perfect lacking nothing Alas if the unprofitable servant be cast out what shall become of the Malignant the Covetous the Proud the Luxurious How are we then to think of that triple charge of Pasce of Jacobs enduring frost and heat of the shepheards keeping watch by night and then of Leo Rugiens to devour both Pastor and Flock And how are they able to resist if we assist not unless we exhort rebuke exhort and minister a word of consolation to every soul that is weary and then the people to be swift to hear How precious is the treasure we bring though in earthen vessels Is it not the Word of God we bring and offer you To mens words we owe temporary belief if they speak wisely and a Resignation of our Judgements till we hear them out But to the Word of God which is diffused into a Sermon or else woe to him that makes it we owe an absolute Resignation and perpetual captivity Take heed then of contempt or wanton ranging after an heap of such Teachers as are after our own lusts lest we cause God to withold this bread from Heaven and endanger the famishing of our souls Let England remember the error of the Jewish Church once the Jewel and peculiar of the Lord of Hosts the defection of the Romish the Degeneration and then the demolition and abolition of Antioch Ephesus Corinth and many others O think in time for we draw very near it of this peoples sin here at the twelfth and thirteenth verses They held the Table of the Lord contemptible and snuffed at it perchance respecting the gorgeous Idols of the Gentiles In the same corrupt affection as many carnal Gospellers not ashamed to let men hear their wishes for the stately and triumphant shews again of Masse Dirges Processions Pilgrimages God hath blest the Land and Church even to the stupor and envy of our Neighbours with abundance of the Gospel of peace and the blessing of God in his Ordinance and with many curious and exact work-men Jewelers of souls and will we not bless the Lord praise him and magnifie him for ever Will we not prize this unsearchable Riches of Christ Shall we rather strive to quench and do despite to the Spirit of his Grace by despising Prophecying and like Swine and Dogs trample upon and turning again rend and tear such as pour these precious Pearls before us stoning them that are sent unto us with hard and bitter censures If the ministration of the Law was glorious what is that of the Gospel Examine it Is it not the Power and Wisdom of God and in the Administration of the Sacrament is not the bread we break the communion of the body and the cup we reach out into you from God the communion of the blood of Jesus Are not the offices of the Church such as distinguish us from Dogs and Infidels Let me then first creep a little into mount Ebal and bitterly curse all those thas have evil will at Sion and then flie into Gerizim and cheerfully bless with blessings of the right band Praise and Honor and Salvation upon the heads of all those Christian Kings Princes and people of all conditions who in their several places seek the advancement of the Truth of God and the encouragement of his faithfull servants while their own hearts strike them with the conscience and guilt of maliciousness and propenseness to Idolatry or schismatick Innovations that dare not say Amen 3. We come briefly to the third day to which we must all come the day of death when Gods own having past the fervor of youth and clean escaped the flesh and worlds contagions and the fiery darts of Satan having in short done what they came for they descend into the grave with their bodies like a rick of corn into the Barn in due season and their spirits return to God that gave them when even death is to them precious as well for rest and security as for that new Newness of life which then begins in death clearing to them that whereof Euripides doubted whether to die were indeed to live and contrary for so St. Paul determines it Christ is to me life and death is to me advantage and therefore desired he this day of his dissolution wherein he might be more perfectly united to his Jesus For these his holy Jewels are never so well set as when inset in the joy and Glory of their Lord and Master which makes that in such souls even the approaching towards death fils and purifies with high and heavenly apprehensions as it is in natural motions nearer still to the center or as in Diggers in a Myne who work most earnestly when near the Treasure But if it happen that any of these Jewels be so far dignified as his Lord accepts his life in sacrifice by Martyrdome consummate in sealing the Truth of Jesus with his blood how doth this add fresh ornament and addition of honor to these Servants of God as came to pass with that Protomartyr St. Stephen first made up a Jewel after his Master those stones the Persecutors threw surrounding his head as a precious Crown of Glory However they are all that die in the Lord enfranchised from those chains