therefore we ought to study this place of holy Scripture and have it much in our thoughts that so our Faith may stand in the Power of God For otherwise how shall we be able to follow the Apostolical Precept which would have us when we are questioned to render a reason of the hope that is in us 1 Pet. iii. 15. We may be able to stand our ground though we be ignorant of the true causes of belief but the enemies of it will look upon it as a foolish obstinacy if we have not so much understanding as to give some other account of our Faith than they give for theirs Suppose they should say Why are you a Christian whence is it that you look for a Resurrection a Glorious body and Eternal life in another world Would they not think us very stupid if we could say nothing to them but that so we have been always taught and are resolved to believe Would not this be as good a reason for them as it is for us and make us unworthy of the name of Christians who know our Books no better which bid us give and furnish us with a reasonable account Consider therefore what Answer you would shape to them that should make such a demand The Apostle says it is fit they should have a reason what is the best that you can offer for their satisfaction shall I tell you The plain Answer is this That Jesus whose Religion we follow was the Son of God and therefore we believe these things because the Son of God taught us so who cannot deceive us and we will not exchange this for any other perswasion though we should die for it It is certain enough that every body who hears this will presently consent to us that he is a fool who doth not stoop to him and comply with us if it be certain that Jesus is the Son of God But how do you prove that will be the next question Here is the labour this is our work and whence will you fetch convincing Arguments to make them yield to you this weighty point There is no such Compendious Abridgment of them any where that I know of as in this place of S. John which furnishes us with reasons both many and mighty to perswade us and others that Jesus is the Son of God You may tell them that the Father Almighty said so by voices from Heaven in the audience of credible persons and that the Word said so as they may be informed of S. Paul who had no reason greater than this to force him to leave all and with the daily hazard of his life to follow Jesus You may alledge the testimony of the Holy Ghost both at his Baptism and afterward the marvellous sanctity of his Doctrine and Life the Confession he made at his bloudy Death the Glory of his Miraculous works his Resurrection from the Dead the Power of the same Spirit in his Apostles after he was gone to Heaven all the Miracles which were wrought long after their times in the places where the holy Martyrs of Jesus suffered together with the wonderful success of these Witnesses who perswaded innumerable People in all Countries to become the subjects of this crucified King Christ Jesus Study this place therefore I say again very well that you may be able to oppress any gain-sayer with the great weight of those reasons which you render of your faith And study it likewise till you feel the faith of Jesus doing something in your hearts till that faith which hath so good a cause have sutable effects that is till it change you as it is ever apt to do into the nature of that cause from whence it flows It comes from God see that it carry you to him and change you into his likeness It relies on his Testimony be sure that it make you perfectly of his mind It comes with the authority from the Word of God it self and from the Holy Ghost let it mightily inspire you with devotion to him and set your affections on things above where Christ is now at God's right hand It relies upon the Purity of his holy Doctrine and Life and therefore ought to purifie our hearts that we may behave our selves in all holy conversation and godliness It is founded on his Bloud on which we can never look but it will deaden our affections to this World and make us crucifie the flesh with its passions and lusts It stands upon the power of God and should therefore make us strong in the Lord and in the power of his might It grows as you see upon sundry roots and flows from several heads and therefore should dispose those in whose hearts it is planted to be abundant in the work of the Lord and to bring forth much fruit that we may be known to be indeed the Disciples of Jesus whose faith is supported by such numerous Witnesses And this now will lead me to the next thing which S. John here makes to be the necessary consequent of this faith and therefore ought not to be omitted IV. If there be such great such abundant reason to believe that Jesus is the Son of God then there is as great a necessity lying upon us to be obedient unto him and punctually to observe all his commands This Faith both requires our submission and obedience to him and also gives us power and ability to perform it It is a meer trick of the Devil another piece of his Sophistry when He cannot dig up the foundation of Christianity which I told you was his first indeavour to hinder all superstructure upon it by perswading Christian People that Faith and Obedience are no necessary Companions but that they may be good believers and yet not keep Christ's Precepts Some think they need not and others which is the same cheat in another shape think they cannot But I appeal to every Man's conscience if he be a believer whether he do not perceive his heart over-awed and his will inclined to reverence and subjection and all his powers mightily moved to tender their service when he seriously thinks that Jesus is the Lord to whom God the Father hath committed all Judgment and will render to every Man according to his works Do you not feel this faith carrying a great authority with it Nay is there not an irresistable energy and vertue in it while you attend to it pressing you to conformity with his holy will Who can gain-say this And who can say then that his Faith does not both engage and inable him to be obedient to his Saviour if he do but mind what he believes He never thinks of that but it powerfully urges and constrains him to yield himself to be a faithful Servant of Jesus in every thing that he declares to be the mind and will of God These uncontrollable inclinations declare to us so plainly the tendency and natural disposition of Christian Faith that we cannot but see it is so far from
may read ver 34 35 36. If they were called Gods in old time to whom the Word of God came i. e. who received commission and authority from God to be the Judges and Rulers of his people then it could be no offence much less a blasphemy for him whom God had sanctified i. e. set apart and anointed to this office of being their Lord and King to call himself the Son of God For so he was by his place and there was no need he should say any thing of the Divine nature that was in him Well then to be the Son of God and to be the Christ being but different expressions of the same thing and the word Christ signifying anointed one set apart to an high office and in its eminent sence that person who was to sustain the place of God in this world to be the King of Israel yea the Governour and Ruler of all mankind we must conclude that when the Apostle says here Jesus is the Son of God his meaning is that He is the Holy one of God the person whom he sanctified by the unction of the Holy Ghost and sent into the World to whom he hath now given all power in Heaven and in Earth that every knee should bow to him as the Sovereign Lord of the World whom we are to hear and obey and depend upon in all things For this is the stile you may observe of the Old Testament from whence you may learn the rise and original of this manner of speech which calls those Kings who derived their authority immediately from God by the name of his Sons Because when they were anointed by his order they were made what they were not before and begotten as they spoke again And being created by God to their new dignity they are therefore called his Sons The first time we meet with the phrase is in the story of the first King of Israel 1 Sam. xiii 1. where Saul is called as the words are in the Hebrew the Son of one year in his Kingdom Because there was but a year passed since the time of his unction by which he was born Gods Vicegerent and as you read x. 6. turned into another man And indeed we find this imitated in Ethnick writers who call the day their Emperors entred upon their Reign their Birth-day So we read in Spartianus that Adrian being informed by Letters that Trajan had named him for his Successor caused the birth-day of his adoption to be celebrated And two days after hearing of his death he ordered they should keep the birth-day of his Empire * Natalem imperii instituit celebrandum But I do not intend to launch out of the holy story where we find this more plainly delivered in the History of the succeeding Kings of Israel For when the Philistins the Moabites the Syrians the Ammonites and other neighbouring People with their Princes conspired after they had been conquered by David against the Lord and against his anointed resolving to cast off their yoke the Psalmist shews Psal 2. how vain and idle their attempt would prove because God had appointed him whom he sent a Prophet to anoint to be his King This decree of God he averrs and openly declares ver 6 7. that the Lord said unto him Thou art my Son this day i. e. when he anointed him I have begotten thee So that to rise against him was to war with God Almighty whose Son that is Vicegerent he was in those Countries And therefore if they were well advised he exhorts them all to go and kiss the Son ver 12. i. e. submit themselves by that token of humble subjection to him who had his Authority immediately from God Nay was his first-born the most eminent Prince that is that ever he made lxxxix Psal 27. And therefore he was the prime type of our Lord Christ to whom these words are applied because he was the Son of David that great King who was to reign over them for ever as the Angel said i. Luke 33. And if you pass from hence to the next King Solomon who had a particular unction also and in whose reign was prefigured the glorious Kingdom of our Saviour you will find that God says by a Prophet concerning him I will be his Father and he shall be my Son 2 Sam. vii 14. Which words are a promise to make Solomon King and settle him on the Throne of his Father David So He understood it as appears by the speech which David made not long before his death to all the great men of his Kingdom 1 Chron. xxviii where he tells them ver 4. that as Jesse had many Sons Yet God liked him only to make him King over all Israel So of the many Sons which the Lord had given him ver 5. He had chosen Solomon to sit upon the Throne of the Kingdom of the Lord. As is evident saith he from those words of God spoken by Nathan ver 6. I have chosen him to be my SON and I will be hit FATHER i. e. made choice of him to be King of Israel in thy room and as I have been to thee so I will be to him Thus Solomon one would think interpreted these words when he prays God who had made good one part of his promise to perform the other also 2 Chron. i. 8 9. Thou hast shewed great mercy unto David my Father and hast made me reign in his stead as much as to say made me thy Son now O Lord God let thy promise unto my Father be established that is of being a Father to me now that I am become thy son and set by thee over a people like the dust of the Earth in multitude By this time I suppose it will be no wonder to any intelligent person that these Kings are called the Sons of God who did not only govern in that Country which was called it is well known God's land and the inhabitants whereof were his peculiar people but were appointed by his special direction and anointed with his holy oil lxxxix Psal 20. and had as it were their being and birth from God who promoted them to sit upon his Throne and to be Kings for the Lord God as you read 2 Chron. ix 8. so that the Kingdom it self is called in that Book the Kingdom of the Lord xiii 8. And the Judges also in the Courts of that Kingdom are said to exercise the Judgment of the Lord and not of man xix 6. that is to sit there in God's stead to do men justice And because of this great power and trust committed to them by him are called as you heard lxxxii Psal 1 6. Gods and the children of the most High whose deputies they were and for whom they judged And therefore it is the less wonder that when this Great Prince came among them to whom all judgment is committed and who hath all power in Heaven and in Earth and is Lord of all and appointed by God
stood so nearly related to him as to be his Son and therefore worthy to be glorified by him again and again until He had fully judged as he there speaks between Him and his Adversaries who denied him to be the Christ but was pronounced by God to be the Prince of life To conclude this you may note that not long before God spake in this manner from Heaven to them our Saviour had said That they had not heard his voice at any time v. John 37. John the Baptist had and so had three of his Disciples And therefore John bare witness of him whose testimony he says was true ver 32. though he did not stand in such need of it as if his credit could not be supported without it No He appealed to him merely because they had such an high opinion of him ver 33 34. otherwise he had a greater testimony than that of John ver 36. which was not only the works that he did which testified of him that the Father had sent him but the Father himself who sent him note this for he appeals now to what the voice from Heaven said he has born witness of him ver 37. And if they had had any goodness in them ver 38. they would have received him whom the Father sent When did He send him but when he spake by that voice from Heaven which now he utters once more in other words for their greater and fuller satisfaction when many of them were assembled together that they who had not hitherto might hear his voice as well as Jesus himself and his Apostles and be awakened hereby to attend to what the other witnesses of him should say especially after he was risen from the dead I should pass now to the Examination of one of them were it not fit before I part with this to take notice of a Tradition which runs among the Jews concerning this way of Revelation by a voice from Heaven which they say was very usual in those ages The Doctors deliver so their words are in the Babylonian Talmud * In the title Sanhedrim cap. 1. that from the death of the latter Prophets Haggai Zachariah and Malachy the Holy Ghost was taken away but yet notwithstanding they had the Ministry of the Bath Col i. e. the daughter of a voice By that name they call this way of Revelation because they say it was not a full and strong voice which they heard but a voice coming out of another voice and heard when it was gone Just as sparks say they are called Bene resheph the sons of an hot coal because they leap out of the fire so is this called the daughter of a voice because it resulted from a voice and came as it were out of the womb of it being a kind of Eccho after something that was spoken which they could not understand but only caught hold of this tail as I may call it and conclusion of it And they would have us believe that as under the first Temple they had the benefit of Prophecy Urim and Thummim and the Holy Ghost so this succeeded them under the second Temple and was proper to that age of the world being then only in use when all the other were wanting Hence many Christian writers of these latter times have fancied that God therefore declared Jesus to be his Son by a voice from Heaven because it was the only way wherein he then communicated his mind to the Jewish Nation Paulus Fagius think was the first that started this notion of the Bath col which was a praeludium b◠imagines to that true Divine and Heavenly voice which was to speak to them indee◠from Heaven that is our Lord Jesus Christ To whom the Bath col it self gave testimony when it said This is my belove◠Son in whom I am well pleased But 〈◊〉 name shows it was not the true voice from Heaven but a mere type signification and testimony of that true voice and word of God which was to come shortly and speak to them To whom alone this Bath col told them they must all hearken Thus he writes upon the Chaldee Paraphrase * In xxviii Exod. 30. And he had said the same before in his notes upon the Fifth Chapter of Pirke Avoth where his word◠are that God would accustom the world 〈◊〉 little by this beginning to that true Heavenly voice our Saviour Christ who was to follow in whom hereafter the Father would be heard But I think there is reason to doubt o◠all that the Jews say about this matter their brags being many times beyond the Truth and devised to obscure the glory of our Saviour Who it is most likely had that honour done him now by these voices from Heaven which was not usual in those days for he himself tells them as I observed before Ye have not heard his voice at any time v. John 37. As for that which they pretend that this Bath col or daughter of a voice was peculiar to the times of the second Temple it is so far from Truth that it is contradicted by some of themselves who find instances of the contrary in the Holy Books God called out of Heaven to Abraham every body knows by his Angel Gen. xxii 11 15. And Maimonides * More Nevoch part 2. cap. 42. observes that he spake to Hagar and Manoah's wife though neither of them he says had any thing of the spirit of prophecy but only heard the Bath col Which interposed if we could believe others in the case of Thamar And often whispered to Moses as the writer of his Life in many places affirms Nay they tell us in the Eleventh Chapter of the forenamed Title in the Talmud that Nebuzaradan heard this Bath col before the destruction of the first Temple bidding him make a fresh assault upon Jerusalem and not be discouraged in his attempt nor fear the fate of Senacherib For the time is at hand that the Sanctuary shall be destroyed and the Temple burnt But that there was any such thing under the second Temple I see no ground at all to believe It is far more probable that they have devised a number of such stories as we read in their Books merely to gain some credit and reputation to their Doctors Can any man of sence imagine that God would bid Jonathan hold his hand when he was beginning to Paraphrase upon the Prophets saying to him by a voice from Heaven Who is this that reveals my secrets to the sons of men And that he like a bold fellow stood up and said I am the man who undertake it for thy honour and not my own And yet Elias Levita has the confidence to tell us in his Preface to these Paraphrases that as Jonathan was going to do as much for the Holy writings as they call them as he had done for the Prophets he was absolutely prohibited by another voice from Heaven which said Is it not sufficient that thou
that he was the Son of God the King of glory able to reward his patient servants and moreover sent Letters by him to several Churches of the Saints testifying the very same things which He made him see and hear in several visions They are recorded in that Book which tells us in the very first words of it that it is the Revelation of Jesus Christ which he sent and signified by the Ministery of his Angel to his servant John Who had already born record so the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is to be rendred ver 2. of the WORD of God and of the testimony of Jesus and of all things that he saw Had declared that is in his Gospel Jesus to be the WORD of God and made known that which he testified to be Gods will concerning men together with all the evidences by Miracles and other ways which he had seen of the truth of that which Jesus testified There could not be a fitter person than he who perhaps also was the only Apostle now remaining in the world to hold communication with this WORD of God and receive new revelations from Jesus He being at this time likewise banished and confined to the Isle which is called Patmos ver 9. for the cause now named that is for the Word of God and for the testimony of Jesus Christ In this lonesome place separated from the rest of the Earth our Lord opened Heaven to him and shewed him the glory which he had there For he fell into a rapture on the Lords day ver 10. and heard one speak behind him with a voice as loud as a trumpet saying I am before and after all things that is God blessed for ever Write what thou seest in a Book and send it to the seven Churches which are in Asia whose names are there expressed ver 11. Whereupon he turn'd about to see whence this voice came and then he beheld in the midst of seven golden Candlesticks representing those Churches a very glorious person appearing in the most royal majesty and power He did not ask him as S. Paul did who he was for he had been long acquainted heretofore with that countenance and knew him perfectly well to be our blessed Saviour Who by his very habit wherein he appeared declared himself to be as he had said the Lord of all who had no superiour nor any second in that Kingdom which God the Father had given him but disposed all things according to the sole pleasure of his will For he beheld him clothed with a garment down to the foot and girt about the paps with a golden girdle c. ver 13 14 15 16. He saw that is as Irenaeus truly expresses it L. 4. cap. 37. Sacerdotalem gloriosum regni ejus adventum him appear in his Priestly and glorious Kingdom For a long Robe and a golden Girdle belonged both to Kings and to the High-Priest in the Jewish Nation And all the rest of the description it were easie to show is a plain representation of a person shining in the glory of God the Father and invested with such an irresistible power in the Heavens as might justy make all his Friends rejoyce who acknowledged him to be the Son of God most high and all his Enemies quake and tremble who opposed his sovereign Authority In short so glorious was the sight that S. John himself was not able to bear it but when he saw him fell at his feet as dead ver 17. till the WORD as Irenaeus speaks in the same place on whose breast he had reposed himself at his last Supper revived and comforted him with these gracious words Fear not I am the first and the last I am he that liveth and was dead and behold I am alive for evermore Amen and have the keys of Hell and of Death As much as to say Thou wast not deceived when thou thoughtest thou saw the Son of man appear to thee It is I indeed therefore be not so afraid though now thou beholdest me in such Heavenly Majesty and Divine glory for thou oughtest rather to rejoyce to think that I am the eternal God I whom thou knewest when I lived upon Earth and whom thou sawest shamefully put to death am now alive as thou seest also never to die any more and am intrusted with a power to rescue you from death and raise you out of your graves It would be too long if I should tell you all that he says in his Letters to those Churches to assert his title to the Name of the Son of God which he expresly takes to himself in one of them ii Rev. 18. and to declare his royal power which he exercises in all the world especially in his Church the house of the living God where he hath such an absolute authority expressed by having the keys of the house of David c. iii. 7. that none can contradict him either by preserving any man in the Divine favour if he reject him or by excluding any man from it if he receive him It may suffice to observe these two things First that there is not one of those Letters but it begins with some such description of our Saviour's sovereign Majesty as this now mentioned For the character he had given of himself in the first Chapter is again repeated by parts in the following messages to the Churches Where he sometimes calls himself He that walks in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks ii 1. that is inspects and governs them Sometime the first and the last which was dead and is alive ver 8. that is the Lord God who can raise him from the dead who parts with his life for me And to name no more he calls himself ver 12. He that hath the sharp sword with two edges to cut in pieces either them or their enemies according as they deserved of him And indeed it being the office of a King which is the second thing to be observed or a supreme Governour to punish offenders and to reward vertuous persons he constantly assumes both these powers to himself in every one of these seven Letters telling them what evil should befall them from his hand if they did not amend and what blessings he would bestow upon them if they did overcome Which is a plain declaration of his Regal power and authority which he now hath at the right hand of the Throne of God There S. John saw him in a second Vision as Irenaeus calls it v. Rev. 6. where he appears in such power with God that none hath the like For there was a majesty represented to the Apostle sitting on a Throne with a Book in his right hand ver 1. which none could open or read or so much as look into And then behold this Lamb of God who had been slain comes and appears in the midst of the Throne being the Lyon of the Tribe of Judah as one of the Elders calls him ver 5. that royal person whom
who have offended them to pass by injuries and to do good for evil and especially to be kindly affectioned one to another in the love of the Brethren in honour preventing one another For which end endue us all with true humility of Spirit with very contented minds and moderate desires Let no covetousness no ambition or love of any pleasure betray us to dishonour thee hurt our neighbours or abuse our selves Help us to possess our bodies in sanctification and honour to preserve our hearts chaste and pure to be temperate in all things to mortifie our members that are on the Earth to put away all foolish talking and corrupt communication out of our mouth and to abstain from all appearance of evil Finally whatsoever things are sincere and true whatsoever things are grave and honest whatsoever things are just and equal whatsoever things are pure and modest whatsoever things are amiable and endearing whatsoever things are of good fame and well spoken of if there be any occasion to exercise a vertue if there be any thing laudable dispose us to have these things always in our mind and to be readily prepared for them That so we may be good in every relation Governours and Subjects Priests and People Husbands and Wives Parents and Children Masters and Servants doing their duties faithfully and to their mutual comfort joy and satisfaction And if thy wise Providence call any of us to part with any thing for thy names sake O that our Love may give an eminent proof of its sincerity by resolved and patient suffering with an humble meek and chearful submission to thy holy will Then shall our Souls rejoyce and triumph in thee when we not only call thee Lord and Master but do those things that thou sayest It will be our exceeding joy to think that thou lovest us as thy children and delightest to behold thine own Image in us We shall rejoyce that thou reignest and rejoyce again in hope that we shall reign with thee Blessing honour glory and praise shall we be for ever giving unto thee who hast washed us from our sins in thy own bloud and redeemed us from all iniquity that we should be holy and unblameable before God in love looking for thy mercy unto eternal life Amen and Amen CHAP. VI. Concerning the Second Witness upon Earth the BLOVD COME we now to hear what the next Witness says which we shall find to give in an Evidence as strong as the former and that is the BLOUD By this word every body presently understands the Sufferings and DEATH of Jesus when his Bloud you know was shed upon the Cross in a most ignominious manner For that envy which began to rise in the Pharisees hearts as I observed in the end of the foregoing Chapter from iv John 1. when they saw him baptize so many disciples never ceased boiling till it turned into perfect Gall and the rankest hatred and malice in the World which was never satisfied till they had baptized him as S. Luke speaks xii 50. with his own bloud For the present indeed as you read there and in many other places he avoided their snares and went out of their way when he thought they intended to apprehend him because he would preserve himself till he had preached all the Country over But when that was done he suffered them to take him at a publick feast and delivering up himself into their hands let them do with him just as their murderous malice inclined them Now this voluntary Oblation and Sacrifice of himself to suffer what they pleased to inflict was such an evidence that in truth he was the Son of God as he had made his disciples believe that there is a particular mark set upon it to this purpose both by himself and by his Apostles He himself in his discourse with Pontius Pilate just before his crucifixion and when he stood before him condemned by the Jews for saying he was the Son of God expresly affirms that for this end he was born and therefore he came into the world that he might bear witness to the truth xviii John 37. Which was as much as to declare that he had rather die than lose the end for which he had lived thus long which was to speak the Truth and particularly this Truth that he was indeed a KING as you there read the very Son of God This was the thing he would justifie whatsoever he suffered for it God had appointed him to seal this with his death and to attest it in the most solemn manner even before his Judge here on Earth and when he was going to be judged by God and therefore he would not for all the world deny it or not confess it We ordinarily say when we would affirm any thing very strongly that if it was the last thing that ever we should speak we would not stick to maintain it And just so did our Saviour I came says he into the world for this end to bear witness to the truth and here I take it upon my death that I do not swerve from it in the least when I say that I am the Son of God S. Paul also as I have noted already takes particular notice of this when he remembers Timothy 1 vi 13. how Jesus did WITNESS a good confession before Pontius Pilate That is asserted this Truth that he was a KING though not of this world by confessing it before him who sate in judgment upon him with the apparent danger of his life He durst not retract any thing which he knew to be a truth though he knew withall it would prove so costly that he must defend it with his bloud He stood in this to the very last that he was the CHRIST and durst not to save such a precious life speak one word otherwise for then he knew that he should have been a lyar like the Jews who denied it This that hath been thus premised to the following discourse is very serviceable to the demonstrating what a Witness his BLOUD was because it calls to mind that which is necessary to be here again considered how he lost his life for nothing else but merely because he confessed that he was their CHRIST the Son of the Blessed Many causes of death were industriously sought for and sundry false witnesses boldly rose up against him and yet none of their testimonies when they came to be scan'd were found to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as S. Mark 's expression is xiv 56 59. equal to the endictment or charge that was brought against him and to the intended judgment which was to pass upon him There was nothing ponderous enough of sufficient weight to justifie such a sentence as that of death which they were desirous to pronounce upon him and therefore they despaired of attaining their end unless they could have such words out of his own mouth as in their opinion would prove him a blasphemer for which they might justly condemn him
had been the mark of folly added to that of insincerity that he was a shameless deceiver And therefore I conclude that he would have witnessed a good confession by denying all that he had said concerning his being the Son of God if he had not known assuredly that he had said nothing but that great Truth which must not be denied whatsoever miseries and disgraces it cost him to make it good V. And this truly is much to be considered that if he had been wont to cheat and speak falsely there could not have been a more seasonable time to make use of some lye than now that it would cost him his life to assert this which no doubt he took for a truth If he would but have denied this one thing and said that he was not the Son of God all their malice as I said could not have found a crime great enough to warrant the taking away of his life according to their Law And therefore supposing him an Impostor and deceiver as the Jews called him he must be a very silly one who would not now make use of his art to save himself when that one little word NO would have done it in answer to the question that the High Priest put to him For what reason can be imagined why he should now scruple to tell an untruth if he were a man of that stamp which would bring such a great advantage to him as the preservation of his life VI. He might at least especially if he had dealt with Beelzebub as the Pharisees calumniated him have put some trick or other upon them and shifted himself out of the hands of his enemies for that would have got him more credit and fame than dying for a lye Why did he not escape from them if he had not both believed this that he was the Son of God and thought it necessary also to attest it even with his BLOUD Had he not opportunity to run away or rather might he not have kept himself among his friends far enough out of their reach Was it not a question whether he would come to the feast or not xi John 56. Nay after the assembly of the wicked had inclosed him as the Psalmist speaks had he not power to break through them and make his escape Yes sure for what else is the meaning of that which you read xviii John 6. that the band of men which came to apprehend him went backward and fell to the ground when he did but tell them that He was the man whom they sought for Was not this a fit time to flye and get away when they had no strength to lay hold on him Had not he power as well to depart as to weaken their hands that they could not approach him Nay was it not far easier to go away himself than to make them lie prostrate there No doubt of it only he would stand to it as I said and make it good by his Bloud that he was the Son of God He showed that he had not lost his power to baffle them but his will was not to use it His death was a voluntary Sacrifice He laid down his life of his own accord and no man took it from him as it is x. John 18. All their Armies had they compassed him about to speak in the Psalmists phrase as strong Bulls of Bashan had they gaped upon him with their mouths as a ravening and a roaring Lion i. e. with the most greedy desire to devour him could not have touched him unless he had been pleased to deliver himself up to their fury and chosen to become their prey that they might do execution upon him And therefore it is most absurd and contrary to nature to imagine that He would have thus freely exposed himself to such cruelties and vile usage as he saw was intended for him unless he had certainly thought it a most eligible and honourable thing to endure them in defence of a great Truth which it concerned all the world to have well asserted and vindicated from all suspicion of falshood Would it not have angred any man but Him to be betrayed by a domestick servant by a Friend one whom he had freely chosen to be a great Minister in his Kingdom and had made at present the keeper of his purse besides many other favours conferred on him Was it not a vile dishonour first to be brought before the Magistrate as a Criminal and then to be abused there by base souldiers and the dregs of the people as if there had not been a more contemptible wretch in the whole Country What was it then to be beaten and cudgelled to be spit upon and mocked to be loaden with lyes and forgeries to be condemned to suffer among thieves to be counted less worthy to live than a murderer to be scourged to be crowned with thorns to be crucified that is to endure a tedious a disgraceful a painful and accursed death and after all this to be unpitied to be laught at even upon the Cross and called a senseless deceiver who had not the wit to keep some of his kindness for himself but having saved the lives of others could not now at last save his own Can you think of any one that would have the heart to offer himself freely to suffer such things but only He who took all this so patiently that he did not utter one discontented or angry word And who can think that he would have endured them when he might have easily avoided it unless he had thought it necessary and worthy to submit himself to such torments and reproaches that he might confirm this Truth and make it live by his bloudy death VII Which had the greater efficacy in it to show the importance of this Truth and the certainty which he had of it because he affirmed it not only before the High Priest when it was apparent they intended mischief against him but before Pontius Pilate also as I observed above from xviii John 37. when they were importunately desiring him to condemn him If we could imagine it was his rashness and heat that made him say as he did before the Council of Jerusalem yet he had time enough sure to have cooled himself before he came to be tried at this other tribunal of the Gentiles Why did he not think of some other answer now that he saw the Jews were not in a sudden passion and transported with a fit of rage to condemn him but by a concocted hatred were resolved to pursue him till they had his bloud There can no account be given of it but this That his Death was an advised thing and his BLOUD deliberately shed to obtain the greater belief to him because he professed again and again though he knew he must die for it that He was CHRIST their KING VIII And observe likewise that even when he was in the midst of his sufferings and when he was ready to give up the ghost He again
