the Divine Nature David hath taught us in the Psalm that The righteousness of God is as the great Mountains and his judgments as the great Deep A great Mountain is easie to be seen a man that will but open his Eyes cannot overlook it but who can see into the bottom of the Sea or find out what is done in the depths thereof Whatsoever we do then let us beware we measure not his ways by our ways nor his works by our works howsoever they seem to swerve from the Rules of our ways and works yet still The Lord is righteous in all his ways and holy in all his works Though we cannot fathom the deeps of his judgments for The Well is deep and we have not wherewithal to draw yet let the assurance of the righteousness of all his proceedings stand firm and manifest as the mountains which can neither be removed nor hid but stand fast rooted for evermore This we must rest upon as a certain Truth howsoever whomsoever whensoever God punisheth he is never unjust The second Certainty To speak of Punishments properly No temporal Evil is simply and de toto genere a punishment By temporal Evils I understand all the poenal Evils of this life that do or may befal us from our bodily Conception to our bodily Deaths inclusivè hunger cold nakedness sicknesses infirmities discontents reproaches poverty imprisonments losses crosses distresses death and the rest in a word all that Sore travel which God hath given to the sons of man to be exercised therewith and that Heavy Yoke which is upon the Sons of Adam from the day that they go out of their Mothers Womb till the day that they return to the Mother of all things I say none of all these are properly and de toto genere to be accounted punishments For to make a thing simply and properly and formally a punishment there are required these Three Conditions 1. That it be painful and grievous to suffer 2. That it be inflicted for some fault 3. That it be involuntary and against the sufferers will That which hath but the first of these three conditions may be called after a sort and truly too Malum poenae a kind of punishment But 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and properly that Evil only is a punishment wherein the whole three conditions concur Now these Temporal Evils though they have the two first conditions all of them being grievous to suffer all of them being inflicted for sin yet in the third condition they fail because they are not involuntary simply and perpetually and de suo genere involuntary to omit also a kind of failing in the second condition not but that they are ever inflicted for some sin deserving them but for that there are withal other Ends and Reasons for which they are inflicted and whereunto they are intended besides and above the punishment of the Offence It may not be gainsaid indeed but these things are involuntary sometimes in the particular and especially to some men even the least of them but simply and universally such they are not since by other some men the greatest of them are willingly and chearfully not only suffered but desired Not but that they are grievous to the best It must needs be some grief as to the Merchant to see his rich lading cast over-board and to the Patient to have an old festered sore searched and singed so to the Christian to have Gods correcting hand lie heavy upon him in some Temporal Affliction The Apostle telleth us plainly No Affliction for the present is joyous but grievous But involuntary it is no more in him than those other things are in them As therefore the Merchant though it pity his heart to see so much wealth irrecoverably lost yet getteth the best help and useth the best speed he can to empty the Vessel of them for the saving of his life and as the Patient though he smart when the wound is dressed yet thanketh and feeth the Surgeon for his pains in hope of future ease so the Christian though these temporal evils somewhat trouble him yet he is willing to them and he is chearful under them and he acknowledgeth Gods goodness in them and returneth him thanks for them because he knoweth they are sent for his future good and that they will at the last yield him the peaceable fruit of Righteousness when he shall have been sufficiently exercised thereby See Peter and Iohn rejoycing when they suffered for the Name of Jesus and S. Paul so far from fearing that he longed after his dissolution and the blessed Martyrs running to a faggot as to a feast Verily Gods children see great good in these things which others account evils and therefore they take them not as bare punishments sent to afflict them but as glorious trials to exercise them as gracious corrections to humble them as precious receipts to purge and recover and restore and strengthen them So that it is not any of the temporal evils of this life but much rather the everlasting pains of Hell wherein the just reward and punishment of sin properly and especially consisteth The wages of sin is death the proper wages of sin eternal death For so the Antithesis in that place giveth it to be understood viz. of such a Death as is opposed to Eternal Life and that is Eternal Death The wages of sin is death but the gift of God is Eternal Life Rom. 6. By the distribution of those Eternal Punishments then we are rather to judge of Gods Righteousness in recompensing sinners than by the dispensation of these temporal evils It was a stumbling block to the Heathen to see good men oppressed and Vice prosper it made them doubt some whether there were a God or no others nothing better whether a Providence or no But what marvel if they stumbled who had no right knowledge either of God or of his Providence when Iob and David and other the dear Children of God have been much puzled with it David confesseth in Psal. 73. that His feet had well nigh slipped when he saw the prosperity of the wicked and certainly down he had been had he not happily stepped into the Sanctuary of God and there understood the end of these men Temporal evils though they be sometimes punishments of sin yet they are not ever sent as punishments because sometimes they have other Ends and Uses and are ordinabilia in melius and secondly they are never the only punishments of sins because there are greater and more lasting punishments reserved for sinners after this life of which there is no other use or end but to punish since they are not ordinabilia in melius If we will make these temporal evils the measure whereby to judge of the justice of God we cannot secure ourselves from erring dangerously Gods purposes in the dispensation of these unto particular men being unsearchable But those
and we by our sale could convey unto him no more right than we had our selves which was just none at all Our Redeemer therefore would not enter into any capitulation with him or offer to him any Terms of composition But thought good rather in pursuance of his own right to use his power And so he vindicated us from him by main strength with his own right hand and with his holy arm he got himself the victory and us liberty without any price or ransom paid him 34. But then unto Almighty God his Father and our Lord under whose heavy Curse we lay and whose just vengeance would not be appeased towards us for our grievous presumption without a condign satisfaction to him I say there was a price paid by our Redeemer and that the greatest that ever was paid for any purchase since the world began Not silver and gold saith St. Peter which being corruptible things are not valuable against our immortal and incorruptible souls But even himself in whom are absconditi thesauri amassed and hidden all the treasures of the wisdom of God and even the whole riches of his grace treasure enough to redeem a whole world of sinners Take it collectively or distributively singula generum or genera singulorum this way or that way or which way you will in Christ there is copiosa redemptio redemption plenty and enough for all if they will but accept it Take all mankind singly one by one He gave himself for me saith St. Paul in one place Take them altogether in the lump He gave himself a ransom for all in another 35. Now for a man to give himself what is it else but to give his soul for that is himself as we heard before and his life for vita in anim◠the life is in the soul and these he gave He gave up his soul when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin Isa. 53. 10. and he laid down his life the Son of man came to give his life a ransom for many Mat. 10. More than this in love he could not give for what greater love than to lay down ones life And less than this in justice he might not give for Death by the Law being the wages of sin there could be no Redemption from death so as to satisfie the Law without the death of the Redeemer 36. Yea and it must be a bloody death too for anima in sanguine the life is in the blood and without shedding of blood there can be no remission no redemption All those bloody sacrifices of Bulls and Goats and Lambs in the Old Testament all those frequent sprinklings of blood upon the door posts upon the book upon the people upon the tabernacle and upon all the vessels of ministry and all those legal purifications in which blood was used as almost all things are by the Law purged with blood Heb. 9. they were all but so many types and shadows prefiguring this blood of springling which speaketh so many good things for us pacifieth the fierce anger of God towards us purgeth us from all sins and redeemeth us from hell and damnation I mean the meritorious blood of the Cross the most precious blood of Christ as of a Lamb without blemish 1 Pet. 1. 18. 37. But can there be worth enough may some say in the blood of a Lamb of one single Lamb to be a valuable compensation for the sins of the whole world First this was agnus singularis a Lamb of special note not such another in the whole flock All we like sheep have gone astray but so did this Lamb never All of us like the encrease of Labans flock speckled or ring-streaked but this Lamb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if Momus himself were set to search he could not yet find the least spot or blemish A cunninger searcher than he hath pried narrowly into every corner of his life who if there had been any thing amiss would have been sure to have spied it and proclaimed it but could find nothing The Prince of this world cometh and hath nothing in me That is something his Innocency But if that be not enough for the Angels are also innocent behold then more He is secondly Agnus Dei the Lamb of God that is the Lamb which God hath appointed and set a-part for this service by special designation so as either this party must do it or none There is no other name given under heaven no nor in heaven neither nor above by which we can be redeemed Him and him alone hath God the Father sealed and by vertue of that Seal authorized and enabled to undertake this great work Or if you have not yet enough for it may be said what if it had been the pleasure of God to have sealed one of the Angels Behold then thirdly that which is beyond all exception and leaveth no place for cavil or scruple He is Agnus Deus The Lamb is God the Son of God very God of very God and so the blood of this Lamb is the very blood of God Act. 20. And it is this dignity of his Nature especially and not his innocency only no nor yet his deputation too without this that setteth such a huge value upon his blood that it is an infinite price of infinite merit able to satisfie an infinite justice and to appease an infinite wrath 31. You will now confess I doubt not that this Redemption was not gratis came not for nothing in respect of him it cost him full dear even his dearest lifes-blood But then in respect of us it was a most free and gracious Redemption It was no charge at all to us we disburs'd not a mite not a doyt towards it Which is the very true reason why it is said in the Text Ye shall be redeemed without money This work then is meerly an act of grace not a fruit of merit of grace abundant grace on his part no merit not the least merit at all on ours And well it is for us that we have to do with so gracious a God Go to an officer and who can promise to himself any ordinary favour from him without a fee Go into the shops and what can ye take up without either money credit or security for it Si nihil attuleris bring nothing and have nothing Only when we have to do with God Poverty is no impediment but rather an advantage to us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Gospel belongeth to none but the poor only The tidings of a Redeemer most blessed and welcome news to those that are sensible of their own poverty and take it as of Grace But whoso thinketh his own penny good silver and will be putting in and bidding for it will stand upon his terms as David did with Araunah and will pay for it or he will not have it Let that man beware lest his money and he perish
understanding can fathom Sic Deus dilexit So God loved the world But how much that so containeth no tongue or wit of man can reach Nothing expresseth it better to the life than the work it self doth That the Word should be made Flesh that the holy One of God should be made sin that God blessed for ever should be made a curse that the Lord of life and glory should suffer an inglorious death and pour out his own most precious blood to ransome such worthless thankless graceless Traitors as we were that had so desperately made our selves away and that into the hands of his deadliest enemy and that upon such poor and unworthy conditions O altitudo Love incomprehensible It swalloweth up the sense and understanding of Men and Angels fitter to be admired and adored with silence than blemished with any our weak Expressions 29. I leave it therefore and go on to the next his Right When de facto we sold our selves to Satan we had de jure no power or right at all so to do being we were not our own and so in truth the title is naught and the sale void Yet it is good against us however we may not plead the invalidity of it forsomuch as in reason no man ought to make advantage of his own act Our act then barreth us But yet it cannot bar the right owner from challenging his own wheresoever he find it And therefore we may be well assured God will not suffer the Devil who is but malae fidei possessor an intruder and a cheater quietly to enjoy what is Gods and not his but he will eject him we have that word Ioh. 12. 21. Ejicietur now is the Prince of this world cast out and recover out of his possession that which he hath no right at all to hold 30. Sundry inferences we might raise hence if we had time I may not insist yet I cannot but touch at three duties which we owe to God for this Redemption because they answer so fitly to these three last mentioned assurances We owe him Affiance in respect of his Power in requital of his Love Thankfulness and in regard of his Right Service First the consideration of his Power in our Redemption may put a great deal of comfort and confidence into us that having now redeemed us if we do but cleave fast to him and revolt not again he will protect us from Sin and Satan and all other enemies and pretenders whatsoever O Israel fear not for I have redeemed thee Isa. 43. If then the Devil shall seek by any of his wiles or suggestions at any time to get us over to him again as he is an unwearied sollicitor and will not lose his claim by discontinuance Let us then look to that Cornu salutis that horn of salvation that God hath raised up for us in Christ our Redeemer and flie thither for succour as to the horns of the Altar saying with David Psalm 119. I am thine oh save me and we shall be safe In all inward temptations in all outward distresses at the hour of death and in the day of judgement we may with great security commit the keeping our souls to him both as a faithful Creator and as a powerful Redeemer saying once more with David into thy hands I commend my spirit for thou hast redeemed me O Lord thou God of truth Psal. 31. 6. 31. Secondly The consideration of his love in our Redemption should quicken us to a thankful acknowledgment of his great and undeserved goodness towards us Let them give thanks whom the Lord hath redeemed and delivered from the hands of the enemy Psal. 107. Let all men let all creatures do it but let them especially If the blessings of corn and wine and oyl of health and peace and plenty of deliverance from sicknesses pestilences famines and other calamities can so affect us as to provoke at least some overly and superficial forms of thanksgiving from us how carnal are our minds and our thoughts earthly if the contemplation of the depth of the riches of God mercy poured our upon us in this great work of our Redemption do not even ravish our hearts with an ardent desire to pour them out unto him again in Hymns and Psalms and Songs of Thanksgiving with a Benedictus in our mouths Blessed be the Lord God of Israel for he hath visited and redeemed his people 32. Thirdly The consideration of his Right should bind us to do him service We were his before for he made us and we ought him service for that But now we are his more than before and by a new title for he hath bought us and paid for us and we owe him more service for that The Apostle therefore urgeth it as a matter of great equity you are not your own but his therefore you are not to satisfie your selves by doing your own lusts but to glorifie him by doing his will When Christ redeemed us by his blood his purpose was to redeem us unto God Rev. 5. 9. and not to our selves and to redeem us from our vain conversation 1 Pet. 1. 18. and not to it And he therefore delivered us out of the hands of our enemies that we might the more freely and securely and without fear serve him in holiness and righteousness all the daies of our lives Luke 1. which being both our bounden duty and the thing withal so very reasonable we have the more to answer for i◠we do not make a conscience of it to perform it accordingly He hath done his part and that which he was no way bound unto in redeeming us and he hath done it to purpose done it effectually Let it be our care to do our part for which their lye so many obligations upon us in serving him and let us also do it to purpose do it really and throughly and constantly 33. Thus is our Redemption done effectually it is also done freely which is the only point now remaining Not for price nor reward Isa. 45. 13. but freely and without money here in the Text. Nor need we here fear another contradiction For the meaning is not that there was no price paid at all but that there was none paid by us we laid out nothing towards this great Purchase there went none of our money to it But otherwise that there was a price paid the Scriptures are clear You are bought with a price saith St. Paul 1 Cor. 6. and he saith it over again Chap. 7. He that paid it calleth it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a ransom that is as much as to say a price of Redemption and his Apostle somewhat more 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which implieth a just and satisfactory price full as much as the thing can be worth Yet not paid to Satan in whose possession we were for we have found already that he was but an Usurper and his title naught He had but bought of us
