that which ordereth his Work is Wisdom and that which perfecteth his Work is Power All things which God in their times and seasons hath brought forth were eternally and before all times in God as a work unbegun is in the Artificer which afterward bringeth it unto effect Therefore whatsoever we do behold now in this present World it was inwrapped within the Bowels of Divine Mercy written in the Book of Eternal Wisdom and held in the hands of Omnipotent Power the first Foundations of the World being as yet unlaid So that all things which God hath made are in that respect the Off-spring of God they are in him as effects in their highest cause he likewise actually is in them the assistance and influence of his Deity is their life Let hereunto saving efficacy be added and it bringeth forth a special Off-spring amongst men containing them to whom God hath himself given the gracious and amiable name of Sons We are by Nature the Sons of Adam When God created Adam he created us and as many as are descended from Adam have in themselves the Root out of which they spring The Sons of God we neither are all nor any one of us otherwise then onely by grace and favor The Sons of God have Gods own Natural Son as a second Adam from Heaven whose Race and Progeny they are by Spiritual and Heavenly Birth God therefore loving eternally his Son he must needs eternally in him have loved and preferred before all others them which are spiritually sithence descended and sprung out of him These were in God as in their Saviour and not as in their Creator onely It was the purpose of his saving Goodness his saving Wisdom and his saving Power which inclined it self towards them They which thus were in God eternally by their intended admission to life have by vocation or adoption God actually now in them as the Artificer is in the Work which his hand doth presently frame Life as all other gifts and benefits groweth originally from the Father and cometh not to us but by the Son nor by the Son to any of us in particular but through the Spirit For this cause the Apostle wisheth to the Church of Corinth The Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the Love of God and the Fellowship of the Holy Ghost Which three St. Peter comprehendeth in one The participation of Divine Nature We are therefore in God through Christ eternally according to that intent and purpose whereby we are chosen to be made his in this present World before the World it self was made We are in God through the knowledge which is had of us and the love which is born towards us from everlasting But in God we actually are no longer then onely from the time of our actual Adoption into the Body of his true Church into the Fellowship of his Children For his Church he knoweth and loveth so that they which are in the Church are thereby known to be in him Our being in Christ by Eternal fore-knowledge saveth us not without our Actual and Real Adoption into the Fellowship of his Saints in this present World For in him we actually are by our actual incorporation into that Society which hath him for their Head and doth make together with him one Body he and they in that respect having one name for which cause by vertue of this Mystical Conjunction we are of him and in him even as though our very flesh and bones should be made continuate with his We are in Christ because he knoweth and loveth us even as parts of himself No man actually is in him but they in whom he actually is For he which hath not the Son of God hath not Life I am the Vine and ye are the Branches He which abideth in me and I in him the same bringeth forth much Fruit but the Branch severed from the Vine withereth We are therefore adopted Sons of God to Eternal Life by Participation of the onely begotten Son of God whose Life is the Well-spring and cause of ours It is too cold an interpretation whereby some men expound our Being in Christ to import nothing else but onely That the self-same Nature which maketh us to be Men is in him and maketh him Man as we are For what man in the World is there which hath not so far forth communion with Jesus Christ It is not this that can sustain the weight of such sentences as speak of the Mystery of our Coherence with Jesus Christ. The Church is in Christ as Eve was in Adam Yea by Grace we are every of us in Christ and in his Church and in his Church as by Nature we were in those our first Parents God made Eve of the Rib of Adam And his Church he frameth out of the very Flesh the very wounded and bleeding side of the Son of Man His Body crucified and his Blood shed for the Life of the World are the true Elements of that Heavenly Being which maketh us such as himself is of whom we come For which cause the words of Adam may be fitly the words of Christ concerning his Church Flesh of my Flesh and Bone of my Bones a true Nature extract out of my own Body So that in him even according to his Manhood we according to our Heavenly Being are as Branches in that Root out of which they grow To all things he is Life and to men Light as the Son of God to the Church both Life and Light Eternal by being made the Son of Man for us and by being in us a Saviour whether we respect him as God or as Man Adam is in us as an original cause of our Nature and of that corruption of Nature which causeth death Christ as the cause original of Restauration to Life The person of Adam is not in us but his nature and the corruption of his nature derived into all men by Propagation Christ having Adams nature as we have but incorrupt deriveth not nature but incorruption and that immediately from his own Person into all that belong unto him As therefore we are really partakers of the body of Sin and Death received from Adam so except we be truly partakers of Christ and as really possessed of his Spirit all we speak of Eternal Life is but a dream That which quickneth us is the Spirit of the Second Adam and his Flesh that wherewith he quickneth That which in him made our Nature uncorrupt was the Union of his Deity with our Nature And in that respect the sentence of Death and Condemnation which onely taketh hold upon sinful flesh could no way possibly extend unto him This caused his voluntary death for others to prevail with God and to have the force of an Expiatory Sacrifice The Blood of Christ as the Apostle witnesseth doth therefore take away sin because through the Eternal Spirit he offered himself unto God without spot That
their Form of Administration Upon their Force their necessity dependeth So that how they are necessary we cannot discern till we see how effectual they are When Sacraments are said to be Visible Signs of Invisible Grace we thereby conceive how Grace is indeed the very end for which these Heavenly Mysteries were instituted and besides sundry other Properties observed in them the matter whereof they consist is such as signifieth Figureth and representeth their End But still their efficacy resteth obscure to our understanding except we search somewhat more distinctly what Grace in particular that is whereunto they are referred and what manner of operation they have towards it The use of Sacraments is but onely in this life yet so that here they concern a far better life then this and are for that cause accompanied with Grace which worketh Salvation Sacraments are the Powerful Instruments of God to Eternal Life For as our Natural Life consisteth in the Union of the Body with the Soul so our Life Supernatural in the Union of the Soul with God And for as much as there is no Union of God with Man without that mean between both which is both it seemeth requisite that we first consider how God is in Christ then how Christ is in us and how the Sacraments do serve to make us partakers of Christ. In other things we may be more brief but the weight of these requireth largeness 51. The Lord our God is but one God In which Indivisible Unity notwithstanding we adore the Father as being altogether of himself we glorifie that Consubstantial Word which is the Son we bless and magnifie that Co-essential Spirit eternally proceeding from both which is the Holy Ghost Seeing therefore the Father is of none the Son is of the Father and the Spirit is of both they are by these their several Properties really distinguishable each from other For the Substance of God with this property to be of none doth make the Person of the Father the very self-same Substance in number with this property to be of the Father maketh the Person of the Son the same Substance having added unto it the property of proceeding from the other two maketh the Person of the Holy Ghost So that in every Person there is implied both the Substance of God which is one and also that property which causeth the same Person really and truly to differ from the other two Every Person hath his own subsistence which no other besides hath although there be others besides that are of the same Substance As no man but Peter can be the person which Peter is yet Paul hath the self-same Nature which Peter hath Again Angels have every of them the Nature of pure and Invisible Spirits but every Angel is not that Angel which appeared in a Dream to Ioseph Now when God became Man lest we should err in applying this to the Person of the Father or of the Spirit St. Peters confession unto Christ was Thou art the Son of the Living God and St. Iohns Exposition thereof was made plain That it is the Word which was made Flesh. The Father and the Holy Ghost saith Damascen have no Communion with the Incarnation of the Word otherwise then onely by approbation and assent Notwithstanding for as much as the Word and Deity are one Subject we must beware we exclude not the Nature of God from Incarnation and so make the Son of God incarnate not to be very God For undoubtedly even the Nature of God it self in the onely Person of the Son is incarnate and hath taken to it self Flesh. Wherefore Incarnation may neither be granted to any Person but onely One nor yet denied to that Nature which is common unto all Three Concerning the cause of which incomprehenble Mystery for as much as it seemeth a thing unconsonant That the World should honor any other as the Saviour but him whom it honoreth as the Creator of the World and in the Wisdom of God it hath not been thought convenient to admit any way of saving man but by man himself though nothing should be spoken of the Love and Mercy of God towards Man which this way are become such a Spectacle as neither Men nor Angels can behold without a kinde of Heavenly astonishment we may hereby perceive there is cause sufficient why Divine Nature should assume Humane that so God might be in Christ reconciling to himself the World And if some cause be likewise required why rather to this end and purpose the Son then either the Father or the Holy Ghost should be made man Could we which are born the children of wrath be adopted the Sons of God through Grace any other then by the Natural Son of God being Mediator between God and us It became therefore him by whom all things are to be the Way of Salvation to all that the Institution and Restitution of the World might be both wrought by one hand The Worlds Salvation was without the Incarnation of the Son of God a thing impossible not simply impossible but impossible it being presupposed That the Will of God was no otherwise to have it saved then by the Death of his own Son Wherefore taking to himself our Flesh and by his Incarnation making it his own Flesh he had now of his own although from us what to offer unto God for us And as Christ took Manhood that by it he might be capable of death whereunto he humbled himself so because Manhood is the proper subject of compassion and feeling pity which maketh the Scepter of Christs Regency even in the Kingdom of Heaven be amiable he which without our Nature could not on Earth suffer for the sins of the World doth now also by means thereof both make intercession to God for sinners and exercise domnion over all men with a true a natural and a sensible touch of Mercy 52. It is not in mans ability either to express perfectly or conceive the manner how this was brought to pass But the strength of our Faith is tried by those things wherein our wits and capacities are not strong Howbeit because this Divine Mystery is more true then plain divers having framed the same to their own conceits and fancies are found in their Expositions thereof more plain then true In so much that by the space of Five hundred years after Christ the Church was almost troubled with nothing else saving onely with care and travel to preserve this Article from the sinister construction of Hereticks Whos 's first mists when the light of the Nicene Council had dispelled it was not long ere Macedonius transfered unto Gods most holy Spirit the same blasphemy wherewith Arius had already dishonored his co-eternally begotten Son not long ere Apollinarius began to pare away from Christs Humanity In refutation of which impieties when the Fathers of the Church Athanasius Basil and the two Gregories had by their painful
which sanctified our Nature in Christ that which made it a Sacrifice available to take away sin is the same which quickneth it raised it out of the Grave after Death and exalted it unto Glory Seeing therefore that Christ is in us as a quickning Spirit the first degree of Communion with Christ must needs consist in the Participation of his Spirit which Cyprian in that respect well termeth Germanissimam Societatem the highest and truest Society that can be between man and him which is both God and Man in one These things St. Cyril duly considering reproveth their speeches which â—aught that onely the Deity of Christ is the Vine whereupon we by Faith do depend as Branches and that neither his Flesh not our Bodies are comprised in this resemblance For doth any man doubt but that even from the Flesh of Christ our very Bodies do receive that Life which shall make them glorious at the latter day and for which they are already accounted parts of his Blessed Body Our corruptible bodies could never live the life they shall live were it not that here they are joyned with his Body which is incorruptible and that his is in ours as a cause immortality a cause by removing through the Death and Merit of his own Flesh that which hindered the life of ours Christ is therefore both as God and as Man that true Vine whereof we both spiritually and corporally are Branches The mixture of his Bodily Substance with ours is a thing which the Ancient Fathers disclaim Yet the mixture of his Flesh with ours they speak of to signifie what our very bodies through Mystical Conjunction receive from that vital efficacy which we know to be in his and from bodily mixtures they borrow divers Similitudes rather to declare the Truth then the manner of coherence between his sacred and the sanctified Bodies of Saints Thus much no Christian Man will deny That when Christ sanctified his own Flesh giving as God and taking as Man the Holy Ghost he did not this for himself onely but for our sakes that the Grace of Sanctification and Life which was first received in him might pass from him to his whole Race as Malediction came from Adam unto all mankinde Howbeit because the Work of his Spirit to those effects is in us prevented by Sin and Death possessing us before it is necessity that as well our present Sanctification unto newness of life as the future of Restauration of our Bodies should presuppose a participation of the Grace Efficacy Merit or Vertue of his Body and Blood without which Foundation first laid there is no place for those other operations of the Spirit of Christ to ensue So that Christ imparteth plainly himself by degrees Iâ— pleaseth him in Mercy to account himself incompleat and maimed without us But most assured we are that we all receive of his Fulness because he is in us as a moving and working Cause from which many blessed effects are really found to