name For even the Devills themselves have acknowledged Christ and this way is not evill spoken of nay it is magnifyed of them who had rather wallow in the mire then walk in it How is Christ made not onely panis quotidianus our daily Bread but sermo quotidianus the talk of every day and houre In our misery we implore his help In his Name we lie down and in his Name we rise up In his Name we Prophesy if afflictions beat upon us he is called upon to calme the storme If our conscience chide us we have learnt an unhappy art and skill to force him in to make our Peace We love to talke of him we many times leave our necessary callings and trades most unnecessarily but to heare of him but all these may be rather proffers then motions rather pleasing and flattering thoughts then painfull ambulations as St. Augustine speaks of himself in his Confessions Confess l. 8. c. 5. cogitationes similes conatibus expergisci volentium thoughts like to the endeavours of men half asleep who would be awak'd and cannot who move and stirre and lightly lift up the head and then fall down fast asleep I have been too liberall and given them more strength then they have I mean then these Gnostiques give them whom they neither more nor stirr but leave them in their prospect fast asleep Or at the best in the third place this inclination this approbation is but a Dreame visus adesse mihi c. Christ may seem to walk with us when he is not in all our ways and as in Drames we seem to perform many things we do all things and we do nothing Nunc fora nunc lites laeti modo pompa Theatri c. Ausonii Ephemeris We plead we wrestle we fight we Triumph we sayle we fly we see not what is but hath or should be done and all is but a dreame so when we have made a fancifull peregrination through all the pleasant fields and rivers of milk through all the riches and glory of the Gospel and delights which it affords when we have seen our Saviour in his Cratch lead him to mount Calvary beheld him on his Crosse brought him back with Triumph from his grave and placed him at the right hand of God wee may think indeed we have walked all this while with Christ but when our conscience shall recover her light which was darkned with the pleasures and follyes of this present life when she shall dart this light upon us and plainly tell us that we have not fasted with him that we have not watched one houre with him that we have not gone about with him doing good that we have loved those enemies which he came to destroy That we have been so farre from crucifying our flesh that we have crucifyed him again to fulfill the lusts thereof That the world and not Christ hath been the Forme which moved us in the whole course of our life behold then it will appeare that all was but a dreame Foolish men that we are who hath bewitched us we dispute we write books we coine distinctions we study for the truth we are angry for the truth we lose our Peace for the Truth we fight for the truth we die for the truth and when all is done upon due examination nothing is done but we have spun a Spiders webb which the least breath of Gods displeasure will blow a way we have known the way and approved it have subscrib'd that This is the way but have made no more progresse towards our journeys end then our picture we have but dreamt of life and are still in the valley of the shadow of Death Conclus And now what saies the Scripture Awake thou that sleepest that dreamest and stand up from the dead Let us not please our selves with Visions and Dreames with the suborned flattery of our own imaginations Let us not think that if we seek the way and like it and speak well of it we are in heaven already or have that hope that well-grounded never failing Hope which may entitle us to it why should such a thought arise in our heart a thought that makes us worse then fooles or mad-men and will keep us so courting of sinne labouring in iniquity and wit greedinesse working out our own destruction a thought that shuts out God and makes an open entrance for a legion of Devills and then welcomes and attends them For all the sinnes which the Flesh is subject to or the Devill can suggest may well stay and find a place of rest with such a thought Why should we please and loose our selves in such a Though See here is water what doth let me to be baptized said the Eunuch to Philip Act. 8. Here is light what hindereth that we doe not walk in it Behold heaven opens it self and displayes all its beauty and glory why do we run from it Knowledge directs but we will not follow Knowledge perswades but we will not hearken Knowledge commands but we rebell we are Illuminated wee professe we know Christ but wee will not be sanctified For by our Works we deny him Tit. 1.16 Our Knowledge follows and pursues us we cannot shake it off it staies with us whether we will or no it goads it provokes it chides it importunes it triumphs within us but yet not over us because those vanities which we are too familiar with will not suffer us to yeeld we cannot be ignorant of what we know but we are too often unwilling to doe that of which we cannot be ignorant our self-love undoes us and our own will drives us on the rocks whilst the light within us points out to the Haven where we should be and the knowledge within us which did exhort instrust and correct is made a witnesse against us and a Judge to condemne us to more stripes then they shall feele who had not so much as a glance of light but did sit in darknesse and in the shadow of Death Let us them not fly but walk not hover aloft in the contemplation of what is to be done but stoop down and doe it subdue the will to our Knowledge the sense to reason let us learn to walk by walking be more learned then before 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for Practice saith Naz. is to Knowledge Naz. Or. tertia what Knowledge is to it a Foundation as we build our Practice upon Knowledge for we must know before we can walk so we raise our knowledge higher and higher upon practice as Heat helpeth motion and is increast by it and the torch burns brighter being fann'd by that aire which it inlightens Psal 25.14 The secret of the Lord is revealed to them that fear him and his Coveuant to give them more understanding saith David Let us then joyne as St. Peter exhorts with Knowledge Temperance 2 Pet. 1.6 and with Temperance Patience and with Patience Godliness and these will make that we
are but as one day so in the case we now speak of a thousand a million a world of men are with him but as one man and when the Lord Chief Justice of Heaven and Earth shall sit to do judgement upon sinners what Caligula once wantonly wished to the people of Rome all the world before him have but as it were one neck and if it please him by that jus pleni Dominii by that full power and Dominion he hath over his creature A Platone dicitur Deus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 vide Plutarch quaest convival l. 8. q. 2. He may as he welneer did in the Deluge strike it off at a blow His judgements are past finding out and therefore not to be questioned He is the great Geometrician of the World which made all things in number weight and measure and hath infinitely surpast all human inventions whatsoever and therefore we cannot do him less honour then Hiero King of Sicily did to Archimede the great Mathematician for when he saw the Engins which he made and the marvellous effects which they did produce he caused it to be proclaimed that whatsoever Archimede did after affirme how improbable soever it might seem yet should not once be called into question but be received and entertained as a truth Let the course of things be carried on as it will let death passe over the door of the Egyptian and smite the Israelite let Gods Thunder misse the house of Dagon and shiver his own Tabernacle yet God is just and true and every man a liar that dares but ask the question why doth He this Look over the whole Book of Job and you shall see how Job and his Friends are tost up and down on this great deep For it being put to the question why Job was thus fearfully handled his Friends ground themselves upon this conclusion that all affliction is for sin and so lay folly and hypocrisie to his charge and tell him roundly that the judgement of God had now found him out though he had been a close irrigular and with some art and cunning hid himself from the eye of the World but Job on the contrary as stoutly pleads and defends his innocencie his justice his liberality and could not attain to the sight of the cause for which Gods hand was so heavy on him why should his Friends urge him any more Job 30.32 or persecute him as God they dispute in vain for in their answers he sees nothing but lies At last when the controversie could have no issue C. 21.34 Deus è machina God himself comes down from Heaven and by asking one question puts an end to the rest Job 38.2 who is this that darkneth Counsel with words without knowledge condemns Iob and his Friends of ignorance and weaknesse in that they made so bold and dangerous attempt as to seek out a cause or call his judgement into question 2. It may be we may save the labor that we need not move the question or seek any reason at all for in these common calamities which befall a people it may be God doth provide for the Righteous and deliver him though we perceive it not Some examples in Scripture make this very probable the old World is not drowned till Noah be stript and in the Ark the shower of fire falls not on Sodom till Lot be escaped Daniel and his fellows though they go away into captivity with rebellious Judah yet their