SInce wee are sure that there is a spiritual death of the soul let us make sure a spiritual resurrection too Audâ—cter dicam saith St. Jerome I say confidently however God can do all things hee cannot restore a Virgin that is â—aâ—n from it to Virginity again hee cannot do this in the body but God is a Spirit and hath reserved more power upon the spirit and soul than upon the body And therefore I may say with the same assurance that St. Jerome doth no soul hath so prostituted her self so multiplied her fornications but that God can make her a Virgin again and give her even the chastity of Christ himself Fulfill therefore what Christ saith Joh. 5. 25. The hour is coming and now is c. bee this that hour bee-thy first resurrection bless Gods present goodness for this now and attend Gods leisure for the other resurrection hereafter and then doubt not but what glory soever thou hast had in this world glory inherited from noble Ancestors glory acquired by merit and service glory purchased by money and observation what glory of beauty and proportion what glory of health and strength soever thou bast had in this house of clay the glory of the latteâ— house as it is Hag. â— 9. shall bee greater than of the former Qui peacat quatenus peccat sit seip so detetion Clem. Alex. IN every sin a man falls from that degree which himself had before In every sâ— hee is dishonoured hee is not so good a man as hee was impoverished hee hath not so great a portion of grace as hee had infatuated hee hath not so much of the true wisdome of the fear of God as hee had disâ—armed hee hath not that interest and confidence in the love of God that hee had and deformed hee hath not so lively a representation of the image of God as before In every sin wee become prodigals but in the habit of sin wee become bankrupts afraid to come to an account A fall is a fearful thing that needs a raising a help but sin is a death and that needs a resurrection and a reâ—â—rection is as great a work as the very Creation its self It is death in semine in the root it produces it brings forth death it is death in arbore in the body in its self death is a divorce and so is sin and it is death in fructu in the fruit thereof sin plants spiritual death and this death produces more sin obduration impenitence and the like Transeant injuriae plerasque non accipit qui nescit Seneca HEe that knows not of an injury or takes no knowledge of it for the most part hath no injury But alas how many break their sleep in the night about things that disquiet them in the day too and trouble themselves in the day about things that disquiet them all night too Wee disquiet our selves too much in being over tender over sensible of imaginary injuries They that are too inquisitive what other men say of them they disquiet themselves for that which others would but whisper they publish and therefore that which hee adds there for moral and civil matters holds in a good proportion in things of a more divine nature in such parts of the Religious worship and service of God as are not fundamental non expâ—dit omâ—â—â— videâ—e non omnia audire wee must not too jealoussy suspect nor too bitterly condemn nor too peremptorily conclude that whatsoever is not done as wee would have it done or as wee have seen it done in former times is not well done Antequam unlneramur monemur Origen BEfore our enemies hit us God gives us warning that they mean to do so When God himself is so â—ar incensed against us that hee is turned to bee our enemy and to fight against us it was come to that Isa 63. 10. when hee hath bent his bow against us as an enemy it was come to that in the Prophet Jeremy Law 2. 4. yet still hee gives us warning before-hand and still there comes a lightning before his thunder God comes seldome to that dispatch a word and a blow but to a blow without a word to an execution without a warning never Cain took offence at his brother Abel the quarrel was Gods because hee had accepted Abels sacrifice therefore God joyns himself to Abels party and so the party being too strong for Cain to subsist God would not surprize Cain but hee tells him his danger Why is thy countenance cast down Gen. 4. 10. You may proceed if you will but if you will needs you will lose by it at last Saul persecutes Christ in the Christians Christ meets him upon the way speaks to him strikes him to the ground tells him vocally and tells him actually that hee hath undertaken too hard a work in opposing him This which God did to Saul reduces him that which God did to Cain wrought not upon him but still God went his own way in both to speak before he strikes to lighten before hee thunders to warn before hee wounds In Dathan and Abiâ—ams case God may seem to proceed apace towards execution but yet it had all these pauses in arrest of judgement and their reprieves before execution yet when Moses had information and evidence of their factious proceeding hee falls not upon them but hee falls upon his face before God and laments and deprecates in their behalf hee calls them to a fair trial and examination the next day Tomorrow the Lord will shew Numb 16. 5 and they said Wee will not come vers 14. Then God upon their contumacy when they would stand mute and not plead takes a resolution to consume them in a moment and then Moses and Aaron return to petition for them vers 25. And Moses went up to them again and the Elders of Israel followed and all prevailed not and then Moses comes to pronounce judgement These men shall not dye a common death and after and yet not presently after that hee gave judgement execution followed vers 31. God opened his mouth and Moses his and Aaron his and the Elders theirs before the earth opened hers In all which wee see that God alwayes leaves a latitude between his sentence and execution which interim is sphaera activitatis the sphere in which our repentance and his mercy move and direct themselves in a benign aspect towards one another Vili vendimus coelum glauci more Christiani sumus Tertul. HOw poor a clod of earth is a Mannor How poor an inch a Shire How poor a span a Kingdome How poor a pace the whole world and yet how prodigally wee sell Paradise Heaven Souls Consciences Immortality Eternity for a few grains of this dust What had Eve for heaven so little as that the Holy Ghost will not let us know what shee had nor what kinde of fruit yet something Eve had What had Adam for heaven but a satisfaction that hee had pleased an ill wife as St. Jerome states
