suffering for Sin but his being punished for Sin And that I am sure is spoke so plain and loud by the Universal Voice of the whole Book of God that Scripture must be Crucified as well as Christ to give any other tolerable sence of it But since Heresy has made such bold invasions upon those Sacred Writings we will consider both those sences which these words are asserted to be capable of 1. First of all then some assert That to be stricken for Transgression imports not here a Punishment for Sins past but a Prevention or taking away of Sin for the future So that Christ is said to be stricken to suffer and to die for Sin because by all this He confirmed to us an Excellent and Holy Doctrine the belief of which has in it a natural Aptness to draw Men off from their Sins In a word because Christianity tends to make Men holy and cease from Sin and because Christ by His bloud sealed the Truth of Christianity therefore is He said to die for Sin A strange and remote deduction and such an one as the Common rules and use of speaking would never have suggested But then besides because it is easy to come upon the Authors of this perverse Interpretation by demanding of them what fitness there could be in Christ's death to confirm His Doctrine And what Reason the World could have to believe Christianity True because the Author of it a Pious Innocent Excellent Person was basely and cruelly put to Death Therefore they further say that this Effect of its confirmation is really and indeed to be ascribed to His subsequent Resurrection though only his Death be still mentioned that being the most difficult and Heroick passage of all that he either did or suffered for our sakes and consequently the greatest Instance of his Patience and perswasion of the Truth of that Doctrine for which he suffered But by their favour if Christ is said no otherwise to die for Sin than because he delivered a Doctrine the design of which was to draw Men off from Sin and which was confirm'd to be true only by his Resurrection How comes it to pass that this effect is still joyned with his Death but never with his Resurrection It being said over and over that He dyed for Sin suffered and bled for Sin but never that He rose again for Sin It is indeed said once that he rose again for our justification but in the very foregoing words it is said that he was delivered to death for our Offences Which shews that those words for our Offences and for our justification have there a very different sence and bear a different relation to the words with which they are joined in that as well as in the other Scriptures But this whole Invention is so forced and far fetched and so much out of the Road of Common reason that it is impossible it should gain but by the strengths and prepossessions of Prejudice and where prejudice stands for judgment for ought I see it is as vain to urge Arguments as to quote Scriptures 2. The other sence of these words and which alone the Catholick Church receives for true is That Christ's being stricken for Sin signifies his being punished for Sin The word For in this case denoting the Antecedent Meritorious cause of his suffering and not the Final as the School of Socinus does assert and consequently must directly relate to the removal of the guilt of Sin and not the Power as is also affirmed by the same Persons Now that Christ's suffering and being stricken for Transgression imports that suffering to have been Penal and Expiatory as it might with the highest Evidence be demonstrated from several Scriptures so at this time I shall confine my self within the limits of the Chapter from whence I took my Text and here I shall found the proof of it upon these two expressions First That Christ is said to have born our Sins in the 12. v. Now to bear Sin is an Hebrew Phrase for that which in Latin is Luere peccatum and in English to be punished for Sin And if to bear another Man's Sin or iniquity by suffering does not imply the undergoing of the punishment due to that Man's Sin We must invent a new way of expounding Profane Writers as well as Sacred and of interpreting the common speeches of Men as well as the word of God Secondly The other Argument shall be taken from that Expression which declares Christ to have been made a Sacrifice or an Offering for Sin in the 10. v. When Thou shalt make His Soul an Offering for Sin The proof of what I here affirm is grounded upon the use and design of a Sacrifice as it has been used by all Nations in the World which was to appease the Deity by paying down a Life for Sin and that by the substitution of a Sacrifice whether of Man or Beast to die and pay down his Life instead of the Sinner For there was a tacit acknowledgment universally fixt in the Hearts of all Mankind that the Wages of Sin was Death and that without shedding of bloud there could be no Remission upon which was built the reason of all their Sacrifices and Victims So surely therefore as Christ was a Sacrifice and as the design of a Sacrifice is to pay down a Life for Sin and as to pay down a Life for Sin is to be Punished for Sin so sure it is that Christ's Death and Sufferings were Penal Now it being clear that the foundation of all Punishment is compensation or exchange that is to say something paid down to divine Justice for something done against it and since all compensation implies a Retribution equivalent to the Injury done therefore that Christ might be qualified to be a Sacrifice fit to undergo the full Punishment due for the Sins of Mankind two things were required 1. An infinite dignity in his Person for since the Evil and Demerit of Sin was Infinite and since Christ was so to suffer for it as not to remain under those sufferings for an Infinite duration that Infinity therefore was to be made up some other way which could not be but by the Infinite worth and Dignity of his Person grasping in all the Perfections and Glories of the Deity and by consequence deriving an Infinite Value to his Sufferings 2. The other Qualification required was a perfect Innocence in the Person to suffer for so much was specified by the Paschal Lamb of which we still read in Scripture That it was to be a Lamb without blemish And there is no doubt but had Christ had any Sin of his own to have satisfied for he had been very unable to satisfy for other Men's He who is going to Gaol for his own debts is very unfit to be a Security for anothers But now this perfect Innocence which I affirm necessary to render Christ a fit and proper Sacrifice is urged by our Adversaries to be the very Reason
