his people purposely to be afflicted yet himself complains in their behalf That the persecutor laid the very heaviest yoke upon the ancient Esa 47.6 It is a lamentable thing to fall under a necessity of suffering in our age Basil Labore fracta instrumenta ad Deum ducis quorum nullus usus wouldest thou consecrate a Chalice to God that is broken no man would present a lame horse a disordered clock a torn book to the King Caro jumentum thy body is thy beast Aug. and wilt thou present that to God when it is lam'd and tir'd with excesse of wantonness when thy clock the whole course of thy time is disordered with passions and perturbations when thy book the history of thy life is torn 1000. sins of thine own torn out of thy memory wilt thou then present thy self thus defac'd and mangled to almighty God Basil Temperantia non est temperantia in senectute sed impotentia incontinentiae chastity is not chastity in an old man but a desability to be unchast and therefore thou dost not give God that which thou pretendest to give for thou hast no chastity to give him Senex bis puer but it is not bis juvenis an old man comes to the infirmities of childhood again but he comes not to the strength of youth again Do this then In diebus juventutis in thy best strength Electionum and when thy natural facuties are best able to concur with grace but do it In diebus electionum in the dayes when thou hast thy hearts desire for if thou have worn out this word in one sense that it be too late now to remember him in the dayes of youth that 's spent forgetfully yet as long as thou art able to make a new choise to chuse a new sin that when thy heats of youth are not overcome but burnt out then thy middle age chooses ambition and thy old age chooses covetousness as long as thou art able to make thy choice thou art able to make a better than this God testifies that power that he hath given thee I call heaven and earth to record this day Deut. 30.19 that I have set before you life and death choose life If this choice like you not Jos 24.15 If it seem evil unto you to serve the the Lord saith Josuah then choose ye this day whom ye will serve Here 's the election day bring that which ye would have Serm. 18. into comparison with that which ye should have that is all that this world keeps from you with that which God offers to you and what will ye choose to prefer before him for honor and favor and health and riches perchance you cannot have them though you choose them but can you have more of them than they have had to whom those very things have been occasions of ruin The Market is open till the bell ring till thy last bell ring the Church is open grace is to be had there but trust not upon that rule that men buy cheapest at the end of the market that heaven may be had for a breath at last when they that hear it cannot tel whether it be a sigh or a gasp a religious breathing and anhelation after the next life or natural breathing out and exhalation of this but find a spiritual good husbandry in that other rule that the prime of the market is to be had at first for howsoever in thine age there may be by Gods strong working Dies juventutis A day of youth in making thee then a new creature for as God is antiquissimus dierum so in his school no man is super-annated yet when age hath made a man impotent to sin this is not Dies electionum it is not a day of choice but remember God now when thou hast a choice that is a power to advance thy self or to oppress others by evil means now in die electionum in those thy happy and sun-shine dayes remember him Creatorem This is then the faculty that is excited the memory and this is the time now now whilest we have power of election The object is the Creator Remember the Creator First because the memory can go no farther then the creation and therefore we have no means to conceive or apprehend any thing of God before that When men therefore speak of decrees of reprobation decrees of condemnation before decrees of creation this is beyond the counsail of the holy Ghost here Memento creatoris Remember the Creator for this is to remember God a condemner before he was a creator This is to put a preface to Moses his Genesis not to be content with his in principio to know that in the beginning God created heaven and earth but we must remember what he did ante principium before any such beginning was Moses his in principio that beginning the creation we can remember but St. Johns in principio that beginning eternity we cannot we can remember Gods fiat in Moses but not Gods erat in St. John what God hath done for us is the object of our memory not what he did before we were and thou hast a good and perfect memory if it remember all that the holy Ghost proposes in the Bible and it determines in the memento Creatoris There begins the Bible and there begins the Creed I believe in God the Father maker of Heaven and Earth Jâ— 7.39 for when it is said The holy Ghost was not given because Jesus was not glorified it is not truly Non erat datus but non erat for non erat nobis antequam operaretur It is not said there the holy Ghost was not given but it is the holy Ghost was not for he is not that is he hath no being to us ward till he works in us which was first in the creation Remember the Creator then Serm. 19. because thou canst remember nothing backward beyond him and remember him so too that thou maist stick upon nothing on this side of him That so neither height Ro. 8. ult nor depth nor any other creature may separate thee from God not only not separate thee finally but not separate so as to stop upon the creature but to make the best of them thy way to the Creator We see ships in the river but all their use is gone if they go not to sea we see men fraighted with honor and riches but all their use is gone if their respect be not upon the honor and glory of the Creator and therefore sayes the Apostle Let them that suffer 1 Peâ— 4. ult commit their souls to God as to a faithful Creator that is He made them and therefore will have care of them This is the true contracting and the true extending of the memory to Remember the Creator and stay there because there is no prospect farther and to Remember the Creator and get thither because there is no safe footing upon the