to consider Gods miraculous deliverances of other men in other cases or whether wee understand it according to the general voyce of Interpreters i. e. bee content that there remain in thy flesh matter and subject for mee to produce glory from thy weakness and matter and subject for thee to exercise thy faith and allegiance to mee still these words will carry an argument against the expedience of absolute praying against all temptations For still this gratia mea sufficit will import this amount to this I have as many Antidotes as the Devil hath poysons I have as much mercy as the Devil hath malice There must bee Scorpions in the world but the Scorpion shall cure the Scorpion there must bee temptations but temptations shall adde to mine and to thy glory And therefore is it conduceable to Gods purposes in us which is the rule of all our prayers to pray utterly against all tentations as vehemeutly as against sins God should lose by it and wee should lose by it if wee had no tentations For God is glorified in those victories which wee by his grace gain over the Devil Salvus factus â—s 〈◊〉 nihilo non de nihilo tamen Bernard THou bringest nothing for thy salvation yet something to thy salvation nothing worth it but yet something with it Thy self hath a part in those means which God useth to that purpose thy self art the instrument though not the cause of thine own salvation Thy new creation by which thou art a new creature i. e. thy regeneration is wrought as the first creation was wrought God made heaven and earth of nothing but hee produced the other creatures out of that matter which hee had made Thou hadst nothing to do in the first work of thy Regeneration thou couldst not so much as wish it but in all the rest thou art a fellow-worker with God because before that there are seeds of former grace shed in thee Nullâ â—o Deus perinde atque corporis aerumna conciliatur Nazian A Moâ—â—ning spirit and an afflicted body are great instruments of reconciling God to a sinner and they alwayes dwell at the gates of Atonement restitution and Bonaventure in the life of Christ reports that the holy Virgin mother said to Elizabeth that grace doth not descend into the soul of a man but by prayer and affliction Besides a delicate and prosperous life is hugely contrary to the hopes of a blessed eternity And certainly hee that sadly considers the portion of Dives and remembers that the account which Abraham gave him for the unavoidableness of his torment was because hee had his good things in this life must in all reason with trembling run from a course of banquets and faring deliciously every day as being a dangerous estate and a consignation to an evil greater than all danger the pains and torment of unhappy souls So then hee that desires to dye well and happily above all things must bee carefull that hee do not live a soft delicate and voluptuous life but a life severe holy and under the Discipline of the Gross No man wants cause of tears and daily sorrow Let every man consider what hee feels and acknowledge his misery let him confess his sin and chastise it let him long and sigh for the joyes of heaven let him tremble and fear because hee hath deserved the pains of hell let him commute his eternal fear with a temporal suffering preventing Gods judgement by passing one of his own let him groan for the labours of his pilgrimage and the dangers of his warfare and by that time hee hath summed up all these labours and duties and contingencies all the proper causes instruments and acts of sorrow hee will finde that for a secular joy and wantonness of spirit there are not left many void spaces of his life Nemo mala morte unquam moriebatur qui libenter opera charitatis exercuit St. Hieron THis the Father with all his reading and experience verifies I do not remember to have read that any charitable person ever dyed an evill death and although a long experience hath observed Gods mercies to descend upon charitable people like the dew upon Gideons fleece when all the world was dry yet for this also wee have a promise which is not onely an argument of a certain number of years but a security for eternal ages Luke 16. 9. Make yee friends of c. When faith fails and chastity is useless and temperance shall bee no more then charity shall bear you upon wings of Cherubims to the eternal Mountain of the Lord. I have been a lover of mankinde and a friend and merciful and now I expect to communicate in that great kindness which hee shews that is the great God and Father of men and mercies said Cyrus the Persian on his death-bed Now I do not mean this should onely bee a death-bed charity any more than a death-bed repentance but it ought to bee the charity of our life and healthfull years a parting of a portion of our goods then when wee can keep them when wee cannot then kindle our lights when wee are to descend into our houses of darkness or bring a glaring torch suddenly to a dark room that will amaze the eye and not delight it or instruct the body but if our rapers have in their constant course descended into their grave crowned all the way with light then lâ—t the death-bed charity be doubled and the light burn brightest when it is to deck our Herse Prima quae vitam dedit hâ—ra carpsit Seneca VVHen Adam fell then hee began to dye the same day so said God and that must needs hee true and so it must mean that upon that very day hee fell into an evill and dangerous condition a state of change and affliction then death began i. e. the man began to dye by a natural diminution and apâ—ness to disease and misery his first state was and should have been so long as it lasted a happy duration his second was a daily and miserable change and this was the dying properly This appears in the great instance of damnation which in the stile of Scripture is called eternal death not because it kills of ends the duration it hath not so much good in it but because it is a perpetual infelicity change or separation of soul and body is but accidental to death Death may bee with or without either but the formality the curse and sting of death i. e. misery sorrow anguish dishonour and whatsoever is miserable and afflictive in nature that is death Death is not an action but a whole state and condition and this was first brought in upon us by the offence of one man But now though this death entred first upon us by Adams fault yet it came nearer unto us and increased upon us by the sins of more of our forefathers For Adams sin left us in strength enough to contend with humane calamities for almost a thousand years
years and judgement hee mouldring for non-imployment and dashed for slowness of promotion when others of cheap and thin abilities men without growth or bud of knowledge have met with the honours of advancement and trample on those dejected book-worms which dissolve themselves into industry for the service of their Church yet meet neither with her pomp noâ— her revenue nay some that have wasted their lamp and burnt their Taper to an inch of years have spent those fortunes in the travels of Divinity which would largely have accommodated them for more secular courses and enforced to retire themselves to the solitariness of some ten pounds cure and so spin out the remainder of their age in a discontented contemplation of their misfortunes and I pray God not in a murmuring against his Church Where the fault lyes hee that hath but slenderly transâ—iqued with the occurrences of the time may judge Spiritual promotions are slow of fooâ— and come for the most part halting or in a by-way Times more than calamitous when the inheritance and patrimony of the Church shall bee thus leased to avarice and folly when these her honours which shee intails upon desert shall bee heaped upon a golden ignorant who rudely treads on those sacred Prerogatives Strange monument of weakness he that reels under his own burthen stoops to be opprest with the weight of others and loe how hee tumbles to a mortal sin the School-men do stile it so directly opposite to a pair of vertues Justice Chastity unjust that the revenues due to worth should be packed upon bulkless and unable persons and uncharitable for him to undertake the guidance and pasturing of