at a price he became our Lord Ye are bought with a price 1 Cor. 7. 23. They that do not acknowledge this are in the number of those men of whom St Peter speaks Epist. 2. c. 2. v. 1. denying the Lord that bought them and bring upon themselves swift destruction and you may judge what kind of Lord he ought to be by the price he paid for the Title what service he expected by the rates at which he purchased them even at the bloud of God Acts 20. 28. He died I told you that he might be Lord. And now Lord what is thy servant that thou shouldst thus value him or what are his performances that thou shouldst buy them at these rates And shall I give to Sin or Sathan those services which he thus values and thus buys No if thou art content to purchase that so dear which was thy own just due before surely now by all rights thou art My Lord. But 3. He is so also by my own most solemn contract and engagement And to pass by all the rest and to stick to that of this day onely we did contract so in the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper and in receiving that we did most solemnly assume to do him faithful service and took him for our Lord. And this would easily appear from hence if Christ's bloud be the price with which he bought the right to be thy Lord and this day thou didst come and here didst take that bloud to all those ends and uses it was given for then in so doing thou didst ratify the contract and take possession of the relation but to do it more solemnly and here I will not stand upon that proof which I have formerly made to you from the account that Pliny gave to Trajan the persecuting Emperor tho truly it be strange that a Heathen should discern this was the meaning of their Sacrament and Christians will not believe it He when he was emploied to persecute the Christians tells him what he had found of them by racking some and by confessions of others at their death Soliti stato die convenire seque Sacramento obstringere ne furta ne latrocinia ne adulteria committerent c. to take an oath they knew no other sense of the word Sacrament to do what their Lord had commanded them What have you don this day Why Christ was sworn your Lord this day and you have taken an oath of service entred into a bond of duty and obedience and if you wilfully shall fail of doing this your Worships will be brought against you your Communions will come in as so many evidences that you have forfeited so many oaths that you have broken No sure I will henceforwards tie my self to better performance for I have hamper'd my self with obligations entangled my self with one other engagement I have again sworn at the Altar Thou art my Lord. But I have a more solemn proof of this that he who comes to the renewing of a Covenant with God now Christ we know saith that that cup is the new Covenant in his bloud he does enter into an oath of God Deut. 29. from verse 10. to 15. Ye stand this day all of you before the Lord your God your captains of your tribes your elders and your officers with all the men of Israel your little ones your wives and thy stranger that is in thy camp from the hewer of thy wood unto the drawer of thy water that thou shouldest enter into covenant with the Lord thy God and into his oath which the Lord thy God maketh with thee this day that he may establish thee to day for a people unto himself and that he may be unto thee a God as he hath said unto thee and as he hath sworn unto thy fathers to Abraham to Isaac and to Jacob neither with you onely do I make this covenant and this oath but with him that standeth here with us this day before the Lord our God and also with him that is not here with us this day Now out of this they who are not convinc'd that our first entring Covenant with God by Baptism is a vow altho the Church require that we should look upon it under that Solemnity and tho St Peter call it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a stipulation or if they think it something like it yet 't is a vow but in the childrens name and so it does not strike those apprehensions of so sacred an engagement into them themselves may see here at an entring Covenant little ones entring into an oath and this was not the first giving of the Covenant that so any thing might be thought peculiar to that but onely a repeting of the Covenant in their presence verse 1. and least that we should think their standing there in solemn manner might imply something more than ordinary verse 14. 15. take us that stand here this day before the Lord our God but also with him that shall be born hereafter Many expositors and the Jerusalem Exposition says with all the generations of you that are to come 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as if they stood with us this day And the Targum of Jon. Vziel says they do stand that is as to this intent and purpose that as soon as they are admitted into Covenant by Circumcision they are within this oath Littles ones therefore that can be admitted into a Covenant by receiving of the sign of it they then enter an oath of keeping it And then my Brethren we have entred an oath to continue Christ's faithful Soldiers and Servants unto our lives end and that is thou and I and every one have sworn he is my Lord. O my Savior I was baptized and at that time did swear service and then if I should fail thee now I renounce my Allegiance I go from my fealty and I throw of my Covenant Every evil action I deliberately commit brands me with the dishonorable base stile of one that slights his oaths there is no hold of his vows not his most sacred ones those that he makes to God Every vain or passionate oath how true soever speaks me perjured the draughts of intemperance would wash off the water of my Christendom every unclean lust every impurity of Flesh or Spirit does as it were bemire and wipe out my contract with my Lord. For I covenanted to be pure and clean for I was wash'd into the very name of his retainer I could not have that title of that relation without being cleansed There I did swear defiance against all his Enimies the Devil World and Flesh and all worldly and carnal lusts that I would neither follow not be led by them and if I should serve them now I should be a Rebel and a Traitor to my Lord against my bond and covenant and oath No my Lord I will not serve these where death must be my wages the Fiends my Comrades and my Conquest Hell I 'le not do homage to destruction
be the Correctives of the distempers of the Soul to quell the risings of the Appetite and Passions and bring the sensual part of us under obedience to Reason and Religion to make all calm and even in us and put us in the frame of Men and Christians of Rational and Pious Creatures And if they do not work this in us if the Soul do not meet in the performances they are not acceptable in themselves at all These are only the mint anise and cummin of our Pieties and as Origen says the condimenta actuum the sauces of Religion not the main standing parts of it which he therefore that offers solitary gives God a Sacrifice of Sallads and thinks that will be a Sin-Offering They do mistake themselves who cherish any hope from having spent a day or Lent of abstinence if the Excesses of their Vices be not made over and evacuated by it if they continue still full gorg'd with their iniquity or who think all is well they have atton'd by having bowed down the head like a bulrush if the Soul were not also humbled in them for as S. Paul does say I may give all my goods to feed the poor yet have no Charity and I may give my body to be burnt yet in those Martyr-fires there may be no heats of Love to God and then all these profit me nothing 1 Cor. xiii 3. So I may chasten my self too and yet yet receive correction or be disciplin'd and then Gods punishments are still due to me That Church indeed which hath found out the easie expiation of Indulgences that hath the Treasure of Christ's merits and all the supererogations of the Saints at her dispose and by Commission can issue them at pleasure out and apply those merits to mens uses not by Sacraments but by a Bull or Brief and not require Gospel conditions of Faith and Repentance in the Persons that receive them but visiting a Church in Rome ascending the steps in such a Chappel in the Lateran on such a day shall give a plenary remission from sin and punishment the saying of such a Prayer over daily shall do it for fourscore thousand years could they but make a Lease for men to live and sin out the indulgence too that would get them good store of Chapmen that Church I say may give encouragement to hope that God may be compounded with at easie rates that for a Surfeit I may give a Meal and God will pardon it and let me have Wine too into the bargain for they allow afflicting of our Souls in Wine that some weeks change of Dyet may go for a change of Life for indeed these come up somewhat nearer the just value than some of their Prices But though there be all the reason in the World they should let men out of Purgatory on what condition they please when themselves onely put them in and make the breath of a few noster's quite blow out those flames which burn no where but in their Doctrines Yet when without any commission from Christ they make Attrition able to secure men from Hell and an Indulgence able to release them out of Purgatory when they make new conditions of Pardon that is new Gospel new ways of application of Christs Merits and though our Saviour God when he found in his heart to dye for us yet in the Agonies of his Compassion could not find in his heart to give us easier terms of Life than such as do require Contrition Humiliation and Amendment which they commute so cheaply with his Vicar We justly stand astonish'd at such usurpation on Christ's Blood and Merits that does assign them at these rates I make no question but easie expiations get them many Converts Rome from its first foundation grew from being an Asylum to the dissolute but they that go away upon such hopes 't is to be feared that easiness betrays them into sins from which those Expiations cannot rescue them and at once makes them Proselytes to Rome and Hell Nor are our trusts much more secure if we rely upon our opus operatum too our little outward strictnesses unless the Soul be engag'd and except there be inward life of Religion all those will not avail If I deny my self my meals and give my self my sins that is so far from expiation that it aggravates I am an argument against my self that my crimes are incorrigible when I will have them though I cut off the Instruments and foments of them and though I meddle not with the Temptation yet I seize the sin What S. Austin does say of Alms In meliùs vita mutanda per eleemosynas de peccatis praeteritis propitiandus est Deus non ad hoc emendus quodammodò ut semper liceat impune peccare This is applicable to these performances also our lives must be Reformed and so on that Repentance and these strictnesses God will be reconciled and our offences done away but he will not be brib'd by these to let us alone in them he is not gratified by such performances so as to wink at Vices for their sakes and suffer us in our Rebellions upon such compositions as these take a Reward to spare the Guilt Nor is he such a soft and easie God as to take them for payment of that infinite Debt we owe that which he bought off with the Blood of God shall not be ours at such unworthy prices The Prophet Micah seeking for a Present to appease him with rejects all the Jewish rites though God prescrib'd them as insufficient and in them all things of the like external kind Mic. vi 6 7. Wherewith shall I come before the Lord and How my self before the most high God shall I come before him with burnt-offerings with Calves of a year old Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of Rams or with ten thousand Rivers of Oyl shall I give my first-born for my Transgression the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul If I do offer up whole Hecatombs to God will that atone for having offered up too plentifully to my Genius Or if I do remove my Riots from my Table to the Altar and change my few extravagant Dishes into whole Herds of thousand Sacrifices shall I by doing so remove the guilt too of my Luxuries If I give God ten thousand Rivers for my overflowing Cups will the Intemperance be wash'd away in those Or shall I think to expiate an Adultery with a Child and for that momentary and unclean delight give up the lovely and first issue of my lawful Bed And who will be content to be his own Priest in such manner to pay such Sacrifices for sins But yet that will not do as it cost more to Redeem Souls which not Rivers of Oyl can cleanse but streams must flow out of the Heart of Christ to do it nor the fruit of Mans body make a satisfaction for but the eternally begotten Son of the Divinity and none but the first born of