captivity is sweetned with honours and good respects in the Land into which they go and which was a kinde of leading captivity captive they had favour and were intreated as friends by their enemies who had invaded and spoiled them And may not God be the same upon the like occasions How many millions of righteous persons have been thus delivered whose names notwithstanding are no where recorded some things of no great worth are very famous in the world when many things of better worth lie altogether buried in obscurity caruerunt quia vale sacro because they found none who could or would transmit them to posterity Vixere fortes ante Agamemnona no doubt but before and since millions have made the like escapes though their memory lies rak'd up and buried in oblivion But then suppose the righteous do taste of the same cup of bitternesse with the wicked yet it hath not the same taste and relish to them both for calamity is not alwayes a whip Calamitas non est poena militia est minus Foe lix nor doth God alwayes punish them whom he delivers over to the sword to lose my goods or life is one thing and to be punisht another it is against the course of Gods providence and justice that innocency should come under the lash Gen 28.23 shall not the Judge of all the earth do right yes he shall and without any breach of his justice take away that breath of life which he breathed into our Nostrils though we had not sinned after the similitude of Adams transgression for he may do what he will with his own and take away our goods or lives from us when and how he pleaseth because he is Lord over them and we have nothing which we received not from his hands God is not alwayes angry when he strikes nor is every blow we feel given by God the avenger for he may strike as a Father and therefore these evils change their complexions and very natures with the subject upon whom they are wrought they are and have the blacknesse of darknesse in the one but are as Angels and messengers of light to the other and may lead the righteous through the valley of death into the land of the living when the wicked are hewen down by the sword to be fuel for the fire What though they both be joyned together in the same punishment as a Martyr and a Thief in the same chain August de civitate Dei l. 1. c. 8. yet manet dissimilitudo passorum in similitudine passionum though the penalties may seem alike yet the difference is great betwixt the patients though the world perhaps cannot distinguish them and death it self which is a key to open the gates of Hell to the one may be no the other what the Rabbles conceive it would have been to Adam had he not fallen but osculum pacis a kisse of peace a gentle and loving dismission into a better state to conclude this then a people a chosen people a people chosen out of this choice Gods servants and friends may be smitten Josiah may fall in the battle Daniel may be lead into Captivity John Baptist may lose his head and yet we may hold up our inscription Dominus est it is the Lord. And now let us but glance upon the inscription and so passe to the third particular and the first sight of it may strike a terror into us and make us afraid of those sins which bring these general judgements upon
the Apostle tells us he was Faithfull in his House 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as a servant but Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as a sonne smite he did the Aegyptians Heb. 3.5 and led the people like sheep through the wildernesse but he who was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Captaine of our salvation as he is stiled at the 10. v. was to cope with one more terrible then Pharoah and all his Host to put a Hook into the Nostrills of that great Leviathan to lead not the people alone but Moyses himself through darknesse and death it self able to uphold and settle an Angel in his Glorious estate and to rayse Moyses from the dead Not Moyses then but one greater then Moyses not the Angels but one whom the Angels worship who could command a whole Legion of them or if a Prophet the great Prophet which was to come if an Angel the Angel of the Covenant Certe hic Deus est Ask the Divells themselves and when he lived they roard it out Ask the Centurion and they that watched him at his Death and they speak it with Feare and Trembling Truly this was the Sonne of God Christ then our Captaine is the Sonne of God but God hath divers sonnes some by Adoption and then he is made so some by Nuncupation and then he is but called so and some by Creation and then he is created so for they who rob and devest him of his Essence yet will yeild him his Title and though they deny him to be God yet will call him his Sonne We must follow then the Philosophers Method in his description of morall happinesse proceed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by way of Negation and to establish him in his right of filiation tell you he is not a Sonne not Adoptivus filius his Adopted sonne who by some great merit of his could so dignifie himself as to deserve that Title which was the Dreame or rather Invention of Photinus Imitatur adoptio prolem Adoption is but a supply a grafting of a strange Branch into another stock but he whose name is the Branch growes up of himself of the same stock and root Deus de Deo God of God very God of very God made manifest in the flesh 2. not Nuncupativus his son by Nuncupation his Nominall sonne such a one as Sabellius and the Patro-passiani fancied as if the Father had been assimilated and so called the sonne impiously making the Father the Sonne and the Holy Ghost not three persons but three names Lastly not filius Creatus his Created Sonne 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a meere Creature and of a distiraâ—t Essence from his Father as the more riged Arians nor the most excellent Creature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in substance like unto the Father but not consubstantiall with him as the more moderate whom the Father 's called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 halfe Arians conceived To these Heretiques we reply non est Filius Dei he is not thus the sonne of God and as Aristotle tells us that his Morall happinesse is the chiefest good but not that good which the voluptuary fancieth the Epicures good nor that which ambition flyes to the Politicians good nor that which the contemplative man abstracteth an universal Notion and Idea of Good so may the Christian by the same Method consider his Saviour his chiefest blisse and happinesse and by way of Negation draw him out of these foggs and mists where the wanton and unsanctified wits of men have placed him and bring him into the bosome of his Father and fall down and worship God and man Christ Jesus Behold a voyce from Heaven spake it This is my beloved sonne we may suspect that voyce when Photinus is the Echo an Angel from Heaven said vocabitur he shall be called the sonne of the most High Our Faith starts back and will not receive it if Sabellius make the Glosse our Saviour himself speaks it Ego pater unum sumus I and the Father am one The truth it self will be corrupted if Arius be the Commentator to these we say he is not thus the Sonne of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Naz. Or. 39. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to contract the personality with Sabellius or to divide the Deity with Arius are blaspemies in themselves Diametritrically opposed but equally to the truth The Captaine of our salvation is the sonne of God begotten not made the brightnesse of his Father streaming from him as light from light his Image not according to his humane Nature but according to his divine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Image and Character not of any qualities in God but of his person the true stamp of his substance begotten as brightnesse from the light as the Character from the Type as the word from the mind which yet doe not fully declare him quis enarrabit saith the prophet who shall declare his generation And who more fit to teach us then he who came out of the bosome of God who more fit to give us laws then God himself what tongue of men or Angels can so well expresse his will as the word which was made flesh and pitcht his tent dwelt amongst us opened a Schoole as it were to teach all that would learn the way unto Happinesse or what expectient could Wisdome have found out so apt and powerfull to draw our Love out of these labyrinths and mazes wherein it wanders and divides it self to take it from these painted and false Glories and bring it back and fix it on that which is eternall as this to bow the Heavens and come down and in our flesh and as man to instruct men to gaine them in their own likenesse to tell them he was not that onely which they saw but of the same essence with his Father which they could not see so that here is Majesty and Humility joyned and united in one to draw them out of darknesse into that great light which shall discover and lay open unto them the deformity the ugliness the deceitfulness of those flattering objects in which our thoughts desires and endeavours met as in their center And if this infinite and unconceivable love of God in manifesting himself in our flesh doe not draw and oblige us if these bonds of love will not hold and fetter us to a regular obedience which must begin and perfect our peace then we are past the reach of any Argument which men or Angels can bring and no chaines can hold us but those of Everlasting Darknesse And indeed his eternall Generation by it selfe would but little avail us for Majesty is no medicine for our Malady we who are children of the Time have need of a Captaine which must be born in Time we were sick of an Eritis sicut Dii a bold and foolish ambition and affectation to be Gods and this disease became Epidemicall we all would be Independent be our owne Law-givers our owne God Pride threw us down and Nothing but