a flock who was never trained up in the conditions of a shepherd Neither is hee an enemy only of a double vertue but a companion of two such sins which seem to brave and dare the Almighty to revenge on the prophanâ—r Incâ—usion Perjury first in rushing on the profession not legitimately called then in purchasing her honours Pompa mortis magis terret quam mors ipsa Seneca VVHy should this sad toil of mortality dishearten us Groans and Sighs and Convulsions are the bodies passing-bells no less customary than natural and more horrid in the circumstance than the thing the retinue and complement of death speaks more terrour than the act The Adversary the Judge the Sentence the Jaylor the Executioner more daunt the Malefactor than the very stroke and cleft of dissolution Are wee so foolish as to fear that sayes the heathen which will dash or split us in the whole no it is the port which we ought one day to desire never to refuse into which if any have been cast in their younger years they need repine no more than one which with a short cut hath ended his Navigation For there are some whom slacker winds mock and detain and weary with the gentle tediousness of a peaceable calm others swifter wafted by sudden gusts whom life hath rather ravished thither than sent which had they a time delayed by some flattering intermissions yet at length must of necessity strike sail to it Some faint-hearted Adrian will to his power linger it and fearfully expostulate with a parting soul Quae nunc abib is in loca pallidula rigida nudula As if the divorce from the body were everlasting and there should not bee one day a more glorious contract When a confident Hilarian shall dare all those grisly assaults Soul get thee out thou hast seventy years served Christ and art thou now loath to dye Again some spruce Agag or hem'd Amalakite would bee palsie-struck with an amara mors death is bitter death mors death is bitter death is bitter 1 Sam. 15. When a Lubentius and a Maximinus have their breast-plate on with a Domine parati sumus Wee are ready to lay off our garments the flesh And indeed saith St. Austin Boughs fall from trees and stones out of buildings and why should it seem strange that mortals dye Some have welcomed death some met it in the way some baffeld it in sickness persecution torments I instance not in that of Basil to the Arrianated Valâ—ns it is too light that of Vincentius was more remarkable who with an unabated constancy thus shuns the rage of his merciless Executioner thou shalt see the Spirit of God strengthâ—n the tormented more than the Devil can the hands of the tormenter And that you may know a true Martyrdome is not dashed either at the expectation or the sense of torture as Barlaam will hold his hand over the very flame of the Altar and sport out the horridness of such a death with that of the Psalmist Thou hast â—aught my hands to war and my fingers to fight Seeing then wee are compalsed with such a cloud of witnesses what should scare a true Apostle from his Cupio dissolvi Let us take his resolution and his counsel too lay aside every weight and run with patience the race set before us Heb. 1â— Iniquitatem damnare novit Deus non facere August GOd knows how to judge not commit a crime and to dispose not mould it and is often the Father of the punishment not the fact Hence it is that the dimness of humane apprehension conceives that oftentimes a delinquency in God which is a monster of our own frailty making God not onely to foreknow but predestinate an evil when the evil is both by growth and conception ours and if ought savour of goodness in us it is Gods not ours yet ours too as derivative from God who is no less the Patron of all goodness than the Creator and it is as truly impossible for him to commit evill as it was truly miraculous to make all that hee had made good And therefore Terâ—ulliâ—â— in his first book de Triâ—â—â—â—â—â— makes it a non potest fieri a matter beyond the list and reach of possibility that hee should bee artifex mali operis the promoter and ingineer of a depraved act who chalengeth to himself the title no less of an unblemished Father than of a Judge If any then fall off from goodness hee is hurried no less with the violence of his own perswasion than concupiscence and in those desperate affairs Gods will is neither an intermedler nor co-partner Cujus ope scimus multos ne laberentur retentos nullos ut laberentur impulsos saith Aug. by whose hand of providence wee know many to bee supported that they might not fall none impelled that they should And in his answer to that fourteenth Article falsely supposed to bee his fieri non potest ut per quem a peecatis surgitur per eum ad peecata decidatur for one and the self-same goodness to bee the life and death of the self-same sin is so much beyond improbability that it is impossible let this then satisfie our desire of knowledge Et ab illo esse quod flatur non ab illo esse quod ruitur That his providence is the staffe and crutch
Catholique Divinity OR The most Solid and Sententious Expressions of the Primitive Doctors of the Church With other Ecclesiastical and Civil Authors Dilated upon and fitted to the Explication of the most Doctrinal Texts of Scripture in a choice way both for the matter and the language and very useful for the Pulpit and these Times By Dr. Stuart Dean of St. Pauls afterwards Dean of Westminster and Clerk of the Closet to the late K. Charles LONDON Printed for H. M. and are to bee sold by Timo. Smart at his shop in the Great Old-Bayly near the Sessions-house 1657. To the Reader YOu may by these few sheets understand in some part that great benefit of humane Learning how serviceable it may bee made for Divine For as the Badger-skins and Goats-hair were made use of for the service of the Tabernacle in the Jewish Church So may the Endowments of prophane Infidel-Philosophers Orators and Poets bee imployed for the service of the Christian And indeed the Arts are but as hand-maids to Divinity Look but back upon those two famous patterns of Jewish and Christian Divines Moses learned in all the wisdome of the Egyptians and St. Paul wise in all the learning of the Grecians a great Artist and a good Linguist Now to what purpose both those gifts unless improved to a further end then they were first intended namely to make Greece and Egypt Proselites and to teach those Nations Christianity from the grounds and principles of their own learning And thus Reader mayest thou make use of this Book if a Minister for thy Pulpit if a Lay-man for thy practice As for the Author hee is too well known to bee praysed by a private Pen onely thus much take notice in his behalf that these were onely some loose scattered sheets of his Juvenilia by which you may guess what his full grown elaborate peeces will bee when ever it shall please God to instruct these ignorant Times with those his most learned Productions Till when I am Thine in all Christian service H. M. Catholique Divinity OR The most solid and sententious Expressions of the Primitive Doctors of the Church c. Quà m malè est extra legem viventibus quicquid meruerunt semper expectant Petronius FAt Swine cry hideously if but touched or medled with as knowing they owe their life to every one that will take it Tyberius felt the remorse of conscience so violent that hee protested to the Senate that