imputed because there was yet no law whereby shee was subjected to her husband was that shee gave not firme credit to the word of her husband delivering the commandement of God but that shee suffered her selfe to bee withdrawne by the craft of the devill speaking in the serpent but that his sinne was in this that hee did unaduisedly eat that which the woman gave him not minding what it was as he pleads for himselfe before Him with whom he could not lye The woman gave me of the tree and I did eate And thus was there mercy reserved for man both in regard of that weake estate wherein hee was created in comparison of the Angels and in respect of the quality and measure of his sinne and of the meanes whereby he was drawne thereto whereas the Angels that kept not their first estate but wilfully sinned against God for their three sinnes and for foure could never finde any place of repentance But it is said Iob. 31.33 If I have covered my sinne as Adam By which it seemes his sinne was more than he confessed I answer The word Adam there used and so the word Enoch in divers places of Scripture doe signifie man in his sinnefull and wretched estate indefinitely as Psal 8.4 144.3 Iehovah what is Adam that thou knowest him the Sonne of Enoch that thou makest any account of him And therefore divers good translations reade that text of Iob If I have covered my sinne as Man who doth commonly excuse his sinne and lessen his offence But of what sort soever the sin of man was it is most certaine that he did sinne 1. For as the effect is manifest by the cause so the cause appeares by the effect Now death is the wages of sinne Rom. 6.23 so then sinne is the cause of that punishment And every punishment is for some offence But it is manifest that Adam was punished even unto death it selfe For otherwise hee had lived untill now and hereafter Therefore it is manifest Adam sinned 2. It is proved before that all the creature was good and upright in every kinde and that man was the prime and chiefe of all the visible creature and therefore that hee was created for the most excellent end which is to bee happy in Him who is the chiefest good of which happinesse hee could not have fayled if he had continued in the state of his creation For every thing ordained for an end by a cause that is powerfull thereto must bee furnished with meanes sufficient for the attainement of that end But it is manifest that Adam hath failed of that happinesse by the utter losse of life and present being Therefore hee continued hee continued not in the state of his creation but sinned against his Creator 3. Death is the punishment of some great offence in the reasonable creature who is able to make a difference betweene good ill But it is manifest that Adam was not created sinfull and therefore not subjâ—ct to death And againe it is manifest that that state of Adâ—m was changed because he is dead But that change was not made by God because it was contrary to his ordinance neither could it bee made by enforcement of any outward meanes For then Adam had not beene made sinfull thereby Therefore it was made by the willing act of Adam himselfe and hee thereby subjected to Sinne. 4. Nothing can be so inseparably in the whole off-spring which is not first in the originall as the fruit cannot be wholly poysonous if the root or stem bee not first infected But it is learned by lamentable experience that the whole masse of mankinde is wholly sinfull and corrupted and that no man can say his heart is cleane therefore it must needs bee that the root or originall from whence they are descended which wee have already proved to have beene one wis sinnefull and corrupt 5. Man with much care and government in his youth with much heed and warinesse in his owne carriage is hardly at last brought unto a course of a vertuous life and that not without many wicked desires and sinfull deedes But if the first man had not corrupted his nature all vertue and that alone had been naturall to all men But experience shewes the contrary Therefore Adam sinned and therby corrupted his whole nature But you will say If that sinne of Adam were onely a sinne of ignorance and that in so small a thing as the eating of an apple the punishment of death and that both of body and soule can no way seeme to be proportionable For shall not the judge of all the world doe right And if the least sinne deserve the greatest punishment what punishment can be left for the greatest sinne or shall wee say as the Stoiâ—ks taught that all sinnes are equall I answer That sinnes compared one with another are truly said to be lesser or greater one than another For it is a lesse sinne to thinke ill of a man undeservedly than to hate him And that than to maime him and that than to murder him and that than to defame him For most of these degrees hold in them all those sinnes that are under it So that as the Stoickes truely said every later exceeds by the multitude of sinnes that are therein Yet is there no sinne in it selfe how little soever it seeme but in the rigor of Gods Iustice deserves more punishment than al that which the sinner can beare because of his greatnesse who is dishonoured thereby For the greater any person is the greater is the offence whereby he is dishonoured As for a word of scorne spoken by a meane man against his equall a small acknowledgment may make amends for which offence against a Peere a Scandalum Magnatum may be brought and if it had beene spoken to the dishonour of the king it might iustly bee accounted high treason in the speaker How great then may wee hold that offence to be which is against the Majesty of God before whom all the nations of the earth are not so much as the drop from a bucket falling into a mighty river Es. c. 40.15.2 Moreover every commandement of his being a rule of infinite Iustice an infinite Iustice is offended by the breach therof And what satisfaction can a finite creature make to an infinite Iustice that is offended but because it cannot beare a punishment intensivè infinite or infinite in quantity therefore it is iust that it should beare it extensivè in the infinity of Continuance Now as it was necessary that God should givâ— a law unto man that he might evermore acknowledge that duty and obedience which he ought to his Creator so having enabled him both in body and soule to performe his law which was also so easie a burthen as that it stood not in doing any thing but onely in the forbearance of one fruit among a million it was most necessary that God in His iustice should require that breach of His law Which law the
no purpose So His greatest and best worke had effected no good to us but a perpetuall ill unto Himselfe But all these things were impossible Therefore Christ our Lord did rise againe 4. It is impossible but that where the greatest union is there should be the greatest love and consent The greatest union that may be is in our Mediator seeing the humane nature is sustained in the Person of the Deity But the soule of Christ being separate did naturally desire to bee united to the body for otherwayes should it not have desired the perfection of it selfe that is to give life and sence and to be one with that body which was peculiar to it selfe as the desire of all humane soules is and therefore depart so unwillingly from the body But if this were the naturall desire of the soule no way sinfull the Deity infinite in power and in regard of the unity consenting thereto it must follow of necessity that our Lord was raised againe from the dead 5. Contrary causes must have contrary effects The devill by the sinne which he wrought in Adam had caused death to prevaile over life in all mankind Therefore Christ who came to destroy the workes of the deuill must cause life to prevaile over death But this could not be done in the members before it was perfected in the head Therefore Christ being dead must of necessity bee the first fruits of them that are raised from the dead And if it were necessary that Christ should first rise Ergo it was impossible that He should not rise See Log. chap. 26.11.1 6. If Christ our Lord had not beene raised from death a then had it beene impossible that any of His beleevers should bee raised againe by the power and merit of His resurrection 1. And so the naturall desire of the soule to dwell with the body should be created in vaine 2. So the debt being paid the prisoner should ever be detained 3. So the afflictions of the Saints which they have suffered in body should be in vaine as cold hunger nakednesse reproach and shame imprisonment stripes yea and death it selfe willingly sustained for the love of God should be without reward But it were against the justice of God to cause the body and soule to suffer together and not to glorifie them both together 4. So also the death of Christ should not be meritorious and effectuall for the procuring of all that good which might and ought to come thereby both to Himselfe and all His beleevers For although the soules of the faithfull for the merit and full satisfactions sake of His death being separate might enjoy an eternall though not a full happinesse without the body yet the body should be left eternally to the power of death and so the workes of the devill should not be destroyed by Christ 5. So also the body should be created in vaine if to sorrow onely without the hope of happinesse 6. So God should lose His right in His creature if Hee were not Lord both of the living and of the dead both of the soule and of the body 7. So the one sinne and disobedience of Adam should be more powerfull to condemne mankind then the everlasting and most perfect obedience of the Sonne of God should be to save it But all these things are impossible And therefore Saint Paul saith Rom. 4.25 That Christ was delivered to death for our sinne and raised againe for our Iustification For if Christ be not raised againe then are we yet in our sinnes 1. Cor. 15.17 not that any addition was made by His resurrection to that satisfaction which He made by His death but because the resurrection of Christ is a sure and manifest proofe of His conquest over sinne death hell and all the power of the devill and that His suffering and death was a full and sufficient sacrifice whereby the wrath of God against sinne was fully satisfied so that we are now justified in His sight whereas if in the conflict of our Redeemer with death and hell He had been overcome then could we have had no faith nor hope that our sinne by His death had beene done away But now knowing that He hath overcome death and is returned to life againe in all the troubles and sorrowes of this life and in the agonies of death wee may be secure as the feet or toes that are lowest under the water may hope at last to come to land because they know that their head being above the water the body cannot be drowned 7. Now concerning that impossibility of Saint Peter it stands thus It is impossible that the Scripture being the declaration of Gods trueth made by Himselfe 2. Pet. 1.21 2. Tim. 3.16 should faile But it hath beene declared by the Scripture that Christ should be raised againe from the dead Therefore it was impossible that He should still be held under the power of death The text cited by Saint Peter is found Psal 16.10 to which you may adde the types of the old Testament whereby the death and resurrection of our Lord was signified as that of Noah Gen. 9. ver 20. c. When our Saviour being as it were drunken with the love of His Church and desire of mans salvation tooke our state upon Him and for us became subject to the death of the Crosse when being seene by the Iewes those Chumits in the nakednesse or infirmity of our estate He was set at nought by them that thought that their Messiah could not die Iohn 14.34 But when Noah our Rest and Comforter awaked out of His grave He brought on them that destruction which was foretold as the punishment of their hardnesse of heart and unbeliefe See Psalm 41.10 Dan. 9.26 So the Ram taken by his hornes in the bush Gen. 22. was the type of His death and Isaac taken alive from the Altar the figure of His resurrection Ioseph also taken out of the dungeon to be ruler over all the land of Egypt To the same purpose was the law of the two goates Levit. 6. the one slaine for a sinne offering the other sent alive into a land of separation to make an atonement for all iniquity transgressions and sinne of the people So by the two Sparrowes Levit. 14. He that was like to the solitary sparrow on the house top Psalm 102.7 shed His blood for the cleansing of our leprosie yet by the other that was sent alive into the open ayre His resurrection was figured Sampson the Nazarite asleepe in Gaza signified our Lord in the sleepe of death for the love of His Church yet waking and having opened the gates of death He carryed them away and ascended in triumph to the top of the mount Iudg. 16.3 And because the strong gates of death are carryed away we are assured that all they that sleepe in the dust of death shall rise to give an account of their workes Beside these types you have also the prophecies of the old Testament as Psalm
too much charity been blamed so long who art said though unjustly see the defence of Pamphilus for Oâ—igen and Ioh. Picus Mirandula de Salute Origenis to have taught that all sinners yea even the devill himselfe shall be saved at the last now thou art justified Sinne is not being it hath no cause of being but comes in by chance beside the good intent of the worker he answeres more directly elsewhere as you shall heare by and by It is strange that this Doctor who sticks every where so close to Aristotle should here depart so farre from him as to make privation in the number of things not being whereas Aristotle rancks it in the order of beginnings with matier and forme In the meane while understand things not being are either utterly not being or not being such In the first kinde you may account the second terme of contradiction Sâ—e Log. Chap. 9. nu 15 16. as not a stone not wise By the affirming of which no being at all is put to the subject as to say Thomas is not a stone The not being such which they call Non ens tale may hold all those termes which we call privative But privation may meane at large either the absence onely of any forme not due to the subject and thus it is in the number of things simply not being for seeing the presence of one forme shuts out all other formes unfit for that subject although all matier in the root of nature be subject indifferently to all formes successively the privation of other formes follow thereon necessâ—rily As the forme of iron in the matier of iron is a privation of the matter of gold so a horse naturally covered with haire is thereby deprived of a covering of feathers like a bird But this privation is not in the number of things that are ill seeing it is the law of nature that every thing be upright in that proper kinde in which it is Secondly privation may signifie the taking away of that forme which was in the subject as blindnesse in the eye which as it may be said to be not being in respect of the taking away of the sight yet in respect of the causes whence it may proceed it is in the number of things being yet ill in both respects that is of the want of that which ought to be in nature and the cause being such as ought not to be and so of all other sicknesses Thirdly privation may be in a subject in respect of the forme to which it hath not yet attained as Tartar or dreggs in the wine by the spirit of salt may be hardned into a hard stone and so the dispositions to other diseases before they shew themselves And this privation or want of forme is in the number of causes as drought is in a thirstie man to make him drinke Now sinne must be one or both of these two last orders of privation and not in any order of things not being absolutely for so first it should not be ill for that which is not at all is neither good nor ill Secondly it would bring upon God the greatest injustice that might be to punish the creature for sinne if sinne were utterly not being And thirdly if sinne were not being then our Lord should have died without cause but it is plaine that sinne was the cause of his death that thereby he might destroy death and the power of the devill over vs to which we were subject because of sinne but that which is utterly not being cannot be a cause Fourthly if sinne bee not being where is then the way which God doth weigh out to his anger Psal 78.50 when he doth balance the punishment with the sinne Are all the punishments of sinne all the sorrowes of this life and death at last both bodily and eternall nothing for if they be any thing they cannot be an answerable punishment to that which is nothing So many commandements of God so many threatnings by his Prophets and Apostles so many woes denounced by our Lord so many sacrifices and clensings from all the temporary punishments and at last the death of the Sonne of God himselfe for the eternall remission of sinnes and is sinne not being How much more true is it to say that our righteousnesse as farre forth as it is of our selves is nothing and to confesse with the Prophet that it is like a soiled ragge as S. Paul knew that in himselfe as a naturall man dwelt nothing that was good that hee had not power no not to thinke a good thought as our Saviour hath taught us that without him we can doe nothing And he that hath had experience of the combat that hath so often been foyled in the bickering must needs confesse the strength of sin and cry out O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from this body of death I say not as some hereticks heretofore that sinne is a substance either materiall or formall or as the author of that booke which is intituled Ratio Rationum that it came into mankinde by that poysonous slaver which the Serpent put upon that apple which hee reached unto Eve but yet I say that sinne is something but the worst of beings It is that pestilentiall contagion wherewith the devill hath infected the masse of all mankind it is that sicknesse of the whole man of which he languisheth unto death but principally the sicknesse of the soule whereto neverthelesse the body is also subject in fulfilling the unorderly lusts both of it selfe and of the minde for one of these works upon another both for good and bad Therefore to answer how God doth will that which is ill it is not nor can be denyed but that Gods punishments of all sorts being weighed with the sinne are just so one sinne as it is the punishment of another may stand with justice and both sinnes together in justice may bee punished When David was in plenty and ease at Ierusalem and had forgotten him that had delivered him out of all his troubles O treason of prosperity his eies wandered in the beauty of Bathsheba and led his heart to lust so sin conceived brought forth adultery that murder thus one siâ—â—e was the punishment of another which were altogether at last punished to every degree in the treason and death of his sonne Absalom So if you compare the sinnes and degrees thereof in the Aegyptians you shall finde one sinne the punishment of another and all together at last balanced in their plagues so that it is most truely observed by the Wise Sap. 11.13 that wherein a man sinneth thereby he shall be punished Now it is a cleere case that all the sinne of mankinde proceeds from the corruption of his owne nature after which wee are most justly suffered to wander because that knowing both the rottenesse of our owne hearts and the punishment due to sinne yet we doe not strive and and fight against our selves to subdue those wicked
thoughts from whence is the streame of all our sinne Heere you will question what strength wee have to fight and universall grace and free will but they are beside this present purpose whereby it is cleere that all our sins being but issues of our owne corruption against which we strive not it is just with God both to punish our carelesnesse and neglect of his commandement and our owne safety with sinne and to leave us in that corruption to be guided by him whom we chuse to serve having forsaken our true Lord and owner But because this corruption is from our birth and that we made not our selves such but that by the fault of Adam sinne and death reigne over all the summe of the question is knit up in that one sinne of our first father concerning whose fall wee are brought to this point If God so foresaw the fall of Adam that he will'd it it was impossible but that he should fall if he will'd it not it was impossible that he should To which doubt Thomas Aquinas in lib 1. Sen. Dist 46. q. 4. answeres wittily and modestly that although the proposition be true and necessary yet it is not necessary that the will should be carried to either side of the contradiction His reason as I thinke is because truth is not the object of the will but of the understanding onely and therefore he saith that God doth permit ill onely not because it is ill but because of the annexes or dependances thereon either precedent as because it is good that the creature should have the power whereby it may be enabled to doe ill or not to doe ill or consequent which is that good that is occasioned by the ill I reverence the judgement but yet Doctor the question is here concerning good and ill the proper object of the will and as the understanding cannot avoid it but must consent to a truth which it knowes so neither can the will in that which it takes to be good or ill but that it must chuse one and refuse the other For as the outward sences cannot refuse to be moved by their proper objects as the eare to heare a sound within a meet distance no more can the inward faculties of the minde Besides the question is here of the will of God an infinite will and convertible with an infinite understanding for in God there is not one being of his will and another being of his understanding as will appeare more large hereafter in the 8. and 9. Chap. Neither is the will of God as mans will which may sit still while his understanding workes but what he understands he wills it also to be or not to be as his promises are not yea and nay but in him all is yea and Amen Therefore to let passe those questions which are moved hereabout concerning the freedome of Adams will why God should forbid that to Adam wherein he saw that Adam would transgresse and so make his eating to be sinne for where no law is there is no sinne and such unnecessary questions I answer directly that it is utterly impossible but that God did foresee the fall of Adam the taint of all mankinde thereby all the sins and all the punishments wherunto any one particular person is lyable all the wandrings backslidings and wants which can be in the creature Neither will I blush to affirme with the Apostle Rom. 11.32 That God hath shut up all under sinne that hee might have mercy upon all But it followeth not hereupon that hee decreed our misery in Adam because he foresaw it yet such was his mercy that out of this great evill he wrought a greater good so that it may seeme by consequence we are rather gainers by Adams fall for though we lost by the sinne of Adam an inheritance of holinesse c. Yet that holinesse was like the morning dew that vanished at the heat of the first tentation it was a created holinesse it was in a low degree fit to his being in whom it was Is not the present inheritance of our holinesse more sure more excellent who are made partakers of his holinesse who is holinesse it selfe his knowledge was but of worldly things ours of eternall and though our naturall knowledge bee by Adams sinne corrupted or lost yet shall it at last be restored againe with endlesse advantage for the gift is not as the sinne Rom. 5.15 His life but a naturall life so that if Adam had not sinned he might have lived a naturall life till now and afterward free from sicknesse and want abounding in all the knowledge of nature and naturall blessings but that should have beene the end of his hope as farre as I can see though some there be that give us hopes of the same degrees of happinesse and glory which now we have although Adam had not sinned Yet because they see that that could not be brought to passe except God should take our nature that thereby we might be lifted up to that estate of glory they thinke that Christ our Lord should have come in the place of Henoch the seventh from Adam and that therfore Henoch was taken away in stead of Christ See Pastellus de Nativitate Mediatoris pag. 116. But wee are bound both by reason and authoritie of holy Writ to know and confesse that the first Adam was of the earth earthly and such should our happinesse have beene if we had continued in our created innocencie the second Adam is the Lord from heaven heavenly into whose image being renewed we are made partakers of his superexcellent and heavenly glorie The meanes whereby we come to this state of glory is also our assurance that it shall be fully accomplished God dwells in our flesh O unspeakeable mysterie he hath taken upon himselfe our sinnes O unspeakeable love he calls them his owne sinnes Psal 40.12 2. Cor. 5.21 He hath healed us with his stripes and is made unto us wisdome righteousnesse holinesse redemption life with an over-abounding waight of glory Is not the exchange well made with this advantage who would not lose himselfe that he might winne Christ with all his demerits who would not forfeit the life and happinesse of Adam in his innocencie that he might gaine the life and glorie of Christ in his eternitie And thus much briefly for the advantage Is it nothing to see the infinitie of the wisdome and goodnesse of God which out of the greatest ill could bring the greatest good The greatest ill on Adams part was his sinne which from him spread it selfe over all mankind to make it liable to eternall death on the devils part his malice and murder yea such a murder as could not be in the world beside in one man to murder the whole world of men Is it nothing I say that out of this great ill God could bring the greatest good that is our assured and everlasting righteousnesse and glorie is it nothing that he hath caught the wylie in his
more easie it was to bee kept so much the sorer punishment did Adam deserve for the breach thereof And thus did that murtherer of mankinde by the sinne of our first Parents set open a doore for the Iustice of God to breake out upon them being now liable to eternall punishment yet did they not hereby bring on their owne punishment alone inasmuch as all their children are made lyable with them to the same condemnation § 2. It may seeme a needlesse question to aske how long Adam stood in his innocency but because opinions have beene about the time of his fall wherein they have differed from the first day of his Creation to three yeers and an halfe betweene which others have thought a weeke some tenne dayes or seventeene at most others halfe a yeare Lidg de Emend temp Omitting conjectures it will not be unfit to examine it by reason and Scripture which hath not left us without a guide and instruction in any doubt that may be moved therein The Hebrewes compare Adam to an oxe that had horns and no hoofs by which they meant he had no strength at all to walk in the commandements of God but assoone as he was created he pushed rebelliously against his ordinance The ordinances of God over and aboue the preheminences which He gave him in his creation were three Marriage for the due propagation of mans naturall life Gen. 2.24 the law of the tree of knowledge the figure of the life of grace ch 2.17 and the Sabbath the assurance of the life of glory For it were a witlesse thing to think that God sanctified that day for his owne use but for man to meditate in the workes of God and for remembrance of his hopes to come Adams transgression was against the second but it will appeare by the circumstances of the other two when that transgression was committed Adam was created a perfect man in the prime and chiefe of his strength and accordingly received that blessing to bring forth fruit and multiply Now if Adam according to that blessing had in his innocency endeavoured the propagation of mankind it cannot be supposed that God who had immediately before given him that blessing to multiply would immediately have taken it away againe And that act of Adam not being in vaine that first sonne of Adam must have bin holy and without the taint of originall sinne although the parents had sinned afterward before it was borne For that staine of originall sinne comes from the conception Psal 51.5 not by the birth But no such holy seed of Adam is mentioned nor none such could bee For the Lord looked downe from heaven upon the sonnes of Adam and they were altogether become filthy Psal 14.3 Now if Adam were created such as hee was aske any lusty young man how many nights hee would allow to his beloved and most beautifull Bride in her virginity and give so many to Adam before hee sinned So then it may seeme that wee may take that Storie of the Scripture concerning Adam thus Adam being made in the morning that God might give him experience of the excellencie of that estate wherein he was created brought the Beastes and Birds before him and gave him the Lordship over them all which that hee might exercise as he ought hee gave him perfect understanding of their nature and power of words whereby to expresse their nature and to command them For as Adam named every thing so was the name thereof But that man might know that hee was for a more noble end than to live among beasts Hee tooke him and put him in the Garden of delight furnished with fruits for every season and gave him power to eate of all excepting the forbidden tree At noone that heavie sleepe fell on him in which the woman was made out of his side Hee awaking the marriage was solemnized and the woman by her husband diligently warned to forbeare to eate or to touch the forbidden fruit But while she wandred from her Husband to chuse fruit to her liking for it is manifest that her Husband was not with her when shee was deceived 1 Tim. 2.14 shee was encountred by the devill possessing the Serpent and drawn into sinne and this about the ninth hower or three of the clocke in the afternoone as all the sacrifices of the Law and that sacrifice for sinne whereby the workes of the devill were destroyed doe sufficiently witnes Matth. 27.46 50. Thus man being in honor 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 bal yalin could not continue a night but by his sinne became subiect to death as the beasts that perish Psal 49.12 The heresie of Pelagius was like a Serpent with many heads of which this was one that Adam was created mortall and though hee had not sinned yet should he have died not for the merit or punishment of his sinne but for the condition or state of his creation for being made of the elements which in everie elementall body may be separated and in their simple being are changed one into another it cannot be thought said hee that Adams state could be more continuall than that from whence hee had his beginning Besides having in his innocencie need of meate to restore the decay of his body his body cannot be supposed immortall but the answer is easie For that immortality depended on the soule which should not have parted from the body but should have ever been able to uphold the body without corruption sicknes or death And although any particular change had beene in the body yet should it not have beene in the whole no more than that corruption or change which is in the simple elements therefore Adam in his innocencie was immortall absolutely inasmuch as his immortall soule should never have forsaken his body but he was mortall onely on condition if he did sinne So mortalitie was the punishment of his sinne but that which is put upon a man as a punishment can no way belong unto him in the state of his innocencie But it is plaine that death was inflicted on him for his sinne for why should it be said to him In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt dye the death Gen. 2.17 if by the necessitie of his creation hee should have dyed though he had not eaten CHAP. XVII That by the sinne of Adam the whole race of mankinde is corrupted and made liable to everlasting death both of bodie and soule ANother error of Pelagius was that Adam by his sin did hurt himselfe alone but that his posteritie were no way tainted thereby with any originall sinne nor brought in danger of eternall death which as it is contrary to the autority of the holy Scripture so do they thereby put an absolute necessitie on the justice of God to admit those infants that never commited any actuall sin into eternall happines whereby as the mercie of God so also the death of Christ as far as he should be a Saviour to them is utterly in
vaine for what need they mercie or Mediatour who for their owne worthinesse must enter into everlasting life yet this poyson the Socinians of late have lick't up as a restorative which heresie with other of theirs you may reade in Wentsel a Budowees pag. 232. 233. But as Adam had received originall righteousnesse so by his sinne did he lose what he had received and that not for himselfe alone but also for his posteritie for hee being that common person in whom the whole race of mankinde was whatsoever gifts or graces God gave unto him hee gave them as a king to him and his for ever if hee as a faithfull liege-man should performe those services that were belonging to that state wherein he was infeoffed but if hâ—e performed not that service whereto hee was bound then must he also forfeit that estate for him and his for ever And because contraries are knowne each by other as a crooked line by a straight it may easilie appeare what that originall sinne is whereto all the sonnes of Adam were made lyable by his offence for if Adam were created in originall righteousnesse so that hee had power both to know and to doe that which was pleasing to God and a freedome of his will to continue or not to continue in that state and without any of those conditions he could not be perfect then must it needs follow that by that sin of his both he and his posterity are deprived both of that knowledge of the will of God of the knowedge of the creature also and of all abilitie to doe or will any thing as of our selves that maybe pleasing in his sight for as that originall righteousnesse had with it not onely an innocencie harmelesnesse or freedome from sinne but likewise a positive strength to doe that which was good so likewise that originall sinne brought with it a corruption of the understanding a frowardnesse of the will a heavinesse or unablenesse to all good and more than that a concupiscence or ill desire leading the minde captive unto sinne for contrarie causes must have contrarie effects so as God had created that first righteousnesse in the heart of man so when man did willingly forsake his service and of himselfe betooke himselfe to the service of his enemie the devill for to whomsoever a man doth yeeld himselfe to obey his servant he is to whom hee doth obey the devill not onely willingly entertained this new come guest whose service he so much longed for but also gave him his livery and infected his heart with contrarie conditions that he might never after be fit for the entertainment of his former Lord. For of contraries about the same subject one must of necessitie be therein as light or darkenesse in the ayer health or sicknesse in the bodie sight or blindnesse in the eye so that in stead of the former vertues wherby the Spirit of grace did guide mans heart to God he is now not only utterly disabled to doe that whereto his conscience tels him he is bound but also become a thrall of Satan to be guided and governed according to his will And this wretched and sinfull estate with the guiltinesse or obligation unto the punishment thereof which is the death both of bodie and soule is that originall sinne wherein every one of Adams children is conceived and borne and for which he is subject unto death for so was the sentence that in what day hee sinned he should die the death And though Adam instantly did not finde himselfe to die yet by the â—ust sentence of the Law and justice of God did he finde himselfe spiritually dead that is destitute of the grace of God and that strength which he had to doe his will and therefore subject to this necessitie that he must die at last and so in an estate contrarie to that in which he was created neither ought it to seeme strange or unjust that God should punish this sinne of Adam in his posteritie also for as it was personall in respect of himselfe to make himselfe liable to the wrath of God so his naturall gifts being lost and corrupted the contrarie qualities brought in in stead thereof became a naturall contagion to all his posteritie There is heere some little question whether this ignorance frowardnesse heavinesse and concupiscence before spoken of be the effects of originall sinne the wounds of nature as the schooles call them or the sinne it selfe But as their contraries were in originall justice as the parts or as the poperties or as the effects thereof so must these be in originall sinne to mee they seeme to bee that spirituall death that was threatned to Adam and so the present punishment of that sinne and in them that are not renewed to the life of grace the assurance of that further punishment that shall come upon the soule hereafter Let us not stay in needlesse questions but looke to the proofes of our conclusion for by the knowledge of originall righteousnesse it will appeare what these things are 1. Because nothing can bring forth naturally any other thing than such as it selfe is If Adam were in himselfe corrupted as hath beene shewed Chap. 16. hee could not beget any other children but such as were corrupted And forasmuch as all men in justice are accounted as one man in respect of the common nature whereof they are all partakers it is just with God to punish all men alike for their common corruption from which no man can say his heart is cleane for doth any man forbeare to kill an adder though he never yet stung any man or beast I thinke not but because the whole nature of adders is venimous therefore will he kill him 2. It cannot stand with the justice of God to punish any one with death who is not lyable to that punishment for some offence Now the sinne of those infants who from their birth are carried to their grave not being any actuall sinne to which any election or consent of the minde could come it is plaine that they are punished for their originall sin And concerning them that have lived to take an account of their owne wayes there needs no other proofe than the testimony of every mans conscience whether they finde not the law of sinne in themselves warring against themselves and leading them captive unto sinne contrarie to the law of their own minds This is that burthen under which the Saints doe groan so as that they hate themselves therfore and desire to be delivered from this bodie of death Rom. 7.18 c. And why of death because the wages of sinne wrought in the body is death Rom. 6.23 yet not of the body onely but of the soule also both in regard of this inbred contagion that bitter root and of that consent which it gives to sinne that I say nothing of them who through custome follow sinne with greedinesse 3. Every creature naturally continues in that estate and followes those things whereto