so heavy nor so discomfortable a curse in the first as in the latter shutting not in the shutting of barrenness as in the shutting of weakness Esa 37 3. when Children are come to the birth and there is not strength to bring forth It is the exaltation of misery to fall from a near hope of happiness And in that vehement imprecation the Prophet expresses the highth of Gods anger Give them O Lord what wilt thou give them Osc 9 14. give them a mis-carrying womb Therefore as soon as we are men that is inanimated quickned in the womb though we cannot our selves our Parents have reason to say in our behalves Wretched man that he is who shall deliver him from this body of death for Ro. 7.24 even the womb is the body of death if there be no deliverer It must be he that said to Jeremy 1. 5. Before I formed thee I knew thee and before thou camest out of the womb I sanctified thee We are not sure that there was no kind of ship nor boat to fish in nor to pass by till God prescribed Noah that absolute forme of the Ark that word which the holy Ghost by Moses uses for the Ark is common to all kinds of boats Thebah and is the same word that Moses uses for the boat that he was exposed in that his mother laid him in an Ark of bullrushes Exo 2.3 But we are sure that Eve had no Midwife when she was delivered of Cain therefore she might well say Possedi virum a Domino Gen. 4.1 I have gotten a man from the Lord wholly intirely from the Lord it is the Lord that hath enabled me to conceive the Lord hath infus'd a quickning soul into that conception the Lord hath brought into the world that which himself had quickned without all this might Eve say my body had been but the house of death and Domini Domini sunt exitus mortis To God the Lord belong the issues of death But then this Exitus a morte is but Introitus in mortem this issue Exitus a moribus mundi this deliverance from that death the death of the womb is an entrance a delivering over to another death the manifold deaths of this world We have a winding sheet in our Mothers womb that grows with us from our conception and we come into the world wound up in that winding sheet for we come to seek a grave And as prisoners discharged of actions may lie for fees so when the womb hath discharged us yet we are bound to it by cords of flesh by such a string as that we cannot go thence nor stay there We celebrate our own funeral with cries even at our birth as though our threescore and ten years of life were spent in our Mothers labor and our Circle made up in the first point thereof We beg one Baptism with another a sacrament of tears and we come into a world that lasts many ages but we last not In domo patris saies our blessed Saviour speaking of heaven multae mansiones Jo. 14.2 there are many and mansions divers and durable so that if a man cannot possess a martyrs house he hath shed no blood for Christ yet he may have a confessors he hath been ready to glorifie God in the shedding of his blood And if a woman cannot possess a virgins house she hath embrac'd the holy state of marriage yet she may have a matrons house she hath brought forth and brought up children in the fear of God In domo patris In my Fathers house in heaven there are many mansions but here upon earth Mat. 8 20. The Son of man hath not where to lay his head saies he himself No terram dedit filiis hominum How then hath God given this earth to the Sons of men He hath given them earth for their materials to be made of earth and he hath given them earth for their grave and sepulture to return and resolve to earth but not for their possession Heb. 13.14 Here we havh no continuing City nay no Cottage that continues nay no we no persons no bodies that continue Whatsoever moved St. Hierome to call the journies of the Israelites in the wilderness Exo. 17.1 Mansions the word the word is nasang signifies but a journie but a peregrination even the Israel of God hath no mansions Gen. 47 9. but journies pilgrimages in this life By that measure did Jacob measure his life to Pharaoh The daies of the years of my pilgrimage And though the Apostle would not say morimer that whilst we are in the body we are dead yet he saies peregrinamur 2 Cor. 5 6. whilst we are in the body we are but in a pilgrimage and we are absent from the Lord. He might have said dead for this whole world is but an universal Church-yard but one common grave and the life and motion that the greatest persons have in it is but as the shaking of buried bodies in their graves by an earthquake That which we call life is but Hebdomada mortium a week of deaths seaven daies seaven periods of our life spent in dying a dying seaven times over and ther 's an end Our birth dies in Infancy and our infancy dies in youth and youth and the rest die in age and age also dies and determines all Nor do all these youth out of infancy or age out of youth arise so as a Phenix out of the ashes of another Phenix formerly dead but as a wasp or a serpent out of carrion or as a snake out of dung our youth is worse then our infancy and our age worse then our youth our youth is hungry and thirsty after those sins which our infancy knew not and our age is sorry and angry that it cannot pursue those sins which our youth did And besides all the way so many deaths that is so many deadly calamities accompany every condition and every period of this life as that death it self would be an ease to them that suffer them Upon this sense does Job wish 10. 