sets his seal to this Truth calling God his FATHER twice as he hung upon the Cross First when he prayed for his Enemies FATHER forgive them xxiii Luke 36. and then when he prayed for himself FATHER into thy hands I commend my Spirit ver 46. With these words he resigned up his Soul to God And had it not been a seasonable time now to retract what he had said if it had not been a Truth which must be justified to the last gasp How can any one think that a man who preached the Life and Judgment to come and lived as if he believed it would venture to die with a lye in his mouth and that of so high a guilt and which he knew also could not be long undetected here as it would be severely punisht in another place nay which He himself he knew very well would presently confute For he frequently had said as his very enemies understood that he would rise again the third day after he was killed which he must needs think would prove a lye if the other had been so when he told them he was the Son of God God who only can raise the dead but cannot lye would never have justified so blasphemous a lye as this and given it an undeniable authority by fulfilling his word For as his bloudy death plainly proved that he believed himself to be the Son of God and took it for an undoubted truth so his Resurrection was an infallible proof that he was not mistaken but had witnessed that by his death which was as true as he thought it His Death show'd that he was certain of it and his Resurrection makes us certain that he was not deceived These two therefore must be joyned together to make up a complete evidence and so they are as you shall see for the Witness of the SPIRIT contains the Resurrection in it Yet I must add that his BLOUD considered alone did not barely prove that he believed he was Gods Son and thought it the greatest sin to deny it but it proved also that he had great reason for such a belief Reasons so weighty that they over-balanced the natural love of life And therefore this alone may be called one of his Witnesses which not only justified his integrity but declared that he had the greatest assurance and the clearest evidence of that which he asserted being so certain of it that the fear of death could not make him doubt it nor all the torments in the world tempt him to deny it IX And if you consider what manner of person Jesus was you will soon be satisfied also that he was not liable to mistake strong fancies for weighty reasons but was as far from being deceived himself as he was from any intention to deceive others The principal thing indeed which his Bloud testified was that he did not on set purpose go about to put a cheat upon the World or invented his Doctrine himself Yet all things considered it proves likewise that his Doctrine was true and ought to be believed by us For such was the quality of his person and of the rest of his Doctrine that they plainly manifest He was neither led by fancy nor possessed with any Demoniacal illusion when he said he was the Son of God So great was his wisdom and the sharpness of his understanding that any man who hath not lost his own understanding may easily see he could not be apt to be gull'd with the impostures of imagination And so great and discreet was his Piety that it is as visible he was not obnoxious to be deluded any other way When He was but a child He amazed the principal men of the Nation with his questions and answers And afterward in the whole course of his preaching there appeared nothing but what declared a most prudent sober and excellently composed mind Nothing of inequality and unevenness in his temper No rapturous discourses or ecstatical expressions Nothing that savoured of Melancholy which imposes upon some or of Pride and Vanity which abuses others But the greatest gravity and seriousness mixt with admirable sweetness and humility is the plain character of our Saviour Then look over all his Doctrine and where shall we find any that ever spoke so clearly and with so much Majesty of Righteousness Temperance Charity and Piety of all our duty towards God and Man as he did Who had the gift of comprehending much in a few but perspicuous words of illustrating his Doctrine with apt and familiar resemblances of confirming it with powerful arguments and of confuting all the cavils of his adversaries with the strongest reasons None of which things are to be found in any of those who have been abused by their own fancies and passions or by the juglings of evil Spirits as will appear more plainly by considering a little more particularly those two cavils Let it be taken then for granted that there have been some men who meant not to deceive that were notwithstanding so overborn by a strong fancy or haughty imagination as not only to take their own dreams for Divine Revelations but also most vehemently to assert them even with the loss of their liberties estate nay and life it self And suppose withall that there have been some who were so fully possessed with a conceit of nearer communion of God that they took themselves to be Christ himself or Apostles sent by him and that no torments could perswade them to think otherways Yet see what a vast difference there is between such vain pretenders and our blessed Saviour even in the very words that they spake And first I think it is very consirable that you never read of any man so presumptuous as to fancy he was the very Son of God who sits at his right hand and rules over all and hath power to judge the quick and the dead No these vain Enthusiasts have only conceited that they were after I know not what spiritual manner made one with Christ and so united to God that as they phrase it in swoln words of vanity they were Godded with God and Christed with Christ But who discerns not the disparity between this foolish language and the words of soberness which our Saviour spake Which indeed is the most remarkable thing If you consider all the Doctrine of these empty Pretenders there is nothing more ridiculous They have ever affected big words lofty and high-flown phrases and mystical expressions wherewith they love to stuff their Books and their discourses which either have no meaning or if they have it is very poor and despicable when it comes to be stript of the fantastical language wherewith it is cloathed And therefore such men have been so far from amazing any considerate persons that they have rather moved their laughter and scorn while they heard them babble nothing but mystical nonsence with abundance of confident boldness And if they have found any followers they were such as had no depth no solidity of
Caesar Then as it follows in the very next words vers 16. delivered he him therefore unto them to be crucified When he heard they still obstinately pretended respect to Caesar and would have him to be concerned in the case he thought it was time to make an end and give sentence that their new King should be crucified For this at last was the crime for which he must suffer vers 19. Pilate wrote a title showing the cause of his death and put it on the Cross And the Writing was JESUS OF NAZARETH THE KING OF THE JEWS Which Pilate knew was false in the sence wherein they meant it a King opposite to Caesar and therefore the words were so contrived that he might still express the opinion he had of him and yet satisfie Caesar too To the very last he would give testimony to the innocence of Jesus as far as he durst and even then proclaimed him their King in several Languages an Omen of the proclaiming it shortly in all Countries to their everlasting reproach when he hung upon an infamous Gibbet And therefore they were not yet satisfied because they saw themselves plainly indited by this Title in the face of the World as the Murderers of their KING Which made them renew their Petitions to Pilate that he would alter the Inscription and not write The King of the Jews but that he said I am King of the Jews vers 21. But now Pilate grew as obstinate as they and gave them this short answer vers 22. What I have written I have written That is content your selves for the first writing shall stand let the World make what they can of it And there is no question but there was a Divine Providence in the business that the cause of his death should be so expressed as that the Jews should be openly condemned and Jesus still cleared by Pilate even after he had not only given sentence against him but ordered it to be put in execution All things concurred to justifie him when his BLOUD was shed Which this very Title declared was upon this account to testifie that he was their KING and told the World withall that in the judgment of him who was his Judge He was no deceiver when he affirmed that he was their KING but the Jews villainous Traytors who had crucified that Person whom they ought to have honoured and obeyed XIV For which the terrible vengeance of God followed them and never left them till they had their own wish His BLOUD was required at their hands and at the hands of their Posterity For they never thrive from that time forward but declined more and more till about Forty Years after their City was besieged by those whom they had importuned to crucify our Saviour multitudes of them were crucified as I told you before in the face of all their Brethren far greater numbers were famisht Jerusalem and the Temple at last destroyed the People of the Nation banished and their Children became Vagabonds even to this day For it was not very long before those very Men who when they said those words We have no King but Caesar in the same breath had for ever renounced their CHRIST and pronounced themselves Rebels if they were not obedient to Caesar took up arms to deliver themselves from their subjection to him whom they really hated though now to serve a turn they courted and flattered They who had rejected their true CHRIST and KING by whom they might have been restored to true liberty were ready upon all occasions to run after those false CHRISTS of whom our Saviour prophesied xxiv Matth. 5.24 who by the promises of a false liberty led them into perdition They could never be quiet till they had undone themselves by provoking the only King whom they pretended to reverence to be the Instrument of our Saviour to make them the vilest slaves and the most miserable wretches upon the face of the Earth S. John lived to see the day of Jesus his COMING WITH POWER to execute Judgment upon them and we see their wish still more and more accomplished upon their Children Who as they never yet solemnly indeavoured to wipe off the guilt of his BLOUD from them by acknowledging the crime of their Fore-fathers as the manner of former times was we see in the examples of Nehemiah and Daniel so they continue to taste of the bitter fruits of this execrable Treason against their Soveraign Lord and King CHRIST JESUS By which you may see that his BLOUD both upon the Cross and upon their Heads by the heavy guilt it loaded them withall is very fitly here alledged by S. John as a great WITNESS that He was sent of God as his only Son For Pontius Pilate himself did not wholly escape but some of it lighted also upon his Head Though he was not so guilty our Saviour confessed as they who pursued him out of hatred whereas he having no unkindness for him delivered him to be crucified only out of fear yet he felt the weight of this crime and was oppressed himself as our Saviour had been by false accusations which the Samaritaus brought against him Whereupon he was deprived of the Government of Judaea by Vitellius then President of Syria And having lost the authority which he abused in condemning our Saviour he was required to go to Rome and there answer the crimes that should be objected to him There indeed he found Tiberius dead but he did not live long after him For he fell into so distressed a condition that about the third year of the succeeding Emperor Caius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Eusebius his word is * L. 11. Hist Eccl. c. 7. he was constrained either by the grievous afflictions he endured or by the command of Caesar which was an usual thing to become his own Executioner and punish himself with Death for all the crimes he had committed But I shall not pursue either his or their story any further it being time to put an end to this Argument which I shall conclude with these Two observations 1. First That after our Saviour was dead one of the souldiers pierced his side with his spear and forthwith came thereout WATER and BLOUD as this very Apostle hath recorded in the Chapter so often mentioned xix John 34. Now some have from hence imagined that he being the only Evangelist that takes any notice of this and setting a particular remark upon it as a thing that he saw and bears witness of ver 35. it is most likely he hath some respect to that passage in his Gospel and to the Water and Bloud there mentioned when he speaks of the witness of WATER and BLOUD here in this Epistle For the Water and Bloud which flowed out of his side were an argument of the truth of his humanity which some wild Hereticks then denied and testified also that he was truly dead and not merely in appearance But it must be observed that S. John is
by this sickness ver 4. Therefore he stayed so long before he would move towards him that Lazarus might be dead before he got to Bethany and He might get more glory by his resurrection than he had done by healing so many sicknesses and casting out such a number of Devils For this proved that he had power not only to break but utterly to destroy the works of the Devil and to tread him quite under foot who had the power of death For which reason he tells his Disciples that he was glad for their sakes that he was not there when Lazarus died to the intent they might believe ver 15. Have their faith that is more confirmed in him by seeing such an illustrious miracle wrought upon Lazarus after he was dead than it could have been by healing his sickness and preserving him from death They had seen many desperate diseases cured but never any man raised to life after he had been so long dead Some of the Jews indeed objected this to him that he ought to have been so kind as to have saved his friends life if he had had the power which he pretended Could not this man say they which opened the eyes of the blind have caused that even this man should not have died ver 37. They do not by these words express their Faith but their unbelief and upbraid him with weakness or want of love The latter could not be imputed to him for by his tears just before mentioned ver 35 36. they all observed how much he loved him But from thence some of the company took occasion to disparage his power and to ask the rest of their neighbours how they could believe that he had opened a blind mans eyes as was commonly reported Chap. ix when he suffered one whom he loved so much to want his help and perish If he had done the former how easie had it been for him to do the latter In which he failing though his affection could not but move him to do his utmost for his Friend they took it to be a demonstration that he was not such a mighty Man as the People imagined This perverse reasoning moved our Saviour very much so that he groaned again in himself v. 38. to see their deplorable obstinacy and malice as much as he had done before v. 33. to hear their pitious lamentations which they made for the dead These mens condition was far more pitious because he foresaw there was but little hope that they would be moved when they saw their frivolous cavil answered by the Resurrection of Lazarus Which would show there was good reason why he let him dye that he might express never the less love to him but more to them and to all Mankind by restoring his life which was a more Divine work by much than to have saved him from Death To this therefore he immediately applies himself and bids the Sister of the deceased whose faith it seems began to stagger not doubt but she should see the glory of God vers 40. such a stupendious instance that is of the power of God in him as would move many to give glory to God that sent him For wherein could the Majesty of God appear more to their astonishment than in such a marvailous work as this which when he entred upon he first lift up his eyes to him and called him Father on purpose that the People might believe he came from God and was his Son when they saw him answer his Prayers in this manner vers 41 42. Where if you read the place you will see he gives this reason why he made a publick acknowledgment to God for hearing him so often not because he doubted of his presence with him now but meerly that the by-standers might know by whom he did such miracles and ascribing them to no other power but his might believe that he had sent him What should they believe else when they heard him after this address to God commanding Lazarus with a loud voice expressing his assurance and authority to come forth and when they beheld him who could not lately move himself in his Bed rise up out of his Tomb and walk about not only restored to life but in perfect health This struck the hearts of many of the Jewes who were there present so powerfully that they believed on him vers 45. that is concluded he was more than a Prophet no less than the Messiah himself And those Cavillers before mentioned who still persisted to maintain their infidelity by the absurdest imaginations were so startled at it that they went presently and told some of the Great Sanhedrim what Jesus had done wishing them I suppose to look to themselves and not suffer these proceedings vers 46. For they were so alarmed with this news that a Council forthwith is called and they enter into a solemn Debate what course to take with him seeing plainly how powerful this Miracle was to win him Proselytes and draw the People to him vers 47. It had had that effect upon many already as you have heard and they were afraid it would increase the number of his Disciples so much that it would prove their utter ruine For they say vers 48. If we let him thus alone all men will believe on him and the Romans shall come and take away both our place and Nation That is the People will proclaim him their King and thereby we shall incur the indignation of Caesar who will send an Army and cut us off till he leave neither root nor branch as it is iv Mal. 1. but destroy both us and our Temple That place they were resolved to preserve though it were with his destruction whose death they now determine as soon as ever they could catch him For so their consultation ended first they decreed v. 53. that for the publick good as they called it He should be put to death and then that if any knew where he was v. 57. they should give notice of it that he might be apprehended in order to his trial Thus their blind malice turned the most powerful means of their conversion into the ground and reason of his destruction For because he did so many miracles v. 47. they did not think it fit to let him live when-as for that very cause they ought to have believed on him and thought him worthy to live eternally For I think these Three things are very considerable wherewith I shall conclude this part of the SPIRITS testimony I. First this Miracle wrought upon Lazarus was so evident a token that he was the Son of God that it had in it all the conditions which the Gentile King whom the Jews speak of in the Book COSRI * Part. 1. Sect. 8. requires in a prodigy sufficient to perswade men to believe that God speaks by him that works it Our mind says he cannot be brought to think that God enters into society with flesh and blood unless it be by such a miracle
it was no common thing but the BLOUD of the Holy one of God It witnessed to that WITNESS and proved that as he did not speak contrary to his knowledge so he did not speak contrary to the truth And if the SPIRIT could not be believed in this it would have lost all its credit and never have been believed more we could never have known any thing by the greatest wonders it can work if such things had been done for a deceiver as it is apparent were done for Jesus For that he was raised up to life again we are assured by the testimony of the Apostles and by the testimony of the Holy Ghost of which none can reasonably doubt as it were easie to show if it were not my present business rather to demonstrate that this was an irrefragable testimony of the SPIRIT to him a most powerful means to beget faith and assurance in mens minds that Jesus is the Son of God It was for this very end that S. John wrote the History of his Resurrection and the several signs and tokens they had of it as he tells us in those words xx John 30 31. Many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his Disciples which are not written in this Book But these are written that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God and that believing ye might have life through his Name For this plainly reversed the sentence of condemnation which the Jews had pass'd upon him It showed that he was acquitted in a far higher Court than that which judged him worthy of death Whose decree it rescinded and openly declared that he was no Blasphemer when he said he was the Son of God If he had God would have been more concern'd than they to have kept him fast in his grave for ever that there so great a lye might have been buried together with himself For the further clearing of which it will be fit to consider briefly these three things First that before he died he promised his Apostles that he would rise again and gave this also as a sign to all the people whereby they should know that he was the Christ And secondly that he declared this to be the greatest sign he had to give of it And thirdly that his very enemies confess it is a sufficient sign and satisfactory testimony of any truth I. For the first of these that it was a sign promised to his Apostles and predicted to the people there is nothing more easie to be observed in the Gospel story For he tells his Apostles very often that they should see him betrayed and killed but on the third day he would rise again No sooner had S. Peter confessed that he was the CHRIST but from that time forth Jesus began to shew them how that he must go to Jerusalem and there suffer many things and be killed and be raised again the third day xvi Matth. 21. For he would not have them expect a Christ that should reign here on Earth but in Heaven And till he went thither he would not have them so much as preach that he was the CHRIST ver 20. And what he had said here at Caesarea he repeats again when they were in Galilee xvii Matth. 22 23. And again when they were going up to Jerusalem xx 19. And not many hours before he was apprehended he said again A little while and ye shall not see me and again a little while and ye shall see me because I go to the Father xvi John 16. At which words they were greatly troubled because they minded more what he said about his death than they regarded his resurrection which was to follow But the greater their trouble was then the greater their satisfaction was afterwards when they saw him alive again The less disposed they were to believe it the more confident they grew when they saw such a wonder They wept and lamented when he was gone as he told them they would ver 20. But when he came to see them again their heart rejoyced with such a joy as none could dispoil them of ver 22. The ground of which joy you shall see presently when I have also remembred you how he foretold his Resurrection to the people as a testimony that he was the CHRIST It was their wont in all Ages and with great reason to ask for a sign that a man was sent of God And therefore now that Jesus came with such authority as to redress many abuses among them and to reform that Nation and Temple they ask him what sign shewest thou unto us seeing that thou doest these things ii Joh. 18. He had given them signs enough already and therefore makes no other answer but this to let them know what should be the last sign Destroy this Temple pointing to his own body and in three days I will raise it up vers 19. From whence we may safely argue that Jesus having given this as a sign and token whereby it should evidently appear more than by all his miracles that he was the Son of God the Almighty would never have fulfilled this promise and prediction if He had usurped his authority and taken upon him to be his ANOINTED without his leave Nothing was more easie than to quash all his pretences which relyed upon his Resurrection without which his Apostles as I told you had no authority to Preach that he was the Christ It had been but letting him rot in his grave as all men naturally do when they are dead and all the World would have been of the mind of the Pharisees that he was a Deceiver And God sure hath not so little care of the World as to deny them such ready and obvious means of satisfaction about the most important truth We ought to think rather that he would have concerned himself to see that this Temple which he spake of should lye for ever in its ruines and be turned to dust and ashes He who alone could do it would have been so far from rearing it up again that he would have provided it should be prophaned and made the vilest rubbish in the World But there being very good proofs many infallible proofs as S. Luke speaks i. Act. 3. that it was quite otherwayes and that indeed it was raised after three days as he had told the People it was a Testimony from God most high that He dwelt in that Temple and that it was his Holy place where he manifested his glory He declared to them by this that Jesus was no Deceiver but that they ought to believe he was the Christ of God For that a man should be raised from the dead by any other power than that of God's all the World concludes is impossible If any of those lying spirits which love to cheat and abuse the world could do such feats why do we not see this frequently happen that so they might break the force of this testimony and overthrow our belief Above
simple words more than all that could be found here and there scattered in the vast Volumes of the Philosophers Nay they advanced the sence of the Law of Moses They called Men to the noblest degree of purity For they cleansed and scowred them from all filthiness not only of the flesh but also of the spirit They advanced the business of holy living to such a pitch that some said it was impossible to be so good And what did they do now How did they overcome this objection This is the greatest marvel of all and gave their testimony a mighty force they show'd by their own example that it was possible This says Lactantius made the Philosophers miscarry in their design that though they spake well yet they did not live as they taught For men had rather have examples than words Because it is easie to talk and hard to do Our Saviour therefore and his Apostles convinced men by their actions that if they would not follow one that taught them they might follow one that went before them They guided them by their feet and not only by their tongues they led their hearers the way in all manner of vertuous and godly living Nay they refused sometimes to do those things which they might lawfully that all men might see their upright meaning and that they had no worldly design in their head So S. Paul tells the Corinthians that whereas he might have lived upon the Gospel and expected maintenance from them yet he chose to preach freely and make the Gospel without charge that it might have an easier passage into their hearts 1 Cor. ix 12.18 And thus he did at Thessalonica also where he wrought with labour and travel Night and Day that he might not be chargeable to any of them Not because he had not power to do otherwise but to make himself an example unto them to follow him 2 Thess iii. 8 9. And such was his practice you heard before at Ephesus xx Act. 34. So that one would think he had taken up this generous resolution at the very first which he continued every where not to make the smallest advantage by the Gospel of which he was a Minister It might have been sufficient one would think that he laboured in the Gospel and took pains to convert souls He needed not have laboured also for his living but expected food from those whom he fed with the bread of life But to make his Ministry unexceptionable and to show he intended nothing in the World but to bring men to this belief in Jesus he would not so much as support himself by their contributions but by the labour of his own hands provided both for himself and for others too as he tells the Ephesian Elders who were instruments with him of their Salvation Can there be any suspicion of the sincerity of such a Man as this What could he have in his mind but this one thing to win Disciples to his Master And could he doubt think you of his power to reward him for all his labour He was no fool it is plain but understood himself as well as the wisest of us all What should make him then neglect all other interests and bend his mind wholly to serve Jesus Such noble spirits as his were the unlikeliest of all other to cheat and deceive whose only business it was to take pains that they might give to others And men of such wisdom would not have taken all that pains for no other end but merely to perswade others to believe in Jesus if they had not been as sure that he was the Son of God as it was that they should get nothing by preaching it but stripes imprisonments infamy reproaches and perhaps lose their lives to the bargain And what should make men so prodigal of their bloud think you II. That 's now fit to be considered in the next place their sharp sufferings the BLOUD whereby our Saviour CAME that is was proved to be the Christ when he was preached by their Ministery No sooner did they appear but all the world with its whole power armed it self against them As the Jews under pretence of Religion opposed and persecuted them so when they fled into other Countries the Philosophers upon the same score set their wits against them and summoned all their Learning and their Arts of reasoning to dispute this new Doctrine out of doors To whose assistance came the Sophisters and Rhetoricians who imployed all their quirks and their eloquence to make it seem ridiculous Nor did the Magicians and Juglers with all the Daemons the then Lords of the world forget to oppose it with all their might But excited Kings and Presidents and Magistrates to exercise all kind of cruelties not only against the preachers of this Religion but against their followers The Edicts of Princes thundred out nothing but confiscations proscriptions banishments imprisonments rods axes strapadoes crosses fire wild-Beasts so that we may say of them all as it was said of S. Paul and Barnabas who were men that hazarded their lives for the name of the Lord Jesus xv Acts. 26. Men set forth appointed unto death as those that fought with wild-Beasts and made a spectacle unto the World and to Angels and Men 1 Cor. iv 9. Even unto this present hour says S. Paul in the following verses we both hunger and thirst and are naked and are buffetted and have no certain dwelling place and labour working with our own hands being reviled we bless being persecuted we suffer it being defamed we intreat God for them we are made as the filth of the World and are the off-scouring of all things unto this day And as they were long thus vilely used and destined to death so at last every one of them together with other great servants of Jesus Christ actually suffered death in justification of this truth that he was the Son of God S. Steven led the way who is called the Martyr of Jesus having shed his Bloud for him xxii Acts 20. And he that calls him so protests that he was ready not only to be bound but also to die at Jerusalem for his name xxi 13. Nay when he speaks of the Martyrdom of S. Steven he was in the hands of his enraged enemies who were ready to stone him too and began to prepare themselves for it as you may read there xxii 23. And both before and after this he was persecuted with such violent and bitter zeal that his whole life was a kind of death which he suffered over and over again for his Masters cause Which makes him say when he gives a large catalogue of his sufferings that he was in deaths often 2 Cor. xi 23 25. and protest in another place that he died daily 1 Cor. xv 31. and in another that he was alway delivered unto death for Jesus's sake and that death wrought in him that he might make others live 2 Cor. iv 11 12. More than this you find in
