Mankind and people in the World Thus St. Mathew useth it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Wo unto the World because of Offences Mat. 18.7 Yes thus our Saviour himself interpreted it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the World cannot hate you but me it hateth where is meant the People or Inhabitants of the world After the same manner Satan is frequently stiled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Prince of the World because he rules and governs in the affections of men and enthrones himself in their hearts But indeed Expositors are various in their constructions thereof some translate it Sic Deus hominem dilexit God so loved the little World Man some hominem ad imaginem Dei factum Man made after the Image and Similitude of God others hominem lapsum et mundanum fall'n and worldly-minded-man all which Translations contribute to extoll and magnifie the wonderful Love of God For is it not worthy our admiration to see light and darkness enter a League To see the torrid and frigid Zone unite and embrace each other To see JEHOVAH and the Gods of EKRON the Ark and Dagon reconciled to see the God Israel and Baal meet together and the Prophets of the Lord and Sons of Belial kiss each other Yet all these was fall'n man compared to him who is nothing but purity it self yet still how does he court this depraved and sinful creature to a reconciliation Shall we not envy his honour and admire his love who will lay down his life for the sake of a righteous man shall we not then be rapt with wonder when we consider the Immensity of the Divine Love to laps'd man to see the eternal Son of the Most High God descend into the lower parts of the earth and in a manner embrace a Dunghil nay beyond that to expose and submit himself to the cruel stroke of the most ignominious death that he might snatch sinful man from a lamentable downfal and mount him from a miserable earth to the Regions of Immortality and Bliss Herein is love John 4.10 not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be a Propitiation for our sins O thou great and All-seeing eye of Heaven what moved thee to glance so favourable a countenance on us miserable sinners what moved thee to send so kind an Embassage of peace to us vile worms to us who were unworthy thy compassion though never so earnestly implor'd to us who had deserved thy wrath more than thy smiles thy Thunder and Lightning thy indignation and anger but not the least drop of thy mercy How comes it to pass thou inexhaustible Fountain of Love thou showr'st down thy goodness upon us in so plentiful a measure 't was thy mercy O God Oh! praised be that mercy which saved us from destruction 't was thy pity and compassion not our tenderness to thy Laws which sheltred us from thy fury 't was thy love and goodness alone Oh! for ever magnified be that love which induced thee to be so bountiful unto us with all thankfulness and reverence O God we desire to join with those Sons of Glory and bright Morning Stars in singing according to our abilitie and power Glory be to God on High for his unspeakable love in giving his only begotten Son that whosoever do believe on him should not perish but have eternal life for thou sent not thy Son into the World to condemn the world but that the world through him might be saved Oh that men would therefore praise the Lord for his goodness and declare the Wonders which he doth for the Children of Men. Which is no more then Justice and our bounden duty to perform for if we consult what we are by nature what shall we conclude our selves but Children of wrath the finful Offpring of disobedient Adam made obnoxious to the worst of deaths before we were entituled to life by sinning against God without whose Reconciliation we cannot but perish For though it is true Man at his first creeping into the World was placed in the Regions of felicity and favoured as one of the Darlings of God yet was he not as quickly disobedient to the commands of his Creator how justly therefore was his Crown forfeited and he deprived of all that happiness God had conferred on him when he was banished Paradise and in the sweat of his brows to earn his bread And if he fell so did we by being in his Lovns for since the advantages of that blessing God promised him if obedient had respect to his Posterity then certainly the curse which was the consequence of his disobedience did not relate to his particular interest alone but was of universal influence and he propagated infection to the last and utmost of his Posterity From our First Parents therefore we derive a curse whose Legacy bequeathed us was sin and damnation and all Man-kind were Joynt-heirs of the same Inheritance the wrath of an incensed God Thus holy David confesseth it Ps 51.5 in sin did my Mother conceive me and in iniquity she brought me forth Now what had been the wages of this sin but eternal death what had been