God alone for thus expiation of sins was wrought Even so to make that expiation mine besides reliance on it I must transcribe the Copy of the Sufferings of that Son transplant the Garden of Gethsemane into my breast If his Soul be sorrowful even unto Death my Soul must be afflicted too Humiliations must prostrate me upon my face to deprecate that Fire and Brimstone burning Tempest that is the portion of the Sinners Cup saith David O my Father let this Cup pass from me The lustful Feavers of my blood must excern themselves in cold sweat of fear and grief in Agonies of Penitence and my excessive draughts not onely make me to cry out I thirst but give me Vinegar and Gall to drink sorrow as bitter as my riotous egestions have been my Oaths that have struck through the Name of God must pierce my Soul with grief as pungent as his Thorns and Nails In a word I must so afflict my Soul as to crucifie the body of sin and nail it to his Cross. And this is that which in its own proportion was required of the Jews this Day here in the Text to the work of which Day how the Afflicting of the Soul in both the given senses does contribute was my Second and the next Enquiry Secondly What this Day was the Verse before the Text informs us it was their Day of Expiation or Atonement Now that the Jews esteem Fasting and Humiliation expiatory Sacrifices appears from a Form of Prayer which even yet they use on such a day where he that fasted says O Lord the Governour of all the World I have now finished my Fast before thee thou knowest that when we had a Temple standing the man that sinned was bound to expiate it by a Sacrifice the Blood of which was poured out and the Altar consumed the Fat to make amends for his offence but now by reason of our many wickednesses we have neither a Temple Altar or Priest to make Atonement for us I beseech thee therefore O Lord my God the God of my Fathers to accept of that little portion of my own Flesh and Blood which this days Fasting hath torn from me in lieu of a Sin-offering and be thou reconciled unto me for thy mercies sake Thus when he cannot give a Lamb for his Transgression he gives some of himself he offers Hunger for Shewbread and Thirst for a Drink-offering he consecrates a Meal instead of a Beast and sheds a sower fasting sigh for Incense and this he hopes God will accept as Sacrifice And truly the Text says no day of Expiation could be kept without it Nor does the Scripture want great instances of its effect towards Atonement of Gods wrath How when Judgment was given on a Nation or Person and Execution going out against them yet this revers'd the Sentence Ahab is a great proof of this 1 King xxi 27. And it came to pass when Ahab heard those words that he rent his Clothes and put Sackcloth upon his flesh and Fasted and lay in Sackcloth and went softly And the word of the Lord came unto Elijah the Tishbite saying Seest thou how Ahab humbleth himself before me Because he humbleth himself before me I will not bring the evil in his days On Fasting-day secured a Life the weaknesses it brought upon the body upheld it against all Gods threats Vengeance pronounc'd and coming out against him falls to ground if Ahab humble and afflict his Soul Gods stretch'd out Arm will not strike Sackcloth nor wound through Fasting Garments One fit of it removes his Judgments a whole Age and had it been sincere and persevering how had it wip'd them out to everlastingness Ninive is another instance of the practice and success of this even among the Heathens Nor should it seem to have less Efficacy among Christians The Primitive Fathers call these severities Satisfaction for sin and Compensations the Price with which they are bought off the things that cover them and blot them out and which Propitiate and appease God for them not in their sense who force up these Expressions to a strange height of meaning and yet have quite beat down the Practice as to the publique wholesom use of them out of the Church But though these sayings assign not the Power and just Efficacy of that discipline in it self yet they do the acceptance and effect of it by virtue of Christs Satisfaction A Fainting Body cannot bear indeed the weight of our iniquities nor will lowest prostrations in the dust bury them in the dust or Tears alone blot out our Guilt but Christ having done that which is effectual to all this and requiring no more of thee to make that thine as he does every where most solemnly avow but faithful humbling of thy self in an afflictive sorrow for what 's past and so to mortifie as to work out Repentance the doing this is doing what he does require and consequently will accept These satisfie the Command and therefore God though not by a condignity of performance yet as Conditions which his Covenant of Grace hath set us which when they are fulfilled then God is satisfied thy sins are expiated and thou art pardoned And so in this lower sense these are thy Satisfactions with which God is well pleased And thus these self Afflictions of the Sinner supply Gods Indignation and divert it They leave no place nor business for it and by these short severities upon himself he does make void he does expunge the Sentence of eternal Torments saith Tertullian As thou becomest severe against thy self so will the Lord abate of his severities and he will spare and he will pity thee in that he sees thou wilt not spare thy self How can he choose but be appeased towards thee when he shall see thee executing his Sentence even upon thy own self and punishing his Enemies although they be thy Members so that by this means thou dost censure thy self into Gods Absolutions afflict thy self into his Pardons and dost condemn thy self into eternal Life Our Church says the same thing That in the Primitive Church there was a Godly Discipline that at the beginning of Lent such Persons as were notorious Sinners were put to open Pennance and punished in this World that their Souls might be saved in the Day of the Lord and she does wish if her wishes be of any force and value when her Orders and Constitutions are not that Discipline could be restored But this I shall not press if all those whom the Primitive Church Condemned or S. Paul sentenced were so used if every Schismatick that lies tearing himself and others off from the Lords Body were rejected and if the Fornicator that joyns himself to his unclean Accomplice were disjoined from Christ and not suffered to make his members be the members of an Harlot if every scandalous debauching Offender that lies corrupting Christs Body spreading Contagion thrusting the Gangreen forward were cut off and these and all
a discourse and it hath filled so many that there is nothing left unsaid or to be said against as to the main And they that pick some little sayings seeming against this order out of those Ancients which were themselves of it and wrote much expresly for it and think by those means to confute it do the same thing with that Romanist who tore some little shreds that look as if they favour'd some opinions of the Romanists out of the Books of Protestants most of which were directly writ against the Church of Rome and putting those together went about by them to convince the world there never were any such things as Protestants but they that did profess to be so were all Papists But I will say no more then my Text hath done which evidences it not a separation only of Degree but Order by a new Ceremony and commissionating to new powers If I would stay on words 't is expressed here by one that speaks very great distances 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 separate which does in Scripture word the distances that the censures of the Church do make Luke 6. 22. and still in the Greek Liturgies when absolution is given 't is said to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to free them from all curse and separation as if to pass into the bounds of this uncall'd were such a thing as to leap over the Censures of the Church over the Line of Excommunication and to break through this wall of separation were to break through Anathema's and Curses Yea 't is used to express the distance betwixt the Lord's two hands his right hand and his left at the day of Doom Mat. 25. 32. betwixt which hands there is a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a most insuperable gulf But these I shall urge Indeed the Fathers of the Church have been in these last days counted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 separate in the severest sense cast out as the dung of the Earth and the calling it self was under reprobation as if it separated only to the left hand of God But so it was with their Predecessours in the Text Saint Paul says of himself and the rest of his Order that they were counted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the filth of the World and the off-scouring of all things 1 Cor. 4. 13. and as if they were called only to ruine and consecrated for a sacrifice he says the Lord hath set us forth as men appointed to death vers 9. Indeed since God hath pleased to own you as his Churches Angels we are not troubled if some have counted you as the off-scouring of the Earth while we know Angels do relate to Heaven And let them consider how they will reprobate those to the left hand of God whom Christ calls stars in his right hand and he is at the right hand of his Father and while you were accounted so you did but follow them that went before in Sufferings as well as Office and to do so was part of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the work that they were separated to which is the next part For the work I shall but run this over and reflect upon it as I pass according as it is of persent Concernment and First Saint Paul's work was to Preach the Gospel and we find him doing it from this time forward to his End The high Priest of the Jews was called the Angel of the Lord of Hosts of which name an Heathen does give this account that he was call'd so because he was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Angel or the Messenger of Gods Commands so Diodorus Siculus And Malachy gives the same reason Mal. 2. 