is not that which delights the Lord or profits us yea if there be no heart no soule in it it is a shining sinne it is abominable as if we blest an Idoll as if a Jew had offered swines bloud The sacrifice of the wicked is an abomination to the Lord Pro. 21.27 But a cup of cold water saith our Saviour and the least sparke of zeale out of a true heart though mixt with much infirmity yet goeth not away unregarded this when the widow good soule came in with her mite the Lord calls his disciples to see as in admiration of her bounty and David here upon Nathans rebuke a contrite sinner presents the Lord with his offering even such he had a broken heart and goeth away well perswaded or satisfied concerning Gods acceptance O God thou wilt not despise You may see there is a double use of that I am to say First Preparatory like the Lords Epistle to the Church of Laodicea that the luke-warme indifferent Christian who sayes he is rich and needs nothing may see he is poore indeed and so become poore in spirit Secondly Principall like the other Epistle of comfort to the Church of Smyrna a Church of a broken heart we see and much humbled but very rich therefore according to the grace of Gods acceptation Now two things were of great regard in the legall sacrifices or oblations the subject and the manner a lambe or a dove there is the thing and both without blemish not the refuse not the reversion there is the quality The burden of the word of the Lord came downe against Iudah because the table was come into contempt and if you offer the blinde saith he for sacrifice is it not evill and if you offer the lame and sicke is it not evill carry these to your Prince and can he be pleased with you and can he accept your persons saith the Lord of hosts Malac. 1. The greatest man alive let him come to the Table of the Lord to receive of his visible and invisible word with an unwasht irreverent and dead heart and the very Sacrament and word he taketh are his judgements for not discerning and because of his contempt wherefore King David offereth like himselfe that is according to Gods owne heart First for the materialls his heart Secondly for the forme and qualification his heart broken and contrite That very Caruncula that little flesh or part of the body the heart some from the triangular figure of that observe a seat and receptacle not of the round world but of the blessed Trinity yea and some gather this same doctrine from the letters of the word Cor. But the heart it meaneth more spiritually and first the understanding in which Saint Paul saith Cor excaecatum a blinded heart Rom. 1. And David sayes The foole hath said in his heart in corde suo that is in his unhallowed unbroken understanding Secondly the heart is the conscience so Davids heart smote him Thirdly it is the desiring part of the soule Quid est cor tuum nisi voluntas tua saith Saint Bernard Love the Lord with all thy heart and out of the abundance of the heart c. Vbi thesaurus ibi cor our affections our wills live with our treasure Vbi ancant non ubi animant Fourthly the heart is the complete soule quite through With the heart we beleeve Rom. 1. with the act of the understanding conceiving and with the armes of the will and affiance consenting 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Acts 15. God which searcheth the heart that is the thoughts the conscience the affections the whole depth of the soule a thing which neither the sight of man can reach nor the law of man can censure This is the subject of Davids sacrifice the matter but without forme and void as it was in the beginning the manner or information the due trimming to the Lords Altar followes in these words Broken and conâ—rite and to take them and apply them to the subject in order First the understanding yea Nathan uses this method with David by the parable of the Ewe lambe 2 Sam. 12. First of all he convinces the judgement breaketh that maketh David plyable to understand himselfe for the judgement unbroken approves of sinne thus David makes no matter of numbring the people so did pride hood-winke reason upon his confession he confesses he did very foolishly or without any true understanding S. Paul so understood as if he did well to persecute the saith of Christ but upon his repentance his judgement altered I did it ignorantly saith he and I am the least of the Apostles not worthy to be so called yea an abortive or one borne out of time because I did persecute the Church of God Surely the reason why wee so rarely repent in truth is because we allow sinne in our judgement our minde dislikes it not and we have no apprehension of the danger of it that it is so deadly and therefore we refuse the Physicke of contrition because we conceive that as a thing more than needs we consider not that God is as well just as mercifull and cannot possibly be served without repentance and therefore this holy informing it deales first at the understanding as in the case of comfort namely against the feares