fail of the Prize he runs for by mistaking the Way he should run in St. Paul as plainly as words can express a Thing tells us That Eternal Life is the Gift of God and Consequently to be expected by us only as such nay He asserts it to be a Gift in the very same verse in which He affirms Death to be as due to a Sinner as Wages are to a Worke man Romans 6.23 Than which Words nothing certainly can be more full and Conclusive That Salvation proceeds wholly upon Free-gift though Damnation upon strict Desert Nevertheless such is the Extreme folly or rather Sottishness of Manâ— Corrupt Nature That this does by 〈◊〉 means Satisfy Him For though indeed he would fain be Happy yet fain would He also Thank none for it but Himself And though He finds that not only His Duty but His Necessity brings him every day upon His knees to Almighty God for the very Bread he eats yet when he comes to deal with Him about Spirituals things of infinitely greater Value he appears and acts not as a Suppliant but as a Merchant not as One who comes to be Relieved but to Traffick For something he would receive of God and something he would Give Him and nothing will content this Insolent yet Impotent Creature unless he may seem to Buy the very Thing he Begs Such being the Pride and Baseness of some Spirits that where they Receive a Benefit too big for them to requite they will even Deny the Kindness and disown the Obligation Now this great self-delusion so prevalent upon most minds is the Thing here encountered in the Text. The words of which by an usual way of speech under an Interrogation couching a Positive Assertion are a Declaration of the Impossibility of man's being Profitable to God or which is all one of his meriting of God according to the true proper and strict sence of Merit Noâ— does this Interrogative way of Expression import only a bare Negation of the Thing as in it self Impossible but also a manifest Undeniable Evidence of the said Impossibility As if it had been said That nothing can be more plainly Impossible than for a man to be Profitable to God for God to receive any Advantage by man's Righteousness or to gain any Thing by his making his Ways perfect and Consequently That nothing can be more absurd and contrary to all Sense and Reason â—â—an for a man to entertain and cherish so irrational a Conceit or to affirm so gross a Paradox And that no other Thing is here meant by a man's being profitable to God but his meritiâ—â— of God will appear from a true State and Account of the Nature of Merit Which we may not improperly define A Right to receive some good upon the score of some good done together with an Equiâ—olence or Parity of Worth between the Good to be Received and the Good Done So that although according to the Common Divisâ—â—n of Iustice into Commutative and Distributive that which is called Commutative be imployed only about the strict Value of Things according to an Arithmetical Proportion as the Schools speak which admits of no Degrees and the other species of Iustice call'd Distributive as consisting in the Distribution of Rewards and Punishments admits of some Latitude and degrees in the Dispensation of it yet in Truth even this Distribution it self must so far follow the Rules of Commutation That the Good to be dispensed by way of Reward ought in Iustice to be Equivalent to the Work or Action which it is design'd as a Compensation of So as by no means to sink below it or fall short of the full Value of it From all which upon a just Estimate of the matter it follows That in true Philosophy Merit is nothing else but an Instance or Exemplification of that Noted saying or Maxim That one Benefaction or good Turn requires another and imports neither more nor less than a mans claim or Title to Receive as much Good from another as he had done for him Thus much therefore being premised as an Explication of the Drift or Design of the Words the Words themselves being too plain and Easy to need any further exposition we shall observe and draw from them these Four Particulars First Something supposed or implyed in them viz. That Men are naturally very Prone to entertain an Opinion or Perswasion That they are able to merit of God or be Profitable to Him Secondly Something expressed namely That such an Opinion or Perswasion is utterly false and absurd and that it iâ— impossible for man to merit of God or to be Profitable to Him Thirdly Something Inferred from both the former to wit That the forementioned Opinion or Perswasion is the very source or foundation of Two of the greatest Corruptions that have infested the Christian Church and Religion And Fourthly and Lastly Something objected against the Particulars discoursed of which I shall endeavour â—o answer and remove and so Conclude this Discourse Of Each of which in their order And First For the first of them The Thing supposed or Implyed in the Words namely That Men are naturally very Prone to entertain an Opinion or Perswasion That they are able to merit of God or be Profitable to Him