7. he was the Substitute to him upon Mount Sinai and gave the Law also only without the thunder Our Governours succeed into the Name they are the Churches Angels and when we hear the word from them we have it as it were from Heaven again and we receive our Law too 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the disposition of Angels Indeed the Case now is not like Saint Paul's the Gospel then was to be first revealed to all the World and by continual inculcating secur'd against the depravations which all the malice of the Devil and the World sought to infuse and the unskilfulness of infant Christians did make them apt to entetrain But now we are all confirm'd Christians Yet truly the time is now such as did give occasion for Saint Paul's charge to Timothy 2 Tim. 4. 1 2 3. a time wherein they will not indure sound doctrine but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers He therefore that is in Timothy's place must heap up Reproofs and Exhortations or he must heap good sound dispensers of them Such as will feed the Lambs with sincere milk not chaf'd and heated with commotion and busie restless Faction not embitter'd with overflowings of a too-ful gall not sour'd with eager sharpnesses of a malicious or a dissatisfied mind not impoisoned with the foul tinctures of a scandalous life nor the Corrosive infusions of Schismatical and turbulent opinions He that caters thus for his flock and provides such as by doctrine and by practice do instruct them to live quiet and peaceable lives in all godliness and honesty He like the Angel on Mount Sinai gives the Law to a Nation together preaches to his whole Diocess at once Continually The second work was praying for and blessing them This does begin and close every Epistle that he asserts of himself constantly and 't is well known the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 gifts of those times inspir'd for this Work Now thus our Angels also are Angels of Incense the High Priests Office in especial Those that did daily Minister performd a service of Incense too that did accompany the prayers of the people and sent them up in perfume but the High Priests Incense was part of the Expiation and was the Cloud that cover'd the transgressions of the people when he came with them all about him before the Mercy-seat And they who shall consider that the prayer of Moses Now Moses and Aaron were among the Priests Psal. 99. 6. and He was the chief Priest did withhold the Arm of God when it was stretcht forth in fury to destroy and did commit a violence upon the Lord such as he could not grapple with but seems to deprecate and fain avoid and says Let me alone that I may destroy them Exod. 32. 10. If thou wilt permit me my fury shall prevail upon them saith the Arabick but if thou pray it cannot therefore let go thy prayer saith the Chald. and let me alone And they who shall consider also that his prayer did maintain a breach against the Lord when he had made one and was coming to enter in a storm of indignation then this made head against him and repuls't him Psal. 106. 23. They that consider these effects will certainly desire the Prayers and
lives and so prepar'd themselves for Baptism on Easter Eve for that was their most solemn time as Tertullian do's assure us in the 2d Century just when that death and passion into which they were baptiz'd was celebrated Diem Baptismo solenniorem Pascha praestat cum Passio Domini in qua tinguimur odimpleta est And that they did prepare for it with watchings fastings weepings and all rigid mortifying discipline and before him Justin M. And they had in the Greek Church their forty daies for these severities and a while too in the Roman in St Hierom's time and Pope Siricius it was so but quickly sunk into this single weeks performances But in all those times they had their scrutinies their strict examinations to try whether their performances were real and sincere So nice and so severe a thing they thought it to become a Christian. The man was to be mortifi'd and die into the very name But now God knows as for the former discipline for Penitents one Church hath lost it and the other hath debaucht it into Pageantry and taught it to countenance and bolster mens continuance in Sin and minister to vice So for the other discipline too if that did import that Baptism hath such engagements in it men in every Church live now as if they either never had been Christian'd or had never known or had perfectly forgot the obligations of that Sacrament the thing which St Paul reproves here by his question Know you not c. And which therefore 't is impossible there can be a more proper time to call to your Remembrance then this is before you are to celebrate that death you were baptiz'd into Now to inform such he disputes here very closely The sum is this They that are dead to Sin cannot live any longer in it Now as Christs Death was a death to Sin for in that he died he died unto Sin once v. 10. i. e. there was an efficacy in that death of his to put an end to all the powers of Sin which being so it was impossible he could dye more then once but must be alive always afterwards to God So in like manner whoever is baptiz'd he is baptiz'd into the likeness of that death v. 5. namely into a death to Sin inasmuch as by solemn profession and express undertaking he do's die to it for he renounces it and if he answer that his undertaking do's so really and really as Christ died once so as to live always afterwards to God engaging himself to keep Gods holy will and commandments and to walk in the same all the days of his life So that the words suggest these things to be discours'd of 1. Christs death was a death to Sin 2ly They that are baptiz'd are baptiz'd into that death namely into a death to Sin 3ly They that are baptiz'd into that death are to die as Christ did i. e. to die to Sin once so as to live always afterwards to God 1. Christs death was a death to Sin i. e. there was an efficacy in Christs death to put an end to all the powers of Sin And here I mean not that extrinsic efficacy of his death as it confirm'd the Covenant of the Gospel whose rewards and punishments engage us against all those powers nor as his blood did also purchase grace whereby we are enabled to resist them but the direct influence of that death tends to destroy all the power that the Devil World or Flesh had either to command us or condemn us The Scripture tells us that by Death he destroy'd him that had the power of Death i. e. the Devil Heb. 2. 14. Christ tells us he hath overcome the world for us John 16. 23. and St Paul says by his Cross the World is crucify'd to us and assures us that God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and a Sacrifice for Sin condemned Sin in the flesh that the Righteousness of the Law might be fulfill'd in us Rom. 8. 3. Which place discovers how all was effected namely as he was a Sacrifice for Sin and that not only as that Sacrifice did consecrate him to and install him in a power to pardon Sins upon Repentance and so whomsoever by vertue of that motive he took off from serving Sin from them he took away the guilt of it but as that Sacrifice did take away the guilt of Sin from us by bearing it in his own body on the tree the direct consequence of which as to its tendency and efficacy is that we being dead to sin might live to righteousness And in both these manners by his stripes we are healed I do not mean to entertain you with the controversy that there is on the account of these two Schemes concerning the effects and uses of the death of Christ. Only I cannot choose but wonder why it should be said to be unjust in God to lay upon him the iniquity of us all so as that he bore death as the punishment due to sin by making satisfaction for us Sinners For I would gladly know to whom the wrong were don in this that makes the injustice and on whose part it was unjust not on his part that made the satisfaction sure For whether it be wrong to force an innocent person without his consent to suffer for the guilty I shall not dispute But here Christ gave himself for us Tit. 2. 14. and had power to do so John 10. 18. And having power to lay down his life and power to take it up again if he had so much love and pity for lost mankind as to lay it down for three days to prevent their everlasting death and misery no justice certainly nay no self-love forbids this Much less was there wrong don to them for whom the satisfaction was made unless eternal redemtion and eternal blessedness purchas'd at such dear rates with such infinite kindness be accounted injuries Nor yet was it unjust in him that did receive it for none charge it upon that account That death which all confess Christ did justly submit to God most justly might accept since he could so dispose it as not only by it to work the Salvation of those whom it was undertaken for but also the advancement of his humane Nature that did undergo it to the highest pitch of glory to all power in heaven and earth Phil. 2. 9. and withal thereby declare his own Righteousness Rom. 3. 26. and work the honor also of his other glorious attributes And therefore if there had bin no injustice as they say altho Sin had bin pardon'd without any Satisfaction much less could the receiving this be a wrong to him Indeed it seems as if there had bin no right don him by it because he furnisht all that makes the satisfaction and he could not receive it therefore since he gave the value to it And 't is most true in compensation of rights of real possessions and
