is the way and lawfull appointment of the imputation of the merits of Jesus Christ when daily repentance goeth before and alwayes ariseth from his fall Which when the impenitent doe not cockering and pleasing the flesh in every thing and sitting at rest under sin reigning therefore such as these cannot challenge the merit of Christ to belong unto them for the bloud of Christ troden under foot can be no medicine CHAP. XVII The Inheritance and goods of Christians are not of this world therefore they must use them as strangers 1 Timoth. 6. We brought nothing into this world neither shall we carry any thing out of it having therefore meat and raiment let us be content therewith SEeing that God Almighty created temporall goods to that end did bestow All things are to be used for necessity onely with feare them on man as certain helps and necessary furtherances it is meet that they should not be otherwise converted but to be used and taken from our most loving God with thanksgiving and feare trembling and whatsoever is more then necessary Riches are trials and proofs of men abound and are superfluous as are gold and silver meat and drink and raiments these are left to man as a triall by God for to try man that by these things it may be seen how his mind standeth between these terrene things and God himselfe that is whether he cleave onely to him alone rest in him alone and seek onely after celestiall and invisible goods or contrariwise sucking in and feeding on the inticement of earthly things addict himselfe to this temporall life and preferre this earthly paradise before that of heaven Therefore God Almighty by reason Man is unexcusable of temporall things and in them only gave unto man his election and choice whom by riches honours graces and goodly gifts it might be manifested in some sort whether he did cleave unto God respect him live in him or being seduced with their splendor and false shewes turn his mind from God and live without him and contrary to him After which manner every one by his owne sentence and triall is declared and remaineth inexcuseable according to that of Moses Deut. 30. Consider what I have propounded this day before thee Life and Goodnesse and on the contrary Death and Evill Superfluous things are proofs of the feare of God that thou mightest chuse life and thou mightest blesse thy selfe All things therefore in this world are exposed to our eyes not for the cause of deliciousnesse and pleasure but as proofs and trials in which the fall is easie when we fall from God and this is that forbidden tree with the fruits thereof the eating whereof is so forbidden lest our mind resting in them doe take delight and play the adulterer after the manner of men now who know no other pleasure but what is taken and received from earthly things abusing thereby the creatures of God meat drink and apparell to the pleasures of the flesh and vain delights wherewith most men at this day are drawn from God But it is the part of a true Christian to think that they be strangers or Pilgrims A Christian is not delighted in worldly things whose necessity these earthly things should serve not for delicatenesse and that they should not set all their delight and pleasure in the world but should place it in God alone but if they doe otherwise they intangle themselves in sinne and being seduced with wicked concupiscence being womanly wanton and effeminate no true Israelites with Eva they eat of the forbidden fruit Therefore Christians do not desire curiously deliciously dainty meats so that they may gormondize them but they hunger after meat which corrupteth not they follow not the pomp of apparell that is earthly but otherwise they aspire to the cloathing of divine light glorified bodies In briefe to true Christians all Worldly things are a crosse to a Christian things whatsoever in this world doe please others are nothing but a crosse temptation allurements of sinne gall and venome and rightly indeed for whatsoever a man to obey his concupiscence and pamper the flesh usurpeth without the feare of God that cannot but be venome or poyson to the soule howsoever to the body it may seem healthfull But such is the indocibility of man no man layeth to heart to know the forbidden tree but every man most intemperatly A Chrstian doth use the creatures with feare is fed with the concupiscence of the flesh the fruit I say of the forhidden tree but a Christian which useth all things with the feare of God and as a stranger using diligence and having great care that he offend not his heavenly Father in meat drink cloathing houses or any fraile good thing by his intemperance or his table-friends taking heed of all abuses most diligently and with the eyes of faith he beholdeth future good things in like manner for what profiteth it the body by by to be eaten with worms if in this world it swell in all kind of pleasure Naked saith Job came I out of my mothers womb and naked shall I return againe that is to say naked infirme and brickle body we bring into the world as an unprofitable burden we bring it into the world which as the spoyle of death when we goe out of the world we carry it out again and in truth poorer then when we entred for being born we have body and life and things not yet ripe