18. that God had not given him an issue from the first death from the womb Wherefore hast thou brought me forth out of the womb O that I had given up the Ghost and no eye had seen me I should have been as though I had not been And not only the impatient Israelites in their murmuring would to God we had died by the hands of the Lord Ex. 16.3 in the land of Egypt but Eliah himself when he fled from Jezabel and went for his life as that Text saies under the juniper tree requested that he might die and said It is enough now O Lord take away my life 1 Reg. 19.4 So Jonah justifies his impatience nay his anger towards God himself Now O Lord take I beseech thee my life from me for it is better for me to die then to live And when God ask'd him dost thou well
know those Wounds which were in Christs Body Ambr. Non esse Christi sed Latronis amare caepit then he began to love him perfectly when he found his own wounds in the body of his Saviour So he came to declare perfect faith Gregory in professing Christs innocence This man hath done nothing and perfect Hope in the Momento Mei Remember me in thy Kingdome and perfect Charity in this increpation and rebuking of his companion August He was as S. Augustine sayes Latro Laudabilis miraculis such a thief as deserved praise and afforded wonder but the best is the last that he was imitabilis that he hath done nothing but that we may do so too Idem if we will apprehend that grace that he did Assumamus vocem Latronis si non volumus esse Latrones If we will not steal our selves out of the number Idem to whom God offers his saving grace Ut sedeamus a dextris pendeamus a dextris let us be content to suffer but to suffer in the right Suffering as Malefactors is somewhat too much on the left hand though even that suffering do bring many to the right hand too But suffering for Schisme in pretence of Zeal suffering for Treason in pretence of Religion this is both to turn out of this world on the left hand and to remain on that hand for ever after in the world to come This thief hung on the right hand and was suddenly made a Confessor for himself a Martyr to witnesse for Christ a Doctor to preach to his fellow If the favour of a Prince can make a man a Doctor per saltum much more the mercy of Christ Jesus which gives the Sufficiency as well as the Title as he did in this Thief this new Doctor whose Doctrine it self is our next consideration Part. II. Doctrina This doctrine was the fear of God which was a pregnant and a plentiful common place for him to preach upon And upon such an occasion and such abundance of matter we have here one example of an extemporal Sermon This Thief had premeditated nothing But he is no more a precedent for extemporal preaching then he is for stealing He was a Thief before and he was an extemporal preacher at last But he teaches no body else to be either It is true that if we consider the Sermons of the Ancient Fathers we shall finde some impressions some examples of suddain and unpremeditated Sermons Saint Augustine some times eases himself upon so long Texts Ser. 10 de verbis Hpli as needed no great preparation no great study for a meer paraphrase upon this Text was enough for all his hour when he took both Epistle and Gospel Ser. de Sancto Latrone c. and Psalm of the day for his Text. We may see often in S. Bern. Heri diximus and Hesterno die fecimus mentionem that he preached divers days together In the second of those Sermons of Saint Basil which were upon the beginning of Genesis it seems that Basil preached twice in a day and in his Sermon de Baptismo it seemes that he trusted upon the Holy Ghost and his present inspiration Loquemar prout Sermo nobis dabitur in apertione oris I intend to speak so as the Holy Ghost shall give me utterance for the present But as S. Augustine says in another case Da mihi Paulum so Da mihi Basilios and Augustinos bring such preachers as Basil and Augustine were and let them preach as often as they will and let every man whose calling it is preach as often as he can but let him not think that he can preach as often as he can speak An inordinate opinion of purity brought some men to keep two Sabbaths a week and others two Lents every year and an opinion of a necessity of two Sermons every Sabbath and two hours every Sermon may bring them to an opinion that the sanctifying of the Sabbath consists in the patience of hearing Here was an extemporal Sermon but a short one he preaches nothing but the fear of God It is not De arcanis Imperii matter of State nor De arcanis Dei of the unrevealed decrees of God The Thief does not say to Christ Perage quod decreveris Thou hast decreed my conversion and therefore that decree must be executed that must necessarily be performed which thou hadst determined in thy Kingdom before thou camest from thence but he says Memento mei cum veneris Take such a care of me for my salvation and preservation and perseverance as that I may follow thee into that Kingdom into which thou art now going for our salvation is opened