of death faith cheeres up the heart by meditation or minding it of the blessed promises that the judgement rectified and made to understand death inwardly as it is without the larvae the shapes it appeareth in to ignorants and Infidels we may be so resolved and setled and not to be amazed for death even so in the case of renovation the Lord alters and breaks the imaginations of the heart first of all layeth open to our eye the heinousnesse of our sinfull estate in generall and then commeth home to us that we relent in particular Yea contrition giveth the minde the understanding a right reflection that it sees it selfe rightly without the vaile and scales of superficiall proud blinde Science The contrite heart feeleth how heavy the wings of depraved reason are and how it hovers like Noahs Raven Super profundum sine fundo and like the earth receives the light onely in superficie in the surface of it and in things divine how it builds rather upon negation to know what the truth is not than what it is how uncapable yea averse it is since the fall from the right scanning of truth that the very Philosophers the best or wisest heathen 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Apostle speaketh They became vaine in their imaginations of God Rom. 1. and indeed the naturall man judgeth of divine truths but according to his owne senses receives no more in religion than he can shew reason for not reason of the word or divine authority but reason of nature or demonstration So the things of God which are spiritually discerned or with a contrite eye carry a kinde of contrariety to him and the undoubted knowledge or perswasion of Gods
God it is a certaine secret feeling or knowledge of our deeds which leaveth behinde it or imprints the motions of joy or sorrow hope or feare confidence or shame it is an inward key which unlocketh and openeth the doores and barres of our hearts that the grieved spirit commeth forth like good Lot out of the house of sinne and sayes to the man of Sodome O deale not so wickedly Now as the great Turke permits every one to live in his owne religion so they pay him in his tribute so the conscience hardned or seared permits the appetites to their pleasure so it may partake it neglects the soule to please the sense it prevaricates and willfully suppresses the true verdict or testimonie and is idle and doth not its office but luls us asleepe in our sinne and layes the raines on the necks of our wilde and untamed lusts Cor dilatatum a spacious loose heart a Chiverell conscience and indeed when the minde is in meere darknesse as in the state of unregeneration or when it is overflowed or dimmed with the dampe of some temptation or wasting sinne as it may befall the godly no marvell then if this particular knowledge bee darkenesse too and our inward thoughts cease from their accusing for a season for the soule it hath not now an actuall or exercised sense and light 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Apostle speaketh to discerne the proportions of good and evill being possessed with a spirit of slumber in any measure so farre it is no rightfull Judge no more than the blinde man is of colours 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a conscience without science a heart like Nabals benum'd and senslesse And the manner or growth of it is thus Originall sinne sends out actuall and they leave a straine a disposition to sinne so againe and sinning so againe slight impressions of evill become radicate and habituall till the callum the crust deadnesse or security in sinne comes over the soule the buds of infirmity steale to the twigs of negligence and they to the tyranny of custome and then audacious and grand sinnes plead prescription and like a stout tenant take no warning and this is nervus ferreus the iron sinew the heart of adamant When Camels grosse sinnes passe and digest without remorse and this our Church in her Letany deprecates most Christianly From hardnesse of heart and contempt of thy word and commandements good Lord deliver us Now the contrite conscience is the very contrary and that it may have its beginning thus as Ioab would not be moved to come to Absalom till his fields were set on fire so we oft-times we have no heart no perceiving of our estate towards God till affliction like fire ceaseth upon us till with Manasses our chaine or with Hezekiah our bed of sicknesse or with Mauritius death of wife and children rouze and startle us and wring forth a holy confession Iustus est Deus justa sunt judicia ejus For thus the good Shepherd oft-times sends after his sheepe poverty persecution sicknesse and the like to hurry them backe when they goe astray from him and the heart indeed the conscience is in a very ill case which ffliction cannot mollifie 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sayes the Apostle Heb. 5.8 the sonnes of God learne obedience by the things they suffer and for this wee may learne to take well the Lords castigations kisse the rod as often as it betides us Againe we must not thinke much to wait at the posts of Gods house continually to listen as David did to his word in the mouth of Nathan his word in the ministery of it God useth to blesse it and to put forth his spirit with it that with David our heart smiteth us we tremble with Foelix we melt with Iosiah we are pierced to the quicke like those thousands at S. Peters Sermon and we are rifled and convinced in our consciences like those in the 1 Cor. 14. Without the Law sin is dead Rom. 7. It is not acknowledged the word is Gladius Domini the sword of the Lord Heb. 4. It opens our sinnes to our eyes and Malleus Domini the Lords hammer to breake our stony heart Ierem. 