ensue and that in sundry both kindes and degrees all tending to eternal happiness It must be confest that of Christ working as a Creator and a Governor of the World by providence all are partakers not all partakers of that Grace whereby he inhabiteth whom he saveth Again as he dwelleth not by Grace in all so neither doth he equally work in all them in whom he dwelleth Whence is it saith St. Augustine that some be holier then others are but because God doth dwell in some more plentifully then in others And because the Divine Substance of Christ is equally in all his Humane Substance equally distant from all it appeareth that the participation of Christ wherein there are many degrees and differences must needs consist in such effects as being derived from both Natures of Christ really into us are made our own and we by saving them in us are truly said to have him from whom they come Christ also more or less to inhabit and impart himself as the Graces are fewer or more greater or smaller which really flow into us form Christ. Christ is whole with the whole Church and whole with every part of the Church as touching his Person which can no way divide it self or be possest by degrees and portions But the Participation of Christ importeth besides the Presence of Christs Person and besides the Mystical Copulation thereof with the Parts and Members of his whole Church a true actual influence of Grace whereby the life which we live according to godliness is his and from him we receive those perfections wherein our eternal happiness consisteth Thus we participate Christ partly by imputation as when those things which he did and suffered for us are imputed unto us for Righteousness Partly by habitual and real infusion as when Grace is inwardly bestowed while we are on Earth and afterwards more fully both our Souls and Bodies make like unto his in Glory The first thing of his so infused into our hearts in this life is the Spirit of Christ whereupon because the rest of what kinde soever do all both necessarily depend and infallibly also easue therefore the Apostles term it sometime the Seed of God sometime the Pledge of our Heavenly Inheritance sometime the Hansel or Earnest of that which is to come From hence it is that they which belong to the Mystical Body of our Saviour Christ and be in number as the Stars of Heaven divided successively by reason of their mortal condition into many Generations are notwithstanding coupled every one to Christ their Head and all unto every particular person amongst themselves in as much as the same Spirit which anointed the Blessed Soul of our Saviour Christ doth so formalize unite and actuate his whole Race as if both he and they were so many Limbs compacted into one Body by being quickned all with one and the same Soul That wherein we are Partakers of Jesus Christ by Imputation agreeth equally unto all that have it For it consisteth in such Acts and Deeds of his as could not have longer continuance then while they were in doing nor at that very time belong unto any other but to him from whom they come and therefore how men either then or before or fithence should be made Partakers of them there can be no way imagined but onely by Imputation Again a Deed must either not be imputed to any but rest altogether in him whose it is or if at all it be imputed they which have it by Imputation must have it such as it is whole So that degrees being neither in the Personal Presence of Christ nor in the Participation of those effects which are ours by Imputation onely it resteth that we wholly apply them to the Participation of Christs infused Grace although even in this kinde also the first beginning of Life the Seed of God the First-fruits of Christs Spirit be without latitude For we have hereby onely the being of
satisfied if they accept it as sufficient and require no more Otherwise we satisfie not although we do satisfie For so between man and man it oftentimes falleth out but between man and God never It is therefore true that our Lord Jesus Christ by one most precious and propitiatory Sacrifice which was his Body a Gift of infinite worth offered for the Sins of the whole World hath thereby once reconciled us to God purchased his general free pardon and turned Divine indignation from mankinde But we are not for that cause to think any office of Penitence either needless or fruitless on our own behalf For then would not God require any such Duties at our hands Christ doth remain everlastingly a gracious Intercessour even for every particular Penitent Let this assure us that God how highly soever displeased and incensed with our Sins is notwithstanding for his sake by our Tears pacified taking that for Satisfaction which is due by us because Christ hath by his Satisfaction made it acceptable For as he is the High Priest of our Salvation so he hath made us Priests likewise under him to the end we might offer unto God praise and thankfulness while we continue in the way of life and when we sin the satisfactory or propitiatory sacrifice of a broken and a contrite Heart There is not any thing that we do that could pacifie God and clear us in his sight from sin if the goodness and mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ were not whereas now beholding the poor offer of our religions endeavours meekly to submit our selves as often as we have offended he regardeth with infinite mercy those services which are as nothing and with words of comfort reviveth our afflicted mindes saying It â— I even I that taketh away thine Iniquities for mine own sake Thus doth Repentance satisfie God changing his wrath and indignation unto mercy Anger and mercy are in us Passions but in him not so God saith Saint Basil is no wayes passionate but because the punishments which his judgment doth inflict are like effect of indignation severe and grievous to such as suffer them therefore we term the revenge which he taketh upon Sinners anger and the withdrawing of his plagues mercy His wrath saith St. Augustin is not as ours the trouble of a minde disturbed and disquieted with things amiss but a ralm unpassionate and just assignation of dreadful punishment to be their portion which have disobeyed his mercy a free determination of all felicity and happiness unto men except their sins remain as a bar between it and them So that when God doth cease to be angry with sinful men when he receiveth them into favour when he pardoneth their offences and remembreth their iniquities no more for all these signifie but one thing it must needs follow that all punishments before due is revenge of sinne whether they be Temporal or Eternal are remitted For how should God's indignation import only man's punishment and yet some punishment remain unto them towards whom there is now in God no indignation remaining God saith Tertullian takes Penitency at mens hands and men at his in lieu thereof receive impunity which notwithstanding doth not prejudice the chastisements which God after pardon hath laid upon some Offenders as on the people of Israel on Moses on Miriam on David either for their own more sound amendment or for example unto others in this present world for in the World to come punishments have unto these intents no use the dead being not in case to be better by correction nor to take warning by executions of God's Justice there seen but assuredly to whomsoever he remitteth sinne their very pardon is in it self a full absolute and perfect discharge for revengeful punishment which God doth now here threaten but with purpose of revocation if men repent no where inflict but on them whom impenitency maketh obdurate Of the one therefore it is said Though I tell the wicked Thou shalt dye the death yet if he turneth from his sinne and do that which is lawful and right he shall surely live and not dye Of the other Thou according to thine hardness and heart that will not repent treasurest up to thy self wrath against the day of wrath and evident appearance of the judgement of God If God be satisfied and do pardon sinne our justification restored is as perfect as it was at the first bestowed For so the Prophet Isaiah witnesseth Though your sinnes were as crimson they shall be made as white as snow though they were as scarlet they shall be as white as wool And can we doubt concerning the punishment of Revenge which was due to sinne but that if God be satisfied and have forgotten his wrath it must be even as Saint Augustine reasoneth What God hath covered he will not observe and what he observeth not he will not punish The truth of which Doctrine is not to be shifted off by restraining it unto eternal punishment alone For then would not David have said They are blessed to whom God imputeth not sinne Blessednesse having no part or fellowship at all with malediction Whereas to be subject to Revenge for Sinne although the punishment be but temporal is to be under the curse of the Law wherefore as one and the same Fire consumeth Stubble and refineth Gold so if it please God to lay punishment on them whose sinnes he hath forgiven yet is not this done for any destructive end of wasting and eating them out as in plagues inflicted upon the Impenitent neither is the punishment of the one as of the other proportioned by the greatness of sinne past but according to that future purpose whereunto the goodness of God referreth it and wherein there is nothing meant to the Sufferer but furtherance of all happiness now in grace and hereafter in glory Saint Augustin to stop the mouths of Pelagians arguing That if God had imposed death upon Adam and Adam's posterity as a punishment of sinne death should have ceased when God procured Sinners their pardon Answereth first It is no marvel either that bodily death should not have hapned to the first man unlesse he had first sinned death as punishment following his sinne or that after sinne is forgiven death notwithstanding befalleth the Faithful to the end that the strength of righteousness might be exercised by overcoming the fear thereof So that justly God did inflict bodily death on man for committing Sinne and yet after Sinne forgiven took it not away that his Righteousness might still have whereby to be exercised He fortifieth this with David's example whose sinne he forgave and yet afflicted him for exercise and tryal of his humility Briefly a general axiome he hath for all such chastisements Before forgiveness they are the punishment of Sinners and after forgiveness they are exercises and tryals of Righteous men Which kinde of proceeding is so agreeable with God's nature and man's comfort that it
unable to be resisted when it cometh yet not utterly impossible for a time in whole or in part to be shunned Neither doe we much fear such evils except they be imminent and near at hand nor if they be near except we have an opinion that they be so When we have once conceived an opinion or apprehended an imagination of such evils prest and ready to invade us because they are hurtful unto our nature we feel in our selves a kinde of abhorring because they are thought near yet not present our nature seeketh forthwith how to shift and provide for it self because they are evils which cannot be resisted therefore she doth not provide to withstand but to shun and avoid Hence it is that in extream fear the Mother of Life contracting herself avoiding as much as may be the reach of evil and drawing the heat together with the spirits of the Body to her leaveth the outward parts cold pale weak feeble unapt to perform the functions of Life as we see in the fear of Balthasar King of Babel By this it appeareth that Fear is nothing else but a perturbation of the minde through an opinion of some imminent evil threatning the destruction or great annoyance of our Nature which to shun it doth contract and deject it self Now because not in this place onely but otherwhere often we hear it repeated Fear not it is by some made a question Whether a man may fear destruction or vexation without sinning First the reproof wherewith Christ checketh his Disciples more than once O men of little Faith wherefore are ye afraid Secondly the punishment threatned in Revelat. 21. viz. the Lake and Fire and Brimstone not onely to Murtherers unclean Persons Sorcerers Idolaters Lyers but also to the fearful and faint-hearted this seemeth to argue That Fearfulness cannot but be finne On the contrary side we see that he which never felt motion unto sinne had of this affection more than a slight feeling How clear is the evidence of the Spirit That in the days of his Flesh be offered up Prayers and Supplications with strong cryes and tears unto him that was able to save him from death and was also heard in that which he feared Heb. 5.7 Whereupon it followeth that Fear in it self is a thing not sinful For is not Fear a thing natural and for mens preservation necessary implanted in us by the provident and most gracious Giver of all good things to the end that we might not run head-long upon those mischiefs wherewith we are not able to encounter but use the remedy of shunning those Evils which we have not ability to withstand Let that People therefore which receive a benefit by the length of their Prince's days the Father or Mother which rejoyceth to see the Off-spring of their Flesh grow like green and pleasant Plants let those Children that would have their Parents those men that would gladly have their Friends and Brethrens dayes prolonged on earth as there is no natural-hearted man but gladly would let them bless the Father of Lights as in other things so even in this that he hath given man a fearful heart and settled naturally that affection in him which is a preservation against so many ways of death Fear then in it self being meer Nature cannot in it self be Sin which Sin is not Nature but thereof an accessary deprivation But in the matter of Fear we may sin and do two wayes If any man's danger be great theirs is greatest that have put the fear of danger farthest from them Is there any estate more fearful than that Babylonian Strumpet's that sitteth upon the tops of seven Hills glorying and vaunting I am a Queen c. Revel 18.7 How much better and happier are they whose estate hath been always as his who speaketh after this sort of himself Lord from my youth have I born thy yoke They which sit at continual ease and are settled in the lees of their security look upon them view their countenance their speech their gesture their deeds Put them in fear O God saith the Prophet that so they may know themselves to be but men Worms of earth dust and ashes frail corruptible feeble things To shake off security therefore and to breed fear in the hearts of mortal men so many admonitions are used concerning the power of Evils which beset them so many threatnings of calamities so many descriptions of things threatned and those so lively to the end they may leave behind them a deep impression of such as have force to keep the heart continually waking All which doe shew that we are to stand in fear of nothing more than the extremity of not fearing When fear hath delivered us from that pit wherein they are sunk that have put farr from them the evil day that have made a league with death and have said Tush we shall feel no harm it standeth us upon to take heed it cast us not into that wherein Souls destitute of all hope are plunged For our direction to avoid as much as may be both extremities that we may know as a Ship-master by his Card how farr we are wide either on the one side or on the other we must note that in a Christian man there is First Nature Secondly Corruption perverting Nature Thirdly Grace correcting and amending Corruption In fear all these have their several operations Nature teacheth simply to wish preservation and avoidance of things dreadful for which cause our Saviour himself prayeth and that often Father if it be possible In which cases corrupt Nature's suggestions are For the safety of Temporal life not to stick at things excluding from eternal wherein how farr even the best may be led the chiefest Apostle's frailty teacheth Were it not therefore for such cogitations as on the contrary side Grace and Faith minisheth such as that of Iob Though God kill me that of Paul Scio cui credidi I know him on whom I do rely small evils would soon be able to overthrow even the best of us A wise man saith Solomon doth see a plague coming and hideth himself It is Nature which teacheth a Wise man in fear to hide himself but Grace and Faith doth teach him where Fools care not to hide their heads but where shall a Wise man hide himself when he feareth a Plague coming Where should the frighted Childe hide his head but in the bosom of his loving Father where a Christian but under the shadow of the Wings of Christ his Saviour Come my People saith God in the Prophet Enter into thy Chamber hide thy self c. Isa. 26. But because we are in danger like chased Birds like Doves that seek and cannot see the resting holes that are right before them therefore our Saviour giveth his Disciples these encouragements before-hand that Fear might never so amaze them but that always they might remember that whatsoever Evils at any time did beset them to him they should still repair for comfort counsel and succour For