The Truth of which will appear from these two Considerations First That it is Natural for them to place too High a Value both upon themselves and their own Performances And that this is so is evident from that Vniversal Experience which proves it no less Natural to them to bear a more than ordinary Love to themselves and all Love we know is founded in and results from a Proportionable Esteem of the Object Loved So that look in what Degree any Man loves himself in the same Degree it will follow that he must Esteem himself too Upon which account it is that every Man will be sure to set his own Price upon what he is and what he does whether the World will come up to it or no as it seldom does That speech of St. Peter to our Saviour is very remarkable in Mat. xix 27 Master says he we have forsook all and followed Thee what shall we have therefore In which words he seems to be upon Equal Terms with his Lord and to expect no more of him as he thought but strictly a Pennyworth for his Penny and all this from a Conceit that he had done an Aâ— so exceedingly Meritorious that it must even Non-plus his Master's Bouâ—â—y to quit scores with him by a just Requital Nay so far had the same proud Ferment got into the Minds of all the Disciples that neither could their own low condition nor the constant Sâ—rmons of that Great Example of Self-denial and Humility whom they daily conversed with nor lastly the Correctives of a Peculiar Grace totally clear and cure them of it And therefore no Wonder if a Principle so deeply rooted in Nature works with the whole Power of Nature and considering also â—he
the Concurrence of Both no less a Power was imployed to raise Christ out of the Grave than that which first raised the World it self out of Nothing 2. Let us consider God's immutability in respect of his Word and Promise for these also were engaged in this affair In what a clear Prophecy was this foretold and dictated by that Spirit which could not lye Psalm 16.10 Thou shalt not suffer Thy Holy One to see corruption And Christ also had frequently foretold the same of himself Now when God says a thing he gives his Veracity in pawn to see it fully performed Heaven and Earth may pass away sooner than one Iota of a Divine Promise fall to the ground Few things are recorded of Christ but the rear of the Narrative is still brought up with this That such a thing was done That it might be fullfilled what was spoken by such or such a Prophet Such a firm unshaken adamantine connexion is there between a Prophecy and its accomplishment All things that are written in the Prophets concerning Me says Christ must come to pass And surely then the most Illustrious Passage that concerned him could not remain under an uncertainty and contingency of event So that What is most Emphatically said concerning the persevering obstinacy and Infidelity of the Jews John 12.39 40. That they could not believe because that Esaias had said that God blinded their Eyes and hardened their Hearts that they should not see with their Eyes nor understand with their Hearts and so be converted and He should heal them The same I affirm may with as great an Emphasis and a much greater clearness to our Reason be affirmed of Christ that therefore Death could not hold him because the Kingly Prophet had long before sung the Triumphs of His glorious Resurrection in the forementioned Prediction In a Word whatsoever God purposes or promises passes from Contingent and meerly Possible into Certain and Necessary and whatsoever is Necessary the contrary of it is so far Impossible But when I say that the Divine decree or promise imprints a Necessity upon things it may to prevent misapprehension be needful to Explain what kind of Necessity this is that so the liberty of second Causes be not thereby wholly cashiered and took away For this therefore we are to observe that the Schools distinguish of a Two-fold necessity Physical and Logical or Causal and Consequential which Terms are Commonly thus explained viz. That Physical or Causal Necessity is when a thing by an Efficient Productive Influence certainly and naturally causes such an Effect and in this sence neither the Divine Decree nor Promise makes things necessary for neither the decree nor promise by it self produces or effects the Thing decreed or promised nor exerts any active influence upon Second Causes so as to impell them to do any thing but in point of Action are wholly ineffective Secondly Logical or Consequential Necessity is when a thing does not efficiently cause an Event but yet by certain infallible Consequence does infer it Thus the fore-knowledge of any Event if it be true and certain does certainly and necessarily infer that there must be such an event for as much as the certainty of knowledge depends upon the certainty of the thing known And in this sence it is that God's decree and promise give a necessary Existence to the thing decreed or promised that is to say they infer it by a necessary infallible consequence So that it was as impossible for Christ not to rise from the Dead as it was for God absolutely to decree and promise a thing and yet for that thing not to come to pass The Third Reason of the Impossibility of Christs detention under a State of Death was from the Iustice of God God in the whole procedure of Christ's sufferings must be considered as a Judge exacting and Christ as a Person paying down a recompence or satisfaction for Sin For though Christ was as pure and undefiled with the least spot of Sin as purity and innocence it self yet he was pleased to make himself the greatest Sinner in the World by Imputation and rendring himself a surety responsible for our debts For as it is said 2 Cor. 5.21 He who knew no Sin was made Sin for us When the Justice of God was lifting up the