starve Alas for how little a time is this curious frame of the Divine architecture of this body of man raised In how small a revolution of time doth it fall into pieces He cometh up upon the stage and walks a few turns and acts a short part whether tragical or comical it may be applauded it may be not it may be plays the part of a religious man in the old notion of an hypocrite then retires untires and is not Like a variegated tulip by degrees which opens and then blazeth a small space and then rolls and shuts it self up again Even so this man cometh out of the same bed riseth and spreadeth and by and by dwindles and withers and goeth to bed again Man is as a continual miracle that all the gimmers should any time consist and when he ceaseth he ceaseth not to be admired in the consequences of one exhalation How many curious imaginations were nested and breeding in his brain which he hoped in good time would have been flegge and would have come out of their causes to good effect and on a sodain all dead in the nest What a vast distance is there made in an instant betwixt himself by the change What a muss and scramble doth this evaporation of life make amongst those who minde other mens deaths more then their own who watch to catch what they can when a tree fals that hath any fruit upon it if it be near them If we live to age we have the more time and longer death For then death as Plato saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 takes security of us for the whole by an Eye or an Ear takes away our sight or our hearing But who can promise himself to run through so many providences to that time which every one would come to and when they are at it they are weary of Indeed as the Heathen said We have not little time but do lose much Nothing so pretious as that which so many take care to drive away Time follows the motion of heaven our time should We cannot spend it better nor improve it then for Eternity Is not this great Babel which I have built for the house of the Kingdom by the might of my power for the honour of my Majesty said Nebuchadnezzar but what then Nay that is all can be said of it or him All makes but great confusion And the greatest condition is the greatest vanity What is this to a man not to say to a Philosopher much less to a Christian what is this to a man that he hath been some body in the the world and hath strutted it here and taken up so much ground as if he would not have his neighbours walk by him What is all this What will it come to Wherein will it be resolved One meditation of death is better then all the world For that may bring in also good works which will follow one after death so the Poet also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Only this godliness goes along with men in death whether men live or dye it perisheth not Godliness is profitable for all thigs and hath the promise of this life and of that which is to come as St. Paul 1 Tim. 4.8 This life that now is is now and but now for ought we know Every moment we change a possibility of death with life Therefore let us not trouble our selves for much provision for there is another life in the promise and this life is very short Let us make it longer by doing more good lest when we die nothing follow us neither good words on earth nor good works to heaven nothing but sorrow without a virtue after judgment without mercy Take notice of a day of judgment God hath appointed a day wherein he will judge the world in righteousness by the man whom he hath ordained whereof he hath given assurance unto all men in that he raised him from the dead Act. 17.31 When we stand before this judge what shall we say How shall we answer Who shall answer for us Thou shalt answer for me O Lord my God as the Psalmist speaks There is no such answer as Christ doth make For he answers by satisfaction and payment of that punishment which was due to us and of that obedience which was due from us The hand-writing of works which was against us he hath blotted out hath taken away hath nailed unto his Crosse Coloss 2.14 Christ hath made sure of this bond It is blotted out It is taken away It is nailed unto his Crosse And it is nailed with such a nail as he was nailed with such a nail as makes it immoveable for this nail was above all price We are not like to be ashamed of our hope in Christ when he cometh to be our Judge He that is the Judge is our Advocate our Jesus our Saviour He will not passe sentence against his own pleading and satisfaction Therefore Grotius when he was dying had his full understanding when for his last words almost he said to him that reminded him of Christ for salvation thus as it is recorded of him In solo Christo omnis spes mea reposita est all my hope is reposed only in Christ He could not die well without Christ his satisfaction He cannot answer without it at the day of judgment But yet our actions will be discussed though they be pardoned that those who shall see others to have committed as great sins as they may by reflexion be more punished because they did not repent and believe and that those who have repented and believed may see the fruit of their virtues when others who have not done worse are condemned and that they may glorifie God for that grace which hath discerned them If we would have this severe tribunall in our thoughts we should more consider what we are doing and what account we shall be able to give of it then when our own conscience if Christ who is God did not know it shall bear witness against us in that judgment unto the expectation whereof it hath privately prepared us Did we think upon these things as we ought would we adventure so dreadfull a reckoning for so little so short pleasure or profit or honour Would we throw away our immortall souls upon a presumption that what we do may be lawfull if we did perpend and ponder it within us that this would be called over again in that supreme judicature wherein we shall be sentenced not according to our opinion of it which blind lust hath impetuously huddled up but according to the proportion it doth beare to the law of God which we are bound to know Weigh it then beforehand whether thy subtil distinction will bear any weight in that even balance of the high Court of justice Will not thy waxie distinction melt at the fire of that great day Will this washie distinction have any substance and depth when it shall be openly brought into the examination and decision of