and Iustice was disesteemed therein Then in respect of the good of which man deprived himselfe by his sinne that was life eternall as the Father saith factus est dignus molo aterno qui in se perimit bonum quod poterat esse aeternum Thirdly in respect of the manly nature dispoyled of grace and glory which nature by the blessing which Adam had received was multipliable into infinite multitudes of men In all which respects that sinne after a sort may well be said infinite 2. But good is more powerfull and active than ill seeing ill neither is but in that which is good nor workes but in the power thereof Therfore if man by one ill deed were able to destroy himselfe much more by many good deeds shall he be able to make satisfaction Answer Ill is in every want or failing of that which is good but Good holds all perfections whether in being or in working Therefore man might easily corrupt himselfe but being corrupted hee cannot possibly repaire himselfe nor yet doe any thing that is good or acceptable Math. 7.18 12.33 3. But the satisfaction being now made are wee not restored unto as good an estate by the suffering of Christ as that which Adam lost so that if Adam for his obedience sake might have lived a naturall life eternally wee also for our workes sake may bee accounted worthy of everlasting blisse For if wee be restored by Christ and for his sake accepted our workes likewise are for his sake both accepted and rewarded according to their merit Answer I say that our estate is farre better than Adams in this that his hope of everlasting life being set in his owne obedience did instantly faile but ours standing in the obedience of Christ who is made to us righteousnesse sanctification redemption and life can never faile For therefore because that pretious treasure of eternall life was so carelesly kept by Adam God who loved the salvation of mankinde better then man himselfe would in no wise commit the keeping of that jewell to man any more Therefore though sinne have no power to condemne them that are in Christ yet is it still suffered to dwell in us that wee should not trust in our selves but in the living God For as the Father saith Multum nobis in hoc carue tribucremus nisi usque ad ejus depositionem sub veniâ viveremus Aug. de Civ lib. 10. cap. 22. And although Adam by the grace and favour of his Creator might have continued in the estate in which hee was created if hee had stood in his innocency yet could hee not even then have beene said to merit everlasting life For merit or hire comes ever for that which is above duty which cannot bee in the creature towards the Creator As to a hired servant the wages merit or hire comes for his worke because it was in his power whether hee would labour for that master or no being not bound unto him but for his hire but in a bondman the possession of his Lord all his service and labour is his Lords to require and imploy it as it pleaseth him Luke 17.8.9 and this is the condition of the whole creature to the Lord and Creator of all And if Adam in his innocency could not merit much lesse can sinnefull man merit any thing but affliction and death by his sinne and service to the devill to whom hee is no way bound but by his sinne And this difference the Apostle maketh Rom. 6.23 the wages of sinne is death but the free gift of God is eternall life 4. But are wee not commanded to worke out our saluation with feare and trembling Phil. 2.12 and is not the sentence of everlasting life pronounced for the workes of charity which were foreseene in us and for which the kingdome of heaven was prepared for us from the beginning of the world Math. 25. vers 34.35.36 Answer What merit can any man claime for that which another hath principally wrought in him And if God worketh in us to will and to doe Phil. 2.13 what is our worke but that wee should with joy runne after Him that drawes vs Cant. 1.4 Therefore although good workes are ordained of God that wee should walke in them and that wee are created thereunto Eph. 2.10 and that God who chose us in Christ to bee heires of glory ordained all the meanes thereto and workes in us to bee ready to every good worke and thereby makes our calling and election sure unto us yet is not that worke solely and intirely ours but chiefely of the grace and spirit of Christ that dwels in us and crownes His owne good workes in us with everlasting life 1 Cor. 15.10 So then our workes must vanish that every mouth may bee stopped and the whole world may bee guilty before God Rom. 3.19 So that every man notwithstanding his owne workes even the chiefest among the Saints may with Iob abhorre himselfe and repent in sackcloth and and ashes Iob. 42.6 5. The naturall desires common to all men cannot bee in vaine because they come not unto them out of any particular choyse or present necessity but by influence or direction of that common nature which is in all men which though it cannot effect it yet hath it shewed what is to bee wrought for the uttermost good of every particular by the Lord of Nature But every man by the inclination of his owne will doth desire the uttermost perfection and happpinesse of his owne being which hee acknowledges to bee in being united to that which is the greatest good and the enjoying thereof in eternall life Therefore every man by the guidance of nature it selfe doth returne unto God as the Author and Finisher of his happinesse Answer No agent can worke of it selfe above the proper strength and power of it selfe And eternall life is a thing beyond the limits of naturall knowledge and desire which mindes onely the well-being and continuance of the whole man according to the present estate of this naturall life alone But because Hee that wils not the death of a sinner Ezech. 33.11 would have all men to come to the knowledge of the truth 1 Tim. 2.4 therefore are all men so farre instructed or at least if they doe not willfully winke may bee so farrē instructed either by the voyce of the creature or by certaine inbred notions or by tradition or by an influence of grace denyed to none that they may know the eternall power and Godhead Rom. 1.20 and the immortality of the soule in a better estate then this life can afford as hath beene said before in Pref. And this is that universall grace which wee may yeeld to bee vouchsafed to all not onely without the visible Church but much more within the Church where by the cleare light of the Holy Scripture all may and ought to know particularly whatsoever is meet for their soules health And this universall grace I say further wee ought to yeeld unto because
above every Name that every tongue should confesse that Christ is Iehova 3. And seeing He suffered under the power of the Romanes it was necessary that He should die by that manner of death which was most usuall with the Romanes which for their seruants and provincialls was the Crosse And although it seemed unto Pilate himselfe an unworthy death for Him Shall I crucifie your King Yet nothing could content His enemies but Crucifie Him Crucifie Him And because our Lord had no such priuiledge to plead for Himselfe that He was a free man of Rome as Saint Paul did Act. 16.37 22.25 29. 25.11 and so lost his head by the sword Therefore He must needs endure that bitter and accursed death of the Crosse 4. The tree through the craft of the devill was unto man-kind a cause of sinne Therefore lest the tree which was created good might become a curse to him for whom it was created and thereby the end of the creation might be perverted it seemed fit to the Wisedome of God that as the tree had beene an instrument in the worke of mans condemnation it should also bee an instrument in the worke of his redemption that man by his wound might also bee healed And therefore that our ransome should bee payed on the Crosse 5. Man by his sinne had made himselfe subject to the curse of the Law Therefore that the promise to Abraham That in his seed all the Nations of the earth should bee blessed Gen. 12.3 might come vpon them it was necessary that the curse should fall vpon that promised seed in whom they were to bee blessed as Saint Paul doth argue Gal. 3.13 and 14. 6. This crucifying of our Lord was prefigured diverslie in the Law as by the Serpent in the Wildernesse if you compare Numb 21.8 with Iohn 3.14 Moses also spreading out his hands in the forme of the Crosse overcame Amalec by his prayer Exod. 17.11 But aboue all other figures that glorious Type of Christ Samson who should begin to save Israel Iud 14.5 most liuely figured our Saviour on the Crosse when he laid his hands upon the Pillars and slew more at his death than he had done in all his life Iud. 16.30 So our Lord the Authour and Finisher of our Salvation though by His Preaching and His miracles He had shaken the Kingdome of the Devill yet by His death upon the Crosse He did triumph over all the power of hell Col. 2.15 David Psal 22.16 prophesies plainely of the wounds wherewith He was pierced in His hands and His feet when He was nailed to the Crosse as the Prophet Zechary Chap. 12.10 of that wound which through His side they made in His heart I the Lord will powre vpon the Inhabitants of Ierusalem the Spirit of Grace and supplicatior and they shall looke upon mee whom they have pierced And thus according to the Prophesies that were before was our Saviour crucified as you reade in the Gospel 3. Dead VVEe see IESVS made a little lower then the Angels for the suffering of death that He by the Grace of God should taste of death for every man Heb. 2.9 All the reasons for His crucifying confirme thus much And for this cause was Hee conceived and borne that He might redeeme His people from their sinnes The arguments also of the 19. Chapter of the 21.22 and 23. come all to this centre that Christ our Lord and onely Redeemer must die for our sinne 1. For seeing man by his sinne had made himselfe subject unto death according to the just sentence Gen. 2.17 In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die it was necessary that He that had made Himselfe our surety Heb. 7.22 and taken our sinne upon him Esay 52. should die for our sinne 2. It was necessary that the highest degree of obedience should bee in him in whom was also the perfection of Sonne-ship But all the perfection of Son-ship was in Christ both that which is Eternall and that which is in time as hath appeared Therefore also the perfection of obedience But there can be no degree of obedience beyond this that a sonne should die at the will of his father Therefore it was necessary that our Lord should die For God so loved the world that He gave his onely begotten Sonne to die that the world by him might bee saved But because it was impossible that He in his Eternall being should be subject to death therfore was it necessary that He should bee incarnate that Hâ—e should bee conceived of the Holy-Ghost and be borne of a Virgin as it hath beene prooved 3. If Isaac the shadow were content to die at the will of His Father how much more ought Christ the substance to fulfill the will of His Father 4. The manifestation of the infinite dignities of God the Father is the proper and peculiar office of the Son See Iohn 17.6 and 26. And how could either the infinite Iustice or Mercy or Love of God the Father toward His creature or His honour in the creature bee better manifested than in the death of that Son For although it were farre from Injustice to punish the innocent for the wicked when He had set Himselfe to answere for the sinnes of the world yet was it the uttermost the most severe and eminent Iustice that possibly could bee to lay upon Him in whom there was no sinne neither was there any guile found in His mouth the burden of vs all to breake him for our sinnes to multiplie His sorrowes and at once to deprive Him of all the comforts of God and life it selfe for our offences Neither could the Mercy or love of God toward His creature be greater than this that when wee were enemies yet spared He not His owne Sonne to worke our reconciliation Neither can the honour of God be more magnified by the creature than for that mercy and love which he hath shewed toward the creature in the Eternall Glory and happinesse which He hath reserved for it through the satisfaction of his Son And because these things could not possibly be brought to passe otherwayes than by the death of the Sonne of God therefore was it necessary that He should die 5. Of contrary effects the immediate causes must needs bee contrary The greatest delight and joy which the naturall man hath is to follow his sinfull lusts Therefore the recovery or restoring of man from his sinfull state cannot bee but by the suffering of the greatest sorrow that is of death 6. The obedience and sufferings of Him who was to make satisfaction for the disobedience and rebellion of all man-kind could not possibly be either exceeded or equalled But if our Lord had not died a most bitter and cruell death in those torments which He endured both in his soule and body then had His sufferings beene equalled if not exceeded by many of the holy Martyrs who for their love and faith in God endured most bitter and exquisite torments Heb.
2. How are wee freed from that damnation under which we were brought through the sinne of Adam while the Divine Iustice is yet unsatisfied 3. And if Christ have not suffered for vs what example hath He left unto vs that wee should follow his steps 4. Wee that are the Disciples should bee above our Master our patience more then His our love to Him more then His to vs If wee for His sake should willingly suffer persecution shame losse imprisonment death which He Himselfe had not suffered for vs. And 5. It had been utterly to no end that He should have become man For as it had been in vaine for Him to have taken a body which should againe have beene scattered into that from whence it was taken as Apelles affirmed so had it beene to no end to take a body and therein to suffer the darkning of His divine glory if by that body no benefit had redounded to the creature But if you desire moe reasons hereto they that are brought in the Chapter for His suffering crucifying death and buryall may give you full satisfaction So the errours that are yet remaining about the suffering of Christ are two one of the Theopaschites who held that the God-head of Christ did suffer while His body was nayled on the Crosse Aug. de Haer. Cap. 73. The other of the Patrispassians such as Praxeas and Sabellius who because they thought that as the Father and the Son were but one substance so were they likewise but one Person and therefore they affirmed that God the Father was incarnate and suffered Aug. de Haer. Cap. 41. But the former of these is sufficiently reproved by the doctrine of the 9. Cha. For if God be not any kind of matier nor a compound nor a formed body nor subject to any accident but that His being be most simple and pure as was there shewed by every one of these circumstances it will follow necessarily that God cannot suffer The later is refuted by all the reasons of the 11. and 23. Chapters And if you hold not your selfe satisfied by that which is brought in those Chapters and the answeres to the reasons of Sabellius Note d on Chap. 11. You may doe well to read Epiph. Haer. 57. and Tertullian against Praxeas For this very question whether God the Father was incarnate and suffered is the Argument of that Booke b That by His partaking of our sufferings He might c. It may heere not vnfitly be demanded for what causes Christ the Holy one of God should die for vs and how that death becomes availeable to free vs from the power of sinne of death and hell For answere Wee must first put that which was the first and principall cause of our salvation the eternall purpose of God which He â—urposed in Iesus Christ our Lord. Ephe. 3.11 See Actes 2.23 And this not for any graces or workes fore-seene in us But according to the good pleasure of His owne will Ephe. 1.5 For He hath saved us and called us with an Holy calling not according to our workes but according to His owne purpose and grace which was given us in Christ Iesus before the world began 2. Tim. 1.9 And he that puts any outward cause or good workes fore-seene in us whereby God might bee moved to chuse us takes away the chiefe glory of his grace and makes him to bee lesse good So then the first cause of all the causes and meanes of our salvation in Christ is the free mercy and purpose of God the Father which because it is the first it must needes also be the chiefe cause seeing all other causes worke to that end to which they are ordered and guided by the first And because the Son doth nothing of Himselfe but what things soever He seeth the Father doe those also doth the Sonne likewise Iohn 5.19 Therefore secondly did the Sonne according to that eternall purpose of the Father offer Himselfe vnto His Father for man as a ransome and satisfaction for their sinne as it is said Psal 40.7 Loe I come in the volume of the Booke it is written of mee to doe thy will O God Heb. 10.7 For in Him onely is God well pleased Matth. 12.18 And this is that Eternall Gospel of the Lambe slaine from the foundation of the World Apoc. 13.8 For through the Eternall Spirit did Hâ— offer Himselfe without spot vnto God But if this offer of our Redeemer who offered Himselfe for vs had not beene accepted of His Father then had it beene of no availe for us Therefore in the third place it must appeare that God did accept this Sacrifice of His Sonne which is manifest first by this That it was the disposition and purpose of God Himselfe as was shewed in the first place and as it is said Heb. 10.10 By the will of God are wee sa ctified through the offering of the body of Iesus Christ once for all Neither was God in this reconciliation of man-kind a willer or disposer onely but a worker also of our Redemption For God was in Christ reconciling the World vnto himselfe not imputing their trespasses vnto them 2. Cor. 5.19 If God then be for us who can be against us If He Iustifie who can condemne us who â—ave the decree and will of God for our Iustification the offer and acceptance of Christ both God and man for our ransome and reconciliation and that offer was made by the eternall Spirit And this Spirit also beareth witnesse to our Spirit that wee are the sonnes of God Rom. 8.16 The second cause concernes the justice of God by which our Lord Christ died for vs. And it stood in this that He according to the will of His Father became our surety Hebr. 7.22 and bound Himselfe to make satisfaction for the sin of man which man himselfe could not doe as it hath beene manifest before Chap. 19. Now in this satisfaction of Christ the infinite Iustice was accorded with the infinite Love of God to the creature The infinite love appeared as was said before first in this that the Sonne was called and appointed to the performance of this glorious worke Hebr. 5. verse 4 5.10 Then in this that being performed it was accepted in our name and for our everlasting happinesse as it is said Iohn 3.16 God so loved the world that He gave His onely begotten Sonne that whosoever beleeveth Him should not perish but have everlasting life The infinite Iustice was manifest in this that the satisfaction of Christ was a full and perfect satisfaction according to the rigour of Iustice and that both in respect of the infinite value thereof and of the punishment which our Mediator endured The infinite value of the satisfaction was first in the Person that offered it For as the grieuousnesse of the injurie exceeded by the worthinesse of the Person of the Father that was offended So the value of the satisfaction exceeded by the worthinesse of the Sonne that made the amends And
having bought them of God and payd their ransome brought out of all power of their strong enemie out of the shadow of death into the everlasting light of Paradise in all the libertie and ioy of the understanding to view the Wisedome of God in His most glorious workes as you may read further a little below Sect. 8. Numb 3. Sect. 7 Sect. 7. Now having shewed the different interpretations of this Article and as I thinke fully proved that the soule of Christ went not to heaven properly so called before His resurrection but that it was glorious and blessed among His Saints in happinesse and so in heaven formaliter as they speake It is fit that wee draw toward a conclusion which before wee can come unto it must first appeare what Abrahams bosome what Paradise is and where it was Then why the word of descending into hell is heere used with the solution of such doubts as fall in the way The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a bosome sometime signifies a baye of the sea wherein harbour and safety is from waves and tempests and thus the word is used Act. 27.39 Thus Lazarus Luke 16. might be said to be in Abrahams bosome that is to have arived and cast anker in that safe and quiet haven of happinesse where Abraham the father of all the faithfull because he against hope beleeved in hope Rom. 4.18 was now in blisse or else it may signifie a bosome properly as it is used in Luke 6.38 and thus also Lazarus might bee said to bee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in cheare and joy in Abrahams bosome as Saint Iohn Ioh. 13.23 lay leaning in the bosome of Iesus his uncle at supper as the manner of that countrey was sometime to eate their meate lying on the ground The word Paradise whether it be native greeke of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because it is supposed to be plentifully watered or a Persian word as good Authors affirme and that of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pardes used in Eccles 2.5 and Cant. 4.13 signifies a place of pleasure inclosed or a parke and so it is used in Xenophon Cyrop lib. 1. or a garden as the Greekes translated the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Gan in Genes Chap. 2. and 3. or an orchard as in the texts of Solomon before And hither was our Lord first said to have come after His death because as Adam by his sin had lost his happy estate in the earthly paradise So Christ by His death did recover the hope of our returne into the heavenly For the gift is not as the offence Rom. 5.15 By these two words the blessed estate of the faithfull is signified though with some difference not of place but degree of happinesse as I shewed For although the children of the kingdome were all and at all times heires of the same hopes yet they that were in Abrahams bosome before Christ had not that fulnesse of joy which they had after their redemption was fully wrought and He not now in Abrahams bosome with them but Abraham and all his faithfull children with him in Paradise To the same sence concerning the state of happinesse is the Kingdome of Heaven used Luke 13.28 29. though that word expresse also the joyes after the resurrection And because it was ever thought even among naturall men as the Heathen Philosophers that the soule was immortall and that after death it was better to them that had lived well then to the wicked therefore were they perswaded that their soules went to a place of rest and happinesse which they called as they pleased 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the house of Pluto by the common name and that of pleasure the Elysian fields of torment a place inclosed by Acheron a river without joy And sith the body went downe to the earth from whence it was and that they perswaded themselves that every creature might be abundantly happy in that region whereof it was an inhabitant as being the onely region that was fit for it therefore they thought that the place of the soules rest was not farre from the body and so went downe into the earth And because the ancient Church could not teach the heathen conuerted to God but by such words and language as they understood and differed not much in meaning from that which they themselues beleeued therefore were they content to use this manner of speech of descending to Hades the house of Pluto or hell which the vulgar had been taught by their guides the Philosophers and Poets In stead of all the rest see Plato in Phaedone and Virgil. Aeneidos lib. 6. yet they meant by this descent of Christ into hell no other thing but that His soule being separate from His body went into that place where the faithfull soules were then at rest and in assured hope of further joy But because our Church uses not the terme descending but teaches her owne children in their owne tongue to confesse that Christ went downe to hell Artic. 2. Let us not forsake the law of our mother Prouerb 6.20 but rather endeavour to know what this going downe to hell may meane And certainely it must needes bee thought a thing either of great obscurity or of little necessity wherein our Church as most other hath not held it fit to make any further declaration Therefore though I take liberty to enquire what the possible or most likely meaning of the words may be yet I presume not to affirme any thing but with submission to the Churches judgement when God shall vouchsafe further light thereto to determine according to the Scripture what is the certaine trueth in this or any other question of the like doubtfulnesse 1. To descend to goe or come downe is used diversly But that I may descend to every understanding I will make it of two kinds one of place and that is of three kinds The other of state or condition 1. Of place higher and lower as it is said Luke 9.37 They came downe from the hill and Act. 11.27 There came Prophets downe from Ierusalem to Antioch or from a place of more fame to a meaner as Act. 13.4 From Antioch 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they came downe to Seleucia Now if the earth and water made one flat surface which stretched from one side of heaven to the other as the old fancy was then could this descent of Christ meane no other going downe but under that surface And although some of the Fathers were no better Cosmographers then to thinke thus yet for the most part they were better thewed But because our faith suffers not to put any untrueth in nature therefore this going down must be refused 2. But if this globe of the earth bee hollow then this going downe may be meant as most of the Fathers tooke it into that hollownesse of the earth 1. And that the earth is hollow both reason and authority shew it Authority you have 4. Esdr 4.7 where
His resurrection and have denied also that I thinke with them that say that He went downe to suffer for our sinne And having as I thinke said enough to all contrary opinions the trueth by the Holy Scripture and the reasons grounded thereon must be made to appeare But first of all it is plaine that the meaning of our Church is such for in the 8. Article it is said that the Creed of Athanasius ought thorowly to bee received and beleeved and that because it may be prooved by most certaine warrants of Holy Scripture And in the 7. Article the Church of Ireland agreeth hereto in these words All and every the Articles conteined in the Nicene Creed the Creed of Athanasius and that which is commonly called the Apostles Creed ought firmly to be observed and beleeved For they may bee prooved by most certaine warrant of Holy Scripture And because it may not bee supposed that our Church cites the authority of Athanasius but according to his owne meaning as he himselfe hath explained it if it were the meaning of Athanasius that Christ after His suffering descended locally into the hell of the damned it must needes bee that our Church accorded to his meaning And what the meaning of this Article in the Creed of Athanasius is we need not to doubt who have Athanasius himselfe to declare it in his Epistle of the incarnation of our Lord Iesus Christ against Apollinarius where hee prooves against his Heresie that there bee onely two parts of the humane nature in Christ a body which the grave received and a soule which went downe into hell the grave received that which was bodily hell that which was not bodily And by his reason you may yet understand his meaning better When the Creator saith he call'd man into question for his disobedience Hee decreed against him a double punishment For to the body He said Thou art earth and unto earth thou shalt returne But to the soule He said Thou shalt die the death And for this cause man being dead is condemned to depart to two places And therefore it was also necessary that the Iudge Himselfe that made this decree should also undergoe it that in the estate of man condemned shewing Himselfe free from sin uncondemned He might reconcile man unto God and restore him to perfect libertie In the same Epistle hee had said a little before that in hell He condemned death that Hee might every way perfect the salvation of man in our image which He had put on and in his fourth oration against the Arians hee saith that the powers of hell withdrew themselues being afraid at the sight of Christ. So the meaning of Athanasius is plaine that the soule of Christ did locally goe downe to hell and withall the meaning of our Church Now among these texts of Scripture by which this doctrine of Athanasius may bee warranted that text of the 1. Pet. 3.18.19 is most plaine especially as it stands in the Greeke Christ suffered for our sinnes that He might bring us unto God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 being put to death in the flesh but quickened in the Spirit by which He went and preached to the Spirits in prison Which Scripture must be applied onely to the manly being of Christ who Himselfe had set an example to His followers to suffer ill patiently which could be onely in His manly being For as God He could not suffer ill Beside His God-head mooves not by any locall motion as the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 doeth signifie And moreover His divine spirit was no way quickned nor could be but He went and preached in that Spirit in which He was quickned which could bee onely in His humane spirit or soule in which having once suffered death He manifested His power to the disobedient spirits by taking to Himselfe the keyes or power over hell and death to shut in and keepe out whom Hee will Reuel 1.18 And although I deny not that the sence is true and good He was quickned by the Spirit that holy Spirit which Hee received not by measure yet I hold that this is not the native meaning of this place and the best printed copies of Stephan Plantin and others are with me Neither will the words naturally beare that change of In and By Neither did the reverend Noel Deane of Pauls and other like Him accord with them Neither is this the onely place of Scripture that prooves the locall descent of Christs soule into hell For that argument of Saint Peter Act. 2.31 whereby hee prooves the resurrection of Christ out of Psalm 16. because His soule was not left in Hell strangles these interpreters harder then Achelous was strangled in the hand of Hercules So that which Ionah the figure said of himselfe being by Christ the substance applied to Himselfe To be three dayes in the heart of the earth must bee as true in the substance as it was figuratively true in Ionah This is the confession of him that was holy as no man was Psalm 68.2 Thou hast delivered my soule from the lowest hell vers 13. as the Apostle speakes Ephes 4.9 10. He descended first into the lower parts of the earth and ascended above all heavens that Hee might fill all things So then the Scriptures not being of any private interpretation that is to set out the stories of private men 2. Peter 1.20 must have their highest and uttermost interpretation in Christ Now that this is the native interpretation of this Article and consequently the right meaning of the Composer or Composers of the Creed beside the texts of Scripture on which the Article is grounded it will bee further manifest by the Reasons 1. In a Catechisme the use of Tropes or borrowed speeches are not fit for the use of children and novices and such is the Creed or forme of the confession of our Faith as it is manifest Hebr. 6.1 And the suffering of Christ His Death Buriall c. is taken properly therefore His going downe also into hell Object Object If Christ went to the faithfull that were dead whose soules were in Paradise why doe you say to hell whereby is specially meant the place of the damned Answer Hee first went to the dead in Paradise as His promise was That the Thiefe should there bee with Him in Paradise Then to hell to take to Himselfe all rule all authority and power For God had put all things in subjection under His feet 2. If this Article He went downe to hell be not to bee referred to the soule of Christ after His death then have we no direction by the Creed to know what became of His soule neither are wee taught hereby whether He had a humane and immortall soule or no. So we are still left in doubt whether this Christ be the Saviour of the world But if this Article be referred to the state of Christs soule after His death then are we truely taught and informed against these doubts But that
sentence pronounced Come yee blessed receive the Kingdome prepared for you for I was hungry and ye gave Mee meat c. and on the other side Depart ye cursed for I was hungry and ye gave Me no meat c. Mat. 25.35 to 46. Ans It cannot bedenied but that the sentence of condemnation upon the reprobate is according to their workes as the deseruing causes thereof For not to beleeve in Christ is that great sin which is the cause of condemnation Ioh. 3.18 and 16.9 Neither is a dead faith ought worth but that faith onely is accepted which worketh by love Galat. 5.6 without which it is impossible to please God Hebr. 11.6 And if all things that are not of faith be sinne Rom. 14.23 Then the wicked works of Infidels and Hypocrites and much more their violent and wilfull rebellions must needs be concurrent causes of their condemnation But the faithfull are therefore called to possesse the kingdome 1. Because they are blessed of the Father 2. Because they are predestinate thereto and the kingdome prepared for them from the beginning of the world So their workes come not as causes of their happinesse but onely as the fruits of their faith But because workes onely and not faith in the heart are manifest to the world therefore is the comparison made onely of the workes both of the godly and of the wicked that the justice of God may be manifested in rewarding the workes that are manifest to man But you will say if men for their ill deeds doe merit hell why should they not by their good workes merit heaven See the answere Chap. 19. Object 2. and 3. 3. A third question may arise concerning that which is said Luke 21.32 This generation shall not passe till all be fulfilled why then was not the judgement long agoe Answer The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a generation in the narrow signification doth signifie that multitude of men which are alive at once and withall that time in which it is supposed they shall all be dead which in common reckoning is 100. yeeres And in this sence the saying of our Lord must be referred only to that which He had spoken concerning the overthrow of Ierusalem which followed about fourty yeeres after and the signes which should goe before that As the preaching of the Gospel in all the world See Col. 1.6 False Christs See Note g on Chapter 24. Warres Pestilence c. But because our Lord after the answeres to the three questions made by the disciples Matth. 24.3 1 Of the destruction of Ierusalem 2. Of the signe of His comming 3. Of the end of the world addes these same words This generation shall not passe c. vers 34. a generation cannot bee so narrowly taken in this place but rather it must signifie as much as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Saeculum and so taking the infancy of the world in the time of nature for one generation that middle age under the Law for another and then this old age of the word under the Gospel there is no other generation or change of state in the Church to be looked for but in this very generation all things shall be fulfilled And therefore Saint Iohn saith 1 Epist 2.18 This is the last time And although Saint Peter say 1 Epist 4.7 That the end of all things is at hand and that therefore we should be sober and watch unto prayer because we know not when our Lord shall call us to a particular account of our stewardship when all things of this world are ended with us Yet Saint Paul 2 Thess 2. directly affirmeth in his time that that great day of God should not come till the Apostasie was revealed which could not be till he that withheld that is the Imperiall power that then ruled was taken out of the way 4. But seeing that day of God is so terrible to the wicked as that they put it farre from them and againe so much desired of the godly as that they cry Come Lord Iesus Come it may seeme not altogether unfit to see some reasons of their different desires Concerning the wicked it is manifest that they being condemned already in their owne consciences have great cause to wish that there were no day of judgement no judge no tormentors But the faithfull in Christ who have the testimony of God in their hearts that their sinnes are covered have great reason to desire that day First and above all that the glory of God His mercy and justice may be manifest Secondly that the merit of Christs sufferings may appeare to the glory of His grace in them that they may have the actuall possession of that happinesse which they have here onely in the assurance of hope And no lesse doe they desire that comming that the body of sinne may be truely abolished For which desires sake even death it selfe is here in life oftentimes desired and when it comes is most willingly embraced because that thereby they are justified from their sin Rom. 6.7 And among other causes for which they pray that the Kingdome of God may come this is one that although euen because they refraine from ill therefore doe they make themselues as a prey Esay 59.15 yet in that day the trueth of their innocency shall be knowne And although here the more innocent and harmelesse a man is the more is hee subject to injuries slanders and surmises and that because men have forsaken the feare of the Almightie and having forgotten that he that taketh up not onely hee that raiseth a slander which every base varlet may doe but hee that beleeveth it and and much more he that furthereth it hath no part in that Kingdome Psal 15.3 Yet they use their tongues as if they were their owne and remember not that they must give an account of every idle much more of every lying and hurtfull word And heere there be some which doubt not to say that the godly may desire the comming of that day that they may see the reward of the wicked perhaps upon that text where it is said The Righteous shall be glad when he seeth the vengâ—ance Psal 58.10 But I suppose it necessary to answere with this difference That so farre foorth as a wicked man or men are declared the enemies of God of Christ of His Church a Christian may say Doe not I hate them ô Lord that hate thee yea I hate them with perfect hatred as if they were mine enemies Psal 139. ver 21.22 the hatred must be of their sinnes not of their persons but concerning those offences that are towards a mans owne selfe let the same mind be in us which was in Christ Iesus who suffered for us leaving us an example that we should follow His steps who being reviled reviled not againe who being mocked and wounded yet made intercession for the transgressors Therefore though thine enemies despight thee dayly without a cause though he that eates thy bread lift up