hee suffered death daily Whereupon Tacitus makes this good Note Tandem-facinora flagitia in supplicium vertuntur as every body hath its shadow appertaining to it so hath every sin its punishment And although they escape the lash of the Law yet vengeance will not suffer them to live as the Barbarians rashly censured St. Paul Act. 28. quietly at least Richard the Third after the Murther of his two Nephews had fearful dreams and visions insomuch that hee did often leap out of his bed in the dark and catching his sword which alway naked stuck by his side he would goe distractedly about the chamber every where seeking to finde our the cause of his own occasioned disquiet It is as proper for sin to raise fears in the soul as for rotten flesh and wood to breed worms That worm that never dyes is bred here in the froth of filthy lusts and flagitious courses and lies gnawing and grabling upon mens inwards many times in the ruffe of all their jollity This makes Saul call for a Minstrel Belshazzar for his carowsing cups others for other pleasures to put by the pangs of their wounded spirits and throbbing consciences Charles the fourth after the Massacre of France could never endure to bee awakened in the night without Musick or some like diversion hee became as terrible to himself as formerly hee had been to others but above all I pity the loss of their souls who serve themselves as the Jesuite in Laucashire followed by one that found his glove with a desire to restore it him but pursued inwardly with a guilty conscience hee leapes over a hedge plunges into a Marle-pit behinde it unseen and unthought of wherein hee was drowned Vestium curiosit as deformitatis mentium morum indicium est St. Bernard OUr first Parents who even after the Fall were the goodliest creatures that ever lived went no better cloathed than with leather no more did those Worthies of whom the world was not worthy Heb. 11. 37 And surely however our condition and calling afford us better array and the Vulgar like a Pohemian Cur fawn upon every good suit purpuram magis quam dominuâ— colunt yet wee must take heed that pride creep not into our cloaths those Ensignes of our sin and shame seeing our fineness is but our filthiness our weakness our nastiness It is a sure signe of a base minde to think hee can make himself great with any thing that is less than himself and win more credit by his garments than his graces St. Peter teacheth women 1 Pet. 3. 3. to garnish themselves not with gay cloaths but with a meek and quiet spirit and not as those mincing Dames whose pride the Prophet Isaiah inveighes against as punctually as if he had viewed the Ladies Wardrobes in Jerusalem Rich Apparel are but fine covers for the foulest shame the worst is Natures garment the best but follies garnish How blessed a Nation were wee if every silken suit did cause a sanctified soul or if wee could look upon our cloaths as our first Parents did as love-tokens from God Quicquid propter Deum fit equaliter fit St. August IT is said in the seventh of Gen. vers 5. That Noah did according to all that the Lord had commanded him Where the word All is a little word but of a large extent hee doth not his Masters but his own will that doth no more than himself will A disspensatory conscience is an evill conscience God cryes to us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hee will have universal obedience both for subject and object Wee must bee intirely willing in all things to please God or wee utterly displease him Herod did many things and was not any thing the better Jehues golden Calves made an end of him though hee had made an end of Baals worship Hee that doth some and not all Gods will with no desire and affection at least doth but as Benhadad recover of one disease and dye of another yea if hee take not a better course with himselfe hee doth but take pains to go to Hell Then shall wee not bee ashamed when wee have respect to all Gods Commandements Psal 119. 6. Sordet in conspectu judicis quod fulgâ—â— in conspect â— operantis Gregor GOd can finde flaws in that for which wee may look for thanks This makes Nehemiah crave pardon of his zealous Reformations and David cryes out Enter not into judgement with thy servant O Lord for no flesh is righteous in thy sight Yee are they that justifie your selves
danger Detestabilis est coecitas si nemo oculos perdiderit nisi cui eruendi sunt Senec. BLindness were a most accursed thing if no man were ever blinde but hee whose eyes are pulled out with tortures or burning bafons And if sickness were alwayes a testimony of Gods anger and a violence to a mans whole condition then it were a huge calamity but because God sends it to his servants to his children to little infants to Apostles and Saints with designes of 〈◊〉 to preserve their innocence to overâ—â—ome tentation to try their vertue to fit them for rewards it is certain that sickness never is an evill but by our own faults and if wee will do our duty wee shall bee sure to turn it into a blessing If the sickness bee great it may end in death and the greater it is the sooner and if it bee very little it hath great intervals of rest if it bee between both wee may bee Masters of it and by serving the ends of providence serve also the perfective end of humane nature and enter into the possession of everlasting mercies However if all the calamities were true concerning sickness with which it is aspersed yet is it far to bee preferred before the most pleasant fin and before a great secular business and a temporal care and some men â—wake as much in the foldings of the softest beds as others on the cross and sometimes the very weight of sorrow and the weariness of sickness presses the spirit into slumbers and images of rest when the intemperate or the lustfull person rolls upon his uneasie thorns and sleep is departed from his eyes Solatium est pro honesto dura tolerare ad causam patientia respicit Senec. IN all sufferings the cause of it makes it noble or ignoble tolerable or intolerable For when patience is assaulted by a ruder violence by a blow from heaven or earth from a gracious God or an unjust man patience looks forth to the doors which way shee may escape And if innocence or a cause of Religion keep the first entrance then whether shee escapes at the gates of life or death there is a good to bee received greater than the evils of a sickness but if sin thrust in that sickness and that hell stands at the door then patience turns into fury and seeing it is impossible to go forth with safety rowls up and down with a circular and infinite revolution making its motion not from but upon its own center it doubles the pain and increases the sorrow till by its weight it breaks the spirit and bursts into the agonies of infinite and eternal ages If wee had seen St. Polycarp burning to death or St. Lawrence rosting upon his gridiron or St. Ignatiuâ— exposed to Lions or St. Sebastian pierced with arrows for the cause of Jesus for Religion for God for a holy conscience we should have been in love with flames and have thought the gridiron fairer than the marriage bed and wee should have chosen rather to converse with those beasts than those men that brought those beasts forth and have esteemed Sebastians arrows to bee the raies of light brighter than the Moon For so did those holy men account them