of corruption which abide the best alive for we dare not boast our Saints as Bellarmine doth Gouraga or his Fellow doth Phil. Nerius who was fain to pray God to depart from him and draw back his mind from heavenly things No we have learnt another way of humble acknowledgement from St. Paul I know that in me that is in my flesh dwels no good thing and St. James In many things we sin all and the day of absolute absolution from sin is not till this day of dissolution wherein these Jewels by death come to take possession of everlasting life 4. The last is the last of dayes Novissimus and the day of Renovation which none but the ancient of days can know and of which also there is a mixt mention in the beginning of this fourth chapter The day of the Lord comes as a furnace and Rev. 6. The great day of his wrath called the day of the Lord Jesus and the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ Rom. 16. The first day we spake on the day of affliction and the last we spake on the day of death do roule up sometime all together It befals alike saith the Preacher to the clean and unclean to him that swears and to him that fears an oath and for the second the day of powerfull preaching the word Hypocrites elude it The devil can transform himself into an Angil of Light and his zanies may make a fair shew in the flesh saith the Scripture But at this great day shall be a real Partition of Sheep and Goats of Wheat and Tares which yet flock and grow together then he will gather his elect from the four winds and declare his mighty Power in glorifying both their souls and
and the winter house Solomons house in Jerusalem and that in the Green and that in the forest of Libanon 1 King 7. And if many houses for a man for a King What for the King oâ— Kings Why the Scripture besides this in the Text mentions very many houses of the Lord a multiplicity a Zodiack of houses for the Sun of Righteousness for our Lord and Master Christ Jesus both to receive our service and to do us service in them all c. 1. First Mundi machina the Universe the whole round world with many fair and goodly rooms 2. then that named Habitaculum ejus sacrum Heaven his dwelling place the new Jerusalem of miraculous Structure past Amphions or Apollo's fingring The work of thy fingers saith David yet he speaks it only of this rough cast out-building stuck with stars which though a glorious sight yet is but the cover or shell of this great hollow Egg wherein as in a perfect Vivary full of Cages and Parks and ponds he hath ark't and housed together us and all inferiour Creatures But of his higher Palace His Empyreal in most court imperial for his Saints and Angels the Apostle calls it an House not made with hands but as he is light and his robe is so cloaths himself with light so is the house Light inaccessible Domine bonum est Let us dwell here No more go down from this mount but 3. we must descend as he vouchsafed to do to the womb of the Virgin Sol in Virgine sometime it s one of his houses in the Zodiack and now the Son of Righteousness was there there was God hid and housed for a time nay Gemini in virgine not in a Nestorian but in a sober sence and to crie up the Miracle such as never was God and Man together though in two natures yet in one person remaining what he was yet taking and made what he was not There was a right vivary indeed when the Lord of Glory blessed for ever took lise blood of the blessed Virgin our Lady O what a Store-house Treasure house Jewel house was that that confined that reserved such a Rarity What a strange new earthly heaven for God to dwell and dress himself in and yet behold without breaking that house forth he comes and brings a fourth house on his back another new house of his own making still though assisted in the nchoation yet terminated in his person 4. he only of the blessed Trinity wearing that garment they all wrought upon which creando assumpsit sumendo creavit non extra sed in persona sua which rayment was a body real not phantastick as Marcion that eldest child of Satan so Polycarpus called him and the Marichees imagined For then is all our faith imaginary too if no true conception then nor birth nor death nor resurrection true then is our preaching and your believing vain This destroyes all but we have not so learned Christ if we have been taught as the Truth is in Jesus We have learned that our Lord here took our very nature and true flesh woven with sinews a clay-house moated round about like one of ours that is compast with all mans infirmities sin except but very man of the substance of his mother No substance out of God or new caelestial or sidereal or Elementary matter as Valentinus thought A body then like ours yet in this unlike that in ipso articulo in the very moment of Conception it was proved entire and perfect in all the parts and endued with a rational soul at once which is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saâ—tb