldst have Lorded over if thou couldst It is his greater glory to force thee to thy duty maugre thy proud heart then to deprive himselfe of what is good in thee thy being how bad soever thou art thy selfe and howsover despicablely miserable in that being too 11. Some doe doubt how Christ came backe to his desert of Quarentana when the devill was gone affirming the good Angels carryed him thither as the bad Angel had brought him thence but probably himselfe gave his own Divinity leave to doe that office to his body if yet we may not say it was the effect of his glorified soule and body too for they were both as glorious then as now Sure enough as soon as he was there the Angels as to their Lord and God came offering their attendance however this is for our comfort that after the devill hath tempted us if we resist we may hope the Angels will come to comfort us that need it since they did so to Christ who stood in no necessity thereof at all The Application 1. WE had the honour to be called into the field to day by the Lieutenant Generall the Priest of holy Church but we are led up to the Battaile by the Captaine Generall himselfe our Saviour Jesus Christ who hath already vanquisht all our enemies for as he dyed to conquer death and purchase us eternall life by dying so by his being tempted he secur'd us of the victory in our Temptations if we but resist the Temptor and persisting in our holy purposes Crown the Fast with our Perseverance therein such as Jesus in his hunger gave us an example of although not bound to Fast as we 2. It is a
common practise of the devill when he cannot tempt to open sin to flatter by pretence of sanctity and so to draw us into the trap of selfe-conceit and dangerous vaine glory thus he in vaine attempted Jesus Christ thus he deludes the soules that he tempts to sin by telling them they are Predestinated to be sav'd and cannot finally be damn'd do what they will the least humility is remedy to this vaine glorious disease Thou shalt not tempt thy Lord thy God our Saviours way to kill that devill of vaine glory Saint Paul hath such another Hee that thinks he stands let him beware he fall not Religious feare and trembling is the firmest footing to hold us fast upon the highest Pinnacles of Grace 3. The latter end of all Temptation shewes the Temptors aime the ruine of the tempted soule This is designed under faire pretexts such as doe tickle natures appetite Riches pleasure honour and command but see the choaking Hooke arm'd with alluring baites behold Idolatry coucht under Gratitude It seemes a reasonable homage to adore the giver of so great a gift as all the wealth and pleasure of the world but 't is a huge injustice to receive them from the hands of an usurper who hath as little power to give as we to take the stolen gift And mark how this usurper then pretends to give when the right Owner takes away by a command of Abstinence Christ came not here to raigne but to bestow on us a Crown of glory to rob us then of heaven the devill proffers us the scum thereof the rubbige swept away from thence and cast into the common shoare the sinke of nature Earth O how sordid earth appeares when I behold the beauty of the heavens thus holy David thus we ought to say and more with Jesus bid the fiend avant so shall we by religious adoration of Almighty God accompany'd with holy Poverty this time of Lent forbear to covet riches and by them to Idolize unto the devill adde then these good workes to the Fast they will accomplish So shall we render our selves the Purified soules we pray to be by fasting On the second Sunday in Lent The Antiphon 2 Cor. 17. v. 9 c. THe vision which thou hast seene thou shalt tell to none untill the Sonne of man doe rise from death Vers To Angels God hath c. Resp That in all thy wayes c. The Prayer O God who doest behold us voyd of all strength guard us we beseech thee exteriorly and interiorly that we may be defended from all corporall adversities and purified from evill cogitations of our soules The Illustration THe last Sundayes Prayer laid our Lenten Fast for the chiefe ground of all the Prayers in Lent This fixed on that ground lookes to the end of the aforesaid Fast our purification of the whole creature which we are and so confessing here first that we are void of all strength to guard our selves we begge of Almighty God a guard both for the exterior and interior man that thus our bodies being outwardly defended from all corporall adversities particularly sicknesse to tempt us from our Fast our soules may be purified from all inward evills of filthy cogitations and this with regard to what Saint Leo told us last Sunday was required for the integrity of a Fast namely to withdraw our minds from sinne lest in vaine we did else take meat from our mouths and hence we shall finde little excuse by what casuists tell us the end of the precept is no precept to us though the meanes to that end be of absolute command for example in this present case they say t is no breach of our Lenten Fast to commit a sinne in Lent though we are commanded to use the meanes of fasting to the end we may avoid sinne and so render our selves the purified creatures which holy Church intends by this forty dayes Fast to make us for truly casuists in this may seeme to favour us but yet upon reflection it is no favour because sinne being at all times prohibited under strict command we never sinne mortally but we breake some precept of Almighty God greater then this of the Church by any other kind of mortall sinning which at all times is forbid us and then much more strictly when we are actually under a wholesome cure for sinne the holy Fast of Lent so it will not be to render soules scrupulous but religious to tell them that sinnes are aggravated at least when committed at that time we are commanded to take Physick for preventing sinne as now when holy Church injoynes a Fast expressely for that purpose But to our maine designe let us see how this dayes Prayer suits to the Epistle and Gospell of the day as well as to the season of Lent why truly very well to the former because this Lenten Fasting is one of the Apostolicall precepts mentioned here by Saint Paul to the Thessalonians and in regard Fasting is one of the best of remedies against that carnall sinne which this dayes Epistle dehorteth from as also it is the best step to that walk recommended to us from vertue to vertue that we may by abounding more and more therein please God by the fulfilling of his holy will which is as Saint Paul to day calls it our Sanctification and that particularly by the gift of chastity of purity both in body and soule which altogether comes home even to the letter and full sense of this dayes Prayer nor is the Gospell of the Transfiguration read to day for any other end then to mind us of being spiritually transfigured from Polluted to Chaste bodies from Sinful to Sainted Soules for so shall we appeare to our Saviours eye with faces shining like the Sunne and bodies pure as the whitest Snow as himselfe appeared on Mount-Tabor to his Apostles and as the expositors conceive Moses and Elias did appear so too thus to shew we cannot by our vertuous lives approach neer to God without being Transfigured to the world and made mirrours of admiration to men and Angels and such indeed ought to be our Lenten Fasters How exactly then is this dayes Prayer set to the other service of the day when by saying it in order to performe our Lenten Fasts it brings forth in us the effect of Sanctification which the Epistle aimes at and that of our Transfiguration from Sinners to Saints which the Gospell points unto The Epistle 1 ad Thes c. 4. v. 1 c. 1. For the rest therefore Brethren we desire and beseech you in our Lord Iesus that as you have received of us how you ought to walk and to please God as also you do walk that you abound more 2. For you know what precepts I have given to you by our Lord Iesus 3. For this is the will of God your Sanctification that you abstaine from Fornication 4. That every one may know to possesse his vessell in Sanctification and honour 5. Not in the Passion of lust
was to terrifie the people the sweet Law of grace was to be their guide he alone their comfort so that to him they were to stand firme in all distresses of him to receive all reliefes and by him to be brought finally to the eternity of that heavenly glory which here the Apostles had but a transient glimmering of thereby to shew this is not a time or place for comforts but rather for afflictions and that lest we should be dejected by being alwayes in affliction we may hope for the intervening comfort now and then of mysticall Transfigurations by which we shall for a short time take content in the service of God but they passing away againe are to leave us unto the trials of new afflictions till by frequent conformities of our wills to the pleasure of Almighty God we be rewarded with eternall glory for our patient enduring the many Eclypses we found here of heavenly comforts in our Soules by the interposition of earthly tribulations 9. By bidding them tell this vision to no body he forbids their speaking of it not onely to the people but even to the rest of the Apostles lest it might trouble them not to have been present at it and by his resurrection all men would be easily made beleeve he was God who if they had been told it before would have doubted thereof especially when they see him dead and buried so to speak of this Testimony of his Deity before his resurrection were labour lost but by this injoyning silence of his glory and propalation of his death and passion Christ gave us an admirable example to conceale our own praises and to be content with publication of pressures and infirmities since none can have any infamy so great to him as was the ignominy of the Crosse to Christ wherein we see he gloryed whilest he suppressed the fame of his glory till he had suffered the ignominy of his most opprobrious death hence Saint Paul forbids himselfe all other glory then in that of the Crosse of Christ a good lesson for all good Christians to learne and practice to be perfect in The Application 1. SInce there is a day made specially sacred to the Mystery of the Transfiguration the sixth of August when that Feast is celebrated we cannot expect to have this mystery looked on to day so directly as that the Prayer should litterally relate to it suffice it then to find it mystically proper to the Prayer 2. And thus it will be proper enough since we are taught the Transfiguration was at least a transient vision beatificall such as Saint Peter held to be a kinde of Heaven where he was content to build a Tabernacle of aboad and look how unable we are to be chaste so are we in our selves void of all strength to goe to Heaven and have need of a world of guards both interior and exterior to preserve us from the corporall adversities or sins that keep us thence or from the spirituall sins of evill thoughts that shut up Heaven Gates against us 3. To conclude since nothing makes our way securer into Heaven then to carry a Pure Soule in a Chaste body we being taught the cleane of heart are therefore blessed because they shall see God for this cause the Gospel of the transfiguration was very fitly joyned to the Epistle of chastity because the Chaste Body is that Transient Heaven upon Earth which is most delightfull to a pure Soule And as Chastity Transfigures us into a similitude of God whom we shall then live like unto when we see him and therefore like unto him because we see him that we may by the vertue of chastity joyned to our holy Fast be Transfigured into a similitude of his Divine Majesty We pray with holy Church as above On the third Sunday in Lent The Antiphon Luke 11. v. 27. A Certaine woman of the multitude lifting up her voyce said blessed is the wombe that bare thee and the Paps that gave thee Suck But Iesus saith to her yea rather blessed are they that heare the word of God and keep it Vers To his Angells c. Resp That in all c. The Prayer WE beseech thee Almighty God looke downe on the desires of thy humble people and extend the right hand of thy Majesty in our defence The Illustration IF any be to seek here what is meant by the desires we beseech God to looke downe upon of his humble people 't is but casting back an eye to what was declared in the first Sundays Prayer of Lent to be the end of this holy fast and finding it thereto be our purification we shal soon conclude that selfe same end is still and ought ever to be our desires all the Lent long because the continuation of the Fasting Medium argues our constant desire of arriving at the end to which it drives our being Purified by that meanes So thus we see the Torrent of our holy Fast runs never the lesse slowly on because it makes not a noyse in our eares rather it growes the deeper by how much lesse we heare thereof for shallow waters are those that tell us of the stones they fall upon but deep ones silently goe by nor is the stile of humble people any common place but hugely proper to this time of Lent which drawes the whole Christian world upon their knees and not content to have them low as earth while they Fasting watch and pray did in a manner bury them below the earth when on Ashwednesday they were all Sprinkled o're with holy Ashes as if they were not worthy longer to be the upper earth that had so proudly rebelled against Almighty God but must lye lower now and hope by falling downe to rise againe and truly if we reflect upon the words of this Prayer they are exact termes of a most humble Soule who dares not say she hath a will to fast on still and to be purified but onely tels Almighty God 't is her desire and hopes this humble expression will make it be his holy will she shall obtaine her desires because his onely looking on it as she humbly prayes to day he will is able to effect it But lest we forget to shew the Prayer suits as well to the Epistle and Gospell as to the time of Lent we must remember no termes could more directly exhaust them both then what this Prayer is couched in For how can we be followers else of Almighty God as Saint Paul exhorts us to be with the Ephesians unlesse we shew our selves to have learned the lesson of the Son of God without book Learne of me that am meeke and humble of heart which lesson this dayes Prayer repeats when holy Church cals us the humble people of Almighty God and meeknesse ever goes with humility hand in hand so having set our first step right into the track of this Epistle we need not fear the missing of our way for true humility hath root in love and will not stumble
Hell or an indefinite number meant by this definite of seven for so the malice of the Jews imports when it grew more inraged against the Son of God then all the devils of Hell alone could have expressed had not the more hellish Jew concurred to encrease the same Blessed God! how truly doth this Verse close saying These devils dwell there since we are told the refractory Jew shall never be dispossessed absolutely of this devil till the day of Judgement when Jew and Gentile shall both make up one Church of Christ though but for a little time yet sufficient to verifie the Oracle of Truth There shall be one sold and one shepherd And thus literally we may expound these three Verses mystically the recess and access of this foul Fiend is verified when Baptismal Grace first cast a single devil out of our Souls guilty onely of single Original sin and he by our reiterated actual sins returns again with his increased numbers his sevensold Fiends the seven deadly Sins or some such graceless rabble who made the last of this man worse then the first God send he dwell not in us till the Day of our private Doom as certainly he will unless we cast the waters of Contrition on him to quench the fire of his Malice both against God and us and so smoak him out of his Mansion house by making it a Temple for the God he hates when it is perfumed with the incense of Devotion and adorned with all varieties of Vertues 28 29. It seems there was a huge energy in Christ his delivering himself upon this subject when a pious woman ravisht as it were with admiration of his Sanctity and solidity of discourse cryed out praising and magnifying not onely him but even the womb that bare him and the paps that gave him suck not without special Providence of God ordaining her speech to the praise of the Mother not the Father to shew he had no Father as he was man 30. This did not deny but it was indeed a great blessing for the virgin Mary to have had her Saviour in her wombe but yet it tels us both she and others are more blessed to have him in their Souls and so to make their Soules Mothers to the Words-Spirit or of Spirituall Words is to be much more honourable then to have the word-flesh in their bodily wombe or to be the Spirituall Parent of Christ bringing forth the fruit of his Gospell then the corporall bringing forth his flesh and bloud so the word of God is valued above the body of Christ his Spirit is better then his Flesh And the reason is that to bee Mother of God was a grace gratis given not making gracefull but to heare and keep the word of God is an internall grace rendring one acceptable againe to be Gods Mother did not suffice to save her but to heare and keep Gods word doeth the one proper to her the other common to all Christians The Application 1. WE heard in the first Sundayes Epistle of Lent the Priests were bound to Preach unto us this holy time as in Catholick Countries they do every day now we are particularly minded of our duty to heare them Preach as a work appertaining to the Integrity of our holy Fast And lest we should thinke we had comply'd with our obligation in this particular by a bare hearing of Sermons in Lent see our Saviour adds another branch to integrate this duty namely to keep the word we heare that is to conserve it in our hearts by meditating thereupon and by doing as the Preacher tels us we are bound to do for those only that so heare as they also keep this holy word are they our Saviour proclaimes to be blessed Soules 2. Now as this Active word of God cannot lye still in our hearts so it was fit to day to tell us of casting out a Dumb Devill thereby to minde us we are bound to speak forth the praises of Almighty God this holy Time of Lent as wel as to heare his sacred word delivered to us 3. And because we are not silent only out of sloth to speak forth the praises of God but sometimes out of shame are dumb and will not speake the guilt of some foule sin that lies upon our soules when yet we are bound in confession to discover it at which time we are truly possessed with a Dumbe Devill who by the story of this Gospell is not to be removed but by maine force therefore the most forcible of other words that we call divine and the mighty finger of God himselfe are said to be the only meanes to cast this devil out who lest he enter in to the disturbance of our holy aimes We fitly pray as above to keep him out and so to be defended from him On the fourth Sunday in Lent The Antiphon John 6. v. 3. IEsus therefore went up to the mountaine and there he sate with his Disciples Vers To his Angels c. Resp That in all c. The Prayer GRant we beseech thee Almighty God that we who through the merit of our own actions are afflicted by the consolation of thy grace may be comforted The Illustration SEe how the Lenten Letter of our Holy Fast is silently carryed down the mysticall streame thereof in this present Prayer for why doe we now afflict our bodies with abstinence but because we have justly merited that punishment to be inflicted on us through the merits or demerits rather of our sinfull actions more it is to be wondered how we dare close this Prayer with a Petition of consolation how we can hope to be comforted by his holy grace with whom we are so deeply in disgrace as to lye actually under the lash of his correction but here is the difference betweene Almighty God and man the latter never mixeth favors with his frownes of the former the royall prophet tels us that even whilest he is angry he is mindfull of mercy towards us so hence it is we begge this consolation of his grace to be our comfort even while we are under the affliction due to the demerits of our actions and this with reason because every action that is absolutely ours is mixt with sin and so merits punishment but this obedientiall action of our Holy Fast is rather an act of grace then of nature and thence it is we presume to begge the comfort of that grace which doth enable us to this act of pennance But we have yet a harder taske in hand what relation is there in this Prayer to the Epistle and Gospel of the day where is there here a word of Agar and Sarah Abrah Jsaac or Jsmael Sinai or Sion where a Syllable of a miracle of the multiplication of five loaves and two fishes into food sufficient for above five thousand persons yet these are the Subjects of the Epistle and Gospel and we must finde report to these as well as to the time of Lent in the Prayer above or
Saint Mark Saint Luke and Saint Paul Now the reason why Sinai is said to ingender unto bondage is because the Law which Moses brought the people from Sinai was a Law of terrour punishment and servitude as menacing temporal punishments and corporal death to the infringers thereof and giving onely temporal rewards to the observers of it namely prosperity and plenty in the land of Canaan and this Law is therefore represented by Agar the woman of servitude and bondage whose children could not hope for better condition then that of their parent Agar Hence we may figuratively say that as Abraham Noah Moses and the rest of the Prophets of the old Law were Christians because they served God filially and freely in hope of Christs coming to redeem them so all wicked Christians are Jews serving God onely servilely that is for fear of Hell 25. This vicinity is of Similitude not of Site or Place for between Sinai and Jerusalem lyes a great distance and that tedious by the interposition of the Idumean Mountains so that this vicinity consists in the sterility of Jerusalem producing no fruits of vertue but the meer ceremonial servitude of the Synagogue as Sinai was a very barren ground again as in Sinai this steril law was given so in Jerusalem it was principally kept and as Sinai was out of the land of Promise so this legal or earthly Jerusalem was out of the Church of Christ Militant and triumphant which is the heavenly Jerusalem but lastly and perhaps most appositely to the Apostles Sense as the people who received the law in Sinai were Parents to the Jews of Ierusalem which is a natural vicinity in blood and consequently begets in the Jews the same dispositions of fear and servitude as was in their parents so Ierusalem with her children is by the Apostle called a servant here of fear and not a childe of love 26. whereas the heavenly Ierusalem the mother of Christians is free and bringeth forth children of love not of fear according to that of the Apostle c. Love banisheth or shutteth fear out of doors for in heaven there is no fear at all but a continual and fervent love which rules in that blessed kingdom The Etymology of this word Ierusalem is worthy our remark not that it is derived as Erasmus would have it of Jebus and Salem by both which names it was formerly called but rather of the Hebrew Jire which signifies videbit or shall see and of the old name it had Salem alluding to the mystery which reports unto this change of the name for example the passage between Abrabam and Isaac on the mount Sion when Isaac seeing the fire burn asked his Father Abraham where the victime was that should be sacrificed and Abraham answered God will see to that or provide it whence the mount Sion is called Moria that is to say visio Dei the sight of God as we read Gen. 22. or his provision for that which shall please his Divine Majesty and hence the city which was neer this mountain was called Ierusalem more exactly after the Hebrew written Ierusalem beginning with Iod then with He though the other be as usual as this thorough a common errour in Orthography Now hence it is easie to apply the reason why Heaven is called Ierusalem or Sion since there God hath provided most abundantly for his own glory where he hath made a glory by vertue whereof all the Saints and Angels see his most glorious face and so the Prophets words are verified saying in thy light we shall see light that is in thy light of glory we shall see thy light of Deity an inaccessible however by thy mercy it is become a visible light of comfort to all the blessed court of heaven whose bliss consisteth in the Majesty and Glory of that blissful Sight and is therefore called the beatifical Vision and it is most literally called Ierusalem because as the old Law was given upon mount Sinai so the new was given upon Sion a mount neer to Ierusalem though figuratively it hath this name from being the place of blessed vision or provision as above It is called Free for four respects it hath to freedom First Civil which is opposite to slavish Second Moral which is opposite to the servitude of sin Third Spiritual which is opposite to temporal or corporal and so serves in the freedom of the true Spirit not in the servitude of the binding Letter Fourth Heavenly which is opposite to earthly or transitory She is called fecund or fertil because out of steril Souls bred up in Gentilism she bringeth forth fruitful Christians such as abound in all vertues whatsoever 27. Whence the next verse bids her rejoyce even for this cause of her fecundity joyned to her freedom and though Isai 54. v. 1. bid her rejoyce in her sterility because out of it as out of nothing to be expected from her own barren Gentilism God by his holy Grace brought forth a plentiful Issue of the Church of Christ when the Synagogue of the Jews was antiquated or taken quite away so though she of her self be steril yet she is to rejoyce that out of her sterility springs Christianity as out of barren Sara sprung fruitful Isaac though she travail not with any Homogeneal fruit of her own barren womb yet she is in travail with the Heterogeneal the spiritual fruit of grace so her cry is to be of joy not of sorrow and why because many more are the children of the Church that was desolate when she did first fructifie then were those of the Synagogue that had a husband that was actually and long married unto God but under the notion of a punisher rather then of a rewarder whereas when Christ was espoused to this desolate Church of the Gentiles then God became husband to his Spouse under the notion of a redeemer a rewarder and a Saviour of his people again more are the children of the desolate than of her that hath an husband might be understood comparatively spoken to the time of the primitive Church unto that time of the Synagogue as who should say God hath more servants in the very first days of the primitive Church then he had in all the time that the Synagogue of the Jews did last so fruitfull was the child of the Spirit so barren that of the letter so abundant the child of grace so sparing that of flesh and bloud the reason was because Moses being but a man of flesh and blood was the first-born of the Synagogue but Christ who was both God and Man was the first-born of the Church not that therefore he was not the head and founder thereof but that in the order of Gods decree the first thought was to serve himselfe of his creatures or people regulated in the old Law by a Synagogue in the new by a Church and so by priority of nature as the Schoolemen speake the Jdaea's of Synagogue and Church were first in Gods decree
us whose guilty consciences tell us we deserve a famine in punishment of our sins rather then such a Feast as joys our hungry souls And as by this we see a joyful Communion is an accomplishment of our Lenten Fast so before that Communion we are fitly taught to premise such a Prayer as may first strike into us an act of Contrition and then compleat our Ioy. Say then the Prayer above and see if it be not most propper to this purpose And say it also to force out of us further yet the vertue of Gratitude such as these people shewed to Jesus when they thought to make him presently their King O let us make him the perfect Commander of our hearts-affections he will not fly from that Soveraignty because he doth affect it On Passion Sunday in Lent The Antiphon John 8. v. 56. YOur Father Abraham rejoyced that he might see the day he did see it and was glad Vers Deliver me O Lord from the evil man Resp .. From the wicked man deliver me The Prayer VVE beseech thee Almighty God propitiously behold thy Family that thou giving we may be governed in body and thou reserving we may be preserved in soul The Illustration IUst as your ebbing waters meet yong floods so doth the Edde stream of Lenten fast fall to the banks to day and leaves the Channel for the Churches Prayers to bring the red Sea of the Passion in upon us whence we cal this Passion Sunday Yes yes beloved This is very true and yet I do believe few have observed this to be so God grant that all may see it when 't is made appear out of the Prayer above which I confess was to me as hard as if I had been forc't to pick a lock whereof the proper key was lost and truly where to finde a mention of the Passion in a proper term in all this Prayer I know not but yet this help remains a common key will do as well when proper keys are missing Take therefore the propitious look of God upon us which to day we beg and then believe the door is open to our Saviours Passion for what is that but a propitiation for our sins which we implore when we beseech Almighty God to look propitiously upon his Family and though we use this phrase at other times as well as now yet that forbids not a common key to open a private door nay rather this is indeed the particular key unto the Passion and made common upon all other occasions because that sacred Sea flows over all the other works and mercies of Almighty God gives force and value to all our actions and so is here properly applyed however it hath become a common stile in all our Prayers Now by this key we shall open all the doors of this days Epistle and Gospel for why is Christ his blood a more powerful Sacrifice then that of Oxen Goats and Heyfers in the old Law as this Epistle tells us but because theirs availed onely to a nominal purity This to a real propitiation for all our sins that onely leads us into the Tabernacle of the Arke this into the Tabernacle of glory to conclude this propitious look we begge to day unlocks the Cabinet of the Gospel also and leads us after a long contest between Jesus and the Jewes whether he or they were devils whether he or Abraham were the greater person unto the very first entrance into his Sacred Passion where we should finde them stoning him to death but that he miraculously preserves himselfe for a more ignominious Sacrifice upon the Altar of the holy Crosse for whilest Jesus thus expostulated with the Jewes certainly he did looke propitiously upon the Gentiles in whose behalfe hee so much exasperated the Jewes as they menaced his death And this may suffice to bring our new floud in See now how the Lenten edde meetes the Passion Tyde in a way as strang as true while we are bid begge our sparing meales out of Gods ample giving hand and the preservation of our Soules out of his reserving from us whereas fasting requires a hand which will take away rather then give food to the body and our soules preservation depends upon Gods ever giving hand his adding more and more to his former graces bestowed on us all this is true in one sence and so is the contrary in another for we begge in this Prayer a rule and government of our bodies and that according to the time of Fast whence it follows our meat should be now given us with the same regulating hand of God that knowes best how to proportion food fit for a Fast which we doe not know nor doe we aske absolutely the full-giving hand of God to be extended to us but that which may so give as to reserve withal and hence we pray that thou giving us little food for our bodies they may be wel governed and thou reserving the former plenty we may enjoy at other times our Soules may be preserved from the guilt of those past excesses and so prepared as vessels empty of worldly trumpery to be the more capable of those heavenly treasures that are Sayling towards us upon the red Sea of thy bitter Death and Passion O Blessed Saviour now flowing in upon us The Epistle Heb. 9. v. 11 c. 11 But Christ assisting an High Priest of the good things to come by a more ample and more perfect Tabernacle not made with hand that is not of this creation 12 Neither by the blood of Goats or of Calves but by his own blood entred once into the Holies eternall redemption being found 13 For if the blood of Goats and of Oxen and the ashes of an Heifer being sprinkled sanctifieth the polluted to the cleansing of the flesh 14 How much more hath the blood of Christ who by the Holy Ghost offered himselfe unspotted unto God cleansed your consciences from dead workes to serve the living God 15 And therefore he is the Mediator of the New Testament that death being a mean unto the redemption of prevarications which were under the former Testament they that are called may receive the promise of the Eternall Inheritance The Explication 11 12. HItherto the Apostle in this Chapter had described the manner of the High Priests officiating in the old Law as also he described the Exod. c. 25. c. 26. Tabernacle wherein were placed the Candlesticks the Table and the Bread of proposition and this Tabernacle was called Sanctum The Holy but behinde a Curtaine at the back of this Sanctum there was yet placed another Tabernacle which was called Sanctum Sanctorum or the Hoâ—y of Holies unto which none but the High Priest could goe who there was to offer Sacrifice while the people remained all without praying for themselves as the Priest did for them all and here stood a golden Thurible the Arke of the Testament all guilded over wherein was a golden Shrine which had in it the Manna the two