Law And we shall find a reason for this way of working in that prayer of the same King David Help me O Lord my God O save me according to thy mercies that they may know that this is thy hand and that thou Lord hast don it When our distresses are beyond the succors of means power and counsels if deliverance come we must needs know 't is from above The Prophet speaks of men as apt to sacrifice to their net and burn incense to their drag with which they catch ascribing their successes to themselves But when the Apostles use their net all night and can take nothing then if one upon the shore whom they know not bid them cast in and they do catch strait one of them crieth out it is the Lord. When out of a desperate condition of affairs we see hope drawn we know it is the day spring from on high Whatever several of the late discoverers of the Popish conspiracy may have said or don to disparage their evidence and the credit of what they testify or men Popishly affected have contriv'd to make it be disbeliev'd yet surely while the trial and the letters of the late apostate busy Factor for the party remain upon record it will be manifest as the light that there was a practice and endeavor to subvert the present establishment in Church and State and introduce the superstition and tyranny of Rome among us And that God will be further gracious in the sending forth his light to discover and to disappoint their dire attemts there is ground to hope because it always was the ordinary method of his working making the day of Extremity the day of Salvation 1. In the Jewish Church and Nation And here I shall not mention their deliverance from the Egyptian bondage tho it be a demonstration of my Proposition but name that from the designs of Haman who had satisfied the King their Laws and their Religion and their Worship differ'd from those of all people 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Josephus and that were still occasions to embroile the State that if he would give order they should be destroi'd he would bring 10000 talents near two millions of our mony into the Exchequer whereupon the King allows him to make what declarations he shall please against them and signs an Edict to his Governors and his Lieutenants for the massacring the whole Nation which might easily be don the Jews then being in captivity and mixt among them Mordecay adviseth Ester to present her self before the King remonstrate the injustice of the fact that being death to do she would decline it but as one acquainted with Gods methods Mordecai does answer her think not with thy self that thou shalt escape in the Kings house more then all the Jews for if thou altogether holdest thy peace at this time then shall there enlargement and deliverance arise to the Jews from another place here is a pregnant instance of the assurance of my text but thou and thy fathers house shall be destroi'd And who knoweth whether thou art come to the Kingdom for such a time as this Hereupon she and her Nation fast and pray and she adventures and God gives her favor with the King and he reverses all and the whole Nation on that very day it was to perish is secur'd and the design returns upon their heads that plotted it on all their Enimies I need name no more but there is one pregnant one on which there lies an imputation from great men I mean when throout that Nation their Religion was so persecuted that it was almost extinct false Heathen worship planted in its place possessed the Temple and the Sanctuary and all was profan'd by Antiochus Epiphanes the state so lively propheci'd of by the Prophet Daniel Now when it was thus there was so universal a defection as already had subverted the whole Government Religion and almost the whole Nation God stirs up the Spirit of the Maccabbees on that day three years that all was profan'd ' was again purified and they deliver'd I instance so least that which Grotius satih that nothing can defend that action of the Maccabbees besides extreme certain necessity and what our Thorndike saith 't is manifest the Arms which they took up against their lawful Soveraign are by God approv'd and their Faith commended Hebr. 11. least these should misguide men it may be seasonable to declare that it is plain Antiochus Epiphanes altho he call that land his Kingdom was not then their rightful King for after Alexanders death the first that got possession of it was the King of Egypt It was after violently taken indeed from him by the King of Syria the Jews gave up themselves to the protection of Antiochus the Great but he gave it in dowry to the King of Egypt with his daughter so parted with all right whatever right the Kings of Syria could be suppos'd to have Antiochus Epiphanes had none of that as being not a lawful King of any place usurping from his Nephew the right Heir and with all injurious angry violence when he was driven out of Egypt the attaques Jerusalem and enters it and sets up all the Heathen Exercises and Religion and forbids Gods Worship ravages and spoils and murders all refusers till the Maccabbees oppos'd his fury and till Judas three years after as I said restor'd all having fought against a violent Aggressor not his rightful Prince and he is by Grotius made the very man that typ'd out Christ and was seen by the Prophet in Isaiah 63. Who is he that cometh from Edom with dyed garments from Bozra to which he makes Judas Maccabeus answer I that defend Gods Worship and the true Religion against Antiochus and all his power and to save my People cast my self upon extremest hazards Once more when Caius Emperor of Rome had sent Petronius into Syria charging him to make war on the Jews and by all utmost force to make thew condescend to let his image the statue of himself I mean be set up in their Temple at Jerusalem the Jews when he came into Syria to their Country met him several thousands several times with supplications and entreaties to divert him if they could from doing it But he declaring his Commission to them let them see it was not possible for him to contradict the Emperor and they declar'd also since he durst not transgress the commands of the Emperor he must not think it strange if they durst not transgress Almighty Gods command resolving to endure whatever should be inflicted on the rather then violate that Doing this often and in multitudes Petronius askt them whether they did mean on that account to fight with Caesar and make war against him they repli'd they would not fight but they could die on that account and prostrating themselves and offering their naked throats shew'd their readiness to entertain their death and this for
his Body and his Bloud is he himself Therefore thou didst receive him as verily as thou didst those and if the Sacramental food be thine then Christ is thine and thou maist say my God My Brethren it was the Bloud of Christ that purchased all the glorious mercies of the Gospel all the blessed expectations of a Christian that was the price of all the joys of Heaven that reconciled God to us bought us an interest in him and the happy enjoyments of himself for us and then if in the Sacrament Christ do give me his bloud when I can shew God that bring him the price of the remission of my sins the value of those glories even the bloud of Jesus come with the purchase-money in my hands that bought my interest in God cannot I say those are mine my Heaven and my God Yea when I can say O Lord Christ whom I have undertaken to obey my God whom I have vowed to serve and worship thou art even my flesh for there I ate thy flesh and thou becamest flesh of my flesh Thou art the portion of my cup when thy very bloud doth fill full my cup and so thou art my flesh and my bloud then surely I may say with Thomas here my Lord and my God O Holy and Eternal Savior who art made both Lord and Christ and by thy Resurrection didst manifest the Omnipotency of thy person the truth of thy Promises and open a way to the everlasting glory and salvation which thou hast prepared for them that give themselves up to serve and worship thee their Lord and God pour down that blessed influence of this thy Resurrection on our hearts in raising us from the death of sin to the life of Righteousness Be thou our Lord and Christ ruling us by thy laws saving us by thy grace and by thy Spirit applying the mercies of thy death and so making us partakers of thy Resurrection therein turning us from our iniquities hereafter in raising us to Glory O Lord we have this day made a Covenant of this with thee and signed the Articles of it in the bloud of our God swore to them at the Altar give us grace we beseech thee to use the strictest care and watchfulness in our endeavors to perform with thee Regard not how we have in times past onely mock'd thee sacredly in these performances O let it from this day be otherwise We have bin onely on a stage of Religion when we are at our devoutest performances and having turn'd our backs unto the Church turn'd them also to our duty put off the vizards of Religion and we untired our selves of all our Piety almost as soon as the exercises of it were don and howsoever we tied our selves our froward wills have bin too strong for all our obligations and burst out of them broke all thy bonds asunder and cast away thy cords from us altho we tied them with all things that were most solemn and most sacred vows and oaths and tied them before the body of our crucified Lord and Savior with the body and bloud of Christ in our hands as if we had no other desires no other cares that should do us good than as we were careful to keep those resolutions and vows and yet O Lord we did let them instantly loosen and slack pass by and fail Yea we did break them wilfully and would not be held in by thine or our own bonds O Lord if thou look upon us in this guilt sure thou wilt have no more to do with us such false and perjured vow-breakers But O look upon us in thine own bloud which thou hast bid us pour out still to establish and renew our Covenant with thee and let this Covenant wherein we have now taken thee to be our Lord and God and taken thee who art so in us remain inviolable be there then with thy Power and Autority subdue our hearts and our desires and bring them under the obedience of thy laws Thou that art God Almighty that didst conquer Death and Satan bring it to pass that none of them prevail against thee now in our Souls where thou art but use thy strength O Lord to drive their power thence that thy servants and thy people may not be enslaved to corruption and ruin nor thy Enimy gain souls from thee which thou hast purchased with thy bloud that we having attain'd thee for our Lord and God may claim the privileges of thy People here have the watches and cares and securities that thou laiest out upon thy Treasures and the Jewels of thy Crown and by thy body and thy bloud being made one with thee and thou being ours all things may be ours thy grace here and thy joys hereafter thy Spirit may be ours and thy Heaven ours and we in thee and thou in us may all enjoy thy Kingdom Power and Glory for ever SERMON XIII THE BELIEVERS CONCERN to pray for Faith Mark 9. 24. Lord I believe help thou my Vnbelief WHICH are the words of a poor parent passionately earnest and afflicted sadly for his child that from his infancy had bin tormented miserably by a Devil for which having sought help every way but finding none no not from Christ's Disciples at last he repairs to him himself beseeching him to have compassion on him and if he were able to relieve him To whom Christ replies that if he could believe then he could work the miracle and help his child all things being possible to be don for him that could believe but nothing otherwise whereupon strait way the father of the child cried out and said with tears Lord I believe help thou my unbelief In which words we have first the necessary Qualification that is to make all that had ever heard of Christ capable of having any benefit from Christ that is belief in him I believe And since Christ hath made this qualification absolutely necessary and by consequence must be suppos'd to have provided means sufficient to work in us that belief that he requires so peremtorily we shall then In the second place enquire how it comes to pass that they so often fail that men do either not believe or their Faith is so weak that much unbelief do's mix with it as in our Confessor here in the Text who tho he did profess he did believe yet withal acknowledges his unbelief And thirdly to prevent and remedy all that here is discovered whither we are to betake our selves for help and where alone 't is possible to find it and that is Christ himself who alone is able to repair in us whatever degree of true belief is wanting in us Lord help thou my unbelief and how he do's repair it And fourthly when it is repair'd to that due height what that degree is can make us capable of those benefits which he hath promis'd to bestow on true Believers and whether such believers can say with our man here I believe yet say too Help my unbelief First of