cause her merciful disposition to take so much the more delight in saving others whom the like necessity should press What in this behalf hath been done towards Nations abroad the parts of Christendom most afflicted can best testifie That which especially concerneth our selves in the present matter we treat of is the state of Reformed Religion a thing at her coming to the Crown even raised as it were by miracle from the dead a thing which we so little hoped to see that even they which beheld it done searcely believed their own senses at the first beholding Yet being then brought to pass thus many years it hath continued standing by no other wordly mean but that one onely hand which erected it that hand which as no kinde of imminent danger could cause at the first to withhold it self so neither have the practises so many so bloody following since been ever able to make weary Nor can we say in this case so justly that Aaron and Hur the Ecclesiastical and Civil States have sustained the hand which did lift it self to Heaven for them as that Heaven it self hath by this hand sustained them no aid or help having thereunto been ministred for performance of the Work of Reformation other then such kinde of help or aid as the Angel in the Prophet Zechariah speaketh of saying Neither by an army nor strength but by my Spirit saith the Lord of Hosts Which Grace and Favor of Divine Assistance having not in one thing or two shewed it self nor for some few days or years appeared but in such sort so long continued our manifold sins and transgressions striving to the contrary What can we less thereupon conclude then that God would at leastwise by tract of time teach the World that the thing which he blesseth defendeth keepeth so strangely cannot chuse but be of him Wherefore if any refuse to believe us disputing for the Verity of Religion established let then believe God himself thus miraculously working for it and with life even for ever and ever unto that Glorious and Sacred Instrument whereby he worketh OF THE LAWS OF Ecclesiastical Polity BOOK V. Concerning their Fourth Assertion That touching several Publick Duties of Christian Religion there is amongst us much Superstition retained in them and concerning Persons which for performance of those Duties are endued with the Power of Ecclesiastical Order our Laws and Proceedings according thereunto are many ways herein also corrupted The Matter contained in this Fifth Book 1. TRue Religion is the Root of all true Vertues and the stay of all Well-ordered Commonwealths 2. The must extream opposite to true Religion is affected Atheism 3. Of Superstition and the Rest thereof either misguided zeal or Ignorant fear of Divine glory 4. Of the Redress of Superstition in Gods Church and concerning the Question of this Book 5. Four General Propositions demanding that which may reasonably be granted concerning Matters of outward Form in the Exercise of true Religion And fifthly Of a Rule and safe not reasonable in these Cases 6. The first Proposition touching Iudgment what things are convenient in the outward publick ordering of Church affairs 7. The second Proposition 8. The third Proposition 9. The fourth Proposition 10. The Rule of Mens private spirit not safe in these Cases to be followed 11. Plans for the Publick Service of God 12. The Solemnity of Erecting Churches condemned the Hallowing and Dedicating of them scanned by the Adversary 13. Of the names whereby we distinguish our Churches 14. Of the Fashion of our Churches 15. The Sumptuousness of Churches 16. What Holiness and Vertue we ascribe to the Church more than other places 17. Their pretence that would have Churches utterly vazed 18. Of Publick Teaching or Preaching and the first kinde thereof Catechizing 19. Of Preaching by reading publickly the Books of holy Scripture and concerning supposed Untruths in those Translations of Scripture which we allow to be read as also of the choice which we make in reading 20. Of Preaching by the Publick Reading of other prositable Instructions and concerning Books Apâ—cryphal 21. Of Preaching by Sermons and whether Sermons be the onely ordinary way of Teaching whereby man are brought to the saving knowledge of Gods Truth 22. What they attribute to Sermons onely and what we to Reading also 23. Of Prayer 24. Of Publick Prayer 25. Of the Form of Common Prayer 26. Of them which like not to have any Set Form of Common Prayer 27. Of them who allowing a Set Form of Prayer yet allow not ours 28. The Form of our Liturgy too near the Papists too far different from that of other Reformed Churches as they pretend 29. Attire belonging to the Service of God 30. Of gesture in Praying and of different places chosen to that purpose 31. Easiness of Praying after our Form 32. The length of our Service 33. Instead of such Prayers as the Primitive Churches have used and those that be Reformed now use we have they say divers short cuts or shreaddings rather Wishes them Prayers 34. Lessons intermingled with our Prayers 35. The number of our Prayers for Earthly things and our oft rehearsing of the Lords Prayer 36. The People saying after the Minister 37. Our manner of Reading the Psalms otherwise then the rest of the Scripture 38. Of Musick with Psalms 39. Of Singing or Saying Psalms and other parts of Common Prayer wherein the People and the Minister answer one another by course 40. Of Magnificat Benedictus and Nune Dimittis 41. Of the Litany 42. Of Athanasus Creed and Gloria Patri 43. Our want of particular Thanksgiving 44. In some things the Matter of our Prayer as they affirm is unsound 45. When thou hast overcome the sharpness of Death thou didst open the Kingdom of Heaven unto all Believers 46. Touching Prayer for Deliverance from Sudden Death 47. Prayer for these things which we for our worthiness dare not ask God for the worthiness of his Sin would vouchsafe to grant 48. Prayer to be evermore delivered from all Adversity 49. Prayer that all Men may finde Mercy and if the will of God that all Men might be Saved 50. Of the Name the Author and the force of Sacraments which force consisteth in this That God hath ordained them as means to make us partakers of him in Christ and of life through Christ. 51. That God is in Christ by the Personal Incarnation of the Son who is very God 52. The Misinterpretations which Heresit hath made of the manner how God and Man are united in one Christ. 53. That by the union of the one with the other Nature in Christ there groweth neither gain nor loss of Essential Properties to either 54. What Christ hath obtained according to the Flesh by the union of his Flesh with Dâ—iey 55. Of the Personal presence of Christ every where and in what sense it may be granted he is every where present according to the Flesh. 56. The union or mutual Participation which is between Christ
behold It appeareth that when Christ did ascend he then most liberally opened the Kingdom of Heaven to the end that with him and by him all Believers might raign In what estate the Fathers rested which were dead before it is not hereby either one way or other determined All that we can rightly gather is that as touching their souls what degree of joy or happiness soever it pleased God to bestow upon them his Ascension which succeeded procured theirs and theirs concerning the Body must needs be not onely of but after his As therefore Helvidius against whom St. Ierome writeth abused greatly those words of Matthew concerning Ioseph and the Mother of our Saviour Christ He knew her not till she had brought forth her first-born thereby gathering against the honor of the Blessed Virgin that a thing denied with special circumstance doth import an opposite affirmation when once that circumstance is expired After the self-same manner it should be a weak collection if whereas we say That when Christ had overcome the sharpness of death he then opened the Kingdom of Heaven to all Believers a thing in such sort affirmed with circumstance were taken as insinuating an opposite denial before that circumstance be accomplished and consequently that because when the sharpness of death was overcome he then opened Heaven as well to believing Gentiles as Iews Heaven till then was no receptacle to the Souls of either Wherefore be the Spirits of the just and righteous before Christ truly or falsly thought excluded out of Heavenly joy by that which we in the words alledged before do attribute to Christs Ascension there is to no such opinion nor to the favorers thereof any countenance at all given We cannot better interpret the meaning of these words then Pope Leo himself expoundeth them whose Speech concerning our Lords Ascension may serve instead of a Marginal gloss Christs Exaltation is our Promotion and whither the glory of the Head is already gone before thither the Hope of the â—ody also is to follow For at this day we have not onely the possession of Paradise assured unto us but in Christ we have entred the highest of the Heavens His opening the Kingdom of Heaven and his entrance thereinto was not onely to his own use but for the benefit of all Believers 46. Our good or evil estate after death dependeth most upon the quality of our lives Yet somewhat there is why a vertuous minde should rather wish to depart this world with a kinde of treatable dissolution then to be suddenly cut off in a moment rather to be taken then snatched away from the face of the Earth Death is that which all men suffer but not all men with one minde neither all men in one manner For being of necessity a thing common it is through the manifold perswasions dispositions and occasions of men with equal desert both of praise and dispraise shunned by some by others desired So that absolutely we cannot discommend we cannot absolutely approve either willingness to live or forwardness to die And concerning the ways of death albeit the choice thereof be onely in his hands who alone hath power over all flesh and unto whose appointment we ought with patience meekly to submit our selves for to be agents voluntarily in our own destruction is against both God and Nature yet there is no doubt but in so great variety our desires will and may lawfully prefer one kinde before another Is there any man of worth and vertue although not instructed in the School of Christ or ever taught what the soundness of Religion meaneth that had not rather end the days of this transitory life as Cyrus in Xenophon or in Plato Socrates are described then to sink down with them of whom Elihu hath said Momento Moriuntur there is scarce an instant between their flourishing and their not being But let us which know what it is to die as Absalon or Ananias and Saphira died let us beg of God that when the hour of our rest is come the patterns of our dissolution may be Iacob Moses Iosoua David who leisureably ending their lives in peace prayed for the Mercies of God to come upon their posterity replenished the hearts of the nearest unto them with words of memorable Consolation strengthned in the fear of God gave them wholesome instructions of life and confirmed them in true Religion in sum Taught the World no less vertuously how to die then they had done before how to live To such as judge things according to the sense of natural men and ascend no higher suddenness because it shortneth their grief should in reason be most acceptable That which causeth bitterness in death is the languishing attendance and expectation thereof ere it come And therefore Tyrants use what art they can to increase the slowness of death Quick riddance out of life is often both requested and bestowed as a benefit Commonly therefore it is for vertuous considerations that Wisdom so far prevaileth with men as to make them desirous of slow and deliberate death against the stream of their sensual inclination conâ—ent to endure the longer grief and bodily pain that the Soul may have time to call it self to a just account of all things past by means whereof Repentance is perfected there is wherein to exercise patience the joys of the Kingdom of Heaven have leisure to present themselves the pleasures of sin and this Worlds vanities are censured with uncorrupt judgment Charity is free to make advised choice of the soyl wherein her last Seed may most fruitfully be bestowed the minde is at liberty to have due regard of that disposition of worldly things which it can never afterwards alter and because the nearer we draw unto God the more we are oftentimes enlightned with the shining beams of his glorious presence as being then even almost in sight a leisureable departure may in that case bring forth for the good of such as are present that which shall cause them for ever after from the bottom of their hearts to pray O let us die the death of the righteous and let our last end be like theirs All which benefits and opportunities are by sudden death prevented And besides for as much as death howsoever is a general effect of the wrath of God against sin and the suddenness thereof a thing which hapneth but to few The World in this respect feareth it the more as being subject to doubtful constructions which as no man willingly would incur so they whose happy estate after life is of all mens the most certain should especially wish that no such accident in their death may give uncharitable mindes occasion of rash sinister and suspicious verdicts whereunto they are over-prone So that whether evil men or good be respected whether we regard our selves or others to be preserved from sudden death is a Blessing of God And our Prayer against it importeth a twofold desire first That death when