Sword of Vengeance over our Heads Christ snatch'd us away from the blow and substituted his Own Body in our Room to receive the whole stroke of that dreadful Retribution inflicted by the Hand of an Angry Omnipotence But now as God was pleased so to comport with his Justice as not to put up the injury done it by Sin without an Equivalent compensation so this being once paid down that proceeding was to cease The Punishment due to Sin was Death which being paid by Christ Divine Justice could not any longer detain him in his Grave For what had this been else but to keep him in Prison after the debt was paid Satisfaction disarms Justice and payment cancells the Bond. And that which Christ exhibited was full measure pressed down and runing over even adequate to the nicest proportions and the most exact demands of that severe and unrelenting Attribute of God So that his Release proceeded not upon Terms of Courtesy but of Claim The gates of Death flew open before him out of duty and even that Justice which was Infinite was yet circumscribed within the inviolable limits of what was due Otherwise guilt would even grow out of expiation the reckoning be enflamed by being paid and punishment it self not appease but exasperate Justice Revenge indeed in the hand of a sinful mortal Man is for the most part vast unlimited and unreasonable but Revenge in the Hands of an Infinite Justice is not so Infinite as to be also Indefinite but in all its actings proceeds by Rule and Determination and cannot possibly surpass the bounds put to it by the Merits of the Cause and the Measure of the Offence It is not the effect of meer choice and will but springs out of the unalterable relation of Equality between Things and Actions In a word The same Justice of God which required him to deliver Christ to Death did afterwards as much engage him to deliver him from it 4. The Fourth Ground of the Impossibility of Christ's perpetual continuance under Death was the Necessity of his being Believed in as a Saviour and the impossibility of his being so without rising from the dead As Christ by his Death paid down a Satisfaction for Sin so it was necessary that it should be declared to the World by such Arguments as might found a Rational Belief of it So that Men's Unbelief should be rendred inexcusable But how could the World believe that he fully had satisfyed for Sin so long as they saw Death the known wages of Sin maintain its full force and power over him holding him like an obnoxious Person in Durance and Captivity When a Man is once imprison'd for debt
office of Conscience clear beyond all Objection And thus much I thought fit to premise concerning the Nature of the Light here spoken of by our Saviour and Intended for the subject of the present discourse Which Light as it is certainly the great and Sovereign Gift of God to Mankind for the Guidance and Government of their Actions in all that concernâ— them with reference to this Life 〈◊〉 a better so it is also as certain that it is Capable of being turned into Darkness and thereby made wholly useless for so Nobl 〈…〉 Purpose For so much the Words of the Tâ—â— Import nor do they Import only bare possibility that it may be so but aâ— so a very high Probability that witâ—â—â—â— an extraordinary Prevention it will bâ— so For as mâ—ch as all Warning in thâ— very Reason of the Thing and according to the Naturâ—l force of such expressions implies in it these two Thingâ— First Some very Considerable Evil or mischief Warned against and Secondly An Equal danger of falling into iâ— without which all Warning would be not only superfluous but Ridiculous Now both these in the Present Case are very great as will appear by a distinâ—t consideration of each of them And First For the Evil which we are warned or caution'd against to wit the Turning of this light within us into Darkness 〈◊〉 Evil so unconceivable great and comprehensive that to give an Account of the Utmost extent of it would pose our Thoughts as well as Nonplus our Expressions But yet to help our Apprehensions of it the best we 〈◊〉 let â—s but consider with our selves those Intolerable Evils which Bodily Blindness Deafness Stupefaction and an utter Deprivatâ—on of all sense must unavoidably subject the outward Man to For what is one in such a Condition able to do And what is He not lyable to suffer and yet Doing and Suffering upon the matter Comprehend all that concerns a Man in this World If such an ones Enemy seeks his Life as He may be sure that some or other will and Possibly such an One as he takes for his Truest Friend in this forlorn Case he can neither see nor hear nor perceive his Approach till He finds Himself actually in his Murthering Hands He can neither encounter nor eâ—cape Him neither in his own â—â—fence give nor ward off a Blow 〈◊〉 whatsoever blinds a Man ipso facto disarms Him so that being thus 〈◊〉 rest both of his Sight and of all his Senseâ— besides what such an one can be fit for unless it be to set up for Prophecy or believe Tâ—â—â—substantiation I cannot Imagine Thâ—â— I say are some of those Fâ—â—tal mischiefs which corporal Blindneâ—â— and Insensibility expose the Body to and are not those of a Spiritual Blindneâ—â— Unexpressibly greater For must 〈◊〉 Man Labouring under this be utterly 〈◊〉 at a loss how to distinguish betweâ—â—â— the two grand Governing concerns 〈◊〉 â—â—fe Good and Evil and may not thâ—â— Ignorance of these cost us as dear as the Knowledge of them did our first Parentsâ— Life and Death Vice and Vertue comâ— alike to such an one As all things are oâ— the same Colour to Him who cannot seâ— His whole Soul is nothing but Night and Confusion Darkness and Indistinction He can neither see the way to Happinesâ— and how then should He choose it Noâ— yet to destruction and how then should