it a man whose great Wisdom and Bounty and Sanctity of Life gave a denomination to it or hath made it the more memorable as indeed it ought also to be for being the birth-place of our Robert Sanderson And the Reader will be of my belief if this humble Relation of his Life can hold any proportion with his great Sanctity his useful Learning and his many other extaordinary Endowments He was the second and youngest Son of Robert Sanderson of Gilthwait-hall in the said Parish and County Esq by Elizabeth one of the Daughters of Richard Carr of Buterthwate-hall in the Parish of Ecclesfield in the said County of York Gentleman This Robert Sanderson the Father was descended from a numerous ancient and honourable Family of his own Name for the search of which truth I refer my Reader that inclines to it tâ— Dr. Thoriton's History of the Antiâ—â—ities of Nottinghamshire and other Records not thinking it necessary here to ingage him into a search for bare Titles which are noted to have in them nothing of reality For Titles not acquir'd but deriv'd only do but shew us who of our Ancestors have and how they have atchiev'd that honour which their Descendants claim and may not be worthy to enjoy For if those Titles descend to persons that degenerate into Vice and break off the continued line of Learning or Valour or that Vertue that acquir'd them they destroy the very Foundation upon which that Honour was built and all the Rubbish of their Degenerousness ought to fall heavy on such dishonourable Heads ought to fall so heavy as to degrade them of their Titles and blast their Memories with reproach and shame But this Robert Sanderson lived worthy of his Name and Family of which one testimony may be That Gilbert call'd the great and glorious Earl of Shrewsbury thought him not unworthy to be joyn'd with him as a God-Father to Gilbert Sheldon the late Lord Archbishop of Canterbury to whose Merits and Memory Posterity the Clergy especially ought to pay a Reverence But I return to my intended Relation of Robert the Son who like Iosia that good King began in his Youth to make the Laws of God and Obedience to his Parents the Rules of his life seeming even then to dedicate himself and all his Studies to Piety and Vertue And as he was inclin'd to this by that native goodness with which the wise Disposer of all hearts had endow'd his So this calm this quiet and happy temper of mind his being mild and averse to oppositions made the whole course of his life easie and grateful both to himself and others And this blessed temper was maintain'd and improv'd by his prudent Fathers good Example as also by his frequent conversing with him and scattering short and vertuous Apothegms with little pleasant Stories and making useful applications of them by which his Son was in his Infancy taught to abhor Vanity and Vice as Monsters and to discern the loveliness of Wisdom and Vertue and by these means and God's concurring Grace his knowledge was so augmented and his native goodness so confirm'd that all became so habitual as 't was not easie to determine whether Nature or Education were his Teachers And here let me tell the Reader That these early beginnings of Vertue were by God's assisting Grace blest with what St. Paul seem'd to beg for his Philippians namely That he that had begun a good Work in them would finish it And Almighty God did For his whole life was so regular and innocent that he might have said at his death and with truth and comfort what the same St. Paul said after to the same Philippians when he advis'd them to walk as they had him for an Example And this goodness of which I have spoken seem'd to increase as his years did and with his goodness his learning the foundation of which was laid in the Grammar School of Rotheram that being one of those three that were founded and liberally endow'd by the said great and good Bishop of that Name And in this time of his being a Scholar there he was observ'd to use on unwearied diligence to attain learning and to have a seriousness beyond his age and with it a more than common modesty and to be of so calm and obliging behaviour that the Master and whole number of Scholars lov'd him as one man And in this love and amity he continued at that School till about the thirteenth year of his Age at which time his Father design'd to improve his Grammar learning by removing him from Rotheram to one of the more noted Schools of Eaton or Westminster and after a years stay there then to remove him thence to Oxford But as he went with him he call'd on an old Friend a Minister of noted learning and told him his intentions and he after many questions with his Son receiv'd such Answers from him that he assur'd his Father his Son was so perfect a Grammarian that he had laid a good foundation to build any or all the Arts upon and therefore advis'd him to shorten his journey and leave him at Oxford And his Father did so His Father left him there to the sole care and manage of Dr. Kilbie who was then Rector of Lincoln College And he after some time and trial of his manners and learning thought fit to enter him of that College and not long after to matriculate him in the University which he did the first of Iuly 1603. but he was not chosen Fellow till the third of May 1606. at which time he had taken his degree of Batchelor of Arts at the taking of which Degree his Tutor told the Rector that his Pupil Sanderson had a Metaphysical brain and a matchless memory and that he thought he had improv'd or made the last so by an Art of his own invention And all the future imployments of his life prov'd that his Tutor was not mistaken I must here stop my Reader and tell him that this Dr. Kilibie was a man of so great Learning and Wisdom and so excellent a Critick in the Hebrew Tongue that he was made Professor of it in this University and was also so perfect a Grecian that he was by King Iames appointed to be one of the Translators of the Bible And that this Doctor and Mr. Sanderson had frequent Discourses and lov'd as Father and Son The Doctor was to ride a Journey into Darbyshire and took Mr. Sanderson to bear him company and they resting on a Sunday with the Doctor 's Friend and going together to that Parish Church where they then were found the young Preacher to have no more discretion than to waste a great part of the hour allotted for his Sermon in exceptions against the late Translation of several words not expecting such a hearer as Dr. Kilibie and shew'd three Reasons why a particular word should have been otherwise translated When Evening Prayer was ended the Preacher was invited to the Doctor
into some such irregularity as made him conscious he had transgressed his Statutes did therefore apprehend the Proctor's invitation as an introduction to punishment the fear of which made his Bed restless that night but at their meeting the next morning that fear vanish'd immediately by the Proctor's chearful countenance and the freedom of their discourse of Friends And let me tell my Reader that this first meeting prov'd the begining of as spiritual a friendship as humane nature is capable of of a friendship free from all self-ends and it continued to be so till death forc'd a separation of it on earth but 't is now reunited in Heaven And now having given this account of his behaviour and the considerable accidents in his Proctorship I proceed to tell my Reader that this busie employment being ended he preach'd his Sermon for his degree of Batchelor in Divinity in as eligant Latin and as remarkable for the method and matter as hath been preached in that University since that day And having well performed his other Exercises for that degree he took it the nine and twentieth of May following having been ordained Deacon and Priest in the year 1611. by Iohn King then Bishop of London who had not long before been Dean of Christ-Church and then knew him so well that he own'd it at his Ordination and became his more affectionate Friend And in this year being then about the 29th of his Age he took from the University a Licence to preach In the year 1618. he was by Sir Nicholas Sanderson Lord Viscount Castleton presented to the Rectory of Wibberton not far from Boston in the County of Lincoln a Living of very good value but it lay in so low and wet a part of that Countrey as was inconsistent with his health And health being next to a good Conscience the greatest of God's blessings in this life and requiring therefore of every man a care and diligence to preserve it and he apprehending a danger of losing it if he continued at Wibberton a second Winter did therefore resign it back into the hands of his worthy Kinsman and Patron about one year after his donation of it to him And about this time of his resignation he was presented to the Rectory of Boothby Pannel in the same County of Lincoln a Town which has been made famous and must continue to be famous because Dr. Sanderson the humble and learned Dr. Sanderson was more than forty years Parson of Boothby Pannel and from thence dated all or most of his matchless Writings To this Living which was of less value but a purer Air then Wibberton he was presented by Thomas Harrington of the same County and Parish Esq a Gentleman of a very ancient Family and of great use and esteem in his Country during his whole life And in this Boothby Pannel the meek and charitable Dr. Sanderson and his Patron liv'd with an endearing mutual and comfortable friendship till the death of the last put a period to it About the time that he was made Parson of Boothby Pannel he resign'd his Fellowship of Lincoln Colledge unto the then Rector and Fellows And his resignation is recorded in these words Ego Robertus Sanderson per c. I Robert Sanderson Fellow of the Colledge of St. Maries and All-Saints commonly call'd Lincoln Colledge in the University of Oxford do freely and willingly resign into the hands of the Rector and Fellows all the Right and Title that I have in the said Colledge wishing to them and their Successors all peace and piety and happiness in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost Amen May 6. 1619. Robert Sanderson And not long after this Resignation he was by the then Bishop of York or the King Sede vacante made Prebend of the Collegiate Church of Southwell in that Diocess and shortly after of Lincoln by the Bishop of that See And being now resolv'd to set down his rest in a quiet privacy at Boothby Pannel and looking back with some sadness upon his removal from his general and chearful Acquaintance left in Oxford and the peculiar pleasures of a University life he could not but think the want of Society would render this of a Country Parson still more uncomfortable by reason of that want of conversation and therefore he did put on some faint purposes to marry For he had considered that though marriage be cumbred with more worldly care than a single life yet a complying and prudent Wife changes those very cares into so mutual Joys as makes them become like the Sufferings of St. Paul which he would not have wanted because they occasion'd his rejoycing in them And he having well considered this and observ'd the secret unutterable joys that Children beget in Parents and the mutual pleasures and contented trouble of their daily care and constant endeavours to bring up those little Images of themselves so as to make them as happy as all those cares and endeavours can make them He having considered all this the hopes of such happiness turn'd his faint purpose into a positive resolution to marry And he was so happy as to obtain Anne the Daughter of Henry Nelson Batchelor in Divinity then Rector of Haugham in the County of Lincoln a man of noted worth and learning And the giver of all good things was so good to him as to give him such a Wife as was sutable to his own desires a Wife that made his life happy by being always content when he was chearful that was always chearful when he was content that divided her joys with him and abated of his sorrow by bearing a part of that burthen a Wife that demonstrated her affection by a chearful obedience to all his desires during the whole course of his life and at his death too for she out-liv'd him And in this Boothby Pannel he either found or made his Parishoners peaceable and complying with him in the constant decent and regular service of God And thus his Parish his Patron and he liv'd together in a religious love and a contented quietness He not troubling their thoughts by preaching high and useless notions but such and only such plain truths as were necessary to be known believed and practised in order to the honour of God and their own salvation And their assent to what he taught was testified by such a conformity to his Doctrine as declared they believed and loved him For it may be noted he would often say That without the last the most evident truths heard as from an Enemy or an evil liver either are not or are at least the less effectual and usually rather harden than convince the hearer And this excellent man did not think his Duty discharged by only reading the Church-Prayers Catechizing Preaching and administring the Sacraments seasonably but thought if the Law or the Canons may seem to injoyn no more yet that God would require more than the defective Laws of man's
â—â—â—s said that after many hard Questions put to the Prophet Daniel King Darius found* an excellent Spirit in him so 't was with Mr. Sanderson and our Excellent King who having put many Cases of Conscience to him received from Mr. Sanderson such deliberate safe and clear Solutions as gave him so great content in conversing with him which he did several times in private That at the end of his months Attendance the King told him He should long for the next November for he resolv'd to have a more inward Acquaintance with him when that month and he return'd And when the month and he did return the good King was never absent from his Sermons and would usually say I carry my ears to hear other Preachers but I carry my Conscience to hear Mr. Sanderson and to act accordingly And this ought not to be conceal'd from Posterity That the King thought what he spake For he took him to be his Adviser in that quiet part of his life and he prov'd to be his Comforter in those days of his affliction when he was under such a restraint as he apprehended himself to be in danger of Death or Deposing Of which more hereafter In the first Parliament of this good King which was 1625. he was chosen to be a Clerk of the Convocation for the Diocess of Lincoln which I here mention because about that time did arise many disputes about Predestination and the many Critical Points that depend upon or are interwoven in it occasion'd as was said by a disquisition of new Principles of Mr. Calvin's though others say they were long before his time But of these Dr. Sanderson then drew up for his own satisfaction such a Scheme he call'd it Pax Ecclesia as then gave himself and hath since given others such satisfaction that it still remains to be of great estimation He was also chosen Clerk of all the Convocations during that good Kings reign Which I here tell my Reader because I shall hereafter have occasion to mention that Convocation in 1640. that unhappy long Parliament and some debates of the Predestinarian Points as they have been since charitably handled betwixt him the learned Dr. Hammond and Dr. Pierce the now reverend Dean of Salisbury And here the Reader may note that in Letters writ to the said Dean Dr. Sanderson seems to have alter'd his Judgment in some Points since he writ his Scheme called Pax Ecclesia which he seems to say in his last Will besides other reasons to think so In the year 1636. his Majesty then in his Progress took a fair occasion to visit Oxford and to take an entertainment for two days for himself and his honourable Attendants which the Reader ought to believe was sutable to their dignities But this is mention'd because at the King 's coming thither May 3. Sanderson did then attend him and was then the 31 of August created Doctor of Divinity which honor had an addition to it by having many of the Nobility of this Nation then made Doctors and Masters of Art with him Some of whose names shall be recorded and live with his and none shall out-live it First Dr. Curle and Dr. Wren who were then Bishops of Winton and of Norwich and had formerly taken their Degrees in Cambridge were with him created Doctors of Divinity in his University So was Merick the Son of the learned Izaac Causabon and Prince Rupert who still lives the then Duke of Lenox Earl of Hereford Earl of Essex of Barkshire and very many others of noble Birth too many to be named were then created Masters of Arts. Some years before the unhappy long Parliament this Nation being then happy and in peace though inwardly sick of being well namely in the