our Lords admonition Pray that ye enter not into temptation When himself pronounceth them blessed that should for his Names sake be subject to all kindes of ignominy and opprobrious malediction was it his purpose that no man should ever pray with David Lord remove from me shame and contempt In those tribulations saith St. Augustine which may hurt as well as profit we must say with the Apostle What we should ask as we ought we know not yet because they are tough because they are grievous because the sense of our weakness flieth them we pray according to the general desire of the will of man that God would turn them away from us owing in the mean while this devotion to the Lord our God that if he remove them not yet we do not therefore imagine our selves in his sight despised but rather with godly sufferance of evils expect greater good at his merciful hands For thus is vertue in weakness perfected To the flesh as the Apostle himself granteth all affliction is naturally grievous Therefore Nature which causeth to fear teacheth to pray against all adversity Prosperity in regard of our corrupt inclination to abuse the blessings of Almighty God doth prove for the most part a thing dangerous to the Souls of Men. Very Ease it self is death to the wicked and the prosperity of fools slayeth them Their Table is a Snare and their Felicity their utter overthrow Few men there are which long prosper and sin not Howbeit even as these ill effects although they be very usual and common are no bar to the hearty prayers whereby most vertuous mindes with peace and prosperity always where they love because they consider that this in it self is a thing naturally desired So because all adversity is in it self against nature what should hinder to pray against it although the providence of God turn it often unto the great good of many men Such Prayers of the Church to be delivered from all adversity are no more repugnant to any reasonable disposition of mens mindes towards death much less to that blessed Patience and meek Contentment which Saints by Heavenly inspiration have to endure what cross or calamity soever it pleaseth God to lay upon them then our Lord and Saviours own Prayer before his Passion was repugnant unto his most gracious resolution to die for the sins of the whole World 49. In praying for deliverance from all adversity we seek that which Nature doth wish to it self but by intreating for Mercy towards all we declare that Affection wherewith Christian Charity thirsteth after the good of the whole World we discharge that duty which the Apostle himself doth impose on the Church of Christ as a commendable office a sacrifice acceptable in Gods sight a service according to his heart whose desire is to have all men saved A work most suitable with his purpose who gave himself to be the price of redemption for all and a forcible mean to procure the conversion of all such as are not yet acquainted with the Mysteries of that Truth which must save their Souls Against it there is but the bare shew of this one Impediment that all mens salvation and many mens eternal condemnation or death are things the one repugnant to the other that both cannot be brought to pass that we know there are Vessels of Wrath to whom God will never extend mercy and therefore that wittingly we ask an impossible thing to be had The truth is that as life and death mercy and wrath are matters of meer understanding or knowledge all mens salvation and some mens endless perdition are things so opposite that whosoever doth affirm the one must necessarily deny the order God himself cannot effect both or determine that both shall be There is in the knowledge both of God and Man this certainty That life and death have divided between them the whole Body of mankinde What portion either of the two hath God himself knoweth for us he hath left no sufficient means to comprehend and for that cause neither given any leave to search in particular who are infalliby the heirs of the Kingdom of God who cast-aways Howbeit concerning the state of all men with whom we live for onely of them our Prayers are meant we may till the Worlds end for the present always presume That as far as in us there is power to discern what others are and as far as any duty of ours dependeth upon the notice of their condition in respect of God the safest Axioms for Charity to rest it self upon are these He which believeth already is and he which believeth not as yet may be the childe of God It becometh not us during life altogether to condemn any man seeing that for any thing we know there is hope of every mans forgiveness the possibility of whose repentance is not yet cut off by death And therefore Charity which hopeth all things prayeth also for all Men. Wherefore to let go Personal Knowledge touching Vessels of Wrath and Mercy what they are inwardly in the sight of God it skilleth not for us there is cause sufficient in all men whereupon to ground our Prayers unto God in their behalf For whatsoever the Minde of Man apprehencieth as good the Will of Charity and Love is to have it inlarged in the very uttermost extent that all may enjoy it to whom it can any way add perfection Because therefore the father a good thing doth reach the nobler and worthier we reckon it our Prayers for all mens good no less then for our own the Apostle with very fit terms commendeth as being 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a work commendable for the largeness of the affection from whence it springeth even as theirs which have requested at Gods hands the salvation of many with the loss of their own Souls drowning as it were and over-whelming themselves in the abundance of their love towards others is proposed as being in regard of the rareness of such affections 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 more then excellent But this extraordinary height of desire after other mens salvation is no common mark The other is a duty which belongeth unto all and prevaileth with God daily For as it is in it self good so God accepteth and taketh it in very good part at the hands of faithful men Our Prayers for all men do include both them that shall finde mercy and them also that shall finde none For them that shall no man will doubt but our Prayers are both accepted and granted Touching them for whom we crave that mercy which is not to be obtained let us not think that our Saviour did mis-instruct his Disciples willing them to pray for the peace even of such as should be uncapable of so great a blessing or that the Prayers of the Prophet Ieremy offended God because the answer of God was a resolute denial of favor to them for whom Supplication was made And if any
same Conjunction so much altered as not to stay within those limits which our Substance is bordered withal nor the state and quality of our Substance so unaltered but that there are in it many glorious effects proceeding from so near Copulation with Deity God from us can receive nothing we by him have obtained much For albeit the Natural Properties of Deity be not communicable to Mans nature the Supernatural Gifts Graces and Effects thereof are The honor which our Flesh hath by being the Flesh of the Son of God is in many respects great If we respect but that which is common unto us with him the Glory provided for him and his in the Kingdom of Heaven his Right and Title thereunto even in that he is Man differeth from other mens because he is that Man of whom God is himself a part We have right to the same Inheritance with Christ but not the same right which he hath his being such as we cannot reach and ours such as he cannot stoop unto Furthermore to be the Way the Truth and the Life to be the Wisdom Righteousness Sanctification Resurrection to be the Peace of the whole World the Hope of the Righteous the Heir of all things to be that Supream Head whereunto all Power both in Heaven and in Earth is given These are not Honors common unto Christ with other Men they are Titles above the dignity and worth of any which were but a meer Man yet true of Christ even in that he is Man but Man with whom Deity is personally joyned and unto whom it hath added those excellencies which makes him more then worthy thereof Finally Sith God hath deified our Nature though not by turning it into himself yet by making it his own inseparable Habitation we cannot now conceive how God should without Man either exercise Divine Power or receive the glory of Divine Praise For Man is in both an Associate of Deity But to come to the Grace of Unction Did the parts of our Nature the Soul and Body of Christ receive by the influence of Deity wherewith they were matcht no ability of Operations no Vertue or quality above Nature Surely as the Sword which is made fiery doth not onely cut by reason of the sharpness which simply it hath but also burn by means of that heat which it hath from fire so there is no doubt but the Deity of Christ hath enabled that Nature which it took of Man to do more then Man in this World hath power to comprehend for as much as the bare Essential Properties of Deity excepted he hath imparted unto it all things he hath replenished it with all such Perfections as the same is any way apt to receive at the least according to the exigence of that oeconomy or service for which it pleased him in Love and Mercy to be made Man For as the Parts Degrees and Offices of that Mystical Administration did require which he voluntarily undertook the Beams of Deity did in operation always accordingly either restrain or enlarge themselves From hence we may somewhat conjecture how the Powers of that Soul are illuminated which being so inward unto God cannot chuse but be privy unto all things which God worketh and must therefore of necessity be endued with knowledge so far forth Universal though not with infinite knowledge peculiar to Deity itself The Soul of Christ that saw in this life the Face of God was here through so visible presence of Deity filled with all manner of Graces and Vertues in that unmatchable degree of Perfection for which of him we read it written That God with the Oyl of Gladness anointed him above his fellows And as God hath in Christ unspeakably glorified the Nobler so likewise the meaner part of our Nature the very Bodily Substance of Man Where also that must again be remembred which we noted before concerning the degrees of the influence of Deity proportionable unto his own purposes intents and counsels For in this respect his Body which by Natural condition was corruptible wanted the gift of Everlasting immunity from Death Passion and Dissolution till God which gave it to be slain for sin had for Righteousness sake restored it to life with certainty of endless continuance Yea in this respect the very glorified Body of Christ retained in it the skars and marks of former mortality But shall we say that in Heaven his glorious Body by vertue of the same cause hath now power to present it self in all places and to be every where at once present We nothing doubt but God hath many ways above the reach of our capacities exalted that Body which it hath pleased him to make his own that Body wherewith he hath saved the World that Body which hath been and is the Root of Eternal Life the Instrument wherewith Deity worketh the Sacrifice which taketh away sin the Price which hath ransomed Souls from Death the Leader of the whole Army of Bodies that shall rise again For though it had a beginning from us yet God hath given it vital efficacy Heaven hath endowed it with celestial power that vertue it hath from above in regard whereof all the Angels of Heaven adore it Notwithstanding a Body still it continueth a Body consubstantial with our Bodies a Body of the same both Nature and Measure which it had on Earth To gather therefore into one sum all that hitherto hath been spoken touching this point there are but four things which concur to make compleat the whole state of our Lord Jesus Christ his Deity his Manhood the Conjunction of both and the distinction of the one from the other being joyned in one Four principal Heresies there are which have in those things withstood the truth Arians by bending themselves against the Deity of Christ Apollinarians by maiming and misinterpreting that which belongeth to his Humane Nature Nestorians by renting Christ asunder and dividing him into two persons the followers of Eutiches by confounding in his Person those Natures which they should distinguish Against these there have been four most famous Ancient General Councils the Council of Nice to define against Arians against Apollinarians the Council of Constantinople the Council of Ephesus against Nestorians against Eutichians the Calcedon Council In four words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 truly perfectly indivisibly distinctly The first applied to his being God and the second to his being Man the third to his being of both One and the fourth to his still continuing in that One both We may fully by way of Abridgment comprize whatsoever Antiquity hath at large handled either in Declaration of Christian Belief or in Refutation of the soresaid Heresies Within the compass of which four heads I may truly affirm That all Heresies which touch but the Person of Jesus Christ whether they have risen in these latter days or in any age heretofore may be with great facility brought to confine themselves We conclude
of words as Alchymy doth or would the substance of Mettals maketh of any thing what it listeth and bringeth in the end all Truth to nothing Or howsoever such voluntary exercise of wit might be born with otherwise yet in places which usually serve as this doth concerning Regeneration by Water and the Holy Ghost to be alledged for Grounds and Principles less is permitted To hide the general consent of Antiquity agreeing in the literal interpretation they cunningly affirm That certain have taken those words as meant of Material Water when they know that of all the Ancients there is no one to be named that ever did otherwise either expound or alledge the place then as implying External Baptism Shall that which hath always received this and no other construction be now disguised with a toy of Novelty Must we needs at the onely shew of a critical conceit without any more deliberation utterly condemn them of Error which will not admit that Fire in the words Iohn is quenched with the Name of the Holy Ghost or with the name of the Spirit Water dried up in the words of Christ When the Letter of the Law hath two things plainly and expresly specified Water and the Spirit Water as a duty required on our parts the Spirit as a Gift which God bestoweth There is danger in presuming so to interpret it at if the clause which concerneth our selves were more then needeth We may by such rate Expositions attain perhaps in the end to be thought witty but with ill advice Finally if at the time when that Baptism which was meant by Iohn came to be really and truly performed by Christ himself we finde the Apostles that had been as we are before Baptized new Baptized with the Holy Ghost and in this their latter Baptism as well a visible descent of Fire as a secret miraculous infusion of the Spirit if on us he accomplish likewise the Heavenly work of our New birth not with the Spirit alone but with Water thereunto adjoyned sith the faithfullest Expounders of his words are his own Deeds let that which his hand hath manifestly wrought declare what his speech did doubtfully utter 60. To this they add That as we err by following a wrong construction of the place before alledged so our second over-sight is that we thereupon infer a necessity over-rigorous and extream The true necessity of Baptism a sew Propositions considered will soon decide All things which either are known Causes or set Means whereby any great Good is usually procured or Men delivered from grievous evil the same we must needs confess necessary And if Regeneration were not in this very sense a thing necessary to eternal life would Christ himself have taught Nicodemus that to see the Kingdom of God is impossible saving onely for those Men which are born from above His words following in the next Sentence are a proof sufficient that to our Regeneration his Spirit is no less necessary then Regeneration it self necessary unto Life Thirdly Unless as the Spirit is a necessary inward cause so Water were a necessary outward mean to our Regeneration what construction should we give unto those words wherein we are said to be new born and that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 even of Water Why are we taught that with Water God doth purifie and cleanse his Church Wherefore do the Apostles of Christ term Baptism a Bath of Regeneration What purpose had they in giving men advice to receive outward Baptism and in perswading them it did avail to remission of sins If outward Baptism were a cause in it self possessed of