hungry was spet upon was whipt was nayld to the Crosse which were as so many parts of that discipline which taught him to be mercifull to be mercifull to them who were tempted by hunger because he was hungry to be mercifull to them who were tempted by poverty because he was poore to be mercifull to those who tremble at disgrace because he was whipt to be mercifull to them who will not yet will suffer for him who refuse and yet chuse tremble and yet venture are afraid and yet dye for him because as man he found it a bitter Cup and would have had it passe from him who in the dayes of his flesh offer'd up prayers and supplications with strong crying and teares for mortall men for weak men for sinners pertinacissimè durant quae discimus experientiâ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ariâ—… Anâ—… post l 2. c. xix This experimentall knowledge is so rooted and fix'd in him that it cannot be removed now no more then his naturall knowledge he can as soon be ignorant of our actions as our sufferings 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Philosopher Experience is a collection of many particulars registred in our memory and this experience he had and our Apostle tells us didicit he learnt it and the Prophet tells us he was vir sciens infirmitatum Es 53. a man well read in sorrowes acquainted with grief and carryed it about with him from his Cradle to his crosse and by his Fasting and Tentation by his Agony and bloudy sweat by his precious Death and Buriall he remembers us in famine in Tentation in our Agony he remembers us in the houre of death in our grave for he pitties even our dust and will remember us in the day of judgement We have passed through the hardest part of this Method and yet it is as necessary as the end for there is no coming to it without this no peace without trouble no life without death Not that life is the proper effect of death for this cleare streame flowes from a higher and purer fountaine even from the will of God who is the fountaine of life which meeting with our obedience which is the conformity of our will to his maketh its way with power through fire and water as the Psalmist speaks through poverty and contumilies through every cloud and tempest through darknesse and death it self and so carryes it on to end and triumph in life I was dead that was his state of humility but I am alive that 's his state of Glory and is in the next place to be consider'd Vivo I am alive Christ hath spoken it who is truth it self and we may take his word for it for if we will not believe him when he sayes it neither should we believe if we should see him rising from the dead And this his life and resurrection is most conveniently placed in that Non dabis thou wilt not suffer thy holy one to see corruption for what stronger reason can there be found out in matters of faith then the will pleasure of that God who brings mighty things to pass to this end Saint Paul cites the 2. Psalme and S. Peter the 16. and in this the humble soule may rest and behold the object in its glory and so gather strength to rayse it self above the fading vanities of this world and so reach and raise to immortality What fairer evidence then that of Scripture what surer word then the word of Christ He that cannot settle himself on this is but as S. Judes cloud carryed about with every wind wheel'd and circled about from imagination to imagination now raysed to a belief that it is true and anon cast down into the midst of darknesse now assenting anon doubting and at last pressed down by his own unstablenesse into the pit of Infidelity He that will not walk by that light which shines upon him whilst he seeks for more must needs stumble and fall at those stones of offence which himself hath laid in his own way why should it be thought a thing incredible that God should raise the dead to life If such a thought arise in a Christian Acts 26.8 reason never set it up I verily thought my self saith Saint Paul in the next verse but it was when he was under the Law and he whose thoughts are staggered here is under a worse law the law of his members his lusts by which his thoughts and actions are held up as by a law is such a one that studies to be an Atheist is ambitious to be like the beasts that perish and having nothing in himself but that which is worse than nothing is well content to be annihilated For why should such a temptation take any Christian why should he desire clearer evidence why should they seek for demonstration or that the Resurrection of Christ should be made manifest to the eye That is not to seek to confirm and establish but to destory their faith for if these truths were as evident as it is that the sun doth shine when it is day the apprehension of them were not an act of our faith but of our knowledg and therefore Christ saith Tertullian shewed not himself openly to all the people at his Resurrection ut fides non mediocri praemio destinata Tert. Apol. non nisi difficultate constaret that faith by which we are destined to a crown might not consist without some difficulty but commend it self by our obedience the perfection and beauty whereof is best seen in making its way through difficulties and so Hilary Habet non tam veniam quà m praemium Hil. l. 8. de Trin. ignorare quod credis not perfectly to know what thou certainly believest doth so little stand in need of pardon that it is that alone which drawes on the reward For what obedience can it be for me to assent to this that the whole is greater then the part that the Sun doth shine or any of those truths which are visible to the eye what obedience is it to assent to that which I cannot deny but when the object is in part hidden in part seen when the truth we assent to hath more probability to establish it then can be brought to shake it then our Saviour himself pronounceth Blessed are they who have not seen and yet have believed Besides it were in vain he should afford us more light who hath given us enough for to him that will not rest in that which is enough nothing is enough When he rained down Manna upon the Israelites when he divided the red sea wrought wonders amongst them the Text sayes For all this they sinned still and believed not his wondrous works The Pharisees saw his miracles yet would have stoned him they saw him raise Lazarus from the dead and would have killed them both The people said He hath done all things well yet these were they that crucified the Lord of life Did any
if we do not dwell in him if we be not united with him we shall joyn our selves with somthing else with flesh and blood with the glory and vanity of the world which will but wait upon us to carry us to our grave feed us up and prepare us for the day of slaughter Oh who would dwel in a Land darker then darknesse it self who would be united with death But then if we dwell in him and he in us if he call us my little children and we cry Abba Father then what then who can utter it the tongue of men and Angels cannot expresse it then as he said to the Father all thine are mine and mine thine so all his is ours and all that is ours is his our miseries are his and when we suffer we do but fill up that which was behinde of the affliction of Christ Col. 2.24 He is in bonds in disgrace in prison with us and we bear them joyfully for we bear them with him who beareth all things our miseries nay our sins are his he took them upon his shoulder upon his account he sweat he groaned he died under them and by dying took away their strength nay our good deeds are his and if they were not his they were not good for by him we offer them unto God by his hand in his name he is the Priest that prepares and consecrates them our prayers our preaching our hearing Heb. 13.15 our alms our fasting if they were not his were but as the Father calls the Heathen mans virtues 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a faire name a title of health upon a box of poison Nazianz. the letter Tan written in the forehead of a reprobate Again to make up the reciprocation as all ours are his so all his are ours what shall I say his poverty his dishonour his sufferings his Crosse are ours yes they are ours because they are his if they had not been his they could not be ours none being able to make satisfaction but he none that could transfer any thing upon man but he that was the Son of man and Son of God and his Miracles were orus For for us men and for our Salvation were they wrought His Innocency his purity his Obedience are ours For God so deales with us for his sake as if we were as if we our selves had satisfyed Let St. Paul conclude for me in that divine and heavenly close of his third Chap. of the 1. Ep. to the Cor. whether Paul or Apollo or Cephas or the word or life or death or things present or things to come all are yours and you are Christs and Christ is Gods and if we be Christs then be we heires joynt heires with Jesus Christ as he is heire so have we in him right and title to be heires and so we receive eternal happinesse not onely as a gift but as an inheritance in a word we live with him we suffer with him we are buryed with him we rise with him and when he shall come again in glory we who dwell in him now shall be ever with him even dwell and reign with him for evermore THE FIFTH