year 1639. a discontented party of the Scots Church were zealously restless for another Reformation of their Kâ—rk Government and to that end created a new Covenant for the general taking of which they pretended to petition the King for his assent and that he would enjoyn the taking of it by all of that Nation but this Petition was not to be presented to him by a Committee of eight or ten men of their Fraternity but by so many thousands and they so arm'd as seem'd to force an assent to what they seem'd but to request so that though forbidden by the King yet they entred England and in their heat of Zeal took and plunder'd New-Castle where the King was forc'd to meet them with an Army but upon a Treaty and some concessions he sent them back though not so rich as they intended yet for that time without blood-shed But oh this Peace and this Covenant were but the forerunners of War and the many miseries that follow'd For in the year following there were so many chosen into the long Parliament that were of a conjunct Council with these very zealous and as factious Reformers as begot such a confusion by the several desires designs in many of the Members of that Parliament all did never consent and at last in the very common People of this Nation that they were so lost by contrary designs fears and confusions as to believe the Scots and their Covenant would restore them to that former tranquility which they had lost And to that end the Presbyterian Party of this Nation did again in the year 1643. invite the Scotch Covenanters back into England and hither they came marching with it gloriously upon their Pikes and in their Hats with this Motto For the Crown and Covenant of both Kingdoms This I saw and suffer'd by it But when I look back upon the ruine of Families the bloodshed the decay of common honesty and how the former piety and plain-dealing of this now sinful Nation is turn'd into cruelty and cunning when I consider this I praise God that he prevented me from being of that Party which help'd to bring in this Covenant and those sad confusions that have follow'd it And I have been the bolder to say this of my self because in a sad discourse with Dr. Sanderson I heard him make the like grateful acknowledgment This digression is intended for the better information of the Reader in what will follow concerning Dr. Sanderson And first That the Covenanters of this Nation and their Party in Parliament made many Exceptions against the Common-Prayer and Ceremonies of the Church and seem'd restless for another Reformation And though their desires seem'd not reasonable to the King and the learn'd Dr. Laud then Archbishop of Canterbury and many others yet to quiet their Consciences and prevent future confusion they did in the year 1641. desire Dr. Sanderson to call two more of the Convocation to advise with him and that he would then draw up some such safe alterations as he thought fit in the Service-Book and abate some of the Ceremonies that were least material for satisfying their consciences and to this end he and two others did meet together privately twice a week at the
write Cases of Conscience And let me here take occasion to tell the Reader this truth very fit but not commonly known that in one of these Conferences this Conscientious King was told by a faithful and private Intelligencer that if he assented not to the Parliaments Proposals the Treaty 'twixt him and them would break immediately and his life would then be in danger he was sure he knew it To which his answer was I have done what I can to bring my Conscience to a complyance with their Proposals and cannot and I will not lose my Conscience to save my Life and within a very short time after he told Dr. Sanderson and Dr. Morley or one of them that then waited with him That the remembrance of two Errors did much afflict him which were his assent to the Earl of Strafford's death and the abolishing Episcopacy in Scotland and that if God ever restored him to be in a peaceable possession of his Crown he would demonstrate his Repentance by a publick Confession and voluntary Pennance I think barefoot from the Tower of London or Whitehall to St. Paul's Church and desire the people to intercede with God for his pardon I am sure one of them that told it me lives still and will witness it And it ought to be observ'd that Dr. Sanderson's Lectures de Iuramento were so approv'd and valu'd by the King that in this time of his imprisonment and solitude he translated them into exact Enlish desiring Dr. Iuxson then Bishop of London Dr. Hammond and Sir Thomas Herbert who then attended him in his restraint to compare them with the Original The last still lives and has declared it with some other of that King's excellencies in a Letter under his own hand which was lately shew'd me by Sir William Dugdale King at Arms. The translation was design'd to be put into the King's Library at St. Iames's but I doubt not now to be found there I thought the honor of the Author and the Translator to be both so much concerned in this Relation that it ought not to be concealed from the Reader and 't is therefore here inserted I now return to Dr. Sanderson in the Chair in Oxford where they that comply'd not in taking the Covenant Negative Oath and Parliament Ordinance for Church Discipline and Worship were under a sad and daily apprehension of Expulsion for the Visiters were daily expected and both City and University full of Soldiers and a party of Presbyterian Divines that were as greedy and ready to possess as the ignorant and ill natur'd Visiters were to eject the Dissenters out of their Colledges and Livelyhoods But notwithstanding Dr. Sanderson did still continue to read his Lecture and did to the very faces of those Presbyterian Divines and Soldiers read with so much reason and with a calm fortitude make such applications as if they were not they ought to have been asham'd and beg'd pardon of God and him and forborn to do what follow'd But these thriving sinners were hard'ned and as the Visiters expell'd the Orthodox they without scruple or shame possest themselves immediately of their Colledges so that with the rest Dr. Sanderson was in Iune 1648 forc'd to pack up and be gone and thank God he was not imprison'd as Dr. Shelden Dr. Hammond and others then were I must now again look back to Oxford and tell my Reader that the year before this expulsion when the University had deny'd this Subscription and apprehended the danger of that Visitation which followed they sent Dr. Morley then Canon of Christ-Church now Lord Bishop of Winchester and others to petition the Parliament for re-calling the Injunction or a mitigation of it or to accept of their Reasons why they could not take the Oaths injoyn'd them and the Petition was by Parliament referr'd to a Committee to hear and report the Reasons to the House and a day set for hearing them This done Dr. Morley and the rest went to inform fee Counsel to plead their Cause on the day appointed but there had been so many committed for pleading that none durst be so bold as to undertake it cordially for at this time the priviledges of that part of the Parliament then sitting were become a Noli me tangere as sacred and useful to them as Traditions ever were or are now to the Church of Rome their number must never be known and therefore not without danger to be meddled with For which Reason Dr. Morley was forc'd for want of Counsel to plead the Universities Reasons for not complyance with the Parliaments injunctions and though this was done with great reason and a boldness equal to the Justice of his Cause yet the effect of it was but that he and the rest appearing with him were so fortunate as to return to Oxford without commitment This was some few days before the Visiters and more Soldiers were sent down to drive the Dissenters out of the University And one that was at this time of Dr. Morley's pleading a powerful man in the Parliament and of that Committee observing Dr. Morley's behaviour reason inquiring of him and hearing a good report of his Principles in Religion and of his Morals was therefore willing to afford him a peculiar favour and that he might express it sent for me that relate this Story and knew Dr. Morley well and told me He had such a love for Dr. Morley that knowing he would not take the Oaths and must therefore he ejected his Colledge and leave Oxford he desir'd I would therefore write to him to ride out of Oxford when the Visiters came into it and not return till they left it and he should be sure then to return in safety and that by so doing he should without taking any Oath or other molestation enjoy his Canons place in the Colledge I did receive this intended kindness with a sudden gladness because I was sure the party had a power to do what he profest and as sure he meant to perform it and did therefore write the Doctor word to which his Answer was That I must not fail to return my Friend who still lives his humble and undissembled thanks though he could not accept of his intended kindness for when Dr. Fell then the Dean Dr. Gardner Dr. Paine Dr. Hammond Dr. Sanderson and all the rest of the Colledge were turn'd out except Dr. Wall he should take it to be if not a sin yet a shame to be left behind with him only Dr. Wall I knew and will speak nothing of him for he is dead It may be easily imagined with what a joyful willingness these self-loving Reformers took possession of all vacant preferments and with what reluctance others parted with their beloved Colledges and Subsistance but their Consciences were dearer than both and out they went the Reformers possessing them without shame or scruple where I will leave these Scruple-Mongers and proceed to make an account of the then present Affairs of London
but a perswasive offer and left to us to receive or refuse is not that grace which shall bring men to Heaven Which truths or untruths or both be they which they will did upon these or the like occasions come to be searched into and charitably debated betwixt Dr. Sanderson Dr. Hammond and Dr. Pierce the now reverend Dean of Salisbury of which I shall proceed to give some account but briefly In the year 1648. the 52 London Ministers then a Fraternity of Sion Colledge in that City had in a printed Declaration aspers'd Dr. Hammond most heinously for that he had in his Practical Catechism affirm'd That our Saviour died for the sins of all mankind To justifie which truth he presently makes a charitable Reply as 't is now printed in his Works After which there were many Letters past betwixt the said Dr. Hammond Dr. Sanderson and Dr. Pierce concerning God's grace and decrees Dr. Sanderson was with much unwillingness drawn into this Debate for he declared it would prove uneasie to him who in his judgment of God's decrees differ'd with Dr. Hammond whom he reverenced and loved dearly and would not therefore ingage himself in a Controversie of which he could never hope to see and end nevertheless they did all enter into a charitable disquisition of these said Points in several Letters to the full satisfaction of the Learned those betwixt Dr. Sanderson and Dr. Hammond being now printed in his Works and for what past betwixt him and the learned Dr. Pierce I refer my Reader to a Letter sent to me and annext to the end of this Relation I think the Judgment of Dr. Sanderson was by these Debates altered from what it was at his entrance into them for in the year 1632 when his excellent Sermons were first printed in 4 o the Reader may on the Margent find some accusation of Arminius for false Doctrine and find that upon a review and reprinting those Sermons in folio in the year 1657. that accusation of Arminius is omitted And the change of his judgment seems more fully to appear in his said Letter to Dr. Pierce And let me now tell the Reader which may seem to be perplex'd with these several affirmations of God's decrees before mentioned that Dr. Hammond in a Postscript to the last Letter of his to Dr. Sanderson says God can reconcile his own contradictions and therefore advises all men as the Apostle does to study mortification and be wise to sobriety And let me add further that if these 52 Ministers of Sion Colledge were the occasion of the Debates in these Letters they have I think been the occasion of giving an end to the Quinquarticular Controversie for none have since undertaken to say more but seem to be so wise as to be content to be ignorant of the rest till they come to that place where the secrets of all hearts shall be laid open And let me here tell the Reader also that if the rest of mankind would as Dr. Sanderson not conceal their alteration of Judgment but confess it to the honour of God and themselves then our Nation would become freer from pertinacious Disputes and fuller of Recantations I am not willing to lead my Reader to Dr. Hammond and Dr. Sanderson where we left them together at Boothly Pannel till I have look'd back to the long Parliament the Society of Covenanters in Sion Colledge and those others scattered up and down in London and given some account of their proceedings and usage of the late learned Dr. Laud then Archbishop of Canterbury whose life seem'd to be sacrific'd to appease the popular fury of that present time And though I will forbear to mention the injustice of his death and the barbarous usage of him both at his Tryal and before it yet my desire is that what follows may be noted because it does now or may hereafter concern us that is to note That in his last sad Sermon on the Scaffold at his death he did as our blessed Saviour advis'd his Disciples Pray for those that persecuted and despitefully used him And not only pardon'd those Enemies but passionately begg'd of Almighty God that he would also pardon them and besought all the present beholders of this sad sight that they would pardon and pray for him But tho' he did all this yet he seem'd to accuse the Magistrates of the City for not suppressing a sort of people whose malicious and furious Zeal had so far transported them and violated all modesty that tho' they could not know whether he were justly or unjustly condemned were yet suffer'd to go visibly up and down to gather hands to a Petition that the Parliament would hasten his Execution And he having declar'd how unjustly he thought himself to be condemned and accus'd for endeavouring to bring in Popery for that was one of the Accusations for which he died he declared with sadness That the several Sects and Divisions then in England which he had laboured to prevent were now like to bring the Pope a far greater harvest than he could ever have expected without them And said these Sects and Divisions introduce prophaneness under the cloak ofâ— an imaginary Religion and that we have lost the substance of Religion by changing it into Opinion and that by these means the Church ofâ— England which all the Iesuits machinations could not ruine was fall'n into apparent danger by those Covenanters which were his Accusers To this purpose he spoke at his death for which and more to the same purpose the Reader may view his last sad Sermon on the Scaffold And 't is here mentioned because his dear Friend Dr. Sanderson seems to demonstrate the same fear of Popery in his two large and remarkable Prefaces before his two Volumes of Sermons and seems also with much sorrow to say the same again in his last Will made when he was and apprehended himself to be very near his death And these Covenanters ought to take notice of it and to remember that by the late wicked War began by them Dr. Sanderson was ejected out of the Professors Chair in Oxford and that if he had continued in it for he lived 14 years after both the Learned of this and other Nations had been made happy by many remarkable Cases of Conscience so rationally stated and so briefly so clearly and so convincingly determin'd that Posterity might have joyed and boasted That Dr. Sanderson was born in this Nation for the ease and benefit of all the Learned that shall be born after him But this benefit is so like time past that they are both irrecoverably lost I should now return to Boothby Pannel where we left Dr. Hammond and Dr. Sanderson together but neither can now be found there For the first was in his Journey to Londoni and the second seiz'd upon the day after his Friends departure and carried Prisoner to Lincoln then a Garrison of the Parliaments For the pretended reason of which Commitment I shall give this