that power either Natural or Supernatural without the present operation whereof no such effect could possibly grow it must then follow That seeing effects do never prevent the necessary causes out of which they spring no man could ever receive Grace before Baptism Which being apparently both known and also confest to be otherwise in many particulars although in the rest we make not Baptism a cause of Grace yet the Grace which is given them with their Baptism doth so far forth depend on the very outward Sacrament that God will have it embraced not onely as a sign or token what we receive but also as an Instrument or Mean whereby we receive Grace because Baptism is a Sacrament which God hath instituted in his Church to the end that they which receive the same might thereby be incorporated into Christ and so through his most precious Merit obtain as well that saving Grace of Imputation which taketh away all former guiltiness as also that infused Divine Vertue of the Holy Ghost which giveth to the Powers of the Soul their first disposition towards future newness of life There are that elevate too much the ordinary and immediate means of life relying wholly upon the bare conceit of that Eternal Election which notwithstanding includeth a subordination of means without which we are not actually brought to enjoy what God secretly did intend and therefore to build upon Gods Election if we keep not our selves to the ways which he hath appointed for men to walk in is but a self-deceiving vanity When the Apostle saw men called to the participation of Jesus Christ after the Gospel of God embraced and the Sacrament of Life received he feareth not then to put them in the number of Elect Saints he then accounteth them delivered from death and clean purged from all sin Till then notwithstanding their preordination unto life which none could know of saving God what were they in the Apostles own account but Children of Wrath as well as others plain Aliens altogether without hope strangers utterly without God in this present World So that by Sacraments and other sensible tokens of Grace we may boldy gather that he whose Mercy vouchsafeth now to bestow the means hath also long sithence intended us that whereunto they lead But let us never think i◠safe to presume of our own last end by bare conjectural Collections of his first intent and purpose the means failing that should come between Predestination bringeth not to life without the Grace of External Vocation wherein our Baptism is implied For as we are not Naturally men without birth so neither are we Christian men in the eye of the Church of God but by New birth nor according to the manifest ordinary course of Divine Dispensation new born but by that Baptism which both declareth and maketh us Christians In which respect we justly hold it to be the Door of our Actual Entrance into Gods House the first apparent beginning of Life a Seal perhaps to the Grace of Election before received but to our Sanctification here a step that hath not any before it There were of the old Valentinian Hereticks some which had Knowledge in such admiration that to it they ascribed all and so despised the Sacraments of Christ pretending That as Ignorance had
the Children of disobedience On the other to lovers of righteousness all grace and benediction Yet between these extreams that eternal God from whose unspotted justice and undeserved mercy the lot of each inheritance proceedeth is so inclinable rather to shew compassion then to take revenge that all his speeches in holy Scripture are almost nothing else but entreaties of men to prevent destruction by amendment of their wicked lives All the works of his providence little other then meer allurements of the just to continue stedfast and of the unrighteous to change their course All his dealings and proceedings towards true Converts as have even filled the grave writings of holy men with these and the like most sweet sentences Repentance if I may so speak stoppeth God in his way when being provoked by crimes past he cometh to revenge them with most just punishments Yea it tyeth as it were the hands of the Avenger and doth not suffer him to have his will Again The merciful eye of God towards Men hath no power to withstand Penitency at what time soever it comes in presence And again God doth not take it so in evil part though we wound that which he hath required us to keep whole as that after we have taken hurt there should be in us no desire to receive his help Finally lest I be carried too far in so large a Sea There was never any Man condemned of God but for neglect nor justified except he had care of Repentance From these considerations setting before our eyes our inexcusable both unthankfulness in disobeying so merciful foolishness in provoking so powerful a God there ariseth necessarily a pensive and corrosive desire that we had done otherwise a desire which suffereth us to foreslow no time to feel no quietness within our selves to take neither sleep nor food with contentment never to give over Supplications Confessions and other penitent Duties till the light of Gods reconciled favour shine in our darkned soul. Fulgentius asking the question Why Davids confession should be held for effectual Penitence and not Saul's answereth that the one hated Sin the other feared only punishment in this world Sauls acknowledgement of Sin was Fear David's both fear and also love This was the Fountain of Peters Tears this the Life and Spirit of Davids eloquence in those most admirable Hymns intituled Penitential where the words of sorrow for Sin do melt the very Bowels of God remitting it and the Comforts of Grace in remitting Sin carry him which sorrowed rapt as it were into Heaven with extasies of joy and gladness The first motive of the Ninevites unto Repentance was their belief in a Sermon of Fear but the next and most immediate an Axiom of Love Who can tell whether God will turn away his fierce wrath that we perish notâ— No conclusion such as theirs Let every man turn from his evil way but out of premisses such as theirs were Fear and Love Wherefore the Well-spring of Repentance is Faith first breeding Fear and then Love which Love causes hope hope resolution of Attempt I will go to my Father and say I have sinned against Heaven and against thee that is to say I will do what the Duty of a Convert requireth Now in a Penitent's or Convert's duty there are included first the aversion of the will from Sin secondly the submission of our selves to God by supplication and Prayer thirdly the purpose of a new life testified with present works of amendment Which three things do very well seem to be comprised in one definition by them which handle Repentance as a vertue that hateth bewaileth and sheweth a purpose to amend Sin We offend God in thought word and deed To the first of which three they make Contrition to the second Confession and to the last our works of Satisfaction answerable Contrition doth not here import those sudden Pangs and Convulsions of the mind which cause sometimes the most forsaken of God to retract their own doings it is no Natural passion or anguish which riseth in us against our wills but a deliberate aversion of the Will of Man from Sin which being alwaies accompanied with grief and grief oftentimes partly with tears partly with other external signs it hath been thought that in these things Contrition doth chiefly consist whereas the chiefest thing in Contrition is that alteration whereby the Will which was before delighted with Sin doth now abhorr and shun nothing more But forasmuch as we cannot hate Sin in our selves without heaviness and grief that there should be in us a thing of such hatefull quality the Will averted from Sin must needs make the affection suitable yea great reason why it should so do For since the Will by conceiving Sin hath deprived the Soul of Life and of life there is not recovery without Repentance the death of Sin Repentance not able to kill Sin but by withdrawing the Will from it the Will unpossible to be withdrawn unless it concur with a contrary affection to that which accompanied it before in evill Is it not clear that as an inordinate delight did first begin sin so Repentance must begin with a just sorrow a sorrow of heart and such a sorrow as renteth the heart neither a feigned nor sleight sorrow not feigned blest it increase Sin nor sleight lest the pleasures of Sin over-match itâ—â—â—ef Wher ore of Grace the highest cause from which Mans Penitency doth proceed of Faith Fear Love Hope what force and efficiency they have in Repentance of Parts and Duties thereunto belonging comprehended in the Schoolmens definitions finally of the first among those Duties Contrition which disliketh and bewaileth iniquity let this suffice And because God will have Offences by Repentance not only abhorred within our selves but also with humble Supplication displayed before Him and a testimony of amendment to be given even by present works worthy Repentance in that they are contrary to those we renounce and disclaim Although the vertue of Repentance do require that her other two parts Consession and Satisfaction should here follow yet seeing they belong as well to the Discipline as to the vertue of Repentance and only differ for that in the one they are performed to Man in the other to God alone I had rather distinguish them in joynt-handling then handle them apart because in quality and manner of practise they are distinct Of the Discipline of Repentance instituted by Christ practised by the Fathers converted by the School-men into a Sacrament and of Confession that which belongeth to the vertue of Repentance that which was used among the Iews that which the Papacy imagineth a Sacrament and that which Antient Discipline practised 1. OUr Lord and Saviour in the sixteenth of St. Matthews Gospel giveth his Apostles Regiment in General over Gods Church For they that have the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven are thereby signified to be Stewards of the House of God under whom they Guide Command Judge and
and operation of their Sacrament surely to admit the matter as a part and not to admit the form hath small congruity with reason Again for as much as a Sacrament is compleat having the matter and form which it ought what should lead them to set down any other parts of Sacramental Repentance then Confession and Absolution as Durandus hath done For touching Satisfaction the end thereof as they understand it is a further matter which resteth after the Sacrament administred and therefore can be no part of the Sacrament Will they draw in Contrition with Satisfaction which are no parts and exclude Absolution a principal part yea the very complement form and perfection of the rest as themselves account it But for their breach of precepts in art it skilleth not if their Doctrine otherwise concerning Penitency and in Penitency touching Confession might be found true We say let no man look for pardon which doth sin other and conceal Sin where in duty it should be revealed The cause why God requireth Confession to be made to him is that thereby testifying a deep hatred of our own iniquity the only cause of his hatred and wrath towards us we might because we are humble be so much the more capable of that compassion and tender mercy which knoweth not how to condemn sinners that condemn themselves If it be our Saviours own principle that the conceipt we have of our debt forgiven proportioneth our thankfulness and love to him at whose hands we receive pardon doth not God fore-see that they which with ill-advised modesty seek to hide their Sin like Adam that they which rake it up under ashes and confess it not are very unlikely to requite with offices of love afterwards the grace which they shew themselves unwilling to prize at the very time when they sue for it in as much as their not confessing what crimes they have committed is a plain signification how loth they are that the benefit of Gods most gracious pardon should seem great Nothing more true then that of Tertullian Confession doth as much abate the weight of mens offences as Concealment doth make them heavier For he which confesseth hath a purpose to appease God he a determination to persist and continue obstinate which keeps them secret to himself St. Chrysostome almost in the same words Wickedness is by being acknowledged lessened and doth but grow by being hid If men having done amiss let it slip as though they knew no such matter what is there to stay them from falling into one and the same evil To call our selves Sinners availeth nothing except we lay our faults in the ballance and take the weight of them one by one Confess thy crimes to God disclose thy transgressions before thy Judge by way of humble Supplication and suit if not with tongue at the least with heart and in this sort seek mercy A general perswasion that thou art a Sinner will neither so humble nor bridle thy Soul as if the Catalogue of thy Sins examined severally be continually kept in mind This shall make thee lowly in thine own eyes this shall preserve thy feet from falling and sharpen thy desires towards all good things The mind I know doth hardly admit such unpleasant remembrances but we must force it we must constrain it thereunto It is safer now to be bitten with the memory then hereafter with the torment of Sin The Jews with whom no Repentance for Sin is available without Confession either conceived in mind or uttered which latter kind they call usually 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Confession delivered by word of mouth had first that general Confession which once every year was made both severally by each of the people for himself upon the day of expiation and by the Priest for them all On the day of expiation the high Priest maketh three express Confessions acknowledging unto God the manifold transgressions of the whole Nation his own personal offences likewise together with the Sins as well of his Family as of the rest of his rank and order They had again their voluntary Confessions at the times and seasons when men bethinking themselves of their wicked conversation past were resolved to change their course the beginning of which alteration was still Confession of Sins Thirdly over and besides these the Law imposed upon them also that special Confession which they in their book call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Confession of that particular fault for which we namely seek pardon at Gods hands The words of the Law concerning Confession in this kind are as followeth When a Man or Woman shall commit any Sin that Men commit and transgress against the Lord their Sin which they have done that is to say the very deed it self in particular they shall acknowledge In Leviticus after certain transgressions there mentioned we read the like When a Man hath sinned in any one of these things he shall then confess how in that thing he hath offended For such kind of special Sins they had also special Sacrifices wherein the manner was that the Offender should lay his hands on the head of the Sacrifice which he brought and should there make Confession to God saying Now O Lord that I have offended committed Sin and done wickedly in thy sight this or this being my fault behold I repent me and am utterly ashamed of my doings my purpose is never to return more to the same crime None of them whom either the house of judgement had condemned to die or of them which are to be punished with stripes can be clear by being executed or scourged till they repent and confess their faults Finally there was no man amongst them at any time either condemned to suffer death or corrected or chastized with stripes none ever sick and near his end but they called upon him to repent and confess his Sins Of Malefactors convict by witnesses and thereupon either adjudged to die or otherwise chastized their custom was to exact as Ioshua did of Achan open confession My son now give Glory to the Lord God of Israel confess unto him and declare unto me what thou hast committed conceal it not from me Jos. 7. 19. Concerning injuries and trespasses which happen between men they highly commend such as will acknowledge before many It is in him which repenteth accepted as an high Sacrifice if he will confess before many make them acquainted with his over-sights and reveal the transgressions which have passed between him and any of his brethren saying I have verily offended this Man thus and thus I have done unto him but behold I do now repent and am sorry Contariwise whosoever is proud and will not be known of his faults but cloaketh them is not yet come to perfect Repentance for so it is written He that hides his Sins shall not prosper which words of Solomon they do not further extend then only to Sins committed against Men which are in