He avoid it For where there is no sense of things there can be no distinction and â—here there is no distinction there can be no Choice A Man destitute of this directing and distinguishing Light within Him is and must be at the Mercy of every thing 〈◊〉 Nature that would impose or serve 〈◊〉 Turn upon Him So that whatsoever the Devil will have Him do that 〈◊〉 must do Whithersoever any Exâ—â—â—tant desire or design hurries Him thither He must go Whatsoever any base Interest shall prescribe that he must set his hand to whether His Heart goes along with it or no. If he be a Statesman He must be as willing to sell as the Enemy of his Country can be to bay If a Churchman he must be ready to surrender and give up the Church and make a Sacrifice of the Altar it self though He lives by it and in a Word take that for a full discharge from all his Subscriptions and obligations to it to do as He is bid Which being the Case of such as steer by a false Light certainly no slave in the Gallies is or can be in such a Wretched Condition of slavery as a Man thus abandoned by Conscience and bereft of all Inward Principles that should either Guide or Controul Him in the Course of his Conversation So that we see here the Transcendent Greatness of the Evil which 〈◊〉 stand caution'd against But then Secondly If it were an Evil that seldom happened that very hardly and raâ—â—ly befell a Man this might in a 〈◊〉 measure supersede the strictness of tâ—â—â— Caution But on the contrary we shaâ—â— find that as great as the Evil is which we are to fence against and that is 〈◊〉 great as the Capacities of an Immortal Soul the Greatness of the danger is still Commensurate For it is a Case that usually happens It is a mischief as frequent in the Event as it is or can be Fatal in the Effect It is as in a Common Plague in which the Infectionâ—â— as hard to be escaped as the distempâ—â— to be Cured For that which brings this Darkness upon the Soul is Sin And as the state of Nature now is the Soul is not so Close United to the Body as Sin is to the Soul indeed so close is the Union between them that one would even think the Soul it self as much a Spirit as it is were the matter and Sin the form in our present Constitution In a word there is a set Combination of all without a Man and all within Him of all above ground and all under it if Hell be so first to put out his Eyes and then to draw or drive Him headlong into Perdition From all which I suppose we must needs see Reason more than sufficient for this Admonition of our Saviour Take heed that the Light which is in Thee be not Darkness An Admonition founded upon no less a Concern than all that a Man can save and all that He can lose to Eternity And thus having shewn both the Vastness of the Evil it self and the extreme danger we are in of it Since no Man can be at all the Wiser or the Safer barely for knowing his danger without a Vigorous application to prevent it and since the surest and most Rational preventive of it is to know by what Arts and methods our Enemy will encounter us and by which He is most likely to prevail over us we will enquire into and Consider those Ways and Means by which He commonly attempts and too frequently effects this so dismal a Change upon us as to strip us even of the poor
be made to such Christians as reject Christ in his Laws as to those very Iews who nailed him to his Cross. In fine Christ comes to us in his Ordinances with Life in one Hand and Death in the other To such as receive him not he brings the Abiding Wrath of God a present Curse and a future Damnation But to as many as shall receive Him according to the expression immediately after the Text He gives Power to become the Sons of God That is in other words to be as Happy both in this World and the next as Infinite Goodness acting by Infinite Wisdom can make them To Him therefore who alone can doe such great Things for those who serve Him be rendred and ascribed as is most due all Praise Might Majesty and Dominion both now and for evermore Amen A SERMON Preached On Good-Friday At Christ-Church Oxon. Before the University ON March the 20 th 1667 8. Isaiah liii 8 latter part For the Transgression of my People was He stricken THIS great and Eloquent Prophet the Evangelist of the Jewish Church as without any impropriety he may be called from the 13. v. of the foregoing Chapter to the end of this seems rapt up with the contemplation of a Great Person under strange and unusual afflictions Whose Character with all the heights of Rhetorick which the Genius of Grief and Prophecy together could raise him to he here sets himself with full purpose to describe In all which description there is no one passage which does not speak something extraordinary and supernatural of the Person described and withall represent the Describer of it in the highest Degree of Ecstacy and Rapture so that nothing could transcend the height of the expression but the sublimity of its Subject For still it fastens upon him the Marks and Tokens of something more than a Man indeed more than a Creature Ascribing Actions to him which surmount any created Power and so visibly upon all Principles of Reason above the strength and reach of the strongest Arm of Flesh that if the Person here spoken of be but a Man I am sure it requires the Wit of more than a Man to make sence of the Prophecy Who that Great Person therefore was here so magnificently set forth by the Prophet is the thing now to be enquired into In which enquiry we shall find several Opinions and every one of them pretending to give the right Interpretation of the Place I shall reduce them all to these two First The Opinion of the Ancient Secondly The Opinion of some Later Interpreters First As for the Ancient Interpreters I may boldly and truly say that it was