thought greater then these sublunaries Christian where is thy minde Is not heaven worthy of thy contemplations whither doth thy uncorrected phansie gad and ramble amidst the variety of these temporal unsatisfactions Call them back and bid them home Thou hast surely nothing better then heaven to reserve thy minde and thoughts and affections for Nothing more natural to thy soul more proper to thy capacity Nothing but this is homogeneous to thy end and thy perfection If the rest and center of our desires be not above man was made in vain And whatsoever is necessarily connexed with thy end thou dost naturally desire in order thereunto for where one is for one there is but one as the rule is And what can be more influxive nay intrinsecal into thy happiness then the sight of God with such injoyment as cannot be expressed here since it cannot be comprehended there as it is but as we are able There is no more to be said of it because never enough Here on earth how much pleasure is there in the converse though short with one real Christian There God there our Head Christ there the Holy Ghost there Angels confirmed there Saints glorified and for ever Or if it be nothing desirable to be positively happy is it any boot to thee to be certainly miserable Sink and fix thy meditations a while then upon the valley of lamentations which is below this valley of tears where there is sorrow and mourning to no end without end No man can desire to be miserable because it is contrary to his will And if any could be so fond as to wish it it would be upon a phansy of pleasing himself in a wilde conceit of happiness by that which is misery Whether it be better not to have been then to be in misery is made a question but to be sure to be in misery is not far from not being because every one that is would not be miserable And what misery is that like to be which is by God prepared for those who would not let him have the honour to save them by his mercy What vexation is like to come upon those who had a Commandement to be happy and would not Let not Satan or the world by thy flesh delude thee with a seeming felicity and short that thou mightest lose a real felicity and everlasting And take up the Bible and read and see if there be not in perpetual torments sufficient to fright thee out of that lethargy wherein thou dost forget thy self more then he that forgat his own name Advance some sober apprehensions of that endless calamity before thou art in it and imagine whether the remembrance of all thy irregular pleasures will in hell make any abatement or will not rather make a reinforcement of sense and loss If thou couldst live without the blissful enjoyment of God and that incomparable superilluxion of those quintessential joys which he hath designed in himself for those who are his children of adoption yet canst thou live in unquenchable flames and canst thou conflict with everlasting vengeance Bethink then thy self while thou art on this side of that calamity and every step thou takest in thy natural life make a thought of esciping the wrath of God and recovering of his favour which thou art made capable of by Christ How often hast thou been warned to flee from this wrath to come Take good counsel in time For how little a time is gone before we are gone Therefore also thirdly set apart some moments upon which depends Eternity to reminde thee in what a readiness thou art in to dye before thou art ready for it Snapp'd we are on a sodain how many And who hath exempted thee from the number of this possibility Let death then enter into thy thoughts before it enter into thy body If thou wilt ever be wise now For every minute of neglect doth set off so much of the account of thy wisedom which is not be valued by a possible deferring of the ruine but by a constant preparation against it in omnem eventum whatsoever happens We may soon be at our home in misery before we think of it if we do not think of it Our natural principles of body are in the dust and how far then have we thither How presently may we come into our inheritance of earth which no body can hinder us of And man returns to his earth as Psal 146.4 such earth as the word is as Adam was made of and such earth as Adam conveighed to us by his lapse He hath no earth so proper to him as this This he came of this he comes to Dust to dust is own to own This is intailed to us by our Forefather and this Intail cannot be cut off Some do not live any longer then to be born and no time betwixt that which was present and past Yea some come dead into the world stil-born ever dead And all from the time they live they dye by a natural Consumption We have as it were one foot in the grave before we can go and when by age we are past going we then are swiftest in our passage home God hath set death a day to come for thee by a private warrant and when it will arrest thee thou knowest not Be always prepared for death will not stay when it cometh If Deaths servant or Serjeant stayeth any while with thee yet when Death comes there is no delay The time and man is expired together And whither then Alas whither whither goest thou Were we to be only after death in that state we were in before life of negativeness it were not so full of horrour to think of going into our first infinitude as we may call it of nothing but to lose our beatifical good and to be overwhelmed in such a punishment should not this be set to our breast as a thorn to prick us and awaken us lest we fall into such a sleep as we awake out of in hell If after some millions of years we might have any hope of deliverance and recovery there would be some light in hell by comfort of hope which being present to the minde although the time were long would alleviate our sorrow but such weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth for ever for ever it may sooner be avoided then expressed Take up then betimes See how much of thy sand is run out Make up thy account speedily which is never done too soon How thin a bulwark is thy latthie flesh to keep out any bullet which may be sent into thee by any of Deaths weakest souldiers How apt and prest is thy nimble soul to leap out of thy crazy tenement Or if thou hast a mass of flesh as much as thou canst waddle under a disease will have more hold on thee and make a deeper impression and more entertainment for worms No man hath received a Commandement to provide for worms but thou hast taken care that they should not