accordingly you may see many that otherwise are not very apt to sin yet then they will offer at little Atheistical beginnings of it they will endeavor because they will be in the fashion of the company And this is one of Satans advantageous seasons when as we see if there be but one by of a sober and discreet virtue that dares speak meek reason or dares when they do swill their Souls in filthy folly of one or other sort or are loud in the rants of vice by disliking gestures let them know that such unclean entertainments are detestable to a sober person or withdraws abruptly by such a departure shews that he scorns to stay to behold or hear such impurities this often does not onely hinder those beginners take them off that would have bin dabbling but does somtimes a little damp the progress of the most professed Sinner It is a bridle to his neck he will not march so furiously in his carrier of oaths or of obsceness or whatever other sin he does not indulge himself so full a licence and so by this means God gets some respect and Religion a little repute when they see it hath some followers and God hath some that will not see him dishonored And truly my Brethren do but consider what a storm it does use to raise in any man to hear an absent Friend or Relation abused or evil spoken of If we be in any degree of them the world calls Gentlemen then nothing but the sword must make return to such a word nothing but life and soul can answer nothing but bloud and death repair and 't is this resentment we in whose company the disgrace was offer'd think ourselves more concern'd than that Friend that was the subject of And then methinks you should not think it strange if there be some that do believe they have so much relation to God and that he hath approv'd himself to be so much their Friend they cannot but take it unkindly and speak when they hear him affronted and see him dishonor'd And methinks too it should not be unreasonable to expect this from all of us to whom God hath bin Friend enough that we should do this handsom this noble glorious thing as to right the Lord in companies where we are and to credit our Maker and not let vice exalt over him where we shall chance to be Truly my Brethren this is the least that God hath reason to expect from us even the reproof of our words that of our open holy lives by which as the wicked say in Wisdom 2. 12. The Righteous do reprove their thoughts and upbraid them with their offending the Law and object to their infamy their transgressions This is strictly and to an high degree required by God of every one of us that we may have influence upon others to be open and exemplary to shine before men that they may see our good works and glorify our Father which is in Heaven which was the reason of the command and the end of our very being Now to God the Father c. SERMON XV. OF THE ACCEPTED TIME the Day of Salvation 2 Cor. 6. 2. Behold now is the accepted time behold now is the day of Salvation THE words foregoing of which these I now read are the application run thus for he saith I have heard thee in a time accepted and in the day of salvation I have succour'd thee which God saying in the 49th of Isaiah 8. signified as in the type in relation to the Church and Nation of the Jews he had days of Salvation fit and proper seasons to deliver them from their affictions and calamities for Salvation often signifies that had his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 tempus placentiae time of grace wherein he was well pleas'd to hearken to their cries and wants and in those he heard and succour'd them so in the Antitype and in relation of the Christian Church and all the Members of it for of these St Paul here useth it expresly he hath his accepted time days not onely for such temporal deliverance of which some will have the Salvation meant here but much more for Salvation Eternal But then as Kings when they publish acts of grace and oblivion do not onely set appoint but limit out the time for Subjects to come in submit and return to their fidelity and allegiance which if once elapst they are incapable of benefit by any such grant cannot at least plead it so it seems God does too and it is not sure that whosoever at what time soever calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved Rom. 10. 13. but as King David told him they shall make their praier to thee in a time of finding Psalm 32. 6. in a time when his good pleasure it the very word here Psalm 69. 13. and this time St Paul restrains here to the present now meaning not onely in the general now in times while they are under grace are in the Covenant of it and when the day-spring from on high hath visited them and while they had the Gospel that word of this Salvation for whilest men live under this gracious dispensation they may let the opportunities of laying hold of it go by them while the light of the Gospel shines upon them yet the day of Salvation may be quite gon out of which St Paul here seems sollicitous for his Corinthians who had receiv'd the Gospel least yet they may have receiv'd that grace in vain and the Salvation should escape them To prevent which saith he there is no other sure way but by seizing on the present Behold now is the accepted time now is the day of salvation so that the words afford these subjects of discourse 1. There is a time wherein we may be certainly accepted if we come to God and there is a day of Salvation offer'd us 2. This time is limited 't is a day of salvation consequently we may possibly outstand it and may suffer it to pass irrecoverably 3. The onely sure way to prevent that is to lay hold on the present to begin now 1. There is a time wherein we may be certainly accepted if we come to God and there is a day of Salvation offer'd us The Text does make sufficient proof of this for if the accepted time be now and if now be the day of salvation then there is such a day and time which our Lord commanded to be preached to every humane creature in the world Indeed the preaching of the Gospel is nothing else but publishing this truth the Gospel being but a tender of Salvation upon pardon of whatever we have don amiss and the accepting us whenever we repent and truly turn to God believing on him and resolving to continue faithful to him and all this assur'd to us by Covenant such as God himself both made and ratified in the bloud of Christ and to prevent exception since he gave command to have this Gospel preach'd
the relicks onely of Christ's Church but also all the memory of the other cruelties when in one small Province in a month he put to death one hundred and fourty four thousand Christians banish'd seven hundred thousand more and proportionably so in other places thro the Roman world with such success that he took confidence to write on his triumphal Arches Deleto nomine Christiano as he had blotted out the very name of Christians then at the last gasp of his Church it pleas'd the Lord to raise up Constantine and strait the whole face of the world was Christian and Dioclesian himself liv'd to see it I might have instanced in our own so fresh deliverance but that it would not look like an incouragement it may be to rely and cast our selves again upon him if so soon we call upon our selves the same needs by the same wretchless methods and there are some they say that apprehend so And God knows the ruin of the Reformation and our Church hath from its first beginning bin still working by her restless indefatigable Enimies and hath often bin preserv'd onely on the account I am now speaking that when things are past all humane help then is God's set time for relief I know the Churches Adversaries brag of multitudes and they come up on every side close to her yea and which is worse we seem to labor to make God himself our Enimy or at least provoke him to desert that Chutch and Reformation we pollute so put out the Worship we unhallow and profane so by ill lives make those that will have nothing of Religion but some forms it may be loose them too and let them die for want of substance and the shew go out not leave so much as the hypocrisy of piety Indeed a flood of Atheism and contemt of all Religion and virtue looks like a just dereliction of them who would not let God be in their thoughts nor Religion or Morality in their actions Nay may it not look like a kindness to remove the Gospel which proves onely the savor of death unto death put out that light which men are but resolv'd to sin against Or can there be a greater mercy than to refuse all the means of mercy to such men as onely make them work out condemnation to them O Lord to us indeed belongs confusion of face but notwithstanding to the Lord our God belong mercies and forgivenesses tho we have rebelled against him and as he knows how to reserve the ungodly to the day of Judgment to be punish'd he knows too how many thousand knees do bow to him in secret reckons all those tears that are pour'd out in Religion's and the Churches cause and how wicked soever the Professors of Religion the Church Members may be if the constitution of Religion and the Church themselves yet be not vitiated or defective there is hope still And truly whereas many blame the Reformation that it did not keep more hold upon the Consciences of the Community did not retain some power which altho not of Divine Institution but things warily and by degrees brought in as seeming to work towards piety and most certainly in humane ways of judging serving to procure more veneration and outward security of the Church and Religion to work out which the other consequential worldly interests we see the very scheme of some Professions not their discipline onely but their faith too is contriv'd I think on the other side if our Reformation instead of doing thus as it consulted not at first with carnal Politicks but Christ's institutions as the Scripture and other primitive Records conveied them and design'd no more to themselves than those bare naked Spiritual doctrines rights and powers which Christ gave them left to Cesar whatsoever was Cesar's knowing God had promis'd Kings should be their Nursing-fathers and to be so is part of their Office trusting therefore God and Governments with their protection and defence of Church and Religion So also if thro all succeeding times whether of flourish or depression and calamity Religion it self whatever its Professors are have retain'd always the same simplicity of principles be it self untainted not new model'd to serve ends or interests then whenever men shall begin to clip it I do not say in maintenance seizing what their Father's sacriledge had left them but I mean because ours did not so as other Churches grasp some usurpt power to secure their own shall therefore cut her Spiritual powers short so that they cannot serve the ends of piety because they know her Children will not cannot by their principles resist i. e. if they endeavor to destroy them for this reason that they make men the best Subjects and of the most Christian Principles that is persecute their Christianity it self and martyr that I must profess that it will look like God's set appointed time to arise and to have mercy upon Sion when it is expos'd a naked Orphan left to his protection onely then he cannot pass it by but when he sees it in its bloud thus he will say unto it live and tho he plague her wicked and ungracious Sons and possibly take away many of the good ones from the evil to come yet the Religion will not die Let them believe it hopeless who desire a pretence to leave it who do what they can to stab their Mother and make it a reason to forsake her then because she is so desperately wounded and let them declare it who design to betray men out of it But whether is wiser to believe these or the God from whom we have these promises and these experiences and the other grounds of trust Sure we know better whom we have believed especially since the very trust to him is an engagement to him not to fail us that 's my last ground 'T is it self a means prescrib'd us by himself Isaiah 50. 10. Who is he among you that feareth the Lord that walketh in darkness hath no light Let him trust in the name of the Lord stay upon his God There is nothing in the world that more engages any man that is not profligately false than trusting to him and for God there is no other piece of piety or virtue gives such honor to him his Attributes as sincere dependance on him do's It does acknowledge his Omniscience that he knows our needs be they never so perplext intricate knows how to help them his Omnipresence that he is at hand on all occasions his Omnipotence how he is able above all our possibility of want his Mercy Goodness Benignity in that he condescended to be willing to relieve us his Faithfulness Truth and Justice in observing his good promises and never failing them and his Immutability in all these and his other Attributes of loving kindness Now truly as our miseries requir'd all these so our trust to him gives him the glory of all these and therefore 't is no wonder if