questioned For if we do not allow this way of conveying down a testimony to future times we can know nothing of what was done before us And by denying all credit to these writings we shall only teach posterity how little credit is due to any of ours Nay we shall shake all mens titles to their estates and Kings will not be able to keep their Crowns fast upon their heads Nothing will be certain but it may be questioned whether all the Records in the Tower and the publick Acts of former Kings and Parliaments be not mere Forgeries Besides no body in those days ever went about to disprove what these Witnesses of Christ preached and have writ Neither Jew nor Gentile undertook to show that these things were only devised for his credit There were too great Testimonies from Heaven still remaining in the Church for several Ages to confute such a slander And therefore all that the Devil himself could think of to shake mens belief was to set up some wonder-workers of his own to confront Jesus and as it were to vie miracles with him and his Disciples But all were so soon scattered like mists before the Sun that they appeared to be but thin shadows in comparison with the living SPIRIT of God that was in the Church which baffled and overcame them all Insomuch that Origen assures the Heathen and they never went about to confute him that there were not above thirty of Simon Magus his followers then to be found in the world though he had made diligent enquiry after them by travel into all parts They were all vanished though he made a great noise for a time whilest the followers of Jesus multiplied and increased even by their persecutions Nor could Apollonius afterward gain any Proselytes that continued but his fame soon died together with himself Whereas the authority of Jesus bare up it self against all the opposition of the Roman Empire and not only was supported but advanced and prevailed more and more their barbarous cruelties only making it grow the faster For herein as Lactantius observes the faith and constancy of Christians was bravely displayed Men thought they did not without cause abhor the Heathenish superstition when they saw them rather die than do that which others doing lived and enjoyed the greatest worldly prosperity It made them enquire what that good was which they defended even unto death which was dearer than all the pleasures and glory of this world The people heard them in the midst of torments glory in Christ Jesus And whilest they enquired who he was the truth of the Gospel was divulged and spread abroad among them Their sufferings brought many to see their Martyrdom and there they saw that which moved their enquiry and by their enquiry they were satisfied and learnt to believe in Jesus as those Martyrs did But it is time to put an end to this Chapter which I shall conclude with a few remarks upon some places of the holy Books relating to the testimony of the Apostles or those that followed them The first is in the 2 Cor. vi 4 5 6 c. where you read how the Apostles approved themselves as the ministers of God in much patience in afflictions in necessities in distresses in stripes in imprisonments in tumults in labours in watchings in fastings by pureness by knowledge by long-suffering by kindness by the Holy Ghost by love unfeigned by the word of truth c. In which words if they be well considered you will find every one of these three WITNESSES which S. John says gave testimony to our Saviour on Earth so that he might be said to come in the ministry of the Apostles by Water and Bloud and the Spirit They expressed the Holiness of his life by their pureness by their long-suffering by their kindness by love unfeigned by the armour of righteousness on the right hand and on the left that is they were every way appointed and armed with integrity against all calumnies there was none that could touch their reputation and say that these men had any worldly design And as they witnessed to him thus in their holy lives so they did in their holy doctrine by knowledge and by the word of truth preaching the Gospel sincerely as those that studied not to please men but God who trieth the hearts And they were made conformable also to his death and thereby continued the witness of the BLOUD in much patience in afflictions in necessities in distresses in imprisonments and all the rest of the hardships here mentioned which I need not transcribe again And lastly He forgets not to remember them of the Witness of the SPIRIT which they brought along with them For he says they approved themselves as ministers of God by the Holy Ghost and by the power of God That is beside all the other Divine gifts wherewith they appeared they confirmed their doctrine by many miraculous works which could not be done but by the power of God Thus they became not only his witnesses as our Saviour said they should xxiv Luke 48. but they witnessed to him after the very same manner that he had taught in his example by Water by Bloud and by the Spirit And therefore when he exhorts Timothy to preach the Gospel and to be strong in the grace of Jesus Christ and to commit the charge of preaching also to other faithful persons He enforces his perswasion by this argument that the things he was to deliver were only such as he had heard of him among or by MANY WITNESSES 2 Tim. ii 2. He learnt them by so many good evidences which S. Paul had given him that he need not fear to speak them to any man much less doubt to commend them to other faithful preachers upon the same account that he had received them that they might be able to instruct posterity Such one would think from what hath been said were those TWO WITNESSES mentioned in xi Rev. 3. men of an Apostolical spirit whom Jesus raised up after his prime Witnesses had left the world to justifie still by all manner of arguments that great Truth which they had preached and sealed with their Bloud and God had sealed by the testimony of the Spirit The next words indeed seem to import that the whole body of Christians whom they instructed joyned with them in this testimony But still these great ministers of Jesus Christ the guides and leaders of those Christians whosoever they were and in what times soever they lived I meddle not with such difficulties were his most eminent Witnesses Who preached the Gospel with such power that it excited against them the fury of unbelievers who could not endure that such Witnesses should speak for Jesus For they testified to him these three ways here mentioned which is all that I alledge this place for not taking upon me to interpose in the controversies there are about the explanation of this Vision by Water Bloud and the Spirit First by Water if
we understand thereby their holy preaching and living For it is said ver 3. that they had power to prophesie which signifies that they were endowed with extraordinary gifts for Prophets were next to Apostles in the Church to interpret and expound the holy writings and prove out of Moses and the Prophets as our Saviour did xxiv Luke 27. all things that concerned him both his sufferings and his glory And this they did cloathed in sackcloth that is in the habit of mourners for the abominations I suppose which they saw committed and the provoking infidelity of those to whom they preached Which was a notable mark of their great piety and charity as you may learn from ix Ezek. 4. and v. Matth. 4. They are said also to be the two Olive-trees ver 4. that is like Zerubbabel and Joshua two famous persons among the Jews after the captivity who were represented by this Emblem iv Zach. 3. King and Priests unto God men endowed with great authority and illumination from above and with as great purity For they had so much of the oil of gladness that they imparted it to others to the Candlesticks that is the Churches wherein they shined For so S. John teaches us in the beginning of this Book to interpret Candlesticks which is a great argument of the excellency of these men who by the witness of their life and doctrine made all those who were under their care to testifie some way or other to the same truth that they did At least by their lives for they are said to stand before the God of the Earth Which is an Hebrew phrase signifying to minister unto God to be imployed in his worship and service as the Priests and People were at the Temple and therefore sets forth the piety and devotion of these persons whose business it was to serve God even then when it was most dangerous so to do And as by Water so by Bloud also they bare witness of him For they had war made against them and in the fight since they would not yield they were killed ver 7. Nay it was notorious to all that their persecutors had not only drawn the sword against them but that they had resisted unto bloud for their dead bodies lay in the street of the great City ver 8. and they would not suffer them to be put in graves ver 9. which shows the enraged malice which they bare to these zealous WITNESSES who had tormented them ver 10. by the sharpness of their arguments and by their constant reproofs of their infidelity and wickedness Nor was the Witness of the SPIRIT wanting for they approved themselves as Ministers of God to speak in S. Paul's language and Witnesses of Christ by wonders and miracles so great that they might be compared to the two great Prophets Moses and Elias who appeared with our Saviour on the holy Mount For they sent fire out of their mouths ver 5. and had power to shut up Heaven that it should not rain ver 6. both which were the known works of Elias They had power likewise over the Waters to turn them to bloud and to smite the Earth with all plagues as often as they pleased ver 6. which is the plain description of men like to Moses who brought such plagues on the Egyptians as these had power to do upon those who were like them both in hardness of heart and in oppression of the faithful servants of God And therefore I suppose they are described with a power to hurt and destroy rather than with that healing and saving vertue wherewith the first Witnesses of Christ principally came to signifie that their rebellious enemies should be punished for their rejecting Jesus and doing despight to the SPIRIT of grace which once came to them in a more healthful and salutary manner casting out Devils turning Water into Wine healing all manner of Plagues and Diseases and that as often as they themselves pleased to desire And more than this you read ver 11. that after the time appointed by God for it he restored these Prophets to life again and thereby made their testimony something like that of his Son 's That is men animated with the very same spirit stood up in their place to the amazement of all their opposers Who were so far from being able to hurt them that they were as safe as if they had been in Heaven The presence of God was with them as in the cloud which preserved the Israelites from all danger And he advanced them to great honour by the Heavenly gifts wherewith they were adorned As Elias is said to come though he did not appear in person but another in his spirit and power and David is said to be raised up to reign over the Jews xxx Jer. 9. because his Son that is Christ was set upon his Throne so did the Spirit of life from God enter into these witnesses and they stood upon their feet when he raised up other Apostolical persons in their stead who were not less eminent than those who were dead but full of the same spirit of wisdom holiness burning zeal and might and power also from God This frighted all their enemies as well it might when they saw the Christian Cause would not die do what they could But if they killed some others started up in their room to witness unto Jesus and assert the same truth by wonders by their admirable preaching by their holy life and by death it self if nothing else would satisfie them For thus all the MARTYRS testified to him Whose BLOUD witnessed not only that they believed his Religion and that they valued the favour of Jesus more than their lives but that they had very good reason so to do or else men of such wisdom would not have endured such torments as they freely exposed themselves unto with so much chearfulness as we find they did For as S. Hilary tells us Some gloried in the chains which they wore in prison others being beaten till they died did nothing but give thanks others readily laid down their necks to be cut off and more ran to those piles which they saw built to burn them and with a devout haste leapt into those fires at which the ministers of their torments trembled and there were those who were thrown into the Sea not as if they were to be drown'd but went to partake of the refreshment of eternal bliss So he writes upon those words of the Psalmist lxv 10 12. Thou hast tried us as silver is tried we went through fire and water c. The fruit of which was that thereby many were converted unto Christ Their death gave life to others who seeing their zeal their constancy their meekness their patience and their charity became Proselytes to that faith for which they suffered A new race of illustrious Martyrs rose up in their stead in whom they yet lived For there was no other cause as that Father adds upon the following
men in former times but had not such strength to enforce it Blessed be God should we all say A PRAYER BLessed be God who hath not done so for any people He hath shown us HIMSELF his WORD and the HOLY GHOST Israel hath not seen his Glory so as it shines in our eyes And as for his Power and Might they have not known them no more than the Promises and the Laws whereby he now governs us He hath given us a better Covenant founded upon a better Bloud which hath brought in also a better Hope and is confirmed by a more powerful Spirit Blessed be his Goodness that our eyes read and our ears hear those things which many Prophets and righteous men desired to see and hear but could not see nor hear them For it was revealed that not unto themselves but unto us they did minister the things which are now reported unto us by them that have preached the Gospel unto us which the Holy Ghost sent down from Heaven which things the Angels desire to look into O Bless the Lord with us ye Angels of his that excel in strength praise him and magnifie him for ever O all ye Powers of the Lord bless ye the Lord praise him and magnifie him for ever O ye Spirits and Souls of the righteous bless ye the Lord praise him and magnifie him for ever Praise him all ye Apostles and Prophets praise him all ye Martyrs and Confessors praise him all ye glorious Lights who have made the Gospel of Christ to shine throughout the world Praise the Father Almighty praise his Eternal WORD praise the Holy Ghost who have made our Faith to stand not in the wisdom of men but in the mighty Power of God Praise him for the Incarnation the Life the Death the Resurrection the Ascension and the Glorification of the Lord Jesus who hath given us strong Consolation by that sure and stedfast hope which throughout all these means he hath setled in our hearts O praise him for his marvellous love to us whom he hath called after a glorious manner and by an amazing vertue to the knowledge of Christ by whom his Divine power hath given us all things that pertain unto life and godliness And make us who are so nearly concerned in this love to be very sensible how great it is which hath not only called us to his Heavenly Kingdom but made us sure and certain by so many Witnesses that Jesus is the Lord of all the King of infinite Majesty Power and Glory Let our Souls never cease to show forth and publish the vertues and powerful operations of him who hath called us into his marvellous light Let our mouths be filled with his praise all the day long who out of the riches of his mercy hath made us who were not his people to be a chosen generation an holy nation a peculiar people to himself O that our Faith may grow exceedingly and be deeply rooted and grounded in our hearts And as it stands upon the surest foundations so we may be built up in it with the most assured confidence and stand unshaken and immoveable in it unto the end And as thou hast differenced us from all other people in the clearness of that Light which lets us see that ours is the most holy Faith so help us by thy grace to distinguish our selves from all others by holding the mystery of Faith in a pure Conscience and by the upright actions of an unblameable life O that the light of Christians may so shine before men that others seeing their good works may glorifie thee our Heavenly Father O that it may disperse the darkness which over-spreads so great a part of the world That all impostures may be discovered and they that live in error may be brought to the knowledge of the truth as it is in Jesus O that his Dominion may reach from Sea to Sea even unto the worlds end Let them who dwell in the most desert places kneel before him and his enemies lick the dust Let all Kings of the Earth adore him and all Nations do him service Kindle in the hearts of Princes and Nobles an holy ambition to advance his Glory Inspire the hearts of all Bishops and Priests with an ardent zeal for the conversion of Souls And dispose the hearts of those who are in error that they may be apt and ready to receive thy sacred truth Plant thy Gospel where it hath not yet been and replant it where it hath been rooted out And give us grace who have long been thine own vineyard to bring forth plenty of good fruit That our lives may be as holy as our faith and we may convince Jews Turks and all other Infidels that thou art among us and that Jesus whom we worship is the Lord. To him with the Father and the Holy Ghost be Glory and Praise among all mankind and throughout all Ages world without end Amen CHAP. X. Other necessary Vses we are to make of their Testimony THere is no great skill required to see the difference between that Holy Religion which we profess and all others that are entertained in the rest of the World Some we must have and it is as palpable that this is incomparably the most excellent as it is that there is any Religion at all There is no Nation so barbarous but pays some respect and ceremony to use the phrase of Tully when he defines Religion to some Superiour and more excellent Nature which we call Divine Though they are ignorant what kind of God it becomes them to have yet they know a God must be had and must be worshipped Their own mind teaches them this as soon as they cast their eyes upon the admirable frame of the World which all naturally conclude must have had some most wise and mighty Builder But what respect and reverence that is which will be pleasing to him they are very uncertain it is manifest by the various ways they have invented to express their Devotion They all with one consent acknowledge a necessity of a Revelation to instruct them for there is no Nation but pretends to have received some things by the instinct inspiration or apparition of their Gods That which pure natural reason dictates is not to be found simple and unmixt in any Nation under Heaven For if we should stand meerly to that it hath ever resolved that the worship of God consists in the study of Wisdome Justice and all other Vertues Which as they are most eminent in God so he is best pleased with them in us And they that addict themselves to resemble him in this manner are the men that shall obtain his favour There are a number of notable sayings both in Heathen and Christian Writers to this purpose But when all this is said and acknowledged Men will offend against these Rules of Vertue and what shall they do then what will make him satisfaction and procure a reconciliation with him whom they have reason
shamefully bow down to it and worship it Let but any man remember when he reads these words LOVE NOT THE WORLD for all that is in the WORLD the lust of the flesh the lust of the eyes and the pride of life is not of the Father but is of the World And the world passeth away and the lust thereof but he that doth the will of God abideth for ever Or when he reads any other lesson in the holy Books let him but remember that thus says the Father of all and thus says his WORD and this is the voice of the Holy Ghost and of all the rest of the Witnesses who testifie that Jesus who teaches these things is the Son of God and then he will never be perswaded to yield to the fairest thing that ever eye beheld or the sweetest thing the mouth can taste or the greatest pleasure any other sense is capable to feel if it must be enjoyed by the breaking of any of these commandments No he will yield himself unto God vi Rom. 13. and lay himself at the feet of his WORD and submit to the dictates and sentence of the Holy Ghost and follow the example of Christ's purity and be made conformable to his Death and be led by his Spirit and think it an honour to be conquered by such Defendants of the cause of Jesus O how hateful would every sin be to us though it dress up it self never so beautifully and court us with never such promises of pleasure or greatness did we but at the same time reflect upon these Witnesses and remember what they have testified to us How should we desire it How passionately should we tear all its gaudy dresses in pieces How heartily should we despise all its temptations which would have us slight all these great Witnesses who tell us the Son of God is come and that he is come for this purpose that he might destroy the works of the Devil 1 John iii. 8. Every unlawful enjoyment would look like a manifest jeer to all these and as if a man should say to them Why do you trouble your selves this is our Darling our God and all your perswasions shall not prevail with us to let it go It would appear a contempt of God a laughing of his WORD to scorn who came upon so needless at least fruitless an errand a manifest challenge to the Holy Ghost who by every sin is boldly opposed And what heart can endure to think of being guilty of such madness which throws dirt into this pure Water I mean the life of Christ and treads his Bloud under feet and miscalls the Spirit of grace as if it were not the Truth but had deceived the world when it told them that this is the will of God even our sanctification For God says S. Paul hath not called us unto uncleanness but unto holiness He therefore that despiseth despiseth not Man but God who hath also given unto us his holy SPIRIT 1 Thess iv 3 7 8. To conclude this you know what is commonly said and it is a certain truth of those who are bit with a kind of Spider in Italy which they call a Tarantula that there is no way to cure them of their pleasant frenzy but by such Musick as is appropriate to the motions which their poison makes in the brain of him into whom it is infused Let this be an Emblem of the truth I have now delivered that the old Serpent having envenomed mens Souls poisoned their principles perverted their affections and depraved their lives there is nothing of efficacy sufficient to recover them but only such charms as these which by this six stringed Instrument as I may call it God hath provided for our Cure And this will certainly do it by infusing the Faith of Jesus into us which is the victory whereby we overcome the WORLD Do but hearken diligently to these Witnesses do but mind their sweet consent their harmony and agreement in the testimony they give to this great truth that Jesus our Master is the Son of God and there is no venome so deadly which this Faith will not expel no love to the WORLD so strong which it will not vanquish and subdue It will recover us to our selves and make nothing seem so ridiculous as the folly and frantickness of worldly men yet it will advance us to a Divine and Heavenly spirit so that we shall not be apt to receive such pestilent infusions any more but keep our selves in the love of God looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life VI. For I must add now in the last place that this Faith is so far from being unable to conquer all temptations which would hinder us from obeying our Saviour's commands that it gives us power and strength to do our duty with chearfulness So S. John here tells us when he adds to what he says of the keeping of his Commandments that HIS COMMANDMENTS ARE NOT GRIEVOUS For as Oecumenius well glosses what load is it for a man to love his Brother What great burden is it to visit him if he be in prison God doth not command thee to deliver him but only to visit him He doth not bid thee knock off his chains but see how he bears them Nor doth he bid thee cure a sick man but only comfort and relieve him Nor provide dainties for a poor man but only feed him nor give rich apparel to the naked but only cloath them And so we may conclude of the rest that it is rather an ease than a burden to be sober and chaste in all enjoyments of pleasure to be content with a small portion of those things which others desire with a greedy and ravenous eye to bear with that patiently which we cannot remedy to be careful for nothing but in every thing to make known our requests to God with Prayer and Thanksgiving to be meek and peaceable amongst contentious people to forgive those that injure us to envy no man's greatness and with an humble modesty to satisfie our selves though we be not equal to them These and such like qualities wherewith Jesus would invest us are in themselves most desirable and though richer than cloath of Gold are like our ordinary garments which are no load to those that wear them But they are the less grievous to those that believe in Jesus who are endued with power from above by receiving the testimony of so many Divine Witnesses who assure them they are in the way of God in the company of his Son under the conduct of the Holy Ghost in the direct rode to that glorious place where Jesus is and therefore why should not they rejoyce and be exceeding glad to find themselves thus happy That load which to a sick man seems intolerable if it be laid on the neck of one in health is so easie that he can run away with it with pleasure And so it is in the case of keeping God's
devoutly obey For He alone hath purged mens hearts by his truth and set due bounds to their desires and fears shewing them the chiefest Good to which they should tend and the way whereby it may be attained Nor hath He onely shewn it but he hath gone before us in it lest any should shun the course of Vertue because of the difficulty that attends it Let the way of perdition and deceit therefore be forsaken in which death lies concealed under the inticements of pleasure And the nearer any man by reason of his years sees that day approaching in which he must depart this life let him cast in his mind the more seriously how he may go away as pure as may be how he may come innocent to his Judge and not as those whose minds are blinded how he may satisfie his lusts more greedily before he go Let every man deliver himself out of that gulph while he may while he hath some power and convert to God with his whole Soul that he may securely expect that day in which God the Lord and Governour of the World will judge every man's works and thoughts Let him not onely neglect but fly from those things of which men are now so greedy Let him look upon his Soul as better then these fallacious goods whose possession is uncertain and fading For they go away continually more swiftly then they come and if we could enjoy them to the last they must be left to others We can carry nothing away but a life piously and innocently led He shall come rich and wealthy to God whom Continence Mercy Patience Charity and Faith shall wait upon This is our Inheritance which can neither be taken from any man nor transferred to another And whosoever is desirous of it may have it if he please But let no man trust in Riches nor in Dignity nor in Kingly Power these do not make us immortall Let us give our mind to Righteousness which alone will be our inseparable Companion till it bring us to God As long as we live let us continue our warfare unweariedly let us keep our watch let us valiantly encounter with the enemy that being conquerours and triumphing over the vanquisht adversary we may receive from our Lord the reward of Vertue which he hath promised There is the greatest reason I have demonstrated to expect it with such a lively Faith as was in the first Christians in whose words I have chosen to deliver these things rather then mine own who confidently looked Death in the face in whatsoever shape it appeared and were not in the least daunted at the sight of it There were innumerable experiments made of it not onely in Men but in Women and Children as the great Athanasius * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. p. 80 c. justly glories Who takes this to be no small token of the abolishing death so that it had no power but was indeed dead it self that it was contemned by all the Disciples of Christ Before whose Divine appearing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it was dreadfull to the Saints themselves who bewailed and lamented those that died as if they were lost But since our Saviour rose from the dead it is no longer terrible but all that believe on him tread it under foot as if it were nothing and chuse rather to die then deny the Faith of Christ For they know certainly that the dead do not perish but that they both live and shall also be made incorruptible by the Resurrection That Evill one the Devill who heretofore by death insulted over us is himself alone now left truly dead Of which this is a sign that whereas before men believed on Christ they lookt on Death as very formidable since they embraced his Faith and Doctrine they do so much slight it that they run chearfully to it and become Witnesses against him of our Saviour's Resurrection Mere Children make nothing of it The weaker Sex so weak is he that had the power of Death now grown who were formerly deceived by him laugh him to scorn as one that is dead and hath lost his power Just as a Tyrant when a lawfull Prince hath vanquisht him and bound him hand and foot is despised and made a mocking-stock by all that pass by him who no longer fear his rage and cruelty even so is Death being overcome by our Saviour trampled upon by all his Disciples who bearing witness to their Master deride it in those words of the Apostle O Death where is thy Victory O grave where is thy sting What conquests hast thou to brag of now Behold we are all made alive through Jesus Christ our Lord. Mankind it is certain naturally abhors Death and the dissolution of their Body and therefore it is no small demonstration of our Saviour's victory over it that he hath so changed the nature of man as to perswade even children in Christ and tender girls to make no account of this Life and with joy to think of Death It may seem to some an incredible thing that Death should thus have lost its power but so it doth that there should be a cloath made of an Indian stone which fire cannot burn or that a mighty Tyrant notwithstanding all his forces should on a sudden be subdued and held in chains by no visible power Let him that doubts of either of these put on that cloath or go into the Dominions of the Conquerour and he shall be satisfied of the weakness of the fire and of the Tyrant In like manner if we meet with an Unbeliever who after so many Wonders and so many Martyrs of Jesus Christ makes a doubt whether Death be destroyed and a period put to his Kingdome we cannot blame his admiration at so great a thing provided he do not harden himself in infidelity nor impudently oppose those things which are most evident Let him for his satisfaction doe as he that would know whether such a Tyrant as I now spoke of be vanquished go into the Conquerour's Country submit himself I mean to Christian instruction and receive the Faith of Christ and then he shall soon see the weakness of Death and the victory that is got over it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. For many who were once not onely Vnbelievers but Mockers have afterwards believed and so contemned Death that they have become Martyrs for Christ 's sake I pray God these Treatises may have the like happy effect upon some doubting or unbelieving Soul who shall vouchsafe to examine the Evidence I have produced for the Christian Faith Against which I beseech such persons not to shut their eyes nor harden their hearts in infidelity If they will condescend so far as to consider what we say they may of Scoffers become such zealous Assertours of the power and glory of the Lord Jesus as to be willing and ready though there will be no occasion I hope to try their resolution to testify their love to him and
p. 280 c. The use we should make of this Record p. 286. A Meditation p. 294. CHAP. IX The Testimony of the WATER concerning Eternall Life p. 299. Where first the purity of our Saviour's Doctrine is considered in many particulars p. 300. to 312. Secondly the purity of his Life Ib. to p. 317. Thirdly the Baptism of John Ib. Lastly his own Baptism p. 322. A Meditation p. 330. CHAP. X. The Testimony of the BLOVD is considered p. 333. in Ten particulars The first p. 335. The second p. 339. The third p. 346. The fourth p. 348. The fifth p. 350. The sixth p. 352. The seventh p. 356. The eighth p. 362. The ninth p. 365. The tenth p. 371. A Meditation p. 376. CHAP. XI The Testimony of the SPIRIT considered p. 381. First in the Miracles he wrought p. 384. which are considered in generall p. 388. and then in 6 particulars p. 397. Secondly in his Resurrection from the dead p. 407. and Ascension to heaven p. 417. explained in eight particulars to p. 426. An explication of 2 St. Peter i. 3 4. p. 427 c. A Meditation p. 434. CHAP. XII The Testimony of the holy APOSTLES p. 439. who opened this Doctrine more fully 443. declaring first how our Lord will appear in person at the last day Ib. p. 444 c. Secondly that in the mean time Souls do not sleep p. 445. proved by severall testimonies of St. Paul and St. John p. 447. to 457. which was always the sense of the Church p. 460. The certainty of the Apostles testimony p. 464. proved by their Life and Doctrine p. 470. by their Bloud p. 474. and by the power of the Spirit which accompanied them p. 478. by which they cured some and delivered others to Satan p. 481 c. A Meditation out of St. Chrysostom p. 491. CHAP. XIII The Vse we are to make of this RECORD First in admiring the great love of God p. 499. Which is illustrated secondly by what God hath done for us more then for any in former times p. 507. How uncertain the Philosophers were in their reasonings about this matter p. 508. How little of it was revealed to the Jews p. 514. who had no express promises of Eternall Life p. 515 c. and therefore saw it but obscurely p. 524. and had no such Witnesses of what they knew p. 532. Which ought thirdly to excite in our hearts such love to God as moves us universally to obey him p. 536. No motive comparable to this p. 539. whose strength appears in six properties it hath p. 541. to 551. Which fourthly makes it more strange that it doth so little move men p. 552. Want of Faith is the reason of it p. 555. which we must therefore awaken p. 556. by the consideration of what hath been said which is briefly summed up p. 557. to 566. A Meditation out of St. Chrysostom to the same purpose p. 571. CHAP. XIV A farther Improvement of this RECORD p. 577. which we ought to believe with an unshaken Faith p. 578. An incouragement to Faith p. 583. For the quickning of which severall questions are proposed which is the Fifth Vse p. 586. First about the way to this Felicity p. 587. Secondly about the nature of the way p. 597. Thirdly about the unreasonableness of being desirous to stay always here p. 606. Fourthly about their distance from it who never have their thoughts in heaven p. 608. Fifthly about the danger of resisting so mighty a motive to well-doing p. 611. Sixthly about mens resolutions all these things considered p. 617. The last Use concerns the great joy the righteous should have in the thoughts of what they hope for p. 624. which is a strong support under the greatest afflictions p. 629. demonstrated in three Observations p. 630. to 636. where the resolution of good men before Christ came is represented to p. 642. The examples of the Martyrs presented p. 643 c. Comfort from hence derived against the death of friends p. 646. or in any other sad condition p. 649. even in death it self p. 653. The Conclusion out of St. Gregory Nazianzen p. 655. ERRATA PAge 101. line 6. reade VI. p. 109. marg r. prosolog p. 461. marg penult Hom iv in Hebr. p. 508. 2. r. own peculiar p. 534. antep r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 606. marg r. iii. IMPRIMATUR Guil. Sill R. P. D. Hen. Episcopo Lond. à Sacris Domesticis Oct. 21. 1676. 1 S. Joh. V. 11. AND THIS IS THE RECORD THAT GOD HATH GIVEN TO VS ETERNALL LIFE AND THIS LIFE IS IN HIS SON AN INTRODUCTION To the following Discourse HAving made in the former Treatise as diligent a search as I could into the Records of Heaven and Earth and found there the clearest Evidences that Jesus is the Son of God to whom therefore we owe the most humble and chearful Obedience I purpose now to make a farther inquiry into them after the Royal Powers which belong to so great a Prince who both in his Nature and in his Office so infinitely excells all other that his loyal Subjects may well expect from him the greatest grace and favour He was God appearing as Man Epist ad Ephes to use the words of Ignatius and Man working mightily as God but yet submitted himself to the meanest condition and the basest death for the purging away our sins by his bloud whereby he obtained as the most ample Dominion over all creatures so the larges◠Power both to remit sins and also to reward the services of all those that believe on him To whom his affection is so great and extends it self in such boundless love that his kindness towards them will not be perfected I shall prove till he hath bestowed on them ETERNAL LIFE A Blessing for which all mankind most passionately wish not onely because the weakness of our bodies the inconstancy of all their enjoyments the troubles we mee◠with in the world and the necessity of dying make it most desirable but because it comes recommended to us by its own proper worth and excellence which is so exceeding great that it renders the most constant untroubled possession of this world's goods and a perpetuity in this life could it be obtained without any sickness or infirmity a vile and contemptible purchace in comparison with it This therefore all considerate minds would gladly be well assured of There is nothing of such importance to their satisfaction as a certainty of immortal happiness when they leave this Body Which will make our Obedience to God's commands as stedfast as our Belief is and withall most sweet and easie whatsoever opposition we have to discourage us For the hope of Eternal Life is able to lift us up above all the temptations wherewith the world can assault us be they either the lust of the flesh the lust of the eye and the pride of life or be they those hatreds reproaches persecutions loss of goods yea and death it self which