23. Wherefore Moses and Aaron being called by the Lord in the wildernesse before the burning mount he commanded them his word and Law not to be supprest in secrecie but to be pitched up in the eye of all the world even that the presumptuous heart might looke on it as Christ did on Hierusalem with weeping eyes to see how short he comes of that hee should and that the dissembling heart might have his paintings and colours his faces of sanctitie thawed all by the fire of Gods justice The Word of the Lord is spirit and life a sacred perspective it is wee may behold in it our sins of thought desire and deed and thereupon see how the host of heaven with chariots of fire march in array ready prest to charge the curse of God how ready it is to light on us A sight for which Davids heart becommeth so intenerate that hee a King commits a Psalme to bee sung here in the Church wherein his owne capitall sins should be blazed to all posteritie by his owne confession a sight for which S. Austen needs would that this verie Psalme should bee set over his bed night and day that with teares hee might read over his transgressions a roll wherof he hath left in his owne Confessions which is admirable to the Reader And Conscience indeed is a sleeping Lion it will awaken in the evill houre we shall finde it our owne heart then seeks occasions against us as Iob speakes and let not him thinke who hath not yet the sting of his sinne that he hath not offended it watches the conscience till the time of most advantage but the Lord by this conscience of sinne awakens those to life that are his by this sensiblenesse or accusing of the heart he doth much in our calling to grace and in our continuing in it for the contrite or wounded conscience dealeth not with our evill motions as Darius did with Alexander suffer them to passe or come over the heart as he did the Hellespont till they beare all before them but like Pharaoh that killed the infants of Israel lest they should overgrow his Countrey So the truly broken and tender heart growes daily verie conscientious of everie the least sin and taketh care therefore of the serpents in the shell Allidere parvulos ad petram to crush the verie occasions of sin and with S. Paul it shaketh of the vipers from the fingers ends at the first motion of evill lest suggestion beget delight and that multiply from action into custome like the fish that swim downe the streames of Jordan in mare mortuum into the dead sea Yea and in the midst of all our prosperities pleasures it is the qualitie of a contrite conscience ever and anon to send us downe an holy feare as it
gospell is not to be had in the worldly wise who doe not who will not so farre renounce their conceited knowledge and subdue their imaginations as farre as they exalt themselves against the word or have repugnance to Gods knowledge Now in the works of repentance or contrition when the Lord puts a holy light into the heart this eye of the soule he makes it simple and submisse The Law of the Lord is pure making wise the simple Psal 19. So that reason it comes to conclude with Iewell the peerelesse Bishop Gratias ago Deo quod ignorantiam meam non ignoro God I thanke thee that I am not ignorant of my ignorance But faith when it winnes upon us first it finds reason sitting like Iezabel painting her face dressing her head and looking out at the window till contrition which like the Baptist ushers the way of the Lord calleth to our thoughts and sayes with Iehu throw her downe and if they yeeld not but advance themselves against God too it sayes of them also as Edom said of Israel Downe with them downe with them even to the ground Contrition it breaketh the understanding maketh it teachable and glad of Gods wayes as they that were stung with the fiery serpents were glad to looke to the brazen serpent so the broken soule with earnest expectation erecto capite waiteth for the manifestation of Christ and his grace Omne humidum facilè alieno termino But take a man when the sunne of much prosperity and the like temptations exhale and draw out this holy moisture of contrition and the Lord of life the Sonne of God though he then approve himselfe ne're so much before him by word and works yet like the Scribes and Pharisees seeing hee will not perceive