to us in that way which Christ hath opened by his death and without him we understand no assurance of election without his second going into his Kingdome we know nothing of that which he did before he came from thence This is then the fear of God Psal 11.10 Prov. 1.7 which those royall Doctors of the old Testament David and Solomon both preached and which this Primitive Doctor of the Primitive Church this new Convertite preached too That no man may be so secure in his election as to forbear to work out his salvation with fear and trembling for God saves no man against his will nor any man that thinks himself beholding for nothing after the first decree Dan. 11.38 There is a name of force of violence of necessity attributed to a God which is Mauzzim but it is the name of an Idol not of a true God The name of the true God is Dominus tzebaoth the Lord of Hosts a name of power but not of force There is a fear belongs to him his purposes shall certainly be executed but regularly and orderly he will be feared not because he forces us imprints a necessity a coaction upon us but because if we be not led by his orderly proceeding there he hath power to cast body and soul into hell fire therefore he will be feared not as a wilfull Tyrant but as a just Judge not as Mauzzim the god of Violence but as Dominus tzebaoth the Lord of Hosts Part 3. This then is his Doctrine and what 's his Auditory He is not reserved for Courts nor for populous Cities it is but a poor Parish that he hath and yet he thinks of no change but means to dye there and there he visits the poorest the sickest the wretchedest person the Thief He had seen divers other of divers sorts Mat. 27.38 revile Christ as deeply as this Thief They that passed by reviled him Praetereuntes they that did not so much as consider him reviled him They that know not Christ yet will blaspheme him if we ask them when and where and how and why Christ Jesus was born and lived and dyed they cannot tell it in their Creed and yet they can tell it in their Oathes they know nothing of his Miraculous Life of his Humble
and he hath transgressed that The necessary precipitations into sudden executions to which States are forced in rebellious times we are faine to call by the name of Law Martial Law The Torrents and Inundations which invasive Armies pour upon Nations we are fain to call by the name of Law The Law of Armes No Judgement no Execution without the name the colour the pretence of Law for still men call for a Law for every Execution And shall not the Judge of all the earth doe right Shall God judge us condemn us execute us at the last day and not by a Law by something that we never saw never knew never notified never published and judge me by that and leave out the consideration of that Law which he bound me to keep 1 Cor. 1.20 I ask S. Pauls question Where is the disputer of the world Who will offer to dispute unnecessary things especially where Authority hath made it necessary to us to forbear such Disputations Blessed are the peace-makers that command and blessed are the peace-keepers that obey and accommodate themselves to peace in forbearing unnecessary and uncharitable controversies 1 Tim. 3.16 but without controversie great is the mystery of Godliness The Apostle invites us to search into no farther mysteries then such as may be without controversie the Mystery of Godlinesse is without controversie and godliness is to believe that God hath given us a Law and to live according to that Law This this godliness that is Knowledge and Obedience to the Law hath the promises of this life and the next too all referr'd to his Law for without this this godliness which is holiness no man shall see God All referr'd to a Law This is Christs Catechisme in S. John That we might know the onely true God 17.3 and Jesus Christ whom he sent A God commanding and a Christ reconciling us if we have transgressed that Commandment And this is the Holy Ghosts Catechisme in S. Paul Deus remunerator Heb. 11.6 That we believe God to be and to be a just rewarder of mans actions still all referr'd to an obedience or disobedience of a Law The Mystery of godliness is great that is great enough for our salvation and yet without controversie for though controversies have been moved about Gods first act there can be none of his last act though men have disputed of the object of Election yet of the subject of Execution there is no controversie No man can doubt but that when God delivers over any soule actually and by way of execution to eternall condemnation that he delivers over that soule to that eternal condemnation for breaking his Law In this we have no other adversary but the over-sad the despairing soule and it becomes us all to lend our hand to his succour and to pour in our Wine and our Oyle into his Wounds that lies weltring and surrounded in the blood of his own pale and exhausted soule That soule who though it can testifie to it self some endeavour in the wayes of holinesse yet upon some collateral doubts is still suspicious and jealous of God How often have we seen that a needlesse jealousie and suspition conceived without cause hath made a good body bad A needlesse jealousie and suspition of his purposes and intentions upon thee may make thy mercifull God angry too Nothing can alienate God more from thee then to think that any thing but sin can alienate him How wouldst thou have God mercifull to thee if thou wilt be unmercifull to God himself And Qui quid tyrannicum in Deo Basil He that conceives any tyrannical act in God is unjust to the God of Justice and