they kissed their stakes and hugged their deaths and ran violently to torments and counted whippings and secular disgraces to bee the enamel of their persons and the oyntment of their heads and the embalming their names and securing them for immortality But to see Sejaâ—us â—orn in peeces by the people or Nero crying and creeping timorously to his death when he was condemned to dye more majorum to see Judas pale and trembling full of anguish sorrow and despair to observe the groanings and intolerable agonies of Herod and Antiochus will tell and demonstrate the causes of patience and impatience to proceed from the causes of the suffering and that it is sin onely that makes the cup bitter and deadly Non est magnum audiri ad voluntatem non est magnum August BE not over-joyed when God grants thee thy prayer the Devil had his prayer granted when hee had leave to enter into the herd of Swine and so hee had when hee obtained power of God against Job But all this aggravated the Devils punishment so may it do thine to have some prayers granted And as that must not over-joy thee if it bee so if thy prayer bee not granted it must not deject thee God suffered St. Paul to pray and pray and pray yet after his thrice praying granted him not that hee prayed for God suffered that if it be possible and that let this cup pass to pass from Christ himself yet hee granted it not Tentemus animas quae deficiunt a fide naturalibus rationibus adjuvare St. Hieron LEt us endeavour to assist them who are weak in faith with the strength of reason though God hath not given the Minister a power to infuse faith into men yet hath God put it into his power to satisfie the reason of men and to chafe that wax to which hee himself vouchsafes to set to the great seal of faith And truly it is very well worthy of a serious consideration that whereas all the Articles of our Creed are the objects of faith so that wee are bound to receive them de fide as matters of faith yet God hath left that out of which all these Articles are to bee deduced and proved i. e. the Scripture to humane arguments It is not an Article of the Creed to beleeve these and these books to bee or not to bee Canonical Scripture but our arguments for the Scripture are humane arguments proportioned to the reason of a natural man God doth not seal in water in the fluid and tranfitory imaginations and opinions of men wee never set the seal of faith to them but in wax in the rectified reason of men that reason that is ductile and flexible and pliant to the impressions that are naturally proportioned unto it God sets to his seal of faith and therefore faith it self by the Prophet Isaiah is called knowledge Isa 53. 11. By his knowledge c. saith God of Christ i e. by that knowledge that men shall have of him Insomuch that it is not enough for you to rest in an imaginary faith and easiness in beleeving except yee know also what and why and how you come to that beleef Implicite beleevers ignorant beleevers the adversary may swallow but the understanding beleever hee must chaw and pick bones before hee come to assimilate him and make him like himself The implicite beleever stands in an open field and the enemy will ride over him easily The understanding beleever is in a fenced Town and hee hath out-works to lose before the Town bee pressed i. e. reasons to bee answered before his faith bee shaked and hee will sell himself dear and lose himself by inches if hee bee sold or lost at last Anima spiritualiter cadit spiritualiter resurgeâ— August
the defect of fewel it vexeth them that their sins forsake them that through the impotency of their limbs and faculties they cannot run into the like excess as in former times Their few dayes before death are like Shrove-tide before Lent they take their fill of flesh and fleshly desires because they suppose that for ever after they must fast from them Thus they spur on their jadish flesh now unable to run her former stages saying Let us crown our selves with Rose-buds for they will presently wither let us eat and drink for to morrow wee shall dye Respice sepulchra vide quis servus quis dominus quis dives quis pauper discerue si potes vinctum a rege fortem a debili pulchrum a deformi Aug. l. de nat grat THe hand of a dead man stroaking the part cures the Tympany and certainly the consideration of death is a present means to cure the swelling of pride in any form in this life many things make odds between men and women as birth education wealth alliance and honour but death makes all even Respice sepulchra saith St. Austin Survey mens graves and tell mee then who is beautiful and who is deformed All there have hollow eyes flat noses and gastly looks Nereus and Thirsites cannot bee there distinguished Tell mee who is rich and who is poor all there wear the same weed their winding sheet Tell mee who is noble and who base and ignoble the worms claim kindred of all Tell mee who is well housed and who is ill all there are bestowed in dark and dankish rooms under ground If this will not satisfie you take a sieve and fift the dust and ashes of all men and shew mee which is which I grant there is some difference in dust there is powder of Diamonds there is gold dust and brass-pin dust and saw-dust and common dust the powder of Diamonds resembles the remains of Princes gold dust the remains of Noble-men pin-dust the remains of the Tradesmen saw-dust the remains of the day-labourer and common dust the remains of the vulgar which have no quality or profession to distinguish them yet all is but dust At a game of Chesse wee see Kings and Queens and Bishops and Knights upon the board and they have their severall walks and contest one with the other in points of state and honour but when the game is done all together with the Pawns are shuffled in one bag In like manner in this life men appear in indifferent garbs and take divers courses some are Kings some are Officers some Bishops some Knights some of other ranks and orders But when this life like a game is done which is sometimes sooner sometimes later all are shufled together with the many or vulgar sort of people and lye in darkness and obscurity till the last man is born upon the earth but after that Erunt ipsis quoque fata sepulchris The grave which hath swallowed up all the sons of Adam shall bee swallowed up it self into victory Theodoro parum interest huminc an in sublime putrescat Erasmus ALthough the heathen Philosophers made little account of Burial as appeared by the speech of Theodorus to the Tyrant who threatned to hang him I little pass by it whether my carcass putrifie above the earth or on it And the Poet seems to be of his mind whose strong line it was Coelo tegâ—tur qui non habet urnam which was Pompeys case and had like to have been Alexanders and William the Conquerors yet all Christians who conceive more divinely on the soul deal more humanely with the body which they acknowledge to bee membrum Christi and templum Dei a member of Christ and temple of God If charity commands thee to cover the naked saith St. Ambrose how much more to bury the dead When a friend is taking a long journey it is civility for his friends to bring him on part of his way when our friends are departed and now going to their grave they are taking their last journey from which they shall never return till time shall bee no more and