Dr. Sanderson's constant practice every morning to entertain his first waking thoughts with a repition of those very Psalms that the Church hath appointed to be constantly read in the daily Morning Service and having at night laid him in his bed he as constantly clos'd his eyes with a repitition of those appointed for the Service of the Evening remembring and repeating the very Psalms appointed for every day and as the month had formerly ended and began again so did this Exercise of his devotion And if the First-fruits of his waking thoughts were of the World or what concern'd it he would arraign and condemn himself for it Thus he began that work on Earth which is now the imployment of Dr. Hammond and him in Heaven After his taking his Bed and about a day before his death he desir'd his Chaplain Mr. Pullin to give him absolution And at his performing that Office he pull'd off his Cap that Mr. Pullin might lay his hand upon his bare head After this desire of his was satisfied his Body seem'd to be at more ease and his mind more chearful and he said often Lord forsake me not now my strength faileth me but continue thy mercy and let my mouth be ever filled with thy praise He continued the remaining night and day very patient and thankful for any of the little Offices that were perform'd for his ease and refreshment and during that time did often say to himself the 103. Psalm a Psalm that is compos'd of Praise and Consolations fitted for a dying Soul and say also to himself very often these words My heart is fixed O God my heart is fixed where true joy is to be found And now his thoughts seem'd to be wholly of death for which he was so prepar'd that that King of Terrors could not surprise him as a thief in the night for he had often said he was prepar'd and long'd for it And as this desire seem'd to come from Heaven so it left him not till his Soul ascended to that Region of blessed Spirits whose employments are to joyn in consort with his and sing Praise and Glory to that God who hath brought him and them to that place into which sin and sorrow cannot enter Thus this Pattern of meekness and primitive innocence chang'd this for a better Life 't is now too late to wish that mine may be like his for I am in the eighty fifth year of my Age and God knows it hath not but I most humbly beseech Almighty God that my death may and I do as earnestly beg that if any Reader shall receive any satisfaction from this very plain and as true relation he will be so Charitable as to say Amén. I. W. Blessed is that man in whose Spirit there is no guile Psal 32. 2. Dr. Pierce Dean of Salisbury his Letter to Mr. Walton Good Mr. Walton AT my return to this place I made a yet stricten search after the Letters long ago sent me from our most excellent Dr. Sanderson before the happy Restoration of the King and Church of England to their several Rights in one of which Letters more especially he was pleas'd to give me a Narrative both of the file and the Progress and reasons also as well of his younger as of his last and â—iper Judgment touching the famous Points controverted between the Calvinian and the Arminians as they are commonly though unjustly and unskilfully misâ—alled on either side The whole Letter I allude to does consist of several sheets where of a good part has been made publicâ— long ago by the most learned most judicious most pious Dr. Hammond to whom I sent it both for his private and for the publick satisfaction if he thought fit in his excellent Book intituled A Pacifick Discourse of God's Grace and Decrees in full accordance with Dr. Sanderson To which discourse I refer you for an account of Dr. Sanderson and the History of his Thoughts in his own hand writing wherein I sent it to Westâ—ood as I received it from Boothby Pannel And although the whole Book printed in the year 1660. and reprinted since with his other Tracts in Folio is very worthy of your perusal yet for the Work you are about you shall not have need to read more at present than from the 8th to the 23d page and as far as the end of § 33. There you will find in what year the excellent man whose life you write became a Master of Arts. How his first reading of Learned Hooker had been occasioned by some Puritanical Pamphlets and how good a preparative he found it for his reading of Calvin's Institutions the honour of whose name at that time especially gave such credit to his Errors How he erred with Mr. CalviÅ„ whilst he took things upon trust in the Sublapsarian way How being chosen to be a Clerk of the Convocation for the Diocess of Lincoln 1625. He reduced the Quinquarticular Controversie into five Schemes or Tables and thereupon discerned a necessity of quitting the Sublapsarian way of which he had before a better liking as well as the Supralapsarian which he could never fancy There you will meet with his two weighty Reasons against them both and find his happy change of Iudgment to have been ever since the year 1625. even 34 years before the world either knew or at least took notice of it And more particularly his Reasons for rejecting Dr. Twiss or the way He walks in although his acute and very learned and ancient Friend I now proceed to let you know from Dr. Sanderson's own hand which was never printed and which you can hardly know from any unless from his Son or from my self That when that Parliament was broken up and the Convocation therewith dissolved a Gentleman of his Acquaintance by occasion of some Discourse about these Points told him of a Book not long before published at Paris A. D. 1623. by a Spanish Bishop who had undertaken to clear the Differences in the great Controversie De Concordiâ Gratiae Liberi Arbitrarij And because his Friend perceived he was greedily desirous to see the Book he sent him one of them containing the four first Books of twelve which he intended then to publish When I had read says Dr. Sanderson in the following words of the same Letter his Epistle Dedicatory to the Pope Greg. 15. he spake so highly of his own invention that I then began rather to suspect him for a Mountebank than to hope I should find satisfaction from his performances I found much confidence and great pomp of words but little matter as to the main Knot of the Business other than had been said an hundred times before to wit of the co-existence of all things past present and future in mente divina realiter ab aeterno which is the subject of his whole third Book only he interpreteth the word realiter so as to import not only praesentialitatem objectivam as others held before him but
Miracles in compiling of Legends in gelding of good Authors by expurgatory indexes in jugling with Magistrates by lewd equivocations c. Practices warrantable by no pretence Yet in their account but piae fraudes for so they term them no less ridiculously than falsly for the one word contradicteth the other But what do I speak of these but petty things in comparison of those her lowder Impieties breaking covenants of truce and peace dissolving of lawful and dispensing for unlawful marriages assoyling Subjects from their Oaths and Allegiance plotting Treasons and practising Rebellions excommunicating and dethroning Kings arbitrary disposing of Kingdoms stabbing and murthering of Princes warranting unjust invasions and blowing up Parliament houses For all which and divers other foul attempts their Catholick defence is the advancement forsooth of the Catholick Cause Like his in the Poet Quocunque modorem is their Resolution by right or wrong the State of the Papacy must be upheld That is their unum necessarium and if heaven favour not rather than fail help must be had from hell to keep Antichrist in his throne But to let them pass and touch nearer home There are God knoweth many Ignorants abroad in the world some of them so unreasonable as to think they have non plus'd any reprover if being admonished of something ill done they have but returned this poor reply Is it not better to do so than to do worse but also what necessity of doing either so or worse when Gods law bindeth thee from both He that said â— Do not commit adultery said also Do not kill and he that said Do not steal said also Do not lye If then thou lye or kill or do any other sin though thou thinkest thereby to avoid stealth or adultery orsome other sin yet thou art become a transgressor of the Law and by offending in one point of it guilty of all It is but a poor choice when a man is desperately resolved to cast himself away whether he should rather hang or drown or stab or pine himself to death there may be more horrour more pain more lingring in one than another but they all come to one period and determine in the same point death is the issue of them all And it can be but a slender comfort for a man that will needs thrust himself into the mouth of hell by sinning wilfully that he is damned rather for lying than for stealing or whoring or killing or some greater crime Damnation is the wages of them all Murther can but hang a man and without favour Petty Larceny will hang a man too The greatest sins can but damn a man and without Gods mercy the smallest will damn a man too But what will some reply In case two sins be propounded may I not do the lesser to avoid the greater otherwise must I not of necessity do the greater The answer is short and easie If two sins be propounded do neither E malis minimum holdeth as you heard and yet not always neither in evils of pain But that is no Rule for evils of sin Here the safer Rule is E malis nullum And the reason is sound from the Principle we have in hand If we may not do any evil to procure a positive good certainly much less may we do one evil to avoid or prevent another But what if both cannot be avoided but that one must needs be done In such a strait may I not choose the lesser To thee I say again as before Choose neither To the Case I answer It is no Case because as it is put it is a case impossible For Nemo angustiatur ad peccandum the Case cannot be supposed wherein a man should be straitned as he could not come off fairly without sinning A man by rashness or fear or frailty may foully entangle himself and through the powerful engagements of sin drive himself into very narrow straits or be so driven by the fault or injury of others yet there cannot be any such straits as should enforce a necessity of sinning but that still there is one path or other out of them without sin The perplexity that seemeth to be in the things is rather in the men who puzzle and lose themselves in the Labyrinths of sin because they care not to heed the clue that would lead them out if it were followed Say a wicked man through heat of blood make a wicked vow to kill his brother here he hath by his own rashness brought himself into a seeming strait that either he must commit a murther or break a vow either of which seemeth to be a great sin the one aga inst the fifth the other against the third Commandment But here is in very deed no strait or perplexity at all Here is a fair open course for him without sin He may break his vow and there 's an end Neither is this the choice of the lesser sin but only the loosening of the lesser bond the bond of charity being greater than the bond of a promise and there being good reason that in terms of inconsistency when both cannot stand the lesser bond should yield to the greater But is it not a sin for a man to break a vow Yes where it may be helpt salvis charitate justitia there the breach is a sin but in the case proposed it is no sin As Christ saiâ—h in the point of swearing so it may be said in the point of breach of vow 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Never was any breach of vow but it was peccatum or ex peocato the breaking is either it self forâ—ally a sin or it argueth at least a former sin in the making So as the sin in the case alledged was before in making such an unlawful vow and for that sin the party must repent but the breaking of it now it is made is no new sin Rather it is a necessary duty and a branch of that repentance which is due for the former rashness in making it because an hurtful vow is and that virtute praecepti rather to be broken than kept The Aegyptian Midwives not by their own fault but by Pharaoh's tyrannous command are driven into a narrow strait enforcing a seeming necessity of sin for either they must destroy the Hebrew Children and so sin by Murther or else they must devise some handsome shift to carry it clean from the King's knowledge and so sin by lying And so they did they chose rather to lye than to kill as indeed in the compatison it is by much the lesser sin But the very truth is they should have done neither they should flatly have refused the King's Commandment though with hazard of their lives and have resolved rather to suffer any evil than to do any And so Lot should have done he should rather have adventured his own life and theirs too in protecting the chastity of his Daughters and the safety of his Guests than
Education Custom Tradition the Tyranny of their Leaders the fashion of the times not without some shew also of Piety and Devotion and themselves withal having such slender means of better knowledge though it cannot wholly excuse them from sin without repentance damnable yet it much lesseneth and qualifieth the sinfulness of their Idolatry arguing that their continuance therein was more from other prejudices than from a wilful contempt of Gods holy word and Will And as for their Repentance it is as certain that as many of them as are saved did repent of their Idolatries as it is certain no Idolater nor other sinner can be saved without Repentance But then there is a double difference to be observed between Repentance for ignorances and for known sins The one is that known sins must be confessed and repented of and pardon asked for them in particular every one singly by it self I mean for the kinds though not ever for the individuals every kind by it self at least where God alloweth time and leisure to the Penitent to call himself to a punctual examination of his life past and doth not by sudden death or by some disease that taketh away the use of reason deprive him of opportunity to do that Whereas for Ignorances it is enough to wrap them up all together in a general and implicite Confession and to crave pardon for them by the lump as David doth in Psalm 19. Who can understand all his Errors Lord cleanse thou me from my secret sins The other difference is that known sins are not truly repented of but where they are forsaken and it is but an hypocritical semblance of penance without the truth of the thing where is no care neither endeavour of reformation But ignorances may be faithfully repented of and yet still continued in The reason because they may be repented of in the general and in the lump without special knowledge that they are sins but without such special knowledge they cannot be reformed Some of our fore-fathers then might not only live in Popish Idolatry but even die in an Idolatrous act breathing out their last with their lips at a Crucifix and an Ave-mary in their thoughts and yet have truly repented though but in the general and in the crowd of their unknown sins even of those very sins and have at the same instant true Faith in Jesus Christ and other Graces accompanying salvation But why then may not I will some Popeling say continue as I am and yet come to Heaven as well as they continued what they were and yet went to Heaven If I be an Idolater it is out of my Error and Ignorance and if that general Prayer unto God at the last to forgive me all my Ignorances will serve the turn I may run the same course I do without danger or fear God will be merciful to me for what I do ignorantly Not to preclude all possibility of mercy from thee or from any sinner Consider yet there is a great difference between their state and thine between thine ignorance and theirs They had but a very small enjoyance of the light of Gods Word hid from them under two bushels for sureness under the bushel of a Tyrannous Clergy that if any man should be able to understand the books he might not have them and under the bushel of an unknown tongue that if any man should chance to get the books he might not understand them Whereas to thee the light is holden forth and set on a Candlestiâ—k the books open the language plain legible and familiar They had eyes but saw not because the light was kept from and the land was dark about them as the darkness of Egypt But thou livest as in a Goshen where the light encompasseth thee in on all sides where there are burning and shining lamps in every corner of the land Yet is thy blindness greater for who so blind as he that will not see and more inexcusable because thou shuttest thine eyes against the light lest thou shouldest see and be converted and God should heal thee Briefly they wanted the light thou shunnest it they lived in darkness thou delightest in it their ignorance was simple thine affected and wilful And therefore although we doubt not but that the times of their ignorance God winked at yet thou hast no warrant to presume that God will also in these times wink at thee who rejectest the counsel of God against thine own soul and for want of love and affection to the truth are justly given over to strong delusions to believe Fables and put thy confidence in things that are lies So much for that matter Secondly Here is a needful admonition for us all not to flatter our selves for our ignorance of those things that concern us in our general or particular Callings as if for that ignorance our reckoning should be easier at the day of judgment Ignorance indeed excuseth sometimes sometimes lesseneth a fault but yet not all ignorance all faults not wilful and affected ignorance any fault Nay it is so far from doing that that on the contrary it maketh the offence much more grievous and the offender much more inexcusable A heedless servant that neither knoweth nor doth his Masters will deserveth some stripes A stubborn servant that knoweth it and yet transgresseth it deserveth more stripes But worse than them both is that ungracious servant who fearing his Master will appoint him something he had rather let alone keepeth himself out of the way beforehand and micheth in a corner out of sight of purpose that he might not know his Masters will that so he may after stand upon it when he is chidden and say He knew it not such an untoward servant deserveth yet more stripes Would the Spirit of God think you in the Scripture so often call upon us to get the knowledge of Gods will and to increase therein or would he commence his suit against a land and enter his action against the people thereof for want of such knowledge if ignorance were better or safer Oh it is a fearful thing for a man to shaâ—â— instruction and to say he desireth not the knowledge of God Noluerunt intelligere ut bene agerent When men are once come to that pass that they will not understand nor seek after God when they hate the light because they take pleasure in the works of darkness when they are afraid to know too much lest their hearts should condemn them for not doing thereafter when like the deaf Adder they stop their ears against the voice of the charmer for fear they should be charmed by the power of that voice out of their crooked and Serpentine courses when they are so resolved to take freedom to sin that they chuse to be still Ignorant rather than hazard the forgoing of any part of that freedom what do they but even run