hath no succour nor hope but only in his mercy that hath made him thereunto if he will desire and trust in his mercy And thus far the reasons of the heathens and the Religion of the Turkes doe drive them But here that foolish Religion of the Turkes is content to stay not holding it necessary to beleeve a Mediator because say they God infinite in mercy made his Creature onely because he loved it Thus while they truely magnifie the mercy of God they utterly forget that hee is Iust Vnto which infinite Iustice of God if they had taken due regard the same light of reason would further have shewed unto them that the soule that sinnes must beare a punishment answerable to his sinne And because by every sinne against God an infinite Iustice is offended therefore it is impossible that any man by his owne righteousnesse which can never bee any more than by the Law of God he is bound unto should bee able to make any satisfaction for his sinne Vpon which true principle it will follow necessarily in the light of reason either that there is no possible returne to the favour of God which conclusion a man would by all meanes avoid or else that the reconciliation of mankinde unto God must needs bee by the mediation of a man in every respect free from Sinne who bearing the punishment due to sinners might finde redemption and mercy for all them that would beleeve it and live worthy thereof But because all men conceived in lust and sinne are originally tainted therewith for our of uncleannesse who can bring that which is cleane therefore must the generation of this Mediator bee wonderfull and not after the common manner of all men but so that no sinne or taint of the flesh must bee therein So that being both borne and living without sinne hee might by his death become a ransome acceptable for the sinnes of others And although reason could not conceive nor finde how this should bee yet seeing that in the necessitie of the divine justice it must bee thus reason would as easilie yeeld that it might bee as it did finde and see the creation of mankinde and the whole creature out of nothing as by the discourse ensuing it will hereafter appeare If this were not thus how should the whole world of Infidels and misbeleevers bee hable to the justice of God for their ignorance of him for their neglect and for their unbeliefe So taking it as granted till it doth further appeare by the Treatise following that reason hath right good and necessarie use in the things of faith it is too manifest that these wretched times are such as seeme to call aloud for the publishing of some such worke as this for though the fooles that have said in their hearts there is no God dare not in words profes it yet by their continuance in their sinful deeds they do proclaime that their thoughts are so Neither are they altogether wanting which say that Religion is but a politicke invention to keep men in civill obedience but if the conclusions of the Christian Religion bee inferred upon necessarie principles then are they not made out of policie as these Atheists say but cannot prove it except they could also make it appeare that policie was able to make naturall reason I will not denie that Mahumed setled his religion so as they say but hee forbids to dispute of the principles thereof because it is against both reason and Scripture and so perhaps it may bee said of those Will-worships that are or have beene among other Gentiles to whom God vouchsafed not the knowledge of his Law But our most holy faith because it alone is true hath no other author than God himselfe who hath revealed it by his word and because no man shall bee excused if hee beleeve it not hee hath commanded reason whereof all men are partakers to seale thereto in everie point but because in the Treatise before mentioned and by the whole practice of this booke this thing is manifest I will here turne mee onely to answer those doubts which may bee brought against the perswading of matiers of faith by humane reason First it may bee objected that the matiers of faith are farre above humane reason and that therefore it is a great presumption to question or skan them thereby for it is said by S. Paul Rom. 11.33 that his wayes and wisdome are past finding out I confesse we know nothing of God but what he hath revealed of himselfe by his workes or by his words for hee dwelleth in the light that none can approach unto even as S. Paul speakes there of his calling and election to faith a will unrevealed but the Articles of our faith hee hath most plainely taught and revealed And further to the argument I confesse that humane reason turning it selfe to behold the divine truthes is as the eye of a Bat to looke on the Sunne But yet the eternall and infinite truthes are so apprehended by mans finite understanding as the light of the Sunne is by the eye that is verely and indeed the same light and no other for though the eye cannot receive all the light of the Sunne yet that which it doth receive is truly that same light which is in or from the Sunne But you say that if in things of common use as hony salt or any other things vegetable or minerall wee must confesse our exceeding ignorance of their nature properties and possibilities both alone and much more in all manner of compositions it may seeme that our dulnesse may much rather be acknowledged in things divine I yeeld not altogether to this consequence for to the knowledge of naturall things we have our owne witlesse experience to helpe us and the deceitfull authoritie of mistaking men but all those truthes whereon our faith relies are grounded on the infallible rules of Gods owne word revealed by himselfe unto us for this end that we should not bee deceived or mistaken And although it was impossible for humane reason ever to finde out the conclusions and most fundamentall points of our faith as the mysterie of the Trinitie the incarnation of God the resurrection of the body c. yet being by the cleer light of Gods own word made known unto us we approve the same truth by the judgement and voice of reason So the reasons that are brought hereunto are not to establish any truth new or unheard of but for that faith which was heretofore taught delivered unto the Saints if the reasons of themselves be weak and by their weakenes shew how mans understanding is dazled at the divine light yet the conclusions stand sure and unmoveable but if the reasons bee certaine and true then questionlesse they are grounded in the Word and truth of God and the conclusion true either for the reason delivered or for a higher reason which wee cannot finde To this purpose the Father Anselm de Conc. Gratiae lib. arbit
stand with the infinity of his goodnesse I answer Base or vile and excellent are onely words of Comparison And if all things created were excellent alike then could nothing at all bee excellent But because it is necessary for the beauty of the whole frame of the creature that there bee difference of degrees in greater or lesse excellencie therefore are these things which have fewer degrees of perfection in them called meane or vile though not truly and indeed such For there is nothing so meane or base but as it is being it is a proofe and image of His being who created it and so though not of it selfe yet in it selfe is exceeding good Gen. 1.31 And if the order of Nature be well marked as we know that the whole Creature was brought out of not being into the meanest and first degree of being which was water Gen. 1.2 2 Pet. 3.5 so all the excellency that is in the creature is but by addition of one degree of perfection unto another which perfections taken together with their cause and originall are in their many differences first being then life after sence fourthly Reason as in a man Fifthly understanding by the onely sight of the being as in the Angels the sixth is of the received power of the Mediatour Ioh. 17.2 Eph. 1.20.21.22 Heb. 1.2 that runnes into infinity the seventh is Infinity it selfe in the simplicity of selfe being beyond which is nothing But whether these perfections of the creature come into it by addition as I have spoken or that it be so raised from nothing immediately into those perfections which it hath it is necessary that these differences of degrees be therein that that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Eph. 3.10 that manifold wisdome of God may be manifest in the Creature In which creature how perfect soever in it selfe no degree can bee found so excellent but that it must differ infinitely on the one side from the perfection of the Creator not none so meane but that on the other side it must differ infinitely from not being I meane that not being which it had of it selfe and in it selfe for in him it had an eternall being being eternally foreseene and appointed in him § 3. But in things that are ill you thinke this answer will not serve For though you can bee content to thinke that the glory of the divine wisdome is nothing abated in the beholding of things no not in their present being how differing soever in their degrees of perfection as it is said Psal 113.5 Who is like unto Iehova our God that lifteth up Himselfe high to sit that abaseth Himselfe low to see in the heavens and in the earth no more then the lustre and shine of the Sunne is more or lesse cleere whether it light upon the beautifull hill of Libanus or Carmell or the dirty land of Cabul yet if he know also things that are ill and that his knowledge be a causing or creating knowledge it cannot bee avoyded but that he must also be the cause of ill I answer Ill is of three kindes one naturall whereby every thing is subjected to some other thing contrary thereto whereby it may be corrupted for the destruction of that particular being that some other thing may be raised thereout according to the possibilitie of the matter and the manner of the corrupting Hitherto we may bring poysons and all those things that we call hurtfull and ill because if they be not rightly used they are harmefull to our kind which are not simply ill but onely accidentally seeing that if they be rightly used they may be helpefull to our nature as it appeares in the trocisks of the vipers flesh and other medicines as Physicke teaches So these things of themselves naturally good may be ill that is good causes of ill effects as riches and authority things civilly indifferent may bee ill if abused to pride idlenesse and the oppression of others The second kinde of ill is that of punishment which cannot justly be termed ill if you consider the use and benefit thereof as S. Paul hath taught Heb. 12. from ver 5. to ver 12. For neither can wisdome be in things civill or morall but with the judgement of good and bad neither is that judgement in the discerning of good and ill ought worth if the good be not praised and rewarded and the ill punished So that without justice and mercie in reward and punishment neither wisdome nor goodnesse can be either perfect or praised Therefore this kinde of ill because it is just that the ill-doer should beare the burden of his owne desert is no way ill but onely in the smart of the guilty sufferer deserving it So these two kindes of ill onely so called for some respects though in themselves necessary and therefore good will easily bee acknowledged to be from God The maine question therefore is onely about that ill of ills which is sinne for sinne both in regard of the effect which is punishment and in it selfe the deserving cause thereof and much more taking occasion by the Law holy and good to worke death in the sinner must needs be exceedingly sinfull as it is concluded Rom. 7.11.13 And because it is as certainely and necessarily true that sinne is sinne and ill is ill as it is that good is good and that the knowledge of the truth in every thing is in the perfection of the understanding it cannot bee but that all ill and sinne is perfectly knowne unto the infinite wisedome Moreover whether ill be onely a privation or taking away of that good which ought to bee in the creature or whether it bee any thing of very being therein it is necessarie that the infinite wisdome know all manner of beings both according to their perfections and all their possibilities and defects But concerning the manner of this knowledge the Doctâ—rs say That because the very being of ill you remember what ill I speake of is nothing else but the privation of that goodnesse which ought to be in the creature it is knowne of God onely by the contrary goodnesse as by the dâ—finition that is to say to be a defect or privation of goodnesse Neither is it any defect in the divine knowledge to know that which is onely a def ct by the contrarie perfection seeing nothing can be knowne further then according to that being which it hath And therefore they say further See Thâ—m Aquin. and his Comment lib. 1. Cap 71. and lib 3. Cap. 4 5 6 c. contra Gentes That ill inasmuch as it is such is in the number of things not being and that of things not being there can be no cause efficient but deficient and privative onely For every agent workes as fâ—rre forth as it is in actuall being to bring forth something into acte or perfection and that to a good end so that ill comes into effect by accident beside the purpose and intent of the doer Ah blessed Origen hath thy
owne craftinesse for whereas the devill envying that happy estate wherin man was created sought his overthrow by making him subject to sinne and so to death He our Creator to shew to the principalities and powers the riches of his wisdome and goodnesse in man did not onely redeeme him from that thraldome of sinne and death but also exalted him unto an estate of glorie and happinesse farre above that in which he was created Thus out of the eater comes meâ—t and out of the strong comes sweetnes Iud. 14.14 Thus the head of Leviathan is broken in pieces and given to be meat to us in the wildernesse of this world Psal 74.15 Therefore seeing it was the good will and pleasure of Almighty God to mankinde to make him partaker of these unspeakable mercies which his goodnesse hath wrought unto us out of the ill of our sin and because he that wills the end wills also those meanes that leade unto the end we may with reverence to his wisdome and truth affirme that although God by his revealed will forbad the tree of knowledge unto Adam and so made his eating sin yet in his secret counsell he did foresee that sin in Adam not as an enforcing or a working cause but leaving him to himselfe But here a doubt must be answered first if we be indeed redeemed from the thraldome of sin why doth God suffer sin still to remaine in us yea so far forth as that we cannot cease to sin yea so farre forth as that it makes our best actions even our prayers abhominable while our tongue utters one thing and our heart wanders after another Answer It was possible and easie to God so to have renewed the heart of mâ—â— so as that he should not sin but yet God would let sin to dwell in us for divers advantages to us but especially for two first that at the sight of our sin we might cast down our selves before him and utterly renouncing our owne worthinesse we might seek that righteousnes which is of him and in him alone the second that by the perpetuall remembrance of our sin the punishment due unto us for the same we might be thankfull unto our most mercifull Redeemer by faith the anker of our souls holding out our hope that although we fal we shal not be cast away and hereupon depends our repentance our patience and our endeavour to the masterdome of our owne wickednes Thus as the wise Physician for long continuing and deepe rooted maladies gives strong purging medicines of Seamony or Colocynthis and after applies his cordialls so our most gracious Healer to let us know what we are of ourselves lest through pride the sinne of the rebellious Angels we should be lost for ever doth not only suffer us to taste the bitter fruits of our owne corruption but suffers sinne also as the flesh of the venomous tyre to be still in us that by it the vertues of the precious spices of his graces may be conveyed to our hearts to preserve us from eternall death that balefull infection of the devill unto everlasting life b Necessary truth in actuall being R. 3 Necessary truth is not here meant that truth which depends upon the necessary being of the thing in respect of the cause thereof but that necessity which bindes the understanding or words to be agreeable to the present being And thus this proposition Peter sits is as necessarily true while he doth fit as to say Peter is a man CHAP. VI. That God is Almightie MIght or power is of divers kindes as you may reade log appendix of Sect. 3. introduct I will not stand repeating nor in this question make any mention of that power which they call passive because it meanes a power onely to suffer in things that are weake and imperfect The might which I meane here is absolute perfect infinite which belongs to God and to him alone as it appeares by these reasons 1. What power soever it is which is equally powerfull over all being either in acte or in possibilitie of being must needs bee infinite or almightie but such is the power of God therefore God is Almightie It was manifest before Chap. 2. that God was everlasting and so not by any other but that all things either being or possible to be are from him above as it will further appeare Chap. 13. and upon this consequence it will further follow necessarily that God is Almighty a in respect of the creature 2. b If God bee not Almightie then either that which is or that which is not must bee able to resist him but neither that which is nor that which is not is able to withstand him therefore God is Almightie The proposition is plaine that hee may doe what he will doe who can finde no hinderance or let in his doing The assumption also is as true for the things that are are all from him as the fountaine of all being as it is confessed by the voice of heaven Reve. Cap. 4.11 Thou art worthie O Lord to receive glory and honour and power for thou hast created all things and for thy wills sake they are and have beene created And that the things that are not should be able to withstand him is utterly impossible for so not being should be more powerfull than being and being more powerfull must of necessitie be and so should both be and not be which is an absolute contradiction and utterlie impossible Therefore the first that God is Almightie is true of necessitie 3. If God be not Almighty so that his power may be answerable to his other dignities in infinitie then either his power must bee accidentall to him or else his being must differ essentiallie from it selfe but both these things are impossible for in him is no accident nor shadow of change Ia 1.17 as it shall appeare more at large Chap. 9. And for the second consequence it is as plaine for that which is infinite and that which is finite must needs differ essentially so that if his goodnesse his eternitie wisdome c. being essentially himselfe as is shewed Chap. 8. be infinite and his power likewise essentiall to him and yet finite then his being must needs differ essentially from his being Therefore it is necessarie that God be Almighty 4. Nothing can either be or worke but by that power which it hath both to be that which it is and to doe that which it doth so that if the power of God were not infinite or almightie neither could his being be everlasting by his eternitie neither could his inward action in himselfe be infinite and eternall neither could his goodnesse his greatnesse his truth glory c. be that which they are neither by his wisdome could he know himselfe infinite and eternall nor yet able to doe any thing answerable to his goodnesse truth and glory Reade Psal 111. Neither could he delight himselfe and be so happy infinitely in his owne goodnesse greatnesse and glory and so
not and seeing that which any thing hath of it selfe is first therein and more proper thereto than that which it hath of another therefore the world of it selfe having not being it could not possible bee eternall but onely in his eternall purpose which had appointed it unto this being The World therefore in God the principle is not begun but eternall and one but whatsoever is severed from this Principle can neither bee one nor yet eternall but comes into the reckoning of othernesse and change and so of necessitie must bee subject to time wherein alone all change is wrought § 2. 1. But here it will be asked whether God who before the creation of the world rested eternallie in his owne glorie and happinesse suffered not some alteration in this that he wrought without himselfe that which hee had not wrought before and how hee can be said both to worke and to rest Gen. 2.2 and yet to bee without all shadow of change Iam. 1.17 2. Then how He infinite in goodnesse and truth and ever one in himselfe subjected the creature to wretchednesse continuall corruption and change 3. Thirdly seeing that to an infinite and eternall power all things are alwayes possible why the world was not brought forth many ages heretofore that seeing it must be subject to vanity it might before this have beene freed from corruption and brought to that libertie whereto it doth yearne Rom. 8.22 1. To the first I answer that although the creature doth of necessitie supposea Creator without which it could not be yet on Gods part there was no necessitie to enforce him to create but he created onely according to the pleasure of his owne will as it is confessed Revel 4.11 For nothing was able to impose necessitie but onelie that which was superiour in dignitie and power which the superexcellencie of the Divine being suffers not neither can the freedome of an infinite will such as the will of God is bee guided either by chance by destinie or by necessitie But because hee is infinite in goodnesse he envied not to any thing the being thereof but out of not being brought it into being by his Word our Lord Iesus Christ Athanasius de Incarnat Verbi But in this creation he suffered no alteration who had eternally wil'd the creature to be in the time appointed and in the time appointed brought it out only by the motion of his will for his will his wisdome his power being infinite and one being no other motion labour or alteration needed but onely to will that the creature should then bee created when hee had from all eternitie willed that it should bee created So then it was in him both to create that it might appeare that hee had no necessitie of the creature who was absolutely perfect without it and yet at his pleasure to create lest that which was not might seeme to be exempted from his power and againe that the creature might be blessed in his goodnesse and yet he himselfe without all shadow of change As the minde of a man which hath plotted a convenient house and given or described the model to the builder suffers no alteration by the house being builded Therefore after the commandement of water the first matier of all things to bee the labour of the Creator mentioned in the sixe dayes was onely the appointment of secondarie causes to worke in their times to those ends which hee had determined for the bringing forth of their severall effects for as the first agent moves all secondarie agents so it is necessarie that all their ends bee ordered to the ends of their first mover So then the sixe Evenings of the being of things first potentially in their immediate or next causes and in their fieri or way to perfection and the Mornings of their actuall and perfect being are the times * See Esay 66.8 ages or dayes wherein they were brought forth by their naturall causes all moving in the power of the first cause unto their perfection appointed by his eternall decree And this ordering of causes and giving strength thereto was his first worke as his continuall blessing and upholding the creature by his word is his continuall worke wherein hee takes delight Heb. 1.3 Psal 104.31 But his rest in the seventh day was his ceasing to bring forth new creatures which day is therefore said not to have any evening because his rest delight or glorie is eternall and is therefore commanded to bee sanctified by us with a Memento because it is a pledge unto us that after the sixe ages of this worlds travell and wearinesse in vaine we shall at last be made partakers of his rest Compare herewith Gen. 1. 2. to ver 4. Esay 46.10 and 2. Pet. 3.8 But this is beside my purpose and therefore I leave it 2. To the second question of that ill which is in the creature though I have answered sufficiently note a on Chap. 6. yet I say further that contraries are best knowne one by another â—ight by darknesse health by sicknesse And therefore that we may not onelie desire but also better know and enjoy our future happinesse it is fit that wee should taste the momentary wretchednesse and miseries of this life yea drinke at last the gar-ans of death it selfe that wee may truly enjoy the happinesse of everlasting life O death how bitter is the remembrance of thee to a man that hath rest with his possessions But how acceptable is thy doome to him that is vexed in all things Eccles. 41.1 And questionlesse if the elect Angels never had any experience of sorrow neither did at any time sinne for he found no stedfastnesse in his servants and laid folly vpon his Angels Iob. 4.18 And in his beloved Sonne alone is hee well pleased Matth. 3.17 Then doe they wonderfully by our afflictions enjoy their owne happinesse while they dayly behold our manifold miseries and yet know us to be heires of equall glorie Luke 20.36 for therfore are the sons of David dayly scourged with the rods of men corrected every morning and die at last that they may be like unto their Lord be made conformable unto his death for if the Prince of our salvation was consecrated in afflictions how should we hope for any portion in his glorie if we should not with joy be partakers of his sufferings For therefore by his owne example did he teach us obedience because in obedience onely we must walke the way to everlasting life A second reason is that wee may be humbled before him when we consider whereto we are come of our selves that is into miserie but not out and consequently that wee may bee thankefull for that abundant grace by which wee are delivered when our sufferings shall bee recompensed with an exceeding weight of glorie 3. The third doubt concerning the time of the worlds creation hath heretofore so troubled some mens braines that they thought there had beene infinite worlds yet so that after
effect should not bee answerable to the cause The infinite essence hee supposes the Father the infinite power the Sonne and the infinite worker the Holy Ghost And by these three are three Trinities brought out of spirituall creatures or Angels as he by Psellus understands the Chaldean in wisdome whether well or ill it skils not much For we are taught Iob. 1.3 That By the word all things were made and without him was nothing made that was made But to his reason Can an infinite Being bring forth an effect without power and working thereto or can an infinite power bee but in an infinite being or can an infinite worke bee without an infinite power so that these three which hee makes divers Creators and that of severall Trinities can bee but one Creator as they are but one Trinity in unity of essence as hath afore beene declared at large And as concerning the conclusion it is yeelded that the number of individuals or particular beings is infinite to us utterly beyond our reckoning but yet to Him without whom a Sparrow lights not on the ground they are all numbred Nay I say further that through his blessing upon the creature to multiply according to kinde Gen. 1. the individuals are in nature potentially infinite but no way to Him by whose onely power nature doth worke For otherwise His wisdome and power could not bee coequall And thus have men wearyed themselves in vaine to finde out his wayes that are past finding out The first supply concerning Man CHAP. XIV That Man was created one alone male and female as the Scripture names them Adam and Eve CHAP. XV. That Man was created innocent and without sinne CHAP. XVI That Man continued not in that innocencie but that he sinned and thereby became subject to eternall death CHAP. XVII That by the sinne of our first parents the whole masse of mankinde was corrupted and made liable to eternall death both of body and soule CHAP. XVIII That there is a restoring of man to a better life and further hope than that from which our parents fell CHAP. XIX That this restoring could not be made by any meanes that was in man nor by any one that was man onely CHAP. XIIII That Man was created one alone male and female THese questions seeme necessarie for the knitting of that which followes to the conclusions that have beene made before And because they are taken as suppositions in the briefe of our Creed and seeme plaine enough of themselves they may be handled with the more shortnesse but yet may they not here bee let passe altogether untouched for although it be given that man is the creature of God yet if he made many men and many women though one or moe sinned yet the rest might continue in their innocencie and so the whole race of mankinde was not corrupted Or if hee made but one man yet if he made him such as men now are then could not his actions be accounted any way sinfull or if Adam by his sin lost not his estate of happinesse or his owne alone or if there were no hope of restoring then to beleeve any Saviour were altogether in vaine or if there were any other meanes of salvation by man or Angell than that which the Christian faith doth hold then were all that which followes utterlie needlesse therefore it must appeare that man was created first one male and female and no moe secondly upright and without any taint of originall or actuall sin onely such freewill he had as that he might sinne if he would or if hee would not hee might not haue sinned And first that hee created them one only male and for continuance of kinde his female it is plaine by this 1. The workes of God are so made in the perfection of number and measure as that it is not possible to finde any defect or excesse therein But if moe men than one had beene made if without the power of bringing forth their like there had beene defect in them and they needlesse and in vaine if with such power of multiplication as Adam had then had there beene excesse in the creature and God had needlesly brought out mankinde from many roots which might bee brought out from one alone but this was unnecessary in the creature therefore it could not bee fitting in the wisdome of the Creator And therefore he being but one he created man in his owne image one man male and female Gen. 1.27 2. The excellencie of Lordship or rule must be in one alone cannot possiblie consist in many so that if many men had bin created the Lordship of man over the inferiour creature had not beene perfect in one although there be now many millions of men yet the Lordship over the creature is to everie one equall with Adam or Noah inasmuch as everie man claimes as the perfection of his kinde so the dignities and prerogatives thereof from his first originall which if it had beene many could not have beene so excellent 3. Everie naturall motion or instinct of nature which is ordered according to one rule must needs have one authour and one beginning But all the ordinarie and naturall motions of every species are according unto one rule to joyne with their like to propagate their like to maintaine their life alike c. Therefore mankinde had but one author of all their kinde and so were not brought out of stones nor trees neither yet were they 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or springing of themselves out of the earth as the fancies of the hâ—athen that knew not their originall leade them to beleeve 4. The worke of God must needs bee of the highest and greatest perfection that may bee But the beginning of a species from one roote is more noble excellent and perfect than from many because in that one both the individuall and the whole kinde also is conteined Therefore the first creature in mankinde was one alone 5. It was necessarie that the God of Unitie and peace should so create man as it might be most availeable for the maintenance of that love and peace which should afterward bee and flourish amongst men But when men know themselves to be the sonnes of one common father of them all they are more straitly tied to brotherlie love and the upholding of fellowship among themselves And this being the end the meanes must be availeable to the end Therefore the beginning of mankinde was onely from one man whereby it seemes that Adam had not his name from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Adamah which signifies earth but rather as a master observed of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Achad dam one blood as S. Paul urges it Act. 17.26 That God of one blood made all the nations of men that dwell upon the face of the earth CHAP. XV. That Man was created innocent and without Sinne. THis may appeare by the consideration of those excellencies which belong to the Creator For no cause can worke