in reflecting how to set their paces to the cadences of an aire so much more considerable 't is to dance well then to live and dye well No guide in that science that must teach them how to be for ever blessed they march forwards in the way they fall into in which provided all their appetites be entertain'd well and themselves diverted the good company submissive and complaisant and let them have their will and rule it then they go on pleasantly not ever thinking what way they are in or whither going Much less are they circumspect and wary watching both their wayes and steps but rather love to walk amongst break into snares and so walking so entangled their last fatal minute overtakes them never till then sensible but then made so by despair when as the wise man words it they repenting and groaning for anguish of spirit shall say within themselvs The Righteous we had in derision and a proverb of reproch we fools accounted his life madness how is he numbred among the Children of God and his lot is among the Saints Therefore have we erred from the way of truth we have wearied our selves in the way of wickedness yea we have gon thro deserts Where there lay no way but as for the way of the Lord we have not known it What hath pride profited us or what good hath riches with our vaunting brought us All those things are pass'd away like a shadow For the hope of the ungodly is like a thin froth that is driven away with the storm but the Righteous live for evermore the reward of them is with the Lord and the care of them is with the most High Therefore shall they receive a glorious kingdom and a beautiful Crown from the Lords hand Which Crown God of his infinite mercy grant c. SERMON XVIII THE LIGHT OF THE BODY is the Eye Matt. 6. 22 23. The light of the body is the eye if therefore thy eye be single thy whole body shall be full of light But if thine eye be evill thy whole body shall be full of darkness If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness how great is that darkness IN daies that above all others so pretend to light yet then in which the Church was scarcely ever more involv'd in darkness wholly overspread with error and confusion and these new lights prove but like those fires that do mislead them that are overtaken by the night guide them only out of their way into dangers and precipices and make them loose themselvs in many wandrings only Religious meteors It cannot be unseasonable or needless to try what kind of light it is that Christ would have us follow if all were true those others do pretend 't would give them but enlightned brains but Christs light here will give us shining lives make our whole bodies full of light and which light if men want notwithstanding all their wild illuminations they are still in the most amazing darkness For the light of the body is the eye c. The words are clearly the former part of a comparison only hinting at and leaving us to guess and to draw out the latter which hath by divers been assign'd diversly In their direct view they say thus much The Eye is the candle of the body that is as in the body of man the Eye is the director do's that office to it that a lamp dos in the dark shews it which way it should walk what it should do and by its guidance the body can discerningly set about its offices and perform its functions and if the Eye be as it ought pure and right it directeth well but if not the body not being able to discern not only cannot exercise its functions as it ought but also may walk on in dangerous errors and stumble upon precipices into ruin So also it fares in our spiritual estate But the particulars thereof are not by all agreed upon and are very variously rendred The single and the evil eye being exprest by such words as do assure us that a spiritual eye is here intended yet leaves place for enquiry into what it is and tho several meanings have been pitch't upon and but one was meant yet each having either large authority or reasons I know not why I may not apply it too and treat of every one seeing each way afford's us true and good instructions And first that which hath most generally been adhered to is that the singleness of the Eye should mean the singleness or simplicity of heart purity of intention So Abimelech Gen. xx 5 6. when he had taken Sarah to him pleads for himself he did it in the simplicity of his heart and God acknowledges he did so with an honest intention meaning to make her his wife not knowing that she was so to another man And then the second part of the comparison says thus So also if thy heart be single and sincere thy intentions right to God if in all thy actions thou intend his service and Glory that thy good meaning will derive a goodness into all thy doings thy whole body will be full of light all thy actions holy but if thy intentions be vitiated if in the duties I named before alms praier fasts thou aime not at my service but the praise of men if thy heart be impure mudded with the desire of earthly things which I did last forbid thee thy actions must needs be dark and foul yea indeed how great a spiritual darkness how much unholiness must needs dwell upon thy doings if the only thing that should give light and shed an holiness into them thy intentions be dark and evil To this sense I shall first speak and divide my text into subjects rather then parts 1. The first shall be this the lamp of the body is the eye a good intention a well meaning must enlighten direct every action to make it not reprovable 2. I shall lay before you a single eye shew you what is required to make a Religious intention singly and purely so 3. That from such a single eye the body shall be light that such good hearty meanings do either break out into holy actions or are accepted as such 4. That such a single eye makes the whole body light that by such pure religious intentions a man may sanctify all the actions of his life 5. The remaining part of the text but if thine eye be evil c. being but the affirming all the contraries to these of the evil eye the bad meaning the intention that is not honest and pure must needs be prov'd and press'd in pressing of the former part and therefore that shall only furnish me with application First of the first the candle of the body is the eye a good intention a well meaning must enlighten and direct every action to make it not reprovable I mean in actions that are any way matter of duty I know only an innocent harmless
utmost that they understood if so be that there were no Treason to discolour it and they that did inflict all this appear but Christian Dioclesians and stand at that sad Day in the train of the Persecutions on the same hand O then those Fires which these Boutefeus called for and kindled shall blaze out into everlasting burnings And now it may seem strange that they who most of all pretend the Spirit of Christ are yet of the most distant temper in the World from that of Gospel always endeavouring to do that which our Saviour here checks his Disciples for proposing and did threaten Peter for attempting There are among our selves that seem to live by Inspiration that look and speak as in the frame of the Gospel as if every motion were impulse from Heaven and yet as if Christ had fulfilled his promise to them without Metaphor baptized them with the Holy Ghost and fire onely that they might kindle fire and the unction of the Spirit did but add Oyl to those flames as if the cloven Tongues of fire in which the Spirit did descend were made to be the Emblems of Division and to call for fire these mens life their garb their very piety is faction they pray rebel and murder and all by the Spirit 'T is true indeed they plead now what we seem to say that they should not be persecuted for not being satisfied in their Conscience so they mince their breaking of the Laws for which they suffer But do these know themselves what manner of Spirit they are of or are we bound not to remember when they had the Power how they persecuted all that would not do at once against their King their Conscience and the Law And we do thus far know what Spirit they are of and if they have not yet repented of all that then it is plain if they can get an opportunity they will do it again nay they must by their Spirit think themselves obliged to do it But these are not all those that above all the World pretend to the Infallible assistance of the Spirit our Church is bold in her Offices of this day to say do turn Religion into Rebellion she said it more severely heretofore and the attempts of this day warrant the saying when not like our Disciples that would call for fire from Heaven on the Village that rejected Christ these will raise up fire from Hell to consume their own Prince and his Progeny the whole line of Royalty the Church and Nation also in their Representative and all this onely for refusing him that calls himself Christ's Vicar There are I must confess among them that renounce the practice and say 't was the device onely of some few desperate male-contents wicked Catholiques and design'd by the Devil And they will allow their Father Garnett to have had no other guilt but that he did not discover it having received it in Confession And this gives me occasion to propose a story to your patience and conjectures Not long before the time of this Attempt a Priest of the Society of Jesus in a Book he publish'd does propose this case of Conscience Whether a Priest may make use of what he hath learn'd in Confession to avert great impendent mischiefs to the Government as for Example One confesses that himself or some other had laid Gunpowder and other things under such an House and if they be not taken thence the House will be burnt the Prince must perish all that pass throughout the City will be either certainly destroy'd