claime of God in respect of his own merits but in respect of the merits of Christ elevating mans workes to a height of value more then in themselves they have or can have or to speake more plainly not that man workes his own Salvation by his owne power but that God workes that in man which man alone cannot work in himselfe and which yet by cooperation with Gods holy Grace he may claime not as absolutely due to him but as due to Christ working in him The Application 1. WHilest St. Paul brings us in the very front of this Epistle our Blessed Saviour himselfe the High Priest officiating to day no marvell that the Church erects the Altar of the bloody Crosse for Christ to celebrate upon and this Passion Sunday when the ensigne of the Passion is display'd alone the holy and the bloody Crosse of Christ 2. As little marvel 't is we are to day depriv'd of all the suffrages of Saints in Publick Office of the Priest such as we formerly made open intercession to beseeching their assistance in the close of Lawds and Even-song because we now are to suppose that time is flowing when there were no Saints at all nor any Angels able to relieve us since we see the Saint of Saints the Son of God begins to suffer more decreed to dye hence are the usuall Ornaments removed to day the Churches left with naked wals in Catholike Countries where Rights and Ceremonies are observed the Pictures of the Saints pull'd downe and nothing left us but the bloody Crosse to minde us that Almighty God nev'r look't propitiously on us but when he frown'd upon his Sacred Son and made his Passion our Propitiation 3 Say then beloved what 's our duty now is it to wave the Holy Fast or no is it to seek for dispensations by corrupting our Physitians by deluding Ghostly fathers by flattering indeed by cheating of our selves under pretext of sicknesse or infirmity fie no where these are reall there 's no Fast commanded where they are not dispensation's Null because the Fast obligeth maugre dispensation Cease then O Christians cease to pamper sinners while God suffers for our sinnes looke for no favor but from Christ himselfe take no reliefe but what his sparing hand gives to your bodies now reserving greater graces for your soules as in the Illustration we have heard Adde rather frequent Tears unto your Fast for the accomplishment thereof adde your Compassion to our Saviours Passion because there is no company acceptable to our bleeding Christ but a weeping Christian Thus may we hope for the Propitious look we begge to day when he beholds us the relenting the resigned soules we ought to be whilest holy Church prayes as above The Gospell Io. 8. v. 46 c. 46 Which of you shall argue me of sinne If I say the veritie why do you not beleeve me 47 He that is of God heareth the words of God Therefore you heare not because you are not of God 48 The Iewes therefore answered and said to him do not we say well that thou art a Samaritan and hast a devill 49 Iesus answered I have no devil but I doe honour my Father and you have dishonoured me 50 But I seeke not my own glory There is that seeketh and judgeth 51 Amen Amen I say to you If any man keepe my word he shall not see death for ever 52 The Iewes therefore said now we have known that thou hast a devill Abraham is dead and the Prophets and thou sayest if any man keepe my word he shall not taste death for ever 53 Why art thou greater then our Father Abraham who is dead and the Prophets are dead whom doest thou make thy selfe 54 Iesus answered If I doe glorifie my selfe my glory is nothing it is my Father that glorifieth me whom you say that he is your God 55 And you have not known him but I know him and if I shall say that I know him not I shall be like to you a lyer But I doe know him and doe keep his word 56 Abraham your Father rejoyced that he might sete my day and he saw and was glad 57 The Iewes therefore said to him thou hast not yet fifty yeeres and hast thou seen Abraham 58 Iesus said to them Amen Amen I say to you before that Abraham was made I am 59 They tooke stones therefore to cast at him but Jesus hid himselfe and went out of the Temple The Explication 46. IT was in the presence of the High Priest as well as of divers Doctors and Pharisees that Jesus used this art of proving he might uncontrouleably reprove the people because he knew they could not answer him by recrimination nor put him to the blush of turpitude in a doctor reprehending others who is himselfe faulty in the same kind so Christ here reprehending the abominable sins of the Jews takes the priâ—iledge he cannot be denied of urging them to tax him if they can with sinne and yet lest his immunity from sinne might not suffice in their esteeme which yet was rooted both in his beatificall vision and hypostaticall union making God and man but one person he futher tels them it is pure verity that he preacheth to them so by these two titles of his veracity and sanctity he claimes beliefe of his doctrine and authority of rebuking their sinnes and he doth not here meane onely a naked delivery of truth but a demonstration of all hee tels them to be undoubted and absolute verity rooted in his owne divine veracity and so not to be any wayes disputed but exacting their firme and constant beliefe whence with great reason he sayes here why doe you not believe me 47. It is here to be noted that the Manichaean Heresie was ill grounded from this place as if there had been some men born of a good and others of a bad Spirit and so they of necessity not of choice were either good or bad since here Christ alludes not to the natural but to the supernatural man Hence when he says he that is of God his meaning is he that is inspired by the Grace of God and of his Spirit such it is that hears the word of God and therefore they heard it not because they followed the inspiration of the evil and not of the good Spirit Now that he meant this as to them ill at that time inspired not ill created or naturally made ill it is evident for diverse of them were afterwards by his death and by his Apostles preaching converted and doubtless saved too whence it follows that as they naturally were not made so bad as no good could come of them so they were by supernatural and not by natural means made the good people which afterwards they became and thus those once good become bad again when leaving the inspiration of the good Spirit they follow the dictamens of the bad one 48. It seems by this manner of speech they were used frequently to call him Samaritane
when he had spoken to them and anger'd them as above The Application 1. SAint Paul to day hath been the Sacristan and made the Altar ready for the Priest lo here he enters in who is the Sactifice and the Sacrificant our Saviour Jesus Christ the lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world And therefore enters reprehending sin as you hear in this days Gospel because he came to dye for sins And who can better reprehend then he that is himself irreprehensible as Jesus shewed he was that asks the Jews who amongst you all can accuse me of sin 2. Thus by his Lamb like Innocency is he brought bleating into Holy Church to day as was the Legal Lamb Exod. 12. v. 11. just fifteen days before the Pascal Feast that by his bleating day and night so many days together he might minde the Jews how the blood of the Lamb upon their doors did cause the Angel to shew mercy there where he had found that blood Now in regard the Blood of Christ is that which is the Safegard of the World from the not onely killing but damning sword of the Angel of Darkness therefore is this Lamb of God brought in to Holy Church to day bleating and minding Christians by the justifying of himself from sin that he is indeed the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world and that brings salvation unto those who by Integrity and Innocency of Life shall accomplish the Holy Fast of Lent and so make up that happy Fold of Lambs and Sheep who know their Shepherds Voyce and who are known by him for their Compassion on him now they hear the Tydings of his bitter Death and Passion 3. And in regard the Jews should not pretend they were excus'd from having his Innocency so far as therefore to believe him God because he was an Innocent Man See how all this Gospel runs upon a pregnant Proof of his Divinity where he not onely tells them Before Abraham was I am that is to say I am who am I am Almighty God whose best Definition is his Eternal Being Nor did he say this gratis for see the stones they sting pretending this was Blasphemy can no way hurt him nor can the Flingers see whom they intend to hurt though just before their eyes because his Deity was not pleas'd they should then see his Human Person whom they thought to stone to death yet from this malicious Intention we may fitly call this Passion Sunday And therefore fitly pray as above expressing in the begg'd Propitiation all his Passion and so conclude by casting all our care upon him both for Soul and Body On Palme Sunday in Lent The Antiphon Matth. 26. v. 31. FOr it is written I will strike the Pastor and the Sheep of the Flock shall be dispersed but after I shall rise again I will go before you into Galilee There you shall see me saith our Lord. Vers Deliver me O Lord from the evil man Resp .. From the wicked man deliver me The Prayer OMnipotent everlasting God who hast caused our Saviour to take humane Flesh upon him and be crucified for mankinde to imitate the example of his humility grant propitiously that we may deserve to have both the Instructions of his patience and the fellowship of his Resurrection The Illustration YOu will have heard in the preface to this Book why the Antiphon above is not taken out of this dayes Gospell of the Masse but of the Gospell read at Blessing of Palmes Suffice it here to say they are both waters of one and the same red Sea and therefore suteable to the designe in hand and I think it will be sufficient to cast your eyes onely upon the Epistle and Gospel here below to satisfie you how this Prayer above and they agree since in them both we have the greatest examples of humility that can be given in the one Christ humbled to the very ignominy of the Crosse in the other his humble entrance that he made into Jerusalem upon an Asse to the triumph of his ignominious Death and Passion for he was pleased onely to accept the acclamations of his being King to make greater unto us that example of his humility which he desired we should imitate and which he gave us for that very end as we see this Prayer avoucheth professing that God caused our Saviour to take humane flesh and be crucified for mankinde to imitate the example of his hâ—mility whence we begge as followeth That he will grant propitioâ—sly we may deserve to have both the Instructions of his patience and the fellowship of his Resurrection Stay blessed Jesu how can we deserve this to have thee our eternall God become our Temporall Master in the Schoole of patience and which is more if more can be to deserve that we may have the fellowship of this Resurrection what fellowship can there be betwixt God and man the creator and the creature setting that aside which is betwixt the Sacred Deity and the humanity of Christ where man may in a kinde be bold to say Haile fellow well met But for us that are as much removed from Christ in dignity as nothing is from all things in the world for us not onely to hope for our resurrection out of the infinite mercy of God but to begge we may deserve it too nay deserve the fellowship thereof with Jesus Christ himselfe this I confesse seems very strange and sounds like a bold presumption rather then a modest Prayer and yet because the Holy Ghost inspires the Church to make this Prayer to day we must not feare to say it with a confidence it will be gratefull in the eareâ— of God and for that reason gratefull to him because feasible by us yet no way feasible unlesse he grant us his propitious glaunce againe by looking on us through the blooshed eyes of his Sacred Sonne then indeed we may hope for propitiation by his passion and that propitious looke being afforded us we may like Peter weep most bitterly when the like aspect was cast upon him by our Blessed Lord. Luc. 22.61 But why doe we so timorously come to that which Saint Paul so confidently leads us up unto did not he vaunt to the Colossians cap. 1. v. 24. His sufferings to have been an accomplishment of those things that are wanting of Christs Passion according as we heard in the first Lenten Sundayes Epistle See there v. 1. for in consequence to the Doctrine there delivered we pray to day that wee may deserve to have had Christ our Master of Patience and to be his fellowes in his Resurrection since then we shall deserve such a Master when we become such Scholers as Saint Paul was and as he taught us in the Colossians to be Imitators of his patience in our passions which then become the accomplishment of his when we bear them as patiently as he bore his Crosse Coloss c. 3. v. 12. and being his at least they must have
Head-City by Saints and Sinners his Apostles Jewes and Gentiles by all Sects and Ages Men women and Children that so he might give an example of his humility to all the world and unto all mankind 2. But especially to great ones Nobles Princes Monarches that these may learn Pal. 61. v. 11. If Riches slow not to set their hearts upon them Nor if honored by their subjects Psal 48. v. 13. to lose their understandings and to become like foolish Beasts by taking Pride in Popular Applause but rather with the wise to say So passeth by the Glory of the world this day cry'd up a King and in three dayes decry'd to dye an ignominious death 3. As therefore Princes you are those whom Jesus represented last of all and made the least demur upon your Pompous State so learne of him to set the world at naught by a contempt thereof and thereto fix your thoughts where true joyes are live humbly dye patiently with Jesus here that you may rise and reign gloriously with him in the world to come See how to all these purposes we fitly pray as above On Easter Sunday The Antiphon Mark 16. v. 4. ANd looking they saw the stone rowled backe for it was a very great one Alleluja Vers This is the day which our Lord hath made Resp Let us exalt and rejoyce therein The Prayer O God who this day by thine onely begotten Sonne hast opened to us the doore of eternity by the destruction of death prosecute we beseech thee in us those good desires which thou preventing hast afforded us The Illustration LOoke how the Salt Sea waters strained through the loose and Sandy grounds breake into Springs that head the greatest and the freshest Rivers thus doth the red Sea of our Saviours Passion breake from his Sepulchre into the Chrystall streames of his glorious resurrection so that all the Churches Prayers will now a while taste of those living waters that doe spring from death from the Sepulchre of our Blessed Lord in such sort as if death were content to dye that we may live For we see by this Prayer holy Church esteemes Christs resurrection to be the destruction of death since he hath no otherwise then by rising againe this day from his grave opened unto us the door of eternity of eternall and blissefull life whereupon she prayes the zeale we are now supposed to have of living eternally may be perfected by God his prosecuting in us our good desires thereof which are first afforded us by his preventing grace without which indeed wee cannot have as of our selves one good thought much lesse can we doe any the least good deed Now as there can be no tidings of any greater joy unto us who even naturally desire eternall life then for holy Church to tel us it is this day bestowed upon us by Christ his rising from his grave and by his raising us to everlasting life from the eternal death of deadly same which before had swallowed up all mankinde so we ought to rejoyce to day as a dead man would to find himselfe revived and brought from the brink of eternal damnation unto a promise of eternal life and blisse O could we say this Prayer with a lively apprehension of this to be our present condition with what fervour should we say it with what joy should we repeat it over and over again and how infinitely should we profit our selves thereby nay how home should we Preach unto our Souls by praying thus Since thereby we should exhaust not onely the whole Epistle and Gospel of the day but even the Introite of holy Mass wherein the Royal Prophet Psalme 138. speaks in the Person of Christ saying I am risen and yet I am with thee He was indeed with Ierusalem many a day after he had risen from his grave to shew her whom she had crucified her Iesus if shee pleased if not her Iudge and againe in the graduall at Masse which Holy Church makes stand to day for a versicle to the Antiphon above the same Prophet Psal 117. Speakes in our persons saying This is the day which our Lord hath made let us exult and rejoyce in it hence we see how gladsome a day our Holy Mother would have this to be unto us how cheerfully she would have us say the Prayer aforesaid and withall how suiteably to the Epistle which if observed is no other then a ground-work of our Prayer in the very sense above of our holy desires given us by Gods preventing grace and prosecuted by his grace continually helping us to enter in at the doore of a new life by going out of the old gate of sinfull death for that indeed is the true meaning of this dayes Epistle exhorting us to purge away the old leaven the sinne that makes our actions not only sowre but deadly in the esteem of God Almighty who having set his teeth on edge by the leavened bread of our sins desired now to make us unleavened loaves seasoned with vertues not with vices for though Saint Paul as the Rhemists interpret this place alludeth here to our Communion at Easter according as by precept we are bound and in that sense cals the blessed Sacrament Christ our immolated Pasch whereon he bids us Feast when by the Sacrament of pennance we have purged away the old leaven of malice and wickednesse out of our Soules yet in very truth both the beginning and ending of this Epistle tels us that while we thus Feast on Christ he feeds on us who have made our selves Azymes or unleaven'd loaves of sincerity and verity which is to say pure Manchet for his heavenly Table since thus we become the new paste and Azymes of Sanctity as the Apostle cals us under the termes of sincerity and verity as to the Gospel which is Saint Mark his story of the Resurrection it is all wide open unto us even in the first clause of the Prayer above saying Christ opened this day the door of eternity by the destruction of death though it be all abstracted too even in these closing words of the Prayer thou preventing for in every deed as Christ prevented the early Maries in his rising so doth his holy Grace prevent even the first thoughts of our rising from the lazinesse of sinne into the sedulity of serving God Almighty And thus we see the whole service of Easterday abstracted in this little Prayer and consequently we have hitherto made good our hard designe thereof The Epistle 1 Cor. 5.7 c. 7 Purge the old leaven that you may be a new paste as you are Azymes For our Pasche Christ is immolated 8 Therefore let us Feast not in the old leaven not in the leaven of malice and wickednesse but in the Azymes of sincerity and verity The Explication 7. BY the old leaven Saint Paul meanes that notorious kinde of Fornication which was practized amongst the Corinthians worse then any among Gentiles as in the first verse of this Chapter the
that where there wants a will a wish sufficeth Say then beloved can you wish at least ability to rise from Death of Sin into the Life of Grace O wish it then for shame and wishing Pray as above with Holy Church that having had from God the grace of such a wish he will vouchsafe to prosecute it in you till you come thereby to such a Glory as you cannot wish to have a Greater The Gospel Mark 16. v. 1 c. 1 And when the Sabbath was past Mary Magdalene and Mary of James and Salome bought Spices that coming they might anoynt Jesus 2 And very early the first of the Sabbaths they come to the Monument the Sun being now risen 3 And they said one to another who shall role us back the stone from the door of the Monument 4 And looking they saw the stone rolled back For it was very great 5 And entring into the Monument they saw a yong man sitting on the right hand covered with a White Robe and they were astonied 6 Who saith to them Be not dismayed you seek Iesus of Nazareth that was crucified he is risen he is not here behold the place where they laid him 7 But go tell his Disciples and Peter that he goeth before you into Galilee There you shall see him as he told you The Explication 1. THat is when Saturday night was past for Saturday was the Sabbath of the Jews then and not till then lest they should be said to violate the Sabbath they bought Spices to anoint Jesus Here is to be noted the Sedulity and Diligence to be used by Christian Souls to take hold of the first minute of time allowed for devotion and not to loyter any instant thereof away since these pious women watched purposely all night to lay hold of the first stroake of the clock which strook twelve that then they might freely call up the Shop keepers to sell them oyntments when the last minute of the Sabbath was past Note these three women were Mary Magdalene the sister to Martha and Lazarus Mary of James that is the Mother of James the lesser so called for distinction from the other Iames the greater who was also an Apostle and Salome wife to Zebedeus Mother to James the greater and to John the Evangelist the favourite of Jesus and whether or no Salome be her Christian name here or her surname is not cleer by the Text For she may have been Mary Salome wife to Zebedeus above which is not unsuitable to the common Tradition of the three Maries that visited the Sepulcher of Christ and to whom in recompence he after appeared by this action we see the ancient custom of Pilgrimage to Holy Places and reverencing of Reliques however those who deny that to be lawful distinguish between the Reliques of Christ and others because Christ was God and it was besides an ancient custom of the Jews to embalm dead bodies to make them odoriferous and sweet so this was not done by them to Christ as God for indeed they did not then firmly believe in his Deity but were passionate Lovers of his Holy Person and as they esteemed him a man of Blessed Life so to shew their devotion to him they went as it were to embalm his Body and his Tombe which they revered as Reliques of man not of God and as this gives a literal avowment to Pilgrimages and worship of Reliques so it is a Tropical Example for all Christians to carry the oyntments of their Vertues and good Works about them as shewing they desire therewith to embalm the Memory of Christs Death and Passion and those who shall be diligent in this Art of Piety may hope with the first to see Christ in Heaven for the reward of their attending so Religiously on the Grave of his Death and Passion in this life 2. It seems they had been stayed in their journey to the Sepulchre either in the buying their oyntments or upon other accommodations for their holy purpose that it was Sun-rising ere they came to the Monument how ever they were going thither from midnight to that time of the day and had assuredly the merit of a more speedy arrival though by Divine providence it was appointed Christ should be out of his Grave sooner then any the most faithful Soul could get thither to see whether he was risen or not according to his promise if yet they were not retarded by the same Providence for a punishment of their want of Faith that came with intent to finde him there and as man to embalm him whom as God they ought to have believed was risen and needed not those pious expressions towards his humanity which this Resolution and Action in these holy Women did represent 3. Here again they betraied the weakness of their Faith as if God could not remove all obstacles in the way to his own Service as it seems really he did by the hands of his holy Angels who St. Matth. cap. 28. v. 3. sayes had rolâ—ed this stone away before they came which yet the Angel did not by any his Corporal Touch but by making an Earth-quake purposely to do it and joyntly to shew the terrour all the Earth was in for having covered the glorious Body of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ and by this we see the Power that Angels have over all Corporal Things when they can even by the Touch of their Vertues or Powers make the whole Earth to quake not that there was need for the Angel to remove this stone that Christ might rise for he did rise before the Stone was gone by the same Power wherewith he came out of his Mothers Wombe without the least violation of her Virginity but meerly that by the stones removal the coming Maries and others to follow might see Christ was risen and why may not Christs Body be as well all under the Little Wafer of the Consecrated Hoste as it was able to pass through the Virgins Wombe a Childe and through the Stone a Man without any Division in either Quantities or Bodies through which it passed Note though these Maries were solicitous who should help them to role away the stone yet they went on with their Holy Resolutions to shew us we are not to desist from doing good though we finde huge Difficulties in our way but to proceed and put our trust in God that to those who Love him even every thing in Nature will co-operate towards the expression of their Loves 4. This Verse gives an excellent Proof of what was said last for see they no sooner look to have the stone removed but they finde it done to their hands by the Angel as above though they knew not who did it and therefore here is mention this Stone was very Great because we should not despair of overcoming any the greatest Difficulties in the way of a willing Soul to serve Almighty God 5. See they lose no time to ask or wonder how the stone was gone their
this day is called White or Low â—unday because in the Primitive Church those Neophytes that on Easter Eve were Baptized and Clad in white Garments did to day put them off with this admonition that they were to keep within them a perpetuall candor of Spirit signified by the Agnus Dei hung about their necks which falling downe upon their breasts put them in minde what Innocent Lambes they must be now that of sinfull high and haughty men they were by Baptisme made Low and little children of Almighty God such as ought to retaine in their manners and lives the Paschall Feasts which they had accomplished * And thus we see an ample performance of our designe taking this Prayer in the true sence it hath The Epistle Ep. 1 Joan. cap. 5 v. 4 c. 4 Because all that is borne of God overcommeth the world And this is the victory which overcommeth the world our Faith 5 Who is he that overcommeth the world but he that beleeveth that Iesus is the Sonne of God 6 This is he that came by water and bloud Iesus Christ not in water only but in water and bloud And it is the Spirit which testifieth that Christ is the Truth 7 For there be three which give Testimony in heaven the Father the word and the Holy Ghost And these Three be One. 8 And there be Three which give Testimony in earth The Spirit Water and Bloud And these Three be one 9 If we receive the Testimony of men the Testimony of God is greater because this is the Testimony of God which is greater that he hath testified of his Son 10 He that beleeveth in the Sonne of God hath the Testimony of God in himselfe The Explication 4. THe Evangelist had in this Epistle and in the immediate verse before told us The love of God consisted in keeping his commands and that his commands are not heavy and this for divers reasons because compared to the grievous weighty precepts of the old ceremoniall Law they are nothing in a manner difficult at all For there were as Rabbi Moses did reckon them in his third Book two hundred and eighteen affirmative and three hundred sixty five negative precepts of the old Law which in the Law of Grace are reduced unto ten and those no other then even any reasonable man would exact of a creature towards God and of one man towards another for a quiet civill and honest neighbourhood and though to corrupted nature mortification may seeme hard yet to sound nature it is sweet and appetible at least as medicine is unto the sick person and as grace is the balsame that renders our corrupted nature sound againe so taking grace into the consideration as a help more powerfull then any impediment it is most true the Commandements are easie to a gratious soule to any one that hath in him the fear or love of God whence the Evangelist inferres that as by grace we are borne a new to in and of God so by this regeneration our feeble nature is made able enough to overcome all the world all the enemies and obstacles man hath betweene him and heaven which is the inheritance of Gods children whence Saint Bernard saith excellently well in his first Sermon upon this day it is an argument of our heavenly regeneration or new birth when we overcome temptations as therefore we are first borne children of God by Baptisme wherein we receive the infused vertues of Faith Hope and Charity so by contrition and confession after actuall sinne we are as it were new borne to God by his holy grace conferred on us againe and bringing back with it all those vertues and graces we had lost by reiterated sinnes But we are specially to note that this Text saith every thing that is borne of God overcommeth the world not every man because it is not by any naturall thing in man that he doth overcome sinne but by that which is supernaturall to wit Grace Faith Hope Charity and whence the Apostle saith immediately and this is the victory which overcomes the world our Faith by the victory he meanes the cause of our victory or the overcommer it selfe of the world whereupon Saint Leo Saint Cyprian and others said oftentimes a faithfull soule is farre greater then the world and one who is in heaven looks upon the earth as on a contemptible point so that it was most truly said of Saint Marke cap. 9. verse 23. All things are possible to him that beleeveth nay we see a strong and lively Faith hath in it a kinde of omnipotency when it commands as it were that to be done which none but God can do And what was it that brought the Infidell world and all the Monarchs thereof to the subjection of the yoke of Christ but Faith how then every way waâ— it true that Faith is the Victory or the Victrix rather that overcomes the whole world for by Faith we captivate our stubborne wils to reason and so quell as well the inward as the outward enemies to Christ and how doe Martyrs else by dying conquer death as Christ did on the Crosse but by dying for the Faith and in the Faith of Christ 5. None else indeed can doe it for in beleeving this we are forced to oppose all other that deny it and if in that opposition we lose our lives rather then our Faith we get the Victory of all the world that persecutes us for it and of death it selfe for he that beleeves this hopes in Iesus and hoping cals upon him and calling him to aide loves him and loving him takes courage to defie all his Enemies which are the world the flesh and the devill and in scorning them gets force to resist them and in resisting obtaines grace to overcome them 6. This is the Messias that Ezechiel cap. 36. v. 25. and Zachary cap. 13. v. 1. foretold should come in water and bloud alluding to the water of holy Baptisme and to the bloud he shed upon the Crosse and to verifie this both bloud and water issued out of his pierced side as he hung upon the Crosse as also of teares and bloud in his circumcision in his Prayer in the garden and in his whipping at the Pillory in memory of all which in the sacrifice of the Masse water is mixed with the wine that is to be consecrated By the Spirit testifying Christ to be verity is understood the holy Ghost descending and confirming the Apostles in grace and in beliefe of all that Christ had said unto them as if not onely a true man but God and man had told them and consequently verity it selfe for God is no lesse then very verity So Saint John rests not content to have given us the double Testimony of bloud and water without he had added also the sumnity or height of all Testimony the pure Spirit of Almighty God Nor are they out of the way that understand this place to be meant also of the testimony of the