it was created except some great contrarietie befall to the hinderance thereof But man was created to know and to love God and to see his wisdome in the creature and to honour him therfore and doing thus to be happie for ever thereby yet nothing of this is done accordingly by any among all the sons of Adam therefore some great hindrance and contrarietie is come between But nothing that good is could be an hindrance to this great good nor yet any thing which is without the man himselfe Therefore mans sinne alone which hath infected all hath beene the onely hinderance of all this good 4. The holy Scripture shewes the truth of this in Iob 14.4 Who can bring a cleane thing out of uncleannesse not one And Psal 51.5 Behold I was shapen in iniquitie and in sinne hath my mother conceived mee Rom. 5.12 By one man sinne entred into the world and death by sinne and so death passed upon all men for that all have sinned Ephes 2.3 Wee re all by nature the children of wrath And this is that taint of originall sinne which being bred in every mans bones will never out of the flesh And concerning actuall sinne you may reade those Scriptures which are cited by S. Paul Rom. 3. They are all gone out of the way they are altogether become filthie there is none that doeth good no not one c. from v. 9. to 18. CHAP. XVIII That there is a restoring of Man to a better life and further hope than that from which our parents fell BVt if the whole world be thus become guiltie before God is it for this end that the whole world may bee subjected to eternall death God forbid but as sin hath abounded unto condemnation so hath the grace and righteousnesse of God abounded much more unto everlasting life for as by the offence of one judgement came upon all men to condemnation so by the righteousnesse of one the free pardon came unto all men for justification unto life See Rom. 5. Chap. Therefore lest man at the sight of his owne perfections should sinne through pride unrecoverably as the devils it was permitted that Adam should sinne as hee did that a way might bee made for the justice and mercie of God to bee manifest and that man at the sight of his sinne might be humbled before his Creator and so received to grace The whole world then being liable to the justice of God by that sinne of our first father as hath beene shewed now it remaines in this place to prove that there is a possibilitie to returne to God in whose favour and acceptance onely is life and happinesse And for the more cleere proofe hereof let us first lay this sure foundation that all the workes of God and all the possibilities in the creature are knowne to him from all eternitie Secondly that to doe well and right and to withstand sinne and the temptations of the devill requires a positive strength and grace in the heart of man which grace man cannot take unto himselfe because no creature can be partaker either of being or of strength or any good but onely so far forth as it is imparted thereunto and where the want of strength is the effect of that want on all occasions must needs appeare So that since Adams fall man being not onely deprived of that strength to resist sinne which Adam had but also infected with a naturall corruption and inclination to sin which they call concupiscence man hath no helpe in himselfe to helpe himselfe upon which grounds the reason will follow thus If there be not a possibility of the restoring of man into the favour and grace of God from which hee fell by his sin then could not the justice of God be without great iniquity and injustice Let him be mercifull that we speake according to the manner of men that is according to that reason and understanding which he hath given unto men for the manifestation of his glorie and grace For if God in the infinity of his wisdome foreseeing that man being created would sin and yet would create him and for his sin utterly cast off the whole race of mankinde to destruction neither could any place of mercie bee found with him for which the creature could give him glorie neither could that justice be but with great injustice inasmuch as they that never were should without any desert be created to eternall punishment and they that had done the least sinnes nay they that had done neither good nor ill as they that die in their infancie should bee shut out to eternall death aswell as they that all their life time had followed all manner of sinne with greedinesse So also all the commandements of God tending to the amendment of life and all his threatnings and promises should be in vaine So also all the endeavours of holy and devout men who through his grace strive to the masterdome of their owne wickednesse and all the constancie of them who have suffered for the profession of his truth and service should be unrewarded So vertue should have no advantage over vice in the difference of the reward But all these things are impossible therefore there is a restoring of man to that favour and grace of God from which he was separate by his sinne 2. If there were not a restoring of mankinde to that estate from which he is fal'n then the sin of man a finite creature should be more powerfull to the destruction of the worke of God who made man to everlasting life than the power wisdome of God should to the upholding of the creature in that estate wherein he created it So ill and sin things not being shold have preheminence for mischiefe above an infinite power and goodnesse for glorie and happinesse But this is impossible therefore as by sinne there was a generall wrack of mankinde so it is necessarie that there be a generall restoring powerfull and sufficient for the sinnes of the whole world avayleable and effectuall to all that beleeve it and shew the fruit of their faith by their strife against sinne and doing such good workes as God hath created that we should walke in them 3. Faith hope charity temperance and all other Christian and morall vertues are the worke of Gods Spirit in man who of himselfe is not able no not to thinke a good thought But it is impossible that the Spirit of God should worke in vaine or to no end in the heart of man to beleeve the forgivenesse of his sinnes and to hope for everlasting life c. or that God should not accept his owne worke in his creature which is ever for the good of the creature Therefore there is a restoring of man to those hopes of happinesse which he had lost 4. The continuance of the world and the creatures therein by a being of infinite power wisdome and goodnesse must bee to an end exceedingly good therefore there is a restoring of man
that the effect of that goodnesse may appeare in his everlasting life and happinesse for if the continuance of the world bee for the multiplication of mankinde onely for satisfaction of the divine justice upon mankinde for his sinne then should it bee necessarie that the world were everlasting that the everlasting justice might receive everlasting satisfaction but so the greater power of the Creator in the longer continuance of the world should bee for the greater affliction and hurt of the creature so the infinitie of his power should bee infinitely distant from his mercie and pitie the effect of his goodnesse toward his creature so he should have made the creature and the continuance thereof because he hated it not because hee loved it But all these things are impossible and against the dignities which wee have before proved to bee in God one infinite being Ergo. § 1. From hence also it will appeare that the restoring is to an estate of further happinesse than the continuance of that naturall life in which and unto which Adam was at first created For if the advantage in the recoverie were not greater than the losse was by the sinne then had the sinne beene permitted to no end then had the losse been sustained in vaine and all those afflictions which mankinde hath ever since endured should be without recompence in the reward But it is impossible that God should permit sinne in man and the punishment thereof afflictions and death onely to set man in the same state wherein he was before for that had been to no end at all it had beene in vaine to suffer his owne justice to bee violated in vaine to give his Sonne to die onely to restore man to that state which hee had lost wherein hee might have been kept and all these inconveniences saved Therefore the recovery is with a super excellencie of glorie and happinesse far above that which Adam lost 2. It is the glorie of the wisdome of God out of the greatest ill to bring the greatest good The greatest ill which the devill by sinne could bring upon man was the losse of his worldly life and happinesse and to make him liable to the wrath of God and so to eternall death therefore the infinite mercy and wisdome prepared so powerfull a remedie against this poyson of the old Serpent that the life and happinesse in this world was changed to that which is to be in eternitie in the heavens with an exceeding weight of glory which no words can utter neither can it come into the heart of man to conceive And this with that assurance of the favour and love of God in Christ from which neither height nor depth nor principalities nor powers nor things present nor things to come shall ever bee able to separate us Rom. 8.38.39 CHAP. XIX That the restoring of Man to the favour of God could not be by any meanes that was in man nor by any one that was man alone WHat hast thou O man which thou hast not received and if thou hast received that which thou hast of grace alone whereas thou could'st claime nothing of duty what is that merit of thine either of condignity or of congruity for which thou canst challenge either reward or acceptance is there not a bond of dutie and thankfulnesse to him of whom thou did'st receive it And if man have received of God his whole being and whatsoever he hath of outward blessings or inward graces how can hee give any thing to God which is not his owne 1 Chron. 29.14.16 So that whatsoever a man can doe which may seeme pleasing to God yet when hee hath done all hee must acknowledge himselfe an unprofitable servant because hee hath done onely that which hee ought Luke 17.10 But being besides in danger of the judgement of God both for his originall and actuall sinne shall hee bring for his ransome ten thousand rivers of oyle or the fruit of his body for the sinne of his soule Mic. 6.7 Oh madnesse of merit and satisfaction where are those workes of supererogation that treasurie of the Church by the pedling and sale of which that purple whore hath lived in pleasure and glorified her selfe But see the reasons of the conclusion 1. Every offender against an infinite justice must in justice either make an infinite satisfaction or else indure an infinite punishment But no finite creature either man or Angell can make an infinite satisfaction so then there is no returne to the favour of God by the mediation either of man or Angell 2. Where an endlesse debt is still increased there no payment can bee lookt for But man by his originall sinne being infinitely indebted doth still increase the debt more and more by his actuall transgression Therefore from man no amends can bee lookt for 3. No creation can bee without an infinite power as it hath beene prooved therefore much lesse can the restoring of the creature being fallen from the estate of Grace For in the Creation there was nothing which hindered the worke of the Creator But in the estate of sinne there is an impediment first in the corruption which is in the understanding and frowardnesse of the will turned away from God Secondly in the concupiscence whereby man is inthralled to the service of sinne c. Thirdly the power of the devill where to a man is subjected by his sinne Fourthly the Iust sentence and wrath of God The soule that sinneth shall die the death O Man see what thou doest when thou doest sinne Can'st thou flee from thy selfe yet the devill will overtake thee Canst thou escape the devill yet the vengeance of God will surely lay hold on thee Therefore there is no Redemption of hope in him that is man alone 4 No man can pay for another that for which he is indebted himselfe But every man and every other Creature doth owe unto God whatsoever it is or whatsoever it can doe Therefore no man only man can supply toward God the want of another mans service much lesse make satisfaction for his sinne as it is said in the 49. Psal v. 7. None can by any meanes redeeme his brother nor giue to God a ransome for him And if the injury were infinite and the satisfaction impossible to be made by a finite creature to which of the Angels shall man turne himselfe And there shall hee finde a further inconvenience For seeing the offence was made by man It is necessary that Iustice seeke satisfaction where the offence was made As an unity in number once broken cannot bee made up by the same parts into which it was broken Objections 1. But you will say a finite Creature cannot doe an infinite deed and therefore cannot commit an infinite sinne thereby to deserve an infinite punishment Answer The sinne is not esteemed according to the littlenesse of the Sinner but the infinity of the sinne is first in regard of Him against whom the sin was that is God whose infinite glory
without it neither the pagans and infidels nor yet the false Christians can bee without excuse But that every one that knowes doth of himselfe according to this knowledge frame his will constantly and effectually to desire whatsoever belongs to eternall life Pelagius will never bee able to demonstrate For he that wils any thing constantly and effectually wils also those meanes constantly and effectually without which that thing cannot bee come unto And because without holinesse no man can see the Lord Heb. 12.14 in whose presence onely is the fullnesse of blessing and joy for evermore Psal 16.11 in the narrow path of which holinesse because the godlesse Pagan and loose living Christian cannot nor will not walke therefore they cannot bee said effectually either to will or to desire everlasting life But this is that speciall grace reserved for the vessels of mercy by which they are not inforced against their will but of naturall men naturally unwilling are made willing to follow Him that drawes them with the cordes of love to love that which is pleasing in his sight and so to will and desire constantly and effectually to follow that which is for their soules health So this desire being wrought in them by Him that is able to fulfill the desire of them that feare Him is a pledge unto them that their hope shall never bee ashamed And thus the weakenesse of the assumption and falshood of the conclusion doe plainely appeare 6. But hee is accounted a cruell creditor that will exact more then his debtor can pay and hee a cruell Lord that requires of his servant that which hee cannot performe Therefore the most mercifull God requires of man no other satisfaction then that which man is able to performe Answer It is just that God should require of man that he enabled him to performe For otherwise His justice should bee deficient or wanting towards Himselfe and his glory likewise unduely esteemed And the cruelty of a Creditor is to require more than a man is able to performe by himselfe or by his suretie Therefore our most mercifull Lord foreseeing the malice of the Devill and the sinne of man thereby to the glory of His infinite grace provided us a Saviour before we had sinned For whose abundant satisfactions sake wee have a doore of entrance as wide as the Valley of Achor set open unto us that by His merit alone wee may come boldly unto the throne of grace there to find helpe in the time of need Of which Mediator we are now to speake in the Articles following ARTICLE II. ⧠And in Iesus Christ His onely Sonne WEE have seene the wretched estate of man to which he is subjected by reason of his sinne whereby he is unavoydably lyable unto the wrath of God which he is utterly unable to indure and from which to escape there is no meanes in his owne power Now consider with thy selfe most wretched caitif that art afraid to die because thou hast no hope but in this life what it were for thee to stand iustly condemned to die and every minute to expect the execution of thy doome if any one could be content to die for thee that thou mightest inioy the usury of this aire but for the time of thy naturall life from which thou knowest thou must part at last But being subject to an infinite wrath to an endlesse punishment the endurance of which but for one houre hath more miserie then the suffering of a thousand untimely deathes what love canst thou owe to him what thankes canst thou give unto him that would free thee from the punishment and instead of that restore thee to an estate of life and ioy eternall And seeing it hath appeared that this cannot bee done by any one that is onely man wee are now in this second place to see what are the conditions of our Mediator who by Himselfe is able to make satisfaction for our sinne For seeing the just sentence on man was that for his owne sinne hee should die the death which because it was the word of an infinite speaker of an infinite truth it must of necessity bee meant according to the uttermost extension of the truth and so meane all death of body and soule temporall and eternall And because the Mediator for man could not endure a temporall or bodily death except hee were man therefore it shall first appeare That the Mediator for the sinne of man must bee man And because eternall death is such a thing as no man onely man can offer himselfe unto with hope or possibilitie by himselfe to overcome therefore it shall appeare in the second place That our most glorious Mediator must bee God who being of infinite life wisdome and power knew how to conquer eternall death that having in the infinite worthinesse of his owne person satisfied the infinite justice for the sinne of man Hee might give eternall life to all them that by true faith should lay hold on His merits and in thankefulnesse for that unspeakeable mercy live in obedience to his commandements And that it may appeare what the superexcellency of the knowledge of our most holy faith in the religion of Christ is and that for the worthinesse and glory thereof it farre surpasseth all knowledge of all things which men or angels can come unto it shall be made plaine in the third place how necessary and agreeing to the wisdome goodnesse and glory of God it was That God should be incarnate Great is the mystery of godlinesse into which the angels desire to looke And because our most glorious Light and guide hath in his Holy word made these things so manifest unto us let us with chearefulnesse and joy in the ready service of our best understanding follow him who in our flesh hath reconciled all things to himselfe and in our flesh hath led captivity captive and triumphed over principalities and all powers of the enemy that we being delivered might serve him in holinesse and righteousnesse all the daies of our life and be accepted of Him in life everlasting CHAP. XX. That the Mediatour for the sinne of Man must bee Man 1. FIat justitia totus mundus ruat But when man sinned it could not stand with the justice of God to punish any for that sinne but man alone And whatsoever is against the justice of God is also against his wisdome his godnesse and power for wee have alreadie proved that all these dignities are in him one most simple and absolute being Chap. 8. And whatsoever is against the power of God is utterly impossible to be therefore it must necessarily follow either that there is no reconciliation of man unto God contrarie to that which hath beene proved in the 18. Chap. or else that this reconciliation must be made by a Mediatour that is man Therefore the Father said fitly hereto Propterea nobis per Mediatorem praestita est gratia ut polluti carne peccati carnis peccati similitudine mundaremur
August de Civitate Dei lib. 10. Cap. 22. 2. God might seeme towards man an accepter of persons and towards the Angels that sinned severe and mercilesse if hee should condemne them to the paynes of eternall fire and yet accept man to mercy when no satisfaction had beene made for mans sinne in the nature that had sinned But both these things are utterly impossible and against the justice of God therefore the punishment of the sinne of man must be borne in the nature of man 3. The iust Law and sentence of the most wise Lawmaker and just judge ought to stand sure and inviolable But the sentence of death was decreed and pronounced against man if hee sinned Gen. 2.17 Therefore by man is the expiation and satisfaction to bee made for sinne 4. Every restoring of any want or corruption in nature must be by that which is of the same kinde as if any flesh in man be rotten the member is not made whole againe but by the supply of sound flesh in stead thereof If a bone be broken the breach is not made up with a sticke nor a cut sinew by a catlin so the nature of man being corrupted by the disobedience of one could not be restored againe but by the obedience of one in whom the nature of man being restored all that are partakers of his in corruption may also be partakers of his immortalitie because mans nature doth not now stand absolutely condemned in Gods justice as before 5. This argument the Apostle urgeth 1. Cor. 15.21 For since by man came death by man also came the resurrection of the dead And againe Rom. 5.19 As by one mans disobedience many were made sinners so by the obedience of one shall many bee made righteous You may yet see more reasons for this conclusion in the Chapter next following CHAP. XXI That the Mediatour for the sinne of man must bee God THat the Angels in glorie with such perfections as they had should sinne malitiously when there was no tempter makes their sinne without excuse and them in justice unpardonable and although the sinne of man in comparison of theirs may seeme much lesse and more pardonable in respect of that low estate of mens creation in comparison of the Angels that his sinne was not malitious nor without a Tempter yet when it is well thought on how hatefull a thing to God sinne is how His pure eyes cannot behold ungodlinesse and wrong how his infinite iustice is violate thereby and what iealousie so glorious and infinite a being ought to have of his owne honour so set at nought by so base and unworthie a thing as man who also by that sinne of his disordered the whole creature so farre forth as it was for his use and made it subject to vanitie and corruption it may well appeare of what man infinite difficultie it was to restore man to that favour and grace from which hee had fallen For in beings of which one is finite the other infinite there must bee an infinite difference and if they bee of contrarie conditions the one pure and righteous the other sinnefull and impure that contrarietie must needs likewise be infinite and an infinite contrarietie can no way be accorded or reconciled but by an infinite concord which cannot be but in Him which is partaker both of the finite and infinite being And because it hath before appeared chap. 18. That man was to be restored to the favour of God and to be reconciled againe unto him it must follow necessarily that this peacemaker must be both God and man For infinitie is with the greatest greatnesse of being and containes all the extremities thereof and such is the Being of God but the Creature being finite is set at an infinite distance from that which is infinite and therefore in a lessenesse of being as having no being at all of it selfe but only imparted by that infinite being from which degree of participation if it fall as man did by his sinne it still falls unto a further lessenesse or badnesse of estate and so becomes utterly desperate except it be upheld as man was by that hope The seed of the woman shall bruise the Serpents head And seeing the greatest greatnesse of being and the least littlenesse of being cannot bee accorded but by an equalitie of being which cannot bee but in that which doth equally participate both of that greatnesse and that littlenesse that is essentially therefore it is most necessarie that our gracious Mediatour bee essentially both God and man which will yet further appeare by these reasons that follow 1. That all mankinde by the sinne of Adam is deprived of the favour and glorie of God hath beene proved in the 17. Chapter and that there is a restoring of mankinde was shewed in the 18. Chap. Now if it bee not in the power of man or of any other finite being to restore man being fallen into the favour of God it followes of necessitie that the Mediatour or restorer must bee God But the first was abundantly proved in the 19. Chapter Ergo the second followes of necessitie 2. For every infinite offence an infinite amends must needs bee made or else there is no satisfaction The sinne of man was an infinite offence See Chap. 19. Answ to the 1. Object But an infinite amends could not be made by a finite creature Ergo the Mediatour for the sinne of man must bee God And although God cannot suffer at all yet because the punishment due to man for sinne was more than any man was able to beare it was necessarie that the manhood in that conflict should bee upheld by the Godhead that the sinne being balanced by the punishment the worthinesse of the person might make the suffering of infinite merit for the sinnes of of the whole world 3. No effect can bee eternall but by a cause that is eternall for whatsoever is this or that by accident must of necessitie be made such by that which is such of it selfe But the restoring of man is to an estate of life and happinesse which is to bee eternall as it will further appeare in the Article of Everlasting life therefore it is necessarie that it bee wrought by a cause which is also eternall But it is proved that nothing can bee eternall but God alone therefore the restorer of mankinde must be God 4. The enemie of mans everlasting salvation is the devill a most powerfull enemie whose power is yet greater against man because he pleades the justice of God against sinners therefore it was necessarie that the authour and finisher of our salvation should bee God and man that he might be able both to satisfie the infinite justice and by a greater power of his owne to withstand the great power of the devill 5. Contrarie causes must have contrarie effects and so contrarie effects must have contrarie causes and one of these is ever knowne and discerned by the other so that man by his sinne being subject
to death when it appeares what mans disease or sinne was the remedie likewise will be manifest but it is plaine that man being not content with his estate would bee God as it appeares first by the temptation of the devill Gen. 3.5 In the day that ye eat thereof ye shall be as God knowing good and ill Then by the consent verse 6. And the woman seeing that the tree was to bee desired to make one wise shee tooke of the tree and did eate If then the sickenesse were this that man would bee God the onely medicine must be this that God would bee man therefore the mediatour would be both God and man 6. To require satisfaction for the sin of man from God was to require that which was not due and that is against justice To require the satisfaction of man was more then hee could performe and that is against mercie therefore that the worke both of justice and mercie might bee perfect it was necessarie that the Mediatour for the sinne of man should in one person bee both God and man for as gold is molten in the fire because it hath parts that may bee made running yet by reason of the puritie and perfection of those parts it cannot be consumed by the most violent flames so our Lord because hee was truly man did feele and endure the pangs of most bitter death and was compassed about with the sorrowes of hell Psal 18.6 yet for the innocencie of his manhood and the glorie of his deitie he could not be overcome thereby 7. It is impossible that a pure creature should have such sufficiencie of merit that in Gods justice the sanctification of mankinde should be due to those merits because all holinesse that can come to any creature whether of vertue or of workes must come thereto from God so no praise or merit can in justice bee due to any man for that which God hath wrought by him therefore the Mediatour of mankinde must be God 8. Every particular man being onely man is of much lesse worth than the whole race of mankinde and so insufficient in justice to make a sufficient satisfaction for the sins of all men therefore that all mankinde might be freed from their sins both originall and actuall it was necessary that the Mediator who should make satisfaction for their sinnes should be both man from whom the satisfaction was due and yet of more worthinesse then all mankinde that his merit might make the ransome sufficient for the sinnes of all men But nothing is of more worth then all mankinde but God alone therefore the Mediatour for mans sinne must bee God For although the Angels bee more excellent then man according to the condition of their present being yet not in respect of the end of their creation First in that they are ministring spirits for mans sake Heb. 1.14 Secondly in regard of their common end in that both the one and the other are to bee blessed in God alone Thirdlie And if any one man cannot bee accounted more worthie then any of the whole kinds of beings that were created as our Lord said Yee are more worth then may sparrowes Luke 12.7 He said not all for no species in the creature may be missing and yet the health of one man was priz'd above the life of 2000 swine Mar. 5.2.13 How can any thing beside the Creator himselfe bee more worthie then all mankinde 9. The greatest benefit which God could bestow upon man must of necessitie be by the greatest gift which hee could give vnto him The greatest benefit was in this to save and redeeme him when hee was utterly lost The greatest gift which he could give to man was himselfe therefore it was necessarie that God should become one with man that in man he might save man that was lost 10. This is that riddle which the Psalmist takes upon him to open Psal 49. where after hee hath shewed that no man either by his wealth or honor can make any ransome for another hee concludes that it is God which redeemes the soule from the power of hell Therefore the Prophet saith Esay 9.6 To us a childe is borne Ergo he is man To us a Son is given not borne but given ergo he is God even the mightie God as S. Paul saith 2. Cor. 5.19 That God was in Christ reconciling the world to himselfe To this purpose you shall have many texts of Scripture hereafter Chap. 23. n. 5. CHAP. XXII That God would bee incarnate VPon that text which is in Psal 91. v. 11. He shall give his Angels charge over thee to keepe thee in all thy wayes some have thought that the sinnes of the rebellious Angels was that when God had created man and arretted the charge of him and his posteritie to the Angels they supposing the state of their creation to be farre more excellent and honourable then the state of man as doubtlesse it was if the hopes reserved and purchased for us had not beene farre beyond those whereto we seemed to be created refused to performe that service to so meane a creature for which disobedience being cast off they have ever since persecuted the woman and her seed And this opinion seemes to have had the originall out of the Alkoran See Wem à Budowes de fab Alk. pag. 157. Some other thinke they were not rejected for any one offence but for three offences and for foure that is for continuall rebellion they were not spared and so for many ages before mans creation they were adjudged to the paines of eternall fire though the execution of their sentence be prorogued untill the number of the sonnes of pride be utterlie fulfilled Of this you may see Postell de Nat. Med. ult It is not fit to determine what is the certaine truth in those things which the holy Scripture hath not declared but because the soule of man is his image who inspired it and that he our Creator the wisdome of the Father knowes all things ex fundamento as he hath seene with the father therefore this image of his will also bee enquiring that although it cannot know what the originall of things is according to all their orders of causes yet by the effects will it be prying into the causes of them And if it doe this with reverence and modesty it oftentimes findes strange helpes beyond that it hoped for and if herein it bee lawfull for others also to propose opinions it may seeme not altogether improbable that the sin of the devill was this That finding himselfe in the first order of the creature he thought that God who out of his infinite goodnes purposed to bring all the understanding creature to the uttermost happinesse which it could be capable of which could not bee but in the uniting of the creature unto God for God in his absolute and infinite being could not be come unto nor apprehended much lesse be enjoyed by a finite creature except hee would be pleased
all the other dignities of God as concerning their outward working must be in littlenesse and lower than that possibility whereto they may come But this is not to be affirmed Therefore the incarnation followeth reasonably 9. Every efficient the more noble and excellent it is the greater and more excellent are the effects which it doth bring forth But the greatest effects are not brought to passe but by the greatest meanes Now there is no efficient more noble or excellent than God no effect better or greater to the Creature nor more honourable to the Creator than the everlasting happinesse of his Creature no means greater or more effectuall than that he become one with his creature Therefore that the creature may bee happy in Him and his honour and praise perfected in the Creature it was expedient that God should dwell in His Creature even in Man 10. By how much any efficient is greater in power by so much more effectually doth it worke to magnifie the end of his worke and so to set it free from littlenesse contempt and unworthinesse of himselfe From which contempt and unworthinesse the creature is set furthest when it is deified and God himselfe is become one with man So the incarnation is the most glorious worke which can bee wrought in the creature To denie then the indwelling of God in his creature were to deny the most glorious worke of God to put an infinite emptinesse betweene God and his Creature wherein no meane should bee and so to exclude the Creature from all accesse unto the Creator which were to put the creature in everlasting contempt and unworthinesse of the Creator so infinite and glorious For the creature being set at an infinite distance from the happinesse which is in the Creator should have no meane whereby it might partake of the infinite glory For no perfection in the Creature being simply and absolutely finite can bee partaker of that which is infinite without the Mediator God and man as it is said Ioh. 14.6 No man commeth to the Father but by mee 11. It is to bee held that God the most wise workemaster of all things should in the creation of the world propose to Himselfe the most noble and excellent end which must bee concerning Himselfe the manifestation of His owne dignities and perfections in the Creature and towards the Creature the greatest perfection which was possible to be therein But if there bee no incarnation neither of these things could be performed Not the first because the divine goodnesse might have done a better worke in his Creature his infinitie a greater his glory a more excellent c. Not the second for seeing God is that superexcellent Goodnesse of which every thing according to the measure thereof desires to be partaker and by man may bee partaker in as much as man participates with every other thing and every other thing being with him if there bee no incarnation this desire of the Creature is vaine the end thereof frustrate and thereby it is subjected to eternall paine the hoped end being impossible to bee attained unto But all these things are inconvenient Therefore it is requisite that God bee incarnate 12. God is infinitely good chap. 4. and so the most lovely being without comparison And therefore are wee most justly charged to love Him with all our heart with all our soule with all our might Deut. 6.5 But God would not require to be wholly and perfectly loved by man except He himselfe did that for man by which Hee might most of all deserve mans love For otherwise he might seeme to require of man beyond that which were due and so the perfection of that love should bee founded in the goodnesse and kindenesse of man toward God not in the goodnesse and mercy of God toward man But this is not so For wee love God because Hee loved vs first and gave His Sonne to bee the propitiation for our sinnes 1 Ioh. 4.10 If then God have done that for us by which above all other things He might deserve our Loves and that nothing can so much deserve our Loves as if he would be pleased to become one with us it was expedient that God would be incarnate 13. That there is an eternall life both in soule and body will appeare hereafter in the meane time it shall be but a supposition Now in eternall life it is necessary that the manly being attaine to the uttermost perfection both of the soule and body that as his understanding so his outward senses be also most pure and perfect But if there were no incarnation seeing the divine glory in it selfe is utterly unapprehensible by our senses and by our understanding neither our understanding nor our sences could have any object wherein to rest and sabbatize and being created without the injoying of their uttermost felicity they would bee the originall of misery and sorrow when as they should bee fit to receive the perfection of all intellectuall and sensible formes from an agent naturall and supernaturall as the Mediator is and yet received it not So also the divine glory should not cause happinesse nor be inioyed by all possible meanes whereby it may cause happinesse and bee inioyed by a meane naturall and supernaturall But if there be an incarnation then the infinite glory dwelling in this mediator may be apprehended and inioyed and make the Creature happie by all meanes whereby it is possible to be happie Therefore God would dwell in his Creature And this argument I suppose may stand well with that scripture Exod. 33.18 and 20. verses where to that request of Moses That he might see the glory of God it was answered that no man can see it and live By which it followes that after death when man is utterly separate from sinne he may see and shall be partaker of that promise which is in Matth 5.8 Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God which blessing is more particularly described Psal 36.9.10 They that put their trust under the shadow of his wings shall be abundantly satisfied made drunke as some reade it others plenteously moistened with the fatnesse of thy house and thou shalt make them drinke of the river of thy pleasures c. all which the faithfull shall see and inioy to the full in the Mediator God and Man without whom there is no approaching unto God And as this argument is good for the soule and understanding so is it for the outward senses For if the bodily senses make for the increase of punishment in them that are damned so shall they also bee for the increase of happinesse in them that are saved If you desire moe arguments to this purpose you may consider them in the 21. chapter The authorities of the holy Scripture may bee seene in the end of the chapter following The objections against this doctrine of the incarnation you may see in Tho. Aquin. cont Gent. lib. 4. ch 40.49 53. 54. CHAP.