we may be in danger of for Piety's sake Now looking a little farther into this Holy Writer who hath preserved the unquestionable Records concerning these matters I find there is as great a certainty of this Eternal Life by Jesus Christ as there is of his being the Son of God and that the very same Witnesses who so fully declare the one give no less strong Evidence for the proof of the other For THIS says He 1 John v. 11. IS THE RECORD or WITNESSE THAT GOD HATH GIVEN TO VS ETERNAL LIFE AND THIS LIFE IS IN HIS SON Which words being a continuation of the foregoing Discourse carry this sense in them There is great reason you should receive the Witness of God viz. of the Father Word and Holy Ghost and of the Water Bloud and Spirit not onely because it is greater then the Witness of men which you cannot justly reject v. 9. and because if you do reject it you make God a Liar which who can have the heart to do v. 10. but also because the thing which is testified to us by these Witnesses when they say that Jesus is the Son of God is of all other the most desirable viz. that God designs for us no less blessing then Eternal Life which the Lord Jesus hath in his hands to keep for us and to bestow upon us The ensuing Discourse then will necessarily fall into these two Parts First to shew what this Eternal Life is and secondly to prove the Certainty of it from the mouth of all those Witnesses Of the first of which I must treat with the greater brevity because it is not the Design of the Apostle in this place to give us an account what the Eternal Life is which God hath promised but to shew that he hath given us an undoubted right to it and that it is in the power of that Great Lord whose Servants we are by Faith in him to dispose of it THE WITNESSES TO Christianity PART II. CHAP. I. Of ETERNAL LIFE in generall AND now I launch out when I go about to speak of Eternal Life into a wide Sea of which it is but little that our eye can descry or our thoughts fathom and less that I must confine my self unto in this present Discourse There is more contained in these two words ETERNALL LIFE then all the world can discover though we have so good a Compass as the Book of God whereby to steer our course and to guide and assist us in our Inquiry We may venture as far as ever our thoughts will carry us into this depth but we shall still see something beyond all that we can conceive and be enabled by our search to discern more fully that it hath no bottom no bounds nor limits as will appear if you do but attend to this general Description of it out of the Holy Writings In whose style it is most certain it signifieth a full and constant enjoyment of all the happiness that our Being is capable to receive I say Happiness because as DEATH in the Sacred language denotes all manner of Misery affliction and trouble so by LIFE it expresses all kind of Felicity pleasure and contentment And I say full and constant happiness because the word ETERNALL must needs adde something to the other and that is compleatness firmness and solidity As Death if it be not eternall leaves some room for thoughts of happiness so Life if it want that addition doth not exclude all vexation and sadness But then on the contrary both the one and the other if this be annexed are made perfect without any hope of happiness in that Death or any fear of misery in this Life To clear our passage I judge it necessary to spend a few words in making good this Notion of Life and Death by producing some places of Holy Writ where they are so used And first for DEATH the very first time we meet with it in God's Book it is used to express all the Misery that man drew upon himself by his Sin ii Gen. 17. In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die i. e. fall into a most calamitous estate as it is explained iii. Gen. 16 17 18 19. till worn out with labour sorrow and pain he returned to the dust out of which he was taken Thus when the Locusts came upon the land of Egypt and destroyed every green thing Pharaoh intreats Moses x. Exod. 17. to pray to the Lord that he would take away this Death onely Which shews that all the plagues and disasters which fell upon that land went under this general name of DEATH though now it be restrained to the last and greatest of all punishments The like you reade in the second Book of the Kings iv 40. where the sons of the Prophets as they were eating of their pottage cry out Oman of God there is DEATH in the pot something that is very distastfull to the palate and perhaps hurtfull and poisonous to the body which made them they could not eat it In the New Testament also penned by men of the same country we find the very same language St. Paul saying that he was in Deaths often 2 Cor. xi 23. and that he died daily 1 Cor. xv 31. and wishing to be delivered from the body of this Death vii Rom. 24. i. e. of such misery that it made him sigh and groan sorely under the burthen of it And to name no more the Shadow of Death in these Books signifies nothing else but an horrible dangerous place or a dismall forlorn condition into which any miserable person is faln This being the notion then of the word DEATH in the speech of the Hebrews such must be the signification of the word LIFE which is opposite to it whereby they express all Felicity and comfortable enjoyments Thus when David says his enemies were lively or living as it is in the Hebrew text xxxviii Psal 19. he means they were in a flourishing prosperous condition abounding with all worldly goods while he was abandoned to contempt poverty and continual danger And when he says their heart shall live that seek God lxix Psal 32. his meaning is they shall enjoy true peace and contentment So when the people say 2 King xi 12. Let the King live which we render God save the King they wish him a prosperous and happy reign And when David acknowledges God to be the fountain of life xxxvi Psal 9. it is as much as to say an ever-running spring of all felicity from whom flows as the foregoing words are a river of pleasures Hence they are bid to keep to God's Commandments as their life xxxii Deut. 47. And this is said to be the excellency of knowledge that wisedom giveth LIFE to them that have it vii Eccles. 12. because by observing those wise precepts they were put into a most happy condition which could not be had by any other means but would certainly be lost by turning from those holy paths This is a
phrase so known and the translation of the word to this use saith * More Nev. par 1. c. 42. Maimonides is so frequent that all good and wholsome Doctrine is called Chajah that is LIFE and thence our Masters say The just are called LIVING even in their death and the wicked are called DEAD even while they are alive because the one were happy and the other miserable in those contrary conditions The true reason of which dialect or manner of speech I take to be this that LIFE being the foundation upon which all felicity is built the root out of which it grows it being impossible to enjoy any thing unless we be alive and it abiding and continuing also when the pleasures and other circumstances of life are often interrupted it was thought the aptest thing to express that felicity which we partake of in life yea the fullest felicity the fruition of the compleatest Good when life shall be made eternal And if this be not sufficient to demonstrate that the Holy Writers intend by Eternal Life all the good we are or shall be capable to enjoy you may farther observe that they describe it by all things that are excellent and desirable having borrowed from the glory of the whole World whatsoever is lovely and illustrious to help to represent it to us Shall I put together the severall lines whereby it is described in as handsome an order and composure as I can and so leave every one to judge of the rare beauty of this Life when it shall have all its fillings up which in its ruder draught appears so amiable in our eyes This LIFE then that it may be understood to be the enjoyment of a fuller good then we can conceive a good beyond the bold desires of the most inlarged and luxurious appetite is expressed by the hugest heaps of Treasures such as the Heavens onely are great enough to contain by the possession of an immortall Inheritance reserved there for us and by Pearls and Jewels of a price so invaluable that he is stupid who sells not all he hath if they are not to be had at a lower rate to make a purchace of them These expressions and the rest that follow are so well known that I need not stay to set down the particular places of Holy Scripture where they may be found but proceed to tell you that this Life is there also set forth by feeding upon the delight of the most exquisite pleasures and being entertained without any satiety and in the most noble company at the most sumptuous Feast by exaltation withall to the sublimest pitch of Honour such as the power of Kings the majesty of Thrones and the glory of Crowns which Holy men call in to their assistence that they may serve to lift up our minds to conceive the height of this happy Life and make it seem the more royal and magnificent To which you may adde that they make use of the names of Rest and Refreshment and Peace and Joy or Contentment For as we reade of entring into Life so we do of entring into Rest and into the Joy of our Lord and dwelling in Peace because these are the onely things on earth which can compleat and perfect the happiness of those who enjoy Princely dignity and power But then when the Earth can afford no more colours for the drawing a picture of this most excellent Life or supreme Felicity those Holy men ascend up to Heaven and fetch from thence not onely some rays of light but the very Sun it self and that in the top of its glory to illustrate by its brightness the incomparable beauty of it For it is called the Inheritance of the Saints in light and our Blessed Lord is called the Light of the world who promises the Just that they shall have the Light of life and shine like the Sun in the Kingdom of the Father But alas it is not in the power of such words as these to express its excellence And therefore when all things that fall under our eyes and our taste are spent in the description of it we reade then of melodious Songs and Thanksgivings and the joyfull voice of those who triumph continually Nay the whole World as big as it is is introduced as a small resemblance of this Happiness wherein victorious Souls are said to inherit all things and to be made equal to the Angels who joyn in consort with them and bear their part in those heavenly Anthems and Hymns wherewith they bless and praise the Great Lord of all But if all the goodly things that are or ever have been in the whole world should meet together and falling down at the feet of one man should with a joynt consent conspire to make him happy they could never advance him near the height of this celestial Bliss whose incomparable excellence cannot be expressed without the assistence of words called down from the highest Heavens the place of God's Habitation And therefore nothing below the Kingdom of Heaven a Mansion in our heavenly Father's House a Building of God in the Heavens is made the portion of such happy Souls And as if the Heavens yea the Heaven of Heavens could afford nothing great enough to represent this Blessedness Holy men lead us at last to God himself whom they bid us behold in the High and Holy place as in his Chamber of Presence And this LIFE is called Seeing GOD and beholding his Glory and being with our LORD which are names of such transcendent greatness that we had need enjoy this Happiness to understand them But thus the Men of God from things sensible lead us by the hand to those that are spirituall and invisible And now that they have placed our thoughts in the presence of God there they leave them to take as full a view as they can of him and to spread themselves in the largest contemplations of his Perfections For they were not able to go any farther then onely to tell us that we shall be made like to him whose Perfections shine so gloriously in our eyes This is the highest pitch to which they carry our meditations Here they bid us rest our thoughts and now that they have advanced them above the Earth and Heavens to consider with our selves what it is to See God till we resemble him and be perfectly transform'd into his most blessed Nature and Life All they can doe more for us is onely to tell us what GOD is the enjoyment of whom is our Happiness and who we are to understand will be infinitely far more to our whole man then Kingdoms and Thrones then Crowns and Jewels then Feasts and Songs then the Sun it self and all the sweet influences of Heaven with the rest of the things forementioned could be were they all united in one design to make us happy The wisest of the Jews as blind as that Nation is are sensible of this how disproportionable all the words which even divinely-inspired
persons use are to the Nobleness of this Life In which saith Maimonides Cap. viii de Poenitent there is no room for meat and drink and such like pleasures but the just sit with Crowns on their heads and delight themselves in the Splendour of the Divine Majesty There are many names whereby this Life is called Derech Mashal after the figurative way of speaking in the Holy Books For example the Mountain of the Lord the place of his Holiness the Courts of the Lord the Beauty or Sweetness of the Lord the Tabernacle of God the House of God his holy Temple the Gate of the Lord. And after the same way of similitude and figurative speech Wise men call this Good prepared for the Just by the name of a Banquet or Feast and most commonly the World to come Let not this Good seem light to thee nor do thou imagine the reward of Piety to be so little as to drink the richest wines to eat the best victuals to have the most beautifull wives to be cloathed in silk and scarlet to dwell in ivory palaces and to have all the furniture of gold and silver and such like things But understand that there is no Good in this world to which that supreme Good can be compared but onely by way of figure and similitude In truth there is no proportion between the Good of the Soul in the other World and the Goods of the Body such as meat and drink in this But that Great Good is incomprehensible and incomparable according to those words of David xxxi Psal 19. O how great good hast thou laid up for those that fear thee He could not tell how great but with what desire did he long after the life of that world when he said xxvii Psal 13. I believe to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living That 's another name whereby they called this place of Bliss For wheresoever their ancient Wise men saith their Mysticall exposition of the Psalms meet with this phrase in Scripture the land of the living Manasseh Ben Isr Probl. xvii de Creatione they expound it of Paradise because that is the country where men live for ever But there are no words like those of our Blessed Lord to represent this surpassing Happiness of the pure in heart who he promises shall SEE GOD. Let us therefore here fix our minds and stay a while before we pass on any farther to search into the meaning of this phrase which is the sublimest and most comprehensive of all other whereby this ETERNALL LIFE is described to us I. And the least that can be meant by it is that we shall be there where He hath his most special residence and shall dwell in his House in the Heavens where there are so many Mansions There the Angels are said to stand before God to behold the face of our heavenly Father And therefore for us to see GOD or behold him must in generall denote that we shall be more like Angels then Men and being admitted into the society of those heavenly Ministers shall take up our habitation in the same place where they wait upon the Divine Majesty Whence it is that as the Angels are called the Sons of God i. Job 6. ii 1. so are all those who shall be accounted worthy to obtain that World and the Resurrection of the Dead xx Luk. 35. We are now the Sons of GOD saith St. John 1. Epist iii. 1 2. in a state that is of great favour with him and therefore need not care if the world hate us But we have far greater things in hope and look for a more excellent relation to him it not appearing yet what we shall be The meaning of which last words in all probability is this that the manner wherein we shall be the Sons of God in the other world is not now manifest There is no body knows how near we shall be to him when we shall be the Children of God being the children of the Resurrection as our Saviour speaks in the place before mentioned Onely this is certain as I said just now that we shall be Companions of Angels and such Sons of God as they are And withall St. John here tells us that when He or it shall appear we shall be like him it being naturall that the Child should bear some resemblance to its Father II. Now from hence it follows that to SEE GOD is to enjoy such favours as He will be pleased to impart unto us in that high and holy place where he dwells yea to have some participation with him in his Blessedness who is most Blessed for evermore For to See in the language of the Hebrews is to enjoy when it is applied to a thing desirable or to be in that state when it is applied to that which is hurtfull Thus to see good xxxiv Psal 12. is to possess it and to lead an happy life and to see the good of Jerusalem cxxviii 5. is to partake of its peace and prosperity and to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living xxvii Psalm 13. is in its first sense to be delivered by God and to enjoy the sweet fruits of it before he died Nor is there any other meaning of seeing life and seeing the kingdom of God but this that the parties to whom those promises are made shall be put into the possession of such blessings And on the other side to see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power and coming in the clouds xxvi Matth. 64. is to feel his heavy wrath the stroke of his revengefull hand upon their nation as may be gathered from i. Revel 7. And to see death lxxxix Psal 48. ii Luk. 26. is no more then to die This is so plain that those things that belong to other senses yet are said to be seen which can signifie nothing else but that they are perceived or enjoyed O generation saith Jeremiah ii 31. see ye the word of the Lord that is hear it mind and consider it or as Maimonides expounds it * More Nev. par 1. c. 46. the intention of the Prophet is that they should apprehend the sense of God's word And that likewise which is said to be seen in one place is said to be tasted in another as to see death viii Joh. 51. is the same with tasting of death ver 52. Which is a demonstration that to See in their language is frequently used for having a sense perception or enjoyment of any object And therefore we cannot necessarily draw any more out of these words of our Saviour which promise that we shall see God but that we shall have as reall an enjoyment of him and as sensibly perceive him as we do now any good in this world though the manner of it be not certainly known as not so plainly deducible from these words Let us conceive with our selves as well as we can what his
Schoolmen imagine is the Aureola or little golden Crown which the Judge will give to rare Vertues By which they mean some accidentall reward superadded to the essentiall Blessedness Like the little crown of gold wherewith the other crown upon the Table of Shew-bread was finished as the Vulg. Lat. renders xxv Exod. 25. from whence this expression seems to be borrowed But that the overplus of reward which Christ will give to some shall consist onely in a peculiar brightness of their body I see no ground to determine because God hath so many other ways to crown the faith and love and hope of those whom he delights to honour It is better to conclude all this discourse with the words of the same Father which follow a little after * Ib. cap. 21. What and how great the spirituall grace of the Body will be because the time is not come to make experiment I am afraid lest all that we say of it be rashly spoken And therefore I shall onely adde of which we may be certain that as Macarius observes whether it be a greater or a lesser glory that we attain we shall all shine together in one most blessed and glorious place His words are these As Birds produce feathers of a different kind Homil. 32. and some fly nearer to the earth others farther off but all fly in one common air or as there is one Heaven which hath many Stars in it some greater then others but all fixed in heaven So the Saints shall be differently planted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in one Heaven of the Divinity and in one invisible country Thither let us all direct our paths thither let us continually aspire saying as he does in another place to which I shall adde the words of another great man O how ineffable are the promises of Christians Macarius Homil. 4. who have such glorious expectations that the Faith and riches of one single Soul cannot be equalled by the glory and beauty of heaven and earth though we take in all their furniture and treasures and variety and goodliness and bravery And yet how fairly do these things shine in our eyes and with what pleasure do we behold their beauty Anselm in Protolog If then the created life be so good how good is that Life which creates If the salvation we receive be so pleasant how sweet is that Salvation which gives all Salvation If that wisedom be so lovely which understands the works of God how lovely is that Wisedom which of nothing contrived them all Finally if there be so many and so great delights in delectable things what and how great is that Delight which is in him that made all things delectable He that shall enjoy this Good what shall he have what shall he not have He shall have what he will and what he would not he shall not have If honour and riches be desired God will make his good and faithful servants rulers over many things Nay they shall be called Sons of God and Gods and where his Son is there they shall be heirs of God and coheirs with Christ If they desire true security there is none like that for certainly they shall be as certain that these or rather this Good shall never by any means be wanting to them as they are certain they shall never leave it of themselves nor God their Lover ever take it away against the will of those he loves nor any thing stronger then He be able to separate them and God They shall rejoyce therefore perpetually And they shall rejoyce as much as they love and love as much as they know And how much O Lord shall they know thee then how much shall they love thee Certainly neither eye hath seen nor ear heard nor hath it entred into the heart of man in this life how much they shall know thee and how much they shall love thee in that I beseech thee O God let me know thee let me love thee that I may rejoyce in thee And if I cannot do it to the full in this life O that I may profit every day untill it come to the full Let thy Knowledge grow in me here and there be made full let thy Love increase and there also be full that here my Joy may in hope be great and there in possession full Amen CHAP. IV. Of the ETERNITY of this LIFE FRom this larger then was at first designed consideration of the nature of this LIFE pass we now to a short Meditation of the ETERNITY of it which indeed is the Crown that God sets upon its head the Circle if I may so speak which wreathing it self about this Happiness makes it to be our sovereign Good And it may not be unworthy our observation that this Eternity of Life is as far above the continuance of all other blessings heretofore promised as the Life it self is LIFE among the Jews according to the letter of their Law signifying onely all earthly good things there was onely a long life not an eternall in the land of Canaan promised to them that kept that Law But quite otherwise the LIFE promised by Christ consisting onely in the enjoyment of spirituall and heavenly blessings it is not a long but an eternall never-ending life in the possession of these good things which he hath assured to us It being but fit that as the Life exceeds that which Moses promised so the duration of it also should as much out-run his as for ever extends it self beyond an Age. Now the word ETERNALL may be conceived to comprehend in it these Three things I. First that there is nothing but LIFE in this state of Blessedness which shall not be interrupted by any dolefull accident Life and Death I told you in the holy language signifie the same with Blessedness and Misery And therefore the Eternity of life must include in its notion a state of pure happiness of mere and unmixed pleasure without any thing that deserves the name of Death to give it the least annoyance There we may hope to be so happy as to know without mistake and to be wise without folly and to increase in knowledge without our present toil to acquire it Love is there without hatred jealousy or envy joy without any sighing or sorrow praises without complaints obedience without reluctance speed and alacrity without dulness and heaviness in one word perfect purity and holiness without spot or blemish to sully the glory of it As this lower region of the air we see is the place of clouds and darkness thunder and lightning storm and tempest but to the dwellings of the Sun and fixed Stars none of these pitchy vapours ascend to obscure their brightness or trouble their peace just so is this World the scene of misery and vexation confusion and disorder our bodies are tossed with severall storms and our Souls many times hurried with more violent tempests the fierce gusts of their own passions but when
us in a great many thoughts and be paid for with much care and solicitude afterward to preserve our contentments which else will be in danger to be lost and leave us the more miserable There will be many also that envy to us our happiness and others perhaps that will endeavour to oppress us and deprive us of it And if we can escape all these troubles yet we must have a sore conflict with our selves and our spirituall enemies which will put us to great pains to keep our selves from being corrupted with the delights of this world or poisoned and infected with the evill examples that are round about us Therefore this present time may well be called the time of our labours after all which there is nothing we have got but must also have an end and we shall be forced quickly to take our leave of it But now in that joyfull Sabbath that is to succeed we shall rest from all these labours and be at no more pains to attain or keep our happiness There will be no danger as I have said of our being despoiled of it No Serpent can creep into that Paradise to tempt and allure us from that great felicity nor shall we be in any danger from our own Flesh nor find our selves in a World where there will be any thing to excite our desires but what we may freely take the fullest satisfaction in By which and all the rest that hath been discoursed you may clearly see there can be nothing wanting to compleat the happiness of that state but onely the never-ceasing duration or continuance of it Now in this as was said at first the Rest we expect in the other world differs from that which God promised the Hebrews in the land of Canaan For by virtue of Moses his Law they had a title onely to a long life in that fruitfull Country in opposition to which as well as to our short life here the Christian Rest is called an everlasting Life an inheritance immortall because incorruptible and undefiled and that fadeth not away reserved in heaven for us 1 Pet. i. 4. So our Lord himself calls it a great number of times in one discourse he had with the stupid Jews Joh. vi where he exhorts them to labour not so much for the meat that perisheth as for the meat that endureth to everlasting life which the Son of man came to give them ver 27. For this is the will he tells them of him that sent him that every one which seeth the Son and believeth on him may have everlasting life ver 40. And because they were still sottishly regardless of what he said he affirms it again with the most vehement asseverations ver 47. Verily verily I say unto you He that believeth on me hath everlasting life And 58. He that eateth of this Bread shall live for ever which is repeated again in sundry other places of the same Chapter And I must tell you for your more ample satisfaction that our Saviour hath taken care to deliver this Doctrine to us in such words as can have no other sense or meaning The word for ever or everlasting in the Old Law sometime signifies onely the duration of severall years or a long compass of time which at last might have an end As the Hebrew servant who had sold himself for six years if when they were at an end he chose not to go free he was to serve his master for ever xxi Exod. 6. that is till the Jubilee if his master lived so long and he were not redeemed nor released And there are many Ordinances of Moses not now to be enumerated which are said to be everlasting because they were to continue till the coming of Christ Now lest any one should imagine that the Life our Saviour speaks of shall be everlasting onely in the same sense a very long continued happiness severall Ages suppose which in conclusion might determine and come to an end he hath prevented such thoughts by using other words besides this of everlasting life that we may be assured it signifies more in the Gospel then it did under the Law that is an Endless Bliss For 1. he not onely tells the Jews in the forenamed Chapter vi Joh. 50. that he was the bread of which if a man did eat he should not die but that whosoever liveth that is every living man and believeth in him shall never die xi Joh. 26. Which is as much as to say He will give us a Life without any death And farther 2. he says that whosoever keeps his saying shall never see death viii 51. Which if it signifie any thing distinct from the former must denote that he shall never be in any danger of death or come near it which in the next words vers 52. is called tasting death How can this be say the Jews since Abraham and the Prophets are dead and thou sayest if a man keep my saying he shall never taste of death That 's the phrase wherein our Saviour's Passion is expressed who tasted death i. e. lay in the grave a while for every man ii Heb. 9. And therefore may signifie here that our Saviour's faithfull Disciples after he hath given them everlasting life shall not die at all no not for the space of three days though afterward they might rise again But I have taken notice of one expression fuller then this for he doth not onely say that they shall not die nor taste of death but 3. that they cannot die any more xx Luk. 36. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 There is no possibility after they have attained that life that they should die again for they are equall to the Angels and are the children of God being by the Resurrection begotten to an immortall life Hence it is that the Apostle calls this happy state by the name of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 immortality 2 Tim. i. 10. and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 incorruption ii Rom. 7. and saith that our bodies shall be raised in incorruption 1 Cor. xv 42. and put on immortality ver 53. and bear the image of the heavenly Adam i. e. of our Lord now he is in glory who we know dies no more ver 49. Which all signifie the Body as well as the Soul shall enjoy such a solid state of happiness as cannot moulder or be dissolved but will remain firm and durable like the Authour of it by whom death shall be swallowed up in victory ver 54. i. e. be so perfectly conquered that it shall never recover the least power any more Innumerable Ages shall never put a period to this ETERNALL LIFE but after they are all past the whole Man shall be as fresh and beautifull without any declension or sign of decay as if it were but newly risen and had just then put on its purest robes of glorious Light There will be as full a Good I mean and as great a strength to enjoy it and as perfect a liking also of it