can wee do less then by accompanying the corpse to the grave bring them as it were part on their way and shed some few tears for them whom wee shall see no more with mortal eyes The Prophet calleth the grave Miscabin a sleeping chamber or resting place and when wee read Scriptures to them that are departing and give them godly instructions to dye wee light them as it were to their bed and when wee send a deserved testimony after them wee perfume the room Indeed if our bodies which like garments wee cast off at our death were never to be worn again wee need little care where they were thrown or what became of them but seeing they must serve us again their fashion being only altered it is fit we carefully lay them up in Deaths Wardrobe the grave though a man after hee hath lost a Jewel doth less set by the casket yet hee who loves much and highly esteemeth of the soul of his friend as Alexander did of Homer cannot but make some reckoning of the Desk and Cabinet in which it alwayes lay Wee have a care of placing the picture of our friend and should wee not much more of bestowing his body If burial were nothing to the dead God would never have threatned Coniah that hee should have the burial of an Ass nor the Psalmist so quavered upon this doleful note Dederunt cadaver servorum tuorum coeli volucribus O God the heathen are come into thine inheritance thy holy Temple have they defiled and made Jerusalem an heap of stones the dead bodies of thy servants have they given to the fowls of heaven Mors non est exitus sed transitus temporali itinere decursâ— ad aeterna transgressus Cyp. de mortal VVHich is verified from Rev. 14. 13. And I heard a voice from heaven c. From whence wee may learn first That if all that dye in the Lord are blessed from the very moment of their death and this blessedness is confirmed by a voyce from heaven Let us give more heed to such a voyce than to any whisper of the flesh or devil Whatsoever Philosophy argueth or reason objecteth or sense excepteth against it Let us give more heed to God than man to the Spirit than to the flesh to faith than to reason to heaven than to earth although they who suffer for the testimony of the Gospel seem to bee most miserable their skins being flayed off their joynts racked their whole body torn in peeces or burned to ashes their good confiscate their arms defaced and all manner of disgraces put upon them Yet they are most happy in heaven by the testimony of heavven it self the malice of their enemies cannot reach so high as heaven it cannot touch them much there much less awake them out of their sweet sleep in Jesus Secondly If the dead are blessed in comparison of the living
been offended in and by his sins this was that which lay heaviest upon and sat closest to Davids heart Hee neither cryes out of his discredit and shame in the world nor yet speaks a syllable of wrath or hell but Psal 51. 3 4. My sinis ever before mee against thee onely have I sinned and have done this evil in thy sight My sin is ever before me not Hel and damnation is ever before mee Not the fame and reproach of the world but my sin is ever before mee It is this Lord that pinches and disquiets mee that I have sinned and done this evill in thy sight A good heart fears more the committing of sin than the suffering of punishment following it Prov. 30. 9. Give mee not poverty lest I bee poor and steal and take the name of my God in vain Hee doth not say lest I bee poor and steal and bring my selfe under the Magistrates sword or thy wrath but hee looks onely at the sin lest I steal and take thy Name in vain Hee fears the prophaning of Gods Name more than the bringing of his name and person in question And to this purpose is that which Elihu charges Job withall Job 36. 21. Regard not iniquity for this thou hast chosen rather than affliction that is thou hast rather chosen sin and iniquity than poverty and affliction as if hee had said Inasmuch as thou hast vainly and rashly expostulated with God vers 20. desiring death rather than to bear this affliction thou art guilty of iniquity and sinnest in this thy choice This therefore implies that a good heart would rather chuse affliction than iniquity to suffer affliction than to do iniquity Now as a good heart is more afraid of sin than affliction and punishment so likewise a repenting heart is more grieved or sin committed than for sorrow to be suffered We shall find David in great anguish and distress of spirit Psal 25. 17 18. The troubles of mine heart are inlarged Oh bring thou mee out of my distress wringing pressing anguishes look upon my affliction and my pain Here bee troubles of heart distresses of spirit affliction and pain but what is it now that thus wrings distresses and pains David See the last words And forgive all my sins not forgive all my punishments Davids sin not his punishment was his pain Wee shall see the like in him 2 Sam. 24. 10. I have sinned greatly I beseech thee to take away the iniquity of thy servant Hee mentions not the taking away of any smart nay vers 17. Hee is willing to bear it I have sinned let thine hand bee against mee Hee begs that the punishment may bee laid upon him but begs that his iniquity may bee taken away Let God bee pleased to take away his iniquity and hee is nothing solicitous for the punishment The offence of God troubled him more than his personal smart So that Gods heart were but towards him in the pardon of his sin hee did not care though Gods hand were against him smiting him with temporal chastisement And this will better appear if wee do but compare Pharaoh with David Exod. â— 8. Intreat the Lord that hee may take away the Frogs from mee The Frogs troubled him more than his sin against God Take away the Frogs but no mention at all of taking away his sin And when afterwards a confession of sin is extorted from him yet was it not his sin that disquieted him Exod. 9. 27 28. not take away my sin but take away the Thunderings and Hail Lord sayes David Take away the iniquity of thy servant Oh! sayes Pharoah Take away these filthy Frogs and this dreadful Thunder A repenting heart is more troubled than a Thunder and Frogs It seems more filthiness in sin than in Frogs or Toads or ever else can bee presented more ugly to it A repenting sinner hath his eye upon God and upon his Law Hee sees the hollness of God that hee is a God of pure eyes that cannot behold iniquity Hab. 1. 