a man Colos 1.13.14 God hath delivered us from the power of darkenesse and hath translated us into the kingdome of his deare Sonne in whom wee have redemption through his blood Col. 2.9 In Christ dwelleth the fulnesse of the Godhead bodily 1. Tim. 3.16 Great is the mysterie of Godlinesse God was manifest in the flesh justified in the Spirit seene of Angels preached unto the Gentiles beleeved on in the world received up to glorie 1. Iohn 4.14 Whosoever shall confesse that Iesus is the Sonne of God God dwelleth in him â—nd hee in God By which texts it is plaine that the Saviour of mankind must bee both man and God dwelling in man and the second person of the holy Trinitie which we call the Sonne Notes a THe subject no other than the termes For the understanding of this see my second part of Logonomia Introduct Sect. 4. numb 11. b Hee tooke on him the humanitie If it bee most true which is said Col. 1.19 that all fulnesse should dwell in him yea all the fulnesse of the Godhead bodilie how can it bee but that if Christ dwell in our flesh all the persons likewise must bee incarnate For all the Persons together make but one infinite fulnesse of the Deitie And therefore 1. Tim. 3.16 it is spoken without any distinction of Persons that God was manifest in the flesh Answer To become man was a personall proprietie of the Sonne of God for the incarnation was not of the Godhead wherein the Persons are one but of that subsistence according to which the three Persons are distinguished So that as in the Trinitie there be three persons in one nature so in the mysterie of the incarnation there is one person in two natures Now why the person of the Sonne and none other could become man the reasons before doe make it plaine And although it bee most true that all the Persons together are but one God in the infinitie or fulnesse of the Deitie yet is it as true that the infinite fulnesse of the Deitie is in all and every person alike as the fulnesse or perfection of mankinde is in every man equally Neither is that in Tim. spoken without distinction of the persons for it followes immediately He was justified in the Spirit What is that but that the Spirit of God the holy Ghost did justifie his doctrine and Gospell as most true in causing the hearts of all the faithfull to beleeve it But it is most manifest that the witnesse is neither the thing witnessed nor the person in whose behalfe the witnesse is given Neither was this witnesse of the Holy Ghost onely but also of the Father from heaven 2. Peter 4.17 1. Iohn 5.9 10 11. Compare herewith if you please the note g on Chap. 24. § 9. Object 1. In the end of which Chapter you may see other objections fully answered Our Lord. CHAP. XXIIII That this Jesus the Sonne of the Virgin Mary whom the Christian faith confesseth is the Saviour of the world THat reverend and fearfull name of God is a name of glory but the word Lord importeth the title of that right which he hath in his creature And how justly this belongs to our Lord Christ may appeare by that interest which he hath in us â—oth by thâ— right of our creation and of our redemptiâ—n and of all the benefits which we hope thereby What right he â—ath in us for our creation it hath appeared in that wee are his workemanship Chap. 13. § 9. Now it remaineth that we make it manifest that he alone is our Mediatour and that besides him there is no other for if the Saviour of the world must of necessitie be man that hee might satisfie the justice of God for the sinne of man as we have proved Chap. 20. and likewise that he must be God that hee may be able to heare and to save all them that come unto him as was manifest Chap. 21. and that the Sonne of God tooke on him our flesh that by him the love of God might be manifest to the creature as it was proved Chap. 23. If there can be but one Sonne of God as it was shewed Chap. 12. and the note thereto it must follow of necessity that there can be but one onely Saviour of mankinde which Saviour is our Lord Iesus the Sonne of the blessed Virgin Mary as it is further manifest by these reasons following 1. It is necessary that all the dignities of God bee magnified in the creature according to the uttermost greatnesse which they can have therein But if this Iesus whom we confesse be the Saviour of the world then all the dignities of God are magnified according to the uttermost extent of greatnesse which it is possible they should have in the creature and that without any abatement or lâ—sning in any one of them for his mercy is magnified to the uttermost in pardoning the sins of many for the merit of one his justice and love in this that he spared not his only Son but gave him to death for a satisfaction for the sin of mankinde his glory in that â—he creature once sinfull and mortall is made partaker of glorie and immortality his wisdome that out of the greatest ill the destructi n of the creature by the malice of the devill he hath brought the greatest good that is the exaltation of the creature beyond that state of happinesse wherein it was created Chap. 18. § 2. and so in the rest But if this Iesus bee not the Saviour of the world as the Iewes affirme if when that other Bar-Coziba of theirs shall come he preach the same doctrine and doe the same glorious miracles which our Lord hath done though it be impossible that God should suffer the world to be so mocked then the same most high and glorious truth should bee both preached and confirmed by a most false and lying Prophet who should professe himselfe the Saviour of the world and was not yet neverthelesse seeing our Lord was the authour and manifester of that truth he shall have the honour to be beleeved and the falshood shall dwell with that other to come But if he shall preach any other doctrine than this which wee have received then neither can the dignities of God bee magnified in his greatest and most excellent worke in the creature that is in the salvation of mankinde as was shewed before neither can his Scriptures bee of absolute authority when another manner of Saviour shall come than they have described unto us but both these things are utterly impossible and therefore this Iesus whom the Christian faith confesseth to be our Lord is the Saviour of the world and beside him there is no other 2. If this Iesus whom wee acknowledge bee the Saviour of the world then the expectation of the most excellent and virtuous men is quieted and at rest in the assurance of his heavenly promise But if this bee not hee but that the Saviour is yet to
that had the husband Esay 54.1 For he came unto his owne but his owne received him not Iohn 1.11 And therefore was hee made a light unto the Gentiles unto the uttermost ends of the earth Esay 49.6 Acts 13.46.47 that is to us even to us of this Island utterly removed from all the world beside Glory be to thee O Lord most high f Gen. 49.5 6. Simeon and Levi brethren their swords are the instruments of violence Into their secret let not my soule enter Let not my glorie be united to their assembly for in their rage they slew the man and in their selfe will they houghed the oxe The interpreters differ in the translation of this text first about the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 mecherotheikem which some bring from the roote 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 chur a furnace or crucible but translate it in their habitations as if it descended of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ghur to sojourne or dwell as a stranger others derive it of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 machar which among other things signifies a sword and may well bee the theame of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 machaers in Greeke a sword by which word Arius Montanus doth translate it most fitly to the sence and without any understanding of the word in Another difference is about the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shor which being pronounced shur signifies a wall and for the authority of the Chaldaean Paraphrast is by many interpreted they pulled or digged downe the wall In which sence though it agree well to that purpose for which I cite it that the high Priests of Levi and the Scribes of Simeon through their malice and violence against our Sauiour caused him to die so in their selfe will pulled down the wall of partition between the Iewes and Gentiles yet the word being pronounced shor as it is pointed in this place doth every where signifie an oxe and so with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies to pull out by the rootes or to cut a sinew as it is used 2 Sam. 8.4 and 1 Chron. 18.4 Hee boughed their chariot horses is by the Greeke and some other good interpreters here turned as you see 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they houghed the oxe neither is there at all any mention of digging downe a wall Gen. 34. where this deed of the sonnes of Iacob is recorded but that they made spoile of all their cattell And although the other sonnes of Iacob were actors in this businesse yet was it by the instigation of Simeon and Levi as the whole multitude before Pilate were perswaded by the Priests and Scribes to aske Barabbas and to kill the Lord of glory Now concerning their scattering among the other tribes of Levi you may reade Ioshua 21. of Simeons scattering in the cities of Iuda of Dan in mount Seir also and the countrey of Amalek you may reade Ios 19. and 1 Chron. 4. from verse 24. to the end And as the Levites though dispersed yet for their zeale in avenging the idolatrie of the Israelites Exod. 33.26.7 8. had this honour from God to teach Jacob his judgements Deut. 33.9 10 so the Simeonites likewise tooke this honour to themselves to be teachers of the law in the Synagogues of Iacob as the Levites in the scholes of Israel as the Thargum of Ierusalem hath recorded and by these was that fulfilled which Iacob here prophesies concerning the man of men slaine by them and that oxe the great sacrifice for the sin of the whole world sinew-cut or deprived of all strength or life as concerning his flesh which fact of theirs the Patriarch doth so detest as that neither his tongue nor thought should give consent thereto For although the ignorant multitude thought that the Messiah should come in worldly glory yet the Prophets knew that his kingdome was spirituall and that by his death they were to be freed from death and him that had the power of death to whom they were subject because of sin And therefore was it that Davids heart smote him when he had cut off the lap of Sauls garment for Saul was a figure of Christ lest by that fact he were likewise a paterne of them and so in some sort partaker with them of whom he prophesied Psal 22.18 They parted my garments among them But you say the Scripture is not to bee strained for by that meanes everie thing may be made of any thing but there is one onely sence of the Scripture and that according to the letter I Answer Our Lord saith That Moses writ of him Can you shew it by the letter hee said indeed A Prophet shall the Lord raise up unto you from among your brethren like unto mee him shall ye heare So he raised up David Salomon Esay and the rest and they did heare and beleeve them but him whom the Father sent they beleeved not Iohn 5.38 Therefore this was not hee of whom Moses wrote Is this your literall understanding He saith also that Ionas was a signe of his buriall and yet there is not a letter of it in all the booke of Ionas Adam said This is now bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh and therefore shall a man leave his father and mother and shall bee joyned to his wife Saint Paul from hence Eph. 5.32 and Heb. 2.14 câ—â—cludes that seeing the children were partakers of flesh and blood therefore the Mediator also must be incarnate But hee could not prove it by the letter and therefore hee calls it a great mysterie So then there is a mysticall sence of the Scripture as well as a literall And the mysticall is rather to bee taken in this place because the Patriarch himselfe in the first verse of this Chapter promises to tell them what shall befall them in the last dayes Now it is manifest that of the three estates of the Church First under the law of nature Secondly of the ceremonies thirdly and of grace that of grace onely could bee called the last dayes For the estate of the Church under the law of nature was the first and not utterly finished till the tables made of the unknowne matier were broken Ex. 32.16.19 and then began the law of the ceremonies when the same words were againe written in the tables of stone which Moses hewed Exod. 34.1 which middle estate also lasted untill the Gospell of repentance was preached by Iohn the Baptist and was utterlie finished in the Consummatum est Iohn 19.30 and then began this last estate of grace called the last dayes as it is manifest Ioel 2.28 compared with Acts 2.17 and Hebr. 1.1 and 1 Iohn 2.18 So that this prophecie of Iacob though it were in some sort fulfilled as concerning their dispersion in the second state of the Church as I shewed yet the uttermost accomplishment of their foule offence in slaying that man figured by their crueltie toward the Sychemites could not bee till the last dayes when Christ was manifest in the flesh Compare
the same theme which might easily be written 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he created Let the students of the holy mysteries give all diligence to read the holy Scriptures in their proper language For there this treason of Arius and all other hereticks is easily discovered 7. Hee that denyes himselfe to be good cannot be God But Christ saith of himselfe Math. 19.27 why callest thou me good there is none good but one even God Answ Good is either absolute and perfect which is God alone or else imparted the image of that Good and so every thing created was very good Gen. 1. Goodnesse is likewise in the vertue and disposition of the minde as Barnabas was a good man Act. 11.24 or manifest in the workes and thus Dorcas was full of good workes Act. 9.36 and our Lord wrought many good workes among the Iewes Ioh. 10.32 In these three kindes our Lord was good as man supereminently above all the orders of created things In the first kinde he was good as God which absolute goodnesse he denyed not to himselfe no more than Hee denyed himselfe to bee God at that confession of Thomas My Lord and my God but rather taught that young man if he had had wit to follow that perfection which hee prescribed For being by the young mans owne confession good it must follow of necessity by that rule of perfection Follow me that he was God and ought to be followed and obeyed Eph. 5.1.1 Cor. 11.1 8. Like unto this are those other arguments which they bring as where it is said Ioh. 6.57 Like as the living Father sent me and I live by the Father So hee c. If he live not by himselfe he cannot be God I answer that this life which the Sonne receives of the Father is not accidentall not of grace not of foresight or purpose but substantiall and eternall seeing the generation is according to the immutable being and eternall working of the Father and his spirituall perfection onely So they object from Heb. 3.2 That hee was faithfull to him that made him and Ioh. 14.28 My father is greater than I so 1 Cor. 15.28 when all things are subdued unto Him then also shall the Sonne himselfe be subject unto him that did put all things under him and many other which you may finde cited and answered by Athanasius and especially by Epiphanius in the places quoted before Wherein observe diligently the differences betweene those termes which signifie his nature and those which have reference to the office of his Mediatorship as in the first place of Heb. 3. Consider what he was made It is plaine by the verses before hee was made the Apostle and high Priest of our profession in which office he was faithfull to him that made him or appointed him thereunto so in the second place to that The Father is greater than I note the difference betweene the Divine and humane nature for the Sonne is inferiour to the Father by nature as man and so as he is the Mediatour in the dispensation of his offices as with us he makes up the body of his Church nay even in the Divine nature the Father is that eternall fountaine whence the Sonne hath his eternall originall although the honour of sending takes not away the equalitie of power nor the excellencie of nature from him that is sent so the greatnesse there spoken of is with respect of the office of the Sonne sent into the world that the world by him might be saved In the third place of delivering the kingdome to God the Father note the communication of idiomes or proprieties of speech according to the rules of Theodoret. That the words proper to either nature become common and indifferent to the Person as the God of glory was crucified 1 Cor. 2.8 that is that Person which is the God of glorie was crucified concerning his humane nature Secondly that the communitie of names makes no confusion in natures now the word Sonne belongs to Christ indifferently either as he is the Sonne of God and so shall hee raigne with the Father and the holy Ghost eternally and of his kingdome there shall be no end Dan. 6.36 Luk. 1.33 And seeing that he as the Son of man hath received all power Mat. 28.18 John 3.35 and 13 3. as to governe his Church Psal 45. so to raise the dead and to execute judgement Iohn 5.26 27. Acts 17.31 Hee shall raigne till all things bee subdued unto him and that he hath utterlie destroyed all the workes of the devill sinne ignorance and death Iohn 1.3.8 that as God the Father doth now raigne by him so he having performed all things which belong to him as the Mediatour may thereafter as God raigne with the Father eternally our everlasting king of glory when God shall be all in all his children as he is in him I am the more briefe in this argument because their arguments are answered in part before § 4. And because this question is neere to that which followes immediately and againe because it is the principall subject of that treatise by me so often mentioned therefore for conclusion first consider the danger of this venome which at once poysons all our hopes of that full satisfaction which is made unto the justice of God by the death of Christ for if he be a creature only then can he not be infinite and if not infinite then cannot the infinite justice that is offended by our sinnes receive a full and sufficient satisfaction by him as you might see it proved in the 21 Chapter before And beside these reasons you may take with you these remembrances against all Arians Turkes Iewes Socinians and other hereticks whatsoever and give honour and glory unto Iesus our Lord and God Esay 9.6 Vnto us a childe is borne unto us a Sonne is given and his name shall be called The Mightie God the Everlasting Father the prince of peace Ier. 33.15 16. In those dayes the branch of righteousnesse shall grow up unto David and Ierusalem shall dwell safely and he that shall call her See Mat. 11.28 is Iehovah our righteousnesse Micah 5.2 Out of Bethlehem shall hee come forth unto mee that shall be ruler in Israel whose goings forth are from everlasting Rom. 9.5 Christ is over all God blessed for ever and ever Amen and 1 Iohn 5.20 We are in him that is true even in his Sonne Iesus Christ This is the true God and eternall life § 10. Thus then our Lord Iesus being declared mightily to be Sonne of God by the testimony of the Father from heaven by his owne profession of himselfe confirmed by his glorious miracles Iohn 5.36.37 by his resurrection from the dead Rom. 1.4 by the consent of the Apostles and Prophets and by the testimony of the holy Ghost in the hearts of all his Children and being truly man by the testimony of his very enemies the onely question remaining concerning his beeing is that seeing all fulnesse must dwell in him
doe necessarily follow the nature and being of any thing is to destroy the thing it selfe so that to deny either the divine or humane will of Christ were to make him an unsufficient mediator and is directly contrary to that scripture which is Luke 22.42 Father not my will but thine be done 4. From whence Iordanus Brunus a Neapolitan in my time in Oxford would inforce a more wicked conclusion That Christ was a sinner because His will was not in every respect answerable to the will of God And because that which comes into the wicked imagination of one may proove a stumbling blocke to another I will by the way remove this out of the way Therfore I answer That because man knowes not nor may presume to know what the secret will of God is hee may in the freedome of his owne Will will desire pray for and indeavor any thing which is not contrarie to the revealed will of God and that without sinne especially in such things as stand with the naturall desire of all the creature in the preservation of it selfe in the present being which it hath As a sicke man without sinne may use diet medicine and prayer for recovery although God in His secret will have determined he shall dye Davids purpose to build the Temple though against the purpose of God was so well accepted of God as that he thereupon received the promise of a perpetuall succession even till Christ the eternall king to come of his seed 2 Sam. 7.11 to 16. Nay when Hezekiah had heard the sentence of death from God Himselfe by the voice of his Prophet Esay 38. was his prayer and his teares accounted sinnefull which God did so far accept as that he confirmed his petition by a miracle And although our Saviour knew himselfe to have come into the world that He should dye for the sinnes of the world yet might he without sinne pray unto His Father to save Him from that houre John 17.17 especially divers figures affording that hope was not Isaak in the very stroake of death rescued by the voice from heaven when the Ram was offered up in his stead Gen. 22. was not the scape goate Leu. 16.21.22 on which all the iniquities and sinnes of the sons of Israel were put sent away alive into the wildernesse But wherein was this repugnancy of his will to the will of God Not my will but thine be done He denyed his owne will he laid downe not onely his life but even the desire of life that he might performe the will of his Father so that the true conclusions which arise from hence or the like places are these first seing all men naturally desire to live and would not bee unclothed that is would not die 2 Cor. 5.4 but rather that our mortality might be swallowed up of life as it shall be with them who are found alive at the comming of the Lord 1 Cor. 15.51 and 1 Thes 4.15 16 17. Christ our Saviour was truly man both in the nature and all the naturall properties of a man contrarie to the heresie of Eutyches and the Monothelites of which you may reade further if you will in Thom. Aquinas contra Gent. lib 4. Cap. 36. Secondly and because every pure and meerely naturall propertie is concreated with the thing whose property it is and that the desire of life is naturally in every thing which hath life and that without sinne lest â—e that put this desire in the creature should be supposed a cause of sinne it was â—o sinne iâ— our Saviour to desire life upon that condition contrary to the folly and falshood of Brunus Thirdly seeing that God the Father so loved the world as that he refused to accept the prayer of his owne beloved Sonne when hee besought him with strong crying and teares for life but would give him to that most bitter death for us what confidence and assurance of life may wee have when the price of our redemption is paid and hee our Redeemer restored unto life for if while we were enemies we were reconciled unto God by the death of his Sonne how much more being reconciled shall we bee saved by his life Rom. 5.10 ARTICLE III. ⧠VVhich was conceived by the Holy-Ghost CHAP. XXV ALthough it were said to Abraham That in his seed all the nations of the earth should be blessed so that the Humanity of Christ was in Abraham and the fathers originally and so descended unto Him yet you may not thinke that any determinate * You may see the contrary opinion in Galatin lib. 7. cap. 3. matter descended from Abraham or the rest of which the Manhood of Christ was to be made peculiarly no more then the manhood of all others that descended from them And as no more so no lesse was He in the loynes of Abraham then the other Israelites But yet with this difference That whereas all other men being borne according to the law of concupiscence are subject to originall sinne from both the parents a Hee being not so borne was not subject thereto And because He was not borne according to the flesh but according to the promise according to the Law of the eternall life that is of the eternall Father onely on the one side without a mother and so of His mother onely on the other side without a father Therefore was He as not subject to sinne so not tithed in Abraham when he gave tithes of all unto Melchizedek Genes 14.20 as Levi was Hebr. 7.9 10. for tithes are an acknowledgment of sinne in him that is tithed and a confession that he needs a mediator unto God But Christ being a Priest for ever according to the order of Melchizedek did therefore in Melchizedek receive tithes of Abraham and by Melchizedek blessed him with whom He had before-hand established His promise Gen. 12.2 3. Now when the fulnesse of time came that this promise of God should bee fulfilled the blessed Virgin Mary being sanctified by the Holy-Ghost unto holinesse of life and puritie of affections was so highly favoured and accepted of God as that in her tender yeeres for they write that shee was not above fourteene yeeres at the message of the Angel shee was vouchsafed worthy to bee the mother of the Saviour of the World Her heart being therefore purified by the Holy-Ghost to beleeve the promise of God made to her by the Angel and by him to bee perswaded of the possibilitie thereof Hee wrought in her also a free consent thereto a full submission to the will of God and a desire of the performance of the promise Reade Luke 1. from 28. to 39. Thus according to the nature of the Holy Spirit she first conceived her sonne in her Spirit or understanding and holy desires then by the working of the Holy Spirit that seed which is the originall of man-kinde was sanctified separate and sequestred into the place of naturall generation and the Eternall Son invested therein that according to the time
that dwelt therein Against the errors about the soule of Christ whether that of Arius or Apollinarius or them that had broached the opinion before their time that Christ had not an humane soule Ignat. Epist ad Philadelph you shall have the most effectuall reasons out of Athanasius Epist de Incarn D. I. C. contra Apoll. 1. There were so many parts in Christ living as He was resolved into when He was dead But He was resolved into two the body which was buryed and the soule which went downe to hell Therefore there were two parts of Christs humane being a body and a soule which two together doe make a whole and perfect man 2. If either the Word or a supercelestiall understanding had beene in a sencelesse body then could not that body have felt either paine without or much lesse inward griefe But the soule of our Saviour was heavy unto death Mat. 26.38 Therefore Hee had a humane soule 3. A thing of one kind cannot bee given as a fit ransome for a thing of another kind but a body must bee given for the ransome of a body and a soule for the ransome of a soule Therefore that Christ might be a sufficient Redeemer it was necessary that He should have both an humane body and a humane soule 4. If either the created Deitie of Arius or the supercelestiall spirit of Apollinarius had beene in Christ in stead of the humane soule then could He not have given His soule for His sheepe But Hee was that Good Sepherd which said downe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 His owne soule or life for His sheepe Iohn 10.11 Therefore He had a humane soule 5. If Christ had not had a soule by the departure of which His body was dead then had not He by His death destroyed him that had the power of death Hebr. 2.14 neither had he triumphed over death by His resurrection neither had Hee beene a sufficient sacrifice and redemption for them that were dead in trespasses and sinnes and so had His comming beene in vaine But all these things are impossible Therefore Hee was in all things like His brethren except their sinnes Hebr. 2.17 6. If Christ had had either a life-lesse body or sensitive onely and in stead of the humane soule either a created deitie or a supercelestiall spirit then had He beene neither God nor man and so an unmeet and insufficient Redeemer of the world For neither had such a body beene perfect man neither is a supercelestiall spirit nor a created deitie perfect God Yet had Apollinarius his reasons though hee erred from the truth and by his reasons it seemes that he had most reverent thoughts of Christ For thus he argues 1. Mans soule is the seate of sinne of anger concupiscence and the like But these things could not be in Christ Therefore neither the humane soule in which onely they dwell Answere Anger sorrow compassion ioy and such motions of the soule are either ordinate which are subject to Wisedome and the rules of the divine Iustice expressed in the Law of God and these were in Christ and were not sinfull But the inordinate affections onely are sinfull and could not bee in Him which knew no sinne 2. Two perfect things in their perfection could not possibly become one Therefore that the God-head with the man-hood might become one Mediator it was necessary that the man-hood should bee assumed imperfit otherwise the Mediator had been two persons Answ This argument was answered before Note g Chapter 24. § 8. Yet in briefe I say that the word perfect hâ—th a two-fold meaning For the God-head tooke the Man-hood unto Himseâ—fe perfect that is According to those parts wherein the perfection of the Man-hood doth consist of Body and Soule But as our Lord in His child-hood did grow in Age Stature Wisedome c. So before His birth did he grow from state to state till the full time of naturall birth And thus the Man-hood was assumed imperfect that is Not yet having attained unto that perfection whereto it was destinate in the Birth the Youth the Manly age and state Therefore that feare of Apollinarius of two persons in Christ was needlesse For beside this that the Humane nature was both conceived and taken to the Divine in one instant nothing in mankind can be called a person till it be living and that it be per se sola of it selfe which seemes not to be before the birth But this is without doubt that that which is sustained or hath the being in another can no way of it selfe be accounted a person But it is manifest that the Humanity of Christ is sustained onely in His divinity You know the received opinion touching the originall of the Soule § 3. Though by all these heapes of Arguments which you may read from Chapter 21. to this place I have beaten out the braines of that beggerly Brat of Ebion which affirmed that our Lord was begotten by Ioseph of his wife Mary as all other children yet you may see how the stinke of that carcase doth rise vp against this Article that He was borne of a Virgin so dangerous a thing an heresie is in matters of Faith But for answere to those reasons that are brought hereto you may reade the Note g § 4. on the 24. Chapter before And although it bee proved by infallible arguments that is to say from authority of Holy Scripture and reasons drawne there-from that our Lord Iesus was both conceived and borne of a Virgin that Hee might be free from originall sinne whereto all the race of man-kind is subject which are begotten and borne according to the common law of humane generation yet would I not be understood in any thing which I haue said thereto to speake contrary to that which the Apostle hath Heb. 13.4 That marriage is honourable among all men for whom it is necessary But notwithstanding the reasons that Christ must be borne of a Virgin the mind will still be asking how He could bee truely man and yet His mother a Virgin Seeing wee have detested the heresies of Valentine Apelles and all such madnesse Whereto I answere That the mysterie of the Gospel is as the treasure of the unsearchable riches so of the manifold Wisedome of God into which the Angels desire to looke Eph. 3.8.10 1. Pet. 1.12 And therefore the pure and simple truth of God being delivered unto you by His holy Apostles and Prophets and after being made manifest by such proofes as reason cannot except against it may seeme an unreasonable thing yet further to require satisfaction for the possibilitie thereof For to an infinite power all things are possible And as our Saviour was conceived so also was Hee borne and His mothers Virginitie saved As He came to the Apostles when the dores were shut Iohn 20.19.26 But you say His body was then changed and made Spirituall He being raised from the dead I confesse it But yet that power by which He hid or made Himselfe
although this Kingdome was to be a spirituall Kingdome of Grace and Glory Ioh. 8.36 yet that is not first which is spirituall but naturall So that our Lord IESVS according to the right of naturall descent by His mother See Luke 3.5 ver 24 c. and of legall right by His father Ioseph See Matth. 1. was the true and lawfull King of the Iewes as he is confessed by the Magi from the East Matth. 2. proclaimed by Pilate Iohn 19.15 19. and professed by Himselfe Iohn 18.37 and that not by any reserved and doubtfull meaning but by a plaine and direct answere according to the q estion of Pilate Art thou the King of the Iewes For for this cause was he borne that He might beare witnesse to the trueth He therefore being both lawfull and naturall King of the Iewes according to His descent from David and that by an unquestionable right of descent as the succession of that Kingdome had stood from David to Iehojakiâ— above 400. yeeres and after the captivity from Zorobabel to Ianna Hircanus almost 300. yeeres and that by the covenant of God Himselfe to David which was to be established in Christ for ever it must follow of necessity that Ioseph had no children by Mary his wife as Helvidius barked For so the right of that title to the Kingdome of David should have been to that heire who had the right by naturall descent from both parents rather then to him which had right onely by His mother and adopted father Neither had this which I plead been good onely for Iosephs sonnes but also for his daughters if he had had any by Mary his wife as it appeares in the case of the daughters of Zelophehad Numb 26.7 8. Wherefore seeing it cannot be supposed but that the holy Virgin blessed above other women and freely beloved should not have bin denied the blessing of children if she had desired any after her Son IESVS it will follow of necessity that for the eternity of Davids kingdome to which our Lord had the only right not by intrusion or disannulling of a better title I meane in civill right He was that stone cut out without hands that shall fill the whole earth and that the blessed body of his mother according to that vision of Ezechiel 44. was that East-gate or ordinary way of entrance into mankind in which the Prince did sit to grow before the Lord as he that eates bread even untill the time of His birth when He should goe out thence perfect man And because the Lord God of Israel had entred in by that gate Therefore should it be shut that no man might enter in by it but that the holy Virgin should continue a virgin as in the conception and birth so for ever after a virgin For neither had the outward Sanctuary of the Tabernacle nor of the Temples afterward any such secluded gate but that both Priests and People did go in and out thereat to doe their dayly service So then that mysticall Temple of Ezechiel must needs intend the Temple of the Virgins body by which God Himselfe entred into our Tabernacle and came forth God-Man blessed for ever Amen ARTICLE IIII. ⧠1. Suffered under Pontius Pilate was 2. Crucified 3. Dead and 4. Buried CHAP. XXVII WHat the infinity of that glory was of which the Sonne of God did empty Himselfe when He clouded it under the forme of a servant all the Angels in heaven cannot comprehend Yet such was the infinite love of God to man as that for our sakes a Hee was pleased to be borne man that b by His partaking of our sufferings He might become a faithfull high Priest for us unto God that we might be made partakers of His glory For a friend loveth at all times and a Brother is borne for adversity Prouerbes 17.17 His friends we are if we doe whatsoever Hee hath commanded us Iohn 15.14 neither is He ashamed to call us brethren when Hee saith Psal 22.22 I will declare thy Name to my Brethren In the midst of the Church will I praise thee Hebr. 2.12 Now what these sufferings were it is in part manifest by the Prophets and by the Evangelists Such was His poverty as that He was borne in a stable among the beasts A manger was His Cradle In His infancy He was persecuted by that cruell King that sought His life and compelled Him to seeke His safety by banishment in a forreigne land The poore Trade of a Carpenter was His meanes of maintenance that had made all the world Subiect He was to our infirmities of Hunger Thirst Heat and Cold Weariâ—â—sse and Griefe both of mind and Body neither had Hee lesse afflictions though He were free from sicknesse But when the time came that He should shew Himselfe to bee that Redeemer that was to come then was He most busily tempted by the devill rail'd on and reviled by His ministers that praised themselves therefore Say we not well that thou art a Samaritane and hast a devill then was he loaden with injury and scorne His life was sought by treason and at last betrayed by His owne Schollar But how great was the anguish of His mind how great was His affrighting at the sight of that death whereby He must fight against the fierce wrath of God inflamed against Him that had set Himselfe the surety to pay for the sinnes of the whole world Arise ô Sword against my Shepherd against the man that is my fellow friend saith the Lord of hostes I will smite the Shepherd and the sheepe shall be scattered Zach. 13.7 What was that anguish of His mind that forc't Him thrice to pray with strong crying and teares and to sweate like drops of blood running downe to the earth That that bitter Cup might passe away verely the sorrowes of hell compassed Him about and the snares of death were before Him Psal 18.5 Yea so were the sorrows of His heart enlarged as a man that sought for comfort and could finde none He prayes and comes to His Disciples to seeke some ease by their mutuall speech but they are fast asleepe and there finds He none Thus while the God-head doth rest toward Him Psal 22.1 And according to the law of Iustice leaves him in His pure humanity to beare the burden of our sinne alone while all the waves and stormes of Gods wrath passe over Him while the dogs of hell with their severall temptations compasse him about while the horrible curse of the Law euer sounds in His eare Cursed is every one that confirmeth not all the words of this Law to doe them Deut. 27.26 which curse Hee that had become our surety Psal 40.7 Hebr. 7.22 must beare for every one What marvell was it if He prayed that His soule thus left alone might be delivered from the power of the dogge that He might be saved from the Lions mouth being thus beset with the hornes of the Vnicornes Read Psal 22. and 69. But yet remembring that for our cause