to day mixeth the Lay mans duty with that of the Priest to shew us that what in an eminent degree Christ taught his Apostles and consequently their successors the Pastors of Gods Church who by office have care of soules in some sort at least the layty was to imitate namely that heroicall or rather that divine Act of Faith which is required to Martyrdom For albeit the Priest be bound to many duties which do not oblige Lay people yet there is no man or woman whatsoever that is not rigorously bound to lay down life it selfe the deerest thing they have rather then deny their faith in Jesus Christ 2. Againe however the Lay-man is not bound to that perfection of charity and Justice which the Priest ought to have nor to excell in many other vertues essentially proper to the Priest as zeale of soules especially yet this dayes Epistle tels us that every Christian whatsoever stands obliged thus far to imitate the perfection of Jesus Christ himselfe as to preserve the proper vertues of the Paschall Feast sincerity and verity which is as much as to say some degree of saintity as was declared in the exposition of the Epistle upon Easter day and consequently if all be bound to saintity none are priviledg'd to sinne but every one is to avoid it as is told us in the second verse of this Epistle none is priviledg'd to beguile or defraud his neighbour for that is contrary to the Paschall sincerity and verity which all the Lambs of Christ are obliged unto 3. To conclude as all Christians are rigorously bound to a profession of the Faith of Christ with hazard of their lives so this Epistle instructs them all in that particular duty of suffering for Justice in testimony of their Faith and for that purpose layes before their eyes in what manner they are to suffer just as Jesus did following his steps therein Not reviling those that revile them not straying away for fear but like believing Lambs to follow their Pastor the Bishop of their soules their Jesus and their God to whom they are converted by their faith in him for whom they are to dye if need be as he hath dy'd for them and by his humble death hath raised them to the hopes of an eternall life and of everlasting joyes therein Which ever living comfort they Petition for to day emboldened thereunto by a pious memory of our Saviours death and Passion since from his Sepulchre as was said before flow all the hopefull streames of our eternall happinesse for the head and spring of Faith is our Saviours Resurrection from his grave The Gospel John 10. v. 11 c. 11 I am the good Pastor The good Pastor giveth his life for his sheep 12 But the hireling and he that is not the Pastor whose own the sheep are not seeth the wolfe comming and leaveth the sheep and flyeth and the wolfe raveneth and disperseth the sheep 13 And the hireling flyeth because he is an hireling And he hath no care of the sheep 14 I am the good Pastor and I know mine and mine know me 15 As the Father knoweth me and I know the Father and I yeeld my life for the sheep 16 And other sheep I have which are not of this fold them also I must bring and they shall heare my voyce and there shall be made one fold and one Pastor The Explication 11. GOod Pastor is here taken for most excellent prime or indeed onely Pastor as from whom all others derive that name because his death is reall life to his sheep whereas the death of other Pastors is 〈◊〉 a due sacrifice for the dyer and an example for the liver to follow rather then to flye from faith so that Christs life was not onely given us as an example but as a satisfaction for our sinnes 12. By Hireling here mystically understand those Priests who serve their Flock more for love of their Fleece then of the Sheep more for base gain then for souls salvation as who should say this very Act renders a man no true Pastour though by his place he be so yet literally by hireling is understood those that are not really true Pastours but usurpe the places of them Namely Hereticks who neither have Orders nor Mission and yet live upon Tythes as if they were truly intituled thereto for to such the souls of men do not truly belong however they take an usurped charge over them and those men commonly in time of persecution flinch steal themselves away and leave their sheep the souls they pretended right over unto the tyranny of the devouring wolfe the persecutor of Gods holy Church Note the true Pastour is said also to flye when he is silent and doth not rebuke his erring Flock by the Wolfe is understood Heresie or the Devil the father thereof ravening and snatching this man to luxury t'other to gluttony a third to murther and so disperseth them from the Flock and Fold of orderly Sheep making them wander till they fall into the pit that cryes Vae soli wo to the lonely 13. St. Gregory says the Name shews the Nature and so gives the cause by giving the Name for to be a hireling is cause enough to flye from danger since it argues he loves his hire better then his cure his profit better then his Office nor is he truly said to have care of his Sheep but of himself and therefore by his flying from his sheep he shews he had indeed no care of them 14. See the mark of a good Shepherd is to know his sheep and to have his sheep know him he knows their vertues to incourage them to more he knows their Vices to dehort them from the same and they know his Love and Doctrine to follow both since as his Love leads them freely so his Doctrine leads them safely again as a Pastour leads his sheep to new Pastures so must the Priest feed them with new Exhortations as the Pastour keeps the Wolfe from his Sheep so must the Priest his Souls from the temptation of sin and the Devil as the Pastour cherisheth his Lambs more then ordinarily so must the Priest cherish his children with frequent Catechisms and his new converts even as children as the Pastour cures the Diseases of his Sheep so must the Priest the Infirmities of his Souls Lastly as the true Shepherd will fight to Death rather then be beaten from his Flock so must the Priest in persecution dye rather then flye from his Parish and in case of Plague the Pastour is rather to run the hazard of it then to leave the people unprovided of Priests and in this case particularly the Pastours are bound ex officio by office to stay when Regulars that onely help ex charitate out of charity as it were may flye in point of danger if they please and that without sin 15. See how he follows this mutual knowledge comparing it to that wherewith God the Father knows his Son and that
the same childe was first cause of pain so he is cause of comfort the like of Christ dying and rising again Sixthly both joys are excessive Great whereas they take away all sense of Sorrow So here the Passion of Christ is in this Parable supposed to be the labour or travail of the Apostles dolorous as a womans in childe-bearing and his Resurrection is supposed to be as the Birth of a Son to them after so hard a labour as they were in whilest all the world jeered and scorned them for hoping after so impossible a comfort as it was thought when the Apostle calls it a scandal to the Jews and to the Gentiles a folly St. Augustine is so acute upon this place as to say Christ compared the Apostles sorrow for his Passion to the pains of a woman in labour of a Boy and not of a Girl because those are the greatest labours of women and again he makes a special remark that the Text saith here the Mother forgets her pains not because a Boy is born but a man one that is to be the Support and Prop of her house when her self can no longer live for saith St. Augustine Christ was as it were born by his Resurrection to the World not as a Childe but as a Man conquering Death winning eternal Glory to himself and to all his Posterity to all Saints of Heaven who are the Children of his Grace 22. This Verse applies all the rest by way of Repetition to the Senses as above while it tells the Apostles this shall be their Case about him this their Grief at his Death this their Joy at his Resurrection like the travail and comfort of a woman first in labour then delivered of a Son But when he adds this Close That their joy no man shall take from them he means neither in this world nor in the next for such shall be their joy to see Christ risen who was dead that even the menace of Death to themselvcs shall be comfortable out of their assurance to share with Christ in the joy of his Resurrection if they partake with him in the pains of Death by dying for his sake Whence St. Paul boasting said who shall part us from the Love of God Nakedness the Sword Persecution Rom. 8.35 No no the love of Christ and hope of Heaven are comforts above all afflictions whatsoever whence we reade of the Apostles that they went rejoycing from the bench of the Iudges because they were held worthy to suffer contumely for the name of Iesus Act. 5.41 And this to shew that no man could takâ— away that joy which God gave them as the Text above hath told us The Application 1. IT is worthy our observation that amongst so many passages as were between Christ and his Apostles after his Resurrection this days Gospel is taken out of Saint Iohn Evangelist his Story of our Saviours Actions reporting what he said to his Apostles immediately before his Death For we see the Expositors upon the first Verse of this Gospel tell us all that is here said alludes to the Death Passion and Resurrection of our Lord as well as to his Ascension and to the coming of the Holy Ghost Then certainly our Mother Church reads us this Lesson to day with intention to draw from us such like Acts of Faith as our Saviour desired the Apostles should make when he told them he was shortly to dye and shortly to rise again 2. And since this Parable aims at raising consolation in the Apostles hearts out of the disconsolate Death and Passion of their Lord and Master by vertue of the Faith they had in his future Resurrection after his Death Assuredly it is now our parts that are Christians to make the Cross of Christ our chief content the Death of our Saviour the onely hope we have to live and his Resurrection the ground of our Faith that by vertue of his Blessed and Incorrupted Body risen from his Grave our corrupted flesh and blood shall rise again and be made partakers of those heavenly Joys which he hath prepared for all that do firmly believe in him and live according to the Rules of Christian belief 3. Note that amongst those Rules a Principal one is read unto us this day of believing firmly that all the sorrows this world can afford us are not able to rob us of the future joys prepared for us in Heaven if from erring Infidels we become right believing Christians and live according to the light of Truth The Faith of Jesus Christ that is if we do such Actions in Vertue of that Faith as We pray to day we may do say then the Prayer and see how pat it is to this Doctrine of the Church On the fourth Sunday after Easter The Antiphon Joh. 16. v. 5. I Go to him that sent me but because I have spoken these things unto you sorrow hath filled your hearts Alleluja Vers Tarry with us O Lord Alleluja Resp For night draweth on Alleluja The Prayer O God who makest the mindes of thy faithful to be of one accord grant unto thy people that they may love what thou commandest and desire what thou doest promise that amongst worldly varieties there we may fix our hearts where are true joys The Illustration O Beloved what a Prayer is here what an elevated language doth the holy Ghost speak in to day behold hold a whole Sermon in a few lines what preacher needeth other Text then this Prayer to dilate upon even till the day of Judgement shall I speak a big word upon this Prayer be it but with us as this day we pray and we are even with God himself at our journeys end and why should we despair thereof since in vain we are bid to pray for this if it were not by Prayer to be obtained beg it then beloved on your often bended knees beg it earnestly fervently heartily and doubt not but it will be granted for God doth not feed us with fond hopes of what he will not grant if we so a k it as we ought But stay how comes it that with so much plenty of Spirit we finde to day so little seeming connexion with the Epistle and Gospel which yet I am confident will prove both as it were eminentially contained in this admirable Prayer And first observe how suitable it is for holy Church to pray thus when we are now in the time that Jesus Christ prepared his Apostles to be content to leave him or at least that he should leave them How often did he command them resignation on all occasions to the will of Almighty God was not this the very form of his Prayer Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven Matth. 6.10 Hence the Church begs to day that we who believe in Christ may live all of one minde and since it is morally impossible so many men should be consenting all in one therefore we see the prayer gives that to God saying it is he
alone damning without redemption for he that beleeveth not shall be condemned Mar. c. 16. v. 16. 10. Againe he shall argue them of Iustice that is hee shall accuse them of injustice shewing to the Jewes all their ceremoniall rites and Lawes did not render them just nor would all the morall vertues of the Gentiles that were infidels justifie them in the sight of God because none could render them just there but Jesus Christ who for that purpose went to his Father to tell him these onely shalt thou justifie who beleeve aright in me who renounce the ceremoniall Law of the Jewes the humane Law of the Gentiles and follow the divine Law that I have left them who alone have redeemed them and can alone save those that keep my Law that can make them truly just in the sight of men and Angels and of God himselfe it is very pretty what Saint Bernard saith of these words Ser. 12. The Holy Ghost doth argue the world of sinne because it dissembles of Justice which it doth not rightly order while it attributes the same to man not to God of Judgement which it usurpes while it judgeth rashly not onely of it selfe but of others too 11. Lastly he shal argue the world of Judgement is diversely understood by some that the Holy Ghost shal shew the world made a false judgement of Christ his Miracles holding them to be witchcrafts or workes of the devil by others that he shal argue men of sloath to be overcome by the wounded and conquered devil for want of diligence to resist him by others of cousenage to put their hopes in the devil who himselfe is damned and can save no man by others and those best of all that the Holy Ghost shal argue men of Judgement in shewing them how justly they deserve damnation who follow for their guides the damned devil and all his wayes and workes and this when he shal make the Apostles cast out devils out of the visible Temples where they were as Idols adored for God and out of the invisible Temples the soules of men whom they had possessed both by their foule persons presence and by the guilt of enormious sinne cast out by Sacramental grace of holy pennance 12. Christ here alludes to the mysteries of Faith the conversion of the Gentiles the foundation of the Churches and Government thereof by his Vicar by the Bishops and Priests in a Hierarchical way all which he left to be the product of the holy Ghost and things deeper then for novices to be able at first to dive into in whose eyes the carnal and ceremonial Rights of the Jewish Churches or Synagogues rather were too fresh as yet and their souls were not sufficiently illuminated to attend to higher matters and those altogether spiritual whence we may gather that even the Apostles had by the coming of the holy Ghost new lights and did daily increase in the knowledge of the mysteries of Faith and Religion according to that of the Proverbs Cap. 4. v. 18. The ways of the just are like light shining and increasing to high noon day whence the Primitive Church is compared to be quasi aurora consurgens like the dawning of the day Cant. 6.9 and proceeding brighter and brighter daily till she come to the brightness of the latter day when all her Saints shall enter like so many noon-time Suns into the kingdom of Heaven 13. When for the reasons above he shall come who is the spirit of Truth he shall teach you all Truth that you are capable off and that is fit you should know to guide your own and others souls to Heaven For he shall not speak of himself but what he shall hear since t is not what he alone says but what my Father and I say too that he shall tell you so all he says shall be as we all three determine nor shall he speak as men do out of their fancy no but just as I have taught you before and as my Father and I will have him tell you hereafter not as fables but as undoubted Truths which are of eternal Verity so look how Christ said his doctrine was not his own but his Fathers that sent him in like manner the truth which the holy Ghost shall teach is not his own onely but joyntly the Fathers and the Sons from whom he doth proceed and from whom he was sent And he shall tell you things to come by this is understood the Apostles were to have the Spirit of Prophesie as Actor 11. v. 18 20. v. 19 21. v. 11. we may read nor is St. Johns Apocalypse other then a continued Prophesie from one end to the other Nor was it requisite Christ his Apostles should be inferiourly gifted to any of the Ministers of God in the old Law and this gave great comfort and encouragement to the Apostles since naturally men desire to know future things by future things also venerable Bede understandeth things of Heaven of Grace and of Glory as who should say the Apostles shall not be onely able to guide you here but to set you safe into a blessed Eternity and future Kingdom that shall never end 14. He shall glorifie me when he shall confirm the world in the belief of my being the Messias expected God and man the Saviour of the World He shall receive of mine for he shall proceed from my Father and me and receive the Divine Essence one and the same in all the three Persons of the Trinity and consequently his Will shall be mine his Science mine his Doctrine mine where note the Text doth not say he shall receive me but of mine because he is a distinct Person from the Son and though he receive not the filiation by his procession he receives the Essence of the Son so that is to receive of him and yet not him nor to be him And thus he gave compleat content to the Apostles seeing they did passionately love him to tell them the Comforter he was to send them should supply his absence by teaching them as he had done by loving them as he did since he received his doctrine from him and his affection too The Application 1. THe whole scource of this Gospel is to beget belief in the Apostles that our Saviours departure from them was for their good and that the Primary effect of the coming of the holy Ghost was to beat down the sin of Infidelity as who should say it were the sin of sins not to believe in Jesus Christ and not to obey all his commands in vertue of that belief 2. What should then be the Practice of us Christians at this time but to use all means possible to fortifie our Faith as the greatest Bulwork against all sin whatsoever and indeed what is it else but a kinde of Infidelity not to do according as we are taught by the rules of Faith that is not to make all our actions tend to the sole will and pleasure of Almighty God since if
is indeed the highest article of our Faith the first and main principle of Christian Religion But to conclude this doctrine 20. See how the beginning of this verse tells besides this mystery what the Apostles were commanded to teach the world namely to do all whatsoever Christ commanded them to deliver as the Will of God that is to say as well to do good works as to believe aright and to professe that Faith which was preached unto them and how ever Luther and Calvin pretend the Church of Christ and the right administration of the Sacraments thereof and of the divine Services had failed for many hundred of years together before they arrogated to themselves a kind of new Apostolate forsooth yet it is from hence confidently asserted by the unanimous consent of all Catholick Doctours and Divines that there neither hath been hitherto nor ever shall be hereafter till the day of doom which is the consummation or end of the world any failure in the Church of Christ nor in Christ his perpetual assistance and presence with his ever visible Church insomuch that he is ever visibly present in his perpetual visible rulers of the Church and invisibly in his continual-assisting grace and hence it is evidently proved that albeit no successours of the Apostles had those ample prerogatives which they enjoyed yet their Ministery is so the same that the Apostles was as Christ is said even to perpetuate the Apostles in their successours and his presence with them in his presence with their followers and in his assisting them as constantly as he did assist their predecessours though perhaps not as amply nor as efficaciously at all times For how else can it be true that Christ said to his Apostles he would send them another Comforter that should assist them eternally not in their persons but in their successours to the worlds end For the same are the gifts of Christ and of the Holy Ghost as far forth as they are both one and the same God Nay more Christ is even visibly remaining with the Ministers of his Church in the holy Eucharist or B. Sacrament of the Altar his blessed body and bloud being exposed perpetually to the receiving and adoration of the people more he is visibly with us in his Priests who are his visible instruments to administer the Sacraments and offer sacrifice unto the sacred Deity for though the Priest be the instrumental yet Christ is the chief and principal Priest himself it being proper to him to be both Sacrifice and Sacrificant so as in seeing the accidents of bodies we are said consequently to see the things whose accidents we see in like manner by seeing the Sacramental species we may be said to see the Sacrament the body and bloud of Christ whose accidents they are after consecration though the same species before were the accidents of bread and wine To conclude we may as truly say Christ is visibly with his Church to the worlds end as we may say a mans soul is visibly in his body that is to say perceptibly so long as a man lives and hath motion for look what the soul is to the body the same Christ is to his Church so that as the soul is the bodies natural life Christ is the supernatural life of the soul believing in him and making her self by that belief a member of his Church for as the soul makes the body move so Christ makes his Church to do according to that of S. Paul Philipp 2. he worketh all in all according to the purpose of his own holy will and again he it is that gives a will to do good and a power to put that will in execution and to perfect by him what was undertaken for him as being to his honour and glory The Application 1. IT is no marvel that to day we hear inculcated to us an explicite act of Faith in the Front and body of this Gospel while Hope and Charity are onely recommended to us in the close thereof and that but implicitely neither notwithstanding as our design of piety is laid in this work Charity is the chief vertue to be practis'd from this day untill Advent This is I say no marvel the very name of the day requiring this preference to Faith and the nature of the Feast inforcing it besides for since the proper object of Love is Goodnesse seen or understood and since the Blessed Trinity is not here seen at all but by the light of Faith therefore all the understanding we can have of it on Earth is first to believe and next to love it according as the Gospel intimates where Jesus by the vertue of Plenipotentiality given him both in heaven and earth sends his Apostles first to Teach the whole world the mystery of the B. Trinity by Baptizing all Nations in the name of the Father Son and holy Ghost and thereby obliging them to believe explicitely these Three distinct Persons are all but one simple and single God whereas he bids the said Apostles here at least but implicitely to hope in and to love the sacred Trinity in as much as he commands their Teaching all Nations to observe all his Commandments whatsoever which yet are not observeable but for pure love of the commander and for pure hope of his recompencing our obedience unto his commands Who so reads the Gospel will soon see this to be the whole scope thereof 2. What then remaines for further application but that by an actual confessing this true Faith we actually glorifie the eternal Trinity and that in the Power of each Divine Persons sacred Majesty namely in the Power of the Father creating us in the Power of the Son redeeming us in the Power of the Holy Ghost sayntifying of us we adore the Unity of these Three Persons Deity since none but God can create none but God can redeem and none but God can sayntifie a soul 3. O Happy Christians who by firmly believing this to be their obligation to the sacred Trinity can neither want motive enough for Love of God nor ground enough for Hope that by this Act of Faith they shall be defended from all Adversity since the true victrix over all our enemies is as St. John tells us 1 Ep. c. 5. our Faith which overcomes the world and consequently all Adversity Say now the Prayer above and see how patt it is to what we here are taught On the first Sunday after Pentecost The Antiphon Luk. 6.37 JVdge not that you be not judged for in what Judgement you Judge you shall be Judged saith our Lord. Vers Let my prayer O Lord be directed Resp Even as Incense before thee The Prayer O God the strength of those that hope in thee be propitiously present to our prayers and because without thee mortal infirmity is of no ability grant the assistance of thy grace that in doing what thou dost command we may please thee both in will and work The Illustration ALbeit this Sunday is
never served but with a commemoration made thereof upon Trinity Sunday which it alwayes falls upon and whereunto with great reason it gives place in the publick Solemnity of holy Churches service neverthelesse we are not forbidden in our private devotions to make use of the comfort which this prayer adjusted to the Epistle and Gospel proper thereunto will afford us since the Gospel and the Prayer are both read to day by way of Commemoration of this first Sunday as above and since the whole Masse of this Sunday is said at the pleasure of the Priest no double feasts occurring between this and Thursday next which is the Feast of Corpus Christi and in regard there is a world of sweet devotion in the exposition both of this Epistle and Gospel I hope it will encourage all good Christians to read both what is written upon the Blessed Trinity and this Sunday too before next Sunday come since it is but this week of all the year that they will have so much to read and which if I mistake not will seem but little neither 't is all so sweet But because the task of reading will be double I shall abridge the glosse of the Prayer and suffice my self to shew the constant connexion between this and the other parts of holy Churches Service to day by summing up the Epistle and Gospel as both teaching perfect charity while they extend it to the love of our enemies and as being both abstracted in this prayer which after an humble acknowledgment of our own weaknesse confessing all our strength is from Almighty God without whom our mortall infirmity is of no ability petitions the assistance of his grace that in doing his commands we may please him hoth in will and work And truly all his commands are included in these two precepts of charity so much insisted on both in the Epistle and Gospel namely that of loving God above all things and our neighbours as our selves which then we shall do perfectly when we love our enemies because this love will make us indeed have no enemies at all and so be as little troubled at what injury other men can do us as we should be at our selves if by chance we were causes of our own mischiefs for though we might be disturbed a little thereat yet never so much as to loose our charity or to hate our selves nor consequently can we hate our enemies if we once arrive at the perfection of that commandment which bids us love our neighbours as our selves Which that we may do this is very aptly made the Churches Prayer to day begging Gods assisting grace that in doing his commands we may please him both in work and will in work by executing his commands compleatly and perfectly in will by doing them readily and cheerfully And it is worthy our remark that on the same Trinity Sunday where we have the deepest mystery of Faith recommended by holy Church we should have also the highest act of Charity inculcated unto us that so we might see the firmnesse of our Faith to day petitioned consisted in the operation of our Love according to the same Faith and that Christian perfection is never attained till we arrive unto perfect Charity which is the nerve that links together the members of the Churches mystical body and unites them all unto their head Christ Jesus as the sinewes of natural bodies knit together the members thereof So still we see our design of connexion between all the parts of Churches Service made good The Epistle 1 Joh. 4.8 c. 8 He that loveth not knoweth not God for God is Charity 9 In this hath the charity of God appeared in us because God hath sent his only-begotten Son into the world that we may live by him 10 In this is charity not as though we have loved him but because he hath loved us and sent his Son a propitiation for our sins 11 My dearest if God hath so loved us we also ought to love one another 12 God no man hath seen at any time If we love one another God abideth in us and his charity in us is perfected 13 In this we know that we abide in him and he in us because he of his Spirit hath given us 14 And we have seen and do testifie that the Father hath sent his Son the Saviour of the world 15 Whosoever shall confesse that Jesus is the Son of God God abideth in him and he in God 16 And we have known and have believed the charity which God hath in us God is charity and he that abideth in charity abideth in God and God in him 17 In this is charity perfected with us that we may have confidence in the day of Judgment because as he is we also are in the world 18 Fear is not in charity but perfect charity casteth out fear because fear hath painfulnesse And he that feareth is not perfect in charity 19 Let us therefore love God because God first hath loved us 20 If any man shall say that I love God and hateth his brother he is a lyer For he that loveth not his brother whom he seeth God whom he seeth not how can he love 21 And this Commandment we have from God that he which loveth God loveth also his Brother The Explication 8. St. John in this Epistle ver 7. had said every one that loveth is born of God and knoweth God now he gives the reason thereof in this eighth verse proving the same à contrario as School-men say by an argument from the contrary assertion he that loveth not knoweth not God because God is charity or love not but that we may speculatively know God without loving him but practically or experimentally we cannot know him unlesse we actually love him For example all men know speculatively that honey is sweet but they know it practically only when they taste it And though the same argument holds in all Gods attributes as in his power in his wisdome c. since he is omnipotency and omniscience yet St. John argues thus onely upon his charity because the subject he now undertakes is the commends of Charity Again between lovers love is the main thing they delight in and much more is it so betwixt God and us for he doth not onely love us and so is our lover but is himself love nay if we say he is the love by which we love him too perhaps we shall not say amisse and S. John being wholly inamoured with the love of God breaks into the recommends of charity as the vertue himself was most excellent in and wherein he would have us most to excell So for the ground-work of what this Epistle is to dilate upon we see it begins thus God is charity both Essential and Notional Essential as it is the nature of the Deity Notional as it is distinguishing the persons and so signifies personally the holy Ghost who by love proceeding from the Father and the Son is called