SERMON EZEKIEL 33.11 As I live saith the Lord I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked Turne ye Turne ye from your evill wayes For why will you die oh House of Israel WEE have here a sudden and vehement out-cry Turne yee Turne yee and those events which are sudden and vehement the Philosopher tells us doe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 doe leave some notable mark and improssion behind them an Earthquake shakes and dislocates the Earth a Whirlwinde rends the Mountaines and breakes in pieces the Rocks what is sudden at once strikes us with feare and admiration Certainly reverenter pensandum est saith the Father Greg in leâ— This call of the Prophet requires a serious and reverend Consideration For if this vehement ingemination be not sharpe and keene enough to enter our Soules and divide asunder the joynts and the marrow here is a quare moriemini a Reason to set an edge on them if his Gracious and Earnest call his Turne and his Turne will not Turn us hee hath placed Death in the way that King of Terrours to affright us If we be not willing to dye wee must be willing to Turne If wee will heare Reason wee must hearken to his Voice and if hee thus sends his Prophets after us sends forth his voice from Heaven after us if he make his Justice and mercy his joynt Commissioners to force us back If hee invite us to Turne and threaten us if wee doe not Turne either Love or Feare must prevaile with us to Turne with all our Hearts And in this is set forth the singular Mercy of our most Gracious God parcendo admonet ut corrigamur poenitendo before he strikes hee speakes When he bends his Bow when his deadly arrowes are on the string yet his warning flyes before his shaft his word is sent out before the judgement the lightâ—ing is before his Thunder Ecce saith Origen antequam Vulneramur monemur when we as the Israelites here are running on into the very Jawes of Death when we are sporting with our Destruction in articulo mortis when Death is ready to selfe on us and the pitt opens her mouth to take us in he calls and calls againe Turne yee Turne ye from your evill Wayes and if all this be too little if wee still venture on and drive forward in forbidden and dangerous wayes he drawes a Sword against us sets before us the horror of Death it self Quare moriemini Why will you die still it is his word before his blow his Convertimini before his moriemini his praelusoria arma before his Decretoria his blunt before his sharp his Exhortations before the Sentence non parcit ut parcat non miseretur ut misereatur he is full in his Expressions that he may be sparing in his wrath he speakes words clothed with Death That we may not die and is so severe as to threaten Death that hee may make roome for his Mercy and not inflict it Why will you die there is Virtue and Power in it to quicken and rowse us up to drive us out of our Evill wayes that wee may live for ever This is the summe of these words The parts are Two 1. An Exhortation and Secondly an Obtestation or Expostulation or a Duty and a Reason urging and inforcing that Duty The Exhortation or Duty is plaine Turne yee Turne ye from your Evill wayes The Obtestation or Reason as plaine Quarè moriemini Why will yee Dye oh House of Israel I call the Obtestation or Expostulation a Reason and good Reason I should doe so for the Moriemini is a good Reason That wee may not Dye a good Reason why we should Turne but tendered to us by way of expostulation is another reason and makes the reason operative and full of efficacy makes it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
for which it was held First we consult Secondly we settle and establish our Consultations and last of all we gaine a Constancy and perseverance in those Actions which our Consultations have engaged and encouraged us in and all these three we owe to Feare Did we not Feare we should not Consult did not Feare urge and drive us on we should not determine and when this breath departeth our Counsells fall and all our Thoughts perish Present Christ unto us in all his beauty with his Spicy cheeks and Curled locks with hony under his Tongue as he is described in the Canticles present him as a Jesus and we grow too familiar with him Present him on the Mount at his Sermon and perhaps we will give him the hearing Present him as a Rock and we see a hole to run into sooner then a Foundation to lay that on which is like him and we run on with ease in our evill wayes having such a friend such an indulgent Saviour alwaies in our Eye but present him descending with a shout and with the Trump of God and then we begin to remember that for all these Evill wayes we shall be brought into Judgement Our Counsells shift as the wind blowes and upon better motion and riper consideration we are ready to alter our Decrees For these three follow close upon each other pallemus horrescimus Circumspicimus Plin. Epist. saith Pliny first Feare strikes us pale then puts into a fitt of Trembling at last wheeles us about to fee and consider the danger we are in this consideration follows us nor can we shake it off longiorisque timoris causa Timor est this wind increaseth as it goes drives us to consultation carries us on to determine and by a continued force binds and fastens us to our Counsells And therefore Aquinas tells us that our Turne proceeds from the feare of punishment tanquam à primo motu as from that which first sets it a moving for though true Repentance be the gift of God yet fear works that Disposition in us by which we Turne when God doth Turne us The Feare of punishment restraines us from sin in the restraint a hope of Pardon shewes it self upon this hope we build up strengthen our Resolution and at last see the horror of sin not in the punishment but in the sin hate our folly more then the whip and our evill wayes more then Death it self which we call a Filial feare which hath more of love then feare and yet doth not shut out this Feare quite for a good sonne may feare the Anger of a good Father and thus God is pleas'd to condescend to our weakness and accept this as our reasonable service at our hands though our chiefest motive to serve him at first were nothing else but a flash from the Quare moriemini nothing else but a feare of Death For in the last place Bas in Psal 32. this is a principall effect of the feare of punishment 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Basil as it brings us to Consultation so is it a faire Introduction to Piety it self Feare takes us by the hand and is a Schoolmaster unto us and when Feare hath well disciplin'd and Catechised us then love takes us in hand and perfects our Conversion so that we may seem to goe from Feare to Love as from a School to an Universitie In the 28. of Genesis at the Twelfth verse Jacob sees a Ladder set upon the Earth and the Top of it reaching up to heaven and we may observe that Jacob makes Feare the first step of the ladder for when he awakes as in an extasie he cryes out Quam terribilis iste locus how dreadfull is this place verse 17. so that feare is as it were the first rung and step of the Ladder and God on the top and Angels Ascending and Descending Love and Zeal and many Graces between Think what we please disgrace it if we will and fasten to it the badge of slavery and servility it is a blessed thing thus to feare the first step to happiness and one step helps us up to another and so by degrees we are brought ad culme Sionis to the top of the Ladder to the Top of perfection to God Himself whose Majesty first wounds us with feare and then gently bindes us up and makes us to love him who leads us through this darkness through this dread and terror into so great light makes us Tremble first that we may at last be as mount Sion and stand fast and firme for ever We now passe and rise one step higher to take a view of this feare of punishment not onely as usefull but lawfull and commanded not under the Law alone but under the Gospel as a motive to Turne us from sinne and as a motive to strengthen and uphold us in the wayes of Righteousnesse not onely as a restraint from sionne but as a preservative of Holiness and as a help and furtherance unto us in our progresse in the wayes of perfection And here it may seem a thing most unbefitting a Christian who should be led rather then drawn Plat. l. de Rep. and not a Christian alone but any moral man and therefore Plato calls it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an illiberal and base disposition to be banisht the School of morality and our great master in Philosophie makes punishment one of the three things that belong to slaves as the whip doth saith Solomon to the fooles back for to be forced into goodnesse to be frighted into health argues a disposition which little sets by Health or goodnesse it self But behold a greater then Plato and Aristotle our best master the Prince of Peace and love himselfe strives to awake and stirre up this kind of feare in us tells us of Hell and everlasting Darkness of a Flaming Fire of weeping and gnashing of Teeth presents his Father the Father of Mercies with a Thunder-bolt in his hand with Power to kill both body and soul shews us our sinne in a Deaths Head and in the fire of Hell as if the way to avoid sinne were to feare Death and Hell ad if we could once be brought to feare to die we should not die at all Many glorious things are spoken even of this feare The Philosopher calls it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Basan Ps 31. Tert. de poenit c. 6. the bridle of our Nature Saint Basil 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the bridle of our lusts Tertullian Instrumentum poenitentiae an Instrument to worke out Repentance Pachomius placeth it supra decem millia paedagogorum makes it the best Schoolmaster of ten Thousand Harken to the Trumpet of the Gospel be attentive to the Apostles voice what found more frequent then that of Terror able to shake and divide a soul from its sinne Had Marcion seen our Saviour with a whip in his hand Had he heard him cursing the Figg-tree and by that example punishing our sterility had he weigh'd the