wash't his hands Matth. 27.24 And was He innocent and just most vnjust and wicked Iudge ought not a Iudge aswell to defend and deliver the innocent as to punish the wicked If He be innocent Why doest thou most unrighteous Iudge betray the innocent to the power of His accusers Take yee Him and iudge Him after your owne Law Iohn 18.31 If He be innocent Why doest thou torture Him with scourges and thornes and the mockery of a purple robe Iohn 19.1 2 c. Why doest thou deliver Him to the will of His enemies Luke 23.35 Thus the wicked play in the credit and welfare of the righteous and account it no sinne if they can have any pretext to say they are innocent Thus our Lord was denyed His right to His Kingdome Luke 19.14 betrayed by His rebellious Subjects His life was set at nought to save a murderer vnjustly accused stript of His clothing And beside all this of losse which He endured He suffered all that paine and punishment which they could bring upon Him As first His base and scornefull apprehension as of a thiefe in the night 2. His being hurried from place to place from Iudge to Iudge 3. The most unjust sentences of Blasphemy of Treason of Death 4. His Buffeting Mocking Whipping Crowning with all kind of contempt and scorne and 5. That by a most unjust Iudge who still profest Him innocent He was betrayed to the will of His adversaries to be Crucified 6. And yet because nothing could glut the gorges of those bloody Priests in the agonyes of death behold a fresh onset of Scorne and Reviling Matth. 27 41. 7. Neither will the abjects be left out with their Gall and Vinegar 8. No nor yet the theeves in the same condemnation with their upbraidings O man of sorrowes and contradiction Behold and see all you that passe by if there were ever any sorrow like unto that which was done unto Him wherewith the Lord afflicted Him in the day of His fierce anger Yet were all these things but small afflictions in comparison of this that God had withdrawne the light of His comforts from Him For this cause alone were His roarings powred out My God my God why hast thou fo saken mee Yet may it not be thought but that He was still one with the Person of the God-head and that not onely in His agony on the Crosse but in death also when His soule was parted from the body So that although there was a dissolution in nature of the Soule and the Body yet the unity of the Man-hood with the God-head was still saved in the Person of the God-head See Acts 2.27 But although this acte of Pilate in himselfe was most unjust yet in God the Father whose Person Pilate in that iudgement did represent the act was most righteous and just That Pilate in his Iudgement represented God the Father it is manifest not onely by this That all power is of God Rom. 13.1 but even in this very case by that which our Saviour answered unto Pilate Thou couldest have no power at all against mee except it were given thee from above Iohn 19.11 In this act therefore of Pilate God did summon and judge the whole world to answere for their sinnes And because euery mouth was stopped and the whole world was found subject to the judgement and wrath of God for their sinne therefore was it necessary that the condemnation and punishment should fall on Him to the full that had set Himselfe to answere for us lest no flesh should be saved So through His sufferings as we were condemned in Him by Him are we also saved But it comes now to be enquired Why our Sauiour should be condemned to a death so infamous as to be 2 Crucified THere were foure kinds of death appointed for Malefactors by the Law of God Stoning Burning the Sword Hanging by the necke The particular offences you may finde gathered from the Hebrew Doctors by Henry Ainsw on Exod. 21.12 And although Hanging amongst all those was accounted the most easie death yet on that kind of death was the curse pronounced as you see Deut. 21.22 But if they that committed the least sinnes and therefore suffred the most easie death were accursed as the adulterer c. how much more they which sinned in higher degrees and were judged worthy of greater punishment This kind of death by nailing to a Crosse more cruell then any appointed by the Law of God was in common use among the Romanes after their first Kings especially for their slaves See M. T. Cic orat pro Rab perduell and Lips de Cruce lib. 1. cap. 12. over whom every Lord had power and vsed to crucifie them for theft and especially for running away After it grew in use for the baser sort of malefactors though free-men as theeues and such like and for their provincialls And when the lawlesse power of the Emperours had made all slaues then they that called themselues Free-men and Citizens of Rome were also crucified at the will of the Emperours as you may see Lips de Cruce lib. cap. 15. et lib. 2. cap. 7. But although this kinde of nayling on the tree by which our Lord did dye was not in use among the Iewes as Lip de Cruce lib. 1. cap. 11. supposes unduly confounding the staking strangling on a Gibbet or bough and nayling on a Crosse yet by the interpretation of S. Paul Gal. 3 13. did the curse directly belong to this suffering of Christ wherein He was made a Curse for vs. Now among those reasons why our Saviour should dye by this most vile and infamous death of the Crosse The first shall bee even from thence because it was most base and shamefull For seeing man-kind by his sinne had forsaken God his just and lawfull Lord and made himselfe a slaue to the Divell what manner of death but the most vile and shamefull could He be judged worthy of that had so falsly and basely transgressed And therefore was it necessary that He who had made Himselfe mans surety and put Himselfe in his stead to beare his punishment should also die by the most infamous death of the Crosse the punishment of slaves that had run away from their Lords 2. It is fit and necessary that the Sonne of God should be exalted to the highest degree of glory The greatest glory is not due but to the greatest humility The lowest degree of humility that can be is to be subject to the most shamefull death Therefore that our Lord the Sonne of God might be exalted to the highest degree of glory it was necessary that He should first be abased to the death of the Crosse Neither is this an argument of amplification but founded in the rules of the infinite Iustice and therefore urged by Saint Paul Philip. 2. verse 8 9 10. He humbled Himselfe and became obedient unto death even the death of the Crosse Therefore God hath exalted Him and given Him the Name which is
and earth Ier. 23.24 Therefore as God is said to have come downe from heaven not properly but in respect of His dwelling in the Manhood So is the Sonne of man also said to be in heaven not properly but in respect of the unity of His humanity with the Godhead According to this sence Hee said also Iohn 6.38 I came downe from heaven to doe the will of Him that sent me as you read before Note g § 10. ob 9. on Chap. 24. Another Text which may seeme to make for Valentin is 1. Cor. 15.47 The first man is of the earth earthly the second man is the Lord from heaven Yet this prooves not that the body of Christ was not taken from His mother but rather that as wee are staâ—ned with or ginall sinne by Adam so are wee washed and clensed by the blood of Christ for so it followes Verse 49. As we have borne the image of the earthly we shall also beare the image of the heavenly And although it be said The second man is the Lord from heaven yet prooves it not that He brought His body from heaven but rather because wee understand nothing of heavenly things but by bodily likenesses therefore is Hee called the man from heaven to signifie that new manner of being which God had with us in our nature and to assure us that Hee our Redeemer is our eternall God able to save us and man with us that doeth pitie our miseries 3. The Heresies of Apelles are refuted by Epiâ—hanius Haer. 44. briefly and plainely but this which concernes the body of our Lord moâ—e fully by Tertullian in his Booke De carne Christi You shall have what I held fit to gather from both or to adde thereto The arguments of Apelles are in part all one with those of Valentin already answered The rest are these that follow 1. If the Angels appeared in flesh not taken from mankinde much more might Christ But the first is true therefore the later Answer The consequence in the Proposition is not good For the Angels came not to die therefore not to be borne as our Lord Himselfe appeared to Abraham not borne of a woman because the time appointed that He should die was not yet But when the fulnesse of the time was come that He by His death should take away the sinnes of the world then God sent His Sonne made of a woman Besides this they are beside the question For to proove their Position that Christ tooke His body of the Starres and Elements they ought to proove that the Angels also tooke such bodies But that they cannot proove For if the Angels made themselves that which by nature they were not why might they not doe it by that which was not 2. It is said Matth. 12.48 Who is my mother and who are my brethren If then Christ had no mother or brethren but in that spirituall kindred of them which kept the word of God He had no body taken of the Virgin Answer No man would have told Him that His mother stood without which did not know that shee was His mother Therefore the circumstances and time of His speech must be observed He was now in the businesse of God His Father for whom all earthly parents must be denied as He also answered Luke 2.49 3. But the flesh of sinfull man was an unfit and unworthy dwelling for Him that came to destroy the workes of the devill Answer As sinne the worke of the devill was brought into mankinde by the body and the bodily sences as it appeares Gen. 3.6 The woman seeiâ—g that the fruit was good for food and pleasant to sight tooke and did eat it So wâ—s it necessary that sin e should be destroyed in the body oâ— that flesh wherein sinne was conceiâ—ed and wrought Moreo er the difference not of the matter which must be one but of the Spirit of sanctification wh ch was in Christ made His body a fit sacrifice for sinne But concerning this unworthinesse alleadged answere was made before Note a ob 1. 3. on Chap. 5. 4. But if He had flesh like ours Hee should have beene begotten like us Answer The consequence is not good as was shewed before Note a § 2. on Chap. 26. 5. If the flesh of Christ were the same with ours the common accidents of both should be alike so that our flesh should forthwith rise againe like His or His like ours bee resolved to dust Answer When our Lord had fully satisfied the Iustice of God for the sinne of mankinde it had beene against Iustice that He which had done no sinne should have still continued under the power of death and therefore imposible Act. 2.24 But our bodies doe therefore still rest in hope because all H s enemies are not subjected unto Him among which the last is deâ—th 1. Cor. 15.26 Therefore for concâ—usion of this point over and above those reasons which you had in the twentieth Chapter and the authorities in the end of the three and twentieth Chapter and these which are heere already cited take that of Eph. 5.30 We are members of His body of His flesh and of His bones So that if we know or beleeve that we our selves have a body oâ— flesh and bones we must also know that our Lord had a true natura l and humane body as one of us Which authority is yet of so much the greater regard because it was prophesied in Parad ce Gen. 2.24 That our Redeemer should be incarnate that in the body of His flesh through death He might â—reâ—ent us holy a d unblameable Col. 1.22 For seeing the chi dre are partakers of flesh and blood Hee also Himselfe likewise tooke pâ—rt of the same that thro gh death Hee might destroy him that had the power of death that is the devill Heb. 2.14 Reade the Chapter from verse 5. unto the end and see how many arguments you find to this purpose onely The fancies therefore of these Hereticks being lighter than vanity it will follow that all those opinions which might seeme to bee raised there-from were as false as foolish As first that of Celsus That the body of Christ was not subject to paine and griefe Against which Saint Origen disputes lib. 2. Cont. Cels For as for that Stoicall vnsufferance of His mind which Clemens Alex. Strom. lib. 7. thought not to bee subject either to joy or sorrow it was onely an over-sight in so learned a Writer and directly contrary to the Text of the Scripture Iohn 11.35 Matth. 26.38 where Iesus wept and was exceeding sorrowfull even unto death And concerning the joy of His Spirit See Luke 10.21 Secondly that of Saturnilus That Christ did suffer onely in shew Epiph. Haer. 23. Thirdly that of the neat-heard Basilides who taught that Simon of Cyrene was crucifyed in Christs stead Epiph. Haer. 24. Of all which if any thing were true what thanks were due to Him from vs when He had suffered nothing for our sakes
because the honour which was done to God herein is valued according to the worthinesse of the Person which worthinesse in Christ is essentiall unto him not accidentall as that of Aaron therfore the satisfaction also is essentially infinite and therefore abundantly sufficient in respect of the Person that did fulfill it For the satisfaction to an infinite Iustice was as fully made by the Person of the Sonne an infinite being than if the creature being finite even all Angels and men had suffered the torments of hell eternally Secondly the infinite value of the satisfaction appeares in the worthinesse of the thing that was offered For our Mediator having no greater nor better sacrifice to offer unto God as nothing could be better then that which was equall to God offered Himselfe God and man for the saving of His people as it is said Ier. 3.23 Truly in the Lord our God is the salvation of Israel Thirdly the value was increased by the manner of the offering wherein was the perfection of the obedience of the eternall Son to His Father and the perfect submission of the humane will of Christ unto the will of God that this sacrifice might by all meanes be meritorious in Him for us See Note g on Chap. 24. § 11. No. 4. The second meanes whereby the satisfaction of Christ according to the rigour of Iustice was perfect is the greatnesse of that punishment which He endured for us which in proportion was answerable to that death which in Iustice was due to the sinne of man having the same degrees and parts which punishment Christ so farre foorth as it was possible for the Sonne of God did endure First the bodily death with all the circumstances as I remembred before Then the losse of that Ioy and Comfort of His soule wherewith the fruition of God and the fulnesse of His graces did euer replenish Him And this Ioy Hee lost not finally or fundamentally as the damned for that was impossible both in respect of His innocencie and of His union with God but onely according to the present act and feeling Thirdly he was subjected to the powers of hell not enthralled thereto as a vassall but yet subject for the present vexation and temptation so that His soule and understanding was affrighted in sorrow and horrour knowing Himselfe to be made a curse for us which brought with it a full sence of the Iustice and wrath of God against sinne Fourthly and although it bee most true that God cannot suffer either paine or losse as was shewed even now yet it is as true that God having taken to Himselfe the living Tabernacle of a soule and body offered this soule and body of His to death for us as it is said Act. 20.28 That God purchased His Church with His owne blood and not so onely but for a time left that body under the absolute power of Death and Buriall And thus the Iustice why Christ should die for our sinnes and the plenary satisfaction which Hee hath made unto God thereby doeth plainely appeare Now a reason or two why and how the benefit hereof doth belong unto us 1. First seeing the person of our Redeemer is infinite and therefore His merit also infinite â—n infinite reward is due thereunto which if God would not give O pardon that we sâ—eake in the voyce of reason Thy gift in us then Hee were unjust if He could not then were He unable to requite But both these things are impossible And seeing hee that makes a recompense for any desert either gives to the deserver that which he hath not or forgives that which hee might require and yet our Lord to whom the reward of His obedience and death is due neither needs any thing nor can receive any thing more then He hath having in Himselfe the fulnesse of all perfection and all things which the Father hath Iohn 17.10 Neither yet needs forgivenesse having never offended neither yet can so great obedience and such an infinite merit bee all in vaine therefore doth this infinite reward redound to us so that we which claime by His Title may draw neere unto the Throne of Grace in the full assurance of faith that God doth not nor will not refuse them that come unto Him in the name of His Sonne seeing unto all them that seeke salvation and eternall life by Him all His infinite merit doeth assuredly belong For that which is infinite can no way become divisible for so should it cease to bee infinite So His infinite merit belongs to every one of His according to the infinity thereof See the doore of our hope set open wider then the walles of heaven See how God with Christ hath given us all things See also if the infinite merit of Christ can any way be compatible of any mans merit or the mediation of Saints 2. Seeing our Lord Iesus being God could not become man but by the power of God Chap. 25. 26. who of the whole nature and substance of the Virgin made Him perfect man both soule and body And that He being thus also the Sonne of God and man did perfectly fulfill the law of a Sonâ—e to doe alwayes those things which were pleasing to His Father Iohn 8.29 whereas all other men had revolted from their obedience and so forfeited their state of Son-ship and interest in their Fathers inheritance by the sinne of the first Father Adam which was created the sonne of God Luke 3.38 therefore the whoâ—e right in that inheritance of glory and happinesse which should have come unto all man-kind is due to Christ onely So that by the right of inheritan e no man beside H mselfe can be capeable of heavenly Ioyes But because the possession of eternall hapâ—inesse is due to Him by a double right not onely that of Sonne-ship or inheritance but also by purâ—hase through the infinite merit of His most precious death whereto according to the will of His Father He became obedient for the sinne of man-kind therefore by this right hath He given an infinite right in the heavenly Inheritanâ—e to all them that come unto Him by a lâ—vely faith their hearts being â—lensed from dead workes to serve the living God In which right If He had not fully stâ—ted man-kind then had the benefit oâ— His pâ—rchaâ—e beene utterly lost So His Incarnatâ—on His sufferings and al. His promiâ—es made to vs had beene in vaine But all these things are impossible 3. Moreover it is to bee considered that the sinne of man in respect of the siâ—ner must â—eeds bee sinne because a finite creature can no way doe an infinite actioâ— but the inâ—â—nitie of the sinne is onely in resâ—ect of Him agâ—inst whom the sinne is beca se of His infiniâ—e Iuâ—tice that is offended thereby But the satisfaction and the meâ—it of Christ death was infinite not onely in respect of the inâ—initie of H s Person who perâ—oâ—med it but of Him also that did so accept it of Him that was
who hold that Hee did locally goe downe to hell so that according to the essence or being of His soule He was truely present there And as the former of these denie not but that Christ by His death did utterly spoile the powers of darknesse and so may be said virtually and by the effects of His suffering to have gone downe into hell because that by the eternall offering of Himselfe a ransome for the sinnes of the world and the performance thereof in the time appointed He did utterly free all His beleevers from Hell which was their due and setled them in the inheritance of eternall life so these latter for the most part denie not but that all this which is said is agreeable to the trueth of the Scripture and the analogie of Faith onely they cannot yeeld that it is the true and native meaning of this Article And betweene these two parties all those texts of Scripture which are brought for the locall descent of Christ are hammered so thinne that may seeme plyable every way But let the strength of the Holy Text for ever stand sure and let us see the reasons a little on all sides with their answeres and exceptions And first of them that interpret this Article by the sufferings of Christs soule Sect. 3 Object 1. As the sufferings of Christ even from the first minute of His Incarnation were meritorious for us yet our ransome from the torments of hell was wrought especially by the suffering of His humane soule which torments of His soule Hee endured not onely by the torture or fellow-feeling of His naturall body not by compassion onely on the sins and sorrowes of His body mysticall but also He might be said even to feele the sorrowes of eternall death when He saw Himselfe to be now set to suffer the wrath of God due to the sinnes of the whole world And if this bee not the proper and native sence of this Article how are wee taught by our Creed to beleeve more concerning Christ than wee confesse to be true of the theeves of whom wee may say they suffered under Pontius Pilate that they were crucified dead and buryed Al. Hume Rejoynd to Doctor Hil. I answere First the holy Scripture is profitable for doctrine for instruction for reproofe c. But the object of our faith is onely the Holy Trinity in Vnity and the satisfaction of Christ for our Redemption and the benefits which wee receive thereby And therefore although I beleeve and know by the Scriptures that Samson was the Sonne of Manoa yet I neither beleeve in Samson nor Manoa And though I know by the Scriptures that the penitent thiefe suffered under Pontius Pilate was crucifyed and dyed yet I beleeve not in him But concerning Christ as I beleeve that all His merits redound to us so I beleeve that all His sufferings were according to the Scripture a satisfaction to the justice of God for the sinnes of the world which they could not be but by the suffering both of His soule and body as it is said Esay 53. Hee shall see the travaile of His soule and bee satisfied If then wee know that whatsoever befell unto our Lord was that the Scripture might be fulfilled Matth. 26.54.56 and if wee beleeve and confesse in our Creed that He suffered according to the Scriptures and dyed and rose againe according to the Scriptures and that the Scriptures doe plainely testifie that by His sufferings and death the wrath of God against mans sinne is fully satisfied which as I said could not be but by His sufferings in His soule as well as in His body After these sufferings under Pontius Pilate what needes a second remembrance of His suffrings in soule under a title of a descent into hell Therefore when as I am bound to beleeve and confesse that the sufferings of Christ under Pontius Pilate were according to the Scriptures that is in soule and body I am bound to deny that the suffering of Christ in His soule is the native meaning of this Article He descended into hell 2. Beside the doctrine of Faith being a catechisme doctrine Heb. 6.1 and the sum thereof being for the use of children and novices it is not likely that the Church would have so generally received a creed wherin the thing to be beleeved should be laid down inwords that were tropicall and obscure when plaine and proper termes were necessary and at hand But hell cannot signifie the torments of hell but by a metonymia of the place for the adjunct of the place neither yet could it properly be said That our Saviour went down into hell when He was lifted up upon the Crosse where the especiall endurance and expression of His hellish torments were both in soule and body 2. Neither can it truely be said He descended into hell that is He suffered in soule the torments of hell but by a Synecdoche of the whole man for one part Neither were these torments of His soule more properly or truely called torments of hel then those torments of His body which we confesse He suffered under Pontius Pilate 3. Moreover after He was dead and buried it comes in unduly againe to make mention of His sufferings in soule a great part of which were endured in the garden before He came to the hands either of Pilate or of the Priests 4. And yet beyond all these reasons there is another argument that the Church did not interpret this Article by the sufferings of Christs Soule because as Gerrardus Vossius puts it De statu animae separatae Qu 1. It was the received opinion of the ancient Fathers even to this our time That the soules of the faithfull before Christ entred not into Paradise till Christ by His death had set it open and entred thereinto according to His promise to the thiefe on the Crosse And if all the soules of the faithfull were in hell taken in the second sence before mentioned though in a place of rest as Theophilus speakes and that by the comming of Christ thither they were brought to Paradise or a place of further joy then certainely this Article must in their iudgement be interpreted by the descent of Christ into hell after his death rather then by the sorrowes of His soule before it And to this purpose the learned Vossius brings some 20. Fathers from Tacianus the schollar of Iustin Martyr about the yeere of Christ 180. before whom He might have put His master Iustin as it is plaine in his Triphon Among those Fathers are Irenaeus Tertullian Origen Eusebius Athanasius Ambrose Ierom Epiphanius Chrysostom Augustin Cyril and beside them whom he reckons up he ads innumerable others and with them the sentence of the Councill of Toledo in the yeere 633. He descended into Hell that He might free them which were there detained Aug. Ep 99. writes thus If the reason be asked why our Saviour would come into hell where those sorrowes are of which He could not be held
adulterate interpretation of His sufferings is excluded 3. And seeing our Lord Christ is appointed of God to bee the Iudge of the world and that as He is the Sonne of man it was necessary that our Lord should goe downe to hell both in regard of the justice and of the mercy which ought to appeare in His judgement of His justice that the enemies of mankind the devills may not torment them according to their cruelty and hatred of man but onely in justice afflict them according to the sentence passed on them according to the measure of their sinne and not beyond as it is said Luk. 12.47 and 48. The servant which knew his masters will and prepared not himselfe shall be beaten with many stripes but hee that knew it not shall be beaten with fewer 4. And because our Lord Christ was by the Father appointed to be the Saviour of mankind it was necessary that His compassion toward mankind should by all meanes be inflamed and therefore that His soule should goe downe to hell that as by the bodily feeling of our miseries in this life He was made a mercifull and faithfull high-Priest for us Heb. 2.7 so by the actuall and present sight of those unsufferable torments He might have the uttermost mercy and compassion which can stand with justice on those whom Hee should judge 5. It is necessary for our Redeemer to passe thorow fire and water that is to have experience of all tentations and all manner of afflictions of death and hell that for us He might overcome them all But He that was the paterne of all Heroicall and excellent vertues that knew Himselfe to have come into the world that He should die that shamefull death of the Crosse Iohn 3.14 and 12.33 was not so affrighted at the bodily death but His strong crying and teares were That the pit of hell should not swallow Him up nor that deepe should shut her mouth upon Him Psalm 69.15 And Hee was heard in that which He feared by Him that was able to save Him from death Heb. 5.7 But He was not delivered from the bodily death Therefore His prayer was That He might be delivered from the power of hell Psal 22.20 21. For hereupon depended the life of the whole world not onely that He might suffer but much more on this That He might overcome death and him that had the power of death And for this great deliverance would Hee magnifie the Name of God with a song and set foorth His praise among His brethren And because the benefit of this redounds to us let us also offer the sacrifice of praise the fruit of our lips confessing His Name Sect. 9 Sect. 9. Now having thus declared the meaning of this Article It remaines that I shew for what reasons I hold this interpretation of this Article rather to bee followed then that of them who say That it signifieth onely those hellish torments which Christ endured in His soule while He was yet alive which although it be the drift of the whole Chapter before as you may see particularly in § 3. Yet to make up the garland take these flowers which have not yet beene bound up with the rest And first I put this as granted That as the Articles themselves so their interpretation must bee such as must stand in the greatest evidence and declaration of the trueth in greatest opposition to falshood and heresie and for the highest hope and comfort of the faithfull 1. Now if you follow the interpretation of the Fathers that the soule of Christ after death ascended locally or really to hell or the place of them that had died in the hope of the deliverer that was to come then it followes necessarily that the soule of Christ had a being separate and apart from the body and that it was therefore an immortall soule that died not with the body being able to subsist of it selfe without the body Whereby the heresie of the Sadduces which deny the being of spirits and soules separate and consequently the immortality of the soule and thereupon the resurrection also Mark 12.18 Act. 23.7 is plainely refuted And so that lie of the Thnatopsychitae which thought that the soule of man came to nought as the soules of the beasts and no lesse that opinion of Apollinarius That Christ tooke of His mother a vegetable but not a reasonable soule all which you see make the death of Christ and our faith in Him of none effect But if that interpretation be onely true That Christ being yet alive suffered hellish torments in His soule are any of these falshoods refuted thereby doth it from thence follow against the Sadduces ergo the soule of Christ is immortall he will deny the consequence he will yeeld it might suffer in His body but that it died with His body or against the Apollinarists therefore Christ had a perfect humane soule hee will deny it For although he yeeld that the soule of Christ suffered such torments yet he will say That it was onely by a vegetable or animall soule which suffered by compassion with the body 2. But because the heresie of Arius did trouble the Church more then any ancient heresie beside Let us see what force our battery hath against his fortifications The soule of Christ went downe to hell locally to the soules of other men therefore Christ had a soule like other men They will answere here That His created Deity which they falsly imagined went downe to the places under the earth For so they explaine it out of Iob 38.17 as you may see Answer to the Ies Chal pag. 282. But that answere will not serue For though it were a created Deity yet being a Deity it must have those conditions of omnipotencie in the creature of ubiquitie wisedome c. without which it could not be a Deitie So then that created Deitie of Christ must bee in hell before the death of Christ as well as after and those hellish torments of the new interpreters which say nothing of the state of Christs humane soule after His death availe nothing to the contrary of this heresie 3. Neither doth this new interpretation onely dismount our artillery against those ancient heresies but also dismantles our fort of that refuge and succour which the distressed soule may have in the agonies of death For bee it put that our Saviour tooke our sinnes upon Him and felt in Himselfe the fierce wrath of God against Him so as if He had committed the sinnes of all men I finde therefore that God doth not deale with me according to my sinnes nor reward me according to mine iniquities And bee it that being dead His body was buryed in the grave I will therefore say unto my grave O sweete bed of rest that wast so perfumed with the odours of His most pretious Merits But when I see my soule all over leprous with originall sinne and spotted like a Panther with actuall transgressions now going to a place
to Him alone For though she hold other Churches her sisters called faithfull and beloved and esteemes of their true Pastors and Doctors as beautifull and shining lights yet followes shee nothing of any mans because it is his whether Luther or Calvin or any other but Christ her Lord alone doth she follow according to his owne rule My sheepe heare my voice a stranger will they not follow for they know not the voice of strangers But therfore as I said before so doe I still professe that if this Church upon any light from God shall hereafter declare the meaning of this Article otherwayes than I have done I forsake my selfe to follow her so far as she shall follow Christ And if any faithfull man be otherwise minded concerning the meaning of this Article then I have shewed yet doe not I therefore hold him of another Church or faith so long as he doth hold fast the foundation one God and one Mediator betweene God and man the man Iesus Christ For the Kingdome of God is not in the excellency of knowledge much lesse in wilfulnesse of opinion in matier of doubt but in joy and peace and comfort of the Holy-Ghost while a man doth those things which he knowes in himselfe he is bound to performe ARTICLE V. ⧠The third day Hee rose againe from the dead CHAP. XXIX THe sufferings of Christ were fulfilled as wee have seene now it followes that wee see the glories that should follow after of which the first is His triumph over death by His resurrection from the dead set against that in the Article before Hee was dead and buried And although by His death He is said to have triumphed over the principalities and powers of death and hell in His Crosse Col. 2.15 that is by the power and vertue of His merit as a champion by His valour and courage in the field overcame His enemie yet the actuall manifestation of His triumph was not solemnized till by His resurrection the power and glory of His victory did appeare But it may here be asked How Christ our Lord is said to have risen againe seeing Saint Paul saith Rom. 6.4 That Hee was raysed againe by the glory of the Father To which the answere is easily returned that Christ our Lord by His owne active power as He was God raised Himselfe from the dead and as man by a passive or received power was raised againe as He said of Himselfe Iohn 10.18 I have power to lay downe my life of my selfe and I have power to take it up againe This commandement have I received from my Father For for this end was it necessary that our Mediatour should be both God and man in one Person that that which was not fit nor possible for the God-head might bee endured in the humanity as those things which concerned His death and suâ—fering and that which was impossible to His pure humanâ—â—â— might yet therein be perfected by His divinitie as Saint Paul saith Rom. 1.3.4 that He was made of the seed of David according to the flesh and declared to bee the Sonne of God by His resurrection from the dead But there is a great difference betweene the state or manner of His being before His death and after His resurrection For although the unitie of the humanitâ—e with the God-â—ead were alwayeâ— before in and after His death the same yet was not that unitie alwayes manifested in the same glory and excellency For in the first state while He bare our infirmities His body was subiect to hunger cold wearinesse death and other accidents of a naturall body His soule also though according to the principall or first acts endued with the excellencie of reason and knowledge yet according to the second acts or practise not knowing the grave of Lazarus the day of Iudgement c. In the second state also His body was deprived of sence and life His soule of the proper habitation But in His resurrection His body was raysed immortall spirituall 1. Cor. 15.44.45 glorious and as in all the perfection of grace and compassion on us so with the fulnesse of Wisedome and Knowledge to see our miseries and to make intercession for us according to the will of God Rom. 8.26 27. Now concerning the trueth of this Article that our Lord Iesus rose againe from the dead though it be most powerfully witnessed by God Himselfe by Angels and men as you may read yet because the authoritie of the Scriptures wherin those things are recorded is set at nought by Iewes Turkes Infidels Hereticks and such God lesse people let not us endeavour to leade them like sheepe that follow their shepherd but drive them like asses with the cudgell of reason And as Saint Peter Actes 2.24 takes his first argument from the impossibility of not performing those things which are contained in the Scripture so our arguments shall be from the impossibilities in reason 1. It hath been prooved before that man was created innocent Chapter 15. That by his sinne he became subiect to death Chapter 16. That there is a restoring to a better estate Chapter 18. And that the restorer of mankind must be both God and man Chapter 20. and 21. Then that this restorer was Iesus our Lord the Sonne of the Virgin Mary Chapter 24. who by His sufferings and death made satisfaction for the sinnes of the world Whence I argue thus For the greatest good that can be done for mankind the greatest ill may not be rewarded for that were unjust with God The greatest good that could come to mankind was the ransoming of man from eternall death both of the body and soule The greatest ill and basenesse is to be left continually in the state of death wherein if Christ had still continued then had He suffered the greatest ill for the greatest good which could bee performed But this was impossible Therefore our Lord did rise againe from the dead 2. If Christ who sinned not should have borne the punishment of sinne that is to be subject to the power of death yea when the satisfaction was fully ended then should His obedience to God the Father have beene not onely without reward but also for the satisfaction of the justice God had He suffered from God I speake after the manner of men extreame injustice who had neither sinne of His owne for which He should suffer and had fully satisfied for their sinnes whose surety He was But this was utterly impossible For he that fulfilleth the Law shall live therein Levit. 18.5 ergo It was necessary that Christ having fulfilled the Law Iohn 19.30 Luk. 24.44 should rise againe 3. If Christ after His suffering and death had not risen againe then had He not prooved Himselfe to be the Saviour of the world seeing none would have beleeved Him to be able to give life unto others that was not able to quicken Himselfe So His suffering had beene in vaine and His satisfaction if not beleeved should have beene to