the fruit which they plucked from the Forbidden Tree in the disguise of an Apple but everlasting ruine had not the wonderful mercy of God found out an expedient to salve his Justice and save us For had he not dealt thus graciously with his Creatures what could we have in reason expected but to have been swept away in the Deluge of Divine indignation that he should have dipt his Arrow in the Poyson of that Serpent which gull'd and mocked us and exhaust were it possible his whole Magazine of Thunderbolts that he should have girded his Sword upon his Thigh and take Vengeance upon us making us to suck the Lees and dreggs of that intollerable potion reserved for the Sons of Perdition This was the fruit flourishing on the Tree of Knowledge this was that miserable plight and woful condition into which we had brought our selves we had deserved the worst of Gods fury by breaking our bands and Covenant with him Stand still therefore all ye that forget God and admire his goodness and tell me if there be any God like unto our God or any Father like unto our heavenly Father who forbore to enter into the Armory of his wrath or to affright us with the furrows of a contracted brow for notwithstanding we were born Heirs Apparent to calamity without end yet loe he sent his only begotten Son to cut off the entail We have sinned O Lord and dealt wickedly but this Lamb of thine what hath he done that he should be thus battered and bruised wounded and bloudy to save us from the Stripes we had justly deserved how great was thy love to us to send him who was in Heaven with thee to us on earth in the likeness of sinful flesh Oh! what charming love was this how pretious are the thoughts of it to us Grant then O
appeared unto him under a Cloud of troubles He changed his note for having received a fall out of his Chariot and his Insolency curbed by an immediate blow from Heaven He could say Justum est hominem mortalem subditum esse Deo It is meet and requisite for Mortal Men to be Subject to the Immortal God So likewise Nâ—buchadnezzar in his carier of impiety defied the Lord of Hosts and proudly vaunted himself against the Almighty until he enter'd into the Armory of his wrath and Metamorphosed this proud King into a base beast and then he could confess the Lord was able to abase all them that walk in pride Dan. 4. last v. For when God perceives a constant course of his kindness cannot wean us from our sins he then applyes the Ministers of his Fury the storms and tempests of afflictions to ruffle us out of them 'T is true great prosperities do not easily corrupt the souls which have taken a good temper in the fear of God nevertheless they wound and in some sort change them A little Bee sometimes playeth so long upon her hony that by much walking there she entangleth her wings So a Soul yea one of those most eminent for devotion and piety being continually soothed with a long sequel of the good successes of the affairs of the World taketh some small flight out of it self seeking recreation in a smiling and delicate air which affords nothing but objects of pleasure and delight But so soon as adversity hath given her blow it reentreth into it self it foldeth it self within it self it fasteth it self it knoweth it self it findeth God in the bottom of her heart afflicted and perplext with the revolutions of the World she raises and darts her self above the ways of the Moon and Tracks of the Sun to that goodly Temple of Eternity where Spirits dwell disrobed of these garments of flesh and bones which we dragg along with us in this mortal life This is that High-Rode the devout soul journeys in so soon as she is alienated from the Court of prosperity and disentangled from the affairs of the World She then enters into a sweet retirement and looks on the embroideries of nature in the Mountains and Vallies Forrests and Rivers as a Theater declaring the glory of God and shewing his Handy-work She relisheth this retreat from the World as Manna from Heaven and tasts the deep silence of sorrow with incredible delight Oh! how will she be delighted How will she be ravished when she shall reflect on the marvelous kindness of God towards her that he should chasten her here least she should be chastised for ever that she should be afflicted with sorrows in this life to free her from eternal gnashings of teeth that he should deprive her of the gilded nothings of this World that she may enjoy an everlasting and supream good That he should make her unfortunate here least she should be eternally unhappy amidst the tortures of Brimstone and Fire hereafter In a word How happy will she be when she shall consider how God hath made her smart under the light afflictions of an adverse fortune on earth to adopt her for an eternal and exceeding weight of glory in Heaven Her adversity will make her imagine as if she were discoursing with God face to face This gall will make her open her eyes