are at hand cloath cloathing The bread of Christistians is the bread of grief meat and drink all which being dead we leave behind and so now whatsoever we had even from our birth to the houre of death in this world the solace of miserable necessity yea the bread of mercy and griefe they were whose use and possession in a moment death hath interdicted and taken away therefore nothing is more wretched then a dead man and especially he who is not rich in God Goe to then O yee mortals because we are strangers and Pilgrims in this world and because we must leave all these things when we die will we nill we let us leave at least to be grievous to our souls in such things In death all are alike riches covetousnes is a kind of madnesse and let us acknowledge it to be a kind of madnesse to gather wealth with great labour for a brickle and fraile body which it cannot carry out of the world especially seeing there is another world and another body and another life Call these things I say O yee mortals to mind to you I speak who in truth are strangers and Pilgrims before the eyes of God as it is in the Psalmes although very few of you doe testifie that you think so by your deeds and if we be straugers in this world it followeth that our countrey is elswhere that which is manifest to man of it selfe if we conferre or compare time with
he died for his cause because they contemne the sptrit of grace that is they despise it and repell it even for that they by their wicked life they deride and contemne Christ his bloud calleth for revenge against the wicked the mighty grace of God offered so that the bloud of Christ shed for them crieth for revenge against them and that by the just judgement of God which is most terrible to heare all which they doe offer up draw upon themselves for truly it is a fearfull thing to fall into the hands of the living God as it is written in the same Chapter for God even our God is a living God not a livelesse Idoll that will not or is not able to revenge this refusall and contempt of his grace which revenge and divine wrath even their own conscience doth threaten them and follow them at the heeles who hearing that the Sonne of God did die a most terrible death for sinne yet doe not take any care to abstain from sinne And this is the cause wherefore presently after the death of Christ repentance Why God requireth repentance of all men was preached over all the world both because he died the death for the sinnes of the whole world and in all places of the world men should repent as it is written Chap. 17. Acts and that they might receive that Panacea that soveraigne hearb that cureth all diseases with a contrite penitent and faithfull heart lest the grace of God should be frustrated and made voyd Without repentance sins are not forgiven for after this serious repentance remission of sinnes doth follow immediatly after neither is it possible he should have his sins remitted that repenteth not grieveth not that hath sinned and yet rejoyceth in sins as also nothing is more fooolish and preposterous that those sinnes should be pardoned the which thou never didst think to abstain from or challenge the merit of Christ to himselfe and in the mean time to wallow in his sinnes which was the cause of Christs death And yet there be many who although all their life they never repented seriously that they had sinned nor have abated a hair of their wrath covetousnes pride hatred envie hypocrisie and unrighteousnesse but rather have grown and augmented their sinnes more and more and yet dare require remission of their sins The false faith of false Christians and challenge the merit of Christ to belong unto them which indeed is their blind and deplorable impudencie These are such as flatter themselves to their exceeding evill perswading themselves through their own foolishnesse that they are good Christians because for sooth they know and beleeve that Christ died for their sinnes and by this meanes they doe beleeve sted fastly they shall be saved but thou art an unhappy and after a most miserable manner bewitched false Christian for neither doth the word of God teach that by this means life eternall is to be obtained neither any of the Prophets or Apostles did any time so preach but this is the unanimous consent Thou which requirest to have thy sinnes pardoned first repent abst in from thy sins and then grieving from thy heart earnestly that thou hast sinned beleeve in Christ But how should he bee sorry for his sinnes who never thinketh how to eschew sinne or how should he eschew his sinnes which is not sorrowfull for the committing of them Wherefore Christ with all his Apostles Prophets doth teach thee that thou must What it is to die to the world dye to the world and sinne as to pride covetousnesse lust wrath hatred and that thou must return with all thy heart to the Lord and ask pardon of him which being done now thou art absolved and free from thy sins and now the heavenly Physitian respecteth thee who onely healeth contrite hearts if thou insist upon any other way Christ profiteth thee nothing and in vain and of no value or belonging to salvation is the boasting of thy faith for true faith which reneweth the man it extinguisheth and mortifieth sinnes in man and quickneth him in Christ that is maketh him to live in Christ in faith and in his charity humility meeknesse and patience And after this manner Christ is to thee the way to life and thou in like manner art a new creature in him But if thou intend to sinne and hast not yet determined to leave thine iniquity but applaudest all thy old sinnes or actions of old Adam let it be how canst thou be another creature or how canst thou belong to Christ when thou dost not crucifie the flesh with all the desires thereof and concupiscences as the Apostle saith Galat. 