Damascen the very extract of all novelty when that invisible and incommunicable verity by the Spirit took a soul and by the soul a body saith both Damascen and St. Cyprian when not by any addition or aggregation of Parts by degrees and leisurely sed uno conâ—extu the whole figure and frame of the body set 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the mighty work of Gods holy Spirit faith St. Austin and the School into which though a flow of manifold Graces from the divine nature of Wisdom Power Glory yet in the two natures united we preserve those adverbs all of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. that is without Mutation Confusion Division Separation as the Council of Chalcedon against Eutyches Corpus aptasti it is in the Psalm Never so fitted for an house For in this house dwels the fulness of the God-head bodily that is not by a simple Inhabitation nor Assistance or Habitude or Dignity or that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 willing consent or what they call Equality of honor or Nuncupation or Beneplacitum only None of all these will serve but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Union or Unition rather hypostatical In this house dwelt our Lord many years submitting to clouds and waves of Our Infirmities and in this house new-raised from ruine and made glorious this blessed Eagle flew Cage and all This holy Inhabiter of Eternity ascended house and all to his Holy Habitation in Heaven and is there enthroned on the right hand of his heavenly Father 5. But while he was an infant Lord in the hand of his blessed Virgin Mother here he dwelt a while in his Cradle-house the stable-cratch then the Palace of a great King at the sign of the Star in Bethlehem then the right house of Bread Panis Angelorum The true Bread-house and true Head-house though low and little of all his greater Houses his famous Churches after at those great Cities of Jerusalem Caesarea Antioch and in good time their sister Rome her self their little Sister earst that had no brests but since ovationed for Mater Domina as if Domus Cultus Dominus himself had been born and upbrought there ab Origine 6. But stay a while Let us observe Dominus Domus yet better and we shall find him returned from AEgypt abiding at Nazareth and Capernaum and Jerusalem but commonly in the dwelling houses and banqueting houses of his Converts 7. Let these then if I staied too long at the former serve briefly for two Removes of our Lord. And because the Sea of Tiberias is near at hand we may safely walk with him on the water or see him take ship or hear him preach from thence and then a Ship is more then Domus 't is Domus Domini the house of the Lord then indeed 8. From the Press of people he was fain to hide himself in that house But no house must hide or hold him long Over the brook Cedron there was a Garden and oft he resorted thither and thence betrayed was brought from house to house to Annas house and Caiphas to Pilats's Judgement-hall to Heroa's and back again to Pilate's so to his Cross and never rested till the noble Joseph laid him in his Garden-house in a new Sepulchre where never man lay yet that the common house and lodging of mankind the Grave 9. There Kings and Counsellors of the
also Negatively Dewâ— 5. â—7 Not kill nor cozomit adultery nor steal and so the Apostle Be not dsceived Neither fornicators nor Idolaters nor covetous nor drunkards c. 1 Cor. 6.9 Not yet to shew you further of this in that new eapanfure and firmament of his Grates under the New â— estament till I come to the consummation I intend â—or the conclusion But by the way even this connexion of comforts may awake our consideration and raise our admiration and by that call up and address and enlarge our thankfulness St. Beraard wonders as well he may at those Dual junâ—toes of God and man and of maid and mother and then that admirable conjuncture in man of faith and reason mixing their auxiliary forces and mutual assistances to comprehend and believe this Mystery How can our souls then escape an extasie of comfort when we light upon those conjunctive precious Promises God will give grace and glory and no good thing will be withhold Glory and Honor and Immortality on every soul that does well and on the contrary the Remembrance of the Law of God given in conjunction should make us tremble to sever what God has so joyn'd and entender our consciences to avoid every wickedness not abhorring Iâ—ols and committing sacriledge not pretending to fear God and yet dishonor the King and yet hope to escape the chain-shot of Gods Judgements which come in conjunctions too and for them that treasure up sin he treasures up wrath against the day of wrath he hath treasures of hail and stormy tempests stor'd up for the ungodly plagues of famine and sword and diseases tribulation and anguish temporal and spiritual and Eternal 3. A third Material is the Expansion