those who overcome includes in it the bestowing on us the most excellent benefits Because he will be our GOD in a more excellent manner then he ever was yet to men such a GOD as he was to our Blessed Lord himself He will prefer us to live with him in great splendour and glory He will give us an inheritance in a better Country which is an heavenly where all delights flow and never cease to spring up to those happy Souls who shall enjoy the eternall fruits of his greatest love For so he adds 4. and he shall be to me a Son A Son you know expects the Inheritance of his Father because to him it properly belongs and upon him it descends And therefore to be to GOD a Son is to be made like him and to live with him in that very happiness and bliss which he enjoys So St. Paul expresses it viii Rom. 17. he shall be an heir of GOD a co-heir with Jesus who as the Son of God inherits his Glory He shall participate that is with God in his everlasting life kingdom honour and joy which what it is we are not able to tell no more then we can comprehend what his Majesty is who possesses heaven and earth and is infinite in all perfections But we have the greatest reason that can be to expect so great a bliss because we know that God loves his Son Jesus and hath given ALL THINGS into his hand iii. Joh. 35. We are sure that God hath made him most blessed for ever He hath made him exceeding glad with his countenance Honour and Majesty hath he laid upon him and his glory is great in his Salvation xxi Psal 5 6. Now it is most evident you may again observe 5. that the generall intendment of this promise is to put us in hope of being made like to Christ our Elder Brother For he is not ashamed to call us by that name And this being his great Prerogative that he is Heir of all things when the Father of mercy assures us that we shall inherit all things it is as much as to say we shall share with Christ in his large possessions It is easy to note how the Holy Gospell describes our expected felicity in the same terms wherein it speaks of that which Christ our Head enjoys with whom St. Paul says we shall appear in glory and reign with him and have a glorious body like his and in order to it be caught up in the clouds 1 Thess iv 17. which was the manner of his ascension to heaven i. Act. 9. And accordingly here God promises to him that overcomes that he shall inherit all things in conformity still with our Saviour whom he hath appointed heir of all things i. Heb. 2. I cannot say there is any allusion in these words to the Olympick rewards given to the Conquerours in those Combats but so it is that they who overcame there were accounted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 equall to their Gods that is their Hero's or deified men Fabri Agonist L. ii c. 11.16 17. and therefore had Statues erected to their honour and an annuall Pension settled on them for their more noble maintenance But what was this to the reall Divine honour and glory which God will give to victorious Souls To whom he promises not a small Pension or Annuity but an inheritance and that of all things i. e. to shine in the glory of our Blessed Saviour who is King of kings and Lord of lords and can prefer all his Subjects to such a greatness that they shall be more like Gods then men So St. Greg. Nazianzen often speaks that * Orat. xxxvi p. 592. we shall be made Gods in the other World by him that was made Man for us in this It is hard to tell what Heraclitus meant by that speech recorded in Clemens Alexandrinus * L. iii. Padag c. 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Men are Gods Gods are men But it is verified in the Christian Religion which reveals a Divine state to which we shall ascend when we leave the earth by him who came down from Heaven into a vile condition that he might promote us thither Let us study then these words very hard and think often what it is to have ALL THINGS that the love of the Almighty will bestow when in the most eminent sense and in another World he shall become OUR GOD and what it is to have an estate in him that can never be cut off but remains as firm as the Throne on which he sate when he spake these words And then if you believe in him it will fill you with unspeakable joy without entring into particular enquiries to think that you shall be so happy as to be his Sons and Heirs who want nothing that can be desired or he can give And indeed these other words ETERNALL LIFE wherein God's gracious promise commonly runs are of the same import and force with those now mentioned All that we hope for is contained in them As 1. Pardon of Sin without which we cannot take one step toward so great a bliss For death the fruit and punishment of sin will still remain unless sin be pardoned and then what hope can we have of life much less of Eternall life which is therefore perhaps called by the name of Righteousness v. Gal. 5. because it includes our perfect justification and absolution from the guilt of sin without which we could not attain it And 2. it supposes the Adoption of Sons which is begun in this life but not perfected till the next when we shall be made the children of God by receiving a new life from him at the Resurrection of the dead And 3. the Redemption of the Body is another blessing included in it For being raised again it will be freed from its present weaknesses alterations and pains to which it is obnoxious and stand in need of not so much as food and raiment And therefore the time when he will bestow it is called the day of our Redemption iv Eph. 30. To which must be added 4. the carrying of it up to heaven to meet the Lord For being raised a spirituall body it will not be fit for this World but for the other Where 5. we shall rest with him in the celestiall Inheritance and enjoy all the happiness it affords for LIFE you have heard signifies all good things And lastly the Perpetuity of them is plainly expressed in the word ETERNALL which makes the happiness of this heavenly LIFE appear so exceeding great that our present Life compared to it is as Censorinus says of Time in regard of Eternity no more then a Winter's day Let this then suffice us to know that we shall have a perfect enjoyment of all the Good we are capable to receive when we are made greater then we are by the change that shall be wrought in us at our departure hence and at the resurrection of the dead And let our pains
verily I say unto you he that heareth my words and believeth on him that sent me hath everlasting life and shall not come into condemnation but is passed from death unto life v. Joh. 24. let us take it for as express a declaration from God the Father as if that voice which required them to hear Jesus had said You that are obedient to my Son have everlasting life and are in no danger to perish being translated from the dominion of death to be heirs of life II. And now from the consideration of the words that were spoken let us pass to the manner wherein they were delivered which is so vastly different from that wherein God spake formerly to Moses and the children of Israel from another mountain that I cannot but think it was intended to signifie something of the grace of Eternall Life which Jesus brings to us When he was transfigured and his face shone as the Sun the Evangelist tells us moreover that his raiment became glistering exceeding white as snow and that a bright cloud also overshadowed them out of which the voice before named came saying This is my beloved Son c. Which if it be compared with former divine Manifestations of the same kind we may reasonably look upon as an indication that this Person came to discover 1. something more glorious then Moses had done and 2. something that expresses more abundant love and kindness of God towards men which is nothing else but Eternall Life First I say something more glorious and resplendent or as the Apostle speaks 2 Cor. iv 6. the light of the knowledge of the glory of God which we behold in the face of Jesus Christ For the Mount to which Moses went up and where he and the people heard God speak to them was all covered with clouds and thick darkness Thus God himself told him beforehand he would appear xix Exod. 9. And so he did when the day prefixed for it came vers 16 18. Unto that thick darkness Moses drew near xx 21. And the people also stood underneath the mountain beholding it burn with fire into the midst of heaven with darkness clouds and thick darkness iv Deut. 11. xix Exod. 17. All which places the Reader may be pleased to consult together with xxiv Exod. 18. where we find that Moses went into the midst of this cloud and there was covered and quite obscured from their sight A very fit emblem of the obscurity of the knowledge which they then had of God and of his will and of the terrours of the Law which was a ministration of death as the Apostle speaks and so astonished them with the thunders and lightning which came out of the cloud that they fled and stood afar off xx Exod. 18. As on the other side God appearing now to our Saviour in a quite contrary manner on the top of another Mountain where there was no black cloud though it was in the night no smoak or sulphureous vapour much less a thick darkness hiding him from his Disciples sight nothing but a bright and lightsome cloud which overshadowed them and shewed them the glory wherein he shone it was a lively representation of the light which he the Light of the world came to give to them that sate in darkness and in the shadow of death and of the glory and bliss whereof he was the Minister unto which he invited mankind in words of grace and sweetness as he did his Disciples to stay here on the mountain by those chearfull beams wherewith the glory of the Lord surrounded them For this manner of appearing as I said Secondly plainly suggests some greater manifestation of the love and kindness the goodness and bounty of Heaven to mankind then had been made before in that way of revelation to Moses which was so much different from the sweetness and amiableness of this When Moses conversed with God upon mount Sinai he descended thither in Fire as the places before mentioned tell you And the sight of the glory of the Lord was like devouring fire in the eyes of the children of Israel xxiv Exod. 17. v. Deut. 22 23. But when our Blessed Lord took his Apostles with him to a sight of the Divine Glory there was onely the appearance of a wonderfull bright and chearful light some mild rays from heaven which had nothing of terrour in them but ravished them with joy to find themselves in so glorious a Presence And therefore they were not left at the foot of this high mountain as Moses left the Israelites at the bottom of the other but he brought them up with him xvii Matth. 1. And they were not put into a fright as the Israelites were who removed their station at the sight of the fire on mount Sinai nor did they shriek as their Forefathers did there who cried out saying Why should we die for this great fire will consume us if we hear the voice of the Lord our God any more we shall die Speak thou with us and we will hear but let not God speak with us lest we die v. Deuter 25. xx Exod. 19. But they were ravished out of themselves with the glory of this sight which was so inviting to their eyes that they wisht for no other station but desired to remain perpetually fixed there They were so far from running away that they said Let us make here three Tabernacles as if they meant to pitch there the place of their abode and never take their eyes from so beautifull a Light It is observable also that in the dark Mountain where Moses was together with the fire and thunder and lightnings there was the noise of a Trumpet exceeding loud which made not onely all the people tremble but the whole mount quaked greatly xix Exod. 16 18. And God spake likewise to the people with a great voice v. Deut. 22. wherewith both they were so astonished as to wish never to hear it more and Moses himself also so terrible was the sight together with the noise said I exceedingly fear and quake xii Heb. 21. Whereas on the Mountain where our Lord was transfigured there was not one such frightfull flash nor the least dreadfull sound nothing but his own glistering Body the splendour of Moses and Elias the brightness of a heavenly cloud and this one sweet voice which proclaimed nothing but love and grace in their ears This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased hear him St. Matthew indeed tells us that when the Disciples heard they fell on their faces and were sore afraid xvii 6. But this doth not signify that they were seised with any horrour at the dreadfulness of the sound but onely amazed at the suddenness of the voice and the marvellous splendour of the Light And therefore the other Evangelists do not mention any such terrour after the voice which being accompanied with a glory they had never beheld might well amaze them but did not make them tremble The very
apparition of Angels was wont to be so surprising as to dazzle mens eyes and make them bow their faces to the ground xxiv Luk. 5. And therefore such a glorious splendour as this equalling that of the Sun might well make the Apostles fall prostrate upon the earth in great fear or amazement But then our Lord presently came and comforted them by a gracious touch bidding them arise and not be afraid though they saw such a light and heard such a voice as this to which indeed they had not been accustomed but was the most amiable and ought to be the most welcome of any that could salute the eyes and ears of mankind St. Mark it is observable says that before this voice came out of the heavenly glory they were sore afraid ix 6. i. e. were so amazed at such an unwonted sight or as Proclus * Orat. viii in Transfigur Domini calls it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the strangeness and unexpectedness of the Divine Brightness shining on them that it put them quite beside themselves But that it was a sweet mixture of those devout passions fear and joy is manifest from the foregoing verse with which those words cohere where you reade they were so delighted and ravished with the sight that they thought not of going down from thence any more but were projecting for their perpetuall habitation in that happy place Which Rapture seems to have been a foretaste of the joy which they were to expect when he should ascend to that glorious state which was now represented in his Transfiguration on the Mount Before I conclude this I shall here take notice as I pass to what remains of something that may help to prove our Lord Jesus is the person by whom God always intended to speak his mind to the World For it was at this very time when the Israelites by reason of the terrible sights and thundring noises desired God they might hear his voice no more that he promised to speak to them by such a Prophet as Moses and in a more familiar manner requiring them to hear that person when he came and spake as they themselves desired So you reade xviii Deut. 15 16 17 18. where when they say Let me not hear again the voice of the Lord my God neither let me see this great fire any more that I die not the Lord said They have well spoken I will raise them up a Prophet from among their brethren like unto thee and I will put my word in his mouth and he shall speak unto them all that I have commanded him Which was perfectly fulfilled in our Blessed Saviour whatsoever lesser meaning it might have before who spake the words of God and not of himself but as the Father gave him commandment and was a Prophet like to Moses as in other regards so in this that he was with God upon the Mount heard him speak there to these Israelites his Disciples is commended to them as the person they should hear but in a voice so sweet and in a way so agreeable that they did not wish never to hear it more but rather always to be so happy as to have such friendly converse with Heaven and receive such tokens of God's Fatherly love For as the fire and smoak and darkness together with those terrible noises were testimonies from God to Moses that they who would not hear him but transgressed his Laws should be the objects of his dreadfull displeasure and be destroyed from among their neighbours So this universall light and brightness which smiled on them in the cloud and in his raiment and in his countenance and in his company when these gracious words sounded in their ears were most manifest tokens from heaven of the extraordinary favour of God towards those that obey the Lord Jesus who shall be saved from death and made exceeding happy and glorious The far greater part of the Precepts of the Law being negative as is evident even from the Ten Commandments to say nothing of the computation which the Jews have made of the whole it abounds more with Threatnings and fearfull denunciations of Judgement then it doth with gracious and inviting Promises But most of the Precepts of the Gospell being affirmative obliging us to doe all the good we can and to be abundant in the work of our Lord you reade therefore more frequently of exceeding great and precious Promises to incourage our labour of love then of Threatnings to deterr us from evill doing And consonant to this as that frightfull appearance of old on Mount Sinai was to shew God's anger and fiery indignation against offenders so this comfortable Presence now on Mount Tabor was to represent his loving-kindness and tender mercy to all obedient persons And as the anger of God declared by the fire and smoak was his inflicting Death upon them so his good will declared by this friendly light and clearness in the heavens is his bestowing upon us Life And as by the former Moses was noted by God to be the Minister of death to all transgressours so our Lord was hereby represented as the Minister of Life and Righteousness to all that in him live godly Now that all these Observations are not the product of mere fancy but have some reall truth in them this is none of the least arguments That the Jews themselves * Pirke Eliezer c. xl make it a Question worth the answering why God uttered his voice to Moses out of the midst of the fire and darkness and not rather out of the midst of light Which is a plain acknowledgment of the nobleness and perfection of this way wherein God manifested himself upon the Holy Mount as St. Peter calls it and that it was far more desirable then that wherein he appeared to Moses else they would not have moved this doubt and endeavoured so laboriously to solve it pretending that it was onely to shew in what a dismall condition they were without the Law which was not to be sent till after forty days were past during all which time the Court of the heavenly King was hung with black and not with white Which as it is a frivolous conceit so hath no truth in it For God spake the Ten Words or Commandments out of the fire and smoak before Moses went to stay in the Mount forty days where he onely received the pattern of God's House which he was to make and all belonging to it together with the Two Tables whereon those X Commandments were engraven All the rest of the Laws were spoken to him out of the Tabernacle of the Congregation after he had built it i. Levit. 1. and we do not find then the heavens hung with white to use their phrase as they were now when he spake concerning our Saviour and bad his disciples hear him But I intend not to trouble my self with confuting their idle fancies The use that I make of this Question is That if they would have thought
risen from the dead and after all my sufferings such as you must endure for my sake am alive as thou seest and in a far better condition then I was before when thou wast not thus afraid of me Though in my first attempt to raise a Church I suffered death and laid the foundation of it in my bloud yet it is apparent I have overcome death and now live in greater splendour then ever If our Lord had stopt here and said no more this had been sufficient to convince him of his power to present to himself a glorious Church and from the lowest and most afflicted condition to raise it to the greatest honour here and to eternall glory in the other world But he proceeds for the stronger confirmation of his faith and says Behold more then this I am alive for evermore I have Eternall Life and can never lose this power and therefore thou mayst believe me when I say that I am the Omega whom thou knowest to be the Alpha for I can perfect what I have undertaken and bring to an happy issue all the good I have begun to work for you The latest posterity shall find that I am alive and able to promote them to everlasting bliss Fear not these words are all true and therefore I conclude them with an AMEN wherewith I was wont thou mayst remember to confirm my sayings that thou mayst rest assured I now say nothing but the certain indubitable truth when I tell thee I am he that was dead and now am alive and that I live for evermore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Andreas Caesariensis conceives his meaning How canst thou imagine then that thou art in danger to suffer any harm by my appearing to thee since the power which thou seest me have is to give life not death unto my servants I never used thou mayst remember to kill men but to save them and therefore thus thou mayst be confident I will still imploy my omnipotent power for I am Alpha and Omega the same at last that I was at first I am come that you might have life and that you might have it more abundantly And indeed as he still goes on I have the keys of hell and of death or as we render the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here translated hell in 1 Cor. xv 55. the keys of the grave and of death I can open the graves as I did at my death and can loose the bands of death as I did at my resurrection I can bring you out of that dark estate where no body sees you and restore you to life again nay raise you to that Light wherein thou beholdest me shine And here again it is observable that our Saviour takes to himself that very power which is ascribed to Almighty God by Hannah who says in her Song 1 Sam. ii 6. The Lord killeth and maketh alive he bringeth down to the grave and bringeth up Whereby he would suggest to St. John that all things are committed to his trust and are in his power for that is frequently denoted in the holy language by Keys the badge of a Steward's authority and power in a family and therefore it is not too hard for him to overcome the great Conquerour of all men to open the prison-doors that have been so long shut and fast locked to loose the chains of death and overthrow him quite who hath the power of it that is the Devill But this he would have us stedfastly believe and therefore immediately bids him not lie as a man dead but get up and write the things that thou hast seen ver 19. That is Let my Church know that I am alive and that I bear the same affection to them that I ever had Send them this comfort from me that I not onely live but always live and have all power committed to me even over the grave and death so that if any man lose his life for me I can give it him again with such an increase of dignity and glory as thou seest me enjoy And we must needs confess that there is an exceeding great comfort in this assurance which he gave thus in his own person and with his own mouth to this holy Apostle who knows as he speaks in another case xix Joh. 35. that he saith true For hereby we rest satisfied of one part of the Record which is to be proved that Life is in Jesus and see moreover much reason to believe the other part that he intends to bestow it on us VI. But for a fuller evidence of that you may consider in the last place that this WORD of God gave frequent testimonies of it to St. John in the following Letters to the Seven Churches of Asia Where they are so obvious that I may leave it to the most careless hand to gather them To one he saith I will give to him that overcometh to eat of the tree of life which is in the midst of the paradise of God ii Rev. 7. To another I will give him a crown of life and He shall not be hurt of the second death ver 10 11. To a third I will give him the white Stone c. a certain knowledge and assurance i.e. as I hope to shew in another place of the promised reward ver 17. To another He shall be cloathed in white raiment and I will not blot out his name out of the book of life but I will confess his name before my Father and before his angels iii. 5. And to name no more he promises to grant to him that overcometh to sit down with him in his throne ver 21. Which though it may have some respect to the high place and dignity he should injoy in the Church in this world yet had not its full completion but in the other life where he will crown the fidelity of all victorious Souls with the greatest glory and honour How can we doubt of it when we hear such express promises of immortall bliss so oft repeated from the mouth of the WORD of God himself after he went to heaven Great is our assurance great is the confidence we may take from such a Record as this if we be in the number of those that overcome remain constant that is and fixed in our Christian resolution notwithstanding any assaults that are made upon us either by the good or bad things of this world to tempt us to revolt from our duty For St. John saw and heard these things from the Lord Jesus himself upon his own Day the day of his resurrection from the dead and in a glory so bright that it was an emblem of the happiness he will bestow upon us and with such earnest asseverations of their truth and certainty as are sufficient to awake the dullest and most lethargick Souls to attend to what he says For thus he begins his Letter to the Church of Laodicea who were grown strangely chill and indevout These things saith the Amen the faithfull
committed to him towards the poor and the broken in heart and the miserable captives to whom he preached the acceptable year of the Lord. Or else as St. Chrysostome's words are He remembers us hereby of the old history For the whole World being once shipwreck'd and humane kind being in great danger to be totally lost this Creature appeared with an Olive-branch in her mouth and brought them glad tidings that the tempest was over and that there was now an universal calm 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All which things were a type and figure of what was to come For now when the affairs of mankind were in a worse condition and they were all in danger of a soarer punishment the unspeakable grace of God in our Saviour steps in for our rescue And therefore a Dove appeared again not bringing an Olive-branch but shewing us our Deliverer from all evill and administring unto us good hopes For it doth not bring merely one man and his family out of danger but appeared to lead all the world to heaven and in stead of an Olive-branch brought the adoption of Sons to all mankind And where the dignity of this adoption is there is the destruction of all evill things and the gift of all things that are good To the same purpose speaks Theophylact who contracts his sense in fewer words As the Dove brought to Noah the news that the waters of the floud were gone so now the HOLY GHOST brought the joyfull news of the doing away of Sin There was an Olive-branch and here was the mercy of God And thus John Baptist understood it who having seen this sight cried out Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world that is Death the punishment of Sin and consequently restores us to immortall life i. Joh. 29 30 c. This he thought declared God to be reconciled and lookt upon it as a token that the heavens had laid aside their displeasure and would be at peace with the sinfull sons of men The windows you know of heaven were opened in the old World but dark and pitchy clouds were all that appeared which poured down nothing but a floud of rain upon mankind Whereas now quite contrary when the heavens were opened again there was no dismall sight presented it self but onely a pure light and glorious brightness shone from the face of God And the HOLY GHOST in the form of a Dove appeared not like that of Noah after the deluge had swept all mankind very few excepted from the face of the earth but to give notice to the World that God would not take such vengeance upon men for their wickedness but be graciously reconciled to them by saving them from death and giving them the blessing of Eternall Life One might well gather as much from this sight especially when there was such an Olive-branch of peace if I may so call it in the mouth of this Dove as that voice from heaven which came along with it saying This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased One of these illustrates and explains the other and both of them tell us that the heavens now look upon us with a serene countenance and that we are no longer shut out of them but God is so well satisfied that he will admit us into those celestiall habitations II. This was farther declared afterward when the Apostles according to his promise were on the day of Pentecost baptized with the Holy Ghost whereby they were sent by him as he was by the Father Then the Heavens poured down such a large showr of the Divine grace as presently overflowed the World with a comfortable sense of ETERNALL LIFE This was one great end of the coming of the HOLY GHOST which then witnessed to our Saviour and openly shew'd him to the World as the Prince of life iii. Act. 15. For 1. it was a plain demonstration that He whom the Jews had murthered was alive from the dead and had not lost his power which was so eminent in him all the while he was on earth to doe good and bestow benefits upon mankind And 2. the greatness of the benefit shews that he was greater in power then ever having ennobled all his Servants and raised men of the lowest condition to the highest dignities by bestowing on them the gift of the HOLY GHOST It was his gift as he fore-told in his life-time when he said I will send the Comforter from the Father xv Joh. 26. and He shall receive of mine and shew it unto you xvi Joh. 14 15. And therefore the Holy Ghost declared his greatness and power over all as St. Peter discourses in the very first Sermon he preached after our Saviour's resurrection on the day of Pentecost ii Act. 33. Where he tells the Jews that what they saw and heard and were amazed at was shed forth and poured on them by Jesus who had now received the promise of the Holy Ghost And therefore says he ver 36. let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God hath made that Jesus whom ye crucified both Lord and Christ Which is as much as to say You ought to look upon this as an undoubted argument that he is Lord of all things the Christ or King whom God the Father hath appointed because he hath sent such royall gifts to his servants as none but the Lord of the world could possibly bestow And by the way we may take notice that the better sort of the Jews themselves expect the Messiah should bring such grace to men For Abarbinel in the place fore-mentioned acknowledging Miraculous works to be a note whereby the Messiah shall be known reckons this for one of them the effusion of the Spirit of God spoken of by the Prophet Joel Our Lord therefore sending this down in a plentifull manner on the day of Pentecost thereby manifested if they would have seen it that he had the mark of their King upon him and indeed could doe that which they all confess is the Work of God alone who onely can pour out the gifts which the Prophet there promises There is no reason to question the power of such a King as this to doe what he pleases even to prefer his subjects to his heavenly Kingdom They may be raised when he thinks good to reign with him above as now they began to doe upon the earth It depends upon his will alone to exalt them to that very place from whence this mighty power of the Holy Ghost came down upon them But that we may be satisfied the HOLY GHOST was an express Witness of his being the Prince of life a King that hath Life in himself a Prince and a Saviour as it is v. Act. 31. who can deliver men from the oppression of all their Enemies the greatest of which is Death you may consider 3. that the miraculous change which was wrought on a sudden in the minds of very ignorant men is an evident argument what he
can doe for our Souls in the other World He inspired them with such Understanding by the power of the Holy Ghost that the greatest Doctours in Israel were not able to resist the Wisedom whereby they spake They understood clearly all the ancient Prophecies There was no veil or cloud any longer upon them but the Holy Ghost made them see the whole Mystery which was wrapt up in them It revealed all Types explained all Figures led them into the Sanctuary and Most holy place shew'd them the true meaning of the Mercy-seat and laid all those things which did but obscurely point at ETERNALL LIFE so open and naked that none could chuse but see if he did not shut his eyes they were not the same men that they had been but just before and were made thus learned without any humane helps of instruction A convincing argument of his power to raise our Minds when we depart this World and have not the clouds of this Body before our eyes to as great a pitch of knowledge as I discoursed of in the beginning of this Treatise And the suddenness of this change was as clear an argument that he can doe it without difficulty and that there is not so great a distance between this present state and that which we expect but he can presently translate us to it And 4. this Knowledge you may consider farther being accompanied with a mighty Power whereby the Holy Ghost inabled them not onely to give eyes to the blind feet to the lame health to the sick but life also to the dead as was very well known in those days was an undoubted testimony that He from whom it came is able also to change these vile bodies and make them like to his own most glorious body For it is visible he hath a power whereby he can subdue all things to himself To take away life you may think is no such great matter that we should take any notice of it yet to doe even this with a word for lying to the HOLY GHOST was an argument of a mighty power residing in the Apostles And when Abarbinell speaks of the power of the Messiah to work Miracles from that Prophecy of Isaiah xi he alledges these words to prove it vers 4. He shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked Which was never literally fulfilled during our Saviour's stay on Earth where he did nothing but good to men but was made good after he went to Heaven by his power in his Ministers who smote that wicked couple mentioned Act. v. without any hands merely with the breath of their mouth What shall we think then of their restoring men to life after they were dead for which they were more notorious We cannot but look on this as a great witness of the wonderfull power of Jesus in them and consequently of the life and glory he intended to bestow on sinfull dust and ashes He would not have filled them thus full of his Spirit if he had not meant thereby to raise their expectations above all that even by its power they at present felt Had it not been his design to make them hereafter like to God he would not have preferred them to such a resemblance of his Wisedom and Power here in this World They that could raise others from the dead had no reason to doubt of being raised up themselves When they saw themselves made the conveyers of such great blessings to all mankind they must needs stand fair they could not but conclude for a very large portion of his favour to their own persons For the truth is 5. these gifts which were then given to men proclaimed aloud the marvellous bounty of our Saviour as well as his power and would not let them doubt of a far more glorious exercise of it in the other World then they saw and were the instruments of in this And if any imagine that though this might be a testimony to them of Eternall Life yet it is none to us the contrary will soon be evident if you do but consider 6. that our Lord having made a promise of Eternall Life not onely to his Apostles but to all that believe on his Name the HOLY GHOST puts us in strong hope of it by demonstrating his faithfulness to his word For the Effusion of it was the performance of a promise which he had frequently made when he was with them both before his death xiv Joh. 16. I will pray the Father and he shall give you another Comforter and after his Resurrection xxiv Luk. 49. Behold I send the promise of my Father upon you c. i. Act. 4 5. Being assembled together with them he commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem but wait for the promise of the Father which said he you have heard of me For you shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence And therefore we have great reason to look for the promise of Eternall Life with much confidence because He who made it was so faithfull and just in fulfilling his former promise at the time appointed Especially since he thereby demonstrated that he hath sufficient power to doe for us according to his word For he who made such an extraordinary change in them on the day of Pentecost that they were able in an instant to speak all languages to prophesy and understand the secret counsels of God can change us we need not question from glory to glory and at last transform us so perfectly as to make us like to himself And I may adde to strengthen this consideration 7. that our Lord declared he would send the HOLY GHOST for this very purpose that they might believe the rest of his holy promises particularly this great one of Eternall Life Which is the meaning of that which you reade in xiv Joh. 12. where after he had told them ver 9 10 11. that God appeared to them and shew'd himself in the Works that He did which demonstrated that the Father dwelt in him and consequently that he would go and prepare a place for them and take them up to himself he adds these remarkable words Verily verily I say unto you He that believeth in me the works that I doe shall he doe also and greater works then these shall he doe because I go unto my Father As if he had said Mark now what I farther declare to you and rely upon it as a certain truth The works that I have done are sufficient to convince you but for a greater confirmation of your faith that I am going to the Father and am the Way the Truth and the Life I tell you that after I am departed these wonderfull things shall be repeated before the eyes of the world by those that believe on me Nay some things shall be done which your eyes have not yet seen because I go to my Father i. e. have power in the Heavens