5. Goe then and daily heare ten Sermons a day and every The vaine worship of God month confesse thy selfe and communicate for all these things are farre unworthy of remission of sinnes because a penitent heart contrite and faithfull which maketh thee capable of this wholsome medicine thou dost not bring with thee Truly and indeed the Sacraments and Word of God which are the most powerfull remedies helps yet but only to those that repent of their sins from the bottom of their hearts and that with daily faithfull mourning doe detest the way of their old and former life For what profiteth it to anoint a stone with pretious oyntment or a medicine Or what harvest shalt thou reap if thou sowest amongst thornes and briers Therefore thou must first pull up all these young thornes that choak the good seed and all things that hinder thee from reaping Whom Christ profiteth nothing a good harvest Last of all whosoever cleaveth to his sinnes it is sure that Christ profiteth him nothing the nativity of Christ helpeth him nothing who careth not to be born with him nothing the death of Christ him who hath not determined firmly in his mind to die unto sin nothing the resurrectioÌ„ of Christ him who refuseth in him to arise from sin lastly the ascension of Christ profiteth nothing to him that will not lead a heavenly life But if converted with the prodigall thou deplore hate and slye sinne and then prayest to obtain pardon of God and beholding by faith Christ crucified and his wouuds like unto the true Israelite thou mayst say Good God have mercy upon me a most grievous sinner then pardon is at hand what and how great soever thy sinnes be thou hast committed so great truly is the perfection in the redemption gotten by the bloud of Christ and so is the perfection of applying the grace and imputation of the whole merit of Christ by faith and it is most true that is in 12. Sap. God giveth place to repentance for sins that is to say pardoning â—reely perfectly and wholly the penitent for Christ yea it is the great good pleasure of God to exercise mercy and to pardon sinnes freely My bowels are troubled within me as towards them I am mercâ—fâ—ll and I will have mercy of
boldly and willingly to sinne is nothing else then to live in the Devill In whom therefore the life of Christ is not this man is without repentance neither is a true Christian nor the sonne of God nay Christ knoweth him not He who will rightly know him as a Saviour and example of life it is meet he know him to be meere love meere courtesie patience and humility which vertues of Christ it behoveth thee to have and love them from the bottome of thy heart and fasten them to thy self As a plant by its favour and smel that it sendeth forth bewrayes its own nature so thou oughtest to know Christ and by experience be certain that he is a certain most fragrant The true knowledge of Christ stock from whence thy soule doth draw and obtain admirable strength and new vitall spirits as also singular joy and solace And after this manner is tasted how sweet the Lord is so is the truth known so is the chiefe and eternall good perceived and then doth he know certainly that nothing is better then the life of Christ nothing more pleasant sweet pretious or more full of tranquillity And lastly nothing can be more likened or be compared to life eternall And do we doubt that because it is better then all it should be more desireable for in whom the life of Christ is not this man cannot know what the peace and tranquillity of eternall life is nor what the chiefe good is nor everlasting truth nor what is true peace and joy the true light and true charity seeing Christ is all these himselfe whereupon John Ep. 1. chap. 4. saith Every one that loveth is born of God and knoweth God he that loveth not knoweth not God because God is love Whereby the fruits of the new birth which is of God appeareth and also life and a new creature not to be words and an externall forme but a substance but the Queen of vertues and which is God himselfe that is to say Charity for of whomsoever any is born it is meet he should have the same properties and he that saith he is born of God let him shew that by charity because God is charity In like manner the knowledge of God resteth not in words and shadowed or vain knowledge but in lively amiable pleasant and most sincere pleasure which ought to flow into the bottome of our heart and mind and there to dwell when we taste by faith inwardly in our hearts the sweetnesse of God This I say this is the true lively and efficacious knowledge of God of which David in Psalm 84. speaketh saying My heart and my flesh rejoyceth in the living God and Psalm 63. How pleasant is thy mercies over our