unmercifull to the God of Mercy Therefore in the 17. of our Injunctions we are commanded to arm sad souls against Despaire by setting forth the Mercy and the Benefits and the Godliness of Almighty God as the word of the Injunction is the godliness of God for to leave God under a suspicion of dealing ill with any penitent soule were to impute ungodliness to God Therefore to that mistaking soule that discomposed that shiver'd and shrivel'd and ravel'd and ruin'd soule to that jealous and suspicious soule onely I say Let no man judge you Coloss 2.16 sayes the Apostle intruding into those things which he hath not seene Let no man make you afraid of secret purposes in God which they have not nor you have not seen for that by which you shall be judged is the Law that Law which was notified and published to you The Law alone were much too heavy if there were not a superabundant ease and alleviation in that hand that Christ Jesus reaches out to us Consider the weight and the ease and for pity to such distrustfull souls and for establishment of your owne stop your devotions a little upon this consideration There is Chyrographum a hand-writing of Ordinances against me 14. a Debt an Obligation contracted by our first Parents in their disobedience and falne upon me And even that be it but Originall sin is shrewd evidence there 's my first charge But Deletum est sayes the Apostle there that 's blotted that 's defaced that cannot be sued against me after Baptisme Nay Sublatum cruci affixum it is cancel'd it is nailed to the Crosse of Christ Jesus it is no more sin in its self it is but to me to condemnation it is not here 's my charge and my discharge for that 28.15 But yet there is a heavier evidence Pactum cum inferno as the Prophet Esay speaks I have made a covenant with death and with Hell I am at an agreement that is says S. Greg. Audacter Indesinenter peccamus diligendo amicitiam profitemur We sin constantly we sin continually and we sin confidently and we finde so much pleasure and profit in sin as that we have made a league and sworn a friendship with sin and we keep that perverse and irreligious promise over-religiously and the sins of our youth flow into other sins when age disables us for them But yet there is a Deletum est in this case too our covenant with death is disanull'd sayes that Prophet when we are made partakers of the death of Christ in the blessed Sacrament Mine actuall sins lose their act and mine habituall sins fall from me as a habit as a garment put off when I come to that there 's my charge and my discharge for that But yet there is worse evidence against me then either this Chyrographum the first hand-writing of Adams hand or then this pactum this contract of mine own hand actuall and habituall sin for of these one is wash'd out in water and the other in blood in the two Sacraments But then there is Lex in Membris sayes the Apostle Rom. 7.21 I finde a law that when I would do good evil is present with me Sin assisted by me is now become a tyrant over me and hath established a government
the sinner so vehemently so pathetically in that catalogue of Comminations and Interminations in that place if all these were never brought into execution we should say at best of those Laws and judgements of God as the Romane Lawyer did of that severe Law of the Twelve Tables by which Law he that was indebted to many men and not able to pay was to be cut in pieces and divided proportionably amongst his Creditors Eo consilio tanta immanitas poenae denuatiata est ne ad eam unquam perveniretur Therefore so grievous a punishment was inflicted that that Law might never come to execution for from the enacting of that Law to the last times in that government there was never any example of one execution of that Law so we should say That God laid those severe penalties upon sins onely to deter men from doing them and not with any purpose to inflict those penalties In Laws to the making whereof there concurs besides the authority of the Prince the counsel and the consent of the Subject there are sometimes Laws made without any purpose of ordinary execution of which the Civil Wisdom and the Religious Conscience and the godly Moderation of the Prince is made a Depository and a Feoffee in trust and those Laws are onely put into his hands as a Bridle the better to rule and govern that great Charge committed to him in emergent necessities though not in an ordinary execution of those penal Laws But who was a counsellor to God or who inserted any Provisoes or Nonobstante's into his Laws or who conditioned them with any such reservations that they should have no ordinary execution And therefore an ordinary execution they have always had The reason why they are sometimes and why they are not always executed St. Chrysostome hath assign'd Si nullus puniretur nemo existimaret Deum pre-esse rebus humanis si omnes nemo expectaret futuram resurrectionem If God should punish no sins here no man would believe a God and if God should presently punish all here no man would be afraid of a future judgement There the obdurate man may finde a reason of the manner of Gods proceeding in the execution of his judgements And if he dare stand the arguing of this case out of Precedent out of Record out of the history of God in his Word he must hear heavie judgments denounced and executed in cases where he would hardly discern any sin to have been committed at least no sin proportionable to that punishment Act. 5. If he were in the case of Ananias and Sapphira of having reserv'd a little of their own whatsoever should