and learning he will not understand let the Lord sing of mercy and he needs it not or of judgement and he feareth it not I referre you to Saint Austen the third booke of his Confess the fifth chapter yea let common experience speake if many an impenitent heart preacheth not talketh not disputeth not subtilly of the doctrines of God and hath no right knowledge of them nor acknowledging but is even made up and mixt of doubtings unbeleefe and errour and Where is the disputer of this world saith the Apostle 1 Cor. 1. Contrariwise as Abraham went to offer his onely sonne upon the mount of Moriah and never once advised with naturall reason he left his servants at the foot of the hill lest by their clamours and disswasions he might be disturbed in his sacrifice so the contrite broken heart the mind thus qualified of God obeyeth the call of God subdueth it selfe and becommeth a slave to his word Da quod jubes jube quod vis Gods commands are not grievous to him but he is ready wheresoever he sees thus saith the Lord to intrust himselfe to the word Say unto his soule that man was by the breath of the Lord and the world was by his word at the beginning he stands not with Galen to censure Moses for want of demonstration say unto him that God Almighty was incarnate and the mother a Virgin delivered of her Maker he learnes not to dispute where the Cherubins are said to vaile but saith with the Centurion Domine dic verbum sanabitur servus tuus the contrite understanding taketh the Lord at his word though hee seeth not his owne reason for it he followes the word of God in all formes Vt aqua sequitur sulcantem digitum And as one said having read the writings of Heraclitus the things I know and the things I know not omnia fortia generosa so he of Gods Scriptures they be celestiall and good all and what he cannot fadome he adoreth and saith O the depths of Gods counsells in summe he hath all divinity in praeparatione animi in a readinesse to submit to the word as it shall bee revealed to him and ever saith Now faith arise and sleeping hope awake awake my glory and though reason would comprehend nothing beleeveth all Agrippina the mother of Nero said o ccidar modo imperet but the faith of the contrite minde saith imperabo modò occidat I will trust the Lord though he kill me with Abraham against hope hee beleeves in hope and offers himselfe in sacrifice to the Lord by an holy violence upon his carnall reasonings he seeketh to bring every thought in captivity to the obedience of Christ and he reckoneth of all science how subtil soever but as drosse compared to the excellencie of the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ our Saviour yea that sweet and pretious name with Ignatius the martyr he hath such a dear impression of it that it seemeth riveted and graven In tabulis cordis in the tables of his heart or understanding for now hee sees well and sayes with Themistocles periissem nisi periissem I had utterly perished if with the prodigall by remorse and contrition I had not beene rein'd in to see my foule mistakings and so to seeke and returne to God my mercifull father in Christ Jesus And lastly this contrite understanding is the onely Irenaeus he delights in peace and therefore goeth on warily and timorously and feareth to frame out articles of faith from the mould of his reason much lesse to frame out oppositions against manifest truths of Scripture or to thrust out publike positions from any private dispositions ludere cum Deo yea hee dares not let himselfe bee deceived with any hate or evill opinion of good wheresoever it is professed lest he commeth in the end to deceive himselfe with a delight or good opinion of evill In summe he minds and is taken up most of all how or by what meanes he may confound the devill rather than how to confute his gainesayers and bewaile the time that ever the simplicity of beleeving should lose it selfe in the Labyrinths of beleefe and that the word should be tam ferax religionum so fruitfull of opinions and so barren of piety as Lipsius once spake and this is to be transformed by the renewing of the minde as the Apostle speaketh this is contrition in spiritu mentis in the spirit of our minde in the understanding The second seat of contrition is the Conscience the nimming away of the skirts of Sauls garment and a rash wish for the waters of Bethlem if these smote David to the heart his conscience if it was of so tender a touch surely his presumptuous fact in numbring the people and this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 especially this scarlet or double-dyed sinne of which the Prophet Nathan rebukt him the conscience of this heinous sinne melts him away like water as wee see in this Psalme a Psalme we may all take up as Gregorie Nazianzene did the Lamentations of Ieremie to make us weepe for our sins and transgressions But conscience is a part of the practicke understanding as Gods Deputy sitting within to judge to see and censure us together with