hairy scalp of wilful offenders who loath the means despise prophecy quench the spirit and so hinder it in its operation of men who are as stubborn against Grace as they are loud in its commendations as active to resist as to extol it For this is to cast it away and nullifie it this is to make it nothing by making it greater nay to turn it into wantonnesse But it may be said that when we are fallen from God we are not able to rise again of our selves we willingly grant it that we have therefore need of new strength and new power to be given us which may raise us up we denie it not and then Thirdly that not onely the power but the very act of our recovery is from God ingratitude it self cannot denie it and then that man can no more withstand the power of that grace which God is ready to supply us with then an infant can his birth or the dead their Resurrection that we are turned whether we will or no is a conclusion which these premises will not yeeld This flint will yeeld no such fire though you strike never so oft we are indeed sometimes said to sleep and sometimes to be Dead in sin but it is ill building conclusions upon no better Basis then a figure or because we are said to be dead in sin infer a necessity of rising when we are called nor is our obedience to Gods inward call of the same nature with the obedience of the Creature to the voice and command of the Creator for the Creature hath neither reason nor will as man hath nor doth his power work after the same manner in the one as in the other How many Fiats of God have been frustrate in this kinde how often he hath he smote our stony and rocky hearts and no water flowed out how often hath he said Fiat lux let there be light when we remained in darknesse for we are free agents and he made us so when he made us men and our actions when his power is mighty in us are not necessary but voluntary not doth his power work according to the working of our Fancy nor lies within the level of our carnal Imaginations to do what they appoint but is accompanied and directed by that wisdom which he is and he doth nothing can do nothing but what is agreeable to it As it was said of Caesar in Lucan though in another sense Velle putant quodcunque potest We think that God can do whatsoever he can but we must know that as he is powerful and can do all things so he is wise and sweetly disposeth all things as he will and he will not save us against our will for to necessitate us to goodnesse were not to try our obedience but to force it quod necessitas praestat depretiat ipsa Necessity takes of the price and value of that it works and makes it of no worth at all And then God doth not voluntarily take his grace from any but if the power of it defend us not from sin and death it is because we abuse and neglect it and will not work with it which is ready to work with us For Grace is not blinde as Fortune nec cultores praeterit nec haeret contemptoribus she will neither passe by them who will receive her nor dwell with those persons which contemn her nor save those who will destroy themselves To conclude this He is most unworthy to receive Grace who in the least degree detracts from the power of it and he is as unworthy who magnifies and rejects it and makes his lise an argument against his Doctrine sayes he cannot be resisted and resists it every day he that denies the power of it is a scarse a Christian and he is the worst of Christians who will not gird up his loins and work out his salvation but loiters and stands idle all the day long shadows and pleaseth himself under the expectation of what he will do and so Turns it into wantonnesse Let us not abuse the Grace of God and then we cannot magnifie it enough but he that will not set his hand to work upon a fancy that he wants Grace he that will not hearken after Grace though she knock and knock again as Fortune was said to have done at Galbas gate till she be weary hath already despised the Grace of God and cannot plead the want of that for any excuse which he might have had but put it off nay which he had but so used it as if it had been no grace at all They that have grace offered and repell it they that have Antidotes against death and will not use them can never answer the expostlation Why will ye die The third pretence And certainly he that is so liberal of his grace hath given us knowledge enough to see the danger of those wayes which lead to death and therefore in the next place ignorance of our wayes doth not minuere voluntarium doth not make our sin lesse wilfull but rather aggrandize it For first we may know if we will know every duty that tends to life and every sin that bringeth forth death we may know the Devils enterprises saith saint Paul 2 Cor. 2.11 and the ignorance of this findes no excuse when we have power and faculty light and understanding when the Gospel shines brightly upon us to dispel those mists which may be placed between the truth and us Sub silentiae faâ—ultate nesâ—ire repudiatae magis quà m non com pertae veritatis est reatus Hil. in Psal 1.8 then if we walk in darknesse and in the shadow of death we shall be found guilty and not so much of not finding out the truth as of refusing it as Hilary speaks of a strange contempt in not attaining that which is so easily atchieved and which is so necessary for our preservation I know every man hath not the same quicknesse of apprehension nor can every man make a Divine and it were to be wisht every man would know it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it is not for him that thresheth out the corn to resolve controversies or State-questions but Saint Peter requires that every man should be able to give an answer 1 Pet. 3.15 a reason of his faith and if he can do that he that knows the will of God is well armed and prepared against death and may cope with him and destroy him if he will And this is no perplext nor intricate study but fitted and proportioned to the meanest capacity he that cannot be a Seraphical Divine may be a Christian he that cannot be a Rabbi may be an honest man and if men were as diligent in the pursuit of the truth as they are in managing their own temporal affaires if men would try as many conclusions for knowledge as they do for wealth and were as ambitious to be good as they are to be rich and great if they were as much
makes it gravell in our mouths and strips us of our rayment and drives us amongst Swine For Friendship It may tie a knot but it will fly in pieces of it self for the friendship of evill men is as false and deceitfull as themselves For our Families It raises a Tempest even in these Basons Fluctus in Simpulo Proverb Tull. 3. de leg these little bodies these petty resemblances of a Republick It sets Father against Sonne and sonne against Father makes a servant a Traytor and raises enemies within doores and draws out a Battalio in a Cottage For Common-wealths the least sinne may sooner overthrow them then the greatest set them up and of all their Glories they cannot shew any one of them that was brought in by either It may raise them for a time perhaps to some height butthen it gets up above them lies heavy upon them and presseth them downe breaks them to pieces and Buries them in their Rubbish this it doth and shall that which can doe nothing but worke desolation be a fit prop for Religion to leane on when shee seems to sink or to bring her back when the voice is that she is gone out of our Coasts Can evill be fitt for any Thing but that which is like it But we are told Tale critopus tuum qualis Intentio Bernard de modo bene vivendi c. 15. that our work doth follow the Nature and quality of our Intention True if the Intention be Evill If I build a Church to set up Idolls If I build a colledge to perpetuate my name If I be very holy on the sudden and pay my vow to usury a Crown if I do a good act in it self for some evil end for then the intention alters and changes the Nature of it and makes it like unto it self and the reason is plain because any one bad Circumstance is enough to make an Action evil but bonum ex causâ intergrâ the concurrence of all is required to denominate it good Greg. Past Cur Part. c. 4. multa non illcitavitiat animus the minde and intention doth bring in a guilt upon those Actions which are otherwise lawful but cannot make that just which is forbidden cannot answer for the breach of a Law Briefly a good intention and a good action may be joyned together and be one nor can they be good but in this conjunction but to joyn a good intention to a bad action is with Mezentius in the Poet to tie a living Body to a Carcase it may colour indeed and hide a bad Action but it cannot consecrate it it may disguise a man of Belial but it cannot make him a Saint it may be as a Ticket or a passe to carry a wicked man to the end which he sets up and there leave him more secure it may be but without doubt more wicked then before For Murder now hath no voice Faction is Devotion Sacriledge is zeal all is well because we mean well we fix up a good intention in our fancy and that is our pole-star and having that in our eye we may steer our course as we please