befal he would never see Counsel nor petition the judge never apprehend danger in this case and yet God declared by the mouth of Peter that Satan had filled their hearts and that they had lyed to the holy Ghost and a heavie judgement of present death was executed upon them both If he had been of the Jury for that man of God who 1 Reg. 13. though God had forbidden him to eat and drink in that place yet when an old Prophet came to him and told him that God had spoken to him by an Angel that he should go with him and eat did go and eat with him he would have acquitted him of any offence herein and yet Gods judgment overtook him and he was slain by a lion But if he will hear the case of Saul 1 Sam. 15. who did but reserve some of the spoil and that purchased with the bloud of the people and that pretended to be reserved for Gods service for sacrifice and yet Saul heard that judgement Rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft and transgression is idolatry because thou hast cast away the word of the Lord therefore he hath cast thee away from being king Jos 7. If he will hear Achan's case who had taken an excommunicate thing to his own use and the heavie judgement thereupon Inasmuch as thou hast troubled us the Lord shall trouble thee this day and so all Israel stoned him If he will hear Helie's case 1 Sam. 4. against whom onely for indulgence to his sons God prepar'd and studied and meditated judgements and threatned beforehand when he said to Samuel Behold I will do a thing in Israel whereof whosoever shall hear his two ears shall tingle and so soon after upon the heavie news that Israel was discomfited that the Ark was taken 2 Sam. 6. that his two sons were slain Heli fell from his seat and broke his neck and died If he remember Oziah's case who for putting his hand to the Ark when it was ready to fall felt the wrath of God and died in the place If he study all this Title of Gods heavie judgements upon sins not great in the outward appearance and then come to them by the consideration of the nature of the first sin of our first parents Adam and Eve and findes there such a lightness in that sin of eating forbidden fruit that he durst do it if it were to do again as though it were no more to disobey God when he forbade the eating of fruit then to disobey his Physician in that point and yet shall see the heavie judgement of God upon all posterity for that sin which he esteems so small a one to extend so far as that all his particular sins even this very sin of undervaluing Adam's sin and his very sin of obduration is but a punishment of Adam's sin If he shall climb by this ladder to the highest step of all from Adam in paradise to the Angels in heaven and see that in those Angels a sin onely of Omission of a not turning toward God for there was no creature then to turn upon in so pure Natures and done but once was so heavily punished as that the bloud of Christ Jesus hath not washed it away certainly the hardness the flintiness of this obdurate sinner must necessarily be so much mollified so much entendred as to confess that he can make no good argument out of that That the judgements of God are not executed Speedily But yet howsoever that be they are not executed speedily How desperate a state art thou in if nothing will convert thee but a speedie execution after which there is no possibility no room left for a Conversion God is the Lord of hosts and he can proceed by Martial Law he can hang thee upon the next tree he can choak thee with a crum with a drop at a voluptuous feast he can sink down the Stage and the Player The bed of wantonness and the wanton actor into the jaws of the earth into the mouth of hell he can surprise thee even in the act of sin and dost thou long for such a speedy execution for such an expedition Thou canst not lack Examples that he hath done so upon others and will no proof serve thee but a speedy judgement upon thy self Scatter thy thoughts no farther
Judg be desposed towards us well or not well there is this comfort given us here that that Judgment shall be per legem by a law we shall be judged by a law of liberty which is our second branch in this second part Per legem The Jews that prosecuted the Judgment against Christ durst not do that without pretending a law habemus legem say they we have a law and he hath transgress'd that The necessary precipitations into sodain executions to which States are forc'd in rebellious time we are fain to call by the name of law martial law the torrents and inundations which invasive armies power upon nations we are fain to call by the name of law the law of arms No Judgment no execution without the name the color the pretence of law for still men call for a law for every execution And shall not the Judg of all the earth do right shall God Judg us condemn us execute us at the last day and not by law by something that we never saw never knew never notified never publish'd and Judg me by that and leave out the consideration of that law which he bound me to keep 1 Cor. 1.20 I ask St. Pauls question Where is the disputer of the world who will offer to dispute unnecessary things especially where Authority hath made it necessary to us to forbear such disputations Blessed are the peace-makers that command and blessed are the peace-keepers that obey and accommodate themselves to peace in forbearing unnecessary and uncharitable controversies But without controversie great is the mystery of godliness the Apostle invites us to search into on farther mysteries then such as may be without controversie 1 Tim. 3.16 the