after imposition of them by lawful authority they are yet in the state and condition of things indifferent for even in these things charity bindes against the use of liberty in point of scandal And so we shall make nothing of authority and so we shall disanul the Ordinance and Laws of God 3. Whensoever they do not obey they give scandal to some or other therefore as towards practice they should always obey 4. Had they the authority and power in their hands would they be contented with such obedience No they would not be contented but would have the world know that their laws are the laws of Christ and whosoever is not obedient is a rebel to Christ And therefore though I have no minde to differ from any one yet if I have liberty of conscience I cannot in conscience joyn with them in this their supposition Neither can we imagin how those cases of scandal and contempt can give satisfaction when they are applyed unto the former texts which require obedience Are we to give obedience to the law of God which commands obedience to the laws of men rightly qualified only in case of scandal or can we conceive that under obedience to lawful Magistrates in lawful things there is no more to be understood then if there be no scandal by inobedience no contempt by disobedience Shall we think he hath no power in things indifferent for if his power be only in the punishing of those who are breakers of the Laws of God and rewarding of those that are observers thereof then is our obedience injoyned to him only passive Therefore if the question be thus stated whether humane laws do binde the Conscience in these terms absolutely taken it is denied because we are assured that no man hath of himself any authority over the conscience and because we cannot be assured that that which is commanded by virtue of his command is right but if the question be stated thus Whether we are bound in conscience to obey a lawful Magistrate in lawful commands not only in the former respects I have no scruple sufficient against the affirmative One Argument may be this All Gods Commandements doe binde in conscience That we should be obedient to humane laws is one of Gods Commandements and therefore are we bound in conscience to be obedient to humane laws because we are bound to Gods law concerning them By the Law Divine we are obliged in conscience to them by manner of the object of the thing If we compare the humane law with the Divine law touching it the humane law in the whole is considered but as a particular matter of the Divine law And if we be bound in conscience to the law of God in all matters of it how should we not be bound to the Law of God in this So that if we do not obey we do not offend a weak brother only but the great God by whom Kings reign 2. We are more bound to our Civil Parents then children are bound to their natural Parents But children are bound in conscience to their natural Parents so then we are bound in conscience to our Civil Parents That we are more subject to our Civil Parents appeareth in several regards because first the dayes we are preserved in are more happy then those we were born in since the condition of our birth is uncertain as the Orator saith well 2. The natural Parent hath not authority of life and death over the childe as the Civil Parent hath which is given him immediately by God as is noted since the people even upon supposal of election cannot give him this as having not power over their own lives And 3. Because even the natural Parents are subjects to the Civil Parent so that if the natural parent should bid his childe do one thing and the Civil parent should bid him do another the command of the natural parent must be sinked in obedience to the Civil as the rule is The precept of the inferior doth not binde when it is contrary to the precept of the superior Now for the Assumption that children are bound in conscience to be obedient to their parents who in conscience can deny since they have this impression in them by law of nature which bindes the natural conscience as Rom. 2.15 and because also their obedience hath a Divine promise annexed to the command of God that they should be obedient to them Ephes 6.2 Honour there is to be expounded by obedience in the first verse Now what promise can we say is made by God but in order to such obedience as we are not in conscience free to Indeed they should be obedient to their parents in the Lord as in the text But this doth not derogate from their due obedience but doth qualifie it It doth not abate their subjection in those things wherein they should be subject but doth restrain the extension of it Or it doth terminate their obedience in God doth not withdraw any lawful respect to their parents therefore the next words in the 2. verse are Honour thy Father and thy Mother Thus in brief as towards our obligations to laws Civil and the goodness of obedience thereunto But some there are who will make a difference betwixt our obligedness to laws Civil and laws Ecclesiastical To this in few and in way of propositions First with us the supreme authority for the constitution of Ecclesiastical things is the same and therefore there can be no difference on that part And as for them who hold that no Civil authority is necessary to the sanction of orders for the Church if they could make their supposition good they would further the conclusion for so the authority is more immediately from Christ himself 2. Ecclesiastical constitutions which have the same authority with us in regard of their original issue of Supreme power are like to binde as much as Civil by reason of as great assistance to be presumed for the framing of them as for the framing of those which are political since we have a promise from Christ of his blessing successively to the greatest actions to be sure of the Church in the end of St. Matthew I will be with you to the end of the world which doth not only respect Credends but Agends also And there is a reason of such assistance in order to the third proposition The peace of the Church unto which the Ecclesiastical constitutions doe binde in uniformity is as considerable as the peace of the Nation And if then the political laws do binde as to the preservation of the publique good in order and peace and strength and plenty then why should not laws of the Church be as valid in obliging unto unity and peace and order and defence against the adversaries thereof And this is strengthned by the fourth proposition which respects the end of all the orders of the Church which is better to dispose them by the means of grace which are dispensed in