and buldge but swell our sayles and bear forward boldly till at last we are carried upon that rock which sinks us for ever and therefore to conclude this a good intention cannot pull out the sting from death nor the guilt from sin but if we sin though it be with an honest minde we sin voluntarily in brief though we know it not to be a sin though from the Tribunal of conscience we check our selves before we commit it though we do evil but intend good though we see it not though we approve it not though we intend it not as evil yet evil it is and a voluntary evil and without repentance hath no better wages then death and this expostulation may be put up to us Quare moriemini Why will ye die for we cannot say but they are willing to die who make such hast to the pit of ruine and in their swift and eager pursuit of death do but cast back a faint look toward the land of the living We must now draw towards a conclusion and we must conclude and shut up all even death it self in the will of man we cannot lay it upon any natural weaknesse nor upon the want of grace and Asistance we cannot plead ignorance nor the distaste and reluctancy of our minde nor can a good intention name that will good which is fixt on evil nor the means which we use commend and secure that end which is the work of sin and hath death waiting upon it if we die we can finde no other answer to this question Why will ye die but that which is not worth the putting up 't is quiavolumus because we will die Take all the weaknesse or corruption of our nature look upon that inexhaustible sountain of Grace but as we think dryed up take the darknesse of our understanding the cloud is from the will Nolumus intelligere we will not understand take all those sad symptomes and prognosticks of death a wandring unruly fancy 't is the will whiffs it about turbulent passions the tempest is from the will etiam quod invitus facere videor si facio voluntate facio even that which I do with some reluctancy if I do it I do it willingly all provocations and incitements imaginable being supposed no love no fear no anger not the devil himself can determine the will or force us into action and if we die it is quia volumus because we will die If death be the conclusion that which infers it is the will of man which brought sin and death into the world And this may seem strange that any should be willing to die Ask the prophanest person living that hath sold himself to wickednesse and so is even bound over to death and he will tell you he is willing to be saved heaven is his wish and eternal happines his desire as for death the Remembrance of it is bitter unto him death if you do but name it he trembles The Glutton is greedy after meat but loathes a disease the wanton seeks out pleasures but not those evils they carry with them under their wing the Revenger would wash his feet in the blood of his enemy but not be drownd in 't the Thief would steal but would not grinde in the prison but the Philosopher will tell us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Aristot. Ath. 2.1 the beginning of all these is in the will and he that will be intemperate will surfet he that will be wanton will be weak he that taketh the sword will perish by the sword he that will spoil will be spoiled and he that will sin will die Clem. Alex. strom 2. every mans death is a voluntary act not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 out of any natural appetite to perish but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by his own choice who did chuse it though not in se
down this natural desire under the will of his Father and would drink that cup Maxima chsequii gloria est in eo quod aequi minus velit I'lin Paneg. which his humane nature trembled at not my will but thine be done Herein is obedience if a man doth the will of God even against his will that is his natural desire When my breasts are full of milk and my blood dances in my veines and my natural inclination is strong within me when beauty not onely tempts but sollicits and opportunity and the twilight favour me when my natural desire is eager and vehement when I thus would and might and will not then am I chast an Eunuch for the kingdom of Heaven when my choler would draw my sword and my reason locks it in my Scabbard then am I meek when I am brought to the trial of my faith and my fear would carry me away from that persecution which rageth against me for the truthes sake and I cleave to the truth and chase this fear away which would carry away me or awe and over-match it by the readinesse and strength of the spirit and resolve against those terrours which would shake me from my rock for I may fear and yet suffer then am I a Souldier of Christ when I am fastned to the stake and am made a spectacle to thousands to some a spectacle of pitty to others of reproach when I see the light the joy of the whole earth the Heavens above me and the land of the living where I was wont to walk when I see all the ceremony and pomp of persecution and death when the executioner is ready to put fire to my funeral pile when my flesh trembles and nature shrinks from that which will abolish it when in this fit of trepidation a conditional pardon is offered and I would yet will not receive it because even the saving letters that are in it are killing when the outward man would not be thus sacrificed and yet I offer him up then the crown is ready for me and the flame of fire in which I shall be reduced almost to nothing is my Chariot to carry my soul up to receive it I cannot say that this strife and contention is in all for the grace of Gods spirit may so settle and quiet it that it shall scarce be sensible but where it is sensible it is no signe that the tentation hath prevailed but rather a strong argument that we are not as yet lead and shut up in it but forcing a way and passage out of it that though the strong man thus come against us yet there is something in us stronger then he something opposite and contrary to the tentation which will not suffer it to come so neer as to shake our constancy or drive us from our resolution it may lay hard at us to make us leave our hold and to represse and keep it back to strengthen and lift up our selves that we do not fall is the effect of our watchfulnesse and Christian fortitude by which we are more then Conquerors To conclude this though the sense and fancy receive the object which is a tentation though our natural temper incline to it and raise in us a kinde of desire to it which is but a resultancy from the flesh yet if we stand upon our guard and watch we shall be so far from sinning that we shall raise that obedience upon it which makes a way to happinesse and the soul shall be sospes et fidei calore fervens inter tentamenta Diaboli Hieron Apronio as Saint Jer. speaks safe and sound vigorous and lively in the midst of all these tentations shall be undefiled of that object which is fair and unshaken of that which is terrible to the sense Put on then the whole armour of God stand upon your guard set up the spirit against the flesh the reason against your sense watch one eye with another your carnal eye with a spiritual eye your carnal ear with a spiritual ear check your fancy bound your inclination if the flesh be weake let the spirit be ready if one raise a liking or desire let the other work the miracle and cast it out and this is to work light out of darknesse good out of that which might have bin evil life out of that which might have been death this is indeed to watch And to this end that we may thus watch let us out of that which hath been said gather such rules and directions which may settle and confirm us in our watch and carry on our care and sollicitude unto the end that we may watch and so not enter into temptation And first we must study the temptations themselves so study them as to wipe off their paint to strike off their illecebrae and beauty to behold them in their proper and native colours and representations optimus Imperator Veger qui habet cognitas res hostium he is the best Commander the best Watch-man who knows his enemy and can see through his disguise and vizor through his counterfeit terrours and lying boasts and knowes what he is For indeed nothing can make tentations of any force but the opinion we have of them it is not poverty that afflicts me but the opinion that poverty is evil 't is not the evil it self but my own thoughts which deserve this ill at my hands I am afraid of it because I think it horrid and whilst I think I make it so It is not the blow of the tongue that can hurt me for 't is but a word 't is not a Thunderbolt and if it were yet the Stoick will tell us inhonestius est dejectione animi perire quam fulmine Senc. Na. Question It is not so great an evil nor so dishonorable to be struck with a Thunderbolt as to be kill'd with fear far worse that my fancy should wound me then the tongue of an enemy For what secret force can there be in a calumniating tongue to pierce through our very hearts and shake and disturb our minds we can hear it thunder and not be cast down but so improvident and cruel we are to our selves that a breath from malice or envy will lay us on the ground Non ex eo quod est fallimur sed ex eo quod non est we are not deceived with the realities but with the disguises and appearances of things which those shapes which we have given them we first make them idols and then fall down and worship them we carelessly take in the object and let our fancy loose to work and hammer and polish it as Poets do make gods of men and Seas of little Rivers and in this fair out-side in which we have drest them they do deceive us if we would look neerer into them if we would desire them involutas evolvere unsold and lay them open take them out of that gaudinesse in which they are wrapt they could not have