fearing Judgment we fall into the errour of heretiâ—ks who presume they are certain of their salvation By fear therefore is here meant despair such as dejected consciences use to have whereas none such enters into those that have perfect charity Secondly he alludes to that fear which in Eccles 5 v. 5. we read of even for remitted sins be not without fear which yet a perfect lover needs not fear but this is said to imperfect lovers of God Thirdly he means servile fear such as makes us serve God meerly for fear of hell not filial fear for that is compatible with nay essential unto perfect love as we read Eccles 1.28 who is without fear namely filial cannot be justified because who ever truly loves is ever afraid to offend his beloved Fourthly this fear is worldly or humane such as men have to loose their estates or friends affections when to preserve these temporal trifles they hazard the losse of eternal blessings Fifthly this fear is scruple whereas perfect charity abandons all scruples and proceeds freely and frankly in her Actions according to that of St. Paul Rom. 8.15 You have not received the spirit of servitude again in fear but the spirit of adoption of sons wherein we cry Abba Father Lastly Charity banisheth all fear of punishment although it allowes fear of the fault that may deserve punishment for the soules in Purgatory are not troubled at their pains so much as they are to have deserved them by their faults which they are even willing to expiate so when he concludes this verse saying fear hath pain he means fear in these senses as above such as is said of war that the fear of war is worse then war it self and all fear which brings pain is opposite to charity that brings ease and content along with it not solicitude nor anxiety which shuts up mens hearts whereas perfect charity opens and dilates them 19. 20. 21. These three last verses are as it were recapitulatory and winding up the clew or threed of this amorous discourse which lead us into the delightful maze of love and hath brought us out again according as we heard in the exposition of the sixteenth verse adding here it is not only a counsel but a command from God that we love one another that we love our neighbour lest men should pretend it were enough to love God onely whereas indeed all the scope of St. John in this Epistle hath been to draw us to a love of one another by shewing how God hath loved us all without respect of persons and taught us to love even our enemies lest we should excuse our selves from that complement of perfect dilection which is a friendly loving of our enemies to shew we have no enemies at all but our own sins the onely things if we may so call them that we are or can be allowed not to love and indeed may perfectly hate them nay the more we do hate them the more we shall love our neighbours as finding we have no enemies of any but of our selves Note the Evangelist tells us we are lyers to say we love God if we love not our Brother because love is a passion leading us by the eye to the embracements of the objects that we see before our eyes if therefore a man looking upon God Almighties picture which himself hath made as he confesseth like himself and do not love that picture which he sees how can he love the prototype or original thereof God himself whom he sees not And truly the Logick of this discourse is convincing because love is first rooted in the object seen if therefore we do not love that object of God which we do see how can we without a blush be so impudent so irrational as to say we love the object which we do not see at all as well a blind man might tell us he sees and loves darknesse which is nothing but a privation of sight and light The Application 1. HAving now given for respect to the B. Trinity the religious preference this day to our first Act of Faith when according to the order of holy Churches services charity is held forth unto us as the chief vertue we are to exercise without intermission from hence forward untill Advent Sunday see now with how strong a flame of love the beloved disciple of our Lord opens his loving heart to day whilest his whole Epistle to us from the very first verse to the last is nothing else but a continual eruption of the burning charity within his loving breast O how necessary is it then for us to strike out of our flinty hearts some sparks of love at least to day who knowes but in time with frequent lesser acts we may at last produce the greatest that of love unto our enemies see how the eleventh verse above doth animate to this bidding us love each other as Christ hath loved us Alas what was there in us but enmity to him when he began to love us were we not all at that time children of wrath Search then beloved out to day the man or men you least affect nay those if any be that bear you hatred and so are brothers of wrath shew but a smiling countenance to them in testimony that you look upon them as Jesus lookt on you when least you loved him when most you hated him indeed then shall you best apply the present Text to your emolument 2. Do not say you hate dissimulation that you cannot smile on him you love not or on him that hateth you lest you seem base and abject minded lest you make your enemy insult the more to see you fawn upon him Fie fie beloved these are but the subtle arts of him that is our common enemy by these devices he deludes us into hell and robs us of our best inheritance this is to do as holy David sayes To search excuses for our sins 3. Say rather with St. Paul I can do all things in him that strengthens me say though this be against thy own corrupted nature yet it is most sutable to his who took upon him thy infirmity that he might help thee with his fortitude Hope then in heavens helping hand hope in the Holy Ghost hope in his holy Grace he came but lately with a magazin of Love to leave thee store enough to love thine enemies if thou canst not at the first both smile and love do thee but that and hope he will do this who can do more the holy Ghost I mean shew by the deed thou hast a wish at least to do it willingly that he may by his holy grace give thee a will to execute this hard command of his to love thine enemies as he hath loved thee frankly freely willingly Let no man say this is a good but not a proper counsel now When is it more proper Then when we pray as above that we may do it Then we best apply the Text to us when we apply our selves
cast an eye into their own consciences And since we are aptest still to be thus rash over enemies therefore the perfection of charity was under the notion of mercy premised before this subject of rash judgement was fallen upon by the Evangelist 42. The Evangelist neatly winds up all the bottome of doctrine this day intended to us upon the button of mercy which then lieth smoothest when it is shewed towards our enemies and then indeed we shew both mercy to them and discretion towards our selves when we spare censuring their little faults by introspection into our own much greater besides we run upon impossibilities when we pretend to see moats in other mens eyes that have beams in our own which take away all our sight from us and therefore in this verse the Evangelist askes how we can with any front or confidence go to looke moats in our neighbours eyes that have beames in our own The intent of this question is to make us absolutely forbear all rash judgement since we see the sight of our own reason is quite taken from us by our irrationall trespasses against the Law of God for upon the matter every sinne is an act against nature because it propends to the nothing out of which our nature was educed when we were created to be alwayes doing something in honour and glory of our Creatour And least we should not apprehend the Evangelist to be in earnest when he beats down this common errour of the world this correcting others in things we are our selves more faulty in then they this tyrannizing over our enemies by taking advantage of their small faults he calls it plain hypocrisie in us to go about censuring any body else untill we have purged our selves of all faults especially of all that are greater then those we hypocritically reprehend in others as if we were free from any such who yet abound in many far greater then they are which we rebuke our neighbour for To conclude by this Art the Evangelist cuts off all rash judgement for ever since he forbids it till we have lesse faults then those we find in others which no pious soul will ever judge of it self and consequently she will forbear all rash judgement which being commonly practised upon our enemies under the mask of hypocrisie to rectifie their errours then we shall hope we may begin to love them when we see we must not reprehend them rashly as for the most part men are prone to do So adding these instructions of perfect dilection which the Gospel affords to the former given us in the Epistle the doctrin proves compleat and we if perfect in it shall hope to be perfect as God is perfect who sent us his sacred Son to perfect us in such heavenly doctrine as this is The Application 1. WE have seen sufficiently the drift of the Expositours upon this present Text how they all conclude under the notion of mercy to recommend unto us the love of enemies and that no doubt because the strongest act of Faith should be accompanied with the most perfect act of charity as in the Illustration above was observed but the rather because as this day closeth up the Feast of Pentecost by making the Octave thereof sacred to the B. Trinity so we being supposed to have received newly the Holy Ghost into our Hearts should at this time especially give demonstration of it by producing the best act of charity thereby to shew how strongly his holy peace doth operate on our rebellious wills 2. And then assuredly we shall be able to work by the holy Ghost most strongly when we put all our Hope in his assistance when we acknowledge our own impotency and have recourse to his Omnipotency and when we humbly beseech his goodnesse to give us his holy grace that our first act of love after his departure from us may be such as aymes at least at the highest charity which is the love of enemies 3. It is St. Austins special counsel and that which commonly all ghostly Fathers give their Penitents that we set upon the amendment of our lives by proposing to our selves some one vertue which we will endeavour to perfect in us and by that meanes to conquer the opposite vice thereunto no way doubting if we can arrive to the perfection of any one vertue though we spend our whole life therein but that we shall dye Saints and get the victory of all sin whatsoever by being perfect masters of any one vertue If we will give holy Church leave to choose for us and surely she is best able to make the best choyce behold to day she chooseth charity for the vertue she would recommend and the best act of charity the love of enemies why should we be faint-hearted be it that beloved what if we begin imperfectly to do as we are bid even against our wills we shall in time be willing doers of God Almighties will herein If with holy Church we now begin to practise that for which we pray to day to perfect our actions by the perfection of our wills by doing good willingly for the love we bear to God and his Commandements On Sunday within the Octaves OF Corpus Christi The Antiphon Luk. 14.21 GO out quickly into the high wayes and streets of the city and compell the poor and feeble blind and lame to come in that my house may be filled Alleluja Alleluja Vers He hath fed them with the fat of wheat Alleluja Resp And hath filled them with honey out of the rock Alleluja The Prayer MAke us O Lord equally to have both a continual fear and love of thy Holy name because thou doest never leave them destitute of thy government whom thou doest instruct in the solidity of thy Law The Illustration WIth great reason this Prayer begs that we may equally fear and love the name of God since it is a Prayer as well adapted to the day of our Lord being the second Sunday after Pentecost as unto the now flowing Feast of the Blessed Sacrament in the Octaves whereof we are at present And since all Sundayes are dayes set apart for the service of God we do most properly on this day pray that we may ever sayntifie his holy name with equal fear and love unto the same which is as much as to say we should never receive the Blessed Sacrament now exposed in all Churches where Catholick Religion is freely practised but that we should as well have a regard to the fear we ought to have of Christ our Judge as to the love we ought to bear to the name of Jesus our Lord and Saviour who is most properly so called now because in the Blessed Sacrament we are in a manner actually saved by having heaven come down to us even before we are able or fit to go up to heaven And therefore this prayer beggs we may as equally at least love God under his best of names that of Jesus by which he is now exposed unto
be reall and not verball onely to be operative not idle or lazy for here the tongue is opposed to truth as dissimulation to sincerity and the word to the work as empty air to a purse full of money or as froth is to beer or wine To conclude hence we are taught further that we must not onely be effectually charitable but also we are bound to be affectionately so for it little avails to give alms unlesse we also love the poor whom we relieve and therefore love them because we relieve Christ in them and unlesse we give thus we sell our selves for popular applause by giving away our substance to purchase the empty air the shadows of vain commends and so lose a divine blessing as to the children of God to get a morall one as to be esteemed humane fathers of the world The Application 1. HItherto it hath appeared how exactly holy Church recommends unto us the practise of charity and truely this dayes Epistle confirms us in the same practise while it runnes wholly upon the subject of love so high that it seems to exceed even the last sundayes act of charity commanding then to love our enemies because now it exhorts us to do more then love them when v. 16. it invites to die for them also if need be which yet a true love of enemies involves as our Saviour did for us to shew his love unto us 2. And least we should pretend to love and not do it really see how the master of this Art S. John Evangelist in the last verse of this Epistle bids us take heed we do not feign the part we ought to act in earnest for he tells us 't is not enough to say we love unlesse we do it too no he obligeth us to love in deed to love in truth lest we seem to mock Almighty God by giving out we mean to act the best part of his sacred sonne his loving unto death those he pretended once to love according to that of the Evangelist Christ when he loved his people he loved them to his end that is he died for love of them 3. Hence we may safely say those are unworthy of the gift of love who have not in their hearts and eyes the holy fear of God as truely those can never have who dare to mock his sacred sonne by their dissembling love that is not reall No Christians no we are not yet in heaven where we cannot erre here we must carry fear before our eyes lest losing it we lose our labours too for without this holy fear we cannot work out our salvation nor can we hope to please his heavenly majesty unlesse we fear his power who is as well our Governour as our God and as we must love his Deity so we must fear his Government Whence it is holy Church most properly prayes to day as above The Gospel Luke 14. v. 16. c. 16. But he said to him A certain man made a great supper and called many 17. And he sent his servant at the houre of supper to say to the invited That they should come because now all things are ready 18. And they began all at once to make excuse The first said to him I have bought a farm and I must needâ— go forth and see it I pray thee hold me excused 19. And another said I have bought five yoke of Oxen and I go to prove them I pray thee hold me excused 20. And another said I have married a wife and therefore I cannot come 21. And the servant returning told these things unto his Lord. Then the master of the house being angry said to his servant Go forth quickly into the streets and lanes of the city and the poor and feeble and blind and lame bring in hither 22. And the servant said Lord it is done as thou didst command and yet there is place 23. And the Lord said to the servant Go forth into the wayes and hedges and compell them to enter that my house may be filled 24. But I say to you that none of those men that were called shall taste of my supper The Explication 16. THis parable is almost the same that was mentioned Mat. 22.2 only there in a different way time and place as under the name of a dinner and here it is brought in under the name of a supper And there are divers senses made upon this supper Some call it a parable of the Incarnation life and death of Christ and thus S. Matthew seems to take it calling it a dinner as to the Church militant and a supper to the Church triumphant Others apply this parable unto the Blessed Sacrament and those make God the Father master of this feast his sacred Sonne the feast it self made of his blessed body and bloud and in favour of this opinion the holy Church at this time reads this Gospel as alluding to the flowing feast of Corpus Christi But yet for all that the literall sense of this Gospel alludes to the last supper of heavenly glory for that is the true supper which ends the laborious day time and begins eternall rest that never shall have end so though many may be cast out of doors after the dinner of the Church militant yet none can be cast out after they once enter to this triumphant supper And for that cause the most genuine sense of this place alludes as S. Gregory saith hom 36. to the society of eternall sweetnesse and glory Where note that great signifies here all the degrees of greatnesse such a supper as none could be greater either for the rarity of the dainties and banquets thereof or for the splendour and duration of it whereof S. Paul 1. Cor. 2. v. 9. sayes Eye hath not seen nor hath ear heard neither hath it ascended into the heart of man what things God hath prepared for them that love him And to this supper he called many by many are here understood no lesse then even all the Jews who were the true Church and people of God and were called by the Patriarchs and Prophets by John the Baptist by Christ himself while he lived amongst them 17. But by his servants whom he sent are properly meant the Apostles left by him to convert these Jews as well as other nations And by the bower of supper here mentioned is understood the resurrection of our Saviour for then and not till then were all things ready for this great supper of glory because then he brought with him from his grave a multitude of blessed souls who therefore were in Paradise as he promised the thief to be that very day he died because they were in his impassible presence that is to say when he was pleased to allow his body the benefit of all the gifts due to glorious bodies so though they were not in the finall place of eternall rest untill they did ascend with him to heaven yet they were set at the table of glory with him and were carried
our Saviour Jesus Christ but the Majesty and power of Almighty God indeed all the three persons of the B. Trinity so that to requite the love of him who made his Body be our food we are bound to come unto this Sacrament with acts of charity and to avoid the danger of unworthy receivers we are obliged to come unto it with all the fear and trembling we can that is to say by going first to confession and purging our conscience not onely from such sins as we are guilty of but even from inordinate affections to things that are not sin since we see in this Gospel those who had onely such affections were excluded from the Supper that was a Type of this holy Sacrament 2. Again since it was an act of the highest wisdome the second Person of the B. Trinity to contrive himself a Tabernacle in the soules of men wherein his infinite glory might take delight to dwell in hearts that had but a care to keep themselves in his good grace as the Priest sayes to day in holy office Wisdome hath built her self a House meaning amongst other senses Jesus Christ hath made himself a Tabernacle in humane soules that worthily receive the B. Sacrament it is but requisite we shew some zeal to his wisdome as well as to his Love namely that we bring with us to this heavenly banquet such a holy fear as may give testimony we aym at a reverence to his infinite wisdome while we shew a sign that we begin at least our selves to be wise by the best argument of humane wisdome holy fear according to that of Eccles 1. The beginning of wisdome is the fear of our Lord. 3. Nor will it be against the main scope of Christianity which is now continually to perfect charity in us while we joyn other vertues with our acts of love because though love must ever be included in all we say or do yet there is no vertue therefore to be excluded but any one or more may well go hand in hand with charity nay she indeed should never go alone being the Queen and Soveraign of all other vertues so they do but usher her where ere they go in her company as to day we are taught to lead our charity into the Church with a holy feare of our Lord. For which purpose we pray to day that we may come unto this holy Sacrament with equal fear with equal love and that for the reasons alledged in the Prayer as was said in the application of this dayes Epistle On the third Sunday after Pentecost The Antiphon Luk. 15.8 WHat woman if she have Ten groates if she have lost one groat doth she not light a Candle and sweep the house and search diligently untill she hath found it Vers Let my prayer O Lord be directed Resp Even as Incense before thee The Prayer O God who art the Protectour of those that hope in thee without whom nothing is valid nothing holy multiply we beseech thee over us thy mercy that thou being our ruler thou our guide we may so passe by the temporal goods of this world as not to loose the eternall of the next The Illustration SEe how in this excellent Prayer are summed up the contents of the Epistle and Gospel of the day how exactly do we in the beginning of this prayer observe the counsel given us in the Epistle humbling our selves under the mighty hand of God when we implore his protection over us confessing that without him nothing is valid nor holy in us and that we have no other title to his protection neither then his multiplyed mercies towards us upon which mercy we cast all our care all our hope and in confidence thereby to have him our ruler him our guide we commit our selves to the combat against all our enemies which we are to encounter in our passage through this alluring world beseeching his Divine Majesty that by our sober vigilancy over our own actions day and night accompanying his never failing conduct we may maugre opposition obtain the victory and receive the crown of Glory which this prayer petitions Behold it also as well adjusted to the Gospel For who doth not clearly see that whilest he shall not with the Publican hang upon our Saviours lips to hear his counsels and commands but runs his own wayes with the murmuring Pharisee he is presently a lost sheep and falls into sin if not to heresie as this parable imports and so in stead of onely passing by the pleasures of this world as the Prayer above adviseth he contrariwise dwelling on them in the swing of his own inordinate desires indangers his loosing heaven unlesse the good shepherd leave his flock in the desert by his being content for a time to see them want the comfort of his presâ—nce and consolation whilest he runs after his lost sheep and with much care finding him out brings him with joy back again to the Catholike Church if he were gone quite out of it or to Sacramental pennance if he were plunged into the mire of other grievous sins not schisme nor heresie But to come more home to our purpose whenâ—e is all this trouble to our Pastour but because the sheep do not with zeal and fervour say this prayer above do not hope in God but in themselves do not flye the roaring and the ranging lyon but run into his Jawes do not content themselves to feed in the pleasant pastures of holy conversation but run a hunting after the food of vain and worldly pleasures and consequently plunge themselves headlong into hell unlesse by the mercy of this heavenly shepherd they be reduced to an amendment of their lives and at last rewarded with eternal glory Whereunto it will hugely conduce to repeat this prayer often with such relation as we see it hath to the other parts of this dayes Service that so the sheep may do as the Pastour sayes This is the end of all preaching This the end of all prayer The Epistle 1 Pet. 5.6 c. 6 Be ye humbled therefore under the mighty hand of God that he may exalt you in the time of visitation 7 Casting all your carefulnesse upon him because he careth for you 8 Be sober and watch because your adversary the devill as a roaring lyon goeth about seeking whom he may devour 9 Whom resist ye strong in Faith knowing that the self same affliction is made to that your fraternity which is now in the world 10 But the God of all grace which hath called us unto his eternal glory in Christ Jesus he will perfect you having suffered a little and confirm and establish you 11 To him be Glory and Empire for ever and ever Amen The Explication 6. THis verse exhorts to resignation unto the Divine Will in all occasions especially of adversity No marvel the hand of God is here called mighâ—y when it is omnipotent See how we are wooed into our own felicity when we are exhorted to humility and
are not bound to have some care of others as well as of themselves if it be but to edifie and lead them on by their exemplarity of life therefore every lay-man ought more or lesse to zeal his neighbours soul and to contribute towards the saving of it in some sort or other though with intermission of his own devotions if the neighbour require his charitable assistance at that time when he would else be at his prayers 3. To conclude least even in the conversion of others souls pride or vain glory run away with ours we are still to keep the lamp of charity light at home burning within our hearts for fear it be as S. Paul said a vain labour to us though we gain all the soules in the world to heaven if we loose our own for want of regulating all our actions by the rule of love and charity to God first whereby we are secured and to our neighbour next that we may help him too Whence it is holy Church concludes her prayer to day petitioning that even in the best of Temporall goods which is the searching after other mens fooles a work of Time though a fruit of Eternitie we may be protected by the God of Love and may be ruled and guided by his charity which will carry us securely through all the allurements of Temporalitie into a safe and blissefull Eternitie Say now the prayer above and see how home it is unto this Application On the fourth Sunday after Pentecost The Antiphon Luk. 5. v. 5. MAster we labouring all night have taken nothing but in thy word we will cast our net Vers Let my prayer O Lord c. Resp Even as Incense c. The Prayer GRant us O Lord we beseech thee that by thy order our course in this world may be peaceably directed and that thy Church may injoy a quiet devotion The Illustration TWo things beloved we aske in this prayer a peaceable flowing of the course of this world and an unperturbed devotion in the Church O that we all had our desires in this or rather that we did all truely desire and pray for it doubtlesse we should then have it since holy Church we see unfeinedly petitions it while by this dayes service she exhorts us to do the like And truly one main reason why we apply not our selves to a still devotion in the Church is because we are neither at peace with one another in the world nor are content to let things flow in that channell which God hath ordered them to glide in but are ever striving to have all things go as we our selves desire For what Christian lives that hath not some grudge or other with his neighbour to say nothing of all the Christian Princes now at warres among themselves leaving the Turk and other Infidels to incroach upon them to perturb the quiet devotion of the Church and laugh us all to scorn besides But it remains to shew how this prayer exhausts the Epistle and Gospel of the Masse to day The Epistle tells us what order Almighty God hath set the world in and this prayer beggs the same course may flow peaceably according as God hath ordered it that is to say neither one man should jarre with another nor those other creatures which God hath subjected to man should repine at their subjection And I would to God man kept his course as peaceably as all other creatures under him do theirs I would to God he did as resignedly undergo those little sufferings he is here subjected unto as they deserve to be undergone in hope of the huge reward they are to have if patiently and peaceably endured see how to day we pray that we may do this What prayer then more suitable to this Epistle The Gospel tells us how sweetly Jesus Christ founded his Church to day upon the persons of the Apostles whom he calls to be the pillars thereof It tells us with what devotion S. Peter followed the first call of our Saviour it shews what miracles accompanied the Apostles being called to this ministery it declares with what peaceable piety they followed our Saviour and left all they had in the world to dedicate themselves to his devotion What else doth the prayer to day close withall then a petition that the same miraculous Institution of the Church may be continued by a like miraculous preservation of it in the self same quiet and peace of piety as it was instituted with for it is indeed a miracle to see it so preserved nor is the goodnesse of God lesse seen in this then in the other and thereby shews that this is not a prayer of one day but ought to continue and be the incessant prayer of holy Church unto the worlds end that so it may appear to be the same sweet Spouse of Christ in the end which it was in the beginning of the foundation thereof and for this purpose holy Church we see makes it her annuall prayer so must we make it our annuall practise to pray in this conformity to the preaching and prayer of our holy mother The Epistle Rom. 8. v. 18. c. 18 For I think that the passions of this time are not condigne to the glory to come that shall be revealed in us 19 For the expectation of the creature expecteth the revelation of the Sonnes of God 20 For the creature is made subject unto vanity not willing but for him that made it subject in hope 21 Because the creature also it self shal be delivered from the servitude of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the children of God 22 For we know that every creature groaneth and travelleth even till now 23 And not onely it but we also having the first fruits of the Spirit groan within our selves expecting the adoption of the sons of God the redemption of our body The Explication 18. HEnce hereticks take their rise to deny merit of good works but in vain for the Apostle onely means that humane actions as humane are not proportionable to the glory to that reward we purchase by them and in that sense onely denies our sufferings to be able to merit heaven But this notwithstanding our humane actions as they are elevated by the grace of God in vertue whereof they became good and meritorious and are by that means dipt in the passion of our Saviour Jesus Christ so they are in some manner proportionable to the reward they purchase in as much as they are so the effects of grace and not of nature and consequently may merit to be rewarded with eternall blisse or glory because grace is as it were the seed of glory and so what grace produceth is capable of glory Thus finite actions become capable of infinite reward thus one hours martyrdome is capable of eternall glory the like of other good works 19. This verse shews the greatnesse of the longing that creatures have after heaven when it seems to make the creature expectation it self whilest