ween is another-gates matter than to make the face to shine This for material Oil. Then for those other outward things which for some respects I told you might be also comprehended under the name of Ointments Riches Honours and worldly Pleasures alas how poor and sorry comforts are they to a man that hath forfeited his good Name that liveth in no credit not reputation that groaneth under the contempt and reproach and infamy of every honest or but sober man Whereas he that by godly and vertuous Actions by doing Iustice and exercising Mercy and ordering himself and his affairs discreetly holdeth up his good Name and reputation hath that yet to comfort himself withal and to fill his bones as with marrow and fatness though encompassed otherwise with many outward wants and calamities Without which even life it self would be unpleasant I say not to a perfect Christian only but even to every ingenuous moral man The worthier â—ort of men among the Heathens would have chosen rather to have died the most cruel deaths than to have lived infamous under shame and disgrace And do not those words of St. Paul 1 Cor. 9. shew that he was not much otherwise minded It were better for me to dye than that any man should make my glorying void Thus a good Name is better than any precious Ointment take it as you will properly or tropically because it yieldeth more solid content and satisfaction to him that enjoyeth it than the other doth 17. Compare them thirdly in those performances whereunto they enable us Oils and Ointments by a certain penetrative faculty that they have being well chaâ—ed in do supple the joynts and strengthen the sinews very much and thereby greatly enable the body for action making it more nimble and vigorous than otherwise it would be Whence it was that among the Greeks and from their example among the Romans and in other Nations those that were to exercise Arms or other feats of Activity in their solemn Games especially Wrestlers did usually by frictions and anointings prepare and fit their bodies for those Athletick performances to do them with more agility and less weariness Insomuch as Chrysostom and other Greek Fathers almost every where use the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not only when they speak of those preparatory advantages such as are prayer fasting meditation of Christs Sufferings or of the Joys of Heaven and the like wherewith Christians may fortifie and secure themselves when they are to enter the combate with their spiritual enemies but more generally to signifie any preparing or fitting of a person for any manner of action whatsoever 18. But how much more excellent then is a good name Which is of such mighty consequence advantage for the expediting of any honest enterprise that we take in hand either in our Christian course or civil life in this World It is an old saying taken up indeed in relation to another matter somewhat distant from that we are now treating of but it holdeth no less true in this than in that other respect Duo cum faciunt idem non est idem Let two men speak the same words give the same advice pursue the same business drive the same design with equal right equal means equal diligence every other thing equal yet commonly the success is strangely different if the one be well thought of and the other labour of an ill name So singular an advantage is it for the crowning of our endeavours with good success to be in a good name If there be a good opinion held of us and our names once up whether we deserve it or no whatsoever we do is well taken whatsoever we propose is readily entertained our counsels yea and rebukes too carry weight and authority with them By which means we are enabled if we have but grace to make that good use thereof to do the more good to bring the more glory to God to give better countenance to his truth and to good causes and things Whereas on the other side if we be in an ill name whether we deserve it or no all our speeches and actions are ill-interpreted no man regardeth much what we say or do our proposals are suspected our counsels and rebukes though wholsom and just scorned and kickt at so as those men we speak for that side we adhere to those causes we defend those businesses we manage shall lie under some prejudice and be like to speed the worse for the evil opinion that is held of us We know well it should be otherwise Non quis sed quid As the Magistrate that exerciseth publick judgment should lay aside all respect of the person and look at the cause only so should we all in our private judgings of other mens speeches and actions look barely upon the truth of what they say and the goodness of what they do and accordingly esteem of both neither better nor worse more or less for whatsoever fore-conceits we may have of the person Otherwise how can we avoid the charge of having the faith of our Lord Iesus Christ the Lord of Glory with respect of persons But yet since men are corrupt and will be partial this way do we what we can and that the World and the affairs thereof are so much steered by Opinion it will be a point of godly wisdom in us so far to make use of this common corruption as not to disadvantage our selves for want of a good name and good Opinion for the doing of that good whilst we live here among men subject to such frailties which we should set our desires and bend our endeavours to do And so a good Name is better than a good Ointment in that it enableth us to better and worthier performances 19. Compare them Fourthly in their Extensions and that both for Place and Time For place first That Quality of the three before-mentioned which especially setteth a value upon Ointments advancing their price and esteem more eminently than any other consideration is their smell those being ever held most precious and of greatest delicacy that excel that way And herein is the excellency of the choicest Aromatical Ointments that they do not only please the sence if they be held near to the Organ but they do also disperse the fragrance of their scent round about them to a great distance Of the sweetest herbs and flowers the smell is not much perceived unless they be held somewhat near to the Nostril But the smell of a precious Ointment will instantly diffuse it self into every corner though of a very spacious room as you heard but now of the Spikenard poured on our Saviours feet Ioh. 12. But see how in that very thing wherein the excellency of precious Ointments consisteth a good Name still goeth beyond it It is more diffusive and spreadeth farther Of King Uzziah so long as he did well and
prospered it is said that his name spread far abroad 2 Chron. 26. And the Prophet saith of the People of Israel in respect of her first comely estate before such time as she trusted in her own beauty and played the harlot that her name went forth among the Heathen for her beauty Ezek. 16. 20. Besides a good name as it reacheth farther so it lasteth longer than the most precious Ointments and so it excelleth in the extension of Time as well as of Place As for Riches Pleasures Honours and whatsoever other delights of mortal men who knoweth not of what short continuance they are They many times take them wings and fly away from us leaving us behind to grieve for the loss If it happen thy stay with us to the last as seldom they do yet then is the parting uncomfortable we can neither secure them from the spoil of others nor can they secure us from the wrath of God However part we must If they leave not us whilest we live sure enough we shall leave them when we die It may be when we are dead some pious friend or other may bestow upon our carcasses the cost of embalming with Spices Odours and Ointments as we see the Custom was of old both amongst the Heathens and the People of God And those precious Ointments may perhaps preserve our dead bodies some few months longer from putrefaction than otherwise they would have endured But at length howsoever the worm and the grave will prevail and we shall turn sooner or later first to dirt and then to dust And here is the utmost extension continuance and period of the most precious Ointments literal or Metaphorical the World can afford 21. But a good Name is a thing far more durable It seldom leaveth us unless through some fault or neglect in our selves but continueth with us all our life long At the hour of death also it standeth by us and giveth some sweetning unto the bitterness of those last pangs when our consciences do not suggest to our expiring thoughts any thing to the contrary but that we shall die desired and that those that live by us and survive us will account our gain by that change to be their loss Yea and it remaineth after death precious in the memories and mouths and ears of those that either knew us or had heard of us Surely no Ointments are so powerful to preserve our bodily ashes from corruption as a good name and report is to preserve our Piety and Vertue from Oblivion Their bodies are buried in peace but their name endureth for evermore Ecclus. 44. And upon this account expresly it is that the same Ecclesiasticus elsewhere as you heard before preferreth a good Name not only before the greatest riches because it will out-last a thousand great treasures of gold but even before life it self yea before a good life at least in this though in other respects it be below it as but an appurtenance thereunto that whereas a good life hath but a few days a good Name possibly may endure for ever 22. Now lay all together that hath been said that a good nà me is a more peculiar blessing That it bringeth more solid content That it enableth us more and to more worthy performances That it is of greater extension both for place and time reaching farther and lasting longer than the most precious Ointments either literally or Metaphorically understood and then judge if what Solomon hath here delivered in the Text how great a Paradox soever it may sound in the ears of a Wordling be not yet a most certain and clear Truth viz. That a good name is better then a precious Ointment and therefore in all reason to be preferred by every understanding man before Pleasures Riches Honours or whatsoever other outward delights of wordly men 23. But it is needful you should be here admonished lest what hath been hitherto said should be in any part either mistaken or misapplied that all this while I have spoken but of material Ointments and such other contentment as the outward things of this World can afford The preeminence of a good Name thus far just beware ye make not unjust by over-stretching For there is besides all these a spiritual Ointment also an inward anointing the anointing of the inner mán the Soul and Conscience with oil of the Spirit the saving graces and sweet comforts of the Holy Ghost that oil of gladness wherewith the blessed Son of God was anointed above his Fellows and without measure and whereof all the Faithful and elect Children of God are in their measure his fellow partakers Ye have an Unction from the Holy One saith St. Iohn And again The anointing which ye have received of him abideth in you This is a singular and right precious Ointment indeed infinitely more to be preferred before a good Name than a good name is to be preferred before other common and outward Ointments The inseparable adjunct and evidence whereof is that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which we usually call a good Conscience God forbid any man should so far tender his good name as for the preservation of it to make shipwrack of the other Duae sunt res Conscientia Fama c. saith St. Augustine Two things there are saith he whereof every man should be specially chary and tender his Conscience and his Credit But that of his Conscience must be his first care this of his Name and Credit must be content to come in the second place Let him first be sure to guard his Conscience well and then may he have a due regard of his Good Name also Let it be his first care to secure all within by making peace with God and in his own breast that done but not before let him look abroad if he will and cast about as well as he can to strengthen his Reputation with before the World 24. A very preposterous course the mean while is that which those men take that begin at the wrong end making their Consciences wait upon their Credit Alas that notwithstanding the clear evidence both of Scripture and Reason to the contrary after so many sharp reprehensions by the Minister so many strait prohibitions by the Magistrate there should yet be found among our Gentry so many spirits of that desperate unchristian resolution as upon the slightest provoking word that but toucheth upon their reputation to be ready either to challenge or to accept the duel Either of which to do must needs leave a deep sting in the Conscience if yet it be penetrable and not quite seared up since thereby they expose themselves to the greatest hazard if not inevitable necessity of wilful murther either of themselves or their brethren 2. Alas that there should still be found amongst our Clergy-men that formerly being perswaded that our Church Ceremonies and Service were unlawful and having during such their perswasion preached
confident that friend will not fail to assist him therein to his utmost power Now if a man be bold to do but what he may and should do and that withal he have some good ground for his confidence from the consideration of his friends ability the experience of his love some former promises on his friends or merit on his own part or other like so as every man would be ready to say he had reason to presume so far of his friend this is a good reasonable and warrantable presumption But if he fail in either respect as if he presume either to do unlawful unworthy or unbefitting things or to do even lawful things when there appeareth no great cause why any man should think his friend obliged by the laws of friendship to assist him therein then is such his presumption a faulty and an evil presumption And whatsoever may bear the name of a Presumptuous sin in any respect is some way or other tainted with such an evil irrational presumption 9. But we are further to note that presumption in the worser sence and as applied to sin may be taken either Materially or Formally If these terms seem obscure with a little opening I hope the difference between these two will be easily understood Taken materially the sin of presumption is a special kind of sin distinguished from other species of sins by its proper Object or Matter when the very matter wherein we sin and whereby we offend God is Presumption and so it is a branch of Pride When a man presuming either upon his own strength or upon Gods assisting him undertaketh to do something of himself not having in himself by the ordinary course of nature and the common aid which God affordeth to the actions of his creatures in the ordinary ways of his providence sufficient strength to go through therewithal or expecteth to receive some extraordinary assistance from the Mercy Power c. of God not having any sufficient ground either from the general Promises contained in the Scriptures or by particular immediate revelation that God will certainly so assist him therein 10. All those men that over-value themselves or out of an overweening conceit of their own abilities attempt things beyond their power That lean to their own understandings as Solomon That mind high things and are wise in their own conceits as St. Paul That exercise themselves in great matters and such as are too high for them as David expresseth it All those that perswade themselves they can persist in an holy course without a continual supply of Grace or that think they can continue in their sins so long as they think good and then repent of them and forsake them at their leisure whensoever they list or that doubt not but to be able by their own strength to stand out against any temptation All these I say and all other like by presuming too much upon themselves are guilty of the sin of Presumption ' 'To omit the Poets who have set forth the folly of this kind of Presumption in the Fables of Phaethon and Icarus A notable example we have of it in the Apostle Peter and therein a fair warning for others not to be high-minded but to fear who in the great confidence of his own strength could not believe his Master though he knew him to be the God of truth when he foretold him he would yield but still protested that if all the world should forsake him yet he would never do it 11. Nor only may a man offend in this kind by presuming upon himself too much but also by presuming even upon God himself without warrant He that repenteth truly of his sins presuming of Gods mercy in the forgiveness thereof or that walketh uprightly and conscionably in the ways of his Calling presuming of Gods Power for his protection therein sinneth not in so presuming Such a presumption is a fruit of Faith and a good presumption because it hath a sure ground a double sure ground for failing first in the Nature and then in the Promise of God As a man may with good reason presume upon his Friend that he will not be wanting to him in any good Office that by the just Laws of true friendship one friend ought to do for another But as he presumeth too much upon his friend that careth not into what desperate exigents and dangers he casteth himself in hope his friend will perpetually redeem him and relieve him at every turn So whosoever trusteth to the Mercy or to the Power of God without the warrant of a Promise presumeth farther than he hath cause And though he may flatter himself and call it by some better name as Faith or Hope or Affiance in God yet is it in truth no better than a groundless and a wicked Presumption Such was the Presumption of those Sons of Sceva who took upon them but to their shame and sorrow to call over them that had evil spirits the name of the Lord Iesus in a form of adjuration Acts 19. when they had no calling or warrant from God so to do And all those men that going on in a wretched course of life do yet hope they shall find mercy at the hour of death All those that cast themselves into unnecessary either dangers or temptations with expectance that God should manifest his extraordinary Power in their preservation All those that promise to themselves the End without applying themselves to the means that God hath appointed thereunto as to have Learning without Study Wealth without Industry Comfort from Children without careful Education c. forasmuch as they presume upon Gods help without sufficient Warrant are guilty of the sin of Presumption taken in the former notion and Materially 12. But I conceive the Presumptuous sins here in the Text to belong clearly to the other notion of the word Presumption taken formally and as it importeth not a distinct kind of sin in it self as that Groundless Presumption whereof we have hitherto spoken doth but a common accidental difference that may adhere to sins of any kind even as Ignorance and Infirmity whereunto it is opposed also may Theft and Murther which are sins of special kinds distinguished either from other by their special and proper Objects are yet both of them capable of these common differences inasmuch as either of them may be committed as sometimes through Ignorance and sometimes through Infirmity so also sometimes through Wilfulness or Presumption 13. The distribution of Sins into sins of Ignorance of Infirmity and of Presumption is very usual and very useful and compleat enough without the addition which some make of a fourth sort to wit Sins of Negligence or Inadvertency all such sins being easily reducible to some of the former three The ground of the distinction is laid in the Soul of man wherein there are three distinct prime faculties from which all our actions flow the Understanding the Will and the sensual