to the Minister of God he presently absolveth in this case the sick Party from all Sinnes by that Authority which Jesus Christ hath committed unto him knowing that God respecteth not so much what time is spent as what truth is shewed in Repentance In summe when the Offence doth stand onely between God and Man's Conscience the Counsel is good which Saint Chrysostom giveth I wish thee not to bewray thy self publickly nor to accuse thy self before others I wish thee to obey the Prophet who saith Disclose thy way unto the Lord confesse thy sins before him Tell thy sins to him that he may blot them out If thou be abashed to tell unto any other wherein thou hast offended rehearse them every day between thee and thy Soul I wish thee not to confesse them to thy fellow-servant who may upbraid thee with them Tell them to God who will cure them There is no need for thee in the presence of Witnesses to acknowledge them Let God alone see thee at thy Confession I pray and beseech you that you would more often than you do confesse to God eternal and reckoning up your Trespasses desire his Pardon I carry you not into a Theatre or open Court of many your Fellow-Servants I seek not to detect your crimes before men Disclose your Conscience before God unfold yourselves to him lay forth your wounds before him the best Physician that is and desire of him salve for them If hereupon it follow as it did with David I thought I will confesse against my self my wickednesse unto thee O Lord and thou forgavest me the plague of my Sinne we have our desire and there remaineth only thankfulnesse accompanied with perpetuity of care to avoid that which being not avoided we know we cannot remedy without new perplexity and grief Contrariwise if peace with God do not follow the pains we have taken in seeking afterit if we continue disquieted and not delivered from anguish mistrusting whether that we do be sufficient it argueth that our Soar doth exceed the power of our own skill and that the wisedom of the Pastor must binde up those parts which being bruised are not able to be recured of themselves Of Satisfaction THere resteth now Satisfaction only to be considered A point which the Fathers do often touch albeit they never aspire to such Mysteries as the Papacy hath found enwrapped within the folds and plaits thereof And it is happy for the Church of God that we have the Writings of the Fathers to shew what their meaning was The name of Satisfaction as the Antient Fathers meant it containeth whatsoever a Penitent should do in the humbling himself unto God and testifying by deeds of Contrition the same which Confession in words pretendeth He which by Repentance for Sins saith Tertullian speaking of fickle-minded-men had a purpose to satisfie the Lord will now by repenting his Repentance make Satan satisfaction and be so much more hateful to God as he is unto Gods enemy more acceptable Is it not plain that Satisfaction doth here include the whole work of Penitency and that God is Satisfied when men are restored through Sin into favour by Repentance How canst thou saith Chrysostom move God to pity thee when thou wilt not seem as much as to know that thou hast offended By appeasing pacifying and moving God to pity Saint Chrysostom meaneth the very same with the Latin Fathers when they speak of satisfying God We feel saith Cyprian the bitter smart of his rod and scourge because there is in us neither care to please him with our good deeds nor to satisfie him for our evil Again Let the eyes which have looked on Idols spunge out their unlawful acts with those sorrowful tears which have power to satisfie God The Master of Sentences alledgeth out of Saint Augustine that which is plain enough to this purpose Three things there are in perfect Penitency Compunction Confession and Satisfaction that as we three wayes offend God namely in Heart Word and Deed so by three Duties we may satisfie God Satisfaction as a part comprehendeth only that which the Papists meant by worthy of Repentance and if we speak of the whole work of Repentance it self we may in the phrase of Antiquity term it very well Satisfaction Satisfaction is a work which Justice requireth to be done for contentment of Persons injured Neither is it in the eye of Justice a sufficient satisfaction unless it fully equal the Injury for which we satisfie Seeing then that sin against God Eternal and Infinite must needs be an infinite wrong Justice in regard thereof doth necessarily exact an infinite recompence or else inflict upon the Offender infinite punishment Now because God was thus to be satisfied and man not able to make satisfaction in such sort his unspeakable love and inclination to save mankinde from eternal death ordained in our behalf a Mediatour to do that which had been for any other impossible Wherefore all sin is remitted in the only faith of Christ's passion and no man without belief thereof justified Bonavent in Sentent 4. dist 15. 9. 9. Faith alone maketh Christ's satisfaction ours howbeit that Faith alone which after sinne maketh us by Conversion his For in as much as God will have the benefit of Christ's satisfaction both thankfully acknowledged and duly esteemed of all such as enjoy the same he therefore imparteth so high a treasure unto no man whose Faith hath not made him willing by Repentance to do even that which of it self how unavailable soever yet being required and accepted with God we are in Christ thereby made capable and sit Vessels to receive the fruits of his Satisfaction Yea we so farr please and content God that because when we have offended he looketh but for Repentance at our hands our Repentance and the works thereof are therefore termed satisfactory not for that so much is thereby done as the Justice of God can exact but because such actions of grief and humility in man after sinne are illices divine misericordiae as Tertullian speaketh of them they draw that pity of God's towards us wherein he is for Christ's sake contented upon our submission to pardon our rebellion against him and when that little which his Law appointeth is faithfully executed it pleaseth him in tender compassion and mercy to require no more Repentance is a name which noteth the habit and operation of a certain grace or vertue in us Satisfaction the effect which it hath either with God or man And it is not in this respect said amiss that Satisfaction importeth Acceptation Reconciliation and Amity because that through Satisfaction on the one part made and allowed on the other they which before did reject are now content to receive they to be won again which were lost and they to love unto whom just cause of hatred was given We satisfie therefore in doing that which is sufficient to this effect and they towards whom we do it are
seemeth even injurious to both if we should admit those surmised reservations of temporal wrath in God appeased towards reconciled Sinners As a Father he delights in his Childrens conversion neither doth he threaten the Penitent with wrath or them with punishment which already mourn but by promise assureth such of indulgence and mercy yea even of plenary Pardon which taketh away all both Faults and Penalties There being no reason why we should think him the lesse just because he sheweth him thus mercifull when they which before were obstinate labour to appease his wrath with the pensive meditation of Contrition the meek humility which Confession expresseth and the deeds wherewith Repentance declareth it self to be an amendment as well of the rotten fruit as the dryed leaves and withered root of the tree For with these duties by us performed and presented unto God in Heaven by Jesus Christ whose blood is a continual sacrifice of propitiation for us we content please and satisfie God Repentance therefore even the sole vertue of Repentance without either purpose of shrift or desire of absolution from the Priest Repentance the secret Conversion of the heart in that it consisteth of these three and doth by these three pacifie God may be without hyperbolical terms most truly magnified as a recovery of the Soul of man from deadly sickness a restitution of glorious light to his darkned minde a comfortable reconciliation with God aspiritual nativity a rising from the dead a day-spring from out the depth of obscurity a redemption from more than the AEgyptian thraldom a grinding of the old Adam even into dust and powder a deliverance out of the prisons hell a full restauration of the Seat of Grace and Throne of Glory a triumph over Sin and a saving Victory Amongst the works of Satisfaction the most respected have been alwayes these three Prayers Fasts and Alms-deeds by Prayers we lift up our Souls to him from whom sinne and iniquity hath withdrawn them by Fasting we reduce the body from thraldom under vain delights and make it serviceable for parts of vertuous conversation by Alms we dedicate to Charity those worldly Goods and Possessions which unrighteousness doth neither get nor bestow well The first a token of piety intended towards God the second a pledge of moderation and sobriety in the carriage of our own Persons the last a testimony of our meaning to do good to all men In which three the Apostle by way of abridgement comprehendeth whatsoever may appertain to sanctimony holynesse and good life as contrariwise the very masse of general corruption throughout the world what is it but only forgetfulnesse of God carnal pleasure immoderate desire after worldly things prophaness licentiousnesse covetousnesse All offices to Repentance have these two Properties there is in performance of them painfulnesse and in their nature a contrarietie unto sinne The one Consideration causeth them both in holy Scripture and elsewhere to be termed Judgement or Revenges taken voluntarily on our selves and to be furthermore also Preservatives from future Evils in as much as we commonly use to keep with the greater care that which with pain we have recovered And they are in the other respect contrary to sinne committed Contrition contrary to the pleasure Confession to the errour which is the mother of Sinne and to the deeds of Sinne the works of Satisfaction contrary therefore they are the more effectual to cure the evil habit thereof Hereunto it was that Saint Cyprian referred his earnest and vehement Exhortation That they which had fallen should be instant in Prayer reject bodily Ornaments when once they had stripped themselves out of Christ's Attire abhorr all Food after Satan's morsels tasted follow works of Righteousnesse which wash away Sinne and be plentiful in Alms-deeds wherewith Souls are delivered from death Not as if God did according to the manner of corrupt Iudges take some money to abate so much in the punishment of Malefactors These duties must be offered saith Salvianus not in confidence to redeem or buy out Sinne but as tokens of meek submission neither are they with God accepted because of their value but for the affections sake which doth thereby shew it self Wherefore concerning Satisfaction made to God by Christ onely and of the manner how Repentance generally particularly also how certain special works of Penitency both are by the Fathers in their ordinary phrase of speech called Satisfactory and may be by us very well so acknowledged enough hath been spoken Our offences sometimes are of such nature as requireth that particular men be satisfied or else Repentance to be utterly void and of none effect For if either through open repine or crooked fraud if through injurious or unconscionable dealing a man have wittingly wronged others to enrich himself the first thing evermore in his Case required ability serving is Restitution For let no man deceive himself from such Offences we are not discharged neither can be till recompence and restitution to man accompany the penitent Confession we have made to Almighty God In which case the Law of Moses was direct and plain If any sinne and commit a Trespasse against the Lord and deny unto his Neighbour that which was given him to keep or that which was put unto him of trust or doth by robbery or by violence oppress his Neighbour or hath found that which was lost and denyeth it and swears falsly for any of these things that a man doth wherein he sinneth he that doth thus offend and trespasse shall restore the robbery that he hath taken or the thing he hath got by violence or that which was delivered him to keep or the lost thing which he found and for whatsoever he hath sworn falsly adding perjury to injury he shall both restore the whole sum and shall adde thereunto a fift part more and deliver it unto him unto whom it belongeth the same day wherein he offereth for his Trespasse Now because men are commonly over-slack to perform this Duty and do therefore deferr it sometime till God have taken the Party wronged out of the World the Law providing that Trespassers might not under such pretence gain the Restitution which they ought to make appointeth the Kindred surviving to receive what the Dead should if they had continued But saith Moses if the Party wronged have no Kinsman to whom this dammage may be restored it shall then be rendered to the Lord himself for the Priest's use The whole order of proceeding herein is in sundry traditional Writings set down by their great Interpreters and Scribes which taught them that a Trespasse between a man and his Neighbour can never be forgiven till the Offender have by Restitution made recompence for wrongs done yea they hold it necessary that he appease the Party grieved by submitting himself unto him or is that will not serve by using the help and mediation of others In this case say they for any man to shew himself unappeasable and