or in great peril and resolves it thus 'T is the most probable and safe Opinion and the more suitable to Religion and to that reverence which is due to the Sacrament of Confession that it is not lawful to make use of this his knowledg to that end That his Holiness Clement the 8. had just before by a Bull sent to the Superiours of the Regulars commanded most studiously to beware they make not use of any thing which they come to know by Confession to the benefit of the secular Government He adds that in cases of Confession the Priest must not reveal though death be threatned to him but may say he knows it not nor ever heard it quia reverà non scit nec audivit ut homo seu pars reipub Yea he may swear all this if he but mentally reserve so as to tell you 'T is Del Rio in 6th Book of his Mag. dis 1. Cap. Sec. 2. It seems 't is safer to break all the Obligations to Allegiance and to truth his duty and his Oaths the Princes and Gods bonds than the Seal of Confession But I did not mention this to let you see the kindness these men have to Princes and their Government I shall avoid producing any the Opinions of particular persons howsoever horrid in my arguments this day but I onely ask whether it be not very probable this instance was the thing to be attempted on this day Whether the resolution was not publish'd the Pope's Bull if not made yet produc'd at least to caution any Priest that should receive it in Confession and should be so honest as to abhor the Fact yet from betraying it and hindring the Execution of it If it were the case this was not then any rash attempt of some few desperate malecontents but a long contrivance and of many heads and its taking its effect was the great care of their Church Well they are even with us yet and lay as horrid Projects to the charge of Protestants Among our other Controversies this is one whether are the worse Subjects bloody sayings are produc'd from Authors on both sides yea there is the Image of both Churches Babel and Jerusalem drawn by a Catholique Pen and then you may be sure all Babel's divisions and confusions make the draught of ours and are said to be the issue of the Protestant Doctrines Whereas such things are countenanc'd by some particular Authors of their Church were never own'd by any publique Act or Doctrine of a general Council to which they provoke us I must confess our Calendar can shew a thirtieth of January as well as a fifth of November There are indeed that say the Romanists hatch'd that days guilt and challenge any man to call them to account for saying so But whether so or not which Churches Doctrines such things are more suited to I will now put to trial that we may know what Spirit each is of And I will try it by the publique Acts and most establish'd Doctrines of the Churches and here undertake to shew the Church of England most expresly does declare against all practices against the Prince for the cause of Religion But the Romish in those acts wherein she hath most reason to expect infallibility of Spirit also in the publique Acts of the Church representative in General Councils does abett the doing them not onely for Religion but for the cause of Holy
Church First If the Church of Rome have reason to expect infallible assistance of the Spirit in any case it is as much in Canonizing of a Saint as in any other it being as unhappy to determine a false Object for Religious Worship to their Church as a false Article of Faith there is as much need that there should be an infallible proposal of the one as other for when she does Decree by the Authority of the Omnipotent God such a one is a Saint receiv'd in Glory and so renders him the Object of their Worship if he should chance to be a Reprobate to cause the People to fall prostrate to the Shrine of one that 's damn'd and call his flames to warm Gods Altar and the Votaries breast to make the whole Church worship one that is in Hell is liable to greater aggravations of impiety than an erroneous Opinion in very many of their points of Faith can be But it is known their Church hath Canoniz'd one of this Nation Becket who though he was indeed illegally and barbarously Murthered yet 't is not the Suffering but the Cause that makes the Martyr now he did not fall a Sacrifice for his Religion but was slain because he did disturb the State by suspending all the Bishops that upheld the Kings just cause against him so that neither King nor State could live in peace for him for opposing also those Laws which himself had sworn to Laws that were not onely truly Sovereign Rights but are maintain'd even unto this day as Priviledges by the Gallican Church and they not branded for so doing In a word he was slain for those actions which his own Bishops condemned him for as a perjur'd man and a Traytor And for persisting in them to the death he was Sainted Now whatever the estate of this man be in the next World I meddle not with that Yet for Disobedience and Rebellion to place one in Heaven whence for those things Lucifer did fall does seem to shew what Spirit they are of that Canonize such Saints For the Church to pray to Christ that by the wounds of this Saint he would remit their sins does express what rate their Church does set upon the merits of resisting Princes and disturbing States in the behalf of Holy Church When such actions make men fit to be joynt purchasers with Christ in the Redemption of the World But when the French Histories say 't was disputed long after in Paris whether he were Damn'd or Sav'd that the Church in her publique Offices should pray to go thither where he is gone to have his Society though it express their most infallible assurance of the condition of those men who for their sakes resist the Secular Powers yet O my Soul enter not thou into their counsels in this world neither say a Confederacy to whom they say a Confederacy much less pray to be in their Society who by resisting S. Paul says do receive unto themselves Damnation Secondly It is notorious that in their first General Council at Lyons Anno 1245. the Emperour Frederick the second by the Sentence of the Pope and the whole Council after long deliberation and producing several Arguments which they say are not sleight but effectual to prove the suspicion of Heresie is depriv'd of his Empire all his Subjects are absolv'd from their Oath of Allegiance and by Apostolical Authority forbidden to obey him Therefore that such things may be done in the cases of Religion hath the Authority of a General Council 't was that Council that Decreed Red Hats to Cardinals Hats red it seems not onely with the Royal Purple but with the Blood of Kings and of Royalty it self Thirdly I should have urged the well known Canon of the General Council of Lateran the greatest their Church ever boasted of which says That if the temporal Lord shall neglect to purge his Territories from such as the Church there declares Hereticks he shall be Excommunicated by the Metropolitan and if he do not mend within a year complained of to the Pope that so he may declare his Subjects absolv'd from their Allegiance and expose his Lands to be seiz'd by Catholicks who shall exterminate the Hereticks saving the right of the chief Lord Provided he give no impediment to this But the same law shall be observed to those that have no chief Lords that is who are themselves Supream This I should urge but that some say that penal Statutes which are leges odiosae tantum disponunt quantum loquuntur Therefore this Canon since it does not name Kings it does not they say concern them although 't is plain it do sufficiently enough But that there may be therefore no evasion Fourthly In the General Council of Constance that part of it I mean that is approv'd by their whole Church The Pope and Council joyn together in commanding all Arch-Bishops Bishops and Inquisitors to pronounce all such Excommunicate as are declared Hereticks in such and such Articles and that of Transubstantiation half-Communion and the Pope's Supremacy are among them or that favour ot defend them or that Communicate with them in publique or in private whether in sacred Offices or otherwise etiamsi Patriarchali Archiepiscopali Episcopali Regali Reginali Ducali aut aliâ quâvis Ecclesiasticâ aut mundanâ proefulgeant dignitate And Commands them also to proceed to Interdicts and deprivation of Dignities and Goods and whatsoever other Penalties vias modos Thus that Council though it took away the Peoples right to the Blood of Christ denying them the Cup in the Sacrament gave them in exchange the Blood of their own Kings making them a right to that And that they extend the force of these Canons to the most absolute Princes even to him that pleads exemption most to the King of France is plain because when Sixtus the fifth thundred out his Bulls against the then King of Navarre afterwards King Henry the fourth of France and the Prince of Conde depriving them not onely of their Lands and Dignities but their Succession also to the Crown of France absolving their Subjects from their Oaths forbidding them to obey them he declared he did it to them as to relapsed Hereticks favourers and defenders of them and as such fal'n under the Censures of the Canons of the Church Now there are no other Canons that do take in Kings but these which can touch him for that of Boniface the eighth which says the Pope hath power to judg all temporal Powers is declared not to extend to France Cap. meruit de priviledg in extravag communibus Thus by the publique Acts of their Church and by the Canons of their General Councils we have found in causes of Religion Deprivation of Princes Wars and Bloodshed and the other consequent Miseries are establish'd Rebellion encouraged by a Law And if Rebellion be as the sin of Witchcraft then we know what manner of Spirit they are of that do