but reason they should be mightily humbled when they do repent 29. After repentance also Presumptuous sins for the most part have their uncomfortable Effects Very seldom hath any man taken the liberty to sin presumptuously but he hath after met with that which hath been grievous to him either in outward things or in his good name or in his soul in some or other of these if not in all even after the renewing of himself by repentance and the sealing of his pardon from God Like a grievous wound or sore that is not only of a hard cure but leaveth also some remembrance behind it some scar in the flesh after it is cured 30. First a Presumptuous sinner rarely escapeth without some notable outward Affliction Not properly as a debt payable to the Justice of God by way of satisfaction for there is no proportion between the one and the other But partly as an evidence of Gods high displeasure against such a high provocation and partly as a fit chastisement wherewith he is pleased in mercy to correct his servants when they have demeaned themselves so presumptuously that both they and others may be admonished by that example to do so no more Be David the instance What a world of mischief and misery did he create unto himself by that one presumptuous fact in the matter of Uriah almost all the days of his life after The Prophet Nathan at the very same time when he delivered him Gods royal and gracious pardon for it under seal Transtulit peccatum the Lord hath put away thy sin yet did he withal read him the bitter consequents of it as you have them set down 2 Sam. 12. And as he foretold him accordingly it fell out with him His daughter defiled by her brother that brother slain by another brother a strong conspiracy raised against him by his own Son his Concubines openly defiled by the same Son himself afflicted with the untimely and uncomfortable death of that Son who was his darling reviled and cursed to his face by a base unworthy Companion besides many other affronts troubles and vexations continually He had few quiet hours all his life long and even upon his death-bed not a little disquieted with tidings of his two Sons almost up in arms about the Succession We use to say The wilful man never wanteth woe and truly David felt it by sad experience what woe his wilfulness wrought him 31. Secondly Presumptuous sins are often Scandalous leaving an indelible stain and blot upon the name and memory of the guilty offender not to be wholly wiped off so long as that name and memory lasteth David must be our instance here too who sinned many other times and ways besides that in the matter of Uriah It can be little pleasure to us to rake into the infirmities of Gods Servants and bring them upon the Stage it would perhaps become our charity better to cast a Mantle over their nakedness where the fact will with any tolerable construction bear an excuse Yet sith all things that are written are written for our learning and that it pleased the wisdom of God for that end to leave so many of their failings upon record as glasses to represent unto us our common frailties and as monuments and marks to mind us of those rocks whereat others have been shipwrackt it cannot be blamed in us to take notice of them and to make the best use we can of them for our own spiritual advantage His diffidence then and anxiety lest he should perish one day by the hands of Saul when he had Gods promise that he should out-live him His deep dissimulation with and before Achis especially when he tendred his service to him in the Wars His rash cholerick vow to destroy Nabal and all that belonged to him who had indeed played the churl and the wretch with him as covetous and unthankful men sometimes will do but yet in rigore had done him no wrong His double injustice to his loyal Subject Mephibosheth and therein also his forgetfulness of his old and trusty friend Ionathan first in giving away all his Lands upon â—he bare suggestion of a servant and that to the false Informer himself and that without any examination at all of the matter and then in restoring him but half again when he knew the suggestion to be false His fond affection to his ungracious Son Absolom in tendring his life before his own safety and the publick good and in taking his death with so much unmanly impatience His lenity and indulgence to his other Son Adonijah who was no better than he should be neither to whom he never said so much at any time as Eli did to his Sons Why hast thou done so His carnal confidence in the multitude of his Subjects when he caused them to be numbred by the Poll. These and perhaps some other sinful oversights which do not presently occur to my memory are registred of David as well as the murther of Uriah Yet as if all these were nothing in comparison of that one that one alone is put in by the Holy Ghost by way of exception and so inserted as an exception in that glorious testimony which we find given of him 1 King 15. 5. David did that which was right in the eyes of the Lord and turned not aside from any thing that he commanded him all the days of his life save only in the matter of Uriah the Hittite That is he turned not aside so foully and so contemptuously so presumptuously and so provokingly in any other thing as he did in that business of Uriah All his Ignorances and Negligences and Inconsiderations and Infirmities are passed over in silence only this great Presumptuous sin standeth up as a Pillar or Monument erected ad perpetuam rei memoriam to his perpetual shame in that particular for all succeeding generations to take warning and example by 32. Yet were this more tolerable if besides a Stain in the Name these Pre sumptuous sins did not also leave a Sting in the Conscience of the sinner which abideth in him many times a long while after the sin is repented of and pardoned ready upon every occasion to smite him and to gall him with some touch and remorse of his old presumption Like as a man that having gotten some sore bruise in his youth and by the help of Surgery and the strength of youth over-worn it may yet carry a grudging of it in his bonos or joynts by fits perhaps to his dying day And as for the most part such grudgings of an old bruise are aptest to recur upon some new distemper of body or upon change of weather so the grief of an old presumptuous sin is commonly most felt upon the committing of some new sin or the approach of some new affliction Do you think David had not in all those afflictions that after befel him and at the apprehension of every sinful oversight
should repose upon such things must needs rise and fall ebb and flow just as the things themselves do Which is contrary to the state of a true contented mind which still remaineth the same and unchanged notwithstanding whatsoever changes and chances happen in these outward and mutable things 7. We see now the unsufficiency of Nature of Morality of Outward things to bring Contentment It remaineth then that it must spring from Religion and from the Grace of God seated in the heart of every godly man which casteth him into a new mould and frameth the heart to a blessed calm within whatsoever storms are abroad and without And in this Grace there is no defect As the Lord sometimes answered our Apostle when he was importunate with him for that which he thought not fit at that time to grant sufficit tibi gratia My Grace is sufficient for thee He then that would attain to St. Pauls learning must repair to the same School where St. Paul got his learning and he must apply himself to the same Tutor that St. Paul had He must not languish in Porticu or in Lycaeo at the feet of Plato or Seneca but he must get him into the Sanctuary of God and there become 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he must be taught of God and by the anointing of his holy Spirit of grace which anointing teacheth us all things 1 Ioh. 2. All other Masters are either Ignorant or Envious or Idle Some things they are not able to teach us though they would some things they are not willing to teach us though they might but this Anointing is every way a most compleat Tutor able and loving and active this anointing teacheth us all things and amongst other things this Art of Contentation also 8. Now as for the means whereby the Lord traineth us up by his holy grace unto this learning they are especially these three First by his spirit he worketh this perswasion in our hearts that whatsoever he disposeth unto us at any time for the present that is evermore the fittest and best for us at that time He giveth us to see that all things are guided and ordered by a most just and wise and powerful providence And although it be not fit for us to be acquainted with the particular Reasons of such his wise and gracious dispensations yet we are assured in the general that all things work together for the best to those that love God That he is a loving and careful Father of his children and will neither bring any thing upon them nor keep back any thing from them but for their Good That he is a most skilful and compassionate Physician such an one as at all times and perfectly understandeth the true state and temper of our hearts and affections and accordingly ordereth us and dieteth us as he seeth it most behoofeful for us in that present state for the preservation or recovery of our spiritual strength or for the prevention of future maladies And this perswasion is one special means whereby the Lord teacheth us Contentment with whatsoever he sendeth 9. Secondly whereas there are in the word scattered every where many gracious and precious promises not only concerning the life to come but also concerning this present life the spirit of grace in the heart of the Godly teacheth them by faith to gather up all those scattered Promises and to apply them for their own comfort upon every needful occasion They hear by the outward preaching of the Word and are assured of the truth thereof by the inward teaching of the Spirit That God will never fail them nor forsake them That he is their shepherd and therefore they shall not want but his goodness and mercy shall follow them all the days of their lives That his eye is upon them that fear him to deliver their souls from death and to feed them in the time of dearth That he will give grace and Worship and with-hold no good thing from them that live a godly life That though the Lions the great and greedy Oppressours of the world may lack and suffer hunger yet they which seek the Lord shall want no manner of thing that is good and a thousand other such like Promises they hear and believe The assurance whereof is another special means by which the Lord teacheth his children to repose themselves in a quiet content without fear of want or too much thoughtfulness for the future 10. Thirdly for our better learning besides these Lectures of his Providence and Promises he doth also both appoint us Exercises and discipline us with his Rod By sending changes and afflictions in our bodies and in our names in our friends in our estates in the success of our affairs and many other ways but always for our profit And this his wise teaching of us bringeth on our learning wonderfully As for those whose houses are safe from fear neither is the Rod of God upon them as Iob speaketh that are never emptied nor poured from vessel to vessel they settle upon their own dregs and grow muddy and musty with long ease and their prosperity befooleth them to their own destruction When these come once to stirring and trouble over-taketh them as sooner or later they must look for it then the grumbles and mud of their impatience and discontent beginneth to appear and becometh unfavoury both to God and man But as for those whom the Lord hath taken into his own tuition and nurturing he will not suffer them either to wax wanton with too long ease nor to be depressed with too heavy troubles but by frequent changes he exerciseth them and inureth them to all estates As a good Captain traineth his Souldiers and putteth them out of one posture into another that they may be expert in all so the Lord of hosts traineth up his Souldiers by the armour of righteousnes on the right hand and on the left by honour and dishonour by evil Report and good Report by health and sickness by sometimes raising new friends and sometimes taking away the old by sometimes suffering their enemies to get the upper hand and sometimes bringing them under again by sometimes giving success to their affairs even beyond their expectation and sometimes dashing then hopes when they were almost come to full ripeness He turneth them this way and that way and every way till they know all their postures and can readily cast themselves into any form that he shall appoint They are often abased and often exalted now full and anon hungry one while they abound and they suffer need another while Till with our Apostle they know both how to be abased and how to abound Till every where and in all things they be instructed both to be full and to be hungry both to abound and to suffer need Till they can at least in some weak yet comfortable measure do all things through Christ that strengtheneth them These exercises
an universal concurrence of judgment as there is in the main fundamental points of the Christian Faith And if we were so wise as we might and should be to make the right use of it it would not stumble us a whit in the belief of our Religion that Christians differ so much as they do in many things but rather mightily confirm us in the assurances thereof that they agree so well as they do almost in any thing And it may be a great comfort to every well meaning soul that the simple belief of those certain truths whereon all parties are in a manner agreed may be and ordinarily is sufficient for the salvation of all them who are sincerely careful according to that measure of light and means that God hath vouchsafed them to actuate their Faith with Piety Charity and good Works so making this great Mystery to become unto them as it is in its self Mysterium Pietatis a Mystery of Godliness Which is the last point proposed the Quale to which I now pass 22. As the corrupt Doctrine of Antichrist is not only a Doctrine of Error but of Impiety too called therefore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The mystery of iniquity 2 Thes. 2. So the wholsom doctrine of Christ is not only a doctrine of Truth but of Piety too and is therefore termed here 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Mystery of Godliness Which 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Godliness since there appeareth not any great necessity in the Context to restrain it to that more peculiar sence wherein both the Greek and English word are sometimes used namely to signifie the right manner of Gods Worship according to his word in opposition to all idolatrous superstitious or false Worships practised among the Heathens I am the rather enclined to understand it here as many Interpreters have done in the fuller Latitude as it comprehenderh the whole duty of a Christian man which he standeth bound by the command of God in his Law or of Christ in his Gospel to perform 23. Verum and Bonum we know are near of kin the one to the other And the spirit of God who is both the Author and the Revealer of this Mystery as he is the spirit of truth Joh. 14. so is he also the spirit of holiness Rom. 1. And it is part of his work to sanctific the heart with grace as well as to enlighten the mind with knowledge Our Apostle therefore sometimes mentioneth Truth and Godliness together teaching us thereby that we should take them both into our care together If any man consent not to the words of our Lord Iesus Christ and to the doctrine which is after Godliness 1 Tim. 6. And Tit. 1. according to the Faith of Gods Elect and acknowledging of the Truth which is after Godliness And here in express terms The Mystery of Godliness And that most rightly whether we consider it in the Scope Parts or Conservation of it 24. First the general Scope and aim of Christianity is by the mercy of God founded on the merits of Christ to bring men on through Faith and Godliness to Salvation It was not in the purpose of God in publishing the Gospel and thereby freeing us from the personal obligation rigour and curse of the Law so to turn us loose and lawless to do whatsoever should seem good in our own eyes follow our own crooked wills or gratifie any corrupt lust but to oblige us rather