the extension of this golden Ingor The spreading and dilatation of this comfort of our being Gods peculiar before we look upon it Refin'd in Christ in the state and trial of adversity For if thou beest of those that in corrupt times canst fear before the Lord and think upon his Name which are the qualifications of these Jewels of God in the Text in what blessed Ark and Repository then art thou How safe dost thou dwell under the shadow of those wings that are never nipt never lose any long feathers wings that are a tent in time of peace in time of war a Pavilion and a strong tower of defençe and protection Let then the world hate disclaim on thee Caesar frown Princes persecute the whole world against thee as it was once said of Athanasius yet as Athanasius entitles one Psalm the 62. Psal Adversus omnes Insidiantes all enemies of state fame body and soul so mayst thou write over this Text and make hither thy appeal and hence derive thy Cordial and Restorative in this that thou art Gods own the Lord of Hosts is with thee the God of Jacob is thy Refuge All the Sentences of Scripture containing gracious Promises are as St. Jerome told Paâ—la fences for the brest of a Christian How is this then able to hoop it round with steel and keep it up from sinking in despair be the affliction never so forcible to press it down Though thou wert humbled with all Davids miseries that thou couldst take up all his complaints at once Though the proud rise and assemblies of the terrible seek after thy soul and thou bear in thy bosome the Reproaches of all the mighty though thou art left as a sparrow or as a Pelican in the desert a brother of Dâ—agons and companion of Owls thy Lovers and friends put far from thee and thy acquaintance into darkness and though thy bones are burnt up as an harth and sorrow hath dryed up thy strength that thy bread is ashes mingled with weeping though thy soul melt thy spirit ore-whelm'd and thy heart within thee be desolate though the terrours of death compass thee and the pains of Hell get hold upon thee or were thy wretchedness equal to that of holy Job Broken with a tempest and fill'd with bitterness the venom drinking up thy spirit thy reins clâ—ven asunder and thy gall poured out upon the ground thy face foul with weeping and thy eye-lids in the shadow of death Or in thy Reputation like him made a by-word and tabret for drunkards or like St. Paul the spectacle of disgrace a fool the scum and off-scouring of all things Yet all this fire is quencht in one drop of his mercy whose thou art and who is thy keeper and Defender Thou shalt be mine sayes God mine for all this the sooner for this I will look upon thee respect remember thee own thee raise thee lift thee up visit mark thee seal thee and make thee up a Jewel for my self 4. This was the Expansure and Dilatation next is the complication of our comfort as it is wrapt up here in Dominus Exercituuâ— the Lord of Hosts Indeed the arresting and conserving of all joyes is in him that weares that Name by a right Excellency And this Title falls fitly in our way to be tryed before we can make a full extraction For though the Emphasis be in They as we shall see anon and the comfort enclosed in â—â— ine yet would this Mine prove but heavy leaden Ruff. Verbum frigidum as St. Cbrysostome calls moum tuum were it pronounced by the greatest Monarch upon earth The life of it is in that the living God hath spoken it For shall not the Judge of all the world do right and hath the Lord spoken and will not perform it That Lord whose Attributes of Power and Mercy both are specified in this Appellation of Dominus Exercituums The pith and strength of all lies in this For though this Name seem incidental here and by way of Perenthesis yet is it axis cardo the hinge on which the whole hope of the Righteous turns and it would break the sence of the whole sentence to leave out this The sence I am sure of the blessing not so full nay none at all if he were not Dominus Exercituum The School makes three Degrees of perceiving God by Names both in nature and Scripture First Negationis remotionis He is not the Sun not finite mutable Secondly Perfectionis affirmationis when what is most excellent in things create we apply to God by way of Analogy and Resemblance so we call him Just Merciful High Glorious Thirdly Names of Excellence and Supereminence as this Title here for to seek him amongst the Hosts of his Creatures yea in the highest things we know is Ridiculous but to determine him there is impious Vltra altra quarendus cryes St. Bernard And yet though it be an impotent hope and impudent attempt to imprison God in Names yet as God every way incomprehensible to make some impression of his Nature to Moses gave himself a Name so we find the man after Gods own heart and by his own inspiration say the Lord is a man of war The Lord of Hosts is his Name By which conjuncture of War and