a present Beatitude After which followes well the end of the verse that we should nor fear nor be troubled at our unjust persecutours because by our patience we are as it were out of their power which aymes onely at our affliction and vexation and failing thereof leaves us free from fear of any mischief they can do us S. Laurence on the Gridiron was a good proof of this 15. It followes we do then sanctifie Christ in our hearts when they are wholly set upon him and regard not any mischief hell it self can do us when our hearts are inflamed with the love of God and of Jesus Christ our Lord. The Application 1. THe Illustration upon this Prayer tells us at how great a height of perfection S. Peter aymes in the Text of this Epistle when no lesse then an absolute sayntity is the rule he gives for Christianity And this is evident whilest we see the Apostle exhort not onely to all manner of positive but even to negative sayntity withall not onely to have us do all sort of good but to have us decline all kind of evill whatsoever not onely alwayes to do well but also never to do ill not onely finally to be Saints but never to be sinners after we have once the happinesse to be Christians 2. And to this purpose he lights up all the lamps of vertues which you see him recommend to day unto us advising that our charity march alwayes through the wildernesse of this wicked world as men do rest by night in deserts when to secure themselves from the ravenous beasts that hunt their prey by night they make a ring of fire round about them and so sleep securely now in regard we have a Noon-day devil hunts our souls by day as well as night therefore S. Peter circles us about not onely in the never dying fire of brightest charity which the devil hates and flies but with the lamps and torches of a many other virtues burning bright about us so to prevent us from the Fiends mid-day incursions as well as from his seizures in the night because the least light of virtue the least glimmering of saintity dazels the eyes of this foul fiends iniquity and makes him run away 3. Now in regard all men are apt to dwell upon their present objects with delight and to delude themselves that every sinne they do commit hath an apparent goodnesse in it at the least of pleasure or of profit therefore to day lest we should be deceived with semblances of that which is not true lest we should run after the folly-fires of the devil as after virtues or follow his flying light of seeming saintity and so lose the society of reall virtues in the desert of this world holy Church makes her prayer particular against allurements of all appearing good whilest she draws our thoughts and eyes to things invisible as if nothing we see were worthy our beholding nothing that we have worth our possessing and so perswades us altogether to covet what we have not yet to wish for what we see not to hope for what is promised as being far above what ever is or can be here possest And that we may do this she begs in the prayer above as a speciall gift of God to give us a desire of loving him unseen and the Invisibles that he hath promised us surpassing all our own desires as farre as they do our possessions The Gospel Matth. 5. v. 21. c. 21 For I tell you that unlesse your justice abound more then that of the Scribes and Pharisees you shall not enter into the kingdome of heaven 22 You have heard that it was said to them of old Thou shalt not kill and who so killeth shall be in danger of judgement 23 But I say to you that whosoever is angry with his brother shall be in danger of judgement And whosoever shall say to his brother Raca shall be in danger of a Councill And whosoever shall say Thou fool shall be guilty of the hell of fire 24 If therefore thou offer thy gift at the Altar and there thou remember that thy brother hath ought against thee 25 Leave there thy offering before the Altar and go first to be reconciled to thy brother and then coming thou shalt offer thy gift The Explication 21. THeir justice was onely an outward shew of virtue a ceremonious observance of their own rather then a religious keeping the Law of God whereby they became servile to one another rather then children of God and therefore Christ tells us that unlesse we become more just then they were we cannot be saved unlesse our internall eye look directly at Gods honour rather then at mans will and pleasure we cannot enter into heaven which is the kingdome of God and not of man so our justice must be internall and reall not onely externally apparent as theirs was This our Saviour proves by examples out of the letter of the law as they took it without regard to the spirit thereof as we observe it or as we should at the least 22. This is clear by what follows for the Pharisees never expounded the law forbidding murder further then as to expose the murderer to the sentence of a temporall Judgement and death but in the Christian sense not onely the murtherer is 〈◊〉 guilty of eternall damnation but even he that shall without murthering as follows 23. Be passionately angry with his brother meaning so angry as to seek unjust revenge upon him in any way of violence at all much lesse of murther he shall be guilty of the severe judgement of God and not onely of man for if his anger be a mortall sinne it shall suffice to damn his soul if he die unrepentant of the sinne if but a veniall sinne yet it shall suffice to make him guilty of Gods adjudging him for it at least to the temporary hell of Purgatory fire a far greater punishment then to die by sentence of the law of man But if he shall in his anger call him Raca expresse any outward contempt or scorn of him he shall be guilty of a Councill This alludes to the order of justice among the Hebrews who punished faults of injustice by three severall sentences according to the quality of the fault and by three severall benches of Judges The first fault was call'd pecuniary or injury in money matters the Judges of that were but three The second was murder whereupon three and twenty Judges sate The third was heresie idolatry blasphemy or the like whereupon seventy two Judges sat Our Saviour who waves the first alludes to the second and third to shew the perfection of his law and compares the excesse of a contemptible expression to our neighbour besides our anger against him for so is understood by Raca to the severest of all the three judgement seats of the Hebrews which was that they called Councill when they were to consult how severely they should punish the offender for this heynous
given us in the Blessed Sacrament whereof this Gospel was but a figure according to the exposition of the best Expositours of Holy Writ For look how to day four thousand persons were corporally fed with multiplied loaves so are millions of soules dayly fed with the body of Christ multiplied under millions of consecrated hoasts and as by this food is chiefly nourished in us all that is good so by the practice of Piety as the prayer petitions in the close is maintained in us what by the aforesaid blessed Sacrament is nourished as who should say in vain we take this spirituall nutriment if after it we do not maintain the grace it gives us by the continuall study and practice of Piety wherefore to make this Prayer accomplished we beg in the close thereof that God will maintain in us by our practice of Piety the good nutriment we receive by the blessed Sacrament Thus wee see how admirably the Prayer is adapted to the other parts of this dayes service and withall we are taught that the perfection of a Christian life consists in the continuall practice of Piety and devotion The Epistle Rom. 6. v. 3. c. 3 Are you ignorant that all we which are baptized in Christ Jesus in his death we are baptized 4 For we are buried together with him by Baptisme into death that as Christ is risen from the dead by the glory of the Father so we also may walk in newnesse of life 5 For if we become complanted to the similitude of his death we shall be also of his resurrection 6 Knowing this that our old man is crucified with him that the body of sinne may be destroyed to the end that we may serve sin no longer 7 For he that is dead is justified from sin 8 And if we be dead with Christ we believe that we shall also live together with Christ 9 Knowing that Christ rising again from the dead now dieth no more death shall no more have dominion over him 10 For that he died to sin he died once but that he liveth he liveth to God 11 So think you also that you are dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord. The Explication 3. TO be baptized in Christ is to be christned according as Christ hath commanded in the name of the Father Sonne and holy Ghost to be baptized in his death is as much as to say in representation of his death and that our Baptisme hath force and vertue from the merits of his death and passion and signifies that as Christ died on the Crosse to this naturall life so the baptized die to sinne and live to Christ which is a life opposite to that of a sinner 4. This verse adds more to the Analogie saying we are not onely dead to sinne in Baptisme but thereby also buried with him in proof of our death to sinne So that the Trine Immersion used in Baptisme alludes to the three dayes that Christ lay buried in his grave as our sinnes in Baptisme lie drowned under the water thereof And for this cause holy Church makes a solemn Baptisme yearly on Easter eve to shew that thereby those who died were buried with Christ do also rise with him by the glory of his heavenly Father that is to glorifie him to a new life in him in testimony whereof the baptized have a white garment cast over them called the Chrisome to shew the purity of their souls and are advised to carry the same inward purity with them to the tribunall of Christ as a proofe of their fidelity to their vow in holy Baptisme of renouncing the world the flesh and the devill so to conserve their puritie or newnesse of life to the which the Fathers exhort earnestly when they inculcate the frequent memory of our baptismall vow which they ground in these words so we also may walk importing so we may persevere in that purity 5. See how this verse insists further upon the consequence of our spirituall resurrection even in this life by our spirituall death and buriall as above shewing that our newnesse of life by Baptism is like the ingrafting us into the stock or tree of Christ whence we are to receive all our future sap or nutriment so that as his death to naturall life was the way to his resurrection in like manner our death to sinne is the way to our resurrection with him and as we see graftâ— following the changes of the tree they are ingrafted in seem in the winter to die with it in the spring to revive with it so do we by Baptisme in Christ seem to die with him in the winter of his passion but revive in the spring of his resurrection 6. Then we know indeed our old man to be crucified with Christ when the new man lives in him By the old Man understand custome of sinning renounced by Baptisme by the body of sinne understand here the whole masse of our sinnes by the destruction of it understand not the palliation of it onely by imputative Justice as heretikes do but the absolute death thereof by inherent justice infused by baptismall grace into our souls 7. And this sense is confirmed by the next verse saying he that is dead meaning to sinne is justified from sinne lives by the infused Justice which hath killed and not onely covered sinnes in the baptized 8. This verse imports our future life eternall which we firmly believe we shall injoy with Christ if here we die with him to sinne 9. The sense of the precedent verse is confirmed by this following that tells us death shall as little reign over us in the next life if we truely die to sinne in this as it did over Christ once risen from his grave and yet withall alludes to the constancie we ought to have in good works even in this life that having once had the happinesse to live spiritually here we should disdain to die again by relapse into sinne and so to let death dominear ever us whom once we had slain by grace Note here the strange goodnesse of our Saviour who being God was content to let death once dominear over him on the Crosse that we might for ever after triumph with him over death 10. Here Christ is not to be understood to die to sinne as we doe but to die for sinne not his own but ours and that once for all our sinnes Where he is said here to live to God understand with God a blessed and immortall life as also that by so living he may perpetually praise and glorifie Almightie God since as he died for sinnes abolition so he lives for Gods glorification 11. 'T is reason we should think our selves dead to sinne when by Baptisme we renounce it and living to God when by the same Baptisme we live in him But it is a high expression of the alteration which the Apostle exhorts unto in advising us to think we are dead to sinne for as dead men have no motion
the devil therefore holy Church as strucken with an admiration at the wonder of it to see souls saved upon so huge an odds as three such enemies to one poor man or three millions to one rather considering every one of these three principall enemies have millions of instruments to damn a soul by and not knowing what else to attribute this unto then to the admirable Providence of Almighty God who hath so contrived that those whom he hath chosen to be his amongst the multitudes of men shall make their very dangers their security their very sinfull flesh the instrument of their saintity and salvation by the sole helping hand of charity Therefore I say it is the Churches prayer gives this prodigious work to the sole Providence of Almighty God and begs that by this never-failing Providence all lets to our salvation may be taken away and all helps possible afforded thereunto The Gospel Matt. 7. v. 15. c. 15 Take ye great heed of false prophets which come to you in the clothing of sheep but inwardly are ravening wolves 16 By their fruits you shall know them Do men gather grapes of thorns or figs of thistles 17 Even so every good tree yieldeth good fruits and the evil tree yieldeth evil fruits 18. A good tree cannot yield evil fruits neither an evil tree yield good fruits 19 Every tree that yieldeth not good fruit shall be cut down and shall be cast into fire 20 Therefore by their fruits you shall know them 21 Not every one that saith unto me Lord Lord shall enter into the Kingdome of heaven but he that doth the will of my Father which is in heaven he shall enter into the Kingdome of heaven The Explication 15. BY false prophets are here understood any that undertake to teach or preach false doctrine By their coming unto us is understood they are not sent lawfully but pretend mission By the clothing of sheep is meant their false pretence of sanctity liberty of conscience expounding Scripture and the like whereas they inwardly are wolves that devour souls under pretext of saving them 16. Their fruits are commonly licentiousnesse of life obstinate heresie schisme from the true Church These the thorns of their pretended vines the thistles of their pretended fig-trees 17. That is to say a true prophet or teacher teacheth good doctrine and leads a good life a false teacheth bad lessons and liveth lewdly too 18. This is parabolically spoken in order to the will of man and so holds not ever but for the most part unlesse taken in the compounded sense that is a good will whilest it remains good cannot produce evil fruit though it may cease to be good and then produce evil 19. What is here said in the future tense is in the third chapter of S. Matthew spoken by the Greek Text in the Present tense as who should say every tree that yields not good fruit is presently cut down and cast into the fire as if it had cut it selfe downe and cast it selfe into the guilt of hell fire by mortall sinne And it is onely Gods infinite mercy that whilest we yield bad fruit whilest we sinne mortally we are not presently damned for so we deserve to be And in the same third chapter the hatchet is said to be placed at the root of the tree to cut it instantly down meaning Christ is come whose Law is ready to passe upon us whose sentence is ready to be pronounced upon every mortall sinne for then we are spiritually dead and after death judgement is instantly ready nay our own guilty consciences do even immediately pronounce our sentence of damnation unlesse God give us grace to repent and amend by producing good fruits again 20. If they live well and do good workes you may know they are true teachers if not they are false ones 21. See the modesty of our Saviour Christ who rather names his Fathers will then his own although they are alwayes both one and the same God and both equally produce the same effect of salvation if equally observed and obeyed But to the first part of this verse 't is not every one that calls upon God or undertakes to preach his word that is saved no he must bring forth the good fruit above required and what is that good fruit the will of God he must square himself and his actions thereunto and then he shall be saved by crying onely or knocking at heaven gates nay wee need not cry nor knock at all if we bring a key to open the doore if we have cast our own inordinate wills into the form of the will of God and so made unto our selves a key to open heaven gates withall to enter whensoever we die The Application 1. AS in the Epistle above Saint Paul bid the Laymen beware of their greatest internall enemies or evils their own flesh so in this Gospell Saint Matthew bids the same Lay-people take great heed of their most dangerous externall enemies the false Prophets meaning false Teachers and Preachers of Gods holy Word We are therefore as in the Illustration was observed by this dayes doctrine armed against all enemies whatsoever internall or externall by the prudence of holy Church collecting at once all the motives that may be to increase our love and charity to Almighty God in shewing us how his infinite Providence hath secured our way to Heaven by pointing out every danger that we can encounter in the way 2. And as the Lay-man hath no better guides to heaven then those that preach and teach the Word of God unto him that catechise and instruct him in the Principles of Christian Doctrine that offer sacrifice to God for him and administer the Sacraments of God unto him because with these guides it is he trusts his very soul so in regard there are that doe usurp this office of Prophets of Teachers and Preachers to the very bane poyson perdition and damnation of souls it was hugely necessary the divine Providence should arme us against this worst of evils by giving us a rule to know these impudent usurpers by these false Prophets from the true ones which knowledge we shall have by looking on the fruits of one and the other them that bring good fruit we are to follow them that bring forth bad to flie 3. Now because holy Church hath not made the Lay-man absolutely Judge in this particular therefore while her Doctours preaching on this Text give all the signes of true and false Prophets she contents her selfe the Lay-men have recourse to God Almighties Providence herein and that they onely follow those who make their works answerable to their Doctrine who doe as well as teach the will of God For as they onely are true lovers of him who keep his Commandements so such onely are to be the Lay-mens guides And to the end they may have such and may be freed from others They pray to day this may be an act of God Almighties speciall Providence over them
ordinary but ultroneous Tythes of things he needed not to pay Tyâ—hes for This relates to what went before as vaunting himself to be the only chast the onely just man living chast as fasting which is the mother of chastity just as giving Tythes of all he had 13. The Publicane a true Type of humility standing his reverential distance from the Altar confessing him elf unworthy to come nearer to the place where the Pharisee proudly stood not daring to lift up his eyes to heaven where he had offended the whole Court the Saints and Angels whose inspirations he had contemned whose prayers defrauded God whose commands he had broken he knocks his breast his heart in token of sorrow and repentance for his sinnes By saying he is a sinner he confesseth his habit of sin by saying have mercy on me he doth not blame either fortune the world or the devil but himself meerly and layes all the load on his own shoulders as true penitents ought to do 14. More then he is as much as to say not absolutely but in respect of the Pharisee he was justified because the one humbled himself the other exalted himself Whence Optatus Milevitanus sayes well lib. 2. against the Donatists Better in some sort are the sinnes of an humble spirit then the pretended or boasted Innocency of an arrogant person The Application 1. THis whole Gospel is summ'd up in these few words of the Publican God be merciful to me a sinner For we see there is nothing else aym'd at in the whole Text but a condemnation of the Pharisees pride and a commendation of the Publicans humility or rather of his humble charity That is such a love as renounceth all proper merit and hath recourse to nothing but the mercy of Almighty God such a love as likes but dares not look to heaven such a love as hates all sin but hath no other hope of sayntity then from the mercy of God Almighty such a love as believes God hath power to save a soul but that he cannot manifest this Power without his mercy first appear because he cannot save a sinner unlesse he mercifully give him first leave to repent his sins 2. Thus we see beloved how charity goes shod with humility when in her journey she is handed on by Faith and Hope But that which to me is most admirable in this dayes service is to see the little end for which Almighty God is manifesting his power most of all by his mercy and how he is besought to multiply that mercy for the maâ—ifestation of his power both to men and Angels upon so small an account as making us pursue our own felicity onely that is to say the Promises he hath made unto us of much better gifts in the dayes of glory then he hath yet bestowed upon us in these our dayes of grace 3. Yes yes beloved our good God hath much to do with wicked sinners We may say with much more reason of mans salvation as the Romans did of erecting their Empire Tantae molis erat O what a huge attempt it was to set up the Roman Nation and to make them Monarchs of this world So if we look upon the final end of God Almighties exercised power and multiplyed mercies over us it is meerly to save his Christian people meerly to make them Monarchs of the next world eternal Emperours everlasting Triumphers over death sin devil and damnation after they had been slaves to them four thousand years together Nay so fond Almighty God is of his darling man that he is even content to bestow his utmost Power his extended omnipotency his multiplyed mercies on him to beget but a desire in him onely of his own felicity which consists in the promises of the next world not in the possessions of this Say then the Prayer above and see how it petitions onely this desire here to make us capable of all the joyes in heaven and of all the Treasures there On the eleventh Sunday after Pentecost The Antiphon Mark 7. v. 37. HE hath done all things well he hath caused the deaf to hear and the dumb to speak Vers Let my prayer c. Resp Even as Incense c. The Prayer ALmighty everlasting God who out of the abundance of thy pitty dost exceed as well the merits of thy suppliants as their desires pour out thy mercy upon us that thou mayst forgive what our conscience is afraid of and adde even what our prayer dares not presume to ask The Illustration HOw apposite is this admirable Prayer unto the Epistle and Gospel of this day which are nothing else but meer relations to the abundance of that pity whereby God doth exceed as well the merits as the desires of his suppliants and whereby he did pour out his mercy upon his people forgiving them what their own conscience was afraid of and adding what their prayer durst not presume to ask Say beloved was it not an abundance of pity that Christ gave us S. Paul and other Apostles to preach unto us the story of his life passion death and resurrection were not these works of his pity exceeding as well the merits as the desires of his suppliants when no mortal durst have desired so much misery to Christ because no man was able to deserve his God should suffer so much for him were not then the mercies of Heaven poured out upon us when our redemption was purchased at so deare a rate to Jesus Christ and was not St. Paul justly afraid something might lurk in his conscience unforgiven when he ends this dayes Epistle saying his having persecuted the Church of God made him unworthy to be called an Apostle and that since he was what he was by the grace of God he durst not presume to ask so great a favour O how literally is this whole Epistle exhausted in this excellent Prayer And what are the cures done upon the deaf and dumb related in the Gospel but an abundance of like pity in Jesus Christ but like excesse of his mercy poured out upon these diseased people what the amazement in the beholders of these miracles closing up the said Gospel but an acknowledgment that the guilt of their consciences made them afraid to be in the presence of so good a God and that the grant of the cure was a thing added freely by Christ as done in more ample manner then they durst presume to aske though with a faint desire and a fainter faith they had presented those diseased people to our Saviour to be cured Say now beloved was I rash in falling upon this bold attempt to shew a sympathy between the Prayers of holy Church and the preaching part of her Services Rather I am to ask God pardon that I did often doubt it was not true because I was many times too lazy to beat it out by way of meditation but now that I see the thing is certainly true I shall not be troubled if I fail at any time in so
are loving and charitable to our neighbours for the love we bear to God so the Gospel ends Do this and live Live eternally live in the happy fruition of all the vaste promises God made to those that love him thus 2. But we have yet a better pattern of our duty then what Jesus bid the Doctour of the Law take to secure him of this happinesse the charitable Samaritan We have our dearest Lord our Blessed Saviour Jesus here not onely the giver but the keeper of this his Law least we should argue our impossibility to keep the same when we see at how dear a rate he kept it how he so loved us as he laid his life down for a testimony of his love and gave us grace to do the like as the onely means of doing it Nor had the end our glory been otherwayes atchieveable then by the meanes unto it his holy grace so he that would our happy end must will us the meanes to compasse it this followes naturally and is therefore in the rule of grace undeniable nature being ever perfected by grace Hear how he sayes himself Blessed are the eyes that see the things you see c. and to the rest of those things which the Explication enumerates we may avowably here adde this for one their seeing Jesus give his life for an example to us of valuing his love at as dear a rate as he did our loves when he dy'd to gain them 3. Yes yes beloved this is the full scope of the Gospel and ought to be the aym of our actions while we read it so we may hope that he whose bounty gives us Faith to believe him charity to love him and hope to enjoy him will mercifully give us grace so to fulfill the condition of his Lawes whereunto his promises are annexed that we need not fear to obtain What to day we beg in the Prayer above the running without offence in to the possession of those promises which they that do offend cannot obtain and those that love can never loose by offending whilest they love So that onely love is the easie rule we are to be happy by for ever as was hinted before in the Illustration On the thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost The Antiphon Luk. 7.15 BVt one of them when he saw that he was made clean returned again with a loud voyce magnifying God Vers Let my prayer c. Resp Even as Incense c. The Prayer ALmighty and everlasting God give unto us the encrease of faith hope and charity and that we may deserve to obtain what thou doest promise make us love what thou doest command The Illustration HEere 's a Prayer that in one word of it richly containes all the doctrine of this day and indeed all the main point of the differential doctrine between the Roman Catholick Church and her antagonists especially the Hereticks of this time who deny good works to be necessary to mans salvation and will have no more then faith alone required on our parts pretending the work of our salvation is already finished by the passion of our Lord if we do but believe as much It is otherwise with us for here we pray not onely for other acts of virtue namely hope and charitie but even for our own increase of faith as well as for increase in other good works which as they are all rooted in these three Theologicall virtues so are they contained in them as the tree is contained in the root thereof or rather in the seed that runs to root the better to support the tree That then we may pray as well to the bettering of our understandings as to the perfecting our wills in the service of Almighty God know beloved holy Church to day instructs us in this Prayer to beg increase of all good works eminentially included in the three Theologicall virtues above mentioned and doth further declare that by this increase it is we may deserve to obtain as much as God Almightie hath pleased to promise us which is no lesse then his heavenly glory especially if we can by our increase in virtue arrive as well to love as to do what God commands that is to say in other termes if we so love God as for his sake we can also love the things commanded though never so contrary to our liking for then we Saint our selves indeed when thus we love And why because where sinne is not in man sanctitie will be undoubtedly as it was in S. Marie Magdalene who then was even canonized by our Lord himself when he declared Many sinnes were forgiven her because she loved much Luke 7.47 And by many we understand all for God never doth his works to halses but leaves them ever perfectly compleat And having thus evinced the veritie of this glosse out of the letter of the Prayer let us further see how the Canon of the Churches service is harmonious by the musicke of her Prayer to day which is therefore best because it is throughout three parts in one Nay if I said the whole Epistle Gospel and the Prayer to boot were all contained in the word increase perhaps I should not erre for if we but apply that word unto the things wherein we beg increase the work is done the cabinet of rich connection by that key is open to the view of the world But lest some dimmer sighted souls do not perceive as much it will not be amisse to show the whole Epistle of the day doth run upon the ground-work of the Prayer while from the first unto the last it beats upon the faith of Abraham joyned with the hope of a reward for his obedience performed with an act of charitie wherewith he shewed he did deserve the promise of Almighty God because he loved his commandement better then he did his onely sonne Isaack whom he was ready to sacricrifice to show how truely he did love the said command Compare this now unto the Prayer and see what can be more desired to make the harmony compleat Yet further look upon the Fathers expositions of the last verse in this Epistle as you see below and then say if the glosse I made above be other then Expositours allow As for the Gospell t is alike concording with the Prayer if we believe the Fathers of the Church expound the saving faith aright wherewith it ends when they declare this faith was saving to the cured Samaritan because it was accompanied with his good works namely with his hope of cure when in that hope he paid obedience unto Christ saying go shew your selves unto the Priest for the Text sayes after and it came to passe as they went they were made clean and lastly by his gratitude returning to give thanks for the cure which acts of other virtues obedience and gratitude made manifest his charitie since they were good works growing out of that root and since by this action of gratitude we see the Samaritan shewed an increase of Faith Hope and