the general sence of all the old Jewish Rabbies that the Person intended in this Prophecy was the Messias Take the affirmation of Rabbi Alschech in his Comment upon this Prophecy Rabbini nostri beatae memoriae uno ore statuunt juxta receptam traditionem hìc de Rege Messiâ sermonem esse And though their Opinion of the Temporal Greatness of their Messias might if any thing tempt them to draw this Prophecy another way since it declares the low abject and oppressed Condition of the Person here treated of yet to shew that a suffering Messias was no such Paradox in the Divinity of the Ancient Iewish Rabbies it was a constant received speech among them that dividing all the Afflictions of the People of God into three parts one third was to fall upon the Messias And as for the Doctors and Fathers of the Christian Church they do all with one Unanimous Breath declare this to be a Prophecy of the Messias and this Messias to be Iesus Christ. And so full are they to this purpose that Esaias upon the account of this Prophecy is Styled by some of them Evangelista and Paulus Propheticus Nor was ever the least intimation given of any other sence of it till a little before this last Century a new Christianity has endeavour'd to get footing in the Christian World Second The other Opinion is of the Later Interpreters amongst which I account the Jewish that is such as have wrote after a Thousand Years since Christ's time Whose Opinion in this matter will be found to have this Eminent property of Falsity that it is very Various For having departed from the old received Interpretation they are no ways agreed what they shall substitute in the room of it Some will have the Subject of this Prophecy to have been the People of Israel Some indefinitely any Just or Righteous Person Some affirm it to have been Iosiah and one among the rest will needs have the Person here spoken of to have been the Prophet Ieremy The Authors of each of which Opinions give us such insipid Stories upon this Chapter as are fitter to be ushered in with the grave and solemn Preface of once upon a time than to be accounted Interpretations of the Word of God He who contends for the Prophet Ieremy is one Rabbi Saadias Haggaon and he stands alone not being countenanced by any of his Jewish Brethren till one in the Christian Church thought fit to be his second and out of his Zeal forsooth to the Christian Faith to wrest one of the strongest Arguments out of the Hands of the Christian Church which it has fought with against Judaism ever since it was a Church And thus much I shall with confidence because with evidence affirm that if such Prophecies may be proved to have had their first and literal Completion in the Person of any besides Iesus of Nazareth all Arguments proving them to belong to Him at a second hand and by accommodation as the word is are but vain and precarious to the Jew who will and indeed upon his Hypothesis may reject them as easily as we can alledge them and then convince him who can But how can this Prophecy be made to agree to Ieremy With what Truth or Propriety could he be said to have been Exalted and Extolled and to have been very High To have been Stricken for our Transgressions and to have had the Iniquity of us all laid upon Him How could it be said of him who shall declare his Generation And that he should see his Seed and prolong his Days and also that he should divide the Spoil with the Mighty With the like Expressions Why yes says our Expositor He was Exalted and very High because the Caldeans had him in admiration which yet is more than we read of and thanks to a good Invention for it Though it must be confessed that upon his being drawn out of the Dungeon he was something Higher and more Exalted than he was before In the next place he was Stricken for Transgression and had our Iniquities laid upon him because by the Sin and Injurious dealing of the Jews He was cruelly and unworthily used as indeed all or most of the Prophets were both before and after him And then for that saying Who shall declare his Generation The meaning of that we
inward Man the Labours and Strivings of his restless Thoughts which cast his Body into that Prodigious Sweat For though it was the Flesh that Sweated it was the Spirit that took the Pains It was that which was then treading the Wine-Press of God's Wrath alone till it made him Red in his Apparel and dyed all his Garments with Blood What thought can reach or Tongue express what our Saviour then felt within his own Breast The Image of all the Sins of the World for which he was to suffer then appeared clear and lively and express to his Mind All the vile and horrid circumstances of them stood as it were particularly ranged before his Eyes in all their dismal Colours He saw how much the Honour of the Great God was abused by them and how many millions of Poor Souls they must inevitably have cast under the Pressures of a Wrath Infinite and Intolerable should he not have turn'd the Blow upon himself The horrour of which then fill'd and amazed his vast Apprehensive Soul and those Apprehensions could not but affect his tender Heart then brimful of the highest Zeal for God's Glory and the most relenting Compassion for the Souls of Men till it fermented and boyled over with Transport and Agony and even forced its way through all his Body in those strange Ebullitions of Blood not to be parallel'd by the sufferings of any Person recorded in any History whatsoever It was this which drew those doleful words from him My Soul is exceeding sorrowful c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It was surrounded and as it were besieged with an Army of Sorrows And believe it his Soul was too big and of too strong a make to bend under an ordinary Sorrow It was not any of those little things