with joy and reverence Now there is no Controversie but as God in that special Case did authorize Nathan so Christ more generally his Apostles and the Ministers of his Word in his Name to absolve Sinners Their power being equal all the difference between them can be but only in this that whereas the one had prophetical evidence the other have the certainty partly of Faith and partly of Human experience whereupon to ground their Sentence Faith to assure them of God's most graous Pardon in Heaven unto all Penitents and touching the sincerity of each particular Parties repentance as much as outward sensible tokens or signes can warrant It is not to be marvelled that so great a difference appeareth between the Doctrine of Rome and Ours when we teach Repentance They imply in the Name of Repentance much more than we do We stand chiefly upon the due inward Conversion of the Heart They more upon Works of external shew We teach above all things that Repentance which is one and the same from the beginning to the World's end They a Sacramental Penance of their own devising and shaping We labour to instruct men in such sort that every Soul which is wounded with sin may learn the way how to cure it self They clean contrary would make all Soars seem incurable unless the Priests have a hand in them Touching the force of whose Absolution they strangely hold that whatsoever the Penitent doth his Contrition Confession and Satisfaction have no place of right to stand as material parts in this Sacrament nor consequently any such force as to make them available for the taking away of Sin in that they proceed from the Penitent himself without the privity of the Minister but only as they are enjoyned by the Minister's Authority and Power So that no contrition or grief of heart till the Priest exact it no acknowledgement of Sins but that which he doth demand no Praying no Fasting no Alms no Recompence or Restitution for whatsoever we have done can help except by him it be first imposed It is the Chain of their own Doctrine No remedy for mortal sin committed after Baptism but the Sacrament of Penance only No Sacrament of Penance if either matter or form be wanting No wayes to make those Duties a material part of the Sacrament unless we consider them as required and exacted by the Priest Our Lord and Saviour they say hath ordained his Priests Judges in such sort that no man which sinneth after Baptisme can be reconciled unto God but by their Sentence For why If there were any other way of Reconciliation the very promise of Christ should be false in saying Whatsoever ye binde on Earth shall be bound in Heaven and whose sins soever ye retain are retained Except therefore the Priest be willing God hath by promise hampred himself so that it is not now in his own power to pardon any man Let him which is offended crave as the Publican did Lord he thou merciful unto me a sinner Let him as David make a thousand times his supplication Have mercy upon me O God according to thy loving kindness according to the multitude of thy compassions put away mine iniquities All this doth not help till such time as the pleasure of the Priest be known till he have signed us a pardon and given us our quietus est God himself hath no Answer to make but such as that of his Angel unto Lot I can do nothing It is true that our Saviour by these words Whose Sins ye remit they are remitted did ordain Judges over our sinful Souls gave them Authority to absolve from sin and promise to ratifie in Heaven whatsoever they should do on Earth in execution of this their Offices to the end that hereby as well his Ministers might take encouragement to do their Duty with all Faithfulness as also his People admonition gladly with all reverence to be ordered by them both parts knowing that the Functions of the one towards the other have his perpetual assistance and approbation Howbeit all this with two Restraints which every Jurisdiction in the World hath the one that the practice thereof proceed in due order the other that it do not extend it self beyond due bounds which bounds or limits have so confined penitential Jurisdiction that although there be given unto it power of remitting sinne yet not such Soveraignty of Power that no sin should be pardonable in man without it Thus to enforce our Saviour's words is as though we should gather that because Whatsoever Ioseph did command in the Land of Pharaoh's grant is it should be done therefore he granteth that nothing should be done in the Land of Egypt but what Ioseph did command and so consequently by enabling his Servant Ioseph to command under him disableth himself to command any thing without Ioseph But by this we see how the Papacy maketh all Sin unpardonable which hath not the Priests Absolution except peradventure in some extraordinary case where albeit Absolution be not had yet it must be desired What is then the force of Absolution What is it which the act of Absolution worketh in a sinful man doth it by any operation derived from it self alter the state of the Soul Doth it really take away sin or but ascertain us of God's most gracious and merciful pardon The latter of which two is our assertion the former theirs At the words of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ saying unto the sick of the Palsie Son thy sins are forgiven thee the Pharisees which knew him not to be Son of the living God took secret exception and fell to reasoning with themselves against him Is any able to forgive Sin but God only The Sins saith St. Cyprian that are committed against him he alone hath power to forgive which took upon him our sins he which sorrowed and suffered for us he whom the Father delivered unto death for our offences Whereunto may be added that which Clemens Alexandrinus hath Our Lord is profitable every way every way beneficial whether we respect him as Man or as God as God forgiving as Man instructing and learning how to avoid Sin For it is I even I that putteth away thine Iniquities for mine own sake and will not remember thy sins saith the Lord. Now albeit we willingly confess with Saint Cyprian The Sinnes which are committed against him he only hath power to forgive who hath taken upon him our Sinnes he which hath sorrowed and suffered for us he whom God hath given for our Offences Yet neither did Saint Cyprian intend to deny the power of the Minister otherwise then if he presume beyond his Commission to remit Sinne where God's own will is it should be retained For against such Ablutions he speaketh which being granted to whom they ought to have been denyed are of no validity and if rightly it be considered how higher causes in operation use to concur with inferiour means his Grace
the Body without the Soul in the Body Christ hath merited to make us just but as a medicine which is made for health doth not head by being made but by being applied so by the merits of Christ there can be no Justification without the application of his Merits Thus farr we joyn hands with the Church of Rome 5. Wherein then do we disagree We disagree about the future and offence of the Medicine whereby Christ cureth our Disease about the 〈…〉 of applying it about the number and the power of means which God requireth in as for the effectual applying thereof to our Souls comfort When they are re 〈…〉 that the righteousness is whereby a Christian man is justified they answer that it is a Divine Spiritual quality which quality received into the Soul doth first make it to be one of them who are born of God and secondly indue it with power to bring forth such works as they do that are born of him even as the Soul of Man being joyned to his Body doth first make him to be of the number of reasonable Creatures and secondly inable him to perform the natural Functions which are proper to his kinde That it maketh the Soul amiable and gracious in the sight of God in regard whereof it is termed Grace That is purgeth purifieth and washeth out all the stains and pollutions of sins that by it through the merit of Christ we are delivered as from sin so from eternal death and condemnation the reward of sin This Grace they will have to be applied by infusion to the end that as the Body is warm by the heat which is in the Body so the Soul might be righteous by inherent Grace which Grace they make capable of increase as the Body may be more and more warm so the Soul more and more justified according as Grace should be augmented the augmentation whereof is merited by good Works as good Works are made meritorious by it Wherefore the first receit of Grace in their Divinity is the first Justification the increase thereof the second Justification As Grace may be increased by the merit of good Works so it may be diminished by the demerit of sins venial it may be lost by mortal sin In as much therefore as it is needful in the one case to repair in the other to recover the loss which is made the infusion of Grace hath her sundry after-meals for the which cause they make many ways to apply the infusion of Grace It is applyed to Infants through Baptism without either Faith or Works and in them really it taketh away Original sinne and the punishment due unto it It is applied to Infidels and wicked men in the first Justification through Baptism without Works yet not without Faith and it taketh away both Sinnes Actual and Original together with all whatsoever punishment eternal or temporal thereby deserved Unto such as have attained the first Justification that is to say the first receit of Grace it is applied farther by good Works to the increase of former Grace which is the second Justification If they work more and more Grace doth more increase and they are more and more justified To such as diminished it by venial sinnes it is applied by Holy-water Ave Marie's Crossings Papal Salutations and such like which serve for reparations of Grace decayed To such as have lost it through mortal sinne it is applied by the Sacrament as they term it of Penance which Sacrament hath force to conferr Grace anew yet in such sort that being so conferred it hath not altogether so much power as at the first For it onely cleanseth out the stain or guilt of sinne committed and changeth the punishment eternal into a temporal satisfactory punishment here if time doe serve if not hereafter to be endured except it be lightned by Masses Works of Charity Pilgrimages Fasts and such like or else shortned by pardon for term or by plenary pardon quite removed and taken away This is the mystery of the man of sinne This maze the Church of Rome doth cause her Followers to tread when they ask her the way to Justification I cannot stand now to untip this Building and to siâ— it piece by piece onely I will passe by it in few words that that may befall Bâ—… in the presence of that which God hath builded as hapned unto Dagon before the Ark. 6. Doubtless saith the Apostle I have counted all things loss and judge them to be doing that I may win Christ and to be found in him not having my own righteousness but that which is through the Faith of Christ the righteousness which is of God through Faith Whether they speak of the first or second Justification they make it the essence of a Divine quality inherent they make it Righteousnesse which is in us If it be in us then is it ours as our Souls are ours though we have them from God and can hold them no longer than pleaseth him for if he withdraw the breath of our nostrils we fall to dust but the Righteousness wherein we must be found if we will be justified is not our own therefore we cannot be justified by any inherent quality Christ hath merited righteousness for as many as are found in him In him God findeth us if we be faithful for by Faith we are incorporated into Christ. Then although in our selves we be altogether sinful and unrighteous yet even the man which is impious in himself full of iniquity full of sin him being found in Christ through Faith and having his sinne remitted through Repentance him God upholdeth with a gracious eye putteth away his sinne by not imputing it taketh quite away the Punishment due thereunto by pardoning it and accepteth him in Jesus Christ as perfectly righteous as if he had fulfilled all that was commanded him in the Law shall I say more perfectly righteous than if himself had fulfilled the whole Law I must take heed what I say but the Apostle saith God made him to be sin for us who knew no sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in him Such we are in the sight of God the Father as is the very Son of God himself Let it be counted folly or frensie or fury whatsoever it is our comfort and our wisdom we care for no knowledge in the World but this That man hath sinned and God hath suffered That God hath made himself the Son of Man and that men are made the righteousness of God You see therefore that the Church of Rome in teaching Justification by inherent Grace doth pervert the truth of Christ and that by the hands of the Apostles we have received otherwise than she reacheth Now concerning the righteousness of Sanctification we deny it not to be inherent we grant that unless we work we have it not onely we distinguish it as a thing different in nature from the righteousness of Justification we are righteous the one
behold saith the Apostle I Paul say unto you that if ye be circumcised Christ shall profit you nothing Christ in the work of mans salvation is alone the Galathians were cast away by joyning Circumcision and the other Rites of the Law with Christ the Church of Rome doth teach her children to joyn other things likewise with him therefore their saith their belief doth not profit them any thing at all It is true that they do indeed joyn other things with Christ but how Not in the work of Redemption it self which they grant that Christ alone hath performed sufficiently for the salvation of the whole world but in the application of this inestimable treasure that it may be effectual to their salvation how demurely soever they confess that they seek remission of sins no otherwise then by the blood of Christ using humbly the means appointed by him to apply the benefit of his holy Blood they teach indeed so many things pernicious in Christian Faith in setting down the means whereof they speak that the very foundation of Faith which they hold is thereby plainly overthrown and the force of the blood of Jesus Christ extinguished We may therefore disputing with them urge them even with as dangerous sequels as the Apostle doth the Galatians But I demand If some of those Galatians heartily embracing the Gospel of Christ sincere and sound in Faith this one only error excepted had ended their lives before they were ever taught how perillous an opinion they held shall we think that the danger of this error did so over-weigh the benefit of their faith that the mercy of God might not save them I grant they overthrew the foundation of Faith by consequent doth not that so likewise which the Lutheran Churches do at this day so stifly and so firmly maintain For mine own part I dare not here deny the possibility of their salvation which have been the chiefest instruments of ours albeit they carried to their grave a perswasion so greatly repugnant to the truth Forasmuch therefore as it may be said of the Church of Rome she hath yet a little strength she doth not directly deny the foundation of Christianity I may I trust without offence perswade my self that thousands of our Fathers in former times living and dying within her walls have found mercy at the hands of God 18. What although they repented not of their errors God forbid that I should open my mouth to gain-say that which Christ himself hath spoken Except ye repent ye shall all perish And if they did not repent they perished But withall note that we have the benefit of a double Repentance the least sin which we commit in Deed Thought or Word is death without Repentance Yet how many things do escape us in every of these which we do not know How many which we do not observe to be sins And without the knowledge without the observation of sin there is no actual Repentance It cannot then be chosen but that for as many as hold the foundation and have holden all Sins and Errors in hatred the blessing of Repentance for unknown Sins and Errors is obtained at the hands of God through the gracious mediation of Jesus Christ for such suiters as cry with the Prophet David Purge me O Lord from my secret sins 19. But we wash a wall of lome we labour in vain all this is nothing it doth not prove it cannot justifie that which we go about to maintain Infidels and Heathen men are not so godless but that they may no doubt cry God mercy and desire in general to have their sins forgiven them To such as deny the foundation of Faith there can be no Salvation according to the ordinary course which God doth use in saving men without a particular repentance of that Error The Galathians thinking that unless they were circumcised they could not be saved overthrew the foundation of Faith directly therefore if any of them did die so perswaded whether before or after they were told of their Errors their end is dreadful there is no way with them but one death and condemnation For the Apostle speaketh