and see that it is the hand of God which presseth her fore and the consideration that it is the Lord will make her to say cheerfully with old Eli 1 Sam. 3.18 Let him do what seemeth him good But indeed until we be thus varnish'd and brightned till we be refined by this fire of affliction until we have whitened our souls by the tears of sorrow our affections will espouse the quarrel of the World and wholly declare in favour of it God therefore to curb us that we may not stray beyond our limits keeps us in a vale of tears often leading us through an Aceldema a field of bloud and persecution that with Jacob we may long for our Fathers house not saying with St. Peter it is good for us to be here but rather with St. Paul I desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ For if like the Moon in the Eclypse we fail not to appear dark on that side which looketh towards earth we shall most assuredly appear radiant and bright on that which tends towards Heaven for it is to withdraw our affections from of the World that Great are the troubles of the Righteous A Second Reason why God visits us with afflictions may be to draw us to amendment of life Thus the Royal Prophet Before I was troubled I went wrong but now have I known thy Law As the eyes of Tobit were opened by the gall of the Fish so the judgments of Heaven inflicted on us make us to reflect on the past actions of our life that we may correct and reform all the errataes and misdemeanors thereof For as the Rod of Moses stricken on the Stony Rock caused whole Buckets of water to issue out thence in like manner the Rod of afflictions smiting on our flinty and obdurate hearts forceth whole Rivers of tears to flow from our eyes for our sins committed For what is more natural to every one when he is in distress than to call to remembrance those sins which he concludes the occasion thereof When Heaven is pouring forth its vials of wrath and vengeance upon us can we act so insensibly as well as irrationally as not to commune with our hearts and ask our souls what have we done How have I deserved this what notorious crime have I committed that I have made my God who delighteth not in the misery of his people so highly displeased with me as to afflict my body with this disease and that distemper Is it not for the Plague of the heart that I am now tormented with the Plague in my Body was not I afflicted with this tumour because I was so affected with the tympany of pride How come I dismembred in my Limbs but because I did not set the broken bones of my soul together Had I been afflicted with Strangury or Stone had I dissolved the Stone in my heart by the tears of a really godly sorrow I had never been oppressed with this Calenture had not that more fatal one of anger needed a cure was not this Feaver this Sickness or that Disease prescribed by God as medicinal for this or that Sin And when he hath ransacked his soul to the botom and found out the troubler of Israel the Fonah who raiseth these Storms and Tempests the Rebel who disquiets him in his peace what can be the issue of it but that he bring him forth and stone him to death I mean that he should be perfectly sorry for his sin and make an absolute reformation least if he return to his wickedness a worse thing fall unto him We must imagine him only the shape of a man who
live for ever and let us put up our Prayers and say O Almighty and most Merciful Father we adore thy Mercies and admire thy Love to the Word in the Gift of thy Son O blessed Jesu how worthy is thy Love to be had in reverence over all the World for thy voluntary susception and affectionate suffering such horrid and cruel Tortures the Waters of bitterness entred into thy soul and the Storms of Death and thy Fathers Anger broke thee in pieces What shall we do who by our sins have tormented our dearest Lord What contrition and tears can sufficiently express those sad accidents which they have produced Lord have Mercy upon us Christ have Mercy upon us and pity our distress And seeing thou hast done so much for our Souls only speak the word and thy Servant shall be whole Suffer us not to neglect that great Salvation which thou hast purchased for us Dispose us by Love Thankfulness Humility and Obedience to receive the benefits of thy Incarnation and Passion Enflame our Affections more and more towards thee and God the Father whose goodness was not contented in barely loving us but to love us so as to give us thee the only begotten Son of God And so I come to the Organ and Means by which our Redemption was effected the gift of his only begotten Son Wherein we consider both the Action he gave and the Gift it self His only c. We begin with the Action And first He gave it gratis freely and of his own accord for he was omnipotent and could not be constrained by any force all Creatures depending on him alone Acts 17.28 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In