which make us put the Finger in the Eye as loss of Estate Friends Preferment Interest and the like things too mean to raise a tumult in the Breast of a resolved Stoick and much less in His who both placed and preached Happiness not only in the want but in the very defyance of them And now after this his Agony in the Garden I need not much insist upon the Wounds given his Reputation by the Sword of a Blaspheming Tongue the sharpest of all others and which like a Poysoned Dagger hurting both with Edge and Venom too at the same time both makes a Wound and prevents its Cure Even a guilty Person feels the sting of a malicious Report and if so much more must one who is innocent and yet infinitely more must He who was not only Innocent but Innocence it self Reputation is tender and for it to be blown upon is to be tainted like a Glass the clearer and finer it is the more it suffers by the least Breath And therefore for him who came to destroy the Kingdom of Satan to be traduced as a Partner with and an Agent for Beelzebub For Him whose greatest Repasts were Prayer and abstinence and the most rigid severities upon Himself to be taxed as a Wine-bibber and a Good-fellow For Him who came into the World both in Life and Death to bear Witness to the Truth to suffer as an Impostor and a Deceiver what could be more grievous and afflicting to a great Innocence joyned with as great an Apprehension However his Church gains this great Advantage of Comfort by it that the worst of sufferings comes sanctified to our Hands by the Person of our grand Example Who was reviled and slandered and tossed upon the Tongues of Men before us A greater Martyrdom questionless than to be cast as the Primitive Christians were to the Mouths of Lyons which are tender and merciful compared to the Mouths of Men whether we look upon that bitter Spirit which acted in those Jews or in some Christians now adays worse than Jews Men who seem to have out-done all before them in the Arts of a more refined Malice and improved Calumny Qualities lately sprung up out of the stock of a spreading Atheism and a domineering reigning Sensuality Sins now made National and Authentick and so much both Iudgment and Mercy-proof that it is well if we can be cured without being cut off But to return to the business before us We have now seen the first thing setting forth the greatness of this suffering to wit the Latitude and Extent of it as that it seized both Body and Soul and every Part and Faculty of both Second The next thing declaring its greatness was the intenseness and sharpness of it We have seen already how far it went we are now to consider how deep It fell not on him like a dew or mist which only wets the surface of the Ground but like a pouring soaking Rain which descends into the very Bowels of it There was pain enough in every single part to have been spread in lesser Proportions over the whole Man Christ suffered only the exquisiteness and heights of pain without any of those mitigations which God is pleased to temper and allay it with as it befalls other Men like a Man who drinks only the Spirits of a Liquor separated and extracted from the dull unactive Body of the Liquor it self All the force and activity the stings and fierceness of that troublesome thing were as it were drain'd and distill'd and abridged into that Cup which Christ drank off There was something sharper than Vinegar and bitterer than Gall which that draught was prepared and made up with We cannot indeed say that the sufferings of Christ were long in duration for to be violent and lasting too is above the methods or measures of Nature But he who lived at that rate that he might be said to live an Age every hour was able to suffer so too and to comprize the greatest torments in the shortest space which yet by their shortness lost nothing of their Force and Keenness as a Pen-Knife is as sharp as a Spear though not so long That which promotes and adds to the Impressions of pain is the delicate and exact Crasis and Constitution of the Part or Faculty aggrieved And there is no doubt but the very Fabrick and Complexion of our Saviour's Body was a Master-piece of Nature a thing absolutely and exactly framed and of that fineness as to have the quickest and most sensible touches of every Object and withal to have these advanced by the communion of his admirably made Body with his high and vigorous Intellectuals All which made him drink in Pain more deeply feel every lash every wound with so much a closer and a more affecting sense For it is not to be doubted but a dull Fellow can endure the Paroxysms of a Fever or the Torments of the Gout or Stone much better than a Man of a quick mind and an exalted Fancy because in one Pain beats upon a Rock or an Anvil in the other it prints it self upon wax One is even born with a kind of Lethargy and stupefaction into the World armed with an Iron
Prey from the Mighty and a Captive from the strong and though he was in the very Iaws of Death yet he was not devoured Corruption the common Lot of Mortality seized not on him Worms and Putrefaction durst not approach him His Body was Sacred and inviolable as sweet under ground as above it and in Death it self retaining One of the highest Privileges of the Living 3. Come we now to the Last and principal thing proposed namely The Ground of Christ's Resurrection which was its absolute Necessity expressed in these Words Because it was not possible that He should be holden of it and that according to the strictest and most received sence of the word Possible For it was not only Par aequum that Christ should not always be detained under Death because of his Innocence as Grotius precariously and to serve an Hypothesis would have the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here