fountain and such a physical and real Influence it hath on all mans habits and actions And if the estate of the best and purest be no better what shall we boast our selves who as they say of Northern Jewels that they are of a vicious softness and will not endure the file so certainly in respect of the primitive Christians when the Church was a true heaven upon earth we are as far from the brightness and miracles of their works as from their firm and miraculous faith It remains that we encourage our selves and stir up the Grace of God that is in us and though we cannot approve our selves in a perfection to a perfect God in whose eyes the moon shines not saith Job and the stars are impure yet if we be but vigilant to dress the paradise of our souls and keep out the Tempter preserving our breast at a garden enclosed and a fountain sealed up if we but earnestly contend for the faith once delivered to the Saints and labor to shake off the sin that cleaves so fast unto our nature if we run and press to the mark and strive to purifie our selves from all filthiness of flesh and spirit and to grow up into full holiness such is then the manifold Grace and Goodness and tender mercy of our gracious God that he not only assists but accepts of our weak endeavors and approaches so far as to impute the very Act of cleansing and obtaining pardon too to such a frail condition and contention We do not we dare not say with Bellarmine de purg lib. 2. cap. 10. it pleases Christ to joyn our satisfactions with his own but by our complying under the hand of God and intention and love to work according to the influx of divine Grace we do by his indulgence impetrate for those sins for which we can never make compensation And as the Scripture enforms us of a cleansing by Redemption and Remission through the blood of our blessed Saviour and a second by application of that blood and a third by infused Regeneration so there is a fourth of mortifying and repressing of Concupiscence subjecting to the Regiment of Grace and also in renouncing and expelling sin by the contrary Acts of vertue and obedience of faith and works of Light expelling Darkness wherefore the Apostle saith All that have this hope in them have purged themselves even as he is pure And again You have purified your souls by obedience to the Truth through the Spirit 1 Pet. 2.22 Here then for a close fals in fitly that exhortation of Zophar in Jab 11.14 If iniquity be in thy hand put it far away and let not wickedness dwell in thy Tabernacles for then shalt thou lift up thy face without spot yea thou shalt be stedfast and not fear thine age shall be clearer then the noon-day thou shalt shine forth and be as the morning But all this is still upon that condition in verse 13. which is If thou prepare thy heart and stretch forth thy hands towards him which puts us in mind of Invocation and the use of Prayer for Gods assistance For as it is with Pearls according to the dew which it receives from Heaven in quantity and quality so doth the shel-fish breed her Pearl and after the Measure and Showr and Proportion and Instilment of divine Grace which our souls drink in we increase and grow in Purity and Sanctification and therefore we should put this into our hourly Letany as the woman in the Gospel John 4. Lord evermore give us of this water We know Lord in our selves there is no more goodness then in the mass of mankind in the rest of our fellow dust and pebbles but that thou by thy powerfull Grace and holy Spirit are pleased to drop and pierce and work upon us and purge away our dross and make us thy blessed work-manship created in Christ Jesus unto good works we have nothing can have nothing from our mixture or specifique forms or power of those materials whereof we consist and therefore to that end we may work Do thou first work thy Will on us instruct inform inlighten us cause thy face to shine upon us and so quicken our dull and earth-affecting souls that they may conceive an heavenly fire and ardent affection and intention by working together with thy Grace and so causing us in the end to work out our own salvation through Jesus Christ to whom c. S. D. G. THE THIRD SERMON At Oatlands MALAC. 3.17 And they shall be mine sayes the Lord of Hosts in that day when I make up my Jewels THis Text at first and second opening afforded us a double priviledge of Gods people in reference to their owner stiled here by his high and stately Title of Dominus Exercituum First They are his own his peculiar and then they are his Jewels In handling the first Priviledge I endeavoured to discover a Mine of Consolation even in this and drew certain Materials from this Mine namely the radiant mingle of Light and joy discernable in a Christians Profession Disposition Conversation Secondly the Connexion and Combination of Graces and Mercies from God observable in this Text pitcht like a Tabernacle with Curtains and Coverings with Loops and taches of comfort