my self but he sent me For which reason he doth not discourse of immortall life as a Philosopher going about to prove it by reasons and arguments but onely asserts it as one that had Divine Authority for which he was to be believed and could himself make men eternally happy This was the onely thing that could be disputed and needed proof that he came from heaven to illuminate the world by his instructions And this he did not desire they should take upon his bare word but abundantly demonstrated it and told them ver 28. that after his death they should still see it made more evident that he did nothing of himself but as the Father had taught him he spake these things For then as you shall see in due place God the Father declared all these words to be true by raising him from the dead These things he said so often so openly so confidently and with such appeals to God who bare him witness as you have heard and never in the least contradicted what he said that we have great reason to believe he did not forge all this but delivered the mind and will of God as sincerely when he said he would give men Eternall Life as he did when he charged them to live soberly righteously and godly in this present world Certain it is that He himself believed what he preached and had no doubt but a perfect assurance of it as will appear if we pass to the Second thing which we are briefly to consider II. His own most holy Life in the strictest obedience to God the Father This Abarbinell in his discourse upon xi Isa which I have so often mentioned makes one of the marks of the Messiah the perfect temper of his desires and affections and the direction of them according to the measures of the Divine Law Which he thinks is the meaning of those words ver 3. He shall be of quick understanding in the fear of the Lord. This was so remarkable in Jesus who was so truly so compleatly and constantly pious that there never was any person so qualified to lay claim to this Dignity as he was His Life was so free from all blame such a perfect abstinence from all the pleasures of this world such a contempt of all that which we think most worthy of our indefatigable labours that it hath a strong force in it to perswade us that he indeed sought Eternall Glory and was fully assured he should be possessed of it for Himself and for all His. Who but a man so perswaded of his Doctrine would have lived in poverty when he might no question by the multitude and devotion of his followers have made himself incredibly rich What should incline him to remain all his days without an house so big as a fox or the smallest bird is owner of but an expectation of that house which is eternall in the heavens Could any thing move him to give away to the poor all that was given him but a certain knowledge of great treasures above We cannot conceive what should make him refuse the dignity of a King when the people intended to proclaim him if it were not this undoubted perswasion that he was the King of Heaven and should sit down at the right hand of the Throne of God Would any of those that doubt this labour as he did night and day for nothing Would any poor man cure multitudes of all diseases and take not a farthing for his pains Would any body live if he could help it and not know where he should eat the next meal's meat And who is he that can find in his heart to endure the hatred of the chiefest of the people and to be in perpetuall danger of snares and treacherous designs for the taking away his life without any hope to be a gainer by it Is there any likelihood that our Lord would have laboured in such sort as not to have leisure so much as to eat and after all that kind pains be content to be called Deceiver and Devill and to run the hazzard of being stoned and killed and yet have no assured expectation to reap some fruit hereafter from all his toil and trouble Let him believe it that loves to sting his fingers with nettles or to roll his naked body in snow we that have a more tender sense of our own pleasure must have leave to be of another mind Let any man try to perswade himself to lead such a life and by his unwillingness he will easily be convinced that our Lord who could look for nothing in this world from what he did and suffered would never have so chearfully freely and without any regret followed such a course had he not known as surely that he should be made glorious thereby hereafter as he knew that he must be made miserable by it here Ask his Poverty then and that will bear witness that he laid up treasures in the heavens Ask his Humility and that will tell you that he sought for the Glory of God onely Inquire of his Charity and Bounty his wonderfull bounty to all men and that will bear Record both that all fulness is in him and that he will not envy any thing he hath to his followers Let his Contentedness speak and that will assure you he was possessed of something greater then all worldly goods which he could tell better how to live without then others to live comfortably withall Examine his Labours and pains his travells and journeys trace his steps over sea and land and they will all confess that he sought a better Country which is an heavenly Ask him what he meant by his Patience his willing endurance of all reproaches calumnies hatreds persecutions and they will likewise conclude in the same testimony that he had a joy set before him which made him despise them all In short consult his Fasting forty days his enduring so many temptations of the Devill slighting his offers rejecting his counsels and you can have no account of them but this that he had indeed the meat that endures to everlasting life that he verily believed the voice from heaven which said he was the Son of God and that he knew he had a greater Glory then all the Kingdoms of the world which the Devill offered him And after all this I suppose there is no considering man but will think the unquestionable belief of such a person as he was to be of very great moment to settle ours in this weighty business It is safest for us without all dispute to follow the judgment of one so well able to discern truth from falshood that he was of as quick understanding in all things else as he was in the fear of the Lord. We have great reason to think that he was in the right and was no more deluded himself then he intended to delude others There was not the least flaw as I shewed in the former Treatise that appeared in his Understanding nor could
longer upon such considerations as these when his Doctrine which is the Second thing I mentioned is so holy and pure so heavenly and divine that the constant preacher of such things could not be guilty of so great an impiety as to call the God of heaven at last to bear witness to a known untruth No it condemns lesser lies to so severe a punishment that to say he was sent of God with the words of Eternall life nay was the Way the Truth and the Life when he knew he was not deserved according to his own sentence the heaviest condemnation To which if you add the manner of his Life which was the last thing it will compleat the Demonstration For it was so perfectly conformable to his Doctrine that we cannot but think he believed it and so could not die with a lie in his mouth Particularly it was so free from all covetous designs and from hunting after the applause and praise of men that it is incredible he should seek that by death which he had despised through the whole course of his life If he was so thirsty of vain-glory as to lose his life for it why did he not make it his business to win all he could of it while he lived Why did he not lay the foundation of his after-fame by insinuating himself in the most diligent and men-pleasing manner into the favour of all the Jewish nation and conform himself so perfectly to their humour that they might have presently made him their King Nay why did he not accept the offer when the people intended to advance him to the throne This had been a more likely way to honour and renown if that was all his aim then the lifting him up upon a Cross He might have hoped to build a lasting glory on the love of the Scribes and Elders of the people whereas this infamous death he could not but see would make him so odious that it would rob him of all mens good word and quite frustrate the design of winning a reputation among men This is a truth of which I presume by this time the most suspicious and unbelieving are convinced who cannot but confess that the voluntary death of such a person as this and a death so horrid and ignominious is a plain testimony of his sincerity and proves beyond any reasonable contradiction that he did not invent his Doctrine himself but believed it to be of God and did not seek to gain any thing by it but immortall life and glory in the world to come VI. Now that we must needs be great gainers hereby as well as himself will appear if you consider that he came into the world on purpose to doe mankind good as the business of his whole life testifies He went about doing good and sought all occasions of obliging even the most ungratefull He had compassion on every body he met withall and never denied a cure to those that begg'd it though they were never so poor and contemptible He imployed his Disciples also who attended on him in the same charitable works of healing all manner of diseases and easting out unclean spirits He bad them go and speak peace unto every house into which they entred And as for themselves he professed the greatest love imaginable to them as they themselves have recorded He called them his Friends and did not use them as Servants nay his Children and at last his Brethren which are all terms of much kindness and tenderness which he ever expressed towards them From whence I conclude that unless he could have served them better by his death then by his longer life he would not have so soon and so willingly gone to the Cross and there left these dear Friends for whose sake he had hitherto lived more then his own If he had not died for their sake too and been certain he should thereby shew more love to them and doe them better service then any other way he would have been as much inclined to stay still with them as they were to desire it He saw how loth they were to part with him and with what sad countenances and troubled spirits they received the news He was incompassed with sighs and groans when he did but mention it for sorrow as he speaks xvi Joh. 6. had filled their hearts Would not this have moved a heart less tender then his to alter this resolution when it was in his power to stay longer with them How could he endure to see their tears flow so fast when he was able to dry them up with the speaking but one word that he would not leave them If he had not been sure that he was going as he told them to his Father and that it was on purpose to prepare a place for them which ought to have made them rejoyce rather then weep because he would come again and receive them to himself that where he was there they might be also xiv Joh. 1 2 3 28. without all doubt his great love would have yielded to their prayers and commanded his power to prolong their happiness in his company He should be able he verily believed to doe greater wonders for them and bestow greater blessings upon them if he did not hearken to their importunities or else we cannot but think if we measure him by our selves he would have still continued with these his dear Companions especially since none as he professed could snatch him from their society but it was his own free choice to leave them V. And he earnestly desired them to believe as much and to look upon his BLOUD as the Seal of a New Covenant which contained better promises then the former between God and men So he said just before his death when he spoke of the Representation of it This is my BLOVD of the New Testament or Covenant which is shed for many for the remission of sins xxvi Matt. 28. And so the Apostles believed and spake of his BLOUD in the same terms when by his resurrection from the dead they saw that it was the BLOVD of the Covenant x. Heb. 29. and that he was most eminent for this above all other things as the expression is xiii Heb. 20. where the Apostle calls him the Shepherd of the sheep 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who was great in the bloud of the everlasting Covenant Now this is one Article every body knows one of the promises contained in it that we shall as certainly have Eternall Life as Israel in due time was brought to the possession of the good Land God promised to their Fathers Abraham you reade xv Gen. 7. had the word of God for it that he would give his posterity the Land of Canaan into which he had brought him out of Chaldaea And when he made so bold as to ask how he should know that this was true you find ver 9 10 11. that God passed this promise into a Covenant which was made by the bloud of sundry beasts
could not contain themselves when they saw what testimonies heaven gave of his innocence and vertue but did him publick honour even at the very place of execution Though he suffered as the highest and vilest offender in the world yet the honest-hearted spectatours were not onely inwardly troubled in their breasts at the sight but beat or knockt them also and shewed thereby that they were not afraid to own him as a most Excellent person whose death they ought to accompany with the bitterest lamentations And so much may suffice concerning the Testimony of his BLOUD which no man can hear speak a word but he must needs think that which got him such honour among the people in the midst of his shame and the reproach of the Cross obtained a far greater glory for him with God in the heavens who best knew how to value his obedience O wonderfull Passion Proclus Homil. xi the Expiation of the World O Death the cause of Immortality and the origin of Life O descent into Hell the bridge by which those who were dead passed into Heaven O Noon which hath revoked the Afternoon-sentence against us in Paradise O Cross the cure of the fatall Tree O Nails which wounded Death and joyn'd the world to the knowledge of God! Great was the victory which He that was incarnate for us obtained on the day of his passion He grappled with death when he was dead Hell and the grave this day ignorantly swallowed a deadly morsell To day death received him dead who always lives To day the chains were loosed which the Serpent made in Paradise The Thief this day made a breach on Paradise which had been guarded by the flaming sword some thousands of years This day our Lord broke the gates of brass and cut the bars of iron in sunder Which of the great Men that ancient times boast of are comparable to him All the just fell under the power of death and none could conquer it Abraham Isaac and Jacob are all turn'd to dust and ashes The memory of Joseph in whom the Jews glory lay in his dry bones which they carried out of Egypt with them Moses is extolled by them to the skies but there is not so much as his tomb to be found Such as these and so many death devoured and swallowed them all down But at last it swallowed one and against its will vomited up the whole World Who now triumph over it and cry with a loud voice O death where is thy sting O grave where is thy victory Thanks be to God which giveth us the victory through Jesus Christ our Lord. His Passion is our impassibility S. Athanasius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 598. His Death is our immortality His tears our joy His buriall our resurrection His Baptism our purification His stripes our healing His chastisement our peace His reproach our glory How much are we indebted to him who from first to last consulted our happiness For he descended Id. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. p. 1002. that he might make way for our ascent He was born that he might make us friends with the Vnbegotten He took on him our infirmities that we might be raised in power and say with St. Paul I can doe all things through Christ which strengthneth me He took on him a corruptible body that this corruption might put on incorruption He put on mortality that it might be changed into immortall In fine He was made Man and died that we who die as men might be deified and death might no longer reign over us O blessed and life-giving Cross of our Saviour which triumphed over death and destroyed him that had the power of it which is the Devil O divine Word and true Wisedom of the Father thou hast overcome the Devill when he thought he had been a conquerour * August de Trinitate L. 13. c. 15. Caet ex Athanasio p. 1022. O Lover of men and gracious Lord thou hast both redeemed us that were captives and freed us by thy own death who were servants of sin O Son of God the true Peace-maker thou hast both given us the adoption of Sons and reconciled us to thy Father having destroyed the enmity by thy flesh O rich Saviour and true King who becamest poor that we by thy poverty might be made rich and hast given to us the Kingdom of heaven O Creatour and former of all things the Word of the Father for thou hast created us again we are thy workmanship created unto good works O Light indeed the brightness of the Father for thou hast inlightned us that were in darkness and hast brought us that were blind to see the light O Likeness and reall Image of the Father for thou hast formed us who were lost and again restored the image of God in us O God the Word and Life indeed for thou hast quickned us who were dead and renewed us that were corrupted and cloathed us with immortality O thou Power indeed the arm the right hand of the Father for thou hast both loosed the bands of death and broken the prison-doors in pieces God forbid that we should glory Ib. pag. 1028. save in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ To this let us adhere let us walk worthy of this And thus living and believing we shall know also his assumption into the heavens and his session on the right hand of the Majesty on high We shall behold the subjection of Angels to him and his coming again with glory Which Angels have foretold which Saints sing of in their hymns and which when we all see we shall rejoyce and be exceeding glad in Christ Jesus By whom be glory and dominion to the Father world without end Amen CHAP. XI Concerning the Testimony of the SPIRIT the Third Witness on Earth THough the Children of Israel were so strangely delivered out of their bondage being saved by the Bloud of the Paschal Lamb from the destroying Angel and then freed from Pharaoh who thought it 's like that his bloud must next of all pay for the keeping them in Egypt yet still they questioned whether they should come into the good Land or no and were at a sad plunge when they came to the Red Sea imagining that they themselves should be there destroyed and become the next Sacrifice to Pharaoh's cruelty To confirm them therefore in their belief of God's kind intentions towards them and perswade them thoroughly that Moses had not brought them out of Egypt to kill them but to save them He gave him power to doe great wonders at that place and in the rest of their journey which added to the Miracles in Egypt were a strong conviction that God was among them and was conducting them by the hands of his Servant to their long-desired Rest This was the last Argument and the most constant whereby he demonstrated the truth and reality of his promises of bringing them to the land of Canaan They saw his signs
much as he desired and when they had done there were twelve baskets of fragments which remained over and above to them that had eaten This Miracle made the multitude conclude that certainly He was the Prophet who should come into the world and therefore they purposed whether he would or no to come and make him their King ver 14 15. And when he avoided it by crossing the sea privately ver 16 17 c. they also took shipping to follow after him and never rested till they had found him ver 24 25. Whereupon our Lord takes occasion to tell them how sorry he was to see them so industriously pursue the food of their bodies and not mind the food of their Souls to which his late Miracle led them and in plain terms tell them that Spirituall food was himself who was the Bread of life they should hunger after more then for the loaves wherewith they had been filled and that if they did eat of him they should have everlasting life and he would raise them up at the last day ver 26 27. and 35 c. This they might easily have believed if they had considered the Miracle of the loaves which was a token from God that he could support them eternally For why should not he be able to give life who so strangely preserved it and out of a little dust make a body as he had out of a few crums made so many loaves If their desires had been fixed upon this Eternall Life which he preached as much as upon the present they would as naturally have taken this Miracle for the Seal whereby God noted him to be the giver of it as they took it to be a mark that he could thus fill their bellies every day and save them the labour of seeking food after the manner that Moses fed their Fathers with Manna in the Wilderness V. And next to this if you consider how he dispossessed Devils which was a Wonder as frequent as any if told the world plainly that He was come to destroy the works of the Devil to overthrow his kingdom and devest him of his power unless they would still uphold him in it By Sin he held his Throne this gave him all the power he had over men and made them his vassals and slaves Who being so often rescued out of his hands and he so openly foiled it was a sign that Jesus was come to take away the sins of the world and thereby disarm him of the power of death and restore men again to that everlasting Life out of which the Devil had before thrown mankind as our Saviour now threw him out of them All this the Jews themselves confess shall be the work of the Messiah According to what we reade in the Authour of the Book concerning the Service of the Sanctuary who saith that the King Messiah shall restore all things to their first estate so that the intention of God shall be fulfilled which he had in the Creation of the World for the World shall return to that naturall perfection which it had before rebellious Adam sinned The Prophets are faithfull witnesses of this as it is written lxv Isa 19. I will rejoyce in Jerusalem and joy in my people and the voice of weeping shall be no more heard in her nor the voice of crying And so he speaks also in another place of that Book xxv 8. He will swallow up death in victory and the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces The Authour also of Baal Hatturim as I find him cited by Hackspan * Cabala Judaica Sect. 72. confesses as much in his Notes upon xix Num. where he saith In the times of Salvation or the days of Christ there shall be no use of the Ashes of the red heifer according to that He will swallow up death in victory Which words are cited by St. Paul 1 Cor. xv 54. as the other part of that verse is by the voice St. John heard from heaven xxi Rev. 4. when he is treating of the Resurrection of the dead as the great comfort of Christian people Who may well expect it and all the blessings that attend upon it from our Lord Jesus the true Messiah if to all that hath been said we adde the consideration of what follows VI. That he raised even dead men to life again which was the greatest Miracle of all and at that time the greatest witness of the SPIRIT to him This shew'd that indeed he had Life in himself and would bestow it upon us as I have already noted for he raised them on purpose to declare what he was and what they might expect from him viz. a perfect victory over death and the grave Which appeared most remarkably in the resurrection of Lazarus who was the most famous instance of this power residing in him For the Miracle wrought on him was not so little as the recovering one who drew his last breath which was the case of the Centurion's Servant nor the restoring one to life who was newly dead as in the case of the Ruler of the Synagogue's daughter nor the raising a young man who was carried out towards his grave as the Widow's son was but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Greg. Nyssen speaks * De Hominis opifici◠cap. xxv his Wonder-working proceeds to something more sublime A man of grown years not onely dead but musty already putrid and in a dissolution as he describes his condition so far gone toward corruption that his own friends thought it not fit our Lord should go to uncover his tomb because of the ill smell which might be expected this man I say with one word of our Lord's was restored again to life firm and compacted and though he was bound hand and foot with grave-cloaths it did not hinder his coming out of his grave which as Theophanes thinks was a Miracle little less then his Resurrection Who can chuse but look on this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to use the same St. Gregory's words as the beginning the little Mysteries as I may call them of the Vniversall Resurrection into which Christ now initiated his Disciples For it is apparent by this He is the Lord of Life who can raise a putrid rotten carkass as well as those who are but newly departed the world And this was no private business transacted onely between him and his Disciples but a thing so notorious that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the multitude who were there present bare record of it xii Joh. 17. That is they affirmed it to be no vain report but told those of Jerusalem whither our Saviour was then going who had not seen the Miracle done that it was a certain Truth upon their knowledge Which they might affirm with the greater assurance because as Theophanes * Archiepis Taurom Hom. xxv observes they were confirmed in this belief by the testimony of all their senses By their own voice which shewed him the Tomb
saying Come and see and his loud voice which they heard saying Lazarus come forth xi Joh. 34 43. By their sight when they beheld him whom they knew very well to be dead obeying his word By their smell when they perceived the ill sent as they rolled away the stone By their touch when they loosed his hands and his feet as our Lord bad them and let him go By all these they were so well satisfied that there was no room left for their infidelity nor much for the Pharisees who knew neither how to confute this Testimony nor how to avoid the consequence of it They began now to despair of prevailing against him any other way then by taking away his life which their malice made them design against the clearest light Though that also proved as you shall see presently but a farther confirmation of the truth they sought to obscure by his rising again from the dead And they could have found in their hearts to have killed Lazarus too because as long as he lived he would proclaim this Miracle to the honour of Jesus who hereby gave such an illustrious testimony that he was the Authour of Eternall Life that just when he was going to raise up Lazarus he inculcates this Doctrine as the fittest season to impress it upon them xi Joh. 25 26. I am the Resurrection and the Life he that believeth in me though he were dead yet shall he live And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die Martha it seems believed this before upon a perswasion that he was the Christ the Son of God that should come into the world ver 27. But when she saw Lazarus come out of his grave then sure she believed it more strongly both because it was a farther argument that he was the Christ and likewise included in it that very thing which he propounded to her belief viz. that He was the Life and would give life unto those who were dead if they believed on him I shall conclude this part of the SPIRIT 's Testimony with those words of our Lord himself viii Joh. 50. where he protests that he sought not his own glory that is assumed not to himself this great power to be the Life of the world but God the Father sought it i. e. perswaded the world of it by the illustrious Miracles which he wrought whereby the Father honoured him as he says ver 54. and passed such a judgment on him that we may all conclude as he doth ver 51. Verily verily if a man keep his words he shall not see death II. Of which we shall be the more confident if we adde now the other Witness of the SPIRIT to him which was in raising him from the dead and giving him Glory at God's right hand This was a greater Wonder then all that preceded sufficient to satisfie those who still remained doubtfull For if any body as St. Greg. Nyssen discourses in the Book before mentioned should use those words of our Lord in another case and apply them to this business saying Physician cure thy self it is but meet that he who did such wonders on other mens bodies to prove a Resurrection should give an example of it in his own We have seen one nigh to death another newly dead a young man ready to be laid in his grave and Lazarus already rotten all these by his word recalled to life Let us see one live again who was wounded and had his heart pierced and his bloud shed one who we are sure was dead Come then and look upon Jesus himself whose hands and feet were pierced into whose side a spear was thrust Come and look upon him who bled to death And if this man was raised from the dead nay more then that ascended into heaven as abundance of credible witnesses testifie what doubt is there left that by him God will give us a blessed Resurrection unto immortall Life if we be obedient to him They that saw the one viz. his Resurrection and Ascension could not but stedfastly believe the other and have told us that he was raised and glorified on purpose that our faith and hope might be in God 1 Pet. 1.21 This was the great design and end of first opening his grave and then opening the heavens to him that our confidence in God might revive again and we might hope by his favour to have the honour of being made the sons of God by being the children of the Resurrection That our Blessed Saviour was really dead as the History testifies his greatest Enemies always confessed and still acknowledge He hung a long time upon the Cross there he bled and at last his side was wounded with a spear in the vitall parts All the spectatours were satisfied that he had given up the ghost and the Souldiers when they came to break his legs as the manner was found the work already so effectually done that there was no need of it He was wrapt in Cerecloaths laid in a grave and given up by all his Friends for a lost man But that after all this he was as really alive again as he had been before is testified by divers sufficient Witnesses and among the rest by one of his principall Enemies who was throughly convinced of it The Apostles saw him very often they spake with him they felt and handled him one of them put his finger into the very print of the nails and thrust his hand into his wounded side They eat and drank with him they received Commissions from him and after he had shewn himself alive to them by many infallible proofs being seen of them forty days he ascended up to heaven in their sight and from thence according to his promise they received the Holy Ghost i. e. in his Name did all sorts of Miracles raising even dead men to life again And after all he appeared from heaven to St. Paul a man that set himself vehemently against him and breathed nothing but threatnings and slaughters against his Disciples whom he turned quite to be on his side perswading him so fully that he was indeed risen from the dead that he became as you have heard a most zealous preacher of it with the continuall hazzard of his life This is a more credible History then any other as it were easie to shew if it were my present business and we may better doubt of all Records then of those wherein the memory of these things is preserved They were holy devout and self-denying persons who report these things upon their own knowledge And they are reported not by one or two but by many of them who met with nothing in the world to tempt them to tell a lie but with a great many things to deterr them from publishing so odious a Truth And therefore if we will not doubt of every thing we do not see we cannot refuse to believe that Jesus did indeed rise again after he was dead and buried and ascended into heaven Which being