mystery of godliness is without controversy and godliness is to believe that God hath given us a law and to live according to that law This this godliness that is knowledg and obedience to the law hath the promises of this life and the next too all referr'd to his law for without this this godliness which is holiness no man shall see God all referr'd to a law This is Christs Catechism in St. John that we might know the only true God 17.3 and Jesus Christ whom he sent a God commanding and a Christ reconciling us if we have transgress'd that commandment and this is the holy Ghost's Catechism in St. Paul Deus remunerator Heb. 11.6 that we believe God to be and to be a just rewarder of mans actions still all referr'd to an obedience or disobedience of a law The mystery of godliness is great that is great enough for our salvation and yet without controversie For though controversies have been mov'd about Gods first act there can be none of his last act though men have disputed of the object of election yet of the subject of execution there is no controversie no man can doubt but that when God delivers over any soul actually and by way of execution to eternal condemnation that he delivers over that soul to that eternal condemnation for breaking this law In this we have no other adversary but the over-sad the despairing soul and it becomes us all to lend our hand to his succor and so pour in our wine and our oyl into his wounds that lies weltring and surrounded in the blood of his own pale and exhausted soul that soul who though it can testifie to it self some endeavour to the waies of holiness yet upon some collatteral doubts is still suspicious and jealous of God How often have we seen that a needless jealousie and suspicion conceiv'd without cause hath made a good body bad a needless jealousie and suspicion of his purposes and intentions upon thee may make thy merciful God angry too Nothing can alienate God more from thee then to think that any thing but sin can alienate him How wouldst thou have God merciful to thee if thou wilt be unmerciful to God himself And qui quid tyrannicum in Deo Basil He that conceives any tyrannical act in God is unjust to the God of Justice and unmerciful to the God of mercy Therefore in the 17th of our injunctions we are commanded to arm sad souls against despair by setting forth the mercy and the benefits and the godliness of Almighty God as the word of the injunction is the godliness of God for to leave God under a suspicion of dealing ill with any penitent soul were to impute ungodliness to God Therefore to that mistaking soul that discompos'd that shiver'd and shriveled and ravell'd and ruin'd soul to that jealous and suspicious soul only I say with the Apostle let no man Judg you intruding into those things which he hath not seen Colos 2.18 Let no man make you afraid of secret purposes in God which they have not nor you have not seen for that by which you shall be Judged is the law that law which was notified and published to you The law alone were much too heavy if there were not a suprabundant ease and alleviation in that hand that Christ Jesus reaches out to us O consider the weight and the ease and for pitty to such distrustful souls and for establishing of your own stop your devotions a little upon this consideration first there is Chirograpbum A hand writing of Ordinances against me v. 14. a debt an obligation contracted by our first Parents in their disobedience and faln upon me And even that be it but original sin is shrewd evidence ther 's my first charge But deletum est saies the Apostle there that 's blotted that 's defac'd that cannot be sued against me after baptism nay sublatum cruci affixum 28.15 It is cancell'd it is naild to the Cross of Christ Jesus it is no more sin in it self it is but to me to condemnation it is not ther 's my charge and my discharge for that But yet there is a heavier evidence Pactum cum inferno as the Prophet Isai speaks I have made a Covenant with death with hell I am at an agreement that is saies St. Gregory Audacter indesinentur peccamus et diligendo amicitiam profitemur We sin constantly and we sin continually and we sin confidently and we find so much pleasure and profit in sin as that we have made a league and sworn a friendship with sin we keep that perverse irreligious promise over-religiously the sins of our youth flow into other sins when age disables us for them But yet there is a delectum est in this case too our Covenant with death is disannull'd saies that Prophet when we are made partakers of the death of Christ in the blessed Sacrament mine actual sins lose their act and mine habitual sins fall from me as a habit as a garment put of when I come to that ther 's my charge and my discharge for that But yet there is worse evidence against me then either this Chirographum the first hand writing of Adams hand or