himself onely shall he have the glory not in another 5 And every one shall bear his own burthen 6 And let him that is catechized in the word communicate to him that catechizeth him in all goods 7 Be not deceived God is not mocked for what things a man shall sow those also shall he reap 8 For any that soweth in his flesh of the flesh also shall reap corruption but he that soweth in the spirit of the spirit shall reap life everlasting 9 And doing good let us not fail for in due time we shall reap not failing 10 Therefore whilst we have time let us work good to all but especially to the domesticalls of faith The Explication 26. IF we have internall life of grace and justice let us walk justly according to the conduct of that grace and by no means look back to the wayes of Judaisme being as we are Christians but let us so farre decline from being vain-glorious as the Jews were that we even forbear the desire as well as the act thereof much lesse let us vaunt our selves to be better then others provoking them thereby to anger or envying if in any gift they excell us 1. Note S. Paul means here such faults as are casually and by frailty committed not those that are habituall or accustomary besides he glanceth here specially at frail relapses to Judaisme and such he commands the Galatians to instruct that is to reprehend gently and with lenitie not rigidly or severely as obstinate offenders ought to be reprehended so besides he makes not every one a reprehender of his brethren but those onely that are spirituall meaning Priests or Churchmen and such reprehension he will have to be in spirit also not in any vain way Note he falls from the plurall to the singular number left he had else seemed to accuse a whole community of frailty and of danger to be tempted which is indeed incident to single persons and not handsomely imputed to many 2. Here he comes to the plurall number again exhorting us to bear each others burthens whether they be of naturall disposition not agreeing with our own or whether they be diseases or afflictions laid upon our neighbour or lastly and chiefly even their sinnes we must bear indeed pardon conceal excuse and if we wil perfectly obey this counsell even do penance for them by our prayers fastings or alms and in so doing we shall fulfill the Law of Christ his command of loving one another This is my precept that you love one another as I have loved you Joh. 15.12 but he so loved us as he bore all our sinnes upon his back and therefore we must be content to help bear those of our neighbours to imitate the example of our Master 3. By something is here understood good virtuous or spiritual as who should say if any man doth not follow the precept above of bearing his brothers burthen let him never think he is or can be any thing in the sight of God Observe the text is so far from esteeming him for some body who is not sweet and gentle to his brother as he is not accounted so much as any thing in the sight of God but is truly as nothing in his eye and absolutely seduceth or cheateth himself if he conceiveth otherwise 4. In this verse we are exhorted to valew our selves onely as we can deserve to be esteemed by Almighty God where we all know we merit little or nothing and not as we may seem to be compared to others For what availes it a man to see another commit greater sins then himself if he commit sinne enough to damne him or at least to render him ungrateful to Almighty God And yet nothing more common then for us to flatter our selves that all is well at home if we see any greater evil in others then in our selves To seek our glory out of others ignominy is folly We shall never arrive to eternal glory in the next world if we do not contrive to be such here within our selves as may deserve the reward of eternal glory rather for our own good works then because others have greater bad ones to answer for then we 5. Note in the second verse above the Apostle meant the burthens of the living brethren in this he reports to those of the dead and in that sense we should each one carry his own burthen before the Tribunal of Christ at the later day as if our sins were then laid in a knapsack on our own backs and each man there to answer onely for his own unlesse he had made himself also guilty of others sins too and in such case they become his also The Reformers mis-understand this place when they alleadge it against purgatory and will therefore have it needlesse to ease our brethren in purgatory of their burthens by our prayers Alas they are chiefly then objects of our compassions and may yet find ease by the communion with the Church in prayer by partaking of the suffrages which the Saints afford them but at the later day it will not be so then is a time for justice not for mercy 6. Observe here the practise of catechizing or teaching Christian doctrine to be as ancient as from the primitive Church in the Apostles dayes Note that then also they who had the happinesse to receive the benefit of being catechized were exhorted to repend the spiritual courtesie by temporal rewards of relief to the Apostles Note lastly that catechizing was by word of mouth not by writing performed for it was indeed prohibited in those times to commit to writing the mysteries of faith lest the Infidels should profane them as they came to their view and yet now what huge force the Reformers put in the Scripture as if it alone availed and tradition were nothing worth whereas both together make up one perfect Record of Christian doctrine 7. This verse may either be refer'd to that immediate before or to the fourth above as who should say deceive not your selves by pretending excuses from relieving their temporal wants who afford you the spiritual helps of Christian doctrine so S. Augustine Theophylactus and S. Hierome expound this place or as more generally others expound it delude not your selves for you cannot cousen God by shaking off your burthens upon other mens shoulders you shall bear your own for God knowes which are yours and you cannot cousen him and thus it reports to the fifth verse as above let each one bear his own burthen So the metaphor imports that this life is a husbandry a time of sowing the next is that of reaping according as we have sowed here if good works then good reward if bad then punishment 8. This verse S. Hierome and the rest above interpret as they did that of the catechized as who should say if you sow the seed of almes to those that instruct you you shall reap the reward the Spirit that is heaven if you sow penury and relieve them not
you shall receive or reap corruption But the common sense is that the fruit of carnality is disease corruption death damnation that of spirit vertue life everlasting glory and salvation 9. The Apostle here exhorts to a perseverance in doing good the Priest constantly continuing to teach the Lay to learn to relieve his teacher and to work according as he is taught as if incessant reward were not otherwise to be hoped but for incessant labour So as we may understand this in two sorts we shall reap in due time in the next world if we do not cease our labours in this or we shall even in this world reap incessant reward in due time for our labours here if we labour constantly and slack not our zeales since it is the end that crownes the work either with grace in due time here or glory in due time in the next world 10. That is whilest we have time to sow the seeds of good works let us do good to all people Christians or Heathens not onely to those we catechize though principally to Christians as being domesticals and of one house with us fellow servants in the Church of Christ the true house of God The Application 1. THe last Sundayes service and this do seem to be almost the same onely that was a more general Application to all mankind this to the chosen sort of men who make up the mystical body of Christ his holy Church Wherefore S. Paul in this Epistle makes his addresse particularly to the Priests and Pastours of our soules from the first verse to the end of the fifth at the sixth he begins to tell the sheep their duty to the shepherd and so continues to the end of the eighth verse in the two last verses he concludes with an exhortation to them of perseverance in their Christian duties bidding them do good to all men whatsoever but especially to one another to the domesticals of Faith to those who have not onely Christ their Father but do professe his holy Spouse the Church to be their Mother 2. We see by the Illustration above that the Priests office to us is double the one to cleanse us by administring the holy Sacraments unto us the other to defend us by preaching praying and offering up their daily sacrifices for us Hence we must conclude our duty consists in preparing our selves worthily for receiving those Sacraments from the hands of the Priests lest we incurr the censures of unworthy receivers no lesse then our own damnation if it be the Sacrament of the holy Altar that we do receive and if any other of them there hangs a curse at least upon all who perform the work of God negligently as all unworthy receivers of any Sacraments do or the negligent hearers of any Sermons or of Masse which is the sacrifice as well of the people as of the Priest and these are peculiarly indeed the works of God as being instituted by his sacred Son nay more they are the works of his continued mercy towards us and so surpasse all other his works whatsoever because we are told his mercy is above all his works 3. Hence the Priest is put in mind further then in the Explication above with what a holy intention attention reverence and zeal of soules he ought to administer any Sacrament and also how with the like regards he ought to preach or offer up his sacrifices thereby to comply with the trust of Sayntity which both God and man have put into his hands lest he incurr the odious brand of becoming like the people so the Priest for how ever both are sinners to God yet the Priests are set apart as Saints to the eyes of men and they peculiarly were those he bade be holy as himself was holy who made them dispensers of the mysteries of God unto the people Lastly hence the Lay-men are minded with what humility reverence fear and trembling yet with what confidence comfort obedience with what Faith what hope what love with what adoration with what zeal to God Almighties honour and glory they ought to receive the holy Sacraments to hear the Word of God to assist at the sacrifice of Masse which is not onely a commemoration but even a renovation a repetition in a mysterious way of our Saviours death and passion so they are to look upon the Priest going to the Altar with the same devotion as if they did behold our Saviour going to be crucified Now that both may do this our holy Mother prayes to day as above for that special gift of God that bounty whereby it is performable that ardent charity which sets on fire the world of flesh and makes it flye out into flames of holy love unto his heavenly Majesty for by this love it is that the Church militant is govern'd and by the same love God is glorified for all eternity in his Church Triumphant The Gospel Luk. 7.11 11 And it came to passe afterwards he went into a City that is called Naim and there went with him his disciples and a very great multitude 12 And when he came nigh to the gate of the City behold a dead man was carried forth the onely son of his mother and she was a widow and a great multitude of the City with her 13 Whom when our Lord had seen being moved with mercy upon her he said to her Weep not 14 And he came near and touched the Coffin and they that carried it stood still and he said young man I say to thee arise 15 And he that was dead sate up and began to speak and he gave him to his mother 16 And fear took them all and they magnified God saying that a great Prophet is risen among us and that God hath visited his people The Explication 11. THis was a fair Citie in Galilee within two miles of mount Thabor and so had the name of Faire for Naim imports as much This made the sadder funerall and the more gladsome miracle being in so vast so famous a City into which so great a multitude such a train of people followed our Saviour 12. This seeming chance to man of two such multitudes meeting those within and those without the City at the funerall was designed by God to render more authenticall the miracle God thereby more glorified and Christ the more beloved though it is to be noted that the Jews and Romans too had their burials alwayes out of the Cities unlesse rarely for Kings who were buried in the Citie of Sion David building a place for that purpose Note this onely sonne was also her onely child hence the mothers sorrow was greater to lose in him all the whole hopes of her house being a widdow of note and so past hopes of more of that family 13. By saying to her weep not he shewed his compassion of her sorrow was such that he meant to take away the cause of her tears by restoring her son to life again and so doubtlesse she believed when he
therein Just thus it is with holy Churches preaching admit a million of people be assembled to one sole Preacher in the pulpit is his Sermon ever the worse because it dynts the soul of every hearer there and moves him so as if the Preacher knew the heart of every auditour he had whom yet he never saw in all his life nor knowes him now he sees him would any man condemn this Preacher No admire him rather and in him adore Almighty God who with one speech could touch the quick of every soul alive And so it is with holy Churches prayers the commoner they are the more peculiarly they touch each pious persons soul if rightly understood they seem to reach as far as all the preachers of the Church can scrue into a soul and farther too for who so sayes them with a zeal suitable to the Spirit whence they flow he like a river runs into the sea whence all the waters have their spring and is not lost although he beâ— not found but rather swells to be a sea of spirit while he falls out of his private devotions into the Ocean of the Churches prayer and sayes to himself Matt. 23.23 These things ought to be done and those things ought not to be omitted O Christians what a sovereign cure have we to day against the worst contagion in the Church the spirit of division of faction Say but this prayer devoutly read but the lessons of the other services of holy Church to day agreeable to this prayer and I shall hope to hear no more of faction in the Church of division in the house of the Holy Ghost of dissention among Roman Catholicks much lesse amongst the Priests of holy Church for in them it were a contagion worse then diabolical who as they are all Ministers of one onely God so should they all agree in one to guide the souls they are to govern in the spirit of peace and unity of love and charity which they shall never teach better then when they give example of it to their flocks The Epistle Ephes 4.1 1 I therefore prisoner in our Lord beseech you that you walk worthy of the vocation in which you are called 2 With all humilitie and mildnesse with patience supporting one another in charity 3 Carefull to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace 4 One body and one spirit as you are called in one hope of your vocation 5 One Lord one Faith one Baptisme 6 One God and Father of all which is over all and by all and in us all 7 Who is blessed world without end Amen The Explication 1. THe cause why he beseecheth them is in regard they had the happinesse to be made of Gentiles Christians and so equall with the Jewes that were the chosen people of God He calls himself prisoner in our Lord because he was in prison for our Lord for teaching the faith of Christ Walking here is understood living Note the word Vocation is of speciall regard and so imports a speciall obligation they had to comply with their said vocation which was indeed their conversion from Gentilisme to Christianitie 2. This verse specifies the eminent marks of Christians from Gentiles the one proud harsh furious quarrelsome the other therefore humble milde patient loving that so it might appeare a religious change to come from one contrary to another Supporting each other imports bearing with each others infirmities In Charitie is to say by or with Charitie repending good for evil 3. By unitie of spirit is here meant unanimitie that is though in bodies divided yet in mind they should be one and make it their studie so to be thus to comply with the care thereof commended if not commanded also This verse is hugely against all schismaticall division in the Church receding from the common Doctrine to follow the fancies of private spirits By the word bond is understood removing private sense in point of religion for a bond imports a tie between parties and so abandons singularitie when it must binde many together in the peace of unanimitie 4. This verse is exhortatorie stirring up to be all as one body and one soul that as you are called to one hope of Heaven by this your vocation to Christianitie so you goe all thither as one man since the Church is properly called one civill man while all the Members of it are regulated by one Law of Christ by one holy Spirit And indeed Saint Paul useth a huge Art telling us we have all one hope namely Heaven thereby to make us tend all one way to the attaining thereof 5. One Lord Christ Jesus one Faith that which the Apostles preached one Baptisme that which is given in due matter and forme applied with due intention water accompanying these words I baptize thee in the Name of the Father and of the Sonne and of the Holy Ghost according as holy Church intendeth when this Sacrament is administred 6. In this verse the Apostle summes up all he said before As we have but one God who is our common Father so we must have but one spirit lest we degenerate from being his children who will own none but those that are one in him and one to one another all others are bastards and cannot be brothers because not begotten of him that knowes no division but consists of unitie and simplicitie No God is above all men by his Majestie and Deitie he is through all things by his power and efficacie in them penetrating and passing through them all as freely as we doe through the Aire in all things by his essence and being in us Christians by his grace which makes us be his children and by his glory which makes us be his heires Others understand by this triple division the Apostle means that God the Father is above us all by creation God the Sonne by redemption runs through us with the Sea of his passion God the Holy Ghost is in us all by his sanctifying grace The Application 1. SAint Paul being by his imprisonment separated from his Converts the Ephesians and desirous in litle to send them much counsell how they might walk worthy of the vocation in which they were called summes up here those virtues that are most necessary for new converted souls Humilitie as the foundation whereupon they must build their monuments of a blessed Eternitie in imitation of Almightie God who raised all the fabricke of humane salvation upon the Basis of his own abasement Mildnesse in testimony they were no more children of wrath and indignation but of their milde Redeemer and Saviour Jesus Christ A charitable Patience that is to say for love of God supporting bearing with one another as the onely means to keep themselves in favour with Almighty God whom they hourely much more exasperate then any man can do them And Unanimitie as the badge of perfect Christianitie testifying they are onely true lovers of one another who are right believers in Jesus Christ
instead of purifying our intentions of honouring as we ought to do one onely God when even under that pretence by the contagion of factious doctrine we Idolize to as many devils as mislead us in the wayes of faction and division For prevention whereof holy Church fitly prayes as above that our intentions may be purified by the unity thereof by intending Gods honour only in those services that are pretended done for Gods sake and not our own interest On the eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost The Antiphon Matth. 9. v. 7. THe sick then of the palsie took up his bed in which he lay magnifying God and all the people which beheld it gave praise to God Vers Let my prayer c. Resp Even as Incense c. The Prayer LEt O Lord the operation of thy mercy direct our hearts because without thee wee cannot please thee The Illustration IF any man doubt what is meant by the operation of our Lords mercy mentioned in this prayer S. Paul in the first verse of this daies Epistle will tell him it is the actual grace of God which the Apostle alwayes gives thanks for as being the cause of the Corinthians conversion of their being enriched in all things appertaining to Christian religion so as to want nothing but the revelation of Christ in glory whom already they beheld in grace as also of their perseverance without crime till the day of doom in that belief unto which by this grace they had been called This is the summ of the Epistle and undoubtedly this is the sense of the prayer begging that as by the operation of Christ his mercy the Corinthians became Christians so we that are by the same meanes of the same profession may by the same help have our hearts directed by the operation of our Saviours mercy towards us by the encrease of his grace within us And indeed that encrease is also properly the operation of his mercy too for the first gift thereof was rather the exhibition then the operation of his holy grace and yet to us it seems like an operation of it too within his own bowels and so as we said above the exhibition of it in our eyes is as the effect of his mercie upon himself but the encrease thereof is the operation of it upon us to whom it is exhibited so by the exhibition of this grace we become children of God and by the encrease thereof we grow to be his champions to live his Saints and die his Martyrs rather then renounce the Faith of Christ Thus we see the first clause of this Prayer hath exhausted the whole Epistle of the day Now that the Gospel should be by the close thereof exhausted too would seem strange if already stranger mysteries had not appeared in the mysterious prayers of holy Church And certain it was for the depth of their spirit that S. Gregory the great collects them all together into a book intituled of Sacraments that is to say of Mysteries as in the preface of this book was hinted not that the stile of Churches prayers is other then plain and easie but that the depth of their meaning is prodigious We have examples in the simple stile of Thomas à Kempis authour of the following of Christ the plainest and the deepest book that ever was written next to holy Writ the fullest of common places and yet the most home to every mans particular that reads it So it is with the Churches prayers they are in words simple and facil but in sense such as the deepest understanding may not be able to sound the bottome of them For instance see how the whole story of the Gospel is wound off by the onely close of this daies prayer if yet the former clause thereof were not appropriable thereunto For what imports the pressing into Jesus presence of the paralytick and those who from the houses top did drop him down into the room where Jesus was when they found not entrance any other way but an infinite faith they had of being cured by the least touch of his sacred person and this to satisfie our selves with the letter of the story not recurring as we might to the mystery thereof What I say means this passage else then a remonstrance of this paralyticks faith in Jesus Christ And who doth not see the close of this prayer excellently well allude to faith since we read that without faith it is impossible to please God Heb. 11.6 Do not we Christians then implicitely beg if not the gift which we have already at least the encrease of faith when we end this prayer with confessing We cannot without God please his Divine Majestie that is to say as without the gift of faith we can be no Christians at all so without the encrease thereof through the operation of Christ his mercy in us we cannot become good Christians such as by works of charity still encrease our faith in Jesus Christ and by that encrease deserve with the paralytick as well the remission of our sins as the cure of corporal diseases since without such remission we cannot please Almighty God and without him no such remission can be had that is without his mercy operate first upon him to pardon us and then upon us when pardoned to offend no more not that this operation of Gods mercy upon himself is any new act but ever is ever was and will be one and the same act in him seeming new to us by the new effects it produceth in us So every way is it an undoubted truth that without him we can no wayes please him And thus do we still adjust the prayers of holy Church unto the other service of the day The Epistle 1 Cor. 1. v. 4. 4 I give thanks to my God alwayes for you for the grace of God that is given you in Christ Jesus 5 That in all things you may be rich in him in all utterance and in all knowledge 6 As the testimony of Christ is confirmed in you 7 So that nothing is wanting to you in any grace expecting the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ 8 Who also will confirm you unto the end without crime in the day of the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ The Explication 4. IN these words S. Paul gives thanks to God incessant for the grace of Christ which was given to the Corinthians who thereby were made Christians An excellent lesson and ought to be frequently practised by us to acknowledge that our perseverance is a continuation of our vocation to Christianity 5. In all things appertaining to your religion Rich in him rich by him that doth enrich you every hour by preserving you in the same vocation he hath called you unto In all utterance in all your words whereby is preached this faith In all knowledge in all true spiritual understanding the doctrine of Christ as who should say I thank God that hath by mine and by Apollo's preaching afforded you all understanding and true sense
of the doctrine of Christ the Gospel we have delivered unto you 6. The particle as here imports as much as if he had said by these two means namely of our preaching and your thereby tightly understanding the true sense of Christs doctrine you are confirmed in Christ in your belief of his veracity and so he becomes confirmed in you by these infallible testimonies you have of him our preaching and your right believing 7. See here how absolutely right masters the Apostles were how absolutely true schollars or disciples the Corinthians were of Christ to whom nothing is wanting in any grace that can be requisite to their confirmation who are true children of Christ who have such masters and who are such believers as the Corinthians were So that what remained was onely to see all they had heard and believed of Christ to be verified by his revealing the certainty thereof at his second coming in the day of Judgment when this perfect and fertile grace shall bring forth in them the fruits of glory in the Kingdome of heaven 8. This verse alludes to the present grace of Christ which the Apostle sayes should confirm them now in their belief meaning the Church not every particular member thereof and render them both here till then and at the day of Judgement inculpable for their having thus believed being thus called by God and thus instructed by the Apostles The Application 1. WE heard last Sunday how this Apostle summed up to his Ephesian Converts those particular vertues that were proper for new converted soules now to day he speaks to the Corinthians much in the same stile they being newly by his means then made good Christians onely here the Apostle insists much upon the effects of that grace in them which wrought their conversion and those effects how excellent they are the Explication of the Text above hath told us 2. It remains therefore that all Catholick Christians while they read this Text which minds them of their like conversion amidst a thousand millions of men who want that happinesse set their charity on work immediately to produce the like effects in their soules by the operation of the grace they have received to be and to persevere in that saving Faith which works it self by charity out of grace into glory at that latter day when every one shall receive according to their works 3. As therefore the gift of Faith wrought upon our understandings and directed them to an assent to mysteries above the reach of reason so charity is to direct our wills to attempt things above nature such as are all good works done for a supernatural end Now because all such works are the effects of grace and not of nature and because grace is given to us by the operation of God his mercy towards us who mercifully operates that in us which we our selves may cooperate unto but cannot operate without his helping hand without the operation of his mercy upon us even towards our cooperation which is indeed his holy grace working in us Therefore holy Church to day fitly prayes as above The Gospel Mat. 9. v. 1. c. 1 And entering into a boat he passed over the water and came into his own cittie 2 And behold they brought unto him one sick of the palsie lying in bed and Jesus seeing their faith said to the sick of the palsie have a good heart son thy sins are forgiven thee 3 And behold certain of the Scribes said within themselves he blasphemeth 4 And Jesus seeing their thoughts said wherefore think you evil in your hearts 5 Whether is easier to say thy sins are forgiven thee or to say arise and walk 6 But that you may know that the Son of Man hath power in earth to forgive sins then said he to the sick of the palsie Arise take up thy bed and go into thy house 7 And he arose and went into his house 8 And the multitudes seeing it were afraid and glorified God that gave such power to men The Explication 1. MUch dispute there is about this Cittie which it was since the Text calls it his own but the most probable sense is that it was Capharnaam which he was most pleased to grace with his miracles and preaching for Bethleem he had honoured with his birth Nazareth with his youthly education Egypt with his slight thither Hierusalem with his passion and so it rests Capharnaam must be that cittie which he now calls his own by his habitation preaching and cuting all diseases frequently therein 2. They bring him a paralytick in his bed the reason was that men sick of this disease lose the use of their joynts can neither go stand nor sit Here we may learn not onely to labour our own but our neighbours wellfare for this paralytick was brought doubtlesse by those who having seen the works of Christ and his wonders were zealous to bring this sick man on their shoulders to the fountain of health S. Marke sayes c. 2. v. 3. there were foure did bring this man to Christ And by the following words in this verse is evinced what we have already said of these mens zeals foâ— they carried the man up to the top of a house not being able to bring him bed and all through the crowd So Christ seeing the faith of these men who brought him with this zeal said to the paralytick in recompense of his and their faiths who brought him for the Text runs in the plurall number Sonne be of good heart thy sinnes are forgiven thee By these words we see the faith of miracles is and must be mixed with a confident hope of obtaining the favour asked which we believe is in his power to grant that we do ask it of and this confident hope is that which chears up the heart which Christ bade this paralytick continue Great is seen to be the benignitie grace and favour shown by Christ to this poore diseased creature when he calls him childe and to make him capable of that denomination forgives him his sinnes to shew he was not onely a corporall but a spirituall Physician and had power over souls as well as over bodies Nor is it marvell he first heals the soul of sinne by remitting it before he cures the body of this paralytick since commonly sinne in the soul is the cause of diseases in the body so that this was even a due order to cure the disease by taking away the cause thereof besides since all Gods workes are perfect it is consonant to Christ his dignitie and bountie being God to doe the worke completely to cure the man both body and soul and this indeed is commonly found to be the practise of Christ in most of his cures since his aime in all his miracles was the conversion of souls besides he came purposely into the world to take away the sinnes thereof But a main reason why here he did remit sin was to shew himself to be God by exercising that power which