nothing of men departed but saith generally of all If ye be circumcised Christ shall profit you nothing Ye are abolished from Christ whosoever are justified by the Law ye are fallen from grace Gal. 5. Of them in the Church of Rome the reason is the same For whom Antichrist hath seduced concerning them did not S. Paul speak long before they received not the word of truth that they might not be saved therefore God would send them strong delusions to beleeve lies that all they might be damned which believe not the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness And S. Iohn All that dwell upon the earth shall worship him whose names are not written in the book of life Apoc. 13. Indeed many in former times as their Books and Writings do yet shew held the foundation to wit salvation by Christ alone and therefore might be saved God hath always had a Church amongst them which firmly kept his saving truth As for such as hold with the Church of Rome that we cannot be saved by Christ alone without works they do not only by a circle of consequence but directly deny the foundation of Faith they hold it not no not so much as by a thred 20. This to my remembrance being all that hath been opposed with any countenance or shew of reason I hope if this be answered the cause in question is at an end Concerning general Repentance therefore what a Murtherer a Blasphemer an unclean person a Turk a Iew any sinner to escape the wrath of God by a general Repentance God forgive me Truly it never came within my heart that a general Repentance doth serve for all sins it serveth only for the common over-sights of our sinful life and for the faults which either we do not mark or do not know that they are faults Our Fathers were actually penitent for sins wherein they knew they displeased God or else they fall not within the compass of my first speech Again that otherwise they could not be saved than holding the foundation of Christian Faith we have not only affirmed but proved Why is it not then confessed that thousands of our Fathers which lived in Popish Superstitions might yet by the mercy of God be saved First if they had directly denied the very foundations of Christianity without repenting them particularly of that sin he which saith There could be no salvation for them according to the ordinary course which God doth use in saving men granteth plainly or at the least closely insinuateth that an extraordinary priviledge of mercy might deliver their souls from Hell which is more then I required Secondly if the foundation be denied it is denied for fear of some Heresie which the Church of Rome maintaineth But how many were there amongst our Fathers who being seduced by the common Error of
declining or swarving aside which absolute perfection when did God ever finde in the Sons of mere mortal men Doth it not follow that all Flesh must of necessity fall down and confess We are not dust and ashes but worse our mindes from the highest to the lowest are not right If not right then undoubtedly not capable of that blessedness which we naturally seek but subject unto that which we most abhorr Anguish Tribulation Death Wo endless Misery For whatsoever misseth the way of Life the issue thereof cannot be but Perdition By which reason all being wrapped up in sinne and made thereby the Children of Death the mindes of all men being plainly convicted not to be right shall we think that God hath indued them with so many excellencies more not onely than any but then all the Creatures in the World besides to leave them in such estate that they had been happier if they they had never been Here commeth necessarily in a new way unto Salvation so that they which were in the other perverse may in this be found strait and righteous That the way of Nature this the way of Grace The end of that way Salvation merited presupposing the righteousness of mens works their Righteousness a natural hability to do them that hability the goodness of God which created them in such perfection But the end of this way Salvation bestowed upon men as a Gift presupposing not their righteousness but the forgiveness of their unrighteousness Justification their Justification not their natural ability to do good but their hearty sorrow for their not doing and unfeigned belief in him for whose sake not-doers are accepted which is their Vocation their Vocation the Election of God taking them out from the number of lost Children their Election a Mediator in whom to be elect This Mediation inexplicable Mercy his Mercy their Misery for whom he vouchsafed to make himself a Mediator The want of exact distinguishing between these two wayes and observing what they have common what peculiar hath been the cause of the greatest part of that confusion whereof Christianity at this day laboureth The lack of diligence in searching laying down and inuring mens mindes with those hidden grounds of Reason whereupon the least particular in each of these are most firmly and strongly builded is the onely reason of all those scruples and uncertainties wherewith we are in such sort intangled that a number despair of ever discerning what is right or wrong in any thing But we will let this matter rest whereinto we stepped to search out a way how some mindes may be and are right truly even in the sight of God though they be simply in themselves not right Howbeit there is not onely this difference between the just and impious that the minde of the one is right in the sight of God because his obliquity is not imputed the other perverse because his sin is unrepented of but even as lines that are drawn with a trembling hand but yet to the point which they should are thought ragged and uneven nevertheless direct in comparison of them which run clean another way so there is no incongruity in terming them right-minded men whom though God may charge with many things amiss yet they are not as those hideous and ugly Monsters in whom because there is nothing but wilful opposition of minde against God a more than tolerable deformity is noted in them by saying that their mindes are not right The Angel of the Church of Thyatyra unto whom the Son of God sendeth this greeting I know thy works and thy love and service and faith notwithstanding I have a few things against thee was not as he unto whom Saint Peter Thou hast no fellowship in this business for thy heart is not right in the sight of God So that whereat the orderly disposition of the minde of man should be this Perturbation and sensual Appetites all kept in awe by a moderate and sober will in all things frained by Reason Reason directed by the Law of God and Nature this Babylonian had his minde as it were turned upside down In him unreasonable cecity and blindnesse trampled all Laws both of God and Nature under seet Wilfulness tyrannized over Reason and Brutish Sensuality over Will An evident token that his out-rage would work his overthrow and procure his speedy ruine The Mother whereof was that which the Prophet in these words signified His minde doth swell Immoderate swelling a token of very eminent breach and of inevitable destruction Pride a vice which cleaveth so fast unto the hearts of men that if we were to strip our selves of all faults one by one we should undoubtedly finde it the very last and hardest to put off But I am not here to touch the secret itching humour of vanity wherewith men are generally touched It was a thing more than meanly inordinate wherewith the Babylonian did swell Which that we may both the better conceive and the more easily reap profit by the nature of this vice which setteth the whole World out of course and hath put so many even of the wisest besides themselves is first of all to be inquired into Secondly the dangers to be discovered which it draweth inevitably after it being not cured And last of all the ways to cure it Whether we look upon the gifts of Nature or of Grace or whatsoever is in the World admired as a part of man's excellency adorning his Body beautifying his Minde or externally any way commending him in the account and opinion of men there is in every kinde somewhat possible which no man hath and somewhat had which few men can attain unto By occasion whereof there groweth disparagement necessarily and by occasion of disparagement Pride through mens ignorance First therefore although men be not proud of any thing which is not at lest in opinion good yet every good thing they are not proud of but onely of that which neither is common unto many and being desired of all causeth them which have it to be honoured above the rest Now there is no man so void of brain as to suppose that Pride consisteth in the bare possession of such things for then to have Vertue were a Vice and they should be the happiest men who are most wretched because they have least of that which they would have And though in speech we do intimate a kinde of vanity to be in them of whom we say They are Wise men and they know it yet this doth not prove That every Wiseman is proud which doth not think himself to be blockish What we may have and know that we have it without offence do we then make offensive when we take joy and delight in having it What difference between men enriched with all aboundance of earthly and heavenly Blessings and Idols gorgeously attired but this The one takes pleasures in that which they have the other none If we may be possest with Beauty Strength Riches Power Knowledge
Covenants of Mercy and the Law of Moses and the service of God and the promises of Christ were made impropriate who not onely were the Off-spring of Abraham Father unto all them which do believe but Christ their Off-spring which is God to be blessed for evermore 20. Consider this People and learn what it is to build your selves in Faith They were the Lord's Vine He brought it out of Egypt he threw out the Heathen from their places that it might be planted he made room for it and caused it to take root till it had filled the earth the Mountains were covered with the shadow of it and the boughs thereof were as the goodly Cedars she stretched out her branches unto the Sea and her boughs unto the River But when God having sent both his Servants and his Son to vâ—siâ—s this Vine they neither spared the one nor received the other but stoned the 〈…〉 s and crucified the Lord of glory which came unto them then began the curse â—â— God to come upon them even the curse whereof the Prophet David hath spoken saying Let their table be made a snare and a net and a stumbling block even for a recompence unto them Let their eyes be darkned that they do not see how down their backs for ever keep them down And sithence the hour that the measure of their infidelity was first made up they have been spoiled with Warrs eaten up with Piagues spent with Hunger and Famine they wander from place to place and are become the most â—ase and contemptible people that are under the Sun Ephraim which before was a terrour unto Nations and they trembled at his voyce is now by infidelity so vile that he seemeâ—h as a thing cast out to be trampled under mens feet In the midst of these desolations they cry Returâ— we beseech thee O God of hosts look down from heaven behold and visit their Vine but their very Prayers are turned into sin and their crys are no better than the lowing of â—easts before him Well saith the Apostle by their anbelief they are broken off and thou dost standby thy Faith Behold therefore the bountifulness and severity of God towards them severity because they have fallen bountifulness towards thee if thou continue in his bountifulness or else thou shalt be cut off If they forsake their unbelief and be grafted in again and we at any time for the hardness of our hearts be broken off it will be such a judgment as will amaze all the Powers and Principalities which are above Who hath searched the counsel of God concerning this secret And who doth not see that Infidelity doth threaten Lo-ammi unto the Gentiles as it hath brought Lo-ruchama upon the Jews It may be that these words seem dark unto you But the words of the Apostle in the eleventh to the Romans are plain enough If God have not spared the natural branches take heed take heed lest he spare not thee Build thy self in Faith Thus much of the thing which is prescribed and wherein we are exhorted to edifie our selves Now consider the Condition and Properties which are in this place annexed unto Faith The former of them for there are but two is this Edifie your selves in your Faith 21. A strange and a strong delusion it is wherewith the man of Sin hath bewitched the World a forcible spirit of Errour it must needs be which hath brought men to such a senseless and unreasonable perswasion as this is not onely that men cloathed with mortality and sinne as we our selves are can do God so much service as shall be able to make a full and perfect satisfaction before the Tribunal seat of God for their own sinnes yea a great deal more than is sufficient for themselves but also that a man at the hands of a Bishop or a Pope for such or such a price may buy the over-plus of other mens merits purchase the fruits of other men's labours and build his Soul by another man's faith Is not this man drowned in the gall of bitterness Is his heart right in the sight of God Can he have any part or fellowship with Peter and with the Successors of Peter which thinketh so vilely of building the precious Temples of the Holy Ghost Let his money perish with him and he with it because he judgeth that the Gift of God may be sold for money 22. But beloved in the Lord deceive not your selves neither suffer ye your selves to be deceived Ye can receive no more ease nor comfort for your Souls by another man's faith than warmth for your Bodies by another man's cloaths or sustenance by the bread which another man doth eat The just shall live by his own Faith Let a Saint yea a Martyr content himself that he hath cleansed himself of his own sins saith Tertullian No Saint or Martyr can cleanse himself of his own sins But if so be a Saint or a Martyr can cleanse himself of his own sins it is sufficient that he can do it for himself Did ever any man by his death deliver another man from death except onely the Sonne of God He indeed was able to Safe-conduct a Thief from the Cross to Paradise for to this end he came that being himself pure from sinne he might obey for Sinners Thou which thinkest to do the like and supposest that thou canst justifie another by thy Righteousness if thou be without sinne then lay down thy life for thy Brother dye for me But if thou be a Sinner even as I am a Sinner how can the Oyl of thy Lamp be sufficient both for thee and for me Virgins that are wise get ye Oyl while ye have day into your own Lamps For out of all peradventure others though they would can neither give nor sell. Edifie your selves in your own most holy faith And let this be observed for the first property of that wherein we ought to edifie our selves 23. Our Faith being such is that indeed which St. Iude doth here term Faith namely a thing most holy The reason is this We are justified by Faith For Abraham believed and this was imputed unto him for Righteousness Being justified all our iniquities are covered God beholdeth us in the Righteousness which is imputed and not in the Sins which we have committed 24. It is true we are full of sin both original and actual whosoever denieth it is a double Sinner for he is both a Sinner and a Lyar. To deny sin is most plainly and clearly to prove it because he that saith he hath no sin lyeth and by lying proveth that he hath sin 25. But imputation of Righteousness hath covered the sins of every Soul which believeth God by pardoning our sin hath taken it away So that now although our transgressions be multiplied above the hairs of our head yet being justified we are as free and as clear as if there were no one spot or stain of any uncleanness in us For it