him we live move and have our Being It was not therefore any compulsion but love only which was so generous as to transport it self up to Heaven and assault the Divinity in its Throne drawing from thence the Eternal Son of God 2dly God so loved the World that not only 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he delivered him and so St. Paul useth it He spared not his own Son but delivered him up for us all Rom. 8.3 He was delivered up to the malice and fury of evil men and thence delivered up to the ignominious death of the Cross 3dly Nay God did not only deliver him up but also sent him For saith the Apostle in this was manifested the Love of God because he sent his only begotten Son into the World 4thly And to augment his Love if perfection will admit of addition This Mission is the more to be accepted by us because it was by way of commutation and exchange for us Commutavit filium suum unicum He exchanged his only begotten Son It was the Worlds Price was set to sale and how dearly did he purchase it What reason then have we to spend every moment of our Life in loving praising and glorifying him And when we contemplate these admirable contrivances of his Wisdom and Mercy can we do less than say O God what shall we return thee in requital or wherewith shall we appear before thee When we would praise thee an Abysse of Majesty exhausts in a moment all Encomiums and our adorations what are they before thy Divine Essence Could we render our selves uncreated in deference to thee the Fountain of all Beings it were a poor Homage to thy ineffable Greatness Nay could we annihilate the World and bring all Creatures into their old postures of nothing for thy Glory yet what is this compar'd with what thy immensity might justly expect But while we labour with our Poverty finding nothing created worthy thy acceptance Oh astonishing Mercy behold the perfect oblation of thy Son which thou hast given us the prodigious Effect of thy Love Him we offer unto thee and through him we hope to be accepted None can speak our Gratitude but that word who can only satisfie thy Justice Since by this Gift the very Treasury of Heaven was emptied for a time and the Earth enriched with that pure Sacrifice wherewith thou wert well pleased and the Odour thereof draws upon mankind a continual Floud of Mercies This is a Sacrifice O God thou wilt not despise him we offer unto thee and with him our selves and all that we have beseeching thee to accept of us for the sake of thy Son who was offered up for us all And so I come to consider the Gift it self His only begotten Son Son is a Name by which men oft endeavour to express their endearments and affection to us Thus when Cushi told David of his Sons unfortunate though just 2 Sam. 18.33 death the Text tells us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the Latine Commotus The King was troubled and much moved and went up to the Chamber over the Gate where Judgment was administred and wept and said O my Son Absalom my Son my Son and refused to be comforted for his death nay he wished death had been subject to a mistake and took him instead of this rebellious Viper who sought the usurpation of the Kingdom and Death of his Parent And if a Son was so dear to David how dear must he be unto God And consequently what a Noble and Royal Gift must this be of our Heavenly Father It had been too great an Honour to have dispatched unto us the meanest Servant in his Heavenly Court to visit us or if he had deputed an Illustrious Seraphim to proclaim to the World That He who is King of Kings the Great God of Heaven and Earth would be reconciled to his Rebellious Subjects Should we not have been startled at the news of such a Message How much more then when he sends his Son the Prince and Soveraign of the Heavenly Host to be had in no reputation and take upon him the form of a Servant But then 2dly It was his own Son and not anothers He was not an Adopted Son who raised himself by his merits to the Title of the Son of God as Photinus and his Followers would have perswaded the World but he was God of very God and Light of very Light Or was it his Son by Nuncupation and name only as others did imagine but his own Son for otherwise we destroy our belief of the Trinity and conclude the Father Son and Holy Ghost not three Distinct Persons but Names Therefore 3dly Mat. 12.18 It was the only begotten Son of God conceived in the Womb of the Virgin Mary by the powerful overshadowing of the Holy Ghost Here is Love in its Zenith the Son in whom his soul was well-pleased Nay his only begotten Son This is that great Mistery the Apostle speaks of God manifested in the Flesh 1 Tim. 3.16 where we may behold the Eternal Father giving up his only Son in behalf of Mankind polluted and depraved by corruption vitiated by sin disobedient to his Lord and insolent to his King a Worm and no Man a poor scantling of putrifaction and a prey for