lives where it is presently manifested the joy and sweetnesse of the knowledge divine which is infused into the faithfull heart and so at length the man liveth in God and God in him so is truth known and so the same truth knoweth man CHAP. XII The being of a Christian man is to die to himselfe and the world and to live unto Christ 2 Corinth 5. Christ died for all men that those which live might not now live unto themselves but unto him who died for them and rose again OVer and above this that this sentence is full of consolation whilst it is manifested that Christ died for all men as also it containeth a most wholsome doctrine concerning the way of a Christian life how we ought to live that is to say not to our He that wil live in Christ must dy to the world selves onely but to him who died for our cause but this by no means can be done unlesse first we die to our selves and the world Therefore if thou hast purposed to live in Christ necessarily thou must die to worldly concupiscence but if thou mind to live to thy selfe and the world it will profit nothing to be with Christ But there be 3. kinds of death one spirituall when the Death is three fold man daily dieth to himselfe that is to the concupiscence of his flesh covetousnesse pride voluptuousnesse wrath such like the second naturall the third everlasting of the second speaketh Paul to the Philippians châ—p 1. To live to my selfe it is Christ and to die it is gain as if he should say To a Christian desiring to die Christ is his life and death gaine for when he changeth this short and miserable life for a better life and this earthly and fraile goods for stable and eternal goods this is a most gainful exchange and he who shall be well pleased with this saying and fit himselfe to the first sort of death in my judgement he shall not erre For that soule is thrice and foure The life of Christ times happy to whom to live is Christ that is wherein Christ liveth or that hath the life of Christ that is followeth his humility and lowlinesse But alas most men The life of the Devill at this day have taken upon them the life of the Devill and their life is the Divell As for example covetousnesse pride concupiscence wrath blasphemy for this is the life of the Devill But thou O man walk carefully and look about thee again and again and see who liveth in thee and thou What it is to die to themselves and the world shalt be most happy if thou canst truly say To me to live is Christ not in the other life only but also in this present life so truly it is needfull also in this present life now that for thee to live is Christ gain to die For is there any thing more profitable then to die in this condition to covetousnesse pride concupiscence wrath and hatred that Christ by that means may live in thee For how much every one dieth to the world so much Christ liveth in him Goe to them let Christ live in thee in time that thou in like manner maist live with him in From whence be the perturbations of the mind eternity But seeing that the mind distracted with divers worldly concupiscences is not capable of true tranquillity and peace it followeth that those that doe die before they begin to live in Christ that which our Sarah the type of the new birth great God hath taught us in divers figures in the old Testament for Sarah when by reason of her age she was unfit to bring children and dead to marriage bed did conceive in her womb and brought forth Isaac which word signifieth Laughter So then unlesse thou root out of thy mind worldly love thou shalt not be able to feel and receive the joy of the Spirit The promise was not made unto Abraham of Christ Abraham is a type of the abnegation of the world and the covenant of circumcision annexed before he left his proper habitation and his own inheritance it is no otherwise with man so long as he hath his mind fixed to the world it is
let us suppose some Usurer for many yeares hath been a servant to covetousnesse without amendment sins are not forgiven after the example of Zacheus or to lust as Mary Magdalen or lastly to wrath and revenge as Esau and this man so soon as he heard these offences were to be left or else the death and bloud of Christ would profit him nothing hee becommeth a suppliant to God and to him as old men did speak to give satisfaction in words and then to desist from his sinnes to crave pardon and grace of God and to beleeve in Christ then it is most certain that all his first offences are remitted him out of meere grace and no merit but for the death and bloud of Christ shed for them But these that have not determined as yet to detest covetousnesse wrath usury pride and lust they because they want faith purging their hearts may hope in vain for the remission of their sins but lament for them in eternall torments never to bee satisfied Whereupon blessed Paul doth earnestly admonish Galat. 