68.20 That to Him belonged the issues of death both to passe out of death Himselfe and also to bring out His from thence Esay also Chap. 53. after He had declared His sufferings and death proves His resurrection by His dividing the spoile with the strong Our Lord also foretold His resurrection Himselfe in Mat. 12.49 and Luk. 18.33 and the b infidelity of Thomas made it certaine unto all Vpon all which texts we may firmely conclude with Saint Peter that it was impossible that our Lord should be held in the bands of death 8. And why the third day was appointed for His resurrection a reason or two are rendered Hee rose not before that none might doubt but that He was certainely dead See the 27. chap. for His death and buriall Neither was it fit to deferre the resurrection longer lest the faith and hope of His Disciples should faile Who trusted that it was Hee that should have redeemed Israel Luke 24.21 9. As Christ was man that He might suffer death Chapter 20. so was He also God the Lord and giver of life Chapter 21. But it was unreasonable that He which is one Person with the Author of life should be subject to death longer then that it might appeare that He was certainely dead and that by His owne life and power He had overcome death Therefore our Lord rose againe the third day from the dead 10. Although by the unseparable union of the humanity with the Person of the Deity the body of our Lord might have beene preserved uncorrupted for if the devills have power to preserue mans bodie uncorrupted for nine dayes Hom Iliad Ω or for a longer time as it appeares in the bodies of the Witches that die not by the justice of the Law much more might the body of the Lord have been preserued Yet because in Him and by His death the whole state of nature was to be restored the soule of Christ returned againe to the body before corruption in the course of nature could seaze on it 11. The signe of Ionas did prophesie as much Matth. 12.40 and Hosea in plaine and direct words Chap. 6.2 After two dayes He will revive us and in the third day He will raise up and we shall live in His sight For in as much as Christ our Lord doth now appeare in the presence of God for us we also are said to have risen with Him Colos 3.1 The word of Christ Himselfe is plaine to this purpose that He would rise againe Matth. 17.23 and 20.19 and Ioh. 2.19 and that even in the understanding of His aduersaries Matth. 27.63 And that it was the same Saviour that had suffered for us who rose againe from the dead the circumstances of the place doe make it evident For therefore was He buryed in a new tombe hewen out of a rocke wherein never any one had been laid because the hard-hearted and brazen-faced Iewes might have no pretext to say That any other had risen in His stead Notes a THen had it beene impossible that any of His beleevers c. Concerning the resurrection of the dead fitter place to speake will bee in the Article following Chapter 38. Here it shall bee sufficient to remember that the beleevers onely are raised up by the vertue and merit of Christs resurrection as it is said Iohn 11.25 but that the rest that shall be raised up in the last day shall rise by the power of the Father that according to the rule of Iustice and that sentence upon Adam and all his seed In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt die the death they may re eive according as their workes shall bee b The infidelitie of Thomas made it certaine unto all God that brings light out of darknesse used the unbeliefe of Thomas for a most evident proofe of the resurrection of Christ so that although he would not beleeve the testimonies of so many witnesses as had seene him alive yet his owne tryalls according to his owne manner of proofe by his finger put into the print of the nayles and his hand thrust in his side might make him to beleeve yet was nothing of all this of any availe to them that aâ—e without For as Epiphanius nor obscurely signifies Haer. 28. and Aug. De Haer. cap. 8. directly affirmes Cerinthus that Hereticke and hiâ— followers tâ—ught that Christ was onely man and consequently that He was not yet risen from the dead But both the proposition Matth. 13.55 and the conclusion Matth. 28. fâ—om verse 11. to 16. were made by the blind-hearted Iewes before our Lords ascension and still is it their errour unto this day But if no man could doe those miracles that He did ex ept God were with Him Iohn 3.2 If God alone doth know the heart If God alone can forgive sinnes Mark 2.7 8. then their seared consciences were bound by their owne words to acknowledge that He was God Yet because they ever resisted the Holy-Ghost Actes 7.51 that their conclusion might stand that He was not risen from the dead therefore with large money hyred they the Souldiers that had watched knowne well to bee takers that they should say that His Disciples had stollen Him away whiâ—e they slept But this foule lie stinks to him that hath but halfe a nose 1. For if they slept indeed how could they say His Disciples stole Him rather then that Hee rose agaiâ—e of Himselfe 2. Besides when the Disciples themselves did not beleeve nor when they heard it understood that it was poss ble that He should rise againe Mark 9.10 and 31. Luk. 18.34 no nor yet after it was come to passe could they beleeve them that had seene Him Mark 16.11 and 13. to what end should they be the auctors of such a device 3. Moreover all other circumstances are against it For if they had stollen Him away wherefore should they offer themselves the second time to a needlesse danger as you reade Iohn 20.4 c. 4. Wherefore left they the fine linnen wherein He was wrapped which either respect to the corpes or covetousnesse or haste or feare of the souldiers or all together would not have given them time to plucke off when all places were full of feare the earth it selfe trembling and quaking Matth. 28.2 5. Beside all this the Priests having such power of themselves such favour from Pilate why did they not call the Apostles in question for the fact That the whole trueth if it were as they said might have appeared and wouâ—d easily by their wit and greatnesse have beene fish't out of silly fishers if they should have gone about to conceale it But male verum examinat omnis Corruptus Iudex And because they knew well enoâ—gh that by their further questioning the trueth of God and their lie would bee manifest to all therefore neither then nor at any time afterward durst they endeavour to disproove this trueth to which God Himselfe with so great power of miraâ—les and wonders and gifts
unfaithfull in other mens wealth unfaithfull in that which is committed unto you onely in trust escape though you be long forborne He that shall come will come and will not stay to give to every man as his workes shall be not as they are here in shew or with pretext that I am but one And this is the next Article whereto ye shall be summoned Arise ye dead and come to judgement ARTICLE VII ⧠From thence He shall come to judge the quick and the dead CHAP. XXXII § 1. THe word to Iudge hath many significations in the Holy Scripture But in this Article of our Creed it is taken onely for the execution of that eternal doome upon men and Angels when God by Christ shall raise up all that are dead and by the ministery of the Angels shall bring all both good and bad before Him that every man may receive the things done in his body according to that which he hath done whether it bee good or ill 2. Cor. 5.10 So the resurrection of the body is in order of time before this Iudgement yet is it here set before it because it is a part of that glory which is given unto Christ for that abasement and blasphemy of sinners which He endured when He was most shamefully and despitefully intreated before the Priests when they smote the Iudge of Israel with a rod upon the cheeke Mic. 5.1 Luk. 22.64 and after most unjustly condemned him before Pontius Pilate And because it is fit that they which are to bee judged should behold their judge therefore the Father judgeth no man but hath committed all judgement unto the Sonne Iohn 5.22 as it is said Actes 17.31 That God hath appointed a day in which Hee will judge the world in righteousnesse by the man whom Hee hath ordained whereof He hath given assurance unto all men in that He hath raised Him from the dead So the authority or power is of the Father the administration or performance of the judgement is by the Sonne and that as He is the Sonne of man in the Person of the Deitie For as by the perpetuall influence of the Deitie upon the soule of Christ Hee is able to know the secrets of all hearts so being man touched with the feeling of our infirmities as having beene tempted in all points like as wee are yet without sinne Hebr. 4.15 He shall administer justice and pronounce His sentence with that equitie that even the damned shall confesse that their condemnation is most just But the judgement is either particular or generall For inasmuch as the soule being separate from the body is capable of joy or paine therefore immediately after the departure doth it goe either to happinesse or sorrow as it is plaine by the history of Lazarus and the rich man Luk. 16. and as our Lord said unto the thiefe Luke 23.43 This day shalt thou bee with mee in Paradise So Saint Paul desired to depart and to bee with Christ. Phil. 1.23 To this purpose you may reade more 2. Cor. 5. from verse 1. to 9. For because the deedes to which punishment is due are voluntary For otherwise they were not sinfully sinfull and that the will is in the soule not in the body therefore the punishment comes first upon the soule as it is said Ezech. 4.18 The soule that sinneth shall die and by the soule upon the body at the resurrection In the meane while as it hath beene said the soule hath a feeling of the wrath of God being shut out from His presence and a fearefull expectation of those torments which it shall endure when it shall be joyned to the body againe So also the soules of the Saints immediately after they are delivered from the burden of the flesh are in joy and felicity having the feeling of the favour of God and the full and assured knowledge of the forgivenesse of their sinnes and waiting for the time of that blessed Resurrection when they shall enjoy their bodies againe and in the meane time this is their Paradise this is their heaven And thus the sentence being beforehand passed on every man particularly that generall Iudgement is onely the publication and execution of that sentence when the blessed shall both in body and soule receive the full accomplishment of all their happinesse and the damned likewise the full measure of their torment in hell And therefore is that day Rom. 2.5 called the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous Iudgement of God And if for the authorities and reasons brought it bee evident that the soule immediately after it is departed is a partaker of joy or paine How shall we hearken to that doctrine of the Sadduces Act. 23.8 or to that Arabian errour of the Thnetopsychitae that the soule doth die with the body Or to our late dreamers the Psychopannychitae who affirme that the soule sleepes in the grave till it bee awaked againe with the body at the generall resurrection Sect. 2 § 2. Now concerning the circumstances of the generall judgement it is manifest by the word of the Holy Scripture first that that the time thereof is unknowne For Hee shall come as a thiefe in the night 1. Thes 5.2 and 2. Pet. 3.10 or as in the dayes of Noah Matth. 24.37 to 47. For as the houre of death or the time of the particular Iudgment is uncertaine to every man and that for our exceeding benefit that wee should not through carelesnesse run into sinne but that wee should ever be mindfull to watch So likewise is that day of the universall judgement For seeing all mankind must stand in this generall judgement therefore it cannot be but at the end of the world as it is manifest Matth. 13.40 c. to 49. Apoc. 20.21 And therefore in His power onely that made the world And as no wisedome beside His owne was in the making of the world so shall there be no other wisedome either in the continuance or putting an end thereto beside His owne And seeing wee know nothing of the Fathers will but by the Sonne if the Sonne Himselfe knew not the time Mark 13.32 who may presume to know it without Him But you will say how could the Sonne bee ignorant of that day seeing by the influence of the Deitie on His humane soule Hee might know what Hee would know I Answere His comming was to give life unto the world and withall the knowledge of all those things and them onely which were profitable for His Church to know and because the knowledge of the time of this judgement for the avoyding of security was no way either necessary or convenient to bee knowne therefore our Mediator would not know that which was not fit to bee revealed to His Church For He would be like to us in all things except our sinne And I have heretofore shewed that some kindes of jgnorance are not sinfull And therefore that womanish fancie that will limit the day of Iudgement to the moneth of
his heele against thee though the drunkards make songs upon thee yet remember that there is a reward for the righteous that thy innocency shall breake forth as the light and thy patience shall shine as the noone day And remember that unthankefull wretches are no new thing in the world for the Orator said long agoe and I have often found it true 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. But if that Punke could say Men ' moveat cimex Pantilius Shall he that hath experience of such monsters of ingratitude put it in the power of a sonne of Belial to disquiet his peace Therefore let the Rymer read what others judge of him Feltham Resolu Cent. 2. Ch. 56. Let him write a booke against me I will bind it as a Crowne upon my head And if for my love and for my best deserts I find enemies yet will I pray for them Psal 109.4 For seeing we know that if we suffer with Christ we shall also reigne with Him shall we not pray for them that seale unto us the assurance of this hope Therefore shall this be among my chiefest joyes That the drunkards make songs upon me 5. It may further be objected from Iohn 3.17 That God sent not His Son into the world to condemne the world but that the world by Him might be saved And if He came to save the world how shall He judge and condemne the wicked to Hell fire seeing this is contrary to the end of His comming Answer First that is spoken of His first comming onely Secondly it is manifest by the verse before verse 16. that the world in this place signifies onely the faithfull in the world for whose sake the world is and continues For to these only God gave His only Son that they should not perish but have everlasting life And as Christ was once offered for these at His first comming so for these shall He appeare the second time to salvation Heb. 9.28 For the last judgment being but the confirmation of the sentence of their justification by the death of Christ and the putting of them in the actuall possession of those promises that depend thereon their sinnes are so covered as that b there shall not be any remembrance of them in the judgement For the worshippers that are once purged have no more conscience of sinne to their condemnation Hebr. 10.2 seeing the gifts and calling of God are without repentance And therefore as a countrey-man of ours saith well Ames Med Theol Cap. 41 This judgement in respect of the faithfull is essentiall unto Christ as He is the Mediator but in respect of the unfaithfull it is of power onely given Him by the Father not essentiall to His mediation but some way belonging to the perfection thereof because the Father hath committed all judgement to the Sonne Yet let me adde thus much that although the judgement of condemnation be not essentiall to Christ as the Mediator of reconciliation yet He being the great Steward of the house of God it is essentiall to Him as the Son of God to take vengeance without mercy on them that dishonour His Father and despight the Holy Spirit of grace which by the light of their consciences proclaimes their sin unto them which they will in no wise forsake Sect. 4 § 4. 6. The last question is with those mockers that say either in words or by their continuance in their wicked deedes where is the promise of His comming For since the dayes of Henoch who threatned that Iudgement Iud. 14. above 4500. yeeres are passed and yet the world continues and that which hath beene is even that which shall be neither is any thing new under the Sun Eccles 1.9 Moreover though for your reasons against the eternitie of the world Chap. 13. it may seeme the world is not eternall à parte antè but that it had a beginning yet is it not cleare but that it may be eternall à parte pòst and continue for ever in as much as the Creator cannot repen◠Himselfe to bee the work-master of so glorious a frame So not to continue it in that being which it hath and to doe good unto it as the Psalmist confesseth Psal 104. verse 31. The glory of the Lord shall endure for ever the Lord shall rejoyce in His workes And if all the creature being made was exceeding good Gen. 1. the destroying of so great a good cannot bee but a very great ill which is farre from that goodnesse by which it was created I answere That the Text of Eccles prooves not but that the judgement shall fit at last and the bookes of every mans conscience shall be open that the judgement may be acknowledged to be according to their workes And although the time seems to us to bee prolonged that the number of the elect may bee fulfilled that the patience and long-suffering of God towards the wicked may be manifest for their repentance that the desire of the godly and their longing for His comming may be inflamed Yet to Him the time is determined and can neither be longer nor shorter than He hath appointed onely that comming to judgement hath been proclaimed so long before that in all ages men remembring the judgement might avoid those things for which they should bee condemned So for those reasons wherby you would enforce the continuance of the world for ever it hath beene answered that it is for the greater good to man and the creature which was made for his use that this world should have an end that the creature might be freed from that corruption to which it is subject by reason of his sinne then that it should still continue Neither doth that text of the 104. Psalme prove any thing to the contrary For as the glory of God had endured in eternity before the world so shall it continue when neither the heaven nor the earth nor yet their places shall be found any more Reu. 20.11 And as for that glory of His which is manifest in the creature it shall bee more wonderfull and excellent in that worke of His recreation which the Cabalists call de Mercava when the creature in the world to come shall be brought to glory and be able to consider the super-excellency of His mercy and goodnesse than it is in this worke de Bereshith or state of creation in this present world And if the deprivation of this present being seeme to be ill because the being of the creature was good in the state of creation then the taking away of all this ill and misery which is since come upon the creature by reason of sinne and the restoring of it into an estate of happinesse without comparison better and surer than that wherein it was created must in both respects be a far greater good than either to have created it such as it was or to continue it in the present being Bring hither what you finde in the 18. Chapter § 2. But because it seemes not
vice or rather should be no vertue at all when there were no difference in the reward Nay rather vertue should be vice and and vice vertue and every man the more wicked violent and bold he were should be so much the more vertuous and blessed in as much as by violence and cruelty he might without feare bring his purposes to passe to the hurt of others although it were onely to please himselfe But all these things are impossible and utterly against the truth and Iustice of God Therefore there shall be a generall judgement wherein the deeds of all men shall be tryed and rewarded 5. That which was threatned from the beginning by God Himselfe must of necessity come to passe at the last But the judgment was threatned to Adam the common father of us all and in him against us all because we were all in him originally that upon the breach of the commandement of God Gen. 2.17 we should be lyable to death both of body and soule Neither was this onely threatned at the beginning but ever since written as it were by the finger of God in every mans heart their owne consciences accusing or excusing them in the day when God shall judge the secrets of all men by Iesus Christ Rom. 2.15 16. Therefore there shall be a judgement 6. It is necessary that the judgements of God done in this world doe appeare to be just For shall not the Iudge of all the world doe right Genes 18.25 But many of His judgements are yet hid and unknowne and of them that are knowne yet the faithfull doe not alwayes see the reason thereof and so the praise which is due unto God for His justice therein is lost But it is necessary that the equity and justice of God be manifest to all that His workes may be magnified and He acknowledged to be just in His words and pure in His judgements Psal 51.4 Therefore it is necessary that there be a revelation of the righteous judgement of God in the world to come 7. No perfect judgement can be made of any tâ—ing till the full end thereof doe appeare so that although the lire of man be ended and a particular judgement passed upon him yet because many things succeed in the time to come which depend upon those things which he hath done in his life therefore it is necessary that there be a finall judgement at the last day when those dependances also shall have an end For in respect of these dependances a man may bee said to live after his body is dead and that in divers respects As in his fame either good or bad which oftentimes is very false but at the last judgement the trueth shall appeare then in his writings as the holy Prophets and the Apostles live in those Oracles which the Holy-Ghost gave out by them So Arius and other Heretickes live yet in those venomous opinions which they broached and other vaine people doe hold after them So parents live by the example of their life to the instruction or corruption of their children Maxima debetur pueris reverentia So by their correction and precepts to them in the feare and nurture of the Lord or by the neglect thereof to their destruction Doe you not heare me ye foolish and wicked parents know you not yet that you shall answere for that wickednesse of your children which they shall doe through your default And if there be any other way whereby a man may be said to live as in the furthering of good lawes So a man lives in his buildings or in the havocke of that estate which his Ancestors disposed to the use of his children in new fashions daily devised worse and worse and if there be any other thing which remaines for example either good or bad after death it is necessary that it be enquired of and rewarded in the last judgement 8. If there be not a generall judgement in which the blessednesse of the faithfull both in soule and body shall be perfected then 〈…〉 the sufferings of Christ and those glories that followed thereon should be to no end seeing He being in Himselfe God blessed above all neither suffered nor did any of all that which was wrought in His manhood for any increase of happines to Himselfe for that was impossible but that the benefit thereof might be manifest in us But this cannot be till the generall judgement For then shall the wicked see that there is a reward for the righteous Then shall they know that there is a God that judgeth the earth Psalm 58.11 Reade hereto Wisd Chap. 5. 9. All the dignities of God have heretofore beene proved to be infinite therefore also His justice which should be defective if it had not given a perfect rule according to which all judgements ought to be guided and if it did not examine all judgements thereby to ratifie or cancell them And because not onely the administration of publike justice is with judgement but also every particular action whereto the will doth consent therefore it is necessary that there be an universall judgement wherein all judgements and actions of men shall be examined and rewarded From this justice also it followeth that it ought to be well with the good and ill with the wicked And because for the most part it falles out contrary in this life therefore it is necessary so to be in the life to come See 2 Thess 1.5 6 7. 10 And because judgement is not fully executed according to justice in this world upon many offenders in great and grievous and hidden sinnes and that especially on great persons who live as they list oppresse others and hold themselues beyond the compasse of all lawes And moreover because in this state of mortality man is not able to endure that punishment which is due to His sinne therefore is it necessary in the justice of God that such sinnes being not repented of should be openly and fully punished in the world to come as it is said Esay 30.33 Tophet is ordained of old yea for the King it is prepared He hath made it deepe and large the pyle thereof is fire and much wood the breath of the Lord like a streame of brimstone doth kindle it Therefore there shall be a generall judgement 11. And if you will admit of an argument inductive it may easily be admitted that there shall be a generall judgement at the end of the world by that severity which God hath so often shewed and doth shew against sinners to put men in remembrance of that great day As the drowning of the world for their cruelty in the dayes of Noah The overthrow of Sodom for their unnaturall lust The captivity of Ierusalem by Nebuchadnezzar for their idolatry And at last the utter casting off of that nation for their unbeliefe The publike calamities of Plague Warres Earthquakes and overflowings of Waters to the overthrowing of Cities and Countreys famine and death every houre attending on
for their justification unto life although they were not baptized as it doth stand with His justice to condemne them because they are tainted by their Parents For the children of the faithfull see the judgement of Saint Paul 1. Cor. 7.14 For the Infants of infidels I say onely this What hast thou to doe to judge another mans servant Hierax and his followers are accounted hereticks because they condemned the Children that died before they had knowledge yet brought he a shew of authoritie for his opinion out of 2. Tim. 2.5 No man is crowned except he strive But I answere that Christ in His agony did strive for them and His merit apprehended by the faith of the Parents brings them within the compasse of the Covenant made to Abraham and to his seed as Saint Paul argues Rom. 4.16 Gal. 3.6 7 8. and 1. Cor. cited before Epiph. Haer. 67. addes hereunto auctorities which make the case most cleere especially for the Infants of the faithfull as that in Psal 145.9 His tender mercies are over all his workes and Matth. 21.16 Out of the mouth of Babes and Sucklings hast thou perfected thy prayse Matt. 19.14 Of such is the Kingdome of Heaven and argues that although the Children of Bethlehem had not knowledge of Him for whom they suffered yet can it not bee but that they should bee partakers of glory for His sake for whom they suffered Hereto you may take that in Matth. 18.14 It is not the will of your Father which is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish 3. But the Doctors square most about them that lived both to know and to doe both good and ill For some thinke that all such must come into judgement for all their workes their words and thoughts But others say that neither the Infidells because hee that beleeveth not is condemned already Iohn 3.18 nor among the beleevers they that are perfect shall come into judgement because there is nothing in them for which they should be condemned But if the infidells never heard how could they beleeve Rom. 10.17 and is there any among the beleevers that can say his heart is cleane Therefore the great businesse in the judgement will be as they suppose about them that knew God and lived in His Religion whose workes good and bad being examined and compared together if the good be moe and over-ballance the bad the doers shall be justified unto eternall life but if the ill deeds exceed they shall be condemned to punishment This seemes to bee the judgement of Lactantius lib. 7. cap. 20. to whom as syding with him Iohn Voss De extr Iud. Pte 1. Thess 4. writes Ierom August Greg. the Greate and Isidore of Sivil But Lactantius hath many things concerning the worlds restoring and the last judgement which to many of this age would seeme strange which perhaps wee may see hereafter Ierom and Augustine are by and by brought by him into the number of them that thinke that all sinnes indifferently shall be brought into judgement though not by way of enquirie or examination yet of condemnation as Ierom speakes impios negatores non judicabit sed arguet condemnatos And thus you see how the Saints already have judged the world But let us see how farre it is fit to approve or reprove their judgment Sect. 2 § 2. First concerning the faithfull in Christ because they as I said before § 3. num 5. at the houre of their death are admitted into a degree of everlasting happinesse and are put in the full assurance of the perfection thereof at the resurrection of their bodies their sinnes are assuredly pardoned and the pardon by those graces is sealed unto them And after their sinnes fully pardoned to bring them againe into remembrance at the generall judgement seemes too inconvenient Therefore they shall be partakers of that blessing which is Iohn 5.24 never to come into judgement And Psal 32. verse 1.2 that their sinnes shall be forgiven fullie covered and no way imputed unto them and in this respect are they equall unto the Angels because their sinnes shall be forgotten as cast into the botome of the Sea but the good deeds which God hath wrought in them and by them shall be remembred that they may be rewarded and thus far wee follow the Doctors But because their judgements are otherwayes contrary to the rule which is 1. Cor. 4.5 Iudge nothing before the time untill the Lord come who will both bring to light the hidden things of darknesse and will make manifest the Counsells of the hearts Let us first see what the Scripture saith of the infidells whom they so cast away as that they hold them not fit to be judged then let us looke on that which they speake concerning the comparison of good and ill workes together for eternall life or eternall punishment 1 For the first it is manifest by Saint Paul that the workes of the Gentiles whom they call infidells shall come into judgement where hee saith Rom. 2. verse 14 15 16. That the Gentiles doing by nature the things contained in the Law shew the worke of the Law written in their hearts their conscience bearing witnesse and their thoughts accusing or excusing them in the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Iesus Christ Now this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this written word of the Law is the knowledge of sinne Rom. 3.20 And seeing every man whether Christian Iew or Gentile hath the knowledge of sinne in himselfe therefore is every mouth stopped thereby and all the world is become guilty before God and consequently subject to judgement as Saint Iude saith verse 14. and 15. Behold the Lord commeth to execute judgement upon all and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deedes and of all their hard speeches 2. Moreover seeing wee doe not put all sinnes to be equall as the Stoicks but doe beleeve and know that the Iudge of all the world will doe right and that the greater sinnes shall have the sorer punishment if all the Gentiles or infidells bee not equally sinners it is necessary that the award of their punishment and so the execution thereof be also different and unequal as it is said That every one shall receive the things done in his body according to that hee hath done whether it bee good or ill Vpon which ground wee may safely conclude against them of the contrary opinion that every mans deeds of what Nation or sect soever hee bee except before excepted and especially the deeds of the reprobate shall bee particularly examined that the cause of their condemnation may appeare to be most just 3. Thus our Lord speaks of the Queene of the South and the men of Ninive that shall rise in judgement and condemne that hard-hearted generation thus of Tyre and Sidon that should more favourably be dealt with then those wicked Cities where his glorious miracles being wrought had no power to turne them
onely in Him through the mercy of God who gratuitò of his owne free will doth wash sanctifie and seale us by the Holy Spirit of promise who is to us the pledge of our eternall inhoritance this is the effect of the Canon Object 3. But how is this Church Catholike or Vniversall if any man be shut out of it Or how is it said by S. Paul 1. Tim. 2.4 That God would have all men to bee saved if there be few that shall enter in at the straight gate Answere The common answere to that text of Timothy is that it is spoken not de singulis generum but de generibus singulorum that is that some of every Nation and degree amongst men shall bee saved not every man of every degree But I suppose that it is rather spoken in respect of the ordinary means which in the Church is the Word read and preached and the Sacraments by which all men are called to repentance and faith in Christ which if they refuse their condemnation is just Also out of the visible Church nature calls in a softer voyce upon all nations and people of the world and upon every one in particular to feare God and to give Him glory which made the heaven and the earth and all therein And moreover the light of every mans conscience accusing or excusing him for those things which he doth contrary or according thereto is the witnesse of God in every mans heart to excuse or condemne him And in respect of these meanes God may be said to will that all men should be saved in that he doth offer his mercy to all and call upon them to turne unto Him that they might be saved if they want not grace to accept it Object 4. The want of that is not imputed to any man which is onely in the power of another to give and seeing that without repentance faith hope and perseverance in vertue no man can attaine to happinesse which vertues of repentance c. are onely in God to give as the Prophet saith Lam. 3.21 Turne Thou us unto thee ô Lord and so shall wee bee turned it may seeme that the want of these things ought not to be imputed to any man Answere If any man refuse a good thing when it is offered the want of that shall be imputed to himselfe as to the wicked that saith to God Depart from us for wee desire not the knowledge of thy wayes Iob 21.14 and these are they whom God is said to harden because they have hardened their owne hearts through the custome of sinne that they cannot repent Therefore though the predestinate that the mercy of God may appeare are conuerted by the inward and effectuall calling their hearts being renewed by repentance to follow him that calleth yet that the order of Iustice may be observed they that forsake their owne mercy are still left to the punishment of their sinne both originall and actuall because they neglect the outward calling and wilfully shut their eyes against the light of their naturall knowledge and conscience See Rom. 9.21 c. And according to this sence is it that in Scripture the hardning of man in sinne and the preseruing man from sinne seemes to be attributed to God both wayes as where he is said to harden Pharaohs heart and to Abimelech a Gen. 20.6 I have kept thee from sinning against me Sect. 2 § 2. And thus it being manifest what this holy Church is and of what persons it doth consist it followes first to proove that there is such a Catholike Church as wee say wee doe beleeve to bee then to see the differences which are betweene this Catholike Church and other particular Churches and Congregations 1 If there were not a number of holy people which God hath chosen unto eternall life then the end of Christs sufferings for us were all in vaine and the whole race of mankind should have beene created onely to destruction So the mercy of God toward His creature that had sinned should be without effect Neither should His glory be magnified in saving that which was lost So the devill the enemy of mankind might magnifie himselfe against God in that he had destroyed His creature irrecoverably But all these things are impossible Therefore there is a holy Church chosen of God unto eternall life And if this holy Church in the parts or members thereof had not continued in all ages since God made His promise of a Savior to Adam then faith had fail'd from among men and the promises of God being either not beleeved or forgotten the sons of God begotten by the immortall seed had failed So the throne of Christ when there was no faithfull heart wherein He reigned should not have beene established for ever contrary to the promise Psalm 89. ver 4 29 36. and Luke 1. ver 33. So the seed of the enemy onely had flourished in the earth contrary to the disposition of that wise husbandman Matth 13.30 Let both grow together untill the haruest But these things are impossible Therefore the holy Church is also Catholike or continuing from the beginning to the end of the world For your better understanding you may take these arguments apart 2. If the goodnesse of God being essentially one with His infinity were not diffusive or spreading it selfe upon the creature for the succour and aid thereof in the greatest misery then should it be exceeded by the malice and wickednes of the devill which though it be the greatest that may be yet must it needs be finite as having the originall from a finite creature But it is impossible that God should be exceeded by the malice of the devill therefore there is a restoring of man to that blessednesse and glory from which he fell by his siâ—ne as you have seene it prooved before in the 18. Chapter and from all the reasons there brought to that conclusion you may bring reasons for the proofe of this Article 3. If man were created according to the will of God innocent and without sinne then that present estate of sinne and death the punishment thereof wherein he now is must needs have beene brought upon him since his creation contrary to the revealed will of God wherein though for the declaration of the justice of God against sinne some be suffered to continue yet because sinne is contrary to the will of God and death contrary to the end of His creation of mankind it is necessary that there be a redemption or freeing of some appointed thereunto from the thraldome both of sin and death But it hath beene prooved Chap. 15. that man was created innocent Therfore there is a Church or a number knowne unto God of them that are so redeemed 4. There is a God who hath made His promises of everlasting life There is faith hope and repentance and other vertues both Christian and morall whereby the promises of God are apprehended and obedience performed to His Commandements Therefore there is
more fully assured unto us then this among all those things which we doe beleeve Stay thou trembling and fearefull soule and though the ugly visage of thy monstrous sinnes make thee afraid which indeed are so much the more hideous and deformed because they are not onely against the Law of God but against the law of reason rightly judging and against thine owne conscience yet stay and see what hope there is for thee and though that messenger of hell Despaire with all that wretched traine of all thy sinne which he brings with him doth hunt thee so close that thou darest not stay though thou wouldest be any thing save that thou art and most of all nothing at all yet see if a doore of hope as wide as the valley of Aâ—hor Hos 2.15 be not set open for thee onely if thou wilt be intreated to goe in and be saved 1. Thou objectest the wrath of God from which there is no avoidance But are not all men borne under one state of corruption and who can sâ—y his heart is cleane if God then should be extreame to marke what is done amisse who can abide it and if every sinne in as much as it is against an infinite justice deserues eternall punishment can no man be saved So all man-kind should have beene created onely to punishment but this is against the infinity of His goodnesse who is full of compassion slow to anger and great in mercy good to all and His tender mercies are above all His workes Exod. 34.6 Psal 144.8 9. Therefore there is forgivenesse of sinnes 2. Therefore is the sinne of the wicked angels unpardonable because it was wilfull in them because they cannot repent them of it and because they have no mediator to make satisfaction for their sinne All which through the mercy of God to us are found contrary in the sinne of man for neither was his sinne wilfull or of himselfe alone but from the devill which tempted him thereto neither is it without repentance in all that belong to God neither is it without a Mediator that is able to make satisfaction fully for all our sinnes But when all sufficient meanes are orderly disposed for an end it is impossible but that the end should follow Therefore there is a forgivenesse of sinnes as we are taught to pray 3. Glory and happinesse is not given till sinnes be first forgiven So that if there be not a forgivenesse of sinnes the greatest and most excellent vertues must for ever remaine without reward For we see that in this life vertue is so farre from reward or esteeme that it is rather persecuted with hatred and contempt as the Proverbe hath it Virtutis â—omes inuidia And if vertue can find no reward neither in this life nor in that which is to come then the goodnesse and justice of God should be defective But this is impossible therefore there is forgivenesse of sinnes 4. Change the termes of the first reasons in the 18. Chapter and they are easily brought to this conclusion So from the reasons for the Catholike Church and from many other this Article is easily concluded as you may see by the reason following 5. Christ tooke not on Him the nature of Angels but He tooke on Him the seed of Abraham H br 2.16 For it behooved Him in all things to be made like unto His brethren that He might bee a mercifull and faithfull High Priest in things pertaining to God to make reconciliation for the sinnes of the people therefore was Hee made a little lesse then the Angels that Hee might suffer death for our sinnes and this that Hee might abolish his power that had the power of death Hebr. 2.14 15 16 17. but nothing of all this for any benefit to Himselfe but for us was He borne for us He died and rose againe and sitteth at the right hand of God making intercession for us And these are the glorious workes which were given unto Him of the Father to doe for us and cannot possibly be in vaine Therefore seeing He Himselfe became our surety for the things of heaven are not knowne but by the Registers of heaven See Hebr. 10.7 and 7.22 Gen. 3.15 Esay 53.4.5.6.8.11.12 and hath in His owne body borne the punishment of our sinnes upon the tree 1. Pet. 2.24 it cannot stand with the justice of God to exact that debt of us which our surety hath satisfied And therefore it followes that our sinnes are forgiven us 6. And that I may at once decide this question both by reason and authority also of holy Writ and give full comfort and hope to thee poore soule that art pressed downe even to the gates of hell under the burthen of thy sinnes stay and see if thy comforts be not greater then thou hadst thought First it is a cleare case that no mans life is justly call'd in question but by the plaine and manifest letter of the Law Thou wilt say that is thy desperate case For it is written Deut. 27.26 Cursed is hee that confirmeth not all the words of this Law to doe them so is the Letter I confesse but that is now cancell'd and that by the interpretation of the Law it selfe builded upon one and the same justice with the former as where it is said Hab. 2.4 The just shall live by faith then not by doing the workes of the Law although it be most just that he that doth the workes of the Law should live therein Levit. 18.5 as Saint Paul argues Galat. 3.12 for Lawes are made for the preseruation of humane society in generall so for the safety and defence of every innocent in particular that doing well they may be without feare Rom. 13.3 But Christ our Saviour though He were separate from sinners though no deceit were found in His mouth lived not in His innocency by the patronage of the Law And if the Law had not power to give life to the innocent neither in justice can it have power to condemne the guilty and if no flesh shall be justified by the workes of the Law Galat. 2.16 but that all men thereby stand guilty before God what madnesse is it to seeke life by that which brings the sentence of condemnation and that upon all men indifferently And if Christ Iesus be of God made unto us Wisedome Righteousnesse Sanctification and Redemption 1 Cor. 1.30 what shall we need to feare the condemnation of the Law which through the infirmity of our flesh was unable to give life or seeke any other righteousnesse then that which by faith we have in him And if He be our righteousnesse how can the Law condemne us when He hath fulfilled it for us Rom. 8.3 4. therefore comfort thy selfe in God Blessed is the man whose hope is in the Lord his God and though thy hopes be weake nay though thou walke in darkenesse and have no light yet trust in the Name of the Lord and stay upon thy God Esay 50.10 And though thy conscience