13. Hee sees him a good gracious patient Father and so it cuts him to the heart to have offended such a Father and God Hee looks upon the Law and sees it to bee holy just and good and this galls him to the heart to have violated so holy and so pure a Law Now wicked men they look wholly at the justice and wrath of God at the curse of the Law and so nothing troubles them but the fear of hell and death If these might bee avoided the offending of an holy and good God the violating of an holy and good Law would not a whit afflict or disquiet them Nay it is remarkable in David that though hee had upon Nathans message to him confessed his sin and Nathan upon his confession had pronounced the pardon of it yet after this hee cryes out My sin is ever before me against thee onely have I sinned Mark then that even pardoned sin forgiven sin vexes and disquiets a repenting heart It pinches him and disquiets him though it be forgiven it grieves him that hee hath so plaid the fool and that ever hee was such a beast to offend so gracious a God When the Prodigals Father sees him coming afar off hee runs to meet him shews compassion to him falls upon him and kisses him That kiss was the seal of his pardon as if hee had said Behold I forgive all thy sin as when David kissed Absolom and Esau kissed Jacob they both did it in token of full reconciliation And yet for all this see how the Prodigal speaks hee sayes not O Father from the ground of my heart I unfainedly thank thee Oh how great is my Fathers goodness thus to pardon mee c. but Father I have sinned against thee I but his Father had kissed him and thereby testified that hee had freely forgiven him what need hee confess his pardoned sin Why is hee not rather in the confession of praise than in the confession of sin Oh no a repenting sinner is so affected and grieved with the offence of God in his sin that though God have pardoned and forgiven it yet hee cannot but mourn for it and be afflicted with it that so holy a Law hath been broken by him that so good a God hath been offended by him Psal 25. 6 7. Remember O Lord thy tender mercies remember not the sins of my youth If God remember mercy hee forgets and forgives sin If God forget it why doth David remember the sins of his youth Yes so will a true repenting heart do It will remember the sin that God forgets it will mourn for the sin which God hath forgiven Nou est poenitens sed irrisor qui adhuc agit unde poeniteat Bernardus REpentance not onely confesses but forsakes the confessed sin Job 34. 22. If I have done iniquity I will do no more That is the language and the resolution of true repentance Eph. 4. 28. Let him that stole steal no more True repentance
yet it is great in vertue and operation The Rabbins say that Manna had all manner of good tastes in it so hath faith it drinks to a man in a cup of Nepenthes and bide him bee of good cheer God will provide for him who likes not to bee tyed to the second ordiniry causes nor that in defect of the means wee should doubt of the providence It is true God commonly worketh by means when hee could do without that wee may not neglect the means as being ordained of him David shall have victory but by an ambush a Saâ—â— 5. Men shall bee nourished but by their labour Psal 128. 2. But yet not so as that hee doth all in all by those means hee made Grass Corn and Trees before hee made the Sun Moon and Stars by the influence whereof they are and grow yea to shew himself chief hee can and doth work other-whiles without means 2 Chron. 14. and against means suspending the power and operation of the natural causes as when the fire burnt not the water drowned not the Sun went back ten degrees the rock gave water the iron swam And then when hee works by means hee can make them produce an effect diverse from their nature and disposition or can hinder change or mitigate their proper effect As when at the prayer of Elias it rained not for three years and an half and hee prayed again and the heaven gave rain and the earth brought forth her fruits A man would have thought that after so long drought the roots of trees and herbs should have been utterly dryed up and the land past recovery But God heard the heavens petitioning to him that they might exercise their influence for the fructifying of the earth and the heavens heard the earth and the earth heard the corn the wine and the oyl and they heard Jezreel Hof 2. 21. Let all this keep us as it did our Saviour when hee was tempted in the fourtth of St. Matth. from diffidence in Gods Providence and make us possess our souls in patience Hang upon the promise and account it as good as present pay though wee see not how it can bee effected God loves to go a way by himself Hee knows how to deliver us saith St. Peter 2 Pet. 2. and hee might speak it by experience if ever any man might The King shall rejoyce in God saith David of himself when hee was a poor exile in the wilderness of Judah Psal 63. 11. but hee had Gods word for the Kingdome and therefore hee was confident seemed the thing never so improbable or impossible Wee trust a skilful work-man to go his own way to work shall wee not God Loose wee then any particular means saith one It is but the scattering of a Sunne beam the breaking of a bucket when the Sunne and the fountain is the same But wee for the most part do as Hagar did when the bottle was spent shee falls a crying shee was undone shee and her childe should dye till the Lord opened her eyes to see the fountain It was near her but shee saw it not when shee saw it shee was well enough If thou hadst been here said Martha my brother Lazarus had not dyed as if Christ could not have kept him alive unless hee had been present So if Christ will come and lay his hands on Jairus his daughter and Elisha stroke his hand over Naamans leprosie they shall bee cured So the Disciples beleeved that Christ could feed so many thousands in the wilderness but then hee must have two hundred pennyworth of bread But our Saviour soon after gave them an ocular demonstration of this truth That man lives not by bread alone but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God Preventus diabolus in accusatione Ultra nos accusare non poterit Origen BE sure before thou come to the Sacrament to renew thy repentance in confession one sweet advantage shalt thou have by it amongst others and that is this our self-accusations in â— our confessions will bee a prevention and a disappointment of Sathans accusations against us The Devil even at the Sacrament will bee laying in against us It is good therefore to take a course to defeat him Hee will bee pleading against a man Lord shall this man bee welcome to thy Table Shall hee receive the benefit of thine Ordinance Hee hath done thus and thus I can lay to his charge these and these sins Thus by his accusations will hee seek to put in a bar against a blessing upon us Now when a man before the Sacrament renews his repentance and hath in his confessions brought in the accusations against himself Satan is prevented for then wee do as I may say furnish the Lord with an answer to stop Satans mouth for then will God bee ready to answer for us why Satan thou accusest this man of nothing whereof hee hath not already to the full accused himself hee himself hath accused himself of all this already Thou comest too late all thine accusations shall bee no bar to my blessing The elder brothers nose swells at his fathers kindness and goodness to his prodigal brother and therefore Luke 15. 30. hee rips up all his courses and throws the filth of them in his face that hee was one that had devoured his Fathers living and had spent it among Harlots And this hee doth now whilst they are at the feast at the fatted Calf and good cheer Yet all this doth the Prodigal no hurt the musick ceaseth not the feast is not broken off nor hee thrust out of doors again And how comes it about that all this did him no hurt because the Prodigal had prevented his brother hee himselfe had accused himself to the full in his confessions when hee came to his Father and so by his own confession had took out the sting and poyson of his brothers malicious accusation So that his brother comes too late now the feast and the merriment goes on nevertheless So will the Devil bee snarling against and picking quarrels against men even in the Feast time but he comes too late to do them hurt if they themselves have first put in the bills of their own indictments against themselves in their confessions before their coming to the Sacrament Hamine non est solammodo necessarium ut Christum iâ— ipsius passione depioret sedmagis seipsum in Christo Bernard BEhold saith the Baptist the Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world Upon the Cross wee behold Christ taking away the sins of the world On it wee see Christ crucified wee see his hands feet and side pierced now this sight should so affect us as it should pierce the very hearts of us What the blessed Son of God to strip himself of his gloryâ— to humble and abase himself to the ignominious and accursed death of the Cross the glorious Son of God thus abused and abased the onely begotten Son of the Father to make