signify but it was absolutely necessary that he should not and impossible that he should continue under the Bands of Death from the Peculiar Condition of his Person as well as upon several other Accounts And accordingly this Impossibility was founded upon these Five Things 1. The Union of Christ's Humane Nature to the Divine 2. God's Immutability 3. His Justice 4. The Necessity of Christ's being believed upon 5. And Lastly the Nature of his Priesthood First of all then The Hypostatical Vnion of Christ's Humane Nature to His Divine rendred a perpetual Duration under Death absolutely impossible For how could that which was united to the Great Source and Principle of Life be finally prevailed over by Death and pass into an Estate of perpetual darkness and oblivion Even while Christ's body was divided from his Soul yet it ceased not to maintain an intimate indissolvable Relation to his Divinity It was assumed into the same Person for according to the Creed of Athanasius As the Soul and Body make one Man so the Divine Nature and the Humane make One Christ. And if so is it imaginable that the Son of God could have one of his Natures rent wholly from his Person His Divinity as it were buoyed up his sinking Humanity and preserved it from a total Dissolution for as while the Soul continues joyned to the Body still speaking in sensu composito Death cannot pass upon it for as much as that is the proper Effect of their Separation So while Christ's Manhood was retained in a Personal conjunction with His Godhead the bands of death were but feeble and insignificant like the Wit hs and Cords upon Sampson while he was inspired with the mighty Presence and Assistance of God's Spirit It was possible indeed that the Divine Nature might for a while suspend its supporting influence and so deliver over the Humane Nature to pain and death but it was impossible for it to let go the relation it bore to it A Man may suffer his Child to fall to the ground and yet not wholly quit his hold of him but still Keep it in his power to recover and lift him up at his pleasure Thus the Divine Nature of Christ did for a while hide it self from his Humanity but not desert it put it into the Chambers of death but not lock the Everlasting Doors upon it The Sun may be clouded and yet not Eclipsed and Eclips'd but not stop'd in his Course and much less forced out of his Orb. It is a Mystery to be admired that any thing belonging to the Person of Christ should suffer but it is a Paradox to be exploded that it should perish For surely that Nature which diffusing it self throughout the Universe communicates an enlivening Influence to every part of it and quickens the least spire of grass according to the measure of its Nature and the proportion of its capacity would not wholly leave a Nature assumed into its Bosom and what is more into the very Unity of the Divine Person breathless and inanimate and dismantled of its Prime and Noblest Perfection For Life is so high a Perfection of Being that in this respect the least Fly or Mite is a more noble Being than a Star And God has expresly declared himself not the God of the Dead but of the Living and this in respect of the very Persons of Men but how much more with reference to what belongs to the Person of his Son For when Natures come to Unite so near as mutually to interchange Names and Attributes and to verify the Appellation by which God is said to be Man and Man to be God surely Man so privileg'd and advanced cannot for ever lie under Death without an insufferable invasion upon the entireness of that Glorious Person whose Perfection is as inviolable as it is incomprehensible 2. The Second Ground of the Impossibility of Christ's continuance under Death was that Great and Glorious Attribute of God His Immutability Christ's Resurrection was founded upon the same bottom with the consolation and Salvation of Believers expressed in that full declaration made by God of Himself Mala. 3.6 I the Lord change not therefore ye Sons of Jacob are not consumed Now the Immutability of God as it had an influence upon Christ's Resurrection was Two-fold First In respect of his Decree or Purpose Secondly In respect of his Word or Promise And First for his Decree God had from all Eternity designed this and sealed it by an irreversible Purpose For can we imagine that Christ's Resurrection was not decreed as well as his Death and sufferings and these in the 23. v. of this Chapter are expresly said to have been determined by God It is a known rule in Divinity that whatsoever God does in Time that He purposed to do from Eternity for there can be no new Purposes in God since he who takes up a new purpose does so because he sees some ground to induce him to such a purpose which he did not see before but this can have no place in an Infinite knowledge which by one Comprehensive Intuition sees all things as Present before ever they come to pass So that there can be no new Emergency that can alter the Divine Resolutions And therefore it having been Absolutely purposed to raise Christ from the Dead his Resurrection was as fixed and Necessary as the Purpose of God was Irrevocable A Purpose which Commenced from Eternity and was declared in the very Beginnings of Time a Purpose not to be Changed nor so much as bent and much less broke by all the Created Powers in Heaven and Earth and in Hell besides For though indeed Death is a great Conqueror and his Bands much too strong for Nature and Mortality Yet when over-matched by a Decree This Conqueror as old as he has grown in Conquest must surrender back his spoils unbind his Captives and in a word even Death it self must receive its Doom From all which it is manifest That where there is a Divine Decree there is always an Omnipotence to second it and Consequently That by