attribute in God a sinner can fly to with any hope His Holiness cannot behold iniquity his Justice speaks nothing but condemnation to guilt his Power without kindness is but omnipotent destruction but if we have his Goodness on our side we have an Advocate in his own bosom that will bear up against the rest for his mercy is over all his Attributes as well as Works But if this also be exasperated and kindness grow severe there is no refuge in the Lord no shadow of him to take Sanctuary under for there is nothing to allay the anger of his Compâ—ssion and Bounty This sure is the extreamest terrour we are to dread his kindness more than his severity and wrath we have an antidote a buckler against those but none against the other if it be provok'd and if the heats of love take fire and rise into indignation 't is unquenchable flame and everlasting burning Therefore when God hath done all things that he can do or they can wish then most of all they must fear the Lord and his goodness My Text and I have spoke all this while to the Jews Nor do I know whether I need to address any other way all this did so directly point at us The glories of this day need not the foil of those calamities from which this day redeem'd to set them off or you may read them in my Prophet here and our own guilts will make too sad a Comment on his Text who were more barbarous Assyrians to our selves We also were without a Prince and without Sacrifice had neither King nor Church nor Offices because we our selves had destroy'd them and that we might not have them had engag'd or covenanted against them ty'd to our miseries so that without perjury we could neither be without them nor yet have them As we had broke through all our sacred Oaths to invade and usurp calamity and guilt so neither could we repent without breach of Vows if this were not enough to make us be without a God too then to drive him away we had defil'd his dwelling places to the ground and by his ancient gifts of remove he was certainly gone There was indeed exceeding much Religion among us yet God knows almost none at all while Christianity was crumbled into so many so minute professions that 't was divided into little nothings and even loft in a crowd of it self while each man was a Church every single professor was a whole multitude of Sects And in this tumult this riot of faiths if the Son of man should have come could he have found any Faith in the Land Vertue was out of countenance and practice while prosperous and happy Villany usurped its name while Loyalty and conscience of Oaths and Duty were most unpardonable crimes to which nothing but ruine was an equal punishment and all those guilts that make the last times perillous Blasphemy Disobedience Truce-breakings and Treasons Schisms and Rebellions with all their dismal consequences and appendages for these are not single personal crimes these have a politick capacity all these did not onely walk in the dress of piety and under holy Masks but were themselves the very form of Godliness by which 't was constituted and distinguished the Signature of a party of Saints the Constellation of their graces And on the other side the detestation of such hypocrisie made others Libertines and Atheists while seeing men such holy counterfeits so violent in acting and equally engag'd for every false Religion made them conclude there was none true or in earnest And all this was because we were without our King for 't was the onely interest of all those usurpations that were to contrive and preserve it thus And when we had roll'd thus through every form of Government addrest to each mov'd every stone and rais'd each stone to the top of the Mount but every one still tumbled down again and ours like Sisyphus's labour was like to have no end onely restless and various Calamity necessity then counsell'd us and we applied to God's directions in the Text I know not whether in his method but it is plain we did seek David our King And my heart is towards the Governours of Isral that offer'd themselves willingly among the people Bless ye the Lord Yea Thou O Lord bless them May all the blessings which this was the birth-day of all that my Text encloses all the goodness of the Lord be the sure portion of them and their Families may they see the King in his beauty and peace upon Israel and may their Names be blest in their Posterities for evermore We sought him with the violent impatiencies of necessitous and furious desires and our eyes that had even fail'd with looking for him did even fail with looking on him as impotent and as unsatisfied in our fruitions as expectations and he was entertain'd with as many tears as pray'd for as one whom not our Interests alone but out guilts had endear'd to us and our tears He was as necessary to us as repentance as without whom it was impossible for us to repent and return from those impieties to him of usurping his rights of exiling of murthering him by wants because we could not do it by the Axe or Sword without him 't was impossible for us to give over the committing these and the tears that did welcome him were one of our best lavers to wash off that blood that we had pull'd upon our selves One endear'd also to us by God's most miraculous preservations of him for us We cannot look upon his life but as the issue of prodigious bounty snatch'd by immediate Providence out of the gaping jaws of tyrannous usurping murtherous malice merely to keep him for our needs and for this day One whom God had train'd up and manag'd for us just as he did prepare David their King at thirty years of age to take possession of that Crown which God had given him by Samuel about twelve years before and in those years to prepare him for Canaan by a Wilderness to harden him with discipline that so the luxuries and the effeminacies of a Court might not emasculate and melt him by constant Watches cares and business to make him equal for habituated to careful of and affected with the business of a Kingdom and by constraining him to dwell in Mesech with Aliens to his Religion to teach him to be constant to his own and to love Sion And hath he not prepared our David so for us And we hope hath prepared for him too the first days of David having no Sheba in the Field not Achitophel in the Councel nor an Abiathar in the Temple not in that Temple which himself hath rais'd God having made him instrument of that which he would not let David do building his house and furnishing it with all its Offices and making it fit for God to meet us in when we do seek him also which was the other perquisite of our
and came on purpose to to prove by their own onely argument they had of providential Miracles they were not in the right but that destruction and misery were in their ways yet these chuse rather to deny their own conclusions and resist Gods goodness then to be convinced and repent For we have seen them as bold Martyrs to their Sin as ever any to Religion signalize their resolv'd impenitence with chearful suffering as if the fire they were condemn'd to were that Triumphal Chariot in which the Prophet mounted up to Heaven Others that did not go so far in condemnation nor guilt as they and therefore think they have no reason to repent of that do they repent of what they did contribute to it Of those that lifted up their hands to swear and fight how many are there that have made them fall and smite their own thigh saying What have I done Do not all rather justifie as far as they themselves proceeded And if all that were well why do not we repent of our Allegiance and Loyalty If all that were well what hath thy goodness done O Lord that hath reverst it all And for the rest those that do not partake the plenties of thy goodness murmur and repine at it are discontent at having what they pray'd for what they would have died for Those that have been partakers of it have turned it into wantonness have made it furnish them for base unworthy practices such as have not the generosity of Vice have not a noble manly wickedness are poltron sins have made it raise a cry on the Faithfullest party the best Cause and the purest Church in the World While we have debauched Gods own best Attribute made his goodness procure for our most wicked or self-ends and the face of things is so vicious in every order and degree and sex that But the Confession is onely fit for Litanies and we have need to make the burthen of ours be Lord give us some afflictions again send out thy Indignation for we do fear thy goodness it hath almost undone us and truly where it does not better it is the most fearful of Gods Attributes or Plagues for it does harden there St. Paul says so in the forecited place and Origen does prove this very thing did harden Pharaohs heart indulgence was his induration Now induration is the being put into Hell upon the Earth There is the same impenitence in both and judgment is pronounced already on the hardned and the life they lead is but the interval betwixt the Sentence and the Execution and all their sunshine of Prosperity is but kindled Brimstone onely without the stench And then to make the treasures of Gods bounty be treasures of wrath to us to make his kindness his long-suffering that is St. Peter says salvation condemn us his very goodness be Hell to us But sure so great a goodness as this we have tasted cannot have such deadly issues and it was great indeed so perfectly miraculous in such strange and continued successes resisting our contrivances and our sins too overcoming all opposition of our vices and our own policies that do not comport with it and in despight of all still doing us good it was fatality of goodness Now sure that which is so victorious will not be worsted by us But Oh! have we not reason so much more to fear the goodness The greater and more undeserved it is the more suspicious it is As if it were the last blaze of the Candle of the Lord when its light gasps its flash of shine before it do go out the dying struggles and extream efforts of goodness to see if at the last any thing can be wrought by it And if we did consider how some men manage the present goodness make use of this time of it and take and catch we would believe they did fear the departure of it But yet it is in our power to fix it here If we repent Gods gifts then are without repentance but one of us must change Bring Piety and Vertue into countenance and fashion and God will dwell among us Nay St. Paul says Goodness to thee if thou continue in his goodness If we our selves do not forsake it and renounce it not fear it so as to flie from it but with the fears of sinking men that catch and grasp lay fast dead hold upon it if as God promises he so put his fear in our hearts that we never depart from it fear that hath love in it and is as unitive as that then it shall never depart from us but we shall see the goodness of the Lord in the Land of the Living and shall be taken thence to the eternal fulness of it This day shall be the Birth-day of Immortal Life the entring on a Kingdom that cannot be moved A Crown thus beautified is a Crown of Glory here and shall add weight and splendor to the Crown hereafter A Church thus furnished is a Church Triumphant in this World and such a Government is the Kingdom of Heaven upon Earth and then we shall all reign with him who is the King of Kings and who washed us in his Blood to make us Kings and Priests to God and his Father To whom be glory and dominion for ever Amen SERMON XVIII AT CHRIST'S-CHURCH IN OXFORD ON St STEVEN's Day MATH V. 44. But I say unto you love your Enemies bless them that curse you do good to them that hate you and pray for them that despitefully use you and persecute you I Need no Artifice to tie this Subject and this Day together The Saint whose memory we celebrate was the Martyr of this Text And 't is impossible to keep the Feast but by a resolution of obeying these Commands you being call'd together on this day to beseech God to grant that you by the Example of this first Martyr St. Stephen who pray'd for his Murderers may learn to love your Enemies and pray for them that despitefully use you and persecute you A strange command in an Age in which we scarcely can find men that love their Friends nor any thing but that which serves their interests or pleasures that indeed love nothing but themselves nor is it onely injury that works their hate and enmity but difference in opinion divides hearts and men are never to be reconcil'd that have not the same mind in every thing as if one Heaven should not hold them that have not one judgment in all things we see that one Church cannot hold them and they that have but one same God one Redeemer and Saviour one Holy Spirit of Suplication cannot agree yet in one Prayer to him though they have but one same thing to pray for to him will not meet in their Worship because they do not in some Sentiments and 't is no wonder all Christ's reasonings and upbraidings all the Advantages he does propose to them that love the shames he casts on them