that which is not good in it self good and profitable and advantageous to us view it well and consider it and you cannot but say it is wroth the shewing wroth the sight and worth the purchase though we lay down all that we are worth And now to proceed that you may fall in love with it and embrace it It is first laid open and naked and manifested unto you Iadicavit tibi He hath shewed the. 2ly publisht by open proclamation as a law which hath 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a forcing and necessitating power that if the cords of love will not draw you the bonds and force of a law may confine you to it 1. he shews it he hath shewed thee O man what is good 2ly he requires it he wills he commands it for what doth God require but this He hath shewed thee O man what is good and what doth the Lord require And first That which is truely good is open and manifest unto all God exposes and layes open puts it to sale and bids us come and buy It is a treasure and he hath unlockt it it is a pearle Math. 13. and he hath opened the casket It is his light and he hides it not under a bushel It is a rule by which we are to walk and being it concernes our conduct in our way it is easie and obvious and open to the weakest understanding sua fronte proponitur saith Tertullian it is presented to us without any mask or vaile For indeed it is the property of a rule to be so perspicuous otherwise it is not a rule but an Oracle or rather a snare to catch us for how shall we be able to embrace it if we cannot see it how shall we be able to do our duty if we know not what it is if the trumpet give an uncertain sound who shall prepare himself to battle saith Saint Paul If this good be clouded with darknesse and perplexities who shall gird up his loynes to make his approches and addresses to it 't is true indeed to draw neere to lay hold and joyne with it having no better retinue commonly then contempt and reproch then misery and affliction then persecution and death being compassed about with these terrors is a matter of difficulty in regard of our weaknesse and frailty which loves not to look upon beauty in such a dresse and that domestick war which is within us and that fight and contention which is between the flesh and the spirit and in this respect it is a narrow way and we must use a kind of violence upon our selves to work through it to our end but yet it is shewed and manifested and the knowledge of the way is not shut up and barricadoed but to those who are not willing to find it but run a contrary way by some false light which they had rather look upon and follow then that which leads them upon the pricks upon labour and sorrow and difficulty Whatsoever concernes a man is easie to be seen for it is as open as the day in other passages and dispensations of himself in other effects of his power and wisdome God is a God afar off but in this which concernes us he is neere at hand he is with us about us and within us In other things which will no whit advantage us to see he makes darknesse his pavilion round about him but in this he displayes his beams His way is in the whirlwind Nahum 1.3 and his footsteps are not known Ps 77.19 why he lifts up one on high and layes another in the dust why he now shines upon my tabernacle and anon beats upon it with his tempest why he placeth a man of Belial in the throne and sets the poore innocent man to grind at the mill why he passeth by a brothel-house and with his thunder beats down his own temple why he keepeth not a constant course in his works but to day passeth by us in a still voice and to morrow in an earthquake as it is far removed out of our ken and sight so to know it would not promote or forward us in our motion to happinesse we are the wiser that we do not know them for there is no greater folly in the world then for a mortall finite creature to discover such a mad ambition as to desire to know as much and be as wise as his creator This was my infirmity saith David I was even sick when I did think of it and he checketh himself for it Psal 77.11 Behold the world is my stage and here I must move by that light which he hath afforded me and not be put out of my part to a full shame by a bold and unseasonable contemplation of Gods proceedings not run out of my own wayes by gazing too boldly on his My businesse is to embrace this good and that will be my Angel to keep me in all my wayes that I dash not my foot against a stone against those perplext and crosse events which are those stones which we so hardly digest I cannot know why he lifteth up one and pulleth down another but if I cleave to this This will lift up my head even when I am down It is not fit I should know why the wicked prosper but by this light I see a serpent in their Paradise which will deceive and sting them to death why they prosper I cannot find out but he that seemes to hide himself comes so neere me as to tell me Their prosperity shall slay them Prov. 1.32 That their greatest happinesse is their greatest curse and if there be an hell on earth it is better then their heaven It is not convenient for me to know things to come quem mihi quem tibi sinem Dii dederint what will be my end and what will be theirs to know the number of their dayes how long they shall rage and I suffer these are like the secrets of great Princes and they may undoe us and therefore they are lockt up from us in the prescience and bosome of God and he keeps the key himself and will not shew them But cast thy burden upin him do thy duty exercise â—hy self in that which he hath shewen and then thon mayest lye down and rest upon this that their damnation sleepeth not that their rage shall not hurt thee and that thy patience shall crown thee In a word If it be evil and thou forseest it it may cast thee down too low and if it be good it may lift thee up too high and thy exaltation may be more dangerous then thy fall but Eschew Evil and follow that which is good and this will be a certain Prophesie and presage of a good end be it what it will whether it come to meet thee in the midst of rayes or of a tempest These things God will not shew thee because thy eye is too weak to receive them nor in the next place will he answer thy curiosity and determine every
prevaile and procure us admittance into his presence who onely hath immortality and can give eternall life This is the vertue and operation of this vivo in aeternum I live for evermore for though a time will come when he shall not govern and a time when he shall not intercede yet the power of his Scepter the vertue of his Intercession is carried on along with the joy and happiness of the Saints as the cause with the effect even to all eternity and shall have its operation in the midst of all our glorious ravishments and shall tune our Halellujahs our songs of Thanksgiving to this our Priest and King that lives for evermore We pass now from the duration and continuance of his life to his power He hath the keyes of Hell and of Death Habeo claves I have the keyes is a metaphoricall speech Et metaphorae feracissimae controversiarum saith Martin Luther Metaphors are a soyl wherein controversies will grow up thick and twine and plat themselves one within the other whilest every man manures them and sowes upon them what seed he please even that which may bring forth such fruit which may be most agreeable to his taste and humour Lord what a noyse have these keyes made in the world you would think they were not keyes but bells sounding terrour to some and making others more bold and merry than they should be Some have gilded them over others have even worn and filed them quite away put them into so many hands that they have left none at all For though they know not well what they are yet every man takes courage enough to handle them and let in and let out whom they please one faction turns them against another the Lutheran against the Calvinist and diabolifies him and the Calvinist against the Lutheran and superdiabolifies him The Church of Rome made it a piece of wisdome to shut us out and all that will not bow unto her as subordinate and dependent on that Church which was but idle physick which did neither hurt nor good but was as a dart sent after those who wee gone out of reach a curse denounced against those who heard it and blest themselves in it indeed a point of ridiculously affected gravity such as that Church hath many for what prejudice could come to us by her shutting us out who had already put our selves out of her Communion unlesse you will think the valour of that Souldier fit for Chronicle who cut off the head of a man who was dead before I have the keyes saith Christ and it is most necessary he should keep them in his hands for we see how dangerous it may prove to put them into the hand of a mortall man subject to passions and too often guided and commanded by them and we know what Tragedies the mistaking of the keyes have raised in the world And yet he that hath these keyes this power hath delegated also a power to his Apostles not onely to preach the Gospel but to correct those who disobey it I would not attribute too much to the Pastors of the Church in this dull and iron or rather in this wanton age where any thing where nothing is thought too much for them where all hath been preaching till all are Preachers yet I cannot but think they have more than to speak in publick which 't is thought every Christian