that the Princes Armies were the hostes in this verse mentioned who after they had sackt did burn the City of Jerusalem 8 This verse alludes to the turning a way Gods face from the Jews his chosen people and casting his eye upon the Gentiles which signifies the transmigration from the Jewish Synagogue to the Church of Christ from the old Law to the new And he sayes truly dinner was ready indeed because Christ was then crucified and yet after that his resurrection ascension and coming of the Holy Ghost the stiffe-necked Jewes would nor be made believe in him so then the Apostles were sent from the unworthy Jewes to the Gentiles 9. Into the high wayes into all the nooks and turnings of the whole world into all Nations with Commission to make no such distinction as formerly God made between Jew and Gentile but to preach and teach the Word of God to all in general and to every one in particular of what Nation soever to every creature of the whole world Mark 16. v. 15. 10. This verse alludes to the performance of this Commission when holy Church sayes in honour of the Apostles Rom. 10.18 The sound of their lips went into every Nation and even to the worlds end their words were heard inviting as they were commanded bad and good that is not denying as Reformists do but that true faith may consist with evill manners that bad men may be yet true Christians or which is all one that in the Church of Christ there are sinners as well as Saints who are not therefore secluded the Church because they are of evil life but are still exhorted to mend By the marriage being filled with guests understand here the Church of Christ was full of true believers of all Nations whatsoever 11. This verse points at the day of Judgement which is the last day of the nuptial feast of Jesus Christ when God coming to view his guests brought into the Church out of all Nations shall espy one wanting his wedding garment wanting his robe of innocence and sanctity of life wrought by charity in his soul and rendring his faith meritorious in the sight of God by the good works of his charity By this one is literally and eminently here meant the reprobated Jew who at the day of Judgment shall be more confounded then any other Nation whatsoever so here is not had regard to faith as distinguished from charity since the onely obstinate Jew is understood to have no faith at all how ever he come thither to receive his doom with others that are then to be judged but his reprobation shall be signal and remarkable when he shall be as it were the onely man picked out to be thrust into the pit of hell Though by one man mentioned here is also signified that at the day of Judgment there shall not one be permitted to enter into the Kingdome of heaven who hath not on him the wedding garment of sanctifying charity hence each one ought to have a great care lest he be the one singled out to eternal perdition since in that vaste multitude not one can hope to lie hid from the sight of the Judge 12. By being dumb is here understood not being able to alleadge any excuse why he should not be damned Yet even in this inexcusable delinquency the text by the word friend out of the King mouth expresseth it is purely our own faults we are not saved for God on his part is our friend and so calls us when we obstinately persist in professing enmity to his Divine Majesty 13. By the Waiters here we may not unfitly understand the divels who wait indeed to snatch away as many soules to hell as they can By the binding his hands and feet is understood the cessation of all future action and place is then onely left for passion for enduring endlesse torments The darknesse of hell is therefore called utter darknesse because there is neither light of reason nor of grace nor place left in the damned to be saved by any meanes Though S. Gregory calls it outward darknesse which is more after the Latine text because it is a darknesse added to the darknesse of the heart and soul wherein the damned creature lived which as contradistinguished to that of hell S. Gregory calls inward darknesse where no light of grace did shine within the soul 14. This is a fearful conclusion for whereas the parable speaks but of one rejected this verse intimates very few are saved that is though many are called into the lap of the Church yet but few are placed in the bosome of Christ and there rewarded with eternal glory namely those onely who by good works and godly life added to their faith have according to S. Peters counsel made certain their vocation and election too 2 Pet. 1.10 certain indeed to God but not so to their knowledge who at most can have but a certain hope thereof so long as they live The Application 1. THe Parable of this Gospel seems nothing else but a deeper inculcation to us of the doctrine delivered above in this dayes Epistle inviting us to an innocency of life in this Paradise of grace by inviting us to a saintity of a far better life in the Paradise of glory 2. For what are all these excuses pretended here against our going to heaven but that which the Epistle forbids a meer practise of lying both to God and man So the Prophet had reason to say Iniquity gave her self the lye by pretending excuses from her bounden duty which ought to be nothing else but the serving God and the saving of her soul thereby What is the laying hands on Gods servants and murdering those that invite us to heaven but the Anger and giving place to the devil both forbidden in the Epistle what our stealing away the grace of our soules by the hands of sin which was a treasure given us to work out both our own and our neighbours salvation also by but a plain practise of the prohibited Theft in the last verse of the Epistle with making the theft a sacriledge to boot by robbing God of his glory and of his Saints whilest we concur to their damnation whom Jesus sayntified by his bitter death and passion 3. What then remaines but that as these falsities passions malices thefts are meerly the devices of the devil the multiplicity of his invented adversities to disturb the quiet of our minds and bodies by that they may not be free to serve God with a prompt obedience to his commands his meer bolts indeed to shut us for ever out of our best Paradise of glory so the Church by the practise of veracity patience goodnesse and honesty bids us work counter to the devil And for this purpose prayes to day that God will by the bolt of his efficacious grace shut out the devill with all his adversities from our soules and bodies that so by a tranquillity of serving God in the Paradise of grace in
our own deadly sinnes to God by means of confession and yet to refuse a pardon to those men that do but slightly offend us 31. This verse rather tells what infirmity is in man to man on earth then that we can think the Saints or Angels runne officiously to God and provoke him to take notice of our sinnes rather then begge him to turn his face away from them or to cast them at least behind him that if it were possible he might not see them So here the story is rather told to make it flow currantly as an act between man and man then as a true expression of the thing figured in the story 32. The following verse shows clearly God's â—trâ—se of our ingratitude to him and our want of brotherly love to one another so it needs no further exposition 33. 34. This wrath is just and so not to be wondred at By the tormenters here are understood the devils By lying till the debt be paid is to say eternally because no torment is punishment enough for mortall sinne which is of infinite malice and which malice continues eternally if man unfortunately dy in deadly sinne so no marvell his pain be eternall when the duration of the malice is without end All the doubt is here whether a sinne once forgiven by God can be recalled and man be damned for it as if he never had been forgiven so this story imports But the true sense of this place is that by this example was presented so great an ingratitude that it became a mortall sinne and consequently deserving damnation it did as good as bring back all the formerly remitted debt of sinne since to be damned for one only or for many sinns imports a desert of equall torments extensive though not intensive that is to say of as long though not as cruel or as bitter pains But to the thing intended by this Parable which is the obligation we have under pain of damnation to forgive our neighbour if we will hope to have God forgive us the story runnes right enough even in the rigour of the words so it needs the lesse glossing The Application 1. AS this Gospell we see is parabolicall so is it applicable at pleasure to the best of piety we can cull out of it Wherefore not to recapitulate what the Illustration or Explication above have told us already we shall do well to perswade our selves this own example of Ingratitude in our wicked fellow servant ought to be a motive to us of practising the contrary virtue not onely towards our common master who is ever obliging us but also towards our fellow servants who can never disoblige us if we remember that all the hurt we receive is from our selves 2. And again this Gospell minding us how the evil of Ingratitude was punished is therefore fitly placed after an Epistle of so much evil intended us as there we have heard to let us see that nothing but our good deeds can preserve us from those evil machinations against us 3. It is therefore as for a reward of doing good that Holy Church presumes to beg protection from all adversity in her childrens way and for their better means of doing good deeds sacred to the holy name of God shee hath to day drawn them all up into a Body least the enemy finding any stragling souldier of this holy Army fall upon him at a lonely disadvantage O Piety O Prudence of our holy Mother teaching us still To pray in consequence to what we Christians should be at according as she preacheth See how the Prayer above is sutable to this On the two and twentieth Sunday after Pentecost The Antiphon Matth. 22. v. 21. REnder unto Caesar these things that are Caesars and to God those things which are Gods Vers Let my Prayer O Lord c. Resp Even as Incense c. The Prayer O God our refuge and strength be present thou the Authour of all piety to the godly Prayers of thy Church and grant that what we ask faithfully we may obtain effectually The Illustration I Must confesse that whosoever casts his eye upon the Antiphon taken out of this dayes Gospel and Prayer above will have small encouragement to think they speak both one sense and yet we must or make them do so or in vain we are come thus far towards the end of our Book and to fail now were to suffer shipwrack in our own haven after the having escaped many a storm abroad at Sea First therefore let us sound the depth of the water in this haven see the sense of the Prayer which in the entrance steers us right by bidding us call upon the Authour of piety Almighty God our refuge and strength and to petition he will be present to the godly prayers of holy Church and to grant that what we ask faithfully sincerely or cordially we may obtain effectually even to the full of our desires This certainly is the sense of the Prayer and further Glosse it needeth not nor God be thanked need we any more to shew it speaks the whole contents both of the Epistle and Gospel of the day For see how the trust in Jesus Christ which Saint Paul begins his Epistle with to day unto the Philippians speaks in other terms that which the Prayer calls refuge See how the strength of God is that whereby the good work of Christianity in us begun is made perfect even to the replenishing of us with the fruits of justice by Jesus Christ unto the glory and praise of God as this Epistle concludes the Philippians were so replenished But that which yet more peculiarly appropriates this Prayer unto the Epistle is the sincerity which Saint Paul hopes will be the effect of their Christian charity and such an effect as to render them without offence unto the day of Christ And indeed 't is this sincerity which opens this cabinet of rich connexion to day between all the parts of holy Churches service since it is not to be hoped we shall effectually obtain any thing that we do not sincerely for that is here the sense of faithfully petition Almighty God and consequently if onely the want of sincerity debar us of our hopes where that sincerity is not wanting there we may hope to speed for all we ask and this hope being given us in the Prayer above renders this Epistle most conform unto the Prayer As for the Gospel if we take the words and do not mark to what sense they drive at we may boldly say no Gospel can be more dissonant then this below is to the Prayer above But if we see that from the first unto the last of the Gospel there is nothing but a juggle in the Pharisees to intrap our Saviour in his speeches and then surprise him most when they most do flatter him with the stile of Master of learned of upright of unpartial even unto Princes and the like when yet at the same time we see they aimed at nothing
more then to undermine him and bring him within the compasse of high treason when I say we see this to be the drift of the Gospel on the Jews part and that our Saviour seeing the naughtiness of their thoughts asks them plainly why they play the hypocrites with him then I presume no man that can tell twenty will marvell to see this dayes Prayer beg fidelity and sincerity of heart in us Christians at least when we see the Pharisaick Jews are convinced of so grosse an infidelity and flattery even when they pretend forsooth a tenderness of conscience and when we hear our Saviour recommend the same fidelity which we petition for to day in commanding them faithfully to render that to Caesar which is Caesars and that to God which is Gods namely their pecuniary tribute to Caesar their religious sincerity to God and that especially when they pretend it as here the Pharisees did though they least intended it Let me therefore beloved beg it as a boon that you all say this Prayer to day with such sincerity of heart as may render it and you gratefull in God Almighties sight and hearing for then shall we pray most consonantly to what the Church doth preach to day and then shall we be sure such our petitions will be granted effectually which are made unto God faithfully and this assurance we have both from the Epistle Gospel and Prayer of this present Sunday A great content I confesse after the fear of so great a losse as we were like to be at for making good the grand design of our work which as yet comes fairly home when we might fear we had been farthest off The Epistle Phil. 1. v. 6. c. 6 We trust in God our Lord Jesus that he which hath begun in you a good work will perfect it unto the day of Christ Jesus 7 As it is reason for me this to think for you all for that I have you in heart and in my bands and in the defence and the confirmation of the Gospel all you to be partakers of my joy 8 For God is my witness how I covet you all in the bowels of Jesus Christ. 9 And this I pray that your charity may more and more abound in knowledge and in all understanding 10 That you may approve the better things that you may be sincere and without offence unto the day of Christ. 11 Replenished with the fruit of justice by Jesus Christ unto the glory and praise of God The Explication 6. THe Apostle here speaks in the plural Number because he writes this Epistle as well in his companions name as his own in Timothies though afterwards himself being onely in Prison and not Timothy he speaks to them in his own person but directs his Epistle as from both to shew them that absent or present they are both of one mind The work he confides to have continued is their conversion By the day of Christ he means the day of Judgement which is that of his second coming the first being his birth-day 7. It is reason indeed for him to conside thus because as their conversion was by means of God his special grace so he presumes the same goodnesse of God will be continued which was begun in them and because he hopes their cooperation will not be wanting to persevere in the faith of Christ as it was not first to accept thereof Hence his charity makes him hope this of them with reason and his faith makes him presume the other of God towards them Yet not so that hence the Reformers can infer as they do out of this place that it is impossible for one who is once called by God and in grace ever to lose the same grace or vocation The Apostles words import no such thing onely a religious hope or confidence he hath they will indeed persevere as they have begun to love serve and honour Almighty God as his following words testifie in this Verse because he professeth here that he prayes continually for their perseverance which argues it is not a thing to be hoped but by endeavours and pains on our parts Nay Saint Paul so plainly speaks to this sense that he seems to say least their own endeavours towards this perseverance should not suffice he hath made it even his hearts desire besides and applies his personal sufferings to this end that God moved by his prayer and persecution may supply what is wanting in them towards perseverance by their own sole endeavours And it is Saint Augustines and the Churches doctrine indeed that justifying grace alone sufficeth not toward perseverance without new favours of more and more grace do inable us to persevere In the close of this verse the Apostle alludes to the hope he hath of Martyrdom for the defence of the faith of Christ against those who oppose it and the confirmation of it in those who have imbraced it And this he means by his joy whereof he prayes they may be made partakers 8. And that he doth thus pray he calls God to witness and doth this with such earnestnesse as if he were not himself happy enough to be in the bowels of Jesus Christ which is in his bosome in Heaven unlesse he might find these Philippians there also or as if his love to them and zeal of their salvations were such that he desired Jesus Christ should have them equally in his breast or bowels of affection with himself Both these senses this text will bear very well as also that by these words Saint Paul professeth he loves them so tenderly that he cannot expresse it otherwise then by saying it is even with the affection of Jesus Christ himself following Christ's instruction Joh. 13.34 Love one another as I have loved you 9. Here he prayeth for the superadded grace which above was said to be necessary to perseverance which is for their increase of charity where that abounds there is wanting neither knowledge of what is the true doctrine of the Church of Christ nor what is the true sense and meaning thereof since by this abundant charity we see the ignorant Apostles were so illuminated that they could and did penetrate into the genuine sense of the deepest mysteries of Christian faith and religion 10. This alludes to the sense as above in the former Verse that by their increase in love and charity they might be able to distinguish between the Apostles Christian and Simon Magus his Judaical and others heretical doctrine as finding that of Christianity the more powerfull and efficacious to salvation It seems by these words the Apostle thinks the pretended charity of hereticks is not sincere love and affection to God and their Neighbour but hath a mixture of hypocrisie in it and makes use of the name of Christ to cover the doctrine of those who indeed are opposite to him by saying this or that is Christ his doctrine which indeed is not so but proves upon a strict examine the sense and doctrine of
some private spirit that values it self above others and so to get repute will defend and spread a false doctrine under the name of the truth And truly this S. Paul intimates while he bids them be sincere not mixing adulterine with true doctrine for if so they cannot be without fault as he desires they may prove to have been at the day of judgement Nay so free he wisheth them from any offence there as they may be neither guilty of giving nor taking offence since in true Christianity no man can be hurt but by himself and therefore should not take offence or be angry at others upon any occasion whatsoever angry he means to sin 11. But instead of being guilty of offence he prayes they may be repleat abundantly filled with the fruits of justice meaning of all virtues whatsoever since every virtue is an act of justice taking justice in the large and favourable sense as here the Apostle doth All which acts we are to practice by virtue of our Saviours passion and consequently as his passion was so must our actions be to the honour and glory of God The Application 1. SAint Paul in this Epistle exhorts the Philippians to perseverance in their faith of Christ and that they may persevere makes it his instant prayer even when he was ready to lay down his life for confirmation of that Christianity he had brought them to imbrace and wherein he prayes their charity may more and more abound and testifie their sincerity and innocency of life not onely here but at the day of judgement 2. What was then the language of S. Paul to the Philippians is now the Churches unto us that are Christian Catholicks O what a saintity would that sincerity produce in us which should carry us on without offence unto the day of doom And yet we are by this Epistle here exhorted to be no lesse sincere in all the actions of our life then we shall be in that where every thought as well as words and deeds shall be sincerely opened unto all the world at least beloved if we cannot here be fully so sincere as there we must and shall be we have another lesse degree yet of sincerity recommended in this Epistle which may suffice to saint us here on earth that which we did professe at holy baptisme who were never other then Catholicks that which we did professe at our conversion who were bred otherwise when we stood resolv'd to sacrifice our lives and fortunes to the persecutours rather then not declare our selves to be converted to the Catholick Religion Yes yes beloved this sincerity at least is requisite the longest day we live since there 's no lesse an account to be made at the later doom of our walking worthy that vocation then of our being Catholicks 'T is not the name but the reality and sincerity of the thing we must account for then and consequently now endeavour for O could this sincerity attend us at our prayers wait on our words and works what a saintity would it produce in our souls both in the sight of God and man 3. To conclude what is great part of the guilt of every sin that lies upon our conscience but a meer defect of this sincerity in our proceedings Whence holy Church to day prayes in a language preaching nothing else to us but this sincerity of soul to God and man when she bids us not hope for what we ask without it and when she minds us of it in the preamble of her petition professing God alone to be our Refuge and our strength and thereby cutteth off all hope of other helps then what he must afford us so that if we think on what we say we needs must be sincere in this petition and cannot hope for help from God towards any thought or deed that is not pious and sincere in order to his honour in order to our own salvation Say then the Prayer and see how home it is to this sincerity The Gospel Matt. 22. v. 15. 15 Then the Pharisees departing consulted among themselves to intrap him in his speeches 16 And they send to him their disciples with the Herodians saying Master we know that thou art a true speaker and teachest the way of God in truth neither carest thou for any man for thou dost not respect the persons of men 17 Tell us therefore what is thy opinion is it lawfull to give tribute to Caesar 18 But Jesus knowing their naughtiness said What do ye tempt me hypocrites 19 Shew me the tribute coin and they offered him a penny 20 And Jesus saith to them Whose is this image and superscription 21 They say to him Caesars Then he saith to them Render therefore the things that are Caesars to Caesar and the things that are Gods to God The Explication 15. AFter Christ had told them the Parable of the man coming to a wedding feast without his nuptial garment Then immediatly the Pharisees consulted amongst themselves how to intrap him in his speeches 16. For which purpose they send him their instruments chosen for this purpose men of their own malicious minds and to make it worse they send as witnesses against him some Herodians men of the family or retinue of Herod a great friend of Caesars or of the Roman Empire because their hope was to wrest out something from him that might be offensive to Caesar and so to accuse him of treason Lo their subtle aggresse in calling him Master whose disciples they never meant to be but rather studied to make themselves masters of his life By the way of God they mean here the Law which leads men in the way to Heaven and since we look on thee as knowing exactly this Law and as one that is sincere and will not dissemble with us and art besides so equal to all men as thou art partial to none nor wilt flatter any one be he never so great for by respect here is understood onely impartiality to all not neglect to any 17. The reason why they asked his opinion in this was in hope he might being a Jew have been infected with the heresie of Judas Galilaeus even his own country-man who taught it was not lawfull for the Jews that were the chosen people of God to allow any sovereignty or dominion to Princes of the Gentiles as if whom God had not elected to be his favourites as he did the Jews they could not pay duty or homage to be they never so great Princes and since namely Tiberius Caesar was a Gentile hence they did hope Christ would have denied tribute to be due unto him and so they would have accused him both of heresie at home and treason abroad 18. Here we see Christ gives a testimony of his Deity because he knows their thoughts to be malicious however their words are fawning and flattering and therefore that he might follow the exact rule of an answerer he looks upon the intention of the words of the asker and he
contracted through the frailtie of humane nature when Christ our Lord came to shew mercy and give pardon not onely to his own chosen people the Jewes but even to all the Gentiles to all sinners how enormous soever Tell me now beloved is it not with reason Saint Gregory calls the prayers of holy Church Sacraments Mysteries when they are set to the same tune that the mysterious Scripture sings unto the people out of the Preachers mouthes for such we may account the Expositours of holy Writ to be And what marvell if we finde the Antiphon leading the tune to the prayer to point at the latter of these two women rather then at the former since we have heard this was a Gentile that a Jew For hence we that are Gentiles are taught to pray peculiarly for pardon of our owne sinnes moved thereunto especially by the benignitie of our Lord who though he first called the Jew yet he first converted the Gentile because as this Antiphon tells us the Gentiles faith was stronger then the Jews and therefore the obstinate Jew shall not be converted till the latter day when we are to have onely one shepheard and one fold of sheep one Christian Church made up both of Jews and Gentiles and for that reason we do not distinguish in the prayer between them because as it is now onely our prayer to God so hereafter it will be theirs as well as ours without putting the Church to the trouble of a new prayer upon that occasion of increasing the number of her children And assuredly that happy time will come with the greater increase if we with fervour say this prayer in the mean time first for the amâ—ndment of our own lives and for the perfecting our selves as in this dayes Epistle Saint Paul exhorteth us and next for the conversion of the stiff necked Jews prefigured to day in the after reviving of Jairus his daughter from death to life though Christ went first about that worâ— when he had before cured the woman of her twelve years issue of bloud first indeed calling the Jew but last converting him as was said above And for further reason of applying this prayer thus to the other service of the day I remit the pious Christian to the Expositours upon the 20.21.22 verses of the following Gospell Suffice it here is enough to shew that the connexion of parts in holy Churches services hath not been wanting hitherto in some measure or other and out of that little I am able to find I doubt not but deeper souls more habituated to meditation then I am will retrive much more The Epistle Philip. 3. v. 17. c. 4. v. 1. c. Chap. 3.17 Be ye followers of me Brethren and observe them that walk so as you have our form 18 For many walk whom often I told you of and now weeping also I tell you the enemies of the Crosse of Christ 19 Whos 's end is destruction whose God is the belly and their glorie in their confusion which mind worldly things 20 But our conversation is in heaven whence also we exspect the Saviour our Lord Jesus Christ 21 Who will reform the body of our humilitie configured to the body of his glory according to the operation whereby also he is able to subdue all things to himself Chap. 1. Therefore my dearest brethren and most desired my joy and my crown so stand in our Lord my dearest 2 Euodia I desire and Syntiche I beseech to be of one mind in our Lord. 3 Yea and I beseech thee my sincere companion help those women that have laboured with me in the Gospell with Clement and the rest my coadjutours whose names are in the book of life The Explication 17. BE not onely followers of my words but of my actions for so he means by bidding them walk live as they do who follow the form of his Apostolical life and actions Happy instructions for the Priests to do themselves as they exhort others to do and in this shew they are truly ministers of the new not of the old law whence Christ bid the people hear believe and obey but not to do as they did themselves that Mat. 23.4 laid huge burdens on their neighbours shoulders and would not carry the least burden on their own Happy sheep that had now shepherds who would not onely let them out into the pastures but defend them from the wolves by loosing their lives rather then expose their sheep to danger as S. Paul did who in persecution gave his flock a pattern of constancy even to the death rather then he would not follow to a tittle his own form whereby he had taught them born in peace and persecution how to serve God 18. This verse again argues the Apostle reports to good life as well as to doctrine when he tells them here many live contrary to the rule he had framed for them for though they beleeve rightly yet they live they walke awry they keep not the direct path of perfection but follow wayes of their own invention and are to those so fondly wedded that rather then leave their own brainsick imaginations they will even deny what no reason can doubt of These are Schismaticks and Sectaries of whom the Apostle often warned the faithfull and now with teares in his eyes moves the Philippians to beware of them again and tells them they are so far from being Christians that they are enemies to Christ for so he means here by the Crosse of Christ And why his enemies Because they mangle his doctrine in pieces believing what they list thereof and rejecting what they please Of this sort were in those dayes Simon Magus who said Christ himself went off from the Crosse and onely left his picture hanging there and Cerinthus who would needs separate Jesus from Christ and teach that Jesus did indeed truly die and rise again from the dead but that Christ was impassible and so went off from the Crosse leaving Jesus there to die Thus while they invent foolish pieties they become blasphemously impious whence it was Saint Paul said 1 Cor. 2.2 He knew nothing but Jesus Christ and him crucified to shew the fondnesse of those who would separate Jesus from Christ and deny Christ to have suffered at all whence he calls these the enemies not of Jesus nor of Christ but of the Crosse of Christ that is such as deny Christ to have been really and truely crucified For beating down of which the Church brought up the use of crucifixes erected in all places And those also who make such simple imaginations the ground of Libertinisme Saint Paul calls enemies to the Crosse of Christ those who teach austeritie of life and mortification to be needlesse under pretence that Jesus hath suffered all punishment due for sinne and so pâ—ofesse it a kinde of injurie and prejudice to our Saviours passion for any man since that time to use mortification 19. But see the Apostles judgement of such Sectaries while he sayes