coupled one to another in Conjunctions And thirdly the Expansion and Dilatation thereof over all Adversity then the conserve Complication of all our comfort in our great Protector who is Dominus Exercituum And lastly I set on the Crown and consummation of all Consolation in Christ Jesus In our Discourse upon the second priviledge of Gods servants in being his Jewels was shewn in what respects especially this Metaphor is maintained and in what qualities the resemblance chiefly is most clear and useful to us All which being done that which is left us now to do is a Retrospect and a Prospect to look back first to the very Ground-work and Foundation whereon God layes this whole pile of Comfort which will be found to be nothing but his holy fear and then we are the more chearfully to look and go forward with the end of our Text and the end of our Faith and Hope and Pravers that in the work of God upon our bodies and souls in those several dayes wherein he promises and will perform this making up of his Iewels which dayes are four First the Day of punishing the ungodly Secondly the Day of powerful preaching the Word then the Day of Death and last the Day of the last Judgement Our first business and it is indeed the main business is to look to our Foundation Other foundation can no man lay but what is laid saith St. Paul that is Christ Jesus That 's most sure but so is this also that every one which calls on the Name of the Lord must depart from iniquity and this again as sure as the reft that without instruction and divine wisdom no man is able to do that and then the only way to that
ye sont of men Arise and come to Judgement Let us do so Arise quicken our thoughts prepare for since prevent we cannot that last by considering of this first Judgement 2. Wherein the parts we made at first are four The two first the two parties appearing in the Judgement God the Judge and Man the Delinquent then the manner of the process by way of calling and last the matter of the process and summons Where art thou in literal sense Whither fled But in the mystick caries a secret increpation and touch of pitty as if he had said How is man the glory of my works fallen to be the shame of all my creatures And of this sense I must entreat you to be mindfull now in special because now I shall make special use of this sense only 3 Both the parties God and Mâ—n and how far the divine Nature is laid forth in these names and then how far we were enabled to take notice of mans condition by the help of two books this book of Genesis first and then another volum which we cary about us the book of Conscience I have already shewed at large as also what we are to think of and what to learn both by the manner and matter of this summons in literal sense Of all which things I will make no repetition nor will I touch any more upon that review of the Text wherein I divided it into two parts only namely a Judgement and the methode of that Judgement Nor of that Doctrine on easie inference and uses thence deducible That our Judgement shall certainly overtake and come upon us to cause us first to stand in aw and not sin against God and then yet to love the Lord for beginning a foundation of a mercy-seat where he first erected his Throne for Justice even in Paradise in that promise of the womans seed to bruise the serpents head Nor will I speak any further of the Methode of Gods proceeding first calling to the man before the woman or the Serpent Nor of the different addressing of this Judgement against the first Monarch of mankind wherein he proceeds by himself immediately and that Judgement afterwards against the two first Kings of his own people wherein he doth all by Delegates by sending his Prophets of which divers reasons are rendred by Interpreters But passing all over that hath passed in several handlings of the words come we only to reflect on that which I called the mystick sense of the last part which is the question Where art thou that is for so I find it opened Where is thy former happiness To what a miserable state art thou now by sin reduced How hath thy fall bruised the seal and defaced that glorious Image I created in thee Alas Adam where art thou From which passionate Increpation and Rebuke mixt with a gracious bemoaning of mans fall divers doctrinal points might be raised as the term is if a man should raise as some do such things as would sleep and be quiet or lie for dead if no such Raisers and Wresters would enforce them up That I only intend and yet will crave leave to insist upon is what this question seems to others to imply and is no coacted no violent expression namely the mifery and desolation of Adam and consequently of all his race by Disobedience Quanta de re decidit 4. In which consideration first the sin was disobedience from a double root of evil An inordinate Covetize of what God had prohibited and pride of heart to be as God which was the fall both of