thy Majesty O thou most mighty Jesus whose power is not the power of flesh and bloud but the power of God who raises those to life who are dead Great was the joy which filled thy Disciples hearts when they first saw thee alive from the dead and called thee their God Georg. Nâ—comed Serm. ix None can understand the beauty of that sight O the brightness of that appearing What a light diffused it self then through the whole Creation What a fragrant smell did the very earthquake breath forth when like a publick crier it proclaimed the Resurrection What was the savour of the ointment which was then poured out How was the whole world then transformed and made new The Angels themselves leaped for joy to see it How sweet was the sound then of their doxologies With what divine splendours were they then adorned How beautifull did those preachers of thy resurrection appear and how great was the glory and the happiness which they came then to proclaim O those Words of theirs which brought us the news of victory over the Enemy which proclaimed the destruction of Death and published thee to the World the Resurrection and the Life O that sweet and above all things desirable voice of thine which by the women that were carrying spices to thy grave sounded joy to the World The Heavens then opened their gates and received the glad tidings which were brought to us as if they had been their own The Intellectuall powers rejoyced and took a pleasure in our happiness The Spirituall as well as Sensible World was inlightned The clouds of sadness were dispelled from one end of the world to the other and the rays of joy possessed all Guilty Nature put off the robes of heaviness and was cloathed with garments of light The hand-writing of the Curse was torn in pieces and promises of Blessing were sealed in the room thereof By that new Salutation when thou saidst ALL HAIL the world was filled with the sweetest and everlasting joy For thou art the Preacher and the Cause and the very Exultation of all joy the Authour of good things the giver of pleasure the joy which can never be taken away the sweet light the spectacle above all others desirable the intellectuall tranquillity and peace Wisedom it self and Power Incorruption and Eternity Security and Delight the onely unchangeable and inconceivable Beauty Sanctity it self and Honour and Righteousness and Glory above measure glorious O how many Names would my Mind bring forth to express thine unutterable excellency It is onely my weakness that hinders and want of words But thou who art the infinite not to be named Good far above all the titles that Mind can invent who regardest not words but rather an inflamed heart who thy self broughtest the joyfull news of thy Resurrection shine now into our Minds by the bright beams of thy appearing Let us see intellectually the superexcellent beauty of the intellectuall Sun Let us inwardly injoy the incomparable sight of our Lord and Master Let us hear his divine voice speaking some sweet and joyfull word to us O thou gracious Lord come and draw us from these present thiâ—â—◠〈…〉 deeps and 〈…〉 never-decay 〈…〉 the quires of those that keep perpetuall festivals above For thou art both light and life and resurrection and the joy of those that triumph in the heavens To thee it becomes us to give together with the Father and the Holy Ghost glory honour and adoration now and ever world without end Amen CHAP. XII Concerning the Testimony of the Holy APOSTLES of our Lord. THere is nothing now wanting to compleat this Discourse unless it be to shew that if the Testimony of the APOSTLES of our Lord be at all intended when St. John saith He CAME by Water and Bloud and the Spirit as in the former Treatise I proved we have reason to think it is they also bear Witness to this Truth and by them God hath given us this Record that we have Eternall Life and that this Life is in his Son That Jesus had Disciples the Talmudists themselves confess who tell us in the same place where they speak of his being hanged on the evening of the Passeover that they were five MATTHAI Talmud Bab. Tit. Sanhed c. vi NETZER NEKAI BUNI and THODA They do not love to speak the truth but to the Four Evangelists to which perhaps they have respect they have added one more and report not one of their names aright except the first and in the last have a little varied from the Name of Judas the Brother of St. James But thus much we gain from their own Records that known Disciples our Saviour had who professed to believe on him and owned him for their Lord and Master These persons we can make no question would be carefull to communicate to the World what they had received from him because they lookt upon him as the Son of God and estemed his words as so many Oracles which his Crucifixion could not disparage Accordingly there are Books that pass under their Names besides the four Gospels which no man ever laid any claim to or pretended to be the Authour of but onely themselves and therefore we have no cause to think they were not of their inditing Now if you examine them you will find that after his Ascension to heaven and the coming of the Holy Ghost their business was to go about and preach this Truth and the certainty of it to all the World as their Lord and Master had delivered it to them They were so fully perswaded of it that they could not forbear to publish such glad tidings of great joy to the whole Earth It was the very end of their Apostleship and that which moved them to undertake so great a task as St. Paul tells us when he calls himself an Apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God according to the promise of Life which is in Christ Jesus 2 Tim. i. 1. appointed by God that is to publish the promise of Eternall Life which he had received from Christ Jesus who would certainly give it to all that believed on him And it is the very Character which the other great Apostle gives of himself 1 Pet. v. 1. that he was a Partaker of the glory that shall be revealed This incouraged him to be a Witness of the sufferings of Christ as he saith just before and not to be daunted as he had been though he followed him to a cross because now he clearly saw he had a right as a Friend of his so the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies Philem. 17 * Vid. Scipion. Gentil ibid. to a share in that unseen glory where He was which should one day be revealed In this they desired that all mankind might have a portion with them 1 Joh. i. 3. by becoming Members of their Society And therefore it was the constant strain of all their Sermons to invite them to it by shewing that Jesus
called The LORD is there was exceeding great no less then eighteen thousand measures round xlviii Ezek. 35. this Answer is returned that the difficulty is small For some behold the very light of God others onely see it obliquely and have no more but a certain obscure duskish image of it There are but few of the former saith the Glosse there who have the Light in its power but of the other who have a weaker ray obliquely and at a distance there are very great numbers Which agrees with those words of our Saviour In my Father's house are many Mansions as they are expounded by the two St. Gregories Nazianzen and Nyssen and others who by a Mansion understand 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 * Nazianz. Orat. 33. c. the rest and the glory which is laid up there for the blessed but suppose some to be in a higher others in a lower condition proportionable to the vertuous dispositions they carried out of the world with them Which being very different they believed some to see less and others to be like Gorgonia the Sister of St. Greg. Nazianzen whom in the conclusion of his Eleventh Oration he supposes to be in the clear light of the glorious Trinity 4. But it would take up too much room in this Treatise if I should enter into that discourse and therefore I proceed to consider that though they made this difference according as we see in a City to follow the former comparison some are accounted the chief others the more inferiour streets and houses and some are nearer unto others more remote from the royal palace yet they did not imagine those mansions to be dark nor those that were in them to have their eyes shut up with sleep but all to enjoy the light of life They lead as another Jewish Writer * Vid. Jo. de Voysin de Jubilaeo L. i. cap. 16. speaks a most sweet life in that light which is the figure and resemblance of the supreme light to which they shall be admitted at the last Thus Moses and Elias appeared in great splendour at our Saviour's transfiguration on the Holy Mount where they talkt and discoursed with him about his departure that he was to accomplish at Jerusalem Which shews they not onely continued in being but had sense and motion and lived in much happiness and bliss Which we are not to take for a singular privilege indulged to them for the Apostles you may observe again lookt upon our Saviour as the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 exemplar or pattern to which God had determined they should all be conformed viii Rom. 29. And their conformity to him here in this world being so exact that they passed the very same way to bliss that he did through most cruell sufferings they could not doubt but upon their departure the conformity would still hold as exactly That as He when he died immediately went to Paradise where he promised the good Thief should be before his Resurrection so they should enter into the same blessed place immediately upon their death and live there in a joyfull expectation of him to come and change even this vile body that it may be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 conformed to his glorious body iii. Phil. 21. And this is the sense also you may observe once more of the Voice from heaven which commanded St. John to write Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord. xiv Rev. 13. With which the Spirit immediately joyned its testimony saying 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Yea i. e. it is certainly true believe what the voice says from henceforth or now at this present I promise them a blessed rest from their labours and their works shall follow with them that is they shall be refreshed with a sweet remembrance of what they have done and suffered for Christ Jesus It is uncertain indeed whether the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be to be referred to the former words Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord or to those that follow Yea saith the Spirit But either way our Church understands it in the same sense as appears by the Funerall office Where referring it to the former sentence the words are thus recited I heard a voice from heaven saying Write From henceforth or Now at this present time blessed are the dead c. They are not onely in expectance of future blessedness but in possession of an happy state already and find inconceivable satisfaction in venturing their very lives for Christ's sake who for this very end as St. Paul observes laid down his life for us that whether we wake or whether we sleep we should live together with him 1 Thess v. 10. There are those who from this word Sleep by which the state of the dead is frequently called in these books there being nothing liker Death then Sleep would inferr the perpetuall motion and operation of the Soul before the Resurrection For it is very busy and active even when all the Senses are lockt up by sleep and hath at that time received very high illuminations from God which is a sign that if the body were quite dead it would not be without them Aristotle I find in Sextus Empiricus * L. viii adv Mathemat p. 312. observes thus much that in Sleep when the Soul is by her self 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 resuming her own nature she prophesies and foretells things to come and declares saith he hereby what she shall be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 when by death she shall be separated from all bodily things By which consideration St. Austin tells us that Gennadius a famous Physician in his time and very religious and charitable was wonderfully inlightned when he was in doubt whether there was any life after death God saith he * Epist 100. ad Euodium would by no means desert a mind so well disposed but there appeared one night to him in his sleep a very handsome young man who bid him follow whether he should lead him Which he thought he did till he came to a Citie where on the right side he was saluted with the sweetest voices that ever he heard which the young man upon his inquiry what this meant told him were the hymns of the Blessed and of the Saints What he saw on the left side he did not well remember but awaking he lookt upon this as a dream and thought no farther of it Till some time after the same young man appeared again to him another night and askt if he knew him To which he answering Yes very well he askt him where he had seen him And Gennadius presently related how by his conduct he was once led to hear the hymns and see the sight before mentioned Here the young man askt him whether he saw and heard what he related in his sleep or waking In my sleep said Gennadius True said the other and now thou seest me in thy sleep dost thou not To which he consenting his instructer proceeded to ask
him Where is thy body now In my bed-chamber said Gennadius Dost thou know then replied the young man that thy eyes are now bound up and shut and lie idle in that body so that with them thou seest nothing I know it said Gennadius What eyes then are these said his instructer again wherewith thou seest me Here Gennadius being silent not knowing what to say the young man laid hold of this occasion to open to him the meaning of all these questions saying Those eyes of thy flesh which is asleep and lies in thy bed have no imployment and doe nothing at all and yet thou hast eyes wherewith thou seest me Just so when thou art dead and the eyes of thy flesh are put out and can doe nothing vita tibi inerit quâ vivas sensúsque quo sentias there will be life in thee whereby to live and sense whereby to perceive Beware now hereafter how thou doubtest that life remains after death And thus that faithful man told St. Austin the Providence and mercy of God quite removed his doubt But I shall not insist on such reasons as these my intention being onely to shew what we learn from the Apostles the faithfull Witnesses of Jesus Christ to confute that drowzy conceit of the Sleep of the Soul which like a thistle sprung up first * Euseb Hist Eccles L. vi c. 37. in the wild deserts of Arabia but ought not to be suffered to grow in the Garden of God In which this Doctrine of the Apostles I might shew hath been so deeply rooted that to testify the Churche's belief of it was one great end of the Commemorations and Prayers which were made for the faithfull departed this life So we learn from Epiphanius his confutation of Aerius who did not approve of this practice The very first account he gives of it is that those who were present might believe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Haeres lxxv n. 7. c. that they who were departed live and are not gone out of being but exist and live with the Lord. And they did not suppose I may adde that those whom they remembred in their sacred offices were frying in the flames of hell as the present Roman Church doth but in a state of happiness though imperfect and some more imperfect then other This we learn from the Service of the Church in those days especially at the funeralls of the departed Whensoever they celebrated the dreadfull mysteries together with the holy Martyrs and Confessours and Priests whom they commemorated they prayed for the whole World for which Christ's bloud was an expiation not forgetting those who slept in him whom the Priest desired those who were present to remember For we are all one body saith St. Chrysostome * Hem. xli in 1 Corinth p. 524.20 who reports this though one member be brighter then another and therefore they desired all might have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pardon and consolation Which they hoped they had it is plain from the Funerall Office which in great part was Eucharisticall consisting of Psalms and Hallelujahs So the same great person informs us in his Commentaries on the Epistle to the Hebrews where he takes occasion from those words ii 15. deliver them who through fear of death c. to reprehend the bitter lamentations and wailings of those who mourned for their dead friends as altogether inconsistent with what the Church did at their funeralls Where the bright lamps * Hâ—m iâ— p. 453 35. 454. 10. they saw burning proclaimed that they attended them as valiant champions and the hymns that were sung glorified God and gave him thanks for crowning him that was departed and for freeing him from his labours and for delivering him from a state of fear that he might have him with himself Are not the hymns saith he for this end is not this the meaning of the singing Psalms 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and all these things are proper to those that rejoyce according to that of St. James Is any well-pleased let him sing Psalms And a little after he bids them mind what they sung at those solemnities Return unto thy rest O my Soul for the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee and I will fear no evills for thou art with me and again Thou art my refuge from the affliction that compasseth me about This was part of the Funerall-service to which he tells them they did not attend but were drunk with sorrow or else they would not have made such lamentations For to say Return unto thy rest O my Soul for the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee and yet to weep and lament is a mockery and a stage-play not a serious piece of devotion This and much more that great Man there says to shew how preposterous it was to mix their lamentations with those hymns which supposed the Souls of the deceased to be in rest and peace and to partake liberally of the bounteous goodness of God and therefore ought to have composed and comforted the minds of the living who confessed their Friends had made a blessed change of a troublesome life for one full of quiet and happy repose To which the Order of buriall in our Church which professes to tread in the steps of the first Ages of Christianity is very conformable Where we Sing Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord c. and acknowledge that we ought not to be sorry as men without hope for them that sleep in him because the Spirits of them that depart hence in the Lord do live with God and being delivered from the burthen of the flesh are in joy and felicity Not compleat indeed but we pray him after we have given thanks for delivering our Brother out of the miseries of this sinfull world to hasten his kingdom that we with all those that are departed in the true faith of his holy name may have our PERFECT CONSVMMATION and BLISS both in BODY and SOVL in his eternall and everlasting glory But it is not my business as I said to seek for testimonies to this Truth any lower then from the APOSTLES themselves who as they preached the glad tidings of Eternall Life every-where so they protest most solemnly and they were men you shall hear who taught and practised the strictest truth and honesty that they had a most certain knowledge of it and therefore we may safely rely upon their testimony Those words wherewith St. John begins his first Epistle may serve in stead of all that might be alledged to assert this ver 1 2 3. where he gives an account of the reason they had to publish to the world that WORD OF LIFE Jesus and his Gospell as they had done a long time For they said nothing concerning that Eternall Life which it was in the purpose of God the Father from the beginning to bestow and now was manifested to them but what they had HEARD that is received from his own mouth and been
hear plainly shewed they were not merely big words which they spake of being with God and our Saviour to see the Glory which the Father had given him but things which they heartily expected For does any man find such inclinations in himself as should make him imagine they would have left their trades their houses their possessions their wives kindred friends all that is desirable in this world and perswade those who were the dearest to them to doe so too if they had not had an assurance upon such grounds as were apt to convince others as well as them of the recompence they should meet withall hereafter in a better life Who can believe that St. Paul would have quitted all his Dignities his hopes of greater preferment his esteem and reputation with the wisest and chiefest persons in the Nation his ease and quiet and every thing else and betaken himself to the troublesome service of a despicable Master if he had not known and seen it as clearly as the Sun in the firmament that Jesus whom he served was raised from the dead and made the King of Glory and would prefer all those that proved faithfull to him unto the greatest honour in the heavens For what reason should those good men live as having nothing and all the time be as chearfull as if they possessed all things Did they not look upon themselves think you as heirs of a Kingdom which could not be taken away from them Reade St. Paul's description of himself to Timothy 2. iii. 10 11. who he says had fully known his doctrine and manner of life not onely what he had been wont to teach but how he had followed his own instructions what his purpose and aim had ever been his fidelity his lenity towards offenders his charity to all Christians his patience under troubles of all sorts for he was persecuted and endured great afflictions by that means at Antioch where they thrust him out of the city at Iconium where an assault was made upon him to stone him at Lystra where they actually stoned him And in how many other places he had been vilely used Timothy he says could not be ignorant having been a companion with him in his travels xvi Act. 3. Now what think you of such a person as this Do you take him for a dolt and an ignorant sot Was this great Apostle a mere lump of clay who was sensible of nothing and imagined others so senseless as that he might without any reason propound this example to Timothy for his imitation How came they to be so stupefied as to chuse rods and whips and stones and all other miseries when they might have lived in ease and peace Nay to glory in these things alone as if there had been nothing that could have done them such honour 2 Cor. xii 5 They did both hunger and thirst as I noted from the same Apostle in my former Book 2 Cor. iv 11. they were naked and buffetted they had no certain dwelling-place they laboured working with their own hands being reviled they blessed being persecuted they suffered it they were made as the filth of the world and the off-scouring of all things Which things no body in his wits can think men of their understanding would have endured if they had not been provided of meat which the world knew not of and been nourished and sustained with the hope of glory and assured of eternall mansions in the heavens and known that they should inherit a blessing and be made more honourable and glorious with Jesus for ever then the World for the present could make them vile and contemptible These things are so clear that the bare recitall of them is sufficient to satisfie us they were no deceivers nor men of light belief who took things upon trust without good evidence but had the greatest reason to endeavour to baptize all Nations into this belief as they did by an indefatigable diligence which was no small testimony of the power and glory of the Lord Jesus II. And their BLOUD speaks as much For as none of them saith St. Paul xiv Rom. 7. lived to himself so none of them died to himself but consecrated even his bloud to the Service of Christ if he pleased to command it Whereby they sealed to this Truth and shewed they were so far from doubting of immortall Life by the Lord Jesus that they unfeignedly desired to be dissolved and to be with him Witness St. Stephen who was stoned because he said he saw the Lord Jesus in the highest glory which he was never more assured of then when he died for then he recommended his Spirit to him as our Saviour had done his to God the Father Witness Antipas a faithfull Martyr Witness all those Souls whom St. John saw beneath the Altar who had all learnt from our Saviour what they must expect in his Service when he said The Brother shall deliver up the Brother to death and the Father the Child and the Children shall rise up against their Parents and cause them to be put to death And ye shall be hated of all men for my Name 's sake Under which afflictions they had nothing to support them but that which he immediately adds He that endureth to the end shall be saved x. Matth. 21 22. These few words were a sufficient incouragement to them and made them not regard their lives for the sake of Christ Jesus who hath abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the Gospell For the which cause saith St. Paul I suffer these things and am not ashamed for I know whom I have believed and am perswaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed to him against that day 2 Tim. i. 10 12. And for this cause he would not have Timothy to be ashamed of the testimony of our Lord nor of him his prisoner ver 8. but to imitate him by being partaker of the afflictions of the Gospell which he endured as he adds in the next Chapter ver 10. for the elects sake that they also might obtain the Salvation that is in Christ Jesus with eternall glory The Apostles nothing doubted that they themselves should obtain Salvation and immortall glory this way and they hoped likewise by their constant sufferings even to the death to draw others also to the faith or confirm them in it that they might have a share with them in this happiness and be willing to suffer for it For it is a faithfull saying he adds that if we be dead with him we shall also live with him if we suffer with him we shall also reign with him ver 11 12. I shall conclude this with that Discourse of St. Paul 1 Cor. xv 30 31 32. where he alledges this among other reasons to confirm that Church in the belief of the Resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come that He and the rest of the preachers of Christian Religion would not
if we observe as we may easily from what hath been said that as they wanted the express promises which we have so what they understood of the nature of this Felicity by the light they enjoyed was but very dull in comparison with what is revealed to us Who can see more even in their Books then they could do themselves and find out that by the light of the Cospell which was wrapt up in dark figures and clouds under the Law and the Prophets As they saw Christ in Isaar and in a Lunb so they beheld Heaven under the figure of Paradise and in a Land flowing with milk and honey and in the â—â—oly city and the Temple of stone the greatest glory whereof was when it was filled with the cloud 1 King viii 10 c. But now in the Church of the New Testament there is no Temple but the Lord God Almighty and the Lâ—mb are the Temple of it xxi Rev. 22. And he saith not now I will dwell in thick darkness but as it follows there ver 23. the glory of God inlightens the Church and the Lamb is the Light thereof who hath made us with open faâ—e to behold his glory in the heavens and given us full assurance that we shall be changed into the same image from glory to glory 2 Cor. iii. 18. This he published so clearly that the dullest and most illiterate fouls saw there was no Master comparable to him who had the Words of â—â—ernall life and by his Death Resurrection and Ascension opened to all believers the Kingdom of heaven That 's a word St. Austin confesses * Tom. vi L. xix contra Faust Man cap. ult he could not find in all the Old Scriptures and St. Hierom says the same There are Testimonies there saith he of Eternall life whether plain or obscure it matters not though the places he alledges would have been obscure if we had not been inlightned before we reade them by the Gospell but this Name of the KING DOM OF HEAVEN I can meet withall in no place Hoc enim propriè pertinet ad revelationem Novi Testamenti For it properly belongs to the Revelation of the New Testament And it is a word as the Authour of the Answers ad Orthodoxos teaches us which doth not simply siguifie the Resurrection 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but the state of things after the Resurrection when we shall be so marvell ously changed as to be fit companions for the Angels and reign with our Saviour in his glory Of which things the Jews have now so little knowledge that they expect onely to rise again to feast here upon earth with the Mâ—ssiah whom they look for and after they have spent some years in the enjoyment of the good things of an earthly Paradise then they think their bodies shall die and their Souls onely live for ever * Vid. Jacchâ—ades in viii Dan. 14. L'Empereur ib. Let any one that is able but reade what Manasseh ben Israel hath writ of the Resurrection and he will find it such poor stuff that the best use that can be made of it will be to put our selves in mind how much we stand ingaged to the Divine love for acquainting us so plainly with the Happiness he will give us at the Resurrection of our bodies to an immortall life Our Saviour indeed saith they might have learnt better out of the Scriptures then to imagine there will be eating and drinking and marrying after the resurrection but there was none of their books could teach them that we should be companions of Angels and shine like the Sun and see God and be coheirs with Christ and such like things which by the Gospell are now so clearly discovered to us that the most ignorant know more then the wisest that want this Revelation R. Tanchum who would fain prove the life of the World to come from the words of Abigail who speaks of the binding David's Soul in the bundle of life 1 Sam. xxv 29 * D. Pocock Not. miscell c. vi p. 91. observes that this Mystery which was a stranger to mens understandings in other nations and far remote from their thoughts to the knowledge of which none but very wise men came by much labour and exercise and after long disquisitions and difficult reasonings was known then among the Jews and manisest even to the Women An argument saith he that wisedom was much spred in our Nation and that as Moses speaks iv Dent. 6. we are a wise and understanding people Which is far truer of the Disciples of the Lord Jesus among whom even the most simple are taught such things as whatsoever such a wise woman as Abigail may be supposed to understand in ancient days their greatest Doctours have been so ignorant of since that we see the words of Isaiah xxix 14. sulfilled in them The Wisedom of their wise men shall perish and the undâ—rshanding of their â—â—ndent men shall be hid Where is the wise as St. Paul triumphs over them 1 Cor. i. 20 27. where is the Sâ—â—â—â— where is the disputer of this world God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise Made use 〈◊〉 of such men as the World for waâ—â— of humane learning accounted no better 〈◊〉 fools to publish so clearly and with such evidence the doctrine of Lternall Life that it may justly make men of the greatest repute for learning blush who could not speak one wise word about it But suppose them all to have been indued with a clearer sight then indeed they had of the Life to come yet of the Blessedness which God intends for us there that of St. Paul 1 Cor. ii 9. will still be true Eye hath not seen nor ear heard neither have entred into the heart of man the things which God hath prepared for them that love him There is a passage in the Prophet Isaiah very like this lxiv. 4. which the Jewish Doctours themselves expound in the mysticali sense of the future life and from thence St. Paul is supposed to have borrowed these expressions Though the very words â—â—â—mselves of St. Paul being found in the Apocryphall Book of Elias it is probable as Grotius thinks that this was grown a common saying among the Rabbins who had been taught by ancient tradition to expect such things in the days of the Messiah as never any eye had seen nor ear heard nor had entred into any man's heart to conceive Which is verified in the whole Revelation of God's will in the Gospell especially in this part of it No man had so much as a thought or a desire of such things as God hath done for us and intends to doe by our Lord Jesus That he should send from heaven his own Son his onely-begotten Son begotten of him before all worlds to be incarnate of a pure Virgin to die for our sins that he might rise again to sit at God's right hand where our Nature shines far brighter