so have their names written in the book of life are predestinate and cannot choose but be saved But this is farre from the genuine sense of the Apostle who had before so much inculcated perseverance in good works as in this Epistle we have heard his meaning therefore must be that those who by Baptisme are first adopted children of God and by a holy life preserve their favour in the sight of God are at last written in the book of glory as at first they were in the book of grace as who should say he did exhort them that were first innocents to be at last Saints and so deserve to be finally inrolled Commanders of the heavenly Militia after they had been once listed souldiers of the militant Church of Christ The Application 1. THe doctrine of sincerity last Sunday inculcated is this day prosecuted by S. Paul to the Philippians and lest they should misunderstand him he tells them plainly he requires as sincere a Christianity in them as they found to be in himself while he makes his own rule of life their pattern and example to follow him by and doth not fear to fright them from their onely nominall Christianity by declaring those to be enemies to the Crosse of Christ who do not really sincerely take up the same and carry it as well as they pretend to do it who have not their conversation in heaven while they presume to hope their bodies shall go thither though their souls be wallowing here in the mire of flesh and bloud Finally lest they should be deterr'd from following S. Pauls Rule out of a despair of arriving to his perfection in Christianity which in those dayes was and still should be Synonyma with saintity he exhorts them at least to follow the examples of the two virtuous Matrones here set before their eyes Euodia and Syntiche as also those of his sincere companion though not an Apostle and of the rest of his Coadjutors in the propagation of the faith of Christ 2. Yes yes beloved 't is a holy sincerity that now our charity must bring along with her to her journeys end and therefore no marvell 't is two dayes together inculcated by holy Church nor can there be a greater sincerity then that to day before our eyes that of the Primitive Church and consequently that is it we should endeavour now to have indeed and not to fain for as we glory to be Christian Catholicks so we should endeavour to be as sincerely such as they from whom we are descended 3. And for as much as holy Church knows rightly well there is no saintity on earth free from iniquity no sincerity that is not waited on by some hypocrisie or other therefore while she preacheth perfection she prudently prayes for absolution especially now that she draws to the close of her annuall piety now that she brings her charity towards her journeys end lest vanity runne away with part of her holy labours For that is the safest step to saintity which tramples on iniquity treads it under foot those stand firmest in the grace of God that are alwayes begging new favours by asking pardon for old offences and they shew sincerity of their love to God who desire to cancell all their obligations to the devil who are not content with pardon for their guilt of sinne unlesse they may be loosened from the bands thereof from their affections unto sinne And for as much as charity is taught to march out of the field of this life with such a sincerity with such a sincere desire of saintity Therefore holy Church brings her towards her journeyes end now praying for it as above The Gospel Mat. 9. v. 18. c. 18 As he was speaking this unto them behold a certain Governour approched and adored him saying Lord my daughter is even now dead but come lay thy hand upon her and she shall live 19 And Jesus rising up followed him and his disciples 20 And behold a woman which was troubled with an issue of bloud twelve years came behind him and touched the hemme of his garment 21 For she said within her self If I shall touch onely his garment I shall be safe 22 But Jesus turning and seeing her said have a good heart daughter thy faith hath made thee safe And the woman became whole from that hour 23 And when Jesus was come into the house of the Governour and saw minstrels and the multitude keeping a stirre he said 24 Depart for the wench is not dead but sleepeth And they laughed him to scorn 25 And when the multitude was put forth he entred in and held her hand and the maid arose 26 And this bruit went forth into all that countrey The Explication 18. THat is as he was giving a reason why his disciples did not fast so rigorously as those of John the Baptist did and as also the Pharisees were wont to do which were onely voluntary and not legall fasts Then came in this Governour who was a chief officer in the Synagogue called Jairus which signifies Illuminatour or teacher of the people By Adoration is here literally meant falling at Christs feet which yet he did not do before news was brought him by his servants that now his daughter was dead lo then he believes firmly and in testimony thereof prostrates himself and in the very manner of his language saying now my daughter is dead he blames his not believing and asking help sooner but to make amends for his not hoping Christ could cure his sick daughter he invites him to go home and revive her though she now were dead not that he doubted but his power at a distance would suffice but that he had heard Christ was accustomed to touch those whom he healed in Capharnaam and this was on the sea coast of Galilee not farre from the same town famous for Christ his miracles 19. That this is the genuine sense of the verse above is gathered the rather from Christ his going immediately to undertake the cure even after the same manner namely by a touch of his sacred hand for we do not hear any rebuke given to Jairus for want of Faith but Christ resting satisfied his belief was full resolved to give him full satisfaction to his Faith and hope by reviving as was desired his dead daughter taking his disciples as witnesses to this his gracious condescending and working this miracle Yet this notwithstanding the Centurions Faith was above this of Jairus who onely asked a word saying Mat. 8.8 speak the word onely and held himself not worthy the honour of Christ his entring his house 20 21. 22. Note this woman was a Gentile and it wants not mystery to have the twelve yeares of her diseases continuation upon her here made mention of in regard it alludes to the twelve years age of Jairus daughter whom Christ was going to raise from death to life and thereby gives us to understand Christ by his ordaining to do those two miracles at
when having once begun to serve God well the whole continuance of endeavours is still to better that beginning still to begin anew where last we did end as in this work you see we doe setting the same feare of our Lord before our eyes in the end thereof the same memory of the day of Judgement wherewith we first begun this practise of Pietie which here I tender unto every one of our sodalitie not doubting but if we live an hundred yeares we shall find of this devotion that it will alwayes please though a hundred times repeated over because the subject is so sweet as the more we suck it comes the sweeter still And since in the Title of this Booke we called it not onely a Christian sodalitie but a Hive of Bees I beseech God we may find no drones amongst us in this Hive no lazy Bees that will not flie abroad to suck the hony of devotion from the blossomes of the word of God which are growing in every leaf of this Book the whole being framed either of the holy Text or of the Exposition of the same The Epistle Coloss 1. v. 9. c. 9 Therefore we also from the day that we heard it cease not praying for you and desiring that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdome and spirituall understanding 10 That you may walk worthy of God in all things pleasing fructifying in all good works and increasing in the knowledge of God 11 In all power strengthened according to the might of his glory in all patience and longanimity with joy 12 Giving thanks to God and the Father who hath made us worthy unto the part of the lot of the Saints in the light 13 Who hath delivered us from the power of darknesse and hath translated us into the kingdome of the Sonne of his love 14 In whom we have redemption the remission of sinnes The Explication 9. THat is from the day we heard you were converted to the faith of Christ upon the hope you had of heaven thereby as in the precedent verses of this chapter is expressed and as soon as Epaphras our fellow labourer in the vineyard of Christ brought us this happy news and of your speciall love to me and Timothy From that time we cease not praying for your being still filled more and more with the grace of God and with the knowledge of his will with the acknowledgement thereof as being done in you by this your conversion The Apostle appositely mentions here wisdome and spiriâ—uall understanding praying they may be filled therewith to shew the difference between the folly of profane learning such as was that the Simonians affected in those dayes meer humane and carnall wisdome and that sacred learning which Christian doctrine teacheth for that onely he accounts true wisdome and true understanding as teaching us to walk spiritually not carnally in the Church of Christ which is the school of Christianity 10. And praying further that you may walk worthy of God in all things pleasing that you may so farre please God in all you do as to make your selves worthy of him by receiving no lesse then himself for your reward of so walking By which we see S. Paul here piously points at the now Catholick doctrine which the pretended Reformers oppose of meriting heaven by our good works though perhaps this place doth not directly prove it since he speaks of making our selves worthy even of God himself whereas there be those who teach we are onely imputatively and not really or de condigno justified by Christs merits or made partakers of them Again lest he should in vain bid us do what he thought sufficient to render us thus worthy he tells us in the following words how to be made so namely by fructifying in all good works by reaping fruit out of every laudable exercise and others we must not addict our selves unto and by increasing in the knowledge of God by making it our study better to understand the mysteries of our faith and religion for thereby it is we come to know God See here the obligation we have to be daily diligent in learning more and more of Christianity and not to lose our time in studying fooleries for thereby we shall hazard the deserving Hell and not God for our reward 11. See the sense of this verse explicated in the Epistle upon the eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost for the first part of it and in the Epistle upon the fourteenth Sunday for the second part theâ—eof because there it is explicated all at large suffice it to note here his aim is to stir them up to alacrity even in persecution 12. And to thank God the Father for the benefit of his grace which gives them that alacrity he directs our thoughts to the Father as knowing they will thereby be more pleasing to his sonne our Saviour Jesus Christ who made offering of all his own actions to his heavenly Father thereby to shew us we must attribute more to the goodnesse of God then even to the passion of Christ which was dignified from the Deity whereunto the humanity was united That hath made us worthy this shews how little we ought to confide in our own merits since even all the good we do is by the speciall grace of God and must have its value from God assisting more then from our selves acting yet by both together we become worthy of God himself for our reward as was said above much more of our share with the Saints in glory though here the Apostle alludes chiefly to the Colossians being made worthy with other Saints of the light and glory of the Gospel by their conversion to the faith of Christ which he calls therefore the lot of the Saints because it is a grace gratis given and no man can merit his conversion which the Apostle calls the lot of the Saints in the light of the Gospel given by God the father gratis through the merits of our Saviours passion Or if we shall take the complete sense of this verse it imports the lot we have to share with those who live in the light of the Gospel is the beginning of the accomplishment of that lot when we shall live and reign with Christ and his Saints in the lot or happinesse they have to dwell in the light of eternall glory 13. By the power of darknesse is here understood the infidelity they were in before conversion when they were under the command of the Prince of darknesse as being then in his power By this Graecisme or phrase common among the Greeks viz. the Sonne of his love is here understood his beloved Sonne the second person of the Blessed Trinity not that as Sabellius would have it Christ was one and the same person with the holy Ghost proceeding as he did by an act of love whereas we are taught the second person was begotten by the understanding of his eternall Father and the third as some Divines hold
doors 34 Amen I say to you that this generation shall not passe till all these things be done 35 Heaven and earth shall passe but my words shall not passe The Explication 15. BY this Abomination of desolation Christ meant a most abominable desolation and most probably he alluded to that which was to follow namely the Romans sacking of Jerusalem as a punishment upon the Jewes for having there crucified the Saviour of the world how horrid and dreadful an abomination that was Josephus his history best describeth But mystically we may well interpret this abomination to be the sacrilegious defiling of the Temple of Solomon both by the barbarous murders therein committed by the Jews and the profaning the Altars thereof by the wicked Priests much more is this abominable when Christian Priests profane their holy Altars and become wicked Isa 24.2 as the people so the Priest of holy Church And the like abomination it is to receive the body of Christ into a sinfull soul for then he is rather betrayed into the house of the devil then received into the Temple of the holy Ghost Not unaptly also this abomination may allude to Antichrist setting himself upon the Altars of the Churches to be adored as God In fine when any of these horrid iniquities are done then we may piously imagine the Judgement of God is not far of since were it not for his mercy sake these abominations deserved immediate damnation 16. By this verse is mystically meant that when good men see these enormities done commonly in the cities they should flye from such evil cohabitations lest the houses of the city fall upon their heads and run out up to the mountains thereby to shew they are desirous of getting up as near to heaven as may be when their houses become a hell unto them Though literally our Saviour alludes to the advice he after by revelation gave the Christians when Jerusalem was to be destroyed to flye from Jurie to the mountains beyond Judea for the Roman forces had possessed those hills about Judea whereas the Jewes hearing of the Romans approaching into their countrey fled all into Jerusalem God so ordaining it for their destruction who yet thought they should in that famous city be most safe 17. They were bid flye from the tops of houses if they happened to be there when the newes came of Titus with the Romans falling upon them to shew those powers were to come like a tyde or torrent upon the Jewes unavoidably and therefore since in those daies their houses were commonly built flat on the top and their use was to eat and walk there as freely as now men do in lower rooms they were advised to make no stay for getting any goods away but immediately to run and think themselves happy if they could save but their own persons insomuch that the sudden destruction of Jerusalem is by the Historian described like to Noes floud to the burning of Sodome with fire from heaven and to the drowning Pharaoh his forces in the red Sea 18. This verse followes the strain of the former by advising immediate flight without regard to any thing else 19. This expresseth their danger who by the reason of children either in their wombs or at their breasts could not make speed enough to save themselves in regard of their burdens retarding their flight Also it alludes to the severity of Gods wrath over the Jewish Nation who to punish their sins would not spare the innocent infants of that race but leave all a prey to the devouring sword of the Romans meeting them in their mothers bellies or nurses laps 20. This shewes the clogg of winter wayes and weather forbids especially to aged men a speedy flight such as was necessary to avoid this instantaneous destruction and the Jewish Law forbidding any man to walk above a mile indeed half a mile on the Sabbath shewes that slow flight was inconsistent with this speedy danger for though Christ did abrogate the rigour of the Sabbath Law yet be alludes here to the Jewes and Judaizing Christians that were hardly brought off from the superstitions of their old Traditions Again Christ here insinuates it is vain to flye on the Sabbath because Jerusalem and so all was taken on the Sabbath day 21. There is no doubt but the destruction of Jerusalem was a calamity unparallel'd for since Almighty God in revenge of his sacred Sons being butthered therein had designed this city to exemplary punishment he was resolved to make the rigour of it such as resembled rather Hell then any horrour lesse onely note that here it is meant the particular destruction of the Jewes is unparallel'd by any particular nations destruction not that the finall day of Judgement shall be lesse calamitous to all the world then this day was to the Jewes alone 22. This place literally alludes to the Jewes as the chosen people of God and so valued by him above all others that he seems to say if they be safe none else are in danger because them chiefly he desires to preserve yet seeing they will not be gained by him he then converts his love to the Gentiles and in this sense he goes on meaning unlesse the daies of the Jewes subversion by the Romans had been shortened no flesh no Jew in all the world should be saved but for the elect for some very few converted Jews before for some in this confusion of their overthrow and for others reserved for conversion in the latter daies to make one Church as also for respect to many Christians amongst them God ordained that Titus the Commander should put a limit to the fury of the sword and after a time should give quarter even to the Jews insomuch that as Josephus writes fourty thousand of them by the mercy of Titus were saved and but for this not one Jew in all the world either would or could have escaped the sword so inveterate was the hatred of the Romans to that persidious Nation Hence we see the power of even a little virtue in man how great a sway it bears with God that for never so little good he averts a huge deal of mischief 23. Many conceive Christ here passeth from his report to the destruction of Jerusalem and falls on the day of general Judgement but it is not so for by the word then he professeth to continue his former sense and this suites well for then the Jews knowing the time of the Messias to be at hand to save themselves and to flatter such as usurped the properties of the Messias they when persecuted by one party would flye to this other that adhered to such impostours as then boasted themselves to be the Messias so our Saviour to prevent danger to such as might be carried by this meanes to infidelity foretels them what arts would be used to insnare them And there were three eminent men of this wicked faction Eleazar the son of Simon Jehu the son of Leviah and Simon the
at least the Blessed Virgin was not ignorant of what they now marvelled at but that the transcendency of the things they were thinking of and hearing did renew in their mindes the memory of the Miracle so often as they thought upon them yet some think even the Blessed Virgin though she did know our Saviour was to be the Redeemer of the Jewes did not perhaps know he was to be so to the Gentiles the which Simeon did here prophecy and further that he was to be a Ruine to some a Resurrection to many in Israell and a signe which should be contradicted 34. We are to note Simeons Blessing here was rather to the Parents of Jesus than to him their child because it had been too great a boldness for him to blesse whom he by Revelation knew to be his Saviour and his God The reason why Simeon addressed his speech to Mary was because shee was really and truly the naturall mother of our blessed Lord and Ioseph was but his reputed father That it is equally said Christ was set unto the ruine and unto the resurrection of many in Israel doth not argue it was equally meant for hee was the ruine of the incredulous by accident onely but he was by decree the resurrection of all that believe in him and obey his Law and their own incredulity who believed not was their direct ruine he was but indirectly the cause thereof By the sign which shall be contradicted some understand the person of Christ who was not onely the mark of their detracting tongues but even of their tormenting hands when they aimed at him by the stripes they gave him in his whipying at the Pillar and by the wounds they made in his blessed body hanging on the Crosse Others by the sign here understand the crosse of Christ whereof S. Paul sayes there were many enemies and so this crosse is the sign of their malice who by contemning it contemn the fruit of salvation that grew thereon Iâ—sus Christ himself but the best and most genuine sense seems to be that by the sign of contradiction should be here meant his prodigious generation of a mother in earth without a father and of a virgin mother which many pretend as yet to be impossible and so contradict this undoubted truth By this sign also is meant the wonderfull miracles of his life the strange effects of his doctrine converting all the world yet contradicted by those that will not be converted by them and thus as the incredulity of the Jews and Infidels is a contradiction to the Faith of Christ in like manner the wicked lives of sinfull Christians are open contradictions to his Laws and to the secret impulses of his holy graces 35 By the sword here some will understand the spirit of prophecie given to the B. Virgin whereby she knew as well the ill affections of the Jewes to her son as the good ones of Christians towards him yet this can at most be but the mysticall sense Others will have it that the B. Virgin dyed a Martyr by the sword which neverthelesse is against all History The literall therefore and genuine sense is That the sword of torment which killed Christ was to his holy mother a sword of sorrow wounding her very heart insomuch that had it not been healed with he comfort shee received by conformity to Gods will it had been her reall death and wee read often in holy Writ that the contradiction of detracting tongues is called a sword of persecution Their tongue is a sharp sword Psal 63. v. 4 They have sharpened their tongues like swords Psal 104.8 and the sword of Christ his torments was twofold One of his persecutours tongues The other of their stripes nails and spear peirciâ—â—â— his side which were so sharp a sword of sorrow to the blessed Virgin that the Doctors of the Church hold her for more than a Martyr actually dying for Christ but it is hard to know the true sense of what follows in this Verse That this sword of sorrow pierced the mothers soul That out of many hearts cogitations might be revealed in her sacred Son for so the words seem to import which yet is verified thus that while some of the Jewes did before privately machinate Christs death others among them pretended they look'd for the Messias but finding Christ come in an humble way they scorned him and so both these joyning attempted at last to be his ruine which then proved a true sword piercing his mothers soul when they revealed the persidiousnesse of their own false hearts that had the one often before wished but for fear of the Jewes durst not attempt his death the other pretended to honour him but when they found his humility suited not with their pride they plotted and actually procured his death and as in that they peirced his mothers soul so they revealed the iniquity of their own cogitations and to this sense Simeon seems here prophetically to have spoken 36. Anne was celebrated for the known guift shee also had of prophecy whereof v 38. we shall read anon so shee did foretell much of Christ She is called Anne which signifies Grace And her Father Phanuel signifying the Face of God is here named to she that her grace of prophecy as well as that of her justification came from God Her Tribe is here set downe to denotate her nature that was peaceable pleasing wealthy long-living and the like besides Aser signifies Blessed all these remarks of her are to shew the dignity of this Prophetesse who was appointed for one to give testimony of Christ her virginity is here remarked because it was three wayes very notable First her maiden next her conjugall and lastly hâ—r viduall virginitie for so her chastity is here called to shew it was in her more than ordinary by living with her husband â—â—â—en years from her virginity is understood seven years 〈◊〉 shew was marriageable which was then held at fifteen years of age for children are not properly called virgins till they arrive to the ripeness of years fitting for marriage so falling widdow at two and twenty yeers of age it was much shee lived in that Viduall virginity untill shee was as in this next Verse is said 37. Eighty four years of age as some say but of pure widdowhood as S. Ambrose will have it who makes her in all a hundred and six years old dwelling continually in the Temple that is not departing thence but spending most of her time there and seldome going home but to refresh at meales never any whither else for other diversion from her prayers yet some thinke her very abode was if not in yet at least joyning to the Temple as many Anchoresses and some Chanonesses now doe spending her time both night and day in fasting watching and prayer and perpetually serving God so we see fasting in those dayes of the Synagogue was an usuall service to God and is not as Heretikes now say held so onely in our
Church 38. Here we may note a kinde of harmonious Quire kept in the Temple at that time between Simeon and Anne since after him shee took up the Province of prophecy and therein confessed that is praised God by revealing his sacred Son to be the Messias 39. The things here done according to the Law were the purification of the Mother and the presentation of her son Iesus in the Temple which rites performed with the ornament of these Prophesies attending on them The B. virgin with her Spouse and Son returned to Nazareth in Galilee where they lived untill they fled to Egypt upon the slaughter of the Infants and whether they returned after they heard Herod was dead and there bred up Iesus but we must imagine the time between this Purification and their flight into Egypt being neer two moneths which was from February to Easter for then were the Innocents butchered all spent in preparing their little necessaries for this flight as their Asse and small burthen of cloathing or the like 40. The childs growth here mentioned was corporal as also was his strength namely that of his limbs for he was as perfect in his internals at the first instant of his Incarnation as at the last minute of his life his fulness also of wisedome here mentioned was the externall proof upon all occasions of his actions that his internall wisedome was full from the first hour of his conception and so his actions externally appeared such as argued him to be internally full of all that wisedome which was due unto him who was called the Wisedome of his eternall Father By Grace is here understood the favour and protection of his heavenly Father which was alwaies found to be speciall over him for in him here imports over him so this grace was not that internally in him but that externally over him which his heavenly Father shewed towards him yet the outward grace appeared in his actions might be an argument of his own divine grace which was in him also and gave a beauty to all his outward comportments The Application VVE shall then best present Jesus to his heavenly Father as his B. mother did to day when we are able to present our selves to God like new born Infants coveting the milk of our mothers Breast That is to say the Recovery of all those gifts vertues and graces which were in holy Baptism bestowed upon us and this is a benefit Grace gives above Nature that though men can never be by Nature little ones again yet by grace they may become as Innocent as new Baptized Infants O let us then to day endeavour so to bee when 't is so proper to indeavour it 2. Let us be content when men despise us now that we hear the son of God become the sign of Contradiction While his preaching was called seducing while his sobriety was stiled drunkennesse while his Deity was termed Devill O what man can lay claim to his Integrity and who can then be troubled to be contradicted for Gods sake when God became the very sign of Contradiction for his love to Man 3. Look every state of man upon the Patterns laid to day before your eyes Look Infants on the Infant Jesus Look youths and Virgins on the B. Virgin Mary Look married people on the Virgins Spouse Look Widdows on the Prophetess S. Anne the praying Widdow Look aged man upon old Simeon And look to him again yee Clerks yee Regulars ye Priests the men of Holy Orders See of these severall degrees so many Saints and be ye such as they So shall yee abound in those good works we pray to day may bee done by us according to the pleasure of Almighty God in the name of his sacred Son Within Octaves of the Epiphany The Antiphon LUK. 2. ver 48 49. SOnne why hast thou so done to us behold thy Father and I sorrowing did seek thee What is it that you sought me did you not know that I must be about those things that are my Fathers Vers The Kings of Tharsis and of the Isles shall offer gifts Resp The Kings of Arabia and Saba shall bring presents The Prayer VVE beseech thee O Lord prosecute with heavenly piety the desires of thy supplyant people that they may both see what is by them to be done and be able to performe what they see they are to doe The Illustration VVE were taught by the last Sundayes Prayer to beseech Almighty God to set our actions right and by the Gnomon of his own blessed will to point them out their way to direct them in their motion Now we are further taught to beg that even our desires propending us to action may not onely be begun but prosecuted with heavenly piety least good beginnings have an evill ending if not prosecuted with the same holy Spirit that began them first and lest humane piety prove but a blind guide we petition the heavenly to lead us on that so we may cleerly see what is by us to be done and seeing what it is may be able to performe our duty both to God and man yes beloved This is the clear and genuine sense of the Prayer above but how to adjust the present time to the Epistle and Gospel of the day will not perhaps easily appear unless we doe reflect upon the Feast of the Epiphany at present flowing in the Octaves thereof and consequently requiring that whilest in this Feast our Blessed Saviour was pleased to appear as well to Gentiles as to Jews in a word to all the world our generall prayer should be that we may at the same time appear to him such supplyants as he most delights in namely such as beg he will vouchsafe to shew us as well his pleasure as his person by prosecuting with heavenly piety not onely all our actions but even our desires for then we shall see him as clearly indeed as in the thick fog of this sinfull world he can be seen by humane eyes when his heavenly piety begins and prosecutes all our desires when through the glass of his heavenly piety we shall discern what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God whereunto the Epistle this day exhorts us to conforme our selves both in body and mind not onely in our own but in our neighbours occasions too helping them as readily as our own hands would help our hungry mouthes to meat And if we will take the Gospel as it must report to us we shall see it set to the same tune as we pray to doe for what is the result of all the Gospel but in a word to tell us Heavenly piety must be the square of all our actions Did not lost Jesus tell his sorrowing Parents this in termes when they had found him out again and began to expostulate his losse asking them if they knew not he was bound to be imployed in those things which were his Fathers will his heavenly Fathers will he meant for it was not his earthly