man and devil The losses by this fall which disperst the whole flock of divine Graces were life of body to be perpetuated as the Angels plenary knowledge with a supernatural influx of divine Faith in admirable clearness both of the object and the internal power with lucide notions of the Trinity and the then future incarnation But above all that choicest Jewel of original Justice And now the Doctrine from this part of the Text in this sense opened and dropping thus from the mouth of God himself will as an Influence coelestial if we open our bosoms our hearts and Understandings and Affections to receive and cherish it with care and conscientious Devotion produce many usefull flowers 5. The first flower or use if so we will call it that is the first good way to take in appliance of this Truth is to sit down like the mourning Levite in the Psalm by the waters of Babylon and looking back and remembring Sion reflecting on the pleasures of the first state in the Garden of Eden turn words to sighs and melt our brains to tears in doleful recounting our lost beatitude and sight of our deplorable condition Where first in stead of a glorious is inferred a sordid nakedness with internal turpitude and privation of all those excellencies Rebellion in the flesh and appetite drawing on black guiltiness and Deformity and a liableness to eternal damnation all sprung from that bitter root of Pride cloven into two one explicite of eating the forbidden fruit the other implicite of unthankfulness to God which was doubtless their sin of omission Ingratitude being the principle and primipile of sin then as it continues the core and bottom of all ill nature ever since 6. Secondly Weigh mans misery in that only term of Destitutus the state of dereliction whereby the appetite becomes enormous having now no guide which is a thing we are so far from missing or hating that from our youth up 't is fatally affected by us all Tandem custode remoto What then why then Cereus in vitium flecti flexible and moldable into any form of vanity or wickedness For it is just so with all the children of Adam as with a child left of his Parents and Tutors to himself which rooted inborn Pravity is bound with Iron round and close unto our souls that even Gods own reborn sons and daughters feel and bewail it in themselves So far St. Paul will witness to the whole world and gives Glory to God in that woful confession O miserable man that I am who shall deliver me from that body of sin and death And thither I must not scorn tocome and Thou and He though thou upon the ground or in a Dungeon and he as high as ever man was mounted on a Throne or in a Palace We all though admitted with open face to contemplate the joyes of heaven in the face of Jesus Christ shining in a Gospel of Peace and Salvation yet in our selves with shame and confusion of face and spirit must pronounce that Wo that Vae misero mihi to every one of our selves single and in a deep sense of our own perversness and infirmity before we can come with comfort to take up that following Antheme of our Apostle I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Let us then labor beloved in our Lord and Saviour to be truly humble in the sense of this our Orphan
meekness which he shews thee in himself and in his anointed who if ever any mortal man is exhibted by God himself to all his people as a Pattern of Patience and Humility thou shalt find a manifold sense in that sentence already pronounced against thee God resists the proud that is justles him in and out of his own way of Pride Renders him in the very acts and Elevations in the hoisting and spreading of all his sails and wings base and contemptible and ridiculous God permitting many proud men by way of punishment to debauch themselves with other vices which yet do spring from thence Resisting them in those very things wherein they please themselves and hope to purchase Reverence while by a most unseemly superciliousness by their haughty eye-lids stiff necks loud speeches oaths Cloaths Buildings they occasion the storks bill behind their backs and expose themselves oft-times to open affronts and derisions and so are a kind of masculine brood of new Muses to the smal Poets and Wits of the time and are many times justly made the songs of drunkards And lastly by approof of that in the Psalmists Aphorism Doubtless every man living in his best state is altogether vanity making their most stately and best Establisht their most hopeful and high-erected fortunes like Turnus his persidus ensis or like blown glass Cum splendet frangitur in the stretch and wresting broken in their very acme and exaltation ruinous and as smoak when most supream then to nearest vanishing with a Sic transit which is no new experiment every age affording such Coments and Meteors exhaled and past their bounds when they have crackt a while and blaz'd fall or shoot or are hurled down to their first original