the faster by these new benefits and to incite us the more effectually by Evangelical promises to the earnest study and pursuit of Godliness The Gospel though upon quite different grounds bindeth us yet to our good behaviour in every respect as deep as ever the Law did if not in some respects deeper allowing no liberty to the flesh for the fulfilling of the lusts thereof in any thing but exacting entire sanctity and purity both of inward affection and outward conversation in all those that embrace it The grace of God appearing in the revelation of this mystery as it bringeth along with it an offer of salvation to all men so it teacheth all men that have any real purpose to lay hold on so gracious an offer to deny ungodliness and worldly lusts and to live righteously and soberly and godly in this present world 25. It is not to be wondered at if all false Religions give allowance to some ungodliness or other when the very Gods whom they worship give such encouragements thereunto by their lewd examples The Gods of the Pagans were renowned for nothing so much most of them as for their vices Mars a bloody God Bacchus a drunken God Mercury a cheating God and so proportionably in their several kinds all the rest Their great Capital God Iupiter guilty of almost all the Capital vices And where the Gods are naught who can imagine the Religion should be good Their very mysteria sacra as they called them were so full of all wickedness and filthy abominations as was already in part touched but is fully discovered by Clemens Alexandrinus Lactantius Arnobius Tertullian and other of the Ancients of our Religion that it was the wisest point in all their Religion to take such strict order as they did for the keeping of them secret 26. But it is the honour and prerogative of the Christian Religion that it alone alloweth of no wickedness But as God himself is holy so he requireth an holy Worship and holy Worshippers He exacteth the mortification of all evil lusts and the sanctification of the whole man body soul and spirit and that in each of these throughout Every one that nameth himself from the name of Christ doth ipso facto by the very taking of that blessed name upon him and daring to stile himself Christian virtually bind himself to depart from all iniquity nor so only but to endeavour also after the example of him whose name otherwise he unworthily usurpeth to be just merciful temperate humble meek patient charitable to get the habits and to exercise the acts of these and all other holy graces and vertues Nay more the Gospel imposeth upon us some moral strictnesses which the Stoicks themselves or whoever else were the most rigid Masters of Morality never so much as thought of Nay yet more it exalteth the Moral Law of God himself given by Moses to the People of Israel to a higher pitch than they at least as they commonly understood the Law took themselves thereby obliged unto That a man should forsake all his dearest friends yea and deny his own dearest self too for Christs sake and yet for Christs sake at the same time love his deadliest enemies That he should take up his Cross and if need were lay down his life not only for his great Master but even for the meanest of his fellow-servants too That he should exult with joy and abound in hope in the midst of tribulations of persecutions of death it self Surely the
Mystery that driveth at all this must needs be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the highest degree the great mystery of Godliness That for the scope 27. Look now secondly at the parts and parcels the several pieces as it were whereof this mystery is made up those mentioned in this verse and the rest and you shall find that from each of them severally but how much more then from them altogether joyntly may be deduced sundry strong motives and perswasives unto Godliness Take the material parts of this Mystery the Incarnation Nativity Circumcision Baptism Temptation Preaching Life Death Burial Resurrection Ascension Intercession and Second coming of Christ. Or take if I may so call them the formal parts thereof our eternal Election before the World was our Vocation by the Preaching of the Gospel our Iustification by Faith in the merits of Christ our Sanctification by the Spirit of grace the stedfast Promises we have and hopes of future Glory and the rest It would be too long to vouch Texts for each particular but this I say of them all in general There is not one link in either of those two golden chains which doth not straitly tye up our hands tongues and hearts from doing evil draw us up effectually unto God and Christ and strongly oblige us to shew forth the power of his Grace upon our souls by expressing the power of Godliness in our lives and conversations That for the parts 28. Thirdly Christian Religion may be called the Mystery of Godliness in regard of its Conversation because Godliness is the best preserver of Christianity Roots and Fruits and Herbs which let alone and left to themselves would soon corrupt and putriâ—ie may being well condited with Sugar by a skilful Confectioner be preserved to continue for many years and be serviceable all the while So the best and surest means to preserve Christianity in its proper integrity and power from corrupting into Atheism or Heresie is to season it well with Grace as we do fresh meats with salt to keep them sweet and to be sure to keep the Conscience upright Holding the mysteries of faith in a pure Conscience saith our Apostle a little after at verse 9. of this Chapter and in the first Chapter of this Epistle vers 19. Holding faith and a good Conscience which latter some having put away concerning faith have made shipwrack Apostasie from the faith springeth most an end from Apostasie in manners And he that hath but a very little care how he liveth can have no very fast hold of what he believeth For when men grow once regardless of their Consciences good affections will soon languish and then will noysom lusts gather strength and cast up mud into the soul that the judgement cannot run clear Seldom is the head right where the heart is amiss A rotten heart will be ever and anon sending up evil thoughts into the mind as marish and fenny grounds do foggy mists into the air that both darken and corrupt it As a mans taste when some malignant humour affecteth the organ savoureth nothing aright but deemeth sweet things bitter and sowre things pleasant So where Avarice Ambition Malice Voluptuousness Vain-glory Sedition or any other domineering lust hath made it self master of the heart it will so blind and corrupt the judgment that it shall not be able to discern at any certainty good from evil or truth from falshood Wholsome therefore is St. Peters advice to add unto faith Vertue Vertue will not only keep it in life but at such a height of vigour also that it shall not easily either degenerate into Heresie or languish into Atheism 29. We see now three Reasons for which the Doctrine of Christianity may be called The mystery of Godliness because it first exacteth Godliness and secondly exciteth unto Godliness and is thirdly best preserved by Godliness From these Premisses I shall desire for our nearer instruction to infer but two things only the one for the trial of Doctrines the other for the bettering of our lives For the first St. Iohn would not have us over-forward to believe every spirit Every spirit doth he say Truly it is impossible we should unless we should believe flat contradictions Whilst one Spirit saith It is another Spirit saith It is not can a man believe the one and not disbelieve the other if he hear both Believe not every spirit then is as much in St. Iohn's meaning as if he had said Be not too hasty to Believe any Spirit especially where there appeareth some just cause of Suspicion but try it first whether it be a true spirit or a false Even as St. Paul biddeth us prove all things that having so done we may hold fast what upon trial proveth good and let the rest go 30. Now holy Scripture is certainly that Lapis Lydius that Test whereby this trial is to be made Ad legem ad testimonium when we have wrangled as long as we can hitherto we must come at last But sith all Sectaries pretend to Scripture Papists Anabaptists Disciplinarians All yea the Devil himself can vouch Texts to drive on a Temptation It were good therefore we knew how to make right applications of Scripture for the Trial of Doctrines that we do not mistake a false one for a true one Many profitable Rules for this purpose our Apostle affordeth us in sundry places One very good one we may gather from the words immediately before the Text wherein the Church of God is said to be the pillar and ground of truth The Collection thence is obvious that it would very much conduce to the guiding of our judgments aright in the examining of mens doctrines concerning either Faith or Manners wherein the Letter of Scripture is obscure or the meaning doubtful to inform our selves as well as we can in credendis what the received sence and in agendis what the constant usage and practice of the Church especially in the ancient times hath been concerning those matters and that to consider what conformity the Doctrines under trial hold with the principles upon which that their sence or practice in the Premisses was grounded The Iudgment and Practice of the Church ought to sway very much with every sober and wise man either of which whosoever neglecteth or but slighteth as too many do upon a very poor pretence that the mystery of iniquity began to work betimes runneth a great hazard of falling into many errors and Absurdities If he do not he may thank his good fortune more than his forecast and if he do he may thank none but himself for neglecting so good a guide 31. But this now mentioned Rule although it be of excellent use if it be rightly understood and prudently applied and therefore growing so near the Text I could not wholly baulk it without some notice taken of it it being not within the Text I press it no farther but come to another that springeth out of the very Text it self And
so many Mock-Graces and specious counter feits that carry a semblance of spiritual fruit but are not the things they seem to be And on the other side inordinate love of our selves partly and partly want of Charity towards our brethren have so disposed us to a capacity of being deceived that it is no wonder if in passing our judgments especially where our selves are concerned we be very much and very often mistaken It might rather be a wonder if we should not be sometimes mistaken 44. As most Errors claim to be a little akin to some Truths so most Vices challenge a kind of affinity to some Vertue Not so much from any proper intrinsecal true resemblance they have with such vertues as by reason of the common opposition they both have to one and the same contrary Vice As Prodigality hath some overly likeness with Liberality and so may hap to be mistaken for it for no other cause but this only that they are both contrary to Covetousness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Aristotle truly fallacy and deception for the most part arise from the appearance of some likeness oâ— similitude when things that are like but not the same are taken to be the same because they are like They that have given us marks of sincerity for the trial of our Graces have not been able to give us any certain Rules or infallible Characters whereby to try the sincerity of those Marks so as to remove all doubtings and possibility of erring 45. Whence I supose I may safely infer that the certainty of a Man's present standing in grace but much more then of his eternal future salvation although I doubt not but by the mercy of God it may be attainable in this life and that without extraordinary revelation in such a measure as may sustain the soul of an honest Christian with comfort is not yet either so absolutely necessary nor so void of fears and doubtings as some perhaps have imagined 46. Not so necessary but that a Man may be saved without it Many a good soul no doubt there is in the world that out of the experience of the falseness of his own heart and the fear of self-deceit and the sense of his own unworthiness could never yet attain to be so well persuaded of the sincerity of his own Repentance Faith and Obedience as to think that God would approve of it and accept it The censure were very hard and a great violation it would be of Charity I am sure and I think of Truth also to pronounce such a Man to be out of the State of Salvation or to call such his dis-persuasion by the name of Despair and under that name to condemn it There is a common but a great mistake in this matter Despair is far another manner of thing than many take it for When a Man thinketh himself so incapable of God's pardon that he groweth thereupon regardless of all duties and neither careth what he doth nor what shall become of him when he is once come to this resolution Over shoes over boots I know God will never forgive me and therefore I will never trouble my self to seek his favour in vain this is to run a deseperate course indeed this is properly the sin of Despair But when the fear that God hath not yet pardoned him prompteth him to better resolutions and exciteth him to a greater care of repentance and newness of life and maketh him more diligent in the performance of all holy duties that so he may be the more capable of pardon it is so far from being any way prejudical to his eternal salvation that it is the readiest way to secure it 47. But where the greatest certainty is that can be attained to in this life by ordinary means it is not ordinarily unless perhaps to some few persons at the very hour of death so perfect as to exclude all doubtings The fruits of the Spirit where they are true and sincere being but imperfect in this life and the truth and sincerity of them being not always so manifest but that a Man may sometimes be deceived in his judgment concerning the same it can hardly be what between the one and the other the imperfection of the thing and the difficulty of judging but that the Assurance which is wholly grounded thereupon and can therefore have no more strength than they can give it must be subject to Fears Iealonsies and Doubtings 48. I speak not this to shake any Man's comfort God forbid but to stir up every Man's care to abound and increase so much the more in all godliness and in the fruits of the Spirit by giving all diligence by walking in the Spirit and subduing the Lusts of the Flesh to make his Calling and Election sure Sure in it self that he fail not of Salvation in the end and sure to him also as far as he can that his comfort may be the greater and sounder in the mean time Now the God of all Grace and Glory send the Spirit of his Son plentifully into our Hearts that we may abound in the Fruits of godly living to the praise of his Grace our present comfort in this Life and the eternal salvation of our Souls in the Day of our Lord Iesus Christ. AD MAGISTRATUM The First Sermon At the Assizes at Lincoln in the Year 1690 at the Request of Sir DANIEL Dâ—IGNâ— Knight then High Sheriff of that Coâ—â—â—y Prov. 24. 10 12. 10. If thou faint in the day of adversity thy strength is small 11. If thou forbear to deliver them that are drawn unto death and those that are ready to be sâ—ain 12. If thou sayest Behold we know it not doth not he that pondereth the heart consider it and he that keepeth thy soul doth not he know it and shall not he render to every man according to his works 1. AS in most other things so in the performance of that duty which this Text aimeth at we are neither careful before-hand such is the uncharitableness of our incompassionate hearts to do well nor yet willing afterwards through the pride of our Spirits to acknowledg we have done ill The holy Spirit of God therefore hath directed Solomon in this Scripture wherein he would incite us to the performance of the duty to frame his words in such sort as to meet with us in both these corruptions and to let us see that as the duty is necessary and may not be neglected so the neglect is damnable and cannot be excused In the handling whereof I shall not need to bestow much labour either in searching into the contexture of the words or examining the differences of translations Because the sentence as in the rest of this Book for the most part hath a compleat sence within it self without any necessary either dependence upon any thing going before or reference to any thing coming after and the differences that are in the translations are neither many in number nor