be delivered over to the severe tormenting powers but to those that are able to bring us to the inheritance in heaven which is prepared for those that love him Which God grant we may all obtain through the grace and loving-kindness of our Lord Jesus Christ to whom be glory and dominion for ever and ever Amen CHAP. XIV A farther improvement of this RECORD THE grounds of Christian belief you see are not so slender but I may take the confidence to say that he who will be at the pains to consider such things as these cannot any longer think it a piece of wit to be an infidel It is rank folly as well as baseness there being no reason in the earth to except against these Witnesses and to deny the Faith of Christ an entrance into our minds and hearts For what we know as I have shewn in the former Book by credible report is as certain as what we see and hear with our eyes and ears And what can be better attested then the holy Gospell Which is justly called the testimony of God 1 Cor. ii 1. and the testimony of Christ i. 6. Because God testified these things to us as his will by his Son Christ and Christ testified them to us by the holy Ghost For so St. Paul saith in the place last named ver 5 6. the Corinthians were inriched by our Lord with every gift even as the testimony of Christ was confirmed or established to be a truth among them After which mighty evidence whereby we are assured God intends to bestow so great a blessing on us as immortall Life it is of no weight whatsoever can be objected against this Doctrine particularly against that part of it which concerns the Resurrection of the body at the last day For that Great Lord who said it we are certain can perform it He knew his own power and would not have said I will raise you up at the last day unless he had been able to make his word good He hath also already fulfilled his word in other things which he foretold though no body would believe him till they saw it which is a good ground as St. Gregory Nyssen observes * De opificio hominis cap. xxv to expect this though it seem never so difficult and incredible had he not promised it Suppose saith he that an husbandman discoursing of the virtue of Seeds should not be believed by a by-stander that had never been bred in the country nor seen any thing of that nature would it not be sufficient for his satisfaction to take but one single grain out of an heap of corn and to tell him he should see in that the virtue of all the rest For he that sees one grain of wheat or barly cast into the ground coming up after some time a full ear will never doubt of the fruitfulness of all the rest of the same kind Even just so saith he it seems to me a sufficient testimony of the Resurrection that the truth of other things which he foretold cannot be denied In them we have an experiment whereby we may judg of every thing else that he hath said But to demand that every thing should be made out by reason before we receive it is to make us Philosophers not Christians whose name is Believers And besides the best Philosophers cannot tell us how the Corn I now mentioned grows up from a little Seed cast into the ground or a Man from so small a beginning in his mother's womb or any thing considerable of the manner how all naturall productions are performed And therefore what folly is it to resolve not to be satisfied unless we shew how a dead body can be raised It is sufficient to know that idoneus est reficere qui fecit as Tertullian speaks in this case He that made it at first is able to make it again It being more as he goes on to make then to re-make to give a beginning to a thing then to restore it after it is dissolved And we have this also to satisfy us that multitudes saw our Saviour raise men from the dead and by other miraculous works demonstrate that he wants not power to doe any thing he hath promised His word may well be taken for any thing to come who hath already done such wonders as are credibly reported to us by those that were spectatours of them in the Gospell And it is very remarkable how he deals with us as a Mother doth with her Child Greg. Nyss ibid. into whose tender mouth she first thrusts her breast to nourish it with milk and when the teeth come gives it bread and when it is grown stronger feeds it with solid meat Even so our Blessed Lord 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. beginning with lower Miracles at the first prepares our faith by degrees for the highest He began with the cure of desperate diseases in which 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he prefaced to his power of raising the dead For that which men thought impossible he shew'd hereby was not incredible Who could have thought that one sick of a burning fever should be made so well by speaking a word as to rise presently and minister to the company yet Simon 's wife's mother was an instance of this Miraculous power in our Saviour Who added something to this Miracle when he restored the Nobleman's son to health though he was at the point of death as his Father thought iv Joh. 47. and this without touching or coming near him For he did not stir from the place where he was at Cana and yet sent life to him as far as Capernaum by the sole power of his command After which he proceeded to an higher Miracle for he restored another Ruler's daughter to life who died before he came to her rescue And again he exceeded this Miracle by raising up the woman's son of Naim when he was carrying out to be buried And at last as hath been before observed he raised his wonder-working power so high that he called Lazarus out of his grave when he had been dead four days Thus he raises our minds by little and little to the highest pitch of Faith to believe that is the Resurrection of the dead He teaches us to expect that in generall the experiment of which he hath shewn in particulars For as the Apostle faith 1 Thess iv 16. the Lord shall descend with a shout c. at the restauration of all things to raise the dead to a state of incorruption even so now he that lay in his grave was awakened by the voice of our Saviour's command and shaking off his corruption came whole and sound out of his tomb the bands wherewith his hands and feet were tied nothing hindring Is this nothing to confirm our belief of the Resurrection when we have not onely our Lord's word for it but by those whom he restored to life we have in deed a demonstration of what he hath promised
Peter says that those heavenly Ministers have so great a value for the Gospell that they desire to look into these things wondering that we Gentiles should be made not onely fellow-citizens with the Saints but equall to themselves They rejoyced when they heard the good news that our Lord was come down to men and it seems he hath told us things beyond all their expectation Shall not we then set a due esteem upon them and look into them and consider them who have them so near unto us and are so much concerned in them Then it were better for us if we had no eyes or if we lived in those places where no such things are to be seen for none will be so miserable as they that might have been exceeding happy and chose to remain miserable and that when so few thoughts would have secured their happiness For there is no way to be undone but onely by not believing or not considering the Gospell of God's grace Secure but these two passages and strict piety will necessarily be our imployment and Eternall Life our reward No temptation will be strong enough to make us neglect our work and I am sure faithfull is he who hath promised and will not fail to pay us more then our wages VI. And what now remains but to put those in mind who obediently believe in the Lord Jesus what cause they have to entertain themselves beforehand with great joy in the comfortable expectation of God's mercy in Him to Eternall life Let all his true-hearted Disciples who hear his voice and follow him rejoyce yea let them be glad in him with exceeding joy Let them say O how great is the goodness of God! how rich are those blessings which he hath laid up for them that love him how exceeding great and precious are the promises he hath made them Our calling in Christ Jesus how high is it what is there nobler then his kingdom and glory To which also he hath called us by glory and vertue Heaven and earth concur in the most glorious and powerfull manner to give us assurance that it shall be well exceeding well with all those that love the Lord Jesus in sincerity Why should we suffer our selves then to be dejected at any accident in this world which falls cross to us Shall we take pet when any thing troubles us and let our spirits die within us who have such glorious hopes to live upon and mightily support us Jesus is alive He is alive for evermore And in him is Eternall life for all his followers The Father the Word the Holy Ghost are come to comfort us with this joyfull news The Water the Bloud and the Spirit all say the same and ask us why we are so sad when life and immortality is brought to light by the Gospell It is the desire of the Lord Jesus that we would not mourn as though he still lay in his grave and could doe nothing for us He is certainly risen and gone into the heavens where God hath made him exceeding glad with his countenance And it will adde to his joy if it be capable of increase to see us rejoyce with joy unspeakable and full of glory And therefore let us doe him the honour to glory in his holy Name and let us say alway Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that fadeth not away reserved in heaven for us 1 Pet. i. 3 4. We ought to say so with joyfull hearts even when death it self approaches which of all other is the most frightfull Enemy of mankind but is made our Friend by the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ who hath abolished death and hath brought life and immortality to light through the Gospell 2 Tim. i. 10. Which hath given us as the same Apostle saith such everlasting consolation that it would be a great reproach to it to receive Death timorously which Wise men before our Saviour came concluded might be for any thing they knew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the greatest of all goods Our Lord assures us they were right in their conjectures and hath made that certain which Socrates whose words those are left doubtfull Plato Apolog Socr. And therefore we ought not to leave the world as if it were the greatest unhappiness that could befall us It is for him onely to fear death as St. Cyprian speaks * L. de Mortalitate p. 208. who would not go to Christ and he onely hath reason to be unwilling to go to Christ who doth not believe he shall begin to reign with him This is the onely thing as he writes a little after which makes men take death so heavily quia fides deest because Faith is wanting because they do not believe those things are true which He who is Truth it self hath promised But though they give credit to what a grave and laudable person promises they are wavering about that which God saith and receive it with an incredulous mind For if they believed they would entertain that which now seems dreadfull as St. Greg. Nazianzen * Orat. xviii p. 284. says that blessed Martyr did whose Death he doubts whether he should call his departure from this life or rather 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his departure of God or the fulfilling of his desire And thus if we may believe Calcidius the famous Trismegistus died Fr. Archangel Dogm Cabalistica saying to his Son that stood by him My Son hitherto I have lived an exile from my country but now I am going safe thither And therefore when a little while hence I shall be freed from the chain of this body see that you do not bewail me as if I was dead For I am onely returning to that most excellent blessed City whither the Citizens cannot arrive unless they take death in their way There God onely is the Governour in chief who entertains his Citizens with a marvellous sweetness in comparison with which that which we now call Life is rather to be termed Death And what if in our passage to it we should fall into divers temptations or trialls of our sincere affection to the Lord Jesus There is no reason that this should dishearten us and deaden our spirits For it is the singular privilege of a Christian to rejoyce in the Lord alway iv Phil. 4. especially when he suffers for righteousness sake In that case the Apostles thought it an honour that they were counted worthy to be beaten and suffer shame for his Name v. Act. 41. And St. James thought their example was not unimitable by other Christians to whom he saith i. 2. My Brethren count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations And so they did as you reade in the Epistle to the Christian Hebrews of whom the Apostle gives
this testimony x. 34. Ye took joyfully the spoiling of your goods knowing in your selves that you have in heaven a better and enduring substance This consideration made them look upon the rapine which the seditious people committed in their houses without that dejection which on such occasions appears in other countenances And yet they were men like our selves who walked by faith and not by sight that is did not enjoy the thing it self which they expected 2 Cor. v. 7. And therefore what should hinder the same effect in our hearts if we believe as they did And to shew the mighty power of this heavenly principle these three things may be here pertinently noted out of the records they have left us of their spirit in all their sufferings I. And first I find that when the heaviest cross lay upon them the sense they had of things to come supported them under it with admirable resolution This was the least effect of their holy Faith which made them when the hearts of others sunk under the load and fell down as we say into their knees stand like a strong pillar which bears up the whole weight of the house and never yield at all The thoughts of what our Lord had promised not onely preserved them from murmuring and repining at their present condition knowing what good provision he had made for them hereafter but from fainting and being sluggish in their Ministry For which cause we faint not or do not grow lazy saith St. Paul knowing that is that he who raised up the Lord Jesus would raise up them also for though our outward man perish or wear away yet the inward man is renewed or grows more youthfull day by day 2 Cor. iv 14 16. And 2. this faith also preserved them from swounding fear either of disgrace or pain or death being in nothing terrified by their adversaries saith the same Apostle i. Phil. 28. who seeing them undaunted under all their sufferings had reason to look upon this as an evident token of their perdition and of the Salvation God would give to these his valiant Champions And 3. from sorrowing also and lamenting the loss of any thing because this Good they found was still secure 2 Cor. vi 10. Which made them as he there saith again to be always full of joy though in the eye of the world they lookt very sorrowfully And so lastly they kept their stedfastness and turned not away from the holy commandment delivered unto them Whereby they marvellously promoted Christianity And the God of all grace who hath called us unto his eternall glory by Christ Jesus after that they had suffered a while made them perfect stablished strengthened settled them 1 Pet. v. 10. II. But the hope of Eternall life did not merely support and uphold their spirits it wonderfully refreshed and comforted them in all their afflictions so that they durst confidently promise to all other suffering Christians the same heavenly comforts from God Who comforteth us saith St. Paul in all our tribulation that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble by the comfort wherewith we our selves are comforted of God And our hope of you is stedfast knowing that as you are partakers of the sufferings so shall ye be also of the consolation 2 Cor. i. 4 7. Their comfort and rejoycing was the testimony of their conscience that every-where they acted sincerely ver 12. and that they served a good Master who had promised them better fare in the next World where he reigns in full power and glory His Kingdom they knew was not of this World even as he was not of the World and therefore they did not expect he should give them a portion of good things here No He told them plainly in the World ye shall have tribulation but adds in the same breath be of good chear I have overcome the World xvi Joh. 33. III. Which victory of his over death and the grave incouraged them to follow him in all their tribulations not merely with simple comfort but with joy as I have observed already and more then that made them exceeding glad and even shout for joy So our Saviour himself required them to doe when they were reviled and persecuted for his Name sake v. Matt. 12. Rejoyce and be exceeding glad for great is your reward in heaven And so they did as St. Paul tells us v. Rom. 2 3. We rejoyce in hope of the glory of God and not onely so but we glory in tribulations also For they had this strong consolation as the Divine Writer to the Hebrews calls it First that nothing either in this World or the other could take away that heavenly Good from them As St. Paul also testifies in that triumph of his viii Rom. 38 39. I am perswaded that neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities nor powers nor things present nor things to come nor height nor depth nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. When their goods were taken away they could make their boast in Christ and say Our inheritance is immovable When they were driven from house and home as we speak they could triumph and say Our house is eternall in the heavens from which none can exclude us When they were in pain they still remembred our Saviour's own words Your joy shall no man take from you In death it self they could glory and say Jesus our Life dies not and because he lives we shall live also And 2. as they knew they could not lose their future Happiness so they knew it to be incomparably greater then all their sufferings viii Rom. 18. For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us For our light affliction which is but for a moment worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternall weight of glory 2 Cor. iv 17. Where there is a Third Reason of their exceeding great joy because these afflictions which they endured for Christ's sake would increase their glory hereafter and make their crown beyond all expression heavier And more then that 4. hereby not onely their present afflictions were alleviated and seemed triviall but they gave them a clearer sight of that most excellent glory beforehand while they looked not as it there follows ver 18. at the things which are seen but at the things which are not seen The removall of these things here below from before their eyes fixed them more stedfastly on the invisible World Now their joy was full as our Saviour speaks xvi Joh. 24. now it overflowed when all things else had forsaken them and nothing else but those unseen enjoyments remained to comfort them This heavenly glory shone brightest in the dark and horrible pit where their afflictions brought them sweeter contentment then ever was the fruit of any earthly pleasure And so we may still
unto me in Paradise a place most sweet to behold and far sweeter to enjoy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but the experiment exceeds all belief Into this the crooked Serpent cannot wind himself as he did into that of our Forefathers nor so much as whisper any of his deceitfull temptations There is none among us but whose Mind is impregnable and cannot be overcome by any artifice nor can we desire to be gratified with any greater good For we are all of us wise with the Divine and heavenly wisedom and our whole life is a continued magnificent festivall in the enjoyment of infinite and unspeakable goods Splendidly cloathed we see God in a splendid manner as far as man can see him and ravished with his inexplicable inconceivable beauty we rejoyce alway and are never weary Which abundant pleasure is the very perfection of love and the power of enjoying accompanying love begets that ineffable joy and exultation of spirit So that now while I converse with thee a most mighty love to those things draws me away and suffers me not to expound the least part of them Thou and my dear Mother shall one day come thither and then confess I have said very little of such great Goods but accuse thy self very much for bewailing me who happily enjoy them Therefore my dearest Father let me go away with joy and do not detain me any longer lest thou suffer a greater loss and for that be more bitterly afflicted If thy Daughter I say could after this or the like sort speak to thee wouldst thou not be ashamed to continue thy lamentations and chuse rather with joy to let her go away rejoycing Consider then if upon a Child's saying such things we should presently grow better and be of good comfort shall we when our common Creatour and Lord cries He that believeth in me though he die yet shall he live and God hath prepared for them that love him such things as eye hath not seen nor ear heard neither have they entred into the heart of man be nothing better for such joyfull tidings but like infidels go on still to increase our sad lamentations We cannot answer this Question any other way but by silence or rather chearfull thanksgivings to God who hath given us such everlasting consolation and good hope through his grace as may well enable us to say in every other troublesome condition Why art thou thus cast down O my Soul why art thou disquieted within me Hope in God and rejoyce in his holy Name who thanks be to his goodness giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ Let us shake hands with grief sadness and sorrow and leave them to those who have no hope of Eternall Life Let us make our boast in the Lord and say that He is good for his mercy endureth for ever Come my Soul what is it that afflicts thee Will not the thoughts of the joys of heaven give thee ease nay perfectly cure thee Will not a sight of Jesus sitting on the throne of his glory revive thee It is but a moment or two and we shall be with him where he is Let us have patience for a few days more of banishment from our heavenly country Hold out my Soul for a short pilgrimage and we shall arrive at our promised inheritance Shall we bemoan our selves thus miserably for whom our God hath made such gracious provision Shall we be weary who want but a few steps and we are at our eternall rest Behold behold thy Saviour Yonder he is I see him shining in his celestiall glory He looks upon me methinks and saith Be of good chear for I am preparing a place for thee Do we not forget O my Soul that Jesus is so highly advanced when we suffer our selves to be thus cast down and sadly dejected Do we not reproach his memory and in effect say too grossly He is dead He is not risen who can chuse but mourn and be sorrowfull For shame let us stay our tears till the testimonies we have heard can be disproved till it appear that Jesus is still in his grave and these are Six false Witnesses which stand up for him But in the mean time let us rejoyce that they never yet could be confuted but have born down all the opposition of the World and the Devill for more then Sixteen hundred years to the eternall honour of Jesus O sweet Name why do we dishonour it with sour faces and sad countenances and a melancholick life If he live sure he will be as good as his word that we shall live also Let us never forget those words of grace Because I live ye shall live also And let us never remember them but with new delight Let it delight us to repeat them a thousand times in a day As long as we live let us comfort our selves with this Our Lord hath said Because I live ye shall live also Doth it not fill a Merchant's heart with joy to hear that his Ship is arrived at a safe port though many leagues from his own house Doth not the Country-man look brisk when his Seed-time is good though he must wait many weeks before he reap his desired Harvest Let not us then be the onely lumpish insensible things who hear the joyfull news that Jesus is alive and safely arrived at our Father's house where there are many Mansions Let not us be so stupid as to be discontented who have his word for it that we shall live with him But let us rejoyce and say as the Psalmist doth we have more reason for it Psal lvi 10 11. In God will I praise his word in the Lord will I praise his word In him have I put my trust I will not be afraid what man or any thing else can doe unto me Jesus hath said I shall live I will depend on his word and expect after all my tossings up and down in this troublesome World to land shortly in the Paradise of God Paradise O that comfortable word that sweetest of all words What should we not have given to hear of any hopes of it if God had not promised it And shall we now make light account of it God forbid We will not sigh at the thoughts of death it self seeing it is but the gate of Paradise We will look upon it with a smile and say it is welcome We will tell it that it is a long-lookt-for friend and bid it doe its office and make way for our entrance into the place that Jesus hath prepared for us What though we have not much acquaintance with that World what though it be a place where we never were and from whence no Friend that is gone thither hath returned to tell us what it is Jesus knew it very well that 's enough else he would not have endured so much for it He is perfectly acquainted with it for from thence he came and there he is And therefore let us not be timorous when we
Verse why they gave themselves as whole burnt offerings to Christ but that by the example of their Faith and Martyrdom they might instruct many more to be Martyrs Nay their BLOUD did not only water many young plants and made them grow to their perfection but He tells us a little after in his exposition of the same Psalm Plures scimus c. We know many who were wholly ignorant of the Divine Sacraments i. e. the Christian Religion that by the example of the Martyrs run to Martyrdom No wonder then that these above all others have been called the WITNESSES of Jesus for that 's the interpretation of the word MARTYR and that Christians were forward even to kiss their wounds and to embrace their dead bodies as the remains of those who had done most eminent service to our Lord. Who himself therefore witnessed to them after they were dead and declared that their bloud was very dear and precious in his sight and that it had sealed nothing but the truth For there can no other reason be given but this why at the Monuments of these MARTYRS or WITNESSES our Saviour was pleased to have so many miracles wrought afterward and before such a number of people that Porphyry himself as we learn both from S. Cyril and S. Hierom though an avowed enemy of our Religion could not but acknowledge them They still spake and bare Witness to Jesus by these wonderful works when they were dead or rather Jesus spake for them as I said and declared from Heaven that these were his faithful Witnesses whose word ought to be believed whereby they had declared him to be the Lord. A PRAYER WHO would not believe on thee O Lord who would not magnifie thy Name For great and marvellous are thy works just and true are thy ways thou King of Saints All Nations ought to come and worship before thee whose Majesty and Glory is so many ways made manifest Thou hast raised poor and ignorant men to be mighty Ministers of thy Grace and Witnesses of thy Resurrection and co-workers with thee for the illumination and conversion of the world Blessed be thy name for all the glorious Lights which have been in thy Church in every Age by whom thy holy Faith hath been preserved and propagated to our days Blessed be thy name for all the Martyrs who sealed it with their Bloud and for all the Confessors who freely acknowledged thee with the danger of their lives Great was thy glory which shone in their most exemplary holiness fortitude patience love unseigned both to friends and enemies and in that mighty power whereby they approved themselves as the Ministers of God Thanks be to thee O God the Lord of Heaven and Earth for the comfort of thy holy Scriptures wherein we read the story of our Saviours wondrous love and of that most miraculous power which appeared in him to testifie unto him and at last raised him from the dead and advanced him to the throne of Glory From whence he sent the Holy Ghost to endue his Apostles Prophets Evangelists Pastors and Teachers with power from on high that they might be his Witnesses and commit that which they had received to faithful men who should be able to teach others also O God I cannot but again adore thy incomprehensible love which can never be sufficiently praised Who can understand the exceeding riches of thy grace that thou whose naked glory is too bright for our weak minds to fix their eyes upon wouldest be pleased in most admirable condescending love to manifest thy self and visit us in our flesh Thou art infinitely above the greatest of us who are far less worthy to approach thee than the lowest creature in this world is fit for our friendship and society So much the more marvellous is thy unheard of love that thou wouldest admit us to such a near relation unto thee So much the greater is our happiness that in Christ Jesus thou hast made thy self our portion and designed us to be eternally blessed with thee Great was his care and kindness all the days of his flesh towards the most miserable wretches who received the greatest tokens of his love I rejoyce now to think with what tenderness he received the poor fed the hungry visited the sick cured the diseased and when he had left the world communicated the same power unto others that they might exercise the same charity that he had done I see both the power and goodness of our Lord in all those works of wonder which he did I see that his mercy endureth for ever which hath preserved a faithful record of these things that we through patience and comfort of the holy Scriptures might have hope Now the God of all grace inspire me and all other Christian Souls with the same faith love and ardent zeal which was in those burning and shining Lights the Witnesses of Christ. That we may be followers of them as they were of him and acknowledging the same Lord being members of the same body partaking of the same Sacraments and living upon the same Heavenly food we may lead the same holy lives in hope to shine one day with them in the same celestial glory Help us to continue in the things which we have learnt and have been assured of knowing of whom we have learnt them that we may not at any time let them slip For how shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him thou O God also bearing them witness both with signs and wonders and with divers miracles and gifts of the Holy Ghost according to thine own will May we always carefully lay up and preserve these sacred truths in our heart which were in so glorious a manner delivered to us May they work there perpetually with great power and be reverenced as the holy Oracles of God! May they be the spring of all our motions throughout the whole course of our life That with an even steddy pace whatsoever dangers come in our way we may walk on towards that happy place where those holy ones rejoyce for ever with our Lord. To whom with the Father and the Holy Ghost be given by us and by those glorified Spirits and by all the Angels in Heaven everlasting Praises Amen CHAP. IX The Vse we are to make of their Testimony IT is time now to bring this Discourse to an issue and having examined all these Divine Witnesses taken their proofs and depositions and found their testimony upon due enquiry to be good and legal to consider with our selves what we have to do and what judgment we will pass now that we have heard their evidence God the Father of all says that Jesus is his Son the Word himself appeared oft to justifie this Truth the Holy Ghost came down from Heaven to attest it the Prophet of the Highest proclaimed it the holy life of our
Saviour spake as much and his Bloudy Death sealed it to which the Spirit set its seal also and undeniably witnessed that bloud was sacred which he shed for a testimony upon the Cross All these have done their part all that Witnesses by their office are to do for the making of this good that Jesus is the Son of God That which remains is our task who are bound to consider and seriously ponder and impartially judge and then faithfully improve their sacred Testimony that Jesus may have the glory that is due unto him and we may have that benefit which God by him designs to bestow upon us I. And first of all let us consider a-while the great weight and importance of this Truth that Jesus is Gods Son If the whole frame of Christian Religion did not rely upon it there would not have been such care taken to settle it and lay it deep in our hearts by so much labour and strength of argument It is equally blameable to be laborious about a trifle and to be superficial and slight in things of greatest moment No man of sense will with a great deal of diligence summon together a number of Witnesses to make good that which when it is proved it is indifferent as to any thing that depends upon it whether it be true or false No question there is a considerable interest of ours which is concerned in this truth else the Holy men of God would not have called HEAVEN AND EARTH TO WITNESS and bear their testimony to it The Father the Word the Holy-Ghost would not have concurred with the Water the Bloud and the Spirit to assert and maintain it but that all is little enough to justifie it and that it is a thing of which we cannot but desire the greatest assurance It is 1. the Foundation of all other Truths in the Christian Religion as you may read 1 Cor. iii. 11. xvi Matth. 17 18. It is the Rock on which the Church is built the Ground that supports the whole Fabrick which if it be infirm and rotten all falls to rubbish and confusion And therefore 2. the Devil laboured to undermine this Truth above all others Like a subtile Enemy when the Apostles as wise Master-builders had laid this foundation he imployed false Teachers and counterfeit Apostles as so many Pioneers to work under this and lay their trains to blow it up which he knew was a nearer way to ruine all than to plant his Batteries against the building onely The History of the first times afford too plentiful instances of this For we find there arose many Anti-christs 1 Joh. ii 18. and many false Prophets went out into the World iv 1. And the very spirit of Antichrist as he tells us vers 3. was this to deny that Jesus who came in flesh in a mortal condition and subject to our miseries was Christ. They would not have it thought that any one who suffered so vilely was the great KING that had been so long expected Or if they believed Jesus to be a great Prophet and that he was raised from the dead and rewarded for his labours in Heaven as other Prophets were yet they denied that he was made LORD OF ALL the Head of the Church and of all Principalities and Powers who was to be honoured by all Men even as they honour the Father And therefore 3. the Apostles imployed as great care and earnest indeavour for to strengthen and support this weighty truth as the Enemies of Religion laboured might and main as we say to weaken and overthrow the belief of it This was the thing they every where preached as you read in the History of the Acts of the Apostles And for this very end S. John wrote this Epistle to confirm his Disciples in this Faith against all the subtile opposition of their adversaries as you may collect from many passages beside that which I have expounded And it was the thing aimed at also in his second Epistle where he rejoyces to hear that they walkt in the truth vers 3. and cautions them against those deceivers and Antichrists vers 7. And indeed 4. it was the great note of difference between the true Prophets and the false as you may see 1 Cor. xii 3. and in the place now mentioned in this Epistle iv 1 2. which also 5. makes him command his Disciples that if any one pretending to the Spirit did not acknowledge this they should not use the common civility to him of bidding him God speed ii Epist 10. And if any man apostatiz'd from this faith which is the last thing I shall mention S. Paul pronounces a most dreadful curse upon him and wishes or predicts the Lord would come and speedily execute it 1 Corinth xvi 22. For whosoever transgresseth and abideth not in the Doctrine of CHRIST hath not God 2. epist of S. Joh. 9. This being a truth therefore of so great moment as appears by these considerations and by the many Witnesses to which S. John here appeals for the proof of it let us be sure to settle a sense of its concernment to us in our hearts and then to think often of it and study it so thoroughly that we may perceive both the truth and importance of it or else we shall prove our selves despisers of God who do as bad as say that it was a needless pains which he bestowed in giving so many evidences of that for which we have no regard or no list to bring to trial and examination And that truly I doubt is the temper of most Christian People at this day They think all discourses on this subject useless or little worth because they prove that which they believe already Heathens might reap some profit by them but what say they have we to do with them But while such thoughts as these have too long possessed the drowsie Christian world they remain alas in the very dregs of Heathenism with a little smack or taste of Christianity It is a sad thing to consider but so it is that they who cannot endure to think upon what ground their belief stands because they would not put themselves to the trouble of understanding it are of that base temper which is the mother of Idolatry of Mahometism and of all spurious Religions in the World For what is it makes Men worship the Sun Moon and Stars or address their services to dead men nay to a piece of wood or a red cloth or some such paultry thing what makes Mahomet so reverenced by a great part of the World as the Prophet of the Highest but that they have ever been so taught and it is the custome to honour him They examine no further nor enquire for any other reason that is do not observe that there is no other reason for their belief Upon the very same account do many receive Jesus for the Son of God He hath no better footing in their Souls nor stands upon firmer grounds than Mahomet or