drossiness so becoming like the Historians Sword-chariots to the World at first a terror and afterwards a Scorn Men we see literally fulfilling that conclusive prediction Man cannot abide in honor which fatal frequent Event is enough to make us imagine a Favorite to be an unlawfull Calling but that we find exceptions to the contrary in Gods own book where we have example of his own rich friend Abraham and of Moses whom he honoured as his familiar and John the Favorite of our gracious Saviour And in the Chronicles of former and for the Chronicles of succeeding times we find and look upon some e meliore luto whose ardent and ethereal vertue preserves them in the love and preservation and protection of the Almighty as so many streight and noble Palms under a royal Cedar still fresh and unblasted as far from self-wickedness as others envie which is a rare complexion in felicity There is a fourth use or extraction to be had out of this by teaching us all to turn upon our common adversary I mean sin that thus first threw the ball of wild-fire to the ruine of our Fathers house and state and race this is truly the noble science of defence and the only bravery of resistance Here then learn to shew mettle courage and spirit and resolution Alas What a wretched feable and squib valor is it for a man to contend in blood with him that gives him then the lie when he most deserves it or speaks disgraceingly of her to him who in his own conscience knows he first and most hath made her liable to that reproach and dishonour and yet this same man so rank a coward as he dare not enter the lifts nor stand the Combat and conflict with this Adversary No no my brother of the sword is fouly mistaken in judging of true courage and must know that he is the poor unworthy the only base and bafled fellow that scorns not to be a fellow that weakly yields to be a servant and a Prisoner and a voluntary slave to sin his mortal enemy and content to be taken captive of the devil to do his will So in the point of Wisdom and true prudential policy which we all affect doth it shew vilely of May it not stand with the temper of a right English constitution to submit to Covenants and Articles with that pernitious foe who by invasion seeks to enthral and trample on and bereave us both of state and liberty What is it then to strike an everlasting league with sin and so with death and hell for sin is their Agent their leiger Embassadour and not rather conspire to draw up all our Auxiliary forces of rectified Reason and moral Precepts but specially confiding in coelestial aids of Angels and Influences of divine Grace and Assistance to root out the body of sin and death root and branch or as it is in Rom. 6. with a Saltem That at least sin may no longer raign and have Dominion Here every Christian Souldier marching under the Ensign of the Cross of Jesus is to bid Defiance and to run ad Arma those especially of Preces Lachrymae The weapons of this War-fare are spiritual but yet able through God to beat down the strongest holds of Satan And for this cause we should be watchfull over sins advantages of which I will make my conclusion and present a few and such as I find here in this story and in this example 1. First The serpentine nature of sin is discovered And all sins may say Documenta damus qua simus origine from the devil in the Serpent they draw their property of Insinuation And yet to see as the same Devil prevailed even at Rome to be worshipt in form of a Serpent you know the story of Aesculapius and the notice of that too in the Apocrypha The Dragon worshipt at Babylon So Epiphanius reckons up among his Hereticks those that worshipt that very Serpent in Paradise as the Author for sooth of Science But as we must all be cautelous of any such serpentine perswasions in the case of any sin and as all great ones are to eschew the danger of Flatterers the worst of all tame beasts so a Caveat here will not be unseasonable against the Romish Synagogue of a serpentine brood Stillant in aure venenum creep into houses and seduce silly women Against such Serpents bless God for Ibides Birds that can destroy that crawling generation by confounding Arguments from the Truth of God And learn even for that very cause to think well of such at least as either in the former Age of Reformation or in this present time from Cathedral Prelacy or other rule have stood up next under God and a gracious Soveraign the Pen-champions and Defenders of the Faith as well against that brood as the other dangerous extream of Sectaries 2 A second observation is the advantage gained by the Tempter in that way as we should think of disadvantage in the harsh unplesant hissing of the Serpent We wonder at the She-wolves affecting the most ill favoured Male and bless our selves to think as well we may that Witches should indent in blood and endure those horrid approaches which thrill our souls to imagine And yet we take no