may do They are the Ambassadours of Christ set apart on purpose in Christs stead to minister to his Church nay but to rule and govern his Church it is S. Pauls phrase and they carry about with them his commission a power delegated from him to sever the Goats from the Sheep even in this life that they may become sheep to segregate them Abstinâ—râ— Cyp. Segregare exauctorare virgâ Pastorali serire Hier. c. to abstein or withhold them to exauctorate them to throw them out to strike them with the pastorall rod to anathematize them c. this was the language of the first and purest times which by degrees fell in its esteem by some abuse of it by being drawn down from that most profitable and necessary end for which it was given which at last brought all Religion into disgrace nor indeed could it be otherwise for if upon the abuse of a thing we must straight call for the beesome to sweep it away what can stand long in its place the Temple is prophaned that must down to the ground Liberalty is abused shut up your purse and your bowels together Prayer is abused and turned into babling tack up your tongues to the roof of your mouth nay every thing in the world is abused if this argument be good the world it self should long since have had its end But such a power Christ did leave unto his Church and the neglect of it on the one side and the contempt of it on the other hath brought in that lukewarmness that indifferency amongst the professors of Christianity which if God prevent not will at last shake and throw down the profession it self and fill the world with Atheists which will learn by no Masters but such as instruct fools nor acknowledge any keyes but those which may break their head But indeed we have had these keyes too long in our hands for though they concern us yet are they not the keyes in the Text nor had we lookt upon them but that those of the Romishparty wheresoever they find the keyes mentioned take them up and hang them on their Church But we must observe a difference betwixt the keyes of the kingdome of Heaven which were given to Peter and the keyes of Hell and of Death although with them when the keyes are seen Heaven and Hell are all one For the keyes of David which opens and no man shuts and shuts and no man opens were not given to the Apostles but are a regality and prerogative of Christ who onely hath power of life and death over Hell and the Grave who therefore calls himself the first and the last because although when he first publisht his Gospel he died and was buried yet he rose again to live for ever so to perfect the great work of our salvation and by his power to bind those in everlasting chains who stood out against him and to bring those that bow to his Scepter out of prison into liberty and everlasting life The power is his alone and he made it his by his sufferings He was obedient to death therefore God did highly exalt him became a Lord by putting on the form of a servant but he hath delegated a power to his Apostles and those that succeed them to make us capable sit subjects for his power to work upon which neverthelesse will have its operation and effect either let us out ot shut us up for ever under the power of Hell and of Death were not he alive and to live for evermore we had been shut up in darknesse and oblivion for
ever but Christ living infuseth life into us that the bonds of Hell and of Death can no more hold us than they can him There is such a place as Hell but to the living members of Christ there is no such place for it is impossible it should hold them and you may as well place Lucifer at the right hand of God as a true Christian in Hell for how can light dewll in darknesse how can purity mix with stench how can beauty stay with horrour If Nature could forget her course and suffer contradictories to be drawn together and to be both true yet this is such a contradiction which unless Christ could die again which is impossible can never be reconciled Heaven and earth may passe away but Christ lives for evermore and the power and vertue of his life is as everlasting as everlastingnesse it self And againe There was a pale Horse Rev. 6.8 and his name that sate on him was death and he had power to kill with the sword with hunger and with the beasts of the Earth but now he doth not kill us he doth but stagger and sling us down to rise again and tread him under our feet and by the power of an everliving Saviour to be the Death of death it self Death was a king of terrors and the Feare of death made us slaves Heb. 2.15 brought us into servility and bondage all our life long made our pleasures lesse delightfull and our virtues more tedious then they are made us tremble and shrink from those Heroique undertakings for the truth of God but now they in whom Christ lives and moves and hath his Being as in his own dare look upon him in all his horror expeditum morti genus saith Tertull and are ready to meet him in his most dreadfull march with all his Army of Diseases racks and Tortures and as man before he sinned knew not what Death meant and Eve familiarly conversed with the Serpent so doe they with death and having that Image restored in them are secure and feare it not for what can this Tyrant take from them Their life that is hid with Christ in God It cannot cut them off from pleasure for their delight is in the Lord It cannot rob them of their treasure for that is laid up in heaven It can take nothing from them but what themselves have already crucified their Flesh It cannot cut off one hope one thought one purpose for all their thoughts purposes and hopes were leveld not on this but on another life And now Christ hath his keys in his hand Death is but a name it is nothing or if it be something it is such a thing that troubled S. Austin to define what it is we call it a punishment but indeed it is a benefit a favour even such a favour that Christ who is as Omnipotent as he is everlasting who can work all in all though he abolished the Law of Moses the law of Ceremonies yet would not abrogate this law by which we are bound over unto death because it is soprofitable and advantageous to us it was threatned it is now a promise or the way unto it for death it is that lets us in that which was promis'd it was an end of all it is now the beginning of all it was that which cut off life it is now that through which as through a gate we enter into it we may say it is the first point and moment of our After-eternity for t is so neer unto it that we can hardly sever them for we live or rather labour and fight and strive with the world and with life it self which is it self a temptation and whilst by the power of our everliving Christ we hold up and make good this glorious contention and fight and conquer and presse forward towards the mark either nature faileth or is prest down with violence and we dye that is our language but the spirit speaketh after another manner we sleep we are dissolved we fall in pieces our bodies from our soules and we from our miseries and Tempâ—…tions and this living everliving Christ gathers us together again breaths life and eternity unto us that we may live and reign with him for evermore And so I have viewed all the parts of the Text being the maine Articles of our faith 1. Christs death 2. his life 3. his eternall life and last of all his power of the keys his Dominion over hell and death we will but in a word fit the Ecce the behold in the Text to every part of it and set the seale to it Amen and so conclude And first we place the Ecce the behold on his death he suffer'd and dyed that he might learne to have compassion on thy miseries and on thy dust and rayse thee from both and wilt thou learne nothing from his compassion wilt thou not by him and by thy own sinnes and miseries which drew from him teares of Bloud learne to pitty thy self wilt thou still rejoyce in that iniquity which troubled his spirit which shed his bloud which he was willing should gush out of his heart so it might melt thine and work but this in thee to pitty thy self we talk of a first Conversion and a second and I know not what Cycles and Epicycles we have found out to salve our irregular motion in our wayes to blisse if we could once have compassion on our selves the work were done and when were you converted or how were you converted were no such hard questions to be answer'd for I may be sure I am converted if I be sure that I truly pitty my self shall Christ onely have compassion on thy soule But then again shall he shed his bloud for his Church that it may be one with him and at unity in it self and canst thou not drop a teare when thou seest this his body thus rent in pieces as it is at this day when thou seest the world the love of the world break in and make such havock in the Church oh 't is a sad contemplation will none but Christ weep over Jerusalem Secondly let us look upon him living and not take our eye from off him to fill and feed and delight it with the vanities of this world with that which hath neither life nor spirit with that which is so neer to nothing with that which is but an Idol Behold he liveth that which thou so dotest on hath no life nor can it prolong thy life a moment who would not cease from man whose breath is in his nostrills and then what madnesse is it to trust in that which hath no breath at all shall Christ present himself alive to us and for us and shall we lay hold of corruption rottennesse and when heaven opens it self to receive us run from it into a charnell-house and so into hell it self But then in the third place Behold he lives for evermore and let not us bound and imprison our thoughts