condemne thee yet God is greater then thy conscience and knoweth all things 1 Iohn 3.20 Objection 1. It is not long agoe that certaine men from the mint of their owne braine sought to give out a coyne under their owne stampe That we are not justified by the active righteousnesse of Christ but by that which was passive onely and another like this That we are not bound to the obseruation of the Law delivered by Moses either Iudiciall Ceremoniall or Morall But because this coyne had not the publike stampe it was accounted false and therefore this last argument of yours which drawes so neere to their last position may seeme to be fallacious The Law defended not the innocent ergo it cannot condemne the guilty Who knowes not that the just Law was most unjustly wrested against our Saviour that Hee ought to die because He said Hee was the Sonne of God when as in the case of treason against Caesar upon His owne interpretation He was acquited by the Romane deputy Answere So He was pronounced innocent against all their other objections and yet His innocency saved Him not Yet His case was a reserved case in as much as He was no private man but even the Head of His Church who had set Himselfe to answere for all His members and therefore when the Law protected not Him who was innocent above all men and for all men it condemned it selfe as unable to give life and therefore the conclusion is good that it is not of any power to condemne any of them who were condemned in Him that was innocent But that I may answere more particularly I say that I am farre from these men in both their opinions For although the things which our Lord did so farre forth as wee can imitate them are examples for us yet not onely for example but also for our justification that the law of perfect righteousnesse being fulfilled for us wee might bee freed from the curse of the Law Moreover by that active righteousnesse which our Saviour performed He was able to save all that come unto God by Him whereas if it might be supposed that God and man in one person could sinne as the devill tempted Him then His suffering had beene onely sufficient for Himselfe whereas now His death was meritorious for all For as that supposed sinne had beene infinite both in respect of the person against whom and the person by whom it had beene done being an infinite Person so must it have had an infinite satisfaction So all that Christ had merited by His death had beene available onely for Himselfe but now being offered a Lambe without spot His sacrifice is sufficient for all that come unto God by Him Then for that other opinion that wee are not bound to the fulfilling of the Law it is most false For though the Iudiciall were peculiar to Israels common wealth and the ceremoniall Law served onely till the substance was exhibited yet the morall Law in regard of the eternall Iustice and equitie thereof as the law of nature may not be broken without sinne nay so much more straightly are wee bound to the performance thereof as the thoughts are more unruly than the actions otherwise what meant those interpretations of the Law Matth. 5. and elsewhere fetch 't from the innermost meaning of Iustice which binds the very thoughts It hath beene said to them of old c. But I say unto you Love your enemies and whosoever lusts hath committed adultery in his heart c. Is not our Lord a sufficient Law-giver for His Church Doe they take away sinne out of the world and so make void the death of Christ For where no Law is there is no sinne imputed Rom. 5.13 I confesse that the Law hath no power over them that are in Christ to eternall death because it was insufficient to protect His innocent life although the keeping of the Law if it were exact might claime to eternall life But the works of the Law and faith in Christ are by Saint Paul set in direct opposition in this argument of justification See Rom. 3. from verse 20. c. And Galatians Chapter 3. But yet though obedience cannot bring life eternall to the doer of the Law because the Law is perfect our obedience imperfect yet sinne brings deserved death upon the sinner whereby their vanitie appeares which hoâ—d the keeping of the law not necessary and likewise the trueth of the former conclusion that seeing the keeping of the law gave not life to our Lord that fulfilled it neither can the breach of the Law bring condemnation to them that are in Him to whom there is no condemnation Rom. 8.1 Object 2 Object 2. But seeing the merit of Christ is infinite and He being both God and mâ—n of infinite woâ—thinesse above the creature and for this purpose appearing that He might take away the sinnes of the world how comes it to passe that after the sacrifice for sin is offered yet both sinne and death the punishment thereof doe still remaine Answere It was an easie thing for God utterly to have abolished death after that by sinne it had entered into the world so that neither the body should have died the naturall death nor the soule the spirituall death of ignorance and pleasure in sinne nor both together the death eternall But yet God would let both sin and death remaine and that for foure reasons especially First that the justice of His most righteous sentence might stand In the day that thou eatest of that tree of the knowledge of good and ill thou shalt die the death 2. That the infinitie of His wisedome and goodnesse might appeare that as death by sinne had entered into the world so by death he might destroy sinne that whereas the devill which had the power of death sought to deprive man of life and glory He might take the weapon out of the hand of that Egyptian and as Benajah kill him with his owne speare and by death bring man to everlasting glory 3. That man might see the greatnesse of the benefit and willingly conforme himselfe to follow Christ through the paines of death and honour of the grave seeing God hath called and predestinated us to be like the image of His Son 4. The devills fell by pride and least man should grow proud therefore is sinne and death left with him to humble him thereby So that to the faithfull the condition of death onely is changed For whereas justice would that man should die because the sentence of death had proceeded against him And mercy would not the death of a sinner Wisedome decided it that death should bee made the way to everlasting life and so both Iustice and mercy might have what they desired Object 3 Objâ—ct 3. But how is sinne said to be forgiven when both sinne and the punishment doe still remaine Answere The meaning and purpose of this Article of our faith is that wee stedfastly beleeve the forgivenesse of our
whether they be elementall vegetable and sensitive and likewise of things that have imagination and reason See hereto Chap. 17. § 4. n. 5. or else because all bodily beings shall have their rest and perfection in him and with him or at least because he uses these things to such workes as are acceptable to God But if there be no resurrection then after the end of this world man in whom and with whom all these things are to receive their perfection not being at all all these things have no end of their being and so either not being at all or else being for no end their creation as concerning their uttermost and true end which is the eternall glory of God should bee in vaine and that expectation or groaning of the creature to bee delivered from the bondage of corruption of which Saint Paul speakes Rom. 8. should also be in vaine and the promise of making all things new Rev. 21.5 Es 65.17 2. Pet. 3.13 should also bee of none effect But all these things are impossible Ergo. It is necessary that there be a resurrection of the body and eternall life 12. Neither is the body nor yet the soule for it selfe but both the one and the other that both together may make one perfect man So the perfection and blessednesse of the whole man is more than that which can come onely to one part But if there bee not a resurrection of the body this greater blessednesse is utterly lost so that although the soule bee happie for ever yet the greater blessednesse of the soule and body together suffers eternall privation So the whole should be onely that one part may bee happie so the hope even of the faithfull should bee in vaine and their eternall happinesse onely in imperfection and so the punishment of the wicked But these things stand neither with the justice of God nor the trueth of His promises Therefore the body shall rise againe 13. And because this is our last hope and uttermost comfort in all our calamities and a speciall bridle to restraine from sinne it is fit that upon all occasions you should exercise your selfe to make this conclusion on whatsoever you thinke or whatsoever you heare out of the holy Scriptures For every promise and every threatning therein brings you to this that a reckoning must be given for all that which you have done in the body For if the body with the sences the servants of the soule either for sinne or righteousnesse should not live againe then the divine justice in reward and punishment should be defective but this is impossible The texts that are plaine you will understand by your selfe as that of Moses in Psal 90.3 Thou turnest man to destruction and sayest Returneye children of men Some are a little further off which yet you may easily bring hither as Esay 38.18 19. The grave cannot praise thee They that goe downe into the pit cannot hope for thy trueth The living the living hee shall Praise thee as I doe this day Therefore the dead shall rise againe For seeing man was made to glorifie God in his body and in his soule and that his end cannot bee frustrate man must live againe that his mercy and justice may be praised both by the good and the bad Iannes and Iambres withstood Moses 2. Tim. 3.8 Therfore Moses Iannes and Iambres must come to judgement For it is a just thing with God to reward you and to punish them that trouble you 2. Thes 1.6.7 And if for your further satisfaction you will reade that which the Fathers have written you may take that which goes under the name of Iustine the Martyr in his questions of the Greekes the oration of Athenagoras concerning the resurrection of the dead Irenaus lib. 5. cap. 4. c. his arguments for the most part taken from Athenagoras Theophilus lib. 1. ad Autolycum Origen 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 lib. 2. cap. 10. Reade also that excellent booke of Tertullian of this argument where you may see what his judgement is concerning the qualities of the bodies being raised and some objections to the contrary answered This Article the Iewes both Cabalists and Talmudists hold so firmely against that heresie of the Sadduces that they say That he can have no part in the world to come which denies the resurrection Lib. Sanhedrin Cap. Halec Neither is there any man that lives and sees the continuall course of nature in the digestion of the food that can deny that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the body of which Pythagoras and after him Plato speakes in Phaed. and most of all Saint Paul 1 Cor. 15.39 § 3. Yet so fearefull is the judgement which follows after the resurrection unto the Atheist that he searches all corners of cavills against it you shall take some of them with their answeres as I find them in Tertullian and Thomas Aquinas contr gent. lib. 4. cap. 80 and 81. Object 1 Object 1. And first it is said 1 Cor. 15.50 That flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdome of God Answer Till by grace it is made spirituall So not the substance of the flesh is there understood but the present estate thereof with the lusts and wicked desires which if a man doe mortifie by the Spirit he shall live Rom. 8.13 So in Iohn 6.63 The flesh profiteth nothing understand the fleshly-minded man which of himselfe knoweth not the things of God and those things which belong to sanctification and eternall life But concerning the being or substance of the flesh or body of man seeing it was tempered by Gods owne hand fashioned according to His jmage made the seat of the soule so excellent a being by which and with which the soule workes whatsoever it doth seeing in the holy Baptisme the flesh is wash't that the soule may be cleane seeing in the holy Supper the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Christ is received by the mouth that the soule may be strengthened in God seeing our bodies are the members of Christ the temples of the Holy-Ghost and He dwells in them seeing our bodies are not our owne but Gods 1 Cor. 6. seeing they are the instruments of holinesse in all the workes of mercy in prayers in wholesome counsell almes deeds in indurance of sorrowes in fasting in imprisonment in martyrdome in death it is impossible that God should leave forlorne the workemanship of His owne hands the closet of His owne breath the masterpiece of His cunning the heire of His riches and the Priest of His religion and service to dwell in eternall death that He should not heale the wounds and restore those dead to life which have beene wounded and slaine for His sake And though the flesh in it selfe be weake and through sinne utterly lost yet seeing our Lord came to seeke and to save that which was lost and that He Himselfe hath borne our sinnes it is impossible that either the merit of Christ for us or the mercy and goodnesse of
God should be in vaine Therefore the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together Esay 40.5 and from one Sabboth to another shall all flesh come and shall worship before me saith the Lord Esay 66.23 And I will powre out of my Spirit upon all flesh Ioel. 2.28 And seeing the flesh hath these holy promises therefore the flesh shall rise againe that as both the flesh and the soule have sorrowed so they may both reioyce together Object 2 Object 2. But the Prophets speake of the resurrection darkely and in figurative speeches onely Answer Not onely but oftentimes so as they cannot be otherwayes meant And though they use figurative speeches yet no figure is taken but from somewhat that is properly and truely such Moreover the words are often such as admit no other meaning as in Iohn 5.28 29. The houre is comming in which all that are in the graves shall come foorth they that have done good to the resurrection of life and they that have done ill unto the resurrection of condemnation Object 3 Obiect 3. If the same body shall rise againe of the same shape and lineaments some shall be whole men some maimed some halting blind c. Answer The qualities of the bodies shall be changed the substance shall not be lost For as it is against the justice of God that one substance should doe that which is pleasing to Him and another be rewarded therefore So if all teares shall be wiped away then also all cause of teares all hurts wants and deformity both of body and soule So that as the same body shall be returned to the same soule so shall it returne intire and whole Object But if the use of the members cease why are the members needfull Ans Though the naturall body shall be made spirituall and thereby be delivered from the necessities of those things to the use of which wee are now tyed as of foode clothes c. and so the members freed from their offices yet are they not therefore unnecessary For the tribunall of Christ requires a perfect man that he may receive in his body according to that which he hath done in his body Moreover for the perfection of beauty and glory the body must be intire the integrity of which stands not in the offices of the members but in their substance Neither yet shall all the offices of every member cease for the instruments of the voyce shall still serve for praise to God as this Father thinketh The objections which Thomas Aquinas brings from naturall doubts are of no force against the reasons which we have brought from the light of grace and knowledge of the Scriptures For it is yeelded that the resurrection of the body is beyond all the power of naturall causes to effect but that it is onely of the will and power of God as to make man at the first so to restore him againe out of his former principles into which he was resolved But that you may see how weake naturall reason is compared with the trueth of God and on what wretched hopes the Atheist depends which trusts that his sinnes shall never be brought to judgement I will propose the reasons and answeres as they stand Object 4 Object 4. That which is corrupted cannot be made the same againe as a naturall habit of the body or mind being deprived cannot be restored Answer The impossibilities of nature cannot limit that power which created nature especially in the resurrection of the body wherein the Author of nature hath professed that He can and hath promised that He will raise it up againe as you read before Object 5 Object 5. But the essentiall principles being lost it is impossible that the same thing in number should be restored Answer The essentiall principles in man are soule and body which being restored each to other in the perfection of them both nothing which is concomitant whether it be property or necessary accident can be wanting and that both these remaine in the state of being and consequently in the possibility of being brought together againe you may see Chap. 17. § 4. N. 5. Object 6 Object 6. Corruption is a change from being unto not being Therefore it is impossible that the being of man being corrupted the same being in number should be restored Answer This is in effect one with the former And it is true that the totall is destroyed in man by the separation of the parts But neither of the parts doe come to nothing but are in the hand of that power to bee conjoyned againe by which they were conjoyned at first Object 7 Object 7. If whatsoever hath beene essentiall to the body of man must in the resurrection be restored unto him then this bodily proportion shall be very uncomely in as much as the haire the nailes and whatsoever else is wasted away by the force of naturall heat were once as essentially of the body as that was which he carryed with him to the grave See the first supply to Logicke question 66. Answer As it was said before that whatsoever was wanting in the body should be made up So understand on the contrary that superfluities and deformities shall be taken away and that every one shall rise againe in that perfection which is peculiar to man-kind Object 8 Object 8. That which is common to all of any kind seemes naturall to the species But there is not any common virtue of any naturall agent to worke this Therefore it seemes that all men shall not rise againe Answer The resurrection of the dead is not by any naturall cause but it depends onely on the power of God to whose justice every man must give an account of his owne workes Object 9 Object 9. Death is the effect of sinne from both which wee are fâ—eed onely by the death of Christ Therefore it seemes that all shall not rise againe but they onely that are partakers of the merit of His death Answer It is true that such onely shall rise to eternall life the rest for justice unto judgement And because death is the wracke of nature in all men and the worke of the devill and that our Lord came to repaire nature and utterly to destroy the workes of the devill Therefore that it may appeare that Hee hath perfectly finished that for which He came all men must rise againe Object 10 Object 10. The last objection seemes a mighty one above the rest That if all men must rise againe perfect what shall become of the Canibals who have eaten one another nay if any of these Canibals eate onely mans flesh and beget children seeing their seed as their wisedome affirmes is onely the superfluity of the nourishment before it be conuerted into the substance of the fathers body here is the knot of Gordius who hath most right to this seed whether the sonne whose body was made of it or the father or he from whose body it was devoured by
the father But this Philosophy of the superfluity of the seed hath been hist out in the 17. Chapter The maine doubt is answered by Saint Paul 1 Cor. 15.44 Thy body is sowen a naturall body but it is raised a spirituall body So then though Beares or dogs or Canibals or wormes devoure the flesh yet seeing onely flesh is nourished thereby a materiall body with a materiall a naturall body with a naturall the spirituall body is free from any naturall change For even now the soule dwells not in the body but by those meane spirits which are raised from the bodily parts as I shewed before Therefore though this materiall individuall body shall be raised up yet because it is raised up a in spiritual estate it will be free from naturall corruption because it is fitted to be an eternall habitation for the soule being wholly spirituall and then there will be no want of any member or part when the soule shall be able to fit it selfe of a clothing for all uses out of a spirituall body neither shall it need to seeke any supply out of a forreigne body For as in justice the same soule must returne to the same body that both may suffer or be glorified together So shall both be perfected together according to the perfection of every individuall in their proper parts And though they be scattered in ashes or dust as farre as from East to West yet shall every atome be gathered into that body in which it first received the impression of an humane soule to become a part of a reasonable man The Poet gives you an example of a Gardiner wehling his seeds being mingled together Namque ut quondam olitor qui forte minuta sub uno Diversi generis confusa videbat aceruo Semina mox secum dum singula seligit hoc est Ozymon hoc apium lapathum istud oxalis illud Daucus andrachne ammi apiastrum urtica melanthum Sic tua sed melior sapientia novit acuto Permistos hominum cineres discernere visu I will give you an experiment for your easier understanding Take a knife a punch or other toole of steele well hardned and touch't with a load-stone mingle a quantity of the fylings of iron or steele with so much common dust as that the fylings appeare not yet with the knife or punch made cleane you may separate the fylings according to the first quantity out of the dust And if this be possible to metall by reason of the common spirit how much more to the soule when it is commanded to gather together that dust which once it had enlived by it selfe § 4. Among the heresies against the doctrine of our holy religion that which denies the resurrection was one of the first For beside the Sadduces which denied it as you read Mat. 22. and thought that the soule died with the body all the sects of the Samaritanes except perhaps the Dositheans held that errour with them And although it bee not knowne to mee which of them fell first into the ditch yet seeing both sorts held the bookes and authority of Moses and none of the Prophets beside authenticall and that the Sadduces interpreted Moses according to the letter of the Law and thought that the blessings and cursings therein contained did belong onely to this present life which was the originall of this errour with mee they shall be accounted the blind guides of the blind Among the Christians some twenty sects of Hereticks have beene which denied this Article some upon one ground some upon another The first fountaine of this poysoned doctrine among the Chri tians was Simon the Samaritane whose Scholars held it successively unto Marcus about a 100. yeeres after Simon This Marcus also upheld the same heresie but after him it was by turnes ca l'd up from hell againe Carâ—ocrates out of Platoes Scho e brought in the change of soules from body to body but much worse than hee For Plato thought that the soules of men were sent into the bodies of beasts or of crazed and old men for the punishment of their formâ—r sinnes but Carpocrates taught that they were brought thither for the fulfilling of those lusts which they had not done in their former bodies For being here subiect to the power of the enemie man said hee cannot escape the wrath of these adversaries but by the filthinesse of life and doing such things as please them And therefore the soules that live heere most vertuously and tempeâ—ately are oftenest sent into other bodies Though this doctrine of the devills Chaplaine upheld the immortality of the soâ—le yet no resurrection of the body Valentine and after him the Manichees taught that the soules of men onely were redeemed by Christ but not their bodies and therefore they should rise no more Neither yet should all soules bee saved For there bee said hee three sorts of men spirituall animall and carnall Spirituall which by nature have a most excellent faith and these shall be saved without good workes as Seth Animal which have but a little faith but may bee saved by a supply of their workes as Abel But the carnall as Cain can by no meanes bee saved Marcion concerning the resurrection of the body sided with Valentine And so did Apelles For said hee Christ Himselfe went to Heaven without any body For that body which Hee had taken from Heaven and the elements at the resurrection Hee delivered againe to their proper principles from whence He tooke it The Seleucians also that affirme that Christ left His body in the Sunne as you read before are bound to denie to us any ascent into the heavens above for it cannot be better with us the members than it is with our Head Origens errour against the resurrection is at large refuted by Epiphanius Haer. 64. and if you minde the objections and answeres before you have the sum of that which Origen brought against it and the other answered Hierax denied a resurrection of the body but is disproved by the arguments heere brought as all the other Hereticks which are here mentioned A resurrection of the soule he yeelded unto except of the Infants which died before they had knowledge because none is crowned except he that strives lawfully as you read before in the 28. Chapter where his reason is answered out of Epiphanius Haer. 67. And although you see such monsters of opinions as I have said and if you have leisure may read the refutation in particular in the Authour aforesaid Yet if you take good heed to that which hath beene spoken for and against the trueth you may confesse that the trueth is great and shall prevaile CHAP. XXXIX ⧠And life everlasting § 1. WHile there was no sinne in the world it stood not with the justice of God that any punishment for sinne should bee inflicted therefore death and all diseases as his fore-runners with hunger thirst and all the enemies of life were far from man But after that sinne
had brought in death it was a mercy that all those enemies of life which accompanied death should shew themselues that man miâ—ht daiâ—y be put in mind of his mortalitie and returne unto H m whom he had offended Now if you shall aske from whence this change of estates from immortality to mortality did succeed in man I thinke even from hence that the pure soule the image of God dwelling in the body which was framed of the bodily creature which was yet pure and not subiected to the curse had power to sustaine the body in that perfect estate wherein it was created and sâ— should have preserved it for ever if it had held that dignitie which it had and hearkened onely to the ordinance of God and had reigned over the bodily affections and desires as it ought and had power to doe But when the soule would forsake God the guide thereof and that dignitie which it had naturally over the body and follow the lusts and appetites thereof and for that treason against God lost the power and strength which it had to support the body and moreover must seeke sustenance for the body out of the creature now accursed and deprived of her first strength it was impossible but that according to the curse corruption diseases and death should follow thereupon Yet seeing the merit of Chri t is so ful of satisfactioÌ„ to the justice of God and He so powerfull to restore all the decay of nature and to destroy all the wrack and mischiefe which the devill hath brought thereinto wee may firmely beleeve as we professe in this Article that wee shall at last be brought to the eâ—â—oying of everlasting life better than that to which wee were at first created 1. For although by the craft of the devill sinne entered into the world and death by sinne passed over all man-kind yet seeing man was made immortall and that neither the end which God purposed nor yet the infinite merit of the death of Christ can bee in vaine it is impossible but that man-kind at last should be brought to eternall life 2. The infinite goodnesse of God is the reason and the cause that he is good to all and that His mercy is over all His workes Psal 145.9 Therefore there is an eternall life reserved for man the most excellent of the visible creature and the will of man above all other things desires an eternall life in glory and happinesse according to His promises But if no such eternall life shall bee then the action of God toward His creature shall be in litlenesse and defect neither shall he fulfill the desire of them that feare Him So also the will of man should more desire the accomplishment of the divine goodnes upon the creature than the will of God should desire the accomplishment of it selfe But these things are impossible therefore there shall bee an eternall life in glory and happinesse 3. Virtue and the ready service of man unto God is that thing wherewith God in man is most delighted and which He hath commanded as it is said Be ye holy for I am holy Lev. 11.44 and the desire of this holinesse is found in them especially that hunger and thirst after righteousnesse and hate their sinnes whereby they displease Him But this seruice of man to God hath not hitherto beene duely performed by any living among the sonnes of men neither can be performed both in body and soule by the dead Therefore it shall be performed in the life that is to come wherein both Gods will and the desires of His shall bee fulfilled See Matth. 5.6 4. If there shal be an eternal life for man then man shall receive of the divine goodnesse and power a power whereby he may both bee and doe those things whereto the divine goodnesse and wisedome hath appointed him But if there be no life eternall then the end of mans creation should be onely to privation and not being But it were better never to have beene than after all the miseries of this life in the end to returne to an everlasting not being For so the effect that is man-kind should no way be answerable to the cause nor yet be any proofe or manifestation oâ— that goodnesse infinity eternitie and power by which it was made But this is impossible and against the conditions both of the prime cause and the infinitie of the dignities thereof Object But you will say that this reason doth no mâ—re prove that there is an eternall life for man than for beasts and other of the creatures which also ought to continue for the proofe of that wisedome and almightynesse of their cause Answere There is a difference betweene the end and those things which are for the end Man is the end of all the visible creature and therefore it followes that all those things are to bee in man as in the end so far forth as they can be worke or be glorified in Him And from hence also it followeth that man must bee for ever lest all these things which were for him should returne to nothing with him and the image of that infinite goodnesse and wisedome by which they were made should come to nothing eternally Therefore though they shall be in man as the idéa of them all yet not in their severall or distinct beings beside man 5. No naturall desire of the creature which is implanted in every individuall of every kind can bee in vaine because it is implanted therein by a superiour power which cannot bee frustrate But it is implanted in all men naturally both to desire and to hope for eternall life Therefore there shal be an eternall life For if after the resurrection man should not live for ever then there should be in God a will to raise him to life contrary to his will that hee should live for ever So His being should not be simple and one but this is impossible as it was proved Chap. 9. § 6. 6. The more powerfull that any cause is the more manifestly doth the likenesse thereof appeare in the effect And sith God is the first and chiefe cause of all and that the likenesse of man His worke shall be greater in his perpetuall welâ—-being than in not being at all therefore there shall bee an eternall life wherein the greatest likenesse of the effect to the cause shall be perfected that man may live in eternall Righteousnesse Wisedome and Glory Otherwise the infinite justice might seeme defective in reward and punishment if both good and bad should perish alike Moreover the word whereby the punishment was inflicted was neither so generall nor so without exception but that there was grace reserved And now lest he take of the tree of life and live for ever in his sin therefore the Lord God sent him forth of the garden of Eden the type of eternall happinesse till he had tasted of death the punishment of his sinne then should hee live for ever in joy 7. And these
the law of the dead and not live to us that are dead to them for when they are gone from hence they are no more seene Psal 39.13 Thus much it was necessary to speake concerning the meanes of the soules knowledge while it is in the state of separation from the body The third manner and degree of the soules knowledge by comprehension in the morning vision is when the whole man glorified shall see the true being of all things in Him that is the cause of all For then shall it know as it is knowne as you may see 1. Cor. 13.12 But this kind of knowledge belongs nothing to the question that is in hand 4. The other kind of descent which is in state or manner of being is when any thing is changed from any estate either proper thereto or else appropriate to an estate or condition that is or seemes to be lower or worse Thus our Lord was said to descend or come downe from heaven when He clouded His Deitie in our humanitie as I have shewed heretofore Thus also He and all man-kind may be said to descend to be abased or brought low when the soule is parted from the body For seeing both the parts are for the perfection of the whole the whole must needs be more excellent than either of the parts so that the whole being dissolved both the parts doe suffer hurt or losse thereby especially the soule which sees the losse and findes it selfe in a state of being beside the end of the creation of it selfe which was to give life unto the body and this is the cause why the soule would not bee unclothed but rather that this mortalitie might bee swallowed up of life And this is the lowest state of humiliation whereto the soule of our Lord could come naturally and by this state some will interpret the descent into hell as I shewed in the beginning Nu. 2. But if this humiliation must meane also the separation of the soule from the body while the body was laid in the dust it reaches no further than to his death For a man is not said to bee dead till his soule be departed from his body But if this state of humiliation be taken in that sence as some doe very fitly interpret it by that phrase used often in the Scripture of a mans being gathered unto his people or cōming unto that congregation of the saints which had died in the faith of Him that was to come then taking also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or hell according to the interpretation of the word Vnseen it will easily be admitted of all that when our Saviour was dead His body was buryed and his soule went unto the assembly of them that were unseene And because this is true safe and unquestionable it may on all parts be agreed unto as I said before and yet the word of descending or going downe reserved to the right meaning by the abatement or losse of that estate which the soule had with the body in the being of the whole and perfect man So also the question about the place of hell and Paradise which hath moved most doubt herein by this interpretation is avoyded But because all this will reach no further than to be perfectly dead and because the Latine interpretation Descendit ad inferos rendered by our Church Hee went downe into hell suffers us not to stay here and because the most voices amongst the Fathers have swayed the meaning to a locall descent and that as it seemes in the third sence spoken of before and most of all because the holy Scripture binds us thereto let us follow our best and surest guides and confesse with the Prophets and Apostles that the soule of our Lord after His death on the Crosse went downe into hell or the place of the dead and there continued three dayes and three nights in the heart of the earth as it was prophesied in the signe of Ionas the Prophet Matth. 12.40 And let us beleeve that the flesh of Christ did therefore rest in hope because His soule was not left in hell nor His body was suffered to see corruption Psal 16.9 10. Actes 2.31 Obiect 1 Objection 1. They object that the soule may signifie the whole man as in Gen. 46.27 All the soules of the house of Iacob were 70. But how doth that helpe to prove that this Article must bee interpreted onely of the torments of Christs soule while Hee was yet alive For it is manifest that Saint Peter bringing that text to prove His resurrection speakes not of Christs soule while it was yet in his body when He was not subject to a state of resurrection but of His soule after His death But if they will hope by that text of Gen. or the like to interpret it as Al. Hume loc cit Thou shalt not leave mee in the grave let them answere mee what they meane by this word Mee whether the body or the soule or both together If they say the soule it was not in the graue they will bee ashamed to say both together for so they should make Him not yet to be dead as the word Mee doth truely signifie the whole Person yet alive jf they say the body let them see what an unfit tautologie it will make with that which followeth Nor suffer thy Holy one that is the body of Thy Holy one to see corruption But in this place the soule and the body are made direct disparates so hell and the place of corruption so that we may argue the body was in the place of corruption Ergo not in hell the soule was in hell Ergo not in the grave or place of corruption Obiect 2 Object 2. The purpose of Saint Peter was to prove the resurrection of Christ and that belonged to the body which had died not to the soule which died not Answere If this be given what will you conclude thereon But I say the resurrection is of the whole man returned againe to life after the parting of the soule and the body So it is neither of the body onely nor of the soule onely but of the whole man which Saint Peter prooves heere to have beene done in Christ because His soule was not left in hell where it was but was againe joyned to the body to cause it to live that it might not see corruption And because all the glorious doings and sufferings of our Saviour were for our uttermost benefit and comfort therefore is this going downe of His into hell also to give us assurance of our full and perfect deliverance from all the powers of death and hell and restoring of all His beleevers unto an immortall life and glory And because the doctrine of our Church into which I was baptized bindes me to beleeve that our Lord Iesus after His death went downe into hell locally and that by the authorities of the Scripture and because I have before shewed that the soule of Christ did not ascend to heaven before