such bitter lamentation My God my God why hast thou forsaken mee What may the cause of all this bee Alas all this was for our sins It was not Judas nor the Jews nor Pilate nor the Souldiers but they were our sins thy sins my sins that put the Son of God to all this sorrow Wee wee and none but wee were the evill beasts that devoured this Joseph Our sins were so hainous and had so provoked the Justice of God that there was no way to satisfie Gods Justice to appease his wrath and to make our atonement but by the precious blood of the Son of God crucified on the Cross And shall I now see my sins lye so heavy upon him as to make him sweat blood shall I see him even squeezed under the huge weight of my sins shal I see my sins crown him with thorns nail his hands and feet to the Cross gore his side with a spear with an unpierced heart Oh the deep sorrow that our hearts should bee filled withall when wee see Christs body bruising and bleeding upon the Cross It should bee with us then as it was with them Zech. 12. 10. They shall look on him whom they have pierced And how shall that sight affect them And they shall mourn and bee in bitterness for him as one that mourns for his onely Son as one that is in bitterness for his first born How bitterly will such a man mourn so bitterly shall they mourn when they look upon Christ whom they have pierced And great reason for is it not a matter of greater sorrow to pierce the onely Son of God the first born the first begotten from the dead than to lose one onely or first begotten son So here when wee look upon Christ whom wee have pierced this sight should fill our hearts with bitterness should make our hearts full of sorrow Not onely with an Historical sorrow or a sorrow of natural compassion when wee hear or see some sad or sorrowful event this is nothing but with a practical sorrow with an unfained sorrow of heart that wee by our personal sins have had our hands imbrued in the blood of the Son of God that our sins envenomed those thorns those nails that pierced him and by their venome made them put him to such bitter torment have wee hearts conformable to Christ on the cross Thou beholdest a broken Christ thou beholdest a bleeding Christ behold him therefore with a broken heart with a bleeding heart with a pierced spirit So behold Christ on the cross as the Virgin Mary beheld him there And how was that Woman sayes Christ behold thy Son How did shee behold him Simeon tells her Luke 2. 35. That a sword should passe through her soul then did a sword pierce through her soul when shee beheld him pierced on the cross that sight was a sword through the heart of her So when we see him pierced it should bee as a dagger in our hearts Oh wretch that I am that my sins have been thorns on his head nayls in his hands and feet a spear in his side Lord saith David when hee saw the people slaughtered by the Angels sword Loâ— I have sinned and I have done wickedly but these sheâ—â— what have they done So let every one say Loe I have sinned I have done wickedly but this innocent and immaculate Lamb what hath hee done It is I that have sinned and it is thou O Lord that hast smarted It is I that have sinned and it is thou O Lord that hast suffered It is I that have put thee to all these sorrows my oaths my uncleannesses my lusts my covetousness my drunkenness these were the Judassâ—s that betrayed thee these were the Jews that crucified thee Lord I have eaten the sowre grapes and thy teeth were set on edge Lordâ— I played the theef and thou restoredst the things theâ— tookest not Quid tam ad mortem quodnon Christi morte salvetur Bernardus HE was wounded for our transgresâ—ions with his stripes wee are heated Isa 53. What sweet comfort may faith retch hence Look upon the wounds of Christ on the Cross as on the Cities of Refuge where the pursued soul by the avenger of blood may flye for safety and sanctuary Indeed I am a grievous sinner I have wounded my conscience with my transgressions but behold my Saviour here wounded for my transgressions I have cause to bee troubled in my conscience for the wounds my transgressions have made therein but yet my confcience needs not sinke in a despondency of spirit whiles I look at these wounds of Christ here bee wounds for wounds healing wounds for stabbing wounds curing wounds for killing wounds Hee was wounded for our transgressions what wound so deadly that may not or cannot bee healed by his death and wounds What comfort is here for faith in the wounds of Christ crucified They pierced my hands and my feet Psal 22. They pierced his side with a spear and there came out water and blood nay there comes out of these wounds honey and oyl unto faith By these passages may our faith suck honey and oyl out of the rock and may taste and see how good and sweet the Lord is The nayls the spear the wounds all preach unto faith a reconciled God That God is in Christ reconciling the world unto himself The Lords bowels are laid open by these wounds so as through them wee may see the tender bowels of his mercy and so as through them mercy flows from those bowels unto us Oh my Dove that art in the clefts or holes of the rock Cant. 2. 14. Some of the Ancients understood those clefts of the rock the wounds of Christ in which the Dove the Church hides and shelters her self However it may bee alluded to that should bee our work of faith when it sees those clefts of the rock opened like a Dove to betake her self thereunto for shelter and security against all fears and distresses that wrath and guilt may put the conscience to Do any fears of wrath trouble thine heart Doth any conscience of guilt disquiet thee with the fears of hell Why now for thy comfort behold the holes in the rock where thou mayest bee sheltered Dwell now in the Rock and bee like the Dove that makes her Nest in the side of the holes mouth Jerem. 48. Nessel thy soul in the clefts of this Rock See and fully beleeve thy peace to bee made with God in Christs blood and look upon him wounded for thy transgressions with such a faith as may fill thy heart with an holy security against all such fears Hannibal vel victor vel victus nunquam quiescebat Augustinus THe Devil left not our Saviour at the first and second temptation this Master-flye Beelzebub though beaten away once and again yet returns to the same place Hee solicits and sets upon our Saviour again and again as Potiphars wife did upon Joseph for all his many denials and is not onely importunate but