thee from falling into that trouble and misery whereinto he hath suffered thy distressed brother to fall and hath kept thee in safety and prosperity for this end that thou mightest the better be able to succour those that are helpless doth not he take knowledg what use thou makest of that Power and whether thou art mindful to imploy it for thy brother's good or no 14. Neither yet only look at the Power thou now hast but consider withal what need thou mayest have of the help of others hereafter The World is full of changes and chances and all things under the Sun are subject to rouling Thou who by reason of thy present power art now sought and sued to by others by a thousand casualties more than thou canst imagine mayest be brought to crave help from others Now the Rule of equity is Do as thou wouldst be done to As thou wouldst expect help from those that are able to succour thee if thy self stoodest in need so be ready now it is in thy power to do it to succour those that stand in need of thy help and expect it from thee Learn by that speech of Iosephs brethren when they were distressed in Egypt Gen. 42. We were verily guilty concerning our brother in that we saw the anguish of his soul when he sought us and we would not hear therefore is this distress come upon us Learn I say from that speech of theirs what a dreadful pang and torture and corrosive it will be to thy conscience hereafter in the day of thy calamity when thou shalt sue to others and find but cold comfort from them if thy heart can then tell thee that though Men be hard yet God is just and that with what measure thou metedst to others before it is now measured back again with advantage perhaps into thine own bosom To prevent which misery learn wisdom of the unjust Steward even to make thee friends of thy Mammon and of thy power and of all those blessed opportunities and advantages thou enjoyest by doing good with them whilst thou hast time That when the tide shall turn thou mayest also find friends to help in time of need to stand by thee in the day of adversity and to deliver thy soul from unrighteous Iudges He that would readily find help it is but meet and right he should readily lend help 15. Pass we now from our selves in the third place to those poor oppressed ones to whom as a fit object for our justice and charity to be exercised upon we owe this duty of succour and subvention From whose condition we may find sundry farther excitements to the preformance of this duty if we shall consider the greatness of their distress the scarcity of their friends and the righteousness of their Cause Whereof the first proceedeth from the Cruelty the second from the Potency the third from the avarice ambition or other iniquities of their Oppressors First Many times the distresses of poor Men under the hand of their Oppressors are grievous beyond the imagination of those that never felt them They are expressed in the Text whether by way of Synecdoche one special kind being put to include all the rest or by an hyperbolical amplification for the fuller expressing of the grievousness thereof by the terms of Death and Slaughter If thou forbear to deliver them that are drawn to death and those that are ready to be slain Verily Oppressors are covetous and they that are coveteous are cruel too For though their aim be the spoil and not the blood yet rather than fail of the spoil they will not stick at the blood too Come let us lay wait for blood We shall fill our houses with spoil Prov. 1. And so the Oppressor proveth both a thief and a murderer a thief in the end he aimeth at and a murderer in the means whereby to obtain it as Ahab took away Naboth's life that he might enjoy his Vineyard Now surely that Man hath very little compassion in his bowels that will not set forward a foot nor reach out a hand nor open a lip to save the precious life of his poor Brother when he may so easily do it Were it but an Ox or an Ass or some beast of less value that lay weltred in a ditch common humanity will require we should lend our hand and put to our best strength to draw him out Xenocrates made scruple of hurting the Sparrow that flew into his lap when a Hawk pursued it And ought not we then much more to set our selves with that power we have by all lawful means to deliver our brother from the snare and from the pit of destruction 16. Yea you will say If it were to save a Man's life much might be we would then strain our selves a little to speak or to do for him But that is a case seldom hapneth in a setled Government such as blessed be God for it we live under The common oppressions of these times are of a lower nature and we are not bound by the Text to set in but in the case of life In petty grievances may we not leave Men to the course of the Law and to shift as well as they can for themselves We would be loth to get the displeasure of some great ones we live near and hold fair correspondency with when we need not and for trifles For answer first although the Text speaks expresly only of Death yet by a Synecdoche membri usual in the Scriptures all other violencies and injuries are intended As in the Law under the name of Murder all malice and revenge and under the name of Adultery Fornication and all other uncleannesses are fordidden Secondly though oppressions should not be directly intended in the Text yet might they be inferred from it by the rule of proportion and for the reason of equity For where there is the same reason of equity as in the present case although with some difference of proportion or degree there is also the same obligation of duty the said difference of proportion or degree still observed But indeed thirdly I take it that all oppressions are not only intended but also expressed under the names of death and slaughter Because to take away a Mans substance whereby he should maintain his life is interpretativè and to common intendment all one as to take away the very life it self Therefore as Abels blood crieth so the labourers wages crieth And the Scriptures so speak of Oppressors as of those that grind the faces of the poor that eat them up by morsels or that to save the labour of chewing swallow them up whole as the greater Fishes do the small ones by which means they make the poor of the land to fail as the Prophet speaketh That which maintaineth life is not only according to the phrase of the world in most Languages but even in holy Scriptures themselves sometimes so mentioned as if it were the
blood by Man shall his blood be shed And that Iudges should be very shy and tender how they grant Pardons or Reprievals in that case he established it afterwards among his own people by a most severe sanction Num. 35. Ye shall take no satisfaction for the life of a Murderer which is guilty of death but he shall surely be put to death And there is a reason of it there given also For blood saith he defileth the land and the land cannot be cleansed from the blood that is shed therein but by he blood of him that shed it Read that passage with attention and if both forehead and conscience be not harder than the neither milstone thou canst not have either the heart or the face to glory in it as a brave exploit whoever thou art that hast been the instrument to save the life of a Murderer 20. Indeed all offences are not of that hanious nature that Murder is nor do they cry so loud for vengeance as Murder doth And therefore to procure undeserved favour for a smaller offender is not so great a sin as to do it for a Murderer But yet so far as the proportion holdeth it is a sin still Especially where favour cannot be shewn to one Man but to the wrong and grievance of some other as it hapneth usually in those judicial controversies that are betwixt party and party for trial of right Or where favour cannot be shewn to an offender but with wrong and grievance to the publick as it most times falleth out in criminal causes wherein the King and Commonwealth are parties Solomon hath taught us that as well he that justifieth the wicked as he that condemneth the just are an abomination to the Lord. Yea and that for any thing that appeareth to the contrary from the Text and in thesi for circumstances may make a difference either way in hypothesi they are both equally abominable In doubtful cases it is doubtlesly better and safer to encline to Mercy than to Severity Better ten offenders should escape than one innocent person suffer But that is to be conceived only when things are doubtful so as the truth cannot be made appear but where things are notorious and evident there to justifie the guilty and to condemn the innocent are still equal abominations 21. That which you are to do then in the behalf of the poor is this First to be rightly informed and so far as morally you can well assured that their cause be just For mean and poor people are nothing less but ordinarily much more unreasonable than the great ones are and if they find the ear of the Magistrate open to hear their grievances as is very meet it should be they will be often clamorous and importunate without either cause or measure And if the Magistrate be not very wary and wise in receiving informations the Country swain may chance prove too cunning for him and make him but a stale whereby for himself to get the start of his Adversary and so the Magistrate may in fine and unwares become the instrument of oppression even then when his intention was to vindicate another from it The Truth of the matter therefore is to be first throughly sifted out the circumstances duly weighed and as well as the legal the equitable right examined and compared and this to be done with all requisite diligence and prudence before you engage in the poor Man's behalf 22. But if when this is done you then find that there is much right and equity on his side and that yet for want of skill or friends or means to manage his affairs he is in danger to be foiled in his righteous cause Or if you find that his Adversary hath a legal advantage of him or that he hath de rigore incurred the penalty of some dis-used statute yet did not offend wilfully out of the neglect of his known duty or a greedy covetous mind or other sinister and evil intention but meerly out of his ignorance and inexperience and in the simplicity of his heart as those two hundred Israelites that followed after Absalom when he called them not knowing any thing of his conspiracy had done an act of treason yet were not formally traitors In either of these cases I say you may not forsake the poor Man or despise him because he is poor or simple But you ought so much the rather to stick by him and to stand his friend to the utmost of your power You ought to give him your counsel and your countenance to speak for him and write for him and ride for him and do for him to procure him right against his Adversary in the former case and in the latter case favour from the Iudge In either case to hold back your hand to draw back your help from him if it be in the power of your hand to do him any help is that sin for which in the judgment of Solomon in the Text the Lord will admit no excuse 23. Come we now in the last place to some reasons or motives taken from the effects of the duty it self If carefully and conscionably performed it will gain honour and estimation both to our persons and places purchase for us the prayers and blessings of the poor yea and bring down a blessing from God not upon us and ours only but upon the State and Commonwealth also But where the duty is neglected the effects are quite contrary First do you know any other thing that will bring a Man more glory and renown in the common opinion of the World than to shew forth at once both justice and mercy by doing good and protecting the Innocent Let not mercy and truth forsake thee bind them about thy neck write them upon the table of thine heart so shalt thou find favour and good understanding or acceptance in the sight of God and Man Prov. 3. As a rich sparkling Diamond addeth both value and lustre to a golden Ring so do these vertues of justice and mercy well attempered bring a rich addition of glory to the Crowns of the greatest Monarchs Hoc reges habent magnificum ingens Prodesse miseris supplices fido lare Protegere c. Every Man is bound by the Law of God and of Charity as to give to every other Man his due honour so to preserve the honour that belongeth to his own person and place for Charity in performing the duties of every Commandment beginneth at home Now here is a fair and honest and sure way for all you that are in place of authority and judicature or sustain the persons of Magistrates to hold up the reputation both of your Persons and Places and to preserve them from scorn and contempt Execute judgment and justice with wisdom and diligence take knowledge of the vexations of those that are brought into the Courts or otherwise troubled without cause be sensible of the groans and pressures of poor Men in the
grievousness of their pressures secondly the paucity of their friends but especially and thirdly the equity and righteousness of their cause when they are in danger to be spoiled by the cruelty potency and iniquity of their Adversaries Some in respect of the duty it self the fruits and effects whereof ordinarily are first honour and renown in the World secondly the blessings and prayers of the poor thirdly the blessing of God upon us and ours fourthly the continuance of God's Mercies unto and the reversing of God's Iudgments from the Land 34. In the opening of which reasons I have purposely pressed the duty all along somewhat the more largely that I might not trouble you with any farther application at the close and therefore I hope it will not be expected I presume you would rather expect if we had time for it that I should proceed to examine the usual excuses and pretensions that are made in this case when the duty hath been neglected which Solomon hath comprehended in those few words in verse 12. Behold we knew it not and withal referred them over for the trial of what validity they are to the judgment of every Man 's own heart as the deputy-Iudg under God but because that may be faulty and partial in subordination to a higher tribunal even that of God himself from whose sentence there lieth no farther appeal This I aimed at in the choice of the Text as well as the pressing of the duty But having enlarged my self already upon the former point beyond my first intention I may not proceed any farther at this time nor will it be much needful I should if what hath been already delivered be well laid to heart Which God of his Mercy vouchsafe c. AD MAGISTRATUM The Second Sermon At the Assizes at Lincoln in the Year 1630. at the Request of Sir WILLIAM THOROLD Knight then High-Sheriff of that County Prov. 24. 10 12. 10. If thou faint in the day of adversity thy strength is small 11. If thou forbear to deliver them that are drawn unto death and those that are ready to be slain 12. If thou sayest Behold we know it not doth not he that pondereth the heart consider it and he that keepeth thy soul doth not he know it and shall not he render to every man according to his works 1. WE want Charity but abound with Self-love Our defect in that appeareth by our backwardness to perform our duties to our brethren and our excess in this by our readiness to frame excuses for our selves Solomon intending in that particular whereat the Text aimeth to meet with us in both these corruptions frameth his speech in such sort as may serve best both to set on the Duty and to take off the Excuses And so the words consist of two main parts The supposal of a Duty which all Men ought to perform in the 10 and 11 Verses and the removal of those Excuses which most Men pretend for non-performance in the 12th Verse Our Duty is to stand by our distressed Brethren in the day of their adversity and to do our best endeavour by all lawful ways to protect them from oppressions and wrongs and to rescue them out of the hands of those that go about either by might or cunning to take from them either their lives or livelihoods If thou faint in the day of adversity thy strength is small If thou forbear to deliver those that are drawn to death and those that are ready to be slain From which words I have heretofore upon occasion of the like meeting as this is spoken of the Duty in this place shewing the necessity and enforcing the performance of it from sundry important considerations both in respect of God and of our selves and of our poor brethren and of the Thing it self in the blessed effects thereof which I shall not trouble my self or you to repeat 2. Taking that therefore now for granted which was then proved to wit that it is our bounden duty to do as hath been said but our great sin if it be neglected I shall at this time by God's assistance and with your patience proceed as the Text leadeth me to consider of the Excuses in the remaining words vers 12. If thou sayest Behold we knew it not doth not he that pondereth the heart consider it And he that keepeth thy soul doth not he know it And shall not he reward every Man according to his works For the better understanding and wore fruitful applying of which words we are to enquire of two things first what the Excuses are which Solomon here pointeth at and then of what value and sufficiency they are 3. Many Excuses Men have to put by this and every other duty whereof some are apparently frivolous and carry their confutation with them Solomon striketh at the fairest whereof three the most principal and the most usual of all he seems to have comprehended in these few words 1. Behold we knew it not As thus Either first we knew it not that is we never heard of their matters they never made their grievances known to us Or secondly we knew it not that is we had no clear evidence to give us full assurance that their cause was right and good Or thirdly we knew it not that is tho to our apprehension they had wrong done them yet as the case stood with them we saw not by what ways we could possibly relieve them we knew not how to help it 4. These are the main Excuses which of what value they are is our next Enquiry Wherein Solomon's manner of rejecting them will be our best guide Who neither absolutely condemneth them because they may be sometimes just nor yet promiscuously alloweth of them because they are many times pretended without cause but referreth them over for their more particular and due trial to a double judicature that is to say to the judgment of every man's heart and conscience first as a deputy Iudg under God and if that fail in giving sentence as being subject to so many errors and so much partiality like enough it may then to the judgment of God himself as the supreme unerring and impartial Iudg from whose Sentence there lieth no appeal Which judgment of God is in the Text amplified by three several degrees or as it were steps of his proceeding therein grounded upon so many divine attributes or properties and each fitted to other in so many several Propositions Yet those not delivered Categorically and positively but to add the greater strength and Emphasis to them put into the form of Negative Interrogations or Questions Doth not he consider Doth not he know And shall not he render That is most certainly and without all peradventure he doth consider and he doth know and he will render 5. The first step of God's judicial proceedings is for Inquisition and that grounded upon his Wisdom 1. Doth not he that pondereth the heart consider it As if he had said The Lord is a