come now A Sermon Preached at St. Dunstans January 15. 1625. The First SERMON after Our Dispersion by the Sickness SERMON XXI Exod. 12.30 For there was not a house where there was not one dead GOd intended life and immortality for man and man by sin induc'd death upon himself at first When man had done so and that now man was condemned man must die yet yet God gave him though not an absolute pardon yet a long reprieve though not a new immortality yet a life of seven and eight hundred years upon earth And then misery by sin growing upon man and this long life which was enlarged in his favour being become a burden unto him God abridged and contracted his seven hundred to seventy and his eight hundred to eighty years the years of his life came to be threescore and ten and if misery do suffer him to exceed those even the exceeding it self is misery Death then is from our selves it is our own but the executioner is from God it is his he gives life no man can quicken his own soul but any man can forfeit his own soul And yet when he hath done so he may not be his own executioner for as God giveth life so he killeth says Moses there not as the cause of death for death is not his creature but because he employs what person he will and executes by what instrument it pleases him to chuse age or sickness or justice or malice or in our apprehension fortune In that History from whence we deduce this Text which was that great execution the sodain death of all the first-born of Egypt it is very large and yet we may usefully and to good purpose enlarge it if we take into our consideration spiritual death as well as bodily for so in our houses from whence we came hither if we left but a servant but a child in the cradle at home there is one dead in that house If we have no other house but this which we carry about us this house of clay this tabernacle of flesh this body yet if we consider the inmate the sojourner within this house Serm. 21. the state of our corrupt and putrified soul there is one dead in this house too And though we be met now in the House of God and our God be the God of Life yet even in this house of the God of Life and the ground enwrapped in the same consecration not only of every such house but let every mans length in the house be a house of every such space this Text will be verified There is not a house where there is not one dead God is abundant in his mercies to man and as though he did but learn to give by his giving as though he did but practise to make himself perfect in his own Art which Art is bountiful Mercy as though all his former blessings were but in the way of earnest and not of payment as though every benefit that he gave were a new obligation upon him and not an acquittance to him he delights to give where he hath given as though his former gifts were but his places of memory and marks set upon certain men to whom he was to give more It is not so good a plea in our prayers to God for temporal or for spiritual blessings to say Have mercy upon me now for I have loved thee heretofore as to say Have mercy upon me for thou hast loved me heretofore We answer a Beggar I gave you but yesterday but God therefore gives us to day because he gave us yesterday and therefore are all his blessings wrap'd up in that word Panis quotidianus Give us this day our daily bread Every day he gives and early every day his Manna falls before the Sun rises and his mercies are new every morning In this consideration of his abounding in all ways of mercy to us we consider justly how abundant he is in instructing us He writes his Law once in our hearts and then he repeats that Law and declares that Law again in his written Word in his Scriptures He writes his Law in stone-Tables once and then those Tables being broken he repeats that Law writes that Law again in other Tables He gives us his Law in Exodus and Leviticus and then he gives us a Deuteronomy a repetition of that Law another time in another Book And as he abounds so in instructing us in going the same way twice over towards us as he gives us the Law a second time so he gives us a second way of instructing us he accompanies he seconds his Law with examples In his Legal Books we have Rules in the Historical Examples to practise by And as he is every way abundant as he hath added Law to Nature and added Example to Law so he hath added Example to Example and by that Text which we have read to you here and by that Text which we have left at home our house and family and by that Text which we have brought hither our selves and by that Text which we finde here where we stand and sit and kneel upon the bodies of some of our dead friends or neighbors he gives to us he repeats to us a full a various a multiform a manifold Catechism and Institution to teach us that it is so absolutely true that there is not a house in which there is not one dead as that taking spiritual death into our consideration there is not a house in which there is one alive That therfore we may take in light at all these windows that God opens for us Divisio that we may lay hold upon God by all these handles which he puts out to us we shall make a brief survey of these four Houses of that in Egypt where the Text places it of that at home in which we dwell of this which is our selves where we always are or always should be within and of this in which we are met where God is in so many several Temples of his as are above and under ground So that this Sermon may be a general Funeral Sermon both for them that are dead in the flesh and for our selves that are dead in our sins for of all these four houses it is true and by useful accommodation applyable to all There is not a house where there is not one dead First then to survey the first House the House in Egypt Part 1. Pharaoh by drawing upon himself and his Land this last and heaviest plague of the ten the universal the sodain the midnight destruction of all all the first born of Egypt hath made himself a Monument and a History and a Pillar everlasting to the end of the world to the end of all place in the world and to the end of all time in the world by which all men may know that man how perverse soever cannot weary God that man cannot add to his Rebellions so many heavy circumstances but that God can