5. Because they doe such things they shall not inherit or possesse the Kingdome of heaven Therefore either eternal damnation followeth or amendment of their lives to a better which where it is done by faith and true conversion unto God there is pardon and divine grace ready at hand yea Christ himselfe without whom there is no grace For Christ doth accompany his most pretious All thingâ— necessary to salvation do accompany faith taking hold of Christs merits merit and consequently satisfaction for our sinnes which being present there is righteousnesse with righteousnesse peace and a good conscience as Psalm 85. Righteousnesse and peace doe kisse each other with a cheerfull conscience the holy Ghost which because it is the spirit of joy thereupon also joy followeth and thereupon life eternal which is nothing but joy sempiternal And this is that light of eternal life w th which they are crowned so many as live in Christ and daily repentance whose beginning and foundation is the death of Christ On the contrary where there is no repentance there is grace wanting and grace wanting neither is Christ there present who being absent his merit is not participated and that which dependeth upon Impenitency hindereth the whole kingdom of God eternall salvatioÌ„ it the remission of sinnes Where that is not to be had or to be found there is no righteousnesse and consequently no peace or good conscience no consolation no holy Ghost no joy of heart and conscience lastly no life eternal but death but hell but condemnation and everlasting darknesse Whereby that is manifest wee affirmed in the beginning That those who by true repentance in Christ doe not intend to follow him in his life cannot bee freed from the blindnes of their hearts nor themselves freed from the eternall darknesse CHAP. XXXVIII That the Antichristian life is the cause of false doctrine hardnesse of heart and blindnesse where certain things are ingraffed in predestination John 12. Yet there is a little light in you walk while you have the light lest darknesse comprehend you SEing it is certain that Christ together with faith and a Christian life is denied renounced and wholly extirpated to what end serveth his doctrine to us which together with the Sacraments to that end is The end of the Word Sacraments given us onely that it may bee turned into juyce bloud and our life And as from noble seed doth arise or grow noble fruit so from the Word and Sacraments should arise a new man holy and spiritual and to speak in a word a Christian out of the Spirit Word and Sacrament no otherwise then a man regenerate out of Christ so beleeving in him and living in him For as an infant is born of his mother so a Christian is born of God and Christ by faith But when wee have not determined to change our life nay rather have so framed our manners as they are against him it is plain we are not begotten of God and therefore his doctrine and light doth profit us nothing when we are sure wee walke in darknesse Whereupon also the light being fled and taken away it must needs bee that darknesse and false doctrine of errors and seducing do incroach upon us Which to beware of our Saviour did admonish us saying Little children whilst yee have light walk in it lest darknesse doe comprehend you I say the darknesse of errors deceivers deluding of blindnesse and hardnesse of heart such darknesse as deceived Pharaoh the Jewes and Julian who in the end convicted by his own conscience in his own evill exclaimed openly and confessed that Christ did yet live and the true God saying Thou hast overcome O Galilean thou hast overcome when it had been better for him to have said Have mercy upon me but he could not so say because of his blindnes From whence hardnesse of heart and because hee refused and denied the mercy of Christ And this hardnesse of heart is that terrible darknesse which in the end overtaketh those that will not walk in the light and is the punishment of those that blaspheme the truth as Pharaoh did Exod. 5. Who is the Lord that I should heare Blindnes is a punishment his voyce and let Israel goe I know not the the Lord. Therefore it was convenient that God should manifest himselfe to him by his power making him an example before the whole world that it might bee manifest that man can do nothing against God In like manner when the Jews would not hearken unto God they were strucken with blindnesse and hardnesse of heart that which Moses had fore-told them would come to passe Deut. 28. 32. The Lord shall strike thee with madnesse and blindnesse and the fury of the mind and it came to passe witnesse Esay chap. 6. Whereby it is manifest that such â—lindnesse is the most just punishment of incredulity and contempt of God and heavenly truth according to that of Paul 2 Thess 2. Because they received not the love of the truth that they might bee saved therefore God shall send unto them or give them over to be deceived by the spirit of errour to beleeve lies that all may be judged that beleeved not the truth but consented to iniquity By which it is given us to understand why God is wont to permit such blindnesse and hardnesse of heart Moreover to whom he denieth and lastly taketh away his offered From whom God withdraweth his favour grace this man is wretched of himselfe neither can return into the way at any time after the example of Pharaoh and Julian and from whom the Lord taketh away his light hee liveth all his dayes in darknesse But Almighty God taketh it onely from those that will not walk in it neither taketh hee his favour away but from those that have refused it In which sense blessed Paul Rom. 9. recounteth that oracle of God out of